The Tribe
1
Boyd Craven Jr
The characters and circumstances in this story are a product of the author’s imagination, and represent no real person, living or dead. Any real public places or names are used only to build atmosphere for the reader’s mind.
Copyright © 2015
Boyd Craven, Jr.
All Rights Reserved
No part of this story may be reproduced in any way without the prior written consent of the author.
The suggested reading order for the Genetic Apocalypse saga starts with Adam, then goes to Adrian. These two brothers each get a series of short-read stories. The Homesteaders series will follow Adam’s life in Michigan, The Tribe series will follow Adrian’s life in Florida.
The back-story of what happened in the world ten years earlier to get us to this point is in The Rise of Walsanto. Read that at any time. Then, to follow how the world fares after the first hybrid is born, and for the 10 years before the Adam story takes place, read Hannah, followed by The Guardians series.
1
Adrian:
I saw Sarah Mae and Maya leaving earlier this morning with rifles, in the direction of Sara Mae’s old place. I thought it odd that they didn’t tell me what they were doing, but oh well… they’re pretty independent now, and they get along great. How many times have Donald and I done that in our lives? I thought. Lots. At least they remembered what I remind all of them about regularly; somebody carry a large caliber rifle for protection, someone else carries a .22 for hunting. We don’t want to be attracting attention to our location by shooting the big ones unless we have to. A .22 will kill just about anything with a good shot. Our .410 shotguns with slugs don’t make near as much noise as the big rifles either, and I don’t know of any creature in Florida that they won’t kill at close range.
I walk out to the barn to continue my work of taking down the snake skins that the squatters had left hanging to cure. I don’t see us doing that for a living. We have no way to take them anywhere to sell, or even know who we’d sell them to if we did. I think we’ll just use them. I don’t know for what yet, but they’re pretty thick and pretty strong. The largest of them are just about like leather, covered with scales. I’m rolling them up around wooden poles I cut, and tying them with strips I cut from some of the smaller, shorter ones, one above the other until the pole is full. They’re like the size of a roll of toilet paper each, done this way. It’s a major space savings, plus it should keep anything from chewing on them and ruining them while they’re stored standing upright.
I can hear Donald whistling away while doing something down by the river. I chuckle to myself, because Donald really sucks at whistling, but I’m not gonna be the one to tell him that. This is way better than my life in Michigan, I think to myself, when I hear a single shot from the .22 in the distance. Yep, if I didn’t know they were out there, I may not have even realized that that was a gunshot. Wonder what they got?
I finished filling up the pole I’m working on, and decide to take a break and go see what my buddy’s doing down by the river. “Hey! You’re gonna scare all the damn fish away, making all that racket,” I hollered at him, when I saw him. He’s fishing. That boy loves him some fishing.
“You worry about what you’re doing and forget about what I’m doing, you big turd,” he tells me.
I look into the old galvanized wash tub we use to keep fish alive, but out of the river, so as not to attract any gators to us. Blue gills! “These for dinner?” I ask.
“Nope. They’re for smoking, dehydrating and storing in jars. Sara Mae explained how the Seminoles do that. Well, they don’t use jars, but she says that that’ll be even better.”
“Cool! Fish jerky for this winter then?”
“Exactly, dork cat,” he said.
“You gotta get some better pet names Donald,” I tell him. He’s so immature…
I see movement up near the barn. “Hey look! The girls are back, and they’re carrying a pig on a pole. C’mon, let’s go check it out!”
“Hey, look at you,” Donald said to Maya, who has the front end of the pole over her shoulder. Sarah Mae has the rear end over her shoulder, and the pig is hanging upside down by all four feet in between them. “That’s a good way to carry that baby pig!”
“Shut up Donald, it’s not a baby,” Sarah Mae growls. “It’s just the right size.”
They carry it over to the skinning stand behind the barn that looks like a swing set frame made out of wood, lay it on the grass and proceed to untie it from the pole.
