The Returners (12 page)

"I know what you mean, that's how I feel about Joe. I've had feelings for him for a while and I know he's had them for me, even though we'd never told each other. My father would have never allowed it." She looked back at Jessica as she continued to peel potatoes.

"I'm sorry." Jessica was sympathetic to Briella's situation. It must have been hard not being able to tell someone you cared for them.

"Don't be, my father was a controlling, abusive asshole. I know it’s a rotten thing to say, but I'm glad he's dead. I feel like I can be me for the first time in a long time." Briella finished peeling the last of the potatoes and dropped them into the pot they were using for cooking.

Jessica didn't know what to say about Briella's last comment. The amount of anger in the girls voice was unsettling. Briella could tell it had made her uncomfortable so she didn't say anything else. Jessica took the pot and walked to the fire where Joe was standing and feeding the fire small twigs to keep it burning hot. He was doing this because he didn't want it getting too big. Even though they were in a sheltered area, they didn't want to chance having the fire draw attention. So they were keeping it small, just big enough to cook on and provide them a little heat.

"How's everything going over here Joe?" Jessica asked as she placed the pot on the spit over the fire.

"Pretty good...glad the fire took. The wood around here's pretty damp, but it’s useable," Joe said as he fed another stick to the fire.

"That's good. Briella seems like a nice girl." Jessica felt the need to make some small talk with Joe. It was her way of making up and apologizing for her cold reaction to him this morning.

"Yeah she's amazing, she's kind of quiet most of the time, but she's had it hard. Maybe harder than the rest of us, her father didn't make it easy on her ya’ know?"

"Yeah I got that impression from the little bit she's said about him." She looked up to see Briella, Jacob and Emily walking towards them. Emily was holding a long narrow fish in her hands.

"Mom! Look what I caught." Emily's face was beaming with excitement as she proudly showed her mother the fish she'd caught.

"Great job kiddo, what kind of fish is it?" Jessica asked.

"Jacob said it’s a pickerel." She hoped she had said it right, it was a hard word for her to enunciate.

"Are they any good to eat?" Jessica asked as she looked at the fish. It was greenish in color with lines on it in a chain link fence pattern.

"Yep, they aren't bad, a bit bony, but if I fillet it out it wont be too bad." Jacob took the fish from Emily. "I'll show you how to clean it and fillet it Emily." The two of them went to the edge of the water so he could show her the proper way to take care of the fish. The others finished getting the food prepared.

"Well ladies, looks like we've got fish with our potatoes tonight. A little fish chowder is alright by me," Joe said as he stood up.

Briella chuckled. "Thank God for beginners luck."

Joe and Jessica both laughed at the comment as the three of them stood around the fire waiting for Emily and Jacob. They soon came back with two fillets.

"Put em' in the pot with the potatoes Emily," Briella said as she stirred the potatoes.

Emily put them in and then sat down on the ground by the fire. The rest of the group soon did the same, waiting for the meal to finish cooking. The sound of the creatures of the night began to slowly fill the air, and soon it echoed with their song. Any other time, any other place this would have been a perfect family camping trip. Tonight it was just another piece in the puzzle of survival.

Chris Dodge lay awake in bed, going over the talk he and a few other folks had earlier. They decided Ray and the others had either been overrun by a horde of Returners or came up against some bad luck. If they hadn't come back by morning a small search party would be sent out. It was in the best interest of the community, especially if there was some sort of threat they needed to know about. One way or the other they needed to know what happened to the group.

Tonight they were taking extra precautions, putting two extra people on guard duty. Something about the whole situation wasn't sitting right with him, the biggest thing was Briella missing. That was the part he couldn't figure out as his mind went over different scenarios of what might have happened. None of what he came up with made a lot of sense. Maybe he was just being paranoid and letting his imagination get the best of him. Although in a world where the dead were returning to life anything was possible.

Even with everything going through his mind his eyes began to get heavy. Despite his best efforts he was soon unable to fight sleep any longer and it welcomed him into its embrace, wrapping warm comforting arms around him.

********

The air was exceptionally cool this morning as the group lay huddled close to the small fire. Briella and Jacob were both awake, taking their turn on watch. They sat a short distance from the others so they could talk if they wished, but so far the conversation had been kept to a bare minimum. Each of them seemed to be taking time to let recent events filter through their mind. Everything had happened so fast they hadn't taken any time to absorb the situation, or what may lay ahead of them. The plan was decent enough, but what were they actually going to find themselves up against?

