Chapter 43

I flew out with Burton and his team. Clara didn’t want me to go, but I told her it was necessary as I wanted the opportunity to see what the terrain was like south of our location. More importantly, I felt I needed to be there just in case Lottie decided to act up, and tried to screw up the operation. Dunbar was riding shotgun, but he needed someone there to keep an eye on Sarah during the flight, particularly after Burton and the others had been dropped off.

We’d covered up the shattered windscreen of the Chinook on the pilot’s side with a skin windbreak just like I’d made back in the days when we’d lived in the old cave. It wasn’t a perfect solution, and everyone needed to dress warmly even with the heaters going in the cockpit and the cargo bay, but it worked and that was all that mattered. The other thing we’d done before the flight to make life easier for us was to frame a corral with stalls in the cargo bay. It made for a very tight squeeze for the rest of the equipment and the passengers that were being hauled along, but it did make sure that the horses stayed in one place during the flight. To make certain that didn’t change we also put a cloth cover over the animals’ heads in an attempt to deaden any stimulus that would set them off in a panic, something nobody onboard the flight wanted to have happen.

The flight turned out to take only an hour and a bit. We were up and over the southern compound ten minutes after takeoff. Lottie radioed back to me that there was no sign of life at it or around it. She also reported that the downed Puma was still there, but deeply buried in snow.

I glanced out a window as we flew over it and confirmed what Lottie had told me. We weren’t stopping at the old compound, but it was interesting to see the place from the air. So far no one had figured out a way to recover the fuel from the Puma without losing half of it in the process and considering how valuable the fuel was, I wasn’t going to authorize any attempt that didn’t guarantee success. At the moment our plan was to wait and see if we could recover a pump of some sort and some fuel hoses from Winslow’s base, if and when we captured it.

The terrain south of the compound was heavily forested, as we already knew. Lottie pointed out the ruins of Ozmat’s and Holgar’s village when we flew over it five minutes later. I noted that there was nothing really left of it. What few structures that had been left standing when Max and company had attacked it, were half buried in snow. At that piece of information, Lottie fell silent for a while, as did everyone else. The sight had left most of us feeling either pissed off or simply down.

I spent most of the trip looking out the window of the helicopter near where I was seated, while Burton kept watch over Sarah. She wasn’t doing much, other than sitting in her seat and staring back at him or at me when I moved about to get a better view out the window.

The terrain as we flew further on continued to be as heavily forested as the terrain near our valley, and even more rugged. As we went, Lottie routinely called out altitude as she flew us over obstructions. We ended up climbing over quite a few hills that were several hundred feet high, and over a number of rivers that were almost as wide as the river that flowed near the compound. We even flew over a mountain that was over fifteen hundred feet in height. From on high it looked like the backbone of some prehistoric creature. Once over it we dropped into a narrow mist covered valley.

Here Lottie turned the helicopter towards the west. She’d already warned us about this. By heading west Lottie could conserve fuel instead of burning it flying over the various ridges that stood between where we were and where Winslow’s base was. Her intention was to hit the coast and then follow it for a bit before dropping Burton and the others off.

That location turned out to be a broad, snow-covered meadow about half a mile up from the coastline. It was in a long valley that was bracketed by a ridge of rugged mountains on the northern side and a series of rolling hills on the southern side. Lottie let me know five minutes before landing that she was about to take us down, and I let everyone else know it as well.

The snow in the valley wasn’t that deep, especially for mid-February. Once the helicopter came down, and the engines had been cut, Sarah popped up and she activated the back ramp. Once it was down, we all got busy. The horses were led out first. It was then that I found out that there was only about six inches of snow lying on the ground.

I had Ozmat turn their horses loose for a bit, having him stand watch over them, so they could regain their land legs. When we’d led them out of the helicopter we’d removed the head coverings that we’d placed on them. They were happy to be free to stretch their legs and to nose and paw at the ground, looking for something to eat. While they did that, the rest of us unloaded the helicopter. It took us a little over half an hour.

“Well, this is it,” I told Burton as I stood by him, watching Sygor and the two youths saddle their mounts and put the packsaddles on the spare horses. “Good luck.”

