Chapter
Fifteen
We walked toward the first fenced in pasture.
All of a sudden we all heard a faint “LU-UKE!!!” coming from the far meadows. It was DeAndre.
“D!!” Jacob hollered through cupped hands.
“Hey!!” called DeAndre from far away. Looking out past the last fence, I saw him trotting toward us.
DeAndre was halfway to us when, all of a sudden, out from a huge pile of manure jumped a zombie. It was a grown male zombie and it moved fast. Faster than most zombies.
Growling, he began to chase DeAndre, who was now about 25 feet ahead of him and had just passed an old wooden shed filled with hay next to a pasture full of cows.
Upon hearing the growling zombie, DeAndre half-turned in surprise and, twisting his leg, fell to the ground.
“Christ!” cried Jacob, running toward DeAndre. I was right behind him, sprinting fast. Jacob was a very fast runner. He’d been on the track team in high school and had kept up the habit of running for exercise in the years since. Caitlyn, Risa and Jonathan ran after us.
DeAndre had fallen right next to the pasture fence about ten feet past where the small hay shed was. The zombie hobbled past the shed, not even giving it a glance, and ran toward DeAndre. D had his gun out and was aiming it at the zombie as it approached him.
POP!!!
Unfortunately, the shot hit the zombie in the side. It slowed the creature a bit, but only for a moment. Before we could do anything, it began growling even louder as it rushed headlong toward DeAndre.
“D!!!” I yelled as I ran.
The zombie was nearly on top of DeAndre, and we were still about ten feet away. It crouched over our friend and grabbed D’ arms. D in turn tried to grab the thing’s head and keep it away from him. To get bitten was to be doomed, and DeAndre knew it.
Running up to DeAndre and the zombie, Jacob took his shotgun and swung it like a club, putting his weight behind the swing. It struck the zombie in the head, and the creature fell off to the side, momentarily stunned.
By this time, we’d all run up to DeAndre. Caitlyn helped him up. Jacob and I had our shotguns trained on the zombie. We were about to pull our triggers when…
“DAD!!” yelled Jonathan. “Oh my God! DAD!!”
This gave us pause. We didn’t want to shoot the kid’s father right in front of him. But it wasn’t his father any more. He had to know this.
It had to be a shock to witness your father as a zombie.
This zombie was wearing overalls and a checkered shirt, with the sleeves rolled up. It was tall, fit and muscular, and it looked quite formidable. It growled at us but held its distance. It wasn’t looking at Jonathan, though. Its gaze was trained on our shotguns.
Looking at its side, I saw the damage DeAndre’s shotgun had done to the zombie. It seemed to realize that our weapons could hurt it. It stood there, crouched, watching us from about 8 feet away. It was looking at us with intelligence, just like the other one.
“Dad!” said Jonathan, sounding sad.
“That’s not your dad, Jonathan,” said Jacob, “not anymore.”
The zombie growled and advanced a few steps, then backed up again.
Jonathan let out a strangled sob and turned away, his hands on his face. Risa came up to him and put her arm around his shoulders. “I can’t watch,” Jonathan mumbled from underneath his hands.
As we stood there, shotguns pointed at the zombie, the creature staring back at us malevolently and growling every few seconds, I saw movement out of the corner of my eye. Turning my head, not wanting to take my eyes off the zombie, I glanced quickly to see what the motion was in the pale moonlight.
My heart sank to my knees as my eyes fell on the sight of Luke, sleepily rubbing his eyes and walking slowly toward us. He was about two feet to the side and behind the zombie.
We all saw him at almost the same time and reacted pretty much the same way, in gasps and choked sounds that came out like near-silent squeaks.
Dear heaven, my son. My baby. Luke.
He rubbed his eyes some more, and I saw how his hair was sticking up and there was a few pieces of hay stuck in it. Glancing quickly at the little shed, I realized at once that Luke must have run here and found the shed full of hay, and hid in it and had fallen asleep. We had all walked right past it, not realizing Luke had been inside, fast asleep, the whole time. Heck, I’d passed it not 6 feet away.
