Revenence: Dead of Winter: A Zombie Novel (27 page)

     "And what would those be?" Neil asked.

     "I'm a pretty decent shot," Shari said. "I mainly use an AK-47 and a .357 revolver.  I'm also very good with a bow.  I have with me a very high-quality recurve bow given to me by a dear friend.  More to the point, I have, along with this woman sitting next to me, used these weapons to defend myself from many, many sadists, sometimes dozens at a time.  And, I'm sorry to say, we encountered these groups all the way here, from Kentucky, 'til central Illinois.  That was shortly before we got on the plane.  And so I'm very confident that our skills could come in handy here, since they're what kept us alive for hundreds of miles of zombie wasteland."

     "I see," Neil said.  "Not to discredit you, but you know it's a very different ballpark here in the city."

     "I'm sure," Shari said.  "And there are also more people here in need of protection.  There are precious few humans left.  I've seen the evidence of that.  I've been on the ham radio, networking with people from all over the continent.  It's the same all over, and as best as anyone can tell, the other continents haven't fared any better.  Every day I wake up into this nightmare, one thing makes me get out of bed to face another day--and that's to do my part to help protect the precious few of us who are left.  Protect them from our mortal enemies."

     "Okay," Neil said.  "You've convinced me.  Thing is, though, it's not my decision to make.  Security and patrol work is given out solely at the discretion of Maximus."  He turned to address Daphne.  "You don't talk much, do you?"

     "No," Daphne said, "not much."

     "What about you?" he asked.  "Any work history?"

     "I never entered the work force before all this happened," Daphne said.  "I do have a handful of skills, though.  I specialize in throwing weapons and knives, and I know how to hunt, trap, follow tracks, stuff like that.  And stealth work."

     "Huh," Neil said.  "Impressive.  Where'd you learn that stuff?"

     Daphne looked him in the eye as she responded.  "Practice."

     "Okay," Neil said, "this is what I'm gonna do--I'll get a hold of Maximus and let him know I think you two are good candidates to work with him.  You should be hearing from him soon."

     "Alright," Shari said, rising from her chair.  "We'll be waiting."

     "Feel free to explore in the meantime," Neil said.  "You saw the directory in the Commons.  The lake is beautiful this time of day, if you're up for a walk."

     "Thanks," Shari said just before she exited the office, "we might do that." 

     She bid him good day and headed with Daphne back into the commons.  They smelled the aroma of breakfast being prepared
en masse
--the rich, thick smell of ham and bacon frying, the warm, hearty fragrance of oatmeal and cinnamon.  The tables were being populated, one by one, with early morning diners filling their bellies before going on to perform their daily functions.

     The two sat down for a light breakfast of oatmeal and canned fruit before making their way to the eastern building.  Upon entering the public area of the building, they saw that the mammoth exhibition hall was being used as an extremely large workshop.  Dozens of workers paced the massive floor, where the items being tended to included moderately-sized yachts, wind turbines and generators.  To Shari's right, a handful of workers were busy installing solar panels and a small wind turbine onto the roof of one of the yachts.

     They walked down a cordoned off walkway running down the length of the workshop.  The walkway eventually led to the lakeside exit and the path leading to the marina.  Shari and Daphne stepped outside into the cool, bright early September morning.  A cascade of water from a fountain trickled down a wall to their right.  Seagulls swooped and arched in the sky, riding the brisk lake breeze.  The waves crashed into the retention wall, echoing through the nearly dead city.  The surface of the blue-green lake glittered brilliantly to the east, as far as the eye could see.

     "Lake Michigan really can be beautiful," Shari remarked.

     "Yeah, it can be," Daphne agreed, "but that lake effect can be a real bitch in the winter.  It's one of the few things I remember about those first years here in Chicago."

     "As long as they get enough of that alternative power that we saw up and running," Shari said, motioning back toward the vast workshop,"heating this place over the winter shouldn't be a problem, at least enough of it, if not the whole complex.  It beats our original plan of looking for an abandoned cabin in the North Woods, living like hermits."

