Published: 07 Nov 2016

Starts Day +16

After nearly nine hours of helping the wounded, starving, and exposure ravaged survivors, Hunter moved back to the van. He was beyond exhausted, both physically and emotionally. Still he wanted to do more, but knew his internal tank was dry. As it was, he could feel his body cramping because of exertion and too little water.

Making matters worse, he couldn’t just curl up in a ball and go to sleep. He had to clean himself up. For not only was his clothing blood splattered, but there were other human related horrors on him as well. There were bits of flesh from burned skin, puss from blisters, and even some puke from people who tried to eat too fast on empty stomachs. Being unable to stand it any longer, he stripped and used the cold rain, which was falling in the pre-dawn hours to wash, literally taking a very cold shower in the rain.

Shivering quite badly, he pulled himself into the back of the van and toweled off while looking at the clothing he had been wearing, Henry’s clothing, he reminded himself. Another glance at it only caused him to shake his head. No way was he going to try to clean it and wear it again. To do so would remind him of this place, of the pain, the way too thin bodies, of the burns, the trying to help people who probably would not live… No, the clothing would stay out there in the mud, never to be touched by Hunter’s hands again.

Looking back toward the makeshift camp the others had helped to set up for the survivors, Hunter shivered again. This time, not from the cold, but the conditions the remnants of those aboard the doomed plane had been forced to live in. Even as he dressed in more of Henry’s clothing, he knew he would have to write about this, but he would also have to take his time and do it the justice both the living and the dead deserved.

His thoughts were brought to an abrupt halt as Angus jumped up into the van, “I’ve done everything I can, so has just about everyone else. What now?”

Hunter pulled a coat around himself to try to warm up a bit more as he looked up from where he was sitting, “What now?” His voice betrayed both exhaustion and confusion, “What are you talking about.”

“I mean…” Angus started to say with a mean edge in his voice but stopped and turned to look out over the crash site. He closed his eyes and forced his voice to come out less angry than he really felt. “Look, Hunter, we’ve done everything we can do. Most of us are wiped out and I have seen about as many burned, broken, and mangled bodies as I can handle. Even Gage was looking a bit green and, as usual, Devin is a basket case.

“These people… what is left of them… If we stay here, we will have to keep our guard up…”

Hunter looked up in total disbelief, “You want to leave them? We came here to help!”

“And we have. We have done everything we can…”

Hunter closed his eyes and started to clench his fist, only to find it wanted to cramp up on him, so he had to force it flat on the bed of the van to straighten out his fingers, “Gus, how can we give them some hope, then leave? What if it was your dad or mom down there? How would you feel…”

“But it ain’t my mom or dad. We brought them enough food and stuff for them to get out of here and head to a town…”

Angus was interrupted by Luke, who came up to the van at a run, “Hunter, Gus, we have movement coming up the road! Gage says it is a military Hummer and some other trucks, but not the same one…”

Hunter started to jump up only to get a massive cramp in his leg. He let out a yelp and fell back into the van while grabbing his left calf.

“Luke,” Angus barked, “get Devin over here to help Hunter and have Ram drive the van up behind those rocks. I’ll take the Suburban around to the back of the tail section. We’ll set up a defensive spot up there.” Angus pointed at what was left of the plane, which was also the shelter the survivors had been using to stay as dry and warm as possible.

Hunter’s face contorted as the cramp only got worse. Still he managed to speak through clenched teeth, “Have Zeek take some extra bullets down to them and make sure he gets Vern to help. Tell Vern not to let Gage start shooting until we know for sure it is these Colorado jerks! It may be help from Hill City!”

Angus grabbed a bottle of water, unscrewed the lid and handed it to Hunter while pulling his friend’s leg straight. “You didn’t eat or drink a thing since we got here, then took a shower under the cold rain, didn’t you…”

“I’d have puked for sure if I had tried to eat or drink, Gus!”

“And now you are cramping up. As Coach Brackmore used to tell us, you did this to yourself, but you hurt the team in doing so.”

Hunter downed the water and nodded understanding, even as the pressure from Angus against his foot eased the cramp. “Just because I seem to have lots of brains, doesn’t mean I am smart.”

Angus rolled his eyes. “You are two of me on my best days!”

“Yeah, but like it or not you are in charge, cause I’m barely able to move at the moment.”

Angus rubbed the back of Hunter’s leg, further easing the muscle, “Devin should be in charge.”

“Yeah, well…”

Angus released Hunter’s leg and gave him a knowing nod, “Keep your leg straight and drink something more than water. I’ll take Luke and get into a spot so we can cover all those you just spent all night trying to put back together.”

While Angus jumped out of the back of the van with his assault rifle in his hands, he looked down the hill and could see the distant bounce of headlights. Seeing Luke coming back up with Devin, Ramsey and Zeki, he pointed to the van. “Devin, help Hunter. His leg is going to cramp up again until he gets rehydrated. Ram get the van up the hill and behind some rocks! Zeek, grab extra ammo for Gage and Vern, but remember it may not be bad guys! Mr. Meeker said he was going to try to get some help up here! Luke, you’re with me.”

Even as the van was fired up and started making its way further up the hill, Kurt Banks came running over. “What’s going on?”

“We have company coming.” Angus pointed down the hill to the headlights. “Get everyone in the tail section and stay down. Luke and I will set up a defensive spot to try to protect you if it is bad guys.”

“If you let me grab some extra guns…”

Angus shook his head, “Mister, the last thing we want is people randomly shooting. Besides, with the exception of you and a couple of others, no one is in any condition to fight and some of those people are going to need help moving to get behind things. Let us take care of this.”

Kurt’s friend, Leonard, came up and looked down the hill, “They are coming to help, right?”

“Us hopes,” Zeki spoke nervously, “no can be sure though.”

Leonard frowned deeply, “You are just a bunch of…”

“Of what? Kids?” Angus growled as he gave Leonard a shove in the direction of the crash, “You are one of the few who was not badly hurt, so go do something important. Instead of getting in our way, go help those who need it into the tail section and have everyone stay down. We’ll keep you covered.”

Leonard gave Angus a sharp glare, but before he could say anything, Kurt grabbed him by the shoulder. “Don’t, just don’t,” Kurt warned while partially dragging his friend back toward the survivors. “They are tired and have worked their butts off to help all of us. Besides, I watched as they took out an armed roadblock and like it or not, the kid who just shoved you was stronger than us before we almost starved to death.”

