“Well Clara, we really need help, and it’d mean the world to us if you would come back with us to the school. You could meet the rest of the council, and we could get you a cool job and everything.” You know, it sounded an awful like she was trying to make it sound like an offer, but it came off as a threat.
To her credit, Abby responded very smart, “Okay, but I’ve got some questions first.”
The woman nodded, like she expected it.
“How many people do you have? I don’t think really large groups are safe anymore.” Abby put the “I’m scared” frowny face on.
“I think there are 40 of us right now, but two of the ladies are pregnant, and due by summer. So it’d be 41 with you, and 43 by summer.” The woman seemed particularly proud.
“Wow, having babies, do you guys have a doctor there? That’d be great.” Abby faked a smile.
“Kind of, we have a woman who was a physician’s assistant at the local clinic. She’s pretty sharp. She’s studying up for the deliveries on the kids something fierce. We’re pretty excited.” Her and the guy exchanged smiles. They did seem genuinely excited to have more kids show up.
“Wow, cool. Who is in charge there?” Abby was starting to feign interest, to keep them going.
“Well, technically we’re a council, so there’s no official, like mayor or anything, but our council is chaired by two people, Sean Stockwell, and my Lieutenant from the Guard base in town, Lt. Daniels. Sean’s pretty much the guiding force, but he needs the Lt’s support to get big shit done, so it works out. The rest of the council is people from town from before. Well, before all this.” She gestured around. This intel was a fucking goldmine if it was all true. Also made me wonder where all the guardsmen were if there was a base here in town. I wonder what the base was responsible for, and what gear they might have kicking around.
“Wow. And you guys have plenty of food? How is that possible?” Abby continued with her drilling.
The man spoke up and answered, “Well, there were two grocery stores in town, and the Chief and the Lieutenant secured them right off the bat when things went south. We got them emptied and got all the food into the school right off the bat. Plus there was a bunch of restaurants that we got the food from, and then my family runs McDowell farm back there. They provide security and fuel for my dad at the farm, and we share our milk and eggs and occasionally a chicken or two. Works out great.”
Again, all solid gold intel.
Abby nodded and thought about it. She was making it look like she was going to go, but the deal was she’d tell them she couldn’t, because she had to return to get her sister first or something. The deal was, don’t get in the truck. “Well, that all sounds great, can I meet you here tomorrow? I need to get my little sister first. I can’t leave her alone overnight.”
“We’ll help you get her.” The woman responded. I remember just about then I got that dumping sensation in the pit of my stomach right before things go bad.
Abby was not prepared for that response, and she stammered some, “I uh, I’m all set thanks, but tomorrow if you want to meet us here again sometime that’d work.”
“No, I think now is best Clara. It’s getting late, it’ll be dark soon, you might run into one of the dead folks, and we can’t have that happening.” The woman reached to her hip and rested her hand on what I figured was a handgun. I dropped to a knee inside the living room of the house and put the sights of the M15 on the woman. If she drew, she died. The man already had his pistol out, but it was hanging down, and he clearly was uncomfortable with the sudden change of stance from the woman.
Abby made her only mistake, and looked right at the window I was behind. She panicked and gave my position away. The woman put two and two together, and spun to face me, drawing her weapon. The man stood still. Before she got the gun up and presented herself as a threat, I snapped off a single round. The windows of the house were open from the summer, and I sent the high velocity 5.56 bullet right through an opening in the window. The woman doubled over and fell on her side, dropping the pistol. The man’s face went white as the sheet on my back as he watched the chick drop. Abby reached into the small of her back and drew her Beretta. Almost immediately the man dropped his pistol.
I moved out the door and through the snow, keeping my weapon on the man. The woman was rolling on the ground, bleeding heavily from the shot to her chest. She was coughing as well, spitting up some blood. Once again, I hit the lungs. Getting good at that. I told Abby to watch him, and I rendered first aid to the woman.
