by Mark Tufo
Zombie Fallout 16
Hiraeth
Mark Tufo
Copyright © 2021 by Mark Tufo
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
Created with Vellum
To all that have made this dream a reality, this book is for you. I hope Hiraeth is merely a beautiful word for you to enjoy.
Contents
AUTHOR PROLOGUE
PROLOGUE
1. Mike Journal Entry 1
2. Mike Journal Entry 2
3. Mike Journal Entry 3
4. Mike Journal Entry 4
5. Mike Journal Entry 5
6. Mike Journal Entry 6
7. Mike Journal Entry 7
8. Mike Journal Entry 8
9. Mike Journal Entry 9
10. Mike Journal Entry 10
11. Deneaux
12. Iggy
13. Deneaux
14. Iggy
15. Captain Vienden
16. Compound
17. Captain Vienden
18. Mike Journal Entry 11
19. Captain Vienden
20. Mike Journal Entry 12
21. Canter
22. Mike Journal Entry 13
23. Canter
24. Mike Journal Entry 14
25. Etna
26. Mike Journal Entry 15
27. Mike Journal Entry 16
28. Iggy
29. Deneaux
30. Mike Journal Entry 17
31. Deneaux
32. Iggy
33. Deneaux
34. Mike Journal Entry 18
35. Mike Journal Entry 19
36. Mike Journal Entry 20
37. Bt
38. Mike’s Final Chapter Entry 21
Epilogue
EPILOGUE 2
AUTHOR’S NOTES
CODA
About the Author
Also by Mark Tufo
Also From DevilDog Press
Untitled
AUTHOR PROLOGUE
Okay folks, a Disclaimer. Let’s get this out of the way. Some of you may remember that a few months back I asked a bunch of random questions regarding some military equipment, what can it do, would it work, am I about to disintegrate my heroes, that type of thing. Sometimes the answers were exactly what I needed them to be, but others were not. So, deep breath, you military folks, I need you to sit back, take a second, and remember this is a work of fiction, my friends. I might have taken some author liberties with a few things, and I understand how that might drive you a bit nuts, but it’s okay. It’ll be all right. No protesting, now, shhh. (Envision me pinching my pointer finger and thumb together quickly in a “zip it” gesture.) We cool? No three a.m. emails telling me that this can’t possibly do that! Shhh! Pointer and thumb slammed shut, again. I bow to your expertise in the real world, now let me tell a story in mine. Whew. Had to be said. Hope you enjoy the book!
PROLOGUE
For a multitude of reasons, I have decided that this journal, the one I’m writing in now, will be my final one. I don’t make this decision lightly. I’ve thought about it long and hard. These journals are an outlet for me, a distraction, an escape of sorts. I think at one time, in the beginning, I suppose, I thought it was a way to take the horrible memories in my mind and place them on paper, and, by doing this, I would magically rid my head of the sickening intrusions, thus relegating them to the realm of nightmares. But it never really worked. No matter how hard I tried to convince myself the purge would be effective. These days, it’s all nightmare, and neither paper nor sleep keeps the visions at bay. In effect, not only do I have all this crap swirling around inside, I also have this constant physical reminder of the atrocities, a page by page description, etching it all even deeper into my soul. I used to think of it as therapeutic, a creative way to handle stress, like, maybe someone would read it and, having gone through the worst of times, would appreciate what we had to do to right the world. But that’s never going to happen, and now I’m convinced my obsessive need to record my life is a destructive activity, right up there with drinking to excess.
I’m sane enough to realize that I’m suffering from an alphabet of psychiatric disorders; maybe we all are. It’s how I’ve chosen to deal with it that needs some adjusting. For me, the first step will be to let these journals go, and with them, hopefully, some of the more painful moments. I need space to let delusion and denial take over. I just don’t know if I can keep remembering some of the beautiful souls that are no longer a part of my world. My father, Ron, Mad Jack, Jen, Brendon, Paul, and that crazy fool, Trip. (God, just listing these here is like drawing blood) even the cantankerous Jed, who turned out to be one of my biggest allies…. Every time I see their names in my handwriting, I feel another small piece of myself break. And there’s just not enough of me left that I can continue to suffer these micro-fractures. Who knows? Someday when I find a balance, someday when these reminders are necessary for my sanity, I might continue. For now, I begin the final chapters.
1
Mike Journal Entry 1
After squeezing my wife hard enough I was afraid I was going to break her, BT came over. He grabbed my arm and pulled me in tight.
“Motherfucker,” he said into my ear. “I thought you were dead.”
“I missed you too.” It was muffled because my face was buried in his chest. He started to flex his pecs, making my head bounce around. “This fun for you?” I asked.
“You have no idea.” He let me go. I could see that the corners of his eyes were wet—fuck, who am I kidding? So were mine.
“The kids?” I asked Tracy. “The squad? Hell, everyone?”