Luke was now level with the zombie. He was right beside it. The creature let out a harsh growl and bared its teeth at us, its milky eyes still fixed on us and our guns. I saw its nose sniff the air as it took a step closer to us, and Luke walked right alongside it. He could have reached out and touched it, he was that close.
I moaned softly in agony. I couldn’t believe my eyes. None of us could. We all held our breath. After a few minutes, even Jonathan took his hands off his face and looked to see what was happening.
The zombie was growling again. It raised its hands, raw and bloody and looking more like claws. It reached out for us but was unwilling to move closer. It’s like it was remembering what the buckshot felt like. Although it clearly was a vicious, malevolent creature and seemed to be nearly salivating at the thought of attacking us, it still was in self-preservation mode. The snarling growls
grew very loud as it voiced its anger and frustration at us. But it completely ignored the small boy right beside it.
It was an incredibly tense situation. We were all in very aggressive postures, shotguns leveled at this monstrous creature, and it faced us, frozen but with barely restrained deadly ferocity … and a sleepy, half-awake little boy was in the middle of it all.
We must have presented an odd sight to Luke, because he stopped and looked at us. He was about a foot in front of the zombie now. It still did not seem to see him. Did not seem to smell him. Did not react to him at all. What was happening?
We stood there, our shotguns leveled at the zombie, Luke standing there a foot away from it, and nobody moved. Luke’s eyes had focused on us and seen the shotguns, leveled almost directly at him. I could see the sleep fall from his face and his eyes grow wide at the sight.
The zombie growled beside him. Luke froze, then slowly turned his head and looked at what was right next to him. The zombie acted as if Luke didn’t exist. Turning to look at us again, our shotguns held at the ready, Luke swallowed hard.
“Mama?” he said in a small voice.
“Babe, I will cover you. Go get him,” whispered Jake.
From behind me, Caitlyn and DeAndre whispered in unison, “We’ve got you covered Alyssa.”
I heard Risa cock her .33.
Swallowing hard, and sending a prayer to the heavens that my Luke would survive this, I lowered my shotgun and laid it on the ground slowly. I dropped to one knee and held out my arms.
“Come here, Luke,” I said in a low, urgent voice. “You come to mama NOW.”
I rarely used this firm mommy voice on Luke, I saved it for emergencies - and this definitely qualified.
Without hesitation, Luke ran the seven feet into my arms. Wrapping my arms around him, I rose to my feet and backed up. Caitlyn, DeAndre and Risa came forward past us.
The zombie, reacting to my movement, growled loudly and advanced several steps toward us. It was now less than 4 feet away. One lunge and it would be on top of us.
It suddenly let out a huge roar and jumped at us.
Jake reacted
instantly;
he leveled his shotgun at the zombie pulled the trigger.
POP!!!
POP!! POP!! POP!!!
Jacob’s buckshot hit it first, but not two seconds later, Caitlyn’s, DeAndre’s and Risa’s shots found their mark.
The zombie took all the shots in the head and chest and flew backward several feet before falling to the ground. The night was silent. Smoke rose from four muzzles.
Jacob was the first to turn to me. “Is he okay?”
I crouched in the dirt, and my hands flew over him, searching for any wounds. Luke looked back at me, smiling. “Mama.” With a choked cry, I gathered him again in my arms and kissed the top of his head. I couldn’t believe he’d come out of that scene unscathed.
“That zombie did not even react to Luke,” said DeAndre, stunned.
We all crowded around Luke, hugging him and making sure he was all right, for our own peace of mind. I must have checked him over at least four times before I was satisfied. We were so relieved Luke hadn’t been attacked that, after D’s initial wondering statement, we all ignored the plain fact that the zombie had completely ignored Luke. Don’t question miracles, I thought.
“How’re you? You okay?” Jacob asked DeAndre.
“I’m fine, I think my foot went into a hole or something. My ankle’s a little sore, but it’ll be okay,” he said, brushing himself off.
We made the introductions, Jonathan to DeAndre and Luke. I kept hugging Luke, and when we started to walk back through the forest, I held on to his hand like a lifeline. I wasn’t going to let him go for a long while.
I kept thinking about how the zombie had failed to react to Luke. I wasn’t sure I understood it.
