“Who the hell did you think I was? A zombie or something?”
“Well…I, um…”
Martina realized that was exactly what her friend had been thinking. “For God’s sake, put that thing away! There’s no reason to shoot anybody! This isn’t a video game!”
Noreen sheepishly pulled the gun inside.
“Get down here!” Martina told her.
When the door opened a few seconds later, the girls hesitated for a moment, and then threw their arms around each other.
“Oh, God. I thought I was the only one,” Noreen said. “I thought I was all alone.”
“You mean you and zombies,” Martina told her.
“You, uh, could have been one.”
Martina pulled back from the embrace, but kept her hands on her friend’s arms. “No, I couldn’t have been. There’s no such thing. There’s the dead, the dying, and us. No walking corpse that wants to eat you.”
“They only eat brains.”
“Noreen!”
“Okay, okay. Sorry. But what was I supposed to think? I’m sleeping on my bed, and suddenly someone’s knocking on my door.”
Martina smiled as she shook her head and pulled her friend into another embrace. Noreen had always had a vivid imagination, fed by a steady diet of horror films, manga comics, and time on her Xbox.
When they pulled apart again, Martina said, “Have you checked on the others?”
“What others?”
“From the team.”
Noreen looked like she didn’t understand. “The softball team?”
“Yeah.”
“Why would I do that?”
“Don’t you get it? It’s why you and I are alive.” Martina could tell it still wasn’t sinking in. “The flu last spring. It’s the same thing killing everyone now. We lived through it, and it made us immune.”
It took a moment before hope dawned on Noreen’s face. “You think so?”
“I’m not a scientist or anything, but you’re alive and I’m alive. Don’t you think we should check and see if the others are, too?”
At first, the search was as fruitless as the one for Riley’s father and sister. Some of their friends’ homes were completely unoccupied, while others were serving as the final resting place for one or more bodies. None of the dead, however, were their old teammates.
Once they finished the east side of town, they headed across town on China Lake Boulevard toward Valerie Bechtel’s house, up the hill near the college. As they passed the intersection with Ridgecrest Boulevard, Martina considered checking on Riley, but decided it would be better to let her sleep.
“Hey,” Noreen said, looking out the front window. “Isn’t that Jilly’s car?”
Martina followed her friend’s gaze. It did look like Jilly’s car. It was parked in a lot between Wienerschnitzel and Carl’s Jr.
“And that’s Amanda’s next to it,” Noreen said. Amanda was another from the team. “And Martha’s, and…and I think that’s Valerie’s.”
Martina pulled into the lot and parked in an empty spot next to Carl’s.
“Of course, this is where we’d find them,” Noreen said, almost giddy.
Carl’s had been one of the team’s favorite hangouts.
As they climbed out of the car, they could hear loud music blasting from inside the restaurant but couldn’t see anyone, as most of the dining area was tucked around the side of the kitchen, out of sight.
With a shared grin, they jogged over to the entrance and pulled the doors open.
The music wasn’t just loud. It was blaring.
Katy Perry, “Last Friday Night.”
Martina and Noreen peeked into the dining area. In the back corner, crowded around the table the team always claimed whenever possible, were eight girls with food and drinks spread out in front of them.
Martina held Noreen back until the song was finished, then gave her a tap on the back. They stepped out where they could be seen.
“You should be careful,” Martina said loudly enough for everyone to hear. “The manager will kick you out for playing the music that loud.”
Head twists and shocked stares.
“Holy shit,” someone said.
The words broke the trance and suddenly the girls were up and rushing toward Martina and Noreen.
At some point as Martina passed from one embrace to another, she began to laugh. It wasn’t that she could forget her family was dead, or all the other things she had seen.
But for this moment, this one precious moment, she was happy again.
19
Jack Cutroy had gladly taken his reassignment. Anything would be a relief after days of finding only the dying and the dead. What had surprised him, though, was that the call with his new orders came from William Ownby, chief of the entire Boulder Fire Department. It turned out there was only a handful of personnel still on the job. From the sound of Ownby’s voice, Jack had guessed it wouldn’t be long before the chief went home, too.
“Need you to gas up your vehicle, then get over to the C&M Clinic,” Ownby instructed. “You’re on escort duty.”
“What kind of escort duty?”
“That girl you picked up, Ellie Gaines. She passed her test.”
“Test?”
“She’s negative for the Sage Flu.”
“You’ve got to be kidding. She was stuck in there with her parents for who knows how long.”
“Well, she’s clean,” his boss said, sniffling. “There’s a place near Colorado Springs called Camp Kiley. They’re taking in kids who test negative but have nowhere to go. Need you to take her there.”
Jack and the girl had now been on the road for nearly three hours. With the roads all but deserted, they were making great time, and were only about half an hour away from the camp.
He glanced over at Ellie, strapped into a car seat on the passenger side of the cab. “You doing all right?”
She nodded. “Uh-huh.”
“Need to go to the bathroom?”
A shake this time. “Uh-uh.”
“Thirsty? Hungry?”
More shakes.
Through the whole exchange she never once looked at him. Not surprising. She had to be scared out of her mind.
Jack focused back on the road and winced, his head hurting again. He’d taken a couple aspirin in Boulder before he’d donned his biosuit again, and it had helped for a while, but now the headache was back with a vengeance. Once he dropped the girl off, he could take a few more and maybe even find someplace he could sleep for a while. That would make him feel better for sure.
He really wished he could take off the hood. He knew keeping it on wasn’t helping his head at all, but keeping the suit was an order from on high, this time to protect the girl in case he was carrying the virus.
Of course, he wasn’t; he knew that. He still felt great. Well, he did have the headache, sure, but that was from overwork and lack of sleep. Still, orders were orders, and he’d been trained well enough to stick to them even if he didn’t think they were necessary.
He checked the GPS, ten curving-up miles left.
“Won’t be long now,” he said.
From the time Brandon had arrived at Camp Kiley the day before, through the middle of the morning that day, cars and vans had come pretty much every few hours with new kids, sometimes just one, sometimes more.
The last had dropped off its passengers around ten thirty, but since then there had been no more deliveries. That was why the sound of an approaching vehicle made everyone perk up.
The truck that appeared out of the forest looked to Brandon like the kind EMTs used.
Loni, who had taken to staying close to him, asked, “How many?”
“Can’t tell,” Brandon said, only able to make out a man in protective gear behind the wheel.