One thing was certain, the business was no longer going to be needed the way it was. Probably they would switch to domestic vehicle work, as opposed to high end European vehicles. That made sense to Juan, keep both lines open. He was not looking forward to working on the Asian cars, but there were bound to be a few mechanics left who could. Shaking his head slightly Juan laughed at himself, here he was thinking of the future again!
'What's so funny Juan?', Hank whispered softly.
'Manana.', Juan replied.
'Oh? Yeah you are planning again, huh? Hard to plan for when this is over, when we are going right through it, huh? It is like we are in a war, I guess we are. I wonder if the people in Berlin in nineteen forty five planned for things like we do too? Anyway I am awake now, you let me sleep too long, ya shouldn't do that brother, you gotta be sharp tomorrow too. Any bad guys running around spying on us?'
'No.' Juan nodded towards the dark alleyways with pools of shadows littering the streets and pointedly held up his light intensifier binoculars.
Sighing, Hank said with good humor, 'Okay, okay you were right, it was a good idea to bring them along, another eight ounces of gear I thought we could live without has proven invaluable. Turn in partner, I'll take your spot, seeings how you got it all warmed up for me.'
Juan laughed as Hank got out of his sleeping bag and moved behind the furnace to urinate before settling into his position.
When Hank came back he found Juan snuggled down in Hank's sleeping bag and laughed too, 'Yeah, okay, you got more warmth out of that deal too, ya bastard! Still you are welcome to it and I ain't gonna wake you guys until one or the other of ya wake up Maybe you will get a nights rest anyway. Sleep well amigo.'
Juan fell asleep watching Hank check the pools of darkness with his pair of binoculars.
Hank lowered the binoculars and checked his watch, a gift from Juan and his family on his last birthday, two am. A very tiring time of night. Hank had not meant to go on and on last night telling his life's story, but somehow getting to where they were now he felt a need to complete the picture. Kevin snorted loudly in his sleep, rolled over and then started to snore more loudly, there had to be something wrong with that kid, his snoring was terrible. Of course he might have just been tired. Hank had no idea what his story was, probably it was typical of the day though. He started living a normal day, about three days ago then everything went to hell.
Juan and Hank had ran into enough stragglers over the past day to know the basics. At the clinic where they had found the doctor holed up they had run into a whole slew of people. Hank had tried to tell them to all meet at the Mike's Club, but only the doctor and one of the nurses who worked for him had agreed. There were three distinct groups, four including Hank and Juan, the groups were the Doctor and his staff, a group led by a female police officer and a group of teenagers with their younger siblings. The doctor was the only one that had any sense so far as Hank was concerned. The cop would not even talk to the teens and tell them to go with Hank or the doc. Hank still shook his head at the memory. She, officer Jane Stewart, had said the kids had lived for three days on their own and were entitled to make their own choice of what to do. Pretty goddamn liberal for a police officer. It had infuriated Hank the way the decision makers from all four parties involved had gotten together and then pretty much went their separate ways. The kids wanted to find their loved ones, Jane was going along with a guy, Max, who was unconscious and shot for God's sake! They were heading out to find his family in the western suburb of Arvada. Max and Juan had argued long and quietly with Jane to come with them, they could use her help, hell they needed her help and she was the first person with 'authority' they had run into since this mess started. Jane was determined; she said they would make every effort to hook up with Hank at the Mike's club after they checked on Max's family, one way or the other they had to do that first. As for the kids, they were led by a guy named Michael and he said he would meet up at the Mike's, but only after they had hiked halfway around the goddamn city trying to find their parents.
While Hank had been mad about the decision to split the four groups back up instead of traveling together he was also very pragmatic. He spoke to them about what the areas they had come from were like and asked about how the zombies they encountered acted. All three of the groups that had been outside had encountered the smarter, faster zombies to a varying degree. No one understood where they came from, everyone had an idea or two about it. Hank and Juan thought that some of them just revived smarter and better than others, just like some people grew up to become nobel prize winners and other worked contently at fast food joints their entire lives. Jane thought maybe it was the amount of time it took for them to revive, so if they came back right away they retained more of their memories and abilities. She didn't have the opinion that they were stronger or faster than a normal human, only that they no longer feared anything and that just made them uninhibited so they acted stronger and faster than ordinary humans. The kid Michael thought that they grew more powerful and even super human by killing and devouring the living. Of all the theories Hank liked Michaels' the least. If it were true, well they could start driving again and use weapons or even…guns. A zombie sniper was something Hank never wanted to encounter. Plus what if they kept eating more and more and more, would they start to fly around like a super hero and become completely unstoppable?
Hank lifted the binoculars and slowly checked all the dark areas again. Nothing. He could see almost all of the front and sides of the building from where he sat crouched in the nest Juan had made of his sleeping bag, but he could not see directly behind him, where the huge roof mounted furnace was at. The back of the building was a wide alleyway with a couple of parking areas, in one of which sat the beat up car Hank thought belonged to the store clerk downstairs. There were no easy ways to climb onto the roof from the back. The best way to get up was the dumpster Juan and him had used yesterday and that approach was clearly visible to Hank from where he sat.
True to his word Hank let the other men sleep in until well after sunrise. As soon as Juan started moving around Hank got up and started the stove, warming up some eggs and making pancakes and some corned beef hash from the camping store packs he had looted the night before. Four days ago this stuff would have been inedible, today all three of them were glad to have it. Kevin had gotten up pretty quickly after Juan and started his day with a subdued, 'Good morning.', surprising them by speaking.
Chapter 4
The men sat around eating off their new mess kits before Hank started talking.
'Well I think we can get back today, there are only a few slow zoms down there, not the mob like yesterday. You think you are up to moving Kevin? We gotta go about two, maybe three miles.'
Kevin smiled softly and asked, 'Where are we?'
'Ah, south Denver, like maybe five miles south of E-470 and three east of I-70.'
'I think I can do three miles. I pretty much ran from north Denver yesterday. It's a mad house. There were a lot of them and more every minute.'
Hank just nodded and said, 'Yeah?'
Kevin went on, 'Okay I will tell you a little about it, you did a little last night, but I won't talk like that, so long and all.'
'Si. Good.' said Juan, laughing a little around his eyes at Hank. Hank scowled at him briefly and said, 'Yeah, not everybody is a story teller like me, do the best you can though, any information you give us helps, ya know?'
Kevin nodded yes to that and started talking, 'It started about three days ago, it probably started for other people earlier than that but you see on Sunday I had lost my job. It was a shitty job, loading trucks at what they call a 'hub' not too far from my house. I had a car a sweet ride, man it was everything to me. My friends and I would take it out, pick up the ladies, go clubbing, all that flash makes for good times. I supported it by humping my ass off five nights a week loading trucks. Hell I live, in my mom's place, you know how it is. I am only twenty. Tried college, still thinking, was thinking, of going back, but now, no. I got this job loading trucks when I started at Red Rocks Community college, class during the day, boxes every night until eleven. Get up, do the homework, go to class, do it again. Only I wanted this car, so bad man. I have money saved up for tuition, thought I could get more,
