The Last Pilgrims by Michael Bunker Page B

most of the Vallenses prior to the collapse.
    There was no city of Penateka, Texas any
more. David had seen pictures of the city in old newspapers that
his father kept, but within ten years of the collapse, the city was
gone. It hadn’t been destroyed by bombs or fire. No one would have
ever wasted an atomic bomb on the town. Nevertheless, in a decade,
the city had been disassembled by hand. Penateka was destroyed as a
result of covetousness and greed, but it had disappeared out of necessity . Piece by piece, the city, which had once been
home to almost 30,000 souls, had been torn down and hauled off in
wagons and carts by people who needed the materials for homes,
barns, caskets, fires, or… whatever.
    A decade ago, there were still some passable
roads in Penateka. There were no street signs or telephone poles,
or abandoned buildings. There were many abandoned cars, or rather,
frames of abandoned cars, but there were no houses, fences or
gates. In many places, even the sewer and water pipes had been
ripped out of the ground.
    David vividly remembered seeing a chunk of
concrete jutting out of the ground, where someone had tried to drag
it off by chaining horses or a team of oxen to it, but they
obviously had given up. The chunk was probably too large or maybe
the chain had broken. Father had said that it was a chunk of street
curbing, but that it represented the old world. Around seven
billion people had tried to drag it someplace God didn’t want it to
go… so the chain broke. And the meek had inherited the
earth . Well, the meek, along with a whole lot of covetous,
militaristic scumbags like the King of Aztlan—who wanted to destroy
the meek and steal the earth. Despite his militant tendencies,
David resolutely believed that God had a plan for everyone,
including the King of Aztlan and those like him.
    In every era of time, he thought, God had
raised up a champion to defend His people and destroy His foes.
Moses, Joshua, David. Now, the Vallenses had a champion in Phillip
and the Ghost militia, even if Father couldn’t see it.
     
    On their way to Bethany the group stopped
from time to time and he and his father would ride up to houses,
barns or fields to inform the local Vallenses of what was
happening. Father told them to pack up whatever food and supplies
they could muster into wagons and head up to the Wall ranch. Many
wouldn’t leave immediately because they were concerned about their
animals, but they dutifully promised their pastor that they would
get prepared and would come quickly whenever they determined that
trouble was near. Some of the more creative ones had already
devised a system during the construction and arrangement of their
farms whereby they could leave their animals unattended for days,
even weeks, and the animals could feed and water themselves.
    David knew that an exodus would soon begin
and the road the men had just traveled would be jammed with horses,
buggies and wagons heading northward. It was very likely that some
of these people might never see their farms again. Father would
say, “Fields can be replanted. Farms can be rebuilt. We have
resources and man-power, but we cannot replace our lives.”
    David honored and respected his father, but
he could not see how teaching his own people not to defend
themselves, especially in such an extreme situation, could in any
way be protecting their lives. The son had concluded that
inordinate pacifism—pacifism in the face of inescapable aggression
and annihilation—actually bred violence. All that he could think of
was— we need to fight!
    The road began to rise as they approached
the Bethany pass. The town was now situated only on this side of
the pass, but before the collapse, another, smaller town had
existed on the south side of the ‘mountains’ (as the locals had
called them). The mountains were actually twin mesas that rose up
about 300 feet above Bethany. The pass between the mesas was 100
yards wide but was made narrower by thickly