by Brown, TW
“No,” Chad said with a snort, “you didn’t miss anything. I don’t think anybody figured that out until well after the world had gone FUBAR.”
“Anyway,” Henry took up the story from where Siggy left off. “I guess the gal was bit and slipped back into the dome. She didn’t tell anybody. It wouldn’t have ended up nearly as bad if she wasn’t working as the assistant to the damn dentist.”
Chad glanced at Mark and Ronni who both wore knowing looks. It was common knowledge that a person did not need to be bitten to turn.
“Let me guess…” Ronni spoke up, “she infected a few people.”
“A few!” Henry snarled. “We have been out of gloves for the better part of seven years. The thing is, we practice good hygiene and everybody was apparently pre-screened and in top health. Nothing communicable…which sort of allowed us to regress to almost a Fifties cultural mindset when it came to that sort of thing. The bitch worked on the entire elementary and junior high classes during a two-day period. She infected over seventy children.”
Henry got choked up, and that allowed Siggy to resume telling the rest of the story. “We really must have missed holy hell up here. We stopped seeing any news feeds the day after the doors were shut. The re-supply obviously never happened, but we had a killer hydroponic system that worked using the natural underground reservoir we were tapped into. We have been using eco-fueled generators that run off waste and power our lighting system as well as a solar panel farm that we were patched into until last year when it just suddenly went offline. Hell, we were self-sufficient enough to go on forever. I guess this was going to be some sort of Mars colonization testing facility. Everything is sectioned into pods that are hooked together sort of like a train. The problem came when the infection started to spread.”
“We got locked in with those damn things!” Siggy blurted. “Somebody hit the emergency switch that put us on lockdown. That prevented any attempt at an escape and too many of our people could not accept that these children were monsters all the way up until they would vanish under a pack of them.”
“We all would have probably died in there if not for the fire,” Henry said grimly.
Just then, an explosion boomed from the direction that Chad was pretty sure had to be the general location of this bio-dome complex. A handful of smaller ones sounded right on its heels.
“Scratch that whole idea of probably,” Siggy quipped.
***
The next day, they were on the move again, and that is when Jody began to think that perhaps they were biting off more than they could chew. He quickly stuffed those thoughts, attributing them to the fact that he was simply becoming too accustomed to being a regular guy, a husband, and a father. Somewhere along the line, his relationship with Selina had taken his desire to be a soldier away and replaced it with this new cautious and perhaps even timid version of himself.
This is what gets a person killed, Jody thought as he walked along the mostly washed out remains of an old country road. When they came to the remains of a bridge, one of the people responsible for carrying the hand drawn map told him that this was the Cache River.
“We are less than a mile out, sir,” the young man reported.
Jody called everybody in; it was time to start acting like a damn soldier instead of whatever the hell it was that he’d been doing for the past few years. Hell, no wonder Danny hardly had anything to do with him lately. He had become soft, tentative, and more of a politician than a warrior.
“Okay,” he said to the expectant faces, “as soon as we cross that river, we have to consider ourselves in enemy territory. I believe that the information we were given was false, so we will have five people go across first and scout the location. Obviously I will be one of the people making that run. I am asking for four volunteers to join me.”
He had not gotten the entirety of that statement out of his mouth when several people stepped forward. Since he was not familiar with any of these people in regards to how they operated in the field, he made his selections based on a different sort of knowledge. He chose people without young children. That was also when he came to another realization that punched him in the gut: all of these people had families. They were just like him.
“Can I ask you all a question?” Jody asked the entire group. He saw nods from almost everybody. “Can a few of you tell me why you volunteered for this mission?”
One of the individuals that would be joining him raised her hand and he noticed that the entire group seemed to defer to her. He knew the woman’s name.
“Go ahead, Kary,” Jody said with a slight nod of his head.
“If there is a threat to our community, and if it is serious enough that you feel the need to send our citizens, not to mention the fact that you were personally going to oversee this mission, I felt it was my duty to be part of the team to ensure our community’s freedom and way of life,” Kary explained.
As she did, Jody saw all of the heads nodding in agreement. He felt a sense of something that he had lost a long time ago become reinvigorated. That had been the same reason that he had enlisted all those years ago. When his dad and mom asked why he would do such a thing instead of going to college, his answer had been very similar. Of course, he had also been more than a little influenced by the events of September 11, 2001.
“Okay then,” he said with a clap of his hands, “everybody else stay put until we return. If you have not heard from us by nightfall, assume something has gone critically wrong and return home. Help get the entire community activated and prepared for anything.”
A few hugs and well wishes were shared and then Jody was on the move with his squad. He was familiar with Kary. He was almost certain she had a teenaged son. Also with him was Jess Gandley, one of the women who had gone with him in the field a number of times since they had settled the community of Hope. She was a crusty, hard woman who was known for her sharp tongue but amazing heart. The other three were people that he only knew in passing.
