A Spark of Sylvan Flame

Most farming families and communities out in the wastes tend to keep all their infrastructure in one place which prevents raids from people and antithesis from going unnoticed. A few families, however, never gave up their other properties, for reasons ranging from impracticality to requiring the extra space. Each of these “outpost farms” are almost always in various states of disrepair due to the resource requirements of running the primary operation.

Those farm operations that manage to make it work are rewarded with extra profits from having a secondary location to expand from.

-A Grade 10 essay titled “Why the Hicks Might Have Had the Right Idea all Along.” 2043

The gravel crackled beneath the truck’s tires as we pulled into Benson’s, the place about as mildly off as ever. Not much was here, except for the few nurseries and finishing barns left over from the turn of the century. They still worked well enough to operate and the distance was too far to have the risk of replacing them with something more modern be worth a potential antithesis raid.

Personally, I believed that Uncle Cy didn’t want to deal with a second manure lagoon.

The only thing here other than the barns and a few derelict machine sheds that had gone unused for decades was the presence of the tractor and drill. And Aunt Nyra of course. She looked up from one of the markers, then waved as we pulled up next to her.

“Fancy meeting y’all out here!” Chortling, Nyra lovingly slapped the machine she was working on. “Just an issue with the marker, and she’ll be ready to go!”

A small grin appeared on my face as I responded with thinly veiled sarcasm, “Why’d ya break it anyways? I worked hard on that!”

I got a stuck out tongue in response as Wyatt chuckled, “Both of you act like children, I swear! It’s like watching-,” he trailed off as if remembering something painful, “Nevermind. Spark, go over and help her fix the dang thing. I’ll get the hoppers filled.”

“Sure thing, can’t let her have all the fun after all.” My feet landed in the gravel with a crunch, and after slipping into my familiar role of family mechanic, I gave the busted equipment a once over.

“Before ya ask, yes, I checked all the bolts on it,” Nyra chimes in from above my shoulder, “It’s something with the hydraulics, dang thing wouldn’t unfold when I was testing everything a few minutes ago. It’s not the tractor either, cause everything else worked just fine.”

With a nod of assent, I crouched down to see if a line had been cut somewhere. Seeing no puddles of oil anywhere, I looked along the lines, just to find the issue practically immediately.

“Auntiiiiiiieeeee, can you go drop the row units for me?” I remove the old strap, grabbing for a replacement from the drill’s mounted toolbox only to find it empty. “You have a pinched hydraulic line, and this toolbox is empty again! Fucking piece of garbage!”

She gave a noise of confusion before she crouched down next to me. “How in the fuck did I miss that?”

Wyatt shouted from the back of the truck, “Cause you hardly ever notice small stuff like that if you aren’t specifically searching for it!”

Nyra pinched the bridge of her nose, “Shut up Wyatt!”

“Why don’t you get over here and make me?” Wyatt peeks out from the back of the truck, only to have Aunty throw a wrench at him.

Rolling my eyes, I walked over to the tractor and turned it on myself. The sound of the engine roaring to life immediately drowned out the sibling banter, and thankfully got Aunt Nyra to move out of the way before she got hurt by the machinery I was about to move. Once the lines were no longer pinched, and the tractor was shut off again, I pulled the line free and checked it for any lasting damage. Finding none, I walked over to the truck’s tool box and pulled out a few zip-ties. Not a good permanent fix, but good enough ‘til tomorrow when I would be free to come out and replace them with something stronger.

Lines bound and (despite the bickering) hopper filled, Wyatt and I had finished our work here. 

“Nyra! we’re gonna take your truck back to Homeplace!” My uncle sits half out the window, then throws his thumb at me. “If you need more seed just give Spark a call!”

Aunt Nyra faced him from inside the tractor’s cab and shouted back, “Got it! I’ll pester you for more seed later!”

Before Wyatt could even react in mock outrage, she had turned the key with a shit eating grin plastered on her face, the noise washing out anything he could’ve retorted with. Well, anything except for the gesture he flashed her, which was also ineffective, as it caused her to almost double over in laughter. She eventually closed the cab door and gave us both a wave before putting the tractor in gear and driving off towards the field just to the north of us.

“Come on Uncle Wyatt, you’ll roast her next time,” I said with a grin of my own.

The only response was a drawn out sigh and a muttered, “Everyone in this family is off their rocker.”

***

By the time we had checked over the automatic feeding system for the pig barns at Benson’s and driven back, the rest of the family had already set out to the fields to start shelling corn. Wyatt went towards the only truck that had yet to be taken out there, while I went towards the dryer. The machine wasn’t too deep into the complex that we all called home, you just had to weave between a few buildings so that you could dump the grain you were hauling in from the field. 

Wyatt shut the pickup off after moving it next to the toolshed, before he walked off towards the armory to get weapons better suited to shooting from a semi than what I had picked out. I, on the other hand, walked towards the grain bins with the gun bag thrown over my shoulder. Wyatt would be grabbing a new set of weapons anyways, it’s just common sense to keep some amount of firepower on me at all times. So why not hold onto what I had already prepped?

