Gleanings Read online

  Gleanings

  A Changed World, Volume 3

  Alice Sabo

  Published by Alice Sabo, 2018.

  Gleanings

  Copyright 2016 Alice Sabo

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to your favorite ebook retailer and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Gleanings (A Changed World, #3)

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Chapter 56

  Chapter 57

  Chapter 58

  Chapter 59

  Chapter 60

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  Also By Alice Sabo

  About the Author

  Chapter 1

  Biobots went from a pipe dream to property to monsters in a very short time. They were created as full grown adults. Raw information was instilled into their brains. At the physical age of one or two, they were sent into the workforce and expected to function at superior levels. I do not understand why people were surprised when these constructed beings started going mad.

  History of a Changed World, Angus T. Moss

  THERE IS A TERRIBLE sound that a crowd makes before it tips over into a lethal mob. Nick knew that sound from bitter experience. It raised his hackles and flooded his body with adrenaline as he shouldered through the people flooding the hallway. The newcomers had the residents of High Meadow outnumbered. The Watch was spread thin dealing with all the little incidents that happen when tired, hungry people get crammed into a small space.

  It took a second for him to realize he recognized a face he’d just passed, but when he turned the man was gone. He scanned the jostling bodies searching for whatever had triggered the vague sense of trouble. Further down the corridor, a man glanced over his shoulder and seeing Nick, he ducked into the next doorway. The growl of the mob kicked up a notch forcing Nick to deal with the obvious threat first.

  He arrived at the source in time to see a newcomer swing wildly at Wisp. His long white braid slid over one shoulder as he settled into a fighting stance. Anyone could see the power in his long lean muscles. His quiet strength made the sweaty, panting attacker look totally outclassed. The numbers tattooed down his neck were clearly visible making this a contest of biobot against human. Nick scanned the murmuring crowd to gauge the emotions. They were watching, teetering on the edge of fight or flight. He was about to step in when Martin tugged on his arm.

  “He doesn’t need any help,” Martin commented in an amused grumble. His brown eyes were bloodshot, and he needed a shave. The influx of new people was running them all ragged, but Martin looked like he hadn’t had a full night’s sleep in too long.

  Nick eyed the circle of wary, travel-worn faces that watched the encounter. Some had the heat of anger in their eyes, but he wasn’t sure if all that anger was aimed at Wisp. It could just be that they wanted to get past into the cafeteria. Nick wished he could read people the way Wisp could.

  The new guy swung again, but Wisp easily sidestepped the blow. And again. A few chuckles began to disperse the tension of the situation. Martin nodded and a group from the Watch mingled into the crowd asking questions and sending individuals off in different directions. The knot of anxiety and irritation unraveled as people got the attention they needed to solve their immediate needs.

  Since Angus had sent out the flyers inviting people in, the population at High Meadow had increased daily. Each new group of exhausted, starving, anxious people brought a new problem.

  Wisp slipped out of the crowd, a frown tightening his brow.

  “You okay?” Nick asked. Wisp was too pale. The muscles in his jaw were tight.

  “Yes.”

  His answer was a little too clipped for Nick’s liking. He put his hand on Wisp’s shoulder. “What started that?” he asked with a nod toward the thinning crowd.

  Wisp glanced at Nick’s hand but didn’t seem to object. “The usual. Some people hold a lot of anger and bitterness. When it’s aimed at me, that close, it’s hard to shut it out.”

  “I’m sorry.” Nick had already guessed the confrontation had something to do with the hatred and fear of biobots. It was one of those things that had fallen by the wayside as year after year of flu had changed all of their priorities. Zero Year had been open season on biobots. They had been shot down or lynched wherever mobs could find them. Then there were countless people dead, and the world was falling apart a little more every day. Survival was too important to care about hunting down a person that was supposed to be property. Any sane biobots without a safe placement went into hiding.

  But now they needed everyone left alive to work together just to make sure that humankind survived. Nick knew that most people thought biobots weren’t human. It was the propaganda of the time. They were biological robots, built not birthed and therefore couldn’t be human. That made it much easier to create an entire class of enslaved people. The politicians passed laws which had to be enacted by all the branches of law enforcement. It was the beginning of a very dark time in human rights. With enough money, the designers could create beings to order. It wasn’t until they’d been around for a few years that the problems began.

  “They will all have to get used to seeing biobots around here,” Nick said, knowing his words had no weight. “We need to talk to Angus about this.”

  Wisp gave him a skeptical look. “I can deal with it.”

  “You can. I’m more worried about Elsa and Dieter. They’re too little to fight back, and they’re too important to leave it to chance.” Nick led the way down the crowded hall wondering how the little Fonts were handling the crush of people.

