Chapter 26: Book 1: Chapter 11 (Part 3 of 4)

We continued cycling West for several more hours. For those first few hours, everything went as expected. We didn’t come across as many homes with obvious evidence that the inhabitants had met an unpleasant end and only added a little over thirty Gold to the kitty.

We sped through Fowler without stopping. I was beginning to contemplate that it might be possible to get to Ionia before nightfall.

My Frost Harmonisation proved invaluable keeping the pair of us cool despite being under the punishing rays of the sun all day. However, I should have foreseen that as soon as it seemed like everything was smooth sailing a wrinkle would appear.

That happened about halfway between Fowler and the next small township, Pewamo.

As we cycled down the road, we came upon a group of roughly one hundred people walking on the other side of the road in the opposite direction. We were flagged down by a man in his fifties in a red and white chequered shirt who led the group.

He didn’t appear to be behaving aggressively and there were many women and children in his group who were visibly distressed. I decided it was safe to stop and have a conversation.

“Shana, we’re going to have a chat with these people, but keep to our side of the road and be prepared to move if this is some kind of trick,” I told her as we stopped at the side of the road.

They may have appeared to be non-threatening, but appearances could be deceiving. A quick analysis revealed the leader to be a Civilian named Bob Harrison. The few other men in the group, all north of fifty by the looks, were similarly only Civilians.

If I ever visited Dean again, which was a big if, I would have to ask him how many people refused to take a class the first time around because if the people we had crossed so far were any gauge, it was a lot.

“Hey there,” Bob said, as we came to a stop and he stepped onto the grass verge separating the lanes.

“Afternoon,” I replied neutrally. “I think that is far enough.”

Bob obliged and halted on the grass verge with a nervous grimace, and we stared at one another then.

Bob seemed at a loss for words now the obligatory pleasantries had been spoken and my warning given. His eyes widened a little when he glanced at Shana.

Unlike me, Shana was not hiding her non-human ears. I still had the bandana and sunglasses on but removed them now. Bob backed up a step when he took in my black-rimmed ice-blue orbs.

“Anything we can help you with?” I asked him.

“Sorry, yes. I was…wondering are you headed to Pewamo?” he asked in return, recovering his composure.

“Not specifically, we were planning on passing through, though,” I said.

“Ah, that’s what I thought. We’ve just come from there and you might want to think again. Things have got, well they’ve got bad,” Bob said.

“You have a talent for understatement, boy,” an old woman using a children’s umbrella to block the sun screeched from within the gaggle of people.

Bob smiled at me apologetically and shouted back over his shoulder. “Not now, Mary, please. I’m talking to these fine folks.”

“I’ll not be shushed by the likes of you Bob Harrison,” she roared back. “It’s bad enough those good for nothing Jenson freaks have turfed me out of my own home. I’ll not be listening to the weak-willed fools who stood by and let them do it. If my Petey were still with us, God rest his soul, he would have whooped those hoodlums up and down the street. They’d be black and blue, not green, from the whipping he’d have given them.”

Giving up on reasoning with the old woman Bob approached me instead as old Mary continued to proselytise to all and sundry on what her departed husband would have done differently in the situation.

“You need to forgive Mary…it’s been a rough couple of days,” he said apologetically.

I let him approach and nodded for him to continue. “What happened?”

He rubbed the back of his neck nervously before he continued. “So, as you may have guessed from Mary’s complaints, one of the local families, the Jensons, have seized control of Pewamo. They were always troublemakers, but well, after the event yesterday, things kind of came to a head. Most of us, me included, thought we was going crazy or something and ignored what these Framework people told us.”

“You didn’t take classes and remained Civilians?” Shana asked him.

Bob inclined his head in agreement. “Yeah, me and most of the others here were either too old or not interested in games and such. The Jenson’s didn’t make the same mistake and they’ve become…something else. Although, by the looks of you, you already have an idea of what I’m saying, right?”

It was my turn to dip my head. “Mary over there mentioned green skin.”

A preteen boy piped up. “The Jenson boys have all become orcs, it would be cool if they weren’t such thieving bastards.”

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“Language, Timothy,” a woman I presumed was his mother snapped and rapped him on the head with the flat of her palm.

