“The one and only,” Lucero replied with another glamour pose.
“And you’re Juan,” she asked the last kid.
Juan nodded and asked about her favorite Pokemon.
“We’ll worry about that later,” Deon interjected. A grin spread across his face. “Unless y’all wanna explain to Miss Torres why we’re late.”
All the kids except for Lucero instantly became serious. “Good point, Mister Deon. I can’t have my busy schedule interrupted with a lecture.”
Ehsan and Sarah chuckled while Fatima smiled. “Let’s get going, then,” Sarah decided.
With a goodbye to the men at the gate, the nine of them set off toward Linda Vista. The kids impressed Ehsan with how well they adjusted once the group passed the walls and entered the first house. They went to the second floor and prepared to cross the walkway to the next house. Lucero and Juan crossed effortlessly, while little Andrea crossed with Sarah. Everyone had a serious demeanor except for Lucero. Ehsan could tell, however, that even while Lucero pretended to be a diva, she understood the situation and wouldn’t do anything to put them at risk.
When the group got to the end of the row of houses, they checked through the window to make sure that the zombies they’d encountered before didn’t await them. Ehsan looked out the window. The coast looked clear. The nine of them went downstairs and outside to the front porch, careful the entire time. Halfway across the street, however, Ehsan noticed Deon staring intently at their destination.
“Hold up, y’all,” Deon commanded with a wave of his hand. “The walkway to the next house ain’t there.” Ehsan looked up. The makeshift bridge connecting the house to the next one was missing.
Just then, the door to the house in front of them flew open. A flock of zombies stumbled out. Ehsan recognized some of them from the group that had been in front of the house on the way to the clinic. With the flock walking toward them so slowly, Ehsan took a moment to scan the rest of the house. He saw a figure standing behind the curtains on the second floor.
“There’s someone there!” Ehsan exclaimed as he pointed to the figure.
“I see them, too,” Fatima confirmed as Andrea latched onto her. “But forget about that now. It could be a zombie who got lost. We need to focus on getting away from these things.”
“I’ll distract ‘em,” Deon decided. “Y’all get to the end of this street and cross so you can get to the next row of houses. If a walkway ain’t at that house, we run all the way back.”
Ehsan nodded and the group powerwalked away while Deon distracted the zombies. They found no more on that street. Ehsan could see that the walkways were intact across the rest of the houses they currently passed by and, indeed, intact on the houses across the street they currently walked toward. He looked over to the kids, who looked scared, but not completely terrified. Even Andrea, while frightened, seemed alright. She clutched Fatima’s arm tightly, but didn’t make a scene.
“Okay, we’re good,” Sarah whispered as they finished crossing the street and walked up to the porch of the house that began the next row of houses. She cautiously opened the door. “Ehsan, you and I should scope this place out. Fatima, stay with the kids.”
Ehsan and Sarah entered, Sarah pulling out the machete she kept holstered. Ehsan went first. He scanned the living room while Sarah started knocking lightly on the walls. No response. They peeked into various rooms of the house on the first floor, then gave the okay sign for Fatima to bring the kids in. They had Fatima wait with the kids on the first floor while they examined the second, which also ended up being clear.
“I do not like this,” Fatima stated as she brought the kids upstairs. “Why did-”
“I’m sure it was nothing,” Sarah interrupted in a strained voice as they walked into the bedroom with the walkway in the window. She nodded subtly over to the kids. “It’s nothing to worry about, but we can talk about it later.”
Just then, the door downstairs opened. Ehsan tensed up. They heard gentle knocks against the walls downstairs.
“That’s Deon,” Sarah pointed out. Ehsan relaxed. Seconds later Ehsan heard Deon’s footsteps. He walked into the room without looking the least bit tired.
“I lost ‘em.” He looked over to the kids. “Y’all are good, we don’t gotta worry about those things no more.”
Juan didn’t look convinced, but Lucero nodded. Andrea was so far in her own little world that she didn’t seem to notice. The group proceeded to cross the walkway. The rest of the trip back went smoothly; none of the other walkways had been destroyed. As they continued the tension gradually lessened for everyone, except for Fatima when it came time to cross.
