Then they all waited in silence, the tension too strong to break with any idle chatter.
Eventually Flora heard it coming. It sounded like someone was shaking a giant beanbag many miles away. The noise grew louder and louder, and then the huge beast powered around the corner, black smoke steaming from the snout. Flora was truly awed by the sheer power of it, while Ember would only steal the occasional glance and then close his eyes to escape to some cerebral refuge.
Patterson had secured them their own train car at the back. It looked to be normally used for railroad workers, rather than passengers. The seats were stained or streaked with grease, and only four of them had any padding.
Only moments after they entered the train car, a great whistle blew, metal squealed on metal, and the beast lurched forward. It began gliding faster and faster down the tracks. A smell of soot and earth and oil reached them and then dissipated as they gained momentum.
Seeville was only minutes away.
KEEPIN’ IT BETWEEN THE DITCHES
Early in the morning the rough path turned into a larger, flatter highway called “64.” Although the broader lanes made the others more wary of exposure, it was a welcome reprieve for Owen’s forearms and back that were feeling punished from the previous day’s bumpy ride.
In midmorning the lead scouts stopped at a three-story tall wooden tower. The scouts were yelling up at it in the distance. They circled back and spoke with Chester and Thorpe.
Everyone clustered around Chester as he explained the situation. “We are crossing the border into a new bandit territory. They call themselves the Yorktown Founders. It sounds like they are a bit like the New Founders in Seeville. They’re going to let us pass, but I’m not sure it’s out of the goodness in their hearts, or because we outnumber them five to one. Be careful with these folks.”
They rolled the platform past the wooden tower carefully, again making their weapons visible as a show of strength. Only two bandits could be seen in the tower, tracking them with wary eyes and crossbows at the ready. These seemed to be of a different breed than the bandits from Tappahannock. There were no hoodies. They wore leather, their faces were clean, and their hair was collected into long braids.
The platform rolled onward. Periodically they would see a house off to the side of the road with signs of living: a cleared lawn, crops, some bikes, or horses tied up. In one case a couple of bandits were riding bikes toward them and they swerved off to watch the platform group pass. These bandits also leveled crossbows at the Spoke platform as they rode by.
One of the mules asked, “Do we know how many people this place got?”
No one answered his question.
They turned off onto a well-worn road. The bandit dwellings became more numerous. Many were miniature farmsteads. When they passed these buildings they could often see a bandit or two hanging back inside, watching the Spokes keenly after gathering whatever weapons they had at their disposal.
“Trailers!” The rear guard yelled out. When Owen looked back, far in the distance, he could see two distant bikes trailing them.
“Keep going,” Chester said from up ahead of them, “and don’t do anything stupid.”
Owen kept wondering is this normal? There did seem to be quite a few bandits, and all of them were wary of Spoke people. It also worried him that the farther they went into this territory, the more they would have to cross paths with getting back out.
A large signpost made of freshly cut timbers appeared. Darkened grooves spelled out the letters Yorktown in the face of the wood.
They passed by a turnoff that led down a hill to a more concentrated bandit settlement. Owen looked back and saw one of their followers turn off, but the other one kept going.
They passed an odd rock formation at the side of the road. It looked to be a mass of stone about two hundred feet long, as tall as a house, and covered in shrubs, vines and moss. Dark grottoes led underneath it in places, some filled with vegetation.
“What’s that?” Owen asked.
His question was rhetorical, but Chester answered anyway. “Don’t know for sure, but could be another statue, fallen over like.”
“What do you mean another statue?”
“Like the beholders.”
Looking again, it did seem possible, based on the size of it, and the form of the rock under the foliage. But why would the founders of Seeville build one here? Perhaps it was some other decaying monument, or just one more Old World ruin of unknown function.
Soon Owen forgot about the odd rock formation as he was forced to exert himself on the increasingly hilly topography. On a particularly steep climb he had to stand and use his weight to plunge the pedals of his bike assembly downward. He still couldn’t match the cadence of the others.
They crested a ridge and a broad river could be seen in the distance.
They began a gradual decline toward the water. Dominating the view was a huge cylinder that formed a bridge over the river. It was propped up on massive stilts. This cylinder also cut across the waterfront, extending south into the horizon. This was undoubtedly the “tube” Chester had referred to the night before. It was much larger than Owen had imagined. The tube diameter had to be as high as a four-story building.
This tube formation dwarfed a number of run-down buildings and small bandit shacks that otherwise littered the hillside down to the river.
The only anomaly to the cylindrical shape of the tube was a large bulbous outcropping on one side. It almost looked biological, like some sort of goiterous balloon pulsing out of the Old World artery. At the base of this outcropping was a sheer wall leading into the ground and cutting off the arc of the cylinder.
Chester pointed at the wall below the extended balloon formation. The group rode over a bumpy pathway heading in its direction, making one last push to their destination.
They stopped near the sheer wall, just out of the shadow of the outcropping. Owen used his scope to look back, and he could see there were now four bandits on bikes behind them. They had stopped at the top of the bluff and were staring down at the Spoke platform, one of them wielding binoculars.
“This is bent… sideways. We’re gonna eat it for sure,” one of the mules said.
“Fuck this,” said another.
Apparently Owen wasn’t the only one who was apprehensive.
“Fuck this is right,” Chester said. “I’ve never seen bandits like these. There are way more than I’m comfortable with, and I don’t like this place. It looks impenetrable. We should leave right now, while we’re all still breathing.”
Thorpe said, “We’re not planning on staying long. Besides, we have ways to dissuade these nice people from annoying us.” He nodded to one of the cases on the platform. Rourke unlocked it and briefly unveiled a machine-gun and tripod mount.
The sight of the machine gun raised eyebrows. It would indeed be surprising to see the bandits have anything comparable to a working machine gun. But the machine gun did nothing to alleviate Owen’s concerns. It only highlighted the high-stakes nature of their situation.
Chester spoke hurriedly, “Fine, so what’s next? If that wall there is made of the same stuff the tube is made of, I’m not sure how we can get in.” His gaze leveled on Thorpe, who in turn glanced toward Preston. Meanwhile Preston had already dismounted and was moving closer to examine the sheer face of the building.
Preston turned to see all eyes on him. “Um, I’m going to need some help.” He sounded nervous. His hands jittered slightly as he took off his backpack and pulled out a folder. “Owen, Jeroun, Frank, Milken, if you could come over here.”