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Case Report #370
Major Henry O'Hara
5th Infantry
At approximately 0900 hours my men came across an anomaly of curious proportions.
In a shallow grave 50 feet by 80 feet we found a group of what looked like fresh infected, they were bound at the ankles and wrists and tied to each other in one long chain of infected. The old hemp ropes that held them down half rotted, like someone was waiting for nature to take effect and for the brute strength of infected to release themselves.
This location was about 35.5 latitude and 86.5 longitudes in Tennessee, just east of Sinking Creek.
Who is out here? Who does this? Where did these fresh infected come from? Could this have anything to do with the burnt corpses we found in the north?
The woods are eerily still, like something is scaring away all the animals and we still can't find tracks to lead us to the source of these infected.
I've lost contact with one of my patrols to the west, I fear it may have been 'the Skulls' behind this disappearance. They are a lawless group of post-apocalyptic Mad Max fanatics who seem to think this new world is their playground. If contact isn't regained within a month I'll have to accept the patrol as lost and the Skulls responsible.
Met up with a fairly amiable fellow and his family travelling in a beat up old VW bus, called them the Partridges. They appear to be making their living on trading junk for junk, seemed harmless so I sent them south to Georgia. I didn't give them specifics about the groups there, just said they may find trading there.
We set them up with one of our military transports. We have too damned many just rotting anyways. In trade they gave us about forty pounds of .22 ammo and some canned peaches.
Reminds me of Georgia. Think we'll check in on them down south as soon as May comes.
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**Blue**
He was returning from feasting on canned meat in the kitchen, heading for the gate and home, when he found a cacophony of noise and arguing coming from the yard.
Shrugging on his jacket, he joined Elise in watching that boy Daryl and his brother have it out loudly.
"What do you mean you just let her go?" Daryl snarled.
Rocking back on one foot, Blue watched those two good ol' Georgia boys have at her, getting in each other's faces, spittle flying.
"I'm not her goddamned daddy, baby bro and you best get out of my face with that attitude!" Merle growled back.
"Goddamned woman should know better!" Daryl shouted, pacing now, eyeing everyone with dangerous, heated eyes.
In Elise's arms Daryl's new baby girl squirmed and began to cry.
Elise hurried the girl inside as the Dixon's continued to have it out.
"How the hell could any of you just let her go out with walkers about?!" Daryl demanded, pointing at them. "You all too chicken shit to head out yourself?"
Sensing the scene getting messy and hearing the word walker, Blue stepped forward, scratching his head. "Now, hold on there, was that was all that shooting was about? I thought you all were testing those door stops of yours."
"Big herd of them," that boy Glenn supplied.
"How big?" Blue demanded, letting Daryl continue to rage, pulling Glenn aside.
"Big enough."
Licking his bottom lip, Blue skipped into a trot, before opening it up into a full blown gallop, heading for the gate.
Jesus, the kids! He thought, not even waiting for them to open the gate for him, but leaping the wall and diving over.
"Mr. Blue!" Someone shouted.
He didn't pause to see who it was, didn't even slow his ass down, just tore through the woods as fast as his old legs could carry him.
Something knocked his ass backwards and he scrambled with it, knowing the smell of rotted meat wasn't anything good. Getting a good foothold, he kicked the thing off him and shot it, before turning his rifle on another creature that was flying at him.
Someone shot another who was creeping up behind him and he whirled to find Glenn standing there holding a rifle, the young man covering his ass expertly.
Without waiting to thank him, Blue motioned for him to follow and the two headed off for the well hidden home and Blue's kids.
They skittered to a halt at the clearing to his home, Blue almost collapsing onto his ass as the sight.
"Oh Jesus," he moaned. "No, no, no, no!"
Nearby a wee walker lifted her ugly face and eyed him with diseased eyes.
Blue collapsed to his knees. "Oh no, no, no…" he wailed.
"Come on, Mr. Blue, there may be some left," Glenn said softly.
"No," he gasped.
The child walker dragged herself closer, hands out for him.
