While BJ and the boys put their rolls away, Natalie approached Thomas. He saw her coming, though he refused to look up from the ground, instead awkwardly shifting in place. As she came to a halt in front of him, he raised his face, and Natalie saw a glimmer of determination flickering in the burned man’s eyes. Something had changed during the night.
“Why?” Natalie spoke only the single word, a distant memory of BJ asking her the exact same question echoing in her mind. Now that she was in a similar position, she felt as though she understood the veteran better. Thomas was injured, he had no idea what he was doing, and he would probably be happier if he stayed behind… yet here he was, volunteering anyway.
“I’m not going to pretend we’ve had a great start together.” Absentmindedly, Thomas’ hand reached up to graze his face where BJ had struck him shortly after they had met. “In fact, I hated all of you after you found me. Because of the way you treated me, because you made me go back... you made me face what I had run away from.”
Reading Thomas’ face was challenging, given the burns and bandages, but Natalie took him for seeming thoughtful. After another moment to collect himself, he continued.
“I need that, that extra push to confront what I’m trying to escape. I’ve seen you, all of you, and after everything that’s happened, I’ve come to terms with why you did all that you did. I get it.” He chewed his lip, a habit he must indulge in often given the broken, bloody skin that comprised it. Natalie tried not to wince for his sake.
“I don’t know if I can ever redeem myself, for what I did, leaving Alison and the others to fight that thing by themselves, but I guess if ever there was a way, it would be with all of you. I… I have to try.” Thomas’ courage flickered, dangerously close to going out, but Natalie punched his shoulder and put on her best smile.
Truthfully, she thought he was making a bad decision, though she respected his reasoning for it. Thomas, in a way, reminded her of herself. Natalie had felt similar fears, and it was only through trial and tribulation that she had come to be where she was now. Maybe someday, Thomas would be in a similar position.
With a nod to Rico, Thomas was supplied with a handgun and a knife, and given the same basic rundown that Natalie herself had received so long ago. They wouldn’t be traveling nearly as far as they had when Natalie was first picked up by BJ and the others, but it seemed like a good idea to ensure that Thomas had at least some means of defending himself.
Once they were satisfied that they were as prepared as they were going to get, they left, though not before Lia gave them each a tight hug and wished them well. Natalie smiled, the first genuine feeling of warmth in her heart weakly sputtering to life. Stephen caught her eye as she let Lia go, and he silently mouthed be safe before turning away.
Knowing that there were people wishing her well made Natalie feel a bit better, but it was a feeling that she knew couldn’t last forever. Soon enough they’d be at the outpost again, and as the crew stepped out of the laundromat and back into the street, she knew they all shared the same grim thoughts.
They began their march, and Natalie wondered just what they were going to find on their return. The whole scene had been mayhem, and everything was going south long before they’d even left. She couldn’t help but believe that it would have only worsened, and so her thoughts were weighed down with images of steadily darker suspicions.
Almost as if mocking them, the streets continued to show no sign of undead activity. Empty as they had been for days leading up to the attack, as if nothing had happened. Natalie bit her lip.
She knew there was more than one outpost still standing in the world. What if the zombies had attacked all of them? What if more people had been caught off guard and butchered, just like the refugees she had been surrounded by? There had been plenty of deaths in her own camp, but the thought of countless other similar supposed sanctuaries also being lost…
That’s enough. You’re not helping yourself. Shut up, and focus. You can do that. Just focus on what’s ahead. Looking to get her mind off of her nightmarish thoughts, Natalie began studying the road they were on in an attempt to discover where they were.
After their flight through the sewers, Natalie had completely lost her bearings. By the time they’d come up and gotten into the laundromat, she had wanted nothing to do with anything, perfectly content with shutting down and tuning the world out.
Now that she was back outside, she recognized some of the street names. Another ten minutes passed, and she knew exactly where they were. The outpost wasn’t far away, after all. It had only seemed like a great distance because of the winding path through the tunnels that they had been forced to take.
