“Why am I a moron? This is the life, isn’t it?” Ted asked.
“You’re a moron because we’ll starve if we stay here. I want meat, red meat. I want elk and as much as I can stuff down my face. We’re growing soft here. Look at us.” Timmons pointed to the others sleeping on the lounge chairs on the beach while normal humans ogled them as they walked by. Timmons shook his head.
Two years later and the pack still hadn’t accepted him as the alpha. “We need to go back to New Boulder, find Char and find Marcus.”
“I’m not sure the others will go for that,” Ted said nonchalantly.
A sail appeared on the horizon. A large boat, heading toward them. The Werewolves, as one, shot straight up in their chairs.
A Forsaken was coming.
“We need to go, now!” Timmons yelled. The others jumped from their chairs and headed for the hotel to get their clothes. “No time!”
Timmons steered them away as they ran at inhuman speed from the town toward the interior of the Yucatan and away. They didn’t know why the Forsaken was coming, but the best place to be when he arrived was someplace else. They hoped he didn’t decide to follow them.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Gerry and Lacy supported Spartacus as he limped downward, leading Terry and the others along a well-traveled path. Greasy-burning candles placed at random intervals showed the way. The light was dim but enough once the eyes adjusted to the darkness.
Terry and Char saw quite well by the candlelight. They used their heightened senses to scan side passages as they descended into the caves. It became cooler and cooler in a good way the lower they went. Dripping water and humid air left a green slime on the walls.
Clyde didn’t seem to have any problems as he’d run ahead a few steps, take a second to pee on the wall, wait for the others to catch up, then run ahead again.
Char sniffed continuously, trying to discover what smelled different. Terry looked at her, and she shook her head. She wasn’t sure what it was. Terry couldn’t sense anything threatening, but he was nothing like Char. She could feel vibrations with her heightened senses, know how many people were around, what they were doing.
He could see to the next turn.
The group shuffled ahead until the tunnel opened up to a much larger cavern where a central fire burned brightly. Numerous cave mouths were covered by blankets and other wall hangings. The underground village.
Terry put a hand on the young man’s shoulder to keep him from dragging them into the middle of the large space. “We’ll wait here. Who should we talk to?”
Spartacus looked back then into the space and spoke in a normal voice, though the acoustics of the cavern helped the sound to carry. “Millie. Could we speak with you please?”
“So, Millie it is. What kind of person is this?” Terry whispered. Char scowled and continued to sniff the air. Geronimo and Lacy squinted as they looked about, trying to assess the tactical situation. “Let him go.”
Gerry and Lacy immediately let go of Spartacus, who teetered and almost fell with the return of his full weight to his injured leg. He stumbled a few steps into the wall where he panted from his efforts. The two members of the Force each took a knee and aimed their rifles into the cavern.
“Relax. Weapons tight,” Terry cautioned. The two lowered their AK-47s, but each maintained a field of fire to cover exactly half the cavern. They looked from one wall to the center and back again, waving their barrels in a figure eight, keeping them close to their line of sight.
Terry kept his hand on his M-4 rifle, although his ammunition was growing dangerously low. Char’s arms hung loosely at her sides within easy reach of her two Glock 9mm pistols.
Blankets were thrown aside as people started emerging from their cubby holes. They stopped when they saw the newcomers with Spartacus.
“What is this, Sparty? Who are these people?” an older woman asked in a low voice.
The young man looked to Terry. “I’ll take it from here, Sparty,” he told him.
“My name is Terry Henry Walton and we come from what used to be Boulder, Colorado, not that any of that means anything anymore. We’re here looking for people who might like something better. We have power and running water. What we don’t have is enough people to do everything that needs to be done. It’s a chance to make a new life rebuilding civilization. If you don’t want to go with us, that’s fine. We’ll leave directions on how to get there, but I’d like to talk further with whoever is in charge, show our sincerity,” Terry said in a normal tone, nodding as he talked.
“No one here is in charge,” the old woman replied. “They were outside, defending our home that you seem to have invaded. You have guns and can see that we’re unarmed. Maybe you should wait for our people to get back. They left early this morning. Sparty! You were with them. Where are they?”
“All dead, Millie. They’re all dead. These people killed them as if it was nothin’. I’d be dead, too, but they said I was lucky.” Sparty looked at Terry, while leaning away from him, defensively avoiding the expected blow. Terry and Char both smiled at the young man. Clyde wagged his tail, expecting to meet new friends.
“That’s right. We asked to talk and they responded by coming after us. We don’t take aggression well, so there we have it. You are now free to live your lives out from under their yoke,” Terry said magnanimously.
“You bastards!” the old lady cried. “Two of those were my kids!”
“And one of mine,” another bawled.
“This may not have been your best plan, TH,” Char whispered, chuckling out of sight of the others. Terry grimaced and started chewing on the inside of his cheek.
The first rock hit the wall above Lacy’s head. Gerry used his rifle barrel to deflect the next one. “Hold your fire!” Terry commanded in a voice that echoed throughout the cavern. The locals only hesitated briefly before picking up more rocks to throw. If you hit my dog, I will fucking kill you all, Terry thought, snarling.
