Month: June 2023

The quiet walk south brought warmth back to everybody’s legs. Nancy led her small group through the woods, trying to stick to animal trails or water-worn areas to minimize the noise. By mid morning, they reached the floor of the valley and neared the road and stream.

She gestured with her hand to get everyone to gather. “Ok, we’re getting close to the road,” she said. “The trees are going to thin out; anybody we run into is probably going to see us.”

“Do you think there’s still anybody there?” Mary asked.

Nancy shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know. We just don’t know what’s going on.”

Oak asked, “You got a plan?”

“Maybe, but it’s not a happy one,” Nancy answered. She passed her eyes over all the group members, analyzing each for a moment. There were some who were known for their skills as hunters, but the others were just people who had nowhere else to go. They all needed to get better at the hunting life if they were going to make it. “Ok,” she started, “here’s my idea. Some of us are better at being quiet and shooting arrows, you know, hunting. I think a small group of us should sneak up to the road to check things out. The rest wait here until we get back.”

“Who do you think should go?” Tom asked.

Nancy glanced away for a moment. “I’m open for volunteers.”

The final selection included Nancy, Oak, Tom, Juanita, Herman, Carlos, and Pedro. It took a brief argument to convince Herman Junior to stay behind, but his mother won out. The seven stalked their way toward the road.

As Nancy had described, the trees grew thinner. The shade of the dense pines gave way to the more dappled light of the aspens. They were at the eastern end of the valley where the hills on either side flattened and it all emptied into wide grassland. The undergrowth was still tangled and hid dry, easily stepped-on twigs.

A wind from the southeast rustled the leaves of the trees, making a soft roar and moving the branches so that the sunlight coming through put on a light show. To Nancy, this meant it was likely to hide any small noises her people might make, but it may also make it easier to hide an enemy. Silus’ people also had spotts and might be hard to see if they wanted to hide.

They nearly reached the road when they saw Enoch and the volunteers.

Nancy stopped and the others drew near.

Tom was the closest. “What are they doing?” he whispered.

“Probably waiting for the rest of their group,” Nancy answered. “There’s only eight of those ragged guys. Why are our people just sitting around?”

Herman sidled up, “I think there’s something wrong with those guys. It looks like they’re chained together.”

Nancy looked more closely at the volunteers. Still about thirty of them, but they weren’t moving much, just sitting on the ground. Herman was right about being tied together; some had chains and others ropes.

Tom leaned in to whisper again. “I really want to kill Silus’ people and untie ours.”

Nancy looked at his angry face and then turned to see that Herman held the same expression. The others had moved in close to hear.

Whispering just loud enough for them to hear, “Does everybody want to do this? Are we all agreed on attacking?”

Nodding heads gave the answer.

“Ok,” she said. “Spread out so we have all of them covered. I’ll give a signal and we all attack. Got it?”

They quickly split and spread among the trees to get a better vantage on Silus’ ragged men.

Nancy moved forward to a position near the edge, kneeling behind a tree trunk. From there, she watched the subtle disturbances in the weeds and undergrowth as her people moved to their places. Her pulse raced and she struggled to keep her breathing under control. Her anger at the Plainos had always made it easy to attack them, especially if they were actively engaged in violence toward one of her kind. Now, she was attacking people like her, sort of, and they weren’t actually being violent at the moment. Still, she remembered what happened at the camp. She also thought about That Thing.

Nancy checked the arrow nocked on her bow, and then strode out of the woods, making enough noise to draw attention to herself.

Enoch and the ragged men saw her and shook themselves into position.

The emissary of Silus raised her arms in greeting. “Welcome! I bring you a message of hope, peace, and love from Brother Silus.”

Nancy raised her bow. “I already got Silus’ message. Take him my reply.”

Enoch looked down at the shaft sticking out from her chest. Her smile drooped and eyes began to water. Then she fell back against the side of her sedan before sliding to a seated position, motionless.

The sedan bearers looked on in shock, but just for a moment. They received their own arrows and joined Enoch on the ground.

In less than a minute, all Silus’ people were dead.

The seven emerged completely from the woods, amazed at their success.

Oak immediately ran to the volunteers to check them. The first he saw, a fellow named Lutz, who sat staring forward. Oak knelt in front of him. “Hey! Hey, Lutz! You ok?”

Lutz looked up at Oak’s face and blinked a few times.

Oak called over to Nancy, “I think there’s a problem. You got to see this.”

“In a minute,” Nancy said back, trying to keep her voice low. She then turned to Herman. “You go back and get the others. Bring them quickly; I don’t want to be out in the open too long.”

Herman nodded his acknowledgement and plunged back into the woods.

Turning to Tom, Juanita, Carlos, and Pedro, she said, “Take up some guard positions around here. We don’t need anybody catching us.”

The four split to surround the scene as best they could. Tom and Juanita went to either side of the trail back toward their former camp and hid just inside the trees. Carlos and Pedro followed the other end of the trail and split, going slightly uphill and finding hidden viewing positions.

With that covered, she could attend to Oak. “What’s up?”

Oak pointed to Lutz. “I think they’ve been drugged or something.”

“Why would they drug them?”

Oak shrugged. “Docile lambs to the slaughter? I don’t know, but that might be why they’re still here.”

“Crap!” Nancy thought about it. If the volunteers couldn’t move, there were only two choices. They could leave the volunteers and let them be at the mercy of anybody who found them, or they could wait around until the volunteers recovered, with the same results. “You don’t think they can move at all?”

“Maybe,” said Oak. “I haven’t tried yet.”

“Well, if they can’t walk it’s going to be a problem.”

“I can try to get him up to see what he can do.”

Nancy looked at Lutz. He sat with splayed legs and his back hunched. Chains held his wrists together and connected him to the hands of the person next to him. Nancy pointed that out to Oak, “You’re going to have to get him unchained before you can do anything with him.”

Pad locks held the chains on ten of the volunteers; rope held the others. While Nancy undid the ropes, Oak searched for a key. He checked Enoch first, and then her sedan. It was the first time he was that close to them. The odor said they weren’t into bathing.

The sedan contained a padded seat covered in a patchwork of white and light gray cloth and fur. Next to the seat, a cabinet hung from the wall. The cabinet seemed like something built in the old days, before the Storm. The joints fit tightly together and the hinges on the doors all matched like they were made by machines. The wood would have been smooth, but something had scratched it quite a bit. The inside had three small shelves and two drawers.

