The Zombie Plagues Dead Road: The Collected books. (169 page)

The other sounds were some sort of
ventilation system. That he could see: High up near the ceiling,
and low down at the floor level, a fresh air entrance and a return.
The one on the floor seemed to be pulling air so the one up top was
pushing it. Maybe, he had thought more than once, there was a
camera hidden in that air vent, but at ten feet or so above the
floor he had no way to reach it to find out.

The first stop, he believed, was Beth.
She must be close by, but he remembered the corridor of doors as he
had been brought down here. Close by could mean any one of two
dozen doors.

He got up and crossed the room to the
door. The guard, or whoever it was that checked, had done their
check and moved on more than three minutes ago. He had counted
those seconds off in his head. Three minutes should put him far
away from the hallway, somewhere that he wouldn't hear him. He
lowered his face to the floor and the small gap at the bottom of
the door, if Beth was nearby he had to know. He listened intently
and then called out. She answered immediately, sounding much closer
than the half second. He involuntarily pushed away from the door,
and just as quickly lowered himself once more.

“
Bear?” Her voice was not
much more than a whisper, but there was so little noise that he
heard it easily.

“
I'm here, Beth.” He drew a
breath and slowed his breathing purposely. “How does it look to
you? This room is all white, no windows, cameras, a vent high up I
can't reach.”

“
Nothing here either... The
same setup. It's bad, but I have your promise to see me
through.”

“
Beth, what” Bear started,
but she cut him off with a harsh whisper.

“
Your promise. I have it...
It's a comfort.”

Bear stayed silent. She was telling him
something, he just didn't know what. He had promised to love her.
He had promised not to coddle her. He had promised to let her lead
her life. He had promised her his own life. He had even promised
her forever, even though they both knew forever was not theirs to
promise.

“
I meant what I said,” Bear
told her quietly. “I meant it.”

The silence spun out. Bear felt the
coolness of the tile against his face. He listened to the minute
sounds of Beth breathing, slight rustle of clothing, it was a
comfort and agonizing at the same time.

“
I love you, Beth,” he
whispered.

“
I love you too, Bear... It
will be fine,” Beth whispered back.

Bear listened a few moments longer and
then, reluctantly, he returned to his cot when he heard the sounds
of footfalls coming. Off schedule. Far too early, he thought as he
listened to them grow closer. The footsteps continued to his cell
and he heard the key clicking as it was inserted into the lock past
the tumblers. He wondered for a brief second if hearing those pins
depress as the key passed them would mean anything to anyone.
Probably, he decided. Most likely there was someone in the world
that could hear that and gain some information about that lock set.
He was not that person. To him it was just a soft metallic clicking
as it passed the pins. The locked clicked louder, the handle
turned, and Major Richard Weston stood framed in the doorway
looking down at him.

The Nation

Jessie stepped into the small closed
off space. Florescent lights dotted the ceiling. The floor was
straw over raw dirt. A small wood stove burned in one corner. The
woman was handcuffed to the steel cot with a long chain that
allowed her to reach most areas of the room except the door or the
wood stove. A lidded bucket sat nearby with a roll of tissue. A jug
of water sat close to the bed.

“
So, they finally sent
someone,” The woman said as Jessie entered. Mike followed her in
and closed the door.

“
Has it been a long wait?”
Jessie asked. She directed the question at the woman, but turned to
take Mike in too.

“
Three days,” The woman
said. She glared at Mike. “I've done nothing wrong and I'm locked
up like some criminal all because someone said they thought I was
bitten. I wasn't. I was never at all.” She rolled up the sleeve of
her shirt to show Jessie her lower forearm.

“
Arm looks okay to me,
Jess,” Mike whispered. “Her stomach is a mess though.”

Jessie walked to the woman and took her
arm in her own hands. She turned it from side to side. “What caused
this wound?” she asked.

