Deadland: Untold Stories of Alice in Deadland (Alice, No. 5) (8 page)

'Alice, am I glad you're okay. Just promise Daddy one
thing.'

Alice looked into her father's eyes.

'Never go out alone again. Please.'

She promised and ran off to play. As Jones watched her run,
he smiled.

'Sir, I think it's time I began training Alice. It'll give
her what she wants, and also get some discipline in her.'

'She's too young.'

Jones shook his head.

'No, sir. I think she's more than ready.'

***

NO MORE
RIDDLES

'Why does he make us run so much?'

Alice grinned at Myra, who was struggling to keep up with
her as they ran along the perimeter walls of the settlement.

'Because, if you find yourself facing more Biters than you
can handle, your best bet is to run away!'

With that, Alice put on a burst of speed and left the other
kids behind as she raced towards Jones who was waiting for them at the gate.
Jones just nodded at her, but she could see a smile playing at the edges of his
lips.

Ever since he had taken her in for training just over two
years ago, she had thrown herself into it with a dedication that had surprised
everyone, including her parents. Alice the troublemaker, the girl who was
always up to some mischief, the girl who never seemed to focus on anything, had
suddenly found something she loved. Since she was naturally fast and agile, the
constant exercise and training had built up wiry strength that meant that Alice
could often take down boys several years older to her in unarmed combat
training, and she seemed to have a natural love for guns. As a mark of
recognition for her first feat in battle, Jones had let her keep the pistol
with which she had warded off a Zeus trooper who had been attacking them.

As she ran into her home and drank a glass of water before
collapsing on the sleeping bag that was her bed, her sister Jane looked up.

'We missed you at the farm. You do know we need everyone to
help gather the fruits, don't you?'

Alice smiled at her sister, knowing that whatever she said
would only tick Jane off even more.

'I was training.'

Jane's reply betrayed her frayed temper.

'Everyone trains, only you need to train three times a day
so you don't have to do any other work. Grow up, Alice. Life is not all about
running around and fighting. You're nine years old, and you need to stop acting
like a spoilt kid all the time.'

As Jane stomped out of the room, Alice watched her leave.
No, Jane was wrong, you could grow all the fresh fruit you wanted, and have all
the nice vegetables to cook a great meal with, but when Biters and bandits came
calling, none of that would save you. The only thing that Alice knew guaranteed
safety was having a gun and knowing how to use it. She giggled to herself as
she imagined Jane trying to fight off a Biter by throwing fresh fruit at it.

She heard Jones calling out to the kids, and she ran out,
reaching him before any of the others. As the other kids reached, Alice asked,
'Uncle Jones, what's up? Are we going out on patrol?'

Jones looked at the little nine-year-old blonde girl in
front of him with a pistol tucked into her belt. He remembered enough of what
the world had been before The Rising for such a sight to still make him regret
all that had happened. The fall of human civilization lay not just in the
decimation of its cities and buildings, but in the fact that its children had
been robbed of all hope, of all their innocence.

'No, Alice. You know kids don't go out on patrols. What I am
going to do is to get you kids drilled on perimeter defence.'

Alice looked up at him, wondering what he meant, yet
hesitating to ask, lest it make her look stupid in front of the older kids.

'Come on, kids. Grab your handguns and join me.'

As they drilled, Robert Gladwell sat in the community
center, sipping on some tea and watching his younger daughter jump onto a
platform near the wall, scanning for imaginary attackers. In his hand he had a
single sheet of paper that had been passed onto him by the local Zeus officer.
It was essentially a rehash of the demands that Zeus had been making for years,
and he had no intention of entertaining them.

Rajiv came and sat down next to him. In the two years since
he had been rescued by Gladwell, Rajiv and his wife Sheila had become an
integral part of the settlement. Having been a Vice President in a bank before
the Rising, Rajiv might not have had a lot of survival or combat skills, but he
had huge organizational and planning skills. Once he had joked that Bob was the
CEO of their settlement, to which Bob's repartee had been that Rajiv was then
the Chief Operating Officer. That was true enough, as Rajiv had taken charge of
planning their resources, ensuring that they had adequate stocks of food and
grain and working out duty rosters so that everyone contributed and also
benefitted from life in the settlement.

