The Undead World (Book 5): The Apocalypse Renegades (7 page)

Ernest seemed particularly attached to Jillybean. As they prepared to abandon Fort Campbell, he was always hanging around her to the point that Ipes became agitated. The zebra, who was lounging on top of Jillybean’s pillow with one of his hooves tucked behind his head, said,
It isn’t normal fora grown man to take such an interest in a seven-year-old girl; everyone knows that
.

Jillybean, who had been flattered by all the attention the older man had given her, replied, “He’s just nice is all.
He
at least thinks I’m smart, not like some zebras I know.”

That’s not the point. All this attention is not what anyone, including your daddy would say is natural
, Ipes said.
Who knows? Maybe he’s one of those pedophiles. There’s no way to really tell, not until it’s too late
.

“Oh stop,” Jillybean said, irritably. “If there’s no way to tell then you can be mis-insulting him for nothing. And that’s not nice at all. That’s what I think. So far he’s just been a nice person and I think you’re being jealous. Now, stop being such a lazy bones and make yourself useful. Help me pack.”

Packing required little more than her going through her Ladybug backpack and ridding it of the odds and ends that were taking up too much room and only adding to the weight of it. So far she had set aside a neon yellow water pistol, a stapler with a butterfly decal on top, and a white dress that wasn’t the one Ram had found for her way back when.
That dress she had lost when the River King’s men took her
I’m a Belieber
backpack. But it was close enough and at the last minute she decided to keep it. Before putting it in its plastic bag she had folded it as neatly as she could manage, which meant it was very wrinkled.

Ipes looked at it quizzically
. A replica of another dress? Will you ever wear it?
he asked.

“That’s not the point,” she answered. “That dress was a gift, maybe the nicest gift I ever got.” She paused, thinking about the day she first met Ram. He had been tied to a tetherball pole and had been within minutes of being eaten alive by little kid monsters. The image of his face in her mind caused her throat to go tight. He was supposed to have died with her that day; they were supposed to have been monsters together for all time. But now only he was a monster.

With her lips pressed tightly together, she placed it on top of the other oddities in her pack. “And I can pretend it’s the same, so it stays. You never know, there could be, like a ball with dancing and music and such. I want to be prepared just in case.”

Sure, that could happen
, Ipes said, sarcastically.

In Jillybean’s mind, it could definitely happen. The possible limits of what
could
happen ended at her imagination, which was near on limitless. She could easily envision a ball in Colorado once they had made it safe and sound. Neil would be there and he would do a father-daughter dance with Sadie. And Captain Grey would dance with Deanna because they were both tall and pretty.

Jillybean would dance with Joe Gates, who was ten years old, but only if he promised not to be mean; he sometimes twirled his finger next to his ear when she went by. She knew that meant “being crazy” which wasn’t at all nice since she really wasn’t crazy. She was just misunderstood. At least that’s what Ipes told her.

There might be other boys in Colorado
, Ipes said.
You know, nicer boys. You just have to be careful not to catch kooties
.

“Ain’t that the truth.” Jillybean was a firm believer in kooties and knew for certain that Joe Gates had them; he was always scratching himself.

Like a monkey
, Ipes said.

“Just like one,” Jillybean agreed.

Once she was packed it wasn’t difficult to find her new friend. Ernest was standing in the doorway just down the hall; he stood so that he could simultaneously talk to someone in the room and look down the corridor.

“Ernest!” she called. “Me and Ipes are all ready to go.”

She skipped down the hall, in a herky-jerky motion, trying her best not to let her toes or heels touch any of the crisscrossing lines in the tile. Although her mother was dead, she didn’t want to chance breaking her back by stepping on a crack. It wasn’t easy, especially with her pack bouncing this way and that. She came right up to him and stood bobbing up and down on her heels.

Ernest patted her head. “That was quick. Really, everyone is moving so quickly.” As he said this a dark look crossed his face.

“Is that a bad thing?” she asked. “Normally it’s hard to get everyone moving at the same time. They’re always very slow.”

The look passed, replaced by a guilty smile. “The truth is I’m not all packed up yet. I should get a move on.” He put a hand on her shoulder, gripped it gently, and then hurried to the stairwell door.

That was strange
, Ipes said.

“Yeah,” agreed Jillybean. “It was his idea to leave…well, really it was mine, but why would he think we would wait?”

Ipes shook his head.
That’s not what I was thinking was so strange. An hour ago he had his one bag all ready to go. What’s he got left to pack?

“You’re still being jealous aren’t you?”

