We finally arrived back at the outpost at six in the morning. Christi ran out and grabbed me. I guess we’ll unload later I smirked as I chased Christi back to the tent. Bev came up to Rus and dragged him away to a tent also. Don got out of the HUMVEE and introduced himself. Let’s get some breakfast, then you three get some rest, and we’ll get everything caught up after you wake up. While you are resting we will get the trucks unloaded, put everything away, and finish up some of the small projects with the final supplies you guy got Mike said. After a while Christi and Bev joined everyone unloading the trucks. They both had naughty grins on their faces. Abby looked at both of them and said jeez what were you two up too? Making sure they were really sleepy Christi laughed. What are we working on? Bev asked. Well a few are installing the garage doors, Mike, Chris, and Bruce went to do the electrical, walls, flooring, and roof of the building you asked Mike to make, Blake and Bart are unloading some vehicles the guys found into the garage, and the rest are unloading the weapons into the armory and clothes into the house. It was now nine in the morning the garage was complete, the trucks were unloaded and put away, and the church only needed the hardwood floors installed. After finishing with the vehicles Bart, Brent, and Blake went to the church to install the flooring, so Mike, Chris, and Bruce could go and finish the pit. They added the bars across the top of the pit with an accessible door on the top and the enclosure also was surrounded with walls made out of plywood and the steel bars and a roof. Now it was one in the afternoon when Rus, Bryan, and Don woke up just in time for lunch in the mess hall. After we ate we showed Don around the outpost and Bruce showed us the new additions. Everything is completed but the bath/shower room was completed and that should be up in three days once everything sets we can turn on the water Mike shared as we walked by. Then we all met in the mess hall to hear of the stories that had happened and we told what our trip involved. Well let’s establish the rules for the compound and if these rules are not followed you can be banished from the outpost or executed depending on the severity of your rule breaking Rus announced. The head of this compound are the ones that started this and stayed calm to get this going. Bryan, Christi, Abby, Bruce, Bev, and I will make the major decisions for the entire community Rus said. The first rule in this community will be we vote on letting new survivors join and become part of the community, second rule is you must be willing to protect one another and put your life on the line for each other we are a family now we may not get along but all we got is each other, the third rule is when you are on night patrol you must stay awake until the next patrol relieves you we will rotate every ten hours, and the fourth rule is if you have infected family that you want to save while we search for answers or a cure let us know cause will we be transferring all our children to the compound and keeping them in a caged pit we have made. Are there any questions or objections to these rules we have established. Everyone stood in the room and shook their heads. Mike raised and glass and shouted to the outpost and family. We all cheered with him. Now let’s get this community completed Rus said. Rus jumped on the Ural motorcycle and Bryan jumped into the side car we are going for the children does anyone know if they have other family members they need us to bring back? Rus asked. No, good luck and hurry back Mike said. The gate flew open and the motorcycle drove down the road. Well what needs to be done first? Mike asked. Let’s go building by building and complete them that way Christi said. All the guys start with getting the sleeping quarters set up, so no one has to try and sleep in the tents another night Christi added. Mike I need you to take the excavator over to the north side of the garage and start digging a large deep hole Bev asked. How big? Mike asked. I am not sure big enough to hold two large tankers, Rus wants to put gas on the site both regular and diesel so we don’t always have to search for it Bev said. Dr. Li, Samantha, and Anne please verify everything is all set in the hospital, Abby, Jessica, and Jennifer make sure the armory and garage are set, Pastor Scott and Irene please check out the church we built and set it up however you want if you need something built make a list and we can complete it tomorrow and after that check out the tool shed. Bev, Blake, and Bruce leave now for the tank that the boys saw at that new gas station being built it shouldn’t tank more than two hours Jessica, Janelle, and I will set the command center, kitchen, and mess hall are in order and make dinner. We have three hours before they return with all the children, so be sure we are completed on everything Christi said.
