Dead Frost - 02 (2 page)

Shane lowered
himself from the side of the craft and zipped up his Parka. He began
to unload rucksacks – most of which remained empty – and
ammunition. Flyboy dropped down from the pilot's door and offered
the captain the cheesiest grin he could muster.

'Bit fucking cold,
ain't it?' Flyboy said, glancing towards the stars as if he was a
seasoned astronomer.

'Never mind the
fucking weather,' Victor said, closing the gap between the edge of
the roof and the now-dormant helicopter. 'Please tell me you got the
fucking antibiotics.'

Shane stepped up;
he was in no mood for this, not now. 'You think you can do better,
Victor. There she is,' he pointed to the helicopter. 'Take her out
for a spin, but I'll warn you, the city is swarming with Lurkers.
You'll be lucky to set a foot on level ground before you get bit.'

Victor grimaced.
'So you got nothing?' he said. It was less of a question and more of
a reproachful statement. 'Well ain't that just the best goddamn news
I've heard all fucking day.'

Shane hoisted the
backpacks up onto his shoulders and lifted an ammunition box to
balance himself.

'There are hundreds
of them out there,' he said. 'Maybe thousands. The city is off
limits, at least for now. Tomorrow morning me and Flyboy will go
back out, try to find a quiet residential zone. There might be some
pills there.'

Flyboy was about to
argue the toss, but knew it would do no good. 'So I guess we're
going back out in the AM,' he said to Victor. 'I tend to work better
on four hours sleep, anyway.'

Shane began to
march towards the doors, laden with around a hundred pound of
weaponry and useless implements. What he would have given to be
carrying at least a box of medicine.

'You're not going
anywhere
, tomorrow,' Victor suddenly snapped. Shane stopped
walking and spun around. His face suggested that he was not to be
pushed further. Victor decided not to heed the warning. 'I'm
sending my men. At least
they
won't come back empty-handed.'

'Your men will get
themselves fucking
killed
out there,' Shane said, lowering one
of the backpacks to the floor just in case he needed to use his fist.
Respect your elders?
Shane didn't think that Victor Lord
qualified; he was ageless, and a prick, and Shane would much rather
smash his head in with a brick than offer him any sort of respect.

'Now you listen to
me,' Victor said, adjusting himself for the impending confrontation.
'I run shit around here. It's the reason why so many fucking people
are still alive. You think you could do any better? Last I heard
you were busting out of jail with your fellow villains.' He pointed
to the door across the roof; the villains he was referring to were
Jared, who was nothing of notability, and Terry Lewis, who had once
again found God and was about as vicious, now, as a poodle in a
marshmallow factory.

Shane could have
launched at Victor, could have beaten him to a bloody pulp right
there on the roof, but if there was any way of proving Victor right
then that would have been
it
.

He took a deep
intake of breath and exhaled, the ensuing mist emerging from his
mouth like cigarette smoke.

'I'm sending my men
in the morning, my way. Your little friend over there,' he jabbed an
arthritic finger towards Flyboy, 'is the only pilot we got, so I
don;t have much choice where he's concerned.'

'Thanks,' Flyboy
sardonically said. 'If you want me to teach one of your grunts how
to fly her, just let me know.'

'Son, I wouldn't if
I were you,' Victor sneered. The loose skin that had once been taut
to his face wobbled as he spoke. To Shane, he said, 'So are we going
to have a problem? Or are you gonna do what I say, when I say it so
that we can all just get along.'

A hatchet, Shane
thought. That would do nicely; right in the top of the head so that
his eyeballs popped out of their sockets and dangled around his chin.

'We're not gonna
have a problem,' Shane lied.

'Then, it's
settled,' Victor said, with an expression that suggested he was more
than satisfied with himself. His reluctance to back down against
someone twice his junior made it feel as if he were back in charge of
his old platoon. 'My men leave at dawn, with you,' he pointed to
Flyboy again. 'And you can try to stay out of my way from now on,'
he said to Shane.

Shane didn't think
it warranted a response, so didn't give one. He picked up the
rucksack and made his way inside, to where the rest of the group were
waiting, hopeful and tired.

*

The main electricity
had been down for almost two weeks, and the entire compound was
operating thanks to the perpetual rumblings of three 20kw generators.
The only problem with these, however, was that they used diesel, and
at some point or other they would consume whatever fuel they had,
which would mean that a scavenger would have to attempt to locate
some replacement fuel. Nobody in the group seemed to know how the
generators worked; just that they
did
. As long as there was
light, and a few bars of fire, the survivors were happy.

Terry Lewis liked
to sit down in the basement alone. There was something about the
steady, rhythmic hum of the gennies that relaxed him. He even had an
armchair down there. Granted, it wasn't the comfiest of seats –
although he was hoping that he might stumble across one soon, perhaps
in an antique furniture depot? - but it was his, and as he sat,
listening to the monotonous rumbles kicking out of the three huge
machines that shared the room with him, he read the bible. It had
been a gift from Shane, who had discovered it while they were still
behind bars. Terry didn't treasure any of his other possessions;
what was there to get attached to? A pair of shoes? A new cane?

But if anyone tried
to relieve him of his bible, he knew that he would kill them.

As the generators
slowed to a less frantic pace, Terry flipped the page and found
himself staring down at the beginning of Revelations.

Like he needed to
read about the four horsemen. He began, though, because things had
changed so drastically now. Everything was different. The world,
and all of its glory, had ceased to exist as they knew it. They were
at Ground Zero, and the only way to look was forward.

