waiting for the second. Give it a couple minutes.' Lucas took ahold of Max and carried him to the edge of the highway, they loitered there in full view of anyone coming along the road now.
Closer to five minutes later a camouflage military vehicle came around the long curve towards them. The Humvee slowed and stopped before them and Max saw the passenger door open and a woman got out. He recognized her.
'You! You're…Harry's girl!' Max said with surprise.
The woman shook her head, ''Harry's girl'? Bah! Harry was my man.' She said emphasizing the word 'my', 'You almost got it right. A small deception that worked pretty well, though not good enough. Of course you almost killed me. Then again you did get Harry.'
'I saw you. You got shot in the street.'
'Neck shot. I healed. Harry…not so lucky.'
'But, the bombs!' Max stammered, 'The bombs started falling everywhere, we barely got out.'
'Yeah, I didn't. You know what it's like to be buried under a building? It took me hours to figure out what happened and a day to organize a digging party to rescue me.'
Both stood and stared in silence for a moment, then Lucas said, 'Are we done with the reunion? He is the one you wanted?'
The woman nodded, 'Yeah, Lucas. This is him. Thanks.'
'I'm gone then. Want me to pin the others down for a bit, or does it matter now?'
'Nah, let them go. I'll have plenty of time to talk. And I can handle a diversion or two myself if I have to.'
'Alright. Bye Aubrey. I'd like to say it was a pleasure, but, well, you know.'
'Yeah, I know. If it's any consolation it is for a higher cause.'
Lucas snorted, 'So you say, I see what you want, but this hierarchy problem is never going to go away. Not until there is only one of us left.'
'We can argue what's best later. I need to talk to this guy now.' Aubrey said.
Lucas turned and went into the woods, pausing before he stepped into them, he turned and said, 'Oh, and Aubrey, he didn't notice. I don't think, you might have to point it out to him.'
'Aubrey.' Max said, 'I don't suppose you brought me all this way to let me go?'
The petite woman smiled and nodded, 'That, believe it or not, is exactly what I am going to do.'
Chapter 23 — Stewart
'The fog is finally lifting.' said Bill. This earned him a sharp look from Stewart.
'So?' she replied, the anger in her voice cut through the hazy air like a knife.
'So we should have an easier time following their tracks now. I think we should go back to where Ruben says it started and try and pick up some actual tracks from there. All this walking in circles hasn't done us any good.'
'That old man. Why the fuck are we hauling a senior citizen out here with us anyway?'
'Stop. Not just as your friend, but as your commanding office. It was not Ruben's fault. Max had his gun out the window, he got pulled out. Ruben and Javier did the best they could.'
'I don't blame them. An old guy and a kid? No, I blame you. You know how Max is, he hesitates. That isn't good in a fight. You are the one who put the three of them in that truck together.'
'I'll take that blame.' Bill said.
'You don't sound remorseful enough for me.' Stewart said tightly.
'I'm not.'
She turn on him angrily, 'What do you mean by that? I thought you were friends? Best of buds, the way Max made it sound.'
'He isn't dead.'
'How do you figure that?'
Bill gestured around them, 'The suns up, the fog is burning off. Notice anything else?'
'There's no fucking zombies.'
'Exactly. They took him and they want something from us. Otherwise they would have kept attacking.' The two of them marched back to the center of the campground. Bill spoke into his radio, 'Ruben, Javier, meet us back at the trucks.'
'Affirmative.' Came Ruben's voice.
'And, Stewart, don't you go treating Ruben bad. Honestly he has been more helpful than you might know. He's from my town and I'm going to have to live with him after all this is over. So are you. If you and Max hook up.'
'Optimist.'
They trudged the rest of the way to the trucks in silence and waited a few minutes for Javier and Ruben to appear.
'Nothing.' Javier said, before Ruben could speak. 'No zombies, not even by the gate where you guys were fighting them. Other than Max being gone and that one there,' he pointed at the body Ruben had found along with Max's rifle, 'you wouldn't know this place had been crawling in zombies a few hours ago.'
'So, sir, what do we do now?' asked Ruben, not quite meeting Bill's eyes.
'Knock it off Ruben, we don't blame you. As Stewart has already told me, it was my fault. What do we do? I'm open to ideas.'
'There's a first.' Stewart chided softly.
'They promoted me, someone had to be in charge. You think I take that lightly?'
'Well, you didn't have to use your authority out here where no one else is around. I think we should have more collaboration, instead of orders.'
'Point taken. Now collaborate. What does everyone think we should do?'
'Find Max. One way or the other.' said Ruben.
'Find Max.' Javier agreed, 'I wouldn't want to be left out here, even if I was…one of them.'
'Stewart?'
'We don't really have any choice but to find him. Without him what can we do? Unless one of you figured out how to see zombies and track their overlord?'
Bill shook his head, 'No. But I am glad just turning tail and running didn't make the list of things we could do. Because that is an option.' The other three just shook their heads.
Bill cleared his throat and continued, 'Good. I wouldn't want to be left out there either. Okay with the sun coming up, let's see if we can find any tracks.'
'Wait Bill, you might as well explain your theory to these two, see if that changes anything.' said Stewart.
'What theory?' asked Ruben.
'That they took Max.' Bill said, 'It only makes sense. They came in, surrounded us and immediately stopped attacking when they had snatched one of us. They even carried off their…dead again. Why would they do that?'
'In wars they do it to deny the enemy a sense of accomplishment and to hide their number of casualties.' Ruben said.
'But why now? It's not like we are reporting our progress to anyone. But why the grab and dash? I think they have him and they want something from us. I think if we wait here, they will come back to us with an offer.'
'So you want us to wait?' asked Javier
'No. I want us to try and track them down first. Find Max if we can ourselves. I could be wrong. But if we can't I vote for staying here the rest of the day.'
'We should leave someone with the trucks, in case they come back.' Ruben said.