Rus headed straight for the county jail with only one thing in mind a transfer van. When we arrived at the jail we found one van abandoned with the keys still in the ignition. I’ll drive the van and you can play with your new ride I joked to Rus. Let’s get Abby’s kid first and my kids last Rus said. We can load them in through the emergency exit on top of the van Rus added. We went to Abby’s apartment first the bathroom door was still barricaded shut. How are we going to do this I asked Rus? I thought I’d open the door while you lasso that electric cord from that lamp around him then we could drag him to the van Rus suggested. It worked without any flaws and we had Abby’s boy locked in the back of the van. Now let’s head to my house I told Rus. My kids would be the one of the easiest to load since they were locked in a dog cage. We took two wooden handles off the shovels in the garage and used them to carry the cage to the van, propped the cage upright and opened the cage door so they could fall into the back of the van too. We made our way to Bruce’s place next which was our other easy stop since his daughter was also locked in a dog kennel as well and we did the same trick to get her in the back of the van. Rus’s kids were going to be much more of a challenge since they were locked in the garage and there were three of them. Once we arrived at Rus’s house we talked out a strategy of how we were going to get three out to the van one at a time. The best way I think will be to distract them through the hole in the roof that we were feeding them from and I will try and lure one out at a time Rus suggested. I went to the roof and opened the latch. I started making noise to see if the children would look at me. After a few yells I saw two of them directly under me and a second later I saw Rus with a bear hug around his daughter avoiding getting bitten taking her to the van. Once he got her in the next attempt was a little harder since both of Rus’s sons were bigger than us and only teenagers. They were both as big as Rus and I, so this was going to be tougher. I started distracting them again from the roof while Rus snuck in behind them. He wrapped a rope he found in the garage around one of his sons but his other son noticed and started heading toward Rus so I did the only thing I could think of and jumped through the latch and land on the back of his other son. We crashed hard to the ground Rus ran over and we hog tied his other son and took them both out to the van. Now everyone was loaded we made our way back to the outpost. We arrived back at the outpost three and a half hours after we had left. We back the van up to the pit and opened the door leading to the staircase. Rus and I tossed a body to the far side of the pit and one by one the kids went into the pit and started tearing the dead body apart. While they were in the pit Rus ran down the stairs and sealed the steel door shut. Everything is all set we have every room ready except for the gas pump and the water to the restroom, but the tank we got from the gas station is in the ground and Chris should have the pumps ready in three days. They went and got the tank and the two trucks full of gas to fill the tank with. We need to have a meeting in the command center with the six heads of the community and Don we have much to discuss Christi said.
Chapter 11
We headed for the command center and all took a seat. Who wants to begin? I asked. I’ll start with what we found at the hospital Christi said. Bev found some patient files and a journal on the desk of Dr. Jacob Holiday. I only started going though these three days ago Christi said. Let me read some of the doctor’s notes from his journal about his shift in the ER: It is Good Friday we have had six patients in the ER tonight all with the same symptoms skin very pale and blue in color, pigment in eyes has dissolved leaving only a white glossy lo
ok to them, and teeth have stained to a yellow brownish color. Two of the patients died a little after two a.m. in the morning and after forty five minutes of CPR we declared them deceased. A little after three a.m. the hospital lost power but the backup generator on. It didn’t look like a storm was rolling in but the real shock that came to all of us was when one of the patients came out of the morgue over an hour later. When he exited the morgue doors we couldn’t believe what we were seeing. I had declared this man dead two hours earlier. He still was pale with a tint of blue, white eyes, and stained teeth. We called security since we didn’t know what was going on or how this was possible. When the security guards arrived they slowly approached the patient and shouted orders for him to stand against the wall. The patient didn’t listen to any of the orders continuing to walk toward all of us so the guards approached the man, when one guard went to put his hand on his shoulder the patient turned toward him and bit him in the neck so hard it tore his throat right out. The other guards pulled their guns and opened fire on the patient shooting him several times in the chest and head. Quite an eventful night after the chaos in the hallway we moved the patient to autopsy room. The other four patients died over the next couple of hours. We decided as a precaution of what had happened we moved the guard’s body with the other four patients into the morgue and barricade the door shut. The other security guards stood watch over the room. I went to the autopsy room to see if I could find anything about our patient that seemed to come back to life. After three hours running all of the tests I could think to try the blood results came back with extremely high levels of radiation found in the patient’s blood. I heard the alarm go off throughout the hospital and exited the autopsy room to find the staff and other patients running down the hallway. I stopped one of the nurses and asked what was happening. She told me a huge four armed creature broke the patients out of the morgue and went all cannibal-like on anyone they could grab. I saw them down the hallway and the first thing I noticed was that everyone was running from was the six patients that had come into the ER during the first eight hours of my shift and the guard that had his throat torn out. I turned to run with everyone one else. As we headed for the exit we were cut off by a huge creature with four arms. Luckily it didn’t see some of us so most of us hid throughout different rooms in the hospital. I took refuge in my office and locked the door. I can hear people’s screams. I don’t know why or what has caused this to happen, I have never seen people die and try to be resuscitated only not to make it, then hours later comeback to life. There are no explanations to what is going on. I hear pounding at my door. I don’t know if anyone is going to make it out of the hospital alive and for my own survival I have to listen to the screams outside my door.
