Life in a Handbasket

Long rays of the summer sun roused the soldiers of Fox Troop, 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment. The history of the unit designation had escaped Army headquarters in New Delhi where the unit had formed last year. To Captain Kirian Long Eagle, his command had nothing at all to do with Custer's ill-fated expedition save a common unit guidon. With 200 million cavalry soldiers spread over two continents in search of survivors from the Great Plagues, Army HQ could not look up the history of every unit. The unexpected humor of a descendent of Native American tribes commanding a cavalry troop 3 centuries after Longhair's demise didn't escape Kirian's notice either.

Asia recovered first for no reason that anyone could determine. The plagues arrived there last and finished first. Maybe the viruses got tired. Kirian didn't know. He only knew that the plagues died out almost as fast as they killed, and then the survivors began gathering first in what remained of China, India, and Vietnam. No race was spared the devastation, all lost 80 percent or more of their numbers. The melting pot of the Americas didn't seem to help survival rates, but it didn't hurt either. The wars after the plague swept through, on the other hand, did send the continents of the New World back into the Stone Age, or maybe the Canned Good Age, if the stories from back east could be believed.

Kirian's troop of 75 troopers, 3 command lieutenants, and the troop sergeant major trailed by a caravan of a dozen wagons with about 30 civilian personnel and his auxiliary Army specialists began preparations for morning chow and routine chores. The horses were fed first in cavalry tradition while the cooks set out the human food. Kirian insisted on a seated meal for morning and evening chow to prevent an us/them mentality from creeping in to the command. Civilian or Army, his men and women were on their own for the most part in the vast landscape of what had once been western Nebraska and northeastern Colorado in the old United States. An emergency medevac could be had, but only for, well, an emergency. And Kirian's command training specified a very narrow interpretation of what constituted an emergency. Survivors of the great plagues were a healthy lot; no one old or prone to illness had made it to a hospital in those dark times. Emergencies generally came from carrying out their orders.

Far easier to obtain was an air evac transport for life, any life. Kirian's orders, like those of every command was to find life from the old world, that is the pre-plague way of things. Cats, dogs, cattle, rabbits, and other domesticated animals came after only one thing, surviving humans. And there were more than anyone expected. Hidden in the remains of towns and cities, having learned in the wars to stay low and feral, the people lived and bred. After several generations their solo and small-group survival skills on their turf were formidable. In short, they were bloody hard to find, and some defended their way of life with sudden and effective ambush.

Small tribes of humans gradually roamed the plains on foot or horse, with occasional and unconfirmed sightings of old automotive vehicles, searching for the next town to settle in until the resources, mostly canned foods, were exhausted. Air and satellite surveys showed that small-scale battles between tribes were increasing as tribes grew and no one bothered to restock the shelves of the local grocery. So, the cavalry came armed and armored, for rifles and shotguns of bygone days could kill, and the Army memorial wall back in Vietnam sprouted new names too often for the Twelve Council too keep their job in the next election.

Enough musing on the current world circumstance, Kirian thought. He needed to get his horse fed and watered, check its armor and see to his personal equipment. Kirian didn't believe in delegating what he saw as his personal responsibility. His officers and the Sgt. Major lived without assistants as well, and his unit soldiers appreciated it. Scanning the perimeter, he noted that 1st Squad had the guard duty. The troops patrolled on horse in full armor just below the ridgeline, with dismounted troopers over the ridge in passive scanning positions. One wagon with its heavy weapons stood on alert, floating over the plain gently on its antigrav thrusters, its heavy draft horses seeking out the good prairie grass. Kirian slept better when he woke up to a tight and alert guard. He turned back to the camp to see last night's duty officer, ComLt. Samuel Byrd approaching.

"Anything last night, Sam?"

"No, sir. I am thinking it has been too quiet for too long." Sam Byrd came from the New Harvard class of '74 on the island of Formosa. They didn't use no contractions or bad speech there, Kirian thought while keeping the smile off his face.

"You are correct, Sam. We searched six empty towns in the last two weeks. There must be a tribe operating nearby, even if we haven't caught up with them yet."

"We did a project in school trying to figure how long it would take a tribe of average size to empty a town of all consumable goods, sir. If one tribe moved through those towns since the plague time, they will be in the next town or the one after that by our calculations."

"Assuming an average size, one tribe, and no hoarding or destruction before the plagues completed of course."

"Yes, sir. Those variable were difficult to account for in a classroom so far away," Birdie admitted. Sam Byrd had not gained entrance to New Harvard through a well-connected relative, he had the intelligence to succeed there and to make a good officer, but leadership didn't always come to the intelligent. One had only to watch the two biologists sent on the expedition to see that.

After Sam left to see to his squad, Kirian finished his personal chores and walked to the mess tent for the daybreak meal. He saw the two biologists engaged in another of their endless debates. The troopers had nicknamed them Hogan and Klink after two colonels on some ancient televideo show they watched on the satellite link. Kirian didn't know which warranted each name, but knew them as Dr. Shelbourne and Dr. Kaltzenbrunner, although oil and water might be more apt. The funny thing was, the two older men looked quite a bit alike, perhaps that was the start of their shared animosity. Whatever the start, though both men obviously knew a lot and put on a show of their intelligence at every opportunity, both were entirely unqualified to lead a horse to water.

