by Kelly, Joe
Jared just shook his head. “I found em, I keep them, you can suffer the wrath of pregnant woman craving.” Jared said with a real smile, a smile that faded a second later.
“You sir are cruel, cruel and cold. Jill?” Steve said turning to Jill who only shrugged and said, “don’t even get me involved Steve, it’s between you two and your addiction”
It was actually amazing what the previous scavengers had missed inside the store, several bags of chips, some pig skins, one single bag of hot and spicy pig skins, a box of foot long jerky that had been under a shelf. Two cases of off brand beer in the back of the cooler. Which Ori had pointed out might indicate exactly how good the stuff was if desperate people had left it behind. Ronnie of the firm opinion that any beer was good beer had scooped it up.
He obviously had never tasted Billy beer or been sober when drinking Pabst blue ribbon. The one discovery that had gotten everyone excited were the two big containers of Columbian coffee that had been stashed in a box under a counter and missed by the looters, they had also found several pre ground and bagged gourmet coffees, and three large bags of coffee beans and a hand grinder.
They thanked god or whoever was responsible for not letting the previous looters be coffee drinkers. “I’m almost tempted to get Ronny to fly some of this back to the farm.” Jared said with another smile. “Almost.”
At least his sense of humor was putting in appearance again Jill thought watching Jared. He had been distant and cold for a short while after Billy’s death. She didn’t know how many people even now noticed; he wasn’t quite the Jared they had known.
He avoided the kids now, and she couldn’t help but feel that bastard who had lured Billy away and killed him would enjoy that little fact. At least till Jared got his hands on him, Jared didn’t say much about it but she could see that steely eyed, cold look he got anytime the subject was mentioned or when he even thought about it. She forced herself to smile over the coffee with the others, wanting to stay in a good mood herself.
They had scored on condiments too, boxes of Ketchup, mayonnaise, Relish, sweetener, mustard, salt, pepper packets and lots of cups and other Styrofoam products.
“You do know the single guys are demanding a run on a porn shop right,” Chris said, with a grin.
“Sure, just what we need, clearing zombies from a peep show.” Jared muttered
“Zombies in the adult toy aisle, we need clean up.” Ori said chuckling, then looked around at his friends. “What, that was funny.”
“Maybe in England.” Ronny said.
“I have no idea why I even talk to you people.” Ori said with a grin, as he removed his glasses and cleaned them. An hour and half later they had all the vehicles topped off what was left went into the fuel trucks. By the time they pulled out ten more zombies had appeared on the road slowly staggering towards the store.
Shortly after noon, they came to a stop and as Jared eyed the road they were supposed to turn on to. It was a narrow two laned road, with tree’s growing up almost to the edge of the road. There was no way they could haul the Plane down that. The wings were too wide.
But that wasn’t a huge problem he thought looking ahead at the long straight road they were currently on. there was a lake by the rental cabins they were headed for, he thought. “Well Ronny looks like you get to fly again” He said over the radio.
“let’s clear those vehicles and any undead, so he can get airborne” Jared said a minute later as he stood on the road looking
“not bad,” Jared said checking his watch an hour later. “and only thirty pus bags.” Mostly trapped inside vehicles which had made it easy to put them down, well not easy but safer.
“Okay here’s the deal Ronny, fly our route to the camp and then the route I want to use when we leave the cabins, once you get that done check out Ashville.” Ronny nodded then waved at Ryan to join him.
Ryan his shaggy brown hair now shaved down into a short mohawk was one of those guys who was handsome enough he could get any woman he wanted, but not so handsome that he made you think of a movie star. And at 17 he knew he looked good. Jared almost smiled as he watched, Ryan who subconsciously flirted with Jill. Jared's Great grandmother would have called him “a little hen shit sport”
“Your riding back seat” Ronny told Ryan who looked less than thrilled at the idea as Ronny handed him a set of binoculars. “All you have to do is look down.”
“Is there a parachute?" Ryan asked as Ronny grinned at him.
“No, but I promise if we go down, I’ll aim for the ground at full speed.” Ronnie replied.
“Great, just great.” Ryan said as he climbed up and looked into the cockpit. “how old is this thing anyway.”
“Seventy years or so, maybe eighty” Ronny replied. “look the real trick to flying is always forget to hit the ground.” Ronny said with what he considered an encouraging smile.
Ryan gave Jared the save me please look, which Jared ignored feeling slightly evil. At least his emotions were not see sawing any more, and he was finding his sense of humor every once in a while. But bouts of dark brooding clung to him, he couldn’t get the image of Billy’s body out of his mind.
Beth was probably worse off than he was, she was quieter now, oh she still acted the same around the kids, but away from the kids she wrestled with Billy’s death. It was hard for her, seeing all the other children’s faces, having to field questions about why the bad man had killed Billy and all the while feeling like she had failed Billy and might fail the rest of the children too. Well I failed Billy, Jared thought. Failed him badly and I won’t forget.
