by Gary Chesla
“Bear will not be running out to attack the dead,” I grinned.
“That’s what he did this morning,” Ed replied.
“That was because he felt I was in danger,” I replied. “He makes sure nothing harms me and I make sure nothing harms him, we’re a team. He has my back and I have his.”
“I feel like the odd man out,” Ed replied.
“Bear will protect both of us,” I said. “We’re a team and Bear is team player. Just stay close to us and do what we do, and you will be fine. Didn’t you ever have a dog when you were a kid?”
“No, my mother was afraid of dogs, she told me to stay away from dogs because they would bite me,” Ed replied.
“That’s too bad,” I said. “Dogs are very loyal friends. But we need to stay quiet now and keep alert. If the dead are moving this way, we could run into them at any time. We’ll have plenty of time to talk later.”
Ed followed quietly. Bear led the way, I was next and Ed brought up the rear. I could see Ed constantly looking back over his shoulder as we walked.
We walked in silence further into the trees for the next thirty minutes. I knew the interstate was about a mile or so up ahead. It was good that we hadn’t run into any of the dead to this point, it meant that the men back at the fort would have more time to complete their jobs.
A few minutes later Bear stopped and began to sniff the air.
Ed walked up to me looking concerned, but I motioned for him to keep quiet as I watched Bear. Bear sniffed at the air for another minute, looked at me then turned his head and looked to the right.
I motioned for Ed to get down on the ground, I knelt down next to Bear and pulled out one of the last three razor tipped arrows that I had left, then silently stared off in the direction Bear was looking. I could hear Ed breathing heavily behind me. I slowly turned and motioned for Ed to put his hand over his mouth and nose to muffle the sound of his breathing. Ed’s eyes were the size of a coffee cup, I could tell he was scared.
When Bear looked back at me again, I set the arrow on the bow and slightly pulled back on the string. When Bear turned back towards the trees, I pulled the string back and held it there as I watched the trees. A moment later I let the arrow fly.
I watched the arrow hit its target, then felt myself finally start to breathe again and I slowly got to my feet.
Bear jogged out to smell the deer I had just shot.
When I started to walk towards the deer, Ed nervously ran in close behind me.
“You can relax,” I whispered. “We will be having another deer roast tonight if all goes well.”
“You shot a deer?” Ed asked. “I thought we were being attacked by the dead. I just knew I was going to die.”
“Were you watching Bear?” I asked.
“Yeah, why?” Ed asked. “He smelled the air and told you we were going to be attacked.”
“No, he smelled the air and detected that a deer was nearby,” I replied. “When he laid down, he told me what direction the deer was coming by where he looked next. If he would have smelled one of the dead, he would have growled, then he would have come over and sat down next to me and looked in the direction where the dead were. I’m telling you this so you will know the next time Bear stops and sniffs the air.”
Ed looked confused.
“Bear and I have been doing this for a while and we can read each other’s signals,” I added.
“Why does he sit next to you if he smells the dead?” Ed asked.
“I guess so he can protect me, or maybe so I can protect him,” I replied. “He knows danger is approaching and that we need to stay close together. I’m not completely sure, but I’ve noticed that is what he does each time and so I’ve learned what to expect.”
“Well I’m glad you understand your dog,” Ed sighed, “because he had me scared to death.”
I gutted the dear and hung it from a tree branch where it would be easier to find on our way back to the fort. I gave Bear a nice reward, and when he was done wolfing down his reward, I cleaned off the arrow I had used to shoot the deer and put it back with my other arrows, then we started moving towards the interstate again.
We had walked for another twenty minutes before Bear stopped once again and began to sniff the air. I figured, based on my last trip out this way that we must be getting close to the interstate.
Bear, after sniffing the air for a few minutes, walked over next to me, sat down and a low growl began to sound deep inside his chest.
I looked at Ed and held my finger up to my lips.
“Bear, where are they?” I asked as I looked at Bear.
Bear looked off to our left side.
“Good Boy,” I whispered, then looked towards Ed. I pointed at Ed, then pointed to myself, then pointed to our right. I tapped Bear on the back, when he looked at me, I motioned to our right. Bear began to move towards our right.
Ed and I followed quietly.
When Bear began to relax a little, I looked back at Ed, “I think a group of the dead were moving through the woods to our left back there.”
“Do you think they were heading for the fort?” Ed replied.
“They might end up at the fort,” I replied. “Hopefully they will follow a path that will take them somewhere else.”
“That was a close one,” Ed added.
“Like I said before, just watch Bear, he seems to have the ability to smell those things long before we get too close to them,” I said. “He has kept me from getting myself into trouble many times.”
We started to walk again, but after only a few minutes, Bear stopped, took one sniff of the air and backed up three steps.
“What’s he saying now?” Ed asked.
“I’m not sure, but I think he is saying we don’t want to go any further and maybe it would be a good idea to turn around and go back to the fort,” I replied, now feeling a little nervous myself with Bear’s unusual reaction.
