 
EARTH'S SURVIVORS: APOCALYPSE

Copyright 2009 Geo Dell all rights reserved.

Cover Art © Copyright 2018 Geo Dell

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This is a work of fiction. Any names, characters, places or incidents depicted are products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual living person's places, situations or events is purely coincidental.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

ONE

TWO

THREE

FOUR

FIVE

SIX

SEVEN

EIGHT

CHARACTOR BIBLIOGRAPHY

EARTH'S SURVIVORS: APOCALYPSE
ONE

High summer: Plague year one

Base Ostega

Northern Canada

1:00 am

The first quake had been minor, the last few had not. The big one was coming. The satellite links were down, but Doctor Alan Weber didn't need to have a satellite link up to know that. He touched one hand to his head, the fingertips came away bloody. In any other circumstances he would be hurrying to get his head wound taken care of, but these were not just any circumstances. The entire world was ending and it was a miracle to him that he had made it through the complex above and down into the control room of the facility before it had been supposed to automatically lock down. His office was a shamble, but his secretary had met him in the hallway having ridden out the quakes in the supply room, between the tall rows of steel cabinets: Together they had made their way to the office.

All main-line Comm links were down, probably because of the loss of the satellite systems. Underground back-up cable Comm: Down. The facility was in bad shape, and he was not kidding himself, there was no help on the way. No hope of reaching the surface and the worst was not yet here. He was probably lucky to have made it down the six floors to his office from where he had been. There was an automatic lock-down program that would shut down the entire facility within seconds of an attack or catastrophic event, it had failed somehow.

He laughed to himself, he had, had to lock it down manually once he had made his way in or else it would still be open to the world. He had blown up the two main entrances to the facility, sealing his own fate as he sealed it off from the world above.

He had spent the last several years here in the Canadian wilderness running the chemical countermeasure unit at the base. He had worked on a top secret virus designed to prolong human life in cases of extreme deprivation: Nuclear attack, war and other unlikely scenarios. He had spent the last two weeks working up to this event from his subterranean office complex. All wreckage now. Still, he had sent operatives out from here three days ago to do what they could to seed the virus: Following his final orders sent down through some now probably non-existent chain of command. He had heard absolutely nothing since, and believed that was because there was no one left in command any longer.

The virus was so secretive that no one beyond the base knew the true nature of it. Even the politicians that passed bills for funding while looking the other way had not truly known what they were funding. A couple of well placed dollars in the pocket could buy a great deal of silence.

Several Army bases had secretly been infected and studied. The commanders of the armed forces had, had no idea that anything was being tested on their men. The troops had done well, surviving their training with little food and water much better than they usually did, but over the next week nearly every bird in the area had died. Some side effect they had not been able to ferret out.

That virus build had also been crippled. It had a built in self destruct mechanism to kill the virus after a short amount of time. In fact that same version had been kept as an antidote for the newest version which had no such mechanism and would go on reinfecting indefinitely.

The entire virus design and its capabilities were top secret. Top secret. And usually Top Secret meant dozens of people knew, but this time it had meant that it really had been Top Secret. Withheld from the public, and even those in charge for years had known nothing of the true nature of the virus.

Last week had changed it all. Last week the news had come down from the finest scientific minds that an extinction event was about to take place. Up to ninety percent of the world population would likely be killed off as events unfolded. It was not a maybe, it was an absolute.

The public knew that there was a meteor on a near collision course with the Earth. They had paid off the best scientists to assure the public it would miss by several thousand miles. A lie, but they had found that even scientists were willing to look past facts if their own personal spin put a better story in the mix. A survivable story, and so some had spun their own stories without prodding. From there the internet had picked it up and run with it. From there the conspiracy theorists, and by the end of the week the meteor was survivable. The story that the meteor would destroy the planet was now a lie made up by commanders of the rebel alliance in the Middle East to take the focus off their actions, the public believed what it wanted to believe.

The truth was that the meteor might miss, barely, a near miss, but it wouldn't matter because it would contribute to a natural chain of events that would make a meteor impact look like small change.

The big deal, the bigger than a meteor deal, was the earthquakes that had already started and would probably continue until most of the civilized world was dead or dying. Crumbled into ruin from super earthquakes and volcanic activity that had never been seen by modern civilization. And it had been predicted several times over by more than one group and hushed up quickly when it was uncovered. The governments had known. The conspiracy theorists had known. The public should have known, but they were too caught up in world events that seemed to be dragging them ever closer to a third world war to pay attention to a few voices crying in the wilderness. The public was happier watching television series about conspiracies rather than looking at the day to day truths about real conspiracies. The fact was that this was a natural course of events. It had happened before and it would happen again in some distant future.

In the end it hadn't mattered. In the end the factual side of the event had begun to happen. The reality, Alan Weber liked to think of it. And fact was fact. You couldn't dispute fact. You could spin it, and that was the way of the old world, spinning it, but the bare facts were just that: The bare facts.

The bare facts were that the Yellowstone Caldera had erupted just a few hours before. The bare facts were that the earth quakes had begun all around the world, and although they were not so bad here at the northern tip of Canada, in other areas of the world, in the lower states, in foreign countries, third world countries, the bare facts of what was occurring were devastating: Millions dead, millions more would die before it was over, and this was nothing new. The government had evidence that this same event had happened many times in Earth's history. This was nothing new at all, not even new to the human race. A similar event had killed off most of the human race some seventy-five thousand years before. The space race had been all about this knowledge. A rush to get off the planet and settle elsewhere on an older, more sedate planet before something that had already happened time and again happened once more.

The virus was an answer, help, solution, but Alan Weber was unsure how well the solution would work. It was, like everything else, a stop gap measure, and probably too little too late. And it was definitely flawed, but he had temporarily pushed that knowledge away in his mind. Even now as he sat and waited for the end, which would surely come, out in the world operatives were disbursing the virus that could save humanity.

He thought for a moment, "Or destroy humanity," he added aloud.

There were no guarantees, and there was strong evidence to suggest the designer virus did its job a little too well. Designed to help prolong life, there were rumors that it could raise the dead. Some scientists who had worked with the virus in the now destroyed facility had nicknamed it Lazarus.

Alan had seen evidence to support the rumors that it could raise the dead, or the near dead for that matter. He had been present when a test subject that had been pronounced dead had come back. Weak, half crazy, but alive again.

As the hours and then days passed the subject had become stronger, seemed to be learning from the situation it was in. The decision had been made to kill it: Even that had been difficult to do. Even so, he knew that it was the only hope for society. There was nothing else. The military machine was dead. The American government was dead. The president, from reports he had read, assassinated by her own guards.

While most of America had tracked the meteorite that was supposed to miss earth from their living rooms, and had been side tracked by all the trouble in the Middle East, he had kept track of the real events that had even then been building beneath the Yellowstone caldera and many other places worldwide.

Yesterday the end had begun, and the end had come quickly. Satellites off line. Phone networks down. Power grids failed. Governments incommunicado or just gone. The Internet, down. The Meteorite had not missed Earth by much after all, and the gravitational pull from its mass had simply accelerated an already bad situation.

Dams burst. River flows reversed. Waters rising or dropping suddenly in many places. Huge tidal waves. Fires out of control. Whole cities suddenly gone. A river of lava flowing from Yellowstone. Civilization was not dead; not yet wiped out, but her back was broken.

In the small military base of Ostega that had rested above the defense facility near the shore of a former lake, the river waters that fed it had begun to rise: The chemical countermeasure unit, several levels below the base in the limestone cave structures that honeycombed the entire area, had begun to succumb to the rising river waters. By the time the surviving soldiers from above had splashed through the tunnels and into the underground facility, they had been walking through better than two feet of cold and muddy water. Shortly after that the pressure from the water had begun to collapse small sections of caves and tunnels below the base that fed the unit: That damage had been helped along by small after-shocks.

Alan Weber watched his monitor as a wall gave way and the main tunnel began to flood. It was only a matter of an hour at the most before the water found its way to him. He sighed and then relaxed back into his chair, reached down and pulled the lower file drawer open, and lifted out a partial bottle of scotch. He leaned forward and Bobbi Trevers cleared her throat in the silent observation room. Weber smiled and turned toward her.

"I suppose you have been watching, Bobbi?"

She only nodded.

He nodded back. "Share a drink with me?" He turned away, not waiting for her words of agreement. He heard her settle into a chair next to him as he pulled two plastic cups from the sleeve in the bottom drawer, left over from the Christmas party last year, and began to pour.

"I don't usually agree to drinking on the job, but this is a different set of circumstances, isn't it?" His eyes met her own as she nodded weakly.

"It's almost over, isn't it Doctor Weber?"

"I'm afraid so... Call me Alan, Bobbi... Is it okay that I call you Bobbi?" He finished pouring the scotch into the plastic cup. He had stopped at just an inch in the bottom, wondered why and then filled the cup half way instead.

North America

Far above the Earth, satellites continued to orbit importantly.

The north American continent lay sleeping far below. A wide inland sea had formed in the middle, fed by a huge river that stretched from the former Hudson bay to the middle of the continent. Small in places and easily crossed, no more than a river: Wide in other places as if it truly were a sea.

The state of Alabama had been divided in two along with most of the lower half of the former state of Florida. What resulted was the loss of the lower, southern half of the state. What remained now sat nearly forty miles out in a shallow bay that was quickly turning to sea: An island, the water surrounding it growing deeper as time moved on and the gulf reclaimed the land.

The upper north eastern section of the continent had already pulled apart and begun to drift. Although it was imperceptible, the two land masses were inching away from one another, and ultimately would be separated by a new ocean. And become separate, smaller continents.

The eastern end of the former United States, was also drifting away from the northern section of Canada. The massive earthquakes had also severed the state of Michigan, turning it into a virtual island.

Toward what had been the north, the St. Lawrence river basin had widened, pushing the land masses further apart. The Thousand Islands bridge spans had toppled, and slipped into the cold waters. The other bridges that had once spanned the mighty river had also succumbed as the river basin had split and pulled apart.

The new continent had severed her ties from Nova Scotia, as she had been pulled south and slightly east, to begin her journey. Only the province of New Brunswick, and a small portion of Quebec remained with the continent. The rest of Canada was severed from them by the wide and deep river, more like a huge lake in places, that surged from ocean to ocean.

Most of the north American continent was now in a sub-tropical climate as well. The poles had been displaced by the huge force of the multiple earthquakes and volcanic blasts which were still ongoing. The old polar caps were melting, and it would be thousands of years before they would once again re-form in their new locations.

The run-off from the melting ice would eventually reach the oceans and even more land mass would be sacrificed to the waves before the polar caps would be re-formed.

There were only thirteen full states left on the small continent. The two former provinces of Canada, one of which was only a small fragment. And parts of five former states, the largest being Florida.

Before the dawn, fires could be seen burning unchecked in many major cities, pushed with the help of freak winds the flames continued in all directions, occasionally fueled by chemical, and oil facilities, as well as numerous other flammable sources they encountered. The world began its fall.

New York

Johnny: October 29th

I am here in this farm house that Lana and I found a few weeks back. By myself. Lana is gone. I sat down here to write this story out before I am gone too. Maybe that sounds melodramatic, but it isn't. I know exactly what my situation is.

We have been to Manhattan, outside of it, you can't go in any longer, and we came from Los Angeles, so we know: It's all gone, destroyed, there's nothing left. Time to hold on to what is left for you. I had Lana... That was my something that was still left to me, but she's gone now...

Lana... I knew they'd find out, Hell, they probably knew immediately in that slow purposeful way that things come to them. I can hear them out there ripping and tearing... They know. Yeah, they know, I know it as well as I know my name, John, Johnny Mother used to say. I... I get so goddamned distracted.... It's working at me...

Bastards! If, only I could have... But it's no good crying about it or wishing I had done this thing or that thing. I didn't. I didn't and I can't go back and undo any of this, let alone the parts I did.

In August when the sun was so hot and the birds suddenly disappeared, and Lana came around for what was nearly the last time I hadn't known a thing about this. Nothing. It's late fall now and I know too much. Enough to wish it were August once again and I was living in ignorant bliss once more.

Lana: I didn't want to do it. I told myself I would not do it and then I did it. Not bury her, that had to be done; I mean kill her. I told myself I wouldn't kill her, and that's a joke really. Really it is, because how do you kill something that is already dead? No, I told myself that I wouldn't cut her head off, put her in the ground upside down, drive a stake through her dead heart. Those are the things I told myself I wouldn't do, couldn't do, but I did them as best I could. I pushed the other things I thought; felt compelled to do, aside and did what I could for her.

The trouble is, did I do it right? It's not like I have a goddamn manual to tell me how to do it. Does anybody? I doubt it, but I would say that it's a safe bet that there are dozens of people in the world right now, people who have managed to stay alive, that could write that manual. I just don't know them... I wish I did. And it won't matter to me anyway. It's a little too late, but I'll write this anyway and maybe it can be a manual for someone else... You...

So the books say take their heads off. The books also say, for Vampires, put a stake in their heart, and older legends say turn them around, upside down in the grave. Isn't a vampire a kind of Zombie? Isn't it? Probably not exactly, precisely, but could it hurt to have done the stake thing just in case? To be sure? To put her at rest? I don't think so.

They can come out during the daylight, you know. I thought they wouldn't be able to. Every goddamn movie I ever saw, starting with the Night Of The Living Dead said they couldn't. You could get some relief. You could get some shit done. And you could if it were true, but it's not. They rarely come out in the daylight, that's the truth. It's hard for them, tough somehow, but they can. It won't kill them. They aren't weaker than they are at night. They just don't like the daylight. They don't like it. And don't you think writing that made me a little paranoid? Thinking it over once more? It did. I got up and checked the windows. Nothing I can see, but they're out there. They're right out there in the barn. Sleeping in the sweet hay up in the haymow. I know it, so it doesn't matter whether I can see them. I can hear them and I know where the rest of them are. And I know they know what I did and they'll come tonight. They'll come tonight because I'm afraid of the night. Not them, me. And they goddamn well know it! They know it! They think. They see. Did you think they were stupid? Blind? Running on empty? Well you're the fool then. Listen to me, they're not. They're not and thinking they are will get you dead quick. And what about me? How will I feel tonight? What will I think about it then?

