The Event Series (Book 3): The Archive and Beyond Read online

  We sat and stared at each other for a little bit, and then she exhaled loudly and turned, walking back toward the ledge, Ceil followed, and Elizabeth lingered for a minute or so and then took off after them.

  I sketched tonight, yeah, it was big kitty pictures.

  (Matt)The word is out, and moving the food is going to be a lot of work. It is not like it is that difficult, or complex, it is just the volume. We have a lot of stuff to move.

  I wonder about living in a cave, even a man-made one. It is like we are going back, starting over as the Neanderthal, or Cro-Magnon. There is a certain irony to it I guess.

  Anyway, not much else to add, just working on the food supplies, I gave word today about finding meat sources to the girls, Margo and Del, they said they will get started.

  Vespers tonight focused on gratitude, being thankful for what we have. It made me think about the guy in Middlefield. We need to try to reach him.

  September 1st

  (Tom) It was rather funny this morning, Lucy, Asuna and I were walking out to the Coyote to take a ride down to Middlefield to see if we could make contact with the straggler. That was the name I came up with for him. As we got to the area where the trucks are normally parked, there was Matt and Tanya, they were just loading up to do the same thing.

  “So you had the same idea?” I asked them.

  “Yeah, I think we need to try to contact, at least give him the option,” Matt replied.

  “Should we take two trucks then? It might work better if we just do one and walk in,” I suggested.

  As we were talking, Margo, Del, and Code walked up. Margo looked at us, “Hey, I let him get away last time, my job to bring him in.”

  “I am not sure that it’s going to be that easy, maybe we should all go, we can set up so if you three roust him out, us old folks can stop him,” I grinned.

  I could see that she really wanted to get this guy herself, but I am thinking that really, if he has been out there this long, it isn’t going to be that easy.

  She looked at me for a minute, then scanned Code and Del, and finally, “You’re probably right. And it makes sense that we ‘youngsters’ go to the door because we have already been there, and either he is going recognize us, as having left the food, or at least not get the idea that there are others out there.”

  So we took two trucks and drove out Skyline Trail. But this time, we stopped about a quarter mile from the town and Matt, Asuna, Lucy, Tanya and I moved into the woods and spaced ourselves out in the direction that Margo said he ran last time. We should be able to hear him coming this time and could react from there to close the noose. Just an afterthought, the way I am describing this it sounds like we are trying to trap an animal. We aren’t, it is just I see no other way to describe it.

  Margo gave us about 15 minutes to get into position and then she called us on the radio that they were heading in. As the truck drove up to the house, the mouse ran out the back door. We could hear him coming and as he must have been looking over his shoulder, the poor bastard ran right into a tree, knocked himself cold. I heard the thud off to my left just a little but as I walked that way, I didn’t see anyone. I was Lucy who found him. He had fallen into some deep underbrush.

  We fished the person out. As we did so, he started to wake up. The person at first looked like a young small Hispanic male, probably late teens, filthy, dirt covered, with matted hair and tattered clothes. And did they stink, oh God, did they stink.

  “Please, I’m sorry, don’t punishment, don’t rape me again,” she sobbed, yes, turns out it was a she, a woman in her late 20s, emaciated.

  Tanya stepped in here, “It’s okay, we aren’t about that.”

  The woman fussed, and sobbed, and shook in fear. It took a little while to calm her, we tried to talk to her. By then Margo and team were with us. The woman looked at Margo and Del, it seemed to calm her a little.

  “You, you are the ones here yesterday, you left me food,” she said.

  “Yes, that was us, we were on the horses.” replied Margo. “We are the helicopter people, the ones who you have been looking at through the binoculars.”

  “No, no, I saw the helicopter, heard it, but it wasn’t me, it is the others. They are watching.”

  I looked at Matt and mouthed, “The others?” Suddenly I had a bad feeling, one that said, time to go. I think we all had that same thought.

