Gary awoke with a jerk.
Something was poking into his stomach, hard. For a moment, he thought that Barry or Darrin had shoved a stone under his body while he was asleep, before he remembered the gun. He’d gone to sleep on top of the weapon, even though he’d feared accidentally triggering it when he rolled over. It had seemed dangerous, but it had also seemed the best way to keep the weapon out of sight. He didn't want anyone to know he had it.
The air was cooler than normal, he realised, as he stumbled to his feet, carefully concealing the weapon in his clothes. They’d been told at school that concealing a weapon on one’s person was easy – it was the excuse for the extensive security measures – but it proved, once again, that the teachers hadn't really known what they were talking about. Gary suspected that hiding the weapon was going to be harder and harder as they progressed. If nothing else, he would have to strip off his shirt at some point or see it sodden with sweat.
“Welcome back to the world,” Austin called. “Come and get something to eat.”
He'd caught more crabs, Gary saw, as he walked over to the fire. The meat was cooking rapidly, while Austin and Darrin were using their shells to collect and boil water for their drinking. Gary hesitated when Austin passed him a knife, then started to saw into one of the dead crabs. Even touching the creature gave him the creeps.
“Not all of that is good meat,” Austin warned. He’d been watching Gary with some amusement. “But not too bad, for a first try.”
Gary found himself caught between embarrassment and pleasure. “Thank you,” he said, finally. “There's more here than we can eat, isn't there?”
“Quite right,” Austin said. It would have been sarcasm from anyone on Earth, but Austin seemed to genuinely mean it. “We’re taking the opportunity to cook the meat and carry it with us. It can serve as lunch.”
He snorted as he picked his way through the pile of meat, throwing the inedible material back into the pond. “Pity we don’t have any salt to help preserve it,” he added. “Without it, the meat will go bad quickly, no matter how thoroughly we cook it. But we will have to make do.”
There was a crashing sound from behind them. Barry was dragging a large piece of wood into the clearing. It looked like he'd torn a large branch from a tree – or, more likely, picked one off the ground and dragged it back to them. Austin examined it quickly, nodded in approval, then started to slice the branch into smaller pieces with his monofilament knife. Once cut up, the pieces were placed by the fire to dry.
The girls awoke and stumbled out of their shelter, looking terrible. Gary kept his face as blank as possible, but Barry hooted and catcalled. Kailee and Samantha looked as if they hadn't washed their hair for a week. Their clothes were filthy and faces were bruised, although it didn't look as though they’d been beaten by someone. Gary felt a twinge of pain on his jaw and touched it, carefully. He'd been sleeping on the ground too and it had left a mark.
“Remember to bury your poop,” Barry called after them, as they hobbled into the countryside. “We don’t want wild animals digging it up.”
Austin gave him a sharp look. “Be quiet,” he said, tartly. “We’re all in this together.”
He plucked an oversized leaf off the rack, examined the meat quickly, then passed it to Gary and motioned for him to eat. It tasted different than it had the previous evening, although Gary would have been hard-pressed to say how or why. He picked at it with his fingers, washing it down with warm water. From what Austin had said, boiling the water was the only way to ensure that it was safe to drink.
The girls walked back into the clearing, looking a little better. Gary wondered just how well they’d slept; he never slept very well, even on his best days. It had to be worse for them, being alone with a handful of horny guys. Going to the toilet in the open had to be a terrifying experience. They would never be sure that they weren't being watched. The thought was disgusting, but he wouldn't put anything past Barry. He would do anything for amusement.
“I meant to ask,” Abdul said, as Austin passed him a piece of meat. “Shouldn't we be going in the opposite direction?”
Austin blinked in surprise, then checked his compass. “No,” he said. “Why?”
Abdul pointed at the stream running away from the pond. “Isn't that water going towards the Jordan?”
“No,” Austin said. He hesitated, clearly trying to organise his thoughts. “We’re on the wrong side of the incline. Water on this side runs down towards the lakes, not towards the Jordan.”
