The cool of his precarious position was a welcome respite and sleep embraced him.
When the morning came, Char sat up, stretched, and got out of bed.
“That was the best sleep I’ve had in a long time, TH. You are a dynamo in the rack!” she teased. “Come on, Clyde. Let’s see what the new day has to offer while we let Mr. Late Sleeper get his beauty rest. Heaven knows he needs it.” Char opened the door to find Margie Rose shuffling past.
Margie Rose stopped, looked at the barely dressed young woman, then pulled her into a matronly hug. She peeked past her into the bedroom where the covers were thrown about and Terry lay with his arm over his head, looking at her with one eye open. She waggled her fingers at him. Terry closed his eye and wished for more sleep.
“Get some clothes on, young lady! I will make you the best breakfast you’ve ever had. I’m sure you need to get your energy back,” Margie Rose said, giggling, followed by smacking her wooden spoon on the scantily clad Char’s perfectly rounded butt. “Now get dressed!”
* * *
“Get your lousy asses out of the rack!” Devlin yelled at the newcomers. It had been three days and all they’d done was every type of physical fitness activity that Mark, Devlin, Jim, and Ivan could think of.
The new recruits were breaking down. They couldn’t seem to do anything right, were reactive all the time, and were late to everything.
Exactly like they were supposed to be. When Terry and Char arrived, the FDG formed in two ranks. The first had the original four members and the second rank had the newcomers. Terry wasn’t pleased with that. He wasn’t happy with himself for spending so much time away from his recruits. Even the old ones were new and needed to learn.
He waved them into a circle around him.
“Here’s what’s going on,” Terry started, looking to Char then back to the group. “There’s a new man, who’s watching us right now from the mountains.” Terry hesitated, not sure how much to share. He knew that he couldn’t tell them the truth.
“It’s Char’s ex-husband and this man is bigger than any human being you’ve ever seen before.” Terry hung his head. “That means Char is his target. Tactically, we can’t have a battle here. Our job is to protect this town, and if, by our presence, we create a greater risk, then it follows that we need to move. Here’s what we are going to do…”
Terry moved the small group to a dirt patch beside the barracks’ yard. He drew New Boulder, Denver, south to New Mexico and east through the worst of the Wastelands to Kansas.
“It looks like it’s not going to be cold enough to get a good snow, but it will be cool enough to travel east. So, we’re going to take four of you north, find the South Platte River and follow it, see if there are any settlements, see if we can find people. If that doesn’t bear fruit, we’ll head south, cross the Wastelands until we find the Arkansas River, and then we’ll follow it back to Pueblo, and look for the stash on our way back through Colorado Springs and home.” He looked from face to face. Char stood behind the group, shaking her head and rolling her eyes.
The stash of arms and equipment was his white whale. Char was right. He couldn’t let it go. He was building an army and needed to be the biggest and baddest. He couldn’t do that with bows and arrows. He couldn’t stand up to Werewolves or worse, the Forsaken, with just rifles. Terry needed C4. He needed flamethrowers and grenade launchers. He needed anything and everything the U.S. Military might have stashed at one time and never come back for.
Had he been active duty during the World’s Worst Day Ever, he would have moved much of the armory to a secondary location, secure in its anonymity. He expected his brothers-in-arms would think the same way.
And then he hoped that those alternate locations hadn’t been found.
Twenty years was a long time, but after the first one or so, the scavenging had drawn down. People settled in to just survive, hunting and gathering like humans had done centuries past. The advanced world tried to destroy everything it had built, but humanity had survived. Technology survived. The people just needed to clean it up and put it back into place.
Infrastructure. They needed factories, facilities to make microchips, raw materials to send to the factories. It was a monumental undertaking.
Terry gave himself one hundred years. As long as he didn’t get his head cut off or maimed so badly that the nanocytes couldn’t do their thing, he’d see his new world take shape.
To do that, he needed to eliminate the threats to peace.
Like Marcus.
