Well Fed - 05 (46 page)

Not three steps away from him stood a tall man dressed in a snowsuit. The snowsuit Gus could understand. The silver face with the punched-hole grin took him a moment. The axe was an entirely different matter.

“What’s happening?” he asked hoarsely.

“Just sit still,” an unfamiliar woman whispered, guarded and brimming with fright. “And don’t move.”

The shiny bastard with the axe regarded him with black-eyed mirth, almost daring Gus to try something.

Gus did not, however, and elected to touch his aching jaw instead.

Armed soldiers roughly handled men, women, and children to their knees and arranged them into rows. Gus slowly sat up, thanking the lady who’d watched over him. The silver-faced lumberjack towered over them, dawn’s light playing over the mask’s surface while smoke drifted by.

Morning
. Gus grimaced and fought through a surge of dizziness. It passed, and he studied the soldiers standing around with fearsome, automatic science-fiction weaponry. Black masks covered their faces, like the one Collie wore, and for a second, Gus wondered if they knew her. Behind a wall of guns rose an awesome three-story dump truck, parked, its headlights blazing. The cab and deck area on the monstrosity had slabs of sheet iron welded or bolted over its more sensitive parts, but the huge tires were at least fifteen feet tall. The indistinct shapes of transport trailers idled beyond the flood of light from this apocalyptic siege tower.

“Jesus Christ,” Gus mumbled as he gazed around, earning what appeared to be a moment’s chuckle from the silver-faced Axeman. Smoke belched from a pair of houses down near the water. A few more soldiers strutted around them while two others prodded at corpses at their feet. That took Gus a moment to process as the upper curve of the sun broke over a distant ridge of treetops.

“What happened?”

“Pick!” a voice shouted.

“Yeah!” a soldier answered, carrying a rifle with a futuristic optical-sight system.

“How many you got now?”

“After that little episode? Seventy-two.”

“Seventy-two.”

The speaker came into sight, shaking his head in apparent disgust, another ski-masked soldier, carrying a subcompact machine gun and dressed in an orange survival suit. Something seemed odd about him, and Gus’s brow furrowed with activating his memory.

“All right. Enough of this shit,” the deep-voiced man yelled and gestured at the captives. “Anyone else tries to run, not only do we shoot the ass off them, but we shoot one of you. Now then, this is how it’s going to work. Whatever life you had here is over. You’ve just been recruited into a much larger body…”

Gasps and sobs of disbelief rippled through the citizens of Pine Cove as the masked man delivered a speech about the life after the apocalypse. He told them about a bunker to the north and the unit of special operators having a gunfight for the ages in a stone courthouse. Gus listened in rapt attention, thinking of Collie and Wallace at times but also sensing he knew this masked man who talked with his hands while presiding over them.

“Sooner or later, someone would have found you,” the speaker continued in a bass rumble and holstered his hands on his hips, “and would’ve butchered the whole damn lot of you. You’re fortunate we came along when we did. We need you. Preferably, all of you, but I know from experience that isn’t going to happen. First things first. Any miners here?”

No one moved, simply too stunned in the dawn’s growing light. Someone coughed.

“No miners? Jesus H… all right… any carpenters or plumbers? Doctors or dentists? Nurses?”

A few hands went up, and heads turned toward them.

“Stand up,” the speaker commanded, and three people complied. The soldiers guarding the lot of them hoisted their weapons and took aim at two women and a man.

“Which is it, then?”

“I was a registered nurse,” said a woman in her thirties.

“Dental assistant,” said the other woman.

“Pharmacist,” said the man.

“Well, well,” the speaker said, clearly impressed. “Bit of a jackpot here, Pick. Get them folks out of there. You’re special to us. We
like
you. You guys get a special deal—a one-time offer, you could say. Anyone else, then?”

No one raised their hands.

“Anyone with any trade skills? Mechanics, for instance?”

Again, no one moved.

“No?”

Gus looked around, remembering Ray saying something about a mechanic. But whoever it was, wasn’t budging.

“I’m an electrician,” one guy called out.

“You are now?” the man in orange exclaimed. “Get outta there.”

Two armed riflemen gestured to the electrician and herded him away.

