by catt dahman
“Sure thing,” George said, wondering why the child needed a special escort. He patted the boy’s back and recoiled with a small motion.
Beth sat up straighter in her saddle, Maryanne clasped Toni’s hand, and everyone looked at one another in confusion.
For the first time in many years, Gabe smiled.
George blushed, “Sorry, but wow…Zane…umm…Len, he’s the one, isn’t he? He really is. He…well…you can just sense it.”
“He really is.” Len faced all the people who watched them. “Zane is the one we’ve been waiting for.” He knew this for sure once Zane whispered a secret Len had not shared with a soul, that the child could not have known, but the last part, “she forgave you” made Len sure this boy was not only special, but a good person.
Zane’s smile lit up.
To Len’s shock, people lined up outside the second enclosure, and after the intake was done, they greeted the new people, but all wanted to touch Zane’s sleeve or his hand, reaching out to feel the unexplainable power that the boy seemed to have. There was strength within him.
The rest were shuffled through while others got busy getting a meal ready a little early and helping the survivors get to their rooms and settle in.
George suggested that Zane, Gabe, and their guardians live in the main mansion for a while at least; since so much was happening, they could spend some time with the little boy.
The compound had a large cafeteria-style room where the religious followers of Norman Pope had cooked, served, and eaten many meals.
Plenty of tables and chairs were available for everyone, but the teachers decided that the children and teens who wanted could have a hot dog roast and a sing-a-long to keep them busy while the adults talked. Bags of marshmallows and the makings of smores were added, and the children welcomed the treat.
The teens and children wouldn’t leave until they extracted promises that every word said would be shared with them later.
To everyone’s surprise, Zane wanted to join the children and get to know them; Gabe went with him, looking delighted at the idea.
“He’s just a little boy,” Walt said, “he wants to be just like the other kids; he misses them, I suppose.”
“And Walt can tell his story just as well, maybe better without his having to relive some of the bad parts,” Charles added.
“I’ve gone to heaven,” Tory claimed, biting into her hamburger, “I can’t believe you have food like this.”
“We sacrificed a cow for it,” Len laughed, “and we have our gardens growing lettuce and tomatoes a plenty. We’ll have more coming in soon, too, but enjoy it while we have it for sure.
We don’t eat quite this well every day, but we have plenty, and we have cooks who can do wonders with anything we have. Wait until tomorrow night; I hear the menu is spaghetti and meatballs.”
“Well, it sounds like you do eat well every night,” Tory protested, “yum.”
“Well, the tuna and pasta aren’t my favorite, but believe it or not, it’s pretty darned good, and they built these…oh…Dutch ovens, are they called that? Something like that, which uses wood for fire, and the chefs make biscuits. We’re learning to churn, and we have milk cows, so we’ll have butter before fall. Buttermilk and cornbread, too.”
“That’s unreal,” Charles muttered between bites.
“Some learn about canning so we can put things up for the winter that’ll be like fresh, and one fellow is building a whole section of bee hives for honey and wax for candle making.”
“You have gotta be kidding me,” Tory said, “seriously?”
“Old time skills are making a comeback.”
“Yup. You’ll see women quilting after dinner while we sit around.We have the cows and pigs, chickens galore, and some sheep.Beth says we can use the wool for thread, and she’ll teach us how to weave it.
We have fruit trees: pear, apple, peach, plum; and berries: blackberries, strawberries, and raspberries. We want to build a huge green house as soon as we get the time and manpower so we can add citrus and more vegetables.
We can feed the animals and have summer fields growing corn, squash, and pumpkins, and we’ll plant a winter garden, as well. And get this, we have outdoor showers; they are paved, fixed up for privacy, and have hot and cold water.”
“I just met you, Len, but you have to be bullshitting us,” Charles said as he laughed.
“If I’m lying, I’m dying. I swear we do. Solar heating for those,” Len said with pride. “We have a school with teachers for the kids and a dozen other projects ready to go as well which will add comfort here. You can learn to shoot a cross bow or swim, and we catch fish for a special treat of fried fish; just today we had cold lemonade that was made with cold spring water and kept in the spring; the lemonade was nice and cold.”
“Cold lemonade. Imagine,” Tory mused.
“Count on us to do our part and more; we’re workers for sure,” Charles promised. He was stuffed and yet found room for a hot dog from the platter that someone brought from outside. It was lucky that no one had time to prepare more than cookies for dessert. “You did an amazing job here.”
“The people did it,” Len turned to Nick, “can you tell us about the president? I think everyone is awful curious about things.”
Nick did, hating to say Germany was bombed, but he explained things as best he could with what he knew.
“They had to blame someone, so they did, and Germany was already dead in the water from being over-run with the damned zeds. I mean, who is there really left to bomb anyway?”
“So do you think there are people in charge in DC, your brother?”
Nick sighed, “He knew what to expect because of the other countries…continents.
I imagine DC is the same as it has always been, full of brainless idiots, trying to feed on the rest.”
Everyone laughed. “I don’t think there’s anyone left; population was too dense. And they all got out anyway, but you can bet not every one really made it…trapped inside places underground with Reds attacking and no way out? Death traps.”
