She probably has one of those massive purses, with everything under the sun in it. Now where did I leave that sewing kit? Down Shelley – don’t be mean.
“You’ve already met Joe.” She stated with a slight smirk and gesture towards her husband. All Joe could do was look around him with an awkward smile. Joe was the only family member that was a bit overweight. He did not strike Shelley as an overly friendly person. His countenance did nothing to contradict this feeling, with distinct jowls pulling the corners of his mouth down into a permanent frown.
That, and the bully behaviour displayed earlier. Shelley mentally added. Here’s hoping that those kids take after their mother.
Rachel went on to explain that Joe was a veterinarian and owned his own clinic in town. Christine also worked at the clinic, while Ethan was a grade eleven student.
Emily Hill didn’t really need an introduction. The English woman had met each one of them as they entered the bus today. Shelley instantly liked her. She didn’t waste much time in the introduction. The short British woman was very much a tomboy. The only new things that the group learned about Emily was that she grew up in London and had been in America for only a few weeks, working as a bus driver of all things.
“Hi everyone.” A handsome middle-aged man spoke up next. Shelley got a good look at him as he stood up from his table. He looked very fit, with bulked up chest and arms.
But not like a body builder – more like a soldier.
He also had chiseled facial features and a short salt and pepper haircut. And he also sported a prosthetic where his lower arm should be. Shelley could make out that the wrist and hand were made from some kind of metal that was painted a dark blue.
Definitely a soldier. Shelley decided, and started imagining how he’d lost his hand.
“My name is John Miller, and this is my wife Melissa.” He motioned to the woman beside him. She gave a small wave and a quick smile. “We’re... kind of retired, I guess. We used to be military.”
Yep. Called it.
The oriental guy went next.
“I’m Keith” the Asian man said with a slight nod. Shelley had already met Keith. She had made a quick assessment of his injuries when he first stepped on to the bus and had applied a temporary bandage to his arm. That had been only an hour or so ago. It seemed like ages.
Keith was now sporting a fresh long bandage on his forearm. The scratch on his chest was nothing serious. It was cleaned and left open to the air.
“Ok. Keith. Nice to meet you.” Craig answered with a quick smile. “Most of us saw your, um, skills with those hammers.”
“Yeah. Well I am a carpenter.” He let that hang for a few seconds. Several people managed to laugh despite the stress of the day.
“I’m also into Aikido. It’s a martial art.”
John turned to him. “Hey, I heard of that. Didn’t one of those movie actors do that as well? ... Anyway ... Cool!” He smiled at Keith.
There were more people in the cafeteria, but it looked like nobody wanted to go next. It was quiet for a couple of seconds. Joe took advantage of the silence and spoke up at this point.
“All due respect to the group.” He said, with a look around him. “But could we continue with the introductions after supper?”
“That’s a good idea, Joe.” Craig agreed.
It was John’s wife; Melissa, who spoke up next.
“I’d like to have a look at that kitchen. Maybe between a few of us we can prepare a meal for the group?”
“Hey that sounds good – count me in for kitchen duty.” Nancy said with a smile.
Craig raised his hand to speak.
“I’ve been thinking and there is one other thing we should do. Maybe while some volunteers prepare supper, we can have a closer look at what we’ve got in the gym?”
He walked over to the stage and picked up the clipboard Matheson had left there.
“We can use this to check against. I’d like to know what they’ve left us with.”
Most people seemed to agree with that.
Joe’s son Ethan raised his hand to speak. He sat with his hand raised until Craig acknowledged him. Shelley liked that. It showed good manners.
“I thought that we should also go explore upstairs?” Ethan supplied when Craig nodded to him.
“Great idea Ethan! Let’s do that as well. Ok, who wants to help in the kitchen?”
“My daughter and I can help!” Rachel Collins called out with a hand on Christine’s shoulder. Christine looked none too happy to be volunteered but went along with it. Sarah completed the volunteer team prepared to take on kitchen duty.
Shelley was curious to see if there were any medical supplies, so she volunteered to come check out the supplies drop, Joe, Ern, John and Craig completed that group.
Keith took Jack, Ethan and the girl wearing the track suit to scout out what was upstairs. It occurred to Shelley that track suit girl had not introduced herself.
Maybe she is just shy.
Everybody agreed that Emily and Bill had already done enough for the day and suggested that they stay put in the cafeteria, along with Maria, who was sporting her ankle injury, and the practically catatonic Claire.
Emily said she was fine and didn’t need to take it easy. She offered to help in the kitchen, promising to try not to ‘Royally cock it up’.
Maria’s ankle was bothering her, but she was uncomfortable sitting around. So, she went exploring. That left Bill and Claire sitting at a table together in awkward silence.
AS SHELLEY WALKED WITH her group to the gym, she noticed a certain familiarity between Craig and John. She could tell just by the way they interacted with each other. She saw John say something to Craig and the other man grinning back at him. She stepped closer to them.
“Hey – do you guys know each other?”