Burton nodded at that. There really wasn’t much to say. There was no way for him to get a hold of me if he got in trouble, and there was no way I could get to him even if he could get a radio message to me. He was on his own and we both knew it.

As it turned out, Burton was saved from having to speak. In fact, to our surprise our conversation got interrupted by a shout of alarm.

“Jake, bad men!” Sygor screamed in warning all of a sudden, grabbing for his carbine as he did.

My head came up immediately and I looked about in alarm. To my horror I spotted a Humvee approaching, travelling at a very fast pace. It had just burst out of the distant tree-line to the south, and it was heading towards us. To make matters worse, the vehicle was a ‘gun-truck’ and it had a man standing in the roof cupola, manning a machine gun. Things were suddenly looking bad.

The only thing that saved us was the fact that the driver of the vehicle was more intent on getting to us, than he was on providing a stable gun platform for his gunner. If he’d pulled up short and he’d allowed his gunner to make use of his weapon, we’d have been dead. He didn’t. The Humvee bounced over the meadow like it was some sort of dune buggy. It gave us time to act.

Burton took charge of his people, ordering Ozmat and Holgar back to take care of the horses, while he grabbed his M16 out of his saddle scabbard. He then stepped up beside Sygor who’d already brought up his carbine. As for me, I was shouting out orders to Sarah to get back into the copter and to Dunbar to alert him of what was happening. As I stood on the back ramp of the helicopter I found myself wishing for my sniper rifle. I’d left it at home, as had Dunbar, opting for my sidearm and my carbine as my primary weapons. All of a sudden I was feeling awfully naked.

Thankfully Burton still had the grenade launcher on his M16 and he made quick use of it. He took aim and fired a grenade right into the oncoming vehicle. In fact the driver of the vehicle drove right into it. The grenade shattered the windscreen of the vehicle and detonated. The end result was a mess. The Humvee had just bounced into the air once more and the detonation resulted in the vehicle flipping over. It came down hard, skidding for a few feet before it came to a stop.

“Shit,” I declared in response, looking at Burton in wide-eyed disbelief. “I’m going to owe you a drink once you get back. That was too fucking close.”

Burton nodded and then looked back at the wrecked vehicle. There was smoke coming from it, but that was it. No one had tried to crawl out of it. With a sigh Burton shook his head.

“Fuck, we got lucky!” the man said as he ejected the spent casing from his grenade launcher.

“Agreed,” Dunbar muttered from where he stood behind me, holding his carbine at the ready, looking just as surprised as I did. “So is there anyone else we need to worry about.”

I didn’t know, and obviously, no one else knew either. I left Dunbar on guard with the helicopter and the two women. I told him to make certain that Lottie didn’t try anything. We were in walking distance, although a fairly long walking distance, of Winslow’s base. Lottie could send a radio message. I doubted she had, since she was standing on the back ramp beside Sarah, staring out at the destroyed Humvee, but in our current situation I figured that we should be careful. He said he would.

Burton put Ozmat and Holgar on sentry. He had them hobble the horses, and then he posted them, telling them to sing out if there was any more trouble. Then he started heading towards the ruined vehicle. I joined him and Sygor tagged alone.

It was definitely not a pretty sight. The gunner was road kill. He’d been crushed when the vehicle had flipped over and then he’d been torn up as the hard-topped vehicle had skidded across the ground, before finally stopping. My only hope was that he’d been killed outright by the grenade when it had gone off. As for the rest of the occupants of the vehicle, the driver was dead as well. To our surprise, the co-driver wasn’t.

I pulled the man free of the wreckage. He was unconscious and banged up pretty bad. Left to his own devices he’d probably die within the next half hour or so. He hadn’t been wearing a helmet and he had a good sized dent in his forehead where it had hit something blunt. It was bleeding freely as were several other minor facial wounds. It looked like he’d broken his nose as well. The worse of it was his left arm and leg. The shrapnel from the grenade and whatever else had been lying about in the vehicle had torn up his arm and leg and from the look of it, his side as well. He was slowly bleeding out. He moaned a bit when I dropped him on the ground.

“Do you recognize him at all?” I asked Burton.