“
Skinned it... Falling
down. I was running away from some dead, I was, but they didn't
bite me, I skinned it on the road when I fell,” her voice was panic
filled. “I didn't get bit, honest I didn't.”

“
I'm a doctor,” Jessie told
her. “I can see this is not infected with plague. I have to agree
with you. I should give you something for it though.”

“
But it isn't a bite,” she
peeked around Jessie and glared hard at Mike. “It's not a
bite.”

“
No, it isn't,” Jessie
agreed. “Now, let's take a look at the stomach? I assume you slid
on the pavement and it also got scraped up?”

Tears began to leak from the woman's
eyes immediately. “It... It got cut up... I couldn't get up fast
enough... They were right there,” she began to sob. “I don't want
you to look at it. I don't want you to.”

Jessie sat on the edge of the cot and
pulled the woman to her with one arm. “Honey, if you leave it
untreated... If it is a scrape and you leave it untreated it will
get infected. Then you'll really have a problem, as it is I have to
give you a tetanus shot. You don't want to fool around with that,”
Jessie soothed.

“
Can't you... Can't you
just give me the shot. My stomach hurts, it hurts bad. I... I have
it bandaged. It'll be fine,” she begged.

“
What is your name, Honey?”
Jessie asked.

“
Jenny,” she raised her
eyes to Jessie's own, pleading.

“
Well, Jenny, I see no
reason to look at it now. Let's let it heal a little and then we'll
take a look at it, okay?”

A smile spread across her tear streaked
face, and her reddened eyes blinked rapidly. “I would appreciate
that. I would. I'll be fine. I will,” she said.

“
Oh I know you will,
Honey.” Jessie reached forward and began to slowly unbutton her
shirt. The smile leapt away from her face and her hands came up and
grasped Jessie's tightly.

“
The shot, dear. The shot
goes in your upper arm, that's all.” Jessie smiled as she gently
moved her hands away and continued to unbutton her shirt. Once she
had the shirt unbuttoned she helped her out of it, glancing at the
bundle of bandage and the black capillaries that ran from under the
bandage toward her head and upper thighs. She made her eyes keep
moving as she took her small black bag she had bought with her from
Mike and began to dig out her supplies.

“
We try to be clean, but
we're living in the wild here,” she said as she pulled on gloves
and then freed an alcohol swab from its foil package and swabbed
the area. “It's hard to keep things as clean as we want them to
be,” She eased a needle from a package and then filled it from a
small bottle she pulled from the bag as well. “This won't hurt,
well, this won't hurt much,” she laughed. “Don't you hate it when
doctors say that and then it does?” She laughed again and Jenny
laughed along with her. Jessie wondered briefly what they would do
when there were no longer usable supplies of medications out there?
What would they do then? No easily treating even the most common
problems.

“
Okay, Honey... A slight
pinch,” Jessie told her as she slid the needle into her shoulder.
She finished, withdrew the needle and expertly ran a small bandage
over the puncture. Maybe tomorrow I'll stop by and get a better
look at how you are doing. Meanwhile, I think we can do away with
the cuffs... Mike?” Mike moved forward and freed her from the
cuffs.

“
There, better?” Jessie
asked her. “Come on, Jenny, let's get you into bed and resting.
That shot will make you feel a little woozy. Maybe a little sick to
your stomach too, but it will pass in a few hours and then you
should start feeling better. I'll come back in the morning, take a
look see, and get you started on some antibiotics, okay?” Jessie
asked.

Jenny nodded as Jessie fluffed up the
pillow and laid her head back on it. “I am tired. I am tired
already,” Jenny told her.

“
I know, Dear. It works
fast. Very fast. You wake up feeling refreshed. Much better. It
will all be over with,” Jessie waited, but Jenny said nothing more.
She waited a few seconds longer and then reached forward and
carefully peeled away the bandaging. Jenny moaned in her sleep and
then fell quiet.

