Last Pandemic (Book 2): Escape The City Read online

  She clearly didn’t believe him. She was poised as if ready to dash back inside, slamming the door in his face.

  He’d aroused her suspicion.

  “Look,” he said. “I realize I look crazy. I’m dirty, sweating, panting, telling you people are chasing me. But I’m telling the truth.”

  He locked his eyes onto hers and didn’t waver. He knew that while his outward appearance might have made him look a little unhinged, his eyes were as sane as they could be.

  “All right,” she said, stepping aside to let him through the door. “Come on in.”

  “Thanks,” he muttered, glancing over his shoulder as he walked past her.

  As he did, he saw someone. Off in the distance, but clear. A figure with a gun. A long gun. Coming for him.

  “Get inside!” he hissed, grabbing her by the arm and pulling her in, slamming the door behind them.

  “What was that? Did you see that person? They were armed!” She spoke frantically.

  “I wasn’t lying,” said Joe. “Shit, this is all my fault. I’ve waited too long. Now they know we’re in here. I shouldn’t have roped you into this.”

  What had started as just a frantic attempt to get into a house for a moment, to gain some shelter, had now brought another innocent person into danger.

  He thought of Sean and his face as it had looked in death. Sean didn’t deserve to die. He’d been a good kid. A good friend.

  And this woman didn’t deserve to die either.

  He looked at her face. At her beauty.

  If only they’d met some other time. Maybe things could have been different.

  No, probably not, he thought. Joe was basically a loner. A man with his land and a couple of friends. A man set in his ways. Not the sort of man a fancy Easterner was looking for.

  It wouldn’t have worked. It was fun to think about for a few stolen moments, though.

  “You have a gun!” she said, shock in her voice, as she apparently had just noticed his shotgun and handgun.

  He nodded. “Do you have weapons in the house?”

  “Weapons?” she said, apparently aghast at the thought. “Oh, no.”

  “You know how to shoot a gun?” he said, already knowing the answer.

  “A gun? Oh, no, I don’t!”

  She spoke as if she was failing some kind of test, as if the answers were completely unexpected, completely strange.

  Any other time, Joe would have felt frustrated. He did notice that her perceived beauty seemed to be diminishing a little bit before him, with each new word that she spoke.

  None of that mattered now, however.

  The man coming for them was surely coming to the house.

  Joe was moving quickly through the tiny home, trying to find its weakness, its points of attack.

  “Is there a basement?” he said.

  Sometimes these sorts of homes had small basements. Other times, they didn’t.

  “No,” she said, shaking her head wildly. “What should I do? Should I get a knife from the kitchen?”

  “Wouldn’t hurt,” said Joe, walking swiftly through the home. It was small enough that it was easy to talk, despite being in another room.

  The rooms were small and there weren’t many of them. The largest of them was circular.

  The windows were also small and irregularly shaped. They had a single pane of glass and no curtains.

  “No drapes?” he said.

  “There aren’t a lot of people around,” she said, speaking quickly.

  She sounded nervous now. Her elegant mannerisms, which were noticeable upon first meeting, seemed to have vanished. Now she moved in a jittery way, her arms and legs apparently not very coordinated now that she was nervous.

  She had returned from the kitchen, a fairly small steak knife clutched in her shaking hand. “Will this do?” she said.

  He didn’t answer. He was peering out one of the windows.

  The one good thing about the house was that there weren’t many windows.

  Everything else about the it was not ideal for the situation they were in.

  There were, how many men and women coming for them? He couldn’t remember. But he knew that soon enough, it’d be plenty more than one.

  There seemed to be only the one door.

  “No other doors?” he called out.

  “I’m afraid not,” she said. It was amazing that she managed to get the words out, considering how nervous she sounded, as if her whole body and torso were shaking.

  “There’s no way out then.”

  His face was at the window, peering up over the thick adobe wall at the glass.

  “There’s another one,” he said, spotting a second man approaching. Because of the way the house was built into the hillside, he could just see the lower bodies of the two men. Their legs were moving rapidly. Their boots hit the ground. Their torsos were invisible.

  “This is crazy!” she was saying, grabbing the phone. “Oh, if only this would work!”

  Joe knew the phone was long dead. And even if it hadn’t been, there wasn’t enough time for anyone to get here to help, no matter who they were.

  Joe didn’t know what to do. He found himself standing there at the window, somewhat frozen, shotgun in hand, watching as the legs approached them.

  Another pair of legs joined in. Now there were three people.

  “Shit,” he muttered, over and over again. Momentarily, he’d forgotten that he wasn’t alone. And then he remembered again.

  He glanced over at this woman whose house he’d invited all this trouble into. He didn’t know her name. She was a nervous wreck. Yet, as he saw now, she was still beautiful.

  And, beautiful or not, she didn’t deserve this. She didn’t deserve the certain death that was coming for her.

  These men had shot Sean. Surely, they’d shoot her along with himself.

  Another sudden flash of a thought: what about the virus?

