Episode 309: In The Bayou, Part Two
We thank everyone all around and trek upslope to Reverend Jim’s. Some time in the past, someone made an effort to civilize this place. The path to the shuttle is paved with paving stones and there is evidence that at one point some effort had been made to put in tended flowerbeds bordering the way up and gardens here and there. A little playground sits off to the side. It’s all horribly overgrown now, though, as the bayou reclaims its own. The shuttle itself is a 30-tonner and though not spanking new, is reasonably maintained given its straitened circumstances and exudes an aura of genteel poverty.
We knock on the door. There’s movement within. A voice calls out woozily.
Reverend: Who’s awakened me?
There is a gaunt-ish older gentleman in a bow tie and a suit, a country preacherman. He blinks at us and says to himself:
Reverend: Strangers? We got strangers? Is it already January?
We tell him it’s November. And that our ship crashed in the swamp.
Reverend: Ohhhh….your ship crashed here. Well come in, Brothers and Sister. Come in.
He leads us into the main room of the shuttle. We see it’s a large shuttle converted to a home, it’s not well cleaned and it’s not filled with a ton of belongings. He hastily clears some clothing and moves some pots and pans around to make room for everyone. Looking around carefully, we notice he’s got protein packs and canned food, and they don’t look fifty years old. Perhaps they’re from the packages Howard mentioned the Reverend gets? The Reverend doesn’t have a protein texturizer, which is a mercy. He won’t get TSE.
He motions us to sit.
Reverend: Don’t often get visitors. But of course, you crashed, you weren’t here on your own providence. It was the Lord bringing you here. So, welcome. Welcome. Is there anything I can get you? I’m afraid I don’t have a lot in the way of amenities here. The town of Willow, they might be able to help you out.
Arden: I think we just need to find parts for our ship so we can be a little more punctual than we are now and we were hoping you could get us in communication with somebody who might be able to help.
Reverend: Well…I wish …I don’t think…. You’re welcome to use my transmitter. I don’t think it would do you much good. It takes a couple of hours to charge up. But usually by nightfall, it’s ready and perhaps we’ll be able to send a message out….I feel that a message sent from here might very well reach someone. My normal expectation is that usually it doesn’t reach over into the next town. We’re kinda in a low-landed area. But perhaps a ship will be flyin’ overhead and the Divine Lord will have that signal reach that ship and rescue you. If you’ll stay and pray with me and make it work.
Arden: (puzzled) How does… praying help radio signals?
Nika: (warning) Arden.
Reverend: Well, God…God works in all sorts of ways. Perhaps he will direct a pilot to fly the shuttle right over our signal.
Rick cuts to the chase. He tells Reverend Jim why we’re here.
Reverend: Oh. I’m not familiar with this Shepherd Faria. Is he another missionary in this area?
Rick: No, actually. He’s a visiting missionary on the moon.
Reverend: There’s somethin’ not right on that moon. Not sure what it is. But we’ve heard tell of some devilish goin’ on up there.
Rick: We’ve met another Shepherd from up there and—
Reverend: Beware of false voices!
And he quotes the pertinent verse from the Bible about false prophets.
Reverend: So you are a mission from the Shepherd?
Rick: Actually, we transported him here and dropped him off and we came back to pick him up.
Reverend: Perhaps he went to Shepherd’s Mission. Well perhaps his shuttle will be that the Lord will direct our signal to.
Rick: That would be great.
Throughout this conversation, Nika is whispering to Arden not to stir the man up. To which Arden protests he’s not, he only wants to ask a question. Nika rides herd on Arden anyway, and lets Rick handle the Reverend.
Rick: That would be the best thing.
Reverend: That would be wonderful. Now tell me—
Arden: An act of Divine Providence if there ever was one.
Looks like Nika wasn’t riding herd close enough. But the Reverend thankfully moves on.
Reverend: We all know the dangers that are out there in the swamp.
Arden: Catfish.
Reverend: Oh, my Brother. The catfish are the least of your worries. I’m talkin’ about the Devil. He’s in this very swamp and he’s been shacking up with the Mistress Queenie, they call her. Now I need your help. We need to save these poor people. You got a ship. We’ve got a signal. We just need to pull them out of the spell of that foul woman. Once we do, we’ll be set and you’ll be able to head back to your ships.
