“To make it worse, their runners left before the problem with the supplies surfaced. Which means the relief column isn’t going to have enough for them either, like as not.
“That means they are going to have to decide what to do right quick, because it’ll be at least a month before he expects the relief to get here.”
“Can they hunt?”
Ezra shook his head. “There’s nothing around to hunt. Dralka have killed any large herbivores that survived here after the rains went away. A hungry dralka will kill rats, mice and any other small animal. There are some, but they are nocturnal and small and hide during the day. He thinks there are some small mammalian predators, about the size of small cats. They are also nocturnal, and closer to a rabbit in size.”
Andie looked sick and Kris closed her eyes for a moment. “Time, then is the most important thing, right?”
“Yes, Kris,” Ezra told her.
“And if we go north, every day we travel, we’ll knock an extra day off how long it is until we meet with the relief?”
“Well, normally I’d say we’d do that. Except we’re screwed on that too. Even if we ditch the extra things from the MREs, we have forty-eight cases of twelve meals. That’s about five cases per person. That’s a hundred pounds, Kris, just there. Maybe the men can carry that much, but you and Andie? I can’t either.
“There’s no way any of us can carry more than two of the water jugs as well. That’s twenty times two and a half gallons each. That’s fifty gallons -- at a quart a day, why that’s ten days supply for all of us. Did I mention those water jugs weigh twenty pounds each, as well? We’re talking about every last one of us carrying a hundred forty pounds of supplies, not counting TP, blankets and the like. With care, we might be able to make it, following the waterholes, I suppose.
“Except this storm is going to have seriously rearranged the landscape -- not just their observation post. Their road is gone, and where there were a few infrequent streams before, now they’re going to be rivers. Maybe in a week they’ll be safe to cross -- but not yet. Waterholes are going to have been washed away, filled with debris or one of a dozen other things that can go wrong with natural springs.”
Kris thought hard. “A week from now -- we’d have eaten up a quarter of the food, right?”
He nodded and she continued, “We wait a week then, unless you have a better plan. That’ll give us more time to hope we can get back home. We get back and we can bring these guys enough food to wait until they get help, and then some.
“And if we do have to leave, it’ll be hundred pound packs, give or take. I know you seem to think Andie and I are wusses, Ezra, but we usually spend a couple of weeks every summer backpacking up in the Sierras. We can manage hundred pound packs for a while.
“Seventy-five and forty is a hundred and fifteen pounds,” he explained.
She flipped him a bird. “One water jug, Ezra. We either find water along the route or we can’t do it. Those dralka are up north, don’t forget. It wouldn’t be a good idea, I’m thinking, if everyone has both hands full -- not to mention these jugs are fragile. Set one down hard and it starts leaking.”
She stopped, breathing hard. “They don’t have anything?”
“Nothing. The clothes they’re standing in, a couple of dozen arrows each and that’s it. If we have to travel very far, we’re going to be a bunch of sad sacks when we get there.”
Andie spoke up. “I take it, sitting on our asses for a month and crossing our fingers isn’t a plan?”
“Andie,” Kris told her. “Shorty built Fox Two in a day. It’s been five days since we got here. Figure it out girl! Whether or not the fusor is still working, someone or something is preventing them from rebuilding it or getting it working.
“If we’re here much more than another week, and if they haven’t come for us, we’re dead, Andie. It’s as simple as that.” She waved back at the tunnel where their things were.
“I want to get back home safely, Andie. I want you and Ezra to get back safely as well. We didn’t ask for these guys, Andie, but they’re not asshole mother fuckers. They’re just guys. If we hog the supplies, in a couple of days it’ll be us or them time. That’s no solution!
“We can leave a note. Earth, Andie! Earth is a cornucopia of plenty! They can bring all sorts of things through that door! More food, more supplies. I bet it wouldn’t be that hard to disassemble some ATV’s and get them here.”
Kris turned to Ezra. “Melek and his boss are going to have to know that the supplies are going to have a price -- we need a map if they have one, and if not, a fair description of what’s between where we are now and where we’ll be going.”
“We’ll leave a map and instructions,” Andie said nodding in understanding.
“Yes. What do you think, Ezra?”
“Kris, your father told me you were the boss.” He nodded at Andie. “Andie was to be your number two. It was a condition of employment, you understand?”
“Do you have any reservations now?” Kris asked coolly.
“Not only no, but hell, no! Andie is a genius! If there is a technical fix, she’ll find it! You, in your own way, you’re as smart as she is! I’m the muscle, along for the ride. I’m here to offer advice, not to do the heavy lifting of making decisions.”
“So, how fast could you kill them all, if it came to that?” Kris asked softly.
He shrugged. “I have a fifty-round clip for the rifle. I’ve got a switch that’ll let me fire three-round bursts. Call it five seconds, maybe. Drop the rifle and kill the wounded. Ten seconds or less.”
“And unless they were ready they wouldn’t have a chance, would they?”
