by David Rogers
“I get that, I guess.” Whitley said. “But I’m afraid the way she’s acting might start creeping out some of the civvies. A lot of them are still in shock over what’s happening. There’s still a ton of things to do that Ms. Sawyer needs workers for.”
“Leave Crawford be.” Peter said firmly. “That’s an order sergeant. You’ve brought it to me, which was the right thing to do if it was on your mind, but I’m aware of what’s happening, and I’ve listened, and I’m telling you to stay out of it for now.”
Whitley nodded, reluctantly, but without any sign of defiance. Peter shrugged. “Everyone’s a little crazy these days. We’ve got batteries to spare. If she wants to play with toys for a while, we owe her that much.”
“I don’t care about the batteries.”
“I know. Neither do I. I’ll keep an eye on her, and I know you’ll do the same, but she’s probably going to be fine. In the meantime, it isn’t like we don’t have other concerns.”
Whitley’s mood shifted a little, from the reluctant concern to her more usual brisk confidence. “Andres says he’s got everyone we need for the planned runs over the next few days, loaders as well as security.”
Peter touched one of the papers on his desk. “I saw list Mendez worked up, and the targets he’s going to cover. It’ll be a good test for the recruits, and the camp should see a lot of useful supplies out of it as well.”
“After everything we’ve been through, it feels weird sending civvies out to do things like this.”
“Hah!” Peter laughed. “Be thankful Mendez did the picking, and offered to lead the runs himself. I was going to send you before he pointed out he’d been spending the most time with them.”
“Thanks a lot.”
“Price of success. Besides, Smith and Oliver both are riding along to stiffen them up. And they’re not going far, and only to little stores. We’re not sending them into the depths of a dark warehouse store. Yet.” He suppressed his own shudder.
“Still feels weird.”
“Sergeant, I have a feeling we’ve only just begun to feel weird. Remember, the world’s in the middle of ending. We’ve done our share of heavy lifting. As of this morning there are twenty-four hundred and seventeen people in this camp. I’m too old to run around supporting them with just you guys. Face it, we’re the vets in this thing. Time we started acting like it.”
Whitley sighed. “I’m beginning to see why you retired.”
“Questioning my senility?”
“Who, me?”
Peter pointed at the door. “Out. Go be useful. I’ve got a planning meeting to finish getting ready for. Sawyer might be little, but I think she can probably kick even your over-confident ass. I sure as hell don’t want her up mine, so I need to be ready when I walk in there.”
Whitley grinned at him and left. Peter watched her go, then looked at the papers on the desk with fading enthusiasm. He really couldn’t believe he was stuck doing paperwork in the middle of a zombie apocalypse.
* * * * *
Chapter Sixteen - Healing
Darryl
The sun was getting low in the sky as the Dogz followed the lake road around toward the clubhouse. On the roof, the guards were waving at them and shouting down into the yard. As the line of bikes turned onto the gravel drive, Darryl saw someone appear from the back yard, running toward the gate. It was being pushed open by the time the first motorcycles reached it. Darryl pulled through and wove to the side before stopping so he could turn in his seat and eyeball everyone coming in.
Bracketed amid the bikes was a Suburban SUV. The driver slowed as he drove through the gate, then rolled the vehicle forward off the gravel path and parked on the grass before the clubhouse’s front porch. Darryl shut down his Softail and dropped the kickstand, leaving the bike next to the fence. His helmet he just flung on the grass next to the bike as he hastened toward the SUV.
As the last of the Dogz got inside the fence, Darryl opened the rear driver’s door on the Suburban. An older man, maybe mid-sixties with white hair and a wrinkled face, was sitting in the seat there.
“Doc, the sick area set up in the back yard.” Darryl said politely but anxiously.
“Alright.” the doctor said, taking Darryl’s proffered hand and easing himself down out of the SUV, swaying a little with a wince. “My leg’s acting up some. Julie, I’ll need my chair. Kathy, would you mind bringing my bag? And we’ll need the supplies I brought too.”