There is a long line going off the page where he was going to start the e and blood splattered across the bottom of the page too Christi said. That must be why we didn’t find him he must have been killed while writing out for help Abby said. Next time a zombie is killed we need to take it over to the hospital so Dr. Li and Dr. Chen can do an autopsy and maybe see if it has radiation in its system too Christi said. We also need to be aware of whatever this creature was too I added. What else do we know Bev asked? Well we found a telegram at the army base requesting all top recruits report to Washington D.C. by order of the President of the United States Rus said. We also found a bunch of longitude and latitude coordinates on the computer that we printed off and took a map off the wall to pin point these coordinates. They are specific city locations throughout the state of Michigan but they look to be around large cities in open areas of land that are not populated. The ladies went and made lunch for everyone in the compound while Rus, Don, Bruce, and I started to pin point the locations across the map. After an hour of locating all the coordinates from the print out we marked twenty six locations. The closest to us was about ten miles north of Port Huron near one of the state parks. I think we should go and investigate this area and see what is going on I suggested. Rus and Don you guys go work on those modifications you wanted to make while Bruce and I get supplies out of the armory. It will take a while to get everything complete Don said. We will leave when Chris finishes installing the gas pumps so we can fill the vehicles before we leave I said. That means you have three days left to finish the projects we will leave either way then.
Rus and Don first went to the armory and took four miniguns and two rocket launchers and then they headed for the garage. They started building brackets so they could mount the weapons onto the vehicles. One of the miniguns got installed into the HUMVEE since it had a gun bracket already installed with a turntable turret on the top of the vehicle. Then over each wheel well of the Spyder motorcycle Rus and Don worked on installing two of the miniguns and the last one installed in the side car of the Ural motorcycle. These took a little longer to install since the miniguns on the Spyder were being installed to be used while driving so an electric switch had to be made and installed on the dashboard of the Spyder to trigger the guns to fire. The one in the side car of the Ural had to be designed not to cross pass where the driver was to avoid injury or ricochet off of the motorcycle. Bruce and I went to the armory and started getting supplies ready for the trip to see what was so important about that area that was marked by the coordinates we had found. What vehicles are we taking? Bruce asked. We are taking both motorcycles and the HUMVEE. Bruce returned his AK-47 and upgraded to M16 assault rifle. You should probably take a side arm too Bruce I said. I’ll take that Colt M1911 that you picked up from that gun shop Bruce said. I’ve got my battle axes and two desert eagles but I need something else other than this shotgun. Looking around the armory the only thing that caught my eye was an unused compound bow. Let’s go to the garage and see what Rus and Don want to take I said. We headed over to the garage where Rus and Don were working on the HUMVEE. So what do you guys have planned Bruce asked? Well we are finishing up on installing this minigun and then we are going to work on a circuit board that will go on the Spyder to fire the miniguns we are going to install over the wheel well Don said. That’s awesome I said, but we need to know what weapons you to want to take on this trip? Rus said pack my usual gear but leave the shotgun and pack just the cross bow. I am not sure what you have I’ll swing over to the armory tomorrow morning, I want to get the HUMVEE finished today and that circuit board started Don said. That’s fine we are going to go pack some food supplies and water I said. Bruce and I headed for the kitchen where we packed packages of beef jerky, power bars, and fruit. How much should we pack? Bruce asked. I would pack enough for three days cause even though that location is only two hours away we don’t know how much we will have to scout since we don’t have the exact location and just the general area I said. Dusk was approaching so we took our supplies to the garage and saw what Rus and Don had completed. The HUMVEE was complete with the minigun installed and the circuit board for the Spyder was installed into the dashboard and needed to be hooked up with the miniguns that were going to get a small