by S. A. Lowry
As Andrew drives through the dark town, he notices some of the light poles are out. There are some remnants of the recent events which have been plauging the country due to some abandoned vehicles in the center of the road and shattered windows of shops along side the road where looting took place. However, there are no bodies visibilly present in the street, which is a good thing Andrew tells himself as he slows the bus’s pace down to study the new enviroment they have just recently driven into.
Riggs decides to make Randall earn his keep within the group by wakeing him up. Riggs explains the situation to Randall and tells him once they stop that he will be pumping gas as he keeps watch. Andrew will remain at the wheel. Randall, awakening from his sleep startled, rolls his eyes.
“Get someone else to do it, i’m busy!” he tells Riggs with contempt. This angers Riggs as he hits Randall across his shoulder. “Earn your damn keep here or else i’ll drag you outside of this bus and leave you here to die, got it girl?” a furious Riggs whisphers into his ear while trying not to wake the others.
A reluctant Randall decides to not make it an issue any further and caves into Rigg’s reasonable demands for help. As the bus rolls along the dark strip of road deeper into the center of the town, he notices a lone police vehicle off into the distance in the middle of a four way intersection with it’s flashers still spinning illuminating red and blue light. This vehicle is right next to a local gas station which still appears to be lit up. Riggs tells Andrew to push up to the squad car so he can inspect the inside of it from the bus. Andrew complies.
As they approach, Riggs carefully looks on to inspect the vehicle. He doesn’t notice anyone in the front of the vehicle because the doors are wide open. The back doors however, are closed. Once Andrew pulls the bus up close enough, Riggs gives him the signal to stop. Riggs brings his pump action shotgun with him and walks off the bus alone, realizing he is better off alone than having Randall on the ground watching his back.
As he approaches the cab of the police vehicle, he looks into it to inspect for any sign of life or weapons. Neither are there. He proceeds over to the passenger side of the vehicle and takes the seat adjacened to the glove compartment. He opens that up and begins searching for anything useful.
Right as he does this, someone from the back of the vehicle begins banging histerically on the plexi glass which is seperating the front of the cab from the back while trying to get to Riggs. The screams and moans grow louder as the thumping of the glass becomes more intense. This startles Riggs as he gets up from his seat and draws his shotgun to the back of the vehicle.
What he sees, is a woman bound by hand cuffs to her front, covered in blood with missing pupils as she kicks and screams and attempts to break through the glass unsuccessfully in order to get to Riggs. Riggs realizes she is infected and must have turned while in custody in the back of the vehicle. He quickly realizes that she is not a threat, seeing as how she has no way of getting to him. Andrew hops out of the vehicle and asks him if he is alright. Riggs orders Andrew to get back behind the wheel as he looks back towards the squad car as he walks back onto the bus.
Once on the bus, Randall is seen looking out the window with a frieghtened look on his face as he observed the situation unfold from afar. Riggs and Andrew inspect the gas station up ahead and notices no sign of life inside or outside the station. Andrew takes off and pulls the bus up to the pump closest to the entrance of the store. Riggs orders Randall outside to check the pump as he gathers up some last minute equipment. Right when this happens, Tabatha awakes and notices what’s going on. She slips out of Lance’s arms as he remains asleep and walks up to Riggs.
“I am going with you,” Tabatha tells Riggs.
Riggs just gives her a blank stare.
“Into the store that is. I am going into the store with you to help turn on the pump. I also need to grab a few things,” she adds. Riggs, still unsure, nods his head in agreement. Randall marches off the bus in disgust due to the fact his sleep being disturbed and walks up to the pump as he sets the four fuel cans down. He turns it on and notices nothing coming out of it. Riggs and Tabatha sees this and proceeds into the store with their weapons ready. On his way out, Riggs tells Andrew to stay sharp and remain on the wheel. Andrew nods in agreement.
