Dead Wrangler (12 page)

Her calves were starting to burn halfway down the road. It wasn't icy, but descending down the rough road was taking it out of her. Her breath came fast and she was already starting to overheat. In spite of that, or maybe because of it, she was feeling great. The euphoria of being in the open and alone was more than enough to counter the pain of unaccustomed physical exertion.

Before the end of the world she had been a bit of a jogger. She ran 5K events. Once or twice a half marathon. The kids and her responsibilities kept her too busy to train much harder. But it had been months since she had done so much as a mile, and she could tell. It went so fast.

Finally she was down the ridge. A huge flight of hundreds of ducks swept in above. The sound of their wings was shockingly loud, and their quacks were deafening just above her. She just stared up at them, smiling, as they swung around to land. They were maybe ten feet above the water when three men appeared as if out of nothing and starting blazing away with shotguns. Ducks were falling out of the air and the flight broke up in panic, each duck flying away.

She screamed. The men stopped firing and looked right at her. She felt cold menace emanating from them as they brought their guns up. She startled and ran away from them.

"Hey! Hey! We thought you was a zombie!" One of them shouted. She ignored them and ran. She ran into the snow covered forest, heart trip-hammering. She kept going for who knows how long, then stopped, bent over and wheezing, a side stitch almost making her sit down. She couldn't hear anything. The woods were dead quiet. She had stayed with the ridge, but she was on the wrong side. Thirty feet of sheer rock was on her right. At least she knew where she was. If she went a little further the sheer wall would stop and there was a place where she could get up and hike back to the cabin. She was pretty sure she could, anyway. Once her breathing was back to normal she started walking. After a half mile she could smell something. It was like a rotten egg. The air was moist, and while not exactly warm, it wasn't the almost stone-like cold she had felt earlier.
She was near the hot spring. Vinny had talked about how bad it stank and how even the wildlife wouldn't drink from it. He claimed he saw a bear taking a bath one winter. On close questioning he admitted he had seen bear tracks near the springs, and that was it. But still, she had to worry about bears now. She was too tired to cut around the spring and bears weren't her main concern so she kept going. She ended up climbing a small hill and there the spring was. Thirty pairs of rotten eyes were already staring at her. They sat in the pool, steam coming off their faces. They seemed almost as surprised as she was. They each just stared at her for what seemed like forever, then they all started moaning and trying to climb out of the pool.

She started running again, at full sprint. She made it maybe a mile. The forest had thinned and she was in the open now. She looked back and realized she had been running away from the ridge. She sat down and stuffed snow in her mouth. As it melted she could see hints of movement in the tree line half a mile back. It was so quiet she could hear them moaning. They were still after her. She groaned and got back up. She wanted to get rid of the shotgun; it was so heavy. But she shook her head. That would just be the capstone to a chain of panicky mistakes she had already made today. The cabin fever that had driven her down to the lake was just the start. When she remembered that her family had no idea where she was she almost broke into tears of guilt. This was almost as stupid as opening the door to that old lady. But feeling bad about it wasn't going to save her life. She needed a plan. She needed to lose these bozos.

Distance. That was the first thing she needed. Distance, and a change in direction. She took off her jacket and tied it around her waist. Half her problem was overheating. She started a light jog. The sun was to her right. A few miles north and then a break to the west to throw off her pursuers and she'd be at the highway. Maybe she could steal a car. But at least she'd know where she was. She could get back to the cabin. She just needed to make sure she didn't bring the bathers with her.

She kept going until her muscles screamed, then fell back to a flat ache. Then they just felt flat and empty and her speed kept dropping, bit by bit. After a while she put the jacket back on and was trudging. Hours had gone by, the sun was now on her left. She was so hungry when she finally hit the highway. A few cars glinted in the sun. There was no movement. She watched until she was convinced she was alone, then trudged to a Jeep Cherokee that had flipped over. She crouched and looked inside. Empty food wrappers, blood spatter on the windshield… and a pristine Snickers bar. Exhaustion forgotten she sprinted to the open driver's door and scrabbled to the candy bar. It was frozen so solid she struggled to chip the chocolate with her teeth. She groaned in disappointment, then remembered–she could just stick it in under her shirt. It would defrost quick enough. She stuffed it into her pants like a gun, then, energized by the promise of food she hit the next car. Two dead occupants, and what looked like an Xbox and a DVD collection. Looked like two head shots. She snorted at the dead bodies, as if to say 'that's all you brought for me?', and tried the door. It was locked. She took her shotgun and rammed the butt of the gun into the window. After a few swings it started to crack, a few more and she was in. She reached over the corpse and twisted the key. She could have sworn the dash lights flickered, but if they did it was so fast she couldn’t be sure.

