After (Book 3): Milepost 291

by Nicholson, Scott

  “The rest of the patrol,” Jorge said.

  “Sounds like they’re a good ways down the mountain. I’ll bet they didn’t even hear our little party.”

  “Then what are they shooting at?”

  “Probably each other. Most survival preppers believe you have to sacrifice your morality, because helping others makes you weak. When you cross that attitude with whatever line of bullshit Sarge has been feeding them, you get a bunch of psychos with assault rifles playing Wild West.”

  “It’s not the world I want to raise my family in,” Jorge said.

  “I guess you can ask God why His hands screwed that one up,” Franklin said, slinging his weapon over his shoulder and going back through the house to check on Robertson and his daughter.

  Robertson was conscious and alert, his head swathed in a folded pillowcase. He rested on the bed, propped against the headboard. His daughter wiped his face with a wet towel. Franklin and Jorge had piled the two bodies in the closet and shut the door. Franklin figured that was all the memorial crypt the assholes deserved, but the stench of decomposition would make the house unlivable in a day or two.

  “How you feeling?” Franklin asked the injured man.

  “Like I drank two quarts of bourbon, only without the giggles,” he said.

  “I want to thank you,” the girl said, not meeting Franklin’s eyes. He figured she was still ashamed about what had almost happened to her, even though she had done nothing wrong. She just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time when the wrong thing came along.

  Guess that can be said for all of us.

  “You two have done okay for yourselves so far,” Franklin said. “Goes to show that most of us are better off without people, because a big slice of the population will always be maniacs. Only now they don’t have to answer for their sins.”

  Robertson put his arm around his daughter. He likewise probably felt shame for not protecting her well enough. “Strength in numbers, though. If you hadn’t been here—”

  “Then they wouldn’t have been here. We’re all just making this up as we go along.”

  “I was a fool,” the man continued. “I thought hiding was the best plan, laying low and hoarding, instead of looking for other survivors.”

  “Well, no telling how many preppers are holed up in their private bunkers, ready to drink their own piss for the next twenty years. I don’t call that a ‘life’ for a free man.” The teen finally met his eyes and he gave a crooked smile. “Free woman, either.”

  “But now we have more than just Zaps to worry about. We didn’t know if there was an army left, but we thought they’d be the good guys.”

  “There ain’t any good guys anymore. Just the dead and the ones that wished they were, plus a few who finally got their chance to call the shots. And I don’t even know where you put the Zappers in that equation.”

  Robertson waved off his daughter’s nursing, although he winced in pain with the motion. “What should we do?”

  “There’s a whole squad of these goons holed up in a bunker on the parkway.” Franklin nodded at the closet. “When these two don’t come back, they’ll send out another patrol.”

  “Maybe we should all stick together.”

  The girl’s eyes brightened with hope, as if loneliness was even more unbearable than the fear and uncertainty, but she sobered at Franklin’s stony expression.

  “Jorge’s going to be looking for his family,” Franklin said. “And I need to get back to my compound. I’m expecting company, and the place isn’t built for a tribe. Nothing personal.”

  Robertson shrugged. “Yeah. I guess when you come down to it, we’re all on our own.”

  Franklin headed for the door, but the teen raced from the bedside and blocked his way. She stared him down with defiant blue eyes. “Shay,” she said. “My name is Shay.”

  “Good to meet you, Shay.”

  “You can’t just leave him. That would make you no better than that rapist scum.”

  “Shay!” Robertson said, with a mixture of pride and annoyance. “These men saved our lives. They don’t owe us anything.”

  “Don’t do it for us,” Shay said, still locked on Franklin’s face so he couldn’t glance away. “Do it so they don’t win.”

  Franklin sighed. “How long will it take you to pack?”

  CHAPTER TEN

  As Campbell entered the kitchen, three Zapheads followed him like fleshy shadows.

  He slid open the drawer beside the filthy sink and studied the utensils. What sort of blade was best for performing an amputation? All he had was memories of old war movies, where the field surgeons performed their grisly work with cleavers and hacksaws. Would a serrated blade do the job effectively, or should he go for the finest honed edge for a cleaner cut?