And the bible,
Terry Lewis's most treasured possession, was different now, too. Now
that the apocalypse had arrived – and it
had
, with great
presence – the bible made more sense. Perhaps Terry was
interpreting it the way he saw fit, changing the text to suit the
event, but no matter which way he looked at it, the bible appeared to
have been written for this very time. With hope, Terry read further
into
Revelations
, for he knew that somebody, somewhere out
there, was doing exactly the same thing.

'Terry?' a voice
called from the head of the metal staircase. Terry jumped with a
start before placing a bookmark between the pages of the bible and
closing it. 'Are you down here?'

It was Jared,
Terry's ex-cellmate back in Jackson. He was a good kid, albeit a
little wimpy and naïve. Jared treated Terry as a father-figure,
somebody to look up to, to aspire to, to keep his ass alive for long
enough to reach middle-age.

'I'm down here,'
Terry said, pushing himself out of the armchair and stretching like a
cat who had just roused from a particularly pleasant nap.

There was footfall,
a metallic tap-tap-tap as Jared edged down the stairs and into the
basement. When he appeared, Terry could see that he was
disappointed. His face hung low, with a jaw that threatened to drop
off at any given moment, and his eyes were sparkling with impending
tears.

'What's the
matter?' Terry said, closing the gap between them. 'You look like
you've been diagnosed with fucking cancer.'

'Shane and Flyboy
are back,' Jared said. 'Shane reckons the city is filled with
lurkers. They didn't get anything tonight.'

Terry relaxed a
little. 'Thank fuck for that,' he exhaled. 'For a minute there I
thought you were gonna tell me one of them had been bit.'

Jared smiled. 'No,
nothing that bad, but it ain't exactly good news, either.' He
dropped his shoulders, clearly disappointed and visibly despondent.
'I don't know how much longer some of those people up there are going
to last without medicine,' he continued. 'Old man Martigan is on his
last legs.'

'He'll be fine,'
Terry said, hoping that he was right. 'Old man Martigan has survived
wars worse than this one. I don't think he's going to let a little
cold finish him off, do you?'

Jared
shrugged. 'I guess not.'

'Right,' Terry
said. 'I'm going to have a word with Shane, see if there's anything
I can do to help. In the meantime, I want you to go to sleep. You
look like a fucking addict.'

This brought a
chuckle out of Jared who, up until that point, looked apt to burst
into tears.

'Haven't touched
anything in years, man,' Jared whispered. 'One thing good about
prison.'

Terry sighed and
smiled, both of which were perfunctory. At least he had succeeded in
making Jared feel a little better.

He headed up the
stairs in search of perhaps the groups' least favourite man of the
hour.

THREE

The main hall was a
hive of commotion. It looked as if everyone, children included, had
made their way in to discover just how badly the night's scavenge had
gone. Shane was at the side of the room, trying to calm himself
down; it wasn't good practice to kick off against the enraged
survivors, but their lack of understanding was justified. If they
had
seen
, though, the mass of lurkers beneath the chopper,
they would have been offering him congratulations on a decision
well-made.

As it stood, they
were just feeling sorry for themselves.

Arguments around
the room were erupting into actual violence; a fight between two of
Victor Lord's men became the main focus of attention, with children
trying to get a better view of the tussle.

Ah, well
,
Shane thought.
While they're watching those two dickheads kick
the shit out of each other they're not questioning me.

Terry
Lewis, complete with bible, sidled up next to Shane. He was,
perhaps, the only man in the room that Shane wanted to talk to right
now.

'Bad night, huh?'
Terry said, glancing down at the leather-bound cover of the love of
his life. Shane wondered if Terry would ever stop with the
gratitude.

It
was a
book
, for fuck's
sake! Nothing more than words.

'You could say
that,' Shane grimaced. He reached into one rucksack and pulled out
two bottles of water. Handing one to Terry, he said, 'There were
just too fucking many of them. We wouldn't have stood a chance.'

'If
it helps,' Terry said, unscrewing the bottle and taking a small sip,
'I don't blame you. Some of these
people,
they don't have a clue what we went through. Most of them were
picked up before it got real ugly. Shit, I'd be surprised if even
half of them have seen a horde, yet. Shock the shit out of 'em, that
would.' He took a larger swig of water before continuing. 'I'm not
sure who these people look up to, but it sure as shit ain't any of
us. That sonofabitch captain thinks he owns them; treats 'em like
goddamned POWs, or something he just trod in.'

Shane nodded.
'He's got it coming,' he said. 'I could have tossed him off the
fucking roof a half hour ago.'

Terry laughed.
'Why didn't you?'

Shane looked down
to Terry's bible and tapped the cover. 'If all of this has taught me
one thing,' he said, 'it's that demons and angels exist. I'm pretty
sure I don't want to come back as one of those fucking things, so I'm
trusting the man upstairs to take care of me.'

'The
man upstairs,' Terry smiled, 'would have probably made you his
right-hand man if you'd kicked that prick's ass over the edge. Now,
I am a man of God, and I don't condone murder, at least not anymore,
but do
you really think he'd
be missed around here?'

Shane shrugged.
'Hope we find out soon.'

Just then, Marla
Emmett paced the length of the room. Her beauty, even with
flesh-eating bastards roaming around outside and the apocalypse
nigh-on in full-swing, was something to admire. Shane could see it;
he'd noticed it back in Jackson, where Marla had worked in the
infirmary. The only difference now, though, was her clothes, and the
fact that she had managed to obtain a purseful of cosmetics. Her
natural beauty had always been there, but with make-up and a nice
dress she was divine.