“Well, I guess we have no president, but we’re all Americans,” George said, and people cheered around the room. “Or so I want it to be…the right, real American way with people responsible.”
“And we have a governor,” Len said as he patted George on his back.
Walt rubbed his full stomach. “I may belch through my story.”
While everyone listened, he told the story in order so it would make more sense: the predictions that Diana made about the Red consuming so many lives and then after Leandra was born about the story of the insane court and the boys who executed Zane’s family and friend.
He had to stop and sip water as he told the story, and everyone listened as if each were hypnotized.
“She was a psychic?” someone scoffed.
“No more than I am,” Maryanne said. “I think she had feelings about things, and how is that any different? Look at us...at me.”
“Maryanne doesn’t have the distractions of radio, television, and all the technology, but she senses things. Sounds like that commune was the same: farming and education; to be honest, what they had was a lot like what we have here,” George said. “But if you listened to the story, their predictions didn’t help them so much; Reds still killed people, and Pascal was born and is with the RA.”
“How does that help us then? It didn’t help them, and Zane lost everyone he loved.”
“Except for Gabe,” Walt said, “if I were more religious, I don’t know if I would say something like God has a will we don’t understand, something impossible like that ’cause it doesn’t make it any better….”
“Because it was predicted and came to pass,” Maryanne said, “it gave validity. We need that.”
George leaned forward, thinking. “Okay. So then we know to take Pascal seriously and that the RA isn’t just a gang of nuts but a real threat we will face sometime.
You don’t have to be religio
us to know that in all history, there have been opposing factions; we say good and bad; you can say unhealthy and healthy or a side that progresses the species and one that retards it.”
“Their killing his family makes me feel sick; how did he even go on?” Johnny asked, shaking her head. “That’s horrible for anyone, especially a little boy.”
“It’s the same when Katie lost her birth mom,” George said, “but she managed somehow, and she’s doing better with Beth as her mommy.”
“And while Gabe don’t talk, well at least that anyone has ever heard, we can’t say he doesn’t communicate somehow with Zane. Gabe protects that boy well, and he provides for him. Gabe is mute, but he isn’t stupid by any means,” Walt said.
“Do you think Zane avenged his people’s death? I mean did he somehow cause those boys to burn up after they killed his family?” Alex asked.
“I think he was angry and upset and didn’t necessarily plan that; he just kind of let that anger fly out, is what I think,” Nick said. “Just because we don’t understand things doesn’t make them impossible. I doubt Zane understands it either.”
“I don’t understand how a car engine works, but it does. That’s magic to me,” Beth said, getting laughs all around.
“Like how we were about Cinder Montaine’s songs and when we figured out where we were headed. It makes no logical sense how we knew, but we found Hopetown,” Carl said as he shrugged. When people looked perplexed, he explained he was whistling a tune from a movie.
Jilly, hearing Carl break into the song they had been singing, earned applause when she finished. She made mock bows to them.
“That sounds better than our whistling it and my singing it,” Walt said, making Jilly blush with pleasure.
“I think we don’t listen to TV and the radio; we listen to…well…other things,” Pan said, and George nodded. “We don’t have all that other stuff taking up our brains.”
“That’s our theory anyway,” George told the rest, “Maryanne is a good example of that.”
Walt went on and explained the basics of how they found one another, showing them the diary and giving his thoughts.
“And this one-eyed man, he is a child? He is with the Reconstruction Army? Then he’s the bad one?” Julia asked. “It’s Pascal we were all scared of, even scared of saying his name for a while until George said to stop being afraid and hiding in caves,” added Julia.
“The boogie man that you can’t see in the closet or under the bed is usually far worse than the one you see when you snap the light on.”
“I prefer no boogie men,” Julia said.
Walt said they heard the same. When he added the parts about stories they had heard about the man Frank and a man with Hank Williams, Junior, type- yellow-glasses, and a big belt buckle with the name Roy on it, people were again stunned.
Frank had been what they called a raider, who attacked them in the hospital and then cannibalized people within his own camp. Former members of the US Militia joined Frank, but some met bad, violent endings.
Roy, a member of the RA, had been helpful when the outbreak occurred. Unfortunately, Roy was also racist, hateful, and without a shred of loyalty to friends.
“Roy and Frank. I expect Richie is there, too, if he made it,” George said, “Talk about bad pennies that keep coming back….”
“Sounds like the bad kid, Pascal, and those three fit in perfectly with the RA if they are all that bad,” Johnny said.
“And Lucas,” Walt added. ”He’s the worst, I think. He is Pascal’s father.”
“We can handle them, right?” Teeg asked. “We ain’t just your everyday misfits; Len taught us well.” The people agreed with him. This was like a sudden pep rally. But the talk had gone too dark, and Teeg needed to get it back to positive thoughts.
“We should be able to, but every one of us could stand some more training; we didn’t fare so well when the hospital was over-run,” George pointed out, sobering the group. “We lost some ten damned fine fighters.”
