Surviving The Aftermath (Book 1): The Dead Linger

by Roberts, Liz

  “Fuck you . . oof!” A sound reverberated like someone smacking a wet ham. Casey slammed his fist into the side of Tom’s already bloody face. Tom recovered quickly and lunged, tackling him in the gut and taking Casey to the ground hard. They rolled, arms flying at each other’s side. smack A fist hit a torso, thump elbow in the ribs. Jill pushed through and saw the guys rolling around the ground and asked “Why aren’t we stopping this?”

  “We thought maybe they had some issues to work out.” A random person in the crowd said.

  “We’ll this is over!” Jill ran forward and couple guys finally joined her to pull the guys apart. It took a few minutes, they were still trying to reach and kick each other. Finally, with heavy breathing, they each took in the sight before them and calmed down.

  “I’m done with this bullshit.” Tom was spitting blood out of his mouth.

  “Fine, then go! But you leave here with nothing more than anyone else would get.” Casey clearly upset with what had transpired. He didn’t want to fight Tom, he was his brother, he just wanted to help him and heal their family. But after taking some many hits to the face Casey couldn’t think of a better solution.

  “Wait Tom, Vikki doesn’t want to go.” Jill stepped in saying. He stalked towards hers.

  “What did you say? You don’t talk to her or us.” Casey slide over between them.

  “Oh that’s right, protect your murdering whore.” People gasped with that phrase as if smelling salts would be needed in a moment. Casey put his hands up in a surrendering gesture.

  “Tom I know what you’re going through. I lost my daughter too.” Casey said very serious.

  “Fuck you. I lost my daughter, I didn’t miss place some baby.” Casey saw red and swung with all his might catching Tom right in the cheek and knocking him down hard.

  “You’re way out of line there Tom.” Someone pointed out.

  “Yeah man you need to chill just a bit, we’ll get you some water, maybe drink of some Jack or something.” Another person said.

  Very serious and sober, he stood back up, looked around at everyone and then back at Casey and Jill,

  “I’m leaving in an hour.” Tom wiped his face, walking away ending what the two men had come to know over the last year and half of living together. The crowd slowly dispersed after having witnessed … well they weren’t really sure at the moment, but the worry was there about some sort of break down happening in this place.

  “Should we go clean you up?” She asked Casey after everyone had departed.

  “Yeah, sure.” Jill grabbed his hand and pulled him to where the showers had been located.

  Miles and miles away, still on his bike Jeff continued to pedal, his knee killing him. He was getting sicker with his infected cuts and possible broken ribs. If he didn’t find some sort of help or medicine soon he’d for sure die soon. He was stupid and tried going downtown to seek help, but that turned into a complete failure. Zombies were every way, thousands and thousands of them, milling around just waiting for fresh meat He’d be back for them, his soldiers. He rode on. Now out in a more rural area, he seemed completely alone, isolated and cut off. Farm land was all around him. He’d never been alone before, he’d always had Tyler to keep him company. He’d been riding for about 2 days, dusk was settling around him. His knee throbbed, and was swollen. His side ached with the cut that wasn’t healing, damn it he was dying and he knew it. As he thought about his new mission in life, for the hundredth time, killing Jill and burning that fort to the ground, he didn’t notice the barn up ahead that was surrounded miles of aluminum fencing or that he had been spotted by its inhabitants.

  “I can’t believe what I just saw.” Kurt was saying to Oscar as they walked back to their make shift armory.

  “I know. I’m kind of worried. Do you think others will follow Tom out? I hate to think this way but we can’t risk losing more people.”

  “I don’t think anyone will follow him. After that comment about Casey’s baby, that just made him look like the bad guy.” Oscar added.

  “I didn’t know Casey had a baby, did you?”

  “Hell no, I only just found out he was once married.”

  “I guess that has to be hard, losing your wife and a baby, never knowing what happened to them.” Kurt said shaking his head.

  “Yeah well life has to go on. I was just thinking now how is Tom’s family going to react. What if Jill is right and Vikki wants to stay?”