Terry pulled his bullwhip and cracked it back and forth in front of the townspeople. “Settle the fuck down!” he bellowed. With the echoes, his words were mostly lost. But the people stopped.
Stalemate.
“The natives are restless,” Char offered in a voice so soft that only Terry could hear it.
“If you want to bury your dead, Spartacus can show you where they attacked us,” Terry said coldly, glaring at the old woman. “We’ll take our leave of you. Please, don’t throw any more rocks. I’ve had enough.”
The old woman reared back and threw her projectile at Terry. Terry was going to let it bounce off his chest as all he wanted to do was leave, but Char reached in front of him and caught the rock. She walked down the small slope and stopped an arm’s-length from the old woman. Char dropped the rock on the other woman’s foot, helping it along so that the old woman howled in pain and started hopping around.
Char looked the men in the eye, from one to the next. None of them would raise a hand against the raving beauty before them, her purple eyes glowing faintly in the relative darkness. The old woman recovered enough to try and push Char, but the Werewolf caught her hands, twisted them around until the old woman was backward, and threw her bodily to the cave floor.
“Anyone tries to follow us? Say goodbye right now because they won’t be coming back. You people are too stupid to save.” Char turned to walk away, but one of the men grabbed her arm. He could have been the old woman’s husband. He seemed the right age. It didn’t matter to Char. She didn’t like to be grabbed.
Char seized his hand and crushed it in hers, yanking him toward her and head-butting his face. As he was falling backward, she pulled him back toward her, having not let go of his hand. She ducked, threw him onto her shoulder, stood up straight, then bent over, body slamming the old man on the rocks. The sound of a melon smacking the ground suggested that the man’s head may have lost the fight with the stone.
She crouched and snarled at the others, then relaxed, turned, and walked a
way. Char hesitated as she passed Spartacus and pointed a finger in his face. “Help them pull their heads out of their asses,” she told him, then continued up the slope on her way out of the cave. Terry waved Gerry and Lacy after her while he brought up the rear.
He was going to tell them to have a nice day, but thought better of it, so he simply waved as he backed into the tunnel and jogged after the others, hurrying Clyde as he went.
When they left the cave, the door shut securely behind them, Terry looked at Char. She shrugged. “I guess that could have gone better,” he said. Gerry and Lacy nodded. “Back to the horses and mount up! We’re going home.”
***
Felicity sat in the passenger seat. The convertible top was long gone, but that didn’t matter. The old roadster was rumbling as Billy Spires carefully shifted from first to second gear. He drove slowly as the roads hadn’t been repaired in a long, long time. But they hadn’t been used during that time either, except by horses and people walking.
Billy and Felicity were taking their weekly drive past the greenhouses and into the plains beyond, to the edge of the Wastelands where they could look upon it to better appreciate what they had in New Boulder. Billy parked at the top of a small hill. He’d roll it to get the car restarted and lessen the strain on the battery. It was what they always did.
“They’re out there, finding us more people,” Billy said softly as Felicity reached into the small backseat to pull out a sleeping bundle. She never understood how the baby could sleep through the racket that Billy’s car made, but she fell asleep every single time as soon as they started driving.
“You take after your momma, don’t you, precious,” Felicity cooed. Billy traced a finger through the baby’s white hair. At two months, she wasn’t sleeping through the night yet, but it hadn’t been too bad. It took Billy a long time to convince Felicity to start a family. Little Marcie wasn’t the only newborn in the town.
Children were arriving monthly now that food had stopped being scarce with the addition of the people from Brownsville. They put New Boulder over the top in being able to produce more than they ate. When the Weathers family arrived with their small herd of cattle, that took it to the next level. The herd had grown over the past couple years and although they couldn’t eat beef every night, they’d get it often enough that craving a good steak was something to look forward to rather than lament.
Billy held the baby for a bit as they sat and watched. The sun was headed over the mountains behind them. Billy handed Marcie back and put the roadster into first gear. He pushed in the clutch, let off the brake, and the car began to roll. When it approached ten miles an hour, Felicity braced herself as Billy popped the clutch, barking the tires as the engine rumbled to life.
He pushed the clutch back in, tickled the gas pedal, and then shifted into second gear for a smooth transition as they leisurely headed back to the garage. They waved at people heading home after a long day in the fields.
“People seem happy,” Billy said loudly to be heard over the sound of the engine.
“Of course they are, Billy dear,” Felicity replied, leaning toward Billy, almost yelling. “Isn’t this what civilization is supposed to be all about?”
The mayor drove on without answering. When Terry Henry arrived, this was part of what he envisioned. People with purpose, without worrying about their next meal or if raiders were coming to take what little they had. New Boulder was peaceful. Terry had pushed the city’s boundaries to the four corners of Colorado. There wasn’t a group anywhere that was organized sufficiently to challenge the people in New Boulder.
The Force de Guerre numbered twenty-five with eight of those on the road with Terry and Char. That left seventeen to protect and defend Billy’s town from anything unknown.
