Nadine was gone.
Plato assumed she was heeding nature’s call, and went about starting their fire. When it was lit, and the kindling was snapping and popping and filling the air with smoke, he stood and called her name several times.
No response.
Plato began circling the camp, increasing his radius with each sweep, shouting for her. He couldn’t understand it. If there had been trouble he would have heard her fire a shot or scream. What could have happened?
After hours of fruitless searching he returned to the flickering flames and collapsed, an emotional wreck. She was gone! Nadine had vanished from the face of the earth without a trace.
Plato never did find her. He returned to the Home and organized a search party. They returned and scoured the countryside for sign, any trace of what might have transpired. Not a hint. Plato remained despondent for the better part of a year. In his heart he never recovered from her loss, and he could not bring himself to reach out for another woman after the tragedy.
Plato sighed. Yes, he could sympathize with Jenny. But he could not permit his personal feelings to inhibit his deductive reasoning. He stared up into her green eyes. “I’m sorry. I will oppose any motion to send a Healer with the Alpha Triad. With them gone, we will require every able-bodied man and woman to assume additional duties. Our security forces will be seriously depleted. We can’t spare another person to accompany them.”
Jenny slowly nodded her head in silent agreement, turned, and walked to a far corner of the chamber. She sat down on the farthest cot and placed her face in her hands.
Plato looked down at the cement floor. If anything did happen to Blade, if the Alpha Triad did not return, he would never be able to forgive himself. He doubted too whether Jenny would ever forgive him.
Sometimes, he reflected, the trials of leadership were an oppressive burden.
“This is great, pard,” he overheard Hickok saying to Geronimo. “Just think of it! The first of the Family to see the world! Who knows what we’ll find out there!”
Quite probably, Plato reflected, your death.
Chapter Four
Funny thing about clouds. They swept in out of nowhere, passed over the countryside devouring all living flesh in their path, and then disappeared as mysteriously as they materialized. Their passing was swift and deadly.
Family records of the clouds, kept since that first cloud had killed Carpenter and nearly decimated the Family, indicated that the clouds would completely pass over the Home within two hours of their first sighting. Add another two hours as a safety cushion, a precaution against a break in the breeze, and invariably it would be safe for the members of the Family to emerge from their shelters and resume their daily lives.
Slightly over four hours after the cloud was first spotted, Plato led those in C Block above ground.
The latest cloud was gone, the sky a clear blue, birds singing, the trees wafting in the wind.
Plato sent two Family members to inform the other Blocks that it was safe to come up.
“So when are you going to tell us,” Hickok asked Plato, “about this secret way we’re going to bring all of the supplies back from the Twin Cities?”
“As soon as the entire Family is present,” Plato answered. They had badgered him for the better part of two hours, demanding to know. He had refused to divulge the information, preferring that the whole Family should experience the thrill and the surprise together.
Within ten minutes the Family was assembled. Plato raised his arms to draw everyone’s attention; then, for the benefit of those who had sought shelter in the other Blocks, he reviewed the details of the plans he had unveiled in C Block. He closed with: “It is imperative that the Family permit these four men to endeavor to reach the Twin Cities. The future, our future, depends on what they uncover.”
“I agree with you, Plato,” a lean, elderly man said. “But there is one point you’ve neglected. How will the Alpha Triad bring back the equipment you want? You can’t be intending to send some of our horses with them.”
There was a murmur in the group. The horses were among the more valuable Family possessions. They were carefully tended to and kept in prime health. A special ramp under F Block, the Block nearest the fields, enabled the Tillers to hasten the horses to safety at the first hint of danger from an approaching cloud or any other source. The horses were the only domestic animals the Family retained. The few dogs, cats, cows, and chickens Carpenter had stocked and intended for his progeny to continue raising had long since perished.
“We are not using any of the horses on this enterprise,” Plato assured them.
“Then how…?” someone began.
Plato waved for them to follow and walked to E Block. The Blocks were clustered in the western half of the Family plot. They were arranged in a triangular fashion. Furtherest south, the point of the isosceles formation, was A Block. In a northwesterly line, one hundred yards distant, was B
Block. C Block was one hundred yards northwest of B Block, and the closest Block to the drawbridge in the center of the western wall. D Block was one hundred yards due east from C Block, and E Block another one hundred yards due east of D Block. Turning abruptly southwest, F Block was one hundred yards distant, and the triangle was completed one hundred yards further by A Block. The eastern half of the Home was devoted exclusively to agriculture and was maintained in a natural state where the soil wasn’t tilled. Just east of the Blocks were several rows of small log cabins, the individual domiciles of the married Family members.
The outer wall, and the moat, encircled the entire Home. Plato stopped at the southern entrance of E Block.
“What are we doing here?” a woman asked. “It’s the library.”
On ground level, each Block was utilized in a specific capacity. A Block was the armory, B Block the sleeping quarters for single members, C Block the infirmary, D Block was the carpentry shop and general construction area, and F Block was devoted to preserving and preparing food and storing farm supplies.
“The library and more,” Plato said, pointing at the ground.
“Yeah,” agreed one man. “A survival chamber.”
Plato smiled. “I am not pointing at the ground directly under E Block. I am indicating the ground directly in front of this doorway.”
“What for?” someone asked.
Plato was enjoying himself. He saw their puzzled, perplexed expressions and restrained an urge to laugh. He wondered if it would still be useable after all this time, after being stored for a century? Carpenter had had top engineers work on the special room. Their job had been to insure that it remained airtight, that the contents would be operational whenever the Family needed what was in there. “Will several of you go to F Block and bring back a half-dozen shovels?” he requested, and ten Family members hastened to comply.
While they waited, Plato leaned against the wall and rested. He spotted Blade in the crowd. The Alpha leader was staring at someone else. Plato followed Blade’s line of vision, expecting it would be Jenny, wondering if she was still distraught. Instead, Blade was watching Joshua! Joshua, attired in his usual faded brown pants and green shirt, was standing quietly in the midst of the crowd, his hands folded in front of him. His brown eyes were downcast, his facial expression serene. His brown hair, grown long, draped across his shoulders. He had adorned his face with a full beard and moustache. Plato knew the identity of Joshua’s childhood hero, and he understood why the sixteen-year-old Robert had adopted Joshua at his Naming. That thought provoked memories of Plato’s own Naming.