“Ouch!” Timothy squawked, more loudly than the light rap warranted as youngsters were wont to do. “Pa says so all the time,” he grumbled under his breath.

“Timmy has the right of it. They’ve basically taken over the town and booted out anyone they considered useless. Telling us to leave or be killed,” Bob explained.

“Okay, that does sound bad, but I’m not sure what you think we can do about it?” I said.

“Ah, no, I wanted to speak to you more as a warning,” Bob said, and not very surreptitiously he eyed Shana.

“Go on,” I prodded, though I had a very good idea of what he was about to say.

“Pewamo isn’t a big place and demographically tended toward us older folks and families,” he started. “There aren’t many young women if you get my drift…and well, the few who were still in town last night high-tailed it for Muir when they got wind of what the Jenson boys were up to,” he finished, his meaning clear.

If we pressed on through Pewamo, these Jenson orcs would undoubtedly try and grab Shana. I felt a wave of unquenchable anger build within me at the mere thought of these yahoo’s trying to take her from me.

Bob must have noticed the change in my demeanour or maybe it was the rapid drop in the air temperature that tipped him off. Either way, he retreated back to the safety of his group.

“Thank you, for the heads up,” Shana said and put a hand on my arm. “We’ve just ridden through Fowler. We weren’t there long but didn’t see any warning signs of trouble like you’ve just described as we passed through. Before that, we spent a little time in St. Johns. It is emptying out there as many of the residents went south for the perceived safety of Lansing.”

“We’re much obliged for the news. I think Lansing would be our best bet too,” Bob said, and he hurried his group down the road. Old Mary’s disgruntled complaints followed them on the light breeze.

I heard a guttural growl and searched the surrounding fields for where it was coming from before I realised it emanated from the back of my throat. Shana put her bike down and took my face in her hands.

“Are you alright?” she asked with concern.

“I will be,” I answered. “Dean, for all his faults, did warn me I might find myself experiencing puberty-like mood swings.”

“I think I know what you mean,” she whispered. “When Bob told us about the danger up ahead there was a part of me that was excited at the prospect.”

This time I didn’t even try to restrain the growl that rumbled from me. Shana actually giggled in my face.

“Not that kind of excited…” she started. “…then again, I wouldn’t want you thinking me being pursued, captured, and possessed by you doesn’t excite me, it does. But you already have me firmly in your clutches and I’m more than happy about that. No, I felt a thrill at the thought of them trying and what hell we would rain down upon them for their temerity,” she finished a little breathlessly.

Instead of answering her I picked her up and kissed her hungrily, her legs wrapped around my waist. We remained entangled like that for several minutes before the cawing of some regular crows brought us crashing back to reality.

“As tempting as crushing them beneath our boots sounds,” I started. “I think avoiding Pewamo is the smarter move. They know the terrain and have sufficient numbers to expel a hundred people and presumably cow in fear a few hundred more.”

<Spoilsport> Quixbix grumped.

The imp’s disappointment was expected. Shana unwrapped her legs from my waist and I reluctantly lowered her to the ground.

“The question is do we turn back to Fowler or plan a route around the orc speed bump?” I asked.

“We should check the map first anyway, as we will have to pass them tomorrow if we turn back today,” Shana reasoned.

She wasn’t wrong and I retrieved my copy of the map as Shana wouldn’t be able to store hers afterwards until we offloaded some of her inventory. The gentle breeze flowing off the fields made holding the paper map tricksy, so we got down on our haunches and laid it out on the tarmac of the road and used a few pebbles to keep it in place. A few minutes later, we had traced a way past Pewamo using smaller roads that went south of the town and led directly into Lyons which bridged the Grand River.

We decided to abandon any ambitious plan to make for Ionia today. Lyons would be good enough and was farther than I thought we would get when we set out this morning. When I made the decision, this prompted Shana to confess her relief. She had started to feel the stress of a full day’s cycling in her thighs.

Obviously, we stayed where we were for half an hour while I gave her leg muscles a thorough massage. This wasn’t entirely me using the circumstances to cop a feel of her sexy long legs, I didn’t need excuses for that anymore.

I had paid attention to the physios in the college dressing room and had learned a thing or two about staving off muscle strains and cramp.

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