“You okay Nal?” Linda asked, afraid the tough woman had cued in on some danger.
“Yeah,” she blurted. “It's early still and I'm not fully with it yet.”
Linda could tell that Nala was lying and she let her gaze linger on the woman for a moment longer before pushing it aside and moving off to find Sam. After the heaviest snows had settled into the mountains in early November, Sam Merrick was one of the first to wander up to the barricades. He immediately took to camp life and by the time Yen got around to interviewing him for entry, he flatly refused, stating that he wanted to stay outside the walls. Linda had no idea what Sam did previously, but he had earned the title as 'Mayor' of the north camp. The other refugees looked to him to resolve conflicts and to pass word into Donner. The guards used him to find out just exactly who was lurking about outside their walls. Linda knew that if anyone was about outside the walls that met their needs, Sam would know about it.
“Ever the diplomat,” Linda remarked to Nala, drawing her attention to the orderly queue at the man's campsite.
Sam's campsite was strategically placed at the inside corner of the L formed where the barricade moved from the wall of the junkyard toward the river. Sam had constructed walls of his own making, using what he called rammed-earth. He had built the walls to be six-feet high, completing the perimeter of his area. Sam had made a handful of stools and benches outside his domicile where he visited with his many guests. As Linda and Nala approached, there were already nearly a dozen people waiting to meet with Sam. Linda stopped at a distance and waited for Sam to spot her, after he was finished speaking with a haggard looking woman who moved away on a crutch, he stood and called out.
“Linda,” he called cheerily. “To what do I owe the honor of your company?”
“Sam,” Linda cast back with a smirk as she walked closer to speak in low tones. “We are looking for someone. Someone with a background in psychology, preferably child and adolescent.”
“Everything okay?” he asked, genuine concern shone through in his voice.
“We want to make sure that any underlying issues that the kids might be having are being addressed adequately. We want to be sure that any of the kids who might be suffering from PTSD get the help they need. Just trying to head off any issues before they become a problem.”
“Who is your friend?” Sam asked after a moment, eyeing the tense woman whose hand had not strayed from the grip of her pistol.
“This is Nala. She came in late last year from the east.”
As Sam turned to formally greet her, Nala cast a quick nod in his direction and turned away, appearing to look at something in the distance. Linda, seeing the discomfort in the interaction continued, before it could get any more awkward.
“Anyone fit that description that you know of?”
“I think I might know someone. Mary lives up north, near the parking lot. If my memory serves me, she might have done some counseling. Let me get my stuff together fast and I'll walk you up there.”
“Thanks Sam, appreciate it,” Linda replied, looking back toward Nala curiously.
As Sam moved to the line of people to inform them he was stepping out, Linda edged over to her.
“What is it Nal?” she asked quietly.
“All these desperate people, just fucking waiting, lurking. It makes me really nervous to have them just existing in squalor outside our walls, Lin.”
“Not everyone is like those people, Nal.”
Linda was referring to the group that Nala had followed west into the mountains from Fort Collins. Nala had been in a roll-over car wreck and had a broken arm at the outset of the outbreak and had fled on foot. The men were escaped convicts who were looting, raping, and murdering their way across the state. Nala had played a dangerous game of cat-and-mouse in order to stay alive. The scenario came to a bloody end a few miles outside of the east gate of Donner. Nala, at the end of her stamina and bereft of hope, decided to end their spree in a hail of gunfire.
“But some people are, Linda,” Nala replied flatly, ending their conversation by walking a half-dozen paces away.
Nala wanted nothing more than to be done with their task and back inside the walls. Finally, after a lengthy conversation with someone in the line, Sam returned to them.
“Bad news,” he stated soberly as he came over. “Mary died day before yesterday.”
“What? How?” Linda asked, surprised and concerned.
As the only doctor to attend to these people she took every death as a personal failure.
“The undead wandered into her camp. She was a newer arrival, so she camped at the fringes,” he replied matter-of-factly.
He was referring to the way the camp ran, with the newer people at the edges while those who occupied the camp for longer gravitating closer to the barricade as spots vacated. Nobody trusted any of the newcomers at first. Trust, if you could call it that, came after weeks, if not months, of familiarity. No one wanted the risk of having the new people too close.
“No one helped her?” Nala cast angrily, speaking for the first time.
“People are scared, Nala,” Sam started. “They cluster in their camps at night and pray for the morning to come. There's no guard out here, you know, even though we have asked for some many times. You can't blame people for being scared and not rushing off into the night to help a complete stranger.”
“So they let a woman die without even trying?”
“Not everyone is a fighter,” he barked back, his tone growing a bit defensive. “Some people were lucky, they fell in with the right group that got them here, but for most people, survival was just dumb luck. Worse than dumb, it was usually terrible luck at that. Most often it was their spouse, or their kid that got eaten instead of them. Even those who were prepared for the winter, with a supply of food and weapons, suffered. Shit happens. Some of the most capable people could have just got unlucky or fell in with the wrong groups and got killed. Mary was a good woman, I liked her. Her family died on the road here and her death is just one of the many tragedies you can hear about if you spend a minute to talk to these people out here. You want to be outraged? Be angry with whoever runs the guard inside. They are the ones who could help protect us, but sit up on the walls cowering in safety instead.”
