No Easy Hope - 01 (3 page)

I researched the sword’s original design on the Internet, and sent a rough blueprint to the guys at the forge, giving them broad latitude to exercise their artistic talents. The sword smith cut the weapon from 5160 high carbon spring steel, and heat tempered the blade to strengthen it. The horse head shaped pommel and cross guard were made of ornately carved bronze, and the handle was fashioned from leather and wire wrapped sharkskin over sandalwood grips.

I drove up to Gabe’s place on his birthday with a bottle of Maker’s Mark and the gift-wrapped sword under one arm. Gabe heard my truck coming up the drive and came out onto the porch.

“Happy birthday motherfucker!” I shouted as I got out of my truck. Gabe stopped and blinked a couple of times.

“Shit, it is my birthday, isn’t it?”  He said. “I literally turned thirty five before I knew it.”

“Let’s get drunk and cut some shit up.” I said, shoving the box into his hands as I went in the front door of the cabin.  Gabe followed me in and set the box down on the table. I poured a couple of fingers of whiskey into two glasses and set one down on the table beside Gabe, smiling in anticipation.

“Go on dude, open it.” I said.

Gabe peeled the wrapping paper off the package and opened it. He didn’t say anything for a moment, he just sat in his chair staring into the box. After a minute or two, he took the sword from the box and drew it from its sheath. The steel of the blade was mirror polished and reflected the light from the lamp beside the table. The sickle shaped spine of the sword was a centimeter thick, and the blade was hollow ground to a razor keen edge. The last fourteen inches of the blade flared into a wide bolo before narrowing down into a sharp point.

“Where the hell did you get this thing?” He asked.

“I had it made by the guys at Legion Forge. You like it?”

“Shit yeah. Is this for me?”

“No Gabe, I boxed it up, gift wrapped it, and drove my ass up here on your birthday just let you see it. Yes, genius, it’s for you.”

We spent the rest of the night putting away whiskey and rummaging through Gabe’s house and garage looking for stuff to cut apart.  The next morning we stumbled bleary eyed around his yard trying to remember where we had gotten half of the things that we’d chopped to pieces. We also lost the sword, and after searching for nearly an hour, we found it in an oak tree nearly fifty feet off the ground. The blade was buried halfway through a branch twice as thick as a man’s wrist. Neither of us could remember how it had gotten up there.

Gabe brought me out of my reverie by throwing a piece of oil soaked cloth at me.

“Hey, space cadet, what are you grinning about over there?” He asked.

“Just remembering the day I gave you that sword.” I replied.

Gabe paused for a moment, then laughed and shook his head, “I hope you can remember more of it than I can. We were so shit faced drunk, I’m surprised we didn’t cut our own fool heads off. It took me two days to get over that hangover.”

He made another pass over the blade with a sharpening stone.

“I have to say though, this thing has served me pretty well since the world went to shit.” He said, his smile fading.

He tested the edge of the blade with his thumb then returned it to its sheath. He stood and propped the sword up against the wall. As he turned to walk back toward his chair, he jerked a thumb in the direction of the table with the laptop on it.

“You know, you really should start putting some stuff together to post to the Net.” Gabe said. “Once we get past the Appalachian range we should be able to get a signal. We should tell people about everything we know.” He said.

“If you’re so concerned about it, why don’t you write something down?” I asked.

“Because you’re better at it, college boy. Besides, I got bullets to polish.”

Gabe walked over to his pack and took out the duty belt we found that morning. He removed the pistol and the ammo magazines, picked up a cleaning kit, and sat down in front of the stove to begin working on them.

I watched him for a few minutes, thinking about how to start before I picked up the laptop and sat down in the chair next to Gabriel’s. After letting my feet warm by the hot stove for a few minutes, I opened the laptop and began to write.

Book I

Our world has passed away,

in wantonness o’erthrown,

there is nothing left today,

but steel and fire and stone...

Comfort, content, delight,

The ages slow bought gain,

They shriveled in a night,

Only ourselves remain…

-Rudyard Kipling

For All We Have and Are

Chapter 1

Divestiture

I was a wealthy man before the Outbreak. Well, wealthy in monetary terms. I had almost no family by the time the world ended. I was an only child, and when my parents were killed, I had only my Grandmother and my uncle Robert. No wife, no children, not even a dog. Just a big empty house and a pickup truck. My existence could have been the punch line to a joke about a country-western song.

I always knew that Grandma had money. My grandfather was a successful attorney, and when his heart gave out on him, he left everything he had to the woman who had stood by him for more than forty years. Grandma didn’t do much with it. She was involved with her church, and she gave to a few charity’s, but nothing too extravagant. When she passed, she split what was left between me and my Uncle Robert. I inherited more than twelve million dollars in bond investments, and a few pieces of real estate.

That was how I met Gabriel.

