The Rotting Souls Series (Book 5): Charon's Vengeance

by Ray, Timothy A.

  To her credit, she took a moment to look around, take in their environment, then with a heavy sigh she shook her head. “I’m no better off here than with you. We’re still pretty close to Denver, despite how it looks, and more people will be flocking this way either later tonight or tomorrow morning. These people will be overrun before they even know what will hit them.”

  “Very few came this way, most were heading south. Though, I expect a fair amount will head north towards Wyoming as well. Two of the emptiest states in the union on the northern and southern borders; New Mexico and Wyoming. Northern Arizona should be about the same though. A bunch of scattered small towns and plenty of mountains to hide in,” he commented as he pulled himself into the driver’s seat.

  He heard the screech of tires and a loud bang, making him jump in his seat. Jerking his head around, he caught sight of an old station wagon veering to the shoulder across from them, a large bronco slamming into it’s rear bumper and impacting it hard as the car shifted sideways across the larger vehicle’s grill.

  It had caught up to them sooner than anticipated.

  “You need to hop in,” he told her, glaring at her through the open passenger window, her hand on the door but her face frozen in indecision. “Jessica!”

  People were running from the gas station towards the Adventure place across the street, the two vehicles coming to a stop as the station wagon slammed into the concrete curbs, rocking violently with the movement. He could hear shouting from the crowd rushing by and felt his adrenaline begin to pump.

  A gunshot rang out.

  He couldn’t help it, he turned and looked at the car accident and saw that the passenger in the station wagon had gotten out, gun in hand, and had begun firing at the driver of the bronco. The crowd that had been running to their aid dropped to the ground, screams piercing the once calm afternoon. He ducked his own head just below the edge of the dash, his heart hammering in his chest. “Jessica, we need to get the fuck out of here!”

  The driver of the Bronco got out, a rifle in hand as he stood on the edge of the driver door and used the hood to aim his weapon. “You got bit, you son of a bitch!” the man yelled and fired.

  The other man’s body twisted around, taking a shot in the shoulder, his gun going off again as he fell out of sight.

  “Murderer!” an old man in a cowboy hat said, charging across the road and driving his shoulder into the door, impacting the rifleman and making his rifle strike the roof of the Bronco.

  Other people had joined in, tearing the man from the car, hands whipping down to beat the shooter, his cries muffled by their shouts.

  “Jessica!” he hollered, looking to the passenger side of the vehicle and noticing that the door was open, but she wasn’t there. He looked back across the road, made sure that no one was paying him any attention, then stood up and looked out the open doorway. His stomach twisted as he saw the blood first, the bile rising as he saw the mangled mess of hair and the gruesome wreckage of the woman’s head. She had taken a stray shot to the face, probably never even knew what hit her.

  He opened up the driver side door and threw up.

  The crowd was getting rowdier, and he knew that the mob mentality had set in. He needed to get out of here before they saw him as a threat, his being an outsider as well. Glancing at the passenger door, he knew that he couldn’t go around and shut it, he’d seen more than enough already. Turning the key, he heard the engine rev up, his arm reflexively coming up to wipe his mouth off as he took one last look at the accident, threw it in gear, and hit the gas.

  The passenger door swung with the momentum and banged into place, cutting off the beeping that had been going off in the background alerting him to an open door. A few stragglers had stood on the edge of the road, watching the scene with awe, and having no idea that he was trying to move past them. He thought of honking, but that might draw attention to himself, so he edged along their backs, got back up onto the highway, then floored it; no longer caring if a cop came after him or not. They hadn’t shown up to the accident site yet, which wasn’t encouraging at all, despite his reckless driving.

  You got bit, you son of a bitch!

  Jessica is dead.

  I need to get to my family.

  The road was clear, the edge of town already passing by, and he still felt an urgent need to get as far away from what was happening as possible. When he steered to the left a bit harder than usual he heard a thump, making him flinch and bite his tongue.

  “Fuck!”

  He chanced a glance at the seat and an item on the floorboard caught his eye; Jessica’s purse. “Fuck!” he screamed again, pounding the steering wheel with his right palm. She had been his responsibility, despite whatever he said, and she’d been shot while he was trying to convince her to stay and take her chances in that town. She had said that it wouldn’t be quiet for long; she’d been right and had paid for it with her life.

  You got bit, you son of a bitch!

  Obviously the man in the station wagon had been on the run, and had probably been bit by one of the fanatics back in Denver. Had the guy in the Bronco been there? Had decided to chase him all the way there to stop him from spreading it further? It seemed like a far way to go, not to mention you’d think if he was going to run them off the road, they’d have done it sooner. No, it was more than likely that they were locals; it was spreading and fast.

  He brought his phone up, his finger pushing the power button, eyes falling on the no service, a curse immediately erupting as his frustration took over. “Dammit!”

  He threw his phone in the passenger seat out of habit, then it hit him that no one was sitting there anymore, and it was probably his fault. If he hadn’t tried to push her out the door, tried to convince her to stay, she would have hopped in the SUV and they would have been on the road before the accident happened. It was the question and pause that had sealed her fate.

