by Russ Watts
“And how do we do that, Hamsikker?” asked Mrs. Danick. “We’re exhausted, we have very little food, and…” Mrs. Danick looked at Erik and Pippa, and her eyes sank to the floor. “We’ve lost too much. This is hard. I’m not sure we have any fight left in us.”
Mrs. Danick was one of the strongest people Jonas had ever known, and if she gave up, the sense of futility and listlessness would spread quickly through the others. “That’s exactly my point. I’m exhausted too. You think it doesn’t tear me up inside knowing Peter’s gone? Well, I say no more. Tomorrow we go into that town over the hill, and get some supplies. We get some gas, and we don’t stop until we get to Canada. We make a plan, and we stick to it. More than that, we stick together.”
“Right on,” said Javier.
“I’m sick of running, feeling like I’ve done something wrong,” said Quinn. “I need to feel like I’m doing something, and that we’re going somewhere. Let’s do it. I don’t want to feel like this anymore.”
Javier felt a frisson of excitement run through him. If Hamsikker could galvanize the group into action, maybe they could be of use after all. He stoked the embers of the fire with a blackened stick, and dropped it in to burn. “Okay, let’s run a sortie tomorrow into town. We need food and water, or we’re not going to make it. There’s nowhere near as much as I thought there might be in the van. Half of us could go into town, half of us stay here as back-up. You’re right, Hamsikker. We can do this.”
“We have to,” said Erik. His face was cast into deep shadow by the dying fire, and he looked old. Grief had aged him ten years, and his red beard looked faded like his pale skin. “Nothing’s bringing my son back, but I’ll be fucked if I’m going to sit back and let these things take us all down one by one. The only promise I can make to you all is that I will die before I let them take another one of us. If it’s in my power, I’ll stop them, no matter what.”
Jonas knew his friend was in pain, but nothing he could say or do would change that. Erik needed time. He needed to spend time with Pippa and Freya and help them deal with the loss of Peter.
“Fine, but we don’t split up. We all go together,” said Jonas as he held Dakota’s hand. “Let’s try and get some sleep. I’ll take first watch with Quinn. We change every hour. Once the sun’s up we’ll take the van into town and see if we can get some supplies. If it’s too dangerous, we’ll back off. No more taking risks. But we stick together.”
Jonas looked at Freya. She was curled up beside the fire, asleep, and he could see her hands wrapped around the key chain he had given her. It was a cheap piece of garbage, but it meant so much more to her. It was a symbol of trust, of hope, and if he failed her he wouldn’t be able to live with himself. He had let too many people down in the past, he could admit that, but he was trying to put things right. He had to make things right with Janey, too, and seeing her and his three nephews again was not just important, but vital. He was going to find her and make a new start. Dakota would love it up there. Janey’s house by the lake would be perfect. Even if Thunder Bay had fallen to the dead, even if there was nobody else alive up there, it was still something to aim for. They could make it work. They could fish on the lake, they would have fresh water, and there were plenty of natural barriers between them and the dead cities of North America.
“And then Canada?” asked Quinn. “There ain’t no coming back from being dead, Hamsikker. We can’t afford to mess this up.”
“And then Canada. Quinn, we can do this.” Jonas stared into the fire. “We’re all on the same side here. We will do this.”
“I’m turning in,” said Mrs. Danick. “It’s a long way to Canada, and we’re going to need all the rest we can get. Anyone mind if I sleep in the van?”
Erik stood up. “Would you mind if Pippa and Freya slept with you? I’d feel better knowing they were in there. In case, you know…”
“Of course, that’s fine.”
Pippa picked up Freya and carried her over to the campervan. Mrs. Danick pulled her shawl tight around her shoulders and shivered. “Hamsikker, be careful tonight.” She shot Rose and Javier a look that suggested she hadn’t bought into their story one bit. “Watch your back, okay? There are monsters out here in the woods.”
Javier watched Mrs. Danick turn and head toward the campervan. There was no doubt in his mind now. By this time tomorrow, one way or another, she was going to be in a world of dead.
