by Rich Baker
Jesse quick-steps it, so he doesn’t get completely soaked by the rain, but he’s still dripping when he gets to the building.
He sees groups of people diligently working – preparing food, washing clothes, doing the sort of drudgery that is much more difficult now that the world has ended. He scans around until he spots Mani.
“Yo!” he shouts. “Ortega! Get Paco and Johnny and meet me in the office!”
Mani nods and heads to the other side of the building to get the other two guys, while Jesse goes to the office. He pulls out a big sheet of paper, upon which they’ve drawn a crude schematic of the strip mall where the sporting goods store is.
Mani, Sammy ‘Paco’ Romero and Johnny Vigil walk in a couple of minutes later.
“How’s Nicky?” Paco asks. “Is he going to make it?”
Jesse looks at the three of them. They were all members of the Latino gang that Max and Jesse ran with before they went into the Army. Jesse knows them as reliable, loyal men who will fight to the death for their people. He considers them every bit the brothers – actually, more so – than the men with which he went to war. Other than Max and Doc, he’s only kept in touch with one or two of the men he served with, even though some of them are just a few hours south, still enlisted and stationed at Fort Carson. He wonders for a second if the Fort is still there and if the soldiers could push back against the dead. He shakes the thought off and returns to Paco’s question.
“He’s alive but unconscious. Doc doesn’t know when he’ll wake up but says he’s a fighter, so he’s got a chance. The bullet missed all the vital stuff, so that’s good. Hopefully, he wakes up soon, and we can get some information from him.”
“That fucker is like a cockroach, man He’s impossible to kill,” Johnny says.
Paco laughs, more of a snort than a guffaw. “I know, right? That throat punch should have killed him. When he was coughing up all that blood, I thought he was done for. I still don’t know how he kept fighting after that. I do know I never wanted to mess with him after that.”
“I never wanted to TALK to him after that!” Johnny says, laughing about it too. “His voice freaks me out, man. Crazy fucking guy.”
“Well, hopefully, we all get to hear that raspy sounding bastard soon. Until then, Max has a job for us.” Jesse steers them back on task. “He wants our plan for taking the sporting goods store.”
“Fuck, man. We lost two people last time. We don’t even know what they’ve got in there,” complains Paco. “Are we even sure that it’s worth the risk?”
Jesse levels his eyes at the shorter man. “We know that whatever’s in there is worth killing our people for, so they seem to think it’s pretty valuable. And we need ammo and food. There’s going to be a ton of camping gear, clothes, knives, who knows what else. I mean, just being a sporting goods store makes it worthwhile.”
“But we don’t know how many people there are in that place. The food and ammo could be gone for all we know,” Johnny counters. “And they’ve got the rooftop. There’s no way we can sneak up on them. It’ll be a slaughter.”
“They had plenty of ammo when we went there before,” Paco says.
Jesse knows the guys are nervous about going into the city as much as going into battle. He just needs to get them into the right mindset.
“Look, you said that there were only a couple of people shooting from the roof. If they had a lot of people, I don’t think any of you would have made it back. I think there’s only a few people in there, probably people who worked there before the Fall. We can take it easily if we make a good plan.”
Mani nods, speaking for the first time.
“I agree. Last time we went straight at them, and they were either ready for us, or they got lucky and happened to be watching at the right time. Based on that, I don’t think we can surprise them, at least not completely, but I think we can run a diversion, get their eyes looking one way, and hit them from another.”
Paco and Johnny look at each other and then at the big sheet of paper.
“What do you have in mind?” Paco asks Mani.
“We come at them from two sides. One group comes from the east end of the mall along the back. The other group comes from the front, two, maybe three trucks. We make a big show of it, driving around the parking lot, shooting at them, play it up real Road Warrior style, you know? While they’re watching that show, the other group goes in the back way. If it’s open, we go in and take them out. If it’s locked, we blow the door. Either way, it’s game over for those assholes.”
