“Isn’t that the show with Trisha Dunbar?” Jessica actually spoke up. It was quietly, but everyone heard her.
“Yeah, it is,” Abby nodded. “My friend does her makeup.”
“She’s the reason I started watching the show in the first place,” Tobias admitted.
“She’s the reason any guy starts watching the show in the first place,” Abby added. It was true, too. The majority of their male audience was due to the beautiful starlet.
“Please tell me you guys at least know who she is?” Tobias asked the boys in the front.
“Nope,” Cillian shook his head.
“I don’t think so,” Cender said at first. “Wait, was she the one on the cover of April’s Maxim magazine?”
“That’s the one,” Tobias half laughed.
“She’s in a TV show?” Cender whistled. “I think I might have to watch that.”
“Was,” Jessica spoke up again.
“What?” Tobias looked at her, confused.
“Was in a TV show.” Jessica was correcting what Cender had said. “Things like that don’t exist in the present tense.”
The car went silent. Jessica had brought down everybody’s mood. She was right though. The whole world was probably being put on hold. Not just on hold, but being completely reshaped. When this thing died down, if it died down, nothing would be the same. No TV shows that were on before it happened would come back on. Books would remain half completed on writer’s hard drives, movies partially filmed. Even the countries may not be reformed in the same way. The government would need to be rebuilt. Abby suspected that Canadians were no longer going to mass along the American border but build out in the northern areas.
“Do you think they’ll bomb the city?” Abby suddenly thought out loud.
“Why would they do that?” Tobias looked at her funny.
“I don’t know,” Abby shrugged. “The woman on the radio said the infection had started here, so right now, here is probably where it’s the worst. Do you think some other country will find that out and bomb us? Or maybe even our own country will bomb us in an attempt to stem it from spreading?”
“Maybe another country will, but ours won’t,” Cender told her. “It’s already spread too far.”
“How do you know that?” Abby asked him.
“Because we get a percentage of our power from Niagara Falls. The infection would have had to spread at least that far for the power to be killed.” Cender’s logic seemed pretty sound.
“The power outage could be completely unrelated,” Tobias offered. “We don’t know that it was due to infection scaring people off.”
“What do you think the odds of that happening today are?” Cender turned in his seat to look at Tobias.
“Pretty good, I’d say,” Tobias frowned at him. “We have no indication that the power was cut off from the source. It could be just that area, that block, that has no power.”
“He’s got a point, Cender,” Abby backed Tobias. There were a lot of reasons the power could’ve died.
“He does, but I’m still glad I grabbed these before we left.” Cender reached down between his feet and held up a gas mask he had apparently stashed down there.
“And if you’re right, we all might end up very glad that you brought those,” Cillian told him. “Right or wrong though, it doesn’t matter. We just have to focus on getting out of this city alive.”
“So you know what route we’re taking, right?” Abby clarified.
“Yup,” Cillian nodded. “Being a firefighter, I had to learn a lot about the city’s layout.”
“How many people do you think will also take that route?” Abby was concerned about another incident occurring like the one when they were in the limo, when they got swarmed.
“Well, I think most people will go for the highway, but anyone from the surrounding area will probably come this way.” Cillian was trying to be honest.
“So we could end up in another swarm?” Abby sighed.
“There’s a chance,” Cillian nodded. “Although, with any direction we take, there’s a chance of being swarmed. Even staying put runs the risk.”
Abby sighed again and nodded. She looked at the book in her hands again.
“All right, I’ll read it out loud,” she gave in to the argument that had ended so suddenly earlier. She opened up the first page and began reading. The first section was about the disease itself and they all quickly learned that these weren’t the same kind of zombies. The book simply covered the slow and dim-witted ones. Still, it was very likely to hold some very useful information.
At one point Abby glanced out the window to the west, past Tobias. She noticed a slight reddening in the sky. The sun was going to start setting soon, and then it would be nighttime. It would be dark.
