Book 3 of The Earth Cleansing Series
by
Kenneth E. Baker
WHISKEY CREEK PRESS
www.whiskeycreekpress.com
Published by
WHISKEY CREEK PRESS
Whiskey Creek Press
PO Box 51052
Casper, WY 82605-1052
Copyright ? 2006 by Connie Baker
Names, characters and incidents depicted in this book are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of the author or the publisher. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
ISBN 1-59374-405-6
Credits
Cover Artist: Jinger Heaston
Editor: Chere Gruver
Printed in the United States of America
Other Books by Author Available at Whiskey Creek Press:
Border Life
Remnants of Love
The Chosen One
Stalker’s Revenge (sequel to The Chosen One)
Dedication
This novel is dedicated to all readers who dream of a better world.
Chapter 1
Zeb/Org stood on top of the hill looking at the sealed doors of the tunnel. Hundreds of dogs, small and large, sat around him, waiting for him to tell them what to do. Beside him, a small mongrel dog lifted its head. Zeb asked, “What are we going to do now? The human, Joe, is out of our reach.”
“Don’t worry, old one. He won’t be in there for very long. Things are happening which will compel him to leave the shelter of the mountain. All we can do now is bide our time until he is out in the open where we can get to him,” Zeb heard in his mind.
Zeb heard and knew everything happening to him, but was unable to control many of his actions. A few months ago, he was a ninety-one-year-old man trying to make sense of a world gone mad. Now he was locked in a small portion of his own mind, while an alien force used the rest of it, and his body. Although unable to control his actions, Zeb discovered if he was careful, he could fool the alien who had taken over his body. He discovered the force in control of him had a few misconceived ideas about humans. For one thing, the being thought that because Zeb was ninety-one years old, he required a lot of rest. Actually, Zeb was as hearty and healthy as a man in his late forties. He used this knowledge to give Joe and his people a chance to escape. By faking exhaustion, Zeb forced the being to rest more than it would have preferred to.
He discovered the small dog, Squeeker, that had been his companion for the last several years, was the true alien force that controlled him. Somehow, the being had placed a small part of himself in Zeb’s mind as he slept a few months ago. Used to living by himself, Zeb had no living relatives. Several months ago when the world started going crazy, Zeb noticed a change in Squeeker. She became listless for awhile, then overnight, she became aggressive as all get out. Zeb’s first thought was she had been bitten by a rabid animal and he was concerned. He was about to take her to the vet in town when she appeared to become her old self again.
He lay down to sleep one night and woke up the next morning feeling strange. His thoughts were muddled and he had a hard time concentrating on anything. As the day progressed, he heard a voice in his head asking if he was in control yet. Zeb thought he was getting the sickness spreading across the country at the time.
His head hurt so bad, he took a whole bottle of aspirin that day. It felt like something was inside his mind, shifting portions of his brain around. The morning after that, he woke up and discovered that even though he was still Zeb, something had sealed away the part of him that controlled his body. At first, the alien was confused as to how the human body func-tioned. Zeb remembered his body taking its first jerky steps under the alien’s control.
It took a while for Zeb to realize what had happened to him. Never a quitter, Zeb tried to fight the alien for control of his mind. Almost at once, Zeb found himself forced into the background and shut off from any control of his own body.
After awhile, the alien learned the basic functions of the human body, but not before Zeb had soiled his pants. The ripe aroma of feces continually assaulted Zeb’s nostrils before the alien realized this wasn’t the way humans eliminated their waste.
Near the end of the day, Zeb heard, “Zeb, can you hear me?”
Still in a state of shock, Zeb asked, “Who are you? What have you done to me?”
“Who I am is unimportant. I have taken control of your short, furry friend. The one you call Squeeker. I have placed a small part of myself in your mind. It is useless to fight it. What I want to tell you is if anything should happen to me, you will also die. What I require is your knowledge of this world so I can function properly. I could obtain this knowledge by force, but it would destroy your mind. I would rather you gave it freely than have to take it, but I will if I must.”
“What have you done with Squeeker?” Zeb asked.
“I am afraid the small furry animal’s mind was destroyed when I took control of her body.”
Zeb gave a mental sob of anguish. “Why did you have to kill the only companion I had left?” he asked, in a tormented voice.
“Her mind was of no significance to me. If I had left it, it would have caused problems with my controlling the body.”
“Why not take control of me and leave Squeeker alone?”
“Her body suited the plans I have. This way, I share your knowledge and it helps me carry out the job I was created to do.”
“What job is that?” Zeb asked.
“To eliminate the few humans who can stop what is happening to this world.”
“You said you were created. Who created you?”
“Of my creator, I have no knowledge. I only know that I am to stop these humans.”
“Why take on the form of an animal? Why not a human?” Zeb asked.
“In this form, I can control all the animals of this species. My maker deemed these creatures, you call dogs, to be the most efficient predators on this planet. In a few years, your human culture will begin to decay without all the modern tools you have to make life easier for you. In the years to come, many humans will die. They will not have the skills to survive in a world without technology. In the meantime, the dogs will survive and flourish because of their instinct for survival. I shall allow a small percentage of people to live so they can do my bidding. Your kind can do so much more than we can. We will keep some of you around to build the things we need. Mankind will never again be rulers of this world. In fifty years, the human race will be totally dependent on us. That is the plan my maker has set out to accomplish. The only thing standing in the way are these people I am to destroy. My maker has another enemy that is very powerful, but he says he can handle her without too much trouble.”
Zeb’s interest perked up on hearing this. He asked, “Who is this powerful enemy of your maker?
Why do you call it her?”
“How little you puny humans know about the world you live on. The enemy I refer to is the planet itself. It may shock you to learn the planet is a living and dynamic entity in its own right. My maker estimates this entity enveloped this world right after it was formed and has been here since then. Because of a complicated set of rules, this entity cannot take a stand openly against us. However, she can and does, indirectly use a few humans to do her bidding. These are the people we are to seek out and destroy. The reason I refer to this entity as her is because the closest description in human terms is mother earth.”
“I’m old, and a little slow, but I’ll be dammed if anything you’ve told me makes any sense at all,”
Zeb fumed.
“It does not have to make sense to you, old one. You are only required to show me the things I need to know in order for me to accomplish my task. If you refuse or disobey me, this is a small portion of the pain you will feel.”
Zeb felt a sharp stab of pain at the base of his skull. It increased in intensity as it spread upward. It felt like his head was expanding; at the same time, he could feel a tearing of tissue in his brain. Holding his head between his hands, he let out a long, loud moan of pain. The pressure dissipated as suddenly as it had appeared and left him with a heart-throbbing headache.
“Remember what I have just done, old one, and we will get along. The next time, the pain will be twice as bad and may do some brain damage. Do you understand, old one?”
“Yes, yes, please, no more pain.” Zeb sobbed as he fell to his knees; his head wracked with pain. So began Zeb’s odyssey. The alien creature dragged him along until they came across Joe’s group. During those months, Zeb learned the creature’s knowledge of humans was incomplete. Carefully, Zeb told the creature that old humans and animals required a lot of rest so their bodies could rejuvenate. Zeb didn’t know what sources the creature sought to confirm this; but it later told Zeb that he understood Zeb had told the truth.
After that, the creature would consult with Zeb about when he should rest. Zeb tried to stop for a rest every few hours, but the creature wasn’t buying he became exhausted so quickly. Finally, the creature settled on a minimum of six hours and a maximum of nine.
Since they traveled a lot, the six hour minimum became routine. Zeb found a way to block the creature’s mind probes when it tried to tell if he was lying. He placed the lie he wanted Org to find on the outside of the door to his part of the brain and waited for the creature to pick it up. Occasional-ly, he would put out a small lie for the creature to pick up. Once confronted with the lie, he would tell the truth.
In this manner, Zeb confirmed to the creature that it was in full control of his mind. While the creature allowed these extended periods of rest, Zeb would block off his mind and plot ways to foil the creature.
Zeb had pleaded exhaustion the night Joe and his group sneaked away from them. While the creature slept at the foot of his bed, Zeb let enough gibberish filter out of his mind to keep the creature from hearing Joe and his group when they left. They almost made it without Org knowing. Org had posted a large German Shepherd to warn him of such an attempt.
The thing that kept Org from having the dogs tear them apart was the giant timber wolf, Stalker. As the German Shepherd began to raise the alarm, Stalker attacked and ripped out his throat. Org woke up and asked who wanted him. Receiving no reply, he settled down again. Using the part of his brain controlled by the creature, Zeb was able to contact one of the dogs outside and follow Joe’s progress. Joe and his group were almost out of the valley when Zeb slipped up and some of his thoughts filtered through to Org.
Org yelped and jumped up on the bed. “How dare you defy me?” Zeb heard in his mind, followed by excruciating pain.
He fought it as long as he could to give Joe a few precious minutes to get further away. The only reason Zeb’s brain wasn’t damaged was because the creature realized what Zeb was doing. It broke off the mental attack to issue orders for the dogs to attack Joe and his group. By then, it was too late, Joe and his people had crested the ridge and were on the other side traveling rapidly downhill. Org ordered a dozen of the dogs to follow them. It was a night Zeb would rather forget. The creature tortured him all night, with enough pain to cause him torment, but not enough to damage his brain. Zeb still had a persistent dull headache from the episode that wouldn’t go away.
“We must find shelter until they leave the mountain,” Org informed him. Org turned and trotted toward the town of Galaxie.
Zeb followed him through the light dusting of snow. Everywhere he looked, he saw dogs tearing meat from human bodies. There were thousands of them in the valley leading up to the tunnel. All of them were gaunt from lack of food. Ahead of him, Org trotted through the feeding dogs without glanc-ing around. A few were fighting each other over some of the bodies. Zeb guessed there were over a hundred men and women killed by Ben’s attack. Many more of them were killed shortly afterward by the dogs chasing Joe.
Zeb made his way through the dogs to the town. Not much as far as towns go. A few dozen houses and another half a dozen businesses. Most of the places were rundown and trash littered the street. A few cars sat beside the houses with flat tires. It surprised Zeb to see there weren’t any bodies lying on the street.
Apparently, when Ben attacked outside of town, the townspeople rushed to help those under attack.
“Over here,” he heard Org say in his mind. He turned to see Org standing in the doorway of a building.
He walked to the building and entered. The place was a restaurant with tables occupying most of the room. A long counter with stools in front of it ran along the back wall. He walked to a door behind the counter and opened it. The kitchen was a total mess. Half-eaten food was strewn on the floor. The stove looked like someone had thrown a pot of stew on it, then turned on the burners and left it. Open cans littered the floor. A rank smell came from a large, walk-in freezer. From where he stood, he saw spoiled sides of beef hanging in it. He backed out of the kitchen and closed the door. Behind the counter, he found a few cans of beef stew that hadn’t been opened. He found a can opener and a spoon which he wiped clean on the tail of his shirt. Zeb walked to the front door and took a breath of cold, clean air. Opening the can, he spooned it into his mouth. He watched Org paw through the filth on the floor.
“What are you looking for?” Zeb asked.
“I hope to find something telling me where the leader of the townspeople is located. I know these people were sent here to break into the complex. They were also sent to stop Joe and his group from getting inside. I wish I had known this earlier. The only difference is they want Joe and Ben alive, while I want them dead,” Org replied.
“You knew they were being hunted. Why, you helped them get out of a trap set for them. Why didn’t you enlist their help, then take Joe and Ben away from them?” Zeb asked.
“There were too many of them for me and my creatures to deal with at the time. If you hadn’t interfered, Joe and his group would be dead. I hope you learned your lesson, old one. Oppose me again and I won’t hesitate to destroy your mind. If I have to, I will wait until another human comes near and take over its mind,” Org answered.
Not if I can help it. In the beginning, Zeb discovered he could shield his thoughts from Org. He went on letting the creature think the mind link was complete. At the same time, Zeb built barriers in the portion of his brain occupied by Org. If the creature didn’t discover these barriers in a few weeks, Zeb might be able to block the pain inflicted on him. He knew when the time came to purge the creature from his mind, the portion of his brain occupied by it would suffer some damage. That was a small price to pay for regaining his freedom. Until then, he would try to find out what Org was keeping from him.
Since meeting Joe and his group, Zeb felt Org had done something to one of them which let him know what they were doing. Zeb didn’t believe Org when told he could occupy only one mind at a time. Although Org could block Zeb’s mind probes, he got enough of the creature’s thoughts to know it wasn’t worried about Joe getting away from him.
That meant Org was in the mind of one of the people with Joe. Zeb felt it important to find out which one before he made his attempt to break the mind link with Org.
“You are awfully quiet, old one,” Org said from beside Zeb. Zeb had not noticed the creature come up beside him.
“Just weary, Org. All this traveling by foot has wore me plumb to the bone,” Zeb said. That was another thing Zeb couldn’t understand. Org was deathly afraid of traveling in a vehicle of any kind. Zeb remembered when they first met Joe. Getting into Joe’s vehicle, Zeb had felt the undercurrents of fear emanating from the creature’s mind. No, this being wasn’t as all powerful as it thought it was. There were things it feared and Zeb hoped to make use of them. He knew Org was terrified of Stalker. Every time the wolf came near Org, Zeb felt fear and hatred emanating from its mind. Too bad the giant timber wolf was dead; surely nothing could live through all the bullets Stalker had taken while fighting with Ben.
“Old one, make yourself a place to sleep. We will stay here for a while,” Org said in his mind. Zeb went back inside and wheeled a rollaway bed out of the backroom. He swept up some of the litter on the floor and threw it out the back door. Unfolding the rollaway bed, Zeb put it in the corner next to a coal stove. Removing ashes from the stove, he put pieces of kindling in it and started a fire. Zeb sat on the edge of the bed, soaking up the heat emanating from the stove. He asked, “Org, if Todd is as well organized as I think he is, how are you going to get him to come around to your point of view?”
“Right now, I have no wish to control Todd or his people. We are both fighting to gain the same end. Afterwards, we will see. The biggest danger to us both is inside the mountain. I know you don’t understand this, old one, but the people with Joe have a very powerful ally. I do not entirely understand the nature of this force helping them. I do know the force can do nothing by itself. It uses the people it has selected to carry out its plans,” Org told him as he lay beside the stove, basking in the heat.
