This Fallen World, page 16
part #1 of Fallen World Series
“There’s twelve of them,” Pete said. “Did you do this?”
His voice was accusing.
“Yes,” I answered. “Yes I did.”
“Why?” was the only thing he could seem to force out. He was scared, he was disgusted, and he was innocent.
“Heard their plans,” I answered. “Couldn’t let ‘em do what they were goin’ to.”
“You can’t just murder someone because they might do something!”
I was standing in front of him. “Do you want to hear what they planned? Well, let me tell you!”
I pointed at the first guy I shot. “This guy here ordered his guys to hit your place tomorrow morning. Now, the orders didn’t include killing everyone. They were going to take all the kids back for some pervert they called the Lieutenant. And this piece of shit was going to keep Neave for himself!
“Now, would you rather have this fight on your doorstep, or would you rather I took care of it where your children didn’t have to see it? This is the world we have to live in now, Pete Dalton! I don’t want it to be, but it is! I went through the wars; I know what people will do when they’re not held in check by the laws. I’ve seen men and women do things that would make your blood run cold. Now I’ve done what needed to be done. You don’t like it. I don’t like it. Deal with it!”
I turned away from Pete and found Doc and Grady standing right behind me.
“We need to dispose of the bodies,” I said. “I think the old lead mine should do. Let’s get ‘em in the trucks and clean this place out.”
“They can do that,” Doc said. “You are coming with me in the other truck. We have to see about that ‘scratch’ of yours that is still bleeding.”
“We’ll take care of it, Zee,” Grady said. “Tony will bring Dagger back in.”
I grimaced. “Alright… alright.”
The burning was starting in my arm as the shock wore off.
Doc pushed me up into the back of the truck. “Gary, get up there with him. You don’t need to be a part of this grisly mess.”
I sat down and pressed the spot where the bullet had went through my arm, wincing. The truck started, and Doc drove us back toward the farm. The ride was quiet, and I was feeling a little spooked by the way Gary watched me the whole way with a wide-eyed stare. I think he had finally seen what I’d been telling people since the bombs dropped.
Innocence would become a rare commodity in this Fallen World.
* * * * *
Chapter 3
“This is a little more than a scratch, Zee.”
I shrugged.
“Quit moving,” Doc said and pulled a syringe from the drawer. “Gonna need some stitches.”
“How much of that do you have left?”
“I have some.”
“Keep it for someone who needs it more, Doc,” I said.
“Gonna hurt like hell to stitch without it.”
“I deserve it for being a dumb ass,” I said and braced myself for him to work on my arm.
“Probably so,” he answered.
He was right, it hurt like hell, but I knew those meds would be needed in the future. We didn’t have any way to replace them. The Hospital had already been cleared out. Our small supply had come from a veterinarian clinic. The first thing stolen from the Hospitals had been the pain killers. We were lucky to have found the antibiotics and the antiseptic we had.
I felt a little woozy by the time he had stitched my arm.
“That sucked,” I said.
“You’ve been shot before,” Doc pointed at a puckered scar on my back.
“Couple of times,” I said. “Never patched up without the painkillers though.”
“That’s your own damn fault,” he said.
“I didn’t want to waste it after being dumb enough to let that guy get off a shot.”
“Not dumb because you attacked a whole camp of raiders?”
“No,” I said. “That needed done. But I should have assessed them better. I’m out of practice. They never should have gotten a shot off. They were amateurs. Dangerous, but they shouldn’t have posed that much of a problem with surprise on my side. I realized a second too late that the one who shot me already had his gun in hand when I walked into camp.”
“Twelve men, one with a gun in his hand?”
“Yeah,” I said and reached for my shirt. “Should have shot that guy first, but the other two really pissed me off.”
“I’ll try to remember not to piss you off,” Doc said with a grin.
“How do people go so far down in such a short time?” I shook my head. “It’s been right at six months, and these people are talking murder and rape as if it was commonplace. Planning to murder Pete and rape Neave, not to mention giving the kids to some guy called the Lieutenant…”
I heard the intake of breath from behind me.
Neave had stepped into the doorway as I was speaking.
“I didn’t believe what they said until right now,” she said. “They said you killed people.”
“I did,” I said. “They were going to hit your farm tomorrow morning. I’m guessing you heard what they had planned. Your father looked at me much the same way you are looking at me right now. I understand.”
I finished buttoning my shirt and walked by Neave to exit the infirmary. We had set it up almost immediately after the bombs dropped. Every piece of medical equipment we could find had been brought back. When we found Doc, we brought him back as well.
“Zee!” Neave yelled from the door behind me.
I stopped and took a deep breath. It hurt like hell to see the horror on Neave’s face as she looked at me.
“There was no other way?”
“There was,” I said. “I could have snuck back from the camp and come to your place where we all could have waited until tomorrow and fought them off together. But then the kids would have been in danger as well as the rest of you. Out there, I was the only one in danger, so I chose to keep you and the others safe. If that makes me a monster, then I guess I’ll just have to live with it.”
