Several people in the audience puked, holding onto their stomachs and heaving for all they were worth. Other than that the crowd was silent, attention rapt on my uncle as he mercilessly gave them the unvarnished truth. “But that wasn’t enough. Several of you were witness to the atrocity at site fifty-nine when this guy, this . . . ‘thing’ tore the throat out of another resident of the campground.” The crowd was staring at my uncle, eyes wide, mouth open, shock and horror painted on their faces. Uncle Andy shook his head, his face still red with anger as he laid into them one more time. “I don’t live here. By all rights I shouldn’t give a rat’s ass what you people do, neither should they,” he indicated Doc and Sally, Michelle and I, “but we do. So you got some decisions to make. The first decision is whether you can abide by the rules to stay here, which includes a medical check. If you can’t, pack your shit and go. The second decision, if you decide to stay, is whether you’re going to pitch in one hundred percent to make this a community effort to stay alive and healthy. If you can’t commit to that, don’t let the door hit you on the way out. And the third thing is that we’re gonna need some volunteers, people whose very lives may be at risk, because before anybody, and I mean anybody goes back to their tent or RV, we’re going to need several teams to search each and every campsite, tent, Winnebago, and sleeping bag. Because there might be more of these . . .” he tilted the bloody, axe hewn head of Mr. Hardison higher . . . “down there.” The silence of the crowd was punctuated by the meaty “slap” of the corpse’s head hitting the tarp as my uncle stood up.
Chapter 12
I’ve got to say that my uncle has a way with words. However he did it, it worked. We ended up getting enough volunteers to make three teams, each team led by either Michelle, myself, or Uncle Andy. All the teams had between five and seven volunteers, and at least one other person besides the team leader had some type of firearm. Our first task however, using the campsite tally paperwork that Sally had come up with, was to go down to the different loops and retrieve anybody that we knew was not at the meeting. Michelle and I took the golf cart to do that; it took about thirty minutes and brought the soccer field population up by about twenty-five people. The second thing we did was to have Doc organize a medical team. Amongst the crowd we located a registered nurse, two dental hygienists and a medical lab technician. I made a general announcement at that point. In a nutshell I said that if anybody knew right then and there that they would not be staying in the campground, now was the time to go, and if they went it was a one way trip; Ravenwood campground would not be taking any new applications. My reasoning is that there was no sense in searching, and potentially putting ourselves at risk for people who would not be staying. Once again, Michelle and I pulled security detail just in case. I was surprised at the amount of people who left—fifty-four families exactly. To be honest, I was pretty sure that for a lot of them, this campground was not their intended destination to start with. We lost our lab technician and one of our dental hygienists that way. Four of the people on the security sweep teams as well. Many of the families wished us well as they were leaving, but others made it clear that there were hard feelings involved. We were called a lot of names. Sticks and stones. The fifty-four family exodus took almost three hours, and when it was done it was almost 4:00 PM. Uncle Andy had the foresight to bring along the FRS radios from Walter, and we used those to keep contact between the security teams, the medical team, and the remaining campers up at the soccer field. Each security team had been briefed on the “Ironfeather rule,” central nervous system—head or neck. My team had a Golden Eagle loop. Michelle had Blue Heron, Uncle Andy had the group camp field. Several “be careful’s ” later, we were off.
