Chapter 8: The New Camp

Balla woke us up just before dawn. “Alex I am so afraid, are you sure that you can defeat all those men?” Balla asked me.

“Yes I am confident this will be over real soon I want to eat breakfast as soon as possible though so my breakfast will be settled while theirs is not. I opened a family-sized can of ravioli that I ate cold. I would get something later when I was back home. Balla just stared at the can, not knowing what to make of it. When Challa put some in a bowl from another can for Balla, Challa fed her like a child. As Balla had never seen a spoon until she watched me eating directly from a can of my own. After the first taste she got busy with the spoon all on her own. After a few miscues breakfast was finished quietly. They had showed me were to water the bushes the scent almost made me lose my breakfast. I hoped to be home before I had to add to the already present stinky smells.

“We won’t be here too much longer please don’t eat or drink anything from this camp. I would hate to find that this camp would do any of us harm. But I am taking no chances here. As this may well be the last time I hope we ever set foot around here once we leave.” I said. We sat on the tailgate, and in the bed of the truck after putting the special tonneau cover back underneath the truck bed with-in its special case. To await whatever was coming our way this morning. Boso came over to ask. “Are any of you going to eat breakfast, as that is all they are waiting for to resume courting Balla.” Boso asked.

“I was almost hoping you had left during the night. As this ganging up on Balla is just plain wrong to the few of us who want to leave this camp.” Boso said.

“We have already eaten earlier, as I have brought my food and drink. It never entered my mind to run as that is the coward’s way out. Thus it would surely be guaranteed to make somebody think that I left in fear. This in turn would allow them to think I was somehow vulnerable to them in some way, thus inviting some brave fool to try me on my own ground.” I said. “I can understand that very well.” Boso said. “Well let’s get this over with Boso.” I said.

“Well is everyone here intending to fight each other for a chance at fighting Balla.” I asked.

“No we intend to fight Balla the same as before. We don’t take orders from you. You are not the camp leader here so we will continue what we started, and be done with it. Balla will be mated, and then we will elect a new camp leader as Boso is no longer considered to be the leader around here.” Malus said. Boso had told me his name. “When the other camps arrived Malus had begun to act as camp leader. Along with the support of his brother who had also became the camp leader at his camp under some strange happenings as well.” Boso said.

“Well as of last night after my mate saw the way your new leaders were treating her mother, I am now in this fight also. So to get the chance to mate Balla you will have get by me. And I am taking on all comers. Think about how bad all of you really and truly want to mate with Balla. I will not be pussy-footing around. Stepping up to this challenge means most likely at best you are going to just get hurt, while at worst you could wind up DEAD. You need to think about the consequences of fighting me carefully. As we used to say where I come from ‘Don’t step up if you can’t keep up’ I mean to end all this shit quickly.” I said.

“You ain’t in-charge of anything here. What if we don’t go just along with what you are saying?” Somebody in the peanut gallery asked out loud.

“I am willing to start by killing every man standing out here until I am allowed to fight for Balla. Or none of you is any longer interested in Balla, whichever occurs first. Do you already have a mate by the way?” I asked.

“No but Balla will soon be my mate shortly I was next to fight her when you interrupted yesterday.” he said.

I pulled my .45 and shot the man dead, shooting him in the chest. “Now where were we? Somebody was telling me about what I could or couldn’t do. All you brave souls that want in on what the now dead person was just telling me, go over there, and stand there near him. So when I all done, with all of you that stand near him, I will know I am done with that issue. And the rest of us can begin fighting about Balla.” I said while putting the .45 away. No one moved near the dead man.

About 25 guys lined up. After the first guy moved towards me, I said, “Remember I will not be playing around, I promise by that with me taking on all of you I will be hurting you badly as I can, seeing that their are 25 of you in line at the moment. I want to say there is no shame in not going through with it after you see a few of your friends get hurt. Please think of your camp and your own long term survival. I have my own camp to hunt for, and I am the only hunter for my camp. You camp leaders you might want to think of your camp’s survival and get your men before they get hurt. As I won’t be hunting for your camps while your men are on the mend, if they live to recover.” I said.

