The First 400 Days (Book 1): We Are What Remain

by Taja Kartio

  "Here they come."

  A light, a brighter light, slowly passed by each window. A beam of white. Sometimes it backtracked and sometimes it completely stopped, but it eventually disappeared altogether.

  "Are they gone?" I could hear Beckett's voice. His presence was right above my head.

  "Hold on," The new voice was deep, crisp. It sounded like the tones came from deep in the back of the throat. Clearly a man, but who was he? "Okay. They've gone around the corner but I don't know how long it will be again until they make another trip down this street."

  "Just keep looking out," This time I heard Kale's voice.

  "Okay Alex. Turn that lamp on again," The lamp was bright and I needed to take a moment to adjust to it. The hand that Beckett had enclasped with mine was released and he gently lifted something off my shoulder. I was sure it was a gauze pad, but hardly looked like it with the blood soaking it, "Hand me another one. Bleeding has almost stopped, finally."

  Pressure was placed back on my shoulder with the new pad. Kales silhouette leaned forward and I could finally see a partial of his face with the angle of the light.

  "How ya feeling, kiddo?"

  Mentally, fan-fucking-tastic. I was out of that damn ER room. I wasn't strapped to a table. I wasn't knocked up with heavy drugs. I wasn't hooked up to like... twenty thousand machines. No IV. No needles. No tasers. No Brinston sending me off to the CDC. I was finally reunited with my brothers. I didn't care where exactly I was, as long as I was with them. Great.

  Physically... was it even worth explaining my physical pain? I didn't really have the will to go into detail.

  "Hurts," I murmured between gritted teeth.

  Kale nodded sympathetically, "I know. Beck's gonna fix you up."

  "Hey, how do you know so much about this kind of stuff anyway?" Alex asked, his hand swinging the lamp a little.

  "Keep still!" Kale leaned his head back to avoid getting smacked in the head.

  "Sorry."

  "I was a combat medic for four years," Beckett answered Alex's question without blinking an eye in his direction. He proceeded with his work.

  "Why only four?"

  My brothers exchanged looks. Both Kale and Beckett had been abroad once upon a time. Kale hadn't been a medic but nonetheless, they'd been military at one point in their lives. They didn't speak much of it, I didn't know why. Maybe it was because home life pulled them away from really the only thing they wanted to do. Mom and Dad was what had happened.

  "Some things just don't work out the way you want them too."

  Beckett ended the sentence in a tone that suggested the conversation was over. Alex either didn't catch on or he just ignored it completely, "Soooo... if you used to be military, why couldn't you and Kale just be all friendly-friendly with the soldiers here and-"

  Kale opened his mouth finally. I was wondering why it was taking him so long to pitch in, "Would you just-"

  "It doesn't matter why we choose to not make it known," Beckett interrupted. He looked just as annoyed as the eldest brother but maybe he knew this really wasn't the time for a heated argument. Kale would only ignite the fire rather than burn it out, "I gave you my answer and that's that. Leave it alone, will you?"

  "Patrol again," The deep voice interrupted the unwanted conversation. Alex shut the lamp off and again, we sat in a dark silence.

  Though this time it was much longer. Lights shone through the windows dozens of times but it didn't seem like it was being done intentionally.

  "What's going on?" Kale whispered.

  The voice spoke lowly, "They are just standing out there, outside the building."

  "Some are inside," This was another voice I wasn't familiar with.

  "Jesus, Casey!" Alex yelped softly. I could hear a slight shuffle from his surprised jump, "You scared the living hell out of me!"

  "Not that hard to do, eh?" The voice known as Casey said.

  Beckett shifted, "How many came in?"

  "Maybe a half dozen of them. They're pounding on every door, looking for all four of you," There was a movement, a small thud against the floor, "Rebecca and Mack have the hole covered up as much as they can. Hopefully it does the trick. How is she?"

  "Finally almost done bleeding," Beckett mumbled.

  "Good," The reply was short and Casey said no more.

