We the People vol 2: Liberty or Death

“Stand down, Lieutenant,” said a rail-thin man with gaunt cheekbones “this woman is mortally wounded.”

The Redcoats lowered their weapons, glaring suspiciously at her. Thane gritted her teeth, trying to hang on to her self control. Her gut had become a gnawing black hole, and seemed to be erasing her rational self line by line.

“Get...away,” she said, staggering on broken legs. Despite her efforts to stop herself, she kept moving forward.

“You need help, my dear,” said the thin man “you’re going to bleed out until you’re white.”

“Maybe better to shoot her, sir,” said one of the men “look at those wounds...she’ll never make it.”

“Yes,” Thane said desperately “shoot me! Please...I can’t stop...so hungrrrry...”

It was an awful feeling, being a passenger in your own body. Having gone so far and so long without sustenance, her physiology was asserting itself over her conscious mind. She watched her hands stiffly grip the coat of the leader, tearing cloth and flesh. He cried out, and one of his men blasted a hole through Thane’s shoulder with his musket.

The perforation bled, but Thane didn’t feel it. The air filled with thunder as the remaining men fired their weapons. She barely noticed the metal balls ripping through her, even the one that went right through her heart.

“It’s witchery!” screamed the gaunt man. He batted Thane’s hands away and took off at a dead run. His men followed suit, all except for the first man who had shot her. He was trying to reload his musket, pouring powder down the barrel, when one of his fleeing fellows rudely knocked him to the ground. The unfortunate man’s head smacked against a rough boulder, ending his life with a wet crack.

The smell of the dead man filled her nostrils. Colorless eyes focused on the gray-red smear running down his fractured skull. She dropped heavily to her knees in the dirt and began shoveling the slurry into her mouth with her fingers. In short order Thane’s face and mouth were dripping with gory brain matter. When she’d culled the last bits on the outside, she forced her hands inside the jagged seam and cracked his head open like a coconut.

Gradually, Thane recovered her sense of self. Though she had recall of her macabre meal, it seemed vague and misty, like a dream. In spite of the revulsion at her own act, she was feeling better physically.

“Sorry, buddy,” she said, closing the man’s sightless, staring eyes. “It’s not like you were using it anymore.”

Thane got to her feet and scanned the dense woods. She didn’t think that ESX carried her so far from the river. There was no sound of the current, and the sun was directly overhead and was no use for navigation.

A familiar bird call brought a smile to her lips. Peering through the trees, she saw a wedge of heron flying toward what she hoped was the Connecticut River.

After nearly an hour of hiking Thane found her way back to the river, but not at the same place she had left her friends. She walked downstream along its banks until she reached the ruined bridge. There was no sign of her friends, so she decided to follow the road that led to New Hampshire.

Thane stopped at a merrily babbling brook and washed off as much of the blood as she could from her face and hands. Her meal helped to heal her injuries, just like always, but her clothing remained a ragged mess. She gave up trying to mend a long rent in her skirt and just used a knife to shorten the dress. Now it came just above her knees, which would probably cause some sort of scandal when she got to town.

That is, if they didn’t pass out from the sight of so much blood. Thane slipped the newly shortened dress over her head and waded nude into the brook. Using a rock, she scoured the bloodstains from the fabric until they were a dull, faded brown.

She stopped for a moment, strained her ears, and then returned to her task. It was almost imperceptible, but she had detected a quiet snap, as if someone had gingerly put their foot down on top of a twig. Thane knew it was likely not a predator, at least not a four footed one. Animals had always been a bit shy around her. That meant a human, and probably not one of her friends.

I swear, if this is James or Chui sneaking a peek, I’m going to castrate them.

Calmly, as if she was unaware she was being observed, Thane stood up and put her dress back on sopping wet. She kept her back turned toward the direction she’d heard the snap until she had her equipment packed up in her knapsack.

