Jake leaned into the fridge pulling out the two frosty bottles and said, “Well, she damn near ran away without even saying goodbye.”
“Why did she do that?” Barry asked.
“Well, hold on. I woke up to the sound of the front door closing, and got up to see what she was doing, when she had gotten about a hundred feet from the door, I ran after her.
“Where are you going?” I asked, panting a little as I caught up to her.
“I’m going south, sorry Jake, but I can’t come with you.” She said, but didn’t stop walking away from the house.
I asked her “What are you talking about? There is no reason to split up, and I’m sure between the two of us…”
But she cut me off “Look I don’t want to talk about it.”
“But this is stupid!” I yelled at her, and stomped my foot.
She stopped walking and turned to face me. After a moment of hesitation and a heavy sigh, she realized I wasn’t just going to leave her alone until she told me why she was leaving. “Ok… You win…” She said, and proceeded to collect her thoughts for a moment. “I used to live in a small town just north of here, Oak Noll. Well that was before the outbreak. My family owned a bakery which usually meant long hours for my parents. So when the outbreak happened they were at work when I had just got back from school with… my big brother.”
She took a big breath and caught her composure before continuing her story. “We lived in a small farm house a few miles from town, so we really didn’t see any zombies. But, there we were close enough to hear the hell going on in our hometown. It took about a week for us to lose hope of ever seeing our parents again, but we never said it to each other. We were trying to be strong, so we could make it through the chaos. I think that was our mistake, instead of admitting what happened to each other and trying to move on to a safer place, we stayed there just faking that we hoped someone… anyone would come to save us.
Then one day after the power was out, I went out to pump the well. It was about a hundred feet from the house. I took the pistol with me just in case any zombies came at me. When I was just starting to walk back I could see a few trucks in the distance, driving up to the house. At first I was excited, I thought they were coming to save us. I started to run back to the house, but when they got out of the truck and went inside… I heard a gunshot.
I was terrified, but I had to know what happened to my brother Billy. I crept up to the house after that.” She covered her mouth and winced in the pain of her emotions, then continued. “When I got to the back door I could hear the men inside. They were laughing. I peaked in through the doggy door.
My brother was lying in a pool of his own blood on the kitchen floor. He was holding his gut crying from the pain. The men stood around him taking turns hurting him… They kicked him in the ribs, stomped on his fingers, spit in his eye, and laughed. The one with his back to me said. ”It’s too bad we had to shoot you for biting me boy. I would have loved to take you back with us.”
One of them saw the family photo on the shelf, and said something like “Ooh, you got a pretty sister, too bad she ain’t around. I would have loved to make her one of us, if you know what I mean?” My brother caught me out of the corner of his eye. He looked over at me. I readied my gun, with tears in my eyes.
But… He shook his head, and mouthed the word “Run.”
“What was that boy?” One of the men said looking down at him.
My brother lifted his hand, and even with several broken fingers and a shaky hand, flipped them the bird and replied “I said fuck you!”
The one with his back to the door, stepped over him and crouched down. He was right in his face when he grinned like a madman. “You’re losing teeth for that.” He said with a slight nod, before beating him in the face with the butt of his gun.
I knew my brother was right. There were too many for me to stop… and I couldn’t bear to watch him suffer anymore. I backed off shaking and crying, and crawled away from the house, until I was out of sight. I could still hear my brother screaming from pain as I lay in the field… It was about ten minutes before the sounds stopped, but it felt… like an eternity.”
I looked at her as she stared at her feet barely able to keep herself together as she told the story. “That was really brave of your big brother.” I said.
“…I went out to pump the well because he wasn’t really my big brother. I called him that because he was big for his size… He was only twelve!” she said breaking down fully. She knelt down in the field crying, and I just grabbed her and held her.
After a few minutes she pushed me off and got up. “That’s why I can’t go back north Jake. I can’t face them again.” she told me. “Those men had red ‘X’s painted on their backs.”
I hadn’t understood why she was so wary of me at first, but after that I understood what the real threat to humanity was. It wasn’t the zombies, they just brought it out. The real threat was human nature; the fact that when we are pushed against the wall we turn on each other. When we should have been working together to save people, we killed everyone else just to make sure that our survival was secured… because none of us were prepared for this.
“Why don’t you come with me instead Jake?” She asked me.
I had really considered this at the time. I looked at her trying to convince myself that going with her was the right way, but for once in my life I thought about the long term. I couldn’t just scavenge forever; eventually I would have to learn to live without what was left of the old world. I knew that if I was going to survive, I would have to go with my own plan, because that was the only way to avoid becoming just like the men who killed her brother.
“Because, I think my only shot at survival is up in the mountains. I’m anything but a survival specialist, but I know I stand a better chance of figuring it out where there are no other people, and no zombies. So to me, going up to the cabin is my only option.” I said to her.
The small gleam of hope in her eyes that I might come with her died as we stood there in the field. It was silent except for the light breeze that carried a few rippling waves through the grass. “Then I should go.” She said, turning away from me and getting to her feet.
