“Whose on guard duty?” I asked.
She sipped her coffee and said
“Karen’s up on the roof for another hour.” “I’m surprised OMT isn’t walking his way through the ceiling like he normally does.” She said “Tell me about it, I think he spends more time up there than any two people combined. But he’s out back with Amy, they are getting the Humvee ready for their field trip.”
Crap, he was taking Mrs. Driscol with him, this was not acceptable. I got up and started towards the door,
“Where are you going?” Janey asked.
“Cutting off a bud of something” I said.
She looked at me strangely and asked
“You mean ‘cutting things off at the bud? Right?”
Whatever I thought, I shut the door behind me and walked out onto the front porch. I started down the stairs and I saw the lights from the Humvee coming around the side of the lodge. I heard the deep throaty engine as it nearly idled into view. I stepped in front of them and they stopped. OMT put it in park and got out.
“What’s up John? Did you get up to say goodbye?” he said.
“No.” I said “I’m going with you.”
He smiled but shook his head no, “You don’t have to do that. Mrs. Driscol is going.”
I heard her voice from inside “AMY!” she corrected.
“They need her here, I should go, we went to Morgantown, and I know what to do.”
The old man looked confused
“John it’s just a scouting mission, maybe some supplies if we get the chance.”
Mrs. Driscol got out of the Hummer and came around to join in the conversation
“What is going on Johnny?” she asked.
I looked at her then said “You are too important to...”
I hesitated trying to find a reason for her to stay and suddenly I had it.
“You are too important to Lucy, I heard her last night, and she asked Elaine if you could be her new mommy.”
Mrs. Driscol looked like I had just stabbed her and she covered her mouth with both hands.” Elaine’s explanation echoed
“I think she just needs to feel safe. Like someone is taking care of her.”
Mrs. Driscol looked like she was going to cry and she looked at OMT, he said
“Maybe you should stay here this time Mrs. Driscol, till Lucy gets her feet under her.”
I felt bad; it was clear that Mrs. Driscol was moved by Lucy’s wish, but I didn’t want OMT to be alone with her, she was a good person and he was a monster. I knew it, but nobody else had seen him do the things I had. He was a monster in an old man’s body and he had killed my mother and I would never let him ruin anyone else’s life.
I had the feeling I had to seal the deal as dad would have said so I said “You can talk to Elaine about it but don’t say anything to Lucy, at least not right away.” She nodded then said “well, I guess you are going with Mr. Tucker then, she stepped back and gave me a little wave, then the strangest thing happened, it was like the tiny and delicate Mrs. Driscol approached Mr. Tucker and went to kiss him on the cheek or something. Mr. Tucker quickly stepped back and turned away, he spoke over his shoulder,
“John and I should be back late tonight or early morning but if we get delayed don’t worry if we don’t get back till tomorrow night.”
His broad back was all I could see as he climbed into the Humvee.
“Right.”
Mrs. Driscol said in a tiny voice, I looked at her and she looked terribly embarrassed.
“Good luck Johnny, do what Mr. Tucker says and be careful okay?”
She turned away from me and half ran up the stairs. I didn’t really get what was going on here but it seemed that she was upset. Well good. She should be upset and embarrassed. Billy’s dad had only been gone for 2 weeks and here she was throwing herself at a…what? Ogre? Troll? Whatever he was he didn’t deserve to be happy and her husband didn’t deserve to be forgotten like an old shoe. I wondered if she had forgotten Billy too. I was angry as I climbed into the Humvee and I slammed the door shut but OMT didn’t seem to notice, he just started down the drive towards Elaine’s confusing road hiding maze
I kept waiting for OMT to say something about what had happened but he didn’t, at least he had a sense of shame and knew when to shut up. We drove about 30 minutes, taking an exit we had not used before. After a while there was a sign for Enterprise, West Virginia, population 1033. We drove through town or what was left of it anyway. There wasn’t a building left standing, some were just piles of rubble others looked like they had exploded. There wasn’t any fire that I could see but there were a few smoke trails. There were bodies everywhere; not a thousand but certainly a few hundred people were gathered in little clusters where they made their last stand, some were wearing military uniforms, but I didn’t see any heavy weapons or tanks, not many small arms either and those I could see were damaged beyond use. It was if the Z’s had destroyed them on purpose so others couldn’t use them. There were some Z corpses but not many, I saw only 10 or so. Neither of us spoke as we left the little village behind.
