by Josh Hilden
“How long do you think we can hold out?” Lisa didn’t want to ask but if they were going to be overrun she needed to know.
“I’m not so worried about the ones that are heading for us. For the immediate future we can keep reinforcing the perimeter until we run out of supplies. What I’m worried about is the increasing number of them we are finding inside the perimeter. We have a lot of living people that are trying to get inside but they have to make it past the growing swarm of Risen Dead.”
“If we are on our own how long can we sustain ourselves?” She knew that the answer was going to be bad.
“Three maybe four days and we will be out of food. And that’s only if the power stays on and we can keep pumping water the entire time. The council is considering everything but I doubt that they will come up with anything.” He shook his head in disgust, “Goddamnit this cannot be happening! The dead do not rise up and walk around!” He slammed his gloved hand against the wall.
“But they are.” She said quietly.
He nodded. There was really nothing else to say.
The radio clipped to his hip squawked and then a painfully young voice said, “Captain Sims you are needed at the Main Street Barricade, over.”
“This is Sims I’ll be there in 15, over.” He replied.
“Copy that, over and out.”
“Sorry Doc but duty calls. I’ll stop by again if I get a chance.” He tipped a phantom hat that he’d lost somewhere in the chaos and walked out of the hospital. As the door opened, she could hear the gunfire and smell the smoke that was growing thicker and thicker outside. A passing EMT told her that the city of Ypsilanti was burning.
She watched Sam head back out into the inferno that had been one of the nicest little university cities in the Midwest just 24 hours ago. Lisa knew that she needed to sleep in a really bad way, but she also knew that the dreams would come again.
She’d not seen her sister in a week. The last time they had talked Sandy had been really excited about her upcoming trip to the Bahamas with Dr. Preston. Lisa had not liked Elliot Preston on the few occasions she had met him. He’d seemed too oily and superior for Lisa to ever like him. But Sandy never dated many people that Lisa could tolerate let alone like. She prayed that she was okay wherever she was right now, but she thought that maybe she wasn’t.
Chapter Five
1
White River Bridge
White Harbor, Upper Michigan
October 18, 2012 AD (Day One)
3:00pm EST
Madness had come to Police Chief David Hall’s small town. Gunshots could be heard in the distance. On the streets of downtown people were walking around so heavily armed that you’d have thought the Minnesotans were getting ready to invade the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Considering what was actually going on David wished that the Minnesotans, or the Cheese Heads, or even the Canucks were really making a land grab. Except for the Military base up the river there was nothing of interest for anyone out here in the boonies. Heck even that base was nothing more than a supply.
Considering what was going on he was glad that they were out there on the river. If things got worse he might have to beg for their aid. But right now David had a task to accomplish. There were three people he needed to see and get on his side or else things were going to get a lot worse for his adopted hometown in a few hours.
David had been the Police Chief of White Harbor, the Township seat, for 11 years. He’d relocated from the City of Wayne in the Lower Peninsula after his marriage of seven years disintegrated and he’d lost the taste for law enforcement in the sprawling metropolitan area. In that time he’d done his best to control the poachers, the marijuana smugglers, and the dumbass drunks that seemed to be the dominant criminal residents of the area. Even with ten years of urban law enforcement and 11 years of rural law enforcement experience, nothing in any of his training had prepared him for the dead rising and attempting to eat the living.
As his cruiser rolled over the bridge the White River he saw a familiar ancient International Harvester pickup truck parked at the east end of the span. It was just the truck he had been looking for. He pulled to a stop and lifted his pump action 12 gauge from its cradle before he got out of the car to talk to Herb Hilstrand. He had been hoping to meet up with Herb first before he found the others and then headed back to the station. Hard choices were going to be made in the next few hours and he would need Herb on his side more than anyone else to prevent the town from collapsing into a full blown riot.
The word he’d received from General Hart on what was happening in Minneapolis and St. Paul gave him a real jolt. There was chaos in the downtown areas and the bridges over the Mississippi river were blocked and burning. When the General told him that all of his active troops had been ordered to the Twin Cities David wanted to shoot someone. If he’d known that these troops had not been reservists and guardsmen, but an entire battalion of Rangers, he probably would have.
David nodded to Herb’s brother Thornton as he approached them. The brothers were both armed with high powered scoped hunting rifles and smoking Chesterfields. When David moved to White Harbor to take the job of Police Chief he’d been surprised to learn that they still made Chesterfields. The Hilstrand brothers refused to smoke anything else. At 80 and 84 years old respectively, David believed that they would die with Chesterfields on their cracked lips.