Once inside the store, the pair notice music still playing which is similiar to that of something you would hear on an elevator. Riggs hops over the counter and begins looking for the right switches to hit in order to activate the pump while Tabatha goes into the hygeine section and begins throwing some items in her pocket.
Riggs doesn’t pay her any mind. Once he turns on the pumps, he rises up and gives Randall a thumbs up from a distance through the window. Randall begins filling up the cans before he fills the bus, which aggravates Riggs immensely seeing as how Randall obviously has his priorities messed up. If something were to suddenly attack them with a quickness, they obviously would have to escape in the bus. What good is it if they have a bunch of filled fuel cans but an empty tank to escape on. Made no sense to Riggs as he walks over to the cooler in search of a refreshing NOS energy drink.
Some time passes by as the pair scavenge up what they need in the store. Randall completed the fuel cans and is now lastly finishing up fueling the tank on the bus. Riggs walks up to Tabatha and asks her if she is ready. She complies. As they begin to walk out of the store, they hear something being knocked over in the back room.
Riggs, realizing he forgot to inspect the back room and the bathrooms, beats himself up mentally over it. Tabatha turns away from the door and curiously walks up to the door of the back room to inspect whats on the other side. Riggs warns her of drifting too far and tells her to ignore it and come back. A stubborn Tabatha does not listen.
“It could be another survivor. Let’s check it out,” she stubbornly states while ignoring Rigg’s wise advice.
His advice now turns into orders as he is demanding her to leave the store with him and to leave it alone.
She ignores him. As she approaches the backroom door with her weapon, she attempts to place her hand on the door knob to open it. Right as she does this, the door flies wide open into her face immediately knocking her back first onto the floor. She loses her weapon as it seperates from the control of her body and slides up against the wall. Riggs comes running to her rescue as Tabatha notices what is standing in the door way in front of her looking down upon her.
An old man, with milky white pale skin, hissing and moaning at her as his left arm is strapped by an apparent pants belt to his walker. He goes to emit a terrifying scream of hunger and pain as he attempts to move forward inch by inch with assistance from the walker while staring wide eyed towards Tabatha’s direction. He begins converging on her closer and closer. Tabatha freezes at the sight in front of her and doesn’t move at all until Riggs picks her up and grabs her weapon.
Instead of engaging the infected older man in the walker with his fire arm, he decides to just walk out the door with Tabatha and head back to the bus. The elderly man can not move that fast as the walker is obstructing most of his movement. As they quickly approach the vehicle in the dead of night, Randall is already back on the bus with the filled up fuel cans. Andrew still remains behind the wheel impatiently waiting for the pair’s return. Once they hop back on the bus with the bag of items they took, Lance is standing there in the center of the bus appearing infuriated as he glares over at Tabatha.
Andrew immediately takes off and gets back on the road he is supposed to be on. Tabatha, looking like a scared child about to be scolded by her father, places her head down in shame as she walks up to Lance. Lance begins yelling at her in anger as to why she left without letting him knowing. Riggs tells him to calm down as all of the passengers begin waking up to the commotion inside the bus. As the bus pushes down the road, Lance directs his anger towards Riggs.
“Who the hell are you to take her in there?” Lance yells to Riggs as he walks up to him and stares Riggs right into his eyes. Riggs warn
s him to back off, Lance does not listen. Tabatha runs up and tries to break it up when Lance turns around and accidently backhands Tabatha across the face. She instantly falls to the ground once again. After seeing what just happened, Riggs immediately grabs Lance by his jacket collar and throws him face first onto the floor in his direction. Once Lance is on the ground face first, Riggs mounts him from behind and commences to pummeling the back of his head with left and right jabs until Lance passes out after screaming profanities and attempting to stand up.
Once Lance is asleep, Riggs displays a sense of regret. Him and Dwayne attempt to help Lance up. They drag him over to his seat and place him down. Riggs immediately walks up to Tabatha, whom was on the floor holding her face crying after she was begging Riggs to stop hurting her fiance and asks her if she was okay. She calls him a horrible person and runs to Lance crying on his shoulder asking him to wake up. She begins apologizing as well.