Then she turned around, expecting that her observer would be concealed in the ample vegetation. She was shocked to see a man just standing there in the open. He was tall, dressed in a long leather coat and matching hat. His leathers were worn, but his wizened face was smoothly shaven. Hair stiff as the bristles of a broom jutted out from beneath his hat, the bangs almost in his dark eyes.

“Can I help you?” Thane crossed her arms over her chest. “Hope you got a good look.”

The figure didn’t move for a moment, then it reached up and pulled the brim of its hat.

“Pardon, ma’am,” he said in a gravelly voice. “Wasn’t rightly expecting to come upon a young lady at her bath. If you are a young lady.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Thane walked up the bank, getting closer to the stranger. “I look like a young lady, don’t I?”

“Well, that you do, but most young ladies don’t eat corpses.”

Thane cursed herself silently. How had he known? She had been certain there was no one else in the woods once the soldiers had taken flight.

“I don’t know what you thought you saw,” Thane said “but you’re out of your God Damn mind!”

“Your pardon, ma’am, but I wasn’t a witness to the act.”

“Then who told you?”

“No one. I’ve been working for the Vermont Rangers as a scout, and I worked for the East India company in a similar capacity before that. I can read a kill like a book, and even skip ahead a few chapters. Trail led me to you.”

“Well,” Thane said “what are you gonna do about it?”

“Do?” The man shrugged as if it weren’t all that important. “I’m not going to do anything, except maybe ask a question.”

“Okay,” Thane said “so what’s your question?”

“What’s the first thing you remember?”

“What?” Thane started laughing. “I don’t...you mean this morning?”

“No, ma’am, I mean what’s the first thing you remember—as in ever.”

Thane’s eyes went wide. The man kept talking.

“See, the first thing I remember is walking down Queensbury road in the middle of pouring rain. Nothing before, and not a soul I’ve ever run into has known me. It’s like I didn’t exist before that moment. That was two hundred years ago and some change.”

Thane felt dizzy, fought the urge to run away. She felt as if this stranger were about to impart knowledge she’d be better off without.

“You...why are you telling me this?” she asked.

“Why?” The man’s face broke in a smile, but his eyes stayed hard. “Because I’m willing to bet that you had the same experience, more or less. There’s something...something familiar about you, ma’am. Look me in the eye and tell me you don’t feel it too.”

Thane didn’t want to look him in the eye. She wanted to get away as quickly as possible. She forced herself to consider him fully, and felt a strange sense of deja vu. She had no memories of the man, and yet he seemed like someone she had known, and should know.

“What...” Thane licked her lips. “What are we? Do you...do you eat...”

She couldn’t bring herself to say it out loud.

“Me?” The man laughed. “No, I don’t have to stomach the diet you do. I have to do something different to fix myself when I get shot up.”

“And what is that?” Thane took a step toward the man. Something told her the conversation was coming to an end, and she desperately wanted answers. “Where do we come from?”

“I don’t know the answer to the second,” the man said, considering the bright sun “and I’m not ready to answer the first. I think we’re not supposed to meet up just yet. No, not just yet...”

“Hey, don’t walk away from me!” Thane chased after him as he turned and melted into the forest “you’re the first one I’ve met who has any idea...”

She stopped, hand on a tree trunk, and stared about in amazement. There was no sign of the stranger, no sign at all.

It was as if he’d never really existed.

“...who I am,” she finished despairingly.

The summer sun beat down relentlessly on the dirt road, causing shimmering curtains to distort the air. Thane felt no discomfort, but she was aware of of a pungent, sickly sweet smell brought on by the heat. It was her own body, rotting for lack of nutrition. It seemed that one solitary brain wasn’t enough to sate her after so long.

Still, her body seemed intact enough to pass inspection. For two days and nights she walked, never resting, always searching for a sign of her lost companions.

On the third day, she passed through a tiny hamlet that was little more than a smattering of houses and a mill. The townsfolk glanced suspiciously her way, but did not challenge her. Her heart sank when she heard a young boy cry out in alarm. She whipped her head around to see him leap off a stack of straw and dash through the dirt to her side.