The next town was only about 10 minutes away but after five OMT stopped the Humvee and shut off the engine.
“Listen” he said.
We both sat there a moment then I got out. I could hear gunfire in the distance. For a bit there was quite a bit of machine gun fire and the rumble of some big guns. We were only about a mile from town.
“THERE!!” I called as I pointed in the air off in the distance.
“What is it?” OMT was squinting again.
“A helicopter Mr. Tucker, an army helicopter” I said. “Its tiny this far away but it is there for sure.”
“Okay, let’s get a bit closer” he said.
We got back into the Humvee and started to slowly head towards Shinnston West Virginia, front line in the war against the Zs. We followed the road right into town; we began to pass wrecks on the side of the road. Humvees, trucks, strange tank looking things with no turret or big gun, there was a huge tank that was on fire and the flames came out of it like a propane torch. OMT pulled over and said
“John, I want you to stay here and guard the Humvee. I want to take a closer look.”
I shook my head “we should stay together.”
He looked at me, “John, I need to count on you. If something happens to the Humvee we are screwed. I need to count on you to guard it. Can you do that?”
I was angry about being left behind but I shook my head yes.
“Good, I won’t be long.”
He got out, the Thompson in his hands, then half shuffled/half ran down a street off of ours to the right. According to a bent road sign it was called Pike Street. The old man jogged out of sight while I angrily charged a round in my M-16.
I waited; then I waited some more; then I waited some more. What seemed like hours to me was probably more like 20 minutes but I found that I was unable to just sit there any longer. I took the keys from ignition and slipped out of the Humvee. I crouched and moved along the rubble on the nearest side of Pike Street. I suddenly felt extremely vulnerable and out in the open. I skirted around a burned out tank and suddenly I felt something hit me in the side of the head. I turned and looked up at a yellow brick building that might have been a church. There was a huge metal bell hanging in a nook on the second floor and peeking at me over the edge was OMT. I sighed and he pointed to the door to my left. I crossed the side walk and dashed inside. There was a stairwell that led to the second floor so I followed it. I saw OMT he was kneeling behind the half wall with the binoculars to his eyes. I crouched and half crawled over next to him.
“What do you see?” I asked.
He handed me the binoculars and pointed a direction across the street from me and just to the right of the remains of some small building. Perhaps a hundred yards away there were three large two story buildings, the streets connecting them had been blocked off with military vehicles of all kinds, Humvees, huge trucks and multi-wheeled things that I had never seen before. There were bodies everywhere, dozens of them, nearly all were human.
“What happened?”
I asked but before he could answer I heard a scream and a gunshot, a moment later a headless torso shattered a window on the second floor; it flew through the air for perhaps 20 feet before landing with a splat in the grass front yard. There was a second scream and then silence. We watched as the Zs moved from building to building, room to room, searching, hunting, and killing.
I started to give the binoculars back but saw that OMT was holding a scope to his eye and was watching intently so I kept them. We watched for almost an hour, the victims of the attack were found out and eliminated one by one by the Zs. They had changed so much it was hard to believe that they had once been human beings. OMT leaned over and whispered to me,
“I saw Zs coming from the other end of town, I think the last hold outs were trapped between two groups of Zs. When I got here there was only a few scattered shots, the military had been wiped out by then.”