Sensing Org was in a talkative mood, Zeb decided to get as much information as he could.
“Maybe I’m just a dumb old man, but I don’t see how you can hope to control all the humans in the country. I know millions of people have died because of the disease. Millions more were killed by the deranged people like Todd, but there are bound to be many millions still alive,” Zeb said.
“Ah, old one. I do not need to control everyone; just those in power. With them under my control, they can order the rest to do my bidding,” Org said.
Zeb wasn’t one of the smartest humans; but even he could see how Org could gain control of the survivors. Most of the people he had dealt with after the disease were followers. For some reason, the disease caused them to be unable to think for themselves, only a few of them still possessed that ability. People like Todd and the group on the east coast who took over the government. These people were in power, but their overriding compulsion was to destroy anyone not like them.
“If this disease hadn’t come along, you wouldn’t have the power you have over me and the animals, would you, Org?”
“I would have the power, old one, but as it was then, the forces opposing me were too organized. To have attempted what I am doing now would have failed. The organized forces of government would have seen me for what I am and destroyed me. Now the only ones who know or suspect my existence are Joe’s group and possibly, Todd. Even they do not know of my true existence. They believe you are the one controlling the animals, old one.”
“Maybe you can tell me about this strange connection between the man called Ben and the wolf?”
Zeb asked.
“The human, Ben, perplexes me. I could not read him at all. I got surface thoughts and emotions from everyone but him. I could feel a power emanating from him, but I am sure he is not its source. I met a blank wall each time I tried to pick up on his thoughts. As for the wolf, he knows I am not what I appear to be. He knew of the symbiotic relationship between the two of us. I believe that is the only thing that kept him from killing me. It puzzles me how an animal could figure out that by killing me, he would also cause your death. Could it be that these creatures, like the one called Stalker, are smarter than humans? Many things puzzle me about this group of Joe’s. For instance, why was it so important for the woman, Tony, to reach this place? At first, I thought it was to destroy me. Now, I am not so sure. The thoughts I picked up indicated she did not know the purpose which she was brought here to fulfill.”
“Do you know what’s behind the doors of the mountain they went in?” Zeb asked.
“It is a government facility designed for medical research. If I knew why they came here, it would answer a lot of questions. Speaking of questions, old one, why are you so interested all of a sudden?” Org asked. Zeb felt Org probing around in his mind so he laid out a lie for Org to find. He double-checked to be sure the part of his mind free of Org was sealed.
Org chuckled in his mind. “No, old one, it would do you no good if you got into the mountain. There is no way possible to rejuvenate you and make you younger. Forget that nonsense.”
Good, Org had taken the lie and was satisfied Zeb had no other motives. He watched Org go over and lay down near the stove. He waited until he heard the small dog start snoring. Cautiously, he sent a mind probe toward Org. He met a blank wall, so he started along the sides of it, probing as he went. He found a weak point and increased the strength of his probe. The fabric parted just a little.
Org’s unfiltered thoughts rushed through the break. The images of millions of dogs formed in his mind. Standing before them was a small mutt, who used to be called Squeeker. Next, came a scene of thousands of humans toiling in fields being overseen by a pack of dogs. Behind all this was a shadowy form, lurking in the background.
Zeb tried to sharpen his focus, but the form wavered and disappeared. The scene wavered and Org sat at the head of a table with a group of men around him. At the other end of the room, some reporters asked questions of a dark-haired man standing behind a podium. On the front of the podium, the seal of the President of the United States was affixed. Zeb saw the flow of thoughts between Org and the man as he answered questions.
Another thought wiped this scene away and Zeb saw Org standing at the head of a vast army. Scenes of this army marching across the country wiping out towns and killing people flashed through his mind. Zeb felt Org’s consciousness begin to awaken, so he quickly repaired the tear and withdrew the mind probe. A moment later, he heard Org ask, “Did you say something, old one?”
“No, Org. You must have heard me thinking,” Zeb answered.
“Good, get some sleep, old one. Tomorrow will be another tough day,” Org said in a sleepy voice. Zeb lay down on his bed and thought about the things he had seen when he entered Org’s mind. The creature obviously had one of those Napoleon complexes people always talked about in the past. Zeb didn’t understand exactly what that meant; but its dreams fit the description he had heard on the news and from different people. The one thing he hadn’t felt was doubt—Org thought failure was out of the question. He had to find a way to plant a seed of doubt in Org’s mind, especially now that he knew how to enter it. He should be able to do it, if he was careful.
He thought about how people always kidded him when he was younger. Back when he was in his thirties, people liked to have fun at his expense. Most people thought him dimwitted or retarded. This didn’t bother him much, because he lived alone in a shack a few miles out of town. He went to town only when necessary. He did odd jobs for the ranchers in the area to get money to buy food and clothes. This was all he needed to be happy. Never one interested in material things, he cared less about having a fine car or home. As long as the roof didn’t leak, he was content. All the ranchers treated him with courtesy and he gave them a hard day’s work for the money they gave him. The only time he had trouble was when he went into town. A few bullies would hang around making fun of him. He didn’t want any trouble, so he tried to ignore them. It always ended up the same. He was thrown in jail for the night after being goaded into a fight. He never knew why the police chief hated him. He wondered if the man didn’t send the bullies to make trouble.
Zeb could tolerate most things, but the one thing he wouldn’t stand for was people putting their hands on him. The bullies knew this, so they would spend an hour or so calling him names. One of them would attempt to show the others how brave he was by grabbing Zeb and trying to wrestle him to the ground.
In his younger years, Zeb was a muscular man. His hard work for the ranchers left him lean and strong. Without a car and walking everywhere, he’d built up strong leg muscles. The bullies were afraid of him, unless there were three or four of them together.
It always started with one of them grabbing him, and then the rest would jump in. At four-to-one odds, Zeb acquitted himself well. He took his lumps without a sound, but he also got in some good licks of his own. The men never left without a few cuts and bruises. The police chief would break up the fight as soon as he saw Zeb getting the best of them. He would handcuff Zeb and drag him off to the town jail, where he threw him in a cell. He would shout and curse at Zeb for a while, then leave. Zeb spent the night in the cell without water or food. The next morning, the police chief would let him out and escort him to the edge of town.
Never one to let himself be taken advantage of, Zeb would sneak back into town after dark. He smiled as he thought of the last time he went into the town before he left the state. The bullies had beaten him almost senseless before the police chief broke up the fight and threw him in jail. His body ached all over that night and his teeth hurt where one of them got in a solid blow to his jaw. After being escorted out of town, Zeb went to a patch of woods a couple miles away. He washed himself as best he could and waited until dark. Many times before, he had sneaked back to town after a fight. This time, he was bent on a measure of revenge. He found the first man in a bar at the edge of town. Zeb waited until the bully came out to use the outhouse, then beat him until the man lay unconscious on the ground. He dragged his body into the brush in back of the outhouse. The next bully he found working his job as a stockman at the local grocery store. At the back of the store, Zeb hid behind the large garbage bin used to hold rotting vegetables. He didn’t have to wait long. The man came out the back door carrying a box of lettuce that had gone bad. Zeb waited until the bully raised the box to throw it in the bin. He jumped up and hit the guy across the back with a two-by-four. The man sagged against the bin, his breath knocked out of him. Zeb hit the man in his legs and arms before hitting him on the head. Making sure the bully was still alive, Zeb threw him in the smelly garbage bin.
Next, Zeb walked to the back of the hardware store and jimmied the door. He took a five gallon bucket of tar and a couple feather pillows off the shelves. He put thirty dollars beside the cash register to pay for the items. Carrying them to the rear of the bar, he rolled a fifty-five gallon drum under the air conditioner, setting the bucket of tar on the barrel in front of the exhaust. The hot air against the bucket caused the tar to become gooey and sticky.
He knew where the third man lived, so he left the items behind the bar and went to his house. Knocking on the door, Zeb shouted that the police chief wanted the bully down at the jail. A few minutes later, the bully opened the door as he pulled on his shirt. He looked around, expecting whoever had brought the message to be there. Shrugging his shoulders, the man closed the door and walked to the steps. As he started to walk away, Zeb stood up and hit him over the head with the two-by-four. The bully melted to the ground. Zeb threw him across his shoulders and made his way to the flowerbed in front of the jailhouse. He laid the man on the bricks surrounding the flagpole. Using some of the rope, he tied his victim to the flagpole. He stuffed a dirty sock in the guy’s mouth and tied a bandanna around his head to hold the sock in.
Only one man left and he was the most dangerous one. He went into the jailhouse and dialed the police chief’s number. It rang half a dozen times before a surly voice asked what he wanted. Disguising his voice, Zeb told him there was some trouble down at the station and he should get down there at once. The police chief told Zeb he would be there in a minute.
Zeb went through the desk drawers in the office. In one of the drawers, he found an old ski mask. Since no one had seen him, he pulled the mask over his face. He turned out all the lights in the office, except the one on the desk. He threw the two-by-four away and picked up a nightstick hanging on the wall. When he saw the headlights of the police chief’s car pull into the parking lot, he went over and stood behind the door.
The police chief rushed into the office. “What in the hell is so imp—” was as far as he got. He started to turn around with a puzzled look on his face. Zeb stepped up behind him and brought the nightstick down on his head. He caught the chief under the arms as he slumped. Dragging him out the door, Zeb placed him next to the man tied to the flagpole. Zeb went back into the office and took two sets of handcuffs from the top drawer. Going to the flagpole, he untied the first man. Zeb put the handcuffs on him so the only way he could get loose would be to slip the cuffs over the top of the pole. He cuffed the police chief in the same way after he gagged him.
Zeb went to the rear of the bar and tested the tar. The bucket was hot and the tar in it was a little runny. He carried the tar and pillows back to the flagpole. He stripped the first man and the police chief. Using a stiff brush, he slowly spread tar over them. The men were a pitiful sight by the time he finished.
The police chief regained consciousness as Zeb tore open the pillows. He mumbled around the gag and struggled to get loose.
Zeb watched him for a moment. Black tar oozed from the top of his head and fell to the ground, forming a hardening pool in the chilly night air. His skin was covered with tar. He had a hard time gripping the flagpole as he stood there seething with rage, watching Zeb. Zeb grabbed two hands full of feathers and spread them on the men. After both pillows had been emptied on the men, Zeb chuckled at their appearance. They looked like some kind of strange black and white birds. After giving the police chief the finger, he walked out of town. A little way out of town, he took off the ski mask and threw it in the stream. He still got a chuckle out of thinking about the sight that met the townspeople the next morning. He walked into the mountains and stayed in them as he moved west until he ended up at the little town where he met Squeeker.
Thinking of Squeeker caused an ache in his chest. Yes, Org has a lot to pay for and I want to be around when you get yours. Zeb considered the ways he could do it as sleep overtook him.
Chapter 2
Behind the sealed doors of the tunnel, a strawberry blond woman held a sobbing girl. Around the woman and girl stood several people with their heads down, as though in prayer. The silence lay heavy around them, broken every so often by a sob from the young girl.
“Why, Tony? Why did Stalker have to die?” the young girl asked in a pain-filled voice. Tony wiped tears from the corner of her eyes and smoothed the girl’s brown hair. “Stalker knew this day would come, Tammy. I knew it the first time we met. He confirmed it to me, himself. It was part of the bargain he made with the entity, which is a part of us and guided us here. He knew he was going to die; but he didn’t know where or when. For his sacrifice, his mate and cubs will be looked after and live a long life. That is the original reason he came south to help us.
“When he left his den in Northern Canada, his feelings toward humans were very hostile. He blamed humans, rightfully so, for the demise of his kind.
“At one time, timber wolves numbered in the thousands. At the time he left to come south, there were less than two hundred of them. Man has hunted them almost to the point of extinction.
“Man hunted them, not as a source of food, which was something Stalker understood, but for sport.
“Man came in their flying machines and would catch one of his kind out in the open, then would chase them to the point of exhaustion. As the wolf would buck through the deep snow in terror, men in airplanes would shoot at it. Many times, he had seen this happen. No, he had no love for humans when he started his journey. All that changed when he met a young girl on his way south.”
Tony lifted Tammy’s head and looked into her eyes. “Tammy, that young girl was you. Through you, he saw it was a very small portion of the human race who hunted and killed his kind. In you and Joe, he came to realize not all humans were wanton killers. Because of you, he came to understand the difference between his kind and humans was very small. In the short time he was with us, he came to love you the same as he did the cubs he left behind and gave his life for.”
“I know he loved me. Why didn’t you use your powers to save him? You could have. The same way you cured him before,” Tammy said through her tears.
“Try and understand, Tammy. I love Stalker as much as you do; but this time, my powers wouldn’t cure him. As hard as I tried, something blocked all my efforts. His life was the price for the safety of his mate and children and in large part, for our getting here. He knew all this. Yet he went through with the bargain in the same way he faced life, with his head up and the pride of knowing he was doing what was right.”
A soft blue glow in back of them caused them to turn and stare. Near the wall where Stalker’s body lay, a shimmering blue light covered his body. As they watched, the light pulsed and Stalker’s body was repaired. The holes in the bullet-torn body closed over and the soft fur covering him became glossy. As the light faded, they noticed that Stalker’s body was whole without a blemish on it. Ben Johnson stepped over to the wolf’s body and turned to face them. “Stalker will be preserved as he is now until he can be taken to his home in the northern wilderness.
“Joe, the task of taking Stalker home will fall to you and Tammy when we’re finished here.”
“Is this what your Guardian tells you, Ben?”
“Yes, when the job we are to do here is finished, you and Tammy are to take his body home.”
“So be it,” Joe said with a nod of his head.
Ben looked around, they were in a long tunnel with a large parking lot at the end. Beyond the parking lot, a paved walkway stretched beyond his line of sight. “Now that we’re here, Tony, what do we do next?” he asked.
Tony sighed and sat down next to the wall. “I haven’t the foggiest idea, Ben. What does your Guardian tell you?”
“She says this is where we’re supposed to be, but she’s also in the dark about our next move. I would suggest we stay where we are for a while.”
“This looks like a pretty sophisticated place. There are bound to be defensive measures in here,” a slim black man said.