Zombies: I thought Haiti, horror flicks...? What else is there? Dead people come back to life, or raised from the dead to be made into slaves. Those are the two things I knew and nothing else. Well, it's wrong, completely wrong. No, I can't tell you how they come to be Zombies initially, but I can tell you that the bite of a Zombie will make you a Zombie. The movies got that much right.

I can't tell you why they haunt the fields across from this house. Why they have taken up residence in the old barn, but I can tell you that it might be you they come for next and if they do you goddamn well better realize that everything you thought you knew is bullshit. See, Lana didn't believe it and look what happened to her! Lana... Lana: I know, I know I didn't tell you about her, but I will. That's the whole point of writing this down before they get me too.

See, in a little while I'm thinking I might just walk out the kitchen door and right out to the barn. I'll leave this here on the kitchen table. For you, whoever you are, who happened along into this kitchen.

Goddamn Zombies. Ever lovin' Bastards!...

I am losing control, I know I am, but...

Anyway, it was August. Hot. Hotter they said than it had been in recorded time. I was not here in this kitchen in rural New York someplace, I was in L.A., outside the city up in the hills, a little farm. There was no wind. No rain. Seemed like no air to breath. Global Warming they said. Maybe... Changes coming, they said. Oh yeah, changes were coming. Changes right there on that wind, probably...

It was on a Tuesday. I went to get the mail and there were six or seven dead crows by the box. I thought, Those goddamn Clark boys have been shooting their B.B guns again! So I resolved to call old man Clark and give him a piece of my mind, except I forgot. That happens to all of us: It's not unusual. I remembered about four o'clock the next morning when I got up. Well, I told myself, Mail comes at ten, I'll get that and then I'll call up and have that talk.

I make deals like that with myself all the time. Sometimes it works out fine sometimes it doesn't. It didn't.

Ten came and I forgot to get the mail. I remembered at eleven thirty, cursed myself and went for my walk to the box.

I live alone. I have since Jane died. That was another hot summer when she went. I used to farm back then. I retired early a few years back. I rent out the fields. Anyway, I'm getting ahead of myself.

I walked to the mail box cursing myself as I went. When I got there I realized the Clark boys had either turned to eating crows or they had nothing to do with the dead crows in the first place. There were dozens of dead crows, barn swallows, gulls. The dirt road leading up to my place was scattered with dead birds, dark sand where the blood had seeped in. Feathers everywhere, caught in the trees, bushes and the ditches at the side of the road. There were three fat, black crows sticking out of my mailbox: Feet first; half eaten.

Some noise in the woods had made me turn, but I didn't turn fast enough. Whatever had made the noise was gone once I got turned in that direction, but there were bare footprints in the dry roadbed next to the box. They were not clear, draggy, as though the person had, had a bad leg. He had of course, but I had yet to meet the owner.

Hold on...

The day's getting away from me. My ears are playing tricks on me too. I thought I heard something upstairs, but there's nothing. I have the bottom floor boarded up. Those Zombies may be far from stupid, but it's goddamn hard to get dead limbs to help you climb up the side of a house and we took everything down they could hold onto...

Where was I? The mailbox. The mail never came that day. In fact the mail never came again. Already Emma Watson, our local Mail carrier, was a Zombie. I just didn't know it.

I tried Clark, but I got no answer. Later that day I heard a few shots, but we're rural folks. There's Deer wandering all over the place: Coy dogs too. Wouldn't be the first time one got shot without a tag or a proper season. Lana came later, upset, her boyfriend had run off somewhere she thought. It'll be okay I told her. She did the cleaning, ran some groceries from town and left. She seemed in better spirits to me.

I seen him almost a week later.

Lana usually came at the end of the week to help me with shopping, bills, she's a... She was a good girl. A good one. A good Zombie fearing girl. She was... She hadn't come as July had turned to August and I was sitting by the stove that night and heard a scrape on the porch.

His leg was bad. Somebody had shot him, but her fella had worse things going on than that. He was dead. What was a bum leg when you were dead? Small problem. But it made him drag that leg. I'm getting ahead of myself again though.

I picked up my old shot gun where it sat next to the door, eased the door open and flicked on the porch light. He jumped back into the shadows.

"Step out into the light," I tried not to sound as afraid as I was.

"No," he rasped

"Step out here or I'll shoot," I tried again.

"Lana," he whispered. His voice was gravelly.

That stopped me cold. I squinted, but it was too dark to make out much: Still I had the idea it might be her boyfriend. Maybe he'd got himself into something bad. I couldn't get the name to come to me. "You Lana's boyfriend that went missing...?"

Nothing but silence, and in that silence I got a bad feeling. Something was wrong. It came to me about the same time that he stepped into the light. There was no sound of breathing. It was dead quiet, that was what my panicked mind was trying to tell me. My own panicked breathing was the only sound until he stepped into the light dragging his leg.

My heart staggered and nearly stopped.

"Lana," he rasped once more. He cocked his head sideways, the way a dog will when it's not sure of something. One eye was bright, but milky white, the other was a gooey mess hanging from the socket on the left side of his face.

I found my old shot gun rising in my hands. I saw the alarm jump into his eyes and he was gone just that fast.

I stood blinking, convinced that I had somehow dreamed the whole encounter, but I knew I hadn't. The smell of rotting flesh still hung heavy in the air. In the distance I heard the rustle of bushes and then silence. Zombies are not stupid, and they are not slow.

The next day it seemed ridiculous. What an old fool, I thought. What had I imagined? But the next few days told me a different story.

I drove into a nearby town around the middle of the week. I passed maybe two cars on the way, but neither driver would meet my eyes. That was wrong. Trash blew through the streets as I drove. The traffic lights were out on the four corners and no one was on the streets. I didn't see a state patrol car.

The ShopMart strip mall was closed. The road into it barricaded. I found a little Mom-and-Pop place open on the way back, but there was next to nothing on the shelves. I got a jar of peanut butter that I didn't want, a package of crackers, there was no bread, and paid with the last of my cash.

The store owner wore deep socketed eyes in a lined face. His attitude said, I will not speak to you, and he would not: After a brief attempt I gave up and went home. I never went back. By that next night I knew what the deal was when Lana showed up.

She came around noon. I heard the sound of her engine revving long before she came into sight. She took out the mailbox and crashed into the porch and that was that. We were up most of the night talking about how much the world had changed. She knew more than I did. She knew there were no more police. She knew there were roving gangs of zombies on the streets of Los Angeles. She had met a man who had come from there. L.A. was a ruin. And she had spoken to another, this time a young woman from up toward Seattle; the same story there. The zombies, it seemed, owned the world.

We stayed until eight weeks ago. I wouldn't have been able to get out my own. That was early, before we knew they would come out into the sunlight. Andy, that was her fellas name, came for her in the daylight when we were leaving the house. If not for the bad leg he would have got her. If not for the fact that we were close to the living room door he might have got her. He might even have got her because we both froze. And when I realized I had to move she was still frozen, just looking at his ruined, rotted face.

I got the shot gun up and blew his head off. I thought she was going to kill me, then I thought he was going to manage to get back to his feet even without his head and kill me. He finally stopped and I managed to drag her inside the house and shut the door.

I had gone back out a short time later, after I got her laid down and sleeping off the shock in the back bedroom, to take a closer look at the body. There were five of them eating him where he lay up beside her car, and two watching the door: When I got out the two guarding the door were on me nearly that fast. I shot them both as fast as I could pull the trigger. My shot gun only holds four shells. Those two were gone and that had slowed them, but they were not deterred. I made it back inside, locked the door and began to wonder if my heart was going to explode.

Later, before dusk, I went back outside. Andy's body was gone along with the other zombies. I decided that we had to try to get out, drive out and find help. She was carrying a child after all, the zombie fella's baby, I suppose. Maybe there was a place outside of California where things were normal, okay, a zombie free zone. The problem was that I was on the wrong side of L.A., we would have to cut straight through the city to head east. There was no other way to do it.

We planned it. I got my truck, drained the gas from her car and my old tractor. That gave us a full tank in the truck and almost ten gallons in cans strapped into the back of the cab. There wasn't much in the way of food, but we took what we had. We left early morning.

L.A.: August 13th

The trek east out of the city was harder than we had thought it would be. We had become mired down in traffic long before we had ever hit the city itself, and had been forced to give up the truck.

It was close to noon before we reached Alameda, and decided to try to find some kind of four wheel drive vehicles, at one of the many car lots that dotted it.

Once we had liberated a truck, it had still been slow going until we reached El Segundo Boulevard. The stalled traffic had been much lighter there, and we had been able to drive part of the way by cutting into the parking lots of fast food restaurants, that dotted almost the entire length of the highway. We had followed that to Willmington, and picked up another truck that had seen better days. Getting that truck had not been a problem; there were several used car lots along the road. We had used the parking lots to swing around the worst of the traffic, and that had worked well until we had intersected Compton Boulevard. It was hopelessly packed with stalled traffic. We had left the truck, which had sounded as if it was close to dying anyway, and struck out on foot again. Lana led the way as we cut cross lots through Compton Woodley Airport.

Crossing the dead airfield had been unnerving for both of us. The runways had cracked, and either lifted skyward, or tilted down into the ground. Blackened skeletons of large aircraft dotted the airfield. Most of them were so badly burned that we had been unable to tell what they had been before. I thought a couple of them may have been military aircraft, but as badly twisted as they were it was impossible to be sure.

Luggage, some burned, some untouched, was scattered across the airfield in every direction, and many of the suitcases were burst, with papers and clothing scattered everywhere along with other personal effects. There were bodies there too.

On our way through the city we had seen very few bodies. It had been unsettling for both of us. Fewer bodies meant more un-dead. We had both wondered aloud if the changing was happening that fast. Raising the dead faster as time slipped by. The bodies we had seen had not been killed by the Earthquakes. They bore head wounds, and appeared to have been dead for only a short period. Possibly only the last two or three days, we decided.

The bodies at the airport were concentrated around the terminal building. The huge glass windows were peppered with holes as if a battle had taken place for the terminal. Most of the bodies inside were concentrated behind the long rows of seats in the main lobby where they had been trying to use the seats for cover. It had apparently done no good. We had paused only briefly, wondering what had occurred before we had moved on. The overwhelming stench in the shattered terminal building drove us out. The wrecked planes, where we had expected to see bodies scattered all around, were empty.

Occasionally we had heard gunfire around us, and twice explosions from further north, behind us had startled us. We had hurried along fearing the sounds, but fearing more the possibility that the owners of the guns might find us. We walked in silence across the remainder of the shattered airfield, and we were both glad when we left it behind us and eventually came to 91. 91 was traffic packed and we had abandoned the truck, making our way across the steel roof tops once more, crossing under 91 on South Central and making our way along the sides of the road to E Del Amo Boulevard.

There, like the Martin Luther King Highway, black topped parking areas fronted all manner of fast food restaurants, store chains and shops, which bordered both sides of the strip. It wouldn't necessarily assure a way around the stalled traffic, I had realized, but it appeared as though it would give us a much better chance of getting to 405.

~

I set the pencil aside and listened to the noises outside the old frame house. Some other farmer's house, three thousand miles from my own home. Dark sounds, rustling, had to be the dead, but there was nothing for it. I picked the pencil up, flexed my fingers and began to write again...

Yesterday I found an old bottle of whiskey in a locked cabinet in the living room and resolved to leave it be. Now I have changed my mind. I have been sipping at it while I sit here and write. Maybe it will help my resolve with the part I still have to play after I write this out. Maybe it won't, I don't know. But I do know it is helping my head right now, and that is enough for me.

So, we had been trying to get to 405...

Leaving Los Angeles...

Johnny led them towards the rear garage area of the dealership, where they found a full size four wheel drive Chevy pickup. Johnny had worked at a dealership before, and recognized the garage area as the prep shop.

"When someone buys a new car," Johnny said, "or truck, or whatever, they have to prep it. Take the plastic off the seats, fill the tank, wax it, sort of get it ready for the customer, you know?"

"I thought they came from the factory all ready to go?" Lana said.

"Well... they do, sort of," Johnny agreed, "but they have plastic over the seats to protect them, and oil drips from the cars overhead on the transport trucks; dirt gets tracked into them when the guys move them around the lot. Sometimes they may have a scratch, or small dent that the body shop guys have to fix, and they get paint over-spray all over the car; dust in it, you name it. I used to have to prep cars, and it's not much fun. Minimum wage type of job and the salesman who sold the car is usually breathing down your neck all the time you're getting it ready. I hated it, but you do what you have to do to pay the bills. I figured if we're going to find a truck all ready to go, this would be the first place to look. Gassed up and the whole nine yards. They even waxed it for us." Johnny finished, trying to break the somber mood that had set in as they crossed the airfield.

His effort worked partially, Lana offered him a small smile as she spoke. "You know a lot of things don't you?"

"Not really," Johnny said. "I just worked at a lot of different jobs. Mainly just to keep the farm afloat, but also, I guess, because I believe you should learn as much as you possibly can. It worked for me. I grew up with a lot of guys who were constantly unemployed. Maybe they were carpenters, or roofers, or auto mechanics, farmers like me, whatever. When things would get bad, they'd get laid off, or the prices would drop for produce, it's always something. Not that things never got slow for me, they did, but I could go to work somewhere else fairly quickly. I can practically build a house from the ground up, and do all the rough and finish, electrical, plumbing, and carpentry. The same with cars. I just learn well, I guess and it paid off. Someday I'd like to build my own house."

