The Clock Runs Down: Half Past the Apocalypse

by Joe Kelly

  Jared walked closer, curious, as Ronny turned to him. The contraption was egg shaped the top half clear; the blue bottom had three struts with wheels arraigned in a triangle. Inside the egg shaped body were two seats one behind the other. A tapering tail made of aluminum stuck out behind the egg. “It’s a custom Jared, this is so damn cool” Ronny said more excited than Jared had seen him in a while. “The wings are in this bag, I could put them on and fly it back to the camp.”

  Jared couldn’t help but stare at the small aircraft. Yes he hated air planes but he could see so many benefits to having it. there were important questions as well like how much weight could it carry. How far could it fly? As he thought about this Ronny was talking about mounting twin m249s to the nose to strafe zombies and adding a rack that could drop grenades.

  Jared almost laughed it was actually good to see Ronny excited for a change. “You do realize how much ammo that would waste trying to strafe zombies and hit them in the head right. And I don’t think we are going to go to war anytime soon”

  “We could fly over zombies and drop dynamite, or bricks or… “ Ronny said excitedly.

  “Don’t get carried away Ronny.” Jared cut him off before he could start getting really wild. He hated to do that, it was really good to see him like this and the fact that Ronny had been just short of getting his pilots license before the end of the world ended his classes.

  “Just get it loaded up with the rest of the stuff and we will see what we can do with it” Spotting Roberts old Enduro dirt bike, Jared walked it out of the barn and around to the front of the house and with work got it loaded into his truck.

  Not really sure if it would be good for much, he thought as he stepped back pulling out a rag to wipe his hands off. Its not like a zombie couldn’t grab a guys shirt and snatch his ass right off a motorcycle. But it still might come in handy even if its to part out for something else.

  It took almost an hour to get everything loaded and secured in the trucks and the trailer by the time they finished a few undead had appeared in the pasture making their slow way towards the small group. “time to go” Jared said opening his truck door. A moment later they were pulling out leaving the house to the dead.

  By the time they got back to camp the sun was setting under the gray clouds piling up on the horizon. They rolled thru the gateway, which hopefully would be filled with a gate in the next few days. Jared pulled up to his normal spot next to the bus parked next to his Cabin and stared in surprise at the new vehicles parked in front of the cabins.

  “no way” Jared muttered seeing one of the trucks. As Jared exited his truck Steve and another man came out of the cabin. Five foot ten or so, a shock of dark brown hair the new comer smiled broadly as he saw Jared. “Jeff? Holy shit, Jeff” Jared said with a huge smile, they met halfway and hugged backslapping each other. “Glad to see you survived. Hell glad to have you here.” Jared said as close to emotional as Jill had ever seen him. there was a haunted, sad look in Jeffs eyes that didn’t wipe away the real joy at their reunion.

  “I be damned, you drag my ass all across the back woods of Tennessee, just to hang out with that Army pussy.” Pappy said from the porch then hawked up a gob of phlegm and spat into the bushes at the base of the porch.

  “Good to see you too Pappy” Jared said turning to the porch where pappy was settling into a camp chair, the old man propped his shotgun between his skinny legs Then somehow managed to leer at Jill while rolling his eyes at Jared with out comment. He looked more exhausted and frail than Jared had ever seen him.

  “Sorry Jared we didn’t have any where else to go.” Jeff said as they walked back to the porch. Jeff lowered himself to the steps watching as Ori and Mark parked two trucks bumper to bumper across the entrance of the makeshift wall.

  “Don’t apologize for showing up your more than welcome. What happened to your cousin in law” Jared asked squatting down next to Jeff

  “Some bastards in Hummers killed them and burned the place out . The only reason we are alive was I had taken my family down to the river to do some fishing. Thank god Pappy went with us to guard the kids and Vickie or we would have lost him too. You know how he is.” Jeff said, Jared nodded in understanding, glancing up at Pappy who looked sleepy. His grandkids and Vickie meant the world to him and the old coot no matter what he might say about his feelings would die before letting something happen to them.

  The door to his cabin opened at that moment as Vickie, Jeff’s wife emerged and there were other people behind her. Seeing him Vickie smiled widely, but Jared could see the Grief, loss and pain in her eyes from the months of hardship, she limped quickly to his side and hugged him hard. Like Jeff, Jared had known Vickie since his childhood. They had been good friends all through school.

  “It is so good to see you Jared.” She said pulling out of the embrace she motioned to the others. “ Hope you don’t mind, but we ran across a few other folks on the way here.”

  Jared turned to face the small group of newcomers. A muscled twenty something guy, stood with a rather plain-faced woman stepped forward and extended a hand. He looked tired, and hungry. “Jason, Jason Collins and this is my wife Linda.” He said his voice was deep, and seemed to rumble up from his thick torso.

  “Nice to meet you” Jared said taking the hand she offered, mildly surprised by the strength in her grip. Looking into her face he decided, he was wrong, she wasn’t plain faced, not with those eyes. Granted most men wouldn’t get past her chest, or the flat stomach or long legs. But she had the most stunning and warm eyes he had ever seen.

