Setting Things Right, Part 2: I depart with the convoy - a burned down house - waiting for Mr. Robbins - reflections on surviving the pandemic (540 hits)
Category: NoneRating: 1.75 on 8 reviews (Rate this item) (V)
Submitted by X54 (View user info) at 2008-10-01 14:57:32 EDT
Part 1: http://www.ubersite.com/m/118878 I meet Colonel Barnes - a standoff - their mission and mine
Part 2:
I collected my gear from inside the Umeda's house and loaded it into the back of a battered black Escalade. There wasn't much, just a large Army rucksack with some clothes and camping stuff and ammunition. Colonel Barnes took a closer look at the bodies by the garage, turned them over with his foot, snapped a picture and wrote something in his sheaf of papers. He watched me with an inscrutable expression as I climbed aboard the Escalade with my shotgun, my Glock and my beloved machete.
The driver, a darkskinned kid named Watson, pumped my hand and grinned. An older guy rode in back. He nodded without offering his hand or his name, then leaned back and pulled his cap down over his eyes.
"Don't mind Grumpy," said the kid. "That's just the way he is."
The convoy drove off, half a dozen vehicles winding up into the mountains. The kid talked nonstop about this and that while Grumpy slept in back. After thirty minutes we stopped at a private drive. The colonel checked the address on the mailbox against his papers, then posted security up and down the road. We turned in the driveway, a ribbon of asphalt that climbed uphill through live oak and bay laurel for a quarter mile, then broke out into chaparral and then bare, fireblackened ground.
The house had burned down to nothing, just a couple of rock chimneys rising up like bizarre geological formations from the charred and melted debris. We sifted through the remnants for bodies. If there were any they were too burned to recognize. In a pen out back a large dog lay bloated, stinking and flycovered, surrounded by the gnawed bones of what looked like another dog or two. Someone found a body in a murky green swimming pool, but when we poled it to the surface it turned out to be a deer.
Colonel Barnes made a note in his paperwork and we drove back down to the main road and continued farther up the mountain. After another ten minutes we stopped in front of a large two-story house that was visible from the road. A wrought iron gate blocked the driveway and a high stone wall ran along the perimeter of the property. The colonel posted security. He sent three men up the road to recon around the left of the house and another three down to recon around the right. The rest of us took up overwatch positions.
The recon teams called on the radio and said they were in position. There was no sign of anyone in the house.
"Grumpy," said the colonel. "You and Swanson go knock on the door."
Grumpy leaned a ladder up against the wall and climbed up and lowered another one over the far side and climbed down. I followed him. From the top I saw a large solar panel array off to one side of the house. We walked up the driveway in plain sight with our weapons shouldered. The front yard was spectacularly landscaped with statues and stepped retaining walls and hedges and bushes carved into shapes but it had all gone to hell. The bushes were mostly dead, weeds growing everywhere. "Chances are no one'll answer the door," said Grumpy. "But in case they do just keep your mouth shut and let me do the talking."
"What are you going to say?"
"That we're here to check up on them because there's some crazies going around killing lawyers." He said this with such a convincing air of concern I couldn't help smiling.
He tried the doorbell and after a few seconds he banged on the door with his fist and called out, "Mr. Robbins?" He tried the handle but it was locked and he banged again. "Mr. Robbins! It's the National Guard, Sir. Are you okay?"
Watson and five other men came up. They split into teams of three and went around both sides of the house checking the ground floor windows and doors. After they'd circled all the way around and met back in front Watson kicked the door in.
"Mr. Robbins," called Grumpy. "We're coming in, Sir. If you're inside, please let us know where you're at." Combat boots echoed off the tile. Fatigues rustled faintly against the walls as the men fanned out to search the ground floor. Grumpy kept calling from the foyer to mask their movement. "Mr. Robbins, it's very important that we talk to you, Sir. It's for your own safety."
The place was generally clean. Floors swept and mopped. Carpets vacuumed. A slight odor of garbage from the kitchen. Dishes soaking in the sink. The search teams scaled the stairs and began checking the upstairs rooms. Colonel Barnes came inside, looked the place over. He checked the refrigerator. Perishables inside. He opened a beer bottle and took a sip, handed it to me. Cold and refreshing. The refrigerator hummed to life.
The colonel wrote a message on a piece of California National Guard letterhead. "To The Occupants," it said. "You are in grave danger. Mr. Robbins has been targeted by a terrorist organization. Anyone found here is likely to be murdered. Please take precautions. We will return in two days to check on you." He taped it to the outside of the front door with a piece of hundred-mile-an-hour tape. Then he motioned to Grumpy and me to follow him outside.
"They're still in the AO," he said in a low voice. "They're probably watching us right now. They'll come back tonight. I want you two to wait for them here. With everyone going in and out they won't be able to keep track of who went in and who came out. They'll think we all left, but you two will be hiding inside."
"What about my gear?" I said.
"We can't bring your gear because if they're watching they'll see it and they'll know something's up. You have to stay quiet. Keep away from the windows until after dark. No lights, not even a cigarette. And no fucking around. Do you understand?"
"What should we do when they come back?"
"I'll leave first squad down the road with a vehicle. Call them on the radio if you need them. Use your best judgment. Don't let anyone get away."