Since my team had the largest area to cover, the plan was that we would be joined by Michelle and Uncle Andy’s teams when they finished their sweeps. Uncle Andy still had my Mossberg twelve gauge pump in addition to his 380. The shotgun was a much better first contact choice. The second armed person on his team was Jason Lambert, and he brought along a lever action 30-30 Winchester. Michelle led the Blue Heron team with her Glock 40 caliber, backed up by Victor Wayne Chapman, who cradled a fancy Beretta over/under trap and skeet twelve gauge, as well as his axe. My backup for the Golden Eagle sweeps was a lady named Brenda Thompson, early forties with prematurely gray hair cut short. She was a little on the husky side, and that combined with her faded jeans and flannel shirt gave the impression, at least to me, that she might prefer, um . . . well, not guys. But she knew how to handle the Remington 11-87 shotgun she carried. It was a little 410, perfect for squirrels and equally deadly at close range against other targets. All of the sweep teams had a quick meeting to go over the procedures. Each site, whether occupied by tents, vehicles, pop-up campers, RV’S, or a combination of those would be hailed from a distance of at least ten yards. If nobody answered, a quick search by the team leader would follow. If nothing was immediately visible during the quick search, the site would then be thoroughly searched, tents opened, cars examined, RV’S entered-everything. Any contact with the living would be treated as a potentially hostile situation, and if cooperation was not established, well then, the safety of the sweep team took precedence. Any contact with the dead was also to be treated as a potentially hostile situation until a closer inspection confirmed that they were, in fact, dead. I reminded everybody that what we were about to do was necessary to secure the area. No one was to fire unless the team leader fired first. I made sure that everybody on the team that did not have some type of gun had another weapon they could potentially use. Baseball bats, hatchets, a guy on Uncle Andy’s team had a hockey stick, somebody on Michelle’s had a tennis racket, there was a crowbar on mine. A lot of the team members were nervous, so was I. Not only for what we had the potential to run into, but more so because I was not used to working with the members on my team, they were all unknowns and I was putting my life in their hands. Before we left, I asked if any of the people who were staying on Golden Eagle loop had locked their RV. We collected keys from several people, and then I pointed at my master key—the crowbar—which would be used on any locked RV that we didn’t have keys for. Almost everybody handed us their keys “just in case.” Sally’s friend Amy—her last name turned out to be Salvucci, but she pronounced it “sal-vu-key” not “sal-vu-chi”—had asked for and received the keys to the set of snack vending machines outside the camp office. She completely emptied them into several pillow cases that she scavenged from somewhere. Amy had drafted several other ladies and they were organizing a makeshift food line for the soccer field gathering. She also stopped at our sweep team meeting and offered everybody their choice. Very few people accepted, I think their stomachs were nervous enough. Uncle Andy of course, didn’t seem to be bothered and swiped a huge bear claw cinnamon roll. I also noticed that VW appeared nonchalant as he scarfed up a pack of nacho cheese crackers. Nobody on my team ate. Our three teams split up and walked to our starting points.
The “four-fold” paperwork had been divided out by Amy and Sally into three piles, one for each of the teams’ assigned area. First up for my team was Doc and Sally’s RV. I was almost positive that this was going to be safe, since Doc and Sally had been in and out of it multiple times all morning. Which made it a perfect icebreaker to practice on. Each team was to report their findings over the radio, and Amy had assembled a small squad of ladies to keep up with the sweep teams’ clearing as we went. They were sharing the radio that was being used by the medical team and kept up with the progress by marking on a large, plastic coated camp map. After a few last minute words from me about safety and fields of fire, we headed over to site number one.
The way that both Golden Eagle and Blue Heron loop are set up is a misrepresentation of their name. They are in fact loops, being that the single road you enter on at the upper end is also the same road you will leave on. However, once you actually get down into the loops there are several one-way “sub-loops.” Each of the sub-loops wind and twist into various shapes
like a partial ovals, rounded triangles and several amoeba-inspired geometric patterns. After the exodus, my team was down to five members. The youngest was a college kid named Scott Fischer. His dad, David, was also on my team. Scott was a first year business major at some college down in Texas and played on his college’s baseball team. I gave him a bat. He was also in charge of our paperwork, announcing any details about the next occupied site before we got there. His dad, Dave, was a Baptist preacher, mom Rebecca was the RN we found. Dave carried our radio and a stout walking stick. The third member was a guy named Mike—he didn’t say his last name. He was a stocky guy with a lot of tattoos, a perpetual frown, and a scruffy goatee. He carried the crowbar. As a matter of fact he brought the crowbar. My impression of him was that he had probably used it for situations other than removing stuck nails. Go team. The final member was Brenda, I’ve already mentioned her.