Just ahead, they would be rounding the street corner and be put on the main road that ran straight into the outpost’s center gates. They would be approaching from a sizeable distance, giving them more than enough room to dodge out of sight if things proved too dangerous to continue.
Once again, images of what horrors were ahead played through Natalie’s mind. Rounding the bend and getting the first sight of the camp since they’d left, she found herself uncertain of what to think.
From their distance, it looked the same. The gates looked closed, the walls were standing. Slowly moving nearer, Natalie noticed the first sign that something was amiss; there were no guards manning the ramparts.
Drawing even nearer, Natalie saw that one of the gates was just slightly ajar, and pouring out from underneath them both was a fresh pool of blood. BJ gestured for Natalie to join him, and the two crept right up to the opening in the gate. It was barely cracked, but it was enough for the two of them to see inside.
Natalie’s veins went cold. Even being severely limited in what they could see, it was unnerving. More blood, gallons of the stuff, covered everything in sight. There were no bodies, no flesh of any kind. The only sign of violence came from the red that painted everything and the thick, nauseating scent of death.
Being the smallest in frame, Natalie gestured for BJ and the boys to wrench the door open, at least enough for her to step inside and give the all clear. As one, they gripped the gate and heaved, even Thomas throwing his best at it. The creak as the metal was manhandled open sent chills down Natalie’s spine. If there was anything alive inside, it knew someone else had arrived.
The whole world was silent, and absolutely still. Natalie flashed a sign to the others to let them know it was clear, though she didn’t like it. Falling back into formation, BJ resumed the lead, but Natalie noticed even he seemed to be hesitating. The camp was completely empty. Not even supplies remained behind; it was picked clean. Natalie hoped that meant people had survived, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that things were just going to get worse.
Tunnels were still gaping open, and Natalie had to suppress the urge to vomit as they skirted around one. There had been innumerable tracks in the gore around them, but it all seemed to converge at the tunnel entrance. Here, the drag marks were overwhelming, as countless bodies had been brought down into the darkness.
Before she had the opportunity to delve deeper into her own sick fantasy, Natalie’s eyes caught movement in the distance. They had made their way to within sight of the inner ring’s entrance, and it looked as though there were people moving atop it. Survivors? Or more undead, just finishing up?
BJ waved his hand, and one of the figures waved back before signing something that Natalie didn’t recognize. Thankfully, BJ understood, and began a short exchange. A moment later, and he gave the group the all clear to approach the center gates.
Natalie had never seen the walls of the inner ring, more because she had never had cause to than anything else. Compared to the outer ring, it was immaculate. No patchwork weave, no shoddy scaffolding. Every ounce of effort had been made to make the place impregnable, and it showed.
Flares of rage went off inside Natalie’s chest. The bastards ran home when these people needed help. Just left them out here to die for nothing. Regretfully, she slung her shot
gun over her shoulder and out of her hands as they quickly passed through the gate. If she held onto it too tightly, it was likely to wind up “accidentally” going off.
The fits of anger cooled as she took in the sight before her. She had believed that the inner ring was somehow left unscathed, but she couldn’t have been further from the truth.
Everywhere around her, men and women were trying to clear the aftermath of the attack and bring some sense of order back to the camp. Others were pressing their ears intently to the ground, obviously trying to prepare themselves for another assault.
Many tunnels were visible, even within the relatively short view that Natalie had, though they had been collapsed and filled with whatever materials were on hand. That explained why the refugee camp had been so bare; the survivors here had picked it clean for materials to build their defenses back up.
Beyond that, the whole camp appeared to be armed to the teeth and jumpy. A reasonable response, but still an unsettling one to see. These people were no longer taking any chances, and while that briefly brought a feeling of grim satisfaction, Natalie couldn’t help but feel as though all of this could have been prevented if they’d just paid attention to their warnings.
Now that they had been vindicated, BJ and the others were treated with a mixture of respect and deep regret. It was obvious now that they had been telling the truth, and those who had survived were forced to live with the results of their disbelief. Their escort refused to look directly at them, his face cast downward and red with shame.
