Forsaken World | Book 6 | Redemption

by Watson, Thomas A.

  Feeling better hearing that, Jarvis followed Dwain to the back of the bridge as the forklift passed carrying a shipping container to block off the bridge so stinkers could only go between the bridges and into the shredder. “I don’t even want to know what all those boys have come up with,” Jarvis admitted.

  “Jarvis,” Dwain sang out. “You don’t know how right you are.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Outside Bravo Wall

  Exhaling fog in the cold morning air, Dwain glanced over his shoulder to make sure Lance was still inside the cell tower building. The same cell tower where Lance and Ian had placed a camera to watch the parkway before they’d even talked to Dwain and Heath. Now, the tower was three hundred yards outside of Bravo’s wall. Lance was reprogramming stuff and had explained what he was doing to Dwain, but Dwain had only understood something about ‘it was being turned on’. Two miles down the parkway, he could see the ‘master plan’.

  This was the third tower Lance was turning on. The first one had been in Barbourville after they’d cleared the stinkers out. Even thinking about clearing the town now Dwain gave a shiver. There wasn’t a doubt in his mind that without gun, thunder and battle bots, they couldn’t have done it. Like every town, there’d been dead stinkers there before they’d started clearing and that just complicated the task. You didn’t just walk into a building unless you let it air out or you had on a closed circuit breathing apparatus.

  Because there was always a base layer of ‘stinker funk’ in the air, you could walk into a building and still breathe, but open a closed door to a room that held dead stinkers and get blasted with gas. One person in Bravo had passed out that way. The others with her had to hold their breath, running for the door before they’d passed out. Lance and Lilly had yanked their masks off and pulled air masks on before running into the building. Lance had carried the woman out as Lilly held an oxygen mask on the unconscious woman. She’d come to, but her lungs had hurt for days.

  It wasn’t just inside where you had to be careful. When they’d cleared the town, they couldn’t get near the Walmart. When people had realized the shit hit the fan, Walmart had become a rescue center for two days. Stinkers seemed to like Walmarts because they had come there in force. Dwain and Heath had never gone there, but had heard it over the CB. There were now several hundred dead stinkers in the parking lot and you couldn’t even get close.

  When Rhett had pulled out a flare to toss over and burn the bodies, Ian had punched him in the face so hard, it’d broken Rhett’s mask. Dwain had already lifted his AR to just kill the fucker. Before Cory or Rita could start whining, Seth had come over screaming at them. “You’ve seen how hot they burn! We light them here and the building will turn to ash! Ian and Lance told everyone, ‘NO BURNING UNTIL THEY GIVE PERMISSION!’.”

  So Lance and Ian had brought up a mini excavator that had a grapple on the bucket and started removing bodies. They had tried to use a skid steer but there’d been too many bodies. The skid steer had a clamp on the bucket and had made a few runs. Then the engine had sucked in too much hydrogen sulfide and blown the head gasket. With the excavator, you could work from a distance.

  Because the boys were still collecting bodies for ‘stinker nut juice’, they’d had a dump truck modified already with a long snorkel. When the bed was full and the wind blew just right, the engine would still run rough but not shut off or blow a gasket. The boys had removed enough bodies to pack two forty-foot shipping containers they had worked on to start the process of collecting ‘stinker nut juice’.

  After that they’d just hauled the bodies out, using the bridge in Artemus to cross the river. In the field where the Devil Lords had set up a trail camera was where stinker bodies were dumped. Dwain was just glad they’d burned each load and hadn’t continued to pile more on. Battle bots now stood vigil there, blocking the bridge from stinkers.

  There were still bodies in Barbourville but Bravo was slowly clearing them out and when they could, the other groups came to help.

  Once the town was mostly clear Lance had started work on the cell tower and after he’d been satisfied, he had headed to Girdler to get that one ready. What irritated Dwain, was there’d been three towers that close and before the infection he’d had crappy service because those towers weren’t his carrier. His carrier had only had a tower in Corbin.

