Enduring Armageddon (22 page)

“Yeah, that happened where we lived before too,” I replied.

“Yes sir, so we’ve got no radios and not very many travelers, so anything you can give us about the state of affairs in America will be more than enough payment for a night or two.”

I weighed my options. We could continue traveling and hope to find a house or barn to shelter in for the night or we could stay here and get some much-needed rest. The people in the room seemed expectant, but I wasn’t sure if they were thirsty for knowledge or something else. I hated that I had to second guess these people’s motives, but that’s where we were now.

“Alright, I’ll go get my friends out of the cold,” I said. “We can tell you what we’ve seen during our trip from Illinois, but we haven’t really talked to many people. It’s more dangerous than you’d imagine out there.”

“Oh, I don’t know. I can imagine a lot,” Jasper said. “Every couple of days or so, we get these extremely dangerous people wandering up to our building. Damnedest things you ever saw. There’s no talking with them and they’re so violent that, unfortunately, the only thing we can do is to put ‘em down.”

“I know exactly what you’re talking about. They’re everywhere. More the closer you get to the cities that were nuked. My group doesn’t know where they came from, but it’s a death sentence for your people if you let one of them near you.”

“Oh, we know. One of them bastards tore poor Chris Hayden apart before we knew what to do with ‘em,” Monica called out from the couch.

“Well, if one of them bites you, you end up catching whatever they’ve got and turn crazy too,” I replied.

“See that? You’ve already earned yourself a night of rest,” Jasper said. “That is very important news that we didn’t know!” He clapped me on the shoulder appreciatively. “Go get your family before it gets too dark and one of those things comes around. We see more of them at night than any other time, but if we stay quiet, they usually pass us by.”

“Yeah, we know. We’ve had quite a few run-ins with those things…” I trailed off as I got lost in my unpleasant memories for a moment.

“Well, we can talk about it in a little bit. Go get those people, we’ll make sure a few rooms are ready for you as close to the lobby’s heat as possible,” Jasper said.

I nodded and replaced my mask, hood and then my gloves. I hoped that I made the right choice bringing everyone into the hotel.

* * *

After the introductions were made, we secured our gear in two rooms. Each room had a non-functioning electronic lock and a regular metal key. Jasper stated that there were only two keys per room and gave us one of them so we wouldn’t worry about anyone coming in our rooms. Sam stayed with Jesse and Trisha while Jordyn and Jackson stayed in our room. The water didn’t work, but Jasper showed Jesse and me where the buckets were for collecting snow that could be boiled and used for bathing or drinking.

Everyone was cleaned up within the hour and we reconvened in the lobby where the teenagers went off to the side to play with the hotel’s children. The adults settled in as best we could on the couches and some folding chairs that were brought in from the hotel’s banquet hall. Mark was absent from the group, but Jasper said that he went to the roof at night with one of the other men so they could watch for the creatures.

“Welcome to Seminole, Oklahoma!” Jasper said to our little group after we were finally settled. “We’re stuck here where not many people come through off of Interstate 40, how’d y’all happen to come this way since you’re coming from Illinois?”

“Well, sir, we…”

“Please, son, call me Jasper.”

“Alright, Jasper,” Jesse continued. “We followed I-44 southwest for a ways, but we had to veer south down back roads to get past Springfield, Missouri because it got nuked. We linked back up with the 44 somewhere near Vinita, but before we’d gone very far, we had to move off the road again because that led right into a nuclear Tulsa. We worked our way south and west around the city and eventually came to I-40 and lost our vehicle near that big lake.”

“Once we were on foot, it didn’t make any sense to stick to the bigger roads,” I said while I scratched idly at the newly formed scar tissue where my pinkie used to be. “There were way too many people on the road. All those people just attracted more of the zombies and scavengers, so we shot off south and picked up the little side road that brought us here.”

“Well, when you take off again, you’ll have to thread the needle between OKC and Dallas. Both of them got hit pretty hard we’ve been told by travelers going the opposite direction that you folks are headed,” Jasper said.

“Thanks for that. We might have drifted further south towards Dallas, but we’ll be sure to steer clear now,” Jesse said.

“Alright, that covers how you got here, how do you guys know so much about the creatures?”

