Part 155
Changing dynamics or not our situation was still “dire.” Or at least that is what I heard one of the medicos say. Then it got direrer if that is even a word. The radio told us that there was an “incursion” being attempted, that the enemy’s line was moving, and that they were using puss brains. Worse, they were using those noise makers initially created by the brain trust … or the brainless trust … to tell the puss brains which direction to go.
“Pushing or pulling?” I asked Limmer who had been at that meeting while I was out foraging for supplies.
“Huh?”
“Are they pushing or pulling the puss brains in the direction they want to go?”
“Er …”
“Pulling,” Sgt. Shelly answered for him. “Is this what you saw back East?”
“Yeah. I think so. The only way to stop them … well the only two ways to stop them … or maybe three ways …”
“Spit it out Pip.”
I sighed. “Fine. One, destroy the sound boxes. Two, find a bigger or better sound that overpowers whatever the enemy is using. Or three …” I grimaced at the very thought.
“C’mon girl,” one of the other soldiers said.
Rather than let my patrol group defend me I said, “Don’t shoot the messenger but the only other thing that I can think of is to allow a horde to form. A strong horde leader will be able to overpower anything that the sound boxes can do.”
“BS,” the guy said.
“I take it you’ve not had too much to do with a real horde,” I said to him.
“And what did you just find us running from?” he asked snarkily.
“A flock. A flock of puss brains. If that had been a horde you wouldn’t have escaped, not the way you were moving.” Looking around I asked, “Who all here has dealt with a real horde and not just some containment escapees that were amped up?”
My patrol, a few others, and then Limmer sighed surprising me. He surprised me further by telling the soldier a few basic facts about hordes that aren’t generally known, including the fact that the Puss Brains develop a pack mentality when a horde builds.
“People gotta stop thinking of them like they are zombies what was seen in movies. They ain’t dead and their brains still work … not always well but they do work.”
I added just to give them more to think about, “And some of them are adapting to be smarter … or at least look and act smarter even if their brain is half pus.”
“No.”
I was beginning to think that was the adults’ favorite word. “Yes. The scientists started seeing it in the hordes that were sent North. That’s one of the reasons why …”
“No!”
There was a quiet, “Yes.” It came from the guy who said he’d worked in Admin.
“Yes. It’s the truth,” he repeated. To me he asked, “Did you see it or just hear about it?”
“Saw it even before the hordes. Pus Brains were putting on extra clothes to protect themselves from the cold, using tools to get into places that should have been locked against them, acting … smarter, like they would avoid trucks and people they recognized had weapons. I didn’t know what it was at the time … thought maybe they were just slow trains or that the cold was slowing the infections way down so that they stayed ‘normal’ longer. But the scientists said it was adaptation. That’s all I know. But we don’t want a horde leader ‘adapting’ and then teaching that stuff to the rest of the horde.”
“God no,” the man shuddered. “They had that happen with a small … with what you are calling a flock … and it … the reports said …” He shuddered again. “They weren’t just crazy hungry, the Infecteds showed signs of using strategy to trap the uninfected, of being sadistic once they did catch someone, completely out of character with what had become accepted behavior. Luckily the command that handled it were able to identify and then eradicate the Infected hierarchy and the flock lost cohesion and was then back to being containable. I don’t want to think what could have happened in their numbers had increased enough to be considered a true horde.”
“Why weren’t we told?!” the first man demanded angrily.
I told him, “Because you don’t need to know to do your job. Who’s ready for lunch?”
“Why you little …!”
He came at me threateningly but was restrained by several other soldiers. I looked at him and said, “Listen, you gotta stop. Whatever is going on in your head you need to put it on hold until we get out of this or you’ll wind up as crazy as some of the puss brains. You want to go off and ‘discuss’ the puss brains and their weird life-cycle after this is all over then fine. We can do that. You may not like what you find out, but I won’t lie to you. I’m not lying to you now, but it isn’t what you would call constructive to sit around telling spook stories right now. The puss brains are what they are and right now they are being used as a … um … what Sgt. Shelly called them, a weapon of war. I think it is a giant accident waiting to happen to weaponize puss brains but apparently the enemy isn’t any smarter than their tool of choice. Just like the hordes got out of control of the scientists, they’ll get out of control of the enemy. We need to be prepared for that. Maybe not the first battle. Maybe not the second or third battle. But it will happen. The enemy is going to get just as overconfident as the scientists were … and that’s when we need to be ready to deal with the mess they make, and figure out how to use their mistake against them.”
