Plague of the Undead (17 page)

part four

THE WRECK

They rode hard for as long as Chelsea could handle it, which wasn’t very far. Even with Kelly to help her, the poor girl could barely stay in the saddle. She was getting thrown all over the place and tiring fast, and to Jacob it looked like they were about to lose her. He came up alongside Kelly and gave her the sign to bring it to a stop. Kelly nodded, and as they slowed to a trot Chelsea slumped forward, her shoulders sagging. She looked beat to a pulp.

“We’re out of sight now,” Jacob said. “Let’s stop here a second and figure out what we’re doing.”

Nick came up alongside Chelsea. “Hey, you okay?”

Chelsea tried to smile at him, but didn’t quite manage it. She was out of breath and limp as a ragdoll.

“You did good,” he said. “For someone who’s never been on a horse before, you held on real good.”

“You’ve never been on a horse before?” Kelly asked.

Chelsea shook her head.

Kelly traded a worried look at Jacob, and he knew exactly the thoughts playing out in her mind. Were they really about to take a hell-bent for leather ride through the wasteland with a little girl who had never even sat on a horse before? You’ve got to be kidding me.

He shared her concerns, but didn’t let it show.

The horses had found a muddy rainwater stream running across what was left of the road and dipped their heads to drink, their sides still heaving from the hard run.

Nick said, “She’ll do fine.”

He pulled a canteen from the saddle, shook it, and heard liquid sloshing inside. He handed her the canteen and said, “Here, have a little water.”

Chelsea took it, unscrewed the cap, and drank.

And promptly spit out. She coughed and spluttered and jutted the canteen back in his direction with a horrified and disgusted look on her face.

“What is it?” he said, taking the canteen.

“Ugh. That’s whisky.”

Nick frowned at the canteen. He took it, smelled it, and flinched away from it. “Whew!” he said. “That’s some good lighter fluid.”

He took a sip and shook his head. “Yep,” he said, wincing, his voice suddenly strained. “The good stuff.”

“Give me that,” Kelly said. She took the canteen, sniffed at it, and drank anyway. Coughing, she replaced the cap and gave it back to Nick.

“That good, huh?”

Still coughing, she started to laugh. “That’s absolutely awful. That’s not bathtub whisky. Somebody made that in a toilet.”

With a chuckle, Nick poured it out and looked down at the stream from which the horses were drinking. “What do you think?” he asked, rattling the canteen.

Kelly looked at the muddy water and shook her head.

“Yeah, I didn’t think so either.”

Chelsea’s horse had drifted away from the stream and caught a whiff of the swill Nick had just poured out. The mare shook her head and whinnied. Unable to control the animal, Chelsea got scared again.

Kelly came up next to her, grabbed the reins, and settled the horse.

“It’s okay,” she said to the young girl. “Here, lead him like this. No, no, use your legs. Squeeze, like this.”

With help, Chelsea got her horse turned around and they headed back to the stream.

“That’s good,” Kelly said. “Yeah, like that. You got it.”

Chelsea’s horse calmed and fell in line with the others.

Kelly released the reins so Chelsea could take them up. “How is it possible that you never learned to ride a horse? Back where we’re from, kids are taught to ride as early as five. And it’s part of school from day one. You got this fantastic education, but no horseback riding lessons?”

“It never came up,” Chelsea said. “I mean, we’ve got horses in Temple. I remember watching them run along the beach. But I never had any real need to learn. Temple isn’t that big. You can either walk or ride a bike wherever you go.”

“What about when you need to carry things?” Kelly asked. “You know, like a bunch of stuff. What do you do then?”

“Well, we have electric cars, so . . . you know.” Chelsea shrugged.

“Electric . . .” Kelly’s mouth fell open in shock.

She seemed to have no idea what to say, which, in Jacob’s experience was definitely a first. He chuckled quietly. Kelly glared at him, and rather than try to respond and make a fool of herself, she turned her horse to the north and studied the horizon for signs of pursuit.

“Can we stop here?” Chelsea said. “Just for a little while. We must have ridden like ten miles.”

“Not half that far,” Nick said. “I’d like to put about twenty-five miles between us and that herd before I’d feel good about stopping. What do you think, Jacob?”

The countryside around them was flat and green, broken frequently by stands of trees and ponds and little rainy weather creeks like the one they were currently using to water the horses. There had been a state highway here at one point, but the years and the vegetation had long since reclaimed it. Now, only rusting and leaning metal mile marker poles remained to show where the road had once been.

Jacob panned slowly around, taking it all in. In their short but hard ride they’d seen more deer and birds and wild hogs than he’d seen during his entire time in the wasteland. And far off to the east, lost in the shadows of the trees, he saw a line of large, bulky animals that he couldn’t make out because they were too far away. He thought of the elephants they’d seen on their trek up Highway 55, and what Owen Webb had said about all the zookeepers during the First Days who had released the animals under their care to roam the countryside, and he could only stare in amazement. It was such a strange world they’d stepped into, beautiful and terrifying all at once.