Arden: She worships some sort of…
Reverend: (singsong voice) I wo-oooonnnnn’t even sa-aaaaaaay with my-yyyy own voice the cra-aaaaazed things that she says. We must not speak of such things.
Arden: I was saying she worships the Divine Power. You worship the Divine Power—
Reverend: How dare you say we worship the same way she—it’s nothin’ the same.
Arden: Okay. I— I’m going to go back and check on our ship.
Arden makes his way outside. The Reverend says on about Queenie.
Reverend: I knew her when she was a young girl. She went to the Core and was corrupted. And when she returned, she was possessed.
Yeah.
Rick: So how long has she been back?
Reverend: Well, as I can say….I’d say maybe two, several years.
Rick: Have things been more darkness and despair here since she’s been back?
Reverend: Well, before she returned I was able to shepherd my humble flock as best I could and the children were right educated in the ways of the Lord. But since she’s showed up, she’s put such a fear into these otherwise good people, and I may say she’s also perhaps tempted some of them into more dark ways as well. Both of which has done….I know there is no irreparable harm beyond the Power of the Lord. BUT. I fear sometimes for their souls that perhaps they will die unsaved after the damage she and her kind have caused.
Outside, Arden inspects the children’s playground.
Rick: I understand that she’s got an army of zombies. Or some zombie servants of some sort?
Reverend: The Good Book is somewhat vague on what sort of creatures these may be. I suspect that they …I don’t know. Perhaps truly living men driven mad by her craziness, her evil. Or perhaps, perhaps even that the Dark Lord has imbued human flesh with life beyond death. I thought I knew what could be here when I… what could be in this great ’Verse, but I’m, I’m not certain of that. And if perhaps you know a Shepherd who come s from a bigger church he may know more of what the cause is here.
Rick: Does anyone interact with her?
Nika: They all seem afraid of her.
Rick: I mean, they’re scared of her and they give, they leave, like, trinkets and stuff in places so that she won’t hex the town. But does she try to come out and talk to the people? Or does she stay where she’s at?
Reverend: Well, she ….has come to town. The Good Lord has protected my residence from her invasions but she has put one on all of them. She has—when the young girls reach the bloom of womanhood, she takes them away….
She’s taking the girls?
Reverend: I’m afraid to know what she does to them but…
Rick: But they come back?
Reverend: She brings them back but they’re changed afterwards and there have been other accounts where she has demanded things.
The Reverend’s voice goes quiet.
Reverend: Sacrifices and such of the people…It is truly—
Rick: What kind of sacrifices?
We are all thinking of the threshing room floor at the sugar mill.
Rick: Animal or human?
Reverend: If my hands were stronger, they would not have. Her—you must forgive me. I’m an old man and I’m not able to defend my flock with physical force. I pray for their souls all day. She….Most of them are animals she has them butcher and perhaps drink the blood, or spread the blood around the house…It is…but you can trust me it is pure evil whatever it is.
Rick: But sometimes there are human sacrifices?
Reverend: I haven’t heard of a human being— ofa man being killed by…well we are only few, a few here. It wouldn’t surprise me if she lured a man into worse than death, into spiritual corruption.
Rick: I’d like to try to speak to one of the women who’s disappeared and come back.
One of the girls that Queenie took and returned changed.
Reverend: I think you’ll find them close-mouthed about it. But you are of course, welcome. I do my best to…to bring them to…to the Light. But…the last year I seen nary a one cross my threshold. But I try every night. I broadcast both on my radio and on my little amplifier here the Word of the Lord and my hope is that they will hear it and that someone will be turned.
Rick: All right. Well, we’ll see what we can do about Queenie.
The Reverend’s voice grows even softer.
Reverend: I implore you to move carefully. She has great reach. Don’t speak of them to any other.
Rick: (seriously) I wouldn’t.
Reverend: I have …they are not well educated and they fear that the power of the Lord may protect me from them, but they may not believe that about you. If you give them reason to be afraid of you, they may…well…
Rick: I feel that we’ll be protected by the Power of the Lord.
Reverend: Let us pray.
Rick: I am one of the messengers of Shepherd Faria and so I have helped work many good deeds. And this could be one of the good deeds. This could be another good deed.
Reverend: All right.
