“What are you proposing?” asked Stu as the light from the lanterns illuminated his tattered face.
“Scott and Nash, I think I’d like the two of you patrolling the woods each day in two hour shifts. Stu and I will talk to the rest of the group and form other pairs we think would be good for the job.”
They each sat for a moment in the harsh lantern light and contemplated the changing scenario around them.
“I can’t believe she’s gone,” said Meghan when she began to cry again. Scott leaned sideways and took her into his arms, his eyes slightly tearing as well.
“Things have changed,” said Sullivan softly. “It’s a new world we’re living in now and I have a feeling it’s about to get a whole lot bigger.”
“We’ll gather everyone together,” said Scott as he stood from the table with Meghan. “You can go over everything with them and then…” He stopped speaking, not wanting to vocalize that they’d have to bury her before the sun went down. “We’ll check in with Cole and let him know what happened to Eliza.”
Everyone stood together and exited the war room in silence, feeling numb as the story of Eliza’s death slowly settled on each of them. Scott escorted Meghan out of the Fort as she wept, both of them off to break the news to Cole. Stu and Dianna ushered everyone to the meeting place as Sullivan stepped up on the platform.
“Everyone, please gather around,” said Sullivan. “As you all know, Eliza was killed today. What you don’t know is that it wasn’t because of a howler...”
The look of shock in people’s eyes was the same from person to person, a mixture of sadness and fear radiated from them all. Fresh tears flowed as the crowd processed exactly what her death meant to the safety of the group. Sullivan himself had to hold back more tears as he stood strong in front of the group and watched them all breakdown collectively.
“Something is clearly happening in the area around us,” he said as he reached his hand into his pocket. “I think it’s time that everyone knows what’s been going on.” He held a handful of red cloth strips in the air. “For a while now we’ve been finding some of the dead with these tied around their wrists. It’s quite clear that they’re all coming from the same place, but for what reason, I don’t know.”
“Why didn’t you tell us sooner?” said a woman who stood at the front of the group.
“Why would I?” said Sullivan sharply. “I wasn’t going to cause a panic among the group by feeding little pieces of information bit by bit. Information that may mean nothing. These,” Sullivan held the little red ties higher in the air. “Could just be people who were in the same group at one time—or it could mean something else entirely. What we know now is that there is a very real threat nearby and we all have to be on high alert. Anyone interested in volunteering for security duty, please see me.”
Sullivan headed back toward the war tent, his shoulders tense. Slowly, volunteers filed over to him.
By the end of the meeting, Sullivan had recruited ten other people to join Nash and Scott in securing the woods each day. Stu dismissed the group, but kept the new members of the security team back to go over their responsibilities and pair them off. Stu and Sullivan gave them an overview of what was required of them. They listened, nodding along. “We’ll take notes on what we see and when. This way, if there is any correlation in movements we’ll see it.”
Almost everyone from the Fort joined them as they walked through the woods to the burial site. They moved in silence as the birds continued their late afternoon melody. Cole led the way with Eliza in his arms, followed by anyone who had known her well inside the fence. The burial was quick, with few words exchanged as everyone stood in disbelief. It didn’t take long for Cole to place her in the ground and efficiently refill her grave with loose dirt as silent tears rolled down his face.
She was laid to rest among a collection of twelve other wooden crosses, each with a name scribed across the front. Sullivan stood in the back of the group as he leaned on a tree and surveyed the number of grave markers, Dianna beside him. They’d created a safe place to settle in the Treefort, but it was a dangerous world they lived and the gravesite was a reminder of that. Cole knelt beside the grave and fixed a cross with her name carved neatly across the front, making sure it was deep enough to stay upright. He stayed on his knees, slumped over as the group watched him in the dying light.
“Take everyone back to camp and give Cole some time,” said Sullivan, watching as tears fell to the ground from Cole’s eyes.
“Of course,” said Dianna. She hugged him softly before she gathered the group. Before Nash and Scott could join the returners, Sullivan held out his arm.
“Show me where you found the slowpokes yesterday.”
They walked quickly together to the area along the creek where the slowpokes had been day before. The three of them stood at the edge of the steep bank, looking down at the clueless monsters that still stood along the water below. Some of them had moved farther down the creek but most of them were located where they had been the day before. The dreadlocked slowpoke stood ankle deep in the water in front of them, gazing up at them with his wild, fiery eyes. There were a few more of them today.
“I could’ve gone without seeing him today,” said Scott as he gazed at the slowpoke.
“This is concerning,” said Sullivan, looking up and down the waterline as the dead continued their monotonous way of life.
“They must have migrated here together,” said Scott as he looked at all of them with the red strips on their wrists. “Dammit I wish we knew what it meant.”
“I get the feeling we’re going to find out soon,” said Sullivan. “Let’s head back. I don’t wanna get caught out here at night.”
The sun had almost completely set by the time the three of them made their way back to the Treefort. Dianna opened the gate as usual. The Fort was blanketed with an eerie silence.
