Follow along as I write the sixth (and possibly final???) book in the Dext of the Dead series. These are the rough drafts as they appear before professional proofing, editing, rewrites, publishing, etc. Feel free to comment, as always.
For new readers: While this book can stand on its own, it is strongly recommended that you familiarize yourself with the first five books of the series. Having knowledge of the existing characters and their individual arcs throughout the original series will ensure you experience the full effect of the tragedies that will no doubt befall our survivors.
-SK
Introduction
It has been ten years since the outbreak and the events of Dext of the Dead. The search for a proper cure died with the remnants of the Old World and modern technology as it was once known is scarce. Every corner of the earth was affected in one way or another and society has reverted to a much more primitive way of life. There are no vehicles, no gasoline, no diesel. Electricity is a luxury afforded to a select few and harsh winters cause mass casualties due to cold temperatures and starvation.
The dead still walk, their numbers in the millions, with no explanation as to why they decay so slowly. While hundreds, possibly even thousands, of settlements have popped up and even more have fallen, what’s left of mankind still finds a way to survive. Some huddle together high above the ground finding shelter within sprawling cities among the canopy of the forests while others still cling to the urban styles in giant, walled off compounds. Competition for resources is fierce among them. Murder, rape, robbery, and revenge killings are commonplace, adding to the numbers of the walking plague.
Natural disasters have come and gone, but even more destructive to the landscape have been the untended technologies from before. Nuclear reactors have melted down and deemed many areas hot zones of uninhabitable, radiated territory spawning gross mutations and radiation sickness in the survivors that pushed too close to them. Broken dams have flooded once prosperous cities and have created treacherous stretches of water filled with voracious corpses and pollution while roadways and bridges have crumbled to rubble in the wake of the dead. The world itself continues to die.
It is in this landscape of feral children and cannibalistic corpses as well as humans that have sloughed off the moral codes against their own cannibalism in favor of a food source that we find Lilly. A once precocious and adorable little girl, she was thrust into a life of turmoil and trained to live in this unforgiving, new world. Having escaped the cruel hands of Colonel Lang and his regime, she returned to Las Vegas with Kylee, Seth, Nick, Murphy, and Alyse to attempt a new life.
Now, at the age of sixteen, she has seen the worst that mankind has to offer and she is cold, brutal. She has killed men, women, and children as well as countless numbers of the dead for her survival and the survival of her group. Vegas stands proud as one of the few bastions of civility left. What happens outside of the walls is left outside while the interior runs smoothly due to a strict social hierarchy, one in which Lilly ranks impressively. Built with the blood, sweat, and tears of The Originals, Vegas is a trade center where rare items such as batteries and books fetch a high price; a price paid in all manner of currency from booze, illicit substances, and often pleasures of the flesh. It is seedy and filthy, but it works. That is what makes it such a valuable property.
Unforeseen threats loom, though, for Lilly as the Vegas she’s called home for a decade has now drawn the attention of a perfect storm. An alliance of misfit tribes has set their sites on her homeland, led by a barbaric group of men and women hell-bent on taking it for themselves. An old enemy who has been plotting his revenge for years is also about to make a move unbeknownst to the Vegas inhabitants. Surrounded on all sides by hordes of the undead, a war is brewing.
The question is whether Lilly will stand her ground for what she’s built… Or will she run?
Chapter One – A Walk Down The Strip
Lilly woke up with groggy, crust-ridden eyes and breath that could knock a buzzard off a shit-wagon to the sound of Seth and Nick bickering in the adjacent room about the price of grain. She stretched a bit only to feel her feet thump solidly against a lump of flesh that wasn’t her own. Curled in a shivering ball at the foot of the filthy flea circus she called a mattress Lilly discovered Wyatt. He must’ve snuck into her room again in the middle of the night like he’d done for the past three or four days. He’d always done that when Lilly was home and back safely from the road.
Lilly staggered to her feet feeling the aches and pains of last week’s raid still stabbing at her joints before taking a moment to cover the boy. She tucked him in tightly and he stirred to half consciousness. “I’m up,” he groaned exhaustedly.
She smiled at him and firmly ordered, “I’m not going far and we have all day. No school, remember?! Go back to sleep. I’ll be back after breakfast.”
Wyatt was about ten years old now and couldn’t look more like his old man. His shaggy brown hair nearly covered his hazel eyes and he was lean. Not an unhealthy sort of lean, mind you, just naturally lanky. He was still wearing his clothes from yesterday; dirt-stained white tee shirt and some camo shorts he stole from Seth that hung loosely from his hips even while strapped tightly into place with a raggedy black belt. “Awesome,” he said to Lilly, satisfied with her answer. “Bring me back an apple then?”
Lilly had him spoiled. From the day he was born she had always made special concessions just for him. It wasn’t uncommon for her to bring him things that weren’t on the supply list when she made runs with the others. I think Wyatt was the only kid on the Strip who had ever seen a book with no pictures or tasted something as hard to come by as fresh fruit. But Lilly was happy to do it. She told him, “I’ll see what I can do. If not, I’ll see if Dante has some of those dried dates you like so much.”
She pulled her pants over hairy legs, careful not to scrape them across the stitches in her knee. Less than a week before, while clearing some squatters from one of the field posts, she had managed to lay it wide open. No surprise, really, when you consider that “clearing” meant executing, and “squatters” meant Savages.
The Savages were turning up more and more in the outer reaches of Vegas’ influence and they were beginning to threaten the trade traffic. You have to understand that Vegas was like Mecca for its time. Traders and caravans would brave the dead wastelands to the east with hordes of bernies and the radiated territories to the northwest just for the opportunity to visit the famed whorehouses and merchants that called Vegas home.
Savages had always been present, particularly in the outlying desert camps, but with the rise of Vegas’ popularity they had come to find a steady influx of materials, weapons, and food in the form of the traveling caravans. It was not uncommon for them to plunder entire shipments headed for the Strip and then roast the traders themselves over the spits. Not before having their way with the women, of course.
Lilly hated them all equally and she relished in castrating the men before bleeding them slowly. There was a time when Nick had to pull her off of one of them because even he couldn’t stomach the fact that she was taking her time dispatching him. What Nick didn’t know was that every time Lilly saw a Savage all she could think about was the day they held her down in the dirt, gravel tearing into her back, as they penetrated her over and over again. She was only thirteen then. That was the day Murphy was killed and her secret died with him as he sacrificed his life to save her. To Lilly it was her job to wipe them from what was left of the planet along with every bernie that gnashed its teeth in her direction.
The day at the post was no different except that as she thrashed her victim from one side of the shack to the other, breaking his bones along with every piece of glass and furniture in the joint, she was blinded by rage to the fact that the ground was littered with jagged edges. She knelt at the window frame, now devoid of glass and rimmed with only the saw-like remnants of the pane it once held, gripping him by his bloody hair. She laid his neck across it, pushing and pulling his head this way and that, sawing the shattered glass of the frame into his throat and tearing away at his esophagus as his gags slowly decayed into gurgles and wheezes. She only felt the pain in her knee as she stood back up and swung her machete through his spinal chord to send his lifeless head rolling out the window. She was lucky that Doc was on the crew that day to sew her up.
She took one last look at Wyatt after pulling her shirt down over small breasts and told herself once again that she’d never tell him about the things she’d done out there. What happens outside stays outside. Then she hit the door to peek in on her dads. Yes, “dads” plural.
Lilly found Seth and Nick battling colorfully as always. Opening the door to Nick’s room on the third floor of what was once called the Palace, she was greeted by Seth with a nod in her direction. The years hadn’t been kind to Seth and, although he still wore his signature leather vest and black jeans, the lines on his face and the scraggly patchwork of hair that he tried to pass off as a beard made him appear much older than he was. His pierced ear lobes, with their huge wooden wheels, sagged feebly. He never lost his fire, though.
He continued to talk without missing a beat. “Nick, I’m tellin’ you, dude! That son of a bitch has been raising the price every single trip for over three months now. You don’t think I know how much we NEED that food?! All’s I’m saying is that now HE knows how much we need it and he sure as shit isn’t gonna let us walk off with seven bags for the same four hundred chips, much less the six hundred he snaked over at the Hag’s Head and the two hundred he drank away at Dante’s place. If he wants to be a cock, then we’re done comp’ing him. He can charge what he wants for the grain, but we’re done paying for his recreational activities while he’s on the Strip.”
Nick raised a finger to hush Seth for a second and greeted Lilly with a tight hug. Lilly tucked her head into his shoulder in a display of affection that only Seth and Nick knew she was capable of before stepping back and having a look at him. He was as dapper as ever. Nick was still the only guy around with a sense of style. Even if his clothes were threadbare and well-worn, his dress shirt and moth-munched tie gave him an air of class that was unrivaled. Lilly ticked her head in Seth’s direction. “What’s he bitchin’ about now?”
Nick shrugged and admitted, “It’s Lester. He’s charging almost double for the grain this time around and I think we should just figure out another deal, maybe with the Foresters in Arizona. Seth’s got a good point, though, when he says we’re assed out if we don’t pay him what he’s asking because the Foresters don’t offer delivery. That would mean monthly road trips to Flagstaff past the nuke plant. To top it off, Lester’s been running up huge tabs at our best spots. And, as you know, compromise isn’t our strong suit.”
Lilly wrinkled her nose and paused to consider the dilemma while Seth rolled a cigarette. He passed it to her and began rolling one for himself with the same stale tobacco. Lilly bent at the waist to light her smoke on one of the candles strewn about the dingy hotel room and inhaled deeply. Sending the blue-grey smoke swirling into the air as she exhaled she replied matter-of-factly, “Lester’s an asshole. We should stuff his seven bags up his ass sideways and send him back west with the horse he rode in on.”
A feminine voice pierced the smoke filled air from the hallway. “The hell you will. You tell Lester that we’ll pay him in one of two ways. He can ride out of here with his usual payment of batteries and the foal we’ve been raising for him, OR, he can have eight hundred chips to spend as he pleases here on the Strip. Nothing more, nothing less, no more comps, no more price increases. If he agrees, fine. If he tries to negotiate, tell him we’ll close the gate on him next trip and let the Savages fight over which part of him to eat first.”
Lilly beamed as she turned to meet the voice. Kylee could be seen standing in the doorway, hand on her hip, and wearing her “disgusted face”. She had long since abandoned the eye patch she once wore, allowing the scar that crossed her brow and eyelids to be worn as a badge of honor. She looked radiant, though, otherwise. Kylee had also abandoned her military fatigues in favor of more ladylike attire, except for her boots, of course. She always wore boots. Ever since she took over the school and stopped going out on the road Kylee was Vegas’ matriarch. She was respected and more or less “unfuckwithable”.
“Mom!” Lilly trilled happily. “I’ve been waiting to see you for days. How’re things at school?”
Kylee ignored the question and snatched the cigarette from Lilly’s mouth. She reached forward, slapping Seth firmly on the back of the head, snapping, “And you! How many times do I have to tell you to stop rolling these fucking things for her?!”
His eyes narrowing to slits, Seth replied, “She’s a big girl. Shit, man, I was smoking when I was fourteen. Lilly’s, what, sixteen now?”
Kylee was not amused by his answer. Holding the cigarette between her index and middle fingers she pointed it coldly at Seth. “One more time, Seth. Let me catch you ONE more time…” She turned her attention back to Lilly and warned, “What you do out there is out of my control, but when you’re home you WILL respect me. Got it?”
Lilly rolled her eyes.
“GOT IT?” Kylee demanded an answer.
“Yeah, I got it. Jesus,” Lilly relented.
Kylee put the cigarette to her lips and took a long pull before smiling broadly, happy to put the correction of Lilly behind them. “How’s the knee?” she asked sincerely.
Lilly rubbed it slightly and told her, “It’s nothing. Just a scratch.”
“Good,” Kylee said contently. “I guess Wyatt ended up in your room again? I had some things for him to do this morning, but he wasn’t in his bed.”
“He’s fine,” Lilly told her. “He just misses me.”
Kylee nodded. She already knew the answer. “I know he does. He also looks up to you, which is why this smoking shit isn’t gonna fly, at least when you're home. You lettin’ him sleep then?”
Lilly nodded. “I’m gonna walk the Strip this morning now that I’m caught up on sleep. I wanna see Dante and David. I also need to check back in with Doc about the knee, though I think it’s a waste of time. He’s so paranoid about infections.”
Kylee dropped the cigarette she had commandeered and butted it out with her boot. “Good. They’ll be happy to see you. Especially David. I think he’s got his eye on you, by the way.”
Lilly’s mouth nearly eeked into a smile but she was cut short when Seth scoffed, “Which eye does he have on her exactly? I’ll happily pluck that motherfucker from his skull, throw it on the roulette table, and bet his paycheck on black.”
Nick added, “I hear there’s a herd of about thirty or forty up north near the river. Maybe Dave would like to make the next water run on his own, perhaps?”
Kylee chuckled at the two of them. “Easy, boys. I think Lilly can handle her gentleman caller just fine on her own. God forbid your little girl grows up.”
Kylee laid a hand on Lilly’s cheek briefly and told her, “I know you like him, Lil. And he’s a nice boy. Just give him a chance. I’ll keep Dumb and Dumber here off his back long enough to give you a chance to talk to him.”
Lilly offered a weak smile. She liked David, too, though she’d never admit it. Instead, she simply told Kylee, “I’ll talk to him. But don’t be surprised if Doc is stitching up another stab wound before this afternoon.” That sent Nick and Seth into a fit of giggles.
Kylee turned on her heels and started down the hall calling over her shoulder, “Don’t forget about Lester. If I have to handle it myself all three of you are gonna answer to ME.”
Once she was out of earshot Nick asked Lilly, “You wanna take that one? You’re already heading down to Dante’s joint as it is. Old Lester is no doubt right next door at the Hag’s Head. I heard he spent the night there after Alyse threw him out of the Cantina for hittin’ on her. I got ten to one says he’s sleepin’ it off with a coupla whores.”
Lilly nodded and hit the door without another word.
The sun had been up for a few hours by the time she hit the street and the vendors were already up and running. The Vegas Strip was much smaller than it once was and it no longer resembled the flashy, neon lit jewel of the West it used to be.
During the first few years of the rebuild things were bad. The Originals had to purposely destroy hundreds of buildings to scavenge the materials to build the great walls that surrounded the Strip. Those walls kept it safe from both the dead and the living. Concrete and wood were carried by hand from the ruins and reassembled by the volunteers that would eventually call Vegas their own. More buildings were lost in fires due to everything from the lazy tending of candles to desperation in the first few winters. Families were freezing and, even though it was against the rules, some lit fires right in their hotel rooms. There were entire pockets of civilians that perished not only from those very fires getting out of control, but also from the small outbreaks when those killed in the fires turned and started biting. Those were some tough years.
But they not only hardened the community; they formed unbreakable bonds of loyalty between those that ran to one another’s aid. That was what defined Vegas. It was those experiences that inspired the organization of the firefighting crews, the local guard patrols, the containment teams, and so on. Everyone had a job to do.
The smell of rats roasting over open coals assaulted Lilly’s nostrils and her stomach growled angrily at her. She wasn’t always a fan of the rats, but the thought of eating some of the other fare on the Strip turned her stomach outright. Household pets were a thing of the past, though, admittedly, dogs still proved their worth as stalwart defenders and watchers. Cats, on the other hand, were food. Same went for the horses when they became too old to pull carts and carry people. Sure, Lilly would pick at the cat jerky when she was on the road, but at home she stuck to the staples. Ratmeat and flatbread were comfort foods.
Dropping a single Vegas chip onto the wooden cart of one of the many stalls, she picked up her rat-on-a-stick, and made her way down to the Hag’s Head, munching contently. She had polished off the greasy meat by the time the whorehouse was in sight and her game face was on in seconds. Lester was a well known pain in the ass and everyone loathed the day they had to deal with him.
As Lilly reached for the door, though, she was cut short by a voice she had been hoping to hear sooner rather than later. “Well lookie what we have here!” David called out to her as he jogged across the street in her direction.
David was a good lookin’ kid about the same age as Lilly. He had the square jaw and stocky build of a farm boy and he was always smeared with mud or some other muck from dealing with his horses. David’s family was famous for their livestock and his horses were second to none. Today was no different and his old jeans were already a mess from his early morning chores. He wore a smile from ear to ear as he caught up to her. “I heard you were back! Had to see it for myself.”
Lilly couldn’t suppress her own smile at the sight of him, even though it took her out of her zone. She was attracted to him, that much was undeniable, but not physically so. No. It was more about his charm. He had that innocent naiveté that had been hard to come by for a long time. She envied it, I think. Not like she’d ever admit it, however.
You see, there are only three types of teenagers in the world, and only two of which were thriving in Vegas. The first was Lilly’s type; the kids who were exposed to the road and its dangers during the Downfall. That’s what the old people called the time when Lilly was with Dext, JC, Cutty, and the others. The Downfall of Society. Kids like her had no choice but to fight for their lives and those that survived, Lilly for example, became largely cold and desensitized to the horrors they faced on a daily basis.
Then there were kids like David. David and his kind were sheltered during all that. Whether their families made it to the good bunkers and communities or in some cases they were brought up in colder climates and remote woodlands, these types of kids were soft. Sure, many of them could handle themselves, and they’d seen their share of struggle, but nothing like Lilly. Kids like David may have seen plenty of the dead put down, but they never faced anything like the Savages or the raiders of old. The ones that did, well, they aren’t around anymore.
The third type is an anomaly. They call them the Flies. I’ve heard it’s some reference to an old book called Lord of the Flies. These kids are feral. They were either lost or abandoned by their families and forced to survive on their own. They’re almost as bad as the Savages sometimes because they simply don’t know any other way. Hell, half of them don’t even speak English and they’ve adopted some sort of pidgin language that would sound foreign to you and me. More on that later, though.
David caught up to Lilly and stood there in front of her like a proud peacock. Lilly gave a nod and told him sarcastically, “Yep, here I am in all my glory. You look… happy?”
David smirked and offered, “Why wouldn’t I be?! I’ve been waiting for days to show you something. It’s a surprise. You got a sec?”
She didn’t. Fact of the matter was that if she didn’t tend to the Lester situation and do it in a hurry Kylee would have her ass in a sling. Not to mention she really just wanted to get it over with. Lilly’s time off the road was the only time she could really relax and it was something she looked forward to. Especially since Wyatt was getting bigger now. Days with Wyatt made her happy for many of the same reasons she felt drawn to David. There was innocence there. She tried to let him down easily offering, “Aww, I’m sorry. I gotta handle some stuff with Lester. He’s up to his bullshit again and Mom put me on it. Maybe once I’m through with it we can meet up?”
David frowned deeply, the wind sucked from his sails in a few short words. He did his best to shrug it off and told her, “Ah, bummer. I get it, though. Kylee isn’t someone you wanna piss off. Mind if I tag along with you anyway?” He was looking for any reason to spend a few moments with her and Lilly saw right through it.
“Sure. Come on. Lester is probably gonna want to hear about that foal you’ve been raising for him anyway,” she told him.
That seemed to brighten him up for the time being. He added, “You know he isn’t in the Hag’s Head, right? Word on the street is that he got put outta there last night for smacking around one of the girls. He’s back at Dante’s place already this morning drinking up the whole bar. I swear, the guy thinks he can get away with anything around here just because he and his men can get their grain for cheap. I’m tellin’ ya, Lil, if Seth doesn’t do something about that guy there’s gonna be trouble. People are already starting to talk.”
That wasn’t good. Seth’s reputation was one of the things that kept the peace on the Strip for a good long time. If that was starting to dwindle then David was right and there were gonna be problems. In fact, it sorta pissed her off. Not only was she going to have to deal with Lester today, she was going to have to have a serious discussion with the others about moving forward now.
Lilly’s smile faded as her hand slipped reflexively to the butt of the knife on her hip. “On second thought, David, I’ll meet you back your mom’s place in an hour or two. I’d rather you weren’t a part of this. Is Lester’s foal ready to travel yet?”
David told her disappointedly, “Yeah. Ready to go whenever he wants to take it. We really need the chips this month, though, Lil. If he stiffs my mom again I don’t know what we’re gonna do…”
She raised a hand to hush him. “I know. I’m on it.”
David relented slightly and asked her, “You promise?”
Lilly told him sternly, “Yes. I promise. Your mom will have her money today.”
With a shake of his head David clarified, “No, no… Do you promise you’ll come by in an hour or two?” He had this adorable look of hope on his face that melted her a bit.
“Yes. Two hours tops. I promise.” She hated herself for blushing.
That satisfied David for the time being and he gave her a wave before disappearing into the crowd across the street once more.
After taking a moment to crack her neck and get back into the game Lilly stalked two doors up from the Hag’s Head to Dante’s Inferno, home of the best rot gut booze this side of the Mississippi. What a shit hole.
She found Lester posted up at the center of the pockmarked wooden bar tossing back his seventh shot of the morning. She hated him with a passion.
It started the first time she’d ever had the displeasure of meeting ol’ Lester about a year ago when he showed up at the gates of the Strip with his offering of grain for chips. Bartering had been the way of the world for years by now, but a single Vegas chip can fetch you untold treasures in the outside world. Even the Savages knew the value of a Vegas chip because it offered more than just a simple, one time trade. A Vegas chip was redeemable at any establishment on the Strip, which meant that anyone with a fair sized stack could fulfill any number of worldly fantasies. Women, booze, hot meals, clean beds, even showers with hot water that actually ran from a tap were all amenities that made Vegas famous. And Lester was keen to take advantage of every single one of those things with exception of the shower, of course.
Lilly was there with Seth, Nick, Alyse, and Kylee to greet him that day and he sneered with his reptilian face the moment he saw her. After their introductions Lester pulled her aside while the others began unloading the bags from his cart. He brushed the hair from her face with a grimy finger and spoke through his rotting, brown teeth saying, “Aren’t you a pretty little one, Lilly, is it? So young. So… fresh.” She cringed at the thought of his foul breath burning her ear as he gripped her shoulders and offered her a cut of his newly earned chips to suck him off in the alley. She was able to refrain from retching before declining. Anyone else would’ve been begging for mercy as Lilly twisted her knife into their gut, but Lester was off limits. He was off limits and he knew it. After all, the people of the Strip needed the food and they needed it badly.
Slinking into the dark interior of the Inferno, Lilly took a seat at a corner table and pointed her ears in Lester’s direction. He was drunk and already talking shit to anyone who would listen.
“I don’t give a fat fuck if she did or not! I hit that little slut because she deserved it! Bitch better learn how to talk to a man, a CUSTOMER, properly. Gonna try and tell me not to put it there… I’ll put it wherever the fuck I wanna put it! She’s a whore for Christ’s sakes!”
The barkeep, an older balding guy they called Joker, tried to keep Lester cool. “Come on now, Lester. You know you can’t go slappin’ the girls around. If everybody got away with that there wouldn’t be any of them left.”
Lester slammed his empty glass down on the bar and pointed that same grimy finger at Joker. “Lemme –hic- ask you sumn’, Joker. What does Dante pay you to do here?”
Joker wiped down a glass, replacing it on the rack behind him and replied, “Ya know, pour drinks, keep the tables clean, shit like that.”
Lester smirked arrogantly. “Good. No one’s payin’ you to open your dumb fucking mouth. –hiccup- Now pour me another drink, faggot. Joker. Hmph. With a name like Joker I’d figured you be a lot more fuckin’ funny.”
Joker protested gingerly, “Come on now, Lester. You’ve had too much already. Dante’s gonna flip out on me if I serve you another and Seth has already warned me about letting people leave outta here drunk like that.”
CRASH!
Whipping his arm, Lester chucked his empty glass at Joker shattering it all over the bar. “Fuck Seth, that little bitch! And Nick, too. What are they gonna do? HUH?! I’ll tell ya what they’re gonna do. Not a fuckin’ thing! They –hic- might think they run shit here, but I bring the food. I bring the food –hiccup- and I spend good money here! I wish a motherfucker WOULD try and shoo me outta here! Now… pour me a goddamn drink.”
Lilly’s hands balled into fists the more Lester spouted off his filthy mouth at the defenseless barman. She took inventory of the people in the room, her eyes darting from one side to the next, sizing up the possible escape routes and making mental notes of the placement of tables and chairs. It was all reflex to her. She didn’t have to think about it anymore, she just observed. She noted the two men at the table to her right, the serving girl passing on the left. She noted Lester’s hunting knife dangling from his hip and reminded herself of the antique Dante kept behind the bar just in case he needed to scare someone off.
Lester kept on. “If Seth wants to kick me out he can bring his scrawny little ass down here and do it himself, ain’t that right darlin’,” he said to the serving girl as she made the mistake of coming within arm’s reach. Lester snaked his hands around her waist and she gasped as he unceremoniously pulled her onto his lap.
Lilly couldn’t stomach it anymore. She shoved herself back from her table and made her move, stalking towards Lester’s back with her knife cleanly out of its sheath.
Chapter Two - Crime and Punishment
“I don’t know about all that, Seth,” Dante said doubtfully. “I always thought it was more about God’s sense of humor. I mean, mankind spent its entire existence consuming whatever we could exploit. Shit, man, everything from fossil fuels to genetically modifying perfectly good food sources just to feed our fat bellies and our even fatter egos. I like to think God sat up there in His spot, nudged lil’ Jesus’ arm and said, ‘Wouldn’t it be hilarious if they consumed themselves, too?’ Next thing ya know, the world is full of bernies.” He chuckled slightly to himself, quite pleased with his own theory.
Seth snorted a laugh appreciating the humor and replied, “Sounds like you got it all figured out, Dante?”
Dante nodded and raised his glass of cloudy water to Seth in a mock salute. The two of them had been meeting every morning for brunch since Dante first appeared on the Strip about four years prior and, unless one of them was on the road, they never missed a day. Their conversations usually revolved around religion and philosophy and, oftentimes, they would get heated. It wasn’t uncommon to see Seth flailing his arms about in an effort to drive home a point and Dante rolling his eyes just waiting for an opportunity to get a word in edgewise. This morning was no different and, after eating a light meal of rabbit meat with wilting greens, the two chatted amongst themselves about everything from the Old World to the future of Vegas.
Dante, known around the Strip as the proprietor of Dante’s Inferno, was not only a keen businessman but also a bit of a genius. He had a mind like a steel trap and a belly made of iron. That meant he could stand toe to toe with Seth and Nick in conversation and drink both of them under the table at the same time. He was respected both for his ability to distill alcohol from Lester’s grain better than anyone else and also because he could fight. He was a skinny little black guy, weighing in at only about 160 pounds, but he could punch like a man three times that size. He was equally as dangerous with his bow, one that was given to him by none other than Murphy. That was precisely the reason that he ran the security detail for the Strip when he wasn’t working his bar. He was trusted and well liked.
“The problem with that theory, though,” Seth continued, “is that, like most of your other theories, it is theistic and you assume that God exists. And since we can’t prove that existence we, by default, cannot prove any other theories that come behind it.”
Dante waved a dismissive hand. “Bah! Just look around, man! You really gonna try to tell me there isn’t a God? Sheeeeit! We’re in here, safe and sound, while the rest of the world is out there falling apart. That’s because we’re GOOD, Seth. We’re not like the others out there. Being able to have a chat like this, my friend, is all the proof I need.”
Seth swallowed hard and tried to hide his true feelings on that bit about being “good”. Seth was far from good and he knew it. Fact of the matter is that Dante probably knew it, too, but he likely defined it differently. Regardless, Seth opted to pass over that for now and instead asked Dante, “So, you’re dead set on the notion of an all powerful God? A creator that can accomplish any feat simply by His will?”
Dante nodded casually. “Without a doubt.”
Seth pressed him asking, “Then explain this to me. Can this God of yours create a rock so large and majestic that even He can’t lift it Himself? I mean, if he can, then He lacks in His ability to lift. And if he cannot, then He lacks in His ability to create. Kinda nullifies the whole omnipotence thing, don’t ya think?” Seth had learned that little gem from Dext many, many years ago and always enjoyed the answers it brought on.
Dante raised his hand and opened his mouth to retort, but was cut short when Alyse burst into the sunlit room and frantically shouted, “Dante! Seth! Come quick. Trouble at the bar.”
Seth turned in his chair and asked calmly, “Trouble? What kinda trouble?”
Alyse was a mess. Her cute features were flushed with panic and she was speaking way too fast for anyone to fully understand her. She sputtered something about Lester and Lilly which Seth was about to shrug off. He was able to make out two words, though, that changed everything. “…blood everywhere…” Without another word both Dante and Seth dashed out of the room to follow Alyse.
Back at the bar things weren’t as casual as light brunch and thought provoking conversation. Lilly was making a mess of things.
The table she had shoved lodged itself against the rear of the barstool that Lester was sat upon, pinning him there for merely a moment. But a moment was all Lilly needed.
She brought her blade down lightning quick, penetrating the top of Lester’s hand like butter. Sinking its tip deep into the bar, the blade pinned him there uselessly. He shrieked with shock and pain and kicked the waitress off his lap onto the floor, but Lilly wasn’t finished. She reached down to Lester’s own knife and slipped it from its sheath as she grabbed his free wrist. SCHICK! It, too, sunk completely through his remaining hand leaving him with both arms outstretched and firmly stuck to the bar. Joker broke into a run out the back door to find Alyse. He knew full well what Lilly was capable of.
Lester was by all accounts neutralized at that moment, but the fire burned in Lilly’s gut. The memories of Lester’s proposition on the street, the image of him grabbing the waitress, and the simple idea of him smacking a woman flashed through her mind and sent her spiraling. He had insulted both Seth and Nick, two men she loved dearly, and made a mockery of the Strip with his insulting price gouges and foul behavior. Lilly was through with him.
She swept her leg underneath his stool, kicking it away, and sending Lester crashing downward, slamming his chin on the bar. He spewed curses at her and threatened her sputtering, “You just signed your death warrant, you little bitch,” as he hung limply.
He tried to say something else, but she gripped him by his greasy hair and smashed his nose into the rounded edge of the wood. The blood flowed and Lester’s eyes watered, blinding him immediately. Lilly had just begun to lay into his ribs with a furious series of kicks and punches when she found herself toppling to the floor.
As the blackness of anger filled tunnel vision seeped from her periphery she gave in to the weight of Seth and Dante atop her. Seth snapped at her angrily, “Lilly! Calm the fuck DOWN!”
Dante informed Seth, “I got her, man! I got her! Get Lester outta here!”
Dante spoke to Lilly in a soothing tone saying, “It’s alright, Lil. It’s over now. You got him. You got him good. Just take a deep breath.”
Lilly finally relented and felt the tension in her muscles melt away. She lay there with Dante perched atop her staring at the ceiling of the Inferno and began to cry, tears streaming in small rivulets across her temples and dropping from her ears. Reality was setting in once again.
Seth gripped the blades in Lester’s hands one by one and struggled slightly to pull them free. He had to rock them back and forth a bit causing Lester to howl, but they finally came loose. He threw Lester’s arm over his shoulder and they made their way outside toward Doc’s place.
A crowd had gathered at the doors of the Inferno and, by the time they pushed through, Nick and Kylee were equally worried and furious. They made their way to Lilly and Dante on the floor where Nick offered a hand to stand them up.
Kylee spoke first. She asked her question with genuine concern and a slight twinge of motherly love. “Lilly… are you okay?”
Lilly knew she was in for it. She nodded in the affirmative after reaching down to feel at her knee. The stitches had held nicely, a testament to Doc’s talent. “I’m fine.”
Kylee’s features hardened. “Good. Now get your little ass back to the Palace and don’t even think about doing anything else until we can sort this out… IF we can sort it out at all. You are in the absolute deepest of shit!”
Lilly protested, “But… but you know how Lester is! And I still have to see David today!”
Kylee stood her ground. “No. Absolutely not. You’ve done enough already. Go. I can’t even look at you right now.”
Desperation fueling her tears now, Lilly bawled, “But I promised him! I promised him I’d be there!”
“You were trusted to handle this. Clearly we misjudged. GO!”
Lilly ran off. Unlike the others, she didn’t need to push through the crowd at the door. After seeing the state of Lester they simply parted the way for her. She ran until her lungs burned all the way back to her bed where she collapsed like any other defeated teenager would. Lilly cried herself back to sleep in minutes.
Seth crashed through the doors of Doc’s place dragging Lester’s faltering form with him. They fumbled along, leaving the odd smear of blood here and there as Seth shouted intensely, “Doc! Get your ass out here! We got a problem!”
The form of a bald man in his late fifties appeared from the adjacent room and Doc made his presence known. He shook his head as he pulled his glasses from a faded leather case in his shirt pocket and said, “Oh, Christ, what happened to him?”
Seth dropped Lester to the floor like a sandbag, knelt beside him, and said coolly, “Possible broken nose, one missing tooth, and knife wounds to both hands, through and through. Probably some bruised ribs, too.”
Doc rolled his eyes, frustrated, and asked, “Let me guess. Bar fight?”
Seth didn’t answer him.
Going to work immediately, Doc assessed Lester’s injuries after opening a duffle bag full of odd medical supplies scavenged by the road crews. He took a good look at Lester’s hands, spreading the skin wide to check for damage to tendons and blood vessels, then he pinched Lester’s nose slightly. It crunched like a bag full of eggshells, broken for sure. “You know I’m in no position to perform a proper surgery right now,” Doc told them both. “Best I can do is patch him up enough to make him comfortable. We’ll have to reassess everything once he sobers up. If I try and sedate him now with what I have on hand he’ll probably die on the spot. I can smell the booze on him. We’ll control the bleeding and tape his nose. I’m no dentist, but that tooth is a lost cause. Not like it was in very good shape to begin with anyway.”
Lester grabbed clumsily for Seth’s vest and pulled him closer. He spoke through bloody teeth with a new lisp, courtesy of his missing tooth. “The price just tripled. And I want that goddamn foal for free.”
Seth winced at the demands. What could he do, though? Once Lester told his people what went on there today they’d have Vegas by the balls. It didn’t matter what Lester did or didn’t do. The bottom line is that people were going to go hungry without another deal.
“Fine.”
Lester gave an arrogant, gap toothed grin before spitting a wad of blood right onto Seth’s vest and smearing it in with his injured hand. “Aww… don’t look so disappointed, Seth. It’s just business. Just business…” With that, Lester promptly passed out.
Doc pushed Seth gently out of the way and began bandaging Lester’s hands. He turned Lester’s head to the side so he wouldn’t choke on his own blood, but it did nothing for the awful, wet-sounding snore that filled the room. Doc addressed Seth with a condescending tone, “You do realize David and his mother broke their backs to get that foal ready, don’t you? And you also realize that this little pricing debacle is far from finished, right? And might I also mention that…”
Seth had heard enough. He raised a hand to Doc and said firmly, “Stop. Just stop. I know. You just do your job and I’ll do mine.”
Doc shook his head unsatisfied. “Point of fact, Seth, you aren’t exactly doing your job. Not well, anyway. I, on the other hand, always perform my duties to the absolute pinnacle. And I dare you to find someone who wouldn’t tell you the exact same thing. I agreed to stay here and offer my services, which are FAR superior to anyone I might add, in exchange for proper materials, food, and safety. Quite frankly, I have none of the three as of this moment. Now, I can respect the fact that you’re under a great deal of pressure… and you’re a good man… which is why I haven’t packed my things and headed to the Foresters… yet. But the clock is ticking.”
Again with the talk of “good men” today, Seth stifled a gag. He was in a bad spot and he knew it. The words that Doc spoke only drove it home further. And what if Lester’s men didn’t take kindly to his condition? What if they decided to retaliate and do so violently? That would put Lilly on the firing line without a doubt. Seth had to keep the peace. It was his job.
Doc could read Seth’s face. “Look, I’m sorry. Bad timing, I know,” he offered to Seth by way of an apology. “Just focus on getting this mess cleaned up. I won’t make any rash moves. Now get comfortable. Once his buzz wears off he’s gonna wake up in a lot of pain. You think Lester was an asshole before? Wait until that happens.”
Seth shook his head. “Nah, we won’t keep him here. I’ll take him up to the Palace and give him the luxury treatment. Hopefully that’ll ease the sting of what comes next. You mind running over to David? Tell him to bring my horse over so I don’t have to carry this sack of shit all the way up the Strip.”
Doc gave an affirmative shrug saying, “Suit yourself. I’ll be back in a bit. Once he wakes up send for me. I’ll bring some gear up there and we’ll see about patching him up a bit better.”
Seth agreed. “Sounds like a plan. Thanks, Doc. I owe you for this.”
Doc smirked at Seth and sarcastically added, “You owe everyone for this, Seth. Not just me.”
It didn’t take long. David arrived out front of Doc’s walking alongside a very large and healthy piebald horse. Seth paid a handsome price for her to some Native Americans who had a large reservation about a hundred miles to the north nearly two years ago. Learning to ride wasn’t exactly fun, but it was necessary. All of the gasoline and diesel that used to run generators and conventional vehicles expired after the first few years and became completely useless shortly after that. Those who didn’t embrace the “joys” of animal transport would easily find themselves stranded. Stranded was the worse thing you could be on the outside. It usually meant an agonizing death whether from the elements, the bernies, or the Savages. Seth hated his horse and he let her know, too, every chance he got.
“Come on, you filthy son of a bitch! Stay still,” he snapped at her as he chucked Lester’s limp form over the back.
Her name was Pi. Seth thought it was clever. No one else cared.
Pi stamped her feet defiantly as if she was equally disgusted by Lester’s presence as everyone else, but she eventually kept still long enough for Seth to climb atop. Good thing David was there to help, though, because it probably would have taken Seth twice as long.
David asked Seth as a few onlookers gawked at them, “He gonna be alright? If he can’t pay for the foal we’re gonna starve this month.”
Seth didn’t like David. He didn’t like him for one reason and one reason only. David liked Lilly. It’s a dad thing… an instinct. He probably –could- like David and he probably –should- like David, but he just couldn’t bring himself to do it. He told the boy coldly, “He’s fine. Tell your mother I’ll be over later this evening to negotiate payment for the foal.”
David looked relieved at that answer. He asked, “Did Lilly do this? She’s promised to come see me later on. Is she okay? Did he hurt her?”
Seth inhaled deeply and let the breath escape his lungs heavily. “Goddamnit, kid, mind your business.” He clicked his heels and began trotting up the Strip with Lester in tow.
As he approached the Palace, Seth continued calculating what the next few hours would bring. It started to make him feel ill at the prospect of bowing to Lester even more now, not to mention how much it was going to cost to keep the food coming in. Lilly pretty much single handedly put all of Vegas at risk and likely painted a target on her own back.
He rode past the Palace without even glancing at its doors. He passed the outskirts of the town and made his way to the north gate where Dante was briefing some of the men on the security detail.
Seth raised a hand and called up to Dante, lying. “Doc patched him and put him to sleep. I’m gonna head on over to the outpost and drop him off to his men. I’ll be back before sundown. Let the others know?”
Dante nodded and waved Seth through as the huge composite gate creaked open.
Once on the other side, Seth kicked Pi into a comfortable canter and made off to the north towards the river, not Lester’s outpost. He kept his eyes on the horizon watching for any movement.
They rode for an hour approaching the river before the smell finally reached his nostrils. The herd they had scouted two days earlier was still in place. The rotting corpses shuffled and bumped into each other slowly and constantly in a cloud of flies and decay. Pi nervously began protesting Seth’s kicks to approach them, but he relentlessly urged her to within fifty yards before stopping and dismounting.
