Chapter 2: the Protectors

The man finished reading the first chapter that he learned as a child. Standing in front of the children dressed in his normal camouflage pants and a loose fitting buckskin shirt, he could tell the children were a little intimidated by his appearance. Standing just a shade over six feet tall, his shoulders seemed unusually wide tapering down to his narrow hips. His pitch-black hair was neatly cut into a flat top and his hazel eyes looked like two pieces of flint. "Any questions?"

A child about ten years old raised his hand and asked, "Are there other people besides us Mister Buck?"

The man smiled. "Yes, we've seen people beside ourselves, but none I'd want to bring home with me."

Still waving his hand, the boy persisted, "What about the rest of the world Mister Buck?"

The man answered, "I believe there must be more than just our little patch of land still good on this big old earth."

A little girl up front queried, "Then why haven't we heard from them Daddy?"

A movement to his right caught the man's eye prompting a smile on his rugged face. "I think I'll let your real teacher answer that darling" he said with relief.

"Leaving so soon sweetie?" teased the beautiful redhead as she walked up.

"Aw come on Betsy!" Buck whispered softly. "You know I hate speech making." Turning his back to the children, "I'm no dang historian, I barely stayed awake myself when I was in this class."

Nudging him in the ribs to the children's delight she countered, "I seem to remember you getting all A's in history honey."

Flustered at her teasing, his fingers lightly touched the black grips of the matched pair of Glock 24 pistols on his hips. "These do my talking now, and they don't stutter."

Deciding she had tortured her husband enough, she let him off the hook. "All right children, shall we let Mister Buck get back to his real job?" As Buck passed in front of her, she leaned over and pecked him on the cheek, whispering "Thank you."

As Buck walked away he heard his daughter Wendi ask, "Where did all the mutants come from and why are they so mean?" Buck suppressed a shudder thinking of the bear-like abomination he fought the day before.

He was returning with his best friend Tex from elk hunting. They were carrying the elk carcass between them on a sapling tree they had cut down. It weighed close to four hundred pounds, and they had carried it over two miles already. Starting to tire, but not wanting to stop, Buck glanced back to see how Tex was holding up under the strain of the carcass.

Tex stood five feet ten, and preferred his blonde hair a little longer than Buck's. At the moment it partially covered his green eyes. A tight fitting camouflage undershirt stretched tight across his upper chest and biceps. His powerful muscles were bulging underneath the weight of the carcass. Buck thought there was only one man in the Sanctuary that could match Tex's strength, and that was Bear, another member of their squad. Tex wore a matched set of Smith & Wesson model 629 revolvers. They were stainless .44 cal. magnums with carved grips of elk horn. And like Buck, Tex had an S.O.G .43 combat knife in each boot.

His thoughts were interrupted when Tex asked, "Did you take a bath recently Buck?"

Suddenly wary, he abruptly came to a halt. "What's that crack for?" Buck retorted. Then he smelled it too. A sickening stench, that came from only one thing, a mutant!

Most animal mutants were a deformation of a normal animal. Then there were the others, the E.D.M.'s short for Environmentally Diseased Mutations. From the time they came out of the mother's womb, the mutant's skin started to decompose. Their flesh started to rot and flies would bury their eggs inside the open wounds. The E.D.M.'s carried a disease resembling the horrific flesh-eating virus of the Old World.

There were two ways the E.D.M.'s transmitted the deadly virus. One was their bite injecting their saliva into a person's bloodstream and the other was their blood itself. If an E.D.M. attacked another animal and it's blood contacted an open wound, inevitably that animal would turn into an E.D.M. Always in torment from the maggots eating away inside their bodies, the mutants were beyond simple reasoning. While a normal animal would shy away from man, mutants would attack anything that moved including their own kind. The saving grace was that their rotting flesh produced such a terrible stench, that it served as a warning when a mutant was near.

Dropping the elk, Buck levered a .44 cal. round into the Winchester 94 that he fondly called Betsy after his wife.

