{{{{{SIGH}}}}}}}
I even tried whining and begging on the main...........to no avail.
Story Zombies Aren't Real ... Are They?
- Thread starter Kathy in FL
- Start date
{{{{{SIGH}}}}}}}
I even tried whining and begging on the main...........to no avail.
I'm getting more than a little frustrated trying to decode whatever the heck I did to The Linder Legacy so I thought I'd post on this story.
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Part 147
“Carp!”
“Why doan chu jes kill it and then take the juevos … eggs? No more ouches. Them ducks jes nasty.”
I looked at Miguel and asked him, “What makes the eggs?”
I got a look like he thought I was crazy. “Huh?”
I tried to explain why I asked even though to me it was obvious. “What makes the eggs? The duck. If I kill the duck to take these eggs – just because she’s cranky – then she won’t make eggs for me to take another time.”
He gave me a funny look and then I could tell that the switch flipped and he got it. “Ohhh. So you get bit but not so bad ‘cause it gives you eggs. I get it now.”
“Good. ‘Cause I don’t want you boys coming down and killing the ducks just ‘cause you’re hungry. I said it once already and Carlos still did it anyway. I’ll feed all of you … but only if all of you follow the rules.”
The rules. It was kinda hard to get the boys to understand new rules, especially ‘cause they complained about the ones they already had to follow. Doubly especially because the new rules were coming from a girl. But after a couple of days I earned their respect and it wasn’t so bad. Most of the time. Teaching them not to pee all over the place was still a chore but Kevyn finally got them to understand … but only after he said if they couldn’t follow the rules I wouldn’t cook. I don’t care what language they speak or where they’re from, boys will do just about anything to keep their belly from growling. The fact that I could feed them from “weeds” and “monsters” ranked pretty high though eventually I was able to convince them that there weren’t any monsters in the woods except for puss brains and they weren’t really monsters but sick people that had no self-control. The more they understood something the less they feared it … just like me.
I tried to show them stuff that would help them understand things. It wasn’t always easy and I had to get rough with them a few times until they understood I wasn’t kidding that not all mushrooms and berries were good to eat. I told them to stick with the things that I showed them and leave the rest alone, they’d stay alive longer that way.
We ate a lot of cattail hash but that was ok. It filled the corners and so long as it had a little taste of meat in it they seemed to not mind too much learning to eat knew things. The yampa root was something else that helped keep us all fed; and keeping us all fed was really turning into work. But it was worth having to get creative. Keeping the boys fed helped Kevyn maintain control and teach them tactics and stuff they didn’t get in training what little bit of time they were at their bases. That kept Kevyn from being so aggravated all the time … at the boys for sitting around doing nothing but getting into trouble and because of worrying over the things that put him in charge of them in the first place.
And since Kevyn wasn’t aggravated or sensitive about his leadership stuff I was able to get some work out of the boys that helped me out. I let them go on thinking that’s all they were doing but pretty quickly Kevyn figured out what was up. At least he wasn’t bent out of shape over it.
He came over to sit near where I was preparing yet another meal to fill the bottomless pits. “You know they call you Little Sister.”
I shrugged. “I kinda figured. Ralphealito told me what Hermanita meant. It’s no big deal. I’m short. The more I squawk about it the more they’ll pick at me over it.”
“So it doesn’t bother you?”
Thinking it over I told him, “Not as long as they don’t get too silly. Too silly will bother me and I’ll knock them on their tail. I don’t want to hurt their boy pride so I’ll ignore it if I can. They just better not make it so I can’t ignore it.”
“Yeah ok. Just checking. Thing is Ralph … well, he gets it even if the others haven’t figured it out yet. Or maybe some of them have and that’s why they call you Sister. They know someplace in their heads that you’re taking care of them … maybe just now how much.”
“Uh …”
“Ralph came to me and we talked. It’s pretty obvious once you see it. You’re teaching them survival skills … the kind that the militia doesn’t have time to teach them, that they are supposed to learn on the hoof out here in the bush only there’s been no time to learn that stuff.”
Rather than deny it I told him, “It’s a trade. They help me stock up for winter quarters and I teach them stuff in exchange. Even stevens.”
He half-grinned. “Sure. And we’ll just keep letting ‘em think that. If they don’t think of it as lessons then they won’t fight learning it. Thing is … it’s a good idea. One of the things that I worry about is one of the ‘em getting lost or whatever … getting cut off from the group. These guys do better than good in an urban setting but out here … they’re just about nothing but bait. It’s what some of the adult militia groups use us for. If my guys had to make it on their own without back up or resupplies they’d be toast real fast. I’m … I’m not real sure I would have been able to take care of them all if we hadn’t found your camp.”
“Look it’s no big deal. I had people that taught me. I guess … I guess I’m paying it forward. Besides it helps me too. More of us that can take care of ourselves the fewer of us get turned into puss brain chow.” Getting uncomfortable with the touchy feely carp I added, “Let’s just drop it ok?”
“Sure. Just … wanted you to know that at least me and Ralph see it … and … and appreciate it.”
I shrugged and returned to what I had been doing and Kevyn went off to break up an argument that turned out to be about some bet over a race between beetles of all things. Boys. Geez.
What I had been doing is taking the arrowroots and yampa roots the boys had helped gather about a half mile upstream, peeling them, cubing them, and then cooking them in boiling, salted water. After they cooked tender I drained them and then cooked them in a dry pan to evaporate the excess liquid that was left; didn’t take long, only about a minute with the pan over the flame. Then I took them off the fire and added a little milk made from my dwindling powdered milk supply, a little olive oil since I was out of butter powder, and then two tablespoons of mashed wild horseradish the boys had found without my help. I creamed all of that together to the consistency of mashed potatoes. It would have been better with real cream and butter but I’ve learned to be thankful for what I do have and work with it.
For our meal the boys had been responsible for catching their meat and since they all choose to practice snares and got squirrels I showed them how to clean and spit roast their catch, save the drippings, and make a kind of pan gravy with it. It wasn’t anything my mother would have ever fixed but no one went to bed hungry, at least not that night.
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Part 147
“Carp!”
“Why doan chu jes kill it and then take the juevos … eggs? No more ouches. Them ducks jes nasty.”
I looked at Miguel and asked him, “What makes the eggs?”
I got a look like he thought I was crazy. “Huh?”
I tried to explain why I asked even though to me it was obvious. “What makes the eggs? The duck. If I kill the duck to take these eggs – just because she’s cranky – then she won’t make eggs for me to take another time.”
He gave me a funny look and then I could tell that the switch flipped and he got it. “Ohhh. So you get bit but not so bad ‘cause it gives you eggs. I get it now.”
“Good. ‘Cause I don’t want you boys coming down and killing the ducks just ‘cause you’re hungry. I said it once already and Carlos still did it anyway. I’ll feed all of you … but only if all of you follow the rules.”
The rules. It was kinda hard to get the boys to understand new rules, especially ‘cause they complained about the ones they already had to follow. Doubly especially because the new rules were coming from a girl. But after a couple of days I earned their respect and it wasn’t so bad. Most of the time. Teaching them not to pee all over the place was still a chore but Kevyn finally got them to understand … but only after he said if they couldn’t follow the rules I wouldn’t cook. I don’t care what language they speak or where they’re from, boys will do just about anything to keep their belly from growling. The fact that I could feed them from “weeds” and “monsters” ranked pretty high though eventually I was able to convince them that there weren’t any monsters in the woods except for puss brains and they weren’t really monsters but sick people that had no self-control. The more they understood something the less they feared it … just like me.
I tried to show them stuff that would help them understand things. It wasn’t always easy and I had to get rough with them a few times until they understood I wasn’t kidding that not all mushrooms and berries were good to eat. I told them to stick with the things that I showed them and leave the rest alone, they’d stay alive longer that way.
We ate a lot of cattail hash but that was ok. It filled the corners and so long as it had a little taste of meat in it they seemed to not mind too much learning to eat knew things. The yampa root was something else that helped keep us all fed; and keeping us all fed was really turning into work. But it was worth having to get creative. Keeping the boys fed helped Kevyn maintain control and teach them tactics and stuff they didn’t get in training what little bit of time they were at their bases. That kept Kevyn from being so aggravated all the time … at the boys for sitting around doing nothing but getting into trouble and because of worrying over the things that put him in charge of them in the first place.
