by Locke, Linus
“What did you do that for?” Deacon shouted as he looked at Sophia holding the taser in her right hand.
“Can we trust him, Deacon? Do you know who the hell came and destroyed our home? While you were gone, they came in, Deacon. They came in, they beat me, and then they fed me, Nora, and the twins to the fiends!” Sophia screamed in the parking lot. Her voice echoing loudly.
“We should probably get inside, Sophia. You can finish your conversation there,” Roger suggested.
Sophia walked over, smacked Deacon across his face and began punching him in the shoulders. The tears rolled down her cheeks, and she swung as hard as she could. She wanted to destroy Deacon. He stood there and took it. It hurt him. She could definitely hit harder than he imagined, but the pain wasn’t physical. She eventually wore herself out and embraced him. She draped her arms around his neck and cried into his chest. He picked her up easily and carried her into the hotel.
“There was no warning,” Sophia began as they were sitting in a large suite on the sixth floor of the hotel. “I was making breakfast and heard the truck barreling down the road. At first I thought it was you coming back, but then I realized it was the sound of a semi. The damn thing shook the house, Deacon. Then it crashed through the gate, knocking down a chunk of the wall.
“I tried to get the twins and hide, but there were people already in the house. They had the twins and Nora. They were going to shoot them.”
“’Where is the man?’ one man asked me behind his mask.
“’I don’t know. He left a long time ago,’ I said, not telling him that a long time had only been two weeks. But for me it felt like months, Deacon. ‘Please don’t hurt the kids,’ I pleaded. I was scared. They were living people and they treated us worse than animals, worse than the fiends. I would have happily died if they would have promised to take the twins and treat them well, but they seemed to be interested only in you.
“’Do you know who he has been in contact with?’ the man asked.
“I said, ‘I don’t know what you mean. We don’t know anyone else. He left one morning without saying goodbye. Now please leave us alone.’ I began to cry so hard. I was so scared and I cried. I wanted to be strong for the twins. The man walked up to me. I was on my knees bawling on the floor, and that man kicked me in the stomach. I couldn’t breathe, Deacon.
“The twins screamed, ‘Stop hurting her. Stop hurting our mom.’ They called me mom. I knew I would die protecting them if needed. I stood up, grabbed a fork out of the sink and drove it into the throat of the man behind me. The blood sprayed everywhere. Then another man came up and hit me in the back. I tried to stay awake and fight. I know you would have, Deacon, but I wasn’t strong enough.
“When I woke up, we were all tied up in the garage. The doors were shut. It was so dark. Both of the twins were crying. ‘We are going to be fine,’ I said. ‘Let me figure out a way out of this.’ Then I saw the man standing in the corner. ‘Who are you?’ I said. ‘What do you want with us?’ He walked right up to me and knelt down. I looked into the cold eyes of President Granderson, a man sworn to protect us and our country. I knew we must be saved.
“’Kill me and let them go if you must!’ Nora shouted.
“I was confused, Deacon. I didn’t know why she was shouting at the president like that. I thought he was there to help.
“The man’s name is Deacon. Where is he?” He completely ignored the old woman.
“’I don’t know where Deacon went. Please untie us so we can get out of here,’ I pleaded with him. He didn’t believe me about you.
“’He has been terrorizing the peace and quiet of this great nation. If you don’t tell me where he is–‘ He stood up and walked over to the door in the back. When he opened it a man came in with a fiend all tied up. The fiend still had the fork sticking out of his neck. I think they left it there so I knew who he was. ‘I’ll make sure your deaths hurt.”
“I cried again, Deacon. He told me you were a terrorist working with a terrorist organization that wanted to destroy the world. You want to stop the research he is working on, the research that will put a stop to this.
“I don’t know anything, I swear.”
“’That’s really too bad,’ he said. He walked out of the door while the other man untied the fiend and followed. I did everything I could to keep the fiend away from the twins. I kicked him. He looked so gross and sad. Blood spurted out of his neck around the fork. I knew he didn’t remember, but I just felt like his body did, you know? His body remembered that I put that fork in his neck.