  Why had it been so important that she stay? So that his hormones wouldn’t get the best of him, the fatalistic view of the world shoving the “we’re all gonna die anyway so why not?” mentality down his throat? Did he need to prove his love for his wife so much that he had wanted to abandon the younger woman in an unknown small town on the side of the road?

  From what he’d seen in the movies, and with the way this was playing out, he was sure that this would be only the first of the regrets he’d have in the days to come, as he fought tooth and nail for his and his family’s survival. Unfortunately, he hadn’t gotten there yet, and it still stung like a bitch. He would never know for sure if he was responsible, and he had a hard time of letting go of guilt for even the most menial of things.

  When he was a kid his family had taken a trip to Florida, and amongst the trips to Miami and Disney World, they had also gone to Universal Studios. They had a behind the scenes tour where they showed how they dubbed tv shows, made sound effects, and he’d heard a joke where a guy asks what the hoof sound he was making was. Obviously, people said a horse galloping, but the real answer was two ash trays being banged together.

  King Kong was down, the Jaws ride was under maintenance, and the Earthquake had mechanical issues; pretty much anything that a fifteen-year-old boy would want to do. The park had given them free passes, but when were they ever going to make it back to Florida from Arizona? So, he’d end up going through the behind the scenes tour again. Except this time, when the guy asked the joke, he gave the real answer and spoiled it for everyone else. It’d been twenty years and his mind still went back to that day, the regret over what he’d done still kicking around in the back of his head.

  He had a hard time letting go.

  That had been a joke on a ride no one but him remembered, this had been the death of a twenty-year-old college student that had trusted him to keep her safe. The regret, he knew, was only just beginning.

  “Why couldn’t you have just hopped in the damn car?”

  II

  He was approaching South Fork when his eyes had grown so hea
vy that he had no choice but to pull over for some shut eye. He had considered sleeping in the SUV, but after seeing that car accident earlier that afternoon, he didn’t want to take the chance that someone would crash into him while he was passed out. Or, come upon his SUV and think him easy prey, either killing him or leaving him abandoned on the side of the road while they took his ride.

  There weren’t many good choices to be had, but he had to do something or else he’d end up driving off the road and crashing anyway.

  It wasn’t that much further to Durango, but he was past exhaustion and when he saw the sign for lodging, he took his foot off the accelerator and prepared to stop for the night. It was only eight, but he had been up since five that morning, Chicago time, and it was biologically later than it was.

  He pulled off the highway onto a frontage road, coming to stop in front of a wooden lodge, the soft lights welcoming him in. He rubbed his fingers across his eyes and yawned into the crook of his elbow. Moving his head to the left, he tried to stretch his neck muscles, but they were bunched up and unwilling to relent.

  He needed a good night’s sleep, and it was going to take pure exhaustion for that to happen. There was just too much going on in the world for it to go down any other way.

  Stepping from the SUV, he locked it out of habit and headed to the front door of the lodge. He’d spent some time in small towns since taking this job and had known quite a few that locked their doors at night, but they must have late night visitors like himself on this highway because the open sign was up and there was someone hovering behind the counter inside.

  Opening the door, he felt the cool night air get cut off by a slightly warmer interior, and he couldn’t help but grin at the smallest of comforts. The man behind the desk was in his early twenties, a bored look on his face, his eyes barely shifting his way as he entered.

  No greeting, that was off. Maybe this was a bad idea.

  “I’d like to check in for the night,” he ventured.

  He noticed a slight twitch in the man’s mouth, then he turned and faced him. “Going to have to be cash, afraid the system’s down. Has been most of the day.”

  Maybe that was what stemmed the youth’s disinterest. Who carried cash around these days? Most were probably forced to move on with no other option available to them. He thought of the quick trip he’d made to the ATM that morning at the airport and was suddenly glad for it. He nodded his head and pulled out his wallet, his license automatically slipping free. “Just the one night.” There was a TV on a stand behind the cashier and he noticed it was playing an old Star Trek rerun. “I see Cable is working. That must be nice, the radio has been offline since this morning.”

  “I hadn’t noticed,” the other man commented, his name tag reading Casey. With short blond hair, blue eyes, and pimply cheeks, he looked like a gamer more than an outdoorsy type.

  “IPhone?” he asked curiously, trying to make small talk.

  The younger man nodded, sliding a card key through their machine and setting it for a so far unidentified room. “Just one key?”

  “Yeah, thanks,” he replied, taking his offered identification back and sliding it back into his wallet.

  “Don’t bother calling, the Wi-Fi is down. No way to fix it, sorry. That’s fifty-four ninety-five,” the youth told him.

  He brought out three twenties, took his change, and took up a pin to initial the waivers he’d been handed, the last bit of business in hand. “Have you seen the news today? Know of anything weird going on?”

  Casey cocked his head and gave him a passive look, “no. Just had it on the FX channel since I got here, and you’re my only customer tonight. You’re in room 8.”

  With the key handed over, the young man took up a Monster and returned to his chair, eyes fixed on the tv, clearly dismissing him.

  Well, the boy’s disinterest had one positive effect, no news was good news. He wouldn’t be sitting there watching Star Trek if the world was ending, much less manning his post. Taking the key in hand, he left the boy to his show and exited the lobby, thinking of whether or not he wanted to lug his suitcase into the room.

