“All right then,” I said, turning back towards the boat.
“Wait!” Both women said at the same time.
“What?”
“We still need to use the bathroom.” The two women stepped over the zombies and went back inside, finally answering the call of nature.
I looked over at Charlie who just shook his head at me. Fair enough.
Chapter 6
We got back in the boat a few minutes later and headed upriver again. I spent a minute thinking about the last couple of days and I couldn’t shake the feeling we were in for a wild ride.
Sarah, ever mindful of my moods, sat down next to me and handed me a bottle of water. “Where’s your head?” she asked.
I shrugged. “Hoping it’s nothing. But I can’t shake the feeling we’ve been handed a warning.”
“How so?”
“Well, look at it. We haven’t had a zombie inside our perimeter in years, and just yesterday, there were fifteen of the suckers practically on our doorstep. And here today, where you and Rebecca found zombies that in all likelihood shouldn’t have been there, and it adds up to some serious portents of things to come.” I learned a long time ago to just open up with Sarah. It saved a lot of time.
Sarah’s green eyes drifted to the riverside for a minute as she contemplated what I had told her. After a minute, she turned back. “I wish I could tell you it’s nothing, John, but this time you may have something.” She leaned over and kissed my cheek. “We’ll be careful. We’ve survived the worst this virus had to throw at us. We’ll survive this.”
I pulled her close as the sun began its quick descent to the horizon. In a couple hours, we would be in darkness and I wanted to get to Leport before then. For all the times I wished my feelings on something were wrong, this time, I really hoped my feelings were wrong.
But I just couldn’t shake the notion this one was going to be a doozy, whatever it was.
We pulled into the dock at the southern end of Leport and worked our way up to the first small barricade. A small four-foot fence ran along the riverside, disappearing off into the bend by the overpass. On top of the road were two tall towers, and even in this distance, I could see they were still manned. The sentries up there would warn of any activity within sight, and men would be dispatched to deal with the threat.
The first well-wishers came down to the docks, and I met several people again. One boy in the back ran off in the general direction of the town, and I knew our presence would be reported immediately. However, for now we greeted some old friends, shook hands with a few who had joined us on the long trip west, and more importantly, made it back.
“John Talon!” A voice called out from above. “John Talon!”
I looked up to the hills and saw a small figure waving down at me. I smiled, waved back, and flagged the rest of the crew over. Together, we went up a rather steep incline, passed some lively shops, and made our way to the small Victorian home nestled in the riverside homes that covered the Northern Hills of Leport.
On a wide porch, a middle-aged woman with deep red hair looked at me. She gave me a big grin, and then gave Charlie hug, followed by Rebecca, then Sarah. When she reached me, she took my hand formally, and then gave a slight bow. I returned the favor, and said as I bowed, “Madame President.”
Dot’s grin widened into a huge smile and she wrapped me up in a big hug. Dot had been elected to the fledgling Presidency after I had declined a second term. Dot was a natural leader, and had an easy way with adults, kids, and dogs. The funny part was she always seemed surprised when people addressed her as ‘Madame President.’
“How are you doing, John?” Dot asked, taking me by the elbow and leading me inside. She beckoned everyone else to follow, and inside I saw a table had been set for six people. Dot always knew before anyone else what was going on.
“So far so good,” I said, moving to a chair and holding one out for Sarah. Charlie did the same and Dot nodded her silent approval. I couldn’t explain it any more than I understood it, but part of me always wanted to have Dot approve of me. I guess it just had something to do with the way I was raised.
“Family okay? I haven’t seen your babies in months.” Dot sat down and immediately the kitchen door opened. I tensed for a second before I realized it was a couple of teenagers, recruited to work as aides to the President. I remembered my own aides, a couple of young men who followed me out into the battlefield. We buried one in Omaha, and the other went out to work his own ranch in Arizona.
“Jake’s full of beans, and Aaron is getting bigger all the time,” I said, looking over the menu. Dot had simple tastes, and the food was hot, filling, and delicious. I knew she had cooked it herself, which made it even better.
“Aaron’s a special boy, John. Keep an eye on him, and he’ll do great things,” Dot said, filling her plate.
I looked over at Sarah, and then filled my own plate, saying nothing. I knew better than to try and get any more out of Dot at that point. Things would work out as they should, and that was the way of it for Dot.
Dot made small talk throughout the dinner, chatting up Charlie and Rebecca. She seemed perfectly suited for her role, and I think the country would move forward pretty well with Dot at the helm. Of course, it was a lot easier to make decisions with only 45 Representatives and 12 Senators.
After dinner, we retired to a side room which had large maps placed up on the walls. I had put them here early on in my administration, marking places which were safe for travel, unsafe for living people, and everything in between. Down the west side of the map, just at the edge of the Rocky Mountains was a large red line. That was as far as we had gone in our war on the zombies. The mountain passes had been closed and nothing undead made it out. On the other side of the country, a similar line had been drawn. This one closed the east coast. However, this one was on the other side of the mountains. And as I looked, it was smaller than I had left it. I guess Dot had been busy in her first year.
