by Gillian Zane
Jazz led me straight to Junior’s private area. It was only a bunch of tarps strung up between shelving from the grocery store, but it was bigger than the brothers’ areas and he had a sofa in the corner and an actual mattress on the floor. He also had a coffee table set up to the side and was using it as a make-shift seat at the moment. Eagle was sitting on the sofa and he had another brother, one of his father’s enforcers, Pink, standing up in the corner with his arms crossedtJazz tell ya?” Junior asked as I walked in, straight-forward as usual. He looked up at me, a smirk on his face. He didn’t look like he was mourning his father’s loss at all.
“That the girl Melinda escaped, yeah, he told me,” I nodded.
“Yeah, that bitch got away. They broke the lock to the back room and she distracted Parrish from the front door. You got any idea how she would be able to do that?”
“None, Junior, I never really talked to her, if you know what I mean.” It was a lie. I never had sex with Melinda and I actually liked her company, which was why I had begun to use my food credit to “buy” her for the night. I thought it would help me blend in better and give her a reprieve from the other men.
“See, I don’t really know what ya mean, ‘cause rumor was you never fucked her.” Junior leaned forward, his blue eyes glinted white in the lantern light. Some of the women said he was attractive, but I didn't see it. He was fit and he liked to show it off by wearing tight black tees, but he was too hard looking, his tattoos too prison-like, his hair too greasy. He was the epitome of what I hated about this club.
“Bullshit,” I spat. The lie tasted vile in my mouth, but it was necessary. I had learned quickly how to lie convincingly with this group. Junior was different though, at times he saw right through my deception. “Who’s ever talking shit to you, Junior, they don’t know what they’re talking about.”
“Jigger’s old lady overheard that slut saying you let her sleep, didn't touch her. Plus, there ain't any sounds coming out of your berth when you get her back there. Sounds like y’all were up to something other than fucking, and with her escaping that’s pretty suspicious, Rebel.” He accentuated my name.
The name he gave me. Coined as an insult, rather than a compliment. In his eyes I was never one of the group. I was always rebelling against the system, the club. The club that he loved. I talked of college and a life with a real job. That was strange for Junior who only saw himself as the future president of the Southern Clan. To him I was different, a rebel, and the name stuck. When you rebel against the rebels - what does that make you?
“It was one fucking time. She had some kind of cold and I didn’t want to get that shit. Who the fuck is up against my berth listening? That's fucked up, Junior. I never helped those girls escape, I had no clue, I wasn’t even here. I was with Bear.” Junior looked at me and then he looked at Jazz who nodded. All the cursing and lies tasted wrong in my mouth, but it was an act I had to maintain. I didn’t like to use foul language, just as much as I didn’t like to lie. I had tried to transition from my MC lifestyle when I was away at college. It was pathetic that I slipped back into it so easily.
“Fine, you were gone, out on watch,” he scoffed and rolled his eyes like a child. Junior hadn’t been on watch, once.
“Protecting this place, Junior, which is what I do every fucking day, more than the rest of this drug using-” It was too much, I stopped in mid-statement. I let my mouth get away from me all the time and it was dangerous with Junior.
“You always did have your fucking nose up in the air, Rebel. Better than the rest of us, college boy,” he sneered. “No drugs for Rebel, no fucking either. Might as well be a fucking priest. I don’t trust you, never did. You shouldn’t have ever gotten those colors. I told Senior that, but he didn’t listen. It was only because of your daddy that you got in. Your daddy should have taught you some fucking respect.” He stood up and I knew I was screwed from the look on his face. He walked over to me and before I could react, he punched me in the gut.
The hit was hard and it made me bend over in reflex, gasping for air. I stood up quickly and faced him. I couldn’t allow myself to show weakness to him. He never could take me down in a fight and he knew it. There was a reason he had his enforcer in the corner.
“You’re tough, I’ll give you that. I don’t know if you had anything to do with those girls taking out Senior. I don’t think I’ll ever know, so I don’t trust you, but you have your uses. Move your berth. You’re going to take over Red’s job guarding the fucking children. I’m wiping all your creds. No more women for you, Rebel. Hang out with the little kids and learn some respect. Maybe one day you can earn those fucking colors you wear. No more patrols either, you’re on lockdown. Fuck up again and I’m stripping you. You’ll be a fucking civilian.”
With one move Junior had effectively neutered me. I was now in with the children. I wouldn’t be able to leave the base, unless special permission was given and I would barely be able to leave the kids’ area. Red was the oldest member of the club and he had been given the job because he couldn’t do much more. It was a shit job. A job that would usually fall to the women, but no one in the club trusted the women enough to let them carry. And the children needed to be protected.
