Beth nodded, “Tabitha is right, she is the logical choice, but we haven’t decided if that is even what we are doing.”
Ceara had been quiet wanting to hear everything and she didn’t want to tell Charlie that Tabitha had a point. “I know this isn’t exactly what we are talking about, but why are we freaking out if we don’t even know they came this way?”
Alden looked at Tabitha and then the group, “Tabitha’s right, Charlie, you and Colt being shot would raise questions. Beth, well hell, you’re the Doc; I ain’t putting you in harm’s way. Ceara you’re not cut out for this, so Tabitha you’re it. Father and daughter is how it will be played. Although, I have my doubts anyone is going to believe you’re my daughter.”
Tabitha laughed, “Why can’t we just be two strangers that met up on the road, that way if they ask questions we got answers. Hell, it’s the truth… almost.”
Alden smiled, “Yeah that’ll work. I think first things first though; you and I are heading to the ranger station to get the trailers and what supplies we can.”
Ceara walked around not sure what she was supposed to be doing. “Ok since the need isn’t urgent, I am going to head back down to the creek to finish the laundry. Charlie knows where I am if you guys need me.”
Alden looked to Charlie, “let me have your keys.”
Charlie walked into to his cabin and came right back tossing a rabbits foot keychain to Alden. Looking to Tabitha, Alden nodded, “let’s go.”
They both headed to Charlie’s van and checked the hitch on the back; it was a 2” inch one. “This should work it’s the standard size.”
Tabitha had followed him, “So what are we doing? We take this and your truck? I haven’t ever towed a trailer before.”
Alden smiled at her, “Trust me cupcake, it’s not as hard as it looks. Towing is really easy; it’s the backing one up that becomes tricky.” He tossed the keys to her and headed to his truck. As he climbed in he called to her, ‘YOU FOLLOW ME AND KEEP YOUR EYES OPEN.”
Alden backed up and waited for Tabitha to pull in behind him then left and headed for the Ranger station. It took less than ten minutes by truck to get there. As they pulled up Alden stopped right at the gate and let Tonto out first. Tonto took off once more checking the place out. He came trotting back and sat down giving Alden the all clear. Getting out of the truck he motioned for Tabitha to join him.
“Okay cupcake here,” he handed her a 45 just like the one he wore on his hip along with a large K-bar knife. “Use the knife first on any wanderer you come across, remember we don’t know who or what is close by. You take that shed, I’ll get this one.”
As Tabitha started to walk away Alden turned and headed to his shed, he stopped and turned around, “Tabitha, You watch yourself, don’t try and be a wonder woman. You get into trouble whistle, Tonto will come running and I’ll be right behind him.” With that he turned and disappeared into the shed.
Instead of putting her gun in the waistband of her pants, she had checked to make sure that it was locked and loaded and simply held it down by her side. She walked very carefully through terrain and then when she got to the shed she tried to open it up and it budged a little. Something was definitely in the way, blocking her from opening it up all the way. Turning around she placed her back up against the door and with her left leg she back kicked the door until it had opened slightly more. When she turned around it had opened enough so that she could creep in. First she peeked inside and took a deep breath. There were no signs of death; she would know what that smell was. Slowly, she crept inside and looked around. The shed was black and Tabitha knew that if she could get the door open that it would bring more light inside. Looking back at the door she saw that what was blocking the door, a huge Coleman cooler. When she tried to budge it Tabitha noticed that it had a bit of weight to it so she decided to open it up. “Why the fuck would some fucking redneck put a ten pound bag of cement in a Coleman cooler?!?!!?” she said out loud then laughed, “Dumb motherfuckers!!”
Tabitha glanced around wondering how the person got out of the shed if they had blocked the door with the cooler. Her eyes landed on a dirty window high on the back wall, with a few handprints in the dust. She shook her head wondering what the point was. The only thing she could think was whoever was in here had been overrun and tried to block the entrance long enough to escape through the window.
