“Caleb, why are you such a fool?” She turned to look out the window, not noticing that he was sweating. Am I going insane? Caleb wondered. I’ll just drive and not try to think, he decided, watching the monotonous mile after mile of scrub brush and pine trees that lined the sides of the road, cautiously passing the occasional wrecked car and truck, willing himself not to look too closely.
The pines began to spread apart, and the ground leveled out, allowing the view to exceed thirty feet from the road. The view now was in the dozens of miles as Caleb began to appreciate the view that included low mountains ahead of him to the north. The fields to the left and right were soon devoid of almost any green when he saw the bridge ahead that appeared to cross over nothing. He slowed to get a view and decided to stop when he saw there was a small river or large creek that was so far cut into the ground that it made it impossible to see the water or bushes and small trees that lined both sides of the banks where it crossed the flat landscape. Time to stretch the legs and drain the hose. He looked over at Gloria who was sleeping heavily and decided against waking her. I deserve a little more peace and quiet, let her sleep.
Slipping down the side of the riverbank, Caleb flashed back to growing up in Texas. He was enjoying the cool air and shade under the bridge. He tossed a couple rocks into the water, as thoughts of home began to grow even stronger, in less than two days he could be back home. The thought was enough to reinvigorate him. He began to climb up the bank to the road, his attitude the best it’d been in weeks. Soon I’ll see mom and dad, there’s no way they’d let the infected mess with them out on the farm.
He made it to the truck and was about to get in when he remembered why he’d stopped and went to the left rear tire and was unzipping when he noticed in the distance a small dot coming from the north. As he finished his business the dot grew. He climbed into the truck cab, slamming the door behind him.
“Hey Grits, we have company coming. Get down behind the wheel ready to move, or shoot. I’m going on the side of the road to distract whoever that is coming.” Caleb grabbed his carbine and climbed down and went over to the passenger side of the truck and waited, wishing he had a real scope on his M4.
The dot changed into a truck as it neared Caleb. It was an old farm truck showing its age, the body heavily scratched and dented, yet free of rust. The driver’s window was open, the driver’s elbow sticking out as he slowed down. He looked like he was on the shy side of seventy. “I sure hope you didn’t stop to drink the water. My cows piss and crap in that water.”
“No sir, I just stopped to stretch my legs. This area reminds me of my daddy’s farm back in Texas. That’s where we’re heading now.” Caleb realized his mistake as soon as the words left his lips.
“Hi, I’m Gloria, my friends call me Grits.” Gloria gave a big smile to the old man as she sat up behind the driver’s wheel.
“Girl raised in the South, huh? My Mary was a Grits too. Buried her last year, she caught a bug and refused to go to the hospital and then when we did it was too late. I told her she died of her own stubbornness. So where are you all heading?”
“I’m heading back to Texas to find my family, sir.” Caleb answered feeling at ease with the old man.
“Well, if you’re going through Winslow, I suggest you go quick and quiet-like. There’s a bunch a dickweeds decided to make the place home. They mess the place up during the day, then lock themselves up at night as soon as the sun goes down. It’s like shift change, and then the walking dead come out until sunup and disappear back inside the buildings. They make a great team. Have about a dozen folks from town living out on my ranch now. I was going to head down to the city and see if I could find some bullets and shotgun shells. We got plenty of guns, just running on empty.” Gloria looked over at Caleb and he just nodded in agreement.
“Sir, why don’t you follow me to the back of my truck, I might be able to help out a little.” The old man got out of the truck and for the first time they saw the giant six-shooter he’d had on his lap. Pushing the door up, Caleb asked, “What calibers do you need sir?”
“First of all, how about you call me Saul?” He looked up into the back of the truck and whistled when he saw the amount and variety of weapons and ammunition. “I guess when you get back to Texas you’re going to clean house huh? I could use a couple boxes of .45ACP for my old six-shooter here, and some 12 gauge double ought buck. My friend hunts with an old .30-30 Winchester. Old man Sanchez has a 12 gauge too, as well as a .30 ought 6. The young guys have AR15s so they could use 5.56, and a lot of the guys have 9 mils.”