Jake dropped from where he’d been walking in the front and fell into step next to me. I held Luke’s hand on my other side. He was growing sleepy, so DeAndre came up behind me and said, “I’ll take the little tyke, here.” And he gathered Luke’s sleepy form and lifted him to his shoulder. Luke promptly laid his head down and fell asleep.
Jacob said in a low voice, “I have a theory about why the thing didn’t see him.”
“I think I have the same theory,” I said softly. “Luke’s a zombie hybrid. The thing ignored him.”
“Because it counted Luke as one of his own,” said Jacob, giving me a sidelong glance.
“The zombies don’t consider him a live human,” I said.
“But he
is
alive. He has a heartbeat, he grows, he lives,” Jake said.
“It’s like he’s caught in between worlds,” I said.
Caitlyn sidled up to Jake’s other side. “I overheard you guys. I think you’re right.”
I looked at her.
“I think this is a good thing, actually. Luke is safer now,” Caitlyn said.
“Although I wouldn’t want to put it to the test,” Jacob said.
“You never know how a zombie will act - or react,” I said.
I looked over at Risa, who walked next to Jonathan. They were talking quietly. “Looks like she’s found a friend,” I said.
Jacob and Caitlyn looked over at Risa and Jonathan. We all smiled.
Chapter
Sixteen
On the long walk back through the woods and meadow, Jake told us about Stanley.
“I thought something was odd about that man,” I said. “I hope he keeps his word this time.”
“He’d better. I knew I should have roughed him up more,” DeAndre said. “I never trusted that guy.”
“I was suspicious from the start. And you know who else was?” Jacob asked.
“Who?”
“Old Paddy,” Jake said. “That’s what he whispered to me right before we left: ‘Watch out for that guy. He’s hiding something.’ Somehow he knew.”
“Oh, man,” said DeAndre.
We continued talking about Stanley and discussing the safety of continuing toward a safehouse the government now knew about. I mean, how safe can a safehouse be if the people who are looking for you know where it is?
In the end, we decided that since it was technically a safehouse from zombies, and since it was in another country, that we’d take our chances. We had nowhere else in mind to go. Hopefully it would indeed be a safe place that lived up the label Paddy had given it: a sanctuary.
After we got back to the Summers’ farm and washed up, with Julie hovering over us and apologizing over and over, we prepared to hit the road once more. Julie insisted on packing several huge bags with not only freshly made sandwiches, but drinks and snacks for everyone. She even wrapped up the needlework Caitlyn had admired and gave it to her, and she gave Luke several toys she that had belonged to her own son during his childhood. At first it sounded rather gross, but after looking over the toys, I saw they were antiques that were still in great shape. I thanked Julie, knowing these would amuse Luke on the long hours on the road in front of us.
DeAndre explained about taking care of the Ethan zombie, and Julie nodded.
“Last night I thought everything over and came to terms with Ethan’s and Tom’s passing. I must have cried a bucket of tears. I see how what we did was ridiculously stupid and wrong. It was mostly Tom’s idea, but I guess I was so desperate to believe Ethan was going to get better that I ignored all the warning signs,” Julie said.
“Will you be okay? Your husband is still laid out on the barn floor,” Jake said. “Do you want us to do anything with the body?”
“No,” said Julie, checking her watch. “The two farmhands who normally help us should be here in a couple of hours. I will get help from them. I need to ride into town anyway. I think it’s time I sold this farm and went to live with my sister in Fargo.”
We packed everything into the van and got ready to head out. It had been a horrific 24 hours, but thankfully Luke was safe and sound and we were even heavy one new friend.
Julie looked over at Jonathan. “Are you going to be alright, Sweetie? I am so sorry about your family. Your mother was a good friend to me,” she dabbed her eyes. “I just can’t believe how North Dakota has become overrun with these creatures.”
“Maybe you should go someplace farther away?” Caitlyn asked. “My family has cousins in Pretty Prairie, Kansas, it’s a good town.”
“Well,” Julie said, “I don’t know anybody in Kansas, I wouldn’t know what to do, but I will think about it.” She patted Caitlyn’s hand. “Thank you for the recommendation. And I hope you enjoy the needlework.” She gave us all pats on the arm and then went to her front door and stood there on the porch, looking out at us and waving goodbye.
