Safety (One Eighteen: Migration Book 1)

by Christopher Wiig

  A kings ransom.

  From the kitchen Sarah said "You don't need to pay me, Jonas. We're friends, right? Friends help each other out.... just for the pleasure of it. One lump or two?"

  I don't know what I answered, but the next thing I remember is that I was laid out on the cushions, with Sarah idly running her fingers through my hair. My head was cradled in her warm lap and she offered me tea a sip at a time.

  "Did Willy do this to you?" she asked. I didn't answer. She knew he had. After a few minutes I felt stranger still and the pain started to slide away, becoming distant. Like someone else's pain. Nothing to worry about.

  "You... drugged me?" I said... or something along those lines. I don't really trust my own memory at that point. My head was swimming, and delicious ripples of satisfaction coursed through my flesh. The pain fled. She laughed.

  "A little. Just some Vicodin. Feel better?" she asked, still stroking my hair. I nodded. Something inside me screamed "get out," but I didn't want to leave the safety and warmth.

  Her robe had fallen open and I was face to face with The White Lady on her stomach. The mixture of the Vicodin and Sarah's breathing made the tattoo move, and as I lay there transfixed I watched her beckon to me.

  Then Sarah was dangling a pill bottle over my head playfully, the words Percocet on the label. It was a small bottle, about a fourth full. I reached for the bottle but she pulled it high out of my reach.

  "No, no, no, Jonas," she teased, "You've got to earn it." She took my hand and lead me to the bedroom. In the distance a lone coyote barked a long, soulful dirge.

  I left with the Percocet, ink staining the fingers on my good hand. I took two pills just to take the edge off the self-loathing. Never again.

  There's ten more pills in the bottle. I can ration them. Four today, three tomorrow, two the day after. The last one I can split into fourths, to help with the detox.

  As I finish writing for the night, I'm struck by a thought that troubles me more than a little. Did Fetch beat me BECAUSE of Sarah? Or did he do it on her behalf?

  I can take one more tonight. Just one more, to take the edge off and help me sleep.

  I can handle one more.

  Jonas Waight

  Kidding himself

  [File Notes:]

  Finally a tidbit of serious, useful information to pass on to the brass and ensure the continuation of this project. After losing two analysts I was starting become worried they might scrap the project. Amazing to think one of our scouts made it nearly fifteen hundred miles, and visited at least two reasonably large cities on the way!

  No wonder we're swelled nearly to capacity here. I wonder if the other groups were so successful.

  We were worried about the scouts getting out of Houston... the ones who went across the bridge. The ones who left by boat presumably had it easier, since they could hug the coast until they found a safe place to land.

  Why can we send small groups through, but whenever we try to take the city the dead appear in such force that we always have to fall back to the bridge?

  There's not much else here that we didn't know already, though it's lucky for us that Franks made it through Omaha before THAT debacle happened. Had he been caught up in the “Omaha incident,” I doubt we'd be hearing about Sgt. Franks arriving in South Dakota.

  Still, it's interesting to hear Omaha being referred to as a "functioning city."

  [Personal Notes:]

  I'm not sleeping well. It's not nightmares, or anything like that. It's just thoughts. There's so much we don't know about this Journal, about the AO's, about the world.

  I feel like I'm about to drift off and then I have an epiphany and suddenly I'm back in detective mode, wanting to run down a lead. Then I have to leave. To the journal, to the library, to the coroner.

  Adrienne thinks I'm cheating on her. I know she's taken losing Jessica harder than I did. I can escape into my work, (and I suppose I always have.) Adrienne has no similar outlet.

  Maybe it's cruel to treat her this way while she's so fragile, but I'm on the verge of major, serious breakthroughs. I'm not always going to be available every time she needs someone and it's unfair to expect that of me.

  I'm rambling.

  Tomorrow, look into any possible meanings for the number twenty-two. Moore's death still vexes me and until I understand the why, I can't move on.

  It's not obsession.

  [Long pause.]