On the far wall, another map had been placed over the original. This one was a large representation of the states just west of the Mississippi. Dozens of pins dotted the landscape, and they were all red except for six of them, which were black. They designated six small towns in the far western section of the state of Iowa, just a little south of Omaha. The biggest of the towns I could see was Red Oak. The black dots were nearly a straight line from the west to the east. I had a creepy feeling I knew what they meant.
Chapter 7
Dot saw me looking and came over to the map. “Six weeks ago, we lost contact with these towns. On the surface, it didn’t seem like much. We chalked it up to bad communication lines. But they happened one after the other, in succession like you see. What do you think?”
I looked at the map again. “Based on what I have here, I’d say you had a new spreading contagion or a group looking to establish themselves in the Breadbasket of America.”
“That’s what our assessment was, too,” Dot said. “We figured it had to be something that was interfering with communication. And these days, the only thing that could do that was lack of people to communicate with.”
“So what was causing the problem? I assume you sent someone out there to check.” I asked.
“We did.”
“So?” I didn’t like the way she said that.
“So they didn’t come back. Everyone we sent out that way has not communicated with us in weeks, and we’re not sure why.”
Captured or dead. I thought. “Who did you send?” I asked instead.
Dot sighed. “Jane Coswell, Brian Hernandez, and Bill Osbourne. Each one went with ten people.”
I was stunned. I knew all three of them and they were solid, steady people. None of them was likely to screw up a fight or walk into an ambush. I looked back at the map. What the hell was out there?
“Thirty-three people gone.” I mused. I looked over at Charlie and I could see he was as shocked as I was. “What do you want from us?” I asked pointedly. I knew wh
at the answer was and I could see Dot knew that I knew. Nevertheless, I wanted to hear the request, just so I could tell myself I had the right of refusal.
Dot looked at me square in the face. “I need to know what’s going on, John. I need a crew that can look at a situation and know it for what it is. I need someone to let me know if I have to mobilize the army or send in a crack crew to stage a rescue.”
Dot looked away. “I know you’ve done your part for the country, and no one is more grateful than I.” She looked back at me. “I need the best, John, and you and Charlie are it.”
I didn’t say a word. I stared hard at Dot and she matched me unblinkingly. I knew I was going to lose this fight, but big chunk of me didn’t want any part of it.
Finally, I said, “Christ, you don’t make it easy, do you Dot?” I looked over at the rest of my companions. “This one’s not on me. We need to talk.”
Dot nodded and left the room, leaving the four of us to stare at the maps and the pins and what mysteries they represented.
I started the ball. “All right. We’ve heard the pitch and we know what is expected of us. The question we have on the table is whether or not we take up the challenge.”
Charlie looked over the maps then back to me before he spoke. “Something is seriously wrong out there. We know that area, and we know the people that were out there. We know the people that went out there and stayed to settle. None of them could have just been blown over, and none of them would have just up and given up without a fight.” He ran a hand over his knife hilt. “Doesn’t make sense.”
Rebecca spoke next. “We don’t know what happened, or what’s happening. For all we know, whatever is out there is headed this way and we don’t have any way of stopping it.” She walked over to Charlie and held his hand. “I guess my fear is not going out, and then wishing we had when we had the chance to take on whatever it is when it was just starting out.”
I didn’t say anything, but Rebecca had just voiced what I was thinking. While it was easy to say this wasn’t my fight, if it was something that stood a chance of wiping out everything I had fought six years for, how could I stand back and just let it go?”
Sarah made the point clearer. “No one says there has to be a fight; all anyone is asking is for someone to take a close look and then high tail it back.” Sarah stood in front of me. “I know what you’re thinking John, and I understand. Whether we like it or, we have to take this one.”
I nodded slowly. “We just figure out what’s going on, and then we bug out. Agreed? We let the ones whose job it is now to fight and take care of it.”
The rest agreed and we called Dot back in. It took a minute to fill her in on the decision, and I could see she was happy about it. For a second I thought she might have been worried I would say no, but I was probably wrong.
When we took our leave, Dot asked me to stay behind for a second. I told Sarah and the rest I would catch up with them in a minute. We watched them walk further up the hill for a second before Dot spoke.
“Thank you, John.”
“You’re welcome.” I hesitated, and Dot caught it right away.
“Say your piece, John Talon,” Dot said kindly.
I gripped the porch rail tightly. “Got a bad feeling about this one, Dot. Got a feeling this one is gonna make the rest of the shit I’ve been through seem like a vacation.”
Dot looked out over the river for a long moment before she spoke.
“Me, too.”
Chapter 8
The next morning we drew some supplies from the armory and stocked up on some traveling gear. We would take two of our own vehicles, and the decision was going to have to be made as to who was going and who was staying.
