The Plague Years (Book 1): Hell is Empty and All the Devils Are Here (23 page)

“You know, we talked about a shoot on sight order at work,” said Chad.

“We've been talking about it too at work. Some guys, they'll have no problem, me, I am not so sure. I haven't told anybody about this, but Amber asked me to shoot her if I couldn't cut her loose. I couldn't do it. I jeopardized my job and maybe the safety of the whole damn city because I couldn't ...”

“Enough,” said Chad abruptly. “You'd have to be super-human or maybe sub-human to do something like that. It's a quality that makes me think we did the right thing, you know, letting you in.”

The conversation halted as they got to the door of the garage. They found Amber sitting on a lawn chair with Fiona, perhaps ten feet away. Fiona had her chess board and they were playing, with Amber calling her moves and Fiona moving the pieces. Dave had set up a table in the garage as well and he was ostensibly working on their groups motley collection of firearms. In reality, he was watching Amber and Fiona.

“This looks cozy,” said Chad with a smile.

“Hi Dad,” said Fiona, “She plays pretty good; I only have to spot her a knight!”

“That's better than me,” said Chad happily, then a little more seriously. “Amber, I need to ask you something.”

“It's ok,” said Amber resignedly. “I know I can't stay here. I am endangering everyone and ...”

“That's not it at all!” said Chris with alarm. “Chad has a little doo dah here that will check to see if you still have the disease. All he needs is a little bit of blood.”

“Ok, sure,” said Amber incredulously as she stuck her hand out.

“Um, I am afraid you are going to have to stick yourself,” said Chad uneasily, “To avoid the risk of infection ...”

“Give me that,” said Chis grabbing the finger prick and capillary tube and Amber's hand. “How much do you need?”

“Just a few drops,” said Chad.

“This is going to hurt you more than it hurts me,” said Chris with an impish grin as he stuck the end of her index finger.

“Ow!” exclaimed Amber as she involuntarily tried to pull away. “You should have warned me!”

“It was easier this way. Here Chad, do your magic,” said Chris handing the capillary tube.

Chad expelled the drops of blood into a test tube that already held a little distilled water and added a couple of drops of two different solutions from small squeeze bottles and swirled them for a moment. Then he held them up to a color chart.

“Well,” said Chris expectantly after what seemed an eternity. “What's it say?”

“Being as this is the first time I have done this test for real,” said Chad, “I was double checking but the light purple color leaves no doubt. She has the correct proteins in her blood stream. Sometimes, when someone's diet has been low on meat proteins, like a vegan or something, you can get a false positive but when the stuff is there it's certain that the disease is no longer there. You are clear, Amber.”  

“This is the strangest relationship I have ever had,” said Chris as he turned to face Amber who looked up into his eyes.

“Chad,” said Dave hyper-causally into the silence, “I've got a problem with the generator I need you to help me with.”

“The generator?” said Chad momentarily confused, “Oh … that generator.”

Chad and Dave headed for the door with Chad grabbing Fiona's hand.

“Come on squirt,” said Chad.

“I don't even know what a generator is,” said Fiona plaintively as she got up. Then she looked over at Amber who winked at her.

“Oh!” whispered Fiona. The she ran out the door to catch her dad.

May 23
rd
, Saturday, 1:49 pm PDT.

“It's my fault,” said Dave as they looked over the generator behind Dave's house that was clearly running flat out. “The fuel usage that is on the box gave consumption for average loads. With three freezers on the circuit along with everything else, the poor little generator is actually running beyond its rated capacity. Fuel consumption is about three times what I thought and we are consuming our own fuel now that the pressure is gone in the Avista gas lines.

With the power going in and out like this, the generator has to start and stop a lot. I have no clue how long it will go before it breaks down. I should have bought a bigger generator.”

“Don't worry about that.” said Chad. “You thought to buy one which is a win. We are all pitching as fast as we can, so what's in the freezers?” asked Chad.

“Lots of ham, bacon and such in mine,” said Dave. I think we can move most of that to the basement and keep it dark and cool for a while. Maybe we can put it all in coolers or wrapped in blankets. In one of yours, we have all the food salvaged from your wife's place of work. We have been eating primarily from that, but we still have 75% left. I don't know what is in your other freezer. The fridges also are putting a draw on the system. I suppose we will have to drink warm beer from here on out.”

