“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
“Try me.”
“They’re like…no. You’ll think I’m crazy.”
“Well,Ron, it’s a little late for that. Besides, under the circumstances I think I’m gonna find out anyway. So why don’t you just tell me?”
Ron’s face tightened up. “They’re dead all right! They’re fucking dead! Some of them have white eyes that fogged over when they passed, and then they got up miraculously. It’s like the end of the world in Romero movies, Revelations, and all that crap, spooky Bible stuff.”
“Don’t talk about the Good Book like that. It’s blasphemous.”
“Blasphemous?!” He chortled and a fire lit in his eyes. “You’re going to talk to me about blasphemy now? What about those things out there? If I’m blasphemous then what the fuck are they?!”
Ann cringed as if he would strike her, and Ron realized how much his voice had risen. He looked over and saw Cassius lying in the corner with his eyes turned down. He turned and faced the wall and stood silently for a few seconds and turned back to face Ann and hissed out a long breath. “Listen, Ann, I’m sorry. Maybe I did go a little over the top.” Why am I apologizing for saving our lives? “I just felt threatened was all. Look, I didn’t get some kind of sick rush from it. I’m not crazy. I just did what I had to do, and I did it until the job was done. I hope that one day you can understand that, one day soon, because that was just a small group. We have to assume that there are more, and I don’t know if we can stay pinned down here. Frankly, I don’t know what the hell we’re going to do. I need a shower. I feel disgusting. You can think about it.”
With that he walked out of the room and left Ann staring at the floor with tears in her eyes.
She stared motionlessly off into space awhile after Ron left, and a storm of thoughts raged behind her eyes. Finally, Cassius walked over and put his head in her lap and pulled her back into the moment. She put her hand on his head and began scratching him between the eyes, and they shut with joy. Both of them needed a little attention after such an altercation. As she continued petting him, her eyes relaxed, and her posture went from rigid steel to softened leather. She turned her back to the monitor and scratched him behind the ears with both hands.
Gradually, after some time apart, Ann and Ron kissed and made up, and closed the door to the bedroom for some privacy. When they had finished washing away their tension, the way only passionate lovemaking could, exhaustion and, finally, sleep overtook them.
Meanwhile Cassius walked over to the exit, cocked his head slightly to the side, and gazed upon the threshold with growing curiosity.
Chapter Thirteen
Out on rural Tennessee State Highway 42, a road time forgot, a mixed group of five, young adults walked east leaving carnage behind. They had attended a small liberal arts college located in the gray area where Middle Tennessee blends with West Tennessee, equidistant between Memphis and Nashville. As people took cover before the asteroid landed, they held out in the warren of rooms and hallways under their university’s gymnasium, just in case the skeptics ended up being right about impact day.
When the day came and went without incident, a lot of people who had chosen the same hiding place ventured outside, despite the warnings about air quality, and never came back. The group of friends watched as one person after another disappeared until they had the gymnasium’s underground all to themselves. Having hastily taken cover without much in the way of planning, they had quickly run out of food and water. When they could bear their hunger and thirst no longer, they too ventured out into the open and witnessed the plague.
Eleven people had exited the gymnasium and staggered out into the dim light. By the time they made it off campus, running madly while shoving the lumbering dead aside, three were left behind with the creatures piled on top rending flesh from their bones in the midst of bloodcurdling screams, and two more fled with injuries. Despite everyone’s fatigue they all summoned up the strength to run and saw that their attackers fell far behind. Fortunately, the college sat on the edge of a small town, and soon they made it out to sparsely populated areas dotted with occasional farms and country houses with large well-manicured lawns. Some hours after walking on meandering countryside roads, often lined with forests, the two of their group who sustained bites began to feel ill, and the group’s progress slowed to nearly a halt. Giving in to fatigue and the weight of their sick comrades, they decided to camp for the evening in a quiet field watched over by a towering oak tree. When they stopped walking the sudden cold had them all huddling close together tucking their knees up into their T-shirts and still shivering. A hastily thrown together campfire started with dry leaves helped stave off the cold, but did little to satisfy their growling stomachs and parched throats.
