Life Among The Dead (Book 3): A Bittersweet Victory (28 page)

“Yeah? Well, it’s gone downhill. Just like
the rest of this town,” Bruce said snidely. “This is supposed to be
a multi-disciplinary project, right? They want to mix the subjects:
art, English, math, and science. Why the fuck can’t we add some
history?”

“Why is he dead?” Danny asked, ignoring the
most recent frackus among the adults.

“He got impaled,” Bruce said, satisfied the
figure was well stuck to the grey cardboard wall that they had
dabbed with sponges to look like concrete. “We’re building this
from the plans of a real reactor. One day there was an explosion in
the core. This gentleman got pinned to the wall like a cocktail
wiener. Radiation was leaking, so they had no choice but to leave
him until they got it under control. He must have been in there for
weeks, maybe months, by the time they had everything
decontaminated. When they retrieved his body, he was still fresh as
a daisy. He should have been bloated and stinking to high heaven,
but radiation halts the decomposition process.”

“He didn’t rot?”

“Nope. This same principle is why a lot of
your supermarket fruits and veggies have such a long shelf life.
It’s called irradiation.”

Danny jotted notes for the report he had to
write to accompany the project. “Is this how irritation was
discovered?”

“Irradiation. You know, I’m not too sure
about that one. I’ll hit the books and give you a call before this
is due,” Bruce said. He noticed that Wall was not in his chair any
longer. Usually his brother liked to watch them do their projects
together. Also as usual, the boy’s mother would pull Wall aside at
some point to tell him she wanted Bruce to leave. “Make sure you
put in those misconceptions we talked about. Despite this accident,
and all the other accidents, nuclear power is quite safe. Not as
safe as my dam, of course, but if they could just find a better way
to get rid of the waste, it’s just as clean. Probably the cleanest
of all the fancy ways of boiling water for power.”

“You’re gonna be leaving soon, aren’t you?”
Danny asked sadly.

“Sooner than I had planned, but you and I
both know that’s always the case,” Bruce said, as Wallace headed
outside. “I’ll be back in a sec. I have to step out for a
smoke.”

“We were going camping,” Danny said.

“We will,” Bruce assured. “And I don’t mean
next time. Pack your shit. Trust me.”

Outside, Wallace leaned against the house.
“Is it just me, or are your visits getting shorter?”

“Oh, it isn’t you.” Bruce lit a cigarette. A
big no-no so close to the house. “Don’t even say it! I was born and
raised here. I’ll smoke where I damn well please. We’re in New
Hampshire. Cleanest air on the planet. The boy needs a little
second hand smoke or else he won’t be able to thrive anywhere else.
Like that kid Travolta played in that movie.”

“I thought you were quitting,” Wallace said,
while tapping his finger on the lid of a Copenhagen can to pack the
dip to one side.

“I could ask the same of you and that nasty
shit.” Bruce pointed to the smokeless tobacco with disgust. “I’ve
never thought ‘Wow! It’s been a while since I put some crap in my
mouth that makes me deathly afraid to swallow my own spit, and
makes my gums bleed.’”

From his room above them, young Dan listened
to the two men he looked up to most in the world while he got his
gear together. Uncle Bruce never broke a promise, so if he said
they were going camping, that’s what was going to happen.

“I worry about you, brother,” Wall said. “Why
don’t you stop chasing those younger girls and just find a nice one
your own age to settle down with? You could move back here and be
happy.”

“Yeah, married life looks like a blast to
me,” Bruce said. “I’m far happier with nubile ladies in their early
twenties. Besides, I don’t chase ’em. They chase me. Personally, I
think marriage has softened you. I just haven’t said anything till
now.”

“It isn’t being soft. It’s called
compromise.”

Bruce scoffed at that.

“If Nancy had her total way, would you even
be here now?” Wall said. “No, you wouldn’t. She lets you come out.
I ask you to go when she’s had enough of you. I’d like to be able
to see more of you, Danny would too… Rosie would have wanted you to
move on.”

“Really? Last I recall she wanted to get
married.”

“She’d want you to be happy. True happiness,
not screwing strippers and making grand gestures in her name. It’s
going to ruin you.”