“I think I can take care of that for you Saul.” Caleb dug through the cases removing the different boxes of ammunition, making a few small piles, until he made it to the cases of 5.56, he reached into the cases next to them and pulled out boxes of .223 Remington instead, and then added to the pile. “Here you are, everything you asked for and what you didn’t. Your friends AR15s might not be chambered for 5.56 so I gave you .223, it’ll work the same and not blow up anyone’s rifle.”
Gloria grabbed one of the boxes while Caleb adjusted the load. “I’ll grab one Saul, if you want to grab the other.” She gave him a playful bump with her hip as she walked by him, bringing a smile to his face. He quickly grabbed the other box and followed watching her. She exaggerated her movements as she bent over the side of the truck to place the box in the bed of the truck. Part of the bed was already filled with bushel baskets of assorted fruits and vegetables. “It looks like you’ve been busy, Saul. Can I steal a peach?”
“Please take anything you want. I have so much that’s going to go to waste if I can’t give it away or can it.” He gently dropped his box of ammunition into the truck bed. He adjusted the tarp to expose all the produce, as well as two crates covered in orange stickers.”
“Is that what I think it is, Saul?” Caleb asked when he walked up from behind, noticing the orange hazard stickers.
“My neighbor, God rest his soul, had a construction company. I borrowed some C4 to get rid of a problem in town.”
“What’s your plan for that?” Gloria asked between bites.
“When it gets dark, I’m going to throw the explosives outside the building they took over. That should bring in the walking dead to finish the job for us.”
“Sir, I think I have an idea that will work out for you. Tell me where they are and then show me how to set the explosives. I can just walk right up to the building and leave them their little surprise.” Caleb bit into a sugar snap pea, enjoying the taste of something fresh for a change.
“That’d be the same as suicide, besides it’s not your fight.”
“Saul, that’s everyone’s fight. I’d gladly risk my life to kill scum, especially after everything I’ve seen and been through.” Both men looked at Gloria in surprise; her intensity had her physically shaking. She slapped the truck bed and retreated behind the moving truck where they could both hear her sobbing. Both men looked at the other, Caleb gave a look of resignation, ready to comfort her when the old man spoke.
“That would be a mistake, let her have her cry, and her dignity. I’m old enough to know that I don’t know much about women, I do know better than to interrupt that particular woman at this time. Let her just get it out of her system.
“Okay, now you’re going to tell us where the bad guys are and how to set the explosives. We’ll set them up to go off early in the night so the Zs can have plenty of time to get into the building and eat the bastards!” Gloria exclaimed, turning the corner of the truck. There was no clue she had been upset earlier and looked like a fighter ready to get into the ring
Gloria’s fierce determination surprised Saul, but he figured better to humor her then to upset her. He reached into the open case and pulled out a brick about twelve inches long and four inches wide. “This is the C4 I picked up. I’m not an expert but I know this’ll make a damn big hole in the wall of the building they’re in. My plan is to blast out the walls on three sides of the building, and then
throw an old boom box up on the roof. There’s a house across the street we plan to shoot off fireworks from to draw in as many of the walking dead as possible. Then when it gets light we’ll go in and clean up any that survive.”
“Saul, even with a truck, that’s a tall order. The Z’s will swarm your truck and then you’re screwed, what type of idiot would try to drive through a zombie apocalypse and think they’ll get by scott-free?” Gloria replied, losing the battle to sound calm.
“Bullshit, Grits! That’s a fine plan, I drove around thousands of infected on the first night of the apocalypse in my pickup, everything turned out good. That’s how I got my medal and promotion to lieutenant!” Saul raised an eyebrow at the information that was blurted out. Gloria immediately attacked his defense of Saul.