And since Kevyn wasn’t aggravated or sensitive about his leadership stuff I was able to get some work out of the boys that helped me out. I let them go on thinking that’s all they were doing but pretty quickly Kevyn figured out what was up. At least he wasn’t bent out of shape over it.
He came over to sit near where I was preparing yet another meal to fill the bottomless pits. “You know they call you Little Sister.”
I shrugged. “I kinda figured. Ralphealito told me what Hermanita meant. It’s no big deal. I’m short. The more I squawk about it the more they’ll pick at me over it.”
“So it doesn’t bother you?”
Thinking it over I told him, “Not as long as they don’t get too silly. Too silly will bother me and I’ll knock them on their tail. I don’t want to hurt their boy pride so I’ll ignore it if I can. They just better not make it so I can’t ignore it.”
“Yeah ok. Just checking. Thing is Ralph … well, he gets it even if the others haven’t figured it out yet. Or maybe some of them have and that’s why they call you Sister. They know someplace in their heads that you’re taking care of them … maybe just now how much.”
“Uh …”
“Ralph came to me and we talked. It’s pretty obvious once you see it. You’re teaching them survival skills … the kind that the militia doesn’t have time to teach them, that they are supposed to learn on the hoof out here in the bush only there’s been no time to learn that stuff.”
Rather than deny it I told him, “It’s a trade. They help me stock up for winter quarters and I teach them stuff in exchange. Even stevens.”
He half-grinned. “Sure. And we’ll just keep letting ‘em think that. If they don’t think of it as lessons then they won’t fight learning it. Thing is … it’s a good idea. One of the things that I worry about is one of the ‘em getting lost or whatever … getting cut off from the group. These guys do better than good in an urban setting but out here … they’re just about nothing but bait. It’s what some of the adult militia groups use us for. If my guys had to make it on their own without back up or resupplies they’d be toast real fast. I’m … I’m not real sure I would have been able to take care of them all if we hadn’t found your camp.”
“Look it’s no big deal. I had people that taught me. I guess … I guess I’m paying it forward. Besides it helps me too. More of us that can take care of ourselves the fewer of us get turned into puss brain chow.” Getting uncomfortable with the touchy feely carp I added, “Let’s just drop it ok?”
“Sure. Just … wanted you to know that at least me and Ralph see it … and … and appreciate it.”
I shrugged and returned to what I had been doing and Kevyn went off to break up an argument that turned out to be about some bet over a race between beetles of all things. Boys. Geez.
What I had been doing is taking the arrowroots and yampa roots the boys had helped gather about a half mile upstream, peeling them, cubing them, and then cooking them in boiling, salted water. After they cooked tender I drained them and then cooked them in a dry pan to evaporate the excess liquid that was left; didn’t take long, only about a minute with the pan over the flame. Then I took them off the fire and added a little milk made from my dwindling powdered milk supply, a little olive oil since I was out of butter powder, and then two tablespoons of mashed wild horseradish the boys had found without my help. I creamed all of that together to the consistency of mashed potatoes. It would have been better with real cream and butter but I’ve learned to be thankful for what I do have and work with it.
For our meal the boys had been responsible for catching their meat and since they all choose to practice snares and got squirrels I showed them how to clean and spit roast their catch, save the drippings, and make a kind of pan gravy with it. It wasn’t anything my mother would have ever fixed but no one went to bed hungry, at least not that night.
Siskiyoumom
Veteran Member
Thank you!
I appreciate both of your stories that are ongoing here.
I appreciate both of your stories that are ongoing here.
Part 148
For almost a month Kevyn and his patrol had been using my camp as their base. He’d take them so far in a direction and then return. They were never out more than two nights running and usually only then if they got caught in a storm not worth traveling in or if they were hunting things up to bring them back to camp like the time they’d found a plane that had gone down and salvaged a lot of stuff out of it though it was more “stuff” than food. Kevyn brought me back a bunch of little liquor bottles that had booze of all types in them and told me to hide them in my private stash that I kept hidden as he didn’t want the boys to be tempted to do anything that he’d have to make them regret. He said it was bad enough when they had gotten into the soda pop.
“I had to stop for the night just so the fidgets could die down. They were so high on caffeine and sugar they could barely walk straight.”
It was funny and it wasn’t. It did illustrate how much things had changed for kids since the puss brains had come on the scene. Before it would have been nothing for most kids to inhale tons of pop and candy in a day with no obvious side effects. After Kevyn told me that the boys had acted like drunk monkeys I had to wonder how I would have acted in their place … that’s assuming I would have been dumb enough to inhale a couple cans of pop in one sitting. All I could think of was the horrified look on my mom’s face if I had enough thought about doing it.
Another time they brought back enough saplings and rocks for me to finish out the dugout and start another one. That trip Kevyn had made them do it because a couple of them had gone off on their own to investigate a pond and nearly got eaten by a bear. They brought back the bear too and it was the biggest one that I’d seen in the area. Made me concerned that the bears here would be as bad as the ones in the Northwoods.
Kevyn’s patrol covered the points on the compass twice before they ran into another enemy patrol. They won the battle but every one of the boys came back with some kind of injury though most were minor. The one serious injury was little Miguel. Kevyn carried him almost the entire way back himself, refusing to let anyone else even try. I think we all got to see just how serious Kevyn took his job as their leader and for some it was a shock to realize that Kevyn actually cared about them as something other than small soldiers.
It took me over an hour to try and do what I could for Miguel and to do it I finally had to shoo all the boys off to do something besides bang into my elbows every time I moved.
“Kevyn …”
“I know. We need a real medic.”
There wasn’t much more to be said. It would have been stupid to get bent out of shape over the truth. To survive you have to be a realist. I can do a lot but I’m not so arrogant that I can’t admit there is also a lot I can’t do. And fixing what was wrong with Miguel was one of the things I couldn’t do.
Kevyn and the patrol had … well they’d won about like that had against the first enemy patrol that had attacked our camp but the men they skirmished with that time had automatic weapons and been better at using them. Kevyn said they were almost real soldiers though not quite.
Miguel had been caught as one of them sprayed the perimeter with one of their fancy guns and he hadn’t been able to move fast enough to get out of the way. He took a bullet in the meaty part of his thigh and another in the calf of the same leg. He’d lost a lot of blood before the battle had ended. We were doing our best to keep infection away but he needed fluids and it was hard for the boy to keep them down because he was in so much pain he was constantly nauseous.
We were lucky in that the boys had been able to bring back all the supplies from that group despite their own injuries – they’d dumped all the bodies of the enemy down a deep ravine after they had stripped them of anything useful. In the supplies was some of that powdered sports drink carp. It had been so long since I’d drank a sugared drink that I nearly heaved after a couple of sips but Miguel seemed to get about his only relief from that nasty stuff.
After a couple of days I told Kevyn, “Let’s try signaling one of those Red Cross helicopters again … or hospital or medic helicopters … whatever they are.”
“They might not be ours. There were reports that the enemy were using captured aircraft to make it look like they were the good guys.”
“So we signal them away from camp and get set just in case. Miguel needs more than we can give him. He’s stabilized but he isn’t getting any better. One wrong move … like a cold or another shock or something and he could go downhill fast.”
And that’s what we tried. For three days running. And never, not once, did they acknowledge they’d seen us though there is no way that they could have missed the mirror message Kevyn had been sending as you could see if reflecting off the cab of the helicopter of the ones that flew low enough. They never stopped, wavered, jiggled their wings, or even flipped us the bird. Nothing.
Being realistic is one thing, but that doesn’t mean you don’t get angry. Some times that angry helps. It’s got me going a few times when I needed the extra energy. But just as often it winds up getting in the way. That time it was the anger that almost got us killed.
For almost a month Kevyn and his patrol had been using my camp as their base. He’d take them so far in a direction and then return. They were never out more than two nights running and usually only then if they got caught in a storm not worth traveling in or if they were hunting things up to bring them back to camp like the time they’d found a plane that had gone down and salvaged a lot of stuff out of it though it was more “stuff” than food. Kevyn brought me back a bunch of little liquor bottles that had booze of all types in them and told me to hide them in my private stash that I kept hidden as he didn’t want the boys to be tempted to do anything that he’d have to make them regret. He said it was bad enough when they had gotten into the soda pop.
