by Tim Yingling
“And Kieran.” He stopped twenty feet from me. “I’ll also know if you come looking for us tonight. So, don’t do it. And keep that radio on you.”
He didn’t do anything but turn around and walk away. I wish I could say that was the last time I saw him, but it wasn’t. That will come shortly.
My people relaxed a bit for the next hour. We wanted to make sure that Kieran was far enough away. In that time I sent the two guys from the town (coming to find out again their names were Marty and Lee, hopefully, this time I’ll remember) to check the woods every fifteen minutes. Just to make sure Kieran didn’t decide to stick around.
Owen let me in on where Tayvon went off to. Owen sent him to our uncle’s cabin. Technically it was our cousin’s cabin since our uncle died five years before, but we still called it our uncle’s. Plus, Owen had no idea where our cousin was. He had gone out to the cabin on more than one occasion to try to find our cousin and his wife to no avail. Owen counted his losses and moved on.
Debbie wanted to move her mother. Danielle and Kate helped her out. When the discussion of whether or not to bury her came up, it was unanimous that we should let the animals have her. Kristy was the only one who wanted to bury her. She subsided when she got the information on what Sara did while traveling to Pilgrim, and what she did while being in Pilgrim. It wasn’t something that some of us could let go.
I took my baby girl in my arms. It was hard to believe that in nine short days she was going to be one. My last child. All I wanted to do was walk away with both my girls and hide somewhere. But I couldn’t do that. There were innocent people in Pilgrim that needed my help.
If you haven’t understood as of yet, I’ll explain now.
I am not someone who can let something like this go by the wayside. Granted, I pretty much put a hindrance in Kieran’s operations, but he could still come back to power. He has the means and the authority to do so in Pilgrim. Much like Elizabeth in D.C., he is more of a virus than the zombies. The only way to eliminate a virus is by fighting it head on. You can’t let it run its course because it will just get worse. I’m the medicine that Pilgrim needs to become healthy again.
Debbie understood that. Claire was far too young to know any different. So, in the meantime, I had to get Debbie and Claire out of the town so they were protected. There was only one way I could do that.
Phil and Owen did inventory on the weapons that came from Kieran’s truck. Added with the weapons that Marty and Lee had brought back from the cache, we had ourselves a substantial arsenal of rifles, machine guns, pistols, shotguns, knives, and even grenades. The locals must have raided the National Guard Armory when this shit popped off.
That being said, all I wanted was my H&K .762 and my .45. They had been trusty enough for me in this world. No reason why they wouldn’t continue to do that for me. I didn’t even take a full combat load for them. Just two extra magazines for the .762 and one extra clip for the .45. If I needed more than that then I would be in some serious shit.
Looking over the weapons one last time before I talked to the group, I realized I may need one more item. I picked it up and put it in the back of the truck, covering it with a blanket. Where I was sending everyone else the item wouldn’t be too handy for them. But I would definitely need it where I was going.
Having everything I needed, I turned to address the group.
“Listen up people.” They turned to me. “It’s time for you all to head to the cabin and stay there.”
Of course, there were grumblings from the crowd. Only Owen, Marty, and Lee were the ones who stayed silent. They had no reason to argue. I wish I could tell you what everyone else was saying, but it was all so close together I couldn’t even hear it. Plus, it all came down to them not wanting me to send them away. They wanted to help out in the fight.
I put my hands up for them to quiet down.
“It will be better for me to handle this on my own. I do believe that he is going to want to do something to me tonight. The first place he is going to check is Hannah’s dad’s house. So, that is where I am going.”
“And where do you want us to go?” The anger in Kristy’s voice was fierce. She could be exceptionally mean when she wanted to be.
“To the cabin I sent Tayvon to,” Owen said before I could. “It’s the safest place for us. We could funnel his group in by placing claymores in the woods. Making it so his group has to come by either the road or the lake. If that happens, then it’ll be a turkey shoot for us. They won’t know what hit them.”
“Are you sure about this, Daddy?” Tears already sprouted in Debbie’s eyes. I hated that. She wasn’t being fair to me.
“It’s the best way, sweetheart. I need to protect you.” I stopped and looked at the group. “All of you. In less than fifteen hours, this will all be over. Either I’ll be dead and Kieran will be trying to get to you, in which case Owen will protect you and get you the hell out of Pilgrim. Or Kieran will be gone or dead and we can live peacefully.”
Owen began to gather all the things they would need. Marty, Lee, and Phil took notice and helped. Kristy held onto the baby while I kissed her head. Debbie held onto me the entire time. Danielle could only shake her head at the situation. I don’t know why she was acting the way she was, but I was about to find out.
As I began to get into the truck with the spare tire to leave, Danielle stopped the door from shutting.
“You are blind in one eye, you still have a concussion, that wound can open up at any time, and you aren’t even on the pain meds you should be on. This has got to be one of the worst ideas I have ever seen.”
“Do you have a better one?”
Her face took on a sternness that I have only seen in doctors and nurses. She had a better one. One that I would have used in a different circumstance. But as it lies, I couldn’t put her in danger.