I walked out of Junior’s area without saying a word. He knew what he was doing. If he suspected me of any kind of malicious behavior then he had me where he could keep me in my place. The kids’ area was always under guard with a constant rotation of brothers. It would be the first place the civilians went if they were to break free, so they had to have it watched. There was always a guard inside and one that rotated at the back door. The one inside acted as the nanny and watched the women that were allowed to come in and tend to the kids.
It was a shit position. I was now the glorified babysitter.
FIVE | Amphibious Ass-Kicker
Trivox was a production facility about five miles from our compound that had produced vehicles for the U.S. military. They specialized in armored land and marine vehicles along with a few weapon systems. It wasn’t a huge facility, but we were hoping that they would be stocked with a good base of weaponry.
Our group hadn’t even considered scavenging in the manufacturing plants that ran along Lake Pontchartrain since most of them were full of tools and materials that we wouldn’t be able to use. They held nothing sustainable like food or water, but we had forgotten about Trivox. Weapons we could use.
The plant had been closed on the Saturday that Z hit, so on our initial scouting we only noticed a few Zs wandering around in the yard, still in their security uniforms. The company must have recently shipped out a lot of their stock since there were only a few of their armored SCTVs in the lot. An SCTV or Survivable Combat Tactical Vehicle, were armored vehicles that were slowly replacing the Humvees. They were cheaper and took a hit better.
We were going in as a team. The mission was to go in fast, take out any of the dead and secure weapons and vehicles as quickly as possible. Our forward team consisted of Romeo, whose nickname was worse than mine, Vance Ito, who we called Ito, Jimmy and Blake. We cut into the chain-link fence that surrounded the place and I whistled to attract the attention of the two Zs that were roaming the yard.
They approached us like good little dead things and we dispatched them easily. I didn’t even have to take out my Bowie because Jimmy and Ito were on it, fast and efficient.
We split up to case the area, looking for an easily accessible entry point. We wanted to enter the plant and not have to search around for the storage area. More chances to have a dead worker surprise us if we wandered around the offices looking for a door into the warehouse. Getting in was probably going to be the hardest process. It was a government contractor so they were locked down tight, not many windows and the doors were reinforced. Most of their security relied on electricity though, so once we found an entrance that looked suitable it only took a crowbar and a bit of muscle to pry open the door.
Our banging and scratching to get in drew the attention o
f the Saturday workers; they were ready for us when the door swung open. A flood of hungry and bedraggled zombies poured out the small entry way. They were actually in better condition than the ones left out in the elements. They were oddly dry, with crusty looking skin, instead of the oozing, wet look we were used to.
Most of them looked like the typical business types in polos and khakis for the Saturday grind, but a few seemed to be workers, possibly the cleaning staff, because they wore coveralls. They reached for us with their mouths opened wide. Their dry, brittle skin looked like it could crack and break away if you touched it wrong. Appearances could be deceiving though, I knew better, they were tougher than they looked. Their grips were like steel. They would pull you to them with a tenacity fueled by some unknown element that kept them alive.
I holstered my piece and pulled out my Bowie knife. I grabbed for the closest and pulled it to me, embedding my knife in its skull. The skin looked dry, but it had a weird consistency, almost like leather. I didn’t know what had caused them to decompose like this, but it was bizarre. A chunk of hair came off in my hand and I shook it off as the body fell to my feet. I tried to kick it away, but it was a solid male and I only moved it slightly. I didn’t have time to mess around, there were more coming, so I stepped over the body and grabbed for another.
This one got a good grip on my shoulder and I had to push my arm up toward its face to keep the teeth away from my exposed skin. I had wrapped my arms in the hillbilly armor we had perfected at the compound, a mix of leather and repurposed rubber tires to keep teeth from finding exposed flesh. When I didn’t have to worry about bites it made it easier to take them out. You couldn’t cover everything, though. I stabbed upward and took it out with a quick jab to the temple.
I took down two more and was finally able to take a breath. The herd was culled as Ito dropped the last one at his feet. Blake clicked on a torch and signaled for us to follow him into the dark building.
We encountered two more Zs on the way to the plant floor, but those weren’t enough of a challenge to even get my heart rate up. When we found the door that led to the big production room floor, where hopefully the vehicles were stored, we clicked off our lights and entered as silently as possible. There was enough natural light coming in from windows high above us to see without the use of the flashlights.
The room was large, big enough and tall enough to fit a few commercial airliners. Motors and engine parts lined the far wall and a good amount of half-constructed vehicles sat to the right of us. The back wall opened to a large bay door that could open and close to about four feet above the ground. The bay door was large and most of it was over the water of a pool and docking area. The pool fed into the lake so the LCACs that were docked inside could be driven out into the lake for testing.
