Chapter 34: Friends of the Wilderness Pt III

The Next Morning

We set out before sunrise into the dark cliffs and narrow passes filled with the untouched brush of this land. Hours passed, the sun rose, the cold winds turned warm and we followed our enormous mutated friend deeper into the wilderness of the Nevada Frontier in search of our friends. We stuck to the brush and passed under the shade of trees, around patches of cacti, over rocks, and on we went across the rolling landscape till the faint smoke was seen in the distant southwest. Even then, over roughly two weeks since the destruction of the Sevieri people and near destruction of our missionaries, the smoke still poured into the heavens. There was apparently plenty to burn, plenty to steal, and plenty to kill as shown when we neared the closest column of smoke. Still a few miles out, we continued through the brush, over the rocks and could see the tall cliffs. With hunched backs, we continued on, lower and lower, the occasional pop of distant weapons punctuated the sound of dry rustling branches, and screech of birds. Further we marched, eventually turning towards the cliffs and leaving the sight of that smoke column on our left, it was here we could see the swarms of birds circling the column like a diseased event of circumambulation. The vultures one by one would dive into the source of the smoke or fall in the crackle of gunfire and few would return to the skies until the cliffs were close and we laid ourselves upon the rocks looking out at the pass.

"Here's the entryway I've been using," said the King, Doyle and I passing the order to standby down the line.

"Is it always this guarded?" asked Doyle.

The mutant raised his head a bit higher over the brush in front of him, seeing the men in heavy jackets and ragged pants milling about the near end of the rickety bridge over the wash beneath the pass.

"I honestly don't know for sure," said the mutant, "I've only ever snuck under the bridge and through the wash during the night… I always told The Lieutenant I should have been made a Nightkin…"

Doyle grinned, both of us only somewhat familiar with the history of mutants like King Mercy. I studied the prospectors, seeing their ragged dirty selves, covered in dust and ash, smoking and laughing around the barricades or standing beside one another in a gaggle. Weapons on their shoulders and almost all of them with drinks in their hands, this siege of extermination was a mere game to them. It looked like there were only eight of them at this pass, but the condition of the dirt path down the cliffs from this post looked like it was pretty frequently used.

"You know how often they change the guards or when?" I asked.

The mutant thought for a moment, "I think Roaring Waters, one of their warriors, mentioned evenings and mornings, but I don't know for sure. Anyone who shows themselves around the rocks is fired upon pretty quickly… Either way, it may be hard to sneak through while there's any sunlight…"

The sun was high at this point, and maybe an hour or two before noon, so stealth was practically out of the question. Just as King finished speaking, one of the prospectors broke away from his group of friends and began to saunter over to the group by the brush and sandbag emplacement. The man's steps were wide and staggered and he was already extending a hand toward the open cooler at the base of the emplacement even though it was still 20 feet away. In the middle of the trail to the base of the bridge, the man collapsed, the magazine-fed rifle in his other hand fell barrel first into the ground. This caused an enormous laugh from those standing and sitting. The one holding the belt-fed machine gun even set his weapon down to clutch his sides in great hilarity before stumbling himself over to the fallen man with a few others.

"… They're probably too drunk to see us if we did decide to sneak by." Said the King.

"I'm sure, but that's quite a thing to risk…" I said, seeing the King grin in my peripherals before turning to Doyle, "… Doyle, you and any of your boys have suppressors?"

It didn't surprise me that before I was even done speaking, Doyle was pulling his pack up to get the makeshift suppressors he and his scouts use on occasion. "Way ahead of you, Paul…." Said Doyle before whispering down the line, "Psst, Hudson, Ray, Lockwood, get over here."

The four scouts shuffled towards us beneath the rocks out of view of the men below. Without anything else needing to be said, Doyle passed out one of his spares to Ray who'd forgotten his at home before they all began clamping the cylindrical aluminum, cloth, rubber, and asbestos devices over the ends of their rifles. In just a few seconds they had done so, opened the ports on the side of them, poured just a few splashes of water on the insides, and were taking their places beside King Mercy.

"Only got about 4 shots before our guns start screaming so let's do it in less," said Doyle.

There were only nods of acknowledgement. The men below had helped the fallen man to his feet, and the rest were still laughing or getting back to drinking. I could see King Mercy shutting his eyes in prayer while Doyle and his men took aim through the scopes of their rifles. Once, all had whispered their targets, and said the word "Ready", Doyle whispered back;

"Fire."

