by Mason King
Hunter broke in, knowing Kendall was too protective and could very well attempt to take his place, “Let’s get this over with. I’ll drive.”
“Like hell you will. I’ll drive and you’ll sit your ass down and tell me where to go.” Paul walked with his back facing the wall as much as possible, making sure he could see everyone, as he and Hunter made their way out of the community room and towards Hunter’s Jeep.
Paul made Hunter get in first and buckle his seat belt. Once he was secure, Paul walked around to the driver’s side and got in, looking at the group behind him.
As the jeep pulled away, Kendall cried for the first time in weeks. She sobbed for everything. She sobbed for Hunter, for Allison, for Jamie, for Ashley, for the outbreak. She sobbed for everything she could think of and she continued to sob until her shoulders shook and there were no more tears left, because Kendall just knew that that was the last time she was ever going to see Hunter again.
Diana sat with her the entire time, and the guys looked out the gate for what felt like hours. No one even made a move to close it. They just stood there and watched. No weapons, no nothing. It was as though the group had collectively lost all of their hope as quickly as they’d lost Hunter.
After the sound of Hunter’s Jeep was long gone, and no one had yet to move a muscle, the sound of a car caught everyone’s attention.
Everyone’s eyes hopefully widened and looked towards the origin of the sound. Kendall stood up and almost jumped for joy at the unlikely thought that Paul had changed his mind and brought Hunter back.
Her dreams were dashed upon the entrance of a black Chevy Tahoe with windows so dark you couldn’t see who was inside.
Brad and Trevor tried to get to the gate to shut it, but it was too late. The Tahoe came in quickly and screeched to a stop upon seeing the group.
Frank ran inside and grabbed all of the weapons, throwing them to Brad and Trevor just as the doors opened and 2 unidentified people stepped out.
Surprisingly, the two agents put their hands in the air in peace.
“Drop your weapons! We’re FBI!” Lil shouted, “I’m going to reach my right hand into my pocket and grab my badge, do not shoot.”
She tentatively slid her hand into her pocket while the group stared at them, stony faced with guns drawn.
Lil quickly grabbed her badge and threw it at them before putting both hands back up. Sam yelled that he was going to do the same, and Frank stepped forward to retrieve both of their badges and ensure that they were real.
Frank gave his group the Okay, and everyone lowered their weapons.
Sam broke in, “We’re looking for 2 people in connection with the outbreak. We think they may have some valuable information that could help us out.”
Kendall looked at Sam, but said nothing. Lillian spoke up as well, “I’m Lillian Turnmire. This is my partner Sam McMillian. We are only here looking for two men that we think have information that could help us.” Halfway through her sentence she recognized Kendall.
“Kendall?”
For the first time since they’d stepped out of their vehicle Kendall’s eyes showed emotion: suspicion. She took a step back with her left foot, finding her center of gravity in case she needed to get defensive.
“Yes.”
Lil looked at Sam and he quickly understood, this was the Kendall that they had originally thought was in on this with Hunter.
“Hunter is one of the men we are looking for.”
Kendall chose that moment to get defensive, “You still think he did this?” she spat towards the agents.
Sam cut in, “No, no not at all. We know he didn’t do this.”
Kendall looked at him, her face showing that she did not believe him.
“We know that Paul is the one who was a part of this. We were hoping Hunter would be able to help us find him.”
Brad spoke up, realizing that Kendall was not in a hurry to believe him.
“They just left. If you go now you could catch them!”
“Where?” Sam was quick to believe the man, this lead was what they needed and he was not going to let Paul, or Hunter for that matter, get away without offering some answers.
“University of California. Hunter told him that that was where they’d left the…vials? Or whatever that Paul needed.”
Sam and Lillian didn’t say another word, they jumped into their Tahoe and sped off, they didn’t even stop to ask how long ago they’d left. They didn’t care. Sam took the driver’s seat and this time, Lil didn’t protest when the speedometer quickly hit 110 miles per hour.
