Viral Misery | Book 3 | Revelations

by Watson, Thomas A.

  Still in a state of shock, Jason turned around and walked over to the gate at the small drawbridge over the moat. Wendy was waiting at the end of the drawbridge for him and saw the awestruck wonder on Jason’s face. “Vicki knows the pediatric doses for several medicines,” Wendy grinned. “She caught Todd giving a full teaspoon when it was supposed to be ¾ of a teaspoon. Oh, Todd thought he’d almost killed a baby, but Arthur told him it was fine and to watch how much he gave in the future.”

  “I almost told Vicki she could do the medicine,” Jason stated, and it felt weird that he was comfortable letting Little Momma give medicine.

  With a long groan, “No,” Wendy told him. “I’ve had this talk with Arthur. Can Vicki do it? Yes. But if she ever made a mistake, it would kill her. I’ve told Little Momma her job is to check how much we or Doc give. I promise you, when Vicki feels comfortable, she’ll ask to do it.”

  It sounded so simple and intelligent; Jason looked at Wendy in shock. He could hear Samantha say the exact same thing. It was on the tip of his tongue to ask where in the hell girls learned this shit but stopped, he didn’t want to know. “Chad’s group had to stop. He called over the radio and said there was like a thousand cattle on the road where it runs through a valley. He was going to try a different route but the cows are moving, so he’s just going to let them walk past,” Jason told her and saw Arthur holding what looked like a pink stuffed doll over the snow. Only when the doll moved did Jason realize it was Nicole. “I need a suit like that for Duke but blue… with a Wilson Combat logo,” he mumbled, then turned around heading back inside.

  Closing the gate, Wendy moved back over to Arthur as he talked to Nicole. “If you want to touch it, why don’t you sit in it?” Arthur asked and again tried to put Nicole down in the snow. But as soon as his hands left her, Nicole informed him this was unacceptable. Groaning Arthur dropped down in the snow and crossed his legs putting Nicole in his lap. Nicole gave a laughing coo that this was acceptable, then leaned over to pat the fluffy stuff around them.

  “Do you have an outfit in Joseph’s old room or guestroom that would fit Duke?” Wendy asked and noticed Arthur cringing. “What?”

  “When did you find it?” Arthur asked.

  “The week I got back,” Wendy replied, and she could see Arthur thought she’d be mad. “Babe, who do you think has been taking shit out and putting it in the containers? I’m the one who started putting the little shoes in Joseph’s old room.”

  “I knew there should’ve been more in there!” Arthur cried out. “I just thought I’d grabbed the shoes and forgot about putting them in,” he shrugged. “I’m not the only one who puts little girl clothes in there. Shawn told me the baby boy clothes couldn’t go in the same room. Why? I don’t know, but if it looks like a girl outfit, I put it in Joseph’s old room and if not, it goes in the guestroom.”

  “I know, there hasn’t been many here who I haven’t seen putting something in there,” Wendy laughed. They had containers full of clothes and one was just for babies, boys on the right, girls on the left. She knew Arthur loved dressing up Nicole to look like a little girl, but being a guy, he couldn’t admit that.

  Sitting down across from Arthur, Wendy scooped some snow up and held it out to Nicole. She wasn’t hard on Arthur anymore about Nicole because everyone treated her different and Arthur had made a point to spread the love around, so all the kids knew they were loved. Expecting Nicole to reach out to the snow in her hands, Wendy laughed when Nicole leaned out and planted her face in the handful of snow.

  “You could’ve done that without me sitting in the snow,” Arthur told her as Nicole jerked back, realizing that white stuff was cold. Because the suit was so thick, she couldn’t even bend her arms to reach her face. Wendy dropped the snow seeing a pouty face starting and wiped the snow from Nicole.

  When the snow was gone, Nicole was happy again and leaned out from Arthur’s lap. They both watched as Nicole buried her face in the snow and sat up. Again the pouty face started but Wendy wiped the snow off and wasn’t surprised to see Nicole moving to bury her face again. “Great, she’s got your stubborn streak,” Wendy groaned.

  “Shit, she got that from you,” Arthur corrected as Nicole sat up with her face covered in snow. Not even waiting for the pout, Wendy wiped the snow off. When Nicole leaned to do it again, Wendy was reminded of a glass bird she had that rocked back and forth dipping its beak in a cup of water.

