Apocalypsis: Book 4 (Haven) (30 page)

“I’m so sorry,” she said.

“Never mind that.”  I looked at Peter.  “What did Jenny say?”

“She’s totally into it.  She’s already talking to your code reader,” he said to Kirsten.  “I hope that’s okay.”

“It’s fine.  And now for the gift.”  She walked over to her stack of belongings.  One of her people had set something down in the pile while we were talking.  Kirsten pulled out a box with holes in it and a small sack.

“Here’s your bird,” she said, walking back to us.  “You need to build him a coop or cage thingy and put some nesting materials inside.  I also have this bag of food.”  She put the sack in my hand.  “You’re the bird’s food stop.  He’ll come here to eat and then back to my place to sleep.  Make sure you always keep his coop full of food.”

“Where do I get more of it?”

“We’ll bring you some.  But eventually you’ll have to harvest your own.”

“What do they eat?”

“Corn, seeds, nuts, fruit, insects … you can find a lot of it in the wild.  The Native Americans will help you identify it.”

She put the box down on the ground at our feet and opened it very carefully, putting her hand inside.  When she pulled it out, there was a gray bird wrapped inside her fingers, its wings folded up tightly to its sides.  She stood and held it up for us to see.  “Here is the leg band.”  She took the bird’s leg in her hand and stretched it out for us to look at.  The ring was plastic and bright red.  “The message goes on a piece of paper folded up inside here.  Use the code.  Don’t send anything in plain English.  Jenny will learn it and the abbreviations we’ve come up with.  We’ll show her some bird handling techniques in just a few minutes.  Chances are this bird will need a few trial runs before he gets it just right.  So expect to see one of us around for the next week or so.”

I nodded.  “This is very generous of you.”

“Nonsense.  This is all about survival.  The more of us there are, the safer we’ll all be from the monsters.  Your job will be to train the people south of here when the time comes.  We haven’t identified anyone we can trust there yet.”

“Maybe someone from here will move there,” I suggested

She shrugged.  “Maybe.  You have a lot of work to do before that happens.  We’ll be around.”

I gave her a weak smile.  “Populating the earth with women warriors.”

“Bet your sweet ass we will.”  She put the bird back in the box and stood again, placing her hand on my shoulder.  “About Bodo.  I know you don’t want to talk about him anymore, but I’m going to just say this.  I want him, if you don’t.  I’m not ashamed to say that.  He’ll breed strong children, and he’s practically a child himself, so he’s fun to have around.  But his heart is with you.  It was just parts of his body I possessed for a short period of time.”

“That really doesn’t make me feel any better.”

“I don’t really care either way if it does, to be honest.  I’m just telling you how it is, so that if Bodo comes to me in the end, it will be because everyone knew the truth of things.”

“But don’t you know that you could never trust him if he did come to you?  You’ve already seen that he lies.”

“I don’t need to trust a man to have him by my side.  I think it’s unreasonable for you to have expected him to remain true to you when he was with a group of women like us.”

“Well … that’s kind of insulting.  Really insulting, actually.”

“No insult to you.  Not at all.  It’s an insult to men in general.  Cold hard scientific facts here that you can’t dispute.  They think about sex a thousand times a day.  It’s a drive they almost can’t control.  It doesn’t take much to tip the balance in favor of indulging.”

“But he never had sex with you, and you wanted him to.”

She smiled, but there was a certain warmth missing from it.  “That’s only because I didn’t have enough time to wear him down.  I would have eventually, you know.  He loves you … but he is a man.”

“You don’t hold them in very high regard, do you?”

“Why should I?  What have they done to deserve it?”

“There are some good men out there.  They’re not all like you’re describing.”

“Well, when you meet one, you introduce him to me and we’ll see.”

The idea made me sick.  I’d already accidentally introduced her to my last boyfriend who I thought would be faithful, and now I knew how well that had worked out.

She spared me any more thought provoking conversation and walked over and grabbed a backpack from the pile, throwing it up onto her back.  “You going to forgive him?”

“Sure.  I forgive anyone pretty much anything if they’re genuinely sorry.”