He bought a large swath of land and a cabin just outside of Morganton from me. The first time I met him, I had driven to the cabin to clean it up in anticipation of a potential buyer coming to see it with his realtor. My agent told me they would not be arriving until late in the afternoon. Imagine my surprise when I arrived at the cabin and there was a silver Taurus sitting in the driveway, with two people standing on the porch staring at me as I pulled up. One of them was a petite Asian woman in a smart looking pantsuit, and the other was a tall, powerfully built, scruffy looking man in jeans and a t-shirt.

I was somewhat irritated to see them there because I wanted to get the place cleaned up and looking nice before showing it. No one had been inside the little cabin in years, and everything inside of it was no doubt covered in dust. I swallowed my irritation and managed a smile as I approached the cabin. As I stepped up onto the low porch, the Asian realtor pounced forward, flashing a dazzling smile and holding out a perfectly manicured hand.

“Hi, I’m Kristina. You must be Mr. Riordan, right?” she said, actually pronouncing my last name correctly (REAR-dun).

I shook her hand and breathed in the flowery scent of her perfume. She had gorgeous almond shaped eyes, flawless cinnamon skin, and adorable little dimples in her cheeks. She was a knockout, even though she was only about five foot three in high heels.

“Yes, that’s right. I was just about to get the place cleaned up for you folks. I wasn’t expecting you so early.” I replied.

“Oh, that’s alright, Mr. Garrett is really more interested in the layout of the property than in the cabin itself.”

She gestured toward the big, grumpy looking guy. I remember thinking that I was more interested in her layout than I was in selling a house right about then. I was surreptitiously checking her left hand for any rings when old tall, dark and ugly made his way over to us. He offered a massive, scarred hand as he introduced himself.

“Hi there, Gabriel Garrett, nice to meet you.” He rumbled.

His voice seemed to start somewhere about six feet underneath his scuffed boots, and issued forth in a resonant, albeit gravelly, baritone. I shook his hand and tried not to wince at the strength of his grip. I am neither a small nor a weak man, but I knew without question that Gabriel could have crushed every bone in my hand if he’d wanted to.

“Eric Riordan, nice to meet you Mr. Garrett.” I said. I resisted the urge rub my hand when he released the handshake.

“Please, call me Gabe.” He said. “This is a nice place you have here.”

“I wish I could take credit for it, but it belonged to my grandfather.” I replied. “The place is old, but it’s well built. Back in Grandpa’s day, people took pride in their work and appreciated good craftsmanship. At least that’s what Grandpa used to tell me. He also used to tell me that Jimmy Carter was a communist, and that people should have to pass a written exam before being allowed to vote, so I took everything he said with a grain of salt.”

Gabriel laughed, and it was like listening to bunch of rocks rattling around in the bottom of a barrel. He sounded much older than he looked. I noticed that he had two thin, ragged scars that started just under his right eye and cut through his short beard all the way down to his jaw line. It occurred to me that Mr. Garrett might have been in a scrape or two over the years.

“Well, your grandfather had good taste in land, at least.” Gabriel said. “This cabin is in a good location. It’s not near any major highways, there’s only one road on the mountain that leads up here, and I don’t think there are any neighbors for a few miles in any direction. Looks like the kind of place a man could go and get away from it all for a while.”

Gabriel had just described all of the reasons why I had decided to sell the property to begin with. It was much too far away from civilization to suit my taste. I got lost twice the first time I came out here, and had to spend nearly an hour driving around on isolated back roads before I finally found the place. I wondered why Gabriel wanted to live so far out of the way.

“Why don’t we go ahead and take a look inside the cabin?” Kristina chimed in.

“Sure, let’s go on in.” I replied.

I unlocked the door to the cabin and held it open for the two of them. I couldn’t help but notice the way Kristina’s hips and butt filled out her tight fitting pants as she walked by. I stepped inside after them and looked around for a light to switch on. It took me a few seconds to remember that the cabin had no electricity.

Gabriel stood in the middle of the common room, silently looking around and nodding to himself. He looked ridiculously huge in contrast to the small space. After a moment, he went to either end of the cabin to take a brief look into the bedrooms. He stopped by the wood stove near the back wall and squatted down in front of it. The cast iron hinges on the door made a loud metallic squeal as he opened it and looked inside.

A thick layer of dust covered every flat surface inside the cabin. I looked over at Kristina, who was standing in a corner of the kitchen with her hands primly clasped behind her back. She was watching Gabriel intently, no doubt gauging his reaction. Her smile looked a bit strained, and I guessed that she was not impressed with the décor. Gabriel stood up from in front of the stove and planted his feet in the center of the room, hands on his hips.

“It’s perfect.” He said. “I’ll take it.”

No one in the room was more surprised than me. Kristina rescued the moment from becoming awkward.

“That fantastic, Mr. Garrett, but we haven’t really had time to put together any kind of an offer. Are you sure you don’t want some more time to think about it?”

If the petite real estate agent had not been so damned adorable, I probably would have been pissed at her.

“Oh, that won’t be necessary. I’ll just pay the list price.” Gabriel replied.

“Well that’s great.” I said. “Do you need some time to put together financing?”

“No, that won’t be necessary either. I’ll be paying by certified check. Would that be sufficient Mr. Riordan?”