He took my hand and squeezed it, then whispered, “That’s my Boss. Been wonderin’ where ya been hidin’.”
I snorted and shook my head, shoving my hands into my pockets. Waters was silent for a long time before finally motioning toward the open front door.
“She’s right. The time for lies is over. I think we should go inside and talk.”
“Be my guest,” Michael replied and extended an arm. He followed Waters inside while the rest of us eyeballed each other. After a beat we fell in line and trailed the other two to the dining room.
“We should have stayed at Crousley’s,” Mia muttered to Jake.
“No shit.”
* * *
“So, let me get this straight. You’ve been what, collecting people? Shipping them off to this Command Center? Are you telling us when you saw them again they were
zombies
?” Michael asked.
We’d been sitting around the dining room table, sipping coffee Abby had made, and listening to Waters’ story. Well, we’d been sipping coffee until he got to the part about the shipments. Then we all pretty much just sat there staring at him, cups in hand and jaws partially dropped. Waters sat at the head of the table with Michael on his right and John on his left, his hands folded tightly together on the table, coffee cold and untouched. I’d just noticed how dirty and raggedy he looked.
He’d told us that when the siege first began at the prison, he and his men had noticed something about the runners. Something we had noticed as well, after the bow shoot. A large number of the runners had been people he recognized. People he had “collected” and then shipped off to the CC. Granted, there had been hundreds of zombies attacking the prison, and Waters had only recognized about a third of them, but that was still a disturbing percentage.
“One question at a time, please. I’m not saying anything for certain. Yes, my orders were to collect living and…unliving ‘specimens’, to be shipped to the CC bi-weekly. I don’t know why and I didn’t ask. It’s not my job to question orders. What I do know for certain is that none of the infected that had been shipped was among the horde that attacked us. Those we recognized, they had been
healthy
when they were sent to the CC.”
“Okay, you do understand you’re dealin’ with zombies, right?” Jake asked rhetorically. “You can’t just throw some deadheads onto a plane with regular people and expect ‘em to stay healthy when you get to where you’re goin’. And, you’re crazier than hell if you think you can keep a bunch of zombies pinned up like dogs in your own house and think nothin’ bad is gonna happen eventually.”
“We took every precaution—”
“Your precautions are shit. You should’ve known better. The fact that you didn’t just shows how incredibly stupid you really are. So now we got some big bad group roundin’ people up, and for whatever reason those same people are gettin’ loose, being turned if they weren’t already, and findin’ their way back home? Someone tell me what the fuck kinda sense that makes?” Jake finished up his little tirade and slammed back in his seat, glancing around at the rest of us with his hands flat on the table.
“Why weren’t we sent to the CC?” Michael asked.
Waters took a deep breath before answering. “You were deemed too skilled not to be used.” He held up a hand to silence the uproar he assumed was coming. “I never liked what we were doing. At first, yes. I assumed the CC had a safe zone and were relocating people. Once they began pressuring me for more, and then telling me to send the infected, and even then later on ordering me to send the Zacks inside the prison instead of putting them down? That troubled me. I had never outright questioned it until the attack. Until I saw people I had known, reduced to mindless killers.”
“Don’t call them that,” I said quietly, speaking up for the first time since this little meeting had begun.
Mia and Jake went rigid next to me, keeping still about Waters’ use of the name Zack. Waters simply bowed his head and remained silent. John held up his hands, then rubbed his bald head, before speaking up.
“Alright. So are we saying the runners can remember shit?”
Everyone looked at each other, no one wanting to voice what they were thinking.
“I mean, it looks that way, doesn’t it? If—and it’s a big if—those people weren’t turned on the trip downstate, then somehow they were infected after getting there. Then for whatever reason, they got loose, and remembered enough to find their way back home? I can’t even begin to swallow that.” John shook his head, clearly in denial of what was becoming increasingly clear to all of us.
“Or they were released.”
Jonah was leaned back in his chair, looking very relaxed and almost bored. His statement shut us all up. For several minutes.
Waters was staring at him hard, as if what Jonah had said was something he’d never once considered, yet something that could be very true. Or at least that’s what his facial expression looked like. I was really hoping I was wrong.
“There was a girl here, the other night. When we first noticed there was something going on over at the prison,” Michael mumbled almost as an afterthought. He rubbed his chin and then looked over at Waters, telling the man the little girl’s name and the names of her parents.
“Yes, I remember those folks. No, they were fine when they left us. All of them. They were healthy, the last time I saw them. No infected were among that shipment. Strictly healthy people.”
Michael seemed to clench his entire body; his hand froze on his chin and he stared at Waters.
“How long ago was that?”
“Two weeks.”
“When was the last time you had contact with the CC?”
Waters’ eyes widened just slightly, barely enough to be noticed.
“The night of your last mission. The day your people found the cannibal camp. Everything was fine. They were secure. The only thing we discussed was ‘low shipment numbers’ and how they needed more…” His throat seemed to close up before he could finish.
“I think that settles it then.”
Michael’s voice had dropped to a hoarse whisper. He had basically laid it all out for us.
I was sweating bullets, a hundred thoughts barreling through my mind. What were those bastards doing downstate with people, with healthy, uninfected people? My mind reeled, fighting not to believe it. At the same time, trying to make sense of it. Were they trying to create a cure?
A large bonfire of bodies burned high outside in the middle of the old pasture field. I turned in my seat to watch it out the window, not wanting the others to see the tears that had welled up in my eyes. Waters’ men were standing around the fire, keeping an eye on it. There were a few sitting on the wall, the large spotlights on top of the club lighting up the area beyond them. It was incredibly late, well past bedtime. Though we were all in serious need of sleep, the chances of that happening now were slim to none. Not after this. Not after figuring out the truth, even if it was only bits and pieces of the whole. Inside, everyone around the table had slumped back in their seats. Fear and anger radiated off all of us like heat from a stove.
