The Infection

Scouting

I woke up early the next morning. The sun way still trying to climb it’s was over the horizon giving the sky a beautiful plethora of pinks, yellows, and blues dancing across the sky like ocean waves. Atris wasn’t in the chair with me, and I assumed that she had already woken up before me and was off helping the other women in the garden. I walked outside. It was incredibly cold today and I began to shiver. I went around back to where most of the others were and found Dale with a gathering of all the people.
        “Awe there you are No Name. You haven’t missed anything, I was just giving my morning speech and planning our day ahead.”
        Atris saw me and smiled at me. I smiled back. “So what is our plan for today?”
        “I was assigning shifts for the day. I put Atris in charge of the fence maintenance, and Julie is in charge of the Gardens while Sarah will take the kids. I’m putting Longshot and Shiny in charge of guard control. You, me and Squeaks are going on a scouting mission today.”
        Atris adopted a serious look, and Dale seemed to notice. “Don’t worry, we’ll take good care of him; we’re just going to show him the basics.” She didn’t seem to let up on her expression, and Dale decided it was a battle he couldn’t win and continued. “Anyway, today we’ll be looking for expansion supplies: fencing, wires, cables, tools, nails, and etcetera-etcetera.  Atris, I want you to take longshot with you. Take what fencing we have and border it around the yard of that house.” He pointed to a house next door, to the right, and Atris nodded, still in discontent. “Alright everyone, it’s a new day. Everyone knows what they have to do, let’s move. No Name, Squeaks, let’s gear up. We move out in thirty.” Both of us nodded silently and headed for the shed.
        I found my riot suit that I was fitted in yesterday. It was a matte black vest with big white letters that spelled out “N.Y.P.D.” To match it was a a helmet with a reinforced plastic visor and a chin strap. There were arm braces and leg braces in the same matte black color that I strapped around my arms and legs. I went to the back and found my sword from yesterday. I picked it up and held it in my hands, gazing at its graceful beauty. It just felt completely natural for me to hold, almost as if it was made and designated just for my hands. I put the strap over me and let it rest on my shoulder, with the sheath hanging at my left side. I let out a slight chuckle. The thought of my appearance must have been both menacing and comical. A tall guy wearing police riot equipment and a samurai sword was almost too hard to believe. But I was that guy.
        Looking over at Squeaks, I noticed he had finished putting his equipment on as well. “Hey, squeaks.” He grumbled in acknowledgement. “What is your real name?”
        He was silent for a moment, and then spoke in a deep grumbly voice. “My real name is Taylor.” I smiled, trying not to laugh. His name made him seem a little less intimidating. It was an innocent name. A harmonious name.
        “I like it.”
        “It’s a terrible name. It makes me seem like a wus. That’s why I asked Dale to only call me Squeaks.”
        “Well at lease you have a name.” I said distantly.
        We were both silent, looking at each other, almost with a sense of respect. Dale interrupted the silence, coming in through the door. “You guys ready? I just got Atris and Longshot situated working on the fence. I want to leave as soon as possible so that we’re not gone too long. With Longshot helping Atris, Shiny is going to have a lot on his hands guarding this place. Hopefully we can find some more survivors as well.”
        Squeaks spoke first. “Alright, let’s go.”
        Dale turned to leave, already have been suited up early this morning. Squeaks followed close behind, followed me myself. Jack suddenly appeared from a hole underneath a the house, and ran to me. “Hey boy, you want to come too?”
        “He’s not going to slow us down is he?” Dale said.
        “No, he won’t. Plus he’s saved my life more than once. You could say I’m reliant on him.”
        “Okay, but he’s your responsibility. Come on.”
        He opened the gate at the front of the house. It was nothing more than a swinging wooden frame with steel wire in the center of it. There was a one way sign nailed to the front of it. With the way Dale ran things, he wasn’t lying. I followed close behind Squeaks who followed close behind Dale. After a while, we were moving as one in a single, methodical unit. I was constantly looking behind us to make sure that there wasn’t anything following us or about to jump out. Squeaks was looking side to side to watch our flanks. Dale would stop us a few feet before we rounded any corner. He would walk up to it stealthily and gracefully. First he would stick his hand out the side to see if anything attacked it, then he would slowly peek his head around the corner.
