Revelations - 02 (40 page)

About ten feet away, I stopped. Pulling the gun he’d given me, I habitually checked the safety. I lined up on the back of the woman’s head—there was no way I could miss from here—took a deep breath, held it for a second, then, after a slow exhale, I fired. Let me just say that ‘silencer’ is a misnomer. She slumped forward and collapsed. Greg fell over to his side, out of surprise I imagine, but he could barely move. I got up and before he could manage to put words to the pleading I saw in his eyes—full of black tendrils confirming his infection—I fired again.

All that remained was Stephen. He sat silently on the log, just watching. I saw a tear in his eye as it welled up past the point of containment and trickled down his cheek.

“That’s the bitch of it,” he sighed. “I guess in the end you feel like you’re burning up. But just now, other than the pain in my arm where the chunk of meat is missing…I feel fine.”

I tossed the gun aside and headed back to camp. The hour journey out took almost twice that coming back. The sun was on its way down past its midday apex. I reached the outer-most campsite and sat on a pine-needle strewn picnic table for a bit. If killing Jack was difficult,
this
was eating me from the inside out more so than any zombie.

My throat tightened for the zillionth time at the image of that man sitting with his eyes closed, totally at peace, waiting for the executioner’s bullet. In just a few days, I’d shot and killed four living, breathing persons. I tried to remind myself why. I tried to remember that night in camp…Thalia’s scream…but it didn’t help.

No
, I insisted,
it has to be done
. I was responsible for not only Thalia and Emily, but…in a way…each of those people. They relied on me to make the tough decisions that nobody wanted to make. Of everybody, I think Dr. Zahn is the only one who really understands.

“Man up,” I said out loud, like hearing the words would help. I took a few deep breaths to ensure I’d either suppressed everything, or pushed it out of my system. Walking down the overgrown, but still easily followed ‘road’ that wound through the twenty-four campsites—each nothing more than a fire pit, picnic table, and post with a water spigot and power outlet—I felt the tension and pain condense to a nicely manageable ball that I could stuff into a dark corner of my mind.

I reached the edge of the clearing and froze. Four people were on their knees, hands behind their heads in the middle of the softball field. Aaron, Billy, and Randi had them at gun point. I spotted Teresa up at the house, standing in front of the door; no doubt keeping Thalia and Emily inside. Barry was up in the watch tower. Everybody else was standing in or near the trench.

As I crossed the ball field, Dr. Zahn came down the hill, cutting me off or wanting to fill me in as I went to see what exactly was happening. I noticed Jason and one of the women from his group coming out of the woods opposite from where I’d come. They were carrying weapons in hand.

What the hell had happened?

“Steve?” Dr. Zahn actually started to jog. Now I knew something was up.

I kept walking, allowing her to intercept me as I crossed the entry road that divided the softball field from the big expanse of open grass. The whole place had a vibe to it that was more than just a little unsettling. It was made just a bit worse by all the unfamiliar faces looking at me like I was Moses coming down from The Mount with the two tablets. Didn’t they know that I didn’t have all the answers. I was flying blind by the seat of my pants. Not much more reliable than a
Magic 8 Ball
.

“What’s up, Doc?”
Did I just say that?
Only, Dr. Zahn didn’t react.

Fine.
I walked across the suddenly much larger seeming field. I became aware with each step that all eyes were on me. Even Lee? And he was…smirking? We reached the cluster and four sets of frightened eyes looked up at me.

“You,” Dr. Zahn walked up to a man about my age, “show him your arm.”

The man glanced at his friends who all shrugged or nodded nervously. He unbuttoned the long-sleeved cuff and pulled it up revealing a forearm. I moved closer, a loud pounding ring gaining force in my head.

The arm was
mostly
unremarkable. It’s only really outstanding quality was the huge bite. Or, rather, the huge
mostly-healed
bite. There was no mistaking what it was. But a bite turns victims within seventy-two hours. This one—

“How long ago?” I forced myself to ask.

“Just over four weeks,” the man said quietly, obviously afraid.

Impossible
.

16

Vignettes XII

Shaw tossed the towel on the floor. Standing naked in his room, he let the warm breeze from the open window wash over his body. He felt pleasantly tired. In his mind, he could hear still the muffled sobs of that bitch, Senator Angela Bergman.
I’ll bet she never imagined days like this when she was struttin’ around D.C. or drivin’ this country into the ground while standing in front of walls of cameras and lyin’ to honest, hard-workin’, God-fearin’ Americans,
Shaw thought. The things he’d done to her were down right satisfying, but the things he’d made her do to herself…

A knock at the door shattered the images playing in his head. Grabbing a pair of shorts, Shaw stepped into them, then went to the door, yanking it open angrily. “What!” he barked.

“You been outside recently?” TJ asked with a tone in his voice that immediately put Shaw on edge: fear. A half-dozen men stood in the hall as well, all of them looking more than a little nervous.

“No.” Shaw folded his arms across his chest, assuming his most authoritative pose. It looked like his men needed their leader at the moment.

“You should come with us,” TJ said. “My room’s on the south side, you can see from there.”

“See what?” Whatever TJ was up to, Shaw didn’t like it.

