by Joseph Coley
“Yeah, and I’ve heard all the Ozzy Osbourne jokes a thousand times over. Just Jim will do.”
“Fair enough, Jim. Now, what’s our prisoner talking about? He’s finally ready to talk?”
“Yeah, said that he’s tired of not getting’ shit for food. I guess he’s used to the good life from stealin’ from other people so long. Sorry sack o’shit took more from people than death and taxes did,” Curtis interrupted. He stood with Jim Crowley as the other guard for Captain White.
“Well, let’s see what he has to say, then. I’m interested to see what he’s willing to give up,” Joe shifted the Mossberg on his back and drew his .45. He wasn’t going to take any chances with Captain White. He’d had plenty of time to heal up from the last incident that he’d had with Joe, and he did not want a repeat. “Open it up.”
Curtis stepped forward with the large chain of keys and pulled the one for Captain White’s cell. He slid the large, odd shaped key into the lock and turned. There was a soft metallic clink as the lock released. He swung the door open and immediately covered his face.
“Goddamnit White! What the fuck?” Curtis exclaimed.
Captain White sat on a small aluminum bed on the right side of the cell, his hands clasped together and elbows resting on his knees. He seemed unaffected by the horrible smell emanating from the room. He turned his head slowly towards Curtis and let out an evil grin. “I told you I was tired of asking permission to take a shit, so I used the facilities.”
Curtis stepped into the room and roughly grabbed White by the elbow, pulling him out of the cell offhandedly. Jim closed the door behind him as Joe pointed his .45 at Captain White. “What do you want to talk about, Captain?”
White made a mocking pout face. “Aww. Ain’t it nice that you still call me Captain?”
Joe narrowed his eyes. “Well, calling you ‘shithead’ was just getting old.”
Curtis pulled a set of handcuffs from his belt and cuffed Captain White’s hands behind him. He shoved White down on his knees and told him to cross his legs. The fake leg that he wore just below his right knee turned at an odd angle and pinged against the hard, concrete floor. If he decided to make a move, then that would be the end of him, as Joe kept the .45 pointed dead center in his chest. A one-legged man wasn’t a prime candidate for escaping, but they weren’t taking any chances.
“You said you wanted to talk, so start talking.” Joe stood in front of him, not blinking.
“No. You give me what I want first. I want some goddamned food and better living conditions. You give me that and I will tell you what I know.”
“You tell me what I want to know or I’ll just shove you out the door and let the dead have their way with you instead. I’m tired of fucking around with you, White. You’ve been nothing but a pain in the ass since we brought you here. As far as I’m concerned, you’ve overstayed your welcome. So either tell me something useful or join the ranks of the undead.”
White clamped his jaw. “At least give me some food,” he said through clenched teeth.
“What promise do I have from you that you’ll tell me anything if I do?”
“General Wyatt is the one you want. I can tell you how to get hold of him.”
“Yeah, the sat-phone. Trust me; we’ve tried to get hold of whoever will answer. No dice, cowboy. Tell me something worthwhile.”
“The number isn’t in the phone. I have it in my head. General Wyatt told us to maintain OPSEC on the numbers to reach him. I’ll give it to you, with some conditions, of course.”
Joe folded his arms, the .45 peeking out from under them, still aimed at White. “I’m listening.”
“No. Food first. Then information. I’m not telling you shit until I get something from you. You keep your word and I promise as a solider to keep mine.”
Joe thought for a moment, then glanced over to Rick and nodded. “Go get him an MRE from the chow hall.”
“But, dad he…” Rick protested.
“Just go get it.” Joe squatted own in front of Captain White. “If I give you food and you don’t give up the number, I will shoot you – again – and leave you outside the wall. I’ll bleed you – real quiet – and let the fucking zombies eat you alive. Understood?”
Captain White’s face softened a bit. He knew Joe wasn’t fucking around. “Deal.”
Rick came back a few minutes later with an MRE. Against his protests, Joe opened it and sat it down in front of Captain White.
“Take his cuffs off, Curtis.”
“Joe, I don’t think that is such a good idea,” Curtis objected.
