Fade to Grey (Book 1): Fade to Grey

by Brian Stewart

  “What did you do with the bodies?” I asked.

  “We put on some latex exam gloves that I had, and then moved the bodies to the amphitheater one at a time in the back of the golf cart.”

  “Why did you move them there? Especially since that’s where the meeting was going to be this morning,” said Uncle Andy.

  “Two reasons. The first is that there was no way I was going to try and stuff him back into the RV at site nineteen. The second reason is that none of the remaining crowd knew who the girl was or what campsite she came from, so I don’t know, I guess I was thinking that at the meeting maybe I could show the people what signs and symptoms are possibly involved in this sickness . . . I don’t know. I was tired. It was the wrong decision.”

  I shook my head and said, “No, it was the right decision at the right time, given the circumstances. Maybe if you were well rested, and didn’t just run back and forth across the campground several times after being grabbed by a dead guy, well, then maybe you would have picked different. But you did the best you could and that’s what counts.”

  He was still shaking his head slightly saying, “. . . No . . . I should’ve put them somewhere else. Besides, I never said that Mr. Hardison was dead. His family, definitely. But as for him, like I’ve already said, he wasn’t moving, but he did have a pulse. It was weak, but it was there and getting stronger.”

  “Doc,” my uncle said loudly as he put his hands on Doc Collin’s shoulders, “what’s done is done, OK. We’ve got to get up to that ball field and get this little shindig moving or them people ain’t going to stay there, and we need your help to do it, OK?”

  That seemed to bring Doc around a bit, and he took a few deep breaths, picked up his backpack, and said, “Let’s go.”

  Chapter 11

  We got there to find that Sally had done an amazing job of simplifying things. She had divided up the campers into three groups, two of which represented the different loops of the campground; the third was for people in tents at the group camp field. Each group had further separated themselves in ascending order based on which campsite they occupied. Each “site” was given a sheet of paper—pens, pencils and markers were shared—and the paper was folded in half, then in half again to make four squares. The other lady that Sally had been talking to earlier was barking out commands, friendly and encouragingly, almost making it a challenge instead of an order. Each site was to nominate one person to be the secretary. If you were the only one at the site, you were automatically it. In the top left square, you were to write either “Eagle, Heron or Field,” and then underneath that in the same square you were to put your site number. The top right square was to have a diagonal line drawn from corner to corner. The top of the triangle was to have a number in it—the total number of people who were staying at that site. The bottom triangle represented how many of those people were currently standing next to you at this meeting. Some may have decided to not attend after all. The bottom left square was to have everybody’s name, followed by a short abbreviation of whether they were male or female, and the approximate age. The final square on the bottom right was to contain the total number of vehicles at that site, and the total number of “residences”—be it tents or RV’S.

  Once the sheets were filled out, Sally and the other lady, her name was Amy I found out later, went around and collected the sheets, giving a cursory glance at each one before accepting it. As they were doing that, Doc explained to me that Sally had come up with this idea, a way to find out who’s who, and where they are. Doc handed me several sheets of paper stapled together. At the top in bold faced, underlined, Times New Roman font was a headline that said, “IDEAS, FACTS, AND PROBLEMS.” I took a couple minutes and read through. True to his physician heritage, it was arranged in a concise, “to the point” format. He and Sally had obviously given it a lot of thought and effort. Under the subsection “problems” several immediate issues stood out. He saw where my gaze was lingering and said, “You know we’re going to have to do that, right?”

  I nodded my head. A lot of people probably weren’t going to like it though, I thought. “Time to put on your game face, Eric,” I said to myself.

  Between Michelle, Uncle Andy, Doc, Sally, Amy, and me, we managed to regroup everybody in a smaller area that included several sets of bleachers that were moved closer together. It was a lot easier this way than trying to shout across the whole soccer field. Once everybody was settled, I stepped out in front of the crowd, reintroduced myself and Michelle, took a deep breath, and began.

  “I don’t know everybody’s story; some of you probably have a lot of information from the past few days that would be very helpful right now . . .“ People started shouting out dozens of things all at once, and it took a few minutes to get them squared away and quiet again. “As I was saying,” I continued, “I’m sure that a lot of you can answer a lot of questions, or at least provide insight, but right now is not the time. I have a lot of things to share with you, and there will be decisions that have to be made, by you, by me, and others as well. Some of those decisions are going to be a tough call. Some of those decisions are going to involve whether you stay here or not.” I let that sink in for a moment. “Nobody is going to be forced to stay at the campground. At the other end of that spectrum however, there are going to be certain requirements for you to stay. I’ll get into those as we go. I think the best way to start this is to take a few minutes and kind of ‘go around the room.’ If you have any important information that may be of use to the rest of us, just raise your hand and we’ll give you some time to share it. Time is of a concern however, so I’m asking you to please give serious thought before you raise your hand to speak. What we don’t need are rumors, or things that you heard from your second cousin’s half sister, twice removed. We only want facts . . . things that you’ve personally witnessed, OK?”

