Envy the Dead - Continuation of the Survival Story

[MinutemanCO]

Envy the Dead - Five


Kevin crawled across the dusty wood plank floor to where Briggs was sleeping. He placed a hand on the man’s shoulder.

“What!?” Briggs awakened at the slightest touch. Kevin jumped. “What is it, kid?”

“Jake’s gone.”

“What’d you say?” Briggs was still foggy.

“I said Jake’s gone. He left sometime in the last hour or so.” The cabin was shrouded in darkness. The crescent moon threw a faint glow, none of which illuminated the interior of the rustic structure.

Briggs jumped to his feet and grabbed Kevin by the arms. “What are you talking about? Where’d he go?”

“I don’t know. Maybe down to Marshall.” Kevin was desperate.

“Marshall!? What the hell for? He’s gonna’ get himself killed… or worse.”

Kevin speculated, “He seemed interested in the activity we saw in Marshall when we were over on the ridge. He didn’t say much about it, but I know him. I’m sure he wanted to see what or who was moving around down there… what their purpose was. He’s always been really curious.”

“You have got to be kidding me,” Briggs was upset. “How’d he get out of here without one of us hearing him?”

“He can be really quiet when he wants to be,” Kevin replied. “He would disappear from our house a lot. My parents had no idea how he would get by them. To this day, he hasn’t told me how he slipped out of the house so easily. I guess he found a way out his bedroom window and down the second story deck. He must have known a way through the forest that surrounded our house. Eventually, after we discovered he was gone, we would pick him up wandering around Pinecliffe or Wonderview and bring him back home. Surviving in the wild is second nature to Jake.”

“Son of a…” Briggs slapped his open right hand down on the old kitchen counter in anger. “You remember what I said back on the mesa when I met you? Remember our deal?”

Kevin whispered his response, “Yeah.”

“I told you two that you needed to follow my lead at all times! I told you… that when either one of you decided to go out on his own that we were finished. Done. Outta’ here.”

“I remember what you said,” Kevin said, dread filling his heart that the brothers would once again be alone.

“What am I supposed to do now?” Briggs was flustered. It was the first time Kevin had seen the big man uncertain about anything. Kevin had a feeling that Briggs liked Jake, like a big brother or even a father-figure. “I can’t abandon him out there. I can’t just walk away and leave him at the mercy of those factional bastards. He’s just a kid. They’ll tear him to pieces.”

Briggs walked to the front of the old cabin. He threw open the heavy wooden door that separated the two from the crisp night air. It squealed on its hinges as if it hadn’t been oiled in years. It hadn’t. He stepped through the threshold and out toward the end of the rutted dirt driveway. The sun wouldn’t come up for hours, but he scanned the valley for any sign of movement just the same. He could see down the steep sloping meadow into the village of Marshall. Lights moved about in patterned order. It appeared that people were either marching in line through the village or that some organized group had managed to repair a number of vehicles for use as transportation. From his vantage point, it was difficult to tell which was true.

“If he’s down there,” Briggs continued, “we gotta’ go get him. Right now. Simple as that.”

If there were anything but moonlight, Briggs would have seen the worry on Kevin’s face. He wrung his hands and paced back and forth under the rotting pine eves of the cabin. “How are we going to find him?”

“We’re setting off in a few minutes, so grab that piece I gave you earlier and keep it handy. Don’t fire at anything unless I tell you. If they get me, do your best to stay alive and get your ass back up Eldorado Canyon. Don’t stop moving until you’re certain no one is on your tail. Comprende?”

“I will do that, but how are we going to find Jake?” Kevin said, his desperation overflowing.

“You know your brother better than anyone. You know his habits, his fears and his interests. We’ll head back to South Boulder Creek and follow it to the outskirts of Marshall just as fast as we can. It’s only about a four mile jog. We’ll need to keep a close watch for sentries. If they haven’t found Jake yet or if he hasn’t clued them in to our existence, we’ll be in much better shape. They won’t be expecting us. Once we reach the town, I want you to give me a sense of how Jake might have approached the compound or where he might hole up. Make sense?”

“Yeah, I think so,” Kevin stumbled over his words.

“Hang in there, kid. We’ll get him back,” Briggs was uncharacteristically compassionate.

“After we get down there and formulate our plan, we’ll need to stay out of sight. The shadows will conceal us until the sun rises. They’re not going to have too much night lighting. It’s too valuable. My guess is that we’re dealing with Blue. They’re closely allied to Kresh’s monkeys and they’re active in this area. They’re as serious as you can imagine. They mean business and will kill you as soon as look at you. Never forget who you’re dealing with.

“My gut told me that Marshall was a prison camp. I didn’t say anything earlier because it wasn’t relevant. It is now. That wasn’t a stock pen at the edge of that trailer park. It was way too fortified and the fence too high. I think I saw a guard shack on the western corner. We’ll cruise down the creek and recon the facility from the protection of the trees. At that point we’re gonna’ have to make it up as we go along.”

“Okay,” Kevin said.