Riggs realizes what he has done. He might have taken it too far, however, the way he was brought up, striking a woman is crossing the line. There is no reasoning with that. Riggs personally apologizes to Tabatha then walks off into his dark corner of the bus. He pulls out a pack of cigerettes and lights one up while blowing the smoke out the window. Andrew continues to drive and now relieved that the situation has been resolved.
While the fight was taken place, he was trying to keep the bus on the road while looking back to witness the action. Andrew always loves a good knock out. However, his need to watch the brawl did not coincide with his driving ability.
Cynthia looks back at Riggs with contempt as the passing light poles on the road shine onto her eyes. Riggs notices her looking at him with disgust. A now even more worried Linda, tells Young Andrew to go back to sleep as she walks up to Tabatha. Linda, with a concerned look on her face, sits down across the aisleway from Tabatha.
“Hunny, are you alright?” Linda asks.
Tabatha, still appearing teary eyed, tells her no. She then goes on to explain how she always messes up and makes Lance mad at her. She also tells Linda that she deserved what she got from him even if he did do it on accident. Linda quickly shakes her head in disagreement.
“You did not deserve any of that. This man obviously loves you, however, the way he goes about it is wrong. You should not be afraid of him like that. Has he ever striked you down before?” an even more concerned Linda asks.
Tabatha quickly shakes her head meaning no. “Lance has never hit me before. He isn’t like that. He does has a very bad temper though and is extremely jealous, but he would never hurt me.” Tabatha explained. A now slightly relieved Linda nods her head up and down in agreement, however, some doubt regarding Lance’s good nature is still in question with her. Linda tells Tabatha she can talk to her any time about it if she needs a helping hand.
“Look, if the both of you want to talk about it later and if you two want someone there to mediate, I will be glad to help. I am just worried about you hunny and don’t want to see you cry like this. I can understand where Lance is coming from, he obviously loves you very much. However, you need to let him know striking you like that, whether it was an accident or no accident has to stop. It definately will not be tolerated here,” she goes on to explain.
Tabatha thanks her for the help assuming Linda was done. Linda then goes on to tell about her prior marriage. “You know society’s view of these type of things change with the times. Back forty years ago myself and my husband just graduated college. We were going through some tough times with money issues. We also did not trust eachother at first and made some mistakes on both sides. Once he found out about my affair which only lasted for two weeks, he beat on me a little bit. He then decided to cheat on me for a little while too until I found out about. When I did, I attacked him with a frying pan and got arrested,” Linda now with an evil grin on her face.
“What I am trying to tell you is, when two people love eachother enough, they will get through anything. Recognize each other’s faults and mistakes and fix them. I don’t think I ever forgave him even on the day he died in that hospital for hitting on me. However, to be honest, I don’t think he ever forgave me for what I did to him either. Regardless, we still loved each other dearly,” Linda preaches with an apparent sadness growing on her face.
Tabatha asks her if she ever had any children with him. Linda shakes her head and tells her she was never able to bear a child. They never adopted either. However, she always wanted a child. Some how now, she feels fulfilled through Young Andrew even as this ‘nightmare’ unfolds, she says.
Her only regret is her husband not being able there to share it with her. Tabatha now has a worried look on her face, hoping Linda’s would have a story about a child and some how adapt it to her situation. Linda realizes at this moment, Tabatha has more to say.
“Can you keep a secret?” Tabatha whisphers to Linda as if she was trying to avoid Lance from over hearing it, even though he is knocked out.
Linda slowly nods her head.
“I am pregnant with Lance’s child. It has only been almost a month. I just don’t know how to tell him. Especially now,” Tabatha concludes.
Linda stares at her in disbelief.
