That had to be a poke at Dalton’s Creationism.
Dalton took a moment to swallow, looked half amused and half disgusted, and said, “Bastard.”
Devereaux said, “So we’ve got a month before it starts getting cold, not just cool.”
Trinidad asked, “How cold will it get at night?”
Devereaux and Spencer exchanged glances.
Spencer said, “This should be a small climate optimum between the Older and Younger Dryas. The temperature in those dropped back to Ice Age levels within three generations. This should be a bit warmer, more moderate, and lusher, and so far, it is, compared to what we had back in A-stan. This assumes we have the time frame right, that the research I read is right, and I remember it right. Winter will still be down into the sub-freezing range at least, though.”
That was a lot of maybes, but winter was winter.
“I endorse the plan for a lot of firewood,” Elliott said, to make sure people knew. “It’s always useful as a barricade and windbreak, and fuel for next year. Stack it deep.”
Spencer said, “We need to finish that smokehouse ASAP and get to smoking meat, salting meat and drying meat. We can use it as a sauna, too. Eventually it’ll be a hot water spa, with a tub.”
Ortiz said, “Goddamn, we could rent excursions here to rich Manhattan bitches for a grand a day.”
“Yeah, if we could.” Dammit.
He spit out a bit of gristle, and tossed it over where the cat was. Hell, they might as well have a pet. They planned to domesticate food animals, after all.
“So what about domestic animals?” he asked.
Ortiz said, “We need to clip bird wings, and build some cages out of willow sticks or something else skinny and straight. We move those around where we plan to plant crops and the guano will prep the ground. Goats are easy, we have the fence, and toss enough stuff for them to eat. Rabbits can go in cages framed in wood and meshed with the Kevlar RPG mesh off the vehicles. Bigger stuff we should just let graze. There’s enough of them hunting isn’t a big problem.”
Elliott said, “Okay, moving on, Doc’s been doing great work with everyone. So give us your background.”
Devereaux leaned back on the log he sat on, hands behind his head, and stretched.
“Armand Devereaux, Sergeant, New York National Guard. Second year med student. I took a break from school to raise more money and look after my mama. I’m a combat medic. This was my first deployment. I was supposed to be doing some local charity stuff for a month, then going home. I’m fucking pissed about that.
“Anyway, I’m from Queens, joined up to get the college, get out of the city, and looks like I did.”
He paused a moment and took a drink from his Camelbak. He was almost never without it.
“I’ve got a good basic kit and few extras, but it won’t last forever. I know I’ve said that. I’m glad I can help our neighbors, and all of you, but you’ve got to stay hydrated, keep clean, be careful. I sound like your mom, don’t I?
“Goddamn, I miss home,” he said, and stopped talking.
Elliott quickly said, “Thanks. And thanks for helping with the calendar. Knowing what time of year it is is going to save us. Oglesby, you’re next.”
Oglesby said, “I’m a Specialist, I enlisted early and finished AIT right after high school. I’m an Urdu translator but I’m pretty good with Arabic as well, and some Hindi. I’ve always liked languages and I’m familiar with roots and development. That’s called ethnology. I’m out of Campbell, and I was supposed to rotate home in three months. Guess I missed that.
“I’m drawing up glossaries and dictionaries so you can speak without me, just in case something bad happens.”
“I guess that’s about it. I have a younger sister and parents, and I really don’t want to talk about them.”
Elliott said, “Hey, translation is critical. You made our entrance a thousand times easier. Don’t sell yourself short.”
To all, he said, “You all hear how we have all these skills, right? It turns out we know a lot more than we thought we did. We’re constructing a camp, we’re fed, we’re getting more variety of food. Doc’s doing a great job with us and the locals. We’re making progress on developing relations with them without letting them too close too fast. It’s working. It will get better from here.
“I’m going to say again that I’m both leader and chaplain. Anything you tell me in confidence stays with me. If you can’t talk to me, talk to Martin Spencer. If not him, find someone else. Cover for each other. Let’s not split into factions and let’s not squabble like siblings.”