“It’s not just the freezers you know,” said Mary. “The kids are listening to music, playing movies and computer games to keep from being bored. Frankly, Heather and I have encouraged it a bit when they don’t have that much work to do. Honestly, I have been doing it myself.”

“Well then I guess, if everyone is in agreement, we are going to have to restrict the use of electrical power,” said Chad. “The kids are going to get a little edgy though.”

“They will have to get used to it sooner or later. Unless things stabilize, we have two weeks of fuel at best.”

“OK, I get it,” said Chad. “Is there anything else we can do?”

“Well, I was a hospitality manager,” said Mary impishly. “Let's have a party and clear out the stuff from work! It's mainly appetizers and I have like a case of our low end wine that I grabbed because it was there. I think it would be a good thing and it will build our stock with the neighbors.”

“I am not so sure,” began Chad. “We have someone who is still technically a fugitive living here.”

“Actually, we can use it to legitimatize her being here,” said Dave. “It would also help getting the neighbors together as a neighborhood watch. We are probably going to need that now that the containment for the infected is gone and the cops are probably going to be doing less and less patrolling.”

“What if someone comes to the party who is infected?” asked Mary with a start. “I hadn’t thought about that. It’s not like we could just shoot them.”

“Dave has a bunch of wire and posts,” said Chad. “We can use the wire and such on the backyard. Hardening it up a little and have a reason to do it at the same time. If someone does show up that is infected, we close the gate.”

Dave looked over at Chad. He was behind Mary and out of her field of view. He very quietly shook his head and made a gun with his hand.

I think it’s a good idea,” said Dave knowingly. “It will help sort out the neighbors.”

May 23
rd
, Saturday, 3:02 pm PDT.

Fortifying the backyard took most of an afternoon. Dave tried to help, but his hip had not recovered so he had ended up just sitting on his patio, directing Connor, Heather, and the kids and fuming at his inability to help.

They had also spent time putting plywood and timber and all the masonry bits and pieces they could find around the lower level of the house hoping to keep bullets and shotgun pellets from carrying through as they had in the last attack. The walls weren’t pretty but they gave them three foot tall barriers to hide behind should they come under fire again.

After the yard was mostly prepared, Chad and Mary went together to all the houses in the surrounding area. Some, they avoided as they were boarded up or it appeared no one was home. When they range the bell at Christi Howeland’s house across the street, Amy came to the door. She only opened it a crack. It looked like she hadn’t slept in days and it was clear she had been crying.

“Amy, are you OK?” asked Mary with concern.

“Yes Mrs. Strickland, I am fine,” said Mary in a shaky voice. “I would like to come to your party if it’s OK. But Mom is … sick.”

“Amy, is this a cold or does she have the ‘Plague’?” asked Mary suddenly serious.

Before she could answer, there was a shot from the back bedroom. Amy bolted out of the door and into the street.

Chad drew his pistol and he and Mary went inside. They had known the Howelands since they moved into the neighborhood when Amy and Connor were three. Connor and Amy had played together on that first day they were in town, when Mary had gone over to the Howelands with a plate of cookies to welcome them to the neighborhood. They had grown up together and had been friends all through school. When Amy’s father had died in a car accident when Amy was thirteen, she had come to stay with the Strickland’s for a couple of weeks while Christi had recovered from her injuries from that same accident. That long friendship made Chad afraid of what he would find and afraid he would have to shoot a friend, but it didn’t work out that way.

When they entered the master bedroom, they found Christi, on the bed, dressed in her favorite tailored dress. He body showed the telltale marks of the disease but it was also apparent that she was quite dead. There was an old .38 special in her hand. She had clearly used it to end her life.

Dearest Amy

You have known for the last couple of days that I have been very sick. You have done a wonderful job taking care of me and hiding me to protect me from the world. But if you had kept taking care of me, you would eventually become infected. There were visions brought on by the Plague that would have put you in danger had I acted them out. I could no longer trust myself and I couldn’t convince you to call the authorities. But I am the parent, and so, as the disease progressed, I chose to protect you in the only way I could. Please, go and live with the Strickland’s. They are kind people and you and Connor have been friends your whole lives. I hope you will remember me kindly and that in time, the hurt from what I have done will pass.

