Chapter XI

A Warning

It took longer than he had originally thought to make it to the main gates, but was surprised that the three had not left, although by the look on Dave’s face, it wasn’t an intentional decision to wait for this long. Combine that with the way Barca’s horse was jittering about, made it apparent to the commander what the hold-up was. Although he didn’t blame Barca, he was not a great rider himself, and unless you had some experience in it, which both Dave and Abi had, it was very easy to make a fool out of yourself. He chose however, not to say anything on their late departure as he walks up to them.

“Ah, look who decided to come see us off. It's nice of you Codsworth but we'll be back by the evening.” Barca said, he was already saddled up, although he was glad that the commander had not seen his earlier attempts. Both Dave and Abi had gotten onto their mounts with ease, it had taken him almost ten minutes to get it right and was the main reason for their late departure.

“Don't flatter yourself, I've been asked to guard this stretch of the perimeter.” Codsworth said, it was the truth, this was the stretch that he had been assigned to, but he still needed to speak to Barca, and get a full debrief about the previous evening. But the lieutenant seemed to want to get going, or at least his horse did, as it seemed to get tired of waiting and began to walk off towards the gates, until Barca got the animal under control.

“Well then as you’re not going to give us a goodbye kiss, we'll be off.” Barca said as he rode out through the large northern gates, the southern gates only lead into the mountains and were completely barren of huntable life. However, Codsworth noted that the horse seemed to still be making a lot of the decisions about where they were going.

“Just bring us back something good, we haven't eaten properly since we left Brutus' place.” Codsworth said, they hadn’t had a lot yesterday, just some leftovers, from the previous occupants of the house which, come to think on it, was probably a main factor on why Jak had become drunk so easily and quickly.

“We'll try.” Abi said as she followed Barca out of the gates and into the wilderland. She was about to voice her concerns until Dave blurted them out.

“That's the problem with hunting, Codsworth. You never know what you'll find.” Dave said following the pair out of the gates and rapidly taking the lead in the hunt.

Codsworth nods as the trio ride out of the gates, whilst Barca was theoretically in charge of that group, the commander was under no illusions as to who would be calling the shots whilst out of the walls, he just hoped that Abi could keep Dave from getting herself and Barca into too much trouble whilst outside these walls. Before he remembered that there was plenty of trouble inside the walls, as well.

It was about an hour into his patrol that something finally happened, he was so bored that he was secretly hoping that these thugs would take a crack at him, which is why it came as a shock when the first person who came up to him was an elderly man, Briger Formo by the looks of him, someone who had spent most of the past half century on the streets, walks up to him, looking with a concerned expression on his elderly and weathered face.

“What is it?” Codsworth asked, as the elderly man walked over, it took several minutes longer than if Codsworth had just walked over himself.

“I overheard something sir, concerning a lad that you were traveling with.” Briger said in a croaky voice, as if the man had not spoken for months and this was the first time that he was using his vocal cords.

“What about the lad?” Codsworth said, he didn’t use Jack’s name, just in case this elderly man was fishing for answers to questions set by the thugs. Whilst he doubted that they were smart enough to send a lacky to get the information that they needed, he was not stupid enough to assume anything about these men.

“The man he angered is out for his blood, as well as the other who intervened.” Briger said croaking once again, something about this man struck him as rather odd. He looked homeless, and yet they had been able to get into a house as soon as they arrived, the commander thought that the north-men would have prioritised their own, rather than a bunch of outsiders that they barely knew.