Oak found a key in a small drawer in the cabinet. “I’m glad I didn’t have to search those guys that carried her,” he thought. “They don’t seem that clean.”

Nancy had most of the others untied, choosing to untie rather than cut so she could keep the rope. One of the women she untied was only groggy, as though the drug was wearing off.

“What’s happening?” asked the prisoner.

“A lot,” Nancy answered. “What do you remember?”

The woman shook her head and blinked a few times, trying to remember. “We left the valley and got out here. Then they said we had to take communion; they said it was a ritual that connected us with God. I don’t know much after that.”

“That’s ok,” Nancy said. She placed a hand on the woman’s shoulder. “There is a bunch of stuff you don’t want to know about.”

Herman returned with the rest of the group and then helped Oak with the unchaining.

A few more of the volunteers became aware of things around them. One of the men, recently unchained, pushed himself to his knees and looked around. He saw Silus’ people on the ground, arrows sticking out of them. “What did you do?” he demanded. “What the hell did you do? I get it if you didn’t want to go, but why did you have to kill them?”

Oak tried to reassure the man. “They weren’t what they seemed. After you guys left, they attacked the camp. They had a whole army of those rag guys.”

“What are you talking about? They wouldn’t do that. They were servants of God!”

Nancy walked over to one of the dead men in rags. She was sure that anybody, other than Enoch, who served Silus went through the same treatment. She pulled the hood off the dead man.

His mutilated head rolled back. Little remained of his nose and both ears had been cut to strands dangling from his scalp. Random scars, some from cutting and others from branding, crossed his face. Part of his skull showed through where he had been scalped.

“This,” Nancy said, “is your servant of God. When they attacked the village, they started branding and cutting everybody they could catch. They drugged you and were leading you to this. If the Plainos hadn’t shown up with guns and wiped everybody out, your nose would probably be all over your face by now.”

The man, and many others of the volunteers, stared in disbelief at the misshapen head of Silus’ servant.

Nancy put her hands on her hips in an attempt to seem forceful. “Alright, we got to move. We don’t know if more of Silus’ people are coming. We don’t know if more Plainos are coming. All we know is that we won’t be safe here. Let’s get everybody on their feet and get going.”

An initial attempt brought some of the volunteers around, but it took nearly an hour before the whole group began their journey southward and uphill.

Mostly Headed Home

After the raid, the villagers and their allies had returned from the valley. The victory left them exhausted, unaccustomed to the adrenaline. That night, back at the village, they held a celebration with what resources they had, but most needed their beds early.

By late morning the next day, Boss Henry had his men ready to go.

Mike Billings saw them off. “I appreciate your help. We couldn’t have done it without you. You’ll let us know if we can help you some time.”

Boss Henry pulled himself up onto his horse. “I’m sure we’ll need each other’s help again. We regular people got to stick together if we’re going to make it. Just remember what I said about bandits; I hate the idea of your village getting massacred just over some grain.”

“I appreciate it,” Mike said. “Have a safe trip home”

With that, the New Chicago team headed south down the road.

By early afternoon, as they arrived at the west end of the valley road, the same valley road that guided yesterday’s raid, Boss Henry called for a halt.

He motioned to one of his men, “Will, I want you to take a few men and check something for me.”

Will Faring, the man he addressed, pulled his horse forward. “What do you need, Boss?”

“You know, Will, I’m not one for spooks or haunts or things like that. Most rational people are like that. You know what I mean?”

Will nodded.

“Good,” Boss continued, “so you’ll understand if I don’t really believe that those men at the village think that those hills are haunted. I think there may be a chance that they just didn’t want us looking around.”

“I can see that,” Will agreed.

“Now, we saw that the hill with the dead cows really does just have dead cows on it, but that could just be there to scare people away. What we didn’t see is that other hill, the one with the old house. That’s the one that’s got me curious.”

Will nodded again. “I’ll see what I can do about that.”

“You do that and then catch up with the rest of us.”

“Sure thing, Boss.” Will pointed to three other men and turned his horse toward the hill. His three companions followed.

Boss Henry watched the group head off, and then started his own group back to New Chicago.

The Hard Part

Getting the newly released volunteers up the hill took quite a while and created a lot of noise. Nancy was sure they all knew how to be quiet and had to keep reminding herself that they had been drugged. Still, every snapped twig or grunt made her cringe.

Ultimately, they had to reuse the rope with which they had been bound. The line of drugged people held the rope for guidance and followed the path as best they could. Oak, the largest and easiest to see, led the line, trying to guide them along a path that didn’t require any complex steps or climbing. His easy path made things slow too, but it was the best way to keep everybody moving.

It was late afternoon before they got to a place where they could stop to rest. The exercise, with its increased blood flow, sped the recovery, and people were getting back to their old selves and their old stealth. The image of the mangled servant of Silus also sped them.

The woods on that side of the hill, being near the end of the valley, were not as dense, nor was the underbrush. That made it harder to hide. Nancy hated that part but decided getting distance quickly was more important than being unseen. Now that they were at the top of the hill, where an enemy could see any silhouettes for miles, it would be more of an issue.

“Ok, everybody, sit down and try not to make too much noise,” she said.

Those who had been with her the previous night or longer immediately dropped. The new people took a bit more encouraging. Once they realized that it was for both rest and hiding, they sat fast enough.

Oak left the volunteers and made a crouched walk to where Nancy sat. “What’s the plan, chief?” he asked.

She rolled her eyes at being called chief. “We got to figure that out.”

Her group of seven hunters all made their own way, hunkered down, to sit around Nancy, each with a form of Oak’s question.

“We still have the main problem,” she said. “We don’t know what’s going on. We don’t know if there are more of Silus’ freaks out there. We don’t know where the Plainos are. And now, we have to move this group of people.”

The others nodded agreement.

Oak added, “We don’t know where we’re moving them to and we don’t know what we’re going to feed them.”

Nancy raised her open hands up and dropped them in exasperation. “That’s another issue. We need food and water for everybody. The nearest water is the stream down through the valley, where our enemies are. We can’t hunt enough food for all of these people, and a lot of them can’t hunt.”

Carlos asked, “Do you want someone to go check the camp to see if we can salvage some food and get water? I’ll do it. Maybe see if there are any bad guys there.”

Tom chimed in, “That’s probably a good idea. We can get information and maybe some leftover supplies. If the Plainos are gone, they probably killed all Silus’ people. Anything the Plainos didn’t scavenge may still be useful.”

