by D. J. Molles
Smith River, according to the map.
Harper leaned on the rusted railing, chin resting on his arms, looking out at the little city ahead of them. Beside him, Julia had her rifle up and was squinting through the scope. She’d been surveying the city for the last ten minutes. Taking it slow and steady. Every so often she would shift to another section of the city, and she would watch that for a minute or two. A cross section of what was going on in Eden, NC.
Harper rubbed his bearded chin against his arm to itch it, eyed his companion. “What’s it looking like?”
Julia pulled her head back from her rifle, eyes still looking out at the town. She had a look on her face: lips pursed off to one side, eyebrows slightly cinched, eyes closed down to little concentrated slits. She slid the rifle across the rail towards Harper. “Here. Take a look.”
He accepted the rifle, settled down over it and trained the scope.
A few minutes passed.
Julia picked at the peeling bluish-green paint of the water tower. It came off in big chunks, revealing dark, rusty metal underneath. The whole structure creaked and groaned every time the wind blew. Vibrated unnervingly beneath them like it might give way at any second. Who knew how old the damn thing was, or how long it had been since it was last inspected? But Harper supposed they constructed these things to last for quite a while.
Besides, there were bigger worries than structurally unsound water towers.
Harper lowered the rifle, glared at Eden as though it had betrayed him. “Shitfire,” he mumbled, then passed the rifle back.
“Hey! Harper! Julia!” A voice yelled up at them from below.
They both leaned over the edge and saw one of the team standing at the ladder, banging on it with his hands, sending little reverberations all the way up to them.
“What?” Harper snapped.
“You gotta get down here quick!”
Julia and Harper both swore in unison and clambered to their feet, brushing particles of rust and ancient paint from their legs. They swung quickly over the rail and onto the ladder. Harper made it a point not to look down. The ladder swayed under the weight of both bodies and Harper felt a little sick for a moment but he just kept working his way down—the faster he got his feet on the ground the better.
It took a minute to descend the tower, but his feet had only just hit the ground before he felt a hand grab his jacket. He whirled, about ready to start swinging, from pure irritation if not for self-defense, but found himself staring at a grin.
A fucking grin.
Not an expression you saw very often. The man who wore it waved excitedly.
Harper almost wanted to punch the teeth out. What could be so fucking amazing that this idiot was grinning? He worded it only slightly nicer: “What the fuck are you grinning about?”
“We’re getting transmissions on the radio!” he almost shouted. “From Camp Ryder!”
Harper looked at Julia. A moment’s hesitation passing between them, the cringing feeling of a pessimist—It’s gotta be a mistake. But then Julia ran for the Humvees, her eyes suddenly alight with a guarded excitement. So Harper followed her.
They ran up to the first Humvee, ripping open the door.
A sweet sound came pouring out of the vehicle. The static hiss of the radio, and the crackled sound of a transmitted voice nearly toppled Harper over right then and there. Nearly brought him to his knees. “Camp Ryder to LaRouche or Harper or anyone in their groups. Camp Ryder to LaRouche or Harper. Please answer.”
The man that had called them couldn’t seem to keep his feet from moving. “I didn’t know if you wanted me to answer or not! Should we answer? Should we answer it?”
Harper reached into the Humvee and snatched the handset, keying it before he’d even brought it to his mouth. Unbeknownst to him, he wore the same stupid grin across his face now, because he knew the voice on the other end of the line.
“Lee?” he almost shouted. “Is that you?”
***
Lee felt an astounding sense of relief, and couldn’t help but close his eyes and smile, the handset held against his head. “Yeah, it’s me, Harper.”
There was a crackle, then a barrage.
“Lee! We’ve been tryin’ to get a hold of you guys for the past three fuckin’ days! What the hell happened over there? Did you guys have some technical difficulties or something? Jesus…do you have Devon and Nate with you? We sent them your way to try to make contact when we couldn’t get anything via radio. Is everything alright?”
Lee looked down. He was seated on the edge of the desk in the Camp Ryder office, wearing only his filthy pants and boots. His body was prickled with gooseflesh in the cold room, but Angela was still working on cleaning and bandaging his side.
