At first count, he saw eleven infected heads in the parking lot. His goal was to end them before they could reach Charlie and before they could kill anyone else. He racked the slide on his shotgun and aimed at the nearest infected head. The sight of black gore spilling across the concrete was one that made Rafe’s stomach turn. He didn’t hesitate to continue his assault. His shotgun clicked empty and he slung it over his back quickly before pulling his hunting knife.
Rafe’s mind went blank and his body fell into a necessary survival mode. As required in his family, he had learned hand to hand combat early in his life. He had continued his training throughout his adult years, honing his body. Little did he realize, that all of that training would come in handy when he needed to kill the dead. These were the thoughts that came to Rafe’s mind as he ducked and pivoted away from the jagged fingers of an infected. Rising behind the attacking woman, Rafe used his knife and ended her dead life. He pulled his blade back and wiped it quickly on the infected’s clothing.
He turned to check on Charlie, who was still loading groceries into the back seat of the truck. He was startled to see an infected moving closer to her. Flipping his knife in his hand, he called Charlie’s name and told her to duck. She complied quickly, and he let the blade fly. Throwing knives was one of his favorite pastimes with his father. His sister Alex rebelled against Mitch’s lessons and Max soaked up every word to become a prepping machine. Rafe was more in the middle. He didn’t revel in fighting like Max did, though he honed his skills to ensure he wasn’t useless in a fight. The one thing he could always do with his father was knife throwing.
The blade had struck home, embedded through its left eye. Charlie stood on shaky legs and looked down at the infected that had fallen five feet from her. Rafe jogged over and yanked the blade free, causing the eyeball to pop out of the socket. He was shocked at the result, holding the knife slightly away from him, looking around to figure out how to fix it. Behind him, he could hear Charlie retching and he felt guilty for what she must be feeling. Finally figuring no other way, he used the shirt from the infected and carefully slid the eye off of his blade. It dropped to the ground with a quiet plop that Rafe only barely heard over Charlie’s throwing up.
Checking on Charlie was his first thought, but he realized that there were more infected streaming into the parking lot. He didn’t count the number he had taken down, but it was everything close to them for the moment. After being sure they had a few minutes before anything else threatened them, he turned back to Charlie and the cart. She immediately stepped back from him and Rafe assumed it was fear on her face. He just looked at her uncertainly.
“You are covered in....” She said, trailing off.
Rafe looked down and confirmed what Charlie was trying to say. His close combat with the infected had left gore on his clothing and boots. At first, his stomach wanted to follow Charlie’s example and let loose. Rafe swallowed down the sickness and helped throw the last items into the truck. He put an old towel on the driver’s seat, to try and keep the nasty substance out of his truck. As he started up the engine the infected were getting within the reach of the vehicle. A tall man smeared himself across the driver’s side window and Rafe just looked at him. A part of him was still waiting for this all to be a joke, a large flash mob. Suddenly everyone would be healthy, and the sickness would fade away. But as the infected chomped at his window, he knew this was just getting started.
CHAPTER NINE
Rafe’s sigh of relief was audible when they pulled through the compound gate and it shut solidly behind them. He pulled the truck up the driveway and parked. Neither of them got out immediately. Charlie laid her head back on the headrest, her eyes closed. Rafe just sat staring out of the windshield. He was having a hard time putting his thoughts into working order. His mind was at least understanding that what he had done wasn’t murder, but protection. Putting the infected down ended their mindless attacking and he saw that as a gesture of humanity.
“It was so stupid of me to go with you into town,” Charlie finally said.
“Why?”
“The thumbdrive. I have too much information. I don’t want to lead 'The Suit' or his men to the thumbdrive.”
“I think they probably have more pressing matters to deal with right now,” Rafe said.
“I hope you’re right,” Charlie said.