“I agree with Jake. This looks like the entrance to an SAC base I visited a few years ago,” Joe told them as he ran his hand along the smooth wall.
“Sounds good to me, I could use the rest so my Guardian can finish repairing me,” Ben said in a tired voice as he sat down next to his wife.
They all remembered the sight of Ben as they roared up in the pickup. He was bleeding from five wounds in his chest and his right leg wasn’t able to support him due to several bullet holes. Even as they pulled him onto the truck, his wounds began to heal. By the time they entered the tunnel, his chest wounds had closed over and he was able to stand on his right leg. Although he looked as healthy as could be, they all knew it took something out of him every time his Guardian made her repairs. His wife, Leila, was stunned by the sight of his wounds. She was sure he was going to die. After being separated from him for three months, she had no idea of the man he had become. She knew there was something different about Ben.
When he left her and Benji in the survivalist cave in Southern Wyoming, he had been normal, or so it seemed to her. The shock of seeing bullet holes that would kill a normal man healed before her eyes was a little more than she could handle.
She sat beside him grateful that he was alive, but wondering what he had become and how it would affect them.
She looked at his face and saw the fatigue there. Although he tried not to show it, every now and then, he would wince in pain as his body healed itself. She laid her fingers against his cheek and asked,
“Is there anything I can do, Ben?”
He pulled her close and hugged her. “Just be with me, Leila, and don’t be scared of what you see. I’m still the same man you married. Only now, I have a few improvements.”
He put his hand under her chin and lifted her head. His lips touched hers in such a tender way, she felt a wholeness about herself that hadn’t been there before. She held him close and a sense of oneness came over her. She knew, come hell or high water, this man would never let harm come to her or their son. Whatever Ben had become, she knew it was for the better and deep down, she was aware of the fact they would never be separated again.
She looked at the group of people around her. Joe was a strange one. An American Indian, he was barrel-chested and had long arms. His penetrating black eyes gave her the impression there would be no mercy for anyone that got on his wrong side. He was an enigma, while ferocious in a fight, neither accepting or giving any quarter, he displayed a tenderness one would think him incapable of when he was with the girl, Tammy. He reminded her of a tiger, always ready to pounce on its prey. Bill was just the opposite of Joe. He was more reserved and thought things through before making a move. In the short time she had known him, he was the one who always wanted to be cautious and not rush into things.
His love for Tony was evident. Every time he looked at her, a tender expression came over his face. She thought he worshiped the ground Tony walked on.
Tony, the strawberry blond woman Ben and the rest of them had gone east to protect, sat beside Bill. She was a beautiful woman, although a little gaunt now. Her posture was that of a frightened doe during hunting season. She looked as though she was ready to bolt at any second. It was only when Leila stared into her eyes that she realized there was much about Tony that hadn’t been there before this all began. A certain steely hardness foreign to one so lovely, showed in her eyes when she looked at a person. At the same time, there was also a haunted look there.
There wasn’t a doubt she was determined, but Leila knew Tony had no idea why she had come here. The uncertainty of what she was to do ate at her and caused her to worry more than she should. As far as Leila knew, Tony had been an ordinary woman before this all began. After the new disease struck the country, Bill and Tony fled to escape the people who were trying to kill them. Along the way, she discovered she had the ability to make herself invisible to other people. All she had to do was wish for other people not to see her and they wouldn’t.
During the latter stages of the trip here, Bill was critically wounded by a group of people chasing them. As Tony held Bill’s head, she discovered she could see to the very core of his being. Through trial and error, she manipulated his body into regenerating the damaged tissue of his wounds. The way she described it was a tiny spark that grew dimmer with the passing seconds. She went to this spark and nourished it with her own life force until it glowed brilliantly and spread throughout Bill’s body. She could heal, but her power took a toll on her. Through experimenting, she learned how far to go before she endangered her own life. As with all of them, fatigue weighed heavily on her. Jake Bonner, a skinny black man, sat on the other side of Ben. Before the disease struck the country, Jake worked for the FBI. His last job before the country fell apart was to escort Ben and his family to the place they were now. Along the way, they discovered the plane they were on had a bomb on it. After finding and disarming it, they were forced to land at an airport taken over by the crazy people trying to kill them.
At the end of the runway, everyone but Jeff, the co-pilot, used the emergency chute to get off the plane. Tricking the people after them into thinking they were headed away from the airport, they circled back to the terminal.
At the terminal, they rescued Jeff, who was the worse for wear after being tortured. Cap, the pilot, found a small plane in the private citizen parking area. They lifted off the ground as the people came up the hill to the terminal.
Shortly after that, they crashed in the hills of southern Wyoming. Ben was killed in the crash. An hour later, he stood up and led them away from the people coming to look for them. As Ben described it, he had a force inside him that brought him back to life. This force, which he called his Guardian, would heal any damage done by the people with the disease. His Guardian wouldn’t be able to save him in the case of a natural accident, however.
The Guardian was true to her word. Several times, Ben had been shot and received wounds that would have killed a normal man. The Guardian healed the wounds almost as soon as he received them. The Guardian was a part of Ben now and would remain with him for the rest of his life. Ben could talk to her in his mind and they often had long conversations.
According to Ben, she was a part of what humans referred to as “mother earth.” In the millions of years she had been a part of the planet, this was the first time she had manifested herself to anyone. She was all that ever was and ever would be. She explained the new disease had started a chain of events which would lead to the destruction of all life on the planet.
Ben and Joe, along with the rest of them, were chosen to correct the situation before it was too late. How this was to be accomplished, the Guardian either didn’t know, or wasn’t telling. Jane, a slightly overweight woman, began the journey with them as Benji’s nurse. She was a retired army major, who was currently employed as a nurse in the Center for Disease Control in Atlanta.
Ben and his family were flown there from their home in New Jersey. She went east with Ben and Jake to find Tony. Ben explained they wouldn’t have made it, except for the army training Jane had used to get them out of some difficult situations.
Leila looked at her as she leaned against the wall across from her. There was something different about her. Leila couldn’t quite put her finger on it. All she knew was when Jane came near, Leila felt an uneasiness that would intensify if Ben was around. Deep down, she wanted to believe it was just her imagination. However, the feeling persisted, so she kept a close eye on Jane. Cap and Jeff were the two people in the group who seemed to have their feet firmly planted on the ground. At fifty-six years of age, Cap acted like a much younger man. Cap had gone into the heart of Todd’s camp. He pretended to be a reclusive goldminer, who spent all his time in the mountains. He discovered Todd was making the ranch in Southern Wyoming his headquarters.
Most of what he learned didn’t make any sense to them. Todd was installing one hell of a big computer in a barn at his ranch. As far as any of them could learn, this was the first time Todd had been remotely interested in computers. Cap had learned Todd’s master told Todd where to find the computer. Todd’s master also told him where to find the people who could assemble the computer and get it online.
A short, red-haired woman and a eight year old boy stood beside Joe. There was a protective posture in her stance, as if inviting anything to come between her and Joe. She showed a fierce determination to protect the two men in her life.
Leila liked the woman, who made no pretenses of being anything other than what she was. Gail McCauley lost her husband to an accident four years ago. She’d lived by herself in a small town in Central Missouri when the disease hit.
Escaping the people sent to take her into custody, she went to an uncle’s farm. When she got there, she found her aunt dead and her uncle barely alive. With his last breath, her uncle told Gail to go to a cabin he owned in the mountains and hide.
That’s where she met Joe and his group. At the time, Joe and the rest of them were looking for a place to rest. Greg, one of Todd’s lieutenants, was close on their heels. Thinking Joe was one of the people trying to kill her and her son, she fought like a tiger. Although weighing only ninety pounds, she knocked Jake out with one punch. After kicking Joe twice in the crotch, Tony and Jane had to pull her off him before she did permanent damage. Later, Ben said it was obvious to everyone but the two involved, that Gail and Joe were made for each other.
Although she only knew Stalker for a few days, she felt the same sense of loss as the rest of them. The large, black timber wolf gave his life so the group could enter the tunnel they were in. She looked to the opposite wall where the body of Stalker lay surrounded by a light blue glow. Leila sighed and lay her head against Ben’s shoulder. Fate had brought them here and like the rest of them, she wondered why. One thing was certain, they had a powerful ally in this Guardian of Ben’s. A loud voice boomed out in the tunnel. “Hi, people in the tunnel. Do not proceed any further until we shut down the automat-ic defenses.”
“Who are you?” Joe asked. He stood ten feet in front of them with his gun pointed down the tunnel. Jake lay a few feet to his left with his rifle pointed the same way.
“My name is Ross. Please be patient, I assure you, no harm will come to you as long as the outside doors are sealed,” the voice said, loud enough to hurt their ears.
“Ross, could you turn the volume down a little?” Joe asked.
“Is that better?” Ross asked, in a voice half as loud.
“Much better. We have a lot of questions. Will you answer them for us?” Joe asked, lowering the gun.
“Please be patient, Joe. All your questions will be answered after you are in the complex,” a female voice answered.
“Who are you? Where’s Ross?” Joe asked.
“I am called Rita. Ross is busy shutting down the defensive programs. Leave your weapons at your present location.”
A sharp squeal sounded. “Ross, Ross, Pete is resetting the laser programs,” they heard Rita say. A few flashes of brilliant light flashed a hundred yards down the tunnel. Joe herded them back against the tunnel doors.
Ben motioned for Joe to come closer. “Neither Rita or Ross are human,” he whispered. Joe gave him a blank look. “What do you mean?”
“My Guardian tells me the two voices you heard were without human form. They are life forms, probably two of the first new entities on this planet in millions of years. There is a third entity convoluted and intertwined with them. This third entity is ruthless and a part of the problem we are here to correct.”
“Your Guardian says we can trust the voices we hear?”
“Yes, Joe, there’s a lot she doesn’t understand, but she assures me that the people here mean us no harm,” Ben answered.
“I guess we wait until they tell us to come forward,” Joe said and hunkered down with his back to the outside door. Gail sat down beside him. The rest of them huddled around.
“Don’t ask me what I wouldn’t give for a hot cup of coffee,” Jake said into the silence, bringing a smile to all their faces.
The one constant during the past few months was Jake’s consumption of huge amounts of coffee. While the rest of them carried a thermos of tea, milk or other type of drink, Jake carried three thermoses of black coffee. At different times, they wondered if the thin black man would ever get his fill of the stuff.
“If I ever need a kidney transplant, Jake, I want one of yours,” Jeff said.
“No way, much as I like you, Jeff, I’m leaving this world with everything I came into it with. You never know, what if I need the kidney in my next life? No, I’ll keep everything I have,” Jake said with a shake of his head.
“He wouldn’t want it anyway, Jake. I can imagine him drinking a glass of milk and pissing pure coffee,” Joe said.
They all smiled and relaxed at the easy banter. A little later, they heard Ross say, “Okay, Joe. Lead your group to the complex. Walk straight down the tunnel and take the moving walkway. Someone will meet you at the door to the com-plex.”
They looked at each other and then walked down the tunnel with Joe in the lead. Overhead strip lighting came on. Joe noticed that as he stepped into a new section, the lights there would come on. Bringing up the rear, Jake noticed as he left a section, the lights behind him would go out. Ahead of them, they heard a soft whirring noise.
Off to the left, they saw a parking lot with two cars in it. The rest of it was empty. Ahead and to the right, they saw a sign saying, WATCH YOUR STEP, DO NOT MOVE AROUND WHILE
WALKWAY IS MOVING.
Joe paused and waited for them to gather around, then stepped onto the moving belt. The beltway whisked them along at a rapid rate. In minutes, they saw the end of the walkway ahead. An object lay at the end of it; as they drew nearer, they observed it was a body and stepped over it, noticing it was that of a young soldier. His face was molted and slightly bloated. A faint stench rose to attack their nostrils as they stepped over the body.
“Wonder how he got in here?” Jeff asked.
“He was probably one of the guards protecting this place. Look over there,” Jake said, pointing to the far wall.
They all stopped and looked to where Jake pointed. In the faint light, they stared hard and were able to make out several bodies lying there.
Joe walked over near enough to see the bodies clearly. He saw no wounds. However, their faces showed the bruises and lacerations of a fight. To all appearances, the men were beaten to death. He wondered what happened to their weapons. Looking around, he didn’t spot a weapon of any kind. Walking to the group, he said, “From all appearances, they killed each other.”
“Why would they do such a thing?” Tony asked.
“My Guardian tells me they were affected by the same disease as the people outside,” Ben answered.
They continued to walk down the tunnel. A hundred yards further on, they came across another pile of bodies, in much worse shape. They didn’t even slow down to check them. Five minutes later, they came to a set of massive doors.
“I guess we wait here until someone decides to let us in,” Joe said. He turned and looked back the way they had come. The darkness behind them had a sinister look to it.
A sharp, snapping noise sounded at the door. As they watched, a small door swung silently open. Framed in the doorway stood a man in his late thirties. His head came near the top of the door. Joe judged him to be around six feet six inches tall. His brown hair was cut short. He stared at them with steely grey eyes. The large handlebar mustache under his nose gave him a sinister look. He smiled as Tammy walked toward him, causing his face to look less frightening. “You have to be Tammy,” he said.
“How do you know my name, mister...”
“The name is Jess Herold,” he said, taking Tammy’s hand and kissing the back of it.
“Mr. Herold, I’d like to introduce you to our fearless leader, Joe Delaney,” Tammy said as she dragged Joe forward.
Joe introduced everyone else as they passed through the door one by one. He helped Jess swing the door closed after they were all in. They looked around the room and could spot nothing but blank walls. Jess walked across to the opposite wall and opened another door. He motioned for them to follow him. They entered a hallway with doors lining both sides. Jess turned left at the end of the hall and went down a short corridor to another door, which he also opened.
Inside, several people sat around a table talking and drinking coffee. Their heads turned toward the door as Joe walked into the room. Joe stepped to the side and looked at the people at the table. Jake and Ben stepped to the other side of the doorway and let the women fall in behind them.
“Dr. Palmer, what are you doing here?” Ben blurted out.
“Glad to see you made it, Ben, Leila,” said a tall man with blond hair. He walked toward Ben with his hand outstretched.
