Assumed Dead, page 17
A shudder went through Peter, and he burrowed yet closer to Matt’s side. He was trembling. Not from cold. He was… Good God, he was crying. Matt had never seen him lose control that way. He held Peter tight and stroked his newly clipped hair.
“I love you,” Peter choked out. “I love you. I hate myself.”
“Peter, no,” Matt protested. “Don’t say such a thing.” Had he succumbed to the depression they all watched one another for signs of? Or was it simply the fear of the whole world being about to change? That could screw with your head for sure.
“Shh,” Matt said softly and kissed Peter’s temple. He didn’t expect a response, but he got one. Peter kissed him, finding his lips with an instinct Matt had developed too, of always knowing where the other was. Of fitting together smoothly and easily, like components designed to slide together and lock tight.
The salty taste of tears was on Peter’s lips, but Matt quickly kissed that away. He let Peter take the lead until he was sure Peter was seeking more than comfort, more than being held and kissed. When Peter ran a hand down Matt’s back and slid it into his long johns to cup an ass cheek, Matt knew what he wanted. He broke away from the kisses for a moment and reached across Peter, into the drawer of the cabinet by his bed. He came out with a condom and lube, held them up to Peter.
Peter nodded. He lay on his back, Matt moving on top of him. Peter’s legs opened, enclosed Matt, and his cock pressed into Matt’s belly. He rubbed it up and down and moaned softly.
“I’m yours, Matt. Take me.”
It was a little unexpected. Matt had been expecting to be on the receiving end. But he was ready to give Peter anything he asked for tonight. They kissed some more, with increasing urgency. Caresses turned into stripping each other’s clothes off until they were naked. Not shivering for a change. Matt got the condom on with some help from Peter, who was almost clumsy in his eagerness—unusual for him.
“Easy,” Matt said, soothing him. He stroked Peter’s face with one hand. The other he’d lubed the fingers of and slipped one into Peter, who gasped. “Shh,” Matt whispered. “Relax.” His body was quivering with tension, his distress still showing. “Relax,” Matt said again. Two fingers, then three, and Peter slowly did relax, until he was writhing and pushing back against Matt’s hand and begging for more.
Matt gave him what he wanted. He lined up by touch, slid into Peter, felt no resistance. Felt welcomed and wanted. Peter sighed and wrapped his legs around Matt. His eyes were closed. Matt looked down on him for a long moment of appreciation. The lantern threw amber highlights on his satiny brown skin, picking out cheekbones, jawline, the elegant line of the neck and Adam’s apple, and the kissable hollow at the base of his throat, between the shallow curves of clavicles. So beautiful. He couldn’t give Peter up. Couldn’t get over him. He’d said “I’m yours.” Matt would take him at his word. Not only for tonight.
He moved, slow and steady at first, determined to make Peter forget anyone but him. So Peter would only remember how good it felt for Matt to fuck him, not anyone else. He sped up when Peter was begging for it, writhing under him, pushing up at him. So good it made Matt half-crazy with desire. He thrust harder, faster, climbing that slope to orgasm, reaching desperately for the peak. Peter was right alongside him on the climb. He was pulling fast on his cock, his knuckles brushing Matt’s belly as he did. He stuttered and panted out words that made little sense, but Matt’s name was in them often.
Peter’s skin gleamed with sweat, darkened with a flush of heat, and he muffled his cry with his hand as he climaxed, cum splashing, light against dark, on his chest and belly. It glistened there in the lamplight on the smooth skin, pearly white on satin brown. So hot…
Matt reached the peak. The light burst over him, like walking out of the darkness into the noonday sun. It dazzled and filled him. His body was on fire. His body was the aurora, buzzing and flaming.
“Peter.” He didn’t scream it out. The word fell from him like a snowflake drifting down to settle on his lover. His body dropped like an avalanche, heavy and spent. He had to push himself to the side to keep from crushing Peter into the mattress. He slid out of Peter as he collapsed at his side.
