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After The Fires Went Out: Amends (Book Five of the Unconventional Post-Apocalyptic Series): After The Fires Went Out, #5
After The Fires Went Out: Amends (Book Five of the Unconventional Post-Apocalyptic Series): After The Fires Went Out, #5
After The Fires Went Out: Amends (Book Five of the Unconventional Post-Apocalyptic Series): After The Fires Went Out, #5
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After The Fires Went Out: Amends (Book Five of the Unconventional Post-Apocalyptic Series): After The Fires Went Out, #5

Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

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History Is Written By The Last One Standing

For Cassandra Jeanbaptiste, her father's legacy is hard to pin down. A hero? A monster? A mix of both?

Having come north to McCartney Lake, where it all began, to preside over a controversial memorial commission, Cassy begins to see just how complicated the story is. Especially the parts that never made it into her father's journal.

Now, as a blizzard cuts off the delegation and brings the whole Confederation to the brink of collapse, old enemies return for a chance to rewrite the story of Robert Jeanbaptiste. And changing the past seems to mean erasing the people who remember what happened.

LanguageEnglish
PublisherRegan Wolfrom
Release dateJul 22, 2015
ISBN9781927903131
After The Fires Went Out: Amends (Book Five of the Unconventional Post-Apocalyptic Series): After The Fires Went Out, #5

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Rating: 2.8928571142857145 out of 5 stars
3/5

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  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    I had really thought that I would enjoy this book. I found it very hard to keep reading, it failed to keep my interest. I also found that it was very forgettable. I felt that I had to endure long drawn out and dry descriptions.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I had a strange reaction to this book, and as such, this will be a strange review. I liked it, but disliked pretty much everyone in it - not that that should be the deciding factor, but it is a rarity for me. Baptiste is one strange duck (if I wasn't reading his journal entries, I would not have pegged him for survival as he is a singularly poor judge of character and should have a trail of newborns and toddlers in his wake), Sara is oddly motivated (and frankly, a punching bag), Fiona is deified, and Lisa and Graham (probably the two I'd want in my post-apocalyptic corner) blindly defer to Baptiste's mediocre judgement until it looks like suicide to continue. Ant, who is dead before the opening pages, is by far the character with the most genuine voice and someone I wish we could have gotten to know other than from his posthumous journal excerpts. Perhaps it is a post-apocalyptic plot device - a lot happens and yet nothing happens - which leaves the reader in limbo, but also only somewhat fulfilled. Regardless, I did enjoy reading ATFWO:Coyote and look forward to the next installment. Thumbs up for pop culture references (greats for signaling the time-stop of the apocalypse) and geography of remote Canadian wilderness.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    This was one of the longer books I've read but my disappointment was the fact that I was thrown in the middle of the story. The Author eluded to previous events in the past but never went on to tell about them. The book was well-written but I really wanted to know more about how this all started and how these people got together. I feel he spent too much time on one character. All the characters are interesting but you really don't know anything about them.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I was given this book in exchange for an honest review.I enjoyed this book. I really enjoyed how the writer stayed away from the zombie post-apocalyptic invasion storyline. The storyline that was created could be very plausible. A group coming together in the insane time that follows an apocalyptic demise. I look forward to reading more from this author.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    I normally love apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction, but I could not even finish this one. While it is technically well-written (no editing errors or things of that sort), it was boring, boring, boring! I will definitely not be reading the rest of the series.

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After The Fires Went Out - Regan Wolfrom

After The Fires Went Out: Amends - Book Five

Copyright © 2015 by Regan Wolfrom

- -

Dedication

To Kendyl. I will find a way to disappoint you eventually.

- - -

PROLOGUE

- - -

There've been a few false starts here. I tried starting entries after the battle at the CN Tower, and once again after the interview with the BBC.

It just never came out right.

I'm not my father, willing to spew out every tiny detail of my life... maybe it's a wee bit presumptuous for me to think anyone will want to read it, simply because there have been no reported deaths resulting from my page or two at the end of Dad's diary.

You know, everyone and their cousin is doing the lifestream thing now, trying to be the next Baptiste or Ant Lagace.

I just want to be Cassy. I'm not even sure I want to be a Jeanbaptiste.

-

And I decided that my voice isn't enough, that I'm not the be-all end-all to the world around me, that there are plenty of other people who have something worth saying.