  “Look, we may be in danger here, do you want to come with us, we do not live near here, and well, I get the feeling that this is not a good place.” Margo told her.

  “Yes, not a good place, I will come with you,” she replied anxiously.

  We headed back to the trucks, and got out of there quickly. Tanya, Margo and the girl rode back in Margo’s Kia, the rest of us were in the Coyote. They talked to her on the way back. And when we got back, it was instant buzzing at camp. We may have stumbled on to a shit storm in the making.

  (Lance) Washa and I drove up to the Archive leading a train that included Fred, Jan, Taylor, Mark, Michelle, Steven and Heather. It was to give them the chance to see the inside of the place. Some had never been there before, Steven and Taylor had, but that was limited in what they had seen.

  Everyone seemed happy with their room assignments and was very impressed with the potential lap of luxury that we could, would soon inhabit.

  We got back around 4 and there was stuff going on. They saw the raggedy man, and it isn’t a man, and there are some things that do not sound good in all of this.

  (Margo) At first I was a little pissed that Tom and Matt decided that we needed help catching the person from Middlefield. But in the end I am glad they did. As Tom always says, everything for a reason.

  The person is woman, and now that she is cleaned up, we can see what she was. The Major and Charlene checked her out health wise. They had to shave her hair; she was covered in lice and stuff. We burned her clothes. She was able to fit into some of my stuff, although she is so skinny, even that is a little loose.

  I was not happy with the smell in the truck on the way back, but it was also okay. I found out a lot of stuff from her. There is another group out here, close by, and they aren’t farmers. They scavenge, and will take what they want from anyone that they come across. And in a lot of ways, they are like the old biker gang that we ran into early on.

  Maria, her name is Maria, and she was captured by them. She was used by them, not in a nice way. She had somehow gotten away from them and was able to hide. But she knew they were close, and on a few occasions eluded them when they showed up in Middlefield.

  She has taken to trusting me, all for a couple cans of beans. But then it was probably the first time in a long time that anyone has been nice to her, if you consider what I did nice.

  It looks like we are going to be doing some more scouting close to home.

  (Matt) Received bad news today, we are not alone. There is another group not too far away and they know we are out here, but not exactly where we are. But my guess, based on talking to our new camper, Maria, they will be or are looking for us.

  Tanya and I tended the garden this morning, but in doing so we have weapons with us. Usually it was just the Indian Axe, and maybe a handgun. Now, it is back to ARs. The Three and Tom are talking. I am not sure where this will go. My gut tells me we should hurry the move along. We should be out of Romanica ASAP.

  Vespers tonight was not fun; we introduced Maria and talked about what was going on. It is unsettling. Tom, Code, Asuna, Margo, Tanya, we all took a little shift at guard duty tonight, we have not had anything to point to an imminent problem, but, we need to be getting ready.

  September 2nd

  (Lance) I was still unable to contact Fort Knox. But I did reach Cheyenne this morning, they are doing well, but they had a situation in which one of their people was killed in an accident, a truck accident. They sat with the body for 3 days afterwards and she didn’t turn. This was the first time we actually got word that the cure worked. Good news!

  Del and
I started to think about what we were going to take with us. I am going to hold off until the middle of the month to move the computer equipment and camera set-ups.

  I am going to move that camera that I set up in our cabin back to its old location scanning the lake. I guess I need to start spending some time monitoring it, just in case. That is also going to cut into time that I can help with the move.

  Del and I spent some time out at the horse farm this afternoon, sword work with Samurai and Shinigami. I am out of practice, but the muscle memories are still there, it came back quick.

  (Margo) Maria is my new BFF in a way; actually, she is a pain in the ass, clingy, needy, and afraid. I guess I can understand it, but dammit woman, I have things I have to do.

  I was able to pass her off to Jan for the morning so that Code and I could start getting some meat together. We came back from our hunting trip with 5 turkeys and a couple of pheasants.