“We can’t stop,” he said. “Not yet.”

“But I’m exhausted,” Chelsea said.

“I know,” Jacob said. “But it’s not safe.” He turned to Nick. “All the animals we’ve seen, they’ve all been going south.”

“To keep ahead of the herd, is my guess,” said Kelly.

“Mine, too. Nick, what are we gonna find if we keep heading south?”

Nick thought for a second, recreating his maps from memory. “Well, let’s see, assuming we’ve gone about five miles, we probably have another five to go before we reach Bernie. About fifteen miles after that, if we keep going south, we’ll come up on Malden. Malden might be a good place to head, actually. Highway 62 runs through there, and that would give us more or less a straight shot back to Arbella.”

“How far?”

“Three days maybe, if we push it.”

Jacob looked back to the north. The smoke was gone from the sky, but he knew they weren’t very far from the herd. Their only hope was to put as much distance on the herd this first day as they could. Jacob and the others were limited on how far they could travel by horseback. Kelly had picked some strong animals, but even the hardiest of horses had limits. Twenty-five or thirty miles a day, especially over the rough and overgrown country they were traveling, was about the extent of what they could reasonably expect. But the zombies, moving on foot, would travel much slower. The fastest of them could do maybe three miles in an hour, and probably closer to two, but they never stopped walking. They never tired, never slept, never stopped, just kept on walking one step in front of the other, slowly, but inexorably making their way to their next meal. Any distance they put on the herd would be swallowed up during the night, while Jacob and the others were forced to rest. It was going to be close.

“Chelsea,” Jacob said, “I’m sorry, but we don’t have a whole lot of options. Stopping here, now, will get us killed.”

She nodded.

Jacob nodded to Kelly. “What do you think, can we make Malden by nightfall?”

“You said it was, what, about twenty miles?” she asked Nick.

“About that.”

“I think we can make that,” she said. “The land is pretty flat, and I bet at least some of the road will still be usable.”

“Okay then,” Jacob said. “Let’s head home.”

Kelly was right about the road.

Another mile went by and they began to see bare spots in the high grass, and soon the grass gave way almost entirely, leaving only sand and patchy clumps of weeds here and there. In some places, they could even see asphalt.

They made Malden two hours before sunset. They were so far ahead of schedule that they even debated using the extra time to push east along Highway 62. But Kelly said the horses needed resting. They’d worked them hard, and they were going to work them hard again in the morning. Best to let them rest.

And so they rode out on Highway 62 just east of town, and stopped at a deserted farmhouse. During his salvage team days, Jacob had learned that commercial buildings, like gas stations and truck stops, tended to make the best choices for temporary shelter. Because of their industrial construction, they tended to hold up better to the ravages of time and weather than residential homes, which were more often than not made with wood frames and therefore subject to termite infestations and wholesale rot. And, because the architecture of commercial buildings was defined by their customer access function, they tended to have points of entry on only one side of the building, making them easier to defend against an undead attack, should that ever become an issue. But the farmhouse they found just outside of Malden was remarkably well preserved. It stood atop a slight rise, commanding quite a good view of the surrounding countryside, and its animal enclosures were hidden from the main road and still in pretty good shape.

And, best of all, there was a huge flock of feral chickens foraging in the yard. Seventy or eighty birds at least.

“Oh, God,” Nick said. “I am so hungry.”

“Me, too,” Jacob said, watching the flock peck at bugs around the yard. He remembered nights of chickens and quail roasting in bacon fat on a cast-iron skillet and his mouth instantly started to water.

Kelly laughed. “You’re going to try and catch a bunch of wild chickens? This I got to see.”

“It’s no problem,” Jacob said.

“Oh, I’m sure it isn’t. Not for a couple of tough guys like you. What’s a couple of chickens up against you two?”

“Is that sarcasm?”

“Oh, never,” Kelly said. She cast a mischievous smile his way. For a moment, in the low light of dusk, it made her look seventeen again. “I’d never dream of doubting you, Jacob.”

Jacob rolled his eyes at her, and then he and Nick went after the chickens. They charged into the yard, thinking the feral variety couldn’t be that much different from the domesticated birds they’d learn to catch, pluck, and field dress in their animal husbandry class back at school. But after the dominate cock spurred Nick, putting a nasty gash in his right arm and almost lopping off his left ear, and Jacob lost the hens when they took to the top branches of an ash tree, they realized they needed a better plan.

“We ought to just shoot them,” Kelly said. She looked up at the tree where about fifty of the birds had taken shelter. “That’s only about twenty-five or thirty feet.”

“It’s an easy shot,” Jacob agreed. “It’s the noise that worries me.”