“No. But I warn you, Kris, there’s a reason I left the army. It was because I wasn’t willing to do that sort of thing anymore to poor sods who didn’t have a way to fight back. Sure, to protect you and Andie, I’d do it. I’d do it in a couple of heartbeats, actually. But that’s not the vibe I’m getting from Melek or any of the others. Even the officer is just a bumbler.”
“I don’t want to do it, either. I just want to know what we’re looking at.”
“Well,” Andie said, “I won’t give the order on one condition.”
Ezra glared at her.
“The map -- yeah, that’s not negotiable. However, I’m also concerned just how we’re going to manage with a little more than one roll of TP for ten people for a month. Any advice in that area would be well received.”
Ezra barked a laugh. “Andie, you like to live dangerously! Yeah, we can talk about it. Since they’re going to be hurting too, I’m sure if there’s something they’ll share.”
Ezra went to talk to Melek, Kris at his side. Melek was watching his officer closely as Ezra made his offer. The man was pale and shaken, his lips moving, without words coming out.
* * *
Melek felt sorry for Menim, but what could he do? They were going to die, which was sad. Menim was going to fail his first duty assignment, but there was nothing he could have done in that storm -- just surviving was a worthy feat!
He saw Ezra and the taller of the young women approach. It galled him; truly it bothered him. How much food could they have? If they tried to share with Melek and the observation crew, even if they had a few months’ worth to begin with, they’d run through it in a few days. He couldn’t ask for that!
Ezra nodded at Lieutenant Menim. “What?”
“Ruin,” Melek told him. “Position, status, family, future -- all gone.”
“We have food, water.”
“Save yourselves,” Melek told him. “I won’t be a party to killing two women because I’m hungry too.”
“Come,” Ezra told him.
They went into the dark depths of the rookery. Melek saw that even the bravest, Collum, shrank back. How do you explain to men that the last dralka had been here a century or more before?
It had always seemed like a joke to Melek that so many people talked of the terror of a dralka nursery. Melek had no i
dea how a single man could enter one and still be alive; much less survive to report back. Men had entered dralka nurseries, but they entered with bows and swords, torches and fagots of wood. There they killed dralka nestlings.
But stories remained of how nestlings loved to eat living humans, biting small pieces off at a time. He laughed mentally. Dralka weren’t large enough to take a whole man or woman at a time. Perhaps an infant or small child, but nothing more. No, the stories were the results of fevered imagination. Not that it took much imagination to realize what the fate of someone who actually stumbled into a nursery by accident would be.
They walked back, Ezra and the taller woman providing light. Then there was a low tunnel that wasn’t terribly long, then a wider spot with square shapes he didn’t recognize.
When they got close, Ezra opened one of the containers and took out some of the food the strangers had been eating. Melek stared at the pile, measuring it by eye. There was a lot there...
“Thirty days, maybe twenty-eight, if you eat too,” Ezra told him.
It was a double surprise. First, he’d assumed they were on short rations, and he’d never imagined a cache of supplies like this. The second thing was amazement that they were willing to share with strangers.
Belatedly he added a third concern -- how did they get these supplies here? They certainly hadn’t carried them. Ezra pointed out the water jugs out as well. Those would be useful, he agreed, but they did seem rather fragile.
The men from the outpost had one two-gallon water skin that Collum had with him, for seven men. These were better, at least for the few days they’d last.
But the food...
“You share with us?” It still seemed incredible.
“You share map to where we go, so our friends can come for us.” Ezra said. A simple sentence that took a half hour to convey. That begged additional questions. Where were they from? Where were their friends? When would their friends come?
The answers to those questions were that Ezra and the woman didn’t know or wouldn’t say. Melek was tempted to just say no to sharing food and information, but that was the same thing as killing himself and the men. No, he needed to think about it.
It was possible that with these supplies and some luck, they could reach the settled areas near Arvala, even if the first two messengers didn’t survive the storm or the dralka. Ezra was right too, in thinking that if they spent a week waiting for the water to go down, that would help... that or they’d have to go up and over the mountains, then back down when they got further north. True, there was a fishing village on the eastern side that also served as a place to house wall guards, but it wasn’t much. It would actually be easier to cross back over the mountains again.
Along the piedmont though, they could travel much faster than in the mountains. Would Arvala send people south regardless, to see how they fared in the storm? He wasn’t sure, but he thought that they might. That led to another question -- who would old General Flaner send south? Flaner’s protégé was Captain Seros, a man who loathed Melek and who made trouble for him at every turn.
Of course, Seros was a coward and even more importantly, a man with absolutely no intention of taking any avoidable risk. He was hidebound, stupid, and prone to making very many poor judgments. Judgments that only General Flaner’s favor had saved Captain Seros from ruining his career.
Captain Dumi, on the other hand, was Melek’s friend and they worked well together. If it was a matter of advocacy, Dumi would be pressing General Flaner from the moment the winds stopped blowing to send out an expedition to make sure all was well.
