Solo

by Dan Yaeger

  A sip from his tea-cup was all that was needed and he snapped back to his naturally mean spirit once more. A grimace and a wince were made as he tasted bitter dregs at the bottom of the cup. He carefully placed the fine-bone china cup back onto its saucer and regarded the airfield for a moment. The sound of an incoming helicopter was welcomed and took one stress off his mind.

  The helicopter came in, blowing a gale of dust all around. Junkies from all around scrambled to receive the aircraft. Small trees bowed in the down-draft and the whining of the jet engine was audible and vibrating through his little office and his little world. The chopper was back; Price and Sirocco with it. “Good.”, Dr Penfould thought. He instinctively tipped his tea-cup which was met with a sudden mental trigger of immediate disappointment as his lips remained dry. “Samantha, is there more tea?” The question was self-indulgent, a veiled order. The timber panelled door was thick and a barely audible reply could be heard but not made out.

  “Yes, yes, the same will be fine my darling,” he gazed outward some more. The door yielded a gentle three-beat knock before it was opened evenly, not too slow nor belligerent. He smiled again, with satisfaction, and nodded unwittingly at the subordination of his people at the Rock. Dr Penfould was very particular and had a temper; the entrant knew this all too well. The picture of a trophy wife entered the room. A lovely floral dress, mid-heels with well painted nails, manicured hands, hair up in a bun, pearls sat low around her lightly freckled neck. Smiling with a very good attempt at real pleasure, she came through the door.

  Sam walked carefully with a replacement tea setting. He watched her every move and curve and being and almost salivated like a fat frog anticipating the meal of a fly. The scene was so terribly wrong. A lovely, well-dressed lady entered the room with a silver tea service- with a dog collar, high and tight around her neck. Similarly wrong was the smirking, snaggle-toothed, butch lady of over six feet in height holding the leash tightly. The Doc and his facility were no ordinary place. People wished for ordinary and could only hope for ordinary once more. Dr Penfould paid the dog-handler no heed and looked up at his servant with a slight smile “Did you bring me a surprise as well?” he asked with a false innocence. Her mind raced, she hadn’t brought him anything extra and this was another of his childish indulgences that she would have to manage or pay dearly for. “Why are you looking so nervous? You have a gift for me don’t you?” His false nicety turned to a cold, sinister and questioning look. Sam thought quickly; a survivor but infected and dependent. “Why yes I do have a gift- a gift for the most handsome of men.” She said with her very good, false smile and a bit of sass that only a truly lovely woman has. She moved forward, putting down the tea setting on the table, in front of Dr Penfould. He watched her like a child looks at a bowl of ice cream. “I have this,” she bent forward to kiss him and the leash stopped her in her tracks. The Doc closed his eyes and the moment of excitement was ruined as he was left hanging there. “Let her go Maeve! Its fine-its fine,” he waved the jailer away, eagerly wanting a kiss from a woman of Sam’s calibre. It was the sort of kiss that he never got before the Great Change but now he was powerful, now he would exploit his position and self-entitlement. He would get his kiss.

  Sam bent down, without a tense leash but tensions nonetheless, and kissed Kian’s fat, dry lips. For her, she could have been kissing a camel, for Kian, he was indulged with a kiss so tender and lovely; he had never had that even from his own mother. “Well that was a nice surprise wasn’t it?” Kian said with his awkward schoolboy laugh to accompany the sort of snotty school-boy prefect sentiment he made. Sam gave a forced but acceptable smile and Kian returned the smile with a genuine one of his own “You and the ladies can have double rations tonight,” he picked up his pipe and re-ignited it with a vintage lighter that had been acquired by the junkies in Squad 1. It made his mind recall the past and that team for a moment. Doctor Penfould loved the work of Squad 1; made up of a mechanic, a former prisoner, a career thief and an awful skin and bones girl who had been a waitress. They were the best at finding things. They had suffered loss with the former prisoner being killed by zombies but he was nothing special so he backfilled with what Kian termed an “unproductive hen”. She was unproductive for many reasons but her lack of affection for him sealed her fate; outside with the ghouls and goblins of the squads. But she had proved helpful out there as a part of Squad 1. In fact, Squad 1 had found his most prized possessions: Sam, Angela, his pistol, lighter and the trail of what appeared to be an immune survivor near Tantangara. He needed that survivor; that person’s existence gave people hope and bought the Doctor more time. Time to rule and time to be indulged, like never before.