Each rifle hopped up from the rocks supporting them and a loud dull series *THUMPs* echoed into a much shorter distance than if they hadn't suppressed their rifles. Although still loud, it was hard to completely suppress the explosion of a .308 steel bullet out of a rifle. Still, the other prospectors at the other camps or the other barricades to the hidden canyon were not alerted. In 4 seconds, about 12 shots had been fired and the eight drunk men down below were laying in the dirt with fresh red staining the dry sands around their bodies, and the way was clear.

We gathered the weapons and ammo off the corpses, and rapidly made our way across the bridge until there were tall rocks on both sides of the brush-filled passes. A quarter mile in, and we came upon the first terrified Sevieris who nearly fired on us before heaving sighs of relief at sight of the large green head of King Mercy towering over the brush.

What these people had been through was beyond the normal but not so unusual since the bombs first fell. A people routed over a year ago from their ancestral home, a people who began to thrive in a region much further west than their native home, had been reduced to a small collection of cowering survivors living in the brush and under the overhanging rocks of a hidden cliff network. Entering the midst of their temporary home, the camp consisted of about 9 warriors wounded in some way, but able to hold a weapon. I counted 19 men women and children all healthy enough to walk, and 17 laying on stretchers made of strong branches and sack cloth too wounded to do much of anything. 5 of those stretcher cases would pass away before leaving or have to be left behind with nothing but last rites given by my friend before departure. Once we had taken this whole scene in, we felt every set of eyes in the camp had fallen upon us, and soon enough, there he was.

My longtime friend Daniel approached me wearing the wide brimmed dusty hat he so often wore, the red and white flannel shirt and dark color were so dusty and dirty and torn that they looked almost like they were as exhausted as he was. He stopped but ten feet from Doyle and I, and with tears in his eyes, the grin on his face opened the fresh cut on his left chin and cheek, and the man outstretched his arms before closing the short distance.

His tired arms encircled me, and he said as if he would pass out in any second, "Welcome brothers, we're so glad you came."

I embraced the man right back and stayed quiet as I looked at the two young girls over his shoulder.

Mary Hughes, daughter of my neighbor, the girl stood holding the hand of her missionary partner and a small boy of the Sevieris, largely unharmed but looking even more exhausted than the others in her torn pants and tattered long sleeve. Maya Lukinay, the pretty black-haired community-adopted girl stood with her hand in Mary's, the other hand bound up in a sling that encased her arm, and her face was so bruised with the tears of relief streaming down her face. Both of the girls looked like they wanted nothing more than to embrace us all, and that's what they did when Daniel turned to Doyle.

In no more than a handful of words and less than 10 minutes after our arrival in the camp, Daniel turned and spoke to the surviving tribespeople telling them it was time to go. He rounded up the last two brahmins they had since eating the other two in the days of siege, and when every surviving healthy person had their hands on a stretcher, Daniel went to give last rites to the five who had died or wouldn't survive the journey. When Daniel had knelt before the first still and groaning tribesman on the brink of death, he looked over to see who had joined him at his side. Daniel only glanced at the burned and wrapped man beside him, and although I was pretty busy walking up and down the line to ensure the others were ready, I could have sworn that I heard Daniel say to Joshua the simple words;

"Thank you, brother."

20 minutes after our arrival in the company of the last of the Sevieris, we were walking back out the way we came in.

Most of those healthy enough to walk and strong enough to carry a stretcher did so. The others were children, and so the children followed along in the middle of the train around the beasts of burden while the stretchers were spaced at the front and back while only a few of the warriors patrolled along the sides with we New Canaanites. Some of those warriors were given weapons we collected off the prospectors and were shown how to use them by my guardsmen in the brief packup. Some were familiar with guns, some were more familiar with spears or axes or bows, but all of them held the guns up, aiming at all our flanks as we filed out of the passes and over the bridge.

Passing the barricade, each Sevieri's eyes studied the bodies of their persecutors with the blood around each corpse already blackened in the sun. I continued on behind King at the head, and heard three or four of the tribals spit upon the bodies as they passed. I could not blame them for that, I understood it. All of these people had lost homes, children, wives, husbands, and everything at the hands of one enemy and then another in less than a year. I just kept my eyes forward and when we wound our way up the cliffs back to the rolling hills of brush and trees, we marched right along until the sun was setting behind us.

By the time the sun was gone, we sat in the dark of a little valley filled with dry bushes, surrounded by small dry trees, dry cacti, and even drier rocks making steep little cliffs all around us in the complete blackness. A place we had reached earlier that day by the time the sun began to peak over the east took so many hours to get to. This trip would be a much longer return one since there were so many exhausted and hurt, but me, Doyle, King, Joshua, and every one of my men stood vigilant in the dark. Every few hours or so, Doyle would send his men to our rear to find out if we were being followed, and every time they returned, they'd let us know that we certainly were.