“Everything okay?” she asked, locking the gate as they filed in. Sullivan exhaled and pulled her in for a hug as Nash and Scott walked off to join everyone around the fires. Melissa and Nash locked eyes and smiled as a loud ruckus suddenly erupted from the armory trailer, followed by Mark releasing a wild string of profanity. Everyone looked over to see him on the ground, yelling as the door of the trailer hung open. Cole stepped outside with a large rifle strapped to his back, as well as a smaller handgun and a large knife strapped to his ankle. Sullivan sprinted to the trailer and helped Mark to his feet as Cole marched past him.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” boomed Sullivan, following behind him as Mark continued to curse at Cole and shake his fist in the air. Cole paid no mind and continued his walk toward the front gate. “Hey! I’m talking to you!”
“Do I really have to say it, Sully?” spat Cole without turning around.
“You’re not thinking clearly,” said Sullivan as he caught up with him and placed his hand on Cole’s shoulder. He spun around and knocked Sullivan’s hand away.
“You think you can stop me?” He glared back at Sullivan through the firelight with red, bleary eyes. Sullivan stared back at him and saw the determination and stubbornness in his posture.
“Don’t do anything stupid. Bring him back here, if you find him.”
“The fact that you even think you have to say that is insulting,” said Cole as he made his way to the gate. “When you’re done getting what you need from him though, I’m going to kill him.”
Sullivan unlocked the gate for him as he stepped outside into the darkness. He stopped and turned around as his face softened slightly in the pale light.
“Tell the kid I’m sorry for coming at him like that.” With that, Cole disappeared into the darkness.
Most of the Fort went to bed early, mourning Eliza’s death and fearing what was to come. The rest sat in silence around the fire. Sullivan sat across from them with his arm around Dianna.
“Do you think he’ll find that man?” asked Melissa, her head resting on Nash’s shoulder. Her eyes flutter
ed as she tried to stay awake.
“I sincerely doubt it,” he said as Dianna tilted her head to look up at him. “Cole doesn’t have any tracking skills and he’s running off raw emotion right now. It’ll be dumb luck if he finds anything at all.”
“You’re convinced there’s another group nearby, aren’t you?” asked Dianna as she leaned her head back into his shoulder.
“Seems pretty obvious at this point. What worries me is that recent events have all but confirmed that this other group, wherever they are, don’t have good intentions.”
About an hour later, Melissa whispered, “Take me to bed,” without opening her eyes.
Nash helped her up and the two of them walked toward the RVs. Nash guided her slowly toward hers, only to be stopped by her smile.
“No. Take me to our RV.”
Nash blushed and gave her a short nod. The door opened smoothly as he escorted her inside, but closing was a bit more difficult. The broken door jam would always remind him of his last night with Duncan, but nothing could ruin the way he felt at that moment.
They crawled into bed together and Melissa snuggled against him. “I feel so bad for Cole. I hope he’ll be okay.”
“Cole’s angry, but he seems like a smart guy. He’ll be okay.”
“I hate losing people,” she sobbed softly. Her tears dampened his shirt.
“Me too,” he whispered. Nash hadn’t realized it before, but she and Eliza had been close. Eventually, her sobs quieted and she fell asleep.
Nash listened to her breathing beside him as he replayed the events of the day. The image of Barry tumbling on the ground as he fell from the SUV, followed by Eliza’s crazed attack replayed endlessly in his mind. The faces of the people in the Fort flashed before him as they realized that Eliza had been killed, each one knowing that it easily could have been any one of them. Nervous energy radiated through every part of his body.
He didn’t sleep at all.
Chapter 14
Nash jolted out of a daze to the sound of heavy banging on the door of his RV. Melissa was gone, just like the morning before, only this morning there was no care package at the edge of his bed to greet him. He quickly put on clothes and opened the door to find Sullivan standing outside looking dreary-eyed and equally as exhausted as he felt.
“They let us sleep in,” he said, stepping into the RV.
“I’m not sure sleep is what I’d call it,” said Nash. “I don’t think I slept a single minute.”
“Me either,” said Sullivan. He sat on a wooden chair at the end of the RV opposite the bed. “I can still feel her weight on top of me, Nash. All night, all I could think about was her gnashing her teeth at me.”
“I kept thinking about it all night, too. I just don’t understand why anybody would do what he did.”
“He was sending a message,” said Sullivan as he rubbed his eyes with his palms. “I think something really dangerous is coming and between you and me, I don’t think we’re ready. We haven’t had a single person come through here with any kind of ill will, until Duncan anyway. I think we all just got comfortable thinking that everyone left alive was decent. I’m guilty of it and I got Eliza killed because of it.”
“It wasn’t your fault,” said Nash; the emotions of the day before were still raw. “He could have fooled anyone. He fooled me. He fooled all of us.”
“I know that. This whole thing has just made me realize how ill prepared we really are. Nobody would know what to do if someone were to come for us. I’m not sure I even know what to do.”
Sullivan looked down toward the floor in frustration as Nash stared out across the open door at the line of people at the food truck. Nash wanted nothing more than to go and see Melissa, but he liked being accepted into Sullivan’s inner circle so quickly.
Sullivan looked up at Nash, his eyes red with sadness. “Do you think she was present? You know what I mean? Did she know what she was doing?”
