Z Strain

by SJ Morris

Tears flooded my eyes and I reached over and grabbed Lance. I turned around and smiled from ear-to-ear at Allycia and Tyler.

  “We made it! We’re here, guys! Justin, let us in before we get eaten!”I yelled at the silver box louder than I probably should have.

  There was a quick buzz before a bar dropped from between the gates and a row of spike strips, I hadn’t seen previously, turned over in the ground a foot from the gate. Then, finally, the gates swung open.

  I pulled through and the gates shut behind us.

  I only rolled towards the cabin another 30 feet or so, and I was stopped by a huge, solid, metal door surrounded by a concrete wall that stretched as far as I could see. With another buzz, the metal gate opened. I drove a little further and saw a light come on from one of the cabin windows in the distance.

  I didn’t remember there being such a large amount of cleared land around the cabin, but between the concrete wall and the tree line that surrounded the cabin, there was a large amount of ground that looked like it was turned over on each side of the gravel driveway.

  “What’s going on, Mom?”

  “I don’t know, Lance. We were here two years ago and nothing was like this. I can’t see much in the dark but it looks like there’s a field out here that has just been primed for planting crops. Maybe Justin knows something we don’t. Let’s just get inside and ask him.”

  Allycia was crying again, but this time, she had a huge smile on her face. She was happy and she finally felt safe.

  Right at this moment, that was all that mattered to me.

  Chapter 6

  We pulled up to the front of the cabin and there was a total of four trucks out front. One, I knew to be Justin’s, but the others, I had never seen before.

  The trucksI didn’t recognize had Delaware, Maryland, and New Jersey license plates. I sure hoped that after what we had just gone through we weren’t walking into some kind of trap.

  It’s amazing how my mind worked its way right toward the worst possible scenario.

  At this point, though, I was pretty much ready for anything, so I told the kids to stay in the truck and tucked my gun into the back of my waistband.

  It scared the crap out of me to do this because I was so worried I was going to literally shoot my ass off, but with my jacket zipped and taped up in every other possible hiding place, that was the only spot left to put it so that the gun couldn’t be seen from my front. I cautiously walked up to the porch steps in front of the door and another light came on.

  Justin opened the door with a huge smile on his face, but it quickly dropped to a frown.

  “What happened to you? You smell terrible…And, what are you wearing?”

  “Well, nice to see you too! Before you get any explanations from me, who do these trucks belong to and why are they in my driveway?”

  “It’s kind of a long story Abby, but they’re friends. Come on in, get washed up, and we’ll talk this all out. Where are the kids? Ugh, I assume they couldn’t stand the way you smell, so they decided to walk?”I had never heard Justin blather on like that. He didn’t seem to want to take a breath in-between questions.

  Now, I was on high alert.

  “No,”I said very curtly,“They are locked in the truck, safely, until I can make sure that the people who own these trucks are not here to hurt them. We have seen and done some crazy shit in the last few hours and I am in no mood for games or jokes, especially when it comes to who is in my house, Justin!”

  “It’s okay Abby, they’re all military friends of Jack’s. Apparently, he had them all in on the little secret of what the government could possibly be hiding and he let them in on his little contingency plan, too. These men did the fences and the extra security around the property as well as a few other improvements. They’re good guys. They have been here for a few days now, getting the place ready for you and the kids.”

  “Really?”My anger deflated almost immediately with Jack’s name mentioned.“I have to go get the kids. They’re probably dying from the smell in the car.”

  “Yeah, what is that, by the way?”

  “I guess your trip up here was smoother than ours, then? You didn’t come across any zombies?”

  “Zombies? No... but you have?”

  “Yes, hence the smell. Let me get the kids and I’ll get cleaned up. Then, we can all have a nice long talk about what the hell is going on. I would definitely like to meet these friends of Jack’s too, please.”

  “Oh sure! Go get the kids and I’ll get everyone else together in the living room.”

  I turned and bounced down the stairs of the porch very happily. The kids jumped out of the truck right away, seeing how happy I was as they took huge deep breaths of clean fresh air. I laughed a little and told them to grab what they needed for tonight and to head on inside. Justin was there to greet them at the door and I looked around to make sure the coast was truly clear.

  Once I was satisfied with my sweep, I started to un-duct tape myself so I could get out of my stinky clothes.

  It was so nice to be somewhere that was familiar.

  Well, kind of.

  At least, while we were here, there was no real worry about what was around the next corner. It was like a weight was lifted off my shoulders.

  One that I wished would stay away for a very long time, but I had a feeling that it wouldn’t.

  These men, these friends of my husband, would not have spent all their time and money putting up two barriers around my 60-acre plot of wooded land if there wasn’t an extreme threat of needing the safety that they would provide. I was going to meet these men and I would ask them about their motivation, but right now, I wanted to get my kids situated and myself cleaned up a little. It had been a very long day. I took my leather jacket, pants, and gloves off and had all the duct tape rolled in a ball. I found a garbage bag and tied them up in it. I would wash them thoroughly tomorrow; right now I needed to meet my new guests.

