“Got it. Cool.” I felt awkward now. I hardly knew these people, and wasn’t the most outgoing person to begin with.
Shanti finished up in silence. She remained on her knees as she observed Jake in the pale light of the flashlight. After a moment, she turned and caught me watching her. “You okay?” she asked.
I shrugged. “Define ‘okay’ and I’ll give you an answer. I’m not hurt. What I am is useless. I don’t add anything to the group.”
The Indian girl watched me with her dark eyes. “You aren’t. Not really. No one is useless.” She hesitated for a moment. “To be honest, I felt the same when I first joined the group. Zero, Jake, and Rex always seemed so put together. They never seemed to need help.”
I huffed out a laugh. “That hasn’t been my experience. Not so far.”
Zero had needed my help almost immediately. Several times, in fact.
Shanti laughed. “Yeah? Then you’ve been helpful. So, what are you complaining about?”
A half-smile crossed my face. “Being useless now? I guess?”
She frowned and stared at me for a few seconds. “Z might get upset at me for asking, but… are you… could you be…?”
Her voice trailed off, and I watched her struggle to come up with the question. “What? Could I be what?”
“Guys? Food is ready,” Zero informed us. Her voice seemed flat, exhaustion in every word. Not at all the normal tired but eager voice I’d grown accustomed to.
Shanti nodded. “We’re coming.” She stood and looked toward me again. “Never mind. It’s not important, okay? Not right now, anyway.”
“Right. Sure,” I agreed. “Not the time. Let’s eat.”
Zero scooped out helpings of the cheesy pasta for everyone. With the ranch sauce, the flavor was a bit different, but it brought to mind simpler times. Days before the outbreak, when a bowl of mac and cheese was the go-to meal. For myself… and my parents.
I stirred the pasta around the bowl listlessly. Everyone here had lost people. I doubted there was a single person in the country who hadn’t. That’s why Zero and this group she’d pulled together were so important. A found family to help conquer the pain of the lost ones.
Until more than half of the group disappeared and Zero was led to believe Jake had died. Her most trusted friend and confidante. Even knowing he’d survived wasn’t enough to wipe out the pain that the thought of losing him had caused.
“Eat, Mike. Who knows when we’ll be able to make a decent hot meal again,” Rex urged. “Especially one that isn’t some kind of soup or stew.”
He had a good point. Wasting food was no longer something we could stand to do. I forced a bite, found it good, and ate the rest more quickly. “Thanks, Zero. It’s nice to have a warm meal.”
She hardly acknowledged my comment, but I couldn’t take it personally. The girl was beyond exhausted. Zero struggled to keep her eyes open, and her words came out soft and careful. “We should try to get Jake up. He needs water and food.”
“Let us worry about that, Z,” Rex said. “Mike, Kate, and I can handle him. You come and get some rest. I’ll make sure we have guards.”
A true testament to her exhaustion was when she did as Rex said without any argument. Or even any further comment. Zero did, however, pick one of the bed areas closest to Jake.
I went with Rex and Kate into the living room while Alex and Ali headed upstairs to search for more first aid supplies. Kate ran a hand over Jake’s cheek, then softly called for him to wake up. She only grew louder when he didn’t respond immediately. “Jake! It’s time to wake up now.”
His eyes squinted tightly shut and he groaned, his hands going to the wound on his side before he opened his eyes. “Hey, you,” Kate said softly. “Think you can move? We need to get you into some clean clothes, and rewrap your side.”
Rex and I stepped forward to help him sit up while Kate located a clean shirt and pants in Jake’s bag. She also prepared the bandage material.
Rex nudged me. “Hey, wanna go get a bottle of water and a helping of the mac and cheese for him?”
“Yeah. I’ll be right back.”
A quick glance toward Zero told me, despite her exhaustion, she had yet to fall asleep. Her eyes remained glued on Jake. I could understand it. After the loss of her parents, Jake was the only adult who stepped up to become her role model. He was a big brother for her, and was always there when she needed him.
