by Dave Bowman
They traveled the road for two miles until it ended in a dead end with a small cul-de-sac with room to turn around.
Jessa stopped the truck. Without waiting, Bethany opened her door and stepped down.
“This is a weird road,” Jessa muttered to herself. “Maybe it’s an old Forest Service road they don’t use anymore and stopped maintaining. But that doesn’t make sense…”
“Hey, Jessa,” Liz interrupted. “Can you get out so we can climb out, too?”
“Oh, sorry,” Jessa said, hopping out and moving the seat forward so Liz could climb into the front and stagger out the driver’s side door.
Liz bent over with her hands on her thighs, catching her breath.
“Car sickness?” Jessa asked sympathetically.
Liz nodded, flashing Jessa a weak smile.
Nick and the rest of the group got out of the Dodge. He threw a glance at Bethany, who was leaned over the back of the Chevrolet.
“You all right, Bethany?”
“I could really use a bed right about now,” she said. “I really need to get the weight off my back. It’s killing me.”
“What should we do?” asked Charlie. “We haven’t seen anything since we left the ski lodge. It’s totally deserted out here. I had no idea the wilderness out here was so… big.”
Nick looked at Jessa, then away. He thought of his wife Kaitlyn’s pregnancy. It had been difficult for her, especially at the end when she was miserable with back pain and exhaustion.
“We still have a little camping gear,” Nick said. “We could set up a tent with a sleeping bag and a pad underneath. Would that help?”
Bethany’s face lit up and she nodded enthusiastically. “That would be great.”
Nick found a spot off the road big enough for the tent, then he got started assembling it. Bethany looked at the tent nestled among the trees spread out across a blanket of pine needles, and her lip quivered.
“Thank you so much. It’s perfect,” she said. “I feel so bad you guys have to wait for me like this.”
“Go lie down already,” Jessa said playfully. “And quit apologizing.”
Bethany nodded and crawled in the tent.
“There’s room in here for someone else, you know,” Bethany called out over her shoulder. “In case anyone else needs a nap. I’m big, but I’m not that big.”
Liz looked down at Mia, whose eyes were heavy.
“Why don’t you go take a nap?” Liz asked. “You look so sleepy.”
Mia smiled sheepishly and looked at Jessa, who shooed her toward the tent.
“Better rest up now, kiddo,” Jessa said.
Mia climbed in the tent behind Bethany and got settled. Jessa zipped up the netting to keep the mosquitoes out.
“It’s kind of a relief to be off the main road for a while,” Liz said, sitting on the rear bumper of the Chevy. “I felt like we were going to run into the BSC around every corner.”
“Yeah, me too,” Charlie said.
“Are we even going to make it out of here today?” Matt asked. “I feel like we’re not making good time.”
“We’re not,” Nick said. “The maps don’t show the topography. So we underestimated the travel time. With these roads as curvy and dangerous as they are, we can’t go as fast as we thought.”
“So we’re going to have to spend the night up here?” Jessa asked.
“Maybe,” Nick said, pulling his map out and giving it a quick study.
He sighed. That landslide blocking the southern route had really thrown them a curveball. The northern route they were now on was much longer. Not to mention it was apparently guarded by the BSC.
He folded the map up. Depending on how long Bethany needed to rest, the chances were looking slim that they’d make it out of the mountains that day. And that meant they’d need to spend time hunting, which would delay them even more.
“I think some of us better go ahead and scout the area while the rest of you rest,” he said. “Make sure the next few miles on the main road are clear. We can check out some more of the side streets like Trina suggested earlier. Maybe we’ll get lucky and find some cabin tucked away down one of these little roads.”
“I’ll go with you,” Jessa said.
“Me, too,” Matt volunteered.
“I’ll go,” Liz offered. “As long as I can sit up front this time.”
Jessa smiled. “Sure, I’ll take the back.”
“So that leaves Trina and Charlie. Are you two OK with keeping watch while Bethany and Mia rest?” Nick asked.
“Sure,” Charlie said. “We can hold down the fort. Right, Trina?”
“Of course,” Trina said.
Nick grabbed a suitcase out of the cargo bed of the Forest Service truck. “No sense in hauling around all this stuff if we’re coming right back. We’ll save on gas this way.”
They unloaded some of the weight from the back, then Nick, Jessa, Liz and Matt climbed in the truck.
“We should be back before too long,” Nick said to Trina and Charlie who watched them load up. “If we can’t find anything after an hour, we’ll turn around and come back here.”
Charlie gave a big, goofy wave as they pulled out. “Stay safe.”
He and Trina watched as the truck disappeared down the dusty road, leaving them in the silence of the forest again.
Trina grabbed her rifle and sat down on the forest floor, leaning against a tree. “Doesn’t seem much point in keeping watch out here. No one’s coming down that road except Nick. And even if someone did, we’d hear them a mile away.”
Charlie grinned and picked his own pine tree to lean against, keeping his rifle within reach. “I thought you would’ve learned by now, Trina.”