John turned to her and explained.
“As a matter of fact, we do. We actually live on the same street.”
Shelley got a good look at John as he addressed her. John looked like he was in his mid thirties. He had that ‘solid’ look, like he could have been a professional athlete or something.
Guess a career in the armed forces will do that for you.
John was a handsome man with a square jaw and a short brown hair sprinkled with hints of grey. Shelley definitely felt attracted to his rugged good looks, and almost missed what he was saying as they arrived at the gym entrance. “We’ve known each other for a few years now – especially our wives.”
Craig nodded and smiled at this. John continued. “We actually spent the last four days in the same house. Right after the hospitals got shut down. Figured it would be safer to hole up together.”
“Sure! My fine selection of whiskeys had nothing to do with it!” Craig piped up. Both men smiled. It was nice to pretend things were normal – even if it was just for a moment.
The team arrived at the gym and stared at all the stuff. There was a lot. Way more than they could inventory in a few minutes.
“All right. Let’s just get a sense of what, and how much, we’ve got here. We’ll come back tomorrow and sort it all out. Sound like a plan?” Craig suggested. The group agreed.
At first, the group just walked around the pallets, trying to figure out what they were looking at. That’s when Joe spotted something. He walked up to a pallet and took a closer look at one of the boxes.
“This is medical stuff!” He turned to Shelley.
“Shelley, you’re a nurse, right? Do you want to take a look at this stuff with me?” Shelley nodded and walked over.
Craig also came over with the clipboard.
“Here.” He stated as he pulled a page from the manifest. “This page is titled ‘Medicine and Medical Equipment’.
Joe smiled at Shelley. “Let’s sort through this stuff and organize it along one of the walls of the gym. I see some fancy looking equipment already!” Shelley smiled in agreement, and they got started.
Ern and John split up and were looking at oth
er pallets. John got to his second pallet when he made a discovery.
“Guys, this pallet has got some weapons and ammunition on it.” Everybody stopped what they were doing and looked at him.
He looked a few more seconds, noting some of the names on the boxes, and gave a low whistle.
“Some good stuff here...”
“Maybe we need to think about putting that stuff somewhere... uh, safe? Out of reach.” Craig suggested. John nodded in agreement.
Craig worked his way around the other pallets over the next few minutes as the rest of the team were checking out all the goodies. The clipboard seemed to suit him well, as he was furiously flipping through pages and checking off items.
Shelley studied Craig while she was checking through the medical materials. He wouldn’t be classified as a great looking man, but then again you would call him ugly either.
There was something about the tall man though. He seemed to carry himself with a bearing that attracted others. His facial features were full of expression and his mannerisms invited friendly behaviour. He also seemed very intelligent, and a bit of a natural leader, considering what had occurred earlier that evening.
Shelley felt that Craig’s most striking feature was his smile. It was infectious. It was one of those smiles that reached the eyes as well as the mouth. Genuine.
He was smiling now.
“Hey guys, I think I hit the jackpot.” With a triumphant motion Craig raised something for all of to see. It was a case of beer.
Joe piped up. “Find me some bourbon in that pallet and we got ourselves a party!” They all chuckled.
The group continued to inventory things for another half hour or so, stopping when Christine Collins walked in and issued a five-minute warning for supper.
Shelley and her group walked back to the cafeteria shortly after, their moods bolstered by their findings. The smell of food reached them as soon as they got to the entrance of the cafeteria. They hastened their steps, realizing just how hungry they were.
The ladies had cooked up chicken breasts and vegetables, and got the deep fryer going so the group had some fries and onion rings as well. There was even desert – there were a couple of flavors of ice cream available. Craig produced the case of beer he had found earlier, and everybody that wanted some beer got some. It struck Shelley as funny that most of their group actually didn’t drink beer. The next half hour was nearly silent as everybody sated their hunger.
Shelley wasn’t sure what it was. Maybe it was the new people, or the perceived safety of the school. Maybe everybody was terribly hungry, or maybe it was just the rush of adrenaline that everybody had experienced through that day – but that simple meal tasted like it was the best food they had had in a long time. Several people commented on how good the food tasted, and the mood of the group seemed buoyed. Most of the group members even smiled at some point during that meal.
Claire was one exception. She just picked at her food. The grandmotherly Nancy sat with her and tried to engage her and encourage her to eat. Bill sat at that table too but looked awkward and pretty much just kept himself occupied with his own meal.
The other exception was track suit girl. She sat by herself and ate her meal in silence.
Wonder what her problem is?
Shelley has seated herself at the same table as the Van Gilze family. She noted that while everybody else was finishing up their meals, Craig was drawing a map of the school on some sheets of paper. Curious, she looked on.
He started with the basement level. First, he drew a rough layout of the basement.
Then, Craig started adding notes underneath for anything special. Shelley leaned in a bit to read what he was writing. Craig noted that there was a smaller gym downstairs, containing fitness machinery, yoga mats, etc. He also marked off the large boys and girls change rooms, including showers.