Across the gravel drive from the grain bins and dryer was the garden. Which was, at the moment, currently full of laughing voices as my cousins gathered up all the food we’d be eating for the next year. Sadly, I had other work to take care of before I could go over there and join in what sounded like a garden hosted version of “So You Want to be a Samurai”, which mostly consisted of Evie roasting various Samurai, (at the younger kid’s request), that deigned to look upon our home from their cloud based thrones.

Instead, I wandered towards the dryer, a large hollow cylinder of metal connected to a gas furnace and a massive fuck off air blower. First things first, warming your hands on the surface of the tower. Easily one of the nicest feelings during harvest. Next the actual important work, manually checking the moisture content of the output and adjusting the burner temp to make it a nice and dry 14% moisture content. 

After a few other basic daily checks to make sure nothing would explode, I went over to the garden to find something to occupy my time while waiting for the first trucks to come rolling in.

“Spark!” Two gremlins come running up to me, “Can you help us lift these baskets into the gator?”

The ‘us’ in question being the twins, a pair of two 10 year old redheads who were near inseparable.

“I’ll be right there Autumn! Go ahead and start filling up another!” She sent two thumbs up in response, picked up one of the empty baskets, then dragged away a, no doubt complaining, Summer who probably wanted to load the baskets herself. 

“Summer, I’ll let you and your sister help me unload them later if you fill another basket with tomatoes!”

Now that got a spring in her step as the roles practically reversed. Summer went right from digging her heels in to practically dragging Autumn towards the few rows of tomato cages.

I, on the other hand, had the absolutely fun task known as heavy lifting.

Which sucks.

A lot.

Luckily, there were only a few baskets already filled and the sound of a semi pulling in graced myself with its wondrous presence. I absconded from the garden and went back to the dryer, this time passing it and walking to the good ol’ loader tractor hitched to the wet tank auger, getting started with practiced efficiency. A quick turn of the key, followed by firing up the PTO, and finally, lining up the bottom of the semi-hopper with the pit. One small adjustment later to empty the second hopper, and the first truck of the day was emptied. Xavier pulled away with a wave, and I went back to the garden to see what else was needed.

I arrived to find Summer had made good on her side of the deal,having loaded up another whole basket of tomatoes and she even almost finished a second one. I let them finish filling it up as I lifted the rest of the filled baskets onto the gator.

“Alright Summer, you earned it,” I say with a grin, “Get over here, before you have to walk to the house!”

Summer practically bolted towards the gator and jumped into the back, Autumn walked at a more relaxed pace and hopped into the passenger seat instead. 

“Spark,” Autumn asked while looking at me with puppy dog eyes, “Do I have to help lift those baskets too?”

Naturally, I folded before she even finished asking her question, “You won’t have to help lift them, but can you stand in the back and push them towards the edge so your sister and I have an easier time?”

She thought for a few moments before looking back at me with a small smile, “Okay! I can do that!”

“Come ON, you can wheel and deal with us later!” Summer was basically vibrating with anticipation, “I wanna go fast!”

I immediately acquiesced to the daring twin, putting my foot hard on the gas as I drove us over to the basement entrance of the house. Thanks to some extra reinforcements the family made a few decades ago, it even acted as a small emergency shelter in the case of tornadoes or a raid by antithesis or bandits.

 “Ok, Summer, remember that we won’t rush these baskets down the stairs,” I lectured, a small smile on my face. “No reason to cause a fall and break your ankle.”

My cousin tilted her head at me, then asked, “Why would it be my ankle and not yours?”

I snorted, “Because I’m built different.”

In the end, the twins practically fused themselves to the task of “Helping Spark unload the gator,” and I continued to flip back and forth between the garden and the dryer throughout the morning. At around twelve, Nana was picked up by Wyatt after he was finished emptying his truck. She had a picnic basket with the field crew’s lunch with her, and promised to come back to give us all some lunch after. They only had a few acres left to harvest, so it was decided they’d just let us get more of the garden done while they ate. Afterwards, they’d finish up and come back down, then take over while we ate our lunch.

Unfortunately, our gardening was cut short when I was taking a short break to drink some water. All the way out in the distance, I paled as I saw something that I’d always wished I’d never have to see. 

Namely, a huge swarm of at least 50 Model Threes running towards the complex.

“Fuck. FUCK!” I turn to the group, my heart slamming hard in my chest.“RAID! Get to the shelter NOW!”

I don’t know if it is something to be proud of, or concerned about, but none of us even hesitated or made a joke. The antithesis were just that much of a threat out here. And a pack like that could only mean that a hive got pissed off somewhere.

As the three kids rushed up to me so that Evie and I could both lead them to shelter, I grabbed the gun bag I had brought with me. 

“Evie take these!” Handing her the shotgun and one of the pistols, I grabbed my bat and the other sidearm. 

It wasn’t much, but it would have to be enough to get us all the way there.