“Here, let some big, strong men hang that up for you,” Donald teases. I cringe at that, because I know what’s coming.
“I only see one big, strong man, and one little boy with a big mouth,” Sara Mae says, laughing while she did.
“Did you hear that Adrian? Your girl says you have a big mouth!” Donald said. He just moved in time to avoid a swat on the back of the head from Maya.
“Hey, leave me outta this man,” I told him.
The girls hung it up by its hind feet by themselves.
“So what’s that for?” I ask.
“To eat,” both girls say.
“C’mon Donald, let’s go before you get us both killed,” I tell him. “They have guns, and you just don’t know when to shut-up!”
~
Later, us boys are up on the back deck finishing cold smoking the blue gill fillets, when Maya comes out of the kitchen and says, “When you guys are done with those, will you build up the fire a little more? We have a pig to roast! We’re going to need a lot of coals.”
“Sure,” Donald says, and he gets his patented goofy Donald grin on his face.
“What?” I ask him. I know him well enough to know that something is going on in that head, I just don’t know what yet.
“I’m not saying a word,” he giggled. Smack! Maya swats him on the back of the head out of nowhere and gives him ‘the look’. “I know something you don’t know,” he sings. Smack! He gets it again, this time followed by the ‘hands on hips’ stance.
~
Today, November 15th, is my birthday. I wake to the sound of an outboard motor leaving our dock, so I jump out of bed and hurry to the window of my room to see who it is. It’s Maya and Donald, heading downriver, with her driving. ‘Ah! So that’s what Donald was keeping secret,’ I thought. ‘I bet they’re going to get Sunny and Sofie to celebrate my birthday. That must be why they stayed up most of the night smoking that porker!’ I think it’s silly of them to make a big deal of it, because we have so much to do, settling into this homestead, but I’m very excited that they’d do that for me though, if that’s what it is.
I get dressed and go downstairs. Sarah Mae is already up and in the kitchen, cleaning up. Yeah, somethings up. “Hi,” I say to her, and go to the sink to brush my teeth.
“Well good morning!” she says, extra chipper, and with a great big smile.
Yeah, she’s never that cheerful in the morning…
She pours me a cup of hot tea while I’m brushing, which I’m beginning to develop a taste for, and sets it at my place at the table. I put my tooth brush away and sit down, leaning over to smell the hot tea. “Mmm, that smells good!” She walks around behind me, so I’m expecting to get tickled or something.
“Happy Birthday,” she says, but her voice sounds really funny. When I turn around to see why, she put one hand on either side of my face and kisses me right on the mouth!
“What are you doing?” I ask, about falling out of the chair.
“Giving my boyfriend a birthday kiss silly. What else?”
Well, I’d never been kissed b
y a girl that way in my life, and I’m not sure what I should say, so I just smile and say, “Thanks!” Doh! She keeps moving about the kitchen like it was no big deal, and I don’t want to look like a dork, so I keep my mouth shut. I just sit there, thinking what a ‘grown-up’ kind of a moment this is, watching her. I begin to realize that I feel something a little bit ‘different’ for Sarah Mae than I do the others. I also notice just how beautiful she is, maybe for the first time. ‘Maybe she really meant what she said to Sofie before,’ I thought. ‘What a great birthday this is shaping up to be!’
She sets her tea cup on the table next to me and goes out to check the grill. “The pig meat is done, and it looks yummy,” she says, coming back in. I watch her cross the room and settle into the chair next to me. Her movements are graceful and even. Her smooth, shiny skin, without a single hair or blemish, catches the light from the windows, so I can practically see her perfectly proportioned muscles working beneath it.
“What are you thinking about?” she asks, grinning.
“It just came to me that heirlooms can’t possibly be looking down on us as something ugly and disgusting like they appear to be. They have to be jealous of our perfection! We have no scars, no bug bites, no pimples or freckles. We never worry about our hair looking bad, and we never get sunburned. We’re never too skinny and never too fat. I’m convinced beyond a doubt, that we’re superior to all of the races of heirlooms.”
