Grantville Gazette Volume 1 Eric Flint
Grantville Gazette
Volume 1
This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.
ANNA’S STORY
By
Loren Jones
Anna ran for all she was worth as the mercenaries chased her, fleeing her father’s farm with no destination in mind except away. Two of the mercenaries followed her, shouting as she ran for her life and virtue. She didn’t notice the change in the landscape until she ran over the edge of a small cliff and collided with a strange man.
Another scream ripped from her throat as she looked around. Strange men in strange black clothes were all around her, surrounding her and the man she had collided with. She looked down and saw some sort of medal on his chest. That medal proclaimed him the leader, and her fear redoubled as she imagined the punishment he would inflict for her seeming attack upon his person. Again instinct sent her surging to her feet and running away, down the hill and across a stream that shouldn’t be there.
Behind her she heard the boom, boom of two arquebuses being fired in rapid succession, followed by several sharp cracks that sounded like pitch-bubbles snapping in the hearth. She didn’t look back. If the new men were fighting Tilly’s bastards, all the better. It gave her more time to escape and hide.
1
George Blanton was spending his Sunday in the same way he had spent every Sunday for over twenty years: watching sports on TV. It didn’t matter what sport was on. Football, baseball, basketball, hockey, soccer, horse races, car races, even golf: if it was a sport, he watched it. He was watching his favorite “all sports” channel when the world suddenly went white. Tremendous thunder roared through his house, making his ears ring.
George sat stunned as the world around him returned to normal, except that the TV was off. Looking at the clock, he saw that the second hand had stopped. Power failure? he asked himself, nodding as he saw that even the VCR’s incessantly flashing clock was blank. Yep, power failure. Shit. But what was that flash and boom? Standing, he walked to the pantry and opened the breaker panel. A quick inspection showed that nothing was tripped, and the tattletale on his incoming power was off. It was the line again.
Anger and disappointment roiled in his belly, making him clench his teeth. He had been complaining for more than a year about the lines into his farm, and the power company still hadn’t done anything. Walking over to the window, he looked outside as he angrily picked up the phone. He knew the number by heart, and started dialing before he noticed that there was no dial tone either. Power and phone? Lovely. Well, he had a solution to one of his problems. Dave’s generator was already hooked up and ready to start. Slamming the phone back onto the hook, he stomped out to the back porch, turning the main breaker off as he passed the pantry.
He paused before starting the generator to say a quick prayer for his son, Dave. Dave had gotten divorced a few years after George and Mary had retired and moved to the farm. The place was big: fifty acres of pasture and a ten-acre garden that Mary had adored, and the farmhouse had six bedrooms. There had been more than enough room for their only child to join them.
That was before Mary had gotten sick. She had played it down, refusing to go to a doctor. She had sworn that it was just her misspent youth catching up to her. Three months later she was gone. Cancer had taken the love of his life.
Dave had taken his mother’s death hard. He’d been working at the mine, bringing home decent wages, but he had become eccentric. That’s what his friends called it; George called it bonkers. Dave had decided that the end of civilization was near, and had begun hoarding things: guns, ammo, food, water purifiers, survival books, assorted other weapons, and clothing. And booze. The hayloft out in the barn was packed with his stuff—cheap department store footlockers full of it.