I may not have been with the group for long, but their reliance on each other was obvious. A sigh escaped as I filled a bowl with food, and grabbed a bottle of water. I wanted to have that kind of relationship with someone. It would feel wonderful to have someone I could talk to and count on the way Zero counted on Rex and Jake.
Since the loss of my family, I hadn’t felt that comfortable with anyone. Hence my living in a cave until Zero and the others found me. Even the people in town who’d been willing to help me wouldn’t go out of their way to do so. They gave me supplies when I came to them for help, but wouldn’t do anything to protect me from the guards.
They didn’t even care to find out why the guards were so interested in me to begin with. So far, no one here had asked either. However, they did push me to come with them. They didn’t want me to remain by myself. I felt wanted here.
“Here, Jake,” I handed him the water. “Try some of this. If you’re up for it, I have some food.”
His answering smile faded into a grimace when he tried to reach for the bottle.
“Other hand may work better,” Kate suggested mildly.
Kate and Rex had managed to get Jake out of his old shirt and were partway through changing his bandage. I winced at the blood and angry bruising around the wound. It looked painful.
“You okay?” I asked. Stupid question. Why would I have even asked? The guy had been shot. Of course he wasn’t okay.
He took a sip of his water and nodded. “Yeah. I’m all right.”
A glare from Kate had him backtracking a bit. “Okay. Right now I’m not completely okay. But I will be. I have to be. We need to get our friends back.”
Kate finished wrapping the wound. “Keep this as clean as you can,” she ordered. “We don’t have any oral antibiotics. At least, not until we can break into a pharmacy somewhere. But we’ll find something.”
“Yeah. We’ll be passing a few towns on our way to the guard station,” Rex added. “We should be able to find something that can work.”
The other boy picked up the button-down shirt Kate had retrieved. “Here. This should be easier for you to get on than a T-shirt.”
Easier, probably. But Jake still needed help from Rex to get it on, and he nearly collapsed back onto the couch once they were done.
I waited, feeling awkward holding the bowl of pasta while Jake panted like he’d just run a marathon. Rex finally looked up at me. “I’m not sure he’ll be up for eating that right now. Give him a few minutes, then I think we’ll try some fruit or something instead.”
“Fruit. Right. Something light and easy on the stomach. I’m on it,” I agreed, practically sprinting from the room in my desire to do something helpful.
I poured the pasta back into the pan, and used a paper towel to wipe out the bowl. There was a can of peaches in water that I thought would be better than the pears in syrup. Although, maybe he would need the sugar…
I almost ran back to the living room to ask, but Alex stepped up behind me. “What are you doing?” he asked.
“Trying to decide what would be the best thing for Jake to eat right now,” I answered honestly. “What do you think?”
He tapped the pears. “I think his body could use the extra sugar after the shock today. We don’t have anything with electrolytes, but the syrup might help. That’s what I’d do, anyway.”
“Electrolytes? Wait. I thought I saw…” My voice trailed off for a moment as I dug into one of the plastic containers on the back shelf of the pantry. “Aha! Drinking water additives. Some of these have electrolytes.”
“True. Thanks, Alex.”
“You’re welcome.”
He hovered as I prepared the electrolyte mixture for Jake. “Can I help you with anything?” I asked. “Have you and Ali found first aid supplies?”
“We found a small kit. There’s a tube of antibiotic cream in it. Ali is upstairs watching out the window. I wanted to come down to see how Jake is doing.”
“Have you gone in yet?”
He shook his head. “No. I… I feel like an outsider. Thought I’d wait and go in when you do.”
I chuckled. Alex looked away in embarrassment. “No. I don’t mean anything by it,” I assured him. “It’s just… I haven’t been with them long either. In fact, everyone here left to go to Ground Zero a few days after I joined them. I barely know any of them.”
“Really? I wouldn’t have guessed. You fit right in. You never seem to question where you should be,” he said.
