“She’s dying,” Shirley said not taking her eyes off the girl.
“Yes, I suppose she is,” Berkley said.
“Let me guess. She failed to ‘do her part.’ Or, do you simply enjoy torturing girls?”
Berkley yawned and offered the doctor a bored expression. “In my bed chamber, I do as I please. Keep this in mind, Doctor Shirley. You are presently in my bed chamber.” With that, the Colonel stood and stretched. When he moved to stand next to her, she found herself looking at her reflection in his dark dead eyes.
“Turn around,” He said, breathing heavy.
“No,” She replied. He wanted something more than she was willing to give. “You can kill me, torture me, or do whatever you like, but I will not willingly participate.”
He smiled.
“Someday you may need my skills to save your life.” Her voice now shook as she tried to control the strange sensation now bubbling in her stomach. What was I thinking, she thought to herself and turned her attention to the girl on the bed.
“No.” He hadn’t heard that word in a long time. “No,” he said again, tasting the word. “It seems you fail to grasp the gravity of the situation or the character of the one you are rejecting.” Berkley padded barefoot over to a small nightstand and withdrew from a rough leather case a knife with a wickedly curved blade. It flashed lamp light.
“You are a valuable resource, Doctor. I would never kill you or torture you, but I will do whatever I like, whenever I like.” It was a threat offered through a dazzling smile. “You see, you are on the verge of violating your Hippocratic Oath.”
“No, I’m—.” It was all she could manage before the blade flew the short distance between the Colonel and the bed with such force that it buried itself to the hilt in the girl’s back as she laid on the bed, the bloodied tip protruding from between her breasts. A last bloody gurgle splattered the girl’s lips and she was gone.
“You . . . You,” Shirley stuttered.
“There is a lesson in this,” Berkley piped cheerfully. “I make requests of you. Your response will always be, ‘Yes, Colonel.’ Failure to provide me the proper response or respect and I will send for one of the pretty girls in your tent. I’m sure that after hours of hearing her beg to be allowed to die, you might be a little more amiable to my requests.”
Shirley stood with her arms hanging at her sides. She couldn’t take her eyes from the tip of the blade in the girl’s chest. Her death was senseless. There was no reason to kill her. She was innocent. Her gaze rose slowly to meet his. In that one look, she learned a deeper truth. He was as dead to humanity as those carcasses that walk the streets in search of the living to devour.
This zombie was a king.
Berkley watched the tears well in the doctor’s green eyes and then fall down her pale cheeks. Her back was straight and her chin was elevated as if to say silently, “My will is my own,” but that was not the truth. He could see it in her eyes. He had defeated her without as much as a fight. In some small way, he was disappointed. He would have liked to take the time to break her.
Painting a pouting expression on his face, he walked over to the doctor and wiped the tears from her face with his thumbs. “You seem to forget that I saved your life yesterday. Now, you can show a little gratitude. Can’t you?” His voice was syrupy.
There was a long pause before Shirley finally squeaked out, “Yes, Colonel.” The humiliation burned in her cheeks.
“Good. Now ask me for permission to take your clothes off.” It wasn’t a request.
Her tears fell more freely and her chin creased to keep her lip from quivering as she realized that she would do anything to protect her girls — even this. “Colonel, may I have your permission to take my clothes off?” she said in a surprisingly steady voice. Her hands moved automatically to positions at her collar where the first of many buttons would need to be unfastened.
Berkley yawned and sat down on the bed. “No,” he said. “You may not. You will take your clothes off later . . . when I tell you to.”
There was a long pause before she realized that he was waiting for her response. “Yes, Colonel.”
“Good. Now get out of my bed chamber.”
“Yes, Colonel,” Shirley said as she moved toward the flap. The air around her cooled considerably when she stepped into the next room. Alone, she hugged herself and sobbed. The statues of children playing around the edges of the room suddenly became more sinister. In fact, the whole room that had seemed so elegant and cultured now had the look of a lair. It was the lair of a predator. The zombie king.
“Doctor?” The Colonel’s voice sounded sweet again.
