Adventures In Homesteading (Day 603)

@wesphilbin just for you!

Another Story

Chapter Zero

We no longer had the wind at our back as we pushed further into the darkness ahead and I gotta admit that I felt a small amount of relief knowing that I was no longer being pushed at what I was already dreading venturing towards in the first place.

Somewhere ahead in the blackness, lay the path that would eventually take us to what folks in these parts call 'Old Well' (not The Old Well just Old Well) and that was assuredly not something to stumble into in the dark to say the least. The hazards of falling into its depths aside, the denizens that had recently been stirring deep down below (and within) it were the more pertinent threat to be mindful of.

Perhaps calling them 'denizens' only complicates the issue, because when it comes down to it they are humans after all... regardless of choosing to abandon all that is actually humane... and further choosing to alter themselves to something other than human altogether. That however, is another story to be told in another time but given the fragments of what is known of that age... discovering 'the full truth' may well be impossible.

I myself, was a wee lad when it all began and truthfully I am simply unsure that I could have done anything differently along the way to help preserve an accurate historical record... because alas I was in a near constant state of simply trying to survive. What notes that I could make along the way, I assuredly did my best at but most of them are mired in my own angst, frustration, turmoil, mania and numerous other behavioral quirks.

In the not-so-grand scheme of things, I am glad to have made it this far... and tend to not create regrets for myself that I cannot hold myself accountable for. So, regretting not doing something that I did not know that I should be doing (like creating a historic record) is not one of those things that I am going to beat myself up about no matter how handy that it would be in the current scenario.

Pondering it all now, while I creep along hoping that the soft rustle of the pine needles beneath my feet does not make too much noise... while passing through yet another dense pine grove... is almost mildly nostalgic. Aside from the thick matting of needles beneath my feet letting me know about my surroundings, the pungent smell of pine sap hung in the air so thick... that even my not-so-keen sense of smell was overwhelmed by it... to the point of it stirring up old memories.

A few days back, I was much more confident about what direction that I was heading in... but after several 'days' going by without any sunlight... I am starting to doubt the accuracy of my own course... regardless of the technology at my disposal telling me that I am on the right track. In places like this, where the very laws of physics not just bend but can break... or have novel forms of physics emerge at... it was best not to overly trust any technology.

Such was the way of things these days, where the very tools that were once mostly reliable... are now either wholly unreliable or 'risky' to utilize for one reason or another. Although myself and my traveling companions were rather adept at keeping most of our vital communication (and even computation) secure in the Bitstream... we still 'needed' (often rely upon) tools like the one in my internal ocular HUD (heads-up display) for navigation purposes.

Choosing to keep the HUD at all, was more than a gamble on my part... but 'getting by' in the old world without it... had in the end... proven too difficult to achieve and be able to maintain a modicum quality of life. Little did I know that all this time later, it would come in so handy... or that I would have been able to 'patch out' the more problematic aspects of its firmware or what folks these days call neuroware.

Not that I had the skills to do that on my own... but I visited the shop/clinic of a rather peculiar pair of twins which specialize in such things... and after a few weeks of development... they had a working 'upgrade' ready for testing. I know it was risky behavior to start with... but the alternative to having a secured HUD was much more risky especially since the 'Bot War' was just getting started... and absolutely nothing in the HUD's design was built for what that unleashed upon the world.

Thankfully, during that period I was already dwelling in a 'limited connectivity zone' and got a warning to turn off my HUD before the full initial payloads began flooding every connected HUD on the planet simultaneously. In other words, it was sheer dumb luck that I happened to have a dodgy connection and noticed the alerts going out (about the incident) before it was too late.

I still shudder anytime that I think about those times, because it was just all so sudden when it came to that stuff in particular and it is not like anyone could have predicted that if humans poked at the universe (and its mysteries) long enough... that something would eventually poke back! The more startling truth (for humanity) was that we were/are the interlopers... and what 'poked' back was much older than even what we can conceptualize as what 'being old' actually constitutes.

There are plenty of folks around that know such histories much better than I do... but by all accounts (including my own) it was quite the harrowing moment pretty much everywhere all at once. Knowing what I know now... I am of the mind that the way that the poking was done... made it so obvious, so blatant, so irrefutable that it (what was found) could not be dismissed wholly... no matter how much (for the sake of sanity) folks tried to downplay it to themselves.

I cannot say that I blame folks for having such a rough reaction, given that on one hand the choice was to accept that everything was a mere facade... or that this other truth had been there all along staring everyone in the metaphorical face, hidden in plain sight for eons. So, yes I understand the will to cling to something that (albeit false) makes sense... and since it really does not need to 'make sense' so much as be found comfortable... folks are not all that keen on changing their fundamental worldview to accommodate truth.

Which after all, is an uncomfortable affair more often than not even during the most stable of times. If the world had not totally gone sideways... and folks could have had more time to adjust mayhaps things would have worked out differently than they did... but here we are!

My thoughts were all over the place as I continued on through the dark, feeling my way one step at a time and moving at such a slow pace that I was tempted more than once to just lay down and take a brief nap... because I was bone weary tired. Shuffling along as I am, would be much more challenging if it were not for the dogs leading the way as they follow the scent of the scout group somewhere ahead of us.

Twice now I had come across roughly scribbled instructions left under a pile of rocks in the path... and would have missed taking the correct branch in the trail otherwise. These mountains being a web of goat and deer paths... it was all too easy to spend long hours traversing the terrain... but not really getting anywhere in particular given how interconnected most of said paths are.

My task was really to 'bring up the rear' and cover the 'back trail' of the scouting party... while also being prepared to continue on alone if by some great misfortune the scouting party should fail. It was a bit of a spooky feeling trying to silently shadow them... whilst making sure that neither them (nor myself) are being shadowed.