  Weren’t the pursuers concerned that he might potentially be contaminated?

  And what about this woman? She didn’t seem contaminated. She didn’t have enlarged veins. No obvious signs of sickness. Nothing out of the ordinary. But had she not even heard about the virus?

  No time to ask her.

  There was a knock on the door. A loud knock.

  Shit. It was happening.

  He’d frozen for too long. He’d been lost in his own thoughts for too long. He should have acted. He should have shot at them through the window. He should have done something.

  “What do we do?” she said, moving behind him, away from the door.

  “Stay back,” he said.

  This was his mess. He should have never come to this house. He should have run beyond it.

  Then again, maybe they would have come in anyway. Maybe they would have attacked her anyway.

  The door was made of wood and was somewhat thick. It was an “artistic” sort of door, meaning that it looked nice but wasn’t necessarily practical and airtight. Sort of the way the whole house was.

  Joe didn’t think about it. He walked swiftly toward the door, his shotgun in both hands.

  He aimed at chest level. Pulled the trigger. The shotgun kicked.

  He pulled the trigger again. More of a pull this time.

  The gun kicked again.

  Two large diameter holes appeared in the door.

  A gasp of pain on the other side.

  Joe threw himself violently to the floor. No chance of just ducking. The shotgun clattered to the floor. No time to reload it anyway.

  The door flew open just as his hand was wrapping around his handgun. He drew it, lengthened his arm, his elbow digging into the tiled floor.

  A man had kicked the door open. His foot was still in the air when Joe pulled the trigger.

  The gun kicked.

  The shot missed.

  The beautiful woman, behind him in the house, screamed hysterically. Nothing but unintelligible words.

  Joe’s mind was in survival mode. Working
on pure instinct.

  Only later would he note, upon reflection, that being flat on the floor wasn’t such a bad position to be in, since it reduced the surface area facing the enemy by a considerable amount.

  Joe kept shooting.

  Two men were hit, on the ground. And one woman.

  Joe’s ears were ringing.

  Was that it?

  It was like the roar of silence had descended over the little house. His heart was pumping. He had tunnel vision from an outpouring of adrenaline.

  And there were three bodies in front of him, only mere feet away.

  The wooden door, now punctured by two large holes, stayed still on its hinges. The frame of the door was busted, hanging out and away from the wall.

  Joe stayed in place, not moving. He was just waiting for more.

  But no one came.

  No one except the blond woman, who rushed up to him, kneeling down over him.

  “Are you okay?”

  He could barely hear her words over the roar in his ears.

  She was frantic. Her long hair hung down around his face, having come undone from her ponytail.

  It was strange. It didn’t seem as if he’d just met her, as if they were strangers. Instead, it seemed as if they had lived together for years in this house as a couple.

  But this little fantasy daydream, with her beautiful face staring down at him, couldn’t last. Not for long.

  There were bound to be more assassins coming. This wasn’t the end. How many of them had there been when he and Sean had seen them? He couldn’t remember, no matter how hard he tried. But more than three. More than four.

  The others wouldn’t give up. He knew it somehow. He could feel it in his bones.

  They’d be coming for him.

  27

  Judy

  Judy was feeling beyond tired. She felt the exhaustion in her bones and her joints.

  She was mentally exhausted too.

  “I’m too old for all this,” she muttered quietly enough that only she could hear it. After all, she had her outward persona that she needed to project. The two others needed her, needed her to be somewhat stable, appearing indefatigable and knowledgeable.

  But the truth was that she wasn’t sure she was up to all this. She’d lost her son. That was enough hardship for a lifetime. And it had just happened yesterday.

  Now, it seemed that she’d lose everything else along with Damian. Not just her house, vehicle, and all her possessions, but the entire society and culture that she’d grown up with

  It was all descending into madness. The gunman, or gunmen, in the homemade armored car were just a representation of that. They served no purpose. They were accomplishing nothing. They weren’t even, as far as anyone could tell, trying to gain anything for themselves.

  It would have been one thing, Judy thought, if the gunmen had decided to kill and rob. There were all sorts of moral and philosophical arguments that could be made in both directions, but in the end, some would consider the actions and others just wouldn’t.

  But senseless slaughter like this? Who could commend that? No one but the sickest and most depraved. No one but the lost and the demented.

  “Isn’t there some way we can stop them?” said Judy, her eyes staying fixed on the homemade tank-like vehicle that now sad idle and silent. No more gunfire erupted from it.

  “How?” said Jamie.

  “No idea,” said Judy.

  “I don’t think we can,” said Matt. “Doesn’t look like there are any weak points.”

  “And why try?” said Jamie. “We’re just going to be risking our lives. And for what?”

  “For the others,” said Judy. “For the people coming after us, the people fleeing the cities...”

  “That’s not our responsibility,” said Matt.

  For some reason, Damian was on Judy’s mind. What if there was another young man like him, coming from the cities, a young man trying to reach his mother’s house, only to get gunned down by some maniacs?

