by TW Brown
“Excuse me?” Wanda asked.
“She has Down’s syndrome. Calling her retarded is…ignorant!”
Perhaps she had misjudged this one, Wanda thought. “Well whatever the case, she serves no purpose and will only be a drain on supplies. How you could allow your doctor and the architect of this little sanctuary to risk everything for a girl who will contribute nothing to the group in any productive way is beyond me.”
“What does that mean?” Shari stood up and brushed the snow from her hands.
“It means that we will not be keeping her,” Wanda said.
“You can’t—” Shari began, but Wanda cut her off.
“I can do whatever I like, little missy.”
“If it’s food, I’ll give her some of mine…if it’s something else, just tell me what I can do, but you can’t just throw her out or shoot her or whatever you plan on doing.”
Wanda glanced around at the group and sort of expected the same looks of outrage from the others. Instead, she was greeted by gaping mouths and looks of obvious astonishment. Now she really wanted to meet the person who had held this all together.
6
Staring into the Void
The plastic shin guard had split and caught the skin just below my kneecap in between the pieces. Somehow they had acted like scissors and cut deep into the flesh. I hadn’t been bitten! I guess I now knew what hysterics felt like, because I couldn’t stop laughing. The tears filled my eyes, and I really thought that I was going to pass out.
“Watch him, Nickie,” DeAngelo growled. “I’ve never seen anybody get delirious like this after being bit. I’ll take out these on this side. Yell if he loses consciousness.”
Nickie nodded in the affirmative, but I was still unable to say anything. God help me, I tried. I finally got enough control of my body that I was able to wave her over. She was really cautious.
“Go. Help. DeAngelo,” I managed each word between fits of maniacal giggling. Then I showed her my knee.
Now it was Nickie’s turn to act like a loony. She fell on top of me and hugged me. Her knee also caught me in the solar plexus and knocked the wind out of me. Oh well, at least I’d stopped laughing. It’s hard to laugh with no air. Anyways, she jumped off of me and took off after DeAngelo.
I was lying in the snow trying to get my wind when I heard the slow and steady crunch…drag…crunch…drag. I wiped my eyes and found myself looking up at a zombie child. She couldn’t be any older than six or seven. The poor thing had been torn open something terrible. Her entire torso was bullet ridden and she had a wound to the neck that looked like a knife had been plunged in and gone all the way through.
I tried to reach for a weapon only to find that I couldn’t really move. Having the wind knocked out of me had left me defenseless as a baby. I managed a croak when I tried to call for help.
Just that fast and all my hysterical joy was gone and replaced by fear and dread. I waited for the child to throw itself on me and start biting. I very briefly wondered how long it would take me to regain my breath, and would I be able to scream once I did.
I was overwhelmed with horror. That is why it took me a few seconds to realize that this child-zombie was just standing there staring at me. All it did was cock its head to one side and then the other like that certain way a dog has when you just know they are trying to figure something out.
I could feel my fingers twitch and I thought that I was going to start sobbing when that first teensy bit of oxygen made its way into my lungs. The entire time, the child-zombie simply continued to…study? That is the best way to describe it. I actually felt like it was trying to figure me out.
Once I was able to flex my hands, it was just a few seconds before I could move my entire arm. I kept my eyes glued on the little girl as I sat up very slowly. The only weapon I still had handy was an oversized pocket knife. I tried to move my hand for it, and that is when the situation changed in a hurry. Just that quick, it was just like any other zombie. It stumbled for me with arms outstretched. I heard it make a squeaky mewling sound as it tripped and stumbled in the snow. The only thing that saved me was that the snow was almost at its waist, her being so small and all.
Something whizzed past and the child toppled over backwards. She wasn’t even heavy enough to sink completely in the snow. The handle of a pretty fancy looking knife jutted up from her face. I looked up to see Nickie standing at the top of the berm with two more matching knives.
“My brother told me I should join the circus,” Nickie said. I stared back blankly because I really had no idea what she was talking about. She waved the other knives at me. “Throwing knives? Like when that guy has a girl hold a balloon or tied to a big spinning wheel?”
“Oh,” I said. Actually, that was kind of what I said. It came out as more of a croak. I was still a bit tender from having the wind knocked out of me.
“DeAngelo is right behind me, he went after two other zombies that tried to get away.”
“Excuse me?” I was positive that I did not hear her correctly.
“Well not really try and get away,” Nickie said with a frown. “It was like they just decided not to come after us.”
“Were they younger?”
“Who?” Nickie looked at me like I was still hysterical.
“The zombies!” I snapped a bit harsher than I intended. I got to my feet and started the rest of the way up the berm.
“I guess…” Nickie was backing up as I climbed like she thought that I was coming for her.
I had this stupid image in my head. I could see DeAngelo chasing down the two escapees, and just as he reached the woods, a bunch of the little bastards would jump out and attack him. My fear seemed even crazier when I reached the top and DeAngelo was already walking back across the snow.
“Nickie told me about your knee,” he said as he reached the berm. “Gotta say I’m relieved. Not just about you not being a zombie…but I didn’t want to be the one to break the news to the little woman.”
