by Tom Calen
The creature howled in rage as Mike stood his ground above it. From practiced memory, he knew that he had one round left in each gun. Pity, not anger, drove him now as he lowered one weapon and delivered a killing shot to the tormented figure. Returning the spent weapon to its holster, Mike turned and retreated through the woods back to the camp. His left hand still held the gun that contained one unspent round when, several minutes later, he reached his destination.
Having heard the screams and gunfire, a concerned crowd had gathered in the darkness. Mike met their stares with a measured look. Locking eyes briefly with Paul, whose own eyes expressed understanding and pity, he moved to his left and entered the stigmatized tent he had been in earlier. His eyes took in the sight of Derrick as he sat before the cage that held his high school sweetheart. As the infected-Jenni raised her head, she greeted him with a snarl and a growl. Derrick turned his attention to follow her gaze.
“What? What do you want?” the young man asked him. His tone showed his exhaustion and contempt.
“I’m sorry.” They were the only two words that he could manage without breaking his resolve. When he spoke them, he slowly raised the gun and squeezed the trigger to expel the final shot. Derrick’s eyes widened and the shout had barely formed on his lips when the bullet whizzed past his head and sunk deep into the creature in the cage. Her body convulsed with one spasm before falling lifelessly to the dirt floor, a shallow pool of blood forming around her head.
Mike felt the air leave his body as Derrick tackled into him. He put up no resistance as the younger man landed blow after blow into his face and chest. He took the beating as punishment for not allowing this scene to play out all those months ago. In truth, he could not feel the pain. His body was numb and his mind had disconnected from it during the screams in the woods. His daze continued as he heard Paul Jenson rush into the tent and struggle to pull the enraged man off. Derrick screamed wordlessly, and Mike understood the sound, having been its owner an hour before. There were no words to express the emotions that now raged through his former student. Even so, Mike recognized each one as if translated in some fashion.
Others soon filled the tent and Mike could feel arms and hands pulling him up from the ground. His eyes stayed locked on Derrick as the boy fought for freedom from the men that held him in check. The voice of Dr. Marena shouting orders to bring Mike to his medical tent seeped into his hearing, though their meaning was distant and incomprehensible. The smell of alcohol and sterilization were the only indications to Mike that he had reached his destination.
“I’m fine,” he mumbled with a voice that felt borrowed.
Did someone say my name? his mind inquired. I’m fine, he repeated, yet his mouth did not move. Why won’t you listen to me? I’m fine. I’m fine!
Dr. Marena’s face hovered before him and Mike felt himself being lifted off the ground. His eyes now stared at the dark gray fabric that lined the interior of the tent.
I don’t want to lie down. I’m not ready to sleep.
He could see Dr. Marena’s mouth move but could not hear the words. He felt a pinch in his right shoulder and soon a warm sensation spread across his body.
I don’t want to lie down. It’s getting dark. Why is it dark? Hello? Hello? Is anybody in here?
* * *
Pain. That was the first sensation Mike could register as he slowly opened his eyes. Correction, he thought, make that a lot of pain. His blurred vision began to clear and he recognized the familiar accoutrements that marked the medical tent. His eyes shifted side to side. Mike tried to turn his head, but he could feel something attached to him to prevent such movement.
“Hello?” His voice sounded rough and scratched. He realized how dry his throat was when he spoke, but the dryness paled in comparison to the pain that shot through his mouth when he spoke the word.
“Don’t try talk, Mike,” came a voice from behind him. The shadows in the tent shifted and Dr. Marena entered his field of vision at his left side.
“You have a broken jaw, among other things, so keep your mouth still,” the doctor instructed.
“How long?” Mike asked doing his best to keep his jaw immobilized.
“You’ve only been out for a few hours. I had to use Demerol to knock you out. I was able to reset your jaw. I don’t have the equipment to wire your jaw shut, so I had to immobilize it with a strap. It’s not my best work, but it’ll hold. Your nose was broken in three places, and I reset that as well so it should heal fine. You had a pretty nice gash around your right eye, which I stitched up. Your lip was split, so you have a few stitches there, too. Both of your eyes are pretty well swollen, and I have given you some anti-inflammatories to help bring that down. Oh, and you lost a tooth, but not much I can do about that.”
Mike listened to the doctor as he rattled off the list of injuries. Well, he thought, guess my modeling days are over.
“Chest?” he asked the doctor.
“Bruised and cracked ribs. Without x-rays I can’t tell you how many, but there is nothing punctured, so if you keep them wrapped and don’t lift anything heavy for a while, you’ll be fine.”
“Thank you,” Mike managed to say after the doctor helped him sip water through a straw. The cool liquid eased his parched throat with welcome relief.
The doctor nodded in return and informed him that he would be back shortly. Once the man left, Mike broke orders and began to rise up from his prone position. Pain seared through his body with a staggering force. At first trying to grit his teeth against it, only to find that increased the unwelcomed sensation, Mike forced himself to sit up on the gurney.
