The Book of a Few (14 page)

“
Did you find them? Your family?”

“
The dead were my family,” Bruce said in a low tone.

Dana sighed. “I’m sorry, Bruce. We’ve all lost people, and I understand. But I need to know something: What do you want from us?"

“
Food…” There was a pause in his speech. “Maybe a quiet room to sleep in?”

I poked my head out of the door and saw Dana nod his head, to my own amazement. I knew that I had missed a part of the conversation, but at the time I wondered: Why is Dana agreeing to help this stranger? Will didn’t seem to have any objections either.

Dana looked up from his thoughtful stare at the floor and said, “Alright. Follow me. But,” he held out a finger, “not too close, okay?”

Dana turned to lead the way further into the building, but paused to whisper something to Will. Will nodded shortly after, and Dana walked through the doors into the break room.

“
Go ahead,” Will said to Bruce, who walked past Will.

After hearing the door to the break room open and close once more, Will began walking my way. He spotted me.

“
What’s going on?” I asked.

“
Dana says to go through the meeting rooms that link to the break room. Stay hidden and put a bead on the back of Bruce’s head. He’s got something up his sleeve, I think.”

“
What?” I was confused.

“
Just do it—I don’t know. I’m joining Dana.” Will waved his hands, shooing me away as he turned around.

I got into position as quickly as I could. After reaching the door, I opened it as slowly as I could and took in the situation in the break room. Dana was already seated at one of the tables, facing me. A candy bar was lying on the table. It must have been pulled from one of the vending machines. Will stood off to the side of the table a-ways. More interestingly, just as Bruce walked up and began pulling his own chair out from under the table, across from Dana, Will pointed and exclaimed:
“He’s armed!”

Bruce quickly spun around. Dana seemed unsurprised when Bruce pulled a revolver from his rear waistband. Will was now at gunpoint, arms in the air. A three-way argument burst in the room between all of them. With everyone yelling at the same time, I couldn’t make out any of it. I raised my own gun to my shoulder and put its sights on Bruce.

The room grew quiet, and Dana spoke in a calmer voice. “Bruce, why did you lie?” Bruce faced Dana, but kept his gun on Will. “How are we to make a deal if I can’t trust you?”

“
The gun stays with me,” Bruce said with shaking hands. The words rolled off his tongue with a forceful presence. “How can I trust you, huh?”

“
Bruce, I need that key,” Dana said steadily. “You don’t know the desperation I’m feeling right now. But you lied, and now I can’t trust you. You said you weren’t armed, Bruce. I need to know, right now, do you have the key?”

What key?
I thought to myself. I
knew
I missed an important part of the conversation while moving into my first hiding place.

Bruce stood there, and I could tell he was thinking about what to say next because he had lost eye contact with Dana. A long moment passed.

“
Room and food first. The key is your payment. If you
want
it, you’ll give me what I
want
,” Bruce demanded.

Dana laughed. “Bruce, I don’t even know if you have the key. Considering you’ve already lied once, I haven’t got any faith that you do.”

Bruce let out an exasperated yell in his anger and shook his fists in the air, then turned his own gun to his chest and fumbled through his pocket with his free hand.

Pulling out a brown key and holding it up, Bruce spoke, “I’ll fucking swallow it.” Bruce’s iron will was formidable, and it was easily apparent that this man was used to finagling his way into everything to get anything he wanted.

Dana laughed again, amused. “That’s stupid, Bruce. I’ll just gut you when you’re dead.” Dana’s tone made it seem like he would enjoy doing such a deed himself. Hopefully it was just good acting.

Bruce reached down to his leg and pulled his pants up, revealing a bloody gauze pad. He fiddled around with it, and finally tore it off his leg with a groan. A small piece of flesh was missing from the side of his calf.

“
There you go again, Bruce!” Dana exclaimed, throwing his hands in the air in disappointment.

Yelling back, Bruce restated his threat, “I’ll do it! I’ll fucking eat the key and blow a hole in myself! How are you gonna get the key then, huh? Digging around in the intestines of a fucking zombie doesn’t sound too safe. I’ll come back and infect every one of you.”

Bruce must not have known that the infection doesn’t spread by being bitten, nor does it reanimate the dead. By the look of his leg, the wound was pretty fresh. I would guess, based on his tale earlier, that his infected family had probably bitten him the night before.
Dana stayed serious, even though we had already told him what Bella had told us about the infection.

“
So, what I’m seeing is even if we do give you a room and agree to all your terms, including you keeping your gun and giving you food, what’s keeping you here?” Dana looked straight into Bruce’s eyes.

“
You seem to threaten your own death like it’s no big deal, Bruce. And I’m going to tell you that it honestly isn’t. Are you planning on killing yourself, Bruce?” Dana paused, sniffling and wiping a finger under his nose. He didn’t speak for a moment, allowing the gravity of what he had just said to sink into Bruce. Bruce seemed astonished, but I could tell that this was a man who wanted to die.

