World of Ashes (20 page)

             
“Wow. And what did he do to deserve this kind of attention from your own unit?” Keith asked. The story was more complicated than he’d suspected, but it wasn’t one he hadn’t seen happen first hand to many of his friends before the fall.

             
“He was a better Sergeant than they were. He never took special privileges, never set unrealistic standards just to flex his rank. He was a mentor and a better example of a Noncommissioned Officer than anyone else in the company. So when he wouldn’t back down on exposing the flaws of the other NCO’s they made a point of ending him. When he stuck up for one of the female Soldiers who was being abused by her team leader it was all over for him. Crossed the wrong people I guess.” Ethan explained. Probably he raised more questions than those he answered.

Since middle school Ethan and Lee hadn’t been exceptionally close, common among siblings who were
near in age. After Ethan’s downfall Lee had distanced himself even more, worrying about his own career and how it would look to have a malcontent alcoholic for a brother. It occurred to him that he’d never actually asked Ethan what had happened specifically. The military had a habit of either making the man for life, or breaking his heart and spirit forever.

             
Paula looked at the Cally brothers and stood. She patted Ethan on the shoulder. “The world is different now. Everyone left has a second chance.” Those words, spoken by a girl who was still months away from being legally allowed to purchase alcohol, were profound to Ethan. He had a second a chance. One just as fraught with danger as the earliest Pioneers, but one more chance than five billion people would ever get.

             
“Ethan… I know you and I aren’t… close… But you really stepped up to the plate before I could get home. In a big way that I can hardly believe sometimes. You could have packed up and left for Oklahoma, or wherever Mom and Dad went.” Lee admitted once Paula had left. “The Lieutenants tell me they’d have elected you Sheriff if I hadn’t come back… And frankly I think they still should. I never was big on the whole small town thing. You really love Home, and to me home has always been just a word. After most of the local government’s new plans and laws go into effect, I’m going to be part of the provision for a new army. It will serve only this town and protect only this town. It’ll only be company size, so don’t worry, I won’t be traipsing around with five-star on my collar like some moron third-world dictator. I like to think I have better taste in uniforms than Kim Jong Il or Fidel Castro. The charter will be to take over the overpass checkpoints and conduct any Infected Search and Destroy missions the government deems necessary. The hilltop fortifications at the state park will be our Forward Operating Base where we can store equipment and house men. ”

             
“Name the FOB yet?” Ethan said after some time, coming to grips with the words of the first conversation of substance he’d had with his brother in almost a decade.

             
“Most people just call it The Hill.” Lee poured a shot of whiskey into a glass for each of them.

             
“How about FOB Alamo?”

             
“Last time I checked, the Mexicans wiped out everyone at the Alamo.”

             
Ethan swigged his shot. “Yeah, they sure did. But why do we remember it?”

             
“Because of that John Wayne movie?” Lee smirked. He knew Ethan was trying to make a point, but teasing each other was just their nature.

             
Ethan was about to argue, but nodded, “Probably. But the point I was trying to make, is that just like our town the Alamo was surrounded on all sides by an overwhelming army. They made a stand, and so did we… May God favor our endeavor more.” Ethan added, sounding oddly like their grandmother at that moment.

             
“Amen.”

5

              With the discovery of a stockpile of uniforms and uniform material at a warehouse just after New Years that year, it was decided no one was going to wear any camouflage that had been used by the U.S. Armed Forces in the last twenty years. A number of refugees, as the steady trickle never seemed to stop, had mistaken checkpoint officers for U.S. Soldiers. They often became combative or uncooperative upon discovering Sullivan wasn’t a representative of the United States Government, even though the town still flew Old Glory and the Missouri flag, a yellow Gadsen
Don’t Tread On Me
flag was personalized to the town and flown on a separate pole. Newly elected Sheriff, whether he wanted it or not, Ethan had suggested those in his employ should wear the brown uniforms that would originally have been worn by tactical units within sheriff departments, and that Lee’s army should be issued the flat green uniforms one would have associated with some SWAT teams. Official looking, but Officially Unofficial. The Mayor’s Office tried to keep up with paperwork to make everything they were doing as legal and close to original laws as possible, but one could never be too careful when trying to out think a governing body that invented something as dubious as the Internal Revenue Service.

             
“Your star looks good on you, man.” Keith said, poking Ethan’s sheriff star repeatedly, just to annoy him. Ethan wanted to slap the grin off Keith’s freckled face.

             
Ethan was about to turn around and slap Keith’s hand when he was stunned into silence by what his friend was wearing. Not brown, or even a doctor’s white lab coat, but Cavalry Green. “The Army? I thought you were staying in the Sheriff’s Department.”

             
Keith shrugged. “I know. I thought so too, but last time I checked none of the nurses or doctors at the hospital have any military experience. Lee offered me a commission as the company’s doctor. Pay to match his too. Means me and Paula can afford one of the better vacated residences without having to do menial labor.”

             
There was a soft cry from the other room. Keith and Paula’s new baby girl, Serenity, was awake and hungry. Keith already had a bottle mixed up and walked towards their room to feed the fussy infant. Ethan put his feet up on a chair to tie his shoes when he heard a shout and a gunshot. Before he knew what was happening he was sailing through the door into his friend’s room and tackling a zombie that had come in through the wide open back door. Ethan and the zombie crashed through the thin wall that separated the bedroom from the laundry room. This freshest zombie so far that winter, for some reason not frozen solid, had been just inches from making a snack of the baby girl when her father returned. Now Ethan had his hands wrapped around the dead man’s neck and had started punching it in the skull as hard as he could. Grabbing a pair of underwear he shoved it in the zombie’s mouth, buying him enough time to grab the iron off the dryer and cold-cock the zombie in the head. It stopped struggling and went limp, dead for good after the sixth or seventh blow, coagulated blood spatter redecorated the room.