Joe raised his chin towards Captain White. “It’s alright. Captain White here isn’t gonna give us any trouble. If he does, there are plenty of guns here to take care of him. I don’t think he’s in any position to take on all five of us.”
Curtis raised an eyebrow towards Larry. “You okay with this, too?”
Larry nodded. “I’m with Joe. He won’t give us any trouble. If he does, I’ll kill him myself.”
Curtis sighed in protest, but uncuffed Captain White nonetheless. White rubbed his wrists and then went to tear into the MRE. He removed the MRE heater, a water-activated combination of finely powdered iron and magnesium metals, and salt. When water is added to the heater, it creates an oxidation-reduction reaction, heating the water to near boiling.
Joe grabbed the heater away from Captain White before he could open it. “I don’t think so, buddy.” He wasn’t prepared to give him any volatile chemicals just yet.
White gave a look of contempt and grabbed the main entrée of the MRE. Another look of loathing passed over him as he read the contents of the packet. “Omelet? Cold? Really?”
“Beggars can’t be choosers, Captain. Take what we give, or go without,” Joe fired back.
White tore open the packet and began to eat the nearly decade-old conglomeration of scrambled eggs and vegetables. The shelf life on the MRE’s were around fifteen years, but on the other hand, they had more preservatives than embalming fluid. White greedily ate the main course and grabbed another portion of the meal – an aged Pop-Tart. White continued to stuff his face for a few more minutes. He chowed down on everything from hash browns with bacon to grape jam and crackers. Joe sat back and watched as his captive ate feverishly, almost feeling bad that he’d nearly starved the former Marine to the point that he was eating a decade-old Army ration with such enthusiasm. Curtis gave him a small bottle of water to wash down the foodstuffs, which White drank greedily.
“So,” Joe said, interrupting the prisoner’s eating. “We’ve lived up to our end, time for you to take care of yours, or else become an overstuffed treat for the undead.”
Captain White wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, bits of uneaten Pop-Tart falling into the floor. “Fair enough. What do you want to know?”
Joe leaned forward. “I want to know what Wyatt has planned. I want to know why he sent you and your cronies after my people. I want to know what he has, where he’s at, and what the fuck he’s been doing for the last nine years.”
Captain White stared at the floor. He didn’t want to give up any information that might put his comrades in danger, but they had not come for him, sent no rescue party, or even tried to help him. He was hopelessly stuck in his current predicament, of his own doing. “He wants to take back Washington D.C. and take back the country as well.”
“Yeah, we’ve heard that one before. We heard it from one of your men when he defected to our side. He said that you were conscripting people into service and killing them if they tried to leave,” Rick replied, crossing his arms.
White looked up at Rick, then to Joe. “You think I liked doing that shit? I was under orders from him to take back Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia. He wanted all the surrounding states to Virginia taken care of before he would come through from down south.”
“So he’s still in Alabama?” Joe asked.
“As far as I know, yeah. The last two years he sent me on runs from Fort McClellan and the Anni
ston Army Depot. Fort McClellan has a shitload of tracked vehicles – tanks and shit – and the depot used to destroy chemical warfare shit; VX gas, sarin gas, nasty stuff.”
“God only knows what that psycho would do with chemical weapons,” Curtis said.
“Is there any way to track the sat-phone?” Joe asked.
“He would have to answer it first. After that, it would take some sophisticated commo setup to get anything useful out of it. I doubt you have the necessary equipment.”
Curtis snickered. “You’d be surprised what we have to work with, Captain. You get that asshole to answer the phone, and I will take it from there.”
White shifted uncomfortably. “Fair enough.”
“So why does he want D.C. so bad?” Joe continued his questioning.
“It’s symbolic. He figures if he takes back D.C. that people will bow down to him and have someone to fight for. He just wants to be some goddamned dictator. I have to admit, he got me hooked on his philosophy quick. He’s tired of the bleeding heart liberals and the rich-boy conservatives that put this country to shame before the fuckin’ zombies did. He wanted to take back the country for the people; problem is that he wants to do it by force. If you don’t go along with him, you are shot. If you disobey orders, you are shot. If he questions your loyalty...”
