PROJECT ANDERSON

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE: SARGE

"Come on Johnny, we need to find those damn medical supplies and get the hell out of here!" I yelled as I searched the aisles for where that boy ran off to. "Where the hell are you?!"

"Shh...Sarge over here." Johnny whispered from behind the pharmacy counter.

"What the hell are you doing back there?" I asked as I headed over to the counter.

"I figured we could use some extra supplies." He explained as he held up two white pill bottles.

"Why would we need pills?"

"Not just any pills Sarge, pain pills...just in case someone gets hurt, I don't want to see anyone suffer sir...I don't like it." He said as put the bottles into his bag.

"Me either John boy." I said softly before hopping over the counter next to him.

"I'm surprised your tall ass could fit." Johnny said with a small laugh.

"I'm an Irish man Johnny, its not the first time I had to hop over a counter." I returned the laugh.

"Have you ever been to Ireland?" He asked as he went back to packing bottles.

"Never had to, my parents were both born there...their fathers were American business men that were living there for work, they ran a brewery together, so they were very close."

"Sounds like your parents were destined to be together." 

"That's what their parents thought too, but you know how that ended." I said as I grabbed a couple of bottles of Percocet. "Perky C's."

"What?"

"Shameless, it was a tv show that you are probably too young to remember."

"Probably." He said with a shrug. "I think we got enough."

"So now we really need to find the medical supplies your sister wanted." I said as we got back over the counter.

"Already done, so lets get out of here." He said as he passed his bag over to me, so he could get over.

"When did you do that?" I asked as I place his bag in the cart.

"After we heard that loud thud and I took off I found the aisle and decided to grab the supplies...did you figure out what it was?"

"Yeah, a can fell off of one of the shelves." I answered as we headed back to the front of the store. "Didn't find out how it fell though, but I didn't see anybody so I figured that it wasn't on it properly."

"Maybe it was a ghost." Johnny said as if he was trying to scare me.

"If it was than it wouldn't be our problem, we only care about Crawlers not the paranormal." I said as I helped him get the cart through the door frame. "Someone must have been trying to protect themselves."

"What do you mean Sarge?" He asked looking back to me.

"This door has been screwed shut." I answered as I ran my finger over the hasty work. "I wonder what happened to them."

"They were probably taken to the Crawler farm." Johnny suggested as we headed out of the store.

"How would they have gotten in to take them?" I asked pointing out the flaw in his theory.

"I don't know, but if they work for the government I'm sure they have their ways."

I knew that he was probably right, but I still didn't want to believe it.

Part of me wanted to believe this was all a bad dream and that I would finally wake up next to my wife, but that wouldn't be the case.

I would never wake up from this dream...this was real, my wife is really gone and my baby brother was gone; now the only oneI had left was my daughter.