He twirled the bat easily as if it was little more than a Geisha’s fan, and then in a big motion, he swung it in an arc to strike the door knob. The round brass bounced off the floor and then rolled in a wobbly arc coming to a rest against Deanna’s sneaker and foot. Bill bent his oversized frame down to inspect the damage done. He stuck a finger into the workings of the lock and wiggled the metal around.
“Almost,” he said. “Stand back.” He lifted one of his enormous feet and smashed the door backward on its hinges. Behind it was nearly all darkness. There was only one thing to see. Neil’s eyes went wide; there was a man with a gun standing just back in the shadows.
“Hands up, motherfuckers.”
Chapter 6
Jillybean
Over the last year of the apocalypse the ex-whores and the rescued prisoners had learned deeply the concept of hopelessness. It showed on their listless faces when the news rippled through the barracks the next day that Neil hadn’t returned. They sat about uselessly moping, pathetically whining, and in at least one case, complaining bitterly. This last was Fred Trigg.
He actively shone the light of “I told you so” all around him, placing blame and predicting doom despite the fact that he had been in favor of Neil’s trip. Ipes found him completely annoying and began a whisper campaign in Jillybean’s mind to prank him and prank him good.
Jillybean wasn’t in the mood. She was far too worried over what was happening to her family to even think about pranking Fred, though she was sure he deserved it. “We can’t,” she said around the fingernail she was nibbling at. “He’ll be mad when he finds out it was us and asides we have lots of figuring to do. We have to figure out our next moves; you know, how to live and all.”
And all? The zebra wasn’t fooled for a second. What does ‘and all’ entail? As if I don’t know. Don’t you remember what Mister Neil and Captain Grey both said? No rescues; it’s out of the question.
“I know it’s out of the question,” Jillybean agreed. “Because, of course, there’s no question we have to rescue them and Sadie and Eve, too. Just how do we do it without getting captured, ourselves?”
You don’t!” Ipes cried, pulling at his mane in exasperation. “Because, if you try it, you’ll end up doing it alone, and you can’t do it alone. That’s what I think. No one is going to help you; they’re all too chicken. And you can’t do a rescue alone because you’re too small.
Jillybean bristled at the accusation and drew herself up to her full three and half feet and said: “And you’re…and you’re, well I don’t know what, but it isn’t good, especially when I count on you to help me. Isn’t that why Daddy gave you to me? To help me in sticky situations like this?”
Ipes shook his head. No! Daddy would never want me to help you do something so dangerous. He’d want me to stop you if I could.
The little girl’s eyes narrowed as a cold silence enveloped the two. “But you can’t stop me,” she said in a hissing whisper. “You can’t take me over no more cuz I’m the boss of you, not the other way around. So you better not even try.”
Ipes held up his stubby hooves. I’m not trying to be the boss. All I’m trying to do is keep you from making a terrible mistake. I’m trying to keep you from getting killed.
“Then help me rescue my family! Because without them I’ll really get killed.”
I won’t, Ipes said, defiantly.
A black feeling erupted out from Jillybean’s chest and bloomed around inside her, turning her mind to dark thoughts. “You must be jealous! Is it the baby? Or is it the fact that everyone loves me the most and not you?”
It’s none of that, Ipes insisted. It’s just you can’t do this, Jilly. Not without a grownup’s help. You’re not smart enough. You didn’t even finish the first grade for goodness sakes. Smart people finish the first grade and besides you’re not magic. You can die, too.
“What do you know about nothing? You’re just a stupid zebra. I’m a girl, a real girl and I don’t need no stupid zebra telling me stuff anyways, so….so you know what? You’re going in time out! No, worse than timeout, you’re going in the backpack.” She hauled off the Ladybug backpack, unzipped the main cargo pocket, and stuffed Ipes inside. Making a little noise: humph, she zipped it up tight.
“Stupid zebra,” she whispered.