“Didn’t he just tell you to stay put?”
On instinct, Mike tried to turn himself to the direction of the voice. His sore ribcage screamed in protest, drowning out his neck’s own complaints. As the pinpoints of light faded from his vision, Mike moved more cautiously and turned to find Paul sitting in a chair in the corner of the tent.
“Where’s Derrick?” Mike said through his teeth.
“Locked up in his tent,” Paul replied.
“Release him tonight,” he ordered.
“You sure about that? What if he decides to finish what he started?” Paul asked him as he indicated Mike’s current condition.
“Then he does,” Mike answered, getting used to speaking without moving his jaw. “But, he won’t, and I won’t have him chained up like a criminal. He and I both did what we had to do. If he decides to stay then it’s on his terms. If he leaves, then we give him what we can spare.”
Paul nodded in consent.
“So, how are you feeling?”
“Well, my legs don’t hurt,” Mike tried to joke, but the laugh caught in his throat as pain throbbed in his chest.
“That’s not what I meant.”
Mike had hoped that his broken face and chest would have allowed him at least a brief reprieve from having to assess his emotions so quickly after the event.
“She died months ago. It’s up to him now if he joins her, or decides to live.” Though he would always carry the guilt of not having acted sooner, he did feel an increased lightness in his soul. He had acted out of contrition by ending Derrick’s torment and with his penance complete, Mike hoped both he and the young man could find whatever peace still existed in the world.
Derrick, having been released from his physical and emotional bonds, left the camp sometime in the night. He left no note, no farewell.
* * *
With the threat of the approaching Tilian horde and the precipitous departure it forced, Mike had little time to rest his sore body. He was pleased to find that the camp had accomplished much in those few days. The majority of the supplies had been loaded into the transport vehicles. In their eagerness to depart, some of the refugees had even taken down their tents and chose to share with others.
Moving slowly through his own quarters, Mike began to box up his belongings. When the virus broke out, he had escaped with the clothes he had been wearing, and the
small gray canine that now rested comfortable on his cot. Gazelle seemed to sense the approaching relocation for she kept her eyes half-cocked and had taken to staying even closer to Mike than normal. She was his only real reminder from his life before the virus. The items he placed into the small box consisted of essential documentation and maps; nothing of personal consequence.
On the third day after receiving his injuries, Lisa updated Mike regarding the Tils advancement. With their closer proximity, scouts had been able to more accurately place their number at eleven hundred. The number still staggered Mike whenever he thought about it. Unfortunately, their pace had increased. Though hoping to gain a two day head start, the refugees would only be one day ahead of the massive force of infected. If the parkways were not passable, or something happened to the vehicles, Mike feared that the infected would be able to over-take them quickly.
The remaining days passed quickly and soon the refugees found themselves waking on the morning of the departure. Not immune to the nervous excitement, Mike found that even he had woken well before the scheduled time. Stepping from his cabin, Gazelle by his side, he took in the broken-down camp site. The mountain camp had been his longest home over the last six years. Its establishment had offered him and the other refugees the first feeling of permanence and routine.
There was a part of him that yearned for this island salvation to exist, but he had learned not to give in to those emotions, so it was with guarded optimism that he joined the other refugees as they began the final descent down the mountain. Mike at first felt foolish for the nostalgia he was experiencing as he travelled further away from the camp. However he soon came to accept that home can come in many different forms, and somehow along the way their mountaintop camp had become its latest definition.
Chapter Seventeen
If pressed, Mike would have been unable to pinpoint when it had happened, but somewhere in the two months since relocating to the stone home in the Willow Falls Campground, the survivors had settled into a routine. Though he still keenly felt the desperation of their situation, he had begun to accept the enormity of what had befallen him and his companions.
As the temperatures steadily increased, and the rains began to fall more frequently, the current inhabitants of the house had developed into a family. Meals were always shared together, and much of the daily work became group activities. After the first foray into town to gather supplies, Mike had grown significantly more cautious on the two subsequent trips. Michelle, still recovering from the trauma of what had almost happened, declined to join them on those trips, opting instead to stay behind with Sarah, her young son, and Gazelle. Mike could see the change in the teenage girl. Perhaps more than the horror of the infected, what her fellow man had attempted traumatized her even more.
Both journeys into town since the altercation had been fraught with anxiety. Mike, along with Blaine, Josh, Erik, Derrick and Jenni, made sure they were very heavily armed and alert as they had gathered additional supplies. Once, they spotted a small group of survivors travelling along the road. With distrust still strong, Mike had ordered the others to hide in an alley as he warily watched the strangers. He saw no sign of weapons, but unsure as to their intentions, he chose not to reveal himself to them. While he loathed the suspicion of others that had replaced his compassion, he could not bring himself to jeopardize the safety of those already in his care. When the party had passed safely into the distance, he and the others resumed the scavenging and made their return to the campsite.