The tension never left completely, though. The thought of who- or what- had destroyed the walkway stayed with Ehsan, and he knew everyone else felt the same way. They encountered two zombies at one point when crossing the street between rows of houses, but the group easily avoided them. As they did so, however, Ehsan couldn’t help but check every window they passed.
When they finally made it to the front yard of the house across from the school, Ehsan saw Ryan and Josue standing guard on the roof. His shoulders deflated with relief.
“Everything go well?” Ryan asked when they were within earshot, seemingly able to pick up on the unusual tension within the group. His voice sounded hoarse. He coughed.
“Yeah. Something happened, though,” Deon replied. “Let’s get these kids in first and we’ll catch up.”
Josue, who looked like he had been on the verge of making a smartass remark, perked up. “Okay. The furniture by the doorway is cleared, like usual.”
Ehsan looked over and saw the desk he and his sister had slid over the previous afternoon had been moved to the side. The group went through and the children went straight to their classrooms, though it took a reminder to Andrea to not climb on Mateo when they saw him gardening in the field with Manuel. Once the kids were in their classrooms, Ehsan, Fatima, Deon, Sarah, Josue, and Mateo met at the lunch tables while Ryan remained on guard duty and Manuel continued gardening.
“Someone took out the walkway in the house closest to the clinic,” Sarah explained. “There were also zombies inside the house.”
“Shit,” Mateo replied. He turned to Ehsan and Fatima. “We didn’t just build those walkways with strong materials, we fastened ‘em to the windows. There’s no way something like the wind just knocked those walkways over. Hell, even a zombie couldn’t accidentally knock it over.”
“In other words, someone took them out on purpose,” Josue declared.
“Yeah, and I’m pretty sure I saw someone in the window of the second floor, watching us,” Ehsan told them. “The curtains were in the way, so I couldn’t tell for sure. It could’ve just been a random zombie for all I know. But, the way they looked in the window… I dunno how to describe it, but it just looked like it was studying us. It didn’t have the body language of a zombie.”
“This ain’t good,” Deon remarked.
“Hold on,” Mateo said, rubbing his chin. “Something doesn’t add up. If there were zombies on the first floor of the house, why would this person take out the walkway before going across? If they were trapped up there, they’d probably want to cross to the next house first, then take the walkway out. Even if they were trying to set us up- and we don’t know that- but even if they were, they’d have crossed first.”
An idea popped into Ehsan’s head. “What if them taking out the walkway had nothing to do with us? What if they got trapped by the zombies in the house, ran upstairs, and took down the walkway so that the zombies would get distracted by the noise of it crashing outside?”
“It is theoretically possible, except I also saw the figure in the window,” Fatima stated. “It looked calm. Considering we do not know their intentions, we should be ready for the worst, just in case.”
“Hmm, good point,” Mateo admitted. “Either way, it’s probably worth looking into. They could be someone we have to worry about, or they could be someone wh
o needs our help. Whatever it is, we should go back.”
Deon agreed. “If they got bad intentions, we gotta handle things quick. If they’re in trouble, we can’t turn our backs on ‘em.” He turned to Ehsan and Fatima. “Half of us standing here ain’t even been here a month, me included.”
“I dunno about this,” Josue said. “I’m all for doing stupid shit, but what if this person is setting a trap? What if someone gets bit?”
“Then we handle it,” Sarah replied. “But you’re right, Josue. We do have to be careful about this.”
“I’m with Josue on this one,” Fatima admitted with a hint of reluctance. “We have no idea what their intentions are, or what we might be walking into.”
Deon looked to Ehsan and Fatima. “Y’all hear how me and Marcus ended up here?”
Fatima shook her head while Ehsan replied “nope.”
“We were running away from a herd when Mateo and Sarah were on a scouting mission. We hadn’t ate in days, we had zero energy. But Mateo and Sarah showed up and helped us handle the herd. Then they offered us a place here.” He looked past the gates, in the direction from which they had come. “They had our backs against a herd, even when they didn’t know us. We gotta do the same.”