She went up to the roof of the barracks and looked out to the west hoping to see Neil and Deanna coming back. They were pretty much the only grownups that she felt she could trust. The others were too scared, except for maybe Michael Gates. Unfortunately, when he had been in charge, he had barely been able to keep his own family safe; his greatest inspiration has been the Floating Island, which had not been more than a few boats strung together and camouflaged by a slew of fake shrubbery. He was good at what he could do—organizing and following orders—however, when it came to innovating and commanding others in dangerous situations, he wasn’t all that good for much.
“You know what we need,” she said to herself. “Guns and an army. With an army we could do a rescue. Right Ipes?” she asked, forgetting that he was stuffed into her pack. She turned a little circle before remembering. “Oh, right. But he wasn’t going to be any help anyways. He would think an army was too dangerous…or impossible.”
Jillybean scratched her backside, thinking Ipes might be right about the impossibility of it. In her mind, the grode-ups weren’t impressive. The day before, Jillybean had trained the entire group of renegades on how to act like the monsters. It had been a taxing experience. There had been an amazing amount of whining on their part, especially when she had insisted that everyone had to demonstrate what they had learned among real live monsters. Some had to be begged into making the attempt. It was embarrassing.
That morning they were going to put what they learned to a real test. As per Neil’s direction, Michael had organized three squads of ten people each; their job was to scrounge around the army base for food, fuel, and weapons.
Jillybean asked to join one of the groups and was readily accepted; most looked on her as either a good luck charm or a genius who would do all their thinking for them. The group she had chosen to go with was led by William Gates, Michael’s brother. He was exceptionally quiet, to the point that he always appeared to be sulking, but he was a good zombie fighter and, better yet, pretty much did whatever Jillybean suggested.
They started by searching the vehicles in the parking lots to find ones that could run. While Jillybean kept the monsters occupied, running Jazzy Blue all over the place, her little team went from car-to-car, checking gas tanks, battery levels, and tire pressure. Gas was easy to come by, and batteries could be jumped and recharged using the truck Captain Grey had found before his capture, however, finding vehicles with proper tires was getting to be an issue. Most sagged, halfway to being completely flat.
Eventually, they found three good-sized trucks with tires that were, “good enough” and then they were off to find food and guns. The little girl directed them to the bunkers where the bombs were first. She thought bombs were very scary but also handy. Her team was altogether petrified of them.
“There’s nothing to worry about, Mr. William,” Jillybean said. “They won’t splode all by themselves. See, watch.” She went down into the bunker, picked out a chunk of C4 and carried it back into the sunshine. Without warning she threw it down on the ground as hard as she could. It thudded into the dirt and just sat there—some of the adults had cringed, while not a few leapt away or hid themselves behind the trucks.
“See?” She went to pick up the block a second time, but William stopped her.
“Maybe you should let that one just lie there for a little bit. Just in case.”
She scrunched up her face, trying to understand why he’d want to do that. “Naw, we might forget it.” Without a touch of fear she picked up the block and then put it into the back of the closest truck. “We need to get more of these, and some of the detonatorers, that’s what means little bombs that make the big bombs blow up. Come on, Mr. William.”
So fearless did she appear that the group followed her down into the bunker. Joslyn came in with a wrinkled nose. “What’s that smell? It smells like the air could catch on fire.”
“Yeah,” Jillybean replied absently. Her eyes were going over the shelves as she tried to remember everything Captain Grey had mentioned concerning all the various types of ordinance in the dark room. He had gone on-and-on, using many words she didn’t know. “Make sure you don’t use a lighter,” she added. To herself, she said, “I think…I think I need Ipes.”
Not this place, Ipes said with dread in his voice when he emerged from the pack. Jillybean, I swear you’re going crazy.
“Am not,” she said to the toy. “We may need this stuff, you never know. Now help me remember all the stuff Captain Grey said.”
I shouldn’t help you, except I know if I don’t you’ll end up blowing us both to the moon. First we have to get the good detonators. Ipes’s memory was, as usual, perfect, and the more he spoke the more Jillybean recalled the names and uses for each of the deadly tools in the room. Under her direction, the group piled up everything she needed: all the remaining C4, three boxes of blasting caps, reels of det cord, four crates of hand grenades and three more of Claymore anti-personnel mines. Finally, they took an even dozen LAW rockets. The rest of the ordinance either wasn’t suited to their needs, or Grey had bypassed them without saying a word, and so she didn’t know what they did.