  Hoping to fool the attentive Zapheads, Campbell flung several utensils to the floor. Then he knelt to gather them, and the Zapheads immediately followed suit. While they were focused on their mission, Campbell tossed one of the utensils in the sink. The Zapheads raised a clatter while doing the same.

  Campbell repeated the game, and when they stooped to the floor a second time, he slipped a long butcher knife out of the drawer and tucked it inside the waistband of his jeans against his hip, tugging his shirt to cover the handle.

  Don’t we boil water and gather towels, or is that for births? Either way, we definitely need antiseptic.

  He hadn’t explored the kitchen much, preferring to let the professor prepare their simple meals. The professor enjoyed teaching these human mockingbirds, although they seemed to have little need for nourishment. But now Campbell opened cabinets, knowing the three Zapheads would imitate him. The first contained tin cans of pork-and-beans, boxes of dried grain and noodles, and some home-canned vegetables, as well as a bag of flour that had been ripped open and left amid piles of white powder.

  The second cabinet contained spices, a can of lard, and some cookware, but it was the upper shelf that held what Campbell was seeking. He climbed onto the counter to reach the bottles, but he was satisfied with the Smirnoff vodka, 100 proof and stronger than the sealed bottles of rum and whiskey. The master of the farmhouse apparently liked a nip now and again, but the relative inaccessibility of the liquor hinted at a casual drinker rather than a full-blown alcoholic.

  The bottle made him think of his friend Pete, who’d been killed by a sniper in Taylorsville. At least Pete had left this world in a state of delirious numbness, a condition that had marked most of his waking days as well. With any luck, the vodka would dull the agony Rachel would soon be facing, as well as kill a few of the murderous germs that would be teeming over their brutal operation.

  And if the gore and screams get too intense, I might need some liquid amnesia myself.

  On impulse, Campbell took the two full bottles of liquor from the cabinet. He twisted the lid from the whiskey to break the seal, and then tightened it again. Concealing the tip of the bottle with his fingers, he held it to his mouth, tilted, and swallowed loudly. Then he deftly removed the cap and passed the bottle to the nearest Zaphead, a bug-eyed man who looked like he’d lost his spectacles. The man jammed the bottle into his mouth and drank deeply, spilling sweet amber liquid from the corners of his mouth.

  Campbell was sure the Zaphead would retch, but it took several deep tugs from the bottle and then popped the opening free with a damp sloosh. The next Zaphead eagerly took a turn, and Campbell left the room as they fought over the bottle.

  Killing, sexual torture, boozing. Pretty soon they’ll have all our human sins down pat.

  In the living room, the professor stood over Rachel, who was still semiconscious on the sofa. The Zapheads knelt around them like some sort of corrupt manger scene, and Campbell realized for the first time that the professor might be consciously imitating the Jesus in the picture upstairs—since Taylorsville, he’d let his beard grow out and his hair had grown long and wavy.

  Was the professor intentionally tricking the Zapheads into subser
vience, or was he going as mad as an Old Testament prophet? Whatever the reason, the Zapheads were all too happy to clasp their hands in silent prayer, creating a creepy tableau that almost made Campbell erupt in insane laughter. But Rachel’s pale, clammy face and the corrupted state of her leg wound kept him distressingly present and focused.

  We might die here, but until then, I’m fighting the good fight. I’ve got to believe we’re better than this.

  He gave the bottle of vodka to the professor, who nodded in acknowledgement. Campbell eased the knife from its hiding place, shivering at the blade sliding along his bare skin. He knelt before Rachel, pretending to pray like the other Zapheads, but then dug the tip of the knife beneath the ripped fabric around the wound.

  “No,” the professor whispered. “Take them off.”

  Campbell tucked the knife between the sofa cushions and reached for the button of Rachel’s jeans. Although she was incoherent with fever, Campbell flushed with anxiety and embarrassment. This seemed too personal of an invasion, even for the purpose of delivering medical care. But he unsnapped her jeans and loosened the zipper and then began working her jeans down her legs, grateful that she was wearing underwear. Blue panties.