  “And this is Henry Servile, and Cathy Hamilton of Kentucky” Vickie said, as the square jawed silver haired man extended a hand. He had a strong handshake and pale blue eyes, so pale it was like looking into water. A thin salt and pepper beard covered his jaw and a slightly crooked nose from some long ago break. Unsettling was the word that came to mind looking into those eyes, Jared thought Cathy looked nervous but gave him a smile. She was probably worried that Jared would order the strangers out of the camp.

  “and this is Deacon Mears and Kyle Watts” Vickie said introducing the last two strangers. Deacon was about Five ten, with a completely bald head he had a lean build and Kyle watts a six foot black man had the battered face of a prize fighter complete with a nose that had been broken more than once, he was a burly broad shouldered man.

  Jared greeted them both then turned back to Jeff, the man had lost something over the last three months. He looked beaten. Vickie was trying to hold it together for all of them. And Jared didn’t doubt it had been hard, especially with Pappy around. Pappy was not the easiest person to deal with not even for Vickie whom Pappy adored.

  Even Pappy seemed down himself. Subdued really. Most likely the lack of people to insult and bitch about on a daily basis has finally taken the fun out of his life, Pappy lived to bitch, considered it a right actually. One earned in the military and old age.

  Whatever was bothering Jeff would come out when the man was ready to actually talk about it and Jared would be willing to lay good money on Vickie being the first one to bring it up too.

  “Well lets get you folks fed” Jared said, by now everyone was gathered outside the Cabins. Except for Ori, thank god someone was on watch. That’s all they needed was to be sitting out here like it was the fourth of July, and have a few undead show up to crash the party.

  Dinner wasn’t much, some canned meat, the rattlesnake he had shot earlier that day, cooked Cajun style read as spicy, seasoned rice, and one huge honking pot of baked beans.

  Beth, the teacher, surprisingly had a talent for cooking, and had gone all out on the beans adding some of the last of the brown sugar to them much to every ones delight.

  The new comers dug in with a gusto, which pretty much confirmed Jared’s idea that they hadn’t been eating a lot lately.

  “How bad was it for you folks?” Jason asked pushing away his empty plate. “the first few days?”

  “Not that bad to be honest. We le
ft pretty quickly all things considered.” Jared answered. Mary looked like she was about to speak but didn’t. Jared wondered if Ronny even knew exactly what Mary had gone thru that day in Downtown Nashville. She had talked to Jill about it, but Jill had not talked specifics when Jared had asked but from what Jill said and what Jared knew about how bad downtown had been that is was almost a miracle that Mary had survived being downtown as the city melted down.

  “Let me clarify,” Jared added “not that bad considering how many died. And how fast it went down. The downtown areas went fast, but once it spread out into the surrounding areas, it slowed down, because by then people were holing up, and had warning. It took us a couple of days to get here, and most of the towns we went thru looked empty. Half the time we didn’t even see the damned undead.” Jared added

  “Not many at any rate till we hit Livingston” Steve added as he wrapped an arm around Bridget who leaned her head against his shoulder. “Now that was a damned nightmare.”

  “Isn’t that where you picked up all those kids” Cathy asked having heard some of the story already before Jared had returned. Jared nodded and let Jill and the others tell that story. He still got almighty pissed every time he thought about what those kids had gone through.

  “I guess Summer school saved their lives.” Linda commented. “if they had been home.” she said then shrugged not having to finish the sentence.

  “It wasn’t summer school” Beth offered. “We had just started a new, and frankly idiotic, all year school schedule. They called it an experiment, but I suspect unless it really drained the coffers they would have kept it going till the end of time.”

  Jared grunted something as he looked around but didn’t see Ben. Ben had been pestering all of them for a while now about going out with one of the teams. But so far they had managed to keep convincing the young teen ager to stay with the kids and help guard them. But with the wall almost done, Ben would get even pushier about going along. And the truth was, none of them wanted that kid to have to deal with the crap any sooner than he had to. He had been thru enough already.

  They spent maybe four hours swapping stories about that day. Well all but Henry who said he really didn’t want to talk about it. Jason and His wife had gone thru hell, before escaping Chattanooga where they had been staying at a hotel on vacation.

  Deacon was from Kansas city had been traveling cross country had stopped up at the Mammoth caves on the day, as every one now called it, from what he said it hadn’t been all that bad till he had tried head to the hotel waiting for him in Lexington. His story about the chaos and wreckage on the interstate had just driven another nail in the coffin of the world. “after that I headed south sticking to back roads in places it was bad but a lot easier than the main roads. Met Kyle there in a rest stop, he was standing on top of the bathrooms with a bunch of those things around it trying to get to him. He had that old rifle and was just popping one head after another. I ran them down.” He shook his head slowly. “scraped the hell out of the side of my truck on that building too. After that we stuck together then ran across Jeff there up by red boiling springs been with em ever since.”