“Gods. Thank you for telling me this, you're free to go.” Codsworth said. but Briger only nodded and hobbled his way back down a deserted street leaving the commander alone once again, that was something else that was weird about this place, Bergskort was an average sized town, and yet he was the only one that was here. He was suddenly distracted by a noise from the nearest alley, Codsworth turned around and instinctively went for his gun, but then stopped and brought out the axe, he thought he probably looked very foolish to the person that was watching him, not knowing what weapon to draw for a time like this. “Hello?” Codsworth said to the empty alley, not expecting for anyone to answer, but to unnerve whoever it was that he was aware of their presence. As he expected however, nothing happened, so he continued along his patrol but with an almost certainty that he was being watched, why he was, he didn’t know, maybe to find out his route to see if it regularly considered with either Jack or Barca’s jobs, or maybe someone wanted to take a pot shot at him, either way, he would be ready for whoever it was. At that moment a small breeze causes Codsworth to panic, raising his axe to a defensive position as he began turn around and look around before turning back only to be staring into the face of Forest Mccoy.

“I sorry if I frighten you.” Forrest said as he took a few paces back so that they were at a more respectable distance, although the look in his eyes said something entirely different to the commander, it seemed to him that the governor was frightened off him, as if he was suddenly going to catch him doing something that would need dealing with. Whether it was his name or generally atmosphere, didn’t matter, the fact that the man seemed to be scared was more than enough for the old commander.

“Trust me, after all I've seen it takes a lot more than someone coming up from behind to scare me. Is there anything you need?” Codsworth said looking around, checking to see if he could spot the person or persons that he had suspected were spying on him whilst he talked to the old man.

“Nope, just checking that everyone is doing their part to keep us all safe.” Forrest said, he looked around at the deserted street before continuing. “Can’t be having anything like what happened in the imperial city now. “What with the former Mayor Osmund dead, one shudders at what could come next.” Forrest continued, which took Codsworth completely off guard, Osmund, dead. That surprised him as he was almost certain that the cowardly mayor would have been the first to try and evacuate.

“What. How?” Codsworth asked, he was interested in finding out, not because he had any love for the man who had effectively escalated a minor situation into a full-blown civil war, but because it would help him understand just how his homeland had fallen.

“No one knows. All I do know is. Is that he killed his top aid before his death, shot him right in the gut after he found out he had been working for the enemy.” Forrest said. Another surprise to Codsworth’s ears, the man was obviously talking about Eugene, the worm was the only person who fit the description. Although this news he took with absolute joy, the fact that that cockroach had met his end for his crimes against the city for the past gods know how many decades. Meant that there was some justice in this cruel world.

“Well, that’s good to know, and everything is good here.” Codsworth said, returning to his business-like tone, Forrest gives a smile that does not reach his cold eyes, which did nothing to ease the commander’s discomfort about this town. “Do you know anything about a group of five thugs. I heard they have been causing trouble, in fact, one of our own was attacked by them last night, at the inn?” Codsworth asked, now going fishing himself, as he had a shrewd suspicion that the reason why Idar had failed to do anything about these thugs, was standing right in front of him at this very moment.

“Yes. They’ve been causing us problems for some time now.” Forrest said with a mournful sigh, trying to act as a victim, but unlike Osmund, he wasn’t very good at it. “If you could get any actual evidence on them, then I’d see to it that they hang.” The governor finished.

“I understand you have an ammo shortage.” Codsworth said, intending to change the subject so that he was constantly on the attack, and by his own logic winning, that was something he had learnt back in Metropololis, even if you were spouting complete nonsense, the fact that you were the one who was asking the questions made it look like you are winning an argument to any potential onlookers. Fortunately, this was something that Forrest obviously didn’t subscribe to as he seemed content to be the one answering the questions rather than asking them

“We do, unfortunately, but it's to be expected, with the fall of the south and the dwarves shutting their gates, we have no-one else to buy more from.” Forrest responded. This seemed odd to the commander, whilst he had heard that the dwarves had shut their doors to all but their own, he had been under the impression that they were including north-men in that description. But, at least according to this man, they too were being excluded from using the wealth of the mountain.

“It's true then, the dwarves aren't letting anyone into the mountain?” Codsworth said, pretending to be ignorant of the matter, another tactic he had picked up back home. This did seem to make the governor happy however, ‘probably because he thought he knew something that he didn’t.’ Codsworth thought but allowed the man to continue.