The boy eavesdropping upstairs had never
heard them get so serious. Usually they joked and verbally abused
one another, and then physically abused one another. The tension in
the air below his window was thick.

Wallace continued, “She’s gone, man, and it’s
a damned shame. You can give to all the charities in the world,
Bruce, you’ll never be able to bring her back.”

“Wouldn’t that be something?” Bruce sounded
sad, like he was about to cry. Danny’s own mood waned
empathetically until his uncle called to him, strong as ever, “Ya
ready, boy?”

“What’s this?” Wall asked.

“I promised my nephew a camping trip,” Bruce
said, tossing his gear into the back of his truck as if nothing was
wrong and no emotional wounds had been opened.

“Not tonight. We’re in for a big
thunderstorm.”

“That never stopped us as kids,” Bruce said.
“Danny and I can take whatever Mother Nature throws at us. If
you’re up early enough, when we break camp you can see me off. If
not, I guess I’ll be seeing you in another year or so. Come on,
Danny! We’re burning daylight!”

A full grown Dan Williamson has trouble
emerging from his jaunt down memory lane, spurred on by what Carla
and Oz reported about their meeting with Major Barnwell. He began
telling them about the project he and his uncle worked on many
years ago, and then got lost in his own mind.

“Honey, are you there?” Heather asks him, as
he blinks a few times to adjust to reality. “You just drifted away
from us.”

“Sorry,” he says to those around him--his
lovely wife, his two loyal lieutenants, and Brock Rottom. The suite
given to his family is quite spacious, but with so many folks in
attendance it feels cramped and claustrophobic. “Anyways, Bruce and
I did go camping and we caught fireflies together.”

“I’d like to hear about that someday,”
Heather gives him a hug. In light of what the three had come for,
it’ll have to wait.

“Oz thinks it’s suspicious,” Carla redirects
them back to the original topic.

“It just doesn’t add up,” Oz says. “I don’t
think he’s told us everything.”

“I think they’re just scared,” Carla says.
“The radiation isn’t only stopping the clock for the dead. It’s
altering their brains. The major showed us aerial footage of
them.”

Oz continues, “It was weird. Droves of them
headed to the nuke plant, and just stood around staring at it. We
saw clips of them chasing something, climbing over and through
obstacles like no zombie we’ve ever seen. Like a small part of them
woke up and now they’re able to problem solve.”

“And he isn’t talking about Sudoku,” Carla
adds.

“That changes the tide in this war, doesn’t
it?” Dan ponders. “If this Brass fellow is as armed as the major
says, and if his people are as efficient…”

“I think it’s the food!” Brock says.

“We have food,” Carla counters.

“But not enough for the long haul,” Heather
says, with little Vincent, soon to be one year old, on her hip.
Their adopted son Jack plays on the floor with a set of large
blocks. She’s almost in her second trimester with their third son,
Johnny, and just starting to show. “With the cure, and with people
reproducing, it won’t be enough, even with the volunteers they send
out fishing.”

“They’ve already started rationing!” Brock
Rottom reminds the group. “Smaller portions, less options. They
won’t even let me restock my truck! I’m down to snow cones and
shaved ice!”

“What’s the difference?” Carla asks.

“There is no difference,” Brock admits.

The rationing hasn’t hit the Williamson
family as hard since small children and expectant mothers have been
excluded from the cut. Dan himself is on a high iron diet to
counteract the frequent blood draws required to manufacture the
vaccine. He thought it odd that they were scheduling so many draws
lately, but now he knows why.
They
still
haven’t
given
all
of
us
the
shot
.
Now
they
need
enough
to
cover
everyone
.

Dan had a run-in with a special carrier of
the virus, a bubble girl by the name of Eve Snyder. The girl’s
immunodeficiency enabled the plague to infect her without any
resistance. It became a part of her but left her alive. Alive but
hungry. One bite from her was enough to pass it to Dan. His body
fought off this weaker strain and built precious, usable
antibodies.

“So, sweetie,” Carla says to Dan, “jealous
that you can’t come with?”

