Not this August

Chapter 1

This sequel to Against the Fall of Night picks up three months after the execution of Charles Dixon. It is August and the Colony is facing many diverse issues. The first chapters reintroduce the characters and set the stage for the remainder of Part II of IV.

The Executive Council met once a week unless an emergency situation arose. The 'Beast', the diesel coach in which Sheldon, Penny and Leslie Winkle had started their exodus from Pasadena, had become the meeting place.

The chair of any meetings rotated even though Sheldon was nominal 'Executive' of the Colony. This week it was Leslie's turn to chair and push the agenda and she did so with her usual bluntness.

"I propose that we collect and install solar panels to augment our generators and extend our fuel through the winter months. Recovery teams have noted the locations of several civilian installations on maps as part of their searches."

Scavengers were now called 'Recovery Teams' since it sounded less demeaning but in reality, they were still scavengers, picking over the bones of a dying civilization.

A vote was taken and it was decided that a team would be dispatched to the largest installation as part of a recovery operation and that one of Dawn Holmes' Providers would fly to the nearest airfield and take on whatever the team had found, dismantled and transported.

There were several such installations, small ones, in Manitowoc and Howard was anxious to put the Badger back to her original port and recover the remaining coal. They could kill two birds with one stone: transfer the coal and pick up whatever useful collectors they could salvage.

Decisions made, they adjourned. Sheldon and Howard remained behind for a few minutes. They'd been cooking something up on the 'down low' and Howard was almost beside himself with the prospects of disassembling an entire hospital and bringing it back to the Colony.

"You're sure you don't want to tag along, supervise…" his friend asked him. He was worried about the stress Sheldon was under and he figured a day on the lake with nothing to do but look at the flat surface and sit around and think would be good for him.

"No, Howard. Wyatt's condition is deteriorating rapidly and Penny wants to spend as much time as possible with him. I want to be there for her when she needs me. Sometimes, when she returns home, she crawls onto my lap and cries. I've never watched someone I loved linger on the edge of death and I worry about her. I'm sorry, I just can't."

Once again Sheldon had surprised his friend with what he never would have expected from 'Pasadena Sheldon' – compassion. It made him proud to be Sheldon's friend and confidant. The man had changed so much in so short a time.

I wonder how things might have turned out if Sheldon had been like this back in Pasadena? He'd have tenure and the damned Nobel by now.

"When do you want to leave? Have you discussed taking the Lake Huron as additional protection? It would be catastrophic to lose the Badger to a mechanical failure – or something worse. The cutter could tow you back – "

"Sheldon, we have a full machine shop on the ferry and besides, the cutter is needed here in case of something equally catastrophic, like an invasion flotilla coming from down south. Besides, it would take the cutter several days to tow the ferry back if something did happen and we can't spare the fuel - "

"You will take the Hulk along. The sight of it should drive any marauders away, I would think."

The Hulk was an M1 Abrams battle tank they'd 'borrowed' during a scavenging mission on the Lower Peninsula. Howard had been delighted and had brought one back along with a flatbed loaded with spare parts and ammunition for the various weapons onboard. Everyone agreed they'd give it back to the National Guard if they asked for it.

He'd also wisely taken the precaution of removing the fuel pump and computer unit from each of the remaining tanks. Sheldon's mantra had been drilled into Howard's brain – never leave an enemy (or useful equipment) in your rear. The Colony had enough small arms and ammunition to fight a small war and win handily.

There was a mission planned for the spring to bring back additional Abrams for point defense and to secure the bridgeheads on the Straits Bridge on both ends but for now, the island's artillery consisted of one tank, hardly sufficient to cover the entire coastline of the Island.

The entire operation to recover the coal, locate and remove the solar collectors and find and remove key equipment and supplies from the hospital would take four or five days. There was no way Sheldon could be away from his family for that long given Wyatt's condition.