“And how do we do that?” one of the medicos asked.
“Do I look like a general or admiral or someone like that?”
Sgt. Shelly said in a too casual tone, “Pretend you are.”
“Oh for the love of …” I said in disgust. “Look off the top of my head? Remember how I was talking about loyalty? Well most uninfected people understand loyalty … and we better hope people my age and younger learn to be loyal to something besides getting fed. But puss brains are … they can’t … geez. If you’ve ever cracked open the skull of an Infected you understand why a lot of people call them puss brains. The part of their brain that gets that way first is at the front and it is the part that controls all the stuff like emotions and self-control and junk like that. So forget a puss brain being ‘loyal’ to the horde leaders. I don’t know what it is that the horde leaders are doing exactly but I do know it doesn’t have anything to do with loyalty, not real loyalty anyway. That means that you might be able to take control of the horde from the horde leaders … or better, figure out a way to disband a horde before it starts. I’m not sure how to do that but someone studying this stuff ought to be able to figure it out. It sounds like someone already got smart enough to figure out how to recognize horde hierarchy so even if it means picking off those puss brains then it shouldn’t need to be much more difficult than that.”
That got about half of the group in a discussion but it only made me groan.
I went off to start taking inventory of what we had left and what we could do to make it go further. Shelly, my assigned babysitter for the day, asked, “Why the sour face?”
“They’re over thinking things. They’re only going to give themselves nightmares once they remember that puss brains are people. And if they decide to forget that part then they’ll lose some of their humanity. Catch-22 and one I deal with enough in my own dreams.”
Gayle said having followed us over, “Not much choice at this point Pip. Pretty good description by saying that the Infecteds are becoming weaponized. In a perfect world we could eventually just let the puss brain population die off. But so long as there are idiots out there willing to use them like weapons or tools to gain power and keep it, those of us that would prefer to treat them more humanely may not have that option much longer.”
Changing dynamics or not our situation was still “dire.” Or at least that is what I heard one of the medicos say. Then it got direrer if that is even a word. The radio told us that there was an “incursion” being attempted, that the enemy’s line was moving, and that they were using puss brains. Worse, they were using those noise makers initially created by the brain trust … or the brainless trust … to tell the puss brains which direction to go.
“Pushing or pulling?” I asked Limmer who had been at that meeting while I was out foraging for supplies.
“Huh?”
“Are they pushing or pulling the puss brains in the direction they want to go?”
“Er …”
“Pulling,” Sgt. Shelly answered for him. “Is this what you saw back East?”
“Yeah. I think so. The only way to stop them … well the only two ways to stop them … or maybe three ways …”
“Spit it out Pip.”
I sighed. “Fine. One, destroy the sound boxes. Two, find a bigger or better sound that overpowers whatever the enemy is using. Or three …” I grimaced at the very thought.
“C’mon girl,” one of the other soldiers said.
Rather than let my patrol group defend me I said, “Don’t shoot the messenger but the only other thing that I can think of is to allow a horde to form. A strong horde leader will be able to overpower anything that the sound boxes can do.”
“BS,” the guy said.
“I take it you’ve not had too much to do with a real horde,” I said to him.
“And what did you just find us running from?” he asked snarkily.
“A flock. A flock of puss brains. If that had been a horde you wouldn’t have escaped, not the way you were moving.” Looking around I asked, “Who all here has dealt with a real horde and not just some containment escapees that were amped up?”
My patrol, a few others, and then Limmer sighed surprising me. He surprised me further by telling the soldier a few basic facts about hordes that aren’t generally known, including the fact that the Puss Brains develop a pack mentality when a horde builds.
“People gotta stop thinking of them like they are zombies what was seen in movies. They ain’t dead and their brains still work … not always well but they do work.”
I added just to give them more to think about, “And some of them are adapting to be smarter … or at least look and act smarter even if their brain is half pus.”
“No.”
I was beginning to think that was the adults’ favorite word. “Yes. The scientists started seeing it in the hordes that were sent North. That’s one of the reasons why …”
“No!”
