Part 7: May 22 - Web-heads

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Carl dropped Frank and James off at the hospital, then continued up the main highway and turned onto the old road leading into South Bend. He stopped on the outskirts of the small town, parking in front of a little drug store where he, Sam, and Tim unloaded the horses and unhooked the trailer from the bus.

Carl turned to the younger woman. “I’ll meet you here at noon. If you’re not here at that time, I’m coming into town to find you. Clear!?” Carl said as he pointed at the pavement he stood on, emphatically indicating this location.

“Clear.” Sam saluted him sloppily with a smile. “I’ll stick to the plan, don’t worry.”

Carl just frowned at her. “Don’t do anything risky.”

“What’s risky about riding around and searching for little kids?” Sam looked at Carl with a confounded expression.

Carl frowned back and shook a finger at her. “Stick to the plan!”

Carl had laid out a plan during the drive to the parking lot he had decided would be the drop point; he had insisted that they coordinate how they would proceed through the town to search for children. Sam made no objection since Carl’s reasoning was rock solid, as always. If he had not been trying to conserve fuel for the bus, he would have just driven around town and not bothered with the horses at all. However, there was only one local supply of diesel fuel for the old bus, which was the only transportation they had for the group at this time. Carl cursed how the majority of services were completely dependent on computers and, in his opinion, the stupidity of civilization’s obsession with those damned machines.

He may have been correct, Sam thought. If she had not developed that infection when they attempted her first implants, she would be like everyone else—some kind of vegetable lying in her cabin, all alone.

Carl stressed that if they found children who needed help, he could easily locate the group by following the planned route.

“I’ll be back around noon; I have to refuel this beast again or we’ll all be doing a lot of walking,” Carl said. “You two be careful.” He reached out and shook Tim’s hand, then clapped the boy on the back. “You watch out for her, you hear?”

Tim smiled. “I will, sir.”

Carl climbed back onto the bus, started the engine, and pulled away, leaving Sam and Tim standing in the parking lot.

Sam watched the bus as it disappeared around the corner. She remembered how she had met Carl during her sophomore year, when he had been assisting the professor. The class had learned as much from Carl as they had from the professor. Sam had liked Carl’s no-nonsense personality; he was honest and caring once you got past his crusty exterior, and she had come to respect this man immensely. She had even asked his advice about what he thought she should do as she planned her life’s career, and they had been friends ever since. She valued his opinion, and if he worried about them searching this quiet little town, she would not flippantly dismiss his concerns. She would bust his butt about it, but she would never disregard his opinion.

He had served in one of the Middle Eastern campaigns and had somehow saved his entire group from a brutal ambush. He had never told her what had happened, but she had heard secondhand that he had single-handedly saved his squad and rescued a group of civilians as well. If Carl said be careful, she’d listen.

Sam and Tim unloaded the tack and proceeded to saddle up the horses. Sam watched the boy carefully as he brushed Rusty and prepared to place the tack on the animal. Tim worked with calm confidence as he placed each piece of tack on the horse, and it was clear to Sam that Tim indeed knew what he was doing. Once they were ready to mount, she had Tim take Rusty through some basic maneuvers so she could observe how the horse and boy worked together. Confident that Rusty would respond willingly to the boy’s commands, Sam mounted Jack, and they started into town.

The plan was to ride around the town clockwise, traveling through the neighborhoods to search for children. South Bend was a younger town than Elmwood, and the streets had been laid out in the uniform north-south grid pattern of a typical modern industrial town.

Sam and Tim rode the horses slowly down the silent streets toward town, but rather than ride straight into town, they turned the horses onto a side street and proceeded to wind their way past family homes. Each step of the horses’ hooves echoed off the silent houses, the sound amplified by the vacuum of human activity. Sam got shivers up her spine from the absence of life around her.

They rode past a car with the body of a woman sitting at the steering wheel. She was, without a doubt, dead—expired from the build-up of heat in the car yesterday or as a result of whatever had frozen everyone.

They rode on in silence, listening for any sounds of life. They took turns calling out: “Hello, is anyone there?” But no other human voices returned their calls.

They were almost parallel to the center of town when Tim informed Sam that he needed a pit stop.

“A what?” Sam said.

