Surge (104 page)

“Can we not talk about this?” I ask. “If I hear anymore, then I’m gonna kill the guy in the trunk, before we get the information that we need out of him.”

“Fine,” John says. “We’ll talk about it when you’re not around.”

“Fine,” I agree. “Anyway, how can you tell that it’s safe to camp somewhere for the night?”

I’m curious since Olivia’s been taking us to her safe houses, and the only one I picked out myself, was the ranch. It kind of makes me feel inept that I don’t have the experience these guys have, since I’ve spent almost two years in the relative safety of my childhood home, but it was what I thought to be best. And it did serve us well, so I guess it was an alright decision.

“No place is a guarantee to be completely safe,” Patsy answers. “We go in to a place and clear it, which I’m sure you guys have done at some point.” I nod to confirm that we have in the past. “But there are risks that come with everywhere you live, be that a chink in the armor which opens you up to an external threat, or a snake in the chicken coop; you just have to be able to care for yourself, and you’re good.”

“And which one poses a problem at the compound?” I inquire.

“Well, there’s the possibility of being raped by a horny cougar,” Ace says. “But overcrowding is our main concern. We’re only equipped to handle about a hundred people.”

“How many do you have?” John asks.

“Before you, there were eighty six,” Webby replies. “After, ninety-eight.”

“They’ll start double booking cabins soon,” Wally adds.

“Or boarding them at the infirmary,” Ace says.

“Can’t you just build more cabins?” Carlos asks.

“You got plenty of space,” Oscar points out.

“It’s more complicated than that,” Wally replies. “More people means that you need more of everything, not just space. You need more food, more power, more defense, more, more, more; until the entire system collapses, since it can’t sustain itself any longer.”

“So, what will you do to prevent that?” I ask. “Turn them away?”

“We’ll have to,” Ace says. “I know it seems heartless, but we can’t take the risk of us all dying, just to squeeze in another fifty people. They’d have a better chance outside our walls, than inside with all of us struggling. It goes back to that whole anarchy concept, if supplies are scarce, people will start fighting each other for them; and internal conflict only opens a gap in our chain for another threat to slip through.”

I understand, and agree with what they’re saying, even if it is a hard pill to swallow. I took more people in then the condo could support, and we all suffered. Sixteen people were squished into a three bedroom unit, more than half of us were sleeping on the floor, food was rationed, and our garden’s soil was being depleted of nutrients for growing too many plants in such a small space. There were so many things wrong with our setup that I’m surprised that we lasted as long as we did. Hell, had we not moved on, we would eaten ourselves out of house and home, before the wheezers got the chance to break through our barriers. I don’t regret taking anyone in, well besides Kelly, but I wonder where I would have drawn the line had we stayed. Would I have continued bringing in more strays like a crazy hoarder, or would I have barred entry to more survivors?

I don’t know, and I don’t think I want to know what I would have done had the situation arisen. I would hope that I would have barred more occupants from gaining entry, but I’m not sure. As Olivia said, I care too much. Before, whenever I seen a stray animal on the street, I brought the flea ridden thing home with me; only to have my father kick it outside again. Of course, I would go collect it and bring it to a shelter, but had he not kicked the neglected animal out; I would have probably kept them all. I’m the male version of the crazy cat lady, only I collect survivors.

I’m jostled out of my mental vision where I’m leading my endless herd of faces through the gates of the bursting at the seams condo, when the van rolls to a stop. I glance out my window shows the sun’s rays highlighting a two story Georgian style house. I don’t see any close neighbors through the trees, but since we’re in Maine, more houses could be hidden in the foliage.

The slider opens and we all pile out single file, with Cory keeping tabs on Kelly. I walk around to the back with John to help carry out the raider. Webby opens the door, to find that the raider is still unconscious. It seems a damn long time to be out, so I’m a little concerned that Patsy may have overdone it with whatever technique he used to knock the dude out; but breathe a sigh of relief when I see the steady rise and fall of the raider’s chest. I grab the dude’s legs, and John takes a hold under his arms, before we follow Webby’s footsteps to the house.

