War

Day Thirty-six, 8:49 AM

I had just reloaded the rifle, when three more of the Neanderthals stepped around the building. I was surprised by what was in their hands, but I moved before they did! I grabbed both girls and hurled them to the ground, as the Neanderthals opened fire. Rolling to the right, I was trying to bring my rifle up, when Jane opened up with her Marlin. The first man went down. I fired twice, and the last two men flew backwards as the rounds hit them.

"Get in the cave and close the door!" I shouted.

I ran for the barn as two more men stepped around with M-16s. I fired before they could spot me. The first one flew backwards and Jane and I both hit the second one. The girls ran for the door, and slipped inside.

I ran down the length of the barn and peeked around the building. Bakai was lying on the ground, groaning. A knife was in her stomach.

Looking around, I saw three more of the Neanderthals running away. Taking aim at the first one, I fired. He went flying as the bullet hit him in the spine. The other two continued running. I let them go, as they were out of range. I looked around for any more danger.

I looked slowly around for any movement. Not seeing anything, I knelt beside Bakai and checked her over. She was crying in pain.

I touched her cheek and said, "Bakai! Hold on, love. I will get you into the cave and Jane will help you."

Stepping to the corner I saw Jane, Charlene and Kari standing there with AK-47s. I shouted out to them.

"I NEED HELP!"

They came running, and I watched for any more surprises, when they reached me, Jane handed me her AK-47, and knelt beside Bakai, while Charlene stripped the weapons off of the dead. Naomi and Kat ran outside, and over to us. They helped with removing the guns and ammo off of the dead, while I turned to Jane.

"James, carry her to the RV, I have my surgical set up inside the garage part," Jane said as she stood up and took her gun back, and my M-1.

I bent down and gently lifted Bakai. We walked swiftly to the garage. We stepped in, and Charlene and Kari slammed the doors closed as we walked over to the RV. Naomi was already lowering the tail of the RV and I walked right up and set her on the sterilized table. Charlene came in behind me, and went into the living area with Jane, where they stripped down and pulled on surgical garb. I was running my fingers along Bakai's cheek and I kissed her.

"James. Out!" Jane said as she came in and went to the glass medicine cabinet and pulled out a vial and needle. Turning she hit the button on the garage door.

I nodded my head and walked down the rising ramp as it started rising. It snapped shut after I had exited, and the AC came on. I went into the house to change as the girls gathered to wait for some word about Bakai. I went to the bathroom and cleaned up.

Coming out, I checked with the girls and nothing was heard yet, so with Naomi, Kari's and Kats help I lowered the first of the two ultralights. We pushed it out the door. I then went back to the armory. I came out with a backpack of hand grenades, two of the AK-47s, a web belt, ten clips, a hand held radio, and a pack with three MREs in it. Handing the three empty canteens to Kari she took off as I went to the plane. I loaded the rifles and hung one on the left side of the seat. I placed the other in the passenger seat. I draped the strap over the back of the seat to keep it in place. Both would be in easy reach when I flew the plane. I placed the pack on the back of my seat. The grenades went on the passenger seat and I put the seatbelt through the backpack's straps.

Kari came back and handed me the canteens. I stuffed them in the pack. I kissed each one of the girls.

"I love you all," I said. "Do what Kari says until Jane comes out. I have the radio set for channel three. The base is set for the same. I will also have the helmet phone on. If everything goes ok, I should be back in about an hour."

"Kill them, James. Finish this and come back to us," Kari said.

"Love you, Daddy," Noka and Kai said at the same time, as David and Donna hugged my legs. Returning the hugs, I kissed all of them and shooed them back inside. Pulling the door closed, I went to the ultralight, and climbed in. It had been years since I had flown one, but the controls were similar to the one I had flown before. Starting the engine, I pressed the throttle to full. I quickly began moving down the asphalt road that Kalib gave us.

I reached take off speed, lifted off into the air and started climbing. I was keeping an eye out for any of the giant birds that had attacked me before, as I gained altitude. I was over the river and had just reached one hundred feet.

The view was breathtaking. The waterfall to the north plunged over eight hundred feet to the valley floor that we lived in, and the rainbow was huge.

Banking south, a frown came to my face as I flew over the forest and headed for the ramp we had come down, after rescuing David and Donna. I knew that was where they had to have come from, but the question was, how fast could they run? I climbed to over five hundred feet above the ground. I pulled the binoculars out of the case that was pre-attached to the side of the pilot's chair, and looked down. I was scanning but couldn't see them as I flew along. Turning more southerly, thinking they had come from further down the valley, I flew until I spotted movement. I focused on the two men running. I dove down towards them as I pulled the right side AK-47 off of the chair.

Taking aim, I fired at the first man and missed as they separated. Banking around I took aim for one that was running for the forest and fired again. The second burst missed and I flew back around and dropped to the deck. The man was running all out and I fired. One of the rounds from the burst clipped him in his leg and he went down hard. Coming back around, I reached over and pulled one of the grenades out. I dropped it as I flew by. The explosion picked the man up and hurled him several feet as I went past him.

With a snarl I said, "That's one of you fuckers."

I turned the plane and changed the clip, then banked around. I headed back towards the other one, and looked for him. I flew over the ramp, and he wasn't on it so I dropped altitude, and went looking over the plains. I zigzagged as I searched for ten minutes, and I couldn't find him.

Unknowingly, I had over flown him three times while I was looking. He was lying between some boulders along the cliff wall. He watched me fly away.

I turned and scouted down the valley. As I flew along, I spotted a side valley and decided I would check it out.

