“Me, too,” Serafina replied leaning back against the cushion in the backseat of the small car. “A hot bowl of noodle soup would be wonderful.”
“Soup?” Daniel replied, grinning. Teasing her, he asked, “That’s the best you can think of? I’m thinking about pizza!”
Brenna spoke up from the seat next to Serafina. “Yeah! Pizza! That would be so good!”
Ashley smiled as she steered the car. “I miss Chick Fil-A…”
Daniel smiled, nodding. Looking over his shoulder, he asked, “Paul? What about you? What do you crave?”
Smiling broadly, the young man said, “KFC.”
“Mmmmm…” Daniel replied, still smiling. “I remember KFC. It was pretty damn delicious.”
Looking at the road, Ashley asked, “Do you think the restaurants will reopen when all this is over? Assuming it ends soon?”
The smile disappeared from Daniel’s face as he looked out through the windshield. “Not for a long, long time. The recovery efforts will be massive. Right now, there are potentially hundreds of thousands of people in the various protective zones. They’ll have to stay there while the cure is distributed, which will take months, if not a year, based on the amount of ground they’ll need to cover. Remember, with Canada and Mexico adjacent to us, our government will have to team with theirs to eradicate the problem.”
“Including those who don’t want the vaccine…” Serafina muttered from the back seat.
“Yeah, not sure they’ll have much of a choice in the matter,” Daniel continued, “and I can’t imagine why they’d want to refrain from the vaccination, but with them….who knows?”
“What makes them think like that?” Brenna asked, frowning.
“Not sure,” Daniel replied. “If I were to guess, though, I’d say it’s something related to them feeling unaccomplished or unimportant. Like, they haven’t really accomplished much in their lives, so they look around at those that have - you know the ones who have successful careers or attained higher education, or both - and they want to bring them down so that they can feel better about themselves. So they find what they think is information that proves the rest of us are ‘brainwashed.’ By ‘not being so’ they’re suddenly a step above the rest of us in their minds.”
“Crazy,” Ashley replied, shaking her head as she pulled the steering wheel to the left, guiding the car around a motorcycle that was laying on its side near the shoulder of the road.
“Yeah…or they’re just that.” Daniel replied. Sighing, he went on. “Anyway, the government will be busy doing that for the better part of a year or more.
“After that, before they allow people to begin repopulating the cities, they’ll have to figure out how to re-establish local governments around the cities and towns.
“The basic services will have to be re-established as well. Medical care, power, water, sewage, etcetera.
“Best guess? we’ll be lucky to have grocery stores within a year.”
“Wow, thanks there, Mister Pessimist,” Serafina said from the back seat.
“Sorry,” Daniel replied, shrugging. “Just trying to manage expectations.”
Brenna spoke up from her spot between Serafina and Paul. “Maybe we can make our own versions of the food?”
Daniel nodded. “Absolutely. Auntie knows how to make pretty much all that stuff.”
“As soon as we get somewhere we can relax and focus on enjoying ourselves,” Serafina said, looking out the window. “Seems like we’ve been just, going, going, going, since this whole thing started.”
“No kidding,” Daniel agreed. “It’s been exhausting. What I would give for a long, lazy weekend of nothing.”
“Sleep.” Serafina said, closing her eyes as she imagined herself in the soft, plush bed they had at home, sleeping with her favorite cat, Tommy, at her side while she rested her head on Daniel’s chest.
“I miss sleeping in,” Ashley agreed, removing her stepmother’s sunglasses and setting them in the cup holder. The sun was descending, allowing shadows to enter the road, which made the areas around the various cars, trucks, and motorcycles difficult to see.
She’d started her turn behind the wheel only twenty minutes prior, when they’d reached the junction for State Route 152, which would take them west, to the 101.
Though she didn’t mind driving, she was quietly concerned about her father. He’d always seemed...indestructible?
