"We'll stay on the roof tonight, keep guards posted in case those things have breached the building. Tomorrow morning we'll send a squad down to make sure it's all clear. Any questions?"
"Yea, I've got one," Monica called out, moving away from Steve's side, "What the hell are we doing back here?" There was a general murmur of agreement from the others.
"Because, if it is still secure, then it's our best place to lay low for a few days. It gives us some time figure out what our game plan is going to be, decide if we're going to attempt to make contact with other military units, maybe find more survivors."
This time it was Fran's trembling voice that called out, "You mean you dragged us out of there without any kind of plan where to go?" Peter reached down and took her hand, squeezing it, silently offering his support.
"If we stayed there it was a death sentence," Briggs replied, matter-of-factly. "Out here,
we're still on death row, but at least we have a reprieve, a real chance at surviving. Or did you want them to experiment on you the way they did your two friends?" She pointed towards Fran's slightly curving belly, the evidence of the child growing there. "Maybe they'd keep you around, experiment on your baby instead?"
Fran looked down mutely, thinking of Luda and her baby. Judging from the silence around her, the same thoughts were on all their minds.
Turning to her own group of soldiers Briggs called out, "Sanchez, Marshall, Walker, you've got the first watch with me."
Without any more protest everyone began settling in for the night. Terry and Nicole curled up together near where their telescope still stood, a reminder of nights past. A shrill whistle bringing the dog running over to them. Steve and Monica moved off towards a corner of the roof out of sight of the rest of them, the furtive moans telling everyone what was going on. Even Ana and Michael openly curled up together for the first time that night, no longer denying that maybe they could have something together, if they survived.
A few hours later, after most everyone else had settled down to sleep finally, Briggs stood looking out over the parking lot. CJ walked up quietly to stand beside her.
"Aren't there a lot more of them down there now then when we arrived?" he asked in a hushed tone, staring out at the parking lot himself.
"They know there's food for them here again."
CJ looked sharply at her, "What makes you say that?"
Sighing, she turned to look him full in the face before answering. "It's the only thing that makes any sense. These things appear to have some kind of pack mentality, and the pack always seems to end up where the food source is, always increasingin theirnumbers."
"And we're the food source," CJ said, stating the obvious. Briggs just nodded, so he asked another question that had been bothering him since it had all began. "So if they're dead, why do they need a food source at all?"
"I don't think it's a need for them, not in the true sense of the word. Look at them down there," she gestured to the parking lot. "When was the last time any of them fed? Days? Weeks? I think feeding is just an impulse for them, that they can go on indefinitely whether they feed or not." Taking a long, last look below, she sat down, settling her back against the short wall. After a moment CJ joined her and for a few brief moments that sat companionably in silence.
"So what's going to happen now?" CJ suddenly asked, breaking the silence. "If they don't need to feed to survive, I mean."
"We keep with the basic plan, we lay low, at the most try to find more survivors, and be thankful that this happened going into summer instead of winter."
"What plan, how do we lay low, and why be glad it's summer?"
"The basic plan is just surviving. We'll have to find places like this where we can hole up,
re-supply our food, water. Fuel for those helicopters will pose the biggest problem. What ammunition we have isn't going to last forever either," she reminded him. "As for why we should be grateful it's summer, the heat will speed up the decomposition on those things. They may be fast now, but once the sinews and muscle start rotting away it's going to slow them down, hell, who can run with their legs falling off of them?" she gave a small humorless laugh. "If it was winter time, the cold would slow down the rate of decay. They'd be mobile for a lot longer than I think they'll be now. Once they start slowing down, losing limbs that haven't already been bitten off we'll be able to take them out real quick, be free to move around on the ground more. Take back our world."
"Why don't we just stay here then? It's already the middle of June, a few more weeks and it should really be heating up out there," CJ commented, hesitant to admit that being back at the mall already made him feel safer, more confident than he'd been in weeks. "Hell, even now you can smell them rotting."
"It's gonna to be too dangerous to stay here for more than a few days, someone associated with Gull Island might come looking for us," Briggs replied softly.
"I thought Randall said you guys were going to completely sanitize the facility."
