He bent at the waist, his hands on his knees. Even though he was in pretty good shape, he was running on fumes and knew he didn’t have the luxury of sleeping for hours yet. This morning, it had seemed like it was still early enough in the disease process that getting a rental appeared to be a sure bet, but now he worried. He’d tried to call and reserve one, but the business was closed for the day. What if they didn’t have one?
Cole had figured he had at least a few days before the general public caught on, and even then, most wouldn’t comprehend the scale of the disease. Not at first. Hell, he could hardly believe it was going to get bad, and his whole career, his field of study, was making predictions about diseases.
He hoped the crowd at the gun shop was just the first wave of people preparing. Walmart hadn’t seemed any busier than normal, so that had him breathing a little easier, but he didn’t want to push their luck. They’d have to leave tomorrow.
Cole entered his kitchen through the garage door, grabbed a glass and filled it with water, mesmerized by the simple act of filling the glass from the tap. So many things he took for granted. There had to be at least one well on the island. He prayed it was in good shape. But if they didn’t have power, how would the water pump? What would they need to make it pump? Could they rig something up? Maybe a windmill? Obviously, people had wells before electricity was invented, and he pictured a pump with a handle, but what went on below ground was a mystery. He took his glass to the other side of the counter, where his laptop rested on the breakfast bar.
Opening his browser, he was dismayed to see more news stories about Sympatico Syndrome, but they still were pretty far down on the list of trending stories. At the top was some celebrity who was getting a divorce. Cole shook his head in disgust at people’s priorities. A second later, the disgust melted away as he realized he would gladly accept shallow priorities if it meant nobody had to worry about a global pandemic. Yes, society was spoiled and obsessing over the marital status of an actor was a luxury only afforded to those who didn’t have to worry about where their next meal might come from.
When clean water and shelter were things you never had to think about, it was easy to get caught up in inconsequential worries. It was a first-world privilege, and he’d been as guilty as anyone. Sure, he didn’t give a rat’s ass about any celebrity marriage, but he obsessed over sports and what player his team should trade for, what a pitcher’s ERA was, and whether his team had a chance to win the World Series that year. Hell, he’d been discussing that exact thing in a baseball chat room just last week. It was a privilege Cole hadn’t ever acknowledged before. And now he feared that it was a privilege which would soon come to an end for everyone.
His stomach rumbled so he popped a frozen dinner in the microwave since it would soon go to waste if he didn’t eat it. While it heated, he headed to his room and dug through his closet for appropriate clothing, pushing aside the suits and dress shirts, pulling out old camouflage he hadn’t worn in years. He wasn’t sure if he’d fit into it although he was still in good shape. He packed it anyway. It might fit Hunter or even Trent at some point. The clothes were thick and durable. As he looked for sweatshirts, he came across a box with old photos in it. He dragged it out beside the bed and lifted it to sit next to the half-full suitcases.
Cole wondered if they’d have room for the box, but decided he’d make room. He went into the living room and took the framed photos from the mantle above the fireplace, pausing at the picture of Hunter and Brenda. Mother and son both laughed as they looked into the camera. He wished he could remember what they had been laughing about, but was glad to have captured a carefee moment. He added the frames to the box and carted it out to the garage.
The remainder of the night, he went room to room, deciding what was needed and what would have to stay. Clothes all went—even old stuff with holes. Cloth could be repurposed into other uses. He should have picked up needles and thread. He had a small sewing kit he’d used once to sew a button onto a dress shirt, but it only contained three needles and a couple of spools of cheap thread. Shit. Why hadn’t he thought of that?
He glanced at his watch. It was almost midnight, and he should be getting to bed, but he knew there was a Walmart on the other side of town that was open twenty-four hours.
Deciding he could sleep after they got safely to the island, he trudged to the garage and headed to the Walmart. Again.
As he pulled in, he was surprised at the number of vehicles in the lot. It was at least as many as this afternoon. He grabbed his facemask and donned it, not caring this time who saw him. Apparently, people were becoming alert to the situation. There were empty boxes of sanitizing wipes strewn on the floor by the automatic doors, but he was glad to see another container with one sticking out. He grabbed it and made a beeline for the lawn and garden section.
Surprisingly, this seemed to be overlooked by the crowd and Cole grabbed packets of seeds. Beans, peas, corn, carrots, and spinach were the first to go in, then he added cucumbers, squash, pumpkin, watermelon, and zucchini. He noted packs of herb seeds and took two of each on the rotating rack. Not only would they come in handy when their dried supply ran out, but he knew they had medicinal uses as well.
He went through the produce aisle section, this time, thinking of getting potatoes— not to eat, but to plant. Cole wasn’t sure of the process but knew it had to do with cutting up the potatoes around the eyes, and planting them. It would have to be a priority if they wanted a harvest this year. How many plants could a twenty-pound bag of potatoes yield? He wasn’t sure, so grabbed two of them. Most people seemed to be shunning the fresh food for canned stuff, so he took advantage of it and piled his cart with carrots, eggplant, jicama, onions, garlic, oranges, and apples. He looked longingly at the strawberries but decided they’d rot too quickly and didn’t want to risk spoiling any of the other fruits they had.