Her hand settled on my shoulder.
“You’re not a monster, Zee,” she said. “We all need to wake up to the world as it is now, and it’s just harder for some of us.”
“I know it is,” I said. “That’s why there are people like Pop. People like me. We fought in the wars so others wouldn’t have it on their doorsteps. Well, now it’s on our doorstep. I look out there beyond those fields, and I’m seeing Hannibal and his barbarians at the gate. The world has gone mad, and we have to be something different than we were before if we’re to survive what’s coming.”
“There’ll be more?”
“Count on it,” I said. “There are things we need to do, now. They have to be done soon. We won’t survive if we stay scattered on all the different farms. We have to consolidate.”
“How do we move away while the silos are filled with corn?”
“That’s the million dollar question,” I said. “We need more people.”
* * *
“Knew it was comin’,” Pop said as he threw a bale of hay into the wagon.
“Yeah,” I returned. “Remember those looks when I came home?”
“I remember,” he said. “Got those same looks when they looked at me. They’d see the action on the vids and got that look for days after when they looked at me. It goes away after a few days.”
“This is different, Pop,” I said.
“Right on our damn doorstep,” he muttered. “Still can’t get ‘em to back the plan.”
“We need ‘em to listen,” I said. “I don’t know what more I can do to demonstrate what we have coming. They all saw the damn raiders in that camp.”
“They saw dead raiders, son.”
“I couldn’t let ‘em hit the farm.”
“I know,” he said. “But I’m afraid it’ll take one of their raids to get in before they’ll see it.”
“Can’t let it happen if I can help it.”
“Not sayin’ to let it happen,” he returned. “But there’ll be one of the raids that gets through, and I just pray we don’t pay too high of a cost for the kick in the ass these folks need. Until then, we just gotta keep workin’ on the fortifications.”
I looked back toward the house at the rock wall that was slowly raising around the place.
“Grady’s not doubting what’s coming,” I said as I watched the group maneuvering another large rock into place.
The rock wall had started a week after the bombs dropped. Pop had seven people working for him at the time, and they all fell right in with the work. Grady didn’t even hesitate when Pop said we needed a wall.
I threw a bale onto the wagon for Sam to stack. This would be the last of the bales. When the fuel ran out, we would have to start storing it loose like they did in the old days. My arm hurt as I threw the bale.
“Quit it, boy!” Pop said. “Let it heal.”
“We don’t have time,” I said.
“Take the time.” His voice had slipped into command voice, and I almost jerked to attention.
“Yes, sir.”
“Get up there and drive the damn truck.”
You never forget the bark of the sergeant, even in this Fallen World.
* * * * *
Chapter 4
“Whoa boy,” I said to Dagger.
He settled a little. The horse was getting better. He was probably the best of the herd. He got more ride time than most of them because he was my favorite, and I couldn’t work with the arm healing so I spent a lot of time out scouting. All of the riding had built muscle on him, and he was a damn tank.
I raised the binoculars and faced toward home. Nothing seemed out of place so I swung toward the Daltens’. Then past them to check Walter’s place. My swing stopped and moved back a little. That was a lot of dust.
“Vehicles,” I muttered. They were moving toward Pete’s.
My blood froze in my veins, but I remembered to send the signal. Red flare was emergency. I angled it up and toward Pete’s so the others would know what the target was then I kicked Dagger in the ribs.
“Run!” I yelled. “Run, boy!”
He almost lost me as he launched forward. Normally we would steer down the aisles in the corn field but I pointed him straight at the target and gave him his head. Dagger loved to run and I would need that love of running to have any hope of reaching the farm in time.
This was a second planting of corn, which we hoped would come in before winter. It had been a gamble but what wasn’t a gamble in the world we lived in. Running toward the Daltens’ was a gamble as well but Neave was there, and I intended to be.
I leaned forward over his neck. “Run like the wind, boy.”
I swear he heard me. I think he actually sped up.
I could see the roofs ahead of us when I heard the gunfire.
Dagger exploded from the cornfield behind a ragged truck with eight men crouched behind it. They would pop up and fire toward the house. I could see a body halfway across the clearing toward the house. I was almost certain it was Condy. Rage filled me, seeing the seventeen-year-old boy laying too still to be alive, and I dropped the reins which were tied together down on Dagger’s neck. Both guns flew to my hands, and I opened fire on the men who faced away from me.
Now, there’s a reason I usually use a single gun at any given time. Shooting two-handed is hard to do with any accuracy. You would always see it in the vid shows but that was a show. There is a time for it. When you want to send as much lead as you can in the general direction of your target, go for it. I was on the back of a running horse—what was I going to hit anyway?
I still hit two of them. Dagger saw the enemy and slammed into one of them as he came to a stop. He didn’t hesitate as he stomped the fallen man. I leapt from his back to tackle another as he turned toward us. My empty pistol crunched into his face as I landed on him.
He screamed as I brought the pistol down a second time. The screams stopped.