“Relax, Joe. If Dr. Palmer is here, we should be safe,” Ben said. He shook the man’s hand and Leila gave him a hug.
“Do I smell coffee and who do I have to kill to get a cup?” Jake asked as he sniffed the air. Jake’s remark cut the tension and every one relaxed.
Joe watched a short, plump woman with curly black hair come around the table. The first thing he noticed was her face. She had one of the most beautiful faces he had ever seen and her dark green eyes only added to her beauty.
Jess turned to him as the woman approached and said, “Joe, this lovely lady is the Vice-President of the United States.”
“Pleased to meet you, Madam Vice-President,” Joe said, shaking the extended hand.
“Please, just call me Ruth,” she said to Joe and the rest of his group. She led Joe over to the table and he held a chair for her as she took a seat.
After everyone was seated, Joe asked the question on all their minds. “Ruth, how did you become Vice-President? You have to under-stand, we’ve been out of contact with the normal forms of government for the past few months.”
“To make a long story short, John Samules was in England when the disease broke out. We were all surprised when this crazy man, Donaldson, named himself President of the United States. Going by the right of succession, John was the next in line to become President. He formed a government in exile after Donaldson became ruthless and started killing American citizens. I was Secre-tary of Agriculture, which put me next in line for the Presidency. Going strictly by the Constitution, President Samules named me Vice-President.
“I have to tell you, the last six months have been hell. I lived in fear for my life every day. This so-called President, Donaldson, had so many hit squads after me, I couldn’t go anywhere without at least fifty security guards.
“There were a couple close calls. I thank President Samules for sending me here. The last few days have been sheer heaven. You can’t imagine how nice it is to just relax and put my feet up without the constant fear of being killed. If I only knew the fate of my husband, I would be content for the moment,” she said with a sad sigh.
Jess was showing Tony, Gail and Jane where the food was stored. They busied themselves preparing a meal.
Joe, Ben and Bill sat at the table drinking coffee that was brought to them. Tammy and Tommy sat on opposite ends of a bunk in the corner, both their heads were bobbing up and down as they fought sleep. Jake, Cap and Jeff were engrossed in a conversation with Ross at a computer console with a speaker in the corner.
Joe, ever on the alert, took in the relaxed atmosphere of the place and lowered his suspicions just a little. They were guided here for a reason and they still didn’t know what it was. He looked across the table at the four star general sitting there. His grey hair, cut short, contrasted with his dark black bushy eyebrows. Joe judged him to be around five feet ten inches tall and somewhere around a hundred and fifty pounds. There was no mistaking him for anything other than a military man.
Since they had entered the room, the man sat ramrod straight in his chair. The only movement from him was his dark blue eyes inspecting each of them. Now the blue eyes were staring intently into Joe’s black ones.
“General, if you have something to say, say it,” Joe said.
“You look like an ex-army man I caught a glimpse of many years ago when I was a major in Vietnam. The man I saw was coming in from a hush-hush mission in North Vietnam. We never did find out where this man had been. General Westmorland’s personal helicopter came to our fire base and took him away. I never did see him again. I had one quick look, but I’ll never forget what he looked like. He looked a lot like you.”
“I was in ’Nam, General,” Joe looked at the name tag above the man’s left-hand shirt pocket.
“General Hawkins,” Joe mused. “Major in 1969, promoted to colonel in ’70. Personally led your unit on almost every campaign in ’70 and ’71. Let’s see, you received four purple hearts in three years. I might add that they were legitimate awards, not like the ones many of the commanders got. A lot of commanders, if they cut themselves shaving, put in for a purple heart and got it. Not you, if there was any fighting going on, you were in the midst of it. You got your first star at the end of the war and that’s the last I heard of you,” Joe said.
General Hawkins looked amazed. “You have the advantage over me. You know a lot about me, while I have no knowledge of you. Why is that?”
“Although I left ’Nam in early ’70, I had some close personal friends still there. They wrote and kept me informed as to what was going on over there. As you know, you couldn’t believe a word the reporters or newspapers wrote. Some of those friends stayed until the end of the war. From them, I learned who the real commanders were, and believe it or not, they weren’t the ones getting all the press coverage. As a matter of fact, I want to thank you, General. You saved one of my best friends in
’71.”
General Hawkins had that faraway look in his eyes. He was remembering the battles and events of 1971. He shook his head and said, “Does your friend have a name? I can’t remember saving anyone that year.”
“He wouldn’t have given you a name. You took your chopper in and lifted him out just north of the DMZ. A ton of shit was coming down on him at the time. The way he tells it, you’re either the stupidest man alive, or the bravest. When you set down at the Marine base on our side of the DMZ, they counted over three hundred holes in your chopper. He said you had tears in your eyes when they pulled your chopper off the landing strip and blew it up because it was beyond repair.”
Comprehension dawned in General Hawkins’ eyes, “You mean that weasel-faced little son of a bitch with the rifle that was taller than him was your friend? Hell, I didn’t get a thank you or anything from him. The next thing I knew, he was on a chopper headed for Saigon. At least, that’s where they said the chopper was going. Come to think of it, I never seen or heard of him again. You and your people kept an awfully low profile, Joe.”
“We had to at the time, General. See, we were the best of the best. Our job was to spend weeks behind enemy lines with the hope of getting a shot at one of the enemy high commanders. I was one of only ten men in the whole army qualified and trained to do the job. Don’t get me wrong, General, that’s not ego talking. There were only ten of us by design of the War Department. I can’t fault their reasoning either. Can you imagine having a couple hundred men as capable as we were loose in the country? Not a politician would get a good night’s sleep for fear these men would band together and try to change the government if they didn’t like the one in place. You see, because of our specialty, a bond formed between us. No matter what happened, all we had to do was put out our code word and the rest of the guys would drop everything to help him. To this day, as far as I know, all ten of us are still alive. What I don’t know is how many of them caught this disease and became like the people trying to kill us. God! I hope it isn’t more than five. I’ve been leaving my code word in every town we’ve been through. Two of the men lived in two of those towns and I found their code words. From all indications, they were going to a stronghold we developed inside Yellowstone Park. Of the other seven, I’ve heard nothing. I assure you, they are alive. The question is, are they on our side?”
Chapter 3
At the time Joe was talking to the general, four of the men he referred to were in a tight spot. They made it to their safe dugout in the woods of Yellowstone, but now, were under attack.
“Damn it, Phil, I tell you that’s Monty out there with a long gun,” said the man with the dark complexion and black hair.
Staring intently through the mouth of the dugout stood a man six feet tall with bright red shoulder-length hair. His brown eyes glanced from tree to tree on the ravine across from him. He eased his gangly body behind the post he stood beside. He held a long-barreled rifle in his right hand. Across from him and behind the post at the right side of the entrance, a beefy blond-haired man lay on the ground. His rifle was pointed at the trees across the ravine.
“How about it, Zapper? Do you think it’s Monty?” Phil asked.
Wayne Lane took the piece of stick he was using as a toothpick out of his mouth and spit to the side. A jagged scar ran from his right earlobe up to his eye. The scar left a bare place in his reddish blond beard. At five foot nine and two hundred ten pounds, he looked overweight. That is, until one looked at his arms, which were as big as his thighs.
“I agree with Dave. It can only be one of us out there, otherwise, we would have spotted whoever it is. Remember, Monty’s trademark was to play with his victims if he had the time and that’s what this guy is doing. If he wanted to, he could have killed Clint. He had a clear shot. No, it’s Monty alright. The bastard went over to the other side,” Zapper answered.
“I’ll kill that son of a bitching gringo if I get my hands on him,” groaned a slim Mexican at the door leading into the cavern. He held his right hand to his left shoulder. Blood slowly seeped between his fingers. Standing five foot six, he looked like he wouldn’t weigh a hundred pounds soaking wet. His coal-black hair was drenched in sweat from holding in the pain. He knew the bullet had nicked his collarbone and no permanent damage was done, but it still hurt like hell.
“Here, let me slap a compress on that before our favorite spic bleeds to death,” Dave Hinkle said. For a big man, his touch was gentle. He towered over Clint at six foot four, and weighed two hundred fifty pounds. His hands were big enough to cup a man’s head, but his touch was that of a fine violinist’s. He pulled the compress from its package and placed it on the wound. Tying it around Clint’s shoulder so it would stay tight, he patted the wounded man on the head.
“In a few weeks, you’ll be as good as new,” he told Clint.
Clint looked at the big man. Time hadn’t changed him a bit. Now, fifteen years later, he still reminded Clint of Hoss on the television show Bonanza. He still had the same friendly grin on his face. There were a few strands of grey in his brown hair. His soft blue eyes still had that impish look to them, as if they knew a secret no one else did.
“Nice to see you again, Dave,” Clint said.
“Looks like you’re the last of the good guys we can expect,” Dave told him.
“Have the other six went over to the crazies?” Clint asked.
“We don’t know for sure. We do know Joe isn’t one of them. They’ve had a manhunt out for Joe for the last three months. The last report we heard, they hadn’t caught him yet. Zapper left a coded message in the town he lived in telling Joe we were heading here. Looks like it’s going to be even-steven, five of them and the same number of us.”
“Christ, man, what happened? I know all about the disease and the way it changed people. Someone has yet to tell me why it happened. This country is in shambles. Man, the radio reports I hear frighten the bejesus out of me. When I left Texas, most of my relatives were trying to kill me. I did everything I could to keep from killing them, but it did no good. They continued to hunt me like an animal. I was forced to kill my cousin, Juan. That’s when I decided to come up here and see if any of you were still alive. I tell you, Dave, for a while, I was beginning to believe everyone wanted this skinny Mexican-American dead. You know, if that is Monty out there, we are going to have to take him out, don’t you?” Clint said.
“We know. After it gets dark, the three of us are going after him. We want you to stay here and guard the dugout.”
“It’s not going to be easy, man. Monty was the best one of us at the hide-and-seek game. Remember when we got together five years ago at that war games range in Maine? He tagged seven of us. The only ones to get him were Joe and Phil. Don’t think because he’s a little older, he’ll be slower. If anything, I think he’s gotten better with age. The best way to get him will be to work in pairs. I won’t do any good staying here. If he wants in here, I wouldn’t see him until it’s too late. If we work in pairs, at least we can watch each other’s back.”
“Let me go talk to Phil and Zapper. If they agree, do you think you’ll be up to it tonight?” Dave asked.
“It will hurt like hell, but I’ll still be able to get the job done,” Clint answered.
“Be back in a few then,” Dave said, giving him a friendly pat on his good shoulder. Dave cautiously made his way to the front of the dugout, where he told Phil and Zapper about Clint’s suggestion.
“I hate to leave this place unguarded, but Clint’s right. The four of us might, just might, take Monty out, if that is him out there,” Phil said.
“You take Clint, Phil. Dave and I will circle and try to come up behind Monty,” Zapper said. Dave squinted at the top of the ravine across from them. The afternoon sun was just going behind the trees of the ridge line. The bottom of the ravine was already in deep shadows.
“Looks like we have about four hours before we can leave. I’m going back with Clint to try and get a little shuteye. Wake me in two hours, Phil, and I’ll take the watch so you can get a little rest,”
Dave said.
He eased back until he was out of line with the mouth of the dugout. He went back to where Clint stood and opened the door leading to the cavern, the inside of which spread out over a huge area. Off to the left side, they had blocked in two of the small side caves with rock. Over the years, they had used cement to seat the rocks, making it look as natural as possible. Unless somebody was right up to the wall, they wouldn’t be able to tell it wasn’t a part of the natural cavern. Dave led the way and tripped a stone on the wall. A portion of it slid open. He stepped into a twenty-by-sixteen room.
Against the rear wall, two sets of bunk beds stood with their mattresses rolled up on one end. On a ledge sat a large, portable stove with a steaming pot of water on it.
Clint went to it and set two cups on the ledge. He opened a jar of instant coffee and put a spoonful in each cup, then poured the steaming water into them. Adding a powdered creamer to one of the cups, he handed it to Dave.
“Thanks, Clint. Looks like the last few years haven’t treated you too bad,” Dave said as he sipped the steaming coffee.
“I have no complaints. I finally got my spread out of hock last year and things were looking up for me. Last spring, I bought a purebred Hereford bull. I was looking forward to the next calf crop. That’s all in the past now. Maybe I’ll get back down to Texas later this year and see if the bull is still alive. He was a randy devil. I would like to go back and give Sylvia a proper burial. She was killed while I was away one day right after this disease hit. I should feel worse than I do after losing my wife and the ranch in the same month. It’s funny, but I don’t feel much of a loss and that really bothers me,” Clint said, taking a seat on one of the lower bunks.
“Sorry to hear about your wife, Clint. This damn disease has hurt us all, in one way or the other. I wasn’t married and lived in an apartment over my dad’s service station. A few months ago, my dad opened as usual, but there wasn’t any real business left. No one drove their vehicles anymore. I guess he opened out of habit. Anyway, I lay in my bed above the entrance to the service area and listened to him cut up with a few townspeople who stopped by every morning to chat. I had just turned over and was drifting back to sleep, when I heard a bunch of cars roar into town. The sound of that many vehicles aroused my curiosity. For the two weeks prior to that, we were lucky to see more than two or three cars a day.
“I eased out of bed and went over to the window facing the street in front of the station. Parting the blinds, I saw a dozen cars and pickups loaded with men and women. They all carried different kinds of weapons. I heard my dad arguing loudly with a male. Going to the closet, I put my pants and shirt on as quick as I could. As I laced up my boots, several shots sounded from below. I reached up on the shelf of the closet and got my .45, along with four extra clips. Going back to the window, I saw a few of them arguing with another man. All of a sudden, the man raised his rifle and shot one of the guys in the chest, knocking him off his feet. This man stood over six feet tall and had long blond hair that came below his shoulders. I’ll never forget how cool he was. He stood there and kicked the guy he shot, and then dared any of the others to start something. They talked back and forth for a few minutes, then got in their vehicles and left.