“That sounds good to me,” Ed said, then turned around and started to retrace his steps.
“We can’t go back yet,” I said.
“But you said we should do what your dog told us to do and he just said to go home.” Ed said.
“We’re not going to go any further, but I want to know what’s up ahead that has Bear so concerned,” I replied.
“How are you going to do that?” Ed asked.
I looked around, then I looked up into the tree that towered above me.
“Did you ever climb a tree when you were a kid?” I asked Ed.
“No, my mother said if I climbed trees I would fall out and break my neck,” Ed replied.
Now why didn’t that surprise me? I thought as Ed answered my question. I imagined that his mother had Ed afraid of just about everything when he was growing up. It sure explained a lot about how Ed has reacted to things ever since I have known him.
“Give me a boost,” I said.
Ed put his hands down and I put my foot in his hands and told him to lift. I began to shimmy up the tree until I finally reached the first branch, then I pulled myself up into the tree. I climbed another twenty feet before I realized that I could see the interstate over the rise. I moved around on the branches until I had a clear view of the highway. Off to my right, north towards Lexington, I could see that the interstate was still packed with the dead as they staggered south. When I looked south, the interstate again appeared packed as the dead moved north. Directly straight ahead, the dead appeared to have bunched up into a massive crowd that overflowed off to each side of the interstate. Something seemed to have blocked their way from traveling in either direction, but what?
I looked down at Ed to see him staring up at me. I signaled for him to come up, it would be educational for Ed to see what was out on the interstate, so he would start to realize what everyone at the fort could soon be facing. Maybe if he understood the enormity of the danger, he would become serious about doing what needed to be done, instead of just loafing around like the bus should be arriving to take him home
any day now.
Ed looked up at me, looked at the tree in front of him, then shrugged his shoulders. I decided not to try to convince him to climb the tree. Maybe his mother was right, as clumsy as Ed was, he probably would fall out of the tree and break his neck.
I took one more look before starting to climb back down out of the tree.
When I dropped back down to the ground, Ed wanted to know what I saw.
“I could see the interstate off in the distance,” I replied. “There are thousands of the dead out there, but there is something puzzling going on out there that I couldn’t see.”
“What was puzzling?” Ed asked.
“The dead are getting bunched up, like they can’t go any further because something is blocking the highway straight out in front of us,” I replied. “When they reach the point where they can’t seem to go any further, they are going down over the embankment on both sides of the interstate.”
“Maybe there was an accident on the interstate,” Ed suggested.
“There aren’t any cars on the interstate, just the dead,” I sighed. What was Ed’s understanding of what was going on out in the world if he still thought that there were cars still driving around on the interstate?
“I know that,” Ed replied. “But you know how the dead are always falling over. Maybe a bunch of them tripped and fell, then all the others started to fall over them, then you end up with a big pile of them out on the interstate. With all the others falling on top of the pile, none of them can get up, so the pile just keeps getting bigger.”
I was shocked, what Ed had just said, in a way could actually make sense, but I don’t think I would have referred to a pile of the dead on the interstate as an accident.
Then an idea came to me.
“You know Ed, you could be right,” I replied. “If the girls came out this way and stumbled out on to the interstate, the dead attacking them would end up on the ground.”
I didn’t want to say that when the dead attacked the girls and began to tear them apart, that the girls would be lying on the ground as the dead piled on top of them trying to tear their share of the girl’s flesh from their bodies. I wanted to spare him the thought of Cheryl being killed in such a horrible way.
“It could explain what I saw out there,” I added.
“Or the dead just started falling over each other,” Ed said.
“Or that could be what happened,” I relented, “But I think this explains why so many of the dead showed up at the fort this morning. It also tells me that for at least the next few days, we could see a lot more of them coming out our way.”
“Can we go home now?” Ed asked nervously.
“Yeah, let’s get out of here,” I replied. “I’ve seen enough.”
We spent the next two hours making our way back to the fort. We took turns dragging the deer. Ed seemed quiet and subdued the entire trip back, maybe the idea that Cheryl was lying dead under a pile of the dead out on the interstate had finally sunk in and Ed was fighting back the horror of that image in his mind.
I couldn’t blame him. I knew the feeling well.
Bear led us back to the fort without any further run ins with the dead, or without spotting another deer.
My questions had been partially answered, all the ideas that made up my new theory had been verified except for one. Was the situation making the dead move off the interstate caused by the girls that had disappeared from the fort?
It made sense that it could be the answer, but I guess that until the dead no longer traveled the interstate, I would never be able to find out for sure. Even then my chances of discovering the answer would be next to impossible. The dead didn’t leave much behind most of the time, and what they did leave behind had a habit of getting up and walking away.
And by the time the dead were no longer around, chances were that I would no longer be here to care about it either.