“Excuse me,” he said in a nervous tone, big blue eyes peering up at her. “I was supposed to give you this.”

“Are you sure?” Thane took the crinkling, thin parchment from the boy’s hand.

“I was told if a young lady with hair like a raven’s wings and eyes gray as stone came through our village I was supposed to give her this.”

“Thanks, I guess,” Thane said, ruffling the child’s hair. He jerked away and ran back to his straw pile. She unfolded the parchment and squinted her eyes at the unfamiliar script. It was in English, but written in the old style where s looked like f.

Thane,

I hope this note finds you well. Your Major Bast thinks you live still, and insisted we leave a few bread crumbs, as it were, along our path. We are making a stop in Manchester, then we’ll be heading north toward Bennington. I have procured horses for the journey, so we may greatly outpace you on foot. It may be that you wish to head directly to Bennington, and skip Manchester altogether.

Until we meet again, be well. As always, I remain

your servant,

Benjamin Franklin, Printer

Thane folded up the note and thrust it in her knapsack. The boy was hiding from her, but she managed to find a miller who wasn’t too gruff to give directions to Manchester. She thanked him and headed out of town towards the southeast. Once the plumes of smoke disappeared behind her, she broke into a run. One of the benefits of her unusual physiology was a near total immunity to fatigue. She could run hard all night, and catch up to her friends more quickly than they gave her credit for.

While she ran she thought about her friends. Franklin’s note had not said whether Chui and Faraday were safe, but it seemed like he would have mentioned their deaths. A wry grin twisted her features. Bast was going to have to accept command now.

Just as the first pink inklings of dawn were staining the horizon, Thane came upon Manchester. The miller had talked it up like it was a major city, but it looked insignificant to Thane. There couldn’t have been more than a couple hundred people living there. A wide lake reflected the rising sun, bordering the Eastern half of town.

As Thane walked the cobblestones in the early morning mist, she heard the ringing of a bell. A voice exuberantly joined the jingling, shouting out information that Manchester folk probably found valuable. Amid the notices and wedding announcements was some news of the war.

“General John Stark has assembled a force of volunteers to defend Bennington from the British!” the mist shrouded voice cried. “Those wishing to join his noble campaign should bring their own musket, fifty balls and a horn of powder and meet up on the road to Vermont!”

Thane cursed her luck. Of all the people to be off on her own, it HAD to be her, the one with amnesia. All these generals and cities meant nothing to her, and she realized that they should.

If I ever make it back, I’m going to study the HELL out of history. Just in case this happens again.

The thought of going back home filled her with a moment of elation. Once they were back home, she and Bast could finally talk things out.

Thane left the misty streets of Manchester behind, moving steadily north. As before, when she was out of sight of the town’s meager fortifications she started running. For a time the only sound was her feet kicking up plumes of dirt, the swish of her skirt, and her steady, slow breathing. Dr. Kass had theorized that while Thane didn’t need oxygen, she still breathed to regulate body heat. Of course, Kass had also told her a heart which beats once a minute could NOT belong to a living person.

Kass was gone, her face worn by ESX. She wondered at the strange creature’s sincerity, if it really regretted the urge to wipe out humanity. Then she decided that it didn’t matter. Reluctant or not, ESX was on a path that could only end two ways.

Either Thane and the others could kill it, or it would kill them.

Morning stretched into afternoon, and Thane ran on. When the Sun was just beginning to sink towards the West, a stiff breeze brought a fetid stench to her nostrils. She slowed to a halt, senses straining ahead of her.

There was death on the road ahead.

Thane couldn’t quite explain how she knew there was death. Certainly, a lot of things could have produced such an aroma; Swamp gas, a rotting deer, brackish water. However, there was just an odd sort of energy that prickled her skin, like a static charge built up from walking across a carpeted floor.