The last two years had been peaceful. Two hundred and fifty people now called New Boulder home, and they accepted Billy as their mayor without question.
What have I become? Billy wondered.
He carefully parked the roadster in the garage, turned it off, and removed the key as he lovingly caressed the steering wheel. Felicity watched him the whole time. “You said the car was my present, but I think you love it more than you love me,” she drawled.
“That is mostly untrue,” Billy snickered. “I can appreciate the beauty and clean lines of a fine machine like this while loving the warmth of my beautiful lady.”
What had he become? A decent human being, the kind he wished his parents had been. Like those of people he envied. He’d become an honorable man, too. “That damn Terry Henry Walton!” Billy blurted out, laughing and shaking his head.
“What did he do this time?” Felicity asked as she struggled with both the baby and opening the car door. Billy put a hand on her shoulder before jumping out and running around the car to open the door for her. “I thank you, father of our daughter!”
“He turned me into a nice guy. What a fucker,” Billy said.
Felicity glared at him. “You will not use that kind of language around our daughter, do you hear me, Billy Spires!”
Billy vowed to teach Marcie how to swear, but he’d wait for the appropriate time. He’d have to do it when Felicity wasn’t watching. In the interim, he’d choose his battles wisely.
“Don’t you have reports to review and people to move around?” Felicity raised her eyebrows at him.
“Mayor stuff. Yup. Got lots of mayor stuff to do,” he replied. It was that time of year where the manpower needs shifted from one place to the next, like migrant workers moving from field to field as the rotated crops matured.
New Boulder almost had a thriving economy with trade and a free market. People earned a share from the fields they worked with everyone getting a minimum where if you didn’t work, it wouldn’t be enough to keep you alive. Since everyone worked at something, getting a cut of this and that, no one was starving. Billy thought that some people were starting to look fat. He’d have to have a talk with them.
He couldn’t abide overweight people. There had to be limits.
Or did there?
He cared about the good people of New Boulder, but not enough to get into their personal business. Now that he had a real family, he focused his energy there. He didn’t have time to live other people’s lives for them.
Billy and Felicity walked from the garage, located up the road from the mayor’s house. They spotted Mark hanging out on the corner and waving at them.
“I guess I have other mayor business that I don’t yet know about…”
***
When Timmons finally called a halt, the pack was exhausted. They’d run as fast and as far as they could. They hadn’t run that hard since the escape from New York all those years ago. Marcus had driven them out of a desire to find food. Now, they drove themselves out of fear.
The other males—Ted, Adams, and Merrit—had kept up. The females had struggled, but only because they had less body fat to use for reserves. Sue, Xandrie, and Shonna collapsed when the pack stopped, probably a hundred miles from where they started.
At least they didn’t sense the Forsaken any longer. They changed into their human forms and lay around, naked since they had changed into Werewolves, ripping out of their clothes as they ran for their lives.
“Why did he come?” Timmons panted.
“Maybe he wasn’t coming after us? Maybe it was just a coincidence?” Merrit answered.
“Coincidence? They have a purpose and it’s never random. I think they were coming after us. Maybe Marcus found them and they’ve been searching all this time, looking for us so he could punish his pack.” Timmons held his head in his hands, feeling his mortality racing toward him like a freight train.
Merrit slapped him on the shoulder. “No way. A Forsaken doesn’t do a Werewolf’s bidding. If anyone was the bitch in that relationship, it would be Marcus. I don’t see him going for that kind of arrangement, no matter how angry he is with us. Maybe the Forsaken are making a move to consolidate the survivors, bring them together to
rebuild civilization, maybe rebuild New York?” Merrit said hopefully.
The others’ ears perked up. “New York City! I miss that place, like, it was so full of energy, and there was so much to do,” Sue lamented.
Xandrie scoffed. She never liked the city although she’d lived there her whole life. She liked life in the wild, life in her Were form. She was the largest of the females and as a She-Wolf, was as strong as the males, all except Marcus.
She was biding her time, thinking about challenging Timmons for the role of alpha, only because she could, not because she wanted it. Alpha wasn’t her thing. It was easy to think that she could lead the pack, but it wasn’t easy.
No. She’d let Timmons think that he was in charge, just until Marcus showed up and killed the pretender, taking the pack back under his massive black wing.
“I liked it there,” Sue said. She was referring to Cancun, but the others thought she was still thinking about New York City. “Would the Forsaken have been that bad? Why can’t we be where they are?”
Sue was an innocent, naïve in ways that some found annoying while others found adorable. She saw things more clearly, living in a way that many could never realize.
“Because the Forsaken serve themselves. They’re whacked! We’d be doing their bidding just until they grew tired of us, then they’d kill us. That’s why we steer clear of the Forsaken,” Timmons stated definitively. Sue wasn’t sure. If they killed everyone they worked with, there’d be no one left.
Then she thought about their predicament and started to giggle. There wasn’t anyone left. Most people were dead. The Forsaken were responsible for the WWDE? It was a revelation that finally made sense to her.
Even though none of it was true.
The Forsaken had an agenda, but it wasn’t for the complete destruction of the world.
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