Jealous, no. Suspicious, heck yeah!

Jillybean rolled her eyes at the zebra, but also agreed with him. “You’re right, he only had one bag. But maybe he picked up more clothes or something. Ever think of that? Maybe if you…”

She was suddenly jostled from behind by Fred Trigg who was carrying a couple of boxes in his arms. They were stacked up to his forehead. “Watch it. Can’t you see I’m carrying stuff here?”

“Sorry,” Jillybean said, ducking into the nearest room to get out of the way.

You didn’t do anything to say sorry about!
Ipes cried, with his mane bristling. He glared at Fred’s back for a few seconds before turning to Jillybean and clapping his hooves together.
Please let me tie his shoelaces together. If anyone deserves it, he does. Please? Please? Please?

The idea did have a lot of merit, and Fred was overdue for being brought down a peg or two, and it had been an awful long time since she was allowed to have any fun…

“No, I don’t think so,” she said. Something was still bothering her and until she figured it out, any prank would feel hollow. She turned away from the door and went to the window. Two stories below on the street in front of the building, fourteen trucks and SUVs were lined up. As she watched, people would come hurrying up with armfuls of their belongings and, after a quick look around for zombies, they would heave their load into this or that truck.

That’s a lot of cars
, Ipes said.
Lucky for them it’s a hot one today or they’d have a ba-jillion monsters to deal with
.

“They need a lookout,” Jillybean said. “And security…holy cow! There’s a monster! Oh, good, William got it. You know, I guess I could go down there with
Jazzy Blue
and keep the monsters away. Only…only her batteries are getting pretty low.” There was another reason she didn’t want to go down there. Something was eating at her, the problem was, she couldn’t put her finger on it.

One thing was for sure, seeing those cars all in a line sure didn’t help the nagging feeling.

They were…she didn’t know what.

You’re obviously over- thinking whatever’s got you in a knot
, Ipes said, poking her in the tummy.
It’ll come to you if you let it
.

“It just did,” she whispered. “
Obvious
is what’s bothering me. Ernest called me obvious, except that’s not me, I don’t think. But those trucks are going to be super obvious. Look at all of them. Like you said there are a whole lot of them and pretty soon we’ll be heading right for the River King in a big parade!”

If he has any spies, they’ll see us for sure
, Ipes said, catching on.

“We have to go warn, Mr. Michael,” Jillybean said, hurrying for the door.

She found him on the floor below, telling people to “get a move on” without actually ordering them to. Five minutes later, he reversed himself and was telling everyone to slow down. “Then we should travel at night?” he asked Jillybean when he had gotten back from spreading the news that they were going to start later.

“I guess so,” she said. “And we should go without our lights on. It will take longer but it’ll be safer.”

“How will we know where we’re going?” he asked.

Ipes blew out pointedly.
Does this guy ever use his brain or do you think it fell out of his head when he lost all his hair?

The zebra received a hard pinch on the bottom for that insult. Jillybean kept her face perfectly neutral, saying. “I don’t know, maybe we could send out some of us to scout the area first. We could use a radio or a walkie talkie to call in a safe location and directions. I don’t think one car will stir up a lot of interest, specially if whoever’s driving it is real sneaky-like.”

“So who should go?” he wondered just as Jillybean had predicted he would.

“I can go,” Ernest said. He had come sneaking up; Jillybean jumped when he spoke and Ipes let out a little squeak of fright. Ernest grinned at the reaction. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. I heard we were being delayed and I came to find out why, and I overheard you two talking about a recon mission.”

“And you would go?” Michael asked. “All by yourself? That’s pretty brave.”

Ernest shrugged the compliment away. “Not really. I’ve been alone for some time so it’s no big deal for me. Besides I just came from that area. There’s a little town called Elco, I’ll check out the local schools. I bet there’s got to be one good building that could hold us all comfortably. What do you say?”

Michael clapped him on the back. “I say we’re lucky to have run into you, Ernest.”

“Now you’re making me blush,” Ernest replied. “I’m just trying to do my part to fit in. Now, I’ll need to borrow one of the trucks and you guys will need to get a CB. What’s a good channel, do you know?” Of course Michael shrugged. Ernest glanced down at Jillybean and asked, “When’s your birthday?”

“My birthday? It happened already. That’s how I became seven. Before, I was six and in the first grade, but now I’m seven but I never did make it to the second grade. Oh, I forgot! I’m a May flower, too.” She said this all so rapidly and breathlessly it left Ernest blinking.