“So what was the deal with the two you chased?” I asked as casually as possible. I had no idea what exactly I thought I’d witnessed with that little girl zombie. The problem was that things just refused to sit right in my mind.
“Kinda strange,” DeAngelo said as we started back towards the cabin. “These two little ones hung back through the entire ordeal. I didn’t think anything of it. It was just weird that every single time that I looked their way, they hadn’t moved. I swear to God that it felt like they were studying me.”
He paused for a second. I couldn’t tell if he was trying to make sense of things in his own mind or what, but eventually he continued.
“When I started towards them, they both just turned and walked away. It wasn’t really like they were trying to escape, just that they had seen all they cared to see and were ready to leave.”
“So it seemed like they were studying you?” I asked.
“I guess,” DeAngelo shrugged. “To tell you the truth, I was a little busy dealing with the ones I had on the ground coming after me.”
“You two mind letting me in on what y’all are goin’ on about?” Nickie demanded.
“That zombie that you nailed with the throwing knife?” I shot a quick glance at DeAngelo. “Did you know that she threw blades like William Tell?”
“William Tell shot an apple,” Nickie huffed.
“Okay…she throws a knife like William Tell would if he wasn’t shooting a bow and arrow. I mean the girl is freakishly good,” I corrected.
“No idea,” DeAngelo shrugged.
“Anyways, that child-zombie was standing there for several minutes,” I explained. “She just stood there watching me and didn’t react at all until I went for a weapon.”
“Wait? What?” DeAngelo and Nickie said in unison.
“How long had it been there?” Nickie asked.
“Not sure,” I admitted. “I closed my eyes and when I opened them a few moments later, she was there. I heard her coming, but I couldn’
t do anything about it.”
“Why not?” Nickie asked.
Crap on toast, I absolutely did not want to melt her confidence this close after her last mini-meltdown. She’d been the saddest looking person I had ever seen; if I told her that she had inadvertently knocked the wind out of me and I’d been in danger of being eaten, she might shut down.
“I was just having trouble is all,” I explained, and quickly went on with my recounting of what had happened minus the whole part about having the wind knocked out of me.
“That’s weird,” DeAngelo said as we reached the stairs to the cabin.
“I can’t even begin to guess what the heck that is all about,” I said.
Just before we opened the door, Nickie grabbed our arms. “If what you are both saying is accurate, then maybe we keep our eyes open and snag one for Dr. Zahn. I bet she could run some tests and maybe tell us what the dickens is going on. That might pull her out of her funk.”
She had a good point.
***
The next few days were blessedly dull. The snow let up and it actually seemed to warm up a bit. Not enough to melt the snow in any visible amount, but enough so that everybody made a trip outside; even Dr. Zahn went out onto the porch for a while and sat on a stump that doubled as a stool and a even a card table on occasion.
That entire time, not a single zombie was sighted. The lookouts reported a few distant pinpoints of light that were likely camp fires, though I could not imagine being outside in this sort of weather for more than an hour or two, and that was with the knowledge that I could duck inside and get warmed by the raging fire in the massive hearth. Face it…as far as zombie apocalypse survival went…I was spoiled.
“Steve?” a voice whispered from right behind me as I was standing out on the porch watching Thalia, Emily, Rabia and Levent make a snow family.
“How’s things, Doc?” I said without taking my eyes off the children. They had decided to create a snowman to represent each of us and were building DeAngelo’s at the moment. They’d enlisted Fiona and Billy to help with the base. This snowman would easily be three or four times the size of all the others. That said a lot about how they saw this gentle giant of a man.
“Tell me everything you remember about that encounter.”
I didn’t need to ask which one. I’d already given her a narration at least a dozen times by now. What could she possibly gain from another re-telling of the story? Still, if it got her going and in any way contributed to getting her out of her funk, then I was obviously going to do what needed to be done.
I related all the details by rote as I had every time before. Periodically, she would ask a question or two. Sometimes she would ask the same questions with a few different words—once a doctor always a doctor, I guess.
When the interrogation was over, she went inside with her pencil tapping furiously on her notebook. I went back to watching the kids, the dog, and a pair of assistants building our snowclones. That is why I was outside when the distant growl of an engine broke the relative quiet. Actually, Buster heard it first and cocked her head to the side in the same way I’d seen that child-zombie do just a few days earlier.
When the Snowcat came through the natural canopy that framed the entrance road, I could tell that something was up. Jesus and Jake were both sitting on top of the cab waving their arms. It was a wave of greeting as opposed to the “grab the guns and be ready” wave. To their credit, I noticed that all the kids were frozen in their spots and watching the arrival of the cat.
I waited as patiently as possible for them to come up to the parking lot area. I actually had to chuckle when Thalia plowed through the snow to the driveway’s entrance and acted as a traffic cop, indicating where they could park. Meanwhile, I noticed that they had a huge load of supplies in the trailer…as well as five new faces.
“How’s the leg, Steve?” That was the first thing out of Jon’s mouth as he climbed out of the cabin and went around to the trailer and began untying the straps. Not, anything about the supplies or the people, I took that as a message.