Outside in the fresh air, Joslyn had one of the crates open and was staring in at a stubby rocket launcher. “It says Light Anti-tank Weapon. Why on earth do we want any of these? And where’s the, you know, the bullet part. You know the thing you shoot?”
Jillybean, who thought her questions were silly, didn’t answer, even though she was an adult. She glanced in at the LAW rocket launchers and frowned; they were terribly un-impressive. Each consisted of a green tube, three inches in diameter and about a yard long. There were two small pips to use when aiming and a raised hunk of rubber on top, the purpose of which was not immediately clear.
“Oh, here you go, Ms. Joslyn,” Jillybean said. Within the crate was a little green booklet: an instruction manual. After taking ten seconds to scan it, and getting the gist of the simple weapon, she handed it to Joslyn, who took it with just the tips of her fingers.
“And what do you expect me to do with this?” she asked.
“It’s a book,” Jillybean answered. “You read it. The words inside will tell you about the rockets.”
William Gates smirked at the blatantly honest answer. “Maybe, Joslyn, you can give us all a class on how to work them, later.”
“What’s next?” another of the ex-whores asked, looking squarely at Jillybean. She wasn’t the only one, either; all the adults were staring at her expectantly.
“I guess we keep looking for more stuff,” she answered. “Maybe over by the airport?”
The airport was a treasure trove of fuel. There were huge tanks filled with ugly smelling black liquid, only it turned out to be the wrong sort of fuel. It was all either for jets or helicopters. They did find a few weapons lying among piles of moldering bones in the control tower.
“Suicides,” Joslyn said. Ipes explained what the word meant, but he couldn’t get Jillybean to understand the concept. In her mind, there was always a way out of any situation; killing yourself just seemed stupid to her.
After hours of searching the grounds and buildings around the airport, and hardly finding anything worthwhile, the group headed back to the barracks, hungry and tired. They had barely found a thing to eat, but thankfully, one of the other groups had discovered a five-ton truck filled with cases and cases of MREs.
Jillybean ate her dinner alone, sitting on the roof once again. Until the sun set she squinted into the glare, hoping to see the least sign of Neil, and after, when the dark hid the world, she sat straining her ears to hear something besides the constant moan of the dead and the evening bugs making their high-pitched clamor. She listened until her eyes began to droop.
The next morning she awoke in her bunk with a heavy feeling in her chest. She knew as soon as her blue eyes blinked open that Neil hadn’t made it back. It had been two and a half days since he, Deanna, and Big Bill had left and so far there had not been a single word from them. It was exactly how she knew it would be.
Ipes remained quiet, perhaps because he didn’t want to hear an I told you so. She gave it to him anyway: “I told you it was a mistake for Mister Neil to try to cross so soon. He should’ve waited.”
True, but that doesn’t mean you were right to try for a rescue, he countered. In my opinion you were both wrong. You should have waited, not for a rescue, but just to let things die down. Besides you still don’t have a plan so what good is talking about a rescue?
“I’ll get a plan going pretty soon.” Ipes gave her as skeptical a look as his cottony features would allow. “Don’t look at me like that,” she groused. “I know you don’t think we have so much to work with but you’re wrong. Who knows? What if we find a working tank? This is an army-man base. They probably had tanks and fighter jets and all sorts of stuff.”
And who’ll drive it? Ipes asked. And how do you plan on getting a tank across the river? They weigh, like a whole lot and you blew up the only bridge, remember?
“Oh yeah,” she answered, scratching her nose. “Well, then maybe we’ll get a helicopter. There were some down by the little airport. They can’t be all that hard to fly, at least for a grode-up. If Captain Grey was here, he’d be able to fly for certainty.”
I wish he was here, too, so he could knock some sense into you. Helicopters are really hard to fly, harder even than airplanes.