  Distant voices from outside were suppressed by the walls around us. Seconds turned to minutes and minutes meshed for so long together that I wasn't sure if we'd only been sitting in the dark for just one minute or one whole hour. Nonetheless, the floor I layed on was only a tad bit comfier than the table from the hospital. I could feel myself getting restless. Kale lightly squeezed my hand in a encouraging effort.

  "They're leaving," The deep voice came again, "And gone."

  Alex turned the light back on and Beckett lifted the pad on my shoulder.

  "Well, hopefully we have a little more time to do something before they round by again," Casey said. I could hear him get up but the lamp Alex held blocked my view of him, "How long do you think they're gonna prowl out there?"

  "Wouldn't surprise me if they lasted through the night," Kale said.

  Alex shifted again, the lamp moving along with him, "The quarantine zone isn't quite that big though?"

  "They'll look for as long as they need to until they find her," Beckett poked at the wound around my shoulder.

  "Are you gonna sew that up?" Alex asked.

  "No, it needs to breathe. I'll leave it for now," Beckett moved on. His eyes looked to my hand and he gently picked it up, rubbing a soft thumb over my wrist.

  "Geeze..." Alex whispered, "What are those from?"

  A deep band of dark purple and deep blue mottled my entire wrist. It was grotesque against my pale skin. My restraints must had been way tighter than I thought to make those kinds of markings. I could only imagine that my other wrist and ankles looking exactly the same.

  Beckett answered curtly, "Restraints."

  "Why would she need those?" The deep voice sounded like it was a tad bit closer.

  "So she can not get away?" Kale had a bite to his voice, "What do you think, Tatum?"

  "But why is that, Kale? Why would they need to keep a child under such circumstances?"

  First, I wasn't a child. I was eighteen, thanks. Second, Tatum? I didn't really think the name was as intense as the voice.

  "We already told you why. She was sick."

  There was no gap in conversation, "But how sick? They wouldn't be holding her down for no reason. You talked to that doctor from the hospital, what kind of sick is she?"

  Kale didn't answer right away. If Kate had talked to him, then he knew about my nerving similarities with the Infected. No doubt he didn't want to share that out loud.

  "Is she..." Tatum stopped himself for a second. I felt Kale tense a bit, "Is she a zombie?"

  "Does she look like one?" Kale asked, earning no answer, "I don't know any more than you do. I just know she had a really high temp and they took her in because of it. After that, I know just about as much as you do!”

  "Then why don't we ask her?"

  I heard heavy footsteps in my direction. Kale stood so quickly that Alex stumbled out of the way, dropping the lamp on the floor. Beckett also rose to both feet but didn't move an inch away from my side.

  "Tatum!" Casey harped and there was rough shambling across the floor.

  "Don't touch her," I heard Kale growl, "She's not an Infected."

  A long pause, followed by a frustrated "hmph". Footsteps led away followed by a low mumbling.

  Beckett relaxed and kneeled back down beside me, "Alright," He said in a low voice, "We'll take a look at you more tomorrow when we have some light. You're okay with sleeping on your back right? I don't want you to roll over on that shoulder."

  I nodded. Once I was passed out, I'd be alright.

  Beckett mirrored my nod and stretch his arm somewhere behind my head. Blankets. He draped two heavy comforter like sheets over my body. Minutes la
ter, both brothers were camped out on blankets near me. With the heavy rain outside, the thunder lightly booming outside the roof over our heads, I remembered the night before we left our home. The positions we laid in now almost mimicked the floor of the bedroom. I felt a sudden homesick, and it was a sure distraction from the physical pain.

  Twelve

  The ceiling was cement. The walls were brick. My head rolled to the side and my cheek landed on the flat mattress I was laying on. The floor was cement too. The window straight across the room from me shined a pretty beam of gold and yellow, spotlighting the grungy floor that was littered with dirt, soil and dusty fumes.

  Where am I?

  I started to sit up, trying to lean back on my forearms but there was a sudden tear in my shoulder.