“Wow! What brought that on?” she chuckles.
“Just watching you cross the room,” I say. “You’re perfect, and you’re beautiful.” Right then of course, just in time to spoil the moment, we hear the sound of a returning outboard motor. Donald! She has a big ole smile on her face though; as we both get up to go help them dock.
Yep, Sunny and Sofie are with them. Sunny starts them all singing Happy Birthday as Donald helps her out of the boat carrying a real birthday cake! Sofie and Maya came next, carrying a present each, wrapped in real wrapping paper. That just about brings tears to my eyes.
“How in the world did you make a birthday cake out here Sunny?” I ask.
“I have modern conveniences Honey, remember? Called propane?”
We all walk up to the house laughing and talking. Before long, we’re all sitting on the front porch in the morning sun, drinking hot coffee and catching up from the two weeks that have passed since we’ve all been together. Granted, Maya and Sunny check in over the radio each morning, but that’s just not the same.
Sunny tells us, “The boat from The Island has been back twice for pick-ups and deliveries since I’ve seen y’all.” She smiles at the ‘deliveries’ part. “The first time, my friend Wednesday (the runner) asked about the stuff on my grocery list for making the cake. She wanted to know what the occasion was. I told her it was gonna be a surprise birthday cake for Adrian, the leader of The Tribe. So the next time she came, she brought everything on my list, plus these two presents all wrapped up. I don’t know what’s in them, just that they are from Madame V, the owner of The Island. Apparently Wednesday is friends with her too and had told her in private about the details of the incident at my house (that actually belongs to Madame V) when her guard got killed. Madame V said that there are no hard feelings over us having killed ‘that creep’ for doing what he did. Oh, and you should wait to open them presents, because right now we need to have birthday cake for breakfast!”
“I second that motion,” I say, and go to cut it into six pieces.
~
A few hours later, Sunny calls us for dinner, from the back deck. Dinner is smoked pig, boiled blue crabs, fresh water shrimp tails, with peppermint water to drink. “This is a regular feast!” I say.
Sunny says, “Kind of weird having all meats and no veggies.”
She seemed surprised at that, so Sarah Mae explained, “Not to us. This is how we always eat now. First of all, there aren’t that many vegetables around here. Second, we feel like we have more energy if we eat just meat and fish, drink lots of water, and get lots of sunshine on our bare skin. We have discovered that we have to eat some fiber though, or we’ll get constipated, and that pretty much has to come from plants, so we do eat some sometimes. We make salads with fat weeds from the yard, with meat or fish in it, and make dressing out of mashed berries and water usually.”
Everyone is having a good time. “This is the best birthday party I’ve ever had, you guys!” I tell them. Finally, it’s time to open my presents. I feel kinda like a five year old! So, I opened the biggest one first, like any good five year old would. It’s a print of an aerial photo of the everglades. It’s printed on a very heavy-duty paper, and came rolled up inside a thick cardboard tube, with a cap. It has numbers written on it here and there lightly in pencil. We spread it out on the table to look at it.
“That’s really nice!” Sarah Mae remarked.
Sunny shows us where we are on the map first, then she points out places she knows, like The Island, Chokoloskee, Everglades City, the bridge at the Tamiami Trail, and her place. It shows where all the rivers and waterways are.
“There’s a lot more places to kayak than I imagined,” I say. “It looks like most of these little lakes are connected up by waterways. Man, you could go forever out there! We’re gonna need more kayaks, that’s for sure.”
There’s also a notebook of lined paper, with pencils, pens and markers of different colors in a zip lock bag. Opening the notebook, I find that there are pages already written on in pen, by someone with very good penmanship. Every few pages there are numbers that correspond to the numbers written on the map, along with details about that location! There’s also some funny combinations of numbers after each location.
