He Was Almost Absorbed By The System - Part Two

Chapter One Hundred And Eighty Two - Returning to Base

Back at the base, the General was becoming quite concerned that they had not heard from Aston's squad in almost two weeks.

A lot had occurred in that time. They had expanded to the riverside, which happened to be wide and seemingly a natural barrier between themselves and the walking corpses. They had seen a zombie floating in the middle of the river, but it seemed to be trapped, unable to move against the current. The scouts spied it eyeing them hungrily through its lone eye through their spyglasses, but it made no attempt to try reach them. What was more worrying was that the rotting creature was fouling their main water source!

River water had always been filled with pollutants, to treat and then boil it was only natural. What they feared was that whatever illness had caused the people to zombify in the first place would survive in the water. Spanner was a bright mind, he deduced that so long as the water was boiled for at least fifteen minutes, then boiled before use, it should be alright. Indeed, they had no choice in the long run but to trust this theory or die of thirst.

The river was also a source of food, what with fish swimming in it's depths and oysters along it's banks. It was also an attraction for geese, ducks and swans, all a much needed source of protein. Someone suggested breeding ducks for their eggs, but no one was quite sure how to accomplish this and to trap the ducks in the first place would require them to have a large space with a viable pond. However, from down town, someone had discovered an old man keeping hens and he and his birds were brought back to the base. That caused its own set of issues.

Aston's squad had not been the only one to travel to the affluent neighbourhoods to seek out survivors and of course, supplies. Apart from potentially larger larders, many wealthy men kept weapons, the energy cells and bullets that the base owned were dwindling and they needed more. One squad had been out just a day before they returned with a small politician, his family and a handful of servants. The man's first port of call had been to greet the general and then authorise himself as the leader of the base. The general usual stoic expression did not waver as he commanded his subordinates to remove the small politician from his office.

"Did you not hear what I said?" The insufferable man yelled out.

Following that, the general received several messages of complaint from the small politician and his small wife.

"Our accommodations are not sufficient. Please rectify this immediately."

"Return our servants, they are in our employ. You have no right to assign them other duties."

"Why are our rations not any better than that of a lowly commoners? Who do you think we are?"

"There are chickens on base, but we have been refused purchase. That man should be grateful for our money, but your soldiers turned us away. My wife wishes to eat chicken! Already you allow us just meagre amounts of meat, this situation cannot continue! I demand that you rectify this or hand over leadership of the base, of which you are clearly able to handle."

"Stop his butler and the other servant from handing over their earned food," the General instructed a subordinate. "In fact, make them move out of that person's house completely." Most of the small politicians servants had left the family of their own accord realising that not only did they not need to rely on the odious group anymore, but the family expected them to work for food as well as work for them. However the butler was an old man, who had served loyally the family since he had been a teenager and was too set in his ways to change, while the servant had the mentality of a child and really did not understand what was going on. "Make that family learn that if they wish to continue eating, they have to earn the food themselves."