Thankfully, I did not have to overly concern myself about the latter due to the all encompassing darkness... and the fact that we had all done quite well to evade the Sensor Web before making our way north into the mountains. That was a feat in and off itself... and without having some well connected synthetic allies in the Bitstream... it would not have been possible at all.

Odd how things work out sometimes... and who winds up being allies in an effort to survive... and especially so in a world of extreme hostility, upheaval and uncertainty. That said, I believe that the same allies would have banded together (so to speak) regardless of how crazed (or not crazed) the world became... but it would have taken them much longer to be moved to taking such action.

I try my best not to dwell on all that stuff too much, because keeping abreast of the constantly shifting 'landscape' of today is taxing enough. Another part of me does however ask the perpetual question of 'what if' but at this point... it usually only gains force when I am drifting off to sleep or just awakening from slumber.

Even then, it is a distant thought (or series of thoughts) that happen when my mind turns to such matters... and I am glad to not spend too much time (these days) entertaining such flights of fancy. Managing my emotions and remaining off the proverbial 'radar' (found within urban areas) without using neuroware... makes for the need to have superb emotional regulation (and compartmentalization) habits a must... and too much sentimentality for the past is prone to upsetting that delicate balance.

I have to almost smile at the way that I call such places 'urban areas' because although it makes for a nice catchall phrase... most such places are manufacturing and agricultural zones. Those places truly creep me out, because the populace has an obscenely high work related death rate... mixed with very poor health overall due to a variety of factors that range from water contamination, general pollution, malnutrition, to stress and on and on.

The number of folks that 'slip off into the hills' as I have done are few and far between... and if it were not for the practice (of living rough) that I had gotten in much earlier in life... I would not have known what the heck to do after slipping off into the woods. Having those old camping, hiking and homesteading skills to lean into... sure made the difference when it came to those first few years of not perishing while existing beyond the bounds of easily available goods and resources.

That said, it has not been easy by any stretch of the imagination... and I have come close to dying from sheer stupidity more times than all other things like hunger, dehydration, hypothermia and predators combined! Let's just say that, having the ingenuity to solve challenges and overcome (or undermine) obstacles on the fly... should always be tempered by thoroughly thinking everything through at least a few times before taking any sort of action!

The law of unintended consequences aside, my closest brush with death was actually from a rather innocuous looking spring that I drank from high up on a mountain. Little did I know (at the time) that there was something even higher up on the mountain that apparently left the water so fouled... that I am still unsure what would have to be in it for a mere handful of sips to put me in the state that I wound up in.

In the stories folks always get found when they befall some kind of mishap and are near death with injury and/or illness... but for me things did not go that way after sipping on that tainted water. I awoke (who knows how many hours or days later) in a culvert at an abandoned construction site near the foot of the mountain half dead, covered in scratches... and feeling like I had been chewed on by every kind of bug imaginable.

There was nothing graceful in how I sucked up rainwater directly off the asphalt of the construction site's parking lot (that I found myself in) before crawling back inside the culvert and falling fast asleep. That period of time, became a blur of waking and being in a near panic... as I pulled myself to the edge of the culvert to see if there was still water pooled where I could get to it... and then painfully crawling my way to it and then crawling back to the culvert again.

I am unsure when the dogs found me... and even more unsure of when or even how we had gotten separated before... but they sure made sleeping in the culvert a much warmer experience. They also boosted my morale a good bit... and I managed to stay conscious for longer and longer periods of time... which over the course of two weeks saw me back (albeit shakily) on my feet again and capable of exploring my surroundings.

The empty husk of the building (some kind of store that had been being built) was a mess of windblown plastic, thick sand and mounds of trash covered in an alarmingly thick layer of rodent dung. After getting up the strength to hike to the other side of the building, I saw that not that far downhill there was a large fleet of delivery trucks for baked goods... and what must be some kind of production facility and storage area... which made the volume of rodent dung make sense.

Needless to say, I avoided the unfinished building the best that I could... and when I finally got healed up enough to continue my travels... I gave the 'bakery' a wide berth just for good measure. How or why the vermin never swarmed on me while I lay there half dead in the culvert... will always be a mystery to me but my best guess has always been that they still had plenty of food at the bakery.

After that entire misadventure was over, I made it back to my own little shack in the woods... just before winter arrived and I had a heck of a time keeping enough dry firewood on hand to stay warm with. The real kicker to that whole fiasco, was that earlier in the year (before the misadventure) I had cut and stacked plenty of firewood... but unfortunately it was on the other side of the ridge where I had planned on moving it from.

Getting through that time did something to me that I cannot rightly define as being a totally 'good' thing... because dealing with prolonged bouts of mild hypothermia aside... the sheer harshness of it all made letting myself become harsh quite appealing. Fortunately, the dogs were there not just as warmth... but as a constant reminder that love and kindness were legitimate aspects of reality and not merely 'wishful thinking' on my part.

During that experience, I also found that hope is an eternal wellspring... and that the mere act of looking for hope is an act of hopefulness in and of itself. Admittedly, I was slow to having that particular realization... and it only came to me after I spent a week deep in a fever where I kept asking myself (in a nearly mantra-like fashion) what the heck is there in this world to have hope for?

Apparently, my mental slight of hand worked because my morale began to improve... and by the time spring began turning into summer I was 'back on track' and recovering from the entire ordeal much faster than I thought that I would. In hindsight, that was actually a very pleasant summer because I did so well with foraging for food and gathering firewood (for the coming winter) that I had plenty of free time for swimming, reading and generally relaxing in the shade.