CHAPTER TEN
Pete Hopper was an insignificant man, just one of many young workers who used to toil away on hot days in the fields and tend to the vines. He had been killed close to the vineyard, and his body still wandered around Utica. There was nothing to draw him away. The legs kept working, and the eyes darted around looking for the living, but it had been months since anything had crossed his path. It was Freya’s faint cry that alerted him to the presence of the living. It was so, so quiet that it took a long time before he was even heading in the right direction. He stumbled through Utica, down the main street full of dead bodies, and tried to follow the only sound that night that was audible for miles. Through the diminishing moonlight and the quietness the crying sound carried on the breeze, alerting more zombies to the presence of the group. The dead gathered together slowly and began to walk through Utica. The zombies were unaware of the camp at the top of the hill, but if nothing impeded them, it would not be long before they found it. The sound of their dragging footsteps carried even further, and the dead soon began to converge.
Utica had been declared a safe zone, and the residents of nearby Ottawa, Spring Valley, and Oglesby had all been evacuated there soon after the outbreak. Utica’s natural population of around 1500 people had swollen to nearly 30000, enticed by the promise of safety. Endless rows of tents had been erected to shelter the homeless refugees, and the small town began to resemble a war-torn city. The National Guard had put up a good resistance, but ultimately they were undone from within. There were several infected within the evacuees, and soon the National Guard had turned on their own. Thousands had died that first day, but as more died, more returned, and the whole evacuation center had very quickly become nothing but yet another place for the dead.
Many of Utica’s rapidly expanded population spread out into the surrounding area following the complete collapse of the safety zone, and Illinois was covered in the dead. Like a bad case of chicken pox, its towns and land were covered in festering spots of the dead with pockets of zombies everywhere just waiting for someone living to come along and give them a reason to move. Some wandered the streets, some the fields, and some remained trapped in the buildings where they had died. Eventually, it appeared that the living were wiped out, and after months of inactivity, the zombies in the area fell into a stupor, slumping to the ground or standing inside homes with nothing to draw them out. That was until sunrise, and there was movement at the camp on the top of the hill.
Freya had almost made it through the entire night without crying. She was still plagued by visions and nightmares, but somehow had managed to stay quiet as she slept. It was early morning, and Rose was watching her sleep. She was on lookout with Quinn, and they had separated to cover both sides of the camp. There was little to suggest they would encounter any trouble, and the night had been quiet. Rose saw Freya clench her hands into small fists, and the girl began to murmur. Rose had hoped to get some alone time with Erik in the night and see if he squealed like his son, but the chance had never arisen. Hamsikker had insisted on having two people as a minimum on watch at all times. Rose could tell Javier was annoyed, too, and it meant spending another day with the group of whining losers. They bleated about not feeling safe, about missing Peter, and how things were getting desperate with such little food and water. She hated being so close to the cop, particularly, and keeping up the pretense of being Mara was fun at times, but she longed to be free again. Javier had promised her he would take care of it, but when he was going to man up and do it, she didn’t know. She would never tire of Javier, but there was one oth
er man amongst them who intrigued her.
Hamsikker.
She had watched him back at the factory, noticing how effectively and swiftly he dealt with the zombies. The way he handled an axe, the way he kept it under such control, amazed her. It was as if he had been doing it all his life. He was strong, and she couldn’t figure out how or why he constantly put up with his wimp of a wife. Dakota seemed like she just drifted through each day, never actually contributing anything, but just content to follow the others and look pretty. Rose wondered if Hamsikker would fuck her like Javier. Was he a gentle lover? Dakota didn’t deserve him. Hamsikker wasn’t a sheep, he tried to lead, he tried to manage situations, so why was he tying himself to Dakota, just another slutty soccer mom who would grow fat before she grew brains? Women like her used to make Rose feel embarrassed, as if she wasn’t good enough. Now she knew that people like that were just zombie-fodder, and she was sure it wouldn’t be long before Dakota succumbed too.
Freya screamed, and Rose cried out, shocked.
“Jesus, Freya, keep it down.”
Quinn came running up to them both and knelt down beside Freya. “What is it?” asked Quinn. “Is she…”
“She’s fine, just a damn nightmare,” said Rose. “You watch over Sleeping Beauty for a while, I need to pee.”
“Keep on watch, Mara. Don’t be long.”