The carrion feeding birds hovered in the sky casting shade on the dead as they murmured and gurgled idly. They were no doubt in sleep mode simply awaiting some sort of stimuli. Seth yanked Lester from the horse’s back thumping him to the ground. That was when he began to stir.
As Lester opened his eyes he moved his mouth to speak, but Seth shushed him, pointing to the mass of undead within earshot. Lester’s eyes went as wide as dinner plates and he came to the realization he was no longer within the walls of Vegas. He realized he was on the outside, alone, and Seth stood above him.
Lester began to beg in hushed tones. “Look… Seth… buddy… Come on. We don’t have to do this. We can work somethin’ out, man.” The worry and fear creased his face as Seth drew his knife. Lester desperately cried, “Seth? SETH! Don’t do this, man. Look, I’ll do grain for half price. I’ll pay double for the foal. Just don’t do this, PLEASE!”
The dead began to stir and snarl. First a few, then ten, then twenty, they turned and began shuffling slowly in the direction of Seth and Lester. As Lester turned on his belly in an effort to get to his feet Seth slashed viciously with his blade sinking it into the upper part of Lester’s heel and severing his Achilles tendon. Lester screamed out, now aware there was no escaping this fate. Seth slashed the other, crippling Lester and sending his blood pouring from the wounds to soak into the parched earth below them. Lester tried to crawl but it was useless with the damage to his limbs and he constantly ended up falling flat on his face, the dirt sticking to the blood that caked him.
Seth mounted Pi and looked down upon Lester’s pathetic, dying form. “Don’t look so disappointed, Lester. It’s just business. Just business…”
Lester screamed and cursed inaudibly as Seth kicked Pi into a gallop, heading back to the Strip. The dead were upon Lester in less than a minute and they began feeding on him before Seth was out of sight. There would be nothing left of Lester by the time they were through. They would surely strip the flesh from his bones and the birds would clean what was left.
Seth reached the gates long before nightfall, but his workday had just begun. After all, the work of a “good guy” is never done.
Chapter Three – Dream a Little Dream
Lilly pushed hard as she tried to get her knife out of the bearded Savage’s chest. He had managed to punch her so hard that she saw stars and when she felt the steel sink into his flesh she knew it was held fast. He slumped forward, toppling her over, and pinned her beneath his weight with her knife between two of his ribs. Her eyes watered, though it was unclear if it was from the punch he landed or his stinking body odor.
She continued to struggle as the battle waged around her. The sound of her party being slaughtered, men screaming for their lives, the clash of weapons; it all rang in her ears at once and she started to panic. Where was Murphy? Why hadn’t he come to help yet?
Lilly yelped as strong hands grabbed her by her short hair to pull her from under the dead man, thankfully before he turned. But she soon found herself wishing he had ended her life moments before. In seconds, she could feel them clawing at her and tearing her clothes from her body. She knew instantly what would happen next. She clamped her eyes tightly shut as countless hands parted her legs. She fought them as hard as she could, but there were too many. The pain shot through her body and she snapped awake to find herself on sheets soaked with sweat.
“Nightmares again, huh, Lil?” Wyatt asked her innocently. He sat next to her on the bed and stroked her hair. It was always cute when he tried to take care of her.
Lilly nodded and sat up, clutching at her stomach. She always felt ill after the dreams were over. She shot a glance to the window instinctively gauging the time by the light outside and figured she’d been asleep for at least four hours or more. The sun was only a hand above the horizon and that meant nightfall would be along in a couple of hours. Perhaps she was more worn down than she thought.
Wyatt warned her gently, “Mom’s still mad. People are saying that you might have killed Lester. No one has seen him since Seth took him from Doc’s place. They’re saying he was slumped over Seth’s horse like he was dead. What did you do to him anyway?”
She didn’t care. In fact, the first place her mind went was to David. She was horrified that he might think she broke her promise to him and now, more than ever, she was worried for him and his mother. Lester was surely not going to pay them in full now. She opened her mouth to tell Wyatt not to worry so much but no words came. Instead, a watery flood of vomit and bile left her lips. She caught much of it in her hands, though the rest ran between her fingers and soaked her bedding further.
“Take it easy, Lil,” Wyatt said softly as he passed her a stained, off-white towel. “You’re lucky I’m here to take care of you, ya know?” He smiled at her. “Anyway, I’ll go tell them you’re up.”
As she wiped herself Lilly asked Wyatt, “What about Seth? Is he pissed, too?”
Wyatt shrugged. “Dunno. Haven’t seen him all day. Stay here, though. Mom and Nick are gonna wanna talk to you.” He left her alone, jogging down the hallway towards the stairs.
Lilly replayed the scene in the bar over and over in her mind as she cleaned up. She even caught herself twitching and dodging slightly here and there as she recalled the moments of action. It was funny to her that in hindsight everything was clear and easy to calculate. Nothing like it is in the heat of the moment. “Such is life,” she thought to herself.
Kylee stalked into the room with a cool and focused gait. She took a seat on the well-worn couch across from the bed and motioned for Lilly to sit down without speaking a word. Once Lilly settled in and braced herself for one of Kylee’s signature rants, she found herself shocked at the unlikely approach being taken. Instead of chewing her out, Kylee calmly asked, “Why?”
Caught a little off guard, Lilly asked in turn, “Why, what?”
Kylee was prepared for Lilly’s confusion. She clarified by saying simply, “Why did you attack him?”
Lilly felt her eyes filling with tears, but she refused to let them fall. At first, she told Kylee about the terrible things he was saying about Nick and Seth. She then recounted the way he latched onto the barmaid and accosted her while Kylee listened carefully and patiently.
The tears fell in spite of Lilly’s refusal as she watched Kylee’s stern features melt to compassion and sorrow at the story of Lilly and Lester’s first introduction. Kylee placed her hands on Lilly’s face and pulled her in, hugging her tightly. “It’s okay, Lilly,” she told her as she shushed her quietly. “It’s okay.” Kylee was much better at holding back tears than Lilly was and this was no exception. She sat there and held Lilly strongly, like only a mother can do, while she deteriorated into a fit of sobbing wails. This was the first time Lilly told Kylee of a gross, sexual advance made on her. Truth is Lilly protected Kylee and the others by keeping those things to herself. Those were Lilly’s burdens to carry. But in this instance, Lester’s proposition played a huge role in her behavior as well as her inability to control herself once the violence began flashing in all directions.
Nick popped his head through the door and caught sight of Kylee and Lilly on the couch. He silently asked Kylee if it was alright to enter and was met with a nod. Alyse followed him in. They made their way to the bed to sit down but quickly thought better of it when the sour smell of vomit hit their noses. They opted to stand awkwardly instead.
Nick said disappointedly, “You really fucked up good this time, kiddo. Doc says Lester’s now demanding three times what he should be getting, Dante’s place is still wrecked, and David’s mother has been up my ass all day about getting paid for that goddamn horse she’s been raising for Lester. If you have any bright ideas, now would be a good time to bring ‘em up.”
Alyse leaned forward and put an encouraging hand on Lilly’s shoulder. “On the bright side, you’re a hero with the girls down at the Hag’s Head. Everyone’s talking about how you put that bastard in his place. Good to let them know that some women aren’t gonna put up with that kinda stuff.”
Nick scoffed and huffed at Alyse, “Don’t encourage her, I’m serious! We’re looking at an irreparable situation here, a food shortage, probable retaliation, and, at the very BEST, an argument that we’re going to have to concede. It’s nothing to be proud of, Alyse!”
Alyse rolled her eyes at Nick. “I know. But still…” She whispered to Lilly, “Good for you, girl.”
Alyse and Nick had grown close in the years following the reclamation of Vegas. Sure, Nick was always going to be a merciless flirt with a wandering eye, but there was a comfort and safety he found with Alyse that kept him honest. She knew just how much line to give him before she had to draw it tight and choke him back to reality. Theirs was a very give and take sort of relationship, which was why it worked so well. Alyse gave Nick’s hand a gentle squeeze as if to tell him to take it easy before leaving the three of them alone to talk.
The room was downright uncomfortable by now with Nick standing there, arms crossed and seething, and Kylee, losing her anger to the latest secret revealed by Lilly. You probably could’ve cut the tension with a knife until Seth arrived. His vest was still caked in Lester’s blood and the rest of him was plastered in dirt and sand. His hair had dust tainting its usual black giving him the appearance of a man who has had one very shitty day.
Lilly snapped at all of them. “Look! I’m sorry, okay?! I don’t know what you want me to do! I don’t know what I’m SUPPOSED to do now!”
Wyatt frowned deeply as he eavesdropped from the adjacent room of the hotel. He was very good at sneaking about, always had been, and he had made himself quite an impressive little network of peepholes and crawlspaces in the many buildings along the Strip. He genuinely felt for Lilly’s predicament and his instinct to protect his big sister from everything grabbed hold of him. If only he was big enough to go out with them. If only they’d give him the chance to learn. He could be a protector like the others. He clawed at his shorts to remain calm as he listened on.
As Seth made his way to the bed to sit himself down Nick started to warn him about the puke. He quickly changed his mind, though, and silently smirked to himself as Seth plopped down, right into the foul liquid. Seth hung his head, defeated. It was just the icing on the cake and went right along with the tone of his day. Seth lit himself a cigarette and inhaled deeply, rubbing at his temples, before informing everyone, “Lester’s dead.”
There was a collective gasp in the room and Lilly panicked. She spouted, “What?! How?! I didn’t do anything that would…”
Seth raised his hand, cigarette between his index and middle fingers, to shut everyone up. He exhaustedly admitted, “I did it. I took him out to the river and made sure there was nothing left. If his men come sniffing around for him we’ll just tell them he never made it here. We’ll just play dumb.”
Nick stroked his chin thoughtfully. “Well played, I guess. Sure, it saves us the batteries and the trouble of ever dealing with that asshole again, but it does little to help the rest of the problem.”
Kylee nodded her agreement with Nick adding, “David and his mom still need the money, regardless of whether or not they still have the foal and we no longer have the food source. I mean, don’t get me wrong. Thanks for making the Lester situation disappear and all, but we still have a lot of shit to deal with.”
Seth took a long pull from his smoke and told them all, “I handled the David situation, too. When I dropped Pi off I passed them enough chips to get them through the month and I told them that once the foal was able to be saddled I’d buy him for Wyatt. He asked about you, by the way, Lilly.”
Lilly brightened slightly at that and she asked timidly, “David? Did he seem mad? Was he alright?”
Nick barked something about how he didn’t give a hot bowl of monkey shit about David’s feelings but he was stifled when Seth said flatly, “Ask him yourself. You’re going to go down there and pick up the wagon, two week’s worth of supplies, and four mounts. We leave tomorrow.”
Lilly’s eyes boggled. “Tomorrow?! Again!? But we just got back and my knee is still…”
Seth wasn’t having it. He’d taken his share for the team today and Lilly’s prattling was wearing on already thin nerves. “I don’t care, Lilly! You helped make this mess and you’re going to help us out of it. That’s your punishment. We’re going to the Foresters to cut a new deal with them because it’s the only shot we got left. Except this time I’ll be over your shoulder while you ‘negotiate’ or whatever you call it so you don’t fuck it up. Got it?”
Lilly exhaled slowly and angrily. She narrowed her eyes at Seth and said through her teeth, “Fine. Can I go now?”
Kylee warned her sternly, “Watch the tone. We’ve been covering your ass all day long. The least you can do is show some gratitude, especially to Seth.”
Lilly curled her lip into a sarcastic, prissy smile and smartly said, “Oh, thank you, Seth. Thank you SO much for everything,” before rolling her eyes and rushing out of the room.
Seth sighed deeply. “I don’t know what to do with that kid sometimes…”
Kylee offered some insight saying, “She’s young. She’s emotional. And she hasn’t exactly had an easy go of things. We have to stay patient or we’ll lose her completely.”
Nick shrugged. “I dunno. Sometimes I think she needs a swift kick in the ass. That’s what my old man used to do.”
Butting his cigarette out on the nightstand, Seth told Nick with a half-assed grin, “That’s why YOU turned out so well, right?”
Kylee put her foot down. “Nick. You go and work out the deal with the Foresters. Let’s see if there’s any truth to your swift kick theory. Don’t be a dick, though. I mean it. Seth, I want you to stay here and smooth things over with the Doc. I hear he’s getting restless.”
Seth was slightly surprised that Kylee knew about that. He gave her a look as if to ask where she had heard it and she told him with a wink, “My little Wyatt has eyes and ears everywhere. Sort things out with Doc, okay? We need him.”
Seth whispered under his breath, “Wyatt, you little son of a…” He looked at Kylee before finishing such a dangerous sentiment and opted to say out loud, “Good enough. I need some sleep first.” He plopped back onto the pillow and closed his eyes, oblivious now to the funk that was soaked into his pants. He was just too tired to give a shit.
Kylee turned her attention to Nick saying, “Take care of our little girl, Nick. I’m serious.”
Nick nodded to her and told her confidently, “Like she was my own, Kylee. Always have. No worries.”
David perked up as Lilly approached him from across the makeshift stable that had been set up in the courtyard of an old motel. He had been checking on Pi’s shoes and just happened to look up at the right time. He beamed at her and jogged to meet her halfway. “There you are! How bad was it?”
Lilly waved it off and said, “Not that bad. I have to go out again, though. That shit sucks. I just got home and now because of Lester, rot in hell, I have to go play politics with the God damned tree people.”
David grinned happily. “I know! And guess what?”
Lilly, thoroughly confused by David’s smile, asked him unenthusiastically, “What?”
Posing proudly, David told her, “I’m going this time, too! Seth said so. Told me if I couldn’t fight then I may as well learn politics. Told me, and I quote, ‘If your sorry ass ever wants to stop shoveling horse shit for a living then you better learn a skill now. And if you’re even gonna think about going after that little girl of mine then you better not be shoveling horse shit for a living. Got that?’ So, that’s it. We’re leaving in the morning.”
Lilly cringed with embarrassment. She’d always hated being called “little girl” and she often made an example of anyone who would attempt such an insult. More importantly, though, she no longer found it sweet that Nick and Seth treated her like their little baby girl from time to time. It was an insult to her intelligence and to her cunning on the outside. It often slipped her mind, though, that the secrets she kept from them directly contributed to their lack of understanding. In Lilly’s mind she had paid her dues a million times over, but much of what she had been through remained shrouded from her family.
“This is bullshit!” Lilly spat. “You’re not ready for this. You don’t have the slightest clue what could go wrong out there at any moment. And what if the shit DOES hit the fan? What then? HUH?! It’s bad enough I have to baby-sit half of Dante’s boys. Cocky motherfuckers. Now I have to make sure you don’t get killed, too?”
David frowned deeply. Again Lilly had gutted him; figuratively, of course. All he wanted was her approval for once. His mind jumped to the surprise he’d been preparing for her. “C’mere! I have something I wanna show you.”
Lilly followed him past the stalls, where a few hired hands were readying the supplies for the next day and loading the large covered wagon, to a ladder that reached up to the rooftops. She climbed along behind David and emerged to a beautiful sunset high atop the buildings of the Strip where she took a moment to scan the horizon. It was an old habit and a very good one at that. She asked David, “What’s this surprise you’re talking about? I only see the usual.”
What she meant by “the usual” was the sprawling rooftop gardens that had been set up among the majority of the hotels and motels of the Strip. They had been there for years and for a long while managed to feed the population of Vegas comfortably. That is until word got out and more people came. Placing the gardens on the rooftops was Alyse’s idea and, although it was a lot of work at first, it did the trick. They saved on space at the ground level, the plants got the maximum amount of sun, and they no longer had to worry about the contaminated soil below. No one was interested in eating things from soil that may have been tainted by a thousand infected corpses.
David shook his head. “To your right. The one all by itself.”
Lilly perused the many dirt-filled boxes with their sharp edges and tight lines. They were expertly crafted. She ran her hands along squash leaves and such until she stood above the one David pointed out. “Well? What do you think?” he asked her. “Do you like them?”
Lilly knelt down and inhaled deeply from one of several red roses that were planted and in full bloom in their own little box. The box was a bit slapdash, obviously handmade by someone not familiar with woodworking tools. The edges didn’t quite line up and a small amount of soil could be seen dusting the ground after having slipped through a gap in the wood. “They’re perfect, David. Thank you,” she smiled.
David nodded proudly if not slightly embarrassed. You know how kids are. It was awkward, but it was sincere, and Lilly genuinely did appreciate his effort. But she couldn’t let him know how much. She had to keep the distance. Especially now. Especially if they were going outside tomorrow. She wouldn’t let herself become attached because David may well be gone all too soon.
“Listen,” she told him as nicely as possible. “You’re very sweet. And I do like you. But you can’t do things like this. You and I… we’re not a thing. And we’re not going to be a thing. You need to understand that. You’re a good friend and someone I appreciate very much. But that’s all we’re going to be. Period. Okay?”
The words tasted sour as they left her mouth. She was lying and she knew it. In fact, she wanted nothing more than to give David a chance. She wanted nothing more than to open her heart for once to someone who wasn’t one of the Originals. But people die. It hurts when people die, especially the ones you let into your heart. So, she had to say those things even if they made her seem cold and heartless.
David pursed his lips and gave her those goddamn puppy eyes she hated so much. “I know. I just wanted to make you something you could enjoy when you’re home. That’s all, Lil. I know I’ll probably never win you over. You need a tough guy, a fighter. I’m not that guy. But that doesn’t mean I can’t try, right?”
Lilly huffed and relented a little, though her guard stayed firmly in place. “Yeah, you can try.” She smiled at him and patted him on the back, urging toward the ladder. “You can start by finishing up the preparations and getting some sleep. I don’t wanna to be scraping your guts off the ground and bringin’ them home to your mother in a bag. Heard?”
David perked up slightly. “Yeah, yeah. I hear ya.”
As David disappeared down the ladder, Lilly stayed behind. She gazed at the flowers, took another whiff of the roses, and wiped the wetness from her cheeks. “Get it together, Lil,” she told herself. “Stop this cryin’ shit and get it together.”
In the morning, the crew gathered at the gates of the Strip and said their goodbyes. Dante kissed his wife and told her for the thousandth time, “I know I don’t HAVE to go. I WANT to go on this one. I haven’t been to the Foresters in forever and Seth asked me personally. I’ll be back before you know it, babe.”
Nick asked David gruffly, “Hey, dickhead! You got the extra batteries and the bows that Chief made?”
David ignored the insults and answered properly with, “Yeah, in the wagon. No sweat!”
Within minutes the envoy had made its way out of the gates and Vegas was disappearing in the dust behind them.
Curled in a ball underneath a pile of blankets and panting heavily in the heat, Wyatt peered out of the back of the wagon. He watched Vegas become smaller and smaller as they rumbled along. Soon they would know that he could be just like the big guys; just like the ones he looked up to. As Wyatt kept himself hidden from the rest of the crew he reassured himself that they would be proud of his initiative. They would respect him like they respect Nick and Seth and his mom and Lilly. Wyatt was very good at sneaking about. Very good, indeed.
Chapter Four – Trapped
In a quiet copse of trees in the mountainous regions of Arizona a lone elk bleated pitifully. Its hind quarter, flayed open and bleeding heavily, began to draw the attention of biting ants and flies as two of the dead tore into the flesh with skeletal fingers.
The trap wasn’t meant for an animal of such size and it wasn’t even placed along one of the elk’s regular game trails. It was just bad timing. The two shambling corpses had startled the doe elk as they crashed clumsily through the woods and it dashed off of its usual route in a panic to find safety. Instead she found her rear hoof entangled in a thin wire snare and was held fast as the undead stalked her. In a matter of minutes they had managed to tear into her, gorging themselves on her warm flesh as she laid still and waited for death to take her.
Some distance away a small hunting party armed with spears and bows hunkered down and listened intently to the bleating in the brisk morning air. Chak, a young twenty-something man garbed in the brindle furs and leather vaguely reminiscent of the Native Americans from ages past, signaled to his group of four to follow him. They moved with calculated steps as silent as prowling jaguars in a rehearsed ballet of tactical precision.
Chak darted his eyes this way and that looking for anything out of place along the forest floor. His instincts were strong and his ability to pick up even the faintest of trails was the result of spending countless hours hunting to feed their growing community, not to mention his two children. It didn’t take long for him to find a human footprint. He gestured to the youngest of the men in his small party to approach him for a chat.
Chak whispered in a tone so low that even the other members of the hunting group couldn’t hear him speaking to his young ward. As he spoke he pointed to each component of the print in an effort to teach the young teen. “Look at the drag mark toward the back before he plants his foot. And see how deep this one is compared to the other. Also, take note of the staggered pattern in which they’re falling. The person that left these prints is one of two things. He’s either a ghoul or he’s a drunk. I’ll let you guess which.”
The young teen was called Ten and he observed intently in an effort to soak in what his older cousin was explaining. Ten was an eager boy chosen to join the hunting party on his sixteenth birthday. He was chosen over a large group of boys similar in age and build because he was sharp and always willing to learn. He also knew when to keep his mouth shut. Ten nodded at Chak that he understood and cocked his head to the right slightly to inform the others the lesson was over. It was time to move.
As the group inched along, following the tracks, and, listening for anything that may resemble food or danger, they did so in silence. One would’ve been hard pressed to hear even the smallest crack of a dry twig or the gentle crunch of decaying leaves at their feet. Such was the skill of the Foresters.
Most of the Foresters were part of an often diluted bloodline all loosely related in some form or another dating back to before the 1800’s. Apache, Hopi, Yavapai, and O’odham blood was soon thinned with that of the white oppressors and, in later years, intermixed with Hispanic and South American stock.
Regardless of what any single Forester’s genetic traits may have been they all shared similar features such as brown hued skin, dark hair, and stoic facial expressions. The women tended to become thick and curvy as they matured and the men mostly remained lean and athletic. More important than their shared features, though, was their unwillingness to let go of the old ways, the traditions, that each family, tribe, or community called their own. And they passed these things down to their children fervently. It was a matter of pride.
In a matter of minutes the hunters had come within fifteen feet of the dying elk and its two attackers. Chak performed a series of hand signals and then drew a handmade arrow from the quiver that hung on his back. One of the older men in the group, known simply as Bull, followed suit and took aim as instructed. Chak began count down from three moving his lips without uttering an actual sound.
Boom!
Boom, boom, boom!
The silence was abruptly shattered. The first of the dead was destroyed with a single shot to the head and slumped over the elk’s dying form immediately. The second raised its head and turned to face the loud noise with a snarl, but instead was met with a series of three shots, two of which tore chunks of its face off before the third removed the better half its cranium.
Birds and other wildlife scattered and fled to God-knows-where, sending the sounds of flapping wings and the shaking of trees whipping through the air. As quiet crept back into the scene Chak, Ten, and their team, now lying flat on their bellies craned their necks to catch sight of who destroyed the feeding dead without giving away their position to the phantoms.
“Son of a bitch!” a male voice could be heard saying disgustedly.
A second male voice added, “Damn meat ain’t no good no more. Damn geeks spoilin’ e’rythin’.”
Chak rolled slowly to his left where he was finally able to catch a glimpse of the mysterious killers. There were three of them, though only two had spoken. All were dressed in rags and the tattered clothing of those who are uncivilized. The Foresters called them the Unclean. Whether you call them the Unclean, Savages, or anything else it all meant the same thing: danger. They listened closely.
The first man to speak was obviously a leader of sorts. He carried himself in a very Alpha-type manner and the other men with him kept their distance. He spit a huge wad of phlegm on the doe elk and then knelt to look into her face.
“Welp. Sucks to be you,” he said matter-of-factly before standing tall once again.
He raised his right foot and brought it down with all of his weight onto the elk’s head. The elk’s nervous system caused it to shake and shudder during the next series of five or six stomps from the gang’s leader before she finally sat there still, her life completely wasted. She belonged to the bugs now.
Chak rolled back and flashed a number three to his crew. He then pointed in the direction of the elk and swirled his index finger around indicating his plan to flank them. Ten nodded along with the others. Once that was established he pointed to Bull and motioned at a rock lying at his feet. Bull knew what he had to do. Chak then turned his attention to Ten and the last man in his group, Talo, the spear man. He twisted his fingers into three or four different signs before holding an open palm up directly at Ten.
Ten frowned deeply. Learning that he would have to sit this one out, Ten protested with a sign of his own. It was a universal symbol that most cultures understood involving an extended middle finger. Chak raised his fist at Ten with a stern look to gently remind him who was in charge.
The Unclean milled around the bodies in the copse, idly chatting amongst themselves while they looted the dead. “Lookie here, Cook! This one’s got hisself some smokes.”
Cook, the leader, replied enthusiastically, “Ah, nice! Toss me one!”
Cook leaned against a huge pine tree and lit his newly found treasure. He inhaled deeply and threw his head back, blowing the smoke into the breeze.
Chak’s arrow hissed through the air and struck true. The razor sharp arrowhead sliced cleanly through Cook’s throat just under his Adam’s Apple and exited out the back of his head. It sunk deep into the tree trunk and hung him lifelessly from the pine as his body went limp.
One of Cook’s companions shouted a war cry and spun around in the direction from which the arrow fired. That was when Talo made his move. The stone hit the Unclean’s head with a solid –thunk- and sent him falling face first onto the forest floor with a stream of blood trickling into the soft earth.
Another arrow whizzed through the air. Bull had hit his mark. The arrow passed completely through the torso of the third man who immediately began running off further into the woods. They didn’t bother to pursue him knowing full well that a wound like that would see him bled out and collapsed in less than a minute.
As the Foresters regrouped around the carnage Talo jabbed his spear tip deep into the back of the wounded man’s head just below where the rock had struck. “The one that ran off… he’ll turn.”
Chak shrugged and said flatly, “Go. Finish him.”
Talo nodded and gestured for Ten to come along with him but Ten hesitated. He offered Chak a silent request for permission and was waved along. The two disappeared into the brush following an obvious blood trail.
Chak knelt next to the body with Talo’s spear still stuck in its head. He reached down to remove the black, metallic object from the man’s hand but it was not going to come loose without a fight. The death grip would require Chak to break several finger bones before he could pry it free. He brandished the weapon uncomfortably and said curiously to Bull, “Guns? Where did they get guns?”
Bull exhaled as deep creases of concern etched across his face. “Dunno. Haven’t seen a working gun in forever.”
As Chak inspected the weapon further Bull warned him to be careful. Only the Elders of the Foresters were familiar with the guns and rifles of the Old World. They would most certainly want to hear the news that the Unclean were not only brazenly hunting on Forester land, but that they were doing so with such dangerous weaponry. It made them both extraordinarily uneasy.
Ten and Talo returned in minutes dragging the body of the third man behind them. His tattered clothes were soaked in what appeared to be gallons of bright red arterial blood and he was as white as a ghost. Ten still clutched his hatchet and began to wipe off bits of brain matter on the clothes of the corpse before hooking back to the cord around his waist. They dropped him roughly at Chak’s feet and stood there baffled.
Talo asked the obvious question. “Why are they so loud? A sound like that is sure to drive off any game that may have been sniffin’ around.”
Chak was too furious to even answer him. He said through clenched teeth, “We’re done here. Bless the animal and the dead so we can get back to the others. Seven Doves will have to consult the Spirits. Be quick. There may be more of them.”
They set to work quickly laying the dead in a semi circle around the body of the elk as Chak approached Cook’s rag doll form at the base of the giant pine tree. He pulled hard at the arrow and it broke in half as the weight of the dead body slumped to the ground. He added Cook’s body to the ritual.
The hunting party gathered various bits of wood and set to making a fire bundle made of pencil thin twigs and dry brush. Ten watched Bull closely as he unsheathed his blade and carefully unwrapped a palm sized piece of flint from a dirty bundle of rags at his hip. He struck the flint with the spine of his knife and sent a shower of sparks into the tinder bundle. “We thank You, Great Spirit,” he offered to the sky as he gently blew the smoking bundle into flame.
They covered the bodies, one and all, in dried brush and sticks and topped them with all manner of aromatic green leaves that were strewn about the clearing. Chak gestured to Talo to begin cleaning and at his behest they began brushing the area around the dead clear of vegetation down to bare earth. This was to ensure their fire would not spread further than the intended ritual.
Once completed, Chak raised his open arms to the sky and recited the ancient words of his people. “Ma’allt Terra. Forta ba’al sentti. Ah’nat bah.” He drew his own knife and walked to the body of Cook. Slicing cleanly into the flesh of his own hand, careful to keep the wound shallow, he allowed several drops of his own blood to fall upon the corpse. He whispered quietly, “With my blood upon my kill I send you to the Great Spirit once again clean. Go in peace, new friend, and may your spirit find itself willing to guide my hands in the future. This is how we forgive one another.”
Bull followed suit and did the same for the man he killed as did Talo after removing his spear. Ten watched intently having not made an actual kill on his own.
Once completed, Bull set alight a small torch and touched it to each body in the sequence in which they passed. The smoke billowed up and out of the forest’s canopy as the foul smell of burning flesh and hair mingled with the sickly sweet aromatics they had placed upon the departed.
They left the fire to burn once the flames died down a bit and began their trek back home empty handed.
They moved in silence once again, but this time it was more of a somber occasion. The group would have to set out again shortly before nightfall in hopes of making a fresh kill and that was weighing on them heavily. In fact, coming home without meat was almost as scary as having to tell the Elders and Seven Doves the news about the Unclean and their fire weapons.
Bull uncharacteristically broke the silence and told Chak with a hopeful smile, “Once we’re Elders we’ll finally be able to stop worrying so much. Ain‘t that right, Chak?”
Chak wasn’t exactly in the talking mood, but he also wasn’t one to be rude, especially to Bull. They had fought many a battle together against the dead and they worked tirelessly alongside one another building the many bridges and tree houses of the community. He told Bull, “Yep. One day we’ll be able to talk to the Great Spirit and we’ll put an end to all of this. It’ll be us who will keep the people safe and fed. We’ll do wonderful things, we will. All of us. Talo, Ten. All of us.”
Ten shrugged. “I don’t think so, Chak. I mean, sure, you guys will. But not me. I’m going to Vegas when I get old enough to travel alone. I wanna see all of it. Vegas, the Dam, the giant crater. Everything!”
Chak stopped walking and turned to Ten. “That’s not for you. That’s not for any of us!” His brow creased with frustration at his young cousin and he chided him saying, “Vegas people are barely a step above the Unclean. You would likely find yourself stripped and left naked in their streets. That place is an abomination to the Great One and I will personally see you shamed for mentioning that filthy hole one more time in my presence, got it?”
Ten frowned.
“I said, ‘Got it?’”
Ten nodded, defeated.
Chak allowed his face to smile and he threw his arm around Ten. “Besides, little cousin, how am I gonna run this place without you? I’ve been grooming you since you were just a little kid. Raised you like you were my own. Now, come on. Let’s get back and get this over with. Tonight’s hunt has to be fruitful.”
Ten smiled weakly giving in to Chak’s encouragement. “Alright. I’m sorry. I just wanna… you know… SEE it.”
Chak nodded his understanding. “I know you do. But trust me, Ten. Places like that only sound good. Once you’re actually there, though, you realize all you want to do is go home. Trust me.”
Chapter Five – Time to Go
“SETH! Seth, wake up NOW!”
Kylee stood above him with worry creasing her face. She clutched in her hands a small, torn piece of paper.
He had been napping for about an hour after seeing Lilly’s group off and checking in on Dante’s place in the aftermath of Lester’s visit. It was a deep and well deserved sleep. Seth answered with a slightly disoriented, “What? I’m up.”
Kylee, nearly in tears, thrust the note into Seth’s hand and he squinted to adjust his groggy eyes. “I found it in his bed,” she told him.
Mom,
I knew you wouldn’t believe me but I’m ready. I’m not a baby anymore. You and Lilly and Nick and Seth have been telling me forever that I don’t need to go outside the gates and that it’s dangerous but there’s something I have to tell you. I’ve been outside before. I went outside and I came back just fine. No one even knew I was gone. So I know I can do it. I knew Lilly wouldn’t let me come along and neither would Nick so I snuck out with them. You’re probably mad and I feel bad about that part. I just hope that when we get back Nick and Lilly tell you that I did good. Mom, don’t worry. We’ll be fine.
Love,
Wyatt
Seth popped up and strapped his belt on without a word. As he slid his knife into the sheath strapped to his thigh and quickly checked the edge on his larger blade Kylee asked him, “How far out do you think they are by now?”
He paused for a moment to glance through the window, gauging the daylight. “Far enough. By the time I catch up they’ll be in The Badlands, maybe as far as the nuke plant. Go see if you can get Pi saddled, I’ll get Doc. Bring his horse, too.”
Kylee nodded and dashed as fast as she could out of the Palace and up the Strip to David’s stable. Seth took only a moment more to lace up his boots before he, too, was out.
On his third patient of the day, Doc was stitching up the hand of a dirty drifter who had just entered the Strip earlier in the morning with a small group of his own. “Yeah, get this. I’m sharpenin’ my knife when my idiot brother decides to play a prank on me an’ the boys,” the drifter spoke with a heavy southern drawl through a mouthful of missing and rotting teeth. “Sum’ bitch comes up behind us and tosses this dead geek’s body into my back. Starts snarlin’ like one of ‘em for added effect or whatever.”
Doc smirked, knowing where the story was going. He asked anyway, “So, what happened?”
“WHAT HAPPENED?! The hell you think happened? I damn near shit my pants, stabbed myself in the goddamn hand, and screamed like a little girl while I was tryin’ to get the bastard offa me.” He cackled in hindsight. “Wait ‘til I get him back! He’s gon’ wish he was dead, the little prick.”
Doc finished the last stitch and, as he bandaged the wound, casually asked, “What brings you into Vegas anyway? Just lookin’ to get patched up?”
The drifter paused to consider his answer before replying, “We’re just here to make the usual trade. Lester said he was pickin’ up some lil’ horse, too. Speakin’ of the boss, you know where he got off to?”
Doc shook his head. “Haven’t seen Lester since yesterday. He’s around here somewhere. You should probably ask Se---“
Seth crashed through the door of Doc’s workspace panting heavily from his run. “Doc! Pack up, we gotta go.”
Pushing his glasses up on his nose, Doc said to the drifter as he gestured to Seth, “Perfect timing. This is Seth. He… keeps the peace around here.”
The drifter jutted out his uninjured hand towards Seth and introduced himself, “Name’s Jack. I’m with Lester’s crew. You seen him? Crazy bastard was supposed to be finished yesterday, but he ain’t been back to camp yet. Caught myself a lil’ cut on the hand so I figured I’d come into town and kill two birds with one stone.”
Seth sighed. He just didn’t have time for this shit. “Nah. Haven’t seen him,” he lied. “He was due in two days ago, but never showed. We just assumed you guys were running behind.”
Still clutching Seth’s hand, Jack stared directly into Doc’s eyes as he answered Seth, “Is that right? Never made it to town, huh? That’s… weird.”
Doc stared at the floor but said nothing. He knew they were caught.
Seth added, “Yep. I’m sure he’ll turn up eventually. Look, can you excuse us a sec?” He reached into his pocket and passed Jack a few chips. “Go on over to the tables and have some fun on me while you wait for him. I have to tend to some business with Doc here.”
Jack let Seth’s hand fall and stood up to make his exit, eyeing them both suspiciously. “Yeah. Maybe I’ll do that. Look, thanks for fixin’ me up, Doc. And good meetin’ ya, Seth.” He flipped one of the chips end over end into the air and caught it deftly before leaving with one last glance over his shoulder.
Doc opened his mouth to speak but Seth cut him off saying, “Wyatt snuck out with the others going to the Foresters. We need to catch them and bring him back.”
Doc stammered, “Um… We? Seth, I really can’t go out right now. Moreover, we have to talk about Lester. That Jack guy just---“
“NOW! We gotta go NOW!” Seth snapped at him, losing his patience. “You can fill me in on the way. Get your shit and meet me at the gate in five minutes. Kylee will have your horse waiting out front.” He didn’t even wait for Doc’s answer.
Kylee met Seth out front of Doc’s place holding Pi and another horse named Sass. She handed Pi’s reigns to Seth and pleaded, “Be careful.”
Seth clumsily mounted Pi and told Kylee, “He’ll be fine. I’ll catch them.”
Unconvinced, Kylee begged him, “Just bring my boy back safe, Seth. Please? I don’t know what I’d do if something happened to him out there. He’s not like Lilly. He’s just a kid.” The tears of a mother’s worry filled her eyes once more.
Seth gave a tight-lipped nod. “I know, Ky. You just hold down the fort. Let me worry about Wyatt.”
Kylee weakly relented and asked him, “What do you need me to do around here while you’re gone?”
Seth gestured to the Casino across the street and told her, “There’s a guy named Jack over there. He’s got a bandage on his hand, talks like a Southerner. He’s with Lester’s crew. Keep and eye on him and make sure he stays distracted until I get back. I told him Lester never showed.”
She nodded and laid a hand on Seth’s knee. “I got it covered. Go get my boy.”
Seth shouted a string of curses at Pi and kicked her into a canter. He whistled at the people in the street to clear a path as he made his way to the North Gate. Doc showed up in minutes and the two were soon galloping full speed across the wastes kicking up huge clouds of dust behind them.
Several miles to the southeast Lilly, Nick, and David were chatting with Dante and his apprentice, a young kid in his twenties named Sean. Sean had been working as a security trainee on the Strip for a couple of months now with Dante and he had proven to be a good asset. With his bodybuilder physique and fighting prowess he was intimidating and confident, yet willing to learn. Dante called him “a natural”.
Sean hadn’t been on the road since before arriving in Vegas with his older brother, but he had seen his share of violence. He asked Lilly, “So, what’s the funniest way you’ve ever seen a jerk get taken down?”
Lilly pondered the question before answering him saying with a smirk, “You should ask Nick. They were his kills.”
Nick chuckled. “Yeah, I don’t think we’ll ever see something like that again, Lil.”
Sean, smiling at the prospect of a good story, pressed Nick for details. “SO? What happened?”
Still hidden in the wagon, Wyatt pressed his ear to the side in an effort to eavesdrop on their conversation.
Nick continued, “We were clearing out some chapel in the Old Quarter. This was back when we had guns and shit. Anyway, I blast this bernie right in the face but he was all old and soft, you know how they get after a while… So, the bullet passes straight through his nugget and hits this huge, brass candlestick on the altar. I shit you not, this thing ricochets and hits a second bernie right between the eyes.”
Sean’s mouth opened wide. “Whaaa…?” he exclaimed incredulously.
Lilly continued, “That’s not even the end of it. The second one falls into a third and that one stumbles down the altar’s steps and smashes its head on one of the spectator seats.”
Nick corrected her casually, “Pews, Lilly. Not ‘spectator seats’. It’s not a sporting event for Christ’s sake.”
Sean raised his fists and laughed boisterously as they rode along at a casual pace. “HAHAHA! That’s AWESOME! Three in one! Beats mine, hands down.”
Dante told them, “Best one I ever saw was my old buddy Gordo. Poor bastard got bit on the road years back and lost his shit on half a dozen of ‘em. He knew he was a goner so he bit the motherfucker back. Tore its entire throat out before he ripped its head clean off with his bare hands.”
David, quiet up to this point, spoke up asking Dante, “What about the other five?”
Dante said with a smile, “He beat them all to death with the first one’s head. Swung it around by the hair like a goddamn mace.” Looking to the sky, Dante said to himself, “Rest in pieces, old friend.”