“If I may, sir,” Spencer put in.
“Go ahead.”
“Shaving and haircuts are obviously already nonreg. That’s fine. Keep them neat for now. I’ve been shaving about twice a week, and it works well enough. I’m kempt without being too strack. I can cut hair reasonably well, male and female. Let me know and I can help you trim down. A couple of us have scissors and I may be able to sharpen them, and I have knives and sharpening tools.”
Sean ran a hand through his own hair, which was civilian thick, though he kept it whitewalled around the ears and blocked in back. His beard he kept trimmed short, but scraggly, between growth and uneven clipping. It didn’t feel professional. He’d ask about a monthly haircut or even head shaving.
“We should keep using the soap and such from that care package as long as it lasts. I don’t care if you only bathe once a week, but wash your damned hands after taking a dump and before eating. And I know a lot of you aren’t brushing your teeth enough. Doc has pliers, or we can drill it out with a hot wire and jam it full of pine tar, and repeat monthly. You don’t want that. Back to you, sir.”
“Anyone else?”
Caswell said, “I made a roof panel for the latrine, of grass and leaves. That gives us three sides and a roof. I’ll need help with a door.”
“I can do that,” Spencer said.
Barker said, “As soon as we can split a couple of logs, we’ll make a proper one with planked walls and roof. It’ll add some insulation, too.”
“Good,” Elliott said. It would be nice to take a crap in private.
Alexander said, “If I did it right, I got wireless working on the laptop, as a hotspot. It means we can use our phones for a couple of hundred meters as long as we’re in line of sight.”
Dalton snorked. “Two hundred meters? What good is that?”
She smiled in the faint firelight as she said, “More useful than shouting, and infinitely farther than zero. Also, you can text me updates on materials, inventory, or AARs.”
Elliott said, “I see it for watch. We can relay photos, too. Or give orders quietly. Thank you very much, Sergeant Alexander.” The range was pathetic, but hell, it was progress. They had the vehicles and parts of them, the gear and their personal stuff, and their skills. It was a lot better than it could be.
“You’re welcome, sir.” It sounded as if she were emphasizing just to drive it in.
“We can test that tomorrow. I’ll also do a periodic inspection of what we’ve got so far. So with that said, I guess it’s free time. Keep the watch schedule. Spencer.”
Everyone wandered off, but only a few feet. The glow of tablets and phones indicated movies and music. That helped a lot. It would get repetitive eventually, but for now, they weren’t entirely cut off from civilization. He’d wondered at first if a full break was better, much like Basic Training from civilian world. But they needed some connection.
“Sir,” Spencer said.
“So, we were right on the walls.” He started walking the perimeter. Spencer followed.
“Hell, I knew that, sir. Animals, natives. Someone is going to be hostile.”
“Yes. Can we speed up the north wall?” He walked along the laid-out line and the huge gap.
Spencer said, “It’s getting faster as we go, except we’re dragging logs farther. The straight ones are getting scarce. We’re carrying them five hundred meters, now. We’
ll be taking them from downstream and dragging them uphill.”
The drag marks were quite visible, where logs had ripped grass and brush from the hillside in furrows. In the dusk they were creepy, like giant worm tracks. The trimmed limbs and branches lay in a long pile that would at least hinder attackers.
“Do what you can. What’s our strategy if we are attacked? Fire the brush?”
“I’d rather not. We need the fuel. It won’t flare up that fast. It won’t burn very long. We’ve got a pretty good break at the moment,” Spencer said, pointing. “It spans most of the gap and is about ten feet wide, five feet tall. It’s a lot of brush, and no one is crossing it quickly. We just dive into the trucks and button up. We have the turrets.”
“What if we have to shoot?” He’d really prefer to avoid violence with the natives.
“Then we shoot. They don’t know how much ammo we have. But that later group bothers me.”
“Yes, but why?” He had his own theories.