‘No, that’s not it,’ she thought, chuckling to herself. It wasn’t like he was a superhero or anything ridiculous like that. He hadn’t been shot, or hit by a car, or in some crazy accident, only to come out unscathed. If anything, the fight he’d been in back at the lodge in Big Bear had proven his mortality.
It was just that he always...kept going. When his shoulder ached from the knife the Sheriff stabbed him with, he just...somehow powered through it, refusing to be the reason for delay, refusing to be a limiting factor. Refusing to be the weak link.
But this was different. No amount of ‘toughing it out’ would make the blurriness in his vision subside.
Only time would heal the injury his brain had suffered.
Glancing briefly at him, she saw him holding the map close to his face as he studied it.
In the backseat, Serafina leaned her head back against the cushion and closed her eyes, shutting out the noise of the road and the presence of the others in the car. She needed rest if she was going to drive the next leg of the journey.
The plan was for Ashley to drive until they reached Gilroy, allowing Serafina to rest before they began the final leg of their journey, heading north, towards San Jose and eventually into San Francisco.
‘Why us?’ she thought to herself. ‘Why do we have to be the ones tested over and over again?’ They had simply been trying to wait it out when they’d left their home and made their way to their cabin in Big Bear.
Then they’d found Isabella.
And been forced to assault one of the Sheriff’s men.
Which made the Sheriff and his posse come for them.
And led to her and Isabella being taken.
Fortunately, Daniel and the others, including Logan, had come to their aid, though she had done her part, taking out the bastard from the drug store who’d had...ominous plans for her. In the end, the family had survived through a combination of skill, luck, and timing, with the help of numerous other people who chose to rise up and fight against the evil in their presence.
They should have been able to stop there.
But then they’d found out the young girl they’d taken in was immune to the Rage Virus, and that the Government desperately needed her.
What choice did they have? Turn her over to strangers to have them take her to the Protective Zone in San Francisco?
The girl had just lost her parents, and she was only recently starting to open up to them.
The only logical choice was for Serafina, Daniel, and the rest of the family - including Paul, the newest adopted member, plus Logan, who’d been heading in the same direction, to take the girl there.
But then Joe had taken the girl.
‘Son of a bitch,’ she thought, feeling her blood pressure rise. ‘When I get my hands on that bastard…’
But she wouldn’t have the chance to.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Central California
“Gotcha,” Logan said aloud when he saw the tail lights in the distance. He pressed down hard on the gas pedal, forcing the truck to go faster. After nearly 5 hours of driving, Reilley and Isabella were finally within reach.
He’d never been a person that focused on getting revenge. It wasn’t in his nature. He dealt with issues as they arose, then moved on. If someone crossed him he learned from it and moved on.
Unless they took something from him. Then he got it back and made sure the person understood that couldn’t happen again. Most of the time, doing so didn’t require violence.
Most of the time.
The lights ahead disappeared as the
car drove over the crest of a small hill.
“No you don’t,” he muttered, pressing down on the gas even harder. He wouldn’t lose the bastard.
The truck’s engine coughed, shaking the entire vehicle on it’s frame. A loud bang came from the engine compartment, rocking the truck, before a massive white cloud of steam spilled forth from the edges of the hood.
The engine’s machinations stopped, leaving only the sound of hissing steam and the truck’s tires on the road as the vehicle coasted along the asphalt of the highway.
“Fuck!!” Logan yelled, pounding the steering wheel with his fist.
He held the steering wheel steady as he looked ahead. There was the sign for a gas station, a Holiday Inn, and a McDonald’s ahead. With any luck, he could find another vehicle there.
The truck came to a rest a few hundred yards from the exit, coughing one last time before giving up. Grabbing his rifle and backpack, he stepped from the truck, feeling the coolness of the early evening as it slowly began to displace the afternoon warmth. Looking into the cabin of the truck, he checked for anything he could be forgetting.
‘Shit!’ he said to himself as he reached into the cabin of the truck and grabbed the map from the passenger seat.