*
“Are you really sure we should leave?” Laura asked her husband for probably the thirtieth time since they first spotted the helicopters.
“No, Laura, I'm not sure. But they offer us some hope for the kids,” he replied quietly.
He had been weighing his own feelings on going back out into the unknown ever since and was still trying to get his head wrapped around the idea.
“Listen, I've been thinking a lot about this place since we got here,” he continued. “We could easily stay here and while our years away, but what about Chris and her child? What about Luna and Sophie? What life would we be leaving them? Survival, yes, but also loneliness, seclusion and some pretty bleak prospects.”
Laura took his words in thoughtfully. She knew he was right, but couldn't come to terms with going back out among the dead willingly.
“Those helicopters represent hope for more than survival. We might set out and chances are we'll never find them, but I think for the kids that we have to try. There must be other survivors, groups, maybe even towns-” Tim cut himself off, refusing to let slip his deepest hopes.
In truth, he was afraid that she would destroy his secret hope. Deep down he held out hope that the undead might have been stopped at the Rocky Mountains.
“Towns like this one?” Laura answered back. “Bjorn and Nick died coming here because Will was so sure that this little shit-hole of a town might have survived.”
Tim flinched a little at the brusque way Laura mentioned the death of his lifelong friend. He paused for a moment to bite back his immediate retort. Once he composed himself, he continued.
“Will wasn't sure, but yeah, the cost was high, way too high. But where would we be if we hadn't come
all this way though? Living in the radioactive fallout from New York City? Even if not, we would still be in one of the most densely populated areas of the country. Filled with the undead.”
Tim was on edge and her words stung, as if she was saying the string of tragedies that befell them was his fault. He walked to the wood stove and got another cup of coffee so he could breathe a little and shake off the argument that was brewing. Finally, once he had composed himself, he returned.
“Look, I know you don't want to go back out there. God knows, I don't want to bring you guys back out there, I really don't. But I can't stay here knowing that there must be people out there, that there are people out there. We need to try for Luna's sake.”
“She could die!” Laura cast back angrily, still upset about the idea. “We could all die, Tim.”
“That's true,” Tim said quietly, this was the hardest part for him to rationalize. “She could, but if we stay here she could die of pneumonia or tetanus or a goddamn tooth abscess. We all could die of any number of things, now. If we don't try, we are just dooming our child to suffer out a lonely existence here until something else kills her.”
“We don't even know where they were going though,” Laura barked back, throwing her hands up in exasperation. “What are we going to do, go door to door?”
“They were flying southwest, we head that way. We can stop at every military base labeled on the map along the way to check for people. We will avoid cities to limit the danger, and who knows, maybe we find some people.”
“Like the ones that shot you?”
Tim shot her a look as if to ask Are you fucking serious?
“What?” she asked, feigning innocence. “We don't know people's motives or intentions. There could be gangs of murderers and rapists running loose. Even if they aren't evil, desperate people could rob us, steal our vehicle and food and strand us somewhere.”
Tim nodded soberly. This was one fact that he avoided thinking about. It was a harsh reality though some people would try and take. He knew that he was risking his family by pushing them back onto the road. He finally responded.
“So, we stay here forever then?”
“I don't know!” she screamed back at him, tears suddenly coming down her cheeks. “I don't know Tim, I'm just fucking scared.”
Tim moved over to her, wrapping her in his arms and whispering to her.
“I am too, Laur.”
Looking up from her shoulder, Tim watched Christine walk into the room. Seeing the two embracing she averted her eyes awkwardly and waited. Chris had lost her boyfriend, Nick, on the flight across the lakes those months ago. The meek girl had withdrawn even further after his death. Tim kissed Laura on the head and stepped away before addressing the girl.
“Hey Chris, how are you feeling?”
“I'm fucking bloated and pregnant. I'm a whale, how do you think I'm feeling?”
Tim blushed and turned awkwardly to Laura for an answer. Thankfully, she was better prepared than he to handle the situation; she put her arm around the girl's shoulders and steered her towards the couch. He lingered for a few moments before he accepted that he had nothing to offer that would be of any help to either of them.
Even though they estimated she was more than seven months pregnant, Christine's condition had only become apparent in the last couple months. She didn't put on too much, as food was limited, but what at first seemed like a little weight gain was hidden by Chris choosing to wear Will's brother's clothing. She even hid the morning sickness that lingered on in this late stage from the rest of the group.
