The Undead Chronicles (Vol. 2): Darker Days

by O'Brian, Patrick J.

  “Let’s just hope it has gas,” she said, putting them in the ignition and getting the truck to turn over.

  Two of the Marines found a small green car that functioned, so those two took the car, leaving Metzger, his brother, Molly, and the Marine leader in the truck.

  Navigating the roads and highways proved a cinch once they were away from the border crossing, and Molly read and reread the instructions about how to meet the liaison once they reached St. Catharines. She expressed concerns that they might not fit the bill regarding what this person expected, so Metzger and Molly volunteered to pose as a couple, leaving the military men a safe distance behind them until the trap was sprung.

  Oddly enough, the instructions ordered them to drive through a number of residential areas along mostly urban roads on their way to the rendezvous point. Molly pointed to an area of the map the Marines had found with a concerned look on her face.

  “General Motors of Canada Company,” Metzger read aloud. “Hell, that’s probably where they would’ve detonated one of those trucks.”

  “It is,” Bryce confirmed. “We’d better hope that shit isn’t lingering in the air, or we’ll all be breathing it.”

  “Why have us meet someone so close to a target site?” Molly questioned.

  “Could your instructions be a trick?” the Marine leader inquired.

  “I doubt it. They weren’t easy to find, and they would’ve just hidden them instead of putting dummy copies in their place.”

  “This is dangerous, sending them in without backup,” the Marine warned.

  “They volunteered,” Bryce reminded him. “We won’t be far behind.”

  Molly continued to study the instructions.

  “Unfortunately, you may not be able to get too close without giving away your position,” she stated. “This place has two buildings several blocks removed from any other structures.”

  Metzger stole a glance at the magnified, more detailed map attached to the instructions. They were heading to a dead-end street near a canal, and at the edge of a business district. He wasn’t sure what purpose the two buildings served before the apocalypse, but it stood to reason that Nadeau’s people planned ahead and repurposed them before that fateful day. They stood in isolation, surrounded by lots of green that might have been a cornfield, a golf course, or some kind of large park, tucked away from the hubbub of the rest of the city.

  When the vehicles turned onto Glendale Avenue, Metzger knew they were drawing close to their destination. He leaned forward from the backseat, holding the map for his brother and the Marine to view.

  “Once we cross the bridge over the canal, they’ll probably hear us coming. Might I suggest Molly and I take the car the rest of the way and you guys go on foot to cover us?”

  Bryce contemplated the plan momentarily, and the Marine remained silent, deferring to the designated leader of their mission.

  “It’s our best chance,” Bryce decided, but you’ll have to give us reasonable time to find cover and watch your backs.”

  Strangely enough, their turn was an unnamed road off Glendale Avenue, and until they drew closer and spotted a row of trees along the back of the property, no one spoke. They’d followed the instructions perfectly, and the wording even spoke of an unnamed road. The undead were present throughout the area leading to the road, but in the immediate vicinity, no zombies were visible.

  “They’ve kept this area clear,” Metzger reasoned aloud. “They are expecting guests.”

  “The question is whether you’re going to be the first guests they see, or are they going to shoot you on sight?” Bryce countered.

  “Only one way to find out,” Molly said, reaching for her door handle.

  She and Metzger exited the truck, fully prepared to swap vehicles. Metzger felt somewhat amazed that odors of death didn’t linger in the air like they often did in urban areas. Urine and fecal release accompanied death in any mammal, so in a concentrated area the smells became overwhelming, sometimes worse than standing in a landfill.

  At the moment, the group remained a few city blocks from the two buildings in question, but they had no idea of knowing whether they were detected, and if their plan might work.

  “The instructions say there’s a tree in the front yard with a bell on it,” Molly stated, still clutching the sheet of paper. “We ring it three times, and someone is supposed to greet us. No random person is going to know this, so I think we can pull it off.”

  “We don’t have much choice,” Bryce reasoned. “Take the car, miss the unmarked road on purpose, and turn around and go back. That should give us enough time to get in position and cover you while we scout the property.”

  When Metzger and Molly started to turn to leave, Bryce stopped them.

  “I want you to give me a signal if you see trouble right away and need us to come running,” he said.

  “I’ll hold two fingers out near my hip,” Metzger said, demonstrating what he meant until he received affirmative nods from everyone around him.

  Metzger had read the instructions with Molly several times through, but he still harbored a feeling of doubt about the plan working. He wasn’t sure if one set of people possessed the instructions, or several hundred different factions knew about the backup plan from various locations. Curiosity ate at him, and he wanted to get to the bottom of their plan, and understand how so many people appeared to know about the end of civilization, and not one of them found the courage to speak out.

  Perhaps the information wasn’t disseminated any further than a handful of lieutenants, because Metzger couldn’t imagine all of them who knew would be onboard with seeing their loved ones and much of the world murdered. Another possibility occurred to him that the intended consequences never meant to turn people into zombies without heartbeats.

  “You drive,” Molly said, nodding towards the car.

