A Girl Called Badger (Valley of the Sleeping Birds)
Read A Girl Called Badger (Valley of the Sleeping Birds) Online
Authors: Stephen Colegrove
A Girl Called Badger
Valley of the Sleeping Birds Book One
by S. Colegrove
Copyright Information
A GIRL CALLED BADGER
Copyright 2012 Stephen Colegrove
First Edition: December 2012
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as permitted under Sections 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without either the prior written permission of the Publisher, or authorization through payment of the appropriate per-copy fee to the Copyright Holder. Requests for permission should be directed to S. Colegrove via e-mail at [email protected].
Cover art by Zummerfish (
zummerfish.deviantart.com
)
Find out more about the author and upcoming books at the links below:
Map of Station and the Valley
The following map, although not exactly to scale, indicates the major features of Station including: Old Man, The Tombs, Windy Peak, Yellow Mountain, The Corral, Leather Workshop, Pass, Lake, and the Field.
ONE
T
he forest smelled like rain and the hunters walked faster.
Four carried wooden crossbows at the ready, metal staves bent and strings cocked. At the end of the single file a young man twirled a shredded length of electrical wire. An occasional slap of the wire against his hemp trousers earned a look from the others. He held a crossbow over one shoulder, by the strap.
The leader held up a palm and the group halted near a pair of white-flowering trees at the edge of a clearing. Thorns as long as a thumb spiked from the knobby branches.
The young man rushed forward with a loud rustle of leaves and snapping twigs. “That’s hawthorn!”
“Quiet, Wilson,” hissed the leader.
“But I can use the flowers and leaves–”
“We’re not here for that. Stop talking.”
The hunters moved deeper into the forest. They stopped before a tangle of chokeberry bushes and sat with legs crossed. After half an hour the lead hunter stood up. He cupped his hands and made a sound halfway between a caw and a squeak.
Something small rustled through the bushes. Instead of the expected coyote, a white-spotted bear cub squeezed into view and ambled happily toward the hunters.
Deep in the thicket twigs cracked like gunshots and a hoarse bellow ripped the air. With a spray of leaves a massive bear charged from the bushes.
Bolts flew at her as Wilson fumbled with his crossbow. The brown and yellow-spotted coat shivered from the hits but the bear kept whoofing forward and swiped the lead hunter across the chest. He flew six feet and tumbled through the leaves.
Wilson shot his bolt as the hunters reloaded and fired again. Steel points ripped through the bear’s heart. She wandered into the trees and collapsed like an exhausted old woman at the end of her day.
The four made a crude litter for the bleeding hunter and raced home across the mountain. Wilson tried to remember his lessons on surgery. He found it difficult to think about anything but the dead bear on the brown chokeberry leaves.
HE FELT THE BLOOD on his face and in the air. It freckled his arms, his clothes, and his hands. It pooled under the wounded man to the edge of the operating table and splashed perfect round circles on the floor.
Wilson jiggled another clamp in his hand but Father Reed was too wrapped up in thoracic surgery. His bloody fingers struggled to find every shredded artery and seal them with the silver pen of the micro-cauterizer. Around the patient, machines flashed yellow and bleated like mechanical sheep.
In the end, the blood loss was too much for the wounded man. After the second cardiac arrest his heart stopped. Sounds from the machinery slowed and paused, became a solitary cricket.
“Trauma monitor––all systems off,” said Reed. He wiped his forehead with the back of a hand. “As it begins ...”
“What was that, sir?”
Reed startled and knocked a metal tray to the floor.
“Cat’s teeth, Wilson, don’t sneak up behind me! I need a washcloth.”
“Yes, sir.”
He helped to clean and wrap the body in hemp cloth, then donned a heavy yellow suit and a scratched, bulbous helmet.
Family and friends waited at the top of the concrete steps that led from the rectory to the surface. Two men came forward to help Reed and Wilson carry the stretcher. The procession officially began, and carved a furrow through the crowds of quiet mourners.
Blunt gray peaks footed by evergreen forests surrounded the valley. In the flat center of the village, pots of lemon trees covered a circular stone plaza. A concrete mouth gaped at each cardinal point and offered worn, narrow steps into the earth.
Windowless buildings broke the lines of intensely cultivated fields around the central stone circle. The gray boxes stood solemn in the midst of leafy vegetable plants and bright herb gardens, but were nothing more than crumbling spider-traps waiting to collapse. To the north lay fields of green hemp and the sheep corral. To the south, intertwined plots of maize and beans stretched to the pass out of the valley.
Reed and Wilson led the procession to a rusted gate at the foot of a mountain. A collection of weather-beaten signs covered the gate and fence. The only visible word was “Station.”
Reed and Wilson waited while a child put a clipping of hair in the hands of the deceased, then carried the stretcher to a concrete trench in the earth. After a short walk underground they arrived at a keypad. Reed pressed a sequence and after a few seconds the metal door rumbled to the side along a slotted track. They stepped into a bare concrete room filled with red light and waited for the heavy door to close. Another metal door labeled “Restricted” faced them across the room. A square, yellowed board on the wall held rows of tiny hooks and dangling tags in a faded rainbow of colors. A dozen black boots were arranged in a neat and dusty line below. In the center of the room lay a scratched floor panel edged with yellow and black stripes. “Do Not Stand” and “Danger” were stenciled in black.