  Dwain had run fiber optic lines from the cell towers to the clubhouse because Lance and Ian wanted to have cellphones so they could talk to people and not have to use radios for all to hear. Even though he was sure they knew, Dwain had pointed out that one tower covered over twenty miles, but the boys had just grinned at him. It was then Dwain had realized the cell towers were going to have another function.

  To the north, Dwain could hear the sound of heavy machinery from a group working just outside the three-mile perimeter. There was a mountain between him and the group a mile away so he couldn’t see them, but Dwain could damn sure hear them. With the ‘master plans’ set up, the roads blocked and bots out, nobody had killed a stinker inside the perimeter for over a week. The first battle bot site outside of Girdler was only averaging six stinkers a day.

  “Waiting for the program to download,” Lance said coming out of the building. Not wanting Lance to explain again what the program did, Dwain just nodded. Lance turned to the north. “That shit is loud,” he chuckled. “That’s why we couldn’t finish Alpha project until the ‘master plan’ was up and running.”

  Just hearing the chuckle, Dwain gave a shiver. “Not complaining or judging, but don’t you think the electric fence is going a bit overboard?” Dwain asked cautiously. The fence was going to be just like the one around the research area. There wasn’t wire, it was cable. The same cable Dwain had been pulling down for months. Dwain knew electricity, and having that kind of raw voltage at ground level just gave him the creeps, not to mention the boys called it ‘The Death Fence’.

  “Hey, be glad I talked Ian out of putting the death fence near the ‘master plans’ to form funnels,” Lance smirked and Dwain shivered.

  None of the death fence was up yet as they had just started clearing a strip of land around the perimeter. Like the fence in Bimble, the death fence was going to run along ridges so that anything approaching the fence would always be downhill. Nowhere was the perimeter going to be three miles because they were following ridges. In the places it was closest would be three and a quarter miles, and the furthest would extend four miles out from the cabin. When it was done, the fence would stretch over twenty-four miles. Unlike Bravo, who’d put half their workforce into building the wall, only a group of twenty from the coalition would work on the death fence.

  Dwain knew the death fence would kill stinkers because the boys had shown them a video of stinkers touching the fence around the research area. Like all lethal electric fences, five hundred amps pumped along the lines. That would kill any human, but a stinker? When a stinker touched the fence they didn’t burn and sizzle, they exploded. It wasn’t earth-shattering, but they damn sure exploded and it wasn’t the entire body, only where the parasite resided. The base of the skull and spine blew out mere seconds after the stinker touched a wire, shattering the bone. Along the arms and legs the skin would split where the parasite had embedded along the nerves. Lance had explained the stinker nut juice was turning into gas nearly instantaneously. Before any had time to wonder, Lance had promptly turned to Heath and told Heath if he asked why, Lance was going to kick him in the nuts. They didn’t know why, and wouldn’t even attempt to start looking into it for years.

  Dwain found it ironic that stinker nut juice ‘special batteries’ would power the fence that would kill stinkers and any human who tried to cross it. Having long ago accepted the inadequate sensation when he compared himself or anyone else to the boys, Dwain just looked out over the rise.

  “What do you miss the most?” Lance asked.

  Giving a long sigh, “Being able to go to the store and just buy what I need,” Dwain answered. “A br
eaker burned out last week at the house. Heath and I had to search twelve houses before we found one that was compatible with the breaker box and the same amperage.” He turned to see Lance nodding his head slightly. “What do you miss?”

  “The routine,” Lance replied immediately. “Wake up, go to school. Depending on the season, sports practice after school, basketball, football, track, swim team, soccer or lacrosse because Ian said we had to play. Tuesday and Thursday, kenpo practice after sports. Wednesday and Saturday were Boy Scouts. Homework when Ms. Penny brought us home, supper at seven, and church on Sunday.” As Lance recited, Dwain turned to him in shock and when he’d finished Dwain’s mouth was hanging open under his mask. Lance and Ian had done more in a week than most people did in a month.

  Then a light went off in Dwain’s head. “That’s where I know Seth from!” he shouted, scaring the shit out of Lance. Realizing Lance had jumped back and brought up his hands to block, “Sorry,” Dwain said.

  “Seth?” was all that Lance blurted out.