“Yes ma’am.” Rose turned her nose up as she left. She didn’t take orders from anyone except Javier, and certainly not from some jumped up colored woman, who should be serving Rose fries instead of ordering her around.
Quinn soothed Freya back to sleep, whispering to Erik that she was fine. Quinn sat down on the ground.
“Can’t sleep?”
Erik sighed and shook his head. He reached over to Freya and patted her head gently. “I don’t know how she is going to get through this. Peter was her rock. She looked up to him so much.”
Erik stopped as Freya murmured again, and then she fell silent.
“You think the dreams will ever stop?” Erik asked.
“One day, Erik,” replied Quinn. “Give it time. When you lose someone, there’s no getting over it. You just take it one day at a time. Eventually, the pain goes away, even if the memories don’t.” Quinn recalled seeing Roger eating her mother that horrible hungover morning, and shunted the image to the back of her mind. She couldn’t let her mind go there, and she swallowed. “If Hamsikker’s right, we could be on to a good thing with Janey’s place. I know we’re going to get there. She’ll be fine, you’ll see. We all will.”
Quinn looked at Erik, and he nodded at her in agreement. She could see he didn’t believe they would be fine, but she had to believe it. If she lost hope now, she would return to that dark place where her family was, and it was a place she never wanted to go to again. Quinn sat with Freya and watched the sun rise over the vineyard. The vines were thick and green, full of grapes, and the sunlight shone over them, illuminating a pair of small white buildings at the end of the valley. The sunrise was quite beautiful, and Quinn felt like today was going to be a lot better than the last one. She had been woken up yesterday by Pippa’s screaming. Peter’s death hadn’t seemed real until she had gone out there and seen it for herself. She had fought the zombies and been amazed when Hamsikker had come through it unscathed. Today was going to be different. There was even the sound of a bird overhead sitting in the oak tree, and the air smelt pure and fresh. If Hamsikker and Gabe were happy to share, then she planned on helping to drive, and God willing they would make it to the border long before tomorrow dawned. Roger was her past. This group was her future. They were going to make it, all of them, and Quinn smiled.
“Quinn, where’s Mara?” asked Jonas.
Quinn looked up at a tired looking face. “Bathroom. She’ll be back in a minute.”
“We should get going. I want to get on the road as soon as we can.”
Jonas went around the camp waking everyone, and soon everyone was in the campervan. Gabe asked him again about how wise it was going into town, but they needed food, and it was more dangerous not going. They were going to need a lot of energy if they were to make it to Canada, and they didn’t want to stop any more than they had to. Jonas explained how it was going to work. They would head into the town and look for a drugstore or grocery store they could raid. He and Gabe would go in with Erik right behind them as backup. Quinn would stay at the wheel, and if things turned sour, she was to take off and head back to where they had camped for the night. The priority was the safety of the women and Freya.
Jonas rolled down the windows in the van and sucked fresh air into his lungs as they drove out of the woods and back onto the road. It was good. It felt like more than just another day, more than just another sunrise. It was a fresh start, a chance to make things right, and he was going to make things work. If it was in his power, then he would have them a thousand miles closer to Janey’s by the time the moon was up. They just had to get from A to B. The hard part was how.
As they coasted quietly into Utica, Jonas looked around. Where was everyone? He thought they might find some zombies, perhaps wandering the main street, or maybe even chance upon someone living, but the town was curiously deserted.
As luck would have it, they had left the camp at about the same time as the army of zombies had arrived at it. The dead had taken the most direct route to them, through the fields and trees, trampling the grapes into the ground beneath their dead feet. When the van had taken off, the noise had turned them around, and the crowd of dead was right now behind them, heading back into Utica. Of course, not all had been drawn to the noise, and Utica still kept a few secrets amongst its derelict buildings.
“Maybe we can upgrade this thing for an RV. Would be nice to spread out a little,” said Terry as he tried to stretch his legs, only to find his knees were wedged into the seat in front of him.
“You see one, you let me know,” said Jonas.
“Over there, look.” Quinn pointed at a store just ahead of them that had a large blue sign over the door reading ‘Brenda’s Bakery’. It was sandwiched between a drug store and a nail salon. “There’s space out front to pull up. We might find food.”
