A quote: “At his best, man is the noblest of all animals; separated from law and justice he is the worst.” ~~ Aristotle
I’ll start with a story …
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Thistle wasn’t her given name. Abagail and John still didn’t know it. He was part of the posse two harvests back who rode to Springhope after a rider came to Oak Lake for help.
Springhope had been more of a promise than a town … a couple of buildings and a gathering of locals a few times a month for trading and socializing. The Posse arrived to find nothing but smoldering ashes and bodies.
John found Thistle still curled against the mother who had given her last to protect her. The six-year-old was terrified beyond speech, covered in ash and brush. He bundled her up and brought her home.
Over the next two years she slowly became a child again. But she still didn’t talk.
But, boy howdy, could she draw! Abagail was stunned when she walked in as Thistle had taken charcoal from fireplace and drew on the wall. A bird … not some stick figure bird, but a grouse in full flight so rendered Abagail thought it would fly right off the wall!
Abagail quickly brought out paper from her stash – nothing from town was thrown away, certainly not any of the paper that wrapped rare purchases from The Mercantile.
John came in for supper to find the table covered with drawings. Their humble home, chickens, squirrels, horses … even a portrait of Abagail, face so sweet, John was startled into tears.
“Oh, Thistle!” he whispered, “these are wonderful!”
She beamed up at him and stunned him further by talking, “My name is Deborah.” She glanced back at Abagail, who nodded. She faced John again and handed him a stack of papers.
“These are the men who killed mama.”
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Now, it’s your turn.
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. featured image, cropped, Adobe Stock standard license
Cameron says: Being on the trail was the perfect escape for me with everything I’d been through; mom and dad dead in an accident, girlfriend decided that another guy was a better deal and having to drop out of college to stay afloat. So I walked away.
I was two months on the trail and I could smell a storm coming. I looked out at a field of thistles and saw a town. Probably not much there but maybe the local law would have no problem with me crashing out there.
To my shock, the town was very welcoming. There was a spare room for me and one of the families invited me over for dinner. I ended up spending two days there as the storm was vicious. I headed back to the trail and felt a lot lighter.
When I made it to the end of the trail and back to the US, there were two surprises for me. First, I’d been gone for fifty years. Secondly, all the money I’d saved before the trip had grown. The town had sent me a letter to thank me for being such a good guest and telling me to take care of myself.
Wombat Lace says: I like it, Cameron! Well told and succinct!
Cameron says: Thanks. Keeping things at two hundred words is a really fun challenge.
Wombat Lace says: We called the town “Refuge”. A refuge for those who saw which way the wind blew and got out before it was too late.
We were a handful of families committed to surviving without the “help” of a government bent on destruction of folks like us, who clung hard to the belief in God, family and hard work. Too outspoken to find a place in the New Order. One of our group knew of this abandoned mining town hidden deep in the hills and had established a base, well-protected by the bull thistles that grew around it.
At first, the only others we let in were survivalists who could name a current resident of the town and be verified. Gradually, though, others joined, largely by accident as they were fleeing the madness in the cities. We found a place for them. Engineers who built extensive underground bunkers. Herbalists and foragers who made use of nearly every green thing growing nearby, including the thistles. Goofy art students, who quickly learned that the only way to eat was to work, and found their skills put to good use camouflaging anything that might look halfway usable to someone spying out the land.
Refuge.
Cameron says: Nice bit of reading! And it gives me an idea for my retirement. -:-)
I’m still getting used to this world. So much seems familiar at first glance, only to prove alien on closer examination.
Take those weeds out there in the pasture. The inflorescence that tops each of them sure looks like a thistle — until you look at it really close and realize that the internal structure of each individual flower is fundamentally different. My horticulturalist’s knowledge is at the hobbyist level, and all my books got left back on Earth when the Kitties scruffed us and brought us out here after the Watts Rebellion blew up.
But it’s a reminder that similar environments tend to produce similar adaptations, enough that an amateur can easily mistake one for the other. And now that this world is going to be our home, we’d better get used to it right quick.
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