Isolation (Book 2): Going Out

by Jones, Nathan

  Darrel nodded his agreement. “You thinking the same thing I am, Mayor?”

  Darby nodded back and turned to Nick, suddenly businesslike. “Listen, um . . .”

  “Nick Statton,” he said, waving politely.

  The Mayor continued in a firm tone. “Listen, Statton. Wensbrook, southwest of us, got hit bad by Zolos near the beginning. Almost everyone there got bused to the St. Joseph quarantine camp with not much more than the clothes on their backs, and nobody's gone near the place since. It's a reasonably big town, about the same size as us, and completely abandoned and untouched. A scavenger's dream come true.”

  Nick was really starting to not like where this was going. “Now hold on! Driving a truck down to a relief stockpile to pick up supplies is one thing, but asking me to break into people's businesses or houses and loot their stuff is something completely different!”

  “Even if nine out of ten of those people are dead?” Darby asked quietly. “And the rest might never come back? We need that stuff, they don't anymore.”

  He shook his head in disgust. “And once I'm done with that, what, you planning to have me head to the nearest cemetery and dig up dead people to steal their jewelry?”

  “You wanted to be useful!” Darrel snapped. “With that town the site of a major outbreak, the stuff'll all rot and become useless before anyone has the guts to touch it. You'd be bringing it here where it can do some good instead.”

  “It's a step up from you and your kids being chased out of town by a mob terrified of Zolos carriers,” Darby agreed.

  Nick scowled. “I'm going to finish burying Mack, then I'm going back to take care of my bedridden daughter. I'll think about your request, and in the meantime how about you try to think of some way I can help out as someone immune to Zolos that doesn't involve looting?”

  “Scavenging,” the Mayor corrected firmly. “In order to help out not just your own family, but other families in a similar situation to yours who are currently huddled outside Stanberry, dependent on our limited supplies to survive.”

  That made Nick hesitate. He had wanted to find a way to pay the Norsons back for their generosity. If Wensbrook really had been hit hard by Zolos and evacuated, maybe scavenging there for supplies that would just rot untouched might not be the worst thing.

  “I'll think about it,” he said again, then turned and headed back to the grave to get back to digging.

  He was almost surprised when he looked up a minute or two later to find that Darby's group had left. Had he convinced them, or just bought himself some time before being kicked out?

  What was he going to do if they did make him and his kids leave? Could he at least convince them to let Ricky stay?

  Chapter Ten

  Scavenging

  Nick woke up bright and early the next morning.

  Specifically, he was sleeping peacefully on the pallet he'd made up next to Tallie's when loud voices calling his name from outside jolted him awake. One of them was unmistakably Darrel's less than pleasant growl.

  “You've got to be kidding me,” Nick muttered, dragging himself out of bed.

  “Daddy?” Tallie murmured, sleepy voice slightly fearful.

  He patted her shoulder. “It's fine, sweetie. Go back to sleep, I'll go talk to them.”

  As she snuggled deeper into her blankets he strode to the door and shoved it open, stepping outside to glare at Mayor Darby and Darrel, who were standing near an unfamiliar car parked in the driveway. “I'm here!” he snapped. “I said I'd think it over, no need to come shouting at my door at the crack of dawn.”

  “You mean the Norsons' shed?” Darrel shot back snidely.

  Darby put a restraining hand on the man's shoulder. “I hope you've been thinking it over carefully, Mr. Statton,” he said with a placating smile. “Because we certainly have been. Last night the City Council agreed on a resolution to authorize agents of Stanberry to scavenge in depopulated neighboring areas, in order to fill the town's stockpile for emergency use.”

  “Agents, as in me,” Nick said flatly.

  “If you want to stay at all,” Darrel growled.

  The Mayor quickly spoke over his buddy. “We've already prepared a moving truck for you to fill up, with enough fuel to get to Wensbrook and drive around a reasonable amount. And we'll have a location for the stockpile by the time you get back with the day's haul.”

  “The day?” Nick repeated incredulously. “My daughter can barely move. She needs constant care. I don't feel comfortable leaving her alone for more than a few hours at most, and since she's a Zolos carrier no one else can go near her.”

  “So take her with you,” Darrel said with a careless shrug.

  “To go ransack a town?” he demanded. “What if I run into trouble? There's more than a few wack jobs with guns running around taking advantage of the chaos to loot and-” he cut off, flushing as he realized how hypocritical that sounded under the circumstances.

  Darby shifted uncomfortably. “Well, we can ask around at the camp going up outside town, see if there's anyone immune to Zolos who could babysit her while you work.”

  Nick wasn't sure how he felt about having a complete stranger watch his helpless, recovering daughter. “Or you could just have them do your scavenging for you.”

  The tall man ignored that. “For now, though, I'm afraid you'll just have to bring her with you. I'm sure you can scout locations to make sure they're safe to bring her inside. Or you can leave her in the cab of the truck with the doors locked so she's safe.”

  Both of those sounded like terrible options to Nick. But he supposed beggars, or people facing a mob ready to run them out of town, couldn't be choosers.

