Spore Series | Book 4 | Exist

by Soward, Kenny

“It’s gross in there,” she said as he walked by.

  Moe nodded grimly and entered through one of the blasted open panes. Six corpses lay sprawled across the front of the store, bodies twisted in the broken glass, exploded snack bags, and big pools of dried blood. They weren’t military but were dressed for an assault. They wore backpacks and ammunition belts. Flashlights and knives hung from clips or were sheathed at their waists. At least two wore radios.

  He knelt next to a woman lying face down near a barrel of soft drinks that might once have been floating in ice. Someone had shot holes in the plastic, and the water had leaked out and mixed with her blood, spreading the reddish halo to ten feet in diameter.

  Her face was pale and gaunt, skin like wax paper. Her light hair appeared colorless and flaxen. He gripped the edge of her ammunition pouch and ripped it open, disturbing the body so an army of flies lifted off in a swarm only to descend on her flesh like an insect blanket.

  Boots strode through the glass and stopped in front of him. Moe stood and gave Melissa a nod before he looked around at the tiny red sprinkles of blood that covered everything.

  “They’ve got all their ammunition, but someone stripped the weapons,” he said.

  “Yeah, pretty strange,” she replied. “But that’s not all that’s strange. Check this out. In back.”

  Moe followed her, their boots crunching on glass and snack bags as they pushed deeper into the store. An aroma of dust and copper lingered beneath the rotting flesh smell, and it clung to his nostrils like a thick, aromatic glue.

  Melissa led Moe to a bullet-ridden sandwich counter at the back of the store. A sign under the spit guard read Big Bob’s Subs. The entire front was chewed up with bullet holes, and large chunks had split off and hung by cardboard threads.

  She gestured for him to come around to the back, and he followed her willingly. Behind the counter lay four corpses.

  A woman at the other end lay curled up on her side in a ring of red. Two men had fallen back against the sink with slumped shoulders and hands resting in their laps. The last figure, the nearest one, was a teenage girl. She’d died crawling toward the exit with her arm stretched out as if grasping for help.

  They all wore Big Bob’s Subs collared shirts.

  Moe shook his head. “They’re all so young.” Moe glanced again, noting one of the men lying against the sink wore a specialized badge on his left breast pocket. “And the manager, too. What in the world happened?”

  “I’d say they probably holed up here, thinking they were safe. Lived pretty well until someone decided they needed gas and supplies.”

  “The employees are stripped of their weapons, too.”

  “Yeah, someone won the fight. Then they took all the guns but no ammunition.”

  “Think they’re still here?” Moe asked looking around.

  “I don’t see why anyone would want to leave.” Melissa stepped over the reaching girl and lifted the sliding lid on the meat and vegetable bins. Moe followed her, careful not to squash the girl’s hand. He leaned in and peered at the rotted meat and cheese and wilted, brown vegetables.

  A month ago, Moe might have pulled a disgusted face, but he’d grown used to the sights and smells of death. Rotten food had little to no effect on him. “It’s all gone bad.”

  “Yeah, but it’s cold.” She removed one of the bins and set it aside. Then she took Moe’s hand and stuck it in the vacant spot with a raised eyebrow. “The refrigeration still works, and the freezers, too. They’ve got frozen meat and other microwave junk. Desserts, too.”

  “You know something?” Moe removed his hand from the cold unit, raised his finger, and pointed it out the front door. “Those solar farms outside the city? I’ll bet they’re still powering things. The system would require very little effort to maintain.” He moved his finger toward the back of the store. “And I bet this place has a battery bank somewhere. Those solar panels charge them up during the day so the coolers can keep running at night.”

  The captain twisted her lips, impressed with the entire setup. “Like I said, why would anyone leave here?”

  Moe looked around as Melissa’s soldiers walked up to listen. “If I had just won a firefight, I would pick up the guns and hide them but leave the bodies--”

  “As a deterrent,” she finished his sentence. “No one wants to hang out with corpses.”

  “Right,” Moe’s eyes shifted. “But where would I hide?”