“Yeah, and look what happened to you, you became infected. Saul’s plan can work, it just needs me to deliver the explosives so that there’s no problems.” Saul was now openly confused and spoke up.
“How come you delivering the explosives is any different than me or one of my neighbors delivering them?”
“Saul, I have a secret.” She pulled down her sunglasses exposing her fully dilated retinas. Saul paled as he tried to back up only to be blocked by his truck. He fumbled for the heavy revolver in the front of his waist only to have Caleb grab it effortlessly from his hands.
“I guess we need to explain a few things before we meet your friends. I was just released from the Air Force because of my infection.” Caleb pulled down his sunglasses to expose his dilated retinas before continuing. “While Gloria might try to argue the opposite, I’m not homicidal, and I do have full control of my facilities. It’s just that we are infected and can be contagious, that’s why I was forced out of the service. And for your information, Grits, my driving around during the first night of the apocalypse had nothing to do with me getting infected. I scratched myself with a bone shard while I was trying to clean up my truck afterwards.” He turned to face Saul and handed him back the revolver, confident he could take it away again just as easily, if needed. “I can drive up or walk up to the building and leave the explosives. Hell, I could just walk straight up to them and look like the other infected, they don’t attack me or Grits since they can sense we’re infected also.” Saul weighed the revolver in his hands for a moment, before sticking it back in the front of his pants.
“Let’s be clear here. I’m not asking either of you to fight our fight for us. I’m also not turning down your offer of assistance either. Why don’t you follow me back to my home and at the very worst, my friends and I can cook you a decent meal that doesn’t come out of a box or needs to be rehydrated. We can eat and then talk over the plans with the rest of my friends. Now just get back in your truck as I turn around, home’s only a couple miles from here.”
“You sense anything from Saul? He seems a little scared and conflicted after we let him know about us.” Gloria said. She was happy with herself for trying to ‘read’ the old man.
“I think he’s a little shook up, but there’s enough trust there that he asked us back to his home. That’s not an offer that’s given lightly, especially these days.” Caleb answered while he increased speed to catch up with the old man. It was only a ten minute drive before they turned left off the road, driving over a cattle guard shaking the truck.
It was another mile before they saw Saul’s home. An old ranch style home painted white, with most of the paint missing, was surrounded by dozens of trees, with a huge stone and wood barn behind and four mobile homes parked haphazardly by the house. A couple of dozen armed men and women stood out front watching them pull up, while smaller children ran for the barn. Caleb could sense confusion and anxiety as the people handled their weapons but made no effort to appear threatening.
Saul’s truck was quickly surrounded by the small crowd, then a murmur of appreciation when he threw back the tarp covering the ammo in the truck bed. Almost everyone grabbed a box of ammo and began to load the weapons they had been carrying, mainly for show. Saul waved over to the truck for them to join him and his people. Caleb could sense they were no longer anxious and most were relaxed now that they once again had loaded weapons.
“Everyone, I’d like you to meet our benefactors, Gloria and Caleb. They’re on their way to Texas and are nice enough to share some of their ammo. They are both eager to help us with our problem in town, they’ve had similar experiences. Now, I don’t know about any of you but I’m hungry and these two young folks probably haven’t had a decent meal since the world went topsy-turvy. Juan, why don’t you grab a couple bottles and glasses and meet us over in the shade. George, grab your laptop with all the plans on it, you can describe our plan better than I can.” Saul walked over to the side of the house where a couple of picnic tables sat under the shade trees, a slight breeze helping create the perfect environment.
Caleb felt the tugging of homesickness as he compared the surroundings to his own dad’s farm, even the locals that were friends of Saul were similar. “It hard to believe what a world of crap it is out there when it’s so nice here and now.” Gloria said as she faced into the breeze.