Wyatt stifled a snicker so as to not get himself caught. He wanted to make sure they were well away from home before he revealed himself. That way, he thought, they would be committed to keeping him along for the duration of the run. He slowly made himself comfortable once more and drifted off to sleep in hopes of napping for a while, safely hidden away.
The laughter subsided and the conversation fizzled as they made their way across the dry terrain in the heat of the day. The sun was high and its light blurred the horizon as the group marched further southeast with the Foresters in mind.
They entered an area known as the Gateway which marked the end of the first leg of their journey. The Gateway was at the mouth of some forgotten riverbed that acted as a highway of sorts into the Badlands. It was a long, winding depression with walls of silt and dirt on either side that offered some shade in the heat of the day as well as some cover. The downside was that once you entered there was only two ways out, straight ahead or back the way you came.
Sean spotted them first. A small pack of the dead, numbering around eight, lumbered ahead of their caravan directly along the rough-cut trail. On most occasions they would have simply gone wide to avoid the dead, but there was all manner of debris strewn across the ground at their feet. No one ever passed up an opportunity to scavenge in those days so a hasty decision was made to dispatch the pack and see what they could come up with.
The melee was short-lived and the dead were dropped in quick succession. Dante stayed at the wagon and covered them with his bow sending arrows with uncanny precision as Nick, Lilly, and Sean separated the pack into smaller more manageable pairs up ahead. David sat out this first round and simply watched as they slaughtered the bernies one after another.
They moved slowly in the aftermath trying to catch their collective breath. While sifting through empty cans and garbage, looking for anything useful, and dragging the corpses out of the middle of the trail, a single shot rang out.
Sean’s head exploded just a few feet from Lilly showering her in skull fragments, brain matter, and blood. Her mouth filled with the salty copper taste of fresh blood and as she moved for cover she could feel the sandy grit of bone between her teeth. She spat on the ground to clear it and shouted, “GUN! GET DOWN!”
The blur of the fight clouded their senses and, as Sean’s expired body finally stopped its nerve induced flopping, the full scale of the threat was realized. Perched atop the mounds that flanked the Gateway stood a group of heavily armed bandits. This was no accident. It was a trap.
Wyatt snapped awake at the shot and lay motionless in the cover of the wagon. He pulled the blankets that surrounded him closer, fully hiding every inch of his small frame. He listened.
“Which of you thinks they’re in charge here?”
Dante, Nick, Lilly, and David stood still with their hands in the air. Dante almost worked up the nerve to make a move but thought better of it as the horses near the wagon began to spook. They were outgunned, outmanned, and out positioned.
Nick called up to the bandits, “I guess that would be me.”
The bandit and his crew were all dressed similarly in old fatigues and battle uniforms from various branches of the U.S. military. They couldn’t have been soldiers because most were too young to have served all that time ago, but that didn’t mean they weren’t professionals. Militias like that could have easily raided some old Army compound or stumbled across some abandoned gear. He kept his pistol trained on Nick as the other riflemen covered the group. He spoke with the calm tones of a psychopath completely in his element. “Just what the fuck are you assholes doin’ on my land and what exactly are you haulin’?”
Nick made an attempt to be diplomatic. This group couldn’t be Savages. Not with weapons like that. No, they had the backing of a much larger force. “We’re just passing through from Vegas. We only have trade goods, nothing more. Now… you’ve made your point here, man. You guys are running this thing, no denying that. Shit, you even got guns. We haven’t seen working guns in a long time. You’re welcome to take the wagon and our weapons but we ask that you leave us with our lives. You have my word and that of Vegas that we’ll steer clear of here from now on.”
The bandit narrowed his eyes and replied coldly, “Vegas, huh? Is that right? Well… Allow me to introduce myself, Mr. Vegas.”
BOOM!
The bullet screamed towards Nick and tore into the side of his stomach just under his ribcage. He dropped immediately as his legs buckled, clutching at his wound. Nick wailed in pain and kicked his feet into the dirt feebly as he slipped into the dark abyss of unconsciousness.
“No!” Lilly shrieked as she dropped to Nick’s side and tried to help.
She was met with a solid kick to the jaw as the bandits dropped into the riverbed one by one. David shivered, terrified, as one of the men pressed the barrel of a rifle against his head. He felt the warmth in his crotch as his own urine soaked through his pants. In minutes, Dante, David, and Lilly were bound hand and foot then gagged with filthy rags.
The leader of the bandits drew a long blade from a sheath on his hip and callously cut the throats of the horses that weren’t attached to the wagon leaving them to bleed to death pitifully.
“Throw him in the wagon!” he snapped at his men, gesturing to Nick’s limp body.
One of the others called out, “What about these three? Kill ‘em?”
The leader stared at them thoughtfully for a moment before telling his people, “Leave them. We’re just sending a message today.”
He jumped into the driver seat of the wagon as Nick was tossed in the back, landing on a well hidden Wyatt with a thump. It took everything he had for Wyatt not to cry out as mixed emotions of fear, confusion, and panic shot through his every nerve.
Lilly and the others choked and sputtered on the dust and dirt as the wagon sped past them, moving further down the Gateway, and disappearing into the Badlands flanked by the rest of the bandit crew. They were alone, incapacitated, and unarmed.
Wyatt finally worked up the courage to peek out from under his hiding spot and saw Nick lying in a blood-soaked pile on the floor of the wagon as the others faded from view. He, too, was alone. But Wyatt was very good at hiding. Very good, indeed.
Chapter Six – Lost and Found
Seth cut the ropes that bound Lilly while Doc worked on David and Dante. She rubbed her wrists because they ached like a bitch after having been strapped tightly for hours.
“Nick was shot. They took everything,” Lilly told Seth flatly. Her voice dripped with an uncomfortable combination of anger and self-loathing. Lilly was blaming herself, as usual.
Seth’s head was swirling worse now than it was when Kylee kicked him awake that morning. He asked them all frantically, “What about Wyatt? Where’s Wyatt?”
Lilly swallowed hard. She and the others stared blankly at Seth bracing themselves for whatever news he was about to deliver. Seth continued, “You didn’t know?” He kicked the dirt at Pi’s feet causing her to snort at him derisively. “You didn’t know? YOU DIDN’T FUCKING KNOW?!”
Lilly was losing her patience and she was still stressing about Nick more than anything. She snapped at Seth, “Cut the shit, Seth! What the hell are you talkin’ about? What about Wyatt?”
Seth went into a full-on tirade, tearing at his hair and clawing at his beard in frustration. “Oh, NO!” he shouted incredulously. “NOOO! You’re fucking KIDDING ME, right? RIGHT?!”
Doc spoke up in attempt to be the voice of reason. He tried his best to remain calm and broke the news. “Wyatt… He snuck out. He was hiding in the back of the wagon.”
Lilly paled immediately, the color washing from her face as the realization punched her in the stomach. She resolved herself in a moment and immediately focused on the next steps. She looked Doc in the eyes and demanded, “Give me your horse.”
Doc pursed his lips and found himself quite disappointed by her lack of calculation. With an encouraging tone he offered, “Let’s think about this for a minute…”
She wasn’t having any of it. Lilly cut him off with, “There’s nothing to think about. Nick is shot! They took him! Wyatt was in that wagon, too. And they took him! There isn’t a goddamn thing to ‘think about’. We’re fucking wasting time. Give. Me. Your. Horse.”
Seth didn’t even blink an eye at the mention of Nick being “shot”. He just figured Nick had caught an arrow to the knee or something.
David interjected. “Um… Doc’s probably right, Lil. We need to be careful with how we go about this. If we don’t plan wisely, more of us might die.”
Rolling her eyes, she turned to face David with her hand on her hip much like Kylee would do. “You, shut up. I told you, you weren’t ready for this shit.” David moved his mouth to protest but Lilly snapped at him angrily, “You pissed your pants for Christ’s sake! You’re going back with Doc where it’s safe. You’re not made for this. We’re going to get Wyatt and Nick and anybody not down with that can fuck off back home.”
Dante stood like a statue, arms crossed, listening intently. He hadn’t said a single word since before the bandit encounter. Dante was cool like that. He didn’t speak his mind all that often, with the exception of his discussions with Seth. That meant when he DID speak people tended to listen. He turned his gaze upon Lilly and asked coolly, “You done?”
If looks could kill Lilly would have vaporized Dante where he stood. She seethed, “Far from it.”
Dante nodded and stepped forward saying, “Fair enough. Seth, gimme your vest.”
Seth obliged, removing his signature leather vest with its many gouges and scratches, and tossed it to Dante. Dante caught it comfortably and passed it to Lilly. “If you’re gonna piss and moan and alienate everyone that cares about you, the least you could do is put your titties away.”
Lilly looked down at herself and immediately deflated. She hadn’t noticed that her shirt was torn during the conflict with the bandits and she had just been ranting at everyone with her breasts fully exposed. She nearly turned purple with embarrassment as she scowled and put the vest on to cover herself. She replied insincerely, “Thanks.”
Seth had cooled his jets slightly after Dante handled business and asked them all, “How many of them were there? How’d they manage to get the drop on you?”
“You ain’t gonna believe this shit, Seth, but they had guns,” Dante told him worriedly. “Fuckin’ guns, man. And not just one or two of them. It was, like, eight dudes and they ALL had guns. Rifles, pistols, all that.”
Seth sighed heavily as he came to the realization that Nick had been gunshot, something far more serious than arrows and such. “Fuck. Any idea why they didn’t just kill everyone?”
Lilly answered for Dante saying, “One of them said they were sending a message. I think they wanted us to know that they’re armed and not afraid to fuck shit up. They want us to tell the others about them. Instill fear or whatever. That’s my guess anyway.”
Seth cracked his knuckles and thought for a moment. “Well, we sure as shit can’t go against them like this if they got guns. We don’t even have enough horses to carry us all. Anybody got any ideas, I’d like to hear ‘em.”
Doc offered, “We should get back to The Strip, regroup. We’ll get some more men and then see if we can track them down.”
Seth shook his head. “No way. If Nick is somehow still alive then we gotta get to him quickly. That also goes for Wyatt without saying. We’re not goin’ back.”
Lilly added, “Besides, I don’t know about you, but I’d rather die out here than to have to go back and tell mom that not only is Wyatt still missing… that we lost Nick, too.”
With a strong nod of agreement, Dante told them, “Yeah, Miss Kylee ain’t no joke.”
“What’s the plan then?” Doc asked dejectedly.
It was Seth who gave them their marching orders. His tone was authoritative and firm. His plan was as solid as it could be, all things considered. “Drop box,” he said half to himself. Looking over to Lilly he formed it into a question. “Lil, where’s our closest drop box?”
Lilly scanned the horizon, taking note of the direction they were facing along with the slight ridge ahead of them at the mouth of The Gateway. “About two miles into The Badlands. Straight ahead, then left when the trees get green. It’s under the first pine we’ll see.”
Seth nodded, “I remember now, yeah.”
Drop boxes were a brilliant idea Nick had come up with just a few months earlier after a particularly bad run in with some Savages. Long story short, the party ended up having to walk back home and not all of them made it. Even with rationing the water, they lost two men to dehydration and a third to the bernies because his blade dulled beyond its usefulness.
After that, Nick decided that every few miles along their regular scavenging routes they’d place drop boxes buried under the earth. Only the people that went outside of the gates knew about them and their locations to avoid ruining the secrecy. If it was still intact, it would be filled with some fresh water, some cat jerky, a few spare weapons, some batteries and chips in case they needed to trade for anything along the way, and some medical gear. It wouldn’t be the best stuff, but it would be better than nothing.
They would have to switch off using the horses and ride in pairs to get there. That would be an inconvenience, to say the least, but it was doable. It also had them heading in the same direction as the wagon tracks and, even though they’d be ill-equipped in an actual fight, they could have possibly been able to get the drop on the group; maybe work some stealth magic. Time would tell.
Seth volunteered David to walk first, leaving Dante riding behind Doc on one horse while Lilly jumped behind Seth on Pi. Lilly wrapped her arms tightly around Seth’s waist and pressed her face against his back as they rode. She said softly to him so the others couldn’t hear, “I’m scared.”
Seth kept his eyes forward. Lilly only allowed herself to do and say things like that with Nick and Seth, and sometimes Kylee to a lesser degree. The others would never be allowed to see that from her.
She told him quietly, “Nick’s hurt bad. Real bad. And poor Wyatt. We just didn’t know, Seth.”
He felt his knuckles burn white as his grip on Pi’s reigns tightened. The thought of losing those two to anyone or anything started a fire in his gut. But this was Lilly talking and his instincts told him to keep her calm and keep her head in the game. It’s a dad thing. He whispered over his shoulder, “Nick is one tough motherfucker and you know it. He’s gonna be fine. Wyatt, too. That kid is a goddamn ninja when he wants to be.”
Lilly relented slightly, “I know. But still…”
She glanced back at David who was already lagging behind them slightly. He was uncomfortably tugging at his wet pants, now that they were somewhat cold and itchy, as he walked along. He was mad. He was mad and humiliated.
Lilly huffed at him and told Seth, “David’s a dead man walkin’. Poor idiot. You shoulda seen him, Seth. The second the gun was on him he started beggin’ and pissin’ himself. Fucking coward.”
Seth smiled to himself. He decided to tell Lilly, “He’s just green, Lil’. He’ll come around. Hey, you remember Dext, right?”
Lilly smiled at the thought of Dext Baxter, Wyatt’s dad. He died when she was little, but she never forgot about him. No one forgot about Dext. “Of course, I do, silly!” she told Seth, smacking him on the shoulder for even asking the question.
“Well,” Seth continued, “The first time someone pointed a gun at Dext he crapped his pants.”
Lilly chuckled. “No, he didn’t! Shut up!”
Seth kept at it. “No, no, I’m serious. He told me he shit his pants on the spot and almost got shot in the face right after everything started. Some people are just late bloomers, Lil.”
Lilly gave David a second glance and her features softened a bit. She whispered to Seth, “He IS kinda cute, though, isn’t he?”
Seth snorted a laugh, “Whatever you say, Lil.” He snapped at Pi, “Yah! Move your ass, you ungrateful bitch, or I’ll roast you up the second we hit home!” Pi began moving a little faster, but not before whinnying her discontent for Seth to hear.
A few miles ahead of them, well into the Badlands, the covered wagon trundled along. Wyatt shook Nick slightly to try and wake him up. Nick had been in the fetal position in a growing pool of his own blood, clutching his wound, for a long time now. Wyatt had heard him whimper from time to time when the wagon would hit rough patches of land and bounce them about, but there hadn’t been a sound from him for too long now.
Nick stirred around before opening his eyes. His sleep seemed to make him forget his wound, but, the instant he moved to sit up, the pain seared into his abdomen. He groaned loudly and went into a fit of coughing that only shot more hot daggers into his torn muscles.
“Shut the fuck up back there, ya hear me?!” a voice called from outside at the front of the wagon.
Wyatt reached out and covered Nick’s mouth. He put his finger to his lips and gave Nick the universal sign for “Quiet!”
Nick’s eyes boggled at the sight of him. Through the pain, he whispered to Wyatt, “Jesus, Wyatt! What the hell are you doing?!”
Wyatt sunk into his blankets to remain hidden and told Nick honestly, “I messed up, Uncle Nick. I wanted to come with you guys, so I snuck out. I messed up bad. I’m freaking out! Are you doing alright?”
Nick lifted his hand slightly to examine the hole in his belly and winced before telling Wyatt, “It’s not good, kiddo.”
The bleeding inside Nick’s abdomen was beginning to bruise badly and his entire left side was purple and yellow. The small entry wound was a neat hole that was now oozing a dark colored blood. Nick felt around his back near his kidneys down to his waist and told Wyatt, “No exit wound. The bullet’s still inside of me. Listen… we gotta get you outta here.”
Wyatt started to protest. “No way! I can’t leave you like this, Uncle Nick.”
Shaking his head, Nick corrected Wyatt saying, “You can and you will! Look, we need to be realistic here. If they find you, there’s no telling what they’ll do. If I die here, I WILL turn. You can’t be in this wagon if that happens.” Nick craned his neck to look out of the back of the wagon. “There’s some woods to this side of us. I’ll distract them. I can keep their attention long enough for you make a break for the trees. Hide there until we’re out of sight then follow the wagon tracks back to the others. Got it?”
Wyatt shook his head. “I can’t. I’m too scared. I wanna stay with you.”
Nick shook his head hard and stared into Wyatt’s eyes. “Keep your head down until I’m outside with them. When you hear me say the word ‘go’, you run, Wyatt. You hear me, boy? You run! I know you can do it. It’s in your blood. Your father was the fastest son of a bitch I’ve ever seen. When I say ‘go’, you go.”
Wyatt shook his head but no words came out of his mouth. Nick pushed him gently back into the pile of blankets and covered him completely before whispering, “Don’t worry. They won’t kill me… that’s your mother’s job.” Nick passed his canteen full of water underneath the blankets to Wyatt along with a small knife, a short bow, and a quiver of handmade arrows that were in the wagon for trade. It was time.
Raising his voice now, Nick called out, “Water! I need some water in here, man!”
A voice called back from outside, “I told you to keep it down back there, damn it!”
Nick called back, “And I told you I need some fucking water. Why don’t you come back here and shut me up, tough guy?! You might be a badass with them guns, but I bet you’re a straight up bitch man to man. Come on back here, you pussy!”
The wagon came to an abrupt halt. Wyatt fought every muscle in his body to remain still as he heard the commotion of Nick grunting as he was dragged from the back of the wagon. He listened closely as the scuffle moved to the side of the wagon. The sounds of fists smacking flesh and the dull thud of boots assaulted his ears until finally he heard Nick shout, “Is that all you got?! I said let’s go, motherfucker!”
Wyatt’s feet hit the dirt at the rear of the wagon and he shot off towards the woods without looking back, using the wagon itself to block their view. The sounds of the fight were soon drowned out by his feet pounding underneath him as he scrambled with everything he had to reach the cover of the trees. He threw the quiver and bow across his back as he ran and tucked the knife into his pocket. The moment he felt the shade, he dropped to his belly and clutched the earth, breathing heavily with a lump in his throat. He stayed there, completely still, for a long time before working up the courage to look out into the Badlands.
The wagon was gone and he was alone.
There was a panic that flooded across his chest in that moment. It made his fingers tingle and his skin itch in waves as his mind raced. He was torn. He felt comfortable in the trees with the cover and the shade. There was a safety there that was provided by the many places to hide. It was much more appealing than the thought of exposing himself in the relative desolation of the Badlands to follow the wagon’s tracks.
Wyatt drew his blade and flicked it open. He could see the rough path that the wagon had been taking in the haze that hung over the sun-baked earth and he estimated that he could stay just inside the tree line for a good while before he would be forced out.
It didn’t take long for the growls to begin, though. The unmistakable howls and groans of the dead echoed throughout the woods making it nearly impossible to gauge their direction and distance. You see, the dead were thick in those woods because that’s where the only food could be found. The Badlands were desolate, but these patches of foliage attracted the wildlife which, in turn, attracted the bernies. That was when the fear truly gripped at young Wyatt’s heart. He put his knife away and drew the bow, nocking an arrow.
He walked slowly, crossing his feet one over the other as he stalked, darting his eyes this way and that. Every twig that snapped sent adrenalin coursing through his veins and his head swiveled in every direction. The first one came shambling through the brush, but it didn’t notice him. Wyatt pressed himself against the tree trunk so hard that it began to dig into his back. He kept the arrow at the ready.
Another one came, then another, and another with their stench filling his nose. He tried not to gag and give away his position as they passed within mere feet of him. Every time he made a move to leave the area another small pack would make itself known.
It was maddening to wait silently as they stumbled by and his patience had finally snapped. Wyatt stepped from the cover of his fifth hiding place and found himself face to face with his every nightmare. Skeletal bones protruded from leathery skin and flies buzzed and landed on its face as the undead form before Wyatt opened its eternally grinning mouth to bare rotten brown teeth. It gurgled a throaty sound at Wyatt and began to move towards him with outstretched arms.
Wyatt pulled the bowstring back as far as he could and sent the arrow whizzing through the air. It missed, flying horribly to the right. The gap was closing as Wyatt struggled to nock another arrow. He raised the bow to take aim once more, but found himself horrifically distracted by no less than seven more approaching dead. They were closing from all directions and he had nowhere to run. The moans of the dead only drew more of them and the pack became a herd as their numbers materialized from the darkness of the forest.
Wyatt shut down. He crouched to the ground almost as if he was trying to hide within his own skin. He clamped his eyes shut and began to cry while he waited for his death to come. His mind raced with the thoughts of what it would feel like the moment their filthy teeth sunk into his flesh and they began tearing him apart. He sobbed at the thought of how long he would remain alive and in pain while they feasted on him. It was time now. Young Wyatt could hear their footsteps all around him now and he could smell their funk burning his nostrils.
But nothing was happening. Why was it taking so long?!?!
He dared to open his eyes and found himself shocked by what he saw. Fifty, sixty, seventy of the dead stumbled all around him. He was standing, now, directly in the middle of a full-on herd, untouched. They shuffled past Wyatt, some even stopping in their travels as if to sniff at him. Some crouched to stare into his eyes with their white-out cataracts, before innocently losing interest. They moved past him as he stood there shaking, waiting.
It would be nearly an hour before the herd had completely moved on and the flies cleared the air. Wyatt dropped his bow and looked to the sky, his cheeks wet. He was alone and desperate, confused and shaken… but alive.
Chapter 7 – Breaking Down
Kylee sobbed with her head in her hands, sitting on the edge of the bed in her dingy Palace room. It had taken her hours to finally break down. “I can’t believe he went out there. I just can’t believe he would be so stupid. He’s always been a good kid, always listened…”
“He’ll be fine, Ky,” Alyse said with a gentle, consolatory tone. “He’s got Nick and Lilly with him, not to mention Dante and Sean. That’s a solid crew. I’d bet my last chip that they’re nearly to the Foresters already and everyone is good to go. Heck, I bet Nick’s already chewed Wyatt a new one for what he did.”
Kylee looked up and offered Alyse a weak attempt at a smile. “I hope you’re right, Alyse. I really do. I just never wanted that for him. Out there… those people, the bernies… He belongs in here with me, safe. Lilly was the one who said we should train him, teach him to live out there like we did with her. I just wanted better for him.”
Alyse frowned. “I know you did…er… DO. Everyone wants a better life for their kids. I talked to Nick about having kids for a long time, but I couldn’t get him to see it that way. He just shot me down. Told me he couldn’t live with the idea that his child may have to be without a father one day. No matter how much I tried to persuade him that he could just settle down, stay inside the gates...” Her words caught in her throat and she choked back tears of her own. Alyse stood strong and resolved herself to maintain for Kylee. “This’ll just be a wakeup call for Wyatt. When they get back you can hug him, tell him you love him, and then he’s grounded until he’s forty, right?” She forced a smile.
Kylee sniffled and threw her head back as if to silently ask the universe for help. Her voice lowered. “There was a time when I wished she had died,” Kylee confessed for the first time. Alyse cocked her head to the side curiously as Kylee continued. “I never dared to tell anyone, though. I see the sadness in Lilly’s eyes, her pain… and, yes, there was a time when I wished she was dead so she didn’t have to live with what we did out there and what they STILL do out there.” Kylee’s tears streamed down her face as she bared her deepest wound of all to Alyse. “We made her a killer, Alyse. I love her so much but… we made her hands as dirty as our own and I never wanted that for them. I never wanted any of that for Wyatt. Things were supposed to be so much better here. We worked so hard to make it better here.”
There was a forceful pounding at the door of the room; three loud knocks in quick succession. Alyse stood from her spot on the bed beside Kylee and moved to open it. She gasped at the sight.
Four filthy men in dusty clothes, reeking of body odor and Dante’s liquor, pushed their way into the room and confronted the two women. Jack sneered at Kylee through blackened teeth and asked coldly, “Where the fuck’s Lester?”
Kylee had her game face on immediately, though her swollen eyes said otherwise. “Lester’s not here. And I strongly suggest you take that bass out of your voice before I call for…”
One of Jack’s men grabbed Alyse by her hair, wrenching her head back terribly and Jack mercilessly backhanded Kylee across her jaw with his uninjured hand. Kylee reeled from the sting, shaking her head to clear it as Jack once again demanded, “Then I want Seth here, NOW! He’s gonna answer for Lester whether he wants to or not and, if you lie to me again, I swear I will…”
Kylee shielded her face once more as Jack raised a threatening hand and held it high in the air. She wiped a small trickle of blood from the corner of her mouth with the back of her hand before shooting a glance to a feebly struggling Alyse. “Seth is gone. We had an emergency and he went out on the road,” she told him, defeated.
The door creaked shut and was locked by one of Jack’s companions. The man holding Alyse released her, pushing her down onto the bed with a solid –thump-. Kylee instinctively clutched at her own hip for a knife that wasn’t there. Her eyes clamped shut for a moment in frustration for her complacency.
Jack reached behind his back and produced a handgun from his belt, motioning for Kylee to join Alyse on the bed. “Then we wait,” he said pointing the weapon at the two of them. Before they even got past the shock of seeing the gun, Jack touched the barrel of the weapon to Alyse’s thigh and slowly inched it up in a disgustingly suggestive manner. “I hope, for your sake, he returns quickly. Idle hands are the Devil’s playground. Ain’t that right, boys?” Jack’s men rumbled into a series of disturbingly creepy chuckles.
* * *
Lilly picked at the stitches in her knee, plucking them out one by one with her dirty fingers as the group sat idly in the shade where the woods began and the desert ended. A smoking cigarette burned with a long ash in her other hand, prizes from the box. The wound was healed for the most part but Doc shook his head as he watched her destroy his handiwork. “You should have left them in,” he told her matter-of-factly. She didn’t even look up.
Seth was still rummaging through the drop box filling his pockets with this and that and puffing on a cigarette of his own. They had no trouble finding the box; however, it did take some time to dig it up. Once it was done, though, Doc loaded the saddle bags of his horse with various bandages, medical tools, and modest rations of jerky and cloudy water.
Dante was beaming widely. He was pleasantly surprised to find a jar of his swill in the bottom of the crate and he uncapped its jar to take a long pull. Exhaling heavily to blow the alcohol fumes from his mouth, he passed the old, glass container to Lilly. She accepted it, again without looking up, and threw her head back to drink. It felt good. The fiery liquid warmed her belly in the waning sunlight and her muscles seemed to loosen immediately. Such was the power of Dante’s brew. She passed it off to David and said confidently, “Drink. It’ll take the edge off.”
David gingerly put the jar to his lips and felt himself visibly recoil as the smell hit his nose. Lilly was watching him now, though. She even gave him an encouraging nod saying, “Go on now.” He closed his eyes and drank deeply. The moment it hit the back of his throat he sputtered and spewed the precious liquor from nearly every orifice in his face. He deteriorated into a choking, snotty mess as the others chuckled and nodded sympathetically.
Dante smiled proudly and announced, “Good shit, ain’t it?” He was still wearing a small smile as the laughing subsided.
David moved to pass it on to Seth, but Doc snatched the jar out of his hand. To everyone’s surprise, Doc capped the jar and stuffed it into his saddle bag before closing the flap and buckling it up tightly. “Enough with that! That’s not what this is for.”
Shaking his head incredulously, Dante corrected him saying, “Uh, yeah, it actually is. It is precisely the reason why I make the shit.”
Doc disagreed vehemently. “No, it’s not; at least not for you, anyway. If by some miracle we find Nick, that gut shot is going to need some serious antiseptic. Moreover, if I am going to be expected to perform an exploration of the wound, including the possibility of rooting around in his organs and such, I’m going to have to disinfect everything. And last, but most certainly not least, if I’m going to be doing all that then my patient is going to need to be sedated... heavily. Now, knowing that a master of the craft such as you has produced this fine piece of work, we can be certain that this will also knock our patient out fully and properly.” Doc lowered his eyes to the ground and also slyly admitted, “Plus it’ll probably keep my hands from shaking.”
Dante opened his arms in surrender and told the Doc, “You made your point.”
Seth stood up and adjusted the hilariously ornate short sword that now hung from his hip, his reward for being the first one to remember the drop boxes were even out there. “Hear that?” he asked as he held up his hand to quiet everyone.
The snarls and wails of the dead echoed throughout the darkened woodlands. “They’re all through here,” Dante noted. “We should get moving.”
Doc agreed strongly. “Exactly. Clock is ticking on that gunshot wound, guys. I hate to say it, but I’d be a liar if I didn’t make that crystal clear.”
It would be another half hour of tough riding before they came upon the spot where Wyatt made his break. Seth stopped everyone and dropped to the ground from Pi with a thud. He scanned the ground with his eyes as did Lilly and the others. “Blood,” he said pointing to the splatters in the midst of a group of boot prints next to the wagon tracks.
Doc knelt and touched the blood with his fingertip. “It’s tacky but it’s not fully coagulated yet. It hasn’t been that long. Maybe they ran into some jerks; had a little scuffle?”
David called out, “What about this over here?” He traced the line of small footprints that went from the wagon tracks in the opposite direction of the blood. “Wyatt, maybe?”
Lilly clapped her hands together loudly one time and remarked, “Definitely. Let’s go.”
“Go where?” Dante asked quizzically. “Which way?”
Lilly scoffed at the question. “He’s in those woods and he’s alone. One set of tracks, one direction. He had to have escaped. I don’t understand why it’s even a question,” she told them impatiently.
Seth’s jaw muscles pulsated as he gritted his teeth in thought. Wyatt was very obviously in the woods. However, everything else pointed to Nick still being with the wagon and in a very time sensitive predicament. On one hand, Nick could be dying and needed help in a hurry. Wyatt could probably hide and wait it out in the cover of the woods. On the other hand, Nick could already be dead and they’d be risking Wyatt’s life by leaving him in the woods. Woods full of the dead, that is. That meant BOTH of them could be dead already. Seth felt his stomach drop at the thought.
The others continued to argue those very points amongst themselves until Seth finally spoke up. He raised his voice above them all and said loudly, “We’re going to the Foresters.”
Lilly spun on her heels and narrowed her eyes at Seth, angrily snapping, “The fuck we are! I’m going to get Wyatt.” She turned her back on them, stalked along the path of Wyatt’s footprints, and began shouting his name. “WYATT! WYATT, COME OUT. IT’S LILLY!”
Seth chased after her leaving the others behind as he jogged to close the gap. “Lilly, wait,” he urged her as he caught up. She ignored his plea, but he finally just grabbed her by the arm and spun her around to face him. “WAIT!” Seth pointed at his head and said strongly, “Lilly… THINK! Stop for a second and fucking THINK!”
She pulled her arm away and stood there defiantly. “There’s nothing to think about!” she shouted at him.
Seth finally raised his voice to her, something he didn’t normally do. “THAT’S where your wrong, Lilly! And you’re too damn stubborn to learn something. What are you gonna do once you hit the trees, huh?! You gonna go trampling through miles of brush shouting his name? You gonna call in every fuckin’ bernie out there while you aimlessly search. You can’t track in the goddamn woods, Lilly, NONE of us can. But do you know who IS able to do that? I’ll give you one guess who can follow that trail, without bringing on the dead, and have this search wrapped up in a couple of hours.”
Lilly frowned because she knew she had been beaten. “The Foresters. Fuck.”
Seth brought his voice down now that he had her attention. “Listen. We stay on the wagon tracks and push the horses harder than ever. It’ll look dumb as hell, but we’ll put three men on one animal if we have to. We keep the afterburners on and maybe we’ll find Nick along the way, maybe not. But I promise you, we’ll get to the Foresters just after dark, we’ll get them to help. Whatever it costs us, we’ll get them to help. They can track Nick, and they can track Wyatt, and it’ll be okay. Okay?”
Lilly spit a wad of phlegm on the ground. She calmly leveled her eyes to Seth’s and softly told him with every ounce of determination in her body, “Fine. But if something happens to either one of them I will NEVER forgive you, Seth. Ever.”
She left him standing there with his mouth hanging open to rejoin the others. Seth took a long moment to peer out into the woods, silently hoping he’d made the right call as three of the dead emerged from the tree line. They began approaching the horses slowly, no doubt riled up by the yelling. “Saddle up!” he shouted to the others over his shoulder. “Gonna be dark soon.”
He whispered under his breath, “Hang in there, kiddo…”
* * *
The day continued to drag on for Wyatt and he was beginning to feel gross after having hiked for miles through thick undergrowth. He had irresponsibly drunk his entire canteen full of water after his encounter with the first herd and his stomach growled at him angrily. Spoiled little Wyatt didn’t know what hunger truly felt like.
They were watching him.
He collected some nuts and berries from the surrounding brush and began munching them greedily while he searched for a creek or small stream from which to drink. The dead meandered along the game trails throughout the area as the sun started to drop and he occupied himself doing the silly and often dangerous things that unattended young boys do.
They didn’t interfere.
He toyed with the dead sometimes, but cautiously so. He would see one in the distance and chuck a stick at it or, at least once or twice, he made a real attempt to take one down with an arrow. They always missed, though. Even the arrows that found their target uselessly punctured an arm or a neck. It was after the fourth failed attempt that he gave up hope of ever shooting something of value, say, a rabbit or a squirrel. It wouldn’t matter much anyway without a fire.
They kept their distance.
That was the realization that once again sent the fear coursing through his veins. There was no way he was getting out of there by nightfall and that meant sleeping on the ground. The temperatures would plummet and he would be alone, cold, and in the pitch black darkness of this unknown landscape. He was confused by the behavior of the dead towards him, and, while it seemed he was safe from those things in this area, he was wholly unconvinced it would last.
They could tell he was scared.
The world began to spin in on itself and his body began sweating profusely. Wyatt’s skin burned and his guts tied themselves in knots, doubling him over in pain. His stomach emptied as he dizzily puked his entire canteen full of water mixed with the masticated nuts and red berry juice all over the ground at his feet. He collapsed in a heap and the blackness filled his field of vision as unconsciousness wrapped its devilish hands around him.
They made their move as Wyatt slept.
Chapter 8 – Sacrificial Lambs
The stink of unwashed men hung heavily in the room as Alyse and Kylee nervously waited for someone, anyone, to return. As the hours passed and the sun began to sink low, the boredom of Jack and his crew began to deteriorate into impatience and a slow burning frustration.
One of Jack’s men, a disgusting and portly man named Bob, whose belly hung out from under his stained and dirty tee shirt, twirled a hunting knife between his fingers. He began poking it into Alyse’s arm as she sat on the floor at the foot of the bed. He repeated the motion numerous times using enough pressure to hurt, but not enough to break skin. Alyse stared forward wincing as little as possible in her refusal to give him the satisfaction.
“Stop it!” Kylee barked at him, having finally seen enough.
Bob sneered at her and wiped his nose with the back of his hand. “What did you just say to me?” he asked coldly.
Kylee stood from her seated position on the bed and told him again, “I said stop it. Keep your fucking hands off of her.” Kylee’s knuckles went white as her fists balled.
Standing to face Kylee, Bob pointed his knife at her threateningly and warned her, “You should watch that little smart-assed mouth o’ yours, bitch. You wanna get cut? Huh? Do ya?” He slashed the knife forward, demonstrating how he’d make the incision.
“Put the knife down, Bob,” Jack said, breaking the tension. “We’re all gonna get along here.” Jack turned to face Kylee and told her in a passive tone, “You’ll have to excuse Bob’s manners. He’s a bit of a sadist.” He added ominously, “I, myself, am more of a romantic. I always figured if you treat a lady nicely she won’t fight as much when… well… You know.”
Bob lowered his knife disappointedly and sheathed it. He muttered to himself, “Fuckin’ cunt,” as another one of Jack’s men said matter-of-factly, “I’d like to get along with both of these two, know what I mean, fellas?” The comment was followed by an eerily terrifying round of affirmatives.
Jack tapped his handgun against his thigh anxiously as he peered out the window at the setting sun. The stalls along the Strip were packing up and the number of people milling around the street began to dwindle. Jack knew from experience that anyone out on the road at that point would be looking for a place to hunker down and make camp. As much as he hated to admit it to himself, he acknowledged the day was done and their revenge would have to wait.
Bob leered at Alyse as Jack announced, “We’re done here for now. They won’t be back until tomorrow at least.” Jack then looked down to the floor where Alyse sat against the bed and told no one in particular, “Welp… I told them what would happen if we were left to wait too long. Bob, you can go first since you fancy this one so much.” He gestured to the other two men and told them, “Hold her down.”
The moment the hands wrapped themselves around Alyse’s she shrieked, “No!” and began struggling against them. Kylee jumped to her defense, but Bob elbowed her cruelly in the jaw sending her sprawling back onto the bed with the whiteout blankness that comes from getting your bell properly rung.
Click!
Jack’s gun pressed firmly against Kylee’s temple as the rest of the men began pawing and groping at Alyse and tearing at her clothes. Alyse cried out and fought them with every bit of her small frame, but she was helpless against their numbers. A swift punch to the eye sent her reeling and she fell onto the floor where they pinned her down with Bob’s vile image hovering above.
“Wait!” Kylee cried out. “Me. Not her. I won’t even fight. Just leave her alone, please.” She looked up at Jack and begged him as his gun dug into the side of her head. “Please, just take me. Leave her. I promise I won’t fight you.”
Jack scratched his head for a moment in thought, looking Kylee up and down. Bob noted, “I like when they fight, though. Makes it more… intense.”
“No.” Jack finally spoke to the room. “She’s right. Let’s fuck this one first. I like the way she begs. We can do the other one next.”
Kylee bit her lip with tears in her eyes as she accepted what was about to happen to her. “That’s not the deal, Jack,” she said shakily. “You leave her alone and take me. Do whatever you want and I won’t fight. Just leave her, okay?”
Jack smiled at her. “Whatever you say, cupcake. Bob, hold my gun.” He passed the handgun to Bob who tucked into his belt with an unsatisfied scowl. “I told you we were all gonna get along, didn’t I?”
Kylee clamped her eyes shut as Jack’s weight sunk onto the bed of that dingy Palace room and his hand tugged at her belt.
***
“There! I think I see something!” David said pointing into the distance along the green line of the forest. “Right on the edge. Looks like a campfire or something.”
The sun was hovering just above the horizon behind them, casting its waning light in fiery orange hues across the landscape. It was difficult to see the flame from that distance, but there was just enough light to make out the smoke billowing into the air above the trees against the purple and pink sky. Just to the right of the smoky pillar stood the tall, arched oak trees that marked the entrance to the Forester territory.
Seth reached into this saddlebag and produced an old, black pair of binoculars. He scanned the tree line for any movement and gave the area around the smoke a thorough scouting. “That camp is empty. Fire’s just about out anyway.”
Dante nodded thoughtfully and suggested, “We should definitely check it out, regardless. Even if they’re gone, there might be something by way of a clue.”
The words had barely left Dante’s lips when Lilly kicked Pi into a canter from behind Seth.
Scraps of bone and sinew lay strewn around the remnants of the small cooking fire and traces of blood were evident where the meal was prepared. Seth scratched his beard nervously as he kicked at large leg bone of some sort. The worry was creasing his face more obviously than ever before.
Lilly stared at Seth for a long moment before deciding to speak the words that he was thinking yet too afraid to speak himself. “You don’t think they… Do you?“
David broke the tension for them. “No. They didn’t eat him.” He knelt over the bone that Seth pushed with his foot before picking it up and holding it confidently in both hands. “Horses. They ate one of the horses. This is a femur from one of them, not a human bone.”
