by Joe Kelly
No the best way was to go around to seize the fuel at that maintenance barn, and then move on to seize the farm itself. He had no desire to kill everyone there. The women and girls would be left alive, and any man with skills that would be needed to run the farm. Then he would have those Indians well and truly screwed over. He had never been a fan of Native Americans his reasons were many.
He looked up as the door to the Chapel opened letting in a gust of cold air and snow, Barry Sanders, a now skinny redhead stepped inside followed by the man they had found almost dead in the snow two days ago. The still raw looking empty eye socket and deep gouges on his nose and check were disturbing to look at. The man hid his pain well, George thought watching as the fit looking man stood quietly. He looked to be in his forties, though he could be older or a little younger. The end of the world had a way of aging people at least in Georges experience.
George walked around and sat down at the camp table that had been set up in the old church and indicated his guest should sit down. “I’d like to know what you were doing out here” he said without preamble. “And by like, I mean to say. Demand to know.”
“I was hunting someone” Mikhail said, suppressing his natural accent, another of his little gifts, a superb acting ability.
“He must have pissed you off for you to be out in this weather.” Reed commented, Mikhail had sized the group of men up instantly, typical redneck Americans, with half way decent level of training for a bunch of peasants. A militia group most likely. He didn’t particularly care for them, but they could be useful tools, especially for what he had in mind. So far, they had done exactly what he had thought they would, starting with his ‘rescue’. Now it remained to be seen if this man, their leader would oblige him and keep the plan on track.
“Looks like he did a number on you” George observed. No, that cripple did this Mikhail thought savoring the revenge he would take on that one before this was over.
“Lucky shot, he tried to kill me and hit my rifle instead, parts of my rifle did this, “Mikhail said pointing at his empty eye socket and cut up nose and cheek. He had been lucky, or his friend was looking out for him, because when he reached his the cache he had set up, he had found two bottles of antibiotics in his bag, and started popping them like candy.
Mikhail sat quietly weighed his options carefully then shrugged. “Doesn’t matter I’m going to kill him and any one at that farm who helps him” George looked at him for a long moment the gears in his mind turning.
“That happened down at the farm?” George asked, leaning forward slightly, almost eagerly, Mikhail thought, and the hook is set.
“Close to it, he ambushed me as I was looking down on the farm.” Mikhail replied absently reaching up and fingered the empty eye socket.
“Don’t that shit hurt” Barry asked becoming almost sick watching the end of the man’s finger slide into the gaping hole where his eye had been. How in the hell could this guy be that calm and collected with such nasty wounds?
“Hurts less than being dead” Mikhail said earning a laugh from George.
“What did this man do to you anyway?" George asked, steepling his fingers together as he gazed at Mikhail. He was suspicious, which was to be expected, groups like this had operated under the radar in the old world. Knowing that if they had trusted the wrong people they would have woken up to a Swat team in their homes one fine night. The world might have changed but the suspicions and paranoia of the old world still remained.
“He was a damned cop, framed me and sent me up for a while. Tried to get me to roll over on some of my friends just because we were independence minded.” And he is hooked Mikhail thought. Watching the mans reaction.
“Cop you say.” George asked, his lips thinning in disgust.
“Yeah, he moved down towards Knoxville while I was in jail, I got out at the right time too, a week before the day happened. I had his address and was all set to pay him a visit and the dead started walking around while I was on my way to his house, couldn’t believe that he was still alive and kicking after all that, but he was so I ---.”
He talked naturally with a southern accent weaving a totally believable tale that had George eating out of his hands by the end of it. Like we are long lost brothers Mikhail thought as he finished his story. All the years the KGB had forced them to train to blend in as American paying off once more.
“- so, after Greenville, I tracked him down here.”
“Cops aint worth spit, they will take a bribe to look the other way, then call in the feds to arrest you. Double dealing assholes” George said. Mikhail tried not to smile; George had obviously paid off Agents who were trying to build a case at some point. What an idiot, probably wanted to hire them to kill someone too. Mikhail thought with amusement. “You’re a lucky man to have managed to track him all this way.”
“it wasn’t luck, his sister lives south of here, once I figured out which direction he was going, it was pretty easy.” Mikhail said.
George laughed “Determined and well informed”
“How many people down on that farm.” George asked, a bit more directly than he might have before Mikhail’s little story of woe.
“Fifty or sixty at a rough count. But first you have to get past the wall they put up across the road” he said not mentioning the rough trail that could bring them down behind the farm to attack from the rear. He knew what was coming and if the raiders knew about that trail, they could attack and probably succeed rather quickly and that was not a part of his associates plan. No, he had to delay the fight, drag things out just long enough for the mass of zombies in his dreams to reach the farm.