“We got it.” Darryl said, turning as he steadied the doctor. The old man straightened carefully, leaning on the tall biker. Several Dogz from the Watkinsville run were already approaching, and Darryl pointed at the back of the SUV without saying a word. Tank and Evil broke into trots as the driver did something on the door panel that made the rear hatch click. It opened at the bikers’ touch.
First out was a folding wheelchair, which Tank fumbled with for a few moments before getting extended out. He carried it over and deposited it very gently on the ground next to Darryl.
“No, you’ve got to lock the latches.” a woman said as she came around the front of the SUV. “Like this.” she knelt and flipped several things on the chair.
“Ah, thank you.” the doctor said as he lowered himself down into the seat. “It’s hell getting old.”
“Yes sir.” Darryl said with a nod. Evil and been joined by a couple other Dogz at the back of the SUV. They were removing some boxes of supplies, handling them very carefully.
“Around the back you said?”
“This way.” Darryl told the doctor, taking the wheelchair’s handles and starting to push the man across the grass. The biker quickly figured out it was easiest, and a smoother ride on the grass, if he tipped the chair back just a little so the small front wheels were off the ground. The doctor was somewhat rotund, but Darryl managed the chair easily as he headed around the side of the clubhouse. Everyone from the SUV followed him; the townie driver with his slung M-16 and holstered pistol, the two women – one of them with a classic black leather satchel in her hand– and the Dogz each with a cardboard box from the SUV.
The sick tents were still occupied. Wind was whisking the worst of the smell away, and Darryl saw the washing and cleaning was still ongoing in the back corner. Vivian was coming to meet them, an expression of enormous hope on her worried features that Darryl couldn’t decide whether to be relieved or concerned over.
“This Doc Early.” Darryl said as she reached them. “He a general practitioner from Watkinsville.”
“Vivian Dwyer.” she said quickly. “Medical assistant. Real glad to meet you.”
“Medical assistant. Fancy name for what we used to just call a junior nurse when I was your age.” the doctor replied as he looked past her at the people laid out under the tents and pavilions. “Alright, tell me what I’m looking at dear.”
“Diarrhea, some vomiting, fever, sweats and a couple delirious.” she said as she fell into step next to the wheelchair. “Some of them got blood in the stool, but only a few. I trying to keep them hydrated, but most can’t keep anything down, not even salted water.”
“Sounds like dysentery.” Early said calmly. “Don’t see that too often, except in these kinds of conditions I guess. Aren’t you treating your water?”
“We boiling.”
“All of it?”
“Some of it might not have been. The Kool-Aid, and some of the salad might have had bad water.” EZ said as he joined the group. He gave Darryl a brief look. “I been asking around. Some of the pots might not have been boiled before they was used yesterday. Not everyone understand the thing about the water.” Darryl felt himself frowning, but he said nothing. Right now there was only fixing it. Figuring out how to keep it from happening again could wait.
“That would do it.” Early nodded. “Well Ms. Dwyer, do you know how to start an IV?”
“Vivian, please doctor. Yes. I a little slow at it, but I can get one going. But I ain’t got none.”
“I was warned you didn’t h
ave any intravenous equipment, so I had some made up while your men here were out getting food for Watkinsville.” Early said, turning and looking over his shoulder at the boxes being carried. “They’re a little unorthodox, but they’ll do the trick just fine. Before I leave, I’ll show you how to make them if you need more in the future. They’re not that hard to put together, but it’s critical you use bottles and materials that can withstand heat so you can sterilize them.
“I brought fifty, but we’ll need hydrating solution to start them with. Ten milliliters of salt per liter of water that’s been boiled for twenty minutes and cooled to room temperature. Now, I brought some drugs too, but I was told you had a lot already on hand.”
“Yes, but I can’t get anything to stay down, and I ain’t got no syringes for shots neither.” Vivian said. “And I ain’t too sure what to be giving them anyway. I tried some ampicillin and some of them that ain’t too bad are getting a little better, but . . .”