“Hello Chief.” Herb, the older of the two, said nodding at David. The faint Scandinavian accent that so many of the locals possessed was especially heavy with the Hilstrand Clan.
“Hello Herb … Thornton.” He said acknowledging the normally taciturn younger brother.
“It’s a bit of a clusterfuck out there ain’t it?” Herb said. Herb always said what he was thinking and that was one thing David always liked about the Ex Township Councilman. That and 11 years ago Herb personally driving down to Wayne to offer him the job as Chief didn’t hurt.
“That’s the fucking truth,” David said and then paused for a second before he continued. He knew that he was only going to get one shot at this. “The Council has called a meeting for five o’clock …” he began but he never got to finish.
“And you think that shit head Jacobson is going to fuck things up don’t you?” Herb phrased it as a question. David knew that Herb had a very clear idea of what was probably going on behind the scenes. “I tell you what, he ain’t a quarter of the man his father was, or even half the man his older brother is. We’d be a hell of a lot better off if Einor and not Arn Jacobson was the Mayor.”
“I think that Mayor Jacobson,” he stressed the title but gave an unwilling grin, “is going to decide to do nothing until the Staties get here and save our bacon. When I talked to him he flat out refused to listen to any of my proposals.” That was actually a very watered down version of what happened. The conversation ended with Mayor Arn Jacobson telling Police Chief David Hall that if he did not do what he was told he would be looking for a new job. ”Without the backing of the administration in White Harbor, my resources as Township Chief are going to be like trying to stop a forest fire by pissing on it.”
“Well that can’t be allowed.” Thornton said chuckling at the image. Every time Thornton Hilstrand spoke it came as something of a shock to the people of White Harbor. He may be his brother’s right hand man on the fishing boat, but even when he had been a kid people had called him Harpo.
“No Thorn it cannot.” Herb didn’t raise his voice an octave but David could hear the annoyance at the Mayor that was contained in that short statement. “Chief, we will be there at the meeting. I think things may go a little different than Mayor Jacobson wants them to.”
“I’ll back your play Herb but we need to get things moving. I am getting reports from Police Departments all over the state and things are already out of hand. At least three communities here in the Upper,” to the residents of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula their homeland was always the U P pronounced “Yoop” or the Upper pronounced “Uppah”, “h
ave fallen completely off the grid.”
“Sounds like things are going bad all over, got a call from my cousin in Duluth. She is getting her family over here before the roads are blocked.” Herb was casual in the way he said this but David knew him well enough to pick the concern out of it. “And I think Chief that this is more your play I’ll be backing, than one of mine that you’d be supporting.” He grinned as he said it. It was a rare thing for a Troll, a person who lived under the big bridge down in the Lower Peninsula, to be considered a local up here. But David Hall managed it and Herb Hilstrand knew it. There was a fair chance that the people of White Harbor would fall in line behind the Police Chief.
David ignored this statement and instead looked toward the smoke rising from one of the bonfires that had been kindled out near the Township line. “I’m going to do a circuit of the perimeter and then head in for the meeting. We need to be organized by morning or I think we are going to be in a world of hurt.” David was heading back to his cruiser as he said this.
“We’ll be there Chief, and maybe we’ll be bringing some friends.” Thornton said. There were an awful lot of Hilstrands and their various relations in the Township.
David nodded to the men that he was preparing to entrust the safety of the town to and then started the engine. It was going to be a long day, and David feared an even longer night.
2
Near Jacobson Farms
3:55pm EST
The last gunshot was still reverberating in the air when the men began heading out into the now still field to collect the corpses for burning. David walked up to the leader of the hunting party holding his hand up high so that he would be recognized. The last thing he wanted was for one of the posse to decide the Chief was another walking corpse and put a rifle bullet through his head.
“Chief Hall,” Einor Jacobson said.
“Einor, how many does that make?” he gestured toward the growing pile of corpses on the far side of the fallow field that were waiting to be added to one of the bonfires.
“This last batch makes 72.” He wiped a glistening layer of dirty sweat off his sunburned bald head. “Got almost the entire Harris family in there, god damned shame about that. Jason and his boys would have been a lot of help. Little Lacy Harris is still alive though, she locked herself in the attic when the killing started in their house. When we cleaned it out we found her. She’s back at the farm with Tammy and the kids.” David was glad to hear that Lacy was alive and with Einor’s wife but Einor was right. Jason Harris, a former Marine, would have been a lot of help in the current situation. And both of his boys had been dead shots with a deer rifle.
