When they were done, Tim told her, “I’m going back into town to scrounge for a hydraulic log splitter. There’s bound to be one somewhere.”
“Why didn’t you do that after you got the books?” Robyn asked.
“Because I wanted to get back and tell you about the milk issue with Skippy over there.”
“I knew you were a big softie, Dad!”
“Well, anyway, that’s what I’m doing. Stay armed when you’re outside,” he told her, and she patted her M4 beside her.
“His name is Fred, by the way, not Skippy.”
“Whatever. I’ll be home before dark,” he said, got in the Hum-Vee and drove off.
Robyn stayed outside for a while, watching the Joey hop around and eat the tall grass of the meadow. Soon the small kangaroo came back to her, and allowed her to pick him of, and he clung to her tightly.
Taking him up to her room, she placed him on her bed where he immediately hopped down and began exploring the alien environment. She went over, sat down and turned on her HAM radio, donned the headphones and began going up and down the dial of frequencies, searching for a signal.
Briefly she tuned into the Taos radio station again, and all too quickly the signal faded after only a few minutes, frustrating her.
“Damnit!” she said aloud, “I know there’s got to be other people out there!”
Grabbing one of the manuals she’d taken with the radio equipment from the house in Utah, she began to flip through the pages rapidly, searching for something she’d seen before.
“There it is!” she said, “Field expedient antennas!”
Looking around and going through all of the equipment she’d gotten, she found a spool of coaxial cable. “I can make a half-wave dipole antenna with this!” she exclaimed, picking up the spool.
She thought about a vertical one, although it would have to be tall enough… Looking out the dormer window, she smiled.
That tree over there!
A ponderosa pine, sitting about fifty meters from the house! She could climb the tree; put an insulator on the top, run the cable down… Grabbing everything she’d need, she hopped up and ran down the stairs, forgetting all about the Joey in her bedroom.
Cutting the cable into the correct lengths, he spliced everything together and made a perfect dipole half-wave antenna. Now to get it up the tree! She’d need to secure the top by attaching it to a ceramic insulator way up in the tree, and then feed it down through the branches, secure the bottom with another insulator, and then connect the rest of the coax cable in the middle, and then suspend it across the open space and up through her bedroom window.
Piece of cake! She thought, tying the top end of the antenna to a belt loop in her jeans and then began to climb up the tall pine tree.
She made it easily to the very top branches that were now beginning to thin dramatically. She secured the insulator, and then attached the top of her makeshift aerial, and then looked down…
Shit, it’s high up here… she said, getting a little light headed. She was so high up, she could see over the roof of the house, and started to get dizzy. The branch she was standing on was strong, only it wasn’t strong enough. It started to crack audibly…
“Oh shit!” she called out as the branch finally broke, and she fell, hitting several other branches on her way down, knocking the wind out of her. About halfway down, the pant leg of her jeans caught on a branch, tearing, and finally halting her decent.
Robyn was suspended upside down, about 40’ in the air, and with what little strength she had left, tried to reach a nearby branch and found it was out of her reach. Still winded and bruised, it seemed as if her whole body hurt. And then, because she was hanging upside down, the blood rushing to her head, her eyesight began to blur and then finally she passed out.
Just before she blacked out, she heard the sound of wood cracking… The branch that had stopped her fall and her pant leg had caught onto was beginning to strain with the weight of her body…
~To Be Continued
About the Author
Thomas Wolfenden was born and raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and is an honorably discharged veteran of the US Army. He’s worked in several different jobs throughout his life, spending fifteen years in law enforcement and the private security field. He has worked as an automotive detailer, ambulance driver, a nuclear medicine delivery courier, a dairy barn cleaner, and most recently has worked as a ballast regulator operator, a switchman, conductor and a locomotive engineer on the railroad. He has travelled extensively throughout the United States and abroad, and lived in several states; Pennsylvania, Arizona, West Virginia, Kentucky, Idaho and Florida, and has travelled extensively overseas, especially in the South Pacific, living in Australia, New Zealand, Fiji and the Solomon Islands. He has written several OP-ED pieces for various local newspapers, and had up until recently kept a political humor blog. He’s a American Patriot, Libertarian, Life/Endowment member of the National Rifle Association, and a strong supporter of the 2nd Amendment, and his fifth published work. He’s also the author the dark humor novella Full Moon Fishtown and two full-length post-apocalyptic action adventure novels, One Man’s Island and One Man’s War. And the Action Adventure Novel Coconut Republic, soon to be released by Post Hill Press. He can be contacted at: [email protected]
One Man's Island ~ The Arizona Chronicles: II ~ Autumn's Fortune Page 3