Love

Mom

Chad and Mary looked at one another. The note was quite possibly contaminated so they left it where they found it without touching it. Mary snapped a picture of it with her cell phone to show Amy.

Outside, Connor had been finishing up digging the post hole for the last of the 4x4 posts prior to stringing the last few feet of wire under Dave’s direction. At the sound of the shot and the slamming screen door, Connor looked up and saw Amy running toward him, silently crying. He had time to lay the posthole digger aside before she raced into his arms, hugging him fiercely.

When Connor’s parents came out the door, they saw Connor, bare-chested from the heat and exertion, holding a sobbing Amy. He was looking very confused but doing the best he could to comfort his friend.

In that moment, Chad and Mary knew that their son was no longer a boy and that their world had changed forever.

May 23
rd
, Saturday, 4:37 pm PDT.

“Hi Amber,” said Chad. “Things have slowed down a bit and I would like to ask you some questions about the disease and your remission. There is a man, a Doctor who helped interview you the first time who needs to learn more about remission and the disease. Can you help us?”

Amber looked uncertainly at Chris who nodded and smiled reassuringly. Amber's powers of recuperation were amazing. While she didn't have the telltale bite marks, save the one on her calf, the rest of her lesions were almost completely healed. She looked very thin, but not anorexic and she was visibly stronger than even yesterday.

“Ok,” said Amber uncertainly. “What do you want to know?”

What did it feel like,” asked Chad, “when you had the disease?”

“Well, at first, I was feverish but just sick and out of sorts. Then as the fever progressed, I started having delusions, horrible compulsions.”

“Like what?” asked Chad.

“Mainly killing people,” said Amber quietly, and then after a pause, “and there is more. Eating them, eating all sorts of things an there was and even weirder set of dreams that didn't settle into my brain too far before I started getting better. It was sexual, evil, like crossing your worst nightmare with a porno movie. I'd really rather not talk about or if I can, never think about it again.”

“OK, I am sorry,” said Chad. “When did you realize that you were going into remission and how did that change occur?”

“Well, about a day before the breakout at the high school, food started having flavor again. I had preferences and even some cravings. Then Chris brought the Spam and it was all I could do not to gag.”

“Is there anything that you think helped you get better?”

“Through all of it there was Chris,” said Amber smiling warmly at Chris, “sitting there when he could, reading or talking to me. Most of the time I didn't hear the words, but the tone reassured me. He also feed me a lot. Judging by his weight loss, he must have given me all of his food.”

“And anything I could swipe,” said Chris with a guilty smile.

“Chris said that you said something like they are coming for me and I am not supposed to resist,” said Chad. “Who are they?”

“I don't know,” said Amber hiding her face in her hands. “I really don't. I still have a vision, or even a compulsion that I can still feel in my mind, but I don't know where it comes from.”

“Well what about ...” began Chad but Chris cut him off.

“That's enough I think,” said Chris gently. “These dreams still haunt her a bit. She needs to let them go.”

May 24
th
, Sunday, 12:23 pm PDT.

The party began at noon. Everyone had agreed that because of the intermittent power and the curfew, people wanted to be home early. Mary had taken out the most perishable items that she had acquired when she was laid off. There were veggie trays with various dips, cold cut and cheese trays, shrimp, egg roll, and much more. Mary had even hauled out one of the cases of wine she had salvaged. Just about everyone came. Food was beginning to get short and people were starting to feel the pinch, but more importantly, people were hungry for human contact.

Close to half the people who showed up were armed. It was all the more amazing in that it was not only accepted, people actually felt more secure when their neighbors were armed. Dave had a chair and a card table just inside the gate. Across the table was his Benelli M2 Tactical shotgun and at his hip was his Browning High Power 9mm. He had a plate of food and was jovially chatting with his neighbors but they all knew that he was watching them for signs of the disease.