Terry clenched his jaw and growled. They’d leave, train on the road, prepare themselves to fight a Werewolf, then they’d return.
The Force members looked at Terry uncomfortably as he’d turned silent and showed a wide range of emotions through his facial expressions.
It was time to turn the Force into a real military organization. He’d thrown out some ranks and such, but they never used the titles or embraced the concept of chain of command. As the Force grew, he needed that discipline and structure to be part of their very souls.
No time like the present.
“Okay, my pretties,” he said in his best drill instructor voice. “Here’s how it’s going to be. If you don’t like it, then you can spar with me. We’ll decide the issue through hand-to-hand combat. Do you understand me?”
A hearty chorus of “yes, sir” greeted him in response as they jumped to their feet.
“You snot-gobbling, slack-jawed, jelly-bellied, tiny-dicked…” Char waved at him mid-sentence. He looked at her angrily as she pointed to one of the newcomers. Lacy leaned out so TH could see her.
“I’m a chick, sir,” she said. He hesitated for half a heartbeat before continuing.
“…no-dicked pieces of gutter slime. You will refer to me as Colonel Walton or sir. My executive officer is Charumati. You will call her Major. I know, she was a private last week, but that was last week. I need her as my XO. James and Mark are my corporals and your squad leaders. Mark will be responsible for the security of New Boulder in our absence. You will have Jim, Ivan, Boris, David, Charlie, and Blackbeard to help you. See that they are armed at all times. You will need to provide twenty-four hour security for the mayor. That is your primary mission. Secondary is the security of the power plant and the greenhouses.
“James and his squad--Devlin, Lacy, and Geronimo--will accompany Char and me. Any questions?”
The men shifted uncomfortably. Terry stood and stabbed a finger into Mark’s chest. “Out with it!”
He looked at the others before speaking. “I’m sorry, sir, but I’d like to go too, probably all of us,” he said weakly. Terry grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him, smiling at the corporal.
“There’s a big nasty out there. He’s coming after Char so we are taking her away from here. That doesn’t mean he won’t come back to New Boulder. I don’t think he’ll be as great a threat, but if he comes back, you will be fighting for your lives, the hardest fight you’ll ever have. I can’t leave the town unprotected. And you, Mark, are the best person to honcho that effort. You get good people to help, but you need to train them at the same time they’re pulling guard duty. I know you haven’t gotten that much training yourself, but of all the people here, you’re the one who can pull it off,” Terry said, never taking his hand from Mark’s shoulder.
“Maybe you can stay here, and Char…” Terry cut him off.
“The major,” Terry corrected.
“…the major can take the others out,” Mark added hopefully.
“This is what I need. I want everyone to feel comfortable enough to speak their minds. There will be times when we can’t have a conversation, and you’ll know when those are. That time is not today, so we’ll talk, make sure that we decide what’s best for everyone.” Terry looked at the map he’d drawn, thinking how to shape his argument on why he needed to be with Char that wouldn’t look self-serving.
Char stepped beside Terry and looked at the group. “What the colonel seems hesita
nt to tell you is that I will have to fight my ex-husband myself. If I’m to win, I need to get better at hand-to-hand and that’s why wherever I go, the colonel must go, too. I am in training from this moment forward with the singular goal of defeating, in unarmed combat, a man twice my bodyweight with longer reach and vastly greater strength. I need to become the deadliest fighter ever. And then I need to win that contest, protect all of you from hell incarnate.”
“But you loved him once,” Devlin stated, unsure of how the ex-husband thing worked.
“Maybe I was given no choice in the matter. There are places on this planet where women are little more than a man’s property,” she replied, giving everyone a small peek into what it was like to be her.
Terry clenched his fists in anger, furious at the injustice, but calmed as he knew that he would keep such things from his world and would prevent those under his influence from devolving.
Again.