Folding it back up, he quickly stuffed it into his backpack. Zipping the backpack up, he threw the straps over his shoulders and checked his holster, verifying the gun was secured. Satisfied that he had everything he’d need, he broke into a measured run, holding his rifle in his hands.
Coming down the exit ramp, he slowed to a walk as his eyes took in the gas station. He saw the big SUV, sitting there with a hose extended from its gas tank, the cement around it soaked with spilled gasoline.
The SUV wasn’t an option, but he appreciated Reilley leaving the hose behind.
Entering the gas station lot, he walked to the SUV and yanked the hose from the vehicle with one hand as he kept his eyes fixed on the interior of the convenience store. Tossing it on the ground near the front of the store, he brought his rifle in front of him as he stepped through the broken door, entering the store. He quickly cleared the store, taking note of items he’d return to grab before getting back on the road, then returned to the front.
Walking towards the side of the building, he heard a shuffling sound. Stopping in his tracks, he listened intently for a moment. The shuffling sounds seemed to be disorganized, as if the owner was simply walking in circles.
‘Infected,’ he thought, looking down at his rifle. He had no idea if there were one, two, or a hundred of the infected nearby, but he did know one thing: if he fired his weapon, every one close by would quickly descend upon his location.
Pushing his rifle to his side, he made his way quietly to the edge of the building. He listened again, then leaned forward enough to see around the corner.
Two infected shuffled around aimlessly, snarling as they moved their feet. One was a tall, balding White man in black pants and a white button up shirt, with a nametag pinned to his chest, the other an older black woman wearing a similar white top with a nametag on her breast, but with a black skirt covering her lower body. Unlike the man, who wore black sneakers, she wore one black pump, leaving her left foot bare. She tilted awkwardly to the left each time that foot came down, but she seemed oblivious to the unbalanced nature of her gait.
Leaning back, he quickly devised a plan. He needed to make a noise to draw them in, but didn’t want it to be so significant that it attracted the attention of any others in the area.
He returned to the store, grabbed a can of soda, then made his way back to the corner of the building. Leaning his rifle against the building, double-checked his protective gear, making sure his skin was completely covered. Satisfied, he pulled his knife from his belt. Using the tip, he pierced the can and tossed it in the air on his side of the building. The can bounced loudly as it hit the ground, then began spinning in a circle, emanating a hissing sound as the soda shot from the hole.
Snarls came from the infected as they charged around the corner, looking for the sound of the noise.
The balding man was closest, and as a result, he died first as Logan sunk the blade of his knife into the back of the man’s neck, severing his spine. The man collapsed instantly, falling forward and hitting the ground with a thud. The woman spun around, trying to reorient herself as Logan swung the blade towards her exposed throat.
Her missing shoe made her fall sideways, moving her throat out of the knife’s arc. Logan’s blade found only air as it sliced through the space where her neck had been.
The woman fell to the ground, only to spin and lunge forward with a quickness that shouldn’t have been possible for a woman of her advanced age. Her hand lashed out and slammed into the side of Logan’s left ankle with tremendous force, knocking his leg out from under him. He fell to the ground, his left arm partially breaking his fall.
The woman sprung forward, her mouth and hands open, ready to tear his flesh.
Against the average person, it would have been an overwhelming, deadly assault, but Logan had hundreds of hours in hand-to-hand combat training.
Spinning himself backwards on his left hip, his right leg flashed out, catching the woman in her gut, stopping her momentum and forcing the air from her lungs.
Rolling forward, he brought his knife high in the air before coming down with all his strength, penetrating the woman’s skull at her left temple and burying the length of his knife in her brain. Her body went slack as her eyes became fixed on a distant point. As he watched, the bubbles of saliva at the edges of her mouth slowly popped, the last remnants of her life leaving as her bladder released its contents.