I would later call it the Valley of Bones, after what I found. Flying over the valley floor, I saw hundreds of skeletons, from mastodons to buffalo. Even the grass looked sickly.

I was about half way down the valley when I almost crashed into the ground. Sitting in the middle of the valley was the shattered remains of what looked like an American A-4E Skyhawk aircraft. I recognized the plane because I had built one. What confused me was all the death. I dropped lower, and flew over the aircraft. That was when I noticed the large bomb, which was broken into several pieces. Everything that was around it, was dead.

I knew what the bomb was, because I had seen enough of pictures of them with my dad being in the Navy, stationed onboard a carrier. I was looking at a B43 nuclear warhead. How it got here, I didn't know. However, I did notice that the fourteen-foot weapon was broken into three pieces.

Banking hard, I climbed and headed back down the valley, with a prayer that I hadn't gotten a dose of radiation. I banked south, with a shiver going down my back, and flew out into the main valley.

I was still looking for trouble and keeping an eye on my fuel gage when I spotted the next pair of valleys. Turning, I went up and over a small outcropping of rock and into the first valley.

I noticed smoke in the distance, and overflew the first of five camps of Cro-Magnons. They were pointing at me and thrusting up into the air with their spears but I ignored them. Turning, I flew back out of the valley and darted south again towards the other valley entrance.

Going in, I noticed the valley was narrower and the wings barely fit through the opening as I flew. The valley entrance twisted and turned, eventually I broke out into a valley that was very large and I started scouting it. There were lots of fruit trees growing here. They looked like apples, oranges, and some pear trees. The girls would love fresh fruit, as some looked ready for picking. Flying towards the northern section I flew over what I thought was grass but was about nine feet tall and realized it was wild corn.

Dropping down to ten feet I was looking at the hundreds of ears of corn when I jerked the wheel back and climbed quickly. I just missed what was a tail of a plane sticking out of the cornfield and I circled around. Looking down, I spotted five TBM Avenger torpedo bombers and a PBM-5 Mariner sitting in the center of the corn. They looked brand new and I wished I could land and examine them, but there was no place to do so.

As I continued circling, I spotted the remains of another plane further up the valley and I flew over to it. I saw that it was a giant cargo plane. The hull looked intact, but the tail and the wings were snapped off. The engines were missing, and I wondered what had happened to them. Turning, I headed back to the entrance and out over the main valley.

Turning a little south, I flew out and over the lower valley. I spotted thousands of animals and about a dozen tribes of Neanderthals and Cro-Magnons. I flew back up over the encampment, and another waterfall that was about a hundred feet high. Flying up the river, I spotted more game and more danger in the form of tigers, lions and several saber tooth tigers. I was flying towards home when the radio crackled to life.

"James, are you ok?" Jane asked.

Pressing the mike on the helmet I responded, "Yes, I am. How's Bakai?"

"James, it will be touch and go for awhile. I haven't done surgery on a human patient in years, but I think she will be ok. We just have to keep her in bed," Jane said.

"Thank God. I got one more of the bastards, but one got away," I said.

"Ok, we will deal with it when we can. Find anything?" Jane asked.

"You're not going to believe the shit I just found. I'm landing, be there soon," I said as I brought the plane down on the road.

Taxiing up to the cave doors, the dogs were going ballistic. I knew I needed to take them out and let them run and play. Shutting the engine down, my family came out to greet me. I kissed each of my wives and then held my children. I noticed all the adults were carrying firearms. I approved! I was going to make sure everyone knew what they were doing with them.

Handing the guns and grenade back to Kari, I said, "Take this to the armory for me. I want to see Bakai."

"Sure, love," Kari said.

"Forget it," Jane said. "She's sleeping and I want her to sleep. I'm glad Kalib supplied some fake blood for us. She needed three bags of it while I sewed up her insides."

"Fake blood?" I asked.

"Yes, it's some type of chemical that works like human blood. Kalib gave us five boxes of 500 units of them. The good thing is, it doesn't have to be refrigerated. You just add water with a syringe, and shake it. Then you hook it up to a person and it's like whole blood," Jane repined as we walked into the garage.

"Cool, I'm glad he supplied it," I said as I thought to myself, 'Now if we can get him to clean up the radiation in one of the valleys, I would be even happier.'

We walked into the RV, and I peeked in at Bakai. She was sound a sleep with Charlene sitting beside her, reading a book.

Charlene smiled at us, and I walked over and kissed her. I kissed Bakai on her forehead, and we walked out to let her heal.

We went out and I said, "She looked so weak."

"James, she was badly hurt. I just wish I had better medical equipment, but I didn't think of getting medical equipment just for us. I grabbed equipment that could work on both animals and humans," Jane replied as we walked out of the RV and headed for the living area.

Sitting down in the living room, I held Bakai's children when they climbed onto my lap. The kids fell asleep, as I started talking.

"Jane, we have a major problem," I said.

I moved Noka off my lap and then did the same to Kai. Covering both of them we went over to the other couch and sat down. I booted up my laptop computer, which was sitting on the coffee table.

"What type of problem?" Jane asked.

"There is a valley to the south of us, it is filled with dead animals, I guess you could call it the Valley of Bones," I replied as I brought up a picture of a B54 nuclear weapon.

"What would do that?" Kari asked as she brought over a pitcher of lemonade and glasses.

"This," I said as I turned the screen so they could see the picture.

Both of them looked at the picture, and Jane's skin went pale under her tan as she looked at me.

"Yes. A nuclear bomb. And there is an airplane crashed right beside it," I said.