“I’m not sure. Let’s find out,” I replied.
I stood up and walked over to the soldier that escorted us into the building. “Excuse me…” I began. “What exactly is going on with the power and where did the infected come from? For that matter, why do only some of them possess the ability to run?” I didn’t know whether they knew the answers to these questions, but it never hurt anyone just to ask (as far as I knew). “Also, aren’t you guys soldiers too? Why do we need a rescue? Who are you?”
He turned his attention to me. Finally in a calm environment, there was time to scan the guy from top to bottom which resulted in nothing since he shared the common appearance the other soldiers had. His brown hair and brown eyes existed only to match his brown camouflage uniform. Everyone else was a clone of each other with their hair closely cut in identically the same manner and the uniform maintained the same exact way. The military allows for no originality. Individuality is looked down on by the owner of the military dogs. (“Jump” “How high, Sir?”)
This soldier I spoke to differed in that his hair was half an inch longer than all the others and this accented his height, being the tallest guy in the lobby, just an inch or two taller than me.
“Alright, I’ll bite,” he said and arched one of his eyebrows, interested in my approach. “I will answer what I can, I suppose. My name is Marcus. No soldier you see here is with the military any longer. Morristown is a place where military officers that no longer serve come to rest alongside the large population of veterans that reside here. During the initial outbreak, early yesterday, I put the uniform on and I did a registry check for all military personnel, then went out and recruited as many of them as I could so that together we could gather and protect as many people as we found. The infection reached us faster than I anticipated and that is why we are held up here instead of on our way to The Hills.” He spoke with little to no emotion, like he experienced worse things a million times in the past. So far, so good, but he still didn’t tell us about the infected or the power outage.
“As for the infected that can run,” he walked around a desk behind him and took a seat on the chair behind the desk, “Whenever one of the normal infected take severe damage to the body or brain and become unconscious instead of dead, they go into some sort of mutation that causes them to reanimate with several times the strength of a normal human, endless stamina, and full use of their bodies, unlike the slower infected or ‘walkers’. The thing that both the walkers and ‘runners’ share in common is that their goal is to feed themselves at any cost necessary.”
“I’ve noticed. Do you know how long this mutation takes?” I asked.
“We haven’t had enough time to study up on this. But based on what we have seen, it varies widely from a few seconds to several minutes. My guess is, the severity of the damage they take somehow affects the speed of the mutation.”
“What about the power?”
“We don’t actually know what happened with that. We don’t even have enough information to build a theory on that. Based on the radio transmissions we received before the power went out in this area, the infected came first in some places and the power outage came first in others. We don’t know what caused either and since communication has been lost, we won’t be getting any more feedback until we can make it to The Hills. Do you have any further questions?”
“No. Thanks. That pretty much covered everything,” I said.
“Okay, good, now it’s my turn,” he said before he placed his hand on his chin to ponder the questions that followed. “Why were you in town and where did you come from?”
“We came here in search of supplies. We learned of The Hills quarantine back in Springfield which is where we live,” I answered. Without as much as the acknowledgement that I answered his questions, he turned around and continued his conversations with the other soldiers. With that I returned to my seat next to Jason. “We’re screwed,” I told him as I sat down.
Hours rolled by. Jason fell asleep on the floor which left me alone to observe the people in the lobby, but mostly this Marcus character. I was curious as to why he went out of his way to protect a bunch of people he hadn’t met earlier in his life. Not that it was a bad thing, but it was an extremely strange one. People tend to do whatever involves minimal work in exchange for great reward but Marcus did not follow this principal of human behavior (Weird). As people fell asleep, the lobby became more quiet until the little conversation that remained made it everywhere in the lobby. Around that time I listened in on Marcus’s discussions with the other soldiers and I realized that he spoke with many self references, commonly a trait that liars did not possess. Either he intentionally did it to throw people who listened in to his conversations off, or he legitimately told the truth every time he spoke, which I also found incredibly strange.
Even longer time went by and the soldiers gave all the survivors some of the food they managed to collect and some drinks. I fell asleep on the floor somewhere around this time. When I woke up, the sun shined brightly through the lobby windows and the lanterns were all off to be saved for a later time. People were much more relaxed after I woke up. Those hours without a fight for their lives calmed them down and gave them some trust in what the soldiers were doing. It gave them some peace of mind.
Half of the soldiers were gone from the lobby and the other half prepared their equipment. Something was going to happen. Once their things were ready to be moved to the next location, the soldiers that remained awoke everyone still asleep and directed their attention back to Marcus who sat at the desk waiting for everyone’s attention.
“Something is about to happen,” I said after I nudged Jason awake.
Once the attention of the entire room was gathered, Marcus began to explain.
“We have located a military base more secluded than most. It rests on the outskirts of a town a few hours walk away. This means there are protective fences, food to feed an army, weapons to train you to defend yourselves, showers to get clean and many, many beds to sleep on. We can hold up in there for as long as we need to, but we need to leave as soon as possible.” He stood up off of the desk and walked over to one of the soldiers. “Our personal medical professional, Doctor John Guirella…” He said after he rested his hand on the soldier’s shoulder in respect. “… He will guide you, alongside some of the other soldiers, out of the building. We are to move quickly, silently, and together at all times. We can do this if we just trust our lives in the hands of these well trained men!” He finished and left the lobby behind for some of the other soldiers to clear while he secured the front of the building for us.