  Squad 1 had brought in Angela, an Italian nurse who had run off. She was in reserve until he was done with Sam. Sam was his and Angela was being groomed as the next in line; both off limits to the other men. Penfould hadn’t bedded Angela, his Roman fantasy, but decided he would in the next couple of weeks. He may even kill Sam himself in some dressed up witch-trial to make a point to others. In his role as gentry, he figured like Henry the Eighth, that he would have one wife at a time. “Anything else,” he thought, “would be uncivilised.”

  He loved Squad 1, troglodytes that they were, and missed them and their work. As for his concubine and the other women there, he hated them for what they were and how people like them had treated him his whole life. But now he was in control and they would be used and punished. He breathed out a skein of smoke which dissipated as did this quick thought for Squad 1; the lost squad.

  His moment of thought was gone and he was back to being the lord and master. “Maeve, make sure they get some nice beef tonight and some formula for the little ones.” He puffed with satisfaction. “I can’t have the next generation of thrall and servant being bred to be weaklings.” He said both ridiculously and frankly. “Yes mate,” she said in her awful, low-class yobbo rasp. He couldn’t help himself and had to brag about his cattle. “Being a landowner is difficult with such poor help. But I must say, my squads can probably claim the best beef in New South Wales because it is more than likely the only beef produced in our fair state!” Neither Maeve nor Sam reacted quickly enough for his liking. Sam tried to keep up with a fake smile and a quiet acknowledgement “You are a real wit, Doctor.” She delivered a good recovery. He then felt that he needed to reassert his lordly status and ownership over things “It is pretty good and I am proud of my produce.” He said to no-one in particular but both women made rumblings in the affirmative.

  “Will you join me for supper?” Kian directed the question at Sam with his bulging, double-lidded eyes. She knew what “supper” meant and she could never forget the nights of being physically revolted and mentally scarred when she had “supper” with the not-so-good Doctor. The very thought made Sam want to wretch but she was being relied upon by others. Her behaviour meant life or death and she loved her sisters-in-suffering enough to endure another night of that corpulent toad’s “affection”. It was all in the hope that change would happen. Sam hoped that she would be free to choose who she kissed again one day. “If it pleases you, doctor,” she continued with that false smile and a rehearsed approach that she knew appealed to his sensibilities and penchant for lordly etiquette and manners. “Well it does now doesn’t it? I will certainly be pleased in the morning!” he slapped his thigh as though he were a hunter in the Raffles, enjoying a Singapore Sling and cigars with British gentry. “Isn’t that right Maeve?!” he continued his boorish behaviour. “Yes Doc, you’ll be ear to ear with a grin won’t ya?” She said as politely as she could, despite the roughest of upbringings and the frankly inappropriate question. “Indeed I will,” Kian smirked and puffed on the pipe. “OK. Pour my tea then and away with you both. I have things to take care of.” He waved at them like an 18th century British royal might “shoo” the great unwashed or a corgi. Sam carefully poured his tea while she felt his unwanted stares and attentions. Every movement was taken in by those revolting eyes and every par
t of her felt dirty. “Please don’t say anything else or touch me-please don’t-please don’t.” Sam thought, internalising her feelings while keeping the desired, demure and poised deportment Dr Penfould had become accustomed to and demanded. It was done and he was sipping his tea again.

  Just as Sam was about to turn in the expected way and depart, Sirocco and Price appeared in the doorway. With a quick knock, they entered. “Doc, you ready?” The bald, former cage-fighter asked. And with that interruption and in some over-the-top expression of his masculinity, Kian pulled Sam onto his lap. Maeve made a split-second decision to let go of the leash so as not to spoil the doctor’s theatrics. “Fuckin’ bitch deserves a good choke…Next time”. Maeve thought, stepping back and leaning up against the wall like a soldier “at ease”, although she wasn’t.