        All the houses on the first three blocks had already been cleared. They had tied shoes hanging on the door knobs to indicate that they had already been there, or were unsafe. One such house had five infected in it. The doors and windows were closed and locked, so apparently they were not smart enough to undo them. They had decided to leave it alone for a later day. Five of them was just too great of a risk.
        Once we got far enough down the street, we came to the first unmarked house. It was another cookie cutter house to the others on the street. The outside walls on the house were a light blue, and it had a brownish blackish shingled roof that was half covered in a blanket of snow. The door was closed, but one of the windows were broken. There was a blood stain that started on the shards of jagged glass and streamed all the way down to the snow on the ground. There was a hue of red under the fresh layer of snow there. Either the blood was from someone frantically trying to escape, or something trying to get it.
        As we approached the house, Jack began growling with a deep rumble. I had to comfort him to keep from attracting any unwanted attention. Dale walked up to the door and Squeaks went to the window to look it. I got on the opposite side of the door that Dale was on, ready to defend against anything on the other side of it. He held out three fingers and counted down to one. On one, he slowly opened the door. I had unsheathed my sword from its holster and had it ready in hand. As the door opened, I looked inside and could see nothing. There were a few drops of blood leading from the window to the kitchen. At the window, there was a small puddle of blood, frozen on the ground. Furniture had been moved in disarray across the room, as if trying to make a barrier against whatever had broken in. A coffee table was pushed over on its side and thrown up against the wall. Cloths were half shoved in a duffle bag.
        We walked cautiously into the kitchen. As we came around the corner we saw the source of the blood. A man was curled up, stiff and frozen in the corner against a cabinet. He had a bite mark in his neck and arm and looked like he had gone through an extraordinary deal of pain before he died. Lying next to him was another frozen, lifeless figure. This one was lying on his stomach with his head turned to the side, eyes wide open and angry; almost lustful. Lodged in his head was a steel kitchen knife. Around his stomach was a messy puddle of frozen blood. It was smeared with hand marks as if the figure had struggled to get up after falling.
        Dale and I both cringed at the site, still not entirely used to such sites. I knew that we were going to see many more like this though in time. Dale walked up to the pair and knelt down, making sure that they were both dead. “Ain’t this a shame? I used to know this guy. His name was Frederick. We called him Freddy though, sometimes just Fred. He was my coworker over at the cable company. Now he’s nothing more than another victim from this sad plague. This, No Name, is why we have to stick together. We’ll all become just another victim like Freddy here if we don’t, you see?”
        “Yeah, I do.” I said gruffly, but with understandment.
        “Now then, let’s scavenge around a bit. No more than thirty minutes, then we’re out.”
        “Got it.”
        “Squeaks, go check their shed for some fortifications or tools we can use. Fencing, hoes, shovels, anything.” I looked behind me to see Squeaks who had once again snuck his way in here without me noticing. He nodded and left out the door. “No Name, I need you to go look for cloths, and supplies. I’ll stay here and look for food.”
        “Okay.” With this I turned and left to check out the back rooms. I went into the hallway and the first room was to the right. The door was shut, but I expected anything in here would have heard us by now and tried to get to us. Opening the door, something fell and crashed on the ground. The noise made me jump and I immediately tensed up, readying my sword. It laughed when I saw that it was only a broom.
        After a thorough search of the two rooms and bathroom, I checked in with Dale. I found several cloths that people could wear, though most were guy cloths, and some medicine in the bathroom. I did, however, find something for Atris. It was a necklace with a silver chain and a diamond on it. I had found it in a jewelry box lying next to the bed in the master bedroom. “I found some supplies. I think for now it’s all we’re going to get out of this house.”
        “Same here, got three cans of beans, peaches, several cans of soup and a half empty box of roman noodles. I think this should get us through on food for a while. Go find a shoe and we’ll move on to the next house.”
        I went and found an old tennis shoe in one of the bedrooms and tied it to the door knob of the front door. Squeaks, who had found a big spool of fencing wire, was standing next to Dale in the yard waiting for me.
        “Ready to go?” Dale said inquisitively.
        Just as I opened my mouth to answer we all three turned our head in unison down the street. We all heard the same thing. A scream.