somehow begin to return. I hope to someday return and collect her body. If possible, I will take her to Sunset and bury her next to the memorial marker for Mama Janie.
The NAA had gone; I guess a very small group was left behind to act as a diversion while the train left. The smell of death was thick in the air as morning broke. Unfortunately, most of that stench comes from all those (the old and apparently unfit for duty) who were executed prior to Dominique’s departure.
When dawn did break, people were still trickling down from the surrounding hills. So much for this grand plan of Ethan’s; it was a failure.
I came to the realization that perhaps I was not seeing things clearly. I had a stake in this because my mother and many of the people I knew had been taken…or killed. These tribes were all individual groups. They had survived as long as they did by living on the fringe and NOT belonging to anything. Most of them were between ten or twenty people. Three families was about the max. They engaged in things like arranged marriages and all sorts of ideas that were foreign to me.
In the end, they dragged their feet and stalled until the threat of danger was gone. All the talk about standing and fighting was bluster. As I walked around the ruins of Warehouse City that morning, I could hear different people making claims as to who had done what to “drive the enemy out” and other equally ridiculous claims.
Now that the threat was gone, those who had spoken were acting as if they had actually done something. All they had really done was stay hidden well enough to not be found and taken.
Even Bob and Felicia had proved to be a disappointment. They were Travelers. Nothing more. When it came down to it, they had no stake in this.
As the bones of Warehouse City were being picked clean, I equipped myself for what I have to assume will be my last journey. I went through the EEF checklist in my head as I gathered what I would need. Like ghosts, Mary and Selina followed.
By late in the morning, I was ready to go, but first I had to confront Ethan and his circle. I was hardly surprised to discover them in what had once served as a council chamber for the leaders of Warehouse City. There was a great deal of self-congratulatory nonsense being spoken as I walked in the room.
“Cowards!”
That was how I began. The rest is more or less as I remember it. (Mary and Selina have read over my shoulder during this entry and helped with a few points to make this as accurate of an account as I can relate.)
Every head turned to me as I walked through the door. A few of these people had their feet up on the table. Everybody seemed to be making themselves feel right at home.
“Little girl,” Ethan said with a scowl, “our efforts have driven this Dominique DuBois and her New American Army from our territory. We embarked on a campaign that the history books will remember as fierce.”
“The history books will mark you as cowards who simply waited in your holes until the wolf decided it was done hunting!” I slammed the two books I’d been given on the table for emphasis.
“I may not be my mother…or my father…but I will promise you that this record will show you for what you really are. You were all talk. You had no intention of doing anything to Dominique. It was all for show!
“The people that you call your tribes are nothing more than a few family members and the only interest you wanted to protect was your own. Now you all strut around like you have done something. All you did was watch and wait until she was gone. And now you strut like roosters that chased off a fox…but the fox left with all the chickens in his mouth that he wanted.
“Well I am going after Dominique. I may not be able to stop her army, but if I can kill her, it will cut the head off of this monster before it can do any more harm. If I fail…you may not know it right away. But when she returns at the head of a column of soldiers bent on
The NAA had gone; I guess a very small group was left behind to act as a diversion while the train left. The smell of death was thick in the air as morning broke. Unfortunately, most of that stench comes from all those (the old and apparently unfit for duty) who were executed prior to Dominique’s departure.
When dawn did break, people were still trickling down from the surrounding hills. So much for this grand plan of Ethan’s; it was a failure.
I came to the realization that perhaps I was not seeing things clearly. I had a stake in this because my mother and many of the people I knew had been taken…or killed. These tribes were all individual groups. They had survived as long as they did by living on the fringe and NOT belonging to anything. Most of them were between ten or twenty people. Three families was about the max. They engaged in things like arranged marriages and all sorts of ideas that were foreign to me.
In the end, they dragged their feet and stalled until the threat of danger was gone. All the talk about standing and fighting was bluster. As I walked around the ruins of Warehouse City that morning, I could hear different people making claims as to who had done what to “drive the enemy out” and other equally ridiculous claims.
Now that the threat was gone, those who had spoken were acting as if they had actually done something. All they had really done was stay hidden well enough to not be found and taken.
Even Bob and Felicia had proved to be a disappointment. They were Travelers. Nothing more. When it came down to it, they had no stake in this.
As the bones of Warehouse City were being picked clean, I equipped myself for what I have to assume will be my last journey. I went through the EEF checklist in my head as I gathered what I would need. Like ghosts, Mary and Selina followed.
By late in the morning, I was ready to go, but first I had to confront Ethan and his circle. I was hardly surprised to discover them in what had once served as a council chamber for the leaders of Warehouse City. There was a great deal of self-congratulatory nonsense being spoken as I walked in the room.
“Cowards!”
That was how I began. The rest is more or less as I remember it. (Mary and Selina have read over my shoulder during this entry and helped with a few points to make this as accurate of an account as I can relate.)
Every head turned to me as I walked through the door. A few of these people had their feet up on the table. Everybody seemed to be making themselves feel right at home.
“Little girl,” Ethan said with a scowl, “our efforts have driven this Dominique DuBois and her New American Army from our territory. We embarked on a campaign that the history books will remember as fierce.”
“The history books will mark you as cowards who simply waited in your holes until the wolf decided it was done hunting!” I slammed the two books I’d been given on the table for emphasis.
“I may not be my mother…or my father…but I will promise you that this record will show you for what you really are. You were all talk. You had no intention of doing anything to Dominique. It was all for show!
“The people that you call your tribes are nothing more than a few family members and the only interest you wanted to protect was your own. Now you all strut around like you have done something. All you did was watch and wait until she was gone. And now you strut like roosters that chased off a fox…but the fox left with all the chickens in his mouth that he wanted.
“Well I am going after Dominique. I may not be able to stop her army, but if I can kill her, it will cut the head off of this monster before it can do any more harm. If I fail…you may not know it right away. But when she returns at the head of a column of soldiers bent on
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