  “Welcome back to the Rock, gentlemen.” He said with an art-imitating life, almost Hollywood villain’s persona. He continued his childish charade: “Can’t you see I am busy?” Penfould snapped at first. “This one won’t leave me alone”, he gestured at Sam who smiled at her captor, and then at the two men who had entered the room. Sirocco smiled back and she blushed. He didn’t care for, or about, Penfould and their relationship was what it was; about survival. He turned a blind-eye to the antics of the Doc, what he normally would have acted on. Sirocco had put beatings on guys like Penfould his entire life but now he was working for one. He shook his head involuntarily.

  The Doc looked left and right at the two real alpha males of the Rock. He was looking for recognition and wasn’t getting any. Price was of a similar mind-set to Siro, but accustomed to inept and pretentious people leading him. His long-standing service in the Army as a chopper pilot had taught him to hold his tongue with the toffs that held a higher station than him. With that, he had held the highest station of all; flying multi-milTiger dollar aircraft on missions where he was in charge in the air and it was up to him to succeed. He was OK with that; following orders and doing what he was asked and bound to do while getting what he wanted. He had it good for someone infected by Divine; food, women, care, a chopper and a mission, he always needed a mission.

  Price walked into the room, his tall hulking physique had almost completely occupied any space the doorway had to offer. “Doctor Penfould,” he said coolly and in a matter-of-fact way. He almost saluted and then did, knowing the Doc would love it. The Doc saluted in response, cocking his head to one-side; he did love it.

  “Any sign of my squad?” Penfould asked Price eagerly. “Which one?” Sirocco replied, interrupting his friend’s opportunity to respond. Penfould ignored the rude and insolent question, with a glare, and waited for Price’s response.

  “No,” the big pilot said, “no signs at all”. He tapped his fingers on the teak. “The must have run off. That cow that went with them-the one who wasn’t producing: what was her name?” Penfould asked. “Number 33,” Maeve answered like she was reporting to a general. He smiled at his jailer; a dehumanising response to someone who had jilted him and it made him feel better. “She didn’t deserve a name, that right,” he said aloud. Maeve smiled at him with her awful teeth and trap-jaw. “Oh, please don’t,” he waved her away with his hand and made no effort to regard her for a moment longer. She stopped grinning.

  Penfould declared: “Yes, she didn’t deserve a name, just a slut really. I think they ran off, 2 men and 2 women. Without their daily doses, they will turn in a matter of a fortnight I should think. They were loaded with drugs too, most of them would have accelerated their condition.“

  There was a pause and everyone watched the Doc smoke his pipe and sip tea without offering hospitality to anyone else. Sam sat there on his lap, awkwardly, holding much of her own weight, as the Doctor had told her on many occasions. It was an awkward moment, made more awkward when his inner monologue seemed to come out. “She was a pretty one, hated me, but no good if she can’t produce or put out. Good riddance to the lot of them I say!”

  The whole room felt Penfould cover them with an awful blanket of negativity. Everyone in the room had lost a friend in that squad, except Penfould. Like before the Great Change, he had nobody, by his own making. Price had a relationship of sorts with the skinny waitress. He felt bad about her loss and missed what little comfort they found together. The Rock’s best mechanic was amongst the missing squad; he and Price were mates. Even Maeve felt something. She had had the occasional “encounter” with that mechanic; warmed her bed and, while momentarily, filled the deep void in her soul. Sirocco’s best Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) student at the Rock, Tommy, was a fallen brother to him.

  Penfould enjoyed looking into their faces and seeing the hurt: he fed off it. Sam shivered and he felt it. His fat clumsy hand rubbed her back clumsily, knowing it would make her feel worse, violated and provoked. He wanted a reaction and none of them gave in to him, least of all Sam. Sam looked saddened at the loss of her friend but dared not cry. She looked at the ground for a moment as Penfould waited for a reaction with a smirk on his face.