Seth, unconvinced, shot a glance at Doc. “He’s right. Well, probably right, anyway. It’s not human, but I can’t speak to what type of animal it is… er… was.” Doc told him. “He is the horse kid, after all.”
A sickly gurgle from their right interrupted the analysis and sent the entire group reaching for their newly acquired weapons. Seth put a finger to his lips to shush everyone as he crept in the direction of the noises.
With Seth in the lead, the others craned their necks to look ahead of him as they readied themselves for yet another fight with one or more walking corpses. He walked slowly, crossing one foot over the other, gaudy sword in hand, stalking towards the wet, crackling moans.
Without a word and to the surprise of the others, Seth let the point of his sword hit the ground as he dropped his head, turning away from the large oak tree. Lilly took one look and shouted, “Oh, God! Help me get him down!”
Nick’s limp form hung from the trunk of the tree held in place by lengths of rope and two huge railroad spikes driven through his shoulders, just beneath his collar bones. He was shirtless and caked in his own blood with a sign above his head that was crafted from planks of the wagon’s bed. Scrawled in the same maroon-brown color that covered his body it read, “Vegas is Dead. Foresters Must Comply or Die.” Nick weakly raised his head at the sound of Lilly’s voice and managed to gasp the words, “Help me.”
It took Seth only a moment to snap out of his shock, but much longer to actually get Nick down from his makeshift crucifixion. David and Dante boosted Lilly up so she could cut the binds that held him while Doc and Seth held him up by his legs. The audible crunching sounds of the spikes moving inside of Nick’s joints as they separated from the tree to pull through his body threatened to make Lilly vomit. Once they had him back on the ground, they laid him out flat. Seth cradled Nick’s head in his hands to keep it from lolling about. He could be heard speaking softly to his best friend, whispering almost privately, to give him the play by play of what was going on around him as Doc set into his work. “There ya go, Nick. We gotcha now. Just try and relax so Doc can do his thing. You’ll be fine, man. We all gotcha now.”
Doc snapped at David, “Get me the blades and the jar from the bag, do it now!”
David proved to be level headed in this instance, which is more than can be said for Lilly who simply wept with her hands covering her mouth as she watched the scene unfold in front of her. He came to Doc’s side and knelt down with the gear he was told to retrieve. Doc spoke to everyone around him like he was back in the operating room all those years ago. “I’m going to sterilize and clean the area as best as I can before I go in. We’ll deal with the shoulder wounds if I can manage to get him stable. Listen up, all of you… He may seem out of it now, but when I pour this alcohol in this wound he’s gonna freak out. Mark my words.” Doc pointed to Dante and Lilly. “You two grab his legs, David get his feet.” He then leveled his eyes to Seth who was now on point like never before. Seth was lucid, focused, and the only think on his mind in that moment to make sure Nick was going to be alright. “Seth… talk to him. Just talk to him. Let him know it’s you.”
With that having been said, Doc unscrewed the cap of the jar and asked one last time, “Everyone ready?”
Nods all around.
The clear liquid splashed onto Nick’s blood-soaked skin and cascaded into the small hole in his belly. It was as if someone flipped a switch in his brain and turned him back on as the pain filled his gut cavity. Nick opened his eyes as wide as dinner plates and shrieked into the night air. He bucked against the weight on his legs and torso forcing everyone to clamp down.
Seth spoke . “Welcome back, brother. Doc’s gonna fix you up, but you gotta stop fightin’ us, man, okay?”
Nick swallowed hard, struggling to speak, and told Seth, “It hurts…”
“I know it does, Nick. I know,” Seth told him reassuringly.
Nick winced as he stretched his neck to get a look at Seth. “You hit the drop box, didn’t you?” he asked Seth quizzically.
Seth smiled slightly and shook his head in the affirmative. “Yeah, how’d you know?”
After a weak grin that deteriorated into a fit of bloody coughing, Nick answered him saying, “Because I knew you couldn’t resist that gay-ass sword.”
The banter brought a brief smile of hope to everyone except for Doc, who was working diligently. That hope was cut short when a snarl and the crashing of leaves broke through. Nick’s scream had surely drawn it from the woods. That left Doc shouting nervously, “Get it outta here now! I can’t focus.”
Lilly jumped up and kicked it to the ground before stomping on its head. The skull cracked under her weight and sent brain matter shooting out in all directions. In seconds she had rejoined the group, taking up her spot with Dante once more as if nothing had even happened.
Doc told everyone firmly, “I’m going to make the cut now. Hold him tightly.”
The blade cut cleanly into Nick’s flesh crossing neatly over the small bullet hole. The wound by this point was so caked and clotted that it barely even oozed any blood as Doc slipped his fingers inside of Nick’s abdomen.
Again, Nick cried out in pain. Seth picked up the jar of Dante’s shine and put it to Nick’s lips. “Drink deep.”
Nick sputtered, unable to swallow the liquid, sending it spraying into the air hitting Seth in the face. He weakly muttered, “I… can’t…”
“No good,” Doc finally said looking up at everyone, his hand completely covered in blood and muck. He looked down at Nick solemnly and told him, “Son, you’re mortally wounded. The bullet has clipped part of your liver and it’s resting next to your spine. The wound itself is septic. There’s just too much damage. I’m sorry, kid.”
Nick looked up into Seth’s face and gave him a pained sigh. It simply wasn’t good enough for Seth. “No! You fucking fix him! You hear me? You fix him and you do it now!”
Lilly responded in kind. “Get it out of him. We can fix this. We’ll hold him and you get it out. You stitch him up like you did me and we’ll get him to the Foresters. They can give him medicine. They can help, too!”
It was clear to Doc that his whole group was in shock. He had to be clear and concise. That was one thing about Doc that never changed through all of this. He never had any trouble delivering bad news and this was no different. “Look… Maybe if we were in a hospital. Maybe if I had X-Rays, and proper surgical equipment. Maybe if we had blood to transfuse and proper anesthetic. Only then would he have a fighting chance and it’s still a very big maybe. The best we can do is to make him comfortable now.”
Doc turned his attention to Nick. “Listen, son. Now is the time to say whatever it is you need to say to your loved ones. Most people never even get that chance. We’ll see to it that you don’t turn and that you get a proper burial.”
“No. No, no, no. Not good enough!” Seth continued to demand. Raging, Seth picked his sword off the ground and placed the point at Doc’s neck, so much so that it drew a modest amount of blood. “Fix him or so help me I will kill you where you sit, old man.”
Doc stayed completely still, but it was Nick that diffused the situation when he struggled against his damaged muscles to reach up and lower Seth’s sword. “It’s just time, Seth.”
Seth pouted pitifully. “You can’t. You can’t fucking do this to me, Nick.” He pressed his forehead to Nick’s and sobbed harder than he had in as long as he could remember. There were no words for what they had been through together. There were no words for Seth to thank Nick for saving his life countless times. There was only raw emotion, sadness and despair.
Nick inhaled heavily with pain but forced himself to fight through his torn ligaments to reach up and place a hand to the back of Seth’s head. He whispered quietly to Seth as the world melted around them, “Kill them, Seth. Kill them all. Keep home safe…”
Those were the last words Nick spoke.
Lilly’s lower lip quivered and she shot daggers at Seth when he raised his head to take stock of the others. The world returned to him heavier than ever before. Seth’s mouth hung open. He wanted to say something to Lilly in this moment but nothing came. She shoved herself to her feet and stalked over to the bernie she had killed just moments earlier. No one bothered to count how many times she kicked it before collapsing in a heap.
Dante offered to prevent the turn for Seth, but found himself shot down. Seth told him flatly, “I have to do it.” He methodically laid his sword down and drew his knife with shaky hands, still sobbing to himself. Nick’s eyes stared at him but their spark was gone.
With the knife placed firmly under Nick’s chin, Seth closed his crying eyes and pulled the blade towards himself, piercing the skin and driving the steel into Nick’s brain stem. He withdrew his knife and sheathed it without even wiping it clean, staring into nothingness.
“Bury Nick. Mark the spot. Find Wyatt.”
He walked past Doc, Dante, and David. He walked past Lilly. He walked past the fire. He walked alone.
Chapter Nine – Rebirth
As the night air grew cold around his shivering body, Wyatt snapped awake. His stomach was still in knots and the stench of his vomit on the leaf littered ground threatened to send him once again into a fit of dry heaves. The toxins in the berries he had scavenged earlier in the day had done their damage and left his gut wrenched and empty.
He lifted himself weakly to his feet and scanned the surrounding area. The light of the moon lit the woods around him with an eerie, blue tint and Wyatt found himself enveloped in a wash of terror and desperation. The groans of the approaching dead once again closed in on him.
The first of three to emerge from the blackness of the surrounding vegetation was badly decayed and it stunk of mold and rot. It shambled towards Wyatt, bits of bone and sinew visible through tears in leathery flesh. It bared its rotten teeth at the young boy as it lurched to within mere feet of him before stopping as if to smell the air. Two more companions followed suit and, in moments, Wyatt was face to face with three walking corpses, locked in a stalemate reminiscent of a high noon showdown.
“Do it,” Wyatt demanded of them. He had given up. He had accepted his death, but the dark angel refused to oblige. The dead simply stood there, cocking their heads at him. It was like they, too, were trying to figure out what was wrong in that moment.
Wyatt’s futility sparked a rage and frustration within and he snapped angrily once again. “Come on then! Do it! Bite me!”
Nothing.
In a bold move, he closed the gap and pushed the first to emerge in an effort to trigger the desired response. “Kill me! Kill me!” He hit, pushed, and slapped at the bernies, shouting at them for his death, for his release from this personal hell, all the while, but the dead did nothing. It would take a full three minutes for Wyatt to collapse into a fit of tears at their feet sobbing, “Just let me die… Why won’t you let me die?”
Thunk!
The first to emerge fell to the ground next to Wyatt’s collapsed form with an enormous hole in the side of its head. The milky-grey matter oozed from the wound next to the offending stone and its two companions snarled at the new stimuli. They turned in place to locate the source of the primitive weapon.
Thunk! Thunk!
In quick succession, the final two were dropped in the same manner as the first from somewhere in the shadows. Wyatt stared at the dead for a moment before coming to his senses. “Who’s there! Lilly? Nick?” he called out.
They showed themselves.
A filthy young teenager, painted like a soldier of the old world in mud and clay, and wearing rags stepped forward into the ring of the dead. He was joined by a motley group of six more children of varying ages, the youngest no older than Wyatt himself, and the oldest, their obvious leader, looked to be about fifteen. They held their weapons on Wyatt, said nothing, and left the first words to Wyatt.
“You’re here to kill me?”
The leader of the boys spoke to the others in a strange tongue, saying calmly, “Pit don su shears. Calma det boi.”
Two of the team lowered their makeshift spears, crude sticks sharpened to pointed ends, and the others lay to rest their bits of cloth used as primitive slings.
The leader raised his hand to Wyatt and spoke to him in heavily accented English, “Why don’t they bite you?”
Wyatt was at a loss, confused and still reeling from the day’s events. He stammered, “I… don’t know.”
The teenager stepped forward, moving within inches of Wyatt and looked him over closely. His eyes traveled from Wyatt’s feet to the top of his head in a creepy and intimidating manner, yet with a strange curiosity. “Tell me how you did that?” he pressed.
Wyatt repeated impatiently, “I said I don’t know.”
One of the other boys spoke up in that odd language saying, “Him polly lai, Jonas. Stickum.”
The teenager shot a glance back at his companion and seemed to angrily demand, “Niet! Calma, Troy.” The boy scowled and narrowed his eyes at Wyatt from behind Jonas.
Wyatt asked Jonas, “What did he say?”
“Troy thinks you’ll tell us if I cut you a few times,” Jonas informed Wyatt matter-of-factly.
The group of boys clearly had no clue what Wyatt had been through on that day. They didn’t know that he had been pushed to the limits of his young mind and that, in this moment, Wyatt had nothing to lose. He wanted death. He welcomed it even. He wanted the nightmare to be over. “Tell him to do it himself then,” Wyatt said, glaring past Jonas to Troy.
Troy spewed venom at Wyatt snapping an unintelligible, “Me gat sik dis! Killum er me don!”
Jonas spun on his heels and cruelly backhanded Troy across his mouth sending Troy to the ground holding his face, blood trickling from a small crack in his lip. He pointed a finger and scolded him, “Me det lead. Niet su! Niet su! Dit ap et be kayat!”
Troy, defeated and burning red with embarrassment, was helped to his feet by the others and slunk to the rear of the small crowd. He was quiet from then on.
Jonas turned his attention back to Wyatt and reached into a small satchel at his hip. He produced a cheaply made cask and uncapped it. He drunk deeply from it and offered it to Wyatt as he wiped his mouth. “Drink. You need water.”
Wyatt accepted the offer and greedily downed the entire contents of the modest cask, even shaking it to free the last drops as he finished. The cool water slid into his belly and he instantly felt a flood of relief and satisfaction course through his veins. He passed the container back to Jonas and nodded his thanks. “Who are you?”
Jonas smirked slightly at his empty container before replacing it into his satchel and told Wyatt, “We are the Watchers, the Shadows.”
Wyatt stared at him blankly, puzzled. Jonas took the cue and clarified, “The big people call us Flies.”
Wyatt had heard of them before by that name and instantly recognized them as the feral children of the New World, the abandoned orphans of the First Wave survivors. He had never seen them in the flesh before and even now the moment was something of a surreal experience.
Jonas continued, “And you are the son of the one-eyed lady with yellow hair, brother to the scarred girl with a name like flowers. They call you Wyatt, right?”
Wyatt was incredulous. “How… How do you know that?”
With a cocky chuckle, Jonas told him, “We watch everything. We know everything. See, kid, no one pays attention to the dirty beggars in the streets. No one cares about us except for us. We’ve been in and out of Vegas hundreds of times and they don’t even notice. We’ve watched the Tree People to the east from their own branches and we’ve hid from the bad men. That’s how we survive, kid. But… what we don’t know is… Why don’t the stinkers bite you? What’s your secret?”
Wyatt didn’t have an answer. Hell, he had just learned of his strange ability mere hours ago himself. So, he told Jonas once and for all, “I said I don’t know. They just ignore me.”
There was a long silence during which Jonas struggled with whether or not he should believe young Wyatt. His gears were turning. The youngest boy in the group spoke meekly to Jonas asking, “Wut nah, Jonas?”
Rubbing his head in the light of the moon, Jonas told the young boy over his shoulder, “Kayat, Danny.” Switching to English again he told Wyatt, “You can hide in plain sight. You’re coming with us.”
Wyatt balked and asked Jonas, “Can you take me home then? Back to Vegas? They’ll come for me, you know.”
Jonas smirked at him. “I’m counting on that, Wyatt.”
*****
Alyse sat with her head in blood soaked hands, trembling violently. From her place on the floor at the foot of the bed she rocked back and forth, knees pulled tightly to her chest, without making a sound. As Kylee’s hand gripped her shoulder, Alyse jerked away, startled, before realizing that she had nothing more to fear. She told Kylee, “That was my first time.”
Kylee frowned because she already knew. “I know, Alyse. But there will be more. You were strong.”
Alyse nodded, wiping her face with both hands, and unwittingly smearing the sticky blood onto her skin and into her own hair. Bob’s corpse sat against the wall across from her with his glassy eyes staring ahead blankly. His neck was full of puncture wounds from just below his left ear all the way down to the depression of his collar bone. He was still leaking like a sieve. At his feet sat a gore soaked chopstick.
Jack had been assaulting Kylee, making efforts to remove her pants on the bed, while the other men cheered and whooped at them. Alyse could feel the bed at her back moving at the onset and she initially covered her ears to shield herself from what was about to happen. Something snapped in her, though, as she looked up at the grizzly form of fat Bob, with his smug, gap-toothed grin. His eyes were evilly transfixed on Jack as he moved to take Kylee by force and the fire began to burn in her gut. It welled up, forming a lump in Alyse’s throat, and tingled her limbs before she finally decided that her simple refusal wouldn’t be enough this time.
Alyse calmly reached up to her head and removed one of the sticks that held her hair up in the loose bun that was her usual style. Gripping it firmly she allowed the fire to flow through her and accepted it graciously as the precious seconds ticked away for Kylee. The world went red.
Alyse shrieked and lurched into Bob. With the wild screaming of a banshee she jabbed the stick into his neck over and over and over, flinging his blood across the room with every piercing stab. He tried to scream, but only managed a sickly gurgle as he stumbled back against the wall clutching at his neck.
The other men in the room, shocked at the outburst, spun to face her as Jack fumbled with his pants. They moved to bring her under control, but the beast had taken over. Alyse reached down and grabbed the butt of the pistol in Bob’s waistband. As she turned to point it at them the crushing blow of a fist crashed into the side of her head sending her to the ground. She cried out for Kylee.
Jack screamed in pain as Kylee kicked with every ounce of her strength, shooting searing tendrils of agony radiating from his crotch. He doubled over coughing and sputtering. Deftly rolling from the bed, Kylee hit the floor and jumped on the back of one of the men moving on Alyse. He pushed back against her, slamming her into the wall and pinning her there. That wasn’t good enough, though. The man bellowed a cry as Kylee’s teeth sunk into his right ear from behind and the cartilage crunched as she tore it from his head.
On the floor, Alyse found herself bolstered by the sounds of Kylee’s assist and shook her head to clear it. The gun felt heavy in her hand but she raised it, taking aim at her target.
Boom!
The bullet crashed into the man’s chest and his flight mechanism took over. He moved for the door with one hand covering the gaping chest wound, but collapsed almost immediately. He laid there on the floor, twitching for his last breaths as the room went dark for him.
Kylee, bloody mouthed and enraged, perched on his back, reached for her attacker’s blade and drew it cleanly from its sheath before plunging it into his ribs repeatedly. He doubled over and allowed her to slide to the floor with him while she continued to stick him in his lungs and heart until he expired in a pitiful heap.
Meanwhile, Alyse had spun the pistol to Jack and held him in place, terrified. Paled by the carnage around him Jack held out his hands in surrender and begged Alyse, “Stop! Please!”
Kylee joined Alyse and they stood to face Jack as he knelt on the bed begging them for his life. The two women panted, fueled by adrenalin and fear, smeared in the bright red blood of their would-be rapists.
Alyse narrowed her eyes at Jack and said coldly, “Hell hath no fury…”
Boom!
*****
Seth sat cross-legged in the dirt punching the ground exhaustedly in a wickedly mechanical manner. He had been at it long enough that his arm burned and his knuckles were bruised and bloodied, but he was oblivious to it. He was silent, replaying the death of Nick over and over in his head, each time finding some minute detail he should’ve caught or something he’d wished he’d done differently. The world disappeared around him and he was stuck, spiraling into that vicious cycle of self-loathing and hateful spite.
Clang!
From behind Seth, his old medieval-style gauntlet flew into his periphery and hit the ground next to him. “Better put that on if you’re going to keep this up,” Lilly said, her voice calm and somewhat soothing. He stared at the ground in silence and continued punching the earth, this time with a bit more angst.
“You didn’t get very far. Only took me, like, twenty minutes to find you, you know. Shit, and that was in the dark. You’re losing your touch, old man.”
Seth said nothing.
“Look… What do you want from me?” she asked him somewhat rhetorically. “You want me to say I don’t blame you for this? Because I’m not gonna.”
She watched Seth’s shoulders draw in and he seemed to deflate even further.
“He was my friend, too. He was my dad. Well, not really, but you know what I mean. But, so are you. I guess what I’m saying is that you don’t have to carry the blame alone.”
Nothing.
Lilly plopped down heavily behind Seth, but kept her distance. “We made mistakes, Seth. We fucked up. But we all loved Nick. Not just you. And this shit isn’t fair, what you’re doing to us. We need you. Now, more than ever, we need you. Wyatt needs you.”
She reached out to put a hand on his shoulder, but pulled it back fearfully as a sound escaped Seth’s lips that iced the very blood in her veins. It was a mix of a wail and a roar -- one that pleaded to the heavens, but condemned them at the same time. It was inhuman, but somehow the most human thing she’d ever heard. Seth’s cry echoed in the night air and spread through the landscape like the very plague that started everything until his lungs could hold no more. When it subsided, he collapsed, catching himself on weak hands against the cracked earth below them both.
Lilly forced herself to choke back her own tears and clung to him from behind in a tight hug. When she released him, Seth stood, feeling his bloodlust and anger coalesce into a grim determination as he stared into the forest. He knew what he had to do.
It was only then that he spoke to Lilly. “The Foresters will help us. And if they don’t, I’ll kill them all. Then we will find the ones that did that to Nick. And I’ll kill them all. I will burn this entire fucking world down if I have to. If I die, I will turn… and I’ll still kill them all.” He reached down and picked up his gauntlet, strapping it onto his torn and tattered hand. “Take me back to my horse, Lilly.”
Chapter Ten – Uneasy Allies
Once the morning sun was over the horizon, Kylee and Alyse made their way outside to the Strip. Both were still caked in the blood of Jack and his men and their clothes and hair were a disheveled mess. Alyse said to Kylee as they walked among the people, “I never thought I’d like it, you know?”
Kylee raised her eyebrow quizzically at her to continue and Alyse obliged saying emotionlessly, “Killing them. Eleven years now, this whole time, and I’ve never killed a living person. I always knew I might have to one day, but I never thought it would feel so damn good.” Alyse looked down at her hands. “I keep replaying it over and over in my head, the stabbing and the shooting. My hands start to shake.”
Kylee nodded solemnly. “You’re not a killer, Alyse. You’re a survivor. Sometimes you have to be one to be the other. It doesn’t have to define you, though. You liked it because it was them or us, and we won. It felt good because you took the power back from them. Trust me, though, Alyse… It doesn’t feel all that great when you have to kill for other reasons.”
A small smile crossed Alyse’s face at Kylee’s supportive words and she quickly switched the subject. She told Kylee, “Nick’s going to lose his mind when he hears about this. He’s always said that someone experienced should be at the Gates at all times. I know he never would’ve supported the idea of pulling Seth and Doc outside the walls, especially to go out looking for him.”
Kylee rolled her eyes slightly and adjusted the pistol now tucked neatly against the small of her back. She wiped a strand of hair from her nose and grossly stuck it back into place on the side of her head using the stickiness of the blood as glue, earning her a disgusted look of disdain from one of the passersby. “Nick’s attitude isn’t the one I’m worried about. Seth is the one that’s gonna get himself killed one of these days with that temper of his. He never could keep it in check. Shit, Alyse, you and I both know that if it wasn’t for Nick, Seth would be dead inside of a week.”
Alyse frowned and stared at the ground while she walked. “They’re gonna be okay, right? All of them?”
Stopping in her tracks, Kylee turned to face Alyse squarely and told her, “They’ll be fine. They’re probably all livin’ it up right now. I bet they’re still asleep in a hammock somewhere in Forester territory enjoying the shade.” Her eyes dipped slightly and she added, “Of course, I’m worried about Wyatt, but he’s got the toughest bunch of assholes this side of the Mississippi out there protecting him.”
Alyse nodded weakly. “Yeah, well, who’s gonna protect us?”
With her left hand placed firmly on her hip, Kylee said to her, “We are. Two women just took out four men and they had a gun, which is a whole other mystery, come to think of it. But the bottom line is this: It’s up to you and me now that the others are on the outside.”
Kylee picked at her fingers, scraping her thumbnail under the others to flake the dried blood from them. “And I’ll tell you somethin’ else, Alyse. It starts now.”
Alyse opened her mouth to ask for clarification but snapped it shut as Kylee stepped up onto an old, abandoned car now used a market stall. With total disregard for the quiet of the morning, Kylee began to shout to the crowd on the Strip, “Listen up! You all know me, right?”
The crowd murmured some affirmatives, but most of them continued to go about their usual morning business. Kylee leaned down to speak to Alyse saying, “Go gather all the men from the wall, pull everyone onto the Strip.” Alyse ran off without a word knowing wouldn’t take her long.
Raising her voice once again, Kylee continued to address the crowd saying, “I know you’re all very busy, but if you could just listen to what I have to say… It affects every one of us.”
They didn’t care, though. None of them cared enough to look up from what they were doing. So, Kylee did what Kylee does. She reached around her back, into her waistband, drew the weapon, and fired one shot straight into the morning air. The sound of an actual gunshot was something most of the people on the Strip hadn’t heard in nearly a decade and some not at all. It brought the proceedings to a screeching halt.
As a bloodied and swollen Kylee lowered her smoking gun, she had that look in her eye. She was older, sure, and she had put on a few pounds after Wyatt came along, but that spark was definitely back in her eye once again.
The men from the wall came running, bows and spears, knives and swords drawn. People flooded the Strip to see about the commotion and in seconds Kylee was the center of attention.
A leader from the wall, a middle aged man they called Copper stepped forward with his spear in hand. He was lean and tanned, scarred and heavily bearded, from many days walking the Vegas perimeter and he moved with the cocky swagger of most men who were still alive at that age. He spoke up, calling out to Kylee with his deep southern drawl, “Where’d you get that gun, Kylee?” He looked over his shoulder to some of the men that arrived with him and said, “And when’s the last time any of you even saw a weapon like that, anyway?”
Kylee called down to him while the many people of the Strip looked on in wonder, “I found this on one of the four men that tried to rape me and Alyse last night. On one of the four men that somehow managed to pass right through our gates, on your watch, Copper. If you and your men were doing your jobs, you most definitely would have seen this weapon long before they were pointing it in my face!”
Copper scoffed and puffed his chest. Replying with a sarcastic formality he said, “Beggin’ your pardon, ma’am, but I think you’re pointing that finger of yours in the wrong direction. I’d tread lightly if I were you.”
Narrowing her good eye at Copper, Kylee challenged him saying, “You and your men were on security detail. You and your men allowed them to pass and we were nearly killed because of it, worse even.”
The crowd began to cast accusatory glances towards Copper and his band murmuring their disapproval, but Copper never was a coward. He had fought alongside the United States Army as a member of his state’s militia during the First Wave and again at the Battle of Hoover Dam when the undead hordes broke through the many fences that lined its border.
It was a tough fight, too. The men and women at Hoover Dam had defended that position for nearly five years without a breach and they kept secure the source of electricity for an enormous area of survivors, not the least of which was Vegas. In fact, one of the things that made Vegas a bustling town after its initial downfall was its electricity.
The herd that fell upon the Dam that day outnumbered the sixty living defenders nearly forty to one, so the story goes, and, when the battle was through, only eight men and three women remained. Copper was among them, so it’s no wonder he took offense to an accusation that he had failed at his job. He barked at Kylee, unloading on her with a ferocious verbal assault. “Bullshit! If you hadn’t taken our best men off the wall to go out after your precious little boy, we wouldn’t have missed it. First we’re down Dante and Nick, plus Sean, and now, Seth and Doc all because Little Miss Vegas Royalty can’t find baby Wyatt. Maybe, if you could control your damned kid, we wouldn’t have been in this position in the first place.”
Kylee jumped down from the car and covered the distance between her and Copper in two steps. Without warning she swung the butt of the pistol viciously across his face, just below his right eye, and sent him reeling in pain. Kylee wasn’t finished, though. She grasped his spear, disarming him with a twist of her wrist, and thrust her foot forward to kick him squarely in the solar plexus. Her boot struck true and laid him out flat, gasping for breath and bleeding from a cut under his eye. She leaned down, grabbed Copper by his collar, and said to him, “Don’t you ever talk about me or my boy like that again, you got me?”
Copper, dazed and wincing said nothing. Kylee shook him by his shirt and raised her pistol once more warning him, “I won’t ask you again.”
As Copper nodded weakly at her, one of the men from the wall put a hand on Kylee’s shoulder. She spun quickly on her heels, training the gun directly at the man’s face. He raised his hands and backed off a few steps as if to silently tell her that he was just trying to hold her back, that he was not a threat.
Kylee, lowering the pistol and tucking it away, called out to the crowd around her, “I’m relieving Copper of his command until such time that Seth returns with the others. In the meantime, if anything looks out of the ordinary, or if you see people on the Strip that you don’t recognize, please report it immediately to either myself or one of these fine men behind me.” Kylee then turned to address the men of the wall. “Keep me informed of anything weird and if anyone, I mean anyone, from the outside asks to gain entry to Vegas, I don’t care if it’s Seth himself, you hold them at the gates and come get me. Are we clear?”
The man that had put his hand on her shoulder nodded along with the others then asked Kylee, “Miss Kylee, where are the men that assaulted you and Alyse. Let us go take care of them for you.”
Alyse answered for Kylee saying, “They’re in the Palace. They’re all dead.”
Kylee nodded that Alyse’s was statement was true and added, “Yeah, they’re done.”
The men of the wall looked on incredulously and one of the younger ones asked her, “The two of you took on four men, one with a gun even, and you managed to kill them all?” He scoffed in disbelief. “I’m callin’ bullshit!”
Kylee gestured to Copper, still on the ground, then looked the kid directly in the eyes saying, “This ain’t my first rodeo, kid.” Then she looked down at Copper and barked at him, “Get up, Copper. You’re coming to the Palace with us to take out the trash. The rest of you men, get back to your posts.”
*****
Doc walked alongside Dante in the dimly purple morning light with his horse trailing behind them by a length of rope. With Seth, Lilly, and David up ahead of them slightly, he picked at the small wound on his neck where Seth threatened him with the sword. “How bad’s it look?” he asked curiously.
Dante smirked at him and said, “Not as bad as the cut I gave myself shaving a few days back, Doc.”
“Stop calling me that, please?” Doc requested sincerely.
With a pensive glare Dante asked him, “Why? Everyone’s always called you Doc.”
“Just because I was a doctor doesn’t mean it’s fine to call me Doc. I never understood why everyone just assumed that was okay. I have a name. What if I started calling everyone not by their name, but by their profession? Do you think that would go over well?” Doc fired at Dante. He continued as Dante pondered the implications. “Let’s call David ‘Shit Shoveler’… and we’ll call you ‘Moonshiner’… and we’ll call Seth ‘Asshole’. How’s that sound?”
Dante raised a hand to indicate he understood, but he couldn’t help adding, “I call Seth ‘asshole’ all the time and it doesn’t seem to be an issue. But I get what you’re sayin’, though. So, what do you want me to call you from here on out?”
Doc told him, “My name is Lawrence. My friends used to call me Larry.” Doc gave a Dante a look that indicated they were indeed friends. “Call me Larry.”
Dante nodded at him with a wry grin and coolly said, “Whatever you say, Doc.”
Up ahead, Lilly snapped at Seth, “Cover it up, I said!”
Seth ignored her and continued to smoke his cigarette out in the open. Lilly was in a huff because anyone who’d spent time on the road, smoker or not, knew that you cup the glowing red cherry of your cigarette in your hand so you don’t give away your position in situations with low light.
Lilly chided Seth saying, “Do you want the Foresters to know we just helped ourselves onto their land? Or maybe you’d like one of their arrows to come screaming through the trees into my face! We can’t let them know we’re here yet.”
Seth exhaled a long puff of blue-grey smoke and looked over at Lilly. She was walking next to David as he led Pi along through the woods. “Lilly… they’ve known we were here since before the sun began to come up.”
“Oh, fuck off, Seth!” she said with a liberal amount of genuine frustration. “They do not.”
A voice called from somewhere and everywhere all at once causing Lilly to stop in her tracks with wide eyes, “He’s right, girl.”
Another voice came now, also seeming to reverberate through the very woods themselves. “That’s far enough now. Let’s see some hands.”
Everyone did as they were told save for Seth. He squinted in the morning light, instead, puffing once more on his smoke. He adjusted his iron gauntlet slightly with the cigarette butt hanging from his mouth before calling out. “Show yourselves, Foresters. We’re friendly… for now.”
The mysterious echoing called back, “Have the girl secure the animal to a tree so it doesn’t get restless. Tell her to do the same with the horses, too.” A chuckle rang through the air.
Seth narrowed his eyes when he got the joke. It seemed the Foresters didn’t have a very high opinion of him already. Seth’s temper, now at a gentle simmer, picked at him. He shouted out, “I’ve always heard how mighty the Foresters were and how fierce their fighters can be. All I hear now is a little bitch hiding in a tree. What’s the matter, Forester? Can’t find your ‘nuts’?”
Doc rolled his eyes. “Such clever banter...”
Dante whispered harshly to Seth, “The fuck you doin’, man? Don’t mess with ‘em when we can’t see ‘em.”
Lilly agreed and added, “Seth, stop it now, I mean it.”
Thit!
An arrow whizzed into view seemingly from out of nowhere and planted itself neatly between Seth’s legs. He jumped back and drew his sword while Pi started to spook and rear up restlessly. David shushed the horse and brought it quickly under his control.
The voice called out once more, “Trust me, friendly… that arrow could’ve found your nuts easily if I wanted it to. Drop your sword.”
Seth shouted back, “Nice shot, Forester, but I ain’t droppin’ shit. Show yourselves!”
Chak appeared on the ground behind the group out of nowhere and his words startled them. They jumped and spun to face him as he said with a smile, “I trust you have business here? Trespassers don’t usually get very far.”
Seth remained amped up with his sword at the ready. He told Chak, “We do. We need your help. We aren’t here for trouble.”
Chak nodded at Seth. “Good. You don’t want this kind of trouble, Vegas-man. But I’m not so sure we’re in the business of helping your kind, or any kind for that matter.”
Chak brought his fingers to his lips and issued a sharp and piercing series of complex whistles. In seconds, Bull emerged from the undergrowth as did Talo. The horses spooked once again as Ten swung himself down nearly twelve feet from a nearby tree, landing on his feet with a solid thud. All were armed and the odds were pretty much even at that point. Only then did Seth lower his sword, although he kept it in hand.
The Foresters stepped forward and made their introductions. A small smile crossed Lilly’s lips as Ten grasped her hand and shook it gently when it was his turn. He returned her smile with one of his own and their eyes lingered on one another far longer than David would have liked. When David was introduced to Ten, he made it a point to squeeze his hand as tightly as he could to send that message.
With that out of the way, and without any other subtle causes for disruption, Chak stepped out ahead of everyone and said firmly, “Give your weapons to my men. No foreigner enters Forester territory armed. Also, you’ll have to leave your horses on the ground. We cannot accommodate them.”
As Lilly and the others began disarming themselves, David told Chak, “We can’t leave the horses on the ground. Bernies are all through these woods. If they get devoured we won’t be able to get back to the Strip.”
Chak tapped his nose knowingly. “I’m aware. We have some crates built that we sometimes use for… well… nevermind what we use them for. But your horses can fit in them comfortably. You’ll be welcome to tend to them as you see fit and we’ll send an armed escort along for your safety while you’re on the ground. Probably Talo. He likes the ground, though I never understood why.”
A raspy snarl floated in on the breeze followed by several more growls and the crashing of branches. Lilly instinctively reached for the blade she had just handed over to Bull and cursed under her breath for giving it up in the first place. Chak perked his ears up and said simply, “Follow me and move quickly. Seven Doves is waiting.”
Chapter Eleven – Something Wicked This Way Comes
The boys hunkered down quietly as the strange looking men trampled through the underbrush loudly. The group of ten to twelve were wearing tattered military fatigues of the Old World and carrying an assortment of high powered weapons. As they moved, the men could be heard chatting amongst themselves idly. Wyatt and Jonas watched them closely for a moment in silence before the youngest of the boys, Danny, asked in a whisper, “Boom-boom men, Jonas?”
Jonas raised his index finger to his lips and nodded to Danny in the affirmative. The boys had been moving for what seemed like ages now, but the energy of their youth was their greatest strength. Well, that and the immensely clever leader they had in Jonas. It was Jonas who almost immediately harnessed Wyatt’s uncanny ability with the dead.
The first pack of stinking corpses that fell upon them sent the boys scurrying up trees and into the deep leaves of the ferns that littered the woodland floor as the gravelly moans filled the air as thickly as their stench. There were at least twenty of them, aimlessly walking in search of the flesh of some ground dwelling creature or an unlucky transient making camp in the shade of the sparsely wooded strip of land between the desert and the mountains. That was when Jonas got the idea.
“Wyatt, go over there and make some noise,” he said in a low tone while pointing to the west slightly. Wyatt shot him an incredulous glance and shook his head as if to say, “Um… hell naw!”
Jonas furrowed his brow. He clarified with a frustrated grate to his voice, “They don’t attack you, Wyatt! Go over there and lead them away by making some noise. We’ll move around behind them. Then all you have to do is double back without them following you. Now go! You want to get home, don’t you?”
That was all it really took for Wyatt to fall into line. All he wanted, more than anything, was to go home. He missed his bed and his mother. He wanted to see Seth and he desperately wanted to know if Nick had made it back alright along with Lilly and the others. So, Wyatt did as Jonas instructed.
He approached the rotting dead cautiously at first. They reacted the same as they would have with any other prey and began their advance with a renewed sense of urgency in their clumsy movements. Wyatt called to them, “Hey! Hey, stinky! Come and get me!” With that, he began his jog in the direction that Jonas had pointed just moments earlier with the entire pack in tow.
He must have gone nearly a hundred yards before he bent over, hands on his knees, making every effort not to puke. Even though he had been through a number of bizarrely calm encounters with the shambling, flesh eating masses it was still a nerve wracking and somewhat terrifying experience when they got too close.
The small herd caught up with a panting Wyatt and they swirled around him almost curiously, some within inches of him. A smell reminiscent of feces and rotting garbage filled Wyatt’s nose and sent his aching stomach over the edge. He shot forward in a series of violent spasms and spewed the contents of his stomach all over ground at his feet for the second time in so many days. When it had passed, he wiped his mouth with his arm and turned to walk backwards.
“Come here,” he ordered them cautiously, as if to see if they would listen. “I want you to follow me.”
The dead crowded amongst each other uselessly. They stared at Wyatt with their mouths agape in skeletal grins, lips long rotted away. Their hollow eyes rolled about trying to locate the sound of his voice with their white-out cataracts of bluish haze.
“Yeah, that’s it. I’m right here. Follow me.”
Wyatt began to walk backwards waving them in his direction and the unthinkable began to happen. The dead followed him without the hungry bloodlust and angry snarls. They no longer gnashed their yellow-gray teeth and instead fell into a sloppy line behind him shuffling along as if Wyatt was just the same as one of them, another corpse in the front of the pack.
After another twenty yards of walking, Wyatt knelt and picked up a large, fist sized stone. He pitched it off to his left and it landed with a crash as it broke sticks and twigs and landed with a solid thud. He pointed and turned his head in the direction of the noise and said flatly, “There. Go.”
He stood still as the pack moved off towards the worthless stone carrying their buzzing flies and maggots with them. Wyatt smiled to himself and walked coolly back to the rest of the boys to find Jonas beaming broadly. “I knew it!” Jonas exclaimed. The other boys with the exception of Troy gave Wyatt a hero’s welcome, albeit short-lived; chock full of pats on the back and ruffles of his hair. For a moment, Wyatt was happy again.
Now, though, the dead weren’t the issue. It was the living. The boom-boom men, as Danny called them, looked eerily similar to the group that confronted and shot Nick. They moved with a calculated arrogance, some tattooed from ages past with various symbols of the gangs they ran with before the Downfall. The images painted on them, the letterings of such groups as MS-13, The Aryan Brotherhood, The Mexican Mafia, and The Black Guerilla Family, identified them as Savages to Wyatt, though he had no idea what the pictures represented. These weren’t your typical Savages, however.
