Generation Dead - 07 (15 page)

It wasn’t until I reached the landing at the bottom of the stairs that I saw it.  Had I not gone upstairs, we would have passed it right on by.  I didn’t see it as I went up, and we didn’t see it when we came in, but it was there, nonetheless.

It was a picture of a family, taken by someone who liked close ups.  I recognized my dad, and the baby in the picture had to be Jake, since it had his eyes and features.  But the woman threw me for a loop.  I looked long and hard at the picture, taking it off the wall and examining it in better light.  I wiped off the dust, but it didn’t change the truth of what I was seeing.

The woman wasn’t our mother.  It wasn’t Sarah.

Chapter 24

I took the picture to the family room, where Jake was running his hand over the wood that covered the windows.  I wondered if the note from our father had mentioned what I was seeing.

“Jake?”

He turned to face me. “What’s up? Find something?”

I handed him the picture, and he first looked at it and smiled.  But the smile turned to a frown and then Jake pulled a chair out and sat down.

“
Jesus,
” He said.  He looked down at the picture.  He studied it for a long time. 

I didn’t say anything, understanding that this was Jake’s moment alone.  I stepped back and went into the study next to the kitchen.  There was a computer, and piles of notes and maps. I looked over the notes, and smiled as I read how our father had learned about the dead, and how to beat them.  That was
Dad .
  As much as he denied it, he was a planner.

I went back to the kitchen, and Jake was standing.  He was looking out the window, holding the picture at his side.

“You okay?” I asked.  I knew it was a hell of thing to discover, and I wasn’t sure how Jake was going to take it.

Jake looked at me.  “Not really.  I came here expecting to find some sort of answers, but
instead,
I leave with more questions.  And the one guy who can explain it all to me is probably a thousand fucking miles away!”

I had to admit he had a point.  “What do you want to do?”

“Let’s get the crap back to the capital, get paid, and get home.  We’ll figure out what we want to do from there.”  Jake said, heading for the door.

“Good enough.” I said.  I was anxious to get home.  I wanted to know what surprises my
father had for me in the box
he had left.  Hopefully I wouldn’t find out I had another father.

Jake was quiet on the way home and I couldn’t blame him.  I had no idea what I would do if I found out the person I thought was my mother really wasn’t, and what had happened to my real mother?  A worse question, and one that was probably going through Jake’s head, was
whether
our father had killed his mother.  With the end of the world and all, it was a real possibility.

We drove towards the capital, reaching the outskirts pretty quickly.  Jake drove towards the big food market, and parked the truck in a spot easily accessible.  There weren’t too many vehicles out and about, but the ones that were available were well taken care of.  It wasn’t like anyone was making any more of them.

Jake got out, and I met him around the back.

“Where are we supposed to drop this thing off?” I asked, not relishing the thought of trying to lift the heavy thing off the bed of the truck.

Jake checked his notes.  “Says here that we are to park it anywhere, go to this address, and let them know
it’s
here.  They will take care of the rest.”

I thought about it for a minute.  “All right then. You want to be the one to go get them, or stay here?”

Jake shook his head.  “I’ll go get them.  Quiet reflection isn’t going to help me much right now.”

I understood. “I’ll be here then.”

Jake walked off and I had little else to do but hang out.  There were a lot of kids in the marketplace today, and since I was a stranger, I was the object of shy attention. 
Several kids hovered around, staring and whispering to each other, trying to look occupied when I looked directly at them.
  At one
point,
I stood up suddenly, scattering several to their respective parents.  I chuckled as nervous eyes peeped from around the safe havens of parent legs.

Others were interested in me as well.  I could see several teenagers hanging about, trying to look tough and shrugging me off as if I wasn’t all that tough.  I had seen it before, and it was interesting to see the teens that had lived here all their lives, and the ones that came in from the frontier, where there was a lot bigger threat of zombies.  I didn’t pay either any attention.

I wandered over to a couple of the tables, spending a few coppers on some fresh fruit for the trip home.  I didn’t notice the trio of large men headed my way until I was right on top of them.

“Sorry, gents. 
Didn’t see you.”
  I tried to step around, but one of them blocked my way.

“Collector, huh?”
  The tall blond one said sarcastically, flipping up one of the straps on my pack.  I immediately marked him as one to cause serious pain to.  The other two spread out a little behind their leader.  That was unfortunate for them, since it gave them only one direction to attack from.  I noticed that more than a few people were
watching to
see what I would do.

“
Yeah,
” I said. “It’s a living.”  I started to walk around the guy to get back to the truck, but he stepped into the way.

“Word is, collectors are supposed to be tough.” Blondie looked me up and down. “You don’t look so tough.”

I smiled.  “I’m not.  I prefer to be lucky.”  I tried once more to go around the guy, but he stepped into the way again.  This
time,
he actually put his hand on my chest and tried to push me back.  He got a concerned look on his face when I didn’t move.

“Lucky?  Yeah, you’d have to be.  You
’d couldn’t
possibly be capable of…”

Whatever he was going to say was lost as I grabbed the collar of his shirt and pulled him towards me.  I threw the bag of fruit at the closest guy behind Blondie,
and then
knelt slightly, taking the big guy across my knee and tossing him to the ground.  I whipped out my knife and held it to the throat of the man on the ground, holding a second knife out to deal with anyone foolish enough to charge me.