“Wait! At least stay for breakfast or something.” I said, hoping I could get her to come with me anyway.
“No…” She barely whispered “It’ll only be harder if we wait.” She started to walk away, but I stopped her.
“Hold on one sec then.” I said taking off my jacket. “That coat is too big for you, lets trade, I could use the thicker coat with where I’m going, and I’m sure this one will fit you better.” She agreed and changed her coat with mine. It was still too big for me, but in the winter I would be glad for the extra warmth. “One more thing.” I said to her and she stopped and faced me. “You warned me about the ‘X’s so it’s only fair that I warn you that the city of Ashville is a wasteland. As far as I could tell there is no one left.”
She gave me one last smile, and said “Thanks.” before turning to walk away the final time. I stood there watching her, just hoping that she would come back so that neither of us would have to be alone, but she never even looked back, not once. It wasn’t until she finally left my sight for good that I went back inside to get my things from the house.
I prepared to hit the road, but I heeded her advice and decided to strafe around the outskirts of Oak Noll. At least that’s what I figured at the point. Things don’t always work out like you plan.” Jake sat there looking a combination of angry and haunted.
“What do you mean by that?” asked Barry.
Chapter 9
Jake stared at Barry with an intensity that was horrifying. “Oak Noll was hell.”
“I thought you tried to avoid the town?” asked Barry.
“That was the plan, sure.” Jake leaned back into his chair struggling with the thoughts in his head. “It just didn’t work out. When I left the house I went north towards Oak Noll, but when I got to, oh abou
t ten miles from the town, I veered off to the west.
There was a problem with that plan though, as I made my way closer to my destination, I found more and more zombies. There were only a few at first, but as I kept going they just kept getting thicker. At this point I had a bit of experience with the zombies, and I figured out a couple easy tricks to deal with them. Simple stuff, like throwing a rock behind them, and sneaking past as they were distracted, or just taking them out nice and stealthy, but… even with everything I knew there were just too many of them. I had a few close calls, which really made me slow down and think about what I was doing. I started to kill more of them in order to make sure that I didn’t get discovered and then surrounded. Doing that however, slowed my pace to a crawl, but I kept pressing on until…
Well, I was just about a quarter of the way around the town when I came upon a hill. I was cautious about climbing it, because the higher up you are, the more likely you are to be seen. So, I took my time and when it was good and clear made my way to the top of the hill. When I got to the top and saw what was on the other side, I hit the dirt.
Thousands… Thousands of zombies! When I looked over the area I figured out what had happened. I recognized the large tents in the middle of the fenced off area. They were the same as the tents outside of Ashville. This was the refugee camp for my city, and everyone who had managed to escape the city with the military died here. Most of the zombies were still in the chain-link fence, with a few pouring out of the holes. Now, I’m not exactly certain what happened there; I certainly didn’t stick around to find out, but I guess a swarm of the bastards big enough to overtake the camp came up and they surrounded the fence. With no exit, and limited ammo, it was only a matter of time till they made their way through a few spots of the fence. I’m sure a few people must have gotten away, but judging from the size of the horde, it couldn’t have been many.
I climbed back down the hill to safety and thought about what to do next. The refugee camp was right in the way, and it was big. The worst part was that other than the hill that was overlooking it, the camp was for the most part on high-ground over the terrain to the northwest. The line of sight from the camp was a good ten miles or so, which meant the only way for me to proceed was to walk all the way around the west side, and climb the backside of the hills facing it, or I could go closer to Oak Noll. It was a long walk to get around those hills, and I wasn’t about to let myself be seen by a horde that size. They may move slow, but I would never have been rid of them.
Now, I was warned not to go to town, but I thought I could get away with going a little closer, that and I was stupid, and impatient. So, I moved back down the hill, and back tracked a bit, because I had already cleared the path. I started to make my way towards Oak Noll and found that the zombie presence on the outskirts of the town were very slim. It didn’t take me very long to figure out why.
As I came up near a gas station that was backed up against a neighborhood, I heard the roar of an engine in the distance. I quickly ducked behind an abandoned truck that was parked off to the side of the building. As the engine got louder, which took a few minutes, I started to see what was going on in the distance. It was a man on a motorcycle, going all of about three miles per hour. I was wondering why he was going that slow, till I saw what was coming up behind him. There were a good twenty, or so zombies tailing the bike; he was using the bike as a way of herding the zombies toward the center of town.
When I realized what he was doing, at first I admired the ingenuity of it, but then I realized something, that he was dragging a swarm of zombies right at me. I had to make a move, or I would be pinned down if they saw me. The only path that I could see where I didn’t think that I would be discovered was to hop over the brick wall behind the station. So, I climbed up, as quietly as I could and jumped over into some back yard, which as it turned out was a horrible mistake.