Chapter 9
When we walked back into the fort, we were greeted by all the men sitting around the fire pit, they were taking a break. It looked like they had been taking a break for most all of the time I had been gone, practically nothing had been accomplished since I had left the fort earlier. The only thing I saw that had been done, was Barry and Albert had made a long pile of grass and brush that nearly stretched all the way across the field out in front of the fort. I couldn’t believe that after the scare we had this morning, that these people had reverted back to their unconcerned, incompetent ways so quickly. So much for thinking that with a little guidance these people could be taught the skills needed to survive.
Bill, Fred and Charlie rushed over to greet me.
“Did you see any signs of the girls?” Charlie asked.
“No, I didn’t see anything specific anyhow, and I tried a few times to see if Bear could pick up a scent, but he wasn’t able to find anything either,” I replied.
“I didn’t expect that you would,” Charlie said. “I can’t imagine any reason why the girls would leave the fort and go off on their own. The girls have always stayed close to the fort. They would have to be crazy to go wandering off like that, none of us knows anything about this area beyond the river and campgrounds. I can’t imagine a reason why any of us would leave the fort and just start walking. I feel the other theory we had about someone taking the girls has to be what happened to them.”
“So far I haven’t found any evidence to support that theory either,” I replied. “It’s almost as if they have just vanished into thin air.”
“I’m hoping that they show up soon,” Bill added. “If we can’t find any evidence that something happened to them, maybe they just got lost and they will find their way back and everything will be fine again.”
“I did, however, find out why so many of the dead came around the fort this morning,” I added. “Something, but I couldn’t see what it was, has the dead in a frenzy out on the interstate. The dead seem to be battling each other, creating a large pile up, causing a lot of them to spill down over the embankment. Once off the interstate, they seem to be going off in random directions.”
“What could they be fighting over?” Bill asked.
“My first thought was that the girls had wandered out onto the interstate, causing all the chaos I saw out there, and that was the reason the dead came out our way today, but I didn’t see any evidence to prove or disprove that theory,” I replied. “I honestly hope that is not what happened. But my first thoughts about why the dead had come out this way were correct. Something has disrupted their movements out on the interstate resulting in many of them changing direction.”
“I understand what you are saying,” Charlie said. “But it just can’t be the girls.”
“I certainly hope that Betty didn’t go out there, because that would mean she was attacked by the dead,” Fred added in a shaky voice. “She can’t be dead, not like that.”
“It was just a theory, Fred,” I replied sympathetically. “We don’t know anything for sure about where the girls are, all we can do is keep looking.”
Fred nodded, “I’m hoping that they just got lost, like Bill said.”
I didn’t want to tell Fred and Bill that the likely hood of the girls accidently getting lost and then finding their way back to the fort unharmed was next to zero for a lot of different reasons, so I tried to move the conversation to what was bothering me the most at the minute.
“We’ll keep looking for all the girls that are missing, but we can only do that if we don’t get overrun by the dead ourselves,” I said as I looked at Charlie. “I believe we are going to have more incidents like we had this morning, we have to get prepared to protect the fort so we can survive before we can go out to find out what happened to the girls. Why is everyone sitting around when we have so much to do?”
“The boys looked tired,” Charlie replied. “I told them to come in and take a rest.”
“They didn’t get much accomplished while I was gone,” I said. “If more than a few dozen of the dead show up, we d
on’t have enough ammo to defend this place.”
“If the dead show up again, we can just hide inside the fort and stay quiet until they go away,” Charlie replied. “That’s what we’ve done for the last year. It’s always worked before. Over the next few days the boys will collect enough wood and stones, we’ll be fine. Tom, I think you worry too much.”
“What about you saying this morning that I should have the men do whatever I thought was necessary to protect the fort?” I asked. “I thought we were in agreement on that?”
“I think I must have been in shock at the disappearance of Susan and wasn’t thinking clearly,” Charlie smiled. “As the day went on and I had a chance to think about what had happened here, I realized that I had overreacted. We’ve managed to get by here at the fort for the last year by keeping our eyes open and then hiding from the dead. I don’t see any reason why we should change doing what has worked so well for us. I don’t think we should change anything. You know the old saying that if it isn’t broke, don’t fix it. I appreciate your opinion, but I don’t think we need to alter our plans over one incident.”
I took a deep breath and tried to control my temper, blowing up at these people would only make them more reluctant to do anything at all. They were set in their ways and felt that they had survived because of and would continue to survive because they could hide from the dead inside the fort and that they didn’t need to do anything else. Because they hadn’t been surrounded by the dead before, I had the idea that they didn’t believe something like that could happen and so they feel that they don’t need to prepare for something that they don’t believe can happen. If there was anything I could count on these people for, it was for them to do as little as possible.
“Charlie, what if a few hundred of the dead show up and are hell bent on getting into the fort?” I asked. “You can only hide from them for so long. The dead don’t get bored and just go away. The dead will stay here until they find a way to get into the fort and kill us all, I’ve seen it happen many times before and if we don’t get prepared, it will happen here too.”