Nate's Escape (Patreon)

Nate Milford twisted the wheel of his black BMW and peeled out to spin the car in a tight U-turn, aimed again towards his sister’s house. He lifted his phone to his ear and dialed the house phone. It rang twice and disconnected before anyone answered.

“Damn it,” he shouted and threw the phone to the passenger seat.

He hit the on-ramp to the highway and entered a sea of cars all traveling out of Nightfall. The shoulder was closed off with yellow barricades and farther down sat a military troop transport. Several soldiers stood watching over the uncountable numbers of cars and trucks all crawling through a one-lane blockade. It took thirty minutes for Nate to reach the soldiers only fifty feet away. Each took a ten-thousand dollar cash bribe to allow his car through the shoulder lane to reach their Captain. The rather rough-and-inexperienced man  took another twenty thousand and Nate’s Vacheron Constantin watch, a gift from his ex-wife for his sixty-fifth birthday. A hundred grand down, he laughed all the way along the side lane to the Stodgy Farms exit, all the while observing the shock and rage of the motorists stuck waiting.

He sped all the way to his sister’s house. He had tried to reach the twins for hours, but they weren’t answering. Only once he connected with Brody, who couldn’t hear Nate’s voice. That was two hours ago.

At the corner of his sister’s property, he pulled to the driveway and witnessed a scene of chaos. Signs of a party were evident, while corpses of infected lie about like sunbathers lying around a beach. A few of the living dead wandered on the lawn, stepping over or around bodies of dead teenagers.

Nate slid the bolt of his AKM assault rifle and stepped out of his car. Crouching, he stepped onto the grass and heard footsteps closing from behind and to the right. He spun and raised the gun. Ten paces away stood Oscar, his chauffeur. He wore an all-black jump suit with a thick Kevlar vest and had a handheld stun gun. Perspiration coated his balding scalp, and his lip twitched.

“What the hell are you doing here?” Nate shouted with a growl.

“I came for you…I mean, for your nephew and niece.” He blinked as sweat rolled into his eyes.

“Fine, but a stunner won’t do a thing to the infected. Go in my car and grab a shotgun. Shoot high on them.”

As he turned, Nate struggled to understand what his driver was doing here. It was too late when he figured it out. The shock rattled his body, dropping him to the lawn. His teeth chatter as he tried to speak, but another touch of the stun gun knocked him unconscious.

---

Hours later…

Nate awoke with a violent sucking of air. Smoke filled his nostrils, forcing a short coughing fit. Tears formed in his eyes, but after a series of hard blinks, his vision returned. He saw a reinforced door straight across. To his right was a small kitchen and on his left a wooden table and chairs. He recognized this room, his safe house in the deep woods outside of Chipper Ridge.

“You’re awake, Nate.”

It was Oscar’s voice, but Nate couldn’t see him. As he tried to turn, bindings held Nate’s wrists in place. He sat in his favorite rocking chair at least.

“Yes, I’m awake. So what’s this about? Did I screw you in some way? Forget your Christmas bonus?” When he spoke, his head throbbed, and now that he was more awake, he felt pain in his right shoulder. It clicked when he rolled it.

Oscar walked in front of him. He now wore a simple t-shirt, showing his well-muscled arms. Nate saw no weapons on him.

“No, Nate. You’ve always been fairly decent to me. Not the best employer but far from the worst.”

Nate started rocking the chair, slowly at first. He was already thinking of ways out of this, and step one was to get Oscar comfortable with the rocking motion.

“So money then? Not surprising. You were never creative.”

Oscar pursed his lips in a grimace. “Not nice. Cutting me up is not a good idea.”

“Why don’t we skip ahead to the part where you name your price, I pay, and you go off to wherever it is you plan to go?”

Oscar sighed. “You know, Nate, you’re not in charge. I’ll tell you what we’re doing when I feel like it. It just so happens I’m ready.” He stepped to the table and lifted a thick folder. For the few seconds he faced away, Nate yanked against his restraints. The left wrist failed to move, while the right had movement. As Oscar turned back, Nate relaxed.

“You’re a rich man with way more money than you’ll ever need,” he said and opened the folder. “You have a lot of money in an account in Bermuda, and I want you to sign it over to me. We’ll also try a wire transfer, but I’m having trouble with a connection on my laptop.”

He moved a chair from the table to a spot two feet in front of Nate and pulled an ink pen out of his pocket. “You’ll do this for me, and I’ll get out of here. You’ll never see me again. If you don’t do it, well, there will be consequences.”

Nate narrowed his gaze at him, cleared his throat, and said, “Sure, I’ll sign it. Money’s yours.”

Oscar sat back and blinked a few times. “Seriously? Great! I, uh…okay then.”

Nate shrugged. “Like you said, I’ve got more money, and I’d rather not waste time. I’ll need you to untie my left hand so I can sign. We can then try the laptop.”

Oscar nodded and untied Nate’s left hand. “Don’t try anything. You may be pissed at me, but if you try something stupid, I’m willing to rough you up if you make me.”

“I’m almost seventy, and you’re what, twenty-five? I know when I’m outclassed.”

They both laughed, and both relaxed. Oscar had a wide smile, eyes round and full. “This is awesome. I really appreciate it, Mr. Milford. This is not how I thought this day would go. I mean, I figured you’d go to save the twins and had this place scoped out. I just figured you’d need more persuading than this.”

