Zombiefest Ch 13

"As you can see, what we have in our blood, replicates something that Sunny created naturally. When she got bit, something in her own blood went nuts and turned the Zombie virus into something else. A side by side comparison shows that we somehow replicated what she does naturally." Torie explained.

"But how is that possible?" I asked while Sunny sat at my side looking around.

"I really don't know, namely because whatever her body was before the bite, well there is no base blood from her to compare it too. I can offer an idea, but it would only be a best guess scenario." Torie admitted.

"Please give us your best guess." I told her and she nodded.

"I believe she had a very rare blood type or disease, nothing bad mind you. But something in her blood made her create a hyper active immune system. Remember the Zombie disease is not an active predator, it lies in wait to ambush other cells. But with Sunny her immune system may have seen everything as a threat." she said and then shrugged a bit. Torie was correct with out a sample of her blood before the bite, there was no way to know for certain.

"Now as for what happened to you earlier, that could have happened to any one of us. Well those with the Cure in their system or even within Sunny." Torie added.

"Explain that?" I asked her.

"Think about it, every time you have given the cure to someone, you aren't exactly by their side, but you are watching over them. Asking about them, keeping tabs on them. Even now you are subconsciously scanning them when you are outside, when you pass by someplace where a lot of them are gathered. When you do not see them right away you ask about them, you know every single one by face and name. We all do, we all watch over each other with out even realizing we are doing it. The Cure adds a heighten protective instinct that demands we watch over each other." Torie said which had everyone reviewing their own actions.

"I'll be damned, she's right. When I think about it, I can name every single one of the changed with out even trying and I always go looking for anyone who is not where they should be or normally are with out even thinking about it." Jackson said quietly.

"Now add that drive with your natural desire to protect someone you care about." Torie said slowly.

"Imagine how you would feel if someone was aiming a weapon at someone you actually love." Torie whispered.

"My Blood's heat shot right up, I mean I barely even had that picture flash in my head and I am ready to kill in an instant." Sam admitted. Torie nodded and was fighting to stay in control, I even found myself working for control. I pulled Torie to me even as Sunny grabbed my arm, I could feel her shaking and her eyes were glowing with her naturally blue eyes, but a purple coloring was bleeding into the blue until only the Purple color was evident. We also found out her blood has a purple hue coloring that would get more pronounced during distress.

"Okay everyone, we are fine, lets all take a deep breath here." I reminded them while hugging Torie and Sunny while Maria hugged Sunny from the other side to help her calm down.

"Why didn't Tami react when Charlie was down?" I asked curiously.

"The shock of the moment, injury to herself at the same time, it's hard to say for sure. You were outside so fast, she may have felt safe and protected at that point so her instincts didn't kick in." Torie said as a guess.

"We'll keep an eye on this new development." I replied while looking at everyone, "For now lets just go back to work, oh and I want all the changed to keep an ear out, if they hear anything that even sounds like what happened, I want to know about it and word for word what was said and when and to whom." I added. They all nodded in agreement.

After everyone ran off to start getting their groups moving, I stood watching the scene below. Everyone going about working on everything, even the trucks were getting serviced, cleaned up and reloaded. Taking a seat I watched as the sun began the slow descent behind the Mountains. Down below purple eyes brightened slowly to compensate the dark. Sunny was, as usual, staying by my side or getting more water when the glass was near empty.

At night we would take turns staying with the abused woman who had been whipped. The wounds were taking time to heal. And running when we would notice the need to move around. The next day, the injured woman was led out and jogged slowly to start getting her worked into a routine.

"She is healing much faster now, with the exercise helping the cure in her system, the cure is now able to replicate faster and now more is available to heal her." Torie explained and I nodded. To me it sounded like we were all making this up as we went, but as long as it worked, why not?

The last two weeks have the injured woman, Carrie, on her feet and helping where she can and running. The other Trader groups returned one at a time with their lists, and would swap things back and forth with us then head out again to complete the trades. Fort Wilderness is up and running, planted a late crop, they'll be short one harvest but it should not hurt them as the fields were more then what their small numbers would ever need.

The other two Forts heading to Stateline would get their trades along with a few more that we could start doing as well. We raided a Warehouse where several of the Big Stores would keep things to save room inside the distribution stores. Much of it was useless as there was no internet. The Flat Screen TV's, DVD players would go a long way in trade with those places who had power in one fashion or another. Not to mention about every movie you could think of inside other boxes.