Jonas, Wyatt, and the boys waited for them to pass before slipping out of earshot and once again rushed toward Vegas. Soon, they would be back in the Badlands and out of the cover. They would have to move quickly if they had any hope of making it by nightfall.
Wyatt told Jonas, “Those look like the same people that attacked us. I only saw them for a second, but the clothes… and the weapons…”
With a scoff, Troy snapped at Wyatt in the language of the Flies, “Nie. Nadda sammuns. Alta Badlands men ‘ava booms nah.”
Jonas nodded at Troy and translated for Wyatt. “He’s right. They’re not the same. Can’t be. We’re too far and all the Badland Savages have those things now for some reason. I wish I knew where they got them, though. We saw one of them use it before. Loud boom and then,” he ran a finger across his own throat, “dead.”
Wyatt knew how they worked. He had never fired a gun before, but he had heard countless stories about how devastating they can be. He told Jonas and the boys, “Yeah, I know what they are. The small ones are called guns, or pistols. The big long ones are called rifles. They’ll mess you up bad.”
Little Danny tried to say the words but they rolled clumsily from his lips. “Pissles…” They let the conversation fizzle.
As they moved, still wary of the Savage threat in the area, reality struck. Danny, with a prepubescent squeal, shrieked in horror and pain as the teeth tore into his shoulder.
He had been following somewhat closely to the others, but his footfalls were slightly louder because he was too little to step over some of the ground cover. He had taken, at times, to hopping over branches and such and he landed heavily. This time, though, his landing was almost directly on top of a Sleeper, those that were in a dormant state due to lack of stimuli. It sprung at him as soon as Danny landed and grasped at his feet, dragging him to the soft earth.
The flesh ripped from Danny’s tiny body spraying his blood into the air around him as the bernie eagerly chewed on his muscle and sinew. “Ahhhhh, hap ma, Jonas!” Danny cried for help as he desperately clutched at his gaping wound.
Jonas and the others rushed to Danny’s side as Troy violently stomped on the bernie’s head. After the third crushing blow, its skull finally shattered, spilling the jellylike brain matter and stopping the attack.
Danny writhed on the ground screaming helplessly with the others around him. Failing at any attempt at sympathy, Jonas snapped at Danny kneeling at his side. “Danny, kayat, nah! Boom boom men kom!”
The footsteps could be heard crashing in the distance with calls of, “I heard it, too!” and “Find ‘em, come on!”
Troy, in his signature bark, told Jonas, “Killum, Jonas. Gatta killum nah. Im tak tu lad.”
Jonas shook his head, clasping his hands around Danny’s mouth in an effort to stifle the screams, and held him fast to the ground as he writhed in agony. For what felt like hours, the boys lay there hiding as the trampling sounds of the armed Savages kicked around in the brush around them until a call could be heard saying, “Ah, fuck it! We ain’t got time for this shit! We gotta re-up with the boss by dark and it’s gonna take at least that long to get to the drop off. We’re out!”
As the silence once again crept in, Danny lay silent with his eyes staring glassily at the sparse canopy. It was unclear whether or not he bled out from the wound or if Jonas had suffocated him. Standing once more, Jonas told the boys, “We go nah.”
This struck Wyatt as wrong. In fact it was against everything he was taught and as the boys began walking away, leaving Danny’s tiny body behind them, Wyatt harshly said to the Flies, “This isn’t right.”
Troy rolled his eyes and crossed his arms defiantly. Eventually, Jonas spoke up and told Wyatt coldly, “He’s gone. We have to move.”
Wyatt shook his head vehemently and when he drew his knife with a trembling hand, Troy and one of the other boys readied their makeshift weapons and trained them on him. It would take Jonas stepping forward for them to relent slightly as he told Wyatt, “There’s nothing more to do here, Wyatt. Everybody dies.”
Closing his eyes and lowering his head, Wyatt told the boys, “But not everybody has to turn.” With that, he jammed the knife downward into the center of Danny’s forehead driving the blade deep into the young boy’s skull.
Standing once more, Wyatt turned to the others and ordered them firmly, “No one… no one… leaves a friend to turn into one of those things. That’s the rule.”
Troy let out an unimpressed ‘bah’ and began moving away. Jonas gave Wyatt an understanding nod and raised his voice, cocking his head slightly to ensure Troy heard him as he said, “That’s it then. We don’t leave each other to turn anymore, got it?” With Troy being the only one refusing to acknowledge him, Jonas repeated sternly, “I said got it?” Grunting in the affirmative, Troy led the way to Vegas once more.
*****
For Seth and Lilly’s group the action was lightning fast. The trees blurred by them as they ran with the Foresters, blindly following their lead. The dead were thick there and they continued to appear in the morning haze in droves. So much so that David had mounted Pi in a swift leap with the reigns of Doc’s horse in his free hand. He tried to keep the panicking horses in control enough that they wouldn’t recklessly run off into the forest.
“Where the fuck did they all come from?” Seth shouted to Chak angrily as they ran.
Calling over his shoulder, Chak told him, “Must have been the men with the fire sticks. They made those things come when they killed the others! Just keep running. We’ll be there soon.”
Dante and Ten ran smack into one the dead as they trotted along and all three fell to the ground in a winding heap. As the bernie opened its gaping maw to bite at Dante, Ten swung his hatchet and landed a glancing blow across the bridge of what was left of its nose leaving a gnarly slash that dug deep into its face. It failed to damage the brain, though, leaving Dante in a hand to hand fight for his life. Dante sat atop the snarling corpse and thrust his thumbs deep into both eye sockets and, with a harrowing roar, he pushed and clawed, tearing the forehead cleanly out, along with a large chunk of its brains. He nodded at Ten and told him sincerely, “Nice try anyway, kid. Let’s roll.” Ten offered Dante a hand to get to his feet and they rushed to catch up with the others.
Seth was having his own problems having found himself and Doc swiftly cut off from the others by a pack of no less than six. Doc was never a fighter, instead staying alive due to his prowess as a surgeon and his masterful wit. This was not a fight for wit, unfortunately.
Using himself as a shield, Seth tried to place himself between Doc and the attack. He swung his gauntlet hard and completely knocked the bottom jaw off of the first of the pack, turning smoothly to hack the head from another with his sword arm. Doc feebly kicked and shooed at them, but when one of the bernies got a hand on him he completely lost his nerve, screaming uncontrollably, “Get it offa me! Get it off!”
There was nothing neither Seth nor Lilly could do as she approached just in time to see it bite Doc viciously, tearing a huge hunk of flesh and muscle from his forearm. Lilly kicked Doc to the ground and stood back to back with Seth to see it through.
Armed with nothing but her bare hands, she shouted over to Talo and Bull who were fighting their way through, “Move your asses, we got injured over here!”
They picked up the pace and, as Talo pulled Doc out of the melee, Bull charged his enormous frame into the pack knocking all of them to the ground. Lilly reached for Bull’s pack and retrieved her blade while Seth began coldly executing the bernies at his feet. When he was through, he quickly checked to see if Bull was alright before whistling for David and the horses.
It was a complete mess. With Doc crying out in pain, Chak, Ten, Lilly, and Seth fought off more of the approaching horde as Bull easily scooped up Doc and threw him over the back of Pi with David. It was futile, though. They were wholly surrounded with the dead coming at them from every angle.
In the blink of an eye, a chorus of loud calls and whistles broke through the commotion and arrows rained down from the canopy of the forest. One after another the bernies began to drop and their numbers thinned. Just as the volley of arrows ceased, another chorus of unfamiliar whistles and whoops seared across the landscape and nearly fifty tribesmen appeared, washing over the masses of the dead like a wave of leather and red with spears and hatchets, mowing down the dead like nothing any of them had seen before.
It was over in minutes and as Doc was let down from Pi as easily as possible he begged Lilly, “Get it over with quickly, whoever decides to do it.”
Lilly shook her head and snapped at Seth and Chak, “Hold him down.” As they complied, she opened her palm to Ten and silently requested his hatchet which he offered willingly to her with a concerned and visible gulp.
With the mass of tribesmen dispatching what was left of the undead threat and ignoring Doc’s pleas, she knelt beside him and picked up a stick. She moved to put it in his mouth for him to bite down on, but he sputtered a desperate protest saying, “No! Just kill me, damn it!”
Lilly shook her head. “No way, old man. Not like that. We’re gonna save you. Now keep your ass still.”
Again, Doc tried to writhe against Seth and Chak to no avail spouting at them, “I’m a surgeon for fuck’s sake! I’m worthless without my hands. I’m as good as dead anyway. Take my life, not my arm, please!”
Chak told Lilly flatly, “If it’s his wish to die, you owe it to him to honor it. Make it a clean kill.”
Seth told Chak, “We need him! Even if he can’t do the job himself, his knowledge is everything to us! We’ll take the arm at the elbow and he’ll probably live.”
Again Chak protested, “Not. Your. Place,” he said with even more emphasis this time. “A man’s fate is his own.”
Seth ignored Chak and told Lilly, “He’s in shock, Lil. Do it quickly. We’ll tie it off and cauterize the stump immediately.”
Dante, now shouting along with the others, “Do it, Lilly! Do it now!”
Bull and some of the tribesmen chimed in, confusing the matter completely and turning the entire ordeal into a shouting match of differing opinions amongst the various groups.
Seth snapped at Lilly angrily, “Make a fucking choice, Lilly! We’re running out of time!”
Without another word, Lilly raised the hatchet high in the air and brought it down with all her might. The world went dark for Doc.
Chapter Twelve – Savior Self
With the thick, black smoke of the forge still burning her eyes, Kylee stepped out onto the Strip with Copper at her side. He scratched at his Viking-like beard and squinted as the mid-day sun bathed his face in warm light. He hadn’t spoken a word since his altercation with Kylee. Instead, he begrudgingly went about the business of making the rounds with her in awkward silence.
“That’s the last one for today, Copper,” she told him casually. “It’s surprisingly quiet, all things considered.” She reached behind herself, into the small of her back, and adjusted the pistol for the twentieth time that day. It was hard to get used to carrying a gun after all those years without them.
Copper grunted and frowned deeply.
With a raised eyebrow, Kylee looked down her nose at him with her good eye and asked sternly, “Somethin’ on your mind?”
He shot a sideways glance and maintained his silence, but that just wasn’t good enough for her. “Cut the shit, Copper,” Kylee snapped at him. “I’ve never seen a grown man pout as much as you. Let’s squash it now and be done with it.”
Taking the cue, Copper turned to face her squarely and unloaded on her saying, “This is bullshit! Cleaning up bodies, babysitting locals, tax collecting…” His voice trailed off with a disgusted groan.
Kylee put her hand on her hip and finished his thought saying, “And you’re just too damned good for all that, right?”
Copper shook his head dismissively. She was right, though. And Copper knew it. He looked away for a moment then leveled his eyes on her once more. “I’ve been running that wall when Dante is out without a single incident since before the Dam. One slip up and you act like I…”
Kylee interrupted him angrily. “One slip up is all it takes!” she shouted at him. He seethed but kept quiet as she continued. “Your one slip up could’ve cost us lives. My life! You don’t have any idea what it’s like, Copper! To have that stinking breath in your nose. To have them hover over you. To have them force themselves inside you. You’re a man. You’ll never fucking get it.” Kylee stepped forward, unrelenting in her verbal assault. “So, go ahead. Go ahead and tell me exactly why I shouldn’t be pissed. Tell me why I shouldn’t have made an example of you out there in the square in front of everyone.”
“Enough!” Copper finally shot back at her. “I’m not gonna stand here and take this shit! Did I fuck up? Yeah, I fucked up. You think I can’t see that? Do you really think I’m not beating myself up about it? But I’m not a fucking child. And you’re not gonna treat me like a fucking child.”
Kylee backed off slightly, but held firm. “So, what then? You want me to just let it go? Act like what Alyse and I just went through didn’t happen?”
Copper exhaled heavily through his nose and grabbed at his beard, clutching it in one hand as he stared at her. He dropped his hand and said, “I’m sorry.” He searched his mind for more words. “That’s it. I’m sorry and I want you to forgive me. And if you can’t do that, I understand. But I also can’t go on like this. I need to be on the wall. The men need me on the wall. Isn’t it bad enough I have to swallow my pride and listen to their shit about you kicking me around in front of everyone?”
Kylee scoffed. “Aww… poor you!” Her words dripped venom. “My son is gone. My daughter is gone. Every little bit of backup I had here is gone. I don’t care how it happened or who’s at fault, but they are all gone and I have no idea how… how… I’m…” The tears filled her eyes and the anger left her in a wash to be replaced by an overwhelming desperation. She covered her mouth and forced herself to look to away. Taking a breath, she resolved herself once more, and looked at Copper with tight, quivering lips. With a single tear streaking down her cheek and a low, growling tone, she said to him, “Don’t you dare talk to me about how bad you got it, Copper.”
He swallowed hard. There was a long silence. His gruff exterior had always belied a good heart and he took her words with every bit of weight they were meant to carry. He reached out to her, but only for a second, before pulling away for fear of her tearing his arm off at the elbow. He spoke softly and put the argument behind them in that moment. “What do you need? How can I help?”
“Just go back to the wall,” she told him dejectedly. She was emotionally exhausted.
Copper shook his head. “I won’t do it. I’ll stay with you. Let me fix what I did.”
She chuckled skeptically, genuinely taken off guard by the suggestion. Half rolling her eyes, Kylee told him, “You? You can’t fix this, Copper. It just is what it is.”
Again he shook his head and, against his better judgment, he grasped her hand. “I’ll make it up to you. I’ll stay by your side until everyone is back. After that, even. If that’s what it takes, then yeah, I will. I’m a lot of things, Kylee, but I’m not heartless. And I’m not an idiot. Trust me.”
Kylee, once again with her hand on her hip, having wiped her eyes and face, flatly said,”Earn it.” She turned her back on him and stalked back towards the Palace leaving him dumbfounded. As Copper turned in the opposite direction, his ears pointed up the Strip as a voice called out, “Hey!”
He turned around and squinted to see through the dust that hung in the air. Kylee had stopped about fifteen feet away and now stood in the middle of the busy market district. She called out to him again, “You comin’ or what?” She gave him a half-cocked smile and Copper jogged to catch up with her as they headed back up to the north side together.
*****
“What do you think?” Dante said to Seth as they stood high above the forest floor. The bridges that strung from tree to tree bowed heavily in the middle, lashed with cordage braided from water vines, their wooden planks strong and sturdy. Every large tree as far as the eye could see cradled a hut in its huge limbs. All were outfitted with hand carved windows and some even billowed smoke from modest fires that smoldered within, nestled in steel pits and carefully tended by the Forester women.
Seth looked down to the ground some twenty or more feet at the two bernies hopelessly reaching up them, clawing at the air as if they could actually reach him. “Leave ‘em. They’ll walk off eventually.”
Dante furrowed his brow. “Not them, dumbass. I mean about Lilly and that boy. What was his name? Ten? I know you saw it.”
Seth was oblivious. He stared at the undead below, listening to them growl and gurgle. With a shrug, he answered saying, “Lilly can handle it.” He spit in his hand and butted out the cigarette he was holding before flicking the crumpled remains over the edge. He watched it fall through the air and bounce unceremoniously off the forehead of the larger of the two bernies.
Dante was unsatisfied and he let Seth know, too, saying, “That’s bullshit. I mean, David I could understand. He’s been pining after her forever now and she’s good at deflecting him. Not to mention the cold shoulder you and Nick give him…”
“Gave him,” Seth corrected. “Nick is gone.”
Dante huffed disappointedly. “My fault,” he offered by way of an apology. “But still. She and that Forester boy both gave each other the eye. It’s bad news, I’m tellin’ you.”
“What do you want me to do about it then?” Seth barked as he finally looked Dante in the face.
It was then that Dante could tell something else was going on. Seth was known to be an asshole from time to time, but never towards Dante. Even during their spirited discussions back home he never displayed actual anger in Dante’s direction. Dante asked him flat out, “What’s goin’ on with you, man?”
Seth poorly deflected saying, “It’s just… Wyatt… Nick… all of it.”
Dante shook his head. “Nah, man. Somethin’ else. What did he say to you? You were in there with that Seven Doves guy for a long-ass time. Spill it.”
With a sigh, Seth gave in a little. “He got in my head. Told me some shit. I dunno.”
Dante pressed him. “Don’t give me that I dunno shit.” He gave Seth a friendly shove and told him, “Look, man. You and me are the only ones out here right now. Drop that pride shit and level with me. You know I’m not gonna say anything to anyone.”
Seth lit another smoke and inhaled deeply before blowing the drag into the misty air of the canopy. “He sat me down in this dark little hut full of bones and feathers and shit, all medicine man style, and asked me what we wanted, why we were even here. I didn’t bullshit him. I told him that our food situation was fucked up and I told him that we lost people on the way here to the Savages. He wasn’t shocked. In fact, he sat there with his dumb, wrinkly face, smoking away on his pipe, with that smug fucking look. I’m tellin’ you, Dante, it was like he knew everything I was gonna say before it left my mouth.”
Dante nodded that he was following along. He asked Seth, “What about Wyatt and the guns. You know they weren’t just Savages out there this time.”
Seth pointed a finger at Dante and said, “Exactly! So, he passes me the pipe and tells me to smoke with him. Now, I’m not one to be a bad guest, so I obliged. I kept talking to him, smokin’ and passin’. Told him about how Wyatt got separated and how the Savages somehow found themselves armed to the Goddamned teeth and then the room started to go all wobbly and shit.”
Dante’s smirk deteriorated into a fit of chuckling. “Y’all was smokin’ that good-good, huh? I’ve been known to partake back in the day. Ain’t mad at ya.” he joked.
Seth continued intensely. “I couldn’t fuckin’ move, though, Dante. I just sat there with my eyelids drooping, gone. I was all there in my head, but my body felt like it was made of lead. Then he stood up and walked towards me. He crouched down right in front of my face and looked me right in the eyes. I’ll never forget it. He said to me, ‘War is coming, Vegas-man. The fire sticks will rain down upon you and you will lose everything you love. He who walks with the dead will lead the righteous to victory, but you will never see it to the end, Lone Wolf.’ I mean, what the fuck is that? Did he tell me I’m gonna die? I know we talked more, but I don’t remember shit. Then I woke up this morning and that was that.”
Dante passed it off with a wave. “Nah. You know how these Foresters are, man. He was probably higher than you were. Sure, that’s some pretty fucked up shit to say to somebody, but I wouldn’t put too much thought into it.”
“I’m not convinced,” Seth told him. “War? That much makes sense when you consider the Foresters have been encroached upon by the same dudes that killed Nick. A gunfight, fire sticks… not much of a mystery there. That shit about walking with the dead, though. That scares the shit outta me.”
Thit! Thit!
The conversation was interrupted when the two bernies below dropped to the ground with arrows sticking cleanly through their heads.
Lilly emerged from under the bridge along with Ten, Chak, and David. David had Pi in tow along with Doc’s horse and a few others they didn’t recognize, all packed down heavily. She called up to Seth and Dante shouting, “Let’s go! We’re headed back to get Wyatt.” She looked rested and recharged.
Seth called down asking her, “We got help?”
Chak answered for her calling back, “Seven Doves said we’re going with you to track the kid. I don’t know what you said to him, Vegas-man, but it must’ve been good. The Elders are sending us each with a horse, some food for your people… and these.” Chak reached alongside Pi and produced the two rifles they had taken from the men who killed the elk. “They say you might know how to use them.”
Seth looked at Dante and gulped slightly. “War is coming,” he whispered.
Dante called down to Lilly and asked, “What about Doc?”
Lilly smiled broadly up at them. “He’s gonna make it. Old fucker ain’t gonna be none too happy with me, though,” she quipped. “Bring your asses! Time’s chips.”
*****
The heat of the day wore on Wyatt’s body and he panted, dying of thirst as they trudged on. The dust devils swirled around the boys, but the area was clear of the dead as far as the eye could see. Finally, Jonas spoke up saying to Wyatt, “Snap out of it. Look! We’re here.”
Wyatt groggily raised his eyes to the horizon, straining to see through the wavy distortion of the heat. He heaved a sigh of relief and looked at Jonas with hope in his eyes.
There was no mistaking it. In the distance, standing tall above the flat earth and in stark contrast to the void of the surrounding desert, the walls of Vegas beckoned them.
“You’re home.”
Chapter Thirteen – Misled
The hooves of the horses pounded the earth like rumbling thunder as the Foresters led them across the Badlands at breakneck speeds. By the time they slowed to a canter, the Vegas four welcomed a slower pace.
They had left Doc behind, in good hands, and the Foresters’ holistic healing methods had proven to be effective time and again. Chak assured Seth that Doc would be kept as comfortable as possible as he healed from the impromptu amputation and he would be returned to Vegas proper sometime in the coming weeks. Those arrangements would have to wait, however.
Ten pointed south slightly to make everyone aware of a roaming pack of bernies in the distance. Nodding, Chak said calmly, “No threat to us. Keep moving.”
In the back of the row, Seth and Lilly rode alongside one another, lagging slightly behind the rest. Lilly scratched at the long scar that ran along her neck, a souvenir from an age past. She snorted in an unladylike display of discontentedness. Seth raised an eyebrow and asked her consolingly, “You okay, Lil’?”
She shook her head. “No.”
He frowned deeply and pressed on saying, “Wanna talk about it?”
With a sideways glance in his direction, Lilly faltered a bit in her attempt to remain bottled up. “Dext used to say I should never let things go. Like, I should always tie up loose ends because I might never get the chance to fix things that are broken if I wait on it too long. But I don’t know what to do right now.”
Seth kept his eyes forward. He was smart enough to know that Lilly would continue to talk freely until he showed he was fully paying attention. She always seemed to snap shut when he leveled his eyes to hers unless they were in an argument, of course. He asked her, “You mean about Wyatt? Or is it Nick?” He was lost. She could’ve even been talking about Doc for all he knew.
“It’s David,” she finally confessed. “I think I love him… but I’m not attracted to him. I know he’s crazy about me, but I’ve been putting him off for months. And now this Ten guy comes along. He’s everything David isn’t. Cute, strong, brave. I was just about to open up to David, but now I’m torn.” She stared at her horse’s mane for a second. “It’s silly, I know. I’ve found myself thinking about this shit to keep my mind off Wyatt and Nick. I’m just all messed up inside.”
Seth suppressed an eye roll. This wasn’t his department. Nick and Alyse were always much better with this sort of thing than he was. He shot daggers up ahead at David and Ten as they trotted along comfortably. For a fleeting moment, he entertained the idea of killing them both to save himself the headache. Not seriously, but still. That was just the way Seth’s mind worked sometimes. Trouble is, without Nick around to keep him in check…
Dante had been eavesdropping intently just a length or two ahead of them. He tugged his reigns and dropped back to fall in line with the two of them. With a tightlipped grin towards Seth, he asked, “Mind if I take this one, bud?”
Seth silently looked to the sky as if to thank the heavens for giving him a pass and told Dante, “That’s Lilly’s call, really.”
Lilly shrugged, so Seth told her, “Just do what Dante says. He’s smart like that. But make it quick. We’re almost to the spot where Wyatt went in.” He winked at Dante and kicked Pi into gear to join the others.
Dante pursed his lips for a moment to choose his words carefully. “Wanna know what I really think?”
Lilly let a smile escape her lips as she adjusted Seth’s old vest to cover her tattered shirt. “I don’t know. Do I?”
Dante smiled back and told her, “Shit or get off the pot. The longer you worry about it, the longer it’ll be before you find out how it turns out. You’re a tough little bitch, Lil. Even if you fuck up, I’m sure you’ll work it out.”
Lilly blushed slightly. She hated when she could feel her cheeks burn like that. “You’re not helping, Dante,” she told him half-sarcastically. “I’m seriously fucked up about this. It’ll break his heart if I reject him. Might even break my own. On the other hand, if I give him a shot, I might regret it if something happens to him.”
Dante’s smile deteriorated into more of an understanding frown. “That’s why the answer is so simple, hun.” He left it at that and gave her a minute to mull it over.
Lilly wasn’t just going to let him get off that easily, though. She pressed him for more saying, “So? You gonna explain that or are you gonna make me ask for it?”
Snorting a small laugh, Dante caved in and gave her his answer. “Keep him safe then, Lilly. Protect him. It’s not always the man’s job to do the protecting. You’re lying to yourself. You are attracted to David, just not in the traditional sense. You’re scared for him because he isn’t physically tough like you. That doesn’t have to be something that counts against him, ya see. He’s got a big heart. You could learn something from a guy like that, Lil. If anybody can learn something from him it’s you.” Dante pointed his chin in Seth’s direction and added, “So could Seth… but he’s too much of an asshole to admit it.” Lilly opened her mouth to speak, but Dante was already trotting up to rejoin the group.
Seth pointed at the footprints in the dirt that led into the wooded area where Wyatt disappeared. “Here. This is where we go in.”
With a frustrated, arrogant sniff, Chak asked him sarcastically, “No shit? What clued you in? The footprints headed directly into the woods next to the wagon tracks? Or…?”
Ten snorted his own laugh at the joke and smiled up at Chak. “Yeah, no crap! We’ve done this before.”
Chak reached over from his position on the saddle and punched Ten in the arm. He corrected him saying, “I don’t need your help on this, Ten. Let me handle it.” Ten rubbed at his arm and nodded his understanding. “Follow me, all of you, and stay behind me at all times. I don’t want you people messin’ up the trail.”
Lilly saw Seth narrow his eyes at Chak’s back and made a mental note to watch the situation closely from that point on.
They entered the woods and dismounted, leaving David and Ten to quickly water the horses as the others began examining the much softer ground within for signs of life. Chak pointed at the slight depression in the rotting leaves and noted, “He stopped here.” Stepping deftly into the boy-sized divot as David and Ten rejoined the group, Chak scanned the forest floor. “He headed back. This way.”
It would be another few hundred yards before they reached the first sign of trouble for Wyatt. Ten’s eyes grew wide and he blurted, “There!”
Chak stalked over to the large oak tree and pulled Wyatt’s arrow from the trunk easily. It had barely penetrated the bark after missing its target. He announced to the group, “Keep your eyes peeled. There’s dead here.” He drew his bow and a single arrow from his quiver.
Dante reached for one of the rifles strapped to Pi, but Seth grabbed his hand. Drawing his sword, he whispered to Dante, “No. Those are for the living. Let’s keep it quiet for now.” Dante understood and shook it off. He snapped a wrist sized branch from a nearby pine and quietly began sharpening its head into a crude spear with his boot knife as they stalked further on.
Ten and Chak led the way, following Wyatt’s trail. Lilly couldn’t resist asking anymore. She sharply whispered to Ten, “The tracks. Can you tell what happened? Is he still alive?”
His face made no expression as he maintained a concentrated glare at the ground below them. He nodded at her and whispered back without looking up, “Seems as though. His gait is the same as before. The footfalls match in depth and distance. No dragging.” Chak looked up at Ten and smiled his approval of Ten’s estimation. Lilly thanked him with an encouraging smile.
The snap of a branch to Dante’s left had Seth spinning to swing but he held up as Dante charged his spear into the face of an approaching bernie. The spear smashed home and sent it sprawling backwards to the ground where it penetrated straight through the back of the bernie’s neck, missing the brain stem by more than an inch. Dante held it pinned to the soft grass and brought a heavy boot down onto its forehead. Several stomps later he dislodged the spear with a sickening, wet schlock! He looked up from his kill with a determined gesture for them to keep moving.
They moved further, with the horses in tow, nearly losing the trail at a few points. Seth was completely out of his league at this point and spat disgustedly. “I can’t see anything. No signs at all. If you lost him already I’ll…”
Chak shushed him harshly snapping, “Quiet! Seven Doves told me to track and I’m tracking. If you’re not helping us, then you’re hurting us. Now… just because you can’t see anything doesn’t mean we can’t. I’m only going to say this one time, so listen and listen good. I don’t like you. Any of you. And I’m not doing this for you. Don’t ever get that twisted.”
Seth’s brow furrowed and the vein in his forehead threatened to burst as he pointed his finger and started to open his mouth. Chak snatched Seth up by his shirt, though, and yanked him about three feet ahead. “Look, now!”
Seth sloughed off Chak’s grip with an attitude, but, as Lilly’s hand landed on his shoulder to calm him he strained his eyes to see what Chak was pointing at. “See it now?” Chak asked frustratedly. “There’s no obvious footprint anymore, but these sticks are snapped. And the grass is bent in this direction.” He pointed west. “And there’s mud on top of this twig. Wet mud. I promise you he’s been through here. You have to trust me. We don’t have to get along, but you have to trust us to do what we do best. Got it?”
Lilly pleaded with Seth saying, “Seth. Please? For me?”
Seth inhaled and exhaled deeply once.
David broke the tension and told them all, “Pi’s gettin’ spooked. Something’s close. We should keep pushing.”
When they got to the clearing, all of them, Foresters included, stood dumbfounded at its center. They looked around themselves at the hundreds of prints and drag marks. Dante said audibly to himself, “Jesus…”
Lilly covered her mouth. “They… they were everywhere.”
Chak and Ten stood looking at one another puzzled. “It doesn’t make sense,” Chak told the young man.
Seth asked him impatiently, “What doesn’t make sense? What’s wrong?”
Chak traced a line of prints, pointing with his finger, out of the crowd of tracks in which they stood and off to the west. “There were nearly a hundred dead here. But look… here in the center. Your boy’s tracks stop here in the center of all these others, then they exit in the same direction he was already heading while the herd’s tracks veer off right.”
The crew tried to make sense of the evidence, but remained clueless. Chak looked Seth in the eyes and added, “He walked away from this. I don’t know how he did it, but he walked away from this.”
Lilly covered her mouth and Dante hung his head. As David moved to console Lilly, she allowed herself to fall into his arms, devastated.
The rage built inside Seth and he lashed out. He swung his arm as hard as he could, slinging his sword end over end into the nearest tree. It pinged off loudly and hit the ground with a thump. “Fuck!”
Chak and Ten let the moment sink in before offering some hope. Ten told the others what Chak already knew. “He’s wasn’t dead, though, you guys. At least not when he walked off. Everything about these tracks leading away is the same as before. He might be okay.”
Seth seethed at Ten, “Look around, kid! Look at all these fuckin’ bernies! If he isn’t dead, he’s sure as fuck been bitten. It’s the same Goddamned thing!”
Chak took a deep breath. “Then we better move fast. You’ll want to recover the body at least, I assume. Give the boy a proper burial?”
The words stung Lilly’s heart. She pulled away from David and pushed Ten forward roughly. “Let’s go. Now. I want to see him.”
For the better part of the day they stayed on the trail. Two run-ins with the dead ended without incident, a testament to the efficiency of the group, but that was the least of their worries. Thoughts of Wyatt being bitten swirled in Lilly’s head as they walked endlessly forward. She rehearsed how she would explain Wyatt’s death to Kylee and she did her best to brace herself for the hurt. She felt her fists clench preemptively as she imagined herself having to put him down if he turned.
She promised herself she wouldn’t look into his eyes. That’s something Lilly always loved about Wyatt. He had these angelic little eyes that reminded her of Dext and she absolutely adored that about him. There was no way she would let herself see those eyes grayed out and hollowed by death. That was a memory that would remain unsullied for her above all else.
Chak pounded the ground with his fist as he crouched and barked, “Shit!”
With everyone already on edge that probably wasn’t the best reaction. They all snapped to attention awaiting more bad news as Chak explained, “Watchers… He’s runnin’ with a few Watchers now.”
Dante was the first to ask what they were all wondering. “What’s a Watcher?”
Answering Dante as if he should’ve already known the answer, Chak told him, “Watchers… you know. The wild children? They must’ve been passing through here and found him. Looks like a handful of them were here.”
Seth scratched his beard impatiently. “Flies? He’s with the fuckin’ Flies? Goddamnit.”
Ten wrinkled his nose. “Flies? That’s what you call ‘em?”
David asked Seth, “Flies? They’re a real thing? I thought they were made up. How would kids survive out here without help?”
Lilly shot a sideways glance at David and put her hand on her hip. “These aren’t your average kids. They’re like little Savages. Those grubby little fucks would steal your boot laces before you even knew they were in the neighborhood.”
Dante added, “I’ve spent more time plugging up the holes they make in the walls than I care to remember. They sneak in, steal my food, steal my ‘shine… anything they can get away with. They think they’re pretty slick, but...”
Seth interrupted him with, “They are pretty slick. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never been able to catch one of the little bastards.”
With a nod of his head, Chak told them, “Yeah, me neither. But I’ve got good news for you…”
Raising his eyebrows, Seth awaited him skeptically. Chak smiled. “Your boy’s not bit. Watchers would’ve killed him on the spot. I still don’t know how he made it out of that jam with the huge herd back there, but he did. Watchers got your boy. He’ll survive.”
Lilly remained guarded, but there was a marked relief that washed over her. Wyatt wasn’t out of the woods yet, so to speak, but knowing that he was with a proven group of survivors was encouraging. She said to no one in particular, “C’mon, let’s move.” With a nod and a cautious smile, Ten and Chak pushed forward once more.
The two Foresters made there way ahead slightly and, in the relative privacy, Ten took the opportunity to ask Chak in a whisper, “So… are we gonna tell them or what?”
Chak played dumb and asked, “Tell ‘em what?” He hoped Ten hadn’t noticed the separate set of tracks. He should’ve known better, though. He had trained Ten well.
“The Unclean. I saw their tracks back there near the Watchers,” Ten said, confirming he had indeed noticed.
Chak grabbed Ten by collar of his buckskin shirt and pulled them both to a halt. “No. We say nothing about that. Nothing. Seven Doves is only interested in the boy and that’s it. Is that understood?”
Ten started to argue with him saying, “Ok, but what if…”
“Is that understood?”
“Okay, okay. I got it. Sorry.”
Chapter Fourteen – The Lost Boys
Kylee stood alone in the dimly lit hotel room as shadows of the setting sun danced on its blood soaked walls. She had moved most of her belongings into a new area after Jack’s attempted takeover. It left her too shaken to stay another night there. The bodies had been removed, but there were still pools of red on the dingy carpet. It squished when she walked through it, for there was no avoiding the sheer quantity, and it left the bottom of her boots caked in its jellylike ooze. Handprints and smears now adorned the walls, browning as they dried.
She had come to collect the last of her things. She moved to the dresser on the far end and slid open the small top drawer. She hadn’t opened that drawer in nearly three years, though she thought about it every single day. Her hands shook as she reached inside and removed a small, metallic case. The past few days and the drama that they brought had her feeling weak, exhausted, and desperate. She gave in to her emotions and opened the case, removing a small lighter and a single cigarette, one of four left inside. She lit it, using both hands on the lighter to hold steady as her wracked nerves shook her body violently.
After a long pull of the dry, stale tobacco she blew the smoke into the air above and coughed slightly. It stank, but she reveled in it as it masked the rotten, metallic smell of blood that permeated the room. Kylee reached into the drawer once more with her free hand and touched the cover of the small book that sat within. She closed her eyes and remembered.
“I wish you were here,” she whispered into the smoke filled air. “God, I miss you so much.”
She pulled the book from the drawer and placed it on top of the dresser, opening it to a random page. A solemn smile creased her lips. It was one of his famous rants. Those had always made Kylee smile. Even in the angriest moments, Dext had a way of making it funny. She liked this one the best, though, because it was a really old one and it was about her. He was raging about how much he wanted to tell her that he loved her, but he didn’t think she would even entertain the notion. She snickered to herself and said to no one, “If only I knew…”
She thumbed to another page and her smile faded to a grimace. It was about the day one of the greatest men she would ever know died. It happened in one of the casinos just up the road, though that place had long ago burned to the ground.
Lilly was just a child then. It was after a long fight that they had returned to find the old Vegas overrun by the dead. Poor Lilly was trapped inside of the casino, behind the bar, with fifty or more packed in and hungry. Cutty rushed the entire herd and took countless bites to get to her. He held her high above the crowd as they tore into his flesh to keep her safe before throwing her to the safety Dext and the others. Once they were out, Cutty ignited the entire building and burned to ashes with the dead. “Thank you… Thank you for Lilly…”
A few more pages flipped. “Here,” she whispered. “This is where it happened.” She silently read the pages where Dext recounted their first few truly romantic encounters. “This is the night we made Wyatt.”
The book snapped shut and Kylee was jolted from her somber reflection as Alyse said from the doorway, “You alright, Ky?”
Kylee recovered quickly from her fright when she realized it was Alyse and made an effort to brush it all off saying, “Yeah. Fine.” She smiled at Alyse weakly. “I’m good. Thanks.”
Alyse saw right through her. “It’s hard, I know. I’m worried about Nick, too. Like, freaking out. I can’t imagine how you’re feeling right now…”
Kylee picked up the book and the small cigarette case and asked Alyse, “Walk with me?”
Standing aside to allow Kylee to pass her through the doorway, Alyse told her, “Of course.”
They went down the stairs to the floor below and into Kylee’s new digs. The rooms were so generic that you couldn’t even tell the difference between them. It was here that Kylee would make her new home, so she put the two items in the top drawer of the dresser and turned to ask Alyse something mundane. She was interrupted, though, by Copper’s voice calling urgently from the floor below as he rushed up the steps. “Kylee! Kylee, come quick it’s Wyatt!”
She met him midway up the steps and asked panicking, “What? What is it? Is he okay?”
He said nothing. Instead, he grabbed her by the arm and nearly dragged her along with Alyse in tow. When they hit the door to the Strip, he kicked it open and released Kylee’s arm saying, “Follow me to the wall. Do it now.” He broke into a run.
They moved with a purpose as they sprinted down the Strip and took a right, dipping into one of the creepy side streets that terminated at the huge wall surrounding Vegas proper. They scrambled up the ladder to meet a team of eight men and women charged with patrolling that section. A small, scrappy looking guy named Chief pointed over the side and said to Kylee, “They want to talk to you.”
Kylee cautiously peeked over the edge of the wall and looked down at the motley group of boys nearly fifteen feet below. Her eyes boggled and she inhaled deeply to call out joyfully, “Wyatt!”
Wyatt moved to step forward, but Jonas placed a hand on his chest and shoved him back, instead stepping forward in Wyatt’s place. He raised a hand and called up to Kylee, “You are the mother of the boy! The one-eyed lady with golden hair. We brought him back.”
Kylee knew of the Flies, the Watchers, though, she had never actually communicated with them before. She addressed Jonas from the top of the wall calling down, “Yes, thank you! I’ve been worri…”
Troy snatched Wyatt from behind and cruelly held him hostage with a knife against his throat. As Wyatt reflexively reached for his own blade, Troy caught the hand and bent it painfully before relieving Wyatt of the weapon. He tossed it to the ground uselessly and barked at Jonas, “Niet, Jonas! Him tow spensive tow b’lettin’ go na! We al kep him!”
Three of the wall guardians trained their bows immediately on the group of six boys as Copper and Chief shot down the ladder and out of sight. Alyse placed a hand on Kylee’s shoulder for comfort as Kylee angrily shrieked down at them, “Let him go now. Let him go or I’ll kill every single one of you!”
Jonas called out in English to Kylee, “No! Not what we want. I can talk to him. He doesn’t speak for us!” He turned to face Troy and shouted lividly, “Les him ott na, Troy! Les him ott… us awl die he’!”