Luke watched to two men head back in the direction of the tail section, “Angus, you just about knocked him over…”

Angus jerked his head in the direction of the Suburban. “He’s lucky. I wanted to punch him.”

Luke’s jaw dropped open but no words came out as he jumped into the passenger side of the old blue Suburban. Before he could even pull the door shut, Angus stepped on the gas and spun the wheel so he could angle the vehicle to get behind what was left of one of the engines.

Angus shot Luke an angry frown, “Look, I get why we are here, but I haven’t even gotten a single thank you out of anyone here, even after I took the backhoe up over the ridge at least a dozen times with the scoop filled with their dead! Even in the dark I could see the arms, legs and even the rotting heads hanging over the sides of the scoop! I have spent the last God only knows how long digging a mass grave and even drug some firewood back from the edge of the river, so they could get warm. All because it is the right thing to do, well I am sick of doing the right thing and then not to even be thanked for it… It sucks!”

“I’m sure they will… I mean, one lady thanked me… They are all starving and stuff…”

An undertone of fury came out of Angus as he spun the wheel again to get fully behind the smashed casing of the engine. “Yeah, and again I get it, but I want to go home! I want to see if I have a home. I want to know if I have a mom or dad! Hell, I even want to give my sister and brother a hug if they are alive! Yet every time we start heading there something else seems to come up! Some other moron needs to be saved, needs our help! And here we are again and I am sick of all of it! I was just about to make Hunter get us out of here, and now I am again helping some other ungrateful jerk-wads out!”

Luke chewed on his lower lip for a moment and dropped his head. With a quivering voice Luke’s head dropped forward, “You mean like me… Right?”

Angus slammed his foot down on the brake pedal and let out a loud frustrated shout, “Yeah, kinda!”

The words hammered into Luke worse than if Angus had punched him in the gut. He started to cry.

By this point Angus just needed to let out the two plus weeks of anger and he did so, “Knock it off you little pansy! We wouldn’t have had to come get you if you had been with us in the first place! All you have done is bitch about Mr. K. making you drink water, well get over it! Grow up and stop being a baby!”

Angus roughly tossed the 7mm rifle over at Luke hard enough to leave a bruise on the side of Luke’s face, even as he jumped out into the mud. “Now grab your damned rifle and at least pretend you belong with the rest of us!”

Back down the hill, Zeki slid behind the rocks Vernon and Gage were hiding behind. “Hunter say no shoot till we know it be bad guy. Him think it might be guy from block road.”

Vernon glanced over with a slight smirk, “Roadblock, Zeek, not block road.”

Gage saw Zeki cringe, so even as he yawned, he managed to reach over to pat Zeki on the back, “Pretty much the same thing, though, right?”

Vernon mage a slight shrugging motion, “Yeah, whatever. Thanks for grabbing me another box of 20-gauge at least.”

Gage let out a long breath while focusing on Zeki, “Don’t worry about it. I think Vern needs his beauty sleep.”

“Screw you.” Vernon stated with a slight grin.

Gage turned sharply, clenched his fist, then shook his head, “Vern, I know you were joking, but do me a favor and don’t say that to me again, ever.”

Even in the darkness Vern could see the look of resentment flash in Gage’s eyes, while the boy’s voice became tinged with deep dark anger. “Hey, sorry…”

“Not your fault, but just don’t… And don’t ask.” Gage forced himself to say as he looked away and spat off to the side. He then turned to Zeki so he could focus on something other than where he found his thoughts going. “Me and Vern were pretty much saying what Hunter told you to tell us. We were thinking we should let them pass us and could then open fire from back here and catch them in a crossfire just like Mr. Korbal taught us. But if we do, we will be firing toward those from the plane crash, so we will have to make sure we hit or at the very least, miss away from all those we just tried to put back together.”

Hearing some of the edge come off of Gage’s voice, Vern decided to keep his friend focused on the problem at hand all the while wondering why his friend, who never seemed to be bothered by anything, was bothered by two stupid words. “I sure wish we knew, because if it’s the Colorado guys we could stop them before they ever get to us.”

Gage patted his rifle as he growled, “After everything he’s done, I’d prefer to shoot him where I can see the look on his face.”

Up in the van Hunter continued to clutch at the back of his leg as it started to cramp back up. He banged his head on the inside of the van and stifled another yelp even as Devin tried to straighten the leg out.

Hunter gritted his teeth, “Push on my toes, just like Angus did! It really helped!”

Up front Ramsey felt the tires sinking into a particularly soft spot and gunned the engine. When this didn’t work, he put it in reverse and backed out of the hole the tires were making, “It’s too muddy to get up to the rocks!”

“Then get behind some of the plane or something!” Hunter all but screamed, as he felt the knot in his leg tighten up even more.

Ramsey’s hands gripped the steering wheel so tightly his knuckles turned totally white as he saw the headlights of the lead vehicle growing closer. “Hold on! I am going to back up into the nose section!”

Seconds later the back passenger side tire went over a hunk of sharp metal and blew out with a loud bang; followed moments later by the screech of metal on metal, as the back doors came into contact with a large chunk of what was left of the nose of the aircraft.

“Great, driving, genius…” Devin started to say only to get a light kick from Hunter with his other leg.

Ramsey looked into the back with a great deal of frustration, “Tell, you what! Next time you can drive! Oh, wait, you don’t wann’a ’cause it’s work and…”

“Would you two stop!” Hunter shouted cutting off any further remarks. “Devin get me one of Luke’s sports drinks and Ram, take a rifle and get up on the roof and cover us or something!”

Both boy’s looked at Hunter for a few moments and did nothing.

“Guys, come on!” Hunter growled as he rubbed his calf muscle with everything he could. “There isn’t any of us who can’t complain about any of the rest of us. If we all want to scream at each other let’s find some time and place where we can just let it rip, but now isn’t it!”

Devin gave a short nod. “I am just tired.”

“Me too,” Ramsey responded, “and breathing sucks again with this rain and humidity. I’d be dying if it was hot and there was this much water in the air.”

Devin glanced over as Ramsey secured his rifle. “You know, El Paso is in a desert. If we find our families, maybe we could all go down there since it sounds like it’s still in one piece.”

Hunter shook his head, “I kind of thought the same thing at first, but Erma, Hank and Sheriff Will all seem to not like what they are hearing from down there. I vote we trust them.”

“Me too,” Ramsey nodded in total agreement. “I just don’t understand why everyone in Jennings is so unhappy about El Paso surviving.”

