Dead 09: Spring

by T. W. Brown

  True to her word, the doctor kept her group back as the five weeping, laughing, hugging individuals a few feet away reveled in each other’s company. At last, she gave a nod to the others and stepped forward.

  “I really do hate to be the wet blanket,” Miriam spoke in a tone loud enough and with a certain degree of sharpness to get everybody’s attention, “but we must be going. There is little doubt that blast will bring a lot of the undead in the area to investigate.”

  “We?” Aleah spun on the doctor. She recognized the woman as one of the people who had tended to her and drawn blood. That instantly classified her as an enemy. “I think you have done enough.”

  “Aleah,” Kevin leaned in close and whispered in the angry woman’s ear, “this one rescued me. She is not part of the bad guys. I will fill you in on the road, but these people are okay.”

  Just that quickly, the bubble of happiness seemed to deflate. The reunion was over, and now it was back to the task of survival.

  “I think we all have a lot to explain,” Aleah said, this time her gaze directed at Catie.

  “Are we really going to do this now?” Rose muttered.

  “No,” Aleah said with a shake of her head, “you’re right. I think I am just a bit overwhelmed. Sorry.”

  “So,” Kevin turned to face Miriam, Adam, and her band, “perhaps now is a good time to introduce ourselves.”

  “Let’s do it while we walk,” Adam said with a wave towards the door. “Barney, you and Shauna take point, get out about a hundred yards ahead.” Two members of the group started to exit, but Adam grabbed them by the shoulder to get them to hold up a moment. He turned back to Kevin. “Which way did you say we are headed?”

  ***

  The rest of the afternoon proved blessedly uneventful. As promised, everybody was introduced as they moved north using the elevated train tracks as suggested by Catie to get them all the way to Interstate 90. Along the way, they passed through several neighborhoods. The devastation was on a scale that Kevin had not yet witnessed; and by the looks of it, the undead were only a small fraction of the problem.

  They passed houses with graffiti scrawled on every exterior surface with cryptic messages, open threats, and gang tags. Large areas were simply burned to the ground. All along the way, Adam would send a pair of his people every so often to scout into the surrounding neighborhoods for any signs of supplies. Each time, they came back empty handed.

  “I can’t believe it,” Kevin eventually whispered.

  He had always figured that the zombie apocalypse would be able to wipe out humanity. However, from his vantage point, it looks like the zombies really were not the problem.

  “Yeah,” Dr. Miriam Reno was walking beside Kevin and Aleah, “this place was a real war zone when things went south. The military evacuated two days after martial law was declared because they were outgunned. I was actually trying to go north and to Chicago Memorial when I and the group I was travelling with were stopped by a convoy of Army vehicles heading south. In fact, it was maybe just around here.” She looked out toward where Interstate 90 could be seen in the east. “They said that gangs had taken the Southside and that all military as well as community services such as police and fire were being pulled out. Of course, by then, there wasn’t much left of those support services.”

  “I just don’t understand,” Aleah said with a sigh.

  “Simple,” Rose piped up. “If there ain’t nobody to enforce the rules, then there ain’t any. I don’t want to come out and make a guess, but I am going to bet that none of y’all ever been on welfare…stood in line for ten hours at a free clinic, or been sitting in your living room when the power gets shut off ‘cause you are five months behind on the bill.”

  “But why destroy everything?” Aleah asked.

  “Lots of reasons.”

  “Such as?” Dr. Reno cast a curious look at the young girl who seemed suddenly to be wise beyond her years.

  “Pissed off at the system that left you to die a slow death of poverty…pissed off at the police who give you a hard time just because they can…or just plain pissed off,” Rose answered with a shrug of her shoulders. “You all lived what were probably normal lives…didn’t have to be rich, but you wasn’t poor or you wouldn’t be asking these questions. It is hard not to be mad when your country worries more about starving kids in a country most of y’all can’t probably find on a map than you do about the ones in Chicago, Philly, or Atlanta. And it ain’t even gots to be about race, I had lots of broke ass white friends, Mexicans, Asians. Poor is probably the only thing in this country that really wasn’t racist. Poor loves everybody…at least that was what my mama used to say.”

  The group continued on in relative silence for the rest of the afternoon. By the time darkness was stretching the shadows, the scouts had returned with a good location to stay for the night.

  The group climbed down from the El tracks and waded into the neighborhood. The scouts pulled up in front of a mostly intact tan building.

  “Mama Tu’s Korner Store?” somebody quipped.

  “Don’t knock it,” one of the scouts said over her shoulder, “whoever was here last did a damn fine job of barricading the upstairs apartment.”

  The group climbed in through the busted out front window, glass crunching underfoot. None of them paid any notice to the small cluster of rotting corpses just inside.

  The narrow stairs were a real challenge as they were strewn with broken furniture, shelving, and even the bumper of a car. All of it was laced with barbed wire to make it just a bit more treacherous.

  “So why are we doing this?” Heather complained as she carefully plucked the hem of her jeans free from where they had gotten snagged.

  “Because it would be nice to sleep through the night without having to deal with any nosy zombies,” the scout, Heather thought his name was David Semmet, called from the doorway. “Besides, wait until you get up here.”