“You know, a pit stop. Toilet. That’s what my dad always called it,” Tim said. “There’s a barber shop over there, I could run in really quick—or there’s a big bush over there.” He shrugged as Sam rolled her eyes.

“Barber shop,” she said. “We don’t have to go too native yet. We’ll take turns. Hand me your reins.”

Sam held Rusty’s reins as Tim entered the shop to find a bathroom. As she waited for her turn to use the facilities, she listened. She just couldn’t get over this crushing silence. There should be surviving children—and children always made noise, didn’t they?

Sam came back out of the shop and checked her saddle girth, preparing to mount up, when Jack snorted and raised his head higher, turning his ears toward the town center.

“Hey bud, you hear something?” Sam watched Jack’s ears and eyes. Something had caught his attention, and he focused his senses toward the center of town.

Tim walked up from behind. “What’s wrong?”

But Sam motioned for him to be silent. “Listen. Do you hear anything?” she quietly asked the boy. Tim listened in the direction the small horse had focused his attention, and then they heard something—a terrified scream.

Sam drew in a quick breath. “What was that?”

Tim shook his head, his eyes wide. “Don’t know,” he whispered.

Sam looked around and pointed toward a fenced yard. “Let’s put the horses in that yard, then we’ll sneak in and see what that was.” Tim just nodded. They quickly walked the horses into the fenced yard. Sam quickly glanced around, looking for plants that could be poisonous to the animals. Seeing nothing harmful to Jack and Rusty, she closed the gate.

She and Tim stealthily hurried in the direction of the scream. As they crept closer to the center of town, they started to pick up the sounds of yelling and laughing. They focused on the direction of the sounds. As they quietly moved closer, the sounds became clearer—but it wasn’t the sound of children having fun. There was something depraved about the laughter.

“Let’s stay out of sight. This feels wrong,” Sam whispered.

“Yeah,” Tim answered just as quietly. “I think you’re right.”

They crept up an alleyway, staying close to the side of a brick building, and ducked into a doorway for cover. The building faced the main street, and Sam and Tim inched closer to peek through a full corner display window, trying to see who or what was making all the noise.

What they saw gave Sam gooseflesh. In the middle of the street, a group of teens with knives, hatchets, and clubs were beating and hacking at a body that lay in the street.

Sam turned away, her eyes wide with horror. “What the hell are they doing?” she gasped.

Tim hissed, “It’s those stupid web-heads. Looks like they’re using the frozen people as targets. I can’t stand those kids.” He stepped back. “They would sneak into the neighborhoods at night and use pets as targets. We lost my mom’s little dog, Muffy, last month—they hacked her to pieces. The police couldn’t prove it, though.”

Sam, horror still etched on her face, whispered, “What makes someone do that?” The sounds of the teens’ cackling laughter, as they continued to brutally hack and beat the body to a pulp, echoed through the empty streets.

Tim pulled on Sam’s arm. “Let’s get out of here, Sam. I’m not so sure they wouldn’t do that to us. They’ve gone viral-mad.”

Sam looked at Tim. “Viral-mad?”

Tim shrugged. “That’s what it’s called when someone gets so far into a game that when you try to get them offline, they just sorta keep going. It’s as if they become a part of the game and think it’s real life.”

Tim and Sam quietly backed away from the corner of the building when they jumped at the sound of another voice quietly calling from behind them. Sam froze in terror, then she and Tim slowly turned to see who was speaking.

“Over here, quick.” A girl was peeking around the edge of a door from the side of a building across the alleyway. Sam and Tim hurried to the door and entered to find a teenage girl and a little over a dozen smaller children huddling in a stockroom. The children started to back away, eyes wide with fear.

Tim squatted down and tenderly smiled at the children. “Hi, I’m Tim. Don’t be afraid, we won’t hurt you.” The children relaxed a little but still stayed huddled together, clinging to each other.

Sam looked around the dark stockroom. Turning to the girl, she asked, “Do you know what’s going on out there?”

“It’s the web-heads. They’ve gone viral ever since all the adults went zombie on us,” the girl whispered. “We’ve been hiding from them. They grabbed some kids, and we haven’t seen them since.”

“What’s your name?” Sam asked.

“Emily,” she replied shyly.

“Hi Emily, I’m Sam, and this is Tim. We came into town to find survivors. Are there any more kids hiding?”