“The twins were strong though, Deacon. They worked together, and they climbed the ladder while I kicked and tripped the fiend as he came after Nora and me. Then the garage began to rumble. The semi started up and was backing out of the driveway. I rolled over and climbed to my feet. I followed the twins up the ladder, but the fiend grabbed my leg. Nora saved me.
“Nora slammed into him. I can’t believe I left her behind, Deacon. I am a terrible person. I was so concerned about saving the twins that I left her behind. She lost her balance after knocking him down and fell on top of him. Her screams were awful as he chewed through the flesh on her face. I didn’t look, though. I couldn’t. I just climbed and cried. Then I realized that he was climbing the ladder.
“He climbed up after us. It would have taken him a while, but he was doing it, Deacon. He was climbing the ladder. I kicked and kicked until the bolts holding the ladder came loose. The weight of the fiend did the rest. The ladder fell; the twins and I got ourselves untied, and we waited to die up there on the roof.
“Then I could see the reflection in the distance. Soon the Ramcharger pulled up the drive and Roger climbed out. He killed the fiend in the garage–both of them–and brought us here. We went back later to see what we could salvage, but they had taken all of our supplies. Everything Jonathan had worked on was gone, the files from the lab, his notes and formulas, that acid paste. They found where we put it and took it all. They must have been pissed that we survived because someone must have driven through the garage door. Roger even helped me bury Nora. We buried her by Emalynn, on the other side of her tree.”
“I’m so sorry I wasn’t there to protect you, Sophia,” Deacon said after hearing her story. “You have to believe me. What I was doing was protecting you. None of them were supposed to know who I was. I can’t even imagine how they fou–“ Deacon paused for a moment before bolting from the room.
“Is everything alright, Deacon?” Sophia asked as she ran after him out into the hallway.
Deacon charged into the suite down the hall where Roger had been keeping Mark tied up in a chair. Roger was sitting on a couch eating a bowl of beef stew. Deacon could smell it down the hall, and it reminded him of how hungry he was. That would have to wait, though. Mark looked up at the Australian as the man rushed toward him.
“Hey Deacon. Tell them to untie me, man,” Mark said not expecting the fist that collided with his left cheek. The punch knocked Mark and the chair to the ground.
“How did they know about me?” Deacon screamed. “They attacked my family, you bastard!”
“I don’t know anything about that, Deacon,” Mark replied through a mouthful of blood. “I think you knocked out a tooth.”
“I’m gonna knock the rest of them out, you piece of shit!” Deacon brought his arm back and prepared to smash it down into Mark’s face once more. Roger grabbed his arm before he could.
“That’s enough, Deacon,” Roger said.
“This man is responsible for this!”
“I don’t think so,” stated Roger. “Sit down.” He bent down to tip Mark and the chair back up to their feet. “I left because I had some things to take care of. I was responsible for Bradley’s death, as Guillermo probably told you.”
“No. He never said anything about that,” Deacon replied, stunned to hear this.
Hearing that Guillermo hadn’t told anyone made Roger smile. He didn’t think he could trust Guillermo, but he real
ly hadn’t cared. Now he felt like Guillermo could have been a true friend. “Anyway, I left to find my wife and kids. I watched as you met up with another group inside of a gas station. I watched over you as you followed them to the library.
“I was there when Jonathan, Guillermo … and Elliot, left. The night before they set out, Elliot used a radio to send a message. I can’t translate Morse code, so I don’t know what the message was. Honestly I wasn’t even sure if he was sending a message. Maybe he was just messing with an old radio he had found. I should have stopped it all right there, anyway, Deacon. I thought that I was the worst person on the planet. I never imagined I was wrong about that.”
Deacon stood up and placed his hand on Roger’s shoulder. “None of us would have known. You made a mistake. Whatever happened with Bradley is behind us. You saved Sophia and the twins. Andy and Amie are alive because of you. Thank you.”
“I found my family,” Roger sighed. “Burying them was the second hardest thing I’ve ever done.”
“What was the first?” Deacon asked.