“Yeah… I may project a more confident personality than what I actually feel.” I coughed awkwardly. “Anyway, we should get back to them. Jake should have some food and this drink before he gets more sleep.”
Alex nodded, and we went back to the living room. Zero, I noticed, had closed her eyes. Her breathing was slow and gentle. Asleep. Finally.
“Here,” I said softly, handing the drink to Jake. “I found some drink mix with electrolytes. Should help get you hydrated a bit better.”
He took it with a smile of thanks. Kate had retreated to one of the sleeping areas, but Rex still sat with Jake.
“You up for some food?” I asked. “I found peaches in water or pears in syrup.”
Jake grinned. “I’ve always been partial to pears. I might be able to eat some.”
The can and bowl were still in the kitchen. “I’ll be right back.”
“Thanks, Mike,” he said.
As I made my way around the different beds, I thought I heard him ask Rex softly. “Are you sure he’s the one?”
I paused just outside the room and strained to hear Rex’s response. “…sure. But why else…?”
He spoke too softly for me to hear, but Alex’s voice was a bit louder. “I think he is,” he said. “But I’m not so sure he realizes it. Not yet, anyway.”
Chapter Seventeen
Zero
I rolled over and stretched. There was a patch of sunlight on my blanket, and I felt warm and lazy. As much as I’d worried I wouldn’t be able to sleep, apparently I’d managed. For the entire night. My eyes drifted to Jake’s spot on the couch, and I smiled at the proof that he hadn’t been killed.
Everyone else was still asleep. Except Rex. He wasn’t anywhere to be seen, and I didn’t hear anything from the kitchen to indicate he was preparing food, so I figured he was probably upstairs on watch duty.
A quiet night. Not our usual, but definitely a nice change of pace. If only everything else could go as smoothly.
I stretched one more time before I decided it was time to get up and get ready to leave. We had already been delayed by yesterday’s events, so we needed to get on the road to free our friends.
By the time I had a few cans of fruit open and the boxes of cereal out of the pantry, everyone else had gotten up. Jake even stood and slowly walked to the kitchen, one hand wrapped around his middle as he did so.
“We’ll pull you in the wagon for now,” I said. “Unless we find a vehicle nearby we can use.”
Rex came in from outside, a grin on his face. “Hey! There’s a van in the garage. I had to break in. One side is empty, but there’s a van there. And it’s got almost a full tank of gas!”
I grinned as well. “Excellent. A van should fit all of us plus our supplies. Any gas cans out there by chance?”
“Two five gallon ones. Unfortunately empty, but maybe we’ll be able to syphon some from vehicles on the road or in the towns we go through.”
Kate had a wide smile on her face. “That is ideal. Jake will be able to rest, and we should be able to make quite a dent in our travel time.”
For some reason, everyone else getting excited about the van made me a little wary of it. Not that it was a bad thing, but I did wonder whether it would help us as much as we hoped. We’d already seen some towns with barricades across the roads to prevent people from going through. If we ran into one of those it would slow us down.
“Just enjoy the moment, Z,” Jake said. He sat carefully on a chair at the kitchen table. “I think you’re overthinking things again.”
I smiled ruefully. “Yeah. You’re probably right.”
We ate in silence. Once we were finished, we separated to get cleaned up, gather our belongings, and collect any other useful supplies from the house. Rex and I went out to load our supplies and the wagons into the back of the van. Siren and King bounced around happily in the sunshine, thankfully wearing each other out a little before the ride in the van.
“I hope we’re able to use this for a decent amount of time,” I said. “It would be easier than having to walk everywhere.”
There was a rack full of keys near the front door, so Rex and I took them and tried each of them in the van until we found the correct key. “Nice. We don’t even have to hotwire the thing!” Rex celebrated.
“We’re ready to go. Let’s get the others loaded up.”
I eyed the vehicle and tried to determine how best to get everyone seated. “Kate will obviously have to drive. Do you think Jake should be in the front seat, or do the rest of us squeeze and let him take the back seat?”