“Cautiously, I crept down the stairs to the garage below. I found my dad behind the counter in a pool of blood. He clutched an old .38 he kept below the register in his hand. Across the counter, Henry Morrison, who owned the town’s hardware store, sagged in one of the chairs with half his head blown off. George Henshaw, the barber, lay with his legs sticking out of the bathroom door. His legs twitched, so I knew he was still alive. I opened the door and lifted him in my arms. He was making an awful wheezing sound. I saw he had been shot through both lungs and didn’t have long to live. Placing him on an old couch, I asked him who the men were. I had to put my ear near his mouth to hear him. All he knew was the leader’s name was Todd. When I asked him why they had been shot, he mumbled, ‘Not the same,’ and died with his head in my arms.
“I loaded their bodies in my old pickup and drove to the graveyard and dug three graves. I put my dad next to my mom’s grave and said a small prayer for them. I went back to my apartment and loaded all my gear in the pickup. I got here two weeks ago and been waiting for whoever showed up,”
Dave said.
He finished his coffee and went to the bunk next to where Clint sat. Unrolling the mattress, he climbed in the top bunk. Turning his head, he said, “Better get what shuteye you can, it’s going to be a rough night.” He rolled over with his back to the door and a few minutes later, a soft snoring sounded from him.
Clint got up, poured more coffee in his cup and went back to the bunk, where he sat down again. He knew he should sleep like Dave suggested, but too many thoughts went through his mind. He thought about Sylvia and how happy she had made him after she entered his life four years ago. He remembered the night he met her.
On Saturday afternoons, he went into town to pick up staples for his cook. After getting the groceries from the store, he met Manuel Alveras, who owned a ranch across the border in Mexico. They had known each other most of their lives. Lately, because of the pressures of ranching, they hadn’t seen each other for awhile.
Manuel said he was in town for the dance to be held at the Grangers Hall that night. He asked Clint to stay over and join him. Clint thought for a moment, then said it sounded like fun. He told Manuel to would meet him later at the restaurant.
Taking his bags of food back into the store, he arranged for the grocer to keep them in one of the long coolers lining the wall. Leaving the store, he went to the barber shop. After getting a shave and having his hair trimmed, he went to the department store next door. He bought a new shirt and pair of pants.
Going to the hotel on the corner, he got a room for the night. After showering and dressing, he went to the restaurant.
Manuel was already there, so they ordered a meal. After they finished eating, Manuel leaned back in his chair and lit a cigar. He told Clint that his ranch was starting to turn a profit. They talked about the concerns of ranching for an hour over cups of coffee.
At eight o’clock, Manuel said they might as well mosey over to Grange Hall. The night was clear with a cool breeze blowing off the desert. They entered the hall, which was twenty degrees hotter than it was outside. Someone forgot to turn the huge ceiling fans on to expel the heat trapped in the building during the day.
Clint went to the table at the side of the room and filled a glass with punch. He turned to walk back to his seat, not noticing the woman bent over, picking something off the floor. As he turned, he took a step and tripped over her bent form. His drink went flying across the room to hit a member of the band. With his arms windmilling, he tried to regain his balance.
Gravity took over. His knees came down on the woman and he attempted to flip to keep his full weight off her. Another man grabbed him by the arm, trying to help him, but by doing so, caused Clint’s center of balance to shift. He crashed into the table holding the huge punch bowl. The moments seemed like hours as he watched the woman try to stand. As she got her feet under her, the table flipped and the punch bowl flew into the air. It made a perfect arc and came down on her head, knocking her to the floor once again. Drenched in the reddish punch and groggy from the heavy bowl coming down on her head, she struggled to get up. Clint lay on the floor in a stupor after his head hit the edge of the table. Although knocked silly by the blow, he clearly saw everything that happened. People rushed to help them.
The woman regained her feet and stared down at him. To this day, he didn’t know what made him say, “Will you marry me?”
A look of fury crossed her face, followed by confusion. She smiled, then laughed, slowly at first and harder with each passing moment.
She stood there with punch dripping from her long black hair. The white blouse holding in her ample breasts was turning red in places. Punch dripped from the hem of her knee-length red skirt and formed puddles around the white western boots she wore. From his position on the floor, he thought she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.
She laughed so hard, she collapsed beside him. Gaining her breath, she asked, “Do you ask all the women you give a punch bath, to marry you, Mister...”
With a sheepish look on his face and blushing furiously, Clint regained enough wit to say,
“Menandaz, Clint Menandaz, and you are?”
She held out a slim, well-formed hand and said, “Sylvia Alveriz, Clint. Do you think you’re finished trying to make an impression on me? If you are, I think I’ll go to the ladies’ room and see what I can salvage of this mess.”
“I promise I won’t move an inch, if you promise to return and give me at least a dozen dances with you,” Clint said.
She tapped her finger on her chin as she studied him. “Give me a while to think about it. After all, you have proven you’re dangerous.” She turned and walked from the room.
She returned half an hour later and not only did she give him his dozen dances, she danced every one with him until the band quit for the night. After a two week whirlwind romance, he married her. That was four and a half years ago. The happiest time of his life.
Now all that remained were the memories of his precious days with her. A cold, dull void had formed under his heart the day he buried her. In the last month, he rarely thought of her, but when he did, a depressing sadness settled over him. Later would be the time for grieving, after all this madness was over.
He unrolled the mattress and lay down on the bottom bunk. All thoughts of ever being happy again were banished from his mind. Moments later, his face relaxed into a happy smile as he dreamed of his lost wife.
At the mouth of the dugout, Phil and Zapper were telling each other their stories.
“For the first time in my life, I had it all together, Zap. My failed marriage was behind me. I found a woman I thought the world of. I threw away all the drugs I had after meeting her. I’ve been straight ever since. We lived together in a small house at the edge of town. I wanted to marry her, but she would say, ‘Wait a few years until the newness wears off, then ask me again.’ We were happy and I was becoming quite domesticated. She worked at one of the banks downtown. I got a job as a clerk at the local lumber company. Believe it or not, it was the first job I held for more than three months since I was discharged. Slowly, we turned that little house into a home.
“We bought our furniture a piece at a time when we saved enough money. She had this thing about credit, Zap. You would think she had to give up her soul to the credit company if she charged anything. As I was saying, we bought our furniture a piece at a time. After a couple years, an interior decorator would have had a heart attack if one entered our home.” Phil chuckled.
“She liked old furniture and my tastes tend toward the modern. Take the time I wanted an easy chair. She dragged me through every furniture store in three towns. She had this crazy idea that a piece of furniture should be in harmony with a person’s personal nature. Anyway, she dragged me from store to store, telling me I would know the right chair for me. You know what, Zap? I’ll be dammed if she wasn’t right. In this hole in the wall shop sat a rocker recliner that seemed to say, ‘Take me home, I’m for you.’ I sat down in it and it conformed to my body like a glove. The reddish-amber color was pleasing to my eye, too. Now you have to understand, the couch in our living room was green with a orange floral print on it. Personally, the combination gagged me, but Tracy loved it. When at home, I would sit in that amber chair and she would sit or stretch out on her couch. Many a comfortable evening we spent with me reading in my chair and her on her couch doing one of her sewing crafts.” Phil sighed, and shook his head sadly before continuing.
“A little over a month ago, I woke up one morning with Tracy standing over me with a butcher knife in her hand. Zap, she didn’t say a word, just struck at my chest with the knife. I knocked it aside and grabbed her. She tried to twist and trip-ped. She fell toward the bed, with me holding on to keep her from using the knife. Striking the bed on her stomach, she let out a loud grunt and I felt something sticky and warm flowing across my hands.” He paused a few moments and gulped in great breaths of air.
With a sob in his voice, he continued, “I turned her over and saw the butcher knife sticking out of her chest. Before her eyes glazed over in death, they stared at me with pure, unadulterated hatred. I sat there all day holding her head in my lap thinking of the good times we had. That evening, I wrapped her in two sleeping bags and carried her to the backyard. I dug a grave and put her in it. After filling in the grave, I went into the house and got my guns. I packed a couple changes of clothes and left town in my old Charger. For a week or so, I wandered around, not really thinking at all. One night, I stopped in this little burg, hell; I can’t even recall the name of it. I went inside a seedy bar and started drinking. No matter how much I drank, it didn’t affect me.
“A few hours later, half a dozen of the locals started harassing me. Calmly, I stood there and downed another bottle of scotch, not really paying attention to the men. One of them grabbed my arm and swung at me. Something inside me snapped. I blocked his punch and broke his arm across the edge of the bar. The other locals weren’t happy about that, so they waded in. In a cold rage, I broke one man’s neck. I broke both legs of the next. The third received a broken back. The last two tried to get away, but in my rage, I stopped them before they could get out the door. The man on the left, I gave a hard, chopping blow to the sternum, then a chop across his Adam’s apple. He was dead before he hit the floor. The last man pleaded with me, but I wasn’t having any of it. Reaching out, I grabbed him by the neck. He was too scared to fight. I hit him hard enough in the nose with the palm of my hand to drive the bone into his brain. I waited until he quit quivering; then threw him aside.
“Tears flowing down my cheeks, I went out to my car and bawled like a baby for half an hour. Wiping tears from my eyes, a deep sadness settled over me at the thought of the men I’d just killed. I started the car and took to the road. I racked my brain for some where I couldn’t hurt anyone and thought of this place. I got here four days ago. What’s your story, Zap?”
Zapper carefully looked at the ground on the other side of the ravine before answering. “My life is still the same as it was five years ago when we last met. I knock about from town to town, doing odd jobs to earn enough to eat. You know me, I sleep as well on the ground as in a bed. In the summer, I live off the land in one of our National Parks. When the disease struck, I was already here in Yellowstone. There’s a nice tree-studded valley, north of here. I got there in early April. I don’t remember the exact date I started getting strange reports over the ham radio I carry with me. As time passed, the reports got stranger and stranger.
“Finally, I decided to go to a small town fifty miles to the north and find out if the reports were true. It took two days walking cross-country to get there. It wasn’t much of a town. A couple thousand people at most.” He took a sip out of his canteen.
Zapper searched the trees on the other side of the ravine, then continued. “Arriving a little after dark, I kept to the shadows. Halfway down the main street, one of the buildings was lit up bright as day, with a lot of noise coming from it. Sounded like a party was going on. Making my way from one shadow to the next, I reached the side of the building. It looked like a normal party the first time I peeped through a window with an open curtain. People were dancing around, swilling liquor and enjoying themselves.
“I was getting ready to go around to the front door, when a group of people against the wall broke up. Two small, bloody children stood there. The girl looked to be about six years old and the boy around four or five. They were naked, someone had cut the little boy’s penis off and cauterized the stump with what could only have been a blowtorch. Around the area of his crotch, the skin was charred and blackened. The girl was making moaning noises. When she turned around, I saw what had happened to the boy’s penis. They had placed it in her mouth and sewed her lips together around it.
“Her eyes had been gouged from her head. A piece of broken broomstick protruded from the girl’s pubic area. The boy appeared to be in shock, but the girl moaned in pain. I saw her body shake as bolts of pain shot through her.” Zapper shook his head and leaned back with his eyes closed.
“Jesus,” was all Phil could say.
Zapper leaned forward; tears fell from his eyes as he continued. “I eased the window up a couple inches. A man near the window was taking bets on how much longer the children would last. Living alone as I do most of the time, I was shocked to the bottom of my soul. How could other humans perpetrate such ungodly acts on small children? I took the rifle from my shoulder and lay the barrel on the lip of the window. I knew it was impossible to get everyone in the room, so the next choice was to put the children out of their misery. I lined the sight up on the girl first, since she looked to be suffering the most. Taking a deep breath, I held it and squeezed the trigger. The top of her head burst apart throwing blood and brain matter against the wall. All sound in the room ceased as I lined the barrel up on the boy. I had to brush tears from my eyes, then I shot him.” A sob escaped his lips and his shoulders shook.
A few minutes later, he continued. “As the boy slumped to the floor, people rushed for the doors. I ran to the end of the house and crossed a side street. The uproar behind me got louder. I circled around until I came to a church with a tall steeple. Going inside, I climbed the ladder until I reached the small, enclosed bell housing. The bell had been removed a long time ago, so there was enough room to sit down. With my back to a corner, I moved the levered pieces of wood until I could see what was happening below me. People went into every house and store rousing sleeping men, women and children from their beds. A huge mountain of a man in charge had all the people line up in the center of the street. I tell you, Phil, he is the most god-awful ugly human being I have ever seen. He wasn’t that tall, I would say, six one give or take an inch.”
Zapper held out one of his huge arms. “His arms make mine look puny. I swear, the man was almost as wide as he was tall. Once or twice, he looked my way and I still get a chill down my spine every time I think of that face. He had a big head, but his face had big bumps all over it. I don’t mean pimple bumps, either. These were goose egg-size bumps; like the kind you see when someone has a tumor. When he smiled, half his teeth were missing. He kept the smile on his face as he ranted and raved at the people in the middle of the street. Running out of steam, he took off the ball cap he wore and I got another shock. The top of his head was completely bald. His shoulder-length black hair grew from the sides of his head. He picked pairs of people and sent them to search different houses.
“I settled down and took a thermos of cranberry juice out of my backpack. I ate a sandwich while I drank the juice and watched the people scurry all over town.
“I learned the ugly man’s called Andy when a guy ran from a side street yelling his name. Behind him came half a dozen people dragging an old man.” Zapper jerked back as a bullet struck the post he sat behind.
Not missing a beat, he said, “They had a rope around the old man’s neck. As three of them dragged him along the rough asphalt, the rest of them kicked his body with every step they took. When they got to Andy, I saw the rope around the old man’s neck was slowly strangling him. This Andy reached down and grabbed him around the neck with one hand and lifted him off the ground. I was too far away to catch everything that was said, but I did get that the old man was the tortured children’s uncle.
“Andy spouted words like soft, unfit to belong and a bunch of other things. The gist of it was, Andy thought this old man had killed the children. This mountain of a man’s hand began to tighten on the uncle’s neck. From a hundred feet away, I heard his neck snap and saw his legs twitch for about thirty seconds. To give you an idea of this Andy’s strength, he held the old geezer off the ground with one hand and I would say the old guy weighed close to two hundred pounds. Andy threw the uncle six feet to the side as easily as you would an empty beer can. I couldn’t bring myself to have any sympathy for the old man. If he was the children’s uncle, he deserved what he got for not trying to help them.