Getting out of the truck, they both acted as if they had run a marathon. Though tired, Rafe needed to handle the evening chores, especially with the animals. He trudged to the barn. Once there he stripped out of his shirt and left it in a burn barrel. For a moment he thought it was wasteful, but his tired mind answered he had plenty of shirts and he would wash the next one. There was a landline phone in the barn and he immediately picked it up, thinking of his sisters and starting Sundown. He didn’t feel surprised when he found the line to be completely dead. Somehow, he had expected the general utilities to keep running. But nothing was going as expected now.
He hurried through the milking, much to the annoyance of the ladies. But he allowed them to roam free in their pasture for the evening, something he rarely did. It was a pleasure for the cows and at that moment he didn’t have the energy to fight with them and keep them in the barn. He fed the pigs their mixture of milk, grain, and slop. They seemed to snort in pleasure as they dropped their faces into their dinner.
When he got to the chicken coop, he waited until the rooster was on the far side before dashing in. He dropped the feed for them quickly, attracting most of the chickens. With haste, he grabbed the eggs that had been laid throughout the day and ran for the gate. Escaping the chicken coop without an attack by the rooster was always a good day. Rafe had a hard time feeling good about it. Instead, he partially wished the rooster had gotten him good, to remind him he bled red. He stood watching the animals for so long, darkness fell, and he felt a chill.
“Rafe? Are you alright?” Charlie called from the barn. Her arms were full of packages of bacon they had taken from the store.
“Yes, I’m ok. Just thinking. What’s up?” Rafe replied.
“We ran out of fridge and freezer space inside. I guessed you wanted the rest out here?”
We, Rafe thought. They were a we now he supposed. He hadn’t meant to take on anyone at the compound. His sisters would arrive, sure. However, he hadn’t planned on taking responsibility for anyone else’s safety. It would seem he couldn’t turn Charlie away. It felt like so long ago that he had found her ran off the road and then her home broken into. The fear she was feeling at the time was nothing compared to what they faced now. Rafe couldn’t leave her to fend for herself, no matter how tough she seemed to act.
Together they stored the rest of the supplies in the large freezer and refrigerator he had in the barn. The dried goods they took to the root cellar to stay relatively cool and it was just good storage. While there, Rafe retrieved a jar of apple butter, deciding they needed a sweet treat after a day like today. They walked together back to the house. Rafe noticed the small looks Charlie threw in his direction and he finally had to ask her what the problem was.
“Do I have more black crap on me?” He said, turning to try and look at his back.
“Ah, no. Not at all. Well, your pants and boots are still filthy,” Charlie pointed out.
They were. In the mudroom, Rafe kicked off his boots and thought about spraying them down. He just couldn’t muster the energy and decided to handle it the next morning. He went straight to the bathroom where he took the hottest shower he could manage without blistering his skin. When he came out, he felt relatively normal and clean. He still stood in front of the mirror and turned around to make sure there was nothing on him.
After dressing in his room, he came to find Charlie sitting back on the couch with the news on. This time she was scouring national news. Rafe watched as she flipped and when she finally stopped he felt horrified to see that there were attacks happening in other cities.
“So finally, someone is reporting the truth
,” Charlie said.
“It would seem so. Where are they saying the attacks are?”
“This story is Florida. I’ve heard a number of different states though.”
“My sisters will see this. And then they will come,” Rafe said, his voice matter of fact.
“How will they get here from across the country?” Charlie asked, baffled.
“You don’t know my sisters,” Rafe said. And he genuinely laughed thinking about it. “If you think I’m extreme, living out here, the guns, the knives. You haven’t seen anything until you get the three of us together. Mitch Duncan’s finest recruits.”
“Your dad was serious.”
“Very. When it came to survival and the end of the world, it was no joking matter to him. My childhood was interesting, to say the least,” Rafe said. He lost himself in thoughts of Mitch and the lessons he taught.