“Ok,” Nancy said, “that’s probably the best plan we have. Thanks, Carlos. But I don’t want to leave all these people out in the open or just sitting around. I want to take them to the old house. We’re already on the hill, but we can get more forest cover and maybe use some of the old structure as shelter until we decide what to do next.”

“Besides,” Juanita said, “The Plainos won’t go there. They think it’s cursed.”

The decisions were made. Carlos, Pedro, Tom, and Juanita would go back to the village. Oak would continue to lead the volunteers; they seemed comfortable with him. Nancy would take point on the path to the old house. Herman and Herman Junior would fall in behind to watch for anyone following the group. Everybody else went with the volunteers.

The sun moved lower in the western sky, showing the distant mountains on the far horizon.

Side Job

Will Faring led his three men to the crest of the hill. He had known the brothers Oliver and Noah Vanier since childhood. He met Jimmy Nakano when they both started working for Boss Henry. He could trust them but, more importantly, they all worked together as a single unit.

The men from that farm village seemed genuinely afraid of this hill. They called it Old House Hill as though that was supposed to mean anything. The world was littered with leftover buildings and crap from before the Storm. It was just junk that someone built once and then got broken. It didn’t mean it had anything supernatural attached to it.

Boss Henry told him everything about the Storm. Most people heard about the Storm, but it was before any of them had been born. Boss Henry heard it from his old man, and the old man was from before the Storm happened. That’s why Boss Henry knew so much.

According to the old man, the Storm was the result of some experimental technology. That means some guys were trying to make a new kind of machine. The old man said he was watching it on something called the news and reading about it online. Those were old machine ways of talking to each other. Anyway, the guys were trying to get their machine to work and some people called terrorists blew it up and made it work wrong. Faring had been taught a little of the art of blowing things up. He could see that as an issue.

Man did it work wrong. The old man said it punched a bunch of little holes in the world and that made everything go wild. He said it was like when you snag a piece of your clothes and it starts to unravel, but there were a bunch of tiny snags everywhere. The weather was part of the world, so the weather unraveled and that’s why we got the Storm.

There was nothing magic or anything like that. It was just a big machine that did something it wasn’t supposed to. That’s why Boss Henry says there’s no such things as curses or hauntings or anything like that. He says it can be fun to tell stories around the fire but as soon as you got to go through the door, it’s all just machines.

That’s why Will didn’t harbor any fear of the supernatural as he and his companions broke through the brush and into the clearing on top of Old House Hill.

The clear area stretched quite a ways, almost the size of a small village itself. Tall weeds covered the ground. Scattered throughout, pieces of debris of some sort rose from the ground. It mostly looked like long, thin sheets of metal sticking up as though someone had stabbed them into the ground.

Will scanned the area looking for signs of movement. Seeing none, he started his horse forward. He drew his rifle from its scabbard beside the saddle.

Without a word, the brothers turned their horses to follow the tree line toward the south. Jimmy Nakano turned his horse north.

As Faring made his way through the grass, he saw various pieces of things that were once part of a building, maybe several buildings. He had seen pictures in books that showed how people lived before the Storm. A house with several other buildings was not uncommon in a rural setting. This hilltop would have been such a place.

The regular lines of bricks protruded from the ground showing the foundations of those buildings. He was right, there had been several, and they were really big. The books told him that the biggest of these buildings would have housed farm machines or livestock. The people before the Storm had incredible machines that did everything for them. Boss Henry was going to bring that world back someday.

It was difficult to see all the things in the grass. The wind blew the tops of the tall grasses around and the tangle of previous years’ growth wrapped the artifacts tightly. Some things looked like parts of rotting boards, all covered in moss and peeling paint. Other things were clearly metal, often rusted beyond structure. There were a few things that were probably plastic. Will had been told all about plastic and had seen many examples. Before the Storm, people made all the plastic, but no one knew how anymore. Boss Henry may want this plastic gathered at some point.

Halfway across the clearing, he stopped. The foundations of this building didn’t just mark the boundary, but marked an actual hole in the ground. The large, rectangular hole was nearly as big as the largest building. The bottom, covered with grass and pieces of whatever had been there before, was about a man and a half down. This may have been the actual dwelling for the people who lived there. Faring thought of all the people he knew who lived underground for protection from the elements and from attackers.

He decided to wait there until his men rejoined him. With the sun sinking behind him and the wind sighing through the grass, the hole took on a somber feeling. He understood how the superstitious people would think this place was haunted. The upper lines of the foundation and the far wall of the hole took on an orange tint. The rest of the hole slowly filled with shadow as though it had sprung a leak of darkness and would soon be overflowed.

The three approached from the east, having met at that side of the clearing. They stopped at the east side of the hole, looked in, and then rode around. Noah and Oliver rode around the south side, and Jimmy the north. As they went, they looked through the hole as best they could.

“Did you find anything?” Will asked as they got to him.

They shook their heads no.

“There’s just bits of building and little bits of rotted things that may have been something,” Jimmy said. “There was less as I got further east. I think whatever wind did this hit from the east and threw everything that way.” He pointed toward the setting sun.

“That’s kind of what we saw,” added Noah.

Oliver nodded.

Will pointed to the hole. “I want to know what’s down there, but it’s almost night. We’ll need to camp up here tonight and do a thorough investigation tomorrow. While we still have some light, let’s make sure there are no surprises down there.”

All but Faring dismounted. Jimmy pulled a rope from his saddle and started to uncoil a part. He handed one end to Oliver and walked to the edge of the hole.

Oliver tied the end of the rope to his saddle and stood by his horse to keep it calm.

Noah grabbed the rope and slid it through his hand as he walked toward Jimmy.

The two men nodded to each other, then Jimmy stepped back into the hole, holding the rope looped around his backside.

As he descended, Jimmy walked backward down the wall, letting the rope slide slowly around him and through his hands. As he reached the bottom, he took one careful step onto the grassy ground. Noting that it was solid, he let himself the rest of the way down.

He drew a knife from a belt sheath and held it at the ready in front of him. Taking careful steps, he followed the perimeter of the hole, looking for anything in the walls or the ground that could hide a danger.

Faring watched this from his horse. He knew his men and what they could do. Boss Henry had relied on them for plenty of side projects. They had explored old buildings, retrieved useful items, removed obstacles, and any number of other special tasks. No matter what happened, Boss Henry could rely on them, and they could rely on each other.

