Winter's Salvation

by Deyo, Jason

  “How was it being passed?” Sam asked.

  “Well that’s the thing, Mr. Wielder figured he must have passed it on. Maybe after eating after his children, but then his wife started acting the same way, so he rushed them into his lab. He gave them the same antidote he gave the first volunteers and waited. More and more reports came in from all over the world. Eventually his families pulse started to slow and they started to turn violent. He rushed them to the hospital and saw many other children and adults with the same symptoms were in the emergency room. Then the cramping started. He realized that he passed it to his family and they passed it to their families and so on. This all happened at once. Everyone started to change all at once.”

  “That’s the story I believe.” WoJo said cutting in then sitting down next to Elijah. “It makes more sense than hell is too full, or some kind of crazy stuff like that. Besides I think that was on some movie or something.”

  Elijah finished his yams in one huge bite, “So when would you like to start helping out with our village.” He emphasized our as an invite into the village.

  Eric forced the white meat substance into his mouth and spoke sensitively. “We were really just looking for a place to stay for the night. We were intending to head north. I was going to find my family. I lost track of them the night all this happened and have to go to them.” Naomi and Sam looked at him inquisitively.

  Eric saw them from the corner of his eye, but said nothing and did not acknowledge their stare.

  “Well I’m sorry to hear that. I was really hoping you could have helped out around here. We are in need of a mechanic and the lil school we have set up, sure could use a good math teacher.” He said sadly. “But I do understand you have to find your family. I do hope you find them and everything is ok.” He stood up from the picnic table and extended his hand to them. “I have to be going, but please stay as long as you’d like and if you come back round these parts you are always welcome.” They all shook his large hand. “If WoJo has any food left over maybe he could get you guys a doggie bag or something.”

  WoJo nodded, “I don’t have much, but I can scrounge up something.”

  “That would be awesome.” Eric smiled.

  **********

  They finished their food and began their trek back to the tent. They passed rows and rows of make shift shanties that butted up very close to the boundary fence. There was only enough room for a guard to walk a muddy path in between them. In the center of the village were sections of tents and small wood huts that circled an open area with either a camp fire or a fifty five gallon drum that was used for fire. They passed the old wood paneled RV that the sheriff lived in. It was made to be a section of the perimeter and two sections of the fence were tied into the front and back bumper of the RV.

  They heard the sound of laughing and carrying on and as they walked closer to the ruckus they saw a pavilion made of wood staging and painters tarps stitched together that draped the top of the pavilion. At the stage or front of the exhibition area was a blond haired woman that was trying to talk louder than the groups of children talking and carrying on. She was writing on a small chalk board a basic multiplication problem. Her audience consisted of twenty five youth. The youngest had to be five or six and the oldest looked to be about fifteen. Most of the older children sat on plastic chairs and the younger kids sat on wooden logs lined up in rows. The older children that did not have a plastic chair pushed and shoved its peers for their seat. Naomi saw this and immediately thought that this woman can’t possibly teach all of these children with such a wide range in age.

  Eric was the first to crawl into the tent and begin to gather his things. Naomi stayed outside and looked at her surroundings. She saw a village that had potential for a new start. She saw a village in which she could make a difference and she felt a sense of security and that is what she needed right now, for her and more importantly for Sam.

  She heard rustling inside the tent and Eric tossed his orange back pack out of the small flap. Eric looked up to her since he was on his hands and knees wondering what was she waiting for and realized she was having second thoughts about leaving.

  “I think Sam and I are going to stay here.” She said to him looking down on him. She liked looking down on people; she felt it gave her power over the people she was talking to. Sometimes she would stand on a curb and look down on the people she was with just to give her the satisfaction of being higher than everyone else. Then Naomi realized what she was feeling is the reason most of the men in her life have left her and she did not want Eric leave her. She knelt down in front of him, “I would like to give this place a chance. These people could use your help, our help, and I need to stop running for a day or two at least. My neck and back have been killing me ever since this all started.”

  “I really need to know about my parents.”

  She brushed her hand across his face and cupped his cheek. “I don’t want you to leave without me, but I need a couple days just to stop running. We are all tired and need a sense of peace for a little bit.”

  Eric stared deep into her dark green eyes and then turned to Drew, who was standing behind her. He hesitated for a few seconds, breathed deeply, “We’ll give it a shot, for a little bit at least. We all could use a break.”

  Naomi smiled and leaned closer kissing him on the lips then hugged him tight against her body. “Thanks.”

  Chapter 14

  Getting Comfortable

  They walked back to the paneled RV and Eric knocked on the small door. Two black rusted steps led up to the door, but time had sunk the tires into the ground and the bottom step was now resting on the overgrown grass. The door opened quickly and Elijah squeezed his broad shoulders out from the door taking a step out of the RV. He had a smile on his face and they could tell he knew what they were going to stay.

