Part 25 (2/2)
The generals looked at each other, seemingly agreeing that this was a good plan. Blue s.h.i.+rt and the woman lurched out the door, and into the crowd of waiting infected patients that were constantly congregating around Bal Shem's trailer.
Bal Shem watched Blue s.h.i.+rt drive the Jeep toward the county road. Blue s.h.i.+rt was the best driver. He remembered how to operate vehicles. The Jeep swerved, narrowly missing a fence post, but continued along the road until out of sight. Bal Shem turned toward the remaining generals.
”The food is being delivered to the barn and the tents?” he asked.
”Yes. We've done everything like you told us to do.” An infected named Joe answered.
Bal Shem gave him a satisfied smile. ”Good. All of you are doing very good.”
Joe snickered nervously, but pleased. ”Can the girl touch me?”
A scowl replaced Bal Shem's smile. ”No, you idiot. Woman just told us the girl needs sleep. She'll touch us later. Find her the cans she liked.”
”Peaches,” Joe said, and left the trailer in search of the fruit.
Rubbing his temples, Bal Shem tried to focus. As the days progressed, the pain intensified. Selah's touch lost its potency and he needed her more often. Without her regenerative touch, his mental skills faded. He forgot more. He grew angrier and less competent. As long as she routinely touched him, he could function on an almost normal level. The others improved as well, none quite as lucid as he became, but close to it. But their constant demands were sapping her powers.
His brain ached. Pounding. Pounding. Pounding with the reverberation of a surging ache, like a hangover on a hot day. He could feel the bones of his skull vibrating.
His headache was intensified by a female scream outside.
He staggered out onto the steps.
There was a loud argument in front of the barn to the right of the clinic trailer. The barn behind the clinic trailer was in bad condition. They rarely used it for anything, but the larger barn now housed some of the healthy upon which they fed. The voices grew louder. Bal Shem spotted three infected patients who held a healthy woman against the barn door.
Two other infected men grunted at the three aggressors. Joe appeared from the storage shed, anger in his voice as he ordered the trio holding the loud woman, Evelyn - Bal Shem remembered her name because she'd caused problems before - to let her go. Unauthorized consumption of the healthy was forbidden.
Two of the infected balked at the order and moved closer to bite the screaming woman. Joe cursed. ”Let her go!”
This kind of behavior was expected from the feral infected, but those identified as such were kept on the other side of the camp now. Bal Shem frowned. Maybe more are deteriorating. Growing worse, he thought. He watched as Joe finally pulled a gun from his waistband and shot the two troublemakers. The gun reports snapped the air and echoed across the farm. The headshots jerked their necks. Their bodies fell to the dirt, and the woman shrieked, running into the barn.
Joe ordered the bodies delivered to the feral quarter. If the bodies were not too ravaged, the feral would eat their own kind if they couldn't find a healthy person. Joe gestured wildly to the pair who were supposed to be guarding the barn and then, leaning over, picked up the bag he'd discarded beside a water station. Joe delivered the bag of canned peaches to Bal Shem, then left for the feral quarters to make sure the bodies were disposed of properly.
Bal Shem took the peaches inside. Slowly, he opened a can and plopped the golden fruit into a plastic pink bedpan. He would give the peaches to the girl when she awoke.
He gently opened the door to the closet, careful to keep the light from s.h.i.+ning on the face of the sleeping child. Selah's chest rose and fell weakly with each breath. Bal Shem was relieved to see she still had life in her.
”Sleep, little one. Sleep.”
He closed the door with a quiet click, fighting the urge to yank it open and touch the flesh of the girl and stop the pounding hammers that tortured his sick mind.
CHAPTER 38.
”Oh, that had to hurt,” Private Abbott said, laughing, as they watched the Jeep on the road in front of them dip into a ma.s.sive crater pa.s.sing for a pothole. Metal shrieked against asphalt, and the Jeep bounced back onto the road.
