by Mark Clodi
"Kevin."
Kristal's eyebrows went up a bit, "The Kevin? Hank and Juan's Kevin? I expected you to be ten feet tall with eyes of glowing fire!" Kevin laughed, then winced. Kristal noticed and said, "Well Kevin, you're bleeding."
By this time a group of people were up to them, including Jeff, who was 'leading' a small group of people from the corner where moments ago he had been advising Kevin on how to take care of the zombie menace. Kevin looked at him and the anger returned to his face.
"Hey Kevin, they got a piece of you man? Aw that sucks, not bitten...."
Kevin raised his gun which was still in his hand and pointed it right at Jeff, who started stammering in confusion. His voice took on an icy anger that he had never used before as he said, "Jeff, I got shot, you wanna take a guess on who shot me? I will give you a hint, I got shot from behind right after I ducked down behind that car" Kevin pointed, "over there. Guess away you son of a bitch."
"Hey, hey, what is going on here?" asked a voice Kevin recognized from the crowd.
"Nothing Hank, shouldn't you be restin'?" replied Kevin.
"Nah, shoot I am alright, been sitting in that damn chair all day, I am feeling right as rain now, really. What is going on Kevin?" Hank said eying the gun Kevin was pointing at Jeff.
"This son of a bitch ran away and shot me from behind, I had cover between me and the other corner, and the bullet hit me from behind, went through my shoulder and hit the car I was hiding behind. I am trying to decide if I should return the favor."
Jeff started talking real fast, "No! No Kevin don't! I didn't mean it, I mean I didn't even know I hit you. How do you know I hit you? It could have been someone else!"
Hank waved Jeff to silence, "Quiet down there, you aren't helping." Looking around he asked, "Who else fired from the south west corner? Raise an arm if you did."
No one raised their hands. "Okay then from the south?" This got two people to raise their hands. "Did anyone see anything?"
Kristal piped up, "I did, about when I screamed I saw the zombie pull out a gun, it looked plastic and he tried to shoot me with it, only it didn't work, then he pulled another silver gun out, a cylinder one, I remember that, the round part looked huge, like from a western movie and when he pulled it out I caught Kevin running towards me out of the corner of my eye, I saw him shoot the zombie. The zombie then took a shot at me and fired at each corner a couple of times before jumping back over the cars. Then I saw Kevin duck and this guy," she pointed at Jeff, "Ran past him and then turned around and ran the other way. But as he ran I saw some flashes of light as he fired back towards us. I didn't see Kevin get hit or anything, only the flashes of light."
"Huh, we do have a situation here then. I think we have a case of friendly fire Kevin and it sucks to be you, but shooting this guy... who are you by the way?" Hank asked to Jeff, who responded with his name, "that just isn't right, there are too few of us here to start killing each other." said Hank.
"I don't care Hank, the man shot me, he wasn't aiming he could have killed one of us! Something has to happen for that, he can't just shoot someone and have nothing happen to him. My momma, she read the bible to us, you know? I was never in much for that stuff and maybe that is why all this is happening, dead coming back and evil walking the land. Maybe the bible was right, that whole 'Eye for an eye' thing. I think I get an 'eye' right now."
Sighing, Hank said, "Kevin, I am not much on debating religion right here while you got a gun pointed at a guy, but the bible is quoted out of context all the time, mostly what it says is 'Don't do bad things'. Kevin, shooting Jeff...that would be a bad thing."
The crowd stood around Kevin and time was sliding by slowly, finally Kevin took a deep breath, and lowered his gun, he put the safety on, as he had been taught earlier the previous day and put the gun in his pocket, before turning away from Jeff to face Hank. "Probably. Yeah, you are probably right. You can explain to me how letting him," he pointed at Jeff, "have a gun is a good thing though? The fucker didn't even aim Hank, he didn't aim! Something should happen to him, some sort of punishment."
"Yeah, you're right. Jeff? No more guns for you until you learn how to control yourself, give it to one of your friends to carry for now."