  “So what do we do now?” Eric said.

  Elijah let out a roar of a laugh and gave him a hug. The sheriff was like this with all the people in the village. He could not contain himself to resist the urge to ruffle a kid’s hair as they ran by and he purposely ran into everyone in the village at least once a day, just to ask them if they needed anything. “That is outstanding. We will start first thing I’ll set everything up and show you exactly what you need to know. Let us go find Doc. He keeps track of all the paper work and all that stuff.”

  “Paper work?” Naomi asked

  “Yeah just so we know who is living where. Doc takes care of that as well. He is not only the doc, but a real-estate agent as well.” He said that jokingly, but thought for a second about it. “Maybe we work that man too hard? Yeah we have to get you situated with a new place. That small hole is not going to work for ya’ll anymore. That’s guest housing. You’ll be moving into one of the circle communities.”

  Eric and Naomi were both rather concerned, but decided they would keep quiet until they found out what exactly was in store for them. They met up with Doc and he showed them to their new home. It was a yellow and green domed tent, just big enough for the four of them. Eric could see that one side of his body would be pressed against the side of it though. It was located on the left side of the path that led into this semi circle, so anyone that entered this community could see their shadows if they had the lantern lit. In the middle was a camp fire that one of the residences took great care in decorating the fire pit. Every stone was specifically placed and stacked around the fire. Around the fire pit were logs for people to sit on and roast their own food.

  Doc explained, when someone leaves the middle tents, they will be filled in order from oldest resident to newest resident of the community to have the opportunity to choose and change their tents.

  Doc stopped by the school first and then asked Elijah to continue the tour, because he had to make sure the latrines were being dug and maintained properly. They could tell they were getting close from the volume of laughter and chatter from the pavilion. As they got closer they saw Dan, the red neck guard leaning against o
ne of the pavilion’s support beams talking to a few of the older students in the back of the class. Whatever he was talking about had them enthralled as they laughed and carried on pushing and shoving one another.

  “This is Miss. Unthank.” Elijah motioned to the blond haired woman at the center of the pavilion, trying to be speak louder than the teenagers. The older children stopped carrying on when Dan saw Elijah and fell silent, turning his attention from him and looked toward the teacher.

  Elijah acknowledged Dan’s presence, but did not greet him. “I’ll leave you here and you can get situated with your new coworker and your new class.” He looked down on Sam and Drew and shook his hand on top of Drew’s head, then let out a welcoming wave to the teacher and she waved back, but with only a fraction of enthusiasm.

  Naomi, Drew and Sam, walked down the middle isle of the class and walked to Miss. Unthank who extending her hand. They greeted each other, then Miss. Unthank waved to the class, dismissing the children to return in a few minutes. She is a short, heavier woman with long blond hair. She wore a very neat grey turtle neck sweater, with a black skirt and black low heeled shoes. She looked to be in her early forties, but that could be because she was overly stressed and it was beginning to show.

  “You are the best dressed person in this entire place.” Naomi said trying to lighten the mood.

  “I try to give them a little remembrance of what an actual school was like.” She rubbed her hands down her skirt as if to press out the nonexistent wrinkles.

  “So you were actually a teacher?” Naomi asked happily.

  “No. A teachers aid in college many years ago though. I guess that was enough to put me here. Victoria by the way.” She put her hand to her chest.

  “Oh, Naomi.” She returned, “We just arrived here last night and Elijah offered us a place to stay. Who can resist a decent place to stay now a days?”

  They talked for some time before the children started to funnel in. “So how did you want to do this?” Victoria asked.

  “Did you have some type of curriculum?”

  Victoria laughed, “Yeah trying to keep the older ones quiet while the younger ones who actually still have some manners, count the seconds until I have a nervous breakdown.”

  “Why don’t I take the older kids and I will start teaching some basic math to them and you take the kids between five and ten.”

  Victoria agreed, wrangled them up and left the pavilion. The ones that were left ranged in age from eleven to sixteen and were scattered in the back of the class. They were all at the highest part of the pavilion and fighting over the few plastic seats. Drew and Samantha sat in the front of the class on the first set of logs. “Hello everyone, my name is Naomi and I will be instructing this class from here on.”

  Most of the kids ignored her and continued to banter amongst themselves. “I am not going to scream over you all day, so would you please come to the front of the class.” The youngest in the class moved closer, but the older ones continued to take no notice of her. She stared for a few seconds at the eight students that talked amongst themselves.

  She walked up the middle dirt pathway to the top of the pavilion, where two of the teenagers were trying to force themselves into a white plastic chair and without hesitation Naomi grabbed it out from under both of them. Neither one of them wanted to give it up, so the momentum threw them both forward over one of the wooden logs. With chair in hand she walked to the other two occupied plastic seats. She grabbed the back of the closest one and pulled up on the back of it forcing the kid to stand up and out of it.

