No Safe Haven: A Last Sanctuary Novel

by Kyla Stone

  “Stay back,” her father said.

  She didn’t point out that she’d already had contaminated bodily fluids sprayed at her face from less than a foot away. If the mask hadn’t protected her, there was no point in taking precautions now. That horse had already left the barn.

  Her father coughed and cleared his throat.

  She knelt on the paved pathway beside the body. She wished he still looked like the Zachariah she’d known and loved, the one who was always grinning, his dark skin splitting into a hundred groves and wrinkles, who loved to ruffle her hair, who’d nicknamed her ‘Little Bird’ with great affection. “Is he—is he dead?”

  Her father holstered the tranq gun. “If he isn’t yet, he will be soon.”

  Her gaze snagged on the small gray tube with the orange top sticking out of Zachariah’s concave chest. She reared back, her stomach wrenching. “What did you do?”

  “He’s no longer suffering,” her father said, his voice flat, expressionless.

  She jerked out the dart and stared at the syringe, the needle. She stumbled to her feet, reeling. “You gave him a dose intended for a tiger. You stopped his heart. You…you killed him.”

  “He was dying anyway.”

  It was true. She knew it was true. Still, the thought of pointing a gun, even a tranq gun, at a friend and then pulling the trigger set bile roiling in her stomach. She took a steadying breath, then another. “I didn’t say goodbye.”

  “He wasn’t himself anymore,” her father said brusquely. “He could barely speak.”

  Still, revulsion filled her. It seemed so horrible, too horrible. She felt sick, her whole body going hot, then cold, then hot again. She thought of the virus, possibly inside her. The same virus that had done this to Zachariah.

  “I should have kicked him out the moment he coughed.”

  She looked sharply at her father. “And abandon him when he most needed us? Where would he go? Who would feed him or bring him water? Who would take care of him?”

  His face was strained, eyes glittering with anger. “He promised me he’d stay in the loft. He swore to me.”

  “He was sick! Crazed with pain.”

  “It was a mistake to allow him to stay.”

  “He is—was—family.”

  “No, he wasn’t. He wasn’t family, and he shouldn’t have been here. I should’ve kicked him out like I wanted to.” His gaze slanted at Raven, harsh and angry.

  She was the one who’d begged to allow Zachariah to stay, who’d suggested the quarantine in the loft. It was her fault. Her father blamed her for this.

  She shook her head, incredulous. Did her father even have a heart? Did he really even care about anyone else? He hadn’t wept a single tear when her mother left. And he would’ve abandoned Zachariah—whom he’d known for fifteen years—without a backward glance or second thought.

  Anger boiled up, but she shoved it down. It was useless. Her father didn’t care about her outrage. “What now?” she asked. “We have to bury him. We have to…do something.”

  “I’ll take care of it.”

  “We have to bury him,” she repeated.

  Her father glanced down at the body, eyes narrowing. “I said I’ll take care of it.”

  “That’s not the same thing.” Her father was unsentimental to the extreme. Who knew what his idea of ‘taking care of it’ meant. “He needs to be buried. We have to show our respects.”

  “Fine.” Her father expelled a sharp breath. “I will bury him.”

  “I’ll help you.”

  “No, you won’t.” His voice was steel.

  “He was my friend, too—”

  “I said no!” He coughed again, a deep, horrible hacking that shook his shoulders. He pulled down his mask to wipe his mouth with the back of his arm.

  Raven stared at the mask, aghast. It wasn’t white like it was supposed to be. Instead, it held a pinkish hue. Her gaze dropped to his right arm. His faded, long-sleeved plaid shirt was speckled with red droplets.

  Understanding struck her, sharp and swift as an axe blade. She saw suddenly what she hadn’t noticed with the world in chaos, Zachariah’s illness, the never-ending tasks of caring for the animals, dread over her impending birthday, and her own plans for escape—which suddenly seemed ridiculous, empty, and selfish.

