Marionette

by S. B. Poe

  “Ok, everybody keep your friends close and your guns closer.” Bridger smirked.

  They had brought some plastic totes in already and began emptying the pantry.

  “From now on, everything we have at all times, has to be ready to go.” Bridger added.

  “I have food at my house too.” Evelyn said.

  “OK, we’ll go get it. Raj, you wanna go with?” Bridger said.

  “Ok.” He looked at Tilly.

  “I’m going too.” Evelyn said. “It’s my house, I need some things.”

  “Ok.” Bridger said. He handed her one of the pistols.

  “Do you know how to use it?”

  “Point and shoot?” She said. He showed her the safety.

  “Red is Ready. Then point and shoot.”

  They went to the front door. Bridger looked out the peephole. He didn’t see any movement. They moved the couch away and opened the front door. The street was empty. He stepped out into the sunlight. They crowded out behind him onto the front porch. Being outside seemed foreign to them already. They had been hidden behind those boarded windows for less than a day and already the sun seemed new. Bridger, Raj and Evelyn started across the cul-de-sac. The others went back inside and closed the door. The group reached Evelyn’s front door and slipped inside. She went into the kitchen and started pulling things out of her pantry. Raj started loading it into garbage bags that she had given him. Bridger went into the garage and found some totes to put stuff in. He also found a garden cart he could use to get it back across the street. He pulled the cart into the kitchen and started loading things up. They had just about emptied the pantry.

  “I need to get some things out of my bedroom. Some personal things.” She said.

  “Ok. Need any help?” Raj said.

  “No, no. Just some small things.” She said as she went out of the kitchen.

  Bridger and Raj finished packing everything onto the cart. They rolled the cart out the front door and went back inside to grab the other few bags. Bridger noticed the pictures on the wall. It showed a happy couple on vacation and at holidays. It showed pets, but no children. Raj came from the kitchen with the last bag.

  “Where’s Mrs. Collins?” he asked.

  “Where’s Mr. Collins?” Bridger asked, smiling.

  “Dead” Evelyn said, walking from around the corner.

  Bridger’s smile went away. She walked past them and out the front door.

  “Well, that was fun, let’s go.” Evelyn said.

  Standing in her front yard between her and the cart were two of the infected. Her voice had carried when she opened the door and both turned to the sound. The closest one was wearing work coveralls with the CXT railroad emblem. The coveralls were shredded around the legs, ripped by the thick underbrush it had passed through. The hands looked the same except instead of cotton and nylon it was flesh and muscle that was torn apart. The tips of the fingers were bone, the flesh completely ripped away. Blood oozed through the coveralls. The same thorns had lacerated the face, the slack skin easily giving way under their sharpness. The other infected appeared to be a teenage girl. She was wearing shorts and a t-shirt. Her leg had been bitten. She had the same slack skin and pale eyes as the man. Both turned in that same jerky way Bridger had witnessed earlier. He raised the rifle. The first one jerked just as he fired and the round missed. It reached out and grabbed Evelyn. Raj fired over them as they fell and hit the other infected in the stomach. Bridger grabbed the one on Evelyn. Raj fired again. The girl (thing) in the yard fell. Bridger was holding on to the other with everything he had as it rapidly chomped for Evelyn’s face. It was twisting and trying to turn and she was pushing it away as best she could. Raj tried to pull Evelyn from underneath it. They were all yelling. Boom. Everything exploded. Bridger fell backwards. The thing had quit struggling. Evelyn pulled herself from underneath with Raj’s help. She had the pistol in her right her. She was covered in what had come out of the back of the things head. They just stood there for a second, each looking at the other confirming they were all ok. Evelyn was crying, but just a tear or two. Bridger was checking her over. Raj wiped her face off with a towel he grabbed from the kitchen.

  “I’m fine. I’m fine. Just let me do that.” She said, snatching the towel from him. “Sorry” she said.

  “It’s ok.” He said.