He noted something Keith had mentioned earlier. Being the basement level, there were high windows set in the walls, about at head height if you stood inside, but only about a foot from the ground from the outside. They were all already shut and locked. But they also had metal roll shutters for added security.
Shelley could see Craig draw six classrooms. She recalled Nancy stating that these rooms felt like dungeons. On one of the classrooms, Craig wrote the word; ‘lab’. That room had microscopes, Bunsen burners etc. Across from the classrooms there was a large boiler room that also was used as the janitor’s office as well as a large storage room.
Next, Craig started on the main floor.
He’s got an architect’s hand. Shelley noted as he drew the layout.
There was an open front office, just off to the side of the main entrance, and a couple of separate offices behind that main office. On the other side of the hallway was the gym equipment storage room. The floor was completed with a large gym on one end, and the lunchroom they were currently sitting in on the other end.
Craig next engaged his son Jack to share what he saw upstairs. After a couple of minutes, Craig started drawing again.
It appeared the apple didn’t fall far from the tree, as not only was Jack a lanky young man with an easy smile just like his dad – but he also appeared to be an analytical thinker. Shelley felt that he did a good job explaining what the second level of the school looked like.
Jack explained that the second floor contained five classrooms, a set of washrooms, and a library. The corner classroom was set up as a media room, including a large screen television. Jack mentioned that Ethan had checked the tv and found it to be working. What was even more interesting was that he checked and found that some stations were still broadcasting.
Nodding to himself, Craig stood up and addressed the group
“Hey folks. I just wanted to provide you all with some information. I don’t want to take up too much time, so won’t go into the details, but here is roughly what we have for supplies.”
Craig went on to tell the group that there was a substantial cache of food, consisting mostly of Meals, Ready to Eat – or MREs as they were called in the military. He told them that there was a pallet full of medical stuff, which Shelley and Joe were sorting through, that there was another pallet full of arms, ammunition and other ‘army stuff’, a pallet with clothing and sundries, and a pile of bedding, cots and chairs. He finished off by stating that they would get a proper inventory list tomorrow and suggested that people set up the classrooms as bedrooms for the night.
“But first, we should all head upstairs. I just found out that young Ethan found us a working television – and that some networks may still be broadcasting!”
That stirred the group into action. People quickly cleaned up and brought their dishes into the kitchen. There was an industrial size dishwasher in that kitchen, and it was quickly agreed upon to take advantage of the machine while electricity and water were still running.
Cots and bedding were collected from the gym and brought upstairs. There were five classrooms upstairs, and four of these were quickly claimed by the Bentleys, the Collins family, the Millers, and the Van Gilze family. The fifth classroom was the media room, so it was agreed that this room would stay empty. The rest of the group would settle into the basement classrooms.
The group filed into the media room and took seats, while Ethan got the tv going.
Shelley sat next to Claire. The poor woman was still in shock. Shelley could not imagine what was going through her mind, having seen her son killed right in front of her. Claire must have felt her staring, as she turned to face Shelley. The look of despair was plain on her face.
Shelley couldn’t help herself. She spontaneously started crying and reached out to Claire. Claire’s motherly instinct took over and they clutched hands for several moments. And then Nancy was there, wrapping them both up in her arms.
“Oh, my dears...” Was all she said as she held them. She knew that no words would suffice.
Nancy was the typical grandmother if there ever was such a thing. Round figured, kind featured, and
with great empathy. This was apparent to Shelley as soon as she got on to that bus. The kind of person to continuously fuss over everybody else. Shelley guessed that she was the kind of person that would help somebody no matter what sex, race, age or mood.
Just a sweet old lady. She showed all her matriarchal capabilities in that moment, hugging the two women tight and tut-tutting.
After a long moment, the three ladies released each other from their hug. Shelley looked over to Claire as they took their seats again and the two women exchanged a quick smile.
Ethan had found a channel that was still broadcasting live, so he turned up the volume.
The group watched and listened to the latest news.
THE NEWS WASN’T GOOD.
The news anchor indicated that this would be his last broadcast, but that the government was going to broadcast textual news from some obscure bunker location.
He went on to say that the latest bulletin by the WHO indicated that anybody that was still symptom free would likely remain so.
That gave the group some hope.
For the rest, the news was grim though. It was inevitable that the syndrome would continue to progress until the host died. Many people would die in terrible agony as their insides were literally being shredded. Those people might be the lucky ones though, as they would remain dead. The ones that had milder symptoms or just managed to live long enough would succumb suddenly as the syndrome attacked the brain. Then the body would rise again.
The news anchor shared one popular hypothesis with his audience. This hypothesis stated that the brain never actually went fully ‘dark’ once the person died. After a brief period of time synopses would start firing up again. That would be when the dead would rise up again, without recognition, without emotion, and without any apparent intelligence or communication skill. But with a terrible aggression towards the living.
Apocalypsis Immortuos | Book 1 | Syndrome Page 13