  Oh well, he could always put up signs on the truck warning that it was contaminated with Zolos to keep people away. Although that wasn't an ideal solution when it came to working long hours while dragging Tallie around with him.

  “I'll need a better solution than that as soon as possible,” he insisted.

  “Of course, of course,” Darby said, in a tone that said he wasn't going to put much effort into the problem. “One last thing,” he added, turning and ducking into the back of his car to retrieve a satchel. He cautiously flung it Nick's way, as if afraid even the air kicked up by it landing at his feet might waft Zolos back towards where the two men stood. “This is all official and aboveboard, you understand. So the City of Stanberry will need you to tape one of these on the front door of every building you loo-ah, search.”

  Nick crouched and opened the satchel, which turned out to have a huge stack of papers inside, along with a roll of duct tape presumably for putting them up. He pulled one out and read it:

  NOTICE

  UNDER THE AUTHORITY OF THE

  STANBERRY CITY COUNCIL

  THE PREMISES HAVE BEEN SEARCHED

  AND ITEMS REQUISITIONED TO BE PLACED IN THE CITY STOCKPILE.

  PLEASE INQUIRE THERE FOR QUESTIONS OR COMPLAINTS.

  Bemused, he looked up at where Darby waited, fidgeting. “So after we steal their stuff, we're going to leave a note so they know who to be pissed at?”

  The Mayor scowled. “It's not theft, it's legal requisitioning of assets to be used for the public good. If private entities come around seeking redress for lost items, we'll of course reimburse them for the full value.”

  “With money that no longer has any?” Nick asked dryly.

  “All their goods returned, or a comparable value in other items,” Darby snapped. “Giving one in ten people back whatever we take from them will hardly break the bank.”

  Especially when those people might have trouble knowing exactly what was taken. “Should I make a thorough list of all items “requisitioned” from every location?” he asked.

  That earned a snort from the city official. “You want to waste half your scavenging run documenting every can of soup taken from an abandoned city?” He waved dismissively. “We can't be too generous reimbursing people, or we might get a flood of crooks trying to scam us out of our stoc
kpile. If people don't even know exactly what they lost, they can hardly be missing it, can they?”

  Nick frowned. “Could you at least try to make it sound like I'm not on the wrong side of this?”

  Darrel threw up his hands in disgust. “Come on, man, look at reality staring you in the face!” He pointed an accusing finger, raising his voice. “You realize that some estimates have the number of dead or sick with Zolos as over half America's population, right? Half. As in you've got even odds that every house, every business, every building you walk into is going to be empty, its owners dead and its contents up for grabs. For a place like Wensbrook that number's closer to a hundred percent. And that death toll is just going to go up . . . scavenging as a profession is looking better by the day.”

  He couldn't believe the man would outright say something like that, even if it was the truth. “You know what, Darrel? You're a real piece of work.”

  The surly man flushed, expression darkening. But before he could say anything Darby pulled him back by the arm and stepped forward. “Mr. Statton,” he said quietly. “The things you bring back could mean the difference between life and death for every resident of Stanberry, as well as the poor people in that camp outside of town. Wensbrook is abandoned, its surviving residents under the care of emergency relief services for as long as this disaster lasts, which might be months longer. And I've already said that we will restore any lost property to those who return to their homes there. Or, even better, offer them a place in the community here, and a share of the resources we've gathered.”

  That all sounded pretty reasonable, although Nick still hesitated. Seeing it, the other man continued resolutely. “Where do you think relief workers are getting everything for their stockpiles? The federal emergency services spokesman outright explained that they didn't have the resources to handle a disaster of this scope. They have to be getting them from somewhere.”

  The Mayor took a dramatic step forward, temporarily forgetting his fear of Zolos in his enthusiasm. “Relief services are going to every single evacuated town and residential area in larger cities, as well as those emptied out by the virus, and stripping them bare of anything useful.” He thrust a finger at Nick. “That's how they create their stockpiles. So we're actually doing them a favor by going and doing the job ourselves so they don't have to do it for us. Stanberry will be one less place for them to worry about. The prized American values of independence and industry.”

  Nick thought it more likely that the federal agents knew where large amounts of food and other necessities had been stockpiled for distribution, or in agricultural communities awaiting sale or shipping to distribution centers. That made far more sense than them going door to door riffling through pantries in order to feed hundreds of millions of people.

  Or however many were left in the U.S., at this point.

  However, that meant it made even more sense for smaller communities that didn't want to burden relief services to scavenge from locations small enough to be overlooked by more large scale operations.

  Darby had a point, darn it.

  “All right,” Nick said grudgingly. “Let's do this, I guess.”

  ✽✽✽

  An hour later Nick was in the cab of a medium-sized moving truck, Tallie buckled up in a nest of blankets and pillows in the passenger's seat next to him.

  They were heading southwest on small roads, following Darrel's directions to Wensbrook. From what he'd said it was about a forty minute drive by the most direct route, which apparently wasn't very direct. Not the closest town to Stanberry, but one of the larger nearby ones.

  It was also a minor tourist destination due to nearby campgrounds and parklands, and so had more stores, restaurants, motels, and other such businesses than most towns its size. From a scavenging standpoint that was good news, although Nick still had reservations about all of this.

