The Project Eden Thrillers Box Set 2

by Brett Battles

  “Not quite. But we’ve found his trail, and think we know where he is.”

  Ash put his palms on the mattress, intending to try to sit up again, but Lily held him down.

  “Let me go,” he said. “I have to find him.”

  “You’re not going anywhere,” she said.

  “You need to rest,” Matt told him. “Don’t worry. Chloe went to get him.”

  “Chloe?”

  “She’ll bring him back.”

  Ash relaxed. Though he’d rather be getting Brandon himself, he trusted Chloe to handle it.

  He could feel his eyelids growing heavy again. Forcing them to stay open, he said, “Josie, how is she?”

  “She’s fine,” Matt said after a brief pause.

  Good, Ash thought. This time he didn’t fight it as his eyes closed. Brandon on the verge of being found, Josie safe—that was as much as he could ask for at the moment.

  Eighteen

  UPPER MOJAVE DESERT, CALIFORNIA

  12:44 PM PST

  MARTINA’S HANDS ACHED from gripping the steering wheel of the Webers’ car so tightly. The drive off the mountain had been the most nerve-wracking experience of her life.

  While there had been areas where the snow barely covered the road, in other parts, the swirling winds had piled up drifts two—and even three—feet high. Every time she encountered one of these, she had to slow the car to a near standstill and find a way around it.

  Then there was the ice. More than once, the car skidded on an unseen patch, threatening to slide off the road. She was pretty sure there was at least one time the tires on the passenger side had moved off the asphalt, edging dangerously close to the ditch that paralleled the road.

  The scariest part by far, though, was when she reached the section of road that led down the canyon to the desert. Two lanes, barely any shoulder, no guardrails, and a seventy-degree downward slope on her right that promised a plummet to the rocky chasm floor several hundred feet below if she made even the slightest error.

  Since there didn’t appear to be any other vehicles using the road, she stuck to the middle of the asphalt and kept her speed low and steady. About the only good thing was that the snow was only at the very top, and it wasn’t long before her worries simply consisted of taking a turn too wide and driving off the cliff.

  When they finally reached the bottom, Martina stopped the car at the side of the road and climbed out. Leaning against the fender, she took several deep breaths until her body stopped shaking, and her heart rate slowed enough for her to concentrate on what to do next.

  They were near the north end of Indian Wells Valley. Along the west side were the towering Sierra Nevada Mountains that she and Riley had just descended. Across the north was the smaller yet still imposing Coso Range. Hills in the south, and the gradual rise of the valley in the east served as the last two boundaries. In the distance on the east side, she could see the hump that was B Mountain. It was a big hill, really, located on the China Lake naval base. Its name was courtesy of the giant B the students at Burroughs High School—her alma mater—repainted on its rocks each year.

  Home.

  She looked toward the highway about a mile away. Usually during the week between Christmas and New Year’s, US 395 was packed with skiers from LA headed to Mammoth Mountain three more hours to the north, but today there wasn’t a car in sight.

  She climbed back into the sedan and settled into her seat, her gaze pausing on the gas gauge. It had been at a little more than a quarter tank when they’d set out, but now it was nearly empty. Having never driven the Webers’ car, she had no idea how far it could go on fumes. Ridgecrest was at least twenty miles away. And while the much smaller Inyokern was closer, it was still a good ten miles. What if they ran out of gas before then? Riley was in no condition for any kind of long hike.

  Wasn’t there something to the north? The last time she’d gone any farther in that direction had been a couple years earlier when the Burroughs softball team went to a tournament up in Bishop. She closed her eyes and tried to remember.

  Yes. There had been something. A few stores and…a gas station, right?

  She started the car, drove to the intersection with the highway, and looked left. She could make out a few buildings in the distance, maybe three or four miles away.

  God, I hope I’m right, she thought, then turned north on 395.

  About a quarter mile before she reached the buildings, a sign along the road read: PEARSONVILLE.

  The town wasn’t a thriving metropolis by any means, more a wide spot on the highway. Like everywhere else since they’d left the cabin, it was devoid of activity. It did have a gas station, though.

  She pulled up to pump number one and hopped out. While the station still had power, the pump needed a credit card to activate it. Martina’s ATM card would have worked, but it was buried in the sedan’s trunk under the water and bags of food. Instead of digging it out, she decided to go inside the attached minimart to see if she could turn the pump on.

  The door whooshed open, and a bong announced her arrival, but there was no one else there to hear it. The cash register and pump controller was in an area sealed off from the rest of the store by a Plexiglas partition. She tried the door that led into it, but it was locked.

  Food’s free today,but not the gas, apparently, she thought.

  She frowned and took a look around. Near the back was a short hallway with one door to a bathroom, and a second that was unmarked. She opened the unmarked door.

  Maintenance room—mops, buckets, cleaning supplies. On the floor under a shelf was a toolbox. She opened it up and found a hammer.

  She knew the Plexiglas wouldn’t give way, but the handle on the door was no match for her softball-enhanced swing. It broke off quickly, but the latch remained in place. Using a flathead screwdriver from the same toolkit, she inched the latch back until it finally popped free. With a simple push, the door opened.