Spencer said, “I suspect they have more belief in gods than spirits. Some modern tribesmen think they’re immune to bullets through various magic. It never works, which just means they need more magic. Casualties don’t dissuade them.”
If so, that was concerning. “Then it depends on if that’s a small group of time travelers, or a regional takeover by contemporaries.” Certainly there was local internecine conflict of some kind.
Spencer said, “And what other groups are out there? If we’re suspecting two, there could be more.”
Spencer had the same thoughts he did.
With a slow nod, Sean said, “Yeah. Get the north done. I’ll figure something out for the river side.”
“Earthworks in several rings, fences, brush, the river. But we need some type of crossing.”
“I’ll design something.”
“I mean the fence crossing the stream. Then we’ll want a bridge, too.”
“Yeah, I got that,” he repeated with some exasperation.
“Sorry, sir, just making sure.”
“Should we store stuff in the trucks?”
“It’s very inconvenient, we don’t have a definite threat yet, and we have at least half a perimeter and modern weapons. I think we’re okay. But we do need to keep the watch up.”
Spencer pointed up where Oglesby and Dalton sat. Dalton was on watch, Oglesby was just shooting the shit, but as long as it kept the watchstander awake, that was fine. Dalton kept scanning the distance.
He said, “I’m tempted to suggest a night vision scan every half hour.”
Spencer replied, “I think that’s a good idea. Possibly not all the time, but definitely the next few days.”
“As long as we have rechargeables, I’m going to make it a regular thing.”
“I’ll spread the word, sir.”
CHAPTER 12
The next day, the two latrine sides went up, and the roof went on. It wasn’t perfect, nor was it a private bathroom, but Martin Spencer felt relieved. He didn’t like shitting in public, and he was sure the women liked it less. Everyone had been discreet and polite on the matter, but the more civilized they could remain, the better. He felt creepy when he caught a glimpse of the women squatting.
They’d need a door and plank walls next. Though Barker was working on that sweat lodge and it would be done in a few days. That would be welcome, too. It had been two months since he’d felt hot water. For now the lodge was just a lashed frame of withes. Alexander was supposed to stitch pieces of goatskin to cover it when she wasn’t busy with administration, helping gather herbs, or chopping firewood. Despite snarky comments from Dalton and Oglesby, she did her share of work. They also liked sleeping in the tepee she stitched the cover for. Well, was still stitching. Some of it was still draped, but that was coming along. They got goat hides with every kill, and tendons and rawhide for stitching them together.
He knew of tepees from books. Barker had built them. With the inside liner and cover over the living area, reflected heat was keeping it quite warm for now. It was also very dark, and darker as the ponchos and plastic got replaced with stitched hide. Eventually, they’d need to scrape some lighter ones, or weave something. But he suspected they’d appreciate the heaviness in a few weeks.
Dalton and Trinidad were chopping trees. Caswell was hunting with Ortiz. Barker was cooking. Oglesby was down and in Number Eight to enjoy privacy. Elliott, Doc, Alexander and himself were doing camp labor—dragging brush, cutting it into firewood, stretching leather, and shortly they’d be macheteing grass. Eventually he’d have to make a scythe. Forge first.
He dragged a pruned bough over to the woodpile and started sectioning it into sticks and small loglets.
Right then, Doc said, “Chilly this morning.”
“Yeah. Winter is coming,” Spencer agreed. They’d had frost. The leaves had started to turn yellow, except for some kind of ivy around the trees that was turning an absolutely brilliant crimson red.
“That breeze is stiff. I almost want to take cover behind the woodpile.”
He burst out laughing.
Devereaux stared at him. “Eh?”
“Old, very racist slang.”
Doc stared at the sky and thought for a moment, then said, “Oh. Ooooh. Hehehe. Good thing we’re not where I can file an EEO complaint, Sergeant.”
“Yeah, good thing my only familiarity is historical. Seriously, Armand, I’m very glad we have you. I expect to get old first. You’re going to be my savior.”
“Hopefully. I’ve got limited facilities.” Devereaux pointed at him. “How’s your guts?”