“Putting them down.” Roger walked out of the room just as Deacon saw the redness in his eyes. Sophia went to comfort him.
“I’m sorry about what every one of you has gone through. It must be tough having a family in this world,” Mark said as the blood continued to flow from his mouth.
“Yeah.” Deacon grabbed a knife from the small kitchen area and walked over the Mark. “I’m just gonna cut you free, man. You need to relax,” Deacon said as he noticed Mark was starting to breath heavily.
“Of course,” Mark said. His heart was still beating in his ears.
“I’m sorry I punched you in the face. I hope you can forgive me.”
“I understand how you must’ve felt about me. I’d be suspicious, too. Besides, you don’t really hit that hard,” Mark said has he spit his tooth out into his hand and wiped the blood off his chin with a paper towel.
“I can hit you again,” Deacon laughed. His expression quickly went to dead serious. “I have to go tell Sophia the truth. If I’m lucky I’ll only look as bad as you do right now.”
Chapter 17
Jonathan explained everything that happened to him from the time their father picked him up from school that day over a year ago, to the minute Mad Man Rob stepped out of that psychotic bus of his. Most of the time he talked, Jonathan wasn’t even really paying attention to what he was saying. For all he knew most of his story was jumbled and chaotic. He couldn’t help but stare at his brother. Michael had changed so much yet not at all.
Michael was still just as tall as Jonathan was. Jonathan was sure that their different diets and activities would create some sort of difference in their appearances, but he couldn’t find anything that stuck out. Michael’s dark brown hair was much shorter than Jonathan’s, whose hair was shaggy from the lack of proper haircuts. Their brown eyes locked at one point, and Jonathan could swear he was staring into a mirror.
“Mom’s death was better than most, given the circumstances. Our whole lives unraveled the day the deadies came. We had to leave Aunt Sheryl in the hospital. She was in a coma at that time anyway, and the power was very inconsistent. The place had been running on backup power and it wasn’t going to hold much longer. Mom didn’t want to leave, you know? She wanted to stay by her sister’s side. It was a miracle I pulled her out of that place.
“Like everyone else, we didn’t know what was happening at first. Mom was all panicked about Dad’s phone call, and a few days later the shit hit the fan. We barricaded the door to Aunt Sheryl’s hospital room until I finally convinced Mom that those crazy people beating on the door would make it through eventually. We were only on the second floor, so when I saw the first opportunity, I jumped down and ran to the car. Drove it around and helped Mom down.
We managed to survive hiding in different houses and buildings in Iowa City. Mostly bars. As it turned out, most of the looters missed tons of supplies left in the bars. We even lived in the Carver-Hawkeye Arena for about a month. That was actually pretty cool. We were forced out of there when it started to get colder, ended up living in the Old Capital building with a few other survivors.
“It was fall when Mom got sick. I don’t know what it was. It started as just the sniffles one day and before I knew it she couldn’t move. I thought to myself, what would Jonathan do, and I realized I was right down the street from one of the best hospitals in the nation. I tried for days to get back into the hospital, but I could only make it so far before the deadies were out too thick to move through. She died because I couldn’t save her.”
“You did what you could, Michael. You heard my story. At least you tried. I stood by and watched as Dad was taken from us,” Jonathan said.
“You want to know what makes me feel better when I get to thinking about our family?” Michael asked with a slightly goofy smile. He saw the look on Jonathan’s face and continued, “Hey, Mad Man?”
“Yeah,” Mad Man Rob answered from across the garage. He had been building something that Jonathan couldn’t quite wrap his head around. His wild hair made it look as if he was just electrocuted. Standing by his large stainless steel workbench was a shaggy black dog. Its long purple tongue hung from its open mouth. A half Chow, half Lab named Dog.
“How do you spell warsh? I can’t seem to figure it out,” Michael’s smile broke into a childish giggle that made him look just as he did when they were kids.
