The Broken and the Dead

I heard Old Man Tucker’s voice he was calling out to me; I sat up in the back seat of the Humvee and saw him heading towards me. I shook my head to clear it, I was still breathing hard when he got to me

“John! Are you alright?”

His eyes, normally small and so dark they looked like little more than black marbles had turned to mere slits. His bushy eyebrows framing them and giving him a wild, unpredictable look. He opened the door and reached in, placing his hand on my shoulder, “John?” he asked again. I jerked my shoulder away not wanting him to touch me,

“I’m FINE!” I barked then added in a little calmer voice “I was dreaming is all.”

He stood erect and nodded,

“It. happens to all of us now and then.”

When I didn’t answer he added

“John, come on and get something to eat and drink. You will feel better.”

He stepped back to give me room so I climbed out of the Humvee and I suddenly found that I didn’t want to make eye contact with him. I knew it happened to everyone, he didn’t have to say that, I didn’t want him to say anything like that to me; ever.

He had let me sleep late so I wolfed down a MRE and helped him pack as many things into the trailer as possible. He was loading rubber hoses, lots of them, shoving them in where ever he could find space.

“What are these far?” I asked.

He shrugged, “Dunno, waterin gardens maybe, just they would be hard to make and they aren’t that heavy so...” he let his voice trail away.

I did as he did, when the shelf was empty of garden hoses we looked around one last time. As we were leaving I saw some of those farmer jeans, you know bib overalls. I looked through the pile and took a couple pair of the largest size; I followed him to the Humvee after I took one last look in the store. I slid in next to him as he started the engine. I tossed the overalls into his lap and said

“Here you go Old McDonald, if you are going to play farmer you should look the part.”

He laughed as he picked them up,

“You know, I think I’ll look pretty good in these.” he said. Why did he always laugh when I was trying to hurt him? I hate that.

We pulled out of the lot, the Humvee not really having any difficulty with the overloaded horse trailer. From his jacket OMT produced a sheaf of papers, our lists, and handed them to me. We spent nearly two hours going over them, trying to remember what we had loaded and what we had not found. Making additions when necessary and notes where we exceeded our quantity or if we were still short. I was surprised when he told me that he had loaded the entire contents of a seed display rack, including dozens of packages of ‘heirloom’ seeds albeit that most of those were tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, and pumpkins. I asked him why heirlooms were special and he explained that those seeds had not been modified by seed companies so that any fruit they produced would have seeds able to be planted successfully.

“What?” I asked.

I could not believe that a company would make seeds for plants that could not reproduce. He gave me a ’what can you do’ face and lifted one eye brow in emphasis. I shook my head and thought I had heard just about everything.

Not long after that we got back onto the highway and I started to get excited. We would be back at the lodge soon; I surprised myself how much I wanted to see everyone, my sisters, Janey and even the Kyle and Karen even though I had not got to know them very well. Mile after mile my anticipation grew and I laughed at myself as I realized my right leg was bouncing about as if all on its own. We slowly took the exit ramp then went across the overpass and then back tracked on the service road. Now we had experienced my sister’s camouflage efforts I knew what to look for and I pointed out the well concealed path that zigzagged its way off the service road and eventually intersected the gravel road that led up to the lodge.

I started to breathe out when suddenly I was overcome with fear that maybe we would find them all dead. My heart pounded in my chest and I started to ask OMT if he thought everything was okay when I felt the Humvee slow and looking ahead I saw a pair of huge military vehicles, a type that I had never seen before.

“What the hell is that?” OMT asked.

“No idea” I answered.

I could tell he was debating what to do when I saw my older sister Elaine and a soldier walking out the front door of the lodge. She did not look to be distressed and she had a rifle slung over her shoulder so I figured it must be okay. I looked over at OMT and was surprised when I did not see relief on his face. I realized that he could not see them so I said

“Look, there’s Elaine, everything looks like it is okay.”

He leaned forward and squinted

“Oh right, good”

He pressed on the accelerator and the Humvee jerked forward; Elaine and the soldier turned and walked towards us, waving to us, a smile on her face. But it was not the bright, excited smile I had anticipated and I realized something was wrong. The soldier at her side looked relaxed though and she did not display any concern towards him, he was Hispanic, broad shouldered and his head was shaved. He struck me as confident and probably not a guy to mess with.

OMT put the Humvee in park and shut it down once we had pulled as close to the big military vehicles as could. We got out and Elaine came and hugged me tightly and when she did she whispered to me

“Something has happened Johnny”.

I looked over at OMT who was introducing himself to the soldier who turned out to be PFC Rico Hernandez, 10th Mountain Division. The soldier didn’t seem to try and disarm OMT and they seemed pretty relaxed so I looked over at Elaine but she was looking up at the porch.

My gaze followed hers and a tumble of people came out of the lodge; Janey, Karen and Kyle, and behind them, much to my surprise, the Livingston’s. Mr. Livingston came down the stairs and walked up to OMT. They shook hands and Mr. Livingston seemed to have a sad smile on his face, Mrs. Livingston followed her husband and hugged Old Man Tucker. I couldn’t hear what they were saying exactly but then all of us looked up at the porch to see Mrs. Driscol holding Lucy’s hand and next to her was a very tall black soldier. He was thin but well-muscled, he had an automatic rifle slung on his shoulder and I knew right away who it was because of how much he looked like his sister; it was Darnell Livingston.

I was waiting for the young soldier to shoot OMT and I had not yet decided how I would feel about that when I caught a pale yellow streak out of the corner of my eye. I saw Lucy and she was racing towards Old Man Tucker; she reached back and with all the force she could muster she nailed OMT in the privates with her fist.

“OOOPH!” he said as he involuntarily bent over.

“YOU SAID ONE DAY! ONE DAY!” she yelled.