  First of Kevin’s group, Heather was at last out of the obstacle-laden stairwell. She walked into the small studio apartment and gave an appreciative nod. Still, her eyes could not help but fixate on the corpse curled up in the fetal position under the small coffee table.

  She walked over to take a closer look and was puzzled. The room had boxes of canned goods, cases of water, and a rack full of assorted rifles with metal cases of ammo underneath, each clearly marked as to their caliber.

  One by one, the rest of the group made it to the room. Soon, everybody was standing in silence, staring down at the corpse on the floor. There were no signs of a bite, or any sort of external injury.

  “What the hell?” Catie finally breathed, nudging the corpse with the toe of her boot.

  “Diabetic,” Dr. Miriam Reno announced, elbowing through the crowd. She held a ragged cardboard box in one hand, a hypodermic kit still in its plastic seal in the other. “The poor guy ran out of insulin. He probably went into shock after some very painful hours of sickness, and then into a coma.”

  “Jesus,” Adam said with a shake of his head.

  “Are we just going to leave him there?” Heather knelt by the figure, casting a glance over her shoulders at the others.

  “S’matter, sweetheart, does he give you the creeps?” David Semmet guffawed.

  Heather popped to her feet and spun on the young man who was not that much older than she. “I got news for you, you little toy soldier, I have done more and seen more since this popped off than you better hope you ever witness. A dead body does not bother me…but it would be an act of decency to at least wrap this poor man up in a sheet instead of leaving him here, stuck to the floor in his own putrid filth. You got a problem with that?”

  “Nope.” David took a step back and raised his hands in surrender. “None at all.”

  A moment later, Rose appeared with a blue plaid sheet in her hands. Together, the pair actually managed to mostly straighten out the body and then wrap it in the clean linen. The entire time, Kevin sat back and tried to get a bead on hi
s new companions.

  There was Dr. Miriam Reno; she had been the first voice he heard after coming out of his medically induced coma. She claimed that the uprising in the compound was really just a minority. Kevin could believe that. In his experience, the fewest people could often ruin things for the majority.

  Adam Scott. Kevin almost laughed every time he thought of the guy. Seriously, he was like a bad 80s action movie hero come to life with his long blond hair, blue eyes, and laid back attitude. Still, there was an alertness in the man’s eyes. Even when he was smiling, you felt like he was studying everything around him. He wondered what the man had done before the zombie apocalypse.

  David Semmet was about Heather’s age and carried himself as if those guns on his hips and the one over his shoulder made him invincible. He wore a Marine-style crew cut that only showed off the odd shape of his head and the three rolls that looked like sausages on the back of his neck. His brown eyes were a bit dull and Kevin did not care for the young man.

  Shauna Galin was a mystery to Kevin. She seldom spoke except in the line of duty. Her hair was a dirty blond that was almost sandy…but not quite; which only added to her generic looks. Still, she had eyes similar to Adam in that they missed nothing.

  Barney Gresham looked like a news anchor with his clean appearance and obscenely well-kept hair. Kevin had no idea how the guy pulled it off a year plus into the end of civilization, but this guy never looked ruffled. His dark hair had a tinge of gray that highlighted his steel blue eyes. His voice was deep and at just over six feet tall, he had an athletic body that moved with grace. That last bit was something Kevin had really noticed when they had made their way up that cursed stairwell.

  Selma Maxwell was the generic soccer mom…except for all the firepower she was packing. Also, he’d seen her peel off more than once to take down a few zombies. She was a no nonsense sort who showed little reaction as she walked up and drove the long spike she kept dangling from her belt into the heads of zombies.

  Cherish Brandini. The only thing that Kevin could think of was that sort of woman who married a rich guy, joined the local country club, and then talked nasty about every woman not in hearing range. She would look you right in the eyes and smile, but it never reached past her curled lips. There were definite signs of medical upkeep in her face as well as the unnatural breasts that she still seemed inclined to try and keep on display.

  Bill Sten was an honest to goodness former pro wrestler. He had never hit the majors as a big name, but he had been a good fall guy for a few of the bigger personalities. Kevin knew they had to be big names mostly because he recognized them when he heard them and had never once watched one single match. Bill was balding, but his dark, curly hair was thick enough to hide that fact unless it got wet.

  Jose Reyes and Manuel Rodriguez pretty much kept to themselves since they could only speak very limited English. Neither men were much taller than five feet. Jose was almost as wide as he was tall, and Manuel was as skinny as his friend was round.

  Jane Mendel was tall, leggy, curvy in all the right places, but had suffered a terrible and disfiguring face wound that had left her with what looked like a permanent scowl. Still, her dark eyes made up for it with a sparkle. She was also the one that could translate for Jose and Manuel.

  Last was Jill Smythe. She had been a coffee shop singer and still carried her guitar. Kevin was not surprised when they had settled in and she opened her pack that she was carrying what looked like a hundred sets of strings. She had straight red hair that hung around her oval face and brought out the abundance of freckles. Her eyes were a hazel that bordered on green and her skin was the classic ivory. As soon as she spoke, Kevin heard that Irish lilt.