“Not bad,” Jesse says. “Timing will be critical. And we’ll need several trucks to make sure we can haul enough of everything away. That means a lot of noise and a lot of zombies. We’ll have to worry about them; they won’t, not until we get the door open. So, we’ll have to account for that too.”
“I have some thoughts about that,” Paco says, leaning in and reaching for a pencil.
Jesse smiles. These guys are all in now. They’ll get the job done.
Three
Robert is asleep on the couch in front of the dark TV, his wounds cleaned and bandaged as best as D-Day can do.
Kyle and D-Day went into Danny’s workshop to talk a while ago, while Carmen sat with the rest of the group. She introduced herself and told them about the events they endured in the high rise in Denver, their trip north, and their spotting the group walking to the house where the gunfight took place. For the time being, she left out the warehouse and the cache of supplies it houses. She figures until they know more about these people, and whether they can completely trust them, it’s best to keep some information close to the vest.
Ben told her about their own adventures, with frequent interruptions from Andy and Natalie, and what ultimately led to their meeting Carmen and D-Day.
“Have you seen any other survivors?” she asks.
“Just the people we saw today,” Ben answers. “And Amanda. You?”
“No, not one. All the way up here from Denver, we saw no signs of life until we saw you.”
“So, is Denver just…dead?” Natalie asks.
“The streets are full of them. Just dead cars and dead people. That’s all we saw.”
“I thought maybe the military would be there like they said on TV.”
“We saw a couple of jets firebomb Speer Boulevard, but they never came back. And we saw some people from Department of Homeland Security try and take the fight to them, but they got overwhelmed. We never saw them again either.”
“Is anyone working on a plan to save us?”
They all turn and see Toni walking out of the bedroom, her arm in a sling, her question hanging in the air.
“This is where Keith would usually make a rude comment about putting a bell on you,” Ben says.
“I know. I never thought I’d miss his asshole sense of humor, but I’d give anything to be insulted by him right now. So, about the plan to save us?”
Carmen points toward the workshop entrance.
“D-Day and Kyle are talking over some plans in there. I think we’re going to have to rely on ourselves unless we get some kind of miracle.”
On cue, the door opens, and D-Day and Kyle come out of the workshop. Carmen goes over to D-Day and takes his hand, and he smiles at her. Kyle clears his throat.
“Ok, gang, gather around. We need to talk. Get the others.”
Ben goes and wakes up Robert, and Natalie gets Stephenie and Annie from the bedroom where they’ve been keeping watch over Danielle.
Kyle looks over the group. Toni sits at the table with Ben standing behind her. Andy and Natalie are next to them. Robert moves to a recliner near the table, his eyes drawn down to slits by the pain meds. Annie and Stephenie stand behind him. Marc stands in the kitchenette.
“Ok, that’s everyone,” Kyle says. “We have a lot to go over.”
He nods to D-Day, who takes a step away from Carmen.
“Alright, I’m going to get right to it. The guy on the table next door is still
alive, and he gave up a bunch of information.
“His name is Dale Nelson, Jr. I confirmed it with his driver’s license. It’s his farm that you guys cut through that first night. He’s the one who opened fire on you.”
He turns to Toni. “He shot you.”
They all are silent, so he keeps going forward.
“When you returned fire, you killed a bunch of his family. His father, a brother, a brother-in-law, and their foreman. That’s where this gets complicated. Dale Jr – he goes by DJ – told this foreman’s family about it, and they’ve got people looking for you. Do you know people named Montero?”
The all look around, shaking their heads. Kyle speaks up.
“It’s not surprising since you guys don’t live here. They own a conglomerate of businesses – the Montero Auto Group – several miles south of town. They own a junkyard, a used car lot, rent-a-bay self-service auto repairs. They have a towing operation, do collision repair. If it has anything to do with a car, they probably do it. They’re quite successful.”