29:
Matty
Mathias Cole was relieved that it looked like Danny had gotten a ride. Even more so, that it meant he was alive. He just wished that he could catch a ride as well. Currently they were walking near the middle of the highway and had been for some time. The shadows being cast by the trees were getting longer. From their angle, the sun had started touching the treetops. Every time a car passed by on the other side of the ditch, or the southbound side of the highway, they had tried to flag it down, but so far, they had no luck. Now the number of cars was few and far between. Whatever was behind them was getting worse, stopping nearly all the cars now, and those that had been ahead of the tanker accident, had gotten far enough to be out of sight. They had given up on the abandoned cars they passed. They were either trapped, or too broken down to get running. Any car that did go by was always racing along faster than the last one. Thinking of the last one, its front bumper had been bloody and dented, the windshield a spider web of cracks and stained red. The driver could probably barely see. That car had passed about a half hour ago.
“Looks like any northbound cars from here on, will be on the road, boys,” Bishop said, pointing off to the side of the highway.
Mathias looked to the right, where she pointed. The ditch, that had been following the length of the highway, became mostly levelled out, and there wasn’t a barrier. There was still a little ditch that would cause one hell of a bump, but judging by the tracks, all the cars that had passed this way had taken it. That meant that Danny had and was now moving even faster away from him. As long as they met up in the end though, that was fine. That’s what he kept telling himself.
“Great, so now we have to be careful that these speeders don’t run us over on top of everything else,” LeBlanc sighed. They had been sticking to the northbound lanes because they were safer than the southbound lanes. On the south side, the vehicles came ripping up the pavement at high speeds, whereas on the north side, they had always been confined to the tree line due to the large ditch. Now though, the cars would be driving at full speeds in all lanes.
“Better run over by a car than trampled by the hoard behind us,” Bishop said.
“True, true,” LeBlanc nodded.
“So, when are we going to eat?” Mathias had been hungry for a while but he had had training to deal with that while on the march. He had been waiting until someone, probably Bishop, brought it up, but he now thought that maybe she was trying to be tough for the boys. Or maybe she wasn’t just trying and actually was tough. From what Mathias had learned so far, she was a fairly intense and strong woman.
“Whenever you want,” Bishop shrugged. “We’re not stopping though. If we stop, the hoard might catch up.”
Mathias swung his pack around in front of him and started going through it. He had no idea how long they would be travelling and therefore, didn’t know what the best way to ration his food was. Eventually he settled on an MRE. He put his pack on the right way again and cracked open the packaging. He ate slowly, chewing thoroughly to try to trick his body into thinking it was getting more food than it was. It may have been a ‘Meal Ready to Eat’ but he never found them filling enough. When he finished, he tossed the pack
aging over his shoulder. He had never cared about being a litterbug in the first place, and now was definitely not the time to start.
“No longer concerned about global warming, eh?” LeBlanc had watched him toss his trash.
“Have you ever seen me concerned about global warming?” Mathias pointed out.
“You were when that chick, what was her name? Penny something? When she first showed up, and was all into the global warming movement. You were totally into it then,” LeBlanc reminded him.
Mathias laughed because it was completely true. “It paid off though, didn’t it?”
“That it did, my friend. That was a good angle on your part,” LeBlanc nodded.
Bishop made a sound of distaste and rolled her eyes.
“What?” Mathias eyed her. “You’ve never lied to a guy?”
“Not about something that was clearly a big issue with him,” she scoffed.
“What if you didn’t know it was a big issue with him until after you had already lied?” Mathias asked.
“Then clearly, I wasn’t right for him,” Bishop answered.
“But this wasn’t about being right for somebody,” he pointed out. “This was about getting laid, having a good time.”
“And what if it wasn’t about that for her?” Bishop frowned at him.
“Oh, it clearly was about that for her.” Mathias remembered the girl in question. Kinky was a word that came to mind.
Bishop just shook her head and looked away from the guys. Mathias knew he was grinning like a fool idiot and when he looked at LeBlanc, he was too. This caused both of them to burst out laughing.