Maybe it was the last time. The last night for them. If so, he’d made it the best. It had felt the best to him anyway. But he was determined it would not be the last. Peter was his man. He’d fight Harrison for him. He’d fight every damn zombie on the planet if he had to.
Chapter Twenty-Two
The day had come, and the base had never been busier. Life had been so slow-paced for almost three years, and suddenly it was frantic as the group rushed to prepare for departure.
Peter was busy in the infirmary, finishing packing his medical kit, when R.J. came in carrying a rifle.
“How’s it going?” R.J. asked.
“Good,” Peter said. “I’m about ready. I hear the boat’s almost here.”
“Yeah, they radioed a few minutes ago. I’m taking a party to the beach to meet them. Keep an eye on things until I get back. Lou is monitoring the radio.”
“Will do.” As R.J. turned away, Peter called his name, making him turn back. “Can I ask? Were you one of the three? Who voted to stay?”
“We agreed not to ask that,” R.J. said.
“You once told me you’d happily stay here the rest of your life.”
“I don’t know that I said ‘happily.’” He shrugged. “It doesn’t matter. We’re going. That’s the vote.” He smiled, but it was a wry look without much humor. “You lot wouldn’t last five minutes without me.”
“Even after all your training?”
“Even after that.”
He left, and Peter went back to packing and tidying up. He had too much pride to leave the infirmary a mess, even if nobody ever saw the place again.
Twenty minutes later, the base rang to the sound of Stav yelling.
“They’re here! They’re here!” Doors started banging. Excited voices rose.
Matt appeared at the door to the infirmary, grinning. “They’re here!” Stav went running past behind him. “Come on!”
Peter followed him and, in the corridor, met Dr. Crawford, carrying a walkie-talkie and grinning.
“Louise says Mr. Russell reported back that everything is fine,” she said. “He didn’t use any of the, ah, code words.”
They’d set up codes that the party going to greet the new arrivals could use on the radio to signal trouble, even if forced to pretend that all was well. The group’s rifles were out of the gun room and lined up in the main corridor ready for use in case of attack. R.J.’s party—him, Kasper, and Brooks—had taken rifles and handguns. Everyone piled out into the south yard, only some of them being cautious enough to take a rifle with them.
Coming from the south walked their people and two strangers, both men, neither of them showing weapons that Peter could see at this distance. Kasper waved, and the party in the yard whooped and hollered and waved back. When the approaching men were only a hundred yards away, the younger members of the waiting group couldn’t contain their excitement. Stav went first, running to meet the newcomers. Chandra ran after him, and Louise and Edvin followed. Matt looked at Peter and grinned, cocked his head in a “come on, then” gesture, but Peter waved him off. Matt looked slightly disappointed, but his excitement was too high to be diminished today, and he ran off after the others.
“I hope nobody breaks an ankle,” Crawford said as the youngsters went racing over the lumpy ground, leaving her, Jay, Peter, and Vicky, with Hope in her arms, behind.
“Kids,” Jay muttered, but she was smiling at their enthusiasm.
In a few minutes the whole gang arrived in the yard. The two strange men with them were having their ears talked off their heads by the youngsters who’d run to meet them. Peter was surprised they hadn’t ended up being carried here shoulder-high.
“Guys,” R.J. said to the folk waiting in the yard. “This is Bud Horner and Henry Jones. They’re from the Moosonee group. We’ve talked to Bud a few times on the radio.”
“When you told us you were on Southampton Island,” Bud said, but with a smile, any offense at not being trusted already gone.
“Better safe than sorry,” R.J. said. He introduced everyone, and there was much shaking of hands. Bud and Henry were both late-middle-aged guys, weather-beaten, and, in Peter’s medical opinion, the type of outdoorsmen who were apparently made out of teak and lived to be ninety.
He couldn’t take his eyes off them, and the others were the same. There was nothing remarkable about their faces, aside maybe from the depth of their tans, and Henry’s exceptionally bright blue eyes that sparkled like sapphires when he laughed. But they were new faces. After looking at the same few faces for so long, any new one was instantly riveting. He’d even found himself regularly transfixed by Hope’s squishy little baby face for the first couple of months after her birth.