It didn't take very long after our departure for the prospectors to figure out their victims had left. Although the sentries at the other chokepoints on their siege line were likely just as drunk as our late friends, it was clear that there was no central leader or organization to the murderers when Doyle's men reported different groups going different directions. For the last time that day, Doyle's men returned to us in the darkness to a black camp, knowing the fires would send trackers our way, and we slept in shifts until it was time to go again.

There was great sadness in knowing who was coming for these people, for us. There seemed to be much more "comfort" in being able to put a clear label on an enemy you had to face. For some reason, it felt better in a way to know that the White Legs killed my men, the 80s killed a peaceful ally, that Caesar destroyed a tribe of the Colorado. It was something else to know that the ones who nearly extinguished the Sevieris were nothing more than a disorganized collection of evil men who just wanted to get rich off the destruction of others. It wasn't even about the money in this case though. The two villages of the Sevieri had been destroyed, looted, the people slaughtered, and those who got away with nothing but their lives were still tracked down. With everything valuable the Sevieris owned up for grabs in the attack on the villages, still it wasn't enough for them as they found sport in finishing off the survivors in their siege of the canyons… I think the worst part is that although they had been referred to as "NCR prospectors," the kinds of men who attacked the Sevieri and were trying to track us down, were the kinds of people even NCR didn't like in their territory. I had plenty of opinions about NCR in general, but anyone they can't control, they seem to send out there beyond their frontiers saying "go make your fortune"… It doesn't seem to matter how many lives they destroy beyond NCR jurisdiction. Although it was true that there were prospector companies in NCR, even those companies were known for atrocities in the days before the agreement the Elders approved last year. Those companies had held their end of the deal more or less, but like I stated earlier, those who nearly destroyed the Sevieris completely were a different kind of evil. They didn't belong to an organization of evil like the 80s, Caesar's Legion, the Levanoans, the White Legs, or an NCR scavenger company, for all we were able to discern, they were just men united by a single common goal; destroy creations.

By afternoon the next day, we had reached a hidden point of turnoff towards King's shack. At a point in the brush with a long drop off before a cliffside, and mountains in all other directions, we rested while King stormed off and up a concealed trail towards the base of a rocky cliff that sat at the base of the mountain his shack was set. Before he left, Doyle and I asked if he would get the good Father Tully, but no. King said without a doubt in his mind that Tully would be fine even if the prospectors managed to find their way there. Apparently, Father Tully was excellent at shooing off raiders. Often times he was just too drunk and passed out to be taken for a living person. Other times, he would just tell raiders to take what they want and leave. The raiders would usually leave or have a nice party with the ex-New Reno Priest and his alcohol when they find out the shack doesn't have anything of value. No, King Mercy was only setting off back to his shack to collect everything of value he had hidden away in order to distribute amongst the refugees.

When King Mercy returned with his minigun attached to the ammo pack on his back as his hands were holding a large tarp. King laid out the tarp to reveal a treasure trove of everything a war weary refugee could imagine. Stimpacks were handed out to boost the recovery of minor wounds by 20x, water was given to everyone who could carry it. Ammunition was given to everyone with a loaded weapon, and prepackaged army rations were put in backpacks on the backs of those at the end of a stretcher. Everything was soon on the persons of everyone in the train or in the sacks on the cattle harnesses, and we had more than we could need to get where we were going even if the trip would take more than two weeks. We set out as soon as the tarp sat empty, the thing was balled up and thrown off into the deep ravine, and spirits were much higher as the silent march resumed.

For the rest of the day since entering the winding paths through the mountainous region around the King's shack, Doyle's scouts gave no news about our pursuers. We had escaped without incident.

Four Days Later

By the end of the third day after the King resupplied the refugee train, we had reached the opening into the wide open plains north of Sevieri Lake. Some of the more recovered Sevieris wanted to stop by their burnt old homes to take up refuge there, but that simply couldn't happen. We emerged from the passes a bit more north than we intended, but there was no going back, especially if the prospectors were scouring the mountainous lands we came from. The territory was a worrisome one, but our reconnaissance said it would be alright if we camped in the cover of the rocky rises for the night. Still with no fire, we embraced the cold winds even at sunset, and the exhausted train immediately went to sleep.