Troy held firm, darting his eyes amongst the other nameless boys. He snapped at them, “Jonas niet truf. Him lie! Us need fout! Us need medzine! Us need safe!”
Kylee pulled her pistol and trained it on Jonas. “Tell him to let my boy go or you’re first! I swear to fucking God I’ll drop you where you stand!”
Jonas tried to reason with her telling her, “He just wants us to be welcome here. He wants us to stay with you people. All of us.”
One of the younger boys warned the others, “Dat boomstick! Boomstick!”
Kylee was incredulous. “Yeah, well, he just fucked that up! I’m not gonna tell you again, boy!” She cocked back the hammer on her weapon with a chilling click.
Seemingly from out of nowhere, the frayed edges of a bullwhip tipped with jagged metal ringlets wrapped itself around Troy’s arm and wrenched it away to send his blade tumbling through the air. The whip released, tearing through skin as it went. Troy grimaced and cried out in pain, but it was silenced as a rope lasso landed expertly around his neck. It snapped closed, choking him purple, and yanking him away from Wyatt.
Wyatt scooped his knife from the ground and separated himself from the group of boys wielding it at the ready. Arms out in surrender, Jonas spun around to find Chief holding the lasso with Copper standing above Troy. Copper had his whip ready to lash out once again as he stepped heavily on Troy’s throat to hold him down. He looked up at a relieved and grateful Kylee and quipped, “I’m earnin’ it, Ky.” He smirked, pleased with himself, and shot her a wink.
Alyse called out, “Wait!” but it did nothing to stop Kylee from deftly vaulting over the edge of the wall, pistol in hand. She dropped the nearly fifteen feet, landing in a crouch with her free hand in the dirt, before popping up and stalking toward Jonas. She pressed the barrel of the gun to his forehead and called for Wyatt to come to her.
Kylee didn’t take her eyes off Jonas until Wyatt was nearly under her arm. Only then did she look down at him. She wiped his face like any mother would and pushed his hair from his eyes. She hugged him tightly with one arm while keeping the gun on Jonas. “Are you okay?”
Wyatt nodded timidly.
She told him firmly, “Go inside. We’ll talk after.”
Wyatt balked and tried to argue saying, “But, mom… Jonas… he…”
“Inside. Now!”
He complied with a huff and moved along the wall toward the main gate where some of the wall guardians had already gathered. Alyse told Kylee from above, “I’ll get him settled and cleaned up. Get him some food.”
Eyes held firmly on Jonas, Kylee waved a hand to thank Alyse without a word. She flashed a quick glance to Chief and told him, “Make sure that little shit doesn’t move.” She then turned her attention to Copper and beckoned him over to her with a head nod.
Copper double-timed it to Kylee’s side and stood next to her looking as intimidating as ever. She grasped his arm with her free hand and brought it up, passing the gun to him without removing it from Jonas’ head. “Copper, you’re in charge of the wall now. Chief, you’re to give your full support to Copper like you always have. I’m going to see my boy.”
Copper did a double take as he noticed Kylee walking off casually and he said to her, “What about these boys? What do you want me to do with them?”
Hand on her hip, Kylee turned and told Copper, “I said you’re in charge of the wall. It’s your problem now.” She spun on her heels and called over her shoulder sarcastically, “Careful what you wish for, Copper!”
Chapter Fifteen – Homecoming Kings
“C’mon, you pain in the ass!” Seth barked at Pi as he tugged her reigns forcefully. Pi stomped her feet and bared her teeth at him, but followed nonetheless.
They stayed off the horses as much as possible to make the tracking easier. With Chak and Ten in the lead, they chatted quietly as they moved along.
Dante, leading one of the Forester horses next to Pi, asked Seth, “Remember that time you and me got pinned down in the old toll booth by the river?”
Seth let a smile creak across his lips and he nodded saying, “How could I forget? That was ugly, man.”
Dante cackled and continued saying, “Ugly… hah! Now that’s the understatement of the century.” He looked over his shoulder at Pi and couldn’t help but to smile at how much trouble she was giving Seth.
With a raised eyebrow, Seth asked Dante, “So?”
Dante shrugged and said, “So… what?”
Seth nudged him and pressed on saying, “So, what made you think of that?”
Inhaling deeply, Dante looked to the sky and told Seth, “I was scared. I mean… I was genuinely afraid that was gonna be the end.”
Seth snorted. “You thought you were scared? Shit, man, I already had my pill in my hand.”
The pills were something all the Vegas scavenging teams carried in their kit. Cyanide. No one knew exactly why Doc had them when he showed up on the Strip, but the day he passed them out to the road crew they didn’t bat an eye. Hell, it was better than getting torn to shreds by the dead. Of course, the only downside was that you’d still turn. No one ever wanted to turn, obviously, but that was a decision you’d have to make for yourself.
Dante brushed his head to shoo away a fly and added, “I’ll never forget the way Nick and Lilly waded into that mess to come save your sorry ass.”
Seth attempted to correct him saying, “You mean our asses,” but Dante waved him off casually. He told Seth, “I said what I meant, Seth. Those two barely knew me. Look, I’m not bent about it or anything. Just calling it as I see it. Point is… that girl loves you like a father.”
Seth took a moment to reflect on that. He smiled to himself and said to Dante, “I may as well be her father. We practically raised her.”
Dante leveled Seth with an icy stare and told him firmly, “Then you need to start actin’ like it. No more of this ‘that’s not my department shit’. Understand what I’m sayin’?”
Seth balked. I daresay he was offended. He came back at Dante saying, “That’s a fucked up thing for you to say to me.”
Dante smiled wisely. “Listen. We talk an awful lot, you and me. But I never told you about my little girl. Well, she wasn’t little when it happened, but she’ll always be my baby. Tabitha was twelve when they took her. Snatched her right out of my arms, man. You don’t have any idea what that’s like, Seth. To see your child wrench her perfect little face in pain as they tore her to pieces…” His voice trailed off and left him with his lips tightly pursed to hold back his emotions. No tears fell from his face, though.
Seth felt the fire in his gut stoke once more. “Fuck you, Dante. Fuck you right in the face for that shit. I do know what it’s like. I watched my son die just the same, Goddamnit!” He stopped in his tracks and grabbed Dante by the shoulder, turning him roughly to speak face to face.
Dante stood tall, almost daring Seth to lash out. Seth, fists clenched tightly, snapped at him, “Who the fuck do you think are to preach to me?”
The others had taken notice now and, although they acted like they didn’t see anything, they were listening closely. Dante raised a hand in a calming gesture after a moment and lowered his voice to a whisper. “I’m your friend for Christ’s sake. Look, I’m sorry. Bad example. All I’m sayin’ is that your little girl needs you right now. Just look at her, man. The shit with Nick. Wyatt. Her feelings and all that shit with David. The girl’s a mess. This ain’t about me and you, Seth. It’s about your little girl. I’m sayin’ this as your friend. You need to take your head outta your ass and get her back on…”
“Dead!” Chak called out, cutting the conversation short of its ending. Seth and Dante let it drop immediately and dropped the reigns of the horses. David kept cool enough to scoop them off the ground but stayed back as everyone else jogged up to Chak and Ten.
Ten drew back on his bowstring and sent an arrow whizzing through the air. It pierced the back of the bernie’s head and exited partially out the front sending it slumping forward. The arrow snapped in two as it hit the ground.
Seth moved up to take out the second as it hunched over, feeding on some unseen meal of flesh. He swung his sword with one hand, lopping its head off completely and sending it rolling across the forest floor. As the body plopped to the ground, Seth stalked over to the still snapping head and brought his gauntleted fist down heavily. The skull burst into shards spraying him with black blood and brain matter.
As the carnage came to a close, though, Lilly gasped in horror. The dead had been feeding on the corpse of a small child and by this point there was barely any meat left on the gnawed bones at all. Chak knelt by the body and shoved the remains of the decapitated bernie off to the side to inspect what was left of the child.
Seth opened his mouth to speak as he stood over a kneeling Chak, but he was stopped immediately. “You. Shut it,” Chak told him raising his finger as a warning. Seth clamped down, frustrated, and remembered Lilly’s words telling him to cooperate with the Foresters. Chak took a close look at the skull and noted the knife wound indicating the body had been put down before it reanimated.
Lilly couldn’t take the silence anymore. She blurted out, “Is it him? Seth, is it Wyatt?”
Seth shrugged helplessly. There was no way for Seth to know for sure considering the state the body was in. Chak would put the matter to rest. “Your boy is, what, eight or nine, right?”
Lilly answered, “Eight.”
Chak rose to his feet, wiping his hands on his buckskin shirt and told them all, “This one is younger. Not him. Let’s keep moving.”
Heaving yet another sigh of relief Lilly and the others began moving once more as the forest began to thin. They were approaching the Badlands finally and, with Chak and Ten confidently following the boys’ tracks, hopeful thoughts began to emerge. Ten looked over his shoulder and smiled at Lilly telling her, “They were pushing hard through here. I think they may have actually made it back to Vegas.”
Chak echoed the sentiment and even smiled at Ten telling him, “Looks like you’ll get to see that place after all, Ten. It’s still a shit hole, though.” He was obviously toying with Seth, but Seth let it go.
Instead, Seth turned his attention to Lilly as he clumsily swung himself up onto Pi’s back. He gestured for her to mount the Forester horse and ride alongside him. She deftly hopped into the saddle and smiled cautiously at Seth. “Do you think he made it home?”
Seth rode slowly with her and spoke in hushed tones so Chak and Ten could concentrate. “I don’t know, Lil’. But I’m feeling better about it with every step. I can’t take much more of this not knowing.”
Lilly nodded, bolstered by Seth’s words. It was quiet for a while before Lilly told him, “I think I’m gonna give David a chance when this is all over, when we get home. I think I’m gonna teach him how we do things on the outside.”
Seth struggled to keep his eyes forward so Lilly wouldn’t shut down. He flashed back to what Dante was saying earlier and made a solid effort to listen and formulate something dad-like to say. Lilly continued, “Can I ask you something?”
With a casual shrug, Seth gave her the go-ahead.
She asked him, “Can I stay home?”
He puzzled on the question. “Of course you can stay home. We shouldn’t have to hit the road again for a few weeks, especially if Wyatt is all good. I mean, we’re gonna have to have a service for Nick… You know Alyse is gonna have a tough time with that. And we’re okay on food for a while thanks to these guys. Shit, we’ll probably be in for almost a month before we have to go back and get Doc. Though, I’m not sure what we’re gonna do about a medic for a while.”
Lilly shook her head to stop him. “That’s not what I mean. I don’t wanna go out at all anymore. I want off the road. Period. And I wanna try to learn how to raise the horses with David. Do you think you can be okay with all that? I know you don’t like David.”
Seth shook his head. “It’s not that I don’t like him, Lil’. I just know he ain’t got the balls to handle himself, much less protect you. And what if you have a kid?”
Lilly trilled at the mention of her having a child. She knew that certainly wasn’t in the cards anytime soon. Seth may not have known, but Lilly wasn’t one for intimacy of that sort. In fact, the idea outright disgusted her after her rape at the hands of the Savages. But she did crave comfort. She sighed after her laugh subsided and told Seth, “I just want you to accept that I have an opinion here and I want it to be heard. Can you accept that much?”
There was a moment where Seth wanted to fight her on it, but Dante was right. He swallowed his pride and smiled at her. “Yes. I can accept that.”
This shocked Lilly. She honestly expected their usual way of things. They would begin talking, then they would disagree over something crucial, then they’d get heated and have a blowout. That’s always the way it had been between them, at least since she was a preteen. Not this time, though. It made her happy.
Lilly beamed at him for the first time in ages. She thanked him and told him, “Thank you. I love you, Seth. You know that, right?”
Seth, gruffly muttering at Pi, found himself slightly melted by such a rare sight as a smiling Lilly and he stepped outside of himself for the first time in a long while. “Yeah, I love you too, Lil’. You can call me dad, ya know… if you want.”
Lilly threw her head back and laughed boisterously blurting, “Hah! You fag!” She kicked her horse in the side and moved forward and away leaving Seth feeling vulnerably embarrassed.
Dante took her place at Seth’s side and said simply, “Ain’t gon’ be easy is it, brother?”
Seth huffed. “Sure as shit, ain’t.”
It would be another three hours before the break in the forest showed itself to them. The afternoon sun shone brightly through the thinning tree cover signaling the Badlands were upon them and Vegas would very soon be in sight. With Chak and Ten strongly encouraged by heavy, footfall tracks and a clear path, they were sure that the boys had made it home. It was an exciting moment for all of them to know that, even though there was somber news to be delivered, a reunion was just ahead.
It was not to be.
As they broke through the last of the trees and stepped onto the hot dirt of the trail, Dante could be heard cursing, “Oh, fuck. Look!”
Chak, Seth, and the others looked ahead to see Vegas shimmering in the wavy light of the horizon, but, above it, hung enormous plumes of black smoke. The city was burning!
“On the horses, now!” Seth shouted at all of them.
Hooves pounded the earth with thundering crashes and the animals panted as the heels dug into their sides. Vegas slowly took form and the carnage ahead became more clear with every inch of ground they covered. They came to a halt where the walls once stood and bounded down from their mounts with weapons in hand.
Seth tossed the spare shotgun to Dante and gave the hunting rifle to Lilly telling them in a panic, “Fuck blades. Shoot to kill.”
The Strip, now devoid of life, was strewn with the corpses of many Vegas residents and still more of the former inhabitants sat hovering over those corpses gorging themselves. They could be seen fighting over entrails in a macabre tug of war before stuffing greedy, lipless faces. The Strip’s bare earth was now flecked with rivulets and small streams of blood as far as the eye could see.
Dante and Lilly began covering fire, using ammo sparingly, and exploding heads from twenty yards out as Chak and Ten loosed arrows from behind them. Seth grabbed David by his collar and ran past Dante’s old place, which was now ablaze and crumbling. He told David firmly, “We need to get to the Palace. Can you hack it?”
David stammered, “I… I gotta get to mom!”
Seth slapped him coldly across the face. “No! This is it, David. This is how it really is. Can you hack it or not, Goddamnit?”
David clasped his hand to his face and nodded. “Yeah… yeah… I can do it.”
Seth nodded back and fixed him with a steely gaze. He changed his tone to something a bit more encouraging. “Good. You have one job. Take this…” He passed David his sword and tightened his own gauntlet straps using his teeth. “Stick to my ass, kill anything that moves, and don’t be a pussy.”
They moved off into the fray.
Lilly and Dante continued to suppress the small packs as the dead turned their attention to the noise of the rifles. The smoke was making it difficult to aim as their eyes began to water and their breathing became labored. Chak and Ten, though, were able to back them up showing off impressive range and accuracy with their bows.
They slogged up the remains of the Strip protecting themselves and the spooked horses, which was harder than it should’ve been without David to lend a hand. Lilly looked over her shoulder to ensure that Chak and Ten were still following when a group of six bernies poured from Dante’s Inferno as it collapsed in flames. “Behind you!”
She raised her rifle to take aim, but thought better of such a risky shot. Instead, she hit Dante on his shoulder to get him to follow and drew her knife. The flaming dead made it to within inches of the two Foresters when Lilly launched herself into a flying kick. The charred bernies bounced clumsily into one another and fell sprawling to the ground. Lilly landed with a thump, flat on her back with her pant leg ablaze from the contact.
As Dante and Chak finished off the dead, Ten crouched down and tore the flaming cloth from her pants. He snuffed out what was left and offered a hand to get to her feet. “Thanks,” she said to him, too busy to say anything more.
The battle raged on for another fifteen minutes before Lilly found herself kicking open the doors of the Palace to rejoin Seth and David. They burst into Kylee’s old room and found themselves shocked at the carnage within. The carpet was still soaked in blood and the walls remained smeared with gore from Jack’s attack.
Seth cursed and lashed out at the room yelling, “Fuck! Fuuuuuck! What the fucking fuck happened?”
Lilly muttered the words, “Mom…”
“There!” Dante pointed to one of the walls.
Scrawled across the rear wall in blood from an unknown source was the message: Raided. Go to HD. GUNS!
Seth roared with rage and then told everyone, “Follow me. Now.”
He stalked with the entire group behind him down the stairs of the ruined Palace all the way to the basement. He moved with a purpose as he stopped at what appeared to be a wall and began kicking it with his boot. He barked at the others, “Help me. Kick it in.”
They group lined up and began pounding and kicking at the wall until it started to crumble and break apart. It would be Dante, with one last heave of his wiry body, who crashed through to the other side of the false barrier first. Chak asked Seth as the dust began to settle, “What is all this?”
Lilly answered for him saying, “An insurance policy.”
They all stepped into the dingy room lined with shelves and stacked with nearly twenty dusty crates and barrels. Hung from the walls and stuffed in cases were countless guns and rifles. Machine guns and pistols, shotguns and boxes upon boxes of ammunition, blades and bows strewn about the makeshift armory made it feel like they had stepped back in time nearly a decade.
Seth reached down and picked up one of the M-4 rifles and snapped a magazine into place. Lilly took the cue and began loading magazines with all manner of bullets and ammunition, passing them off to Dante and David as they went. It was a flurry of activity that left Chak and Ten standing there dumbfounded and, for the first time since the two groups had met, completely out of their element.
Seth finally stood with his rifle in hand, wielding it comfortably, and looked at the group. All eyes on Seth.
“Seven Doves said war is coming.”
Chak told Seth, “It’s already here. They’ll come for our people, too, before long. You know that.”
After throwing a rifle over her shoulder, Lilly stuffed two handguns into the shoulder holster that now hung beneath her leather vest. She looked at Chak reassuringly and said, “No, they won’t.”
Ten stared at her from next to David, both looking terrified. “What makes you think they won’t?”
Seth racked the action on his own rifle, sending a round into the chamber. He looked at them, one by one, before saying bluntly, “They’ll all be dead.”
Chapter Sixteen – Welcoming Committee
The cell smelled like a mixture of sour body odor and stale piss. It burned at Chris’ nose, and he’d been trying to ignore it for nearly a day now to no avail. Nash was chained up next to him and he dug at the sores from the shackles on his wrists and ankles as they waited for their next meal of scraps from the raider’s camp. It would likely be more of the same – burnt ends of meat, charred bones with some marrow inside, and some boiled water.
They were in the small outpost north and east of Vegas, nothing more than a mud and stone shack that the raiders recently turned into a makeshift prison with a camp setup out front. The two friends had been part of a considerably larger group on their way to Vegas for sanctuary, but the raiding party fell upon them before they could get any closer. The riflemen had grouped the females into one wagon and the males in another, but not before they executed the children in front of the adults. The bodies of the children, unbeknownst to the prisoners, were put on the fire, infants and toddlers alike. Not for disposal, but for food. The boys of working age were grouped with the rest of the men.
In the forty-eight hours that followed their capture, Nash and Chris watched as the population in their cell was gradually reduced from the original fourteen down to just the two of them. One of the raiders would step into the dingy building every few hours, towering above them all, and survey each man, one at a time, before choosing a handful to be pulled out to God-knows-where. Any of them that tried to struggle were viciously beaten with fists and rifle stocks until they fell into line.
Chris was the bigger of the two men, standing well over six feet tall. He walked with a limp, courtesy of an old gunshot wound to the leg, but he managed just fine. Better than most men, as a matter of fact. Chris’ size, along with his battle wounds, earned him the respect of the other men in their group, but no one loved Chris as much as Nash. They were brothers, you see, and they had been together since the beginning.
Regardless of the imposing size of Chris, Nash was easily the more capable of the two. Nash was a little guy. He stood more than a foot shorter than Chris and nearly half his weight. He was scrappy as hell, though. Never once was Nash bested in a fight, with or without a weapon, but he was often underestimated by his foes. That underestimation was usually their downfall. Nash simply refused to die, whether by the hands of the living or in the mouths of the dead.
Chris stretched his neck and said to Nash in a low voice, “We’re done for, little brother.”
Without even a glance in Chris’ direction, Nash told him sternly, “Bullshit. There’s no reason for them to hold us if all they wanted to do was kill us all off. There’s something else going on here.”
Chris pondered that for a moment and asked him, “What, though? Why do they keep taking us away?”
Shrugging in his chains, Nash left it at that for a bit. As the sunlight beamed through a few cracks in the steaming cell, it lit up the dust floating through the air like smoke. That place was worse than death. The only sounds to be heard were the muffled chattering of men outside and the sporadic sniffing and snorting of horses.
Chris strained to peek through one of the cracks, but he couldn’t make out anything due to the brightness on the other side. He spat disgustedly and began fidgeting with his own chains. “You got anything on you at all? Anything?”
Nash shook his head. “Nope. You already know that. They stripped us of everything but our clothes.”
That was the most helpless feeling in the world at the time for both of them. It was only worsened once they were locked up. They were still together, though, and that comforted them - at least a little. Even with their wrists bound and their legs only able to shuffle along at shoulder width, they were still together.
A voice was heard from the opposite door signaling that it was once again about to open. The two men snapped to attention and moved to their feet. Having seen the state of the others before them as they exited, both Chris and Nash new they wouldn’t be fighting back unless their lives were in danger on the very spot. Yet, they still had to keep their dignity. They refused to kneel in front of any man capable of shooting a young child in the back of the head. They would never die on their knees. That was the way the McGowan boys rolled. If they were going to die, they were damned sure going to die with their boots on.
The door swung open swiftly and the usual guy stepped inside. The other raiders called him Sarge. He was a well muscled, heavily tattooed man in his early forties with a patchwork face full of salt and pepper hair and a black skullcap. Sarge was balding slightly and it bugged him, so, regardless of the heat, he always wore that hat. The rest of his attire was a brown tee-shirt and a pair of camouflage pants. He looked every bit as tough as he was.
Sarge looked at Chris and Nash for a moment before gruffly calling over his shoulder to the outside, “Are they ready?”
An unseen voice replied, “Yeah, hurry up! They’re gettin’ shitty!”
With a devilish grin, Sarge reached out and grabbed the chained wrists of both Chris and Nash, dragging them along to the outside. The sun was high in the cloudless sky and all three men wrenched their faces and squinted until their eyes could adjust. The scene outside sent a shot of adrenalin and fear through Nash’s body.
Just ahead of them sat the raider’s camp. The fire pit off to the left was still smoking and above it, skewered on a spit like a hog, was the charred carcass of one of the group’s children. The realization hit Chris before Nash and he leaned forward, vomiting the contents of his stomach all over the ground at his bound feet. Nash narrowed his eyes at Sarge as he, too, realized they had been fed the children for the past two days and he flew into an emotion-filled rage. He clumsily charged forward, but fell to the ground as the chain on his ankles tripped him up. He writhed for a moment to get to his feet, but Sarge stepped up and kicked him hard in the ribs.
The men of the raider camp could be heard laughing and taunting the two prisoners as Sarge brought Nash to his feet by his hair. He shoved Nash forward while another man did the same with Chris, moving them toward an old cattle pen near the outpost. They opened the gate and shoved the pair inside. That was when they heard the snarls.
Lumbering toward the still bound brothers, two rotting corpses closed in to feed with arms outstretched. In a panic Chris moved to the fence line for escape, but the raiders were now surrounding the area and they only shoved him back to Nash’s side.
“It’s only two! We can do this, Chris.” Nash said, not even believing it himself.
Chris swallowed hard and looked at Nash skeptically. “Any bright ideas then, little brother?”
Ignoring the shouts from the raiders and the garbage being thrown at them, Nash nodded slightly and told Chris, “We need to separate them. We’re fucked if we don’t. Follow my lead.”
Nash hobbled toward the two geeks and shakily lowered his shoulder, crashing into the one on the left. It lost its footing and fell to the ground, but the impact also left Nash off balance. The one on the right nearly grabbed hold of him, but Chris managed to grab the bottom of its shirt with his bound hands and spun it away, flinging it several feet back.
Having regained his composure, Nash desperately called for Chris to restrain the one on the ground. It wasn’t pretty, but it was effective when Chris straddled the fallen corpse, legs shoulder width apart, using the chain that bound his feet to pin it to the ground. That left Nash in a one on one fight with the remaining bernie. He shouted curses at it and held his ground as it approached once more reaching for him.
At the last moment, Nash dodged to his left and threw his arms around the corpse from behind, lashing the short chain on his wrists under its chin. He closed his eyes and squeezed with all his might. The leathery skin on the bernie’s throat split and tore as the chain dug in, spilling the thick, black blood down its torso. He heaved a desperate scream and kept up the pressure until the body dropped uselessly to the dirt and the head rolled away still snapping its jaws.
Once through and soaked in gore, he hobbled over to Chris and jumped with both feet to squash the head of the second. It crunched beneath him like eggshells in a wet bag, leaving both of the brothers breathless and wheezing. Nash fell into his brother’s chest in what could only be described as a congratulatory hug of sorts.
Chris looked down at him and asked him, “You okay?”
Backing away slightly and cocking his head to wipe his cheek on his own shoulder, Nash nodded saying, “Yeah, you?”
As Chris opened his mouth to speak, he was cut off by Sarge who began sarcastically clapping for them. Sarge called out to his men, “Now that’s how it’s fuckin’ done, ain’t that right, fellas?”
The men whooped and hollered in agreement, pleased by the good showing.
Sarge continued, “Finish up that snapper over there,” gesturing for Nash to destroy the severed head.
Nash stepped forward, still separated from Sarge and the others by the pen’s fence, and told him flatly, “Fuck you.”
In an odd way, Sarge was almost impressed by that. He jutted out his bottom lip and nodded affirmatively. He drew his sidearm, something Nash and Chris hadn’t seen in nearly five years, and competently aimed at the head on the ground.
Boom!
That was the end of that. He holstered the gun and opened the gate, offering the brothers an easy exit. They complied and hobbled out to where the rest of the raiders were gathered.
Sarge asked one his guys, “Which one you want? We only need one.”
The other man eyed them both carefully, but came to a decision quickly. He told Sarge, “That really isn’t our call, is it? Better let the old man decide.”
Sarge thought about it for a moment and replied with a slightly frustrated sigh, “Ah, shit, you’re prolly right. Call him out then?”
With a shrug, the man dashed off to one of the many covered wagons that surrounded the camp. He disappeared into the biggest of them all for a short time before returning at a much slower pace. He was followed by a man impeccably dressed in clean clothes who was walking with a decidedly confident air of authority.
As the two reached the larger group of men, Nash saw that the older man was in his sixties, for sure, and he had been badly burned at some point. The left half of his head was devoid of hair and the skin on that area, along with the same half of his face, was wrinkled and brownish pink with scarring. His left eye squinted grotesquely from the old injury as he leveled his gaze to the two brothers.
“I see they both came out of it alright,” the old man said observantly.
Sarge answered, “This little one here did most of the work. He’s a tough little fuck. Got a mouth on him to match, too.”
Nodding, the old man gestured to Chris and asked, “And this one?”
“Meh… he didn’t do too bad,” Sarge answered. “Which one did you want?”
Nash finally spoke up. “We’re not separating. We’re not going anywhere without each other.”
Less demanding in his tone, Chris agreed saying, “That’s my brother, mister. We stick together. Always have, always will.”
Somewhat out of character, Sarge urged the old man telling him, “They’re definitely both in the best shape out of all the others. And they did seem to work well together. You sure we only got room for one?”
The old man reached into his pocket and pulled out a small handkerchief to blot at his deformed eye. He wiped a tear away revealing that the eyelid no longer worked as it should before stowing the cloth back in his pocket. “Brothers, huh?” he said thoughtfully. He pointed at Chris. “Bring this one over here to me.”
A random raider grabbed Chris by the back of his shirt and roughly shoved him to the old man before turning him around to face Nash. The old man told the same raider, “Hmm… too tall. Kneel him down.”
Chris struggled slightly as the raider pushed him down, but folded like a wet cloth when Sarge snatched the rifle from the raider’s shoulder to whip Chris in the back of the knee. Chris stared at Nash with the old man standing behind him awaiting a decision.
The old man looked Nash in the eyes and said coldly, “Your brother…”
In an instant, the cold steel of a blade tore across Chris’ throat and the bright, arterial blood from his neck began cascading down his chest and knees. Chris gagged and choked as the old man held his chin up with a free hand and sawed through his windpipe until the blade scraped against the bone of his spine. The old man tore Chris’ head back hard to make the wound gape as widely as possible and a sickening crack signaled the breaking of Chris’ spinal column. He threw the convulsing body to the ground.
As soon as the knife had begun to sink in, Nash was screaming and crying, pleading for mercy for his older brother - his best friend in this world. There would be no mercy that day and, as Nash lashed out, he was restrained tightly by the raiders until he, too, collapsed in front of the body of his brother, wailing tears of sorrow and despair.
The old man stepped forward and pulled Nash’s head up to look him in the face. He wiped the blood from the blade using Nash’s hair before sliding back into the sheath on his hip saying, “These men are your brothers now. These men will fight by your side and you will protect them as they will protect you. You will no longer be hungry. You will no longer be thirsty. You will have only the best weapons. You will have your choice of women… and children… if that’s what you’re into. But you will serve me for that privilege. Are we clear?”
Nash, still in shock, shattered and broken, stared silently, but the old man was not going to be satisfied by that. He asked Nash once more, “Are. We. Clear?”
Nash hung his head and feebly answered, “Yes.”
The old man smiled and asked Sarge, “What is his name?”
“The dead one was calling him Nash,” Sarge replied dutifully.
“Good,” the old man said with a genuine smile. “Nash,” he said looking down at his new raider-in-training. “You will call me The Colonel.”
The Colonel turned to Sarge and told him, “Now, get these chains off of him and break camp. We’re moving out… And have Nash destroy the dead one before it turns.”
Chapter Seventeen – Power Absolute
Sarge walked alongside Nash as they trudged behind the many wagons of The Colonel’s entourage. Behind them, in a long line, were a group of about twenty new prisoners bound at their wrists and chained to one another. The prisoner at the front of the line had another length of chain that connected him to the rear wagon to ensure that the caravan would keep moving regardless.
Fidgeting with the strap of the new rifle that hung from his back, Nash quietly pushed on. He hadn’t spoken much in the days that followed Chris’ death and, instead, opted to keep his head down and do as instructed. Sarge had been shadowing him in the handful of raids they made and Nash had been making every attempt to not abuse those they had taken. Even the rest of The Colonel’s men had abstained from their usual prisoner rapes and beatings as of late and seemed more focused on an unknown goal. This struck Nash as odd considering his own, personal knowledge of the Savages and he finally got the guts to ask Sarge about. “What makes him so special?”
Slightly surprised by the question, Sarge asked him back, “Huh? What do you mean?”
“Like, what’s the big deal with The Colonel?” Nash clarified. “What makes a group of guys like this follow around some feeble old man? I’m sure any one of you could take him out in a heartbeat. I just don’t get it.”
Sarge snorted a laugh and told Nash, “Yeah, kid, you don’t get it. That man is the key to everything. He’s going to make us gods one day very soon.”
Nash balked. “Gods? What does that even mean?”
“Look at this shit, kid,” Sarge said hefting his huge machine gun. Sarge’s piece was nothing to scoff at. It was a beast of a weapon equipped with a bipod on the fore end and a carrying handle on top. It was belt fed and capable of firing hundreds of rounds per minute as evidenced by the huge straps of ammo that crisscrossed his chest. “We’re unstoppable and it’s all because of him. He keeps us communicating, organized, equipped, and… well… There’s more, but now’s not the time.”
Nash shrugged a partial understanding, but he was still grieving his brother. Even when it comes to family, people in that world accepted death much easier than in the old world. Everyone learned how to cope in their own way. But making nice with the very people that took Chris’ life was eating at Nash and there was no getting around that. He had so many questions, but even the relatively simple task of asking those questions nagged in the back of his mind and the words tasted sour leaving his mouth. The only saving grace for this new group was that since that day at the raider camp, Nash had been very well accommodated. The men had been making a very honest effort to bring him into the fold.
As they moved further along the trail, their conversation would be interrupted from time to time by the snarling of a shambling corpse. The prisoners chained in the rear would gasp and panic due to their helpless state, but one of The Colonel’s men would inevitably make short work of it with a well aimed jab to the brain with a boot knife or some other type of skull splitting, makeshift tool.
Nash, feeling more comfortable now with Sarge’s openness, asked him, “And why are we even taking prisoners at this point? It’s just more mouths to feed if you ask me.”
Sarge joked with him answering, “Yeah, well, I didn’t ask you.” He laughed slightly before answering him more seriously. “They’re gonna be put to work. The Colonel wants to have full control of the communities from the valley to our southwest straight east into the greenlands by month’s end. ‘Control the resources, control the people,’ he always says. It’s pretty straight forward, kid. We muscle in and take control of the communities, then we simply put the people to work for us. Some, such as yourself, we find to be highly capable. Others, not so much, so they end up in the working class. They’re fed, protected, and allowed to stick in family groups so long as they work and remain productive. Simple, really.”
That didn’t sit well with Nash. “So, we’re enslaving them, then,” he said to Sarge, sure to drive home his disdain in the tone.
Sarge frowned. He turned to Nash to respond, but an interruption in the prisoner line distracted them both. One of the older men had fallen to his knees and was being dragged as the others chained to him clumsily tried to help him up. As a few of the raiders began to approach the line, Sarge held up a hand that halted them and passed his weapon to one of the other men. He then pulled Nash along and unlocked the old man from his bindings causing him to drop to the ground, fully prone, as the procession continued along without them. There, Sarge unleashed a vicious kick to the elderly man’s abdomen. Then another. The man grunted in pain as his ribs shattered under the force.
Nash watched in disgusted horror as the beating continued for a moment. After about the third or fourth kick, Sarge backed off and wiped his face with his arm. He looked at Nash, then down at the old man. “Give it to him,” he told Nash as he panted.
Nash stared down at the helpless old man with a thousand thoughts running through his mind. He shifted his gaze back to Sarge who was waiting impatiently for him to make a move and then to the other men who had stopped to spectate. Sarge repeated, “Go on, now. Get you some, Nash.”
Time stood still for Nash, but not for the rest of the world. His thoughts moved to his brother and his mind’s eye could see the agony on his face as the knife dug in. Nash loved his brother, but he would never die like that. Ever. His eyes narrowed at the thought of being held on his knees and anger welled in his gut. He thought about how many times he had gone hungry before and how far he had run because he and his group were hurting for weapons. It didn’t have to be like that anymore. All he had to do was act accordingly and he would never have to be hungry or scared again. All he had to do was set aside the thought that these were people. He closed his eyes.
They weren’t people anymore.
They were weak.
They had given up.
They were cattle now.
Nash’s eyes snapped open and he screamed as he tore into the old man’s midsection with a violent burst. His second kick landed under the man’s chin and sent the last of his teeth flying into the air in bloody shards. The fury had been unleashed and Nash allowed a decade of anxiety to flow from his body in a primal display of pure aggression. He dropped to a knee, straddling the now limp form, and began pounding with his fists the rag doll underneath him.
Soon, he would find himself dragged from atop the old man breathless and bloodied. Sarge smiled at Nash and threw an arm his shoulder telling him, “That’s what the fuck I’m talkin’ about, kid!”
Wiping his face and inadvertently smearing blood all over himself, Nash asked him, “What’s next?”
The grin stayed on Sarge’s face. “Time to feed The One.” He whistled up ahead and after some barely audible shouts from the caravan, the procession came to a halt. Taking on a more authoritative tone, he told Nash, “Make sure he still has a pulse, then strip him. Some men will be up to collect him after you’re through. Follow them to the front and meet me behind The Colonel’s wheels.”
Drawing his knife, Nash set about the task of cutting the cloth from the unconscious old man before removing his boots and lashing the laces together. He tossed them over his shoulder and made a mental note to try them on later that day to see if they were in better shape than his own. As Sarge had predicted, two men arrived and began dragging the body with Nash following behind them.
The prisoners in the line, no doubt grateful to have a break, turned their heads to gawk as the three men moved with the limp form of the old man. Not a single one of them mustered up the gall to say a word to the raiders. They did, however, murmer amongst themselves once the procession had passed, expressing their disgust and fearing for their own wellbeing.
As Nash reached Sarge at the second wagon in line, The Colonel calmly and confidently appeared from the side doors of his lead position. He was helped down the three steps on the wagon’s side by one of the raiders Nash hadn’t met yet and, once his feet hit the dirt, The Colonel folded his hands neatly behind his back.
Once again, Nash found himself forcing the emotions of hatred down deep into the bottle within himself and made every attempt to control his thirst for revenge. He kept telling himself things would be better now. He justified Chris’ death by making an internal promise to take this new life that he’d been offered, with the sacrifice of his brother as the price, and embrace it - make the absolute most of it. So, instead of an outburst that could cost him dearly, Nash stood at attention like the other men and awaited The Colonel’s orders.
The disgusting, scarred Colonel wiped at his eye with his handkerchief as he sized up the beaten man at his feet before saying to Nash directly, “Why did you beat this man?”
Nash had never been bad at reading people. In fact, he’d been damned good at it. So, instead of potentially throwing Sarge under the proverbial bus in the case that The Colonel was unpleased with the decision, Nash took it upon himself and answered saying, “He fell out of line. Started to bring down the others around him. Can’t have that, Colonel.”
Nodding his head slightly, The Colonel followed up by asking Nash, “And why can’t we have that, young Nash?”
The second question came as a bit of a surprise for Nash. He had been hoping that his first answer was enough to get the attention off of himself and onto the injured man. Hesitating only slightly, he told The Colonel, “Because it’s weak and a group is only as strong as their weakest link.”
The Colonel smiled a satisfied smile. “Precisely, young Nash. And you’d do well to remember that, son.” He blotted his eye once more and returned the handkerchief to his pocket before looking down at the body. “He is still alive, yes?”
Sarge answered for Nash. “Yes. Not sure for how long, though.”
“Pass me a hatchet,” The Colonel said to no one in particular.”
The same guy from before that Nash hadn’t met yet drew a small hatchet from a leather holder lashed to his belt and passed it into The Colonel’s hand before stepping back. The Colonel thanked him with a nod and then grasped the hand of the unconscious old man below him.
The hatchet fell at breakneck speed and landed solidly into the old man’s shoulder with a wet thunk! The moment the hatchet’s blade sunk into his flesh and began to split bone the old man shot back into the real world and screamed bloody murder.
Whack!
Nash had sent yet another fist across the old man’s temple and instantly knocked him unconscious once more. Smiling down at Nash, The Colonel told him, “Nice. Grab that arm.”
As Nash complied and stretched the arm out The Colonel brought the hatchet down at least three more times, flinging blood and bits of bone and cartilage into the air each time he raised his arm until, finally, the entire limb came loose at the joint and nearly sent Nash reeling backwards and off balance. The Colonel wiped his face with his handkerchief and told Sarge, “Cut the rest of this up and feed the workers.” He turned to Nash, who was still clutching the severed limb, and said, “You, bring that here.”
Nash followed The Colonel to the second wagon in line and watched as he unlocked the enormous padlock on its rear and swung open the door. The fetid stench of an unwashed body flooded Nash’s nostrils threatening to water his eyes as he made out the shape within. Chained by a collar to the back wall of the wagon was a filthy, naked man with wild, crazy eyes. He was crouched in the corner, but as the door opened he lashed out at the two men, bursting forward until the collar yanked at his throat and pulled him backwards once more. He grunted and choked at the collar, but made no intelligent effort to communicate. He was once again docile.