  “I think were even now in the tending wounds category.” Jill was saying to Casey will she dabbed hydrogen peroxide on the cuts on his face. A smile split his face. “Ouch! Don’t make me smile, it hurts.”

  “Sorry.”

  “No problem, it was pretty funny though.” Jill finished up and cracked and ice pack for the black eye that he was now rock’n.

  “Casey I have to tell you something.” She was scared what her confession would do. “I talked to Vikki.” He looked shocked. “She told me didn’t know what she was going to do if Tom wanted to leave, because she wants to stay.” She went on to tell him the story of Cindi sneaking out with Tyler and meeting up with the other girls, and their plans to run away for a supposed better life.

  Casey put his head down in his hands. “Shit. Vikki is going to put up a fight.” He muttered. “I have to go out there, it’s almost been an hour, and Tom will be ready to leave soon.” He stood and glanced at his face in the mirror, ugh, hopefully Tom looked just as bad. “Come out there with me, please?”

  “I don’t want to go.” Susie being 13 said in a whiney voice. “Shut up and pack, were leaving immediately, where’s your mother?” Tom demanded of his daughter, while rummaging around.

  “I don’t know, I thought she was with you.” Crap where was that woman? He thought to himself. Tom was flying through the room packing everything and anything he could find. Where was that woman?

  “Dad, you’re like bleeding.” She stated the obvious. Tom grabbed a towel and whipped his face off quick, all the open cuts and scrapes burning with the rough material on the towel. The door opened and Vikki came in obviously upset. “What the hell have you been doing? Why are you bleeding and where the hell do you think you’re going?” She demanded.

  “We’re leaving this place, pack your stuff, now.”

  “I’m not going, nor is Susie.” She said gently.

  “What!?!?!?”

  “I’m serious Tom, if you want to go, I understand, but we are staying.” She said again in her gentle tone.

  “You’re leaving me?”

  “No I think it’s you who’s leaving me.” She pointed out the obvious. “You want out, you got it.”

  Tom sat down heavy on the bed looking at her. “I can’t go anywhere without you honey. You’re my life, I love you.”

  “Well in the last week or two you haven’t even noticed I was still here. I figure this way you can go be on your own with your thoughts and feelings still kept to yourself.” She declared.

  “What the hell are you talking about?” He was shocked now.

  “Ever since Cindi died,” He cringed at that those words. “You’ve been a ghost. You won’t talk to us, you won’t acknowledge us, and you don’t even look at us. Susie is your daughter too, do you want to lose her as well? I’m your wife.” Vikki’s eyes filling with tears. “I loved Cindi too, she came from my body, don’t you think I feel the loss? You’re not the only one hurting you know.” There was a long pause. “Don’t you think Jill feels bad too?” Tom reinvigorated with anger at the mention of Jill’s name.

  “I don’t care what she feels.”

  “Well I do. I like her and she’s genuine. You think Cindi was so innocent, she and her cohorts met up with Tyler and Jeff, they were sneaking off together, planning whatever. I knew something was going on, and so did you, but we didn’t stop it. Her death is partly our fault too. Maybe if you had encouraged her to be involved around this place with something, instead of always trying to protect her she wouldn’t have been so taken in with a taste
of danger from him. You have to take some blame just like me.” Vikki was on the verge of sobbing. She couldn’t believe her husband of 19 years was about to leave her. After all the trial and tribulations of the old world and then the crap in this new world and he was ready to call it quits. Yes their marriage didn’t start under the best conditions, she got pregnant with Cindi right out of high school, their parents weren’t happy about it, and left them to fend for themselves. Her and Tom both missed college but they had built a home, raised 2 daughters and they still loved each other through it all.

  “Tom we are staying. I want, no, I need you stay too, with me. But if you can’t, I guess I understand.” She said standing over Tom who was hanging his head. She ran a hand through his hair as she had done so many times before. She had to be strong for herself, for her other daughter. She couldn’t keep Tom here if he really wanted to go. The anger inside him had built up so much she didn’t know if any of them would survive it.