“Ok, we’ll go with channel fifty-seven on the CB,” he said. “I’ll call you at ten tonight with a location and the safest directions. How does that sound to you?”

“Sounds perfect,” Michael gushed, reaching out and shaking Ernest’s hand.

It sounds too good to be true
, Ipes hissed.

“That’s it!” Jillybean said, turning from the two men. She pulled off her pack and unzipped the top pouch. “You’re grounded for the rest of the day, Mister!”

“Something wrong?” Ernest asked.

“Just Ipes acting up,” she explained. “For some reason he doesn’t…” She faltered even saying it aloud. Here was a perfectly normal man, who had done nothing to deserve the suspicion Ipes was heaping on him. She was embarrassed that Ipes would think the thoughts he did. “…Uh, he doesn’t want to leave just yet, is all. He’s strange that way.”

“That’s too bad,” Ernest said, sadly. “I was just thinking it would be perfect if you would come with me. Everyone says you’re handy in tight places and you never know what could come up.”

“It’s true, she’s the real brains of the outfit,” Michael said, rubbing the top of her head.

Now it was her turn to blush, only she just realized Ernest hadn’t blushed at all. He had smiled, pretty much like he always had since she had met him earlier that morning. It was a completely pleasant and fixed smile. And she just knew that Ipes would have a problem with it.

“I don’t really have an outfit,” she said to the two men. “Except these monster clothes and I don’t think that counts. But either way, I should stay…because of Ipes, you know.”

“That’s alright,” Ernest replied, still smiling. He patted her on the head as he left the room. “I’ll catch you later tonight.”

The night was dark, the barn darker, and the stairs up to the copula were just a dim shape in an inky black. Yet the man behind the gun stood out clearly. He wasn’t much of a man; he was spindly and pale, with a bare fuzz across his cheeks. By the way his hands kept clenching and unclenching on the grip of the assault rifle, Neil guessed he was nervous as hell, which didn’t make a lot of sense as he caught the three of them virtually unarmed.

“Take it easy,” Neil advised, endeavoring to make his voice sound tougher than normal. “You don’t even want to think about pulling that trigger. If you do, the rest of my men will be on you like flies on shit.”

Deanna raised a single eyebrow at this lie. Big Bill added to it. “We got sixty people coming right up on this here barn. Yeah, you might get a few of us, but you’ll die in the end and that’s a fact.”

“Is that right?” the man asked.

“Yes, that is a fact,” Neil said. “So maybe you should do yourself a favor and stop pointing that gun at us. We won’t hurt you. We just want to go our own way in peace.”

The gun did not waver an inch. “You don’t recognize me do you?” the man asked.

Neil felt his stomach turn over. Where could he have known this person from? Most likely he was one of the River King’s men, which meant all sorts of trouble. But even if he was with Colonel Williams from the Island, or one of Abraham’s disciples from New Eden, or was with Yuri from New York the trouble wouldn’t be all that much less. “I guess I don’t. We’re not from around here.”

“We’re from Texas,” Deanna said, quickly.

The young man smirked at this. “You don’t sound like it. You sound like you just escaped from the River King.”

“Yeah?” Big Bill growled. “What’s that sound like?”

“Like money. A whole gob of it,” the man said, leering at them as if they had bags of gold around their necks. “Now, very slowly, I want all of you to turn around.” There was no way to get the drop on him. Big Bill had set aside his weapon to bash at the door and Deanna’s gun was in its holster at her hip. They faced away from him and he came up behind Deanna. “I’ll take the gun, lady.”

He wrestled the Taurus out of the stubborn holster and when it was free he practically giggled into a two-way radio, “It’s them! I got three of them and one is the leader. I know it.”

“Hold on till we get there,” the radio crackled. “Don’t fuck this up, shit bird.”

Neil closed his eyes for a moment as dread bloomed in his chest. He had been recognized. They were caught and there wasn’t any way out as far as he could see.

“My name is Jeb,” the young man said, speaking angrily into his radio. “And if you don’t want me to take them in all by myself I suggest you be a little more polite.”

The silence in the barn was drawn out. It was a minute before the radio crackled again: “All right Jeb, you freaking pain in the ass. Will you please keep the prisoners safe and sound until we get there? It’ll be ten minutes, can you handle that?”

“That’s a little better,” Jeb said to himself. He clicked the send button and added, “Ten minutes will be no problem. I got ‘em disarmed and everything. They ain’t goin’ anywhere.”

The ten minutes in the barn ticked slowly by in a strained silence. The three prisoners could do nothing. They took turns looking back and forth from one another, each hoping to see a plan forming behind someone else’s eyes.