  In the afternoon, Code and I headed out for a while to see if we picked up on anything as far as human activity, the other group. Gillie came with us. We saw nothing.

  Maria re-attached herself to me tonight, and she seemed quiet. I asked her about it and all she would say was that she had talked with Tom, and that some bad memories had come up. But she refused to go any further.

  (Matt) Dream again last night, Raven, and it is on my shoulder this time. It is squawking and looking west. I am thinking that maybe I am supposed to move to go to Alaska like I always wanted to before this all started.

  Tanya and I did a little veggie stuff in the morning, canning and such. In the afternoon Margo and Code brought back some birds that we gutted and loaded them into the smokehouse.

  That presents another interesting thought; I will have to build a new smokehouse when we move top-side, or would it be underground.

  At Vespers tonight I did a kind of almost cautionary talk about being ready, ready for evil, for what this other group may hold for us, if they find us. I didn’t want to stir the pot much, but I have to believe that they are figuring out where we are in a general area and it is just a matter of time before we get a visit.

  (Tom) Maria, what does she know, and what is she willing to share. That is a question that really needs to be answered for the safety of us all. I suddenly am finding myself feeling the old Tom coming back. There is the part where I am the ‘Commander’ of the Mass Militia, the old war chief of the group from the early days, but also, the old detective side.

  I talked to The Three; no, more I talked at The Three. I am concerned and this was not a time or place for pussy-footing or dancing around. To my surprise, they agreed and gave me their blessing to run with this.

  Before anything, I needed to talk to Maria. I would have liked it better if Margo was with me during this, she has a connection with the girl, woman. But she had left this morning to go hunting, and although I probably could have waited until she got back, this is too important. I took her off of Jan’s hands under the guise of having a coffee with her.

  We sat in the Rec Room part of the dining hall. I had Sgt. McManus make certain that we were not interrupted.

  “Maria, how are you doing? Feeling a little better, safer, you certainly look a lot better than when we brought you in the other day.” I started, easy, go easy.

  “Yes, thank you, I am good,” She responded.

  “I’m Margo’s dad.”

  “I know, and you need to ask me some questions,” she was looking down at her coffee.

  “Yes, if you can help, I will be honest with you, the ‘others’ that you talked about, they, I need to know about them.” I told her.

  She looked at me, and smiled weakly, “I will try to help.”

  “Good, and maybe the best way to do it is for you to just tell me the story, as close to the beginning as you can.”

  She fidgeted for a minute or so, and then started. She had been a teacher from the Springfield area, Chicopee. She and a group of other teachers and family had left the area before the bomb went off. The group, about 20 of them, had moved west of Westfield.

  After a little while, when things calmed down the plan was to move from there back toward the city, they figured that the city would be clear of the sick and that they could find a way to live or survive off of the foods left in the area. There were a couple of the teachers who wanted to move to a little place on the river that they knew of, but the others all wanted to move down south of where we were, to stay away from the city.

  So far this was going pretty well, and I was thinking that this may have been part of the group that Teckla had talked about, out at the River View Farm. But I let that sit for a bit, because if there were bad feelings toward them I might shut down the flow of information.

  She went on to say that in May of last year they split up, the AG teachers and their families went one way, and a dozen of the others the other. It worked out well at first. They had a good summer and were able to grow a little food, scavenge a little and really, the sick didn’t bother us much, they could get a sick one every once in a while, but it was good, mostly. The group lost a couple of people, Gemma, and Antonio, they got bit, and Sam, he killed himself, hung himself after Gemma died.

  But still, until late October, it was working. The group was doing well, and she said that they thought they were going to make it. They had some people join us, a couple of guys, with about a half dozen others. They changed it all. At first they were cool, helpful, and really seemed nice. But then, as winter rolled in, Nat took charge, Barry was the other guy.

  I had to jump in here, Nate? Barry? I knew those names. …..”Maria, did they say where they came from?” I asked her.