     "Yeah," Daphne muttered, "for you, it does."

     "Wisconsin was a long shot," Shari said.

     "We made it this far, didn't we?" Daphne countered.

     "I don't know," Shari said, shaking her head.  "I don't think anything could make me regret coming here.  This is the kind of place that I would have hoped existed, if hoping were something I still did."

     "I know," Daphne said, "and believe it or not, there's a part of me that feels the same way.  But for me, this arrangement is going to take a lot of getting used to."

     "Understandable," Shari said, lighting up a smoke as she and Daphne strolled down the lakeside path.  Three young men exited the building, settling onto the stone benches overlooking the fountain near the entrance.  Shari felt their curious stares, but while she could hear their voices, she couldn't make out the conversation.

     "Everyone wants to know about us new kids," she muttered with a faint smile, her gaze scanning the lakefront, the nearby museum campus, and Navy Pier in the distance.  She and Daphne stood silently while she finished smoking.  Shari looked around, noting that a solid lane of Lake Shore Drive had been cleared from the north wall of the convention center, where a makeshift wall blocked the highway as it ran between the north and south building, to the intersection at Roosevelt Road to the north, where the Field Museum sat between the highway and the lake.  She couldn't help but to marvel as she thought,
These people really got their shit together early on.

     "Let's head back in," she said, snuffing her joint out on a rock.  As they neared the stairs leading into the building, one of the young men spoke to them.

     "Welcome to the neighborhood," said the tall, narrow twenty-something.

     "Thanks," Shari said as she and Daphne passed them and opened the wide glass door leading into the workshop.

     "Everyone's talking about you guys," the young man told them just before they entered the building.

     "Not all bad, I hope," Shari said.

     "Not all," he replied, "but it depends on who's doing the talking."

     "We just got here," Shari said, concluding just before she slipped into the building, "so they might not want to jump to any conclusions about us."

     They walked back through the workshop, noticing Hugo toward the far end, deep in conversation with one of the workers.

     "This place is like a playground for him," Shari said.  "Give that boy a year, tops, and he'll be running this workshop."

     They crossed the skywalk over Lake Shore Drive, entering into the south building.  They explored the interior of the building, most of which was the cavernous commons.  There were, however, various meeting rooms and private areas.  The center had apparently been hosting some sort of sci-fi convention as its last pre-zombie function.  Throughout the parts of the exhibition hall not used for the commons, Shari was seeing posters, replicas, and cardboard cutouts of popular characters from futuristic folklore.  Behind one panel that never was, apparently one that had been zombie-related, a quote was splashed across the wall in large red letters on a white background.  It was a Philip K. Dick quote reading,
The cries of the Dead are terrible indeed; you should try not to hear them
.

     "Terrible, indeed," Shari concurred, "though the cries are nothing compared to the bite."

     They stopped to gaze through a large window on the third floor, where they could see Soldier Field and the Field Museum down Lake Shore Drive.  Far off in the distance, in the direction of the Loop and its towering high-rises, gunshots could be heard, ringing out into the subdued city.

     As they continued to look out the window, the sound got to be closer.  After a moment, Shari saw a figure on a bicycle racing down Lake Shore Drive.  As the operator of the bicycle passed the Field Museum, approaching Soldier Field, the low rumble of motorcycle engines could be heard.  The sound ricocheted through the southern boundary of the Loop, and a moment later the pursuers exited the eastern border of lifeless steel and concrete giants.  They raced onto Lake Shore Drive and past Grant Park in pursuit of the bicyclist, who was now close enough for Shari to identify as a male.

     The unknown man's hunters began to close in on him as he reached the northern blockade that sealed off the highway between the northern and eastern buildings.  Rather than be cornered, the man on the bike turned and headed north once again, this time taking an exit ramp leading from Lake Shore Drive to Museum Campus Road.  He passed Soldier Field for a second time, pursuers on his tail and firing .44 rounds at him.