“And the RA is full of some fierce, crazed people who will fight dirty and can think a sight better than zombies,” Walt said.
“We’ll train better, get more supplies: ones to fight with, lay in more food, fence more areas to hold better when we are attacked, and add more people who can fight,” Julia said. “They will have to come fight us on our own turf.”
“They’ll want fighters, too. I bet we are getting more women and children, the future, you know,” George said. “And I don’t think the upcoming battle will be with magic but with brains and weapons.”
“We have brains,” Teeg said, “and we have heart and soul.”
“And at least we have Zane. That’s good, right?” Beth asked. “I mean, I know he isn’t a magician, but he’s the polar opposite of Pascal, so that is good.”
“It’s very good; he’s our ace. They have an ace, too, but that leaves two in the deck, doesn’t it?” George said.
11
Captives
Kimball lay curled in a ball. The next time he was needed, he would force himself, using his hands, raw and skinned, to pull himself to his feet. He would ignore the healing broken bone in his arm, the festering infection from a deep cut on his thigh, and the open lashes on his back that crawled with flies and seeped thick, yellow pus.
Kim would drag himself up and work for them: gathering firewood and water, fighting zombies with nothing but a bat or making fires at night. He would happily do anything else they asked because he wanted to live. He was through fighting them for a good reason.
He dreamed of Beth and Katie at times, but they didn’t keep him going; he kept going because sometime, one of his captors would make the tiniest mistake, and Kim would take advantage and escape his bonds. Then, he would slowly skin each man alive.
That was his only focus: getting free to skin them.
That was why he stopped fighting the men and the chains and did his chores willingly: to live, to live and skin.
They sent two of the men away for staying drunk and acting stupid, putting Earl in the truck too since they figured he was going to die soon. They beat him until Kim wondered if any organ were healthy and if any bone remained intact. Earl fought hard and did not turn into a submissive, well-behaved slave but fought back until he was beaten almost to death.
Or maybe to death.
Slaves being beaten were common, and one being beaten to death and tossed away was not a big deal.
They weren’t a huge camp, not like the one they soon would be joining, but at the State Line, they watched for travelers, enslaved some, and shot others who were too old or too young to be good slaves. Kim recalled how Rev and Pan spoke of bodies piled up close together under the bridge where they lost friends.
Sometimes large groups got past; the men were cowards at heart and didn’t confront larger groups. Kim knew their orders were to stop all people and deal with them, but the men disobeyed, and Kim wondered if they would be found out and what would happen then?
He and the other three escaped the zombies in the hospital parking lot only by a few coincidences that came together for their benefit. They hid, were out of ammo, and were ready to run and hide again, but the zombies advanced.
A cat ran by, and the creatures were distracted for only a split second, but that was all they needed. Kim, Andie, Mark, and Earl ran.
In a safer spot, they stopped to rest, knowing the undead soon would be after them again and that they were without much hope for a new escape. Andie watched the parking lot, then looked through the binoculars, and gasped. Hagan and Bryan, two friends of theirs, had holed up in a truck cab to escape the walking dead.
“They’re talking; they look…kind of like they gave up.”
“Bryan limped. He was bitten, I think,” Mark said.
“O, my God,” Andie said. She set the binoculars down. Scratching and moaning and slobbering on the truck’s glass, the zeds clambered to get at the two men.
Scores of the zeds clawed to ge
t at the men; some pushed up onto the hood of the truck. The team couldn’t think of a plan to get to their friends and get them out. They didn’t want to see the men die under teeth and claws or turn into the creatures, either.
The night lit up as explosions rocked the parking lot, tanks going up with noise and light. The shambling zeds were tossed and crushed, set afire, and burned up. The four were able to run to the next street and then over and across again, losing the horde to the fire.
“They saved us,” Andie whispered, “Bryan and Hagan, they did that.”
Kim thought Bryan to be a pretty brave, dependable, cool guy, and Hagan to be like glue that held everyone together at times with his calm, caring manners and ways. It never seemed that those two could ever lose a battle with mere zeds. They lost, but they hadn’t gone out alone.
They kept running, looking for a vehicle with keys until they ran right into the raiders who were attracted by the gunfire.
They were slaves, now.
Mark fought back less and didn’t have the stripes on his back from the whip like Kim did.
Something was done to Mark, or he saw something that changed him; Mark obeyed without complaints and ignored the wounds he gathered, but he stared off into space and never spoke anymore. He stared off into nothing, a thousand- yard-stare.
If Kim escaped, Mark would be of no help. Andromeda might be helpful to the cause if she were physically able.
This group used her as a slave, too, yet claimed to hate black people and thought them to be lesser beings, but that didn’t stop the animals from raping her repeatedly.
Andromeda fought back each time, and the men went away with cuts and deep scratches, but her once beautiful face was a mess, eyes were blackened, nose was broken, and cheeks were smashed. She went about her chores sullenly, getting cuffed often, but she stared at the ground unless she was sure they weren’t looking; then, she glared with hatred so pure and intense it almost cut the air.
Days passed that way: they worked for the men, ate very little, glad for scraps they received, and tried to sleep when they were allowed.
