Envy the Dead - Continuation of the Survival Story

I didn't want to commandeer Rick's really valuable survival role playing thread with my less helpful, more entertaining story. So I thought I'd start a new thread with each segment offered as individual entries. Please comment any way you wish. I'd love to hear all manner of feedback as this story may morph into a full blown novel in the not-too-distant future.

Envy the Dead One -

“Damn it all!!” Briggs kicked the fender out of sheer aggravation. “Friggin’ thing’s never gonna work. What, was I asleep during autoshop?”
He climbed out of the engine compartment of the half ton Ford. Frustration turned to anger. He threw the 5/8 inch into the weeds. After stomping around the yard muttering obscenities, the thirty-nine year old man composed what was left of himself.
“Easy man. You’re losing it.” He watched the dust blowing through the burned out neighborhood. In the distance someone screamed. The sound of glass breaking echoed from a block or two away. Don't want nothin' to do with that.
“I gotta get out of here. I gotta stop talking to myself. Just who the hell am I supposed to talk to? Huh, you idiot? Molly and the kids ran to the shelter in Greeley. Everyone else disappeared or up and died on me. There’s nothing left.”
Matthew Briggs turned and walked the two miles back to his makeshift lean-to at the far end of the wheat field. His walk seemed to take on an air of confidence. He had decided.
The virus hit like a hurricane back in ’14. The missiles fell from the sky like rain a few months later. The flashes on the horizon were overwhelming, something out of a weird movie. Surreal even. Denver… gone. Colorado Springs… gone. Boulder… vaporized… friggin hippies. What do they think now of the global communist movement they loved so much?
Briggs hunkered down in situ for a long time. He tried to get Molly to stay. He succeeded for two years. One day, she just up and left. Said there had to be something better out there and that living in a shithole on the outskirts of Platteville, Colorado was making her crazy. Will and Sarah went with her. He would have had to kill Molly to keep her from taking the kids. He wasn’t that crazy… not yet. For a few weeks, it hurt. The pain came in waves – loneliness, followed by despair, chased by despondency. Briggs was one of the lucky ones. The deep depression didn’t crush him.
He remembered the guy down the street – what was his name? Doesn’t matter. His wife and kids died from the virus, the initial outbreak. He saw the poor dude walking the streets for a few days afterward. He looked like a zombie. After a week, Briggs found the guy in front of his house, splayed out on the front lawn amid a stain of dried blood. The self inflicted wound left him with a baseball-sized hole in the back of his head. Expediency dictated. He rolled the rotting corpse over and found the Beretta half buried in the dried grass. He popped the mag, racked the slide to eject the live round and tucked the gun into his belt. Briggs searched the house for supplies.
His stores were dwindling. He harvested the grain that had seeded itself in from the prior year back in September. It was holding up reasonably well, but everything else was bare bones. He had to get moving.
For years Briggs resisted the move to the mountains. The environment was harsh and unforgiving. His hope was that there’d still be an abundance of mule deer, elk, rabbit and trout up there. The summer homes of the more affluent would be open for habitation. At the upper end of Fourth of July Road was a series of well built cabins rarely occupied by the owners. He’d head for one of the more rugged structures he remembered near the treeline. Briggs knew from decades of hunting, fishing and camping how to survive in the alpine forests that dominated half of Colorado, but didn’t want to make the move until it was absolutely necessary.
He caught word from transients that the Chinese were moving in with a huge force from Canada. Venezuelans and Bolivians up from Mexico. They were certain to roll through north central Colorado between the serious hot zones. That would put the bastards right in his lap. Can’t have that.
Briggs packed his loose supplies into the metal frame ruck he’d kept for just such a purpose. He slung the old pack and attached two water bottles to his belt. Damn thing must weigh a hundred pounds. He holstered his sidearm and held onto his shotgun just in case. He already buried what was left of his stored goods. He’d try to come back for them before winter blew in for real.
His thoughts turned to the small church community up near Nederland he’d once been a part of eight or ten years ago. Those folks, the ones who weren’t killed by that stinkin’ virus, were well equipped to ride out a storm like the one that hit the US. He’d have to convince them to accept him into their little group. Might not be as easy as it sounded, even if they did remember him. He had a lot to offer, though – hunting skills, construction experience, survival and tactical abilities.
Briggs walked.

