Arcadia (Book 1): Damn The Dead (18 page)

Chapter 26

Char had been told there were a total of fifteen prisoners. She wondered how such a giant operation could be run by so few.

The prison was two levels. The cells lined three walls on both levels, in a U shape. The cells were barred, each with a locked door. The floor was cement. There were four picnic tables in the center. The guard station was at the open end of the U. It was a large office with a barred picture window. Behind it papers were posted on a corkboard, she saw a computer, and a few filing cabinets.

The guard led her up a set of metal stairs. He used a key and unlocked a door toward the center of the U. Her cell faced the office. Seemed like a prime location. She’d be able to see everything going on.

“This is your home. Make yourself comfortable for the night. Your foreman will be by in the morning to give you more of an orientation.”

“And I keep this mask on all the time?”

“Hard to sleep with it on. It isn’t as toxic in here. There is a ventilation system. Nothing fancy. I’d suggest wearing it when you work at the very least.”

“So I can take it off?”

“Choice is yours, McKinney. It’s your health. Not mine.”

“You wear yours all the time?”

“I’m here twelve hours a day. I have no problem wearing it my entire shift.”

She wanted to rip it off his face and punch his nose. “Where is everyone else?”

“Working.”

He closed and locked the door. Without a word he walked away. She listened to his boot footfalls on the plank.

She stood with her hands wrapped around bars and stared at her new surroundings. She knew she was going to cry. It was the last thing she wanted to do. While she was alone, it was also the best time to get it out of the way.

The cell was maybe 8 x 8. There was a bed, and a toilet. The shelf over the john held a roll of toilet paper and nothing else. She removed her mask and gloves and set them on the shelf over the toilet. She breathed in deeply, exhaled loudly and plopped onto the bed. The mattress was a bit firmer than the one in the holding cell at City Hall. A pillow was at the head, and a blanket was folded at the foot. Bars made up the front and back of the cell. The left and right walls were solid. She mostly had privacy from the other prisoners, except for those cells across from her. Those prisoners could stare right into her cell. She looked at the toilet again, and shuddered.

She crossed her legs and sat with her back to the bars. Just behind her was the carved rock wall. Water trickled down the face. She reached an arm through the bars and her fingertip just touched the wall. The water was cold. She brought her finger to her nose and smelled it.

Sulfur.

She breathed in and out and was already tired of the sound the mask made with each breath. It echoed inside her head. She lowered her head onto the pillow. Using a foot, she shuffled the blanket up her legs, grabbed onto an end, and covered herself. The prison was lit, but held many, many shadows. The idea of sleeping seemed like the best escape for the moment, if falling asleep was even possible.

#  #  # 

Antonio Velasquez raided other houses in the area. He did this daily. Supplies were always running out. His posse consumed everything. It reminded Char of when her Dad went shopping. She and Cash would dig through the groceries and pull out and devour the junk food. He wouldn’t buy anymore until the next time he went shopping. When it was gone, it was gone. They’d never learned to ration the chips and soda pop.

Char stayed in the mix of raiders, armed with her sword, machete and knives. She knew if she had to, she could take on any one of Velasquez’ crew easily. One on one that was. They were big men. Dangerous people. They were usually intoxicated. That added to the intimidation, but also incapacitated their reflexes, making them just slightly more threatening than fresh, fast zombies.

The house they surrounded looked vacant. They always did.

Guys barreled through the back door at the same time she and Velasquez rammed through the front.

Everyone yelled. “Get down! Drop it! On the floor!”

They weren’t zombies. Overpowered, a Mexican man, woman, and three kids fell to the floor.

Velasquez spoke Spanish. He pointed his men to head off in different directions of the house.

She stood with her sword in both hands, daring the Mexicans to move.

The woman and her two daughters were crying. They were face down on the floor, arms over their heads.

Char knew this wasn’t right.

They weren’t looting from an empty house. These people needed their own supplies to continue to survive.

“Antonio,” she said.

He shushed her. His eyes were dark, under thick eyebrows.

Some of the men returned. “There ain’t shit here,
‘Ntonio
,” Juan said.

“Si,” Velasquez said. He jabbed the barrel of his rifle into the man’s back. He spoke more Spanish at the resident.

The man didn’t look up, but instead lifted his hands off the back of his head and raised them as high as he could. He was crying, and talking, and despite speaking a foreign language, Char could imagine what he said.

“We should get out of here if they don’t have anything,” Char said.

Velasquez jabbed his elbow into her arm. It was a powerful blow that sent her reeling. She lost her balance and landed on a sofa. A plume of dust rose and lingered in the air, sunrays spiked through it. The cloud danced in the light.

When Velasquez banged the butt of his rifle into the man’s head, blood sprayed across dirty hardwood floors.

The women screamed.

The wife spoke fast. Her R’s rolled constantly.

Char knew the mother begged for her daughters to be spared.

“That’s enough, Antonio!” Char jumped to her feet.

The men were in a frenzy. Char knew they were making comments about the teenaged girl on floor. She was in a long white nightgown. She didn’t like the hungry look on their faces. Velasquez was getting riled up, too.