  “You really never heard of a ‘gun cherry’?” Wendy asked, again.

  “Hell, I’ve told you everything I’ve ever learned. I’ve never heard that. If I would’ve known I had one, I would’ve spent the money to get rid of it,” Arthur proclaimed. “But I knew the second I lost it, even though I never knew I had it.”

  There was no aim to the left and up an inch because that was the gun’s impact zone. She’d just aimed and that’s where the bullet hit. As soon as she’d picked up the AR it’d just felt like an extension of her body. Losing her cherry wasn’t the earth-shattering revelation to her that Jason described, but Wendy had known when she’d lost hers. “Did you feel what Jason described?” she asked.

  For a brief second, Arthur drew his bottom lip between his teeth in apprehension as half his face contorted. “Kind of,” he finally said. “Jason compared losing your gun cherry to sex. Now, it felt good, but it didn’t feel that fucking good. I got tingles and have to admit, shooting is more fun now, but my toes didn’t curl up and my ass didn’t clench up tight enough to turn a lump of coal into a diamond.”

  With a serious face, “Don’t be mad but if shooting ever felt like sex, I would be cranking rounds down range every day,” Wendy told him.

  When Arthur lifted his eyes to her face, Wendy thought she’d irritated him. “We’d be fighting over the bullets,” Arthur told her.

  Not even thinking about it, Wendy reached over and wiped Nicole’s face off and she promptly buried it in the snow again. “Ready to go inside?”

  “Depends. Has Skannish turned his Nintendo off?”

  Trying not to grin, “No, Sarah took it away from him,” Wendy snickered.

  “Hey,” Arthur snapped but Wendy kept grinning. “I told Shawn not to play the damn game. He has three different platforms in his room. But if he had to play Super Nintendo, to wait for Skannish to go to bed.”

  Wiping Nicole’s face off, Wendy got up and held out her hand. “Come on,” Wendy smiled.

  Grabbing her hand and standing up, “Shawn sucks at playing games. He just asked me to help get Mario past a spot,” Arthur told her.

  Nicole let out a shout to let them know she wasn’t finished, so Wendy bent down to grab a handful of snow in her right hand and hold it in front of Nicole, who promptly shoved her face in it. “You got Shawn through the first three worlds in an hour and Skannish is still on the first,” Wendy smirked and wiped snow off Nicole’s face with her left hand.

  Shrugging, “Well, Shawn kept asking how to play it,” Arthur said. “If I would’ve known Skannish would start crying, I never would’ve touched his game.”

  They walked to the house and Wendy had to get more snow in her hand, holding it so Nicole could plant her face in it. “Skannish has spent every hour he’s not working trying to catch up. Last night around midnight, Vicki turned the TV off while Skannish was still playing and told him to go to bed.”

  Reaching the porch, Arthur realized he wasn’t even shocked that he didn’t ask if Skannish had gone to bed because Little Momma told him to. He knew Skannish had gone to bed. Oh, he’d probably sulked and did his shuffling feet routine, but Arthur knew Skannish had carried his sulking ass to bed.

  Stopping at the door, Arthur spun Nicole around and held her out to look at her red face and huge smile. “Enough snow, we’re going inside,” he told her, and Nicole saw Wendy drop the snow in her hand. Nicole looked at Wendy like Wendy had thrown her blanket away.

  “AAAhh!” Nicole cried out, reaching for the snow.

  “Hey!” Arthur snapped, making Nicol
e jump. “You don’t get to act like a bitch.”

  Slapping Arthur’s arm, “You watch how you talk to her,” Wendy warned, but then heard Nicole laughing at Arthur. “Oh, this one’s going to be a potty mouth of epic proportions.”

  “No, she’s not,” Arthur scoffed, then pulled Nicole to his chest. “She’s going to be a cute little princess who can kick anyone’s ass,” he stated proudly.

  “With a potty mouth,” Wendy added, opening the door. Going in they saw the living room, aka, daycare area, packed with kids. The twins were in the daycare area helping Little Momma and Chloe since it was their assigned day. Along one wall they saw eleven naked kids with their noses touching the wall. “I want the kids to mind me like they do Vicki.”