  “Yeah, Heath and I knew we had seen him before but couldn’t figure out where. I just did,” Dwain stated proudly. “He was a preacher at a Baptist church south of Fourmile.”

  “Was?” Lance asked and Dwain shrugged.

  “Yeah, we were looking for a new church since our pastor had left the church we went to and we didn’t like his replacement,” Dwain explained. “Kathy was pregnant with Jodi and we’d gone to that church with some friends. I remember we liked it, but it was a good drive. I liked the church but not having to drive nearly an hour to get there. We only went that one time. We started going to a Baptist church near Artemus.”

  “He never said he was a preacher,” Lance mumbled. Dwain understood because the boys had asked everyone what they did or could do and about hobbies.

  “Lance, that was over eight years ago. He could’ve retired,” Dwain offered. Thinking that Seth was ‘young’ to be a retired preacher, Lance just filed it away. “Lance, is Jodi really doing okay?” Dwain asked. He could tell Lance was thinking but wasn’t even going to make a guess about what.

  “Oh yeah,” Lance chuckled. “There isn’t anything we’ve taught that she’s had a real problem with. Yesterday, she made hydrochloric acid in Ian’s chemistry class. The only thing I can say, Jodi isn’t learning C++ as fast as she learned python.” Feeling cheated, Dwain gave a groan but was proud of his baby girl. In time, he just hoped Jodi could teach him what she had learned.

  “Is, ahh, she goin’ to make a good Ladybug?” Dwain asked.

  “Oh, Allie and Carrie love her, so yes,” Lance admitted, then gave a sigh. “Jodi is the only Ladybug who doesn’t try to make me crazy.”

  Not sure how or if he should address that, Dwain just kept his mouth shut. Yes, he did feel guilty because his child was learning from the best in this forsaken world. The other kids in the coalition and even the ones still at the Bear Trap clan were learning, but not at the pace those at the cabin were. Lance, Ian, and the moms had sent stuff out to all the groups for the kids to work on. But unlike at the cabin, there wasn’t really anyone who knew all the stuff that had been sent over to help the kids learn.

  It had been brought up several times at the dinner table in the Bear Trap house. A few months back, Grady had suggested the other kids rotate out of the cabin. Jodi, Lori, and Denny could come home and three others could take their place. What had shocked everyone was when Kathy had jumped to her feet holding a steak knife and told Grady if he ever suggested that again, she would cut his throat. Dwain had never expected that from his wife, but he’d been about to get up and go dig a hole to throw Grady’s body in before her threat.

  Last week, he’d gotten to go on his first patrol with Jodi. Dwain had to keep reminding himself that this was his eight-year-old daughter. No sooner than the patrol had started Jodi had become all business and Dwain had to admit, she was good. Jodi was nearly at the level of Allie and Carrie. Since they’d had to find a stinker, the patrol had left the perimeter to the north and Dwain had watched Jodi drop stinkers from a hundred yards with her tiny AR.

  A beeping noise sounded behind them and Lance just walked back into the small building, leaving Dwain to look at the morning sun sparkling off the frost across the land. When Lance came back carrying his laptop, Dwain followed him over to the UTV they’d driven up in.

  Passing by Lance, Dwain got in behind the steering wheel. Not because he didn’t like Lance’s driving, but Dwain wanted Lance on gun. Even with all the cameras, traps and such around, Dwain knew if shit went down, he wanted Lance shooting. It didn’t even enter Dwain’s mind anymore that he felt better with a thirteen-year-old on the gun. Dwain knew Lance was faster and a much better shot than he was.

  Glancing at his watch, Dwain wasn’t surprised to see they were done right on time. “Back to the build house?” Dwain asked.

  “Yeah, Ian’s shift will be done on the fence path in an hour,” Lance answered, and Dwain eased out into the trees. There was a dirt road to the cell tower, but the fence from Bravo blocked it. Even if the road wasn’t blocked, it was faster to just head through the forest.