Of the many routines adopted by the survivors, operation of the battery-powered shortwave radio receiver was the one upon which they placed much faith. Derrick had discovered the radio in the small groundskeeper’s house on the eastern edge of the campground. Mike shared the responsibility with the others of scanning the radio waves for any incoming communication. Hopes rose at each interruption in the usual static, but quickly plummeted when the static returned without a message. On only one occasion did they discover signs of life in the world.
Andrew Weyland had been manning the radio several weeks into their stay when a voice was faintly heard amidst the static. The young boy jumped excitedly at the sound and immediately called out to the others. Like a black and white, World War-era photograph, they huddled close to the radio as Mike adjusted the dial slightly until the voice rose above the ambient noise. In what sounded like an Asian dialect, the male’s voice spoke calmly. Though unfamiliar with the language, Mike soon realized that the voice was repeating the same message several times. The message ended as abruptly as it had begun, and in the days that followed, continued to be absent from the radio waves. Not knowing its meaning or content, the group continued to spend much of their time scanning the frequencies with diminishing hope.
The supplies scavenged on the trips to town had not only kept the refugees adequately fed, cleansed and clothed, but also worked towards making their new home more livable. Blankets, sheets, pillows, and inflatable mattresses had been taken from a big-box chain store. Several small area rugs from the same store now covered the cold stone floor of the house. Sarah had even managed to hang curtains over the lone window in the large front room. Not soon to be featured in any interior design magazines, the dwelling had improved greatly since their arrival.
Each day after breakfast, everyone got to work on the various chores that had proven essential to the happy cohabitation of nine individuals. Laundry, food preparation and clean-up, and firewood collecting were perhaps the most time consuming tasks. The teenagers took to their various jobs with eager abandon. The steady enhancement of the house, as well as an increasing sense of security, had lightened their previous moods of despair and defeat.
In the evenings, once the chores had been completed and the evening meal served and consumed, it became common for several of the group to engage in card games, book reading, and even board games, all of which had been scavenged during their two month stay. Mike understood the need to resume some normalcy, but he also refused to allow complacency any entrance into his thoughts. While the stone home certainly proved serviceable, he doubted that nine people could continue to live in such close quarters. Additionally, the food supply would become cause for major concern. It was fine to rely on what could be scavenged from stores and homes in neighboring towns, but Mike feared that those sources of supply would soon reach an end. Each day that the radio aired no broadcast indicated that there was still no formal survival base. We have to begin thinking in the long term, Mike told himself often.
Lacking any real experience with agriculture, save for handing his grandmother tools in her garden when he was a young boy, Mike understood that this was the time for planting. If events did not change, and no help could be found, then the refugees would need to rely on their own food production if they hoped to survive through the winter. He knew the campground, with its thick canopy of trees and stone outcroppings, was not going to allow the growth of much.
Though he disliked the idea, and had not yet mentioned it to the others, Mike was quickly becoming convinced that, sooner rather than later, a search for a more habitable locale would need to begin and the stone house would have to be abandoned.
* * *
Another month had passed and the southern summer was evident with temperatures well above ninety degrees, and a humidity that was debilitating in its oppression. Mike had yet to broach the topic of relocation with the others. His remembered exhaustion and anxiety from the first days of the outbreak held his tongue. The dangers of staying versus leaving soon became his main thoughts, yet his mind could not determine a victor. The idea of being out in the open, on the road, gave him chills, yet starving in a frozen stone home did little to soothe him.
As he had suspected, the availability of food supplies in the neighboring towns had diminished substantially. Most stores were picked clean of non-perishable items, leaving only the rotting meats, fruits and vegetables to create a burning stench. Mike estimated that their current stock should, if well rationed,
last this new family of his through the summer. The daily portions were adequate for basic nutrition but he could easily see the weight loss of his companions. His clothing hung far more loosely than similar sizes had before the outbreak. Though his gym attendance was certainly non-existent, the daily labors of this new life had continued to work his body to extremes.
Stripped to the waist, Mike carried a heavy bundle of wood across the stone walkway leading to the house. As he stacked the timber into a pile against an exterior wall, Sarah stepped out of the home to speak with him. In the months since their settlement, Sarah’s optimism never flagged. Whether out of motherly protection for her son, or a genuinely positive disposition, her spirit remained unclouded. Today, however, he could see an anxiety and wild fear in her eyes as she approached him.
“He’s sick,” she said to Mike as her hands twisted the hem of her yellow shirt. Her hair, normally pulled back into a neat pony-tail, now fell haphazardly to her shoulders, with some larger locks still held in an elastic band.
“Andrew?” Mike asked, assuming that her state could only be brought upon by concern for her own flesh and blood.
Nodding, Sarah’s eyes quickly filled with tears. Mike reached his hand to her shoulder to steady her and offer comfort.
“What’s wrong?”
“He has a fever. He woke up this morning looking a little pale, and then he complained that he was cold. I took his temperature…it’s high, Mike. And he can’t keep anything down,” she said in a nervous ramble.