***
“So you get your vials. Then what?” Hunter figured he was going to die soon anyway, so he made no attempt to placate Paul.
Paul said nothing. Staring straight ahead.
Hunter looked out the window. He toyed with the idea of telling Paul the wrong directions, but he knew the second they didn’t get to UCLA that Paul would probably just kill him. Hunter wasn’t scared of that possibility; he knew he’d been lucky to make it this far. Part of him even realized that he’d been waiting for a moment like this the entire time. He’d been too damned lucky. It had to run out sometime. So he decided he would take Paul to the university. He continued to let his mind work on what he would do once they actually got there.
Hunter didn’t tell him what exit that they would be getting off. Paul asked and he had just responded with, “I’ll tell you when to turn.” Even when Paul had pulled his gun back out and threatened Hunter, Hunter had just stared at him back, reiterating, “I’ll tell you where to turn.”
Paul had looked at him with disgust but finally put the gun in his lap, keeping his finger on the trigger, and continued driving.
They pulled in to UCLA, Hunter having given Paul all the correct directions.
“Damn. I was sure you’d have tried to trick me.” He remarked nonchalantly.
Hunter didn’t respond. Instead he sarcastically asked, “Can I get out of the car now, Master?”
Paul laughed, “Go ahead.”
Once they were both out, Paul once again pointed his gun at Hunter’s chest once more, back to business.
“Take me to them.”
Hunter tried to ignore the close proximity of the barrel to his back as he turned and led the way inside.
Hunter led him into the building and then straight down the stairs towards the basement. His heart rate picked up as he anticipated moving forward with his plan. He wasn’t sure if it would work, there were a lot of variables to it. Hunter knew it was a long shot, but he stayed calculated as he made his way into the room that he had been in just a few short weeks ago, yet it felt like an eternity.
Hunter walked in to the room and quickly darted to the side. Paul looked at him questioningly and Hunter’s heart sank. He had thought for sure there would be some zombies meandering throughout the building.
“Oh uh, I didn’t know if there were any Dead in here.” Hunter’s entire mood dropped.
“Ah, I see. You figured you’d jump out of the way and let them get me, then you’d be free? Dick.”
Paul scanned the room, walking further towards the back. Paul didn’t find what he was looking for, “Well?”
“Well, what?”
“Where’s my bag ass-hat?”, Paul pushed.
Hunter had been scanning the room for the case they’d transitioned the vials to and wasn’t seeing it. He remembered that they’d transitioned them in Dr. Lattimore’s office. Maybe the book bag would still be in there and Hunter could lie and say obviously someone had found them and taken them. His heart soared once more with hope.
“Follow me, I think I might know where they are.”
Hunter led the way towards Dr. Lattimore’s office, Pauls’ ever-present gun taking up camp in between his shoulder blades.
Back in the office, sitting right on the desk, was Paul’s empty backpack. Paul cursed a string of expletives that rivaled the time Hunter’s dad had shot himself in the foot back home on their farm.
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Paul turned and glared at Hunter, “Where. The fuck. Are they.”
Hunter did his best to look confused, this is where they were the last time I saw them. I swear, if they’re gone, I have no idea what happened to them.” He even put his hands up to show his surrender to the situation.
“Freeze!” The simple word from behind caused Paul to lose his focus on Hunter, giving him the opportunity to grab Paul’s wrist and violently jerk it upwards. As Paul’s wrist snapped and audibly broke, his gun fell to the floor and Hunter grabbed it as Paul was tackled by an unknown…woman?
“Damn it Lil, I wanted to take him down!”
Lil quickly handcuffed both of Paul’s wrists behind his back, causing another wretched squeal to escape Paul’s lips, as Sam introduced himself to Hunter. Hunter, who’d had the gun pointed towards the unknown assailants, quickly lowered it once they identified themselves as FBI agents. They did quick introductions, Paul’s curse words continuing to emanate through the room on deaf ears.