I looked back at the buildings that had made the improvised fortress, brick and solid; many of the vehicles had large caliber guns on them. I suddenly felt sick as I saw a Z’s dragging the corpse of a small child by one leg. Once having pulled the corpse into the open it looked all around as if looking for observers and then it squatted and began to eat it. I felt my stomach revolt and I had to look away.
“I have seen enough OMT. Let’s get out of here” I said.
“Not yet.” he answered.
So we waited and we watched for over an hour of the same. I gave it up and faced away, resting my head in my hands. I had dozed off when OMT shook me awake,
“John” he whispered.
I took the binoculars and peeked over the edge. The Zs were gathering in the open area in front of one of the buildings. They were bunched up in concentric circles without regard for size, the newest arrivals just filling in space in the outermost circle. Their heads all pointed towards the center with scarcely any space between their shoulders.
“Listen, do you here that?” I asked.
OMT gave a noncommittal grunt in response. There were about 50 of them and when the last Z arrived they began to make a soft buzzing or humming sound but I could not tell if it came from their throats or some other way.
“What are they doing?” I asked.
OMT shrugged;
“Not sleeping, talking or thinking? No, I think they are deciding.” he said.
“Deciding what?”
I said with a touch of fear in my voice. We watched in silence after that and for an hour or so nothing happened except more of their stupid singing then without warning four of them, all shoulder to shoulder peeled away from the circle and dashed off in a ‘V’ formation as if they knew where they were going. A few moments later four more did the same thing in another direction and I swallowed hard. OMT looked at me
“OK John, we can go now.”
We worked our way downstairs and found a way to a fire exit set in the back wall; it was ajar so no alarm sounded when we passed through, of course in retrospect with no power that wouldn’t have been an issue. The road turned back towards Pike Street but a poorly paved one lane road continued towards the overpass where we had left the Humvee. On our left we passed the burnt out shell of a machine shop but when OMT saw the corpse of a Z on the ground he handed me the Thompson and he raced to the body. He kicked it a couple of times; satisfied he picked up one arm and put his thick bullish neck under it. His other arm reached between its legs and he lifted it so that it road across his shoulders. “Come on.” he said already breathing heavily as we started up the slope that led to the overpass.
I stared after him, he truly was crazy. He didn’t answer my hushed questions until he gasped out
“In a sec John.”
When the Humvee was just a few yards away I raced ahead of him and jerked a rear door open with a painful, metallic squeal. OMT looked up at me with panic in his eyes then he threw the corpse into the Humvee and spat in a whisper
“Let’s get out of here!”
He ran around to the driver’s door and I climbed in the other seat. He snatched the keys I held out to him. The Humvee roared to life and we quickly pulled a wide U-turn before we back tracked out of town.
“Alright, why do we have a dead Z in the back?”
I demanded. He was checking the rear view mirror when I asked which made look behind us but I saw no pursuit. He looked back at me and answered me with a question of his own;
“Do you know who Sun Tzu was?”
I shook my head no and he continued
“He was a Chinese General who won a whole lot of battles and in his spare time between drinking tea and chopping off heads he wrote a book called “The Art of War.”
I stared and waited, he went on
“Sun Tzu said something like ‘
know thyself and know thy enemy and you will win a hundred battles blah blah blah yadda yadda yadda
’. I intend to know my enemy.”
We sat in silence for a moment then he added
“Inside and out.”
I shivered and looked at the black and brown creature in the back seat.
We didn’t head back to the lodge, instead OMT insisted we try to reach the last town on our list but our route was long and confusing, we eventually found a little motel. It had been ransacked but it was unclear if it was by Zs or by survivors. There were three human corpses in the lobby but they were swollen and already in a state of decay. We claimed the room that was as far from them as possible at the far end of the parking lot, it was undamaged and locked but a quick kick by OMT’s size 12 boot and we were in. We dug out some MREs and made some food. We ate in silence then I crawled in one of the beds while OMT sat at the little table in our room with a flashlight going over a map of West Virginia. I fell asleep and dreamt of humming bugs.