So I asked those people, people in Toronto, in Kawartha and Haliburton, along the line near Windsor and Detroit, and, of course, up north in Temiskaming, where the short-lived government of General Ryan Stems had fought skirmishes not just with Sonia Manolis and her crew, but with half the people in the area, arming themselves with anything they had, reducing his hundred-strong numbers men to a shadow.

They've been sending their stories in, mostly in pieces, and I've been trying to bring them all together. One big omnibus of our country — or at least the pieces we've got left of it — and our people, after The Fires went out.

I don’t know when I’ll have it all together, ready for mass consumption. You don’t grow up believing your mom or dad even have any kind of legacy.

And now protecting my father’s story is the biggest part of my life.

- - -

1

- - -

Today is Saturday, September 7th

It feels like the first day at summer camp. Not a good summer camp, mind you, but one that could go either way between forced labour and hockey-mask-themed axe murders.

Considering I've dragged my pretty carcass to the site of the New Post Massacre, across a few rivers from the old indenture plantations of Dave Walker… I guess if things go bad I’ll be lucky if all that happens is a recomm-mandatory gig mining moose guano.

It’s possible that the general unpleasantness of the work might save me from all the standard questions about my father.

No, I don't know if he's still alive. No, I don't hang around with his whole gang of McCartney Lakers.

Today is the first time I've seen any of them since the attack on our place at Coleraine.

Turns out I didn't really miss them.

-

I’d ridden up from Toronto in a redneck motorcade, two pickup trucks and a couple security guys from Kensington in olive-green uniforms — the Canadian Auxiliary Army being the latest incarnation of our various post-Fire militias — leading in one of those canvas-topped jeeps that look cool but would probably roll right over if it hit a junebug.

It isn’t fall yet, not really, since the trees that have leaves instead of needles are all still green; it looks a lot like summer, even if the harvest is set to start this week.

I’d worked last harvest, actually; we didn’t have enough biodiesel or enough electric combines to make up the gap, so it was many-hands-make-light-work for a lot of it. Wheat was the priority for the mechanized stuff, so I spent two weeks hand-gathering corn along the Grand River.

It felt weird not being there to pitch in, but it’s not like a few commission blowhards would have made all the difference.

Most of the people I’ve come up with — blowhards or otherwise — are total strangers; I’d seen a few of those faces here and there, during the attempted love-in after First President Paquette signed the neutrality treaty with all three versions of the United States. Those faces belonged to two forty-something men who’d worked with Payton Yallow in the good times, and Leyden Decker in the bad… probably two men who had no business representing anyone, really.

Not that I knew what they should have done otherwise.

I mean, I worked with Decker, too, in a way. Not that I knew he was a total shit. But it’s not like I’d ever stood up and spoken out against his stupidly bad policies.

Maybe I have no business being here.

Not that I ever had anything more than my last name and my hopes-to-be-prominent fiancé.

What has Cassy Jeanbaptiste actually done on her own?

Do I even know where to find my goddamn bootstraps?

-

I suppose the security guys messaged Matt Kazimierski with our ETA, since he’d parked his own pickup — a white heavy-duty — on Highway 11 to wait for us, right by the turnoff sign for Ch. Hanna Rd.

We don’t put chemin at the front of roads in Toronto; I think we pride ourselves on not speaking any French. (Says the girl who’s a quarter Haitian.)

Our little caravan stopped, and Matt hopped out of his truck and ran down the line. Passed the jeep and the first pickup, and right to the passenger side of the second.

Right up to me.

He gave me a ridiculously big smile.

I opened the door and climbed out.

Cassy, he said, it’s great to see you again.

It’s good to see you, Mister… uh, Matt.

He grinned. "First name basis… I like it."

I laughed.

Did you want to introduce me to everyone else? he asked.

I don’t know everyone else, I said.

Quiet trip?

"Well, I know the guy driving this truck." I motioned to Darrel Meek, the sanitation engineer who’d mostly talked about basketball on the way up.

So I introduced the two, and then we all went over to the two men in the first truck, the compromised assholes from Kensington, neither of whom were big fans of my father, or, by association, of me.

The woodenly handsome Rob Danzart had apparently been the Minister of Public Works in the Yallow/Decker regime, while the vividly less attractive Arjun Gehlot had been Minister of Education.

I’m not sure how much educating had gotten done in the two years after the comet, but I’d seen first hand how little we’d had in the way of infrastructure improvements.