He’d protected her from the men in his company. They never laid a hand on her. She knew if Antonio wasn’t around, she’d of been in trouble. They’d have ravaged her relentlessly. Nightmares of an assault that never happened filled her dreams. She often woke in cold sweats and screaming from the torrid scenes that played on the screen behind closed eyelids.

Juan and Perez placed the rifle straps on their shoulders and bent down to scoop the teenager up. They had her under her arms. She struggled, kicking out.

The mother got up onto her knees. Tears fell from her eyes as her hands shot in the air and she screamed over and over, “
Deténgase
!
Deténgase
!”

Char felt bile rise in her throat. “Velasquez, this has to stop!”

When she stepped forward, Antonio grabbed her arm. She shrugged free. She raised her sword.

Something slammed into the back of her head. Juan, Perez, and the teen went cloudy in front of her. The floor raced up at her.

Laughter filled her ears, pounded around loose inside her skull as her eyelids fluttered. She knew she couldn’t black out.

Three gunshots erupted from somewhere.

The bangs were close to her head. She waited for the pain from searing hot bullets passing through her flesh.

She never felt the pain.

Her eyes closed.

Part of her was thankful.

She fought to stay conscious. She forced her eyes open. It felt like weights hung from her lashes, opposing every ounce of strength left inside her and making the attempt futile.

She placed palms on the hardwoods and pushed up onto her knees.

She closed her eyes against a spinning room. When she opened them again, the sun was gone. No. Not gone. Just in a different place in the room. Not as bright.

The woman was dead, her skull shattered by a bullet.

The two young kids beside her were dead, too.

Bullets through the skull.

“They were not zombies,” Char said, and she cried as she crawled toward them.

She heard them.

The noises came from upstairs.

It took effort to stand. She got up slowly, using a coffee table and the arm of a recliner to get to her feet.

She stood at the threshold leading from the family room to the foyer and looked at the bodies sprawled on the floor.

The people were dead.

Kids.

Holding her sword, she heard the rhythmic horror and shuddered as she climbed the stairs. Antonio and his men were animals.

She knew she had to stop them. Doing so would cost her life. It was an easy sacrifice, considering.

They howled. Beasts.

#  #  #

They howled like beasts, like animals . . .

Char sat up. The blanket fell off her.

The howling did not stop. The nightmare was not over. The prison was filling. The laborers were back from work and entering their cells.

Barred doors rang out as they were slammed shut.

She was thankful for the walls on either side of her cell. She could only imagine the monsters living beside her.

She grabbed the blanket and hugged it close to her body.

She wanted to go home, wanted her family back, wanted the infected gone, and life back to normal. Burying her face into her drawn up knees, she tried to muffle her crying. Tried.

Chapter 27

Char never fell back to sleep. It seemed like hours before everyone else was out cold. They’d worked all day. She didn’t think they’d stay up long. She wanted to find some kind of inner peace, but every time she tried to concentrate her tattoo itched. Her skin felt a bit raw where the work had been done. All she wanted to do was scratch at it. The itch stopped, but started all over again the minute she focused on focusing. It was odd and annoying.

Once the lights went out, she sat curled on her bed, hugging the blanket tight, and squeezing her eyes closed.

They had taunted and cried out in the darkness. They knew she was here. Word must have spread.

When the lights came on, she waited. Prison life was about to begin. She wasn’t ready for it. Her stomach muscles ached. She had to pee, but didn’t want to be watched while urinating. She’d hold it as long as she could.

She heard footfalls on the walk and climbed off the mattress. Her mask sat on the shelf over the toilet, staring at her. It was her identity now.

“Rise and shine.” The guard stood outside her cage. “I’m Kyle. Kyle Newstead. The second floor is mine from six until six. I get the luxury of escorting you to breakfast, to work, and to dinner. Lucky me. Grab that mask, those gloves and let’s go,” he said.

Char’s hand trembled. She closed her fingers on her things, but thought she might drop them. She brought them to her chest, and pressed them tight against her body. Her throat felt dry, and it was difficult to swallow. She wondered about bathing. Her last shower was in the hotel up top, and aside from stepping into the frigid river to clean up, she couldn’t recall how long it had been since she’d had that shower.

Char waited while Kyle used a key to unlock her door. “I open this door, you step out, and you stand here until I have all of the other doors unlocked. I give the word, you turn and follow the person in front of you. You guys head down the stairs and fill in the tables below. Sit where there is a food tray—that is if you want to eat. Understood?”

He pulled open the cell door. He tapped a long black rod onto his thigh. The handle displayed a yellow lightning bolt. She guessed the baton was electrified. He wanted her to see it, maybe to stop her from getting any funny ideas. Char wanted to tell him she hadn’t had a funny idea in over three years.

She nodded, and then stepped out of the cage. A man stood to her left. He had his hands in front of him, holding onto his mask and gloves. Eyes forward. He couldn’t be more than five-nine, with unkempt mixed dark and gray hair. She followed his lead and step forward toward the single safety rail and stared ahead with her gear held in front of her.

Peripherally she watched Kyle size her up for a moment, his eyes roamed over her from foot to head. He nodded, but still tapped the baton on his thigh. Perhaps finally satisfied that she wasn’t going to run or get any other
funny ideas
, he turned and walked away.