In fact, all of the adults in Chad’s new family were armed. Chad was carrying Dave’s Colt New Agent that he was coming to view as his own. Mary was carrying Chad’s Ruger Security six and Heather had Dave’s Glock Model 27 in a shoulder holster rig.

Connor was very self-conscientiously carrying an old fashioned Colt 1911A1 that Dave’s father had carried in Vietnam. Amy Howeland was also there. She was unarmed, but never ventured more than a few feet from Connor’s side and spoke very little. Most of the neighbors knew what had happened but we unsure what to do about it so they mostly left the two young people alone.

After some discussion, it was decided to have Amber there openly. She was not dressed in her Deputy Sherriff’s uniform as she was supposedly reported missing in the riot at the high school. Instead, she was dressed in slacks and a simple white long sleeved blouse that were originally Heather’s. Amber still looked very thin but thankfully, she had few of the lesions left that were associated with the Plague and all were covered by her clothing.

When asked, she told everyone that she had been a graduate student in comparative literature at WSU and had just managed to get home. She was also packing Chris’s back up pistol, a Walther PPK in .380 in an unobtrusive holster on her belt. She was introduced as Chad’s ‘nephew’ Chris’s fiancée. The last was the most truthful thing about her cover story and also the most recent.

Chris was there in his Washington Highway Patrol uniform, confirming the story they told about the arrival of Chris’s patrol car. He was taking an hour long break but was due to be back on duty by one. The number of absentee officers in the various police units was approaching forty percent and the National Guard was worse. 

The neighbor had arrived in small groups, usually families or living groups. The party was subdued but happy. People attempted to avoid the plague as a topic of discussion, but it kept coming back.

“So Chad,” said Mitchell Davis, the stock broker who lived down the street. He had a very self-important view of himself. “How long do you think the current disturbance is going to last? The Market has been just devastated. All trading was suspended last Friday and now I can’t get a reliable feed from anywhere.”

“Mitch, most anything I can say has already been on the news,” said Chad stalling for a bit of time. “I wouldn’t count on anything like that being open for weeks if not months.”

“Surely you are overreacting!” exclaimed Mitch. “Money makes the world go round. If the markets don’t open, trade and commerce will fail! Why, I went to the grocery store yesterday and the doors were closed. I looked in the window and the shelves were quite bare. Things are going to have to change. What is the Government doing?”

“Let’s not get into this right now,” said Chad. “Relax, enjoy the party. Help us out by eating up this food that would surely go to waste.”

Chad was attempting to disengage from his neighbor when a shotgun blast brought them all up short. Chad looked over at Dave, who was now standing in a combat crouch with his Browning in hand.

“Wasn’t me, Chad,” said Dave simultaneously grabbing his shotgun and scanning the area.

Many weapons at the party were drawn but nobody was firing. Then there was another shot and another. 

Chad went across the deck into the house and looked out the front window, Mary at his side. From there they could see a thin, unshaven man whose age appeared to be somewhere between fifty and seventy, stumbling down the street. His clothes were old, dirty, and in disarray. The sole of one of his shoes flopped loose as he tried to run. Four middle aged men were chasing him with weapons. Chad recognized one of them as his neighbor from the house on the corner, Mathew Williams, a dentist.

Chad unlocked and opened the front door. He picked up his AR-15 from the front closet and went out on to the porch.

“Matt!” shouted Chad. “What the hell ...”

He didn’t have a chance to finish his question because Dave had not been idle. He had come out through the gate and appeared behind them, his limp was gone for a moment.

“CEASE FIRE, CEASE FIRE!” bellowed Dave in his best gunnery sergeant’s voice. “This is a quiet residential neighborhood and you will not fire weapons without cause Dr. Williams! Is that clear?”

“Can’t you see him?” said Matt. “He has it!”

They were still agitated but the group with Matt slowed and lowered weapons they were carrying. Chad looked at the man they were chasing. He had a number of scrapes and bruises and he needed a bath rather badly, but it didn’t really look like the plague.

“What’s the deal?” said Chad as he placed himself between the four men and the object of their ire.