  I walked inside and there were six new people, that I didn’t know, staring back at me from the living room. I was always awkward when meeting new people and this was certainly a new experience for me. What was I supposed to say?“Hey, looks like we're going to be surviving the zombie apocalypse together, nice to meet you all.”I got a little flustered with the quiet stares and ended up just blurting out the first thing that came to mind.

  “I had to kill a zombie or two to get us here and they smell really bad when they die... again. So, sorry if I smell a bit”

  It was definitely the weirdest conversation starter ever, but it is what my brain came up with.

  A man that looked about my age grabbed what appeared to be his daughter by the shoulders and whispered to her to go off to bed and that he would be in to tuck her in shortly.

  The young girl looked back at me and smiled a huge smile. It seemed that she knew more than I did about what was going on and thought my uncomfortable introduction to the group was funny.

  Right off the bat, I liked her, whoever she was. It also made me happy that she looked to be Allycia’s age.

  Justin stood up and cleared his throat uncomfortably.

  “Everyone, this is Abbigail, Jack’s wife. These are her children, Lance, Troy, and Allycia,”Justin said as he motioned to my kids, who were unwrapping their duct-taped leather outerwear and unloading their backpacks on the dining room table.

  The kids all kind of said hello and did a casual uncomfortable wave to the group of people they had never met before sitting in the living room of their own house.

  I chimed in to try and break the ice a little better this time.

  “So, it appears that you all knew Jack, and he shared some things with you all that were very secretive, so you must have been on very good terms with him. He may have mentioned you in conversations before, but we have never met formally, so why don’t we do some introductions?”

  A tall dark skinned man with a shiny shaved head who had the broadest shoulders I had ever seen stood up.

  “Ma’am, my
name is Thomas Buckeneye. I was in the military with your husband a very long time ago and I currently reside in southern New Jersey and work in construction, ma’am.”He sat back down in the love seat and he just about took up the entire thing himself he was so big; Not fat big, though, but muscle big.

  I was certain that he could single-handedly be responsible for the six-foot cement block wall that now surrounded the property.

  Next, a very tan, tall, blond Caucasian man stood up with a petite red headed woman standing next to him.

  “I am Daniel Bakers and this is my wife, Kristen. I was also in the military with your husband, Mr. Buckeneye, and Mr. Bryant whom you will meet next. This is our son, Chase, and we’re from Delaware.”He pointed to a very handsome young man that looked like he could be his father’s twin, they looked so much alike.

  I guessed Kristen was so petite that her genes had no say in what her son looked like.

  “It is a pleasure to meet you and your family. Jack had nothing but wonderful things to say about all of you and I have been waiting a long time to make your acquaintance.”

  That sounded like he was uncomfortable, too. I have been waiting a long time to make your acquaintance...

  Who says that anymore?

  However, I told myself that if Jack trusted this guy enough to have him come here, I would give him a chance; especially after my own outburst in front of these people. Everyone was entitled to a second chance at introductions after they weren’t so nervous, right?

  The last person in the room that I didn’t know was the man that had told his daughter to go to bed. He stood up and he was a very shrewd-looking man with an extremely squareface. If I ever pictured a jarhead, this guy was it. He was just as tall as Thomas Buckeneye but he wasn’t as huge in the muscle department. Although he was proportionate to his height, that was, as my best guess, six-foot-five. He still looked like he could bench press a Chevy with no problem. He had dark hair that was clipped close to his head and dark eyes that seemed to be looking for danger everywhere.

  “My name is Christopher Bryant and you saw my daughter, Christine before. I also was in the military with these gentlemen, and your husband. My daughter and I drove in from Maryland last week when we got the call from Troy that things were probably going to go south. I assume you got that very same call?”

  “Yes, we did. Has anyone heard from Troy today? He said he was going to try and call again if he could, but his number was blocked so I couldn’t call him and I haven’t heard from him yet.”I said as I pulled my cell phone from my pocket and saw that there were no missed calls or messages. Everyone was in agreement that they had not heard from him.

  “So does everyone know how I met Jack and well... Troy?”

  “I know that you two met at the CDC in Georgia but Jack never really gave me the details.”Justin jumped into the conversation, finally.“From what I have heard is going on now I assume that being at the CDC has something to do with the outbreak on the news,”Justin said this as he pointed to the TV that I hadn’t even noticed was on since it was muted.

  What I saw was frightening on a whole new level.

  There were people in the streets running away from the open bloodied arms of monsters. That was the only way I could describe them. When they were grouped together, going after people that were alive, just like they had once been, it hastily became a feeding frenzy when someone went down.

  “Where is this? There’s no caption on the screen... Turn the volume on.”

  Justin looked at the screen and then looked around for the remote. He finally grabbed it and un-muted the atrocities that were on the screen. There was screaming, and running, and dying…a lot of dying.

  The newswoman was saying that the camera crew who was broadcasting these images in a second story apartment building was in downtown L.A. and they were barricaded inside.