“People drifted back to their homes and Andy went into what looked like an office down the street. Minutes later, lights started going out in most of the houses as people went back to sleep. I waited four hours, then climbed down from the church tower and made my way out of town. I decided to come down here and get some explosives and heavier weapons. The longer I walked, the madder I got. By the time I was halfway here, I was so mad, I promised myself I was going to go back there and kill every one of the bastards. I finally made it and found Dave already here. A few days later, you showed up and today, Clint walked in. That’s about the size of it.
“Phil, you know when we go out tonight after Monty, some of us won’t be coming back, maybe none of us,” Zapper said.
“I’ve got a little surprise in one of the bags I brought in that might keep us all alive, if we use them right, Zap.”
“It had better be something good,” Zapper said from the side of his mouth as he stretched his neck to look further down the ravine. A bullet slammed into the post six inches above his head. “Did you catch the muzzle flash?” he asked.
“Yeah, he’s to the right and near the top of the ravine. About twenty feet to the right of that twisted pine tree growing out of the lip of the ravine,” Phil answered.
Zapper leaned against the wall, picking splinters out of his hat. “What’s this surprise of yours, Phil?”
“On the way here, I stopped at Fort Riley, Kansas. The post was nearly deserted. I wandered around and nobody challenged me. I was digging through a pile of trash in one of the supply rooms, when I came across a dozen pairs of night vision goggles. I picked up a couple duffle bags laying there and put the goggles in one of them. I picked up a bunch of other stuff; like grease paint and camo fatigues. When both bags were full, I beat it back to my car and got out of there.”
“How are the goggles going to help us?” Zapper asked.
“If you were Monty, what would you do when it started getting dark?” Phil asked.
“I would make my way closer to the entrance here and make sure none of us left the dugout,”
Zapper answered.
“You know he will, because that’s the way we were all trained. If Monty went over to this disease, he’ll do exactly what he was trained to do, to the letter. From what I’ve observed of the people who have the disease, they’re quite literal. They do exactly what they have done all their lives. Any change, even one that will make things easier for them, is totally foreign to them. I don’t know, something in their mind must short out. Suggest something different and they always go back to the way they did it before, even if that doesn’t work. I’ve seen it happen time and time again. So we have to assume Monty will stick to the way we were trained. He won’t improvise or change his plan. He’ll do things the way the training manual says to do it. According to the manual, what would be the last thing we would be expected to do?”
Zapper scratched his head and thought about his answer for a few minutes. “The craziest thing for us to do would be to leave the dugout. In here, we’re fortified and have only one front to watch. Out there in the woods, it would be every man for himself. The manual says we’re stronger together than separate,” Zapper said with a puzzled look.
“What would happen if we rushed out of here just before it got dark and went in different directions?” Phil asked.
“That would be playing right into Monty’s hand. He would take his time and track each one of us down,” Zapper answered.
“Right, but which one of us would he go after first?”
“The one who posed the most danger to him,” Zapper said.
Phil smiled and said, “Who would that be?”
Zapper thought for a minute, then said, “Dave. Remember he always said if he had to go up against us one on one, Dave would be the hardest to take out.”
“Let me run this by you, then tell me what you think. What if we ran out of here, but had a certain point to meet? Now, suppose this spot was at a place that allowed me, you and Clint to get there first. We could set up and wait for Dave to lead Monty to us. Do you think it will work?” Phil asked.
“There’s one hole in your plan. What if Monty catches Dave before he gets to us? Monty will take Dave’s night vision goggles. If that happens, we’ll be sitting ducks,” Zapper answered.
“We’ll just have to trust that Dave can stay ahead of Monty. Dave may be big, but he can move like a ghost when he wants to. If Dave agrees to go out without the goggles, if he buys it, at least our edge won’t be taken away.”
Zapper looked at his watch. “We have to wake them in little bit. You tell them about your plan then and see what Dave says.”
“On the way here, I heard that a General Lawson deserted the new President’s forces. He joined the rebels in West Virginia. You don’t think it could be our man Boyd, do you?” Phil asked.
“It’s possible. The last I heard, Boyd was still in the army. General, huh, wouldn’t that be something? Old pecker-head Boyd, a general,” Zapper said with a laugh.
“I know what you mean. Remember when he joined us back in ’70? The man was a Bible-thumping lunatic. He would gather us in a tent before each mission and pray for our souls. Then he would jump up and say, ‘Let’s go get the godless bastards.’”
“Yeah, I remember, Charlie always asked him if he wasn’t being a bit sacrilegious, cursing and going out killing people.”
Phil laughed. “Remember the somber face Boyd put on and said, ‘The Lord works in mysterious ways, Charles.’ Charlie would shake his head and mutter, ‘The man is fucking nuts!’ over and over.”
The smile faded from Zapper’s face. “I wonder if Charlie went over to this disease?” he said in a low voice.
Phil broke out laughing. “Imagine Boyd Lawson standing on a street corner telling these godless crazies to repent? I can see it now, Boyd wading into a group of people with the disease trying to save their souls. I can see him killing those who objected and throwing them aside while saying they were the tools of the devil. Try to imagine Charlie Holbrook standing across the street saying, ‘The man is fucking nuts.’” Phil laughed hard at the thought.
“Go back and wake Dave and Clint up. Tell them about your plan. I’ll stay here and keep watch,”
Zapper said, chuckling at the images Phil just described.
Chapter 4
Todd shook his head in anger. “You say they were all killed?” he asked the short man before him.
“All of them. I stood on a hill a mile away and watched the dogs hunt down and kill everyone who tried to get away. There were thousands of dogs in and around the town. This old man, Zeb, walked among them as they went about dragging our men down and killing them. The only thing saving me was that I left a few hours earlier to run a trap line I had set out a few miles from town.”
“What did they do after the last of our men were killed?”
“The old guy, Zeb, gathered his dogs around him and marched off toward Galixe. That’s when I hightailed it back here to inform you about what happened.”
“You did the right thing; now get something to eat, then find a bed in the bunkhouse and get some rest,” Todd told him.
After the man left, Todd pulled a map from his desk drawer. Unfolding it, he marked the location of Galixe and the spot where his ranch was located on the map. The town was less than two hundred fifty miles away. This Zeb was becoming a pain in the ass. He didn’t have enough people to send down and take care of the man. Every able-bodied man he had was along the eastern front. While it was true he gained more people every day, the demand for more bodies on the eastern front increased. Thanks to the hillbil-lies in Appalachia, he gained a little more time to consolidate his holdings. President Donaldson couldn’t get his men and supplies to the mid-western states very easily, because the hillbillies controlled the east/west rail lines. As long as the hillbillies held the line, Todd was slowly taking control of the states President Donaldson had said were his. He was going to St. Louis to take charge of things there very soon. He wanted to be sure the person he left in charge could handle things. Picking up the telephone, he said, “Find Andy Payne and tell him I want him immediately.”
The teletype in the corner started chattering away. He knew another message was coming from his master. When the bell sounded that it was finished, he ripped the paper off the machine. Taking the paper to his desk, he read the words out loud.
“Todd, I want you to pick up some things while you are in St. Louis. These things will allow you to complete your computer so I can transfer from here to there. It is important you get these items as quick as you can. I will tell you where they can be located. As soon as you find them, ship them back here and have them installed. I can’t stress how important speed is. The woman is in the complex and I am sure she is here to destroy me.
Down to business now. President Donaldson’s Science Advisor, Angus Coburn, has discovered I have been bugging their phones and is in the process of setting up a secure network. However, we are not blind, thanks to the men you sent in who planted the voice trans-mit-ters in most of the rooms in the White House. Through them, I’ve learned that Greg Fitch, head of intelligence, has convinced President Donaldson to take the railway from the people in West Virginia. If they do this, we will be faced with a swiftly growing troop buildup on our borders. I have dropped a few pieces of information into the computer-link the rebels are using, but it will not be enough. You know Presi-dent Donaldson is paranoid about President Samules attacking the east coast. I need for you to transfer a thousand men to the port of Galveston in Texas. Dress them in U.S. Army uniforms. Put them aboard one of the troop transports located there. I have made arrangements for them to be taken to a point south of Washington, D. C. where they can disembark. Once on land, they are to march toward the Capitol. Do not send anyone you can’t afford to lose, because they will all be captured or killed. Arrange for the commanders to have information on them saying they are a part of President Samules’ forces. This will cause him to pull some of his troops away from the campaign against the rebels. Again, if you wish to continue to get the information I can provide you with, it is important to get the computer parts and have them installed. I have the feeling my time here is running out.”
Todd threw the paper aside. There was a knock on his door. “Come in,” he said. A huge man opened the door. His face was a disaster with large bumps covering it from forehead to chin. The man was almost as wide as he was tall. His deformed arms looked monstrous. Never had Todd seen a man with such big arms. “You wanted me, Todd?” he said out of a mouth with half the teeth missing.
“Have a seat, Andy. I’m going to be leaving in the morning and would like you to take charge of things here. We might have a problem I’d like you to keep an eye on,” Todd said and told him about Zeb and his dogs.
“Don’t worry, Todd, this Zeb won’t make a move we don’t know about,” Andy said.
“Good, be here early in the morning and we’ll go over any last minute details,” Todd told him and escorted him to the door.
Todd took his jacket off the hook beside the door and put it on. Stepping outside, he drew in a breath of chilly night air. He walked down the steps and crossed the yard to the barn. The guard saw him coming and said something into the walkie-talkie he carried. Todd smiled, knowing he alerted the other guards of his presence in the area. Since killing all the guards who were on duty the night Captain, the old mountain man, walked away from the ranch, they took their duty seriously.
He entered the barn. In the middle of the huge interior was a glass-enclosed room with an airlock for an entrance. Going to the entrance, he stopped before a camera mounted over the door. A mechanical voice said, “State your name for voice recognition.”
“Todd Christian,” he said.
“Voice recognition confirmed. Good evening, Todd. Please place your hand palm down on the plate beside the door,” the computer voice said.
Todd placed his palm on the plate and stared into the camera for the retinal scan. A moment later, the computer said, “Identification confirmed, you may open the door now, Todd. There will be a ninety second wait while all dust and contaminants are removed after entering.”
Todd entered the chamber and felt a gentle stirring of the air once the door was closed. Ninety seconds later, a green light came on over the inner door and it slid open. Inside, men in white smocks were busily working at computer stations. He walked over to where a grossly fat man sat studying a sheaf of computer paper. Although the room was kept at a constant sixty-five degrees, his shirt was soaked in sweat. His pudgy fingers flipped pages as his small, beady eyes studied the print. Todd meant to ask the man where he found the oversized rollaway chair that could hold his immense bulk. Sweat glistened on his bald head.
“Mr. McDonald, are things about ready to accept our master? He tells me time may be running out for him,” Todd asked.
“All we need are the two components you’re to pick up in St. Louis, Todd. The master is doing most of the programming himself. As you know, I am the foremost computer specialist in the country, but the things our master is doing completely baffle even me. He has developed new and unheard-of programs. I feel like a new student. Even with the master’s help, most of what he’s doing is far beyond my ability to comprehend,” the man said in an awed voice.
As always, Todd felt lost when talking to McDonald. All Todd knew about computers was how to turn them on.
“Good, McDonald. Keep on top of it. Have the remote sensors been programmed into the computer?”
“All of them are up and operating, except for the ones we planted near the town of Galixe. There’s some sort of electromagnetic interference on all the frequencies we try to use. We’re trying to isolate the cause, but so far, we’ve come up empty. Our master is puzzled. He says the magnetic interference wasn’t present until Joe and his group came into the area. If I didn’t know better, I would say someone is trying to blind us as to what goes on there. The rest of the sensors are working superbly, watch.” He turned on a large monitor mounted on the wall. A graph came up on the monitor. “This is a sensor located in Western Kentucky.” He typed on the keyboard and the graph changed to a line of figures. “In the last twelve hours, fifty-six rebels passed the sensor. Two dogs and a rabbit also came near it,” McDonald said, interpreting the figures on the screen.
“Good, then the subterfuge of my people attacking the rebels worked. I want to thank you again, McDonald. You and your men did a good job of placing the sensors. Now we’ll know which areas the rebels are building up in and can counter their moves.”
McDonald leaned his bulk back in his seat and looked up at Todd. Todd watched the man as he thought through what he was going to say. He was the most methodical person Todd had ever met. He doubted McDonald ever spoke a word in his life he didn’t think over at least half a dozen times before uttering the words.
“Todd, you’ve dealt more with the master than I have. How shall I put this?” Starting again, he said, “Is the master human, Todd?”
Todd thought about his reply. “At one time, he was human, but not anymore. Why do you ask?”
“As you know, my entire life has been dedicated to computers and ways of improving them. In all my work, I’ve never met or read about anyone as well-versed about computers as our master is. I would say some of the things he’s doing are impossible if I wasn’t seeing them myself. It’s unreasonable to think I wouldn’t have run across someone as smart as he is if he were human. In all the contact I’ve had with him, he acts like a very smart computer, but reasons things out in a human way. It would help me understand some of his work if I knew what he was,” McDonald said as he fidgeted in his chair.
“He’s now a machine, McDonald. The master told me how he got to be that way. Not being versed in computers, I couldn’t follow most of what he told me. All that matters to me is that the information he gives me is correct. Be he machine or man, I use him for my own ends, just as he uses me to get what he wants. He knows vastly more than I do, but he’ll never be able to incorporate that knowledge in the reality of the physical world. You see, McDonald, he’s a tool for me to use to gain my goals in the physi-cal world. By the same token, I’m his tool for getting what he needs to construct his type of world. His story is that he worked for an electronics firm in New Jersey as a janitor. He insists he was a god in his other life.