  Give the new girl an extra five minutes or so with the journal. We need to stress test her.

  [Short pause.]

  Also... pick Adrienne some flowers.

  It'll give me an excuse to go back to the garden and retrace Moore's steps.

  Chapter 6:

  The Drugs We Need, The Drugs We Want

  “Gotta get my mojo runnin',

  Engine hummin'...

  Don't I?”

  Peeping Tom, Mojo

  February 19th, 2008

  Two pills left, and I've got to go over the wall tonight. Not enough. Not nearly enough. I tried to ration them, but it just hurt so fucking bad.

  You take one, just to take the edge off. Then you realize that you're not thinking about walking corpses as much, or the cold, or the fact that John Sanford is never going to write another novel. That there's never going to be another Apatow flick.

  You don't get depressed at the fact that all your favorite bands are probably long dead, along, with every person you ever called a friend.

  That kid who kicked your ass in third grade? Dead. The girl who gave you your first kiss. Dead. That guy who does the infomercials about getting fit in under eight minutes a day? A walking corpse somewhere. You feel all that slide away just a touch.

  And you take another.

  Suddenly you're not reliving using a teenage girl as a canvas for images that Salvador Dali wouldn't conceive on an opium bender. You're not wondering when Robert Valentine is going to stick a knife in your ribs. You're not even concerned about the greenish, off-smelling gunk that you find on your hand when you change your dressing.

  And for the first fucking time in nearly eight months, you're content.

  I can deal with it. I just need a couple more for what I have to do tonight. Someone else needs pills more than I do.

  Em's hurting bad. I visited his house today, and when he didn't answer the door I broke a window and let myself in. I found Emmett curled up in a ball in the corner of his bedroom weeping; gripping his stump and moaning.

  "Get the frick out of here, Jonas. I didn't invite you," he growled. I tried to help him and he screamed "Get the.... get the FUCK out."

  The swear hung in the room like a foul stench. I've NEVER seen Em so bad off that he legitimately swore.

  I think it humiliated him, me seeing him like that. I remembered just a few days ago when I was in his position, just wanting to be alone in my pain.

  He was soaked with sweat, and stinking of moonshine. His medicine is so fucking close, just two miles outside of town. There's two full bottles of Lyrica in his garage, but only the Deputies are allowed to leave town to get it. He needs those meds.

  I tried to do things the right way. I dragged Horace in to Em's house when he refused to send the Deputies after the pills and made him look at Emmett himself.

  "It's too God damned far," Horace said. He looked at Em like he was some sort of bug. He didn't care.

  I argued with him, told him I'd go with them. I even offered to go alone. He said no. Fat lazy fuck. The Deputies have gone further out on hunting trips than that. They've probably BEEN to Emmett's place before.

  "It's two below zero," I argued. "There's not a Dead Thing that can move faster than a crawl in this weather. Just let me go if you're too scared."

  His lip quivered and for just a moment I thought he was going to hit me. I balled my good hand up into a fist and prayed that he would. I hadn't realized until that very moment how badly I wanted to knock that fat fuck on his ass.

  It was his rules that turned us into
a stone aged society. His kids that played "Pin the Fist on the Jonas" with me and put me in so much pain that I had to go back to the witch, and draw on her back while she moaned and... doesn't matter.

  His fault.

  "Raise that fist and you're gonna need a fucking dentist," I growled.

  Horace postured but I felt it. Fear. Just a touch, but he was scared of me. He had plenty of time to throw a fist before Em struggled to his feet and pushed between us.

  He didn't.

  He's scared of me. Right now, he should be. I'm running out of patience with him and the rest of the Hitler Youth.

  "I'm fine," Em said through clenched teeth.

  "Hear him? He's FINE. You're not leaving this town," Horace said, turning and stalking out the door.

  "I'm going." I shouted after him, "You hear me?" Horace slammed the door behind him, the rest of the glass in the window shattering. Em went to clean it up but I wouldn't let him.