“They took the car when Maggie – my wife – had her crash…” Marc starts but trails off. He hasn’t talked much about the crash that killed his wife just over a year ago, and he’s not going to get into it now.
“Anyway,” D-Day continues, “these Montero’s told DJ that they had two people here in town working out of a pawn shop, and he would have them find you.”
“Wait,” Ben interrupts, “how do they know who we are or where to find us?”
“The registration from your truck gave them your last name. There’s only so many Puckett’s in town, I’m guessing. It would be a process of elimination.”
Ben nods his head. “Makes sense, I guess.”
D-Day continues. “The stuff that Robert got from the dead guy’s pockets leads me to believe that you have encountered these two Montero agents.”
He puts some pieces of paper on the table.
“Notepaper from ‘Pawn King’ – clever name – with a list of four locations with the name Puckett tied into them. A piece of paper from Montero Auto Group with the name Ben Puckett on it, and the instructions ‘find, observe, do not engage.’”
Ben’s face turns red at the mention of his name, and his stomach knots up thinking about some random person writing it on there with instructions to find him.
“Now, I think it was bad timing that these two guys happened to attack you at Amanda’s place. From what I gather from you guys, they were probably the ones who attacked her and her family. I have no clue why they came back there, but you all were in the wrong place, and wrong time for that trip to bury her family.
“This guy, DJ, was kicked out of his parents’ house after a disagreement about hunting you guys down. He went lone wolf, decided to come after you by himself.
“Your friend Danielle was holed up in a house on the north side of town after she trashed her vehicle.”
“MY vehicle,” Marc interjects.
“Right, sorry. Anyway, DJ came along in his APV, wounded from a fight the previous day. She took him in, they got to talking, and your names came up. She was happy to bring him to you – in fact, he says that she offered to serve you up to him in exchange for him helping her get to California. They were on their way here, to your bunker, but on the way, he heard the gunshots from your fight with these two Montero people. They followed the noise, she ID’d you all to him, and he started shooting.”
Natalie speaks up. “So, she knew what he was going to do?”
“He said they made a deal – she gives up the Sims, he gets her to California. He had his sights set on them hooking up and riding off into the sunset together.”
“So, we kill her, right?” Annie asks.
“Kill them both,” Marc says with no emotion.
“We can’t just kill them! Can we?” Natalie exclaims.
“Why not? She destroyed my car and led that man back to us. They killed my son. I think the justification is pretty clear.”
“Those two Montego people killed Keith, not her or what’s his name? DJ?” she says.
“Montero,” Andy corrects her.
“And that son-of-a-bitch put them on to us. He shot Toni, he put the Montero’s on our trail, he killed Amanda and shot Robert. And she enabled his attack! She might as well have pulled the trigger herself!”
“He’s going to die,” D-Day says. “I’ve kept him alive for now, but I can’t fix those wounds. Unless one of you is a surgeon, it’s a matter of when not if.”
“Good,” Marc says. “The sooner, the better.”
“I don’t think anyone here doubts his guilt,” Kyle says. “And if his wounds are mortal, that decision has been made for us. The bigger concern from my point of view is Danielle.”
“She should die too,” Marc says.
Kyle stares at Marc for a minute. He can’t imagine what he’s going through. Just a few weeks ago, he and Naomi were talking about how Marc was emerging from the dark cloud that surrounded him after Maggie’s death in that car accident. A week later the world fell apart, and now his son has been killed. He has no one left.
“We know your opinion, Marc,” he says. “And I get it. But we can’t go vigilante and kill people because we feel like it.”
“Why not? What are you going to do? Take her to the police? There aren’t any, in case you forgot. Do you want to jail her? Feed her, wait for her to get a chance to escape and kill more of us? Or maybe you want to turn her loose and just hope she won’t try to kill us again? The broad has snapped, and she needs to be dealt with.”
