900 Miles (Book 2): 900 Minutes Page 16

  Kyle reached down to flip the chunk of glowing metal in the fire, and turned his attention back to Jarvis.

  “That smart bastard made our little holding millions. Heck, tens of millions. There was nothing stopping us. Money simply wasn’t a challenge anymore…and that may have been the problem.”

  With a sigh, Jarvis dug his boot down and took a swig of his own mini-bottle.

  “I can’t pinpoint the change, but at some point, Gordon’s mind started to twist. The same brilliance and drive that brought wealth seemed to have turned on him and started to push his desire to seek control. He wasn't satisfied with money. He wanted power…and not the kind of power one gets sitting in an office chair on the one-hundredth floor of their own skyscraper. He was more interested in power over people.”

  Looking over at the metal in the fire, Jarvis took the last swig from his mini-bottle, tossed it into the flames, and cracked open another.

  “I wish I could say I saw it come all at once, but really, it came over time. I may have been able to harness his ambition. However, ultimately, I didn’t fully realize what he was capable of until it was too late.”

  “You mean the Arena at Avalon?”Kyle asked.

  Shaking his head, Jarvis responded,“No, that came later. Gordon’s freshman effort is where I really started to question his actions. It’s where the first sliver of the divide started between us…culminating in the eventual takeover of Avalon.”

  He paused for a moment to look out at the fire. I was reminded of the creatures moving through the forest below us. The low, echoing, unified moan from the horde was moving through, around the forest flames, and away from us.

  “You see, he knew he couldn’t have power without surrounding himself with powerful people, so he created a world within a world that he knew he could sell to the elite of New York. Outfitting a broken-down abandoned building that had ceased construction after 9/11, he created what I can only reference as a mini-compound right in the middle of the city. Outfitting it with bunk beds, a cafeteria, and entertainment areas, he managed to build his own control area. Once complete, he simply opened it up to anybody that would be willing to come in and live. Everything was paid for - food, shelter, and entertainment. There were a few caveats that everybody who lived there had to sign on for. First, anybody who entered had to agree not to leave for three months. They would forfeit their clothing, any possessions, and had to agree to live by the compounds rules, of which there were very few.

  They would also agree to be video recorded at all times. There were cameras at each bunk, the cafeteria, and the entertainment areas. He even had cameras in the bathrooms…in the toilets and the showers. Privacy was completely signed away by the compounds’inhabitants.”

  Kyle reached over to a pile of wood that we’d gathered and threw a log onto the fire, sending embers floating out over the ravine. I watched as they parachuted down into the abyss and quietly out of sight.

  “The compound attracted people from all ways of life. He had vagrants off the street that were happy to have a hot meal and a place to sleep. Then he had well-off people who just simply wanted to be part of his experiment. The people had to have all been a little nuts to join, but I think that is exactly what Gordon wanted.”

  I glanced over at Aidan. It was clear from the expression on his young face that he was hanging on Jarvis’s every word.

  “Gordon didn’t let me in on his little secret world until he had it up and running. He took me down there for the first time, and I witnessed what people turned into when they had no rules, no responsibilities, and were encouraged to do whatever they wanted. At first, I thought the idea to be brilliant. Something that he may be able to televise…kind of reality TV-esque. However, I quickly realized this wasn’t meant for the masses.

  He took me to a back room that was outfitted with chairs and large flat panel TV monitors. The technology involved was amazing. Mission Control at NASA headquarters didn’t have jack on Gordon Green’s compound. The room also featured a one-way glass mirror that opened to a large white room fitted with padded walls. A number of prominent people of New York were plopped down in those chairs…simply watching the madness ensue. Looking up at the monitors, I was shocked to see people openly having sex on one screen, a fight breaking out on another. Two nearly naked men were picking a fight with a woman, nearly beating her to death for what seemed like fun. Nobody was there to interfere or stop anything.”

  Pulling a deep breath into his lungs, Jarvis popped open another mini-bottle and chugged it down. I wasn't sure if he was killing the pain of his leg, or the memory of Gordon’s compound. As he grew more intoxicated, his calm demeanor started to wane. In addition to the serious look growing across his face, I noticed Jarvis had an edge to him that I had previously not seen.

  “That was when two men were pulled into the padded room. They both appeared be vagrants by my count. Rail thin with scruffy beards and matted hair. I watched Gordon pick up a microphone and instruct the two to fight. Only the winner would be allowed to stay in his world. So they did - fight, I mean. They beat the shit out of each other, boys, all because Gordon found his way to control. His way to entertain the powerful. He had become a celebrity of sorts. Famous within the ranks of the nation’s elites…and he was drunk on the power.”

  Aidan finally asked,“Why did you go along with it? I mean, why did you stay friends with him? You could have just dropped all dealings with him if you truly were appalled by it.”He said this in a nearly accusatory way. However, I found myself questioning the same thing in the back of my mind.

  “I have to admit, the whole thing was a bit intoxicating, boys. The rush of the fight, the control he had over the fifty or so inhabitants living down there and the caliber of people paying high dollar to come and watch his little experiment…well, let’s just say that I’m talking former presidents, CEOs and military leaders.