All the way back to Starved Rock we talked about the trip and speculated about what might be happening. Charlie was convinced a rogue group was trying to establish themselves in an area before making a play for the big time. Rebecca and Sarah were thinking some kind of crossover contamination was how the animals were getting the virus and we were looking at zombie dogs, cats, or something. I personally didn’t want to think that was happening. We had no chance at all as a species, if animals became infected.
I stuck to the notion that it had to be a fresh outbreak that was spreading. It was the only thing that fit the facts as I saw them. The only flaw in my thinking was the loss of thirty-three seasoned fighters. If they were gone, and if my view was correct, the contagion had gotten huge, and we were going to need a hell of a lot of help.
In the end, right before we pulled into the dock, we decided that we needed to be ready for two possibilities: a live one and a dead one.
It was near dusk when we returned to the lodge, and I had to admit I was tired. Tommy and Duncan had a lot of questions, but I had to wave them off until tomorrow. It wasn’t fair, and I knew it, but some things needed a night to clear out of your head. I hoped in the morning I wouldn’t be as spooked and my bad feeling would be less.
Right before I went to my room, I checked on the boys. Aaron was in a small ball at the foot of the bottom bunk, and Jake was sprawled across the top bunk, snoring softly. I touched each boy once on the head and left the room.
Even with Sarah next to me, sleep was a long time coming, and restless when it did.
In the morning, after everyone had eaten breakfast, I called a meeting for those of us at the lodge. Charlie sat on one side of me, while Sarah took the other. If I didn’t know better, I would have sworn Charlie was sticking close in a subconscious effort not to be left behind. He hadn’t come on our trip to DC, and we both kind of regretted that decision.
Tommy, Angela, Duncan, and Janna all sat around the table. I didn’t include my brother Mike in the discussion. Since he had moved to the other lodge, he had pretty much gone his own way. I didn’t mind in the least, everyone makes their own choices. He wouldn’t stop being my brother, no matter what happened. In the center of the table, I had spread out a map of Iowa. On the west side of the state, I had circled a large area.
I didn’t waste any time. “Here’s what we know. Something or someone is causing some problems on the west side of the state. About six towns we know of so far have been lost, overrun, or captured. Three teams of eleven have been sent to this area, never to be heard from again.” At this, Tommy and Duncan’s eyes got wide. I continued. “Speculation at this point is a new contagion or a rogue group. Dot wants us to go take a look.”
“No offense to anyone.” Tommy started, “but why us? Why not send in the army, such as it is.”
I answered pretty much as Dot had. “A massive group could get the captives killed, and would take too many resources to keep in the field. A smaller reconnaissance group would stand a better chance of staying supplied and moving unseen.”
Duncan piped up. “If it isn’t a rogue group, and I don’t think it is, then a contagion seems more likely. But here’s the problem with that. Wouldn’t a large contagion attract attention from someone, and get reported?”
I hadn’t thought of that, and it made sense. If a large outbreak had happened, someone would have had the presence of mind to flee and report it to the nearest town which would have some form of communication. If it was a contagion, then it was something new, something that wiped out populations very quickly. A new thought occurred to me.
“What if it’s airborne now?” I asked quietly. That was our worst fear. A virus contained within bodily fluids can be protected against, but an airborne one was nearly impossible to escape.
Everyone went dead silent as the implications of this possibility sunk in. In this part of the world, the winds typically brought the weather from the west to the east. Looking at the map, the contagion, if that’s what it was, was spreading from west to east, so it made a horrific kind of sense.
Charlie spoke first. “I don’t think so. We’ve had heard of it by now, for the same reasons Duncan mentioned. Someone would have figured it out and reported it. Last I knew, there were medical teams out and about, and th
ey would have said something.”
I had to agree with Charlie, and was glad to do so. Disease, both old and new, was a constant threat, and now people were spread so far apart. As president, I had implemented a plan to have roving teams of medically trained personnel tour the country in big RVs, servicing communities, delivering babies, and reviving the tradition of house calls. If someone needed major surgery, they were brought into the capital, which had the only surgery center in the area.
“Okay, then we’ve eliminated the likelihood of a major new contagion. Then what do we have out there?” Sarah asked. “It has to be something that can take out the communications of a town, and be able to silence three teams of hard-core zombie killers.”
We all looked at the map and wondered the same thing. What the hell was out there?
Tommy spoke up last. “Since we are looking at possibilities, here’s one to consider. We’ve looked at this from the virus point of view and the living point of view. What about the zombie point of view? We’ve seen them get a little more intelligent since the Upheaval, with some being able to open doors and others being able to execute a kind of ambush. What if they’ve evolved further? What if they have become just a little bit smarter? Old style defenses are now useless, because they can just outthink them. That closed door is no longer an obstacle, and that ladder can help them now.
Dead Surge Page 3