When they were finally brought in to what appeared to be a makeshift command center, the man who came to greet them looked like he had been working himself to death. He smiled warmly at BJ, and to Natalie’s shock, BJ returned the look with a hug. Though the stranger was easily dwarfed by BJ’s size, he still patted the giant earnestly on the back with a laugh.
Surprise colored Natalie’s face, and she took another second to observe the small man now wrapped tightly in BJ’s arms. He looked to be in his fifties, perhaps a decade older than BJ was, with a scraggly white beard peeking out around his tan and wrinkled face. Though he was undeniably slight of frame, he was all muscle; a lean and wiry opposite to BJ’s sizeable and bulky form.
“BJ, my friend. Am I glad to see you alive and kicking. Tell me, what in God’s name does it take to put you in the ground?” Marco and Rico were smiling, and BJ boomed a laugh.
“More, apparently. Though I will say it was closer than I’d have liked. I’m glad to see you survived, Raoul. And that you seem to have been promoted.” It was still friendly banter, but something about the way BJ mentioned this Raoul’s promotion seemed odd. Her suspicions were confirmed as Raoul’s jovial expression took a turn for the downcast.
“We lost a lot of people, B. We tried to call the soldiers back to at least protect the lab, to try and save the medical team and their work on a cure, but it all went to Hell anyway. Wesley’s gone, snatched away into one of those godforsaken holes out there. All of our science team, dead. By the time we fended them off and closed up their tunnels, the damage was already done. The hope for a cure was lost, and the refugee camp had been reduced to drag marks in the mud. We lost, and bad.” Raoul sighed, and suddenly he looked much worse, as though any minute he would fall apart under the pressure of his memory.
“The boys in charge should have been better prepared, should have listened to you, but none of us were expecting an attack that organized. Shit, we still thought they were mindless. Most of us were so focused on curing this damn thing, or keeping out traitors and saboteurs, that we didn’t even guess such an assault would be possible.” At that, BJ rested a hand on his friend’s shoulder, shaking his head and rumbling discontentedly.
“You believed me from the start. This isn’t on you, it’s on Wesley and the others.” BJ’s consolation drew a bitter laugh from Raoul.
“Well then, Wesley’s dead and we won’t be making the same mistake again, if that means anything to anyone.” BJ frowned, but Raoul was already brushing the remark off. Taking a step back and getting a good luck at BJ’s group, he snickered quietly to himself.
“I don’t know if you made a deal with God or with the Devil, but I have to say I never thought I’d see you again. How did you make it out of that pit?” Now BJ chuckled, shrugging his shoulders and jerking a thumb in Natalie’s direction.
“Natalie told us to take the tunnels. It was ballsy, and we lost a couple of people down there, but we’d all be dead if we hadn’t.” BJ’s revelation drew a whistle from Raoul, and twin stares of surprise from Marco and Rico. Natalie hadn’t realized that none of them knew her involvement in their escape, and she felt a hint of red rising in her cheeks.
“That was a gutsy move. I’m impressed, though it sounds like your new member may be taking a little too much advice from your playbook, B.” Both men rumbled in amusement to themselves before Raoul spoke again, a glimmer of hope in his eyes.
“Did many of you make it out? We need all of the people we can get to regroup, you know.” BJ almost looked sorrowful as he met his friend’s gaze.
“I’m sorry, Raoul. It was just us, and three others who stayed behind to rest. Considering how violent the sewers were, I don’t believe any other refugees would have survived that way.” Even Natalie felt miserable at the look on Raoul’s face as BJ delivered the news.
“A mess. This whole thing has been one giant mess, from start to finish. But, I stand by what I said. We have room here for all of you, if you’ll have it.” BJ smiled again, as awkward and unsure as ever, before patting Raoul on the back.
“We’ll consider it but, for now, we need a new plan.” BJ’s talk of action rekindled something in Raoul, and the man immediately adopted a more energetic demeanor.