  Melissa slowly nodded and joined Moe in looking around. The soldiers caught on and moved toward the other end of the store while he and the captain passed through a pair of swinging doors and stepped into the kitchen.

  The kitchen stretched the full width of the building. Sinks and cleaning supplies occupied the back wall, while shelves of canned tomatoes, salsa, and other restaurant goods lined the near one. An employee locker area with restrooms stood off to the left.

  In the center of the room sat three prep tables covered with a stack of sandwich wrappers, cutting knives, and a head of lettuce that had been rotting for weeks.

  As they walked further in, Moe looked over his shoulder to see family-sized bags of tortilla chips residing on a top rack in fluffy packaging. He wasn’t surprised to hear his stomach rumble with hunger.

  “You say you checked all the freezers and walk-ins?” Moe asked, looking toward the opposite side of the kitchen as the soldiers walked through. Behind them stood two big walk-in refrigerators and a freezer, all of them humming with power.

  Melissa nodded.

  “The place doesn’t have a second floor, so there must be a basement somewhere.”

  Moe turned left and walked into the employee locker area. Not only did it house the standard lockers, coat hooks, and punch card machine, but it was a storage for extra tables and chairs.

  One such table sat off to the side with two chairs around it. On its surface lingered a handful of snack wrappers and a tall foam cup full of fountain soda.

  He reached down, picked up the straw, and stirred up the liquid. Ice cubes clattered gently, and foam sparkled around the edges. Moe narrowed his eyes and looked up to see several tables overturned and stacked like pieces of a Tetris game. Someone had pushed them against the wall between locker sections.

  He heel-toed it to the stack and peeked around to see it hid a door. It left enough space for someone thin to climb back there and squeeze through the door with little problem.

  Moe grabbed a table edge and started to move it aside.

  Melissa snagged his arm. “Wait,” she whispered, guiding him away from the stack.

  “What is it?”

  “Maybe we just leave it shut.”

  Moe shook his head. “We have to clear the room. Once that’s done, we gas up, strip the store clean, and move on.”

  “We can do all those things,” Melissa shifted to her other leg, “but just leave the door closed. Put a guard on it. If we open that door and someone has a pistol or rifle trained on us...” she gestured toward the front of the store, “...that they took from a corpse. One of us will get shot for sure.”

  Moe glanced at the stacked tables and nodded. “You’ve got a point. What do we care if someone is in there, as long as they stay in there?”

  “Exactly.”

  “One of your men?”

  Melissa nodded and snapped her fingers at a soldier. He jerked to attention and stepped around the table, training his weapon on the door.

  Chapter 28

  Moe, Las Vegas, Nevada

  “You guys want sandwiches?”

  A roar went up from the group as Moe shoved a stack of frozen ham into one of the two microwaves and pressed “Start” to thaw it out. A huge bowl of salsa sat in the middle of a prep table with two bags of chips opened for anyone who wanted a dip.

  After he’d fueled up the truck and moved it into position in front of the store, Moe had returned inside and scarfed down a quarter of a bag of chips. He gulped huge scoops of salsa with every bite.

  A part of him felt g
uilty, but none of them had eaten much in the past forty-eight hours, and some of what they ate would spoil, anyway. They enjoyed fresh ice and fountain drinks, sandwiches, and stale oatmeal cookies from a glass counter out front.

  His ankle injury had gotten him out of the heavy work, so he’d resigned himself to thawing out meat and making food for the others who loaded produce into the back of his truck. Still, what they ate hardly made a dent in the walk-in inventory, and the fresh grub lifted everyone’s spirits through the roof.

  They posted guards outside and around the truck, leaving six people to carry goods out of the store. They cleared the shelves of snack packages and boxes of unopened product. They stripped the kitchen supplies and raided a small storeroom.

  Rex, Casey, Melissa, Aponi, Waki, and Johnny Windwalker worked for the next two hours. On breaks, they ate what Moe made for them, taking their meals in back on the employee picnic table or out front by the truck. They stayed as far away from the decaying bodies as possible.

