by SD Tanner
He took Isaac’s hand, and they walked towards the graveyard where mourners were gathering. A fresh grave had already been dug and the woman’s body laid to rest. She was only waiting on a few words from him to acknowledge her short life. Walking into the graveyard, men and women nodded to him and some called him Father. He wasn’t a priest, but he figured it didn’t really matter. Pop was looking grim at the head of the grave, and about sixty people stood waiting for him. Nodding to Pop, he walked over and stood next to him at the head of the grave.
The graveyard was an untidy collection of crosses and scattered rocks. Each one signified that there was a body beneath, but few had any names or inscriptions. In this new world, friendships and families were formed quickly, but people didn’t really know one another. All that seemed necessary to forge a bond was a willingness to care for the other person, and that instantly made you a friend or more. The expanding graveyard was fenced off with a hastily assembled low wooden barrier. Someone had painted the wooden barrier white, but already the salty sea air and strong sun was causing the paint to peel, and patches of dirty brown wood made it look like a virus was eating away at their work. It didn’t matter, the wooden fence wasn’t to protect the graveyard, but to signify the separation between the living and the dead.
He looked over the assembly of tired and worn faces that were watching him intently, and waiting for him to tell them the woman was now in God’s care. He wished he had a faith in God as deep as the one Gears showed in mankind. Trying to gather his thoughts and feelings, he looked down into the grave and felt a sharp shock. He’d sat with the woman while she died, and now she was zipped in a body bag, but placed on top of her was a small parcel he assumed was her baby.
“We lost the child as well?”
Pop replied quietly, “An hour ago. She was too weak to survive.”
Isaac was standing at the edge of the grave, and peering down at the bodies, he said, “She wants her mother.”
He looked at Isaac, and not for the first time, he wondered what the boy could see that he couldn’t.
Trying not to sound as upset as he felt, he said, “We need to put the child in the body bag with its mother. It can’t rest this way.”
Pop and two men climbed into the grave, opened the body bag and slipped the small bundle inside. People waited patiently while this wrong was made right, and once Pop was pulled from the grave, he began as he always did.
“Does anyone know this woman?”
An older woman stepped forward. “I did.”
He signaled her to come to the head of the grave and stand with him. “Tell her story, so we can all remember her.”
“Her name was Joanne and she was twenty-three years old. Before the outbreak, she worked in a bank and lived in a small flat in Tampa. She loved animals and travelling, and was a kind girl who was always willing to help other people. She had an older brother and a younger sister who she talked about a lot. I know she missed them. She always said if she had a girl she would call her Dawn after her Granny. I hope she and Dawn are with her family now.”
As was the new custom people applauded, not for the speaker, but for the person who was now being buried. It wasn’t as if anyone really knew Joanne, and he supposed it was their way to acknowledging and appreciating her life. There were no one left who knew her before the outbreak of the virus and few who knew her after. These days it was a miracle you were buried at all, and if anyone knew your name when they buried you, then you were doubly blessed.
“God, please grant Joanne and Dawn safety in your grace.”
Unless specifically told not to, he always ended a funeral with a short prayer. Even though he rarely knew them, he would select something especially for the person. For Joanne he’d chosen Romans 14:7-9. Had he known about Dawn, he might have picked a different verse, but he thought it still fit the loss.
“For none of us liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself. For whether we live, we live unto the Lord; and whether we die, we die unto the Lord: whether we live therefore, or die, we are the Lord's. For to this end Christ both died, and rose, and revived, that he might be Lord both of the dead and living.”
They all stood in silence for a full two minutes, and then the funeral was over. People left to continue whatever task they’d interrupted for the short service to bury a woman they didn’t know, and a child who was granted too little time. He walked with Pop back to the living quarters for the island. While they walked down the gentle incline, he noticed people were subdued and wandering back in small groups. The loss of a child always hurt more. It chipped away at everyone’s hope and optimism for the future.
