by Ellis, Tara
His hands clenching, Jason’s eyes focused on her face as he brought them down into his lap and he sucked in a loud breath. His whole body visibly tensed as he straightened in the seat. His eyes flitted around the interior of the truck, stopped on Eddy, and then out the front window. Nodding, his nostrils flared and he forced a small smile as he looked back at Peta. “Right. I’m good, though I think this reality might be slightly worse than the nightmare I was having.”
Reassured by his use of humor, Peta completed the motion of grabbing the map. “I wish I could say something to change your opinion, but I’m afraid I don’t have any good news for ya.”
“What happened?” he asked, his frown returning as he looked at Eddy.
“Nothing, yet,” Eddy said before pointing at the gas gauge. “But we’re getting close to fumes. I’m not sure we have enough to make it to Guayana City.”
Jason was shaking his head before he even took the map from Peta. “No, we don’t want to get caught stationary in the city. It’s bad enough we can’t go around it. The last thing we want to do is stop.”
“I’m sure there’ll be something before the city,” Peta urged. “How big do you think it is? If it’s anything like Barinas, there’ll be some outlying buildings and neighborhoods.”
Jason spread the map out on their laps and ran his finger along the route marked with red ink. Garrett had been thorough with detailing the route, thankfully, so they at least wouldn’t get lost. However, maps only had so much information, which meant that a lot of it was left to their discovery as they traveled through the terrain.
“If this is right, I’d guess it’s more than twice the size of Barinas,” Jason said, looking up from the map. “Even though it was late, we still saw more people in Barinas than I expected. Based on that, I’m concerned about the level of unrest we might encounter someplace bigger.”
“Why do you think there’s more survivors here?” Peta wondered, while chewing on her nails and studying the map. “Devon had speculated that if The Kuru originated from this continent, it might be affecting them slightly differently, prior to any future mutations. This could possibly be proof of that.”
“Or, it might also be about genetics,” Eddy speculated. “Which we’ve suspected to be playing a role in this. That could also tie into the local, indigenous population.”
“This is an interesting conversation,” Jason interrupted. “And I’d honestly like to pick it up later, but right now we need to focus on the gas issue. According to the last mile marker we just passed, we’re less than fifty miles outside the edges of town, so let’s keep an eye out for any houses or something useful.”
“Don’t you find it ironic?” Peta asked, as she folded the map in half and handed it to Jason. “That a higher survival rate is going to equal more potential for violence in populated areas, making it harder for us to help stop it?” Pursing her lips, she rubbed at her eyes and tried to dig deep for some motivation.
“It’s the epitome of human nature,” Eddy said in his irritatingly impassive way.
The most frustrating aspect was that Peta couldn’t disagree with him. Except that she’d also met enough people and experienced enough during her life to understand what true hardship was. As well as the rare fraction that rose above it. She’d spent time in communities that would have been considered by most to be unbearable, but the people who lived there were some of the happiest she’d ever seen. It might be a part of human nature to destroy what you fear, and to turn to panic and the fight or flight response out of desperation. But there would always be those who chose to come together and seek out something greater. To trust in love and empathy and the side of human nature that separated their species from the animals. That was what bothered Peta the most about the man she was sitting next to, and the growing number of other Cured amongst the population. That they lacked the ability to see the advantage in those traits, or to feel it. Because it could very well end up being what would give them the ability to persevere.
Keeping her internal musings to herself for the time being, she shifted away from Eddy involuntarily and found herself pressing into Jason’s side. Instead of pulling away, he lifted his arm and draped it across the back of the bench seat to give her more room, as if he understood her inner turmoil.
“There!” Eddy shouted, apparently ignorant to Peta’s reaction to him.
Looking to where he was pointing, she saw what appeared to be the rooftop of a house in the distance. Turning, she knocked on the back window and gestured to Tyler and Devon that they were stopping.
