by Tara Ellis
“I have no way of testing it, Alex.”
“The Mudameere’s will be changing the virus too. Even if what you came up with will work on the current sample, how could it possible work on a different one?”
“It is hard to get across the vastness of this,” he says quietly. “Think of a large bucket of sand. I reached down into the middle and moved a few grains around and took out one or two. So long as the other scientists do not remove the exact same grains, then my anti-viral medication should work.”
Opening the black velvet box in his lap, he holds it out to me. “Did I mention Susan makes beautiful jewelry?”
Just when I was beginning to think he could hold a rational thought for more than five minutes, we have yet again taken another detour. Resigned, I look down and am captivated in spite of myself. The bracelet looks like it’s made out of hammered copper and has been expertly crafted and manipulated into intricate designs. Taking it out of the box, Professor Hassan places it on my wrist. It is a snug fit, and even though I’m not much into jewelry, I think the small, discreet piece is very attractive.
“Even with the data I gave you, it will take the other Khufu Bast scientists days to replicate it. But with this, they can begin production much quicker.” Intrigued, I watch as he slides his finger under the center of the bracelet. The small, thicker piece at the center of the design pops open, revealing a small space. Inside is what appears to be a tiny capsule. The hairs on the back of my neck stand up; the prickling continuing down to the base of my spine. This can’t be good.
“Before you leave today, I will give you a map. It will lead you to a horse farm near Bigfork, Montana. Senator Zane Adel lives there. He is the highest placed member of the Khufu Bast here in the States and will have the resources to do what is needed. But Alex, you have to hurry.” The urgency in the professor’s voice brings me back to reality and I sit up a little straighter.
“There’s no way I can make this trip and it has to be hand delivered. Time is running out for us. If the Mudameere release their new version of the virus before you get there Alex, you have to take this capsule. I can’t guarantee that it will work, but it’ll be your best chance. Only do it if you develop symptoms though. There is a good chance you’ll still be immune to any airborne version, but not the bloodborne. So long as you take this within 24 hours of exposure, it should be effective. Your blood could then be used to reproduce it. I’m sorry I don’t have more than one capsule, but I actually just finished this one last night. It’ll be another week before I can produce a few more because my supplies for the ingredients are limited. The plan had always been for me to do the research, not the production.”
With the new information tumbling around in my head, I wait for it all to settle into place and to come to terms with what’s ahead. We have a plan now, a destination, a contact and even a possible way to fight back. Standing up with renewed energy, I gently close the cover on the bracelet and face the professor. “Well I guess I better get going then.”
FOUR
The stars have started to come out, but the moon won’t be up for hours so it will be a dark night. Looking at the group seated around me, I can barely make out their faces in the fading light. We’ll have to be careful going back, and not turn on our flashlights unless absolutely necessary. We are all so use to the trail by now though, that it’s like walking around your house with the lights off. Well, almost.
The days have continued getting warmer as we draw closer to summer, but even in mid-May the nights in the Cascade Mountains are cool. I pull the hood up on my sweatshirt to hold in the heat, but it makes it too hard to hear the whispered conversation going on around me, so I pull it back down. Should’ve grabbed my warmer jacket.
I have just finished explaining to them everything that happened today at the professor’s. It’s a lot to talk about. I focus on Chris directly across from me. He’s engaged in a heated debate with his friend Nate about exactly how we are going to get from Washington State to Montana.
Chris and I met up at the rendezvous point on the way home today, like originally planned. He didn’t see anyone following or watching me or the professor’s house. Actually, the only other traffic he saw was an Army jeep on the main road, probably going to trade places with the road block crew.
I was so relieved to see him standing there, leaning casually up against the stop sign. I hadn’t realized how stressed I really was until I pulled up to him and he promptly lifted me from the bike and gathered me up in a big hug. I melted against him, tears threatening for the second time in a day. It took me all of about 30 seconds to get embarrassed and push gently away, pretending to laugh it off.
I blush slightly, remembering how he made me feel. Chris’s voice gets a bit louder and even in the gathering darkness I can see his scowl deepen. I’m reminded of the important discussion at hand and shake my head to clear it.
I watch my two friends silently for a minute, trying to decide if I need to intervene. Chris runs a hand through his thick, black hair, clearly frustrated. It’s gotten even longer these past weeks and I had joked with him earlier that I was going to braid it soon if he didn’t get it cut. He’s almost full Omak Indian, so it would actually look good with his dark, sharp features. I cover my face with my hands, realizing my mind is wandering again. I must be tired.
“How in the world are we going to afford the gas to drive there?” Nate is demanding, his voice much louder than Chris’s. Even though we are out in the middle of the woods, he’s being too loud. We’ve been meeting at a secret fishing spot that my brother Jake and I have used for years. It’s secluded, but voices carry out here.
“Nate!” I interrupt. He looks at me, red hair standing out in sharp contrast to his pale skin. He and Chris are good friends, and it’s totally normal for them to have a good debate about pretty much everything. I think they enjoy it. Now just isn’t the right time for it.