From what I can tell, those two public servants have been more interested in pumping themselves up, at the cost of never accomplishing anything important, and, of course, the necessary political requirement of putting everyone else down.

Including my father, the current target for their bullshit. I wonder how much of that is because I’m here?

The two security guys introduced themselves with only their last names, which I presume is an attempt to seem like a couple of badasses. Honestly, I don’t care enough to ask for more information about Brodeur and Muzyk.

We’ve got a crew at McCartney Lake, Matt told me, as he walked me back to my seat. Been setting up living spaces for over a month now.

Back at the old hacienda, I said.

He nodded. It’s definitely been strange. But it’s still one of the best spots left up here.

He opened my truck door for me, all gentlemanlike, and once I’d gotten in and he’d gone and climbed back into his pickup, he took the lead in the procession, bringing us north five or ten more kilometres before turning right onto Nahma Road, making the jog around the burnt-out town of Cochrane.

Darrel Meek was talking about local tryouts for a Toronto-based NBA Protest Team, whatever that means; instant regret that I hadn’t asked to ride with Matt.

I’d already known we would be detouring around Cochrane; suggested routes didn’t go through the places that were destroyed. We’d already taken the newly-marked detour around North Bay on the way up, another — and much larger — place that hadn’t made it through.

But still, I wanted to see the town of Cochrane.

It was such a big part of my father’s time up here, part of almost everyone he’d known in the north, Sara Vachon and Fiona Rees, and Matt, of course.

Is it weird that I have more interest in seeing a dead town than spending time with anyone who actually made it out of there?

God. I sound like a teenager.

I feel like a teenager.

We followed the road until it what was apparently the last junction, where the main road seemed to bank left, and going straight started looking more like someone’s driveway.

Not long after, Matt stopped his lead truck at a railway crossing.

He climbed out and made his way back to my door.

Darrel rolled down my window.

This is where the bridge to New Post was, Matt told me. Someone blew it up, probably Ryan Stems.

I don’t know if he realizes that I’ve read all of the journals. You’d think he’d know that, but… I guess it’s not something people really think about.

I’m not sure Matt’s read them; otherwise, I think he wouldn’t be so gentle on good ol’ Robert Jeanbaptiste. It’s not like Dad painted a particularly flattering picture of Matt Kazimierski.

Can we keep going? Darrel asked. I’d really like to take a shower.

Matt chuckled.

No showers? I asked.

No, there are showers, Matt said. Just not as hot as people like. Er… not yet.

Oh.

Can we go? Darrel asked again. Please?

Yeah, we’ll go, Matt said. Keep your pants on. He gave me a little smile. Want to ride up with me? Then I can give you the tour without pissing everyone else off.

Sure, I said, unsure if I was sending the wrong kind of signal.

Thank Christ, Darrel said.

-

Matt talked to me about scavenging with my dad, that usually it had been more of a Baptiste-and-Graham-Ellie affair, but that sometimes he’d been in on it. He wasn’t actually gushing about him — about Dad — but he was definitely straddling the line.

I don’t think he’s doing it for me, like he thinks I want to hear everything all sugar-coated up. I think he really wants to remember my father that way. And I’m okay with that; I just don’t think that’s ever going to work for me.

I knew my dad well enough to know that there wasn’t nearly so much sugar for the coating. There was more of… I guess the opposite of sugar.

We reached the main highway, 652, and then we drove onto the bridge over the Abitibi.

There’d been a total of three gates, from what I could see of the leftovers, but none of them had been left blocking the road.

We passed several yardsites that had clearly been burnt, until we reached the first right and took it.

New Post Road.

Why does everyone call it New Post? I asked. And not its other name?

Taykwa Tagamou?

Yeah.

I asked Kai about that, too.

Kai?

He’s on the crew, Matt said. Grew up at New Post.

And what did he tell you?

That it’s just New Post. Just a townsite. It’s not even a part of the original reserve. Not that it matters, anymore.

What do you mean? I asked.

They’re part of the Mushkegowuk Nation. A nation within a nation, and all of that within whatever we are. He smirked. Canada, maybe?

The Confederation, I guess… unless they’ve come up with an actual name. The United Provinces of Burnt to a Crisp.

He gave me a friendly nod. Names don’t really matter.