As soon as they pulled onto the short gravel drive that led to the small house, it was obvious there weren’t any vehicles, and it looked abandoned. Devon jumped out of the back of the truck and jogged around to Jason’s open window.
“We looking for gas?” he asked, running a hand over his wind-blown hair in a useless attempt to tame it.
“Yup, just about out,” Jason confirmed. “This place is a no-go, so be keeping an eye out for any other prospects.”
Though Devon left without mentioning Hernandez, he didn’t need to say anything. Peta could tell by the way he looked at her, and how he kept glancing back to where he was lying, that there wasn’t much time left. For the same reason he didn’t mention it, neither did she. There wasn’t anything to be done about it, except to stay with him so he wouldn’t be alone when he died.
In another ten minutes they came upon a larger house, and there was a small car parked out front. Jason and Eddy quickly exited the truck as soon as it had stopped, and Peta watched in fascination as Jason led the way to the front door in a fast-moving crouch, weapon at the ready. As soon as his feet hit the ground, she saw a shift come over him as he slipped into soldier mode. She had no idea what kind of a doctor he was, but it didn’t take long to determine that he wasn’t someone you wanted to be on the wrong side of in a fight.
Feeling vulnerable out in the open, she retrieved her own weapon and went to stand by the bed of the truck with Tyler and Devon. They all exchanged furtive glances but refrained from speaking.
They didn’t have long to wait until Jason and Eddy reappeared around the corner of the house, having gone out the backdoor. Jason waved a hand at them, giving the all-clear sign, and Peta was able to take a deep breath again. She wondered if she would ever use up enough adrenaline so that she’d stop getting so anxious every time something stressful came up. She’d have to talk with Jason at some point and learn how he was able to control his response. It was something she’d always envied in some of her colleagues. She might come off as cool and controlled on the outside, but in reality, she was an emotional wreck.
Devon already had their gas can in hand and was jogging toward the car. Eddy met him there, and together they worked on siphoning what amounted to less than two gallons of gas.
Slamming his fist onto the hood of the truck, Jason squinted as he looked out toward the road. “We’re getting too close. This might be enough to get us into Guayana City, but not much more. We’re going to have to stop again.”
Peta trusted his instinct about the dangers the town presented so, as they continued driving and got several miles further without seeing another house, she began questioning their lack of a more solid plan. She knew that realistically, they didn’t have any other options, but that didn’t stop her highly analytical mind from criticizing every decision they’d made along the way that brought them to that point.
“Here we go,” Jason muttered, as two empty sideroads abruptly appeared and ran parallel to them. They passed a street sign, announcing the upcoming city. Unlike how most highways worked in the states, the main road they were on didn’t go around Guayana with exits, but instead went straight through the heart of it.
Just as Jason had feared, the suburbs weren’t accessible from the direction they were approaching, and they were being taken directly into the outskirts of the city. Eddy slowed to a stop as the first intersection came into view. Though they were on the fringes and still far
from the city center, the level of destruction was obvious.
A band of dark smoke hung over the sprawling metropolis in the distance, and the sense of desolation grew as Peta saw burned-out vehicles littering the road less than a quarter-mile ahead. The intersection was only a block away, and each corner was occupied by a building of some sort. Most of the windows were broken out, and she could see at least two bodies scattered in the otherwise empty parking lots.
It was hard to know the order in which the various levels of chaos occurred. Garbage was piled on the sidewalks, and masks were mixed in with the refuse blowing across the road. After the power went out and the infrastructure collapsed, there would have been riots and looting in the streets. Soon after, they would have run out of gas and other temporary fixes to their immediate problems. Then, as with the rest of the world, The Kuru hit. In a matter of days, they would have gone from your typical civil unrest to full-blown survival mode. By now, everyone would either be dead, in the last stages of the illness, or one of the Immune or the Cured.