  It didn’t feel natural. He wasn’t used to seeing so many people in one place. And from the looks he was catching, he wasn’t the only one. In all of his travels, he hadn’t seen any settlements as large as High Meadow was now.

  Angus’s office was full of people all talking at once. It was loud and chaotic and felt a hair trigger away f
rom a bare-knuckle fight. A shrill whistle split the air. Jean stepped up onto Angus’s desk.

  “Out! Everybody out right now!” Jean hollered above the grumbling. “Get out in the hall, and I will start a list of appointments.” She glowered at the shuffling crowd. “If you all yell at once, we won’t get anything done.”

  Enough people cleared out so that Nick could move in to offer her a hand down from the desk. She took his hand but jumped lightly to the floor. “Need help here?” he offered.

  “No, thanks.” She rolled her eyes. “They mean well. It’s just that there are so many of them all of a sudden.”

  “And it’s going to get worse,” Nick warned.

  Jean huffed out a sigh of frustration as she gathered a clipboard and a sheaf of papers.

  The last stragglers left the office, and Nick realized Angus wasn’t here. “Where is he?”

  “Try the map room. He told me that he’d be lying low until we could get some kind of system in place. Everybody wants to talk to him.”

  Nick glanced at Wisp to confirm Angus’s whereabouts.

  “I can’t help you,” Wisp said with a shrug. “I’m totally shut down with all these people around.”

  They left Jean sorting people by topic in the hallway and headed upstairs to the map room.

  Chapter 2

  With the physical infrastructure still mostly in place, that leaves food as the only true need for survival. Most people are willing to work for regular meals. But there are the dangerous few who feel they can just take it away from anyone weaker.

  History of a Changed World, Angus T. Moss

  TILLY NOW STARTED EVERY day climbing up the stairs to visit the map room. It was one of the smaller offices on the top level along the corridor that led to the chapel. Elsa and Dieter had collaborated to draw the map which took up an entire wall. The tiny biobots had needed special scaffolding built for them to reach it all. Dieter did the plotting from old maps and satellite images that were probably dangerously out of date. Elsa sketched out the territory that Angus indicated he wanted to control. They’d put High Meadow in the center. Holly Hill farm was the northwest border and Creamery the southeast border. The rest was a bucolic blur waiting for details. As reports rolled in from Martin’s men who were surveying, more sections were filled in with towns, streets and buildings, and what condition they were in.

  She was often amazed by what the men found. Like the moonshiner living up in the hills behind the school. She couldn’t imagine expending all that effort to grow the corn and not eat it. The man had been bartering barely enough for food to get by when the Watch made contact. Having a high-quality alcohol was important for the new herbal medicines that they were distilling, and he was glad to get the ample food High Meadow offered in return. Harlan had been more than happy to do the bartering, and probably some tasting as well. She had to admit to having had a tipple or two herself. They’d also found a gunsmith who’d been delighted to take up residence near their armory.

  With the refugees flooding in and the surveyors finding others, High Meadow’s resources were stretched thin. Tilly had thought they were rich after Holly Hill farm had agreed to join forces with them. But even with those supplies coming in, she worried about a hungry winter. How Trey had managed to keep the farm going on his own with just his twin nephews to help was a mystery to Tilly. If Wisp hadn’t stumbled on that farm when he did, grief might have taken Trey and left the boys on their own. That thought frightened her. It would have forced the twins out on the road, hopefully, to be collected by Ted on one of his journeys. The world kept changing no matter how hard she tried to stop it.

  One good point of having so many people coming in was that it gave them more hands than they needed here. She had sent six able adults over to the farm, and Trey had sent word he could use more. The same was true of Creamery. Last week, she’d sent an even dozen over to help Creamery set up its own Watch, and the old patriarch, Abel, had said they could take as much more. It was a relief to send these people on, but more took their place the next day.

  With so much planning and oversight required, Tilly was delegating a lot more work. Eunice and Mary ran the kitchen so smoothly together, she couldn’t have asked for a better pair. Others were stepping up to take over the day to day concerns of the settlement leaving Tilly the time she needed to try to keep a few steps ahead. Although it seemed like something new was always cropping up before she could finish sorting out the last catastrophe.

  They reached their capacity for housing people in the school building last week. Comfortable housing, she corrected herself. Frightened people didn’t mind sleeping on a safe, clean floor. Martin wanted to set up a barracks for the Watch which would relieve some crowding at the school but required a whole slew of supplies. They would need beds, bedding, clothes, soap, and food, along with someone in charge of cleaning, cooking and laundry. Tilly realized she had been staring at the map but seeing her problems instead. She shook herself free of her musings and checked for anything new.