"I've always wanted to own a house," Lana said, the tentative smile had grown wider as she listened to Johnny talk. "I never thought I would live anywhere except that crummy apartment," she laughed. "Manor la cucaracha," She smiled at Johnny's puzzled look. "Cockroach manor... My nickname for the place. If I never own a house I guess that would be fine with me, as long as I never have to live in that dump again."

Johnny was nodding his head as she finished speaking. "I know what you mean. I had a crummy little place up in Seattle out of college. I used to take all the overtime I could get, so I wouldn't have to go back to it too soon. I really hated it, I mean completely. I had this dream of buying some land and building my own house, when this is over that's what I would like to do. Just find a nice place and build a house. Maybe have some cows again. I guess that sounds kind of stupid, but it really is what I want to do, and if I make it through this in one piece, I'm going to."

"It doesn't sound stupid to me at all," Lana said, "in fact it sounds like a good plan, a good dream to hold on to. I've never really dared to dream. I guess now it's okay to dream. You think?"

"I think so," Johnny agreed. "I mean if you can't dream, what's the use, right?" she nodded her head as if to say yes before Johnny continued. "Like, I live my life, and you live your life. You believe what you want, and I'll believe what I want. You see?"

"I do," Lana said. "I guess I'm sort of the same way. I always tried to live without hurting people. I was getting pretty bitter though, I have to admit. I just saw too much that didn't make any sense to me, and I could never understand why, if there was a God, he would let so much bad exist. I guess though, if people want it, it's going to be there. People thought I was bad, but I never really dared to look at myself. I guess I was bad, to a certain extent, but what was I supposed to do?" she seemed pensive.

"I had family, but... Well, you know.... I guess I don't want to get into that: Suffice to say I couldn't be with them. There isn't much for a poor Mexican girl to do to make a living here." She had lost her smile as she spoke, replacing it with a wistful pursing of her lips and a sadness that sat deeply within her eyes.

Johnny nodded his head and they both fell silent for a few seconds.

"Lana," Johnny said. "It really doesn't matter anymore. I mean that sincerely."

Now it was her turn to nod her head. She hadn't realized it, but his opinion mattered to her, and what he said allowed the small smile to re-surface on her face. She had told herself that she didn't care what he thought about her, but she knew even as she told herself that, that she was wrong. It did matter. It mattered a great deal.

They walked together to the back of the garage, and pushed up the steel overhead door. It took a few minutes to move a couple of the cars out of the way, so that they could drive the pickup out of the garage and into the lot behind the dealership.

Johnny drove the truck across the grassy back lot, and stopped at the rear of a gas station convenience store to look for a state map. Lana followed him into the deserted station.

She filled a paper bag with some groceries, mostly canned goods, while Johnny opened the map and studied it on the counter at the front of the station.

"Looks like the best way out," Johnny said, "Is still going to be 91. We passed it, we'll have to back track to catch it. We should be able to skirt around most of the traffic, shouldn't we?"

"Believe it or not, I don't really know," Lana answered. "I mean I live here, or did, but I didn't get out of the city at all, or hardly ever, so I don't know what its' like."

She paused and looked at Johnny as he bent over the map. He smiled as he spoke.

"I actually understand that," he said. "I didn't really know a lot about getting around L.A. Either. I guess you learn how to get to the places you need to get to, and that's about it. No real big deal though. According to the map there are a lot of loops, sort of side roads that go around, and run parallel to 91, and hey, we've got four wheel drive, we can cut through the fields if we have to, right? That will get us to 10 and ten is our ticket east."

Lana shrugged her shoulders, "I guess?"

"You know," Johnny said as they climbed into the cab of the truck. "We should stop and pick up a couple of sleeping bags, and maybe tents too. We still need to pick up a couple more rifles." He didn't want to alarm her, or make her start to worry, by bringing the subject up once more, but the truth was that he was fairly worried himself. If there were armed people running around killing whoever they chose too, it would be kind of stupid, he thought, not to have better weapons. Lana had the pistol, and her rifle. Johnny had his own pistol and a rifle, but he wasn't sure it would do a lot of good. He wasn't a good shot. She surprised him when she not only agreed, but didn't seem to lose her smile when she did.

"I think it would be stupid not to stock up on whatever we can, guns included," she said, echoing Johnny's thoughts. "You know much about them?"

"Not really," Johnny confessed, "I've shot a rifle, you know, hunting," he frowned. "It's been years to be honest, but I think I could learn again. You know anything about them?"

"Well, now that you mention it, I do. At least a little. Not from shooting one, but more from seeing them. There are a lot of pawn shops in my neighborhood, sort of goes with the territory, I guess. That's where I got this," she said, holding up her small pistol, "I got the rifle from a smashed in pawn shop... There has to be a pawn shop or sporting goods shop out here somewhere." Almost as she spoke Johnny spotted one across the crowded interstate.

"There's one," Johnny said as he pointed.

They left the truck beside the stalled traffic, and walked through and around the cars to the large shop. The shop was picked over, but they spent the better part of the afternoon outfitting themselves from the racks in the shop and carrying what they needed across the road to the truck. The pickup had a black vinyl bed cover. They opened it, stored the tent and the sleeping bags along with the other camping gear inside it, and then snapped the cover back into place.

"It probably won't keep everything totally dry," Johnny said, "if it rains, I mean. This is more for show than protection," he said indicating the cover. "But it should still do all right."

They had both picked up weapons in the shop. Johnny had picked out a deer rifle, a fairly impressive looking Remington. He had also picked up several boxes of the ammunition the rifle took. Lana had settled on an entirely different sort of weapon. It looked more like a machine gun of some sort to Johnny, and she also picked up several boxes of ammunition and spare clips for it. She explained to him that it really wasn't a rifle, but a machine pistol, and that it could fire better than seventy rounds a second if it were converted to full automatic. This one wasn't, she said, but she had seen some that were. To Johnny it still looked like a machine gun, and he joked that the sight of it alone would probably scare anyone.

By the time they had loaded the truck and gotten under way it was late afternoon. Even with the late start, and the slow going due to the stalled traffic, they managed to make it to the Colorado River in Ehrenberg Arizona just before nightfall.

~

I flexed my hand and looked around the kitchen in the flickering candle light. Writing about it is bringing it all back, like I'm right back there. Lana's rifle and two spare clips lay on the table top now. I haven't needed it yet, but the night is young. Who can tell what it will be like in a few hours from now when the light is entirely gone: When all the dead wake in the old barn across the road. My rifle is also loaded, but I have less ammunition for it and it isn't worth a damn up close. Lana was a lot smarter about weapons than I was... Much smarter.

It's so goddamn quiet. I hate that. That quiet. These bastards don't breath, they don't trip and fall, they aren't clumsy... You would never know they are there, never know it at all. Jesus, I... Never mind. My mind wanders too much. Too goddamned much. I'll be back...

I took a walk around. Upstairs I can still see a faint line of sunlight on the far horizon. The yard is dark. I can't hear any more sounds. It's unnerving. The boards are all in place, everything seems secure. I'm back at the table...

The cramping is gone from my hand. I guess in the digital age we just don't write much, but when it's all you got, it's all you got. The whiskey is holding out. I'm being careful with it, don't worry, not that it will make a bit of difference...

We had passed a sign and entered into Arizona. We made great time on the open road...

ARIZONA

The country had been turning more arid as they drove, the river was an oasis. Off to the north giant plumes of smoke blanketed the sky, seeming to spread across the entire length of the horizon. They had both wondered what it might be. Lana had checked the map and she though it could be Yellowstone or something close to Yellowstone.

Shops, stores, and even an RV park had sprung up around the interchange. They foraged for food in the late afternoon and gassed up the truck before evening began to take the sunlight. The air had a bitter, hot smell to it, the river flowed sluggishly, the water gray, and a scum of yellow white foam and ash rode the slow current. They sat in the truck and ate quietly while the map lay open across their legs and the seat top. Their eyes would drop to the map and then jump back up to scan the area. It had seemed too quiet, and there were no bodies anywhere. No sign of life either, and the stores and shops had not been looted. Some were still locked up. Empty RV's in the park when they rolled slowly through it. Neither liked the feeling, the whole place felt wrong.

"Johnny," Lana waited until his eyes left the map and met her own. He lifted them to follow her own gaze. "The silver building over to the right. The door just opened and then closed."

Johnny frowned. "Not something the dead would do, is it?"

"We didn't think they would come out in the daylight," Lana said.

As Johnny watched he saw the door edge open slightly and then close just as slowly. "Saw it... I don't like it. Dead or alive they know we're here and they're checking us out." He dropped his eyes back to the map.

"Okay," he said after a few moments. "Let's get off the road, run a ways out... Follow the highway. That takes us away from civilization to a degree, but eventually that will bring us into Phoenix." He waited for her to nod her understanding. "There's a lot of desolation between here and there, at least on the map."

"Desolation is fine as long as the dead aren't there." Lana said quietly.

"Less likely to be," Johnny agreed.

A few minutes later they were running through the desert that ran alongside I 10. There were not a great many cars or trucks there, but in several places there had been wrecks that closed lanes down. With no one to clear them they would have ended up in the desert anyway. And there seemed to be a dirt road that ran beside I 10 for as far as they could see.

The landscape in the distance had been changing as they drove the day away, but with the sun setting a few hours after they set out once more it was hard to tell what the surrounding countryside was like. Johnny dropped speed and flicked the trucks high beams on. A short while later Lana was sleeping, her head heavy against his arm. He drove through the night and into the early morning before she woke again.
TWO

August 14th

Johnny had eased the truck up onto I10 and the tires bouncing over the broken asphalt had awakened Lana.

"Not a big city... A town from the looks of it. Phoenix is close. Ten, fifteen miles maybe. Can't really tell from the map," Johnny said. A gas station loomed out of the early morning gray and Johnny wheeled the truck under the roof that covered the pumps intending to siphon some gas to top off the trucks tanks. He shut off the motor and they both listened to the tick of the hot metal for a few seconds as it cooled.

"Coffee would be really nice," Lana said. "No way do we want to go into Phoenix... Too dangerous." She yawned and then covered her mouth and laughed. "Mal aliento, dios... Morning breath." She zipped open her knapsack, retrieved a bottle of water, her toothbrush and some toothpaste. She stepped down from the truck.

Johnny opened his door and settled his feet onto the pavement. It wasn't just old pavement, he saw, it was gray, washed out, used up: There was no black left in it. Lana stood slightly in front of the truck, her gun in one hand, the toothbrush working around her mouth on its own. In a blur her free hand was reaching to catch the rifle which was just coming free of her shoulder. Johnny had his own rifle off his shoulder and into his hands before he even saw what had alarmed her. She spit out the toothbrush, pulled her gun and flicked the safety off. Three men stepped out of the shadows of the open garage bay.

They were kids, Johnny saw. Or at least not much more than kids. They walked slowly forward.

Lana raised the rifle and pointed it at the lead kid. "That's it." She said.

She didn't scream it, softly spoke it, Johnny thought later, but the kids stopped in their tracks.

"What's with the fuckin' guns?" The lead kid asked.

"Ours weren't aimed at you until you aimed yours at us," Johnny said. He hoped he sounded as cool as Lana had.

"Bullshit," one of the other kids said. "You had it in your hands when I looked at you. That's why I got mine ready."

"I don't want to kill anyone today," Lana said.

"It really don't bother me," The third kid said. His eyes were blood shot. They had interrupted him while he was sleeping, it seemed. He kept rubbing at his eyes, Lana saw.

"I think you're right... Can't matter if you're dead," Lana said.

"Hey," the lead kid said, "Maybe all's we want is to party a little."

"Well I don't know if Johnny swings that way," Lana said.

"Pretty funny," the kid responded. "Look... It's our town. We ain't the only ones here. You shoot there will be twenty more here in seconds. Then everybody dies."

"Oh... I guess I didn't see it right," Lana said. "I can see where it might be preferable to get raped and then murdered instead of getting murdered outright."

The one in the back, the one with the sleepy eyes, stiffed a yawn and reflexively raised one hand to his mouth as his eyes slipped shut for a split second. Lana shot the lead kid in that split second, Johnny had the second guy a moment later. The third kid opened his eyes to a changed situation.

"Just give me a reason," Lana said. "Any reason." The kid released the rifle he held and it dropped from his hands to the pavement.

"Can't shoot me I ain't got no gun... Can't... Can't shoot me..." He spun and looked off toward a rag tag collection of trailers that lined a dirt road in back of the station. "James!" he screamed. "James! Killers!" he turned back to Johnny and Lana. "Can't shoot me... I ain't armed... Can't..." Johnny shot him.

A second later the truck roared to life and Johnny spun the wheel hard heading back towards the drop off from the pavement, back the way they had come.

Lana bounced around the cab and smacked her head hard enough on the windshield to star the glass when the truck left the pavement at better than fifty miles an hour and hit the hard packed dirt that ran alongside I10. She finally got her balance, swept one hand across her forehead, looked at the blood and cursed lightly in Spanish. Behind them three trucks had launched off the pavement and were running hard to catch them.

"Dammit," Johnny said. He pushed the pedal to the floor, there was nothing else for it. The glass in the back window starred a second later as Lana rammed the rifle stock into it. Another hit and the glass fell out into the pickup bed area. She raised the rifle and began to fire back at the trucks. A second later a hole punched through the windshield to Johnny's left. He mashed the pedal harder into the floorboard feeling the truck skate across the hardscrabble of the desert as it flew beside the highway.