Based on what was happening in the states, and their rough guess of one million for the population of Guayana, there should only be around a thousand survivors. Adding in one percent for the Cured, and then taking other injuries and illnesses into consideration, there’d be less than two thousand people left in the whole city. Even if they doubled that, it would still make it close to a ghost town.
However, if what Jason suspected was true, it wouldn’t take very many of those survivors to band together and cause problems. It would come down to a game of luck, or chance, or maybe fate. Peta wasn’t sure what to call it. All she knew was that in spite of the odds, she didn’t want to play the game.
Chapter 14
TYLER
Guayana City, Venezuela
“Hey, I think this still has some stuff in it!” Tyler shouted to Eddy, who was standing watch outside the gas station’s door. Tyler didn’t think he’d ever get to a point where he was sick of eating vending-machine food, but after a few more days he’d probably get there.
The machine was already on its side and scavenged, much like the rest of the small store, but he was able to reach inside and dig out some candy bars and even a couple bags of chips. The shelves were only partially stripped and oddly enough, there was even water stacked in the back corner. Standing in the middle of it all, Tyler speculated that they’d only just started panic buying and then looting when they started getting sick. It was the one benefit of an apocalypse from The Kuru. People died so fast that they never got a chance to finish freaking out and destroying everything first.
They’d stopped at the first three cars they came upon, but they’d been dead in the street for a reason. And just like with the food, people had time to drive their cars home and then stayed there to die, so there weren’t nearly as many abandoned ones as Tyler thought there’d be.
He’d seen a handful of people staggering around so far. One other car had passed them going in the opposite direction, the two occupants staring at them suspiciously. Someone ran from the gas station as their truck pulled up, dropping a package of toilet paper in their haste to get away. Tyler didn’t know what he’d expected, but it certainly wasn’t the eerily empty and garbage-strewn streets surrounded by burnt-out buildings. He was thinking it would be more like something from The Walking Dead, instead of The Stand. Maybe if they’d gotten there two days earlier it would have fit the script better.
Fortunately, Peta had at least been right about there being a gradual increase in buildings, and the outer ring was mostly stuff like restaurants, stores, and gas stations. They’d only gone a couple of blocks and a few intersections before coming across the station where they were stopped. The pumps weren’t working, but so long as there was some fuel in the main tanks, they’d be able to get what they needed. Again, it was another one of the benefits to first the loss of power, and then the lack of people wanting or being able to drive around.
With his backpack crammed full, and a case of water under one arm, Tyler headed back outside into the odd early-morning light. The clouds had cleared up, but the haze continued to make the sky really weird. It was a color he didn’t know how to describe. It was sort of like the time there was a big fire near a campground his dad made him go to for a father-son weekend, but the hue was…different. He didn’t know why it always caused a deep gut reaction whenever he thought about it. Maybe it was something instinctual, but Tyler didn’t like it.
Looking away from the sky, he saw that Peta and Jason were both bent over an open ground-cover, working on syphoning the gas with a handpump they found in the attached service station. Devon was pacing next to the truck, while Eddy continued to scan the streets around them, a Glock held openly out to his side. Tyler figured anyone thinking about approaching them might see the gun and think otherwise, which was exactly why Eddy was making it so obvious.
“Why do you think there’s less people here than there was last night at Barinas?” Devon asked.
Devon was looking toward Peta, but Eddy was the first to answer. “It’s been over ten hours since we were in Barinas,” he said. Gesturing to the empty intersection with the Glock, he looked at Hernandez. “We all know how rapidly the infection progresses. I doubt by now that there are many left who haven’t been exposed to The Kuru, and most are incapacitated within twenty-four hours. I don’t find it at all surprising that we’ve seen a further decrease in the population since last night.”
“Which is all the more reason to get the hell out of here,” Jason said, clearly irritated. Standing, he picked up what Tyler hoped was a full gas can and carried it to the truck.
Peta wiped her hands on her jeans before studying Tyler’s bounty. “Why don’t you throw that in the truck, and then you and Devon make one more pass through the store? See if they have any gas cans. I’d love to take all we can get out of there.”