Reverend Jim takes out his tattered Bible and for fifteen minutes or so leads us through a short sermon. Rick pays attention, makes an effort to convince the Reverend that he’s on his side, a believer. Rick’s showmanship skills stand him in good stead here. The Reverend is happy to believe that Rick is as he seems, going on in the sermon as how Rick was brought to the land by Divine Will to rid the area of a great evil and so forth and so on.
At the end of the sermon, Rick suggests that we will try to open trade relations with the people of the area and by doing so, try to persuade them to listen to the Reverend’s words. The Reverend doesn’t seem too excited about the idea and we get the idea that the little influence he as over the people is from the care packages he receives. If we opened up the area to trade….well. That would be the end of what little influence he has here. The Reverend doesn’t say this as such, but we get the impression anyway.
To repair any damage by his gaffe, Rick emphasizes we do have a doctor with us and he may be able to check out the children and make sure they’re healthy. The Reverend again is lukewarm in his reception of the idea, holding the children’s spiritual well being to be more important than transitory flesh.
Rick asks the Reverend why the rule against having the power on exists.
Reverend: It’s so she can stop me from sending my message. But I do not obey those rules. I answer to a Higher Power.
Rick: (whispers to Nika) Shit. We turned the power off on our ship.
Reverend: The people are…they’re ignorant and many of them believe the original colony was lost because of some sort of power issues and she’s taken advantage of that.
Nika: What kind of power issues?
Reverend: Well, I was just a young man when that all happened. And then as I recall I was the voice of reason that was trying to protect all the colonists from themselves but greed and lust and all the other weaknesses had burrowed their way into the minds of the good folk of Willow…and now what we have left? You’ve seen the tattered remains of the once proud colony. Perhaps if they’d turned to the Book earlier, none of that would have happened. Whether it was a generator destroyed or…I don’t know.
Nika: What did they believe was going on with the power?
Reverend: Well, at one point a harvest was destroyed by a plague and some people believed it was because of the vibrations made by the generator that summoned the plague but I know that it was not the vibrations. It was the sin that summoned the plague.
Rick: What was the plague?
Reverend: Ants.
Rick: So…you’ve never seen the ants again?
Reverend: Oh, I have on occasion have had to deal with them but… (shrugs).
Rick: Hopefully we won’t have to run into any ants.
Reverend: Well, you can’t help it, a few ants. Now that people just fish and pull fruits and such, it’s not….but back when they was growing sugar and all, that was a different story.
Nika: I bet that required a lot of machinery.
Reverend: More importantly, when a big thing of ants come running on your sugar….
Yup. Ants in the sugar can ruin your day.
Nika: I s’pose that’s true enough. How do you handle yours when you have a problem.
Reverend: What’s that?
Nika: Does the power you use for your transmitter cause you a problem?
Reverend: It wasn’t the power. It was the sin.
Rick: When you have ants, how do you deal with them?
Reverend: I sprinkle some acid and that seems to take care of them.
Good to know.
Rick: Thank you. We will be back by to talk to you later and see if we can get a signal out tonight.
Nika: The gentleman in town said it might be better on a full moon?
Reverend: Well, yeah, it seems my voice reaches furthest when the moon is full and overhead.
Nika: He seemed to mention a town name and I wasn’t sure.
Reverend: It has been some time since I’ve traveled from town to town. My leg isn’t much good anymore so I don’t do much travel.
Nika: I’m sorry to hear that.
Rick: Are the towns that are close by, are they bigger towns? Do they have more people in them?
Reverend: Well, there are some that’re a mite bigger and some that are hardly even towns, just a house or two…About the same.
Rick: Thank you.
And Rick and Nika thank the man and take their leave. Nika finds Arden and together the three of them go back down the slope to the town of Willow to find Howard. He seemed amenable to transporting them around.
Nika: (chuckling) Howard is all interested in what we might be able to give him.
And they catch up with the man in question. Rick opens the conversation as we set off in his boat.
Rick: So, Howard.
Howard: Yeah.
Rick: You think you can bring us to our ship?
Howard: I ’spect. I didn’t see exactly where it went down but I think I can get you there in my boat.
Rick tries explaining where we landed, based on his knowledge of tracking through the wilderness.