He keyed the mic. “It’s a long story, Harper. Devon and Nate are with me and they’re fine. I’ll explain everything to you soon, but there’s a lot going on right now. A lot we’re trying to coordinate. I need a sit-rep so we can figure out what the fuck we’re doing.”
There was a long, uncomfortable pause.
Crackle. “Lee…we’ve, uh…we’ve taken some losses. We’re down three—Gray got killed, and…” another long pause. The transmission clicked off. Came back a few seconds later. “And Torri and Mike, too. They got killed. And we sent Nate and Devon down there to check on you guys, so we’re pretty much a skeleton crew right now. We need people, Lee. Bad.”
Lee tapped the handset against his forehead, trying to ignore the pain of Angela threading a needle through his skin. He weighed his words carefully. There was a fine line between disseminating necessary information, and being a morale crusher. And it sounded like there wasn’t much left to Harper’s morale as it was. “Buddy, I’m sorry to hear that. We’ve all taken some losses over the last few days, okay? But we’re making it right. We’ll be sending Devon and Nate back up your way with reinforcements.” He almost added supplies but stopped himself. Because he didn’t have any supplies to give away. “What’s your location right now and can you hold it for the next forty-eight hours?”
“We’re, uh…just outside of Eden. I think we’re in an okay spot.”
“Can you hold it for forty-eight hours?”
“Yeah. I think so.”
“Have you had a chance to scout out Eden?”
“Just got done with that.”
“What’s it look like?”
“It’s not good, Lee. I think we might be a little late to the party on this one. The place is fucking swarming with ‘em. All on the east side of the river, though.”
Lee swore, then keyed up. “You got an estimate?”
“Lee, all I can tell you is that Jacob was right. He was one-hundred-percent fucking right.”
Lee grit his teeth. “Ball park it for me, Harper.”
“Several thousand. At least. And that’s just what we can see. Lee, they’re everywhere on the eastern side of the town. And I don’t know how long it’s gonna take them to cross over.”
“How many bridges?”
“Five road crossings and one railroad.”
Lee rubbed his beard nervously, looked over at Tomlin. He raised his eyebrows in question.
“We’re gonna need a lot of manpower to blow those bridges,” Tomlin said, thoughtfully. “And we’re gonna need them there quickly to get it before they start crossing into the western section of town. Plus we’re gonna need manpower to secure the demolition crews while they work. You back a couple trucks up onto those bridges, the infected are gonna hear it and come running. Then you have to fight and place charges at the same time?” Tomlin rubbed his eyes. “Crap shoot. Fucking crap shoot.”
Lee keyed the radio. “Harper, I want your honest, real-time, battlefield assessment. Do you think we can make a stand in Eden or do we need to pull back and focus somewhere else?”
Lee expected a long wait while Harper mulled the question over, perhaps talked it out with a few of his teammates. But instead, the radio clicked back almost the second Lee releas
ed his transmit button. Only it wasn’t Harper’s voice on the radio.
“Hey! Wilson to Camp Ryder! Can I get a word in here?”
Lee stared at the radio. “Wilson? Where the hell have you been?”
“I been trying to transmit, but ya’ll keep hoggin’ the air time.” There was a bit of hesitation in his voice. “Cap, I’m gonna come right out with it. I’m on the radio because LaRouche is MIA.”
Lee shook his head. “MIA? You mean MIA like he’s taking a shit? Or MIA as in you don’t know where the fuck he is?”
“Captain, I’m sorry, he disappeared last night.” A breath. “He, uh…well…I don’t know.”
Lee swore under his breath. Held the handset in front of him and looked at it. He closed his eyes and leaned forward, tapping the handset on his forehead. Missing? Did that mean that he wasn’t dead? Did he just get lost in the middle of the night? Did something snatch him and drag him away without anybody seeing? Maybe it was the way Wilson had said it, but Lee felt like there was more to it than that.
“Captain,” Wilson continued. “I think we might be able to help with the problem at Eden.”
