Condemn (BUNKER 12 Book 2)

by Tanpepper, Saul

  "Listen, Eddie," Cheever said. "We need to move quick. There's too much cover here, and every minute we spend is another minute those things have to find us."

  Eddie walked back over to him. "We need to go back to that town."

  "Why?"

  Eddie pursed his lips. "Because we left a couple people behind there. They were scouting for supplies when we were attacked. We had to run."

  Captain Cheever's jaw tightened. "How many?"

  "Two men."

  "You left them overnight? I can almost guarantee they're dead. Or infected. We can't afford—"

  "Almost is a long way from a guarantee."

  Cheever pointed at the burning pyre. "Those things attacked you in town last night? They followed you there, didn't they? Your people are gone. You only put yourselves at further risk by going back. And you put my men at risk—"

  "Nobody's asking you or your men to do it, Captain. But I have a responsibility to my people just like you do to yours. We're going back."

  Cheever surveyed his men. "Private Ramsay," he called. "Singh! You two drive into town. Check in the shop for a couple people, two men. They were left there last night. Thorough search, but no dawdling."

  "The auto shop?" one of them asked. He looked troubled, his eyes flicking from the captain to Eddie. "They won't be alive, sir. Not overnight."

  "Did I ask for your opinion, Ramsay? Just find them."

  "And if they're alive, then what?"

  "Bring them back. Do I need to spell everything out to you?"

  Ramsay's face burned with anger.

  "Here, sir?" Private Singh asked. "Bring them here?"

  "Straight back to base, Vinnie. We're clearing this scene as soon as we get this tub dug out."

  "Yes, sir."

  "Well? What are you waiting for?"

  Cheever turned back to Eddie. "They're good men. They will find them, one way or another."

  Eddie swallowed his frustration. By telling his men to take Jonah and Danny back to the base, the captain had just made it impossible for him to refuse going there, too.

  "Is this the road?" Bix asked, glancing at the sign. "I don't remember what the reverend said the name was."

  Because you were too busy ingratiating yourself with Jennifer, Finn thought, then felt bad for thinking it, especially since his own mouth was watering at the thought of bacon and fresh eggs. Truth be told, though, he'd be just as happy with a can of congealed stew and the security of the dam.

  He suddenly felt homesick— oddly, not for his home before the Flense, but for the bunker. He missed his food storage room — his own private refuge — and now regretted that they hadn't thought to pack more of those supplies before busting out. Of course, they hadn't figured on it taking so long to get anywhere, or that it would be so hard to find stuff along the way.

  They had passed several houses and even a general store on the road, but the buildings had clearly been ransacked, leaving nothing to eat or of any use as a weapon against anything which might attack them.

  Some of the buildings had been burned down. One house, standing alone at the end of a long dusty driveway, had some dark brown spatter marks on the walls of the entryway, and the carpeting just inside the door was shredded into pieces. They left the place in a hurry, not bothering to search it.

  As a result, all they'd had to eat in the hours since leaving the gorge behind was some stale homemade granola bars Jennifer had made and a half dozen small apples that the couple had given them to tide them over until they met back up again.

  As bruised as the apples were, both boys had eaten them nearly to completion, nibbling away until nothing more remained than the seeds and the bottom, which Bix called the "fuzzy butt" in an attempt to gross Finn out enough that he'd give his part to him. Which he did not.

  It was the first fresh fruit they'd eaten in over three years, and it was almost too much for their stomachs to handle. Bix had twice needed to excuse himself. Thankfully, they'd reached a forest by then, which provided him with privacy, though not enough that Finn couldn't hear his groans of misery. He couldn't be sure if Bix was exaggerating them for comic effect.

  The cover also made him nervous, and he began to wish they were back out in the open again, despite the blistering sunlight. Bix kept emphasizing that they were safe now, since Adrian and Jennifer had cleared the area of Wraiths. Finn seriously doubted that two people could do such a big job as that on their own.

  "Well? Is this, or is this not, the right road?"

