Chapter 11

Supper came around by and by, but tonight there was no sex play. We'd all done too much work today to be feeling frisky. As we settled into the furs Reela and Keela both had a surprise for me though.

"Good night, Jack," they said, at the same time, and then giggled.

I gave all my harem girls a good kissing, just to keep up appearances, and then we settled down to sleep.

My bladder woke me up with everyone else this morning and I was glad of it. I didn't want to get a reputation for being a lazy ass. Of course my main job in the morning was going to the pisser, but still, I wanted to look like I was at least doing something.

I was a little surprised when Mecha came over early to talk with Mary. The tea wasn't quite ready yet, but I went inside and brought out a couple more lawn chairs. One for Mary and one for Mecha. Of course I already had mine outside because I'd been lazing in it when Mecha arrived.

Mary came over to join us and she brought mugs of hot tea when she did. I didn't bother she and Mecha while they were talking shop, but I could see Mary was explaining the sewing she'd done yesterday. After a minute she went in and fetched five of the curved needles like she'd used for the job.

Mary called Reela over to help translate and then spent several minutes showing Mecha how this trick worked. I was fascinated myself, but realized right away a clinical discussion of the process was far removed from actually sewing a wound back together on a living squirming human.

The lesson went on for nearly an hour. When Mecha asked what the spray on stuff had been by holding her arm out and mocking the process as she'd seen it, Mary fetched the pump bottle and gave Mecha's arm a light fogging. Mecha just looked at her arm for a few minutes, no doubt wondering what the deal was.

Suddenly, Mary gave Mecha's treated skin a sharp pinch. Of course Mecha didn't feel anything, or not nearly as much as she'd expected. She yelped a little in surprise and then looked at Mary like she was a Goddess come to earth. To head off hero worship Mary had Reela spray a spot on Mecha's other arm, and later Reela gave the pinch demonstration.

The teaching was going well and that was fine. My worry was how much of the medicine Mary had, and how long it would last. Finally I asked her about it.

"Poppies."

"What?"

"Poppies. We'll have to find some poppies and extract opium, morphine, and codine for pain relief. You don't have to use it full strength. It can be used topically also and it can be injected. We'll have to make do for other things but if we gather enough of the poppies we shouldn't have any shortage of pain relievers."

"But that stuff is addictive," I said.

"Almost any pain reliever can be, but it isn't magic. You don't get addicted from medical use, and since I'm sure I'll be the only one who knows how to prepare it there won't be much of a problem.

"I have a pretty good supply of other medications, but they will run out sooner or later. Thank goodness I was very interested in home remedies for a couple of years. I think if we get settled I might even be able to make a crude sort of penicillin. We had to do it for a lab experiment once. Of course we didn't give it a real trial, but I think I remember how it was done. No doubt we'll end up with plenty of infections to experiment on," she said.

I didn't know how I felt about that, but I'm sure she was right. If someone came up with an infection after the medicine Mary had on hand ran out, they'd be much better off with an experiment than an amputation.

Thoughts along those lines let me realize we wouldn't be best served living in a wooden hut with a dirt floor. We needed a cave we could secure, and could eventually get fairly clean. Living with this group was working out fine for now, and it was helpful for both parties.

"Mary, can you or Chris communicate well enough with Reela and Keela to ask them if they know where there are any caves? We're in the foothills of those mountains now, and some of the nearby peaks are fairly high. I wonder if there are any caves nearby," I said.

"We're ahead of you on that. There is a big cave less than five miles from here. It will be a problem though," she said.

"What problem?"

"It is occupied by Cave Bears. Keela says several of them hibernate in it every year," she said.

"How many is several?" I asked, though I knew even one was close enough to several.

"Keela says there are five adults and three yearlings in it this year. There could be some newborns by now too."

"That is several, considering their size it's more than plenty to be a problem. I still want to see it though. I want to go right now. Can we do it?" I asked, since I knew every one of them would want to come along.

I wasn't wrong about that either. Chris, Mary, Reela, Keela, and even Mecha demanded to come. Mary loaded every Extreama2 we had with slugs. I loaded all the Barretts' extra magazines, strapped on the Wildey, the 44 Mag Smith and Wesson, and both my Glocks, and Chris loaded both thirty ought sixes and both seven millimeter mags. We carried so many guns we needed to take a sled to tow the overflow.

As we loaded the sled others in the camp watched with unabashed curiosity. Even Jockat kept up a watchful eye. I wasn't keeping it a secret but I'd rather the rest of them not come with us. I didn't want to have to be careful to keep from shooting one of them. Thankfully none of them came up and asked to join us until right at the last.

Kemela didn't exactly ask to join. Apparently she was Mecha's helper, apprentice, student, or something. Mecha let her know she'd be coming too. I had a lot more sense than to argue. Beside, Kemela was another raving beauty, albeit a young one. Male chauvinist pig that I am, I was hoping she'd walk in front of me so I could spend a little quality time ogling that fantastic ass she was almost showing. It was enticing even though it was covered with the fur on the outside winter clothes most of them wore.

Thinking about Kemela's ass reminded me that Mecha had a beauty of her own. Somehow I hadn't seen an ugly woman anywhere in the camp, and it made me wonder how they'd cropped up centuries later. The ugly women that is. All the ones I'd seen here and now looked great. Of course some looked better than others, and I seemed to have fallen in among them somehow. It didn't make me feel bad or anything.

As we walked I wondered about it some. I'm sure part of their attraction was the excellent physical conditioning. There wasn't a way in hell for any of them to end up fat. They had to work too hard just to stay alive. That didn't explain the generous size of all the titties I could get a hint about, but something was obviously going on in that department too.

My voyeurism helped pass the time until we reached the cave, but after we had, the sight of it got all my attention. At least the outside and the area around it did. The entrance was up a shallow slope from a small stream that ran across the bottom of the tall hill, or short mountain I guess you'd say. It wasn't more than three or four hundred feet to the top but it must have been more than a mile around the lower circumference.

It wasn't really a circumference though since it molded itself into an even larger peak on the back side, and the one behind it joined an even larger one behind it. Still, the entrance to an obvious cave was apparent. The opening was easily twenty to twenty-five feet across and seemed to be half a semicircle into the mountain. Things looked excellent so far.

There were plenty of large trees scattered around near the opening and my first job was convincing the women they needed to get up into the trees. If something came chasing me out of the cave I wanted them in place to start blasting anything that came out behind me. Reela, Keela, Mecha, and Kemela didn't need to be close since they weren't armed. That didn't mean they didn't want to be, and they found their own trees to keep me from making them move farther out.

When everything was squared away I walked to the entrance and went inside with the Wildey in one hand and a powerful flashlight in the other. One of the Barretts was leaned up against the nearest tree outside and the other was in similar position about fifty yards farther out.