Gary made a face. The explanation puzzled him, but then he'd never had a chance to study geography in any proper manner. There were no rivers left on Earth, as far as he knew, certainly not ones he was able to visit. And no one in their right mind would want to visit the heavily-polluted oceans. All he could really do was trust that Austin wasn't leading them astray. The colonial boy probably wanted to get them back to whatever passed for civilisation on Meridian as much as they wanted to get back there. If he’d wanted to abandon them, he could have done it at night. They wouldn't have realised that anything was wrong until it was far too late.
“We have to be careful around here,” Austin added. “Sudden rainfalls and floods are common.”
Barry snorted, rudely. “We noticed,” he said. “And why are we constantly heading upwards?”
“It's the shortest path to the Jordon,” Austin said. There was a hint of irritation in his tone. “If we had maps or a working GPS receiver, I might take a longer route that would be easier on untrained walkers. But we don’t have either and I don't want to take the risk of getting lost.”
“Should have one in the emergency packs,” Barry muttered. “Or something else to call for help.”
Austin passed him a leaf of meat, then settled down to eat his own food. Barry stared at him angrily for a long moment, clearly annoyed at being so openly dismissed; Gary watched him, nervously. Barry had always insisted on forcing his way into taking charge back at school, when they’d been instructed to complete projects as a group. Somehow, those projects had turned into group bullying sessions, where everyone had picked on Gary. It had been a relief when they’d moved higher up the system and group projects had been abolished. He wouldn't have been able to keep his grades if he’d had to work with others.
Barry isn't going to be able to keep his mouth shut, he thought, grimly. He will want to challenge Austin again ...
He briefly considered asking the colonial boy how to use the pistol, before dismissing the thought. After Barry had messed around at the shooting range, it was unlikely that Austin would let Gary keep the pistol. Gary couldn't really blame him for wanting to keep it out of his hands, but he didn't dare risk losing the weapon. It was his only means of defence.
“There are a great many things I wish we had,” Austin said, into the silence. “But we don't have them. We have to make do with what we have. If you have a problem with that, I suggest you complain when we get home. No doubt future plane flights will carry a comprehensive emergency kit.”
He was mocking Barry, Gary realised. But would Barry realise that he was being mocked?
“No doubt,” Barry said, darkly. “We could sue, couldn't we?”
Austin ignored him. “Gary, go looking for more edible plants,” he ordered. “Girls, help me to pack the meat into one of the packs. Everyone else, pack up the remaining packs, then dig a large hole for the waste. We don’t want to leave any signs that we were here.”
Barry scowled as Gary stood. “Surely they will have sent someone after us,” he said. “Steve would have pointed them in the right direction, right?”
“Maybe,” Austin said. “But if they start looking for us, they’ll start from the air. They won’t have the manpower to search for us on the ground.”
He nodded at Gary. “Go.”
Gary obeyed, walking away from the clearing and looking for edible plants. Thankfully, a handful were easily recognisable, although he knew that they had to be careful with mushrooms. Some
of the ones they’d found yesterday had been inspected by Austin, then hastily discarded as being unsafe to eat. Gary wondered, absently, if Austin’s time in the scouts had taught him to recognise dangerous plants by instinct. No matter how carefully Gary looked at the mushrooms, he couldn't tell the difference.
“They did,” Austin said, when he returned and asked. “Do you know what we had to do to earn the badge for Middle Survivalist?”
Gary shook his head.
“They flew us to a forest, not too different from this one, and dropped us off,” Austin said, cheerfully. “We were completely naked, save for our belts and a handful of tools. All we had to do was make it back to camp alive.”
He scowled. “It took three days.”
“Naked, you say,” Barry said. “It sounds like fun.”
He leered at the girls. “Come on, get naked.”
“It wasn't,” Austin said, quietly. “There was no protection at all for our feet, let alone the rest of us. And for those who went on to do Advanced Survivalist ... well, they weren't given tools at all, just told to get out there and find everything they needed.”