When I open the second present, it reminds me of a big cell phone at first glance, but the package says it’s a “GPS”. It comes with its own solar charger to keep it charged up without electricity.
“Hey, I bet those combinations of numbers in the book are GPS numbers, like these on the box,” I say. I notice Maya is busily looking over the different sizes of connectors coming out of the solar charger, and suddenly, without a word, she takes off running upstairs. Weirdo. She comes back down a minute later with her iPod. She checks, and finds that one of the connectors fits it.
“Oh Adrian, can I borrow this charger for a little while? Please? You have no idea how much I’ve missed my music!” she squeals.
“Yeah, go ahead,” I tell her. What else am I gonna say? “We could use some music for this party anyhow!”
Off to the porch where the sun is shining she goes, on two wheels, with little Sofie hot on her tail.
“Now that is one excited girl,” Donald said, laughing.
2
Sunny:
We’re all sittin’ here ‘round the kitchen table, ‘cept Maya and my little Sofie, just relaxing and yakkin’ it up since Adrian opened his birthday presents from Madame V. Those two took off to find some sunshine to charge up Maya’s iPod with the new solar charger Adrian got. Maya says she likes her music, and I know my baby girl Sofie does. She can get down with some music for a five year old. It prolly helps that her mama was a professional exotic dancer, but she ain’t got ta hear much music since we left The Island, ‘cept for the day we all took the van on that road trip. That day was good times!
I love hangin’ out with these kids, but that’s exactly what they are; kids, in adult hybrid bodies. All of ‘em ‘cept Adrian. He’s already bigger, and has more muscle than most heirloom men, and he just today turned seven! They sure are different than regular folk in some ways, but the same in others. Adrian has the mind of an adult. Hell, I’m pretty sure he’s smarter than me.
I feel kinda bad ‘bout the news I have for ‘em, but that news lets me feel a little bit better ‘bout the way he catches my eye. Like every time I’m around him. I just can’t help it. He’s off-the-scale hot, and that’s kind of a problem ‘cause of his age and all. Maybe. ‘Cause now they ain’t considered human no more. Does that change the rules? Green light? I d
unno. It’s all very confusing, what’s been happenin’ to the world. Adrian only has eyes for Sarah Mae anyhow, so’s long as I keep my big mouth shut and ain’t too obvious, I figure I can look and imagine all I want…
“Hey y’all, Wednesday told me some stuff the other day when she came by to pick up product. Her ‘guard chick’ stays in the boat like she’s s’posed to, so we get a chance to yak some,” I tell them. “She says our morning walkie talkie check-ins are gettin’ picked up by The Island’s base unit scanner, and bein’ monitored by security. She says that we should keep doin’ ‘em, but we should watch what we say. Maybe even say stuff that we want ‘em to hear, if we wanna be tricky. She says the head of security there, Leonard Matson, has sworn to get even for the death of that creep y’all killed.”
“It’s a good thing that you warned us,” Donald says. “I never really pay much attention to what Maya says to you, but I’ll have to talk to her about it for sure now.”
“Another thing she said, is for us to stay on this side of the bridge for a while, because Matson’s men are scopin’ out some failed tourist trap on the other side. It’s called Everglades Airboat Excursions & Kayak Rentals. It’s right here,” she said, pointing at it on the map. “Number 7. She says that one of the men has told her that the place has no business anymore, but that they have good equipment, and a good location. I guess they have two nice airboats, and a bunch of kayaks and canoes. Supposedly Matson wants it, ‘cause it has good access to Hwy-41 (the Tamiami Trail), a bunch of rental storage units, a bunch of parking and full utilities,” I tell them.
“What’s he interested in roads for?” Adrian asks me. “I thought that they are all about not having any road access, so there can’t be any surprise raids on The Island’s marijuana crop and stuff?”
THE TRIBE 1 (GENETIC APOCALYPSE - THE TRIBE) Page 1