Chapter 9
When May rolled around, the food supply at the community center was getting low so I decided Bobby and I would take the trailer and get some supplies in Yuba City. Bobby was thirteen now and thought he needed a manhood ritual to show everyone he was an adult. Bobby and I hit the road about 5:00 am on a clear May morning. The trip was only about three hours. We pulled into town and I backed the trailer up to the doors of a large Big Box store.
I told Bobby to check his weapons. Bobby checked his 9mm. He locked and loaded a full clip and stuffed six or seven more clips in his coverall pockets. He then repeated the operation with his M4. Bobby looked over at me and I nodded smiling I gave him a thumbs up sign.. I repeated the procedure on my own weapons. We dismounted the truck and walked to the front doors of the store. I checked the doors, they were locked. I said "Good, this means we won’t find an empty looted store." I walked back to the truck and grabbed my wreaking bar. I jammed the bar between the doors and levered them apart, I kicked at lock level. The door swung inward. "Let’s go, watch your front, and at the end of aisles make at least three fast steps through before pivoting and checking your left and right." I said to Bobby. "First we check the store aisles for Zombies, and then we grab food. Be careful, there could be infected employees or even infected customers. The lighting was limited to mid day sun coming through the skylights" I cleared the first aisle and was halfway through the second aisle when I heard shots being fired.
I jogged to the end of the aisle and started across the store in the direction of the shots. As I turned the corner I saw Bobby lying on the floor. Blood was soaking through his shirt from his left bicep. Another shot sounded, and I saw the muzzle flash from the butchers room behind the meat counter. I looked back at Bobby who had scooted over against the shelving. I inched back to the end of the shelf and ran toward the last aisle.
As I rounded the aisle, I met two individuals dressed in military fatigues. I brought up my M4 and fired two sweeping bursts, both individuals dropped to the floor. To guarantee they stayed down, I paused long enough to put a bullet into each guys head. I then continued down the aisle and vaulted over the meat counter at the back of the store. I rushed forward and kicked the door open to the butchers work area. There was a guy dressed similar to the two I had encountered in the first aisle. I brought up the M4, but before I could fire, the guy dropped his rifle and started screaming, "I give up!, I give up!" "How many of you guys are in here!" I yelled. "There's just me and two other guys." He answered. "Ok, climb over the counter and let’s check the kid." I said.
We climbed over the meat counter and moved over to the aisle where Bobby was lying. I bent down to look at Bobby’s arm wound. I looked up at my prisoner and said "Take off your shirt, then remove your shoes and pants." The guy started to protest and I brought up my M4. The pants got peeled off. Bobby sat up and I told him to remove his shirt, it looked like a flesh wound. I told my prisoner to go and get some bandaging gauze, alcohol and iodine from the medicine aisle.
"Won’t he run away?" asked Bobby. "I wouldn’t want to be out there without clothes, shoes, or a weapon would you?" I said. The prisoner returned after a few minutes with the items I had asked for. I opened the bottle of alcohol he handed me. I told Bobby, "Brace yourself Bob". I poured the alcohol onto the wound. Bobby let out a yelp but stood his ground. I took the box of gauze from the prisoner and ripped it open and dabbed the wound dry. Next, I poured the iodine onto the wound. I took the second box of gauze and wrapped and tied the it around Bobbies arm. I gave Bobby a pain pill. "Ok, pull your shirt and vest back on Bobby, then go sit in my truck and rest. Bobby said, "No, I'll keep gathering stuff, I'm Ok". "Alright, but if you need to rest let me know, Ok?" I told him. Bobby got dressed and headed to the medical aisle to load his cart.
I turned my attention to my prisoner, and asked "Ok start talking, tell me everything, who, what, and where are you guys from?" "My name is Neil Lestrom, my buddies Simon, Gary, and I were just here to get some supplies when we heard you break in the front. We have been holed up just south of town in an old power plant. There’s a good strong stone building and the whole thing is surrounded by a 12 foot high wire fence. There are about 18 guys staying there. We drew straws and the three of us lost, so we had to come out and look for food. This is the fifth grocery store we found. Our semi-truck is parked out back. We spotted this store and thought we could get one more load into the trailer." Neil babbled, spilling every bit of information he had.