“We’ve been dealing with them since a week or two after the bombs went off,” Jesse replied. “We were about forty-five miles north of St. Louis, so they’ve been a constant thorn in our side.”

“Are they zombies?” Rick, a retired sheriff’s deputy from Georgia, asked.

“No. Well, I don’t know. What’s a zombie?” I asked rhetorically. “I mean, they’re not undead because you can kill ‘em, but they sure don’t give a shit about pain. We think that they’re so mutated from radiation that they’ve just gone crazy and want to kill everything in sight.”

“Okay, pass along all the info you’ve got. Pretend we haven’t dealt with these things at all, maybe you’ll give us some info on how to stop them,” Jasper said.

“Let’s see. We know that they were normal people before the apocalypse, so they aren’t like an alien or something. I can’t guarantee it, but I’d bet they’re hot as hell… I mean they probably give off radiation so you’ll want to ensure that you don’t have skin-to-skin contact with them. I think they come from the cities that were hit. They weren’t consumed by the fires, but were changed somehow. They’re not necessarily stronger than a normal person, but once they get their mind set on something, the only way we’ve found to stop them is to kill them.

“To do that, they can absorb a lot of rounds. Think about all the news stories you used to see in the 1980s about PCP addicts. They’d get shot seven or eight times by the police and still keep coming. It’s the same with these things. The only way to put them down quickly is to give them a fatal blow to the brain or heart…” I paused as I thought for a moment. “Actually, I slit one’s throat open and it bled out very quickly and died. I’ve also choked one to death. We’ve had a bunch of them die slowly from blood loss, but they continued to be dangerous until their heart finally stopped.”

“Geezus! How many of these things have you dealt with?” Monica asked in amazement.

“Between Jesse and myself, easily over a hundred of them,” I replied to a general gasp of surprise.

“We’ve seen less than ten. I had no idea that there were that many of them,” Jasper muttered. “What the hell are you guys, Special Forces or something?”

I chuckled and said, “No, I was a mutual fund salesman.”

“I delivered the big containers of water to office buildings so people could gather around the water cooler and talk about last night’s episode of whatever,” Jesse said.

“In Virden, where we ended up for a few months before going on the road, we were part of a gathering force that went out and collected food and supplies from abandoned warehouses,” I explained with only a slightly modified version of the truth. “So, as you’d guess, we ran into a lot of things while we were running around near St. Louis and Chicago.”

“Hmmm, I bet you ran into a lot of other things as well,” Jasper replied. Again, he was more observant about what was left unsaid than he should have been.

“Yeah, well we did what we needed to do in order to survive,” Jesse stated.

“Hey, calm down, big fella. I ain’t saying anything negative about what you did or didn’t do. I’m just pointing out that I’m sure you saw a lot of action up in Illinois. What caused you to leave?” he asked, turning back to me.

“We decided it was time to go,” I said as I stared him dead in the eyes.

“Bullshit! Virden got wiped out by a bigger, meaner bunch than we were and we barely escaped!” Sam burst out. “I’m sorry, Chuck, you’re awesome, but if they’re looking for info, you’ve got to tell them the truth. That Allan fucked up and tried to attack a city full of crazies.”

I shook my head slowly and thought about what the hell I’d have to say to the kid later. Out loud I said, “Yeah, Sam’s right. The town’s leader decided that the city of Springfield, Illinois had resources that we needed and sent us there to get them. We went into the city with almost three thousand people. Four survived that I know of.”

Everyone in the room stared at Jesse and I in shock. Finally, Rick spoke up and said, “Four people? That’s it? What the hell happened?”

“They were waiting for us. There was a traitor that told them we were coming. She has a special hatred for Chuck, so it was imperative that we get out of Illinois ‘cause she’d just hunt him down,” Jesse said.

“What the hell happened up there? Armies of people, American citizens, fighting one another over food. Maybe you all went crazy up there,” Jasper said.

I bristled for a moment and then relaxed and placed a hand on Jesse’s knee to let him know it was alright. “Maybe we did,” I agreed. “Not everyone was a willing participant, but it was definitely madness. It makes me glad to hear that everywhere isn’t like it was up north. Maybe there were just too many survivors competing for the same resources. Or maybe the survivors let madmen be in charge and we let the events overwhelm us. I just hope that we find more people like you folks as we move further south.”

