by TJ Weeks
“Asshole!” She said dusting herself off. “Let’s go!” Karen stated.
The five did not take any time to get to the front door and check the parking lot. With no rotters in sight, Lisa made a bee line for the truck and backed it up as close as she could to the door. Kris and Sandra began throwing things in the back while Tina and Karen stood guard inside and Lisa watched the outside.
“Here it comes!” Tina shouted. Karen thrust her knife forward and stabbed a woman in the face, she pulled it out and stabbed her again in the top of the head before she was dropped to the floor. Tina could hear banging in the aisles of the store and watched for another one to round the corner.
“Guys, we may have to hurry a little fucking faster with that shit!” Tina whispered to Kris and Sandra.
They hurriedly began to pass things to each other quicker than they had before. Tina took a step forward and viewed the skinless bastard coming toward them she stepped out of his sight. Once the smell hit the rotter’s nose, he began to try and charge them but his limp prevented him from going any faster. Tina watched for his foot to round the corner and swung for him as soon as she saw it. She hit the display shelf that they had emptied earlier and had to pull her knife back to charge it towards him again. He was able to reach for Tina before she was able to come back down with her knife. She held him back with all of her might, while Karen tried to make her way to the other side of him. She was able to get to his head when his mouth opened and showed Tina his brown rotted teeth. Tina’s eyes widened, knowing that she was getting ready to end up like Rachel. Karen, Kris, and Sandra came down on the man’s head all at once with their weapons. The man fell on top of Tina and brain matter splattered onto the three that had saved her. Kris pulled Tina out from under the rotter and to her feet. She pushed her towards the back of the truck making her sit on the bumper. Tina wiped the red smudges of blood from her lips from the rotter and the yellow brain splatter from her hair.
“Thank you.” Tina managed to get out to the others. Karen picked up the remaining pieces of wood and the few tools that remained on the floor and threw them into the back.
“Get the fuck in and hurry!” Karen
whispered.
They all four climbed in and Kris banged on the side of the truck.
“Let’s go dammit!” Kris yelled to Lisa. She stomped on the gas and the four fell from standing to lying on the bottom of the truck.
Karen raised her head to four rotters making their way out of the store. “Look.” She told the others.
All peered at the small mass of them headed to follow the truck.
“Shit, I’m glad we got the hell out of there.” Sandra stated. The four were able to catch their breath when they felt the truck stop. The door slammed and Lisa appeared to them in the back.
“Everyone okay?” She asked her group. “We are good. Let’s just get back.” Kris stated. Lisa jumped down and back to the driver’s seat. Karen heard the door slam and the truck began to move, but slowly.
“What the hell?” Tina questioned the others.
Kris climbed the side of the inside of the truck and sliced through the canvas cloth that covered them. She was barely able to see over the top of the truck when she stuck her head through the hole.
“There are rotters. She must have hit one and it went under the tires.” Kris told the group down below.
Lisa revved the engine and the truck climbed the rotter and fell hard back to the pavement and sped on. The other three looked out of the back and saw two women laid out in the road. Their jaws still opening and closing knowing that their next meal was in that truck, but their bodies were embedded in the asphalt below them. The truck swerved and made Karen fall forward and almost out of the truck. Tina reached for her and was only able to catch her by the back of her pants. She pulled Karen’s tiny body back into the truck, but not before her head hit the small tailgate that covered the back of the truck and knocked her out. Sandra grabbed her arm and pulled her to lay her on her back.
“Karen!” Tina shouted.
Kris pulled her head back through and shimmied back down the side of the truck. She jumped next to Karen and checked her pulse.
“She is fine, just knocked out.” She put her ear to her chest and listened. “She is breathing, just give her a minute to come to.”
Tina brushed Karen’s hair away from her face and saw the blood trickling down the side of her head.
“Oh shit, I killed her!” Tina hollered. “Tina, she is okay. Just give her a few minutes. It is only a bump.” Kris told her. Sandra and Tina sat back while Kris grabbed a pack of shop rags that they had thrown in the truck. She tore it open and pressed one against the side of her head.
The truck stopped and the squeak of the gate created a sigh of relief from the women. The truck stopped inside and Lisa jumped out.
“What the fuck was that I saw in the mirror, did someone fall out?” Lisa asked holding her chest thinking she lost someone. “I couldn’t stop, there were rotters everywhere.”
“No, It’s all good. She is fine, just a little mishap. We are home, that is what matters.” Kris told her.
Karen opened her eyes and looked around her. “I was sure that I fell.” She muttered. “You did, Tina caught you and you hit your head.” Sandra explained.
“Sorry.” Tina apologized.
“I’m alive. Thank you.” Karen mumbled before closing her eyes again.
*** The training was over and I pulled the backhoe over to the gate before I broke ground with the stinger. I dug down leaving a slope to drive the backhoe into and started moving along and piling the dirt on the inside to keep kids from falling into the hole. Gizmo and Steven took turns riding with me to watch and get a better hang of it. Once I hit about ten feet, the ground turned to stone, but still had to be leery of the dirt and clay above us in case it collapsed.