Jeff looked for a moment like he wanted to argue, spying the crowd he knew better and handed it over to Doug, who pointedly put the safety on and tucked it behind his back in his belt.
Another member of the crowd yelled out, "What, he shoots one of us and gets off with having his gun taken away? I say we boot him out!"
The crowd seemed to follow this sentiment and after only a few seconds they began jeering Jeff and working themselves into a frenzy. Hank finally relented and asked a couple of them to put Jeff into one of the management offices, away from everybody else until they could decide what to do with him.
"Okay, okay, lets calm down, we'll deal with this mess later when we are all more awake and calmed down. A couple of things for now though; First check your fire people, if you cannot see your target, do not fire your gun, we clear on that? Second someone needs to explain to me just how the hell this happened in the first place, I mean where were the guards?" Everyone started talking about how the guards worked and debating on how to make it better so this would not happen again, Hank leaned in to Kevin he spoke softly under the babble of the crowd, "Why don't you go get the doc to look you over, and Kevin?"
"Yeah Hank?"
"Thanks for not shooting that asshole."
Chapter 21
The night passed quickly, but not uneventfully. The group at the hospital was busy for a couple hours after sunset going through all the rooms in the eastern wing of the hospital where they had taken up residence. There were no fast zombies on any of the floors, but they did run into maybe eighteen slow ones that had to be put down, most of these were previously the elderly or people in for major operations, as zombies they made for a decrepit group, easily taken down, yet disconcerting too. No one, it seemed, wanted to cap grandpa or grandma in the head. Juan watched the crews move into the rooms and took his own turn leading the others into the various rooms to 'clear' them too.
Their group formed a wall with the vehicles they had to block off the emergency room doors and throughout the night they kept this area well patrolled and clear of zombies too. Towards the morning this area had drawn the attention of a lot of zombies, in fact it was pretty much a raging battle. Juan had not slept all night, he felt mildly euphoric when the sun finally peeked above the horizon. They had limited their shooting as much as possible, so as not to draw even more zombies attention, but there was a crowd of probably fifty to sixty zombies milling about outside the wall of vehicles. Juan was not sure how they would be able to get out without opening a hole in their line of defenses.
Probably they couldn't do it, however no one had said anything about leaving, in fact most of the crew who had stayed here over night were quite content with staying where they were, the beds were far better than the floor of the Mike's Club and the rooms all had heavy doors too. The doors could be busted through, but anything trying that would at least make a lot of noise.
Right now Juan was on solo duty behind the wall, they had found having too many living humans also drew the attention of the zombies, but one or two people under moderate cover created only a small 'draw'. Juan smelled the coffee long before he heard the emergency room doors slide open in back of him. As Nanci walked up behind him he sniffed in appreciatively and said, "Ah mi amor, gracias. That smells wonderful!"
Unseen Nanci stiffened, then said, "How did you know it was me?"
Laughing Juan imitated Hank's southern drawl and said, "Darling you have been bringing me coffee every day for the last twelve years, who else would it be?"
Still a little unsure, Nanci said tentatively, "Juan, you know, the others, well Charlie, he said something happened to you?"
Juan scowled "Me? No I am alright, nothing bad happened."
"Charlie didn't say anything 'bad' happened to you,
but that he saw you after...after you killed one of the zombies and you, well you looked different is all."
"You think I look different?" Juan asked, raising his eyebrows. "I hope my pants are two inches too short, I could use a little height."
Nanci smiled then looked him over more closely, "Yeah, something is different, I can't say what it is, but there is like an air about you now, something different."
"That's helpful."
Punching him lightly on the shoulder Nanci said, "You hungry? They would not let me cook, they have it handled, so you get whatever they make, but Terry said you'd like it."
"How is Mary doing? Anybody check on her?"
Nanci frowned, "I don't think she is doing so good, they wouldn't let me see her, that is not a good sign. I'll ask Terry though, when I get breakfast, I saw her coming out of Mary's room this morning when I got up. I thought you were going to come to bed last night?"
