The Red X_Complete Edition

by Robert P. Sullivan

  Although it wasn’t early for Jake, he knew that a lot of people in those days were getting back to how life was before the outbreak, which made it not uncommon to meet people who weren’t morning people. Jake thought that it was a little funny to see someone devoted enough to get up early to do his job, but not yet awake enough to do it well. Jake did notice however that even though Barry was still trying to wake up, he looked like he had rested well. There was little sign of fatigue on him. He was well groomed and clean shaven.

  “Are you ready now?” Jake asked Barry.

  Barry looked through his bag real quick to pull out a notepad and pen. He double checked to make sure that he had everything he needed before saying “I think I’m ready now.”

  “Alright, so as I was saying… We hadn’t seen any ‘X’s and quite a bit of time passed before anything real important happened. It must have been a little over a year. Everything was going well… But, things change you know.” Jake exhaled deeply before he started back into the story. “It was late spring. The trees that weren’t evergreen had gotten their leaves back, and the whole world was back thriving. We hunted a lot in those days, but we still had to take care of the cattle. It was funny just how much time had changed me. I didn’t have a single piece of clothing that I hadn’t made myself at that point. Everything was made from the leather that we got from animals, even my shoes, or I guess I should have called them moccasins. I had grown a patchy beard, that I suppose I was more proud of than I should have been. And I worked hard for everything that I had. It was nice, I didn’t need to be taken care of anymore, and Gale knew it. Of course she panicked a little bit after the whole thing with the ‘X’s, and to be honest I can’t blame her, but eventually she calmed down and started to let me go out alone again. Although it must have been quite a relief for her when she didn’t have to keep so close an eye on me anymore.

  Well anyway, one day, and it was just like any other day, we went out to fix a part of the old fence that kept the cows in. It wasn’t anything special. A tree fell down on the fence and broke a few of the crossbeams, it was going to be easy to replace. She was ahead of me, and I was walking a good fifteen feet or so behind holding two of the rails over my shoulder. She got up to the fence and leaned against it to look over the other side to see if there was anything that needed to be fixed. Well, a cow got between us and it was a little bit scared. I don’t know if you have ever had to work with cattle before, but they don’t much like to be near people. So it backed up to get away from me and pushed Gale against the fence.

  She cried out in pain when a jagged part of the broken beam gouged into her right thigh. I dropped the poles and the cow ran off to be with the rest of the herd. Gale pulled her leg away from the wood, and blood started soaking her pants. I asked her “Are you ok?”

  Her face contorted from the pain. “Fuck! Yeah, I think I’ll be alright.” She said trying to act tough. I offered to fix the fence by myself, but she helped me anyway. We got the job done pretty fast and she walked back to the house to go take care of the wound. It really wasn’t all that bad of a cut, it was a pretty deep, but it was something that would have healed. Truth be told, neither of us really thought much of it at first. It was just a simple accident, the kind that happen all the time.

  The following days were bad though. The wound festered, and started to rot. We cleaned it with some alcohol, but it wasn’t having much of an effect. Each day she got worse and worse until she was bed ridden. I remember the difference in her face. She went from tough as nails rancher, to pale and sickly old woman in under a week. I knew she was going to die if I didn’t do something, so even though she begged me to stay with her I ran to the local medical clinic.

  I looked through everything for some antibiotics, but it was all raided a long time ago, and anything that was left was either broken, a few years past its expiration date, or some name I couldn’t even read let alone feel safe injecting into a friend. It was hopeless, and when I finally realized that, I knew I had only wasted precious little time that I had left with her. I ran back to the ranch, but stopped just out front. I didn’t know what to do or say. I was terrified that this was going to be the last time that I ever saw her, or that maybe she passed when I was out trying to get something to help. I couldn’t decide what was worse, but I decided that standing there was the worst possible option, so I went in.

  Her breathing was labored, and slow. I lit a lantern so that we could see. When the light cast over her face I could tell that there wasn’t a lot of time left. She almost looked dead already. She opened her eyes and looked at me. “Jake.” she called to me.

  I hushed her saying “It’s going to be ok.” and took a hold of her hand.

  “Don’t be stupid, I’m fucking dying.” There was no anger in her voice, in fact she even grinned ever so slightly as she said the words. She wasn’t afraid of what was coming, and she didn’t want to seem that way either. It was more important to her to let the truth be known, than to pretend that it was all going to work out. So she told the truth.

  I smiled back at her with tears in my eyes. “You’re right. Who would have thought a fence would be what killed you?”

  She laughed a little before coughing. “I think it was more the cow’s fault. But I guess my granddaughter would have told me it was the ranch that did it. She always told me this life was going to kill me one day… I guess she was right.” Now that was important, in the entire time that we had known each other Gale had never said a word about her old family. She just focused on what she did to live, and what I needed to do.

  “Tell me about her?” I asked her politely.