“Have you heard anything from Gears and TL?”
Looking distracted and grim, Pop replied, “No, in theory their radio could work, but it’s not guaranteed.”
“Are you worried about them?”
“I always worry about my boys. They’re good boys, but they do push their luck some days. Pax has got no damned sense, Gears is overconfident, and TL just goes along with whatever foolhardy nonsense them two get up to. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’d catch the three of ‘em doin’ some damn fool thing that could get ‘em killed. I thought the Army would knock some sense into ‘em, but I reckon it’s jus’ made ‘em worse. Now Gears is more confident than he ever was, jus’ ‘cos he knows how to blow the hell outta stuff. As for Pax…don’t get me started on that boy. He’s runnin’ around all over the goddamn country as if he’s on a holiday. I don’t even know where he is. He tells his own shooters they have to radio in regularly, but he never does it himself. I asked Gerry to get him on the horn, but he ain’t respondin’. Mom is gonna give him a smack up the head when he gets back.”
Hoping to ease Pop’s worry, he asked, “Do you know if he’s travelling with one of the Infected?”
Seeming surprised by the question, Pop replied, “I always forget the Infected can talk to one another telepathically. I can’t quite get my old head around that one. But yeah, I guess he must be, but I dunno who he’s with.”
Turning to Isaac, he asked, “Do you know Isaac?”
Isaac stopped walking and briefly seeming to lose focus, he said, “No. But he was not alone. I will check more.”
“Typical. When that boy wants to go radio silent, not even God’s own goddamn radio can reach him.”
Laughing, he replied, “I’m not sure telepathy is God’s radio, and I’m sure Pax is just being Pax and he’s fine.”
“I hope so, but those boys survive more by luck than skill.”
CHAPTER NINE: Dealing with the Devil (Hull)
“Why the hell does he want that?”
He slammed his magazine back into position in his gun. “I dunno. He’s got a bug up his arse about the place.”
For the past four months since his failed attack on the bases, he’d been building his army and integrating it to work with the super hunters and the hunters they controlled. Determined not to fail at taking the bases a second time, he’d resisted the desire to prove his strength by rushing his next attempt. Originally he wasn’t interested in the bases, but his defeat by Gears had been scathing. It left him feeling inadequate and he channeled his anger into his one objective to attack and take the bases. Absorbed with his mission he’d been annoyed when Ruler insisted he prepare his army of men and super hunters to attack a ranch in Red River County, Texas.
“Oh yeah, he hates that place. I think he was killed there.”
Gray had some idiotic view Ruler couldn’t be killed. Ruler had told Gray someone he called imp had torn his throat out, and then he’d resurrected himself inside someone else living in a government bunker. He thought it was an absurd story, and shaking his head at Gray, he said, “Aww, don’t start that bullshit again. I don’t believe that nutter can reincarnate himself.”
“Why the hell not? The super hunters can be reborn into new bodies as easily as I change my socks.”
He’d witnessed a super hunter possess the body of the living wi
th own eyes, and he supposed it was reasonable to assume Ruler could too. He grunted and thought, I’m getting good at living in denial, but if Ruler can get a new body, why doesn’t he? Ruler was a pale-looking, slack-skinned man in his mid-forties, with greying hair and a face like a droopy bulldog. If he could change bodies, he’d strongly recommend he did.
Putting his now clean and reassembled gun back on the table with a heavy clunk, he asked, “If Ruler can do that, don’t ya think he would have gotten a better body by now?”
Gray chuckled. “He thinks he’s quite handsome. Apparently he judges looks by height.”
“He does some seriously stupid shit.”
“Stupid? What he does is seriously evil.”
He thought evil was a big badge to assign anyone and he asked sneeringly, “If you think that, why do you stay?”
“And go where, Hull? Show me an alternative.”
There was an alternative for both of them. Rather than fight with Gears, they could join him in Jacksonville. No one who ever met Gray had ever escaped the camp to be able to identify him. The people at the base might have seen him the day he had attacked it, but assuming any were still alive, they were unlikely to recognize him.
