The Systemic Series - Box Set

by K. W. Callahan

  It wasn’t a perfect plan by any means, but without knowing what the situation down in Tipton was, we kind of had to take things on the fly depending upon what was thrown at us.

  In essence, our best case scenario – and main goal of our trip – would be to conduct what we hoped would be a safe and mutually beneficial “meet and greet” with area residents.

  CHAPTER 15

  There was a strong sense of tension among the group the Saturday evening before we set out for our scouting mission. There wasn’t much talk at dinner. Everyone was thinking about the upcoming trip, the dangers involved, and what was at stake, but no one wanted to bring up their concerns. Even Cashmere, my loyal kitty-cat, seemed to know something was up, as when I sat down to dinner, she immediately jumped up on my lap and sprawled herself widely across my legs as though she hoped that by doing so it would help keep me put.

  The kids helped take our minds off things a little by chattering away about completely nonrelated topics. Paul talked about his target practice for the day and how much better he was getting at hitting the bulls-eye targets we’d drawn for him. Sarah discussed a tomato plant she’d been nursing back to health after Cashmere had gotten into the greenhouse the other night and given it a good gnawing and then used its soil for kitty-litter. And Shane spent a few minutes complaining about the handwriting homework his mommy had left for him to do while she was away.

  Most of the adults just listened quietly, our thoughts elsewhere.

  Later, I spent a little extra time tucking Jason into bed, reading him a story and rubbing his back as he lay snuggled under his covers. We were all still sleeping in the family room for warmth, but we had moved beds down from the guest rooms upstairs to make our sleeping situations more comfortable. It looked like some sort of haphazard army barracks with all the beds laid out in various portions of the huge room, but it worked for our needs. If anyone needed private time, plenty of other bedrooms were available; they’d just better be ready to hunker down or snuggle up because the temperature differential from the family room to the castle’s upstairs tended to range around 20 to 30 degrees.

  Just as I began to think that Jason was asleep, he mumbled tiredly, “Daddy go-go tonight?”

  “Yes,” I whispered to him. “Daddy has to go-go.”

  “Why?” he asked. “I no want Daddy go-go,” his voice trembled.

  It was a conversation I was hoping to avoid with my little man and that until this moment, one that I’d thought I’d escaped.

  “Daddy has to go on a long hike,” I said. “But I shouldn’t be gone too long.”

  Working from home before the flu hit, and then being around Jason so much after we’d left Chicago, had gotten him used to my constant presence. And I’d become accustomed to being with him as well. This made it even harder to leave, but I knew I must.

  “No go, Daddy,” he sobbed softly, a tear running down the side of his check. “Pease stay,” he said, taking my thumb in his tiny hand, gripping it tightly, and then turning his head away to bury it in his pillow. I petted his hair softly with my other hand, hopping he’d just fall asleep.

  “I love you, sweetie,” I said, half wanting to cry myself. “I’ll be back soon,” I promised, hoping that it wouldn’t be a life-lasting lie with which I was leaving my son.

  He angled his face slightly on the pillow, and I could tell by his breathing that he was near sleep. I waited until I was sure he’d ventured into the land of nod, and then I crept quietly from his bedside.

  I finished putting my pack together for the trip, laying everything out before me before securing it inside to ensure I hadn’t forgotten anything as Will, Ray, and Joanna did the same. Once we were set, we decided not to hang around. We were tired of the tension inside the castle and figured it would be better for everyone if we were just on our way.

  Joanna waited patiently by the door while Ray, Will, and I said goodbye to spouses. She had already put Shane to sleep and left instructions with Janet, Claire, and Emily regarding his upbringing – as well as a sealed envelope to be given to Shane when he was of age – should she not return from the trip.

  Our leaving was a somber affair with lots of tears shed, and I was actually glad once we were out and on our way, tromping through the snow with other things to focus upon other than the sad departure. I felt bad for those we’d left behind to worry about our well-being, but what was done was done.

  It was around 10:30 as we found ourselves working our way down the entry drive in the dark. It was a calm, clear night, but cold. The moon was out, which helped to guide our way, but the lack of cloud cover meant January temperatures had dropped into what felt like the low-20s. The group was warmly dressed, and our movement, paired with the lack of wind meant that the cold didn’t bother us much.

  Slowed by the snow cover – which was about six inches – and the weight of our packs, it took us almost an hour to make it down to the end of the entry drive where it met with the main road, but the going, while slow, was relatively easy due to the downhill grade.

  The main road into town was, as we’d hoped, completely deserted. We kept our guard up and stayed constantly prepared to rush for the cover of the nearby forest if necessary, but it proved not to be.

  While the road was covered with snow, which slowed our pace slightly, it was much easier going than trying to navigate our way through the woods, and we got to the outskirts of town – indicated by a green sign that read, “Tipton: Population 189” – at a little before five in the morning. With several hours still remaining until daybreak, we found a secluded spot in the woods about 30 feet from the road. There we regrouped, taking a rest and having something to eat. None of us – other than Ray, due to his army training – were used to hiking this far in normal conditions, let alone in the cold and snow and while carrying heavy packs.