"Bringing an XBox. Didn't buy a good battery." She looked at the DVDs. "Christ, you bought 'Season of the Witch'? I gotta tell you I'm a bit embarrassed for you." She popped the trunk. It was empty. She shook her head and looked right at the corpses.
"Well, I have to say you've boosted my self-esteem a bit," She took the Snickers out and took a bite. It was still pretty frozen, but it had softened enough to get a bite. "Compared to you two I'm a fucking genius."

The next SUV had an entire box of energy bars just sitting there in the back. She stared at it like she had found the Hope Diamond. The car wasn't even locked. She popped the rear door. Jackpot. Energy bars. Canned goods. Propane stove. Boxes of shotgun shells. Two gallons of frozen water. Slushy Gatorade. She was so entranced she didn't notice the zombie until it tried to crawl over the rear seat. It was a little girl and she got so close her fingers brushed against Janet's hood. She fell back on her ass and brought the gun up. She got off three shots. The first and third missed, shredding her precious supplies. The second took the zombie's head off like it was a watermelon. She cursed at herself. Slushy Gatorade gushed out on the ground like orange blood. Sympathetic howls went up. She bellowed profanity, then she was back at the supplies. She stuffed candy bars and bottles of Gatorade in every pocket, then ran to the front of the car. No keys. She was crying, but she kept moving. At least the Snickers was warm now. She wolfed it down and chugged some ice cold Gatorade with it. She hadn't seen any zombies. She scanned around. Nothing was moving. The howling was faint.

A building stood not far from her. It might have been a house sixty years ago. It tilted to one side. Trees grew and twisted out of its windows. It was as ramshackle as a house could be. Just then it looked as welcoming as the cabin she should never have left. She squeezed in through a tree that had punched a hole in the wall. Inside everything was dust and bird shit. Tetanus crossed her mind for a second. But hunger took over and she devoured energy bars and chugged Gatorade. Soon she felt like she had eaten a brick. She laid down and fell asleep. In her sleep she dreamt that her feet and hands were gone and she was back at the house wondering when Calvin would show up. She needed him to come, but she didn't know why. A formless anxiety filled her with dread. Then she was driving her first car, a ramshackle 1984 Chevy Celebrity. She was drunk and her mother was in the passenger seat demanding she pull over, but she just couldn't. She couldn't hit the brake and she drove the out of control car through yards and through fences trying to get her foot to move but it wouldn't.

That's what she was dreaming when the zombie jammed its head through a window. She startled awake, and she felt like she was in molasses. She stared at the zombie, wondering what on earth it could want. Then it forced its torso through the tiny gap. More appeared, casting shadows through the copious chinks in the wall, and it all came back. She staggered up and brought her gun up. What had once been the second floor beckoned. She scrambled up the jagged pile of splinters that had been a stairway once upon a time.

All of them. All of them from the hot springs, or maybe a whole other group, but there had to be dozens outside at least. She wept hot tears. How had they found her?
Then it came to her. The same way anyone would. They had just followed her tracks in the snow. She moaned.

"You stupid bitch. You're going to die because you had to see some ducks. How's that for your epitaph? 'Left a poor fourteen-year-old girl orphaned because she wanted to see some ducks.' You stupid cunt." She went through her pockets. She had left the shells at the car and taken candy bars instead. She had ten shells left, and that's only because Vinny insisted she carry a few extra in her pocket. Not enough. Not even close to enough.