  Would have been easier to just use your card, she thought. But the truth was, she didn’t know what the future held, and the few hundred dollars still in her account might be needed for something else. It was better not to use it if she didn’t need to.

  The next trick was figuring out how to turn on the pump. It took a few tries before she let out a whoop of triumph as the light next to pump number one turned green.

  “What are you doing?” The voice was muffled but still made her jump.

  Riley was standing outside the store, looking through the window.

  “You almost gave me a heart attack,” Martina said.

  “Why are you in there?”

  “We need gas. Had to turn on the pump.”

  Riley looked around. “Where’s the attendant who works here?”

  “They’re all gone.”

  For a second it was as if Riley had forgotten all about what was happening. Then it seemed to click.

  “Right,” Riley said. “Oh, shit.” She grabbed the wall as if she’d suddenly lost all her strength.

  Martina rushed from the booth and out of the store, the door bonging again as she left. When she reached Riley, she grabbed hold of her friend to steady her. “Look. You’re alive. I’m alive. That’s all that’s important right now.”

  Riley stared at her for a second, then looked back at the car. “Where are the others?”

  Martina hesitated. “There are no others. Only you and me.”

  “But…but my mom. Pamela.”

  “And Donny and my dad and my mom.”

  Riley gaped at her. “All of them?”

  “Yes. All of them.”

  This time, Riley did lose the strength to stand, and almost took Martina down with her as she dropped onto the ground.

  Martina wanted nothing more than to slump down next to Riley, but she knew one of them had to keep her head. “Stay here. I’m going to get the gas started.”

  The pump worked flawlessly. As it filled the sedan’s tank, Martina kept an eye on Riley, deciding it best to let her f
riend have a few minutes alone. The girl stared at the ground the entire time, unmoving. When the pump clicked off, Martina replaced the nozzle in its holder and walked back over.

  “You going to be okay?”

  For a second, Riley’s expression didn’t change. Then she looked up. “What?”

  “Are you going to be all right?”

  “All right? No. No, I’m not.”

  That’s when the tears started.

  Martina knelt in front of her. “I didn’t mean it like that. I know we can’t be all right. I just meant…” She stopped, thought about it. “Hell, I don’t know what.”

  She started to cry, too.

  How long it lasted, she didn’t know—ten minutes, fifteen—but at some point the tide receded, and she was able to get control of herself again.

  “I think M&Ms are in order,” she said as she wiped her face and rose to her feet.

  “Skittles,” Riley blurted out. “I’d like Skittles.”

  It was tempting to clear the shelves and take as much as they could fit in the car, but neither girl could bring herself to do that yet. Deep down, they were both hoping that everything would go back to…if not normal then something close. Martina didn’t let herself think about it too much, though, because deep down, she knew normal would never return.

  Riley switched to the front passenger seat for the final leg of their drive. Her flu symptoms had been replaced by a general weakness one would expect after such an illness, similar to how Martina had felt after the spring outbreak.

  That got Martina thinking again about her own condition. She still had no symptoms. It was like the virus had passed her by completely. It reminded her of something her mother had told her about chicken pox. Though Martina had received the vaccine when she was young and had never had the disease, her mom had said that wasn’t always the case, and that everyone used to get it as a child.

  “Your grandma made me go play with the neighbors’ kids when they had it so that I’d catch it, too,” her mom had said.

  “Why would she do that?” Martina asked.

  “So I’d get it over with and wouldn’t have to worry about it anymore.”

  Martina still hadn’t understood, so her mother explained, “Usually you only get chicken pox once. After that, your system builds up an immunity and you never get it again.”

  Could it be that after surviving her first brush with Sage Flu, Martina’s system had built up immunity? If that were true, then…

  She stopped herself, not wanting to hope too much. She could test the theory soon enough.

  They saw their first body as they drove through Inyokern. Two bodies, actually. Both were sitting in a car parked on the other side of the road. Though they may have just been sleeping, neither girl believed that. The tiny town itself seemed otherwise deserted.

  Once they passed the bed where the old railroad tracks had been, Martina increased their speed and raced down Inyokern Road toward Ridgecrest.

  In disaster movies, when the world seemed to be coming to an end, streets would always be packed with abandoned cars. That wasn’t what they found. The streets were completely empty. It was clear that the president’s order for a nationwide curfew had been heeded and people had stayed home, where they had probably become too sick to venture out again.

  At least it gave Martina and Riley clear sailing into town.

  Though it was evident Riley no longer needed to see a doctor, she still wanted to go to the hospital. That would be where her father had taken her sister on Christmas Eve, and she hoped that would be where the girls would find them.

  Like the roads, most of the parking lots they passed were empty. But that wasn’t true of the lot surrounding the hospital. It was jam-packed. There were even cars along China Lake Boulevard, where neither girl had ever seen any parked before.

  Martina pulled into the lot, and stopped the sedan in the middle of the road near the main entrance. Given the lack of people, she was pretty sure what they would find inside, so blocking the way wouldn’t be an issue.