The Colonel reached inside and grasped the man’s arm. Still holding the hatchet in his other hand, The Colonel drew the blade across the prisoner’s forearm and opened a deep gash that instantly began bleeding heavily. A few seconds later, he pinched the wound closed and held it there briefly before releasing the pressure and, much to Nash’s amazement the wound had sealed itself shut completely. The Colonel wiped the blood away from the gash and smiled, amused at Nash’s look of utter disbelief.
“There. You see that, young man?” The Colonel said matter-of-factly to Nash. “Good as new. That’s what this is all about… Once we can get this under control for all of us, we will have absolute power. We will be unstoppable.”
Nash’s mouth hung open in awe. He couldn’t believe what he had just witnessed. The Colonel continued, “This is why we are doing what we are doing. You see, son, we are going to rebuild the world under our rule… our way. We can’t control the dead anymore. We lost that opportunity. But we can control the people… And once we harness the talents this man possesses, we will be invincible. All we need is the right person.”
Nash couldn’t help himself. He asked, “How? Who? I mean, who do we need?” He was well aware he was stammering along, but it was understandable considering the circumstances.
The Colonel offered him a warm smile and clarified saying, “I call him 17. A magnificent specimen, isn’t he? One that I’ve had to fight many battles to protect. In fact, there was a time many years ago when I almost lost him altogether, but the past is the past. He doesn’t get sick if they bite him. He heals thirty times faster than any normal man. He barely even ages. This is my vision for all of us, Nash… my vision for you.”
Nash was incredulous. “You know someone who can make us all like that?”
With a nod, The Colonel took the severed limb from Nash and tossed it inside the wagon. 17 looked to The Colonel for approval and, after a moment’s pause, he voraciously snatched it from the floor and began tearing into the still-warm flesh. Blood smeared 17’s mouth and face as he ripped muscle and sinew from the bicep, chewing it in a disgusting display. Nash could barely tell the difference between 17 and any other walking corpse in that second.
“I know of one, yes,” The Colonel answered him. “He’s a medicine man in the forests to the east. I’ve already sent him a warning that we were coming to pay him a visit. The tree dwellers call him Seven Doves.”
The door of the wagon slammed shut.
Chapter Eighteen – We All Fall Down
Alyse was in the corner of the control room, still sobbing. “I can’t believe it’s all gone. Everything. All those people… our people… slaughtered like dogs… carted away…” She buried her face in her hands and trailed off.
Copper listened silently as he sat against the rear wall of the room, away from the lights and beeps of the control panels and computers. He was seething. A handful of years before moving on to Vegas, he had fought a great fight there at Hoover Dam to protect one of the only remaining power sources that fed the various communities that had sprung up after the Downfall. He stared blankly at the walls, with Alyse’s words stinging in his ears like a thousand stabbing yellow jackets. Vegas fell on his watch and he would never forgive himself for it.
The boys played in the center of the room, keeping their minds off what happened to them in Vegas the best they could. Jonas, Wyatt, and Troy were attempting to bounce an old, rusted washer into a paper cup they had scavenged from a break room. They were arguing amongst themselves, as boys often do, and, as usual, Troy’s temper was getting the best of him. He barked something that Kylee couldn’t understand at Wyatt in the unique language of the Flies and stood up to confront a cowering Wyatt.
Smack!
Kylee slapped Troy on the back of the head, clicking his teeth, and sending him reeling forward rubbing the area where she hit him. He deflated his chest immediately and his cheeks burned red with embarrassment as Kylee peered down her nose with her good eye to command Jonas, “Tell him we don’t tolerate that shit. Tell him every time he loses his cool like that, I will remind him. Got it?”
Jonas nodded obediently and said to Troy, “One-eye no feck ‘round. Calma. One-eye pap tu‘gen.”
Troy scowled and sat back down quietly. Kylee wasn’t finished yet. She told Jonas, “Tell him to apologize… to everyone… in English. He will say I’m sorry, everyone. I will try not to let it happen again. And you will stop calling me One-eye. My name is Kylee.”
Side-eyeing Kylee cautiously, Jonas obeyed once more telling Troy, “One-eye… erm… Kylee wan tu-tow fel bad. Tu sa en big spek I’m sorry, everyone. I will try not to let it happen again.”
“Bah!” Troy balked at the thought of it, but Kylee raised her hand once more and sent him flinching. He sputtered the English words clumsily and with an odd accent, but managed to get it all out. Hand still raised as Troy completed the task, Kylee reached for him, once again sending him flinching in fear, but she simply ruffled his hair encouragingly. She offered him a genuine smile of approval for his effort and Troy puffed out his chest proudly as the tension dissolved.
Kylee told Jonas firmly, “We’ll be working on his English. No more baby talk, got it?” Jonas nodded his understanding with a smile.
Chief stood stoically, arms crossed, as a guard at the door to the control room and broke his silence after Kylee corrected the boys on their behavior towards one another. He had been watching Copper, who had always been a good friend to him, stew over the failure of Vegas. He decided to offer some words of comfort saying encouragingly, “This isn’t on you Copper. Doesn’t make a shittin’ bit o’ difference who was working that wall when they came at us. Machine guns for Christ’s sake? No one could’ve stopped that with what we had. No one.”
Copper snorted at the notion. He wrung his hands together in frustration and started talking to no one in particular, “Five years… Five whole years I held this Dam against a thousand geeks and hundreds of raiders. Sixty of us held out against numbers that would send anyone else screamin’ for their mommies.
“The day the fences fell, I was right here in this room. I had been checking on some of the women and children because they were afraid the fences were getting weaker...”
Copper looked at the ceiling as if silently asking for inspiration. Tugging at his beard in an effort to straighten himself up, he continued, “We all knew it, too. Working around the clock to slay the ones up against the fence wasn’t doing it anymore. We were tired… All of us were. The ones we were executing just kept piling up because they were too thick out there for us to clear them away anymore. There just weren’t anymore breaks in the waves. Some of them crawled themselves on top of the piles and started pushing the fences from near the tops until the posts finally snapped in half.”
He chuckled to himself remembering it somewhat fondly. “Man, you should’ve seen it. They poured in like water.”
By this point, Copper’s lip was quivering so much that it was noticeable underneath his beard and his eyes glazed over slightly. “They got to the kids… I couldn’t stop them. None of us could. Shit, I’ll never forget Charlie… He was this timid little dude that spent most of his time maintaining the valves and whatnot. Never was much of a fighter, Charlie, but that day… when they made it to the children… I saw him take out at least thirty on his own. And he did it with bites all over himself. God… he was just missing huge chunks from everywhere. They just kept coming as he stood between the doorway and the children to block the path and he just kept killing them. He’d get bit and scream, then he’d just keep swinging that old piece of pipe he had, cursing them all to hell…”
Copper’s voice trailed off leaving everyone in a blank silence as they listened to his story. Chief took the opportunity to interject saying, “But you made it, Copper. You fought. You saved the Dam and you made it, just we like we did this time.”
Copper wiped his face and leveled Chief with an icy stare, telling him, “Not because of me, though, Chief. We made it this time in spite of me. We lost everything. You know as well I do that if Wyatt hadn’t made those tunnels of his and if it wasn’t for these little weirdoes and their holes in our walls, we’d all be dead… or worse. So, don’t you tell me about how I fought back there, Chief. I didn’t fight. I ran.” He paused for a moment to let it sink in. “We all ran.”
Alyse moved over to console Copper, but he shrugged her off gently. Kylee stood there with her hand on her hip looking down at the two of them disgustedly. “Cut the shit,” she told them somewhat angrily. “Vegas is gone and we’re here now. It is what it is. We’ve all been pushed out before and we’ve all had to start over more times than I care to count. Crying about it all day isn’t gonna do a Goddamn thing. How much food we got?”
Chief piped in with, “About three days, assuming the kids eat lighter than the adults.”
Kylee nodded. “Weapons?”
Thinking for a moment, Alyse answered her saying, “Just what we carried out. Nothing in the packs. It’s bad.”
“What now, mom?” Wyatt asked her worriedly.
Kylee looked down at Wyatt and pushed his hair from his eyes. “We wait. Again. If the others made it back and saw the note, I’m sure they loaded up the weapons cache and started heading here. We’ll give them two days. Just remember, Wyatt, we’ve planned for this. We always planned for this.”
Wyatt hung his head. He almost worked up the courage to tell Kylee about the way the dead left him alone in the woods, but the timing just felt off. He let it go.
Asking the obvious question, Jonas said, “And if they don’t make it?”
Kylee moved for the door of the control room that led to the courtyard outside saying, “We’ll worry about that in two days, Jonas. Sit tight for now.”
*****
“I have to go see about mom,” David said to Lilly. It was the first time he’d ever said anything to Lilly somewhat forcefully.
Lilly and the others stood close to the two wagons, now loaded down heavily with weapons and body armor, food for a few weeks, and various other survival gear. Seth scratched his crotch unceremoniously and gave a Lilly the go-ahead. She turned back to David and told him, “I know you do. C’mon, I’ll go with.”
A few of the dead still milled about the Strip, but they were busy feasting on the remains of some of the citizens that were slain in the raid. Lilly and David stuck close to the buildings and moved slowly, so as to not draw any attention to themselves and made their way to the stables. It took them only a few minutes and they were safely inside the horse fences.
Lilly passed David an old crowbar and told him quietly, “Just go slow. In and out, quick and quiet. I’m gonna head up to the rooftops to scout the area headed towards the Dam.”
David nodded and hefted his crowbar comfortably. He asked Lilly, “Meet me back here in five?” to which she nodded affirmatively.
Lilly turned to leave him for the ladder that led to the rooftops, but David grabbed her by the arm. He spun her around and planted a kiss directly on her lips, having finally worked up the courage. When he pulled away, Lilly stared at him blankly for a moment in stunned silence. He told her, “Be careful, Lil’.”
As David stood there, nervously proud of himself, Lilly looked at him for what seemed like an awkwardly long time. He braced himself for an outburst and prepared to block his face from her swinging fist… but she didn’t lash out. She grabbed him by his ragged hair and kissed him again. “You, too. See ya in five.”
Lilly scurried up the ladder leaving David below. The rooftops remained in the exact condition that she left them in since the raiders weren’t clever enough to check them. She scanned the horizon and saw nothing but desolation in the direction of the Dam. That seemed like a good sign, actually. No people. No bernies. Clear shot.
Confident in that, she made her way to the box that David had made her, full of roses, and she smiled to herself. She knelt on her left knee, since her right was a still a little tender after the fighting; she plucked one of the roses and reveled in the sweet smell for a moment. It reminded of her of a time when things were good.
She opened the small pouch that hung from her belt and pulled out Kylee’s diary. After they had collected the weapons, Lilly went through the rooms gathering whatever personal belongings she could muster without adding too much weight. She knew Kylee would want the book back when they found one another. She tucked the rose between the pages and pressed it tightly before putting it back and drawing the pouch closed.
As she descended the ladder, she caught herself smiling. She landed with a thump and headed to the small shack that served as David’s old home and opened the door to meet him.
The scene inside, though, left her shrieking for Seth and the others at the top of her lungs. David was splayed on the ground, nearly torn in half. His intestines were strewn across the floor and two of the dead were feverishly devouring pieces of him. As Lilly cried out, the two feeders rose to their feet and Lilly was able to recognize one of the pair.
It was David’s mother, throat torn open so that she could barely swallow the bits of her son that she was cramming into her mouth and the flesh simply fell from under her chin as she stood. The other was one of the old market workers. Lilly couldn’t recall his name, but it didn’t matter when Lilly drew her knife and jammed it forcefully into his forehead.
The walking remains of David’s mother grabbed at Lilly, taking hold of her vest as Lilly drew one of her pistols. Knocked off balance, the weapon fired loudly sending the round uselessly up and into the ceiling of the shack as Lilly fought for her life.
Thit!
Ten’s arrow struck true and dropped Lilly’s attacker where it stood. Ten called from the doorway, “Run, Lilly! Run! They’re coming for us!”
The shot that Lilly fired had drawn the attention of the remaining bernies on the Strip and they were converging on Dante, Seth and Chak at the fences.
Dante raised his weapon to take aim, but Seth stopped him barking, “Don’t! It’ll just draw more.”
Chak fired two arrows in quick succession trimming the numbers down to eight on the approach. Another arrow whizzed over head. It went straight through the eye of the lead bernie, out the back of its head and lodged firmly into the forehead of the one behind it. Ten joined the group to a chorus of compliments on the shot.
All that time, though, Seth did nothing. He just stood there, staring at one of the encroaching dead with glassy eyes. No one heard him whispering under his breath, “No, I killed you, Nick. I killed you.”
Six now.
Thit! Thit!
Four.
“Seth, stop!” Lilly called to him from behind the fences. “What are you doing? Somebody help him!”
Inexplicably, Seth was calmly walking forward and directly into the line of fire. Chak and Ten pulled up, letting bows come back to the rest position as they called out to Seth. He wasn’t listening, though.
Seth checked the straps on his gauntlet as he moved purposefully toward the group of four much akin to a one man, O.K. Corral-style showdown.
Clang!
His gauntlet crashed into the head of the first, leaving a gaping hole as he drew back once more. “I killed you, Nick!”
Clang!
The second dropped. “Why are you here, Nick? Why?”
He pushed the larger of the remaining pair back while simultaneously drawing the sword from his hip. He slid the blade cleanly under the chin of the closest assailant driving the point straight through the top of its head. He let the sword drop along with the body before turning his attention once more to the one he had pushed back. “Nick… I’m fucking talking to you. Why are you here, Nick?” he shouted at the corpse.
The bernie reached for him, but Seth stepped in and knocked it to the ground. He started pounding its face in all the while screaming and shouting, “Die… Die… Die… Die…”
What was once the bernie’s face was now reduced to a pile of bloody mush and shards as Dante tore Seth from atop the body. Dante held Seth tight and tried to calm him saying, “Okay, Seth… Okay, you got him, man. It’s over now…”
The group stared at the unmoving corpse in complete confusion as Dante held a panting Seth to the ground. It looked nothing like Nick.
Seth shrugged Dante off and stalked back towards the wagons without another word leaving the others behind. Lilly had since hopped the fence to join them and stood there wiping tears from her face. She told the guys, “We have to go now.”
As she started to walk towards Seth, Dante stopped her and asked her concernedly, “But… What about David? We should… you know…”
Lilly looked over her shoulder to the shack that held what was left of David and his two killers. She turned back to Dante, wiping the last of the tears from her face, and coldly told him, “David was weak. Let him turn.”
*****
A lone horseman approached The Colonel’s caravan waving his free hand in the air to get the attention of the watchmen. Within minutes he was greeted by Sarge and Nash at the head of the wagon train.
He pulled his horse to a stop and sat perched atop his mount wearing an enormous smile. Calling down to Sarge he asked, “Did you guys get the word yet?”
Sarge cracked his neck and shook his head. “Nothin’ new. What’s up?”
The horseman called back, “The Badlands crew took Vegas two days ago. The whole Strip is ours. Even pulled about fifty new laborers. Looks like tailing Lester finally paid off. They managed to get Lester’s supply line, too. Said they were gonna hole up just outside the forest and await orders.”
Sarge beamed proudly and threw an arm around Nash who wasn’t exactly sure how to react. “Nash, my man, it’s time to celebrate! Go call The Colonel out so we can tell him the good news.”
Nash eyed Sarge cautiously and asked him, “You sure it’s cool if I’m the one to go get him? I’m not exactly comfortable just knocking on the old man’s door, ya know?”
As the lone horseman dropped to the ground with a
thud, Sarge told Nash with a huge smile, “Don’t worry, kid. You’re about to make his day.”
Chapter Nineteen – Revelations
Seth had separated himself from the group for some time now as they took a break to feed themselves and water the horses. The two wagons were loaded down heavily and it had them all working extra hard to push through the heat of the day. He had skipped his food, though, in order to take care of something much more important.
He spoke in hushed tones. “You made me look like an asshole back there.”
Nick chuckled to himself. He stood before Seth still bloody and full of holes. Both of his shoulders had gaping, rotting wounds in them from where he was nearly crucified on the tree and blood seeped slowly from under his chin where Seth had driven the point of the knife through. Nick’s skin was pale and lifeless, almost waxy, and his shirt hung in tatters on his torso exposing the bullet wound in his gut. He was a mess, yet he still looked spry despite his sunken eyes. He told Seth, “No, dumbass, you made yourself look like an asshole back there.”
Scoffing at the response, Seth argued, “What did you think I was gonna do, Nick? Just stand there? Fuck, dude. I didn’t even know what was going on. Still don’t, to be honest.”
Still smiling, Nick shook his head and joked, “You’re lucky you’re good lookin’, Seth, because you sure are fuckin’ stupid sometimes.”
That brought a scowl to Seth’s face. Nick continued, “I’m in your head, you retard! You killed me days ago, but for some reason you felt the need to bring me back like this… which is pretty fucked up if you think about it because you chose to bring me back like this.” He gestured at his current appearance. “The least you could do is imagine me in a better state, bruh. I mean, Jesus Christ, what’s wrong with you?”
Seth scratched at his patchwork beard curiously. “Yeah, well, you’re here now so it is what it is. At least you don’t stink like the rest of ‘em. Question is… why? Why are you here?”
Rolling his eyes in frustration, Nick snapped at him, “I don’t know! You brought me here, so that’s for you to figure out, you silly shit! All I know is that you’re probably going a little nuts again, like you do. Maybe I’m supposed to be here to talk some sense into you or somethin’… like I’ve always done. Beats me, man.” He shrugged helplessly.
Seth eyed him thoughtfully for a moment before the edges of his mouth turned up into a sly grin. He teased Nick saying, “You’re my Obi Wan, aren’t you?”
“Um… no. I don’t think that’s it. I don’t think that’s it at all. Try again,” Nick told him, wholly un-amused.
“You’re my guardian angel, then?”
“Strike two, dumbass. You don’t believe in God.”
Seth was at a loss. He stood there for a long moment, mouth agape. “I got nothin’…”
Nick pursed his purple lips and asked Seth, “Know what I think? I think I’ve spent entirely too much time reining you in - too much time trying to keep your crazy ass level. I think it’s time for me to feed the beast.” He smiled an evil grin.
Seth told him, “So, you’re here to tell me to kill things? Shit, Nick, I’ve never needed any help with that.”
Still smiling, Nick clarified with a nod saying, “I know, I know. But let’s just assume for a moment that I’m here to motivate you to do a better fuckin’ job at it. Starting right now.”
Nick gestured behind them towards the horizon. “Look there. Do you see them?”
Squinting in the sun, Seth struggled to make out the shapes in the distance. His blood boiled as his eyes adjusted and he was able to make out the large group of people and wagons that rumbled along far to the north of their position.
As he turned to rejoin the others, Lilly startled him. She was standing right in front of him now, having quietly approached while he was distracted by the forms on the horizon. She took note of his twitch and asked him, “You alright? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
Seth scoffed and shot a glance over his shoulder to where Nick was just a moment ago. He was gone. Playing it off, he told Lilly, “Naw. I’m good. But look there.” He pointed to the wagon train in the distance. “We got company. Gather the others.”
In a matter of moments, Dante and the rest stood at his side. They passed the binoculars back and forth, examining the group the best they could, and fighting against the glare of the sun and the waving heat.
Chak spoke first asking, “You aren’t thinking what I think you’re thinking, right?”
He was answered by Seth. “Depends on what you think I’m thinking,” he said with a somewhat smart-assed twinge to his voice.
Lilly made an attempt to talk sense to them. “I can see the guns from here. They’re armed to the teeth.”
Agreeing with Lilly, Dante added, “Too damn many of them. We should let ‘em pass. Going at them like this would be suicide.”
Seth checked the ammunition in his magazine then slammed it back into his rifle, satisfied. He told the others, “Put a few more mags in Pi’s saddlebags and pull her off the wagon.”
Ten stood quietly as Chak chided Seth arguing, “That’s just dumb. You think you’re gonna just ride up there and blast them all? I’m not going along with that. No way.”
With a shrug, Seth stalked over to Pi and unlashed her reins from the wagon before stuffing more ammo into the bags. The others protested the entire time telling Seth that they weren’t going to let that happen. Once he was finished he spun around and angrily told them all, “Shut up! Just shut the fuck up and listen!”
He looked at each one of them in sequence before announcing to the group, “I’m not going to kill them. I’m going to talk to them. I’m going find out what their deal is, why they’ve been doing what they’ve been doing, and hopefully find out who’s backing them in all of it. Consider it a recon mission. Maybe I’ll join up with them for a bit and see what’s what. ”
Lilly stood there with her hand on her hip, looking much like Kylee. She scowled skeptically at him and barked, “Okay, smartass. Assuming they don’t kill you on sight, and by some miracle you get all of that answered, then what?”
Seth vaulted himself up onto Pi’s back and smiled down at Lilly. He said flatly, “Then I’m gonna kill them.”
He kicked Pi gently to start trotting off, but Lilly snatched her by the reins and brought her to an abrupt halt. She was livid at this point and shouted at him, “Bullshit! You’re not going alone! Let me gather my stuff. I’ll back you up.”
Seth held up a hand to stop Lilly from her tirade and told her in an uncharacteristic and fatherly tone, “Lil’, just stop. You need to get to the Dam and make sure your mother and Wyatt made it off the Strip in one piece. I’m not gonna tell you again. I got this. I’ll meet you at the Dam, trust me.”
Lilly relented, but only because she knew Seth well enough to know that he wasn’t going to be talked out of it. She took a deep breath and said, “Fine… but take this with you.”
She unbuckled her belt and reached for her knife, slipped the sheath and the blade from her person, and passed it up to him. He took it from her with a puzzled look on his face and asked her, “What’s this for? Lil’, I can’t. You’ve had this thing since you were a little kid.”
Lilly leveled him with a steely gaze and said, “When you find the one that shot Nick, gut him with it.”
Seth sighed heavily and nodded to her solemnly. “Done.”
As Seth and Pi began to fade into the distance, Dante told Lilly, “I hate to say it, kiddo, but I think that’s the last time we’re ever going to see him.”
Lilly smiled slightly. “Nah. He’ll be back. He doesn’t have a choice.”
Dante didn’t believe her. He said gently, “I don’t know… How can you be so sure?”
She buckled her belt tightly and told Dante without a second glance as she jumped into the wagon’s seat, “Motherfucker’s got my knife.”
*****
“Can you hear them?” Copper asked the boys and Chief as he moved to the sealed door at the rear of the room.
Jonas pushed Troy behind him somewhat protectively and told Copper, “Yeah, what’s going on in there?”
Standing stoically at the other door to the courtyard, Chief answered for Copper saying, “What’s left from before… They must’ve heard us talking.”
Copper nodded and continued to explain saying, “Back during the breach, we couldn’t kill all of them and we were running low on everything. To make sure we could keep the power going, we sealed and locked down as many doors as we could before clearing out what was left. They’re, uh… still in there.”
Wyatt moved forward to join Jonas and asked the men, “How many?”
A loud thump pounded on the opposite side of the sealed door as Copper told Wyatt, “More than twenty, less than fifty.”
Just as the words left his mouth, Kylee rushed in from the outside, almost toppled Chief over, and slammed the door behind her. She was heavily winded and slightly pale. Instantly dropping to her knees, Kylee clutched at her side. Another series of loud thumps thundered in their ears, this time from the steel door behind her.
“Mom!” Wyatt exclaimed worriedly, rushing to her side. “You okay? What happened?”
Kylee pulled her hand away revealing a nasty tear in her shirt and the bloody bite mark beneath it. Her hand was smeared from pressing against the wound. She sarcastically quipped, “A girl can’t even take a piss in peace around here…”
Chief backed away and fearfully noted, “Oh, shit. You’re bit!”
Kylee regained some composure and pulled herself to her feet. She wiped her hand on her pants and took stock of everyone in the room. The only one who wasn’t freaking out was Copper. She told them all, “I’m fine. Bites don’t affect me like everyone else.”
Jonas snapped at her, “Liar!”
Taking his cue from Jonas, Troy spat out, “Bah! Killum fo’ turnin’, Jonas!”
Kylee didn’t miss a beat. She reached forward and slapped Troy across his head once again before turning to Jonas and telling him, “Call me a liar one more time and I’ll toss your little ass outside with the rest of them.” She then addressed Troy, firmly saying, “And I’ve already told you to calm your little ass down, didn’t I? Jones, translate now.”
Jonas spoke the words in their language for Troy who cowered slightly. He still had his mean face on, though.
Copper raised a calming hand to everyone and backed Kylee up saying, “She’s right. It’s a long story, but she’ll be okay. She’s not like the others.” Facing Kylee directly, he added, “I still want to get it cleaned up, though. Alright, Ky?”
Nodding her agreement, Kylee removed her shirt. Wearing only a tattered, old bra Kylee examined the wound more closely. It wasn’t too bad. She said matter-of-factly, “Soooo, yeah… outside is fucked up. They’re everywhere.”
As Chief gingerly began tending to her wound, Jonas translated quietly for a skeptical Troy. Wyatt whispered to Jonas, “I have an idea. I’m gonna need your help, though. You in?”
Jonas nodded to him.
Kylee kept jabbering on nervously. “We have to get them out of the courtyard in case the others make it back soon. I can’t have them running into a herd like that, especially considering they’re gonna be tired and shit. We’ll head through that way and flank them near the drainage towers… We can lure them away from there.”
The thumping at Copper’s door was enough to inform her that the idea was a bust. Copper shrugged and said comically, “Yeeeeeah… about that…”
“Shit!” Kylee barked at no one in particular.
Wyatt finally spoke up. He was trembling because he knew the others wouldn’t believe him. He stammered through saying, “Um… Mom… I have an idea.”
She was impatient with him. “What, Wyatt? Make it quick, hun.”
He pursed his lips and prepared to spill his secret. “I can lead them away, mom. All of them.”
Kylee genuinely laughed at the absurdity of the notion. It was the kind of laugh that made the entire room feel awkward despite the noises from the doors at both ends. “Absolutely not.”
Jonas came to Wyatt’s defense. “He can. I don’t know how, but I’ve seen it, One-E… er, Kylee. The dead ones don’t even go after him. They just walk by, I swear it.”
Feeling bolstered by Jonas’ help, Wyatt continued, “I’m serious, mom. In the woods, when I was alone, I saw hundreds and they just walked right past me - more than once. I even led a bunch away from us. I’ve done it already and I know I can do it again. I’m… I’m special… like you and Dext… I mean, dad.”
Kylee gnawed on her lip, eyeing him suspiciously. “You’re telling me they don’t even try to bite you or anything?”
Jonas interrupted. “Yes! You’re asking me to believe that you won’t die after a bite. If I didn’t see Wyatt’s ability before now, I’d still think you’re a liar… but now… If you can survive bites, and you want us to believe, then you have to do the same for us. You have to believe that he’s got something special, too. Prolly from you.”
Kylee sprung to action and told Chief and Copper, “Think we can drag one of those stinks in here from that door and keep the others back? I wanna see it with my own eyes.”
Copper shook his head. “I don’t think so, Ky. There’s just too damn many of them. We’re gonna have to take a pretty big leap of faith on this one.“
Silent throughout all of that, Alyse finally spoke up and told Kylee, “They’re not lying. You can trust what they’re saying.”
Copper visibly jumped and told Alyse, “Yeesh! I almost forgot you were there.”
Alyse threw him a sideways glance and said to him sarcastically, “Thanks, asshole.” She turned back to Kylee and explained. “Nick and Seth can spot a liar better than anyone left on the planet. You know this. Well, Nick’s taught me a lot of things and spotting a liar was one of them. These boys are telling us the truth. Wyatt’s just got some of that ‘magic’ in him. We should use it.”
Rubbing her face and clearly struggling with making a choice, Kylee stalled.
Finally, Wyatt told them his plan. “Listen. All you have to do is hide - all of you. I’ll open the back door and then the one to the courtyard. I promise you, mom, they’ll walk right out behind me. I can lead them away and circle back.”
Kylee knelt in front of Wyatt, brushing his hair from his face, and placed both hands on his cheeks. She winced slightly at the pain in her side. “You sure about this, baby? I mean are you really sure about this?”
Wyatt flashed her a somewhat cocky smile. “I got your back, Jack. Just like Lilly. It’s my turn now.”
Kylee rose to her feet and ordered everyone sternly, “Make yourselves disappear, people. Find a nook, a locker, whatever.” As the others began tucking themselves away safely throughout the room, Kylee looked down at Wyatt and told him, “Okay, baby boy, you got this.”
He met her eyes and asked her sincerely, “Make me a deal?”
She smiled and said, “Sure, anything.”
“Good,” he replied with a grin. “If I pull this off, you stop calling me ‘baby boy’?”
Kylee chuckled, eyes misting over with worry. “I guess that’s the last time I’ll be calling you ‘baby boy’ then; because I know you’re gonna pull this off. You have to. I could never lose you again, Wyatt.”
She ruffled his hair and disappeared into one of the employee lockers along the rear wall.
Wyatt looked around to ensure everyone was well hidden and approached the door cautiously. He called out to them, “Here we go, guys. Keep quiet and stay hidden. One… Two… Three!”
He flung the rear door open and the dead washed over him like a maggot-ridden wave of rotted flesh.
Chapter Twenty – Answers
Seth sat bound at the wrists and ankles, with his mouth gagged by a dirty piece of cloth. He was positioned next to the group about ten feet away from the line of new slaves as they struggled to shove scraps of bone marrow and fat into their hungry mouths. On his other side, the caravan guards were just sitting down for dinner as well. He looked over his shoulder and saw Nick standing idly beside him picking a dangling hunk of skin from under his chin with a disgusting tearing sound. “Relax, Seth. You got them right where you want them,” Nick joked as he flicked his own flesh from his fingertips.
Seth shook his head in a feeble effort to get rid of the hallucination, but it was useless. As he turned his attention to one of the slaves on the line, he made eye contact with a familiar face. He couldn’t place the name, but he was sure it was one of the traders that used to come by the Strip from time to time hawking this and that. As the man moved his mouth to say something to him, Seth brought his bound wrists up and pointed to his lips as if to say,
“Shhhhh...” He then turned his attention to the men gathered around the flames of the fire.
“You was a community boy wasn’t ya?” the unfamiliar black man said to Nash as the guard detail sat casually around the cooking fire, ignoring Seth altogether. The sun was still up, but everyone could tell the evening wasn’t far off. “Yeeeeah, you was. I can tell ‘cause you still get that look on your face sometime,” the man continued to Nash, almost teasing him.
Sarge plopped down next to Nash with a plate of his own in his lap. Speaking around a mouthful of food, he said, “Take it easy on him, Doughboy. He’s just now gettin’ his feet wet.” Sarge leaned in and whispered to Nash, “Don’t mind him much. He’s just fuckin’ with you.”
Nash stared at Doughboy - all six foot five inches of him. He thought about coming across the small space between them and making him regret everything he just said, but Sarge’s words struck true. Instead, Nash opted to converse civilly saying, “Yeah, I lived in communities. Your point is…?”
Doughboy spit a piece of gristle into the fire and told Nash, “Yeeeah, I knew you was a community boy. You ain’t never seen no shit like this, huh? Don’t get Doughboy wrong now, I can sees that you can handle ya’self - that ain’t the issue. But can you hack this shit for real is what I’m talkin’ ‘bout.”
His doubt was well founded; Nash had to admit to himself. There were a lot of things that Nash was still conflicted about. Instead of folding right away, though, he opted to play the student role. “What are you concerned about specifically? Speak your mind.”
“Attaboy!” Sarge barked, still stuffing his face. He encouraged the control Nash was displaying in the face of Doughboy’s prodding.
picked his teeth with his finger and leaned forward a bit to say, “It’s the food, ain’t it? That’s what’s got you all conflicted and shit. Shows all over you, young buck.”
A smirk crossed Nash’s lips. What, rather whom, they were eating was the least of his worries. “Hate to burst your giant bubble, Doughboy, but just because I was a ‘community-boy’ doesn’t mean I never had to eat a friend. Shit, we had some bad winters early on. We did what we had to do. Just because someone starved to death didn’t mean we all had to. This isn’t my first barbeque.”
Doughboy sat back, slightly impressed by the revelation. “A’ight then, so that ain’t it. Still, though… somethin’s buggin’ you.”
Sarge belched loudly and tossed his scraps in the fire. He told Nash, “Can’t disagree with him there, kid. I detect a little of that, too. As long as you don’t say anything reckless, you’re free to get it off your chest now. Matter of fact, I strongly suggest you do just that before we get to the trees. It might get ugly in there.”
Chewing the inside of his lip, Nash thought hard about how to pose his question without seeming ungrateful or putting himself at odds with the men surrounding him. “I just don’t understand killing the kids and the old folks. I mean, I understand controlling territory and the set up… all of that makes logical sense to me. But where I’m from, we protect the children and the elderly. It’s just something we’ve always done. Take care of people who can’t take of themselves. Not saying I can’t do what needs to be done… It’s just foreign to me.”
Doughboy listened carefully and waited politely for Nash to finish before bursting with laughter. He said through his chortling, “I knew it! I knew somethin’ was fuckin’ witcha!” He called over his shoulder to some of the other men near the wagons and brought them in on the joke. “Ay, yo! This nigga soft as shit!” Some of the others snorted a laugh or two at Nash’s expense.
Nash moved to stand, fully prepared to prove he was far from soft, but he was interrupted by Sarge who put a hand on Nash’s shoulder and stood up in place of him. Sarge lashed out at Doughboy kicking the plate of food from his hands, sending bits of it flying through the air. He clutched Doughboy by his shirt and slapped him forcefully with a vicious, open handed smack!
Doughboy reeled from the strike and Sarge raised his open hand once more threatening him with another. Smartly, Doughboy raised his hands and stammered, “A’ight, Sarge, a’ight! My bad, man. I’s just fuckin’ with him.”
Releasing his grip on Doughboy, Sarge turned and addressed all the men. “That shit don’t fly around here, you got me? We’re a team, all of us. We got shit to do and I ain’t got time to babysit a bunch of bickering little babies. I see it happen again and I’m gonna bring the old man out here and you can deal with him yourself.”
As the men nodded amongst themselves and went about their business, Sarge turned back to Doughboy and asked him, “You alright, Doughboy?”
Rubbing his stinging cheek he answered Sarge, submissively saying, “Yeah, man. I’m good.” Then he looked across at Nash, still sitting there bewildered by the outburst, and told him, “My bust, nigga. We good, Nash?”
Nash shrugged it off and told him, “It’s done. We’re good.”
Sarge told Doughboy to clean up the mess then sat back down next to Nash. He wiped the grease from his mouth with his hand and exhaled as if formulating his next sentence. He fixed Nash with serious stare and told him, “I get it, kid. I was like you once. I played hero before, breaking my back and risking my ass for the weak ones. I understand the pride that comes from that… but I woke up. That shit’s just a dream, kid. Someone always dies doing that shit and half the time it’s guys like you… and me. See, after a while, there ain’t no one left to protect them and they die anyway. It’s just a waste of time… and life.”
Nash thought about Sarge’s words silently as Sarge continued his speech. “Nothing is wasted with us. Nothing. We vet every single person that we come across based on one key factor – usefulness. If you can fight, and you got the stomach to be in the trenches, you end up with us… just like you did. If you can’t, then you work. It’s that simple. Everyone has a purpose, even the old ones and the little’ns. They can’t work, they can’t fight, so we simply find a use for them. And that use is that they feed the workers and the fighters - they keep everyone healthy and they keep us moving forward. They’re not just slaughtered, kid… they’re our heroes. They keep us alive. Consider it just a repayment of debt that people like them have accrued from people like us over the past decade.”
Nash noodled on it for a moment, but still felt dissatisfied by Sarge’s explanation. He returned Sarge’s stare and asked him flatly, “What about my brother then? Why was he killed? He may not have been as good as me in a dust-up, but he damn sure could’ve worked. He didn’t have to die… Not like that.” The agony showed in Nash’s grimace as he remembered The Colonel slashing his brother’s throat and leaving him to bleed.
Sarge’s eyes left Nash’s and he stared at the ground for a moment. “Yeah,” he said sympathetically. “I was wondering when you were gonna bring that up.” He adjusted his hat as he tried to find the words. “That wasn’t my call. The Colonel likes to make a memorable first impression. If I had my way, I probably would’ve put you both on the guard detail. Truth is I don’t know why The Colonel did what he did, but I just trust he saw something in you that needed to be broken. If I had to guess, I’d say the old man was sure that your usefulness would be hamstrung by your companion. He wanted you to join us with a clean slate.”
Seth’s ears perked up immediately having heard Sarge mention ‘The Colonel’. His mind swirled as the memories of that nickname flooded in and he fought against the implication despite himself. It just couldn’t be…
Nash shrugged, trying to hide his sadness. “I guess. It’s just gonna take me some time to get over that. Can I ask you something else?”
In a particularly good mood, likely still giddy over the news of the fall of Vegas, Sarge told him, “Go on, shoot.”
Taking the cue, Nash asked him sincerely, “Do you believe him? Do you think The Colonel can do what he says he can do? Can he really make us like that guy in the wagon?”
Sarge grinned widely. “Kid… Let me tell you a story…”
Seth couldn’t help his curiosity. He struggled slightly against his bonds and scooted over a bit closer to eavesdrop on the conversation causing Sarge to snap his head around and bark, “You! Sit the fuck still! I’ll get to you in a minute.”
“As I was saying… That old man is the toughest son of a bitch on the planet. Back in the day, he led a force that secured the entire sector in Cali and he single handedly built the compound at Bragg. Trouble is, some rogue marine fucks ambushed the entire place and left it wide open to be overrun by the stinks. Now, that’s bad enough, right? I mean your own allies come in and fuck up over a year’s worth of work… no one even knows why they did it either. But that didn’t stop the old man. Nope! He managed to escape with a few of the leftovers even though he was burned up from head to toe. Fuckin’ tank blast tore through his post and lit the whole place up. He crawled out, gathered his shit and broke for the shore.”
Nash shook his head in awed disbelief. “Jesus…”
Over to the side, Seth was putting the pieces of the puzzle together. He knew full well that half of that story was bullshit, but he also knew that what they were up against just got a whole lot worse for everyone involved. He could hear Nick behind him saying, “And that, my friend, is why you need to calm the fuck down and just listen before you make a move. Shit just got real.”
“Jesus didn’t have anything to do with that, kid,” Sarge quipped. “It was all The Colonel. He spent six months recovering from his injuries on a Goddamn oil rig before retaking command of his force. Then he spent another year building up supply lines behind the backs of those marines before he took the fight right to their fuckin’ doorstep. And that was where he found our little ace in the hole over there. That part was all luck. Turns out, all those marines wanted was that one guy and they were willing to die to keep him for themselves. Can’t say I blame them, though.
“We’ve been trying to piece together enough resources and find a survivor that can make his special set of abilities available to all of us. Just imagine… Another ten years from now, by the time we’ve culled the weak and mastered this new shit that The Colonel’s most prized possession brings to the table, the world will be ours again. And we, you and me and the rest of these men, will secure our legacy. We’re getting our hands dirty, not to mention our souls, for the good of what comes after us. We’re gonna go down in history as the ones that fixed everything.”
Nash nodded and found himself bolstered by the new information. He rose to his feet and told Sarge, “So, I guess that’s it then. We just have to break a few eggs to make this omelet, eh?”
Sarge smiled approvingly at Nash and replied coolly, “Yep. What do you say we start with this egg over here?” gesturing at Seth.