Then they were through. Tired of waiting for the ones to squeeze in, a mass had just decided to walk right through the paper thin wall. The building was shaking and humming in a frightening way, like it was warning them all to get out before it just finally fell over. She brought the gun up. Might as well take a few with her. Boom. Kill. Boom. Kill. She couldn't miss. Boom. Boom. Out. She jammed shells in the tube as they came at her. One was climbing up, fingers gouging the wood as the wood fought back with dozens of dry splinters. She finished reloading. Boom. Its corpse fell back and knocked a few zombies back down, knocking even more boards out of place. The whining feedback loop grew stronger. Outside she thought she heard a flat popping noise that she ignored. Boom, one down, boom, two down. Boom. Boom. Three. Two shots left, three zombies. Boom. Two left. She started to feel like she was winning, even though there had to be twenty still outside. That popping continued. One shell left. She waited. The two zombies left fought and jostled with each other trying to get to her. She waited until they were head to head. Boom. Double kill. Zero left. She looked around. Where were the rest?

Pop pop pop pop pop pop. Silence. No moans or anything except the whining of the house.

"Hey, whoever is in there. You'd better come out. That thing is about to go Poltergeist on you." It was a man's voice, twangy and a bit high pitched.

She dropped down and jumped around the corpses to the hole the zombies had created. The sunlight burned her eyes, but she could see the zombie corpses trailing away. At the end of the trail stood a man. He was short and in unseasonably cool clothes. A bicycle lay on the ground next to him, and he held a tiny rifle. He had killed all the rest. She stared in awe as the house crackled and snapped and finally collapsed in a cloud of bird shit and sawdust.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Salvation

The rest of them stared out the windows. She watched them. Vinny and Gerald sat around Tabitha, as if to protect her. Maybe that was the idea. It seemed obvious to her that there was a great deal of dick waving going on, though nobody had out and out done anything. But she was afraid it was only a matter of time.

The three strangers, Daryl, Paul, and Brian, had come up the trail in their truck this morning. They were a bit sheepish as they explained that they seemed to have frightened a woman who had run off into the wild. They thought it would be better if someone she knew helped look. Meghan had called Vinny and Gerald on the walkie-talkies they kept for emergencies. When she told them Janet was missing and strange men were at the cabin they had gotten real cold. They told her to wait and they would be there as soon as they could. That proved to be almost two hours later. From the way their jackets were closed when they walked up, she guessed they'd spend an hour hiking and an hour watching the cabin. Long enough to get cold again.

Daryl was the leader. And it wasn't because of his personality. It seemed like he ranked the other two. If they had been on their own she would have picked Brian as the natural leader. They didn't wear uniforms but they acted like Trevor's friends had when she had visited him at his barracks.

They didn't do anything as Vinny and Gerald walked out of the woods. They didn't raise their guns, but they didn't drop them either. They stayed low, and ready.

"Who are you three and what is going on?" Gerald said with anger in his voice.

"I'm Sergeant Daniels. This is Privates Paul and Brian O'Donnell. We seem to have startled a woman from your group. She fled into the woods. We thought it would be better if we helped you look for her. She is armed and she would probably take being chased around the forest by armed men the wrong way."

"Fuck! How did you startle her?" Vinny snarled.

"We saw the ducks landing and we thought we'd head over and bag a few. When we popped out I guess she was walking down the road and startled. She was just standing there when we saw her. We drew a bead on her because well, our first reaction was that she was a zombie. When she ran away we realized we had make a mistake."

Gerald turned to Meghan. "Why was she down there alone?'

Meghan shrugged. "She was outside watching. I guess she decided she wanted to take a walk. She didn't say anything."

"How could you not notice she had left?" Gerald yelled.

"Gerald! You shut up. I didn't notice she was gone either. If we can't trust a grown woman not to wander off, well, that's Janet's problem. You leave Meghan alone. This isn't her fault," Tabitha broke in. Diane was staying behind Tabitha, looking scared. Gerald looked chastised and angry because he didn't want to feel chastised.

They stood off like porcupines. The intrusion of three armed men made everyone tense. The claim to military rank was confusing as well, since they were wearing normal winter clothing. If anything it was in worse condition than what they were wearing. It raised suspicions in everyone. But they were trying to be helpful. After some barking the men had packed off in the truck and left the women alone, again, up in the cabin. They didn't even look at her. They were driving down the road before it even occurred to her she was being left behind.