“
You came here,” Dana said, “hoping to find some food and a quiet place to spend your last night. Wanting nothing more than to die with a full stomach. Turns out you were a business owner, which is something you should have kept to yourself. When you said you managed the sporting goods shop, I realized that you had something we desperately need. So I listened to your pleas and humored you. I even tried to strike a deal between us, Bruce. But you lied, and now I can’t trust you. You lied about two very big things. If there is any hope at all that you will get what you want tonight, it will start with you giving me the key.” Dana pointed a finger down on the table, intensifying his statement.

Bruce took a moment to think. His hand holding his gun dropped slightly, then lowered to his side.

“
I don’t want to fight anymore,” Bruce said somberly as a tear escaped the corner of his eye. He wiped the water from his face and locked eyes with Dana. “You better come through.” He tossed the key on the table.

A sigh of relief came from Dana as he tucked the key into his pocket.

“
Bruce, what was your kid’s name?” Dana asked.

“
Amy,” Bruce replied faintly. “She was twelve.”

Dana nodded and looked down at his hands for a moment, then back at Bruce. “Think of her, okay?”

Dana winked to me, and I fired a bullet into Bruce’s skull without thought or hesitation. It was just done in a moment’s notice—wink-pull-
boom
. Bruce hit the floor convulsing as his brain fired every last synaptic connection still intact. I wasn’t thinking clearly at the time, and I let another man control my actions. I regret this.

He didn’t have to die, at least not now and by our hands. If the man wanted to die on his own terms, why did we deny him? It wouldn’t have held us back or put us at any risk of starvation if we just gave the man a meal and a room to do his business in. Maybe I’m just clinging to the ethical side of myself and it really isn’t that big of a deal, but I’m having difficulty accepting my own actions.

I have no qualms killing people who pose a threat to my well-being, or that of my friends. But on the other hand, innocent souls who did not deserve death are completely different. I don’t think I can kill like that again. I feel guilt like I never have before.

I occasionally like to think that I already am a survivor. I have imagined myself as a grizzled, battle-hardened man and all my kills are my means toward a bigger goal. The goal of being one of the few still alive standing atop a mountain in all of my vicious blood-soaked glory. Shouting out that I had bested everything that the world sought to take me down with. I’ve come to find that my personal mountain, due to my morals that increase its height, reaches up into the heavens. I have no hope of making it to the top.

Sacrifices I’ve made so far seem so trivial right now; smoking, good food, technology in general, relationships with distant friends, and even a lover pale in comparison to what I now realize is ahead of me. If I really want to survive this and endure the ages, I have to throw out a whole lot more. I have to be willing to sacrifice friends, partners, and homes. There will always be blood on my hands, no matter where I go.

Dana laughed over Bruce’s twitching body and said, “You think I’m going to feed you just so you can blow your brains out?”

Shortly after the gunshot, Branden and Taylor burst into the break room. They immediately asked what had happened, and Dana and Will told the tale while I stood quietly. As Dana finished reciting, I interjected.

“
I…I don’t think we had to kill him.” I stuttered, nervous that there would be repercussions. “We could have just given him a room, and let him…let him do his thing. It wouldn’t have hurt us at all.”

Dana looked at me, bewildered.
“He was a risk, Chester. He straight out lied multiple times. The way I see it and the way you should see it is that, for all
we
know, he could have popped us all in the night.” Dana stomped his way around Bruce’s corpse and over to Will’s side while glaring at me.

“
Unlike you,” he said, “I look after my friends. The only concern I have is the safety of those
already
with me. If someone wants to be one of the pack, even if just for a night, so be it. But you don’t do it like that.” Dana pointed down at Bruce.

At that point, I felt it was meaningless to argue further. I shook my head and kept quiet; I’m a pacifist at heart.

Dana handed the key to Will and said, “Go get the locks off those guns you told me about. I don’t know where they are.”

“
Who’s getting them?” Branden asked.

“
We’ll work from the ground up. Will can have the handgun, and Taylor can have the other one. That way we’ll all be armed with something semi-decent.”

Dana bent over and examined all of Bruce’s pockets. He retrieved a handful of ammo from one of them and his wallet from another. He also took the gun Bruce snuck in.

Lisa rushed into the room, panicked. “What happened? I heard gunfire.” Then she noticed Bruce’s body and began looking between the three of us, waiting for one of us to speak.

Dana looked up from his crouched position and said, “This guy just came in and wanted to do some business. Nothing wrong with that, but before we walked him in, I asked him if he was armed; he said no. Turned out he lied and started making threats if we didn’t give him what he wanted. He couldn’t be trusted, so we had to do away with him.”

“
What did he want?” Lisa asked.

“
Food and a place to stay,” Branden said.