by Mark Tufo
Walked the entire street looking at the pros and cons of each building, and in the end, we decided on the one closest to where we’d stopped. It was immense, almost too big, but the street level floor would need the least amount of defensive bolstering. There were minimal windows, and the ones in place were set up high and weren’t much larger than a doggie door. The doors in front were solid oak. In the back of the building was a retrofitted steel door that had seen better days but was still serviceable. The place was as close to a fortress as we were going to find. It was an old textile factory; my guess was they wanted to make sure the labor force, made up mostly of poor children, couldn’t escape all that easily into the light of day.
The inside looked to be the birthplace of graffiti. There was balloon-shaped lettering telling everyone Skeedo had been there; on the wall opposite was a burgeoning artist’s rendition of female genitalia, and right next to it, an amateurish penis discharging copious amounts of spray paint.
“Should be hanging in the Louvre,” BT said as we looked.
“At least part of it. When we start getting the kids in, maybe get them onto the second floor quick and then we need to find a way to cover that up.”
“You’re going to censor art?” BT asked.
“Okay, I’ll leave it. You explain to them what it is.”
“I’ll call Kirby, tell him to bring some paint.”
“Thought so.”
BT and I walked the entire structure. It was three substantial, open floors, somewhere around fifty feet by a hundred. The area had been swept up previously, but it had been a half-assed job done by an uninterested party. Any dangerous paraphernalia was gone, but there were still plenty of beer cans and alcohol bottles; good chance that some of the personnel on the base were still using this place as a hangout. Why not? It was past the range of where the MPs generally patrolled, and you’d be able to play music as loud as you wanted without them coming to break it up. There were a few old plastic lawn chairs, a propane grill and fire-pit on the third floor that lent more credence to my theory. I wasn’t a fan that all of this was sitting on a rather intricate drawing of a pentagram chock full of symbols, that, I’m sure were meant to summon less than savory characters. Never could quite grasp why some among us were so willing to meddle in things they had absolutely no idea the ramifications of. I’m not going to sit here and write that I wholly believe in monstrous, red-horned demons popping out of the ground, but then again, why fuck around with it on the off-chance there was some validity? After all, here we were, hiding from the undead. Who’d a thought?
“I’ll tell Kirby to bring extra paint and maybe some salt.” BT was looking at the same thing I was.
I went downstairs to tell everyone this was the place; of course, it was Trip that stopped in front of the Not Safe For Work mural.
“I think this represents the Neo-Impressionist phase of Georges Seurat. With regard to the issue of content, the internal dynamic of the negative space encroaches on the devious simplicity of the distinctive formal juxtapositions,” he said. “Or it’s just a juvenile statement…either-or.” He was tilting his head back and forth. Angel came around from behind me; I had to steer clear as she wanted to see what the “funny man” was looking at. “What do you think, hon?” Trip asked as Stephanie headed his way.
“What are you talking about?”
“Drawn to scale? Let’s take a look.” He started fumbling with a zipper his sweatpants did not contain. Stephanie, having had years of experience with Trip’s idiosyncrasies, quickly restrained him from exposing himself.
“Mike, there’s a part of me that cares for that guy, albeit an almost insignificant fraction, but the much larger angrier part just wants to…” BT wrapped his hands into fists and twisted them back and forth like he was trying to unscrew a frozen lid from a pickle jar.
“Breathe, let it go…just realize that for the foreseeable future, we’ll be eating MREs,” I told him, patting his back.
“Thanks, that helps.” His face looked relaxed; his hands, however, were still ripping the heads off of stuffed bears.
The squad showed up an hour later. I now knew the reason Gary’d had a hard time finding a truck. They rolled up in three of them. It looked like they had stripped an entire barracks of material; there were beds, mattresses, chairs, desks, tables, and for some reason, a vending machine.
“What the hell guys?” I asked Grimm and Kirby as they wrestled the large machine with a heavy-duty dolly.
“Full of beer, sir,” Grimm grunted.
“Why didn’t you say so?” I jumped in to help.
BT watched the entire proceedings, and waited to speak until we found it a home near an outlet. “All you geniuses realize this building isn’t on the grid, right?”
Crestfallen is a word I would use to describe my feelings right then.
“Got you covered, sir!” Stenzel had a small solar panel in her arms. In fact, they had a truckload of them.
“Do I even want to know where you got those?” I asked.
“Nope,” Kirby said as he went back to help unload the trucks.
“I love Marines’ appropriation skills,” I said.
“You realize it’s called stealing, right?” BT asked.
“You want cold beer or not?”
“Sir, what do you want to do with these?” Kirby was grunting under a heavy load of glinting metal.
“I should have never made that trade; seemed like a good idea at the time.” I was looking at the chain mail shirts. “Who has a closet full of chainmail?”
“The same guy that has a dozen rubber women,” BT said. “They got any in my size?” He was pawing through the stack.
“That’s all right. I’ll just stand here and hold them,” Kirby said, sweat forming on his forehead.
“Of course you will.” BT held one up.
“Gonna look like an S&M tube top on you,” I told him.