Meghan tried not to be resentful. She was in the best physical condition of any of them but she was doing laundry. She could be out there covering two or three times the territory they could. But they assumed she would stay here and cook them dinner.

She'd been telling herself that she was a guest here. They didn't have to let her stay in their nice warm house. If they wanted her to do laundry and stand guard and flirt with them a bit, it was a small price to pay for a nice warm winter with plenty of food. But she could feel herself getting out of shape. She was dying for a run, but here she was, trying to get Diane to stop crying and slow cooking some venison while Janet was off in the wild.

Tabitha was watching her. She had a look on her face like she knew what Meghan was thinking and agreed with it.

"The way Janet told it she found you running down the highway in those tiny shorts and an AK-47 on your back."

Meghan nodded.

"How far did you run that day?"

"I don't know."

"Twenty?"

"At least. Probably more really. Though I was walking quite a bit."

"Gerald and Vinny know that and yet here you are."

"Yes."

"They are good men but they can be a bit dense. They're used to women like Janet. Nothing against her, she's shown quite a bit of grit since all this started. Before this she wasn't the kind of woman you wanted to have your back in a crisis. She's the type of woman who is a feminist until there's a spider that needs to get killed. Then she expects the men to step up and do it. Or at least she used to. That's the type they are used to. I'm an honorary man so I don't count. Don't expect them to see you the way you are. Make them see."

Meghan blushed in self-recrimination. It was silly. She wanted them to acknowledge her as an assertive person, and here she was slinking around waiting for them to do it. Maybe they should on their own, but waiting around for what should happen meant nothing was going to happen.

"Maybe I should go..." Meghan said.

"No, it's too late today. There's no reason for another person to get lost. Just take your shot the next time it comes along."

"What if it doesn't?"

"In this world there's always going to be another chance to do something brave."

They dragged in just before sunset. Janet wasn't with them.

Tabitha looked grave.

"Did you find her?"

Gerald shook his head. Vinny looked away.

"What?" Tabitha demanded.

"She... she went near the hot springs. I guess there was a bunch of zombies there doing something, God knows what. She got away, but she was just running. We got to the highway. Looks like she got some supplies out of some cars there and went into an old house. The zombies caught up with her and then between her and some stranger they killed all the zombies. The Sergeant seems to think it was a guy named Pete. Nobody on the radio knew anything last we checked, but they're still outside talking. So... who knows? She might be alive. She might be dead."

Sergeant Davis came in. "I heard from command. Pete picked up a woman that sounds just like Janet. They didn't get her name but she said something about duck hunters so it's her. She's exhausted but fine." He eyed the couch. "Mind if I take a seat?"

Tabitha nodded and he plopped down with some force. "So Janet is fine. That's the good news. The bad news is my orders are to pack you all up and head up north."

Gerald stood up. "Like hell! We don't even know you're in the military! You might just take us out in the woods and kill us and take our cabin!"

"Would having a uniform make it more plausible? There's a lot of dead soldiers these days. Having a uniform doesn't mean a whole lot. We're not doing it to be mean. The truth is that you've got, and I'm not exaggerating here-- you have a million zombies coming your way. As in a hundred thousand times ten. Literally one million zombies. The Chicago horde is about to sweep through this part of the country. It's days away. If you stay you've got at best four days before you're surrounded. Maybe a few days before they get enough of them to just brute force their way through a door or wall. Under the National Recovery Act, I have the authority to forcibly evacuate anyone I believe to be in imminent danger from zombies. Your cabin is about to be crawling with zombies no matter how well you hide. This place just smells inhabited, you know? Your laundry pipe reeks of detergent, for one thing. Your drier has fresh lint all over the side of the house. Fresh shit in the latrine. Fresh blood where you butcher your catch. It's not enough to attract them long distance, but any zombie who gets within a hundred yards of this place is going to be curious. If he gets within fifty feet he's going to just know there's somebody around. You smell alive. I guess the cold will help dampen the smells a bit, but if I can smell it so can they. Far too dangerous. You have to come with us. We can take you someplace a lot safer, with lots of people. Soldiers to protect you, something pretty close to a regular town."