  She looked at the other student, who had already stood up and put his hands out as an offering. “Take that one to the front of the class.” She paused, “Please.” Her back was coursing with pain, but she resisted the urge to show it on her face and never let her movements show her discomfort.

  The teenager stood up and walked behind his new teacher, listening to his peers snicker and call him obscene names as he walked down the dirt path. He turned and smiled to them as he took the calls and sat next to Drew and Sam.

  The gang in the back continued to carry on as Naomi put the plastic chairs behind her. “Now you all can go find Doc and I’m sure he could replace you with the current toilet hole diggers.”

  They all stopped and acknowledged her with a stare.

  “Do you have a problem? Can you not hear? I said go find Doc and go dig some shit holes so we all have a place to relieve ourselves after class.”

  None of them moved, they stood staring at her and waited for her next reaction. Was she serious, they all stood in amazement? The teenager that was now standing by himself, since his friend was now voluntarily sitting in the front of the class broke the stillness and made his way to the front and sat on the log next to his friend. The other students followed shortly thereafter.

  Now with the entire class sitting in the first two rows she continued quite happy with her accomplishment. “My name is Naomi and,” she looked at her daughter, “This is my daughter Samantha,” She looked at Drew for a second, “and this is my son Drew.”

  Drew sat back and gave it some thought and decided that he was acceptant of the title. He was happy to, officially, be part of a family again. Sam stood up and gave a wave and Drew stood up nodding his head to the class affirming Naomi’s gesture and showing her that he welcomed it.

  **********

  Elijah and Eric began to walk to the opposite end of the village. Passing a few more circles of tents and a few make shift houses that were shaped like lean-tos. Periodically they would pass one of the wooden structures that were built on top of metal staging next to the perimeter fence.

  “What are those for?” Pointing to the staging.

  “We have guards watching the camp twenty four seven. We have not had any undead enter the village since we put the fence up and since the guard towers, we have not had one touch the fence.” He seemed rather proud of himself, “We are very safe and secure here. I assure you, you will not have to worry about being woken in the middle of the night by the undead biting at your feet here.”

  They walked the rest of the way in relative silence with the exception of Elijah shouting out greetings to every other person he passed. The opposite side of the camp was beginning to make its self visible with a series of vehicles and two buildings that were built from the same staging as the towers, but constructed with better materials and visibly more structurally sound. Both could be seen very close to the perimeter fence and one was very close to the fence’s swinging gate and the other was about twenty yards further from the first building. There were more people walking around in this area than any other section of the village and the vast majority of them were men or older boys.

  “Everyone here in the village helps out in one way or another.” He was working his way up to tell him what he was going to be tasked with. “We have over eighty working class people here in the village and from the age of sixteen until you become incapable of performing any task, you have to assist us in your trade. Since you are a mechanic we would like you to assist us in maintaining our fleet. Also since you were in the military we would like for you to put some of that expertise in assisting in defense and acquiring supplies. All the mechanics are assigned these extra duties.”

  Eric was not the greatest car mechanic in the world and in fact despised working on them, but he agreed to help. “I don’t know about the whole expertise thing.” He looked up at the large man, “I was in the Coast Guard.” He laughed, “Now you put a buoy out there and I could scrape the shit out of it, though.”

  Elijah laughed a good hardy chuckle and then spoke calmly. “Maybe we could use some of that discipline you may have received and use it to motivate and to keep the village running properly. Sometimes the younger kids try to be heros and go off and almost get themselves killed along with the people working with them.”

  Eric thought about this for some time and continued to walk toward the busy section of the village. “I’m not making any
promises, but I will do what I can for the duration that we’re going to stay.”

  “That’s all I can ask of you then.” Elijah was pleased with his response.

  As they made it closer to the motor pool the red ford truck they had seen the day before was parked next to the swinging gates entrance with it’s hood up and someone working in it. Next to the pickup was a few cars and SUV’s, but this was the only truck. The back part of the village butted up against a thick section of woods and the same road they walked on to get into the village was the same road that led completely through to the opposite side of the village. They walked to the building closest to the swinging gate.

  “Jacob.” Elijah said as he tapped the man on his back.

  When they got up to the truck, long thick blond dread locks were tied together with a piece of twine that held them stiffly down the middle of his back. The man pulled away from the car and stretched. He is very thin, thinner than what he appeared when he fought the undead in front of the grocery store and the thick dread locks appeared to be too thick for his small frame. He looked at Eric and then to Elijah, “New guy?” He had a slight Boston accent that to Eric just did not seem to fit his clean shaven tight face.