Lee forced himself to focus. He opened his eyes and keyed the handset. “Okay, Wilson. Talk to me.”
“We’re at the Highway 51 bridge over Roanoke River,” Wilson said. “I got someone with me that you need to speak to.”
Lee’s head felt sullied. “Okay. Go ahead.”
There was a click, a rustle, then silence. Then another transmission.
A different voice. Middle-aged. Soft-spoken. Midwestern accent. “Is this Captain Harden?”
“It is.” Lee frowned. “Who am I speaking with?”
“This is Colonel J. F. Staley, 6th Marine Regiment,” the voice stated in its mellow tone. “Good to know we have some friends still alive out there, Captain.”
***
LaRouche was led blindfolded down a dirt road. That was all he could really tell of the place. He could still see just a small sliver of the world out of the bottom of his blindfold and he could see the hard-packed macadam of an old, unpaved road under his feet. He listened to the world around him and he could hear it bustling. There was the sound of trucks rumbling back and forth, the sound of people talking. Even the sound of goats and chickens—the smell of them too.
There were trees, he thought. Their dappled shade splashing across his vision every once in a while. Plus the scent of the woods—bark, rotting leaves, composted soil under decades of natural mulch. He knew the scent well. He’d spent plenty of time in the woods as a child.
He could feel the well-spoken man’s hand on his shoulder. During the drive over, LaRouche had not spoken a word, nor had his captors asked any questions. However, they did converse amongst themselves and LaRouche had discovered that the man who now walked with him, who sounded strangely like he had an Ivy League degree, went by Clyde.
Darren driving.
Clyde behind him, with a gun to the back of his neck.
Going to see Deacon Chalmers, whoever the fuck that was.
Do you want to die, or do you want to live? LaRouche had pondered the question ad nauseum and come up with no definitive answer. There were benefits to both. Downsides to both. It was almost as though he just didn’t care. Like he would rather someone else make the decision for him. He was tired of trying to control the uncontrollable. Maybe it was best to let go. Ride the river, instead of fighting the current.
Do you want to die, or do you want to live?
Maybe he wouldn’t even be given the choice. What a relief that would be. If Deacon Chalmers simply took his head off with a battle axe and was done with it. Or whatever the fuck these people did. He wasn’t sure. Of course, the concept of death made a cold little worm of fear wiggle its way through him. It was an unknown. It was a mystery.
So he simply walked along with them, compliant as he could possibly be. Save for the constant jockeying of that single question—to live or die—his mind was otherwise blank. Every once in a while he thought of Jim and Wilson and the rest of them. Even Camp Ryder sometimes. But mostly those felt like dreams. Like they’d never really happened.
He heard voices off to his left. They were women’s voices and they spoke quietly. The hush of them was what got his attention, the way their voices were riddled with fear. He turned his head and lifted it, trying to see through that narrow slot. He got a glimpse of a cage made of wood and rope and the impression that it was huge. Dozens of desperate faces crowded the bars. Women’s faces. Some of them were older, but many of them younger.
Clyde pushed his head down. “Keep your eyes on the ground.”
The hard-packed dirt turned into a narrow path. Dry, wintered grasses crowned either side of this little walkway. Not much more than a footpath. They slowed and LaRouche could see some wooden steps ahead of him. He navigated them, Clyde’s hand pushing him gently upwards. Then the hand grabbed his shoulder, halting him.
“Stop here,” Clyde instructed.
There was the sound of fabric being pulled back. Boots on wooden planks, slowly walking towards them. A voice, slightly rough around the edges, but undeniably kind. The inflections were warm, not hostile, as LaRouche had expected.
“Clyde. Who’s this?”
“Deacon Chalmers, sir.” Clyde’s voice was nervous. “We caught this man moving through the woods, just west of the bridge.”
“Hmm.”
LaRouche watched two old, worn-out motorcycle boots stop right in front of him.
“Let’s take the blindfold off, yeah?” Deacon Chalmers suggested.
“Yes, sir.”