“We haven’t seen any signs of zombie activity all day. And the noise wouldn’t carry that far, would it?”

“A few miles,” Jacob said.

“At least that,” said Nick.

“Well, do either of you have a better idea? We’re all really hungry.”

That much Jacob couldn’t argue with. He stepped back from the tree, raised his rifle, and fired six times before the birds took to the air and flew to a nearby tree. They didn’t stay there, though. They took to the wing almost immediately, and when they reached the next tree, repeated the process. In a matter of minutes, they were out of sight.

“I had no idea chickens could fly like that,” Nick said.

“Me either,” Jacob said. He motioned toward the fallen birds. “Come on, help me with this. I’m hungry, too.”

Kelly found a package of sea salt in the kitchen and brought it out. “I didn’t trust any of the other spices,” she said. “But salt is a rock, so . . .”

“Sounds good to me,” Jacob said.

They made a small fire and salted up the five birds Jacob had managed to hit and cooked them on a spit roast.

Jacob knew they were taking a chance with the smoke, but there was no arguing with their hunger, and the smell of the roasting meat was enough to forgive the bad tactics.

Forgive, but not ignore.

As soon as the birds were ready, Jacob got a bucket from the barn and filled it with water and threw it on the pit. Once the fire was out and the coals soaked to stop them from smoking, they went inside and tore into the birds, the four of them eating from plates Kelly found in the kitchen.

For Jacob, it was one of the best meals he’d ever had. He sat back in his chair, and a plate full of bones stripped bare, and stifled a burp. “Oh, man, that was good.”

Kelly laughed. She was seated on Jacob’s left, Chelsea right across the table from her. Jacob, who knew Kelly pretty well, and who could tell Chelsea’s comment about the electric cars had been bothering her all day, couldn’t help but laugh when she finally brought it up.

“How is that even possible? In Arbella we had, what, like three gas-powered trucks that we could use for big projects, but usually only one was working at a time, and that because we had to cannibalize parts from the other two. I mean, the scale of production alone is just astronomical. Galveston Island isn’t that big, at least from what I remember on the maps. There are a limited number of people who could live there, right? Just like in Arbella. How could your people create the industry necessary to build electric cars? And the aerofluyts we saw? And the clipper ships you described? How is that possible?”

“I don’t know,” Chelsea said. “I was ten when we left. But I know that my parents had one, and most of the families I knew growing up had one.”

“Incredible,” Kelly said. “It’s just so hard to imagine.”

Jacob couldn’t help but smile. Poor Kelly, she was beside herself with a mix of wonder and jealousy.

“It’s no more difficult to imagine than those huge airships we saw,” Nick said.

“Aerofluyts,” Chelsea corrected him.

“Aerofluyts,” Nick said. “Sorry.”

“You said your people renamed Galveston Island The Temple,” Kelly said. “Is that like a religious thing? Are you Mormons, or Jewish, or something?”

Chelsea shook her head. “There’s no religion in Temple. And it’s just Temple, not
The
Temple. The founder of our community was a man named Dr. David Knopf.” She looked at the others for some sign of recognition, but when it didn’t come she said: “After the Provisional Government fell and it looked like the War was a total loss, Dr. Knopf led the surviving research teams and their families from Ohio to Galveston. Really, he was our town founder. There’s a statue of him in front of our public administration office.”

“Why Galveston?” Nick asked.

“Because it’s an island,” Kelly said. “They thought it’d be the safest spot to build a new community.”

“Makes sense.”

“And the Texas A&M maritime research campus was there,” Chelsea said. “When Dr. Knopf and his teams moved in to the campus they started calling it Temple. I don’t really remember why, but that’s what they called it, and eventually the name just stuck for the whole island.”

“What about the aerofluyts?” Kelly asked. “Why are they so big?”

“Well, they need to be to run the morphic field generator. That thing is huge. And plus there’s a whole community living inside. All the scientists and their families. That’s where I went to school, where we grew our food, where we went to the movies. You know. Lived life.”

Jacob and the others traded a glance.

“What?” Chelsea said. “Did I say something wrong?”

“No,” said Nick. “All of us have heard our parents talk about the movies, but none of us have ever seen one. Not one that we can remember anyway.”

“Oh,” Chelsea said. “Sorry.”

Kelly, not wanting to lose the momentum of Chelsea’s account, plowed on. “Tell us more about the aerofluyts,” she asked. “Those huge wings are solar sails, aren’t they?”

“Oh, yes,” Chelsea said. “They provide nearly all the power the ship uses.”

“Amazing,” Kelly said. She looked pleasantly lost, like one caught up in a daydream.

Jacob said, “What do their engines run on? Are they powered by the solar sails, too?”