  "Woah, woah. Take it easy there tiger," Kale kneeled down in front of me, a relieved grin formed on his face.

  I let a small breath of exhaustion escape before my lips curled into a tiny smile, "Kale."

  "Lay back down, kiddo. Beck won't be too happy if you tear open your stomach or shoulder again," His pointer finger lightly jabbed the collarbone an inch beneath my neck and gently pushed my head back down the pillow.

  "I feel like I've been lying on this thing for a week," I croaked in between a small, harsh fit of coughs. "My back kills."

  "Well... not quite a week," Kale's smile grew weak, "But it's been a few days."

  "How many exactly?"

  His head bobbed side to side like a debate, "Uh... five, you were going on six this morning. I mean. You weren't passed out the entire time, but you had a bit of an infection with both of your battle wounds. That and you just needed a week of rest anyway."

  That was probably true. After constant testing and experimenting? Sleeping for five days was in my best interest. But an infection? I vaguely remembered some kind of damage happening to my shoulder which I guess was five days ago, I had no knowledge of what particular damage, but I did remember it, but my stomach? What was wrong with that?

  "What happened?"

  Kale sat back against the brick wall and leaned his back. He looked so exhausted. Maybe even more than I was. The lighting showed his heavy eyes, the dark bags showing an obvious lack of sleep, "Some idiot soldier shot at us when we were busting you out of the hospital. Aiming for Beckett but he got you instead, nicked your shoulder pretty good. I mean, there wasn't a bullet wedged in your skin or anything but it was deep enough to keep bleeding for awhile. Beckett wasn't too worried about that."

  Getting shot would have definitely explained that sudden pain when in my shoulder when we were leaving the hospital, "Okay. What about my stomach?"

  I watched my brother's fists tighten. His jaw grinded, "You don't know what they did to you, do you?"

  My hand found it's way underneath the baggy, oversized shirt I was wearing. My fingers slid slowly across my skin until they pricked against something a tad bit sharp. My other hand reached for the bottom of my shirt. I lifted it enough to see the bottom of the stitches.

  "They go all the way up your stomach and section off above your chest. A Y-shape," When I glanced back up at him, he looked like was struggling to hold himself together. The lines on his face were penned, showing the hurt and utter disbelief on his mind, "Beck said it's the same shape used on a cadaver."

  I surprised myself a little by not being so surprised over being an actual dissected human frog. I should have known, even if I had no recollection of ever having a surgery.

  "I shouldn't have let them take you," Kale continued, "I should have stopped them somehow."

  "There's nothing you could have done Kale."

  "I should have done something. Anything! I'm your brother, I'm supposed to protect you! I mean, just look at what they did to you!"

  I put my shirt back down, "You wouldn't have known what the doctors at the hospital were going to do! Most the soldiers probably really didn't even know! They were all just filling whatever orders they were given!"

  "Ya, I know but..." He forced himself to say before dropping his head back against the wall, "I should have done something sooner."

  "You did what you could. You and Beckett saved me. That's all I can really ask for," Kale didn't reply but forced his head into an agreed nod. I fiddled with my fingers for a moment, "Brinston, the head scientist dude there, he was gonna send me to Atlanta."

  That caught my brothers attention, "Atlanta?"

  "To the CDC. There wasn't anything else they could do to test me here. They had no results and didn't have the resources or whatever to continue."

  'When were they going to do that?"

  I shrugged, "I don't know exactly when. Soon."

  Kale shifted, swallowing, "I'm glad we got you when we did then."

  I nodded slowly. So am I, "So do you know? What's wrong with me?"

  "There's nothing wrong with you."

  "But you know what makes me different from you, and everybody else."

  Kale exhaled heavily, "Ya. Ya, I know. Kate told Beckett and I."

  My stomach, my actual stomach, suddenly hurt. I was scared. I obviously wasn't turning into an Infected but what did having the blood of an Infected mean for me? What will it do to me? What does my future have for me when I'm a being that's in between the monsters that took over the world and the people who are fighting to keep this world intact.