Shirley turned to find him sticking his head through the curtain.
“You didn’t come in here without a purpose. What did you want?”
Doctor Shirley Baker refused to look him in the eyes and said, “The girls. They need to be treated better if they are going to do their part. Some of the men have been torturing them.”
“Give me a name,” Berkley said.
“Primrose.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
“W ere goin’ to have to move out shortly,” Nathan Samuels said to the empty Command Tent. It had been days since they’d been out scouting for provisions and the stores were running low. He shook his head and wiped a hand across his face. The sound of humming hard drives, an electric fan, and the drip of a coffee maker offered no answers to his dilemma. The muffled song of a distant generator tugged at him like an old friend. The Command Tent was the only place where electricity was commonplace. It reminded him of a time not so long ago.
Lieutenant Nathan “Bulldog” Samuels was a large black marine. At twenty-six, he came across as being much older. Being Berkley’s Second-in-Command, he stood at well over six feet in height and carried the bulk of his muscles in his neck, chest and shoulders, hence his nickname.
The tablet in his hand was lit up with an aerial photograph of the city. Superimposed on the picture was a series of boxes of varying colors. The predominate color being red. It marked the locations where the dead had overrun the city making scavenging impossible — impossible meaning too costly. They couldn’t afford to waste more supplies, fuel and ammo trying to get supplies, fuel and ammo.
Tapping on the screen, the picture zoomed in closer and revealed a small building on the south side of town surrounded by a chain link fence. The roof was covered in military personnel. They were defending the building from the rooftop. Four heavy machineguns nestled behind piles of sandbags were spread out covering every approachable direction to the building. The picture was the last one taken by satellite before the whole system went down. The Band needed the weapons, ammo and fuel stored in the depot.
Nathan lifted his eyes from the screen at the sound of footfall outside the tent. It turned out to be Poppy — a mentally handicapped teenager who was more of a mascot or a pet to the soldiers than anything else.
“What is it Poppy?” the big man asked.
“All hands on deck! All hands on deck!” the young man said and then took off running through the camp chanting, “All hands on deck!” There was trouble.
The Lieutenant laid the computer tablet on the table and picked up his AR-15 from beside it. It was matte black with a standard ABS plastic stock. Pulling the action to chamber a round, he stepped out into the crisp morning air. The cold air suited him just fine. He always liked it cold. It’s good for my inner Yankee, he thought to himself. The boy disappeared into the morning fog that hung in wisps in the lower part of the camp. The Command Tent sat on an eastern hill and overlooked the encampment. He could see the men moving quickly along the lip of the western barrier that faced the city. Gunshots echoed from across the way.
It was the fourth time in two days. The dead were attracted to the sounds of the camp and the smell of the living. It was as if they each had a built-in radar that was able to hone in on a human heartbeat. It took the lieutenant a couple of minutes to reach the western edge of the encampment w
hen he realized that the gunfire had increased. He growled when he heard his ammunition supply being wasted as a rifle went to full automatic, filling the air with ceaseless chatter.
He swore and sprinted toward the wall. The wall was a barrier constructed from two semi-tractor trailers that were overturned in a clearing between two large patches of dense foliage. Similar barriers were set up to the North, South and East allowing for the hundred or so in The Band to live in relative safety. That was until yesterday morning. The wind had shifted direction and now carried their scent into the city.
“Simpson!” the lieutenant screamed.
Simpson, a young PFC, who was on the verge of tears, was standing on the wall pouring the ammo from his rifle into, what was to Samuels, an unseen enemy. The rifle quickly emptied. Samuels leapt into the silence screaming, “Simpson! Stand down!”
The young man turned to see the lieutenant staring up at him from the ground. Blood vessels were standing out in his shaved forehead like a topographical map. He was angry. On the other side of the trailer was a herd of undead. There were hundreds, maybe thousands of them. They were piling up against the trailers with outstretched hands grasping at the soldiers manning the barrier. Simpson shivered as the smell of something spoiling carried on the morning breeze. He’d seen his sister fall prey to a man-eating mob like this one. He could still hear her screams on his bed at night.