Burton shook his head no. I didn’t recognize him either.

“Watch him,” I told Sygor before putting my head in the vehicle to have a look about, “and let me know if he wakes up.”

I checked out the inside of the vehicle, while Burton stepped over to the driver’s side of the wreck to pull the driver out. From what I could tell, the driver had taken the brunt of the blast.

I found the roof of the vehicle littered with everything that hadn’t been strapped down. That included the personal packs of the vehicle crew and two M16A1 rifles. Amazingly, the rifles had survived the explosion and the roll-over. I reached in and grabbed those, as well as the three packs. By then Burton was rooting around inside the vehicle as well. He pulled out three drums of ammunition for the roof mounted machine gun. The machine gun was now just so much scrap metal, but the ammunition was still good and it matched the weapon we had back at the settlement. He put it aside and then started rooting about again.

We did end up with two more gifts courtesy of Quantum.

One was a vehicle mounted radio set. The antenna was now gone, but I thought maybe Monty could fix something up for us. I grabbed the radio, the headset and the handset. I toted it all back to the helicopter once we were ready to go.

The other gift was a map case. It turned out that this vehicle had a case filled with maps of the area, marking off fords, villages, and other interesting sites. I handed them over to Burton.

“Keep them,” I told him as he looked at me incredulously. “They’ll be of more help to you here, than to me back at the settlement. Besides, you can update them as you go along, and then you can show them to me, when I get back here for the final show.”

The co-driver never woke up. He was in fact dead by the time I got back to him. I might have tried to save his life, but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. I’d taken a look at him when I’d plopped his sorry ass down in the snow and the first thought that had come into my head was a question; was this guy another Gus or maybe someone worse? I didn’t know and truthfully, I didn’t want to find out.

We stripped the bodies of what was valuable and stowed it all into the packs that we’d pulled from the vehicle. These and everything else except the map case went into the helicopter. By then it was time for us to leave, and for Burton to get the hell of sight. My gut told me it wasn’t safe for any of us to hang around.

“I’d get my ass out of here,” I told Burton bluntly as we walked back to the horses. “I’ve got no idea where that vehicle came from, or if there are anymore in the area. I do know that when it doesn’t get back to base, someone is probably going to come looking for it.”

“I know,” Burton declared looking thoughtfully back towards the wreck as he said it. “Personally I think I might just hang around here, although out of sight, at least for a couple of days. Someone else might come by and this time, if we’re lucky, I might be able to get a prisoner or two to interrogate.”

“It’s definitely an option,” I admitted, “but don’t take too many risks, and remember those drones. I don’t want to get back up to the settlement only to get hit the next day by an airstrike. It definitely wouldn’t make my day.”

Burton agreed to keep the drones in mind. I watched him mount up and then I bade him good-bye once again, as well as Sygor and the two youths. I promised Sygor I would take care of his mates. He thanked me.

I let Burton and the others ride off before stepping back into the copter. By then Dunbar was back in the cockpit with Lottie. The moment I stepped into the cargo hold, Sarah hit the controls for the ramp and it started to rise.

“You okay?” I asked the young woman, after she’d called forward to let Lottie know we were onboard and everything was locked up.

“Yeah,” Sarah muttered softly in reply. “I just got spooked. I hadn’t expected trouble.”

“I hadn’t either,” I said as we walked back to our seats to strap ourselves in, “but shit happens and you roll with it. You did fine, and we’re all still alive, so don’t sweat it.”

“I’d have been happier armed,” Sarah muttered as the engines of the helicopter turned over. I just caught it, before things got too loud.

I sighed in return. It was a bone of contention with all the people that had been working directly for Winslow. Gus was the most verbal about it, but the others mentioned it from time to time as well. Of all five, Carmen was the only one who’d mentioned it only once. I’d given them all my standard reply. When Winslow was dead and I’d dealt with Quantum, then they’d get their weapons back. Until then, they’d live by my rules. If they didn’t like it, they could leave. So far none of them had left.