“I want to check out the drug store,” said Javier. “There’s plenty of stuff we could do with. Headaches are the least of our worries, right, Hamsikker?”
Jonas knew what Gabe meant and had been worrying about Dakota not getting enough vitamins. They might be able to find some supplements that would help with the baby, and he really didn’t know the first thing about childbirth. “I’ll come with you. Dakota, you stay here with Pippa and Freya.”
“Let’s go quick. I don’t like this. It’s too quiet.” Erik put his hand to his side as the van rolled to a stop. He felt for his Glock, and then realized it would be useless without ammo. He picked up the hammer from the floor and opened the door. “Terry, you’re with me, we’ll go check out the bakery. Jonas, Gabe, you hit the drug store. Quinn, I want you behind this wheel. Any sign of trouble, you take off, you got it?”
“And what do I do?” asked Rose. “Sit here and look pretty?”
Erik jumped out of the van. “I’m sure you can manage that, darlin’.” He looked up and down the street, but it was quiet. The shops were empty, and there was no sound coming from anywhere. There was a scratching sound emanating from a storm drain, and Erik watched as a skinny rat darted out. It grabbed a piece of crumpled paper in its mouth, and then scurried back into the darkness and security of the drain. He turned back to the van to see Mara with a scowl that had settled across her face. “Look, you can make yourself useful, and keep a look out for us. Stay close to the van. You see anything, yell like there’s no tomorrow.”
“I’ll come with you.” Mrs. Danick made to get up, and Jonas pushed her back down. “No way. You’re staying put. Pippa, Dakota, and Freya need you here.”
“There’s a motel over the road,” replied Mrs. Danick. “I could take Freya for a walk. Who knows, we might find some bottle
d water, or…”
“No,” said Hamsikker firmly. He jumped out of the van and closed the door. “Stay here. Too many of us start snooping around, and the more of us we put in danger.” He nodded at Erik, and then turned to face Quinn. “If we’re not back in five minutes, get out of here.”
Erik and Terry went quietly into the bakery. They slipped in through the open front door, and Jonas turned to Gabe. “Watch my back, and be quiet.”
As Jonas made his way into the store, Javier took the Pulaski from Hamsikker so both of them were armed. He kept the gun hidden, but at hand. He didn’t intend to get caught now, and Hamsikker could bark orders any way he wanted. If there was a choice to be made inside, then ultimately Javier was going to be walking out of the drug store alive, one way or another.
It was a small room they entered, with a sole rack down the center of the store and a counter at the end. Jonas could see the racks had been cleared. Evidently the owner had the foresight to clear his stock away before abandoning the place. As he progressed deeper into the store, Jonas’s feet swept through a variety of garbage, yet he saw nothing of use. It wasn’t easy in the dim light. The store was illuminated by the open doorway, and Jonas scanned the shop. If they were going to find anything of use, they were going to have to search further, go deeper in. There was a closed door in the corner of the room and beyond the counter a door inset into an alcove behind a grill. He turned around and spoke in a whisper.
“Gabe, see if that door over there is open, will you? I’m going to check behind the counter.”
Jonas didn’t wait for a response but walked towards the counter. The register was open, empty, and he pushed aside the cluttered display of cough sweets and lipglosses. He leant over the counter, expecting to perhaps find a body, but the floor was clean, and there was nobody there. He jumped up, swung his legs over, and dropped to the floor. As he landed, his trailing leg knocked over a can of antiperspirant, and it rolled away from him before he could grab it. It hit the wall with a ding, and Jonas held his breath. The store seemed quiet, but he didn’t want to get caught out like he had been before. He slowly counted to five in his head, but the store was silent. He heard Gabe rattling the door handle behind him, but it seemed to be deathly silent ahead. Jonas stood up and approached the grill. The cupboard behind it was locked, and if the owner hadn’t cleared it out, it probably held a huge stock of medicine. The only problem was that the grill was secured in place with a padlock. Jonas scanned around looking for the key, but there was nowhere obvious he could find it. He could smash it open with his axe, but he was reluctant to break it, knowing the noise he made could put them in danger.