  “But you’re right. I couldn’t stand by watching idle. The place got shut down by the NYPD. Somehow the word leaked out, and the police shut it down, citing that it was a cult, and against city ordinances.”

  None of us asked if it was Jarvis that had called in the tip, but he sure as hell implied it.

  Kyle picked up the metal piece that was smoldering in the fire and ash at that point, took a good look at the glowing end, flipped it once more and placed it back in the fire.

  “So how did Avalon come to be?”he asked.

  “Gordon had been building it for years. For all intents and purposes, it was operational when the dead started to rise. Realizing that violence was the truest form of entertainment, his new vision was to have gladiator-style battles. Live and to the death is how he explained it to me. He had already been hosting underground matches for a while. We’d gone slightly different paths by that point. However, when shit hit the fan on that first day of the outbreak, he reached out and invited me to his sanctuary. I didn’t know about the Arena until I got there. In Gordon’s mind, this is what he had been waiting for, and he wanted me, his partner, there to enjoy it. It was just a matter of putting a new kind of contestant into the arena. I knew I had to put a stop to it.”

  “Jesus…”Aidan groaned, genuine shock on his face.

  I’m not sure if he was playing to the crowd, or if he really got that Gordon was a monster. Either way, Jarvis didn’t respond. He looked over at Kyle while finishing off the last of his mini-bottle. Dropping his shoulders and taking a deep breath in, he looked down at the smoldering metal.“I’m ready for that now. Let’s make it quick.”

  Jarvis put up a hell of a fight for an old man. He arched his back and nearly threw Aidan over the edge when Kyle first pressed the heated metal against the front and back of his leg to cauterize the wounds.

  Holding a bandage over his melted skin, and just before he passed out, Jarvis looked up at Aidan and whispered,“Gordon has caused nothing but pain in this world, young man. You’d be better off to remember that.”

  Aidan took a step back and stared out at t
he fire raging below. Kicking his new Nike Pegasus shoes into the ground, while twisting a stick that he’d been holding, I could tell that at the very least, Jarvis had got him thinking.

  Chapter 22

  Desperation seemed to shine a new light on what we were willing to do…how far we were willing to push ourselves to survive.

  Kyle reached over and tapped my shoulder, pulling me from the uncomfortable half-sleep I was in. It was my turn to be on watch, and I grunted as I pulled myself upright in one of the busted airline chairs. We had moved ourselves into the cabin of the plane, deciding it would be the most defendable position should we come under some sort of attack.

  Lifting my cell phone, only to find it still dead, I glanced over at Kyle.

  Looking at his wristwatch, he said,“We’ve still got eleven hours. We’ll get back in time. We just need to sort through how. Hell, we’ve made it further in less time.”

  “How long till dawn?”

  “Maybe three hours.”

  “We need to find a radio or a working car,”I said grimly.

  “We will. There is something out there. The light will reveal it,”he responded before patting me on the back and lying down to get some rest.

  After taking a deep breath in, I shook my head and walked away from the group to relieve myself. After watching a rainbow of piss flow over the side of the ravine, I decided to take a seat at the small campfire which had long since burnt out. Looking out at the scenery before me, I could see that the forest fire continue to burn bright, albeit now further in the distance. Luckily, it was burning away from us.

  Dawn was close, but I could still see the moon trying to peek through the clouds and smoke on the far side of the horizon. Thinking back through the nightmare we’d survived below, I couldn’t help but wonder what the landscape would look like in the daylight.

  Once Kyle fell asleep, I realized just how quiet it was out there. We were alone, or at least, I thought we were, in the largest forest I’d ever stepped foot into. The worst part about it was that we were completely out of ammunition, leaving us with nothing but blunt force objects to defend ourselves if something should force us to have to fight.

  Tapping the wrought iron fence post against one of the chairs, I listened to the rhythmic moans from the creatures below. By my judgment, they were starting to diminish, letting me know that the center of the horde had likely passed by us at some point in the night. With the realization that the horde was now in front of us, I couldn’t help but shake the strange feeling that I could still hear the creatures in the distance behind us.

  Not sure if I was losing my mind or not, I listened intently, unable to determine how far away the noise was, or how many of the creatures were making it. However, I was sure of one thing. It wasn’t moving toward us…well, pretty sure anyway.

  Still, it created a stereo sort of effect, reminding me that, regardless of our little temporary safety, we were completely surrounded and we were going to have a hell of a time trying to figure out how to get home.

  After a while, my mind finally drifted away from the monsters and toward Tyler and the first months of taking care of him. It had been an adjustment for sure, but I always found solace in the little things…like when he would burp over my shoulder, or giggle at me making silly faces. I smiled at the memory of the first time he’d opened his eyes and really looked at me, his father. I had all but thrown in the towel after Jenn had died. Tyler gave me a reason to keep on fighting. It was that look of pure innocence and trust that helped me to turn the corner.

  I knew I couldn’t let him down.

  Tapping the metal rod against the ground now, I suddenly found myself stewing at the fact that I was so far away from him because of Gordon. If we managed to survive this, I knew we’d have to make sure that Gordon would never be a threat to anybody ever again.