  It was nice to shed our loads, get off our feet, and eat something. The food hit the spot, and while we couldn’t have a fire, the respite from our hike was rejuvenating. It also gave us a chance to discuss our next move.

  “Everything’s been pretty quiet so far,” said Will. “May not be much to see here.”

  “Yeah,” said Joanna. “Could just be some backwoods hillbillies that stole our stuff. They might be living somewhere out in the boonies, not in town.”

  “Either way, we’re here, so we might as well check the place out,” I said.

  “Where you want to start?” asked Ray.

  “What do you think?” I asked him.

  “Well, I’d probably start by breaking us up into two teams, one team circling the perimeter of town in either direction until we meet up on the other side. Then we can exchange data, plan our next course of action and go from there. Anything goes wrong or we don’t connect on the other side, we meet back here at 8 a.m.”

  “Sounds good to me,” I said.

  “How are we going to break up?” asked Will.

  I thought about it for a second and then said, “I figure you two are a pretty good team already since you’ve spent so much time hunting together. So why don’t you and Ray head to the right and Joanna and I will take the left. Everybody good with that?”

  There were murmurs of agreement.

  “Well then, I guess we’d better get moving,” I said.

  We all stood and roped our packs together. Then we found a tall tree, looped the rope up over a tall branch and hauled our packs up high, tying the rope off to the base of the tree to keep our supplies out of reach of any animals.

  “Everyone check their weapons…just to be on the safe side,” Ray reminded us.

  We all took a moment to ensure that our guns were loaded and ready; then we split up.

  I led Joanna through the woods and out to where the road we’d followed from the castle crossed a small creek and met with another road that led into Tipton. The tree cover thinned noticeably as we moved closer to town, and the roadway was relatively clear in this area from where the previous day’s sunlight had warmed the pavement enough
to melt most of the snow cover.

  We passed a few lone houses along the way that didn’t look like they were occupied. A number of windows were smashed on one and the front door of the other stood wide open – certainly not indications of people holding out inside them against a harsh winter.

  We paused at the junction of the two roads to survey the area and then moved past the street that led into town. In the moonlight, I could see more homes lining both sides of the street and what appeared to be some larger, business-type buildings another block or two down from these. After bypassing a few more streets off to our right, and a gas station to our left, it appeared we’d come to the other side of town.

  “Not much to see here, is there?” I said to Joanna.

  “Doesn’t look like it,” she said. “Should we check a few of the houses?”

  “Not yet,” I told her. “I want to find out what Ray and Will have to report first, then we can make a decision.”

  We continued on, deciding to move past what appeared to be the last street with houses on it, flanking it, and cutting through the woods behind the homes. In the process, we left the road that continued on up a winding hill and out of town where it eventually met up with Interstate 40 about eight miles further on.

  From our elevated position partway up the wooded hill behind the homes, we could see a few pickup trucks parked on the street below. The houses in this part of town appeared to be in better shape than those we’d passed earlier.

  “Think anybody lives in them?” Joanna whispered.

  “Hard to tell from here,” I said. “I’d like to check for tracks in the snow around them. Finding those would be the tell-tale indication of people here. But then we’d risk leaving tracks of our own that could give away our presence and make it easier to track us.”

  “Good thinking,” she said taking up the lead. “Let’s keep moving.”

  As we traveled, we were gradually forced to move higher up the hillside to avoid several of the larger backyards of certain homes, some of which were fenced and protruded into our path. I didn’t mind staying in the cover of the forest, not just to conceal our tracks, but to avoid a potential unexpected confrontation. The last thing I wanted – should there be other people around – was for someone’s dog to come charging out barking because we were in its yard, alerting the entire town to our presence.

  Eventually, we came to a steep drop off where the hillside broke away into a deep ravine. It appeared that it was a spot where runoff from the hillside drained into a ditch that was maybe 20 or 25 feet deep and probably 40 feet across. It looked like when it rained, the ditch became a sort of stream that flowed down between the yards of two houses below us and then disappeared into a culvert that ran beneath the street.

  “Better follow the edge down a bit until we find a safer place to cross,” I said.

  “Sounds good,” Joanna said, turning to follow the hillside down closer to the row of homes that lined the street. But as she turned, her left foot slipped, losing traction in the snow, and she quickly began to slide backwards and off the ledge that dropped cavernously away into the ditch.

  I went to grab Joanna’s hand in mine, but she hadn’t released the grip on her shotgun. Therefore I grabbed the only thing available – the hood of her coat – and hoped it’d hold.

  “Ah! Goddamn it!” she cried, finally dropping her gun and using her arms to help hold some of her weight as her legs dangled over the side of the ledge. “You’ve got my HAIR!”

  I quickly dropped my automatic rifle and bent to grab hold of her arms with both hands just as she began to lose her grip on the ground. After a few seconds of struggling, I had her back up on the hillside, half in the snow and half on top of me. We were both panting and out of breath.

  “Sorry…about your hair,” I gasped.