The two men were almost as transfixed by the baby as Peter had been in those early days. Vicky proudly showed off Hope to them.
“Most of our group’s over fifty,” Henry said. “And some children, too young to be having kids yet.”
“That’s a beautiful daughter you’ve got there, ma’am,” Bud said. “Okay, it’s great visiting with you folks, but I want to get back out of here as soon as we can. Make the most of the light.”
“We’re all packed up,” R.J. said. “Everyone, get the last of your gear in the ATV trailers and carry the rest. Okay, Stav, Matt, can you go douse the furnace? Doc, can you help me out with the generator?”
Peter was surprised. What did he know about the generator? But he followed R.J. to the generator room and, at R.J.’s direction, helped him close it down and secure the last barrel of fuel from it. They were making a gift of the remaining diesel to their rescuers. Jay had spent hours the previous day ferrying barrels to the beach with her helicopter, using up most of the last of her aviation fuel.
They used an electric lantern to finish the work up as the shack went dark when they turned off the power.
“They seem okay,” R.J. said to Peter as they worked. “Bud and Henry, that is. They said there’s only one other guy on the boat. But we can’t be complacent. A nasty surprise could be waiting for us when we get on the boat, or when we get ashore, so don’t let your guard down. Make sure you pass that on to Matt. He’s got the makings of a good soldier, but he’s easily distracted and he’s not cynical enough. Make sure he’s got his eyes open. Pass that on to any of the others that you get a chance to speak to away from the Canadians.”
Peter nodded. He wasn’t sure what to make of the idea of Matt as a soldier. But Matt had been one of the people who remembered to pick up a rifle when they all ran outside to meet their rescuers. And he liked that Matt wasn’t cynical, even if R.J. considered that a failing.
R.J. held out his hand for a shake, and Peter took it automatically. He had a sudden fear R.J. intended to stay, but then he’d hardly be shutting off the power and heat if that were the case.
“Everything changes from here on,” R.J. said. “So let me take a second to say thanks for your work so far, Peter.” The use of his first name took Peter aback. R.J. rarely called him anything but Doc or Lane or some variant. “You’ve been a hell of an asset to the group, and I don’t only mean as a doctor.”
“You too, R.J.” He didn’t return the first-name gesture. He knew R.J.’s full name, since he had his medical records. But the man never used it. He rested his other hand on R.J.’s forearm for a second before breaking the handshake and following R.J. back out of the generator room.
The ATV trailers were packed. People put a last couple of things into them. Everything inside had been tidied up and put away. The base was eerie as he and R.J. did a last walk-through looking for anything accidentally left behind. Probably nobody would ever come here again. Peter looked into the room he’d shared for only a short time with Matt. The beds were stripped. Belongings gone, all packed away. When winter came, the snow would settle on the roof and eventually cave it in with the weight when nobody cleared it. The island would belong once again to the bears and the birds and the arctic foxes. Maybe in a thousand years archeologists would excavate the site—but only if the human race survived that long.
Their sweep complete, they left, securing the door behind them. The group was waiting in the yard for them, Stav and Edvin riding the ATVs with the trailers, everyone else ready to walk. For a long moment everyone looked back at what had been their home for so long. Part of Peter would miss it, however marginal a life it had become. He’d originally come here to find peace. And he had.
He was going back to a world where job stress would be the least of his worries. So yes, he had a little regret about leaving this…haven.
Stav broke the spell by revving his ATV and setting off. Edvin did the same. Slowly the group broke up, turning in ones and two and walking south. Peter was the last. He moved only when Matt came up and took his hand.
“Time to go.”
“Yes,” Peter said. “It’s time to go.”
Still holding hands, they followed the others.
* * * *
It looked to Matt like all twenty of the Moosonee group who weren’t on the boat were waiting at the landing stage for them. Half a dozen were children of various ages. The others were older people, as Henry had said. Everyone waved madly. The children jumped up and down, thrilled to see some new people.