  They filled fifteen coolers full of ice and buried packages of meat deep inside them. If they moved fast, the meat might survive the long journey home to the canyons.

  It wasn’t until they’d cleared out the store and were about to leave that the soldier guarding the blocked door stepped back and raised his rifle.

  Moe backed away from the prep table and drew his pistol. Aponi happened to be in the kitchen at that time, and she snatched her rifle from where it rested against the wall and pointed it at the stack.

  A shuffling came from the other side. Bumping, scraping, and a grunt.

  The soldier saw the person first, and he lowered his rifle barrel, gesturing for them to come out. A pair of pale hands gripped the edge of the stack to reveal black fingernails scraped and worn down.

  First came a head of dyed black hair, lighter brown at the roots. A pale face followed, blue eyes darting around above a thin nose, one nostril pierced through with a nose ring.

  A girl. A teenage girl.

  She wore tight black jeans over her skinny legs and a stained Big Bob’s Sub shirt.

  She gave the soldier a wary look before stepping past him. Her eyes grew wide when she saw Aponi and Moe and addressed them in a frail voice.

  “You can’t take my food,” she said, eyes brimming with tears. “It’s all I have.”

  Moe had long ago lowered his pistol, and he shook his head at the poor sandwich worker. “Easy now…my name’s Moe. And this is Aponi, and we mean you no harm.”

  The girl seemed to sense the truth of Moe’s words. Her shoulders relaxed, and she nodded. “I’m Zoe. Zoe Sandoval.”

  He smiled at her. “Good to meet you, Zoe. Can I make you a sandwich?”

  *

  “I figured I’d just go for broke,” Zoe said as she shoveled the last bite of her sub into her mouth. “I could hear there were a lot of you, but you didn’t sound like the rest.”

  Moe, Melissa, and Zoe sat at the employee picnic table out back, sharing sandwiches and chips and a fountain drink each. The warm Nevada wind blew through, but a single tree shaded them from the sun’s hot rays.

  The girl had calmed considerably, though her eyes flitted back and forth between them with wariness.

  “Who were the rest?” Moe asked.

  “The first group was the one we fought with. Kind of ended in a draw.” Zoe’s eyes flitted to the store, and she sniffed and wiped at her nose with a napkin. “You can probably guess what happened there.”

  Melissa and Moe both nodded.

  “I never shot a gun in my whole life until then,” the girl continued. “We should have just run like everyone else.”

  “Run from what?” Melissa pressed.

  “We heard about the toxic clouds coming in from the west.” She gave the two a doubtful look. “You know about those, right?”

  “We do,” he replied.

  Zoe took a sip of her fountain drink. “It was all over the news, but no one knew if the clouds would hit Las Vegas or not. The first two days were fine, and corporate said it was business as usual. On the third day, we came in just like any other day. It was me, my friend Jeanine, Max and Joey. But by then things were getting bad. We heard some stores got robbed, and we started to get scared.

  “Our manager, Max. He had guns in his car. The guy was a freak about guns,” she scoffed. “He brought them in saying we needed to protect ourselves and the store. We laughed at him, saying he was overreacting. But sure enough, toward the end of shift, six people came in looking for trouble. It happened so fast...”

  She took another sip of her drink. “Bullets flew everywhere. Jeanine and I fired back once and then ran. She got hit, but I was too scared to check.” She shook her head. “I’m such a coward.”

  “You’re not a coward.” Moe said.

  “You’re not,” Melissa agreed, and she touched the girl’s arm before drawing her hand away. “I’m a captain and I hadn’t seen combat until all this started. I’ve been afraid a lot, even with all my training.”

  Moe glanced at the officer, surprised.

  “Anyway, when it was over, I went out to see what happened. I found her...” Zoe stared at the door. “I heard groaning from the front of the store. Two of the people who’d tried to break in were still alive. I shot both of them. Then I climbed into the storeroom and cried. I eventually fell asleep.”

  “What about your family?” he asked. “Did you ever think about going home and hunkering down with them?”

  “I’m from Ohio, so no family here.” Her eyes flitted toward the store again. “And my best friend is in there.”

