“ ‘And your plan is what?’ I asked. ‘Take us across the world to look for a town that you may or may not be able to find?’
“ ‘Oh I can find it,’ he said. ‘I remember it really well. They saved our lives coming out of the jungle. We were out of water, out of food, and out of rounds. They took us in for more than two weeks, until one day they showed us the way out of the jungle. They have a leader, a woman with this, like, blood-red hair. Complete red, not like you see here in the States. She spoke English, a white woman, and said her name was Tristan. I asked her how they weren’t infected, and she just smiled and said that God had favored them above all other people. Wouldn’t talk about it again.’
“Luther said, ‘And you think they have a vaccine or a cure? They probably just weren’t exposed to the virus properly. Or if they were, maybe they just killed off the infected before it could spread.’
“Jason shook his head. His eyes moved between the window and Jessica, and the way he looked at her, the sadness, I wondered if the picture he’d been staring at was of a child. He swallowed and said, ‘They were exposed to it every day. The ips would run out of the jungle, come screaming through town. Sometimes they’d take a chunk of someone, cover them in blood, but that person never got infected. Tristan told me one night they don’t get infected. They must’ve found a plant… something. I pressed her hard, and that’s when they asked us to leave town. They don’t want the world to know what they know.’
“Luther now appeared enthralled by what Jason said, that glimmer of hope that the damned get in their eyes when someone gives them something to hope for. He looked at me and then back to Jason before he snorted and said, ‘I’ll believe it when I see it.’
“A few hours later, the bus broke down. It was just a city bus from New York, after all, really old. We pulled over on the side of the road, and I could see the smoke billowing from the engine. The driver called it in, and they said they might be able to get someone out there by tomorrow, so we’d all be sleeping on the bus. My back and legs ached, so I stepped off and stared in every direction. It all looked the same: sand, dirt, brush, and hills. Other than the road, you wouldn’t even know you were in America. We were in the middle of nowhere and stuck. You have to understand—now I know better. Now I know that the government, in an emergency situation, considers most of the population expendable. Each politician looks out for their powerbase, the people that keep voting them into office. But most of the people in this country don’t vote, and they don’t call their congressmen or legislators for favors. They’re abandoned first, just like the major donors are taken care of first. I didn’t realize it then, but no one was coming. The buses were expected to be a one-way trip for relocation in sparsely populated areas. If we made it, we’d have to fight for our survival there. If we didn’t… just fewer people for the government to worry about.
“A desert wind blew and whipped my hair. After being crammed on that bus with only a few inches of open window providing new air, the wind smelled fresh and clean. The blue sky was painted with the contrails of the jets and commercial planes that had sped across the sky but weren’t there anymore, the sky as empty as the desert before me.
“ ‘What do you think?’ Luther asked as he came out behind me. ‘We wait here or walk? The driver told me there’s a town about four miles up. We could be there before it got dark. Or we could wait here for help. I think wait here.’
“I nodded. The thought of trudging through a desert without food or water seemed a death sentence as certain as going back to the cities. Jason came out, too, holding Jessica’s hand. She had this demeanor that made me think of her as an adult occasionally. But right then, that demeanor dissipated, and she ran across the road to a patch of desert flowers, scarlet flowers with yellow centers. Instantly, she was a child again.
“ ‘It’s not a good idea to wait here,’ Jason said when Jessica was out of earshot. ‘No rescue’s coming.’ Luther, at this point, ignored him. He turned away and leaned against the bus, which was fine because Jason was really only speaking to me.
“I disagreed with him. I still held on to that old-world view that, if possible, the government would help us. The military would help us. Being betrayed by both seemed about as likely as suddenly being able to fly. ‘The driver said to wait and that he’d radioed it in,’ I protested. ‘We have food and water here, and other people. There’s no reason to risk the desert.’