Envy the Dead Two -

Briggs snapped awake. The violence of the unknown interruption erased all fatigue from his mind. He never really slept that well anyway. Something had invaded his not-so- REM-sleep, something unknown. And “unknown” immediately translated to “threat” in the extant world of death and devastation.

*Snap* He rotated to locate the noise, scanning the darkness for any sign of movement. It was dark, coal mine dark without the oil lamps. The wind was blowing, just strong enough to disrupt sensory input. He thought he could hear someone (something?) moving through the dried prairie grass. Certain not to move a muscle, he listened with the acuity of a military scout. He made out a human voice whispered to at least one other person. He now knew what he was up against.
Briggs made camp on the west-facing side of Davidson Mesa just below the ridgeline as the sunset bathed the land in its fiery light. He settled against a grouping of large sandstone boulders along a steep slope that overlooked ninety-five percent of the Boulder Valley. The city, the university and all the homes of the upper crust were obliterated, replaced with twisted black destruction.
The five-hundred kiloton nuke that visited its ruin upon Boulder, a Russian SS-27 Topol-M, originated from a mobile launch vehicle deep in the Siberian wasteland. The single warhead penetrated US airspace above Wyoming and air burst detonated a few minutes later over the Pearl Street Mall killing one hundred thousand Boulderites instantly. The hotspot at ground zero, soil, cars, building materials and groundwater activated by the initial nuclear radiation, had barely faded, even after four years. The hazardous radius around the blast point wasn’t enormous but deserved respect nonetheless. Briggs would skirt the edge of what would have been the southern limits of Boulder and head for Eldorado Canyon.
The intruders closed in on his small encampment up the slope from the west. The starlight backlit two figures long enough for Briggs to pinpoint a fix. Two people, close formation, slightly crouched and climbing toward his vantage point. He waited in hiding until they drew close, twenty feet… nowhere to run. He depressed the trigger on the pump action 870, discharging a single round of the precious double-ought buck into the ground at the feet of his adversaries. The round echoed like the concussion of a howitzer in the still of the night. Dirt and gravel flew everywhere. Both prowlers screamed in surprise and froze solid.
“You take another step and you’ll be bleeding.” Briggs circled around the far side of the largest boulder. “Turn toward me and sit cross legged with your hands in the air. If you move – I mean even the slightest twitch – you’ll be spouting holes you never had before.”
He cut two three foot lengths of rope from a coil attached to his ruck. He handed one length to intruder number-one, “Tie your friend’s hands.” The figure complied. Briggs tied up number-one and checked number-two’s rigging before forcing them apart from each other, face down in the rocky soil. He did a quick body search for concealed weapons.
“Now talk! What are you doing up here? Are you scoping the area for one of the ten factions?”
“Factions? No. My brother and I saw you from a couple miles off, earlier today. Man, we haven’t talked with anyone in months. We just wanted to talk.”
Only then did Briggs realize he was putting the screws to two kids. “You’re kids. I can’t believe this.” He helped both boys back to a sitting position. “How old are you and what are your names?”
Number-one did all the talking. His entire body shook as he tried to explain, “I’m Kevin and this is my brother Jake. He’s fourteen and I’m sixteen.”
“Have you got any weapons on you?”
“Just a hunting knife, and you found that,” Kevin said.
“You’ve been surviving since the nukes with a hunting knife? I don’t believe you,” Briggs said.
“Well not exactly,” Kevin began to elaborate. “After everything went to hell, my parents and older sister were killed by the virus. I got real sick but somehow managed to survive. Jake never picked up even one symptom. After a week, I got better. Real sudden like. It was if something in my body kicked the virus out. One day I had a 104 fever and puking everywhere, the next day, I felt a lot better.”
Briggs looked at the boys, his skeptical nature showing through. He waved his right hand in a circular motion as if to say, “Tell me more.”
“We lived with our parents up Coal Creek Canyon. After our parents died, we survived for about two months on the food and water we had stored. When the food ran out, we realized that we needed to change our plan. We took day trips from the house over that two month period, trying to find food, supplies and answers.”
“What answers,” Briggs demanded.
“Anything. What’d happened? Who was still alive? Was there any law or government left that could help us? Like that,” Kevin said.
“What’d you find?”