Char continued, “We’ll be going tomorrow, so horses. You four, get six horses, four that you’ll ride, two to take as spares. I believe the Mongols invaded and conquered half the world by taking four horses for every warrior. We don’t have that luxury and we aren’t on a conquest, so two extras to pack gear should we find the colonel’s white whale. Mark! Establish the guard rotation and put the men in place. We will inspect your setup this afternoon. Is that understood?” She clapped her hands and waved the Force away.
“Yes, sir,” Mark replied, locking his body at the position of attention. The others mirrored his position for an instant before running off. Mark and James corralled their designated people and pulled them close for private conversations.
Terry looked sideways at Char. Where in the hell had that come from? In her previous life, had she served in the military? He didn’t know that, or hardly anything else, about her. He needed to find out, get her to talk more while he talked less.
Char turned to him and asked, “What do you think, Mr. Colonel TH, sir?” She smiled as she tried to stifle a laugh.
It wasn’t a game, but she played her role well. “I hope that man-mountain doesn’t return before tomorrow,” Terry told her. She stopped smiling and punched him in the stomach with a short jab. His gear protected him from most of it.
He rolled into the punch, grabbing her arm as he continued downward, pulling her off-balance. Terry dove forward and twisted, throwing Char to the ground as he let go, hit, rolled, and came back to his feet. The ten members of the Force watched, wide-eyed.
Char attacked, jumping into the air for a vicious roundhouse. Terry ducked it and dodged to the side, sweeping a leg past her. But he hadn’t put enough into it and kicked her leg, not enough to take it out from under her. She leaned forward and punched him in the back as he continued past.
Terry stood and danced, shaking off the pain from Char’s last punch. The nanocytes kicked into overdrive as his natural adrenaline surged, sharpening his senses and hardening his body. Char continued in the attack, feigning and striking, left, right, high, low. Terry blocked most of the blows, but some got through, and he started to tire.
Char went for the haymaker, choosing an axe-kick, a straight overhead kick bringing the heel down on the defender’s head to drive the person to the ground.
But Terry wasn’t that tired. When her leg went up, he lunged forward, trapping her leg against her body. He lifted her and drove her body back and down, into the ground. He dropped to a knee and punched her repeatedly in the abdomen. She tried to backflip out of Terry’s hold, but he had her in place where she couldn’t get her leg under her.
He called a halt, and she conceded. Char was faster and stronger, but she’d lost the bout. Terry was breathing hard and sore from the pounding he’d taken. Char flexed her mid-section, feeling the strain from TH’s flurry of punches that ended it.
Terry turned to their impromptu audience, standing in amazement. “The man that could be coming is bigger and faster than either of us. Understand what you’re up against. Don’t be afraid, just be aware and know that if you ever go anywhere without your weapon, you will have no chance at all.”
“What the fuck are you gawking at!” Char screamed. Half of the men jumped and the others cowered, but only for a moment before running away like rabbits.
“Shall we, TH?” Char asked, grabbing Terry’s arm as they walked away. Clyde had been silent through it all. They wondered if he was okay. His head and tail hung as he walked. Terry stopped, kneeled, and looked at him. Bloodshot eyes, lids droopy.
“You’re tired, aren’t you, buddy? Me, too, Clyde, me too.”
Char laughed as she left the commiserating, tired old men and headed toward the mayor’s house. They needed to talk.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
“We hunt, you worthless fucks,” Marcus growled. The pack wasn’t sure they could eat any more. Three elk in as many days, but Marcus’s appetite seemed insatiable. The only thing that lightened his mood was tracking and killing the largest of the bull elk. He reveled in fighting those with a rack and trying to defend themselves. Marcus unleashed his full rage upon the unwitting creatures.
One more, then he’d take the whole pack into the human settlement and bring Char out of there one way or another; either she could walk out or they’d drag her carcass into the hills and dump it there.
Marcus walked away from the pack, expecting them to follow, which they reluctantly did, grumbling the whole way. He dumped his clothes in the crook of a tree branch and shape-changed.
The great, black Werewolf sniffed the air and reached out with his senses. There was something different coming from the mountains, something big and mean. Exactly what he wanted. He turned and angled away to stay downwind. He growled at the pack to remain behind and to keep quiet. Marcus slinked away, silent as the falling snow.