"Mr. Blue, come on, get up," Glenn urged, shooting the girl down mercifully.
"Oh, Lord Jesus! Caroline!"
More child walkers shuffled from around the house and he felt Glenn's hand on his shoulder, tightening. "Don't give up, come on. Let's see if any survived."
"Blue! Blue!" A cherubic angel chirped from high above his head.
He sniffled and looked skywards at the trees overhead. "Where are you, girl?" He demanded, recognizing the voice as Liddy's.
"Up here!" Liddy said. "Everyone else got inside, but I got trapped, I'm up here like a treed possum!"
He smiled sadly. "You surely are, darling. Stay up there, Glenn and I'll get you down, Possum!"
"Hurry, the branch is making snappy sounds!"
Standing up, Blue eyed the child walkers who were approaching him, trying hard to imagine they weren't the sweet babies he loved, raising his rifle.
He shot.
He shot and shot and shot until his rifle went click and nothing moved.
"I can't hold on, Blue!" Liddy shouted. "I'm coming down!"
"Hang on, Possum!" He shouted back, but with several cracks and snaps the girl flopped down hard on him and he struggled to hold on to her.
She wrapped her arms around him and buried her face in his shoulder. "I don't want to see anything, okay?" She whispered.
"Okay, darling, come on, let's get the others. We're getting the hell out of here. Glenn, your people will put us up?"
Glenn nodded. "Of course, I'll start burying the kids," the young man said, his voice cracking on the word 'kids'.
Blue thanked him and headed for the house, where he knew the others would be holed up in the cellar.
He stepped inside cautiously, his knife in hand. There was only one walker clawing weakly at the cellar door and thankfully it wasn't one of his children.
Swinging Liddy onto his back, he moved for the thing, ramming his knife into the back of its skull.
It landed heavily on the cellar door, earning a few screams of fright from the children below.
Kicking the foul beast off the door, Blue knocked on it hard. "Ruth, you down there?"
There was no reply.
"Come on, girl, Jesus!"
"She's scared, Blue," someone chirped.
"Buck? You open this door now, it's okay, we're safe," Blue commanded.
Carefully the lock was undone and Buck crawled out, the sweet boy clutching his fiddle case tightly, his face pale, the freckles on it standing out like pepper on mashed potatoes.
"Come on, boy," Blue said. "We're getting the hell out of here."
"I didn't save Cara," the boy whispered. "I'm sorry."
"Don't be sorry, darling, you just stand over there with Liddy," he said, poking his head down into the cellar. "Ruth? Get on up here!" He said, unable to see in the dark.
Maddy crawled out, followed by Dawson and Critter, but there was no Ruth.
"She's scared stiff," Critter lisped.
Wiping his snotty nose with his sleeve, Blue sent the boy over with the others and handing his knife over to Dawson, he leapt into the cellar and allowed his eyes to adjust.
Ruth huddled in the corner, quiet, shaking.
"Come on, girl," he said sternly. "We've lost young ones before."
"You were right," she whispered, still trembling. "We should have moved into the convent."
"Aw well," Blue scratched his head. "Maybe now you'll quit goin' around your ass to get to your elbow." He suggested. "But I ain't one to say I told you so, so let's get our tails in gear and head for high water."
"It happened so fast, Blue," Ruthie said, standing up on shaking legs with a lot of help from him.
"Girl," he mused gently, trying to lighten the mood, "you're shakin' like a hound dog trying to shit a peach pit."
"Oh God, did anyone make it from outside?" She warbled.
"Liddy, girl climbed a damned tree. Think I'mma call her Possum from now on," he said.
"Oh, small miracles," Ruth whispered. "Oh God, Blue!"
"I know," he said. "I know, darling. Come on. We'll be alright, we'll pick up our asses and haul them home now."
When they got back to the convent, after burying the children, Blue was exhausted and found Daryl still mad as a wet hen, marching around in an absolute fury, but Merle was nowhere in sight.
As they slipped in the gate with the children all linked by hands, Mary Claire whispered, "I'm so sorry," when she took a head count.
