by Chesla, Gary
Of course, Tony knew that there could be variations of the two outcomes, but he felt confident that when the time came, he would know what he would need to do.
But the smoke coming from the mountains was confusing.
Why would anyone build a large fire?
It was difficult to understand what it could mean.
There were only two reasons Tony could think of why someone would build a fire that obvious.
The first reason was that whoever built the fire was being careless.
The smoke would give away their position and Tony couldn’t think of any reason why anyone would want to give away their position unless they were careless, or they wanted others to know where they were.
A careless act he could possibly understand how that could happen, but the only reason anyone would want anyone else to know where they were, was to get their attention with the possible intent to lure them into a trap.
The idea that someone would want to set a trap for their fellow living kind was disturbing.
What kind of people would do that and what were they hoping to accomplish?
Any answers that came to mind were not anything that Tony cared to think about.
But again, maybe he was just being paranoid.
Tony had always tried to think everything through and consider all possibilities to prepare himself before tackling any problem.
Maybe he needed to relax and stop overthinking this.
Until he had more facts, he wouldn’t accomplish anything.
But paranoid or not, he knew they needed to find out the reason for the smoke.
His group couldn’t continue their lives as usual until he knew the answer and knew who was out there.
To ignore this new information in their situation, would be reckless on their part and could put them all in danger.
It was a dangerous world, an unforgiving world now where the carless died.
Tony was trying to approach the problem logically, but his thoughts were distracted by a sound off in the distance.
Tony sat up and listened.
It sounded like a car’s engine.
He listened carefully until he determined it was coming from the direction of Westmont.
If it was the Kia coming back, by the erratic sounds of the engine, hitting that deer earlier this morning had damaged the car more than the glass fragments and Kia emblem they found on the road would have seemed to indicate.
The engine sounded like it was roaring then it died down before again roaring and sputtering.
By the sounds that Tony heard, he wasn’t sure if the car was going to be able to make it up over the mountain.
Tony loaded an arrow on his crossbow and got into a kneeling position behind the brush.
He kept his head down and listened as the sound of the car grew nearer.
A few seconds later, Tony spotted the red color of the car glistening in the bright sunlight as the car crested the hill.
The car swerved back and forth across the road, from the right lane, over the double yellow line into the oncoming lane then jerked back again to the other side of the road.
The engine roared as the car weaved all over the road.
When the car was within two hundred feet of where Tony waited, he stared at the windshield of the car to see who was in the car.
He hoped to get an idea of what kind of people were inside the car, but his attention was drawn not to who was driving but to what they were doing.
There were two men in the car, the driver and a passenger.
The driver seemed to be wrestling with the passenger as he struggled to keep the car on the road.
“What the hell?” Tony started to say as the car passed by him, veered off the road and then crashed into the embankment a hundred feet past his position.
The horn blasted a few times as the men struggled inside the car, their bodies bouncing off the driver’s window and steering wheel.
Tony waited behind the brush as he watched the shapes in the car continue to struggle.
Did one of the men need help? Did the driver pick up the other man to help him out and now the other man was repaying him by trying to steal his car?
Were the two men fighting over something they had found?
Tony wanted to run up to the car, but the thought that the men could be armed and would not appreciate it if he interfered, made him keep reminding himself to be patient.
“It’s a different world now,” Tony thought. “Wait until you have a better idea of what the hell is going on.”
Finally, the driver’s door was thrown open.
A young man, maybe in his late teens or early twenties, appeared to be trying to get out of the car.
The man’s hands and arms were bloody and kept slipping as he tried unsuccessfully to grip the door to pull himself out of the car.
A look of terror was on his face, his eyes large as he desperately struggled to get out of the car.
Suddenly an older man collided with the younger man and the two men tumbled out of the car onto the gravel next to the pavement.
The older man landed on top of the driver.
When the older man thrust his face into the neck of the younger man, blood sprayed from the young man’s neck, covering the grass and gravel along the side of the road.
The young man finally stopped struggling as the other man continued to tear and rip the flesh from the young man’s face.
Tony stood and stared at the scene in front of him.
The memory of Ryan’s death at the cabin flooded through his mind as he watched the bloody savage attack.
Tony felt like he was watching the end of the world begin all over again.
Tony raised his bow and fired, putting an arrow into the top of the attacker’s head.
The man’s body slumped and dropped on top of the dead body of the younger man.
Tony walked slowly towards the bodies as he wondered what it was he had just witnessed.
The driver had been killed by a zombie, he knew that much, but why was the zombie in the car with that other man?
Why did that guy become a zombie?
Tony had just stepped onto the pavement when he heard someone calling his name.
Tony turned to see Mike standing among the trees at the side of the road.
“I heard a horn blow,” Mike said. “I came running down to see if you needed help. What the hell happened?”
