The Harvesting (9 page)

“
Gross,” Jensen
said.

“
Dammit, she was fast,”
Dusty cursed.

“
Who?” Ian remarked
sarcastically.

We all paused and waited, listening.
My heart was pounding.

“
Let’s check upstairs,”
Ian whispered.

When we got back to the foyer, Gary
joined us.

“
Better keep guard,” I
told him. “You might have gotten someone’s attention.”

“
I’m on it,” he said and
took a post on the porch.

When we got upstairs, Ian called out.
“Anyone alive up here?”

We waited.

A moment later we heard slow
foot-steps. Everyone raised a weapon. One of the bedroom doors
opened, and an elderly man stood clutching the door frame. It was
Mr. Franklin. Clearly, he was not in good health, and he looked
frightened out of his mind.

“
My wife,” he whispered,
rasping.

“
I’m sorry, Mr. Franklin,
she’s dead,” Dusty told him.

He nodded sadly and took a puff on his
inhaler.

“
Come sit down,” I said,
sheathing my sword. I guided the old man back into the room and to
a chair. The room smelled like body odor, urine, and moldy food. He
must have been locked in there for several days.

“
Mr. Franklin, we need to
move you. You’re not safe all alone in the house. Let us take you
to stay with someone,” Dusty encouraged.

“
Mrs. Finch is going to
move in with Fred Johnson. That might be a good place for him,” Ian
suggested.

“
My medicines,” the old
man said, motioning toward the table.

My stomach hurt. There was no way this
man would survive. Just like Frenchie’s children, he was so
vulnerable. The enormity of keeping such people safe overwhelmed
me.

“
I got them,” I said and
rose. I unzipped a pillowcase and put all the medicines
inside.

Dusty and Jensen led Mr. Franklin down
the stairs. Outside, Gary shot twice at an approaching undead man.
I could only see the shadow of their figures through the beveled
glass windows. Mr. Franklin stopped.

“
What is happening?” he
asked.

“
It’s the end of days,”
Dusty replied. “Come on, Mr. Franklin. The good Lord hasn’t called
you just yet.”

The old man muttered in
reply.

When I reached the bottom of the
stairs, I noticed Mr. Franklin’s and his wife’s wedding portrait
hanging on the wall. They looked so young and happy.

Ian came up behind me. He stopped and
looked at the photo as well. “I want to talk about last night,” he
whispered, but I raised my hand to cut him short.

“
Not now,” I said and went
outside. Who would have thought that the end of the world would
bring me the one thing I thought I wanted most. I did still want
him, didn’t I?

Chapter 11

The sun had just peaked over the
mountains when we collected in the elementary school parking lot.
The sunrise was a mix of pink and orange. The air was cool. Mist
was rising off the lake and river. Half the streets were shrouded
in fog. It was amazingly quiet: no cars, no hum of electricity, no
nothing, just birds and the sound of the wind.

About two dozen people had
assembled.

I rubbed my gloved hands together. “We
need to get some barricades in place at both ends of Main Street.
Is Fred here?” I asked, looking around.

“
Here, Layla,” he
called.

“
You’re our man, Fred.
What have we got? What can we roll in?”

“
I need about ten bodies
to help. We can drive in the old school buses and fill the gaps
with scrap, dumpsters, barrels and the like,” he
replied.

“
I think I saw that in a
movie once,” Jeff muttered.

“
The Williams folks just
had a ton of chain link fencing delivered to expand their kennels.
It’s still rolled up on their property. We could try to fence the
barricade as well,” Jensen offered.

“
Sounds good.”

“
Layla, this is Kiki
Jones. She’s Lil’s and Orlando’s daughter—they didn’t make it. She
had an idea,” Tom said.

Kiki’s eyes were red and swollen from
crying. Dark rings made half-moons under her brown eyes. “Well,”
Kiki started, “I did a project at college with short wave radios. I
might be able to get a radio up and running. Maybe we can see if
there are other survivors out there. But I need to see if there is
some equipment in the school.”