Sarah nodded in agreement. “Not only that, but look at what we got out of it,” she added, giving Deon a friendly nudge. “We all win when we help other people.”
Ehsan and Mateo nodded in agreement.
“You do make a good point,” Fatima conceded reluctantly. She paused. “So who goes, and who stays?”
“Same group that just went right now,” Sarah suggested.
“Even the kids?” Ehsan asked jokingly.
“Especially the kids,” Sarah shot back. “Andrea is our best scout.”
“I’ll come too,” Mateo decided after chuckling at Sarah’s joke. “We’re ahead of schedule with the gardening, and if it’s a trap, we want as many hands on deck as possible.”
“Alright then, ladies,” Josue said to Fatima, Sarah, Mateo, and Deon’s disgust. “Seems like you got everything figured out. I’m gonna go back to guard duty and update Ryan. I’ll also grab him some whiskey or something, he’s been coughing a bit.”
Josue went back to the roof. Ehsan, Fatima, Mateo, Deon, and Sarah each went to grab a piece of fruit to eat before their trip. After Mateo grabbed his ax, now named Nimbus, they departed. Deon and Sarah led the group, while Mateo covered the rear. Everyone firmly gripped their weapons as they walked. Ehsan felt dread in the pit of his stomach. He fully supported the mission, but at the same time he didn’t like either outcome. What if it was a trap and someone got hurt? What if they all got bit or eaten? On the other hand, what if the person had needed help, and they’d left that person to die?
It didn’t take long for them to get to the row of houses that had the walkway taken out at the end. No zombies around. As they approached the two houses with the severed walkway, the feeling of dread turned into despair. It felt like his last few weeks of wandering with his sister all over again. His palms started to sweat, and his chest felt like it weighed twice as much as usual. What could possibly be inside?
The five of them crept cautiously up the porch, Deon and Sarah going first. The door remained open. Deon slowly walked in, followed by Sarah. The area near the front door seemed clear. Ehsan, followed by Fatima, followed finally by Mateo, entered the house. Once all five were inside, they performed their usual knocking routine. Nothing. They decided Ehsan would stay by foot of the stairs, which began near the front of the house, while Fatima covered Mateo as he combed downstairs. Deon and Sarah went upstairs. Ehsan had Dragon Hair at the ready, his mind racing. Mateo and Fatima checked the living room and kitchen, finding them to be clear. Before they could go check the other side of the downstairs, however, they heard Deon’s voice upstairs.
“Oh shit,” he exclaimed, loudly but without yelling. Ehsan saw his head poke out of the doorway of the upstairs bedroom near the stairs. “Y’all are gonna wanna see this.”
Ehsan shot up the stairs. He heard Fatima and Mateo behind him. “What’s going on?” he demanded as they burst through the door.
“Check it out,” Sarah said, pointing to the wall by the window. Ehsan looked over to see a crudely drawn map. It was written with crayon and showed the Rancho Madero Clinic, the houses connected by the walkways, and Linda Vista Elementary itself. The clinic and the school were labeled CLINIC and SCHOOL, respectively, in barely legible handwriting.
“This is not good,” Fatima declared as she spun the end of her hair with her fingertips. Ehsan felt his throat tighten. Would the school fall before he and Fatima had even been there a week? Before they’d even been there for two full days?
“No, it’s not,” Sarah agreed. “This definitely wasn’t here when we passed through on the way to get the kids.”
“Now hold on,” Mateo said. Everyone turned to him. “Let’s try to figure out who did this. And why they did it.”
Deon took a breath and sighed. “He’s right. This shit is alarming, but we gotta think. If it were some plan for a secret attack, he would’ve written this on a piece of paper or something. No reason to leave it here for us to see.”
“Not to mention this looks like some pretty shaky handwriting,” Mateo added. Ehsan looked at it again. It definitely didn’t seem like something done by an adult. The houses were crudely drawn and the letters looked like the work of someone who’d just learned how to write. It didn’t quite look childlike, but it was too sloppy for most adults.