  “Tom I love you so much. It ripped me up losing Cindi, and now I’m faced with losing you. I don’t think I could handle it. Please just think before you act.” She kissed his head and whispered I love you in his ear. Then Vikki signaled Susie to come and they both quietly left the room together.

  Weeks have passed since Tom’s departure. It had been an emotional sight, his family begging and pleading with him not to go, tears streaming down their faces. Casey had been trying not to fight with him but that’s what it turned out to be, another fight, but just with words. Others also tried to reason with Tom not to leave, asking where he would go, what he would do. No answers for anyone, just that he couldn’t stay here. Jill stood far off to the side, hoping that Tom would see reason, but she watched him get into his car and drive away like everyone else. People seemed to settle back into their routine around fort.

  “I say we try for the apartments.” Jill said to the people while there sitting around at lunch.

  “It’ll help us expand, give the others room and privacy for the expanding families. We can start using these stores as storage and manufacturing facilities.”

  “We’d have to enclose the entire area, I don’t think we have the resources for that.” Kurt said.

  “Well we might.” Oscar interjected. “There’s all that construction equipment we’ve been trying to decide what to do with.”

  “What equipment? I haven’t seen anything.” Jill said.

  “It’s about a block away, we used it to help put up the fencing, and how we were able to get so much equipment on to the roof.”

  “It’ll be perfect!” Jack said getting excited. He lived for this crap, building and adding, going out on supply runs, he was becoming very efficient at all of this.

  “There’s that concrete fencing surrounding that newly built subdivision, we could take all that apart and move it here.” Oscar was now getting excited with the idea.

  “We’ll split everyone into teams, to disassemble and transport the walls, people to dig holes and prepare cement to anchor the I-beam supports, and then there’s clearing out the apartments.” Andy said.

  “Yeah that’ll be the hard part.” Lucy added. “Who do we pick for that shit job?”

  “We can do it on a volunteer basis. We’d need maybe 4 teams of 3, there’s only two main hallways, and 2 levels for each structure. We’ll just systematically go through and clear out each room.” Casey filled in.

  “I’m in.” Jack said.

  “Me too.”

  “I’ll help.”

  “I’m there.”

  “I’m in too.” The others all starting saying.

  “I’m going in.” Jill added when the others quieted down. Casey just looked at Jill with concern and promise that they would talk later.

  “I guess we need to fill everyone else in on the situation and go from there.” Everyone nodded or grunted in agreement went and off to dinner they.

  “Hey Meghan.” Jack jogged over to where she was re-distributing supplies for meals to keep the pantries filled in the kitchen area.

  “Hi Jack.”

  “So I was wondering what you were doing after dinner tonight?” he asked shyly.

  “Um nothing really that I know of. Why?”

  “Well I . . I was thinking maybe you’d like to take a walk or something. Just us.” He replied. “You and me.”

  Smiling Meghan secretly loved seeing Jack sweat a bit, he was getting so good at everything around here it was making him almost cocky, it was becoming a rare sight to see him stutter, and thought it was kind of sweet and enduring.

  “Sure. I think I could put aside some time for you.” Now Meghan was really going to mess with him. She put down the cans she was holding, and sidled up to Jack. They’d rarely seen each other since that night on her third shift watch and then everything starting happening with Jeff and the zombies breaking in and she was worried that Jack had lost interest, but now, she was going to find out where they stood.

  “I’ve gotta go meet the guys.” He indicated with his thumb over his shoulder, taking a step backwards, because he wasn’t really sure what was up, but Meghan had a look in her eye that sort of scared him. He was hoping to grab a kiss from her tonight, but Jack was having a hard time reading her at the moment. She kept stepping towards him, she put her hand on the side of his face.

  “Come find me, 8 o’clock tonight.” She kissed him and turned back to her stacking shelves. Jack stood momentarily perplexed for a moment then smiled and took off to meet the others and Jill.

  Kurt was working on the lists and plans for all the supplies and the teams of who does what, with recommendations from Oscar and Jill. He was working intently when suddenly a tap on the shoulder startled him out of his task.

