by David Peters
--5--
Dylan and Cap-Cap rode side by side on their way back to Paradise Falls. This was the third and final trip from the now abandoned and thoroughly gutted military trucks. They had taken anything they thought could be used from the trucks right down to the batteries. Cap-Cap was smoking a cigar as they rode up the winding trail. After the second time through the number of people and horses traveling the trail had turned it into a three foot wide river of mud.
“We need to nuke the Sumter hive Dylan.” The captain stated as a matter of fact. “We need to get a pack down into the bottom of that damn thing and turn it into a black hole.”
Dylan looked at the tall man, “Don’t we have to worry about fallout and radiation and whatever the hell else comes with those things?”
“When it comes to nukes these are pretty small. If we can get them deep enough into the hive I doubt we will get much up top. Maybe a small rise and a big hole afterwards, but no towering mushroom cloud full of fallout.”
As they talked the trail broke out of the heavy forest and into an open field high on the side of their mountain. The captain took a few quick puffs of his cigar and looked around the valley below them, “Have you seen any Corrupted lately?”
“They haven’t sent any large force to the town since the first snow. We see the occasional Hunter near the wall and the scouts have had a few sightings here and there but they were from fairly far away. More foot prints than anything. I haven’t heard any reports about sightings for several weeks. They obviously keep an eye on us. No major attacks though. Been kind of nice compared to last fall to be honest.”
“That is all going to change real soon you know.”
“We know it all too well. It comes up at every town meeting at this point. I figure we have until the first heavy rain. Once the temperature comes up I expect they will be on our doorstep again. Looking at those clouds I would say we will see our first rain sooner rather than later. The trees are almost bare now and the snow on the grown is melting pretty fast during the daylight hours.”
Niccole and Jen were riding a few horse lengths behind Dylan and the captain.
“So it looks like you two are kind of an item now I see.” Niccole asked quietly.
“You could say that. We aren’t together, but we aren’t apart. I guess you could say it’s complicated but it really isn’t. The time just hasn’t been right for anything but fighting and running.” Jen watched the captain ride ahead of them with a look she knew all too well.
After a moment of silence Niccole changed to a less uncomfortable topic, “I’m anxious to get that new aerial we took off of the command Humvee on top of our tower. I can’t imagine how much more range that will give the radios. The thing is immense and tied into a seriously nice radio.”
“Have you made any new contacts since we last talked?”
“On really clear nights we can occasionally pick up someone in Alaska somewhere. It’s a long ways off and we may get every other word if we are lucky. They are somewhere outside of Anchorage and have a very heavy accent so what words do make it through are very difficult to figure out. Sounds like Russian. Any of your guys know Russian?”
“Not that I am aware of. Perkins is fluent in Spanish and Ridgley speaks quite a bit of Japanese.” Jen was silent for a few minutes as they continued up the trail, “I was stationed in Alaska. That’s a hearty group of people there. Wouldn’t think the Corrupted would like the cold but it would be hard to grow any food. There is a ton of game to hunt and fish to catch if you are in the right place though.”
“There are some pretty harsh winters to survive without power or fuel though. I’m sure there are people up North somewhere, Alaska, Canada, wherever. We’ll find ‘em.” Niccole said with a smile.
--6--
The storm sounded like an out of control freight train as it moved up the valley and over the top of the small town. The temperature had risen to well above freezing over the last ten hours and just after dusk the first winds from the rapidly moving front slammed into Paradise Falls. The military tents in the center of town fluttered and shook but they stayed anchored down. Most of the people still calling them home were huddled in the cabins of new, or old, friends.
Dylan threw another log into the wood stove and returned to the couch with Niccole. She handed him his cup of tea and they snuggled up as the wind whistled through the eaves of the small cabin. Cap-Cap, Jen and Erica were playing a board game at the kitchen table. The gas lamp on the table gave off a warm glow.
Dylan said what was on everybody’s minds already, “I think we can say goodbye to the snow and cold. We know what that means.”
Niccole sighed deeply, “I guess I need to get that new antenna up sooner rather than later. We don’t have jobs anymore, how come it seems like we are always behind on stuff?”
Dylan smiled, “No kidding. My to-do list is a mile long at this point. Hopefully it won’t include trying to round up a bunch of rogue tents out of the trees once this wind moves on.”
Cap-Cap looked up and gave Dylan a mock frown, “That would be my house up a tree somewhere thank you.”
Dylan laughed with him, “I checked earlier, they aren’t going anywhere.”
“I will try and get the aerial up by the end of this week. I can get Jonathan to help me, maybe Williams too if I threaten him first.” Niccole sighed as she thought briefly to herself. She and Williams had not started off well when Niccole and Dylan first arrived. Williams had been antagonistic then and was barely tolerated by the town now. Once Niccole had put him in his place he had become a borderline recluse. He avoided the town meetings and would only pull his own weight around town when he was harassed into doing something. “I really wish I could get through to that guy. He is a hard worker when he finds something he likes, he just doesn’t seem to like it long enough to ever finish.”