  “Lisa, my granddaughter was a little younger than you. She was blonde and pretty, and… she wasn’t as big of a pansy as you either.” I couldn’t help but laugh as I cried. “Seriously though, I miss her. She used to live with me here after her mother died.” Gale pulled out a picture from the dresser next to her bed. Sure enough she was a pretty little thing, but I didn’t recognize her or anything. “The day the zombies came and attacked our local town was the most terrifying day of my life. I didn’t see any of them at the ranch, but I heard the gunshots in town. I knew that they were getting close because a lot of refugees were coming through town the day before, but I wasn’t about to run scared from a problem.

  That’s why Lisa was at school. So when I heard the shots, and saw what was on the television, I grabbed my guns and ran out to my truck as fast as I could. I got in and raced toward Bear Lake. It’s only about three minutes away in the truck, but the school is on the far end of town, you know. When I came off my dirt road and hit the highway, I saw all of the zombies walking on the street. It was horrifying, and I knew that I had to press on, I had to get to Lisa. I didn’t care that they were in my way, that old four by four just ran ‘em over like sticks. People begged me for help when they saw me go by. It broke my heart to just drive past, but I was determined to save my granddaughter.

  It didn’t take long to get to the school plowing through those things. I called out to Lisa over and over as I drove around the school. I didn’t hear anything. I eventually just rammed through the fence and drove all the way up to her class room. It was empty, as were all the classrooms. That’s when I figured the faculty probably went to the gym due to the emergency. I got back in the truck and drove over there. The doors were wide open and puddles of blood surrounded the outside.

  I got out of the truck and opened fire on the zombies that were around there. It didn’t take me long to figure out that you had to shoot them in the head, seeing as that was how I started shooting them in the first place. I entered the gym and saw about eight or so zombies that were hunched over a pile of bodies in the corner of the gym. I had to reload, but I made short work of them.

  When they were dealt with, I nervously checked the bodies. The first was some dumbass kid that had the hots for Lisa. Can’t say I miss him. It was easy enough to tell that the ones intact weren’t her, but there were three bodies, that were ma
ngled beyond recognition. I looked over the first one, but couldn’t tell if it were even a boy or girl. The second was almost as tore up… and what I feared most lay there in front of me. The necklace I gave her, was smeared with blood and wrapped around the neck of the body that I was looking at. I found Lisa… but it was too late.” Gale took off the necklace and gave it to me.

  “I’m so sorry… I… I.” I told her as I struggled to find the words to say.

  “Jake shut up. I don’t have much time left.” She took a deep breath and tried to savor the air. “When I found her like that I lost it at first. I didn’t break down and weep like some coward, I went out and killed dozens of the bastards that had done that to my granddaughter. After a few days though, I realized that they weren’t much more than animals, and that holding a grudge against them wasn’t going to solve anything. I gave up on avenging her death, and instead went on trying to live.

  I knew that this apocalypse bullshit was going to bring out the worst in people, and so I went into hiding, sort of. I went to the dirt road that connected my house to the highway, and covered it up so that it didn’t appear as anything special from the road, then I burned down the post office and town hall because they had maps that showed where my property was. Once that was done I knew that I was hidden. I kept on living my life as if nothing had happened, well, except that I quit using gas and power. When a few months had passed by, I had realized that I wasn’t doing anything but prolonging the inevitable. I was going to die, and nothing I was doing mattered at all.”

  Gale took a deep breath and tried to compose herself. She looked away from me with shame in her eyes before she continued. “There was nothing left for me, no family, no friends, no reason to live. I went up to Lisa’s room and hung up a noose. I was ready for it to be over, my way… I cooked up one big last meal and was just about to eat it, when I saw you walking through my meadow.”

  It all made so much more sense after that, the meal when I arrived, and her cleaning up the room that I was sleeping in before I went up there. But to be honest, I didn’t even know how to react when she told me that, I just listened as she went on. “Jake… At first I was terrified that you were nothing but bad news, and I am sorry about the hand. But, when I realized that you needed my help, I had a reason to go on.”

  I interrupted her. “Gale, it’s ok, I’m not going to die of…” But she cut me off.

  “Just be quiet and listen. The reason I am telling you all of this is so that you don’t make the same mistake that I made. If you just stay here, you’ll never know what you are living for… You will only be waiting to die.” She moved her gaze back toward me. “Jake you have to leave here when I am gone. You have to find a reason to live.”

  When my words ceased to find my tongue, I nodded in agreement. “Well, I think I can die with that off my chest.” She said.

  “I love you Gale. You’re like a grandma to me.” I told her.

  “I know, I love you too Jake. So don’t be a pussy.” Those were Gale’s last words. Ha ha, I can’t help but laugh at them still to this day. She had quite the way of making sure that I would remember her the way she was, and not just some feeble old woman that died of an infection. Still, to think that‘s what finally did her in.”

  Jake turned away from Barry with the thoughts of Gale running through his head. “She was a tough old bitch. But she was more family than anyone else I had known. Now she didn’t die immediately after saying that, she held on for about another half hour until she finally took her last breath and went pale. I was sad to see her go, but I knew there was nothing I could do but honor her memory and do as she asked.

  I buried her out in that meadow, at the place where I first saw her, the same spot where she bent my finger back. It seemed fitting to let her stay there, as a part of the ranch.”