Well, everyone except Jake. He was still leaned forward, his eyes darting around the room, his trademark impatience eating him up inside.
“Wait, what have we settled?”
Waters leaned toward Michael. “I’ll contact my counterparts in the other three districts in the morning. See what I can find out about this.”
“You and your men are welcome to stay here for the night. I say we all get some sleep.” Before Michael could assign any of us to watch duty, Waters beat him to it.
“I’ll rotate my men. Get some fresh eyes over here. They’ll keep watch. You folks get some sleep. If you would?” Waters asked, gesturing toward the dining room door and the staircase leading upstairs.
“Yeah, sure. There’re plenty of guest rooms. Come on,” Michael said, scooting back from the table and standing slowly.
This was our cue to leave as well; we silently shuffled out and upstairs. Waters spoke on his hand-held with one of his men outside, issuing orders and informing them of the situation. Then Michael led him upstairs to one of the empty rooms at the end of the hallway.
Meanwhile, I put a leash on a very pissed off Gus and took him outside, Mia and Jake right on my heels. We stood in the grass, letting Gus do his business and sharing a smoke between the three of us. We stared at the huge fire, still able to make out body parts as the flames snapped and crackled. The smell was horrendous, but we didn’t seem to care. I think we were trying to pick out Nancy’s remains from the burning mess. It kept our minds off of what Michael and Waters had said, and what would most likely need to be done in the coming days.
I blinked my eyes, which were beginning to sting after staring at the bright fire, tugged on Gus’ leash, and headed back inside. Jake locked the door behind us and followed along upstairs. I had a feeling those two wouldn’t be sleeping in their own rooms, and it turns out I was right. After showering up in their own rooms, Jake and Mia tiptoed back to mine, meeting outside in the hallway and pecking on my door. Already in my pajamas, I opened the bedroom door without a word and jerked my chin toward the bed, rolling my eyes as Gus made room for them.
“You guys are like a couple of eight year olds, you know that?” I elbowed and shoved my way back under the covers.
“Eww, damnit, Jake. Get your pickle off my hip,” Mia complained, scooting away from Jake and crowding me damn near off the bed.
“Hey, least he’s got shorts on this time. Dude usually sleeps naked. And scoot the hell over, Mia, before I fall off,” I said, elbowing her again. She grumbled and Jake laughed.
“How do you know I sleep naked?” He tossed and turned for a minute before finally rolling over and throwing his arm across Mia, his hand searching until it found mine.
“Oh, and Mia,” he whispered, “If you feel somethin’ pokin’ ya in the mornin’, just remember: it’s not me, it’s Gus.”
Gus stretched and pressed his underside against Mia’s leg for added effect.
She jabbed Jake again; he laughed, she cussed, and it went on and on for several minutes. Finally I cleared my throat and squeezed Jake’s hand.
“Kids, shut up and go to sleep or I’ll whoop both your asses.”
“G’night, Ma,” Jake whispered.
“G’night, John-boy. G’night, Mary Ellen,” I replied. “Now, shut up.”
A few more snickers and a grunt from Gus, then we drifted off to sleep faster than I’d thought we would. For the first time in months I slept through the night, no night terrors and no screaming in my sleep.
November 20th
“Mom,” a boy in his late teens whispered.
The woman next to him didn’t move or even flinch. She was middle-aged, good looking by most standards. After months spent inside the Cage, she barely resembled the woman the young man called his mother.
“Mom,” he said again, more persistently.
His eyes darted to the outside of the fence; the guards were busy jacking their jaws and smoking cigarettes. The boy jabbed his mom with an elbow to the ribs. She sucked in a breath and turned her head to stare at him.
“What?” she hissed.
Liz Stratford had always been a strict mother. Disobedience and unruly behavior had always been stomped flat in her house. She loved her children, make no mistake. But all three would agree: Mom had been the drill-sergeant, Dad had been the teddy bear.
Her son averted his eyes, knowing the look she was giving him.
Fat chance of a lecture in this hellhole, Mom
, he thought, knowing they had to remain quiet unless they wanted the guards to come down on their heads.
“I’m hungry and I need to piss,” he whispered in reply.
“Language,” she said in a low voice.
The boy bit his lip and sighed, then mumbled an apology. Liz shifted her body, scooting up and pressing her back against the chain link that surrounded them. Her hand found his and squeezed.
“You’ll just have to hold it until the next rotation. You know that’s when they feed us and let us use the restrooms,” she reminded him, her voice more soothing than before. Her son’s eyes locked onto hers. Liz was startled to see such naked sadness in them. Was her son giving up?
“We’ll make it through this, Ryan. We will. Just hold on a little while longer.”
“Where’s Dad?” Ryan asked after a moment.
He wasn’t crying, wasn’t getting loud. It was just the look in his eyes. He was breaking, and Liz knew it. She turned to completely face him, taking both his hands in hers, ignoring the stares from the others around them.
“Listen to me. Dad is okay. If he wasn’t, we’d have seen him already, right?” she said, referring to the laboratory down the corridor to their left.
The miserable damnations the scientists created were always marched right past them, from the lab to the facility’s exit. She guessed it was to study their reactions. Not the living people in the cage, but the dead people walking by. The reason she thought this was based on the ever-decreasing aggression she’d been seeing from those groups. At first, they’d leapt at the fence, snarling and growling, having to be beaten down by the guards, or shot outright. As time went on, each group was less and less hostile. The last group that had been released hadn’t even paid the prisoners any attention at all.