Devin let out a long sigh. “Maybe we should ask them when we go back there. I know the mayor didn’t want to let anyone down there at the Fort Bliss place to know about Jennings for some stupid reason.”

“Well,” Ramsey stated as he grabbed a couple of extra assault rifle magazines out of one of the packs, “all the adults seem to think the same thing, so we must be the stupid ones.”

“Pretty much what I was thinking.” Hunter winced slightly as he reached over and grabbed his pistol just in case.

Devin, feeling Hunter’s leg tighten up yet again, pushed hard on the boy’s foot. “Man, these better be good guys,” Devin muttered as he reluctantly grabbed his shotgun with his free hand. “We are all way too tired and grouchy to fight.”

“Yeah,” Hunter agreed as he listened to Ramsey climb up to the top of the van, “I think I could sleep for a week!”

Before the Humvee and the three trailing trucks even got to Gage, Vernon, and Zeki, the Humvee skidded to a stop. The passenger side opened and a large man got out, “Kid’s it’s Tom, Tom Meeker. I brought some help from Hill City!”

Gage slid around and moved well away from the others, keeping rocks and wreckage between him and the four vehicles before he yelled. “Mr. Meeker, who are the military guys?”

Tom kept his hands up and open as he stepped into view. “They are National Guard, but not the ones you told me about. They have been in Hill City since a couple of days after the bombs fell. My brother is with me and has been around them since they came to Hill City.”

Gage clutched his rifle a bit tighter as he moved again to get better cover between him and the vehicles. As he did so, Vernon spoke up, “Um… as much as we like you and stuff, we haven’t really had good luck with military guys…”

“I know, son, you told me all about it. But these guys aren’t like those others. I know you really don’t have much trust in you either. Look, you saved me and mine. I owe you everything and I sure wouldn’t have brought anyone here I even suspected would hurt you all.”

Not hearing a reply, Tom took another deep breath and stepped out into the open. “Look, I get it, but you all told me without a military man as your scout leader, none of you would be where you are. These are the good guys, boys.”

“Give us a minute or two, Mr. Meeker.” Gage shouted from his new position. “Zeek, go tell Hunter what’s going on and see what he wants us to do!”

Gage then took a bead on the man behind the wheel of the Hummer as Zeki took off up the hill, fully exposing himself to those in the small convoy. Gage couldn’t help but cringe, but when no one moved and there were no shots, he relaxed his grip on his rifle slightly. Still he muttered, “We are going to have to work with him on staying down and hidden better.”

It took almost five minutes, but Hunter finally came down the hill with Devin beside him. He could tell the cramp still wanted to come back, but the water and sports drink seemed to be helping. Seeing Mr. Meeker standing out in front of the other vehicle helped calm his nerves some, but only some. The sight of the military vehicles made his heart speed up. With a shallow and nervous breath he gave a quick wave and spoke in a fear-tinged, squeaky voice, “Hi again.”

Tom moved forward a few steps so he could better see the boy in front of him. “You look exhausted, Hunter.”

Hunter nodded and forced a slight smile as he heard the concern in the man’s voice as well as in the words themselves. “I’m not sure what is the next step past exhausted, but I’m there.”

“Then let us take over…”

Hunter glanced back over his shoulder at the wreck. With the help of the headlights from the vehicles, he could see a few people moving around. He looked down then back at the man he had shared dinner with less than a half day ago. “You are sure these guys are not like those others we told you about?”

“Hunter, there is no way I would have brought them here if I thought they would put you in any danger. I know from all you told me there are good reasons for you fearing military, but they aren’t all like those you faced. This is no different than you all deciding to trust the sheriff you told me about. You trusted me enough to help me and share a meal with me too. This is just another in a long list of times you have to decide what is best. I can tell you this much, should they try anything, which I am sure they won’t, they will have to get through me to get to any of you.”

Hunter chewed on his lip, “Ok, but we are going to have our guns ready. I also need to figure out how to convince the others…”

“I’ve already warned them you are armed and they talked to Patrick, so they know you are dangerous and know how to shoot and fight. As for what to tell the others, from what I’ve seen, they’ll listen to you. However, I also have someone your football player buddy knows from Hill City, a Mr. Lake. He was one of the trainers at the summer football camp last year.”

Hunter took a deep breath and nodded. He then spoke softly enough to where he couldn’t be overheard, “Well, I’m sure Gus will be happy, but Gage is my real concern. He really doesn’t trust well.”

“I am sure he has good reasons. Just tell him you still have the upper hand. First off we only brought five of them. There are another twelve back in Hill City.” Tom responded softly. “Second, two of the five are medics and one is the officer in charge of the group and is injured himself. None of them are going to hurt you, but the officer, Lieutenant Grader, would like to talk to you and hear firsthand about those others. In addition, he may be able to give you all some more information about what is going on and what happened.”

Hunter rubbed his eyes and yawned, “And they will help these people and let us go?”

“Absolutely!”

“Good,” Hunter sighed, “cause we’re wiped out.”

“You look it.” Tom reached out and patted Hunter on the shoulder before he turned back to the trucks. “Let’s take over for these boys!”

Even as the truck just behind the Humvee turned to go around it, Gage called out, “You sure Hunter?”

“Yeah, Gage, but why don’t you and Vern keep watch just to make sure.”

“OK, but we all need some sleep and I don’t think I can with them around.”

“I know…” Hunter responded as he let out anther sigh, followed by a long yawn.

Hunter turned and trudged up the muddy hill toward the bulk of the plane crash; letting the three trucks pass him. He was already soaked again and shivering some. He looked up and let the rain hit is face. It had the desired effect of waking him up a little more. Before he could continue the trek up the hill, the Humvee stopped next to him. The voice of a man caused Hunter to tense up. “You want a lift up there?”

Hunter’s hand went down to his pistol even as he glanced over. He started to say ‘no way’ but a combination of not being rude to an adult and noticing Tom in the passenger side stopped him. After a few seconds of debate, he finally nodded, but paused long enough to shout out, “It’s OK, Gage, Tom is offering me a ride up to the others!”

Gage said something in response, but it was cut off by a rumble of thunder. Hunter didn’t bother to find out what. Instead he pulled open the back door, noticed there was a man wearing an Army uniform with his hand in a bandage, and a stack of cases of canned food between the man and where he would be seated. Hunter felt a burst of fear but forced it down as he reluctantly climbed in, his hand still on his pistol.