“I agree,” Stephenie says aloud. She starts signing, and Annie translates. “She attacked us before she fled, remember? She stole Marc's truck and fled, then came back with a murderer that she pointed at us like a rifle. I don’t care that she didn’t pull the trigger, she needs to answer for this.”
“But we – you – killed several people in their family. And we took you in, so we’re not innocent. I just don’t see this as black and white,” Natalie says.
“So, what – you want to hang this all on us now?” Robert asks from the recliner, his words slurring from the meds. “If it wasn’t for us, you never would have gotten out of Fort Collins. You would have been lost on private land and overrun by the dead! And IF you made it, going the way you were going, that DJ prick would have killed you all. Now shit’s getting hard, and you want to throw us under the bus?”
“No, that’s not what I’m saying, I’m just saying, I can see why he’d be mad. That’s all.”
“Natalie,” Annie says, “he started that fight. We were no threat to them. They shot first, they hit Toni and almost killed her, for no reason. If they hadn’t come out shooting none of this would have happened.”
“Yeah, but we were trespassing, even if we didn’t know it,” Natalie says. “I’m not saying what they did was right, I’m just saying if the roles were reversed we might have done the same thing.”
“You wouldn’t because until you got here, you didn’t even have guns,” Robert says. “And, also, you wouldn’t because you’re not a moron who shoots before knowing what’s going on. We went nowhere near them. We posed zero – ZERO – threat to them. We had already passed their farmhouse! They responded by opening fire indiscriminately, hitting Toni, and, if it weren’t for us, you would have been next.”
“Okay, guys, this is not getting us anywhere,” Kyle says. “Regardless of how this got started, I’m convinced that this DJ Nelson is a murderous thug. It’s also clear that Danielle helped him, but to what extent we don’t know. We know his side of the story, but who knows if that’s the truth. He could be trying to pin this whole idea on her to try and get some mercy from us. We need to hear what she has to say.”
“I don’t need to hear anything she has to say,” Marc says. “I’ve made up my mind. Put my vote under ‘kill the bitch.’” He gets up and heads through the door into the tunnel.
“Ben, Andy, go get her,” Kyle says.
The two young men get up an
d head into the back bedroom to retrieve the prisoner.
“When she gets in here, I’ll ask the questions. Don’t interrupt her, let her tell her side,” Kyle says, then turns to D-Day and Carmen. “You have an outsider’s perspective. I would like you guys to give me an impartial assessment when she’s done, okay?”
“A psycho bitch killed my parents just a few weeks ago,” Carmen says, a cold edge to her voice. “I’m not sure how impartial I can be.”
“More than most of us, I think. Just try, please.”
She nods, and D-Day agrees to give her a fair hearing.
“Dad!” Ben calls out and runs into the room. “She’s gone!”
“What do you mean she’s gone?”
“She’s gone, Dad! Come look!”
The group heads into the bedroom. Kyle goes and peers through the ballistic glass into the airlock. The tunnel behind the second door in this window well was un-excavated, but Danielle has opened the door and clawed her way through the dirt and into the neighbor’s window well. The bottom half of an old five-gallon bucket sits in the mud on the airlock floor, likely used as an improvised shovel. Rain is running from the window well into the airlock making everything a muddy mess.
Kyle turns to the rest of the group, his face red. D-Day speaks up.
“In my experience, innocent people don’t run.”
“Andy,” Kyle says. “Get the Parrot up. Let’s see if we can spot her.”
Andy runs and retrieves the iPad and in a minute, has the drone fired up and rising out of the window well-hiding spot. He raises it over the rooftops and lets it settle into a hover.
Kyle is looking over his shoulder. The camera is facing the field across the street, but there’s no sign of Danielle.
“Rotate it clockwise,” Kyle says.
Andy starts it turning. The camera scrolls past the vacant lots, the alleyway, and still no sign of her.
“Can you move it over the spot where she escaped?” Kyle asks.
Andy manipulates the controls and the drone moves until it’s directly over the window well where she made her escape.