Dark Titan Journey: Finally Home (15 page)

Taking off his boonie hat, Nathan put the harness on and raised both monoculars up. Hearing a horse coming up Nathan glimpsed back seeing Jasmine move up beside him. “Hey hot stepmom, the kids driving you crazy?”

Shocked with the question, Jasmine jumped in her saddle. “No, they’re being good.”

Nathan smiled. “That’s good, because I might want to sneak a kiss later.”

A flaming blush crept up Jasmine’s face. “You don’t have to sneak one.”

“I do like the sound of that,” Nathan said, smiling and raising his thermal binoculars.

Jasmine wondered where this mood came from. She liked it. “What got you in such a good mood, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“We’re alive and doing pretty good. All of you are stepping up and working hard,” he said. He looked down at Emma, who was just staring at him. “Well, almost all of you.”

“You didn’t think we would?” Jasmine asked.

“To be honest, I didn’t think all of you would accept it this fast,” Nathan admitted.

Jasmine looked off at the sunset. “What about me personally?”

Nathan turned to see her looking at the sunset.
Damn, she is pretty,
he thought. “I’m very proud of you. I’m very glad I told you to come.”

Jasmine turned to see him staring at her. “So am I, even if you complain about how I sleep.”

“Seeing a super hottie like that in the morning can give one palpations,” he explained.

“So you’re not going to make fun of me anymore?” she asked hopefully.

“I can’t promise that. Sometimes I need to so I don’t pass out when you walk over,” Nathan said. Jasmine snickered and looked away, trying to fight the blush. “Now don’t you go getting ideas about wearing a onesie with bunny feet. I’ll be forced to take it off so I can see ya wake up in the morning like you always do, starting a battle between my Id and superego.”

Jasmine coughed, trying not to laugh. “I didn’t know I was starting a battle.”

“Hell, the last few days, Id won big time. He says, ‘Look,’ and superego wants to avert the eyes. This morning Id wanted pictures,” Nathan confessed.

Covering her mouth with her hand, Jasmine fought not to laugh. The sun was just sinking below the horizon when she could talk. “I like Id,” she said as Nathan was taking a drink. The water went down the wrong pipe, and Nathan started coughing, shocked at the answer. Jasmine moved closer but Nathan quit coughing.

Nathan reached up wiping tears from his eyes. “Sometimes I think you women are trying to kill me.”

“Why in the hell would we want to do that?” Jasmine asked.

“Not sure. Maybe it’s just your way showing dominance,” Nathan said as he filled Emma’s sippy.

“I’m not answering that,” Jasmine said, smiling.

Nathan handed Emma her sippy cup back. “Hell, Id wants to know where your handcuffs are.”

Jasmine blew snot out her nose as she covered her mouth. “That was nasty.”

“You did it,” Nathan said, turning on the thermal and NV monoculars. “Jasmine, don’t take this the wrong way, but get back behind me.”

Jasmine’s jaw fell down then she thought something was near them but she didn’t see anything. “Because I blew snot?” she asked worried.

Nathan snorted. “No, that was cool, even superego said so. No, when I put this contraption on,” he pointed to the harness, “I see the thermal view overlaid with the night visions and a person up close looks spooky. I know who it is but I really don’t want to associate you with it.”

Jasmine almost took off running so he wouldn’t associate her with something not nice. “Can I see?” she asked. Nathan handed them over. Jasmine put them on and looked at Nathan. Seeing a white shaded ‘ghostly’ Nathan with dark eyes in a green world sent a shiver down her spine. She took them off. “Yeah, I don’t want to be thought of like that by you.”

Nathan put the harness on and lowered the monoculars. He could feel a headache starting, but within the first hour it passed, and Nathan just watched the world. Seeing the ghostly animals in the green world was weird, but Nathan could take it. Just before midnight Nathan spotted a group of people walking around a house about half a mile away, but he didn’t see any other people.

They stopped and watered the horses. Nathan had to take the harness off after seeing the kids. They ate as the horses drank and munched on the grass along the bank. Nathan leaned back in his saddle with his eyes closed as he ate.

Amanda moved her horse over beside Nathan. “A
re you going to ask what ‘Fuck u G men’ said?”

“Can’t you call him F-U-G-men?” Nathan sighed.

“Fug men? Instead of sounding really cool you make him sound like he wants to molest pug dogs,” Amanda accused.

