A Different Virus: Heartfire

Chapter 5

Evan raised his eyebrows incredulously at me while munching on his dinner.

"Seriously, go to the field behind the dugout and see it for yourself," I insisted.

Evan shuddered lightly and shook his head. "I'm not sticking a single toe outside that perimeter fence for anything short of an emergency."

He was not the only person who had zero desire to leave the safety of the fence. I could kind of see his point. There were always at least several zombies around the fence regardless of how often we lured them away. The quads had reduced their runs to conserve fuel, so it wasn't unusual to see a handful of zombies leaning against the chain-link fence in their desire to meet us.

It turned out that most people actually thought the Foragers and Raiders were crazy for spending most of the daylight hours outside of the fence. Admittedly, the Foragers and Raiders did have a lot more training sessions with zombies throughout the week than other groups, but zombie encounters were practically guaranteed in our line of work. While at a farm or on a raid, someone had to lure those things away, and we all took turns doing it.

"Truly and surely," I insisted, trying to convince him. "The group that is trying to capture a Swift is building an obstacle course to keep it entertained until they can get the animal trailer set up."

"An obstacle course as in jumps, fences, and other things?" Kailey didn't believe me any more than Evan did.

"Yes, a quad or dirt bike can quickly go around the obstacles, and with luck, the Swift will try to take the shortest route. It is being set up to channel it into the challenges. They get to watch what the creature is capable of and buy time for the others to get the transport trailer set up. We drove by it on our way back from picking strawberries."

Kailey shook her head. "Glad it isn't me out there doing that."

I nodded in agreement. "I can agree with that. Leading slow zombies off at a slow jog while picking fruit is one thing, but running from something that can run as fast as me is a whole different ball game."

Kailey glanced over at me as mischief twinkled in her eyes. "Did you hear that some people decided they didn't want to do some of the dirtier chores that were part of their work? The Commanders told them that if they didn't split the work fairly, then they would have to leave. About six decided to leave. All of them came back before dinner, terrified out of their minds with a crowd of zombies chasing them. They are now quite happy to do whatever chores we give them as long as they don't have to go outside of the fence again."

I shook my head at their actions. What kind of people were so lazy that they would rather leave than work for eight hours every day? Sure, some of the chores were dirty, like mucking out stalls or unplugging a clogged toilet, but those tasks were far preferable to trying to survive the night while zombies searched for a midnight snack.

Evan rolled his eyes. "Serves them right. You can see the zombies outside of the fence. I certainly don't need to walk out there to have a first-hand look. Too bad I didn't see that group return with their tails tucked between their legs. Hopefully, they learned their lesson."

Smirking in amusement, John said, "I somehow doubt they'll try that again. But on a different note, I was talking to my Group Leader today, and he mentioned that the first graduation ceremony is in a couple of weeks."

That caught our attention. A celebration would boost everyone's mood and morale. Such bright spots were hard to find in a rather grim situation like a zombie apocalypse. Everyone was looking forward to the graduation ceremony. We had already been told that it would be held at least once a month.

When a Group Leader deemed that someone in their group had learned enough about their profession and had enough experience, then they graduated. Our original white name tags in their shiny plastic holders showed that we were trainees in our positions and still learning. We would get a fancier metal name tag when we graduated.