She wasn’t surprised when she came around a bend in the road and saw the bodies spread out over a huge meadow. The sheer scope of the massacre was almost incomprehensible; hundreds upon hundreds of dead rebel soldiers, their bodies twisted and mangled. Smoke drifted lazily into the air from fires not quite extinguished by the recent rain. Wagons lay splintered in the tall grass, the horses that once pulled them either long fled or gathering flies. Thane dropped into a crouch next to a man who couldn’t have been more than twenty. His face and chest were intact, but from the waist down he was meat and tubes and shattered bone.

Hardening her heart, she forced herself to look at the body objectively. Bast taught her that there was a lot to be learned from a body. The soldier’s musket was loaded but hadn’t been fired. So he had time to recognize a threat, but not time to draw a bead on it. Looking at the carnage all around her, it was difficult to say what had caused so much mayhem. Her first thought was cannon, but where were the deep ruts in the earth from the wagons that must carry such heavy burdens? The turf was torn up badly, but ALL of the corpses were rebels. Had the British taken the time to gather their fallen?

A furtive movement caught her eye. Crouching behind a patch of high wild grass, she parted the verdant barrier to find an older man looting the bodies. He found a shiny coin in one of their pockets and bit it with his few remaining teeth. It must have been gold, because the old man cackled before storing it in a pouch.

Thane approached from behind, but the man was wary. Her foot snapped the smallest of twigs and he was up on his feet with a formidable-looking club in his hands.

“Back off!” he hissed. “This is my loot! Mine!”

Thane considered the wild, unfocused eyes, and the erratic movements of the man, and decided he wasn’t quite all there.

“I don’t want your loot,” she said “I just want information. What happened here?”

“John Stark’s boys got themselves shot up, that’s what happened! I seen the whole thing.”

“And you survived?” Thane cocked her head to the side, and the man picked up on her incredulous attitude.

“I did! I was smart, and stayed up on Carter’s Hill. Let me tell you, the British have been holding out.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Thane didn’t much care for this strange fellow. Not only was he looting the dead, he seemed quite excited over the terrible carnage.

“Why, the cannonballs that laid them low came out of a clear blue sky.” The man took Thane’s flinch as proof that his story was having its desired effect, and leaned in closer. “Oh, yes, I saw it all. Their men spread out in an undisciplined line, straining their eyes to see an enemy that’s leagues away. The British must have hundreds of cannon to fire so many volleys so quickly.”

Thane remained tight lipped, but she thought of ESX and its cannonball attack on the bridge. It didn’t take much of a leap for the alien to have been responsible for this slaughter as well.

“Of course, then that negro girl came down from the sky, but I think that was just the shakes,” the man said.

Thane’s mind snapped back to the present. She reached out and took the man by his tattered and stained shirt.

“What? What about a woman from the sky?”

“Nothing. I told you it was the shakes.” He licked his lips. “I’m a sick man, my fair lady. Very sick. I need my spirits, but I have not the coin...”

Thane sighed, but she dug out a few colonial coins and poured them in his palm. He looked down at them and sneered.

“These are next to worthless!” he hissed. Thane noted the coins still disappeared into his pouch, however.

“That’s all I got. What did the woman from the sky do?”

“She asked one of the survivors where John Stark was. Between groans and pleas for his life he indicated a position near the front of their line. A man stood up and said he was John Stark, but he was a damn liar.”

“How do you know he was lying?”

“I seen John Stark. He’s old, over forty. The lad who stood up couldn’t have been more’n sixteen summers old.”

“What happened to him?” Thane asked.

“The woman just pointed at him and he grabbed his chest and fell over.”

“No, not...what happened to the general...what was his name? Stark?”

“I don’t rightly know. Didn’t see him after the cannons started firing.”

Thane turned on her heel and left the man behind her. Her knowledge of history was deplorable, but if ESX thought Stark’s troop was worth taking out...

It was probably a very bad thing it succeeded.