I signaled to the first man to come forward. He rushed me only to be tossed over my hip, a roundhouse kick to the throat left him gasping for breath. A kick to the head knocked him out I hope he woke back up later. “Next” I shouted out. Well the next to answer was in much larger than me by 4 or 5 inches, and the better part of a hundred pounds! He just smiles and says. “Me Pollo going to break you, and all that big talk!” I just smiled and shook my head. And we just circled each other until he made his move. I was so bored waiting until he did make that move. As I was worried about his strength I wouldn’t let him get a hold of me. Thinking he was finally close enough he lunged at me.

I just managed to get out of the way. I did get my foot in the way to assist him in finding the ground. When he got to his knees I kicked him in the nuts as hard as I physically could, lifting Pollo completely off the ground. The high-pitched scream that followed nobody could really and truly believe came from Pollo alone. I did hear more than a few sounds of sympathy pains. And more than a few men grabbed their packages to protect them from the phantom kick. Hell I was limping at first because the blow was so hard. In the back of my mind I hoped Pollo had already had kids as there was a good chance he was no longer a functioning model with those capabilities. Pollo never moved from the fetal position he was in he just moaned. The poor man wanted nobody to touch him in any way.

It was then that Tetra and a group of women came over to where the fighting was going on. “ENOUGH OF THIS DUMB SHIT MALUS! You have taken this power trip of yours far enough. So far it is only been your men getting hurt. All your men are at the front of the line. Hasn’t this camp lost enough hunters to injury or death?” Tetra shouted at Malus. “Malus frowned as he didn’t want to look bad at the hands of a woman.

“Look woman this is man business!” Malus shouted. But he did stop to notice that indeed all the men at the front of the line were his men only.

Tetra paying him no attention went on to say. “You wanted to be the man in-charge. Well now you are, so lead on. Look at all your remaining hunters waiting to get hurt. How will this help this camp? No female is worth the destruction of this camp. By the way you do know that you are feeding parts of three different camps, as well as your own. With a good part of your hunting force down are any of these men going help you hunt to replace all the meat you are so happy to give away? And are any of these women to help us gather foodstuff’s?” Tetra yelled at Malus.

“But more importantly what will you do if we run short of gathered food later this year, none of these camps will be sending anything they gathered back to this camp. Is this how your leadership is going to go Malus?” Tetra asked.

“Well no I know we will need to get meat. That is what we have Alex for. He knows what will happen to Boso if he doesn’t hunt for this camp! Did I not make this clear to everyone yesterday woman?!” Malus shouted.

“Well maybe you have been having so much fun being in-charge that you have not been keeping up with the latest current events happening around here. But Boso asked if he could leave with Alex as soon as Alex got here. He also asked if Mago and Taro could also go along too. Boso may have been standing here looking at this foolishness, but his belongings have been moving. Mago and Taro have all our things into that thing we will be leaving in as soon as these dumb ass men quit lining up to be hurt or killed. And all of our offspring, and their mates are also leaving too. Thus you have lost even more hunters, and future hunters and gatherers. Some of the unmated men, and women have made themselves very obvious near the group that intends to leave too.” Tetra said.

“In other words your camp is getting smaller as others are plotting to leave to join some of those camps here eating up your food. You broke the rules of how a camp worked when you took it in your head you could just take Boso’s leadership position. You did this without any votes so no one felt they had to consult with you about if they could leave this camp or not. By the way you do understand with Mago leaving Brassa the camp healer is going too?” Tetra inquired. Malus’ face paled as he was unaware of any of these new developments. He was scrambling trying to think of how to figure out what to do. His first move though was to pull his men out of the line for the Balla sweepstakes.

“Boso I won’t let any of you leave this is your camp! You are one of the leaders here! With the damage Alex has done we need to pull together to rebuild our camp. Can you not see this?” Malus cried.