  Careful not to disturb her wound more than necessary, he peeled her jeans free of her legs. He reached for the vodka, intending to douse her upper calf with the liquor. He didn’t see how the professor intended to penetrate the thick gristle and tendons around her knee, assuming that was where he’d sever the leg. Campbell wiped sweat from his forehead, wondering if the professor was as knowledgeable about human physiology as he claimed.

  The sheet rose and fell with Rachel’s labored, restless breathing. Campbell was sure she’d go into shock as soon as the blade penetrated. He might go into shock himself.

  “What about the blood?” Campbell whispered.

  “What about it?”

  Campbell nodded at the assembled Zapheads, who were bowed in creepy reverence. “What if they…get ideas?”

  “We just have to be quick and clean.”

  Campbell didn’t see how a makeshift surgery with kitchenware could be either of those things. The professor’s eyes glowed with a confident serenity that did nothing to soothe Campbell’s anxiety. He wasn’t sure he wanted to be in the room when the Zapheads witnessed the carnage, but he couldn’t abandon Rachel. Somebody had to hold her down.

  “You sure we have to do this?” Campbell said. “Can’t we wait and see if it gets better.”

  “She wouldn’t make it to sunrise tomorrow,” the professor said, totally comfortable with his nudity as he stood like some cult leader preparing for a ritual sacrifice.

  “Okay, then. Let’s get this over with.”

  Campbell splashed vodka over the open wound and around the area where the professor intended to make the first incision. Rachel moaned at the sting of pain but didn’t fully awaken. He wondered if he should pour a little in her mouth, and then decided no amount of alcohol could dull the pain ahead.

  The professor massaged the area around the wound, causing glistening, yellowish pus to break and run. A few of the supplicant Zapheads grew restless and several pairs of eyes opened, their strange glittering increasing Campbell’s anxiety.

  “Hurry,” Campbell said, although he wasn’t sure how you could rush the nightmare to come.

  “I need to determine where the flesh is healthy,” the professor said.

  “If you don’t start cutting, you’re soon going to have about twenty eager little helpers. And unlike you, I don’t think they studied biology in college. They studied on the dead people upstairs, maybe, but Rachel’s still in one piece.”

  “Let’s do it.” The professor slipped the butcher knife from the couch cushions, still rubbing the infected area with his left hand. The blade seemed ridiculously unsuited for the task, and Campbell wondered once again if the professor had gone absolutely mad from his confinement.

  Campbell had never felt so helpless. He didn’t know enough to challenge the professor’s decision—hell, he’d barely been a C student in science—but Rachel undoubtedly was headed for a horrible death if they did nothing. But before the professor could bring the blade to bear, the nearest Zaphead unclasped her hands and laid them on Rachel’s injured leg. The Zaphead beside her followed suit, and the others nearest the sofa shifted forward and reached out their own hands.

  They rubbed her skin in imitation of the professor’s massaging motion, and Rachel’s flesh quivered with the attention. More pus ran free, now tinged pink with blood. The Zapheads were no longer praying, instead gathering closer and closer to the sofa.

  Campbell felt trapped by the crowd, but he refused to release Rachel’s wrists. He was atop her torso, applying enough weight to hold her down without crushing her, and Rachel’s uneven, labored breath whisked past his ear.

  “For God’s sake, put the knife away,” Campbell hissed at the professor.

  The Zapheads crowded in so that the professor had difficulty keeping a hand near the wound. More Zapheads reached in, rubbing and stroking her bare leg with all the fervency they’d recently expressed in their mockery of prayer. They muttered in unison, but those weren’t words issuing from their throats. The sounds melded and flattened out into a single sonic vibration, almost like the mantra of meditating monks.

  Campbell pushed at the nearest hands, almost in tears. How long before they began digging into the wound and tugging bits of rotten meat away?

  “Give me the knife!” Campbell yelled at the professor, who had backed away from the bizarre scene. Campbell planned to launch himself into the pack and chop, slice, and hew his way back to sanity, although he was aware the violence would be met with a like response.

