“Sam!” she sobbed. “Sam… I’m so sorry.” She rose to her feet shakily. Blood was continuing to pour from her left wrist in a steady stream, and her skin was growing ashen. Sam could only cry in answer, his sobs shaking Duke’s body.
“I had to protect you, Sam!” Janelle said. She swayed, then took a step forward, reaching out for her son.
Duke now understood what was happening, and what was at stake. He rose, blocking Janelle from reaching Sam, and let out another threatening growl. At Janelle. Janelle who was still living. Janelle who was his own family. But the smell was there. Growing stronger with each pulse of blood that flowed from her ragged wrist. Soon she would not be Janelle. She would not be family. There was nothing Duke could do to stop it. Nothing he could do but protect the only family he had left. He must not allow Sam to come to harm, no matter what. It was the only thing that mattered now.
“Duke?” Janelle wheezed. Her face was a mixture of fear and betrayal. She took another, shakier step forward. “Sam? I’m going to take care of you Sam, I…”
Duke barked like a wild beast, fur bristling. Janelle faltered. She lost her balance and fell to her knees on the carpet.
“Duke?” Her eyes began to cloud over. “Sam? Sam… I love…” Her eyes rolled back, and she slumped limply to the floor, her breath stopping moments later.
“Mommy!” Sam screamed. He pushed at Duke, trying to move around him. Duke would not budge. He could smell the last of her scent fading, smell the death and corruption pouring out of her. Her undamaged arm twitched.
Duke spun and grabbed Sam’s sleeve firmly in his teeth. He began pulling the boy off of the couch, leading him forcefully toward the hall.
“No! No, Mommy!” Sam screamed. “Duke, no! Mommy!” Duke continued to pull the boy toward the front door. Behind them, Janelle sat up.
Duke growled around the mouthful of sweater and continued dragging Sam away. Corpse-Janelle was now rising to her feet with a series of terrible, awkward jerks.
“No! No!” Sam screamed. His cries were heartbreaking in Duke’s ears. “Mommy! Mommy!” Deperate and terrified, the boy reached out and grabbed a hold of a small lamp on the little table in the hallway. He pulled it off of the table and swung it around, smacking Duke soundly on the back with it. It did no serious damage, but Duke cringed, horrified by the boy’s fear and anger, and nearly lost his grip on the sweater.
With slow, lurching steps, corpse-Janelle followed them into the hallway. Duke pulled harder. Sam, crying inarticulately now, flailed out with the lamp again. This time it connected with Duke’s sensitive nose. The pain was sharp and more than a little dizzying. Duke yelped pitifully and lost his grip on the sweater.
Sam darted away, running with his hands thrust out toward his mother. She continued her approach with arms open and eyes lifeless.
Duke howled in pain and terror, bolting after Sam. His legs were much faster than the boy’s, but the distance was small, and corpse-Janelle’s stiff arms were almost around Sam by the time he reached him. Duke lunged, trying to grab a secure mouthful of sleeve. He did that, but in the process also nipped painfully through the skin of Sam’s arm. Sam screamed shrilly, terrified and now in pain as well, but Duke could not release him. He pulled back with all of his strength and speed, pulling Sam away just as his mother’s fingers brushed through his tousled hair, seeking a grip.
Duke ran with everything he had in him, dragging Sam roughly to the door, his teeth continuing to hurt Sam even as he saved him. The boy’s cries were like knives in Duke’s heart.
He reached the front door, crashing into it, and slapped desperately at the lever-style handle. Ted had talked for months about swapping it out for a knob after they’d first discovered that Duke could operate it, but Ted’s home improvement drive was no match for his procrastination, and it remained unchanged. Ted’s laziness saved his son in that moment, as Duke hammered repeatedly on the handle until it unlatched. He pulled the door open with his paw, still gripping Sam’s arm in his mouth, and then pulled the boy outside and across the front lawn.