“ ‘There’s at least thirty people on this bus. How many people do you think can fit onto a transport chopper or a jeep? Seven or eight at the most. The nearest base is two hundred miles from here. You think they’re gonna send an Mi-17 four hundred miles three times to rescue civilians on a bus? I don’t know when the decision’s going to be made or if it already has, but some people are going to be abandoned. The brass knows they can’t save everybody, and they’re not coming out to Buttfuck, Wyoming, to rescue us.’ He looked around. ‘We’re wide open. You might as well put a target on the bus. Ips ain’t all we got to worry about. The law doesn’t exist anymore, especially out here. No cops to enforce it, and you can sure as hell bet there’s no military patrols. You wanna live, we gotta get to that town.’
“Luther pushed himself off the bus. He put his hands behind his back and turned to Jason, facing him square, and said in a flat, even voice, ‘We’re not going anywhere. We’re waiting here until help arrives.’
“Jason didn’t fight. He simply nodded his head. He must’ve expected us to react like that. What he basically told us was that the world didn’t work the way we were accustomed to it working anymore. In a flash, almost overnight, that world had changed. It began with the T-Zero event, but it wasn’t until the dormant unidentified virus became active that the world really changed. I think Jason knew we would have to see this new world for ourselves, that no one could explain it to us. So instead of arguing, he strolled over to Jessica and began describing the different types of flowers and bushes.
“ ‘I don’t trust him,’ Luther said. He had a knack for understatement. The tension between them had more to do with ego than trust, but I didn’t tell him that. I think in a way, Luther was jealous. He’d had this grand plan that we would, the three of us, fly off to Russia on some great adventure seeking out a vaccine. Even if we did, Luther wasn’t a fighter. He’d never held a gun, as far as I knew. Couldn’t fistfight or scavenge if he had to. Luther was an academic, most comfortable in a classroom or a laboratory, and this new world we were just thrown into didn’t have much use for academics. ‘And why’s he so damn interested in Jessica?’ he asked.
“I watched the way he played with Jessica. He knew children, was accustomed to them in a way only those who had them could be, and Jessica couldn’t have been happier. Maybe she had a small crush on him. I didn’t think that at the time, though I can see it now, but the most likely explanation for her affection was that Jason reminded her of her father. It became apparent to me how much his absence had left a hole in her life that I couldn’t fill no matter how hard I tried.
“I looked up to the sky and the sun, which would begin setting in a few hours. ‘We better eat something,’ I said. ‘It’ll be dark soon.’ Luther glanced up to the sky as well, but his gaze returned to Jason and the laughing child who couldn’t be separated from him.”
9
“Night fell in the desert in a way I wasn’t used to. I couldn’t believe how quickly the sun set and how cold it got. That was the most surprising part, I think, the cold. You would think the desert would retain heat, but that wasn’t the case at all. The wind howled, and it made your skin feel like ice. We had eaten outside, just some MREs stocked on the bus, but as soon as the sun went down, we couldn’t stay out there anymore. We and the other passengers climbed back onto the bus and settled in for what we knew would be a long night. The seats weren’t exactly comfortable, and sleeping in them upright sounded miserable. I let Jessica lie across my lap and ran my fingers through her hair until she fell asleep. Luther had his arms fo
lded and drifted in and out. It seemed he wanted to stay awake, but exhaustion took him. Jason was the only one of us who didn’t seem tired. He sat stiff as a board, his eyes glued to the windows.
“ ‘Who’s that photo of?’ I said quietly so as not to wake Luther or Jessica. He looked at me and didn’t say anything right away. Even the mention of the photo brought pain to his eyes. I don’t think he was the type of man to display emotion, so the emotion he did display must have been involuntary… unwelcome.
“ ‘My daughter,’ he said softly.
“The way he said it, I knew what had happened. I could see the entire ordeal in my mind already. He’d been away, and he couldn’t protect her. That caused even more pain, the feeling that he had failed her as a father. I regretted bringing it up, but he continued to talk about it.
“ ‘You know the worst part?’ he said. ‘I didn’t get to say goodbye to her. The phones were out, so I rushed back when her mom told me she was sick. But by the time I got there…’
“I swallowed. ‘This was during the initial outbreak?’