“Fine, fine, all of them good.” She wiped her eyes. It was difficult for me to see my tough-as-nails wife with quivering lips.
“I’m here, I’m here,” I told her as I once again hugged her. BT couldn’t help himself and proceeded to envelop us both in his all-encompassing embrace.
After we’d received our rib-crushing bear hugs from BT, he grabbed my shoulders and pushed me back so he could look me in the eyes. “You look a little rough around the edges, Talbot, but I’m mighty fucking glad to see you.”
A little rough around the edges didn’t even begin to describe how I was. I’d been holding it together because Dallas, the dogs, and even Rasher deserved the best I had to offer, but now that my job was done, the façade I’d erected was beginning to crumble from severe weathering, overexposure, and constant battering.
“Where’s hippie-man?” BT asked, surveying my misfit group. I didn’t say anything, didn’t need to. The sudden welling of tears, the minuscule twitching of my bottom lip, the rigidity of my body, they told the story I was incapable of. “Oh shit, brother.” BT let go of my shoulders. I watched as he wiped his face with a massive hand before turning away from me. Not because we were done here, nor to slight me, but to hide the true core feelings he had for the man. Trip, without a doubt, had been the strangest person any of us had ever known, full of a depth of quirks and tweaks we couldn’t even begin to fathom, and he truly was one of us. His love for the group and the love we gave back, that was real; it was a tangible thing. Now that, too, was gone.
“Where’s Stephanie?” I asked.
“Oh, man.” His shoulders bobbed at the prospect of having to tell the man’s wife he was not coming home. “I’ll come with you,” he said as he turned.
I appreciated and needed the support, even though I knew he wanted nothing to do with the bad news breaking detail. BT had been a cop; I’m fairly positive he’d made at lea
st one visit to a loved one to let them know Jill had been scraped off the road in a drunk driving incident or Johnny had been a victim of a drug deal gone bad. This was different, vastly so. When it hit this close to home, you were a loved one too, and the news dragged you down into despair along with the recipient.
Stephanie ended up being more stoic than myself; I couldn’t get through a sentence before I lost control. She was more consoling to me than the other way around.
“Michael, this is Trip we’re talking about. There was nothing you could have done. He knew the risks, and if you’re to believe what he had to say, he knew this was going to happen. He chose to stay with you in spite of that knowledge, to do what had to be done.” She had her hand on my chin and was holding my head up as I was wont to keep staring at the ground. “I think…I don’t believe there will ever be another person either of us will come across that will be more difficult to forget, and as long as we can hold on to him in our heads and our hearts, he’ll never truly be gone.”
I appreciated her kind words; they were an aloe-based balm to my scalding wounds. But I’d already made it abundantly clear how I felt in regards to “keeping someone alive in memory.” It’s a big old, fuck that. I would rather hold on to the physical than the mental. You can’t hug a memory and you can’t shake hands with it. I can’t say I felt better after talking to Stephanie, relieved, maybe. I walked away, dazed, in an altered state I could not identify.
Once that was done, I introduced a shy Dallas. Ben-Ben and Riley were excitedly saying hi to anyone that would pet them; Rasher stayed by my feet until I picked him up.
“A pig?” BT asked.
“Long story but it doesn’t start with him. I’ll tell you all about it, but I want to get to this camp of yours, kiss my kids, and undo any damage you may have done to the squad.”
“Kirby deserved it,” he said preemptively.
I love my kids, and I’d do anything for them, up to and including killing or dying to protect them. Where I tend to fail is I don’t always express to them how deeply I care, not in so many words, anyway. I mean, I think they know, but it’s definitely better to give them a demonstration, and that was precisely what I did. As low as I’d been when I thought I’d lost them, I was euphoric that I once again held them in my arms, to kiss their heads and just hold tight. Life is fleeting; love is eternal. I can’t even explain how I felt, so many emotions bubbling to the surface. Somehow there was even the luxury of ambivalence; I was thrilled to be holding them and angry that there was so much relief in so normal a gesture.
“Does this mean I can get the new PlayStation for Christmas?” Travis asked.
I would have walked to the North Pole and hit Santa up myself if only I could make that reality. Hell, I’d have worked an extra job. What wouldn’t I give up to go back to the grind I’d detested so much? That rut I thought I was in was somehow actually a high point. Funny how an apocalypse can change your whole perspective. I’d literally dreamed of the day when a z-poc would save me from the mundane, lend a little adventure to my life. I wonder what happened to that first person, that guy who coined the phrase, “Be careful what you wish for.” He probably wanted to develop a faster way to travel, came up with the wheel, and when that happened, his wife insisted that they could now visit her family more frequently.