She died as soon as I got her sat up against the tire of the truck. I must’ve hit something a lot more important than just a lung. Lots of important stuff in your chest when it comes to getting shot there. I swore up and down quietly and repeatedly for a minute or two as the dude just watched in horror. He was totally unprepared for this. I stood up, grabbed the woman’s Beretta 92F pistol as well as the two magazines in her jacket pocket, slung the M15, and walked over to him.
He took a few steps back, and I picked up his pistol. It was another Beretta 92F. Or an M9 as the military calls it. They must’ve been Guard issued or at least from the Guard base. Enticing factoid.
Here’s a summary of our conversation;
“Do you know who we are?”
“I have no idea who you are.”
“My name is Adrian Ring. I’m the guy your leader Sean decided to attack twice now.” I wasn’t threatening him, just passing along info. Once I said that his eyes lit up.
“You’re the dude who killed all our people at Christmas? You’re a fricking monster, you just killed Tera. Oh gosh no, oh shit…” I caught a whiff of urine.
“Look man, what’s your name?” I put on the Adrian “I’m really your friend” face.
“Oliver. They call me Ollie.” His eyes were as wide as Lindsey Lohan’s after a meth binge. Well, as wide as they might’ve been if she were still alive at least. You get the point Mr. Journal.
“Ollie, I am really sorry I had to shoot Tera. But she was probably going to shoot me. And I’m sure if you had the chance to shoot someone who was about to shoot you, you would do the same, right?”
“Uh yeah, I guess.” Stronger smell of urine. His dark jeans looked a little darker around the crotch.
“Excellent Ollie. Here’s what you need to know. We want nothing to do with violence. However, your leader Sean followed people from here to where we are, and then attacked us to get our food. Now we’re hungry too, and you don’t just attack people and take their food. You start peaceful trade, or barter, right?” I was trying to talk slow, and appear as non-threatening as possible. I didn’t even have a gun pointed at him.
“Yeah, but they told us you attacked them when they followed people leaving here.”
“That’s horseshit Ollie. And if you know Sean like I know Sean, you know he’s feeding you bullshit. Anything to get your people to hate us. Shit, you guys blew up a gas station near us the other night, as well as a building in the town we live in. Over a hundred people died the other day because of Sean, Ollie. That’s a lot of spilled blood over nothing.”
His face squirreled up on me when I said that, and I knew he wasn’t lying, “I knew about the gas station, but the building you’re talking about, that’s news to me. Don’t forget mister, you shot and killed three of our people when we hit the gas station the other night.”
“The ones with empty guns you mean?”
His face went pale white and I knew he had no idea what I was talking about. “Yeah Ollie, they had guns, and I shot them because they were still there holding them. But when I checked, their guns were empty. Any chance those people that died that night were maybe against Sean’s ideas at all?”
No answer, he just looked down at the ground trying to hide his expression. I responded with a hmph.
“Ollie how many pistol magazines do you have on you?”
He thought for a second and replied, “I’ve got one in the gun, plus two more in my pocket.”
After I pried the hatchet out of her head, I went back to Ollie. “Gimme the two mags in your pocket man.” He did. I dropped the mag out of the Beretta and rifled it down the road. It skipped and slid about 75 yards or so. I pocketed the two magazines and searched the interior of the truck. There was a police radio, and I took it. I killed the motor, and threw the keys down the road near the gun magazine. No other guns or good stuff. In the back of the truck they had the crates of milk, as well as three dozen eggs and what looked like a butchered chicken or two.
Here’s where I took the moral high ground. “Ollie, you know as well as I do there’s nothing stopping Miss Clara here from putting nine millimeters through your forehead right?” I tilted my head towards the angry little blonde in the road.
Ollie nodded at me solemnly.
“I don’t want to hurt you, and neither does she. Furthermore, I don’t want to steal your food. You’ve got pregnant woman to feed, and I’m sure you’ve got kids there as well, right?”