circuit control hooked up to control the firing mechanism. Tomorrow we should have all the vehicles ready to go then we can help Chris finish the gas pumps Rus said. Don why don’t we head over to the armory and get you set up with some weapons? I said. Don and I headed to the armory while Bruce and Rus headed for the mess hall to eat supper. We entered the armory and Don started looking around at what we had collected. I’ll take that Smith & Wesson double action .45 to start with and I’ll also take the MP5 submachine gun. What melee weapons do we have? Don asked. They are over on that wall there most of them are hatchets and machetes plus a few Japanese and medieval items we got from the pawn shop I said. Are those mini scythes there? Don asked. I think they are called kamas they are a Japanese ninja weapon similar to a scythes I said. The kamas had a two foot handle, a fourteen inch long and four inch wide blade and could be connected with a chain to make it a deadlier weapon then it already was. Those will do nice I think Don said as he was twirling one of the blades. We headed to the mess hall to meet everyone for su
pper. After supper we headed for bed while Jon, Brent, Bart, and Blake took the night watch. They had been taking the night watch since we finished the camp.
The next morning we woke up to a very windy day. Rus and Don headed over to the garage early to work on the final adjustments needed to finish the vehicles. Christi and I went to the mess hall to prepare breakfast for everyone. Jessica and Samantha went to the hospital to prepare a small medical bag with pain killers and bandages for our trip. Around nine in the morning everyone headed to the mess hall for breakfast. We sat down to a large meal of eggs, bacon, potatoes, sausage, toast, juice, and coffee. How is it coming in the garage Rus? I asked. We finished the Spyder and Don stayed to attach the bracket to the side car of the Ural and when I went back he was going to come get something eat and I was going to finish attaching the minigun Rus said. What time will you guys be finished in the garage? I asked Rus. Should be no later than one why what’s up? Rus asked. You, Don, Abby and I will have the afternoon shift walking the catwalk from two till ten tonight. Ok I will let Don know before he comes and eat Rus said. Rus headed for the garage again to relieve Don for breakfast. I headed to the command center with Bev to scout the map for the best route toward the state park area to avoid the major cities and stick with the country roads and to listen to the radio for any broadcast or CB calls. Christi went with Abby and Bruce to see Dr. Li and check on the progress of the baby. Don finished up his breakfast quickly and rushed back to the garage to help Rus finish up before our patrol shift started. Abby got into a gown and got up on the table for examination. Well let’s take a look at baby and Mama Dr. Li said as she prepared the ultrasound machine. She put gel on Abby’s stomach and moved the device over her stomach pushing down until an image came on the screen. Here your baby Dr. Li showed the monitor to Bruce, Christi, and Abby. Bruce hugged Abby and kissed her cheek. How far along is she? Christi asked. She is twenty weeks along and is due around the end of December Dr. Li said. Did you want to know the sex of the baby? Dr. Li asked. Abby and Bruce looked at each other and said no we want to be surprise. Everything else is completely healthy for both you and the baby Dr. Li said. Thanks again I have to go get ready for my patrol so I will get my guns and some comfortable clothes on Abby said. Up in the command center we heard a broadcast for severe weather rolling in later in the afternoon. The wind could get up to seventy mile per hour gust and a severe thunderstorm will be rolling in. After that it was just normal news talking about the zombies and the national warning that the government was working to contain the issue, but we never saw any military personnel ever scouting the areas. Two o’clock came around and Abby, Rus, Don, and I relieved the patrol. Abby took the east wall, Don took the west wall, Rus the north, and I took the south wall. The winds were still blowing really hard and had been all day around forty mile per hour. It was hard to not get pushed around the catwalk so we took extra precaution as we were walking our patrol. We walked so that when we got to a corner we met with the other patrol wall. So when I met Abby at the southeast wall, Don would meet Rus in the northwest wall. Around four in the afternoon we had fiercer winds that blew across every five to ten minutes. I was walking toward the east wall when I noticed Abby having trouble