“I have to go with you.”
“No.”
She reached in and took the keys from the ignition. “Then you don’t go anywhere. Take your nurse with you, or don’t go at all. Those are your only two options.”
She turned to Owen, pleading with him.
Owen stepped away from the van towards me. “I have to agree with Danielle, Sarge. You are still in desperate need of medical care. Just do us all a favor and take her with you so she can at least keep an eye on your head.”
Looking at the faces of everyone else I could see they wanted the same thing. I don’t know how it happened, but in an extremely short amount of time, I had so many people who would lay their lives on the line for me. It almost brought me to tears. Almost.
“Give me the keys.”
Danielle held them back. “I need to hear you say it first.”
I breathed in deeply in anger. “Get in the truck and give me the keys then.”
She didn’t hesitate. She took a pistol with two extra clips from the cache and hustled to the other side of the truck. As she got in, she handed me the keys. We drove off from my group of people just as suddenly as we arrived.
* * * *
Monday, 11 July 2016 (Early Morning)
Pilgrim, Indiana
I wasn’t exactly at my father-in-law’s house. We were in the heart of the city, just on the south side. The house was average for Pilgrim, with a field on the other side of the road. The field is what I wanted.
We got there around ten the night before. I quickly went in to check the house over. It was deserted, to say the least. There was no need for me to continue looking.
After retrieving the sniper rifle and ammo, Danielle and I walked across the field. The field took up an entire block. On the other side of the field was a barn. I didn’t want the barn. I wanted what was next to the barn.
Anybody worth his salt when it came to tactics of war would be able to say that if a sniper was to be overlooking a house (like I was about to), the sniper would take the barn, not the silo. For me, taking the silo offered more cover. I could open the door to the chute and look over a vast area. The ch
ute was thirty feet high, there was no way they would be able to see where the firing came from.
The tier we were on, offered me a chance to try to get an hour of sleep. That was until she showed up.
Danielle and I had everything set up. It was just past midnight, and I wanted to get some sleep before Kieran and his group showed up, if they showed up. I figured they would, but they would most likely wait until they were sure I was asleep.
Danielle took her time redressing my head wound. She made sure my wound, as well as my eye, were cleaned out. Being delicate with what she did was a major relief for me. My head pounded all day since I woke up. The Naproxen helped a bit, a lot less than I had previously told anyone, but the pain was starting to get to me. Danielle told me the reason behind that was because of the swelling, not in my brain but my head. She described exactly what it felt like to me. Tightening of the skull, full on pressure on the left side of my head, and a stabbing pain where the cut was. She’s good at her job. I just hope she would be able to keep doing it.
It took her close to twenty extra minutes to get done. I was about to lay down when I looked over the field. There was a lone figure moving from my father-in-law’s house to the field. Coming straight for where I had just hunkered down. Danielle noticed the person as well. Her job in case something like this happened was to take the .762. The rifle would give her a bit more kick than she would anticipate, but it wouldn’t stop her from firing.
I knew the figure once she moved into the moonlight. Kate was persistent on wanting to help me out, or protect me. Either way, she was about to get into a whole lot of trouble.
What she did when the headlights flooded the small street reminded me of the first deer I spotlighted as a kid. I wasn’t hunting yet, my dad was just beginning to teach me how to track. Once I put that light on the deer its head popped up, eyes wide, tail in the air, and hind legs ready to jump if the situation called for it. The deer didn’t know I wasn’t going to shoot it. When I turned the light off it took off. We could hear it prancing through the trees.
Kate was frozen just like the deer. She hunched over a bit. Maybe she was tensed, I couldn’t tell from seven hundred yards away, with one bad eye to boot. I gazed to the west to see a cargo van rip-roaring down the road. Kate needed to move, and move she did.
Once the van got onto the block, she was already fifty yards into the field, sprinting for the silo. I didn’t want her running straight for me. It would give away my position. Although the rifle did have a silencer on the end, it still wouldn’t hide the flash. I needed to help her.
As the van came to a stop, I reached for the rifle. By the time I had it placed on the edge of the chute, Kate was halfway across the field with one man already out of the van chasing after her. I got behind the site, adjusted for the little wind there was, guestimated on the distance and the speed of travel of the guy, said a silent prayer, and fired the rifle.
Half-a-second later, a gush of liquid flew from the guy’s head. His forward motion carried him an additional seven feet then he fell.
“Back to the van!” Danielle shrieked to me. Then into the radio, “Don’t do it, Kieran.”
I raised the rifle to see that someone standing next to Kieran was raising a rifle as well. It wasn’t a sniper rifle like mine, but what looked like an AK-47. The man stopped after Danielle told Kieran not to do it because Kieran put up a hand. He had to reach back into the van to get the radio I told him to keep on him.
“Well, if it ain’t the traitorous, sexy, bitch Danielle.” There was a bit of humor to his voice.
I looked down to see where Kate was. I couldn’t see her. She must have made it across the field to a safe spot.
“Where’s Byron?”
I motioned for Danielle to put the radio beside my head.
“I’m right here, Kieran. You do realize that I can take all three of you out rather quickly, don’t you?”
