Dead Hunger III: The Chatsworth Chronicles (51 page)

I returned the gesture.

“Sure feels like longer than a week,” I said.  “So much happened.”

“And a lot learned, I understand.”

“Dave radioed ahead,” he said.  “You’ve made a breakthrough, I understand.”

I told him a little about it, and said we’d set up a lab capable of producing it in huge quantities.  The crowd around us listened intently, because this was the most important news since the zombie apocalypse had turned ever
ybody’s world upside-down.

We didn’t spend much time at the state house.  Vikki Solms, Victoria Hansen, and Kimberly
Treloar
came to see me, all passing out some of the tightest hugs I’d felt, but they didn’t limit them to me. 

They had all been very concerned for Dave and Charlie when they’d set out to find me.  If pressed, I’d agree it was a foolish thing to do, but at the same time I was so grateful they did.

Betty Kapla, whom I had not seen in some time, walked into the grand room, the fireplace blazing, and smiled at me.

“Do you sing, Hemp?” she asked.  “I’ve opened a little bar in town, and we’ve got karaoke on Thursdays.  Not late.  It’s still safer during the daytime.”

“I’m afraid I might be coming.  I’d fancy a bit of Tom Petty if you think you can pull it off.”

Betty winked at me, her shoulder length hair bouncing as she walked away.

And finally, the greatest joy of my return – besides my Charlie – came running up to me.  She held Bunsen’s leash loosely, and dropped it and stopped as Bunsen charged toward me and Charlie.

I was certain Bunsen was going to knock us over, for she practically flew the last few feet, her giant paws bounding, her giant tongue flapping in the air.  When she got to us, she stood up on her hind legs, towering over us, and kissed both me and Charlie as though she could not force herself to stop if she’d wanted to.

Trina stood off, a huge smile on her face. 

“Here, Bunsen!  Come here!”

She slapped her thighs, and the ever-obedient Great Pyrenees bounded back toward her and sat.

Then Trina ran to us, and I vaguely realized she was wearing tap shoes or something, as she
threw her arms around my neck and climbed me like a tree, screaming, “Uncle Hemp!  I missed you so much!  Where in the world were you
, mister
?”

She pressed her cheek against mine and Charlie
leaned in, too
, intertwining her arms with ours.  We all pulled back to look at one another.

Her little face bounced from mine to Charlie’s, and she finally
forgot
her smile just enough to
allow her mouth to form the words
, “You’re a fuckin’ sight for sore eyes!”

Charlie and I laughed. 
“Who taught you that?” I asked, my face hurting from smiling so hard.

“If I tell ya, I’ll have to kill your ass,” she said.  “But I’m glad you’re back, Uncle Hemp.  So glad!
  Do you think I’m gangsta? 
Tay
says I’m totally gangsta.
”

“I don’t know gangsta from metal, little girl.  But you be just what you want to
be
, just as long as you keep on making me smile, okay?”

She bounced her head, and I put her down.

Trina ran back to Bunsen.  “She’s gotta go take a crap,” she said cheerily.  “I’ll be back.

Charlie and I waved to her and dropped back down to the soft sofa, both releasing a big sigh.  It really felt good to be home.

W
e both
spotted
her at once.

Taylor
.

She
wore a green dress, just above the knees on her long, little girl legs. 
Taylor
walked slowly up to us, her face serene and beautiful, her red hair gleaming, and her profile so like her mother’s that I think both Charlie and I were
both
without words.

She pointed between us, and we slid apart.  She sat down and curled her arms around
ours
.

Holding us tightly, she said, in the tiniest of voices, “I missed you both so much.”

“Really,
Tay
?” said Charlie.

Taylor
looked up to meet her eyes.  She nodded.

“How are you doing, kiddo?” I asked.

“It was hard without you here,” she said.  “I’m not gonna lie.”

Charlie smiled at me and leaned forward, planting a kiss on the girl’s head.  “We missed you, too,
Tay
.”

“I want to ask something,” she said.  “And I don’t want you to be afraid to say no.”

“I don’t know that I could say no to you,
Tay
.  You’re one of my favorite people in the world,” said Charlie.

“That goes double for me,” I said.  “What is it, babe?”

She stood and turned around, facing us.  She took both of our hands.  “I love you.  Both of you.  And I think you love me.  I feel it.”

Tears sprung from Charlie’s eyes.  “Oh,
Taylor
, I love you so much.  I was so sorry I didn’t have the words to make your sadness go away. 
And then I left, and –”

“You brought him back, Charlie.  I knew you would, and that’s why it was okay,” she said. 

So mature, this one.  So wise for a young soul.  I was mesmerized.  “What is it,
Tay
?  Go ahead.”

“I want to live with you,” she said.  “I want you to raise me, to teach me how to be brave and good, and . . . well, and everything.”

“Do you really want that?  I think we both thought you wanted to stay with Trina, Gem and Flex.”

“Staying with them is just staying with them,” she said.  “I love them, but staying with you would be like having
. . . I don’t know,
you know
.”