They settled the children in the dorms, in Graces' office in front of her large fireplace, the poor young ones all shivering and frightened from their ordeal, Ruth even worse off.
Blue felt the loss deeply too, but he offered his children kind smiles and playful tickles with a brave face, recovering from his initial pain for their sake.
Buck reached for his fiddle, something that went everywhere with him since it was his daddy's and rosined his bow, before dragging it mournfully across the strings of his fiddle.
"Blue moon of Kentucky keep on shining, shine on the one that's gone and proved untrue," the boy wailed in a real southern twang. "Blue moon of Kentucky keep on shining, shine on the one that's gone and left me blue."
"A woman can't even recover in bed anymore!" He heard someone outside the office declared loudly.
Grace limped in, holding her stomach tightly, her face pale from her journey, that St. James fellow hovering behind her looking disapproving.
Pausing as though she wasn't expecting them in her office, Grace blinked, before sagging against St. James.
"What happened?" She panted gently, weak and looking like she was about to pass out.
"You're out of bed AMA," St. James snarled darkly.
Grace pushed the man away roughly and staggered to her desk, where she collapsed in the chair. "Infected?" She asked Ruth.
The woman was still in shock.
"Yeah," Blue offered.
"Us too, from the sounds of it," Grace said. She coughed and winced, grabbing her stomach again.
"If you pull those stitches I will nail you to that fucking bed," St. James growled. Pausing and eyeing the children sheepishly. "Sorry," he said to Blue.
"Aw, hell no, go on, a good curse word never ruined a child's ears," Blue said, pocketing his hands.
"Mind your foul mouth," Grace panted. "You…filthy…whatever."
"See," St. James replied, "you're in such bad shape you can't even find a name to call me."
"Busybody," Grace murmured. "I'll leave this desk after this place gets back to normal, otherwise shut up and let me sit here."
"Shoot girl," Blue said. "Looks like you're about as busy as a cat on a hot tin roof. Don't think you need to be this busy. Go back to bed."
"I'm fine," Grace said. "Baby's sleeping anyways. St. James, who went out after Carol and Fate?"
"Merle and Cash."
"Alright, bring me Daryl, I'd better calm him down before he rages so hot he melts the remaining glass in my church."
"I'm not your butler," St. James said.
"I'll get him myself then," Grace moved to stand.
"Sit, Jesus, I don't know how the Lieutenant puts up with you," St. James growled. "Miserable, stubborn ass…"
"I heard that!" Grace shouted after him.
"Good!" The office door slammed and Blue winced.
Blue whistled low. "That boy is maaa-aad."
"It gives him something to do," Grace replied. She eyed the remaining children as Buck continued to sing to them. "I'm sorry, Mr. Blue."
"Me too. Mighty nice of you all to put us up, I promise we'll pull our weight."
"I know you will, Mr. Blue, you're a rough, hardworking fellow. I know we're getting the better bargain here."
He flushed a little. "Well shoot, girl, I do what I gotta do to get by.
He didn't add how he felt he let those kids down.
Shit, he felt as useless as tits on a boar.
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DarylDixon'sLover - What's wrong with them having a girl?
vickih - Milton taking in Toby was cute I thought, Milton is so a daddy, even if he wants to deny it.
Yazzy x - Hehe, Merle's big hands and feet also are important to note. ^_^
Brazen Hussy - You know, I don't care how hard Carol is getting on the show, in my stories, she will always give pause for children walkers. And in no way does this mean she deserves to get bit. Gotta keep her human in some ways, right?
Merle's Right Hand - You know though, as I was writing the Lt. teasing Carol and calling her General, I got weird sexual vibes about it...like in another world they'd have ended up together and he'd call her General playfully...never mind, just thinking muh thoughts.
Claire Randall Fraser - Ooh, girl, sorry...there is some heavy stuff coming up. But as always I'll try to add some levity to it.
Ciao Bella - Ah, Elise, I hope this chapter answered your question. She's around, I just have so many characters to try to cover I sometimes neglect a few. ^_^