“
Great idea,” I said,
smiling encouragingly at her, “take whatever you need.” She
reminded me of my fencing students. I choked down the wave of
despair that bubbled up as I realized they were probably all
dead.

“
I can give a hand with
that,” Gary told Tom and Kiki. “I used to play around with the CB.
I have some stuff that might help.”

“
Alright then. Let’s split
up. This group can go with Fred,” I said, portioning off the crowd.
“The rest of you will keep patrol. We need to set up a schedule,
get on rotating shifts. Jensen, can you put that together and let
people know when they are on patrol?”

He nodded affirmatively.

Summer waved at me. “I’ll come with
you to Mara Hunting Club. They have bulk food stored up there, and
I have a key,” she said, dangling a key chain in front of
her.

“
Great, let’s go,” I
called and everyone moved out.

Jamie, Summer, and I packed into my
SUV. Ian, Will, and Dusty headed out in Ian’s pick-up. We crossed
town and turned up Morrigon Hill. I sat in the back while Jamie
drove. Summer tried the radio stations. There was nothing but
static.

“
How is it that everything
just stops?” Summer asked. “It all just stopped.” She snapped off
the radio.

“
I haven’t seen an
airplane in days. Sky is completely empty,” I added as I looked out
the window. We passed a dense pine forest, the green leaves making
a thick canopy, the ground covered in pink needles.

“
Makes you wonder, right?
How many man-made things out there are dependent on electricity,
oil, fuel? With no one around to push a button, what prevents
missiles from going off or dams from collapsing?” Jamie
questioned.

“
I guess we’re screwed
either way,” I said, popping a cartridge into my gun. I rolled down
the window. “Slow up” I called to Jamie.

An undead man plodded out of the woods
and into the ditch that led downhill toward town. As we rolled up
on him, he stopped and looked at the SUV. I leaned out the window
and took a shot. His neck snapped back as the bullet hit him
between the eyes, and he fell into the ditch.

“
Christ, that water runs
downhill and into the stream,” Jamie said, putting the SUV into
park.

I grabbed some medical gloves and
jumped out, handing a pair to Jamie. We pulled the gloves on and
went over to the body.

“
Recognize him?” I asked
as we stood over the body.

Jamie shook his head.

We lifted the heavy man, carried him
to the bank, and dropped him into the forest. We climbed back into
the SUV.

Summer was staring out the window at
the dead body.

“
We need to tell people to
boil their water,” Jamie said as he put the SUV back in
gear.

Summer rolled the window back up.
“Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth,” she
recited absently, “the beatitudes, Matthew 5.5. Yeah,
right.”

Neither I nor Jamie knew what to say.
We rode in silence the rest of the way to Mara Hunting
Club.

When we got there, Ian’s truck was
parked at the very end of the long driveway. The club sat in the
middle of a large field. The shooting range was set down in a pit
with an earthen retaining wall. From the end of the driveway you
could see the roof above the shooting stand. The club itself was a
large log-cabin with arching windows that looked out onto the
field.

What caught us all off guard was the
fact that there were cars in the parking lot. There was not another
town within an hour’s driving distance.

“
Was there an event or
something?” I asked Summer.

She looked surprised. “Not that I know
of.”

We got out of the SUV and joined Ian’s
group. I had brought my binoculars with me. I crawled into the back
of Ian’s truck and leaned on the roof. I focused the binoculars to
get a better look.

“
See anything?” Ian
asked.

I scanned the place. There seemed to
be no movement anywhere. Nothing moved at the shooting range nor
could I see anything through the windows. “No movement in the
building.” I looked toward the parking lot. “Nothing is moving, but
there are two vans and six cars in that parking lot.” I jumped out
of the back of the truck and stared at the building. My hands were
shaking. Something felt off. Something felt wrong.

“
Okay, let’s go,” Ian
said.