“I had to stop for the night just so the fidgets could die down. They were so high on caffeine and sugar they could barely walk straight.”
It was funny and it wasn’t. It did illustrate how much things had changed for kids since the puss brains had come on the scene. Before it would have been nothing for most kids to inhale tons of pop and candy in a day with no obvious side effects. After Kevyn told me that the boys had acted like drunk monkeys I had to wonder how I would have acted in their place … that’s assuming I would have been dumb enough to inhale a couple cans of pop in one sitting. All I could think of was the horrified look on my mom’s face if I had enough thought about doing it.
Another time they brought back enough saplings and rocks for me to finish out the dugout and start another one. That trip Kevyn had made them do it because a couple of them had gone off on their own to investigate a pond and nearly got eaten by a bear. They brought back the bear too and it was the biggest one that I’d seen in the area. Made me concerned that the bears here would be as bad as the ones in the Northwoods.
Kevyn’s patrol covered the points on the compass twice before they ran into another enemy patrol. They won the battle but every one of the boys came back with some kind of injury though most were minor. The one serious injury was little Miguel. Kevyn carried him almost the entire way back himself, refusing to let anyone else even try. I think we all got to see just how serious Kevyn took his job as their leader and for some it was a shock to realize that Kevyn actually cared about them as something other than small soldiers.
It took me over an hour to try and do what I could for Miguel and to do it I finally had to shoo all the boys off to do something besides bang into my elbows every time I moved.
“Kevyn …”
“I know. We need a real medic.”
There wasn’t much more to be said. It would have been stupid to get bent out of shape over the truth. To survive you have to be a realist. I can do a lot but I’m not so arrogant that I can’t admit there is also a lot I can’t do. And fixing what was wrong with Miguel was one of the things I couldn’t do.
Kevyn and the patrol had … well they’d won about like that had against the first enemy patrol that had attacked our camp but the men they skirmished with that time had automatic weapons and been better at using them. Kevyn said they were almost real soldiers though not quite.
Miguel had been caught as one of them sprayed the perimeter with one of their fancy guns and he hadn’t been able to move fast enough to get out of the way. He took a bullet in the meaty part of his thigh and another in the calf of the same leg. He’d lost a lot of blood before the battle had ended. We were doing our best to keep infection away but he needed fluids and it was hard for the boy to keep them down because he was in so much pain he was constantly nauseous.
We were lucky in that the boys had been able to bring back all the supplies from that group despite their own injuries – they’d dumped all the bodies of the enemy down a deep ravine after they had stripped them of anything useful. In the supplies was some of that powdered sports drink carp. It had been so long since I’d drank a sugared drink that I nearly heaved after a couple of sips but Miguel seemed to get about his only relief from that nasty stuff.
After a couple of days I told Kevyn, “Let’s try signaling one of those Red Cross helicopters again … or hospital or medic helicopters … whatever they are.”
“They might not be ours. There were reports that the enemy were using captured aircraft to make it look like they were the good guys.”
“So we signal them away from camp and get set just in case. Miguel needs more than we can give him. He’s stabilized but he isn’t getting any better. One wrong move … like a cold or another shock or something and he could go downhill fast.”
And that’s what we tried. For three days running. And never, not once, did they acknowledge they’d seen us though there is no way that they could have missed the mirror message Kevyn had been sending as you could see if reflecting off the cab of the helicopter of the ones that flew low enough. They never stopped, wavered, jiggled their wings, or even flipped us the bird. Nothing.
Being realistic is one thing, but that doesn’t mean you don’t get angry. Some times that angry helps. It’s got me going a few times when I needed the extra energy. But just as often it winds up getting in the way. That time it was the anger that almost got us killed.
naturallysweet
Has No Life - Lives on TB
Woo-hoo! My zombie story is back. Thanks Kathy!
SairieBelle
Member
Thank You. Thank You. Thank You. moar please?
sssarawolf
Has No Life - Lives on TB
Thank you Kathy was great to read some more of this story.
Part 149
Anger makes you do stupid stuff. Even if it isn’t stupid it can be careless. We’d all been so angry about the helicopters not responding to our pleas for help that we got sloppy. We still had guards but we weren’t as focused as we should have been. You can’t just be careful when you are on guard duty, you have to have it in your head that you are on duty all the time and to be careful.
Ralph came running back into camp almost dragging a bigger boy named Jorge who was so pale he could have passed for white when normally you had trouble seeing him in the dark.
“Infecteds! Muy Infecteds!! Esto viene camino rápido!!”
I couldn’t understand all of it but basically he was saying a lot of infected coming in fast. I grabbed my bat and then wasted precious seconds trying to remember what to do next. The other boys froze until Kevyn and I got our own brains going straight and kicked them in gear, some of them literally. Between anger and depression we’d let our guard down too much. The boys had learned to deal with puss brains better but I hadn’t taken into account how afraid or superstitious they would still turn when faced with a large number of them all at the same time.
I was dousing the fire when I heard the first man trap go off.
“Hermanita! Hermanita!” the boys called wanting me to hurry and climb to the safety of the trees. And I would have only as I turned I saw that it wasn’t just puss brains running out of the trees but boys wearing the same type of uniform as Kevyn’s patrol. At first glance I almost mistook them for some of Kevyn’s patrol until I noticed these were all beat up.
“Help them get into the trees but watch out in case any of them have been chomped on!” I shouted as I started swinging my bat.
It was gruesome work but Kevyn quickly got his boys organized and they joined in, pulling the new arrivals into the trees as well as the uninfected adults who were mixed in with them. The adults turned out to be a mixture of militia and active duty personnel though I didn’t know it at the time.
It was dark so we all had to be careful. It was hard to see despite the bright moonlight and despite swearing otherwise some of the adults had been chomped and were on the fast train to turning infected. Found out later that a couple of the medic types from the military personnel had set up an inspection point in one of our platforms in the trees and were clearing people or turning them over to personnel that … that dealt with them if they refused to deal with their problem themselves.
A couple of times I barely pulled my swing in time to keep from killing someone not infected. A few times bullets came so close I had to dig out splinters out of my cheek and neck the next morning. Then in a patch of moonlight I saw them. They’d been covering the rear until a flock of infecteds had come and turned the caravan of mixed personnel into chaos. Two were limping badly and they were practically carrying a third while the fourth tried to cover their escape. Even with everything going on around me I heard the dry click as their guns ran empty.
I didn’t think, not really. The lessons of the city were too engrained. You didn’t let a friend get chomped. I don’t remember much of the next little bit and what I do remember I pray I eventually get around to forgetting. What I do remember is Kevyn and Ralph coming to help and then blasting away with some of the weapons they’d taken from the last enemy patrol they had encountered. They were powerful weapons and Ralphealito was nearly knocked off his feet the first few times he pressed the trigger. They cut down anything in their path after it was confirmed that anyone behind their position was infected one way or the other.
We were finally all up in the trees and I taught the new folks how to use our rope bridges and swings to get from platform to platform. Miguel and the worst of the new wounded were laid out on two of the biggest platforms we had built and the medics were tending to them. As morning broke we started to pick off the infected one at a time until Sgt. Shelly ordered, “Leave ‘em. Give those a$$***** behind them something to deal with until air support can get here and blow them ******* right the **** up.”
She was swearing through her pain. She was senior of the personnel still conscious and able to issue orders. Lucy and Josie were banged to heck and back and looked like carp but it was Gayle that looked the most shell shocked and pretty much spoke for all of them when she muttered, “Well I’ll be dipped in ****. We’d given you up for dead Pip.”
“Why?”
“The evac team said you weren’t at camp.”
“There was an evacuation?”
Josie sat up enough to grab my hand. “Yeah. Yeah, we … we wouldn’t have just left you.”
They all seemed kinda shook to see me so I told them, “Well, no evac team or whatever ever came here. This is the same camp we set up. I’ve been here the whole time watching your spare gear. I promised that I would you know. I’d never go AWOL after I gave my word.”
Josie just shook her head and they all kept looking at me like I was a ghost. I told them to get some rest as I had to go check out Kevyn’s patrol and make sure all the boys were accounted for and then probably have to help him get the new ones settled down.
It was Lucy who asked, “Whose Kevyn?”