I climbed up into the driver’s seat and put the key into the ignition. As the engine roared to life, I turned to Jacob beside me. “Do you think she’ll be all right?”
“I hope so. I think so. Regardless, I think I want to concentrate on the safety of this family and nothing else, from now on,” he said, giving me a look.
Laughing, I agreed. “Look out for our own first.” I looked in the rearview mirror at Jonathan, seated between Risa and Caitlyn. “And something tells me our ‘own’ might have risen by one.”
Although we were in rural North Dakota, I found my way to the freeway, and we were cruising along Interstate 29 before long. It was early morning and none of us had had any sleep - with the exception of Luke - but none of us wanted to stop. We decided to just swap out drivers every few hours while the others caught cat naps as they could. I looked in the mirror at my family and saw that most of them had settled in to sleep once we had hit the freeway. Jonathan was gazing out the window with an unreadable look on his face. I felt so bad for that boy, seeing his family go zombie like that. I was amazed he’d survived uninjured. After Jonathan had taken a hot shower and got some clean clothes ready, Jacob and DeAndre had taken him into a bedroom and, with his permission, they’d searched him thoroughly for any bites, scratches or other signs of infection. The boy had been so grateful at the prospect of getting away from the infected lands of North Dakota that he’d submitted to the search without complaint. After losing his family so abruptly, I hoped he’d be okay.
Settling in for the long drive to what I hoped would be an easy border crossing into Canada. I still wondered how we were going to get over the border. The checkpoint was just about a four hour drive north from where we were now, and while we all had passports
(as was required by law in the emergency)
,
the border had been closed more of the time than open. It was hit and miss crossing into Canada, they were very suspicious and usually stopped just about everyone trying to cross north.
I cruised along the freeway without incident for about two hours. We passed Interstate 94 and the exits for Fargo, and I kept on driving. I was beginning to feel like I’d rather drive than stop
unless it was absolutely necessary. It almost seemed like every time we stopped something bad happened. So I kept on driving north. We passed Grand Forks, and I kept on going.
I was about an hour south of the Canadian border, less than fifteen miles north of Grand Forks, when I saw a bunch of patrol cars stopped, with lights twirling. The sun was climbing into the sky and it was maybe 8:30 in the morning. There was no smoke as far as I could see, but at least three patrol cars were stopped alongside of the freeway. All the lanes were still open, but there was definitely some kind of emergency there on the shoulder of the road. I couldn’t help myself, slowing as I passed the commotion. I could see at least five police officers with guns drawn and what looked like three zombies on the side of the freeway. I had no time to wonder how they got there, but I shook my head at the scene. Zombies were turning up everywhere; you couldn’t know where or when they would appear, but they were getting to be a common sight.
Suddenly, something else caught my eye. About two miles past this incident, I saw a car stopped on the side of the road. These sights were always fodder for speculation, as nowadays people rarely stopped on freeway unless there was some kind of zombie emergency. You didn’t want to stop for something and then get caught unaware by zombies.
This car was a black sedan, and from what I could tell there were three people inside. I noticed as we passed that the driver was on some kind of phone or radio, and his eyes were following our van as we went by. Then, right after we passed, he pulled his car back onto the freeway and began following us. He stayed exactly the same distance behind us, pacing us, in the same lane we were in. He never closed the distance or fell farther back.
You know how sometimes you look at something and the hairs on the back of your neck stand up and your sixth sense kind of wigs out? You just know something is not right with something. That’s how I felt. I kept watching that black sedan behind us, and I knew it was bad news. They were following us, I felt it in my gut. I glanced behind me. Everyone was asleep. I continued down the freeway, traveling in the same lane, going the same speed as I had before, giving no indication I’d noticed the car was following us. I kept checking the mirrors, and it maintained the same distance, the same speed. I could feel goosebumps all up and down my arms. I kept telling myself silently to stay calm, but still my breath quickened and my pulse sped up.
Okay,
I thought.
I am not going to play this game. Maybe this is all in my head, maybe it’s not. But I’m not just going to keep driving with you creepazoids following me. I will control this, I will end the standoff.