"We have to get north, the other side of the highway. If they squeeze us south we'll be in the goddamn Mexican desert," Lana yelled above the scream of the engine.

"There's stalled cars up there," Johnny yelled back. "On the highway!"

"There are bullets down here and they're gaining on us," Lana yelled back.

"Better sit down," Johnny yelled.

"Just do it, Johnny!" She continued to fire out the back window.

Johnny turned the wheel hard right and the truck lurched hard to the left, threatening to roll over as the center of gravity changed. It nearly rolled before it hit the edge of the pavement, broke over, and then became airborne. It came within ten feet of a stalled, wrecked semi and trailer and then it plunged off the other side of the highway so smoothly that Johnny couldn't believe it had actually landed.

"Nearly broke my neck slamming it into the ceiling," Lana yelled. She fell silent. "I..." She started, but an explosion from the highway stopped her words.

"Hit that truck," Johnny screamed. "Has to be."

"Keep it floored though, Johnny. Keep it floored." She stayed where she was, staring out the back window, knees driven into the seat top. Johnny's eyes strayed to her ass, and then snapped back to the road. He watched the hard packed earth fly by.

"Roads coming up... Dirt roads," Johnny said. He had no sooner said it than the truck hit the slight rise and flew across it.

"Like back roads, looks like," Lana said. "Nothing on the map." She was trying her best to read the map as the truck bounced and tilted. One hand clutching the seat back held her in a somewhat stable position as she looked at the roads. "Looks like all dirt roads, back roads and then it falls away to nothing. Just keep it pointed at the mountains in the distance." She turned completely around and sat down with the map in her lap. "Must have hit the truck or each other. Whatever it was I don't think they will feel like coming after us again... Johnny, we can't screw up like that again. I don't know what I was thinking letting my guard down like that, Dios mio!"

Johnny said nothing. Lana went back to reading the map.

"Start breaking left, Johnny. There's a river... No, maybe some sort of waterway, not a river, too straight. It ends and then picks up again a few miles later. We can get through and into the desert from there." She looked at the map for a few more minutes, "Maybe twenty miles or so. Just run right by I10 and we should be good." She turned and peeked over the back seat once more. "We're leaving a lot of dust, Johnny."

He looked over at her.

"We gotta figure this out too. I mean, we're going backwards, back to where we came," Lana said.

"I could loop out deep and then swing back," Johnny said.

"Yeah, except in this desert you can see dust for miles... The dust is the problem." She leaned over and looked at the gas gauge. "Less than a half tank." She frowned.

"We've got gas in the back," Johnny threw in.

"I'm thinking this... We hit that water way, or an out building, has to be something around here. We crash, sleep the day away, and then tonight we run across the desert to the other side of Phoenix. What do you think?"

"Sounds like a plan... I'm shot," Johnny agreed.

"Okay, so take the next road that crosses, slow down to keep the dust down and let's start looking for a place to hide for the day... We've got enough gas in the back we can get a long way before we need to find a station if we don't burn it up running in circles and backtracking."

Johnny slowed the truck and began heading to the right, the east. "One of those towers will do... High voltage lines? Something like that. Just scrap metal now, but that will hide us if we drive right up to it," Lana said.

They drove to the tower and a dirt service road that circled it and continued to the north. Johnny pulled the truck up close to the tower and shut it down. The silence held for a few moments, he fisted his hands into his eyes. "Jesus, I'm shot."

"Come here," Lana said. She pulled him down to the seat and laid his head in her lap. She began to rub lightly at his temples.

"God, don't do that, It'll put me to sleep," Johnny told her half jokingly.

"Which is why I'm doing it." She stretched her legs, angled them across to the driver's side floorboard, and leaned back into the door. The last thing she remembered was smoothing the hair out of his eyes and then she spiraled away into a series of dreams.

~

It was the most tired I had ever been. I laid my head down and I was gone for a little while...

The sun is down all the way here. I went back upstairs. Nothing on the horizon. That time of evening when the sun is down and the moon has yet to rise. Very dark. Can't see anything in any direction. Thought they must be all sleeping in the barn, but I heard some movements out near where I... Never mind what I did there, I'll get to that soon enough, I guess. I only heard it once, but I know damn well it's one of them... Some of them...

I don't believe the whiskey is going to make it to daylight, but I have a feeling I'm not going to make it to daylight either... Feeling funny now, not myself... I'll try to get this done...

It was the 15th when I came awake in that truck. Hot, but desert heat...

September 15th

It was late afternoon when Johnny awoke. Somewhere in the day Lana had wound up beside him. He lay still, unwilling to let her go, his hand was curled protectively around her. Lana moved and he felt the sleep leave her body. One moment soft and willing, the next a live wire.

"You didn't cop a feel did you?" Lana asked in a mumbled half sleepy voice.

"Lana, can't you ever just say something like, good morning?"

She twisted her head around and smiled. The secret smile she rarely ever gave out. "Good late afternoon," she said and the smile slipped away. There was still something there, but it wasn't that secret, vulnerable glimpse into her heart that it was usually. She stretched, yawned, and her feet came up against the door. "Next vehicle we get is an SUV so we have some place to sleep too."

"I don't know, I kind of liked this," Johnny said before he could shut his mouth down.

Lana laughed and it was the unguarded Lana once more. "As long as you know what the deal is." She twisted her head once more, and then her entire body so she was looking directly into his eyes.

"I... I know the deal," Johnny said. The press of her body was maddening.

"We really don't need to talk it out?"

Johnny shook his head and looked away. "I'm a little too old for you, Lana. I know."

Her eyes became sad. "Let me just say these few things." She took a deep breath and then began to speak. "I am attracted to you. I considered sleeping with you before you became my friend, before I knew it couldn't work between us. I even considered it after... Maybe ten minutes ago too, but it would cost me a friend because it wouldn't mean to me what it would mean to you. It has nothing to do with age or anything else." She held his eyes as if willing him to understand.

"It's like you see me as this fragile little princess, and I am so far from that, Johnny. So far. I can't see why you try to see me that way." She laughed. "It's a thing men do. Like... Like that is love, you see? Instead of love just being about all the other stuff... The things I admire about you, you about me. The things in common, the things that we share, the parts of you and me that are real that end up in the mix... But no, I'm a princess, unattainable beauty, something to worship, and it has nothing to do with what I really am at all. I have lived that way, tried to live up to that. It's not possible... The man I need is out there, I hope. Just someone that looks at me as me." She watched his eyes.

"I think I can do that," Johnny told her.

Lana laughed.

"No, really. I think I can separate those things... I'm pretty sure."

"Yeah? I think you like the idea of me... I think it might even hold together in a situation like this... At least for a while. And I think you could talk me into that comfort we could give each other, and I think you would feel completely different about me once that happened. You would think it meant that we were together, and it wouldn't mean that at all. It would mean we were scared and we took some comfort in each other... Because the attraction was there, and because it can just be about that sometimes." She drew a breath. "But I think then I would go from princess to whore, because that's the way this world works, princess to whore in sixty seconds. I've seen it... I've felt it... And then I lose my friend, and I also hurt my friend, because he doesn't want to see it, I mean really see it for what it is." She reached one hand up and pushed Johnny's hair away from his eyes. He looked vulnerable, maybe he would love her forever, never hurt her, never treat her badly, never leave, but he would be reacting to something in her that didn't really exist. Something only he saw. Awestruck, in love, but not the kind of love she needed him to feel, to be in with her... She sighed again. She could see the hurt in his eyes.

"We probably should get going," Johnny said. A smile played across his lips, tentative, but there.

"Okay," she laid her head against his chest. "I need a toothbrush... That little puta made me lose my toothbrush."

Johnny laughed. "I got extras."

She lifted her face up, "Really?"

"Really."

She bent and kissed his forehead and then rose from the seat and looked around at the scrub brush and sand before she rose all the way up and sat on the edge of the seat while Johnny straightened his long frame out and sat on the driver's side of the seat.

"That felt sort of, I don't know, brotherly... That kiss," Johnny said.

"I hated my brother," Lana said. She levered the handle and stepped down to the ground.

"Hey?" Johnny said. Lana stopped and looked back at him, her eyes careful.

"I'll work at it... I mean," he looked at a loss. "I don't want to lose our friendship either."

Lana smiled. "Thanks... I mean it. Now get out here and get me a toothbrush, Johnny." She laughed as she finished.

~

"So, look." Johnny jabbed his finger at the map and Lana leaned across and looked at the map, "Teddy Roosevelt Lake... Tonto National forest... Connected to Gila National forest... Cibola National forest. Pretty isolated."

Lana turned her eyes back to the desert. There was little to see, but twice she had hit bushes that popped up out of what seemed like nowhere. They had passed under the truck, but there were cactus out here too in places, and she was pretty sure a cactus wouldn't just pass under the truck.

"So... Why there?" Lana asked.

"Just a place to get ourselves together: Breath for a few moments, really look the map over and pick a destination."

"Isn't that taking us closer to Yellowstone, or whatever is causing the problems to the north?" Lana asked. They had both noticed thick plumes of black on the far horizon in that direction. The radio in the truck was dead. Static all across the dial.

"It is... But," Johnny checked the scale and did some quick measurements. "Still close to a thousand miles away from there." He looked up. "I think it is Yellowstone. I heard something just before everything hit the fan, something about the park in Yellowstone."

"What was it?" Lana asked.

"I don't know," Johnny answered. He shrugged. "I wasn't paying attention... Wish I had been... Something like everyone in the park went off line... Like they couldn't reach any of the stations, rangers, whatever you call them... Something like that. And seismic activity, like an earthquake centered there." He shrugged once more and shook his head.

"So it's a good place to stay away from," Lana said.

"Yeah... I would say so, but we'll be a thousand miles away." Johnny shrugged once more.

"So?"

"So, head north... We'll have to cross a few highways... Just keep out from the cities... I mean Phoenix turns to suburbs that spread out a long way, at least that's what the map looks like. Like it just kept spreading and so they just kept adding names."

Off to their left the city was easy to spot. There were fires all through it. In some places huge sections were on fire, in others it was scattered fires. There were no areas that didn't seem to be affected, and with the fires it was easy to track the edge of the cities as they drove.

Lana laughed. "So they just added names. Well, couldn't the same be said about Los Angeles? About any large city as it grows? Isn't that the way it works?"

"I guess... I hadn't thought it out."

~

"Going to have to cut through part of the city," Lana said a few moments later.

Johnny looked up from the map as the truck rolled to a stop. "A river."

"Probably a canal..." Lana said. "Either way we can't drive over it... Does it break anywhere?" She turned the truck and began to run along the side of the canal heading for the city once more. In the distance several fires burned, but the fires seemed to be several miles distance, nothing close. "Like a housing development or something," Lana said a few minutes later as the truck bumped up onto a road that was paralleled by a brick wall. The wide concrete gutter was bone dry, the pavement smooth after so much time in the desert

"Not on the map..." He shrugged. "I just don't know, Lana."

Lana had stopped on the edge of the housing development. It was dark, lit only by the headlights of the truck. Cars and trucks sat neatly in driveways. The streets were empty. Heavy dust seemed to blanket the whole scene. Little trails cut from place to place.

"Spooky," Johnny said. "Volcanic ash?"

"Probably... What do you think the trails are?"

Johnny frowned. "It has to be the dead."

"It doesn't have to be the dead... Could be small animals raiding house to house... No garbage any more so they have to get into those houses and get what they can or starve... Or it could be the dead."

"Great, you had me ha..."

Something hit the truck hard and it rocked on its springs. The smell of death hit them about the same time, and Lana hit the gas, mashing the pedal into the floor boards.

A rotting hand came through the open back window and fastened around Lana's throat, her hands left the wheel as she was yanked backwards; the truck spun hard to the left and accelerated, her foot still mashed on the gas.

Johnny lifted his gun and shot the zombie in the face. It seemed slow motion at first, the face exploded as it fell away into the back of the pickup, Lana drew a deep breath and tried to grab the wheel, but it was too late. Everything sped up to real time and the truck roared forward and slammed into the side of a house, continuing on through the wall and into it. Her foot had slammed down on the brake and the truck finally stopped several feet inside the house.

Johnny hit the dashboard hard and then rebounded and slid under the dash as the truck plunged into the house. Seconds later he scrambled out from under the dash, the smell of gasoline was strong, the smell of the hot motor equally strong. He looked over at Lana but she seemed dazed, her eyes unfocused, a trickle of blood running from somewhere under her hairline, mumbling softly under her breath. Johnny levered his door open with a little help from his foot, it screeched as it opened. The screech of metal was very loud in the silence of the house. The headlights were still on, illuminating what looked to be a kitchen.

The smell of death came to him over the smell of gas and hot motor.

"My God, Lana, we've got to go," Johnny said loudly. He reached down, gabbed Lana's rifle where it had fallen to the floor and then shoved his gun into his holster. He was surprised he had the presence of mind to actually pull the strap over the hammer and snap it in place to hold the gun in. He reached over and pulled Lana to him, she came willingly. A second later he was outside the ruined truck and staring out the hole it had punched through into the house. He saw no dead, but he could smell them. He debated only briefly and then ran for the hole and the moonlit night outside.

The dead were all around, pulled from their wanderings by the sound of the wreck and the smell of the living. Johnny shifted Lana's weight more fully onto his shoulder, and lifted the gun, but before he could fire, the truck blew up behind him and he felt himself pushed by the blast out into the street where he struggled to stay on his feet. A warm rush of air moved rapidly past him and Johnny got his feet moving only a second later.