Quickly she put the lid back down and laid her 45 on top of it and carefully shoved the cooler out of the way then opened the door to the shed. After it was fully open Tabitha propped the cooler in front of the door so that it would remain open while she searched the area. Looking around she saw a sickle hanging from the ceiling along with some huge logging chains. “I’ll have get Alden in here to check this shit out”, she commented while looking a little more.
Other tools were in there and an old fashioned push mower was sitting over in the far right hand corner with some old oily rags hanging off the handles. However; right next to it was upright red tool boxes that had several little drawers on the top and underneath the two doors were slightly open. Tabitha exclaimed, “JACKPOT!”, and then made her way over to investigate. Inside she found a hand saw with some hammers, chisels, and an electric hand saw.
Alden walked up to his shed lifted the latch and pushed gently on the door. The creaking hinges were not that bad. As it opened he caught sight of a small mouse scurrying across the floor. Tonto sniffed the floor and looked at Alden. Pushing the door all the way open he could see the sun’s rays shine through the dust. He walked in and looked around. The shelves were full of canned goods, vegetables, fruits and even canned meat. He walked back out and located the trailers outside by the horse barn. Checking the hitches he smiled, “Damn caught a break on that one.” Both hitches took a 2 inch ball hitch. Getting his truck first he backed right up and hooked the first trailer.
Once it was all hooked up, he walked over to where Tabitha’s shed was. Walking in Alden saw all the tools. “Well this is nice and all, but we really would only need that keg of nails and those boxes of wood screws.”
Tabitha frowned as she was holding an acetylene torch, “but.. but… but, this is cool.”
“Yes, but cupcake, unless one of us knows how to weld it isn’t worth its weight in dogshit. Like I said, we can use that keg of nails there and those crates of wood screws. Also the lumber will be okay we’ll find a use for that.” Alden started to carry out 8 ft. pieces of treated two by fours and laying them next to the second trailer as Tabitha was dragging the keg of nails. He smiled and pointed to the side of the shed, “If you use that two wheel dolly you’ll find that easier to move.”
As they finished loading the tools in the second trailer he smiled at Tabitha. Get Charlie’s van and back up over here, we’ll get you hooked up.
Tabitha looked at him and frowned, “Okay but I already warned you I have no idea what the hell I’m doing.”
Alden smiled, “Just watch your drivers mirror I’ll guide you.”
Tabitha got in and pulled the van around to back up. Seeing Alden in her mirror she put the van in reverse. As she backed up she could see Alden waving her back then he started to motion with his thumb to the right. Tabitha turned the steering wheel to the right and Alden threw up his hand to stop. “Cupcake, pay attention when I want the back of the van to go right you turn the wheel left pull up and try it again.”
It took several tries but they finally got it hooked up. Alden walked up to her window and tapped her shoulder, like I said that was the hard part.”
Tabitha looked at him, “You’re not going to make me do that with the trailer and all that back at the camp, cause if you are you can just go fuck yourself.”
Alden rubbed the top of her head, “Naw cupcake I wouldn’t do that to you… besides we need the cabin intact until we leave.”
The two spent the next hour carrying food, blankets, and supplies from the general store shed. Alden held the door to the van as Tabitha got in. “Just few things to remem
ber, one, this van will not stop as fast as it did before, so drive carefully and give yourself plenty of braking distance. Second, when you turn make it wide to allow for the trailer. Basically, watch me and do what I do and you’ll do fine.” The two took off and soon were pulling back into cabin area. Tabitha got out first and looked at Beth, Colt and Charlie, “You should see all the cool shit we got.”
Ceara had been doing the laundry for well over an hour and her arms were killing her. She was now on her knees in the mud. Within thirty minutes crouching down had really started hurting. She had thought of stripping out of the jeans and washing them as well, then when she was finished all she would have to do is wade out into the water and wash off her legs. The fact that Ceara knew that if anything happened and she had to run for it, she damn sure didn’t want to be in a t-shirt and panties.
As she scrubbed a pair of Charlie’s jeans, she let her mind wander, remembering back to when her mom use to drive her nuts, bugging her to do laundry, Ceara looked to a small patch of blue sky, “Mom, do you see me? I should have never gripped about folding clothes, much less loading and unloading them into a washing machine. I miss you Mom, I wish we were back the way we were, but I guess I wouldn’t have met Charlie if this didn’t happen.”