We went upstairs and positioned ourselves in a back bedroom mostly filled up with miscellaneous junk. We sat on the floor in a corner out of sight of any window. The colonel had his men troop every which way through the house, in and out like a Chinese fire drill. Then they locked everything up and filed down the driveway and climbed over the wall and picked up the ladders and drove away. The house went silent.
Grumpy leaned his head back against the wall and pulled his cap down over his eyes. A bright square of sunlight crept across the carpet, edging toward his outstretched feet. I wondered about my gear, whether this whole thing was just a setup to separate me from it. Well, I had nothing to hide. They could look through it if they wanted. I had my shotgun and my Glock and my machete with me and those were the important things. There was nothing in my ruck I couldn't replace. The sunspot moved with maddening slowness, drifting over Grumpy's legs.
I wondered how many people were in the Robbins family. It was a big house, big enough for three families. Half a dozen bathrooms. Bedrooms and offices and guest rooms and studies and a library. Maybe they had a lot of kids. Maybe there were other people living with them. There's comfort in numbers. I scraped my thumb over the machete blade, feeling the razor sharpness of it tug my skin.
The house creaked and settled as the sunspot slowly climbed the wall. They say most of the people who lived through the pandemic survived by avoiding contact with anyone sick. But a few of us--one in a thousand, if that--contracted the virus and recovered. We're the real survivors. I don't consider those others who never got sick survivors. How can you claim to survive something without even being subjected to it? If you lived in California, for example, could you claim to have survived a hurricane in Texas? Or if you lived in Texas could you claim to have survived an earthquake in California? Of course not. Only those of us who got sick can claim to be survivors. The eye settled right on top of us, the epicenter split the tectonic plates beneath our feet. But we're still here. We're the true survivors.
The sunspot turned yellow and then orange and its edges got blurry and then it disappeared altogether. They say the virus did something to our minds, those of us who survived it. Supposedly we see the world through some sort of lens that distorts our perception of things. But frankly, things never looked more clear to me than they have since I woke from my coma. Everything before the pandemic seems like a weird dream. I can't make sense of it. Though I have to be careful who I tell this to, I like things better now than the way they were before. A lot better.
A faint scraping sound came from overhead. It almost blended in with the creaking wood of the cooling house, so faint I might have imagined it. I looked at the ceiling. It came again, more noticeable this time. Grumpy took off his hat and looked up. A low murmur drifted down, all but inaudible. We looked at each other. His teeth and eyes gleamed in the semidarkness. In a whisper as soft and stealthy as creeping death he said, "They're in the attic."
User Reviews
Submitted by hellish (user info) at 2008-10-04 02:09:50 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment
Submitted by write-of-way (user info) at 2008-10-02 15:24:26 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
First round voting ends Friday at midnight!
Give them a read even if they won by forfeit, there's some really good stuff.
icarus1987: Gargoyle http://www.ubersite.com/m/118950
vs
Impassive-Digressive: The Gargoyle http://www.ubersite.com/m/118922
stardamage: Floorboards http://www.ubersite.com/m/118960
vs
Ahumblefool: Floorboards http://www.ubersite.com/m/118981
Fungah: Like Unto Stone http://www.ubersite.com/m/119028
vs
JoeyG: Heartstarter http://www.ubersite.com/m/119012
inion_de_trua: the blizzard http://www.ubersite.com/m/119033
vs
Jack_McCallum: The Blizzard http://www.ubersite.com/m/118987
Hornet: The Nest http://www.ubersite.com/m/118982
vs
Gonefiguring: The Nest http://www.ubersite.com/m/119029
Brian_Johns: The Unspoken http://www.ubersite.com/m/118961
Brdn_Nkd: Under Glass http://www.ubersite.com/m/118973
Squirrelly_Girl: Who Killed the Chokomut Loving Zombie and Why? http://www.ubersite.com/m/118945
Snark: Brick by Brick http://www.ubersite.com/m/119032
Whiskeyjack: Needles http://www.ubersite.com/m/118983
Desz: Duel http://www.ubersite.com/m/118989
Sandmantate: Burning Eyes http://www.ubersite.com/m/118997
NintendoCzar: Made to be Broken http://www.ubersite.com/m/119021
Frankthebear: Pearls Of Wisdom http://www.ubersite.com/m/118941
Submitted by haikumikoo (user info) at 2008-10-02 15:21:27 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
This +2 is to encourage you to vote Astley.
http://ema.mtv.co.uk/vote/#__best_act_ever
Now do it.
Submitted by whiskey_jack (user info) at 2008-10-02 01:08:49 EDT (#)
Ranking: 0
It's well written and typically I like the ATP stories but the premise for this is just plain dumb.
Submitted by shadow (user info) at 2008-10-02 00:01:05 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
I really wanted to read this and give appropriate rating and whatnot, but my head hurts so bad it feels like my eyes are going to pop out and saunter down to the drugstore for migraine meds without me, and I just can't look at the damned screen any longer.
Here's a two since you probably deserve it.
Submitted by locksly (user info) at 2008-10-01 21:40:13 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
yeah bring on the next
Submitted by St_Jimmy (user info) at 2008-10-01 17:33:26 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
This installment was kind of boring.
But I'm pretty sure this series will be +2 worthy.
Submitted by Brdn_Nkd (user info) at 2008-10-01 16:06:57 EDT (#)
Ranking: 2
No Comment