“Found something!”

Jimmy’s call from the hole seemed excited but not alarmed.

Faring got off his horse and walked to the edge of the hole, rifle at the ready.

Jimmy pointed to part of the wall. “There’s a door here. A big one, made out of metal. Looks like people could go in. The hinges are big too. I can’t see the latch to open it.”

“Does it look like it has been opened recently?” Faring asked.

Jimmy looked around for signs of activity. “No, the whole thing’s rusted.”

Faring thought for a moment. If it was rusted shut, it was unlikely to be a threat right away, but it would be worth exploring, maybe with explosives. “Ok,” he ordered, ‘finish the rest of the check and we’ll see if we can open it in the morning.”

He went back to his horse. From what he remembered from the books, most people did not have large metal vaults in their houses. That was something for rich people, the ones who had resources. Whoever had this house must have had something worth locking up. It could be precious metals, machines of some sort, or even weapons.

Someone once told him about people called preppers who stockpiled weapons and food for when things went bad. The Storm would have definitely been a “gone bad” situation. Is that what happened to this house? Did preppers live there? If so, that vault may contain their stockpiles. If the wind that destroyed their home happened fast enough, Boss Henry would be really happy with what they found.

Jimmy made it the rest of the way around without finding anything more than the remains of old metal pipes and rotting wood beams. Oliver and Noah, with help from the horse, helped him out of the hole.

Will pointed toward the treeline. “We’ll camp over there, out of sight. If anybody shows up to this so-called haunted place tonight, I want to know about it. Tomorrow, we’ll open that door and then head home with whatever we find.”

The other three walked their horses toward the trees. It wasn’t the first time they had camped in the cold and dark, waiting for someone to come along.

Nancy and her crew sat around their fire in the midmorning sun when they saw the four men carrying Enoch back into the camp. The light activity from all the camp residents slowed as they turned to see Silus’ emissary.

Like before, her four bearers lowered her sedan to the ground and she rose from the top to address those present. “Today is a glorious day for the Chosen of God. Today is the day when you take up your rightful place as a servant of the Lord to do the Lord’s work in the world. Who among you have felt the divine call within your heart and will accompany us on our Holy path?”

Nancy looked around the camp to see who would go. Many still seemed to be discussing it within their groups. Then, just a couple started their walk toward Enoch and her carriers. As the first few made their way, others seemed to make up their minds and head down as well.

Beside her, Oak stood up. He looked down in the direction of Enoch, his face pursed tight in thought. Finally, he took a deep breath and forced it out his nose before sitting back down.

Tom put his hand on Oak’s shoulder. They watched the rest of the camp.

In all, nearly thirty camp members made the choice to join Silus.

Enoch raised her hands to the sky and shouted, “God is great!” Then, looking at the rest of the camp, “I know in my heart that the rest of you will be moved to join us, if not now then soon. Until then, give your prayers to God and ask him for guidance.”

To those gathered around her, she said, “Follow, and we will guide you to your new home, a home of Holiness and God.” Then she sank back into her box.

Her bearers hefted the poles to their shoulders, turned the box around to face the path, and marched away.

The people who chose to join followed them until they all faded into the woods. Within a few minutes, even the sound of them was gone.

Nancy asked Oak, “Are you ok?”

He shrugged. “Yeah, I’m ok. It just sounded so good. I don’t know, maybe too good. Besides, you guys would be useless without me.”

Making Plans

The men from New Chicago and Wood Hill got their horses ready and cleaned up their camp. Their leaders gathered with Mike around a table in the middle of the village.

Seth the hunter had joined them. He pointed to a map to describe the situation. “This is Owl Hollow, where the Spotties have their camp. It’s a valley with heavy forest around, but there’s a clearing where they got their tents. They stay close to the bottom of the valley where the old road and the creek go through. They won’t go up any further.”

Boss Henry thought that sounded strange. “Why won’t they go up any further?”

“Well,” Seth explained, “that’s haunted. This ridge to the north is called Dead Herd. I’ve only seen it from a distance, but the old cattle herd still stands there, just skeletons. On the other side, to the south, is Old House Hill. All that’s there is the ruins of an old house, but everybody says it’s haunted too. My guess is that the Spotties picked this valley knowing nobody would ever attack from either of those directions.”

Both Boss Henry and Eric Pree, the leader from Wood Hill, rolled their eyes. Hauntings didn’t make a lot of strategic sense, but if the Spotties believed it, then that was important to know.

“What’s the story of this old road?” Eric asked, pointing to the road through Owl Hollow.

“Oh, that old thing,” Seth said. “It mostly ain’t there anymore. We can follow the road through town here,” he pointed just outside the village, “and it will connect to part of the valley road. By the time we get to the woods, it is so overgrown with forest, it might as well not be there.”

Mike added, “When we go, the fastest way to get to the woods is to take that road as far as we can. Then we’ll need to follow whatever path we can find.”

“Yep,” said Seth. “On the other end of Owl Hollow, the road is more of a path, but it is still passable. If the Spotties know we’re coming and they want to get away in a hurry they can run right out that way.”

Boss Henry leaned in to look more closely at that part of the map. “When we attack, we need to get across their camp as fast as we can to cut off that escape route. That’s going to need horses. Can we get at least some of the horses through the woods without tipping off the Spotties?”

“I don’t think so,” said Mike. “All the forest is really dense. Do you know a path, Seth?”

“Well, sort of,” Seth answered. “It depends on how superstitious your men are. If you ride around and come up the west edge of Dead Herd, you can come down through an area where there aren’t as many trees. You’ll have to be careful to be quiet if we’re going to do a sneak attack. Then it’s just a matter of doing your horse thing at the same time everybody else attacks.”

“I think my boys will be ok with a spooky hill. We can just get there and wait until we hear the first gun shots.”

Eric put his thumbs in his belt buckle and leaned back a bit. “So, that’s the plan then. We sneak up, kill all of them, and come back.”

Mike hung his head and shook it side to side. “I guess so.”

Boss Henry looked at him, raising one eyebrow. “You don’t seem so confident in this.”

Mike sighed. “I don’t like having to kill anybody. Unfortunately, it’s come to this; either us or them. Me and my men will go and do what we got to do, but I’m never going to be happy about it.”

They all stood for a moment, vaguely looking at the map.

Mike finally broke the silence. “Any objection to being ready to ride out in fifteen minutes?”

They exchanged glances. There were no objections.