"What happens to the cabin?" Gerald asked. Vinny just held his head in his hands.

"We mothball everything, leave a stock of food, and mark it on the map as a good place to hole up next time a patrol sweeps through. It'll probably be too hot for months, but one day it might be accessible again."

"We just lock the door then?"

"And we leave a key under the mat, yeah."

"We don't want to go."

"You don't have a choice."

"I fucking well have a choice. This is America."

"Yes, it is America. And America doesn't need five people fucking off in a cabin in the middle of nowhere just existing. We need you growing food or shooting zombies or working in a factory. We especially don't need five more zombies trying to eat the rest of us."

"I won't go."

"Look, Gerald, I'm not trying to be a hard on. But you need to come with us. It's best for everyone. I know you're used to being alone and maybe you can't believe it when I say that civilization still exists. But it does. And what will happen if you don't go is that I will pull a gun on you. If you pull a gun back, one of us dies. If it's you, you just made me kill real people and I'll regret it for the rest of my life. If I die, you're going to have to kill my friends. Then their friends are going to roll up here with a Humvee and a machine gun and arrest you. Then they'll give you a drumhead court martial, and then execute you."

"You can't do that! It's not Constitutional," Gerald shouted. The Sergeant just stared at him like he was stupid. He looked at the rest of their faces. He seemed to gauge their reactions.

"I'll give you guys some time to discuss it. I'll be outside if you need me," he said, and pulled himself out of the couch. He turned and look right in Gerald's eyes. "There's a lot of people out in the world tonight in bad situations. They would consider getting rescued by the US Army to be the best thing that ever happened to them. I have to admit this cabin is about the sweetest setup I've ever seen out in the wild, and I'd be upset to lose it too. But let's not let your good fortune in having this cabin make you curse the biggest lotto ticket any of you have ever won in your life. Certainly don't make it into bloodshed." He left.

They stared at each other, silent. Tabitha spoke first.

"He's right. I don't know about these hordes, but you told me there were thirty zombies down at the base of this hill. I could have rolled a rock down on them this whole time. If they had found their way up here! It was one thing when we had nowhere better to go. Civilization!"

"Tabitha, don't be foolish! They'll just take us out and kill us or do God knows what!" Gerald said.

"Gerald, you're being the fool. If they were murderers, wouldn't they have just killed the women and waited for you to come in unawares and shot you too? If they wanted to go that way, they could have gone that way a lot easier. The fact is they are the only people we've seen in months who didn't want to kill us. I guess it's a leap of faith to believe that, but I do."

"They threatened us!" Gerald shouted.

"They did. They did. After you accused them of being murderers out to steal our house, they threatened to make us go to a safe place. What assholes!" Tabitha snapped back. "Gerald, I know you don't like it, but unless you're going to shoot me I'm going with them whether you like it or not. I'll be taking Diane with me because Janet is with them. Meghan?"

"I want to go with them," Meghan said. She wasn't sure she did, but if Tabitha was going she didn't want to be the only woman left. Gerald and his son were nice, but she'd be stuck being their maid, and probably their bedwarmer too.

Gerald pouted, arms crossed. It was not a pleasant look for a grown man.

"Gerald, I am telling you that we need to go. I want you and Vinny to come, because you might be right. Even if you aren't we need your protection."

To Meghan it looked like Gerald sensed Tabitha's bald manipulation, but he seemed to take it as a way to save face. He nodded and went to the bedroom to sulk. A storm of frustration crossed Tabitha's face, but she wiped it away with a force of will. She stood up and went outside. After a minute she came back in.

"We leave at first light. We can take whatever we can haul in our vehicles. They want us to leave a little bit in case someone needs to use it later. He suggested the cured meat would be pretty valuable and that clothes were cheap. Get packing." She clapped her hands. "Vinny, you take care of Gerald and make sure he gets it together."

They packed and argued and rolled and jammed things in bags for hours. They had been living in what she would have considered poverty, but when it was time to move it all they had too much. And unlike her old apartment, where there were boxes that she hadn't opened since her last move, all of it seemed vital. A dozen situations would pop through her head in which this piece of clothing or that tool would be critical. In the end it was food, clothing, shelter in that order. Tools she crammed into a box.