“What’s that?”
“Things go wrong when you least expect them.”
“I suppose you’re right,” Trina said. She looked at the rifle she had placed on the ground and brought it a little closer.
20
Garrison Reynolds could scarcely contain his excitement.
Everything had been worth this opportunity. All the loneliness, all the rejection from his peers.
Finally, he would come out on top. His lonely existence was going to change at last.
An assistant professor at the University of Colorado, he was used to leading a solitary life. Of course, being an immunologist made it difficult to make friends with the public at large. Most people weren’t interested in hearing about cell structure. And he had never quite learned how to make small talk.
But he could never fit in with his colleagues, either. He was ostracized in undergrad, shunned in graduate school. As a professor and scientist, he was respected for his rigorous research and teaching style. But for some reason, the other members of his academic world avoided him.
It troubled him to no end, and he never understood why. Over the years, he had chalked it up to his position at the top. Genius was isolating. Other people just envied his brilliance. He heard some whispers once or twice. It was easy for them to call him crazy. People feared what they couldn’t understand.
Maybe it was his interest in guns and outdoor survival. He wasn’t like his colleagues, who seemed to trust the government blindly. Every time he talked about the collapse of civilization, people gave him strange looks. So he kept to himself more and more.
He had tried to be content in his solitude. He poured himself into his work and his hobbies. He told himself he didn’t mind living alone and keeping to himself. But he couldn’t shake the feeling that something was missing.
As he got into his thirties, and then forties, he saw the people around him finding spouses and having kids. Yes, that was what he needed. A family.
Then he wouldn’t feel so alone. He needed someone to share his life with.
But women just weren’t interested in him. They never had been. He didn’t understand it. He was lean and fit. At forty-four, he was losing some hair, but he wasn’t bad-looking.
Still, though, women seemed nervou
s, uneasy, around him. It was almost as if they were afraid of him.
He had all but given up on the idea. Instead, he began to focus his energy toward his future. If society rejected him, he wanted nothing to do with it. He would begin to prepare for what he had always known was coming: the end of the American lifestyle.
Several years ago, he had bought a remote property with his meager savings. It was buried in the woods with only a small dirt road leading up to it. With a natural spring on the land, he would have access to the best water. And of course, the end of civilization would destroy any access to gridded electricity, so he didn’t worry about that either.
He was able to build a simple cabin during a sabbatical from the university, and since then had been working to improve it. Most weekends he drove out from Denver to work on the endless projects he had to improve it. Recently he had set up a solar system.
The property was extremely remote, tucked away among the wilderness southwest of Denver. After completing construction of the cabin several years back, he had let the long road leading up to the edge of his property grow over. He began parking his truck in a small clearing a few dozen yards past the end of the state road. Garrison would cover the truck with a few camouflage tarps, then drag limbs, saplings, and forest debris on top of that. A few more limbs and dead logs over the narrow path he drove in on to park the truck, and his tracks were covered. The path, and his truck, were nearly invisible to the casual observer.
The rest of the way to the cabin was covered in untouched woods. He took a different route each time he walked between his truck and his cabin so that there was no path.
It was a long distance with lots of twists and turns. After a while, he knew the woods like the back of his hand. Even better, it had become difficult for anyone else to locate the cabin with no trails leading up to it and its location so far from the state road.
It was just as he liked it. He didn’t want just anyone to find him here.
When the Hosta virus broke out, he was stunned. But he wasn’t surprised.
Like the research facilities the world over, his lab tried to help. He and the other scientists in his department began to work furiously for a cure. He had tried to warn his colleagues that something like this was bound to happen, but no one had ever listened. And when it finally did happen, they didn’t even have the decency to admit he had been right all along.
Despite his bitterness, he tried his best to develop an effective antiviral therapy. Once Denver had its first Hosta case, they isolated the virus and studied it day and night. Camping out in the lab, Garrison worked endlessly.
Garrison’s team tried an experimental therapy in infected mice to stop the virus from reproducing within cells. The new technology programmed cells to die – essentially, commit suicide – when coming in contact with Hosta. When that didn’t work, they tried protease inhibitors.
But nothing worked. The Hosta molecule developed resistance to any antiviral agents. The researchers watched the mice die faster and faster.
Then, the scientists began to die.
When Garrison saw his coworkers wake up with discolored skin, he knew there was no escape. Despite their highest security and most rigorous safety protocols, the virus had resisted their attempts to contain it. To call it highly communicative was an understatement. There was no point in trying to enter a quarantine once the virus had gotten within a several mile radius.
A handful of mice survived even with exposure to the virus, and it gave Garrison hope. A four percent survival rate was determined. While everyone around him had gray skin and bulging eyes, Garrison remained healthy.
He had always been the odd person out. Why should his immune system be any different?
He watched the news reports alone in the laboratory as panic spread across the world. There wasn’t a single researcher that could stop this thing. Politicians cautioned citizens to not panic, until the politicians disappeared – gone underground in a futile attempt to quarantine, Garrison assumed.