Each man turned away, headed to his place.

Lunch Interrupted

It had only been a couple of hours since Enoch led her procession from the camp. The overall mood in the camp seemed somber, with no one being particularly loud or energetic.

Juanita had brought out the cooking utensils and Oak built the lunch fire from the ashes of breakfast. Nancy and Tom were still out hunting for something to extend lunch.

Something moved.

Oak only noticed it in the corner of his eye, but it was there. Something in the woods. It was probably just Tom or Nancy, but he decided to look anyway.

They were concealed well. There were men moving along the line of the camp, just beyond the treeline. Not making a noise, they seemed to walk single file, following the edge of the camp.

“Juanita,” he said, “I’m probably just being paranoid, but let’s get our weapons.”

She stopped pulling two pans apart and looked to where Oak looked. She saw the men moving through the woods. Her heart seemed to stop for a moment. They had never been attacked in the camp before.

She reached to the side of the tent and grabbed Oak’s bow, quiver, and machete. She handed them over to him, trying not to make any sudden or large move that might get her noticed. Then she grabbed her own bow, quiver, and knife.

By now, it was obvious that others in the camp had noticed something. Many stood looking around at the woods bordering the camp. Their attention was soon drawn to something else.

A group of men in ragged clothes, like those of Enoch’s servants, came into the camp from the eastern path. In groups of twos, the men carried crates. Four men carried a metal brazier, filled with glowing coals, and with rods of metal protruding. Behind them walked the only one among them without a hood.

His skin color showed that he was a spotted person. Beyond that, he was barely recognizable as a person at all. Both sides of his nose had been slit open from the nostril to bridge, the skin flopping to the side. Scars, as if from branding, covered his cheeks and forehead. The tatters of his ears flopped down the side of his head.

As the group stopped, the scarred one stepped onto one of the crates. He shouted out to the camp, “You have heard the Call of God and you have refused it. You have been marked by Him and must follow His Holy Command but have chosen to turn your back on Him. But worry not, my brothers. We are here to put you back on to the Path of Righteousness.”

With those words, the men in the woods stepped out into the open. They were dressed in the same ragged skins and cloth. No more six or seven feet apart, they completely encircled the camp. They held clubs and weapons of rusty-looking metal.

More of the men entered the camp from the path. They ran past the scarred one and grabbed the nearest camp resident.

Juanita and Oak watched as the invaders grabbed several of the valley dwellers, overpowered them, and dragged them down to the scarred one. There, the scarred one pulled a glowing blade from the brazier and sliced the first one’s nose open.

The scream echoed through the valley.

The scream was also the call to action: escape now or be tortured by Silus’ people.

Juanita and Oak both turned toward the men nearest them and ran for the woods. The men grabbed at them, trying to prevent their escape.

Oak slammed his fist into the jaw of the attacker on his side. The attacker fell, landing on his back. Oak stomped on his head while running by.

Juanita stabbed her attacker and stumbled past him, only to be grabbed by another.

The second attacker dropped to the ground, bleeding from the neck wound left by Nancy’s knife.

“Run!” Nancy hissed to Oak and Juanita.

Together, they ran into the woods, passing Tom who covered them with his bow.

About fifty feet in, they ducked and checked for pursuit. There was none, but they could still hear the chaos back at the camp.

Nancy did a quick visual check of her friends and then asked, “What happened?”

“They were men from that Silus guy,” Juanita said. “They snuck in and had us surrounded before we knew anything. Then they came in and started attacking because we didn’t join them.”

Oak added, “They cut a guy’s nose off. I think it was Jenkins; you know the one who liked marbles.”

Tom caught up with them and knelt with the group.

Nancy asked, “Anybody else coming?”

Tom shook his head no. “I didn’t see anybody. It looks like some of us got out and the creeps are just working on the ones they could catch.”

“How many were there?”

“I couldn’t tell,” said Tom. “There were at least enough to be a threat.”

“Yeah,” said Juanita. “They had us completely surrounded and that was before the torture squad came in.”

Nancy seemed to think of something. “Where’s That Thing? Was she with you?”

Juanita and Oak looked at each other. In the moment, they forgot all about her. “Last I saw,” said Oak, “she was still inside the tent.”

“Damn it,” Nancy spat. “Let’s hope she knows how to hide and those bastards don’t look too hard.”

Tom leaned in, afraid to speak too loudly. “What do we do now?”

Nancy shook her head. “I don’t know. I don’t have enough information about what’s going on. I want to save everybody, but if we’re totally outnumbered we’ll probably be lucky to save ourselves.”

Juanita suggested, “We could try to sneak back and have a look. Try not to be seen or do anything until we know what’s going on.”

Nancy thought about it for a moment. “Yeah, that’s probably the best idea. That’s what I’ll do. You guys don’t have to come if you don’t want to.”

Tom smiled. “Where else would we go?”

As quietly as they could, the four moved back to the edge of camp where they had escaped just minutes before. The men they killed still sat where they fell. The cordon of attackers was gone.

Instead, Silus’ men stood guard over nearly twenty of the camp residents near the crates. All the prisoners wore chains around their wrists. Fifteen of the prisoners stood on one side of the scarred one. Those prisoners showed signs of struggle with bruises and contusions around their heads. Some seemed to nurse damaged arms or favored hurt legs.

It was the other prisoners, on the other side of the scarred one, that looked different. Their faces showed signs of great trauma. Reddened with blood and blisters from burns, contorted with beatings, mangled by their captors. Three lay on the ground, motionless. The other two writhed in agony.

Oak crawled away from the edge of the camp quickly and quietly. Then, as noiselessly as he could, he wretched into the brush behind a tree.

Over in a tent, the tent Nancy had placed That Thing in, something moved.

That Thing had hidden under a sleeping bag when all the commotion started. Her short life taught her to go unnoticed when there was trouble, so she did so without thinking. The attackers hadn’t noticed her at all.

She huddled under the covers through the screams. They reminded her of something, some lost memory from her earliest childhood. Each scream hit a little harder and dug a little deeper.

She made up her mind and crawled from her hiding place. Ducking her head to get out, she stepped out of the tent and into the afternoon sun. She saw it now. It was all true.

The Plainos had always made her life miserable because of her spots. But she had seen them be horrible to each other as well. Now she was with people just like her, people who promised a new, safe life. But that wasn’t true. People with spots and people without spots were just people and they were all cruel. There was no escape in this life. She would never be free from them for as long as she lived.

