The Preacher Man

"For our survival testing sir, we were dropped on November 20th. For this cave sir, about a day and a half. The bears hit us on the night of the 25th, shortly after 11:00 PM."

I nodded. "Go on."

"Yes sir. Our plan was for me to be on guard duty 9 PM to 1 PM, and then switch with Private Aasim. Our plan was to start hiking before 6 AM." Omran paused for a moment before continuing. "There was a brief but intense snow squall, about two hours into my duty shift."

I remembered my first night with Abigail, hearing her surprise at seeing the snowfall. "Yes. Go on."

"The bears used the storm to attack us sir. They came in hard and fast, from multiple directions. I've never seen animals act that coordinated sir. Aasim barely got out of our tent in time. Thank the Holy he slept with his boots and night-vision on! We retreated into this canyon, firing all the way, often blindly. It took all our ammo to make it here alive. We would be dead if it weren't for this cave."

I took a look at their retreat. It wasn't a bad spot. The floor sloped down to the entrance with about a ten degree tilt, but at least everything was dry. After coming through the entrance, there was a lot of nice headroom, almost three meters for a full ten meter run back into the granite. After that the ceiling rapidly fell to meet the rising floor. There was no other exit.

I turned back to the two Priests. "And you've been holed up here ever since?"

Aasim replied, "Yes sir. We tried climbing out. We can make it to an overhanging ledge about ten meters up, but after that it's just smooth vertical stone. Without climbing gear, the only exit is to walk out. And the bears..."

Omran finished the thought. "...have been on guard duty since we got here, keeping us prisoners. They're like a pack of dogs that have treed a cat. And we don't have the ammo to fight our way out." He paused and then smiled at my devil-dogs. "Not until now sir, I mean."

I grinned. "We're in even better shape than you think!" I went to Michal's pack and extracted the two rifle clips, handing one to each of the Priests. They looked both overjoyed and worried.

Aasim spoke first, "Sir, if we load these, our rifles will log the RF-ID of the clips. Isn't this illegal?"

I considered his point. "I've read the rules. Using another team's gear is allowed."

"Sir, doesn't that team have to be dead?"

"The first team that had those clips is dead."

"Oh... Yes sir. But using another team's weapons sir? Isn't that still forbidden?"

"A direct order privates, lock and load! I'm making a field decision that weapons are rifles and pistols but clips are supplies. I'll put it in writing. No matter how this eventually gets decided, you two will be held harmless."

Aasim looked at me with pure gratitude as he loaded his rifle. "Sir, you don't have to do that."

"No sense putting more than one of us at risk private!"

"Yes sir..." and then a whisper, "Thank you sir."

Having loading his clip, Omran looked at me and asked, "Sir, how far do you think we are to Jericho?"

"About twenty, twenty-one kilometers."

"Yes sir. That was our thinking too. Perhaps we should try to make it in one push."

"Yeah... Well, we'll have to wait for the storm to clear first. Traveling now would give the bears a huge tactical advantage."

"No argument there, sir."

As my eyes adjusted to the dim light I realized these two men had absolutely no gear with them except for their outfits and the two rifles. We moved further away from the entrance and sat down completely out of the wind. The blizzard outside was severe, but very little sound was penetrating into the cave. The place almost seemed cozy.

I occurred to me these two Priests probably hadn't eaten since their first encounter with the bears on the 25th. I grinned at them. "You boys hungry?"

"Yes sir!" two grins replied back. We began swapping stories over a late breakfast.

It turned out Aasim and Omran knew each other since childhood, a very unusual fact considering they grew up in different cities. Aasim was raised at the monastery at Kedar, the home township of the Ballistics Guild, and Omran was raised at Zoser, the home township of the Rocketry Guild. Along with Qataban, these three townships were founded in the first millennium and form a near perfect isosceles triangle, with a mere sixty kilometers between their city walls. Outside of Bandar Arenas, it's the densest concentration of humanity on the planet.

The reason for the concentration is Xerxes, the world's spaceport located in the center of the ancient Bolivian triangle. Only sixteen degrees south of the equator and with an altitude of over 3300 meters, it is an ideal location for efficient launches of the world's observation and communications satellites. It was at Xerxes where Aasim and Omran met, working with their monasteries on different projects.