Howard: Now, we don’t really deal with credits so much. We mostly trade and barter’n such.
Arden: I think we got that.
Howard: Yeah.
Rick: So, you have a family?
Howard: Eh, yeah.
Rick: You got kids?
Howard: Got kids, yeah.
Rick: I only ask in case, you know, anyone in your family is potentially in need of medical attention.
Because Arden is, you know, a doctor.
Howard: No, we’re all goin’ on pretty strong. You got ammo? We could use ammo. That’s not somethin’ we c’n make here. They charge us an arm’n’a leg fer, you know, one clip or more. Or a handfull’a bullets. So if you have ammo, we’d be happy to trade ya for that. An’ eat all the fish you want, or anything. An’ lessee….what else? Got knives? Any knives or anythin’ to be used fer knives?
Rick: There might be something we can do.
With all the scrap and metal aboard and with Rina and her machine shop? There’s something that can be done, surely.
Howard: If you got any explosives…?
Nika: We don’t have any explosives, sorry.
Howard: Yeah, cuz when them sugar snaps get goin’, they get pretty scary.
Rick and Arden together: Sugar snaps?
Howard: Yeah. The turtles.
Arden: No?
Rick: You want explosives for the turtles and not for the catfish?
Howard: Oh, catfish. Yeah, they’ll work for them, too.
Nika gets it first and she starts to laugh.
Rick: How big do the turtles get around here?
Howard: Oh, I dunno. Mebbe three, four time this boat?
Meanwhile, back at the Gift, Rina’s waiting for the ants to leave now that the power has been turned off and the damned little buggers are sticking around. In fact, they begin to move to the parts of the ship where the equipment will retain a charge when the power is off, especially those sections that have an electromagnetic charge. Like our entire pulse train. Depending on the massing of the ants, they can overheat the system. Ants also have formic acid which may not be beneficial to our ship’s workings and the damned things might be chewing on the wires to boot. And they’re burrowing through the insulation in those parts of the hull that are insulated.
We’re just going to have to accept that fact that we’ve got ants until we can get the ship fumigated. Again. Which fact has Rina fuming.
Rina has Joshua seal up the hole in our bow to keep the swamp out of our ship, if not the ants—being just a millimeter wide, there are plenty of places they can try to enter our ship by.
Rina’s on the bridge and keeping an eye on things and damned if that beaver hill of sugar cane over there didn’t somehow get closer to the ship. Is it possible a beaver lodge could come loose from its base and float free? She points it out to Joshua. He doesn’t quite believe it.
Joshua: No. No. No…..no.
Rina: How big was the whale that swallowed Jonah?
She looks again. It’s a subtle movement, to be sure, and we’re not talking Gamera here, but still….the dang hill is moving.
Joshua: I think it moved, but I don’t think it moved very much.
Maybe so, but it was moving toward us.
Joshua: All right, let’s just keep an eye on it.
Rina slaps some duct tape onto the deck, stands on the mark thus made and sights through the bridge window at the floating hill, and starts calculating its trajectory on the window with her grease pencil. Just like someone tracking a plane on the plotting board. And of course Karma, being the fickle tease that she is, arranges it so nothing happens for a long enough time that Rina and Joshua are more than halfway convinced they’d imagined the whole thing.
After all, they’d been working all day in a hot jungle-y swamp, for cryin’ out loud.
Until they see some ripples spreading out from one of the ‘hills’ in the water. And it seems to move forward for a couple of feet. It’s about the size of a mini-van and it’s covered with sugar cane. Rina sights down her outstretched arm like an artist at her easel, plants her feet on the tape, and makes another mark on the bridge window. She starts musing aloud about the math of it: trajectories, speed in the water vs. time and distance traveled…
Joshua: Rina…Rina…
Rina: (distracted) What?!
Joshua: No. No, no, no. It’s moving. We don’t really need to know what its velocity is or which way it’s moving. It’s moving.
Rina: Do we have any grenades?
Joshua: Do I have any grenades. (Not really a question.)
Rina: I said ‘we’.
Joshua: I doubt it!
Rina: (with a growl) I keep telling the Captain to get grenades.
Joshua’s still out there in the water, with those moving ‘things’, and taking it rather well. He seems more alarmed by Rina’s behavior than independently moving geological features.
Rina: Get in here.