  “You figure that out, you let me know,” Arthur said, pulling the snowsuit off Nicole. Wendy grinned seeing Nicole had tiny overalls on under the snowsuit.

  Stopping in the daycare, they both dispensed hugs and kisses. When Chloe walked past, Arthur sighed at her now pink hair. He liked it much better than that black shit she’d been dying it. Without the makeup, dog collar, and bulky black clothes, Chloe was a pretty teenaged girl, but Arthur just wished she would choose a hair color found in nature. This was the third color to don Chloe’s head.

  As Chloe picked up an infant, Arthur reached out and pulled her to his chest startling her. “Pink, really?” he asked, then hugged her tight. Wendy was looking at Chloe’s face and saw the astonishment from the hug turn to contented bliss as Arthur hugged her tight. Wendy knew this was the first hug from Arthur that Chloe had gotten. They’d both given her praise on her work and even pats on the shoulder. But it seemed Arthur had thought it was time to show Chloe she was part of this family and Wendy agreed.

  “The kids like it, Pops,” Chloe said, tilting her head to the side against Arthur’s face.

  Letting her go, “Well, I guess I can’t say anything then,” Arthur laughed as Vicki walked past. Stunned that she wasn’t carrying a kid, Arthur lunged while tucking Nicole under his arm and taking Vicki to the floor. She gave a squeal as Arthur started chewing on her neck.

  “Pops!” she squealed out, trying to push him away. Then Arthur grabbed her wrists, holding them above her head.

  “Get her, Nicole,” Arthur said, putting Nicole on Vicki’s chest. Lifting her head up, Vicki saw Nicole coming up her chest with drool dripping out of her mouth.

  “Nicole!” Vicki cringed as Nicole rubbed her mouth all over Vicki’s face, giving what she interpreted as kisses.

  Lifting Nicole off, Arthur used the bottom of his shirt to wipe the baby drool from Vicki’s face. “Have the little nudists been punished long enough?” Arthur asked and Vicki turned to look at the clock on the wall.

  Nodding, “Pops, if they run outside again naked, they’re going to bed without supper,” Vicki told him.

  Not even thinking about it, “I’m good with that,” Arthur agreed as he got up and picked Vicki up off the floor. He watched the ruler of the little people stroll over to issue her warning. Vicki had told him and everyone to stop trying to force Robin and her merry band to wear clothes because it would only make them not want to even more. Wendy agreed, but it seemed the nudist factor was increasing among the knee-high tribe.

  Stepping over the fence, Arthur realized Nicole wasn’t in his arms. Letting out a gasp, he spun around and found Nicole in Little Momma’s arms. “How in the hell did she do that?” Arthur mumbled in wonder. Not about to ‘take’ a kid from Vicki’s arms unless she said to, Arthur headed into the dining hall to see most of the ‘big’ people sitting down with what he called the leaders at the end of the table where he normally sat.

  The only one absent was LL. He was waiting with the ‘older’ kids, mostly mini-mes, to lead the visitors in. Arthur had told each group to send over five people to discuss the surroundings and plans. They didn’t have to send the one in charge, but Arthur had highly encouraged it. He was making plans and had to have everyone on the same page. Jill had asked first because some of her captains wanted to bring significant others and Arthur could understand that, so he’d told all the groups they could, but to put a cap at twenty for each group and suggested they travel in ‘at least’ three vehicles. With everyone somewhat of a specialist now in moving around, Arthur didn’t think he had to tell them, but he’d felt it better safe than sorry.

  Even with the sixty coming today, the hall could accommodate the extra bodies. It was only now with the Tomb up and running, the entire group wasn’t present at every meal. Ten were always manning the Tomb day and night, and one of those manning was always a ‘big’ person or adult. Meals were taken to the Tomb and Arthur had pointed out to Wendy that they had thirteen-year-olds he trusted to run the Tomb with a group. But Wendy had wanted an adult so there’d be no complaints about who was in charge. Oh, did a fight ensue.

  Arthur had informed Wendy that when Sarah gave him the schedule list, he or one of the chiefs would mark who on that shift was in charge and everybody better like it. Since the event had taken place in a greenhouse, everyone had left because it was clear, neither was giving in. An hour later, against his will, Joseph was herded inside the greenhouse and the door was shut behind him, to break up Wendy and Arthur. In the end a compromise had been reached, but only because Joseph was there. For the first month, a ‘big’ person would stay in control until everyone had done shifts. Then the one listed, despite age, would be in charge of the shift. There were patrols inside the fence and while these were more for training, they did check the fence. But those patrols returned to the dining hall for meals.