  In the end, it was his stomach that made the final decision, as he had food in there and he was sure to have a microwave. That was just standard in most rooms. If it did fail to have one, he had a can of peaches he could eat, and it was far better than nothing. Hell, even the PB&J sounded like steak and mashed potatoes at this point.

  As he took out his suitcase and shouldered his backpack, his mind turned to the woman’s belongings that had been left on his floorboard, and he had reached in and retrieved it before realizing it, then began walking towards the nearby rooms. He didn’t know why he needed it, but it seemed wrong to just leave it there, regardless of its owner’s condition.

  Yet, he was glad no one came out to see him carrying it, that would have been awkward.

  Entering his room, he set his suitcase against the wall next to the air conditioner and looked about the quaint accommodations. It had the standard diamond shaped comforter on the bed, which was a queen, luckily. Had it been a twin bed, that would have made the night miserable. There was a box tv on the dresser to his right and a microwave on the bathroom sink, the toilet and shower behind the closed door beyond. The carpet was brown and worn, the walls white and only slightly stained, and there was a stale smell of cigarette smoke in the air. Looking to the right, he saw an ash tray, and took solace in the fact that he wouldn’t have to poke his head out before morning. Though, he might have said fuck it and done it anyway. If this was going where he thought it was, why did it matter? And it’s not like the cashier had taken his credit card to put on his file, they couldn’t charge him even if someone did notice.

  Setting his backpack on the bed, he took out his ceramic bowl and a spoon, then went to his outer pocket of his suitcase and brought out a can of Stagg chili and his can opener; something he had not once regretted buying. He used it to take off the lid, tossed it in the nearby trash, and then emptied the contents into the bowl. Before heading to the microwave, he picked up the television remote and hit the power button, a standard station blaring to life; a rerun of Elementary.

  Well, at least it wasn’t Gilligan’s Island.

  He set the microwave to work, then took out his phone and glanced at it. He had a missed call and several texts.

  His wife had tried calling him and he’d missed it while he was checking in.

  Carrie: made it to Show Low okay, thank God. Phoenix has gone crazy, police everywhere. Almost got in several accidents until we got to Globe and turned north.

  Carrie: hope you’re okay, haven’t heard from you all day

  Carrie: Kyle answer your damn phone

  Carrie: ☹

  Deanne: you need to call work as soon as possible.

  Yeah, that’s not happening.

  Instead, he dialed his wife and was overjoyed when she picked up. “Oh, thank God you are okay. How are the kids?”

  “Why didn’t you answer the phone? And yes, we’re okay. They’re asleep. It’s been one helluva day.”

  The television show paused as the EAS came up on the screen. “Carrie, turn on the tv.”

  “What? Why? It’s nothing but old reruns. I can’t find a news broadcast anywhere. Even CNN isn’t showing anything but old documentaries.”

  “Just do it,” he told her, listening as the three loud tones finished, the President’s Seal appearing on the screen before him.

  Michelle Obama was behind the desk in the White House, her face grave, her composure barely held in check. “My fellow Americans, today I address you not only as the President of the United States, but as a citizen of the world. An unknown terrorist organization has launched a series of deliberate and deadly attacks that can only be intended for one purpose; the total annihilation of the world as we know it. Every nation across the globe is currently working on their own way to fight back, to survive. None have been spared this evil loosed upon the world. Tonight, I ask that you pray
with me; pray for us all.”

  “Here is what we know. Yesterday morning at 10:00 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, a biological attack was launched upon the United States in an airport in St. Louis, Missouri. By the time the response teams arrived, and the airport was quarantined, it was too late. It was already flying across the nation in planes, driving along interstates in cars, and spread by people on foot. With the information they had, all proper procedures were followed, and I cannot in good conscience blame any of those first responders for what is now happening.”

  “Are you hearing this?” Carrie asked him.

  “Yes,” he said in a soft whisper.

  “This was an airborne contagion of unnatural origin that exhibited no classic symptom of infection. Immediate quarantine procedures were initiated, and a sample was flown to the CDC for analysis. The potential threat was not immediately apparent as the biological agent lies dormant in a living human host. It does not interfere with normal bodily functions, does not attack living tissue. It acts like an additive to the bloodstream with no apparent behavior other than replication and attachment to the blood cells of its host. Our doctors worked through the night trying to uncover the threat it posed to those infected and found nothing of relevance. It wasn’t until a person who contracted the virus died that we discovered the horror that had been unleashed upon the world.”

  “Now, let me stress this point. There was no sign of infection until brain death. From what the doctors at the CDC in Atlanta are telling me, the virus is not spread through bodily fluids; it is an airborne virus. By the time an infected person comes in close contact with an uninfected host, it’s already spread. Estimates show that the majority of the nation has already contracted this virus and that any thoughts of quarantine would be a useless exercise. I have ordered the grounding of all civil air traffic and the Department of Transportation has been instructed to shut down interstate travel. However, it has already been flown beyond our borders and is even now spreading across the globe with no signs that containment is possible or would be effective.”