“Well, we quickly discovered that most of the areas close in to the cities and bigger towns were crawling with the wild people. Do you know who I mean? The wild people?”
Briggs thought back to his first encounter with the roving mobs the boys called “the wild people.” He needed supplies one summer day four weeks after the missiles came and decided to explore what remained of Fort Lupton. He avoided the individuals and small groups of people staking claims on the more valuable stores and houses in the area. He kept to the shadows and moved only when no one was looking. He gathered all he could find in a one hour period of time. Not wanting to be a victim of his own carelessness, Briggs walked quickly with his stash for the outskirts.
The sun was setting and the shadows started to play tricks on his eyes. He was only a few hundred yards from the nearest farm field when he heard what sounded like a human howl. The call was answered by yells and screams from a larger group a bit further away. He hit the dirt and crawled on his stomach to a rusted hulk that was once an old tow truck rig. Hidden in the shadows beneath the burned out truck, Briggs peered out to witness a scene that caused him great distress. What he saw haunted his dreams for months.
The mob had captured a man from somewhere in the business district and dragged him toward a large Quonset hut set back off the main road. The man, gaunt and malnourished, was struggling to get free but was no match for the mass of distorted humanity that held him captive. After reaching the Quonset hut, the mob turned vicious. Briggs saw only a fraction of what really happened. The captive’s screams coupled with Briggs’ imagination provided sufficient description. Rumors circulated among the rational people that the wild mobs consisted of people somehow infected with a mutated strain of the virus. They were reasonable, sensible citizens who were altered by the mutant strain just enough to distort their collective reality. Unable to think in a lucid manner, the wild people often resorted to cannibalism. They were to be avoided at all costs.
“Yeah, I know all about the mobs,” Briggs answered. “You need to stay away from them. What else did you learn on your fact finding missions?”
“We ran into groups of people patrolling the Front Range region. They appeared to be assembled under some kind of formal leadership. We were told later that these groups were known as factions. Green Faction exercises control over what remains of Boulder. Gray Faction… Longmont, I-25 and Erie.”
“Yup, that’s correct,” Briggs said. “There are at least ten factions controlling the sectors surrounding Denver. The overall leadership, if you can call it that, lies with a warlord named Kresh. No one that I’ve spoken with knows where his headquarters is. Some say he holes up in a bunker near the old airport. Others are convinced he’s in the mountains… Idaho Springs or Genesee. I’ve got my suspicions. It’s not relevant, though. Fact is, even with ongoing wars between the factions, Kresh and his Black Faction are in control. Many have died in his quest for power. Of this you can be certain.”
“Who are you?” Kevin asked. “Are you a member of a faction?”
“I’m nobody. You should learn what questions not to ask, kid.”
“I didn’t mean any harm,” Kevin said. “Jake and I have been on our own for a long time now. We were approached by members of the Blue Faction. They wanted us to join them in return for protection, shelter and regular meals.”
“Why didn’t you?” Briggs wondered aloud.
“There was something not quite right about their offer. They were hiding something. We heard enough rumors of forced servitude and slave labor within the factions to give us concern. We managed to evade Blue’s coercion and keep to ourselves ever since.”
“Why seek out other people now? What’s changed since then?” Briggs had a ray of compassion for the brothers. His constant vigilance would never subside, but as his thoughts returned to Will and Sarah, his heart melted just a little.
“Look mister, we’re lonely and barely getting by. It gets harder every day to find food. We need to be part of a family, a community. A group of people we can be dedicated to. Do you know what I mean?”
“I do.” Briggs stared off into the distance as if trying to recollect what it was like to be a part of a family. It wasn’t clear, but the memories were there.
“I know what you’re getting at, Kevin.” Briggs said. “Part of me would like the same exact thing. I’m headed into the mountains in search of just such a community. You can come with me if you want.”
“You serious?” Kevin said. Both boys looked hopeful.
“Yeah. You can come along on one condition.”
“Name it,” Kevin said.
“You’ve got to listen to me. I’m in charge of our little group. The moment you start to freelance, I’m out of here and you guys are on your own again. You willing to make that sacrifice?”
Kevin looked at Jake. The silent conversation between them reached a conclusion. “We are.”