  Riley was out of the car first, moving surprisingly fast given her condition. Martina caught up to her just inside the hospital lobby, where her friend had come to a sudden stop.

  The reason was immediately clear. Here was where the dead had taken up residence. There were over two dozen bodies in the lobby, sitting in chairs, lying on the floor, propped against the wall.

  “Hello?” Riley called out, her voice weak.

  “Anyone here?” Martina shouted. When no one responded, she looked at her friend. “If your sister was admitted, she’d be in one of the rooms, not out here.”

  “Right. Sure.”

  Behind the reception counter, Martina brought up the patient database on one of the computers, and searched for Laurie Weber.

  “Her name’s not here,” she said.

  “Maybe…maybe they got too busy to input everything. This place looks like it got crazy.”

  “Maybe,” Martina said, not adding, “If she is here, she’s probably dead.”

  It took them an hour to do a room-by-room search. What they found was a mix of the dead and the almost. The vast majority of the latter was unconscious, but a few moaned as Martina and Riley passed. It was a real-life house of horrors. Martina lost track of how many times she nearly screamed.

  “She’s not here,” she said after they checked the last room on the top floor of the tower section.

  Riley looked one way down the hall, then the other. “But this is where my dad would have taken her.”

  “Maybe they went home,” Martina suggested, hoping it would prod Riley into movement. The sooner they got out of the hospital, the sooner she’d stop feeling like there was something crawling under her skin.

  “Home?” Riley said as if she didn’t understand. Then her face brightened. “Yeah, they didn’t have any room here. After Laurie was treated, Dad probably took her to the house.”

  They headed for the stairwell, walking at first, but running within the first couple of steps, both anxious to leave. Martina reached the bottom of the stairs first, threw the door open, and screamed.

  “Help me. Please.”

  A man stood teetering a few feet on the other side of the door, facing her. He was wearing green scrubs, and looked about the same age as Martina’s parents. There was no question he was sick—his watery eyes rimmed by blackened skin, snot running out of his nose.

  He tried to raise his hand as if he wanted to reach out to her, but his arms only moved a few inches.

  “Please,” he repeated. “Someone has to take care of him.”

  The words seemed to knock the wind out of him. He fell back against the wall, panting.

  “T…t…take care of who?” Martina asked from just inside the stairwell.

  “Come on,” Riley whispered. “We need to go.”

  Whether it was guilt for having screamed at the man, or compassion for his request, Martina couldn’t bring herself to move. “Are you talking about a patient?”

  A nod.

  “Where is he?” she asked.

  The man’s lips parted, but no words came out.

  “Where is he?” she repeated.

  “Post…Op.” The man’s legs began to shake, and he slid down the wall until he was sitting on the floor. “Please.”

  As if in slow motion, his eyes closed and he tilted to the side, falling the rest of the way onto the hallway tiles. If he wasn’t dead, he would be soon. Martina thought he’d probably been hanging on by sheer force of will, and now that someone had shown up, he could let go.

  “Let’s get out of here,” Riley said. She stepped into the hallway and turned for the main exit. When she realized Martina wasn’t following, she looked back. “Come on!”

  “We need to check,” Martina said.

  “Why?”

  “He asked us. We need to check.”

  “Are you kidding? His patient is probably dead.” She paused, then added, “We’ve checked all the rooms already. There
was nobody we could help.”

  “We didn’t think about Post-Op.”

  Instead of waiting for Riley to come up with another argument, Martina headed to the right, looking for a map of the hospital.

  “Martina, come on! Please!”

  “Wait for me at the car. I won’t take long,” Martina shouted.

  She found a map pinned to a bulletin board. Though Post-Op was not listed, Surgery was, so she figured it had to be in the same general area.

  She located the surgical rooms first, then found Post-Op down the hall. It was a big room with several beds, most empty. Those that weren’t were occupied by the dead. All except the bed at the back of the room.

  Unlike the other beds, it was surrounded by a see-through plastic wall, and on it lay an older man. The heart monitor beside the bed beeped a steady, rhythmic beat.

  Martina examined the plastic wall. Someone had duct-taped the top and bottom to the ceiling and floor. On her side of the wall were two big oxygen tanks, each with plastic piping running from their nozzles under the duct tape into the enclosed space.

  “Hello?” she said.

  The man on the bed stirred and opened his eyes.

  “Who are you?” he asked, weary.

  “Martina,” she said. “Martina Gable.”

  He looked at the room beyond her. “Where’s Frank?”

  “You mean your doctor?”

  “My son. He’s taking care of me.”

  “Your son’s your doctor?”

  “Yes. Where is he?”

  Just to be sure, she described the man she’d met in the hallway.

  “That’s him. Why isn’t he here?”

  She bit the inside of her lip, unable to tell the man what she’d seen.

  He seemed to realize it on his own. “He’s dead, isn’t he?”

  Martina still couldn’t bring herself to speak.

  “I knew he was sick,” the man said. A tear slid down his cheeks. “He was pretending he wasn’t, but I knew.”

  “How long have you been in there?” she asked.

  “Since those damn containers opened up. Frank picked me up at home and put me in here.”

  “What…what can I do for you?”