  They took a quick look around. They pulled the cart back across the cul-de-sac. The gunfire had alerted the others. They were standing in the front yard and rushed to the street to help when the saw them coming back. Tilly ran over to Raj and hugged him. Kate met Evelyn and helped her pull the cart. Bridger stopped and stood in the middle of the cul-de-sac. He looked up the road towards the buses. He looked at his watch. Not time to worry yet. He had another hour before he was even overdue. He looked at the sun, climbing higher in the sky. Nice weather, he thought. He turned and followed Raj and Tilly.

  JW had reached the Home Depot. It was on the edge of the main part of town. Past the Home Depot was the college and just south of the college was downtown. He had encountered several infected but only randomly and he drove by them. As he approached the store he could see more in the parking lot, wandering around. He stopped the car and opened the glove box. Binoculars. He scanned the road ahead of the store and could see several more in the street. He walked to the back fence of the store and found a gate. He approached the back of the store and climbed the ladder mounted for the AC service. He got on the roof and walked to the front of the store. When he got to where he could see, he paused. The parking lot didn’t just have some infected. It was full of them. He could see loudspeakers mounted on poles. There was some kind of aid station set up in the adjacent field the store had used for outbuilding displays. There were dozens more infected shuffling in and out of the shelter. He had seen enough. He climbed back down. He convinced himself that what he wanted to do was the right move. He knew that it was a lie. It wasn’t the right move. It was the only move. And it probably wasn’t enough. He drove towards home.

  Charlie Fair and his daughter walked back to their house. The group across the street were staying put. The couple that had taken shelter with Charlie, Amanda and Chris Bettis, were going to stay with Charlie. If he left they left. Counting them, his daughter and her friend Lori, Charlie’s group totaled five. He told his daughter to start packing whatever food they have; he was going to make sure they were ready to go, if the time came.

  “So do we need to pack clothes?” Amanda asked.

  “Yep. I’ll help.” Charlie said. He and the couple headed next door.

  “I don’t want to leave. My parents, my brother. I don’t know what happened to them. I can’t leave.” Lori said after they left.

  “Lori, we have too.” Jennifer said.

  “Why?”

  “Because we have too.” They kept packing.

  Charlie was in the neighbor’s kitchen loading the food into plastic Magix bags. Chris brought in a few smiley face boxes to load the bags into. Amanda brought two suitcases from the bedroom and proclaimed that they were ready. Charlie put the bag into the box and they headed back next door. They could see someone walking down the road. They watched as it shuffled along. It turned towards the sound of a dog barking. They hurried inside. Charlie looked back as the police car pulled up.

  “Be ready. Sometime this afternoon.” JW said out the driver’s window of the police car.

  “How will we know its time to go?” Charlie asked.

  “It’ll be just like being a kid again.” JW drove off. Charlie walked inside shaking his head.

  “Weird guy” he thought.

  JW drove past the one infected walking the street. He parked the police car all the way past the buses. He crawled under and walked towards his house. He saw the two bodies lying in Evelyn’s yard. He walked to his front door and knocked. He could hear them moving the couch and the dead bolt being opened. Scott opened the door. They hugged. He walked inside. Kate heard him come in and they all walked into the living r
oom. Evelyn and Raj were sitting on the couch and Tilly came out of the bathroom and sat between them. Bridger was standing in the kitchen doorway. Josh was on the floor.

  “I went to town. I got as far as the Home Depot. It all appears overrun,” he continued, “The aid shelter was full of them. I don’t think there is anything left. Anyone down there is either one of them or going to be if they don’t get out. And that is what we are going to do.”

  “What?” Evelyn asked.

  “We are going to get out. We are going to leave.” He said.

  “And go where.” Raj asked.

  “Nowhere, well actually the middle of nowhere.” Bridger said.

  “What the hell are you talking about?” Tilly said.

  “I have a piece of land and right now I think being as far away as possible from populated areas is the best way forward. We can load up everything we have in the buses.”

  “Oh great, the Partridge fucking family goes camping” Tilly said. JW cut her a glance.