The biologists tried to order Kirian's troopers to do their bidding, and were completely ignored. They tried to order Kirian to order his troopers to do their bidding, and were told the way of things in his command. They got no further with F Troop's officers, and almost lost their miserable lives when they approached Sgt. Major Applewhite one evening as the career Army man stood duty as officer of the guard. Finally, the scientists called their civilian boss back in Hanoi, and were told that if Captain Tall Eagle saw fit to leave them out on the plains for insubordination, the corporation would be happy to stop their paychecks. The men then tried to take out their need for dominance of some sort on their small crew of biological techs, only to have Kirian notice and step in before both of his trained biologists ended up murdered one night. They fell back to bickering constantly with each other in an effort to win unwinnable arguments. Kirian gave his well-worn senior NCO a look one morning as the unit got underway, and that was all it took.

Sgt. Major Applewhite took the two scientists mid-argument, handed each an unloaded sidearm, and put them on point for the search of the next town. Kirian formed his command behind them in the usual way, and waited. Slowly it dawned on the scientists that just maybe they had annoyed F Troop a bit more than enough. The town turned out to be empty of life, and the loud arguments and other nonsense had ceased. The scientists still bickered, but with less volume and mostly in the privacy of their portable lab shelter. Kirian didn't know what they would do if a trooper ever came upon something to argue about, such as a small animal to have shipped back home.

A sign on the town border read Lodgepole, in the state of Nebraska, if Kirian recalled correctly. The search of this town would not take long, Kirian saw perhaps a dozen houses south of the old rail lines and three times that amount to the north. The increased rainfall since the plagues made searches of some older houses a moot point, the trees had completed demolition of them some decades past. The old roads held up fairly well, but they too were succumbing to the growth of weeds. Some weeds grew so tall in the valleys where streams ran all year now that Kirian's command went kilometers out of the way to approach some towns. 3rd Squad spread out to encircle the town, 2nd Squad went south of the tracks, 1st Squad to the north according to the duty roster. Kirian saw the wagons spread out with turrets manned and ready, one wagon slowly moved along the main highway through town. His unit was getting good at this, Kirian noted. Right at this point was usually the time in the video stories back home that something went badly wrong, he thought.

Nothing happened. A ritual that Kirian implemented after the search of the second town began. The entire unit came to a standstill, and every third trooper took off the protective scanner helmet typically worn at all times when on duty. Kirian didn't trust the audio receptors for some reason he could not yet explain. The listening pause went for five minutes at each town. This time, a trooper heard something in the last house on the north side of the tracks. The squad commander quickly implemented a detailed search of the house with four troopers. Kirian reconfigured the other squads for ambush protection. If they had found a stash, any tribe who felt strong enough would attack to protect what was theirs.

No attack came, but ComLt. Byrd called the biology team up. A life? Kirian ordered a perimeter defensive spread. Diamond formations of four troopers from 2nd and 3rd Squads took off at full gallop for the high ground to the south and north of the town. His wagons increased their altitude and went fully tactical, but the area proved resolutely empty of enemies. Kirian shrugged and went to see what Sam had found.

Kirian still had his helmet in hand, so he heard the sound that had caught the trooper's attention. A faint mewling sound, cats, or probably kittens, if Kirian's training was accurate. Sure enough, in an old handbasket lay a litter of six kittens perhaps born two or three weeks ago. The mother cat lay a few feet from the basket, obviously dead. Kirian saw more than one problem. His troopers felt what Kirian felt, the urge to hold and stroke the tiny things. He knew the purr of a kitten could comfort most humans. It was time for an emergency call.

"Emergency call, captain?" his comm trooper, Corporal Thomas, appeared at Kirian's side.

"Yes, better do an actual. Someone up the chain may want to confirm with me.

"What about the biologist recommendation, skipper?" Sgt. Major Applewhite asked over Kirian's shoulder.

Kirian turned to find the biologists rolling around outside the house beating on each other and yelling various animal names, none of which were correct.

"We've been low-bid, gents. Send them back with the transport," Kirian turned to the communicator. "Request a meat re-supply and then give it to me."

"Kittens!" the speaker on Cpl. Thomas commpack bellowed for all to hear. Kirian grinned. This had gone straight to Brigade command, none other than the boisterous General Douglas Simmons. "Put your actual on, son."

"Yes, sir, this is F Troop actual," Kirian responded through his head set. "The biologists are useless, and I'm shipping them back, but I can confirm from personal experience this is a litter of six kittens, the mother is dead, sir." Kirian's grandmother had one of three known feline breeding stations, but due to government restrictions he had seldom visited.

"Excellent! Emergency air evac is on the way. If that's Hogan and Klink you're sending back, I'll have the air crew drop them somewhere over the Atlantic. Look for a special package on your resupply, Kirian. Simmons out!"

"Beer, sir. We'll have to be careful with that out here," Sgt. Major Applewhite said.

Kirian knew that, but appreciated the reminder just the same. The troop was way beyond the civilized frontier, which had only reached the Appalachians last year. "Looks like we'll be camped out here for a few days of reward time. Bring the officers up. Cpl. Thomas, get the biologists ready for transport; giver their kits to the bio techs, we'll keep them. Sgt. Major take some troopers from 1st Squad and find the most defensible place for a camp-over."

Troopers moved swiftly to carry out Kirian's orders. The bio techs moved to secure the kittens in a special transport container where they would be safe for the trip back east. Kirian saw the techs - how the same government division could send out a team of techs so competent and a team of biologists so incompetent made no sense, but there it was - had already rigged up eye droppers with goat's milk to feed the hungry kittens. The transport signaled inbound in one hour. The general was pulling out the stops on this evac, probably a reroute from a dying trooper medevac. Another day in the New World.

Bucky Denzil