Savage (The End 1)

After their very thorough and bullshit health check, he’d been given a pair of clean jeans and a plain white tee and put in this room.

No one would talk to him.

He needed to know his woman was okay and right now, he was on the edge.

He tugged on the chains. They didn’t give, but he knew metal. It would, even if it meant cutting through his skin to get out.

“You don’t have to do that,” a man said, entering the room. He wore a pair of jeans and a plain black shirt.

He closed the door.

“I’m Abel,” he said, taking a seat opposite him.

Malachi glared at the man.

“Look, I know you’re pissed right now and we all get it, even accept it, but this is protocol here. You think we would have lasted as long as we have if we didn’t enforce our checks?”

Again, Malachi glared at the man. He would gladly sink the cuffs into the man’s neck.

Abel put a file down on the table. “You, Lucy, Sasha, and Millie, you’re all clean. Even your dog is clean.”

“You checked the damn dog?”

“You finally speak. Yes, we checked the dog. We had to. We don’t have a choice in this. Believe me.”

“If you did any of these kinds of things to my woman and her sister, I will kill you.”

“The women have a different health screening than the men.”

“Did you hurt them?”

“No. We also have them psychologically analyzed as well.”

Malachi frowned. “What the fuck does that mean?”

Abel sighed. “We don’t want any crazies in here, possibly hurting others and risking the very makeup of this camp. This is a safe haven for everyone. Crime, rape, you name it, we don’t accept it here and the punishment is steep.”

“What do you do?” Malachi asked.

“Well, depending on the crime, we either take them out and shoot them, or we release them back out there.”

“Really?”

“There is no greater punishment than knowing you can’t be part of something. You’re at risk in the outside world, and we promise everyone a chance. All we ask is they do their part.”

“And their part being?” Malachi asked.

“You try to fit in as much as possible. You work with the community, pitch in, make sure you’re contributing. We know it’s not always easy. In fact, we know it’s incredibly hard. A new life, starting from scratch. It’s never easy.”

“You do realize by releasing them back into the wild like vicious animals, you’re creating an army. An army of potential rejects that could storm this camp if they got enough men and ammo,” he said.

“It’s a risk we have to take. We have protection in place and lookouts. We’re ready for any attack. Most people fail to make it here. The trek proves to be too tiring. You’re the first people to seek shelter in months.”

Malachi stared at him.

“Are you wondering why you’re in here?” Abel asked.

“I’m wondering why you’re wasting my time and I want to see the people in my group.”

“Sasha and Lucy are safe. Millie is as well. They are being kept in a family room waiting for you. Sasha keeps asking about you.”

“That woman is my life. I vowed to protect her and her sister and you’re not going to make me fail them. They trust me.”

“Lucy has been asking for you. She wants to know you’re safe.”

“You’ve not mentioned Tree Man,” Malachi said, suddenly realizing one member of his little clan hadn’t been talked about.

Abel stared at him this time. “Where did you pick him up?”

“He found us,” Malachi said. “He’s fine. Rambles on a bit, but he’s a good guy. He helped me to protect these women.”

Abel opened up the file, spun it around, and pushed it toward him. “Your man is infected with the virus.”

Malachi stared at the file and slowly shook his head. “No, that can’t be. We’ve been around him.”

“It’s why we had to increase the health check on all of you. You’ve been exposed to him, but none of you have it.”

Malachi knew he was looking at medical stuff, but he couldn’t make out what the numbers or graphs meant. “I don’t have a clue what I’m looking at.”

Abel pointed to the numbers up top. “We don’t have modern equipment for obvious reasons, but we have enough to do blood tests. These levels are raised, which we see in the infected. But he’s not showing any symptoms of having the virus. Well, aside from the clear deterioration of his mental capacity. So that means one thing.”

“He rambles because this world made him crazy. We’ve had to kill people to get here. It was that or die. Do you even know what the outside is like right now?”

“I know,” Abel said. “It’s why you and your girls are still here. You brought him here, and well, as a medical subject, he has our team quite excited.”