"A Holy decision sir," Aasim said thoughtfully, looking at Michal as he finished his meal. "I don't think I would have had the guts to do it myself. But she is pregnant, and it might be a boy."

"You're from Anqara originally, aren't you sir?" asked Omran.

"That's right." I sat back and reflected how completely these two Priests had accepted me as their superior. I was the same age as Omran, an adult for less than a year, and Aasim was an adult for almost seven years, about to take the gate to CL-4 for the second time.

But with the anti-aging drugs, physical appearance was no indicator of authority. The uniform and insignia are everything, so the years of drilling at the monasteries taught. They would have been unhappy about it, but if I had ordered Aasim and Omran out as suicidal bait to distract the bears while I escaped, they would have followed my orders.

Omran nodded at me in approval. "Tough monastery sir, one of the best."

I sighed, thinking of my childhood. "Yeah, tough and isolated. They do their training by the numbers up there... We kids had a rumor going, that the Priests of Anqara never had to decide whom to cull, just whom not to..."

Aasim had been staring at the blizzard snow blowing across the mouth of the cave. "A Shaitan of a storm. Any thoughts sir, on how we're going to get out of this?"

I nodded. "Some. I think we should hit the bears before leaving, hit them hard, make trailing us the very last thing they'll ever think of doing. What you boys take for armaments?"

Aasim answered. "Standard assignment sir, one rifle with four clips for each of us. We had our choice for a proximity detector too, but went with the night-vision goggles."

"Oh yeah," I replied. "For a two-man team, that's the right way to go."

Omran spoke up. "Sir, if I may ask, how did you get two devil-dogs?"

"Simple. I swapped almost all my food supply for the second dog and another five clips."

Aasim nodded in total approval. "Smart move sir."

"Oh yeah, it turned out that way. I've already used five clips. If I started this trip with the standard four, the bears would be chowing down on my grub right now... on me too..."

Two days later...

Time: November 29, 8235 2:50 AM

I stood with Abigail at the end of the canyon, the rocks to our backs and a 300 meter corridor of bears in front of us. To me, it was typical autumn scenery, deep heavy snow, a full half meter with deeper drifts. Omran was still amazed by the sight, thinking that the winter solstice on December 29th was still a full month away. But I've been living through these late autumn snowstorms all my life.

The two privates were positioned on an overhanging ridge, out of my sight but with a commanding fire zone of most of the corridor, except for the very end near me. The setup was perfect for my plan.

The moon was at waning gibbous, 85% of the disk still illuminated and just reaching its transit position now, providing me ample light for my part of the mission. At least I hoped so. I took one last look at the peaceful scene and sighed. It was time to start the festivities.

"You ready Abigail?" I whispered.

She gave me a small humph noise back. "You're the one who's doing the risky part. Be careful Ilias! I love you."

I walked out as silently as I could about thirty meters. There was still another thirty meters to first line of bears. It was a huge gathering. Over the last day the number had grown to sixty-nine, with about half juveniles. A few of the nearest bears looked at me sleepily and growled, probably confused with my presence.

My plan hinged on the certainty that with Abigail by my side, we would withstand any bear charge as long as we both had exploding darts. So I had both pistols set for non-exploding darts. I took careful aim and started drilling the heads of the closest bears.

One nice attribute of a devil-dog is that they make very little noise, and without the pop of the exploding darts, it took the bears a while to realize they were under attack. I killed seven of them with sustained head shots before their roars managed to arouse the group. And then I flipped over to antagonize mode, firing short bursts of darts into as many bears as I could, trying to target the largest males. I jumped from one target to the next at lightning speed because my goal was not to kill but to enrage. By the time I drained both pistols of the non-exploding darts, the canyon was filled with roaring bears and as a group they began to charge.

I turned and ran to Abigail as fast I could. Over the sound of the roars I could hear the rifle cracks of the two Priests, both top-rated marksmen of the Jericho militia. Our plan was for them to cull the bears from the beginning of the canyon and work their way in. Our objective was complete slaughter.

The plan worked. The alpha-males nearest us were enraged by dart stings and saw no damage to their nearby numbers from the rifle shots. The sight of me as a fleeing target was too much to pass up. They roared a complex howl, and as a mass, the great group of bears began to charge.

