“What the hell Liam. You just about became lunch for him. What were you staring at that you didn’t notice he was coming at you?”
I took a breath and looked at Katy you had a very concerned look on her face. “Sorry, my curiosity got the best of me and I was staring at his very shoddy suicide.”
“Well, just be glad I came back around.”
“Wait, did you start with this house? The front door was standing wide open.”
“I was across the street at another house. I didn’t even notice that the door was open until I came out of the other house.”
I stared at her, not sure what to say next. She saw the look on my face and said, “You’re welcome.”
“Yeah, thank you. I’m sorry Katy. My brain’s not working all the well right now.”
“I gathered that.” She paused, and half turned to the door out of the room. Silently and a little timidly she asked me if I had been in the other rooms.
“No, I came to this room first because I figured if you were in the house you’d be here looking for clothes.”
“So, there is a functioning brain in there?”
“Suppose so. Should we?” I pointed out the door.
“I really don’t want to, but we should at the very least check.”
Both of us walked out of the parent’s room and walked to the bathroom door. I put my ear to the door but heard nothing. I slowly took hold of the door knob and turned it and opened the door. There was no one in there. We both breathed a sigh of relief and I closed the door. Both of us looked at the two doors which should be the kids’ room. Neither one of us moved. Katy was standing right next to me and I could feel her body stiffen. I took a step forward as did she. Neither one of us wanted to open those doors and see those children dead or risen dead. Somewhere in my mind I decided it was best to get it over with and walked to the door nearest the bathroom. I hadn’t noticed that Katy hadn’t gone with me. I reached for the doorknob but didn’t listen to the door this time and swung the door open. It was obviously the teen daughter’s room but there was nobody in there. I pulled the door shut and turned around. Katy was wide-eyed staring at the other door. “No one in this room. I guess all three in there?” I asked her, but it really wasn’t a question.
I walked over to the other door and swung it open and a breath of air escaped me.
“What is it?” Katy asked.
“Nothing.”
“Wait. Nothing?”
“There’s no one in here.”
I hadn’t taken my eyes off the empty room. I had so expected to find the three siblings in here either naturally dead or risen dead that the sight of seeing no one in the room had caused me to lose my breath. I said as much to Katy. I finally turned to look at her and she had gone as white as a ghost.
“What’s wrong?”
“I don’t understand.” She said. If they aren’t in the bathroom, and aren’t in any of the rooms, then where are they?”
“I don’t know but they aren’t here, but it would explain the open front door.”
She physically shook herself. It looked like she was attempting to clear her head. She finally seemed to find some peace in her mind and looked at me. “Well we should get going. It’s going to be another long, hot, and humid Arkansas day and if we are serious about bringing a tanker here it’s better to get it out of the way as quickly as possible.”
“I would completely agree. We’ll take my car. It’s a little bigger than Steve’s and his is still packed with all my treats from yesterday. Is there anywhere we need to stop before getting the tanker so that you can cut it?”
“Yeah, we’ll need to find a machine shop or something similar, so I can grab the necessary tools.”
We started walking down the stairs and out into the hot morning. Sweat started immediately forming on my brow. A thought occurred to me then as we were walking back to the house. “You don’t happen to know how to drive a big rig do you?”
She stopped and looked at me. “I just assumed you did.”
I looked at her sheepishly and admitted that I had never even driven a stick shift.
“Lucky for you, the same man who taught me how to use cutting tools also taught me how to drive. So, yes I should be able to do it.”
She started walking again but I held my position. I was embarrassed. Not because I couldn’t drive a stick or couldn’t in any way offer her much protection. I was embarrassed because I was going to attempt to do all this myself before she showed up. I was embarrassed because I didn’t think I needed any help when the truth was I needed all the help I could get.
She had walked about twenty yards when she realized I wasn’t with her anymore and turned around to regard me. What I saw in her eyes wasn’t hate, or hurt, or disappointment but caring. “Liam, I know that you thought you were on your own and didn’t need or want anyone’s help. You said as much last night. You said you didn’t want me staying in the same house as you. I understand Steve’s loss hurt you in a way that you probably can’t fully explain, but …” she trailed off, but turned and walked back to me.
She looked me dead in the eyes and said, “I have no one either. I’ve lost everyone I really, truly loved. I assumed I would eventually come across people again, but I wasn’t sure how any of that would go. Whether you like it or not Liam, you are stuck with me. I don’t mind living in another house if that is what you need, but I hope somewhere down the line you can find a way not only to trust me, but care about me. You aren’t alone, you have me. And I will protect you the best I can.”
She slung her left arm into my right arm and kissed my cheek. I blushed. She hadn’t exactly read my mind, but she was extremely close.
We started walking back to the house in silence neither really looking at the other. “Katy?” I said more to the sky than to her. “You can stay in the house with me. You will have to protect me because my mind is screwy right now. When my head clears I’m really good at what I do, but I’m not there yet.
But I’m glad you’re here. Let’s go get us a tanker.”