“You guys are weird,” Bishop muttered.
This only caused them to laugh even harder.
“Guys, shut up. Seriously, shut up,” Bishop suddenly sounded a lot more worried than annoyed. “Someone is coming, see the light?”
There was, in fact, a light coming through the woods on the left, on the other side of the southbound lanes. They had left the development area, with its sound-blocking wall on that side, some time ago. Now it was forest on both sides. The woods were a lot darker than the highway, explaining why someone had a light on. They had no way of knowing if the light was being held by something dangerous or not. As one, they ran up to the concrete highway divider and crouched down behind it. Bishop had assimilated to their team quickly. Mathias made a mental note to ask her if she had had any military training.
“What are people’s bets?” LeBlanc whispered. “I’ll give you ten to one.”
“Ten to one for what?” Bishop whispered back.
“I’ll tell you after we’ve found out if you won,” LeBlanc grinned.
Bishop rolled her eyes. Mathias sat silently. He had heard that one before, several times. Whenever there was someone new with them, in fact, LeBlanc would find some point and time to use that joke. It was the only one he reused.
The light reached the edge of the road and flicked off. Either it was a thinking being, or a zombie that had a lot more reasoning skills than its cohorts. Or it just managed to hit the button at a lucky time, which made it look like it did it on purpose. They couldn’t see anything moving amongst the trees. Whoever or whatever was there was staying still. This added another point in favour of it being a rational human. Well, rational in that it was thinking about self-preservation. After roughly a minute, some bushes moved, and a man appeared between the trees. The light he had was strapped onto a hat he wore, which was useful since both his hands were occupied holding a large hunting rifle. He started to scan up and down the highway. As his eyes were about to sweep over their position, all three of them dropped completely out of sight.
“What do you think?” LeBlanc whispered to Mathias.
“I’m not sure,” Mathias shook his head. “I’m not sure I like the look of that guy. The way he’s holding that rifle makes him look like he intends to use it.”
“We hold our rifles the same way when we’re being cautious,” Bishop pointed out.
“Yeah, when we’re being cautious about the presence of zombies. This guy showed up not long after we were being pretty damn loud. Odds are, he showed up here knowing there would be people,” Mathias counter-pointed.
“He also didn’t look like he had any supplies with him.” LeBlanc had apparently been studying him even more closely than Mathias had. “Now it’s possible he left them in the woods for fear of someone stealing them, but that would also mean that the idea of theft has popped into his head, at least once.”
“You think he wants to rob us?” Bishop gave him a disbelieving look.
“Yeah, actually, I do,” LeBlanc told her.
“There’s three of us and one of him. He’d be stupid to try,” Bishop gripped her rifle tighter.
“We don’t know that there’s only one of him,” Mathias cautioned. “There could easily be more in hiding.”
“You guys are paranoid,” Bishop sighed and started to get to her feet.
Mathias pulled her back down before she got high enough to be seen. “Says the girl with a plan for every disaster she can think of.”
“So what do you want to do? Belly crawl along the divider until you think we’re far enough away?” Bishop threw up her hands. Well, not quite, because she couldn’t put them up very high without having them go over the barrier.
“We’re just going to wait a few minutes.” Mathias placed a hand on her shoulder, trying to calm her. He was all for keeping moving forward, but he also knew he would be no good to Danny if he were dead. He recalled his haste earlier that nearly got him run over. Since then, he swore to himself that he would be more careful.
“And what are we going to do then? What if he doesn’t walk away?” Bishop crossed her arms in front of her.
“I actually don’t think he will leave.” Mathias shifted into a more comfortable position. “But I happen to know that a few minutes’ walk behind us, there’s a man walking down that side of the highway.”
“So?” Mathias actually saw his idea click in Bishop’s head. “Wait, you want to use him as bait? To see what the guy in the woods will do?”
“You got it, sister.” LeBlanc also made himself more comfortable. Mathias rarely ever needed to tell him what he was thinking. They usually came up with the same plans at the same time.