“Look, Kevin… I’m going to need you down there. I’ll need every ounce of your intelligence and guts. I know you have guts, kid. You wouldn’t have survived four years in this hellhole if you didn’t.”

“Alright. I’m ready.”

“Let’s go,” Briggs said.

They jogged as fast as possible across the elevated meadow that led to South Boulder Creek. Their footing was unpredictable at best. At one point Kevin tripped over a low-lying branch jutting from a mass of mountain mahogany and fell face first into the rocky dirt. Before Briggs could ask if he was okay, Kevin was up and running again without a word.

Tough kid.

It took them twenty minutes to find the creek. They ran alongside the willows, staying on higher ground. If they chose to move within the channel, they ran the risk of getting wet and making too much noise. The shadows were dense and provided ample cover.

After an hour of careful jogging, both Briggs and Kevin were breathing heavily. They stopped for a rest. Marshall was only a half mile from their location.

Briggs whispered, “We’ll move very quietly from this point on.”

“Okay,” Kevin said. “Jake would have been very careful advancing on the village, especially if soldiers were around. Like I said, he is very good at going unnoticed. He would have used the creek to his advantage and probably circled around the outer edge of the town before moving inward. Jake’s not stupid or reckless. He would avoid capture at all costs.”

“Excellent, Kevin. That’s exactly the information I needed.”

Briggs could hear people yelling and vehicle engines in the distance. He motioned for Kevin to follow. He placed a single finger against his lips as if to say, “Use only hand signals.” Kevin put his right thumb and forefinger together indicating he understood.

They crept closer to the village. The fenced pen, lit around its perimeter with oil torches, appeared fifty yards from their position as they rounded one of the more significant meanders in the stream. Briggs held up his hand, motioning for Kevin to stay put. He lowered himself into a prone position and crawled out onto the irregular surface of what used to be a farm field. He moved to the edge of the light field thrown by the torches and terminated his advance next to a rusty steel dumpster.

Briggs peered into the fenced compound. There was movement within. People were being detained, definitely against their will as the razor ribbon attested. Forced laborers. People captured in faction raids on regional population encampments, no doubt. There was always heavy work to be done, and the prisoners were expendable. They weren’t fed much and required very little in the way of shelter. If some died, and they did with striking regularity, they were disposed of and life went on.

The compound was roughly one hundred feet wide and square in shape. Guards watched the area from a single shack on the far end. No observation towers were evident and very few sentries walked defensive posts. Briggs counted two. Blue had grown arrogant. They weren’t protecting their resources very well. Their alliance with Kresh’s Black guards undoubtedly made them fat and careless, thinking no one would dare strike one of their strongholds. For the most part, they were correct. Blue’s Marshall camp was heavily armed and contained a small battalion force – over three hundred men. It wasn’t often in their world of plague and devastation that so many would be gathered in one place. There just weren’t that many people left in the world.

Briggs wondered where Blue Faction was when Kevin, Jake and he passed through Marshall earlier the previous day. His best guess had the entire unit participating in a larger raid on another rival encampment. Rumors to verify his contemplations would circulate soon enough.

What Blue never envisaged in their defensive structure in Marshall was the employment of a small surgical strike meant for a very specific purpose. They were vulnerable. Briggs would exploit their weaknesses.

He counted twenty-two detainees within the compound. Most were adults. A few teens could be seen milling about the larger group. He saw a darker form, isolated from the main body of prisoners, sitting against the fence with knees up and head down. He couldn’t distinguish the person’s features and had no way of verifying if the person was Jake. He had to move closer.


Briggs turned back to where Kevin was hidden and held up two fingers followed by a zero. He then pointed to his wrist and an imaginary watch signifying “twenty minutes”. Kevin would wait twenty minutes for Briggs to return and then exfiltrate the way they came in.

Briggs disappeared into the darkness. He circled the pen away from the concentrated light sources and toward the back side of the guard shack. The shack wasn’t lit. He inched his way around the small building and, finding a tiny window, raised himself to full height and looked to see how many Blue guards were within. There were only two. He continued away from the shack to see if he could identify the lone prisoner sitting against the fence. A grouping of sagebrush near the multi-strand fence hid his body well. He’d wait for the kid to raise his head.

Five minutes passed, then seven. The kid must have been asleep. Briggs found a small rock and tossed it gently into the dirt past the sleeping figure. It made a slight *thump* as it hit the ground, just enough to grab the kid’s attention. The kid looked up and around to see what might have generated the noise. Briggs caught a glimpse of the loner’s face. It was a girl, about sixteen. She was deathly thin, as if she hadn’t eaten in weeks. He felt rage rise from within. Even in the dark of night, he could tell she was near death… AND NO ONE CARED! She was someone’s daughter, innocent and a victim of the plots of evil men. The bastards. If only I had the manpower. I’d make you pay. Thoughts of freeing all the captives flashed in his mind. They would have to wait.

Briggs had to force his mind back onto the mission at hand. Two options now remained. Jake was still on the loose… or he was dead.