Nathan opened his eyes. “You want to tell me what has you riled up, or you just want to fight?”

Amanda looked down. “Sorry,” she said. Nathan reached over patting her leg. “He said interstate eighty is firmly in government hands from Denver to Omaha, and don’t go near it.”

“They can’t watch six hundred miles of interstate. It would take ten thousand men and all they could do is watch the road. I’m sure he means for people to not attack convoys on it,” Nathan said.

“You’re not worried about it?” she asked.

“Just a little bit. Not much. It just means we will have to camp a mile or so from it and watch. I’m more worried about gangs and dogs,” Nathan admitted.

“Yeah, even F-U said to watch out for dogs. But they’re staying near cities, eating dead bodies. In L.A. there are packs of hundreds of them roaming. They’re killing living people. He said a man watched a pack of a hundred dogs take down twenty people. No one lived for more than a few seconds,” she said.

Nodding his head, Nathan patted her on the leg. “What about gangs?”

“He talked for a while on those and you will want to read it. He said the government wasn’t doing anything to the roving motorcycle gangs,” she said.

“Makes sense. Let them roam and kill in areas you don’t control, driving the ones left to you,” Nathan said.

“Nathan, they bombed the Mexico border,” she said.

“Who did?” he asked.

“Texas and the government. It appears the cartels were getting out of hand. There isn’t an intact city from the border to fifty miles south,” Amanda said as Nathan finished his food.

“There’s nothing we can do about it. From now on only write down information about attacks, areas we are heading into, riots, and stuff like that. I don’t want your hand to fall off,” Nathan said.

“You don’t want all of it?” she asked.

Turning on his monoculars, Nathan smiled at her. “I did before, just to see what people were saying. Now I know, so let’s look for information we need.”

“There have been a lot of reports of cannibalism,” she said.

“We were expecting that,” he said, glancing at the others.

Amanda looked off. “Atlanta is a war zone.”

Nathan froze. “What?”

“The area in and around Atlanta is a war zone. Most of the city is gone and the government is locking down the area. U.N. troops and troops still fighting for the government are fighting patriots as they try to move out west and north,” she said.

Closing his eyes, Nathan said a prayer for the friends he left behind. “We can’t help them, let’s go,” he said. Amanda looked away. “And Amanda, you were right for wanting to go with me. I would be turning around now to come and get you.”

Letting out a cry, Amanda jumped off her saddle and wrapped her arms around Nathan as she started crying. “I love you, Nathan,” she sobbed. Emma started yelling as Amanda squished her.

“I love you too, firecracker,” Nathan said, rubbing Amanda’s back and with his other hand moving Emma out from between them.

Amanda leaned her head back, wiping her tears off. “Emma’s bitching.”

Looking down, Nathan snorted. “She only has two moods: bitching or laughing. If she’s not doing either she’s sleeping.” The others had listened and watched the exchange. Many were wiping tears off their faces as Amanda climbed back to her horse. Emma was still crying as Nathan lifted her up. “She didn’t mean it,” he told Emma, and pulled her to his chest, hugging and rocking her.

It didn’t take long for Emma to calm down and let Nathan put her back in her sling. Seeing Emma smile, Nathan lifted his head to check on the others and they were all staring at him. “In the words of Stich ‘Nobody gets left behind,’” Nathan said.

Amanda wiped snot off her face. “You acted like you wanted to go alone.”

“I was wrong, we’re safer together,” Nathan said, snapping his fingers. Ares was splashing in the water with Athena. They both looked at him with innocent faces. “Ares, let’s go.” Ares leapt out of the creek with Athena right behind him. They both stopped and shook water off, covering the donkeys.

Giving Smoke a gentle kick, Nathan guided her back to the dirt road. Ares and Athena trotted past Nathan, staying less than ten yards ahead of Smoke. Nathan lowered the monoculars over his eyes once again, seeing the weird white and green.

Everyone was getting tired of the vast expanse of farmland, Nathan included. He liked the fact he could see forever but that just meant someone else could as well. The thermal actually gave him a good picture just in black and white, like a black and white TV, but not the best definition, hence the ‘ghost’ look of people up close. He could tell who it was he was looking at, but they looked like a weird ‘ghost.’ The green world his right eye imposed with the night vision made it all the more weird.