He knew he would never join Gears, but he didn’t know why Gray couldn’t. “What about the mob in Jacksonville?”
Gray snorted and said derisively, “And become a nobody? If I join them, then they’re in charge. If I stay here then I’m the POTUS.”
Throwing back his head, he roared with laughter and wiping his eyes, he said, “You’re no more the POTUS than I’m the King of England, mate.”
Now becoming angry, Gray said through gritted teeth, “Don’t piss me off, Hull. I don’t like being laughed at.”
Still chuckling, he said, “I’ll tell ya what, you stop behaving like a tosser, and I’ll stop laughing at ya.”
Now irritated, Gray said brusquely, “Ruler wants to know what your plans are for the Ranch.”
It was no small endeavor to build an integrated army between his soldiers and the super hunters. Four months ago he’d given a hundred of his worst men to Gray. Since then Gray had expanded the group to be about five hundred men who always dressed in black, and they called themselves the Black Army. He thought the Black Army were no more an army than he was a woman, but they were effective at running the camp and finding people to add to their numbers. It was more of hunt and kidnap than rescue operation, but it provided him with an endless supply of potential recruits for his army.
Anyone who couldn’t be used as bodies for the super hunters or added to their armies, were left to the whim of Ruler. Despite successfully kidnapping many innocent people, the refugee camp was not overflowing. He assumed many of them died one way or another, but with his barracks a mile from the camp, he wasn’t privy to the details and he didn’t want to be either. That was Gray’s problem and he was happy to leave him to it.
His men were known as Hull’s Army and they weren’t the best, but he’d seen worse. By integrating their weapons capability with super hunters and their hunters, he was convinced they were a force to be reckoned with. With over two thousand armed men and a limitless supply of super hunters and hunters, he figured that the next time he met Gears and his troops they wouldn’t win so easily. For the past four months he’d obsessively focused on building a fighting force capable of taking over their bases. He’d been on track to attack the bases again in the next few weeks, when Ruler flounced in, with his skin flapping wildly, and declared he had to destroy the Ranch and kill everyone in it. He was told the destruction of the Ranch was to become his number one priority, and if he fucked up again he would be skinned alive.
Working closely with the super hunters gave him considerable insight into how their world worked. He’d learned being dead no longer offered eternal peace. The victims of the super hunters were technically dead, but not quite. The super hunters would take over the bodies of the living by infecting them with the hunter virus they carried. Aware of their existence and actions, but unable to control themselves, the victim was absorbed into a shared consciousness. From time to time the super hunters would allow their co-inhabitant a voice, and listening to the desperation of the living soul inside them was harrowing. Those poor souls were trapped inside their own bodies with a demon that possessed and controlled their every moment.
When he told Ruler to hand over control of the super hunters he’d taken on more than he intended. The super hunters were not mindlessly obedient puppets. They were demons who enjoyed their power. Functioning without empathy, compassion or interest in anything other than their own entertainment, they obeyed him only because Ruler told them to. The moment Ruler changed his mind he knew they would enjoy breaking him apart, owning his body and tormenting his soul for all eternity. He was under no delusions as to the deal he’d made, but even if he regretted it there was no turning back now. The deal was done, and if he didn’t win the war against Gears, he’d sold his soul for nothing.
“Why doesn’t Ruler ask about my plans himself?”
Gray sighed. “He’s busy.” Then smiling proudly, he added, “I caught Pax.”
It was a blatant lie, but Gray frequently lied. “No you didn’t, Gray. My men caught Pax and handed him over to your guys. I was there.”
Gray looked confused and said vaguely, “Oh yeah.”
In the months he’d known him, Gray had deteriorated from a slick, well-polished looking man into an unkempt, shuffling drug addict.
“Are you still poppin’ meds?”
“What do you mean?”
