"I ran back towards where the bikes were stowed and suddenly stopped. If I headed right back to New Plymouth would they follow me? So I hid in a more-intact ruin for the rest of the day and that night. I still had my rucksack so I had water. Once my panic subsided I was deeply worried. We had clearly stirred up a hornets' nest, and lost good people doing so. Bernard had been my best friend during the rebuilding of some sort of society, and Jim had invaluable skills. And so young too. At that time I thought that Cally was also dead. My fears grew deeper the more I thought about what we'd done. Okay, we'd shown the Daleks were not indestructible. But at what a cost! We would have no chance of beating any serious attack by them on our little settlement. Now they were alerted to our presence and were bound to be on the lookout for us. Should we abandon what we'd set up and move up into the hills? Later I calmed a bit and thought more sensibly. We knew they could be destroyed, apparently by gunfire although that one had been seriously weakened by the grenade. They moved slowly and we could use that to our advantage in hit-and-run attacks. They also avoided rough terrain - they appeared to float a few centimetres off the ground so maybe very uneven surfaces upset the field or whatever did that. In addition their eyesight or sensor suites or whatever were good but not perfect, otherwise Cally and Rice could not have got round behind that on, and I could not have crept away behind that one's back. I had to get back and report what had happened - a shuttle or whatever of the invaders could be on the way to New Plymouth as I huddled in that ruin! At first light I cautiously emerged from my shelter - there was no sign of life at all - and retrieved my bike. It was then that I noticed with a leap of pleasure that Cally's bike as gone. I pedalled as fast as I could sustain all day and impatiently stopped off at an abandoned truck-stop at night. About the middle of the next day I reached the outskirts of New Plymouth.
"All was quiet and I skirted round the town. As I pedalled up the track towards the farm I was getting slower and slower, not wanting to have to face everyone. I pulled into the yard and Cally and Lynch were there, talking earnestly. Cally ran up and looked as if she was about to hug me, but she hesitated and instead punched me on the arm. Lynch looked very sombre. They had already called a meeting for next morning to discuss the next move. Cally had of course told them about the disaster. At least we did not appear to have been followed.
"People began to arrive early, and eventually there were a dozen of us including Butch in his capacity as liaison officer for the bikers. Cally had already done the hard work and explained what had happened; she told the story again, looking towards me occasionally and all I had to do was nod to confirm what she said. At the end there was a lively discussion about what we would do. I proposed that we stay put, gather all the weapons we could, train, and fortify the farm-houses. That was debated, voted on, and defeated.
"Someone else suggested we move en masse to the hills for safety. That was voted down too. Then an older guy called Hendricks suggested we disperse, abandon the farms, and make our own way to wherever we thought fit. That was voted down by everyone else to one, and Hendricks nearly got punched. Cally jumped up and said that any strength we had was in numbers, and did anyone else have any ideas? A hesitant suggestion that we join up with the bikers was also voted down. Everyone looked disenchanted with the whole process and the meeting was winding down to an unsatisfactory end when one of the younger guys, Garry Lucas, said that we needed more information. How many of the invaders were there? How many people survived the plague? Was there an organised resistance? Was there a way to get machinery going? None of us knew. He then proposed gathering a group of scouts, equipping them with the best kit we had, and sending them out to see what they could find. They would avoid the invaders and any survivors that looked hostile and contact any friendlies they encountered. This was seized on by the group as a good idea, largely because there was nothing else positive coming out of the meeting. Lucas was delegated to get things organised, and along with Stacey Hodges, a touchy and quarrelsome woman who lived the same place Rice did - I mean had - and Bert Abbott, a sensible salt-of-the-earth type that I think had sold insurance before the invasion, was given the power to request any help or a loan of any equipment they might need. There was no thought given to what sanctions might be placed on anyone who declined.
"Within a week another meeting was called. The scout team was ready. Garry Lucas and Stacey Hodges were going, as were two more I didn't know - Lori Mendez, and a guy called Errol Slade, which sounded like a made-up name to me and who had been part of the biker group and had volunteered to help. He was definitely an ex-military type although he denied it. Bert wasn't going but was in charge of organisation. He'd done well, and the four looked the part. They showed off their kit to the meeting. They all had full sets of camo uniforms of various unmatched types, plenty packs and pouches, foil blankets, water purification tablets, mess gear, and so on, all from the camping and hunting stores in town. They also were well armed and it seemed as if the bikers had taken their part in this seriously and really come up with the goods. They proposed to leave as soon as they could. Everyone pitched in with luxuries and in a couple of days they left, loaded with smokes, cookies and who knows what. It was a special day for us all. I think the people leaving really felt wanted and valued. Those of us staying behind felt we'd lost something, taken a step into the dark, and also gained something - a sense of community.
"Maybe cynically, I decided to call another meeting the day after they'd gone. I hoped to push through the idea of making the place defensible. This time it was passed in a strangely subdued gathering. We agreed to pool our ammunition and weapons and dish it out evenly; to set up a rota for look-outs so that there was always someone watching each of the main roads into the area; and to devote some time to building simple bunkers for the lookouts. When we put this into action someone handed in a flare-gun with a few flares, which the lookouts would get, and another guy, Matt Gonzalez, had been digging about in Jim's repair shop and found a real treasure. It was a hand-cranked siren, maybe from when the old fire house was torn down. With a bit of work he got it going and when it was set up on the roof of my barn, which was a handy look-out point, it could be heard for miles now that there was no traffic noise, no airplanes, no TV or radio to compete with it.
