A Long Time Until Now (18 page)

That done, he went back to Charlie Nine to go through plans.

He seemed to always be looking at plans. At least he could have them on a laptop, and Alexander even had Photoshop, PowerPoint and AutoCAD. That and the solar charger meant saving paper, and the ability to create substantial maps and documentation. Which meant he was stuck here, not out digging in poles. They had little enough manpower, and it wasn’t kind, but true, that the females just weren’t up to the heavy lifting the males were.

Onscreen, he adjusted a vertical for one of the lodges they planned to build, letting the worries run on their own mental channel. The weather was decent enough that he was quite comfortable in the back of the vehicle. He wondered how long that could continue. They’d need firewood soon, and that meant fireplaces in each hut. Crap. There was some way of doing them in wattle and daub, he recalled. Maybe Spencer knew. Oh, right. Caswell had mentioned that. But he’d feel a lot better with stone or sod. There were enough rocks here. They kept finding them while digging the ditch.

Dalton came up to the rear, knocked on the side and said, “Sir, do you have a moment?”

“Yes,” he replied. It would be good to take a break. He stretched. There was just no way to be comfortable in the back of these things.

Dalton climbed up and sat across from him.

“Tomorrow is Sunday. Do we have any plans for worship service?”

“I hadn’t planned on any, sorry.” Yeah, they needed at least a little down time, and a chance to talk to the Lord. No one else was going to get them out of this.

“Would it be okay if I hosted something?”

“Please do. Keep in mind the Catholic members may want to do their own thing, and I suspect Alexander and Spencer will not want to participate.”

Dalton said, “Yes, sir. I don’t want to be pushy, but I do want to hold a service.”

“I’ll put the word out tonight.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“No problem.”

That evening, they had goat for dinner again, but it was a little different.

“Mushrooms?” he asked.

Caswell said, “There was some tree fungus in the ditch. I made sure to do a spore test. And I’ve eaten some.”

Barker said, “I sautéed them in suet on the rock.” He pointed at a flat chunk of slate set on four stones. There was a bed of coals underneath. They’d gone from a rock next to the fire, to a griddle over it. “There’s a little bit of kidney mixed in for salt. I rinsed it well. Unrinsed kidney is nasty.”

It didn’t sound that appetizing. He lined up gamely, though.

Instead of skewers, they had more flat rocks to eat off. The slate worked well enough, as long as you didn’t have too much liquid. One dribble of grease ran off and over his wrist and cuff.

He wondered how long MRE spoons would last. Otherwise, it was pocket knives. He assumed they could whittle spoons from wood, or at least chopsticks.

The mushrooms weren’t bad. A bit mild, but it was good to eat something other than meat. They were a little salty tasting. There were some kind of grassy herbs mixed in. They tasted surprisingly good. The goat was just goat. It had been interesting for a couple of days. Now it was just food.

Barker said, “We’ve got some cattail we can turn into flour. We’ll see how that goes. We also need to start looking for eggs, and birds we can clip and keep as layers and roasters. I’m sure there’s some kind of wild rice down there.”

“No wheat, I assume?”

Caswell said, “Any grass seed is edible. It’s just not really worth the effort, and it won’t taste like much. That’s a Neolithic Revolution development, sometime in the next five to ten thousand years.”

She kept her eyes down on her platter, but he could see her tearing up. She didn’t have close family, that he was aware of, but that didn’t make it easier.

They were here forever. It was a life sentence at hard labor, and there was no appeal.

“Okay, we’re going to have nightly formations, and they’re going to be informal, but mandatory, unless you’re detached or sick. Specialist Dalton has something.”

Dalton stood up and said, “Tomorrow is Sunday, so I’m going to set up between the trucks at about oh nine hundred. I’ll be spending some time with the Bible and anyone is welcome to join me. We may build a church eventually, but for now, we’re the church.”

Elliott said, “I’ll be there. Medic Devereaux, your turn.”

Devereaux stepped forward, and took a good, authoritative stance.

“Health is critical. My supplies are limited, facilities nonexistent. So, first, sanitation. We have water. Use it. Creek water is better than not cleaning. Clean when you use the latrine, before meals, bed, whenever you can. You know we have that box of soap, shampoo and other stuff the civilians sent for the Afghans. It’s ours now. We’ll use that until it runs out. Save the shampoo to use as soap, too. It’s for hand washing, not laundry or hair.