As the group started to exit the building, a familiar groaning noise caught Hunter’s attention. Neither Lil nor Sam seemed to notice.
“Um, guys?” Hunter began, “Just out of curiosity, neither of y’all have actually come toe to toe with any of these suckers yet, have you?”
Lil begrudgingly confessed, “No, actually. Why?”
Hunter tilted his head to the side, “No reason. Except you’re about to.”
At that moment 3 Dead wandered casually in to the building, groaning softly. Upon realizing that there was fresh meat inside, well, needless to say they started to get a little antsy. Two headed straight for Sam, who had taken it upon himself to lead Paul outside. Hunter popped off three quick shots and was able to take two down. Unfortunately, the third had made its way towards Lil and grabbed ahold of both of her shoulders.
Lil screamed, being taken completely off guard. Sam dropped Paul to the ground and rushed towards her, gun firing shot after shot into the Zombie’s skull.
The thing was dead, but Sam kept shooting until his magazine was empty.
Hunter walked up to Sam and put one arm on his back and the other on the gun, slowly lowering it, “Hey, hey. He’s dead. Do you have another magazine?”
Sam nodded his head yes, completely shaken. Lil ran to Sam to check on him and they embraced in a fairly intimate manner that took Hunter by surprise.
“I hate to interrupt y’all, but Sam reload, and Lil get your gun out. Whoever’s going to get that douche on the floor back there, go ahead. I’m not carrying that dead weight.” They all looked to Paul, forgotten on the ground, and he was ashen faced staring back at them.
“I mean…we can leave him if you guys want.” Hunter remarked, looking down. Paul, for the first time, shot him a pleading look.
“No. We need this asshole for questioning.” Lil responded as Paul’s shoulders slumped in relief.
“Have it your way.” Hunter took the front line and headed out towards the exit, remaining vigilant to any dead that could still be lingering, “How did you find us anyway?”
“Your group pointed us in the right direction.” Hunter turned his head towards them so he could hear, while keeping his eyes ahead, “Are they okay? How’s Kendall?”
“They’re all fine. We weren’t far behind you guys, apparently. Do you want to call them when we get to the car” Lil asked, knowing his group would want to know that he was okay.
“Can’t. No power in the development, all of our phones died weeks ago.” They made it to their vehicles without further incident.
“Before we go, would you mind telling me what’s going on out there? Even before we had no power there was nothing on the radio or anything about what was going on?”
Sam explained, “There were 4 outbreak sites total.” Hunter let that sink in as Sam continued, “We actually have the vials, we found them here day before yesterday and our lab guys are working on a cure.”
“Good luck.” Paul spoke up.
“Hey, are these cuffs tight enough, bud?” Sam asked, cinching the one on Paul’s broken wrist until he cried out in pain.
“Anyway,” Sam wanting to finish filling Hunter in, “There’s no coverage going on because the head of Homeland Security and the CDC both decided that they weren’t going to update the public until, 1.) This was more stable and under-control, or 2.) we had a cure. We figured it was kind of a “no new is good news” kind of thing.”
“Seriously?”
“Yeah, trust us. No one agreed with that bull shit call.”
Sam locked Paul into the back of the Tahoe before talking anymore, “We’re hoping now that we have Paul we’ll get him to crack and tell us who his accomplices are. One of them may know if or what the cure for this is. But honestly…I hate to tell you this but the FBI is truly planning to wait this outbreak out unless we find a cure.”
Hunter, who had always been an advocate for the United States military, if not always the government, asked, “What about the government? And the military? Aren’t they helping anyone?”