  As he sat down and found his notes and computer were still at his spot where he’d left them at breakfast, Arthur started going through his notes. He knew how much Wendy loved his new friendship with Jason, but there was one thing everyone had found out in July that Wendy didn’t like about Jason. Just like Joseph, Jason could look at Arthur’s plans and do it without any explanation from Arthur. What really chapped Wendy’s ass, Jason could and did make changes to the plans sometimes in the middle of construction, on the fly, and every change Jason did, even Wendy saw, it was an improvement.

  Since Jason had worked in construction in high school, he had a foundation. The only thing Jason couldn’t do was survey, but it had only taken four days with Arthur and Jason was out surveying work sites. Wendy had bit her tongue the first time for an hour after Jason had made major changes to a plan. He’d changed the plans on the heating and cooling system for the first grow barn. But when she’d asked Arthur, he’d taken her to the side and shown her how much of an improvement it had made, and Wendy wondered why Arthur hadn’t done it like that the first time. He’d just shrugged and admitted he hadn’t thought about it. Joseph would make changes and they were never anything earth-shattering, but it was always an improvement.

  The very first improvement that came from Jason was the construction of the cement rock fence. Instead of doing five feet at a time, Jason had his crew build ten-foot boxes, fit rebar in, then pour in several feet of cement. After that, the front end loader came in dumping rocks. When the level of cement stopped rising, Jason poured in more cement and repeated. The top five feet were put up like Arthur had done. The top was boxed in, and a conveyor belt moved up to run the rocks in. In July, they’d put up a thousand yards of concrete rock fence. In August, they had done two thousand yards. In September and October, they had added nearly three thousand yards each month. Arthur had told Wendy that by the end of next year, the fence would be done. Wendy was expecting it to actually be completed in the summer.

  Shawn came running in smiling. “They’re here!” he cried out.

  Chapter Ten

  Company’s here

  It was on the tip of Arthur’s tongue to tell Shawn to show them in, but he looked around at the excitement on all the kids' faces. With the exception of the mini-mes and a few who had helped set up fences at the ‘new’ places, these were the first friendly faces many had seen in some time. Those who were deemed �
��good enough’ to patrol outside the fence never ‘met’ those they saw. Granted, there weren’t many out there to even see.

  Getting up, Arthur saw Jason chuckling at the excitement of the kids. “Well, they are nice groups,” Jason said, holding Samantha’s hand as they followed Arthur outside the backdoor to find Wendy already there with a small group of little people.

  LL’s truck pulled around back and was followed by a line of Suburbans, Expeditions, and Escalades, eighteen in all. The one thing they all had in common, they were all new. One of the Suburbans and two of the Expeditions still had the glue on the driver’s window where the sticker had been removed. Kids directed the vehicles where to park so the road from the south gate that ran through to the house area wasn’t blocked off.

  “Grrreeoowwwooo,” Arthur heard and yanked his pistol as kids scattered, because everyone knew what that sound was. A fluffy, big ass, gray cat was at the side of the back porch near the mound of snow that had been shoveled off with its back arched, hissing. “Medusa, I can say I hate you more than Kong,” Arthur stated as a green laser shot out, hitting Medusa between the eyes. With her long hair, Medusa looked bigger than Kong, and when she was hissing and her ears were laid back, Arthur would argue that Medusa was nearly the size of Donald and Daisy.

  “Medusa!” Wendy shouted and Medusa dropped to her belly, looking around innocently.

  “Meow,” Medusa sang out loud, like ‘it wasn’t me’.

  “I’m going to kill that cat,” Arthur vowed, shoving his pistol in his holster.

  “Don’t you dare. Medusa just had babies, she’s allowed to be temperamental,” Wendy replied.

  Casting his eyes to the heavens, Arthur just sighed because there was no doubt who the daddy was. For a week, every night, Kong and Medusa went freak nasty on the back porch with screeching yowls. To Arthur, the two were rubbing it in his face that they were spawning more just like them and announcing it to all.