“Alright,” John said. “I want everyone to exit in a single line. Don’t push others, and be respectful, we are in this together. When we reach the outside I want all the women and children in the center and all the men will have to surround them. This formation will allow the women to protect the children and the men to protect the women. The men will be protected by anyone armed.”
“What if the number of infected overwhelms us?” some concerned parent asked.
“We will be walking aside buildings at all times in case a situation of that nature arises, we could rush inside the nearest one and get to safety fast. We’ll leave once I get confirmation that it’s clear outside. Anyone else have a question?” He waited for a few seconds. “Alright, carry on.”
Once the soldiers returned to let us know it was secure, it was time to begin. In single filed lines we made our way to the first floor and waited in front of the doors to the outside for John to tell us we could go out. No one looked like they wanted to leave the safety of the building but it was a necessity if the supplies were going to run out.
The doors opened and light rushed in. Marcus came in behind the light and waved at us to come outside.
It was bright outside, the perfect amount of light to be safe and ready for any threat that could approach from a mile away. We followed the instructions that John gave us and we surrounded the women and children, while the soldiers surrounded us. The paranoia the group emitted was so great it could be felt. They stared in every direction at once, kept close and walked without consistency. The group was just too large. Any attack that took place would likely result in the loss of someone in the panic. It would instantly turn from a safe escort into chaos.
Marcus led the way and we all followed.
A few of the soldiers remained distant from the group to lure and execute the infected they came across with sharp or blunt objects to avoid the sound the guns would make, but every once in a while we came across one of the infected that was separated from those clusters. To deal with those, someone in the outer wall of the defense would head out and take care of it, then came back to his position.
We walked for some time and the number of infected we came across continued to grow the further we went. Eventually the number of infected matched the number soldiers. If it came to the point they were forced to fire their weapons, the number of infected in the area would multiply and the group could be forced to split up to deal with a lesser amount of infected. Once things became too serious, I felt the need to join in and help the soldiers that protected us. I still had the knife with me but I wasn’t ready to stab what was potentially still human in the head to kill it. Instead, what I did was hand the knife over to one of the soldiers that were unarmed so they could physically join in, and I filled in the outer wall where he stood.
The night crept in and we did not yet arrive at the military base for refuge. The limited number of lanterns turned the trip into more of a hazard than it was beneficial, but we continued to push on. Jason joined in to help the soldiers, he didn’t give it a second thought he was more than willing to stab anything he could to assure his own safety. Some of the other guys used weapons of their own they managed to pick up during the chaos of the day before. They also joined in to help the soldiers, but the more of us that helped out, the more infected there were to deal with.
Marcus stopped and held his hand as a sign for us to stop too. A horde of infected collected up ahead. We managed to get close without our presence being known. John watched Marcus and easily he read what the next move was; redirect the group head. Send us the opposite direction and find another way. There were too many infected on the path we were on, we couldn’t stay.
John went to the back of the group which turned it into the front. We were to find another route that wasn’t the one we were on.
“No! We can take these freaks!” some guy in the group said. He stepped forward, angry that it would take us longer if we moved around the dead. It was the same guy that argued with Marcus back at the lobby. He figured we could cut straight through the mob of infected that outnumbered us, three to one. He walked to the front by Marcus and another argument with him surfaced. “If you want to be a coward then be one but I will run right through these freaks no problem!” he yelled out, loud enough for all the infected to turn our way and notice we were there. He reach behind him and pulled out a revolver, took a shot at the infectee, hit one in the head and walked towards the others that slowly moved towards us. On his second shot, all hell broke loose.
The infected that walked towards us moved faster and runners shot out from the horde and took the guy down. His screams could have made it far enough so that any of the infected not already around us could find us with more ease. “RUN!” Marcus yelled out as he turned around and made some distance between him and the infected that were gaining on us. Only one or two soldiers stood in the front of the group to lead us away to safety. All the lanterns were now on but over a period of time, their range would not help us locate any infected in the dark. With so many runners in the horde it was going to be much more difficult to shake them off. Every building was now unsafe to go into. Not only would people trample each other in an attempt to get inside but with these infected they would definitely take the door down with their large numbers and trap us. We had to run the rest of the way to the military base and everyone knew that was not going to be easy.
“TAKE THIS!” Jason’s voice came from behind me. He was with Marcus at the back of the group holding two assault rifles taken from fallen soldiers that threw them to anyone who could grab them. He wanted me to go back and help them shoot down the infected so the survivors could… survive! I didn’t want to risk my life, but this instance served a purpose. What better reason to risk death than to protect the many? I slowed my pace so that everyone could run right by me. Jason and Marcus caught up with me and Jason gave me one of the guns. Earlier I didn’t want to take part in the execution of anything or anyone, but it was no longer an option. We focused fire on the runners, but there were so many of them that we found ourselves spraying the ammunition from side to side. Our support fire worked as expected and the group of survivors went further and further from us into safer distances. The few soldiers that were with them were now out of sight and eventually they turned the corner and we couldn’t see any of the survivors.
On our side, a few more soldiers were caught by runners that surprised us in search of the gun shots and lost their lives.
“We have to hold them off till they get far enough for us to make a run for it! Anyone who wants to leave now and join them Go!” Marcus said to be sure that those with the will to fight till death stayed and the rest left. None of the soldiers left although some of the grown men that picked up weapons from the fallen soldiers did.