Sam’s cries rose to become shrill shrieks as he reached for his mother, who now stood stiffly in the open doorway. She shuffled down one step, then tripped on the second, falling hard on her face on the concrete walk with a crunch. When she stood up again, her face was covered in abrasions and several of her teeth were gone.
Sam wailed, caught between terror at the sight and the powerful need to run to his mother. He continued to pull against Duke. Duke whined pathetically. He could taste Sam’s blood in his mouth. The wound wasn’t severe, but it was getting worse with every tug. He desperately wanted to release the boy, but couldn’t allow him to run to his dead mother. Whatever happened, he must protect the boy.
A wash of bright light shone over them as engines revved at the end of the street. A car and two large trucks approached, smelling of gas, oil, metal and live human beings.
Several bright spotlights swung about, causing sharp-edged shadows to leap all around. One beam focused on Janelle’s corpse as it limped toward Duke and Sam. Duke heard a sudden sharp bang and the smell of gunpowder, and Janelle’s skull spurted blood. She toppled like a pile of rags to the grass as Sam screamed louder than he ever had before.
Just as Duke began to relax his jaw, ready to release Sam to his now harmless mother, another beam washed over the two of them, followed by another sharp bang.
Duke yelped and flipped to the side as the force of the bullet knocked him off his feet. The movement pulled Sam over, and he immediately began to cling to Duke, screaming “No! Don’t kill him! Don’t kill him!”
Several living men rushed over, converging on Duke and Sam. Duke immediately smelled that they were healthy and untainted by the corruption that had taken Janelle, Ted and the neighbor. He tried to sit up, then felt a searing pain in his side and slumped back to the pavement. Sam took his paw in his tiny hand, tears spilling everywhere. Duke’s breathing was becoming quite painful, and more difficult with every breath. But the living men were taking hold of Sam now. They would protect him. He would live. Duke began to relax, even as Sam was pulled away, crying pitifully, his little hand slipping free of Duke’s now limp paw.
The boy would be alright. The boy would live.
Another man approached and examined Sam’s arm, then sent them back toward the trucks. “I’ll need to bandage it, but he’ll be fine.”
One of the men standing nearby with a rifle was wiping tears from his eye. “Aw shit, man. I thought it was attacking him. I didn’t know it was the kid’s dog. Can you do anything for him, Arnold?”
The man who had checked Sam turned and kneeled next to Duke. “Lemme take a look. Head back to the truck. You just did what you thought was right.” The crying gunman moved away as the man named Arnold examined Duke’s wound. The injury didn’t look too bad on the entry side, but when he rolled Duke over the dog yelped in agony.
“Oh, fuck. What a mess.” Arnold shook his head. “I’m sorry, boy. You did real good. What a fucking day…”
Duke panted in short little wheezes from the pain, then took several sharp sniffs. He could smell something coming from Arnold’s ankle. It was the smell of a wound. It smelled of cotton, adhesive, blood, antiseptic, and… death. Corruption. It smelled broken. Duke growled, faintly.
The man didn’t know. He would rejoin the others. He would die. He would kill.
Every breath was agony now. All Duke wanted to do was relax and slip into sweet sleep. But his job wasn’t done. Not yet.
He eyed the man, waited until Arnold looked back at the others to shake his head regretfully. Then he lunged upward. The effort of movement tore through his side like razors. He felt something strain, then rip inside him. He kept pushing, sinking his teeth into Arnold’s throat and clamping down until his jaws clicked shut. Then he relaxed, pulling most of the man’s throat away with him. One of the other men spotted this, and screamed, opening fire. The bullets went wild, most hitting the street, but one bore into Arn
old’s skull, dropping him to the street like a stringless puppet.
Another hit Duke. It dug deep, puncturing his heart. He jerked, and felt the pain, but didn’t care anymore.
Now his job was done.
Now the boy would live.
Duke loved his family. It was the only thing that mattered.