The dead scattered. They made an odd clicking sound, a sort of strangled scream, which Johnny supposed was all they could do with no air to move their lungs, as he ran they slowly disappeared into the hiding places they had stumbled from. An SUV loomed out of the darkness, illuminated by the flames and the moonlight: Dusty, sitting in the driveway of a house three houses over from the one they had plowed into. A second later and Johnny had the door open and he tumbled Lana inside onto the passenger seat. He ran around the car to the other side and fired a quick burst at three of the dead that came from the side of the garage and started toward him in their stumbling, dragging way. They all three went down, but they were back up again almost as quickly as they had gone down. He was too far away for head shots. He got the handle open and jumped into the car pulling the door shut behind him.

He sat, his breath coming in ragged gasps and pulls. His lungs hurt, there was a stitch in his side and his heart felt like it just might explode at any second. He looked over at Lana, but her head was rocked back against the seat back. A sob escaped his throat, but he bit down on it, breathing hard, and checked the ignition.

No keys, but that was what he had expected. What he hoped for was gas. The car should start, the gas was the important thing. He reached to the floorboards for his knapsack and a screwdriver to jimmy the ignition and that was when he realized he had nothing to get the truck started with. All he needed was a screwdriver to hammer into the ignition, pop the cylinder, and then start it, but he had neither the screwdriver nor a way to get it into the ignition in the first place. He fisted his hands and slammed them against the wheel. His head sank onto his hands.

"Smash it," Lana said. It was not much more than a whisper, but it bought Johnny's head up fast. Outside the truck the dead were gathering. Just three or four, but they could smell them, and it wouldn't be long until more showed up. He focused on her face which was ashen and blood slicked, unsure if she had really even spoken. She turned her face to him, eyes heavy lidded, unfocused. "Smash it, Johnny... Rock... Rocks by the driveway... Saw them... Smash it." Her head sank down to the dashboard and stayed there. A trickle of blood ran across the dusty plastic and rolled toward the edge of the dash before it slipped over the edge and continued down into darkness.

"Lana. You're hurt bad, Lana."

"Johnny... Johnny, shut up and get a rock... Get it, Johnny. Stop whining, get the rock." Lana told him. Her words were muffled, whether from the effort or the position she was in he couldn't tell. He picked up the rifle by the barrel and looked through the glass at the dead that were trying to figure out a way into the truck. He waited for the one near the driver's door to slip backwards along the side of the SUV and then he threw the door open and jumped from the truck.

He landed bad, on the very same rocks Lana had been talking about, and nearly went all the way down before he caught himself and slammed his knee into the pavement to stop himself. He had been unable to close the door as his ankle twisted and he fell away. The one that had just slipped past the door was already turning to get inside. He couldn't shoot, if he did he might hit Lana. He launched himself at the shambling wreck instead and dragged it backwards and to the ground. They were both snarling he realized a moment later when he shot it in the head.

A second one came around the back of the SUV. Johnny took two steps and shot it in the head. The third was on the opposite side of the truck and seemed frozen, unsure what to do. Johnny turned, picked up a large rock, and tried to step back into the truck. The ankle collapsed and he went sprawling, losing the rock, barely holding onto his rifle as he once again slammed his knee into the ground to stop himself from planting his face on the steel door sill of the car. The zombie on the other side made up her mind, stood to her full height, and sprang to the roof of the car. Johnny heard the metal buckle as she landed.

A second later he forced himself to his feet, adrenaline flooding his body, leaving that sour electric taste in his mouth as it did. The zombie stood to her full height once more, nothing but tightly stretched skin and protruding bones, but determined to have him. Johnny raised the rifle and shot her under the chin. She collapsed on the barrel and he turned as she spilled past him and burst open onto the driveway behind him. Johnny took two shambling steps of his own, ankle and knee screaming, pain so hard that it made him stop and double up. He vomited, losing control for a brief instant, the pain was so hot. A second after that the adrenaline kicked back in and he finished his shambling travel, managed to stoop and pick up another large rock and get back inside the SUV. He slammed the door on the hand of another zombie that had come out of the darkness. He heard the bones snap, and the fingers fell away into the SUV as the door thudded home. Johnny collapsed against the steering wheel. He couldn't seem to catch his breath. He waited for his heart to slow down.

The dead seemed to be everywhere when he lifted his eyes a few seconds later. One was inches away, staring into his own eyes through the glass. Dozens of others milled about as if waiting to be told what to do. His heart staggered once more, and the rifle was coming up before he realized he could do nothing. He lowered the gun and raised the rock that was still clutched in one hand. He smashed it down on the cheap plastic that surrounded the ignition built into the side of the steering column.

Outside the zombies went crazy. Sounds did that to them, but to Johnny it was almost as if they knew he was about to escape. The one next to the window stepped back and cocked it's head. Johnny looked back at the column, smashed the rock down again and the pieces of the ignition fell to the floorboards of the SUV. A splinter of plastic cut his hand as he jammed his fingers into the opening and pushed down into the hole the cylinder had once occupied. It took a second to find what he was searching for, but once he found it his finger pressed down and the motor began to turn over. At nearly the same time the zombie dropped from sight outside the window.

The motor coughed to life just as the zombie shot up with a rock in its rotting hands and smashed it down on the glass. Johnny let out an involuntary scream as the rock skittered across the glass and flew across the hood. The zombie did it's odd little scream and then fell out of sight once more. Johnny slammed his hand forward, caught the shift lever and yanked it down into reverse. His foot was already mashing the gas pedal down, the engine was revving and so when the zombie came back up with yet another rock the front fender slammed into him as Johnny spun the wheel, and the car began to race backwards, turning as it went. The zombie and several behind it flew away from the side of the car, the wheels hopped as it bounced over them and then caught. The car rocketed out into the street. Johnny locked the brakes up to get it stopped and nearly stalled it as it ground to a stop. A second later he dropped it into drive and plowed through a group of a dozen or more of the dead as he fumbled for the headlight switch and roared off down the road.

The dead flew up over the hood. One smashed into the glass hard enough to spider web it as it hit and then tumbled over the roof. He could hear them bumping as they slammed into the roof and fell into the night behind them. A few seconds later and all he could hear was the scream of the motor as he accelerated down the street. He forced himself to slow down so he didn't wreck. Lana was holding onto the dashboard in a death grip.

The truck left the pavement and flew out into the desert once more. Johnny mashed down the pedal a little more and began to put some space between themselves and the housing project. He reached over and pulled Lana away from the dashboard. She rocked back into the seat, her eyes closed, blood still running from under her hairline and slicking her face.

East of Phoenix

The moon was fully up. The desert seemed almost as if it were lit with streetlights to Johnny. He had found a dirt road and followed it to a concrete building that was part of a complex of buildings. The place didn't look like it had much going for it. A collection of buildings in the desert. A few trucks sitting around. Company trucks of some sort, painted the same colors, but no name on them. He passed through the complex slowly on the dirt road that fed it. Nothing. He turned and drove through it more slowly. Nothing again.

Johnny stared out into the night. The moon was moving past the halfway point, there wouldn't be much of the night left. He looked over at Lana where she sat, head back, breathing slowly. At some point the bleeding had stopped. He looked back around at the buildings. Maybe ten, unless he had miscounted. A dozen trucks and cars sat scattered around the buildings. A large building that was probably a garage, or at least appeared to be: Doors down. A side door, closed. He drove slowly, circling the building. A back door, also closed. Maybe, he thought, if it had been closed from the start nothing had been inside.

Johnny pulled back out front of the building, shifted the SUV into park and left it running. The door was fifteen feet away. He reached over, pushed the button on the glove box and let it fall open. He pawed through insurance papers, candy bars, those would come in handy later, maybe, and a half bottle of water. There was a small flashlight on a key chain. No keys on the chain. Probably no battery in the flashlight either, Johnny thought, but when he pushed the click button on top of the small aluminum flashlight it shot a bright beam that lit up the inside of the truck and nearly made him blind to the night before he clicked it back off. He waited a second and then leaned across to Lana.

"Lana... Lana, I got to go... Lana?" Nothing. Her breathing didn't change and it scared Johnny more than the attack by the zombies had. He sighed, fingered the safety on the rifle to make sure it was off, and then stepped from the truck.

The door chuffed closed behind him, nearly silent. Silence in the desert night, or at least it seemed silent for a moment. The desert wind reached his ears, just a soft rising and falling of sound as it slipped around the buildings. Nothing else. He made himself search the entire area once more with his eye and then he walked to the door, took one more look back at the SUV and then turned the knob and stepped inside the building.

Johnny stood in the darkness and listened to the wind slip around the metal building. His hand skittered along the wall and found the light switch. He flicked it before he had thought about it. Old habits die hard, he told himself. The click was overly loud in the darkness and made him jump. He forced his heart to slow down and then breathed deep. There was death here, he could smell it, but it was old death. Not the smell of the zombies. He breathed in deeply once more to be sure.

The building was much more than a garage, although there was a garage area to pull trucks into. One sat inside now, two large rolls of fencing in the back and dozens of long steel fence posts. He had seen them before. About five or six feet long with a sharp steel cross piece at the bottom to drive into the ground. A sledge hammer to the top to drive it down into the earth and you had a fence post. He stepped forward toward a glassed in room just past the truck. A lunchroom or sorts he guessed, or a break room. Vending machines lined the walls and three tables sat in the middle of the room with plastic chairs scattered about them. Empty.

Off to the left a steel door separated another area. He was beginning to panic about Lana. He had been gone a long time, but he forced himself to twist the knob on the door. It led to a hallway. A small office, bathrooms; lockers, a shower area, and the door that lead outside. He walked to the door and locked it. There was a glass wall that looked into the office and his eye caught something he had missed as he walked past. There was a chair that had been pulled over to a window that looked out on the desert. A man sat in that chair.

Johnny's heart leapt into his throat, but only for a second. The man was dead, but he had been dead for some time. A gun rested in his lap, his head cocked at an odd angle. Johnny backtracked to the door, opened it and stepped inside.

The smell was not that bad, but it was what he had smelled. The dead smelled differently once they rose to their new life. That was all he knew. It wasn't something he could definitely put his finger on, just a different smell of corruption. Johnny reached the chair and stared down at the man.

He had dried out in the heat of the desert. Johnny grabbed the armrest closest to him and dragged the chair from the office and out into the garage. He rolled it up to the doors and looked them over. Electric, but they could be manually raised and closed. Probably a nod toward electricity that might not always be available in the desert. Johnny pulled on the chains that dropped from the ceiling and the door went up easily, squeaking as it did. He pushed the chair out across the cracked pavement and left it close to one of the other buildings. The SUV rumbled close by, the motor turning over smoothly. He could see Lana, head back against the head rest. A minute later he drove the truck into the garage and then worked the chains, lowering the door down once more.

# ~

The Barn

The moon rode high in the sky. Moonlight gleamed from bits of gravel in the dirt road that lead into the barn. Silence held, and then a scraping came from the ground, muffled, deep.

At the edge of the woods, eyes flashed dully in the over-bright moonlight. Shapes shifted among the trees and then emerged from the shadows onto the gravel roadway. One dragged a leg as he walked, clothes already rotted and hanging in tatters. A second seemed almost untouched, a young woman, maybe a little too pale in the wash of moonlight. She walked as easily as any woman, stepping lightly as she went. The third and fourth moved slower, purposefully, as they made their way to the freshly turned soil. They stopped beside the grave, and silence once again took the night, no sounds of breathing, no puffs of steam on the cold night air.

"Do you think...?" The young woman asked in a whisper.

"Shut up," the one with the dragging leg rasped. His words were almost unintelligible. His vocal cords rotted and stringy, no air in his lungs to move his words. The noises came once again from the earth and the four fell silent... waiting...

A hand broke through into the moonlight. A few minutes later a young woman's head pushed up, and then she levered her arms upward and began to strain to pull herself up and out of the hole. She noticed the four and stopped, her pale skin nearly translucent, her black hair tangled and matted against her face and neck. Her lips parted, a question seeming to ride on them.

"It's okay," the young woman whispered, "it's okay." She and one of the older ones moved forward, fell to their knees and began to scoop the dirt away from her with their hands.

"It'll be okay," the young woman mumbled in agreement through her too cold lips.

"It will... It will," the other woman repeated.

Johnny

I got up a second ago just to move around. The silence is killing me. How can it be so quiet? I made the circuit, nothing. The whiskey is gone and no effect left from it either. Maybe my body just can't respond to it any longer. Maybe there is nothing left that can shock it. I don't know. I DON'T KNOW!

Sorry... I should just say to hell with writing this out. I mean it's like some sort of penance, isn't it? Feels like it is. I hate it, but it is so real in my head, and I don't really know that it can't help someone else if it's down on paper... Maybe it can, maybe it can't. Where was I at... Arizona...

I remember that night in Arizona... I thought Lana was dead...

September 18th

Lana

She awoke with a gasp and sat upright. The movement caused pain to flare inside her head and her hands flew to either side of it as if to hold the pain inside.

"Here," Johnny said from beside her. "Drink this... Coffee." He handed her the paper cup.

"Dios... Johnny, my head is killing me," Lana moaned. She sat carefully for a few seconds longer, holding her head steady, before edging open one eye and looking around her. The blanket that had been covering her slipped down and she reached for it unconsciously, catching it before it could slip off and onto the floor.

She was laying on a table, soft blankets beneath her, her shirt had been stripped off. Her bra was stiff with dried blood. "Ay Dios Mio," she said softly.

"Come on, Lana. Drink the coffee, and," He held out his other hand. "Aspirin... At least I think it's aspirin. Some off brand, but it'll help that headache."

Lana tried a small smile on her face, took the aspirin and the coffee and managed to get the aspirin down.

"Johnny, that really is coffee, bad coffee, but real coffee." Lana said. Her eyes were traveling around the room. Vending machines, including a coffee machine with the front door pried off.

