the bleachers she attempted to pull out of the soldier's hands, causing the first two rows of men to scramble upwards away from her and into the legs and laps of the men behind them.
Ericson again spoke, “Any bullet you put in them is a wasted shot if you do not hit them in the head. I am not going to send this one back to hell, not tonight, I think our point here was made. The men are going to hold her over against that wall, anyone who wants to examine her can do so after we get our volunteers. Now many of you fathers have shown concern for the sons we might be taking with us. Before I call for volunteers I am going to do something that, technically I probably should not do. If it were my son's life on the line I would hope someone would help me. If any man volunteers to come with me before I have to start drawing names out of the box, I will allow him to remove his young male relative from the pool of candidates. Your younger son or nephew or even cousin will be still be a part of the local militia, but I will not be taking them with me when I leave tonight. So volunteers please come down to the floor now, bring the young man you are putting in the militia with you. We will draw from general volunteers first, then from those with younger relatives, then we will drawn the remainder from the box.”
Bill found himself rising and turning to his sons, “John, you sit down and wait, if they don't call your name you will go back to the house with Will and take care of things while I am gone.” Turning to Will he said, “C'mon son, I am not letting you have a chance to face that.” Taking his son's hand firmly in his Bill started down the steps.
“No dad! No!” Will said softly, starting to cry, “I don't want you to go!”
Bill laughed, a cheerless sound, “They got me over a barrel here,” he raised his voice, “No real man would let them take their son when he could do something about it. I, for one, was going to volunteer anyway, this just adds incentive.” He and Will were the first ones to stand in front of Ericson. “Well, uh, sir, what do I do now?” Others were slowly following Bill down the steps onto the floor.
“Good man! No hesitation, I like that, you can read the facts and decide on the right course of action, this is what we need! Sergeant make sure that this man…”
“William Carson” supplied Bill.
“Make sure William Carson gets a temporary promotion to 'Corporal' before he walks out of here, and make the next three in line that grade too and bump the next ten up a grade as well. Thank you all for coming down and helping your country. Go over that way to the soldier there, no, don't salute me yet, you are not in the military until later.” leaning close Ericson said in a low voice, “Thank you. I want to talk to you after the rest of these men clear out.”
Going over to the soldier at the table Bill told him William's name and the man took it out of the ones he was going to toss into the box for volunteers, along with Bill's. After the other volunteers were processed and there were many of them, they were still thirty three men short of the one hundred Ericson needed.
“Okay, last chance to join, instead of being drafted, anyone?” One more man came down, then the Lt Colonel said, “Alright Stacker, please pull another thirty two men to come with us. John's name was the last one called.
Chapter 9
“I am going to shoot that fucking dog.” Stewart said, “I swear to God I will.”
“Calm down, take a breath Stewart.” said Tom, while Amelia slowly cut away part of Stewart's pant leg with a pair of medical scissors.
“I was goddamn playing with the kids!”
“I know, I know. You know how Riley is.”
“So I get bitten because 'I know how Riley is'? Bullshit. Ah!” she said as Amelia got the cloth away from the dog bite.
“Oooh!” said Amelia, “That's bad.”
“I think I knew that already. Just bind it up, you can, right?”
“All my years in the gulf war prepared me for this, yes.” joked Amelia, “No seriously I think I can get it. This might sting.” she said as she poured some hydrogen peroxide over the dog bite.
“Hey Max!” Stewart called to the man who was about thirty feet away with the barking dog and the kids, “Does that thing have tags on it? Or do I need to worry about rabies too?”
They saw Max talking to Seth, then Kenny got involved animatedly moving his hands as he spoke. Erin and Nick were petting Riley who was barking at some zeds coming towards them slowly across the park's grass. “The boys say the dog had shots, but there isn't any collar on it.” Max yelled back.
“Fuck a goddamn duck, my lucky day. No tags means no shots where I come from.” Stewart muttered, then drew her breath in as Amelia bandaged her leg up.
When the younger woman was finished Stewart took the boot off of the bitten leg and tossed her sock out into the street, it was wet with blood and hydrogen peroxide. She then limped over to the trunk of the cruiser and pulled a new pair of socks out and put one on her bare foot. “I should just get some flip flops.” she muttered looking at her wet boot. Scanning the stores around the small town's square she found one was a hardware store, which might have what she needed.
They were in Nebraska, but just barely, the road had been made all but impassible by a huge line of stalled vehicles where interstate seventy six hooked into interstate eighty. When they hit the pile up, which had quite a few zombies squirming around in it, they had to back track and take a side road that led them, eventually, back to the small town they were in now. It was about noon and the kids were hungry and irritable, so they had stopped to give them a break and check the maps they had for the best way to proceed to Tom's family farm. The town was empty, not a soul in sight, living or dead. Max and Amelia were still watching the area while the children ran off some steam. The kids, with Tom and Stewart, had been playing in the park when Riley had mistaken Stewart's rough and tumble play with the boys as a threat and bit her on the leg. The dog had to be pulled off of her by Kenny.
“That dog sure does like those kids.” Tom said shaking his head as he approached the back of the squad car.
“And hates adults. I figure Kenny and Seth have got to be mental cases, that dog was treated just like they were, like shit, that is. They were all stuck together with what they had. Kenny, obviously had some problems when he was born, and I think Seth's were given to him by his parents or guardians or whatever the fuck you want to call them. I would shoot that goddamn dog right now if I didn't think it would kill those boys.” Stewart said this while looking over at the group of children playing around on the park once again. Riley was tagging them and jumping up to chase them on the playground equipment, as immersed in the game as the children.
“You were pretty heated when we got Riley off of you. I thought you were going to kill the thing then and there.”
“Tom, I had a dog biting my leg. Anyone who gets bit would have felt the same way.” With a sigh Stewart pulled the other sock on the same foot and sat her boot up on the trunk of the car in the sun. Tom raised one eyebrow questioningly at her double socked foot and she said, “I am going to the hardware store to get some dry footwear. I knew we should have stopped by my place before leaving Denver, nuke or no nuke it would be nice to have my own clothes.”
“Alright, I will go with you.” Turning Tom called out, “Amelia, Stewart and I are going to the hardware store, will you and Max be okay out here?”
Amelia nodded, “Yes, sure Tom. See if you can find…uh, well some dog treats and maybe a better collar and leash for Riley, would you?”
“And a muzzle.” Stewart muttered softly under her breath.
“What?” Amelia asked.
“Sure thing.”
Tom laughed and they walked across the street to the faded storefront. “It looks locked up.”
“Yeah, just the sort of place a human who had been bit would go to hide away from the mob.”