He turned left onto Nelson Road, through a gate that was wide open. Just not closed, as opposed to having been knocked down.

I thought it was weird that they didn’t bother closing it. I know Dad would have something to say about that.

So how many on your crew? I asked.

Uh… not sure… I’d have to count…

You have until we reach the lake to get me an answer.

What?

Just messing around, I said. Sorry.

He nodded. Then nodded a little more. Eight, including me.

That’s more than I expected, actually.

They gave me approval for eight, he said. I have the paperwork, Cassy, in case you need to review it.

I looked at him for a second. Trying to figure him out.

Was he messing with me, now?

Fiona’s not on the crew, he said. Not officially.

Fiona?

Look. I’m calling her a dependent. Stretching the definition. Is… is that going to be a problem?

I wasn’t sure how to respond.

He was looking at me. Instead of the road.

Waiting for… my approval…

Cassy?

I don’t think this is a war zone, I said. Pretty sure Fiona can go wherever she wants. I smiled. And, well, I’m not sure why you think any of this would be a problem for me.

You’re the chair of the commission, aren’t you?

Yeah… but it’s not like we’re curing stupid out here, Matt. It’s just a memorial site. Busy work for busy bodies.

He frowned at that.

I felt like the kind of idiot science will never be able to fix.

But then he smiled. I guess I knew you’d be okay to work with, he said.

Uh. Thanks.

I mean it.

Okay.

It’s good you’re here, he said.

I know he wasn’t trying to make me feel bad.

I haven’t talked to Fiona, I said. Not for a while.

That’s fine. She’s okay. Hanging around with some idiot.

Some idiot?

Or moron, Matt said. Your dad tended to alternate between my two pet names.

Are you guys… together?

"She’s too young… she’s amazing, but… she’s still too young."

I smiled. And she has impeccable taste in idiots.

He laughed. Now you’re just buttering me up to get a bigger bedroom.

Heh. I’m just glad I won’t have to sleep in a tent… right?

He laughed a little more.

And took the last little turn, stopping in front of an oversized house that looked like a cross between a cottage and a farmhouse.

Yeah, I’ve seen the photos.

I know it’s where they’d been living.

Matt parked right out front, beside a small electric two-seater. The other three vehicles in our little convoy parked on the road behind us.

Matt let the engine idle for a moment.

He turned to look at me.

Thank you for coming up here, Cassy, he said. This stuff… it really matters.

Yeah, I know…

Not that I hadn’t just contradicted myself on that...

He sighed. Some people say he made it up. Your dad. That things didn’t happen like he said. That he twisted it around to make himself look good, and to make guys like Stems look bad.

You were there, Matt, I said. You know what happened.

You’d be surprised how little that matters.

I nodded. I guess it’s our job to make sure people know the truth.

Yeah…

Even as I’d said that, about truth, I knew that Matt and I don’t really agree on what the truth is. Not really. I’d only read the journal, but I knew my father. I know my father. Matt had gone through most of it, but you know… I don’t think he can see the whole picture when it comes to Dad.

But those little variations on a theme are nothing compared to what some people are pushing. That Dad made half of it up. To make himself look good. To make Ryan Stems look bad.

And I was pretty sure two of those people had ridden up to McCartney Lake with me.

I hopped out of the truck.

Matt rushed to meet me on my side of the vehicle. I wondered if he’d been planning on opening the door for me again.

Matt’s exactly like I remember him, from the freight yards in Coleraine, sure, but mostly from my father’s diary. Just a nice guy. No… a good guy.

The kind of guy you don’t expect to run into anymore, after everything that’s happened. Like he should have a sign hanging around his neck that reads critically endangered.

I’m really glad he’s here.

I saw a broad-shouldered aboriginal man walking toward us, from the general direction of the barn.

He didn’t look particularly cheerful.

This is Kai Linklater, Matt told me, as the man held out his hand.

I shook it, and then the man gave me a friendly smile.

I appreciate you coming up here, Ms. Jeanbaptiste, he said. I really do.

Thanks, I said. Call me Cassy.

Kai turned to Matt. I’ll take our new arrivals to Cabin F, he said.

Matt nodded.

I wasn’t sure if I was included in that, having newly arrived and everything. Until Kai waved goodbye to me, and walked toward the jeep that still had Brodeur and Muzyk inside.