Site number one went by quick. We stopped out on the road and announced ourselves, no answer. Brenda covered Dave and Scott while Mike and I circled the campsite looking for any place that had enough room to hide a body, dead or alive. We looked in Doc’s car, all around and under the RV. Nothing. Our plan for opening RV’s was pretty simple. Mike would sneak up to the door with the keys, checking to see if it was already unlocked. If it wasn’t, he would quietly unlock it and stand by. I would be about seven yards away, gun out and ready, waiting. Brenda’s job was to provide backup if something came out and I couldn’t drop it in time. Scott and Dave were our eyes to make sure we didn’t get surprised if something came out of another campsite while we were occupied with this one. After Mike opened the door, he would beat feet to get out of the line of fire. If nothing came out, then I would have to go in. I went over the procedure one more time, and then we set up. Even though this was Doc’s trailer, I think all of us were half expecting a horde of cannibal zombies to spill out the moment we touched the door latch. It didn’t happen. But we did learn the first of our valuable lessons that day, and that was the door on most RV’s is spring loaded so it shuts as soon as you let go of it. Mike was up by the door; it was unlocked. I was standing about seven yards away ready to fire when Mike flung the door open and sprinted away. The door crashed against the side of the RV before slamming shut. We ended up stealing some clothesline from Doc’s campsite and using it to hold the door open from a distance. Live and learn. Sites two and three were unoccupied. Four through nine were occupied by RV’S; nothing jumped out at us though, and a search of the interior revealed nothing out of the ordinary. Ten and eleven were empty of any vehicles but covered in trash from the previous occupants. Twelve was our first contact.
Site number twelve had a pop up camper on it. The kind you pull behind a car or truck using the tow hitch. There wasn’t a vehicle on the site. Scott checked the records and said that this was supposed to be an empty site, the family that had been there left after the announcement about medical exams. Red flag. I reminded everybody to be extra careful and we set up for entry. It was locked, no keys. We retreated a short way to go over our keyless entry procedure, which was basically the same as before except Mike would pry the door open and I would take a slightly closer cover position. We set up again, Mike moving to the door with the crowbar ready. He inserted the straight end between the door and frame and got ready to pry while Dave held onto the clothesline that would hold the door open. A few silent nods at everybody and we were ready to go. Mike looked at me and Dave, making sure we were set, then gripped the crowbar and silently mouthed, “One . . . two . . .“ Before he got to three, a gunshot shattered the silence, then another. A few seconds later, a third. It had come from the group camp area and Dave was immediately on the radio saying, “What happened . . . is everybody OK?” Several other voices asking similar questions stepped over each other on the radio.
“HEY! . . . focus on our task,” I said loudly and with some aggravation in my voice. “We can’t afford to let anything distract us from what’s right in front of us, OK? They’ll report in soon enough . . . everybody got that?”
There were a few head nods and mumbles.
“DOES EVERYBODY HAVE THAT?” I said again.