  "I'm fine. Why'd ya go and do that, Jonas?" he asked, taking another long pull from the moonshine. His free hand was idly trying to work the cramps out of his missing leg.

  "Because I need you well," I said.

  I told him about Alex, and Franks, and Galveston while I cleaned up broken glass. About all of my ideas. About the caravan. About the shotguns Jackson Tate had stacked up in his rec room.

  (I've been thinking about the shotguns a lot lately. The Deputy kids like rifles (because the scopes make them feel like snipers in a video game I'd suppose.) With their hunting backgrounds, the rifles feel familiar in their hands, like a best buddy and they defend their practicality the way they would a friend. They swear by the things.

  I don’t agree with that at all. If one of the things is far enough away that you need a scope to take off its head, it’s far enough away that you don’t need to waste ammunition shooting at it. Live and let shamble, I say. But up close you need to drop them quick, and in one shot. A lot of people don’t like them because of the big kick, the big shells and the small capacity. But for me, that’s your bang for the buck (literally) right there. You need something that will take off a head every shot even if you you're not exactly on target.

  I’ve been considering all of the things I won't need for the trip that can be used to trade for more shotguns, who has them. If you give a shotgun to someone who can’t shoot well, they're still likely to slow the things down a step or two. A step or two all you need when you're on the move, so that's money well spent to me.

  The legality isn’t really an issue at this point and the customizing seems easy to do. I couldn't tell you how to mount and align a scope, or add a red dot sight, or half of the things my tattered “Guns and Ammo” suggests. But I can chop a stock or slice a few inches off a barrel with tools I've already got in my possession.

  With a cut down barrel and a chopped stock, you’ve got something you can sleep next to. Something you can wear around your neck on a strap. A 12 gauge panic button. Maybe two if we had enough to spare. We'd have at least a half dozen if Jackson will come with us. Jackson Tate... That's when I added him to my mental list as well.)

  "But first, we've gotta get you well,” I told Em “We'll need cars.” He looked at me skeptically.

  "Electricity turns people nutso," Emmett said. “I can't ever work on cars again.” I checked the door carefully for any eavesdroppers, then leaned in close to him.

  "It's not true. I've been using a flashlight for a while now," I told him, "That's not all. A digital watch, some other things. Franks even had a stopwatch, I saw it on a rope around his neck. I bet he uses it to count down when something dies.”

  “What about radios and-” Emmett said, but I rode over him.

  “It's JUST things that receive transmissions. We could chop out the radios and we're gold. If the roads are clear we could do the whole trip in a couple days."

  As I spoke to Em, the plan started to gel in my mind. I-29 was practically a straight-shot for the majority of the trip. If the change happened in the middle of the night, it's unlikely to be impassible in many places, and clearable in the places where it is with a little know how and a truck.

  A tow truck, even a good truck with a good chain, and we could clear anything we needed out of the way. Circle the wagons at night, be quiet and safe (and armed if necessary.) All the way to Omaha. If Omaha's still alive we can resupply there, pick up more people, more supplies. More guns. One long wagon train.

  "I... I get to work on cars?" He said.

  "The whole trip."

  That was it. Em was sold. He could care less about the rest of it if he was allowed to touch a car again.

  I celebrated with half a pill to take the edge off of the itch in my left hand. Then I went to find Franks. It took me about an hour or so to track him down. I found him talking shop at Jackson Tate's home.

  Jackson was smoking a Virginia Slim, and scowling at it after every drag. "Not a man's cigarette left in this whole fuckin' town," Jackson's fond of saying. I trade with Jackson every time I get cigarettes. The man is a chimney. You bring it, he'll smoke it. He burned through the Marlboros I traded him in about a week. Loves Marlboros.

  The two of them had stripped down Sgt. Franks' AK to it's component parts and were cleaning it with gun oil. Franks was in the middle of a story:

  "So there are like six of these fuckin' coyotes, right?" Franks said, running a cloth across the barrel of the AK, "And they're dragging this poor fuckin' AO across the road. Cute girl too... well, woulda been cute if she was alive."