“Hunny you have to tell him. He has a right to know,” Linda responds. Tabatha shakes her head in disagreement and tells Linda she isn’t ready. She needs to wait for the right time to do so and right here is neither the place or time. She goes on to tell Linda that she plans on telling him once the group reaches the safe zone established at Fort Hood Texas where they will be safe and medical teams are in place. She does not want him to worry about her anymore than he has to already.
Linda disagrees with her, however, honors her promise not to tell him. Tabatha hugs her in return and thanks her for the concern. Many uneventful hours pass by while on the road. Andrew ends up changing out his shift with Dwayne again once he is fully rested. Dwayne drives along a lone and peaceful strip of road in the Alabama country side while the rest of the group is beginning to wake up as day break hits. As they move down the road, Dwayne begins noticing home made spray painted cardboard signs erected on the side of the road as he passes them.
The first one reads, “Survivors near.” Dwayne informs the group of what he is seeing. Riggs and Andrew push up to the front to identify the next upcoming sign a hundred meters down the road from the last one. As they drive by, Riggs identifies it.
“Food, water, shelter, security. Next exit, Right turn, Straight for two miles, complex on the right.” another makeshift sign reads. Riggs and the group ponders the decision whether or not to check it out. Riggs tells them there would be no reason to check it out if they weren’t so low on food as they are. However, at this point, the incident earlier requireing them to high tail it out of Wal-Mart due to the premature shooting, as he quickly stares at Audrey, hampered their ability to gather adequate enough supplies for the trip. Audrey puts her hands up as if she wasn’t willing to accept criticism.
Andrew and a few others agree with him. A now concious Lance, seperates himself from the group with Tabatha close by his side as he glances a few times over to Riggs while trying to avoid looking at him. Dwayne and Randall got on board quickly as well.
Randall likes the idea of the word ‘shelter’ he says.
That may include a shower and a nice bed he goes on to add. Moments later, as Dwayne approaches the turn, he slows down to get final word from the group before committing to the exit. Riggs gets everyone’s confirmation and gives Dwayne the go ahead to turn off. Once he does this, the bus enters a long strip of deserted road with thick woodlines surrounding both sides of the road. The bus continues to drive further down the road as they notice there not to be any abandoned vehicles or signs of the apocalypse for miles in the area. Everything looks normal as if the world was the way it used to be.
Some time passes as they drive down the road. Most of them, at this point, seem to be expecting the worse. The group grows nervous as to what they might find. It could be anythi
ng they tell eachother as they pass the very last makeshift spray painted sign which reads “Next Right.”
Once they clear the sign, the woodline turns into an open grassy field. Beyond the field, lies a gigantic walled and fenced off complex with strains of C-wire wire around it. It appears to be a prison. As the bus approaches, they notice the turn off road leading to the front gate. Multiple watch towers are noticed from a distance. Andrew notices people up in there wearing civilian attire and holding rifles. One of the men is looking through binoculars staring right at them. Seconds later one of the men in the watch tower begins talking into his radio, obviously reporting the approaching vehicle he has spotted.
“Wow, a prison. Great idea. Why didn’t we think of that?” Riggs jokes as he turns around looking at the people around him seeing if they are laughing with him.
No one is.
“What happened to all the signs along the road? Normally there would be signs warning drivers of nearby facilities such as these,” Linda wonders.
“Could be a trap,” Randall declares. Everyone brushes his statement off. At this point, however, everyone on the bus appears to be nervous as to what type of people they will meet inside as Dwayne makes the turn and pushes closer to the gate. As the bus pushes forward, he notices that part of the concrete in the road up ahead has been removed and a drop off follows.
However, it doesn’t appear to be that deep or wide as he decides to punch it through anyway. As the vehicle approaches, the bus decends a few inches below into the dip. Once he accelerates and pushes the bus back up on to the pavement, loud popping sounds can be heard along with air escaping at a loud and high rate of speed.