             
Bloodied and stunned and looking like a pissed off snowman with all the drywall on him Ethan climbed back out the hole he’d made in the wall. “KEITH!” He shouted, looking around frantically for his friend and God Daughter.

             
“In the kitchen!” Keith shouted back. “Stay in the room, Ethan, look for bites!”

             
Ethan did as he was told. He knew that if he showed any signs of the rage phase Keith wouldn’t hesitate to blow his head off to protect his baby girl. Stripping down to nothing Ethan checked himself. “There’s some blood from my nose and ear, but I cut them on the wall. I’m not feeling any other effects.” He reported. He didn’t bother to get dressed again, not only were his clothes torn and bloody, but Keith would insist upon examining his whole body anyhow. Keith locked Serenity in another room and came back quietly, pistol raised. He checked Ethan and breathed a sigh of relief when he discovered no bites. Cuts painfully filled with white chalk, but no infections.

             
“Jesus H. Christ.” Keith looked at the zombie. “That’s Deputy Harper. He works at the North Checkpoint.”

             
“Yeah, I know.” Ethan pulled his underwear up. “I don’t think I did much trauma to the brain. He might just be knocked out like that zombie the Japan checkpoint shot. Remember?”

             
“Yeah, the round went under its skin and knocked it out, but didn’t penetrate the skull. Got back up and almost killed Nguyen.” Keith cocked the hammer back on his 38.

             
“Wait, let’s take him outside. I don’t wanna clean brain stew off the dryer.” Ethan went and put new duds on. He came back and together he and Keith dragged the zombie outside and put a .22 round in the back of Harper’s skull. At least his family could have an open casket funeral now, a rarity these days.

             
Walking back to the door Ethan stopped suddenly, Keith ran into him. “Look. There’s more than just Harper’s footprints in the snow.”

             
Keith examined the staggering footprints. It had snowed perhaps a half inch overnight, fresh snow Harper had staggered through to the door, but the snow was only a light dusting and footprints in the mud that led away from the door could still be seen.

             
“Those aren’t Paula’s or Lee’s shoes.” Ethan said. “Paula wears those stupid flat soled skater shoes and Lee wears Bates combat boots. Those are cowboy boot prints.”

             
“What?” Keith studied the prints, not making the connections Ethan had. “How can you tell?”

             
“I used to play a cop on TV.” Ethan said sarcastically, looking around, feeling as if he were being watched. “I think someone was in our house, Keith. And I think Harper over there was supposed to kill us in our sleep.” Ethan followed the snowy footprints until he came to a tree with a mess of prints beneath it and a rope tied to the trunk that had been cut with a knife, all the edges frayed in a uniform cut, not gnawed. “After infecting Harper, whoever it was left him tied to this tree. They came back after his rage phase so he’d be easier to control and cut the rope.”

             
Keith saw the boot prints that led away from the tree, eventually leading them to the road where whomever had tried to kill them had tied up his horse, returned, then ridden away. They went back to the house and Ethan made the call to the station. Keith decided he was going to take Serenity and Paula and stay at the barracks for a couple nights. Someone was trying to kill them, so logically the safest place was being surrounded by friendly soldiers. Remember, if you’re going to go to a gunfight, bring at least two guns. Also bring all of your friends who have guns, and maybe some of their friends too.

What was left unsaid was that as soon as Lee got there the Cally brothers and
the soldiers that came with them were going to follow the snow prints until they found the man who had murdered Harper and sent his corpse to kill the Sheriff. They were probably going to kill him when they found him, because you don’t invite armed Soldiers to hunt for someone and then expect them not to kill the prey when they find it. Unless of course you’re the U.S. Government, in which case don’t worry about it because well, you’re the damned Government! Let them eat cake.

             
Pulling up in a Humvee with Lee, three deputies who’d become his sergeants in the town’s Cavalry stepped out ready for a gunfight. Ethan laid out his theory that the person had found a time when no one was home, come through the front door, which was unlocked because zombies couldn’t turn doorknobs, and unlocked the back door that no one used. Ethan and Lee were anxious to avenge the trespass on their home, and given the threat to Serenity both men wanted blood more than they wanted rank insignia or badges.

“Sergeant Baptiste, take Capt
ain Brewer and his child to my office at FOB Alamo. Post four Military Policemen on them with orders to kill anyone who comes within fifty meters of them. Return to guard this premises with two more Cavalrymen. I’ll advise you when and if the situation changes.”

             
“Aye, Sir.” Baptiste took Keith and Serenity back the Humvee, and as they took off the hunting party starting walking slowly though the silent twilight lit woods before full light could expose them.

             
“So the men are saying ‘aye-aye’?” Ethan smirked, walking next to Lee.

             
“Yeah, that’s one thing I never liked about the Army. They steal all the Marine’s traditions and pretend they’re our own, but refuse to use the language. Besides, Roger was
way
overused. I will accept WILCO, however.” Lee smiled and zipped his undershirt up so that it made a turtle neck. It was still early morning and near freezing. The snow was soft and muffled their footfalls, rather than crunching. It would help them hunt, but might also conceal the approach of the assassin, or a zombie. One of the Cavalrymen spotted a deer with a full set of antlers. It would have made a nice meal, but they had to let it go. In a way that was okay with Ethan. He and Lee stood and watched the buck, awed at the majesty of the wildlife in their native lands. They’d been Boy Scouts once, nature was beautiful and sacred to them both.