There was a quiet, “Yes.” It came from the guy who said he’d worked in Admin.
“Yes. It’s the truth,” he repeated. To me he asked, “Did you see it or just hear about it?”
“Saw it even before the hordes. Pus Brains were putting on extra clothes to protect themselves from the cold, using tools to get into places that should have been locked against them, acting … smarter, like they would avoid trucks and people they recognized had weapons. I didn’t know what it was at the time … thought maybe they were just slow trains or that the cold was slowing the infections way down so that they stayed ‘normal’ longer. But the scientists said it was adaptation. That’s all I know. But we don’t want a horde leader ‘adapting’ and then teaching that stuff to the rest of the horde.”
“God no,” the man shuddered. “They had that happen with a small … with what you are calling a flock … and it … the reports said …” He shuddered again. “They weren’t just crazy hungry, the Infecteds showed signs of using strategy to trap the uninfected, of being sadistic once they did catch someone, completely out of character with what had become accepted behavior. Luckily the command that handled it were able to identify and then eradicate the Infected hierarchy and the flock lost cohesion and was then back to being containable. I don’t want to think what could have happened in their numbers had increased enough to be considered a true horde.”
“Why weren’t we told?!” the first man demanded angrily.
I told him, “Because you don’t need to know to do your job. Who’s ready for lunch?”
“Why you little …!”
He came at me threateningly but was restrained by several other soldiers. I looked at him and said, “Listen, you gotta stop. Whatever is going on in your head you need to put it on hold until we get out of this or you’ll wind up as crazy as some of the puss brains. You want to go off and ‘discuss’ the puss brains and their weird life-cycle after this is all over then fine. We can do that. You may not like what you find out, but I won’t lie to you. I’m not lying to you now, but it isn’t what you would call constructive to sit around telling spook stories right now. The puss brains are what they are and right now they are being used as a … um … what Sgt. Shelly called them, a weapon of war. I think it is a giant accident waiting to happen to weaponize puss brains but apparently the enemy isn’t any smarter than their tool of choice. Just like the hordes got out of control of the scientists, they’ll get out of control of the enemy. We need to be prepared for that. Maybe not the first battle. Maybe not the second or third battle. But it will happen. The enemy is going to get just as overconfident as the scientists were … and that’s when we need to be ready to deal with the mess they make, and figure out how to use their mistake against them.”
“And how do we do that?” one of the medicos asked.
“Do I look like a general or admiral or someone like that?”
Sgt. Shelly said in a too casual tone, “Pretend you are.”
“Oh for the love of …” I said in disgust. “Look off the top of my head? Remember how I was talking about loyalty? Well most uninfected people understand loyalty … and we better hope people my age and younger learn to be loyal to something besides getting fed. But puss brains are … they can’t … geez. If you’ve ever cracked open the skull of an Infected you understand why a lot of people call them puss brains. The part of their brain that gets that way first is at the front and it is the part that controls all the stuff like emotions and self-control and junk like that. So forget a puss brain being ‘loyal’ to the horde leaders. I don’t know what it is that the horde leaders are doing exactly but I do know it doesn’t have anything to do with loyalty, not real loyalty anyway. That means that you might be able to take control of the horde from the horde leaders … or better, figure out a way to disband a horde before it starts. I’m not sure how to do that but someone studying this stuff ought to be able to figure it out. It sounds like someone already got smart enough to figure out how to recognize horde hierarchy so even if it means picking off those puss brains then it shouldn’t need to be much more difficult than that.”
That got about half of the group in a discussion but it only made me groan.
I went off to start taking inventory of what we had left and what we could do to make it go further. Shelly, my assigned babysitter for the day, asked, “Why the sour face?”
“They’re over thinking things. They’re only going to give themselves nightmares once they remember that puss brains are people. And if they decide to forget that part then they’ll lose some of their humanity. Catch-22 and one I deal with enough in my own dreams.”
Gayle said having followed us over, “Not much choice at this point Pip. Pretty good description by saying that the Infecteds are becoming weaponized. In a perfect world we could eventually just let the puss brain population die off. But so long as there are idiots out there willing to use them like weapons or tools to gain power and keep it, those of us that would prefer to treat them more humanely may not have that option much longer.”