  “I’m Keith.” Bridger said. Earning a glance of his own.

  “We need to get everything packed up. All the food, anything we think we need.” He said. “Anybody have anything questions?”

  “For how long?” Evelyn asked.

  “I don’t know.” He said. “We need to carry everything we can. We will take the two buses and Kate’s SUV. My truck is already up there.”

  “Why?” Bridger asked.

  “Why is my truck there? Long story.” JW said, absentmindedly rubbing his head. “Why the buses? So we can carry more stuff but more importantly, when we get there, we can use them for shelter. We need to leave as soon as we can. I found another family in the neighborhood. We will stop to pick them up. After that we don’t stop. I scouted all the way to the bridge. It is clear. Once we get across the bridge I will stay ahead of the buses in the SUV. Kate you drive the first bus, Bridger you follow. Get everything ready. We move the buses in one hour. Let’s get to work.” He said. They started packing.

  7

  Caravan

  JW and Kate were standing in their bedroom. It was really the first time they had been completely alone together since this all started. She sat on the bed. He was changing clothes.

  “How you doing?” She asked.

  “Huh?”

  “How are you doing? Are you okay?” she asked again.

  “I’m trying. Right now I am focused on getting us away from this.”

  “Ok. You don’t have to do all the heavy lifting. We have a plan. We know what to do.”

  He finished getting dressed and they walked back into the living room. They had managed to fill it with boxes and totes of food, blankets, clothes and anything else they thought they needed. Everyone was sitting on a box or on the couch.

  “Ok. Here’s the plan. Bridger, Kate and I will go get the buses. The rest of you start moving everything into the garage. When we get back we’ll pull one bus against the garage and the other in the street. We’ll load everything and everybody in one bus. The other bus will be just Bridger and Raj, it is Raj right?” JW said. Raj nodded. “I’ll lead, Kate you next with everybody on board, then Bridger. Everybody be on alert. We don’t know when these things are going to show up.

  “Everybody ready?” They nodded

  JW, Kate and Bridger walked out the front door and up the road to the buses. The sun had given way to clouds and it looked like the day was going to end in rain. They opened the door to the first bus as the drops began to fall. Bridger climbed on board followed by JW. They looked up the street. A few infected wandering at the far end of what they could see. Nothing else. They cranked up the bus and Bridger climbed off. Kate had the other bus running.

  “Y’all go ahead and pull down. Get everything loaded. I will watch the road. Now go.” Bridger said.

  JW and Kate pulled their buses down the cul-de-sac. Kate parked by the garage and JW parked in the street. He climbed down and went to where they were loading up. He grabbed his backpack out of Josh’s car. He grabbed his toolbox, the first-aid kit from the deputy’s car, an axe and a couple of other tools and threw them on the bus. He loaded the weapons still in his gun safe into the SUV. He walked back down the driveway and waved up the street to Bridger. He made sure everybody was loaded into the bus. He jumped in Kate’s SUV and started to pull away, he looked back to make sure everyone was in line behind him. They set off.

  Charlie was looking out his front door peephole. A bus pulled up to his driveway and opened the door.

  “Just like being a kid again.” He smiled. “Let’s go everybody. They’re here.”

  JW parked and got out of his car. He was watching the street. Bridger stood in the stairwell of his bus. The first infected came from between the houses, by the time Bridger saw it there were at least a dozen more coming from behind the houses. Tilly and Raj were helping get the last few things from the house. Amanda was coming out of the door with them. The rest were halfway to the buses. JW ran towards the group trying to carry suitcases down the driveway.

  “Go, go get to the bus. NOW!!” he said in a muffled shout.

  They paused, surprised. The first screams caused the infected to react. Bridger jumped down from his bus and covered one side of the driveway while JW was holding the other. Shots rang out of the bus windows from Josh, Kate and Scott. Most of the infected fell away. Charlie’s group dropped everything and ran for the bus. Tilly and Amanda were coming out of the house when one of the infected came around the other side of the house. It was a girl, no more than 7 or 8 years old. It grabbed Amanda by the arm, Amanda jerked away from the small hands. She screamed. Tilly leveled the shotgun at its head and fired. It exploded. The child’s body fell, headless to the ground. Amanda screamed again.