“The others can’t keep anything in long enough to take effect.” Early nodded again. “Well, that’s why we invented intravenous medication.”
“I don’t know how to convert an oral dose to IV.” Vivian said anxiously. “I know if it ain’t done right, it gonna hurt more than help.”
“True, but it’s not difficult. I can teach you easily enough. Show me what drugs you’ve got and we’ll see what we can do about getting some medicine into their systems where it can help.”
Darryl parked the wheelchair at the supply tent and stood back out of the way, watching anxiously but unsure what to do. The doctor looked over the pill bottles Vivian had set out, then flipped through the drug handbook when Vivian told him she’d marked it up with what was on hand. The two women – Darryl had been told they were his daughters – supervised the unpacking of the boxes.
The IVs turned out to be water bottles that had been fitted with lengths of plastic tubing and capped needles, attached to three foot stakes with simple wooden bases. One was set up next to each patient, and Early supervised Vivian closely as he directed her in how to fill the bottles with the homemade saline solution and let the fluid fill the tube and needle before starting it in someone. Vivian listened closely, asked questions steadily, and earned herself a nod of approval from the doctor when she got the first one going in Bobo without apparent issue.
While she went to work sticking the others, Early named two drugs that EZ went and got from the clubhouse. With the old man again directing, EZ measured out water and salt for a fresh batch of saline that had crushed pills dissolved in it after cooling. Early produced a batch of syringes from his leather bag and started filling them with the new solution when he was satisfied it was ready for use. When Vivian was finished with all the IVs, she started giving injections. There weren’t enough for all the patients, but the syringes turned out to have removable needles; and syringes and needles both could go into another pot of water for boiling to sterilize them for reuse.
Every camp lantern the Dogz had available was brought out and set up to light the tents as the sun sank below the western horizon. Flashlights were handed out and held as needed by Dogz who stood around looking for something helpful to do. Darryl watched as anxiously as the others when there was no obvious errand or task that demanded a pair of hands, but Vivian seemed completely happy to do whatever Early directed, and the doctor showed no sign of hesitation or uncertainty as he gave orders.
With IVs going and drugs given, Early had himself rolled from patient to patient while Vivian took temperatures and blood pressures and other vital signs. The doctor seemed especially concerned over a few of the patients, and when they’d checked each, he had another dissolution prepared and given to them by injection. Bobo was in this group, along with two other Dogz, three of the women, and some of the children.
Darryl didn’t realize he’d fallen asleep until he opened his eyes to see Jody in front of him. He blinked blankly at her for several seconds, then sat upright in the lawn chair. It was dark with a quarter moon up, but he could make the woman out. Her eyes were moist with tears, and stress lines were graven across her face. “What wrong?”
“Doctor say he don’t think some of them gonna make it to morning.” she said quietly, kneeling down next to the chair. “Riahanna, Isis, Fish, Tia . . . and Bobo.”
“What!” Darryl said in alarm. That was two of the children, Tia was a girlie groupie who floated from Dog to Dog, but also Fish and Bobo. Not Bobo.
“They the ones worst off.” Jody told him. “He say they still bleeding inside, and there ain’t no blood to give them. They in shock from the bleeding and the illness, and he say they ain’t gonna get better. We don’t know their blood type or anyone else’s, and there ain’t no time to go looking for anything for him to try with.”
“We . . . what do we need?”
“DJ, we in the middle of next to nowhere. He say there some blood banks in Athens, and some hospitals, but with power out ain’t gonna be no reason to go because it all spoiled now anyway. And I talked to Tank about Athens. He say it take hours to get in there, and y’all probably need more help from Watkinsville to even have a chance. Early say there ain’t enough time, even if there were what we needed.”
Darryl drew a deep breath, trying to cover the impulse towards panic or pain. “He sure?”