We awoke and set out again far earlier than usual since almost everyone Sevieri or New Canaanite was familiar with the region north of Sevieri Lake. It was a dangerous one. The plains were flat, the winds strong, and anything traveling along the old world 50 or 174 could be seen from miles around. The land we had to traverse was a dead zone for traders even slightly familiar with the Utah Wilderness. It was a no-man's land between the warring 80s, White Legs, and occasionally even the Levanoan raiders. With so many traders avoiding the area in recent years, instead of sending their raiders other directions, the three tribes of horribles were almost constantly battling one another to settle scores and claim some small ruin or other in the desolation at the cost of dozens if not hundreds of lives.

Rising and setting out long before the sun began to glimmer over the east, we had gotten much further than we thought we would by the time it was too light to move. Staying well off the nearly disintegrated old Highway 50, we used every foot or inch of elevation to conceal our march the best we could, but soon enough, the sun sat above the mountains of the east, and in the brightness of the early morning, there was one other enemy we hadn't accounted for with our entrance into this region.

Gunshots erupted through the morning calm in all directions. One of the Brahmin collapsed, and children screamed while stretchers were almost thrown to the ground with the bodies of the carriers. The dust kicked up all around us with the landing of each bullet, and a few figures were bobbing up and down, sending shots our way from several automobile carcasses off to our left. Gunshots boomed from everywhere in my rear, I raised my drummed .45 to my shoulder and got as low as I could, putting short bursts at the figures I could see. The bullets sparked off the metal husks, and more gunshots landed all around me before I saw the shoulder of King jerk back as though he was hit. Although I was firing at the visible enemies, I could see almost clear as day as the mutant to my left stood himself from a crouch and began to spool the six barrels of his minigun. In an instant, the gun began to fire so fast it was like one endless burst. No beginning or ending to stream of bullets as the mutant aimed with his right arm towards the cars I was peppering only a second earlier. A heavy stream of hot empty casings poured out of the weapon, many of them falling onto my prone self until the mutant advanced forward. More gunshots popped off in my rear before a bullet ricocheted off the mutant's arm guard. Despite being hit again, this only enraged the mutant as he spun around and aimed the weapon over my head to continue the screeching bark of the spinning barrels firing. I stood myself up, seeing the train, and all those lying down or firing in all directions while that stream of bullets went towards one stubborn figure beyond the dust, then another, then another.

At last, the mutant raised the red glowing barrels of his weapon into the air, and a short silence lasted until the start of several groans began.

"Who's hurt!?" Shouted the mutant. I pulled the drum magazine out of my submachinegun, shook the thing, heard the slight rattle, and felt the weight of at least a dozen remaining bullets before putting it back in my vest and drawing a fresh stick of 30. Taking the brief silence for all I could, I stuffed the magazine into the weapon and found I was not alone in the loudness of my breathing.

Everyone was either too injured, too winded, too shocked, or too alert to answer. Some of my men were crouched and panting as they stared at me or Doyle, and some were already putting hands over places on their extremities where bullets had grazed them. Graham stood over a group of children near the middle of the train with his weapon up, and Daniel was keeping the New Canaanite girls down with some of the other Sevieri women behind the collapsed body of a Brahmin nearby.

The mutant stormed down the line, checking the status of everyone, and all the men on my side of the train looked toward me at the head as if awaiting orders to breath again. Granger, Fleischer, ok. Hansley, grazed in the arm, Licus treating him so he's fine. Parrish looking down at someone, probably treating one of the wounded. There's Rhynes, holding a red mark on his shoulder, but he's standing so he's ok. The four Sevieri warriors on my side are good, but where was Nathan?

The groaning of our injured along the train grew louder in the calm, but then I heard a noise off to my left. I found myself moving towards that noise on a little rise before I even thought about doing so, and as I stepped up to the groaning man half concealed in the brush, I looked down and could see Graham right beside me in my peripherals.

I saw the rusty 9mm SMG laying in the dirt about a meter away from the groaning man, and saw the man clutching his neck in a feeble attempt to stop the blood as it poured over his hands. I turned the body over and the dirty man's eyes grew wide in terror at my face.

"Who are you?" I asked the man calmly as I looked him over. The thin coat he wore was laden in pouches and he had an ammunition harness around his waist with leather straps going over both shoulders. He didn't look all too dissimilar to the prospectors we killed outside the pass. Either way, the man didn't answer. His eyes continued to show horror as they looked up at me and the blood continued to pour over his fingers. He seemed to want to say something as his mouth quivered and a soft gurgle sounded like blood deep in his throat.

"He's one of the prospectors… His group probably got ahead of us and were lying in wait."

The prospector's eyes moved to Graham as he spoke but then returned to me. Those eyes were still so wide, still so scared, and still shocked at my calmness of presence.

"Anything you'd like to repent?"

Again, the only response was those wide eyes and a choking sound but nothing else came out.

