Fantasy World Farm, page 1
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Chapter One
Birds were chirping, the sheep were bleating, and I could hear the sprinklers going off already somewhere in the distant fields.
Yeah… it was gonna be another good day.
Salinas Valley felt like it was outside of time and space itself sometimes, like we were just out of reach of civilization and the modern age, but it was home, and it had been home my entire life. We were nestled in a four hundred acre nook of said time warp, and I loved every second of life out here.
Even if it did get a little lonely sometimes.
The farm had been in the Dawson family for over two hundred years. I’m talking pioneers abandoning that good old Goodnight-Loving Trail in Texas and jumping on the manifest destiny bandwagon all the way to sunny California.
A pipe dream flourished into a pretty successful farming family. We were never huge, but considering that I was still here, two hundred years later, carrying on the Dawson name on our little piece of paradise, I’d say that they’d done a pretty good job.
I had a good routine going here. Stepping into my Pops’ shoes was pretty hard at first, but thankfully, the old man had trained me well over the years. I remember when I was a kid thinking that managing a four hundred acre farm on my own one day seemed impossible. But the more my dad had shown me, the more confident I’d gotten. It was kinda my destiny to keep this place alive and running, and I had no qualms about that.
I sat up in my bed and stretched my tanned arms above my head with a grunt. I felt the muscles in my back relax as I pulled on them, and my spine made a satisfying pop as the joints clicked into place.
Then I heaved myself up off the stupidly cozy mattress and headed straight for the shower. Today was going to be warm, and I needed a nice cold wake-up call before I did anything else.
I turned the water on as cold as it would go and hopped straight in after undressing. The chilly onslaught made me leap up in the air in shock, but it did the trick. Any remnants of sleep slipped down the drain with the water, and I quickly washed my body with some mint shower gel for an extra hit.
Once I was done washing, I jumped out and dried off pretty quickly, and I left my towel hanging around my waist as I took a look at myself in the mirror.
My sandy-blond hair was getting pretty unruly. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d gone into town and got it cut, and it showed. It was edging more and more toward a mullet every day, but with everything that needed taking care of on the farm, that was the least of my worries.
I combed through it, regardless, and scratched my stubbled cheeks. That was another thing I’d need to clean up sooner or later. But not today.
I headed back into my bedroom and picked out an outfit for today. Blue jeans, a white tank top, and a red plaid flannel. That was my usual go-to, and considering no one ever came out here, I wasn’t exactly looking to put on a fashion show.
After I was dressed, I put on some socks and slipped into my steel-toed Timberlands. I also put on my gun holster and tucked in my Glock 20 10mm that I kept on my bedside table. I never left the house without it, and it had become a compulsory part of my outfit, come rain or shine. I’d never had to use the pistol out on my farm, but Salinas Valley was wild hog country, and every farmer or rancher carried a sidearm just in case they happened to be too many steps away from their rifles during a male hog encounter.
After I felt adequately dressed for the day, I headed into the kitchen and turned the coffee maker on. Then I pulled out one of my mom’s old chipped mugs with hand-painted sheep on the side, and I waited for the liquid gold to brew.
The sound of it churning filled the otherwise silent house, and as soon as it beeped to signal it was ready, I was pouring it into my mug at the speed of sound. I was used to chugging molten lava at this point thanks to my busy schedule, so I took a long sip straight away and sighed in contentment as the strong java hit the back of my throat.
After a few more long, deeply needed swigs, I made my way over to the phone on the cabinet by the TV. The old thing was a landline and had been here since before I was even born. My parents never upgraded, and, honestly, I’d never had the time to, either. Plus, there was never any need to.
I never really got calls.
Not anymore.
Being all the way out in the middle of pretty much nowhere didn’t leave too much room for making friends and having a social life. Plus, the farm was my top priority, and proudly. The yield for this season was gonna be immense, but it still wasn’t going to be enough.
The Tax Man had started knocking, and because of how well my crops had done in the previous years, it had skyrocketed to an amount that was pretty much unpayable. It’s funny how that works.
I wasn’t left with many options, and honestly, I was starting to get a little angsty about the whole thing. It was times like these that I wished my Pops was still here, but it was all down to me now.
One option was to sell everything I could on the farm. Not just crops, but valuables and keepsakes that my mom and dad had left behind. I’d even considered selling off some of my best animals, but the thought of getting rid of them was almost unbearable. They were the only things I came into contact with on a daily basis, and they were like my babies at this point.
I fed them, protected them, got gophers off their tail, killed coyotes before they could eat them, cleaned out their pens, watched them as they roamed… yeah, letting them go would be tough. And it really was one of the last options I wanted to think about.
But there was one more option that was maybe even worse.
Selling the entire farm.
I pressed the button on the phone to play my voicemails and immediately groaned at the monotone voice that started playing through the speaker.