“Bone meal seems to help, as does the low carb diet.” He seemed to be okay taking a pill every other day, and had a little irritation but no pain. Still, he might be dissolving his esophagus from that, and eventually it would kill him. He or Alexander would be first from their medical issues, unless rampaging animals trod Caswell or Dalton into the mud.
“Good. I wish I had some way to scope you, but there isn’t.”
“I’m more concerned about the palisade at the moment.” His stomach would kill him slowly. The predators or intruders might be a lot quicker. They’d had a bear walk through the previous night, and crap behind Number Eight, less than twenty feet from Ortiz on watch, thirty from the tepee.
“At least we’re getting buff and fit,” Devereaux said, and flexed a bicep. He’d been wiry and lean before. He had bulked up and ripped down from the diet and exercise.
“We are. Pity there’s no one we can use it on.”
“Native women. Eventually. They’re very nice to look at, when they’re young and healthy.”
Martin said, “Yeah, but they don’t stay that way long, and you’d need to teach one hygiene, I have no idea what we do about age restrictions, and they have families who want gifts.”
“I know.” There was a long pause. “Martin, since we’re using first names for now, what do we do about the regs? How long do we try to remain U.S. Army?”
He’d thought about that often.
“I’d say as long as we can. It’s frustrating, but we need the framework for discipline. In a way, this is worse than death. It’s a lot like being a POW.”
“It is. It’s depressing. I’m worried about a couple of our people.”
“Which ones?”
Doc checked his fingers. “Well . . . Alexander is depressed, partly environmental, partly endocrinal. Caswell seems constantly hyperalert and ready to break. And the LT. He’s prone to zone out.”
There was a hollow thumping sound. Was someone fitting another pole? He thought today was chopping day.
Martin said, “I think Elliott will be okay. Alexander is a medical case, but she responds when you prod her. Caswell . . . she seems to have a lot of issues. Some of it’s being Air Force among us. Some is being female. Some is that unrealistic view she’s had of the egalitarianism of primitive societies. A lot of feminists have that, even though nothing I’ve read supports the idea. They want it really badly, but it doesn’t h
ave much evidence on its side.”
“I wondered about that.”
The thumping came again, and he said, “Stop wondering and start running, it’s a stampede.” He turned and shouted, “Dalton! Trinidad! Stampede! Head for the stockade.”
They had plenty of time. It wasn’t quite a stampede, but it was a large movement of animals. To the west, the large, ugly antelope ran in streams among the wooly rhino, who stirred up dust and plant debris with their gallops.
Spencer shouted, “Open the gate!” as he climbed up onto Number Eight, and without looking down called, “Oglesby, we have stampede,” as he climbed up into the turret.
“Uh? Oh.” The man had been sleeping.
Trinidad called back, “Why the gate?”
“Open the fucking gate!” Why couldn’t he just do as he was fucking told?
The kid did it.
“I don’t get it, either,” Elliott said as he climbed up the back.
“Half a gate. They’ll bump it and might break it. Better they run right through.”
“Logical,” Elliott agreed, then said, “Everyone aboard the vehicles.”
“Ramps up?”
“I don’t think that’s a problem, but keep a spear handy.”
The rhino weren’t numerous, but they were huge. One of them lumbered through the gate, snorting, and drove straight through the fire circle without damaging anything. He appeared to move a lot lighter than his bulk suggested, but the ground shook. He charged over the tree stumps and brush by the creek and kept going, splashing mud as he scrambled up the far bank.
Several gazelles followed, and one of the ugly saiga type beasts.
That was it. A few others had gone around the ditch, and some south of the wall. All in all, a nice livestock show.
“I wonder what set them off?” Alexander asked below him.
“Could be anything. Something disturbed one, he jogged, bumped another, pretty soon they’re charging. Everything else around them either takes it as a hint, or tries to get out of the way.”
From the roof of Number Nine, Ortiz said, “That was a small one. There’s lots of room. They don’t seem to form huge herds, just family groups.”
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