Jamie read the expression on my face.
“What is it? What’s wrong?”

“
I don’t know.
Something.”

Ian started pulling guns out of the
back of his truck. “It’s clear. Let’s move.”

“
Naa, no, Ian, not like
that,” Jamie said, taking one look at me and then back at the
building. Jamie turned and gave Will a knowing look.

Will nodded and took off in a sprint
across the grassy field, keeping as low as possible in the tall
weeds.

I lifted the binoculars and watched
him go.

“
Do you always have to be
right, man?” I heard Ian grumble at Jamie.

“
Just being cautious,”
Jamie answered.

Will moved quickly and soon he was at
the building. “He’s clear so far,” I said. I watched as Will looked
into the windows of the club. He flashed me an “okay” sign and then
dodged around the back of the building and out of sight. I held my
breath. We waited.

Moments later, Will came running from
behind the building. He was dashing quickly through the grass.
“They’re coming,” he yelled. “They’re coming,” he screamed again as
he ran toward us.

Seconds later, cresting over the
shooting range hill, two dozen little bodies appeared. I lifted the
binoculars. “Oh my god,” I whispered. “Oh god,” I said, pressing
the binoculars toward Jamie.

Without even waiting to know what was
coming, Summer yelped and jumped back into my SUV.

Jamie lifted the binoculars and took a
quick look. “Is that the Cub Scouts?” he asked in
amazement.

I jumped into the driver’s seat of
Ian’s truck. “We need to get Will,” I called to the guys. They
hopped into the back, and I hit the gas.

I sped across the bumpy field to
intercept Will. When he was close, Ian and Dusty leaned down and
pulled Will into the back of the truck.

“
Layla, turn the truck
around so we can get a line of fire on them,” Jamie
called.

I turned the truck, and getting it on
higher ground, pulled to a stop. At once they started to
fire.

“
Fuck, there is like two
dozen of them,” Will called. “They are in the god damned weeds. I
can’t see a thing.”

“
Layla, we need your
automatic,” Ian yelled to me.

I shimmied through the window of the
pick-up cab and stood in the back. I unholstered the gun and took
aim. The first child appeared in the grass. He was still in his Cub
Scout uniform. Half of his face was a bloody pulp. He looked like a
broken cherub. He came crashing toward us at an alarming
rate.

“
Layla, shoot,” Ian yelled
at me.

A moment later six more children
emerged from the weeds. The guys shot at them but they were quick,
moving swiftly toward the truck.

“
Layla, shoot that fucking
gun,” Ian yelled at me.

I stood frozen.

“
Shoot that fucking gun!”
Ian screamed again.

A split-second later Jamie took the
automatic from my hands. “It’s alright,” he whispered. Turning
then, he launched a barrage of bullets toward the oncoming
children. They fell quickly. I backed up toward the cab. A moment
later, however, I heard the horn on my SUV honking.

I looked back. At least four women
were clawing at the side of my SUV. I realized then that Summer had
locked herself in without the keys.

A boy grabbed at Will’s leg, nearly
pulling him to the ground. Dusty shot the child’s brain through his
ear.

I looked back at Summer. “Dammit,” I
swore. I pulled the Glock from the holster, climbed over the roof
and down onto the hood of the truck, and set off in a sprint toward
Summer.

“
Layla!” Jamie called, but
the children kept coming at them.

I dashed through the field back toward
Summer. When I got close, I whistled to draw the undead Cub Scout
moms’ attention. Afraid I would hit Summer, I didn’t want to shoot
toward the SUV.

The women turned and lunged toward me.
I was quick. I shot the first two with no problem. The second two
were fast and I missed. As the third one came close, I finally got
a shot off. The fourth, however, seemed to purposefully avoid being
shot. She dodged. I pulled my sword and let her get in close. I
swung, decapitating her. Her head fell to the ground. The body
wandered across the grass a few more steps then toppled
over.