“Mr. Dawson, this is Mr. Berry from Sunnyside Real Estate calling… again,” he added with an agitated edge. “Please call me back at your earliest convenience. I’m sure you’re very busy running that farm of yours, but as you know, time is of the essence.”
I gritted my teeth at his condescending tone, and I forced myself to keep listening to see what else the asshole had to say.
“We are still very much interested in buying said farm, and for a very good price, too, might I add.” He chuckled smarmily. “Our offer still stands. And, for your sake, I suggest you give us a call back.”
The voicemail abruptly ended, and I let out a growl as my fist hit the wood-paneled walls. I felt my knuckles click from the intensity of the punch, and I immediately shook my hand out to try and relieve the pain.
Sunnyside Real Estate were the Grim Reaper waiting to collect my soul to drag it down to the frickin’ depths of hell. They were private equity vultures and had been buying out the land around me from other farmers who couldn’t afford their property tax.
But I couldn’t sell to them. I would go down kicking and screaming before they got their hands on my farm. A farm that had been in my family for too goddamn long just for it to be handed over to those assholes so they could build a resort or some shit.
“Hey, Noah, it’s your Aunt Mildred here,” another voicemail started playing, and I quickly snapped out of my rage. “I just wanted to check in on you, sweetie. It’s been a while since we’ve heard from you. And, well… we heard about the farm--”
I unplugged the phone from the wall and took a deep breath. The last thing I needed was to hear a lecture from my Aunt Mildred of all people. She was like a goddamn vulture herself, that woman. She showed no interest in me or the farm my whole life, but as soon as my parents died, she was straight in there.
I was surprised she wasn’t running Sunnyside Real Estate herself just so she could get her hands on this place. She was my aunt on my dad’s side, and she was sure as hell resentful that I wouldn’t hand the land over to her after it passed onto me.
I don’t know how she found out about the tax thing, but listening to that old bat pretend to be upset about it was not something I cared to do today. So, I headed out into the warm outside air.
The sun was shining, as it usually was, and the sky was completely clear, save for a few white clouds in the distance. Rain was scarce, but that’s why this whole place had a stupid amount of irrigation set up. Sprinklers did most of the work, and there was drip irrigation for smaller plots of crops like my carrots to make sure they had at least one inch of rain water per week.
Center pivot irrigation took care of the rest of the large plots of crops, like my potatoes, and they helped keep the sustainable cycle running on my farm. It also meant there was less upkeep to do. Plus, if I ever wanted to rotate my pivot crops, it was wayyy easier than rotating my ground irrigation ones.
It was a good day. It was just a shame Sunnyside had to ruin it by reminding me about my impending doom.
I tried to get them off my mind and instead focused on the immediate tasks at hand. First things first, I needed to feed my chickens and make sure nothing had got to them. It was unlikely, but there was one summer where a coyote somehow got in thr ough the fences and killed eighty of my birds.
That’s what my Ruger 10/22 Carbine was for. This baby had served me well, and the .22lr round was perfect for killing any varmints that would harass my livestock and crops. It had a stainless-steel barrel and was weatherproof, so I normally kept it oiled up and bolted onto the rack of my side by side so I could grab it whenever I needed it. I was a pretty good shot with its iron sights, and I’d once taken a red fox at about eighty yards as it was sneaking up on my chicken coop.
My last fun purchase that took me a year to save up for was a PWS long stroke piston AR-10 in God’s perfect rifle caliber: the .308 Winchester. I also put a Primary Arms 1x8 LPVO on it just in case I spotted some hogs out in the woodlands surrounding my farm when checking on my fields.
She was a heavy girl because of the scope and piston, so she lived in a weatherproof case on my side by side, and I only took her out on rare occasions when my 10/22 couldn’t do the job.
I jogged over to my John Deere Gator and grabbed the Ruger from the roof rack, and I slung it over my shoulder before I started walking over to my chicken coop. It wasn’t too far from the house, like the rest of my animals. My Pops always liked having them close by in case he needed to run out guns blazing in the middle of the night, so I’d kept them where they’d always been.
The farm was split up into two big sections. The front half facing my little homestead house was for the animals, and it was sectioned off into the relative pens and pastures. The chicken coop was the closest and had three big individual coops in a fenced grassy area for them to free roam.
Next to that was the largest barn on site. That’s where the majority of the animals stayed during the winter months and where I’d recently shorn my sheep and removed the horns from the new calves. They’d be weaned come August, which meant they could start grazing on the grass pastures that were right at the front of the property. June was a pretty hectic month, but I’d managed to get most of the laborious tasks out of the way.
Next to the main barn was the pigpen, and it was in the furthest corner away from the house, thank god. I was used to the smell, but every now and then I’d get a good whiff of their stench and remember why taking care of those big girls was my least favorite job on the farm.
On the opposite side of the main road into the farm was the sheep pasture and pen, as well as the cow pastures which I kept in rotation so the ground could replenish itself. I usually rotated them once every two or three days, especially after I had to sell a few last season for an extra buck.
