Eric Flint - Time spike

That would give Blacklock an edge. Dealing with Blacklock was going to be a bitch, as it was. And he couldn't feed them. Not two thousand, two hundred and forty-six men. He figured he couldn't feed more than a thousand or so. Actually, right now, he couldn't even feed that many.

But with only a thousand mouths and stomachs, he thought he'd be able to stretch out the food supply long enough to come up with alternative food sources. It was the only chance he had. This was really just a simple mathematical problem, when you got down to it. And he'd been a damn good accountant. Still was. Danny Bostic left the office and headed for the compound. Luff was crazy. He was screwing up, and Danny wasn't going to sit on his ass and die just because the man was an idiot. The prison was a trap, for God's sake, not a haven. Yeah, there were people out there. But they were people armed with rocks and spears. And, yes, their ammo wouldn't last long. But it didn't have to. All it had to do was get them on top of the heap. Then, they'd be home free. They could set themselves up as chiefs, with warriors they'd recruited from the natives to keep them on top. The same way any good gang got organized. Danny knew some history. Not much, but enough. Medieval times, medieval ways. Nobody started off as Duke Whoozit. They started off-their ancestors, anyhow-as the toughest and smartest barbarian gang leader around. Walking fast, he went down the corridor in the administration building that led to the yard. Bostic knew Luff. If the man was already planning to kill five hundred people, just like that, it wouldn't take him long to decide that was the way for lots more to go. Including, sooner or later, Danny himself. Luff was a sicko. The fact that he didn't seemed to be, didn't have any of the obvious habits of a sicko, didn't mean squat.

Underneath, the bastard was the scariest crazy in the whole joint.

Where would it end? Danny could already see the logic. As long as Luff was fixated on staying in the prison because he thought it was a safe haven, there'dnever be enough food. How could there be? A prison was a fucking prison, for Christ's sake. What'd he think it was? A farm?

Cannibalism, that's where it would end. Sooner or later, in that crazy quiet way he had, Luff would decide it just made sense for the men he wanted to stay alive to eat the ones he didn't. Danny Bostic had been a criminal since he was eleven years old. Earlier, really, if you counted petty theft and misdemeanors. He made no bones about it. As far as he was concerned, so-called "honest citizens" were just damn fools. Work their asses off their whole lives so the millionaires and billionaires they worked for could buy some more yachts, and then retire on Social Security and a measly pension-assuming the pension hadn't been shredded. Spend their last dollars paying the bill at a nursing home that smelled like piss. Fuck that. If Danny hadn't been born into a great wolf pack family, he could at least make a decent weasel. But this was just nuts. Plain and simple nuts. Even if Luff could keep control over the situation, he didn't seem to realize he was just the captain of a ship going down fast. Danny slowed his pace, as he neared the exit, trying to keep his expression neutral. That was the reason he'd pushed, at the end, for his own hunting party. He didn't want a large band. A few men would be plenty, as long as they were well armed and well supplied. He knew the men he wanted, too.

They could raid the armory, the kitchen and the infirmary before they left. Take everything they needed. Leave during the night. He paused at the entrance and looked down at the list of things Luff wanted him to do. He would do them. He had no choice. He had to do them and anything else the asshole told him to do. But a few days from now, he would be gone. First, he had to go see the Boom about the body-disposal business. That was another stupid move. Boomer might be crazy, but he was crazy like a fox. On that, at least, Luff had it right-but he hadn't thought through the logic. The Boom had managed to keep his boys together for years. Word had it that his gang of misfits had even grown a lot lately. Every con not already hooked up and not full white-or who was even willing to claim he wasn't-had attached to the man. That wasn't surprising, of course. Not long after the uprising, things had gotten out of hand for a while. Every con or group of cons with a grudge to settle had settled it, or at least tried. The big gangs had steered clear of each other, but lots of loners had been taken down. That was the reason there were twenty-three bodies piled up in the yard. That had scared every loner in the place, and some of them had gone running to Boomer. Who-yeah, crazy, sure he was-had played that "Uncle Timmy" bullshit to the hilt.

It wasnuts. Couldn't Luff see that Boomer and his boys needed to be kept isolated? The other gangs could be played off against each other, but Boomer's was unpredictable. They should all be locked up tight, in lots of separate cells. You put them in charge of something-didn't matter what it was-and you gave them the opportunity to start planning and working together. And then-icing on the cake-Luff wanted the new kid in charge. Jesus H. Christ. New or not, Cook was a fucking hardass, couldn't Luff see that? With that Indian mask of a face he had, you never knew what he was thinking. Danny wouldn't put the bastard in charge of emptying kitty litter boxes. Bostic left the administration building and headed toward D-house. One of the men he was planning to take with him was very good at making keys. A few of those passed out at the right time, and the rest would be history. The shit would come down and when it did, he would be long gone.

Chapter 28 At what he estimated was noon, Joe Schuler called a halt. He had to estimate based on the sun's position, because he couldn't use his watch. The watch was working, as were most watches.

The problem was that they were skewed. His watch said it was 6:17 AM.

Not surprising, really. It would be a little much to expect that a disaster that had sent them all back tens of millions of year in time would have maintained the same time of day. Someday, he supposed, if they could survive long enough to afford the luxury, they'd have to agree on a new standard. This was a good place to stop anyway, since they'd finally come to the river Marie had instructed the nurses to follow north. If the women had made it-and all indications were that they had-then his band of a little over sixty men and women were less than a half-day's walk from the cave Marie had sent the nurses to. Joe sat at the edge of the stream and soaked his feet in the cool water.

Most of the others joined him. Their feet were raw and bleeding. Marie and Casey were the only ones wearing shoes. They were also of the few wearing long sleeved shirts, so they'd been spared most the misery of the sticker bushes. When Joe first felt the cool water, his skin crawled with the cold. But that sensation left as the icy water numbed the dull, burning ache of his feet. A few more hours and they could rest. Food wasn't going to be an option. Not tonight. But Marie had said she should be able to get enough to feed everyone at least one good meal tomorrow. Joe thought about that, smiling ruefully. One good meal sounded good. Not so long ago, the thought of just one meal in a two-day time frame would have had him complaining to the high heavens.

He stretched back on the bank, leaving his feet in the water, and looked at the sky. A few clouds were drifting in front of the sun. He was looking forward to the shade they would give. It was the little things that mattered. So he told himself, as he closed his eyes, trying to relax. The little things: a little touch of cool, a little food, a little water to ease the pain in your shredded feet. But he couldn't relax. Too much anger was still seething inside him. Not anger at the prisoners. They had behaved no differently than he'd expected them to behave, given a chance. Better, actually. They hadn't killed anyone or even raped any of the women. The only one who'd even tried had been a guard. That stinking filthy Collins. That was the source and object of his fury. But the anger faded. Collins was dead, after all. He'd gotten his just desserts and, best of all, had gotten them almost right after his betrayal. Certainly before he could enjoy any of the fruits he'd expected from his treason. Mostly, Joe knew, he was just mad at life, at that thing that could throw you for a loop no matter how hard you tried. But that was pointless, too. Collins was dead and life was what it was. Joe was in charge of this group and he needed to stay in focus. When they'd left the prison, at his command, they'd gone away from the cave and the nurses. If they were tracked, he didn't want to lead the prisoners to the women and the only baby on the planet. He still thought that had been the right decision, although he hadn't anticipated the price their feet would pay for it.