  It didn’t take long to reach the road that ran from Bimble toward Hinkle to the perimeter. The only reason Dwain took the road now was the fence crew was clearing and he didn’t want to get in their way or spook anyone who was on guard. No matter what was in place around them, someone was always on guard. The only exception was work at the build house or the valley below the build house. There were enough cameras around for those at the clubhouse to spot trouble before it reached the valley.

  Dwain soon spotted the path the crews had started this week. The thirty-yard-wide path started on the valley floor running up a finger to the ridge. It looked like a dirt road because it’d been cleared and the dirt was packed. Large rocks and stumps had been dug up, leaving just trees on each side of the dirt path. The trees taken down were stacked in piles along the valley floor and would be sent to the sawmill in Bravo. Averaging two miles a day, the crews were harvesting a lot of trees.

  Passing through Hinkle, Lance had Dwain slow so he could check on the battle bots and gun bot. The last recorded stinker here had been over a week ago. When the death fence was up this group was going to be moved, and that wasn’t going to hurt Dwain’s feelings one bit as he stared at the gun bot on the ridge above that was standing sentry.

  “We need to move this site to Cannon before the death fence is up,” Lance sighed. “It’s not doing any good just sitting here.” Dwain almost told Lance to turn the gun bot off and he would hand-carry the shit to Cannon.

  Closing the laptop hard, “Fuck!” Lance screamed.

  “What’s wrong?” Dwain asked, not wanting a tantrum.

  “We can’t get ahead for shit!” Lance snapped. “No matter what we do, shit keeps piling up!”

  “Oh,” Dwain agreed by bobbing his head. “Lance, I hate to say it, but that’s just life. You do as much as you can because there’s always something else to do. Fix one thing and discover two more problems.”

  “Being a grown-up sucks nasty, crusty ass!” Lance shouted, stomping the floorboard.

  “You got that shit right,” Dwain scoffed. “You want to go find some shit to kill?”

  Dwain was actually shocked when Lance looked at his watch before answering. “Nah, we don’t have the time,” Lance replied. Knowing that Lance wanting to kill shit wasn’t good, Dwain took off up the valley.

  On the right, the levee rose from the valley floor and the dugout area was filling up with water. Below the levee was a large cinder block building for the ‘power house’. There was a turbine there on a pipe that would feed from the lake. Denny had made the turbine and had been very proud of his work. But the ‘power house’ was just another sham because the ‘special batteries’ were going to be put in to supply the real power.

  The fact that dirt was piled around the power house just reminded Dwain of the danger the special batteries could pose. He understood the significance. The ro
of was wood so if a battery did blow, it would be directed up and not spread across the valley.

  He turned to the step that had been expanded and the three metal buildings were now up, and those would require real power. The one on the right held two smelters. Dwain knew that because he had seen the one Ian and Lance had built, but these were bigger, much bigger. Also in that building were new machines that Ian and Lance had built. Unlike the smelters, the machines had been turned on so Ian and Lance could make sure they worked. Dwain and Heath had been there that day and had watched as the machines chopped up steel rods. One line made half-inch steel ball bearings and the other, one-inch ball bearings.

  When he’d seen it, Dwain had thought it was the coolest shit ever because he’d never considered how a ball bearing was made. The center building against the cliff face now held the bot production lines from the barn at the build house. There had been people working and wiring up the building for electricity because the stinker nut juice was being made at the research area for the batteries.

  The building on the left was the only one currently in use. It housed a supply area but one end had several clean rooms, and people reported there every day for shifts to make thermal cameras. Once Lance had figured out the best process, he and Ian had devised an assembly line. Dwain thought about his wife Kathy because she was there now. Only one camera was completed every day, but that was one more than they had.

  Taking his foot off the accelerator and pointing at the smelter building, “How in the fuck did you and Ian know how to build smelters and machines that make ball bearings? You didn’t learn that in Boy Scouts because if you did, my scout troop sucked hind tit!” Dwain cried out.

  “No, we didn’t learn that in Scouts,” Lance laughed. “Didn’t you ever watch ‘How It’s Made’? Uncle Doug has every episode.”

  The first thing that went through Dwain’s mind was ‘when in the hell did Lance and Ian find time to even watch TV’. “So you watched a TV show at the cabin and figured out how to do it?” he asked.