He nodded again.
“So the food is yours. When we leave, you walk to the keys and the magazine, and then you come back to the truck. How you decide to tell the rest of the people what happened here is up to you, but I sincerely hope you tell them exactly what happened. Tera was shot when she pointed a gun at me, and I’m regretful it happened. You make sure to tell them I’m sorry for it, okay?”
He nodded again. I noticed the faint glimmer of hope in his face when he figured out he was going to walk away from the situation alive.
“Now you need to pass along a message for me, and I need you to understand fully that I am as serious as someone can possibly be about this, okay?” I gave him the “Adrian means business face.”
“Okay, anything.”
“You can tell this to Sean, but I’d prefer you told it to the people who are against him. Okay?”
He nodded again.
“Sean has done wrong by me, and he’s done wrong by my people. Now this is no longer a country made of laws, but justice will be served in this regard. I expect you all to understand that attacking my people for no good reason, blowing up a perfectly good gas station filled with fuel, then blowing up a building filled with my friends, is entirely unacceptable. I’ve never done anything to you people here, other than this today.”
Ollie nodded.
“I want Sean. Sean and only Sean. He pays for his crimes against me and my people. I want nothing to do with hurting anyone, but mark my words Ollie; I will tear your school down brick by bloody brick until that man is brought before me to pay for what he’s done.”
Ollie pissed himself again.
“Talk to your people. Tell them we want peace, but he needs to pay for what he’s done. If he isn’t brought before me within 20 days, then I will start forcing the issue. I really do not want to force the issue Ollie.” Serious Adrian is Serious.
“We have your radio now. We will be turning it on every other day at noon to listen for transmissions on.” I saw they were on channel 4. “Channel 5. If you want to communicate in a diplomatic fashion, I suggest you radio my people. Our first day listening will be the 15th.”
Ollie nodded, “Channel five, at noon, every other day, starting on the 15th, roger.”
“Ollie I want to apologize for putting this on you, it wasn’t our intention for things to go this way. Shit happens man, this is bad times for everyone.” I put my hand gently on his shoulder. He didn’t flinch, which I took as a good sign. I don’t think he was afraid of me anymore, and that meant he believed me. (In my head at least)
“Start walking towards the gun and the keys. We’re going to head this way. When you get to the keys and the magazine, you can come back to the truck and get the gun. We’ll drop it about 25 yards in the opposite direction, okay?”
He nodded, “Yeah, thanks for not killing me.”
“Ollie, I want nothing to do with killing people. I just want Sean dead, and it’s debatable he’s even human anymore.”
Ollie nodded back at me, and started walking past Abby. Abby and I made eye contact and we booked it towards the area where Gilbert had the snowmobile. I dropped the empty Beretta in the road and we were gone like ghosts.
Gilbert got us back to the truck and we hightailed it the fuck out of town. Roads were shitty again but we’ve beaten them into submission the past few days. I was really angry over how it went down, but Gilbert said it was perfect. He had the feeling that Tera bitch was one of Sean’s people, and that dropping her actually helped us.
We got back an hour ago. I’m exhausted. Gilbert is up with Patty taking the first shift of the watch. If we’re going to get hit, it’ll be in a few hours. If we don’t get hit, then my bet is Ollie passed the message along to the people over there who wanted to hear it, and we’ve started to sow the seeds of rebellion in Westfield.
Brick by brick Sean. Brick by brick.
-Adrian
February 14th
It’s Valentine’s Day. Surprise surprise…. breakfast in bed for the girls didn’t happen earlier. I thought it’d be nice to get up early and make them something, but I wound up taking the late shift for watch last night and by the time I made my way back to Hall E they were already up and about. I caught a grade A tongue lashing from Patty this morning after Abby bragged to her about being such a central part of the ambush. The idea of her 17 year old daughter holding a grown man at gunpoint definitely did not soothe her already ragged feelings. She’s pretty sensitive at the moment. I told her risks were inevitable, and that I was sorry to put Abby in that situation.