I was moving again just as Dagger went for a second guy. The bearded raider in front of me raised his gun to point at the horse but my arms circled his head. With a snap, his head twisted sideways.
A shot boomed, and Dagger screamed but he didn’t slow down. A second victim died under his hooves. My gun dropped, and I pulled the knife sheathed at my back. It sank to the hilt in another raider’s neck. The last one behind the truck aimed his gun toward me, and the top of his head exploded as a shot from the house took him out.
The second vehicle, a sedan with metal armor started up and shot back toward the way it had come. I retrieved my .45 and ejected the mag. I slipped another mag in before holstering the weapon. My second was reloaded as well. Then I eased toward Dagger who stood trembling.
“Damnit boy,” I said. “You’re a badass.”
He bumped me with his head.
I started inspecting the big black horse. There was a nasty groove on the side of his neck.
“That was a close one, brother.”
I heard one of the raiders gurgling behind me so I turned and looked at him.
The knife had really done a number on him. Looking back toward the body of Condy, I drew the .45 and put a shot between his eyes.
Looking back up and toward the house, I could see Neave’s pale face staring wide-eyed out of a window.
There was a dead raider where the second car had been, but I walked to where Condy lay. There was a large bullet hole in his chest. It would have been quick, at least. Dagger followed me. He sniffed the body and pushed at the boy with his nose. Condy had really loved the horses. Dagger blew air through his nose and laid his head against my arm.
I knew the horses had become part of the family, but it was gut wrenching to see the sorrow in Dagger. Condy had been part of his herd.
Looking west, I could see the plumes as the farmers closed in. Looking east toward the fleeing dust cloud, I knew today was the day Pop had been talking about.
“Zee?” I heard her voice from behind me. “Is it over?”
“No, Baby,” I answered. “It’s just beginning.”
I looked back to where she knelt beside her cousin, tears flowing from her beautiful blue-grey eyes. I looked back toward the direction the raiders had come with hate in my heart. It hurt to see her cry.
“We need to get inside.” I placed my hand on her shoulder. “They may turn around.”
“What about Condy?”
“I’ll bring him in.”
She returned to the house, and I pulled the boy from the ground and placed him across my shoulder, remembering other days carrying my brothers off the field.
“Come on, boy,” I said, and Dagger followed me toward the barn. I was pretty sure that Dallas and Fin didn’t need to look at the body of their brother.
Dagger followed me into the barn. I placed Condy inside the cleanest of the stalls and went to the cabinet where the first aid supplies were kept. We didn’t have much, but the antibiotic salve would help keep Dagger’s wound from infecting.
I looked to the door as I saw Pete step into the barn.
“We should have listened,” he said. “I…”
“We don’t need to go into that, Pete,” I said. “But we need to prepare for ‘em to return.”
“You think they’ll be back?”
“Probably before the day is out.”
“After losing nine men?”
“Especially after losing men.”
He looked doubtful.
“In something like this, people will follow the strongest person they can,” I said. “Now the guy who is in charge can’t afford to show weakness. It’s the nature of the sort of groups that have the raider type of mentality. If he doesn’t step on us quickly, his position becomes much less secure.”
“How do you even know these things?”
“We didn’t just fight JalCom when I was in service,” I answered. “Overseas we saw a lot of the Warlord types. Down deep they’re all the same. They rule with strength or fear, and it’s hard to keep that sort of thing rolling without raiding others to keep your people focused on an enemy instead of looking at your head to go on a pike.”
“You knew this was going to happen.”
“Yes,” I answered. “I’ve dreaded the day for the last few months. There was no way of knowing when or where it was going to happen, but we knew it would. I’m sorry it was here, Pete.”
“I wish I had listened,” he said, softly.
“The important thing right now is to prepare for the next attack,” I said. “We need all of the guns you’ve got placed and we need to fortify anything that we can before they come back.”
“What can I do?”
“First we go to the house and see if there’s any spots we can reinforce.”
After leaving Dagger in the rearmost stall Pete and I crossed the clearing toward the house. I waved at Grady as he climbed the ladder on the side of the corn silo to find a good spot to lay in wait. He knew it wasn’t over.
Entering the house and looking around for a moment, I stopped in front of Gary, Neave’s youngest brother. It was easy enough to tell which of the people inside the house had been the one to shoot the guy who had been aiming his gun at me. Gary was in the corner, holding the rifle close. His face was pale, and I had seen that look in many a young soldier’s eyes. I, myself, had carried that look one day nine years ago.
I squatted down in front of him. “Thank you, Gee. You saved my life out there.”
“How did you know?”
“I’ve been there, boy,” I said. “It’s never an easy thing.”
“Grady got the other one,” he said.
“Grady’s been there too,” I said. “He was a deputy before this all happened.”
“How can I feel this bad?”
“You should always feel bad when you have to take a life, Gee.”
“You killed all those men out there in that camp,” he said. “Then more here. Do you feel bad?”