“Yeah, you get shot. We get it. Why all the sudden have you had a change of heart, Captain?” Joe asked.
White’s face toughened. “Because you assholes have kept me locked up for a couple fuckin’ months now. I’m not doing myself any favors by sitting here and slowly rotting to death while you get to live free. I had you people pegged for insurgents to our cause. I was just following orders when I came to this town. All I wanted to do was get those trucks and get the fuck out of here in one piece.” White looked away, his face still compressed with anger. “Those sorry-assed motherfuckers left me here to rot. I just asked myself ‘Why am I still helping them?’ and honestly, I can’t come up with anything viable.”
Joe titled his head as a thought came to mind. “So, let me get this straight. You want to help us now?”
Captain White turned his full attention back to Joe, wincing. “Something like that.”
“Captain, have you ever heard the old saying ‘if she’ll cheat for you, she’ll cheat on you’?”
“Look I understand. If you don’t feel comfortable with me joining with you, then just shoot me now because I’ll be damned if I spend another minute in this goddamned jail.”
Joe raised his .45 to Captain White’s head and cocked the hammer back. “Why should we trust you? And what promise do we have that you’ll do what we ask of you?”
White lowered his head in surrender. “You have my word as a Marine that I will do everything in my power to help you.”
Joe glanced around to the other four men in the small hallway with him. Curtis looked as if he was thinking it over. Jim looked like he wanted to pull the trigger himself, as did Rick. Larry was in deep thought, rubbing his beard.
Joe eased the .45’s hammer forward slowly and holstered the sidearm. “I’ll call a meeting tonight and those of us that do the decision making will discuss it.”
“Do what you need to do, then,” Captain White said flatly.
“If we decide that you should join us, you will stay. If not,” Joe pointed towards the land outside the wall. “Then it’s death by exile.”
CHAPTER 4
April 17, 2022 – 1832 hours
After a hearty dinner of turkey, potatoes and a mixture of corn and green beans, the “essential” personnel were sitting around an old picnic table in the chow hall. The rest of the town’s residents had all left except Joe, Rick, Curtis, Balboa, Jamie, Larry, and Cornbread. The seven men ate together quickly and quietly as they waited for the rest of the residents of Tazewell to file out for the evening. Angel and Heather were in the kitchen cleaning up and keeping track of tomorrow’s breakfast items. They were far out of earshot, unable to hear the heated conversation going on in the main hall.
“Look, I’m not saying that I trust him, but I think we should consider all choices right now. I’m not suggesting that we just give him an M4 and let him go to town with it, but if he can help us get rid of Wyatt, then I say it’s a worthwhile risk,” Joe stated.
“He’s not trustworthy at all. Hell, he tried to kill us a couple months ago and now all the sudden he wants to be fuckin’ buddy-buddy instead. I’m not buying it, Joe.” Cornbread replied.
Larry put his hands flat on the table. “It’s not a matter of trust. If we let him go, he’s going to go back to his people and give us up. If we decide to use him, at least we get something out of it,” he paused and then continued. “That being said, his boys haven’t come after him, either. Maybe they’ve given up, maybe not. He might not give a shit about them, and he might not want to hook back up. I think it’s just a little too unpredictable that we let him out among us. Wyatt has no idea where they are, where we are or what we’ve done. I say that we just keep him locked up. It’s the only sensible idea.” Larry turned his attention to Curtis. “Did you mean what you said at the jail? Can you track Wyatt?”
“Yes I can,” Curtis said confidently. “If he answers that sat-phone, then I can triangulate where he’s at, or at least within a couple miles. If he’s in Alabama, we will know.”
“And there lies our problem.” Joe leaned forward on the table. “Look, I had every intention of going into that jail, getting the information that we needed, and putting a bullet in his head. When he offered to help, I have to admit, it took me a second to get out of that mindset. I’m not saying the idea is off the table just yet, but I think we should consider he’d be a hell of an asset. He’s not some Special Forces Airborne Ranger, he is, or should I say was, a Marine officer. He was following orders. I don’t think brainwashed is the term I’m looking for. Indoctrinated is a more apt description.”