He scoured the deli area, finding several rounds of hard cheese. Those would keep for a long time, so he scooped up all of them.
Next, Cole made a pass through the food aisles, getting more canned goods but the selection was limited and heavily picked through. He was able to get several large cans of sweet potatoes, squash and pumpkin, but he’d hoped to add more beans, peas, and carrots. He reached for a can of mushrooms at the same time another man did and got an elbow to the ribs for his efforts. Rubbing the sore spot, he glared at the guy. “What the hell are you doing?”
The man threw Cole a dirty look and shrugged. “I got it first.”
Shaking his head, Cole turned to his cart but stopped when a pack of seeds slipped between the bars of the cart. Bending over, he snatched it and saw a gleam of metal way in the back of a shelf. Grinning in triumph, he went to his hands and knees and grabbed the two cans he saw. He didn’t care what he came up with. He pulled out an industrial sized can of baked beans and another of tomatoes. He looked down the length of the aisle and spotted more overlooked vegetables pushed way back. Setting his finds in the cart, he headed for the end of the aisle, and almost ran into a woman pushing a nearly empty cart. Two kids clung to the side of it.
She took one look at the shelves and burst into tears.
Stunned at her sudden emotion, Cole stopped. “Are you okay?”
With a long, hiccupping sob, she shook her head. “I had to wait to shop until today. I’ve been watching the bank, waiting until my paycheck hit my account at midnight so I could get something for us to eat. But everything is gone, and one guy already stole my cart. Now I only have these.” She waved her hand at a few boxes of lasagna noodles, and two cans of soup.
Cole tried to steel his emotions. It wasn’t his problem. They weren’t his problem, but guilt flooded him. He looked at her then to the children, a boy about seven and a little girl who appeared to be about four, and his resolve melted away. He reached into his cart and took the tomato sauce, beans, and a round of cheese and set them in her cart. In the long run, it probably wouldn’t help them survive, but he couldn’t walk away know
ing that children were going hungry. Damn.
The woman’s eyes opened wide, and she swiped at the tears on her cheeks. “Are you sure?”
Cole nodded. “If I didn’t have others counting on me, I’d give you more. Listen, out in the garden section, there were still loads of seeds.” He lifted a couple of the packets from his cart. “They might help you out in the long run. If you can, get out of town. Take the kids somewhere in the country.”
“I can’t. I have to stay with my mom. She can’t take care of herself.”
It was on the tip of his tongue to say that she was probably destined to be one of the first to go, either from disease or from lack of medical care, but he just nodded. “Well, keep it in mind. Grow a garden in the yard at least.”
With that, he left her behind, heading to get the rest of the items he thought they might need.
Cole left the items in the back of the SUV when he got home. Too tired to unpack, and figuring he could deal with it in the morning after he rented a truck, he trudged into the house. It was almost one a.m., and he had to get some sleep if he was going to drive tomorrow. He wondered how Hunter was doing but didn’t want to wake him if he was sleeping. He sent him a quick text, giving him directions to the island. With luck, Hunter would arrive in a couple of days. Driving alone, he’d have to stop and take breaks sometimes.
Despite his exhaustion, his brain refused to shut down. There was so much he still needed to get ready. Clothes for all weather situations, towels, soaps, cleaning agents… The list went on and on, but he rolled over, punching his pillow. Should he have bought more guns? Possibly a handgun? He imagined things could get dangerous when actual panic set in, and he wanted to be able to protect the island.
Finally, he slept but dreamed of zombies breaking into the house and tearing the kitchen apart. They climbed the stairs and took Hunter from his room, dragging him with them as they left. Even in the dream, he wondered why Hunter wasn’t at college, but dream logic kicked in, and he didn’t question it too much.
He awoke with a start, bathed in sweat, and glanced at the clock. Six thirty-five. He flopped back in bed, wishing like hell that he could just pull the blankets up and go back to sleep. The sudden hope hit him that maybe the disease had been contained. Maybe he had just panicked yesterday. He got up and jumped in the shower. As he soaped up, he went over the news on the Sympatico Syndrome. He had to have over-reacted. That was it.
As he dressed, he grabbed the television remote from his nightstand and aimed it at the small TV mounted in the corner of the bedroom.
The story was getting bigger but seemed as if most of the panic was centered on the West Coast. He wasn’t sure he was buying it. While last night’s trip to the store hadn’t been a brawl-fest like what he saw on the feeds from the West Coast, his ribs were still tender from the sharp jab he’d received.
Cole flicked through the channels, reading the crawl across the bottom of the screen that told of another nine hundred and eleven people who had died overnight. Most of the deaths were in California, but there was also several hundred in Texas, most on military bases. Chicago was reporting a hundred and eighteen deaths overnight.
His first thought was of Elly. Had she made it out okay? He hoped she had found a way to get back home to Atlanta.
That the disease was hitting the military made sense from his perspective. The disease had started on a military base. He wished he had access to passenger lists departing from Aislado.
Cole itched to hop on a plane and head to the source of the disease. It was too late now, but if he’d learned of it last week, maybe he could have made a difference. What if he hadn’t retired? Would he have spotted the danger earlier? He liked to think he would have, but the truth of the matter was, he might have missed it too.