“Can I give it a try?” Steven asked while squatted down against the door.
I sunk the teeth into the ground and stood up. “Get after it.” He slowly made his way up from being cramped against the door to the operating seat. He started out slow and fumbled some of the dirt back into the trench a couple of times, but got the hang of it fairly quick. “This isn’t too hard. I don’t know about digging for pipes and shit, like you used to, but this isn’t bad at all.”
I laughed. “Yeah, it’s a whole different story when having to dig and feel for pipes, but you usually have a pretty good idea of how deep they are when you start.”
“Did you ever break any?” He questioned. “I broke a couple, but they were quick fixes. Most you could just throw a clamp on. Not too many that I had to replace pipe on.” I replied.
I had him pause for a moment so I could climb out of the hole and run up to the cafeteria for something to drink.
Shianne was wiping down tables when I walked in. She looked very stressed. I walked over to a tea pitcher and grabbed a Styrofoam cup before pouring my drink, then walked over and took a seat at the table that she was cleaning.
“You alright, honey?” I asked.
“Why did mom have to go with them?” She questioned as she took a seat next to me. “She knows the in’s and out’s.” I answered. “So do some of the others. She didn’t have to go.” She stated. “That’s very true , but if I would have told her no, she would have probably went anyways and then I’d be sitting here having this conversation with you all pissed off.” I responded.
She dropped the rag on the table. “Could I go out with you next time?” I almost spit my tea on the table at the thought, but took in consideration the
circumstances. “I don’t see why not.”
“Really!” She was shocked. “I don’t know about taking you out on runs, but I think something around here would be good for all you kids. If something ever happened to me or your mom, you need to know how to protect yourself and more important, how to survive in this world.” I responded.
“I’m not a kid, dad. I’m twenty.” She made clear. “Well hon
ey, that’s still a kid to me and no matter how old you get to be, you’ll always be one of my babies.” I stated.
“I know.” She responded with a subtle smile. “Well, kiddo…I’ve got to get back to work, but I am glad you made it back to us.” I stated while getting up and heading back out.
I pushed open the chow hall doors to see the Deuce pulling back up to the gate. I started walking over but I couldn’t see who all was in it and trying to hold back thoughts of the worse.
CHAPTER FOUR
DONALD OPENED the gate and the
Deuce drove through before he closed it back. I could see an arm dragging from the under carriage and bouncing upward with each bump it was drug across. The Deuce came to a halt with its air breaks screaming. Lisa jumped out of the front cab, Kris and Tina jumped out of the back while Sandra handed down Karen’s limp body. I ran over and grabbed her feet before she was dropped out of the back of the Deuce while Sandra climbed down.
“What the fuck happened?” I shouted. “She just hit her head, she’s alright.” Kris informed. “She’s awake, just weak.” I felt something grip the bottom of my pant leg, so I jerked my leg back to see the arm that had been dangling from the under carriage was now attached to my leg and to my surprise, it was attached to a torso. I dropped Karen’s legs to the ground and tried to reach for my knife, but it wrapped up both legs and tripped me up. I fell hard on my ass and tried to sit up as fast as I could to keep it from biting me.
Steven had jumped out of the backhoe after seeing some commotion and ran over and punched it in the face and instantly screamed in pain.
“Stab the mother fucker!” I called to him. He gathered his wits and grabbed his knife and buried it into its skull. He didn’t bother pulling it back out of the rotter, he just grabbed his hand that he had hit it with.
“Goddamn, you going to just let it eat me while you try out your boxing skills or what?” I hollered in a pissed off tone as I threw its body off of me.
“I’m sorry, I just did the f irst thing that came to mind.” He replied while still holding his hand.
“Did it bite you?” I questioned.
“No, but I busted my knuckles when I hit it.” He answered. I caught my feet and pulled his hand toward me to get a better look. It appeared to be nothing more than a scratch. I tossed his hand back to him. “I’ve had bigger scratches on my dick.”
“Maybe you should stop putting your dick in rugged holes.” He suggested.
“HEY!” Kris chimed in.
“Sorry.” He quickly stated and took a fast pace back towards the backhoe.
“Lisa, can you and Sandra get Karen to her bed and keep a watch on her?” I asked. “No problem, but I’ll have to check on the plant in a few hours.” She answered. “That’s fine. If it’s just a bump on h er head and nothing serious, she should be fine once she gets some rest.” I replied.
They walked away carrying Karen. Tina started to walk away.
“Hang on there, princess.” I told her. She slowly turned around with both hands placed on her hips. “What?”
“What happened to Rachel?” I followed up with.
“She didn’t make it and why are you asking me?” She replied. “I’m not stupid, you didn’t like her from the moment she came through those gates. So what happened?” I repeated the question.
“She g ot bit and ripped apart after wandering off on her own, so I put her down.” She answered with Kris next to her agreeing.
“I’m sure you did…I need you two to gather up two teams, one to build the guard tower and the other to start building the frames to throw off into the trench once it’s finished.” I responded.
“How is that trench going to work anyways, the rotters can just walk around and walk right up the slope by the gate?” Tina asked.