The boat tied up, a gangplank was secured, and in a moment the two groups had become one, mingling on the dock, shaking hands, laughing, unabashedly staring at the new faces around them. Hope became an instant center of attention.
Matt had wondered if Peter and Chandra would be the only people of color there, but he’d made a wrong assumption. Several of the Moosonee group were Native Americans, or…what did they call them in Canada? First Nations?
“We have to get the boat unloaded,” Henry called over the chatter. “There’s some bad weather coming in.” He gestured at gathering storm clouds.
“I want to see the planes,” Jay said. “Can anyone take me there right now? Let me do an inspection while it’s still light?”
“I’ll take you,” a woman said. “I used to work at the airport. Can you ride pillion? I’ve got a motorbike.”
“I can ride on the luggage rack of an ATV,” Jay said, grinning. “Lead on.”
They left in a roar of noise, and most of the Shriver group swarmed back up the gangplank to fetch their stuff off. Several people from the town joined them. Matt wanted to yell with the joy of seeing and hearing them. All the talk and laughter and reminding one another of names that had flashed by too fast to catch. It was wonderful. They were on their way. This was the first step on the way to a new life.
* * * *
The Shriver group walked into the communal dining area set up in what had been the town hall and gave gasps and exclamations of amazement. Not only at the sight of the food—the variety of it in comparison to their monotonous island diet dominated by eggs and caribou meat—but the electric light blazing. Someone had even hung up a strip of fairy lights that twinkled and flashed, giving the room a festive atmosphere. It was also warm enough that they all started stripping off a couple of layers of clothing.
“Where does all the power come from?” Matt asked Henry as he came to greet them.
“Wind turbines,” Henry said. “I thought they were real eyesores when they were put up. Now I couldn’t be more grateful that they were. They give us plenty of power. More than we need.”
“You have plenty of food too,” Matt said, absolutely itching to get at the table.
“We had food stores for a whole town, and we have livestock, we fish, and we can grow some food. We’ve got all we need to survive here for a long time.”
“You don’t have a doctor, though,” Peter said as Henry led them to the table. They sat, scattered among their new friends.
“No. That’s one we don’t have. Couple of registered nurses and a pharmacist. We’ve managed as best we can there. But…” He looked haunted. “We lost people. Even after the first danger passed.” His voice dropped. “My grandson. He was only twenty. He had diabetes since he was a kid. He fought so hard when it all started. Helped clear the town of those…things. But when the insulin ran out…” He didn’t go on. Matt saw Peter grimace. Thank God nobody on the island had been diabetic. Matt wondered how someone died of that once they couldn’t get insulin. Was it fast or slow? He decided he didn’t want to ask.
He turned his attention to the food. There was fish, in a white sauce, which was his first taste of anything involving milk and butter in years. It was rather odd-tasting. There was a casserole of a meat he learned was reindeer. That might be the origin of the milk, he supposed, if they had some tamed ones. Plenty of bread, fresh baked. The town had once been home to seventeen hundred people. With under twenty-five, the food stocks would last some time if correctly stored. The big difference was vegetables. Some were probably canned, but some were fresh. They must manage to grow them. All the Shriver group dived into the vegetables with gusto.
Jay and the woman she’d gone off with, a First Nations—or specifically, as Matt had learned from chatting with the others, Cree—arrived a few minutes into the meal and took the last seats at the foot of the table.
“What’s the verdict on the planes?” Henry asked.
“Hopeful,” Jay said. “The Dash 8 looks airworthy. That would take all of us.” She bit some bread, and her eyes went wide for a moment. “Oh my God, butter.” Her eyes closed as she appreciated that butter, before she turned back to the subject at hand. “There’s plenty of fuel, and it’s Jet B, so it’s designed to survive the cold winters. I hope it’s still usable, but the only way to be sure of anything is testing. I’ll start on that in the morning. Kiche here”—she nodded at the woman at her side—“is going to help out. I’ll need a hand from anyone else mechanically inclined. R.J. and Stav, that means you, but other volunteers are welcome.”