  “Oh the humanity and all that shit, I get it. Now shut the fuck up before you get us killed.” Tilly said.

  One of the infected that JW shot fell at the feet of Charlie’s daughter, she stopped and screamed. Everyone behind rushed against her and the whole group went down. Most of the infected were down too.

  “Ok folks, everybody up and on the bus.” JW said reaching out to help them up.

  The gunfire from the bus had stopped. Bridger was dispatching the few infected still coming from behind the house. Tilly, Raj and Amanda made their way down the driveway.

  “Come on folks, don’t have all fucking day.” Tilly said. “It’s just the fucking zombie apocalypse.” Earning a few disapproving looks from the newcomers.

  Tilly grabbed the suitcases, strolling around the bodies. She loaded them one at a time onto the back of the bus.

  “Wouldn’t want you to lose your panties.” She said, climbing back on the bus. JW and Bridger gave each other an approving smile. JW didn’t know where Bridger found this girl, but she had her moments.

  They stood outside the bus. JW, Kate and Bridger. The rest were hanging their heads out listening. It was time.

  “OK here we go. From this point on we do not plan on stopping.” JW said. He hugged Kate. He looked up in the bus at his two sons.

  “Saddle up.” He and Bridger shook hands.

  They slowly pulled to the end of the neighborhood. They turned left. As they past a few houses they saw odd sights. Signs haphazardly painted on the doors. Save us, mainly. They occasionally saw a curtain move or a shadow pass by the window. No way to tell if it was living or dead. As they passed a church its door flung open. The sound of the passing buses had awoken the congregation. They were streaming out in the same falling, stumble run they had seen before. Jennifer and Lori were looking out of the back of the bus. They could see the other bus behind them and the crowd of infected beyond that. They drove on. Kate was not prepared for the sight of her school. Cars abandoned, some burnt. Tents torn down and scattered. She could see the same windows JW had seen earlier. She knew which one was her classroom. She could see it as she passed the building. Tears came down her face as she saw the streaks of blood. They drove on. They approached the bridge.

  JW
stopped. What had been an empty bridge two hours ago now had a small gang of infected wandering around the car he had seen earlier. He stepped out of the SUV and walked back to Kate’s bus.

  “Tell Josh to come up here and drive my car.” He said.

  Josh came out of the bus. JW saw Bridger walking up to him.

  “Raj can drive my bus, I’ll help.” He said.

  They walked around the SUV and started towards the bridge with the buses following behind. Bridger and JW methodically cleared the path. There were infected wearing military uniforms. Bridger took the opportunity to relieve them of any weapons as the passed by. From the variety of clothing among the others it appeared these were the poor souls who had encamped at the school. JW could see children and women among the infected. As they moved the caravan followed. They made their way around the car on the bridge. Once they made it across the bridge they stopped. JW climbed back in the SUV with Josh and Bridger back to his bus. They set out once again.

  Tilly sat in the back of the bus. She rolled down the road looking at the smoke filled pine trees as the rain brought the smoke down to the ground. The fading light still provided enough for her to be able to make out the burnt out structure of the night before as they passed. She didn’t know where they were, but she knew where she was.

  “About twenty more miles.” Scott said over the back of the seat in front of her.

  “What?” she said.

  “Twenty more miles until we get there. I come up here all the time. I think it is going to be a good place.”

  “A good place for what?” she asked.

  “I don’t know, a good place to get our heads together and figure out what to do next.”

  “And what is next?” she asked. He didn't answer.

  Bridger was sitting in the first seat of the bus he and Raj were using. They both saw the dirt road and smoke. They didn’t talk about it.

  “What the hell?” Raj said, looking in his rearview mirror.