“We’ll have a laundry detail using water and possibly homemade soap. The latrine is designated, no pissing or crapping around the camp. I know some of you use drink bottles to urinate in at night. That’s fine, but keep them well-separated and save them. We can’t spare any. And I haven’t seen nearly enough tooth brushing. I talked to Lieutenant Elliott. You will all brush your teeth for two minutes at formation.” There were giggles and chuckles, but he kept on. “We will time this. You will brush your teeth for two minutes after each meal and thirty seconds after each snack. I have almost no facilities to fix teeth, and dental caries can kill you. It is not a joking matter.

“I’ve treated two of you for blisters and one for splinters. We have gloves. Use them until they wear out and your hands toughen, and we’ll need to try to make more. We need your hands. Wear your gloves, the sex life you save may be your own.” Devereaux smiled and pointed as if it was a commercial.

Sean chuckled, and hoped no one got offended, but who the hell were they going to complain to?

A moment later, the rest laughed, too. Good.

The medic continued, “If you get injured, see me as soon as you can. Every blister, splinter, hangnail, I need to put eyes on, just in case. Don’t wake me for minor stuff, but do see me at sick call in the morning. It won’t be formal, but I’ll be here. And we will have PT.”

There were some groans as he said that.

Sean said, “Yeah, I feel it, too. We don’t know when or if we can get home. We’re just hoping whatever happened sorts itself out. Depression is possible, anxiety, whatever. No, not whatever, I mean other issues, I don’t want to minimize them. And we’ll have more as we go. Talk to each other if you need to. And talk to me.” He took a deep breath. “UCMJ remains in effect, but any problems we can resolve here will stay here, and I will keep the communication privileged. Assuming we get back, I’ll be reporting on events, not thoughts or comments. Consider me the chaplain in that regard. There has to be one. I’m not very religious, but I take your welfare seriously. I’ll say again—anything that doesn’t need to be shared, I’ll keep as privileged. We can’t have a lot of secrets here, and the environment means our ROE has to change.”

He pointed through the purple dusk. “Charlie Eight vehicle is designated a private area for now. Each of us gets one day or night to use it for sleeping, meditation, music, whatever, undisturbed. We’re a small group. We all need privacy and escape. The only reason anyone should knock and go in is if there’s a life or death emergency. We need the safety valve.”

That had been Spencer’s idea, and it made sense, once he thought about it.

“And with that, Sergeant Devereaux is going to lead us in brushing our teeth.”

It took a couple of minutes for everyone to dig their kits out. He was about to make a snarky comment about Caswell having an electric brush, very Air Force, when Doc pulled one out, too, saving him from making an ass of himself. No one had expected to be here, and he’d heard they cleaned better. He’d make do with his old reliable. He had a well-worn spare, and there were a dozen or so in the care box, so they could manage a few years.

There was something ridiculous about standing in a circle, brushing. It was almost childish. But, he knew it was easy for troops in the field to neglect it, and it was critical. He brushed vigorously and well.

Half a minute in, he realized Barker was humming the Jeopardy theme. Within seconds, they all were, and stifling giggles.

“That’s two minutes,” Devereaux said. “Honor system for other meals, but don’t neglect it. All I can do for bad teeth is pull them.”

Spencer said, “Well, you might manage a temporary filling with hot pine pitch. It’ll need replaced every month or so.”

That was creepy, and didn’t cause anyone to laugh.

Every time Elliott thought things were as primitive as they could get, something like that came about and shocked him again.

Armand felt better with a morning sick call instituted. It let him do his job. Most of the stuff was minor, but fixing minor stuff prevented major issues.

This morning, Alexander had a tick on her ass, rather close to the perineum. Easy enough to guess it jumped aboard while she was relieving herself.

She was bent over the seats in the back of Charlie Eight, facing the ramp to offer what privacy there was, though most of them had relaxed about body modesty. And this was not a bad view, but he was working.

“Semi-professional question,” he asked.

“Laser hair removal. Worked very well,” she replied, anticipating the question.