Even as he closed the door, the man on the other side of all the canned food spoke up, “I’m Lieutenant Grader, Kansas National Guard, 137th CAB, Bravo Company. Tom told us a whole lot about you and pretty much single-handedly convinced us to come down and help you all. From everything I am hearing you are an impressive group of youngsters!”

Hunter eyed the sandy haired, blue-eyed man for several seconds, even as the Hummer started back up the hill. Seeing the man’s eyes remain soft and concerned helped Hunter a great deal. Finally Hunter shrugged, “I think you are giving us way too much credit, sir. We all just want to get home, if we even have a home to go to.”

“Where you from?”

“Colby… But we heard it was bombed…”

Lt. Grader’s lips tightened as he gave a sad nod. “It was hit. At this point we have no idea how bad, but it was a nuke. It seems the Chinese had this invasion plan and even though they didn’t invade they still used some of it. The part they used was to isolate places by hitting spots people in less populated places went to a great deal.”

Curiosity took over his uneasiness. “How’d they know where people went?”

“From what reports we have managed to get, they went after towns that all had one of two things in common…”

Before the lieutenant could continue, Hunter looked over, “So you know all the places they bombed?”

The man rolled with the question, figuring the boy would come back to what he was about to say later or he would tell him when he was more receptive. “The last week or so we have spent most of our time getting as much information as we could from whoever was broadcasting. Some of it is still pretty hit and miss, but we have managed to get a good picture of west Kansas, southwest Nebraska, northwest Oklahoma, and east Colorado. Beyond those areas we can give you some information, but it is pretty sketchy and unconfirmed. Pretty much every big city is gone other than El Paso and there is some interesting chatter out of North and South Dakota which, if true, would mean most of both states survived remarkably intact.

“Also for totally unknown reasons, Little Rock Arkansas made it through without a single hit or even a near miss. We have gotten a big nothing out of the East Coast and very little from the West Coast. What we have heard, suggest most places along all coastlines were hit with tidal waves of massive size. The problem is, in all the nuclear exchanges, someone, or lots of someones, detonated nukes in space taking out satellites and the International Space Station. As best we can tell there are no functioning satellites left. Also with all the detonations both in space and above land, there is mass disturbances to the electromagnetic field…” The man stopped as he saw Hunter yawn, “Sorry, I am going over your head…”

Hunter shook his head, “No, I am following you. I’m just real tired.” Seeing the look of ‘yeah right’ in the man’s eyes, Hunter giggled. “I wish I could tell you how many times adults have given me the stare you are giving me.” He forced a smile, “Just to let you know you didn’t go over my head and you don’t have to talk to me like I am a two year old, let me take over for a second, OK?”

Lt. Grader’s left eyebrow shot up as he studied the boy for a couple of seconds, “By all means…”

Hunter couldn’t help but roll his eyes. “What you are saying is this: With a breakdown of the EM field there is radio wave disruption because some of the solar waves are messing with the signals, just like what happens in a solar flare, only this time it’s because the Earth isn’t protecting us like it is supposed to. This means the EM field is unstable or buckled, or something along those lines. But without satellites to measure it from space and most scientific ground stations now nothing more than radioactive dust particles, there is no way to know for sure.

“The real question then becomes something a whole lot more important than radio signals. In simple terms, what we need to be asking, is the EM field so screwed up we aren’t as protected from the Sun as we should be?”

Lt. Grader’s eyes went a bit wide and his jaw dropped. At the same time Tom glanced back over his shoulder, “I think the two year old is the one sitting up here! You totally lost me!”

The nineteen-year-old Private First Class driving the Humvee, glanced back even as he put a bit more pressure on the gas to get the vehicle moving up the muddy slope, “Way, way over my head. Is he right Ell Tee?”

Lt. Grader let out a sharp noisy breath, “Yeah, Sheffield, he’s more than right… He’s absolutely on the money right…” He then turned his full attention back to Hunter. “Um… OK… I guess I didn’t really lose you… Beyond impressive… But, to be honest, we are still trying to figure out how well the Earth’s EM field is doing protecting both us and other living things from the UV waves of the sun…”

Hunter’s head dropped as he realized what this might mean, “So even if we get crops planted and growing soon enough to harvest, some might die because a bunch of jerks had to push a bunch of buttons… Just great… So there is also chance we will all get sunburned to death or starve even if we avoid the radiation and the bad guys.”

“I can’t say for sure, but as of yet we have not heard of any quick sunburns over any radios, nor have we heard of mass die-offs of plants or animals outside of radiation contaminated areas. Because of this, I am guessing there is enough of the EM field left to protect life on Earth, at least what is left of it.”

Hunter let out a relived sigh followed by another yawn. “So there is still a chance we can make it… Um, so what do you know about Colby?”

“Not enough.” Lt. Grader admitted. “Things were really confusing leading up to the nuclear exchanges. When Norton was hit, we were a few miles outside it and endured the initial blast. Since the wind pattern was going to take the radiation right toward us, we headed out without any clear idea of what we were doing. All we really knew was we were way too close to the blast, which meant too close to radiation and the wind was going to push it right into where we set up.

“We spent three days on some farm road, but responded to gunshots. We found a farmhouse under attack by some guys we later found out had been incarcerated at the jail outside of Norton. The three remaining family members from the farmhouse wanted to see if their family in Hill City would take them in, so we decided to escort them and see if we could find a good base of operations.

“With the bandit activity and the chaotic state of the world we have found ourselves in, we knew we had to find a stable base of operations. Once we got to Hill City, we found it basically intact, but there has been extensive flooding on the south and east sides of the town. Still, most of it is in good shape and it has a good water supply. Even better, there were several trucks taking windmills to some wind farm. They were able to set up two of them with equipment on hand, so there is some power for key buildings most of the time.

“Hill City quickly became our home and we its security. They also accepted us as part of the town, probably because we have a couple of Bradleys and a trio of Strykers to give them good defenses. Whatever the reason, we are glad to have a place to operate out of and be able to keep people safe. We happen to have a good antenna and a couple of radio operators, including my senior NCO. We were also able to escort the trucks down to the wind farm and secure a couple more wind generators so my command also has power most of the time. We are going to try again, but at the moment the roads going there are flooded, so we’ll have to wait. Because we do have power, however, we have spent the last week plus trying to piece together what is left. All I can tell you is, Colby is not one of those places, but as far as damage or survivors go, we just don’t know.”