Nearby sat the board where she helped Juanita prepare food. The pots were where Juanita left them. Next to the pots were the cooking utensils, including the big knife.

That Thing stepped up to the board and wrapped her hand around the handle of the knife.

Nancy watched, not realizing at first.

She saw That Thing pick up the knife. “Good girl,” Nancy thought, “She’s getting ready to defend herself.”

The thought melted when she realized that the girl held the knife the wrong way for fighting. It was completely the wrong way.

That Thing crumpled to the ground, the knife under her ribs. Her torso spasmed once in a soft cough, and that was it.

Nancy’s entire body seized with tension. This person she saved was just unsaved. Another innocent person dead just because they were born with spotted skin. It wasn’t Plainos this time, but those bastards at the bottom of the hill.

Nancy rose up to a crouch and knocked an arrow. There was no plan in her head, only anger and frustration.

Tom stared at her in disbelief. If she loosed that arrow, it would give away their position and they would be overrun.

She let it fly.

The scarred man, holding his hot iron, staggered back as the arrow went through his chest.

The other attackers looked around to see where it came from.

Tom whispered to Nancy, “Let’s get out of here!”

That is when the gunshot rang out.

With the echo in the valley, it was impossible to hear where it came from. It was soon joined by more.

People in the valley, both the attackers and their captives fell, either hit or looking for cover.

To the right of their position, Nancy heard horses running, breaking through the brush. About a dozen of them, each carrying a Plaino wielding a machete or something. They rode through the remains of the camp toward the people down in the valley floor.

From the western side of the valley, more Plainos emerged from the woods. Some had firearms and the others had makeshift weapons, mostly tools. They yelled their excited war cries and ran toward their enemies.

Nancy turned to Tom. “Good idea.”

Getting Away

Less worried about stealth now that there was a full battle, the four ran back into the woods and as far uphill as they could without leaving the protection of the trees. Once near the top, they chose to turn east without discussing it; it just seemed to be the thing to do.

This went on for nearly half an hour, long after the sounds of the battle went away. They ran to get away not only from the danger, but from the thoughts, memories, emotions.

Exhaustion caught up to them and they chose to rest. They dropped down behind a clump of bushes, lying in the grass.

After a few moments, Juanita asked, “What do you think happened”

“If the Plainos showed up with guns and horses, they probably killed everybody,” Nancy said. “That’s what they do.”

“I don’t understand how the Plainos knew where our camp was,” Tom said.

“I have an idea,” Nancy said. “I think it was the people who chased That Thing the other night. We sent one back with a message saying to leave us alone. I don’t think they liked that.”

Juanita sighed. “They don’t seem to like anything.”

Tom chimed in, “That’s one thing that Enoch chick got right. The Plainos are real pissed about the Storm wrecking all their stuff. All they ever do is try to rebuild all that. I don’t know why.”

Oak sat up. ‘I’m glad I didn’t go with them, but now I wonder what happened to the ones that did go.”

“It’s probably best to not think about it,” Nancy told him. “We have enough stuff to think about. Like where we go next and how any spotted person we meet could be an enemy now.”

Oak laid back down.

They rested for another half hour before they heard motion in the woods.

They took up their weapons and rolled into crouching positions.

The sound moved closer toward them, faint footsteps as though someone tried to move quietly.

The sound grew closer until it was coming around the bushes.

“Oh, it’s you,” Nancy said.

The sound had come from a group of spotted people, former residents of Owl Hollow. They included Herman, his wife Mary, their teenaged son Herman Junior, Carlos, and Pedro. Nancy knew them to all be hardworking, as well as good hunters. Like her, they just wanted to live in peace somewhere. Pedro always worried her a little because he liked pranks too much.

The newcomers crouched down to join the four. “Have you seen anybody else?” Herman whispered.

Nancy shook her head. “You guys are the first since we got out. How about you?”

“No, we were out gathering food when everything started,” said Mary. “Then we ran into Carlos and Pedro and they told us what happened. Did you see it? Was it really that bad?”

Tom nodded. “Oh yeah, it was really bad.” He turned to Carlos and Pedro. “When did you guys get out? Was it before or after the Plaino attack?”

Carlos looked puzzled. “Those were Plainos? I thought they were those Silus people.”

Juanita clarified. “The first ones, the ones in rags, those were the Silus people. They had just won their attack when the Plainos showed up with guns and horses. We were hoping you could tell us how that turned out.”

“Sorry, no,” said Carlos.

“So,” asked Herman, “Do you guys have a plan for what to do next?” He raised his eyebrows hopefully.

Nancy shook her head again. “Not really. We were just focused on staying alive. We’ve got to come up with something.”

“I vote against returning to Owl Hollow,” said Mary. “Even if the fighting is over and all the bad guys are gone, that’s just not going to be a happy place. Besides, now everybody knows where it is.”

“Agreed,” said Nancy. Now that she could plan with people, her mind came back into its usual focus. “North and northeast of here, we run into open grasslands. I’d rather stay in the woods. It’s better hunting and better hiding. If we go straight west we run into Plaino farmland and a couple of villages. South would lead us to some woods, but we have to cross the road that Silus’ people used. I do not want to run into them.”

“I may know a place, if we can get there,” Carlos offered. “My uncle Manuel, God rest his soul, told me that there is a dense forest to the southwest. It is at the south end of some mountains, so it is too hilly for farming. The Plainos can’t use it, so it’s just wild. If we could get to that, we could hide all we want.”

“That would be good,” Tom said, “if we could get there. We still have the immediate problem of getting away from this spot.”

“How far away is this place?” Nancy asked. Everybody had seen the tops of the mountains on the western horizon, but they seemed really far away.

“That would be the problem,’ Carlos answered. “It would probably take us a week or two, maybe a little more.”

Nancy nodded while she thought. She still needed a short term plan, but once the immediate danger was done, the long term could take focus. Plainos did like farmland, so land too rough to plow would be excellent. Just the thought of it reignited the fire in her heart.

“Ok,” she said, “I think I might be coming up with a plan. It’s just an idea, so everybody give me your thoughts. First, I like your idea, Carlos. That can be our long term plan. If we survive the next couple of days, we’ll figure out a way to get to that forest.”

Carlos smiled and everyone nodded their approval of this part of the plan.