Joshua: Yes, ma’am.
And he scrambles in. When he gets to the bridge he picks up the conversation where they’d left off.
Joshua: We’re still not finished.
Rina: It’s not going to make any difference. The ants are already aboard the ship.
Joshua: It doesn’t mean that we’re not—
Rina: (heatedly) Look, we can’t do anything now. We don’t have the parts.
Joshua: (backing off) Okay, okay. That’s what I meant—
Rina: And I don’t want you falling into the water and becoming some happy meal for a—whatever that thing is.
Joshua: …(shuts up)
Joshua and Rina settle on the bridge to watch whatever those things are. After a while from the corner of the eye, one notices a smaller hillock of sugar cane is moving through the water too. This one’s the size of an old VW Beetle and it’s moving at a decent clip. It’s sideways to the original one sighted. And the smaller one has what looks to be a tail the size of an elephant’s trunk whipping side to side in the water behind it.
Joshua’s frankly fascinated by it all, like a kid at the zoo or on safari for the first time.
Joshua: That’s really cool…
Rina: (not so much!) A village could eat on that for a week.
Joshua: That’s really cool…
And on that comment, they both see the “little” one submerge below the surface, right in front of their eyes.
Joshua: (wonderingly) Wow….that’s really amazing.
Rina: Well, I suppose in the Land of Oz everything grows bigger. (Heavy sigh) I hope they’re vegetarian.
Joshua: Well? We’re inside.
Inside the ship, he means. Then:
Joshua: What eats metal, really? Like…?
Rina: (Dear God, no) Ohh, don’t go there. Please, don’t go there, Joshua. We already have ants.
Joshua: We’re good. So what can we do, stuck inside the ship?
Rina: Now that’s a loaded question now, isn’t it?
Joshua: Repair wise. Repair wise. Repair wise, what can we do?
Rina: I know. I’ll call the….I need to warn the others.
Joshua: About what? Moving hills?
About the moving hill/swamp monsters. Not…um…yeah. And it’s a moot point anyway—without our power on, our hand comms range is limited by battery strength. Rina won’t be getting though to them until they come closer.
And at the away party’s end, Arden is unsuccessful at raising the Gift, because her power’s off and her beefier comms system is offline. Either Rina forgot that line from Arden about his calling back in an hour and a half, or she’s too busy to answer the comm.
Arden: I hope nothing’s wrong. Something’s wrong.
Nika: I take it they didn’t tell them about the hour and a half mark?
Arden: I’m sure I did, but they didn’t answer.
Nika: So you tried to call and nobody answered?
Arden: You think they made up?
Nika: We’re humped. We’re always humped when our lives are on the line.
And that sets of a brief spate of salacious speculation as to what Joshua and Rina are up to. It dies quickly when Rick asks Howard about Queenie and the conversation turns serious again. After all, Rina and Joshua are big kids and should be able to take care of themselves, right?
Howard: It’s best jes’ to work with me an’ I’ll do my best t’keep her away from you, so you don’t have to worry about it.
Rick: So you’ve talked to her?
Howard: I wouldn’t say I talked to her, but…she’s a special girl and it’s best to jes’ not get on her bad side.
Rick: Oh yeah. I don’t want to get on Queenie’s bad side.
Arden: I don’t want to get on any woman’s back si—bad side.
Howard: Yeah, I hear’ya, but this’un’s a mite diff’rent than most. Jes’ a natural scorn you might gain. (to Nika) No offense.
Nika swats Arden for that snarky comment of his and Howard nods knowingly.
Howard: See? See how easily they are offended? Now give her superpowers, an’ that’s how it works.
No arguing that. Nope. No, sirree. Nuh-uh.
After about an hour, the party encounters the downed trees the Gift snapped off in passing and soon the Gift herself comes into view. Howard squints into the distance and slows the boat, then stops.
Howard: Aw, hell….
Arden: (warily) What?
Howard: See there’s a bump covered with sugar cane? Yeah. That’s one’a them there sugar snaps. We need to—
Arden: That’s a turtle?
Nika: What?
Howard: That’s a monster ’uv’a turtle.
Arden: (bowled over) That’s a…a big turtle.
Howard: Right.
Nika: Wait. They grow things on their backs?
Howard: They might. They’re purty big.