“I don’t know,” Chelsea said. “Partly, I think. Chris would know more than I do. But I do know they can stay in the air for months at a time, and they travel all over the Americas, monitoring the great herds, testing the land and the zombies they capture for signs that CDHL levels are going down.”

“You know about CDHLs?” Kelly asked.

“Of course,” Chelsea said. “They taught us about them in school. Plus, my dad was supposed to be a big deal in researching them. I remember him and my mom talking about them all the time, so I got it twice as much as the other kids.”

But it wasn’t CDHLs that had Jacob fascinated. It was something else she’d said.

“Chelsea, you mentioned the great herds. What can you tell us about them?”

“Not much, really,” she said. “We didn’t get a whole lot of that in school. But I do know from listening to my parents that there’s the Plains Herd, which is the herd we just got away from, and the smaller herds up along the East Coast. Those are smaller because of all the barriers put up during the War. They’ve got all sorts of names, but I’ve forgotten most of those. And, let’s see, there’s the Desert Herd on the other side of the Rocky Mountains, and a few more in Mexico and Central America. But the really big one is the Great Texas Herd.”

Jacob was almost afraid to ask, but his curiosity wouldn’t let him avoid it. “How big is really big?”

Chelsea shrugged. “Nobody knows exactly. The numbers change pretty much all the time. Some zombies rot away. Others get lost and drift off. And all the while new zombies are made from the recently dead and find their way into the herd. Their numbers probably vary by several hundred or maybe even thousands from day to day. I do remember my dad saying once that he thought the Great Texas Herd might be fifty million, maybe more.”

The full magnitude of her answer didn’t seem to scare her at all, but it sent a chill down Jacob’s spine.

“Your home sounds like such a wonderful place, Chelsea,” Kelly said. “I’m still trying to wrap my head around it. An entire community built around scientific research.”

Chelsea licked the last little bit of chicken grease from her fingers and nodded.

“Incredible,” Kelly said, shaking her head.

To Jacob, it looked like someone had just sold her on a picture of paradise.

With the meal finished, they wandered off to find places to sleep. Jacob took the first watch. The house had several rooms, and he spent an hour walking the place, getting a feel for the layout. Kelly had found a spot in a small side bedroom and had managed to clear most of the dust and accumulated trash from one corner of the room. Nick had talked Chelsea into sleeping in his room. Several times Jacob passed the closed door to their room and heard the girl giggling, but when he heard the giggles change to moans of pleasure he couldn’t take it anymore and went outside.

Three hours passed by as silently as the stars that wheeled overhead, and when his time was up he went back inside and woke Kelly.

“Your turn,” he said.

She sat up without seeming groggy at all, like she hadn’t even slept. “Are they finally done in there?” she asked, and nodded toward the bedroom Nick and Chelsea shared.

“I didn’t hear anything when I came in,” Jacob said.

Kelly frowned at the closed door. “That’s not right,” she said. “She’s just a little girl.”

“She’s seventeen,” Jacob said. “Girls younger than her get married in Arbella two or three times a year.”

“She’s not getting married,” she said. “She’s getting used by a horny thirty-five-year-old man. It’s not right. It’s disgusting.”

Jacob thought on that, and deep down he suspected that she was right. It felt like she was right. Still, that was Nick in there, his best friend, the man he trusted. “What do you want to do?” he finally asked her. It seemed like the easy way out, put it back on her, but he couldn’t think of anything else to do.

“I don’t know if there is anything we can do,” she said after a long and thoughtful pause. “You can’t tell a seventeen-year-old girl to stay away from a guy.” Suddenly she was looking at him with a mix of anger and something akin to regret. It caught him by surprise. “I know that as well as any woman. Tell a girl that age that a guy is no good for her and she’ll run to his side faster than a rumor in the night.”

Jacob sat there in the dark, stunned and hurt. Was she talking about Nick and Chelsea, or about them? There had been a time, so many years ago now, but not so long ago that he couldn’t remember every day of it, that they’d been Arbella’s hottest couple. All the mysteries you could open up for the first time at seventeen, they’d opened up together. It had been a wonderful, magical, and ultimately heartbreaking summer.

Or so it was in his memory.

He’d always assumed it had been the same for her. But memory was a form of relativity, wasn’t it? It depended upon one’s point of view, both in time and space. The past, the present . . . hunger, desire, regret . . . they all played a part in building different vistas on the same battlefield that is teenage love. And what had seemed real, and powerful, and touched by an irresistible gravity to him—and, as he’d always envisioned it, for her as well—could be something else entirely from another’s point of view.

The epiphany hit him like an earthquake.

It hurt.

It hurt badly enough for him to turn a shield toward her.

“Has he violated Arbella’s Code?” he asked her.

Even in the weak silver starlight that leaked in through the open windows, he could see that the sudden hardness in his tone caught her off guard. She started to speak, but managed little more than a stammering and inarticulate mutter.