“Then,” Nancy continued, “we have to deal with our short term situation. With everybody dead or captured in the valley, I expect the Plainos will go back to their homes and Silus’ bastards will head back to wherever they came from. We need to give them time to do that. That’s why I recommend that we stay here tonight. Then, in the morning, we head south, being very quiet and keeping an eye out for trouble. If we see or hear anything, we hunker down and wait it out. I want to avoid any actual conflict.”

“Sounds good to me,” Tom chirped. “I could use more rest. This day has been exhausting.”

Herman Junior held up a back. “I got some berries and bread, if anybody’s hungry.”

“I have venison jerky,” added Oak.

They camped, without fire, that night behind the bushes. During the night, three more of their former neighbors joined them.

With the dawn, they stretched the cold stiffness from their joints and started their stealthy trek southward.

That Thing sat in the tent she had woken in that morning. So far, no one had told her what to do or otherwise bothered her. Around midday, Nancy brought some bread that had been cooked on a stick over a fire. It was good, but not as good as the bread Grandma Grace made. After lunch was when things changed.

The activity level in the camp increased. A large number of people gathered together, facing toward part of the woods where a path disappeared into the trees. That Thing saw the people she had met so far and plenty of strangers, but they were all like her, covered with spots.

Four men, probably men, came from the woods carrying a large box on their shoulders. Each man wore ragged animal skins from head to toe. They limped and stooped as though broken in some way. Over their faces, the skins had eye holes of odd size, not quite in the place eyes should be. A crooked painted line mocked the position of a mouth. A triangle of skin, in a different color, represented the nose, but off center and rotated.

The box was large enough to carry a person comfortably. Skins and furs covered this too, but all in very light colors, some almost white. Two long, sturdy poles ran along the bottom, and these sat on the shoulders of men carrying the box. That Thing remembered seeing something similar in an old book Grandma Grace had shown here. In the book, it was how important people were carried.

The men staggered to a central location where everyone could see them, and then they lowered the box to the ground. Each man, they were probably men, shuffled a couple of steps to the side, surrounding their box. They lowered their heads.

After a brief moment of nothing happening, there was a sound from inside the box. Something emerged from the top, as though walking up steps. As it came out fully, it appeared to be a person, also covered completely in ragged furs and skins. These coverings were similar to the ones on the box, light grays and white, looking very clean and almost gleaming in the afternoon sun.

The figure stood for a moment. Then it reached up to pull back its hood, revealing its face.

It was a woman, in her mid twenties. Her skin was pale, almost white, and her spots were various light shades of gray. That Thing thought she was very pretty, especially for a spotted person.

The more unusual part was the woman’s hair. Many spotted people had spots on their skin, but it only rarely appeared in the hair as well. This woman’s hair fell long and straight, mostly white, but with gray bands that matched her spots. Unlike the dirty, oily hair of everyone else in the camp, hers seemed clean and the sun glinted off as though her hair contained silver.

She spoke in a powerful but pleasant voice. “I am called Enoch. I bring you a message of hope, love, and blessedness from Brother Silus.”

The four men raised up their heads and their hands, bringing their hands up to head level. With fingers splayed, they shook their hands and bowed back down while muttering, “Brother Silus.”

The people of the camp exchanged glances with each other, not sure what to make of the spectacle.

The woman continued, “Silus was a man of God. He served the Lord the best he could. He preached the Holy Word. He preached about the hubris of man and how it would damn everybody. But that was before the Storm.”

The four men performed their splayed hand bow again, this time muttering, “Rum, rum, rum, rum, rum.”

“It was then that Silus learned that the Lord had a plan. The Lord saw what man was doing with science and DNA and space travel, and the Lord knew it was time to start over again. He had done it before with the great flood, but this time it was with a Storm.”

Once again, the four did their part, “Rum, rum, rum, rum, rum.”

“Silus stood in his church, preaching to what he thought were the faithful when a glowing hole opened up beneath him. He was sure he was being cast into the fires of damnation.”

The four did, “Fell, fell, fell, fell, fell.”

“But that is not what happened. The hole deposited him in the sky. Lightning struck his body, cleansing his self righteousness from him. Then he fell again, this time through the trees beneath him, only to land on soft ground below. He was alive, but damaged.”

“He asked himself why the Lord would treat His faithful servant in such a manner. He got his answer when he got back to town. The town was gone but for some rubble. His church was nothing but parts of a foundation. The Lord had saved him to continue to do God’s work.”

The four said, “Saved, saved, saved, saved, saved.”

“For many years, Silus traveled the world, trying to teach the Word of God. Everywhere he went, he found man trying to rebuild, trying to return to the path from before the Storm.”

The four men returned to, “Rum, rum, rum, rum, rum.”

“That’s when he found us. All around, there were people like us, those who were marked by the Storm.”

Another, “Rum, rum, rum, rum, rum.”

“He knew that God had marked His chosen people to be the future of this world. He saw how the old world people treated us, with hatred and evil-filled hearts. He knew his purpose, and it was to take care of us. We are the Damaged Ones, the ones touched by God, the ones to inherit this world.”

She paused to look around.

“Come, brothers and sisters, come and join us. You will be safe and free, and you will be doing God’s work. But it must be your choice.”

“Choose, choose, choose, choose, choose.”

Four more spotted people came out of the woods from the same direction as the caravan. They wore the same type of ragged clothes, but with their faces uncovered.

Enoch motioned to them. “These servants of God are here to answer your questions. Tomorrow, we will return to Silus and those who choose to do so can follow.”

She stepped smoothly back into the box.

The four bent men picked up the box, shouldering the poles, and moved back toward the woods. The new arrivals moved into their place and waited for any who may want to chat.

News from the Wilderness

Mike stood looking over the smoldering remains of Grandma Grace’s house. He knew it was necessary when someone died of the Cough, but it was a waste of materials and all the things that had been inside the house. More importantly, Grandma Grace was smart and whose smarts were going to be missed during the hard times.

“Hey, Mike, I think you want to hear this.”

Mike turned to see Mario with two other guys. He had seen the other two before, but they looked like hunters. Those types usually didn’t like villages.

Mike continued, “This is Seth and Jake. They were hunting east of here and saw something worrisome.”

Mike nodded to the two men. “What did you see?”

Seth started, “It was Spotties, a large camp of them. They had tents, fires, everything. I never seen that many of them before.”

Jake added, “I didn’t even know there were that many!”