“Wait!
Stop!”
Jake’s voice cut across the
marketplace,
as the area had suddenly grown very quiet.  Dozens of faces stared at me and the man on the ground, who was desperately trying not to
move
,
as
I kneeled on his chest and held a knife on him.  Him friends had their hands up and were trying to tell me something.

“I got this,
Jake,
” I said, shifting my eyes down to the man I was on.

“Aaron, stop!  It was a supposed to be a joke!”  Jake was laughing and I wasn’t really sure what was going on, so I decided to let the man up.  He climbed slowly to his feet with the help of his friends, and held a hand to his neck.  I hadn’t hurt him, although I probably had scared the hell out of him.

I turned my attention to Jake. “Explain.”  One of the men held the fruit out to me and I took it with a scowl.

“These are the guys who have come to get the desk and stuff.  I thought it would be funny to get a rise out of you.  I didn’t think you’d try to kill
them,
”  Jake
laughed and I had to admit it had worked.

I took a deep breath and looked over at the three men.  “No hard feelings?”

Blondie shook his head. “When I saw
you,
I thought about dumping the whole scheme.” He touched his throat again. “
Kinda
wished I had.  No hard feelings.  I should have known better than to mess with a collector.”

We shook hands and went over to the truck.  When the assembled audience realized the show was over, they went back to their shopping.  At the truck, the men heaved the desk out of the bed, and I handed over the rifles and books.  Blondie checked a list in his pocket,
and then
spoke.

“Says here only the one rifle.
  Where did the other one come from?” 

I answered.  “Found two in the house, didn’t know which one was the right one.”

“Got no claim to it.
  You want it?”  He asked.

I knew a rifle was decent money and we could have sold it, but I figured I owed it to them for the scare. 
“No, thanks.
  I don’t care much for suicide guns.”  I wasn’t going to let it go for free, though.

Blondie looked at the rifle,
and then
shrugged.  “I don’t believe in curses.”

Jake shook his hand.  “Me either.  You have the balance?”

Blondie nodded and handed over a small pouch of coins.  Jake checked the amount, transferred the money to his own pouch, and handed the empty one back.

“Nice doing business with
you,
” Jake said.

The men departed and Jake looked slyly at me.  I held up a hand and Jake dutifully stood still as I thumped him on the forehead.  He knew his joke had nearly gone seriously wrong and was sorry for it. 

“Anything we need?”  I asked, looking out at the marketplace.

“Not
today,
” Jake said, climbing into the truck. 

I was right behind him. “Let’s get home.”  I wanted to see what my father had left for me, and playing games around here wasn’t going to get the job done.

Chapter 25

We headed south and picked up the main highway to the West.  I-80 was mostly cleared, and we were able to make good time.  Instead of heading back through
Ottawa
, Jake kept going and turned off the road to Utica.  This was not a main road, so there had been some cars to avoid, but over the
years,
we had managed to clear the way.  Unlike the other highways, though, there weren’t any leftover zombies in
these.  Our dad and Julia’s
had made sure of that. 

We passed a couple of homes along the way, and were surprised to see one of them occupied.  We had no problem with
that;
people did it all the time.  If you could keep a house, you were welcome to it, as long as no one had a prior claim.  There had been some incidents in the past where someone went home to find another person living there.  It led to some awkward moments, but overall I like to think people were pretty good about it.  I
mean
there were so many empty houses and land out there that we all could have massive estates if we wanted them.

Most people lived in communities and towns, and there were few who chose to live in the frontier
as
we did.  My father had his reasons for choosing Starved Rock and I can’t fault him for them.  He made his home out in the middle of zombie territory, and fought to keep it. If anyone earned the right to be here, he did.

We pulled into the long drive and up towards the lodge.  We passed a ditch and a fence, and finally pulled into the circular drive at the front of the lodge.  Julia came out to see us, and gave both of us hug, which surprised Jake
as
much as it did me.

“Hey, good to see you,
too,
” I said, pulling my gear and guns out of the truck.  “How come you’re so friendly?”

Julia rocked up on her toes, and then back onto her heels. 
“Just because.
  I’m glad you guys are back.  It’s not the same place when someone’s away.”

I could accept that.  There have been times that I have been alone, and the big place tends to have a lot of noise when you least expect it.

“Well, we were successful, although we had to kill a wedding party to get the job
done,
”  Jake
said.

Julia’s eyes got big and I just laughed.  “We’ll tell you about it in a minute.  I want to take a shower and get my stuff taken care of.”

Julia turned to Jake.  “You look thoughtful. 
Anything new?”

Jake gave her a sideways smile.  “Yeah, we learned something new.  I’ll tell you about it later.”

Jake walked off and Julia turned to me with questions in her eyes.  I shook my head and said, “It’s his story to tell, not mine.”

Later that evening, after I had showered and changed, I wandered up to the second floor and down the hall, past my bedroom and towards the room my parents had shared.  It had been two years since my father had gone, and I hadn’t been in here since then.  I had often wondered what it would take for a man to leave his children, and I had spent a long time being angry about it.  But I have never loved a woman like my dad had loved my mom, and losing someone like that must have been hard to take. 

I took a deep breath and opened the door.  Since Jake had already been in
here,
it wasn’t as bad as it might have been.  The bed was made, and the place was neat.  It
wasn’t even dusty, so Jake must have cleaned a bit.  He was weird like that.  On the small coffee table in the lounge
section
of the suite was a small box, about the size of a big shoebox.  It was made of wood, and closer inspection revealed it was
handmade
.  The
sides were meticulously put together, and on the lid were
painted in gold letters ‘Aaron’.