Black Tide Rising - eARC (19 page)

“And take the kids.”

Sam said, “Monica isn’t comfortable around him. You know how she voted. Grandpa is loud about it, even online. She feels he’s angry enough to be scary.”

“I hate being critical of your wife, Sam, but she needs to remember she joined this family. We visit hers, she needs to return it.”

It’s not that easy.”

It probably wasn’t. Sam had never been the strong one. He read a lot of books, sat in the corner, and even now, he sat in an office writing corporate reports. Andy actually traveled and looked at the sites he was insuring, ladders, hoists, the works.

He hated to think his little brother was a wuss, but in many ways, he was.

* * *

The screen showed a dozen people, naked and vacant-eyed, suddenly turning angry and charging toward the camera. Then there were rubber bullets, then tasers, and cops wrestling with angry, snarling, biting people.

Reggie wasn’t sure what to make of the video. It could be drugs, like Krokodil or bath salts, but it was a lot of people. It had to be some sort of disease. So he’d need to start quarantine protocols. He’d also need to make sure he had plenty of diesel for the generator.

He pinged his friend Kevin in State Dept, for any info he might have, and Ted, who was a neuroscientist. Both had private emails that didn’t go through official servers.

Ted didn’t reply. Kevin’s response was very short. “It’s real. Global. Duck and cover.”

He stared at the screen for a few moments, then composed a new message.

“My place is available. Ping if you’re inbound.” He addressed it to six people and pressed send.

He felt bad that none of them were family.

He slammed the locks into the doorframes, and he was glad the kids had never seen those. Steel doors with internal crossbars were proof against a lot of things, and they were kevlar lined with light ceramic backing.

The windows, though, on the ground floor especially, were going to be tough. He had the sandbags. He needed to fill them. There were a lot of them, and the fill pile was at the bottom of the yard, nicknamed “goat mountain.”

The video from the cities got worse over the summer. There were rampaging mobs of naked, insane people, and someone used the “Z” word. Zombies. Whatever it was was communicable and nasty. He was going to have to secure things as best he could.

The food, more than the guns, would be useful now. He had a well out back, and there was a seep from the cornfield that he could filter. It might contain a few fertilizers he couldn’t neutralize, but that was less important than not going near anyone communicable.

He took to ordering all his food online, and having it delivered to the garage. It was all packaged, and he ran them under the UV light, spritzed them with bleach, then rinsed them off with the hose. Then he put on his paint respirator and used tongs and gloves to shelf stuff. After several days, he dated each item with a Sharpie, then placed them into regular storage. They’d still need rinsed again, though. He’d need rinsed, actually, and it was hot enough a shower was a pleasure.

At his computer, he ordered a lot more bleach, soap and respirator filters.

He also realized that he might have to triage his own grandkids, if there was a risk they were contaminated.

As he was thinking that, he heard a car out front. He stretched to look out the window. It was Andy, pulling into the driveway, still doing about thirty. His wife was with him.

He sprinted and strained up the stairs to the door, before they were out of the car.

Andy called, “Grandpa! I called in sick at work. Do you have room?”

“For what?”

“Have you seen the news?”

Yup. That was it. “Yes. Why did you come here?”

Andy spread his hands and said, “Because you have all that food and gear.”

Oh, he was going to make them sweat.

“I see. So now that you actually need help, you want me to take care of you. After you already told me I didn’t know what I was doing and made me get rid of most of it.”

Andy looked ashamed and embarrassed. “Dammit, I’m sorry, Grandpa. We couldn’t know.”

“And what are you bringing?”

“Uh?”

“What do you have that’s useful? Skills? Food? Ammo?”

“Uh…”

“Did you even bring your shotgun?”

“No.”

Reggie gave the young man The Look. It was the look all old timers kept on hand for these occasions. Tommy Lee Jones did it perfectly. Reggie had practiced while watching him.

“Grandpa…please.”

He tilted his head. “Go out back. I’ll send out a tent, and it even has a heater. Park it down the street and walk back slowly so you don’t scare people.”

“Tent?”

“Quarantine, for a week. Then you can come in.”

Andy gaped. “Are you serious?”

