Chapter 375

The Prison Planet

After having arrived back at the cave with a full rolling case of lima beans and peas, plus a few carrots and onions, Morales booted his computer to make sure he knew how to preserve the latter two vegetables. After reading the article again, he sat back with a grin on his face. Turning to 2214's version of a wolf, "With carrots and onions mixed in, our stews this winter will taste a lot better, Lobo." Looking at the rolling case nearby, he continued, "I have a lot of shelling to do, but ... what if it rains? There were a lot of peas and beans that had dropped on the ground under the plants and ruined. I suspect that was caused by the rains. We managed to get most of the mature beans and peas that remained on the stalks, but what if there are other vegetables out there? From the scientists' description of their 'seeding' project, I suspect there is much more hidden in those weeds."

His eyes focused on Robinson's rolling case, now Morales' second case. "I don't want to even think about wading around in all those weeds with them wet." Making up his mind, he came to his feet. "We've been getting regular rains, and if the cycle continues, the next one is already overdue. Let's check out some more of that valley, Boy. If we manage to get another case full of veggies before it rains, I will have plenty to do preserving them while the valley dries out again."

After handing the wolf a couple of handfuls of jerky for him to start on, he stuffed some in his own mouth while putting more into his pockets. Continuing the one-sided conversation, he mumbled around the jerky, "To save time, we'll eat as we head back to the valley. If we do find more vegetables, it will be pushing it to pick them and get back before dark the way it is."

Lobo gobbled his food, as always, and was ready to go. A quick trip to the spring to fill a canteen with cool water and they were off. Morales had developed the habit of taking a shovel with him everywhere he went with the case, spending some time on the worse spots if he thought he would return using the same route, but he was in a hurry this time so just ignored the areas he was tempted to smooth out.

As they hurried along, he spoke to Lobo. "I'm going to make sure we get more of the carrots and onions while we're there. I have no idea whether we'll find anything else or not. As they say, 'Better the bird in hand rather than two in the bush, '" he told the wolf as he altered his direction slightly so they could stop by the onions and carrots first.

Both were easy to collect. The onions were mostly just sitting on top of the ground with little more than their roots in the sandy soil. Carefully lifting the whole plants, he shook most of the soil off each onion before putting it, plant intact, into the case.

The carrots were a little more difficult to get, but not much. Most didn't look exactly like the ones he bought in the grocery store, but were rather shorter and thicker, and ... they had a sweeter taste. Unlike the onions, he did not take the whole plant, but instead, cut the foliage off just above the carrot itself as the article said, winding up filling the case a third full with the two vegetables. Now if I can successfully preserve them, I'll be in business, and from what I read in the article, all I have to do is weave the tops of the onion plants together and hang them in a dry, dark place. I'm supposed to cut the top off the carrots and layer them in rotted sawdust. I don't have any of that, but I'll try straw and see what happens.

There were more carrots and onions, but he wanted to see what else he could find. After leaving the area, Morales continued to parallel the wandering little stream that seemed to describe the outside of a smaller "L" shaped area of this section of the mile-long valley. Here, similar to where the carrots and onions were, there weren't as many tall weeds. Soon, he came upon another area with a different type of plant. Bending down to check out the low plant, he discovered that the ground was cracked under it much as it was with the potatoes when the tubers were fully grown. Digging a little in the sandy soil, he let out a chuckle as he unearthed a cluster of the tubers. "Sweet potatoes. Something I never liked that much unless it was Mom's candied sweet potatoes that she made from time to time. I don't have a lot of sugar, so that's out, but these things are food. Hell, I think they can even be roasted in the hot coals like a regular potato. If I'm hungry enough, they'll taste damn good no matter how they're fixed." Looking around, he added, "And there seems to be a lot of them."

After rearranging the contents of his case, he loaded the back half with sweet potatoes, only to find another area a little farther along with regular potatoes similar to the ones he had harvested by the spring.

He wasn't foolish, or greedy enough to overload the case in this sandy soil, so he decided not to gather any of the regular potatoes this trip. The steep hill below his cave was challenging enough without overloading the case with two of the heavier vegetables.

A hundred yards farther along, he came to a densely overgrown field of what was obviously corn. "Shit, I love boiled corn slathered in butter with a little salt sprinkled on," he told Lobo. But after a search, he realized that the corn was fully mature, its leaves brown and dry, and the kernels on the ears dried and hard. "I guess it's too late in the season," he told his friend. "Oh, well, we'll have something to look forward to next year." As he and Lobo pushed through the tangled mess of corn stalks, weeds and vines, in many areas the foliage taller than Morales' head, the wolf obviously heard something. Before Morales could stop him, Lobo charged into the vines, flushing out five big birds – well sort of. Cackling and squawking, and with a hard flapping of wings, they took flight, but they leveled out about ten feet off the ground. It was soon evident they were headed for an apple tree a hundred and fifty feet farther away. Moments later, they practically crash-landed in the bigger limbs, still squawking and obviously irritated at the wolf.

"Son-of-a-bitch," Morales muttered. "Chickens!" Granted, they were unlike the chunkier chickens he had seen on TV. These looked to be taller and thinner with a nice combination of several colors blending into each other, particularly on the rooster. Its head, like the hens', was a fairly bright red, the neck, like part of the chest and back, was a brilliant white. Its back and belly seemed to be a blend of blacks, browns and reds with the rear end and tail an intense, shiny black. The hens were much drabber in appearance, their colors muted and their tail feathers much shorter, but they tended to adhere roughly to the basic color scheme of the proud rooster who reared his head back and crowed raucously. For chickens, they were perfect specimens of a healthy breed, and to Morales who wanted eggs to go with his bacon, they were beautiful.