“Gas isn’t the issue. Not for the first part of the trip, anyway. Professor Hassan has a couple hundred gallons stored in his shed and he said we are welcome to as much as we can carry with us. If you would listen to Chris, he was trying to tell you that.” I smile at him, and he returns the gesture good-naturedly. He isn’t done though.
“I get that, Alex. But what are we going to do after it runs out? We’ll have to carry it on several miles of trail before we reach the truck you guys hid. A five gallon can of gas weighs about 35 pounds. I figure at most, we can manage five of those between all of us. That only gives us 25 gallons in addition to whatever gas is already in the truck. At best, it’ll take more than one tank to get to Bigfork.”
I have no idea how he knows what five gallons of gas weighs. Nate is full of random information. I believe him though, and at least he lowered his voice. “We only need to get as far as Couer’d’Alene, Idaho,” I explain. “My friend Missy and her family live there. I’m sure they’ll be able to help us out.”
This trip is already full of unknowns, so I don’t blame him for asking questions. Starting with my truck. Mom and I hid it in the woods several miles outside of town. It had been Chris’s idea when he was still healing from the gunshot wound. A few advance government investigators had shown up in Omak and he was afraid they would shut everything down once they located the pyramid. He, of course, had been right, and now it was our best chance of getting away. If it was still there.
Chris’s other friend, Kyle, slaps Nate hard on the back. “Don’t worry so much, Red. Worst thing that can happen is we get captured by either the Army or these other Muddie guys and they do all sorts of twisted experiments on us.” Nate glares at Kyle, but it effectively shuts him up.
I can’t help but laugh, and appreciate Kyle’s ability to always find the lighter side. He’s much taller than Nate, and even Chris. He and Chris played football together, so they have that kind of team camaraderie, which we really need.
Mom reaches out and picks up the thumb drive that I had placed in the middle of our circle. “We need to put t
his someplace safe. Maybe we should hide it. What do you think, Lisa?” Chris’s Mom looks up at the mention of her name. She is sitting next to him, Jacob on her other side, and then me and Mom.
“I don’t know, Katie,” she says quietly. “When do you guys plan on leaving?”
Chris looks down at his mom, concerned. I wince slightly, knowing where this is headed. “What do you mean, Mom? You’re coming with us.”
Looking away from her son, Lisa takes the drive from Mom and studies it for a minute. “I think I should stay here, distract them for a while if anyone notices you are gone.”
“That would be a bad idea,” Nate says. “According to Alex, the professor told her before she left that we were right not to trust the government. Right, Alex?”
“Yeah,” I confirm, thankful now for his analytical mind. “He said the Mudameere are all over it, highly placed. We have to assume that any kind of action to locate anything associated with the pyramid is conducted by them.”
“Okay then,” he continues, turning his attention to Lisa. “Once they realize we are gone, they will take you. They won’t let you go until you tell them what they want to know. I’m pretty sure they wouldn’t follow any interrogation rules either. You already know everything, where we are going and what we have with us. They would get that out of you one way or the other. It’s too much of a risk for any of us to stay here, now.”
Resigned, she hangs her head. I feel so bad for Chris, that his Mom would actually be okay with being apart from him. It isn’t her fault, but it’s still hard to understand. Chris puts an arm around her, always supportive.
“Okay,” she finally agrees and gives the thumb drive back to me. “I think you should hide it. Don’t tell anyone where it is. Not even us.”
At this moment, I can see so much of Chris in her and the way her mind works. If the professor is right about the neural pathways, maybe there is still hope that her personality will return. Mom has told me how stroke victims continue to recover for years as their brains re-build connections. I take the drive from her and stick it back in my pocket. “Good idea, Lisa. Thank you.”
“I wanna leave tonight.” Jacob is pulling at my arm, and I’m surprised at his eagerness. He’ll be eleven in a couple of months and has had to grow up quickly lately. I’ve been impressed with his resolve more than once, but right now, he seems very young. Baxter, our golden retriever, looks up from the head of the trail where he’s been pacing and whines at us. When he goes back to sniffing after being acknowledged, I take it to mean he is sensing Jacob’s anxiety, rather than that anything is wrong.
“We can’t leave right now, Jake,” I say, hating to see the disappointment on his face. “Trust me, I would love to, but there are too many things we have to do first. When we get back home tonight, we’ll pack what we need and get it ready to go. I think we should set a time and place to meet tomorrow and head out to the professor’s property. Now that we know it’s safe to go there we can just drive, but we’ll have to go on foot from there. It’ll be several hours to the truck. ”
“No, we can’t do it tonight,” Mom agrees. “Everyone will be pushing it to make it home before curfew as it is. There’s no way we could be on the road before that, and we certainly can’t try and leave afterwards. We have to be smart about it.”
She’s right. It’s already after nine. The curfew was started by the military the second night they were here. Anyone caught outside after eleven is automatically detained and identified. We can’t risk any extra attention.
“That reminds me,” I say and pull a weird looking placard from my back pocket. It’s the kind that hangs from a rearview mirror. “Professor Hassan gave this to me. He got it from the lab he worked at during the outbreak. It’s a special pass thingy for medical personnel. I figure that if there are any other roadblocks out there, this along with Mom’s personal pass for work should get us through. Once we’re outside of Omak, I doubt anyone is really going to care too much. You can say you’re being transferred to another hospital or something, Mom, and that we are all extended family.”