"Where's it at?" whispered Tex.

Buck scanned the forest on either side of the path and shook his head. "I can't tell, but if we can smell it it's got to be close."

A branch snapped to their right, as a bone-chilling roar reverberated through the woods. Huge pieces of brush were tossed into the air, the smaller trees tops were swaying back and forth as something forced it's way towards the men. Whatever was out there was coming and it was Big!

Putting their backs to a large pine tree, the two men waited for the charge of the mutant. Emerging though the dense undergrowth announcing its rage was some kind of bear. Tex's astonished mouth fell open. It was an E.D.M.! The abomination stood close to twelve feet tall with two slathering heads! The enraged snapping heads were filled with razor sharp teeth, and its massive paws displayed four-inch claws. It was indeed a sight straight from hell. Buck yelled, "Go for the head!"

Tex raised his M16 and exclaimed, "Which head?" Hearing no response from his friend, Tex shrugged, firing his M16 at the first head that snapped at him. The slugs only infuriated the mutant, who was swatting the bullets like so many bees.

Buck sighted along the barrel of Betsy and fired, watching the mutant's head snap back. Enraged the monster moved towards the two men, swinging it's pulverizing claws and snapping with its heads. Both men nimbly kept out of the mutant's reach, splitting up to bewilder the monster. After jumping aside to avoid another swipe, Buck saw his rear gun sight had slid down! "Damn!" He looked past the bear and saw Tex was in trouble. The mutant had cornered him against a stand of pine trees! "Hey you ugly varmint!" yelled Buck, trying to draw the animal's attention away from Tex. One head glanced back at him snarling; but the other head and the rest of the body ignored Buck. Giving up on using the rear sight, Buck twisted his model 94 at an angle, looking down the side of the barrel he opened up. Levering shot after shot into the bear's head, as he circled to his friend's side. The mutant took another swipe at Tex, clipping him on the right shoulder and the side of the head. Tex went flying into Buck, sending them both to the ground. Buck ended up on the bottom, with Tex lying across his stomach. "Damn!" yelled Buck. "Get the hell off me Tex! That dang varmint is coming again." No reply came back, and Buck realized the tremendous blow had knocked Tex out.

Shit! He thought. We're lying on the tracks and the train's coming in. Hearing the Monstrosity roar, he knew it was charging in to finish them off. Move! His mind warned. Where the hell did Betsy land? Allowing himself a quick look, he located the mutant only twenty feet away barreling down on him. His eyes spotted the Winchester ten feet behind him; he'd never make it. Sitting up his hands flashed down and out with a Glock in each hand, firing both at the same time he unloaded both guns into the mutant barely slowing it down.

A flash of green camouflage caught his eye, and then he heard the sweet thunder of a .50 cal. machine gun firing. The E.D.M. rocked under the impact of the 710 gr. slugs tearing through its snarling head and chest. It stumbled, and then with one last roar of hatred, fell tumbling to land at the gun owner's feet.

It seemed like an eternity, when in fact it only took about 20 seconds before the machine gun grew silent. "Lying down on the job again Buck?" quipped a deep voice. A black hand picked the unconscious Tex up like he was a rag doll.

"I had that varmint right where I wanted him Bear." Buck responded, looking up at the huge black man dressed in camouflage from head to foot.

Bear stood six feet ten inches, weighing close to 280lbs and was solid muscle. Like the real animal, Bear could move quietly through the woods with almost no sound. There was only one person more adept at stealth than Bear, and he was the fourth member of their squad. Bear was just his nickname given to him by his parents. His real name was Barney but his parents started calling him Bear when he was about three because the amount of food the child could put away and still be hungry was staggering. He was truly always as hungry as a ... well you know. So the name had stuck. A pair of SOG jungle knives was belted around his waist, boasting fourteen-inch razor sharp curved blades. Weighing slightly over two pounds each, they were lethal weapons in the big man's hands.