Age of Z: A Tale of Survival

by T. S. Frost

  Casey frowned. “That's illegal under the grounds of the Constitution...”

  “Trust me,” Alexa said, jerking a thumb at the still-smirking Blake, “If anybody could manage to rewrite the Constitution it'd be this guy.”

  Blake laughed, but added, “The Russian alliance isn't set in stone yet, and the faction I'm in contact with is still very small. But we're hoping an alliance between our stronghold and their group can provide an example of good relations and maybe foster some additional interest in future relations as well. The situation's still a little sticky there, but if things go as well as we hope, some political changes should occur soon.”

  “At least things are working out here,” Alexa noted. “It's not doing so good elsewhere.”

  “You'll have to give me the details later,” Blake told her firmly. “Anything I can pick your brain for to add to the databases. The clearer a picture I have on the state of things in the country, the better I can act on things.” He grew more serious. “For now though... you needed my help with something?”

  “Yeah, but it's gonna take a serious discussion to get through it all,” Alexa explained, giving her friend a pointed look.

  Blake got the message, fortunately: you need to be sure the place is secure before we can talk about this. “Hey, Lewis, can you look into that?” he asked. “I'd like to get this taken care of tonight, if I can.”

  “And maybe find some snacks while you're at it?” Alexa asked hopefully. “You've always got something special hidden around here, don't you?”

  Lewis scowled at her. “I've got better things to do with my time,” he snapped. “I am a bodyguard, not your mother.”

  Blake flinched. It wasn't obvious, just the tiniest reaction to the words, and for a moment his eyes seemed to go dull. Alexa winced in sympathy, and a moment later Lewis seemed to realize what he'd said, and grimaced. “... Sorry, Blake, I didn't mean it like that–”

  “It's fine. I know you didn't.” Blake's voice was mostly neutral, but there was a sliver of pain in the words. Lewis, still grimacing, put an apologetic hand on his charge's shoulder. Casey glance back and forth between them in confusion, and gave Alexa a sidelong glance. Alexa shook her head just slightly and muttered, almost too low to hear, “Later.”

  “I'll take care of things,” Lewis added carefully after a moment. “Wait until I get back to start.” After a quick glance at the other two, he headed out of the small cabin. Alexa could hear him talking to the guard posted at the outside door, although the words weren't easy to make out.

  Blake seemed to have forced himself to recover remarkably fast, but said with just a little too much enthusiasm, “Right, so, in the meantime, anything else I can take care of?”

  “Oh... uh... well, I've got something for you, for starters,” Alexa said, scrounging again for a topic. She recovered her bag from the corner and dug around until she found the abandoned iPhone she'd discovered in the sub-levels of Gentech. This she handed over to Blake, saying, “No battery power, but it looked pretty up to date otherwise, I figured you might be able to get something out of it.”

  “Are you kidding, this is great,” Blake said enthusiastically. “These came out right before the major outbreaks, the technology in it will be some of the most advanced stuff I can find short of breaking into a military base somewhere.”

  He accepted the phone and flipped it over carefully, examining every inch of its surface. Alexa could tell just from the way his fingers twitched he itched to take it apart and start sorting through it for useful bits and pieces.

  Casey seemed confused. “I thought we were supposed to leave all the technology and stuff behind when scavenging?”

  “Mostly, yeah,” Alexa agreed. “Things like desktop computers are just too cumbersome to carry anywhere–even if you're strong enough, there's just no feasible way to lug it around without breaking it while running from zoms. But Blake here has a bounty out on pretty much any portable tech you can find–phones, tablets, laptops, that sort of thing. So if I see'em laying around and it's small enough to carry, I usually grab it for him.”

  “I use it to supplement my makeshift technology here,” Blake added. He jumped up from the cot and headed back over to his piles of tools, starting to sort through them for ones small enough to disassemble the phone in his hands as he finished answering Casey's question.

  “Computers were always my thing back before Z-day. I've been building new systems with the parts people bring me–that's why I've got a bounty on them. It's a slow process and a bit of a crapshoot, because you never know what you're going to get or if the parts are in working order. But it's been coming along, slowly but surely.”

  “What good are computers now?” Casey asked flatly. “I don't see how they would have helped us out at all when we were outside your walls.”

  “They're still useful–if you know what you're doing,” Blake told him confidently. “Fortunately, I do. And I use them for a lot of things here. Mostly I use them for communications. That Russian alliance? Happened because I was able to get in touch with them. No computers, no communication, no alliance.”

  Casey raised an eyebrow at that, but when he spoke he actually sounded impressed. “Oh. Well. What else can you do with them?”

  Blake shrugged, and then smirked as he successfully managed to slip the back case of the phone off. He laid both parts out carefully on the table and pulled up a seat, neatly inspecting the phone insides as he talked.

  “Lots of stuff. I use one system for the more mundane things here, keeping track of supplies and people and stuff. Data crunching, spreadsheets, search boards, that sort of thing. The other one's a little more high-end, I use it to, uh... keep an eye on the military operations on the other side of the country.”