“The slope will be gone when it’s finished, it’s only there now to get the backhoe down in it.” I answered.
“Hmm.” Is all she came back with before trying to walk away once again. “Oh , and Tina...You need to get your shit together. I need all of us to pull this shit together, not you being a snooty bitch and living in our past life.” I let her know real quick.
Her jaw dropped in shock, but with a loss of words and walked off.
“I’m not sure that was called for.” Kris told me as Tina walked away. “There’s a difference in going out and being here. If we can’t pull together and work together here, it will fall. When we go out, we have to work together and realize that no matter who goes out with you, they have your back or we die. She needs to keep her fight back until the fight needs to happen.” I replied.
Kris shrugged her shoulders, but nodded her head to say she semi agreed. “Either way, I need you to keep a count on supplies until Karen gets back on her feet. I don’t want my door to be the one she comes knocking on if her supply count gets messed up.” I added.
“I agree with that.” Kris stated before running off to help find some crews her husband had asked for.
Gizmo started walking out of the school. “What’s up bro, what are we doing?” “Go ask Steven if he needs some relief, if not then I’m going to need you to lead one crew and I’ll lead the other to get this shit built.” I instructed.
“10-4 little buddy!” He said as he walked off to check on Steven. I hopp ed in the driver’s seat of the Deuce and fired it up after letting the plugs charge back up and drove it closer to the gate with the tail gate towards the fence. Steven was already walking up by the time I got out.
“Need a break already, princess?” I teased. He held up his middle finger to flip me off, but quickly pulled it back to grab his hand again. “There’s no breaks going on here, it’s either working on the backhoe or working over here.”
“You want a band aide for your hand?” I teased further. “Look asshole, I’ve told you…I’m not a fighter and I’m too old for that shit.” He responded.
I started laughing at him and climbed in the back of the truck. “Can you at least hold lumber?”
“Just hand the shit down, dickhead!” He started getting irritated. I started grabbing the 2X6’s and 2X8’s that were on top and handing them down. After about a half hour, I got down to the 4X4’s and started handing them down as well when I saw Kris returning with Tina, Shianne, Howard, Bobbi and Chelley to help unload. Once I got to the bottom of the boards, I found all kinds of tools, nails, bolts and nuts to hand down as well.
We grabbed two posthole diggers and went to work digging the holes for the 4X4 posts. We dug each of eight holes three and a half foot down and then threw the posts in the holes. Kris and Tina grabbed a couple of buckets of water to bring out to us as we cut open and poured one, eighty-pound bag of Quickrete per hole. We then poured about two gallons of water in each to mix. It was starting to get dark, so we called it a day to allow the cement to harden.
CHAPTER FIVE
EVERYONE METat the chow hall
except Gizmo that kept digging on the trench. Milissa was serving some sort of make shift pizza, which was badass as that was one of my favorite foods before all of this.
Steven sat at the table with us after collecting his food. We all noticed at once that his hand was very swollen.
“Dude, your hand is fucked up? You sure you didn’t break it?” I asked.
“I’m not sure, but I know it still hurts like hell.” He responded. About that time Karen walked up and pulled up a seat. “Hope y’all don’t mind me joining you. I just wanted to say thank you for saving my ass back there.”
“No problem at all.” Kris stated.
“Yeah, I’m just happy that you’re alright.” Tina added.
“I’m fine, just have a headache.” She answered. She then turned to look at Steven that she was sitting next to. “Oh my god, what did you do to your hand?”
He held it up and rotated it from left to right. “I think I sprained it or something.” She took a closer look at it. “I can’t say for sure without looking at it more, but I think that’s a little more than a spr
ained hand.”
Gizmo walked through the door and Tina got up and walked through the line again to grab him some pizza.
“Well bro, how far did you get?” I asked. “I got about midway down the second part of the fence.” He answered. I was a little shocked from two people that had just learned how to use a backhoe that morning. “That’s pretty damn awesome.”
“Yeah, I would have stayed at it for at least another hour, but ran out of gas and couldn’t see shit.” He stated.
I took my last bite of my pizza. “I’ll refill it and get to work here in a few.”
“Why don’t you just wait until the morning?” Kris suggested. “I’ll be alright. The faster we can get this done, the faster we can get back to finding food and other things we need.” I answered.
“We can do that now.” She stated. “I’m not going back out until I c an get this place as safe as I can. It didn’t work out too well the last time.” I answered.
“It’s okay, mom. If you don’t mind dad, I’d like to come hang out with you for a bit.” Shianne stated.
I smiled. “Sounds good to me, honey.” “Well alright, but I hate sleeping without you.” Kris added. “I won’t be gone all night. Once I finish the second side, I’ll come lay down with you and we can start on the other two sides tomorrow.” I replied and gave her a kiss before excusing myself from the table.
Shianne took her last piece of pizza to go and grabbed her drink and followed me out. We walked out of the chow hall and made our way to the other side of the lot to grab a couple of cans of gas. Unfortunately we were down to only three cans that actually had fuel in them. I took a deep inhale and then exhale.
