by K. M. Fawkes
“Okay,” he said evenly. “Then can you tell me when he might be free to talk with me?”
The soldier sighed. “The Major will find you when he wants to talk to you.”
“That doesn’t really do me any good, though, does it?” Brad asked, trying hard to keep his tone civil. “Especially if he doesn’t know that I’m looking for him.”
“I’ll give him the message. It’s best if you get moving now.”
The soldier was older than Brad, but not enough for him to take that tone. Brad pushed his hands into his pockets so that the other man wouldn’t see that they’d clenched into fists. How had he been so blind? How had he not seen what he was walking into?
“I haven’t given you my name,” Brad pointed out. And he knew damn well that this soldier probably had no idea what it was. He wasn’t on any of the crews with Brad.
The soldier’s jaw went tight. “Fine. What is it?”
“Brad.” Then, figuring that if he was going to go for it, he might as well go whole hog, he went on. “Tell him that I want to talk to him about the search and rescue mission he promised me.”
The soldier nodded. “Fine, I’ll be sure to do that. Now. Move. Along.”
Brad moved. There were two possible outcomes: either the soldier wouldn’t tell Major Walker anything and Brad would be back to square one, or the soldier would tell Walker exactly what Brad had said and he’d end up in quarantine.
Brad finally managed to unclench his fists as he walked. Then, he forced himself to take a deep breath. No. Forewarned, as Lee had taught him, was forearmed. He wasn’t a damn tax attorney and he’d be a hell of a lot harder to take down if it came to that.
Or, he could simply leave. His pace slowed as he thought about it. If he skipped out in the night, no one would be able to find him. If his trips with the hunting crew had taught him anything, it was that he was the best tracker they had. The wind swirled around him and he shivered at the reminder of why staying here had been so important to him in the first place.
It didn’t mean that he had to stay; it just meant that he had to be careful with how he handled leaving. He still had his pack and now he could loot the apartment, but he wasn’t sure that would be enough to get him through. There wasn’t a lot of food in his place. Maybe he could live on half-rations for a while and stock up. He frowned. That still put him at upwards of a week before he could get out of there. And he might not have that long.
A truck rolled out through the gates, catching his attention. That would be the best way to go out. Covered vehicle, plenty of room to store things and to make a comfortable and warm bed in the back of. He wasn’t sure what he’d do about fuel, but he thought that he could probably siphon some from the cars on the road.
He made a mental note to find out how they filled the tanks. If he’d already opened the can of worms, he might as well scatter it around, after all. Then, he began to inventory what he had. Food was the sticking point. He just didn’t have enough of it.
Neal showed up with new rations every few days. Where did they come from? Were they locked in some room in the building where the Major spent his days? Or were they in an apartment like “quarantine”? Brad added that to the list he was making in his head.
He would pack his bag with emergency supplies tonight, but in the event that he had time, he’d find out about the rations and the fuel. His shoulders started to relax as the plan slowly took shape. At least he was doing something.
He was nearly relaxed when he heard the howl. Brad stopped in his tracks, listening as other people began to run toward their houses.
“It’s a wolf!” a kid running past him yelled.
Brad stayed where he was as doors slammed around him. It was a high-pitched howl, with yipping barks at the front end of it. It wasn’t a wolf. It was a coyote. And he had a feeling that he knew exactly where it was.
He ran for the cattle pen as fast as he could. Which, he was pleased to note, was still pretty damn fast. He skidded to a stop in front of the pen and looked around. A bellow of pain and fear from one of the cows answered his question. The coyote leapt at it, biting deep into its flank and it stumbled. Brad jumped over the fence.
“What the hell are you doing?” Ben demanded from behind him. The other man was out of breath and leaning on the fence about a yard away.
“Get me a gun!” Brad yelled back.
He picked up a rock and threw it, hitting the coyote in the side. It let go, stumbling and snarling. Blood dripped from its muzzle and it looked exactly like everyone’s worst fear. Still, Brad felt a flicker of sympathy. It was just trying to survive like the rest of them.
“Brad! Here!” Ben tossed him the rifle.
The coyote leapt for the cow again. Brad’s shot rang out and the creature fell with a whimper. Brad had missed the heart. The coyote tried to stand and failed. Brad raised the gun again, moving closer.
“Don’t waste the bullet,” the soldier Ben had gotten the gun from called out. “It’ll bleed out anyway.”
Brad didn’t even turn to acknowledge the words. Instead he raised the gun to his shoulder, aiming for the head, this time. The next shot seemed louder than the first. The animal went still in the dirt of the pen.
The soldier came in, yanking the gun away. “I told you not to waste the damn ammo,” he barked.
Brad’s throat felt too tight. “I wasn’t going to let it suffer,” he said.
“We don’t have the supplies for you to be a goddamn bleeding heart!”
“If you want to be useful, go get me a medical kit,” Brad snapped. “Or do you want me to let the cow bleed out, too?”
The soldier’s eyes went wide for a second. “What did you just say to me?”
“Did I fucking stutter?” Brad demanded. “Get me a med kit. Now. Or you lose this cow.”