“He nodded, pulling out the photo and gazing at it. His eyes grew moist before he exhaled loudly and slid the photo back into his pocket. ‘Nine months ago. She was eleven, right about her age,’ he said, motioning to Jessica with his chin. ‘What’s her story?’
“I ran my fingers through her hair again. The way she slept was beautiful, her lips and face softening from the hardness she wore during the day, the protective wall she’d put up around herself to convince the world she was fine dropping away while she slept. Now she really did look like just a child. ‘Her father died during T-Zero, and he asked me to look after her. I don’t know why I said yes. Maybe I thought I could find a way to get her to people who actually knew how to raise a child or something, but that first night at my house, she threw her arms around me and cried, a long cry, as though all that pain had to come out and she couldn’t control it anymore. She hasn’t cried since then. It was like she had to get it out once and then put on a brave face for the rest of the world. She’s been with me ever since.’
“Jason nodded, grinning before he said, ‘You know what she told me today? When we were outside playing with those flowers? She said she hoped that you and me got married because she doesn’t like seeing you lonely.’
“I don’t know why that statement hit me hard, but it did. I think I blushed and looked away. I had been lonely, a deep loneliness that I didn’t even know I had until Jessica came to stay with me, and I realized how much I liked the sound of someone else in the house with me. I was going to reply when Jason turned back to the window. His fingers reached down to the pistol he had tucked in his waistband and his eyes narrowed. ‘What is it?’ I asked.
“ ‘Somebody’s out there.’ He rose, and marched off the bus.”
“I didn’t wait long to follow him outside. I slowly laid Jessica down on the seats as I slipped out from under her and went outside. The air had grown even colder, and the winds were like jet engines in your ears. The clouds were black now, and I knew a storm had come in. I stood in front of the doors of the bus, looking out into the blackness of the desert, when I felt a shiver up my back. I thought it was the air at first, just the coolness of the wind getting down my collar, but it wouldn’t go away. ‘We should go back inside,’ I said.
“Jason stood still, his hand on his pistol like some Wild West gunslinger. ‘Be right back,’ he said, and then he strolled into the desert and out of sight over a small hill. I was left searching the night for him, and I debated running out there to find him. I glanced back into the bus to check on Luther and Jessica, and as I did so, I noticed the arm reaching down to me from the roof.
“The fingers gripped my collar and pulled so hard the cloth wrapped around my throat and strangled me. I began fighting, pulling at the hand on the collar, trying to break away. I spun around to get a good look at my attacker, and I saw it.
“Its nose was gone, maybe bitten off, maybe rotted off. The skin on its face drooped, missing in some parts and thin in others. Its mouth opened, revealing blood-soaked teeth that had bits of ragged flesh hanging from them. It snapped at me from the roof, toppling over, nearly taking me down with it, before that scream escaped its lips. I ripped myself away from its fingers. As I turned to run, another one ran around the bus and tackled me.
“I hit the ground on my back, the weight of this… thing on top of me. It had once been a man. That’s the hardest thing about ips, that you still see them as human. That you imagine their lives and families… that you think you can talk or reason with them. And then you see their eyes, completely vacant, washed-over eyes, pox eyes, like looking at two flashlights or something, just nothing there.
“It tried to bite me. I shoved my arm against its throat, pushing its head back, the teeth snapping a few inches from my face. Blood dripped down over my cheek and hair. Luther had rushed off the bus, but he was the only one. Everybody else just watched from the windows. Luther grabbed it and pulled it off but only for a second. It was back on its feet and rushed him. I rose, gagging from the blood that rolled down my face. It had Luther by the throat and pinned him against the bus. As it snapped forward, its teeth headed for Luther’s shoulder, suddenly half its head blew off, bits of brain and bone spraying over me and into the desert sand. Jason came around the bus with his pistol drawn. The ip fell to its knees and then to its side.