walking with the high gust of wind that was coming thru now. She stumbled a little edging closer to the wall. When all of a sudden she flipped over the edge of the wall and was out of sight. I screamed for someone to grab a rope and sprinted over to where she fell, while Rus rushed down for a rope. I got over to where Abby had fallen over the wall and when I looked over Abby was lying on her back. I dropped my gear and jumped over the edge after Abby. I hit the ground and rolled. I jumped up and ran to Abby. How you doing darling? I asked with concern. I landed on feet and then fell to my back but I think I broke my ankle Abby cried in pain. The rope came over the wall and landed next to us. I tied a loop big enough for Abby to sit in so she could be raise back up. As I helped Abby up and got the loop around her a group of people started to pull her up when Rus yelled down for me to turn around. I looked behind me in the field to see twenty zombies emerge out of the over grown grass and weeds. I grabbed the bottom of the rope underneath Abby and put my feet to walk up the wall while everyone started to pull us to safety. We got about ten feet up the wall when we stopped suddenly. At the bottom of the wall now was all the zombies trying to grab at us. What’s going on? I screamed. The rope is starting to break Bev yelled. I heard someone shout out ooooo woooo and when I looked up I saw Rus standing there with my axes in his hand. Rus threw them straight out toward the field, so I pushed off the wall and jumped grabbing the axes out of midair and flipping backwards landing in a crouched position. Abby was pulled the rest of the way to safety and was taken to the hospital with both Dr. Wong’s. I stood up as the zombies turned around toward me and swung my axe in my right hand over my head and buried it into the first zombie that approached. As I was doing a back spin swinging the axe in my left hand into the neck of another zombie, Rus and Don jumped off the wall and tackled a large group of the zombies. Rus decapitated four zombies doing a helicopter spin with his machetes drawn and Don stuck his kamas into two zombie’s temples and then hooked the chain together. Swinging one of the kamas now hooked to the chain Don wrapped the chain around a zombies head and pulled hard cutting the head right off the torso. Rus threw a knife from his right bicep without looking again just past my head piercing a zombie right in the eye. I looked at him and screamed will you stop doing that as I hacked two more zombies down. With only five zombies left about ten feet away from us Bruce opened fire with his M16 taking the rest of them down. Once the zombies were all taken care of Jon came around the corner with the gator and drove us back thru the main gate. We headed to the hospital to check on Abby’s condition. How’s she doing doc? I asked. Her and the baby are doing just fine Dr. Chen said. Abby broke her right ankle from the fall but that was the only injure we have found so far, but we will keep her here in the hospital for a couple of days and monitor her and the baby Dr. Chen said. Rus, Don, and I headed back to our post since we just had an encounter we wanted to keep an eye out for anymore trouble. Blake came and took the south patrol and I took Abby’s spot on the east side of the outpost. It was now around seven at night with most of the outpost in the mess hall having dinner when Blake was looking down the scope of a sniper rifle he had grabbed from the armory. I walked over and asked what do you see? I think I see two more zombies about a hundred and fifty yards out Blake said. I looked through the binoculars and confirmed what Blake saw two more zombies walking across the field to the south. Can you take them down from here I asked. It will be hard in this wind to be accurate, but since the zombies are walking west across the field and not headed toward us I think we should just monitor their movement Blake suggested. Alright keep an eye on them I said. The rain started drizzling around nine with flashes of lightning coming out of the west with booming thunder and twenty minutes later the rain was pouring down and the lightning was everywhere across the sky. We made it to the end of our shift on patrol and once we got relieved we headed to the mess hall. Chris should be finished with the gas pumps by noon then we will fill up and head out then I said. We all headed for our rooms except for Bruce who went and spent the night with Abby in the hospital. In the morning we will get everything ready and once Chris is finished we will head out and find out what’s so important about those coordinates we found I said.
Government Z (Book 1): The Beginning Page 9