Eddie Smith, Part Three:
Chasing Hope
Kids, y'all realizing we need to move at first light right? Your momma is gonna tan my behind if she finds out you stayed up to the wee hours listening to me rant and rave about things that done past.
Oh? Is that so? You're gonna take the fall for Eddie? Jump right on top of that grenade for me? You're a crew of kind critters aren't ya? Ha. I suspect your momma is gonna accept your tale of woe and good intentions and tan my behind anyways. Mothers are like that.
What's the story tonight? What is it you simply must hear about to keep yourselves warm as we head stupidly north and east to our destination away from the warm embrace of the Lone Star state?
Why? You wanna know why we're doing this?
Hm. That's a bit of a complicated one kids. It's like explaining how you know the sun's gonna rise in a few hours. Sometimes, things in life are just decided for you, and your job in it all is to accept that decision and do your part. God's will, as it were.
Well you probably recall the Fort and how we was all set up inside it, selling and trading fuel to the locals who wanted peace, and shooting up the ones who didn't. Dark times that first winter was. None of us inside the fences of the distribution facility had much in the way of a green thumb, so we had a bit of a 'being hungry' problem. Fortunate for us, we had a lot of fuel to burn to run generators to keep warm, and to trade to the people who had food spare. That wasn't much.
I lost something in the way of fifteen pounds that winter, and of all forty of us back then, I had it easier than some. We never ate each other like some did -barbeque style Texan- but we did share a few too many one-spoon meals.
What's a 'one-spoon meal?' That's a deeee-licious sit down dinner where you crack open a single can of something barely edible and each person gets a single spoonful. If there's enough for a second spoon, then it goes to the children. If I never sit down in front of a bowl of beans, corned beef hash or chicken noodle soup I'll be a happy man. Perhaps a happier man. I don't know if true happiness is attainable anymore, but that's part of why we're on this road trip. You probably don't remember the times we only had one spoon because you never had just one spoon. I'm good with that.
Right. Where was I going with this?
So the winter of ought ten into ought eleven was a tough one. Cold and hungry. We didn't lose anyone to starvation, and we had enough rain for water, plus we just had plenty of water in general, so that was good. We did lose a few people protecting the fuel depot though. Theo bought the farm in a shootout over a gasoline sale, and we lost Max and AJ the same day. AJ's wife Danielle shuffled off this mortal coil by her own hand just a few days after that, and then the twins Ivy and Violet left with their mother to head home on the gulf. That incident directly led us to dropping down to just thirty left. Barely enough to protect the fuel.
When the weather turned warmer in late February things got better. Local gardens were making a comeback and we were able to do some plucking and replanting to get some food growing, and we took in that group of Masons we'd been working with on the other side of Longview. They were down to eleven, and we had good relations with them, so it made sense to have one safer home than two. Brad that's how you got to us. Your momma and daddy are good friends of mine now.
That summer was an un-blessed mess. It was a good thing we had another eight adults with us. We took on attacker after attacker every week pretty much. People wanting fuel and thinking it'd be easier to take it by force than simply trade for it. We had to kill off thirty and nine that summer.
How do I know that number?
Because I kept count as I prayed for them over every grave I helped dig.
You can't just take a life and walk away from it kids. That person, a strange though they might be is still a human being with life, love, dreams and family and when their life is taken from them, by you or those who you stand beside, you must do what is right and see to it they are given peace.
If you can't see the inherent good in doing that deed on its own merit, then maybe you'll do it so they won't haunt your sleep each and every night, begging for a proper burial.
I had that experience. Once.
Despite the death and fighting, our fuel and diesel supply kept us warm and fed, which is more than we had any right to ask for with the dead wandering the world, and the living doing their best to kill each other off. We made it to about August, when the heat was right about insufferable without the juice to power the air conditioning at full blast when the McCoy family made their way to us.
