by TW Brown
Vix felt her stomach twist. Once again, her plans involving the taking of Buckingham were doomed to end in failure. Her head dropped, and she didn’t know if she was angry or sad.
“I say we use Dolph’s own idea against him,” Paddy said, suddenly appearing at Vix’s side.
“What do you mean?” Mike asked.
Vix looked up to see that not only had many of Gary’s people come closer now that it seemed clear there would be no skirmish, but also her own rag-tag band had gathered as well. All eyes had shifted to Paddy. He grinned big and motioned for Seamus to come hoist him for all to see…and hear.
“Tell us what you mean,” Gable insisted.
“The noisemakers, you big oaf.”
***
“Dad!” Ronnie screamed as Chad jumped back.
“Run!” he shouted, breaking into a sprint.
The father and daughter ran as fast as they could, neither of them so much as risking a look over their shoulders as they did so. Chad kept just behind his daughter out of instinct and habit. Nothing was going to come from behind and take her down without going through him first.
When they reached the edge of the woods, they both began to slow down just enough so that Chad could speak through the ragged panting that was a sign of how out of shape he had allowed himself to become. He had to make a few attempts before he could actually speak.
“Zombies…hundreds of them,” he managed.
“How?” Ronni asked.
“No idea, but there is a tunnel that goes on for at least a few hundred yards. Probably farther.”
“How could the patrols from the camp miss it?”
“They probably didn’t go far enough into the woods. Plus, it wasn’t like the thing was obvious or had any signs pointing to it.” Chad slowed to a walk and finally risked a look over his shoulder. “Whatever is down there…hell…I don’t know. But I saw a helluva lot of zombies coming.”
“Did I hear a scream?” Ronni stopped at the edge of the path that would take them back to the camp.
“I think so.”
“We need to tell the coordinators here. Security is going to want to know.”
“Agreed,” Chad said with a nod. “Just let me do the talking.”
They walked the rest of the way back in silence. Every so often, each of them would look over their shoulders like they expected to see a zombie horde on their heels at any time. However, there was no sign of a single zombie. Not only that, but they could not even smell the smoke anymore by the time they reached their cabin. Stopping just long enough to deposit their gear inside the door, the two headed to the main lodge.
Chad was not surprised that the chief of security was less than pleased with their having slipped out of the confines of the authorized secure zone, but he was even more upset to discover that there might be a herd of zombies in the area—not to mention the whole thing about some possible underground bunker complex.
“I need you to take me and a team to the location,” the security chief said once Chad had finished giving every detail he could think of.
“You don’t want me to just show you on a map?”
“If that entrance is as well hidden as you say, I don’t want my people out there looking around for something and end up being overwhelmed by a possible herd,” the burly man said as he rose and grabbed his weapons belt and ushered Chad and Ronni towards the door.
Twenty minutes later, with the noonday sun shining brightly overhead, Chad and Ronni were leading a group of the recreation camp’s security personnel through the woods. Along the way, Chad learned that the security chief was a man named Mark Reynolds. The man had been in his final week of Marine Boot Camp when everything went to hell. He and a group of his fellow Marines had managed to stick together for the first several months before they even suffered their first casualty. He was serving his third tour as the security chief for this particular campground. He loved the mountains and was an avid skier.
“Sure as hell didn’t think I would ever have the chance to hit the slopes again during those first years,” Mark said with a good-natured chuckle that seemed very natural for the big man. “Can’t recall too many zee-pocalypse scenarios where folks got to take vacations, ski, and snowboard.”
“I think the movies left that stuff out,” Chad agreed.
“I gotta take your word for it,” Mark said. “Honestly, I wasn’t too into that kinda stuff back in the day. Give me a John Wayne movie or some Eastwood and I was good. I never had any use for horror. It just seemed so stupid. Monsters? No such thing…right?”
When they reached the point where they could smell smoke again, all casual conversation ceased. The rest of the team was made to spread out and told to keep their eyes open and be ready for anything. That last command proved to almost be unnecessary. Just as they reached the crest of a small ridge, the leading edge of what proved to be a relatively small zombie herd (by the current standards at least) was stumbling into view.
“This is different,” Mark said with a curt nod as he released the safety on his crossbow. “Correct me if I am wrong, but these all look relatively fresh.”
“That was what we noticed as well,” Chad agreed.
“You didn’t think that was important enough to share?” the big man grunted as he crouched down and signaled for the rest of the team to halt.
“I…uh…” Chad stammered, but Mark simply gave him a dismissive wave.
“I think we have it from here. If you think you can find your way home with no trouble, why don’t you and your daughter return to the campground?” It wasn’t a request.
Ronni opened her mouth to protest, but Chad gave her a tug and led her away before she could say anything. As it was, he thought they might be in some sort of trouble for having left the grounds. There were a lot of security issues involved. The biggest being that unauthorized movements like what he and his daughter had partaken of was a way for people to get injured and turn inside the walls. That was a big no-no.
