The Fly-By-Nights (8 page)

No more explanation was needed! And again shaking his head, then turning away to avoid embarrassing his father, Garth could barely keep from grinning!

Chuckling, Zach took up four pieces of aluminum tubing from his effects, fitting them together to form a lightweight crutch. Then standing up: “Right, I’m off,” he said. “But I don’t think I’ll be too long. No, I’ll be back to snatch a few hours’ sleep before Big Jon reckons it’s time we moved on again…which he won’t, at least not until the sun’s down. So then, I’ll see you later.”

Garth simply nodded and watched Zach move off toward an up ramp. Then, undressing and bundling up his vest and underpants until the next time the clan’s washerwomen got their cauldrons going—which, considering the scarcity of untainted water was a rare event indeed—he put on a clean, soft leather breechclout and stretched himself out, finally drawing his blanket up under his chin.

It was only then that he realized how weary he was, but for the moment sleep refused to come. Instead his mind went back to that time in the Southern Refuge, prior to the exodus, when Big Jon Lamon had called the meeting at which the lives of everyone in the sprawling underground shelter had been changed forever.

Big Jon had talked about his contingency plan: a plan based upon the ideas—the written records, strategies and proposals—of other, long-forgotten clan elders: men who had envisioned a future when, for various unspecified reasons, it might become necessary if not convenient to abandon the Southern Refuge and venture out into the poisoned land.

And now Garth recalled certain of Big Jon’s list of preparatory requirements: the work to be done, provisions to be made, and items to be acquired as he deemed essential:

From the scav teams he had requested lead from the roofs of ruined churches, to be beaten into panels in the workshops. (In fact, for at least a fortnight prior to the leader’s actual disclosure of the looming disaster—and a further ten days to the exodus itself—on those several nights when Garth had gone out scavenging with Singer’s team, he had time and time again heard the bully complaining about the seemingly endless loads of lead they were trundling back to the refuge.)

“Oh, it keeps out a lot of the radiation,” Singer had grumbled, “but in that great burrow under the hills, why do we need so much of the damned stuff? I appreciate the feel of it around me when I’m out and about in a salvage skip, for sure—but in the refuge—under four hundred or more feet of solid rock…? It makes no sense, not to Ned Singer it don’t! And then there’s the boss, our so-called ‘leader,’ Big Jon Lamon, sending us out on these stupid so-called ‘initiatives.’ It beats me why we put up with
his
nonsense! And tell me this: why the hell do we need a dozen or more new scav teams? I can’t figure it out! Or is it that I just don’t want to?”

Those last of his questions because much of the heavy metal they had been salvaging was soon to be seen hinged to the roofs and sides of an apparently endless production line of vehicles, including a great water bowser, that were obviously being prepared for outside work; which to Ned Singer’s unimaginative mind could mean only one thing: that Big Jon intended to establish a veritable army of scavengers!

And in support of Singer’s reasoning, however flawed:

In the workshops, the entire mech workforce had been set to servicing motors salvaged at least eighty years ago, before anyone alive in the refuge now was even conceived—indeed in the time of their forebears, their great-grandparents! All of these motors, from ancient buses whose carcasses had long since turned to rust—vehicles used all those decades ago to convey certain privileged people and a few surviving remnants of the local populace to the refuge in the earliest hours of the war—had been stored and preserved as best possible and were now being installed and geared into as many metal frames and chassis—however ugly or ungainly—as could readily be made serviceable.

Just as Ned Singer had observed and just as obviously, this could only be the creation of a small army—or rather a fleet—of transports. But contrary to the bully’s conclusion, it was in no way a fleet of scavenger skips and trundles. Trundles, by all means, but
people
carriers as opposed to salvage; and by no means an army but a soon-to-be convoy and veritable Ark!