Hunter wiped a couple of tears out of his eyes, “We already knew it was hit… We were just hoping something was left…”

Tom turned to look back at Hunter, “Kiddo, even if some of it survived, there would be too much radiation to stay…”

“I know…” Hunter bit back a sob before forcing himself to continue. “But, Angus’ place is outside of Colby and one of the kids in our troop has cancer and we were supposed to meet there from what we have been told. If Sid’s house is still there, maybe someone left a note or something…”

Lt. Grader rubbed his chin with one hand, while clenching a fist with the other. Never having had kids, never wanting kids, he didn’t really know what to do or say. Still, he felt he had to do or offer something, “How about we get you all to Hill City and see what we can find out from the radio?”

Hunter wiped the tears on his soaking wet shirt before looking over at the man, “Let’s get the plane crash people to Hill City, then I’ll talk to the others in my patrol.”

Lt. Grader gave a single nod, “You know, Tom and his wife were right when he demanded we come out here to help you. You are a damned fine young man.”

It took a bit of work from both the kids and the National Guard troops, but some basic bonds of trust were formed between the scouts and the National Guard members. This was made a bit easier because Tom made it a point to put himself between the sides when there was any sign of uneasiness. When combined with the fact Mr. Lake, a camp coach of Angus’ was there, let the boys begrudgingly accept the National Guardsmen. In turn, this built some rapport between the two groups. Finally, working to help those in the most need fostered a setting for some mutual respect to grow and a chance to get to know each other.

With the help of Lt. Grader, those under him, and the handful who came from Hill City to help, it took only four hours to get all the living and useful surviving items loaded up and back to Hill City. The hardest part proved to be pulling the van out of the section of plane and replacing the tire, but between Private Sheffield who turned out to be a National Guard trained mechanic, Tom, and Angus using the backhoe, they were able to pull the van out and repair it.

Although the others were not thrilled with heading further away from Colby, they were too tired to argue much. In fact, most of group were having a hard time keeping their eyes open even as they helped the last of the crash survivors onto the back of the trucks Hill City sent. Once Gage and Angus relented, both reluctantly admitting they needed rest, food, and a place to dry out, the entire group joined the convoy into Hill City.

Upon arrival a couple of hours after dawn, they found members of the town praising them as if they were heroes. However, it was just as obvious the boys were exhausted, dirty, and hungry. To this end, the boys were cooked a hearty meal and given use of a small community center, right next to the firehouse the National Guard group had based themselves out of.

It didn’t take long for them to clean up, get into some dry clothing, and sit down to eat. Even as the boys cleaned up and ate, a few of the National Guard members under Lt. Grader set up extra cots for the eight boys, while PFC Sheffield and PFC Lopez gave the backhoe, Suburban, and van a careful once over, making sure they were mechanically sound.

Lt. Grader moved over to the table the boys were eating at and sat, nodding his thanks as one of the women from the community set a plate of hamburger, noodles, and a tomato sauce in front of him. Seeing the kids all eying him, he decided to take a couple of bites of food first before speaking. After a few seconds he put his fork down and looked over toward Hunter, “I have Master Sergeant Keating, my second in command and lead radioman, doing everything he can to find out more about Colby for you. We also managed to get ahold of Jennings. A Sheriff Will and Erma send their love to all of you.”

More than anything this helped to loosen up the kids at the table. Seeing tensions noticeably ease and even a couple of smiles appear on the exhausted faces in front of him, caused a slight smile to cross Lt. Grader’s lips. “You guys seem to make a really good and lasting impression on everyone who meets you.”

Devin spoke even as he took another large bite of the spaghetti-like dish. “Thank you, but I think we are only doing what our scout leaders and parents would want us to do.”

Off to the Devin’s left both Ramsey and Vernon shot a bit of a glare at Devin, but said nothing. This was picked up on by a pair of the ladies who had cooked for the boys. The older one moved over and put a tender hand on the shoulder of both boys, “You guys are tired. I think you should all finish up and go to bed. Getting mad at each other after all you have done isn’t going to help anyone.”

Even though the words were spoken as a recommendation, everyone in the room could tell it had a ‘motherly command’ embedded in it. To this end, and not having noticed the looks in the first place Lt. Grader snickered, “I think the lady has spoken. But while we all eat, let me tell you all what we do know at this point and assure you all we will do everything we can to get you more information. Erma says you all should take a day or two of downtime here too. She is really worried about you.”

Hunter ran his hand down his face, “We probably should, but the longer we take to get to Colby, the harder it will be to find anything on where our families may have went.”

The older woman eyed Hunter with ‘the look’ of a mother who was not going to take no for an answer, “Boys, me and a few of the others are going to wash your clothing in real washers and dryers, find you some warmer clothing, and feed you a few more good meals. Tom told us you were in a gun battle, then went and helped out all those people from the plane crash. You need to unwind. Now eat, listen to this man and get your butts to bed, understood?”

Everyone but Gage and Zeki answered with a wide-eyed, “Yes ma’am,” while both Gage and Zeki nodded.

Lt. Grade even found himself responding with an “Understood,” which in turn caused a couple of the boys to giggle, while the woman simply nodded and dropped some more food on the plates as she made her way around the table.

Lt. Grader waited until the boys looked back to him before speaking. “First off, I can tell you we do have a few Geiger counters here and radiation levels are low here and the water being pumped from the aquifer is not contaminated. We have tied into the civil defense system and will broadcast if there is a spike in ambient radiation or ground water…”

“Ambient?” Vernon asked with a cock of his head, “What in the heck is ambient?”

“Background.” Hunter stated while forcing his eyes not to roll. Still, the tone of his voice caused the lady serving them to shoot him a quick but warning-filled glare. Hunter got the unspoken communication with a gulp. “Sorry, guys I’m real tired….”

Lt. Grader held up his hand to cut further comments, “So should something go wrong, and you hear the siren, go inside and don’t drink the water until you are told what the problem is. Should something happen with the water supply, we have scrounged up everything capable of holding water and are keeping them filled in case a problem with the water does come up, but if it hasn’t happened by now, it probably won’t. This means if the siren sounds, it is probably airborne radiation being blown in from a storm or something. Being inside and below ground is the best should this happen.”

With this all eight boys nodded in understanding. Angus spoke up, “Mr. K. taught us all about radiation and we have a Geiger counter too. We even know how to use dirt to help filter out the water…”

“Good to know!” Lt. Grader spoke with a high degree of admiration. “You probably have been given more survival skills than ninety percent of the people who survived. But there are a few things we have come up with over the past week or so which is very important to think over before you head back out. Should you all decide to take off without waiting for my people to try to find you some better information, let me just pass on what I do know.”