“I guess anything is possible, but I don’t think so. I like to think if there were any part of her remaining, she would have been able to stop herself. Look at Melissa’s parents; her dad ripped her mom apart without a thought. I think that once you’re infected, that’s the end of who you were.”
Sullivan returned his gaze to the floor and silently wept. Nash walked over to where he was sitting and placed a hand on his broad shoulder, patting a couple times before he let his hand rest.
“She loved you, Sully.” The short form of his name came out smoother than he thought I would. Only people close to him shortened it, and as he said it, it felt right. “They all love you. No matter how much you do to safeguard this place, bad things are going to happen. They all know that. Nobody out there is blaming you.”
“I know,” he said through his tears, his voice not wavering in the least. He inhaled deeply, letting the air sit in his lungs for a moment before he exhaled a long, powerful breath. “Let’s get out there. Go see Melissa, I know you’re itching to.”
Nash smiled at Sullivan stood. He placed his dark sunglasses on his face to hide his red eyes, and patted Nash on the back before he ducked his head and left the RV. Nash watched Sullivan walk toward the middle of the camp as Melissa leaned out of the sliding glass window of the food truck. Any uneasiness he felt from the restless night washed away as he stepped out of the RV to join her.
He’d woken up thinking about her every morning since he got to the Fort, and time without her was starting to become a blur. She smiled wider as he approached, her eyes remaining sad from the day before. She placed a package of food onto the window ledge, similar to the one from the day before.
“I woke up a little later than I should have and people were getting hungry,” she said as he reached the truck. “Sorry I didn’t have time to bring it to you like yesterday.”
“No worries. I can stand in line just like everyone else,” he said with a smile. “How are you feeling after yesterday?”
“Better, I guess.” Her eyes were visibly red from crying through the night. “I didn’t sleep well, as I’m sure you can tell.”
“I didn’t sleep at all,” he said as he opened the package of Pop Tarts and bit down without separating them. “Sullivan was up all night too. We were talking this morning, and he’s not doing well. He thinks that everyone is going to blame him for Eliza’s death.”
“Poor Sully,” she said, looking past Nash as Sullivan sat alone by a small fire. “None of us are in denial about the world outside the fence. It’s dangerous, and not all of us are going to make it. Most of us probably wouldn’t even be alive if he hadn’t found us in the first place.” She closed the glass window and joined him outside the truck, putting her arms around him as she rested her head against his chest. “How do you feel today?”
“Sore, but not too bad.” Sullivan was gathering the group together who would work the security detail outside the fence, talking to them all from the platform he usually spoke from. “I should probably be over there.”
He placed his hand on hers and squeezed it softly before he joined them. Sullivan stepped down from the platform and instructed the group to follow Stu to see the schedule and get further training.
“Not today, chief,” he said as Nash tried to follow the group. “You and Scott are gonna patrol as a team, but not today. After yesterday, I’d be negligent to not give you a bit of a break.”
Sullivan trotted off to help Stu with training the volunteers as the lack of sleep from the night before finally caught up with Nash. He looked back at the food truck, which now sported a considerable line of people waiting to get food. Melissa was busily dispersing breakfast and marking it in her ledger.
Knowing that she’d be a while at the food truck, Nash wandered back to his RV to try and get some rest. The inside of the RV was considerably warmer than it had been that morning as the sun continued to rise high above the trees. He unlatched some of the windows and cranked them open, letting the fresh air fill the space around him. He undressed all the way to his box
ers, finished a half empty water bottle, and crawled back into bed.
****
He woke him in the darkness of the RV, a fire roaring outside as an overwhelming sense of urgency flowed through him. Against his will, he stepped out of bed and went out into the darkness as he stepped barefoot onto the cold ground. The fire roared wildly in the center of the Fort, and other than his RV, the entire space inside the fence was empty. He kept quiet, looking from corner to corner and realized he was completely alone.
The front gate rattled softly, “He’s coming to get you,” a voice called. He walked toward the gate slowly. The rattling more vicious the closer he got.
“Coming to get you,” the voices chanted. Nash stopped at the gate and silence descended.
“Buddy Boy, Buddy Boy, let me in,” Duncan’s voice hissed. Terror grabbed Nash and he stood still listening as the voices hissed at him from the other side like hungry serpents.
“She’s out here with us, Buddy Boy,” Duncan cackled. “We’ve all taken a turn. She was worth the wait.” A girlish giggle echoed through the air, a dark and twisted version of the laugh he had come to love.
The camouflage attached to the fence dissolved into mist revealing hundreds of angry, glowing eyes staring back at him. Black fingers curled their way through the chain link fence, shaking it until it shattered. Duncan stepped forward first, giggling with glee as Nash tripped.
The ghoulish giggling continued and Duncan descended upon him.
****
Nash burst into wakefulness. Even after they exiled Duncan, he still tormented Nash. Maybe there was no ridding himself of the monster. His head pounded with exhaustion as he reached for his watch to see that two hours had passed. Nash grabbed a bottle of water and drank half of it quickly. He opened the RV door as an engine roared to life nearby. He stepped outside and watched as Sullivan maneuvered one of the RVs along the fence, right behind three others now parked in a line.
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