He had stopped doubting his dreams a little while back, and did not doubt for a minute that his nightmare was real. Hundreds of zombies trudging silently thru the snow-covered forest. Their dead eyes fixed on the distant location of the Farm. There was one at head of the pack, indistinct, almost shadowy in his dreams. One he didn’t want to see any closer. But he knew like you sometimes did in dreams that it led them. He didn’t really care why his associate, wanted this band of survivor’s dead, nor did he really care.
✽ ✽ ✽
Ori lowered his binoculars and slid back below the ridge top before rising and working his way a mile back to rejoin his friends who waited in a natural shelter formed by two slabs of rock one half across the other. “Well we found them,” he said as he slipped into the small area in the rock, where the group waited. “And it’s not going to be pretty”
“give us the bad news?” Jared said frowning.
“I counted about a hundred fighters, most of them are carrying a mix of AR’s and AK’s. I think I spotted a FAL in the lot too. Heavy wise I saw two .50s, and at least three grenade launchers. They also have a snowplow, several trucks set up for off road, a couple of hummers, a beat up Deuce and what looks like a Ferret armored car.
“Damn” Chris muttered. “How are we supposed to stop an armored car” he looked around at his friends. “Anyone” he asked.
Ori, ignoring Chris’s question, squatted on his snowshoes and said. “It doesn’t look like they are planning on going anywhere yet. It looks more like a permanent winter camp. There are four deer stands scattered around their camp that they are using for observation posts. Two, six-man patrols roam the perimeter of the camp, standard weapons seem to be AR’s. Tac vests, a wide variety of pistols.
From the number of ammo pouches on each man I’d have to guess an average of six mags per man in the patrols. Other than the 40mm, I didn’t see any other grenades. Looks like ten men and four women are staying in the chapel, which also appears to be where they keep the majority of their ammo and spare weapons.” Ori said quietly. “and they are sloppy about weapons maintenance and stay indoors a lot.”
“How could you tell that?” Jill asked curious, to her what Ori did was damn near magic.
“some of the men had ice on their weapons. Which means they have been spending time inside where the weapons gathered moisture in t
he warmer air. Take them outside and the moisture freezes, it’s also sloppy as hell.” He said sounding disgusted at the unprofessionalism.
“I got a few looks into the chapel as people came and went. There was a large pile of boxes stacked off to one side of the doorway covered by a tarp. I could see the end of one box and it was a standard Military Ammo case.” Ori explained.
“Could be using them to store other stuff in.” Jared pointed out.
“Possible. Anyway, it looks like they are using the Church as a CP and storage place.” Ori replied. “The fact that they use ranks and few other things I saw. I'd guess they were a militia unit. I’d guess they were one of the Antigovernment types. There was always news about how much ammo and weapons some of those groups stocked up for when the New World Order took over.”
“Nice, it just gets better and better” Jared replied with a grimace, thinking about the damage this group could dish out. “at least we have some intel now, even if I don’t like it.” Jared said, and then asked. “Anything else”
Ori nodded, “Back behind the chapel they built outhouses. In the tree line behind the outhouses, there are six travel trailers, a couple of old Winnebago’s, two Gp medium tents covered by Camo netting. They erected wire fence around the Gp’s, it looked rushed but would hold off a mob for a for a few minutes. The Gp’s are pretty well hidden as far as I’m concerned. Now if we had thermal, it would be damn hard to hide anything.” Why the raiders had bothered to set up something like military General-purpose tents was beyond him. Even with all the manpower Gp’s were slow to set up and taking them down in a rush wasn’t all that quick either.
Jared looked in the direction of the camp, wanting to leave a lookout to keep a close eye on the activities there. But even if the radios could reach back to the farm, the cold would just suck the batteries dry.
If Ori was right, then the raiders weren’t going anywhere, at least not anytime soon. And there is no way we can run a raid against an organized group that large. Not with out getting a few of us killed. And a big question, what happened to the Horde of undead, that John reported had been following this group? No, we have a prepared position back at the farm that will give us a huge advantage against them. If I thought we could drive them off or cripple them I might take the risk and attack right now, but I think all we could do was annoy them at best before some of us died.
No, we just might have time, Jared thought, to get back to the farm and set up some extra booby traps now that we know how many and what direction they will be coming from. “Let’s leg it out of here, file out just like we came in.”
✽ ✽ ✽
If Jared wasn’t mistaken, it was around the 15th of December by the time they got back to the Farm. They had taken the time, on the way back, to set up a few surprises at the maintenance yard and found a surprise of their own. A few more zombies had moved in since they had stripped the place.
The whole team had gotten a bit too comfortable with the lack of zombies in the mountains, it could have turned out nasty. But luck had been with them, and they had cleared out the undead hard and fast, set the booby trap then hauled butt back to the Farm.
The first thing they all did, after stopping by to tell Lloyd what had happened on their little winter trip, was take a hot shower while some food was cooked up, thanking god, fate or whoever for the Geothermal hot water system.
