Chapter 1: Radley
After Rad, Frisky, and Jeff had finished unpacking everything from the ute the middle and youngest Heeler brother had some questions about what their brother had been up to. Frisky and Chilli were together by the caravan, where they along with Trixie and Wendy were discussing motherhood. Mary and Chris were with Lee in a playpen nearby; the kids had taken to welcoming the new babies. The twins were surrounded by children cooing at them. This left Jeff and the brothers to sit together by the fire pit and talk.
"So, it's been a year, what happened to you guys?" Stripe asked.
"You said that you guys got marooned for a while, how did you get back here?" Bandit asked.
"It's a long story." Jeff sighed.
"But I suppose we owe you it." Rad stated, "But I need you to promise not to judge us, we had to do some things we aren't exactly proud of."
"Bandit and I are in the same boat." Stripe stated.
"We'll share ours after you." Bandit noted.
Rad nodded, then exhaled as he began his tale.
"As you guys know Jeff and I worked on an oil rig, which meant we were pretty well isolated from the rest of the world when the whole 'zed apocalypse' thing happened. When we got word that Australia had fallen most of us were devastated. We knew it was likely, but it meant that we were basically the last dogs around that were still uninfected. Our boss, a German Shepherd guy named Bruno, called us all together and we talked for a while. We knew we had limited supplies and the only boats we had were emergency craft, not designed for long distance travel back to the mainland. That meant that we were basically stranded with only ourselves, rations for another week, and not much else."
"As you might imagine, it didn't exactly end well." Jeff said.
"Frisky didn't arrive until five weeks later-between our comms going dark and the rig not being mapped, it was tough for her to find us. She'd been prepared though, and apparently her dad taught her how to deep sea fish?" Rad remarked looking over at his wife, "Which was definitely a plus."
"In any case, by the time she arrived we'd gone from a crew of 12 to 5." Rad cleared his throat. "I won't share all that happened, as I myself can't remember all of it, but the fact that I'm not fully feral is only because of her arrival."
"We did things we aren't proud of." Jeff noted, looking down. "I never thought I would ever kill a fellow dog, let alone eat one."
"Jesus Christ…" Stripe said, looking at the two.
"You, you ate other dogs?" Bandit asked, his stomach clenching. "You're cannibals?" He whispered.
"I think so." Rad admitted, dipping his head deep in shame. "Most of the last two weeks are hazy in the best of times, but I know when Frisky arrived I was still alive, along with Jeff and three others. The bodies she saw… Well, there wasn't much left of them."
"I promise you, we haven't touched any meat since." Jeff said raising his paw, "After all that, I can't help but feel sick when I even look at the stuff."
"Same here, mate." Rad swore, crossing his paw across his chest.
After a moment Bandit sighed, "Okay, it's a different world now. It isn't like there isn't precedent for this kind of thing." He rationalized, "You're still our brother, and we still love you."
Rad smiled, looking up slightly.
"Mate, I shot a teenager point-blank in the stomach and enjoyed watching him die." Stripe added, "We've all gone through some pretty fucked up shit." He clasped his brother's shoulder. "What happened after Frisky found you guys?"
"We left the rig and got in her boat. We had a pretty good idea of how to get back to land, but we got caught in a storm and got marooned. We ended up on a miniscule island in the middle of nowhere, thankfully there was a small spring with freshwater and a few coconut trees, but otherwise it was mostly empty."
"At one point it looked like it had been someone's private island, there was the ruins of a hut and a few other odds and ends, but none of it was particularly useful." Jeff added.
"So we were stuck there for three months while we tried to get the boat fixed. During that time Frisky and I conceived the twins and we lost Cam." Rad frowned, "Cam had been one of the other guys from the rig who survived. He was a good guy, even if he was a fan of the blues… Unfortunately he was supposed to be on meds for his heart, and one day…" Rad paused, trying not to call back the memory as he swallowed, "…well, it gave out. We tried to save him, but we weren't able to."
"I'm sorry mate." Bandit said.
"Thanks." Rad nodded.
"We know how it feels to lose someone; we both lost one of our daughters." Stripe said, looking at his middle brother.
Rad was silent a moment in somberness before he spoke again, "When we're done, can I see them? I want to pay my respects."
Stripe nodded, "Yeah, we can show you where they're buried."
Jeff continued, "After we got the ship working again we managed to get to the mainland, we docked in some port in the north and worked our way inland on foot. There wasn't much around, or so we thought. We were near a river one night when we heard a noise. Turns out there were crocs nearby. One of 'em got Len and took his leg off. Poor bastard bled out."