"Forgive him father," said I, and before I could even think it, I shot the man, putting him out of his misery. No sadness, no anger, no joy, no nothing. I just wished the whole thing didn't have to happen.

I looked out at the north, and just as Graham said it, I saw it.

"We need to move to a better position, now…"

Far to the north, the dust was rising. Some large group was coming towards us, and even though my heart began to beat a lot faster, I turned to where Graham was now pointing as he said,

"Two groups. We need to go."

In the north, maybe two or three miles away was one group, to the southwest and about the same distance was another storming towards us from the shore of Sevieri Lake. My heart began to thump even more as I looked the direction we were headed and saw a collection of single story ruins around a half mile or so up the road. I knew we were still about another day of quick marching from the outskirts of Hinkley Ruins where we knew we would be safer, but whatever those ruins were, they were our only salvation. Just before I could muster myself enough to give the call to head out immediately, and just when I thought I couldn't take much more, my body acted for me when I heard from down by the train;

"Lieutenant Young! Get over here! Nathan's hurt!"

Before I could blink, I was standing over Nathan. Joshua was telling the survivors what was coming, and everything that could be taken with us was hurriedly being rounded up as I was looking down at Nathan. The man's face was pale like he was on the verge of death and he looked at the face of Rhynes as he injected himself with a stimpack before Nathan's eyes turned back at the work Dean Parrish was doing to tighten off the tourniquet. I felt Nathan's gaze come to me, but all I could see was his arm as Parrish put a clean cloth over the stump that immediately turned red with another wrapping he'd hastily put over it. My lips trembled as I looked from the wound to the pale face of Nathan;

"Nathan…" I didn't know what to say. The blood had stopped completely when Parrish gave the stick of the tourniquet another strong twist, but the paleness of Nathan's face remained. "… You don't have a hand anymore?"

I turned my attention back to the stump where Nathan's right wrist and hand used to be, terrified completely out of my mind as I feared what his face would look like when he told me what I knew was going to come; "Don't let me bleed to death, LT," "Paul, I'm so scared," "Please, save me."

Rhynes knelt down and injected Nathan in the left arm with one of his spare stimpacks and in my peripherals, I could see that face go even whiter as those lips quivered just like the prospector from moments ago. I felt the tears begin to well up in my eyes and felt one of them break loose and flow halfway down my dusty face. Nathan coughed painfully, then groaned as Rhynes pressed down on stimpack syringe. Another tear broke free when I clutched Nathan's left hand tightly, and still not strong enough to bring myself to look at his face, I told the young man,

"You'll be fine, you're not going to die, son."

He coughed again, I felt that hand weakly grip my own, and saw the survivors scrambling to get what they could before our flee to those ruins when at last, Nathan choked out;

"… It's just my hand, LT… You seen it by the way? Heh-heh-heh."

Immediately I saw that stupid pale face smiling and went through every emotion there was before standing myself up in a flash and shouting to Hudson and Granger, "You two! Get a stretcher over here for this idiot!"

As happy as I was that Nathan didn't lose enough blood to die, he could not stop being himself. Even as he was loaded on one of the formerly tribesman occupied stretchers, he kept laughing and said to no one in particular in that nearly dead man's laugh;

"… Can't believe they got my jerking hand… Shoot! Did I say that out loud?! Don't worry boys, and sorry bout that, Lord, I'll repent about that later I swear, heh-heheh-heh."

My friend and son of the guard would unfortunately survive with his whole personality intact, but there was no time for anything else. The distant dust of two bands of tribal raiders came closer and closer. We set out only with what we could carry, leaving three dead Sevieris behind, and both beasts of burden now slain. With all of our weapons shouldered, everyone helped carry an occupied stretcher, or child on our backs, or both, and we ran all of our shot up exhausted selves towards those rubble ruins as the twin storm clouds of dust came closer and closer.

We stepped upon the main road just as it merged with the sun-destroyed and time-eroded asphalt of a vacant coverless parking lot for the closest building. It was nothing but a simple service station garage like so many others out in the wilderness. Looking back, there was absolutely zero guarantee that the little collection of buildings in the middle of this desert plain was safe. Ruins like these in danger zones like these were almost always occupied by terrible warriors of one of the nearby clans who fought over such nothingness. Truly we were blessed indeed because the service station and surrounding old ranch homes off the main road were devoid of any life. The second we arrived at our impromptu fortress, Doyle screamed;

"Take the wounded inside! Now!"