Deanna seemed to be on the verge of panic, Bill looked glum and Neil was suicidal. He knew that if they were taken back to the River King they’d be tortured into revealing the whereabouts of the others. There was no doubt that one of them would cave—Neil feared it would be himself.

The manly thing to do would be to rush the lone guard while they had a numerical advantage. Neil tried to suggest this with a few head tilts and a couple of pointed looks at the guard however neither Bill nor Deanna seemed to pick up on it. This left Neil considering the idea of trying to attack Jeb by himself. He had been in many sticky situations but he had never before been in the position which required him to throw himself on the barrel of a gun. He knew it wouldn’t work just like he knew it was really his only choice. Yet after five minutes of mental prodding the most he could do was to take a timid little step toward Jeb. The second he did the man’s assault rifle, either an AR or an M-16, Neil couldn’t tell the difference, shifted in his direction.

“I…I have to pee,” he said.

“Then go in your pants,” Jeb replied.

Neil bobbed his head as if contemplating the idea. “But I need to go before your friends show up,” he said, emphatically, inclining his head toward Jeb’s gun. “I need to do it now. If I wait then it may be too late.” Deanna’s eyes widened in understanding, but Big Bill only looked confused. Neil grimaced and added “I have a secret that I don’t want everyone to know about. So I should do something about it now.”

Jeb smirked. “What, you got a small dick?” He tipped Deanna a knowing wink.

“It’s not a big deal,” Big Bill said. “A lot of men aren’t as endowed as they wish they…”

Neil interrupted him. “It’s not my penis that’s the problem.” He added a quick tilt of his head eastward—across the river—for emphasis.

“Crabs?” Bill asked.

“No, damn it!” Neil seethed. “I want to rush this guy and take his gun before his friends get here but I can’t very well say it out loud. Jeez!”

“Oh,” Bill said as Jeb stepped back, threatening them with the assault rifle.

“It would have been suicide,” Deanna told him.

“I think it might have been an easier death,” Neil said. He blew out noisily through puffed cheeks. “But it doesn’t matter now.” There were voices outside speaking quietly but in the still air of the undead world they carried easily into the barn.

“I would’ve got you anyway,” Jeb bragged. “I’m faster than you know.”

“Keep telling yourself that, junior,” Bill said.

There wasn’t any more time to banter useless manly crap back and forth as Jeb’s compatriots arrived just then. Neil and the others were thrown down and frisked by the three newcomers, who were led by a long pale fellow with cherub cheeks and a cruel turn to his lips. Deanna’s frisking was exceedingly thorough and each of the men took turns running her hands all over her body, one even suggested a strip search. During this Deanna held herself stiff as steel.

The leader’s name was Lenny and he shook his head in mock sadness saying, “No, the River King won’t pay top dollar for used goods.”

“She’s a freaking whore,” Jeb said, pointing at her crotch. “She’s about as used up as they get.”

“She isn’t a whore, she was an accountant,” Neil said, spitting the words out quickly. “She kept count of our possessions, you know weapons and ammo. She isn’t a whore.”

Lenny smiled nastily. “Oh, she’s a whore all right. All women are whores to one extent or another. But, I think this one was one of the colonel’s babes. Rumor has it he keeps quite the stable.”

Neil tried his own wicked smile, hoping to exude confidence as if he weren’t scared out of his wits. “Believe what you want but if you touch her, we’ll make sure to mention it to the River King in graphic detail. I’m pretty sure he won’t look kindly on you.”

Lenny was not impressed with Neil’s tone, yet he supported him. “Exactly, pipsqueak. Now enough yapping.” The three were trussed with their hands behind their backs and gags in their mouths before being bustled off into the night.

“We should send shit bird to go get the truck,” one of the men said.

“Hey! You can’t…” Jeb started to say.

Lenny grabbed him roughly by the collar and shook him. “Shut your mouth, all of you,” he snapped. They were barely into the field of wheat and all around them were the moans of the zombies. Some close, some further away. Lenny led them, snaking through the field, avoiding almost all of the undead. When a zombie would suddenly come crashing through the rows, one of their captors would step up and brain it with a baseball bat they each carried along with their guns.

After a few minutes, they slipped into an adjoining field which was tall with old corn. Everything rustled and the shadows were deep. They crept along in single file, following Lenny to the next farm. Neil kept his eyes open, looking for a possibility of escape—bound as they were it seemed impossible. But then they heard something other than the moans of the dead and the crackle of dry corn husks under their feet. It was a coughing drone intermingled with a throaty rumble. It was the sound of trucks racing up the nearest frontage.