I flipped both pistols to exploding dart mode as I ran, watching Abigail for a hand signal that I had to turn and fire. But the bears were used to being the hunters, not the hunted. They had no experience being attacked while soundly asleep, and the moments it took them to wake up provided me the few precious seconds I needed to jog back to Abigail through the deep snow. As I reached her, I handed her one of the pistols and turned with the other. We both started firing.

Short bursts, three or four darts, she was magnificent. We had discussed this moment before the battle, and had established a fire zone perimeter starting at eighty meters At that distance the exploding darts were still super-sonic and incredibly deadly. No bear made it to within forty meters of us on our first clips.

Abigail and I ran out of darts at almost the same time. We both ejected and reloaded with one easy motion. Our pistols now contained the last of our dart ammunition. As I reloaded I took a quick survey of the battle. I estimated that out of sixty-nine bears, perhaps twenty were still standing, all within fifty to a hundred and fifty meters of us. Beyond that the canyon was littered with bears dead from the rifle fire.

Aasim and Omran were excellent marksmen, culling the bears from the back of the canyon. Their eight-gram rifle shots would stay super-sonic for more that three hundred meters and they were methodically chewing up the rear of the bears' attack.

Abigail resumed firing. I thought the bears' position was so hopeless I switched to non-exploding darts, deciding to keep the most deadly ammo as a reserve.

Abigail took over the center of our fire perimeter, targeting when the bears would get within eighty meters. The carnage was so great the bears were often climbing over the corpses of their fallen comrades when they were killed. I let my few remaining targets close to within thirty-five meters on my left before killing them with one-second sprays to the head at full auto.

Less than thirty seconds after reloading the pistols, Abigail had killed an additional seven bears and I four. I think the two militiamen eliminated an additional six or seven. Incredibly, there were only three bears left, one enormous alpha-bear about eighty meters away from our position, and two juveniles roughly twenty meters out in front of him.

The alpha-male suddenly seemed to notice he was the only one bellowing the roar-charge. He abruptly braked and stood up on his great hind legs, surveying the scene. The devil if he didn't seem to realize how badly he been suckered into our trap. He let out a tremendous howl as he stood. It brought the two juveniles up short. They turned to stare at him.

I used to think it was risky to read human emotions into animal behaviors and vocalizations. We have such different minds and perspectives. But the devil if I couldn't hear the depth of the alpha-male's frustration and anger in his howl. And then his head exploded. One crisp rifle shot caught him square in the forehead.

The two lone juveniles remaining stood aimlessly gazing at the slaughter, their charge forgotten. They were too bewildered even to flee. I dimly felt sorry for them. They were up against a superior species, one with superior minds and superior weapons, and they never had a chance. If it were only a question of ordinary bears, my heart would have been asking me to be merciful and spare them.

But these were not ordinary bears. These were bears that had learned how to stalk prey from their tracks. Had other bears stumbled onto this knowledge? From the size of this group, the militiamen and I had concluded it probably represented every bear within several thousand square kilometers. Perhaps we had the opportunity to stop this threat here and now.

Two more rifle shots rang out, so close together it sounded like one very loud report. Our last two targets went down. The battle was done.

Abigail flipped the safety on her pistol and handed it to me, whispering, "Excellent shooting Ilias! And good thinking to conserve the exploding darts!"

I nodded as I holstered both weapons. "You were magnificent Abigail!" I whispered back.

We were all packed to depart, and there was no reason to delay. The five of us walked through the canyon warily, on the alert for a wounded bear, but they were all dead. We got back to the ancient path of I-8-9 by 3:30 AM.

The militiamen and I discussed our travel plans. We both hoped to be at Jericho by sundown, but as a safety buffer my team was still carrying our gear. We also wanted to observe the rule that different teams don't travel together. I made a decision that a hundred meters would be a sufficient separation.

Before we split up Aasim handed me a coin. It was made of stainless steel and brightly accented with the battle colors of Jericho's militia. It's an unofficial practice among the township militias, to hand out such coins to people greatly deserving of the militia's respect. I told Assim I was honored.