She laughed as did I and we covered the rest of the ground to the house. I opened the garage and gave her my keys, so she could back it out and out the gate as I walked down to the gate and opened it.
Something was different. I didn’t feel safe at the time. Hell, even as I’m writing this I don’t really feel safe, but something about her sincerity and her assuredness calmed me in that short walk back to the house. It would be tested more than I could have imagined once we got back to town, but for the first time since all this started I almost felt like everything was going to be okay.
I was wrong, but in ways that I could never imagine.
***
About 30 minutes later Katy and I had made it roughly half way to our destination. Before the end the entire drive would have taken about 15 minutes. We had only planned on making two stops that day. The first would be at any shop that had the required tools Katy needed to disassemble the tanker. I happened to know of a place that I hoped still had the required tools. The second was the place I had told Katy about that the last time I drove past had two tankers sitting there. The two places were not that far apart, so I had hoped the entire trip would only take a couple of hours. Looking ahead of us I no longer felt that sure.
“How many do you think there are?” Katy asked.
I didn’t immediately answer, partly because I couldn’t even begin to guess and secondly because I was just in awe of what I was seeing in front of us.
The quickest way for us to get to our destinations in the old world would have been south on Highway 7 and then east on 64. I had told Katy before we left that it would possibly also be the most densely populated with the dead. I had decided to drive east on the interstate to the last exit to essentially go in the back way, coming back west on 64. That plan was fully out of the question. Sitting in the parking lot of a fast food restaurant at the corner of the road we had come in on and 64 we were currently staring at a massive horde of th
e dead.
Lost in thought I had forgotten that Katy had asked me the question. She elbowed me hard in the ribs. I assume it was harder than she had meant it to be, but I ignored it.
“Hello? Earth to Liam.”
“In the thousands at least” I finally answered. “This would explain why we have seen so little of the dead in our area. They have mostly concentrated on the highway.” No matter which direction we looked (east or west) all we could see were the dead.
“Is there any other way to get where we need to go?”
“There’s a road behind us that runs parallel to the highway. We can drive that and hopefully either find the end of the horde or a gap we can drive through.”
“Alright, let’s do it.”
I put the car in drive, which was a late model Ford SUV. It was a larger vehicle but got good gas mileage, so at least we could drive a bit without worrying about gas. Because of its size I felt it was better suited for our endeavor. I fully expected to come across the dead. Not just this size. I turned around and headed back in the direction we came and turned left onto the parallel road. We drove for about a quarter of a mile seeing no dead on our road. I took a chance and turned left at the road ahead and drove back towards the highway.
There was a small hill leading up to the turn but even at the bottom of the hill we could hear, see, and smell the dead. I quickly turned around and drove back the distance to the road and turned left back onto it.
“Liam?”
“Yes?”
“I think you’re right about the herd mentality.”
I had figured as much but I wanted to hear her reasoning, so I asked her what she meant.
“Well, I was on the road for a long time coming from home. After hearing what you believed, I thought back to my time on the road. There were some larger hordes but even the smaller groups tended to migrate the same as the large hordes. The only reason I came west instead of going east along the interstate was because that would have taken me towards Little Rock which I figured would have led me straight into even bigger hordes.”
I shook my head in agreement and said so.
“But watching the dead as I came west and watching this horde today they all seem to be moving in the same direction, if not very slowly. They are trudging west. If I had gone towards Little Rock I would have run into them sooner.”
I hadn’t really thought about directional migratory patterns of the hordes but as I thought back on my experiences with the dead I realized that with very few exceptions (the family of five outside the gate) they seemed to be moving west.
“Huh. Well, maybe if we survive all of this and start rebuilding things you and I can research that deeper. I don’t know what it means that they are heading west. It doesn’t make any sense, but it does give us a way to plan if we ever need to go on the move.”
Without realizing it we had made our way to highway 7. I turned left onto the highway and made my way towards 64.
“You do realize Liam that if the road ahead is clear, your theory would have been completely wrong.”
I blushed a little with embarrassment. “But if our other theory is right then the horde that we saw on the highway couldn’t possibly be the dead of Stantonsville. Possibly a town or two away towards the east.”
“I remember one town.” Katy said with a shudder. “There was an even larger horde there. I don’t think these are the same ones though. I can’t be sure.”
I came up over the train tracks that essentially divided the south side of town from the north side in this part of town and saw that the highway was clear. I drove up to the intersection of 64 and 7 and looked in both directions. To the west it was empty. To the east where the highway rose up above the tracks was also clear. I turned left and drove up the overpass and stopped at the top. I put the car in park and we both got out. We could see the horde, but it was further back than I thought it would have been. The next intersection (where I needed to turn) was empty and none of the dead were near it.
“Okay, this should work out in our favor. The road we need is up ahead just to the right.” I pointed to the road and Katy looked. “Assuming the horde hasn’t spilled over from the highway we should be able to make it to the shop with relative ease, hopefully get what we need come back out and back to the highway and find it easy sailing to the trucks. At the speed they are going (if we don’t face any issues) we should be back in our neighborhood with ease and in a couple of hours.”