Yanking his knife free, made his way to his feet, gingerly stepping with his left leg. The woman’s blow had come with incredible force, and he felt lucky that she hadn’t broken something. As it was, he wouldn’t be running anytime soon.
‘All the reason for more caution, Logan,’ he told himself as he bent down and wiped the blade clean on the woman’s uniform. Knowing it wasn’t sufficient, he returned yet again to the store and found a bottle of disinfectant wipes. Ripping away the plastic packaging, he pulled one from the container and used it to wipe down the entire knife, from the tip of the blade to the butt of the handle.
Walking to the dim refrigerated section, he opened one of the doors and grabbed a lukewarm Coca Cola. He slid his knife back into its sheath as he stepped outside, then opened the soda and sipped it, ignoring the warmth of the liquid. It was still Coke, and it was a taste of previous times, before the world turned to shit.
Capping the bottle, he returned to the corner of the building, grabbed his rifle and slung it over his shoulder, and began walking towards the nearby diner. He’d already wasted too much time, and he needed to be back on the road.
There were only a handful of cars in the parking lot of the diner, and three of them were tangled up as the result of a collision near the parking lot exit. Of the remaining two, one was a giant, lifted truck with massive tires and a thick metal brush guard around its front bumper. The truck’s pristine condition told Logan it had rarely been off-road, but it certainly wasn’t the practical choice for his mission. The remaining vehicle was an old, dusty station wagon that looked ready to give out at any minute.
Shaking his head, he moved across the street to where the McDonald’s was. Like what he’d found at the diner, several cars had collided during a desperate attempt to flee the fast food restaurant. The cars themselves were mangled from the impact, and in each case, the drivers and passengers had either been killed inside or dragged from the vehicle, leaving blood and bits of flesh on various parts of the interior.
Though he couldn’t be sure, Logan didn’t think the virus would survive long outside the human body, but even so, he didn’t want to be sitting in the blood of the victims.
Moving to the other cars in the parking lot, he found two that were in similarly bad shape, one with a dead man behind the wheel, the other with a severed arm still holding th
e steering wheel.
The last vehicle appeared to be clean, but as luck would have it, it was a big, V-8 Cadillac that was already low on gas.
Frustrated, he left the McDonald’s parking lot and jogged towards the Holiday Inn at the end of the road. As he approached, he saw what would be a big problem.
An eighteen wheeler sat blocking the entrance/exit ramp that led down into the parking lot. Even if he found a car that was clean and usable, he wouldn’t be able to drive through the small gap between the front end of the semi and the cement curb at the edge of the driveway. A large drainage ditch sat on either side of the driveway, creating a barrier as well.
“Come on!” He muttered, still aware of the need for quiet.
Standing there, he exhaled, looking down at the parking lot and the front of the building, wishing he could take the Honda Accord that sat near the small section of the parking lot designated for employees.
He was about to turn away and return to the McDonald’s parking lot for the big Cadillac when something caught his eye. Without hesitating, he descended the driveway ramp and made his way to where it stood in the lot.
The keys were in the ignition.
Under normal circumstances, he wouldn’t be caught dead on the thing, but these weren’t normal circumstances, and it would serve the purpose he needed it for well.
Great gas mileage.
Highly maneuverable.
Lightweight, easy to move around obstacles if necessary.
Sighing, he threw his leg over the light pink moped and sat down on the seat. Turning the key in the ignition, he started it and drove out of the parking lot, heading north in pursuit of Joe and Isabella once more.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Mount Weather Emergency Operations Center, Virginia
‘Prior to a week ago, I’d never been on one of these,’ Jonathan Reed thought, strapping himself into his seat, ‘and now this seems almost routine.’ Counting his trip to the west coast and back a week ago, this was his third time in a Boeing C-17 Globemaster aircraft. Looking over at the dog carrier that was strapped to the deck of the aircraft a few feet away, he found Steight’s eyes watching him.
Surviving Rage | Book 4 Page 8