Dr. Robbins rode in the first Jeep with Private Brooks and crates of supplies. Dejah, Shaun, and David rode in the vehicle behind them, every muscle in her neck and jaws clenched with nervous antic.i.p.ation of what they'd find at the camp, and a nearer dread that they'd end up on their roof in the field. To describe the county road they were on as ”poorly maintained” would have given it too much credit. The Jeeps b.u.mped and bounced over crater-like potholes, washboards, and deep cracks in the earth that looked deep enough to die in. On a normal day, she figured the road only saw action from tractors and a battered pick-up or two, if that. Dejah clung to the side of the door, cold air freezing her face and ears.
”I wish I had a hat!” she shouted over the din of the Jeep. David and Shaun concurred.
”Cold fall this year,” Private Abbott said. The Jeep swerved to avoid the jagged pothole encountered by the vehicle of Dr. Robbins and Private Brooks.
Dejah let her mind wander to fall, to this autumn that was like no autumn that had ever come before. No harvest parties, no fall festivals, no beer sampling or human-sized turkey legs at the various Octoberfests. No, this autumn had only seen the arrival of destruction and death. Halloween was a complete bust, unless you considered the real life walking zombies a plus. She watched the trees whiz past as they drove along: oaks of all variations, southern pines, cypress trees - the greens just hinting at a fade to brown.
The Jeep ahead slowed to a stop, and Private Abbott braked. Abbott s.h.i.+fted into park and got out, walking to the driver's side beside Brooks.
”What's the problem?” Abbott asked. Brooks had turned off his Jeep.
”Right front tire is flat. Didn't you see it?”
Abbott crossed in front of the vehicle, and looked at the tire on the front pa.s.senger side. A large two-p.r.o.nged harvester blade protruded from the black rubber like fangs ripped from a giant mechanical vampire bat.
”d.a.m.n. Looks like a blade off an old combine.”
Brooks got out of the Jeep. Abbott frowned at the destroyed tire some more. Then he glanced at Dr. Robbins. ”This won't be a problem, doctor. We'll have the tire changed in a matter of minutes.”
David leapt from the Jeep and approached the soldiers who were removing the spare tire from the back of the vehicle. ”A few minutes are all these b.a.s.t.a.r.ds need to find and swarm us, gentlemen.”
”He's right.” Brooks nodded. ”Abbott stand guard, I'll change the tire.”
”I'll help,” Dr. Robbins seized the jack, and started back around to the front. David joined him.
Dejah and Shaun sat nervously in the car, scanning the dense trees for signs of threatening movement. The wind blew deadfall and dried leaves in whirlwinds of brown and black around the tree trunks, forming strange patterns that seemed suspicious at first glance.
”I wish they'd hurry,” Dejah said to Shaun, her voice low.
Shaun rubbed his arms fretfully. He knew as well as she did they were sitting ducks out here on the road. There was nothing else out here aside from them and trees, and a few abandoned trailers set back in the woods here and there. ”You want me to go see if they need any help?”
”No, we should stay out of the way.”
”Did you see my new boots?” Shaun pointed to his black-booted feet. ”Genuine Army issue. Courtesy of the U.S. government.” He grinned and gave her a thumbs-up. Dejah looked down at his s.h.i.+ning boots and smiled with him, nodding appreciatively.
Gunshots ripped the air. Dejah reflexively jumped at the noise. Shaun dove onto the floorboard, hands over his head, as if the sky would collapse. The gunfire continued. The M-16 in Private Brooks's hand spat lead into the treeline several yards from the road. The rifle reports echoed.
”Oh, s.h.i.+t,” Dejah said. ”Stay down, Shaun.”
David ran toward her and the Jeep.
”Start the Jeep,” he yelled. Abbott ran behind him. Dejah climbed over from the back seat and turned the key. The engine fired up. Abbott and David reached the vehicle at the same time and scrambled in. Dejah jumped out of their way into the back seat to make room.
<script>