  She pulled her hood back and rubbed the back of her braided head. “It’s not your fault. I should know better around you by now.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” I said, kind of taking offense.

  “Means you’re fucking dangerous! Ran me over with your car, nearly pulled my scalp off. Shit! You fucking HURT!” she spat venomously.

  “Oh,” I said, somewhat unsure of what else to say. “Okay,” I drawled. Then, I touched the back of her head lightly. “Looks like it’s still there to me,” I murmured in kind of a shitty tone.

  “Asshole!” she swore, pushing me hard in the chest with a hand and almost crushing my nuts with her elbow that she was using for leverage.

  “Ah!” I exclaimed, flinching back more from the danger in which she was putting my testicles than the force of the blow to my chest.

  Then we sat a moment in silence, Joanna still partially atop me.

  “Sorry,” she said finally. “I didn’t mean it. You saved my ass. It just hurt is all…bad.”

  “I’m sorry too,” I said. “I didn’t mean to hurt you…either time…with the car or now. I just grabbed. I didn’t think.”

  “You did the right thing. Don’t worry about it. I’m…well, I don’t know…it just hurt, and I’ve been kind of…I guess…frustrated lately.”

  “Frustrated?” I said, confused and kind of wondering where she was headed with this and why she was choosing to bring it up now. “What do you mean?” I asked, half curious, and half not wanting to know.

  “I don’t know. I shouldn’t have mentioned it. It’s just hard with everyone having someone and well, I…I…” she took a deep breath. “I don’t know. Just forget I said anything. We’ve got work to do,” she said, almost knocking me over backward as she forcefully pushed herself off me and got to her feet and then bent to pick up her shotgun and brush the snow off it. “Come on, let’s go,” she said, offering me a hand up.

  I recovered my rifle, and we continued down the hill, across the ditch, and on to the end of the street in silence.

  I’d say we’d only covered maybe three-quarters a mile at most, but the town was so tiny, there just wasn’t much to get around. I began looking for Will and Ray, assuming that if they were making similar progress around the tiny burg, we’d be meeting up shortly.

  Before long, we came to what looked to be a small school. It was a three-story structure with a playground out back and a big parking lot to one side. On the other side of the building there was a baseball field, running track, and several outdoor basketball courts. It was probably the largest structure in town, and I figured it likely acted as one of the main schools – if not the main school – for the entire county.

  It took us several minutes to loop out and around the school grounds, and we met up with Will and Ray on the other side. The previously black sky was starting to brighten just a little, indicating that dawn was approaching.

  “See anything of interest?” I asked them as they approached.

  Will shook his head. “Seems pretty dead right now, but we didn’t want to get too close to any of the buildings. What about you guys?”

  “Pretty much the same,” I said.

  “I did notice that it looked like the walkways of several homes on our side of town had been cleared,” said Ray.

  “So it’s likely there are still some inhabitants here,” I nodded. “The question is, how many, and where are they? Did they all move to one part of town or did they stay spread out after the flu came through.”

  “Guess we’ll have to stick around to find out,” said Joanna.

  “Yeah,” said Ray. “I don’t think it’s a good idea to go tromping in to town just yet. And I definitely don’t think we should give away our position by leaving a bunch of tracks for people to follow.”

  “I think you’re right,” I said. “Why don’t we pick a good spot on one of these surrounding hillsides where we can scope things out and see what the situation is in the daytime? We can get some rest too. We’ll leave two people on watch and the others can nap, and then we’ll switch off every hour or so.”

  “We saw a good spot over by a church at the end of what looks to be the town’
s main street,” Will offered. “Behind it, there’s a big hill with some tree cover at the top. We could take up positions there. It’s a good quarter mile or so to the top, so we’ll be fairly isolated but with a good view over the town.”

  “Sounds like a plan to me,” I said. “We’d better get moving before it gets too light out.”

  It took us about half an hour to make our way through the forest and up to the top of the hill. Along the way, we did our best to ensure that we stayed in areas that appeared to be untraveled by others in an effort to conceal our tracks. When we finally arrived and got ourselves settled in, it was about 6:30 a.m. Joanna and I took the first shift, watching for an hour and letting Will and Ray rest. There was nothing to see and we chewed slowly on pieces of deer jerky to help keep us awake through the cold and boredom of sitting in the snow.

  Then it was our turn to rest.

  I’d say I was asleep in a matter of minutes if not less. And it seemed like it was only a few minutes that I’d been asleep before I felt a hand shaking me awake.

  “John…John,” Will’s voice whispered in my ear. “Wake up.”

  “Already,” I moaned.

  “People are down at the church,” he said.

  I was instantly awake. As I sat up, there was a throbbing pain in my right hip and I reached down confused. I felt something hard under me and then realized that I’d fallen asleep on my sheathed hunting knife. I pulled it off my belt and threw it angrily in the snow.

  It was dawn now, and in the early light, I could see people getting out of a vehicle parked outside the steeple-topped stone church below us, attached to which was a small building that I guessed served as a rectory. Meanwhile, a pickup truck was approaching the church down Main Street.