“Anyway, for some reason, a man named Ben Johnson killed him. By the way, don’t mention the name Ben when you’re talking with him. He blows his cork at the mention of it. I tell you, the man, machine, or whatever he is, has more than a few screws loose. He used to terrify me when he went off on one of his tantrums about Ben. To tell you the truth, I was afraid to meet the man in person. You can imagine my relief when I found out he wasn’t human. Don’t get me wrong, I still respect the guy and we have accomplished a lot together. When it comes right down to it, I have to cover my own ass. One thing I want you to understand, McDonald, is never take the master lightly. Just because he doesn’t have a human form anymore doesn’t mean he can’t hurt you. If he thought you meant to harm him or me in any way, he would kill you. Nothing simple like shooting you. No, one day you would turn on a light switch or a TV, any number of things, and receive a lethal jolt of voltage. I’ve seen him do it a couple times. It’s not a pretty sight. Enough about the master. I came over here to tell you to keep an eye on Andy Payne while I’m gone. I’m leaving him in charge of everything outside of this place. I’m confidant he’ll do a good job. However, he has a mean streak in him a yard long. It could get him into trouble and bring a mess down on us here. What I want you to do is quietly watch him and if he starts to go overboard, bring him back to reality. I’ll make sure he understands, if you give him an order, it’s to be obeyed as if coming from me.” Todd stood up, shook the man’s oily hand and went to the door.
Outside in the chilly night air, he wondered if there were anymore loose ends to wrap up before he left. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust Andy, but it was hard leaving someone else in charge of the only safe haven he had.
During his last talk with his master, he was informed that pockets of resistance were forming against him. He knew about the rebels in the coalfields back east. President Donaldson would be nipping at his heels eventually. Those were the two big ones, but it was the little pockets of resistance in areas he already controlled that worried him more.
Take last week when he sent over two hundred men to take the tiny town of Boone in Colorado. Hell, the whole town had less than fifty people, but they fought like they’d gone berserk. He lost over seventy-five of his troops taking the place and didn’t gain a damn thing. As the last pocket of resistance fell at the church, the whole damn town went up in flames. The townspeople had planted explosives in every building and tied them together at the church. He didn’t care about the place. It was a little spot in the road. The only trouble was he was finding a lot of little places like that. He would have to find some way to get rid of these rebels without losing so many men. He didn’t like leaving these people behind his lines, but it couldn’t be helped.
In five months, he was going to move against the rebels and he needed every man he could get to fight that battle.
Placing the sensors inside rebel country was a stroke of genius. Essential-ly, they were motion sensors, but his master had redesigned them so they could recognize the difference between humans and animals.
Over the next few months, they should be able to get a pattern of how the rebels reacted to different situations. By probing here and there along the lines, they would be able to pinpoint which routes the rebels used to bring up reinforcements.
When it came time for Todd to make his main push, he planned to send small ambush squads to take out any reinforcements before they got to the battle line. He was learning that when it came to pitched battles, not to count his eggs before they hatched. Things didn’t always go the way he wanted them to when there was a large force of people fight-ing each other.
He wished he had listened to Joe more when he described how they did this or that on the battlefield. He didn’t fear Joe like he had a few months ago. For one thing, Joe shunned the larger groups of people who could have helped him. For some reason, Joe had purposely kept his group small while he was taking the woman to his master’s location. The possibility existed that Joe would come out of the mountain and join one of the groups resisting him. If that occurred, he would have to be very careful. His people were becoming better as they fought small skirmishes against the rebels. Here lately, the rebels’ tactics had changed. Maybe it had something to do with the general who had defected from President Donaldson’s army to join them. Two weeks ago, he started losing more men than he should have against the unorganized enemy. He was forced to send larger and larger forces into rebel territory just to get the information he needed.
In one respect, he was lucky the rebels concentrated most of their forces in the east, keeping President Donaldson from using the railways. If it wasn’t for the crazies, which were his biggest asset, he would wait a few years and let the rebels continue their fight against President Donaldson. The crazies forced him to keep expanding. If they didn’t find an enemy to take their rage out on, Todd would be forced to kill them.
Chapter 5
Zapper looked at his watch as the others prepared to leave. “No sense in putting it off. Are you sure you want to be the guinea pig, Dave?”
“Hell no, but what choice do I have? No, Phil’s plan is the best way for us to get Monty. Just make sure the rest of you are in position when I lead him into the trap,” Dave said as he strapped a large knife to his leg.
“Don’t worry, Dave. All I need is one shot. I owe the bas-tard,” Clint said as he rubbed his wounded shoulder.
“Time to draw,” Phil said, holding out his closed hand. He held three small protruding sticks in it. Clint reached over and drew out one of the sticks. Zapper drew another. Phil opened his hand to show them his stick, which was the shortest of the three. “Well, I didn’t want to live forever anyway,”
he said.
“Give us time to get into position before you expose yourself,” Zapper said as he moved toward the front of the dugout. Zapper was glad he hadn’t drawn the short stick. The one with the short stick had to expose himself enough to get Monty to fire. The rest of them would take up positions so they could watch the entire area across from the dugout. It was important they knew Monty’s exact position. In order for Phil’s plan to work, Dave had to leave as far away from Monty as he could. It was hoped Monty would go after Dave first. That would give the rest of them time to get to the ambush site first and wait as Dave circled around to them.
“Here goes nothing,” Phil said. He eased his way from post to post until he was beneath the overhang of the dugout. Sucking in a deep breath, he edged into the light staring intently at the top of the ravine across from him. Holding onto a vine imbedded into the side of the wall, he leaned out. The next thing he knew, he was falling flat on his face, then he heard the shot. Scrambling, he crawled back into the dugout, where he leaned against the wall breathing hard.
“You can let loose of the vine now, Phil,” Dave said.
Phil looked down at his hand. He still had the vine in his hand, except he gripped it so tight, his fingers were turning white. Six inches from his hand, the vine had been cleanly severed.
“Did you spot his muzzle flash?” he asked, dropping the vine.
“I did,” Zapper said. “He’s behind that tall pine tree off to the right. See the one I mean? Just above those two rocks jutting out ten feet from the top of the ravine.”
“Okay, Dave. You go left. Remember that spring a quarter of a mile down the canyon? That’s where we’ll set up. Lead him there, we’ll be waiting on him,” Phil said, shaking his hand. Clint and Zapper shook Dave’s hand and wished him good luck.
Phil held up his hand and looked at each of them. He waited until he got a nod that they were ready. He brought his hand down and rushed from the dugout, going to the right. Clint and Zapper followed right behind him, firing their rifles at the ridge as they ran. Looking over his shoulder as he came to a curve in the hill, he saw Dave plunge into the underbrush to the left of the dugout. The steady crack of a high-powered rifle beat down from the ridge of the ravine. He stopped at the edge of the curve and let Clint and Zapper pass.
Squatting between two boulders, he watched the ridge where Monty was supposed to be. He saw a flash followed by the bark of a high-powered rifle. The tree above Monty trembled from a burst of fire from Dave. The next muzzle flash came from further to the left as Monty tracked Dave, who was below him.
Phil waited until he saw another flash, which was farther to the left, then he turned and ran to Cliff and Zapper. “Monty took the bait. Let’s go to the spring and take up positions.”
* * * *
After plunging into the brush, Dave cut sharply to the right, bringing him closer to Monty but putting him under the protective edge of the ravine. The bole of a pine tree exploded three feet from him showering him with splinters. Pulling a splinter out of his jaw, he started to stop the flow of blood, but had an idea.
He stopped under an overhang and turned his head so the blood dropped onto an exposed rock. The -puncture bled profusely.
Another bullet hit a tree twenty feet from where he was. He took a gauze compress from his pack and slapped it on his jaw. He eyed the blood on the rock and placed his right foot beside it. Leaning heavily on his right leg, he dragged it along the dirt leaving behind an imprint in the soft ground and leaves. Ahead, he saw a patch of rocky ground. He angled until he came to the rocky stretch. Looking back, he saw a trough plowed in the ground.
From all appearances, a badly-wounded man had dragged a useless leg across the stretch of soft ground. Dave smiled because he knew Monty would think him severely injured and would be extra careful in following him.
It was almost dark at the bottom of the ravine. He took the night goggles from his pack and put them on. Flipping the switch, everything turned green and white. Trees and rocks had a greenish tint as they radiated the day’s stored heat. Fifty feet off to the left, he saw a deer bound away. He raised his rifle and closed his eyes to keep the muzzle flash from blinding him.
Firing one shot into the air, he started up the ravine. The distinctive crack of his 30-30 would let Phil and the rest know he was still alive. He ran up the ravine as fast as he could without making too much noise. Now the game begins.
Monty would be somewhere behind him, trailing him through the brush. Darkness was closing in rapidly. Dave knew Monty didn’t have night vision goggles, so every now and then, he would break a twig with his foot. The sharp crack as he broke the twig sounded loud in the stillness of the night. He could picture Monty listening intently for such noises.
He climbed silently up the side of the ravine and lay down beside a fallen log. Watching the way he had come, he saw Monty step out from behind a tree. He stood still as a rock and waited for Dave to make a sound. Dave didn’t want to make it too easy for Monty.
Monty knew Dave was very good at going silently through heavy brush. If Dave made it too obvious, Monty would suspect a trap.
He watched Monty stalk up the ravine, carefully placing one foot in front of the other. Every few steps, he would stop to listen. Dave wished he had a night scope on his rifle. It would be easy to take Monty out as he crossed some of the open spaces.
Although he could see Monty, aiming his rifle with the bulky goggles on would be difficult. He would have only one shot. Monty wasn’t dumb. If he shot and missed, Monty would figure Dave had a device that let him see in the dark. He would fade into the brush and wait until daylight so they would be on equal footing.
In a situation like that, Monty was the better of the two. Not by much, but just enough to give him the edge. Dave waited until Monty was a hundred yards from the spot where he lay. Picking up a few stones, he rolled them down the bank. They made a clicking noise as they collided with other rocks.
He saw Monty stop and cock his head to the side like a predator sniffing out prey. He let one more rock, larger than the others, roll down the bank. Although the noise wasn’t loud, a person with good ears could hear it, and Monty had excellent hearing. When Monty started toward him, Dave crawled away from the bank.
Getting to his feet, he plotted a way through the trees. Now the dangerous part would begin. He had to let Monty stay close without exposing himself. He positioned himself behind a tree a hundred feet from the lip of the ravine. Although he had done this countless times before when he was in the army, the waiting seemed to drag out longer than it should.
He was beginning to worry that Monty had slipped behind him when he saw Monty’s head pop up and back down, sixty feet to the right of where he had come up out of the ravine. Monty swiped at his forehead wiping sweat away. Now why would he be sweating so much? The night was cool. He judged the temperature to be near fifty degrees. On careful inspection of the figure outlined in the goggles, he thought Monty looked bulkier than he should. Bulk and sweat meant only one thing. Monty was carrying a lot of extra weight. Dave couldn’t see any backpack as Monty moved out from behind a tree. It clicked in Dave’s mind that Monty had to be wearing some kind of heavy body armor. This meant the only sure way of taking him out was a head shot.
The odds shot up again in Monty’s favor. Dave backed through the trees keeping Monty in sight. When Monty took a track leading away, Dave would let his jacket brush against a tree. It was just enough noise to cause Monty to veer back toward him.
What he wouldn’t give to have a radio now and be in contact with Phil. He needed to let them know about the armor Monty wore. As he turned to check behind him, a wild cat screamed right beside him. Something swatted his leg. Moments later, he felt the trickle of blood down the leg. He backed quickly away from the hollow tree he was behind.
Of all the damn luck, he would have to stumble on a wildcat’s den. Frantically, he looked for Monty. He knew the noise of the wild cat and the noise he made getting away from it had given Monty a definite location on him.
Monty would now be circling around to come up behind him. Dave was now sweating. It was one thing to see Monty, but out of sight, he became as dangerous as a cobra. Dave wanted to rush, but knew he had to keep Monty from pinpointing his location.
Rapidly, without making any noise, he went through the trees. Every ten feet, he made a complete turn looking for anything out of place. Not that he was expecting to see anything. Monty was good and he wouldn’t make any mistakes.
He heard the wildcat scream again from the direction he came from. Was that a twig snap off to his left? He stopped and listened intent-ly. Nothing, he was beginning to spook himself. He had to get himself under control. Nerves as tight as a banjo string; he slowed down, it would be fatal if he let his imagination run away with him.
He slowed his breathing and remembered his training. Let my peripheral vision catch movement to the left or right. Don’t look at one spot, keep my eyes moving. When moving around a large tree, keep low and close to the trunk. Stagger my steps, don’t walk with a regular rhythm. Avoid straight lines of travel, which would give the enemy a chance to set up in front of me. Attune my hearing to my surroundings. As I travel forward, a silent void will follow me. Be alert if I enter a void.
What that meant was, as he traveled forward, the insects and birds would become silent just as he stepped into their zone. There would be a split second when he heard them before they stilled. On the other hand, if he entered a dead zone, it was guaranteed someone was near. Dave’s mind and body went on automatic as he got control of himself. He heard a bird or owl take flight off to the left. He ignored it and angled that way. Off to the right, he heard a small animal scurrying through the leaves. Keeping his eyes in the direction of the sound, he saw a ground squirrel dart across an open space. The ground squirrels move-ments weren’t those of flight from a predator. Monty would have reached the point he wanted by now, so he was close.
Dave got down on his stomach and crawled to a stump ahead and to the right of him. He parted the leaves on a plant growing nearby. At first, he thought he was hallucinating. On the other side of the stump, a figure with goggles on stared directly at him.
“Hi, Dave, I didn’t think you’d ever get here,” said Monty.
“Where did you get the goggles, Monty?”
“Sorry to be the one to tell you, Dave, but Clint didn’t make it. Tell me, was this one of Phil’s plans?” When Dave didn’t answer, Monty shook his head. “I thought so. While I played with you today, I wondered how the four of you would come after me. Since you’re almost as good as me, I decided the others would use you to decoy me into a trap. Oh, I followed you as far as the top of the ravine to make it look good, because I didn’t know if you guys had radios. After letting you see me at the top of the ravine, I slipped back to the bottom and ran like hell after the others. Seeing the direction they headed in, I knew the only place for an ambush was the spring. I cut across the hill and got there before them. It was Clint’s bad luck to hide behind the same boulder I was behind. I would have taken out the other two, but that damn little spic got out half a yell before my knife slit his throat. Careful, Dave, slide your 30-30 across the stump to me. Uh, uh, butt first,” Monty said as Dave started bringing the barrel around.