“Just come,” TJ said impatiently. With that, he turned around and walked down the hallway. The other men looked around nervously between their leader and the man stalking angrily down the hall. One by one, they peeled away and took off after TJ.

“Dammit,” Shaw cursed. He grabbed the pair of pants hanging over the foot of his bed, pulled them on, and took off down the hallway. He’d deal with TJ’s insubordinate attitude later. None of the men
told
Jonathon Shaw what to do.

He reached the man’s room. The door was already open, and murmuring trickled out into the strangely empty corridor. Shaw entered to find at least twenty men standing at the two windows; the ones in back up on their tip-toes, craning to see over those in front. Shaw reached the rear of the group and began shouldering his way to the front. Several men resisted him until they turned to see who exactly was pushing through. Then, of course, they hastily moved out of the way.

At last, he reached where TJ stood, staring outside. “What’s this all about, TJ?” Shaw asked, but as soon as he looked outside, he knew.

“Holy shit!” he breathed.

“All of that little town…Heath…it must all be burning,” TJ said.

Well off in the distance, a huge black cloud rose in the otherwise flawlessly blue sky. It was enormous. Shaw felt something churning in his gut.

Anger?

No, this was much more. Somehow, he was certain that little pencil-necked bastard he’d let live back at the RV park was responsible. He’d obviously not taken the generous offer and gotten out of Shaw’s territory. Instead, the little geek had decided to wage a war. The man obviously lived in a fantasy.
Well,
Shaw thought,
I’ll put a quick end to that.

“Muster all of the men on the compound, TJ…assign a detail to lock down all the women. Tell the doctor to meet me in my quarters. Whether this is a rival faction…or…as I suspect…a single act of terrorism…we will crush it. Today!”

A chorus of cheers echoed from the room.



Night time.

Peter watched the caravan of vehicles roll out the huge gate. He hadn’t been surprised that Shaw chose to ride in
his
APC.
Oh well,
he thought as he looked around the empty entry-foyer. Inside, it looked like a normal building. He still found it interesting that the outside of the place looked like a giant picnic basket.

Shaw had left him with specific instructions. Prepare an emergency room, and be prepared for the possibility of casualties. Well…that was absolutely
not
going to happen. He bounded up the stairs.

Reaching his room, he burst in. Shari was standing at the window and shrieked at the sudden intrusion. “Grab the bag I had you pack,” he said as he went to the footlocker in the corner and pulled out a small duffel.

“Three?” Peter asked skeptically. “I hardly doubt this was the work of
three
guys.”

“Yeah?” Shari smiled. “Well…they were super-smart. Most of the time I needed a dictionary when they spoke.”

“Still…” Peter considered the possibility, then shook it off. “Three guys waging war on Shaw’s men? I just don’t buy it. But whatever it is, this is our chance. There aren’t a dozen men left watching this place. If we’re ever gonna go…it’s now.”

“Look,” Peter cut her off, trying his best to keep from sounding angry. He understood her concern for her family, but this was better than his best-case scenario when it came to an opportunity to escape. And even now, it wasn’t for sure that they’d get out. He didn’t have the time to search for two women that could be anywhere in this facility. “We’ll grab your little sister, but that’s gonna have to do. Otherwise…you can stay.”

Shari’s head dropped, her shoulders shook a little as she began to cry. Peter felt for her, he really did, but they needed to be gone. Pronto.

“Okay,” she looked up, her face tear-streaked, but her eyes showing…resolution.

By the time he was ready, Shaw and his men had been gone at least a half an hour. During that time, he detailed his plans to Shari and hoped that she understood. They went upstairs to Erin’s room and Peter produced a key, the biggest break up to this point being that he possessed a master-key that worked on all the doors of the maternity floor. He opened the door and stepped aside as Shari rushed to her sister. He allowed them a few minutes for a tearful reunion, occasionally reminding them to quiet down.

Eventually, he stepped between the girls, giving a very brief explanation to the younger Bergman girl. He allowed the girl enough time to gather a few things, which he stuffed into his own bag.

“Remember, neither of you two say a word once we leave this room. Follow me and do exactly what I say when I say it,” Peter said, trying hard to sound more confident than frightened.

The girls nodded and he led them out the door. They hurried down the hallway, occasionally passing rooms where weeping could be heard clearly from the other side of the doors. He opened the door to the south stairwell and froze.

“Wow,” he breathed. The distant horizon was glowing from a massive fire.
Nope,
he thought,
definitely the work of more than just three men.

The two reached the ground floor. He pushed open the emergency exit door and took a look around. They were only going to be visible from one lookout tower at first. He scanned the depleted row of vehicles. An army-green truck sat parked at the bottom of the wheelchair ramp. It was one of those heavy-duty types with four wheels on the rear axel. A reinforced, black front bumper would serve his needs perfectly, but first…

“You two stay here,” Peter whispered.

He couldn’t see anybody in the gun-tower, hopefully that meant that whoever was on watch was either actually doing his job and keeping an eye outside the facility, or, and this was quite likely, sitting on the floor drunk or asleep with his radio turned up so that he would wake up if anybody tried to contact him.