“I think I could splice two of them together.” He was tugging at the ringlets.
“You’re going to wear that shit?” I asked.
“The question is, why haven’t we been wearing this stuff all along? We’re battling an enemy that fights primarily by biting.” BT had grabbed two.
“Why is it taking me so long to figure this out?” I grabbed one as well. “Kirby make sure the entire squad has one. Then go see if Sorrens has any more.”
“Aw, come on, sir! The dolls already creep me out and then handing them off to him…”
“I’ll look past you the next time we are exposed to a biological agent. Take Stenzel.”
“You know where to hit a person. Yo, Stenzel, got some swimwear for you!”
Spent the entire day cleaning and setting up the area. My squad set up residency on the second floor while the rest of us spread out on the top. Stenzel and Rose had set up a solar array along with a small battery storage. They told me it would be plenty for what we had there, which was mostly some lights. We shored up whatever needed reinforcing on the bottom floor. Rose fixed what she called “party favors” for anyone that wanted to crash our party. Tomorrow I was going to send them out to get stuff to cover up or repair the many broken out windows. It wasn’t overly cold just now, but that could change. Plus, it rained here about every other hour; we didn’t need water coming in, or light bleeding out, for that matter. I realized our whereabouts were far from a secret, but I didn’t want to advertise it either. We certainly weren’t keeping the lights on for others
The night went by without much of a hitch, although I didn’t sleep. What could be happening soon or already was, played a big factor, but sleeping in what was basically a giant barracks was something I wasn’t fond of during bootcamp, and definitely not now that I was older and more set in my routines. Dogs snoring, cats playing, babies crying, people wandering around to take care of business…it did not make for a restful evening. I kept my gaze fixed on the window nearest me; the moon traveled past, think it was the red dot of mercury next, and then early into the morni
ng I watched the sun make its journey onto the horizon. I should have been exhausted; maybe I was, but for some unexplainable reason, I was running on endless adrenaline. Maybe my body knew something my head was unaware of just yet.
I got downstairs just in time to see a caravan of trucks pull away, Stenzel, the only one left behind.
“They have to get the trucks back soon, and they want to get the window stuff, a few more essentials, and Rose isn’t quite happy with everything she’s got happening.”
“She scares me sometimes,” I said.
Stenzel handed me a thermos. “Thought you might want this.”
“Screwdriver?”
“Um, no sir, just iced coffee.”
“That’s what I meant.”
“Uh-huh.”
“What’s in it?” I asked as I unscrewed the top.
“A couple of creamer packs and two sugars.”
“Was the coffee hot or cold when you poured it in?”
“That make a difference?”
“Not an iced coffee drinker, I take it?”
“Pretty much addicted to Red Bull, sir. I have a whole case of it upstairs; I’m getting worried with it being harder to find.”
“That’s the way of it, isn’t it? Haven’t found a decent snack cupcake in months. How is one supposed to survive without all that gooey, sugary goodness in the middle?”
“More of a Tastykake Dreamies girl myself.”
“And that is?”
“Twinkie knock-off, but so much better.”
“Stenzel, not much isn’t better than a Twinkie.”
“I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that, sir. I’d hate to lose any of the respect for you that you’ve been accumulating.”
“Red Bull and Dreamies, sounds like the breakfast of champions.”
“Sir, two weeks ago when Rose and I were on our run we went by your house; you remember that?”
“Vaguely.”
“You were sitting out on your front deck, drinking beer and eating Pop-Tarts. You said you were having breakfast. I don’t think you have any room to be calling me out.”
“Technically, I hadn’t been to sleep yet, so that was more of a super late-night snack. Hey, this is pretty good.” I took a sip of the coffee.
Tracy came downstairs. “You drinking already?” she asked, looking at the thermos.
“Where you going?” I asked.
“I’ve got to get to school.”
“We’re sort of in a situation here,” I told her.
“Are we? I haven’t heard any alarms, no shots fired, no screaming. Until such time as we are in an active zone, life goes on, and I’m not going to change up my students’ routine until that time.”
“But the school…Deneaux.”
“Deneaux is an evil bitch, I’ll give you that, a murderer, even, but she’s not a child killer.”
I wasn’t sure if anything was beyond Deneaux’s scope. Odds might be decent that she wouldn’t take out a classroom, but this wasn’t gambling a few dollars away. I could continue to argue the point, but Tracy wasn’t having any of it. She’d walked out of the building and into the truck with Gary. I weakly waved goodbye.
“Sucks when you realize you don’t wear the pants in the family.” BT was smiling, he’d been leaning up against the building.
“Boo Bear!” my sister called down from upstairs. “I need help putting the sheets on!”
“Boo Bear? Sometimes I love karma,” I told his back and the middle finger he threw up over his shoulder. “You going by BB instead of BT, now?”
“He loves when I call him that,” she told me. I was smiling; I could hear BT grumbling.