LaRouche felt Clyde’s fingers working the knot at the back of his head, untying it. The blindfold fell away and LaRouche closed one eye against the daylight, squinting the other painfully. The light was harsh and painful and it reminded LaRouche that the toxins from a bottle of whiskey had not been completely removed from his system. He felt almost instantly nauseous.
“Whoa.” Deacon Chalmers faced him and laughed. He was a medium sized man, but one of those men who seems too big for his body, like the charisma for a much larger man was mistakenly given to him. He wore a beard, but well-trimmed. His hair pulled back into a short ponytail. “I thought I smelled bourbon when you came up, but the eyes don’t lie, do they?”
LaRouche supposed that meant that his were bloodshot, bleary, puffy. They felt that way.
“You hungover, son?”
LaRouche nodded slowly.
“I understand.” Deacon Chalmers leaned back away from LaRouche and took a long, hard look at him, crossing his arms over his chest. He wore a leather jacket and a black bandana around his neck with white printing on it that LaRouche suspected would be a skull if the image were flattened out.
Deacon Chalmers is a former biker, apparently.
“What’s your name, son?”
“Everyone calls me LaRouche.”
“Everyone?”
“My…” LaRouche was about to say friends, but he didn’t suppose that he had many of those left in the world now. “People.”
“Your people?”
“No. Just…people.”
“Do you not have any people, LaRouche?”
“No.”
“You have God, my friend.”
LaRouche didn’t respond. Wasn’t really sure how to. He wasn’t trying to be rebellious, or to prod at Deacon Chalmers. Frankly, he just didn’t have it in him at the moment for such things. In this particular case, he was just blank. He had no words.
“Kneel down, LaRouche. I’ll kneel with you.”
LaRouche considered it for a moment, then slowly lowered himself to one knee, then both. Deacon Chalmers followed suit so that the two men were on their knees, facing each other. Chalmers put a hand on his shoulder and gave him a look of pity, the look that any missionary might give a Stone Age savage.
“LaRouche, I’m going to have a very honest conversation with you.” He lowered one of his hands down to his side and when he raised i
t again it held a large, silver revolver. LaRouche watched it glide towards him and for some reason he felt very little. Some slight apprehension, but muted. Nothing like he should have felt.
Chalmers, one hand still resting grandfatherly on LaRouche’s shoulder, placed the revolver against LaRouche’s temple. “LaRouche, I do not know your background. I do not know your sins. Only God knows these things. And God is who I answer to. I cannot allow evil to be a part of my body, and so I cannot allow an evil person to enter my fold. However, I am obliged to offer every sinner a choice, just as it was once offered to me.”
Deacon Chalmers slipped his finger into the trigger.
LaRouche met his gaze, and he felt very calm.
Chalmers spoke calmly, earnestly: “Listen to my words, because I’ll only say them once. In exchange for your life, will you renounce this world and all of its evils? Will you repent for the sins you have committed against God? Will you commit yourself to the Lord, the one true God, and his Son Jesus Christ, the Almighty? And in so doing, will you serve with purity and sanctity, and with faithfulness and truthfulness? Will you promise to fight for the Lord your God, against all the wiles of Satan, and Satan’s people, and thereby extinguish evil from the world and return this country to a path of righteousness?”
LaRouche lowered his gaze, still blank on the inside. An empty vessel.
“Make your choice, LaRouche,” Deacon Chalmers said gently. “No one can decide for you. Will you repent, son? Will you make these promises?”
LaRouche took a deep breath. Like he was smelling the world for the last time. Tasting it. Soaking it in. Then he raised his eyes to meet Deacon Chalmers, and his voice was solid and steady.
“I will repent.”
CHAPTER 44: RATTLESNAKE
Lee sat in the office of the Camp Ryder building, surrounded by the people that he trusted the most. Tomlin, Angela, Marie, Old Man Hughes, Nate, and even Devon. There were others as well—people like Kristy Malone, and some of the others who had supported Bus and Lee from the beginning. A man from the group that had come with Jacob from Smithfield.