“He say he is.” Jody nodded. “And before you ask, I already talk to Vivian too, when he weren’t near enough to listen. She say the doctor right about the blood and about how the bleeding gonna kill them. And about how long it would take even if we did have all the stuff to test everyone, including our sick folk, and figure out who matches who. They ain’t got that long, even if we could start right now. She say it all gotta be done by hand, like science lab. Without computers and electric lab shit, it gonna take a long time to do all of it right.”
“There’s got to be something . . .”
“There ain’t.”
“Damnit!” Darryl said, clenching his fists in frustration. “After . . . after what we gone through, we still . . .”
Jody just nodded.
Darryl stared at her for a moment. He felt like screaming. He felt like hitting something. He wanted to find the cause of all this and destroy it with his bare hands. But there was nothing, nothing he could put all the helpless rage on so he could release it. It was the most infuriating and paralyzing feeling he’d ever known, and he didn’t know what to do about it.
He’d never felt more useless and angry in his entire life.
“Yeah.” Jody nodded. “We is. Now pull your shit together, because if Bobo die, you the new top. Ain’t no good for you to roll around weeping and moaning when you in charge.”
“I ain’t weeping.”
“I know you better than some.” she said quietly. “You put on a good show, but you ain’t all that tough like you make out.”
“It ain’t fair.” he almost whispered.
“No, but it is what it is. What we gonna do if we lose Bobo and you both?”
Darryl blinked at her. “I here.”
“You thinking about not being here. Right now you the best glue we got. You gotta hold it together.” She said, studying him. Suddenly she leaned forward and wrapped her arms around him. “Bobo won’t want everyone splitting up. He got us all out here because he needed to save us. Now it on you.”
Darryl hugged her back and struggled to keep his breathing coming evenly. Her body was soft against his; he didn’t even mind the mingled sweat and scent of the long day they both had endured. Jody put her head into the crook of his shoulder and sighed as he enfolded her with his much larger arms.
“You feeling okay?”
Darryl blinked a few times, but he wasn’t crying. He felt like he should, like he needed to, but Jody was right. If he collapsed into pity and grief, even for a day or two, there was a risk the Dogz would lose focus. Even the strongest and most level headed of the bikers still tended to drift if they weren’t kept on track; to say nothing of some of the snippier of the wo
men and lazier of the men. The entire group had only been held together by Bobo, and if Bobo died, that just left him.
“Some.” he said, his voice thick with unspoken sobs. “Some.”
“Day at a time, hour at a time, minute at a time.” Jody murmured. “Pain fine. Sad fine. But you gotta be strong so we can be strong. We need you. Ain’t no one else ready to lead.”
“I ain’t no leader.”
“Yes you is. You the new Top.”
Darryl heard running footsteps and looked up. Burnout was approaching, slowing as he neared.
“What?” Darryl asked, a little more harshly than he wanted to, as he lifted his head some.
“Bobo awake.” Burnout said quickly. “He want to talk to you DJ.”
Jody stood and stepped back to make room for Darryl to come out of the chair. She followed at his side as he ran for the first tent, which had been erected right over Bobo earlier. The air mattress the old biker lay on was wet from its most recent cleaning, as was the tarp beneath that. Vivian knelt next to him, listening to his chest with her stethoscope. Bobo’s eyes were closed, but they flicked half-open weakly when he heard Darryl pound up.
“Bobo.” Darryl said, dropping to his knees next to the mattress.
“DJ.” Bobo said in a weak voice thready with painful breathing.
“Yeah. How you doing bro?”
“Not good.” Bobo answered with a faint sigh. “Vivian say it not good.”
“We doing everything we can.” Darryl told him quickly.
“I know you is. Vivian say there a doctor here you done went and fetched back. That good. She say we got a lot of sick, but most everyone gonna pull through.”
“So are you.”
“Don’t feel like it.” Bobo shook his head gently. “I old DJ. Old and worn out.”
“You strong Bobo. You always been strong.”
“Not anymore.”
Darryl blinked and felt his fists clenching. He really wanted to hit something. He really, really did.
“Fucking listen to me.”