"And we did. Whoever was left when we flew out would have been seeking shelter in the upper levels of the facility, probably hoping to barricade themselves into a room somewhere in the hopes that they'd be rescued. When the patrols started getting scaled back due to Frankenstein's research demands I had Sanchez, Jones and Cook start setting booby traps. Trust me, there isn't anyone left alive there." She'd been staring off in the distance as she spoke, as if visualizing what had happened.
"So who would be looking for us then?"
"Either Timmons or Steiner was in contact with someone on the outside, another group holed up somewhere, probably doing the same kind of research. When they go without any communication for an unusually extended period, something outside the norm, someone's going to come looking to find out why. I don't want even the slightest chance that they're gonna spot our birds here on the roof and put two and two together."
They sat in silence again, each drawing comfort from the other. Finally CJ spoke, trying to lighten the mood. "So, why didn't you tell me you and Cowboy were married?"
She looked at him, "Someone's got a big mouth I see. And we're not married, we've been divorced a long time."
"I know. I just thought it was kind of interesting, you two working together like you do,
with that kind of history and all. Now, me and my ex-wife we couldn't get along like that for anything."
"How long were you married for?"
"Four long miserable years. She was eighteen, just graduated from high school, I was nineteen and thought I had all the answers. Anyways, right after her graduation party she drops the bomb on me that she was pregnant, so I up and married her."
"So what happened then?"
"We fought all the time, she'd run off and stay at her sister's house for a few days getting drunk. Then one day we fought and she ran off to her sister's, but she decided to take the kid with her. He was only three and a half. While they lounged around on the couch getting drunk they didn't hear him get up from his nap. Anyways, he fell in the pool, drowned..."
"Jesus, I'm sorry for bringing it up CJ."
"It's alright, it was a long time ago." He gave a choked sounding laugh before saying,
"Do you want to know what the worst part of the whole thing was? It was at his funeral that the bitch told me he wasn't even mine."
"Hey Kenny," Cowboy's voice startled them both, neither having heard him approach. "I'll take over the watch, why don't you grab a few hours of sleep."
Briggs nodded at him and stood up, grabbing up her rucksack. CJ followed suit. Together they walked, not towards the others, but to the far side of the roof. They settled in against the wall again, trying to make themselves comfortable, neither ready to fall asleep yet.
"Can I ask you something CJ?"
CJ looked startled, "Yea, go ahead."
"Why'd you tell me all that about your marriage?"
"You want the truth?"
"Yea."
"I don't have a fucking clue," he laughed. "I just didn't want to talk about people chasing after us anymore. It all kinda slipped out." He looked sheepish then, almost like a kid in school who got caught passing a note so the teacher made him read it out loud to the class.
Briggs smiled. "Me and Cowboy, we went through basic together, then AIT. We were best friends, well, best friends with benefits. I gave him the nickname Cowboy, he couldn't stand being known as Charles Edward Tyler the Third," she intoned in a suitably snobby voice before breaking into laughter at the memory. "We were assigned to the same post after AIT, that's when I found out I was pregnant. We got married, I miscarried a few months later, so I gave him his freedom. We're a lot better at being friends then we are at being married."
"So now it's my turn to ask, why are you telling me this?"
"Consider it tit-for-tat. We're even, story time has now ended. Unless.." she trailed off.
"Unless what?" CJ asked suspiciously.
"What's the story behind the 'CJ' initials?"
He grimaced. "You absolutely have to swear you won't laugh, and you won't tell another living soul."
"Deal. Now spill it, what's your full name?"
"Calvin James Smith."
She started to smile.
"I told you no laughing," he said, face flushing red in the moonlight.
"I'm not laughing," she declared, even as her lips continued to twitch with a smile.
CJ suddenly leaned over and kissed her. After a few moments, once she'd untwined her arms from around his neck, she asked, "What was that for?"
"Just thought it would keep you from laughing."
"Effective."
"I thought so."
They lay back then, pulling a blanket from her rucksack to use as a pillow. After sharing a few more kisses they finally gave themselves up to sleep. When the sun began to rise, CJ woke to find himself alone, the blanket beneath his head the only sign that the previous night had really happened.