Living a normal life wasn’t a possibility with Mitch Duncan. He remembered the time he was sure his father had completely lost himself. Rafe was a typical ten-year-old boy. He was interested in sports, playing with his friends, and the introduction of video games. None of those things were an option in his life because his dad didn’t see their benefit for their prepping lifestyle. Mitch had a one-track mind, only concerned with preparing his children for the worst. Rafe went along easily, but at times he just yearned for something normal. He started sneaking things into the house that he enjoyed, baseball cards, a football and comics. They were all items he could trade for at school with items he found at home. That was until Mitch found out.
At ten-years-old Rafe wasn’t naturally sneaky. When Mitch found the items hidden under his bed, Rafe wasn’t even sure how to lie about them. Instead, he told the truth. Mitch didn’t get angry like other fathers. He got quiet and contemplative. When he didn’t say anything, Rafe knew he was in for some sort of punishment. Mitch had left his room telling him to be prepared for a campout the next day.
“What about school?” Rafe had called after him as Mitch left the room. It had been a Tuesday.
“There’s nothing that school can teach you that I don’t teach here,” Mitch had said, stalking away.
That was just like Mitch. He didn’t believe in traditional school. If the truancy officer hadn’t shown up when he took them out of school too much, he would have pulled them completely. Rafe knew that Alex was especially thankful for being able to leave and go to school during the day. She had bright dreams of going to college. Where Max would have been happy to never step foot in another classroom if she could have prevented it. Rafe was right in the middle. He loved his home, the wildness of it. But he also wanted things that normal life had to offer.
Wednesday morning, Mitch woke Rafe an hour before his alarm was set to go off. He gave his son no time to get up and grab his bug out bag and follow outside. Rafe hastily pulled on the clothing he had set out the night before, a sturdy pair of hiking pants, thermal shirt with vest, and boots. He ran out the door to catch his father climbing into his truck. Rafe noted that there was no other equipment in the back of the truck. The missing things like a tent or food gave Rafe a nervous tremble in his stomach. His father rarely wasn’t prepared for whatever was to come. He clearly wasn’t concerned about shelter for his son.
An hour later, Mitch pulled off of the asphalt side road onto a dirt trail. When the trail came to a dead end, Mitch exited the vehicle without a word. Rafe knew that he was meant to follow. With his bug out bag, Rafe followed Mitch. While they walked, Rafe remembered a few years before when Mitch had left Alex out in the wilderness alone. She had come back injured and while it seemed like Mitch cared his daughter was hurt, he also believed he had taught her some important lessons. Alex still refused to drive alone with him anywhere, afraid he would just leave her again. Rafe was prepared if his father was going to repeat his form of punishment.
Instead, they came to a large pine tree. Mitch looked up at its branches for a few minutes before motioning to Rafe.
“Climb it. There’s a good v section up there that you can set up camp. You will stay there for two nights. You will not come down. I will know if you do. Do you understand me?”
Rafe had looked at him dumbfounded but had nodded anyway. His father was going to leave him, but unlike Alex, he told Rafe what he was doing. Also different, Rafe had to stay in a tree for two days before Mitch would retrieve him. Rafe had accepted his punishment and with his bug out gear on his back, he started to climb. He had always enjoyed climbing trees and being out in nature. Since they were little, he and Max used to camp away from home on their own. But they always had tents and were well prepared. Sleeping in a tree wasn’t his idea of safe.
Once Rafe had settled on the branch Mitch had instructed, his father disappeared back down the path. From his perch, he could hear the truck start and see the brake lights as he drove away. The world closed in around him, quiet and calm. Thinking, Rafe had known he would be in trouble if his father found his prized items. He took a few deep breaths and decided how he was going to handle the days. His father had no idea that he had hidden comics in his bug out bag, just in case. As well as a Hardy Boy’s book he was reading. He would keep himself occupied as necessary and stay in the tree as instructed.
“So, he just left you? In a tree?” Charlie asked, pulling Rafe back to the present.
“Yup. That was what he would do as punishment. Something to prove that the skills he was teaching us were more important than the things we wanted.”