All of the trade vehicles made one run out to Stateline to drop off supplies and machines to rebuild the Stronghold with walls of Cement and Steal Gates. The Interior holding a complete system designed for wind and solar power and the Buildings were torn down one by one and rebuilt. The Once captive women, watched as the building they had been forced in to was torn down with silent tears in their eyes. While they did help to rebuild the place, they would never stay, instead they returned to Reno.

The walls were built much like Reno's and each tower had weapons capable of devastating fire power. While we could make our own shells for the rifles and hand guns. Once the rockets were used up, it would be the end of them.

The Walls had been extended enough that a small five acre area was set up for growing a mixture of vegetables. Outside a large Coral and Stables was set up for Horses and Cattle, long as the Zombie's don't get curious about the human scent on the stables, they should leave the animals alone. Besides two of the watch towers have an overlapping view of the corals and stables to insure that Bandits and fools did not try and help themselves.

"Seriously?" Jackson asked me and I nodded.

"Many of your Officers from Redmond have not gotten the Cure, opting instead to remain unchanged and use the cure as a last resort. Why not put one of them in charge of the Stateline Fort, it would insure that they adhere to the rules that most Military follow and keep them from trying to shut their doors to the Changed. I explained to him while he listened.

"I don't care if the unchanged are scared of us, but I won't allow their paranoia to create rifts within the Forts we have, they can either get with the program or get the hell out. I am done trying to play politician." I added and he chuckled lightly.

"Agreed, with a couple squads at hand, they should be able to keep the nonsense to a minimum." Jackson said while thinking about who could be trusted to do this. In the end they assigned four Officers and two squads who would be the Forts security and when given a choice another 37 men and women also moved to the rebuilt Fort.

The Trade vehicles began running once more and with trailers full of things considered valuable trade, they were gaining the trust from outlying Forts and Strongholds. Letters carried back and forth, people reunited with relatives feared to be dead. A few times Husbands and Wives thought lost, had remarried having given up long ago in finding their spouses.

The Biggest surprise was when Maria announced she was pregnant, most of us feared that the Cure might have made us sterile. And for those who wanted the 'Cure' it was stated that it was a possibility. Another reason so many opted not to get the Cure, with Maria coming up pregnant, now we had an influx of people wanting to become Changed.

We adopted a new rule, no one new could be given the Cure until after being with us for six months. If they still wanted it and had shown a desire to help the community. They would become one of the Changed. Many believed the rule to be fair, besides for most they would opt out of being changed once they realized they no longer needed to fear Zombies once inside the walls.

Because of one phobia or another, we ended up putting together two unchanged trade groups. They still carried six of the changed so they could stand watch over the sleepers at night. The unchanged were quite grateful for that but still hated that only six could join them. Nearly a year gone by and my Daughter, born of dark hair, brown skin tone and lovely Purple eyes was born to our family and we named her Raven. It had been Maria's Mother's name. Trade routes expanded and with a bit of work, we were able to adapt electric powered Motorcycles into short ranged deliveries. Safe Houses set up to pick up and drop off mail and small parcels along with People who maintained the Houses and could provide a hot meal and a safe place to sleep before continuing their Journeys.

"Now, over here in Montana, we can set up...." I said and paused. I had been listening to one of the many trucks pulling up to the main gate and then they hit a signal that said the truck was in distress. Jackson and I look at each other and nodded. He went out the door while I jumped off the terrace from two floors up. Security was also ready and waiting, one of the new recruits had opened the gate anyways even though the signal was wrong. While looking at the recruit in question I could see they were giving off strange hand signals. I grabbed an arrow from one of the guards and threw it at the recruit. It went through his head and stuck in the wall behind him.

"What the?" Jackson said and looked at me.

"He's signaling the people in the truck, be ready." I warned him.

"That was not very neighborly of you. I guess we'll have to even this up before you can be given the choice of surrendering the Hold or fighting to the death." a voice called out. One of the young men from the trader group was suddenly shoved out the side door and shot down before everyone's eyes.

"You have five minutes to decide which you will want. Surrender or battle." the voice called out.

"What'll it be?" Jackson asked me while all of the Changed relayed what was said to their unchanged counter parts.

"On something like this, I tend to rely on an old Marine saying, Kill them all and let God sort it out." I said in reply and many were grinning with evil intent on those who would attack their people and kill them in cold blood. With a nod to several standing on the ramparts, they landed silently on top of the two trucks. Moving forwards they knelt by the hatches and began removing the well greased hinges.

"What's it to be?" the voice called out at the five minute mark.

"I do not surrender to a coward sitting behind bullet proof glass. You want this stronghold then show me what you got to take it with.." I demanded while moving to stand before both trucks.