Reggie was serious, and had to make them believe it. Besides, he owed payback on Andy helping Sammy cut back his preps.

With The Look, he said, “Don’t make me shoot you. Park, then ’round back.”

The man did so.

So, was Sammy going to come running up with his brats? Reggie had been gentle with John, John had been downright wimpy with Andy and Sammy. And once it got to Sammy’s boys…

Andy parked, but he walked back awful briskly. It was obvious he was tense. Reggie noticed he didn’t bring anything from the car. Not even sunglasses.

Meanwhile he called his neighbor Wendell.

“Hello?”

“Hey, old man, seen the news?”

“Only a bit. Some drug gang or something?”

“That’s what I thought, but it’s worse. Quarantine is in effect.”

“Crap. You’re serious?”

“Yeah, my friends in State and elsewhere say it’s depopulating chunks of Africa and Asia already.”

“I ain’t got more than a couple of weeks of groceries.”

“I still have you covered.”

“Thanks.”

“Any time, brother. But when did you last go out?”

“Two days ago.”

“So you stay there five days, and don’t answer the door or get close to anyone. Then you come here on Saturday.”

“Will do.”

Wendell had far less preps, but the man had skills. He’d volunteered for a second tour before Reggie was drafted, and had real decorations from it. He still knew how to shoot, too.

Andy squealed and sprinted as he reached the driveway.

“I saw one!” he said.

Reggie looked up the street. Yeah, that was a naked old man, soggy and flabby, who seemed aware enough to track Andy and follow him.

Reggie reached inside the door, grabbed the rifle he had there, and took two shots. The second one dropped the man.

“It’s started,” he said.

There were eyes at curtains and windows around the neighborhood, and he saw Davis across the street in his front porch, holding a rifle. Davis had been Navy during the Cold War, but he knew how to shoot.

Andy set up the tent with difficulty, but managed. They had an airbed, blankets, an electric heater for night, extension cord for laptop, and his wireless. He put food outside the French window every meal, and they took it. He handed out a box of bleach wipes, and they dug a slit behind the hedges. Reggie wished he’d stocked lime. If they were contaminated…

* * *

Sammy arrived the next day, with Monica and kids. He pulled into the driveway and parked, fussed around, then got out.

“Move it down the street,” Reggie said.

“That’s not safe.”

“It’s in the way there.”

“Why? You’re in the garage.”

He sighed.

“Anyone getting close can hide behind it. It needs to be moved away from the house.”

“But the—”

Reggie sighed because he already was responding to what the boy was starting to say.

“Leave the others here, and
move it
.”

Monica tried to run for the house.

He pointed his M4 at her.

She just stared, then started screaming at him.

“I knew you were an all out right wing gun nut! You—”

“Shut it, woman.”

She gawped and stared.

“Now listen closely, because your life depends on it. I’ve got a second tent. You will take it to the bottom of the back, a hundred yards from Andy. You will camp there for a week. You will not touch, get close, or even move near Any and his wife, or they have to wait as long as you do. I’ll put food out. You’ll have heat and internet. Or, I lock this door right now, and shoot you if you try to go near them. Whatever this disease is, it’s a killer, and I’m not taking chances. Otherwise, I wish you luck, you can have a shotgun, a box of shells and a crate of MREs, and you go elsewhere.”

Sammy didn’t argue. They stared each other down for five minutes, in silence, and the boy said, “Okay.” He turned and let the kids out of the car, spoke carefully, and pointed around back.

Reggie said, “I’ll do dinner in an hour.”

“Ya got macaroni n cheese?” Jaden asked. He was five. He looked scared because the adults were arguing.

“Sure do.” He looked at Monica. “I can make that for them? And just soup and sandwiches for the rest of you.”

Sammy barely parked past the property line, and sprinted across the yard. Reggie sighed. It would have to do.

Up the street were several more wandering naked bodies. They went to the first house and started breaking in the front windows. The widow Mrs Lee’s house.

To Sammy, he said, “I took you shooting when you were young. Did you ever stay with it?”

“Uh, no.”

Reggie stood another rifle outside the door.

“Then you learn again now, and fast. Keep that in your tent. Wait until I’m inside.”

