"Wow, that’s lucky." Kenji said.
"Yeah. If I’d spent anymore time in that town, I would’ve died."
"From dehydration?"
"No. The recon team had tracked something big to the area. They said it was a miracle it hadn’t found me."
"What was their target?" Daniel asked. "What were they tracking?"
He shrugged his massive shoulders. "All I know is they call them ‘anomalies’. Something to do with the dust storm that hit. Judging by the way they were acting, I’d say it was something big, bad and scary."
"What the hell does the dust storm have to do with anything?" Maria asked.
"The dust storm was man-made. And now because of that, the outback is no safer than the cities and the towns."
"A man-made dust storm?" I asked. "That’s impossible."
"Is it?"
"Yeah," I answered even though I wasn’t sure.
I mean, the dust storm was huge. It covered the entire eastern seaboard of Australia and stretched way out west into the outback. Daniel had told me that there had never been one like it before. Ever. That’s why it was initially thought to be nuclear fallout or some sort of nuclear winter.
But it wasn’t.
It was something else.
"So the recon team took you back to the Fortress?" Daniel continued.
"Yeah. They were convinced I was contaminated or something. They couldn’t believe I was still breathing. They locked me up in quarantine for a few days. But they eventually gave me the all clear and let me out."
"And then you joined one of the scavenger teams."
He nodded. "Met with General Spears. He told me that in order to stay, I had to earn my keep."
"General Spears?" Kenji said. "He was in charge of operations in Woomera."
"That’s right. He is the boss man. I told him I didn’t have a problem with earning my keep. Told him I’d be happy to do it. I got in his good books. Joined up with a few other people local to this area. We knew the towns, knew the terrain. As a result, we were the best scavenger team the General had at his disposal. So we were afforded certain luxuries."
"Like what?"
"Extra food. Booze if we wanted. We got to keep any money or anything valuable we found. Not that there was any point to keeping that stuff."
"How many scavenger teams were there?"
"Not sure. We were all kept in different sections, isolated from each other. Just in case there was an outbreak."
"What did you scavenge for?"
"Anything and everything. Food and water. Fuel. We’d usually leave just before sunrise. Make sure we were back before sunset. We’d been out most days for the past month. We had some close calls but like I said, nothing bad ever went down. Until today."
"What happened?"
"I guess our number was up. We found a town. It appeared to be empty. She vouched for it," he said motioning towards the dead woman. "She said it had been evacuated early on. And from our vantage point it looked to be deserted. But it wasn’t. They came outta nowhere. The buildings, the storm water drains. In a matter of minutes we were completely surrounded. Everyone freaked. Complete panic. Complete chaos. We were separated."
My heart was beating loud as the stranger told his story. It was all too familiar.
"I just hope she had the guts to end it quick," he added.
"She did," I said.
He raised his eyebrows in surprise. "Good for her."
"So what now?" Jack asked. "Are you going back to the Fortress?"
"Not sure. I’m starting to think I’m better off on my own."
"You can’t be serious," I said. "You nearly died on your own."
He nodded slowly. "I’m aware of that."
"Why?" Maria asked. "Why would you want to be alone?"
"These people, the people at the Fortress, they won’t last long," he said.
"Why not?"
"It’s only a matter of time. There’s barely any food out here. Barely any water. This place becomes more and more dangerous with each passing day. These people will probably end up killing each other first."
"Not everyone is evil," I said. "Not everyone will forsake who they are just to survive."
"Believe me," he said. "We’re all gonna die out here."
"These people are just scared," I continued, trying to convince myself more than anyone else. "They’re just being careful. We’re on the same side."
"Maybe I wasn’t clear before," the stranger said. "But it’s like this folks. When the virus first hit, people lost. They lost big. They lost everything. You’re right about these people being scared. They are scared out of their minds. Fear is what motivates them. That is why they hit you. That is why none of us are getting out of this town alive."
I was shaking my head as the stranger spoke. I did not want to believe him.
"There will come a time," he said. "When your survival and your friend’s survival will make you do things you never thought you were capable of."
CHAPTER 16
After we realized there was nothing we could do about the corpse of the dreadlocked woman we were all silent for a few minutes. Eventually, the adrenalin rush of being on the run all night and surrounded by the infected and then captured and blindfolded wore off. Exhaustion brought on by dehydration and starvation took over.
Jack then remembered that he’d left Doctor Hunter’s computer back at the farmhouse. I told him not to worry about it. When we get out of here, we could go back and get it.
We sat down and tried to rest and conserve our energy. We sat down on the opposite side of the vault to the stranger. Nothing was said between us, but we made sure Maria was completely surrounded and protected by the guys.
I felt like saying something to the stranger. Something like, ‘hey, don’t you dare try anything. Kenji is a martial arts expert and a U.S. Marine. And Daniel is an elite Special Forces soldier’. But I didn’t say that. I was too scared it would just provoke him.
