Eden's Hammer - By Lloyd Tackitt Page 0,1
said, “It’s because she’s been cooking and her hands smell like food.”
“Sure, Roman, whatever you say. When’re you going to tell me about the trouble?”
“Right after I hear about the bear loving. You go on in and I’ll take care of the horse.”
Adrian said, “Thanks! I’ll take you up on that.” He pulled the rifle from the scabbard, grabbed the saddle bags, and strode into the house, shouting “Damn, that smells good!”
Adrian cleaned his plate of its third serving, leaned back, and said, “That’s the best meal I’ve had since I left last year. Aunt Sarah, you are one hell of a cook! I’m so full, I could bust.”
“Does that mean you don’t want a slice of pie?”
“Pie? Oh Lord, you should’ve warned me to leave some room. No ma’am, I couldn’t possibly right now. Well…maybe just one small piece.”
Sarah got up from the table, returning with a large wedge of pecan pie. “Try this—it’s not as sweet as I used to make it, but I think it’s every bit as good anyway. Jerry and Shirley said they’d be here after you ate; they didn’t want to eat me out of house and home by bringing their families with them.”
Roman chimed in, “Damn straight it’s as good—I like it even better. We’ve gotten civilized again since the grid crashed. Took us three years, but we’re making steady progress. Planted sorghum last year and made molasses. Got sugar beets growing this year; soon we’ll have real sugar again. “
Roman continued while Adrian was eating, “After the CME destroyed the electric grid, things were hard. Had to hide out in the brush from all the walking starving from the towns and cities. That lasted over six months. Then the war with Mad Jack—that professional wrestler west of here. Then it was back to square one, planting crops and living by the skin of our teeth while they grew. Then we had a hard winter that was helped a little by the food we had grown, which wasn’t much the first year. Got down to our seed corn by spring. But we pulled through long enough to make a second crop, bigger than the first one. The village grew up around us real fast, too, becoming the central trading point for a long ways in any direction.
“Matthew’s wood-gas devices really helped, letting us use tractors again. That was a giant leap forward, that was. It also let us use generators to gin up electricity, too, another tremendous help. We can weld, run refrigerators, use power tools, and it keeps the field hospital going.” Roman went quiet, afraid he had re-ignited Adrian’s grief. Sarah gave him a look that said he was a bumbling idiot.
Adrian noticed their expressions, paused eating, and looked at Roman and Sarah. “It’s all right. I can think about Alice without going nuts, even talk about her. Go on, you were saying?”
“I’m glad to hear that, son. That was the hardest thing in the world, her dying like that, and with a baby in her.” Roman paused a long time. “Still hard for me to talk about it, must be hell for you.” He paused again briefly. “The hospital she set up that had to be burned because of that damn plague has been rebuilt, in a different spot of course. It’s still the biggest draw for people for miles and miles around. But now we keep outposts manned at the trails way out of town. Anyone showing up with plague symptoms is turned away. Hate to do it, but we can’t afford to help them and risk plague in the village. There were quite a few plague victims after you left. It slowed down a bit a few months back, but some still wander up. Lord only knows how many died from it over the past year. We hear of whole villages wiped out now and then. Something you have to be mindful of when travelling. That’s one of the reasons I told you not to talk to anyone on your way home. You didn’t, did you?
Adrian finished the pie wedge slowly. Roman thought he either really was full, or the talk of Alice had killed his appetite. Adrian said, “Didn’t talk to a soul. I came in off-trail and didn’t pass your outposts, either.”
Roman continued, “Best anyone can figure, there are maybe fifteen million people left in the U.S. Course, there’s no real census because there’s no real government. We hear of broadcasts now and then from what’s