For all that, there was one important issue on which the two
of them disagreed, and Gladwell suspected that it was that very issue that had
brought Rajiv to him now.

'Bob, are you sure you don't want to think again about the
Zeus offer? We've done well on our own, but how long can we manage like this? I
talked to one of the other settlements, and they said that in the Zeus camps,
they get fresh food and canned vegetables and fruits flown in.'

Gladwell looked at Rajiv, knowing just how tempting it was
to get back a life of security, one where someone else was in charge of keeping
you free and safe. Where every day was not a battle for survival.

'Who are these guys? They are a mercenary army, a very well
equipped one at that. Who's equipping them and paying them? What is their
agenda? Why don't we ever hear of who this bloody Central Committee really is?
Here we grow our own food and our labor feeds our families. In the Zeus camps,
they have people work as little more than slave labor. Everyone works the land,
but the produce is flown out to feed whoever Zeus' masters are and people wait
to be rationed food they themselves grew. What kind of freedom is that?'

Rajiv had no answers to any of those questions, of course.
Still, he wasn't going to give up quite so easily.

'Their demands are not unreasonable, are they?'

'Rajiv, I will not sell our freedom for a few cans of fruit.
Have you forgotten when their troopers attacked our kids? Have you forgotten
stories of how Zeus intimidates other settlements who resist them? They don't
mess with us because they know we have the firepower to resist them, and so
they probably figure why bother taking losses in fighting us when there are so
many other settlements out there willing to sign up to be their slave labor,
producing food for their masters in the Central Committee.'

Rajiv shook his head ruefully. He admired Bob and what he
had managed to achieve in his settlement, yet he couldn't shake the feeling
that they were making a mistake by trying to stick it out all alone.

'You do know all the reports about them trying to take the
old airport from the Biters, don't you? We've seen an airplane flying around as
well. If they have working airplanes, Bob, they have a base somewhere for them.
That means there is still civilization somewhere, and we're not signing up for
it.'

'Civilization does not just mean having airplanes or
gadgets. Let Zeus come totally clean on who their masters are and what their
agenda is and we'll talk.'

Their argument was cut short by a single cry.

'Biters at the wall!'

***

Alice heard the shout and ran to the far end of the wall
where one of the sentries had spotted the Biter. She climbed onto the box that
acted as a platform near the wall and peered over it.

A single Biter shuffled along, seemingly oblivious to the
many guns that were now pointed at her. It was an old woman, with long gray
hair flowing over her bare torso that was covered with blood and gore. She wore
torn trousers and kept snapping her jaw at something.

'Our boys swept the area just fifteen minutes ago and it was
clear. Now this freak shows up out of nowhere.'

'Do you think those stories of underground Biter bases are
real?'

Alice shivered in spite of herself as she overheard the men
talking near her. Biters were bad enough, but Biters with enough sense and
guile to hide in bases under the ground and then emerge to strike were
terrifying. Alice had seen Biters for many years, and they seemed to be exactly
what they appeared at first sight—brutish monsters with no intelligence. No,
the stories of their bases had to just that—stories.

The Biter seemed to be ignoring the settlement, but then
someone coughed and her head snapped towards them. Even at this distance, Alice
could see the blood dripping from her mouth.

'This one's fed recently.'

The man next to her had also seen it. Seeing a Biter never
failed to make Alice feel a mixture of hatred and revulsion. Hatred because
these were the monsters that had made her people live in so much fear, and
revulsion because of how dirty, how horrible they seemed. She felt for the gun
at her belt, but one of the men whispered to her.

'No point wasting bullets on this one. Let her roam, and
she'll pass us or fall into the moat and we can finish her later.'