  “The crew has told us that they have learned to keep very quiet. It seems that when infected individuals hear noise, it attracts them. They have found that if they make noise, one or more of the infected will try to get in. If they remain quiet, the infected go away after a few minutes. It appears that the people infected with this unknown virus have lost all motor skills since they cannot seem to open doors, but this may only be those that are heavily afflicted, which we are seeing now.”

  “Are they kidding? They are still calling these people sick like they can be cured! This is going to cause a lot more people to be killed. I can’t believe that this has been on the news for hours and they are still making it sound like this could just go away with a vaccine! Can’t they see that these people aren’t sick? There's no going back from this. Once you are infected, you are dead already. And it’s in Los Angeles. It’s widespread throughout the states, now!”I said this with tears in my eyes. I blinked a few times and bowed my head to get them to go away. My tears might have gone away, but the solid ache in my stomach just kept getting worse. I sunk to the floor on my knees and Allycia came over to hug me on the floor. Lance and Tyler just put their hands on my shoulders.

  They knew I had just about reached my breaking point after today’s events. I looked up to the people now taking residence in my home and they all averted their eyes away, but Justin looked stunned. I wiped my face quickly. I had my pity party and those few seconds were all I was going to allow myself.

  I stood up defiantly.

  “I killed three people today and Lance had to kill one, also. This is real and it’s here. Not just here in the sense of a few infected here or there either. If it’s this widespread in L.A., then it is only a matter of days before it’s absolutely everywhere.”

  Allycia started to sob in my arms again. I decided that she had had enough for one night.

  “Tyler, please take Allycia to her room and make sure that she gets to bed. Lance, you had a hand in what went on today, so if you are up to it, we need to have a discussion with our new friends here about what’s going on.”

  “I’m good, Mom.”

  I squeezed Lance's hand, handed off Allycia to Tyler, and gave her a brief hug. No more tears for me, no more being vulnerable. We had to do something to be sure we were all safe and getting here was the worst part so far. I was not going to let it get to me anymore. What was done was done.

  “Justin, when did you get here and did you see anything out of the norm, or run into any infected?”

  “No. Jessica, David and I got our camping gear just like we planned, and headed here. We didn’t get a phone call from Troy. I guess he knew we were coming anyway and that you would plan for the worst.”

  “So, I assume you know what’s going on since there were visitors here when you got here?”

  “Kind of. They filled me in a little.”

  “So, Mr. Bryant...”

  “Call me Chris, please.”

  “Okay, Chris. When did Jack first let you in on what happened to him and his team in Africa?”I looked at the former marine, trying to look just as stone-faced as he was, but as soon as I finished asking my question, he lost a little bit of his scariness.

  “Africa? That’s not what Jack told me.”

  “Okay, so let’s hear what Jack told you since I apparently haven’t heard it.”I sat next to him on the end of the couch he was sharing with Dan, Kristen, and Chase. There wasn’t enough room for me so I sat on the arm and it put me in very close proximity with this dangerous-looking man. At least he had to look up a little to look me in the eyes.

  “Alright, I guess I’ll just start from the beginning. Jack and I go all the way back to boot camp. He and I both excelled from the moment we started our training and became quick friends. We were both at the top of our class and both went to sniper school together. After sniper school, I went off to Ranger training and he left to be a Navy Seal, or so he told me. I came to find out later that he was part of a task force that really didn’t have a name. The team went from place to place, taking care of situations that needed to be kept very quiet, but needed more manpower than just one opera
tive could supply. I can’t get into many details because that’s all he really told me about it. He did tell me that they had been sent to Afghanistan on a mission in a very remote, mountain area. He said they were tasked with wiping out a small village; all the inhabitants had been labeled insurgents. This pretty much meant killing every living thing in it and then, what he called,‘sterilizing’it. He said it meant to make it like it was just another random ghost town. He said that normally, this would take the ten-man team one or two nights at most, but he said once they got to the village and did their recon, they knew something wasn’t right. It was only a family of about thirty living together in seven or eight small homes with a well in the center of the village, but none of the people really came out of their homes. There was a large structure with a long table near the well that would have normally been used for family meals daily, but there was almost no one around. Jack said that he only saw two or three people run to the well for water very quickly for the first few days and the third day no one left their homes at all. He said the team frequently heard moaning or screaming coming from the houses but no one came out. Jack said they reported their findings and were told to retreat with no further orders, other than to not engage. One of the men broke his ankle on the way to the extraction point so it took them longer to get back than planned. He said they saw three fighter planes level the entire valley where the village was, with two passes. This was when Jack knew something was wrong. If they needed the village wiped out, then they could have told the team to infiltrate the homes and take out the residents like they had done countless times before. He said something was definitely not right about that mission. He said it had to be a biological since the team was subject to a full physical workup when they returned.”

  It was difficult to hear that before I met my husband he was a ruthless killer for the government, but it was his past that got us to where we were today. My heart ached to know that he had done those things and knowing him, he kept all of that with him. All of the faces of the people he killed would have stayed with him. I am sure that’s why he made it his remaining life's mission to help people after he was released from the military.