Rick interjected. “Yeah but that I was just following orders crap is a cop out. He knew what he was doing and he kept on doing it. If he was a real soldier, then he would have helped the people that he met, not make them into indentured servants.”
Joe though it over for a second. “Well, let’s play devil’s advocate. If we decide to keep him locked up, what’s going to happen? He’s going to get pissed off and more bitter at us until he finally snaps and takes our people out or gets someone sympathetic to him and then we have a divided town. If that happens, then we will have a civil war on our hands and it’ll destroy us. If we just let him go, he might go back and tell Wyatt everything. Hell, he might not even make it back to Alabama anyway,” Joe turned his right hand over. “On the other hand, if we keep him, we gain a valuable asset and someone that not only has more military experience than the rest of us, but potentially has information that could save our lives. It’s not a matter of if Wyatt finds out about us; it’s a matter of when. Since Captain White hasn’t contacted him in a couple months, then I’m sure that Wyatt is wondering exactly what went down here. It will take some time for the information to pass down to him, but he will find out and he will come to kill us. If we at least know where he’s at, we can prepare our defenses. I’m not saying we go out looking for trouble, but we should be ready for it nonetheless.”
“How will Wyatt even know that it was you that took out his crew?” Cornbread asked.
“He won’t, but I know this asshole and I know what he did to me down in Alabama. He seems like the type to get revenge any way possible, and if there is a way, I’m sure he’ll find it. He’s too big of a threat to ignore. If we can keep White, then maybe we can milk some information from him – information that might save some lives.”
Curtis spoke up. “So what exactly are you suggesting? That we keep him? Use him?”
“I think it’s in our best interest to, yes. We use him to train some of our people. If he does well, then we go from there. If he doesn’t…” Joe trailed off and looked around to the faces of his men. Once again, it was difficu
lt to get a read on everyone. A long silence, glances exchanged, and idle fidgeting followed. Joe hung his head and shook it slowly. “Look, if we can’t come to an agreement, then I’m just gonna go ahead with my original idea of blowing his tongue out the back of his skull. I say we put it to a vote.”
“Aight, let’s vote,” Cornbread said, standing and raising his one good hand. “I’m for keeping him.”
Joe raised his hand. “You know my position on it.”
“I say keep him,” voiced Larry.
“I vote lead poisoning,” Balboa added. “One less motherfucker tryin’ to kill us.”
“Kill him before he kills us; I can go with that,” Curtis put forth.
“I don’t want him around either,” Jamie said.
The group collectively looked to Rick as the deciding vote. He raised his right hand and looked his father in the eye. With a stern, concrete look on his face, he voiced his vote. “I’m with you on this one, dad. I say we keep him and see what we can get out of him.”
Joe smacked the table, making the other six men jump smartly. “Democracy in action! Maybe there is hope left for this country after all.” Joe got up from the table. “Since Rick, Larry, Cornbread, and I voted to keep him, whenever Captain White is out among us, one of the four of us will be with him always. Until further notice, he is not to be left alone with anyone. I say we leave him in the jail for the night. It’ll be a lot easier to keep track of him in the daytime. We’ve only got about an hour’s worth of daylight left, and I’ve got shit to do. Tell the next shift that I’ll be on to relieve them in the morning. If Captain White asks anything, tell him we will talk to him in the morning.”
“Let’s wrap it up for the night, boys,” Larry said, stretching and yawning. “I got a bed callin’ my name.”
“Well, as much as I’d like to, I’ve got one more thing to discuss,” Joe replied.
A collective of groans and deep sighs answered him back. “Alright, alright, alright. I apologize, but Rick brought something up today that I think that we ought to consider, especially since we are going to be getting some more information out of Captain White.” Joe remained seated, and leaned back to get all the men in his view. “If we have some unwanted intruders, be it Wyatt or not, we are going to have to expand our operating area. I have put a lot of thought into where we should put them, and both are in well-protected areas.”
