Dropping down behind the front register he tried to look out the window. His line of sight was limited. He could see his truck and some of the shops across the street but his view was blocked by parked and wrecked vehicles. Looking around he found a round hand mirror. Alden moved to the door and held the mirror out first one way then the other. Still he could see nothing, but something told him it wasn’t right. Just then he heard the unmistakable sound of Humvee’s. “Shit.”
He turned to Ceara and Beth, “Ceara get behind that counter and tell Beth we got company stay down and stay quiet.”
Alden slipped out the front door and kept low till he got to his truck. It was then he caught the first glimpse of a glitter of sunlight off a scope on the roof of the old theater down the street. He moved just as a shot rang out. The bullet landed all the way at the other end of the street. He heard voices from behind a wrecked, van up the street and the sound of the Humvee’s coming from where the shot had gone. “Goddamn it. I’m caught in the middle with my ass hanging out here.”
He looked into the pharmacy and saw Beth and Ceara looking at him with worried eyes. He motioned them to just stay put. Just then the Humvee’s came around the corner one from the right and one from the left joining together. As they did, shots from automatic weapons rang out from the theater and from the wrecked van. Alden laid down under his truck as the two groups converged on each other.
The loud braaapp from the 50 caliber machine guns on Humvee’s let Alden know that the other group was definitely outgunned.
“Fuck, let them kill each other and I kill what’s left” is all he thought as he tried to get closer to the truck. Hearing a commanding voice giving orders from the Humvee’s he knew the man in charge was no fool. The Humvee on the left jumped the curb and started down the sidewalk coming up on the back side of the van. Fifteen men dressed in civilian camo poured out from all directions trying to get away from the onslaught. The Humvee on the right had trained its 50 cal on the rooftops and was making quick work of not one but four snipers that had spread out over two buildings. Alden thought nice plan boys but you didn’t get enough distance between each other.
The battled was violent and short lived. The Humvee’s stopped and nine soldiers got out of the vehicles. Alden heard a young voice first, “WE GOTTEM SARGE, WE GOT THOSE SONS OF BITCHES.”
The next voice was more calm, “Yeah we got’em but stay alert they may have more.”
The soldiers began to spread out. A third voice added to the conversation, “I make it 19 total, Sarge, the young girl said she thought twenty but she wasn’t sure.”
The Sergeants voice spoke again, “She may have been wrong but I want to be sure.”
Alden had to make a decision and quick as the squads were starting to disperse and search for survivors. He heard one coming around the truck so he laid his weapon next to him and closed his eyes. A young private walked up to him. “SARGE,” he called out, “I GOT ONE MORE HERE,”
Just as he finished his sentence, Alden swept the young man’s leg and then was on him quick pulling him up to his feet along with himself he had grabbed the young private’s sidearm. Alden Had the young man in front as his buddies all turned and cocked their weapons.
Alden called out, “WHO’S THE SERGEANT IN CHARGE?”
A man in his late twenties stepped forward. He was wearing the new digital fatigues. His uniform was soiled but that was from days in the field. The others around him stayed their posts which let Alden know they were well trained and well disciplined. The man spoke up, “Easy there mister. Your friends are all dead and no one else needs to die.”
Alden looked to the bodies then to young Sergeant, “Do I even look like someone who would associates with a bunch of undisciplined maggots. Tell you what, you tell me what’s going on and we can go from there.”
The sergeant looked to his men, then went on to explain to Alden what was happening. “Those…. maggots over there attacked a group of civilians back in West Plains. The killed a father and mother of a young girl then raped and plundered the rest of the group. We came up on it just as they were pulling out. We chased them over to this town. They had big pick-up trucks and had some heavy shit, a couple of RPG’s, some hand grenades, but they didn’t know how to use them effectively. We pulled back because Randy here grew up in this town, he knew what they would plan.”
The sergeant point to private Alden was holding, “He knew way the street was laid out we knew they would try to ambush us. That’s why they got here ahead of us. We let them set up then we took them down.” He looked at the bodies, “They’re fucking leaches, Sir preying on innocent people.”