“It is as good as can be expected.” I raised my eyebrows in the universal symbol for ‘What’s up?’ as I made my way to the cat, but he seemed satisfied with the answer and moved on.
“Where is the doctor?” Jake asked as he slid down from his perch and landed in the snow.
“Inside,” I replied. By now, the rest of the gang was making their way out onto the porch. I knew I would only have a few seconds before they made their way down and could hear normal voice tones. “So what’s the deal with these folks?” I kept my voice as low as I could.
“We found a small group.” Jake looked past me like he wanted to be sure that nobody else heard. “These were the ones we felt comfortable traveling with, but we left a dozen back at their camp.”
“Comfortable?” I asked. I didn’t like where this was headed. A look came across Jake’s face that I couldn’t read. Then Jesus came down beside Jake. I wasn’t close with the man, but I’d never seen him like this. He was pale, and if I didn’t know better, I would have sworn he was infected.
“Jon made us promise to keep our mouths shut, he said he wanted to talk to you,” Jesus said.
Jesus went to the cab of the cat and opened the door. The stench that poured out of that rectangular opening was almost enough to make me sick. The first person to be helped out had a face that looked like one of those people from the old concentration camp pictures. I seriously could not initially tell if the individual was male or female.
I don’t know how long I stared, but the person did not seem to notice. Even with the layers of clothing—all of which looked recently acquired—I could tell that this person was nothing but skin and bones. One by one, the others were helped out. They just huddled close and waited until each of them was out, then they followed Jake like ducklings would a mother.
By now, everybody had come at least part way, but at some point the children had run up to the house. I could see them, Thalia and Emily clinging to Melissa while Rabia and Levent each had a grip on DeAngelo. Even Buster had retreated and was in a crouch at the base of the stairs.
As Jake approached, everybody either backed up or moved to give them a wide berth. In a way, it was kind of embarrassing. Obviously these people were in dire straits, and here we were acting like they were the walking dead.
“We need to head back out right away.”
At some point, Jon had come up beside me. Jesus was still standing beside the Snowcat with a haunted and blank expression. I had to know what was going on. And going back out? I better have some answers first, because I was prepared to use my so-called position to veto any further activity until I had the whole story.
“What is going on?” I asked as I turned to face the man. Then I took a step back. Even Jon looked awful. Whatever it was, it had a man that showed no fear shaken to the core.
“Go up to the house and see,” Jon said. “I will give you the details, but you have to see first hand and hear their story. Then, if you can tell me not to go back out there…well…I guess we’ll see.”
Each of us grabbed a box of supplies and headed up to the cabin. As I approached, I noticed everybody had stopped short of entering. My entire group was out on the porch, crowded around the doorway or the windows.
“Make a hole!” I barked, causing them all to jump.
“Steve?” Melissa had a look that went way past concerned etched on her face.
“I have no idea,” I said with a shrug as I shouldered my way past everybody and entered the cabin.
The group of five had stopped right where Jake did and simply stood motionless while he peeled off their outer garments carefully like he was afraid he might injure one of them.
I had to do a double-take. The first one that I’d seen turned out to be a male. I could not put an age on him, but he was young enough to not have gone through puberty because his face was devoid of even a trace of fuzz. However, it was the left arm that I could not tear m
y eyes from. Rather, it was what remained of that left arm. It had been severed at just below the elbow and looked like it had been cauterized by shoving it in a campfire with the skin all black almost to the shoulder.
That was just the beginning. One by one each of them were stripped of their jacket and moved close to the fire. Each had the exact same injury. Everybody, that is, with the exception of what turned out to be a woman. Again, the malnutrition had made determining the age next to impossible.
Of all the members of the group, she was the only one without the missing lower left arm. However, there was something in her face that seemed far worse. It was just the expression, but she actually looked more damaged emotionally than the others.
“What is it?” Dr. Zahn grumbled as she came out of her office with Sunshine dragging her by the wrist. “I’ve got—”
Whatever else she was about to say died in her throat as she saw—and most likely smelled—the new arrivals. I was about to say something when I saw a flicker of the old doctor in the eyes of a woman who I had thought to be lost for good.
“Get these people into the back room. I want everything we can use put to the task of getting me as much hot water as possible. I want rags and I want the cleanest clothing we have as well as a minimum of three blankets for each.” Doctor Zahn was back.
The room was silent for a few seconds until she stepped into the middle of it and clapped her hands together once. “Now, people!” With that, it was like roaches in a room when the light came on; everybody took off in different directions. Some bumping into each other.
I caught Jon’s gaze and we both headed back out to the cat to get it unloaded. As we walked down the stairs, Jesus caught up.
“I can’t stay in there with those people right now,” he said.
“You can help us unload,” Jon offered. “But then we are going back.”
If it were at all possible, Jesus turned even paler. “I just don’t think—”
“Your job isn’t to think, soldier,” Jon barked, sounding very much like a Marine sergeant. “You will do as you’re told. Do you understand me?”