  The sweat leaking down her father’s face, beading on his forehead, his lower lip, staining the underarms of his khaki shirt. Sweat on a cool day. The bruised circles beneath his eyes, which she’d assumed were from lack of sleep. The coughing—she’d believed it was simply his asthma.

  And the smell. Which she’d barely noticed until now, but Vlad had. Vlad, who was still frantically pacing behind the fence at the bottom of the hill, his lips pulled back from his two-inch fangs as he snarled and shook his head, unable to rid himself of the stench of something sharp and pungent, a sour, noxious scent that turned her stomach and filled her with dread.

  The stink of sickness.

  Her father was infected.

  4

  Raven slumped in a metal chair several feet from her father’s bed. Afternoon light slanted through the windows, bathing the room in warm shadows. Her father groaned, tossing uncomfortably, his limbs slick with sweat, his face gaunt, eyes hollowed.

  “Ten feet,” he’d growled when she tried to come closer. The CDC broadcasts had recommended remaining ten feet from any suspected infected persons. After a while, they simply advised survivors to stay away from everyone.

  She brought him a damp washcloth to press against his fevered forehead anyway, and a pitcher of water for his aching throat and rasping cough. Without power, the water and the washcloth were both warm. She couldn’t even give him ice for his parched thirst.

  It wasn’t enough. How could it possibly be enough?

  She stared dully at the bare, log-cabin walls. It had been a day since she’d realized the truth. Her father, who had hidden his symptoms and barreled through the pain, determined to endure, had collapsed at the breakfast table that morning.

  She knew what the vloggers had said in the newsfeeds, the parade of scientists and virologists and CDC experts, their technical terms masking the true horror: the Hydra virus was designed to destroy the human body from the inside out.

  After initial infection, there was a seventy-two-hour incubation period. On days two to four, mild coughing and sneezing set in, just enough to efficiently spread the contagion.

  Then, as the disease advanced through the later stages, came the high fevers, breathing difficulties, chronic coughing, and hemorrhaging from the mouth, eyes, and ears on days ten through twelve. Between days ten and fourteen came respiratory failure and death. Some infected experienced what Zachariah had—an adrenaline surge during the last stage, the virus’s last-ditch effort to spread itself.

  A small percentage of the population was immune. For the rest, the mortality rate was one hundred percent. There was no cure, no escape once you were infected. No reprieve. No hope.

  Which meant she was watching her father die.

  Raven hunched over a small pine log she’d chosen from the stack of firewood next to the fireplace. She scraped at the wood with numb, trembling fingers, barely seeing the object taking shape in her hands. Several times, her fingers slipped. The blade nicked her thumb, bit into her knuckle.

  She wiped the blood on her pants and kept working, breathing hard, cutting and cutting, carving deep into the soft wood, wood shavings tinged with red falling into her lap, drifting to the floor like shriveled petals. The feelings boiling inside her were too big, too horrible to look at head on.

  Her legs were shaking, aching to run, to flee, to escape this awful stench of sickness and her father’s awful rattling breaths. The darkness closed in on her, seeping into her skin, her pores, her cells.

  The sight of him lying there, quivering and helpless, body wracked in pain, sent a hot spike through her gut. She’d never seen him anything but capable, self-contained, strong and stoic, needing nothing and no one. Now
he was weak, suffering, a stranger with her father’s face.

  He may not have been the father she’d wanted—but he was the father she had. He was dying. And she was helpless.

  She closed her hands over the wooden bird she’d carved—a raven. One rough-hewn wing was stained a pale red from the nick in her finger. When she had been small, only four or five, she used to collect things—stray buttons, ribbons, pretty stones, bottle caps, magnets—anything shiny and bright and lovely. Her father had called her a little karasu, a raven. Her mother had laughed merrily—back when she still laughed—and the name had stuck.

  Her real name was Emiko, but no one had called her that in years. She’d loved that her father had given her a nickname. As a girl, she’d adored it, clung to it like one of the bright little pebbles she tucked under her pillow, hoping with all her heart that it meant he loved her.