Alden could just tell by the way the young sergeant spoke he was telling the truth. Alden looked at the sergeant and read his name tag, “Well Sergeant Cline, My Name is Master Sergeant Godfrey U.S. Army retired. We need to talk, but as you can see you’re outnumbered. So, I want your troops to lay their weapons down in the middle of the street and back off towards the theater. I want you to come up here with me and to show my good faith you can keep your weapon.”
Sergeant Cline shook his head and looked to a Corporal standing next to him. “What ya think Tom?”
Tom shook his head, “I don’t know. He looks okay, he’s definitely not one of them, and he does have Randy.”
Sergeant Cline stood for a moment and searched Alden’s eyes. His training had taught him how to read a man but Alden was unreadable. He finally spoke up, “Alright men, lay the weapons down behind me and back off. Sergeant Godfrey and I are going to have a chat.”
The men grumbled but did as they were told. As Cline moved forward he got to the front of Alden’s truck and spied the Green Beret inside on the seat and the Arkansas license plates. His eyes went wide as he suddenly realized who was standing in front of him. “Your Alden Godfrey, You were with Colonel Lansky in Grenada in 83’ and Libya in 85. I’m Staff Sergeant Jeff Cline, I served under Colonel Lansky in Iraq he talked about you…. A lot.”
Alden grinned, “yea Floyd had always had a big mouth.”
Cline looked at Alden, “Sorry His name was Car..”
Before he finished Alden Finished for him “Carl Johanson Lansky.”
Sergeant Cline smiled and Alden let the young man go. Looking to the kid he smiled, “Go join your buddies.”
Turning to Jeff he said “You come with me. They stay outside for now.” Jeff turned, “POLICE YOUR AMMO AND SECURE THE AREA. I’LL BE RIGHT BACK”
Alden and Jeff turned and walked into the store, “BETH, CEARA, It’s okay, I’m coming in with a friend you keep going about your business.”
When Beth saw Alden walk in with the Sergeant she smiled and nodded her head in a acknowledgement. However, Beth did not want to waste any more time, looking over to Ceara, “Ok girl, let’s do this and get this done quickly so we can get the hell out of here. Now, we can work quickly if you take one side of the back room in the pharmacy where they keep all of the prescription antibiotics. There will be a ton back there and you will probably get overwhelmed when you see all of the bottles wondering which ones I need.”
Beth chuckled and winked then continued, “Hell if I had the room I would take all of it but we will take only what we need right now.” Beth turned and walked into the back room with Ceara following close behind. “Follow me over here to the left where the aisle begins in alphabetical order. I will show you how to do it and if you have any questions let me know.”
Beth found the first bottle Amikacin and showed her the bottle with the grams, “This right here is a very important antibiotic used for treating severe, hospital-acquired infections. Now many of the infections in a hospital will be able to be cleared up by this. So if something is a little more infected and that penicillin won’t be able to cure it or if say the patient might be allergic to penicillin this is an all-around good antibiotic to help treat one.”
The look on poor Ceara’s face seemed really confused and Beth then realized that with two guys from the military
were guarding the doors out front, Beth could take her time. “Tell ya what hun, follow me and I will teach you everything I know.”
As the girls went to the back Alden looked to the young man, “Jeff is it?”
Sergeant Cline nodded, “Well tell me what’s going on in the world. Our little group as had no information for over two weeks.”
Jeff took a drink of water from his canteen, “Well Sir.”
Alden held up his hand and grinned, “Sergeant you know better.”
Jeff began again, “Sorry Alden, force of habit when around some one of your stature. Well let’s see, you’re aware that CDC is basically closed down. Their done for, all their offices and labs were overrun within the first week and those who were not infected were basically murdered by a bunch of pissed off civilians. The President was bitten by one of his aides so he’s gone now too. I heard they shot the Vice President too, along with that congress women from California.”