“Guy who leads one of those militia patrols made up of young boys. That’s him over there,” I told them pointing to where I saw Kevyn looking on the ragged edge of crazy as he tried to deal with twice the young boys he normally did. I turned to look at them all and said, “I’ll get you fed just as soon as I make sure the boys aren’t going to panic. They can handle a few puss brains at a time but flocks like this kinda set ‘em off.”
Josie snorted and said right before passing out that, “This one hasn’t done much for me either.”
Anger makes you do stupid stuff. Even if it isn’t stupid it can be careless. We’d all been so angry about the helicopters not responding to our pleas for help that we got sloppy. We still had guards but we weren’t as focused as we should have been. You can’t just be careful when you are on guard duty, you have to have it in your head that you are on duty all the time and to be careful.
Ralph came running back into camp almost dragging a bigger boy named Jorge who was so pale he could have passed for white when normally you had trouble seeing him in the dark.
“Infecteds! Muy Infecteds!! Esto viene camino rápido!!”
I couldn’t understand all of it but basically he was saying a lot of infected coming in fast. I grabbed my bat and then wasted precious seconds trying to remember what to do next. The other boys froze until Kevyn and I got our own brains going straight and kicked them in gear, some of them literally. Between anger and depression we’d let our guard down too much. The boys had learned to deal with puss brains better but I hadn’t taken into account how afraid or superstitious they would still turn when faced with a large number of them all at the same time.
I was dousing the fire when I heard the first man trap go off.
“Hermanita! Hermanita!” the boys called wanting me to hurry and climb to the safety of the trees. And I would have only as I turned I saw that it wasn’t just puss brains running out of the trees but boys wearing the same type of uniform as Kevyn’s patrol. At first glance I almost mistook them for some of Kevyn’s patrol until I noticed these were all beat up.
“Help them get into the trees but watch out in case any of them have been chomped on!” I shouted as I started swinging my bat.
It was gruesome work but Kevyn quickly got his boys organized and they joined in, pulling the new arrivals into the trees as well as the uninfected adults who were mixed in with them. The adults turned out to be a mixture of militia and active duty personnel though I didn’t know it at the time.
It was dark so we all had to be careful. It was hard to see despite the bright moonlight and despite swearing otherwise some of the adults had been chomped and were on the fast train to turning infected. Found out later that a couple of the medic types from the military personnel had set up an inspection point in one of our platforms in the trees and were clearing people or turning them over to personnel that … that dealt with them if they refused to deal with their problem themselves.
A couple of times I barely pulled my swing in time to keep from killing someone not infected. A few times bullets came so close I had to dig out splinters out of my cheek and neck the next morning. Then in a patch of moonlight I saw them. They’d been covering the rear until a flock of infecteds had come and turned the caravan of mixed personnel into chaos. Two were limping badly and they were practically carrying a third while the fourth tried to cover their escape. Even with everything going on around me I heard the dry click as their guns ran empty.
I didn’t think, not really. The lessons of the city were too engrained. You didn’t let a friend get chomped. I don’t remember much of the next little bit and what I do remember I pray I eventually get around to forgetting. What I do remember is Kevyn and Ralph coming to help and then blasting away with some of the weapons they’d taken from the last enemy patrol they had encountered. They were powerful weapons and Ralphealito was nearly knocked off his feet the first few times he pressed the trigger. They cut down anything in their path after it was confirmed that anyone behind their position was infected one way or the other.
We were finally all up in the trees and I taught the new folks how to use our rope bridges and swings to get from platform to platform. Miguel and the worst of the new wounded were laid out on two of the biggest platforms we had built and the medics were tending to them. As morning broke we started to pick off the infected one at a time until Sgt. Shelly ordered, “Leave ‘em. Give those a$$***** behind them something to deal with until air support can get here and blow them ******* right the **** up.”
She was swearing through her pain. She was senior of the personnel still conscious and able to issue orders. Lucy and Josie were banged to heck and back and looked like carp but it was Gayle that looked the most shell shocked and pretty much spoke for all of them when she muttered, “Well I’ll be dipped in ****. We’d given you up for dead Pip.”
“Why?”
“The evac team said you weren’t at camp.”
“There was an evacuation?”
Josie sat up enough to grab my hand. “Yeah. Yeah, we … we wouldn’t have just left you.”
They all seemed kinda shook to see me so I told them, “Well, no evac team or whatever ever came here. This is the same camp we set up. I’ve been here the whole time watching your spare gear. I promised that I would you know. I’d never go AWOL after I gave my word.”
Josie just shook her head and they all kept looking at me like I was a ghost. I told them to get some rest as I had to go check out Kevyn’s patrol and make sure all the boys were accounted for and then probably have to help him get the new ones settled down.
It was Lucy who asked, “Whose Kevyn?”
“Guy who leads one of those militia patrols made up of young boys. That’s him over there,” I told them pointing to where I saw Kevyn looking on the ragged edge of crazy as he tried to deal with twice the young boys he normally did. I turned to look at them all and said, “I’ll get you fed just as soon as I make sure the boys aren’t going to panic. They can handle a few puss brains at a time but flocks like this kinda set ‘em off.”
Josie snorted and said right before passing out that, “This one hasn’t done much for me either.”
WOOOOOOOO HOOOOOOOOO
Part 150
Before I could get far I ran up against those medics but lucky for me there was a distraction that helped me slip the noose they were trying to put on me.
I told them in no uncertain terms that, “I am not stripping in front of all these people just so that you can check for chomp marks. Even if I was inclined I don’t have the time. I’ve got to check on the boys and then get some food going. I’m the cook.”
“The hell you are,” snapped a growly voice from behind me.
I turned and then groaned, “Limmer. My luck hasn’t changed at all.”
“Yeah and just who …,” he started to snap before swallowing the wrong way, coughing and then whispering, “Hoooollllllly hell.”
“Oh carp on that. If you want to feed the adults be my guest except I’ll take care of MY patrol. AND I’ll take care of the boys.”
Not too put off by my own irritated growl he asked, “Now just how the **** do you think you’re gonna do that?”
Already pulling over one of the swings we had set up I told him off handedly, “Two trees over is a metal sink. It’s bolted to some of that flame resistant junk that comes out of planes … which is where the sink came from too. We’ve had to use it a few times. Have to keep the fire small but we can heat enough water to make a decent soup. If you can just help me convince Sgt. Shelly to let the boys take out the infecteds that wander too close to the creek I’ll show you. I don’t want the water source contaminated if it isn’t already.” The contamination was something I was already worried about.
“I heard that,” Sgt. Shelly sighed. “We are low on ammo. We can’t afford …”
“We’ll snare ‘em and spear them. The boys have gotten pretty good at it. If you want I’ll pass the word along to Kevyn.”
“The … the leader of the boy’s patrol?” she asked, obviously trying to muster the energy and concentration that she needed now that her adrenaline was going down and her injuries were feeling even worse.
“Yeah, he’s real good at making sure the boys do what they need to do.”
“Show me.”
I sighed thinking that it was a waste of time and she should have just let me tell him to do it. I swung over and Kevyn got it fast. “Sure. It’s a new technique. Sounds weird even to me and we’ve been doing it for a couple of weeks now. ‘Sides, you always have to prove a new technique works to someone that’s never seen it … especially if it comes from bottom of the command chain instead of the top.” He turned and then scowled before turning back to me. “These new guys are really green; greener than my guys ever were. They say they’re from up in Oregon and … well they’re just really green.”
“If I feed them will they shut up?” I asked referring to all the blubbering the new boys were doing.
Kevyn winked then turned back and dead serious told the new boys, “You want to eat you do what she says. You mess with the cook and you’ll be lucky to see food before you get back to your base. Got it?” They stared at him wide eyed then at me but they nodded.
Kevyn took Ralph, Jorge, and a couple of the other boys and left the rest to “encourage” the new boys to behave and tow the line. Frankly the new boys looked almost more scared of Kevyn’s patrol than they did of the infecteds that wandered below the trees they were sitting in though they looked scared enough of them when they glanced down.
“OK, first there aren’t going to be any crybabies. You gotta do it then do it on your own time and where other people can’t see you. Crying might have been ok when you were a boy back home but out here it is a distraction none of us need if we are all going to survive. Second, I don’t feed people that have snot bubbles coming out of their noses and I don’t even want to know what on their hands. Jorge, set up a wash station please and make sure they scrub … even under their fingernails. Show them how to use a twig to do it if they complain they can’t get ‘em clean … they still complain then use your blade and then they can blubber to a medic if they get nicked.” The boys’ eyes got wider. “Third … food ain’t free. You want to eat you follow the rules and you do your share. I ain’t your momma or your slave. Got it?”