"After that it was four of us and Frisky was starting to show. We knew we needed a better way to get about than on foot so we ventured into a town to try and get a truck. We found the ute, but in the process Zach was bitten. By the end of the day he was delirious and we knew he wasn't going to make it. We said our goodbyes and put him down." Rad paused, "After that it was just Frisky, Jeff, and I. We wandered around for months, trying to find any sign of you all or some way to fix the radio. When the time came I helped deliver the twins, and we eventually decided we needed a community to be a part of-somewhere safer for the kids. We heard about Burketown, and settled there. I'd been working on the radio for a while when I finally got it working and talked with you guys."
"When I heard you were alive I thought I was dreaming." Rad admitted. "I thought with everything we'd gone through, the whole world must've gone to shit."
Bandit grinned sadly, "We were in the same boat."
"But hey, we're all here now, right?" Stripe smiled. "Heeler high water, we're all here together."
Bandit and Rad groaned at the pun.
"I didn't miss that." Rad said, jokingly as he noogied his littlest brother.
Stripe swatted away the hand and rolled his eyes, "In any case, it's good to have you here, mate."
"Thanks."
***ST***
Bandit and Stripe explained the last year to Rad and Jeff, who in turn were shocked at some of the more graphic items. After the conversation they walked to the graveyard and Rad mourned his nieces.
"God, I barely got a chance to even know them…" He said, wiping tears from his eyes. "I can't imagine… I don't want to imagine how it felt. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry…"
"It still hurts, but we're here. We need to stay alive and help those who are still here." Bandit said, swallowing dryly as he looked at his daughter's grave.
"We still have their memories, that's something at least." Stripe said as he closed his eyes and thought about his youngest.
"C'mon, let's get back to the others; I'm sure they all want a chance to meet you. We haven't even gotten a chance to introduce you properly to everyone." Bandit cleared his throat.
"Yeah." Rad nodded, casting one last glance back as he followed them back to camp.
***ST***
That night, after everyone had been properly introduced and the histories shared among the adults the camp had celebrated their continued survival before retiring to a well-earned restful night. Jeff was sleeping in the cabin with the other adults while Stripe and Wendy stood guard and Bandit and Chilli looked after the caravan with the kids. As Jeff snored, Rad rolled over to Frisky.
"Hey." He whispered.
She blearily looked at him. "Hey, what's going on?"
"I…" He sighed, "Bandit and Stripe, they both lost one of their kids. Bingo and Socks are dead."
Frisky frowned, while she'd only met Socks once or twice, she'd been Bluey's godmother and spent plenty of time around the girls. "I know. It's… well, it's fucking tragic. I don't know what else to say. But that happened months ago, we can't change it, unfortunately. Right now we focus on what we can do."
Rad sighed, "I know, but it's still messed up. Bingo wasn't even in primary school, and Socks was three!"
Jeff stirred at the outburst but continued snoring a moment later.
"What if… what if that happens to us?" Rad said.
"What if one of us dies?"
"No, what if one of our kids does." Rad said, his voice shaking.
"No, we can't think like that." Frisky shook her head, placing her hand on Rad's chest.
"Yeah, well, that's easier said than done."
"Rad, we're going to be okay. Your brothers and everyone else here is going to do their best to keep our kids safe."
"Yeah, and they tried the same with Bingo and Socks and they're both buried twenty feet from here in shallow graves!"
Frisky sighed, "No matter what we do, we can't control anyone else's lives, including our kids. We can try our best to keep them alive, but in the end, we can't stop it if something outside our control happens."
"That isn't exactly comforting." Rad remarked.
"No, but what is is the fact that you're worried about them. You are a good father, Radley Heeler, and a good husband. You will do everything you can to keep us safe, just like your brothers. If something happens we will have to deal with it when it does, but for now we're together. We're family."
Rad smiled smally, "Thanks Frisk."
"You're welcome. Now, let's get some sleep-they said we've got work to do in the morning."
***Author's Note***
Hello and welcome back! We're picking up where we left off with Outbreak! Hope you liked this little intro. This chapter is a short one, but fills in some blanks about what Rad and Frisky were up to. Coming up next? Medical discussions and some awkward conversations! Thanks again for reading, and all reviews are appreciated. I will be updating once a week-as my schedule is more restricted since I'm teaching now-but I've got this one, a sequel to Brandy in the works, and my collab with Kodiwolf "Project New Era" ongoing, so you should still have some new stuff coming out on a regular basis.