“Not unless you have a good enough reason for them. Now I have urgent business to settle, if you'll excuse me.” Forrest said and walked off, leaving Codsworth wondering why he had come over to talk to him, if he had important business to settle, he pushed that to the back of his mind however, there was after all a more pressing matter. He had been unable to shake the feeling that he was being watched, and his conversation with Forrest had done nothing to alleviate that concern, he sighed, and continued on his patrol whilst he mulled things over in the back of his mind.

Out in the wilderland things were going about as well for Barca, as it had been for Codsworth in the city. He had never been a good rider, and the fact that he was being shown up by his two, more adept companions was making the situation worse. To compound the situation, he had found out that it was Dave’s first time riding a horse. However, he seemed to have taken to it like a duck to water. Although he had told him that he prefers to go out on foot, as apparently it made it a lot easier to track animals and people when a person was closer to the ground. He chose not to act on his thoughts about shooting the cocky teen off his horse and leaving him a ditch somewhere, however. As they needed his uncanny ability to track their dinner.

They had not yet been asked to bring back food for the whole town however, as due to the winter, there would be little enough out there to feed themselves. And most of the north-men would rely on their stores. But due to their recent arrival they had little enough in store as it was, and they didn’t feel comfortable asking to take food from the locals. As time would go on however, they all knew that they would be expected to surrender a portion of their catch for the town.

Barca heard his two hunting companions laughing up ahead, and rode to catch up, he guessed that he was the butt of the joke once again, his riding skills were seemingly very amusing to the pair. However, when he finally managed to catch up, his horse which had been so eager to leave the town was having problems catching its siblings, he found Dave having dismounted and was kneeling on the ground, examining a set of prints embedded onto the snow-covered plains.

“What is it?” Barca said, he was a good hunter to say the least, but only when he was withing sight of an animal. Tracking was a skill he did not possess, however.

“Deer. Most like, and close.” Dave said as he tied the reins of the horse onto a nearby tree and carried on, on foot, moving silently through the snow drifts as if they were not there. Barca and Abi on the other hand were more conspicuous, Dave turned around and shook his head, at this Barca really had to restrain himself from killing the teen.

Dave made no more remarks however, until they reached a small bit of woodland, where, standing in the shelter of the trees, the trio saw a deer eating what little grass there was underneath a tree.

“She’s all yours’s lieutenant.” Dave said quietly as he stepped aside and Barca moved forward with his gun raised. Both Dave and Abi raised their own guns, just in case the lieutenant missed, and the deer bolted.

Barca raised the gun and took aim, it was difficult as the snow underneath him, was making him rapidly lose the feeling in his feet. He pulled the trigger. And hit the deer dead on, striking it above the front leg. The animal fell to the ground and moved no more. The lieutenant smiled to himself, he wasn’t totally useless out here after all.

“Easy money.” Abi said as he got up, but Barca forced her back down, he had sensed something else in the clearing.

“What?” Abi said, annoyed at the shove. In response Barca simply pointed into the trees, initially they saw nothing. However, after a few moments a wolf came sniffing around the deer and began taking bites out of the fresh kill.

“Oh no you don’t.” Dave said to himself and aimed the gun and took aim at the wolf who was devouring their meal. Bringing the beast down with as much ease as Barca had done with the deer.

“Good shot.” Barca said as he heard what he imagines as other wolves scatter at the sight of their fallen comrade. Both Abi and Dave followed along behind, covering the lieutenant as he walked along towards the two slain animals.

“Do you think it’s safe to eat.” Dave said, referring to the deer, huge bite marks had been made into the animal’s skin, and he was worried if there were any potential diseases in the prey now that had been transferred from the wolf. Barca paused a minute before answering.

“Best not to try. We’ll take the wolf though, that should be safe.” Barca said as he hauled the beast up and carried it over to his horse, followed by Dave and Abi. As they mounted their horses, Dave thought he saw a strange black object in the distance. He was about to say something but chose not to. He may like being outside, but he was also hungry. So, he pushed the strange object out of his mind and rode off with the others back towards the small town in the distance.