“You got through to him pretty well I thought. Only took the bruises three weeks to clear up. Poor guy looked like you beat him with a tire iron.” Dylan said as he tried not to laugh. Niccole knocking Williams to the ground was still talked about around town.
“You have issues with someone Niccole?” Cap-Cap said without taking his eyes off of the game in front of him.
“One of the guys in town has a serious chip on his shoulder when it comes to women in positions of authority,” Niccole offered back.
“Not just women, authority in general. Williams has been our little pink elephant in the living room for some time. No one really wants to deal with him because he is so difficult to be around, has to be one of the most negative people I have ever met. He has been moved from job to job trying to find some place for him but he always winds up coming back. Every fight we have had in this town since I got here has involved him in some way,” said Dylan. “I had to break up a fight with two people who had heard a rumor that Williams was coming to work with them. I guess I need to grow a pair and make some tough decisions.”
“But he has definitely chosen me as the one responsible for every little issue he has.” Niccole stood up and walked into the kitchen, “He isn’t anything I can’t handle, it’s just that we can’t seem to find anything that will sit with him. We tried giving him jobs where he could work alone, but he would never get them done. The second I am gone he goes back to his shed and hides. We certainly can’t trust him with any guard duty. Everyone would be terrified to walk around at night wondering if Williams was going to shoot them or if he had simply gone to bed and some Hunter was going to get them.”
Jen asked “Why don’t you ask him to leave? If he can’t play nice in the sandbox, kick him the hell out of the sandbox.”
Dylan sighed from the couch, “It may come to that. At least when he is working with Niccole he actually does something. He doesn’t necessarily do it well, but at least it’s something.”
“Aren’t I the lucky one? That man will be the death of me yet.”
--7--
Dylan took the saddle off Jonah and hung it on the wall hoo
k next to Niccole’s. Jonah followed Dylan as the two walked out of the barn and through the pasture gate. He pulled the gate closed and latched it as the horse galloped playfully across the field to meet with the others grazing on the far side. He watched them graze happily for some time before he it finally occurred to him that he was just putting off the inevitable. The sunlight was just beginning to cast its glow on the field and the morning was rapidly dwindling away. He needed to do this so he could get on with the things that he had to get done today.
With a heavy sigh he started off towards the small shed standing off alone in an empty corner of the town fortress. He had been dreading this all morning. It wasn’t what was going to be said that was bothering him, it was not knowing how Williams was going to react in any situation. The man really did have a screw loose and the whole town knew it. He stood in front of the worn door, the green paint was flaking off in places and the floorboards placed in front of the door were rotting through. With another sigh he knocked lightly. A flake of the green paint fell off the door and he watched it fall to the ground. His heart sank slightly after not hearing anything for nearly a minute.
He knocked again, this time with much more force and volume.
“What do you want?” Williams’ voice sounded tired and irritated. He pronounced ‘you’ like he knew exactly who was out there and how little respect he held for the man.
“Need you to help Niccole and Jonathan today, up the hill on the radio tower.” He waited nearly a minute and didn’t get a response, “You hear me Williams?” He had a hint of anger in his voice.
“I heard you, Boss.” The word ‘boss’ come out sounding heavy with contempt for Dylan, almost like he had to spit it out.
Dylan clenched his fists and counted to five in his head, “Great, meet them at the stable around ten if you would be so kind.”
“Sure Boss,” he said again with even more hatred than the first time, “Wouldn’t want to anger yer old lady now, would I?”
Clenching and unclenching his fists Dylan debated kicking the door in and beating Williams to within an inch of his life. He actually took a step back to kick the door when he caught himself and turned to walk away. He could hear Williams laughing quietly to himself in the shed as he left it behind him.
He decided he was going to have to do something about Williams, he just didn’t know what to do that wouldn’t seem inhumane. “What am I supposed to do,” he thought out loud, “The town was done with him but I just can’t throw him outside can I? How would the town feel about him being outside the walls now? What was the saying? Keep your friends close, but keep your enemies closer?” He smiled to himself, “How about keep your enemies on the other side of a sixteen foot wall.”
Turning the corner of one of the older cabins he stepped up onto the wooden boardwalk that ringed the main part of town. He was headed back to the cabin with the blue door to pick up Cap-Cap. He had agreed to take the captain on his morning rounds and was actually looking forward to that part of his day.
--8--
Dylan stood on the wall next to Cap-Cap, “So we did most of the original wall layout over several days of really heavy work. Just looking at it makes my entire body ache. Over time we have added here and there. Like the battlements there and the extra stairs everywhere.”