  "I don't want you to tell anybody about it. The only people who know are Becket, Kale and I. Let's keep it that way," Kale stood.

  "Okay," I understood why it had to be that way. I don't know how anybody would react to knowing why I was the way I was with no reasonable explanation.

  I watched my brother wander to one of the walls lined with metal shelving, mostly bare with the exception of a few backpacks, extra pillows, and folded blankets. There were a few bottled waters and canned foods but there were black words written on the front of each of them. I couldn't make out what it said.

  The rest of the room was just as denuded as the shelves. The entire area was brick, stone, and concrete. The ceiling had two small bulbs that gave the room a considerable amount of lighting. The three tiny windows spaced out by the ceiling brought in more light than the bulbs. Mattresses and bunched up blankets were spaced out on my side of the room. Four were placed by myself, including the one I currently laid on. The other two were farther away, reaching the other corner. The only other somethings in the room were the two ladders. One was in the opposite corner from me, by the farthest metal shelf. The other was straight across the room from my mattress. Both led up and disappeared into the ceiling.

  "So... where exactly are we?" I asked.

  Kale didn't look up from the backpack he was scrounging through, "Some kind of cellar underneath a small apartment complex. Not really sure what the original purpose was. Tatum and Casey have been living here for like six months or something."

  The names sounded familiar, "Tatum and Casey?"

  "Uh... ya. You don't know them," He pulled two cans, a bottled water, and a couple plastic forks from the backpack and rounded back toward me, "We met them a couple days after getting here, in the apartment complex above. With it being a survivor building, they moved up to one of the rooms up there but since they've been helping us, they've kind've become fugitives too," Kale set the food and water on his mattress, "Let me help you sit up."

  He placed one hand on my solid, not-shot shoulder and the other grasped my own hand. Gently and as slowly as I needed, we managed to place my back up against the wall, a pillow placed in between my back and the brick.

  "Why have Tatum and Casey been living down here for six months?"

  "Homeless. Born on the streets," My brother slumped down beside me, handing me the water, "They know the city like the back of their hands. They know where we can find food that hasn't been touched and supplies where no one has been looking for them. Beckett and Alex are out with them now."

  I couldn't open the cap of the water. My fingers were dull and weak. Kale took it from me and cracked it
open, holding it to my lips. I leaned forward slightly and tried lapping what I could but the liquid hardly made it down my throat before I started choking. It took several tries but I eventually managed to down a third of the small plastic bottle.

  "Alright," Kale took a swig of water for himself and set the bottle between us, switching it out with the can of mandarin oranges, "If you can't drink water too well, I don't know how much of this you're going to be able to handle."

  I took the can gratefully, "I'll take my time."

  Kale nodded and turned to his own can of fruit as I stabbed the first orange with my fork. I ended up having to nibble bit by bit otherwise, I would find myself coughing up a painful storm. Altogether though, it felt wonderful to have something in my stomach. I didn't really realize how hungry I was until I started eating.

  Minute by minute, the light outside slowly faded. I must have not woken up until late afternoon. My brother and I sat in a comfortable silence, both seemed to be lost in a thick maze of thoughts. I glanced over at him when I finally finished my meal.

  "What's going on out there?" I asked.

  "What do you mean?"

  "Everything. The lab. The survivors. The Infected. What's happening? What have I missed?"

  He ran a hand through his hair, "I mean, even after being out of the loop for a month, nothing too crazy has changed. More survivors are getting picked up off the streets and dumped off here. They're trying to expand the quarantine zone, but being that this is Minneapolis, a big city, that progress is going incredibly slow. There are a lot of Infected on the outer perimeters. The only positive thing about that is that it's a good distraction from the soldiers. They're not always hunting for us."

  Kale laughed shortly. I glanced at him and watched the really flaky, fake grin disappear from his face, "Why did you kill those soldiers?"

  He was obviously startled by the question, "What?"

  I looked down at my fingers, fidgeting with my fingernails, "Brinston said that you and Beckett killed three soldiers."