"We'll leave Wednesday morning, weather permitting. I don't want to get caught on the lake in a storm." The Choker had made weather prediction iffy at best. No one was left who knew anything at all about meteorology.

Sheldon put his hand on his smaller friend's shoulder and looked him dead in the eye and said quietly, "If you fail to return I shall find your body, reanimate it, and then shoot you myself, do you understand? After which I shall reanimate you again and let Bernadette at you."

For Sheldon Cooper it was as close to a declaration of brotherly love as he could make and Howard was taken aback at the emotions he felt at that minute.

"Yeah, well, someone has to build those weirdo contraptions your skinny ass comes up with. Wouldn't dare miss out on your next project. What will it be, hmmm? Whatever it is, I will be here to build it for you."

There was a lamp lit on the porch of their house. The electricity was shut off at 9pm and Penny always left a lit oil lamp on the porch for him. It was after 11pm and he figured she'd retired rather than wait up for him.

He locked the doors out of habit and went upstairs and into their bedroom. He undressed and went into the bathroom for a shower after carefully unloading his 9mm pistol and putting it into the top dresser drawer. He'd just stepped in when his lamp was extinguished and a giggling blonde wrapped her arms around him in the shower.

"It's been three nights, Moon Pie, and the monthly visitor is gone so I thought…" His lips found hers and whatever she was going to say was lost as she was wrapped up in the arms of her husband.

Later, after things had calmed down, he asked her "how's you dad, Penny?" It was always the one question she knew he would ask before saying anything else.

Dawn Holmes yawned mightily and blinked at Bomber and Leslie. "I know it's early, Dawn, but try to focus. These are the most creative times of the day, watching the dawn break and – "

"Shut her up, Bomber, before I stuff a fist down that yawning maw she calls a mouth. It's way too early for puns."

With the help of the Wolowizard, as Dawn fondly referred to Howard, they'd outfitted two of Dawn's ancient Texas Air Guard Providers with

'offensive weaponry' and this morning they were going to see just how 'offensive' they could be.

The Brain Trust had gamed an invasion of the island and determined that the key to stopping it was to sink the invaders before they could land. The Colonial Air Force now had two heavily armed Providers to accomplish the task plus the cutter Lake Huron as backup and mop-up.

"Wow, that was so much fun!" Dawn Holmes smiled widely and gave Bomber a 'high five' while Leslie looked on, not at all pleased with the petite pilot's sudden interest in her man. No, she was not pleased at all.

"What do you think, Les? We blasted the crap out of those oil drum rafts!" Bomber had been in his element and didn't mind flying second seat to the more experienced major.

"I think that the safest place to be in the invasion force will be on whichever boat you decide to shoot up. You both used up the entire ammunition load and in a real engagement, the door gunners would have been more effective if you'd have kept the range at 500 yards and circled the targets instead of playing fighter pilots and flying in on the deck."

She turned on her heel and stalked back to the operations shack of the small airfield.

"She's right, y'know? The door gunners can have an almost unlimited amount of ammunition while we only carried 600 rounds for the Ma Deuces," said Dawn.

"Yeah but did she have to be so damned blunt about it? It felt great to unload on those targets instead of just flying circles around them so the guys could pepper them at a safe distance."

He thought about his response and grinned. "I hate her when she's right."

Dawn looked over at Bomber and thought, 'I hate her all the time.'

Bernadette Rostenkowski-Wolowitz looked at the home pregnancy test strip again. Still two bars. She was torn between joy and dread. Will our baby inherit our Natural Immune genes or will it be prey to the Choker and it's mutations?

Of the 577 adult Colonials, over 400 were Natural Immunes while the remainder were either High Immunes or just plain lucky and had survived a Choker infection at some point. She'd taken blood samples from every new arrival and categorized them into groups. She hoped to somehow create a vaccine that would protect future generations from the Choker but now, now it was more important than ever.

She had a baby on the way and there was no way in Hell she was losing her child to the Choker.