I also had two greenhouses where I grew a lot of food for myself that I didn’t sell at the end of the year. Lettuce, cucumbers, peas, that sort of thing. It used to be my mom’s pride and joy, and she’d use it as our personal grocery store, so I figured I’d carry on her legacy by keeping those to myself.
There was also another barn just next to the house that temporarily housed my John Deere 7530. That was my dad’s baby, and it had served him just as well as it did me. You couldn’t go wrong with a John Deere. I used that barn for other loose shit that I’d need during the year, as well as my back-up generator in case my solar panels failed at any point.
The other half of the farm behind the house was my fields. There were three huge ones that were around a hundred acres each. I currently had potatoes and corn planted, and the other big field was for my fruit trees. Not to mention a drainageway in between that I grew hay on for the rest of the year when the months started getting colder and my animals had to be brought inside.
So far, the irrigation had been doing its job, and I knew we were gonna have one hell of a harvest. There wasn’t too much upkeep to do thanks to the irrigation doing its job day in and day out, and that meant I could focus on my livestock this month.
I eventually reached the chicken coop and scooped out a bucket full of feed from the feeding bin. Nothing had gotten in by the looks of it. There were no dead chickens strewn around or panicked squawks. I’d been on top of most pests this year, so I hadn’t expected anything, but it was still a relief to see them all alive.
I unlatched the big gate and stepped into the enclosed area. Then I shut the door behind me so they didn’t escape and started sprinkling the feed onto the ground.
The chickens swarmed me with happy clucks and started pecking at the ground the moment the feed touched the grass. I chuckled as I became surrounded, and I started throwing it a little further out so they’d give me some room.
One minute the feed bucket was in my hand, the next it was clattering to the ground as everything around me shook fiercely. The chickens shot up a few feet and flapped their wings in a crazed panic as it trembled, and I stumbled down to the ground from the sheer intensity of it.
The earth beneath me churned, like a huge drill was powering through it or something, and I scrambled up to my feet as quickly as I could without falling over.
The rest of my animals were bleating and mooing in panic as the ground continued to shake, and I had no idea what the hell was going on or what to do.
Earthquakes were pretty common, but I’d never felt any this bad. Usually, they were just tremors that went away after a couple of seconds, but this… this was bad. I tried to usher the chickens into the coops, but they were frantic and unthinking as they flapped around the enclosure clucking away.
“Goddamnit,” I said through gritted teeth before I bolted for the gate and dashed out onto the main path, all while keeping a firm grip on my Ruger.
My first thought was to just lay down on the ground outside of the coop and hope for the best, but then the ground beneath me started to crack like glass. I stared down at it in complete horror before another tremble sent me straight to the ground. I spluttered out clouds of dust after it filled my mouth and pushed myself up off the path. My muscles screamed in protest at the sudden strain, but I pushed through the pain and booked it straight for the door of my house.
Usually, the safest place would be out in the open so nothing could crush me, but with the ground starting to split, I had no idea whether or not I would fall through and plummet straight through the earth.
So many thoughts rushed through my head. How the hell was I supposed to protect my animals from something like this? How the hell was I supposed to protect myself?
I scrambled for the doorknob and pushed myself through which almost made me face plant again, but I quickly regained my footing and slammed the door shut behind me. I bolted it, just in case it flew open and took me out, before I hurried to the kitchen.
Everything on the shelves were rattling and trembling as the house shook. Mugs and glasses toppled out of the cabinets and smashed onto the floor. Picture frames of my mom and dad and me as a little kid tumbled to the ground and shattered.
There was nothing I could do to save it all, not when I wasn’t sure this whole place wouldn’t fall down around me. So, I ran straight to the huge oak dining table in the center of the kitchen and crawled underneath it. I clutched my gun tightly like it was a lifeline, and like it would do anything to protect me against what was happening all around me.
All I could hear was a horrendous cacophony of all of my animals crying out in fear and the house and its structures shaking violently back and forth.
Suddenly, the sunlight shining in through the open windows started to flicker rapidly, like someone was turning a light on and off outside.
“What the fuck?” I whispered before my jaw went slack.
I watched with an open mouth as the light started to flicker more rapidly. It was like lightning was being struck in constant, quick successions right outside my windows.
This had to be it.
This had to be how I died.
A freak fucking earthquake or whatever the hell this was.
The wooden floor beneath me started to vibrate, and I felt my bones rattling inside of me. I clung to my gun and squeezed my eyes shut as the sensation almost made me vomit. But then…
It stopped.
The house went still. No more shaking or vibrating. No more colossal sounds of it being nearly torn out of the ground.
I slowly opened my eyes and looked around. The light outside was normal now, maybe even a little brighter than before. Warm orange sunlight poured in through the windows and lit up my now messy house.