  As the moon traded places with the sun, I inadvertently found myself sitting at full attention looking out at the aftermath below. Between the fire and the mega-horde, there was nothing left but ash. I could literally see the path that the creatures had carved through the dense forest, leading right up to where the fire had opened up and burnt everything away. In the distance, I could still see the tail end of the flood of monsters pushing through another section of forest. At some point in the night, the fire had shifted to the right, while the Zs continued forward. It created what I could only imagine looked like a giant fork in the road from above.

  Squinting, I could see the ground below moving ever so slightly. The realization that it was Zs that had been mangled under the weight of the horde, likely because they were too slow or too small to stand up against its sheer force, reminded that in the end the zombies were no different from us. In this world, and even in the one before the dead began to rise, humans would run right over each other. Whether it was for something as seemingly significant as a promotion at work, or something as obviously fucking stupid as being the first in line on Black Friday to get the best deal on that big screen TV, the masses were bred to push past the slow and trample the weak.

  “You hear that?”Nearly jumping out of my skin, I responded,“Jesus, man, what are you, a fucking ninja?”

  Color had returned to Jarvis’s face and despite a nice limp as he stepped closer, he was looking a hell of a lot better than he had the night before.

  With a warm smile, he apologized and repeated the question.

  “I can certainly still hear that horde out there, if that’s what you’re talking about,”while shifting my eyes out toward the monsters pushing through the trees in the distance.

  “No, not them,”he replied, pointing out beyond the rear of the airliner.

  “Yah, I hear them too,”I said, letting my shoulders drop.“I’ve been listening to them all night. They don’t seem to be moving toward us.”

  “That’s the point. They’re not moving.”

  Thinking about that for a second, I realized he was right. Wherever the other group of zombies was, they appeared to be staying in the same spot.

  Jarvis gazed out beyond the crashed airplane, which looked even worse in the morning light.“Ever known a group of Zs just to huddle up and hang out without something to keep them focused?”

  Raising my head a bit, and following his gaze, I replied,“No, I guess I haven’t.”

  Rubbing his leg, and then standing back up straight, Jarvis looked me dead in the eyes.“My best guess on how to get out of here is to follow the moans.”

  Follow the moans. The statement buzzed like a broken alarm clock in the back of my head. I had never willingly followed the cries of the dead. Normally, I knew better…we all did. Desperation seemed to shine a new light on what we were willing to do. How far we were willing to push ourselves to survive?

  When Kyle and Aidan joined us, we discussed Jarvis’s plan, and decided it was our best course of action. No matter what, the plane radio was not going help, and we decided that the helicopter that Aidan and the rest of Gordon’s men had flown in on was toast…literally. Besides, even if anything like the radio in it was still salvageable, the idea of trying to walk through the landscape below seemed insurmountable, especially with all the broken-down creatures ready to grab out at us if we tried to trek around down there.

  Throwing down some more peanuts and a few bottles of water that we’d managed to dig up in the wreckage, we surveyed what we had left in terms of protection. With the guns out of commission, we weren’t left with much. Kyle grabbed his fence post, which had gotten him that far. Jarvis rummaged through the wreckage before cracking a faint smile as he picked up the long chunk of metal used to burn his leg. Coincidentally, it had burned into a nice jagged point. Aidan yanked a two-foot metal piece off of one of the chairs and wrapped part of the seat belt around the end of it, making it look like a sword of sorts.

  Of course, I had my hammer, which I was plenty happy to be carrying.

  Taking one last look at the chairs circling the campfire, as well as the busted plane, I couldn’t help b
ut think that we were damn lucky to have found the place. Perhaps only the kind of luck that would happen in a bad book or stupid movie to continue the plot forward…but lucky all the same.

  Getting down to business, the four of us ventured toward the forest in what Kyle called a“four man spread.”He explained that it allowed us to cover more area, while at the same time keeping us from being a line of sitting ducks for anybody or anything that may want to take a crack at us.

  Moving past the debris left behind from the plane crash, we continued back into a thick forest, each of us trying like mad to minimize any noise as we moved through the leaves and branches.

  Knowing I was no more graceful than a contestant from that old TV show The Biggest Loser trying to perform in a ballet, I could literally feel Kyle’s eyes drilling into me to keep it down. Suddenly, he completely stopped in his tracks. Knowing something was wrong, the rest of us froze.

  Kyle was the first to hear it in the distance, but almost immediately, the echoing sound of a helicopter flew above us, shaking the forest canopy violently. It flew right over our position, seeming to head back toward where we had just come from.

  “Gordon just won’t let up,”I whispered.

  Jarvis lowered his head and met my eyes.“He never does.”

  Aidan kept his eyes glued on the canopy, seeming to be in deep thought. He wasn’t alone.

  As we continued along, I couldn't help but wonder where the sounds were coming from. I saw no civilization or obvious place that would be attracting the creatures. Maybe there was a small cabin or farm out here. Perhaps someone was hunkered down in some sort of small bunker like you’d see in the movies or those end-of-the-world apocalypse preparation TV shows. The types of underground one-room living spaces that were cramped with nothing more than food, beds, and people.