Deadland's Harves(28)

Clutch couldn’t come along today for three reasons. First, the air was too turbulent for his back. Second, Tyler was the only person who’d spoken with the guy we were meeting today. Third and most important, Clutch was shit as a diplomat. He was great at getting people in line—and was likely running all the residents through the training wringer right now—but when it came to begging for help, Tyler’s smooth personality was needed.

Tyler currently had his head propped against the glass, looking outside, his hand tapping to the beat of the music piping through our headsets. He had his iPhone plugged into the plane’s audio system, and the connector charged the device while it played. Right now, music from the Nadas filled my headset.

“The zeds around here aren’t showing any signs of migrating yet. I wonder if they do leave, how far south they’ll go,” he said without looking up, the music volume auto-muting while he spoke.

“Who cares as long as it’s a long ways from us,” Jase replied from the backseat.

“I don’t get it,” Tyler said. “The zeds are rotting away. Why would they migrate when they’re probably going to be dead within a year, anyway?”

The zeds still owned the area, but their bodies had slowed down as the plague ate away at their flesh and muscle. With how decayed many were, that they hadn’t died off already made no sense. Then again, that anyone could have their throat ripped out and yet return as a zed made no sense either. The virus, in its cruel effectiveness, was terrifying.

Still, on this trip, our greater risk was survivors, not zeds. Most zeds remained near towns, with only herds roaming the countryside. If only I’d flown over these roads before and mapped out any roadblocks or signs of raiders, we could’ve driven today. This was the first time Tyler was meeting with this radio contact. I would’ve preferred to drive so that we could have taken more reinforcements.

Tyler’s contact, a riverboat captain named Sorenson, had a community roughly the size of Camp Fox on a riverboat casino. He’d told Tyler he was confident his people would make it through the migration unscathed, and Tyler had believed him. The question was, would Sorenson take Camp Fox under his protection as well? That he had offered to meet with Tyler gave us all hope.

Right now, everyone at Camp Fox was busy packing up their belongings and pulling together all the food, livestock, supplies, and weapons for winter under the assumptions that Tyler’s diplomacy would succeed and we could temporarily relocate to Sorenson’s riverboat. If Tyler failed in gaining Sorenson’s help today, our only option was to run. I hoped to God Tyler wouldn’t fail.

On the ground, a few zeds dotted the landscape. Nothing like the herds Clutch, Jase, and I had seen north of us. Every hour I hoped the herds would stop their migration or at least pass through without coming near Camp Fox, but I knew better. I’d seen the herds and the paths they’d trampled. They moved like locusts intent on a mission. “Maybe the zeds in Chow Town will head out with them,” I said, thinking of the only possible benefit of the migration.

“We can only hope,” Tyler said. “It would be great to be able to get into town and clear out the stores before bandits get to them.”

Right now, around three thousand zeds lurked in the streets of Fox Hills, now called Chow Town. I’d made the unfortunate mistake of getting myself stranded in town not once but twice, and I’d barely gotten out alive each time. No one was crazy enough to venture near Chow Town. Zeds had laid claim, and no one dared challenge them for it.

Every day, a few more would trickle out of Chow Town, and our scouts would put a quick end to them. Still, at that rate, it would take years to clear out the town that had once been Fox Hills.

We couldn’t wait a decade for the zeds to clear out of Chow Town. We needed food and resources now. After Clutch’s farm and Camp Fox were destroyed, it was too late to replant, leaving everyone to harvest wild crops and the few gardens that had been planted. It scared the beejeezus out of me knowing there were even more zeds on the way, eating everything in their path.

Swallowing, I glanced over my shoulder. “Hey, Jase. Did you bring the map that’s marked up with the herds?”

“Got it right here.”

“Good. If we get the chance to make a fuel stop, I’ll fly us north. What do you think, Tyler?”

He nodded. “It’s a good idea to see if they’re still on track for what we calculated. I think we’ll need to start scouting to the north every day.”