The enemy of panic is routine.
Hammond had once mumbled that under his breath when he thought I wasn’t listening. I had taken it as his personal rallying cry, the thing he told himself when situations appeared to be at their most dire. Above all, people needed things to do. Needed to be occupied. If they sat around thinking about the dead rising, they would break rank and that would be the end of everything. So Camp Elderwood had settled into an orderly sort of chaos, everyone having something to do at all times.
Keller obviously subscribed to a similar theory, or tried to. As I settled in to life in Hastings, I watched familiar scenes play out. Soldiers drilled constantly, both in the confines of the area they claimed as base and out on the city streets. Civilians had jobs, though most of them were completely unrelated to their pre-apocalyptic careers. Professors had become street cleaners. Line cooks scavenged pantries. Real estate agents patched clothing and maintained storefronts to keep people clothed.
It was order—at least, order of a sort. We got up, ate breakfast, worked, and came home. Lattimore grudgingly allowed me to stay on as medic. Though she made it clear she had expected more from me, she soon left me to my own devices, permitting me free rein of the Main Tent and entrusting most of the minor illnesses and injuries to me.
For a time, there were no bites. I didn’t miss them.
At the end of each day we ate pastrami MREs, washed our dinner dishes, and collapsed into bed, too physically tired and mentally worn out to discuss our situation. Tony refused to address anything serious, repeating the same feel-goodisms he’d been spouting right along, and Dax, upon realizing he would not be moved from the medical center, lapsed into something of a sullen temper.
Every night I asked about Gloria. Every night Tony rebuffed me, saying he hadn’t heard anything but that he was sure she was fine. Then he stomped upstairs to read.
I slept unevenly, often awakened by the cheering throngs at the soccer games. But I slept without fear, and that made me wonder if I might find some peace here.
I know. It was a stupid thought.
I had been out of Zombie Jail and in the workforce for about a week when another attack came.
I arrived at work at seven o’clock in the morning and was immediately confronted with a sea of injured soldiers. Lattimore gave me a quick rundown: a fence had fallen somewhere in the Quarantine Zone—that place was starting to sound like trouble—and while our brave soldiers had managed to fight back the tide of undead, many of them had been set upon and bitten. “This is the morning rush,” she said, shoving a kit at me. “Bites and injuries right now, and I’ve heard there’s some kind of sickness in one of the neighborhoods. If you think someone's contagious, for heaven's sake, they need to stay here and not go back into the city to spread things around. I’ll need your help cataloging the really bad ones.”
I only understood morning rush and bites, and I took the kit from her, numbly gazing over the wounded men and women. Other medics and nurses had dispersed already, working on those who seemed most bloodied. I searched for a victim—er, patient.
“Hey, Vi-beck.”
I swung around. Food Truck Guy sat on a cot, his right hand pressing a towel against a bloody wound in his left arm. I didn’t see anyone else with a more pressing hurt, so I made my way over and sat down beside him.
He immediately pulled the towel away, revealing a nasty bite that swiftly welled up and ran over with blood.
“Well, that can’t feel good. Take your jacket off.”
He obeyed, though his eyes didn’t leave me as he stripped off the jacket. He discarded it next to him and held out the arm again, and with the sleeve out of the way I realized he had not one but two bites.
“Nice to finally meet you,” he said. “I’m Logan.”
I poked at the arm, feeling his gaze on me. “Did you get bitten so you could come talk to me?”
He laughed aloud. “Would that be creepy? Maybe I just wanted the hot medic for once.”
Oh, great. Post-apocalyptic charmers.
“So where in our fair city have you been hiding?” he asked.
“Did some prison time,” I said. Hey, it wasn’t exactly a lie.
His eyes widened, and his smile took on a rather unnerving gleam. “Prison? What were you in for? Tell me everything.”
Apparently, a prison stint during the endtimes is considered interesting and worthy of further discussion.
I considered Logan for a few seconds. “My friends and I came in with Gloria Fey,” I said, trying to gauge his reaction. If Tony had stonewalled me regarding Gloria, maybe this soldier wouldn’t. “Captain Keller threw us in the brig. They let me out because Lattimore needed the help.” I paused, not entirely sure whether I ought to go on, then decided I might as well get some information while I could. “Oh, and there was a zombie in the brig with us.”
He frowned. “Alfred?”
“Yeah, Alfred.”