He wanted to dig into what had happened. Was it some dormant virus found only on some remote part of the island? Was it a virus that humans had never encountered before? He supposed that could be the case, and Aislado had only been inhabited for the last hundred years or so, but it didn’t seem likely. It wasn’t that big of an island. While it had some forest, it wasn’t a jungle.
Only one other island in the world was as remote, but it didn’t have a military base. In fact, one of the reasons the base had a level four bio-lab was due to the remoteness of the island. It was felt that in the event of a breach, the island could be locked down. He shook his head. Obviously, that hadn’t worked. His gut instinct was that this disease wasn’t naturally occurring. What if it was the result of biological weapons experiment? He’d bet a good number of the military personnel who had left Aislado in the last week had carried the disease with them. And, being military, once they got to San Diego, they would have scattered to various connecting flights, or stayed over a day or two before catching a flight to other parts of the country.
After dressing, he grabbed his phone and called Hunter. No answer. Dammit! He looked to see if his son had replied to the text he’d sent last night. Nothing. His stomach clenched. How could he leave for Uncle John’s island if he didn’t know where his son was?
6
A knock on the window woke Hunter. He blinked, and bolted upright in the driver’s seat. A police officer rapped his knuckles against the window a second time.
“Could you step out of the vehicle please?”
“Uh…yeah. Sure.” He fumbled for the door handle and slowly opened it. “Is there a problem?” He looked around the parking lot. He had driven as far as he could last night, but had become too tired to drive anymore, but heeding his dad’s warning, didn’t want to stop at a motel or even a rest-stop. Instead, he had pulled into a church parking lot. It had seemed the safest place he could find. The church was located on the outskirts of a small town only a few hundred miles from his college. He’d hoped to get more miles in, but after getting as many of the supplies that his father had suggested, he’d only been able to drive a little over three hours before fatigue set in.
The cop eyed him but didn’t get too close. “Show me your license.”
Hunter reached for his wallet, conscious of the officer’s tense posture. Slowly pulling his license from the billfold, he extended it to the cop. “I was just catching a few hours of sleep. I was driving,” he gestured in the direction of the highway, “but got so tired, I thought I better pull off before I fell asleep at the wheel.” He thought maybe the cop would give him credit for doing the smart thing, but instead, he just scowled at Hunter.
The cop glanced at the license and handed it back. “You’re a long way from home.”
“I go to school in Colorado, but I’m on my way back home.”
The cop looked Hunter up and down, and then peered into the backseat of Hunter’s car. “Well, if you’re looking for the homeless shelter, this church only serves as an emergency shelter one night a week, and that’s on Thursdays, so you’ll have to leave.”
Hunter put his license away. “Homeless shelter?”
The cop indicated the clothes piled high in the back of Hunter’s car. “Living out of your vehicle?”
“Oh! No. I just told you—I go to school in Colorado at the university.” He was glad he’d put most of his purchases in the trunk of the car. One of them had been an excellent crossbow along with two dozen arrows. He had taken archery classes when he was a kid and had been pretty good. He had even competed for a few years but gave it up when he started working a part-time job after school. Since all the guns—every single one—was sold out, it couldn’t hurt to have a good bow. Since buying it, he’d been rehearsing how to tell his dad about the purchase. At close to five hundred dollars, not including the extra arrows, he knew his dad would have a fit when the bill came due. He’d have to figure out a way to pay for it, but last night, with the fear of an apocalypse looming in his mind, it had seemed like a logical purchase, but now in the light of day, he felt silly for the fear he’d felt last night.
The cop opened his mouth to say something, but his shoulder radio sounded, the dispatch
er saying something about a fight at some store. The cop sighed and keyed in a reply. Afterward, he pointed at Hunter and circled his hand to encompass the car. “I’m going, to put it bluntly. Leave town. And here’s some more advice—don’t go into any other towns. Go straight to your destination. People are going a little crazy because of that Sympatico disease.”
Hunter nodded. Maybe his dad hadn’t been exaggerating his fears. “Yes, sir.”
After returning to his car, he sat for a few minutes and checked his phone. Shit. It was dead. He rooted around in the center console for his charger. He had the extra power banks, but he’d tossed them in a backpack that was now buried under the pile of clothes. After plugging the phone into the car charger, he had to wait for it to get enough juice to power on.
He glanced in the rearview mirror when he heard raucous laughter. Curious, he watched a group of people at the far end of the street. Even from over a block away, he had no trouble hearing them. They seemed to be drunk, and he glanced at the dashboard clock. It was still early. Barely after seven a.m. He could understand a lone drunk staggering down a street, but a group of twenty? At this time of day? As he watched, a few men in the group darted off, dodging oncoming cars, making the drivers screech to a halt and blast their horn. The guys returned to the group, laughing hysterically. The sound of it sent a chill down Hunter’s back. There was something off about them. Even the women were cackling like hyenas. Not waiting around for his phone to charge, he put the car in drive and tore out of the parking lot and made a beeline for the highway.
Sympatico Syndrome Trilogy Box Set Page 5