“Shut up,” Mad Man Rob said light-heartedly, scratched Dog behind the ear, and returned to work. Before the attacks, Mad Man Rob was one of the best mechanics around. Self-taught, but hands down the best. If it had an engine he could fix it, regardless of size. Anything from lawnmowers to heavy construction equipment and he loved it. Rob had a short fuse, though. It was all too often that he could blast off into a fit of rage, throwing things around and destroying stuff. Scaring the shit out of everyone around that didn’t know him well enough to know if they just stayed out of his way they’d be find.
“I haven’t seen an animal in quite some time. There were a few squirrels and maybe some birds in the mountains, but I guess I haven’t thought too much about the animals,” Jonathan stated as Dog came over to him and rested his big head in the young man’s lap.
“Yeah. The deadies attack them, too. They really hate anything that is alive. I actually watched one across the street in the field trying to catch a bird,” Michael laughed and shook his head as if to say, stupid deadie. “Did you find anything in the morgue?”
“What?” Jonathan asked. This question blindsided him.
“The morgue. At the BCRC?”
“There is a morgue at the BCRC?” Jonathan would have never guessed.
“There’s a morgue at the BCRC?” Michael said in a high pitched, mocking tone. “Yes there is, Jonathan. It’s a damned medical research facility. They have a morgue. Hundreds of bodies are donated to that place each year for their top-of-their-class researchers to cut up and poke and prod. I’ve never seen it myself due to security reasons, but I know it’s there. Dad has talked about it many times. It’s not a secret, it’s just non-employees can’t get to it.”
Jonathan thought about this for a while. Dog tried for a second to climb into Jonathan’s lap, realized he wouldn’t fit, and sat back down on the floor. A morgue? But Sam was never in the morgue. He was in the lab from the start. Any bodies in the morgue would have all been on record. It was certainly interesting to know that he thought they searched the whole place. There may be many more secrets in that building. Jonathan was lost in thought for the rest of the afternoon.
“Wake up, Jonathan. There might be an issue with your friend.” Michael stood at the open door of a small bedroom. Jonathan was tangled in a blanket on the floor. His sleep had been restless, making it an unpleasant battle to work his way out of the tangled mess. Grabbing his jeans off the back of a chair, he pulled them on and walked out to find Guillermo.
“What is the problem?” he asked May as he walked into the l
iving room at the other end of the house.
“Your friend will starve to death if we don’t feed him soon. We have most of the supplies we could ever need here. After all this time I’ve collected many things to cover almost any emergency. However, I don’t have any feeding tubes,” May stated solemnly. “He’s going to need real nutrients or he won’t make it.”
“I thought you said he would be fine,” Jonathan hadn’t intended to sound as angry with her as he had.
“I’m truly sorry, dear, but I assumed he was in better shape than he is. After all, there is only so much I can do with what I have.”
“So what do I need to find?” Jonathan asked. “I will leave immediately.
“There’s a hospital in the center of Muscatine. I’ll need an NG-tube. Nasogastric. The tube will run through his nose and down into his stomach. We can prepare food for him here, but it will be much better to find any of the formula that would go with it. It’s prepared with all of the nutrients his body will need, and it will go through the tube easier. You can probably find everything you need in a med room. There’s one on each floor.”
“I will return soon. Thank you,” Jonathan said. He walked out of the room to find his coat.
“Wait for me, Jonathan,” Michael said catching up to his brother in the hall. “I’ll ask Mad Man Rob if he wants to go with us.”
“I cannot ask all of you to get hurt helping me save my friend,” Jonathan replied.
“He’s your friend, Jonathan. I would do anything for you and your friends. Besides, Mad Man Rob loves going out to bash skulls.”
“Why do you not just call him Rob?” Jonathans questioned.
Hesitating for a second on the answer as if he wasn’t sure himself, Michael replied, “Because his name is Mad Man Rob. Why do you talk like a robot?”
“Fair enough.”
The air outside was cold. The light from the sun hadn’t reached over the top of the large wall yet. Tears were forced from their ducts as the biting cold assaulted Jonathan’s face. The walls blocked the wind, but there was no blocking that awful, bitter chill. A loud clanking of steel on steel erupted from the garage as the two walked across the gravel driveway. Michael pointed at CREEPR 1 parked outside of the large building.