  “What if there’s a blind spot?” said Judy. “You know, some little section that they can’t see? We could sneak up without getting shot, you know? A homemade thing like that has got to have some serious design flaws.”

  Matt just looked at her and shook his head. “No way,” he said. “There might be a blind spot, but it’s risky. Way too risky.”

  “I’m all for altruism when the situation is right,” said Jamie. “But that’s just crazy.”

  “Come on,” said Matt. “We’ve got to go.”

  He held his hand out for Judy. There was kindness in his eyes. He seemed to recognize that this strange thinking on her part had something to do with losing Damian, even though she hadn’t mentioned it.

  She grasped his hand firmly, but only for a moment. She could do it all herself.

  “You feeling okay, Judy?” they both asked her, concern in their eyes.

  “Of course,” she said, brushing off their concern for her health.

  She’d either succumb to whatever condition had struck her down hours earlier, or she wouldn’t.

  Time to press on.

  They made their way away from the homemade tank, heading around the back of the gas station and convenience store.

  The land was rockier there, with plenty of weeds that had grown up early in the spring, possibly from the great rainfall that they’d had this year.

  The mountains off in the distance looked incredible, with clouds hanging around their peaks. In another season, she would have expected to see rain streaming down from the clouds, silent lightning strikes as the monsoons swept through the land.

  The sun was getting low. In a couple of hours, it’d be setting. They weren’t going to make Joe’s land by nightfall.

  Given how dark it got around these parts, especially on cloudy nights when the moon and stars weren’t shining, it might be difficult, if not impossible, to progress across uneven terrain at night.

  They walked as quickly as they could until they were far, far away from the intersection and the convenience store was now only a small dot on the horizon.

  “I can’t believe it was that simple,” said Jamie. “Just go around it...why didn’t anyone else do it?”

  “Maybe some did,” said Matt. “And the others? Maybe they were just so used to traveling on roads, another option was almost unthinkable.”

  “Yeah, it’s almost as though people can’t envision a path other than the official one.”

  “The road less traveled. Literally.”

  “People are going to have to get used to doing things the ‘unofficial’ way, if I get what you’re saying.”

  “Yeah. There’s no more ‘official’ way to do anything. Just do what works. Just try to survive.”

  “You think we can make it?”

  “What? Long-term? Maybe.”

  “I think we can.”

  Eventually the scattered conversation fell into silence and they walked until the sun went down.

  The detour led them far away from the road and added on a considerable amount of time to their journey.

  There were the occasional fences to mount and while the terrain at times looked easy and flat, it was anything but, and they found themselves exhausted by nightfall.

  “We’ve got to stop,” said Matt.

  “It’s not like we can really set up much of a camp,” said Judy.

  “I’m just about tired enough that I can sleep right here,” said Jamie.

  Judy eventually agreed, because she found that once she stopped and stood there in one place for a few moments, the exhaustion really started to come on strong.

  There wasn’t much, if anything, to set up, so they simply lay down on the ground.

  Matt said he’d take the first watch shift and before she knew it, Judy had fallen asleep into fitful dreams.

  In her dreams, she was walking through the mountains with her now-deceased son. They were talking about her cousin, Joe, and the last time they’d seen him. Damian was r
emarking on the wildlife, pointing out various interesting-looking birds and saying that springtime was his favorite season of all.

  Judy woke with her heart pounding and the instant realization that Damian was dead and would never return.

  She played the tough woman on the outside and really, that was her. But there was always an interior life to everyone, no matter how tough and hardened they appeared on the outside.

  The night was dark and quiet, with only subtle sounds of animals and insects.

  “You there, Matt?”

  “Yeah. Having bad dreams?”

  She nodded, knowing that he couldn’t see her.

  “Better try to get back to bed,” he said. “Likely another long day tomorrow.”

  “I doubt I’ll get back to sleep,” she said, speaking with experience. “The older you get, the harder it gets to sleep.”

  “I was going to wake Jamie up in a couple hours,” said Matt. “That’ll give me enough rest.”

  “Better rest now while you can,” she said. “Before I change my mind.”

  He didn’t need more convincing than that and soon enough, he was lying out on the cold ground, wrapped only in an extra shirt, not far from Jamie.

  Judy found herself staring off into the night, alone with her thoughts, her hands on her gun.

  Her life was different now. Things were never going to go back to the way they’d been.

  If they managed to reach her cousin’s property, then there was a chance they might live.

  But it seemed like such a far-off chance.

  It was hard to imagine things working out in the long-term if they did get to the property.

  What would their daily life look like?

  What would they eat?

  Sure, they’d have water to drink from the well.

  But what about everything else? What about the hundreds, if not thousands, of little things that everyone takes for granted in their daily and weekly lives? There’d be no stores to go to. No internet sites to buy from.

  And what about outsiders, people who’d do whatever they could to steal what little others had?

  It’d be a life of constant turmoil, constant struggle. Constant warfare, punctuated by mere moments of relief. Like right now. Right now, in the middle of the night, the only one awake for miles, hopefully.