So, the odds were that it would be Captain Dumi coming, if anyone was. Melek could talk to him and get him to understand the importance of this, but what about once they returned to Arvala? General Flaner made Captain Seros look open-minded. There was no doubt in Melek’s mind that Flaner would do something incredibly stupid.
And the only way to prevent bloodshed, that he could see, would be to get Ezra and the two women to voluntarily give up their weapons. Would he be willing to let strangers disarm him?
Well, if they had the drop on him, probably yes. There wasn’t much you could do in that case, except die pointlessly. He didn’t think Ezra would be willing to die pointlessly, and he doubted if the young women would be either.
And that bolt weapon the little one had made! Collum said he understood it, so maybe it was true, that they could build their own. Maybe. Would the short one, Andie, be so forthcoming if she was a prisoner? He doubted it. He doubted she’d be forthcoming, either, if she was being well-treated and the others weren’t. And he hadn’t worked out the precedence between the two women. Kris gave orders to Ezra, but she treated Andie like a peer -- or perhaps a good friend. If Ezra was in the employ of Kris’ father, that would explain things about Andie’s relationship to Ezra, but what of the two women’s relationship between each other?
Ezra clapped him on the shoulder and grinned. Melek was very sure that he understood some of the thoughts going through Melek’s head, which was disconcerting, at best.
Kris had Ezra explain her thoughts about how much to carry, which took most of the afternoon. They’d gone back to the main chamber and sat around a small fire Collum had built.
Melek tried very hard not to let Lieutenant Menim worry him as the officer sat near the fire, staring into the flames and shaking like a leaf.
Today, they would rest and he could think; tomorrow he was going to have to decide. For the first time in his life, he understood the desire of many officers to defer decisions until the last possible moment. There were so many complications!
Chapter 11 :: The Woman Who Figured
Ezra sank down next to Kris and Andie as the sun started its final plunge beneath the horizon. They were in the main chamber, but close to the entrance to the nursery. Melek had detailed some of his soldiers to see if they could find any wood earlier, but they had returned without significant success. Melek and his group were now huddled by the door to the outside, facing another dark night.
“These people have no game like poker,” Ezra told the two girls. “We probably don’t want to teach it to them,” he added with a bitter laugh.
“Why not?” Andie asked. “They’re bound to have something like money, and we could take it all away from them.”
“Yeah, but they might figure out how to keep poker faces. Right now, they don’t have a clue.”
“And what does that mean?”
“It means Melek is wrestling with his conscience about what to do about us. They have units of time like days, weeks, months and years just as we do, although all different lengths. The days are about twenty hours, and there are eight days in a week, six weeks in a month, and nine months in a year. Our years are 365 and a quarter days long, and theirs are, so far as I can tell, 432 and a tenth long. At least they have a leap day every ten years instead of every four.
“They came here, according to Melek, about twelve hundred of their years ago, which is something like fifteen hundred of our years. They are still paranoid about the barbarians that drove them out of their former homelands. Think Muslims upset about the Crusades kicking them out of the Holy Lands, except half again as far back.
“Even now, they are afraid they’ll be pursued.
“And to make life interesting, I don’t think he’s assured we will receive a warm welcome back at his home.”
“That bites,” Kris said, frowning. “The fact we’d be saving their asses doesn’t count for anything?”
“Well, with Melek it counts. Hey, it wasn’t that much different in the army! And you don’t even want to know how many times some captain, major, or colonel promised the American Indians peace, only to have the request laughed at up the chain of command and the promise broken almost at once. There was one son of a bitch in Arizona that broke every agreement he ever made with the Indians -- right up to slaughtering women and children who came in for peace talks. He started a couple of wars all by himself.”
“Obviously, that’s not as good as months of food, but we were going to be hurting for water before the food runs out anyway.”
Ezra chewed that over. “It would almost certainly jam up Melek with his bosses,” Ezra explained.
“Those bosses he doesn’t trust,” Andie commented. “Maybe we can get him to come with us.”
“Maybe if the door was open, but seriously, Andie, what do you think I’d have told an Aussie in Afghanistan if he asked me if I’d like to defect to Australia before a firefight?”
“What would likely happen if he gets in trouble?” Kris asked.
Ezra shrugged. “There’s no way to tell. I can say this, though -- you’d be right about kicking the can down the road. Unless his relief column was a large group or they brought along a shit pot of supplies with them, they would most likely turn around and go back, then mount another expedition here. That means they might not be back for two months -- we’d be eating our shoes by then. That might not be a good thing if we haven’t been rescued before that.”
“There don’t seem to be any good options,” Kris said forlornly.
“Yeah, and I was thinking that I could make some more crossbows,” Andie told them. “Except there’s enough material for one and a half more stocks, unless they burn the wood for firewood tonight. Because, while that steel wire they have works okay, there aren’t any more broken swords in the midden heaps. I’ll defer to you about asking them to part with their swords, Ezra, but I suspect not.”
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