  Finally, Jared rose then grimaced as he looked down and realized just how dirty he was. In all the excitement, he hadn’t even bathed yet and it was getting damned late. It might even seem ridiculous to some that he and the others actually took time to do something so bourgeois as bathing with the end of the world going on but the health benefits alone made it critical.

  “If you folks will pardon me I should have gotten a bath as soon as I got back,” Jared said then stifled a yawn. Once he had gotten thru the round of goodnights, which felt strangely normal he grabbed a towel and headed out to the hot tub. He couldn’t wait till they got a pump running so he could take a shower inside. For now, being able to fill the hot tub with hot water so that he could soak and bathe was wonderful. Some things about civilization were more missed than others. Rob had promised to have showers set up in another day or so.

  He had a lot to think about not just the about the new arrivals either. The questions surrounding Roberts house bothered him a lot. There had to have been more than one zombie in that home. And there had been only Sheila been inside, what had happened to the others?. who had locked the door?

  The one question he didn’t want to think about tonight was how they were going to increase their food supply to feed the new mouths. By the time he got out of the tub and headed upstairs, everyone else was already in bed. Jason and Linda were asleep on the floor in the living room, wrapped in an old afghan to ward off the chill of the night.

  Once in his room, he slipped off his shorts and decided to use some electricity and turned on the light so he could do some light reading. He had started getting into a technical Manuel on how to rewrap generators the other night which he was sure might be helpful later on.

  But all thoughts of reading vanished, as he saw Jill sitting naked in his bed, the sheets pooled about her narrow waist. Her hair was unbound and fell around her face in delicate waves.

  “What are you doing here?” he heard himself asked. Like he didn’t know and wasn’t more than eager to do the deed. But can you risk it, he asked himself then told himself to shut up.

  “Mary told me you can be a bit slow so after months of hinting I decided to take the direct route. Get in this bed, and make me very happy.” Her eyes drifted to his crotch and she smiled. “ And so far I’m pretty happy with what I see”

  Later he worried that all the noise might have drawn the attention of the undead in town. As he drifted off to sleep he realized it was worth the ammo they might have to use to fend off the undead.

  The courtyard was huge he thought as he looked around. The arcades were deep in shadows. “Do you remember this place?” Elliot Stone asked. Jared turned, surprised, but not. This was a dream; his dad had been dead for years now.

  “Ft. Sumter,” Jared replied. “We came here when I was 12 or 13,” Jared said smiling at the memory then looked up to see His dad smiling back.

  “Best vacation we ever took,” Elliot Stone said as he rubbed Jared’s hair with a large callused hand.

  “I personally liked St. Johns dad,” Jared replied, he should have found it odd such a banal conversation in a dream but it beat the nightmares he had been having. Then again, he thought it was really odd he knew he was dreaming.

  There was a strange feeling of reality to this dream too. Something that he had never really experienced in a dream before and couldn’t have explained it to anyone else and have it make sense.

  “That’s where you met Donna Maria.” His dad said as they walked across the courtyard. Jared grinned remembering the pretty Puerto Rican girl. She had been his first real love, his first woman. They had spent the week sneaking off to skinny dip in the ocean and make love on a deserted beach.

  “Always thought your old dad didn’t know you were up to no good.” Elliott said with a smile. Jared grinned at that. He wasn’t surprised his dad had known, the old guy was pretty sharp, had been he corrected himself. “I have to say dad you haven’t aged a day”

  Elliot Stone stopped and looked at Jared. “ Its one of the better points to being dead.” He replied. “ Well for those that passed before the end of the world”

  “You know about that, “ Jared asked. Elliot looked around the old fort and smiled in fond remembrance.

  “Nice place to bring kids, even ones that aren’t into history. Old forts are magical to a kid.” Elliot said softly then turned to face Jared once more. “Times short son, you’re going to wake up soon. Back to that pretty woman in your bed. Your mom likes her by the way.” Jared felt tears well up in his eyes, for once not hating the surge of emotion.

  “There’s a lot you should know, but I cant tell it all to you, not yet. Maybe not ever. There’s good and evil loose in the world, battling it out you and your friends have a part to play. It wont be easy but we are pretty sure you can do it. And while the Light, has its champions. So does th
e Dark and one of them has an interest in your group. Can’t tell you why son, or it changes things. It’s got to be done because it’s your decision not because you think its fate. There are rules to this; both sides have to play by them. Even the champions whether they knew them or not.”

  “ Is this a dream dad, or just in my mind? I mean” Jared asked.

  “ Rules Jared, it’s what you decide it is,” Elliot said, then placed hand on his sons shoulder and led him up to the top of the wall.

  Father and son stood side by side watching the moonlight play on the choppy water of Charleston harbor under a star spangled sky. The wind was cool on Jared's face, and the smell of the water was strong and pleasant. He could even taste the salt in the air. “Its time for me to go son, but I want you to know, “ Elliot said breaking the silence as he turned and gazed at Jared. “You’re a good man Jared, and I’m proud of you.”

  Jared woke up feeling a pressure on his chest where Jill’s head rested. Her hair splayed out across his bare chest tickling him. One toned and tanned arm was draped across his stomach.