One problem solved seemed to reveal two more, and the increasing weight and severity of the condition made everyone's head hang low. To make matters worse, no one could relax and conserve what little energy they had as they looked on in horror at their two friends whose illnesses grotesquely deteriorated into choking spasms.
The healthy ones sat helplessly beside them holding hands and whispering prayers that pleaded for a miracle until death’s silence delivered the only relief.
In the dark by the firelight, fighting to see through teary eyes, they dug makeshift graves with sticks and stones then entombed them in earthen graves. They gave eulogies through laughs and tears that reminisced about nights of partying and inebriation, funny pranks, comical misadventures, and drinking games. The weight of the others who had fallen in their flight from campus dampened their moods further, and the gravity of their words carried lamentations for them as well. They had all made one another laugh, and enriched each other’s lives at a time when youth scratches at the door of maturity’s abode, yet fails to get inside.
Later that night as they slept huddled around the fire Jeremy, the athlete of the group, turned in his sleep and covered his head with one arm. He tried to sink back into slumber a little longer, but it eluded him as it had so many times for the past several nights. He gradually turned his head out toward the edge of camp and listened to the sound that he realized had awoken him. He slowly pulled his thick arm out from under his girlfriend’s neck, rolled his hazel eyes over toward the noise, and raised his muscular frame to all fours. He sat crouched for several, long seconds before creeping to the edge of the fire’s light. He stopped and listened for a moment longer, with pinched eyebrows, to the groans and tearing noises emanating from beyond the darkness. When the sounds could tell him no more about what lurked in the darkness, he decided to pull a burning log from the fire and crept forward. As his torch pushed back the night its first light fell on a hand twitching involuntarily. Jeremy paused and stared with a stony face before slowly inching forward. The light peeled back the shadows bit by bit, and what he saw made him shudder. The darkness ebbed to reveal a bloody torso, savagely ripped open from neck to navel. There, hovering over the carcass resembling two vultures on carrion, he saw his two friends, who had been buried only a short time before, devouring the guts of his fraternal little brother, Kyle.
Jeremy had screamed and jumped back, almost dropping the torch on himself. He scrambled to his feet and ran toward the campfire shrieking and flailing his arms. He pushed his feet so fast they slipped, turning up leaves and dirt, and he fell down with a grunt. He had to force himself to move slower to keep his feet from slipping on the grass.
Back at camp the others shot up to the sounds of screams and staggered to their feet. The natural reaction to Jeremy’s panic was to ask questions first, wondering if the pressure had broken him. No one could put together the meaning of his words, unable to fathom that two people they watched die had come back to life, and murdered one of their group in his sleep.
Jeremy made such a stir that no one noticed Kyle’s absence as they tried to calm him and suppress his brawny trunk. It was not until his eyes widened as he pointed out to the edge of the fire�
��s light, continuing to scream, that anyone discovered the source of his fright.
With a trembling finger Jeremy pointed into the darkness. “Look, there they are!”
Everyone turned with blank expressions expecting to see nothing of import, thus confirming his insanity. However, as the images of their two dead friends standing in the firelight’s dim wash, smothered in blood and guts still oozing from their red teeth, entered their eyes the group recoiled in a wave of screams and moans. In a split-second everybody dispersed and scampered off into the night, leaving only the dead to keep each other company.
After the sun came up they found each other walking through adjacent fields, or sitting on the side of the road, all heading in the same direction as before—east.
The remainder of their group consisted of Jeremy, the most athletic of them, and his girlfriend Meg, a business major. Donnie studied pre-med, and his girlfriend, Laura, was a psychology major. The fifth wheel in the group was Jim, a drama major, who had no girlfriend due to his promiscuous nature.