“And what if he does get robbed?” Bishop’s helpful doctor nature came through again.
Mathias was thinking he liked her better when they first met and she remained a cold clinical fish. “If it’s just the one guy, or even two or three, we’ll help out the other traveller. If it’s more than that, or if the guy is just looking to shoot some people… Well then, yeah, we’re probably going to have to belly crawl.”
Bishop was silent for a moment, considering. She then settled herself like LeBlanc and Mathias had.
“This is a stupid plan,” she muttered.
“Agreed, but it’s the best one we’ve got.” Mathias thought about eating some more, but then remembered he had to ration for an unknown amount of time. Rationing sucked.
Bishop, on the other hand, took out some sort of squeeze food and started eating it. It looked like toothpaste the colour of peanut butter. It looked gross. LeBlanc hadn’t eaten anything since they left Keystone.
“Aren’t you hungry?” Mathias asked LeBlanc over Bishop’s head.
“No,” LeBlanc shook his head and gave Mathias a confused look. “Should I be?”
“Probably. You haven’t eaten since Keystone,” Mathias reminded him.
“Actually, I ate at Bishop’s house,” LeBlanc grinned.
“What?” Bishop frowned at him.
“Yeah, while I was bringing those boxes to the garage, I totally raided your fridge. You had some left-over pizza in there; it was extremely delicious.” LeBlanc patted his stomach.
“And you didn’t save any for me?” Mathias put on an exaggerated sad face.
“Hell no. When did you ever save me some cold pizza? That’s right, never,” LeBlanc gave him a mo
ck smile in return.
“That’s ’cause I could only eat pizza when I went to see Danny, and there is no way I’d be able to smuggle that in,” he explained.
“Sure you could,” LeBlanc put on his shark grin. “You’d just have to…”
“Stop there.” Bishop put her hand up in front of LeBlanc’s face. “I don’t know where you’re going with that, and I really don’t want to know.”
When Bishop removed her hand, it revealed that LeBlanc’s grin had gown wider, but he stayed silent.
* * *
The trio sat in silence for some time. The only sound was the wind in the trees. They had no idea if the man with the gun was still standing in the woods. He could have easily walked off while they were whispering, and none of them would have noticed. Mathias hated waiting, but he constantly reminded himself of the importance of it. Although he would have loved to have been up and doing something, he knew that was how guys got shot. Hell, it might have been why most of his family had bitten the bullet already. Some predisposition to charge into the fray half-cocked. He had gone through a reckless phase himself. When he was in the army, his whole unit had been reckless. It wasn’t until one of them, another kid named Kestrel, got shot through the eye while he was right next to Mathias, did he realize the insanity. When he realized that, he also realized his commander was a total bat shit dick wad. He had let him know it, too.
His commander had let it slide the first time, and the second, because the rest of the guys in the unit liked Mathias, but when Mathias punched him, full force, on the third instance, he got dishonourably discharged. He didn’t care though, he had kind of been hoping for it.
He drifted around after that, not being able to hold down a job for very long, his family dropping like flies. There were a lot of funerals. His mother died giving birth to Danny while he was still in the army. She had been too old to have another child, but she insisted on bringing him into this world. Not long after, it had been Mathias’s father, a formerly high-ranking soldier who let himself waste away in a drunken stupor until he wrapped his car around a tree. Mathias’s older brother and another younger brother were both killed in action: soldiers like he had been. His sister, only a year younger than him, had been raising Danny on her own. She was shot when she placed herself between a group of kids and a man robbing the convenience store. Aunts, uncles, and cousins all died off or vanished without a trace throughout Mathias’s entire life. When it ended up being just him and Danny, he freaked. He never told Danny, but he had seriously considered just dumping the kid and bugging out. He couldn’t raise his brother like he was supposed to, not like his sister had, no way. Keystone had found him, though. They approached him one night, out of the blue, with a job offer. It seemed almost too good to be true.
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