Christine had been in denial at first. The denial had quickly turned into abject fear. She had the very real concern that the group would turn her and the baby away once it was born. The reality of sheltering a screaming, crying newborn terrified her. Luna was one thing, she was well behaved, rarely fussed, and even when she did, she was distracted easily and listened fairly well. A crying infant would attract the undead like nothing else. It was only when Jen walked in on Christine getting dressed a month or so before that the others became aware of the pregnancy. While Laura spoke quietly and calmly with the girl about the baby and what to expect in the final couple months, Tim went upstairs to the walk-up attic that was now both the kids’ play-room.
Little Sophie had taken on the role of Luna's playmate full time since she lost her father. The poor thing had lost her brother and mother early on, in the first confusing days of the coming of the living dead. Then after the grueling journey across New York state and the Great Lakes, she had lost her father. Tim had a terrible time with the loss. His friendship with Bjorn went back to their teenage years and the man was as close to a brother as he ever had. Since his death, he and Laura had showered the girl with all the affection and love they could in attempt to bring some comfort and happiness in her life. They tried to compensate as much as possible for her loss, as if that were possible. Tim always brought her back gifts from the scavenging trips he and Jen went on.
As Tim approached the door leading to the attic he could hear the sounds of the children at play, laughing and squealing. The sound of the children's unbridled joy brought a smile to his face, followed quickly after by a frown, as he thought about the prospect of dragging those sweet kids back into the dead filled world. He shook his head to clear the darker thoughts and opened the door with a big smile on his face.
“Hey guys! What are you doing?”
“Playing, daddy!” Luna called back.
His daughter was wearing an adult's bathrobe and a tiara, she had heavy blush, lipstick and eye shadow on. Sophie was behind her giggling in her own bathrobe.
“How would you ladies like to go on a trip?”
*
The two-vehicle caravan set off to the north a few moments later. Mark and Amber followed behind the filthy Bronco, keeping a buffer of a few car lengths between the two vehicles. The couple drove in silence as they wound their way through Umpqua National forest for nearly two hours before the tall conifers finally began to thin out. Houses started appearing intermittently as the miles drifted past. The two vehicles slowed to take in the scene, as the forest gave way to open fields and the city of Bend appeared sprawling out before them. Smoke clogged the sky ahead and the roadway grew more congested. Their pace slowed to a crawl as they picked their way through the stalled traffic. They were forced to a complete stop on three separate occasions. On each stop, Mark and Amber waited anxiously for the man whose name they didn't know to push or winch vehicles out of their path. On each occasion Mark cast nervous glances to the traffic around them, each time wishing he hadn't as the struggling writhing forms came into focus, thrashing about inside other vehicles.
To their left as they drove, the small city burned, completely unchecked. If not for the constant lane changes and dangers on the highway, Mark would have been transfixed on the conflagration. Unfettered by the needs of the journey, the tears streamed freely down Amber's face as she watched the inferno. Gunshots rang out frequently, and on a number of occasions they could see cars racing down the surface streets of the city. They caught glimpses of people running in full flight, and always they could see the shambling and shuffling forms of those things moving about. Mark did his best to keep his attention purely on the road and the Bronco ahead. He had a death-grip on the steering wheel and he could feel the beginnings of a panic attack creeping in. He did his best to block out the rest of the world disintegrating around them for fear that the panic would set in fully and he would need to pull over.
Once they had passed the city center, the road started to clear up. Within five minutes they were again able to move freely on the highway. The Bronco accelerated away and Mark followed suit, eager to put the disaster stricken city far behind and out of sight. The tension had been mounting as the miles moved past and it became abundantly clear to both he and Amber that the situation was much more widespread and serious than either of them had even thought to consider.
“What's happening, Mark?” Amber as
ked softly, her voice almost a whisper.
“I don't know, Amber, I really have no idea,” he replied, almost inaudibly.
An hour later, after they had passed through the barren streets of Prineville, Oregon, the Bronco put on its directional signal and drifted onto the shoulder. Mark eased the Tesla in behind the truck and noticed the man stepping out of the Bronco and beckoning him with his arm. Mark slid the transmission into park and nervously slipped out of the driver's seat. He felt awkward and vulnerable standing out on the empty roadway as he waited to see what the man wanted. His anxious mind worried that they were about to get robbed or worse. The Ochoco national forest loomed darkly, just a short distance ahead, sending a shadow of dread over Mark's heart.
“Didn't catch your names,” the man said, approaching with his shotgun in hand. “I'm Jack.”
Mark gulped past a lump in his throat. He was unnerved by the dense forest and further stressed by the speed at which Jack was approaching with the gun in his hand. He tried his best not to flinch or cower from the man. When he was within a few feet, Jack extended his hand.
“Mark,” he blurted out as he grabbed the man's hand and shook it vigorously, relieved that it was merely an introduction.
“Good firm handshake you got there Mark. My wife, Esme, is in the cab with John Jr. and Sammy, my little girl.”
“Glad to make your acquaintance,” was the best Mark could come up with. “Amber is in the car.”
Jack nodded towards the passenger side where Amber sat, staring vacantly out of the side window, before continuing.
A Spring of Sorrow Page 4
