The Book of a Few

by Rodgers, Austen

  “Something must have happened out there.” Casey replaced the magazine and gripped the bald man’s collar. “Who the fuck let Vince go out there? I said that no one is doing any talks!” Casey shoved the man to the ground and said, “They don’t know shit, and we aren’t leaving.”

  One of Casey’s goons took an elbow and fired over the truck. I sat there as the fight ensued in front of me. The men of the Triple B.F.C. jerked and jumped about as the attackers outside fired back. A man stopped firing and fell while clutching his neck. The other members of the faction kept on fighting like nothing had happened. None of them turned to aid their bleeding companion.

  “Got one!” one of the men yelled and immediately thereafter fell down to the ground. There was a minute of ceasefire where the men stayed down beneath the cover of their truck. They unperceivably whispered to one another for a moment. Casey and a few others consistently peered out as carefully as they could without making themselves a target.

  “Second truck!” Casey yelled. “It’s going around to the main doors.”

  “What do we do?” an unfamiliar voice asked.

  “We can’t move. We have to keep these guys pinned down. Wait for the others to find us.”

  The firefight resumed with another of the Triple B.F.C. dropping dead. That was the fourth one, and so far it seemed as though they were losing.

  I spent some time thinking of which party I would rather see survive the battle. On one hand, we had the assholes that were here first. We knew they were hostile to us and had the potential to kill us for revenge of their men lost by our hands. On the other hand, based on the second-hand assumptions of Casey, we had the C.V.P.M. with motives unknown. I didn’t trust Casey’s word, though. I would have rather assumed them to be just a random group hoping to clear the building out.

  Considering them to be the C.V.P.M. didn’t seem logical. Being an outfit of the remnants of the National Guard, or any form of military force, I didn’t understand why they would be out in force and assaulting people. The only thing that seemed probable was that they had been watching the Triple B.F.C. for a while and had finally come around to putting them down or doing whatever they do with scum. After realizing this, I figured it must be them. I imagined that this is what Dr. Milaka meant. This incident that I was witnessing was proof that they had become serious about imposing law and order. Somehow they knew about what was going on and were trying to deal out justice in the way they saw fit.

  The gunfire grew more random and spaced out. Casey and his thugs had changed their tactic to become more defensive and use ammo more sparingly. All was fine and well with their plan until three people burst through the locker room doors to my left. One stocky and well-built man wielded the biggest gun I’ve ever seen. He was clad in riot gear, and I knew this was a man not to be fucked with. His eyes swept across the room, and he paused when his eyes landed on us. He stared for only a moment before moving on to look around the rest of the equipment room. The other two men stayed right on his heels as the big man weaved his way through forklifts.

  Casey pointed at the newest threat and his men began firing at the armored brute. I jumped in my seat. The probability of a bullet ricocheting off one of the pieces of equipment and striking me became too high for comfort. Branden was the first to get with the plan and try to rock and slide his chair out of the way. The rest of us were quick to do the same as the flying lead tore through the airspace around us. I’m lucky to have gotten out of there unscathed; a few times I was looking down at my feet, I swear I saw the concrete break apart near inches from my toes.

  Of course I was too curious to know the outcome of the fight to resist the urge to peer out from behind the forklift I took cover next to. One of the men, who I definitely knew at this point were C.V.P.M due to their gear, was sitting on the ground with his back against one of the other forklifts. His vest had become soaked with blood already.

  An incredibly fast volley of bullets sprayed from the barrel of the big gun. I had always enjoyed first-person shooter games before the Silence, but goddamn, I did not expect it to be so intense. The echoes of his gunfire remained just as deafening as the shot that birthed them. I’m surprised that the two men that had been shot down by this impressive machine didn’t instantly transform into mounds of raw hamburger meat.

  I looked about me to see that the others had made their way to safety. All except for Joey, who had been left behind. His eyes met mine and I realized that he was completely unmindful of what was going on around him. He felt no fear of danger while the bullets whizzed past his head. He was even confused as to why the rest of us had moved away from him. Must be nice to live out such a simple existence.

  I cautiously looked out at the ongoing battle across the room and saw that the third C.V.P.M soldier was dead. Only the large brute of a man with his heavy machine gun was left. Two of the five remaining men of the Triple B.F.C. were firing into the darkness outside. It seemed as though the C.V.P.M had a good bit of pressure put on Casey’s thugs; they were pinned down behind their truck at this point.

  The C.V.P.M. brute began running back into the locker room. He sprinted past three forklifts and metal guardrails in a matter of seconds. With all the added weight of his armor, I was surprised at how quickly he made the distance. Then again, I suppose you would move pretty quickly if you had watched two of your partners die right in front of you. Just before he stepped into the locker room, he turned toward us one last time before slamming the door behind himself.