  “Yes, they said that they were from a camp, Runover?” she replied.

  “Maybe Camp Over-Run, in Otis?”

  “Yes, that was it. Do you know it?” she asked.

  “Yeah, it was….they must have escaped.” I half mumbled to myself, those bastards, they ran away, they left Elgin, and everyone else to die and they ran away. I was starting to see who we might be up against. I wondered who else had gotten away with them.

  We sat quiet for a few minutes as this all sank in.

  “Maria, you said they took control, how, what happened?” I asked.

  “Benji, he was our head guy, he had been the shop teacher, a good guy. They killed him, claimed that he was bitten on a scavenging run. I never believed it; Benji was too good, a veteran, too sharp for that to happen.”

  I offered nothing, but I knew she was probably right. Nate and Barry were some shitty people, and I am sure they had gotten worse over time.

  “So how many of them are there, in their group?” I asked.

  “Last I know there were 19, mostly men, mean men,” she replied, tears welling up. I could see her getting upset here.

  I touched her hand, she pulled away at first, and then smiled weakly, “I’m sorry, it is…..they, Daphne and I, we, we were the only women left, and they touched us, and…..” She sobbed uncontrollably.

  I had done enough sexual assault investigations to know to back off for a bit, let her cry it out for a while. When she calmed down, I kind of gave her a smile, and simply said, “Want to pay them back?”

  She looked at me, confused, hesitant; there was still goodness in her. If I had been this girl,it would have been a resounding yes.

  “Can you save Daphne?” she asked.

  “We can try,” I replied, “We will try.”

  We talked further and she told me how she had run away, where their camp was, and as much as she could about how they operated, and what they did.

  After a couple of hours I brought her back to Jan.

  “I overheard some of it. I am guessing that those fuckers are on your list, and I’m thinking that there is more to this than just the abuse of Maria and Daphne’” said McManus.

  “Oh yeah, number one with a bullet!” I said, I was thinking about Uncle Elgin and all the people they abandoned at Otis, and that easily we could have been part of that mass o
f bodies we burned.

  I filled in Asuna about what I had learned, and what these people were. I need to think how to do this, I need a plan to give to The Three tomorrow, and reject it or not, this is not only a rescue, this is revenge.

  As we talked, I rummaged through my stuff, I had packed it away when she and I went with Krezz, but there it was, Uncle Elgin’s Katana. I smiled, thinking, I hope you are thirsty my friend.

  September 3rd.

  (Lance) Washa and I flew up toward the Archive again today. This time we took McManus, Gillie and Tanya with us. It was just a ‘go and show’ flight, we really didn’t have a whole lot to do, although we did bring some of Del’s and my stuff up and set it in the radar room. We will build a little sleeping area off of the main area.

  We flew in at about 10 and started back around noon. As we cleared the top of the mountain we saw smoke to the southwest. It looked a good size fire and we checked it out. It was part of River View Farm, the house was on fire.

  We flew in and landed, it was bad, the fire, yes, but it worse. Larry and Link were tied to the fence, both had been shot, Larry in the chest and Lincoln had both arms shot. Belinda and the kids were dead on the ground, shot in the back, they may have been running for the woods. Belinda was naked.

  McManus and Washa took over, weapon ready.

  “Stay sharp people, we got no time for anything right now ‘sept to Evac the living. Grab them two.” shouted Washa over the helicopter engine.

  McManus was watching, ready, Teckla and Gillie cut down Lincoln while Tanya and I headed to Larry, but it was too late, he was dead.

  As they loaded the survivor into the chopper, it was “Go! Go! Go!” and we were off. As we began to climb, the helicopter started taking small arms fire from the area of the woods. McManus and Washa lit it up the best they could. They must have hit someone, because as they tore up where the shooting had come from, it stopped.

  Teckla and Tanya worked feverishly to stop the bleeding. Lincoln was unconscious but breathing.