“This guy has been rooting around in our garbage cans for the last two days,” said Matt who was a bit calmer now. “I am surprised you guys didn’t see him. We have been shouting at him to get out and he would run off, but later, sometimes at night, he would creep back and keep at it. We tried to talk to him, but he just keeps mumbling. He has got the Plague I tell you!”

In the excitement, no one had noticed Chris as he had come out of the backyard and walked up behind the group in the street. Amber was two paces to the left and two paces behind, holding her gun in the classic depressed pistol stance as she moved to cover Chris’s weak side. He waited until he was perhaps thirty feet behind Matt before he spoke startling everyone.

“Did you call the police on this?” asked Chris in a more conversational tone, looking to dial down the confrontation.

Yeah,” said one of the men with Matt belligerently. “We called a bunch of times. We were told that if he wasn’t being violent, we should watch him but they had other problems. We decided to fix the problem ourselves!”

“So what were you going to do?” asked Chris who was using the time to close the distance. He had his hand on his pistol but did not draw it.

“Run him off, scare him good!” said Matt. “We weren’t actually going to shoot him.”

“Firing weapons indiscriminately to scare someone like that is often considered felony reckless conduct,” said Chris amiably. “I could take your guns as evidence and run you all in, but I won’t. I suspect you will need them before too long, but firing a shotgun down a residential street without a specific target is that special kind of stupid. There were kids playing in that backyard not fifty feet from where you fired.”

Matt and the men with him began have trouble meeting Chris’s gaze and started to back away, realizing that they could be in some serious trouble.

“But nobody got hurt, right officer?” said Matt trying to placate Chris and avoid trouble. 

“This time, you’re right,” said Chris suddenly very serious. “But there are going to be a lot more civilians like yourselves involved in shootings aimed at controlling the infected, demands on law enforcement being what they are. So I have some advice for all of you. First, be damned sure of your target. Make sure the reason you are shooting is really a life threatening situation and not just because you are scared or angry. Next, you can only shoot to kill. People with the ‘Plague’ or hopped up on drugs don’t feel many wounds. You have to put them down. Finally, make sure that you know where your stray rounds will end up.

“I can’t tell you how many police officers have lost their jobs and in some cases have been prosecuted because they were involved in what they thought was a righteous shoot, only to have the round penetrate the wall board of a cheap apartment or shatter a windshield and injure someone.

“So why don’t you guys get a long home and think about what I said?” 

Chris was by then among the men and looking at the unfortunate that was the focus of their dispute.

“I know you,” said Chris. “Your name is Charlie Hanson.”

“Maybe you do and maybe you don’t,” mumbled the old man. “Old Charlie ain’t telling anybody anything.”

“Charlie, I have run you out of half a dozen rest stops for spending the night in the past two years,” continued Chris. “I thought you were in a half-way house in Spokane for alcoholics?”

“I was and then I wasn’t,” said Charlie vaguely. “The whole place was full of busy bodies and holy rollers. A man couldn’t think.”

By this time Chad and Dave were standing near the group, armed but not menacing.

“Chad, you’re the expert,” said Chris. Chad winced inwardly. “Does this guy have the plague?”

“Let’s look at the symptoms,” said Chad trying to sound reasonable. “He is not violent or aggressive. He isn’t bleeding except through some pretty recent scrapes that he probably got running from you. He isn’t trying to bite anyone. He is hungry but not out of control. If he was infected, he would have attacked you the first time you yelled at him.” 

“He yelled at us!” said one of the men defensively.

“Them kids was throwing rocks at me!” shouted Charlie with some heat.

“It is my professional opinion,” said Chad crossing his fingers as he was by training a statistician and not a medical doctor, “that this man is in the advanced stages of alcoholism. Much of the physiological evidence you see is from living on the street for years. The dementia you are seeing is most probably a result of delirium tremens.”

“I ain’t seein’ no pink elephants,” said Charlie defensively.

“His habits indicate that he has been obviously foraging in the garbage cans outside of restaurants downtown,” said Chad, trying to steer the mood to a less violent focus. “They characteristically throw away a lot of food. When the restaurants shut down last week, apparently so did his meal ticket. He is just an old homeless alcoholic with nowhere to go and no support, but he is not infected yet.”