In the hope that he might eventually find chickens, turkeys or some fowl that laid eggs, he had taken the time to read a lot about chickens and turkeys. He was fairly certain that the chickens that Lobo had flushed most closely resembled the breed of game chickens of Earth that were frequently used for fighting cocks, but seemed, as was frequently the case on 2214, to be quite a bit larger than their Earth cousins.

"Son-of-a-bitch. Eggs!" he almost shouted as the biggest grin he had mustered in a while split his face. Now where in the hell would they lay their eggs? he thought as he looked around at the tangle of grass and weeds, the area bordering a group of apple trees of a different variety than the ones he had already harvested. Then aloud, "Nests. Chickens have fucking nests, don't they? If I had a place for the chickens near the cave, I could have eggs any time I wanted. But how in the hell do I find where they lay their eggs in all this mess, and how can I keep the chickens close to my cave – if I somehow manage to catch some?"

Fences? Chicken houses? All were concepts he knew little about, and he had no real knowledge of how chickens were kept. He remembered seeing something on TV about the inhumane treatment of laying hens. Something about them being kept in cages barely large enough for the hen to sit, let alone stand or move around in.

Dammit. The early pioneers had chickens, didn't they? How in the hell did they keep them? Bet they didn't have wire fences easily available back then. Think Morales. Think.

He stood staring at the chickens as they sat in the branches of the apple tree staring back at him. "Shit," he muttered, "They damn sure don't look concerned that they're in danger of me catching them. Hmmm. I guess they wouldn't have survived out here if they were easily caught. But dammit, where there are chickens, there have to be eggs."

Lobo, apparently realizing that his master was interested in the chickens, began following the scent trails that the wandering birds had left as they sought out their food in the cornfield. Morales followed along, wondering what Lobo was after. Fifty feet later, Lobo suddenly burrowed into the vines, going completely out of sight, although Morales could see the brambles shaking some twenty feet away as the wolf continued on. Suddenly, there was a squawking and fluttering in the mess. After a few seconds, Lobo came back out to flash his tooth-barring grin at his master.

After staring a moment, he whined and turned back into the brambles. A couple of seconds later, he was back. After whining again, he went a short distance into what was becoming a tunnel he had begun to open in the mess of weeds and vines. Quickly returning, he stood looking at Morales all but shouting, "Come on, Idiot."

That presented a problem. No way could he crawl into the dense brambles with a bow slung over his shoulder, not to mention the two quivers and the crossbow he always carried. Looking around to check for danger again, he stood undecided while Lobo stared at him and whined. Slowly, looking at Lobo all the while, he stripped himself of his weapons, but retained his crossbow. I know you're smart and you know what my weapons are for. With a sigh, he knew he had to make a final decision. Lobo has searched the area. If there were danger here, he would tell me. If he can't smell anything dangerous, and neither of us can see it, I'm going to trust him and leave my bow and quivers here. I won't be entirely unarmed. I still have three extra bolts on the quiver mounted on the crossbow, and the crossbow is going with me.

On hands and knees, Morales followed Lobo into the brambles. In the denser places, he had to crawl, his crossbow constantly having to be untangled from vines as he made his way behind the wolf. Some thirty feet in, Lobo came to a halt just as the squawking commenced again. As Morales made his way around the wolf, he was suddenly looking at a nest made of small branches, leaves and inner down feathers from the very pissed off hen that was now staring back at him.

Things remained at the squawking stage until he reached a hand out to slide it under her in an effort to determine how many eggs she was sitting on. He had read that on Earth, a setting hen might peck you a few times, but this was 2214. She was bigger, meaner and meant business. No interloper was going to steal her babies. They were eggs to the human, but babies to the hen. The eggs were all fertilized, of course, so in the not distant future, if left alone, they would, indeed, be baby chicks.

Morales quickly found out about the bigger and meaner, and he also learned the hard way that the chickens' beaks on 2214 were not nearly as blunt as Earth chickens were. She had no problem penetrating the skin as she slammed her sharper beak into the back of his hand.

"Oooww. Shit!" he hissed out as he snatched his hand back dripping blood, the hen making a puck, puck, pucking sound as she stared him eye to eye while fluttering her wings.

"Fuck it," he growled. "If I can't have a look at your eggs, I'll take your ass instead. Hell, that's a better idea, anyway."

Reaching out, he grabbed for the hen ... and the fight was on. He was trying not to hurt her. She had no such concerns or limitations. She was fighting for her babies and was going for the kill.

This is a fucking chicken, he kept telling himself as her beak beat a bloody tattoo on his hands, and before he could get them in front of his face, she had managed to get him just above his left eye, with an even deeper gouge in his left cheek. And ... she wasn't quiet while the battle raged. He never knew a chicken had such volume or was capable of making the sounds this one did. Lying on his belly in the tunnel he had forced through the brambles restricted his movements, but the hen had plenty of room. While she was assaulting him, he did manage to get a look at her nest, but he certainly didn't have time for an accurate count as he tried to protect his face and eyes. His best guess was a half dozen or so eggs.

Reaching out with both hands, he managed to grab her, but he didn't have the best hold on her. Her wings were bigger and stronger than he expected, and she used them to thrash his face. Spitting feathers, he finally managed to gain some control of her wings. Coming to his knees despite the brambles cutting into his head and back, he held her against his chest long enough to wrap his hands and arms around her, finally gaining full control of her wings and feet, having learned the hard way that she had spurs on the back of them, said spurs having left a long scratch on his already-abused left cheek.