“So Phil and Zapper are still alive?”
“For a little while at least. Since they were alerted, I came directly here and waited for you. You should take it as a compli-ment that I consider you the only one of the four who’s a threat to me,”
Monty said with a smile.
“Why all the talk, why not kill me and get it over with?” Dave said as he eased his hand down beside his right leg.
“It may surprise you, but I’m lonely. After all, when you’re the best, what does the rest of humanity have to offer? I want you to stand up and move to this side of the log, Dave,” Monty said, backing away about twenty feet.
Quickly, Dave slid the knife from its sheath and stuck it up his sleeve. He stood up with his hands out to the side and stepped across the log.
“Sit down with your back to the log and keep your hands in sight, Dave,” Monty told him as he squatted on the ground. The rifle he held never wavered a bit. “Relax, Dave, you still have a few minutes left. Think of it as the better man winning. Really, Dave, you disappoint me. I thought you were better. The way you came stumbling in here, a sixth grader could have followed you. What is it, age taking the edge off, or is it that I’m so good, you didn’t have a chance?” Monty asked. Dave couldn’t remember Monty being so stuck on himself. He decided to agree with him and see where that led. “You are good, Monty. As a matter of fact, I haven’t seen any better. I tried to learn from you, but some things you have to be born with and you were,” Dave said, reaching up to pull a splinter from his cheek. “That shot almost did me in, instead I have a face full of splinters.” He saw Monty relax when his hand came down with nothing but the splinter. Reaching up again, he pulled another splinter out, wincing in pain.
“Must hurt like a bitch.” Monty laughed, enjoying Dave’s pain.
“I’ve had worse,” Dave answered.
“That’s right. They pulled six slugs out of you in ’71. What made you go on, Dave? Hell, even I would’ve given up ten miles before I got to our lines. What do you have inside you that makes you go on when everyone else quits? I admired you when you made it back to our line. The doctors at the hospital said you’d lost almost three pints of blood. Shot twice in the same lung, another hole in your stomach, one in each leg and another in your shoulder. All that and you walked twenty miles through dense jungle. Before I kill you, Dave, tell me what makes a man suffer such pain and misery,” Monty asked in a perplexed voice.
Slowly, Dave’s hand movements between his cheek and leg became faster as he pulled out splinters. He knew he had less than a minute to live. The next time he brought his hand up, he slid the handle of the knife out of his sleeve and into his hand. The throw would be awkward, but he had no choice. He opened his mouth as if to speak and flicked his hand forward. As the knife left his hand, he fell to the side. A sharp pain hit his right shoulder and he heard the sound of a shot. He rolled over twice and looked toward where Monty had been. Monty sat with his back against a tree. The rifle lay on his legs pointed at the ground. Like the horn of a unicorn, Dave’s knife stuck out of the center of Monty’s forehead. Dave rolled to a sitting position holding his numb right arm.
“Faith, Monty, and the knowledge that you and the other guys were out searching for me. That’s what kept me going. Sorry it had to end like this, old friend, but you were wrong. I don’t blame you, Monty. You were a good man and an even better friend. The game of life caused you to go over to the other side and I don’t hold it against you. I know if you had a choice, we would be sitting here talking,” he whispered to the dead man.
Reaching for a nearby tree, he pulled himself to his feet with his left hand. He felt blood trickling off the fingers of his right. Unbuttoning his jacket, he grunted in pain as he pulled it loose from where it was imbedded in the wound. A fresh swell of blood covered his fingers as he probed the wound. A clean wound through the fleshy part of the shoulder.
Awkwardly, he pulled a bandage compress from the pack at his side. Using his teeth, he ripped the package open. Pressing the compress against the wound to stanch the flow of blood, he walked away from the site. Nearing the spring, he began to yell for Phil and Zapper. A little later, he heard, “Is that you, Dave?”
He slumped down against a tree; glad to be off his trembling legs. He must have lost more blood than he thought. Shock was starting to set in. “Come help me. I’ve been wounded,” he said in a weak voice.
He must have passed out for a moment. The next thing he knew, Zapper was pulling his hand away from the wound. “Hold the light over here, Phil,” Zapper said.
Dave raised his head and saw Phil looking around. He stood with the rifle, poised to shoot at the first sound. “He’s dead, Phil. Relax and help Zapper,” he said in a hoarse voice.
“You’ve lost a lot of blood, Dave. Did Monty shoot you in the face with a shotgun?” Zapper asked as he bound the shoulder.
Zapper eased Dave to the ground on his back and turned Dave’s head so he could get a good look at the side of it. Blood seeped from dozens of splinters still lodged in the side of his face and cheek.
“This is going to hurt, Dave, but we have to get the splinters out.” Zapper dug in his first-aid pack and pulled out a pair of tweezers. Slowly, he began to pull the splinters out. Pulling the last one out, he asked Phil to open a few packets of medicated cream. As Phil handed them to him, he smeared the cream on the side of Dave’s face. Placing a large gauze bandage over it all, he tied it in place and sat back.
Dave struggled to sit up and they helped him by lifting him and placing his back against a tree.
“Monty told me Clint is dead.”
“We know, we found his body a little while ago,” Phil said.
Dave felt himself slowly sinking into sleep. He fought it, but couldn’t and was soon slumped against the tree, sound asleep.
* * * *
Zapper cleared away leaves in a space between two trees. Using his knife, he dug a hole in the ground. “Go to the dugout and get two sleeping bags, Phil. Bring back a pot to heat water in, so we can clean Dave’s wounds when he wakes up. I’ll build a fire to keep off the chill until you get back,”
Zapper said.
Phil turned and left while Zapper broke small twigs and placed them in the bottom of the hole. Soon, he had a blazing fire going. As carefully as he could, he eased Dave’s body near the fire. He took off his coat and laid it on Dave, who was shaking with a fever. Gathering rocks, he placed them the length of Dave’s body until he had built a wall two feet high. The wall of rocks kept the breeze off Dave. The wall also absorbed heat and radiated it back at Dave. For the first time that night, he let himself relax.
Sitting with his legs crossed, he tossed more wood on the fire as it burned down. It saddened him that Clint was dead, but in a way he couldn’t explain, he knew Clint was with his beloved wife, Sylvia.
“Be happy, amigo,” he whispered.
Staring into the orange glow of the fire, he wondered why he had never found someone special. Someone he wanted to share his life with. Living the way he did tended to put off any permanent relationships. Thinking about it, he considered himself lucky. He couldn’t imagine loving someone so much that when they were gone, an empty place formed inside like it did with Clint. To his way of thinking, it took a lot more courage than he had to go on living with that kind of permanent ache. No, he had always lived by and for himself. His wants and needs were simple. Still, he wondered what it felt like to care about someone more than he cared about himself. Being raised in an orphanage made a person realize the only one he could depend on was himself. Not that his life in the orphanage had been all that bad. The nuns and priests were kind. Punishment came only when it was warranted. No, he wouldn’t delude himself by saying he was this way because of his childhood.
His lone-wolf attitude was a conscious choice. One he made shortly after leaving the army. Many said the army was to blame, but he knew different. Many years of thinking about it brought him to the conclusion that it was “the edge.”
After living on the edge for two years, where death was an instant away, the mundane life of a normal person lost its luster. Once he was there with his senses consistently attuned to the now, the instant, normal life and its future planning seemed dull.
He found he had little tolerance for people and their petty problems. Most of which they brought on themselves. He discovered that life consisted of users and the used. Wanting to be neither, he kept to himself, avoiding the temptation of getting involved with other people. At times, it was lonely, but he considered it worth it to be able to say he was his own man. The only people he felt truly comfortable with were men like Phil and Dave. They had been there. They shared something very few people knew.
During those times when he became despondent, and he did from time to time, he would open his mind and try to think like a baby seeing things for the first time. Simple things like blades of grass moving in the breeze, a butterfly flapping from flower to flower took on a whole new meaning. The truth of the matter was that living on the edge of death for so long gave one a profound respect for life. Life, in its ever evolving process, consisted of events beyond number. People went through life not realizing their effect on others, or the way events controlled them. He knew it was cynical, but he considered people to be like sheep. They were led around and used by the few people who were users. In today’s world, even before the disease, he considered the users to be the people in positions of power.
How had it all gone astray? When had the people lost control of their government? When did it happen that the criminal received more rights than the victim?
The greatest tragedy was the loss of childhood innocence for today’s generation. His troubled thoughts were broken when Phil struggled into the clearing with his awkward load. They spread a sleeping bag out next to Dave and gently rolled him into it. He mumbled something in his fever-induced sleep. They zipped him up in the cocoonlike bag. Zapper went to gather more wood for the fire, while Phil set up a rod attached to two tripodlike stands on either side of the fire. He poured some water from a canteen into a blackened pot and placed it in the center of the fire on the rod. By the time Zapper returned with the wood, the water was boiling.
“That will hold us for the rest of the night,” Zapper said. He piled wood off to the side. He took the cup of coffee Phil gave him and sipped the hot brew. They both felt fatigue set in from the tension of the last twenty hours.
Sitting with his back against a tree, Phil said. “I don’t want to go through this again. When Dave recovers, I think I’ll leave.”
“Can’t say as I blame you, Phil, but I think we should stick together. Alone, anything can happen, but together, we stand a chance. Things are so fucked up out there in the world, you wouldn’t know who to trust. As for me, I’m going to wait until Dave can travel, then go with him. If you don’t have anyplace in particular to go, think about traveling with us,” Zapper said.
“No, no place in particular, Zap. My ex-wife and son are dead. They were killed at the start of this thing. There are no living relatives I want to visit. I thought I might live like you do for a while and sort it all out. To tell you the truth, what’s happening out there scares the shit out of me.”
“If I’ve learned anything in my years of solitude, it’s that running away won’t accomplish anything,” Zapper said.
“I don’t know if you’d call it running away as much as taking time to understand the new world order,” Phil said.
“What new world order? Human nature hasn’t changed since man came out of the caves. When you strip away all the trimmings, it comes down to one thing, good versus evil. This situation is a prime example of that. From the little I know of what’s going on out there, some very bad men are inflicting a lot of pain on innocent people,” Zapper said, as Dave moaned in his sleep.
‘Maybe it’s time we stripped away some of our so-called civilized ways. Shit, Phil, look at the shape our country was in before this happened. Crime everywhere, drugs being sold on street corners. The working class people being taxed out of existence by politicians who wanted to spend more and more of the money they didn’t have. Hell, maybe I am a sixties guy and haven’t kept up with all the changes in the world, but I do know this. When I was growing up, we settled things with our fists and if you lost, that was it. Today, if people have an argument or fight, the first thing they do, is go get a weapon and go back to blow away the winner.”
“Doesn’t say much for our society, does it?” Phil said.
“Look at today’s youth, ten and eleven year olds killing each other with guns. That was unheard of when I grew up. Power and greed have corrupted this country. I may not know a lot of things, but I do recognize that a teenager making thousands of dollars by selling drugs in school is wrong. Even if they’re caught, what do they get? A slap on the wrist and told to straighten up. No, there was something fundamentally wrong with our country. This is a mute point now. Oh, we still have the greed and power mongers, but the change is there are only two classes of people now. Us and them,”
Zapper said, pouring himself more coffee.
“From my understanding of the situation, if you aren’t like these crazy people, you have to die. No coexistence, no diplomacy; just death for those who are different. It cuts across all ethnic and racial barriers. On the radio, I’ve heard of former Ku Klux Klan members working with black people. Cops working side by side with crooks. Let me tell you, there are a hell of a lot more of them, than there are of us,” Phil said.
“From what I heard, millions of people have died and many more have been killed. By now, we’re lucky if twenty percent of the country’s population is still alive. Of that twenty percent, fifteen are like Monty was. Over the last month, I’ve heard reports of a fellow by the name of Todd wiping out pockets of people like us. Seems this Todd has gathered a large army of people like him and is setting up his own form of government.” Zapper put his hand against Dave’s forehead and shook his head saying, “He has one hell of a fever.”
“This new President Donaldson is doing the same thing on the east coast. Sooner or later, they are going to clash. The only thing separating them now is the stubborn resistance of the mountain people in Appalachia. I’ve given it some thought and if Dave agrees, I think we should try and make our way back to these rebels and give them what help we can,” Zapper said and eased down into his sleeping bag.
They both fell silent, lost in thought. A little later, Phil stood up and said he would take the first watch. Zapper crawled into the sleeping bag and dropped into a troubled sleep. Four hours later, Phil woke him for his watch and crawled into the warm sleeping bag Zapper left. Zapper heated a pot of water over the hot coals of the fire and made himself a cup of coffee. Every now and then, he would check on Dave, who was now resting easily.
As the light of a new day began to filter through the trees, he woke Phil. Together, using two folding shovels, they dug a grave. Phil went to the spring and brought back Clint’s body. After lowering it into the hole, they filled in the grave.
“What about Monty?” Zapper asked.
“Far as I’m concerned, let the animals have him.”
“No,” a hoarse voice said.
Looking over, they saw Dave propped up on a wobbly elbow. “Even though he tried to kill us, he was our friend. It could have been any of us that went over to the disease. I don’t blame Monty. What happened to him was beyond his control and we shouldn’t hold it against him. Bury him as you would a friend. That’s the least he deserves for the years of friendship we’ve known.” Dave collapsed back to the ground.
After checking on Dave, Zapper and Phil went through the woods until they came to Monty’s body. Removing the heavy knife from his forehead, they laid him out in the grass. Going through his pockets, Phil pulled out two sets of dog tags. Without saying a word, he handed them to Zapper.
“Shit, shit, shit,” Zapper mumbled over and over. The dog tags belonged to two members of their team. At least they knew the fate of the men. The only way Monty could have gotten the tags was by killing them. Now there was only six of them left.
In silence, they dug a grave and placed Monty in it. They carried rocks and piled them on the grave to keep animals from digging up the body.
Not much was said the rest of the day as they watched Dave overcome his shock-induced fever. By the next day, Dave was able to stand and walk around the clearing for short periods of time. At the end of the week, he told them he was ready to start east. Packing everything they thought they would need, they made their way out of Yellowstone Park.