Shrugging his shoulders Juan replied, "Shit. Too bad about Mary. I just never really got tired last night, I am still not so bad now. How was the bed?"
"Lonely." purred Nanci, "but better than the club, the door was great, it shut out all the noise, did you guys shoot last night?"
"No, well a couple times, maybe three, mostly we just batted them if they came over or under the cars. We gotta watch that truck" Juan pointed at a four wheel drive truck with several bodies underneath, "it is too high off the ground, they keep trying to get under it. We shouldn't have put it there as part of the wall. I think it is worse than the humvee would have been. It has gotten really quiet now, I think they have learned not to try and get in here."
"Well we can move the truck today once we figure out what the plan is. Let me go get breakfast, and I will send someone out here to relieve you so you can come in an eat and maybe sleep a couple hours too."
Seeing Juan nod, Nance went back inside and made her way to the kitchen where Charlie, Jack and Terry were standing drinking coffee and several other yawning residents were eating at some of the tables.
"Well?" asked Jack.
"Nothing, he is hungry, that's all." Nanci replied.
"He hasn't noticed anything weird yet then?" Charlie pressed her.
"No, if he did he didn't say anything. We got more food ready? He'll come in and eat and then you can see if anything changes."
"It will, you'll see." said Jack. What they were talking about was the fact that over the course of the night several people had noticed that if Juan was on guard the zombies tended to hang back and not attack, which is exactly why Juan was out there alone now. He had been 'on watch' for almost two hours and not a single zombie had tried to get past the line of cars. Some of the others who had stood watch with him, Charlie included, had noticed that the zombies never seemed to try and attack Juan, they just ignored him, treated him exactly like he was one of them.
"Alright, let me get a couple-three of these guys to go cover the exit and we'll bring Juan in. Terry there is grub right?" asked Jack.
"Oh sure, for everyone and probably more. Anyone seen the army guys yet this morning?" she counter questioned.
"No, they needed the rest though, they hadn't had a good night's sleep for a couple days, I gotta say the sleep I got was great, this place just feels safe and well built." said Charlie.
"Yeah, built for the rich with the money of the poor. Well it don't matter, right now it is ours." said Jack, "I'll go check on the army dudes as soon as I get Juan back in here."
A few minutes later Jack was back with Juan and two men and a woman had taken over guarding the ER entrance. Charlie refilled his coffee and sat down on one side of Juan, Nanci sat on the other and started to make headway into her own plate, both watched him eat.
"This is good, eggs, potatoes, good stuff, I could eat a horse." said Juan speaking in English for the benefit of Charlie.
Terry overheard and said, "Thanks Juan, I bet it is not up to what you are used to, but I am cooking for a group here, so I am doing the best I can."
Juan nodded and continued to eat, then asking for, and getting, seconds. A few minutes later Jack came back in and sat across from Juan. Looking up Juan said, "Ah, you guys eat already?"
Jack and Charlie both nodded 'yes' and continued to sip their coffee. Jack spoke up, "The army guys seem fine, they are just sleeping, woke one of them up and I got to see his lightning reflexes, he scared the crap out of me, even though he was only pointing one of his boots in my direction. I told him to go back to sleep, I was just checking up on them." Jack's face turned troubled, "Mary though, I don't think she is going to make it."
Juan put his fork down, "That ain't good breakfast news Jack."
"Sorry Juan, Nanci. Sorry, wasn't thinking there. She hasn't turned or anything, just ain't looking too good." Juan resumed eating, slowly.
"Hey I stopped by the ER entrance too and looked out before coming back here, the zombies are getting restless again." said Jack.
Jack, Charlie and Nanci shared a look and Juan noticed it. "What?" he asked, "C'mon, what?"
"We-ell", started Charlie.
"No, let me", interrupted Jack, "Juan, how many zombies tried to get through in the last couple hours you were out there by yourself?"
"Uh, none, they had all quieted down, which is why everyone went off to bed, they were just in the lobby if I need them though. Why?"
"You left and the zombies started in again." said Jack.