At the moment none of it mattered to them, not the bills and loans hanging over their heads, not the unread books or unwritten papers, and certainly not the empty classrooms overlooking the campus massacre from which they had so recently fled. All of life’s normal cares and problems, suddenly so tame by comparison, had been abruptly usurped by stark misery. At present, and foremost on their minds, they found themselves walking on some lost country road shivering uncontrollably and feeling dehydrated, starving, exhausted, and desperate.
After walking in silence for a while since the group had reassembled, Meg started grunting with every step she took uphill as her brown hair whipped in the wind. Her scrawny shoulders hunched and cast shadow over her thin legs, and each step seemed to bring her closer to the ground. For what felt like the millionth time in the last few minutes she ripped strands of hair out of her mouth and threw it out of her eyes, only to get smacked in the face with it again. She growled like a dog and finally held it in a ponytail as she walked. “What I wouldn’t give for a stupid hair band! I’m so thirsty, and I’m freezing. When did we last have water?”
Jeremy did not look up from his feet, and his voice sounded raspy. “Try not to think about it. We’ll get a break soon. We just have to keep movin’.”
Jim stopped with his hands perched on his hips. “I need water too, very soon. We’ve got to find something up here…somewhere.” He had sandy, blond hair that capped his narrow head like a carelessly draped mop. Of average height, he had fair skin, a tapered chin that gave the impression of pointy, elven features matched with penetrating blue eyes, and his tight clothes sported a dancer’s build with wiry muscles that seemed to possess a strength closely allied with endurance.
Jeremy looked over at Jim and shook his head with a smile. “Oh shit, don’t you start too. Pretty soon everybody’ll be whinin’.” Jeremy looked back at Meg. “Don’t worry. I’m sure we’ll find somethin’ soon.”
Meg only nodded and plodded on with shaky legs.
Jim’s face had grown redder by the second since the comment, and he finally knifed a finger at Jeremy. “Oh, I’m sorry, Superman. Why don’t you run a five second forty up there and find us some water since you’re so strong?”
“Backtalk me again and see what happens you little drama fag.” Jeremy clenched his fists and his face tightened up as he stopped and spread his legs into a wide stance.
Donnie’s eyes slowly swung over to the two of them and then fell back down. “Talking just wastes energy guys, y’all should conserve it. If y’all want to argue and fight, why don’t you just stay here and settle it while the rest of us leave to find food and water?” He did not raise his head of brown, curly hair as he spoke. Normally strong but not terribly athletic, with a touch of extra body fat that looked intertwined with muscle, his feet grazed the road with each step, and his arms dangled at his sides, useless as vines.
Once he heard Donnie’s words, Jeremy looked away before dragging his legs back into action. “Yeah, maybe you’re right.” His face flattened out as the blood retreated, returning his skin to its normal color. After a few steps his hands relaxed, and he resumed his hunched over gait.
Donnie and Jeremy shared a close friendship that spanned several years, and was most notably complemented by their differences. Donnie evoked Jeremy’s more compassionate and intelligent side which he had devoted considerable energy to overshadowing throughout years of participation in sports and high-five moments in competition. At the same time Jeremy brought out Donnie’s more adventurous and fun-loving side which seldom escaped between his studies and the serious, scholastic environments in which he normally found himself. They complemented each other perfectly by entertaining suppressed natures which needed release. Together they could just as easily study as end up drunk while trying to crush beer cans on their foreheads. It was a unique friendship. More importantly, for the present situation, whenever Jeremy started to lose his considerable temper Donnie always seemed to have the right words to bring him down. Their girlfriends often concluded that, if not for Donnie, Jeremy would not listen to anybody.
Jim breathed a quiet sigh of relief since he could not outrun, outfight, or outdo Jeremy in any physical match, unless they had an acting contest. So he let his head fall and walked in silence as well.