"There was the powder that it's made from inside... I just liberated it and made it over a fire." He turned and pointed back through the glass into a garage area where she could see he had dragged a camping stove of some kind and hooked it up to some bottled propane. The small cook surface looked funny with the giant propane cylinder next to it. Johnny laughed. "Yeah... Not exactly made for each other, but it's good enough."

Lana looked Johnny up and down. He was dressed in clean clothes. "Where did you go shopping," she asked as she sipped at the coffee. She swung her legs off the table and a wave of dizziness swept over her. Her stomach clenched and for a moment she was sure the coffee and aspirin were on their way back up, after a short battle they decided to stay. For how long she didn't know, but she did know she had to take it slower.

"Slow, Lana," Johnny said as if he had looked into her mind and stolen her words.

"Got you... Got you," Lana agreed.

"Clothes in the back, Lana. Lockers. I'm guessing this was some sort of ranchers place... Maybe a big operation... Cattle? Crops? I don't know. Bags of fertilizer, fencing, overalls, gloves, trucks, and about thirty lockers back there, most with clothes still in them."

Her fingers crept up her head and felt carefully under her hairline. "Are those stitches I feel?" She asked.

"Yeah," Johnny agreed. "Had to. Used dental floss and a needle. You never budged, scared me, Lana."

"Well, if I had moved I would probably have kicked you right in the sac..." She sighed, "Thanks, Johnny... What happened... We were somewhere," Her face clouded, but she could not bring the memory.

"That housing project?" Johnny prompted.

"Nope," Lana said.

"Nicer homes... Back toward Phoenix?"

"Nope," Lana said again.

"We were running at night..."

"That I remember," Lana agreed.

"Okay, so we stopped to check out this housing project. Like upscale houses out in the desert. It looked empty, but it was full of zombies. One got you through the window..."

Lana's hand went to her throat. It was bruised and yellowed in the bright light inside the room. Lana looked around and then up. The ceiling lights were on.

"Yeah... So you do remember," Johnny said.

"Yeah... Muerto." Her eyes went to the lights and then back to Johnny's face. "We got away."

"Barely," Johnny agreed." He followed her eyes up to the lights. "Generator." He stopped talking so she could hear it.

"Okay... So that's that sound," Lana said. She cleared her throat, drank some more of the coffee and then cleared her throat again. "I didn't get bitten, did I? You?"

"No... I would have done it if I had to, but no. They didn't get us." Johnny said.

"Would have killed me?" Lana asked.

Johnny nodded.

"Johnny, it's okay to say you would have... It wouldn't be me... It would be one of those things and I don't want to be one of those things, Johnny."

"I know... I would have killed it. No way would I have let you become that." Johnny swallowed hard and the silence fell, just the generator chugging away.

Lana eased her feet slowly to the floor and tested her weight. Better than earlier, but she decided to sit a while longer. She drained the cup and Johnny took it.

"You want more?" He asked.

"I need water, just plain old water." She looked around hopefully.

"Got that. A water cooler. You can even have it cold with the power on." He was back just a few moments later with a new cardboard cup, this one filled with cold water.

"Dios... Cold water in the desert. I would not have believed that," Lana said.

"Yeah," Johnny agreed. "Not much longer though. There isn't much fuel oil. That's what it runs on. It was meant for short power outages. It's been on two days now."

Lana choked on the water. Coughing bought the headache back, slamming into her forehead hard. She nearly passed out. Johnny was right there, an arm around her, holding her. She took a breath, another, and she was all right again. She would just have to wait on the headache to retreat once more.

"Come on, Lana. Let me get you into a chair." Before she could argue he picked her up and carried her to a nearby chair. Not one of the plastic ones scattered around, a leather one. Beat up, but comfortable. She sank back into the chair and immediately began to feel better. "Si, verdad? Two days here?"

"No. Three. It took a day to get the generator going. It wasn't designed to run after the initial time allotted. It would come on, run a while and shut right back off. I had to wire it direct. Maybe some safety feature so it wouldn't run out completely. I had to fill the tank from fifty five gallon drums, that was a bitch, but once I cut out the safety, filled her up, she started and stayed running. We're down to a quarter tank though... No more fuel oil... So I'm glad you're back."

Lana upended the cup and drained it. It was amazing how good the water could make her feel. Like new life and strength being poured into her. Johnny bought her another and then another before she sat back into the chair. Her eyes fell on a vending machine with crackers, cookies and bagged chips. The door was ajar. Johnny followed her eyes.

He laughed. "Cookies, crackers, chips?" He asked.

"Yeah," Lana said. Hunger had suddenly leapt up in her stomach. She was starved. Johnny came back with a couple of packs of each and she ate greedily as he talked.

"Maps out in the garage. I can't tell exactly where we are though. Somewhere to the southwest of Gold Canyon is my guess. I didn't see anything here with an address on it, letterhead, no signs on the trucks. Nice trucks though, so it made money, whatever it was."

"I'm going by where I think we are. I know we crossed over water before we got here, a bridge across a viaduct, at least it looked that way in the dark. But we didn't cross a highway, and 60 is right there, couldn't have missed it. Of course, we could be a little farther north or a little more south. But even so we have to hit 60 it's right there, so I'm pretty sure the next thing up is going to be 60."

Lana said nothing, the food was like heaven, but the crackers were a little dry so Johnny left and came back with a cup of water and a Coke. The Coke was also cold. She nearly drained it in one pull. It was like her body was bent on a mission of replenishing itself in one setting. She made herself stop. "Good, but I don't want to get sick." She said to Johnny's raised eyebrows.

He nodded.

"Any dead... At night? In here when you got here?"

"One... Took himself out in the office." He motioned through the glass. "Put him outside. Turned black in the sun in a day or so." He stopped and cleared his throat, left and came back with a Coke for each of them. "None of the others. Not one. Nights are quiet... Truck runs good. I gassed it up, swapped better tires onto it too from the rack in the garage. Pretty easy to do. Extra gas cans, oil, a bunch of those blankets." He paused for a second.

"You look... Clean." She had looked down a few seconds before at her gore stained bra and jeans. She'd been in these clothes far too long.

"Shower in the back. Hot water too once I got the electric on."

"De veras, and I am sitting here talking?" She stood from the chair, found her stomach did not intend to give her a hard time and turned to Johnny. "Clothes?"

"Sure... I... I don't know if..." He turned red.

"Yeah," Lana said. She laughed. "No bra, panties?"

"Right," Johnny agreed.

"Well I don't care if it is boxers, a t-shirt and a pair of jeans. Clean clothes, Johnny" She looked around her... "Soap... A towel... That is it. Where is it?"

"Um. Right here," Johnny said as he stepped to the door and pushed it open for her.

Johnny returned to the lunch room a few moments later and cleaned up the blankets and empty cups while he waited.
THREE

September 28th

Johnny angled the truck off into a grassy median they had been traveling along Arizona 188, and followed a dirt road into the forested park area. About a half mile in they came to a wide calm lake. The area was completely deserted. No cars, no trucks, and only a few rustic buildings close by the water. A quick search confirmed the buildings were empty. They worked together to gather some dead-fall to build a small fire.

Lana piled the dry wood next to a large stone fireplace, and Johnny carefully arranged some wood inside the fireplace, over some smaller twigs and crumpled pieces of paper, while Lana opened the rear of the truck and pulled out the sleeping bags, as well as some metal camp utensils they had picked up earlier when they had passed through a small town. They debated on leaving the tent, but decided to set it up instead, close to the fireplace. The buildings were dark and deserted-looking, and not the least bit inviting to either of them. The tent would not offer anywhere near as much protection as the empty buildings, but to them it was much more appealing.

Once Johnny got the fire going he began to set up the tent as Lana started dinner.

"What are you making?" Johnny asked, as he walked back to the fireplace.

A large steel pot sat directly over the metal grating of the outdoor fireplace, and the aroma from it was all he could smell as he finished setting up the tent. His stomach was growling.

"Well," she asked, "how does it smell?"

"Pretty damn good," Johnny replied, "in fact about the best thing I've smelled in a long time. What is it?" he asked again.

"Well, it's nothing great, beans and corned beef," she looked at him and shrugged her shoulders as if to say, who knows? "Smells good though, huh?"

Johnny nodded his head in agreement, and said aloud. "It's got bachelor food beat, that's for sure... It's going to be a few minutes, right?" Johnny asked.

"Probably more like an hour," she replied, "That's why I've got it off the heat, simmering. Why?"

"Well," Johnny said, "that lake looks pretty good. I'm thinking seriously about jumping in it and washing some of this road grime off."

Before he could say more Lana jumped up and said, "Last one in!" Johnny stood dumb founded as she raced away towards the lake.

He caught up with her next to the water, slightly out of breath, and laughing. When she started to remove her clothes, he nearly choked on the laughter though. Lana seemed not to notice, and after she had stripped down she dove gracefully into the water and swam out into the lake, toward a wooden raft that was anchored about fifty feet off shore.

Johnny got over his initial shock, stripped down and also dove into the water. The coldness of the water shocked him, but it helped in a way to. He hadn't realized just how beautiful she was, and his body had begun unconsciously to respond. The cold water ended that though, and he turned over on his back and floated as he kicked with his feet towards the raft. When he turned back over as he sensed he was nearing the raft he saw her sitting, looking back at him as he swam towards her. She smiled, and he couldn't help but smile back. Cold water or not, he thought, she is a beautiful woman.

He had guessed she must be in her late thirties when he had met her, but now he thought he might be wrong. Maybe it had been the fact that he could not recall ever seeing her smile that had contributed to his observation. Whatever it had been, he was pretty sure he was wrong. She looked like maybe she was only in her late twenties, maybe, he thought. It was more the way she looked now, he realized, that made him think she was probably a lot younger than he had initially thought.

In their old life she had been wary and tired-looking. She seemed more alive to him now though, and the smile went a long way towards smoothing out the lines that had seemed to be embedded in her forehead. He supposed that to her he must seem awful old at fifty-two.

Lana sat on the wooden surface of the small raft and watched Johnny turn back over on his back, as he continued to float towards the raft.

Everything she had depended on had fallen apart and he had seemed to be the one to go to. To open up to, to look for stability in. He had seemed like that kind of man, and he had turned out to be that sort of man. He had convinced her to open the door to herself and it had been a big deal to her. It was something she would normally never do at all, under any circumstances. Nevertheless, she had let him in. He seemed honest, she told herself, and reminded her of herself. She had started life honest anyway, it was just that she couldn't be as honest as she wanted to be, she reminded herself. Life was just that way, she had decided.

Johnny was different. She knew it was stupid, here she was entertaining what she had told him to forget, but even as the thought entered her head she reminded herself that it was only comfort she needed. It was sexual attraction. He didn't move her inside like she wanted to be moved. She wondered if she could be moved that way by any man and the thought caused her smile to slip away.

The meal was excellent. Johnny's mind was not entirely impaled upon the world and what it had become. He thought they both just wanted to be part of the whole again.

He realized, on an unconscious level, that it was even more than that. He wanted some sort of security again. Some kind of normalcy... Same old, same old, he thought. The thought made him laugh.

"What?" Lana asked.

"Well, first, this is so good. And second, I was thinking that as much as I used to hate the same old, same old of the world, I find myself wishing I had it back again. Ironic, I know."

Lana nodded. She felt the same way. In a world that was constantly cruel to her, she had held out hope that it would not always be that way, that somehow, someday, it would all change for her. And it had, and for her this was even better than she had dreamed. She didn't have to pretend about her past, it didn't matter anymore. She didn't have to be anything, or anyone, other than who she had always wanted to be, herself, the woman that she had buried deep within her. She was happier than she could ever recall being in her entire life. It was as if she had been blind, and now through some unimaginable miracle could see. It was so much and so many feelings that it threatened to overwhelm her.

Johnny spoke as they finished eating. He had been thinking non-stop about everything that had happened in just the last few days, and he was no longer certain he wanted to risk traveling on.

"Lana?" he began, not quite sure how to proceed with what he had been thinking. "Do you want to go? I mean, do you want to go all the way across this country? It's just that, well, I'm not as positive as I was that it has to be done, or that we should."

She thought for only a brief second before she answered him.

"I think that we have to, Johnny. It's not a question of whether we should. We have to," she said.

Johnny nodded. "I've changed a lot of my thinking," Johnny told her. "I really have. I don't always pay attention, but I did when it came to you. I don't think I've ever had a friend like you. I don't want to lose that. I'm explaining it badly, I guess." Johnny said.

"No... No you're not. I know exactly what you mean. How about some tea?" she asked.

"Tea?" he looked puzzled. "Where did you get tea from?"

She held up a small package, and said, "It was in the camping gear, a free sample package. Want some?"

"Sure," he said, as he smiled at her, "it sounds good, actually."

While Lana made the tea, Johnny took the small tin cups, along with the plastic bowls that had also been in the camping kit, and walked down to the water to wash them. The moon had begun to rise and a silver trail spread across the lake, seeming alive as it rode the small ripples of the water. When he finished, he stared off across the shimmering surface. It was calm and peaceful, and he listened as somewhere in the distance an owl hooted its greeting into the night. It was good to hear. He had heard little of any birds at all recently. He walked back to the fire feeling good. The night was dark, but it held no fear for him. Lana looked up from where she was stretched out beside the fire and smiled.

"Johnny, where do you want to be when this is over? I mean to live?" Johnny thought for a second and considered before he responded.

"I guess it would depend," he said. "I don't think I would want to live in a city though. I like it here... It's peaceful. I guess someplace like this. Mountains, but this is a type of mountains I've never seen. I mean mountains like you would see in New York... Pines, Maples."

Lana rolled over and propped herself up on one elbow next to him as she spoke.

"This place, it used to be a state park, but now it is just a nice lake. Nobody owns it anymore. It would be a good place to be... Away from the city... Build a little community here... There are thousands of places like this now... All over the country. I would like a place like this." Lana said quietly. She removed the pot from the fire, setting it to one side so it would be there in the morning when they awoke. They crawled into the tent and were asleep within minutes.