The captain shook his head in amazement, “That has to be over a hundred meters out to the forest line. That is some serious open territory to cover when they attack.”
“They have the numbers though. The last major attack we had was at least several hundred Corrupted and mostly Sappers at that. I’m pretty sure they could melt concrete in high enough numbers. When we hit the lights at night we can see almost to the tree line. The Hunters won’t come into the light much so we don’t get clear shots at them very often. One of our guys is a history major and came up with the trench idea. It also gave a ton of fill for the center of the walls. We originally were just going to leave them raw timber. Good thing too, those Sappers could burn through a single log in no time at all.”
The two continued Dylan’s normal morning rounds, getting his reports from the night guards and pointing out defensive elements to the military man, “That center tower gives us a three hundred and sixty degree view of the town. It’s a pretty sought after position. It has its own heater,” he added with a smile. “We have a competition once a month to see who gets to man it. It’s good for morale I think.”
With an audible metallic ‘clink’ of his Zippo lighter, Cap-Cap nodded and relit his cigar.
“At the base of the tower we have our alarm bell and the main breaker for the lights. The bell can be rung from the ground level or by that line going up to the tower, same with hitting the lights. It gets people up fast. I’m really anxious to see what you think and how we can improve what we have been doing.”
“My old team will be able to supplement guard duty right off the bat. We should be able to train folks pretty quickly on how our night vision goggles work. The dos and don’ts, that kind of thing. They turn night into day but it can be rough on ‘em if you look at one of those sodium lights. I’ll talk to Erica about building a recharge station for them, shouldn’t be too hard, they are pretty standard as far as that goes.”
Dylan patted the older man on the back, “Now that’s what I want to hear!” Dylan continued to show him all of the elements of the town as they walked towards the front barricade door.
Nearly a mile away Niccole rode her horse up a long winding trail with Jonathan and Williams in tow. The trail switched back and forth up the back side of Paradise Falls finally opening up onto a small field that held their communication tower. They were nearly twelve hundred feet above the town and very few peaks were higher than this point.
“So Niccole, how much do you think this will help our reception?” Jonathan asked as he absently tried to make small talk.
“Hard to say. The whip will put another twenty-three feet on top of the tower and the gear we are attaching it to is several decades newer. I would imagine it will be considerably better. When we start looking at filters and the likes we should be able to hear things that might have been covered by static in the past.”
They let the horses loose in the field below them and set about unpacking all of the gear. Niccole being the lightest and most agile would climb the tower, Jonathan would be in the middle while Williams would hand the gear up from the ground. He had grumbled nearly all morning about having to help with the radio gear but once on the trail he had been his uncomfortably quiet and non-social self.
Inside the refrigerator sized box that sat on top of the metal framed tower Niccole was extending the large copper grounding wire when Jonathan poked his head in, “Williams is acting really weird Niccole.”
She paused a second and wiped some of the sweat off of her brow, “How so? Like normal weird or different weird? How can you even tell?”
“He’s really antsy I guess. Every time I look at him he is looking all around like he expects an attack any minute. The guy is really starting to creep me out.”
“At least he’s working. Have to give him that much. Can you get the cable prepped? I’m almost ready to connect this to the main.”
Jonathon looked back down below and frowned. He got back to the task at hand and he climbed back down he said “Sure Niccole.”
It was well after lunch when Niccole finished bolting the long grounding cable to the new equipment mounted in the tower, “Can you give me some slack on this coax Jonathan? I need about two more feet to mount this correctly.”
“I’m trying. Williams, can you get us some slack here?”
There was no response from below and the cable was still just as taught.
“Williams! Come on man!” Jonathan yelled down.
“What’s the problem people?” Niccole poked her head out and looked toward the base of the tower. “Williams! Where the hell are you?”
Jonathan had climbed back down to ground level and was looking around the clearing,
“Niccole, where are the horses?”
Niccole looked down to the small now empty field, “Does he think this is some kind of joke?” Niccole backed out of the small access hatch and started down the tower. Jonathan helped her down the last few feet.
“Did that bastard take the horses?”
Jonathan was looking around with growing concern, “I don’t hear anything. No birds, no nothing. It’s really quiet.”
Niccole looked at the base of the tower for her pack and rifle, “Jonathan, that little shit took the rifles and our bags too. This is bad.”
Niccole was reaching for her pistol when the Hunter struck Jonathan. It threw him to the ground like a toy. The beast bent down and picked up the man shaking him violently. Jonathan screamed as the black thing threw him against a tree. He hit the tree hard with a sound like branches breaking and fell motionless to the ground. The Hunter turned and looked down the barrel of Niccole’s pistol. She fired seven times as she followed the corpse to the ground. It was dead before it landed.