“I’m not sure,” Tony replied as Mike walked up next to him.
Both men continued to walk across the road and stopped a few feet from where the bodies laid outside the open door of the Kia.
The car’s engine was still running and idled quietly as the car sat with the front end of the car wedged in the brush.
“I heard the car coming up over the mountain,” Tony said. “I thought they were having engine problems by the way the engine kept reeving as they neared the top of the hill. As it got closer, I saw that the driver and passenger seemed to be wrestling for control of the car. The next thing I knew, they ran off the road, then I saw the driver trying to get out of the car. The passenger dove on him and stared to rip the guy apart.”
“Do you think the passenger was attacked and bitten by a zombie when they were out looking for supplies and turned on the way back up over the mountain?” Mike asked.
“I don’t know,” Tony replied as he moved closer to the bodies, then using his foot, Tony rolled the attacker’s body off the young man’s dead body and onto its back.
Tony studied the older man for a moment.
“The older guy doesn’t have a mark on him,” Tony said.
“How can you tell with all that blood on him?” Mike asked. “If he wasn’t bitten, what happen to him? He obviously got infected somehow.”
“If they were going through the houses down in Westmont,” Tony replied, “maybe he became infected by breathing the contaminated air in one of the houses.”
“Like we almost did,” Mike said.
&n
bsp; “Yeah, like we almost did,” Tony replied. “I wasn’t sure if the infection could be spread that way or not, I guess we now know the answer to that question.”
“The walkers are dying off,” Mike said, “but whatever virus caused all of this is obviously still alive.”
“Walkers we can see and we know how to protect ourselves,” Tony added, “but how the hell are we supposed to protect ourselves from something we can’t even see?”
“Maybe we should go back to Outdoor World and get ourselves some of those face masks we saw,” Mike said.
“Yeah, but will they really help?” Tony added. “I wish that Doctor Kennedy would have told us about this possibility.”
“Since we haven’t heard from him for a few days, maybe he didn’t know this could happen either.” Mike replied. “Until it happened to him.”
“Well, if this happened to him,” Tony said. “What chance do we have against the virus?”
“We kept questioning why he was always telling us to stay where we were and not to go out wandering around,” Mike said. “Do you think this was the reason?”
“I don’t know, you would have thought he would have said something,” Tony replied.
“I would imagine when this all started that everyone was as clueless as we were,” Mike said. “We’re still here maybe because we just got lucky.”
“I just hope we stay lucky,” Tony smiled. “How about hiding behind that brush over there and keeping an eye on the road,” Tony asked. “I’m going to run up and get the car and some rope so we can move the Kia and get these two out of sight. If there is anyone else still around, I don’t want them to have a reason to stop here, it’s too close to the road leading up to the house. After we’re done here, I think we need to go investigate that smoke.”
“Do you still think we should be doing that?” Mike asked. “Even if there isn’t anyone else up there, who knows what kind of trouble we could get ourselves into.”
“In this case I think we have too,” Tony answered, “We have to find out what’s up there.”
“OK, but I just want to go tell Linda that we’re leaving before we go,” Mike said. “I told her what we suspected and that we needed to go check it out.”
“Was she OK with you going?” Tony asked.
“She’s not happy about it, but she understands,” Mike replied.
Tony nodded, “Just keep your eyes open, I’ll be right back.”
Back at the house
“We won’t be long,” Tony said. “We don’t plan on doing anything more than getting close to where that smoke is to determine why it is there.”
“How do you plan on getting there?” Linda asked, “You can’t just drive up to it, if there is anyone else there, they will see you coming.”
“I thought we would drive to Outdoor World and go the rest of the way on foot through the woods,” Tony replied.
“Just be careful,” Linda said looking worried.
“I can do this myself,” Tony said looking at Mike, “you don’t have to do this.”
“Mike and I talked this over while you were down at the road,” Linda said. “You need someone to watch your back. We’re a team. We’ve worked together since this all started. You’re now part of our family and we can’t let you go out there without anyone to cover your backside. Jamie and I will be fine here at the house.”
“If you’re sure,” Tony said.
“We’re sure,” Mike smiled.
“OK then. After you secure the door, you and Jamie should stay upstairs,” Tony said to Linda. “You can see the entire area around the house from the windows in the bedrooms. I don’t think that anyone will be coming around the house. If there is anyone else out there, they’ll be where that smoke is, not here. They’ll be waiting for the two we just dragged into the woods to return, at least that is what I would do.”
“I’m hoping that there isn’t anyone else up there,” Linda said.
“You and I both,” Mike smiled.
“The sooner we go the sooner we’ll get back,” Tony said.
Mike kissed Linda and ruffled Jamie’s hair, glanced at George, then he and Tony left.
They drove towards Outdoor World.