  Metzger complied, and once they were inside, he started the car and drove it slowly in the direction of the unmarked road. He tried keeping their actions realistic, like a couple searching for the road listed on their tattered, vague map.

  A few different times he glanced in the rearview mirror, failing to find his brother or the Marines. Hiding spots near the two buildings were fairly easy to come by because trees and shrubs formed a line behind the property and along the side closest to Glendale Avenue. Metzger worried more about the closing distance between the vegetation and the buildings if he and Molly were ushered inside. If the buildings were modified before the dawn of the apocalypse, the military men would be blind to the interior, possibly walking into a trap if they needed to enter.

  For his part, Metzger planned on acting harmless, hoping his new hosts didn’t shoot him on sight or believe he threatened their plans.

  He turned around just down the road, finding an unusual number of vehicles around, indicating someone carried out routine sweeps of the area to clear vehicles and staggering dead. When he pulled into the short driveway that made a curve in front of both buildings on the property, he parked in the middle, eyeing the tree with the bell on it. He looked to Molly, who tried providing reassurance with a grin, but they both knew the danger they faced, even if they weren’t certain the risk was worth the reward.

  Metzger glanced in the rearview mirror, unable to see the military men, wondering if they hadn’t yet reached their positions, or simply remained well-hidden.

  “Ready?” he asked Molly.

  “As ever,” she replied.

  When Metzger stepped from the car, he noticed the one building appeared more like a garage, or outbuilding of some sort, and on the side facing the house, not one window existed. Built like a metal pole barn, the building appeared to exist for storage, rather than living quarters. He pictured a lawn mower, perhaps a tractor, and other large equipment being housed beneath its metal roof.

  Strangely, the house appeared fortified, its win
dows boarded up with wood coverings as though hurricane season were expected to hit at any moment. Metzger had seen similar houses, and such décor was usually a dead giveaway that the living still occupied them, or had occupied them, expecting to ride out the storm of the undead plaguing the world.

  In this case, however, the people inside likely found good reason to keep themselves holed up as they waited for visitors in the days following the apocalypse.

  Molly walked over to the tree, and looked to Metzger before reaching up to grab the small rope attached to the bell that hung from a branch at eye level. He provided a nod, and she rang the bell slowly, and distinctly, three times, so anyone inside knew the ringing was not the wind, or random passersby fooling around.

  Daring to glance at the tree line surrounding the property along the back and the side closest to Glendale Avenue, Metzger still didn’t see a soul. He worried that the Marines had been pissed off by Bryce and taken the opportunity to revoke their orders and harm him, but they were professionals. Chain-of-command seemed a bit lax with government employees not being paid in the traditional sense, and a lot of ego appeared to accompany some of the more dangerous missions, at least from his perspective.

  From the corner of his eye, he caught a glimpse of a rifle barrel, barely emerging from the side of one tree, and he knew someone had his back. He turned to the front door, wondering why their reception took so long. He pictured a small gathering inside, and Fournier being extremely paranoid after his close call with death and the grave misdeeds carried out at the former school. Clenching his right fist at his side, Metzger contemplated the kinds of punishments he wanted to inflict upon Fournier, but the door opened to a young man dressed in black jeans and a black long-sleeve shirt who studied them briefly before speaking.

  “Can I help you?” he asked.

  Molly held up the sheet of paper with the instructions.

  “We’re here for refuge,” she replied.

  Giving a crooked grin, the man didn’t immediately move from the doorway.

  “That’s odd. You’re the second set of people in the last day to come here. Where’d you come from?”

  “The greater Buffalo area,” Metzger answered, trying to avoid being specific.

  He suspected Fournier and any associates were holed up inside, and Metzger couldn’t state he was part of their group, or the door would be slammed in their faces.

  Still not moving, the younger man looked between them suspiciously. Metzger knew he and Molly would be outnumbered once they stepped inside, and these people would likely ask for their weapons in exchange for protection.

  “We didn’t think anyone else survived,” Metzger said, quickly thinking of a way to neutralize the man’s distrust.

  “Survived what?”

  “We got back to the school, and this group of assholes had taken it over. We’ve been on the road a few weeks, trying to find our people, but I didn’t think anyone else survived the attack.”

  “What group were you with?” the young man asked, obviously intrigued by the story, likely because Fournier told him a slightly altered version.

  “We were with Xavier Fournier, but we left on an errand that day, and when we got back, everything had gone to hell.”

  Metzger’s wording registered a barely detectable hint of recognition in the man’s eyes, and he knew his arch nemesis was either hiding within the walls of this house, or had been as recently as a day ago. Whether this man let them inside, or not, no longer mattered to him. He needed answers immediately, and he wasn’t going to put Molly at risk by getting them locked inside a modified homestead.

  “Is he here?” Metzger asked, feigning interest enough to bestow him an acting award if such things still existed.

  Now the man appeared on the fence about letting them inside, or screaming for help, so Metzger attempted the last move in his arsenal.

  “If he survived, then everything isn’t lost,” he said, holding out two fingers near his hip area.