  Jill had come from a long line of police officers. When she had decided to leave the force and pursue music, her dad had been furious. When she had come out of the closet at Christmas by bringing her new girlfriend…that had been it. Jill had a lot of sadness in her heart, and it came out in her music.

  Kevin settled in with Aleah, Heather, Catie, and Rose as Jane went to the roof for first watch and everybody else fell into whatever spot on the floor they were standing. It was almost no time before the sounds of snores varying in pitch and volume resonated through the room.

  It took a while, but eventually, everybody got caught up on what had happened to each other in the past several days. Once that was done, it was Catie who spoke up.

  “I don’t know if any of the children survived that mob, but if they did, the most likely place to find them would be the hospital we had been approaching when all hell broke loose.” She looked at Rose and took a deep breath before continuing. “I’m not necessarily inclined to go after them. That place looked well defended. If they took the kids in, I doubt they did so to cause them any harm. It would not have made sense for any of them to venture out of their stronghold if they did not intend to help.”

  “You want to just leave them?” Rose started to stand up, but Kevin put a hand on her shoulder to keep her down.

  “Let’s hold a second, Catie,” Kevin said with a shake of his head. “I don’t get you. First it is one thing…then another. I don’t help, I help too much. Now, if I am hearing you correctly, you want to just abandon however many of the children that managed to survive?”

  “You are not hearing me,” Catie hissed, glancing around the room to see if they were being eavesdropped on by the others. Any of them could be pretending to sleep, but at least it did not look like they were the focus of anybody’s attention. “That hospital looked well set up. And the people that came out did so to help. And they did so against the wishes of some of their cohabitants. I think they have as good of a shot at survival as any of us. Better, since they won’t be out on the road where anything can happen.”

  “And what about Deanna?” Rose challenged. “You think she has it good? Did you see what Sean did?”

  “If we see any signs of them, we will do our best to try to find her, but this is a big, wide world. If I learned anything this past week, it is that you can’t just wish for something and have it happen. In case you have not been paying attention…they ain’t runnin’ Amber Alerts anymore. Those two could be anyplace. And after this long…our chances of finding them are slim to none. It sucks, but it is reality.”

  Catie suddenly found something interesting on her fingertips and began rubbing her thumb across them. Kevin had watched her during that last statement, and he was now certain there was something else she was not sharing with the group. He would ask her later when they were alone.

  The group sat in silence for several minutes. Rose opened her mouth at least a dozen times, but closed it each time with a frown or a scowl. At last she simply flopped onto her back and shut her eyes.

  “We still thinking South Dakota?” Heather finally asked.

  Kevin thought it over. This plan had been made several years ago. He had done his research like he did with anything else. He had based his plan on population density. South Dakota was ideal in that it had almost nobody living there when compared to other states. Hell, it had less population than some of the major cities.

  He felt certain now that there were no promises when it came to the undead. They were congealing into mobs that numbered in the hundreds…thousands…millions. They never slept and could show up anyplace.

  “I don’t know.” Kevin felt his mouth curl at the mental taste of those words. It was not something that he was accustomed.

  “What?” Catie’s head popped up. “But I thought…” Her voice trailed off and she slumped over. After a deep breath, she brought her head up and looked the others in the eyes; she explained about her real reason for joining them. She spilled her history to these people that she had kept herself apart from to a degree this entire time.

  When she finished, she told them that she would accept any choice they made, and she would stay with them until they reached that destination. However, she could not promise that she would not eventually feel the need to go and se
e for herself.

  When she finished, she found that she felt a lot better. It wasn’t that she had been burdened by her desire to go home and see if anything remained; it was more that she had used that as a divider between herself and the others in some way. They were serving her means, and thus, they had been like any tool that you would wield.

  “South Dakota sounds like as good of a place as any,” Kevin finally said. He looked around their group; one by one he received a nod. Rose was the last one. She didn’t so much nod as shrug her shoulders.

  “Looks like we continue on with our plan as scheduled.”

  11

  No Mercy

  I hustled down the narrow alley and came to a halt at the corner. Giving a low whistle, I listened and smiled big when the worst owl hoot in the world came in response. A few seconds later, a huge dark blob that could only be BP emerged from behind the husk of some unidentifiable vehicle.

  My team all came up on my heels. I gave them a nod and pointed to where BP was emerging with Gable. Not for the first time, I offered up a silent prayer that each of us make it back alive and well. I knew that I would feel solely responsible for any casualty that we suffered.

  I had picked each one of these people. Granted, they could have refused, but I’d known in my heart that they wouldn’t. That was part of the reason I’d selected each one. Besides Darla, I had cherry-picked the people that my gut told me were right for this mission. Yes, it was supposed to be a rescue, but it was also going to be a take-no-prisoners assault.

  The first choice had been that guy who had been eyeballing me from across the room when I’d stepped back to ascertain my potential resources. His name was Andy Magillicuddy. He was a little taller than me; maybe six-foot-three. I guessed his weight to be around two fifty, and it was all solid. Andy was a Ranger poster boy; square jaw, his reddish hair in a high and tight haircut despite the apocalypse, and a single scar in the middle of his chin for added character.