The lieutenant’s hand extended when he reached the top of the ladder. Simpson handed over the gun. The barrel was hot. “Go get some breakfast,” he told the young man. The Simpson simply nodded, wiping his nose, and climbed down the ladder. “Where’s Blankenship?” the lieutenant shouted from the top of the barrier. Fingers pointed.
On the far side of the western wall near the foliage sat a man in a lawn chair. He wore a colorful Hawaiian shirt and khaki shorts. His feet were propped up on a cooler and he was drinking a beer. His cargo hat was tipped down over his nose so that he had to throw his head back to take a swig from the brown bottle. He heard the lieutenant ask about him, but ignored the query. It wasn’t until he looked down to his left that he noticed the lieutenant’s size twelve boot resting too closely to his chair. He thought it prudent to acknowledge the beefy LT, then.
“Oi! Mon,” he offered in his best Jamaican. When no response was offered, he sat upright in the chair and tilted his head back to see Samuels pointing off to the right into the woods that were the secondary defense for the encampment. Curtis Blankenship was supposed to be the first line of defense against zombie intruders in this quarter.
He followed the line of the lieutenant’s finger to a place about a hundred yards away where four lurching intruders seemed to stumble into the no-go zone. “I’da seen ‘em eventually,” Curtis offered with a smile. When Samuels failed to see the humor in his observation, he threw the cargo hat back so that it rested against his back. He smiled again and winked.
Despite his bravado, his throat went dry. He knew that he was allowed to get away with his shenanigans because no one could do what he’s been trained to do — snipe targets at distances that would make a man call him a liar. However, he also knew that none of that impressed this particular man. If there were only two men in the world who scared Curtis Blankenship, it was Berkley and his goon Nathan Samuels.
Curtis Blankenship lifted his SR-25 sniper rifle and set it gently on the handrail. In seconds, the wandering dead were once again the unmoving dead. Three bullets; four headshots. Over his left shoulder, he noticed that the lieutenant didn’t even hang around to be impressed. “Lighten up, dude,” he whispered and then sat back down with his beer.
Lieutenant Samuels moved slowly along the barrier watching the hordes of dead roll in like the fog. There were simply too many to shoot. In fact, they were beginning to stack up the side of the trailers as newcomers pushed others down in their attempt to reach the living. At this rate, it would be less than a day before the barrier would be breached by the lumbering horde.
“There are just too many,” Samuels said to himself.
“What’s all the hubbub about, Lieutenant?”
Samuels turned to find Colonel Berkley standing on the ground below him. The Swedes stood on either side of him. They were more like twin mountains than twin brothers. They were identical in every way except Vaughn had a scar that ran across his round nose. His brother Sebastian was the smarter of the two, meaning that he understood when to shut up and when to speak.
What the twins lacked in brainpower, they more than made up in size and strength. Between them, their IQ barely fell into the double digits and this gave those that knew them a sense that they were not much more than overgrown children.
Unfortunately, their feelings were so easily hurt that they developed a reputation for tearing a place — and people — apart in their tantrums. Despite their size and strength, they were terrified of Berkley.
Samuels couldn’t help but notice how small Berkley looked standing between the two mountains of flesh. The only thing that messed with the image was the fact that the twins acted as if they were standing on both sides of a viper.
“The dead — there are too many of them,” Samuels offered. “We’re not going to be able to remain here much longer.”
“How’s our resources holding up, lieutenant?” Berkley asked as he climbed the ladder to stand next to his number one. He surveyed the mass of moving dead. They lamented and clawed at the air like children having a tantrum.
“We’ll be down to rationing in a couple of days. I don’t think that is our biggest problem right now, sir.”
“No?” Berkley said, his eyebrows rising with the question.
“No. If you’ll notice,” Samuels pointed to the piling dead at the base of the trailer, “in less than a day, they will breach these barriers. We don’t have enough ammunition to stop the flow. We’ve attracted a city’s worth of zombies.”