Similarly, scav boss Bert Jordan and his team had been required to concentrate their efforts on fuels; for out there in the ruins, the locations of several small lakes of gasoline had been known for more than seventy years. Having somehow survived the holocaust’s missiles and fires, these were the subterranean reservoirs of black gold that had fed the pre-war service stations and fuelled the populace’s motor vehicles; and for decades now they had served the refuge in a similar capacity.

A third team under boss Don Myers had been required to raid the shattered remains of what was once a local military arsenal. While many weapons were beyond salvaging, a small percentage of recovered ammunition—some cartridges, bullets and grenades in their protective crates and packaging—were (amazingly!) still viable. And Myers’ team had searched out and gathered up every last shell of this treasure trove that scavengers had been collecting since time immemorial for use against the fly-by-nights.

But the scavs had not been alone in their industry. Within the Southern Refuge itself, once the worst was known, there had been plenty of frantic work…the careful filling of hundreds of jerricans, with many gallons of gasoline or diesel allocated to each trundle; while three of the larger, more powerful vehicles had been loaded exclusively with fuel: gasoline, diesel and kero…the filling of the great water bowser from the refuge’s precious reserves…the preparation of preserves, and salting of meats…the continuing culling and destruction of contaminated animals and birds, as their sicknesses gradually surfaced…the gathering of what fodder was available from hydroponics…the building of secure pens and cages in farm trundles, for what healthy livestock remained, without which a dubious future would seem yet more uncertain.

These things had been done and many more; and then, finally, there had been the closing down of the refuge’s own small reactor which, ironically, had remained “clean” as a result of many decades of specialized tech dedication and industry. The generators had been silenced, the always dim lights had flickered low and gone out, and behind the departing convoy all had been still in the great labyrinth which had been the Southern Refuge…

All of this and more passed through Garth’s weary mind, and doubtless through the minds of a good many more of the convoy’s folk where the majority rested or settled to uneasy sleep; even as Garth himself now settled down…

But having closed his eyes for what seemed barely a moment, suddenly Garth sensed a silent figure standing there, silhouetted against the dull glimmer of near-distant daylight: a young woman’s figure and quite motionless. And through half-shuttered eyelids, finally he recognized its owner.

“Oh!” said Layla Morgan as Garth’s eyes snapped fully open and he jerked upright in his bed. “Garth, I’m so very sorry! I didn’t mean to disturb you, but I saw your father going off on his own and…well, I didn’t think you’d have your head down yet, and if you didn’t maybe we could… I mean, we never seem to get a chance to…so what do you think? Perhaps now is as good a time as any to…to…?”

Equally or even more tongue-tied, and not yet fully awake—though his weariness was rapidly falling off him—Garth groped for something, anything to say, just as long as it didn’t sound too stupid! And at last: “Yes?” he nodded. “Please go on: now’s a good time to…to what?”

Layla shrugged helplessly. “I don’t know! Talk, maybe? Oh, dear! This is no good! It’s supposed to be
you
doing the talking, the…well, persuading!”

Layla wanted to talk, wanted to be persuaded? Garth’s heart sang! She wanted to talk to
him,
to Garth Slattery! Previously: a shy smile in passing (most of the modesty being his); or occasionally, in reply to a bout of wistfulness he couldn’t conceal, Layla’s querying, soft-eyed glance (which might mean anything or nothing at all), and that had
been
all…almost. Ah! But what of that yearning, that anxious, even sad and frustrated expression that she’d worn in the trundle last night, when their eyes met during those few fraught seconds when it seemed likely they were under attack by fly-by-nights?

And now…now she wanted to talk to him!

That
was
what Layla had said, wasn’t it? Yes, yes of course it was! But she’d also said it was supposed to be
him
doing the talking!

“You wanted to talk?” Garth blurted, edging awkwardly aside under his blanket, and almost unconsciously, on impulse issuing a silent invitation to sit by patting the barely adequate space that he’d vacated. Which was when he saw that Layla had brought her necessaries with her, a small bundle of items to ensure she got her day’s rest: a rather thin, worn blanket, a pillow (actually a cushion,) and a pair of soft, warm leather leggings.

