The sound of a shotgun blast ripped across the plateau, echoing off the woods around them. The entire camp went immediately silent.
“Godfuckingdammit people!” Jack's voice bellowed through the silence following the blast. “Y'all need to shut the fuck up! Are you trying to bring the undead down on us?”
Mark sloughed slowly through the ice-crusted mud, moving towards Jack's voice and the light of the fire. The dancing shadows cast by the roaring fire in the crowded and cluttered camp were too unnerving for him to linger by himself. The silence that followed Jack's roar was palpable before he finally spoke again.
“Where in hell is Esme? Where is my wife?” he roared.
He was irate that he had dragged his butt out into the night, worried for her life, when she was already up here. She should have handled this nonsense herself.
“She was playing hearts with the women about an hour ago, over in Fred and Nancy's tent,” a man that Mark had seen, but didn't know, called from the far side of the fire.
Mark moved into the clearing around the bonfire just as Jack moved off through the opposite end of the firelight. He wasn't sure if he should follow, assuming that a domestic spat was about to start. Mark decided to sit down and wait by the warmth and light of the fire for Jack to return. He couldn't help but notice the eyes of a few men on him. He knew that he was the object of a great deal of scorn and ridicule among the refugees, earning the nickname of 'Jack's baby' or just 'the baby'. His only contribution thus far had been to help set up the wiring needed for Jack to sell electricity to the group. Other than that, he spent nearly all of his time in the cabin. The only times he had ventured up to the camp were on the occasions that Jack needed him and for the beginning of today's celebration. In those cases he had always remained in Jack's shadow.
Numerous sets of eyes were boring through his head at that moment, and he actively avoided meeting their gaze. His palms started to sweat and he could feel the need to squirm away growing stronger with each passing moment. This was a feeling he hadn't encountered since high school gym class. The blood was rushing to his face, and he stood up and started anxiously scanning the camp for Jack. He wanted nothing more than to slink back through the campsite and run back to the cabin. Only the real, tangible fear of the stretch of darkness that lay spanning from the base of the plateau to the front door of the cabin kept him pinned in place. Even though he was too scared to run back to the cabin alone, Mark knew that if the drunken men approached him threateningly, that he would without hesitation.
“Hey, boss!” One of the men's voice rose above the drunken grumbling. “Boss.”
Mark did his best to ignore the call, until the man stood up and started walking over to him.
“Boss!”
Mark finally raised his eyes up, meeting the man's gaze. He was a slender fellow, with a rolled cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth.
“Yeah?” Mark managed to reply quietly.
“That Chinese girl you with. . .do she got a sideways hoo-ha?”
The rest of the men broke down into peals of laughter at this point. Mark was infuriated by the question, and took a couple steps back towards the cabin, eager to be away from the Neanderthals. The skinny man turned to the laughing crowd, and looked legitimately confused by their laughter.
*
Bob lay down on his side and took a few moments to recover from a massive coughing fit. His low, pained moans sent goose flesh down the spines of the rest gathered around the fire. Sophie whimpered and slid behind Jen. Only Luna was oblivious to the eerily familiar moan. It took a few sips of coffee and nearly a full minute before Bob was able to compose himself enough to continue speaking.
Tim took the pause in storytelling to take a walk out into the darkness. He wanted to scout the perimeter, but more so, he wanted a moment to his own thoughts. The months of boredom had surely piqued his curiosity in Bob's story, but hearing the man's tale about the beginning of it all brought him back to the warehouse, when everyone was still alive and relatively unscarred. His thoughts drifted to the immediate terror of those first few days. Hope still bloomed in their hearts that everything would get sorted out and return to normal. That naivety was crushed when Lilly, his best friend's wife and Sophie's mother turned undead and, took her son as well. These thoughts led him to think of Bjorn, something he avoided doing when possible. Bjorn carried the sadness of that loss on his face for the remainder of his short life. Tim knew a large part of the man had died in that warehouse. If it weren't for his own feelings of loss for his friend, he might have thought that Bjorn's death was a blessing. In the end, his friend had died on that frozen lake so that they could all live. His daughter and some fond memories that were painful to remember were the only things he left behind.
Tim sighed heavily, pushing the excess weight off his heart. He forced his attention back to the task at hand. He waited for his eyes to adjust before making a quick but stealthy loop around their campsite. All was quiet, save the crickets. Tim had been making a habit, since they were on the road again, to pay attention to the fauna. He was trying to find patterns in behavior, whether birds took flight and crickets grew silent when the undead were about. Thus far, his studies had yielded nothing, but he hoped that if he paid close enough attention, that he could find something that might help them in the future. By the time he returned to the campfire, Bob was back in the seated position and continuing in his slow storytelling.