“Never mind. Tell Ruler I’m planning to take twenty men and a couple of super hunters. We’ll drive down and recon the Ranch before we attack.”
Looking worried, Gray asked, “Twenty men? Do you really think that’s enough?”
He wasn’t interested in what Gray thought would be a decent fighting force. “I don’t see why not. It’s not a base. From what Ruler told me, it’s some kind of hippy commune.”
“Have you been there yet?”
“No, but I’m leaving tonight. I’m driving down with Spud. We’ll park a few miles from the Ranch and take a look, but I’m not expecting much. That’s why I don’t understand why Ruler wants it destroyed. If you ask me we’re just gonna to tip our hand, and then Gears’ will know what kind of capability we have. I’d rather take fewer men and not give Gears any idea of how well prepared we are.”
Gray scratched his chin. “No. You need to take at least a hundred men, and three or four super hunters. And if you don’t want to tip off Gears then you’d better kill everyone there. Dead people don’t talk.”
“That’s not true anymore, Gray.”
“You know what I mean. Why do you have nit-pick all the time?”
“You sound like a whiny woman.”
With a sudden shift of mood, Gray chuckled. “Look at us. We’re like an old married couple.”
“You’re gettin’ to be very weird, Gray.”
Leaning forward with his elbows on the table, Gray asked intently, “Whatever happened to the idea that we should kill Ruler?”
“You said yourself he can’t be killed.”
“Yes, and you said killing him would at least get him away from us.”
Over four months ago they’d talked about killing Ruler, but the idea had come and gone in his mind. If they killed him there was no guarantee he wouldn’t return somewhere near him. With so many demons now walking the earth, he thought killing Ruler was effectively committing suicide and he wasn’t ready to do that.
“It’s all gone a bit far for that, mate. We missed our window.”
With his face falling, Gray replied, “I suppose so. When will you be ready to attack the Ranch?”
Running some calculations through his mind, he said, “Give me a few days to recon the Ranch, decide the plan of attack and then it’ll take a week to set up a convoy and head down. The more men you make me take, the longer it’ll take to set it up.”
�
�You need to take no more than a week, Hull. You know how impatient Ruler can be.”
“I know that and the fewer men I take, the faster we can do the mission, but until I recon the Ranch I can’t be sure how many men I’ll need.”
“Ruler isn’t going to like that answer. You need to accelerate your plan.”
CHAPTER TEN: A Horseman unleashed (Gears)
After spending the night in the offices at the ammunition factory, they decided to check the fifty thousand pallets of ammo in Warwickshire. Hoping to confirm the consignment was still intact, they were travelling down the motorway towards London. The countryside remained stunningly quiet, but having learned how many people were hiding in the U.S., he suspected there were survivors here too.
It was late afternoon and they stopped in a town called Henley-on-Thames. Philip said it was once one of the most expensive areas in the UK. Climbing out of the vehicle and looking around the small town center, he didn’t understand why. The area consisted of old and modern buildings crushed together along a narrow main street. Shop fronts still displayed their dusty goods and cars were haphazardly parked on the narrow sidewalks. Other than the quaint bridge they’d driven over, the place looked tired and ordinary, much like any country town in the southern states.
Stretching his stiffened body, he radioed TL. “Where do you wanna stay for the night?”
TL was standing at the end of the road that led to the bridge and the river. “There’s a row of townhouses overlooking the water. That’d be a nice view.”
Rolling his eyes, he replied sarcastically, “Oh yeah, ‘cos I base all my decisions on where there’s a nice view.”
Deciding to walk to the townhouses with TL, he waved to the shooter driving their vehicle and told him to park closer to the properties. A weaving path barely visible under the grass and weeds traced the line of the river. Rotted wooden stumps, once used to moor small riverboats, stood above the water line. He noticed a building at their end of the bridge was a traditional British pub, and he supposed full of life it might have had its charm, but everything looked old, dirty, and well used.