Envy the Dead - Three

They felt the sun rising. It warmed their backs as they walked. Briggs reached into the side pouch of his pack and produced a rolled up oilcloth. He opened the package and handed a chunk of a golden-colored substance to the boys. “I call it tapas. I don’t know why. Go ahead and eat it. It’ll give you some energy. I make it out of wheat berries and the remains of my stash of peanut butter. It ain’t bacon and eggs, but it’s not too bad.”

“Thank you,” Kevin said for both of them. They ate the tapas with such intensity that Briggs realized they needed more. He gave them each another small piece.

As they ate, they followed Briggs down the slope to the base of the embankment that formed the northbound lane of the highway. It was better to stay out of sight, keeping to a route hidden from the spotting scopes of faction sentries. There were, in addition, plenty of survivors with questionable motives strewn throughout the countryside. It was always a better tactical scenario in their world altered by inhuman devastation to avoid strangers. Even those who once were considered friends could only be trusted with the utmost caution. There was no security in the deepest thoughts and nightmares of men.
They followed the Turnpike into the valley until it bottomed out at South Boulder Creek. The winding creek bed lined with massive cottonwood trees would provide cover and lead them to the mouth of Eldorado Canyon to the southwest.
“There’ll be a big culvert at the bottom of the road bank,” Briggs said. “We’ll cross there. Can you guys swim?”
“Swim?” Kevin asked.
“Yeah, you know…” Briggs gestured with his hands as if he were doing the dogpaddle. The big man looked comical in the morning light. Jake laughed.
“Hey, that’s the first sound I’ve heard come out of his mouth. I was beginning to think my friend Jake here was incapable of speech.” A broad smile grew from Briggs’s weathered countenance as he spoke. He couldn’t remember the last time he felt happy about anything. He ruffled Jake’s hair and turned to hike down to the creek.
“Well, you never know what you’re going to find inside one of these concrete boxes. It could be full of water, although that’s unlikely this time of year. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting face to face a dead cow, numerous human corpses in various states of disrepair and untold quantities of gruesome ugliness. Come to think of it, in the last four years, I’m sure you guys have seen your fair share.” The brothers nodded in agreement.
At the base of the slope, the creek bank hugged the side of the concrete box. The water appeared to be only a couple feet deep at most. A twisted and rusted shopping cart made up the worst of the carnage. Briggs found a segment of copper pipe forced into the steel mesh of the shopping cart by the storm surge of some long forgotten weather event. He yanked it free and jammed it into the water before him as he walked.
“Follow me,” Briggs said. “Be sure to walk where I walk. A broken ankle out here would put us in a world of hurt.” He wove his way through the rubble and organic debris deposited by years of stream movement.
The width of the Turnpike at that point was no more than one hundred feet. As they looked around, each lamented a culture, a people, long since passed into history. The Turnpike stretched between Denver and Boulder would have, just a few years ago, been flowing at capacity with BMWs, expensive SUVs, semi-trucks and all manner of diminutive econoboxes. They were all gone, leaving behind only disembodied spirits to haunt the memories of a few survivors.
After five minutes of careful stepping, the group found themselves walking along side the coyote willow that extended the length of the creek. The pasture that paralleled their path was empty. Not even the prairie dogs that once scarred the plain were anywhere to be seen. There was nothing left to do but walk.
“Kevin and Jake,” Briggs said. “Stay vigilant. I need you two to watch everything. I’ll keep a pretty sharp eye out for any abnormalities in front of us. Jake, you watch to either side of our path. And Kevin, your duty is the rear quarter. If you see anything, a dog with five legs or a scarecrow with a green wig, you let me know. Understand?”
Jake gave Briggs a thumbs-up. Kevin said, “You can count on us.”
“Time will tell, kid. Don’t make any promises you can’t keep.”
Fifty minutes had gone by. They walked nearly two miles through the dense riverine vegetation, weaving between the tall grasses, trees and shrubs of their tortuous corridor. The brothers searched every field and grove for movement or strange phenomenon. As they approached the miniature village of Marshall, Jake spotted what appeared to be a sign post planted in the field off to the east. He grabbed Briggs by the jacket and muttered, “Sir, come see.”
“What is it Jake?”
Jake said nothing in reply, only pulled Briggs up out of the creek bed and into the field. The sign post was a roughly hewn cedar post, silvered by years of rain and snow. Atop the post was a skull bleached white in the sunlight, a human skull. No one said a thing even though all stared at the macabre sculpture. The skull displayed a dark, circular void the size of a nickel in the center of its forehead… a bullet hole. It was a sure sign of how desperate and fragile life had become.
The sign itself consisted of three wooden shingles nailed to the post. The message appeared to be hand written in blood. It read “Envy the Dead”. The brothers turned together and walked back to the creek without saying a word. Briggs scanned the horizon for movement. The homes in the distance were dark. Nothing stirred but the wind in the grass. He pivoted on his heel and strode quickly back to South Boulder Creek.
“I’ve got a bad feeling about this, guys,” Briggs said while hustling through the undergrowth. “There’s something dark happening here. Something that would just as soon swallow us up with it.”
“What are you talking about?” Kevin asked. “I didn’t see or feel anything.”
“Remember. Always use all of your senses. You can’t rely completely on the obvious… sight, hearing, smell. Within us is the ability to sense things. Whether it’s a combination of all our senses working in concert or possibly a distinct sense that we can’t name… like some sort of intuition. It is in all of us. You need to hone that ability, to come to rely on it as much as you would your own eyes. It will keep you alive. You need to stay alive, boys, more than anything.”
“But the sign said…” Jake whispered.
“Screw the sign!” Briggs shot back. “People lose hope around here, every day. They aren’t the lucky ones. They’re the dead ones.
“Let’s move. Now.”