It took a moment and a nudge from a couple of Kevyn’s boys but they all finally nodded. “Good. Start by picking up all this carp laying all over the place. Gear flung every which way is a tripping hazard and I’m not going to explain to the medics why some dope of a kid tripped over his gear and landed on his head to become puss brain chow. Now move.”
I heard one of the boys whisper, “What’s a carp?”
Jorge snorted and said, “She means your junk man. Hermanita don’t swear. She says things like ‘carp’ instead of crap or ****. Just go with it. Ain’t so bad once you get used to it. Besides, she cooks good. A man can put up with a lot so’s long as the cook knows what she’s doing.”
Slowly they started to do what I’d left for them to do and I used another swing to get over to the “cooking platform” that Ralphealito and a couple of the other boys had cobbled together for me. I needed the space. Jorge was fourteen and really full of himself. I tolerated him but that was about all. He got stupid with me once … and once was all it took. I told him he’d be walking funny the rest of his life if he tried it ever again. Since he knew what I was capable of by then he suddenly decided to respect the boundaries and we didn’t have any more trouble. He’d never be someone I wanted to be around but he’d learned to respect me and stopped giving me grief.
I was starting some coals when a soldier swung over and asked, “The medics want to know what you are using for water. Almost everyone barely has a swig left in their canteens.”
I slapped my forehead. “Geez. I didn’t think. You see that rope that’s tied off on that third branch? Yeah, that one. Don’t untie it but follow it to the pulley and then … yeah, you see the arm the boy’s rigged? Pull that arm and that barrel will swing this way. Be careful, we just refilled it yesterday and it’s going to be heavy. It’s full of potable water.”
“Treated water?”
“Put through a gravity filter and then boiled … no chemicals though. I ran out of those little pills.”
“We’ve got some. Is this all the water there is?”
“No, there’s three other barrels but they’re strapped to another tree and camouflaged. I’ll get ‘em when we need ‘em. I have some other water containers but they’re down in my dugout and … do you want to go get ‘em?”
“No,” he said sardonically. “I do believe this will be sufficient to our needs.”
“That’s what I thought too.”
Before I could get far I ran up against those medics but lucky for me there was a distraction that helped me slip the noose they were trying to put on me.
I told them in no uncertain terms that, “I am not stripping in front of all these people just so that you can check for chomp marks. Even if I was inclined I don’t have the time. I’ve got to check on the boys and then get some food going. I’m the cook.”
“The hell you are,” snapped a growly voice from behind me.
I turned and then groaned, “Limmer. My luck hasn’t changed at all.”
“Yeah and just who …,” he started to snap before swallowing the wrong way, coughing and then whispering, “Hoooollllllly hell.”
“Oh carp on that. If you want to feed the adults be my guest except I’ll take care of MY patrol. AND I’ll take care of the boys.”
Not too put off by my own irritated growl he asked, “Now just how the **** do you think you’re gonna do that?”
Already pulling over one of the swings we had set up I told him off handedly, “Two trees over is a metal sink. It’s bolted to some of that flame resistant junk that comes out of planes … which is where the sink came from too. We’ve had to use it a few times. Have to keep the fire small but we can heat enough water to make a decent soup. If you can just help me convince Sgt. Shelly to let the boys take out the infecteds that wander too close to the creek I’ll show you. I don’t want the water source contaminated if it isn’t already.” The contamination was something I was already worried about.
“I heard that,” Sgt. Shelly sighed. “We are low on ammo. We can’t afford …”
“We’ll snare ‘em and spear them. The boys have gotten pretty good at it. If you want I’ll pass the word along to Kevyn.”
“The … the leader of the boy’s patrol?” she asked, obviously trying to muster the energy and concentration that she needed now that her adrenaline was going down and her injuries were feeling even worse.
“Yeah, he’s real good at making sure the boys do what they need to do.”
“Show me.”
I sighed thinking that it was a waste of time and she should have just let me tell him to do it. I swung over and Kevyn got it fast. “Sure. It’s a new technique. Sounds weird even to me and we’ve been doing it for a couple of weeks now. ‘Sides, you always have to prove a new technique works to someone that’s never seen it … especially if it comes from bottom of the command chain instead of the top.” He turned and then scowled before turning back to me. “These new guys are really green; greener than my guys ever were. They say they’re from up in Oregon and … well they’re just really green.”
“If I feed them will they shut up?” I asked referring to all the blubbering the new boys were doing.
Kevyn winked then turned back and dead serious told the new boys, “You want to eat you do what she says. You mess with the cook and you’ll be lucky to see food before you get back to your base. Got it?” They stared at him wide eyed then at me but they nodded.
Kevyn took Ralph, Jorge, and a couple of the other boys and left the rest to “encourage” the new boys to behave and tow the line. Frankly the new boys looked almost more scared of Kevyn’s patrol than they did of the infecteds that wandered below the trees they were sitting in though they looked scared enough of them when they glanced down.
“OK, first there aren’t going to be any crybabies. You gotta do it then do it on your own time and where other people can’t see you. Crying might have been ok when you were a boy back home but out here it is a distraction none of us need if we are all going to survive. Second, I don’t feed people that have snot bubbles coming out of their noses and I don’t even want to know what on their hands. Jorge, set up a wash station please and make sure they scrub … even under their fingernails. Show them how to use a twig to do it if they complain they can’t get ‘em clean … they still complain then use your blade and then they can blubber to a medic if they get nicked.” The boys’ eyes got wider. “Third … food ain’t free. You want to eat you follow the rules and you do your share. I ain’t your momma or your slave. Got it?”
It took a moment and a nudge from a couple of Kevyn’s boys but they all finally nodded. “Good. Start by picking up all this carp laying all over the place. Gear flung every which way is a tripping hazard and I’m not going to explain to the medics why some dope of a kid tripped over his gear and landed on his head to become puss brain chow. Now move.”
I heard one of the boys whisper, “What’s a carp?”
Jorge snorted and said, “She means your junk man. Hermanita don’t swear. She says things like ‘carp’ instead of crap or ****. Just go with it. Ain’t so bad once you get used to it. Besides, she cooks good. A man can put up with a lot so’s long as the cook knows what she’s doing.”
Slowly they started to do what I’d left for them to do and I used another swing to get over to the “cooking platform” that Ralphealito and a couple of the other boys had cobbled together for me. I needed the space. Jorge was fourteen and really full of himself. I tolerated him but that was about all. He got stupid with me once … and once was all it took. I told him he’d be walking funny the rest of his life if he tried it ever again. Since he knew what I was capable of by then he suddenly decided to respect the boundaries and we didn’t have any more trouble. He’d never be someone I wanted to be around but he’d learned to respect me and stopped giving me grief.
I was starting some coals when a soldier swung over and asked, “The medics want to know what you are using for water. Almost everyone barely has a swig left in their canteens.”
I slapped my forehead. “Geez. I didn’t think. You see that rope that’s tied off on that third branch? Yeah, that one. Don’t untie it but follow it to the pulley and then … yeah, you see the arm the boy’s rigged? Pull that arm and that barrel will swing this way. Be careful, we just refilled it yesterday and it’s going to be heavy. It’s full of potable water.”
“Treated water?”
“Put through a gravity filter and then boiled … no chemicals though. I ran out of those little pills.”
“We’ve got some. Is this all the water there is?”
“No, there’s three other barrels but they’re strapped to another tree and camouflaged. I’ll get ‘em when we need ‘em. I have some other water containers but they’re down in my dugout and … do you want to go get ‘em?”
“No,” he said sardonically. “I do believe this will be sufficient to our needs.”
“That’s what I thought too.”
beaglemama
Contributing Member
Thanks Kathy!!!!!
stjwelding
Veteran Member
Kathy THANK YOU from the bottom of my hart. Finding new chapter for this story was a greatly appreciated surprise. Thanks again for all of your story's and the time you give us in writing and posting them. Being self employed for the last 40 I know what time is worth and you have given us more than most will ever know. This story is one of the best yet.
