Free The Swamp by R Yates Page B

out…” Sam shook his hand “It’s probably nothing.”
                  “It is a good idea. We need to check out the other side anyway.” Paul agreed.
                  Sam gathered his pack and weapon and crawled farther back into the tree line before rising to a crouch and moving off south. He proceeded with caution, stopping every fifty yards to stop and glass the fields. He couldn’t believe security was this lax for a military group, even rogues like these.
                  Before long, he had made a wide circle around the farm and started his way back keeping the grove of trees between himself and the farm. He felt silly crawling the way he was, but he had convinced himself to take no chances. It took him longer than he thought just to get to where he could see the trees. His hour estimate to Paul had almost elapsed, so this would have to be a quick look around.
                  The grove was only about two square acres. Here and there bushes sprouted around the bottom of the trunks of the pecan trees, and the ground was covered with dried leaves of the past season. It was a pleasant place, peaceful and serene, the kind of place that at one time would just be screaming to be relaxed in. In today’s world it mostly just gave you the creeps. At first, he saw nothing moving except the slight breeze rustling the trees leaves. A few birds flitted amongst the leaves and squirrels had a game of chase going at the far end of the copse.
                  To his left side, he heard a weak sound, almost a cough but barely audible. He froze, listening intently, but there was no further sound. His almost decided to back out of the search and head back to Paul, but he slowly turned towards where he thought the sound had come from and slinked forward. Ahead of him, one of the trees had been cut down, its rotted stump showing its long absence. This created a clearing of sorts, a small sunny opening ringed in large trees. As Sam worked closer, he could see that each of these ring of trees had a human body bound tightly to it with thick rope. As he looked at the six figures He almost gasped when one turned its head in his direction and made the same soft sound he had heard earlier, but this time the noise was longer. Sam recovered his composure quickly and realized the dead thing was attempting to groan, but the ropes under its arm were so tight they cut off its ability to fill its rotted lungs. Sam turned to look into the trees and could see where the ropes trailed up into the trees from each zombie and running off in the direction of the Farm before dropping back down were it was lashed to another tree. He walked over near the clearing to take a closer look. The dead eyes followed him as he approached. Upon closer examination, each dead person was wearing what was basically a harness made from rope which extended into a loop on the ropes tied to the tree and then heading up. Sam wasn’t sure how he had missed it, but he gave himself credit because the rope was camouflaged.
                  It was a big man, dressed in fatigues, and on its collar gleamed two parallel brass bars.
                  “Captain Robertson, I presume.” Sam said from just beyond its grasping arms. Its dead eyes stared at him, and yet through him at the same time. The other creatures in the circle, alerted by the first, stretched out their arms and somehow were able to moan. Sam had never been this close to the creatures without being in immediate peril and was fascinated.
                  The dead reached lazily for him, almost as if they could sense their inability to reach him, and were only putting in a token effort. The next one in the ring was an elderly woman, most likely the one mom had told of trying to help that poor young girl get away. The next several seemed to be all men in their twenties and thirties, all were wearing heavily soiled clothing and