Taking a breath he smiled, “No loss there, as far as I’m concerned, that bitch hated us. Anyway, as the Government basically fell apart the military began to try to takeover. At first we were simply trying to keep some sort of civility going, but that did not work. The virus, that’s what they called it, spread like wild fire. We lost units in all the major cities. The last I heard the only organized units left were Special Forces and the S.E.A.L.S. along with groups like ours.”
It was Alden’s turn now, “So what is your group? Are you just a bunch of guys who went A.W.O.L. or are you a unit dispatched?”
Sergeant Cline looked down at his boots; there was no sense in trying to hid the truth from this man. He’d see right through the lie. “Well we’re what you’d call and independent fighting force for what’s left of our country.”
That raised an eyebrow with Alden. “You see, our post commander over at Fort Lost in the Woods, well he went nuts in our opinion, and began what one would call genocide. He started of course, with those that were infected, but pretty soon he became paranoid. He was giving orders to shoot people who even looked ratty, which by then were a lot of us. We had been through the literal hell as it were.”
Alden looked down, spit and his voice almost a growl, “Go on” he said.
Jeff became to feel a bit uncomfortable, he could see the look in Alden’s eye’s and knew the stories Lansky had told were true. Alden when pissed; was a cold killing machine till there was more evil to kill.
Jeff stood straight, “That’s when we left. We took what civilians we could and left in the early morning one day. We got them to a safe place and made sure they were armed and could defend themselves. Some of our initial group stayed with them. The rest of us broke up into smaller units based on whose family lived close to whose. You see, all we want to do is get home to our loved ones, if their still alive. Then try and go on from there. Randy’s Dad and grandma lived only five miles from my wife and kids. I sent her a text of their address and did get a reply that she would head over there. Randy’s Dad was a former Marine so I figured she’d have a chance.” Jeff trailed off as they both watched the girls raid the pharmacy.
Working quickly, Beth started down the aisle looking for the exact things that she knew that they would need. Quickly she grabbed a couple bottles of Azithromycin which would treat a number of possible infections that could come along. Then of course, she went for the Penicillin which she grabbed about four bottles of that. Stopping for a moment Beth then thought about some of the things that they may have to eat, like berries and other wild game things that may cause some digestive problems and immediately found a couple bottles of Metronidazole. If anything got inside the body that did not need to be there, this stuff would definitely get rid of it. Beth grabbed the two biggest bottles of that and Ceara kinda gave her a weird look. Beth remarked with a chuckle, “This medicine here will knock anything wrong in your tummy, right out of you!! Only drawback is it all comes out the south end, if you get my meaning!! Another bad side effect is that it tastes like your sucking on nickels, but it will knock any ickies out of ya that is for damn sure!”
Ceara smiled, “Can’t say I am looking forward to needing to take any of that.” Ceara held the bag while Beth chucked more and more stuff into it. After filling the bag with more antibiotics for just about everything she finished by getting a few tubes of really good Bactroban Cream. “This stuff right here Ceara…..well, you heard of Neosporin right?” Ceara shook her head and Beth continued while holding up a tube of the Batroban, “makes Neosporin look like petroleum jelly!!” With the bag weighed down heavily now Beth turned and headed out of the room with Ceara right by her side.
Just as they got out of the back room Ceara remembered soap, “You go ahead, I’m going to look around a bit more.”
Ceara walked up and down the aisles picking up razors, shaving cream, deodorant, and even found a small box of Tide. “Well Mom would be happy to know I finally have to do my own laundry.”
Most of the store was empty but she was pretty sure they had found enough to hold them over for a little while. Ceara still hadn’t found good soap, but they could make due with the Dial she had found at the farm. It was better than nothing in her mind. Making her way back to the front she saw the aisle marked outdoors, she turned down it and found charcoal scattered everywhere.
All the bags were gone except the tattered remains of two bags that Ceara figured several people fought over. Stepping around all the briquettes on the floor she looked for lighter fluid or matches, remembering about the gummy bears and how they had been kicked under a display she knelt down and searched under the shelves. These went all the way to the floor so she had no luck, “Damn it, well we made it this long without that stuff.”