*
“There were about seventy of us in total in the embassy, mostly attaches and office workers, though there were a few custodial staff and cafeteria workers as well. There were only a dozen servicemen, including Hank and I. The two of us didn't trust Wringle a bit, so every few days we would sneak up to the helo and check to make sure it was still operational. We really were worried that he might do something, sabotage it or something. But while we were there we would turn on the controls to see if we could hear or hail anything on the radio. Wringle kept the embassy's only comm set locked away in his office. He refused to let anyone else use it. He was our only source for information about the outside world. There was a lot of grumbling among the other servicemen about that, and other things.
“Wringle was a slimy bastard and Hank and I, we just weren't willing to accept his word blindly. It was March 8th when we finally got a response on the radio. We were beginning to think that Wringle was right before that call came across. They identified themselves as US Central Command, after they verified our credentials, we apprised them of our situation. They offered us nothing in return at first, no information, no news. After a few minutes of contact, they cut communication, ordering us to contact them daily at the same time. It was strange, but we were just happy to have contact with the world again. It rekindled our hopes that we would get out of our situation and hopefully get back stateside. Hank and I both had families.”
Bob choked back a frog and talked through the hoarseness in his throat until it cleared.
“That's how it went for the next ten days. We got some bits of information, only if the operator's CO wasn't in the radio room. Mostly, though, it was a one-way street, us apprising them. We tried contacting them more often, whenever we could slip to the rooftop without Wringle finding out. The info we managed to get out of them was mostly in the early morning, when the brass was still in their quarters. The rank and file would tell us their stories or stories they heard. Most of it could've been bullshit, but it was good to hear news, any news, from back home. We were informed that the remnants of the government were holed up in Cheyenne mountain, in the old NORAD base. They were real strict about what they shared, they wouldn't provide us with any logistical information, though they demanded to know our numbers, ranks and ability to transport. Typical chain of command, “need to know” BS you get used to being in the service.”
Bob took a long pull of the whiskey and stared off into the darkness. Tim could see the glint of firelight off the tears that welled up in the man's eyes before he started anew
.
“Found out about Dallas-Fort Worth, though, they let that one slip.”
“What happened in Dallas?” Jen asked quietly.
Since Bob started his story, Jen sat transfixed. Storytelling was the new television, and they all soaked it in, hoping for as much detail as the man could muster. The depths of darkness outside their fire-lit circle let their imaginations carry them off to London, a place none of them would ever see with their own eyes. Instead, they saw it through Bob's.
“Gone,” Bob said with finality and wiped the filthy sleeve of his flight suit across his eyes.
“Family there?” Tim queried sheepishly, though, with Bob's reaction, he knew the answer already.
“Wife and three kids on base.”
The silence that followed was long and pensive. All of them looked inwards as the fire popped and cracked, thinking of what they had all lost so far.
“New York is gone too,” Will said at last. “Saw that with my own eyes. The explosion blew me off the moped I was on.”
Bob nodded silently, he considered the information for a minute before talking.
“Probably some kind of containment contingency plan. They have them for all types of scenarios. We had heard they were using manpower to channel people away from the cities but the damn virus moved too fast, all they did was string out large numbers of troops across the length of the interstate systems. Could've used those troops to fight the things. Instead . . . well, you know the rest.”
“It's a virus?” Laura asked, standing for the first time since the fire was lit “How is it passed? Is it airborne?”
Bob held up his hand in response until her questions petered out.
“Sorry, didn't mean to get your hopes up. We came to call it a virus because it seemed to spread like one, y'know, person to person. We heard every kind of story you could imagine about it, from space bacteria to God's wrath to global warming thawing out a virus that was trapped in the permafrost. I have no answers for you in that department. Whatever it is though, no one was ready for it and from the transport we were assigned to later on, it looks like it hit everywhere.”
Bob took another pull from his tin coffee mug and sighed heavily.
“There were some good stories shared on the radio some mornings, tales of heroism. . . of great battles and small ones. All of them were Pyrrhic. We finally got our orders on March 26th. We were ordered to fly out the next morning, just Hank and I, to evac some VIPs.”
Bob looked around at the group as he struggled off the cap of the flask.
“Wringle had received a follow-up communique on his band to inform the ambassador of our orders. He was not happy.”
Bob stopped and fought off some heavy emotions before continuing.
“Can't say I blame him, y'know. I mean, put yourself in his shoes, getting told that the helicopter, the only escape from a city of a few million of those things was getting taken away. The implications of that, as well as the insult of him being told that he wasn't important enough to be evacuated. Well, he got mad and tried to have his guards stop us. It got real tense there for a bit, half a dozen servicemen with weapons drawn on us.
“In hindsight, we should have seen it coming, but we were still in our military mindset, orders being orders and such. We didn't consider the desperation that some of the others were acting upon. We were probably just too excited about getting out of there and heading back to the States.”