Hearing a horse trot up beside him he closed his left eye, blocking the thermal, and turned to see Jasmine. “Don’t look at me then,” she said as she guided her horse in beside his. “Why are you wearing both?”

“The night I got my headache, I realized a few hours in I wouldn’t see my UV laser with the thermal on if we were attacked. Since my head hurt anyway I tried both and it’s manageable,” he said.

Jasmine reached up to her own NVGs and adjusted the intensity. “I have to admit I like seeing in the dark.”

Nodding his head in agreement, Nathan looked out across the field on their right to see a herd of cows. “Yes, it is a great advantage.”

They rode side by side, each occasionally patting a sleeping kid, studying the vast expanse of nothing. The only exception was wildlife and cows, and Nathan knew they all preferred that. Every thirty minutes, Nathan lifted his monoculars and looked through the thermal binoculars. The thermal binoculars could detect heat miles away, much farther than the monocular alone. Not seeing anything Nathan turned the binoculars off and lowered the monoculars.

“Nathan, do you regret not taking some of the group you left?” Jasmine asked.

“No. I offered to a few but they didn’t want to take the risk, which is understandable,” he said.

Turning around, Jasmine checked on the others. John was looking behind them. Tom and Natalie were watching the fields on their sides. “You think they will be okay?”

“Unless the military bombs them or sends armor, that group will be fine. Not even a large gang could take that group,” Nathan replied with confidence.

Jasmine smiled, even though Nathan wasn’t looking at her. “I’m glad, because you care about them.”

“Yeah,” Nathan said as his thermal went dead. Unclipping it, he dug in his messenger bag for a battery. “I do care for them, but this group is much more important to me.”

Hearing that made the smile on Jasmine’s face grow, “I like that.”

“So you’re going to continue to sleep in your panties and bra, right?” Nathan asked.

“Unless you don’t want me to,” Jasmine said as she giggled silently.

“Best vision I can think to wake up to,” Nathan admitted.

Jasmine pulled back on her reins, falling back in her place behind Amanda and Casey. Amanda turned around in her saddle with a big smile at Jasmine. “He likes your tah-tahs.”

“That’s none of your business, little lady!” Nathan snapped loudly. Everyone jumped at the sound of his voice as it broke the quiet. Nobody ever spoke over a quiet voice, and they were shocked that Nathan almost shouted.

Amanda waved her hand at Nathan’s back. “If you’re my stepmom, tell him I want a bra.”

Jasmine started to giggle as Nathan stopped Smoke, lifting up the thermal monocular, and turned to Amanda. “I’ve told you I don’t want to hear that.”

“Natalie wears one,” Amanda snapped at him as she stopped her horse along with the others.

“Hey, I didn’t need to know that either. Little girls wearing bras and thongs aren’t images I want in my mind,” Nathan growled, locking his gaze on her. He was trying not to smirk because the monocular Amanda was wearing made her look like a weird bug.

Amanda stared back at him. “I’ve figured it out, a bra will make them grow.”

Nathan opened his mouth to say something and promptly closed it, spinning around in his saddle and kicking Smoke to go. The others followed suit as Nathan lowered his thermal back down. They rode the rest of the night without another word.

It was five a.m. when Nathan led them off the dirt road into a field. Up ahead they could make out a small ribbon of trees running along a creek. They didn’t like that they could see through the ribbon of trees to the other side. Nathan stopped Smoke beside the creek and climbed off.

Amanda looked over the creek through the trees and could see fields. Turning around she could see fields behind her through the trees. “This is bullshit. I can see out, so that means people can see in.”

Nathan started undoing Smoke’s saddle. “Amanda, this is the best around us. The closest house is two and a half miles east.” Everyone climbed off except Amanda, who was still looking around. “Wait till you see tomorrow’s campsite, it’s just a small ravine,” Nathan informed her as he turned off his thermal.

“What the hell is wrong with people in Kansas? Don’t they like trees?” she asked, slowly climbing down.

“Trees take up farmland and soak up much-needed water,” Nathan said.

Amanda took off her saddle. “Maybe, but they block the sun and you can hide in them.”

Dropping his back, Nathan spread out his woobie. “Firecracker, I hate to tell you but you won’t see real forest again till we get to western Wyoming. The only difference you are going to notice in Nebraska is we will get to small hills with patches of trees and the houses get farther apart.”