Mike took a deep breath through his nose, held for a moment and pushed it out. “This is what I was afraid of. Everybody keeps treating them bad and the next thing you know we got a bunch of them ready to get revenge. You can’t keep slapping a dog without getting bit.” He stared into the distance for a moment. “How many do you think were there?”

Seth seemed to dig into his head for an answer. “There were at least fifty of them, and probably closer to eighty.”

Mario could tell Mike was stressed, but he was stressed too. “So, uh, what do you think we should do about it?”

“Nothing for the moment. We gotta wait till Tyler and Zach get back to see if we are getting any help. In the meantime, I guess we better keep an eye on things. We don’t want a sneak attack catching us.”

All nodded their heads in agreement.

Turning back to Seth, Mike asked, “Do you know exactly where this camp was?”

“Oh yeah, we call it Owl Hollow,” he turned to Jake, “Wouldn’t you say that’s where it was?”

“Definitely,” Jake answered. “It was Owl Hollow. That’s the little valley between the Old House Hill and Dead Herd.”

Mike thought about it a bit. They made repeated efforts to change the names of those hills, but post-Storm names had stuck. That also meant the Spotty camp was fairly close with plenty of woods in between. The Spotties tended to blend in with the trees and brush pretty easily, what with their natural camouflage. Someone was going to have to sneak out there and keep a watch.

Focusing back on Seth and Jake, he said, “Would you boys mind going back out there and keeping an eye on things? Nothing too dangerous or close; just enough to let us know if the Spotties are coming our way. I’m sure we could give you something in trade.”

Jake seemed a little worried, swaying from foot to foot. “Is there going to be a fight?”

“Probably,” Mike answered. “They killed one of our people last night and put a couple arrows in another. They told him to bring a message that they were going to get us. We sent some people over to Wood Hill and New Chicago to get some help. We haven’t heard anything back yet.”

Seth and Jake exchange glances and seem to come to an agreement. “Sure,” Seth said, “we’ll do it. If you got any honey, butter, and bread to eat on the way, it would be appreciated.”

Time to Talk

It was late afternoon in the camp; the sun would set early in the valley. Tom and Oak stacked firewood for cooking. That Thing and Juanita chopped carrots on a board nearby.

Nancy approached with her bow in one hand and a couple of dead rabbits in the other. “We have meat for supper,” she said as she laid the rabbits on the ground. “It’s not a lot of meat, but it will make a stew.”

“What do you think?” Tom asked her.

“About what?”

“We were talking about this Silus and his messenger,” Oak clarified. “We were talking about whether we should go.”

Nancy began cleaning a rabbit. “I was thinking about that too, while I was out. I’m not sure yet, but I’m probably not going.”

“Why not?” Tom asked.

“Well, all the things they promised, I’ve already got. As long as I stay out of the Plaino villages, I’m pretty safe. I can live off the land without any trouble. I don’t really need somebody’s divine mission to do all that.”

Oak asked, “But what if Silus is right? What if we are the chosen of God and we have a mission? Shouldn’t we try to get involved and do our part? As it is, the only purpose we have is to stay alive and to stay away from the Plainos.”

Nancy set the rabbit carcass in a nearby pot and started work on the second. “I figure if God has some mission for me, He is more than capable of putting me in the right place at the right time. I don’t need to go hunting for it. What do you think, Juanita?”

“I don’t know. I was sorting of siding with Oak, but you’ve made some good points too. I probably just need to sleep on it.”

Nancy shrugged. “Yeah, well as long as you don’t sleep on it while on guard duty. We got third shift tonight.”

The rest of dinner passed quietly with no further conversation.

Noone bothered to ask That Thing what she thought. She wasn’t sure what she thought, still getting used to the camp. It was odd that people would just hand her a bowl of rabbit stew. She never belonged anywhere and now two different groups were inviting her to join.

A preacher once came to Grandma Grace’s place. He seemed nice enough at first, but once he was in, everybody was wrong and he was right. When Grandma Grace disagreed with him, he screamed about how women needed to know their place and he slapped her. She nearly crushed his skull with the fireplace poker. The men of the village bound his hands, gagged him, and tied him to his donkey. The donkey carried him out of the village to who knew where.

This Silus sounded like he might be the same kind of preacher. If he was, that was bad. On the other hand, villagers had talked about good preachers from before the Storm. Maybe Silus was one of those. Something just made her uncomfortable about the whole thing.

At least she was exempt from guard duty, whatever that was. They said she hadn’t shown that she could use a bow or move stealthily yet.

New Arrivals

It was late afternoon and the sun would set soon. Mike watched the new activity in town.

Tyler had returned earlier from Wood Hill followed by a dozen men from there. They set up their tents in the center of the village. Each had ridden a horse of his own, and there were a few pack horses, all now tied to a rope stretched between posts. Most of the newcomers carried bows and machetes. Three carried rifles, and two pistols. Firearms weren’t very common anymore, but there were stories of more being made in some village way out east across the grassy plains.

Mike turned away from the tents to watch the next group arrive. Zach made it back from New Chicago with about twenty new men. They also rode horses, pulling up as they approached Mike.

Zach pointed to an older man on the horse next to him. “Mike, this is Boss Henry. He’s the leader over in New Chicago.”

Mike waved to him. “Glad you men could come. I’m Mike Billings, sort of the leader around here.”

Boss Henry looked around at the village and the farms around it, nodding his approval. “It looks like you got a good set up. Probably need to build some fortifications around though. Starting to hear tales of bandits. Afraid of work but more than happy to run in and pick a little village clean.”

“Yeah,” Mike said, “we’ve been thinking about that lately, especially with the new Spotty threat.”

“Spotties,” Boss Henry said. “You know, I’ve never heard of there being more than one or two anywhere. How’d they get an army?”

“Don’t know. Guess they’ve just been slowly collecting the ones run off from anywhere else. Anyway, a couple of hunters found their camp, said there’s about fifty to eighty of them.”

Boss Henry’s face contorted as he did his calculations. He looked back at his men and then stared forward a moment. “They got guns?”

Mike shook his head. “Nobody has seen any, but they all seem to have bows. Based on what they did to two of our guys, they know what to do with an arrow.”

“Alright,” said Boss Henry, “where do you want us to set up? Let us get settled and we can all have a pow-wow about what’s next.”

Within minutes, the New Chicago group were setting up camp next to the Wood Hill group. Boss Henry insisted that his men begin building a dirt wall to act as cover for firing out toward the woods if need be. The villagers, realizing this was a good idea, gathered their shovels to help.