Matt and I stood for a couple of minutes in slightly-awkward silence, even after Kai had hopped into the back seat of the jeep and the three vehicles had turned around and headed back toward Nelson Road.

I guess Matt was giving me a moment to take it all in.

Maybe he thought I was going to need to have a little cry or something?

So this is where you’ll be staying, he said. With me and Fiona, if that’s okay.

That’s great, I said. Not that I could have told him otherwise, but honestly, I didn’t mind the idea.

I mean, it does feel a little bit awkward with Matt, and I’m sure it’ll get even more awkward with Fiona. But awkward isn’t the end of the world. And that’s what you get in most families, too, isn’t it?

And that’s what they are, or so I keep reminding myself, as I avoid having to talk to them or about them.

Part of Dad’s family. So they’re part of mine.

Just… you know, not part of Mom’s.

Is Gwyneth here yet? I asked.

She arrived this morning, Matt said. Uh, she’ll be staying in this cottage, too.

That doesn’t sound all that cramped. You guys certainly crowded in tighter the first time.

He nodded.

I was wondering where Fiona was.

The windows were open, as was the front door, aside from the ever-present screens to keep the bugs out.

She would have heard us coming.

She would have known I was part of the group.

But that’s not what I’m about, is it? Worrying about the off chance that Fiona knows I’m here and she’s stalling, completely dreading having to see me, even more than I’m dreading talking to her.

Even more than I dread coming up with excuses for why I haven’t bothered to reach out. Why it’s been three months of radio silence.

Would you like to go in? Matt asked. Or did you need another minute?

Sure, I said. Let’s go in.

Matt motioned to the front door, so I took the lead.

There were two pairs of dirty work boots arrayed along a long mat on the front porch; both pairs were significantly smaller than my sasquatch-sized feet.

"Looks like they are here, Matt said. Weird."

"Where should they be?" I asked, assuming we were thinking of the same two people with their perfectly-proportioned shoe sizes.

It’s just… Fiona was pretty excited to see you again.

Maybe she’s hiding in the broom closet. And when we least expect her to jump out…

Matt laughed. I’m sure she’ll come see you as soon as she can.

We walked into the living room.

And I couldn’t effing believe it.

Sitting on a striped couch — that had seen better days — was a hundred-percent naked woman, her legs crossed and a wide grin on her face.

Kayla Fucking Burkholder.

It’s so nice to see you, Kayla, I said, trying not to look away. Because I had a feeling she expected me to be squeamish about it, like she wanted me to be. I wouldn’t give her that. "Nice to see all of you, apparently. Because that’s something people do?"

I was pretty sure she was drunk. Which was unusual, but not completely shocking, at six-thirty in the evening.

What the hell are you doing? Matt asked her. Is this supposed to be funny?

I looked over to Matt. What’s funny to me is that you somehow forgot to mention that Kayla was up here, too.

I’m on the crew, Kayla said, barely intelligible. Definitely drunk. Matt doesn’t mention me much. It’s a whole thing with him.

Okay, I said.

She patted the cushion beside her, wanting me to sit down. So I guess I’m almost like your stepmother now.

Yeah, almost. Except… not at all.

Okay, uh… jerk. She was still patting the seat next to her. It was possible she’d forgotten to tell her hand to stop.

So… I’d say I’m not drunk or naked enough to sit beside you there, I said. Or to pretend like this isn’t the most ridiculous thing you’ve done so far. Which is really something.

This definitely hasn’t happened before, Matt said. I’m really sorry, Cassy.

Don’t apologize for me, Kayla said. "I’m not sorry."

Matt groaned. I’m apologizing for myself. Since I was stupid enough to let you come with us.

Let me come? Are you friggin kidding me?

So I think I’ve solved the mystery, I said. Of why Gwyneth and Fiona are currently anywhere but here.

They have a problem with me, Kayla said. But that’s okay. I have a bare assload of problems with them.

I turned back to Matt. I think I’m tired. A couple minutes ago, I was gonna go with being hungry, but… you know, things change.

I thought we’d be having dinner, Matt said. But I’m not sure dinner’s happening.

I’m not invited, Kayla said to me, in a loud whisper. "Matt wants me to think they all just eat from the ration packs. But I know better, because I’m not a goddamn idiot. But, if you’d like, you two can slink off to the kitchen and make your dinner plans sans Burkholder."

I had no idea how to respond to that.

I looked to Matt for some kind of

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