He didn’t say anything for a long minute. The silence weighed down on me like the pressure on my head. Thankfully, the military had taught me patience. Something I never had before I joined.
“Yes, I do. The problem is, if you do that, then everyone else is going to be killed. Tell me, when was the last time you talked to them.”
He was trying to bait me out.
“That won’t work with me, Kieran. You have no idea where I sent them. And the place I did send them is easily defendable by Owen. Plus, these radios have no range then maybe a mile. Why do you think I wanted you to keep it? I can’t talk to Owen any more than you can.”
Another pause by him. I looked through the scope to see him conversing with the other two. For someone who wanted to be solely in charge, he seemed to get advice from people a lot. I let them talk amongst themselves, keeping that patience in check.
“So, you have no proof they made it to their destination?”
“Cut the shit Kieran and tell me where you supposedly snagged them from.”
He didn’t hesitate this time. “We took them from Owen’s house. All seven of them.”
I instantly made the wrong answer buzzer noise into the radio, quickly followed up by my best cheesy game show host voice, “Well, Kieran, I’m sorry but that’s the wrong answer. Now I need you to pick left or right.”
Looking down the scope, I saw Kieran look to his right. I quickly changed direction to his left and put a round through that guy’s head. His head whipped back into the open window, then flew back out carrying his body forward.
Kieran instantly raised the radio to his mouth. “WHAT THE FUCK, BYRON?! What the hell did he do to you?”
“It’s not what he did to me. It’s what you did to him. I told you to hold off until tomorrow. You should have known there was going to be consequences to your actions. How do you not know that by now? I can tell you this though. I’ve had two chances to kill you when you thought you had the upper hand. I can assure you that I will not be lenient a third time. Next time I will fucking kill you, and I won’t make it slow and painless. No, if you force my hand I will make it the most painful action that ever happens. Do you understand?”
No hesitation from the other end. “Yes, I understand.”
“Then you are free to go. If I see you before noon, I will kill you.”
Kieran and the last man got into the van. They were gone just as quickly as they showed up. It was kind of comical in a way. Kind of like the old black and white movies where the villains get scared of the good guys. They stumbled over each other. Neither one could get into the vehicle. To top it off, they couldn’t get it started on the first try, but eventually did. They were still out of there in less than five seconds though.
Danielle and I stayed where we were for another twenty minutes. I didn’t hear any movement below us. Kate must have known not to move either. Once we did move down the stairs, she must have heard us. She was there, waiting.
“Even though I didn’t want you here, I’m glad you came. You were able to flush one of them out of the van before I needed him to.” I didn’t raise my voice to her. Yes, I was furious, but her showing up the way she did help me.
She could tell I was mad. “I’m sorry. It’s just the way you are, you need all the help you can get. And Owen knows you’re the only one who can take Kieran out. Owen told me that Kieran’s afraid of you. You showing up was a complete unpredictability to him. Now he doesn’t know what to do.”
I nodded and put my arm around her shoulder. The sniper rifle was slung on my right shoulder, and Danielle was carrying the .762. We decided to leave everything else up there. We didn’t need any of that anymore.
The three of us walked back to the truck together, but I only talked to Kate. Kate nodded and “uh-huh”ed at the right times, but didn’t say much of anything else.
“I’ve tried to make it a point that you shouldn’t put your life on the line for me. I’m not worth it. If I die, another five can take my place just as easily. Owen is one of those five. But you showed up and helped me all the same.”
“That’s bullshit. You’re more than just some soldier. You managed to get yourself a whole company” – I had to laugh a little at that part – “to fight with you. Most of the people you traveled with seem to want to put their lives on the line for you. But you won’t let them. I can understand why you won’t either. You need to use them to this advantage, Sarge. They’ll take a bullet for you, and you don’t want them to.”
“Are you included in that number?”
“Have I decided to leave yet?”
I thought about what she said. “I know they all would lay their lives down for me, but I didn’t, and don’t, want them to. I want them to stay alive. I’m not worth anyone’s life.”
I couldn’t get any more out. Kate elbowed me in the ribs. I turned to her, but still heard Danielle. It was like they were both on the same wavelength. There was no way they rehearsed what was happening. They just met no more than six hours ago.
“You are worth three lives right now. Your life, and your daughters’ lives. You have two beautiful little girls that need their father. Do you want your wife and son to die in vain? I know I don’t want my father’s life or my husband’s life to be in vain because you decide you are a modern day Riggs.”
Using a pop culture reference that I would be one of few to understand against me? How dare she?
“You don’t get it.”
Kate said, “Then explain it to us.”
We still hadn’t moved. These two women had me deadlocked in the middle of the field. If Kieran decided to hide out just as I had, we would be easy to pick off. But they wanted answers, so I had to give them.
“I’m putting my life on the line for my daughters. Nobody else needs to do it for them besides me. If I have anyone else around I will also concentrate on them. As long as it’s just me, I can handle that. Having more people complicates how I want to handle certain situations. You know the cliché ‘I work best alone’? That’s true for me. I really do.”