“Ah, that’s my boy! Always ready for more. I don’t know what I’d have done if you hadn’t come back home, B.” Raoul grinned, revealing a set of stained teeth that suggested a lifetime of nicotine habits, but Natalie found the expression infectious.
“We need volunteers to contact the other major military posts around the area, both to make sure that they’re okay and, if possible, to warn them about what happened here.” BJ cocked a brow at that.
“Why haven’t you been able to maintain contact here? We’ve been radioing back and forth between them for months.” BJ’s question drew a scowl from Raoul, who slammed his fist down on a nearby table. Apparently they had struck a nerve, and though he was attempting to compose himself, it was obvious that this was a question he had been torturing himself over for quite some time.
“We’ve been trying! Some turncoat prick keeps fucking with our gear, and any time we make progress, we get set back again.” Natalie felt bad for the man; he blamed himself for everything that had gone wrong, even in spite of the fact that he had done everything he could with his limited influence.
Raoul exhaled slowly in a weak attempt to get his nerves back in line, and it was plain to see that guilt was taking its toll on the old soldier. BJ’s frown had deepened, but Raoul ignored him as he continued to explain the situation.
“A while back we caught a saboteur interfering with our comms, and we thought the problem had been settled. Then a huge chunk of our equipment got fried, and we found out the hard way that we’d been more compromised than we’d thought. The bastards are crafty and our boys are stupid.” Raoul glowered to himself, scratching a scar on his neck and adding in a low mutter, “Hope the fucker died slow when the beasts came.”
BJ paused, mulling over everything he’d heard. After a few moments of silent consideration, he grunted, and nodded his head in affirmation. Everyone present, aside from a confused Thomas, understood his meaning: they were taking the envoy job.
“We will need some ammunition, as well as armaments for three, then we’ll be heading out immediately. If you don’t hear back in a week, assume the worst and send another team.” BJ had barely finished his sentence before Raoul signaled at one of his subordinates, who promptly left to retrieve
the requested supplies.
BJ saluted Raoul, something that Natalie understood as a means of conveying his appreciation and respect for his friend, who only chuckled grimly before pulling the big man into another embrace.
“Take care of yourself out there, B. You and your crew.” Raoul flashed his filthy smile at all of them again. “You’ve got good people with you.”
With a final goodbye squeeze, BJ turned on his heel and made his exit. Natalie and the others followed behind. Though they had left Raoul with smiles, she was disappointed in the conclusion they had reached. Raoul seemed to be on the up-and-up, but even so, Natalie loathed the idea of continuing to run errands for the military. If she was being honest, she was surprised that BJ had agreed to take the job.
Trust him, Natalie. He hasn’t led you wrong yet, and you’ve got no good reason to believe he will. Maybe he’s just thinking more clearly than you are. Natalie had to admit that, despite the circumstances, she was still bitter about what had happened to the refugee camp.
Hearing the explanation made sense, but didn’t make her feel better. Everything had been a wash. Even with their attempt to draw back and protect their medical staff, they had lost. The realization that Mejhit had likely been killed settled in as well, and Natalie felt a conflicted sense of loss.
The guard who had been tasked with their supply run was waiting at the exit from the inner ring, but Natalie’s attention had returned to the thought of the tunnel mouths ahead. As BJ took hold of their new gear and they made their way back through the outer camps, she could swear, just on the edge of her senses, that she heard screaming echoing out from within the nearby tunnels. Whether the rest of the crew shared her concerns or not, they gave a wide berth around any of the holes that they came across as they made their way back to the main gate.
Returning to Lia and the others didn’t take much time, and the road back remained as clear as ever, a sign that Natalie had now taken to mean that thousands of people were being slaughtered elsewhere. Throughout it all, though, she noticed Marco and Rico exchanging strange grins with one another, as if they were privy to a joke that only they had heard.
The Phoenix Trilogy (Book 1): World On Fire Page 27