The soldier stepped closer. Brad didn’t step back. He was taller than the man by a good half a foot and he knew that he was right. With an inventive swear questioning Brad’s parentage, the soldier left, ordering Ben to come with him.
Ben came back with the kit alone. It was huge.
“Good God,” Brad said. “Where did you get this?”
“It was in the supply room,” Ben said. “Zach was so pissed that he practically threw it at me.”
One question answered. There was a supply room. And it was within ten minutes’ walk to the north of the cattle pen.
“Think you can help me with the cow?” Brad asked.
“Sure,” Ben said. “Just tell me what to do.”
“If I can get her confined, I’ll do a lot better,” Brad said. “I’d really rather not get kicked in the face.”
“I guess I don’t blame you,” Ben said with a slight smile. “And actually, I have something rigged up in the shed. I just finished it.”
Brad followed him in and saw a sling suspended from the rafters. “Great,” he said with relief. “And you’ve tested the weight?”
“Yep. I just did that this morning.”
They managed to wrangle the cow out of the pen and into the shed. Then, Ben lowered the sling so that it rested on the ground and Brad pulled the cow forward so that her midsection was over the fabric. Ben hoisted her up just enough so that she couldn’t kick. The sling was wide and supportive, and the cow was blasé about the experience. Brad figured that would change a little as he disinfected the bite.
He was both grateful and relieved when he found some numbing gel in the kit. He rubbed that on and then followed up with an injection to numb more deeply. He thought that the Major probably wouldn’t like him using these supplies on a non-human, but as far as he was concerned, the Major could get fucked.
He worked slowly, washing the bite thoroughly several times before he applied the disinfectant. There were places where the coyote had really bitten deeply and he focused on those. Ben spoke to the cow as Brad worked, patting her nose and feeding her to keep her distracted. He made a hell of an assistant.
Brad’s neck was hurting by the
time he put in the last stitch. His eyes were stinging, too. The long proximity to the strong disinfectant had been a factor, as had the fact that the sun had gone down. It was hard to do detail work in the light of an oil lamp.
With a deep sigh, he packed the kit up again and rubbed his neck.
“Okay,” he said to Ben. “I’m done. It might be good to keep her isolated for a while, just to be sure that nothing messes with the stitches. And…” He hated to even bring it up, but he had to. “I didn’t see any signs of rabies in the coyote, but we should probably observe her for a while, just in case.”
Ben nodded. “Yeah, I was going to ask about that. I’ll make sure that she stays in her stall when the others are out. How long should we watch her?”
“At least a week,” Brad said as he stood up. “After that, I’ll do an evaluation.” He rubbed his hand down the cow’s side. The pain medication would be wearing off soon and he wished he could have given her more. “Then, you can go hang out with your buddies again.”
“I’ll get her put away,” Ben said. “Go on back to your place.”
“Yeah, that sounds like a good idea,” Brad said. “Thanks for your help, Ben.”
“No problem,” Ben said as he led the cow to the stall he’d built. “I like these guys a hell of a lot better than I like most people, anyway. That’s why I’m out here so much.”
Brad grinned. “I get it. That’s why I went the veterinarian route instead of going into med school.”
Ben didn’t turn, but Brad heard the smile in his voice as he said, “That’s what I would have done in your position. You’re not great with people, you know.”
“Believe me,” Brad said with a laugh as he left. “I’ve been told.”
Chapter 12
“What’s the topic of discussion tonight?” Brad asked as he approached his front door. Jack, Vance and Charlie were sat on camping chairs outside, each with a beer in gloved hand. Remington was by his master’s side, but came over to sniff Brad’s hand before settling next to Charlie again.
“We started out gossiping about the wolf,” Jack said.
“Coyote,” Brad corrected.
Vance handed him a beer. “Right. And you killed it.”
“I had to,” Brad said. “It was either the coyote or the cow and I know which one I’d rather eat.”
“Damn straight,” Jack said.
“You were amazing,” Charlie said. “We were all…well, amazed.”
“It was nothing,” Brad muttered as he opened his beer. “What did you guys move on to talking about, anyway? Since my amazing and heroic efforts weren’t of enough interest.”
“People that we’ve lost,” Jack said quietly.
“Or seen die,” Charlie added.
“God, why?” Brad demanded, pausing with his beer halfway to his lips.
“Well, we’re all a little drunk,” Charlie said, swaying gently in her seat.
That explained the slur in her speech, then. Brad looked down at her. She was one of those people who got a little red in the face when she drank. She was also apparently a lightweight. There were only two empty bottles by her chair.
“Charlie gets maudlin when she’s drunk,” Jack explained, stroking Remington’s ears softly as he cast a smile at his tipsy wife. “And, anyway, don’t therapists say it’s good to get these things out into the open?”
“Therapists say a lot of things,” Brad said with a shrug.
“My wife was a therapist,” Vance said suddenly.
“Seriously?” Jack asked. Charlie sat up a little straighter and Brad got the feeling that this was uncharted territory for Vance.
“Yep,” he said. “She specialized in marriage counseling.”
“Did that make your life easier or harder?” Brad asked with a smile.
