The Guardians (35 page)

"It looks kind of nasty out," Rachel said as she walked out of the shed and looked up at the sky.

"It could be better," replied Nate.  "But on the bright side, it will keep the moon from illuminating us as sitting ducks on the river as we pass by Huntsville.

"Do you think it's going to rain?" sh
e asked.

"There's a chance of it, but the sooner we get in the water, the sooner we get out.  Besides, after all that pedaling we could use a good bath anyway," Nate said with a smile.

The three of them picked up the canoe-raft-contraption of Nate's and carried it to the water's edge.  "We will have to paddle out of this protected area to get to the main channel," Nate said.  "Once we get in the channel, we should be able to drift with the current, paddling just to steer and keep us straight."

"Should we put our
packs in the boat, or keep them on our backs?" asked Luke.

"I was thinking about that," Nate replied.  "I think we should wear them.  Just in case we have to get out of the boat and run for it in a hurry.  We don't want to leave what few provisions we have behind.  We should keep our rifles in front of us and ready to go, but maybe run the sling through our belts so that we can't lose it if we tipped over."

"Yea, that sounds like the way to go," replied Nate.

"Well Rachel, climb on in the front seat of one of the canoe's and Luke and I will shove us off," directed Nate.

"If I could have looked into the future and saw my life, I would never have believed climbing into this thing would be an acceptable mode of transportation," she said jokingly.

"Yea, it's definitely not the way most of us saw our futures, but I'm just glad you're in mine," Luke said to Rachel in reply.

She just smiled as Nate and Luke shoved them off and climbed in their seats.  "Dang it! I got my feet wet.  I hope my leg doesn't rust," Nate said jokingly.

"Don't worry," Rachel said.  "We sprung for the model with the undercoated chassis."

With a laugh, Nate and Luke began to paddle their way out of the marina.  The joking subsided as they began to realize the seriousness of their new phase of the adventure.  It was a dark and creepy night and the last of the visible stars faded away as the cloud cover continued to build.  Nate hoped that he was not leading them down the wrong path with his bright idea.  He just wanted to avoid an altercation with Rachel in the group at all costs, and through his previous cross-country travels, he had learned two hard lessons:  an attractive woman is never safe in this new world, and the cities are not where you want to be.

The cool fall air, even this far south, was beginning to bite at them as the breeze blew over the cool water.  It felt a good ten degrees cooler on the river than it did asho
re.  As they rounded the corner of the marina and joined the main river channel, they could feel the canoe enter the current.  Nate and Luke used their paddles to turn the canoe downstream, and they just let the current take them.

"OK, guys, something to consider here," Nate said.  "We need to stick to the right of the channel for a while.  There is a strip of terrain that divides the river right down the middle coming up ahead.  If we get ourselves stuck to the left of it, we will be land locked and have to beach it and get out and drag the boat over to the other side.  The right side is the dredged side for boats to get through.  After it's clear we've passed that divide, we want to move over to the left side of the channel, as it is the smooth and clear side.  I can't see the map right now in the dark, but I studied it pretty well before the sun went down."

"That's good to know," said Luke.  "I'm sure glad we've got you here to be the one to pay attention."

With that
being said, Nate and Luke began to steer the boat over to the right side of the bank.  "I really can't see a thing," said Nate.

"Me either," replied Luke.  "How about you Rachel?" Luke asked.

"I'm kind of freaking out to be honest, I can't see a thing," she replied nervously.

Just
then, it began to rain, reducing their visibility to near zero.  "Is this thing gonna fill up with water?" Rachel said nervously.

"It would take a long time to do that," Nate replied.  "We won't be going that far in it."

"Your patches seemed to be holding up well.  It will be hard to tell now though with the rain water in the boat," added Luke as the rain picked up its intensity.

"I don't like this guys, let's paddle to the shore," said Rachel nervously.

"We can't see the shore," said Nate.  "We could paddle ourselves right into a mess of brush and muck.  I think we are better off just riding it out here in the channel," he said trying to keep control of the situation.

The continued down the river, struggling to see and guide themselves away from the shore when they could.  They had passed two major bridges, only seeing the bridge piers as they passed next to them.  They could tell the rain upstream had sped up the current by the speed at which they drifted past each bridge.  The river now began to narrow, accelerating the current
even more.

"We've got three major bends in the river to get around now, once we pass through the bends
, we will come up on one more bridge," Nate said.  "After that bridge, we can beach the boat on the left side of the bank anywhere it looks safe and continue on our bikes from there."

They rounded the first bend, and then the second, occasionally bumping a log or some other debris in the water, startling them and adding to the stress of the situation.  The winds began to pick up, rocking the boat and creating choppy surface water, further disorienting them.  Nate held his paddle down in the water straight down to the side with the blade turned in the direction
of the canoe in order not to induce drag that may turn the boat.  He figured that if he felt the paddle begin to drag the bottom, he would know they were getting too close to the riverbank.  He felt a whack on his paddle, and before he could say anything, the boat violently came to a stop and began to swing sideways with the current.  Rachel screamed as she became tangled in a partially submerged fallen tree.  The current kept rotating the boat, which was now sideways in the river, as Rachel was pulled into the water, entangled in the tree.

Nate and Luke heard the scream and the splash
, but in the total darkness could not see where Rachel had gone.  Nate and Luke both paddled furiously in the direction of the tree, but the current was carrying the boat away.  Luke took off his pack and rifle and jumped into the dark waters, swimming as hard as he could towards the sound of Rachel's cries for help, which soon gave way to mere splashes and the sound of a struggle.