Neither Daniel nor Joshua had to translate for the Sevieris, the warriors threw themselves into the steel door and all the men, women, and children filed inside with our wounded. The windows were burst open and Doyle led some of my men to their spots. Graham, Daniel, and the girls went inside to continue working on the injured while I followed Doyle's boys up a dumpster and onto the flat roof of the structure to take what little cover there was on top between the foot tall rise along the edge or HVAC units. Doyle's boys looked out at the dust clouds through the sights of their rifles and I helped Rhynes and Parrish up onto the roof as well. Weapons were all checked the second we had our positions and I joined Doyle's sharpshooters on the edge of the roof. Together we breathed heavy breaths as we heard the trample of footsteps beneath us slow to a halt and I drew my binoculars to take in the view.

About a half mile away, in what looked to be about the same spot of the ambush, the group from the north and the group from the lake shores had met. It was not a friendly meeting. Through the haze and dust, what little we could see of our pursuers was exactly the best thing that could happen. Almost immediately when the groups were in shouting distance, the far-off rumble of gunfire broke through the winds to reach us. The two warbands were at war, and even through the dust, they closed distance flinging spears and tomahawks, grenades, and fire bottles at one another as they fought over the corpses of the prospectors and our fallen brahmin. Although it was hard to tell, the two groups looked around the same size of about 40-50 each, and as their warriors met in the middle, the explosions continued to boom and the crackle of gunfire continued to envelop the scene of battle in a dusty haze.

"White Legs and 80s again?" asked Rhynes from behind the decayed HVAC system.

I nodded, letting Doyle's boys reply, "That's my guess," said Lockwood.

"Thank God. If those were together…" panted Parrish, still collecting himself, "… I'm just not ready for a last stand."

Everyone nodded. I continued to look out there with my binoculars and Doyle's boys lowered their eyes from the scopes on their rifles. Ray said, "I think the Sevieris have had their fill of last stands too," without any humor in his voice.

Another explosion came to us in a dull boom and there was one last long succession of rattling gunfire before a long silence as the dust of a half mile away just then began to settle. As more became visible, all I could see was a dozen or so dots fleeing back to the north and although a part of me was relieved, another part of me was equally panicked by the sight.

"Back on the rifles, boys. We may still have a fight yet."

The boys saw the survivors of the raid, the victorious 80s warband of the southwest wasn't celebrating their victory over the White Legs. No. Now they were rallying themselves up, and between 20 and 30 of them were already charging our way down the Highway 50.

"Wait till they get closer…" I told Doyle's sharpshooters before shouting for those below our feet, "… Bar the door! Get weapons on all windows! We'll do what we can up here but be ready to fire!"

I placed my submachinegun on the thick rise along the perimeter of the roof right beside Hudson, Ray, and Lockwood with their scoped semi-auto long rifles. I didn't need the binoculars anymore, the 30 or so 80s raiders ran along the concrete road kicking up no more dust as they got closer. I told the boys to hold, and they did, even if they did so hesitantly when the terrible screaming war cries grew loud. I could hear the breathing of Parrish and Rhynes behind me and the heavy breaths of those New Canaanites and Sevieri warriors in the windows below. The muffled cry of one of the injured children came up to us from below and the scoped .308s on my right began to speak when the 80s warband was less than a quarter mile out.

Again and again the long rifles fired, and I emptied one 30 round magazine in 3 long bursts. One magazine was gone and the automatics of Parrish and Rhynes started to pop off as well. By the time I put a new magazine into my weapon and fired off the first shot, the 80s warband had dispersed wide, continuing their charge towards us while another near dozen bodies were left behind on the road.

When the first of another 20 or so 80s raiders were close enough to describe, I watched as the man with a red-painted torso and heavy ragged dirty grey pants holding a submachinegun in one hand and ripper chainsaw in another fell where the asphalt of the road met the parking lot. All along the base of the structure below us, the men we had in the windows fired their weapons.

When that first 80s raider fell in those sprays of bullets, only one more was killed before the rest of the 80s began to flee from us back the way they came. The guns below fell silent and the scouts beside me on the roof let off a few more shots, and I was mid-reload when I told them all to hold fire. The guns froze, and we watched as about 20 80s warriors sprinted or limped away from us. The adrenaline and sound of so much gunfire made my ears buzz and so much of me wanted to continue picking them off, but I realized why I ordered the ceasefire when I felt I only had two more magazines left. I added for the men through deep breaths;

"… Ceasefire… Save your ammo. We might need it later."

The only response from all the boys on the rooftops was nods as they too took the moment to catch their breaths. We continued to watch the retreat as the surviving 80s appeared to cut their losses and take what they could from the fallen White Legs and prospectors around the scene of our ambush. The sun got higher, the breeze was still cool, but already feeling slightly warm, and a large cloud began to turn the sunlit landscape a dull grey as the 80s cheered around the scene of battle as if they hadn't been routed by a group of tired New Canaanites and refugees.