A few hours passed and I began drifting in and out of consciousness. Daniel and Kenji both managed to keep themselves awake, still not trusting the stranger or the people upstairs. But I could tell they were both fighting off sleep. Every now and then their eyes would close and their heads would dip. But they remained awake. Daniel once told me that they trained for situations like this. Well maybe not exactly like this. But sleep deprivation was an important part of their training. It was called ‘hell week’. He said that during ‘hell week’ he slept for a total of maybe three hours. I initially thought he meant three hours a night. Not so bad, right?
But no. He meant three hours in total. For the whole week.
Sounded more like torture than training to me.
I had just closed my eyes and felt myself falling into dreamland when the vault door clicked loudly as it was unlocked. Once again, the heavy door slowly swung open. Everyone was immediately wide awake. I wondered if they were going to throw another dead body in with us.
I actually scuttled back away from the door.
Kenji and Daniel jumped to their feet, making sure that Jack, Maria and I were behind them. Jack held Maria tightly. The stranger continued to sit in the corner, on the pallet of cash. He had barely moved.
Four armed men entered the room. They were all carrying rifles. They may very well have been our rifles.
One of them spoke. I recognized the voice. It was the guy who’d told me to stop talking. The guy who had hit me in the face. He was a fairly large man. Not compared to the stranger, but still not someone you’d want to come across in a dark alley. He was completely bald and slightly overweight. He had multiple tattoos on both arms.
"Don’t get any wild ideas," he said as he pointed his rifle directly at the stranger. "Especially you, big guy."
"Wouldn’t dream of it," the stranger replied.
The three other men seemed to have various injuries. Black eyes, broken noses. Fat, bloodied lips. These injuries were no doubt inflicted by the stranger.
Both
Kenji and Daniel held their hands up to let the men know they weren’t a threat.
A few seconds later another man entered. He was wearing a black robe.
It was the priest.
The first thing he did when he entered the vault was kneel down next to the woman. He stayed there for a few minutes. After awhile I thought I could hear him whispering. I couldn’t be sure, but it sounded like he was asking for forgiveness.
Begging for forgiveness.
He then made the symbol of the cross over the woman’s disfigured face.
In the name of the Father.
The Son.
The Holy Spirit.
Now and forever.
Amen.
He stood slowly, his knees cracking as he did. He then held his hands out to greet us. "My children," he said quietly. "Welcome to Hope."
I can’t speak for the others but I for one was getting mixed signals from these people. One minute they had rescued us, the next minute we were their prisoners. One minute they were giving us water and the next minute they had thrown a dead body in with us. And now the priest was welcoming us with open arms as four guys with rifles stood behind him.
Mixed signals.
"OK, enough with the niceties," Daniel said, getting straight to business. "What do you want with us?"
The priest tilted his head to the side as if he was confused. "Want? We don’t want anything from you."
"Then why did you lock us up?" Daniel asked. "Don’t get me wrong, we appreciate what you did for us back there and we’re grateful for the water. But why did you take us prisoner? Why tie us up? Why blindfold us?"
"Why did one of your men hit me?" I added.
"I apologize for the rough treatment. Really, from the bottom of my heart, I am sorry. But I assure you, it was all necessary. It was for your protection and for safety of the group."
"Protection? Hitting me was for my protection?"
"Yes," he answered calmly. "The dead have risen. Judgment day is upon us. The forces of evil, the forces of hell, they are relentless. They will hunt you down. They will not stop. You must understand, your voice, your scent, your very soul is what attracts them. That is why we hide underground. That is why we only ever go outside when it is absolutely necessary."
I was looking at everyone else to gauge their reactions. Judgment day? Forces of hell? Surely the priest was just being dramatic, right?
"We’re not stupid," Kenji said. "We know what we’re doing. We wouldn’t have made it this far otherwise."
"That may very well be the case. But we are barely surviving. We could not allow you to compromise what we have here. It’s not much but it is our home now. I am responsible for these people. They look to me for answers. We must stay vigilant."
"So you’re in charge here?" Daniel asked.
"No. I am not in charge. I am a guide, a shepherd. The Lord is in charge. He has a plan for us all."
The stranger chuckled. "Amen," he said.
The weird thing was, when the stranger laughed, the guards flinched, as though they were scared of him. Which, I guess they probably were.
"I also want to apologize for leaving you down here in the vault for so long," the priest continued. "But we had to make sure none of you were infected."
"You could’ve just asked." Jack said.
"We could’ve. But people tend to lie. And when people lie, it puts the whole group in danger. The only real test, the only real guarantee is time."
"We’re not infected," I reassured him. "Far from it."
"Good."
The priest was all smiles. But there was something about him I didn’t like. For example, if he was so concerned about us being infected, why the hell would he lock us up with the corpse of someone who had been infected?
"Why did you bring her down here?" I asked, pointing to the dreadlocked woman.
"Again, I apologize for that. I understand that being in the same room as the deceased can be uncomfortable for some people."
Especially someone who is missing half of their face, I thought.
"But we had to lock her up down here," he continued. "We have no electricity, no refrigeration system. This is the coolest place."
"You could have just buried her," I said. "You could have left her where she was."
"The way I see it," Daniel said. "You put the group in danger by bringing her down here. She’d been bitten. Doesn’t seem very safe."