“What is that?” Jeb asked, standing on tiptoes, trying to see above the corn. It was a stupid question; the source of the sound was obvious.

One of their captors suddenly blinked and said, “Someone must have been listening in on our conversation, you know like with a scanner or some shit like that.”

“Fuck!” Lenny cried. He took off in as fast a run as Neil could manage. Jeb ran beside him, quietly urging him on, but after forty yards Neil could barely breathe with the gag in his mouth. He felt lightheaded and close to passing out. He purposely fell and took to grunting and shaking his head until Jeb realized what was wrong.

When the gag was pulled out he sucked down air until he could talk. “Them too,” he said of Deanna and Bill. When their gags were removed also, Lenny hissed at them to get moving.

Neil purposely dragged his feet and fell at every ditch, log, or chuck-hole. The men in the trucks were undoubtedly more of the River King’s men, which meant that he was only fleeing from danger into more danger. His only hope was that the two groups would fight it out and in the confusion he, Deanna, and Bill could find a way to escape. But that didn’t look likely since the trucks were overshooting them, heading south. Neil considered yelling but he lacked the lung capacity to be heard from that distance.

The zombies saved him, at least for the moment.

So far, they’d been coming in ones or twos but all of a sudden, a veritable gang of undead appeared out of nowhere and more wrapped around them in the corn. Lenny slipped his assault rifle off his back and blasted seven of them in quick succession clearing a way through.

“Book it!” he yelled. The trucks had screeched to a halt kicking up dirt. In seconds the dark night was being cut up by headlights aiming their way.

“Faster, damn it!” Jeb hissed at Neil. “Or so help me…” He pulled out a knife and shoved it in Neil’s face. “I’ll take your fucking balls right off. I’ll do it, I swear.” He had crazy eyes, round as marbles and bulging in his face.

Neil hurried as best as he could but it seemed like a waste of energy. They were heading for the next farm over; a run of just over a mile and there didn’t seem to be any way they could get their before the trucks caught up with them.

Lenny dropped back, saying, “I’ll slow that convoy down, you guys keep going but don’t you fucking leave me.”

His M-16 started firing within a minute; seconds after that, there was a chatter of machine-gun fire in return. The battle was short but fierce and it wasn’t long before Lenny’s M-16 went silent. The little group kept on running and soon the trucks could be heard heading their way once again.

Gasping, and out of breath, they arrived at the first of the outbuildings just ahead of the trucks. One of their captors took charge: “Okay… Okay… Jeb stay with the prisoners. The rest of you with me.”

They were gone all of three minutes before guns started going off again, sounding like a full-fledged battle was being fought in the corn. “In here!” Jeb said, pointing into the barn. Inside, it was so dark that Jeb immediately ran smack into the side of the tractor. He began a string of curses as his three prisoners stood hucking hot breath in and out, waiting for their night eyes to catch up with the pitch black.

“We’re not just going to stand here, are we?” Neil asked.

The sweat pouring off of Jeb’s face shimmied in the weak light of the stars; his eyes were huge and with every gunshot they grew bigger. When the first scream was added to the din, Jeb went frantic. “Come on!” he demanded of his prisoners, jabbing them forward with the muzzle of his rifle.

Deanna was in front and she could hardly see a thing. Every few steps there would be a clunk or a groan or a little cry of pain as she ran into this or that hunk of machinery. “Where am I supposed to be going?” she asked.

“Just go,” Jeb hissed.

Using his shoulder, Neil pushed her behind him and then led the little group, basically aiming for the other side of the building where the shooting had stopped. “There’s only one way you’re getting out of this, Jeb,” Neil said. “You’re going to have to take off on your own. You’ll never get anywhere burdened by three prisoners.”

“Shut it!”

“Or what? You’ll shoot me?” Neil shrugged a move made useless by his bound hands and the dark. “You’ll just give away your position and then…bammo! They got you. You don’t want that, do you?”

“I said shut it.”

“And I’m not going to,” Neil replied. They had made it to the far wall and now Neil was treading gingerly to his left, sticking out of foot oddly, here and there, so as not to run into anything too dangerous, though he still managed to bang his face into something metallic.

“Look out… Go left. I just hit something.” Whatever it was extended a good twelve feet and it wasn’t easy to get around. Bill hit it with a solid thunk. When the four had gotten around it, Neil stopped at the door that led out.