“What if it was someone without a formal education or something? Maybe they just never learned to read and write that well,” Sarah suggested.
“Or even someone who is left-handed,” Fatima said. “My writing is terrible on whiteboards and chalkboards because I’m left-handed. We have to hold our hands away from the board to keep our palms from smudging. That probably means we would do the same thing when drawing on walls, too.”
“Could be,” Mateo admitted. “Either way, we don’t know if the intent was bad, even if it was an adult. Maybe they drew it out to help make sense of the area.”
“I really doubt that,” Fatima replied. “Look, maybe this is innocent, but it also specifically traces the route from the school to the clinic. This is scary. We need to get back to the school.”
Sarah nodded. “Yeah, even if it’s nothing, we can’t take that risk. The school is missing about half its adults with us here. We gotta get back now.”
Everyone agreed. Sarah and Mateo cleaned up the crayon map while Ehsan, Fatima, and Deon searched the rest of the house to make sure they hadn’t missed anything. Their search revealed nothing out of the ordinary. The five of them left the house and ran back to the school. They decided to forgo using the walkways entirely, instead moving through the streets and taking out any zombies they found along the way. Ehsan saw discomfort on the faces of Deon and Sarah, but all five of them understood that time was of utmost importance.
When they turned the final corner and looked to the school, Ehsan saw Ryan and Josue perched on top of the building like usual. He breathed a sigh of relief. They waved to the two of them as they ran up the street and the two of them waved back.
“Y’all okay?” Ryan asked as they drew closer. He coughed twice.
“Yeah, but we found something weird,” Mateo replied as they reached the school lawn. “There was a map of the route from the clinic to the school written in crayon in one of the rooms of that house.”
“So someone knows about our system and wrote it down on a wall.” Ryan repeated. “Well, shit. That don’t sound good. We got any other info?”
“Just that we know it hadn’t been there earlier today,” Sarah answered. “And the writing was sloppy, almost like a kid’s.”
“Good to know,” Ryan replied. He coughed and cleared his throat. “Well, ain’t too much we can do about it for now. Sounds like they didn’t exactly leave an address for us to find ‘em, so we gotta have everyone here in case someth
ing does happen.”
Deon sighed. “Yeah, guess there ain’t much else we can do. We got no other leads, and we didn’t encounter trouble to or from the house. Maybe we can do a search party later. But going through every house without any idea what we’re looking for while leaving the school less protected probably won’t help much.”
The group walked back inside. Though the trip hadn’t been physically demanding, Ehsan still felt tired, and he assumed the others felt the same way.
Fatima turned to Mateo. “So what should we do now?” she asked as Deon went to help Manuel garden and Sarah went to do some cleaning. “Ehsan and I could search a couple nearby houses if you want. Maybe see if we can find any clues.”
Mateo shook his head. “Go ahead and relax. I appreciate the offer, but if we’re gonna do a search party, we should have a bit more muscle behind it. Besides, I remember when Deon and Marcus first joined. They were pretty tired for the first few days ‘cause of everything they’d been through, and I bet it’s the same for you two. Go ahead and relax.”
“Are you sure?” Fatima asked.
Mateo chuckled. “Yep, I’m sure. Don’t worry, we’ll have plenty for you two to do after you’ve settled in more.” He turned toward the houses they had just come from. “We might need you at full strength soon, so it’s better you rest.”
Ehsan and Fatima went back to their room and laid down where they had slept the night before. Ehsan’s mind still raced. Who could’ve drawn that map? Why did they do it? Was that figure in the window a stray zombie, or a person?
Before Ehsan knew it, he’d fallen asleep. A knock at the door woke up him. “Lunch time!” Sarah’s voice declared from the other side.
“Be right there!” Fatima replied. Ehsan could make out an edge in Fatima’s voice. Clearly the thought of the map hadn’t left her mind, either. He wanted to ask Fatima about her thoughts on the matter before heading to the tables, but his stomach grumbled loudly. They could talk later.
The Human Spring Page 8