The problem with close quarters living and rationing of resources meant that privacy had died a quick death, Jared thought as the team got undressed and headed into the showers. There was no point in wasting extra water so that Jill or any other woman could bath alone, in fact the only ones that had real privacy were the kids
There were many in the old dead world that would have been shocked at the notion of Jill or the other woman showering with a group of men, but in the here and now people had adjusted and it was just as normal as riding in the same vehicle together. Showers and meals were social occasions these days. It wasn’t like everyone could meet up at Starbucks or a bar any more. Every aspect of life had changed with the coming of the dead.
By the time he had finished and dressed, half the group had assembled for dinner. Jason and Linda waved at him to sit with the two of them. Rob and Warren as usual were sitting across from them. Dinner was a thick stew, with actual meat in it. “Where did that come from?” he asked Carol sniffing suspiciously.
“It was canned meat, we took it out drained it, then spiced it up, let it marinate for a while then added it into the stew where it simmered all day over the fire. Eat it and shut up,” she said with a smile. He took another sniff and had to admit it smelled good.
He smiled as he saw Mattie sitting with Kevin and Logan. As long as she was careful, Doc Winston and Linda were letting her spend time outside the Med Rv. We’ve come a long way, he thought, especially Anne, who was amazingly sitting and talking quietly with Gary and smiling. “Sit with us” Linda said motioning to the seat beside her.
“Aren’t you worried about leaving Jill in the showers with Ronny” Jason asked, with a grin. Jared shook his head.
“Only for Ronny. If he flirts and Jill doesn’t kill him, Mary will castrate him” Jared said with a casual shrug, Rob and Warren started laughing. Linda looked up as Steve entered the room still damp from his shower. There was something about the way she watched him and then her eyes would slide to Bridget that roused Jared’s curiosity.
“What’s going on?” He asked her as Steve sat down next to Bridget. Linda motioned for him to be silent, Jason rolled his eyes at her then made a semi-circle with his hand from the bottom of his rib cage to his waist, Jared stared at him, puzzled for a second then his eyes widened. Oh hell, he thought just as Steve rose from his table staring at Bridget, he looked terrified, happy and totally lost. “Pregnant, when, how…. I mean…” Steve said loudly then fell silent his tongue tied as he tried to sort out his thoughts.
“Well when two people love each other” Ronny called as he entered the room “… ouch stop hitting me” he barked as Jill Gibbed slapped him.
Steve swept Bridget up from the table and hugged her. cheering and cat calls erupted around the room. Jared stood and clapped, as much as he was happy for the both of them he was terrified as well. Seeing Jill crossing the room He made himself smile. “It will be okay,” She whispered in his ear as she hugged him. She knows me so damn well its almost scary he thought.
✽ ✽ ✽
“All right kids, we have time for one more story and then it will be time to clean up before bedtime.” Beth said forcing herself to smile brightly at the children sitting around her. Unlike Jared and some of the others, the end of the world didn’t help her sense of humor, but she had to keep a brave face for the kids. Sometimes she even really felt happy, when she was with Ori. She had never met a man as kind and considerate as he was, and the way he acted around the children was icing on the cake and more importantly she felt safe with Ori around. Jared was good with the kids, especially with Billy but Ori went above and beyond.
She turned and began searching through the pile of children’s books, that Jared and Ori had found on a run. She wanted something light that helped keep them from stressing to much. Though since they had arrived at the farm the kids seemed to be almost normal, not that they didn’t’ still have issues but they acted more like kids here. That one will do, she thought deciding on Poo bear.
She turned back to the kids, ready to sit back down, then stopped in surprise. Billy was rocking back and forth, his face slack, and eyes dull, empty looking. Behind the circle of children, she thought she saw something in the shadows then it was gone. “the hat man is coming soon.” Billy said softly still rocking. There was an odd timbre to his voice, like two voices speaking at once, almost but not quite out of sync.
Billy” Beth said dropping the book as she rushed to kneel in front of the boy. “Billy, please stop your scaring the other children.” She said, as the other children shrank away, their eyes wide with fear, the truth was he was s
caring her more.
“He hates us, but he hates Mr. Jared more.” Billy said in that odd voice.
“Billy,” Beth said more sternly taking the child by the shoulders.
“The Darkening land, he lives in the darkening land.” Billy said then suddenly his face and eyes came alive again. “what’s wrong Mrs. Beth?” Billy asked staring up at her. realizing she was holding him too tight, she loosened her grip. “who is the hat man Billy?” She asked.
“what?” Billy asked looking confused, and a little scared at the intensity of the question. “you mean Mr. Clay, he wears a hat sometimes, but I like his fake legs better.”
She released Billy resisting the urge to sigh in frustration. None of the kids ever seemed to remember what they said or had seen in those weird fugue states they sometimes had.
“Billy this could be important to all us” She said gently. “do you remember anything about what happened to you.”