Jacob stood and stretched, his arms and legs stiff from all the walking. The traveling between the camps and then back to the cabin, plus what they'd done so far on this trip had caught up with him. Briella walked over to the fire which had begun to die down and placed more wood on it, poking at it with a stick to stir up some of the coals.

"How's the fire looking anyways? Is it salvageable?" Jacob asked in a whispered voice, trying his best to not speak loudly and wake the others.

Briella walked back over to where Jacob was standing. "It's not bad, the coals are nice and hot and throwing off a lot of heat. I put just enough wood on there to keep the fire from going out completely."  

It was small talk, but it was a positive step in breaking some of the shyness she'd had around these new people. She had always found it difficult to talk to men. Her father always made her feel uncomfortable when she did, like she was some kind of cheap whore. So she'd always limited what she said to them at the camp, usually only what was necessary.

It was one of the many things her father had done that beat down her self esteem. Honestly if it hadn't been for her mother and brothers she probably wouldn't have survived childhood. So many times she'd thought about ending her life, but the thought of them kept her from doing so. Now they were gone and so was the man who had caused all of that pain.

"That's good, we'll probably head out as soon as everyone's up and ready. We've got enough food left in the pot from last night so everyone can at least have something for breakfast. We should make good progress as long as we get a good jump on the day. The sky looks all right right now, but looks like storm clouds might be coming in. Could make for some hard traveling if it starts to pour later." Jacob pointed off to the west where the clouds were dark and thick and slowly moving in their direction.

"Getting an early start would probably be a good idea." Briella agreed with what he was saying about the travel. These woods could be treacherous when they were wet and adverse weather would slow them down. "Why don't we get everyone up then?"

"Why don't you wake them, I want to go down to the pond and see if those lines I put out last night have anything on 'em. I'll be close enough so you can see me in case anything happens."

"I can do that, maybe we'll get lucky and have some more fish to cook up or take with us." Briella responded to Jacob as she walked towards the group to wake them. 

Jacob turned and headed to three lines he had tossed out last night. It was the way he had learned to fish for eels as a kid. It was a simple and very effective method. Something his uncle Brian had taught him how to do. Uncle Brian would sell the eels he caught to people who liked to eat them or use them for bait. He'd always thought it was weird, but people liked them. Besides eels they often would catch bass, horn-pout and other fish, so he figured it was worth a shot throwing out a few lines overnight.

The first line he pulled in had nothing on it. He wrapped the line up around the stick he'd used and set it on the ground beside him. Grabbing the second line he could feel something tugging on the other end and it felt fairly big. Excitedly he pulled the line in, curious about what type of fish he'd caught. As the line got closer, something didn't look right.

It wasn't until it was up to the shore that he realized what was on the end of the line. It was the top portion of a body that had reanimated, it looked as if it had been cleaved in half just below the upper portion of the chest. One arm was partially missing, the face mangled and the flesh half rotted off. Even in its advanced stages of decay you could make out its features and tell it had once been a man.

He had seen and done some gruesome things since all this had started, but something about this made him sick to his stomach. The sounds of the group beginning to move around the campsite now began to fill the air.

"Joe! Can you come over here?" Jacob hollered, hoping Joe was awake.

Joe had just stood up and was going to walk away from the campsite to do his business when he heard Jacobs holler and immediately headed toward him. 

"Be right there," Joe said as he began to approach Jacob. He could see he was visibly upset. "What's wrong?"

Jacob pointed to the reanimated corpse on the end of the fishing line. Joe’s jaw dropped, he hadn't seen anything like this before. This was messed up on so many levels, even for these days. Not only was it messed up, but it was downright disturbing.

"What the fuck? That's really messed up. I'll take care of it for you man," Joe said. He could tell something about this really bothered Jacob. He didn't doubt Jacob could do it if he needed to, but felt it would make it easier on him if he did it.

"I would appreciate that." Jacob’s normally calm voice trembled a little as he spoke.

Joe pulled his hunting knife from its sheath and walked towards the corpse. He'd only taking a few steps towards the corpse when he stopped. A sense of dread filled him, and he felt like he was going to be sick. He recognized the Returners face.

"Jacob, I know this man."

Jacob was caught off guard, and wasn't sure he'd even heard him correctly at first. It wasn't something he expected to hear, that was for damn sure. "What was his name?"

"His name was Alex Drayton, he was Ray’s second in command for a long time. Him and Ray had am argument a few days before going out on a scouting mission. Just him, Ray and another fella by the name of Jason went. Can't remember Jason's last name, anyway, neither Alex or Jason came back. Ray told us they had run into a small horde of Returners and been caught off guard."

He paused for a moment, a bit of rage building up in his voice as he continued to look at the mutilated returned corpse of the man he had once known.