Nash nodded and moved towards Seth, grabbing him by his bound wrists and pulling him to his feet.
Seth could hear Nick’s words echoing in his head. “You’re not allowed to die today, Seth. It’s bigger than you now.”
Chapter Twenty One: Moving Night
Doc snapped awake in the treetop hut and screamed in pain as the searing burn of his dressings being peeled away chiseled their way into his consciousness. The moonlight shone through the carved windows, playing off the candlelight within. He spouted an impressive string of curses before Seven Doves could quiet him enough to speak rationally.
Crouching next to the makeshift wooden cot, laced in jewelry fashioned from bone and sinew and garbed in tasseled hides and fur, Seven Doves offered a genuine smile saying to Doc, “I know it hurts, but you’re healing well. The infection didn’t spread and that girl, Lilly, made a nice, clean cut with the hatchet. It went through the bones without even splintering.”
Doc winced as he looked down at his severed arm, now cauterized and brown from the hot steel they used to stop his bleeding. “Better off dead…” he mumbled angrily.
“Bah! Not so,” Seven Doves corrected him. “Death may be an escape from… this… but your work isn’t done yet. It’s time for us to move now.”
Puzzled, Doc furrowed his brow and asked Seven Doves, “My work? Heh… you got it all wrong. I can’t work like this. Not anymore. The only thing that’s kept me alive this long is my skill set as a doctor and a field surgeon. People kept me safe because I had something to offer them in return. I’m useless now. You should’ve let me bleed, red man.”
“Not my call,” Seven Doves corrected him. “Besides, you’re still a doctor and you still have those skills.” He smeared a goopy extract of plant matter across the stump using a brush made of soft cotton spun onto a stick, which caused Doc to grit his teeth together and growl in agony. “Your job has just… changed slightly.”
“Howso?” Doc asked. He didn’t even want to hear the answer, but couldn’t help his own curiosity.
Working as he talked, Seven Doves wrapped the wound over once more and told him, “You’re a teacher now… a professor, if you will. Those that can’t do, teach, as the old saying goes.”
Doc snorted a derisive and sarcastic laugh. “Teach. Right.”
Seven Doves smiled again, confidently this time. He laid a moist towel across Doc’s head and wiped the clammy sweat from his brow. “Sleep for now. We’re moving in the morning. The war is nearly upon us and my people have to be gone before it arrives. That’s my job; protect them.”
Closing his eyes, Doc asked him half asleep already, “What war?”
“The painted men, the Unclean, will be arriving shortly with their firesticks and their greed. Led by the burned man, they will sweep through our land and pillage everything. Until we can face them head on we will simply stay ahead of them. We’re counting on your people to help us become strong enough to fight them back. We’re counting on you. But until you’re strong enough to do your job, you must rest. Now… enough talk. Sleep. There is much to do.”
*****
“Wyatt, no!” Lilly shrieked as they approached to within a few hundred yards of the Dam’s complex. She dropped from the wagon, leaving the others behind.
She rushed towards the young boy’s limp form, lying motionless on the ground, as a few meandering corpses turned their eyes to her and began shuffling in her direction with arms outstretched. Dante, Chak, and Ten looked on as Lilly became a machine.
She stalked towards the first of the four and reached to her belt to draw her knife. It wasn’t there. Smirking at her own reflexes she slung the rifle from her shoulder by the barrel and swung it like a baseball bat. The brittle skull of the bernie tore off at the forehead and its entire brain sloshed out onto the dusty ground as the body dropped.
She reached the second one that blocked her path to Wyatt and laid a well placed kick to its midsection to send it tumbling clumsily to the dirt. Lilly brought her boot down hard, squashing its head flat and sending black blood and gray matter spraying out the sides like a popped water balloon. With Chak and Ten calling to her to clear a path for their arrows, she ignored them and placed her foot on the arm of the fallen biter.
Lilly grabbed its hand with both of hers and, with a sickening crackle, tore the entire thing free. Sliding the rotted flesh off like softened butter, she exposed the jagged radial bone of the forearm and lunged at the third bernie, jabbing the severed arm into its brain. She watched it fall with the arm grotesquely sticking out of the side of its head.
She roared like an angry pride of lions as she stood face to face with the final threat. It gnashed its blackened teeth through a lipless, worm filled face and gurgled at her with a primal snarl. With Wyatt’s body just out of reach, Lilly grabbed the bernie’s greasy hair with her left hand and clasped her right hand to its throat.
The world went red.
Lilly squeezed hard and dug her nails in until the flesh gave way beneath her pressure. She felt her fingers sink deeply as foul smelling fluid began spurting from the undead’s neck, soaking her hand and dripping down her wrist, then tore it away when she felt its spine through the muck. Jerking her left hand backwards, the spinal column finally cracked and released the head entirely. Lilly flung it off to the side and it rolled a few feet, still snapping its jaws, until Chak’s arrow sunk in from behind her.
They reached Wyatt and Lilly fell to her knees shaking him violently. “Wyatt! Wyatt, wake up,” she desperately cried. “Please! You can’t do this to me now! I found you! We found you!”
Dante quickly joined her, carrying a bag full of weaponry, and began looking Wyatt over for bites and other wounds as Chak and Ten stood there dumbfounded. “C’mon, boy! Get up!” Dante called to him.
Finally, Wyatt shook his head and winked one eye open. “Lilly!”
At the mere sight of his sister, Wyatt snapped to attention and sat up rubbing his head. “You made it!” He hugged her tightly and she returned the gesture, eyes closed, with all the enthusiasm of an Old World child on Christmas morning.
Dante interrupted them gently and said, “Hey, uh… not to rain on the parade here, but we should get inside. More of them could still be around.”
Lilly nodded and took the advice willingly. She asked Wyatt, “You okay to walk? What happened out here anyway?”
Wyatt shook his head to clear it and, as they made their way into the Dam’s courtyard, he told them all, “I was leading them away, but it felt like I was running forever. I got tired and tripped on the way back. Must’ve bonked my head.”
Wiping his face, Chak told Wyatt, “You’re lucky they didn’t tear you apart, kid.”
“Nope,” Wyatt corrected him. “They don’t bother with me. It’s weird.” Ignoring the confused faces around him, Wyatt asked Lilly, “Seth and Nick should be here soon, right? You guys found him? He’s okay isn’t he? He saved me, you know.”
Lilly and Dante exchanged a somber glance before Dante told Wyatt, “Let’s talk about all that inside, Wyatt. A lot has happened.”
As the door to the control room opened, the light from without spilled in, leaving Lilly’s crew backlit and only visible as a silhouette to everyone inside. Kylee snapped to attention from her anxious nail biting and took up a fighting stance. Copper, Chief, and Alyse, along with the Flies, followed suit as they all squinted to make out who, or what, had arrived.
“Look who I found!” Wyatt said proudly as the group entered the room. Kylee squealed with joy and ran to greet them clutching at Lilly and Wyatt with tears in her eyes.
Dante felt a smile cross his lips as the room heaved a sigh of relief, reunited once again in spite of the odds. He turned to Chak and Ten and said, “Can’t thank y’all enough for this… for everything.”
Everyone gathered in the center of the room as Chief secured the doors and took an inventory of one another. Kylee worriedly asked, “Seth? Nick?”
Lilly sighed heavily and told her, “We found the people that did this to us. Seth is scouting them now. Says he’s gonna catch up once he has more info. We’ll hit ‘em hard once we get our shit together again.”
Alyse was showing her fear and cautiously asked, “So, Seth’s fine. That’s great news. What about my Nicky?”
Lilly frowned deeply. She looked at Alyse, mustering up the courage to tell her the news. “I’m so sorry, Alyse… He didn’t make it. We found him, but he was too far gone for Doc to save him.”
“Oh, God, no…” Alyse managed to say before breaking down. Copper scooped her into his arms and held her gently in an effort to console her grief.
Kylee dropped to a knee, shocked by the news as well, and clutched at her wound. It was still bleeding slightly. Lilly noticed it and asked her, “What happened? You alright?” Kylee shrugged it off. “Fine. Nick, though. Damn. Did he suffer?”
Lilly couldn’t bring herself to tell, so Dante answered. “He was gut-shot by those assholes that robbed us. Once he got Wyatt out, they made an example of him. They strung him…
Ouch!”
Lilly interrupted Dante with an elbow to the ribs. He realized he may have been a bit raw in his explanation and opted to simply end it by saying, “He died in Seth’s arms, as it should be. He didn’t turn.”
Wiping her face and drawing herself upright once more, Kylee said to Lilly, “Fuck. And David? What about Doc? Dead, too?”
“David is gone. Doc isn’t dead, though,” Lilly told her. “Not that we know of anyway. He got bit, but I cut it off in time. He’s with…”
Copper cut her off saying, “Umm… who the fuck are these guys?” He gestured to Chak and Ten, but they stayed silent.
Answering him, Lilly said simply, “They’re friends. That’ll have to do for now.”
Kylee nodded and shot a glance at Copper telling him to stand down. He nodded back and told them with a shrug, “Good enough for me.”
"What’s next?” Kylee asked.
Chief told them all, “We should wait for Seth. Once he gets back here, we’ll figure out where to go next. We got nothing to fight with.”
Dante’s bag hit the floor with a thump. “False.”
Kylee’s eyes widened at the sight. “Yes! You guys got to the cache! Fuckin’ sweet!”
Adding to that, Lilly told her, “That’s not all. We have more outside in the wagons.”
Kylee nodded her approval. “Excellent. How much more?”
Chak finally spoke up telling her, “All of it.”
That was all Alyse needed to hear. She pulled away from Copper and reached into the bag to begin arming herself heavily.
“Slow down, Alyse. We still have time before Seth gets back,” Chief reasoned with her.
Tucking a pistol in her belt and throwing a rifle across her back Alyse told them all, “Bullshit! I’ve had it.” With an uncharacteristically powerful tone, she narrowed her eyes at Kylee saying, “I’m sick of sitting around waiting for other people to make a move. I know I can do it now. After that night… I’m not gonna sit around and be a victim. Load up.”
Dante protested as well, but Kylee held up a hand to silence the various arguments in the room. She told Dante and Chief, “Seth’s a big boy. He knows what he’s doing.” She then turned to Chak and asked him, “You. You have people. The Foresters are still strong, right? Can you take us back to them so we can get our shit together and meet these fuckers on a level playing field?”
Chak and Ten nodded confidently. “We have a dog in this fight, too. Whatever you need.”
Bolstered by the positive response, Kylee told the entire room, “We’re together now. That’s all that matters. And we’re gonna stay that way.”
She turned to Copper. “Leave a note for Seth. Tell him we’re going to the Forest. Tell him who we have with us and tell him we’re prepared to fight. He knows the way. Do it now.”
Copper went to work without another word.
Dante suggested, “We should post a few people outside with the wagons until we’re ready to take off. If the dead come and take the horses, we’re fucked. There’s too much in the wagons to carry.”
Lilly nodded an agreement and told Chief, “Take a few weapons and stand guard with Chak and Ten until we’re ready to go. Let them take out any bernies with the bows and only fire the guns if you get overwhelmed. We won’t be long.” She looked over at Chak and Ten and asked, “That cool with you guys?”
Ten answered her with an encouraging smile, “Like Chak said, anything you need, Lil’”
The three of them exited the room to the outside and made their way to the two wagons, leaving the others behind. Lilly pointed to Jonas and Troy and asked Kylee, “Who’re these kids?”
Taking a cue from Lilly, she simply said, “They brought Wyatt back to Vegas, so we owe them a favor or two. That’ll have to do for now.”
As everyone geared up to go, Kylee seized the moment to look at both Wyatt and Lilly. The three of them stood in the center of the room in silence, happy once again just to be together, regardless of the circumstances.
“Nick…” Lilly said sadly.
“He saved my life. If I hadn’t snuck out…” Wyatt added with a guilty twinge, his voice trailing off.
Kylee frowned deeply. “Wyatt, I’ve spent these past ten years trying to hide this from you… this world and all the ugly things it does to people. But I failed. You’re not a kid anymore. It’s time to get your hands dirty for the family.”
He nodded his understanding.
Lilly looked down at him and added, “What happened with Nick wasn’t your fault. One thing Nick and Seth taught me is to never let guilt own you. Never let it swallow you. Things are gonna happen. Mistakes are gonna be made. You’re gonna do things and see things that you never get to take back. You do what you gotta do to survive and protect the people you love.”
Kylee agreed. “You’re stronger now, Wyatt. If you wanna pay Nick back for saving you out there, then you do it by surviving. You do it by protecting the people you love at all costs, just like he did for you… and just like you did today for us with that herd. I’m not mad at you, Wyatt. I’m proud of you.”
Lilly looked puzzled. “Yeah, about that. What exactly did you do anyway?”
Wyatt told Lilly about his abilities with the dead. Kylee supported the story and explained that whatever it is, it’s probably because of the circumstances surrounding Wyatt’s conception; Kylee explained that Dext was already infected and her own bloodline with regards to the plague must’ve imbued him with some bizarre ability where the dead recognize him as one of their own.
Lilly’s head swirled at first, but she put it behind her, opting to treat it as the blessing it had thus far proven to be for the boy.
When they were through, Kylee made for the door, but not before asking Lilly sincerely, “Is Seth going to be okay?”
Solemnly, Lilly told Kylee, “Seth died with Nick. He’s never going to be okay again.”
Chapter Twenty Two – Out of the Frying Pan
Seth choked and sputtered as Nash’s boot tore into his ribs once more. His bound wrists and ankles caused him to drop back onto his side as he lurched forward from the impact.
“Get him back up,” Sarge ordered. Doughboy snatched Seth by the crook of his elbow and jerked him to his feet again.
Crack!
The sickening sound of a fist meeting a clenched jaw had Seth spitting blood onto the ground as a nasty gash opened on the inside of his cheek, the result of his now aching teeth digging in. Nick’s voice echoed in his mind, “They ain’t shit, Seth. Quit bein’ a pussy!”
“Get out of my head…” Seth growled, woozy from the relentless beating at the hands of Nash, Sarge, and Doughboy.
“Boy’s tough as nails. Again!” Sarge barked.
Nash grabbed Seth by the back of the head and sunk his fist deep into his gut. Gasping for breath, Seth buckled again. Nash leaned in close and whispered to him so the others couldn’t hear, “Not much longer now. We’re not going to kill you. Just hang in.”
Seth’s eyes were glazed over and he was simply in another place for a moment as Nick’s voice once again echoed, “Listen to him, Seth, Goddamnit! Keep your shit together.”
“Get. Out. Of. My. Head.”
The butt of Doughboy’s rifle across the back of his knee sent Seth sprawling, but as Sarge wound up for yet another kick, a piercing scream from the back of the slave chain broke his concentration. “Shit! Where did they come from?” Sarge called out to anyone who would listen.
In seconds the snarls of the dead could be heard throughout the darkness of the makeshift camp. The foul stench in the air accompanied by the buzzing of insects was enough to let everyone know there were more than a few and chaos erupted.
Half a dozen men at the front of the caravan rushed to their weapons and joined Sarge and the others as Seth lay at their feet helplessly begging Nick to leave him alone.
Sarge, Nash, Doughboy and the others left Seth on the ground and moved along the chain to meet the corpses head on, swinging rifles and knives to save their ammo. Screams of the helpless slaves broke out as the dead descended upon them, feasting on their flesh and bathing in their blood and entrails.
Seth could only hear the furor because his eyes were swollen enough to make the scene unclear in the darkness. He squinted up to see Nick scowling down at him. “You can’t die here, Seth.”
Behind him, one of the dead had managed to wander through the ranks and took notice of Seth’s bound form. It fell upon him snapping its jaws in an effort to tear him apart.
“Fight, Seth! Fucking fight!” Nick shouted at him through missing teeth and rotted lips.
Snapping out of his reverie, Seth lifted his feet in a defensive maneuver and managed to catch the neck of the bernie with the thick twine between his ankles. He struggled to push the walking corpse back while simultaneously trying to avoid getting his legs bitten.
The battle raged on along the slave chain with Doughboy and Nash efficiently reducing the numbers with every swing of their knives and rifles. Sarge shouted over the screams of the dying, “Nash, move back and secure the Colonel! Pull the caravan up and get us some space!”
Without a word, Nash sprinted back towards Seth. As he jumped over the Seth, still struggling for his life, he skidded to a halt. Nash looked back, hesitating for a moment.
Seth called to him, “Cut me loose, man! Cut me loose! I can help!”
Torn between following orders and his better judgment, Nash stared at him as Seth did his best to not die. He looked ahead to the Colonel’s wagon and back at Seth. “Goddamnit…”
Thunk!
Nash’s knife penetrated deep into the skull of Seth’s attacker sending the body crashing down uselessly. “Don’t make me regret this,” he told Seth as he cut the ties that bound him. Seth stood painfully on his own two feet and rubbed at his wrists. He asked Nash, “Where’s my shit?”
Nash dodged left as another bernie staggered towards him and lashed out with his knife hand. It hit the ground hard. “All the way up front. This’ll have to do for now.” He passed Seth the knife he was holding and drew another from his belt.
Seth looked down at the familiar blade in his hand and realized it was Lilly’s knife. He smirked to himself. “Thanks. You goin’ up front?”
Nash nodded and told him quickly, “Yeah, gonna move the wagons up and drag the slaves out of harm’s way. Can you go help the others?”
Seth nodded in the affirmative and shared a brief stare with Nash, almost coming to a wordless understanding. They parted ways.
As Seth jogged, knife in hand, along the slave chain towards Sarge and Doughboy, the trader that recognized him earlier clutched at Seth’s pant leg almost tripping him completely. He begged Seth, “Seth, get me outta here. Let me go, please!”
Seth glared at him through his swollen, purple eyes and told him, “Stop saying my name.”
The man persisted, “C’mon, Seth, bro… you know me. I know you know me! Get me out!”
Again, Seth warned him, “I… can’t. I can’t do it right now. You have to keep quiet about who I am.”
Panic stricken and with the cries of the devoured in their ears, the trader ignored the warnings. “Please, Seth… Look at my face. You’re not like these guys. Let me go. We can get ou… gech!”
The words spoken by the trader caught in his throat as Seth brought the point of his knife solidly down onto the top of the trader’s skull. Gaining his feet once more, he grabbed a passing bernie by its tattered shirt and tossed it atop the fresh kill, confident that it would begin feeding immediately while the body was still warm.
Doughboy and Sarge could be seen trying to drag another biter off of one of their own just ahead, so Seth moved up to join in the fray. The numbers of the dead had obviously dwindled due to the fighting, but it was still unclear how many the modest herd included in the dark of night.
Seth angrily pushed between Sarge and Doughboy in a full sprint and tackled the bernie off of the dying raider. As they rolled to a halt, Sarge spouted a rushed apology to the man on the ground before stomping his boot down hard enough to smash the man’s skull and spill the contents. The two men turned their attention to Seth and watched in awe for a moment.
Seth was in full beast mode perched atop the snapping corpse. He roared with rage, Nick cheering in his mind, and pounded his bare fist down on the bernie’s temple repeatedly until it finally opened with a sickening crackle.
He stood, leaving the knife on the ground, and engaged another staggering corpse face to face. It bared its rotting teeth and black tongue at him, mouth agape, but Seth was having none of it. He grabbed hold of it by its stringy hair and tore into its face with his own teeth. Ignoring the gag worthy funk of death and rot, Seth chomped down onto the bernie’s decomposing nose and clamped his jaws until he had bitten completely through. He spoke to it around his mouthful taunting, “How’s it feel, fucker?” before smashing his forehead into the corpse’s. Repeatedly, over and over, Seth head-butted the undead until there was no telling whose blood was whose. Eventually, the skull of the bernie gave way to the relentless assault and Seth no longer felt the cracking shell, but only the soft squish of brain and jagged shards of its former cranium.
Picking up his knife, he turned to face an incredulous Doughboy and Sarge. Spitting the nose he had chomped off at their feet and smearing the blood across his face with the back of his hand, he said panting, “We’ll settle up later.”
Doughboy stood dumbfounded, looking at Sarge. “Yo, you see dat shit?”
Sarge bared his teeth in a grin at Seth and told him, “You got yourself a deal.” The three of them left it at that and rejoined the battle.
Up at the front, Nash had managed to get the caravan moving and, as the horses began pulling the wagons, the remaining slaves were dragged past Seth’s crew and out of danger. Nash came sprinting back to meet them and jumped into the fight calling to Doughboy, “Take these men up to the slaves and execute the ones that got bit. We’ll clean up back here.” Doughboy barked at the helpers and moved away, leaving Seth, Nash, and Sarge to finish off what was left.
Standing back to back, Seth and Nash helped one another fight off half a dozen while Sarge battled five of his own single handedly. Slashing wildly with a blade in one hand and a full size axe in the other, Sarge cursed and shouted at the dead.
It wasn’t enough, though, as he soon found himself nearly overwhelmed. His swings were missing their marks as he panicked and he called to Nash and Seth for help.
Seth pulled his knife from the eye of his latest kill and grabbed another by the back of the neck. He raised his knife to impale it, but stopped short. Glancing at Nash, he narrowed his eyes and shoved the bernie in Sarge’s direction. As Nash fought with one of his own, Seth grabbed that one, too, and shoved it at Sarge.
Nash looked on wide-eyed as Sarge then found himself losing his battle with more on the way. Sarge yelled at Seth, “You motherfucker! I’ll fucking kill you!”
As the teeth tore into Sarge’s throat and limbs he gurgled, feeling the darkness close in on him. His blood spurted and shot out into the night air as his screams began to fade into choking, wet gasps. Seth caught Sarge’s eye and told him, “I’d say that settles it between you and me.”
He turned his attention to Nash and told him, “C’mon. We’re done here. Let’s catch up with the rest. The body will keep them busy.”
Nash gave Sarge one last look, before turning to Seth and telling him, “I didn’t see anything if you didn’t.”
With a nod, Seth replied, winking coolly with a swollen eye, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He heard Nick’s voice behind him saying, “That’s it, Seth. That’s what we’re talkin’ about. Now you have an ally and a job opening in management.”
*****
As dawn crept over the horizon, Lilly drove the lead wagon with Wyatt by her side. To the rear, Chak sat in the second wagon’s driver seat chatting idly with Kylee and Chief.
Lilly told Wyatt, “You scared the shit outta me, ya know! Running off like that. I know mom is gonna let that shit slide because she’s just happy you made it back, but if you think I’m just gonna forget about it you’re sorely mistaken.”
Wyatt frowned as Lilly continued, “I can’t say I’m not impressed by whatever it is you got going on with the dead, but let’s just think about that for a second. You only learned about it because you were surrounded. If you were like everyone else, you’d be dead. Fuckin’ dead, Wyatt. Do you even get that? There’s no coming back from that… You either walk and kill… or you’re put down. Either way, it’s over.”
He knew she was right and, as most children do when they’re so obviously defeated, he sat in silence. Lilly wasn’t going to allow it. “Well? Fucking say something!”
Wyatt sighed heavily. “I’m sorry, okay? What do you want me to say?”
The truth was that Lilly didn’t even know what she wanted to hear. She just wanted him to know she was pissed about the whole thing. She just wanted him to understand that carelessness costs lives. If anyone knew about people dying because of the actions of others, it was Lilly. Lilly had a long line of people who perished in an effort to save her ass. People that she felt were much better than her.
She asked Wyatt, “Look… Remember Murphy?”
He nodded and told her, “Yeah. I mean I was little, but sure I do. He was my favorite. He used to always bring me stuff back from the road… fun stuff like comic books and toys.”
Lilly smiled as she remembered. “Yeah, he always thought about you out here. I know he liked you a lot, too. But one day, we were out and I saw the Savages near the river crossing. Murphy told me we should just leave them that day because we were on our way back and there were too many for us to handle. I didn’t listen to him and I started that fight anyway.”
She frowned at herself. “They were on me before I knew it, Wyatt. They put their dirty hands all over my body and… well… let’s just say if Murphy hadn’t come to save me I wouldn’t be here right now to give you hell. They didn’t take my life, but they took his. He gave himself up and I’ll never be able to take that back. I’ll never be able to forget the way he looked at me while they stabbed him over and over again.”
Wyatt listened to her story and asked her, “Do you hate yourself for it?”
Softening herself for a moment she told him, “That doesn’t matter. What does matter is what we talked about back at the Dam. I learned from it, I think. That’s why I’m telling you. So you don’t make the same mistake. The guilt will never go away, but if I can’ teach you from my fuckups then it doesn’t have to be for nothing. Understand?”
“I think I do,” he replied, deep in thought.
Deciding to change the subject as the Forest loomed in front of them, she asked Wyatt, “So, what happened back there at the Dam anyway?”
With a shrug, he told her, “It’s crazy, Lil. They follow me wherever I go. It’s like… they come at me and then they just stop and stand there. They wait for me to make a move. I just ran and they followed along. Problem is getting them to go away, though. I have to get them looking at something else long enough for me to run away. It took me forever back at the Dam because there was nothing big enough to throw. Every time I thought they were moving off, they’d see me start to move and they’d follow again.”
Lilly shrugged. It could’ve been worse. “How did you finally lose them?”
Wyatt smirked proudly. “With this.” He pointed to the shoe on his left foot, which was now tied with a crude lace made of braided horse hair.
Lilly furrowed her brow. “I’m not following.”
He explained, “Alyse made me this lace, but I used the good one to rig up a noise maker. I got some sticks together and made an ‘H’ shape out of them stuck into the ground. I tied the shoe lace across the top of the ‘H’ and twisted another twig up really, really tight in the middle. When I let it go, the twists unwrapped super fast and the twig spun around clacking against the middle one in the ‘H’. They couldn’t resist the noise. Well, most of them anyway. The ones you killed followed me back before I fell.”
Lilly smiled at him and told him, “Wow! Pretty clever, kiddo.”
“Don’t call me ‘kiddo’, okay?”
She nodded. If anybody knew what it was like to not want to be called ‘kiddo’, it was Lilly. “Sure, Wyatt. No more ‘kiddo’.” She ruffled his hair and let the subject drop as they entered the shade of the trees.
Immediately upon entering, a loud snap rang out and Lilly pushed Wyatt out of his seat and to the ground just in time to save him from the swinging, biting corpse. Whatever had triggered the trap had caused one of the undead, bound by its feet to come swinging down from the tree above snapping its jaws. It was deliberately designed to get someone bitten and infected.
Chak brought everything to halt and shouted loudly to everyone, “Stop! Stop everything and don’t make a move!”
Frozen in time, Alyse called to him, “What was that? Who would do something like that?”
Chak and Ten dismounted the wagon and moved up to Lilly’s wagon to help Wyatt to his feet. “This place isn’t safe. Looks like our people have prepared for war,” he told them as he scanned the Forest.
Ten explained further, “We collected the dead in crates in case we ever had to lock down the forest. This place is littered with traps like this… and worse.”
Kylee cautiously moved up to where Chak and Ten stood with Wyatt. She grabbed hold of the struggling bernie that hung upside down thrashing and biting before sinking her knife into its eye socket. “You two better take point then,” she said to Chak and Ten.
Chak turned to her and said sarcastically, “Gee… ya think?”
Chapter Twenty Three – Moments of Clarity
Chief knelt beside the creek aggressively scrubbing the blood from his hands. The stinking body of a dead one on the ground next to him, riddled with beetles and maggots, didn’t even faze him. Ten approached him, leaving the others a few feet upstream, to chat idly as he cleaned up.
“They’ll never be clean, you know,” Ten observed casually.
Chief flicked the water from his fingers as he stood before wiping them on his pants. He looked down at Ten, who stood nearly a head shorter, acknowledged his presence, but remained silent.
With a casual shrug, Ten admitted to him, “I don’t know. It’s just something Seven Doves used to always say when I was little – No one’s hands will ever be clean again.”
Unimpressed, Chief held his hands up on display. “Look clean to me.” He adjusted the whip that hung on his belt before casting a glance over his shoulder towards the rest of the group. They were still washing up.
Grasping for conversation, Ten asked him, “You don’t talk much. How come?”
Chief ignored him. It wasn’t rude, but it was just his way.
“Why does everybody call you ‘Chief’?” Ten asked, still pushing.
Chief snorted a laugh at the question and eyed the boy thoughtfully for the slightest second before answering him. “Because my mother fucked a red man… Some nicknames stick, whether you want them to or not.”
That left Ten frowning. “What’s your real name, then?”
Finding himself with a strange mix of amusement and frustration, Chief began walking a bit further up the trail to scout before the others finished up. Ten tagged along, sticking by Chief’s side. As they moved along, Chief answered Ten saying, “Orville. My name is Orville. Jesus, you ask a lot of questions…”
Ten chuckled at the answer. “Orville? Your real name is… Orville?” He grinned up at Chief widely.
Scowling at him at first, Chief’s face soon broke into a smile. “Bah! In this case, I didn’t mind it sticking so much.”
Ten agreed heartily as they shared the laugh. “Yeah, Chief is a lot better than Orville.”
Just as the words left his mouth, Ten jammed his shoulder into Chief and, while it didn’t knock Chief to the ground, it certainly veered him off course. Ten snapped at him, “Stop! Don’t move.”
Chief did as ordered by the young man. Ten used his bare hands to remove some dry leaf litter from the ground at Chief’s feet. It revealed an extremely well hidden piece of hand woven cordage that was strung tightly across the broad game trail they had been walking along. Chief’s eyes widened at the revelation.
“Stay there for a sec,” Ten told him intensely without taking his eyes off the ground.
Ten carefully stepped over the tripwire and scanned the ground on the other side before slowly taking a knee. He drew his hatchet and used the head of it to clear more debris that was piled on the other side. As he went, he asked Chief, “Hear that?”
Chief strained his ears, but pursed his lips saying, “I got nothin’…”
In moments, Ten had uncovered no less than three severed heads from under the pile of leaves. All three worked their jaws and snapped hungrily at Ten, who was keeping a safe distance. “Exactly. You heard nothing. We cut them off at the neck so they can’t make noise.”
Chief stood there, dumbfounded for a moment, before speaking. “Jesus Christ! So, someone trips on the line and falls face first into a hidden pile of snapping heads. The fuck’s wrong with you people?”
Ten shrugged at Chief. “I think it’s cool.”
Incredulous, Chief pressed him. “You think it’s cool? How the fuck is that cool? You got fuckin’ bernies swingin’ down from the fuckin’ trees, fuckin’ spike pits, fuckin’ severed fuckin’ heads hidden in the leaves… You gotta be one sick fuckin’ fuck to think that shit up.”
Ten cringed at the string of curses before noting, “No wonder you don’t talk much…” He pulled a face. “But it’s a lot better than your plan. I know that much!”
Chief eyed him skeptically. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Puffing out his chest slightly, Ten told him confidently, “It means we don’t wait for the fight to come to us. We don’t just put up some walls and hope that we can fight off whoever comes to take us away. They never even make it that far. Most people end up bitten and turned from our traps or they turn tail and scurry back into whatever hole they crawled out of. We make the dead fight for us. That’s why we are still standing and your home is in ruins…”
Chief deflated immediately causing Ten to regret his delivery. Ten offered a slight apology saying, “Crap. I’m sorry… I… I didn’t mean it that way. Just that…”
Lilly’s voice chimed in from behind them, “He’s got a point.”
Turning around, Chief and Ten noticed the group had finally caught up with them. Chief sighed heavily and replied, “Yeah… Yeah, he’s got a point.” He turned his attention to Ten and told him, “You don’t need to apologize for anything, Ten. I’m big enough to admit when I’m wrong. Maybe your people got the right idea after all.”
Kylee interjected saying to everyone, “We need to keep moving. Chak, stay up front, please. Copper, Dante, and I will be directly behind you cutting a path for the wagons. Lilly can lead the animals and we’ll keep the boys between us. Ten and Chief, since you’re clearly getting along so well, you two stay to the rear. That work for everyone?”
There were nods all around.
As Ten let the group pass, he gestured for Chief to move along before resetting the trap. Ten caught up with Chief and sniffed his derision as he looked ahead. “This is crap. I’m always stuck doing nothing when Chak’s around.”
Chief smirked to himself as they walked along. “It ain’t so bad, man. Being back here has its perks, ya know?”
Ten was unconvinced. He asked Chief sarcastically, “Oh, yeah? Like what? Missing out on all the action?”
Pulling Ten by his shirt, slightly to the left, so he could see around the wagons, Chief informed him, “At least we get to stare at Kylee’s ass the whole time.”
Ten let out a boisterous laugh and punched Chief playfully. “You dirty dog!”
Spreading out his hands in mock surrender, Chief told him, “Hey, old man or not, I still got a little lead in the pencil, know what I mean?” As the laugh subsided, he asked Ten, “So, what about you, kid? Why do they call you ‘Ten’?”
In a poor effort to match Chief’s wit, Ten puffed his chest once again and gestured at his own crotch. “Some nicknames stick, whether you want them to or not. I didn’t mind this one sticking so much.” He grinned in anticipation of Chief bursting out laughing as he proudly gripped his package.
Wholly unimpressed, Chief stared at him skeptically with pursed lips. “Bullshit.”
Their joking stopped immediately when the horses spooked and a scream echoed through the woods, “Help! Please, God, someone help me!”
Kylee barked from up ahead, “Lilly, keep the boys here with Copper, the rest of you come with me!”
*****
“So how many men we got total?” Seth asked Nash as they marched next to The Colonel’s wagon. They had been trudging along for the better part of the day after cleaning up the mess from the attack on the caravan.
Nash answered him honestly. “Sarge never really put a number on it, but I figure around seventy or so in fighting shape. Most are with the other crew that took out Vegas… They’re headed to the forest and are set to meet us at the rendezvous point. There’s another forty or so that are based in the various communities to keep order and maintain the slave labor.”
Squinting in the sun as he did some math in his head, Seth reviewed for clarity saying, “So… the fifteen or so we have left here, another fifty or sixty meeting us. Not bad. All of them have weapons like us?”
Nash nodded and added, “Seems as though. Where’d you get your gun? The one you showed up with?”
Lying easily, Seth told him, “Picked it off a jerky in the Badlands. He didn’t have very much ammo, though. I guess he used it all up trying to fight off whatever chewed his ass up. How’s the ammo situation with you guys? I see the head honcho’s wagon stays up front. Is that second wagon the ammo or what?”
“Naw,” Nash answered him as he gestured behind him for Doughboy to catch up.
In seconds, Doughboy was beside them. He greeted them saying, “Whattup? Y’all good?”
The two men nodded. Nash asked Doughboy, “So, what happens now, without Sarge? Who’s running things on the ground besides The Colonel?”
Doughboy shrugged, unsure. “Man, I don’t even know. I seen the old man after the herd rolled through and he was mad’ than a muh’fucka ‘bout Sarge. Basically told me to get the fuck out and handle shit until we got to the rendezvous.”
He turned his attention to Seth and told him, “By the way, ma nigga, that shit with the face biting… da fuck was that?”
Seth shrugged. “Sometimes I get mad…”
Doughboy shook his head, still in disbelief. “Yeah, well, I’d hate to be the nigga to get you mad. Just sayin’.”
“So, what about that other wagon?” Seth repeated.
Nash looked to Doughboy as if to ask permission to tell Seth about the guy inside it, but Doughboy shook his head. “That ain’t none of your business, yet, homie. Gotta pay some dues before we get into all that.”
Seth shrugged. “Whatever, man. I don’t plan on sticking around too long anyhow. Way I see it, I earned a pass when I helped with the herd. I’ll be moving on soon.”
Nash stopped in his tracks. “I don’t think it works like that, Seth. You’re with us now. I can tell you from experience that The Colonel doesn’t just let people come and go as they please.”
Doughboy backed him up. “He right, though. You’s a soldier now. Consider yourself drafted.”
Seth cracked his neck and inhaled deeply, trying to keep his cool. He could hear Nick in the back of his head telling him, “Calm your shit. Just go with the flow.” Seth kept his mouth shut for a minute.
“When’d you come on with us anyway, Nash?” Doughboy asked casually. “I can’t remember. Last week or two been busy as fuck. You been on a Badlands raid yet?”
Nash shook his head. “Haven’t been around long. Shit, man, I haven’t seen the Badlands in years. Let me remind you that guys like me used to avoid places like that because of guys like you.”
Doughboy laughed at that. “Yeah, yeah… I hear ya, my nigga. But look… y’all met Joe yet? He’s that dude that came to us on the horse and brought news that Vegas was ours.”
Wrinkling his brow in thought, Nash tried to remember if he had met the guy. He told Doughboy, “Naw, not that I remember. I think he’s been with The Colonel in the lead wagon since he showed up. He hasn’t said much.”
“Yeah, that makes sense. He’s one of The Colonel’s old crew. They go back since before he got burned up. Joe’s a bad dude, though. Nigga’s ruthless. He was telling me about some peeps he came up on when they were preppin’ for the Vegas raid in the gully. Yo, he said they had some little fine-ass honey with ‘em and a wagon full of some good shit. Batteries, bows… all types of shit.”
Seth’s ears perked up.
“He took a shot from two hundred yards out and blew this one fuckin’ kid’s dome clean off and got the drop on them niggas.”
Seth chose his words carefully. “Batteries? That sounds like a Vegas trade.”
Doughboy nodded and continued, “Hell yeah, that was Vegas stock all day. Now… myself? I’da fucked that lil’ fine-ass hoe on the spot. But Joe? He don’t even fuck around like that. He fucked up their entire day, homie. Said he left them niggas tied up to burn in the sun and gut shot the main dude. Then he strung that man up, so the tree peeps knew who they were fuckin’ with. Joe just be makin’ examples outta niggas, straight up.” He shook his head in awe at the thought.
Seth narrowed his eyes and felt his hand drop to the hilt of Lilly’s knife. He said coolly, “Joe, huh? I’ll have to meet him at some point.”
Shrugging off the conversation, Doughboy told him, “Yeah, well, when you do, I suggest you stay on your Ps and Qs, bruh. Like I said, Joe don’t fuck around… and him bein’ The Colonel’s boy and all… Just be cool, ya dig?”
Seth let his hand drop from the hilt of the knife. “Gotcha. So, what’s the plan then, once we get to the trees? I figure we’ll be there before dark at this pace.”
Doughboy answered him confidently saying, “Well, it ain’t gonna be easy. Those tree fucks have a habit of trappin’ shit left and right. That’s prolly why The Colonel wants most of the men together. It’ll be harder than Vegas if you ask me. We’ve tried before with smaller crews, but they always end up getting all fucked up and shit. I’ve only heard stories, though. Who knows? Maybe Joe stringin’ that Vegas boy up got the message across.”
Nash asked Doughboy, “What about the slave train in the back?”
Looking back at the chained line to the rear of the caravan, Doughboy told him, “The herd fucked most of ‘em up. Ain’t but a handful of ‘em now anyway. What’s left will prolly just be used up for the feast instead of being put to work now.”
Nash followed up with another question. “Feast?”
“Yeah,” Doughboy clarified. “We always eat well before a big raid.”
Without notice, The Colonel’s wagon called for a halt in the progress. As the wagon’s door swung open and the old man was helped to the ground, he blotted at his eye with his handkerchief.
The Colonel folded his hands behind his back and calmly approached Nash, Doughboy, and Seth, almost slithering as he went. With the hulking form of whom Seth could only assume was Joe following closely behind him, The Colonel looked directly at Seth with his good eye and said curiously, “I see we have a new face in our midst…”
