Chapter 2

Nature Comes Calling FOR "MCKAY"

The weeks and months that followed became nothing much more than a blur of aching muscles and broken foragers tools scattered about like clothes in the throws of passion. Cramming in small breaks to devour my daily catch. Slowly but surely I was becoming self sufficient beyond my earlier means. Moving ever so quietly, swiftly blending my movements through the forest as did the black bear. Sneaking within the long shadows of dusk like the coyote I used to fear. The creatures that once hunted me now belonged to me. I know them now as my living, breathing and deadly sustenance. Free to hunt me as they once did but now at the risk of they're own peril. It had been months since I saw another human being and quite frankly I had no desire to now. The thought of it made me feel weak. Timid as I once was. I needed no human companionship. All I once cherished had vanished away. Washed from my life by the toils of survival.

Dawn cracked onto the horizon with a fervor I had never seen or felt before. Shedding slow pulses of sunlight gently dancing through the fur trees to my south. This day would begin much like any other day I suppose. With me Working the fields and gathering supplies. Interrupted by the occasional intrusion of Revenants and mutant beasts. I was not aware of it yet but there to the south, just on the heels of the morning warmth there lurked a new presence. One that would refuse to be denied my acquaintance. My suffering had yet to begin. Loss would take on new meaning and my meager existence would be challenged in a way I had never imagined possible. I Stood frozen for a moment. Gazing out across the valley below like a helpless child. Tattered and toughened from my journey yet remarkably young and full of wondrous reason. My Leathers strung across my shoulders like a badge of honor. My Steel Axe dangling from my side defiantly casting it's own shadow upon the granite rocks below. There I stood. Ready for anything. For nothing.

But not for what was about to happen......

Midday arrived with the usual break to refill my water skins down at the river. Accompanied by the ever present hungry eyes of Charlie. An affectionate name I had given the coyote that stalked me each day yet never attacked. I had watched him kill many chickens and the occasional stray dog but for some unknown reason he had never bothered me. Just that never ending trivial stare he gave me. It was as if the damn thing was trying to understand me. I had never considered the prospect that I would grow attached to the fur ball I now called Charlie. But never the less I did and this bizarre relationship went on each day like clock work. Him following me and me trying not to turn my back on him long enough to give him the opportunity to pounce.

AS I refilled my water skin I caught a blur to my left across the stream. Bones glistened against the waters reflection like a bullet from a barrel. I quickly sunk into a cat like posture and backed up into the stumpy over growth. Across the deep grass came a figure of a man. Wrapped tightly around his head rested the antlers of a mule deer and his bone armor clanked it's deadly music as he crouched and ran low trying to conceal his movements. I melted further back into the underbrush as Charlie flowed to the mans south with ears perked like miniature teepee's. Charlies tail darted back and forth against the saw grass like antenna feelers as he locked onto his prey. Suddenly the crunching sounds of bone and whimpering beasts bleed out across the river soaked valley. I sunk into my hide even deeper as I heard Charlies lungs gurgling in bloody spasms of defeat. His poor tail twitching slowly against the rocks of the rivers edge as the mans knife plunged deeply into his back. Over and over again he pounded his blackened knife into charlie until no movement remained. Just the quiet valley and water tones of the river could be heard over the numb pounding of my heart.

My thoughts raced in all directions. I clenched my pickaxe and slowly stalked this man. Blood rage boiled inside of me as I approached the rivers edge. Circling the kill zone I could smell death and I knew The revanents would not be far behind. I had to dispatch this man to the soils of the earth.. He had killed my friend Charlie. He is too close to my home. He would not live through midday. How right I was, but how wrong the method.

To Be Continued.......