Rachel had been dragged underneath the water by the swift current and
had become even more entangled in the submerged branches.  The straps and buckles of her pack were hopelessly tangled in the web of limbs and branches that were hidden underneath the water.  Her pack, now soaked with water, was also weighing her down.  She struggled to release the buckles, but in her panic could not get them off.  She was more terrified than she had ever been in her entire life.  This is it, she thought as her last gasp of breath she took before going under was beginning to fail her.

Just then, she felt a hand grab her and tug her to
wards the surface.  Unfortunately, her pack was too entangled in the branches to bring her up.  Luke struggled to free her.  He quickly grabbed his knife and began cutting her straps.  Once free of the pack, he pulled her up to the surface where she desperately gasped for air.

Luke and Rachel were now both desperately perched in a tangled mess of dead tree branches in the swift current.  There was no way to get to shore as the trunk of the tree leading to the river's edge was submerged and cov
ered with slick algae and mud, and with the current, there was no way they could hang on to the tree while traversing it to the shore.

During Luke's struggle to rescue Rachel, Nate had frantically paddled the boat in the direction of the shore until he was able to beach it in a muddy area about one hundred feet downstream from where they were stranded.  He dragged the boat up onto the muddy bank and untied the mooring line th
at they had used to lash the canoes and bicycles together.  He tied the pieces of rope together creating one long section and ran up the bank, slipping and falling on the muddy and slippery side hill every few feet as he went.  It was the first time he had dealt with mud with his new leg and had not quite gotten the hang of it.

When he got to a point upstream of where Luke and Rachel were stranded, he tied one end of the rope to a branch and threw it in the water.  He yelled, "The rope is on a branch drifting to you, try and grab it."

"OK," Luke yelled in reply.  When Luke felt the branch wash into him from behind he felt around and grabbed the rope.  "OK, I've got it!" he then yelled.

Nate ran the rope around a tree and held on tight and yelled downstream to them, "The rope is secure, use it to work your way over to the bank."

Luke held Rachel tight as he tried to work is way down the slippery trunk of the tree while holding on to the rope and branch.  He slipped and fell, almost losing his grip on Rachel and was now a few feet downstream of the tree.  She held on tight and the current and the angle of the rope washed Rachel and Luke over to the bank.  As soon as Luke could feel the mud and rocks beneath him, he began to struggle to pull her ashore.  Nate ran back downstream to them and helped him pull Rachel, coughing with water in her lungs, out of the cold and muddy river.

For the next few minutes, she just laid there crying in Luke's arms as he tried his best to comfort her.  After she calmed down and had somewhat regained her composure, Luke and Nate led her up the hill into a wooded area where they could rest and recover.  He then got the two canoes, where were no longer lashed together, and dragged them up the hill, giving one to Luke and Rachel to use for shelter from the rain, and one for himself.  They flipped the canoes over and took shelter underneath.  What have I gotten them in to?  Nate thought to himself as he settled in for the night beneat
h the canoe.  What have I done?

Early the next morning
, the sunrise revealed a whole new day.  The rain clouds and high winds had given way to a beautiful sunrise with a thin fog lifting off the river in the perfectly calm air.  The birds were chirping again, and the sound of natural life was all around them.  They combined their MRE's to inventory what was left after the entire loss of Rachel's pack.  They had a total of four, which for three people, gave them a good day's worth of food, two max if they traveled hungry.

Nate studied his map and scouted the area to determine their exact location.  Once he had it all figured out
, he returned to Luke and Rachel and said, "That bridge up ahead is Highway 231, just on the other side is Hobbs Island Road, which will take us towards New Hope.  It's a rural area, so it should be our best bet for bike travel.  The way I see it, if we go that way and ride for at least twelve hours per day, we will be in Del Rio in two days."

Rachel was still a bit shaken up from the night before
, and was still wet and cold.  Just as Luke began to suggest that perhaps Rachel needed more rest before they continued, she stood up and said, "Well, let's get going then.  I want to get the hell away from this God forsaken river, and maybe the wind from the ride will dry us out."

****

Chapter 38: The Reunion

It had been several days since Jason's mountain lion attack at the Homefront
, and the increased security efforts had now fallen into the new routine.  It was just after breakfast and everyone was lending a hand cleaning up, when Sarah, who was standing watch from the upstairs window, reported on the hand held radio that a man was approaching the front gate on horseback.  Jason and Griff ran upstairs to see, while even grabbed his VZ58 and went outside to investigate.

"Looks like Daryl Moses from here," Griff said to
Evan over the hand held radio.

"Roger that, I'll go meet him and let him in," replied Evan.

Even walked down the long driveway to the gate, and there stood Daryl Moses in his typical frontiersman attire, holding the reigns of his horse in one hand and waving hello with the other.

"Howdy," Evan said with a smile.  "I hope you're not bearing bad news."

"No sir, I just thought I would swing by and chat about a few things," Daryl replied.

"Well, come on in," Evan said as he opened the gate.  "We've got fresh coffee on, c
ome on up to the house and we'll sit out back and have a cup and catch up on things.  Griff is going out on patrol around the perimeter in a few minutes, but Jason can join us."

"I'd love a cup.  Hell, I would ride all the way over here for that reason alone.  Coffee is getting dang hard to come by these days," Daryl said.

"Yea, thankfully those big wholesale clubs made it easy to stock up before the collapse," Evan replied.  "I wish they were still in business today.  Our supplies won't last forever with all the mouths around here to feed."

They walked back to the house and Evan, Jason, and Daryl sat around the fire p
it in the back yard to enjoy a sip of coffee on the beautiful fall morning.  Jason stuck a log on the fire for a gnat smoke and asked, "So, how have things been out your way since the raid?"