“All right, that was the easy part.” The leader sighed and studied the people in the first row. “What I’m offering you all now is citizenship in a new nation. Anyone can join, provided you can get past the initiation test. Y’see, we’re looking for survivors. A
survivor’s
survivor, you might say. The kids I see among you, well, they’re coming with us, regardless. The parents or guardians, well, that’s optional. Allow me to explain.”

Gus blinked. Coldness rose and flooded his chest and limbs like a life-threatening allergic reaction. His mouth went dry, and his mind focused on the speaker as the man rambled on with his horrific selection process.

Holy fuck
, Gus mouthed and held his jaw as if to steady it.
Holy fuck
. He knew the identity of the man talking. God above, he knew him.

Soldiers moved among the people of Pine Cove, yanking the children away from the parents or relatives. Gus barely registered the activity, even when the kids screamed and kicked. His eyes stayed on the speaker while everyone else watched the kidnappings.

One of the soldiers carrying a toolbox approached the speaker.

But he wasn’t just a speaker anymore—not to Gus. He was positive of the man’s identity, recognizing the mannerisms, the way of speech, and that unmistakable bedrock voice that could hit the kind of low notes that could shake windows in their frames if he sang. He just couldn’t believe the guy was…
there
.

Gus stood up on shaky feet, drawing the glowing attention of the Axeman with the silver face. A few nearby guards turned as well, taking aim with their weapons. Then the people of Pine Cove held their breaths, wondering why the newest member was suddenly wigging out and committing suicide. Children’s faces looked on in a heart-breaking mixture of fear, desperation, and hope as they saw him stand.

Even the speaker took notice and cocked his head to one side.

“You got something to say, son?”

“Yeah,” Gus straightened his back and tried to find the man’s eyes. “I know who you are. Christ on a stick, I thought… I thought you were dead.”

The speaker’s head tweaked again in an
oh really?
kind of way, and the henchman with the toolbox regarded his leader.

“Yeah?” the speaker said, his hand tightening about the machine gun hanging from his shoulder. “Well, then introduce yourself. And make it a good one.”

Gus’s mouth hung open. “Jerry. It’s me. Gus. Berry.”

The speaker stopped talking as if winded. He released the weapon, his entire posture sagging from one of supreme confidence to heart-attack dismay.

“Gus?” he asked, totally disarmed.

Gus nodded.

“I thought you were dead.”

“I thought
you
were dead.”

The pair of men quieted then, staring at each other for seconds before Jerry reached up and pulled the mask from his head. Then, remembering where he was, he glanced around to see his followers watching, waiting for the final reveal.

Jerry didn’t give it to them, but he waved Gus closer. “Get over here.”

As if dreaming, Gus walked toward his brother.

In a smoky haze, Jerry clasped both of Gus’s arms and held him there, and both men marveled at each other’s scars. Amazement swept over the people witnessing the reunion, and the tension of the attack bled away. Figures moved around the two men, allowing them space, but neither noticed.

“Holy shit,” Gus said and embraced his once-dead brother. “Holy
shit
. I can’t believe it. I can’t believe it.”

Jerry reluctantly returned the hug, patting Gus on the back, allowing him to hold on. Gus finally released his brother and cleared his constricted throat. “Sid?”

Jerry’s face wilted around the eyes. “Sid didn’t make it.”

“Oh.” The word almost became a wail. Jerry shooed away the perplexed soldiers and nodded at the guy with the toolbox.

“Carry on, Pick,” Jerry said. “You know the drill. I’ve got things to attend to. Gus, this way. Follow me.”

Gus did as told. To his surprise, the building Jerry was leading him to was the RCMP office. A misshapen lump came into view then, splayed on the ground outside the main entrance, lying on its back. Gus faltered and stepped back, bumping into a wall. He glanced over his shoulder to see the silver-faced Axeman standing right there. Gus switched back to the bloody mess on the ground.

The body was the town mayor, Ray Minglewood. He’d been damn near cut in half by a burst of automatic gunfire. Ray’s troll-like mop of hair had sopped up a good amount of the blood pooled around him, but there was so much more.

“Jesus Christ,” Gus burst out. “That’s Ray!”

Jerry hesitated in his tracks. “You know him?”

“He was like the fuckin’ mayor.”

The silver-faced goliath chuckled darkly, earning a classic
the fuck’s so funny?
glare from Gus.