Wayne
Wayne
sssarawolf
Has No Life - Lives on TB
Thank youuu girl 
.
.
Part 151
“My gawd, look at those little savages,” I heard some of the adults mutter. And if it wasn’t that they mumbled something shockingly similar. I was too tired and let it get to me; my anger made me see them as nothing more than a bunch of sanctimonious so and so’s.
Swinging into their space and let rip as I asked, “Who’s more savage? Them using what tools they’ve got whatever they happen to be to survive and protect your backsides? Or the ones that would send little kids into the bush to do men’s work without weapons, not even guns? I don’t see any adults brave enough to do what they’ve been forced to do.”
“Now you listen here little girl …” Limmer butted in.
“I’m not a little girl … old man. That got ripped away from me on Z-Day and what little bit was left after that got destroyed when people thought it was ok to block in the cities and leave us all to die or worse. Got a question for you Limmer. How much longer you think you’re gonna be able to do this? How much longer before you get too old and stiff to run? When you and all the rest of the adults here get old and slow the only thing between you and all the bad carp out there is people my age and younger. Because from where I’m standing I can pretty much say it ain’t going to change; there’s always going to be bad stuff. It’s never going away … ever. Instead of complaining what savages we’ve turned into, how about you get up out of your disgust and help us learn better ways to do what needs to be done. How about instead of pounding on us and using us … forcing us to become what we are, you pound the carp out of the people your age that started all of this so we can keep what humanity we have left.”
I felt a hand on my shoulder and it was Kevyn. “It’s ok. Don’t’ get in trouble. We knew what we were getting into.”
I snorted. “I live in trouble. And you knew maybe, but them? You know they didn’t, not really. They just wanted to eat regular. They gotta learn loyalty is about more than food. If someone doesn’t show them better, they’ll think having a full belly is all there is to shoot for. If they grow the rest of the way up like that it will really freak the world up.”
Someone tossed their two cents in by asking, “The world isn’t freaked up now?”
I looked around at the attention I had and answered, “Things can always get worse. Used to be all there was to worry about was the occasional bad guy. Then for a while all we had to worry about were puss brains. Then came the puss brains and hunger … and other kinds of sickness. Now there’s puss brains and hunger and sickness AND the bad guys. You want all of that and the next generation not giving a carp about loyalty except to whoever can feed them?”
Sgt. Shelly said into the quiet my question caused, “Point made Pip. You need to … find your station.” Her way of telling me I was stepping too close to the line and it would make her have to get involved if I stepped any closer.
“Sure,” I said with a nod, knowing I needed some distance to get my temper under control before it turned into a full bore tantrum. I told her, “I showed the guy helping the medics where there is potable water.” I hefted my bat and grabbed a rope to swing away. “Since everyone seems to want to eat I gotta go check some snares. Hopefully the puss brains haven’t found the ones upstream.” Before anyone could stop me I swung away telling Kevyn, “Make sure they wash their hands when they’re finished putting those puss brains out of their misery.”
I was four trees away when someone caught up with me; a red headed someone who surprised me. “Chris?”
He nodded with fatigue before whispering so he didn’t draw attention to the thinned out puss brains below, “Was wondering if you would remember me.”
I told him, “Hard to forget someone you get stuck in a tree with. How’s Dorrie?”
“Dad and her went to live with my aunt in a navy controlled settlement near the Mississippi. Dad is working a fishing fleet gig, trying to stay away from the booze.”
“Uh …”
“It’s ok. Better all around.” And from the look on his face I could see the subject was closed.
“Ok. So why are you following me? Orders?”
He finally grinned his old grin and said, “Naw. I’m just hungry.”
I rolled my eyes. “No squirrel pizza this time.”
“Bound to be something just as good.”
I shrugged. “How much food you guys have in your supplies?”
“Three or four days more if it gets rationed out right and no more gets lost. Most of it is just dry soup mixes and some oatmeal and stuff like that. We were heading to a resupply point.”
I winced and seeing it he asked why. I told him, “You don’t want to know how many times I’ve heard that only to have people say no one showed up.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah. First my patrol takes off but they told me an evac team was supposed to extract me but I swear no one ever came. Then Kevyn’s patrol waited for a resupply not too far from here that never happened. Then we tried to get the attention of some Red Cross helicopters to get help for Miguel …”
“The little guy the medics are goo-goo over?”
“Yeah him. Well those helicopter pilots didn’t see us and I’m pretty sure they didn’t see us on purpose. So I wouldn’t count on that resupply point too much if I were you.”
“My gawd, look at those little savages,” I heard some of the adults mutter. And if it wasn’t that they mumbled something shockingly similar. I was too tired and let it get to me; my anger made me see them as nothing more than a bunch of sanctimonious so and so’s.
Swinging into their space and let rip as I asked, “Who’s more savage? Them using what tools they’ve got whatever they happen to be to survive and protect your backsides? Or the ones that would send little kids into the bush to do men’s work without weapons, not even guns? I don’t see any adults brave enough to do what they’ve been forced to do.”
“Now you listen here little girl …” Limmer butted in.
“I’m not a little girl … old man. That got ripped away from me on Z-Day and what little bit was left after that got destroyed when people thought it was ok to block in the cities and leave us all to die or worse. Got a question for you Limmer. How much longer you think you’re gonna be able to do this? How much longer before you get too old and stiff to run? When you and all the rest of the adults here get old and slow the only thing between you and all the bad carp out there is people my age and younger. Because from where I’m standing I can pretty much say it ain’t going to change; there’s always going to be bad stuff. It’s never going away … ever. Instead of complaining what savages we’ve turned into, how about you get up out of your disgust and help us learn better ways to do what needs to be done. How about instead of pounding on us and using us … forcing us to become what we are, you pound the carp out of the people your age that started all of this so we can keep what humanity we have left.”
I felt a hand on my shoulder and it was Kevyn. “It’s ok. Don’t’ get in trouble. We knew what we were getting into.”
I snorted. “I live in trouble. And you knew maybe, but them? You know they didn’t, not really. They just wanted to eat regular. They gotta learn loyalty is about more than food. If someone doesn’t show them better, they’ll think having a full belly is all there is to shoot for. If they grow the rest of the way up like that it will really freak the world up.”
Someone tossed their two cents in by asking, “The world isn’t freaked up now?”
I looked around at the attention I had and answered, “Things can always get worse. Used to be all there was to worry about was the occasional bad guy. Then for a while all we had to worry about were puss brains. Then came the puss brains and hunger … and other kinds of sickness. Now there’s puss brains and hunger and sickness AND the bad guys. You want all of that and the next generation not giving a carp about loyalty except to whoever can feed them?”
Sgt. Shelly said into the quiet my question caused, “Point made Pip. You need to … find your station.” Her way of telling me I was stepping too close to the line and it would make her have to get involved if I stepped any closer.
“Sure,” I said with a nod, knowing I needed some distance to get my temper under control before it turned into a full bore tantrum. I told her, “I showed the guy helping the medics where there is potable water.” I hefted my bat and grabbed a rope to swing away. “Since everyone seems to want to eat I gotta go check some snares. Hopefully the puss brains haven’t found the ones upstream.” Before anyone could stop me I swung away telling Kevyn, “Make sure they wash their hands when they’re finished putting those puss brains out of their misery.”
I was four trees away when someone caught up with me; a red headed someone who surprised me. “Chris?”
He nodded with fatigue before whispering so he didn’t draw attention to the thinned out puss brains below, “Was wondering if you would remember me.”
I told him, “Hard to forget someone you get stuck in a tree with. How’s Dorrie?”
“Dad and her went to live with my aunt in a navy controlled settlement near the Mississippi. Dad is working a fishing fleet gig, trying to stay away from the booze.”
“Uh …”
“It’s ok. Better all around.” And from the look on his face I could see the subject was closed.
“Ok. So why are you following me? Orders?”
He finally grinned his old grin and said, “Naw. I’m just hungry.”
I rolled my eyes. “No squirrel pizza this time.”
“Bound to be something just as good.”
I shrugged. “How much food you guys have in your supplies?”
“Three or four days more if it gets rationed out right and no more gets lost. Most of it is just dry soup mixes and some oatmeal and stuff like that. We were heading to a resupply point.”