We made it back to the settlement without any further incidents. Lottie put us down where the helicopter had been before and then she killed the engines. By the time everyone was out of the helicopter and on the ground, people had shown up to help camouflage the big bird once again. I pointed to people and gave them tasks, such as toting the radio set up the hill to the settlement and to Monty, and the securing of the weapons we’d taken from the vehicle. Once those jobs were delegated I left Sarah and Lottie in charge of securing the helicopter and camouflaging it. For now we’d just cover it up with the big tarps. Tomorrow, I’d see what could be done to shift a little snow onto it to hide it better from any prying eyes.

I was met by Clara on reaching the longhouse. I pulled her to me and then I leaned down and I kissed her.

“How was it?” Clara asked when I broke the embrace, her eyes dropping down taking in the bloodstains that marked my hands and the sleeves of my parka. “Did someone get shot?”

“Nobody important,” I told her, grinning for a moment before becoming more serious. “I’ll tell you inside.”

I told Clara about the trip, as well as everyone else who’d been waiting anxiously for my return. This included Tisa and Sapha, Helen, and Carmen, amongst others such as my advisors. I reassured the women that everyone was all right and that all was well. Then I told those gathered by the central hearth what had happened. It didn’t take me that long. By the time I was done, Dunbar, Lottie, and Sarah had come to join me.

“For better or worse, that makes three less men that the people here have to face, if this ever turns into open warfare,” Clara muttered thoughtfully, her brow furrowed as she spoke. “I don’t like it, but it is better than the alternative.”

“I agree,” Helen spoke up, drawing attention to her, “and the way things are going, by the time you do fly south, Winslow’s army will be wiped out. He’s got to have less then twenty trained men by now. Who knows how many Burton might take care of by spring? You might just be able to walk in and kill the man.”

I looked at the woman and sighed. It had been a long day and I really didn’t want to argue with her about it, but I decided I had to. She was right, but she was also wrong.

“I won’t disagree with you on how many men Winslow has left,” I told her, although I was speaking to everyone gathered, “but I won’t simply write Winslow off just because I’ve been killing off his trained thugs. He has support people who are still following him, plus the scientists, and others as well. He has a local chief in his pocket, and according to you and others, a couple of other village chiefs as well. He also has drones, and who knows what resources that he can throw at us. Until Winslow is dead, and everyone willing to follow in his footsteps has been dealt with, I can’t just dismiss the man! No one in this settlement can afford to, either! It’s just too dangerous. Is that understood?”

“Yes,” Clara said when Helen hesitated. Then everyone else said ‘yes’ as well. I left it at that.

I headed to the bathhouse after the discussion. I was still chilled from the flight in the Chinook and from being out in the cold, and I still had blood staining my hands from when I had manhandled the wounded man out of the overturned Humvee and from rooting about in the blood splattered interior of the vehicle. I wanted a hot shower, a warm soak, and a chance to think in peace. I got two out of three.

I was soaking in the tub, thinking about the day and wondering whether Burton and the others were doing okay, when I was disturbed by the arrival of Ruba and Carmen. Ruba’s presence didn’t really disturb me. Our relationship had improved greatly since I had agreed to train her to fight, and then defended that decision before our community. She had become very friendly since then. Carmen’s presence raised warning flags the moment I saw that she was there, and noted the fact that she was naked as the day she had been born.

“Do you mind if we share your bath, Jake?” Ruba asked courteously, even while she slipped over the lip of the tub and lowered herself into the warm water.

I didn’t answer Ruba immediately. Instead, I glanced over at Carmen who was standing off to one side, by the bench that lined the wall of the bathhouse. She was trying not to meet my gaze and it was clear that she wasn’t comfortable with whatever Ruba had planned. I noted that the young woman was very attractive; hard-bodied, muscular, physically fit, with small round breasts tipped with dark nipples, and a trimmed bush. I knew I could really enjoy Carmen, even if just looking at her, except for the fact that I knew she was a lesbian. I also knew that she wasn’t comfortable standing there naked before me.

“You don’t need to be here, Carmen,” I told the young woman pointedly. “If there is something you must speak to me about, you can do so with clothing on. You certainly don’t have to show me your body.”

Carmen blushed and then fidgeted for a moment before glancing over at Ruba. Ruba met her gaze firmly.