This time they nodded with some enthusiasm. We set up again and Mike busted open the door. Dave pulled on the clothesline, and as the door swung open I saw movement. An arm flopped out, leaving a streak of putrid brown on the inside of the door. “CONTACT,” I yelled. My CZ stayed locked on the doorway, but aside from the arm nothing came out. Lesson number two—in the late afternoon it’s difficult to see inside the open door of a darkened RV. I took out my flashlight and clicked it on, illuminating the doorway and area behind. The arm belonged to a dark haired lady. She was dead. Which brought us to lessen three, how to check to see if someone is “really” dead. The easiest solution we came up with, as juvenile and gross as it sounds, was to poke them in the eye with a stick. She didn’t move. Which brought up lesson four, how to step over a dead body laying on a narrow staircase in order to search the space beyond. The answer to that is you can’t, at least not safely. We ended up radioing the medical team who sent down several pairs of latex gloves. Michelle’s team echoed our request. Dave volunteered to drag the body outside while I held my gun and light ready in case anything was beyond it. Nothing came out, so I went in. There weren’t many areas to search in the small popup, and I was in and out in less than a minute. We radioed in our find and received an “Affirmative.” from a female voice who confirmed the site number and that we had one deceased body, adult female. Dave removed the used latex gloves and left them with the body. I called a short break for a little rest and some congratulations on a job well done. A guy came over the radio, someone from Uncle Andy’s team to give his report. It seemed like everything was going well, until they discovered two bodies in a medium sized dome tent. They had also developed their own form of the “stick/eye” test, and were in the process of performing said test when from out of the tent behind them came a fat, naked man with red eyes. My uncle turned to shoot, but since they were set up originally facing the other way, one of his team members was behind him and in the line of fire. Uncle Andy shifted right to get a clear line just as Jason fired his deer rifle. He missed. Uncle Andy’s first shot hit the guy in the upper left chest, spinning him around and dropping him to the ground. He didn’t stay there. The second shot from the Mossberg took off the top half of his head. He stayed that time.
We searched the next two sub-loops without any surprises, found three more dead bodies in a large RV and another, apparently a suicide, in the shower stall of an old Winnebago. All of the bodies we found except the suicide were the same putty gray. None attacked us. Site number forty-six was the furthest point down on Golden Eagle loop, and consequently had the best view of Ghost Echo Lake. There was a late model yellow Volkswagen Bug outside a twenty-four foot Gulfstream travel trailer. Parked next to the Bug was a dark blue Nissan Xterra with rental plates. The Volkswagen had plates from Virginia. Scott confirmed that we had no record of this site being occupied, so his dad radioed it in and we started setting up. A few seconds later, Doc’s voice came over the speaker, advising us to hold a minute. My team looked at me with some curiosity but all I could do was shrug my shoulders. Doc said he was heading our way on the golf cart, so we waited. A few minutes later he showed up and said, “That one is locked. The keys for it are on the same ring as the ones for my RV. No one should be in there, it’s been locked for, well, at least a few days I think.” It was starting to get dark, and my mood was already frazzled with all the searches I’d been through. It probably showed in my reply.
“Doc, is something going on here . . . somethin’ I should know?”
“No, I just wanted to make sure that you . . .” he looked at the RV for a moment . . . “had the right keys,” he finished slowly. I could tell he wanted to say more, but I didn’t have the time to pull it out of him.
I motioned for him to back up out of my team’s way and we set up. Mike walked up to the door of the Gulfstream and pu
t the keys in the lock, then cocked his head and slowly let go of the keys, backing away. He pointed to his ear and then to the trailer. I motioned for everybody to retreat back to the road. Doc was still standing there, a slightly puzzled look on his face.
“I thought you said no one was in there,” I said.
“There shouldn’t be . . .” His voice trailed off for a few seconds and then a look of sudden recollection crossed onto his face. “Unless . . .”
“Unless what?” I said.
He paused for a moment before replying. “A . . . man came here a few days ago, that’s his Nissan . . . but he should’ve been gone.”
I dimmed my flashlight by twisting the lens cap; one of the things I love about the Quark AA was its ability to have multiple intensities selectable, from a level so low you could hardly see it all the way up to the 205 lumen, ultra-bright turbo mode.
“Just one person in there . . . you sure?” I asked.
In the muted light I could see a dark cloud pass over his face before he answered quietly, “I hope.”
I stared hard at him for another moment, the faint illumination from my light clearly showing his brow creased with worry. “Doc . . .” I said, letting my unspoken question hang out there.
“Just do it,” he said softly.
I nodded and we set up around the Gulfstream. Radio chatter indicated Michelle’s team had located another body, and Uncle Andy’s team reported that they were finishing up with the last tent in the group camp area. We had already checked the Bug and Xterra, but I quietly rechecked them just so my team stayed on the same pattern. Mike moved back up to the door and got ready. I looked around to verify everybody else was in position, nodded back to Mike, who started the silent countdown again.
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