“Ok, maybe so, but still my point is that there might be all sorts of cool things on this base to help us free Sadie and Captain Grey. Maybe even a missile. You ever think of that?”
Here’s what I think, a RESCUE IS CRAZY! And trying to cross the river is just as crazy. We should stay put.
“I don’t think so. We need to get close to Cape Girardeau, just in case we get an opportunity to try for a rescue.” Jillybean stood up and took her eyes from the zombies below. She faced west and zeroed in on the road, hoping once again to see Neil and Deanna coming back. She didn’t like it when they were gone because everyone looked to her for answers, especially Michael Gates whose confidence in his own abilities as a leader had disappeared altogether. He ran every idea through her before voicing it aloud. It was why she had slipped away to hide on the roof again.
But she knew she couldn’t hide there forever.
“Come on,” she said, grabbing Ipes by one soft hoof and swinging him along.
She called a meeting of the entire group that morning. She went to each door, knocked politely and said to whoever answered, “There’s a meeting at 9 AM in the cafeteria, thanks.” No one questioned her at all. If she said there was a meeting then they believed it.
At nine she stood next to Michael as the room filled with the renegades. He was frowning, causing a dozen lines to crease his expansive forehead. “They’ve probably been captured by the River King, haven’t they?” Michael asked quietly.
He meant Neil, Deanna, and Big Bill. “Yep,” Jillybean said, simply.
“Do you have a plan yet? You know, to save them?” Michael asked, hopefully.
“Well…not yet,” she admitted. “But that’s because we’re so far away. I need to get closer to the base.”
Fred Trigg, just on the other side of Michael, leaned forward to ask, “What for? You know the layout of the base. You know where the prisoners are kept. What else do you need?” As always Fred was loud and the room was quiet and still as everyone listened in on their conversation.
“I guess I need to be close, you know, just in case of stenuating circumstances. Like something might come up.”
“Something?” Fred asked, dubiously. He stepped forward to the center of the cafeteria where everyone could see him. Raising his voice, he said, “I guess we are having this
meeting to figure out our next step. By now it’s pretty clear that Neil and the others were captured. Just like I warned.”
“You didn’t warn about that,” Jillybean said, quickly as Fred paused to take a breath. “Really, what you said was…”
Fred snapped his fingers at her, saying, “I have the floor young lady. Be respectful of your elders for once and wait your turn.”
Jillybean melted in close to Michael, her thin cheeks turning pink. “Sorry,” she said in a whisper.
Satisfied, Fred turned back to the band of renegades. “Neil’s capture sends a clear warning for us not to make a crossing of the Mississippi en masse, which leaves only the options of staying put or making some sort of suicidal attempt to free Neil and the others from the River King. A rescue is precisely what Jillybean is proposing we do. But there are two problems: first she freely admits she doesn’t have a plan and second we don’t even know if they’re still alive.”
“They’re alive,” Jillybean said, obstinately.
“What proof do you have?” Fred asked. “None. And, without proof, a rescue should be out of the question. To me it seems like a waste of time unless we have a foolproof plan in place.”
“But I might could think of one if we got close,” Jillybean said, meekly.
“Might could?” Fred asked, dubiously. He then smiled benignly at the little girl before turning to the larger group with raised eyebrows. “I don’t know if we should place our trust in a might could.” He laughed and a few of the people laughed along but, as usual for the group most sat looking slightly confused. Fred, the constant politician, saw it just as Jillybean did. “A ‘might could’ plan will only get us captured or killed. What we need to do right now is stay put. We need to stay in hiding until we can come up with a real plan or until the heat blows over. Unless, of course, anyone…anyone other than Jillybean, that is, has a workable idea.”
Hiding seemed to offer the safest route and most everyone began nodding along with each other, forming a consensus of sheep. Only Marybeth Gates disagreed. She spoke through clenched teeth, “You shouldn’t be so quick to disregard her input. She’s a genius or a prodigy or whatever.”
The Undead World (Book 5): The Apocalypse Renegades Page 5