  "AO?" I asked, sitting down with them and picking up a cloth. I've learned a little about cleaning fire arms since the mess, enough not to make an ass of myself.

  "Mr. Clumsy!" Franks said, his voice full of comradery. He's a hard man to dislike. Kid, I guess. He's younger than me. "Ready to tell me who beat the shit out of you yet?" Jackson looked me over and chuckled as he checked the spring on a magazine

  "I walked into the door," I said to Franks with a wry smirk. "But seriously, AO?"

  "Altered Organism" he said, "Army speak for 'dead fuckin' zombie.' They're not quite ready to stop blaming terrorists up in... Galveston. Fuck, I almost said Washington. Time's change don't they? They've got the asshole's sending me out to die in a completely different place, now. It's crazy. Where was I?"

  "Cute dead girl," Jackson said.

  "Yeah, yeah. Cute dead girl. So these six coyotes are dragging this AO along, and she's completely oblivious to them.”

  “She's swiping at us, snapping, biting, and just has no idea why she can't get us. She knows where she wants to be, but she just can't make it happen and it's funny as hell.”

  “Meanwhile these coyotes are pulling her across the road, and they get her... like... caught on a telephone pole. They're pulling from both sides, feet and arms, and she's t-boned on this thing and she's still trying to get at us.”

  “So, me, I'm a nice guy. I mean, it's funny as hell, but that's someone's daughter or sister or some shit, you get me?” Jackson nodded in a way that said he did indeed “get him,” and Franks continued.

  “So I try to do the right thing. I take a shot at her head; trying to put her out of her misery. But I miss, hit the phone pole and I promise I'm not lying; a ricochet hits the alpha dog right square in the chest and kills it."

  "Oh shit," Jackson said, laughing. “How close were you?”

  “Like twenty feet.”

  “Shouldn't missed,” Jackson said. Franks grinned.

  "I was laughing so hard my hands were shaking. So from there, things go ape-shit. All the coyotes run off except the biggest, meanest bitch of a coy-dog you've ever seen. And she's PISSED.”

  “She's gotta be the alpha dog's mate because she just b-lines for my throat. Meanwhile the AO's free now, so she hops up and tears after Benson. I'm not even gonna lie, I panicked like a motherfucker between the two of them, and missed with about 10 rounds of good old American firepower before the coyote tackles me."

  Jackson coughed. "Russian firepower." />
  "Yeah yeah yeah, shush. Russian. Anyways, Benson's rifle jams and now panics and start's swinging his M-4 like a Louisville slugger; beating this AO into pulp.”

  “Where's Mac, you ask? Mac's rolling on the ground laughing his ass off as I'm trying to get this coyote off of me. Now Mac's a good guy, don't get me wrong. He's normally Johnny on the spot with shit like this. But the situation, it's so... bizarre.. he just can't get it together."

  "OK, I came in late, who are Mac and Benson?" I asked.

  “Jonas, you just ruin a good story. Let him tell it,” Jackson said, punching me in the arm. I winced and he said “Sorry. Forgot.” Franks ignored us, he was on stage, we were the audience.

  "Squaddies. We started with me, Mac, Benson and Baker. Lost Baker trying to get through Houston. Couple AO's got the drop on us before we really learned how to maneuver out there. Mac died from a fall."

  "Benson?" I asked, and was immediately sorry I had. He looked angry for a moment, and then he just sort of stared off into space for a while.

  "I killed Benson. Fucker went bad," he whispered.

  "Did he-" I started to ask, but he growled.

  "He went fuckin' bad and that's the beginning and that's the fucking end of it. Now do you want to hear the fuckin' story or not?"

  I have trouble with curiosity I never seem to know when to stop asking questions. We cleaned the gun in silence for a few minutes before Jackson said "So... Mac was laughing his ass off?"

  "Yeah... Yeah, Mac is laughing his ass off, and I'm trying to get this big bitch off me. And the funny thing is, I'm actually apologizing!”