I jumped headfirst into what I’m guessing was supposed to be a barbecue. When I got up, the group of men and I just looked at each other for a moment. “Hey, kid you need some help? Why don’t you come inside?” one of them asked me. At first I was relieved until one of them turned around to open the door, and I saw the ‘X’ on the back of his shirt. My heart raced. I tried to fake a smile, but I don’t think it came out right. A few of them gave me a shifty glace as they tightened their grip on some weapons they were holding, and shot glances at each other, giving a few slight nods. I think they were still hoping I would just walk inside casually, but after I wouldn’t move for a moment they asked me “What’s wrong?”
I bolted back towards the wall and tried to climb over back into the street. “Get him!” one of them yelled and he grabbed one of my legs.
“You dumb asses! You’re supposed to shut up when I’m leading the zombies back to th...” I caught the man on the motorcycle saying as rode by, but he stopped mid sentence when he saw me climbing the wall. “What do we have here?” he said pulling the bike near the wall, zombies in tow. I kicked the man who had grabbed my leg in the head, which made his friends laugh as he fell on his ass. It’s because of that, I managed to get on top of the wall. Unfortunately by the time I was free to jump the zombies were surrounding the base of the wall. “Go ahead boy, jump into ‘em, their hungry.” said the man on the bike ending his sentence while shaking his head a little to get the point across.
I had nowhere to go but back into the yard. I turned around slowly, and just before I could get a good look at the men. I felt my leg get yanked out from underneath me by one of them. I fell and hit my ribs on the wall before crashing to the ground; it knocked the wind out of me. I winced in pain trying to catch my breath for a brief moment, before they started kicking the shit out me. That… sucked…
Lucky for me I had lost consciousness somewhere in the beating, and didn’t come back around until they were dragging me into what I think was a dog kennel. I remember being face down on the concrete as they dragged me by the legs through the filth into some cage. They locked it after they left me inside, and spit on me for good measure. “See you in the pit.” One of those assholes said, closing the door to the room.”
Chapter 10
Jake rubbed his face for a moment, as he thought about the room that he was locked in all those years ago. He closed his eyes and took a moment to relax, and try and forget some of the pain, but it was only a brief reprieve from the memories, and he looked at Barry ready to continue.
“So, they caught you… How did you escape?” Barry asked engrossed in the story at this point. He had almost completely forgotten about how this was supposed to be relevant to the founding of the town of Bastion, and Jake could see it on his face.
Jake nodded, before getting back to the tale. “Hold your horses, I’ll get to it. After the door shut, it was dark. It took a moment for my eyes to adjust to light, and when they did I wish they hadn’t.
The room was absolutely disgusting. They had turned it into some kind of makeshift prison for holding people that they didn’t need. I sat up and wiped something off my face. I didn’t want to know what it was, but they dragged me through a puddle of blood and… something, it had a smell. But then again, the whole room was rancid. They didn’t wash the cages since they started putting people in them, and there wasn’t a toilet, so it didn’t take a thinker to figure out that the ground was like a sewer.
“Ooh! Another one joins us!” yelled out someone from one of the other cages to my right.
“Shut up!” replied someone in the cage to my left. To which the first voice muttered off into rambling noises.
Even though my eyes had adjusted to the light it was too dark to make out anything clearly, and I was still in a lot of pain. “Who’s there?” I said coughing a bit at the end, and grabbing my side in pain.
“Does it matter?” someone asked hopelessly from the cage across from me.
I took a minute to digest the situation. There weren’t any guards in the room, but the cages were solid enough to hold us without some real effort
, and each had a padlock on them. As I looked around the room I saw that quite a few of the cages had dark figures in them, other captives. And to top it off there were even a few cells where the prisoner had died, and they didn’t even bother to clean out the cage. The sound of flies buzzed nonstop in the room, and after a few minutes of trying to swat them away I found it pointless.
“Does anybody have a plan?” I asked naively to everyone in the room; it almost got a few chuckles from some of the others, but the room went silent except for the flies.
The man in the cell across from me was sitting in the corner of his cage, and he tilted his head in my direction, looking at me with that stare of disbelief that I could only barely make out. “No… we don’t got a fucking plan.” he said as he leaned against the cage wall.
“So, what? We just wait to die then?” I asked, getting a few looks, from around the room, but no one replied. A few moments passed and I leaned against the wall of my cage, and put my head between my knees. I was in total despair.
The light coming in from under the door flickered, and everyone in the room but me took notice. After making sure the lights didn’t flicker again, the silence broke. “Ok, here’s the deal kid, those idiots haven’t figured out that their boots cast a shadow under the door, so we can tell when their listening in.” said the man in the cell across from me.
I perked up a little, and realized that some of the people in here had not completely given up. “What’s the plan then?” I asked a second time. The effect was exactly the same as the first time.
“Well… we don’t got a fucking plan…” He said this time more disappointed in himself than in despair. “But, at least we’re trying. Let’s start with any new information. What do you know about these guys kid?”
“I really don’t know a whole, lot… they wear ‘X’s on their backs, and they kill people.” I struggled thinking of anything that might be useful. ”Oh, they heard the zombies with a motorcycle.” I added hoping it might mean anything. “And my name is Jake.”
The Red X_Complete Edition Page 4