Charlie dropped to her knees and pulled
Taylor
in for a long, deep hug.  “
I do know, baby,” she said.  “And the
answer is yes,” she whispered.   “As Trina would say, the answer is fuck yes!”

I joined the embrace and within another hour, all our hellos having been dolled out and accepted, we went home.

I slept for two days.

Okay.  Charlie was there, so it was on and off, so to speak.

****

There are a lot of things I have to investigate.  There have been so many observations we’ve made and questions that must be answered – for everyone’s sake.  I’m sending out regular transmissions over the short wave with regard to my area of expertise, and trying to get more scientists to come to
Concord
.  Please, allow me to list some of my questions, and what I intend to work on.

1.
                  
The relationship b
etween the zombies and the ratz:

This one I’m not sure about.  When we were in the cemetery and the rats
had
burrowed in
to
the graves,
the mystery of why they did this at all has
left me
perplexed
, as I’m certain it has you. 
Were they intentionally trying to free the human zombies? 
What is the relationship?  Did the ratz feel a kinship?  Do they feel anything at all besides hunger?  Do they possess an ability to recognize their own? 

Did they perhaps mistake what they sensed i
n the ground to be more of themselves, and if so, why would they work to free them?  Or, and this is the answer I’m leaning toward until I discover something else, did they merely feel the vibration of something below moving, shifting, clawing, and believe it to be food?

I need to understand this.

2.
                  
The ability of the zombies
to strategize:
 

We were
fla
nked in the church in
Ala
bama
, I’m almost certain of it.  The zombies broke into three distinct groups to come at us from three directions.  I haven’t seen it very often, but I’ve not been able to arrange any structured tests to confirm or debunk the idea.

The wafers will allow this.  We can walk among them for a time, lead them, even position them.  We can, under highly controlled guinea pig testing, create scenarios where they can wage an attack.  This can all be very helpful to those who don’t have the capacity to produce WAT
-
5.  This is the working name for the wafers I’ve created.

It stands for Walk Among Them
-
5 hour.

3.
                  
The
WAT-5 wafers themselves:

I need to learn exactly what part of the endocrine system is affected by the wafers - whether it resides in the pituitary gland or elsewhere.  I need to understand how the changes are being perpetuated – is it making us smell like them, or is it entirely masking our scent?   It wouldn’t even matter, however if I ever want to create
a product with a longer term effect
, or
one that
is even permanent, this
is
a crucial question
that requires an answer
.

There is also the possibility of building up a tolerance.  Perhaps after a time, they will no longer be effective – or perhaps the effects could become permanent.
  I would call that product WAT-L – for lifetime.

Wouldn’t that be a kick in the ass.  Yes, that was a bit of Charlie.  She is standing here as I write this, and suggested that bit.

4.
                  
We need to
learn more about the gas, how it comes out, and if it’s changing:
:

The gas coming from the earth is
, in my opinion,
the cause of this widespread, human
and rat
metamorphosis.  Ultimately, we need to learn whether
the gas
is emitting from the core equally in all directions, or if it is like a bulging disk in your spine, pushing out in one direction, affecting one place more than another.  Perhaps there are areas of this country, or the world, where it is not prevalent, and in fact may be entirely non-existent.  But for how long?  If the gas doesn’t leave the atmosphere, and simply accumulates, how long before millions more convert? 
Is the gas staying the same, or is it gaining or losing potency?  Will there be a time when it is entirely harmless?  Or
is there a time when it intensifies so much it kills all of us outright, urushiol immunity or not? 
So many questions.  Shitloads of time.

Thanks, Charlie.

5.
                  
Enhance and focus
on our HAM radio communications:

We’ve started a list
of people out there – radio operators all – which has grown quite extensive
.  We’ve tossed the
typical HAM operator handles
and we’re just going with names.  We want to know who these survivors are, and where they are located.  So far, we’ve found people in over eight countries, including
Canada
,
Mexico
,
Russia
and
Australia
. 

China
is quiet so far.

There are
men, women and children out there broadcasting
, and we’ve written down their
names,
locations
, and numbers of survivors
.  We’ll continue to do so.

Some we heard from initially, and have not heard from again.  One group in
Guadalajara
,
Mexico
was being overrun as we spoke with them on the HAM. 

Horrifying.

And that’s my list so far. 
We must learn all we can from
everyone we contact., and pass along survival information that we’ve obtained.  W
e’re not the only people making discoveries, though I would
guess
that we’ve made some of the most important since this
whole nightmare
began. 

Where
, you may ask,
is the largest enclave of survivors we know about so far?
 
Right here in
Concord
. 

So far.  But we must keep looking, because if this is
ind
eed more of a bulge than an equal distribution of gas,
some areas may have been spared the conversion of the living and the reanimation of the dead.  I
f the component leaves the atmosphere as helium does, it may
nev
er affect
these safe zones
with any significance.
  And if that’s true, these are the places people need to go.