“There are eight of us, and two dogs, Z. I think we’ll have to have him in the front seat so the rest of us can actually fit. He can recline if he’s uncomfortable sitting up. You and I should be near the sliding doors in case we run into trouble. They’ll open easily for us to shoot at anyone or anything that might try to stop us.”
“Sounds good,” I agreed.
Everyone came out with their packs of supplies and personal weapons. Kate got in and drove the van out of the garage so it would be easier to load everyone up.
A slight tingle began at the back of my neck. The creatures weren’t super close, so I decided to test my fellow experiments as we drove. “Guys, let me know if you feel any of the creatures at any point.”
I called the dogs into the van and directed them to the small sections of floor space open to them.
“Aren’t you going to be feeling them out?” Shanti asked as Kate pulled out of the driveway.
“Well, yeah,” I told her. “But it would be good to figure out who of us can sense the creatures, and how close they need to be for you to tell.”
Alex stiffened. “You’re feeling some now, aren’t you?” he asked. “That’s why you’re asking.”
“I do. They’re pretty far away, so I thought it would be a good time to test you guys.”
“I don’t feel anything,” Shanti said. She actually sounded a bit bored, despite knowing zombies were around.
Not too surprising, especially since I told her they were pretty far off. And getting farther as we drove. Although there were some coming up ahead of us too.
Kate drove confidently through the back roads, and I wondered whether she’d had time to check the maps, or if she just happened to know this area.
“I feel something,” Alex said. “I think they’re nearby. It’s making my whole body feel like I need to either run or hide.”
I nodded. “Yeah. They’re pretty close. We should be going fast enough to avoid this group though.” I glanced at Shanti and Ali. “Do either of you feel them?”
Ali nodded hesitantly. Shanti shook her head. It didn’t surprise me too much that Shanti didn’t feel them. She had never told me anything about feeling them before, and we’d been up close and personal with them many times.
“Okay, so you two can feel them if they’re pretty close. Based on what I feel we sh
ould see a couple of them within a minute or so.”
Shortly after I spoke, I pointed out Rex’s window. There, a few zombies tried to rush the van. They came from around a small grouping of houses, and fell behind us within a few seconds.
Mike let out a low whistle. “You’re pretty good, Zero,” he said. “Definitely a helpful talent.”
“True. But I wasn’t trying to show off. I’m trying to give Alex and Ali an idea of the difference in reactions depending on how far away they are,” I explained.
The siblings exchanged a glance, and Alex nodded. “Yeah. She and I were pretty much limited to dealing with zombies who were super close to the compound. We had to push them away, or they would have come in and killed everyone, including us.”
I glanced back at Mike and frowned thoughtfully. He had to be the other experiment. Right? No one else made sense. My connection to the creatures had definitely changed when he joined us.
Mike shifted when he saw my eyes on him. “What?” he asked.
“Nothing.” I shook my head. “I just… I’m just thinking.”
He chuckled. “That much is obvious.”
Mike’s chuckle died, and he suddenly frowned. “Seriously, though. What’s going on? I keep getting the feeling that you all want to ask me something, but no one is stepping up to actually ask.”
Jake glanced toward the back when Mike’s voice raised a bit. “Just ask him, Z. Better for us to know, isn’t it?”
I sighed. As usual, Jake was right. I turned toward the back seat with a huff. “Fine. Mike, we’ve all been thinking that you have to be one of the experiments.”
We were coming up on more of the creatures, but the light tingle told me it wasn’t an urgent issue just yet. This conversation had to happen.
Rex gave me a sideways glance at the blunt statement, but nodded. “Yeah. It seems to make sense. Why else would the guards have been out to get you? Of everyone in your town, what could a teenager have done to draw their attention?”
Mike didn’t seem overly surprised by the question, but acted uncertain. “I… I don’t think so. I’ve never been able to feel the monsters. Never created one either, as far as I’m aware. And, I don’t remember ever losing a chunk of time or being kidnapped and experimented on.”
Countdown to Zero (Patient Zero Book 2) Page 8