On some level, the boys knew what I’d gone through, thinking that I’d lost them, but Nicole, with a kid of her own, yeah, she understood on a whole other level. I promised we’d talk more at dinner, but I needed to see my squad and also Overland, Eastman and Jackson; everyone here needed to be caught up quickly on the new threat. The reavers were by far the deadliest adaptation the zombies had produced to this point, and it appeared they could reproduce; that fact was a game-changer and not in a good way. It would have been like Major League Baseball adding a new rule in saying that it was perfectly acceptable for a pitcher to hit batters, in fact, it would be like dodgeball—instant out, and a concussion would give a bonus point. The fans would love it though; nothing quite like being beaned with a ninety-mile an hour fastball. My squad had heard about my arrival but had waited somewhat patiently for me to say my hellos to my family. Kirby wasn’t more than ten feet away, watching. He was shifting from foot to foot like he had to pee.
“What?” I finally asked after giving my grandson a quick kiss.
“I’m just so happy to see you, sir,” he said.
“Bullshit, you’re just happy I’m here so you can stop doing push-ups.”
“I’d hug you, sir, but I haven’t been able to lift my arms in two days.”
2
Mike Journal Entry 2
I was back with my family and friends. The sheer relief of it all was to the point I couldn’t breathe right, like I’d been fending off a potent anxiety attack for a week and had finally succumbed. I realize it’s strange to suffer an attack after finding out everything is fine, but the build-up had been too massive to effectively discharge. Four had been missing from my group and five had come back, but Dallas was not Trip.
I said my hellos to the entire group. Even the aloof Patches let me pet her twice before she hissed and walked away. I hugged everyone a little longer than was the social standard; no one said anything, except Kirby, who patted my back briskly and would probably have preferred a brief handshake. Young Marines are too full of piss and vinegar to be much into great shows of affection.
“Everyone, this is Dallas Cambria. She’s one of us for now. Stenzel, tomorrow could you catch her up on our way of doing things?”
“We have a way of doing things, sir?” she asked, smiling.
I spent the next hour talking about Trip, Charlie’s group, the chase and especially the reavers. I left out the bunker because it didn’t pertain, and it had left an oily residue upon my brain that I didn’t want to stick my finger in. Harder needed to die and I was fine with the fact that I’d made it happen. I would have been more fine having never come across him and his deviant ways, but such is life. It saddened me to no end to realize just how many people were out there that had lost their way or found a new way because of the breakdown of civilization; worse yet was thinking of those whose crazy had only been held in check by that civilization and were now free to act on it. When I was done and everyone dispersed to do whatever they were doing, I found a place as far away from the activity as I could without calling attention to myself.
I thought I was alone. “Hey, brother.” It was Gary.
“How you doing?” I asked. I wanted to be alone; Gary, it appeared, did not.
“I’m a little fucked in the head.” It was strange to hear those words from his mouth. “I keep thinking about Christmas.”
“Yeah, I guess that’s coming up.” It was a few months away and honestly, I couldn’t even say it was the last thing on my mind because that would mean I was thinking about it.
“Past ones.”
“Okay.” I wanted to tell him I didn’t want to think about the past or the future; both tended to rip at the edges of my frayed heart. The past was never coming back, and the future seemed…unlikely.
“I remember how fun they were, all of us just ripping through packages, laughing, having a great time. Mom making fried dough.”
My mother cooked out of necessity, not desire, and it showed. But in the rare times when she made desserts, that script was flipped. That stuff was out of this world.
“Going to Aunt Teresa’s for the Christmas party, being with all our cousins.”
I’m not sure if he was oblivious to it, but all of our cousins were over-achievers, heading out to be doctors, lawyers and various other white-collar professions, while our immediate family was nestled deep and unapologetically in the blue-collar. They were cordial, but even as a young kid, I could see that they believed themselves superior. Besides that one day a year, none of us ever hung out, despite the fact that they lived less than ten minutes away. It didn’t bother me much then and certainly not later in life. Gary continued, thankfully stoppi
ng me from heading further down land-mined memory lane.
“We had a big family, not Kansas-farming size, maybe, but five kids—that’s a good size.”
I kept quiet, I was aware of how big our family was.
“We’ve lost our parents and two siblings; there’s less than half of us remaining.”
I was at a loss as to what to say, or more likely what he wanted to hear, I guess. He had tears running down his cheeks, he did not attempt to wipe them away. I had some clichés I thought of using, even falling back on the standard one I hated: “As long as we remember them in our hearts, yadda yadda…” instead I said nothing. I got the impression he wasn’t looking for platitudes.
“What I’m trying to say is I’m glad you’re back.” He gave me an awkward hug.
“I’m glad I’m back too, and it's good to see you too, brother.” With that, he left, his shoulders stooped.
“What was that about?” BT asked, walking over.
“Bump in the road,” I told him. I was going to have to keep an eye on my brother. He was down. If I could, I would help him back up, but that’s hard to do when you’re a floor lower.