She got back to her feet and dusted off her knees, grabbing her backpack she headed to the front of the store. Alden, Beth and the soldier were all talking and she set her backpack on the register to listen.
Alden looked up at Jeff, then noticed that Ceara and Beth had joined them. He looked at them and they had tears in their eyes. He knew the story had brought back their own painful memories.
Alden was about to speak when Randy came running in, “SARGE WE GOT COMPANY AND IT AIN’T THE AVON LADY!”
As Randy turned and started back out the door, he fired a round and hit a middle aged deadhead in a flower dress, “Well maybe she was the Avon lady but the rest ain’t.”
The squad had taken up defensive positions and were locked and loaded. The soldiers had massed around their vehicles and were ready for a fight and flee tactic. Jeff turned and looked at Alden, “Sergeant you take your lady friends and get out of here, we’ll cover you.” Alden turned to the girls, ‘MOUNT UP WE’RE GONE!”
Ceara and Beth didn’t giggle this time, they moved quickly throwing their plunder into the back of the truck and climbed in. Beth, in the middle and Ceara at the door, Alden moved to the driver’s side and started to climb in, “Sergeant I have a ten meter ham radio but not sure of an antenna yet If I get it working I’ll be on frequency 158.68”
Sergeant Cline waved as he ran to his Humvee shooting two deadheads that had crawled out of an alley. Alden started the truck and put it in gear he pulled out and turned down the alley the deadheads had come out of. Ceara screamed, “ALDEN THIS PLACE IS COVERED WITH DEADHEADS!”
Alden grinned as he pushed down on the gas and began running them over as he drove faster, “yeah I know” he said with a laugh.”
Beth looked at Ceara, “you know he seems to be enjoying this way too much,” as another deadheads body was crunched under the tire of the truck and they all bounced inside the cab. Coming out on the main highway Alden let out loud, “WHAAAAAAA HOOOOOO,” as they tore off back to their home. The sounds of machine gun fire coming from behind them.
Chapter 5 – Or Foe
Colt watched as the others pulled away, as the dust settled Colt wondered if he would ever see any of them again. Charlie’s hand landed on Colt’s shoulder, “They’ll be back, we’ll give them a few hours then we’
ll go after them if we have too.”
Colt looked down the road, “Yeah, ok… I just don’t know that separating was the smartest plan.”
Charlie laughed, “Well I don’t know about that, Alden always seems to know the best plan of attack and this was his, I trust his judgment.”
Charlie turned to walk back in the cabin then stopped in the yard, “How about we keep ourselves busy, I can go hunting and you get some wood cut and maybe Tabitha can look for that antenna thing Alden wanted.” Colt nodded and turned to follow Charlie to the cabins, Charlie stopped by his cabin to grab his rifle and Colt headed to the back.
The axe lay against the first cabin; he grabbed it as he walked by heading to the stump that he had used when he and Beth were here alone. Picking up the first log getting ready to split it, he heard Tabitha, “Hey, what’cha doing?”
Colt smiled as he let the axe fall, splitting the log, “Doing a puzzle, what are you doing?”
Tabitha smirked, “Primping for the Ms. America contest, how am I doing?” She twitched her hips and smiled.
Colt laughed, “Not bad.” He leaned over grabbing another log and Tabitha headed off to the shed calling over her shoulder, “Well I have to find that antenna that Alden wanted, wish me luck.”
Colt kept cutting hoping it would distract him from thinking about what could be happening to Beth. She was with Alden and that made him feel better but far from good. His mind wandered to Beth being mad at him and he had to smile, every woman was different. If he had said something Jessica didn’t like she would have just put her little hand on her hip, glare at him and simply say, “Really, you going to stick with that line or would you like a do over?”
Not Beth, Beth let it bug her for over twenty four hours before she let him in on what he had done. Soon Charlie was walking out with his rifle and waved to Colt.
Surviving Day By Day (Book 1): So it Begins Page 34