Chapter 14: Death and Plague

09:19 AM:

Matt:

I hit the ground and rolled, the dog flipped over me, but didn't let go of my arm. Rolling and kicking at the dog, I noticed it was a German Shepard, and was wearing a badge on its collar. It was growling as it chewed the right sleeve of my parka.

"Let go you SON-OF-A-BITCH!" I screamed as my foot smashed into its chest.

The dog yelped but continued to try and get through my sleeve to get to the flesh inside. I could hear gunfire from behind me as John fired at the advancing dogs. I wanted to help him, but didn't have time to do anything as the dog started dragging me across the snow. My left hand found the sheath of my Bowie; I fumbled with the blade with my left hand and eventually was able to pull it out.

I could feel my sleeve starting to tear, and felt the bone of its teeth pressing against the denim of my shirt. I knew one more bite, and he would have flesh. Raising my feet to kick it again as I tried to grip my knife in my hand, the dog jerked and started dragging me across the snow. The dog started shaking me like a rag, trying to get me to drop the weapon. Rolling my body, I started struggling to my knees and was raising the blade to stab the dog when it moved again. The dog shot to my left, half turning my body as it took my right arm with it. At the same time it was snarling and gave me another shake. The knife went flying from my hand as the dog shook me so violently that I flipped over and landed on my back with my legs almost pointed at the beast.

"You son of a bitch!" I snarled as I brought my legs around. One leg went under my right arm; the other hit the dogs shoulder. Before the beast could react, my legs came up and locked around the dog's muscled throat as I pulled it towards me. I was looking at the dog's collar when I started squeezing, as I shouted, "Sampson! Stop attacking me you FUCKING MUTT!"

The dog let go of my sleeve, its paws started scratching at my legs as it whined to get free and then collapsed as I continued to squeeze.

It was whimpering and not fighting me anymore so I let it go and rolled away. Scrambling to my feet, I pulled my pistol out. My .44 was pointing at the dog's head. It just lay there with its head on it paws.

"Sampson, sit!" I said and the dog sat up.

"Sampson, stay!" I ordered and started backing up. The dog stayed right where I told it so I turned back towards John.

John was in trouble, his empty rifle lay on the ground beside him and he had his Glock out and was firing at the pack of dogs. Rushing to him, I knelt beside him and raised my pistol. The dogs, which looked like Dobermans, were charging through the snow on the road at us, throwing it up with their massive paws. I didn't see any that looked like they were infected as I emptied my pistol at the nearest dogs. But having no choice, I pulled my back up guns and emptied them as well. The dogs broke when six more of them went down, either dead or badly wounded under John's or my firepower in less than sixty seconds. Standing up, I reloaded and watched the pack running into the forest.

Pulling my knife, I walked across road to the neared dog. She was dead, but the male two feet away was still alive and whining in pain. The round had hit it high and the chest and I knew the back was broken. I slit its throat and went to the next. John was doing his part, but I could tell he didn't have the heart into it, when I saw him kneeling by the Dobies. Slitting the Eskimo's throat that had two broken legs, I walked over to John and watched as he patted the side of the brown dog that was lying on his side breathing hard. There was a bloody wound to his chest and I knelt with my knife, the dog licked John's hand.

"What's wrong John?" I asked.

"This is Chance, Mrs. Hawks champion Doberman. These are all her dogs," John stated as he gestured to the dozen dead Dobermans. Wiping his eyes, he reached over for Mathew's hand.

"Please, let's take him to Doc's," John asked.

"He's suffering. He's not going to make it," I said as I reversed the knife.

"But..."

"Alright, let's get you on your snowmobile, and I'll place him in front of you," I said as I picked up the dog.

I followed John to his snowmobile, and when he was sitting down, I placed the dog on his lap, and then used duck tape to keep him there. I slapped two pieces of the tape on the wound to slow the blood loss.

I picked up John's 30.30 and slipped it into the holder attached to John's snowmobile.

"Thanks Mathew," John said as he gripped the handle with one hand.

"Welcome. Since you know the way, you lead and I'll follow you," I said as I straddled my machine. Pulling my goggles down, I shouted, "Sampson. Up!" as I pointed the bench seat behind me. I watched as the Shepard ran over and jumped up on the bench seat behind me. Putting the machine in low, I nodded to John and he started going down the road. I followed him for two miles and he stopped at a gated driveway.

John leaned over and hit the intercom for the gate when we came to a stop. I looked at the wrought iron fence, with the brick towers on each side. The gate was designed split open in front of us, and the six foot stone fence went out of sight to the left and right of us.

With a static burst, a voice blared out, "Get the fuck out of here or I'll blow your head off!"

"Doctor Hollander, its John Tyron, I need your help. It's an emergency," John said as he patted the dog's head in front of him.

"John? You're not sick are you? What about the other guy?" Doc's voice came through the small speaker.

"No, we're fine, but we really need your help," John shouted as the wind started picking up.

"Ok. Let me open the gate," came the reply as the right side gate started slowly opening. It opened about four feet and then seemed to get stuck.

Climbing off the snowmobile, I said, "Stay!" to the dog and walked to the gate. Looking behind it, I saw the tree limb. Turning I looked at John and shouted, "Tell him to close the gate for a minute."