People argued on the news about the likely cause of the virus. But Garrison figured it was the North Koreans. He had heard speculation over the years of them trying to develop a biological weapon. He reckoned they had finally succeeded.
In any case, the news broadcasts didn’t last long. Soon, there were no more updates on the TV, radio, or internet. Then the power went off.
Whatever the reason, the Hosta virus was out of control. There was no cure that he could conceive of, and most of Denver was dying.
His little house in town was near the university. He started to hear gunshots more frequently. A fraction of the population was left, and they were killing each other. There was no reason left to stay.
He packed up what he had, which wasn’t much. His city house had been mostly empty. He wanted to bring more food with him to his mountain home to supplement his supplies. But he quickly found that all the supermarkets and convenience stores were under gang control. He decided it wasn’t a big problem. His supplies at the cabin were decent. And anyway, it would force him to spend more time hunting and trapping. He’d make it through the winter with wild game, then he’d plant a garden in the spring.
The issue of his medicine, however, was a problem. He didn’t have much of his drug left. And the pharmacies were guarded by gangs as well. He didn’t want to tangle with them, so he gave up on the idea of stocking up. He’d have to find a way to live without his prescription drug. He’d be all right.
It was time for him to start a new life away from everything. He regretted that he had no family to share his life with. On the other hand, there would be no one in the woods to call him crazy. No one to reject him. That part, at least, would be a relief.
Garrison retreated to the woods. He ran out of his pills quickly. But he was amazed to find that he felt much better off them. He was more vibrant and creative. His senses were sharper. He laughed to himself when he realized that he hadn’t needed the medication after all.
At some point after being alone in the cabin, his ideas started to change. He had a feeling that he would find his family after all. He didn’t know how yet, but some part of him was sure that he would have a wife and child. They would come to him.
The longer he spent up in his hideaway, the more changes he saw in himself. He started to feel confident, invincible. This would be his time to shine. Finally, Garrison would have the life he had always deserved. It took a virus that wiped out modern society to finally bring him justice.
The sound of vehicles had roused him from his work in the cabin. After three weeks alone on his property, hunting and trapping with no noise from the outside world, he finally heard trucks on the little road below.
Grabbing his Remington, he quietly emerged from his cabin. He stealthily moved through the forest, stopping every few yards to check for any intruders. When he arrived at his lookout point, a high spot with a view of the dead-end dirt road below, he looked through his binoculars.
There were eight, most of them armed with guns. Why had they appeared? Were they looking for him? His thoughts came furiously; his hands grew sweaty.
Then he saw her: a beautiful, pregnant woman with a halo of curly brown hair. Looking at her swollen belly, his heart raced. And standing beside her was a perfect little girl with doe eyes and fine, dark hair that shook around her face when she moved her head.
They’re finally here.
He waited, watching the people discuss something.
Then, miraculously, four of them left in one of the trucks. The pregnant woman and the little girl stayed behind. He couldn’t believe his good fortune. A smile spread across his face.
It was destiny. Finally, he would claim what was his, what he deserved.
A family.
There were two others – an injured man and a small woman. Nothing he couldn’t handle. The small woman he didn’t want. Her expression looked argumentative. And besides, he had already found his new wife.
He didn’t know how long the four others
would be gone. Perhaps they were scouting ahead for shelter while the others rested. If so, he surely had a good while.
The curly-headed woman and the child were resting in a tent. The other two sat nearby with rifles. He watched them for several minutes, then set out down the hill toward them.
He approached, getting just a few yards away, waiting behind a stand of thick trees. There was a strong breeze going, which was good. The sound of the wind whistling between the trees disguised any noise he made, which was minimal. He had gotten good at moving silently through the forest the past few days of tracking animals.
He waited for several minutes, patient for the right opportunity to make his move. Finally, it came.
The woman in athletic clothes who was on guard moved to her feet and stretched her arms overhead. She grabbed her rifle and slung the strap over her shoulder. He could tell from the way she handled it she wasn’t very comfortable with the firearm. She said something to the man, then trotted off in the woods in the opposite direction from Garrison.
He had to move, now.
He advanced quickly through the woods, still careful to minimize the sounds he made. The man sitting against the tree was within his reach. Garrison paused for just a moment to plan his next move.
Garrison could see the back of his head, could hear his breathing. He sat cross-legged with the rifle in his lap.
Garrison leapt forward, pinning the rifle down with one arm and using the other to bring a rag soaked in isoflurane to cover the guy’s mouth and nose. The unsuspecting man fought for a couple of moments, then went limp and slumped over to his side. The chemical worked quickly.
Darting his eyes around as he slipped the rifle out of the man’s lap, Garrison saw no sign of the woman. She must have gone into the woods to relieve herself, which meant she could be back at any second. He had to move quickly. Retreating back into the woods a small distance, he moved toward where the woman had gone. He again hid himself, this time behind some shrubs. He applied more of the isoflurane to the rag.