They returned to their cabin and waited for the inevitable knock on the door. When it came, they still both jumped, neither realizing that they had gone a few hours without even speaking. Chad had actually drifted off to sleep. It was one of his quirks; if he was extremely stressed, he would often suffer a mild version of narcolepsy. Ronni simply sprawled on the bed and stared up at the ceiling, every once in a while giving her dad a nudge if he began to snore too loudly.
Chad jumped up from his chair and answered the door. No surprise, Mark Reynolds was there. He had two men with him, and all three were a mess. Chad stepped aside to welcome them in, but Mark shook his head.
“It would be best if you come out here,” the man said.
Chad felt his heart flutter just a bit. How serious was this? If it was bad, he would take all of the blame. There was no way he would let Ronni suffer or pay for this in any way. The usual punishment for something serious was banishment. He could handle that much better than his daughter. In any case, his concern obviously shown on his face, because Mark raised his hands and waved Chad off his mental ledge.
“You two aren’t in trouble.” The security chief glanced at his two comrades; one of them gave a curt nod.
Now that he thought about it, Chad didn’t recall seeing either of these men on the detail that he and Ronni escorted out to that cave or tunnel or whatever it had turned out to be.
“In fact, these men wanted to thank you personally.”
“Thank me?” Chad was beyond confused at this point.
“Mister…” one of the men began to address Chad and trailed off so that Chad could give his name.
“Just Chad, and this is my daughter, Ronni.” He reached out to shake the man’s hand but the trio all stepped back.
“We are filthy and have not been through decontamination yet,” Mark said, making an up and down gesture of his body to indicate the gore and filth that covered all three men.
“You saved a lot of people,” the stranger who had remained silent
up until this point blurted.
“Do you think the herd could have been that big of a problem?” Chad asked.
“Not to the communities in the area,” Mark said.
“But to those of us from Bio-Dome Three, you are a freakin’ hero,” the other stranger said.
“Umm…what?” Chad was not becoming any less confused by all of this talk.
“What is Bio-Dome Three?” Ronni stepped up beside her dad, sounding at least as confused as Chad felt.
“We were a research center that was converted into…” the first man paused as if searching for the right words. “Well, for lack of a better word, we were a sort of societal ark. When all hell broke loose, a group that we all have assumed to be some part of the government plucked us from our regular lives and brought us here.”
“Were you special? Doctors? Scientists? That sort of thing?” Chad asked.
“Nope,” the second man spoke, “I was a mechanic. Had a repair shop just outside of Long Beach, California called ‘Surfer Bugs’ that specialized in VWs.” The man made a slight bob of his head. “The name is Henry Johnson, I’ll definitely shake your hand later, Chad. Yours too, Ronni.”
“I was just finishing my degree and was set to be a school teacher. My name is Sigmund Flies, but just call me Siggy,” the other man said.
“I guess I am still missing something,” Chad finally mumbled. “I don’t know how I saved anybody, and I sure don’t know anything about a bio-dome.”
“Yeah, well, that is our fault,” Siggy replied. “Actually, I guess I am surprised something like this didn’t happen sooner. One of our people found a way out of the dome. She came topside and got bit. I guess we went dark before the word of the potential for immunity was put out.”
“No,” Chad said with a snort, “you didn’t miss anything. I don’t think anybody figured that out until well after the world had gone FUBAR.”
“Anyway,” Henry took up the story from where Siggy left off. “I guess the gal was bit and slipped back into the dome. She didn’t tell anybody. It wouldn’t have ended up nearly as bad if she wasn’t working as the assistant to the damn dentist.”
Chad glanced at Mark and Ronni who both wore knowing looks. It was common knowledge that a person did not need to be bitten to turn.
“Let me guess…” Ronni spoke up, “she infected a few people.”
“A few!” Henry snarled. “We have been out of gloves for the better part of seven years. The thing is, we practice good hygiene and everybody was apparently pre-screened and in top health. Nothing communicable…which sort of allowed us to regress to almost a Fifties cultural mindset when it came to that sort of thing. The bitch worked on the entire elementary and junior high classes during a two-day period. She infected over seventy children.”
Henry got choked up, and that allowed Siggy to resume telling the rest of the story. “We really must have missed holy hell up here. We stopped seeing any news feeds the day after the doors were shut. The re-supply obviously never happened, but we had a killer hydroponic system that worked using the natural underground reservoir we were tapped into. We have been using eco-fueled generators that run off waste and power our lighting system as well as a solar panel farm that we were patched into until last year when it just suddenly went offline. Hell, we were self-sufficient enough to go on forever. I guess this was going to be some sort of Mars colonization testing facility. Everything is sectioned into pods that are hooked together sort of like a train. The problem came when the infection started to spread.”
“We got locked in with those damn things!” Siggy blurted. “Somebody hit the emergency switch that put us on lockdown. That prevented any attempt at an escape and too many of our people could not accept that these children were monsters all the way up until they would vanish under a pack of them.”