Tommy, Patsy, Wally and Ace went in the check it out, so the twins, Cory, Kelly, Webby, John and I all wait outside for the all clear. It takes a few minutes, but eventually Wally calls down that it’s good. Webby leads us toward Wally’s voice, so we enter a dining room and see that Patsy has a chair set up with duct tape and rope on standby. A similar chair has been set off to the right, but this one has the addition of socks, so I’m guessing that one’s for Kelly. And I’m proved right when Patsy picks up the sock, looks at Kelly, and grins.

“I’m going to take great pleasure in taking away your ability to speak,” Patsy says as he steps toward the blonde. Kelly tries to back up a step, but Cory grabs hold of her wrist and passes her off to Patsy. Patsy then proceeds to use rope and three rolls of duct tape to attach Kelly to the chair. When he’s done, he holds a hand up to his ear, closes his eyes, and sighs. “Blessed silence.”

“Not for long,” Ace warns as he walks back into the room with a bucket. “I’m just about to wake our captive.” He continues toward the raider, which Webby and Wally have tied up, and hurls the contents of the bucket at him. The guy starts sputtering and swearing indecipherable threats.

“Shut up,” Patsy orders, as he kicks the legs to the chair. It tips back, but rights itself, and catches the raider’s attention.

“You’ll pay for that,” the raider hisses.

“I don’t believe that you’re in a position to be threatening people,” Patsy counters. “So, how about you shut your fucking mouth, answer our questions, and we might let you live.”

“Fuck you!” Raider man shouts.

“That’s strike one,” Webby says as he steps forward. “Three strikes, and you’ll be missing a few parts.” Webby glances pointedly at the guy’s lap. “I’m sure that no man would want to live without a particular piece of equipment, so how about you play nice, and you might get to keep yours?” The guy gulps, and Webby grins. “That’s what I thought. How about we start with something simple? What’s your name?”

“H-henry,” the raider stutters.

“Sounds made up to me,” Wally remarks.

“It’s not!” Henry protests. “It’s even on my driver’s license. Just check my pocket.” Patsy looks to Wally, who nods, before doing as the raider suggested. Patsy reaches into the guy’s front pocket, and comes out with a wallet.

“Henry Collis, 42 years of age, 6’ tall, 200 pounds, married, organ donor, resident of Framingham, Massachusetts. What’re you doing all the way up here, Henry?”

“My group, we needed supplies,” Henry answers. “Our leader split us into groups, one went north, and one went west.”

“You’re a long way from home,” Ace says.

“That hasn’t been home for almost two years,” Henry says. “I’ve been up this way for months.”

“So, you’re camp is up here?” Wally asks. Henry snaps his mouth shut. “Now, don’t be getting shy on me, where’s your camp?”

“I can’t say,” Henry replies. “He’ll kill me if I do.”

“And we’ll kill you if you don’t,” Cory retorts. He takes a step forward, grabs Henry by the scruff, and gets right in his face. “Tell us what we wanna know, or I can guarantee you will suffer the most drawn out, painful death, that you can imagine. And even that won’t compare to what I’ll do to you.” Henry’s breathing audibly increases.

“A-alright,” he whispers. “C-can you b-back up, a-and I’ll a-answer?”

Cory releases his hold, but only stands upright, as opposed to backing off. I would guess that it’s to intimidate Henry, but you can see from the fury radiating off of Cory, that he can and will tear this man limb from limb if he doesn’t get a location right this second. And even that might not be enough to spare Henry’s life.

“Who’s your leader?” Webby asks.

“He goes by
‘Boss,’
but I’ve heard the others call him
‘Cole,’
” Henry says.

“Where and when did you meet him?” Wally asks.

“About six months ago,” Henry answers. “Down in Reading, Mass.”

“And your camp has since moved?” Patsy asks.

“Yeah,” Henry says. “It’s moved further north, to Amesbury, Maine.”

“Is it still there now?” I ask.

“It is,” Henry replies. “Cole got a tip about another military compound up this way, and wanted to try to take it.” Ace stomps forward, grabs Henry’s collar, and points a finger at the fatigues that the raider’s wearing.

“It looks like you’ve already taken a compound,” Ace hisses. Henry goes to shake his head to deny it, but Ace ignores him. “How many of us have you killed? How many civilians? We give our lives to protect you, and you betray us like that?” Ace starts shaking him as he hisses out more questions.

“Adam, that’s enough,” Wally orders. “Focus on what we need, and then we’ll leave this piece of shit by the side of the road.” Ace nods and pushes away from the captive. “Henry, where in Amesbury is your camp located exactly?”