Ceara looked back to the clothes and started working on the next pair of jeans, letting her mind continue to wander as she scrubbed some mud out of the knees of Charlie’s jeans. She kept her eyes out looking for any Wanderers or even survivors from their battle, but her mind was going all over. She replayed her time in the apartment, hiding for days before she was forced out to find supplies, but even then she ran back to hide again. Ceara had been so scared then, she wanted to believe she wasn’t the same girl, but part of her knew she was. She was still scared to death and still didn’t want to leave the safety of her new home, part of her hated Alden for forcing them into this. For all she knew, he and Tabitha were back and they were all packing up to move to the damn ranger station that he had found.
Alden had a good reason to want to move them, Ceara knew it, and if she was truthful with just herself, she knew it wasn’t just his choice but the majority had decided. The battle had been the driving force to that decision, so she thought they should have waited for a few days before making such a big choice. The fight had been horrible, she and Charlie got to stay out of the chaos of it, but they had cut down so many people, for no other reason than a couple of them had attacked their group.
Alden knew they would be back to get the supplies and they had to stop them. Ceara was so glad there were no kids in the group, there would have been no way she would have let Charlie fire on them. She could see the scene in her head; it had played so many times that now it was in her dreams too. The dreams weren’t like the real battle, every time she slept she saw people but in the dreams there were little kids too, hell, most of them were kids and her and Charlie just kept killing them.
The three times she had slept, she had the nightmare, everyone in her group were brutally killing the another group, adults and children were dying all around them. Ceara kept feeding the ammo and Charlie kept firing, Alden was in the camp killing anything that moved. The dust and smoke started to clear and the ground was covered with bodies, Tabitha, Alden and Colt were checking bodies. Tabitha flipped one and the woman on the ground was Tabitha.
Colt and Alden were flipping bodies too, but not one of them seemed to know they were seeing their own faces looking back at them
Ceara tried to scream in the dream when two kids hand in hand started running for cover and Charlie fired on them, they fell to the ground looking at Ceara, the children were Charlie and Ceara. Each time Ceara woke she was in a cold sweats and wanting to scream “NO!!!!”
Ceara shook herself out of the memories, looking to the jeans she had been washing, “I guess they ain’t going to get no cleaner.”
She began to rinsing them out and tossed them to the side. An hour later she had the clothes as wrung out as she could and tried to pick up the tub, “Shit, damn thing is too heavy now.” She grabbed all the jeans and threw them across her arm and started back to the camp. As she walked out to the trees she saw everyone walking toward two trailers that Alden and Tabitha had brought back. The thoughts of the nightmares were still bugging her so Ceara began hanging the jeans on the clothesline before going to the trailers with everyone else.
Beth came outside when she heard Alden and Tabitha pull up. “Hey guys! Did you all pick up some take out?”
Tabitha looked up and laughed then replied, “Naaaa, sorry Beth all the places were closed but the delivery boy was just walking… well more like crawling on the ground with the good side of his body pulling himself along while the other part of his body looked worse than a four week old pepperoni pizza.”
Beth wrinkled up her nose, “That bad huh?
Looking back towards Colt, Beth smiled at him widely to show him just how happy she was to see that Alden and Tabitha had returned safely. Quickly turning Beth made her way over to Tabitha, “Well, let me give you a hand with some of those goodies you have there.”
First Tabitha handed Beth a big box of the canned goods that Alden had picked up. “Alden picked up a whole shit load of food that will hold us over for a while.”
Once Beth had received the box she noticed that there was a little bit of weight to it. “Well I hope we got a variety of things because that would be a nice treat for our patients and not just for them, for all of us.”
Colt went to the truck trailer with Charlie, “You going to go get Ceara?”
“Nah, I’ll let her have some time. She should be about done anyway.”
Colt shrugged, “Yeah, we all need some alone time even if it’s while doing chores, hell when I chop wood I get to work out frustrations.”
Charlie grabbed one of the boxes with his good arm and smiled at Colt, “Frustrations?”