“I have another group hidden at the flower shop. I have to get these kids and those out of town,” Emily explained. “But let’s not talk here.”

“Alright, you lead the way and we’ll follow,” Sam stated.

Emily quietly gathered the terrified children together and led the group through the shop to a door exiting to the back alley. She opened the door a crack. Checking outside, Emily made sure the alley was clear, then they all followed her out the door and ran down the alley, away from the din in the street. Emily, with the help of the older children, continued to wind their way through buildings and alleys, guiding the group until they arrived at the back of a flower shop. Emily quickly entered and brought out eight more children.

“I have to get them as far from the center of town as I can,” she said to Sam and Tim.

“What direction are you taking the children?” Sam asked.

“There’s a motel on the outskirts, near the old factory.” Emily pointed in the general direction. “I’ve been hiding the children there. We had to move some zombies out, but there’s plenty of room, and the web-heads haven’t gone near it yet. We keep lookouts on the roof.” Then Emily asked, “Where did you come from?”

“Pine Ridge. We took the children from that town to a safe place. There were almost 200 children there with one of their teachers and my friends. We’re all trying to figure out what to do next.” Sam turned and copied Tim’s example, kneeling down to eye level with the children. “Tim and I came here to find more children. We had no idea that the teenagers were acting like that.” She pointed toward the center of town.

“My friend will be back to pick us all up and take us back to the campus. All of you are welcome to come join us. That’s why we came here—to find survivors and bring them back. If you haven’t already noticed, most of the survivors have been young kids like yourselves,” Sam conveyed to the group.

Emily nodded. “Yeah, I’ve noticed. Most of the zombies are over the age of 13 and under the age of 50. So, it seems that the very old or the very young aren’t going zombie.”

Tim broke in. “The kids at the Colony are calling the frozen people veggies. The zombie word scares the really little kids, but it looks like the zom… I mean veggies aren’t the people we need to be afraid of.”

Emily looked at Tim quizzically. “Colony?”

“Yeah, at least that’s what the little kids are calling it—the Colony.” Tim turned to the children. “It’s at the university. We set the kids up in the student dorms. You’ll see, it’s kinda cool.” He turned back to the group and squatted down beside Sam to address the frightened children. “And Sam here,” he pointed at her, “brought in puppies and kittens and bunnies and ferrets, hamsters, and other pets for all the kids at the Colony to play with.” He smiled as the little faces looked up at him, and some of their fear started to dissolve. “And some of the older girls and I set up a movie theater to show movies after supper for the little kids.”

Sam stood up and turned to Emily. “Listen, my friend will be back about noon to pick us up and anyone we find. Are there any other groups you have hidden?”

“No, this is all I could find,” Emily said. “I’m afraid that the teens have scared the little kids so much they’ve hidden and won’t come out even for me.”

Sam looked at the ground, shaking her head. “Okay, let’s just get these kids the hell out of here. I’ll report back to the group and see if we can come back here to straighten out this mess.”

Sam and Tim followed Emily’s lead as she lined the children up and quickly hurried them through the back streets and alleys toward the outskirts of town.

They were all startled when a boy of about 12 stepped out from behind a dumpster. “Can you help us?” he pleaded. “There’s a bunch of us hiding in the old paint store around the corner. I came out to see if you were dangerous, like them.” He pointed toward the center of town. “We had to hide. They killed the lady from the drug store yesterday. They don’t care if you’re a zombie or okay—they just start beating and kicking until you don’t move anymore.” Tears ran freely down the boy’s cheeks.

“Hank,” Emily ordered. “You take this group and go with this lady to the safe house. Tim, will you come with me to get the others?”

Sam turned to Tim. “I’ll get the horses on the way and meet you there.”

She watched as Emily and Tim followed the boy who had asked for help, jogging down the alley toward the paint shop. Sam marveled at the way the teenage girl had taken charge and taken on the task of collecting and protecting the small children. She then gave Hank a nod for him to lead the way.

Sam felt a tug on her shirt, and a little dirty, tear-streaked face looked up shyly. “Lady, can we ride the horses?”

Sam smiled down at the child. “Well, you’ll have to take turns and be very quiet.”

The children looked at each other, some tentatively smiling.