"None of this was without disagreement, however. Naturally no-one enjoyed guard duty in the cold or the dark or the wet. I advocated building road-blocks of logs we found in the Davis barn. Bert Abbott in particular seemed quite cold on the idea, and one day when I suggested getting going he burst out - 'They can cross interstellar distances, defeat the US army, and nuke cities from orbit and you propose stopping them with logs?' It was hard to argue with that but I pressed ahead; it's not in my nature, but I shouted back and we both eventually laughed about it. The barricades went up, though."
Go to chapter four - http://www.spodilicious.com/dalek-invasion---chapter-4.html
Go back to chapter two - http://www.spodilicious.com/dalek-invasion---chapter-2.html
"All was quiet and I skirted round the town. As I pedalled up the track towards the farm I was getting slower and slower, not wanting to have to face everyone. I pulled into the yard and Cally and Lynch were there, talking earnestly. Cally ran up and looked as if she was about to hug me, but she hesitated and instead punched me on the arm. Lynch looked very sombre. They had already called a meeting for next morning to discuss the next move. Cally had of course told them about the disaster. At least we did not appear to have been followed.
"People began to arrive early, and eventually there were a dozen of us including Butch in his capacity as liaison officer for the bikers. Cally had already done the hard work and explained what had happened; she told the story again, looking towards me occasionally and all I had to do was nod to confirm what she said. At the end there was a lively discussion about what we would do. I proposed that we stay put, gather all the weapons we could, train, and fortify the farm-houses. That was debated, voted on, and defeated.
"Someone else suggested we move en masse to the hills for safety. That was voted down too. Then an older guy called Hendricks suggested we disperse, abandon the farms, and make our own way to wherever we thought fit. That was voted down by everyone else to one, and Hendricks nearly got punched. Cally jumped up and said that any strength we had was in numbers, and did anyone else have any ideas? A hesitant suggestion that we join up with the bikers was also voted down. Everyone looked disenchanted with the whole process and the meeting was winding down to an unsatisfactory end when one of the younger guys, Garry Lucas, said that we needed more information. How many of the invaders were there? How many people survived the plague? Was there an organised resistance? Was there a way to get machinery going? None of us knew. He then proposed gathering a group of scouts, equipping them with the best kit we had, and sending them out to see what they could find. They would avoid the invaders and any survivors that looked hostile and contact any friendlies they encountered. This was seized on by the group as a good idea, largely because there was nothing else positive coming out of the meeting. Lucas was delegated to get things organised, and along with Stacey Hodges, a touchy and quarrelsome woman who lived the same place Rice did - I mean had - and Bert Abbott, a sensible salt-of-the-earth type that I think had sold insurance before the invasion, was given the power to request any help or a loan of any equipment they might need. There was no thought given to what sanctions might be placed on anyone who declined.
"Within a week another meeting was called. The scout team was ready. Garry Lucas and Stacey Hodges were going, as were two more I didn't know - Lori Mendez, and a guy called Errol Slade, which sounded like a made-up name to me and who had been part of the biker group and had volunteered to help. He was definitely an ex-military type although he denied it. Bert wasn't going but was in charge of organisation. He'd done well, and the four looked the part. They showed off their kit to the meeting. They all had full sets of camo uniforms of various unmatched types, plenty packs and pouches, foil blankets, water purification tablets, mess gear, and so on, all from the camping and hunting stores in town. They also were well armed and it seemed as if the bikers had taken their part in this seriously and really come up with the goods. They proposed to leave as soon as they could. Everyone pitched in with luxuries and in a couple of days they left, loaded with smokes, cookies and who knows what. It was a special day for us all. I think the people leaving really felt wanted and valued. Those of us staying behind felt we'd lost something, taken a step into the dark, and also gained something - a sense of community.
"Maybe cynically, I decided to call another meeting the day after they'd gone. I hoped to push through the idea of making the place defensible. This time it was passed in a strangely subdued gathering. We agreed to pool our ammunition and weapons and dish it out evenly; to set up a rota for look-outs so that there was always someone watching each of the main roads into the area; and to devote some time to building simple bunkers for the lookouts. When we put this into action someone handed in a flare-gun with a few flares, which the lookouts would get, and another guy, Matt Gonzalez, had been digging about in Jim's repair shop and found a real treasure. It was a hand-cranked siren, maybe from when the old fire house was torn down. With a bit of work he got it going and when it was set up on the roof of my barn, which was a handy look-out point, it could be heard for miles now that there was no traffic noise, no airplanes, no TV or radio to compete with it.
"None of this was without disagreement, however. Naturally no-one enjoyed guard duty in the cold or the dark or the wet. I advocated building road-blocks of logs we found in the Davis barn. Bert Abbott in particular seemed quite cold on the idea, and one day when I suggested getting going he burst out - 'They can cross interstellar distances, defeat the US army, and nuke cities from orbit and you propose stopping them with logs?' It was hard to argue with that but I pressed ahead; it's not in my nature, but I shouted back and we both eventually laughed about it. The barricades went up, though."
Go to chapter four - http://www.spodilicious.com/dalek-invasion---chapter-4.html
Go back to chapter two - http://www.spodilicious.com/dalek-invasion---chapter-2.html