Red shirts, his mind whispered. Every mission needs a red shirt or two.
He stuffed that thought away almost immediately. He did not consider any of his people expendable. Each of these people had friends and family back in Hope. It was his responsibility to ensure that as many of them returned as possible.
They crossed the river and started across the overgrown fields that had become almost like jungles. There were places where the wild grasses grew taller than most people. That was one thing that the citizens in Jody’s community took great pains to control. Besides offering a place for zombies and raiders to use as cover, it was also a very flammable source of fuel for wild fires that could start with an errant lightning strike (if it wasn’t started by a careless human).
It was not long before they ran across the perimeter sentries. A small copse of trees on the left sat in a sea of tall grasses and out of control vines. It was one of the team Jody did not know that pointed and signaled for the group to halt. At first, Jody thought that maybe the man had imagined something, but then he caught the flash of sunlight hitting something reflective.
A few minutes passed that felt like an eternity before Jody had seen enough to formulate a plan. In the time he and the others watched, he was able to spot two single-man roving patrols. That did not mean there were not more, but at least he had a place to start.
“Can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs,” he whispered.
He broke his team into pairs and decided to partner up with Jess since he was at least somewhat comfortable with her. “This is where it gets ugly. We will move in from the front, left, and right. Jess and I will be coming from the front. As soon as the rovers leave the trees and head your way, take them down. Do it fast and then rally in the trees.”
With that, Jody and Jess started towards the trees after giving the other teams a few minutes to get wide of the location. They entered the tall grass and eventually were on their bellies just inside the trees where a small shack was built to blend in well with t
he greenery. Three people were visible. One was just inside the door of the hut sitting at a desk and reading a book of all things. The other two were on stumps sharpening some very nasty looking blades.
Jody pointed to the one on the left and edged that direction. Jess positioned herself for the other and they both brought up their crossbows. With one hand in the air, Jody signaled the countdown on his fingers.
Three…
Two…
One…
In almost perfect unison, a pair of bolts flew to their targets. Jody’s caught his in the throat and sent the man backwards as he flailed and kicked, his hands clawing impotently at the end of the shaft that jutted from his neck. Jess caught her target in the eye. Both jumped to their feet as they reloaded. The person in the hut looked up in surprise and died with that same expression on his face as Jess fired first and hit this one smack dab in the heart.
Looking around, Jody saw nothing too interesting. There was a peg board on the wall inside the hut that had rows assigned to “Sentry 1”, “Sentry 2”, and “Sentry 3”. Gray pegs were apparently moved across the board as the rovers checked in. The problem was that he had only seen two rovers; that left one unaccounted for.
The mystery was solved in short order when the sound of somebody approaching from the direction of Delaplaine came from the trees. The person managed to emerge from the well-traveled path just to the right of the hut when a pair of crossbow bolts hit him in the chest and face.
Less than five minutes later, the other two teams arrived. By then, the rovers had been stripped of anything useful and Jody’s team was on the move once again. As the bend in the road came into view, so did a single house. This was obviously an outpost of some sort. A tall fence had been built around the house and a large area surrounding it. There was a moat as well as twenty foot high towers at each of the corners.
“There is absolutely no way we can approach that without being seen,” Jody said.
To their left, a series of silver silos were visible. Even from this distance, it was obvious that those silos had been converted to watch towers as well. They could do a huge circuit of the area, but Jody was pretty sure they would find that they would encounter more of the same.
“If they have enough manpower to commit to this, they sure as hell have more than fifty people,” Jess, always the realist, grumbled.
“Agreed,” Jody said with a pensive sigh. “Perhaps we should call this off and return to Hope and focus on our defenses.”
“How would these people know who we are or where we are from?” one of the red shirts asked.
“That is a good point,” Jess said after a moment. “I have an idea…”
A few minutes later, Jody and Jess were walking down the middle of the road towards the miniature fortress outpost at the bend in the road. They were still a few hundred yards away when five people on horseback emerged and began to gallop in their direction.
“This is a really stupid idea,” Jody said from the corner of his mouth.
“Why didn’t you say so before we walked out into the open and made ourselves known?” Jess shot back.
The pair came to a stop and raised their hands. They still had all their normal weapons on them because it would be really stupid for anybody to be walking around unarmed these days.
“Hey!” Jody called as the horses pulled up and fanned out around him and Jess. “Just passing through, we don’t want any trouble. In fact, we were sort of hoping that your place took in folks who were willing to work hard and carry their weight.”
“Is that right?” one of the men said with a nasty smirk. “Well, that might all be well and good, but since you weren’t brought here by Drew and the boys, something tells me you are full of shit. Most likely, you are part of some two-bit raiding crew. The problem is that you just bit off way more than you could chew.”
“You mean the guys we found dead back in those trees?” Jess asked, sounding more annoyed than nervous. “Hell, we thought you guys killed them.”