  "It is," Finn said. He looked around them nervously, half expecting to see something following them. "About a mile up the road, he said, we'll reach a gate. We wait there."

  "Finally. My feet are killing me."

  They walked along the semi-shaded path, kicking at the thick carpet of alder and birch leaves, thrilling at the novelty of it. There were also cottonwood and maple trees, though in lesser abundance.

  The surface of the road was visible only in spots, and had it not been for the overgrown signs and metal rails, they might have easily wandered off track.

  Birds happily chirped in the trees all around them. Leaves rustled in the breeze. A twig snapped.

  Finn stopped and turned to stare at the spot where the sound had come from. The road behind them was clear, as was the road ahead. But the woods seemed to have grown gloomier, hiding dangers that had not been there a moment before.

  Bix stepped closer to Finn's side. "What was that?"

  They both stared into the trees and waited. Something rustled, perhaps thirty or forty feet away.

  "I can't see—"

  Another twig snapped.

  Finn nudged Bix in the arm. "Go," he whispered. "Quietly."

  They began walking again, Finn's hand on Bix's back, Bix with a fistful of Finn's shirt.

  Suddenly, the forest around them was completely silent. The only sound was the rustle of the leaves beneath their feet. Their walk became a jog; the jog turned into a run.

  Something trampled through the bracken off to their right, keeping pace. To the left, birds exploded from the trees with their raucous cries, blackening the sky.

  They were separated now, Bix ahead by several feet, running at an all out sprint. Finn stumbled, slipped, and they switched positions. Behind them, to the left, something howled. Bix cursed. His face had gone white with terror. Off to their right, something else answered.

  "I can't . . . keep it up!" Bix cried, no longer bothering to be quiet.

  "Keep running!"

  "They're getting closer!"

  "Don't stop!"

  "And what do we do when we get to the gate and can't go any further?"

  Shit! Finn realized. He tried to think as he ran. What should they do? Should they turn around?

  They rounded a curve and a hint of a shape off to his right caught his eye, a shadow moving quickly, dark and low to the ground. Branches snapped. The noise grew louder. Whatever it was, it was getting closer.

  "There's something there!" Bix squeaked. "Finn! It's going to get us!" He was running awkwardly, trying to shed his backpack.

  Something shrieked behind them, raising the hair on Finn's neck. The creature was on the road.

  Bix flung the pack away, nearly knocking Finn down with it. "Shoot them!" he screamed.

  Finn's hands were full. In his right, he carried the rifle. In the left was his stun gun. He tried to aim the latter, but there was nothing to shoot it at.

  Don't pull the trigger until you see the whites of its eyes, the reverend had warned. You get only one chance to zap em.

  Finn had wanted to remind him that their eyes were black, not white, but he figured that was just being a little too literal.

  "Take this!" he shouted at Bix, and tried to pass him the stun gun. Bix reached out and grabbed it. For a split second, the weapon floated in mid air between them, then it simply fell away on its own. It slid into the leaves. Neither boy stopped to retrieve it.

  Finn tried to raise the rifle to eye level. The pack on
his back jounced up and down, throwing off his ability to aim.

  "There!" Bix cried, pointing to the right. Finn pulled the trigger and the air exploded with the blast of the shot.

  "You missed!"

  Of course I missed, you idiot! Finn wanted to shout back. How the hell am I supposed to aim when I'm running?

  The forest rang with laughter. Finn's blood froze in his veins.

  "Stop shooting, assholes!" rang out a man's voice. "Jesus Christ, don't be stupid!"

  Bix and Finn kept running. By the time their minds had parsed the words and what they meant, they'd reached the gate.

  "Don't touch the wire!" another voice warned.

  Finn pulled Bix back by the collar, and they slid to a stop. The electrified chain link rose up less than two feet away.

  "Billy, you okay?" came a shout from behind them. The boys spun around, but no one was there.

  Once again, laughter pealed through the trees off to their right.

  "Billy?"

  "I'm good, Luke!"

  "Boys!" Jennifer McCoy appeared on the other side of the gate astride her horse. "Quit scarin our guests, boys!"