George sat down opposite the pair and began to show a map of Winslow on his laptop, then changed to where the police department was. “The folks who are now running Winslow are mainly biker trash and crazies that love the power they now have. We’ve never been in a position to count them but think there are about forty of them. I’m pretty sure they have hostages also. They have a couple of pickups that they mounted machine guns on and it seems like they each have an automatic weapon and like to spray around bullets like they have an unlimited supply. Every day, they try to clear a little more of the town, but only the stores where they need or want something. They’ve made a dent in the liquor stores and grocery stores. They’ve stayed away from the big box stores. When night falls they get back to the police department with plenty of time to spare.”
“Here we go ladies and gentlemen.” Juan interrupted, dropping 2 big silver pails of ice loaded with long neck bottles of beer. Caleb reached in for one and watched Gloria grab hers and slam the neck against the pail, popping the cap off and catching it in the air with her other hand.
Saul took a swig of his beer and appeared like he was at a family gathering before looking back to George. “Please continue with your briefing, George.”
“When they see any locals they either shoot outright at them or try to capture them if they are female. A couple gals made a habit of letting themselves be seen, then run away like they are going into a house, only to duck around it. The others would then follow into the house and find the deaders waiting for them inside. They don’t fall for that anymore. Anyway, when night comes, they're quick to lock themselves in. That’s when we plan to blow them up and invite the deaders to have a meal. We just need to find the best way to deliver the explosives and live to tell about it.” George stopped to take a sip of beer.
“That’s where we come in. When they are making their way back to the cop shop for the night, Gloria and I will drive as close as we can, and then walk the rest of the way carrying the explosives. Have the explosives detonate about two or three hours after it gets dark, so we can have a good audience to watch the fireworks. That will also leave plenty of time for the Zs to go after any survivors before sunrise. When the sun comes up, everyone returns to town and take care of anyone that managed to get by the Zs.
“How do you plan to get by the deaders? They’ll bunch in too close to drive by, then they can smash car glass like nothing. We don’t need suicidal gestures, we need a real plan.” George stated, exasperated. Where did these idiots come from?
“I can fill in some squares for you, George. Before the Zs come out in full force, Caleb and I will drive to the south wall of the police station where there’s no windows and park nice and quiet. Then we’ll put the explosive on the front of the building and the back. After they go off that’ll attract the infected, then I’ll play music from my truck through its PA.
” Gloria removed her sunglasses, forced to squint from the brightness, even in the shade. “You see, Caleb and I are both infected so the infected will leave us alone. Our only danger is the norms, shooting at the truck to silence the speakers.”
George slipped trying to get off the picnic tables seat as quickly as he could, ending up on his back in the grass with his leg tangled with the table, looking up at Caleb, as he offered his hand. “Get the hell away from me, you damn freaks!” He shouted, falling free of the table and trying to crabwalk towards the house.
“What the hell is wrong with you, George? Caleb and Grits are not only my guests, they volunteered to help us, and you act like a virgin at a biker rally. Get out of my sight.” Saul was noticeably unhappy as he fought to keep his voice low. “Caleb, Grits, I apologize for my friend. When he realizes what an ass he was, I believe he’ll come by and do it himself, he is a good man. We still have a couple hours till it starts to get dark. Since it’s going to be a long night, I have a room you can catch a nap in.” Saul arose, not waiting to see if the pair were even following him as he headed for the house. He stopped and held open the screen door before continuing down the hallway, only stopping to point out the bathroom, before opening the door to the bedroom. The room was like a museum. The double bed covered in an old white lace bedspread, the walls covered in multi generations of pictures. “I’ll wake y’all in two hours, that bed’s nice and comfy. I have to warn you though, that the springs can be a little noisy, been a long time since the bed ‘sang’ for me.” He closed the door behind him as he made a quick exit.
“Well, here we are.” Caleb said jokingly that came out slightly nervous. Gloria just looked at him with a look that he could understand, fool. She softened here glare as she untied her shoes and laid down on top of the bed.
“Don’t even think of taking your pants off. Now come to bed you make me nervous when you just stand there like a puppy dog, waiting for me to give you an order.”
Infected World Trilogy (Books 1-3): They Only Come Out At Night Page 71