  “Sorry about Jeanine.” Moe gave weight to his words, because he knew how she felt. “We’ve all lost a lot. What did you do next?”

  “I didn’t have any place else to go. But I had plenty of food here and a place to hide. I figured the world was dying, so I’d be better off waiting it out. I took all the guns but left the bodies.”

  “As a deterrent, right?”

  The girl nodded. “Yep. Like, who would come in here with all that stink around. But they did. Three more groups came. I hid each time, and they didn’t think to check behind the stack. Then I tried to bury Jeanine but couldn’t do it. I couldn’t even touch her.”

  Melissa leaned in. “These other groups. Were any of them military?”

  Zoe shrugged. “Didn’t see them too well. They were small groups. Less than four or five people. Real quiet. Shifty. They took food and left. I guess none of them wanted to mess with the bodies. It’s like the place is cursed now.”

  “You mentioned you heard news reports,” Melissa said. “Did you hear anything about Nellis Air Force Base?”

  “All the news talked about was the growing unrest and rioting. People burned casinos and businesses and shot each other. They organized and took out one of the police precincts. They said the military and local law enforcement would keep law and order, but it only got worse.” She shook her head. “It was insane how fast things escalated. The rioters even attacked the reporters until the news stopped showing altogether.”

  Moe imagined the girl’s fear as the world fell apart around her. “That’s why you were afraid to leave.”

  Zoe nodded, and her eyes darted up I-15. “And out there it’s nothing but desert. I’m stuck here, and you just took all my food.”

  “Sorry about that,” Moe said. “But we’ve got almost four thousand people to feed back in Chinle. Our lives depend on this food.”

  “So does mine!” Zoe exclaimed. She jammed her straw into her cup. “Look, I’ve got all the guns in there. You can have them. Just don’t take my food.”

  Moe stared at the girl. “Give us a moment, Zoe.” Then he took the captain by the elbow and gently led her away from the picnic table.

  When they stood ten yards away, Moe turned to face her. “What do you think?”

  “She’s definitely telling the truth.” Melissa bit her lip. “And it only confirms my suspicion that the base may have fallen.”

  She
’d used the truck CB radio to try to reach Nellis Air Force Base all morning but had given up on getting a response. All they caught were voices through the static. They’d both decided the signal might improve once they escaped the surrounding mountain ranges. At least until they heard Zoe’s story about the city’s unrest.

  “It makes me wonder if we should even enter the city,” she finished.

  “There’s no question we have to go in,” Moe said. “If we don’t, things will become desperate for my people fast.” He put his hands on his hips and stared up at the vast blue sky. Then he lowered his eyes to the captain. “I think we should take Zoe along with us. She’s got nowhere else to go, and we could use the extra hands.”

  Melissa glanced at the girl. “She seems a bit unstable.”

  “She’s scared and alone. I’d probably be a little jumpy if I were her. I sense she has a good heart.” Moe said as he caught himself talking like one of the Navajo elders. “I never thought I’d hear myself say this, but she has a good energy about her.”

  Melissa smiled. “If you’re good with her, I am, too. And we could use the help.”

  He nodded and walked back to the bench, sitting across from the girl. He folded his hands on the table and leveled his gaze. Zoe’s pale blue eyes followed him, her face expressionless in the shade.

  “We’re taking all this food,” Moe stated. “I mean, we can leave a day’s worth for you, but the rest comes with us.” He saw her crestfallen expression, and he quickly added. “But you’re welcome to join us. We’re going into the city to load my truck up and take it back to Chinle. It’s a Navajo reservation out in the middle of nowhere. Our people live down in the canyons. It’s tough, but we’re going to make it.”

  “Is it safe?”

  Moe thought of Carver and his strange cult and the trouble at Window Rock.

  “I can’t promise you anything,” he said, honestly. “But it’s about as safe as anywhere I can think of. You’d be surrounded by good people. Some you might even end up calling friends.”

  Zoe’s eyes fell to her drink. She pulled the straw in and out of the plastic lid, making a slight squeaking noise.