The silvery moonlight shown down as they slept, the nearly full circle slowly traveling across the darkened sky.

# ~

Johnny

The moon is up, but there isn't much to see. I thought about eating, but the thought of eating when I know Lana is out there...

Been gone a little. This whole thing has gotten so deeply into my head. It has. I don't want you to think wrong about Lana and me. We were together. I mean we were becoming like that. I'm not going to explain it past that. Sometimes the things you want are exactly the things you didn't know you wanted and the same things you cannot get once you realize that you wanted nothing but those things all along. All through life: Before you even knew they existed.

I just read that. Think what you are going to about it. You'll understand it or you won't.

That park was like a magic place. I have to be honest, I didn't want to leave it. I could see staying there, making it work right there, but like I said, sometimes the things you want, you just can't see, and I was willing to move on too, when I'm positive now she would have stayed if only I had insisted, if only...

San Mateo Mountain range

September 29th

They awoke early to the chatter of squirrel-talk in the trees. Gray squirrels playfully leaping through the pine branches and running up and down the thick trunks, scolding as they went.

Lana set the tea to heat once she had rekindled the fire from the still glowing coals, as Johnny broke camp and quickly loaded the truck. They ate a small breakfast of the leftovers of the meal from the night before, and sipped the strong, hot tea as the sun began to slowly peek over the tops of the trees across the lake. After they rinsed the utensils in the lake, and doused the fire, they climbed into the truck and drove slowly back to the main road.

Lana had awakened feeling torn to be under way, and yet feeling a strong urge to stay: Once they regained the main road and Johnny pointed the truck north she felt better.

The going was slow, but the farther they traveled the less traffic there seemed to be, and, Johnny discovered, if they stayed on the shoulder they could make pretty good time.

Towards mid-morning they turned off onto state Route 260, and began to angle toward the New Mexico border. The going was much easier and they found that they could keep to the pavement, most of the time, which allowed them to make even better time.

Late afternoon found them in the small city of Springerville just inside the Arizona border, and Johnny drove the truck into the parking lot of a large shopping mall on the outskirts.

The mall served as an anchor for several department stores and a large grocery chain. There were several other specialty shops scattered throughout the mall. They stocked up on canned goods, as well as several packages of freeze dried meats from a sporting goods store in the mall. By the time they had finished it was late in the afternoon. They left the small city behind, and continued into New Mexico on I60. Just before nightfall they reached the Cibola National Forest and Johnny pulled the truck off onto one of the dirt roads of the park and found a place to park among the trees. He unloaded the truck and set up camp, as Lana made dinner. She experimented with canned meat along with some freeze dried food, and the result was a tasty stew-like dish.

"Where did you learn to cook, Lana?" he asked, "this is really good."

"Oh it's just a little something I threw together," she joked, as she blew lightly on her finger-tips.

"All I ever ate when I was by myself was fast food," Johnny said, "I'd drive into town and there was a good selection. It all sort of tasted like cardboard after a while though. I can't believe you made this out of that stuff we picked up today."

"I drove through that town every time I came out. How do you call tacos or burgers a good selection," Lana joked.

Johnny laughed. "Okay, a fair selection," he amended.

Lana laughed lightly. "Well," she said, "I did throw in some canned meat. If you think this is good, just wait until I have some decent stuff to cook with." Johnny bugged his eyes out comically at her, "You mean this isn't the good stuff?"

"Not even," she joked back. They sipped at cups of hot tea as the fire crackled invitingly in front of them.

They were at the edge of the San Mateo Mountain range, and it was somewhat cooler at the higher elevation. They had both remarked though, on how much warmer it was than it should have been. Lana more so than Johnny.

September 30th

In the morning they broke camp before the sun was even up and headed out into the chill pre-morning air.

They both enjoyed the scenery as they drove along, and verbally promised that they would take their time if they returned, and stop as often as they wanted to, to look at the scenic mountains.

As they traveled, they encountered less and less stalled traffic, until the road before them opened up, totally deserted for miles at a stretch. Mid-morning brought them close to the Oklahoma border, and if they had not had to slow down and find an alternate route around the City of Clayton, they probably would have entered Oklahoma by nightfall.

The stalled traffic had returned several miles outside the city, but once they were within two miles of the city limits, it had become impassable. Even the breakdown lanes were packed full, and the traffic had forced them into the fields that flanked the highway to find a way around. Once past Clayton however, the stalled traffic had once again given way and they spent the night camped beside the highway less than twenty miles from the Oklahoma border.

Noon of the following day brought them to the outskirts of Woodward and more stalled traffic. After taking several shortcuts across open fields, they eventually came upon route 412, which, Johnny found by checking the map; they could follow most of the way across the country.

They spent that night by a quiet lake that reminded them of the one back in Arizona. They were just outside the small town of Cleo Springs Oklahoma. They were both becoming used to the traveling, and had each developed a routine they followed every night when they stopped. They had twice seen smoke off in the distance that day, as if to the east of them some great fire were burning. They had correctly guessed the reason long before they reached the fire. Someone, or something, had set the entire city to flame.

For several miles before they reached and successfully passed around and beyond the city of Enid Oklahoma, black oily smoke had hung over them in the sky. They had been forced to detour more than twenty miles to the south, running through the fields to get around the still burning city. Even from that distance they could feel the heat, and occasionally see the flames leaping into the sky.

When they stopped that evening at a small lake just off 412, the glow of the fire was still visible in the distance behind them. They were both tired and dropped off to sleep before the last vibrant colors of dusk had fully faded from the sky.

The next day they traveled steadily onward toward the distant mountains. The going was slower and they had to stop several times to move stalled vehicles out of the roadway, or take other routes that were less traveled. They kept on a roughly north east direction, rising only slightly up through the states.

They had finally been stopped by the wreckage of three cars that had collided on the Quachita river bridge on 270. The collision had taken out the concrete and the guard rail on one side of the bridge. There had been a fire after the wreck. And the heat must have been tremendous. Two of the cars were wrapped around the steel guard rail that had either broken on impact, or in the fire after that had shattered the remaining concrete that was still connected to it. Johnny managed to winch one of the cars out of the way, and together they had pushed the other two off the bridge and into the river.

They had both watched as the cars flipped end for end, and finally landed half in the river and half on a small island that split the river. At the expense of a small amount of paint, which was scraped from the truck as they passed the one remaining vehicle, they managed to get into the Quachita National Forest preserve before nightfall.

Two additional days of travel brought them just into the Alabama border and the small community of Ardmore. They found a logging road just off 31. After Johnny had set up the tent in a clearing back into the woods, he walked back over to take a closer look at the truck while Lana started dinner.

Lana had surprised him earlier in the day when they had stopped by the side of the road to rest. A large buck had wandered out of the trees to their left and stood staring at them in the roadway. She had used the Remington, and carefully sighting, had brought the large animal down. Between them they had managed to dress it out, and had filled a large plastic cooler in the back of the truck with the venison. The smell of fresh steaks sizzling on the fire made the delay worthwhile.

The trip across the country had been tough on them, but it had been much harder on the truck, Johnny saw now, as he looked it over.

Most of the damage was superficial, long scrapes down both sides of the truck, a small dent here and there. The big problem however was mechanical.

The brakes were borderline, soft and spongy, probably due to the rough terrain they had traversed. Johnny had, had to constantly ride the brakes as they went down steep inclines to get around the road when it was hopelessly blocked. The other problem was the motor. It had developed a constant rattle deep within the block every time it climbed even a small grade. He supposed most of it was due to the fact that they had been forced to use whatever gas they could find, and several times that had been low grade unleaded. That and the fact that the fuel injection system had not been set up for high altitude, it had been a desert truck up until it's liberation from the garage in Arizona. The truck was running better than twelve hours at a stretch, most days, and almost all of that was labored driving. As a result the truck had also developed several small oil leaks.

He walked around the truck and looked it over carefully. The tires were chewed badly from the rocks they had crawled over. It looked ten years old, Johnny realized. He pulled the map out of the glove compartment, and after studying it, decided the truck would probably make it to Athens Alabama, and they should be able to pick up something to replace it there. He really hated to though, as he had grown to like the truck a great deal, even become attached to it. But he realized, the truck would never make it the rest of the way.

He tossed the map back into the glove compartment, shut the door and walked back over to the fire. The smell of the cooking venison was maddening.

While he had meant it when he told Lana she had done wonders with the canned stuff, there was nothing like the real thing. He resolved to also hunt around for a case or two of Quick Cold to keep what was left of the meat fresh when they reached Athens.

Although they had seen plenty of wildlife, they had yet to see any people. They both felt, however, that there were people. For whatever reason they just weren't showing themselves. They both understood, to a point, what would make other people distrustful of them. They had seen a lot of evidence themselves, bodies horribly mangled, cities burned, and they had no wish to meet up with the people who had left it. They had found most of the bodies as they passed through the larger cities and towns, and most looked to have met with violent deaths. It was almost as if they were trying to finish the killing that the earthquakes had not been able to finish. And more dead meant more dead rising to whatever that new life was. It wasn't something either of them liked to dwell on too long. It was sobering to both of them, and Lana had taken to carrying the machine pistol with her whenever they left the truck. Johnny had already gotten into the habit of keeping the Remington close at hand, but he too now made sure it was with him, and the safety off, all the time.

Johnny walked back from the truck and sat down next to the fire.

"The truck's in bad shape, Lana. The one front tire's cut to the threads already." He had also checked the oil and other fluids. "She took two quarts of oil, last two we had, and it's still not touching the stick. Not good."

She screwed up her face and looked at him pensively. "Well, I suppose I could get a second job. Then I guess we could afford a new one," her humor caught him by surprise, as it usually did, and he laughed out loud.

"You are nuts, you know that?" he said. They laughed together, and then he told her that they should be able to get another truck in Athens the next day. After that she fished out the meat, which she had wrapped in foil and placed over the coals at one edge of the fire, and they ate. They ate it with relish, and laughed at each other about what pigs they were, and then after a swim in a clear mountain stream that flowed nearby they crawled into the tent.

They were only three miles outside of Athens the next morning, when the truck gave up the ghost.

It died with one dreadfully long rattle deep within the block of the engine. Johnny coasted over to the side of the road and they simply left it. He had tried to start it, but it would not turn over. Johnny took the Remington, and Lana held the machine pistol as they walked along the road. It took the better part of an hour to walk into Athens, but when they arrived it was still early morning.

They had both been bothered by a feeling that they had been followed, or were being watched. It was unsettling, and they were constantly glancing around themselves as they walked, but they saw no one.

They were standing on the pavement of a car lot looking over a long line of vehicles, trying to decide which one to take, when the first shot came.

The side window of the truck directly in front of them imploded, covering the interior in small jewel-like chunks of glass. They both reacted instantly, dropping to the ground and rolling towards the rear of the truck.

When they reached the rear of the truck they both crouched low and sprinted deeper into the lot. Another shot rang out as they ran, and Lana watched as a wide hole was suddenly punched through the fender of a truck just a few inches ahead of her. She dropped to the ground and rolled over on her back, raising the machine pistol instinctively in front of her. It was all that saved her life.

Johnny was still running deeper into the lot, not realizing Lana was no longer beside him. The sound of the machine pistols chatter behind him stopped him cold, and he turned and ran back toward the front of the lot.

When Lana had fallen, a tall dark haired kid had appeared from in front of the truck, and directly into the steel sight of the machine pistol. He raised what looked to be an automatic rifle, but before he could fire Lana began squeezing the trigger of the pistol, and it jumped and began to bark in her hands. Johnny had just come up beside her, and watched as the man toppled over, nearly cut in two. The sound of screeching tires out on the roadway dragged his mind away from the still twitching body of the young man, and as Lana jumped up into a low crouch they both began to run towards the road. Johnny stopped only long enough to pick up the automatic rifle from the ground where the man had dropped it.

When they reached the road a small Jeep was moving rapidly away from them, and a blond haired man, not much more than a kid, Johnny realized, was crouched in the back aiming a rifle at them, while a dark haired young woman sat behind the wheel. They both dropped once more to the ground, and opened up on the Jeep as the young man began to fire. The slugs from the young man's rifle ripped into the pavement, tearing huge chunks out of it close to Johnny's face as he fired back at the Jeep.

The blond haired kid suddenly bolted upright, and seemed to jump from the rear of the Jeep. He landed on the roadway, rolled, and then was still. Both rear tires blew out on the Jeep as Lana's gun continued to speak, and before it had traveled far the young woman lost control, and it flipped several times rolling down the middle of the road. The young woman fell headfirst in a heap on the pavement where she had been thrown, and had then been rolled over by the Jeep as it continued to flip down the road.

Smoke curled up from the overturned Jeep. Within seconds it attracted a small circle of flames from under the hood that grew and began to curl up and lick at the rubber of the still turning front tires.

"You okay?" Johnny asked, in a panicked voice as he looked at Lana.

"Aún estoy un poco... conmocionada... Good... A little shaken," she amended.

They both walked slowly down the road to where the bodies of the young man and the young woman lay, they were perhaps twenty feet apart. Lana had thought that possibly the young woman might still be alive, but she was not. Her neck was broken, and they had quietly carried both bodies off the road and into a field before returning to the lot. They had debated briefly whether they should bury them, but had decided not to. It was not a decision made out of spite, but out of necessity. They had no idea whether the three were alone or not, and if they were not, and there were others close by, it might be best to get back to the lot, pick up a truck, and head back out to where the Chevy had broken down as quickly as they could.

They walked calmly back to the dealership, and went inside. They both felt safer inside despite the wide glass windows that fronted the road.