He looked back to Mrs. Lee’s house, where the three might-as-well-be-zombies were still breaking in the glass. He raised the rifle, aimed carefully, and squeezed off a shot. He hit, but not solidly. Again. Torso, and the man started to slump. The second one took three bullets.

Because he couldn’t leave Mrs Lee like that, he dropped the last of the three, but knew he couldn’t waste ammo like that again. The distance wasn’t impossible, but moving targets made things a lot tougher, and he didn’t have enough ammo.

He pointed at the rifle for Sammy, then went inside and latched the door bolts.

He didn’t have her number in his phone. He called Wendell.

“Wendell, can we get Mrs. Lee?”

Wendell said, “I dunno. Maybe Davis can help. Anyone else coming?”

“Yeah, my friends, but I don’t know when. I’ll check.”

“Okay. I’ll tell Davis to check on her. Anything else?”

He thought for a moment and replied, “Yeah, if they can move out to the country, they should. Much as I’d like to form a neighborhood watch, people want to vote on things, then they vote for what they want, not what they need. Imagine that in ’Nam.”

“No thanks. I’ll tell them. I’m not sure they’ll do it.”

“No, but we have to try.”

* * *

During the days, he fastened barricades inside the windows, and bars outside, drilling into the masonry. He ducked inside when the mailman came past, and waved off some salesman or other. They got lots of them around here.

Wendell came over after six days. On day seven he let Andy and Lisa in. He was going to make Sammy’s family wait an extra day plus, just to make sure. He thought the car had moved slightly and the boy had made a late night burger run or something. He couldn’t entirely blame him. The five year old and three year old were bored and angry.

Every major city was now reporting outbreaks. Once the infection took, people got violent and vicious within a few hours.

Things started falling apart.

Lots of people were trying to quarantine, few had enough supplies.

Andy and Lisa came in, and he pointed to the bathrooms.

“You should shower. We have hot water for now. The food won’t hold out for long with all of us here,” he said. “It would have, but…and you know what I’m going to say, right?”

* * *

Andy felt a burn and said, “You told us so. But how the fuck could we predict zombies?”

“Zombies, commies, Nazis, angry native tribes, aliens, mutant bikers, something, sometime, will require the use of guns and food. Remember that, you little shit.” He wanted to smack the boy.

“Yes, Grandpa. I’m sorry.”

Grandpa turned and said, “Wendell, I think it’s time we started stacking stuff.”

Wendell said “Roger that,” as he walked into the room.

Andy blurted out, “You’re black.”

“And?” the man replied. He was about Grandpa’s age, carrying that civilian variant of the M14 with a scope on top. He looked pretty damned fit and lean for someone near seventy.

“Nothing.” He had no idea why that had come out. Inadvertent racism? This was a bad time to even discuss that.

Wendell jogged upstairs and went into the garage.

Grandpa said, “I have friends coming. They’re bringing more stuff. Then we’re going to see about moving further out, where there’s less people and more food.”

“Farming?”

“Maybe. Farming takes fuel and effort. Depends on how many people die. If it’s enough, we just hunt and plant a truck garden.”

That was a frightening thought.

From upstairs, Wendell shouted, “And we have another bunch, up the street.”

“Okay, after this, we get out the backup supply. Andy, Sammy, grab the rifles.” Grandpa snapped his fingers and pointed. Andy did so. Sam hesitated, but he did as well.

“Outside, on the porch.”

Andy asked, “Shouldn’t we fight from in here?”

Wendell said, “No, we fight where we can see and maneuver, and lock up later. Those gooks aren’t even visible from the house.”

It was scary to be outside, but Grandpa made sense, and there were four of them with rifles.

He stood on the porch, which now had a couple of planters and some sandbags around it. The old men had been busy. Up the street was a nightmare.

Four filthy, naked, raging men were beating on a car, trying to break into it, and the passengers inside.

They were people, and they were sick, but they’d kill him if they could. He lined up sights and shot, and missed. Sammy went through five shots before he hit one, a creepy-looking guy with a beer belly, who drooled. The shot was into the leg and tore a hole that just seemed to make him madder.