Katy was looking at me with a little awe in her eyes. “I like it when the sane part of you takes over. You’d make a great leader.”
“I don’t know about that. When the pressure is on I go all loopy and you take over. Let’s just agree that we complement each other well.”
She nodded. “I agree but we should get a move on instead of building up each other’s egos otherwise any issues we face will be of our own doing.”
“Giddyup.”
“Easy Kramer.”
I laughed. “I didn’t think you’d be old enough to appreciate Seinfeld.” I said as we walked back to the car.
This time she laughed. “Alright so I have a little nerd in my soul.”
I smiled at her. “That’s the sexiest thing you have said since we met.”
She looked ahead. “Let’s get going.” She said with a smile.
“Yes ma’am.”
I drove down the other side of the overpass and took a right at the next intersection and then a left onto the side road. Fortunately, there were no dead on the road and I was able to get us to the work shop. I pulled around the side, so at the very least we would be out of sight, and we got out of the car.
“Where do you think the tools would be if they are here?” I asked Katy.
“Behind that garage. It’s probably going to be locked so we’ll need to find another way in.” Katy began walking to the front of the shop and I followed suit. “By the way Liam, you said you had your doctorate yet when you introduced yourself you simply referred to yourself as Liam. Not Doctor whatever-your-last-name-is.”
“Thompson.” I said.
“What?”
“My last name. It’s Thompson. I really don’t like people referring to me as doctor. I wouldn’t even let my students call me Dr. Thompson. I preferred Professor Thompson, or Mr. Thompson, or even just Liam. Let other doctors demand to be called doctor. I never understood the fascination.” I was being honest with her. In fact, I tended to cringe when people called me Doctor Thompson. I can’t really explain why, I just never liked it.
“Makes sense … Not! You did all that schooling, did all that work. Why not reap the benefits?”
We had come to the front door, which was glass and still in place telling us that at least no one had broken in. “I got paid well, and I got to teach at the university, do any research I wanted to. In my mind I was reaping the benefits without forcing people to call me doctor.”
She looked at me. “I can respect that, even I still don’t understand why you don’t like it.”
“That’s okay,” I said. “I don’t understand either, just never did. The door’s locked. Look for something to smash the window.”
She grabbed my right wrist and held it up. “I don’t know, maybe the machete you have in your hand will work.” She said sarcastically.
Warmth flooded my cheeks and I’m sure I was blushing. She smiled at me and took the machete from me and slammed it at the glass door. The glass shattered on contact and fell away leaving nothing but a hole where the glass once was. I turned to look around us hoping that the sound hadn’t alerted any of the dead. I didn’t see anything coming to us and turned back around to see that I was alone staring in the door. Katy, I could see, was already inside mulling around looking for what I assumed was a door into the main floor of the work shop. I stepped in after her and realized it was probably a good idea to check the office for anything we might need.
“Hey Katy, let’s check the office for any walkie-talkies or flashlights.”
&nb
sp; “Good idea, but if they have a walkie-talkie system we should only find the base and maybe two walkies, the rest would be in the back for communication over the noise. We’ll definitely need a flashlight until we can get the garage open.”
She began looking through the desk she was standing at to my right. I walked to the desk on my left, that looked like it could be a secretary’s or service desk. Behind the desk I saw nothing in particular that could help us. I went around the desk and started pulling out drawers. In the third, large drawer I saw a flashlight and grabbed it. It was a larger type flashlight, slender, and heavy. I pushed the button and the flashlight came on.
“Perfect.” Katy said. “That should be more than enough light to help us find our way to the garage. I found the base for the walkies but there were none in it. I guess they are in the back.”
Standing there I thought of my experience at the gas station and found the light switches and flicked them to the on position … Nothing.
“Well, shit.”
“Were you expecting electricity to magically still be working, dumbass.” She chuckled letting me she was just joking.
“Hey, it worked at the gas station yesterday. You never know.”
“Alright, let’s check out the workshop.”
Since I had the flashlight I led the way down the dark hallway to the door we assumed would lead into the workshop. As we were nearing the door I heard that familiar gurgling/growling sound to my left. I shined my flashlight in that direction and saw a door with a plaque on it that read “Mark Sherwood, Owner.” The sound was coming from behind the door. I leaned in and heard the sound again. Katy had gripped my left arm a little hard.
“Liam.” She whispered.
“We should be okay from whatever is behind that door. I don’t know of any dead that can open doors. Of course, …” I trailed off.
“Of course, what?”
“Mr. Sherwood could be alive behind the door and just doing something believing he’s alone.”
“Oh, that’s gross.”
“Relax. I’m sure it’s the dead Sherwood. If he was alive he would have at least checked on all the noise we were making in here.” I turned my flashlight back towards the end of the hall where another door was.
The Dead Chronicles (Book 1): The Dead Chronicles Page 7