I winced and seeing it he asked why. I told him, “You don’t want to know how many times I’ve heard that only to have people say no one showed up.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah. First my patrol takes off but they told me an evac team was supposed to extract me but I swear no one ever came. Then Kevyn’s patrol waited for a resupply not too far from here that never happened. Then we tried to get the attention of some Red Cross helicopters to get help for Miguel …”
“The little guy the medics are goo-goo over?”
“Yeah him. Well those helicopter pilots didn’t see us and I’m pretty sure they didn’t see us on purpose. So I wouldn’t count on that resupply point too much if I were you.”
sssarawolf
Has No Life - Lives on TB
Very good thank you.
Bunkerdown
Contributing Member
Excellent, Excellent, Excellent, as usual you have outdone yourself. Loving these new installments.
Thank you.
Thank you.
freshPotatoes
Contributing Member
Aahhh my favorite story is back !! Thank you so much Kathy !!!
fastback08
Veteran Member
Thanks, I have been missing this story. Sorry about the Linder Legacy, but, glad to see the new chapters here.
Bawhahahahahahahahahahahaha ha
stjwelding
Veteran Member
Kathy thanks for the chapter a great way to start another great day. Hoping for more soon.
Wayne
Wayne
Last edited:
Part 152
Kevyn and Jorge met Chris and I half way back. Kevyn said, “No wonder you were gone so long.”
“Yeah. You mind helping with some of this?”
“This” was a large canvas shopping bag of wild greens, a pack full of cattails and arrow root, several rabbit carcasses, and the carcass of a large, field-dressed buck.
Chris stopped to offload some of the meat and grimaced at his sticky, bloody gloves. “Weirdest thing I have ever seen. I was catching the roots DeeDee was tossing to me on the bank of this creek when I miss one and it winds up flying into the bushes and hitting this buck in the face. Basically it freaked out. It ran straight into this small stand of trees and broke its neck when it tried to run between two trees too narrow for its rack to fit through. Splat! Crack!” He stopped and tilted his head over and let his tongue hang out for visual effect.
George made that religious sign Catholics do and said, “Es un regalo de Dios.”
Chris apparently had enough Spanish to understand but rather than make fun he said, “Maybe it is a gift from God. That’s way above my pay grade though so I ain’t saying one way or the other. Either way it was too good to leave behind so give us a hand already. This stuff ain’t lightweight.”
When we got back to tree camp we had to explain all over again. I left the three guys to hang the deer and tell the story since Chris was in the mood to ham it up some more and went to finish skinning the rabbits and getting a big pot of camp stew started. Limmer came and surprised me by helping. He said, “You got a mouth on you girl but you can cook, I’ll give you that. I’ll throw in with you and everyone can eat the same thing and save us some work. We may have to water it down some but that shouldn’t hurt nothing.”
“Won’t have to … water it down I mean. I brought back plenty of greens. I was gonna ask if you wanted some. There’s wild garlic in there too.”
Limmer’s nose twitched and he nodded. “Them boys know what they’re doing with that deer? We’re gonna need it all – antlers to hooves – to feed this bunch. Extraction is at least a couple of days off. Whot’s more we have enemy movement on three sides complicating things. Some of this crew that I came in with hasn’t spent much time in the bush and is getting twitchy. They ain’t sure what to make being in these trees like monkeys and having all these infecteds running around. This ain’t the kinda thing they are used to. Ones with more experience ain’t much better off.”
I sighed, suddenly tired of all the people crowding my safe place but feeling like they had some right to complain. “The guys know what to do with the deer or they can suffer the consequences,” I told Limmer, repeating something I’d heard Dad say a lot. “As for the rest of it, I don’t know what they are whining about. They aren’t getting chomped and it was Sgt. Shelly’s order to leave the puss brains alone. This isn’t a family vacation. I suppose we can try and pacify them with food to keep ‘em from getting cranky and foul. I can see it helping with the little boys but geez, we shouldn’t have to treat grown people like they have no sense.”
Limmer snorted and then spit a stream of brown snuff down onto a particularly gruesome looking puss brain’s head making some of the boys cheer silently before Sgt. Shelly gave them “the eye.” “Pip, you might just be surprised how much pacifying some adults take.”
“Uh, maybe not surprised, but I just expect these particular adults wouldn’t need it.”
Limmer snorted again and said, “Soldiers sometimes need pacifying more than most. I’ve not met one yet that takes to sitting around waiting for something to happen with much enthusiasm. Now hand me them greens so I can see what we got to work with.”
I handed the bag to Limmer and after taking inventory in my head I told him, “Looks like I need to lay in more forage just in case the area gets contaminated. We’ll need to smoke most of this deer and try and bring in at least one more for fresh.”
“Girl, you fergettin’ all them infecteds right down below us we were just talking about?”
“No. Even if I wanted to my nose wouldn’t let me,” I answered scrubbing my nose at the dirty, scummy smell of the mess of them wandering around my once neat clearing. “Just look at it this way, right now those puss brains are our guard dogs. Let’s let them do that job, be that tool. Let’s let them become a problem for the enemy. But we’ve got a job to do too and need to be the tools we need to be.”
“Yeah,” Limmer said with a load of sarcasm. “We’ll be tools all right.”
“Huh?” I asked not understanding.
Gayle interrupted by swinging in and saying, “You’re already a tool Limmer. Stop picking on Pip.” She turned to me and asked, “Can you leave this? That kid Miguel is asking for you and refusing to cooperate. He’s gonna open his wounds back up at this rate.”
I looked at Limmer. He said, “Get lost girlie. The day I can’t watch a pot is the day they plant me.”
I would have thanked him if I hadn’t been sure he would have gotten crankier than he already was. I quickly made my way over to Miguel to find Kevyn there ahead of me and trying to calm him down and having zero luck.
Miguel grabbed my hand as soon as I bent close enough and started crying, “Hermanita … I don’t hurt. Am I dying?”
I blinked and slowly turned to look at the tired medics. One of them mumbled something foul before shaking a small vial at me. Recognizing what it was from Doc hording the stuff I sighed in relief and sat down all the way. “What a loco question. Now you’re complaining you aren’t hurting after all you been feeling the last week?”
“I don’t wanna be no ugly puss brain. If I gotta die I want it to be you that fixes it. You won’t let me be no monster and go to hell so I don’t seem my momma.”
‘Don’t be silly Miguel. You ain’t going to turn into a monster. You got shot, not chomped. And you’re not dying either; you finally got the kind of help that Kevyn and I have been trying to get for you you big ol’ Ding Dong.”
“Promise?”
“Yeah. Now mind or I’ll start poking on you again and you remember how much fun that was. What did the medics tell you to do?”
He got a mulish look and said, “Take a nap.”
Seeing what half the problem was as I’d seen the little guys get their pride hurt too easily about some things I snorted. “Naps are for babies and old people. You ain’t either one. You just need to sleep so the medicine can work and your body can heal so you can get up and help us out.”
“I ain’t no baby. I tried to tell ‘em. I ain’t.”
“No you’re not, so don’t act like one. Put your bottom lip in before a puss brain grabs it.”
It took a moment but he grinned a little then finally gave it up and went to sleep; but, I still had to work to untangle my hand from his. I looked at Kevyn and he said, “The guys are going to keep taking turns sitting with him. He won’t be alone … you know … in case.” In case things got bad and we had to evacuate.
I nodded and stood up. One of the more severely injured – a militia woman – snapped, “Could you be a little meaner to that little guy?”
I looked at her but didn’t say anything. There was nothing I could say that would explain it. People understood or they didn’t. It wasn’t my job to be their mom or aunt or anything else. They called me Sister but I really wasn’t that either. I was just the closest thing they had to it right now. My real job was to feed them. When needed, I fed them more than just food … and that included telling them what they needed to hear to tough up so they could survive.
Miguel didn’t belong where he was at any more than I had belonged in the city. He shouldn’t have been here, hurt and surrounded by things that wanted to eat him. But shouldn’t bees still sting. I couldn’t stop them from stinging … but I could teach the boys how to deal with the stings couldn't be avoided.
Kevyn and Jorge met Chris and I half way back. Kevyn said, “No wonder you were gone so long.”
“Yeah. You mind helping with some of this?”
“This” was a large canvas shopping bag of wild greens, a pack full of cattails and arrow root, several rabbit carcasses, and the carcass of a large, field-dressed buck.