  Casey didn’t send any men after the lone retreating soldier. Instead, he turned his men’s attention to the ones immediately outside. The gunfire slowed, and I heard Casey tell his men to let them leave. Before too long, I heard the slamming of vehicle doors, and the trucks outside roared to life. With screeching tires, the C.V.P.M. drove off, giving up for now.

  Casey and his men stood up.

  “Close that,” Casey pointed at the sliding garage-like door. “I want someone on the roof at all times. Ethan,” he turned to a pudgy, scruffy-faced man, “you start us off. Grab one of those walkie-talkies. They are with the other new stuff.”

  “Got it,” Ethan replied. He ran past us and began rifling through the pile of our belongings, then headed toward the roof access.

  Casey walked toward us aggressively and said, “Check these men. Strip ‘em, and throw them out on the street. Do the same for the ones outside. Two of you do that; don’t go outside alone.”

  For a moment, I feared that he was going to throw us out into the world unarmed and bare, but then realized that Casey was speaking of the two C.V.P.M men that lay dead close to us. I scooted myself out from behind my cover and watched the men remove the armor from the dead soldiers. Elbow pads, bulletproof jackets, knee pads, Kevlar helmets, a few grenades, one had some C-4 plastic explosives, MREs, and standard issue M4 rifles. Sweet baby Jesus, I want some of that stuff. I felt like I was about to drool, and if I had a choice, I’d have picked up an M4. Although I’m sure that it would take some getting used to, seeing as how it’s challenging enough for me to fire quickly, but that three-round-burst selective fire would be a thrill to shoot. Burst-fire weapons always were my favorite back in the day. Can’t be that hard, right?

  Casey called to his last available grunt to try and track down the missing soldier. Peeking into the locker room, guns up, they pushed their way inside the locker rooms and out of sight. The two men in the room stayed busy removing the gear from the two dead soldiers. They ogled the new equipment just about as hard as I did. When they were finished, they did as they were told and dragged the bodies from the building. Left a fresh trail of slick blood on the floor.

  While the men were outside, Dana and I attempted to break free from our restraints. But our attempts were foiled when Casey returned. Luckily he did not catch us struggling. I wouldn’t enjoy another broken tooth.

  “How’s it look up there?” Casey spoke into his new walkie-talkie.

  “Okay, I suppose. I can see the trucks. The
y’re a couple blocks away, probably. Well, I’m pretty sure it’s them. I can see tail lights,” Ethan responded over the radio.

  Casey sighed, “What are they doing? Can you tell?”

  “No, they are just parked close to each other, looks like they might be talking.”

  “All right, keep me updated.”

  “Will do.”

  Casey looked down at us, and his eyes showed the pensive sadness in him. His shaking hands showed his downright fear. Without saying a word, he turned away and left us again.

  Casey is a doer. He sees a problem or threat to his own existence or the lives of his men and charges into the predicament and pushes his way through it. I may not agree with the means that he uses to take care of his men, but because of the sorrow I saw in him, I without a doubt do believe that he is not an entirely horrible man. I will never feel any bit of sorrow for him, or praise him. In fact, I will probably always hate him for what he has done to us in both occurrences today. I would say that I simply have respect for him in this single aspect: his men are his first and foremost concern. He’s a team player, just like me.

  An hour passed and I was still strapped down. We had repositioned our chairs closer to one another so we could all speak easily. Every now and again during our conversations, one of the Triple B.F.C. would drop in for ten minutes or so and check our bindings before leaving again.

  They spent their time scouting about the building. They investigated the entrances, offices, the surrounding area, and, of course, the food. Then without an explanation, two of them sprinted from the fridge. They ran past us and up the roof access. I tried to ask them what the hurry was about, but they didn’t reply.

  “The fuck is it now?” Dana yelled just before the two left our sight. “Jesus Christ…” he muttered.

  We were alone for a rough estimation of five minutes before their return.

  “What are we going to do?” Ethan asked, stopping a few feet from me to look dead straight at Casey.

  “As they ask, we don’t have much of a choice,” Casey replied.

  He looked over at me and gave a brief sigh. He retrieved a knife from his pocket and began cutting the zip-ties that kept my legs and arms attached to the chair. I immediately began rubbing the bruises on my wrists, and God did it feel so much better. By the time I was done soothing my own skin, Casey had already released Dana and Will, too. He continued down the line, cutting the others’ restraints.

  Casey turned away from me and walked over to the pile of our belongings. He kicked a few things over, and then bent over and pulled up three guns, two of which were handguns.

  “What’s going on?” I asked.

  Casey returned to the group and said, “We’re making a show. Head out of the building, that way.” He pointed in the general direction of the main parking lot, out past the locker rooms, break room, and Human Resources offices.

  “What do you mean a show?” Will asked.

  Casey grunted, “Just fucking move! Goddamn it!”

  With our hands above our heads, we did as we were told. We were walking through the break room when a thought struck me.

  “Why do I have the feeling that we are walking to a firing line?” I asked.