“Where was all of this concern that I am suppose to have, before, or after you threatened my life? Then you also threatened not only my family, but other families here also, if Alex did not comply with your wishes. Just so you can continue to be lazy,” Boso asked.

“I had no such plans, I was not going to do that. You have to believe me. I had hoped to get some other men to join our camp by mating with some of our women. I knew you were intending to rebuild the camp at a slower rate. I just thought with these camps here I could make something happen much faster. And since some of them were my family I thought they might listen to me. Now a few more of our hunters are injured, a now you are talking about leaving. But you just can’t do that, as it will be a very hard blow to this camp.” Malus said.

“I can most definately do so after you made it clear that you are in-charge here now. Nothing about any of that news says that I have to stay here in a camp under your leadership. No thank you Sir. You wanted this real hard, and you took it. I did not fight you about it. Now that you are feeling the pressure of all your actions, you don’t seem to think it so much fun being a leader now. Though now you want me to fix it for you if I can. You have tasted power, you will take it back just as soon as I fix it for you if I can. But only after all the dust settles, and everything is running smoothly again, of course. Even if I am wrong about you, understand this Malus, I never wanted to be the leader. I only stepped in when Chazzo was getting people killed. But I was content to just do the job, then you made your move. Well you are now the leader of this camp as you wanted. You need to make a deal to save your camp, to save yourself. These people you are leading will rise up, and kill if you can’t make things right. They want to know you have a plan to get some meat into this camp to feed them. Ask Chazzo all about the getting killed part.” Boso said.

“I am leaving and hope we are still welcome to visit after we leave, but if not, I will still be ok with that too.” Boso said.

“Now that we have had a little break and the line has been shortened, does anyone else want to continue? I don’t want to continue I just want to take Balla and go.” I said. After a few of them were looking at me and looking at Pollo many of those thinking about it decided Balla wasn’t good looking enough to risk life and limb over. Those few that were left held steadfast. “Remember the camp healer is leaving within minutes of all of this ending, thus she won’t be here to help you with any injuries that you receive.” I said. Their friends made up their minds for them by dragging them away the area.

We walked to the truck I reached inside to make sure all the doors were unlocked. With as many as would be going the men and a few women would be walking. After we loaded as many of the people as we could we took off for home. To think of the cave as home was just how it felt. We would need to build a barracks type building that would take up much of the area in front of the caves, after harvesting the trees that are presently standing on a good portion of the courtyard.

“Alex before we leave you should know that several of the men wanting to leave with us are different from most men. They have let us say interesting views on some things.” Boso said.

“Are you trying to say they don’t care for the company of women in their furs? May be they seem to enjoy the company of men instead? I asked.

“Well yes that is what I was trying to say.” Boso said looking relieved that I seemed to understand, and saving him from having to talk about this subject in further detail.

“Boso I have met men like this before. If they want to join our camp I have no problems at all. Most of the time if these men are welcomed and made to feel comfortable being in camp. They will often times defend the camp harder than most. Because they may not be welcomed at this camp if there was a change in leadership. Let alone at another new camp somewhere else.” I said to Boso.

We stopped about halfway to the caves. To make sure all were ok. And for restroom breaks. Some traveling food was passed around. After the short break we got back on the move.

My blackberry vibrated to get my attention making me appear to jump. I played it off looking into the truck to read the text ‘Outdoor pool house for bathing with outdoor attached bathrooms at the end of the house cave. With additional outdoor bathrooms attached to the front wall of the horse cave, and at the other end of machine cave. I need to talk to you in your office when you get a few minutes after your back to your caves. Gazoo.’ That takes a load off my mind. The thought of outhouses were not going over well with me. Culture shock, culture shock; well that will be interesting. As I had yet to use my office for anything that will be interesting also.

We arrived late into the afternoon I pulled up in the middle of the courtyard as it was at the moment. The first thing I did was explain the bathrooms to these newcomers. The men understood the urinals quickly enough. And everyone asked all the usual questions, but all-in-all everyone was extremely happy about this new option.