I propped myself up to a kneel, and looked down as the people inside began to file cautiously out of the building. Sevieris and New Canaanites, guardsmen, missionaries, a Burned man, and that large green mutant humanoid entered the calm of the outside, looking towards the source of those distant cheers before all eyes went to me and the men on the rooftop. So many of those eyes were full of thankful tears while others were just ready for this to all be over. Standing beside Graham, Daniel, and a few men and women of the Sevieris, I met eyes with Doyle and asked them all;

"You all ready to get home?"

Once more, all I got were nods, and we on the rooftops began to climb down in the midst of those far away 80s cheers.

24 Hours Later

We traveled through the rest of the day and as fast as we could all through the night. It was exhausting and tired work, and beyond a couple groups of raiders trying to shoot at our train of refugees from a distance, nothing else more life threatening happened in that stretch of wasteland. By the late morning, we had reached a land we knew was relatively safe outside the ruins of the old town of Delta. Largely untouched by the bombs, the place was still a wreck as scavers, tribals, raiders, and everyone else had picked over or fought over it since the bombs fell over 200 years ago. Communities had rose and fell in those ruins over so much time, fields planted on the outskirts and fields burned, and by the time we reached the first decaying old homes, we had entered the current territory of our allies in the Tar Walkers tribe.

The Tar Walkers had settled the ruins at least in the past year or two, and our Sevieri refugees knew we were in a safe place when some of the boys fell to their knees and kissed the ground. The Tar Walkers moved around often, and were not that powerful of a tribe, but they'd held their own against the 80s and Levanoans in the past year and greeted our arrival with a band of 10 warriors to see if we were friendly. Once they discovered we were New Canaanites and the people we were escorting were members of their old trade partner by the shores of Sevieri Lake, I can't thank them enough for what they did.

We politely declined the Tar Walkers' offer to leave the badly wounded with them, but accepted all the healing and blessings we could get as we were escorted through their village within the ruins. Children and women greeted us in the streets as we continued along and a brief visit with their chieftain allowed Daniel to translate the best of news. Daniel was told by the chief that there were other New Canaanites just north of their territory at a spot where the 136 and 6 met, and we knew that was our place. That was our rally point, and everyone felt as though the past weeks or days of travel had not happened knowing that the Constable had come through for us.

After a brief stay in the company of the Tar Walkers, their warriors escorted us to the rally point and by sunset of the day after our ambush, we could see the group of New Canaanites just past the sand-buried old airfield sitting on the concrete-barricades around the ancient highway interchange. I was not the only one to greet Lt. Pryor and Camden themselves with an exhausted embrace as I stepped up to them and the 15 men they had brought along. We were safe, and we were more than ready to continue our journey to New Canaan after a short rest.

There at the interchange, the groups of us leading the Sevieris and the men the Constable sent relaxed. Our group was understandably tense compared to Pryor and Camden's but they brought enough supplies for us to enjoy another brief moment of rest while we caught our brothers up on what the past several days have been like. Camden and Pryor were both interested to hear about the destruction of another White Leg war band at the hands of the 80s and the two recalled passing the site of another massacre on their way to the highway interchange right outside Tar Walker territory. Mention of this brought up both memories of the men I lost over a year and a half ago at White Leg hands, as well as memory of the gas station where the newer men of the detachment became acquainted with the kinds of violence the savage tribes outside of New Canaan can commit... While at the time we were mostly just thankful to be alive, the amount of defeats the White Legs of the Great Salt Lake had been experiencing in the past was something I thought a lot about on the way home from this trip... However, my mind would soon get pulled elsewhere as new responsibilities and more focus on the tasks at hand came my way.

Still, with the two groups united, there truly was safety in numbers for a group as tired as ours and a group as war-weary as the survivors of the Sevieri tribe. It was unfortunate that our route would not take us through 89 City, but the tribes of Nephi were only another day or so out where we could find rest again. However, it was here at this rest stop and this reunion with our brothers of the guard that I was told something I did not expect.