“Get in the tub, Carmen,” Ruba commanded the young Puerto Rican woman. “Jake won’t bite you, I promise.”

Carmen hesitated for a moment and then she did as Ruba told her. She climbed over the lip of the big tub, and then she settled herself into the warm water, seating herself beside Ruba and as far away from me as she could.

“What’s going on here, Ruba?” I asked bluntly, a frown marring my face. “You know I don’t like games.”

“I know,” Ruba responded softly and in an apologetic manner, “and I’m not really playing a game with you, or with Carmen. I’m just trying to get her to relax. She has issues, particularly around the men, and I was hoping to help her get beyond those issues, and at the same time have a chat with you.”

I continued to frown for a few minutes, glaring with annoyance at Ruba. She had the decency to look away. Her face had coloured with embarrassment and the knowledge that she’d pissed me off.

While I looked at Ruba I wondered what she was on about, concerning Carmen. I had some thoughts on the topic and they came to mind quickly. Carmen was Roman Catholic and she’d probably been brought up in a strict manner, particularly in relationship to flaunting her charms in public. I could understand that. I could also understand where Carmen might be resistant to flaunting her charms around a bunch of brawny cavemen. She was a lesbian, and the last thing she wanted was to attract a man’s attention, deliberately or otherwise. I mused about that for a moment and wondered about Ruba’s relationship with Carmen. I knew that Carmen was in a relationship with Lottie, but I didn’t know whether or not that relationship was monogamous. Even if it wasn’t it didn’t explain why Ruba felt that Carmen needed to push her boundaries. I wondered a bit more and then came to a conclusion. I glanced at Carmen who was looking very embarrassed by the cold silence that had fallen on the room, and then I glanced at Ruba who was trying to meet my gaze, while biting her lower lip and peering at me through the corner of her eye.

“You shouldn’t have done this,” I told Ruba bluntly. “Carmen isn’t like you or me, or most people in our community. She was raised in a different world, and with different customs. You should have accepted that. Yes, she needs to learn to fit into our community, but this isn’t something that she must learn to do. You, of all people, should have understood this. Did I force you to conform to my ways when you came to our community, or did I let you be?”

“You let me be,” Ruba admitted in a soft, almost childlike voice, still avoiding my gaze. “I’m sorry, Jake.”

“I’m not the one you need to apologize to, Ruba,” I declared sternly. “You need to apologize to Carmen.”

Ruba turned her face to Carmen who looked at her, a bit frightened from what I could tell, although not a hint of sympathy in her gaze.

“I’m sorry,” Ruba murmured softly, before leaning into the young woman and kissing her tenderly on the lips. “I should have known better.”

Carmen slipped an arm about Ruba and held her, whispering softly to her as she did. I decided it was time to leave.

“No!” Carmen said in a startled voice as I started to stand up to leave. “We still need to speak to you.”

I hesitated momentarily, and then I sank back into the water which wasn’t as warm as it had been before.

“All right,” I told them both, “but the water is getting cool, so you’d best make this quick. Besides, if you really needed to speak to me, you could have spoken to me earlier. This was never necessary.”

“I know,” Ruba responded weakly, her voice filled with regret, “and I’m sorry, both to you and Carmen, Jake. I didn’t think. We should have spoken to you earlier. I just thought ... well you know what I thought, so we don’t need to speak about it anymore. We did however come here for another reason, as Carmen has pointed out. I want Carmen to join the women training to fight. I think she should be our medic.”

“Trona is your medic,” I stated bluntly, my voice sharp and cold. “You know this already, Ruba. She’s been training with you for over a month.”

Ruba dropped her gaze again at my chastisement of her for her request. Her face coloured as did Carmen’s.

“I know,” Ruba admitted a few seconds later in an apologetic manner, “but Trona is still young, and she’s never been through what we might expect to encounter out there fighting the bad men. Carmen has. It would be better for us if she came along as our medic.”

I was tempted to snap back that few in the two squads of women had experienced what could be encountered out there in the real world fighting Quantum, but I didn’t. At the last moment I realized the statement wasn’t completely true. Ruba and the women from Ohba’s old village had definitely experienced the chaos of coming under attack. Their experience was probably one sided and all had been taken prisoner, but they did have some experience. I didn’t want to insult her on that point. I still wasn’t ready to let Carmen join their fighting force.