“Are you going to take him back, though?”  She picked up another backpack and blew a really sharp whistle towards the door using just her lips and teeth.

“I don’t know,” I said, mostly to myself.  I couldn’t imagine a life without him, and I couldn’t imagine one with him either.  It was probably because the Bodo I thought I knew didn’t really exist, and in his place was this stranger.

“Well, if you decide to cut him loose, send him my way.  We’ll take good care of him.”

I’ll bet you will, you boyfriend ruining jerk
.  “Thanks.”

I was leaving to go back inside when I remembered the other thing I’d wanted to talk to her about.

“Oh, I forgot to ask … do you have any way of making antibiotics?”

“Yes.  We’re stockpiling the ingredients now.”

“Can we trade you for some?”

“Sure.  What did you have in mind?”

“Not sure.  What do you want?”

“We could use some clothes.”

“I have lots of prisoner jumpsuits.  And apparently lots of slippers and hairnets.”  I laughed at that, picturing these gorgeous girls running around like imprisoned cafeteria workers.  I’d bet they’d all refuse to wear them.

She shrugged.  “That’ll work.  I’ll send someone for them later.  For now, this should do for you.”  She reached into the bag in her hands and tossed me a small sack similar to the one that the bird feed was in.  “It’s a broad spectrum antibiotic.  A little rough around the edges but should fight most common infections.  Four times a day.”

I opened it and saw several pills inside.  They were in the shape of regular medicine but not exactly uniform.  “How did you make these?”

“Supplies from my old work.  If you have anyone in your group interested in chemistry, send them our way.  I can get them trained in a couple months on some basics, and you can have your own in-house pharmacy.  Nothing fancy, but painkillers, antibiotics and fever reducers for sure.”

“Wow, that’s amazing.  Thank you so much.”  I gave her my first genuine smile of the afternoon.  “I don’t really understand why you’re being so generous, but I appreciate it.”

She walked over and put her hand on my shoulder.  She was so much taller than me I had to look up to see her face.

“Good people have to stick together, and most particularly, good women.  This world belongs in the hands of those who will nurture and guide.  You’re one of those people.  I invest in assets that will give me a return.  Haven is one of those places.  If my place ever burns to the ground, I hope we can find a home with you here, at least until we find another.”

I reached up and put my hand on her forearm.  “Absolutely.  Our home is your home.”

“Cool.”  She leaned in a kissed me on the cheek.  “I’m outta here, chica.  Tell the others I said goodbye.”

Her compatriots came out the front door right on time and joined her at their pile of belongings.  Once they were all suited up, they walked to the gate.

Ronald came out with the keys.  They jingled as he sorted through them to find the one that would do the unlocking.

He turned the tumblers and I helped him push the gate open and then closed again.  As he locked it back up, I stared at the Amazons through the links.

“See you soon,” said Kirsten, her back to me.

“Yeah.  See you soon,” I said.

Ronald and I stood side-by-side watching them walk away.

“Everything go okay?” asked Ronald after they were well on their way.  I turned to face him, and he stared at my bloodshot eyes, his own filling with concern.

“Things with the Amazons went … well.  Very well, I think.”

“And things with you?  How are they going?”

“I guess that remains to be seen.”

Ronald put his arm around me as we walked to the door.  “God works in mysterious ways, you know.  I know things are strained between you and Bodo right now, but don’t count love out of the picture just yet.”

“I’m not counting love out.  I have a lot of it around me.  I just don’t know how this story is going to end.”

“That’s what makes it interesting,” he said, opening the door for me. “If we knew the ending, we’d never want to do the middle part.  It’s not the destination that matters anyway.  It’s the journey.”

“Sometimes I want to cheat and skip to the end.”

“No.  I don’t think any of us would like that.  Just be patient.  God has a plan for you, and it’s a
good
plan.  I promise.”

“Thank you, Ronald.  I hope you’ll agree to be our church guy here at Haven.  I don’t know who will come to be a part of your gig or your services or whatever, but I’m sure there will be some.”

“It’s already in the works, don’t you worry about that.”  He gave me a hug before gesturing for me to go into the building before him.