“Well, I appreciate that, but we ain’t nothing special,” Jasper replied. He held up a finger and began counting off points. “So, one, don’t go north! Two, the creatures can be killed just like you and me, but if it’s not a catastrophic wound, they can take a lot of damage. And three, your friend over there probably shouldn’t be allowed into meetings where you guys are trying to keep personal details quiet. No offense, sweetie.”

“Oh. My. God. You don’t know me!” Sam exclaimed as she stormed out of the room.

“Sam, wait!” Rebecca called after her. She pushed herself up and said, “I’ll go talk to her.”

“Okay,” I nodded. “Stay away from any windows.”

I looked back at Jasper and continued, “That reminds me. How secure is the hotel from attack?”

“None of the windows in the rooms open up, so we’re okay there. We’ve also locked and blocked off all doors except the front ones there,” Jasper pointed to the glass doors. “We keep them open during the day, but it’s all locked up at night. And there’s our emergency exit in the back. That one’s locked and covered up with piled snow from the outside so it doesn’t really stand out as an obvious door.”

“Okay, that’s good,” I replied. “I’m not sure how smart the zombies are, but you might want to reexamine it to ensure that people like us who are moving south don’t discover it. The creatures are dangerous, but they’re manageable, it’s the people you really have to worry about.”

“But we want people to know that we’re here. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have found you or your group, and you’ve been such a wonderful addition,” Monica said.

“No, I think I understand what he’s saying, dear,” Jasper replied for me. “Besides the occasional creature, we haven’t witnessed anything like what Chuck and Jesse have mentioned. Sure, there’s been some stealing, but it seems almost impossible to us that these large-scale wars over food would happen. We’re still viewing this place as America. It’s not like that anymore.”

“Yeah, that’s really it,” I agreed. “Right now, there is no United States. There are a bunch of tiny independent islands in the sea of anarchy. Maybe in the future we can advance and grow to larger communities, then counties, states, regions and so on.”

“Given what we’ve seen, that’s a long way off though. We don’t mean to rain on your parade here guys, but things are probably going to get worse before they get better,” Jesse said to a frightened room. “It’s great what you’re doing here, but it’s also really risky and I worry about your safety. Especially if people discover that you have food.”

“You’re right, Jesse,” Jasper agreed. “I wish you weren’t, but the more of your story that I hear, the more I realize that we’ve been going about this the wrong way.”

“So you’re saying that we’re just gonna sit tight and not have any more communications with anyone from the outside world? That’s a little harsh and I don’t know if that’s what we signed up for when we agreed to stay here,” Rick said.

“I know, Rick. It’s something that we’ll have to vote on, but these folks have seen what’s out there. They know…” The sound of a muffled rifle’s report cut Jasper off.

“Looks like Mark got another one. He’s an expert marksman,” Jasper continued. “Anyways, Rick, these folks…”

“Wait a minute,” I cut in. “Mark is up on the roof
shooting
them? Haven’t you heard anything that we’ve said? Those things are attracted to noise. The more you make, the faster they come.”

“That’s what we’ve done every time after the first two came along. It’s easier to just shoot them before they get up close,” Rick said.

“Shit. I’ll go up and stop him,” Jesse said as he trotted towards the stairs.

“The sound of a rifle travels for miles. If there are any of those things around, they’ll be headed this way,” I said.

“Well, then we can just shoot ‘em and clean up the mess in the morning like we’ve done before,” Monica said as she continued to knit.

“I’m sorry, but you guys don’t get it,” I said. “You’ve been extremely lucky so far that this place hasn’t been overrun by the infected or attacked by scavengers. If onsies and twosies of these things have found their way here, you can bet there are more out there.”

Mark fired his rifle again. I stood up and rushed to the glass doors and shook them gently. “We need to block these off better than just a lock. I think we’ve got some more of these things coming this way.”

The hotel’s residents looked back and forth at each other for a moment and then they got up and started moving furniture and objects around. The easiest thing was the concierge desk since it was on wheels. It took a little more effort to flip the heavy bastard, but we eventually got it in place, blocking little over half of the doorway. The rifle fired three or four more times and I wondered what in the hell was taking Jesse so long to get him to stop.