  But before the professor could react, Campbell saw something even more utterly remarkable and strangely horrific—the flesh at the edges of Rachel’s wound turned from greenish-red to bright pink, and the pustules began to dry and shrink. The fecund, spoiled aroma of the wound dissipated. As the many hands stroked and smoothed, the wound began to close.

  The Zapheads were healing her with their touch.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Wonder if this is how runaway slaves felt.

  DeVontay Jones had been on the run for weeks, ever since he’d lured away the Zapheads that had been closing in on their camp. The ploy allowed Rachel and little Stephen to escape, but he wasn’t sure he’d made the right decision. Abandoning them might have left them more vulnerable, and splitting up might have lowered each of their chances for survival.

  But he hadn’t been thinking much of his own survival, not as he’d raced through the woods, noisily kicking up dry leaves and snapping branches to draw the attention of his pursuers. He’d barely been able to make out their forms in the darkness. If not for the glittering of their eyes, he wouldn’t have known they’d followed him, because they moved as silently as sharks in the ocean of the night.

  At times he was sure they would all rush him and tear him to pieces, but only minutes later he’d just as deeply believed they had given up pursuit. The rifle had provided little comfort. The pairs of eyes seemed to greatly outnumber his supply of bullets. So he kept moving, sweaty and breathless in the October night, until he’d led the Zapheads miles away from Rachel and Stephen.

  He’d wondered if the strange, luminous quality of the Zapheads’ eyes gave them enhanced night vision. Maybe they’d mutated into highly efficient killing machines, although their reluctance to attack him didn’t seem to fit the bloodthirsty behavior they’d exhibited in the immediate aftermath of the solar storms.

  When dawn broke, there’d been no sign of them, although he circled round and found multiple sets of footprints. Still, he’d been afraid to backtrack to the camp, in case Rachel had disobeyed his command to flee. In the end, he’d kept moving, planning to circle around the forest heading northwest until he found a paved road that would lead him on to Milepost 291.

  A day after parting with Rachel and Stephen, he’d heard a great explos
ion in the distance, followed by a plume of black, oily smoke rising over the distant gray ridges. DeVontay had worked his way toward it, following a creek that soon swelled into a rushing river, but the passage was slow amid the boulders and lush vegetation on the stream banks. He’d often had to wade in the icy water, and once he’d slipped and soaked his clothes and gear. Worse, he’d lost his grip on the rifle and it had been swept away in the churning rapids.

  Defenseless, he’d made his way to the site of the fire, discovering the scorched shell of a gas station and a number of desiccated corpses in the ruins. He also saw the pages from comic books torn out and stuffed under windshield wipers, a message from Stephen meant to show that he and Rachel had made it this far.

  But his heart sank when he found Rachel’s blackened backpack among the charcoal and ashes. He was sure they’d both died there, probably fighting off a Zaphead attack. Rachel might even have deliberately started the fire to save them from whatever horrible fate the Zapheads would have rendered.

  DeVontay had been savagely dejected—not only had he developed a deep attraction to Rachel, he’d grown to revel in his role of protector. For the first time in his life, he’d found a true purpose, one that he’d fully committed himself to and one which seemed greater than himself. To lose that purpose—even in a world already hopelessly lost forever—seemed more than any man should have to bear.

  As a child growing up in South Philly, he’d fought his way through his teens. In the city of Rocky and the Liberty Bell, you didn’t back down. When he wouldn’t join the neighborhood gang, he endured a set of brass knuckles to the eye, turning it to jelly. Even after he was fitted with a glass prosthetic, he still refused to abandon the streets. Most of the kids who had attacked him wound up dead or in jail.

  So instead of giving up, he worked his way toward the Blue Ridge Parkway and Milepost 291, even though it had become something of a mythical promised land. He walked days and hid nights, and even when he didn’t see any Zapheads, he sensed their presence, shapes moving just beyond the perimeter of his vision, soft scurrying like rodents, and occasional throaty vocalizations that might have been birds but were too strange to name.