Colt grabbed a box beside Charlie’s, “Yeah, frustrations, what do you know about that?” Charlie called over his shoulder, “I ain’t that I!”
Colt shook his head laughing; he finally looked into the box he was carrying, “NICE, canned hams!!”
Everyone was carrying things to the cabins but Colt had to set his down on the picnic table to give his leg a break, he thought he felt it bleeding and didn’t want Beth to know. He pretended he just wanted to get some coffee but Alden gave him a look, “No worries Alden, I’m coming, just need a quick break. Are we loading all this in the cabins or some in the sheds?”
Alden looked at him, “Both put the canned crates in the shed nothing in boxes or bags or we’ll have Yogi and Boo Boo with all their buddies all over here tonight.”
He walked over to Colt and placed a hand on his shoulder. Lowering his voice to a whisper, “Listen up cupcake you take it easy on that leg. There are plenty of others to do the heavy shit. You bust that thing open and Florence Nightingale over there is going to be on your ass, and not in a good way.” He turned to walk away, “More like a lawn boy in a weed pile.” He watched as the group seemed to work out a system of unloading.
He grabbed Charlie, “Listen I’m heading back to the station. There were a couple of large barns I wanted to check out.” Whistling, Tonto was up and by his side.
Half an hour later Alden was back at the Ranger station. Heading to a large metal building he found the big double doors chained and locked. Smiling at Tonto, “I know where the key is.”
Within minutes he had pulled the acetylene torch Tabitha had found. Wheeling the dolly over to the building he lit it and was making quick work of the chain and the door’s lock. Kicking the chain off the door, he reached up and slid on door open. Inside was what he had been hoping for. Two large tractors with mowers on the back end, road grader, and the prize of them all was a D-4 Caterpillar bulldozer. Searching the walls he found the key box. Reaching in, he found the keys to the Dozer. Picking them up he started to walk away and turned back and grabbed all the keys and shoved them in his pocket. Alden checked the fuel
it was full. As he climbed aboard he saw another large piggy back tank in the back of the shed that red DIESEL FUEL. A large grin came on his face as the engine roared to life. Driving it out he took a few minutes to familiarize himself with the controls.
He started to test drive it an open field. He was getting the hang of it, and then decided to try to practice driving backwards, that’s when he heard a large crunch and the left rear track sank deep into the ground. Putting it in forward he pulled it out and stopped it. Tonto was quickly at the opening of the hole, barking and clawing at the ground. “TONTO SIT! STAY!,” Alden then turned back to the hole. He waited for Wanderers to make their way out but soon knew it wasn’t deadheads in there.
“ALIGHT NOW COME ON UP OUTTA THERE OR I SWEAR TO GOD I’LL THROW A GRENADE DOWN THERE AND RUIN YOUR FUCKING DAY.”
A voice came from deep in the back, ‘NO NO NO WAIT IT’S COOL REALLY I’M A RANGER.”
Alden stepped back as the man came up a ladder. He was wearing the Ranger uniform although it was dirty it was in good shape. As the man reached the top he climbed out and stood up. Alden’s eyes kept going up as the man in front of him stood a good six foot eight, “Holy shit, how big is that storm cellar.”
The ranger took his hat off and brushed the dirt off it, “Well it’s about twenty feet by twenty feet but the ceiling is only six foot, a bit on the short side for me.”
Alden was looking the man up and down, but he still held the pistol at him, “Now the million dollar question. Who the fuck are you cupcake, and how long have you been down there?”
The man put his hat on and brushed the dirt off his clothes and stood straight. His face was thin and long and his beard was a bit scraggy. He had blue eyes, blond hair and looked to be in his late twenties. He started to smile then went sad, “Names Heath Williamson, I’m a U.S. Forest Ranger from Colorado. I was on my way home to try and see my kid when the world went to shit. When I got to Jeff City I was forced to head south because of the hordes of people and zombies. I knew about this place and came here looking for help. I was too late. The rangers here had been bitten so I killed them with a baseball bat and buried their bodies over in that field.”
Surviving Day By Day (Book 2): Fears, Flames, and Future Page 8