That was a lie. I wasn’t sorry about it all. I was happy that we all made it out in one piece to be honest. Whether or not Patty is ready to admit yet or not, Abby is a soldier now, just the same as her. It’s the reality of this. It’s not like I’ve got other adults to bring along for my overly frequent and violent endeavors.
So with breakfast in bed as a sweet gift shot to hell, I decided to scour campus this morning looking for something cool I could give the girls. Sadly I’m not really the romantic type. I can pull off sweet every now and then, but I usually wind up going with the proven stuff like chocolates and flowers. I’ve spent too much time being not sweet to turn on that part of my personality easily. Sadly, there is a shortage of chocolate lately, and all the florists appear to be dead. Improvise, adapt, and overcome.
I went to the girl’s dorm rooms and went through everything I could find. I needed to find something that said, “I really appreciate you, and am thankful for all that you do for me.” I didn’t want to send the wrong message and have to beat one of the girls off with a stick if they thought I was coming onto them.
After searching around, I found nothing. However, when I swung by the cafeteria to grab some more food for the dorm, I had one of those eureka moments. At lunchtime Patty was on watch, Abby was sleeping on the couch, and Gilbert had gone home. I made lunch. I found one of those canned hams in the food stash, as well as some pineapple rings and some raisins. I carefully cut the ham into half inch thick slices, then carved the ham slices into the shape of a heart with a giant arrow going through it. About as artistic as a jello jiggler. I cobbled together a pretty sweet glaze to go along with it.
I made some boxed mashed potatoes that didn’t require milk as well as a can of carrots and a can of corn. I ran over, got Patty, and woke Abby up. The girls were suitably impressed by my meager culinary skills. I felt bad when they both cried, but I think it was a good cry. I’m kinda shitty at figuring out the difference between the two. When I see a woman I care about crying all I want to do is go to her and help make everything all right. Sometimes that just cocks it all up though. Shrug. I do the best I can.
Gilbert re
turned to campus right after the girls finished eating. He could smell the ham in the kitchen and smacked the hell out of me for not making enough for him. I got a good laugh out of that. I think he might’ve been genuinely pissed though lol. It did smell pretty fantastic for a canned ham.
Once we were all gathered in Hall E and the women had eaten their fill we went over the plan. Gilbert is now fully convinced that yesterday’s largely failed ambush was a blessing in disguise. Once we’d gone over everything and he had time to think about it, he was sure it was a successful breaking of the ice. He said that the lack of attack on us spoke volumes. Either Ollie had covered for us and said nothing to Sean, or Ollie had taken our story to the other powers that be, and they had decided an attack on us wasn’t the best idea.
One way or the other, I am heading back to Westfield tomorrow to listen in on the radio. If they want to make contact with me, they will. We’ve got one more egress into the town we haven’t used yet, so there’s still some hope we can get close if they’ve burned our previous two ways in. Gilbert made some more spiked boards on 2x4s this afternoon as well that we are going to put in the road when I leave tomorrow. If they blow out some tires five miles from here that’s a lot better than 500 yards from here.
Gilbert is thinking we give them three chances to communicate with us via radio, or basically six days. He’s betting we hear from them tomorrow when I go there. He said, “I’ve seen this before, and I bet you anything we’ve got them by the balls bub.” I can appreciate the voice of experience. I am scared of the voice of senility though.
Its funny, but I don’t think I’ve seen any emotion out of Gilbert over the STIG thing. I would’ve thought when the place blew he’d cry over Brian dying, but he hasn’t. I think that says a lot about how much he actually cared about them. I mean, I know he cared, but he couldn’t have been that close to Brian otherwise I’d suspect he’d be showing it more. That or he went home to bawl his old ass off.
Midnight (Adrian's Undead Diary) Page 31