The wound was a mess. Black veins
pulsed under the skin. The black capillaries had spread across her
chest and up into her neck; some larger blood vessels there were
turning too. The black had spread lower into her groin and her
thighs. It was far beyond hope.

Around the wound itself there were
distinct bite marks. They may not even have been so evident
earlier, but since she was still alive the body had begun to treat
them as the wounds they were. Individual teeth and bite marks
showed perfectly well. Some ragged edges of the wound showed bite
marks as well.

“
She's far gone,” Jessie
said. Her voice hitched. She turned her tear filled eyes to Mike.
“I hate this part of it,” she told him.

Mike nodded. “I hate it too. I
do.”

“
The shot will keep her out
a few hours.” She looked meaningfully at Mike.

“
It will be enough... She
won't suffer,” Mike told her. “Stay? Come back and visit with
Candace,” Mike offered spur of the moment.

“
I can't... Brad is outside
waiting, Mike. I can't. Another time?”

“
Of course,” Mike
agreed.

Jessie stood, repacked everything into
the small black bag and then left without another word. Mike stood
watching the closed door for a second and then turned back to the
woman.

She was peaceful now. Quiet. Her
breathing shallow. Even so he could see the blackness creeping
farther up her neck. He walked back out into the barn and picked up
what he needed. It had been secreted by Bob who had told him where
it was.

Mike hefted the small object in his
hand. It didn't really look much like an actual gun in design, it
was a bolt gun. Designed to shoot a bolt into an animals brain and
kill them quickly. It was used by slaughter houses, although this
particular type was a penetrating type, entering the brain,
destroying the cerebrum and part of the cerebellum as well, and it
had fallen out of favor due to a fear of spreading disease. They
had both laughed uneasily at that, but the truth was they were all
certain they were already diseased. Dying was the release of that
disease process and nothing could stop it, but true death, and true
death was a bullet in the brain. A bolt, as it turned out, worked
equally well.

It was a perfect zombie tool Bob had
told him that just happened to have been invented more than a
hundred years before the first zombie came along. Maybe, Bob had
added with a serious expression, who knows how long these people
have been playing with this compound. That had caused both of them
to fall silent.

Since Bob had given it to him it had
been used a dozen times. It was accurate and completely fatal. None
of the dead had come back. It was charged with a gas cartridge. The
bolt was released with a backward pull of a slide mechanism and the
bolt cleaned easily. The gun was easy, using it was not, and he
hoped it never would be. He walked back into the room and sat on
the edge of the bed for a second.

He could call someone, delegate this,
but that was unfair. Arlene had done her share of this too. Far
more than anyone. He could handle this one as he had a few of the
others. He leaned forward and placed the business end of the gun
against her forehead. He closed his eyes, said a quick prayer, and
then without opening his eyes he pulled the trigger.

The noise was a small metallic clank,
hardly any noise at all, even in the small, quiet room. It was
inconceivable that a noise like that could kill someone. He heard
her breath catch and become ragged. When he opened his eyes a few
seconds later she had drawn her last breath and let it out slowly.
It was over. He pushed himself away from the bed and went out into
the larger barn area. He ejected the bolt into a container of
bleach, wiped down the front of the gun with bleach too, and then
returned it to the empty shelf he had taken it from. As he stood
taking deep breaths to clear his head the barn door opened and
Ronnie stepped inside.

“
Hey,” Ronnie said. His
eyes cut to the room where the door stood open. “Finished.” It may
have started off as a question, but it became a
statement.

“
Yeah. Jess came, you know,
gave her a shot so it would be painless.”

Ronnie nodded. “Well, let me help bury
her. It's turning damn cold out there and the snow is starting to
pile up. I wonder if it was smart to send Bear and the others out.
They might not be able to get back.”

Mike nodded this time. “Nothing for it.
You know they had to go. Hell, I would have gone too if not for
Candace.” He looked around the barn and then back up at Ronnie
where he stood. “I can use the help, Ronnie, and I appreciate it.”
He nodded his head toward the open door.