Envy the Dead - Four

“I’m sorry,” Jake said quietly.
“Don’t be sorry, kid,” Briggs regretted having yelled at Jake. “I’m an old ogre of a man with barely a worthwhile emotion left in me, save a ton of anger and some sadness. I guess I should be the one who’s sorry for getting crosswise with you back there.”
The trio continued walking the creek bed until they drew close to Marshall. From their limited perspective, the town appeared deserted. The potential for danger in any peaceful-looking settlement was astronomical. Briggs knew this from experience. He preferred to see a few people moving here or there, between the houses and commercial buildings. He was uncomfortable with the lack of activity, the absence of any sound whatsoever. There was an eerie calm over the town of Marshall, the darkened doorways beckoned. Briggs held up his left hand. The group stopped.
“Come here you two.” Briggs pulled the large hunting blade from his belt and handed it to Jake. “Jake, if we’re attacked and you have a clear path to counter the attack, stick this blade into whoever you can. Just don’t perforate me or your brother, okay?”
Jake nodded and said under his breath, “I will.” Briggs thought he saw fire in Jake’s eyes, something he hadn’t yet witnessed in the boy.
“Kevin,” Briggs said.
Kevin gave his brother an encouraging look and slapped him on the back. He turned to acknowledge the older man. Briggs unslung his ruck and unzipped the outer rear pocket. He pulled from the pouch a plastic bag neatly wrapped in duct tape. Kevin stared at the package as Briggs unwrapped the contents. He removed layers of silvery tape and carefully wound it back onto itself for future use. He pulled the bag free, unveiling a medium frame semi-automatic handgun – the Beretta he’d taken off his friendly neighborhood corpse years ago. He worked the slide and peered into the action. He was meticulous about his gun maintenance. Any instrument so vital for his own defense deserved constant attention to assure it was in working order when called upon.
“Have you ever used one of these?” Briggs asked.
“Yes,” Kevin nodded. “My dad had a membership at a gun club in Boulder. We shot with him a few times before he died.”
“What happened to his guns?”
“He only had a couple,” Kevin responded. “A Kimber 1911 and a nine millimeter, a Springfield Arms I think. Because he went to the club a couple times a week, he stored them there in a locker. The club is a pile of rubble now.”
“That’s a shame,” Briggs said. He extended the Beretta toward Kevin. “This is a nine millimeter similar to your dad’s Springfield. I only recovered one magazine from its original owner, but I’ve got a small stash of ammo I’ve been collecting for a few years. Watch closely. We don’t have a lot of time.”
He pulled the slide back and locked it in the open position showing the brothers the empty chamber. He slid the magazine in place and pushed the slide stop, returning the slide forward with a metallic *chunk*. The hammer remained in the cocked position.
“This is a double action, semi-auto handgun,” Briggs began. “It is now ready to go. There are fifteen rounds in the mag. When I engage the safety, the hammer will return to a decocked position. If you want to fire, release the safety, point and pull the trigger. The double action will allow you to fire just like a revolver. Understand?”
Kevin and Jake registered their comprehension. The brothers wondered what had caused the man to be so anxious about their surroundings. They looked around and saw nothing out of the ordinary. Houses, barns, farm fields, old commercial buildings stood like soldiers in the distance. There was even a large agricultural pen constructed of barbed wire and steel posts. The fence was eight feet in height with ten strands of the harmful filament lashed together at close intervals with smooth wire. Was this a stock pen? If so, it was the largest and most substantial pen the boys had ever seen.