Vance grinned and shook his head. His southern accent seemed to deepen as he said, “That woman never gave me an easy day in my whole life.” He took a long sip of his beer. “She didn’t have the bots. She didn’t need ’em for one thing, and we wouldn’t have had the money, for another. But one of her patients did. And that’s how she caught the virus. She couldn’t make it to an MRI machine in time.”
He took another long swig of his beer before he continued. “And since they wouldn’t let me back in, I couldn’t be with her. I was on the phone with her when she died. Video chat, because we both knew it was close to the end. I’ve never seen so much blood in my whole damn life.”
“I couldn’t believe it the first time I saw someone die from it,” Jack said with a nod.
“Who did you see?” Brad asked.
Jack shrugged. “I didn’t know him. It happened on the train, near the beginning. Some guy in a business suit started coughing and couldn’t stop, but we couldn’t get the conductor’s attention. The call button wasn’t working.”
Jack looked down at his hands and took a breath. “He just…he collapsed on the floor. A few people leaned over him when it looked like he’d stopped breathing. And then…God. It was like a sprinkler system came on. They were all covered in his blood. I guess they probably all got infected. They said that was how it spread. I just got lucky being at the other end of the car. And being too chicken-shit to get near him.”
Charlie winced and reached for Jack, touching him as if in thanks that he was still with her. “You weren’t a coward,” she said. “There wasn’t anything you could have done, anyway. And this way, you came back to me.”
He took her hand, giving her a slight smile. “Charlie’s been lucky so far,” he said, his voice relieved. “She hasn’t seen anyone die.”
“How the hell is that possible?” Brad asked in surprise.
Charlie laughed mirthlessly. “I’ve been lucky, I guess. And Jack. He dealt with anything we found on the road.” Her fingers tensed in Remington’s fur and the dog leaned against her, sensing her need for support. “And it doesn’t mean that I didn’t lose people. I had a big family. My parents had been together since freshman year of high school. They got married right after graduation.”
She smiled, but it twisted a bit. “They started having kids right away. There were eight of us.”
“Eight?” Brad yelped. “Are you serious?”
Charlie laughed his reaction. “There have been people that have had more than eight kids,” she pointed out.
“Yeah, but…eight of you? How big was your house?!”
“We had four bedrooms,” Charlie said. “And my dad converted the attic, too, so I guess we technically had five.”
Brad simply stared at her.
Jack grinned. “I think I detect the horror of the only child in response to having to share a bedroom.”
“Okay, maybe,” Brad said with a small laugh. “But that just blows my mind. Eight kids!”
“It was wonderful,” Charlie said. “I had three sisters and four brothers. My dad always said that he got the mix just right. My mom took all the credit, too. They used to pretend to fight about it. I don’t know if I just never noticed or if they really never fought…but I don’t remember them ever raising their voices or being angry with each other. They loved each other so much. And they loved us, too. We are…we were a very close family. And now, I’m the only one left.”
She was silent for a moment and then she looked up at Brad. Her eyes were sparkling with tears in the moonlight, but she didn’t allow them to fall. “What about you, Brad? Who did you lose?”
Brad shook his head. “Nobody, really. My mother was gone before the whole thing started. My dad and I…we were never really close.”
“What about those people you keep goin’ on about?” Vance asked. “Annie? Ain’t that her name?”
“Anna,” Brad corrected him. “I met her a few weeks after the EMP.”
“I thought you had kids together,” Jack said in surprise.
Brad shook his head. “No, Sammy and Martha weren’t mine. Sammy was Anna’s son. And Martha…I found her. She was an orphan and I found her right when the first big snow storm
hit. She would have died out there where she was.”
He remembered how pale and terrified the girl had been. How she’d been unable to speak. Had she been reduced to silence again? She’d made so much progress in such a short time while she’d been with them. “Anyway, we weren’t family.” He paused, trying to think of the best way to put it. “We just…took care of each other.”
“That doesn’t mean that they weren’t your family,” Charlie said. “You don’t have to share blood to be that.”
After a moment, Brad nodded. “I guess that’s true.”
He stayed silent while the conversation swirled around him, moving on to better topics as the night wore on. The word weighed heavy on his heart. Family.
He’d never called them that, not even to himself. Now, he saw how well it fit. Anna, Sammy, and even Martha had been his family.
It had been a long damn time since he’d had any family at all, and then he’d lost it. He clenched his hands into fists. No. He wasn’t going to admit that. They weren’t lost. He’d find a way back to them again, with or without help. He had to believe that. It was the only thing that kept him going.
Chapter 13
The sounds came first, oddly familiar although he hadn’t heard them in a long time. The sound of many different low conversations and the bustle of a busy place. Knives and forks clinked against plates all around them as the other diners cut into their meals. Busboys came by and waiters hurried over to the customers who had finished up their desserts and were waving imperiously for service.
Brad watched as their waiter approached with a dark green bottle wrapped in a bright white cloth. Without speaking to Brad, the man leaned down to fill Anna’s glass. The dark wine splashed into it like a red wave, vivid and almost lurid. Once the waiter had filled it nearly to the rim, Anna lifted the glass by its delicate stem and took a long sip. Her eyes met Brad’s as she drank. The glass was nearly empty when she put it on the table again.