.
Jill touched him on the arm drawing him out of his thoughts. She was getting good at that, he thought. She knew him so well now she could catch the little signs that he was sliding down into anger or depression and bring him back with a touch or a soft word.
Finally, Ronny climbed up and settled himself into the cockpit strapping himself in. then slid the canopy closed. Ryan looked scared out of his mind as he sat in the back seat staring out the canopy. Jared expected Ryan at any moment to press his hands and face against the Plexiglas canopy and beg to be let out. The motor coughed into life then the plane swung around in a tight circle lining up in the middle of the road.
It rumbled forward gathering speed, and then finally left the ground with ease. Ronny did a graceful turn to the north and in moments the plane was out of sight.
“Let’s get moving” Jared said turning and heading towards the vehicles.
They reached the camp two hours later. The camp, situated near the base of a mountain, was deep in the woods of a state park, the cabins sat back a short ways from a small lake, which was one of the many reasons Jared had picked it. He planned on using every state park and campground he remembered or could find on a map to keep them out of densely populated areas.
The cabins were spread in a line facing the tree-lined lakeshore, where water gently lapped against the rocky shore, under a cerulean sky. Jared got excited when he spotted a hawk riding the thermals over the lake. A hawk meant small game, and that meant food.
Team one swept the cabins and then half mile around the place, but found nothing. Jared studied the area then had the Vehicles park in a line on both sides of the line of cabins forming a U that ran to the waters edge. The walls between the RVs were attached while he got smaller vehicles to park between the camps closing off those spaces.
“Lets get guards up on top of some of the RV’s, and on the roof of the cabins on each end of the line.” Jared said. At least if they had to run, the guards on the cabin roofs could just step over to the roof of an RV. “also park a Deuce at the edge of the water on both sides so the guards there can be up off the ground where the undead can’t get to them.”
Rob got a group together and set up the Deer stand he had modified with longer legs to use as an Listening post/Observation post in the middle of the lager. Jared got guards posted and the screamers out. Sooner or later they were going to run out of
batteries, but till then he was going to use everything he could to give his people a edge on survival.
They were just settling in, when Ronny flew overhead, banked and then lined up on the far end of the lake landing in a spray of water and mechanical thunder.
Ronny taxied the plane up to the beach and cut the motor as Jason splashed thru the water to tie the plane off. By then Ryan was out of the cockpit and leaping into the water with a wide grin on his face. He and his friends were hugging and backslapping each other much to the amusement of the rest of the group.
Jared passed out fishing poles and nets and got some of the folks down to the water. The canoes were unloaded so the fisherman could get out on the lake and find some good fishing holes. With that done he got Ronny to one side. “What was Asheville like” he asked. Ronny’s good mood faded.
“Not good, looks like half the city was bombed, and I mean bombed. Looks like thousand pounders, bomblets, even artillery fire judging by the moonscape landscape on the south side of the city. Whoever did it walked artillery fire back and forth leveling everything. About half the city is still reasonably intact. And it’s filled with the undead. I buzzed a couple of streets and they were packed in there like sardines. Maybe there are living people around there, maybe not. If there are, there is no way in hell we could get to them” Ronny said emphatically. “ As for the route, well I marked it out on the map. There’s some hellish wrecks in a couple of spots but nothing we can’t get past with some work.” Ronny said passing Jared a folded map.
It made sense, Jared thought at some point, the Government would have tried to take back a city and bombing the crap out of it before sending in ground troops would have been considered the best option. I wonder if they had at least kept the bombing away from the critical areas of the city, and I have to wonder how many cities they might have tried that with. Charleston would be an ideal city for that kind of operation, what with the naval storage facility, warehouses and port. I can see that being a priority along with Norfolk.
Jared took the map and spread it out on a picnic table studying the locations of the wrecks and obstacles Ronny had marked. It was going to get worse the closer to Sullivan they got, he suspected. Both in the number of blocked roads and the undead. I know I have some topo maps of the area north of Charleston, I just hope they were in one of the boxes we loaded up before we left home. He jotted a note to remind himself to check later.
Lets see ammunition, not good but not bad, yet. He thought as he started off the supply list that Bridget and a few others were keeping update. Food, he snorted seeing the amount. Granted its better than most survivors have, but for a group this size it needs to be bigger. Clothes, we are in good shape. All good, he thought then saw the last entry. School books for the kids needed. He wanted to say hell no, but truth was if they survived and wanted to keep from sliding to far back education was going to play a large part of in that.
When this is over, he thought then snorted with bitter amusement, there’s optimism for you, we are going to have to work our tail off to salvage as much equipment, tools and books as we can, open some kind of university for lack of a better word and get a regular school up and running for the kids.