We had thought about taking an LCAC, but they were too much. The LCACs were big. They required a crew and could carry ten land vehicles and a whole regiment. It would be like firing up a destroyer and taking it into Lakeview. We needed something smaller that could be manned by one or two of our people.
“Jimmy and Ito, check out the water, see if there's anything we can use,” Blake said and the two peeled off and headed toward the docks.
“I want the rest of us in an SCTV, it looks like they have enough,” he gestured to the group of tan vehicles to the left of us.
“Get the garage doors up, Ba–Hannah.” I glared at him for almost calling me Baby, then I followed his orders and went to the doors. They were electrical but there was always a way around.
It took a bit of poking, but I found the manual release and disengaged the rail, allowing me to pull on the rope and bring the door up. It was big and I was huffing from the weight, by the time it was all the way up, but I got that bitch open and managed to engage the latch to keep it from crashing down.
I heard the crank of a few engines and fell back to find my own armored vehicle. I had secretly hoped they had a tank or two. I always wanted to drive a tank–but it was nothing but these armored vehicles. They didn’t even have mounted .50 calibers, which was rather disappointing.
My com crackled with static, Ito and Jimmy had found something. Jimmy’s voice came over the small speaker, “We got a small craft, looks like maybe a prototype or something they were engineering for a private customer. It’s not military. Can only hold five vehicles at max and has the controls of a regular craft. We can handle this one. It’s berth five. We can load a few of the SCTVs onto it.”
“Good job, Jimmy. Romeo and I will meet you down there with two of these vehicles.” The com clicked off as I walked to Blake. He was paging through a binder.
“Looks like they only have vehicles. The weaponry must be attached at another plant, this is it. Number eight-seven over there should be gassed up. Take that one out into the yard,” he said to me. “Romeo, take number nine-two down to the docks. I’ll follow in eight-three. We can come back and grab those two,” He pointed at the ones closest to us, “And follow Baby out.” I let him slide this time with the name and walked to my assigned vehicle without a glare. I was getting better.
The keys were in the ignition, the benefits of being in a locked plant, and the machine started right up. It wasn’t exactly like driving a truck, but it wasn’t rocket science either. I revved the engine and rolled out. Looks like the S-Island crew were now militarized.
SIX | Housekeeping
The babysitter was in the house.
There were only about eighteen children. They ranged in age from seven to fifteen. I hadn’t had much contact with the kids, didn’t have any reason to. It wasn’t like I had any kids myself, or knew any of them personally. They mostly belonged to civilians, only three of them were legacy children and they were mainly tended by the old ladies and kept in another location.
They greeted me suspiciously when I moved my box of possessions into the building. Red had told them he was leaving, which if I was one of those kids, I would think it was a positive. Red wasn’t exactly the cuddly and kid-friendly type.
The oldest boy, a scrawny fifteen-year-old, showed me to Red’s old berth and I tried not to think about how oily he was when I looked at the cot.
“What did Red do all day?” I asked the boy.
“Nothing. He sat around complaining and he distributed the food when they sent it back for us,” he said quietly.
This was going to be boring.
I spent the rest of the evening checking out the place. The building was secure. It had been a gym, but all the machines had been moved into the back parking lot. The front was all glass and overlooked the front lot where the civilian men lived and worked. The entire parking area was surrounded by a chain-link fence.
There was only one exit in the back, a rear door that was guarded by one of the brothers day and night. Or it was supposed to be. Mostly it was locked from the outside and there was no way to look out and check if someone was standing there.
Realistically if I were to make a break for it, it would be through the back door. The back parking lot led right into a residential area and I could slip away quickly without being noticed. But I would have to break the lock and hope there wasn’t a guard on the back door.
For now I would have to feel out my new role and hope that an opportunity opened up and I could slip away.
The place was a sty, old food and trays were piled up in the back. Red had probably been waiting for one of the women to clean it up for him. Old candles had been allowed to burn down to nothing and pool wax over counters and tables. I even found a stash of food that Red was hiding from the rest of the group. It was kid stuff, like gummy bears and stale Pop Tarts, obviously intended for the children. Red must have forgotten about it since I found it under a pile of paper in the corner, discarded like trash.
You would have thought it was Christmas when I handed it out to the kids. It had no nutritional value, but they were happy. At first they were suspicious, but as the first taste of sugar melted on their tongues, they became giddy. Kids were
easy to please.
After the sugar party, I continued to clean up the place, throwing everything in a cardboard box I found by the back door. There were plastic cups everywhere and toys in every corner of the place. I was mostly concerned about the old food and the state of the bathrooms. It wasn’t healthy. I guess I could keep busy by getting it in order. There was no way I could think in this mess.