Berkley looked across the field toward the city. Thousands of the undead were moving toward their position. “What about the depot?”
“It’s heavily guarded. I’m afraid that we don’t have the resources to take it. It will cost us too much.”
Berkley and Lieutenant Samuels turned when the sounds of slaps and grunting erupted from below them. The Swedes were wrestling. Amidst the grunts and smacks, they could hear Sebastian whispering to his brother, “No. Me smarter than you.” The response that followed was a nasally, “Nuh-uh.” Though their movements were slow and deliberate, they looked like two boulders grinding against one another.
“Have the team meet me in the Command Tent,” Berkley said. “I’ve got an idea.”
“Yes, sir.”
* * *
Berkley stood in the doorway of the Command Tent as his men filed out. The meeting had lasted about an hour, but he knew the men. They were on board with anything he thought feasible. In fact, most of the men in the camp would agree with him if he said that the sky was red and not blue. He also knew that he needed special insight from those who didn’t scurry around trying to gain or keep his favor. His men were good and he trusted most of them, but if his plan was to succeed, he needed some honest assessment — the type of honesty that would never take place in such an open meeting.
One by one, the men passed him. They offered him a nod, followed by a curt, “Colonel.”
He nodded in return.
The first out the door was Dave Primrose. He was a thin wiry twenty-two year old with some serious daddy issues. Word had it that the kid had been tormented, both physically and emotionally, by his father. Berkley had consciously released the boy upon an unsuspecting world to wield his insecurities on the helpless. Berkley smiled at the thought. The boy was a weapon. His cruelty against those who could not defend themselves was unmatched among his fellow soldiers. Outwardly, Primrose was boastful and belligerent to authority figures, but inwardly he was a coward. He ran from challenges. He preferred to back stab, sneak, and manipulate. The words “fair play” would never find a perch on his lips.
&
nbsp; The second man out the door was Curtis Blankenship. He was a twenty-four year old loner who had earned high marks in accuracy with both pistols and rifles before he left JROTC in high school. The young man was a savant when it came to marksmanship using standard military weapons. Berkley permitted him certain privileges because of his unique skill set. They were privileges that few of Berkley’s men enjoyed like bucking lines for chow, taking second choice of women among the leisure tents and having private quarters.
Berkley attributed the young man’s arrogance regarding his skills to his youth. All the same, Berkley enjoyed the effect Blankenship had on other men in the camp. He kept things interesting. Enemies, within and without, kept a man on his toes.
Michael Simpson followed closely on the heels of Blankenship. Simpson, Berkley’s newest recruit into the inner circle, was a Private First Class who was on leave when the outbreak occurred. Berkley took the twenty-one year old in just before the Quarantine Zone had been demolished. The boy wouldn’t have survived without The Band. What fascinated the Colonel the most was the boy’s moral compass. It pointed straight north. He only entered the leisure tents at the cajoling of others and then was heard talking to the whores and apologizing for his fellow soldier’s misconduct. He was not abusive and refused to take advantage of those he saw as innocent. The kid lacked the kill instinct, but there was a certain nobility about the boy that made the Colonel like him from the instant he met him. The boy had become a project. Either he would become one of Berkley’s most ruthless killers or he would fall prey to his most ruthless killer. Again, Berkley smiled. The boy would be turned, as the saying goes. There was no room in the Colonel’s world for innocence.
The gleaming white smile that stepped through the door wiped the grin from Berkley’s face. Dale Vanderhoft’s smile was practiced. It was polished and it was … fake. It made Berkley think of an artificial smile filled with Chiclets teeth. Dale was of the Vanderhoft family of Frankfort, a sort of lower class nobility. Some referred to them as “new money.” In this new world, lots of money was about equal to lots of firewood. All it’s good for is burning. Yet, despite finding himself without a fortune to back him, he managed to carve a space out for himself. He had two great assets — his playboy good looks and his lethal tracking skills. The latter being of value to Berkley and the only reason the man continued to breathe.
Dead World: Hero Page 14