"I always thought there was something odd about the story, seeing we'd never seen any decent sized groups of them out here. Looks to me like he was cut in half."

He knelt beside the corpse and took a deep breath as he plunged the knife into the skull of what once was Alex Drayton. The Returner immediately stopped moving, with a quick motion he pulled his knife out, wiped it on the grass and returned it to its sheath. Standing up he turned and walked back towards Jacob. Standing in front of him he spoke,  his voice unsettled.

"That was the type of man Ray was Jacob, he was evil and cold. That's why at the cabin I couldn't let him hurt you, Emily or Jessica. He needed to be stopped." Joe pointed towards the corpse as he spoke, his voice trembling with anger.

"No point in dwelling on the past kid, what's done is done and we can't change it.  We can only make the best of today and tomorrow, you did what you had to do." What Joe was telling him now made him realize even more why he'd wanted to get Briella away from the situation she was in.

Joe knew what Jacob was getting at, the advice made perfect sense. Although it didn't completely erase the anger he was feeling right now. “Thanks man, you need help with anything else?”

"I should be all set, I'm going to finish taking care of the lines. Shouldn't take me long, I'll come back over when I finish up and we'll go over our plan for today." Jacob grabbed the line he hadn't pulled in yet and began to bring it in.

Joe nodded his head and headed back to the others who were now standing up and looking to where he and Jacob had just stood. 

“Nothing to worry about, all taken care of. Lets finish getting stuff ready to go.” There was no point in going into detail about what had just transpired, it was a moot point anyway.

It only took Jacob a few moments to finish wrapping up the lines. The third line he'd put out also didn't have anything on it, and in a weird way he was glad about that. Looking one last time down to the shore at the corpse, he shuddered. It was an image that wouldn't soon be forgotten. Grabbing the wrapped up lines from the ground he headed back to the others.

Everyone was up and were already eating the leftovers from last night. Emily held out a bowl for him, he wasn't hungry after what he'd just witnessed, but knew he needed to eat. Who knew when they might get another chance.

"Thanks Emily." He took the bowl, it was mostly just small parts of potato and a little bit of fish. It wasn't much, but was better than nothing at all. He took a few mouthfuls of food and drank down the broth. The others were still eating so this was a good time to lay out the plan for today.

"Everyone, this is what's going on today unless anyone has any objections or ideas how we should go about this." He waited for moment to see if anyone had anything to say, and then began to speak again.

"There should be an old logging road about ten or twelve miles from here. We should be able to make that today, from there it's about fifteen miles into Greenstone. I'm not sure what's out on that road, so I want to make sure we're careful once we get near it. I think other people had the same idea as us, and I don't think many of them were as lucky as we were. There may be a lot of Returners out there, there might be none, but we need to be careful. Anyone have any questions or suggestions?"

No one said anything for a moment and Jacob looked like he was going to start to speak again when Jessica spoke up.

"If we can find a car when we get out to the road do you think that's a safe option?" 

That was a good question, one Jacob hadn't really though about. "I hadn't really thought about that to be honest. I guess that's a call we'll have to make when the situation arises. For now lets finish eating and getting our stuff ready. If we're going to make the road today we've got to leave fairly soon." 

It didn't take them long to finish eating and get the camp packed up. Most of them had been on the move more than once over the last few years. Packing up and moving in a hurry came back to them pretty quickly. It only took half an hour before the group was ready and on the move.

Jacob was the last one in line while Joe took the lead. Before moving he stood and took one final look at the pond and what remained of the corpse of Alex Drayton.

"Hurry up," Emily shouted, her voice snapping him back to into reality.

“Coming.” With a shudder he turned back towards the group and hurried to catch up with them.

********

Chris Dodge was up before the first light of morning. His sleep had been restless and he didn't feel like trying to fight it any longer. He sat on the porch of Ray and Briella's camp with a cup of coffee in his hand. It was one luxury he still enjoyed every day and one thing he was lucky there was still an ample supply of here. The camp was silent and there was no sign of any movement around the pond. 

He saw the two others that would join him on the search walking towards him. Figuring there was no point in waiting around on the porch any longer, he got up and headed to meet them.

The two men could see Chris walking towards them, he was an intimidating figure if you didn't know him. Standing over six feet tall with broad shoulders and a bit of beer belly. His gray ashen eyes always seemed cold and his balding head of hair gave him a wild and crazy look. Once you got to know Chris he was a good guy, loyal and always had your back, level headed and not usually one to go rushing into something without thinking it through. Though he could be a hot head when it came to protecting his friends.