Mom nods in agreement and smiles at me. Oh man, this might actually work. It’s starting to sink in that we are going to finally leave Omak and my stomach flutters a bit with excitement. I hope we can come back here someday, if things are ever normal again. Jake and I grew up here. It’s where all the best memories of Dad are and we love our home. Right now though, this place has become our prison instead of our retreat.
“More people were taken today,” Nate says, confirming my feelings of isolation and fear.
It began last week. At first, it was just one person at a time. There doesn’t seem to be any correlation between the people selected, at least not that we can figure out. They started with Mr. Pearson, our old P.E. teacher. The story was that two soldiers came up to him in front of the Library and after exchanging a few words, grabbed him roughly and forced him into their unmarked SUV. No one has heard or seen from him since. His wife tried going to the central command and asking about him, but they refuse to talk with her. He had been a shiner, but just a couple of days later Mrs. Olsen was taken too and she hadn’t been infected during The Shining.
Two days ago, a brother and sister were abducted from their own house, the dad badly beaten when he tried to stop it. This was a big part of waking us up and forcing us to take action. We had been getting way too comfortable with just hiding. It was becoming more obvious that it was only going to get worse and we had to go talk with the professor.
Jacob knew the young boy that was taken; he’d been in his class. He was at the park with his family during the Holocene meteor shower and his whole family had been sick. It didn’t seem to make any sense. What would a boy his age have that the military wanted, but leave the parents? I reach out and take Jake’s hand to reassure him, but he pulls away. Looking at him, I can see that he is struggling to appear brave in front of the older boys. So maybe he really is growing up.
“Who did they take this time?” Chris asks, the night too dark now for me to read his expression.
“It really sucks you guys,” Kyle adds before Nate can answer. “Coach Johnson, his wife, and their son were all seen being dragged into one of the SUV’s out in front of their house. The Coach put up a pretty good fight ‘til they knocked him out with a rifle and then threatened the neighbors with it so they’d move back. I guess it was a really ugly scene and a lot of people saw it happen. Whoever they are, they’re getting bolder. I mean, it takes some iron-“
“-What do you mean ‘whoever they are’?” Chris interrupts. I can tell he is talking through clenched teeth. I didn’t personally know the football coach, but Chris played for him all through High School. I’m sure they were probably friends.
“Well, people were talking about it all afternoon,” Kyle explains. “They were saying that these guys aren’t wearing the same uniforms as the regular military. It’s like black SWAT team gear without any insignia on them. The Army has to be aware of what’s going on and allowing it, but word is that there’s another group at work here. Doing what, no one knows. You think it’s these Muddie guys?”
“Mudameere,” I correct. “And I don’t have a clue.” I’m struggling now to see Chris, to find some reassurance. I can’t believe I didn’t suspect them right away. I feel like an idiot. We shouldn’t still be here. Something wet touches the back of my left ear and I jump, realizing at the same time that it’s just Baxter. I swear he’s grinning at me as I pet his head. Putting an arm around him, he sits down in between Mom and me and leans into my side.
“It doesn’t matter who it is,” Chris says. “We can’t do anything about it and we’re leaving in the morning. Best thing we can do now for anyone is to get the information to this Senator guy. Nate,” he continues, “I appreciate your concern about the gas and how we’ll manage to get the rest of the way after Idaho. The reality is that we don’t know anything for sure right now. We’ll just have to do the best we can. I know that we’re all grateful fo
r your and Kyle’s help. You’re good friends.”
I hear them clasping hands and patting each others’ backs in the darkness, and feel relief that we are all united. We have to be if we’re going to be successful.
“It’s time to go.” I can tell that Mom is growing more nervous. She is supposed to work the night shift tonight. Another reason why we can’t go until morning that I hadn’t even considered. Not only is the curfew in about an hour, but she is supposed to be at the hospital by then. It’ll be up to me to pack our things, but we have already talked about what we will need. We’ll be traveling as lightly as possible.
Everyone mumbles in agreement and slowly get to their feet. We all pause for a moment, knowing we are on the brink of leaving this reality behind. A small group of friends brought together by unimaginable tragedy. No words are spoken, but the bond connecting us is strong. Lisa leads the way and we all silently follow her up the trail.
FIVE
It takes less than half an hour to get back to my house, following the level trail that winds through the woods surrounding our property. Everyone says goodnight quickly and heads out, except for Chris. His mom drove here while he rode his bike. I can tell he wants to talk with me alone, but it will have to be fast. It’s almost 10:30 and it’ll take him ten minutes to ride home.
Mom literally runs to her room and is still pulling her nursing smock on as she runs back out to the garage. “I’ll be back around 7:30 tomorrow morning, Alex. Please have everything ready.” She’s already getting into her small Honda when she pauses. Quickly turning to where I am standing nearby, she hugs me tightly. “Love ya, Ally.”
She hasn’t used that nickname in a long time. For some reason it stirs up memories of an earlier, normal time. As I hug her back, I realize that it’s because we have hope now. “I love you too, Mom,” I tell her before she closes her door.