Arden: I don’t think they grow things on their backs, I think things grow on their backs. They don’t grow things on their backs. Things grow on their backs.
Howard: Well, some think that they grow stuff on their backs specifically to lure prey, what for bites an’ all.
Arden: I …. can’t imagine wanting to eat sugar cane that bad.
Howard: Well…(shrugs) Lotsa animals like the sugar stuff. Rats an’ stuff.
Arden: We can go up and….They’ll leave us alone, won’t they?
Meaning the sugar snaps.
Rick: You think they can damage the ship?
Howard: No. Well…..I ’unno. It’s a big ship.
Howard’s looking a little stunned, actually, and it’s obvious this is the first spaceship he’s really seen.
Howard: No. Well…I reckon that’s metal. That’s probably really strong, but…uh…they might damage my boat.
Rick: We’ve already crossed that river without anything before and we may be able to do it again.
Howard: Okay…let’s see if I can’t take us on a bittuva wide path…
He guides the boat to the engines, near the aft transverse corridor and the hatches there.
Howard: They prob’ly won’t go underneath the ship. They ain’t much fer tight spaces.
Arden tries raising Rina and Joshua again via hand com. This time he gets through, being close enough for the battery powered range.
Rina: Rina. Go.
Arden: You know our ship is surrounded by turtles?
Rina: No shit.
Arden: Oh, so you noticed.
Rina: Are you here?
Arden: Yeah, we’re—
Rina: Do you need to board?
Arden: Yeah, we’re—
Rina: Where?
Arden: Listen. We’re outside. What I would like you or Joshua to do is to get some sort of protein paste the turtles will find palatable—
Nika: (can’t believe this) Oh, my goodness, we’re feedin’ the turtles.
On board, Joshua looks askance at Rina’s comm.
Joshua: What is he doing?
Rina: (can’t believe this) He wants us to feed the fuckin’ turtles.
Arden can hear every word they’re saying.
Arden: But I want you to add a sedative from the med bay that I’m going to tell you where it is.
Nika: What? You want us to sedate the ruttin’ turtles?
Rick: How much sedative will take that thing out?
Arden: I don’t know.
Rina: (accent getting thick) How long were you veterinarian?
Arden: Then shoot the turtles then. I don’t care.
Rina: My pleasure.
Joshua: Hey, hey, hey…. Let’s not shoot the turtles.
Rick: I think it might just piss them off.
The man’s got a point. Rina shoves the comm at Joshua.
Rina: You reason with him.
Joshua: (to Arden) We’re not shooting the turtles.
Rick: We do have the ship-mounted weapons.
Joshua: Hey wait, why are you shooting the turtles? I thought you were Nature Boy.
Rick: I’m just sayin’ if we had to shoot the turtles, we’d have to use ship-mounted weapons.
Joshua still doesn’t get it and the others outside explain they’re afraid the turtles will hurt the boat they’re in. Rick suggests that since they’re beside the ship now, if someone could come to the Gift’s top hatch and throw a rope or something…..
Nika: (fed up) Just let us in.
Rina: I’m on it.
She opens the top hatch, secures a rope and throws it down to the crew. They climb aboard. Problem solved.
Nika: (to Rina) Good Lord, thank you.
Howard mentions that the turtles are likely just interested in what the ship stirred up when she landed here. Like if she killed somethin’n such. We should just wait, but he’s not going to wait around.
Rick: Will you come back tomorrow?
Howard: Sure, I’ll come back tomorrow.
Arden: Are the turtles good eating?
Howard: Uh, yeah. Small ones. Pretty good.
Arden: What about the big ones.
Howard: (chuckling) Well, I ain’t ever seen somebody eat a big one. I reckon you can, an’ I’ll be happy t’join ya on that feast.
Rina: What do we owe you for bringing the rest of the crew back?
Howard: Oh, we’ll figger somethin’ out.
Rick: All right. Sounds good.
They settle on a time shortly after daybreak, if that’s all right with everybody. It is.
Howard: You c’n git out whatever you feel like you wanna trade and whatever you want.
And after introductions are made all around before the man leaves.
Howard: All right. I’ll try an’ get my best stuff out.
We see him off and thank him for the ride. Once we all climb aboard the Gift, the catching up starts in earnest.
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