  Bix and Finn scrambled to their feet. They were both shaking, gasping for air. Feet pounded the road behind them, and then a figure appeared around the bend, slowing to a walk. He wore dirty jeans and a long-sleeved shirt, and his long brown hair was tangled with leaves. In his hands was a military-style assault rifle. He'd slung Bix's discarded backpack over one shoulder.

  "You boys should be ashamed of yourselves!"

  "Aw, come on, mutha!" cried the second one, emerging out of the woods. He was even more disheveled than the first. "We were just havin fun."

  Finn and Bix stood gaping at the "boys." They weren't young at all. In fact, they looked to be in their thirties.

  Jennifer flipped a switch, then drew the wire gate to the side. "Well, y'all coulda gotten yer damn heads blasted off!" she snapped. She took the rifle from Finn.

  "I, uh, dropped the other one," Finn panted. "The stun gun. It's back there on the road somewhere."

  "You hear that, Luke? Go back and find it."

  "Aw!"

  "I don't want to hear another word! Billy, go with him." She turned to Finn and Bix. "They ain't the smartest tools in the shed, those boys. Coupla no good fools." She shrugged. "But they're family, and we take care of family, don't we?"

  Bix nodded. He'd forgotten to shut his mouth.

  "Good. Now, come on inside before y'all trip over those chins of yers."

  * * *

  "We arrived about twenty minutes ago," she explained, riding her horse beside them as they walked. "Wanted to get here before y'all to avoid the boys shooting first n'askin questions later. Shoulda known they was goin to try and scare ya." She shook her head. "Their mother shoulda whupped them more when they was growin up."

  "They're not yours?"

  Jennifer laughed. "Do I look old enough to have children that age?"

  Bix's face flushed bright red.

  They abruptly exited the woods and found themselves in a broad, flat clearing that had been disked up to prevent last season's grass seed from growing. Finn guessed that the deeply rutted ground would also slow anyone and anything that might try to cross it to get at the house, which was a massive, beautiful log cabin. It stood several hundred yards away on a short spit of land jutting out over a pristine lake.

  "Oh man," Bix murmured. "Please tell me there's a Jacuzzi inside."

  "There is, but it ain't workin."

  "The lake?"

  She shook her head.

  "What are the markers for?" Finn asked, pointing at the several dozen golf flags fluttering in the field to their left.

  "Land mines," Jennifer replied. She turned to Bix. "They're in the water, too, so no swimming."

  "Mines?"

  "It's a different world than the one y'all remember. Best get used to it."

  Later, long after they'd both enjoyed hot showers and a wonderful home-cooked meal of sliced smoked ham steaks and scrambled eggs and real potato hash browns — thankfully without the company of Billy and Luke — after they'd all gone to bed that night, Finn would recall that comment and wonder, How could anyone get used to it? The more he thought about it, the more he worried.

  The comment seemed to have been made offhand, a throwaway remark. But in the darkness and silence of the giant guest room in the giant house, as his ears longed for the sound of the old comforting turbines, it would feel more and more like a veiled threat than advice. And he'd drift off to sleep with her words echoing hollowly and ominously in his mind.

  Of course, the next morning the smell of cooking bacon would smack him in the nose and make him forget his trepidation.

  "Before we get you settled," Jennifer said, steering them away from the house, "we should take care of the horses. Y'all can help Adrian and the boys feed and water while I rustle us up some dinner."

  She shielded her eyes from the setting sun and peered out over the turned-up field in the direction of the dark trees and pointed at a new path, which they took.

  After a bit, they came to a large barn adjacent to a number of animal pens. The strong smell of manure wafted over to them. Bix took a deep breath, as if relishing it.

  Several smaller plots were marked out with string. They appeared to contain vegetables.

  "Just four of you living here?" Finn asked, incredulous at the amount of work that had clearly been done.

  "That's right," Jennifer said, chuckling. "We once had more, but life is tough and it sometimes takes the ones we love before their time. Wish it wasn't so, but it is. We take wanderers, too. They stay for a bit, but they always end up leavin sooner or later."