“Do not, I repeat, do not fire without provocation and a clear line of sight. The ammo is very valuable and I don’t want you to hit one of us.”
“Okay,” Kevin said.
“Follow me,” Briggs instructed. “About ten paces apart. Jake you’re in the middle. Don’t bunch up. We’re too easy a target that way.”
Target?
Briggs climbed the stream bank and angled off toward the back yard of the nearest house with the brothers close behind. Two abandoned cars sat together like Siamese twins under an ancient Oak. They stopped at the cars and scanned the area. Still nothing to be seen.
“What’s going on here?” Kevin said softly to Briggs.
“Not sure. It ain’t the wild people, though. They’ll be closer to Rock Creek or Louisville down the road a piece. Something else is happening in this little berg. It’s echoing through my bones. Did you see that pen?” Briggs tightened his grip on the shotgun. “When I figure it out, you’ll be the first to know. Just keep your eyes open, got it?”
They moved off toward the next house and stopped at the far side of the garage. Colorado Route 93, a four-lane divided highway, stood as their next obstacle. The empty expanse of linear concrete linking Boulder to Golden was harmless enough in and of itself. The lack of cover offered by a rapid crossing in the light of day was more daunting than Briggs wanted to comprehend. He would have waited until nightfall, but something screamed at him to move out immediately. His inner voice warned expressly against being in Marshall after dark.
They dashed to a grouping of trees and shrubs at the side of the highway. Briggs looked to the north and again to the south. The brothers watched intently for any movement. “Let’s go,” Briggs said.
One by one, separated by five second intervals, they sprinted across Colorado 93 to the far side of a series of agricultural outbuildings. They fell prone in a semicircular formation. Kevin, Jake and their adopted guide, Matthew Briggs, kept a lookout in all directions. They waited, expecting an unknown confrontation that didn’t come. After five minutes of half-breaths and absolute stillness, Briggs raised himself to a crouching position and shuffled toward the edge of town. The brothers mimicked his movement.
He turned back for a second. “This is it. This is where you’re gonna’ have to suck it up and dig deep. You’re going to have to keep up with me ‘cause I’m not stopping for anything. We’re headed for Shanahan Hill.” Briggs pointed to a ridgeline in the distance. “We’ll move along that line until we make our way to Towhee Gulch. To the west. It’s about three miles, probably take us two or three hours to do it without being seen. You up for it?”
“We’re with you,” Kevin said. Jake gave Briggs his characteristic nod.
“There’s a cabin in the foothills above Eldorado Springs we can bed down in. We’ll search Eldo for supplies tomorrow and refill our water jugs before we hit the mountains. Come on then.”
They marched toward the high ground at the southern end of Boulder proper. Shanahan Hill commanded a wide view to the south and towered three hundred feet in elevation above the creek bottom ground in Marshall. The walkers stopped short of the numerous residences that dotted the ridge and turned west. The October sun had reached its apogee and had already begun its descent. Briggs estimated only two hours of daylight remained.
They climbed though the mountain mahogany and rabbit brush that covered the east-facing slopes. The steep meadows led to the once-famous Boulder Flatirons. The going was slow.
As the daylight faded behind a wall of rock four thousand feet high, Briggs felt compelled to search the valley from whence they came. The blanket of shade cast by the setting sun washed away all visual contrast making the details of the landscape indiscernible. Something moved below them, though. This was obvious.