Darrin gave him an odd look. “Why didn't you do it?”
“I came to the city for a year’s experience of something apart from the farm,” Austin said. “I was planning to do it once I returned home, although dad might have forbidden it. Only a handful of people have ever completed Advanced Survivalist and most of them went into the Bush Rangers ...”
Gary stared at him. “What happens if you die out there?” He looked down at his bruises merely from sleeping on the hard ground. “Or if you get injured?”
“There's an emergency signal,” Austin told him. “All you have to do is trigger it and they come pick you up. But you don’t pass the test if you do.”
He shrugged. “There was a big argument a few years back, while I was a Beaver,” he added. “Someone got seriously injured and his partner triggered the distress beacon, then insisted on remaining in the forest and completing his test. Depending on how one looks at the rules, that’s cheating, even if the evacuation crew didn't give him any actual help. Lots of outraged fist-shaking over that!
“In the end, they ruled that he hadn't really had a choice. But it still irked the people who had passed without calling for help, even if the help wasn't for them.”
“That’s stupid,” Darrin said. “He couldn't have left his friend to die, could he?”
Gary blinked in surprise. Darrin was arguing in favour of helping someone? On Earth, helping someone was a mug’s game. If you helped someone, you could be blamed for anything that went wrong and sued ... assuming, of course, that you didn't put your own life in danger trying. Gary hated to admit it, but he probably wouldn't have tried to help someone, no matter how desperately they needed it. And the thought of Barry or Moe helping someone was absurd.
“That was the point his supporters raised in the debates,” Austin confessed. “But it still annoyed a great many people.”
Kailee turned suddenly and ran into the forest. Gary watched her go in some alarm, then looked back at Austin. The colonial boy didn't look surprised, merely ... concerned. But he made no move to go after her.
“Get the packs on your backs,” Austin said, instead. “Once Kailee is back, we’ll start moving.”
***
Kailee hadn't felt right since she'd woken up, unsure of where she was. The shelter had seemed nightmarishly weak in the early morning light. One strong gust of wind, she told herself, and it would have collapsed on top of them. Instead, her body had ached mercilessly when she got up in the morning ... and then, when she’d eaten her share of the meat, her stomach had started to burn. She’d barely been able to hold herself together long enough to run into the forest and find a bush to hide behind while she did her business.
Afterwards, she stumbled forwards and collapsed on the ground. She felt utterly filthy, far worse than she’d ever felt on Earth. It was worse, in fact, because she now knew what it felt like to be actually clean. If there was one thing Meridian was not short of, it was water – and the endless showers and baths had been a luxury in and of themselves. All of the girls had simply luxuriated in the water, washing themselves again and again. Now ... they seemed like a distant memory.
She didn't dare bathe in the pond. Even if the boys hadn't been there – and she knew that Darrin and Barry would certainly try to peek – she knew that there were animals in the water, animals that could pinch or bite her. Shuddering, she reached for a leaf and wiped herself as best as she could, cursing under her breath. Her stomach still hurt, badly. All she could do was lie on the ground, her pants around her knees, and pray.
The meat wasn't good, she decided, remembering everything they’d been told about the advantages of algae-based products. It was true enough that she’d never had a tummy ache after eating ration bars, or even Aunt Lillian’s attempts to make the food more palatable by adding various kinds of flavourings and sauces. Indeed, they'd been told, time and time again, that real meat was unhealthy. She’d wondered if that was merely an attempt to convince them not to eat it, but now ... now, she wasn't so sure.
And yet she hadn't felt unwell after eating meat the first time ...
She heard the sound of someone crashing through the bushes and frantically pulled herself to her feet, yanking up her pants to cover herself. The girls toilets at school were forbidden to the boys, but that hadn't stopped them from coming in from time to time; Kailee had often forced herself to just keep it in, rather than walk into the toilets. Even when the boys weren't invading the room, there were girls who were almost as bad.