  They'd reached the barn by then and the whinny of several horses inside mingled with the mournful low of a cow and the agitated squawks of chickens. Jennifer lowered herself from the saddle and stepped over to the door.

  "Now, before we go in, I want y'all to remember what we said before about findin an end to the plague. That's always been our main objective."

  Finn nodded, but the hairs on his neck were starting to prickle again.

  She pulled the door open and led them in. It took a moment for their eyes to adjust.

  "What the—?" Bix said. "Jesus Christ!"

  A wire cage occupied the pen just to the left of the door, and inside were two naked figures. Dried blood covered their ashen skin, staining their chins. Their wrists and ankles were manacled to the floor.

  "Wraiths?" Finn cried.

  The creatures looked up and snarled. Then they launched themselves off the ground at the trio.

  It was Danny who first heard the motorcycles, confusing them for the sound of the bus returning. He was out of the room he and Jonah were searching, running down the stairs before Jonah could stop him.

  "Wait, Danny!"

  But Danny wasn't listening. He was shouting for the bus. He slammed through the front door just as the two bikers disappeared around the corner.

  Jonah grabbed his arm and drew him back up onto the porch with a hiss. "It's not them!"

  "It's people, though! And they might know something about the bus!"

  "Except they came into town from a different direction. Did you notice that?"

  "They did?"

  "Did you also notice the semi-automatic rifles?"

  Danny slowly shook his head.

  "Slung over their backs, and another in their saddlebags. We need to know who they are or at least their intentions before introducing ourselves to anyone that heavily armed."

  "So they have guns. That doesn't mean they're hostile. You saw what happened last night, Jonah. We should be carrying that kind of fire power, too. If we'd had guns, we wouldn't be trapped here now."

  You may be right," Jonah calmly answered, "but it doesn't mean we go running after the first uninfected people we see. Friendly or not, they're liable to shoot you dead before they realize you're not a Wraith."

  Danny winced, but he nodded.
"You're right."

  "Look," Jonah continued, "I hope as much as you do that they can help us, but let's be careful, okay? Even if they are good people and want to help, it doesn't mean we stop helping ourselves. Besides, the noise those motorbikes make is loud enough to draw whatever Wraiths in the area straight to them. I'd rather not walk into the middle of that scene."

  He pulled Danny back inside the house, where they had gathered the few useful items they'd managed to scrounge up in town since sunrise. It wasn't much— a couple kitchen knives, a cracked baseball bat, a rusted hatchet, a few cans of dog food, and some expired bottles of aspirin and veterinary antibiotics.

  There were a few more buildings that they hadn't yet searched, including the small brick bank on the corner, and the church opposite it. What they had seen so far convinced them that others had come through town before them with the same intention, probably many others at many different times. The pickings were slim indeed.

  Jonah began to fill his pack and instructed Danny do likewise. Keeping one of the kitchen knives out, he hoisted the heavy bundle onto his back. "Keep close. I want to find out as much about these guys as we can before we show ourselves. We'll circle around."

  They stepped back out onto the porch, making sure to keep in the shadows. "House-to-house," he said. "Try to stay out of sight. When we reach the corner—"

  "What if they didn't stop?" Danny suddenly asked, looking afraid. "What if they just kept on going? I don't hear the bikes anymore."

  Jonah didn't answer. He frowned and shrugged. He knew it was a possibility. If the men had left, then it would be all on him for keeping Danny from stopping them. But it didn't mean they'd been abandoned. He had faith the bus would return.

  Assuming anyone on it is still alive.

  They slipped down the steps, then sidled over to the corner of the house. Jonah checked around the corner, shook his head, and ran for the next. In this fashion, they made their way down the street, and when they reached the end of the block, Jonah held Danny back. "They're parked in front of the auto shop. No Wraiths in sight."

  Danny's eyes widened. "The shop? Seems like too much of a coincidence. Do you suppose they knew we were there?"