  Seventeen

  Jillian felt her blood boil as she confronted the woman who caused so many problems in her town for several years.

  “How dare you step foot in South Hill again,” Jillian stammered as Gracine, Sutton, Luke, and Samantha took her side.

  “You uppity people always thought you were too good for us,” Dark Lady spat her reply. “We brought our goods to your little town festival, so you could chew us up and spit us out.”

  “Because you overstayed your welcome, bitch.”

  Gracine tapped Jillian on the arm that held a firearm loosely pointed at Dark Lady and the three men who now took her side.

  “Girl, what the fuck is going on here?”

  “This bitch and her band of simpletons waged war against our town after they tried to make South Hill their personal storage facility and the town council took action.”

  “Your precious council ripped us off,” Dark Lady said. “As restitution, we’re taking the town for ourselves.”

  Jillian didn’t want to give in to demands, but she had three adults and a child to worry about. For the moment, she wasn’t going to address the worst of the crimes the people before her committed against her formerly quaint town.

  “Where the hell is Buster?” Jillian quietly asked Sutton to the side.

  “He’s in a car a few blocks from here.”

  “Lot of good that does us.”

  “Sorry,” Sutton replied with a slight rolling of his eyes.

  “My cards told me about you,” Dark Lady stated, her eyes burning daggers into Jillian. “They revealed a virgin would degrade herself by fornicating out of wedlock.”

  Everyone looked from Dark Lady to Jillian and back with surprised stares. Jillian recalled Dark Lady proclaiming herself a fortune teller within her tent every year at their hometown festival. Jillian considered her words bullshit back in the day, and nothing had changed regarding her feelings about the woman’s occupation and behavior.

  “Did they tell you that you might die today?” she asked, pointing the gun directly at Dark Lady.

  “No, they did not.”

  “Shoot the lot of them and be done with it,” Sutton said with a hint of concern in his tone.

  He typically remained stoic, regardless of what odds the group faced, but something about the carnies got to his psyche.

  “You need to get off our property,” Dark Lady demanded, which seemed rather bold considering no one in her party held a firearm.

  “Start shooting,” Gracine said, nodding toward the animated corpse of the man who flew part of their group to Virginia when they otherwise wouldn’t have made it.

  “I can’t,” Jillian replied, drawing quizzical stares from her group. “There might be more of them.”

  “Look at it as thinning the herd,” Sutton prodded.

  “Starting a war with them right here and now isn’t what we need,” Jillian insisted. “We need to regroup before we do anything.”

  Dark Lady took a step forward before speaking, looking like a cross between a witch and the crazy townsperson who uttered ominous warnings to passersby.

  “My cards foretold of bloodshed,” she announced with a deepening to her voice. “If you and your friends don’t leave, it’s inevitable.”

  “You killing our friend made conflict inevitable,” Jillian countered. “We want him back.”

  “You can’t have him back, you tramp,” Dark Lady sneered. “Shoot me if you want, but it won’t save you.”

  Jillian fought to make a decision while leaving the emotional element behind. Any move based on rage, or made in the heat of the moment, might create a situation too large for her friends to handle, especially with one of them already deceased.

  Instead of shooting anyone, Jillian walked over to Vazquez, who saw her only as food at this point, while she slid the gun into her back pocket. He groped at her, compl
etely unaware in his primal state that she reached for a pocket knife in her front pocket, quickly unfolding it because she didn’t want the goons occupying the property to charge her. Vazquez growled at her, and as she risked getting close to him, his fingers began to clasp her clothing, but Jillian ended the conflict before any damage was done, stabbing him in the side of the skull with the knife forcefully.

  He slumped over, but couldn’t fall to the ground because of the rod stuck through various parts of his body to keep him standing as an animated display piece. Jillian wanted to remove him from the post and give him an appropriate burial, but time didn’t permit. She didn’t want to endanger the others.

  She simply needed to make a statement, and she’d accomplished that much. Playing a human chess game against Dark Lady and her assembled family required patience and strategy. Jillian wasn’t about to leave her hometown to such mentally unstable people, though she personally found little reason to stay.

  “Where are the rest of you?” Jillian demanded, wiping the knife blade clean along some of Vazquez’s clothes before pocketing it and drawing the sidearm.

  Dark Lady simply provided a smirk that turned into a sneer after a few seconds.

  “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

  “Bitch, I will murder you right now and hunt them down if I have to.”

  “It’s not in you, honey,” Dark Lady said confidently. “My cards said so.”

  Jillian looked to Samantha, who huddled by Luke’s side, confused by all of the adult conversation and negativity. At that moment, Jillian knew the gypsy woman spoke the truth, but she wasn’t going to let her and the dangerous, deranged people who accompanied her win in the end. She couldn’t bring herself to murder, particularly in front of her group members.

  “Let’s go,” Jillian said to her friends, storming toward the opening in the fence.

  Everyone followed, but once they were a few houses away from the dangerous clan, Sutton spoke.