My wives and I led the way home. My left pistol was reading 40:2, and the pistol Abigail was firing 11:40. We still had a good punch left for a short battle, though I felt certain we would see no more bears today. Aasim and Omran both had nine rifle shots remaining. They would provide long-range cover for us if needed, and we would dash back and protect them if needed. Our success seemed a certainty, and we started hiking in very high spirits, exhilarated by our victory.

It was slow going in the deep snow, less than two kilometers an hour, but no one was worried. We stopped for a leisurely breakfast at 8 AM; certain Jericho was only a dozen kilometers away. We sighted the famed walls before 2 PM, and walked through Beggar's Gate a full hour before sunset. The two militiamen soon joined us, and a moment before we were met by a crowd of people, Omran dryly commented we were in time for evening Prayers. Our survival test was over.

Chapter 18. Ilias Rides Again!

Time: December 2, 8235 11:20 PM

I had spent the last three days settling into Jericho, both family-wise and job-wise. My first impression of my job was that there were not enough hours in the day to do it. I had a book knowledge of how much work it would be to be a township's head Security commander, but the experience of actually being one was another matter entirely. On the plus side, I thought my initial meetings with both the cathedral directors and some of the many Guild station commanders at Jericho went well. But there was still so much to do.

Jericho is the home township for one of the many Health Guilds, in particular the one for research and treatment of infectious diseases. I spent most of my days touring the labs and specialized hospitals and drug manufacturing facilities. Nothing out of the ordinary; the Guild presented no particular challenges for me. I thought the Health Guilds as a group are probably some of the easiest for Security to monitor.

The 120 Guilds of the world are organized into ten Keiretsu, and most of my work would be interfacing with the other Guilds at Jericho at the Keiretsu level. In particular, I'd be working tomorrow with the various agricultural and fishing Guilds in the Citizen Staples Keiretsu. The following day I'd be tied up in meetings with the mining Guilds that have a small Jericho presence. Those would be the Materials Keiretsu. The day after that I'd be going over security protocols with the Construction Keiretsu. And so on... So many things to do! It would be very easy to overload my schedule. I knew I'd have to careful and allow myself enough time to prepare for my final ride on the Asad on the 21'st.

On my first day back to Jericho, I asked Michal when she would like her nightly sleep cycle. She was both surprised and grateful that I let her choose the time and had decided on a midnight to 4 AM schedule. We were slowly moving to that time slot for her memory purge.

My wives and I had also gotten into a comfortable rhythm of the three of us sleeping together but alternating our sexual play. It was Michal's turn tonight.

Michal and I were both sleepy from a full day of work were engaging in some very gentle sex. Michal was lying on her side, her left leg slightly raised, and I had entered her from behind, stroking her slowly with both my penis within her and my hand caressing her belly. She would sigh and coo and occasionally wiggle her rump into my groin to show how much she was enjoying herself. And then we both drifted for a while, very gentle thrusts up inside her, just enough to keep me erect. I felt Michal relax completely as she fell asleep in my arms.

I looked out the window for a moment, and then the clock. It was twenty-three minutes till midnight, and the last-quarter moon was low on the horizon, having just risen a half hour ago. My bedroom suite had magnificent vistas, windows facing both southeast and southwest, affording me views of both the city night lights to the east and the moonlit lake to the west. A beautiful world, two beautiful wives, I sighed as I realized how happy I was.

Abigail was lying quietly behind me, and completely misinterpreted my sigh. "Ah, forgive her Ilias. Her pregnancy and the virginity drugs drove her into sleep. Michal and I were speaking earlier in the evening. She really was an eager virgin, looking forward to having sex with you tonight."

I nodded and kissed Michal. My sleeping wife was totally non-responsive, almost comatose, the typical sleep pattern for an eternal virgin. "Oh, I know. I was just thinking, how much I love her... and love you too Abby. The both of you, you are teaching me what love means."

Abby curled behind me, kissing my neck and running her fingers between my thighs. A gentle tap on the back of my sac, a signal Abigail wanted to pet me. I lifted my leg to give her better access. Her hand came up to cup and gently squeeze my scrotum for a while, cradling the testes in four fingers and softly running her thumb back and forth on the rear of the sac.. And then her soft caress drifted forward, feeling how my erect penis was still fully sheathed inside Michal. I thrust forward slowly, burying myself in Michal's slick warmth. More kisses to the back of my neck...