  In the next half hour or so, some of the generalized statements that seemed to pan out across multiple volunteers were that traffic exiting the major cities was a gridlocked nightmare; many people were walking or just sitting in their vehicles, out of gas along the side of the road. Another frequently mentioned observation was that while they were still within the range of the transmitters, the only radio they could pick up was a repeated broadcast of “This is a recorded announcement from the emergency broadcasting network, please stay tuned to this station for an important announcement.” However the announcement never came, just a repeated alert to stay tuned for it. A third tidbit that came up was from an older lady on crutches. She said that her son-in-law was a member of the North Dakota National Guard, and had come over to her house to pack her a suitcase and get her away from her home in Slate Hill, a suburb of Bismarck. She said that he told her that the governor had authorized the National Guard to use deadly force on any person who appeared sick or would not comply with other orders. When questioned further, she said he didn’t really specify what “other orders” there were. The fourth and final piece of information came from at least a dozen different people. They swore that they personally witnessed people suffer massive injuries—car wrecks, shootings, even the severing of a limb in one case—and walk away.

  Sally was taking notes of everything that was said, and I asked Doc to come over and tell the story of what had happened last night. He did. During his narrative of the events, I stopped him for a moment to remind the crowd that some of what they were going to hear from Doc, myself, and possibly others may not be suitable for younger ears, but to bear with it anyhow. After he got through, I gave an abbreviated version of what I knew, leaving out everything that had to do with Uncle Andy’s cabin, the fuel supply, or other “core group” related items. I told them about Trooper Ironfeather and what had happened at the barracks, and I told them about Mr. Westwick and the blond. After I finished, I answered a few questions, at least as far as I was able. Most of the questions asked I didn’t have the answer to. Sally’s friend Amy had taken the golf cart up to the camp office and filled several large
coolers with water from the small kitchen sink up there. She brought it back down with several sleeves of paper cups and everybody took a quick water break before I continued.

  “So, what does all this mean, and more importantly, how does it affect everybody here? I think I should start by mentioning a few indisputable facts so we’re all on the same page. Fact number one is that this campground can provide only a limited amount of resources. Those resources primarily being power, water, firewood, and to some small degree food and shelter. Power is only available on Golden Eagle loop as you may know; however, as you may also know, none of the power is currently working. We don’t know if it’s a local problem, or something larger in scope. We also don’t know when, or even if it will be restored. Some of you have generators, and that’s great. But generators require fuel to run, and the nearest gas station is about eight miles away and already empty.” I lied. I scanned the crowd for reactions, didn’t find any that I wouldn’t expect, so I looked at Doc’s notes before continuing. “The second issue is water. This is both a simple and potentially complex issue, so I’m going to let Doc explain it, since he knows more about the system.”

  Doc stepped to the front and said, “The water for this campground comes out of Ghost Echo Lake. That water is pumped up to a series of holding tanks that are located in that cement block building over there.” Doc indicated a black painted squat structure on top of a small rise just past the sand volleyball court. “Inside that building are two 1,500 gallon water tanks, as well as a 300 gallon pre-filter and sediment tank. The way the system works starts with a suction pump located inside the building, and it’s wired to a float valve assembly. Think of the pre-filter/sediment tank as tank number one, the first 1,500 gallon tank would be tank number two, and the final 1,500 gallon tank, of course, would be number three. When you turn on a shower in the restroom, or flush a toilet, or refill the water tank in your RV at the filling station, the water you are using comes out of tank three. When it gets to a certain level, the float valve in tank three causes a valve to open between tanks two and three. This refills tank three from the supply in tank two. When tank two gets low, the float valve in it triggers the pump to come on, which sucks more water out of the lake and pushes it through the pre-filter tank, and from there into tank two. The magic happens in tank two. If you were to pull the lid off of tank two, you would see what basically looks like a set of underwater fluorescent lights. It’s actually a UV sterilization system that kills bacteria and other nasty things that might be in the water. There’s also a small circulation pump to keep the water moving in tank two,” he paused for a second to ask if everybody understood. A few questions came up, but mostly just for clarification until some guy asked, “So it sounds like we’re pretty much set for water, right?”

  Doc answered. “Yes and no. You see, there is a dependency in this system to have continual power. There is a backup generator in the pump house for temporary situations, but like all generators it requires fuel. We have a little bit of fuel for it, but not enough to keep it running for any length of time. So the end result is that we have several billion gallons of water right next to us, how much of it we can safely drink is another matter. I’m sure that by rationing water, and the fuel for the generator, we should be able to provide at least a few weeks of potable water, based on our current campground population. In the meantime, we could supplement those resources by boiling water, as well as exploring other potential options that may come up. Another issue related to water is our ability to give you hot water, which right now is zero. It will remain zero until the main power comes back on.” There were a lot of grumbles in the crowd as that sunk in. Doc looked around for questions and then sat down.