Pete and Emma McCoy came to town from the east coast with their two little girls Patience and Katie. They were traveling to California taking as many back roads as possible to stay far off the zombie jams of the interstates, and smelled our meat cooking as they rode their horses and begged for some shelter and rest. We couldn't say no to the kids and they offered to leave one of their two spare horses with us for payment. They had good timing, as we'd been stocking up on horses for when the diesel ran out. That's why we brought the horse trailers. Eight isn't enough for all of us to ride, but it's a good start, and we got a good pair of studs. In a few years with proper care we'll have enough for all of us to ride and then some.
So Pete and Emma are telling us this tale as we sit around eating some wild hog that night. They explaining that up north there's this man who it all rides on, and two more people are coming to him, and they form a trinity, like the holy trinity from the Bible.
Of course in Texas you do not worship false idols, but they way they explained it, and the way our dreams were being, we all knew the Lord's hand was in the mix. Their story made as much sense as any, and like a seed planted in a fertile field, the words the McCoy family shared with us that night took root, and bore fruit.
Many of us knew that when the fuel ran dry, there was little reason to stay in Longview, especially no good reason to stay at the fuel plant. Other than the tanks in the ground, it had nothing to offer us besides good fences. And you know what boys? Fences can be built around anything.
The McCoys told us about their meeting two people up north who had met this man. A girl named Angie, and a man named Raef. Raef didn't much care for this man, the one the McCoys said was important, but Angie liked him a good deal, and they couldn't argue with the dreams.
No one can, once you have one.
So a few days and more than one conversation later Pete and Emma left with their four horses and their two kids for the west coast. I sure do hope they made it. Doesn't make much sense for us to head north here in the late winter, but we're hoping we'll get to Bastion as it warms up.
What's Bastion? It's a place. It's where we're going.
Oh right. Why?
Well the McCoy family took their Irish blood west and we stewed. More dreams came, and in those dreams we saw and heard more of the Lord's truth. He had chosen a new path for us, and we had to walk together as one or fall together. And this man, this Adrian… He was the one to lead us. He and the other two in the trinity of man.
So we spent the next few months fighting off the locals, and shooting hogs, and putting down the stray dead that walked their way to the edge of town, and generally just getting through the winter. All the while debating what's real, what's fake, what's right and wrong and what to do. Was it enough to just survive? Or did we need to do more.
Some of us prayed. Some of us laughed at it all. Some of us drank. Those of us who could get their hands on booze, that is. Had a lot of fighting back then. I guess that's to be expected when confused, scared people piss through bottles of whisky and vodka left and right. In all this I think one of the greatest blessings is we're running out
of liquor.
It all came to a head two months ago in our town meeting in the cafeteria. Right before Christmas.
Your daddy -Adam- says this to the group. He says, "I believe our time here has come to an end. Longview has treated us as well as we could've hoped and prayed for, but with our fuel supplies dwindling, and the news that salvation is possibly within reach, I would like to speak of the idea of relocating to this place called Bastion."
He said it real polite. People lost their minds anyway. Most of us have never stepped foot outside of Gregg and Harrison county, let alone Texas aside from those that served, so the idea that our leader tabled seemed like insanity. Absolute insanity. Think of it kids; why would you leave a secured, safe place and drive halfway across God's country to try and track down some dang crack head that likes winter claiming to be the second coming struck everyone as a bit insane. Now if you're clever you'll be thinking of the wasted fuel, the foreign roads we'd be driving on, and the fact that the world is littered with a hundred million of the feisty dead.
Maybe two hundred million. It's real hard to get a handle on the population since the census bureau was eaten alive. God rest their souls, amen.
As you can imagine, there was a lot of arguing. That's what adults do, after all. Some folks used that moment to confess that they was thinking of leaving to go find relatives or friends in other places, and some folks said they had no interest at all in going anyway. Only a few of us were thinking real hard about the reality of our situation, and the idea that leaving was a good idea, and that this stranger in a strange land was a good enough reason to.
One night we was sitting around a small bonfire outside, and like it always seemed to, the subject of the man and the three came up.
Unhappy Endings Page 15