I told Neil to show me the truck. We walked to the back exit of the store and Neil asks if he could get dressed. "No, I think unarmed and half naked gives you a little more incentive to hang around and not run. Right now I want to checkout your truck." I said. The truck was heavily loaded with canned goods and booze. "Ok, let’s get most of that liquor out of there." I told Neil. Neil jumped into the trailer and started to unload the whiskey. Just throw it over there away from the truck I told him." The guys aren’t going to like that." said Neil. "I don’t care what they like or don’t like." I said. I then told Neil to head inside and load carts with stuff from the medical aisle. I grabbed a forklift and started loading pallets of, rice, beans, pasta, and canned goods into the Semi’s trailer. Then Neil and I started loading the cart loads of medical supplies into the trailer Bobby and I had brought with us. After a couple of hours I called a halt to our loading, put a tarp over the trailer load and pulled down the Semi's trailer door and locked it. After I checked Bobby's arm, it appeared the bleeding had stopped, but it would be sore for a week or two. "Bobby, can you follow me in my truck?" I asked. "Sure, I think so, but I never pulled a trailer before so don’t leave me too far behind." He said. "I don’t think that will be a problem." I said. I tossed my keys to Bobby and said, "Go out front and get in the pickup truck and wait until I come around, Ok?" Neil and I started to the rear exit where the semi truck was parked. "Wait, can I put on my clothes now?" Neil asked. "Not yet, just carry them back to the semi" I said. At the Aisle where Bobby had been shot, I picked up the rifles Neil and his friends had been using as well as their spare ammunition, just 50 rounds each. "You’re not very well armed for a trip into the city" I said. "They only gave us enough ammunition for an emergency. We don’t have a lot to spare." Neil said.
"Ok, mount up. Let's see if I can drive this thing." I said. "What are you going to do with me?" asked Neil. "Well, I could just shoot you now, or you could tell me more about the guys at the power plant." I told him. "Well, we just started gathering there after the Zombie thing started. There were about 30 of us at first. Most of us came from a construction site up the road from there. At first we let anybody join us. But, then we let in eight women from a club just down the road and all that changed. About three or four days after we let them in, one of the girls went Zombie. We killed her, but about a week later six guys and three of the other girls turned Zombie. By the time we killed them we had lost 14 more people. After that we didn’t let anyone else in. If anyone tried to break in, we shot them. Between the Zombies that show up, and the people wanting inside, we have been running low on ammunition."
I drove around the corner to the street where Bobby was waiting in the pickup truck. "Do you have friends at the power plant, Neil?" I asked. "No, I just saw it as a place to be safe. I hadn’t been working at the Site but a couple of days when this Zombie crap started. I hardly knew any of the guys before we took refuge in the power plant." Neil said. "Well, you can get out somewhere along here and go back there, or you can come back and stay with us. You’ll have to prove yourself trustworthy before you’re accepted into the group. But if you earn our trust, you’ll be fine. If you do anything to endanger the group, you will be expelled or executed. That is the same for everyone, not just you. So decide what you want now" I told him.
"I’ll take you up on your offer of asylum if you mean it. I’d be glad to be shed of that power plant." Neil said. I looked over at Neil and told him "You can get dressed now but no weapons yet. I’ll talk to Bobby and he
will be Ok. But don’t let his sister know you shot him. I can’t guarantee your safety from her". "Is she your wife?" Neil asked. "No, I found her and Bobby holed up in their granddad's attic last summer. Now their more like adopted kids or a niece and nephew." I told him.
I turned onto highway 80 and headed east before I started the twisting turning route home to try and throw off any Zombies that might be chasing us. Bobby was doing a good job driving my truck and pulling the trailer, I saw the trailer wheels off the pavement a few times, but in fact, he was doing a better job than I was. Driving a semi tractor and trailer rig was a lot more difficult than I had anticipated. About three hours later we finally turned onto the road leading to the entrance gate to Haven. "Where the hell did you find that thing Ralph?" said Tom when we stopped at the gate.
Now we need to have a neighborhood meeting to question Neil some more about the guys at the power plant and determine if we should try a rescue or just let them survive or die on their own. Then there is the National Guard Armory to check out. It probably would be a good idea to setup some kind of early warning sites to warn us if large groups of Zombies are headed toward Haven.
It never ends. Each day more things occur that need to be dealt with just to survive. It doesn't get easier it just gets harder.
THE END?
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About the author
Jeff Ping is a retired RF Engineer living in Northern California.
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