John nodded his head and shouted into the intercom. As the door started closing, the limb went with it so I stepped on it and it slid free. Reaching down, I grabbed the limb and dragged it out of the way as the gate started opening again. Going back to the snowmobile, I climbed back on and followed John up the snow covered road. Behind us, the gate slowly closed again as we went around the bend and came to a stop in front of the huge house.

"Bring them into the garage, or you'll never get them started again," shouted a voice from the doorway.

John took off for the garage at the end of the house, as we neared it, the door went up and we came to a stop near an Excursion SUV. On the other side were several snowmobiles. Shutting down, I stood up as I heard a shotgun being racked back.

A feminine voice called out, "Loose the hardware or die!"

"No problem," I replied as I took off my parka and laid my guns down on it. John did the same and then stood up holding the Doberman in his arms.

"Look we need Doc to look at Chance. He's been shot," John said as he turned and stared at the girl I was looking at.

She was standing beside the front of an old World War Two Army Jeep parked in the front of the garage. She was leaning over the hood, the SPAWS shotgun clutched in her small hands.

"Regina, put that gun away," came a male voice as a door opened.

"Grandpa, I don't know them, so..."

"Well, I do know John Tyron, not sure on the other guy, but I recognize Marsha Hawks' Chance in his arms. Come on into the emergency clinic," the voice said and I heard a door open.

"Follow me," Regina said as she turned around and walked out of sight.

I followed John and we went through a door into a kitchen. I didn't get the chance to look around, but my nose detected chili being cooked over on the counter. Regina was standing at the other end of the room holding a door open and we went through it. Sampson followed at my heels and we walked down another hallway. I could see a man standing at the end of the hall. He had scrubs on and was tying a mask across his face.

"Bring Chance into the room. Set him on the table. Regina, get in your scrubs for emergency surgery, I'll get Chance under," Doctor Hollander ordered as John walked by.

"Thanks Doc," John said as he went into the room.

I was going to follow, when the man closed the door.

"Sir, you can watch from the room beside you, please take the other dog in there with you," Doc ordered as he opened the door and slid inside.

I walked to the other room, and over to the plate glass window. "Sampson, sit," I said as I watched the doctor talk with John. I peeled off my sweater and tossed it on one of the benches. Looking back in the room, I saw John leave the room and the man leaned over and started examining the dog. John came in and stood beside me as the girl entered the room. She guided several trays over to the doctor so they were in easy reach.

"Doc thinks he'll be ok," John said as he started pealing his outer clothes off and tossing them on a bench.

I spotted a coffee pot in the corner next to a water cooler, above the cooler on the wall was a small monitor, and beside it was a clock that said 10 am. I went over and saw it was almost ready to go. Filling the pot with water from the water cooler, I had the coffee brewing by the time John had gotten all his outer garments off. Grabbing a cup, I filled it with water and walked over to Sampson. Kneeling, I let the dog drink a little.

"Mathew, how do you like your coffee?" John asked.

"Black will be fine," I replied as I stood up and looked through the window.

They had set up several bags on an IV stand, and were working furiously on the dog.

"Here, Matt," John said as he held a styrofoam cup out.

Taking the cup, I took a sip of the brew and then walked over and sat down. Finishing the cup of coffee, I felt my insides warming as I leaned back on the bench.

"Mathew, they're finished," John said as he shook me awake.

"They are?" I replied as I jerked awake. I looked at the clock and it said it was 1pm.

"I don't know how your wives can sleep. You sound like a freight train going through a tunnel," John said with a snicker.

"I only snore when I'm real tired or used a lot of energy like we did outside," I replied as I went to the coffeepot and filled another cup just as the door opened and Doctor Hollander came in.

"John, Chance will be ok as long as he doesn't catch pneumonia or an infection, then he should recover. Now why were you shooting them?" Doc asked as he handed him the bullet he had extracted.

"Well, Sir. It's like this. We got burned out this morning and when the fire department didn't show up. We went and checked out the fire station up the road. We found the station empty except for some dogs. We disposed of them, and as we were leaving, a large pack of dogs attacked Mathew ... Oh sorry, Mathew, I'd like you to meet Doctor John Hollander our local vet. Doc, this is Mathew Davis from Florida. He and his wives live in his grandfather's hunting lodge up on Pine Ridge Road..."

"What's wrong with the fire station? When did they pull them out? Wives?" Doc asked as he walked over to the coffee pot and filled a cup.

"They didn't pull out. They're all dead, it looks like the virus has gotten past Driggs..."

"It has, a lot of my neighbors are dead. I've been tying red cloths around their mailboxes and fence posts so the Sherriff would know if he came up this way..."

"How bad is it?" I asked.

"About two in twenty are surviving. Mostly people of the survivors are ones who stocked up for the winter or hadn't gone in to town the last three months. The worst case was Old Mary McMiller's house. Every one of the kids in the orphanage was dead. It seems all five of her kids came home with their kids and they were infected, or one of them was. I found fifty-nine children and eighteen adults dead. I think that was the only time I cried was when I found three infants around a year old frozen to death. I burned the place to the ground after pouring all the fuel from the diesel tank for the generator into the bottom floor of the house," Doc replied as he wiped his eyes and then asked, "Are you two hungry?"