Perhaps I could have brought this up sooner, but every scout or expedition like the one I was on with Doyle had us lieutenants carry a radio. On the trip to the Sevieris, I lost signal contact with the Constable and New Canaan about a day before reaching the oasis. That signal was also garbled on the return trip when we exited the mountains north of Sevieri Lake. I brought this fact up with Lt. Pryor and Camden, and their radios were working fine, so they asked if I wanted to check in with the Constable on their radios. However, when I turned the knob on my radio, powered the thing on, and Doyle did likewise, our radios were working just fine once again. This signal problem was a bit of a mystery until I turned to the Constable's channel to tell him we linked up with Pryor and Camden at the rally point. I relayed everything that happened on the trip after losing signal, and told him of everything we had gone through after linking up with Daniel and the Sevieris. I attempted to explain the signal problem, but all the Constable said was;

"Oh, that reminds me. Since Camden, Pryor, and the men they brought should be able to escort the Sevieris the rest of the way, I'd like you and Doyle to take two men each and link up with the group of techs sent out to the signal tower near Jericho, you know the one. So just ensure they get the job done safely, Camden and Pryor will take over from there and see that Nathan gets help when he returns. I may have another errand or two for you once our techs are done, but go ahead and set out now if you can and know your men are in good hands…"

"Thank you Constable, we'll get on it right away. Over and out."

I was sad I couldn't be there with the Sevieris, Daniel, the girls, or Nathan the rest of the way home, but it didn't sound like the work of the techs on the Jericho signal tower was too far out of the way. The new order explained the problems we had with our signal even before entering the mountains, and Doyle and I were happy to set out at once.

As we started moving again, I rounded up and gave orders for Licus Messiah and Dean Parrish to accompany me while Doyle ordered Hudson and Ray to accompany him since splitting up those two was almost considered cruel. Then, once we reached the fork where the ancient highways split, we gave a departing farewell to the Sevieris, Daniel, and the rest of our men going off with our lieutenant brothers. While Doyle and I led our boys further up the Highway 3 towards Jericho and the others went east up the 132 towards Nephi, we just wanted to get this job done and return home.

Once we met with the four New Canaanite scaver techs and their two-man escort at the Jericho signal tower, we ended up protecting their work for nearly two full days. Some of the techs worried about attacks from the Levanoans, and so was I, but not for the same reason. Although it was true that the Jericho communications tower was almost directly west of the old town of Levan where the Levanoans originally got their name, I assured them that the Levanoans had been pushed northwest a few years ago and the ruins of Levan were almost empty. It probably didn't help to tell them that if we did end up getting attacked by the Levanoans, it would be from the north, but we were still fairly close to Nephi territory so I wasn't that worried. All I wanted to do was just get the techs to work faster, and they did as quickly as they could, but they didn't bring all the parts they needed to get the wiring done correctly, so part of this delay was due to their need to jury rig the system in some places.

I actually brought along Licus on this task since he was an eager young man, and I thought this little job for the Constable might add some excitement, but that didn't happen and I was just glad I brought Dean Parrish along as well. With little in the way of excitement as the techs worked on that communication box mounted to an old-world electrical tower, I could at least pass the hours getting back in touch with Mr. Parrish. I haven't had much chance to talk or even write about him, not out of prejudice, it's just that sometimes it was hard to keep in adequate touch with all the men of the guard I considered my sons. So, besides bonding time with Parrish, Licus, Doyle, Hudson, Ray, the two escorts under Lt. Roth, and the techs who weren't actively working, there wasn't much to say about this errand.

Two days after linking up with the techs, I figured Lt. Pryor, Camden, and the Sevieris were probably passing through the north side of Provo and a half a day out from New Canaan by the time I checked in with the Constable. I was relieved to hear him say that we were allowed to return home, but was only a little disheartened when he had another task for me and Doyle to do before we could return home. Luckily, this task was one we could do on the way home without going out of the way too much. All we had to do was check in on two of our hidden weapons caches in the region and then pull a few items from storage at our main armory beyond the walls at the National Guard stockpile in Spanish Fork.

A/N: I just wanted to let my readers know that I will be taking a little bit of a short break from regular posting after the next chapters. I have recently come across a program where I can do really excellent sounding voice narrations using AI. Some of my long-time readers know that I started acting upon the idea of reading my fics for YouTube while I was between this story and my story The Edge of Glory. Some may not know that I only really stopped the YouTube project because it was just too much work to read all that, record it, edit it, create art, etc, all while trying to get settled into a new job. Now that I have access to an AI reader that doesn't sound like a literal robot, I'm thinking I'm going to get back into that at least for a little bit... Something tells me the Fallout Series is about to get really popular again with the coming of the TV show, and something also tells me that the TV series is going be pretty entertaining while also taking an enormous dump on the lore. Because of that, I want to do what I can to be there for the YouTube Fallout fans by releasing some of my especially Lore-minded works on that platform. I will have more details about the channel in my next chapter for those interested in it while I'm on my little break from fanfiction .net. :) Thank you so much to all my readers and hope you enjoyed the chapter! :D