“Did you hear that the Mayor called an emergency town meeting at five?” He asked Einor. David knew that what was said next would probably determine whether White Harbor survived or not, and if it did who would be making the decisions from here on out. It was almost as important for him to have Einor on his side as Herb.
“Yeah I heard.” He waited for a moment and really looked at David before continuing. Einor and David were not exactly friends, but they had always had a solid working relationship. Einor was always willing to tell the Chief about poaching and unauthorized, or wildcat, logging in the area. And the Chief for his part never looked hard at some of Einor’s more remote fields, where it was rumored he grew something a little more potent than corn or barley. “My little brother has always been a bit of an obnoxious and bossy little shit. But you know he means well don’t you?”
David breathed an inward sigh of relief before answering. “I know he means well Einor. He has been a damn good Mayor. But we need some decisive action right now not another town meeting. Things are getting bad out there”
“I know Chief, I know.” Einor said and the resignation in his voice was clear. “If the Hilstrands agree with you, I guess I am willing to stand with you at the meeting.” David had the impression that just maybe he was not the first person to journey out here to the edge of the township and make this pitch. The look on Einor’s face confirmed that thought. As one of the largest landholders in the area, Jacobson Farms employed more than a hundred people, and Einor held a large amount of sway in White Harbor politics.
“I’m not looking to oust the Mayor.” He emphasized Arn’s title to back up his statement.
“If I thought you were, David, we wouldn’t be having this conversation. And odds are that tonight we would have a new Chief of Police. Which by the way we won’t.” Einor said.
They were interrupted by shout from the field. “Oy boss behind you!” one of the heavily armed field hands called out to Einor.
Einor and David both turned and looked behind them. A lone figure came stumbling out of a section of the Northern Woods that grasped the Township of White Harbor like a giant’s mitt. A quick assessment lead David to believe that he was probably a hunter that had died in the woods. The day glow orange suit and the rifle slung over his shoulder were the obvious giveaways. The front of his jacket was encrusted with dried blood from a horrible facial wound that left part of his jaw and teeth exposed. He moaned and reached toward the two men and began to shamble toward them.
Einor didn’t even flinch and David had to admire that Norwegian staidness. He looked over at David and asked, “Does he look familiar to you chief?”
David studied him for a moment and then said, “I think he was part of a hunting party that headed toward Willow Mountain last week. There were seven of them if I remember correctly.” He looked harder at the man and then asked, “Einor, does it look like he’s been shot to you?”
“Yep, two in the chest,” Einor said and then drew the Colt .45 on his hip and took aim at the hunters head. “Do you mind Chief?” he asked.
David indicated his ascent and Einor stepped up to pointblank range and put a bullet in the dead man’s head. He fell over and Einor called out, “One more for the fire, make sure to get his gear.”
“This isn’t right Einor,” David said, “When people die they are supposed to stay dead. I have to be straight with you, I am really having a hard time dealing with the idea that everyone that dies from now on is going to have to be put down again. What happens when somebody dies in their sleep, and then gets up and decides to munch on their family in the middle of the damn night?” David had no idea why he was telling Einor this, but he had been holding it in since late last night and it needed to come out.
“People are probably going to have to start sleeping alone and in locked rooms for safety from now on.” He said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world, and he had been thinking about it since all of this had started. But David would have bet that he had come up with the answer from right off the top of his head. He was a practical man and David knew that he would need his help in the days and weeks to come.
“I’ll see you at the meeting Chief.” Einor said as he holstered his weapon and headed for his Jeep.
“One more to go,” David thought.
3
White Harbor Public Library
4:45pm EST
David pulled the cruiser up in front of the Public Library building. This was going to be the hardest of the conversations and he had the least amount of time in which to have it. Arn Jacobson for all of his faults ran a very tight ship, and if he said that the council meeting was going to start at five o’clock then even the Risen Dead would not be able to stop him from having that meeting at five o’clock on the nose. At least the government center building was less than two blocks down Main Street from the library. He heard more gunshots in the distance, “I think we are going to be hearing a lot of that.” He said to himself as he ran a dirty hand through his graying black hair.
“I expect so Chief.” A female voice said from behind him.
David nearly jumped out of his boots before he turned to face the speaker. It was Amy Waters, the Superintendent of the White Harbor Combined Schools. The very person he’d been looking for. Also she had been his fiancée until three weeks ago. Her blond hair was pulled back
into a pony tail and David noticed that she had a pistol strapped to her hip.
“What do you want David?” She didn’t sound hostile like last time but the question was brusque.
“The Council meeting is in 15 minutes.” He began but she didn’t let him finish.