“We all would have probably died in there if not for the fire,” Henry said grimly.
Just then, an explosion boomed from the direction that Chad was pretty sure had to be the general location of this bio-dome complex. A handful of smaller ones sounded right on its heels.
“Scratch that whole idea of probably,” Siggy quipped.
***
The next day, they were on the move again, and that is when Jody began to think that perhaps they were biting off more than they could chew. He quickly stuffed those thoughts, attributing them to the fact that he was simply becoming too accustomed to being a regular guy, a husband, and a father. Somewhere along the line, his relationship with Selina had taken his desire to be a soldier away and replaced it with this new cautious and perhaps even timid version of himself.
This is what gets a person killed, Jody thought as he walked along the mostly washed out remains of an old country road. When they came to the remains of a bridge, one of the people responsible for carrying the hand drawn map told him that this was the Cache River.
“We are less than a mile out, sir,” the young man reported.
Jody called everybody in; it was time to start acting like a damn soldier instead of whatever the hell it was that he’d been doing for the past few years. Hell, no wonder Danny hardly had anything to do with him lately. He had become soft, tentative, and more of a politician than a warrior.
“Okay,” he said to the expectant faces, “as soon as we cross that river, we have to consider ourselves in enemy territory. I believe that the information we were given was false, so we will have five people go across first and scout the location. Obviously I will be one of the people making that run. I am asking for four volunteers to join me.”
He had not gotten the entirety of that statement out of his mouth when several people stepped forward. Since he was not familiar with any of these people in regards to how they operated in the field, he made his selections based on a different sort of knowledge. He chose people without young children. That was also when he came to another realization that punched him in the gut: all of these people had families. They were just like him.
“Can I ask you all a question?” Jody asked the entire group. He saw nods from almost everybody. “Can a few of you tell me why you volunteered for this mission?”
One of the individuals that would be joining him raised her hand and he noticed that the entire group seemed to defer to her. He knew the woman’s name.
“Go ahead, Kary,” Jody said with a slight nod of his head.
“If there is a threat to our community, and if it is serious enough that you feel the need to send our citizens, not to mention the fact that you were personally going to oversee this mission, I felt it was my duty to be part of the team to ensure our community’s freedom and way of life,” Kary explained.
As she did, Jody saw all of the heads nodding in agreement. He felt a sense of something that he had lost a long time ago become reinvigorated. That had been the same reason that he had enlisted all those years ago. When his dad and mom asked why he would do such a thing instead of going to college, his answer had been very similar. Of course, he had also been more than a little influenced by the events of September 11, 2001.
“Okay then,” he said with a clap of his hands, “everybody else stay put until we return. If you have not heard from us by nightfall, assume something has gone critically wrong and return home. Help get the entire community activated and prepared for anything.”
A few hugs and well wishes were shared and then Jody was on the move with his squad. He was familiar with Kary. He was almost certain she had a teenaged son. Also with him was Jess Gandley, one of the women who had gone with him in the field a number of times since they had settled the community of Hope. She was a crusty, hard woman who was known for her sharp tongue but amazing heart. The other three were people that he only knew in passing.
Red shirts, his mind whispered. Every mission needs a red shirt or two.
He stuffed that thought away almost immediately. He did not consider any of his people expendable. Each of these people had friends and family back in Hope. It was his responsibility to ensure t
hat as many of them returned as possible.
They crossed the river and started across the overgrown fields that had become almost like jungles. There were places where the wild grasses grew taller than most people. That was one thing that the citizens in Jody’s community took great pains to control. Besides offering a place for zombies and raiders to use as cover, it was also a very flammable source of fuel for wild fires that could start with an errant lightning strike (if it wasn’t started by a careless human).
It was not long before they ran across the perimeter sentries. A small copse of trees on the left sat in a sea of tall grasses and out of control vines. It was one of the team Jody did not know that pointed and signaled for the group to halt. At first, Jody thought that maybe the man had imagined something, but then he caught the flash of sunlight hitting something reflective.
A few minutes passed that felt like an eternity before Jody had seen enough to formulate a plan. In the time he and the others watched, he was able to spot two single-man roving patrols. That did not mean there were not more, but at least he had a place to start.
“Can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs,” he whispered.
He broke his team into pairs and decided to partner up with Jess since he was at least somewhat comfortable with her. “This is where it gets ugly. We will move in from the front, left, and right. Jess and I will be coming from the front. As soon as the rovers leave the trees and head your way, take them down. Do it fast and then rally in the trees.”
With that, Jody and Jess started towards the trees after giving the other teams a few minutes to get wide of the location. They entered the tall grass and eventually were on their bellies just inside the trees where a small shack was built to blend in well with the greenery. Three people were visible. One was just inside the door of the hut sitting at a desk and reading a book of all things. The other two were on stumps sharpening some very nasty looking blades.
Jody pointed to the one on the left and edged that direction. Jess positioned herself for the other and they both brought up their crossbows. With one hand in the air, Jody signaled the countdown on his fingers.