  What had been an irregular blob near the train station was now carefully delineated into streets and buildings. According to the color-coded legend inked in at the bottom of the map, that neighborhood had an office park, firehouse, library and a street of usable storefronts. Martin had made a notation about a possible barracks in an office building by the fire house. Tilly fought down a shiver knowing she was being silly about having the men so far away. There had been a time when the empty hallways of High Meadow had seemed so lonely. Now they were crowded, and she didn’t want any of her flock to move away.

  Another note indicated that the row of stores by the train station was being repurposed giving Tilly another pang. A barber had started cleaning out a shop as soon as he was strong enough to walk down there. One of the most ragged refugees, he had made an amazing recovery with just safety and a couple of days of regular meals. She’d heard rumors of a teashop and a furrier. And that had gotten Angus speeding off on the need to mint money.

  Turning away from the map, she chuckled over the fight they’d had about the basis for currency. Martin had automatically assumed gold. When Angus told him he wanted to base it on calories, he’d been nonplussed. Tilly liked that idea. And it made sense when food was one of the most important things to survival. The major denomination, a square of tin with a sheaf of wheat stamped into it, was worth a full meal. She’d seen the sketches and the listened to the pros and cons of using precious metals. But it all came down to the simple fact that metal had no value when the population was starving.

  She hadn’t raised the issue but wondered if Angus intended some sort of Fort Knox of supplies. If the coins were based on calories, should they stockpile food to back each lot printed? There were so many issues to be hashed out, but she worried that there just wasn’t enough time to get to it all. Everything was in the now. People needed food and clothes and safety now. She couldn’t make a hungry child wait while she figured out how she was going to feed an increasing number of people throughout the winter.

  They were still debating whether to break the denominations into fifths or tenths. Although she couldn’t imagine what a tenth of a meal might be in reality. Angus had a monetary committee drawing up equivalents. Was a day in the fields worth three meals or more? Was a night on patrol only worth the one meal they’d miss? And how did that translate into commerce? What should a coat or shoes or a basket of potatoes cost? And when did they need to start paying people, so they could buy the meals Tilly now provided for free? She was deep in her thoughts when a poke made her jump.

  “Sorry, my dear,” Angus said as he squeezed her arm. “I thought you heard me coming.” There was a mischievous twinkle in his blue eyes that belied his apology.

  She shifted gears. The currency argument needed to wait for another day. Instead, she gestured to the map. “That’s a lot of territory for us to cover.”

  Angus turned to regard the map with serious eyes. “It is. But I think we are up to the challenge.”

/>   Nick and Wisp arrived before she could muster her rebuttal.

  “Got a minute?” Nick asked.

  He was looking as rough around the edges as the rest of them. She thought he needed a haircut or a comb at the very least. His brown hair was sleep tousled, and his green eyes sparked brighter because of the dark circles beneath them. Wisp, on the other hand, appeared entirely too well rested. That made her wonder if biobots needed less sleep than regular humans.

  She started to leave, but Nick stopped her. “I think you should hear this.”

  They went down the hall to Nick’s new office. It was small but adequate for the four of them. He sat behind his desk, which for some reason irritated Tilly. She felt like she was here for an interview or evaluation. Angus took the chair that was twin to hers in front of the desk. Wisp perched on a low filing cabinet.

  “Problem?” Angus asked.

  “One of the newcomers threw a punch at Wisp.”

  Tilly looked but saw no bruising on Wisp. She hadn’t expected to see any. The man was solid muscle and had lightening reflexes “I think he can take care of himself?”

  “We have a lot of biobots here,” Nick clarified. “Elsa and Dieter, Ted and Nixie, Kyle.” Nick nodded towards Wisp. “They aren’t all tattooed like Wisp, but it isn’t a secret what they are.”

  “Are you suggesting we should make it a secret?” Angus asked. His blue eyes clouded with concern.

  “Too late for that,” Nick said with a thoughtful squint. “But we need to do something. There are a whole lot of new people coming in that might not be too happy to see that we have biobots walking around the place.”

  Tilly’s blood pressure ticked up a notch. “I certainly hope you aren’t expecting us to assign any Keepers.”

  Angus patted her hand. “He doesn’t mean that. But you’re right Nick, we need to be prepared for a problem because one will surely arise if we aren’t ready.”

  Chapter 3

  At some point in time foraging for hard goods will no longer be an option. Before that time comes, we must train people to build and craft the essentials.