When they reached the store, Tony drove the car through the parking lot, into the grass and parked the car out of sight behind the store.
When they got out of the car, Tony looked up over the trees to locate the smoke.
“It doesn’t look like we’ll have to walk too far,” Tony said. “I would guess no more than half a mile. Do you know what is out that way?”
“Not really,” Mike replied. “We never came out this way more than a few times to go to Ligonier.”
They checked their bows, then began to walk.
They walked through the grass behind the store for a hundred feet before they entered the woods.
They had walked for ten minutes before Tony stopped.
“We have to be getting close,” Tony whispered. “The smell of smoke is strong here.”
Mike nodded and followed as Tony started walking through the woods again.
Tony stopped a few minutes later.
“Listen,” Tony whispered.
Mike strained to hear what Tony had heard.
“I don’t hear anything,” Mike whispered. “But I can see the smoke getting thicker near the top of the trees.”
“I thought I heard a voice,” Tony whispered back, then motioned for Mike to follow him.
A few minutes later Tony motioned for Mike to get down on the ground when the forest around them grew brighter as they approached a clearing.
Tony and Mike crawled the last few yards to the edge of the clearing.
Out in front of them in the clearing stood about twenty small wooden cabins.
A dirt road ran through the clearing dividing the cabins with half of the small cabins standing on each side of the road.
At the entrance of the clearing, acting as a gateway to the camp were two poles with a large sign nailed across the poles.
At the far end of the clearing, one of the cabins was on fire.
Nothing remained of the cabin to its right but a pile of smoldering ashes where the cabin had once been.
“I know what this is,” Mike whispered. “It’s Camp Kelly, its a girl scout camp or at least it was at one time. I knew it was between Ligonier and Westmont, but I didn’t know where it was for sure. I didn’t think it was this close to Westmont. Do you think the two guys in the Kia are staying here?”
“They could be,” Tony replied. “If they are staying here, they somehow managed to burn down two of the cabins.”
“That would make everything simple,” Mike replied. “Two of the most unlucky guys that I’ve ever heard of, just trying to survive found this place, burnt down their cabin and then got themselves infected looking for food.”
“I would call that unlucky,” Tony said. “It would also explain a lot.”
“So, what do we do now?” Mike asked. “Have you seen enough? Can we just go home now?”
“I think we should check out the cabins before we leave,” Tony replied, “to make sure there isn’t anyone else here and maybe we can find something useful.”
“OK,” Mike said, “you lead the way and I’ll watch your back.”
Tony slowly got to his feet, walked out into the clearing and approached the nearest cabin.
When he reached the cabin, he stood in front of the door and raised his bow.
“Push the door open and then stay off to the side,” Tony whispered.
Mike nodded, and moved next to the door with his back against the cabin.
He reached over, turned the door handle and pushed the door open.
Tony stood looking in through the door for a moment then walked up to the doorway and looked inside.
“Clear,” Tony whispered then motioned to the next cabin.
Mike leaned over and looked through the door.
It was a small one room cabin with two sets of
bunkbeds across from each other against the walls.
A small table and two wooden chairs, sitting in front of the cabins one small window, completed the furnishings of the cabin.
Mike turned and moved to the next small cabin that stood only twenty feet away.
They had cleared about half of the cabins and were starting to relax, feeling that the camp was empty.
The only sound they could hear was a slight thumping sound, but they dismissed the sound as probably a loose board that was swaying in the soft breeze that blew through the campground.
“I wonder where those two guys came from?” Mike asked quietly as they walked around the corner of the next cabin. “And how did they manage to catch their cabin on fire?”
But before Tony could reply, they were startled to find a woman standing in front of the cabin door.
As the woman began to groan and turned to face Mike and Tony, Tony immediately saw the lifeless white clouded eyes on the woman’s dead gray face.
The woman raised her arms and opened her mouth wide, revealing a mouth full of dark teeth surrounded by her black lips.
The heavy smell of death coming from the woman’s mouth as she let out an eerie moan caused Mike to put his hand over his nose. He began to gag as he quickly backed away from the woman.
“Oh shit!” Mike yelled.
Tony quickly raised his bow and put an arrow into the woman’s forehead.
“Where the hell did she come from?” Mike asked.
Tony studied the body for a few minutes.
“Do you notice anything different with her compared to the walkers that came around the house a few days back?” Tony asked.
“Yeah,” Mike replied. “This one smells a hell of a lot worse.”
“No, take a good look at her body,” Tony said as he continued to study the body.
Mike looked at the woman’s body for a second.
“She’s not decomposed like the others were,” Mike finally replied.
“She must have just got infected recently,” Tony added. “There also aren’t any marks or wounds on her body. She wasn’t bitten by a zombie. She must have become infected directly by the virus like that guy we saw this morning.”