  A small groan escaped Raven’s lips. She blinked away the burning in her eyes, shoved the knife and the carving into her cargo pocket, and stood abruptly, nearly knocking over her chair. “I’m going into town. I’ll find a doctor.”

  Her father opened his eyes, his face clenching from the effort of speaking. “There are…none.”

  She knew he was right. She knew billions were dead, and those who weren’t were taking care of themselves, their own families. She knew the hospitals had refused to admit any more sick people weeks ago. And even if there were doctors and hospitals, they wouldn’t be able to save her father. They hadn’t been able to save anyone.

  And yet her fear was an irrational thing. She clung to the old world with desperation. After all, she hadn’t left Haven herself. She hadn’t seen it with her own eyes. Surely it wasn’t that bad. Surely there were still doctors and surgeons and medical centers and people going to work and coming home and kids riding hoverboards and playing virtual reality games all day and stores with shelves full of food and medicine.

  “Then medicine! Something to ease the pain!” she choked out.

  “It’s not safe.” He turned his head slowly to look at her. His dark eyes were glassy. His sweat-damp hair was slick against his forehead. “I’ll be fine.”

  She let out a bitter laugh at the black irony. “I’ll be back before dark. I’ll make sure the animals are taken care of.”

  “Don’t take stupid risks,” he growled. “Not for anyone.”

  She’d heard that argument a hundred times. Keep to yourself. Keep your head down. Take care of yourself, first and only. That may be the way her father lived, but it didn’t mean she had to live the same way. Not now. Not like this. She’d obeyed him, only to watch her mother leave and Zachariah die.

  She’d been hours from leaving her father for good—for months, maybe years. But that was leaving by choice. That was leaving someone healthy and alive, someone you knew would continue to move and breathe and do all the things they’d always done while you were gone.

  This was different. This was a giant hand reaching inside the cage of her ribs and wrenching her heart out, squeezing the life from her veins while she watched.

  “It won’t take long, I promise. I’ll come right back.” She hadn’t left Haven in weeks, since before the Hydra virus reared its ugly head. First, she hadn’t had a reason to. And then her father hadn’t allowed it.

  “I forbid it,” he croaked.

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  His fingers scraped the bed sheets like claws, tendons bulging in his neck as a wave of agony pulsed through his body. She watched, frozen and helpless, sickened and horrified but unable to look away. Looking away felt like a betrayal, of both herself and her father.

  The pain released him, and he sagged against the mattress, panting. She grabbed the damp washcloth from the nightstand and tried to press it to his forehead, but he waved her away.

  He pointed a frail, trembling finger at his dresser beneath the window. The tranquilizer gun lay atop the dresser, steeped in golden sunlight. “You want to ease my suffering? That’ll do it.”

  “No,” she said, recoiling. “No.”

  “I want you to do it.” He took several ragged, rasping breaths. “I’m asking you to do it.”

  “I—I can’t.”

  He worked his jaw, like he sometimes did when he was chewing on words he’d rather keep to himself. “Let me go on my own terms.”

  Revulsion settled in her stomach like a block of ice. She shook her head, tasting acid in the back of her throat. “I’ll be back. With medicine.”

  “Raven!” he croaked. “Don’t you go!”

  But she was already headed for the door, frantic with the desire to escape that claustrophobic room full of the stench of sickness, swirling with the whispers of grief and bitterness and regret.

  “Take the tranq,” he said behind her.

  She stiffened for a moment, but she obeyed. She pivoted, seized the thing from the dresser, and fled the room.

  She rushed through the shadow-darkened living room, pausing only to grab her dad’s SmartFlex on the shabby coffee table so she could use the car. She’d already put one of the solar lamps on the nightstand in her father’s room next to the water pitcher. He’d have light even if she came back after dark. They saved the generator for the electrified fences to keep the carnivores inside where they belonged.

  Too many horrible thoughts churned through her mind. Her father was dying. He wanted her to kill him. She hated the thought of his suffering; she hated the thought of aiming a gun and pulling the trigger even less. That it was a dart and not a bullet meant little. The end result was the same. Quick and sudden death.