  Alexa smirked, and said in a conspiratorial whisper to Casey, “He means he hacks into their stuff.”

  Casey looked even more impressed. “You can do that?”

  “If you know what you're doing.”

  “Which you do,” Casey pointed out, with a raised eyebrow.

  “Maybe,” Blake drawled, but the way he winked was a very obvious of course I can. “It took me a while to build a system strong enough for me to manage it, but their stuff isn't all that high-end anymore either, they've been suffering too. Mostly I just use it to keep track of things on the Western half of the country... zom movements, resistance movements, survivor news... that sort of thing.”

  He shrugged. “Oh, and satellites, too. Mostly I just hack the weather and communications ones. That way we're prepared for any major storms or abnormalities that come our way, and on good days if we get lucky we can get in touch with other major settlements for a short while.”

  “Other colonies have electronics and communications too?”

  “Not all of them,” Blake said. “None of them are as good as mine, either. But sometimes we get lucky.”

  “Speaking of lucky...” Alexa hesitated. She'd been itching to ask this question since she first met up with Blake again, but between the introductions and the explanations there just hadn't been a chance. Now was as good a time as any, and she asked almost tentatively, “Have you... have you heard anything at all...?”

  Blake fell still at the table, and after a moment slowly set down the phone casing and his tools. He looked like he didn't quite want to meet Alexa's eyes, but after a moment he sighed and glanced at his friend, shaking his head quickly. “No. I'm sorry. I've been keeping an eye out on entry reports and traffic through this island, but nobody matching your family's descriptions have come through Island Refuge.”

  Alexa felt her heart sink a little, but there was still some hope, and she asked with undisguised desperation, “What about outside? Any news from any of the other camps you've kept in contact with or... or anything?”

  Blake looked deeply, genuinely sorry as he answered, “No... I'm sorry, Alexa. I've checked reports and asked around when I can, but I've got nothing from any of my open lines of communication, either.”
<
br />   Alexa felt miserable. Her shoulders slumped, her entire body seemed to droop, and her heart felt like it was being squeezed in a vice. Casey looked concerned, and tentatively reached out to put a hand on her shoulder. He was frowning just slightly, like he wasn't sure if he was doing the right thing or not.

  Blake was more responsive, bounding across the room to put an arm around his friend's shoulders reassuringly. “Hey, Alexa, it's not a total debacle, okay? No news can also be good news. Your family's tough, they could still be out there. Stay strong, alright?”

  “I know that. I just...” Alexa took a deep breath, trying to control the whirling mass of emotions and thoughts in her head, and rasped softly, “I just... I hoped, that maybe there'd be something. It's been three years, Blake. Three years. What are the odds that... that after all that time, they could...”

  “You're still alive,” Casey pointed out.

  Alexa blinked in surprise and glanced over at her traveling companion. Casey still looked uncomfortable, like he wasn't exactly sure how to deal with emotional turmoil or even comfort anybody, but he was obviously trying and he looked sincere enough.

  Blake seized on to the words, and he was much better at dealing with people; he smiled, which Alexa knew had to be fake but it looked real, and felt infectious. “Casey's right! I mean, you were what, twelve, and you figured out how to survive the crisis? If you can do it, they can do it. You just have to hang in there.”

  “Cardinal rule of zombie apocalypse survival,” Casey added, repeating verbatim one of the first lessons Alexa had ever given him, back at Gentech. There was a hesitant, tiny smirk on the clone's face as he said it, and between the two of them Alexa couldn't help but offer a weak, watery smile of her own.

  “Yeah. Yeah, okay, right. Hanging in there still.” The weak smile slipped away, and Alexa admitted, “I just... I'd been hoping, that at least I'd have something to work with, some sort of sighting or... I don't know.” She sighed, rubbing her forehead with the heel of one hand in frustration. “I'm back at square one again. I don't even know where to look anymore.”

  Blake seemed to hesitate for a moment, and slowly pulled away. Alexa glanced up, a little surprised–Blake was rarely if ever one for shows of cold emotion–and could practically see the gears turning in her friend's head. “You know something,” she realized, eyes widening.

  Blake grimaced. “Not exactly–”

  “Blake, if you have any hints at all, anything, you have to tell me. You have to.” Alexa stared at him, one part pleading and one part accusatory, and added, “You know what it's like. If you know something...”

  Blake winced again, but after a moment dragged over one of the chairs from his work table so that he could sit directly across from Alexa. He leaned forward, elbows on knees, fingers steepled in front of his face, expression solemn.

  “Look, Alexa,” Blake said, after taking a few moments to collect his thoughts, “I don't want to give you false hope or anything, which is why I was so hesitant to share this...”

  “You do know something!” Alexa already felt her spirits lifting. False hope or real, it was still worth it.