Angus again spoke up, begrudgingly taking more of a leadership role, “Sir, we’ll stick around for a couple of days, but we can’t wait too much longer. My home is a few miles outside of Colby and everyone in the troop knows where I live. We have a farm with food, a few guns, and other stuff plus a fully stocked storm shelter. Some of our folks may be there right now.”

Lt. Grader nodded in full understanding, “Son, I get it and whether or not you believe me, I respect the hell out of all of you for your commitments to loved ones. It will be kids like you who will put this shattered world we find ourselves in back together again. But we need you to stay alive and healthy to do so. This means keeping in mind things like we have heard from just outside of Sterling Colorado, from a HAM radio operator there. Animals, former pets like dogs, have started to form into packs and are dangerous. Some may be rabid, others sick with radiation. There are reports of a large pack of dogs attacking people. I heard a few of you talk about dogs, and your love for them. Just be damned careful if and when you come across them.”

Angus again spoke up, “We already kind of dealt with a dog and talked it over. We know not to mess with them…”

“Which is great,” Lt. Grader confirmed, “but in a pack they can be extremely dangerous and aggressive, so if you see one, look out for others.”

Lt. Grader noticed all the boys were now all giving him their full attention even as they ate, so he moved on, “Now, from what we have been able to piece together, most of the nukes we were hit with here on the west side of the country came from China. When them and Russia started exchanging shots, someone here decided to threaten them with our nukes to get them to stop. Russia hit our big cities on the East Coast with big ones, while China enacted a invasion plan. Now this has come through us by way of what is left of a shattered China and Russia and through a few surviving U.S. military channels, most from what we believe are somewhere in North and South Dakota. Because of this, we have not been able to verify a lot, but one thing we can tell you is to stay well away from small towns with Wal-Marts…”

“Huh?” Luke spoke while taking a bite of food, causing him to start coughing. Even as the older lady moved over and started firmly patting Luke on the back a couple of the other boys spoke.

“Why?” Vernon demanded to know.

“Mom hates cheap Wal-Mart stuff,” Angus stated with confusion, “but their stuff can’t be THAT bad, can it?”

This got some snickers out of both ladies and some outright laughter out of Lt. Grader, “No…” Lt. Grader had to stop as he found himself almost choking from the sudden laughter escaping him as he had been trying to swallow.

After nearly thirty seconds Lt. Grander got enough control to be able to speak, but still couldn’t help but snicker some. “No, son, nothing like that…” He took a deep breath and a large drink of water to stop himself from busting out in laughter again. “While things are still kind of unclear, the Chinese military had a plan should they ever need to invade us. In simple terms they wanted to isolate people by taking out key places. They knew we have lots of guns, so it would be hard to take us over, even with lots of people. But if they could isolate small groups, then it would be easier. Because of this, they pre-targeted two places they knew would screw us up. First was National Guard Armories.

“While this would take care of a lot of military supplies, it would not always cut people off from each other. However, there was a ready-made way to do so. Wal-Mart didn’t just haphazardly place their stores in the middle of nowhere. They did marketing research. They put stores in towns people from other places could get to easily and where there were central locations. By targeting places with Wal-Marts in the western part of the US, they figured they would cut us off from one another.”

“So are the Chinese coming to take us over?” Vernon asked with a great deal of concern.

“No,” Lt. Grader assured the clearly frightened boy. “First off, even if they had tried, their ships would have all have been destroyed in the waves. Even ocean liners and Navy ships at deep sea were pretty much taken out in all the ocean wave activity. Entire tectonic plates shifted creating massive tidal and rogue waves. We know there is one Disney ship, the Dream, still out there that didn’t capsize, but it is now parked off of Nassau, and it reports the island was totally swept clean. We have been in direct contact with it. It also says it cannot find a single other cruise ship or any other ship for that matter. Last we heard, it was told by radio communication the USS Omahawas heading to try to link up with her. We have no idea how the USS Omaha survived, but at the moment, she, the USS Independence, USS Fort Worth, and USS Sioux City all seem to be operational. They are all being dispatched to help other craft by whatever is left of US military command. It must have been something to do with the hull design of the four ships, because they are all new Littoral class warships. Other than the ships in the Gulf of Aqaba, which have since joined Israel, we know of no other surviving warships. Although there have been scattered reports of part of another carrier group, but if it is out there, what is left of the U.S. military is keeping it a closely guarded secret.

“But let’s stick closer to home, then get you all in bed before Mrs. Merlot puts me in time-out or something…”

The older woman shot a smirk over at the lieutenant, “My oldest be a couple years older than you, so don’t go temptin’ me! Them boys need to get to bed!”

Lt. Grader nodded understanding and agreement, “Anyway, we think they never sent troops to begin with; they were in a knock-down, drag-out with Russia. Instead they just went with the preplanned targeting to give us enough of our problems so we couldn’t take full advantage of the fighting between them and Russia.”

Luke managed a smile as he attempted as a joke, “Either that or they didn’t want us to have all the cheap junk they sold to Wal-Mart to sell to us. Other than Ammo, which is about the only thing Dad ever buys there, I don’t think I have ever seen something in Wal-Mart not made in China.”

Luke’s efforts were rewarded by a few snickers at the truthfulness of the statement. Still Mrs. Merlot moved up to the table again. “Finish up, brush your teeth and turn in boys. Hopefully by tomorrow our good lieutenant, here, will have found you some more information.”

By this time it was clear the woman had taken charge and there was no arguing about it. Still Devin looked over at Lt. Grader, “Mister… um… Lieutenant… Um, can you try to radio the hospital up in Oberlin?”

Vernon nodded vigorously at the question, letting those who didn’t know the boys, he was as every bit as much interested in contacting Oberlin, Kansas as Devin was.

Without any hesitation, Lt. Grader pulled out a small pocket notebook and a pen, “Yeah, be happy to try, but I haven’t heard my people say anything about Oberlin. What am I asking about when we try?”

Devin started to speak but tears welled up in his eyes and his voice faltered so Angus took over, “Devin and Vern’s dad headed to Oberlin from Prairie Dog where we were going to go camping. We heard from others, Devin’s dad was hurt real bad, but Vern’s dad was OK. We are hoping they are there…”

“Give me names and I’ll see what we can find out. In the meantime, this building is all yours and we’re right next door if you need anything.”