He felt the bear coming and got into position. A worthy adversary. The bear raised up on his back legs and looked around, sniffing excessively. Marcus ruffled his hair, felt that the wind had changed. The bear could smell him.
What matter?
With a roar, he raced through the trees, singularly focused on the grizzly that waited up ahead. Marcus sped past the last tree and in two bounds, leapt, jaws open as he angled his muzzle toward the creature’s throat. The bear’s paw swiped, faster than the eye could see, and Marcus was thrown away, maimed by the bear’s claw, ribs exposed by the angry slash through the Werewolf’s fur.
Marcus looked stupidly at the wound. The bear roared and dropped to all fours as it charged, turning the tables on the Werewolf. Marcus jumped straight in the air, turning to land on the grizzly’s back, but the bear’s jaws were faster and clamped on the Werewolf’s back leg, crushing the bone just above the back paw. The bear shook its head and threw Marcus to the side.
He stood on three legs, suffering the real pain of a horrible wound along with the blow to his ego. The only time he feared for his life during a battle had been at the hands of a Forsaken, but that wasn’t a battle to the death, only to teach him a lesson. Marcus’s life had not been in jeopardy, but he hadn’t known that at the time.
The bear circled, looking to press his advantage, then throwing caution to the wind, he charged. Marcus’s body was already healing itself. He’d eaten enough that his energy was at its peak.
The bear thought he was wounded and vulnerable. Marcus let the bear get close, then dodged backward as the grizzly slapped a paw at him. The Werewolf darted forward and planted his jaws on the grizzly’s massive neck.
The bear tried to throw Marcus off, but couldn’t reach him. The grizzly backed up and twisted his whole body around in a circle, lifting Marcus off the ground and swinging him wildly. But the Werewolf hung on, grinding his teeth in the flesh, trying to rip out the artery that fed the creature’s brain. With another swing, Marcus was thrown off, carrying a mouthful of the bear’s neck with him.
Blood spurted in a long arc, then again. The bear shook its head, trying to clear its fading vision. It sat back, then tipped to the side and fe
ll over. Its eyes glazed, surprised that it lost a fight to a lone wolf.
Marcus staggered forward, his leg in agony and fire burning along his side. He howled to his victory, but it was weak, not his usual bellow. The pack slowly appeared and took positions around the bear. He wondered if they were going to rise up against him
But no, even in his weakened state, they were afraid of him.
He bit into the grizzly, tearing a hunk of meat from its chest. He chewed slowly, but ran out of steam. He leaned against the grizzly, feeling the warmth of its fur, closed his eyes and fell asleep.
* * *
“What in the fuck do you mean you’re leaving? Fuck no! FUCK NO!” Billy screamed almost hysterically.
“Language, Billy dear,” Felicity cooed from the loveseat against the wall. His head whipped around, and he glared at her, almost feral.
Fear did that to people. Billy thought Marcus would return. And Terry couldn’t convince him otherwise because he believed the Werewolf would be back.
“Billy Spires, Mayor of New Boulder,” Terry started. “I’m leaving you with seven people and I’ve directed them to set up a twenty-four seven guard for you. They are to be armed at all times. With that kind of firepower, they’ll be able to hold Marcus off.” Terry had a hard time looking at Billy because he knew for a fact that his men and their rifles wouldn’t deter Marcus.
Billy sat down heavily and slouched in his chair. He was adamantly opposed to his security chief leaving when such a threat was nearby.
Char spoke, “He’s come for me, Billy. He doesn’t care about you or anything you have. He only cares that he’s lost his property. He wants what he considers to be his, and I can’t have that, but I also can’t have him tearing up this town to get to me. You need to trust me that he will know that I’ve left. He may follow us, will probably follow us, but we’ll lead him far away from here. That’s best for everyone, Billy.” Char was leaned forward, elbows on the table, looking intensely at the mayor as if trying to sway him with the power of her mind.
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