As the Biter came closer and hissed at the people ringing
the wall, someone threw a stone that hit her on the leg. She roared in anger
and came towards them. Another stone hit her on the head, and she stumbled to
the ground, only to get back up and come at them, her jaws snapping. Two of the
men were now taunting her and shouting at her to come closer. The Biter roared
and hissed in anger at them and was coming closer.

Alice felt a tug on her arm. It was her father. Gladwell
pulled her off the platform and led her away from the wall. They could now hear
cheering as the Biter fell into the moat.

'Fighting to protect one's own is one thing, but being cruel
for the sake of it is another.'

Alice didn't always understand what her father said, but she
was sure it must have been something important. Still, this line of thinking
didn't make sense to her.

'But, Daddy, Biters are the enemy.'

Gladwell looked down into his daughter's eyes.

'Yes, Alice. They are, and when they threaten us, I'll be
the first to destroy them. But there's no bravery in jeering at them from a
distance. There's no bravery in butchering one for sport. That doesn't show how
brave you are, it shows how weak you are.'

Alice nodded, though she wasn't very sure if she had got it
after all.

That afternoon was unarmed combat training with Jones. All
the other kids were at least ten years old, and most were bigger than her but
Alice had got a significant head start, having started her training at the age
of seven. Jones liked to keep his training simple, because as he liked to say,
'No Biter's yet got a black belt in Karate,' so the focus was on quick
take-downs and fighting off multiple Biter attackers. Today, Alice was sparring
with Junior. He seemed to have grown more in the last two years than in all his
preceding years and now, despite being only around thirteen years old, towered
over Alice, and was as tall as some of the grown men in the settlement.

So far, Alice had sparred only with kids her age, and she
had been pestering Jones to let her spar with the bigger kids. How else would
she be ready to go out on patrols, to fight battles? Well, it looked like Jones
had decided to grant her wish today by pairing her with Junior, who was not
only bigger, but reputed to be a real brawler.

Junior looked down at Alice.

'Ready, pipsqueak?'

The tone was still there, but the smirk had long gone. Gone
that day two years ago when Alice had picked up Junior's gun to ward off a Zeus
trooper. The banter was still there, but the bullying had gone. Junior moved
towards her, faster than Alice would have given him credit for, and swung his
leg out. Alice knew that he meant to sweep her feet out from under her and she
moved back, barely managing to keep her balance. Junior was not going to give
her any quarter—he moved in again, this time striking at her solar plexus with
an open palm.

'Oooff...'

The breath exploded out of Alice as she fell back, crumpling
to the ground. Junior came towards her, and she cringed, expecting another
attack. Instead, he smiled and held out his hand.

'Up you go, pipsqueak.'

Alice sheepishly took his hand and was hauled up. Jones was
waiting, watching her with a smile on his face.

'Alice, what did you learn today?'

Alice shrugged.

'That it's not a good idea to get hit?'

Several of the kids giggled and Jones' eyes bored into
Alice.

'You wanted to fight a bigger opponent, but you tried
fighting him the same way you fight kids your size. He was bigger, taller,
stronger and with a huge reach advantage. If you try and play by his rules, you
will land on your ass every time.'

Her cheeks burned with embarrassment as Jones continued.

'If you kids ever want to go out on patrol, remember that
there's all kind of shit out there. Biters, bandits, even drunk Zeus troopers,
right, Alice?'

She was now looking down, wishing she could just do this all
over again, and be spared the public embarrassment. Jones walked up to her as
another kid called out.

'So what do we do?'

'There's no one answer. You play to your strengths. Some of
you are strong, others have good eyesight, and Alice here is the fastest kid
I've seen. Know what your strength is and use it against your opponent.'

Before they could begin sparring again, Alice heard a boom
that was louder than anything she had heard before, even gunshots at close
range. As she looked around to see where the sound had come from, a pillar of
black smoke rose over the horizon.