The two lowered the body to the floor. Reed crouched down and opened a tiny door next to the panel. He stuck his hand inside the opening and a silver console hissed from the floor to waist height. A display screen with keyboard yawned open and hummed to life.
“Your turn.” The helmet muffled Reed’s voice.
Wilson stepped to the screen. Through scratches in his face-shield he could see a single line of green text and a lazy, blinking square.
USAF Altmann Research Station
05.03.2312
[]
He typed the memorized words one letter at a time.
ARSRS032
[Enter]
bluebird45645
[Enter]
term002 manop
[Enter]
rel lift002
[Enter]
Wilson closed the screen and the console hissed down to the floor. A klaxon whined somewhere deep below his feet and the floor vibrated. After a minute the floor panel split apart and a black slab rose from the pit. Hydraulics moaned as the obelisk slowly turned flat. A horizontal seam appeared in the center. The sides of the black rectangle opened and folded down like the wings of a stone butterfly.
Together, Wilson and Reed slid the dead man onto the concave surface in the middle.
Reed touched the cold, waxy forehead. “By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken. Dust you are and to dust you will return.“
He bent down to the small hatch and again turned his hand. The wings hissed together to form a seamless, inscrutable block, and the underground klaxon woke from its nap with a groan. The block descended and the metal floor slid over the pit.
“Goodbye, Airman Ralph Lewis,” said Reed.
Wilson followed him out of the Tombs into the warm sunshine.
People in the village had returned to their daily chores. Many of the men and women were busy in the gardens. A half-dozen men walked toward the southern forest with axes on their shoulders. A group of women carried bundles of hemp from the fields. Three boys laughed and chased each other toward the smokehouse.
Wilson watched the running boys and wondered if his life could ever be that simple again.
HE DIDN’T SLEEP WELL and went to breakfast early.
A thick mist filled the air and hid the mountains from view. Wilson walked along a stone path and passed rows of staked tomato plants and green squash. At the plaza, the lemon trees splashed the mist with color. A pair of hunters passed him, headed for the gap out of the valley. They talked about finding deer in the corn fields.
The path led him to a concrete opening in the earth. Wilson walked down a set of stairs to a heavy metal hatch and went through the entrance tunnel to the cafeteria. He took a bowl of porridge with a teaspoon of honey to a bench in a far corner. Memories of the bloody, lifeless body of Lewis kept him from finishing his breakfast as quickly as usual.
The cafeteria slowly filled up. A pair of boys sat next to him with a clatter of wooden bowls.
“Hey, Wilson,” said a tall, red-haired scarecrow. “Out of your cave?”
“Leave him be,” said a muscular teenager. “Wilson is holy material. He’ll tell the big man upstairs and–” He whacked a spoon on the table. “–hello, lightning bolt.”
“Keep your voice down, Mast. But if anyone deserves to fry, it’s the Colonel,” said Wilson.
“Don’t call me that!”
“Inside voice, please,” said Mast.
He swallowed a mouthful of tea and pointed the cup at Wilson. “You look tired. Some unlucky lady? I bet you’ve been wandering the Tombs.”
“Yesterday was the first time I’d been there in months. I don’t enjoy it.”
“Yeah, right,” said Mast. “I bet all those stories about singing ghosts are just made up. You priests just want a peaceful nap down there, undisturbed by us nosy citizens.”
“ How could I sleep? You know I’m scared of spiders.”
“Scared of spiders,” chanted Robb. “Scared of sleeping. Scared of sleeping spiders.”
“Can it,” said Wilson.
Mast shrugged. “I admit those things grow big. But an all-seeing, all-knowing priest like yourself shouldn’t be worried.”
“More like all-work all-the-time. My apprenticeship has been nothing but broken fingers, display screens, books, crying babies, and more books,” said Wilson. “I can’t escape on Sunday like you two.”
Robb covered his mouth. “Look over there. It’s Badger,” he whispered.
The tall girl ate alone and without looking up. Unlike the other village girls, her dark hair was parted into two braids that stretched down the front of her white shirt. On the right side of her face, two pale scars ran from temple to jaw and disappeared into her collar.
“Badger looks sad. Maybe she hasn’t killed anything today,” said Robb.
Wilson glared at him. “Her name’s Kira and don’t say things like that.”
“You keep bringing up her birth name,” said Mast. “Nobody cares, including her. Especially her.”
“I can’t believe it.” Robb laughed and pointed his spoon at Mast. “He’s still sore about his broken nose!”
“Shut up.”
“She’s got fourteen wolf pelts. What’s your count again?”
Mast sighed. “Allow me recreate the famous battle of My Hands. It takes place at Scrawny Neck, Robb.”
Wilson watched the girl until she finished her meal and left.
HE RAN AFTER HIS father through a field of sunflowers. Something banged, rapid and metallic. His hands whipped through tall, needle-covered stems and the banging came again. Wilson jerked out of his apprentice bunk and scrambled to the hatch. In the dark tunnel three hunters held a long stretcher covered by a bear pelt. They breathed hard and sweat dotted their faces.