  Act: III

  Chapter 26

  I didn’t stay there much longer after that. I got my things together, and made a good sweep of the house to make sure that I had everything that I was going to need. I got some food together and had to come up with a new plan. Before that, my whole thought was just trying to survive, but now I had a different goal, I had to live. Well, it turns out that those are two entirely different things, because surviving I could do, but living meant I had to go find something else to live for, and that meant finding more people… and I had not had the best luck finding people that weren’t trying to kill me. But still, it was better to try and die, than to just live out there alone and end up dead anyway.

  When I was ready to go, I looked back one more time at the cabin and tombstone, which I placed over Gale’s grave. It was a beautiful sight, and a sad one… I knew that I was probably never going to see that place again, and I left with tears in my eyes. I did go back and visit the place a few years ago. The house is pretty worn down now, the porch collapsed, but the tombstone is still there. It was nice to see again.” Jake stopped, he looked at Barry who didn’t seem very attentive. “Am I boring you with this stuff?”

  Barry came to attention and set his eyes on Jake. “Oh, I’m sorry, I just…” Barry sighed. “Look I don’t need to know everything that happened. I am looking to get the facts of the events here. I don’t mean to be rude, but I do have other people waiting for me.”

  Jake was more than a little frustrated, but calmed himself before speaking again. “I understand that, but if you want the story you are going to have to listen to the rest of it, not just the short version.”

  Barry closed his eyes. ”Ok, I’m listening.”

  “Good!” said Jake. “Now where was I again…?” He looked through his thoughts and stopped Barry before he could respond. “Oh yeah, I was leaving the ranch. I came to the conclusion that I was going to have to find some people, but I was looking for ones that weren’t associated with the ‘X’s. So the first thing I did was get a map to look for the nearby cities. I knew of them, but once again when you haven’t driven anywhere, you don’t know just how far away anything is. I found a map at the old gas station in Bear Lake and found that the city of Renate was about forty or so miles east of Oak Noll, and I figured that would be as good as any place to start.

  There were a few smaller towns along the way though, and I thought that I might as well check them to see if I can find any signs of civilized people. I was in dread when I started my trek down the mountain, back toward society, but it was really not that bad. After a few days on the road I found that the skills that Gale had taught me were more than enough to make it out there in the wilderness. I ain’t saying that it was easy mind you, but that instead of just trying to keep my ass from starving or getting eaten, I was able to make it on my own pretty well. I took my time traveling, to really make sure that I got a good sense of the surrounding areas, and wasn’t going to jump into another one of the ‘X’s barbeques… So I went a little slower than I needed to. It gave me time to see what had really happened to the world after the zombies came.

  It was all destroyed, there was nothing that worked anymore. No cars, no electricity, no running water, nothing. These were all things that we counted on to be working in order to survive, and there was nothing. Everything was either scavenged, or just worn down through time. It turned out that the forest was more hospitable than the towns and cities had become. It was all getting washed away with time though. There were some bones of the dead still, but the stench had long faded from them. It was strange seeing it all again, but this time instead of being horrifying, it was kind of peaceful. It was nice to see that the world was able to get on without us, like a reminder that we were only ever guests here.

  Anyway, I looked at a few small towns and found that they were empty, mostly just a waste of time, and I had no need to look for food or supplies in the buildings anymore. I had everything that I needed, so it was really just a simple hike through the torn down towns. I was hesitant to enter the buildings though, because I knew that there could be lurkers just waiting for their moment to strike. But the smell made them easy en
ough to avoid, so all and all it really wasn’t nearly as scary as it had once been.

  Well, except that after a week or so of traveling I didn’t find a single person. I was getting afraid that I wasn’t going to find anyone out there except the ‘X’s, and that was a terrifying thought. It was more of a nagging thought that crept up slowly as I traveled, as opposed to something that you realize all of the sudden, but it was a problem that I was facing nonetheless.

  I was faintly wondering if I should have just gone back to the ranch when I reached the old city of Renate. I was just inside the city limits when I came across an old ponding basin. Although, I guess you would just call it a pond now huh? I had been alone without so much as seeing a single soul, and I let my guard down. I decided I was going to take a bath in the water. It was cold, but I had gotten used to that a long time ago. I didn’t even really mind anymore, it was just how things were and you really do get used to it.

  I took off my clothes and placed them on the shore with the rest of my belongings, and waded out into the water. I was there for a few minutes just cleaning myself off, when I heard a twig snap behind me on the shore. I whipped my head around to see what was happening, and to my surprise I saw a teenage girl, about a year younger than me crouching over my belongings. When our eyes locked we were both speechless… until she grabbed my shit and ran.”

  Jake started to laugh wildly. “And I do mean all of my shit, my clothes even! It was one of funniest damn things I can remember. I bolted from the water and chased her for about a mile running after her butt ass naked, hootin’ and hollerin’ “Give me back my stuff!” and “You stupid girl!” Oh, I didn’t think it was funny at the time of course, but looking back on that moment, it was just hilarious.