The building was buzzing with activity. Gary was shuttling people back and forth, most of my family and friends were going about their normal business, and my squad was gathering supplies and putting in fortifications. I wasn’t even going to ask Rose what she was doing, but of us all, she seemed to be having the most fun. For the most part, I was alone. Occasionally someone would come up to me with a question or to say hi. BT had tried more than once to escape my sister’s clutches, but she was worse than the mafia, she just kept pulling him back in.
I don’t particularly like being alone, or maybe just when it feels lonely, I mean, I’m good with some alone time, need it in fact. But then there’s the other side of the spectrum, being around too many people can be suffocating, and I don’t think I’m unique in this way. Just an observation. It’s challenging to find that middle ground because even as you’re walking it, the damn thing can shift. The top floor right now, between people and animals, was closing in on thirty individuals. Sure, the space was large enough to accommodate all of us, but there was zero privacy. Some tapestries were being hung up on clotheslines, but that was only line of sight. Could hear every sneeze, cough, whisper, and in Henry’s case, fart. Kids were loud, babies louder, and the only one saved from it was one deaf dog to trump them all. Going to the second floor with the squad seemed a viable alternative, but Tracy would kill me, and the team might not be able to completely relax if their CO was there, though we hardly had the typical military relationship.
I was left wondering if the missus would like to stay on the bottom floor with me. Had about as much chance of that as Trip doing a DARE commercial. If those were still on. It was later that afternoon, the building was bustling, and all I’d managed to do was get a lawn chair and enjoy the day; at some point, my dearest friend Kirby had brought me a six-pack. Well, more like I’d caught him with it and he’d reluctantly given up the contraband, but you know, same thing. I could hear him swearing as he walked up to the second floor; he even continued when he got up there.
“Kirby, no windows, remember?” I shouted up.
There was a pause. “Shit, sorry, sir!” he replied.
“It’s all right; I can drink the pain away.”
He didn’t add anything to that. I was two deep when Major Dylan pulled up. I wished my reaction time was a little quicker, I would have hidden the beers. The woman could down a beer like Trip could smoke a joint.
“Major,” I said, standing and handing her one.
“Still on duty,” she replied as she twisted the cap off and killed half the bottle in one pull.
“So, basically, that just means you have to drink faster?”
“You understand.” She tipped the bottle toward me, then placed it back to her lips and finished it. “Sure could use another one.”
“Going to have to find someone else to confiscate from,” I told her as I bent down to grab her a refill.
“Nice place you’ve got here.” This beer she was drinking at a more reasonable pace. I pushed the remainder of the six-pack behind my chair with the toes of my boot.
“Getting there. You just coming to look, or would you like in on one of our luxurious units? One just opened up; it has an open floor plan, excellent airflow, and a rousing view of a guard tower.”
“Not yet. I like my bed and Bruno isn’t fond of change.”
“Who is?” I told her. “The bed, though, I could have that brought over here.”
“Once I’m forced to come here, Lieutenant, both of us know that the bed won’t be slept in much. I’d rather enjoy it while I can.”
“I get that.”
“Is it true about Vivian Deneaux?”
“Which part and probably so.”
“Good enough.” She killed the second beer and was peeking around the edge of my chair.
“Don’t you have an appendix to remove or something?”
“You don’t share well with others.”
“Sharing is one thing, completely giving over, a whole other.”
She laughed, then her face grew serious.
“Chain of command really haunts us. I steal from Kirby, you steal from me.” I got her another.
“I come bearing gifts. Got a Hummer full of medical supplies I’d like to drop off.”
“Any pain killers?”
“You in pain?”
“Should I have brought a padlock for the footlocker?”
“Maybe. I’ve got a dog in there that interacts with the world by putting everything he encounters in his mouth. You have no idea how terrifying it is to watch a dog chew on a grenade. Do you run toward or away from something like that?”
“Just help me out, will you?”
“Do you one better. Kirby, Grimm!” Couple of seconds later had two privates to do the heavy work. “Could you put this on the second floor? And when you’re done, see if you can find any more beer. The Major here thinks it’s happy hour.”
“Don’t worry about me; I do have to get back.” She watched as Kirby and Grimm took all the boxes away, and then she waited some more. She was about to say something when Stenzel came out.
“Heading to the armory, sir. Any special requests?”
“Whatever you can get your hands on will work.”
It was relatively quiet as she waited for Gary, like this was a bus stop. Dylan wanted to tell me something, and Stenzel and I both knew it; it was just that Dylan didn’t want an audience. There was a lot of awkward silence. I kept trying to fill it but only made it worse.
“How about them Bears?” I offered.
“You mean the sport where grown men tried to kill each rather than yielding territory on a playing field?” Dylan asked.
“Yeah, that one.”
“Sorry, I’ve seen enough devastation wrought by the defending of perceived lines in the sand.”
“They’re not perceived, they’re painted,” Stenzel offered.
“Stenzel, I can’t keep coming up with dumb things to say,” I told her. “Wait, let me rephrase that. I don’t want to have to keep coming up with dumb shit to say.”
“Sir?”
I pointed for her to go further down the building.
“I won’t be able to hear what she has to say if I go down there,” she mumbled as she left us.