She’d been holding her breath, but hadn’t realized it until she exhaled. It was a slow, calming exhale. Then as soon as her lungs emptied, she sucked in another deep breath. The death grip on her gloves and mask was to keep her hands from shaking. It wasn’t working. She needed to get it together. Char did not want these guys, the other prisoners, sensing her fear. Fear was weakness.

Eight prisoners occupied a cell on the second level. They all stood by the rail and stared straight ahead. Seven men were now being let out of their cage on the first.

Kyle stood by one of two staircases and waved his baton.

The group on the second level turned. Char turned with them. They walked toward Kyle, proceeded down the stairs, and went toward the picnic tables in the center of the prison.

Char walked up to a table.

The man from the cell next to her shook his head. “Not there. First three tables are for the guys on the first floor. We’re over here.”

She walked behind him.

“Sit here,” he said.

As she sat, she turned to look at the first three tables. A man with a curved and jagged scar running from his chin to the top of his cheekbone watched her. The corner of his upper lip twitched. The seat where he sat was the one she’d been eyeing.

“Ignore him,” the man next to her said. “If you can, ignore everyone at those tables. Don’t look at them. Don’t talk to them. Do your best to stay clear. Got me?”

Char nodded.

The man set his mask and gloves on the table ahead of his food tray, and then offered his hand. “I’m Ross MacNeil,” he said.

“Char,” she said, shaking his hand.

“This guy over here is Frank Ryan. And next to him is Chris Paleo.”

Everyone said hello.

“What are you in for?” Ross said.

Char shrugged. “Self-defense. I defended myself against a group of people who attacked me and my friends.”

“Fighting,” Frank said, “same here. Had a bit too much at the Bent Elbow. Broke some chairs, some tables, and some noses. Told the judge it wasn’t me, it was the alcohol. She didn’t go for it.”

Frank was big, burly. If he had a long curly beard, she’d of sworn he was Rubeus Hagrid from the Harry Potter films.

“It’s not what I heard,” Chris said.

Ross shot him a look. “What have you heard?” Char said.

Chris looked at Ross, as if for approval.

Ross said, “Rumor is, you’re down here for murder.”

“Self-defense,” she said.

Ross held up his hands. “Just what’s going around. That kind of puts a target on your back. You know the old saying, take out the biggest and the badest to establish a name, build a reputation? You aren’t so big, but you might be the worst down here. No offense.”

“Yeah. None taken.” Char looked at the brown bag on the food tray. “What is this?”

Ross used teeth to tear open the plastic bag container. “M.R.E.’s.”

“Meals ready to eat,” Chris said. “Chicken fajitas.”

Char opened her bag, dumped the pre-wrapped, pre-cooked food onto the table. There was a bag of corn chips, the fajita, an oatmeal cookie, dried apple slices, packets of pepper and salt. “This is okay to eat?”

Frank was biting into the fajita. “It’s not bad.”

“Cold? We eat it cold?” Char didn’t feel hungry. She did not get dinner last night, and should feel like she is starving. Food was food, but something about shrink wrapped meals stored in potato chip-like bags didn’t excite her.

“Eat up. Dinner is a long way off. You’ll need your energy. Trust me,” Ross said.

She opened the corn chips. “What do we do, exactly?”

Ross looked up from his meal, looked over at Frank and Chris. “It’s not pleasant,” he said.

She’d gathered as much on her own.

“We basically walk on a treadmill, or ride a stationary bike. It’s how they power the generators that supply the town with its electricity.”

“Treadmills?” Char said. It couldn’t be like what she now pictured.

“You have to keep at a steady five miles per hour. Over five is fine. Under, and Kyle over there will remind you to pick up the pace with his lightning stick,” Chris said.

“Same for the bike, you have to pedal between six and eight miles an hour. It doesn’t sound fast, but after a while it isn’t as easy as it seems,” Frank said. “I run what’s called the wheel. I crank it around and around by hand.”

The chips crunched between her teeth. The taste of food hit her. She realized now how hungry she actually was. She opened the chicken fajita and took a bite. It tasted roughly like dry chicken with peppers and onions. Nothing Mexican about the flavor, other than it was wrapped in a tortilla. “But how is the power working if all of us are here eating breakfast? We generate that much power that we can stop at night and start again in the morning?”

This time Frank looked around the table. “We’re not the only ones running the plant,” he said.

“People choose to work down here? With prisoners?” Char couldn’t believe that. It was a claustrophobic’s worst nightmare. The sulfur in the air alone should keep people away.

“Not exactly,” Ross said. “You get to meet any of the Gathering Patrol? They’re a special unit with the sheriff’s department.”

Char pictured Benjamin Forti in his uniform. He’d mentioned more than once something about gathering, but couldn’t recall anything specific. “Yes,” she said.

“Let’s say they help staff the generator plant who work twenty-four-seven down here.”

“The Gathering Patrol works down here?”

“No, they find bodies to fill the positions,” Ross said.

“I’m not getting it. You just told me that people don’t work down here with us.”

“They don’t,” Ross said. “Zombies do.”