“No. Just worried,” he tells her. He’s
suffered many loses during this past year, but he’s gained so much.
Even if his blood wasn’t required for the antibodies it holds, even
if half of his left foot hadn’t been bitten off by a gator, he
doubts he’d want to go out there. “So, these super-zombies are
heading south on an intercept with this town?”

“Rubicon, yup,” Carla says.

Oz smiles. “Rubicon. That name’s a bad omen.
Then again, I’m from Waterloo.”

“Why’s that?” Heather asks.

“The word Rubicon is synonymous with a point
of no return. It’s a river in Italy that Caesar had to cross. Doing
so was an act of war and meant that once he and his troops landed
on the other side there was no turning back. The die was cast. God
I miss the History Channel.”

“Did the major say how many?” Dan asks.

“The way he put it, ‘imagine the population
of New York all of a sudden decided to take a walk at the same
time,’” Oz says. “Their spotters in the sky report waves of them
are heading our way, with Rubicon in between. We’re supposed to use
the cure as an incentive to get the citizens and all their stuff
here. We leave tomorrow at zero eight hundred.”

“We just came to say goodbye.” Carla hugs the
couple in turn. “Tell you what’s up.”

“The vampires in the lab have me scheduled
for yet another bloodletting at that time,” Dan says.

“Probably don’t want you trying to tag
along,” Carla says.

“Maybe. Fuck ’em. I’ll be there to see you
guys off.”

Dan shakes hands with Oz and Brock before
they depart. Then he and Heather exchange looks of concern for
their friends, but they know that if anyone can handle themselves
out there it’s them. However, they still worry. They’re family.

Dan sits with Jack, trying to get his mind
off this new revelation while the boy builds with blocks. His wife
takes the floor next to him and holds him tightly with her free
arm. The Williamsons find comfort in the safety of their suite,
watching the boys play. Though Jack and Vincent are from different
parents and nine months apart, they are as inseparable as twins.
The two chatter in a language all their own.

Heather senses troubled thoughts in her
husband’s mind, so she distracts him.“Tell me about the
fireflies.”

No sooner do the recruits finish their
training before Brass gives them and a few of his seasoned soldiers
new assignments. Abby is not pleased with his, and as soon as he
gets Brass alone in the armory he tells him as much. “This is
bullshit!”

“What’s bullshit?” Brass sighs. He was in
high spirits on the ride back from the final exam, but now that his
people have dispersed to prepare, those spirits drop as he
self-reflects.

“I should be going to that base, not test
driving an outpost.”

“I have my reasons. You, myself, and Vida are
going to stay at Gabe’s tonight. Lady Luck can handle Eagle
Rock.”

“It doesn’t make any sense,” Abby complains.
“Vida has seen Gabe’s family. She’d be able to recognize them on
sight. She and I should be going to Eagle Rock.”

“If the place is still standing, all our
people have to do is ask to see them. If it has fallen, they’ll
bring in anyone alive, along with all they can carry out of the
armory. I think returning to the farm will be good for Vida.”

“Fine,” Abby surrenders, but he would still
rather be in on the mission to the base. It’ll be the farthest
they’ve travelled since establishing their settlement and he’s
going to miss out. “Maybe Vida can bring her guitar to pass the
time.”

“Pass the… How about talking to her?” Brass’s
mood shifts to irritation.

“What’s your problem?”

“You, you dense fuck! How about sharing the
time instead of killing it? Talk, laugh, kiss the pretty girl!”

“Is that what this is about?” Abby asks. It
isn’t the first time Brass has attempted to push him into the arms
of a woman. “I told you--”

“Yes, I know! When things are better. What if
things never get better? What then? What if this is as good as it
gets, as close as we’ll ever come to normalcy?” His harsh words
echo. “How many homes have we entered where the folks inside
starved to death, waiting for help that never came? Maybe making a
run would’ve gotten them killed, or maybe it would have saved them.
They never took the chance.”

Abby struggles for another excuse. “Plus,
she’s only seventeen.”

“During an apocalypse! Times like these age
us in dog years.” The age gap between the young pair isn’t much,
but in the world before it would be construed as inappropriate,
illegal in some states. “I hate watching you chase a future that
may never be. You should at the least be able to share it with
someone. Take some sort of comfort, no matter how fleeting.”