“No,” I stated firmly. “Trona is your medic, and that is that.”

“But Carmen is a better medic,” Ruba protested as I moved to get up and leave the tub.

“No,” I told her sharply, standing and stepping out onto the woven mat that stood beside the tub. “That is final.”

“I’ll do anything to go with you, when you go in the spring to face Winslow,” Carmen interjected in a voice filled with trepidation. “I swear it.”

“I said, ‘no, ‘“ I told her as I took a towel down off a hook and I started to dry myself, “and I don’t want you ever to make me that offer again. I don’t expect anything from you, Carmen, but your cooperation. Now I’m tired, and I’m going off to bed. This conversation is over.”

“But...” Carmen stammered frantically, shifting in the tub to stand up to face me. “I want revenge, too.”

I paused at that point. I was in the process of tying on my loincloth. I stopped and looked at the young woman. By then Ruba had stood as well and she had Carmen in a comforting embrace, holding her from behind. I noticed that Carmen was crying. Seeing her like that I let out a sigh.

“I will think about it,” I told Carmen plainly, “but do not get your hopes up. Trona is the medic for the women, and I don’t wish to change that. I will think about your request. I am, however, very disappointed in Ruba at the moment. What she did today shows bad judgment, and that is something a leader cannot afford to develop in their character. I might have to rethink who will lead the women. I will talk to both of you, tomorrow. Good night!”

I grabbed my clothing then, and I essentially stormed out of the bathhouse and I headed off to my bedchamber. I found my women there, chatting in a low voice as not to disturb our children whose beds lay to one side of our room, or Ezra who was nursing at Gabby’s breast. All of them looked up at me when I came in.

“What’s wrong?” Clara and Kim asked almost the same time.

I told them about my encounter with Ruba and Carmen. I wanted to vent, but I really couldn’t, not with the children there and Ezra tanking up for the night. The women listened to me politely and with an understanding gaze.

“Ruba should have known better,” Clara declared with an exasperated tone in her voice. “I’ll have a word with her. In fact, I think all the women will have a word with her. This can’t happen again.”

“I feel sorry for Carmen,” Gabby interjected in a low voice. “She’s actually a very nice young woman, and she’s been helpful minding the children, particularly when we’ve practised the evacuation drills. The kids actually like her and listen up when she speaks to them. She didn’t need to be embarrassed like that.”

“Ruba didn’t think,” I muttered softly, shaking my head at the same time. “I couldn’t blame her deep down, even though I was angry, once I figured out what she was up to with Carmen. You’ve got to admit, I was pretty much in people’s faces back when we first got here. I received public blowjobs, and we kept the cave awake on several occasions with our lovemaking. She saw it and accepted it like most of the tribe did, assuming that what we did was normal for our people. She didn’t think it was normal just for us, and she didn’t take Carmen’s feelings into consideration. That is something I can’t forgive.”

“She needs to be punished,” Clara declared firmly, glancing at the other women as she said it. “I just don’t know how. We certainly don’t want to spank her.”

That actually caused a titter amongst the group, with smirks appearing on the faces of the women sitting with me on the bed. All of them knew that Ruba enjoyed a firm hand from time to time during lovemaking. I was going to say something about it, but Kim spoke up first, changing the topic slightly.

“You’re right about that, we can’t physically punish Ruba,” Kim agreed fighting back another smirk as she spoke, “and I don’t really have an idea about how we should discipline Ruba at the moment, given our community make up. But, I’d like to talk about Carmen for a second. I do think it would be good to let her serve as a medic.”

“I don’t know about that,” I stated bluntly. “She wants revenge, which to me means putting a weapon in her hands. I can’t allow that, regardless of how often she’s pledged to be a good member of our tribe.”

“And I disagree,” Katherine said speaking up for the first time since I’d told everyone what had happened. “I’ve seen Carmen about this place. She really has been working to fit in, unlike others that I’m not going to point out at the moment. I think you should give her a chance to prove herself.”