“But Miss Lucy...” he began.

She kicked him in the shin,

“I DON’T CARE ABOUT YOUR BUTT, YOU SAID ONE DAY!”

OMT was now limping away, holding his hands up in front of him;

“Miss Lucy, PLEASE...” he begged.

She made a fist and acting as if she were going to hit him again but instead she said

“YOU ARE A LIAR AND I DON’T LIKE YOU ANYMORE!”

Lucy spun on her heels and stormed up the stairs and into the lodge. At last, someone else saw him for what he was, a monster, and one worse than the things out there; he was right here in our own group. I felt a smirk on my face but when I looked at the Old Man he seemed deflated and small. If I didn’t know better I would have thought that he had actually been hurt, that he actually had feelings.

Mrs. Driscol walked up to him and I stepped close enough to listen in

“Mr. Tucker, don’t be mad at Lucy, she was terribly worried about you and Johnny.”

I looked at him and I saw despair in his eyes. He said quietly

“I’m not mad at Lucy, Mrs. Driscol”.

Darnell Livingston walked up beside Mrs. Driscol and said

“Kids huh? Can’t live with ’em and can’t eat ’em.”

He laughed. OMT looked at him and then walked away. Mrs. Driscol said

“Mr. Tucker...”

But the young soldier grabbed her arm and whispered to her softly to let him go.

After that we all gathered in the Lodge dining room and full introductions were made. Our band had grown significantly. It seems that Darnell, as he insisted that I call him, had indeed been in California when his unit was overwhelmed from inside and out. A dozen soldiers had got obtained a bus somewhere outside of Reno and made it to Colorado before things started to fall apart. Apparently things had become ‘fluid’, whatever that meant, people came and went but he and two of his friends stuck together as they tried to head home. They had been picked up by another band that was heading east and that group had just split into two after leaving Covington. That was where they had gotten those huge army vehicles, they were called M-RAPS, which I found out stood for Mine Resistant Ambush Protected Vehicles. Anyway they were big, armored and not eco-friendly.

Most of the convoy had turned south towards Florida; only two vehicles had headed here. It turns out that the two vehicles parked out front had contained five people when they arrived at the Livingston’s home in addition to Darnell there was: Rico Hernandez from the 10th Mountain Division, St. Louis County Deputy Sheriff Carl Weir, and two Marine Corps Reservists, Staff Sargent Vincent Barnes and 2nd Lieutenant Jessica Klein. Both were in the 1st Battalion, 24th Marine Regiment but although Lt. Klein was highest in rank apparently none of that mattered anymore. OMT said to her that he didn’t know women could be infantry officers and she said she had been in the second group of women to graduate from the school back in December of 2013. She had been in Motor-T for 8 years before being selected. OMT said that it was about time and that the women marines he knew had been strong and capable soldiers.

Everyone was talking and getting settled when I realized that I had not seen Mrs. Franks so I asked Elaine about her and she whispered to me that she was upstairs and that was what had happened. She swallowed and explained to me that not long after the soldiers arrived Mr. Franks had gotten a gun from the armory and shot himself. Mrs. Franks was upstairs and had taken some sleeping pills, Janey and Karen were taking turns watching over her. I sat back and thought about it, I had to figure this out, I didn’t like Mr. Franks but this was wrong. Why did he do it? I knew he had never gotten over what those people had done to him and his wife but this? Didn’t he care about his wife? I tried to be upset, I really did but it just wasn’t there. I decided I Mr. Franks was a coward, he didn’t help anyone and now he was dead, I decided that I just didn’t care.

Everyone took turns telling their story but to me it was just the same song with different words. I told everyone about our trip while OMT sat there next to the two marines as if their honor and courage could somehow rub off on him; good luck with that. Finally I turned it over to OMT so he could tell what he had found out about the monsters. He produced the cell phone and passed around the disgusting pictures to anyone who wanted to see them. He talked a good game, he sounded as if he knew what he was talking about anyway. I wondered how he knew about such things but I kept it to myself. Basically the infected people had evolved into something new. He said it was his opinion that the nerve bundles at the base of their skull were actually creatures who had taken over their human hosts; that somehow these creatures had re-written the DNA of the former humans and that whatever they were now, they were not finished.

I looked over at Lucy sitting on Mrs. Driscol’s lap as she stared daggers at Old Man Tucker and that was when I realized that even though she was mad at him now, she would eventually forgive him, damn it. I also saw that Darnell never left Mrs. Driscol’s side and that he was making quiet little jokes while OMT was talking and that Mrs. Driscol didn’t seem to mind so much. I was feeling pretty smug and relieved by this since I had been afraid that Mrs. Driscol was starting to like Old Man Tucker. This was much better after all, the handsome young black soldier was intelligent and charming and this, well, this was the end of the world.

As the discussion finished people started wandering off and Mrs. Driscol carried Lucy upstairs and I found myself becoming pretty drowsy. It had been a long day and I think the stress of things was wearing on me, I was sure glad to be back here at the lodge. I saw the lady Marine sit by OMT and she started a conversation. She was in her thirties, had short cropped blond hair, and reminded me of one of those lady Olympic high jumpers; all arms and legs, she was almost as tall as OMT. He told her that he had been in the 2nd Marines many years ago as an oh-300, whatever that was. He answered her questions and it seemed I was not the only one that was wondering about his past. In response to her he said that he had a degree in engineering and had taught at both the high school and college level. Teaching high school bio had given him the skills to dissect the monster and the background to know what was missing and what shouldn’t have been there at all.

The last thing I heard before I too dozed off was OMT saying that the monsters were searching out pockets of survivors and eliminating them. He told her about the humming circle and that he was starting to feel that we might have to change strategies if the human race was going to survive. More bull shit from a liar, a murderer and my own personal monster.