"So? Could be the sun coming up or them noticing the movement, or maybe somebody made some noise. Could be anything really."
"Yeah, I suppose it could. Let's explore that though, the anything could include you and that is what I want, no need, to talk to you about."
Shrugging Juan said, "So. Talk."
"I, no, we, think it is you. The zombies don't seem to want to attack you and from what Charlie says something happened when you killed that super zombie yesterday, and, well, we don't know what else to say."
"I don't think it is me." replied Juan.
"Okay, so we have to convince you too, so we could try something, right? You wouldn't care?" asked Jack.
"Depends on what you wanted to try I guess."
"How about you get close to a zombie and see what happens, see if it goes for you. Not unarmed or anything, I mean you keep your gun out and pointed at its head and we'll be there, but something happened and I think the zombies don't want you anymore, not for food anyway. Also we let Charlie check you out, you know, physically."
Puzzled Juan, asked, "Why? I didn't get bit or anything, they hardly touched me as it was."
"Yeah, yeah, we know Charlie was there, Mary was there, they said the same things, but we should still check anyway."
Sighing Juan said, "If it will make you feel better, I guess. Look Jack, Nanci, Charlie, something did happened, I felt strange, sort of, not like superman or anything, just weird for a little while, the feeling went away, I got nothing now. Nothing unusual anyway."
"Well, let us all check on that, okay?"
After he finished eating they headed back to the ER into one of the two rooms the group had elected to keep empty for emergencies, the rest of the rooms were occupied with men and women ready to spring to the defense if they were needed. Snores came out of several of the open doorways. Turning the lights on in the empty room Charlie gestured for Juan to hop up on the gurney. He checked Juan's pulse, listened to his heart and all but had him strip naked to look for scratches, bruises and injuries. He found nothing, all four of them were silent for a very long time, before Juan said, "What? You didn't find anything, that is good right?"
Nanci said, "Juan when you came back with Hank yesterday at the club, the car was a mess, you had bruises, you had some cuts from the glass. They are not there anymore."
Juan thought about it, he didn't recall getting cut up or injured in the last couple of days, he had been living pretty rough and could remember the doc putting hydrogen peroxide on some cuts he hadn't noticed after they had arrived at the Mike's Club. Look himself ov
er he didn't see any cuts, scraps or even half healed scabs where he thought there had been minor wounds. Nothing. He stared at them for a moment. Then said, "Well maybe..." he shook his head, then said, "Madre de Dios, what does this mean?"
No one answered him right away, then Jack spoke, "Keep your mind open partner, lets go see how our zombie friends like you?"
Still shaking his head Juan followed the three to the ER exit and went towards the cars acting as a wall. The zombies were definitely more active now, they had started pressing around the cars trying to get in at the three humans defending the area.
Jack pointed to one side of the cars, "You move over there Juan and the rest of us will get over on this side, don't do anything if you don't have to, okay, this is a test. Then again don't let them get too close either."
Juan took up a position in front of a zombie that was clambering over one of the trucks, the zombie turned his head up and looked at him, or through him, and just slowed down, the effect was immediate and everyone noticed it. On the other side the group of five people was agitating the zombies even more, the monsters made haste in their efforts to get past the vehicles before any of their brethren. Of course fast is relative and the group was easily able to cut down any who led the pack. Meanwhile Juan's zombie just stopped in the bed of the truck. On his knees the middled aged man with bald head and green pants just waited, looking at Juan. Juan looked at him. A staring contest of sorts came about, the others put five zombies down while 'farmer green' just stood staring with Juan. Jack called out from where he was, "Hey Juan, maybe get closer to him and see what he does?"
Juan stepped forward, the zombie did not move, but he did cock his head sideways, as if looking at Juan for the first time. His head remained at that odd angle when Juan took two steps back. The zombie stayed in the truck bed. Juan started talking to the zombie, "Go away, leave us alone, get out of here."
The zombie rolled over the other side of the truck's pickup bed wall and started shambling away. Charlie let out a whoop of delight, "He is a zombie whisperer!" This brought a laugh from the others.