“Okay. Well, that will help prevent sweat rash and make parasites easier to locate.” The tick was middling fat. He pulled her skin taut, grabbed a lighter and said, “Heat coming, hold still.”

A flare of flame and it twitched, crackled and popped. He swapped lighter for tweezers and started gently working the mandibles loose.

“That was part of my thinking, not just social,” she said. “I’ve also had tubal ligation and endometrial ablation, so I won’t be having any issues with pregnancy or periods.”

“Understood,” he said. He wasn’t going to say “Lucky you” because he didn’t know the background. He made a tiny incision over the bite and applied a suction cup for a few seconds. She hissed and said, “Ouch.”

“Not safe for me to have more kids,” she said. “And my hormones are bad enough with my thyroid issues.”

“How are you doing with those?” he asked as he swabbed the site with a precious drop of alcohol. Spencer and Barker insisted they could have a still going in a few months, but . . .

She hissed in pain and flexed her ass, and damn, that looked pretty good.

She said, “Running out of medication, then I’ll start having problems with mental acuity, sleep, memory, and weight.”

“I’ll see what I can come up with,” he said reassuringly, but he had no idea what to do about that.

“All I have would be eating the thyroids of animals, and trying to find stuff with zinc in it. It might help. I read something about it somewhere, but I have no idea how reliable it was.”

“Yeah. I don’t know, really. We’ll do what we can. It’s clean. It might itch. Try not to scratch it.”

“Roger. Thanks.”

She straightened her uniform while standing.

From Charlie Nine’s gun turret, Caswell called, “Approaching party!”

They both scrambled for weapons and down the ramp.

It was a local hunting party, coming up from the north, waving and calling. They carried meat, and one of them limped painfully between two friends.

Elliott shouted, “Oglesby!” uphill toward the stream, where more trees were being cut.

Caswell stayed up top, covering them with her rifle. Everyone else had gotten armed, and the tree party had a good crossing fire zone.

As they got closer, Armand could see the injured man had been gored by something with a horn.

“Tell them to bring him in. Get a poncho down for me to work on.” He ran back inside to grab his pack.

Barker had a poncho from the tepee fast. At Oglesby’s direction, they laid the casualty on it. Armand moved in and started assessment. It was cramped between the seats, but he preferred overhead cover to open sky.

The man was a tall, lanky bastard. Armand was 6’2”, and this guy was almost a foot taller, with long, lean muscles and little fat. He was mostly tall in the limbs, but his torso wasn’t short, either.

He had thoracic damage, probable pneumothorax from the weezing and gurgling sounds. Seeping, wet wound. Probable broken ribs. Cuts and abrasions all over, including a nasty hematoma and a superficial scalp wound.

Elliott was alongside, and said, “I’m a combat lifesaver, can I assist?”

“Yes, keep him calm, look at the minor stuff and get it clean. Oglesby, tell him this will hurt, but I can heal him.”

“I’ll try.”

Spencer said, “If the spirits favor him.”

“Oh, right,” Oglesby said and continued in Paleo.

He took vitals, and listened to the chest. Yes, traumatic pneumothorax, and possible lung damage. Not good.

Elliott asked, “Not to be a dick, but how much of our resources will this take?”

“Not much.”

“Good. It’s neighborly and I want to help, but there are limits.”

“I know.” Yeah, he knew. Once he ran out of stuff here, that was it. Cleaning, bandaging and suturing would be all that was left.

The locals jabbered to each other, and to the patient. They brought out some weed that they lit from the fire and made pronouncements to the sky, and anointed what he presumed was the man’s spear with animal blood.

“If you can, please explain to them I need some distance.”

Spencer said, “Tell them the healing spirits need room to approach.”

Oglesby said something. They backed off, but started moaning and crying in sequence, to appeal to the spirits, he supposed.

“Somebody hold him down. This is going to hurt.”

“Anesthetic?” Elliott asked.

“I’d rather save it for us. He’s already getting antiseptics I can’t replace, and I figure he’s more used to pain than we are.”

“True.”

“And barely conscious as is. The ribs broke clean, but in two directions.” He pulled on gloves. He had fewer than five hundred pairs, but he didn’t know what germs this guy had, and there was no need to spread any of his. Hopefully they’d not need them that often.