With the binding off his wrist, Nate took the pen and signed the first page of the transfer. The amount on the bottom showed in bold $28,012,569.43 USD. He felt it was a small price to pay this dolt. Not like money would matter much in a few days. Even if it retained value, how would Oscar travel to Bermuda to claim the money? Nate smiled. This would be over soon. Oscar was wouldn’t hurt him if he played along. He might be a thief but no murderer.

“Just out of curiosity, what were those consequences you mentioned?” Nate asked, now curious.

Oscar flipped to page 2. “Initial here. Consequences? Right. Well, I figured I’d beat you up a bit but not too bad. I also have a bottle of whiskey to pour on your cuts.”

Nate chuckled and scribbled NM on the line. “I understand. No need for that. You have the upper hand. Why should I get all beat up if I don’t have to, right?”

“Sign here and here. Yeah, you did the smart thing. Of course, I had other things planned. If you really were being a hard ass about signing, I was going to go after the twins.”

Nate stopped signing. “What’s that about Madison and Brody?”

Oscar took a deep breath and rested the folder on his lap. “If I had no other choice, I’d drive over to their house, knock them out, bring them here, and force you to sign. That would be a pain in the ass and really tiring. This is so much easier.”

Nathaniel Milford felt like the wind got knocked out of him, and he took in deep deliberate breaths. His head swam and shoulder ached. “Is that so? My niece and nephew.”

“You okay? You look a bit pale,” Oscar said and leaned in with the folder. “Finish signing, and I’ll make you a cup of that black tea you like.”

Nate drew in a breath and held it. He felt his pulse quicken and heart beat in his chest like a drum line. Raising the pen, he turned it in his hand and slammed it down. The point drove deep into Oscar’s left leg right above the kneecap until it clipped bone. Oscar screamed and gripped his thigh, bucking in his chair like he was being electrocuted.

Nate rocked back in his chair, raised both legs, and kicked out. One heel caught Oscar’s chin, the other his ear. The chair fell over and to the side, stopping against the kitchen island. He went to work dragging the chair across the kitchen as Oscar pulled at the pen. It came out with a sickening sound like cutting into meat, and blood pooled out and spilled to the floor.

Nate struggled against the weight of the chair but reached a knife block. Removing the first blade he touched, he sawed through the twine used to tie him to the armrests.

“How dare you threaten my family, you coward,” Nate yelled as he turned with the knife raised to strike. “You would stoop to hurting children—“

Nate went quiet as he saw Oscar unconscious. “For god’s sake, what a moron.”

---

Twenty minutes later…

Nate heard Oscar rousing just as his kettle whistled. The smell of strong Darjeeling tea wafted in the air. “Don’t bother trying to stand. Unlike you, I know how to tie a fella up.”

Oscar tried to move. His ankles were bound together, and a 2x4 of wood was fashioned against his back with arms over it and hands bound to it. No matter which way he turned, a rope tugged against him. His injured leg had a fresh bandage where the pen had poked a hole. “Let me go, damn it.”

Nate poured tea into a mug and added a few drops of honey. “When the tables were turned, and you had me all tied up, did I scream and shout? Nope. Pipe down.”

“If you untie me, I’ll just go. I’ll leave, and you’ll never see me again.” Oscar’s eyes formed tears, and his nose ran into his mouth.

“You know how I got so rich, Oscar? Opportunity. Anytime something went wrong, I turned it into an advantage. Not always easy, but I never turn down a chance to turn crap into gold. Some would say my whole fortune was built on that philosophy.”

He stepped to the entrance wall where an air conditioner hanged and pulled out one corner, revealing a safe. He typed in a code on a punch pad and pressed his thumb on a tiny screen. The safe made a series of mechanical clicks, and the door popped open.

“Just let me go,” Oscar said and strained to pull out of his binds. He yelled and bucked, arms bulging, veins popping. “Get me out of here. Now!”

Nate withdrew a small cherry-wood box from the safe and walked it to the kitchen table in view of his captive. “I guarantee you’re not getting out, and I’m not releasing you.” He waited for Oscar to settle down before continuing. “Sit back and listen. I have a helluva story to tell. I knew about this virus before most people had any clue about it. Having my kind of resources gives you access to all kinds of information. I actually am, or was, funding some research over in Japan. Reports made their way to me on this Zeta virus. Crazy stuff in those files. Scary things. I tried telling some colleagues and friends, but they all thought I was just an old fool losing his mind. No one believed me.”

“Come on, Nate, just let me get outta here.”

“Pipe down. This is a good story, and I haven’t gotten to your part yet.” He took a sip of his tea and breathed out a soothing sigh. “Ahh good stuff. Anyway, I was interested in seeing an infected, an actually real live one and paid for a group over in Japan to smuggle one here to the States. Customs in DC got it though. Not sure what happened to the specimen, but it wasn’t getting to me. It wasn’t a total loss though. Like I said, I see opportunity in failure. While the infected subject was detained, I had one of the customs officials take a tube of its blood.”

Nate opened the cherry-wood box, took out a vial of brownish liquid, and rolled it around in the palms of his hands, warming it. “I have a lot of unanswered questions solved by this blood. How long does it take the virus to turn a host into a zombie? Is it a painful process? If you feed a zombie, will it lose its ferocity? Lots of questions, and you’re going to help me answer them.”

As Nate rose, he took out a long metal syringe and slipped the vial inside of it. Oscar squirmed and struggled again, yelling for help, calling out to anyone. In the depths of the Colorado forest, no one heard him, even when the syringe when in his neck, nor when the change started. Many of Nate Milford’s questions were answered that day, but as with any inquisitive mind, more answers formed that would not be answered by the man formally known as Oscar.