We went inside, and I took Peter up on an offer to give me a tour of Haven.  He wanted to show me everything they’d done to organize it, and I wanted to get away from all the people who were expecting me to make their lives good again.

***

Two weeks went by with a flurry of activity.  Jenny proved herself worthy of the title Code-Reader and she had two new birds in her flock of messengers, given by a happy compatriot over at the Amazon contact point.  They were very happy with her progress as were we.

Several more Miccosukee and Creek kids had joined us at Haven, bringing more animals and supplies.  We added lots of stragglers too, who’d made their way down I-95, sent to us by the Cracker Barrel contact point and the Amazons.

Everyone who came was offered a cell to make into an apartment.  None of them had windows, but they were worlds better than where most of them had been sleeping, and you couldn’t beat the security system.  A pack of dogs, four watchtowers with armed guards, and several explosive-rigged traps ringed our little town.  Many signs warned people approaching to follow a very specific protocol before coming to the gate or risk being blown to bits.  It was harsh, but effective.  We’d had zero accidents and all good additions to our community so far.

But while several things were going well for us, there were still some problems we had to deal with on a regular basis, and two of them haunted me night and day: Bodo and the girl I liked to call the Bad Penny.  No matter what I said or did to smooth things over with her, she just kept turning up under my nose making me nuts.

“Gail, I’ve already said this to you like fifty times.”  She was standing in front of me and Peter in Peter’s workspace.  We were sitting in two of the swivel chairs that ringed a large laminate, oval-shaped table.

Peter had claimed an old conference room as his City Manager headquarters, and it was stocked with all the writing materials we could find and a huge cork board and magnetic board.  All of his plans were hanging up around the room, and over fifty checklists were in the process of being completed and refined at all times.

“I don’t have to listen to that crap from you,” she responded, arms folded across her chest.

“Uh, yes you do,” said Peter, as frustrated with her as I was.  “Bryn makes the rules here, and you follow them.  Just like everyone else does.  You’re not special.  You’re not the exception.  No one is.”

“Could-a fooled me,” she said in a mocking tone.  “I don’t see you coming down on Fohi for getting involved in the weaving.”

“That’s different.”

“How so?  You said his job was setting traps.  But eeevery day I see him in the weaving room, messing around with the looms. That means you do let people do other jobs.  I guess that rule only applies to certain friends, though.”

“You’re comparing apples and oranges again,” said Peter, getting ready to launch into his politically correct explanation about how we have to spread out our resources and put the most qualified person in the most appropriate position.  Fohi was just there flirting with Winky, but that had nothing to do with this at all.  Gail knew this.  She was just trying once again to get under our skin.

I held my hand up to silence Peter.  I was staring at Gail the whole time.  “Okay, Gail, here’s the deal.  We’ve been understanding of your issues, nice to you …”

“Issues?”

“Yes.  Issues.  We’ve been nice to you, given you food, clothing, shelter, everything you need to survive and thrive here … and all you’ve done is cause trouble.”

“That’s bullshit.”

“No, it’s not.  You harass Jenny non-stop about the birds, you mock Fohi until he punches walls, you say negative remarks about the food to anyone who will listen … and frankly, none of us is interested in your shit anymore.  It needs to stop, and it needs to stop today.”

“I’m just interested in learning the code stuff too.  What if Jenny gets sick?  What if something happens to her?  You need a second person trained.”

“That second person will never be you, you can count on that,” said Peter.

“Listen, gay boy, I don’t need you …”

I stood up all of a sudden, the chair flying out behind me.  “Stop right there!”  I came from around the table to stand just a couple feet from her.

She backed up as far as she could go, until she ran into a shelving unit with files on it.   “Stay back.  I have a knife!”

“You’d better not have a knife.  You know this is a weapon-free zone.”

She fumbled in her pocket and pulled it out, holding it up in front of her and pointed at my face.  “Stay back, I’m not kidding.  I don’t have to stand here and be bullied by you.  I have the right to defend myself.”

The weapon looked like something she’d made out of a piece of metal she’d found and sharpened.

“What is that?” laughed Peter.  “A prison shank?”