  Dana cursed under his breath and I glanced over my shoulder at Casey. Odd thing was that one of the guns he had picked up from our pile, my rifle, was pointed down at the ground. The way he carried the rifle made me feel a little easier, a little less worried. Even though with just one quick movement he could bring it up to his shoulder and fire away at my back.

  Obviously, seeing as how this written journal resumes, Casey did not shoot me. He led us out of the Warehouse and kitty-cornered across the parking lot. We walked up to the fence and looked down the steep hill. Two trucks sat humming on the road with spotlights pointed on us. Four soldiers stood outside their vehicle. The streetlight down the road that rested on the nearest corner did not provide enough light to reveal much.

  Casey stood next to us with the guns still in his arms. My confusion as to what was taking place was solved when over a loudspeaker, one of the soldiers spoke to us.

  “These are the men?” the enhanced voice of a soldier said.

  “Yes, can your witness confirm that these are the right ones?” Casey shouted, and there was a brief moment of silence.

  “He recognizes them. Arm them.”

  Casey began handing out our firearms back to us. “Shoot a round off, please,” Casey said.

  “Why?” I asked, completely dumbfounded.

  “To show them you’re armed and loaded.”

  I did as he said and raised my gun up and pulled the trigger.

  “All right. I am ordered to tell you that if anything is to happen to either of you two parties involved, the C.V.P.M. will use deadly force, by order of the Colonel, to the offending party. Damage to the building will not be tolerated. Negotiations will begin tomorrow, following the Colonel’s arrival. That is all.” On that note, the soldiers returned to their vehicles and drove away.

  “What the hell was that? Explain,” Dana asked.

  Casey turned to him and said, “They want to reach a diplomatic solution. Seems like we,” he said, referring to both the Triple B.F.C. and us, “aren’t the only ones that want the food.”

  Day Eleven

  Didn’t sleep for crap. All because I knew what today was bringing. Dana and I stayed up most of the night talking about what was going on. He seemed rather angry with all that had taken place. I’m not saying that I wasn’t; I’m just saying that he seemed a little too angry. He would cuss and mumble idle threats. It was almost as though he was talking to himself to mentally prepare to accost and verbally rip apart the men of the Triple B.F.C. and the C.V.P.M.

  “We were here first, fuckers,” he’d say. “Fuck them. Fuck this.” And he’d get up and walk around the room. He even threw a crowbar in his rage. I’m also quite certain that the heroin he partook of just a half an hour before was the biggest cause of his outburst.

  Casey and his men stayed on the other side of the building, thank God. That guy’s an asshole. The only bad thing was that I had no doubt in my mind they were eating our food. We didn’t have any way to stop them or catch them in the act. So I guess we didn’t have a choice anyways. With Branden and Will asleep, I wasn’t able to talk about it with anyone. I figured it wasn’t logical to tell Dana I felt that the men who got us into this whole predicament were probably stealing our food. He’d go off the wall and probably get himself killed.

  This morning, I also looked outside and found that a rather large mass of infected had begun gathering just outside the fence. They probably came from town. They noticed me and rushed into the fencing as I approached to deal with them.

  The scariest thing about them is their aggression. They don’t just push into the fence and try to reach through, they tear it up if they see something they want to eat on the other side of it. They’ll beat at it wildly and sometimes even kick it. They’ll pull on it and shake it, trying anything to break it open so they can get through. And they scream and yell in horrid ferocity as they do. I imagine dying by one of them is like dying at the hands of a psycho. The amount of violence and determination to get the kill is frightening.

  By roughly ten in the morning, both Branden and Will were awake and active. They got themselves fed, and as they ate, we all had a conversation of what was to come.

  “Colonel, huh?” Branden asked. “I have no idea what position in the ranks that is.”

  “Me neither,” Will struggled to say through his mouthful of pre-sliced lunchmeat.

  I noticed how Dana kept looking up at the high ceiling, almost like he was investigating. His neck must have become sore considering all the time he was investing in eyeing the metal supports and piping that ran through the building. Confused, I asked him what he was constantly looking up at.

  “Oh,” he said, seemingly glad I asked. “I was thinking, ya see the signs on all the pipes around here?”

  I
looked around and saw one that spelled out “ammonia.”

  “What about it?” Branden asked.

  Dana smiled an evil-genius smile and said, “Ammonia, man. This place is cooled with ammonia. That’s how it stays cold. It runs through this place like veins in my body.”

  “Clotted?” Will interjected.

  I laughed harder than I have in a while, a long while. Dana didn’t; he took a swing at Will’s face, but missed.

  “No, fucker,” he said pretentiously. “There are ammonia pipes everywhere. This place is like a ticking bomb. Ammonia is flammable. I was thinking, maybe we should consider leaving this place with a bang.”

  “Blow it up?” I asked.

  “Yeah. Fuck those guys. I say, before we lose anything or anyone else, we get a semi and load food into one of the refrigerated trailers, and drive out of here riding on the concussive shockwave of this place bursting into flames.”