     Upon reaching the Shedd Aquarium, he turned right, swerving sporadically as he traveled down a bridge toward Northerly Island, attemptingto avoid the gunfire directed at him by the 3 motorcyclists.  He passed the marina and reached the island, making a right as he approached the parking area of the Adler Planterarium. At that point, he disappeared from Daphne and Shari's view, obscured by the northern end of the hulking lakeside building to their east.  Shari lowered her binoculars, turning to regard Daphne.

     She uttered the word, "Lakefront," and they both took off in the direction of the eastern building housing the workshop.  As they ran through the Commons, they came across Neil.

     "Do you know whether or not Maximus knows about the situation by the marina?" Shari asked him.

     Neil shook his head.  "I'm not rightly sure," he said.  "Why?  What situation?"

     "Someone got chased over there by some sadists on motorcycles," Shari said.  "Surely someone had to have heard all the noise?"

     Neil spoke into his walkie-talkie.  "Maximus," he said, "do you know of anything going on over by the marina?"

     "Yeah," Maximus' voice crackled from the receiver, "I'm on my way."

     Shari, Daphne and Neil headed toward the east building, gazing northward down Lake Shore Drive as they crossed the skywalk.  The three sadists appeared to be retreating, taking a left at Grant Park to return to the Loop from whence they had come.  The three continued on to the workshop, where the workers were apparently none the wiser to the situation.  They reached the glass entrance, peering outside.

     They saw a team of roughly a dozen security personnel surrounding the mystery bicyclist.  He was dripping with lake water from his short swim across the width of the marina to the shore, with soaking wet, oily strands of hair partially obscuring his eyes.  His arms were lifted, palms up, to show his cooperation.  Still panting and short of breath, he smirked at the guards who surrounded him, an unhinged expression in his eyes.  Maximus exited from an alternate door farther south, Dacee beside him.

     "Who are you?" Maximus demanded.

     The bicyclist laughed, a gently rippling, carefree titter.  "Merlin," he said.  "But what's in a name anymore, my friend?  We can all rename ourselves now--I know Merlin could.  What about you?  What would you rename yourself?"  He laughed again, his greasy, tangled dishwater blonde curls brushing the tops of his shoulders.  His features were fixed in a perpetual smirk, with unfocused, blue eyes.

     Maximus shook his head.  "You know what?  Fuck it.  On second thought, I don't give a shit what your name is.  What I'm interested in learning is what the hell you're doing here."

     "Well, as you may have noticed," Merlin said, "I was being chased.  Now, I may be lacking in some departments, but when it comes to survival, Merlin wants to be an alive Merlin.  What fun would it be for Merlin if I were dead?"

     Shari saw Maximus make a very slight movement backward, away from Merlin.  "The fuck are you on, you freak?"

     Merlin feigned indignance.  "What makes you think I would do drugs?"  He snorted, then threw his back, howling with laughter.

     "What's in the duffelbag, Merlin?"  Dacee asked.

     Merlin stopped laughing, but still smirked as he pointed his finger at Dacee.  "You'd like to know, wouldn't you?" he said.  "But how about this--how about you don't worry about the bag?  How 'bout I'll be on my way, now that those guys are gone, and you can forget that Merlin was ever here?"

     Maximus shook his head.  "Nope," he said, "too late for that."  He motioned to the guards.  "Take him inside," he said.  "Lower entrance."  One of the guards handcuffed Merlin while the others trained their assault rifles on him.  They took him at gunpoint to the entrance Shari and the group had used upon their arrival, the one that circumvented the public areas of the building.  Shari presumed that he would be taken to the roof, as she and her friends had been.

     "Excellent," Neil said, rolling his eyes.  "Good to know there's always a livewire to come along and casually fuck your shit up, no matter how much you have your shit together."