"And what if I just shot you down like a mangy dog?" the voice asked.

"Then it would be up to my second as to what they will do, just know that if you take the cowards way out in this, they will never follow you." I replied evenly.

"And why is that?" they asked and sounded almost bored.

"They only follow someone who has earned it, who has worked side by side with them. Who had bled with them and who has known joy with them. Firing a gun, killing a hostage.. that does not get respect." I answered while pulling off my shirt and handing it to Torie. Then with a grin I added, "I will even help you and your people to evacuate the trucks." then nodded at the people on the trucks. They dropped smoke grenades and stun grenades down through the hatches and sat on top of the hatches after they were shut once again.

After several whomp sounds from inside, doors opened and men and women stumbled and fell out of the trucks. The drivers door and passenger door opened as well to have the rest of the vile group landing like heaps of coughing and tear streaked faces from the irritation caused by the small bombs.

"Drop your weapons or be killed, I will not repeat myself." I called out. One man raised his rifle and was shot down before he could even take aim. Several more men and two women were also put down for their foolishness.

Looking over at the would be leader, he pulled a long sword from a sheath. I held up my hands to stop anyone from taking him down and then looked at him, "Show me what you got.." I said to him and he rushed forward.

I spent the better part of five minutes remaining just out of the reach of the sword. He was getting tired and sloppy so I kicked the sword from his hand and it flew upwards. Then I slapped his face to get his attention once more. He yelled several curses and I stepped back six inches and he followed me. Just as he had taken that step, he looked to have realized his mistake.

"You're Dead.." I said to him and his eyes widened even as the falling sword sunk deep into his head.

"How did you know the sword would be sharp enough?" Jackson asked while moving closer now.

"The sword was clean and polished. You do not take the time to clean and polish a sword with out taking care to sharpen it as well." I replied and he nodded as he considered it. Jackson got people to work clearing out the bodies and once outside they were beheaded just to be sure they would not be coming back.

I would love to say it was the last time we had such trouble, but that would be a lie. In any society you will have those who disagree or who want to take what you have. Disagreements can be talked out, can be reasoned with. But the Renegades would have to be dealt with differently. We built up several more strongholds within a days drive and added several more trucks and trade routes.

Just about everyone had heard of the Purple eyed traders who always dealt fairly with everyone and who managed to gain access to things like TV's and Radio's to solar panels and wind machines so power could be added once more to their creature comforts.

Nearly twenty years later and the City of Reno and Sparks are clear of Zombies. New Walls surround the entire area now and most of Sparks has been turned into farm lands and Cattle Ranches which have become our main trade commodity. We still have the bandits of one group or another trying to cause trouble. But for the most part they can do nothing to get past the gates and with our increasing number of Changed, it did not take long before the entire populace to become changed. We also increased the wait time for new people to become changed to one year.

Sadly, we did have one of our group run off. They led a group of bandits for almost five years before we finally caught up with him. We wiped out his entire camp and then him. It wasn't until after ten years that we noticed something rather strange. None of the Changed were aging, now my Daughter, born of Maria, and my Son, born of Torie. We could see them aging, in fact we noted many things about them.

They developed much faster, they were walking much sooner then the other children. Better balance, they could work out problems quickly as well. In school, they caught on very quickly there too and they all had a form of photo graphic memory which enabled them to pull up answers to questions at a remarkable rate.

Torie once commented on the Change being the next step in evolution. Perhaps we are, but did it really have to be a freakin Zombie apocalypse that would bring it around?

Raven, my Daughter, leads one of the Trader groups that heads out East. Storm, my Son, is training to become a Commander of one of the many Forts that we have set up. Torie has noticed that the Children have started to slow down the aging process, she figures they will stop aging in the low Twenties, like Charlie and Tami.

Looking out across the City, more lights are on as people took residence out beyond the original Walls and houses and neighborhoods could be reclaimed. They all know to come back to the main Stronghold should the alarm be sounded. We only had it sound once, a bandit group had infiltrated the outer wall. It took less then ten minutes for them to be found and dealt with by the Security.

Now a days my family and I enjoy keeping tabs on the work crews, helping out where we can. Most of the population just tells us to stop. Seems they feel we have done more to aid them when they were cast a drift by others. We still sneak in and help though. We have also heard of Traders up North, traders who have Blue eyes that can glow. Perhaps Sunny may have family among them.

Never know and time will tell....

And so ends Zombiefest. I may write a continuation, but at the moment I am writing several new books and still have stories already written and not posted as yet. Two are fanfictions with the Avenger's and superheroes. Hope you all have enjoyed what I have written so far.