  I addressed the gathering again, “Other issues are going to be food, shelter, and firewood. As of right now, due to the extraordinary and unforeseen circumstances that we find ourselves in, I am authorizing you to remove any fallen trees in the campground for use as firewood. Please don’t waste the wood with bonfires twelve feet tall. On the west side of Blue Heron loop there is a firebreak, where a few years ago they pushed back the tree line about seventy feet. That area contains enough firewood to provide everybody with several weeks—if not months worth—of firewood. However that firewood is currently in tree form, and will have to be cut up by hand or drug over and burned one section at a time. The campground maintenance is done by a contracted service, so we don’t have access to a fully stocked tool shed here, but there is a small chainsaw, as well as a few axes, hammers, and splitting wedges. Remember though, the chainsaw also uses gas.”

  I paused before continuing, letting the information sink in and wetting my throat with a few cups of water. “Food is going to be a real problem. I’m working on a potential source . . . hear that word people . . . ‘potential’ . . . It’s not guaranteed, but I may be able to come up with a limited amount of staples like rice and beans. A very limited amount. The food you brought with you may be all the food you have for while. I cannot force anybody to share their food, I can only encourage it. In the meantime I am authorizing you to take any game—fish, fowl, or mammal—whether in season or not and no matter what size it is, for use as food.” The grumbling got louder, and I could see several heads shaking and shoulders shrugging.

  “Shelter is next on the agenda. Everybody here got here somehow, whether RV or car, minivan or hitchhiking. As far as I know, everybody has a place to sleep. According to Doc, if we had to we could sleep several people on the floor of the campground office, and I’m sure there’s a lot of room in some of these RV’S, all it takes is somebody willing to make the offer.”

  “The final topic I want to talk to you about is security, and it’s a pretty broad topic, encompassing several different concerns. We don’t know how this sickness, or disease, or whatever you want to call it, is spreading. We can make some guesses based on what’s happened, but we’re still not one hundred percent sure. Symptoms seem to be elevated temperature, skin tone changes, delirium or confusion, redness in the eyes . . . these are things we’ve already seen.” I stopped talking and gazed out at the crowd, trying to meet some eyes before I continued, “As a condition of staying in the campground, everybody will submit to a medical evaluation by a team that will be appointed by, as well as led by, Dr. Collins. Anybody who does not submit to this evaluation will be asked to leave the campground immediately. Anybody who is found to be potentially infected will be isolated for a length of time to be determined by the medical team. I wish there were an easier way to say this, but the facts are that if this campground is to provide a sense of safety for the residents, then everybody will have to play by the same rules, and those rules will include submitting to a medical evaluation.” The crowd was silent for almost two seconds. Then they exploded. Shouts of, “You can’t make us do this,” and “There’s no need for this,” were mixed in with “Why, what are you afraid of,” and “I’d be happy to do it, but if you’re not going to I’m not going to,” as well as dozens of others—both for and against the idea. I turned to Doc and Michelle and whispered something. They nodded, hopped in the golf cart and left. Five minutes later the crowd’s aggravation and intensity level had multiplied almost exponentially. People were being pushed and shoved, names and derogatory comments were flying left and right. Doc and Michelle drove the golf cart right up to me. I tried several times to shout over the crowd but my voice was washed away in the din. That’s when Uncle Andy fired his 380 into the air. People screamed and ducked, looking around for the assailant, hugging their children or spouse. Uncle Andy holstered his gun and removed a pair of latex gloves from his jacket pocket, putting them on as he moved around to the cargo area of the golf cart. He grabbed the tarp enshrouded object and muscled it onto the ground. Grasping the frayed edge of the blue vinyl tarp, he stood up and spun the object out like he was unrolling a heavy lumpy rug. The gray-skinned, split-skulled corpse of Mr. Hardison landed face up in a grotesque parody of a marionette puppet. Arms out to his side, elbows slightly
bent in opposite directions from each other, left wrist ninety degrees up, right wrist ninety degrees down. His mouth was still encrusted with the dried arterial blood that comprised his last meal. Bits of flesh and skin could clearly be seen wedged between his teeth as well—I didn’t want to think where it came from. Uncle Andy knelt by the head of the cadaver, grabbing a patch of graying brown hair with his left hand, he tilted the neck so the face was visible by the majority of the crowd. Using his right hand he propped open the eyelids. Even in death they were hellishly red.

  “DO YOU SEE THIS?” he shouted at the crowd. “Take a good look, because yesterday he was just like us; he had a family, a wife and three kids. But he became infected somehow, so did his wife . . . so did his kids. They’re all dead now . . . all of his family . . . DEAD! And whatever happened to him made him . . . different somehow. Two nights ago this man was probably tucking in his little girls, reading a story to his son, telling his wife he loved her. Last night he was tearing the flesh off of his children’s dead bodies and eating it.”