  Still, he was committed now. Better to focus on the good he could do with his efforts.

  He drove at a responsible speed in spite of the empty roads, and the truck's dashboard had no clock so it was hard to tell the time. Even so, it felt like less than forty minutes before he topped one of the many rolling, thickly forested hills in the area and saw the town spread out below.

  Wensbrook was a pretty little place nestled among the hills, the thick woods tastefully thinned among the buildings to provide shady parks and avenues. Most of the residences were charming old houses all neatly maintained, while its tourist section looked inviting and energetic, with buildings constructed and painted in predominantly greens and browns to bring to mind the closeness to nature that was the draw of this area.

  It was hard to believe such a peaceful, secluded little place could've been hit so hard by Zolos right at the beginning. Although maybe it made sense due to the fact that it drew tourists from all over Missouri, and probably the nearby states too. Which would've put the town in more danger of infection.

  He didn't see signs of any people still living there, which seemed to support Darby's and Darrel's claim that the place was deserted. Then again, Zolos tended to make everywhere look like a ghost town as people huddled in the safety of their homes.

  Nick supposed he'd see for himself soon enough.

  He slowed down as he approached the first house along the road. The simplest way to thoroughly search the town would be to do it in an organized grid, and starting with the closest house was as good a place as any. At the same time, he dreaded the prospect of approaching the place with the intent to strip it bare. Especially since he was starting out by knocking sheepishly on the door to make sure the owners were gone first.

  In this case, though, the thoroughness of the relief workers solved that particular concern for him.

  As he pulled in front of the house, he spotted official looking laminated notices plastered across every entrance and window. They looked like the standard Zolos contamination warning signs that could be printed from the federal relief website, warning that the building was contaminated with the virus.

  Nick parked the truck and settled back to stare at the signs.

  Well, this simplified a few things. If the people in this house had gotten sick with Zolos and been evacuated, nobody would want to touch this place but him and others who were immune. As for the residents, while it felt callous to think it the odds were strong that they'd died of the sickness, so their possessions were available for Stanberry's stockpile.

  Even if some had survived, not only would they probably still be recovering from the deadly disease, and would require the help of relief workers to survive for some time to come, but if they returned to find their possessions gone they'd know who to go to about getting them back.

  They might be angry about it, but it wasn't like Nick planned to trash the place while he scavenged; he'd treat the house with the utmost respect, and take only what the citizens of Stanberry and the people in the quarantine camp outside its borders needed to survive.

  No harm done if they came to claim it back, right?

  He was well aware of just how much he was relying on justifications, but it was enough to let him unbuckle his seat belt and get ready to get out of the cab. He gently shook Tallie, whispering as she stirred sleepily, “Go ahead and keep resting, sweetie. I'm going to lock the cab and go check a house.”

  “Okay, have fun,” she said, yawning sleepily and burrowing back into her nest.

  Have fun. It was a farewell he and Ellie and the kids tossed out all the time when someone was going somewhere, but it seemed a bit inappropriate under the circumstances.

  He wasn't certain he wanted to get to the point where he had fun doing this.

  Sure, under different circumstances, like if he was the last person on Earth, he could see the appeal of seeing what he could find. The urge to explore and gather useful things was human nature, after all. And he could readily admit he doubted he'd find this job boring, no matter his reservations.

  He locked the cab, went around to the back to open it up and grab th
e moving truck he found there, then headed for the front door. Common sense probably would've been to try to find a more subtle way in, but maybe this would bother him less if he wasn't sneaking around as much.

  On the porch he paused, reaching in his front pocket for the pair of gloves Darrel had left in the cab and tugging them on.

  Darby had insisted he wear gloves at all times while handling the stuff he scavenged for the town, to keep it from being contaminated with the Zolos he himself carried. The man also wanted him to try to sanitize the gloves frequently.

  It wasn't as good as wearing a hazmat suit at all times, but Nick had flat out refused to do hard manual labor and potentially dangerous tasks that would require full use of his senses while wearing a suit. Especially since the Mayor had already stated that they were going to treat everything he brought back as potentially infected with Zolos anyway, and put it through decontamination and wait 21 days before handling any of it.

  Precautions were well and good, certainly important, but when they became a pain in the rear for no good purpose it was time to be reasonable about things.

  To be honest, even wearing the gloves was probably a waste of time for this house. It was marked as contaminated with Zolos anyway, so hoping that what he scavenged would be safe was wishful thinking.

  On the other hand, wearing gloves while doing manual labor seemed like a good idea in and of itself; digging that grave yesterday without gloves had seriously torn up his hands, especially since he didn't have callouses. His blisters would hopefully turn into those before too long if he kept this up, but until then his soft programmer's hands needed all the help they could get.

  Nick stepped up to the door and knocked loudly. He gave it fifteen seconds and knocked again, waited another half a minute, then pounded on it for a few seconds.

  Well, if that hadn't at least gotten the owners cussing at him through the door, nothing would. Hopefully that meant the place was empty, so he risked reaching for the knob.