  “Whoa, sorry didn’t me to scare you.” Oscar said and came around sat down on the couch next too Kurt.

  “I knocked, a few times, I thought maybe something was wrong.”

  “No it’s fine, I’m just trying to get this stuff finished, we wanted to get everyone updated on what all the plans for the coming days.

  “This is going to be a major undertaking, we’ve never done anything this big before, with this many groups and people at the same time. The coordination is so important, the timing, we can’t mess up.” Oscar said.

  “We’ll we’ve acquired cars, guns, built on extensions, doors and fencing. I think we can handle this with minor bumps. Just have to be smart.” Kurt replied now sitting so close to Oscar.

  “I know, but it just seems like we’ve been so stagnant. Like people are getting to comfortable, and forgetting that there’s a risk.”

  “Very true.” Kurt put the lists down on the coffee table in front of him and scrubbed his hands over his face. “I just want to get all this done and have it go off without a hitch. You know Casey and Andy were talking about searching for survivors again.” It was something they had tried in the very beginning, they found numerous people, mostly via CB radio. They used reconstructed conversion vans at first, until they found a couple abandoned school buses and tricked them out apocalypse style, chicken wire reinforced on the side windows, emergency access out the back and roof. They installed flood lights, cattle catcher on the front end, bars on the windshield. The vehicles were awesome and served their purpose, they found almost 75% of the population currently here, back safe. Now they would be used again. Since they planned on expanding, the idea seemed to make sense, but would they have enough fuel for this?? They had been collecting different varieties of gasoline and fuels since the first day began, they had all kinds of additives to add to the gas to keep it from going bad, but that only worked for so long. Now they were embarking on this new venture, would this deplete there sources or help add to their current existence.

  “So you’re wondering if this is a smart move?” Oscar asked with his arms draped on the back of the couch.

  “I have no idea but I think we have to keep doing stuff around here, make it safer, bigger, and if we find more survivors we’ll for sure need the room.”
Kurt still leaning forward, Oscar tugged on his arm to get Kurt to look at him.

  “Kurt I don’t care if people know about us. It really doesn’t bother me.” Oscar had been trying to have a serious talk with Kurt for a while now, but Kurt was good at avoiding the topic.

  “I like being with you too. I just can’t help but worry what others will think. Like what would Casey say? He’s like my best friend and I don’t want that to change.”

  “I think Casey already knows, and besides, you know if he’s really your friend he’ll love you know matter what. I know I do. Love you.” Oscar said with a quietly with all the warmth he could muster.

  “You do?” Kurt asked shocked.

  Chuckling Oscar turned Kurt to face him. “Yeah, I do. Haven’t I been here with you almost every night? And not just for the sex. I try to show you how much I love you every day, but I have to take it easy because you don’t want others to know. And that’s ok. Because I want you to be comfortable with us.” Kurt was honestly shocked by all these revelations.

  “But you’re a solider, I thought you weren’t allowed to do this sort of thing?”

  “Doesn’t mean it didn’t go on, there are many, many gay and lesbian soldiers, you just don’t know it.”

  “I love you too Oscar.” Oscar closed his eyes and smiled at those words, he’d been waiting a long time to hear them from Kurt.

  “Can I stay here tonight?” He asked Kurt.

  “Yeah, and then we’ll go meet Casey and Jill for breakfast in the morning, I have good news to tell them.”

  Somehow Jeff woke up alive, he was lying on a bed in a decently clean room, and he wasn’t in pain anymore. Sitting up he was dizzy and thirsty. How long had he been out cold? Last thing he remembered was riding that stupid fucking bike. He got up and wandered out of the room into a deserted dust filled hallway. He walked to the stairs and limped down them, it was hard with his knee wrapped up with several ACE bandages. Getting to the bottom which turned into what was a kitchen the place was bustling with activity. Guys were sitting around a large table, women were cooking something, and it smelt decent. One of the guys noticed him and motioned him over to a seat next to him.