Austin came into view and she relaxed, slightly. Her tummy still felt uneasy and she didn't want to go far, but at least he wasn't Barry. And she wasn't clean ... one of the few pieces of advice they'd been given about preventing unwelcome male attention was to piss on them in hopes of putting them off. But Kailee had heard of several girls who’d done just that and then been beaten to within an inch of their lives. Boys didn't take sexual frustration very well.
“That does tend to happen, if the meat isn't perfect,” Austin said. “How are you feeling?”
Kailee glared at him. “Does that happen to your glorious scouts too?”
“It's been known to happen,” Austin agreed. He ignored her tone, thankfully. She'd known boys who had beaten their girlfriends for speaking to them in anything less than a respectful voice. “I’m sorry it had to happen to you.”
“Thank you,” Kailee growled. She rubbed her belly, angrily. “Is there nothing we can do about it?”
“Not until we get home,” Austin said. “We’re stuck out here.”
Kailee stared at him, then sagged to the ground, wrapping her arms around her legs. She just wanted to go home. Even being with Aunt Lillian would be better than being in the forest, eating poisonous food and being eyed by four boys who had nothing to restrain them, but their better instincts. And boys, she knew, had no better instincts. They were creatures of lust and desire, barely maturing until they were too old to chase girls. There were few things she would ever have in common with Aunt Lillian, but one of them was a certain wariness of untamed boys.
She flinched as Austin knelt down and put a hand on her shoulder. “I know how you feel,” he admitted. “I felt the same way too once, when I ran into the countryside. I got lost, rather badly. If I hadn't found my way to another farm, I might well have died out there.”
Kailee looked at him. “You?”
“I was five,” Austin said. “I’d had a row with my mother. It was just a petty little argument, but it felt like the end of the world. After that ... I started learning more about the countryside. Dad signed me up for the Beavers and the rest is history.”
He stood, then held out a hand to help Kailee to her feet. “The difference between survival and death is often a matter of will,” he said. He sounded as though he was quoting someone he'd heard once. “If you want to give up, you can stay here and wait for death t
o find you. Or you can spit in the old man's eye and keep going, whatever the world throws at you.”
“That’s stupid,” Kailee objected, as she stood. She didn't take his hand. “I could be shot in the head and then I’d be dead. No amount of willpower would keep me going.”
“I said that too,” Austin said. “And I got told that whatever didn't kill me would make me stronger.”
He turned. “Come on,” he added. “It's time to start moving again.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Does this seem absurd? Everything from replacing processor boxes to navigating starships required (at the very least) the basic ability to read. The Empire was forced to simplify its infrastructure as much as possible, yet even the most simple repair jobs required years of retraining before a potential worker could handle them.
- Professor Leo Caesius. Education and the Decline and Fall of the Galactic Empire.
If anything, Darrin discovered, the second day of walking was even harder than the first. His body began aching within minutes, while Gary and the girls were clearly held back by their own aches and pains. Only Austin seemed unbothered; Abdul and Barry were also in pain, but trying to hide it. Darrin couldn't help wondering if they were ever going to make it to the Jordon. At this rate, they were all going to collapse at the end of the second day.
The landscape changed too, becoming more mountainous. Trees pushed in around them, casting long shadows over their path, while small animals ran past them constantly. Abdul lost his footing at one point, falling down the slope and almost banging his head against a rock. Barry sniggered, of course, but Austin climbed down and helped Abdul back to his feet. Darrin felt oddly guilty about not trying to help himself, even though he was carrying a heavy pack. Austin was definitely stronger and nimbler than he looked if he could scramble down without removing the bag from his back.
He found himself becoming thirsty, but struggled manfully not to stop and demand water. The medical kit could serve as a makeshift water carrier – Austin had filled it back at the first campsite – yet it couldn't actually carry very much. Darrin forced himself to ignore his body’s demands, even though he knew he should probably request help. He didn't want to waste what they had.
The Empire's Corps: Book 07 - Reality Check Page 25