“ ‘Get on the bus,’ Jason said. ‘Now!’ We didn’t have to be told again. I dashed for the doors and Luther followed… but the doors were locked. I pounded on the glass and the driver just shook his head. I screamed, ‘Let us on, you asshole!’ but I may as well have been speaking a different language. He didn’t care at all. The other passengers were no help, either. They stared at the violence going on not five feet from them with a type of detached curiosity. I saw Jessica’s head pop up, sleep written on her face. Behind me, I could hear Jason’s pistol popping and the screams that encircled us in the darkness. I didn’t look back. I kept pounding on the glass. Jessica’s face contorted in anger and confusion, and she rose and dashed for the doors. The driver grabbed her around the waist and pulled her back. She kicked and clawed at him, but he didn’t let go.
“Fear got the better of me, and I had to look back. At least thirty ips were sprinting for us, screaming in the darkness. Jason took his time, picking his shots carefully, firing each round deliberately. I didn’t know how much ammunition he had, but I guessed it wasn’t over thirty rounds. I pounded on the doors harder, hoping they’d break, or that someone would change their mind and help us… anything. No one moved, no one except Jessica. She bit down into the driver’s hand so hard she drew blood. He yelped loud enough that I heard, and he let go. She quickly opened the doors and Luther pushed me through. Jason backed up into the bus, still firing, and closed the doors as the ips were on top of us. One of the ips got his head in, vomiting blood over the steps as we tried to pull the door closed. Jason shot him in the top of the skull, creating what looked like a canoe, before he kicked the ip in the head and sent him flying onto his back. We got the doors closed, but they were glass doors. They wouldn’t hold forever.
“I jumped up and grabbed some luggage. Bags and suitcases, gym bags, whatever I could get my hands on. I tossed them to Luther and Jason, who began stacking them against the door, piling them high. The windows were too high off the ground for them to climb through, and other than that, there was no other way onto the bus with the exception of the windshield. The ips didn’t seem to figure that one out, and they kept pounding against the door. We heard the glass break, and Luther and Jason put their backs against the luggage, pushing against the ones trying to get in. A few of the other passengers ran over and tried to help, but most of the people sat there, wide eyed and scared, unable to lift a finger to help. I grabbed Jessica and pulled her to the back of the bus. The infected pounded at the bottoms of the windows, shrieking, spattering blood against the panes of glass. I could see them clearly now, civilians, d
ressed much like us. A few of them wearing Yankees or Giants T-shirts and jerseys, clearly from another bus from New York, one that didn’t make it.
“I searched the bus for weapons and couldn’t find anything but a set of golf clubs. An entire bus escaping a war zone, and no one bothered to bring weapons on board. I locked Jessica in the bathroom and told her to wait there, giving her one of the golf clubs. I hugged her and she said, ‘Don’t leave me here.’
“ ‘I have to, but just for a bit. Don’t come out, no matter what you hear.’ I shut the door and turned around to see the driver hobbling to the back of the bus. He pushed past me and tried to get into the bathroom, probably because he knew it was the one place with a lock. I shoved him away from there and he swung at me with a fist, barely missing my jaw, and then grabbed me by my hair and tried to take me down in the aisle. I still held one of the golf clubs, and I swung at him, hitting him in the ear, which made him wince but not let go. I swung again and hit him in the eye. My swings couldn’t generate enough power to really hurt him, not until he reached back to strike me, which gave me room. I hauled off and hit him hard in the temple. It must’ve caught him off guard, because he stumbled back, and I pulled away. I lifted the club like a baseball bat and swung with everything I had, catching him on the side of the head, bending the club. He fell onto one of the seats, disoriented and bleeding from the head. I lifted the golf club… and then stopped. I dropped it to the aisle and ran over to help keep the ips out.
“Several men, including Luther and Jason, had their backs to the luggage. There wasn’t room for me. So instead I ran to the driver, pulled the keys out of his pockets, and ran back. I tried starting the bus, but the engine wouldn’t turn. One of the infected out in the road saw me. Our eyes met… another woman. She sprinted for the bus and threw herself up against the front, clawing at the windshield as though it were a piece of fruit she could get through. Her nails scraped against the glass, a few of them ripping away, leaving a smear of blood and skin.”
Scourge - A Medical Thriller (The Plague Trilogy Book 3) Page 8