“What?” That exclamation came in a number of ways; each with its own individual expletive depending on the person.
“Yeah, we found four guys dead back in those trees and thought that they might have tried to cross you guys or something,” Jody continued with the story that they had decided on before approaching this place.
“That doesn’t make any sense,” the man who had been the spokesman of the group snarled. “Something about this doesn’t feel right.”
“You really think we would just walk out in the open like this?” Jess shot back. “Our community just got wiped out a few weeks ago by some group of lunatics. We figured our best chance at survival was to find someplace bigger and better equipped to deal with a group the size of the one that hit us. We knew of two large communities in the area and you guys were the closest, so we decided to give you a look.”
Jody kept his eyes locked on the man who had been doing all the talking. It was obvious that their story was not going over. He was getting a little worried…then the first bolts flew.
***
Entry Nineteen—
Maybe I should just throw myself off of one of the many cliffs around these parts. I want to believe that I am a good person and that I am acting for the benefit of humanity, but I think I am just becoming more and more like those I hunt.
This started because I discovered a terrible murder. I took it upon myself to do this. Nobody asked. I simply threw the cross up on my shoulders and began the journey. I keep telling myself that I was not hired and that I can simply pack what little I have into my backpack and find someplace else to settle down and call home. I certainly could have left after the girl finally succumbed to her injuries. I think she might have had some internal bleeding. Whatever the case, her death was certainly slow and agonizing.
As for the young man, he eventually gave me all the information I believed him to have and so I finally ended him through suffocation. Here is the kicker…at the time I was holding that piece of plastic tarp over his face and he was thrashing about, I was telling myself that it was better than if I’d slit his throat.
How sick has my mind become when I am rationalizing which method of murder is best?
Like I said, maybe I should just throw myself off a cliff. I actually went to one this morning. It was a perfect day. There was a mist weaving through the trees and it was like looking down into a big, fluffy pillow of cotton. I almost convinced myself that I wouldn’t feel a thing. I couldn’t see the ground below, but my brain flashed an image at the last second as I was leaning forward. In that split second, I saw those huge boulders and all the scree. Yes, it would hurt quite a bit.
Obviously I returned to my cabin. However, I am not sure how long I will be able to resist that voice in my head that tells me that my time has come and I have outlived my usefulness.
Entry Twenty—
I guess Kenneth has decided to take a more active approach in trying to discover what has been happening to his little minions. Had I been paying attention, the man would be dead and perhaps I would have been able to move in on those kids by now and change their mindset.
Yes, I have decided what my actual mission is here. I need to take down this Kenneth Mead and assume his role. My thinking is that these children are obviously very impressionable. If I can instill in them the spirit of hard justice that I have been practicing, then just maybe this will have been worth it.
I was out scouring the area for food when I heard the noise. I followed the sound of voices and came to the top of a hill. I was on one side of a massive ravine. On the other side was a man that looked to be in his fifties. He was standing up on a log and addressing a group of five youngsters. They were too far away to really determine their age, but I knew who and what I was looking at, so I guess my mind has filled in the details.
The man was the only one I could really see since he was the only one not wearing a hooded cloak. His long, gray hair was pulled back in a ponytail and he had a beard that woul
d have made the guys in ZZ Top jealous. He was wearing jeans and what looked like a heavy denim shirt with metal bands sewn onto it. He had a spiked baseball bat over his shoulder. I mean, it probably was just a carved club with spikes, but it looked baseball batty.
The one thing that I saw that got my blood up a bit was one of the youngsters standing in front of him. It was obviously a female, and she was leaning with her back against the man’s legs. He was running his hands over her shoulders, caressing her in a way that implied intimacy. That punched a hole in what I’d been told. That also gave me the reason I needed to fully commit to taking that guy down.
It is simple fate that has given him one more day of life. Had I been on the other side in the direction of the place they call home, I would have been able to figure something out and end this human piece of crap.
I guess I am over the depression or whatever it was that has been kicking my ass these past several days. Suddenly I feel invigorated. I have a mission now. I am going to kill the leader of these New Aryan kids and teach them a new way. A better way.
My way.
Entry Twenty-One—
Today I made the long hike that took me to a spot where I could actually see the compound these little miscreants call home. I am honestly a bit impressed. I now think that perhaps this Kenneth person might have been in our military.
It is a well-patrolled base of operations. The roving security personnel are not on any sort of routine schedule that I could time and exploit. Also, I got a good look at the place and see how easy it would be for somebody that stumbled on this location to think that the other two buildings are occupied. It took me a while to realize that the movement I saw inside was not the living. I am not sure how he has managed to do it, but there are what look to be kids that walk past some of the windows. I have some very high grade binoculars, and that is how I saw that the supposedly occupied buildings are housing zombies.
I have given it a lot of thought. I really don’t want to kill any more of the followers. If I have to sit in these woods for a year, I will do what it takes to make sure that the next person I kill is Kenneth Mead.