Jeremy’s hatred for Jim had spawned a couple years before out of sheer jealousy. Donnie shared some of the same feelings, but did not let Jim bother him the same way. It all started during the first semester of their freshman year. Meg and Laura had introduced Jim to the group after seeing him in a play. The two impressionable young women had thrown themselves at him backstage and kicked off his college career of sexual conquests from which he never looked back.
At that time no one in the group had started dating. Two other first year students in their growing circle, Kristy and Sarah, also took a liking to Jim. The four of them let him pass through each of their beds as they experimented with their newfound freedoms. Gradually the four ladies moved on to more meaningful relationships but never completely left Jim behind.
By their sophomore year, Jeremy and Meg had taken a long term liking to each other, while Donnie and Laura had journeyed down the same path.
Jim, always needing a spotlight to drown out the rest of the world, used his entertainment prowess to leech off the group as long as the fairer sex laughed at his antics. Donnie and Jeremy, especially Jeremy, waited for the day to come when the young women would gain more maturity, stop finding him so amusing, and finally bore of his childishness, but college sometimes resembled a playground. Jim received tolerance from the majority, so the guys had to play along.
Since the group’s reassembly after their terrifying night, Donnie noticed that Laura walked without uttering a word. The longer she remained silent the more he kept an eye on her. He stole a glance at her and, even with fatigue, let his eyes roll over her curvy features. Her blond hair swayed limply occasionally whipping in the wind, but not seeming to give her any trouble. Some strands of hair latched onto her eyelashes, partially obscuring her blue eyes, and caught the edges of her shapely lips. He noticed the way her mouth turned down, and, in fact, her whole body seemed to point downward while somehow staying up. He wondered how he looked. He tried to swallow and only felt his esophagus stick together and slowly separate again. His stomach grumbled as he rubbed it. He opened his mouth to speak but abruptly closed it. He knew that only a complaint would come out, so he saved his breath. He felt a drop of saliva form in his mouth and immediately tried to swallow it, but it disappeared before getting off his tongue. He closed his eyes and puffed his cheeks out as he exhaled. He decided that until he could not walk anymore, he needed to concentrate on putting one foot in front of the other, and that would have to do.
They walked on under the ever-cloudy skies for several more hours, losing skin tone as their feet dragged on and bouts of shivering seeped in. A passerby might have mistaken the group for the undead. They all looked as i
f they had to throw each step out in front to keep going, and then moved forward as if trying to keep balanced on a wet noodle. All of them had extreme cotton mouth and purple lips, more visible against ashen white faces. They looked stranded wandering down the road, what one would expect to find of people lost in a wilderness clumsily forging an ill-conceived path with hope dangling by a thread in the distance, not on a road.
They had left the flat drab landscape that encroached on Middle Tennessee from the Mississippi Delta several miles back in favor of the rolling hills that continued east into the mountains—the inspiration of so many songs and poems. The road wrapped around and rambled over the topography like a giant python coursing through a mesh of vines. The group reached the base of a hill and seemed to groan in unison. They all began breathing harder and uttering curses to themselves as every step forced them to lift each foot higher than the other. The hilly landscape’s beauty had increased and along with it the burden of travel.
Laura had refrained from speech for a while, and could not remember when she had last spoken to anyone and did not care. Her eyes slowly raised up to the top of the long hill in front of her, and she felt a growing urge to speak well up inside. A dot on the road appeared at the edge of her visual range, on the crest of the hill some distance away. She tried to speak, but only a raspy, cracked whisper came out. She pointed as she continued stumbling along the road. Her arm started shaking as she kept it out in front and continued walking, but she refused to lower it.
One by one the others noticed and followed the imaginary line her arm made with their eyes. Squinting and pinching their faces, a few eyes popped wide open as they recognized what sat atop the hill. In unison they found energy that laid dormant deep in their bodies, and only emerged to snatch up an imminent opportunity. Picking up the pace, they all cruised up the hill a little bit faster, closing on the object with growing anticipation.
The Inroad Chronicles (Book 1): Legion Seed Page 13