Then (amazingly!) Layla threw the cushion down in the space he’d allowed her, got down and sat beside him (somehow managing
not
to crush too close; a consideration which, to him, mattered not at all, or perhaps a great deal), and shook out her blanket over her knees and feet.

And now Garth found his voice, the words, and something of his courage. “You’re right: we’ve never had a chance, an opportunity to talk about…well, anything! And I’ve really wanted to…to talk, I mean! Then there’s Ned Singer. It seems whenever you are there, he’s there too, and you haven’t appeared to mind his company. At least not that I’ve noticed. Well, I understand something of that: he’s an older man and experienced, and runs his own scavenger team. Or at least he used to, before the trek. So you see—”

“—So I see you’ve got it all wrong, Garth!” Layla stopped him short. “Yes, Ned’s always there—because he cuts everyone else out! Other young clansmen have showed interest in me, too. And more especially since I’ve been on my own. But I’m sure Ned has warned them all off. Anyone who looks at me more than once: they soon lose interest after Ned has talked to them. Why, he’s nothing but a bully!”

Garth nodded. “Ned’s spoken to me, too. And he made himself very clear. A threat, really, but I don’t much care for threats—and I
very
much care for you. Ned says he wants you; well so do I, and I’m not about to lose interest!” There, he’d said it! Or had he said too much? “But…as yet I’m a nobody, and he’s got years on me. Also, he’s my boss, and—”

“Do you really want me, Garth?” Again, in mid-sentence, she cut him off. “I mean
really
?
I know you’re young—younger than me, even—but you’re a lot more than just a boy. Oh, I’ve seen the man in you, Garth Slattery! You’ve been a scav, too; you go out protecting the convoy; and anyway, what’s a year or so when I’m little more than a girl myself? Time is passing, Garth, and who knows how much we have left? You say you want me, but maybe you think you aren’t ready? Well, I think you are—or rather,
we
are. So what if I tell Ned I’m not interested in him?”

Then, before Garth could answer, she laughed however uncertainly. And pressing closer, shivering (but not from any chill, he fancied), she repositioned her cushion and finally, stretching out, said: “There. So after all is said and done, here’s me doing the persuading, the arranging!”

Garth’s throat was dry, his voice husky, when he said, “You know, I think I’ve probably dreamed about this; well, something like this, and can’t help thinking I may be dreaming still! And Layla, I do think—in fact I know—that I’m quite ready. As for Ned Singer: you don’t have to tell him anything. I’ll speak to him myself,
for
myself.”

Lying back, he moved over more yet on his mattress; Layla’s lithe body followed his, pressing even closer. He turned on his side in order to face her, and she turned her back to him, snuggling closer yet! Clothed and in every respect decent, seemly—except possibly in their thoughts and desires—they nevertheless fitted together like lovers, which Garth was now sure they would be. And his arm went around her almost of its own accord.

“Let’s say no more,” he said then. And with a shrug: “If we talk any longer I’m sure to get my words all tangled!”

“No, not you,” Layla replied, shaking her head and sighing. “Actually, I think we’ve chosen our words rather well!”

Following which the pair very quickly fell asleep. And all around them in the cool gloom and the shadows of the car park’s lower level, some fifty others of the refugees settled to their much needed rest. Among those sprawling nearby, several couples had witnessed Layla’s arrival, seen how she remained and nodded their understanding and approval; especially the women, smiling and making small, whispered comments to their partners.

But keeping well back, unseen in the deepest shadows, there lurked a certain cold, calculating figure—a physically unattractive, scar-faced man called Arthur Robeson—who had like-wise kept a discreet distance while following Layla Morgan from the moment she’d climbed down from the trundle. And Robeson was one of Ned Singer’s small coterie of cronies.

Now, seeing Garth and Layla lying there together, still and warm in the faint, filtered light of day, Robeson smiled sardonically. Then, his mission completed, he moved silently away…