  Sirocco noticed her catch his eye; a quavering lip told him to look away or else expose her to more of the Doc’s unwanted attention. He could have made her cry but he didn’t want that, none of them were as sick as Penfould. But somehow, they all marched to the beat of the Doc’s drum.

  Just as he smirked, still looking at their faces, in that pregnant pause. His face dropped, with just one thought of regret. He wished he could smell the hair of the pretty “one that got away” and make her do his bidding, dirty stuff that he would make her do. “Yes,” he thought to himself. His face returned to a smirk for a moment before snapping back to reality.

  “Yes, they can rot and die like the rest,” he laughed, self-assuredly. He had no idea of the squad’s true fate and gave up; the search and running them into the ground. Not finding their trail, the lack of attention and care, would have a profound effect on his little empire in Cooleman. Another awkward moment ensued.

  Price lifted everyone’s spirits, except Penfould. “We have indeed found someone though,” The entire room looked to Price with full attention, breaking through the negative malaise the Doc had created. “The survivor we thought was up there? You what? Was it the zone where Squad 1 was searching under my orders?” Price’s nod meant this was indeed an interesting development. Penfould sat up from his lazy, slumped position and paid attention. “This could change everything,” he thought.

  Women had no place in Penfould’s business, men’s business. He pushed Sam off his lap and gestured, more shooing, for Maeve and his slave to get out. “Out, out- now!” Penfould raged at them. There was an awkward, pregnant pause as the two women got out of there as quick as they could, to leave the men to their business. The Doc was great at creating these moments which embarrassed, dehumanised and made people feel worthless. He continued his approach on those remaining.

  “Shut the door will you?” Penfould sounded angry rather than happy as perhaps he should have been. “Yes, we found someone up-“, Price continued, his ruddy complexion now going red with stress and more than a little anger. “Were you raised in a barn?” Penfould asked rudely. “For god’s sake, close the door properly and sit down“.

  Price moved first, shutting the door and crossing in front of Sirocco who leant up against a book-case with his arms folded. Pulling his army flight-suit up at the thighs, he landed heavily in one of Penfould’s sitting chairs with a characteristic “argh…” of a man that had bad knees and too much weight to carry. “If you are wasting my time like the last few times, I will-I will-“, Kian himself was cut-off, this time it was Sirocco. “You will what?” Sirocco flicked his head upward in a challenge. The tension in the room was murderous. “Might I remind you that you need me and you will do my work, when I ask and as I ask if you ever want to be cured.” Dr Penfould looked intimidated and a little scared of a man who commanded a physical presence few men have. His hand began to reach to a drawer next to him where he had a pistol, just in case. “Whatever, dog.” Sirocco restrained himse
lf and things cooled. Sirocco needed this; he was hanging onto survival and an uncertain future. Prior to the Great Change, Siro had been at the clinic in Cooleman, rehabilitating a blown-out knee prior to the Great Change. He had been hiding out from his fans and competitors and doing some altitude training in the Australian Alps and had been healed. He had been in the medical centre when he was cured and saw the Rock as a place of healing and renewal. He needed the Doc and the Rock to deliver again; a cure. Price was also reminded why he needed to get back in his proverbial box and he had, sitting down. That movement of sitting at the doctor’s table was a gesture of acknowledgement and compliance. Penfould’s fat lips pursed with satisfaction and he waited for the same compliance from Sirocco. They locked eyes and then Sirocco also moved to sit. The strong, hardened fighter crossed the room like a Jaguar and sat carefully, never taking his cold eyes off Penfould. “Right, now we have cleared things up,” the well-dressed Eurasian sipped from his teacup pompously. “Who is it you have found, why aren’t they here and under what circumstances did you find them in?” he sat back in his chair, pursed lips and looking for any hole in their discovery to get one up on them. All was to change and Penfould knew it and nor could he control it. That’s what scared him; he had been enjoying his little game and it looked as though it would end or have its rules changed.