*
Yen finished packing his tent up and tossed it onto the pile of gear already loaded into the back of the pickup truck. Harold had lent them the truck to move camp. The day prior, Tyler Peterson, whose property they had been staying on, had returned home in the late afternoon in a foul mood. The man came by four-wheeler over to their camp which occupied at the far west edge of the acreage that he owned. Three men had come with him, all heavily armed with scowls on their faces and told Yen and his people to vacate the land. Despite the hesitation on Tyler's face, Yen could tell by the set of the other men's jaws that to argue was to risk starting a conflict. After running across the breadth of Colorado and half of Utah from a sea of undead, Yen had no desire to see any more bloodshed. In response, Yen simply thanked the man for his hospitality and assured him they would be off the land within twenty-four hours.
It didn't take long for the last of the Ute to find a new home. When Yen asked to borrow Harold's truck, the man had simply offered up his barn. It was only after the final tent was loaded onto the truck that Yen went to return the shovel he had borrowed early on from Tyler. He also brought a gift of smoked venison to ensure that there was no ill will. Though he wasn't friends with Tyler, in fact, he could tell the man wanted nothing to do with him, gift-giving was considered a duty in his household. His mother raised him to leave every person he encountered remembering him fondly and he wanted to continue the tradition in her honor. Even if the man were turning them out. Never dwell on someone else's bad behavior, he had to remind himself.
“I'll meet up with you all at Harold's” Yen called to Cesar, sitting behind the wheel of the pickup.
“You walking?” Cesar called back, craning his neck around to meet Yen's eye.
“I'll see if Tyler will do me one last favor and give me a lift.” Yen smirked back, thinking about the look on Tyler's face when he asked him for a ride.
Cesar cranked the radio and the sounds of Cannibal Corpse came blasting out of the window as he hand-cranked it shut. Yen watched as the pickup spun out and fishtailed its way down the ice crusted path toward the main road. He waited until the truck was out of sight before turning and starting off towards the ranch house with a sigh.
Approaching from the west, Yen was nearly to the cluster of farm buildings when the sounds of gunfire erupted from the driveway beyond the barn ahead. As per Tar's rules, Yen was the only one of the Ute that was permitted to carry a weapon. He drew his pistol as he skirted around the side of the barn, curious to see what was happening. He learned early on in life that people would often turn on a good Samaritan when family was involved. His mind whipped back through the years to Maria, his first girlfriend. Maria had an abusive father. The man would beat his wife and children mercilessly after he had some liquor in him with little to no provocation. Yen intervened without hesitation the first time he saw it with his own eyes. The man shoved his wife by her face through a doorway over a comment she made about the show they were watching. Yen, young and full of righteousness, put the man in a choke hold. Moments later Yen had to shield his own face as Maria's mother recovered from the fall and started slapping him. He had fled from the house and never spoke with Maria again. Thinking about that occasion, he decided that if the gunfire ahead was a family dispute, he would sneak away and return the shovel some other time.
As he eased his head around the corner of the barn he could see two men lying on the ground in front of a Police issue Ford Explorer. One of the men was very familiar to Yen, though in the snippet he caught before he ducked back, he couldn't be sure who it was. The one thing he was sure of was that both of the men were shot. Blood pooled out from underneath the two, soaking the ice and snow around them. Gunfire continued to ring out from around the box canyon created by the barn, garage and house. Without even realizing he had done it, Yen had set the shovel and venison down on the ground and moved to the corner of the barn, with his pistol in hand. The hail of gunfire ceased a moment later.
“Sidney. Get over there and make sure they're dead,” shouted a voice that Yen recognized clearly as Tyler's.
Yen took a deep breath to steady himself, knowing he was going to act, but just not yet, how. If he stopped to think about what he was about to do, he would never do it. From the corner of the barn, he waited for the man to approach the bodies. He scanned the bodies on the ground and though he didn't let his attention linger, he thought that he could see the telltale movement of a chest rising and falling. A moment later, a man dressed in hunter's camouflage stepped forward into the open. Yen raised his weapon in resp
onse to the man, and waited. The man moved slowly and cautiously, eyes never leaving the two prone forms on the ground. He held a scoped rifle in his hands. If he had taken his gaze off the bodies for a moment he would have immediately spotted Yen, wearing blue jeans and a black parka standing in stark contrast to the snowy landscape. He didn't look away. The man stopped abruptly, about fifteen feet from the bodies. Having also noticed the signs of life, the man started raising the barrel of the rifle towards them. Yen squeezed the trigger and watched the man crumple to the tire-packed snow; a mist of blood spurted out from the back of the man's head as he fell.
*
Mark couldn't tell if the heat in his cheeks was from anger, embarrassment or if it was just from his proximity to the huge bonfire. He wanted nothing more than to meld back into the darkness and disappear altogether. As his tension peaked, the sound of a loud argument came from the opposite side of the fire. All heads turned as Esme, followed by Jack, walked into the clearing, bickering loudly. The crowd hushed and everyone watched until the pair moved off back down the slope towards the cabin. Mark hurried to follow after them and get away from these people. Someone made a quiet remark and the sound of many voices raised in laughter reappeared behind as the darkness enveloped him once again.
A Spring of Sorrow Page 10