It was well after dark when Hunter woke up with a jerk and a yelp. He sat up in the cot and looked around with wide fearful eyes. Even as he did so his hand reached down and secured his assault rifle. “Another nightmare,” he muttered as he glanced around in the very dark room. The only light came from under the door. A glance toward the room’s only window provided no help. No light at all could be seen coming through the dirty window.

It took a few seconds for him to remember exactly where he was and why. He scanned the room using what little light was available. He could barely make out five others on cots and could hear the steady sound of Angus snoring in the far corner but could not see him. Finally he let out another breath, “Hill City, we’re in Hill City.”

Still his mind found it hard to fully process where he was at or even how he ended up asleep on a cot. Part of it was his brain was still trying to process the nightmare. This one centered on the plane crash, he was sure of it, since what little he could remember was of one of those he had tried to help. The woman had been badly burned and was near starvation. It was clear by the fact her teeth were green tinged, she had been eating some plants, probably grass. What he could remember of the dream ended there.

He had a twinge of panic as he realized he had put his trust in the military guys. To this end he checked his rifle and found it was still loaded and ready. He also found his pack with his pistol and other essential gear under his cot. With another sigh of relief, he wiped the crusty junk from his eyes and tried to remember where the bathroom was.

As he stood, Luke spoke up softly, “Hey, you good to take over guard? I’m still real tired.”

Hunter almost commented on his surprise someone had let Luke take a guard shift but stopped himself. The most important thing was Luke was one of them again. “Yeah, sure. Um, where’s the bathroom again?”

Luke clicked on a small penlight flashlight and pointed to the door on the opposite side from where the light was coming under the door. “Not much wind tonight, so no power. You’ll want to take a flashlight.”

Hunter yawned, “So, who’s up in the other room?”

“Mr. Meeker and a sheriff deputy, um, sorry, I forget his name. But I know Sheriff Will knows the guy since we were able to raise Jennings on the radio. Since Sheriff Will trusts him, and from what Gage said, he agreed to help keep an eye on us while we slept, because so many of us didn’t want to trust the Army guys.”

“Good,” Hunter yawned again. “I don’t even remember going to bed.”

“You were wiped out. So was Gus and Ram. The medic lady, Specialist Grimm, even made him take a shot from his inhaler because he wasn’t sounding so good. She said they are going to have the hospital take a look at him and give us all a once over in the morning too.”

“We should have made him sit down and warm up in the van for a while or something.” Hunter grumbled. “I never thought about it…”

“None of us did, but he’s fine and she promised she’d find us a couple more inhalers and maybe some pills for him too before we leave. She is really nice.”

Hunter let out a long breath, “Good, I hope she and all the others stay nice until we leave.”

“Well, from what Vern told me, Gage stayed up until Devin got up, and Devin woke me up a couple of hours ago, cause he said he couldn’t keep his eyes open. So one of us has been awake to make sure nothing bad happens.”

Hunter rolled his head and simply stated, “Good,” again as he gave a thumb’s up, grabbed his flashlight and made his way to the bathroom. As he entered and shut the door behind him, he had a memory of taking a shower in the small stand up shower off to his right, then eating a meal of deer jerky and fruits, followed by spaghetti but honestly couldn’t remember much else. “Man, I must have been stupid tired.”

Exiting the bathroom, he decided to leave the door open so others could find it. He then glanced over to the cot Luke had been sitting on, only to find his friend already asleep. With nothing better to do, and not wanting to chance falling asleep, he leaned his assault rifle up against the wall next to a small folding table, pulled out a candle from his pack, lit it, and made one last check of the room before pulling out his journal. He took a moment to glance at a wind-up watch someone from Hill City had given him since he had lost the one he found in Selden, probably during the firefight, but wasn’t sure. But now he couldn’t even remember if it had been handed to him by a man or a woman. He closed his eyes for a few seconds to focus in on the events since his prior entry before turning his full attention to writing.

Day of N +17

It is just after one in the morning now. We are in Hill City, which is not the place or direction we need to go, but we didn’t have much of a choice. More on that in a minute.

This is probably going to jump around some because it is hard to have the last day and a half or so make much sense in my own mind, much less write about it.

I pretty much slept through the day time and all the way till now. The reason I am so tired is, we found a survivor of a plane crash. Actually Mr. Banks found us while we were checking on Luke. He was looking for food or anything else in some of the houses in Selden to help those he was in the plane crash with. When I say plane crash, I mean a big one. It was a jet full of people. It crashed when the bombs fell. From what I heard from those who were still alive, the plane was hit with a shockwave and went down fast. I guess the pilots managed to regain some control, but it still hit the ground real hard, broke up, and part of it burned. The pilots were killed so we’ll never know exactly what happened. The nose hit some rocks. It was all scrunched up and nothing more than twisted metal. We didn’t even go look up there. None of us really wanted to see what may have been left of them.

I don’t know how many were on the plane to start with, but Angus used the backhoe we found just down the street from Luke’s house to move lots of the dead over the hill from the main crash and bury them. I bet it had to be over a hundred. All I know is there was thirty-five alive when we got there and at least one died before we got to Hill City. I hate to say this, but I bet many of the others will not make it either. Most of them were real bad. Some had burns, others infected cuts, most both, and all of them were starving.

I think they ate whatever plants they could find, because a few of the people I tried to help had green teeth and one girl had grass stuck between her front teeth. She is about the same age as me, too. I felt so helpless cause she kept kind of holding out her arm for me to fix it with a blank look on her face, but there was nothing below the elbow worth saving. Someone had put a tourniquet on it, probably right after the crash and the only things left were broken bones sticking out of a crusty stub. It was so nasty… Without the lady medic taking her away I think I would have… Well, I almost walked away from all of them. There was so much I couldn’t fix, so much wrong, so much pain. Do the people who blew up the world even care what they did to people?

Getting to the crash was bad, too, real bad. We got to… found… came across… not sure what the right words to use… I guess got hit by our first ambush might be best. However I word it, we had to fight people who set up an ambush just so we could get to the crash. It was almost exactly like Mr. K. told us to expect and the way he told us to take them on worked crazy good. They never really had much of a chance and should have run away when I gave them the chance.