  She pushed those thoughts out of her mind. She needed to focus on one single thing at a time. Step A led to step B led to step C.

  If she found strong enough painkillers, he wouldn’t need the tranquilizer. She would get medication to ease her father’s pain. Then she would tackle what needed to be done next.

  Raven hurried out the door.

  5

  The town of Clay Creek was small and dingy by anyone’s standards. Population: 1,800. One crappy McDonalds. A grocery store. A mechanic shop. Two dreary gas stations that had seen better days. The nearest mall, not that Raven cared, was over thirty miles away. Ditto for the nearest big box store.

  Even on its best days, no one could say the town was busy. Today, it was a ghost town. Only a few people hurried along the sidewalks, heads down, masks covering their faces, gloved hands shoved deep into the pockets of their jackets to ward off the late afternoon chill.

  Most of the sagging storefronts were closed, many with two-by-fours barring their front doors. The windows of Dewie’s Barber and Shave were smashed in, the ancient red-and-white-striped barber pole knocked to the weed-infested sidewalk.

  Raven had passed several dozen abandoned cars on the twenty-mile drive in. There were more abandoned cars, several on the side of the road, one with both its doors hanging open; another parked at a stop sign, with no one inside.

  She drove to the doctor’s office first, a two-story brick building where she’d had every shot and check-up she could remember. It too had been broken into. Every window was shattered. The door had been taken right off its hinges.

  By the time she pulled her father’s battered fifteen-year-old forest-green Toyota into the empty parking lot of Maxwell Family Pharmaceuticals, the hairs on the back of her neck were standing on end. There were no broken windows. No graffiti on the brick exterior walls. The sidewalk was swept. A hand-scrawled sign taped to the front door said: “Still Open, 12-4 Daily.”

  Clay Creek was a small town, a safe town. Nothing like the chaotic, rioting cities. Still, the best thing was to get in and out as quickly as possible.

  She glanced at the tranq gun on the passenger side seat. She knew how to handle a gun. She’d gone hunting dozens of times. But the idea of using one against other people turned her stomach.

  She pushed her mask up over her nose and tugged on a fresh pair of disposable gloves her dad kept in the glove compartment. She stored the tr
anq gun inside, next to the box of gloves. It was there if she needed it.

  She shut and locked the car and hurried past several motorcycles parked outside the pharmacy. The bell tinkled as she opened the door and slipped inside. The shadows were deep, but there was enough daylight streaming through the windows to see by. The small shop smelled like pine air freshener and aftershave. She went straight to the back counter.

  Phil Maxwell, the owner, and his son Carl, who was in his mid-thirties, stood behind the counter. They both wore masks and gloves.

  “I don’t have much left,” Phil said, barely glancing at her as his gaze fixed on the four bikers, who stuck out like bulls in a china shop. The bikers—burly, tattooed—were hunched together against the far wall, prying at the junk food machine and swearing when the printer jammed.

  Raven scanned the nearly empty shelves. She licked her dry lips beneath her mask. “My dad is sick. He needs something that can help him.”

  A flash of pity shone in Phil’s eyes. “Kioko Nakamura was a good man. I’m sorry to hear that.”

  “He’s not dead yet,” she said, her heart constricting. It was a stupid thing to say, but she couldn’t help it.

  “He won’t get better,” Carl said. He was a short, toady man with a snubbed, flattened face and dull eyes. He always stared suspiciously at everyone under twenty, like he longed to accuse them of shoplifting or some other nefarious activity. Raven had never cared for him.

  She forced her voice to remain calm. “I know that. But he’s in pain. He’s suffering. I don’t have a prescription, but…”

  Phil sighed and ran his hands through the halo of white hair that ringed his balding head. “I’ve been keeping this place open for just that reason. Carl, go back and grab some oxycodone.”

  Carl scowled. “That’s our last bottle. Our livelihood. All that’s left—”

  Phil’s expression tensed. Shadows pooled beneath his eyes. “Just do it.” As Carl obeyed with a huff, Phil dragged his gaze back to Raven. “When’s the last time you had power?”