And with that thought in mind, I did something I would later regret. Had I not, I think I might have regretted it more.
With one eye on the car following us, I put my blinker on and took the next exit. Smoothly turning off the freeway, I pulled up to the stop sign at the bottom of the off-ramp. With a sinking feeling I saw the black car pull off, too. Before it could stop behind me, I turned abruptly off to the right and sped off down a side street. The black car followed immediately. Cursing under my breath, I swung an abrupt left, taking the corner fast, nearly on two wheels, and sped down another side road.
By this time, everyone had opened their eyes and uttered variations of “What the …?”
“We’re being followed,” I said tightly, taking another fast turn onto a street on my right and speeding up. This street was a long, straight shot east, and I sped up to 50 mph trying to lose them.
Rubbing his eyes, Jacob sat up. “How long have they been following us?” he asked.
“About ten minutes,” I said.
Jake turned to look behind us. “They’re gaining on us. I don’t think we can outrun them in this van,” he said.
I leaned forward and sped up to 60 mph. The black car just accelerated with me and kept pace.
This was getting ridiculous.
“What do you think I should do?” I asked Jake.
“Well…” he started, but stopped, because the black car was making its move.
It accelerated on our left side and sped up to our nose. I looked over to the car and saw its passenger was gesturing at me to pull over.
“No way,” I mumbled, and slammed on the brakes, fishtailing to a stop and leaving the black car many lengths ahead of me.
It slowed as I took a wild right turn and drove down a side street. Without looking to see whether it had followed, I took the first left turn and floored it.
Still, the black car caught up with me in less than a minute, this time tailing me quite closely.
“Alyssa, how long do you think you can keep this up?” Jacob said.
“I don’t know. Not for long. I’m just not going to make it easy for them,” I said grimly.
The black car was making its move again, this time on our right side.
Everyone was watching it out the window, silent, stunned, staring.
It sped ahead of us and then abruptly swung in front of us, forcing me to the side. I was faced with being run off the road, so I stopped. In a swirl of dust and gravel, I pulled our van to the side and put it in park and took the key out, slipping it into my pocket.
“Let me handle this, Alyssa,” said Jake, undoing his seatbelt. But before he could even get his hand on the door, the occupants of the black car were on both sides of our van, showing badges and demanding that we get out.
We were all ushered out of the van and lined up against it, like common criminals. After a few moments of this treatment, Jacob had run out of patience.
“Please tell me who you are and why you pulled us over,” he said, lips thinning as he met their gaze.
There were two men and one woman, all wearing dark suits. They acted with efficiency and speed. When they got a look at Luke, they seemed to get excited, whispering back and forth to one another.
“WHY have you DETAINED us?” DeAndre demanded to know.
It was clear to me they were with the government and were after Luke. They refused to answer any of our questions and then, after conferring for ten minutes, they decided to do the unthinkable. They grabbed Luke.
“NO!!” I cried, and ran after them. One of the men held me back as the other man and the woman put a struggling Luke in the back of their car. The man holding me dragged me back to the others. I decided to go limp, so he held my armpits and dragged me backward, the heels of my boots scraping on the asphalt.
“This is unbelievable,” I muttered.
“WHO ARE
YOU?
” Jacob said loudly. “WE DEMAND TO KNOW.”
Finally, after much struggling and protestation, one of the men came up to us.
“Sit down, all of you,” he said, “or I will cuff you.”
“What is going on?” DeAndre demanded.
“We haven’t done anything wrong!” Caitlyn said.
“This is still the U S of A. You cannot hold us without reason,” Jonathan said.
“Oh, you have no idea,” mumbled Risa. We had taught her all about what America used to be, and what it became when Congress passed the Zombie Quarantine Act of 2013 and introduced the death penalty for harboring anyone who might be infected two years later. For the past three years, the federal government had suspended or revoked our civil rights, one by one, in an attempt to contain the outbreak. There was no more unlawful search and seizure. Everything - and everyone – was fair game.
The man took out his handcuffs. We all sat down.
So there we were, sitting in a nice, neat little row with our backs to the van. Luke was in the black car with another of the men. We just looked up at the man and woman. They were about 5 feet away from us, huddled in discussion.