The people used cars to block the road, and both sides of the road had lots of water in the drainage areas, so there was no way around. We had to shoot our way through. I mean I guess we could have tried to find a way around, but the badguys were robbing a family in a car. It was a bad shootout too. We had to kill lots of the badguys. Actually, with the help of Mr. Meeker, the guy they were trying to rob, we killed them all except a couple of kids. One of them Gus knew from playing against him in football. The other was a kid who was at the ambush with his dad. We killed his dad… I feel really bad. Part of me wants to cry. I am trying to find my dad and mom and I helped to kill another boy’s dad… Why didn’t they just put their guns down or let Mr. Meeker and us go? Why did the guy bring his ten year old to rob others? Why did they want to rob others? There are so many questions… I don’t know if I will ever find answers to them. I also have started to wonder if that is who humans really are underneath. I have always heard people are basically good, I’m not so sure I believe it anymore. Without any laws and no threat of a police officer showing up it seems like most people have become horrible. Is this who humans really are when there is no law and they don’t follow the will of God?

The big problem for me isn’t others, it is me. What does God want me to do? Killing a boy’s dad can’t be what he wants, but I can’t see Him wanting me to let others get robbed either. I mean, I tried to warn the badguys. I shouted at them, but then they just wanted to rob us too. I know they robbed some already, since we found a bunch of stuff they had taken… The problem is we took it after we killed them. So am I now a robber? I really don’t think I am. I mean I gave most of it to the people from the plane crash and we let Mr. Meeker take some too. This seems like we did the right thing. We stopped the badguys, we helped the people from the crash, but still I helped kill a boy’s dad. This whole thing sucks. I need to talk to Pastor Mike or some other minister. I just can’t figure out what God wants when every option seems to be against His word and the Bible.

But I guess figuring out what God wants is something I will need to write about later since there is so much else to talk about. Since we rescued Mr. Meeker, he came back with people from Hill City and brought some different National Guard guys to help. They seem way different than the Colorado group and those they hooked up with, but it was still real scary, especially at first. I kept my hand on my pistol pretty much from the time they showed up till we got here to Hill City. I’m a little calmer now, but still scared of them. At least they seem nice and the people here like them, so maybe they really are the goodguys. The leader of this army group is a guy about the same age as Mr. K. He said his name is Lieutenant Grader but everyone under him keeps calling him ‘Ell Tee’. I think that is a way to say his rank or something, but I haven’t really figured it out yet. There is one other difference between Lieutenant Grader’s group and the Colorado guys. He has some women in his group. One is a Medic and she really helped out at the crash and has been super nice to us. I bet she has kids.

Once we got done at the crash we really wanted to try to head back toward Colby. When we got the last of the crash survivors into the trucks Hill City, we kind of argued about it. But Mr. Meeker pretty much took over and told us we needed to go to Hill City. Now I am kind of glad he did.

Angus was the most unhappy, but we were real tired, REAL TIRED, and Mr. Meeker and a football coach Angus knows convinced us to come to Hill City and rest, eat and take some down time where it would be safe. So far they seem to be right. The people here fed us and gave us a place with running water to wash. The armyguys set up cots for us and so here we are. But we are keeping a guard up. They are armyguys after all, and we have seen what they can be like.

I really hope they turn out to be as nice as they seem, cause Lieutenant Grader says they have some information about where the bombs hit and stuff. They were getting some updates up till the time the first wave of nukes blasted us back in time too. One thing he did say when he heard about us finding a train was really interesting. He said the NTSB, not real sure what that is, but anyway it is some government law group or something, told trucks, planes and trains all over the US to leave cities with full loads of food, coal, and other important stuff just a couple of hours before the attacks. Whoever this NTSB is or was, or is, they made a list with order of importance with canned goods, dry food, fuel, and coal being on the top of list of things to get as far away from the cities as possible.

From what Lieutenant Grader says, he thinks the train yards were all told the same basic thing. One of the last messages he got from whoever was in charge of him told him to check the tracks for supplies if needed then went dead. His second in charge guy, a huge black guy by the name of Master Sergeant Keating… And I know this is not real important or nothing, but when I say huge, I mean it. This guy is one step down from being his own building. No joke, he is massive, like I could stand on a chair and not be taller than him huge… You get the idea.

Anyway, he is a radio guy and said he managed to overhear some messages telling people in the train yard in Wichita there was information about a terrorist attack on trains so they wanted to protect as much as they could by getting them well away from the cities. Many of the train operators were told to take an extra engine and go back so they could get more cars since it was the weekend and there was not enough train drivers to get it all to safety. He said the train drivers were told to leave at least one engine attached so the trains could be moved once the threat passed. I bet the train we found was one of those moved to safety and left. It would kind of explain why there was no driver and it was found by those park rangers sitting on the tracks in the middle of nowhere. It just had to be one of the trains left behind.

If this is true, then Zeki is more important than ever, because there could be trains loaded with food all over the place. He could get them to towns and do for other places what the train cars did for Jennings. Too bad Hill City doesn’t have train tracks next to it. If it did maybe we could find a train for Zeki to bring back here. I think, since Zeki knows all the tracks and stuff, we should find out where the nearest tracks to here are and see if we can bring a train there so the people here can have more food and stuff.

The other thing we found out is many of the nukes that hit were Chinese. They used some kind of invasion plan, just without the invasion part. They hit areas to keep people apart and take out main roads. To do this they targeted two things on the areas west of the Mississippi river. First was military armories. This makes sense to me. The second, well it was the reason Colby was attacked and I am still trying to figure out why the Chinese would target them, but according to Master Sergeant Keating and Lieutenant Grader, they went after places with Wal-Marts… I don’t get it, but it seems to make sense to Lieutenant Grader and some of the other adults. It had to do with something about separating us and junk, so I guess Colby is gone because it had a Wal-Mart. It makes me so mad, but there is nothing left to get mad at and I still need to get back there. We need to let Lieutenant Grader help us though. Maybe he can find out more about what is down there while we rest for another day or so.

The only problem is, if we do it will mean more time before we head to Colby. I’m not sure if Angus will go for another delay. Maybe I should talk to him first. The one thing Angus might be willing to wait on is news from Oberlin. We know it’s where Vern’s and Devin’s dads went. Lieutenant Grader said they would try to find out if they are there or if not where they went. One way or the other we need to find out what happened to our family and I need to know if Pastor Mike is around so we have to try to get to Colby. I really need to talk to Pastor Mike about what God wants.

While Kyle likes feedback, he really likes it in the form of criticism. If you don’t like something, find errors, or just want to bitch about something, email him at: KyleArrons at CastleRoland dot net. If you are only reading this and you are enjoying the story, you may still let him know at the above email addy.

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