Chris stopped to offload some of the meat and grimaced at his sticky, bloody gloves. “Weirdest thing I have ever seen. I was catching the roots DeeDee was tossing to me on the bank of this creek when I miss one and it winds up flying into the bushes and hitting this buck in the face. Basically it freaked out. It ran straight into this small stand of trees and broke its neck when it tried to run between two trees too narrow for its rack to fit through. Splat! Crack!” He stopped and tilted his head over and let his tongue hang out for visual effect.
George made that religious sign Catholics do and said, “Es un regalo de Dios.”
Chris apparently had enough Spanish to understand but rather than make fun he said, “Maybe it is a gift from God. That’s way above my pay grade though so I ain’t saying one way or the other. Either way it was too good to leave behind so give us a hand already. This stuff ain’t lightweight.”
When we got back to tree camp we had to explain all over again. I left the three guys to hang the deer and tell the story since Chris was in the mood to ham it up some more and went to finish skinning the rabbits and getting a big pot of camp stew started. Limmer came and surprised me by helping. He said, “You got a mouth on you girl but you can cook, I’ll give you that. I’ll throw in with you and everyone can eat the same thing and save us some work. We may have to water it down some but that shouldn’t hurt nothing.”
“Won’t have to … water it down I mean. I brought back plenty of greens. I was gonna ask if you wanted some. There’s wild garlic in there too.”
Limmer’s nose twitched and he nodded. “Them boys know what they’re doing with that deer? We’re gonna need it all – antlers to hooves – to feed this bunch. Extraction is at least a couple of days off. Whot’s more we have enemy movement on three sides complicating things. Some of this crew that I came in with hasn’t spent much time in the bush and is getting twitchy. They ain’t sure what to make being in these trees like monkeys and having all these infecteds running around. This ain’t the kinda thing they are used to. Ones with more experience ain’t much better off.”
I sighed, suddenly tired of all the people crowding my safe place but feeling like they had some right to complain. “The guys know what to do with the deer or they can suffer the consequences,” I told Limmer, repeating something I’d heard Dad say a lot. “As for the rest of it, I don’t know what they are whining about. They aren’t getting chomped and it was Sgt. Shelly’s order to leave the puss brains alone. This isn’t a family vacation. I suppose we can try and pacify them with food to keep ‘em from getting cranky and foul. I can see it helping with the little boys but geez, we shouldn’t have to treat grown people like they have no sense.”
Limmer snorted and then spit a stream of brown snuff down onto a particularly gruesome looking puss brain’s head making some of the boys cheer silently before Sgt. Shelly gave them “the eye.” “Pip, you might just be surprised how much pacifying some adults take.”
“Uh, maybe not surprised, but I just expect these particular adults wouldn’t need it.”
Limmer snorted again and said, “Soldiers sometimes need pacifying more than most. I’ve not met one yet that takes to sitting around waiting for something to happen with much enthusiasm. Now hand me them greens so I can see what we got to work with.”
I handed the bag to Limmer and after taking inventory in my head I told him, “Looks like I need to lay in more forage just in case the area gets contaminated. We’ll need to smoke most of this deer and try and bring in at least one more for fresh.”
“Girl, you fergettin’ all them infecteds right down below us we were just talking about?”
“No. Even if I wanted to my nose wouldn’t let me,” I answered scrubbing my nose at the dirty, scummy smell of the mess of them wandering around my once neat clearing. “Just look at it this way, right now those puss brains are our guard dogs. Let’s let them do that job, be that tool. Let’s let them become a problem for the enemy. But we’ve got a job to do too and need to be the tools we need to be.”
“Yeah,” Limmer said with a load of sarcasm. “We’ll be tools all right.”
“Huh?” I asked not understanding.
Gayle interrupted by swinging in and saying, “You’re already a tool Limmer. Stop picking on Pip.” She turned to me and asked, “Can you leave this? That kid Miguel is asking for you and refusing to cooperate. He’s gonna open his wounds back up at this rate.”
I looked at Limmer. He said, “Get lost girlie. The day I can’t watch a pot is the day they plant me.”
I would have thanked him if I hadn’t been sure he would have gotten crankier than he already was. I quickly made my way over to Miguel to find Kevyn there ahead of me and trying to calm him down and having zero luck.
Miguel grabbed my hand as soon as I bent close enough and started crying, “Hermanita … I don’t hurt. Am I dying?”
I blinked and slowly turned to look at the tired medics. One of them mumbled something foul before shaking a small vial at me. Recognizing what it was from Doc hording the stuff I sighed in relief and sat down all the way. “What a loco question. Now you’re complaining you aren’t hurting after all you been feeling the last week?”
“I don’t wanna be no ugly puss brain. If I gotta die I want it to be you that fixes it. You won’t let me be no monster and go to hell so I don’t seem my momma.”
‘Don’t be silly Miguel. You ain’t going to turn into a monster. You got shot, not chomped. And you’re not dying either; you finally got the kind of help that Kevyn and I have been trying to get for you you big ol’ Ding Dong.”
“Promise?”
“Yeah. Now mind or I’ll start poking on you again and you remember how much fun that was. What did the medics tell you to do?”
He got a mulish look and said, “Take a nap.”
Seeing what half the problem was as I’d seen the little guys get their pride hurt too easily about some things I snorted. “Naps are for babies and old people. You ain’t either one. You just need to sleep so the medicine can work and your body can heal so you can get up and help us out.”
“I ain’t no baby. I tried to tell ‘em. I ain’t.”
“No you’re not, so don’t act like one. Put your bottom lip in before a puss brain grabs it.”
It took a moment but he grinned a little then finally gave it up and went to sleep; but, I still had to work to untangle my hand from his. I looked at Kevyn and he said, “The guys are going to keep taking turns sitting with him. He won’t be alone … you know … in case.” In case things got bad and we had to evacuate.
I nodded and stood up. One of the more severely injured – a militia woman – snapped, “Could you be a little meaner to that little guy?”
I looked at her but didn’t say anything. There was nothing I could say that would explain it. People understood or they didn’t. It wasn’t my job to be their mom or aunt or anything else. They called me Sister but I really wasn’t that either. I was just the closest thing they had to it right now. My real job was to feed them. When needed, I fed them more than just food … and that included telling them what they needed to hear to tough up so they could survive.
Miguel didn’t belong where he was at any more than I had belonged in the city. He shouldn’t have been here, hurt and surrounded by things that wanted to eat him. But shouldn’t bees still sting. I couldn’t stop them from stinging … but I could teach the boys how to deal with the stings couldn't be avoided.
SairieBelle
Member
Curled up on the couch with a comfy blanket, a cup of hot chocolate, my dog and Kathy's latest chapter. Ahhh. Life is good.
Thank you Kathy.
Thank you Kathy.
Siskiyoumom
Veteran Member
Thank you so much. I love coming home from a hard day at work, a long commute, and then I get to read more of your story.
sssarawolf
Has No Life - Lives on TB
This was wonderful to come home to, thank you.
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stjwelding
Veteran Member
Kathy, thank you for another chapter, great way to start another day's work.
Wayne
Wayne
Nature_Lover
Wait! What?
Thank you Kathy.
I'm glad her patrol finally found their way back to her, and now she has a bunch of new boys to corral and train.
I'm enjoying this story very much!
I'm glad her patrol finally found their way back to her, and now she has a bunch of new boys to corral and train.
I'm enjoying this story very much!
Siskiyoumom
Veteran Member
Know your are on journey to your place of refuge. May your time be filled with restoration, with tasks completed and a maybe a wee bit of more of this fun story churning in your head. Appreciate your writing efforts and may you be blessed with your time away from the time away from the family business. I still love remembering your details on I think Sas' family home in the wilds of Florida. I especially loved the roll down shutters, the upper story with the hidden rooms. Our place is too tiny for hidden anything. And metal shutters are no in the budget. We make do with the wood dear hubby has placed across our vulnerable windows that the bears just love to place their paw prints on. When we come home to the cabin we are always grateful the bears have not gotten in.
themarksmn
Member
Miss Kathy,
you are an absolutely talented writer, thank you so much for your work. (has been responsible for many late reading nights)
you are an absolutely talented writer, thank you so much for your work. (has been responsible for many late reading nights)
maineforlife
Contributing Member
A very unexpected treat. Thank you for entertaining me once again.