“The country club,” Henry says. “You pass the cemetery, and it’ll be on your right.”

“How many of you are there?” Webby asks. Henry looks at the ceiling as if thinking, but takes too long for Cory’s liking, so it earns Henry a cuff to the head.

“A hundred?” Henry guesses with an attempted shrug in his bound state. “Can’t be sure.”

“All men?” Cory inquires.

“Nah, there’re women too.”

“But are they captives, or raiders?” Cory demands. “Does one of them have black hair, and grey eyes?” Cory holds his hand up below his shoulder. “She’s about yay high, and curses like a sailor...”

“Ah, the new girl,” Henry says as grins. “We found her at the outlets a couple hours before we saw you. Hal and Xavier said that they would take her back, so Chulo, Dil and I stayed behind to get the supplies that we needed, and perhaps a few extras.” Henry licks his lips. “Hal said that she was one of Cole’s, but I know that a few of the men were already marking their calendars for guard duty with her, if you know what I mean? The tits on her, a man could bury his face in there and get lost, and that ass...”

Cory dives at Henry at the same time I do, so the three of us go down in a crash. My fist is swinging, and I hope it’s making contact with Henry and not Cory, but I don’t stop to check. Especially, when I feel one or two wild punches from Cory hit me. I’m not sure if they were accidental, or if he felt like punching me too; either way, it isn’t stopping me from beating the fuck out of this douchebag. After I land another fist to the guy’s nose, I feel hands grab me and pull me off. I see Cory get the same treatment, so the bloody raider is left on the floor, while we get dragged from the room.

“Jared, calm the fuck down,” John demands as I continue to struggle against the arms restraining me. “We got what we needed, now let that fucker rot, so we can go get Olivia. Every second we spend sitting here, is more time she’s stuck with Cole.” At the mention of Olivia’s name being said anywhere near Cole’s, I calm down. “Good, now go get in the van, we’ll be out in a sec.”

“Not a
‘sec,’
right the fuck now,” I counter. “Or I’ll leave your asses behind.”

“We have to get Kelly first,” John says. I shake my head.

“Leave the bitch,” I say.

“You know we can’t do that,” John replies. “She knows about the compound, so she could escape and come for us.”

“Then put a knife in her, I don’t give a fuck.”

“You don’t mean that,” John says. “I know that you want to get to Olivia, but we have other stuff that needs to be done too.”

“Olivia’s more important than that shit,” I hiss. “Do you have any idea what they could be doing to her right now? What they’ve already done to her? She can’t take any more of that shit!” I don’t realize that I’ve been shouting, until the wheezers come running out of the woods. “Fuck. Wheezers!”

John immediately pulls out his magnum, but I reach inside my jacket and pull out my whistle. Placing it in my lips, I give it a strong blow, and see the eight mutated wheezers slide to a stop. They lift their arms from the ground, and face plant in the dirt when they go to cover their ears. I see the others come sprinting out of the house, as I pull out my knives and run toward the downed creatures.

I keep a steady blow going as I cut the distance between me and the infected. Getting within range of hurling my ginsu knives, I throw them at their heads. I’ve taken out four of them by the time I see Patsy dive on top of one, and twist it’s head. I hear a nauseating crack before the wheezer ceases movement, and Patsy moves on to the next. Ace has a cleaver that he hacked the last one’s skull with. I look around to double check that he was indeed the last of the wheezers that I seen, and find that my count was off by one. Cory’s walking out of the house, but since he’s dragging Kelly; and the bitch is putting up fight as usual, his back is toward the wheezer coming up from behind him. I don’t waste time shouting his name, I just run.

Sprinting as fast as I can, I reach Cory, push him to the right; and try to push Kelly along with him, but she pulls back. Right into the wheezer, that was going to miss his dive, if she had just followed my guide for once in her life. The shriek that comes from her throat, is the worst sound I’ve ever heard. It’s a combination of nails on a chalkboard, a cat fight, and a fog horn.

The hairy wheezer tackles her, and has his teeth imbedded into her neck before they hit the ground. His clawed hand is scratching at her face as he tries to grip her thrashing form. There’s blood pouring from the wound on her neck, and the scratches are starting to bubble up with unspilled blood. It’s still a red color, so she isn’t an animal yet, but it’s only a matter of time before the infection runs its course.