  “Maybe,” Blake said. This time it wasn't a joke; he looked very serious, and stressed the uncertainty of it. “It's all speculation and rumor, Alexa. I haven't been able to confirm anything yet, and looking into it further could be very dangerous. You need to take this seriously or I'm not going to tell you anything.”

  “I've never taken anything more seriously in my life,” Alexa told him, voice flat. “You know that. Whatever you know, I'll be careful. I promise. But you can't keep this from me, you just can't.”

  “I'll make sure she doesn't do anything stupid,” Casey added, to Alexa's surprise. The clone had retreated back to his corner of the couch, removing his hand from Alexa's shoulder, but he sounded absolutely serious when he said it and met Blake's gaze without backing down. Alexa might have laughed, if the situation hadn't been so serious; she was the one that usually kept Casey from doing stupid things, not the other way around.

  But Blake seemed to accept both of their reassurances that they would be careful, because after a moment he nodded.

  “Okay,” he said slowly, “I've been keeping an eye on recorded scouting and traveler reports recently, trying to get a better lay of the land.”

  Casey looked a little puzzled, and Blake added mostly for his benefit, “There are lots of other colonies out there that do the same thing I do here–get news from travelers and passersby to figure out how things look outside them. Alexa here usually gives me a report on everything she's seen in between trips–where settlements are, or if they don't exist anymore, where possible supply caches are, where there's a pretty heavy zom population... that sort of thing.”

  Casey nodded his understanding, so Blake continued. “Recently I picked up a report from a traveler who was passing through the mountains, trying to head west. He was stopped at one of the military bases across the country and they picked his brain. Their scouts found him half starved, ranting and raving about the dead heads and slipping in and out of delirium. The things in his report might not even be real, they could just be in his head.”

  “What'd he find?” Alexa asked, barely daring to breathe or risk missing the answer.

  “He thinks,” Blake stressed the word heavily, “that there might be living people in the Saint Francois Mountain range. Possibly around the Taum Sauk peak, but it's hard to say. He reports having seen smoke once, and signs of human life. He also stressed that he decided to steer clear of the area, just in case.”

  Alexa nodded grimly. As a practiced solo traveler, unless she had a reason to inspect the settlement, she would have done the same thing: approached cautiously, or avoided it altogether. Just because there were no zoms did not mean the people were safe. There were roving bands of thieves and brigands these days that largely survived by killing and stealing from their fellow humans.

  It was not unheard of for smaller settlements with relatively low numbers of people to simply be overtaken, and the thieves to move right on in. it was also not unheard of for wayward travelers to approach these dangerous settlements and never leave them again.

  It sounded dangerous... but it was also a lead. She hadn't had a lead in months, not since she checked out that settlement in Florida, only to discover it had been completely eradicated. She'd even checked the bodies that remained there, terrified every time she turned over a corpse, but she'd recognized no one, and had obtained no answers ever since.

  Casey frowned at the news. “How is it possible that nobody would even know these people are here?”

  “Easier than you might think,” Blake said with a shrug. “We're talking a lot of square miles and elevation, and Missouri is the 'cave state' for a reason; there's hundreds of places in the mountain range where people could hide. The mountains have running water and game for hunting, and with a little ingenuity they could get gardens growing as well. A small group could be fully self-sustaining and remain isolated from any other forms of society for years, if they had to.”

  “That range is barely three hundred miles from where we lived!” Alexa said excitedly. Things were sounding more plausible by the minute. “They could have gotten there, in the outbreak–dad used to go camping all the time, he'd know about it, I'm sure–this is perfect! They've got to be there, they have to be–”

  “Alexa!”

  Alexa froze in the middle of her rambling to glance up at her friend. Blake was staring at her with a very serious expression on his face, and said sternly, but not unkindly, “You need to deal with this realistically. I hope they're there, I really do, but don't take stupid risks. There's a very high probability that they aren't and this is a dangerous area.”

  “I know. I know, okay? But I still have to look. I have to try. I can't just not.” Alexa clenched her fists on her knees, determined now that she finally had a goal again.

  “I know that,” Blake told her, very patiently, “But that's not going to s
top me from worrying, got it? I'm getting sick of watching people I know die, Alexa, I just want to look out for you.” His expression flickered for just a moment, looking bitter and sad and far too old for his face, but when he spoke again it was more serious.

  “Just keep the important things in mind, okay? Even if this camp is there, searching the mountains won't be easy–that's a lot of space to cover, and it's a long trip to get there. Don't get yourself stuck out there in mid-winter. And that's not even taking into account the journey there–you know that central U.S. is still crawling with high concentrations of dead heads. Take things slow, think things out, and don't die.”

  Alexa offered him a weak smile again. “You don't have to tell me to be careful, Blake.”

  “I know I don't. I am anyway.” Blake gave her a firm look. “You still going to go?”

  “Do you even have to ask?” Alexa snorted. “I'll need to spend tomorrow resupplying, but I need to get out of here as fast as I can. Still need to beat the weather. If I'm lucky I can make it to the colony closest to the mountains before winter–”