“When we moved in here, things got a little crazy,” Jerry said with a twinge of regret in his voice, diverting Gus’s attention back to him.

“Things got a little crazy?” Gus stopped and stared. “What the hell are you doing, Jer? These are good people, and you’re fuckin’ invading them. And what’s with that overlord speech and yanking the children away? What’s up with that? You’re actually forcing them to join you? You got an insane way of going about things. I mean, Jesus, what happened to just driving up and introducing yourself?”

Jerry regarded his brother stoically for a moment. “You get burned?”

“Huh?”

“Your face is all fucked up.”

“Oh. That. Yeah. I… I had a hard time back in Annapolis there. Had a place up on South Mountain there––”

“South Mountain?” Jerry blurted and grinned. “That’s high country up there. Some rich sonsabitches’ balcony. You holed up in one of them mansions?”

“Well,” Gus shrugged. “Not a mansion exactly, but it might’ve been a summer home for someone. Had a wall and solar panels and all that.”

“Living off the grid.” Jerry approved.

“Yeah, well, yeah, something like that.”

“Come on in here,” Jerry said soothingly and guided Gus past the dead man at their feet.

“What about––”

“Don’t worry about him. Or them,” Jerry said, cutting Gus off. “That guy on the ground there shot first anyway. My boys were defending themselves. Ain’t that right, Nolan?”

The ogre at his back thought about it for a second before giving a ponderous nod.

“Easy to do at night,” Jerry continued, pulling the outer door open. “Shit’s going down. Everyone’s all short-circuiting on adrenaline like a pack of squirrels jacked up on speed. Unlucky shit like this is bound to happen every once in a while. Wait for us out here, Nolan. We’ll be out in a few minutes.”

Nolan lurched to a stop right at the door, his silver face watching. Gus glared back, not feeling particularly friendly, and bumped into a corner of the second security door. Inside, the spartan office remained untouched, right down to the rack of firearms and ammunition on the west wall. Jerry circled Ray’s desk and pulled out a chair. He gestured for Gus to do the same, and both sat down.

In the morning light, with the smell of smoke on the air, Jerry leaned back and stared at Gus from the chin up, inspecting him,
remembering
him. His mouth became a thin line before puckering into a tight button of amazement.

“Should’ve known you’d pull through. Goddamn. If there ever was a bastard to kick the apocalypse in the balls and get away with it, it’d be you. Goddamn.”

“You too,” Gus said, captivated by the last surviving member of his family. “Holy shit.”

“Not like you, though,” Jerry said with a slow shake of his head. “Not like you. For one, I was up north in deep backcountry, rooting around with pipes and goons and suits, sucking up every last drop of tar-sand oil we could sniff out. Took days to drive onto site and over some pretty shitty roads too. We didn’t have to worry about zombies up there. Oh, there were one or two guys that turned, but we isolated them pretty fast. And when we found out that they were fucking undead, well, we put a nail in their head, and that was that. Nothing like what you or anyone else in a city or town had to go through. I’m not saying we had it easy. Far fucking from it. Only different.”

Gus smiled. “Good to see you, bro.”

“Good to see you too.”

“
But
,” Gus stressed the words, “the
fuck
are you doing?”

“Feeding the machine.” Jerry answered truthfully and stared back, clearly ruminating on how best to deal with the situation.

“Feeding the machine,” Gus repeated. “By killing folks? Yeah, that’s right—I didn’t forget the fuckin’ corpse on the doorstep. The same guy who was pretty fuckin’ helpful to me a few hours ago. You said
your
boys. You in charge of this outfit?”

“I am.”

“So how is it you’ve gone about corralling everyone in town who ain’t dead and giving them this draft speech?
Forcing
them to join you? What kind of fucked-up thought process is that? Jesus Christ, Jer, what would Mom or Dad say?”

Jerry snapped forward and bared his teeth. “
Hey
. You keep them out of this. You keep them
out
. No one had to make the fuckin’ choices I had to make. No one crossed the lines like I did. Mom and Dad were lucky they went before the zombies. Quick and painless. One flash of light, and they’re gone. They were
lucky
. The rest of us who lived after the shitbagging of everything fine… well, we weren’t so lucky. Like I said, lines were crossed, moral compasses stepped on and left in the dirt. All just to get by. Now, well, now it’s life.”