“Of course!” Lil responded, almost offended. “The first week of realizing we were in an outbreak was spent evacuating anyone and everyone in to safe places. You’d honestly be surprised. The population of the United States is roughly 320 million. We had established about 10,000 “safe havens” all over the country that we were able to evacuate people to. Every one of those evacuation centers has remained un-contaminated thanks to the US Military. They’re packed to capacity and receiving food and water. Anyone not in those safe havens is considered either Dead, or Surviving, much like you guys are. The last count that we were at for people who are completely deceased, not Turned, was 17,644 documented as of two days ago. According to Homeland Security, there are a minimum of 10 million people who have not been recorded dead, nor have they been noted to be in a safe haven. They think about 5 of that million are turned…”
Hunter’s head began to spin at all the statistics, but he thought he was following, “So you guys think that of all the people in the United States only about 5 million are actually zombies? Is that why we haven’t encountered nearly as many as the movies would lead you to believe?”
“We think so, yes” For the first time Lil was actually taking pride in the way they had been able to handle the outbreak.
Hunter shook his head in admirable disbelief. “Well then, good job guys.” He paused, “Please tell me you don’t need me to come with you, I need to get back to my group.”
Sam started, “It would be great if you could come with us.”
Hunter’s shoulders slumped. Lillian took pity on him and pulled Sam to the side, “We don’t need him. We just need to be able to get in touch with him.” Without waiting for Sam to answer, Lil turned to Hunter, “You still have a phone?”
“Yes, but like I said, it’s been dead for weeks.”
Lil reached in to the car and grabbed her car charger and threw it Hunter’s way, “Here. Charge this, and you have to find a way to keep it charged. We’ll need to contact you if we have any further questions, understood? Plus, we know where you live.” She smiled, hoping to ease the tension a touch.
Hunter was beyond grateful, and told her so. “Hey, and by the way, if it isn’t much trouble, is there any way you could kind of keep me updated on the situation? I think me and my group are going to be fine, but we’ll want to know how things are going, if we can ever go back home…etc.”
Lil promised that she would, but even as Hunter hopped in to his Jeep and headed back towards the development, he admitted to himself that where he was headed was home now. It was the only home he knew to plan a future in.
***
“Damn it, Trevor!” Kendall screamed as they watched the Tahoe pull away. “What if they take Hunter too?! You have no idea what their intentions were!”
Kendall got in Trevor’s face, Diana had to pull her away from him.
“Kendall,” Trevor tried to reason with her, “Them taking him in is better than Paul ki
lling him! Or worse, Paul finding those vials and spreading this thing even more! If what you guys said was true, that guy is bat shit crazy. He already wiped out God-knows how many people! The world has gone to shit because of him and whoever else was involved and, I’m sorry, but I think Hunter would want for us to help them catch him!”
Trevor hadn’t been able to remain calm, and his breathing was harsh as he stopped yelling back at Kendall. They stared at one another for several seconds before Frank sided with Trevor, “Sweetie, he’s right. You know that’s what Hunter would have wanted.”
Kendall shook her head and stomped off from the group. She went in to her house and didn’t speak to anyone for the rest of the evening, no matter who came to her door and attempted to lure her out with food and water.
***
The drive back to the development was torture. Hunter had plugged his phone up. He marveled at himself that he even still had it. Everyone else had ditched theirs a long time ago, he guessed old habits die hard.
As the phone flicked back to life, the screensaver he had of he and Allison on the day they’d gotten engaged mocked him. It broke his heart that, after weeks of no contact with anyone, his phone still did not beep with any missed calls, voicemails or texts. It reminded him of how Allison had been his only constant.
Hell, he had more family now than he’d had before this whole thing started. As he drove, he changed the screensaver to a picture of himself with a 25-pound catfish he’d caught years and years before, with Jake. Scrolling through his phone he tried Jakes number and it, of course, went straight to voicemail.
“Oh well, it was worth a shot.” He said out loud to himself.
Hours passed as he made the trip back from UCLA to his development. It was dark by the time he got back, and the gate was shut.
Hunter pulled his Jeep directly in front of the gate and honked his horn 3 long, loud times.