Hearing Mattie shouting something at Kevin, Jared looked up to see Kevin doggedly wheeling and hopping his wheel chair down to the lake were Mattie was watching three of the children. “Damn it Kevin, I’ll come and get you, stop before you hurt yourself.” She shouted at him. Kevin happily ignored her determined to do it himself.
Mattie, refusing to be separated from Kevin, had left the farm to be at his side, and was now Beth’s Assistant with the kids. She apparently had a knack for teaching and the kids loved her. She was only one of the people from the farm who had wanted to leave with the group, Colin, a thirty-year-old IT professional, and one of the newest members who had joined up from the farm, was chopping wood. He at least had been an experience climber and hiker, and Gary had already gotten him to help connect some of the systems in the Com RV. Colin, with his shock of dark hair and brooding eyes, was friendly but a loner. Jared would not be surprised to find out that Colin had been a regular visitor to Comic con or had a star trek uniform stashed away his stuff. Jared smiled slightly thinking of his little brother the closet nerd, and Special Forces soldier.
Lindsey, was a tall statuesque blonde, who had no real skills but leaped into any task, with good humor and eagerness, she was asked to help with. She also seemed to be the main interest of Ryan, Jerry, and Ben. The girl Ben had liked back at the farm had stayed and he was now gravitating to the older women once more. Not that he had much of a choice. And that wasn’t something Jared wanted to get involved in or know much of anything about.
“Well that’s a sight you don’t see every day” Ori commented as he walked up in time to see half the group strip down and jump into the lake. “Group skinny dipping, is that an Olympic sport” Ori asked, Jared shook his head, not really smiling but not frowning either, which was a good sign for any Joke Ori attempted.
“no, but it should be.” Jared said then turned and walked towards the medical RV.
Ten minutes later he and Jeff carried Pappy outside to enjoy the day, Linda following along with a bulky bag. When she explained she was carrying stuff in case pappy needed help. Pappy wrote out on his pad. “If you want to help, help me stand up and hold my Pecker while I piss.” Jared smiled and this time there was real humor in his eyes.
He watched the people splashing about in the water, thinking that most of those people before the Day, would have never considered skinny dipping in front of another person. Much less a whole group of people, the kids didn’t seem to care, they were racing around splashing in the water’s edge, but their eyes constantly turned towards the woods, expecting to see undead at any moment.
Jared shrugged, hating the reality, but nothing he could about it, he sat down at a picnic table, he had plans to make so there was no time for him to get in a swim just yet. The impromptu swim, turned into a clothes-washing party. As tubs were dragged out and filled with water, and scrub boards appeared. Most of the RV’s had washers and dryers in them. But to conserve fuel and propane, they had all agreed to only use them three times a week to wash three loads of clothes only. It sucked but so would running out of fuel.
By five most of the fisherman were returning, many of them with catfish, bass and croppy. It seemed zombies had been good for something after all, with no fisherman all summer; the lake was hopping with fish. Jared decided that it might be a good idea if they spent a day or two here to stock up on fish. Some they could dry, others could be Vacuum sealed and placed in the freezers.
The fish were being cleaned and the cooking fires lit. People not on guard had clustered together in groups. Some were working on the fish, others were mending clothes, another group was cleaning weapons, and even a few kids were helping out. Jared wasn’t sure how he felt about that. They needed to know, and understand firearms to survive these days. But at the same time, seven years old was young, probably to young. Damn he hated what life had become.
The next day they patrolled further out from the camp and found a few zombies wandering the woods and slopes of the mountain. They quietly dispatched the undead and left them where they fell. He doubted that the wild life would touch them. God knows fly’s and ants didn’t get near them. Which was weird and creepy if you stopped and thought about it.
The Fishermen of the group had gotten up before dawn to take to the lake. The vehicles for the food run were already set up for an incursion into the zombie held town just outside the park. Jared particularly wanted a phone book; if he could locate the distribution centers for the stores in Ashville he would consider a run to one of them if they were outside the wall of undead. He rather doubted they would find much in any grocery store no matter how lucky they had been in the beginning. What he really didn’t want to do was to have to clear a neighborhood, so they could strip houses clean. But he knew it was mostly likely going to come to that a
t some point.
They set out for the nearby town after their patrol with two teams again. Jared didn’t feel anything smaller was safe enough for this kind of job. he would have preferred to have a battalion or two of men, an Arty division and Apaches for air support, but he had what he had.
✽ ✽ ✽
The Parking lot of the Piggly Wiggly was about half full of vehicles, two dozen zombies wandered around the lot. Half the plate glass windows were shattered, and they could see a lot of empty shelves inside. “Should we even bother,” Jill asked, as she watched more zombies appear down the street. She knew that there would only be a few at first, then that would turn into a flood.
Piggly wiggly stores had been around long before Kroger, Safeway, or any other modern grocery store, Jared thought. I remember mom shopping in one and I know Grandma used to shop at a Piggly’s when she was young. They made it to the end of the world at least. Mind on the job, he told himself as he reached for the microphone.