"The Lord has other plans for her. Her death will not be in vain."
"What do you mean by that?"
Before the priest could answer Daniel, another man entered the vault. He also had various injuries to his face. A black eye. A fat lip. He sported an old school handle-bar moustache. It was hard to tell in the darkness of the vault, but his moustache appeared to be caked in blood. He spoke to the priest quickly. He was anxious, jittery. "Excuse me, Father," he said quickly and quietly. "The others have finally made it back. They’ve found another survivor."
"Alive?"
"Barely. She’s lost a lot of blood."
"Excellent. Our prayers have been answered."
"It's not all good news. They’re being tracked."
The guy had a walkie-talkie clipped on to his belt. The voice on the other end said, "Ed? Ed, are you there? We’re coming in hot."
Ed spoke into the radio. He looked even more terrified. "Radio silence, goddamnit."
He then looked at the priest and apologized for swearing. "Sorry, Father."
"Just breathe my son. Stay calm. What is the situation?"
"The big one," he said, his voice wavering. "The one that got Michaels. It’s here."
"Very well. Get the others. We need to do this now."
Two of the men grabbed the woman’s body and took it away.
"Big one?" I asked. "You mean like… wait, shouldn’t we stay down here? Shouldn’t we all stay down here?"
The stranger stood up from the pallet of cash. The priest backed away slightly, and the other two men both pointed their rifles directly at his chest. "Where are you taking her?" The stranger asked.
"We are taking her outside," the priest answered. "Now you will see what we are dealing with here. Ed, take their shoes. And bring them up to the bell tower."
"What’s going on?" Daniel asked.
The priest ignored him. "Can I trust you to behave?" he asked the stranger. "Do we need to handcuff you?"
"I’ll behave as long as you tell me where you are taking her."
"You will see for yourself. You have my word."
The stranger nodded.
"Good," the priest said. "I trust the rest of you will follow the example set by Benjamin."
Benjamin, I thought. So the big guy has a name. Somehow this made him less intimidating.
Daniel reassured the priest that we would fully cooperate. Not that we had much of a choice.
The priest left with three of the men. Ed and the bald guy remained. They told us to take our shoes off. Put them in the far corner. We reluctantly agreed. I guess they didn’t want us running off. And there’s no way you’d run off into the desert with no shoes.
Even big Ben did as he was told.
Once our shoes were off, Ed motioned for us to move out of the vault.
We were told to keep quiet. No sudden movements.
If we talked, if we tried to run, if we tried anything, they wouldn’t hesitate to kill us.
CHAPTER 17
We were led out of the bank in a single file to the church next door. I remember my dad once told me that churches were always built on top of a hill or in the best real estate in town, or right next to a bank.
We began climbing up the stairs to the top of the bell tower. The stairwell was extremely narrow and extremely steep. A feeling of claustrophobia combined with vertigo took hold in my chest. Each step, each flight I kept looking back over my shoulder. I still couldn’t shake the feeling that maybe we should’ve stayed hidden in the bank vault.
About half way up, Ed’s walkie-
talkie came to life again with two fearful and panicked voices.
"Hurry up! It’s coming. You gotta get out of there!"
"We’re going as fast as we can!" a voice replied.
Ed unclipped his walkie-talkie. "What do you think radio silence means? Get off the damn airways!"
I looked at Daniel to see if he knew what was going. But he just shrugged his shoulders and shook his head.
Ed turned to the bald man. "Stevens is losing it, man. He’s freakin losing it."
"Can you blame him?" baldy replied. "He’s been through a lot."
"We’ve all been through a lot."
We climbed up one more flight of stairs and arrived at the top of the bell tower. It was a large, square room, with the bell hanging in the middle. Open arched windows on each side provided us with panoramic views of the whole town.
We must’ve been locked up in the bank vault for longer than I realized because at that moment the sun was slowly and lazily falling below the western horizon. This meant that we’d been locked up all day. I had completely lost track of time.
Towards the east, a huge full moon hovered low in the sky. It had taken on this weird reddish, orange color. It was a breathtaking view. The town looked so peaceful. Picturesque. Bathed in a soft orange light of the sunset.
I had one last look over my shoulder, still desperately wanting to hide. But the bald man motioned us forward with the barrel of his gun. There was no turning back.
The other men and the priest were already there. They were kneeling down, staying hidden below the arched windows of the tower. All of the men had a pale, grim, look on their face.
The priest was saying a prayer, asking for forgiveness again, asking for strength and courage. He had his finger up to his lips, urging us to be quiet. "We initially chose to stay here in the town of Hope because it is isolated," he whispered. "The town was evacuated early on and as a result the Oz virus never made it here. In the weeks since the nationwide quarantine, since the television and radio and emergency broadcasts were silenced, we’ve only ever had one or two lone infected persons stumble into our town at any one time. Fortunately, we were able to eliminate them quickly and quietly. But then everything changed. The gates of hell were opened. The earth, the sky turned the color of blood."
Where The Dead Men Lie (The Secret Apocalypse) Page 8