“What did you do?” Charlie asked, her attention rapt on Rafe and his story.
“Well, I tied myself to the tree. I used a length of paracord that was made into a survival bracelet. My dad used to make those before they got big and commercialized. Anyhow, we all had something like that in our packs. So, I tied myself to the tree to sleep. My biggest fear was falling out and breaking my neck. At night I wrapped myself up in a sleeping bag and slept sitting up. It was uncomfortable, but I was fairly warm.”
“Of course. You were only ten-years-old. How did your father never have the police called on him?”
“Out here? No one knew what was really happening to us. I don’t know about my sisters, but I never talked about my crazy father to my friends. They never came over, because we lived so far from town. It was easy for no one to find out. And in my father’s mind, this wasn’t abuse. It was teaching.” Rafe said.
“Did you eat in the tree?”
“Yeah. I had MRE’s stored in my pack. So, I ate them cold, using the water I had also hauled up. I did start a small fire in a can after I ate the fruit from it, to warm my hands a bit. But I was really careful because a forest fire wouldn’t have helped me at that time,” Rafe explained.
“This all seems so crazy to me, but you talk about it like it was so normal. My family, well we were lucky if we took vacations together. And those were never camping. The closest we ever got was a hotel room that wasn’t a suite,” Charlie said.
“It wasn’t a vacation for us. It was just our lives. I didn’t know anything different. And though I saw my friends with normal parents, I did enjoy living out in all the open like we did. Like I do now.”
“So, you stayed in the tree for two days, two nights. What happened on the third day?”
“My dad showed up like promised. He always meant what he said and did what he promised. I had succeeded in living through the days and nights. I climbed down when allowed. He never praised us. But when I came down, he patted me on the shoulder in a way he rarely did. We got in the truck and came home. Life was back to normal after that, minus my hidden contraband.” Rafe said.
“Wow. I really have no other words. I guess you’re right. If your sisters are like you, they will have no trouble making it here. But then what?” Charlie asked.
“Then we survive. I’m not sure what’s going to happen to society. What the government is going to do. We are meant to be self-sustained here. That is what we always prepared for.”
“When your sisters come, I mean the hou
se will be pretty full I assume? I can move back to the cottage. It’s away from town, so I should be fairly safe from the sick,” Charlie said. When she spoke, she looked down at her hands, the subject making her uncomfortable.
“You trying to get away from me already,” Rafe said, a smirk on his face. The tone made Charlie look up with a retort, but she bit it back when she saw his smile.
“I don’t want to be an inconvenience.”
“You aren’t. You’ll pull your weight. You aren’t going back to that cottage. It’s completely unsecured. You’re safer here,” Rafe said. His tone left no room for arguments.
“What will your sisters think of some random woman living with you?”
“They will probably be more interested in the work you were doing that could have caused all of this. Maybe we should work on that after dinner?” Rafe suggested.
Charlie agreed, and the pair went into the kitchen to work on dinner. Rafe found it amusing that at every turn he was a surprise to her. When he put out the apple butter he had brought from the root cellar, she didn’t believe he had made it himself. He laughed harder when she tried it, claimed it was heaven and then called him a liar. They put together a dinner of cheeseburgers with all the fixings, canned pears, and Charlie’s favorite cookies. They ate mostly in silence. Rafe figured Charlie was horrified by the story he told her and wasn’t sure what to say to him now. He didn’t really blame her. In the regular world, leaving a child in a tree for two nights was considered child abuse. For him, it was a lesson in survival.
The dishes cleaned and put away, Charlie brought out her thumb drive. Rafe brought his laptop to the dining room table. Side by side they waited as the laptop recognized the new thumb drive. Charlie worked the computer, finding the specific files on the pathogen that was in the mouse that bit Tammy. The information that came up could have been in a different language to Rafe. However, Charlie read along, murmuring to herself, touching the screen at points to follow something specific. She then got very silent, her body going stiff.
Alive (Sundown Series Book 3) Page 9