Happy to be assigned an important task, Tyler did as he was instructed. Careful to avoid Hernandez when he lifted the case of water into the bed of the truck, he then patted Marty’s head. “Don’t you need a bathroom break, bud?” he cooed, worried about the dog’s recent mood. “I’ll look for some dog food, too,” he promised. “The wet, stinky kind that you probably aren’t normally allowed to eat.”
Back inside the store, he and Devon made quick work of finding the few useful items that were left, including some cans of Alpo and one gas can. Tyler was busy thinking about how weird it was to find Alpo in Venezuela as he stepped back outside, so he didn’t see the old man at first.
“Ayuadame.” It was a dry voice that was hardly more than a whisper. It came from somewhere off to Tyler’s right, near the corner of the building.
Tyler jumped, and saw that Eddy had already moved so that he was standing further out from the building. It gave him a clear aim at what appeared to be an old, sick man leaning against the store.
“Ayuadame,” he croaked again, reaching out to them, apparently oblivious of the gun.
“He’s saying ‘help me’,” Devon said, giving Eddy a disgusted look. “I think it’s safe to put the gun down, Rambo. I don’t think he’s much of what Jason would call a viable threat.”
Sliding down the wall until he was sitting on the ground, the old man leaned to his left, and it was obvious he couldn’t move his left arm as he raised his right toward them. “Agua, por favor. Por favor.”
Tyler didn’t have to be fluent in Spanish to understand the guy was asking for water. Setting down the second case he’d scored, he pulled out two bottles and approached the man, holding one of them out. “Here,” Tyler said, as he squatted down in front of him. “Do you know how to say we don’t have anything that will help?” he asked, looking back at Devon.
“No hay cura,” Devon said with a shake of his head. “Lo siento, pero todo lo que podemos hacer es darte agua.”
The old man began to sob as he held the water bottle to his lips, nodding in understanding.
“What did you say?” Tyler asked, backin
g away.
Devon shrugged. “That there isn’t a cure and we can’t do anything more than give him water. Come on,” he added, waving him back to the truck. “I’m going to take this gas can over to Peta.”
Jason and Peta were back at the tanks, filling up again. It was only a five-gallon jug, so it would take four trips to fill the truck. The addition of another container would cut the work in half, and they’d refill them again to take for later.
Tyler looked around at the other buildings, wondering if there were any other stores that might stock gas cans. They needed to find something else to take more of the gas with them.
“This will be enough to get us to the next small settlement,” Eddy said, correctly reading his thoughts. “It isn’t worth the risk to try and scavenge for more. We should keep moving as much as possible.”
Discarding his grand plans of being the gas can savior, Tyler went back to the truck. He realized as he looked in at Hernandez, that part of the reason he was so eager to go running around in the potential Walking Dead buildings, was avoidance. Ever since the sun came up and he could see him, Tyler kept freaking himself out and thinking that Hernandez was dead, until he saw his chest rise-and-fall. Along with it came a rush of dread, and a mix of sorrow and relief. When Hernandez was unconscious, he wasn’t suffering. It was when he woke up briefly and moaned in agony that Tyler began to think death would be a relief for his friend, and he felt horrible for it.
Popping a lid off one of the Alpo cans, he dumped the glob of goodies right out onto the floor of the truck, under Marty’s nose. Taking the plastic bowl they’d been using since the first military base they’d refueled at back in Mexico, Tyler added a serving of water to the meal.
Marty sniffed at the unrecognizable mass for a moment before eagerly burying his snout in it. Tyler laughed at the dog’s antics over the food, but then felt a fresh wave of guilt. The poor thing hadn’t gotten anything besides chips and a pepperoni stick since they’d left the CDC. No wonder he was getting lethargic. Wherever they stopped next, he’d make sure to make dog-edible food a priority.