A huge four wheel drive Suburban sat on the showroom floor nestled in between other cars and trucks that surrounded it. It was obviously a heavy duty truck. It sat much higher than the pickup had, and the tires were much more aggressive, and the open cargo space behind the driver's area would be an asset to them, Johnny realized, much better than the open pick-up bed had been with its flimsy vinyl cover. He walked around the truck, noticing that it was also equipped with a winch as the pickup had been, but this one looked to be a lot sturdier to him, strictly heavy duty.

He walked over to a slightly raised area, where a board filled with keys spanned most of the rear wall behind a small, but long counter top. He gave Lana the keys to a convertible that was between them and the doors, and she moved it while Johnny jockeyed the truck around until he managed to get it aimed at the wide glass doors set into the side of the building. He drove it outside, checking the gas gauges as he did.

The truck had dual tanks, and both of them were full. Not that they'll last any longer than the pickups single tank, he thought, but he was still glad that they were full. They edged carefully around the still burning Jeep, and made their way slowly out of town and back to the pickup, watching the side roads as they went. They were both spooked.

When they were still more than a hundred yards from the pickup, they could tell that they'd had visitors while they were gone. Johnny edged the Suburban up carefully to the truck and they searched the surrounding countryside, but decided whoever had been there was gone.

The truck was demolished. Someone or some-ones had attacked it with a vengeance. All the windows were smashed, and the black vinyl cover that had spanned the bed of the truck was slashed to ribbons. The tires had been flattened, and they had dented or punctured nearly every body panel. The camping gear, along with the rest of the venison, was gone. The map they had been using lay ripped and shredded across the front seat, which had also been slashed.

They only walked around the truck once, but it was enough. They both turned without speaking and walked back to the Suburban.

"Doesn't matter," Johnny said once they were safely back inside the Suburban. "We can pick up more gear down the road. I saw a small sporting goods store about a mile back, it had a little shopping center right next to it."

"I guess we don't have to deal with the dead here because these people are here and killed or chased them off. But then we got to deal with people alive trying make more dead out the living... One or the other and no in between, I guess," Lana said.

Johnny shook his head slowly as they drove away.

When they reached the small sporting goods store he pulled as close to the front doors as he could. The parking lot looked deserted, but the dealership had also looked deserted, and he was taking no chances. They looked the huge lot over for better than ten minutes before they left the truck. He wished they didn't have to stop at all. The sooner they were on the road the better, as far as he was concerned. He supposed it probably wouldn't be any better stopping somewhere else though. They entered the store and took turns watching the lot as they picked up what they needed. Besides a handful of dead, all head shot, the store was empty. Lana looked over the bodies.

"I guess some archaeologist is going to dig all this up in forty thousand years, if we all survive and have to come up with some explanation as to why so many skulls show evidence of bullet holes... Makes me wonder what they'll say... Religious practice? Sacrifices to Dios?" She asked.

"Hopefully they'll never know what this was really about," Johnny said quietly.

By the time they had re-outfitted themselves it was nearly dark. The setting sun casting the lot in deep shadows, and Johnny was glad he had parked the truck close to the doors. They debated staying. They could sleep right inside the small shop Lana argued, but Johnny didn't want to, and Lana's argument was halfhearted at best. They both decided they would rather put as many miles as possible between them and the small town. In the end they left despite the descending darkness, and they did not stop that night at all.

Johnny drove while Lana slept, and towards daybreak as they were nearing Fort Deposit the road disappeared into the water. They had stood looking as the sun rose higher into the sky. It was water as far as the eye could see. The air carried the tang of salt. They were both at a loss for words. Finally, Johnny angled the truck down off the pavement, turned it around and drove back to an old logging road he had seen a few miles back. He dropped down off the pavement and followed the rutted road into a quiet, forested area and killed the hot motor.

They quickly set up a small camp in the sparse morning light, and then crawled into the tent. They held each other tightly as they drifted off to sleep.

~

Lana awoke long before Johnny, and now sat outside the small tent, watching the last rays of light fade from the sky. It seemed to seep slowly away, and darken the sky above the trees. The wind kicked up briefly, blowing the dead leaves across the ground. They scratched and rattled as they went, making her think of small skeletons rattling in the wind. She felt afraid, and had since she had awakened earlier. She couldn't explain it to herself. She had been tempted to awaken Johnny, but had decided after twice starting to do so, to wait until he awoke on his own.

She could tell now though, by the change in his breathing, that he would soon awaken, and she walked to the small fire she had built earlier to start some coffee brewing. She placed the small tin pot on the coals next to the fire.

She was sitting by the fire wondering how to approach the subject of what next, when Johnny rolled out of the tent. She turned around to face him, and she saw the sadness etched into his face. He's worried too, she thought, and before she could complete the thought he proved her right.

They had been undecided for a short time after they had found the highway arcing down into the water somewhere inside what had been the border of Alabama. They would have to go back, but where? They had been heading south, not an absolute place, but south nonetheless. South was now out of the question., The water had stretched away as far as they could see to the south, east, and then arced away forming a new coastline to the west. Far out in the water there was a low blur on the horizon. Maybe it was land, maybe it was wishful thinking. They had starting backtracking the next day.

Lana poured coffee in the small tin cups for both of them before she spoke. "Where are you thinking?"

They had backtracked all the way into Kentucky. Stopping last night at what they assumed was the Ohio river, too tired to decide what was next.

He shrugged his shoulders as he responded. "I think we can start heading for the East coast. What do you think?"

"I guess so, I... I don't know. It certainly won't hurt, and where else would we go?" she stared into the fire as she spoke. "I think we should be a lot more careful though. I get the feeling that those people we ran into aren't the only ones around who would just as soon kill us, and I'm not kidding myself about it, I think it was pretty clear. They didn't want to talk, or even to just take us prisoner or something, they wanted to outright kill us. No sense pretending about that." She paused.

"I mean, I really thought there, for a second, that they were just scared or something, or maybe saw me and... Well, you know. But that wasn't it."

When she finished he nodded silently, and then sipped from the cup before he spoke. "You're right, I just didn't want to think about it, Hell, I couldn't think about much of anything except getting as far away as possible, and I kept thinking about the truck too. Did they do that before they tried to kill us, after, or was it someone else? There's no real way to tell, but even if they were alone I'm not kidding myself that there won't be others just like them. We do have to be careful," he paused, thinking. "In fact I think we need to get off the main road from now on. These parks, rural areas seem better. No dead... Few dead anyway... Fewer people. I never thought I would say fewer people was a good thing, but," he shrugged, "Guess I just did. I don't think it's safe... You agree? I mean, there are lots of other roads that parallel the main highway. I guess it just seems like the smart thing to do, and it feels like the right thing to do. What do you think?" he asked.

"I think you are right. I've been sitting out here thinking about pretty much the same thing for quite a few hours, and you're right, we have to be careful, and you're also right about the main road... It just doesn't seem safe, or the safest way to get anywhere anymore."

"Well," Johnny said, "if we're going to take side roads, we're going to have to get another map, and that means we're going to have to go into the next city to get one. I'm not thrilled about that, but we're also going to need to pick up more ammunition too. Either way, we have to at least follow the highway into the next town down the line. No way around it," he almost seemed as though he were hoping that she would come up with some alternative as he spoke.

"No other way," she said, "so... I guess we better get moving?" She allowed what she had meant to be a statement to rise at the end and turned it into more of a question.

"No," Johnny said immediately. "No way. It'll be dark soon, and I really don't think that would be a smart move at all. No... I think we should wait it out here tonight, and get on the road early in the morning. We should be able to make the next town without a map. I don't even know what the next place is, but it can't be too far, can it?" he didn't wait for a response; he had asked more for himself than her. "No, I'm pretty sure it won't be far. We've been running into lots of small towns every twenty, thirty miles or so, and most of them at least have gas stations. We should be able to get a map fairly easily. After we do though, that's it. We get off the main road, and stay off it."

As darkness closed in, they had both turned quiet. Lana had begun a small dinner over the coals in the fireplace, they had hastily thrown together earlier that morning when they had arrived, and Johnny had walked over to the truck and occupied himself with checking the mechanics, making sure that nothing had been damaged the night before as he had driven.

Several times he had driven over debris in the road, but in his haste to put miles between them, he had ignored it. He had also become convinced during the night as he drove, that they were being followed. He had kept glancing into the mirrors, sure that he would see glowing headlights closing in on them from behind. It had not happened though; the road behind them had remained empty all night as he had driven.

He had another thought as he stood looking over the truck. What if they had done something to this truck? He wondered. He knew it was irrational, there had to have been over a hundred trucks on that lot, and... How would they have known to choose this one? And if they had, wouldn't something already have happened?

In spite of how ridiculous it seemed, he checked the truck over anyway. There was one small gouge in the front passenger fenders paint, probably due to some debris flying up and hitting it, but other than that the truck seemed fine, and none the worse for the hurried trip. He pushed it from his mind as he walked away from the truck and back to the fire.

Lana was stirring a stew like mixture, to keep it from burning on the hot coals.

"I think it's ready," she said as he approached the fire, and squatted down beside her. "Hungry?" she gave him a small spoonful to taste.

"Oh yeah," he responded, and rubbed his stomach with one hand to show her it was true. He sat down close to the fire, and turned his thoughts away from the truck.

Johnny tried a tired smile on his face as he took a bowl of the stew. Lana sat down next to him, and they began to eat as the last traces of light seeped from the sky.

October 18th

Lana awoke a few hours before dawn and sat just outside the small tent, lost in thought.

They had spent the last few days driving, stopping only when they had to. As a result they had put a lot of miles between themselves and the bad memories.

She slowly became aware that the sky was beginning to color with the first rays of sunrise. The silent, night-black forest surrounding them began to color. A chatter of a multitude of squirrels who called the forest home came with the light. The croak of crickets, the light rustle of leaves in the faint, morning breeze. The bird song was absent, she thought. It made her wonder why, but the symphony created by the other forest inhabitants began to break apart her troubled thoughts as she listened, the black mood that had begun to descend upon her finally lifted as the first brilliant rays of sunlight began to stream down through the thick pines of the forest.

They were somewhere inside the borders of what had once been New York. They had done nothing but drive the last few miles, and the side roads they were following had been clear enough to make good time. They had found and raided the roadside ruins of a small Mom-and-Pop place. The maps on the counter were for the Southern Tier. A few maps for the Western New York city of Rochester. They had yet to see any town or city signs, but she suspected that once they left the safety of the wooded area they were in they would.

She rose slowly and began to re-kindle the fire. When Johnny awoke a few minutes later, she had coffee heating, and had already prepared a small breakfast from the left over dinner of the night before.

Lazy curls from the wood fire drifted slowly up through the trees into the morning air, the smoky scent hung in the air, and invoked nothing but good feelings in her. When Johnny crawled out of the tent, the black mood that had threatened to envelop her was completely gone, and had been replaced with a deep feeling of peace that calmed and soothed her soul. She knew they would have to be careful on their trek to the coast, but she was no longer overpowered by the sense of foreboding that had washed over her earlier.

"Morning," Johnny said, as he sat down next to her and took the steaming cup of coffee she offered, "Sleep okay?"

She considered her answer only briefly, "No," she replied, "I woke up a couple of hours ago and couldn't get back to sleep. I kept thinking about things, Johnny. Like what's ahead for us, and I couldn't shake the feeling that we have to be careful, but I shouldn't spend my time sweating this stuff," she looked into his eyes as she finished speaking.

"I know how you feel. I feel the same way," Johnny said, "I spent a long time thinking about it last night before I could finally get to sleep. I guess I just don't care anymore. We could drive ourselves crazy trying to reason it... whatever happened, happened, and we'll just face what we have to as we go," he paused for a second. "I think truthfully that we'll be okay, I really do. If I didn't I would say so. We'll just keep going."

Johnny finished speaking, and when he did he pulled Lana to him and held her.

"Are you afraid?" he asked her.

"No," she replied, "not afraid of death anyhow, maybe just afraid of turning... I don't want that, Johnny, I really don't," she began to cry as she finished, and Johnny held her, comforting her as best he could. I won't let that happen, he thought, not at all.

Aloud he said, "Lana?" he waited until she looked up at him. "I think that we just have to be careful so that doesn't happen, you know, like if we just went ahead with no thought to what we were doing, we could find ourselves in a bad situation, or we might not be able to think quickly enough if something happened. But I don't, and can't believe that we will. Not if we're careful, Lana, and that's probably what we're being made to see." He was looking over the top of her head as he spoke. "I think," he said, changing the subject, "that those stitches need to come out... Might hurt a little."

She looked up at him from his arms. "Might?" She asked.

The surrounding symphony continued as the rays of sunlight fought their way deeper into the forest to awaken its inhabitants; they held each other and allowed the chatter and scolding of squirrel-talk to dispel their fears. Its calming effect soon overcame the fear and apprehension thinking of the trip had heaped upon them. Johnny worked with a pair of nail clippers, tweezers, and peroxide, pulling each piece of dental floss from her head.

"Put some iodine on it too," Lana told him as he finished.

"That's gonna hurt like a bitch," Johnny told her.

"Really? Like a bitch?" Lana asked.

"I didn't mean it exactly like that," Johnny told her. He let the dropper suck up some iodine and then squeezed small drops on each small hole that the dental floss had slipped out of.

"Oh," Lana said. "That does hurt like a bitch," she gritted her teeth as Johnny continued until each hole was done. A few minutes late he was done and Lana got up to walk it off. "The hard part is that I want to itch it," she told him a few minutes later.

Johnny nodded his head and looked into the eyes of a small gray ground squirrel that sat watching them on a gnarled limb of an older nearby pine. Its tiny hand-like limbs were clasped together across its white belly, and to Johnny it seemed as though the squirrel were an old and wise man, sitting and watching them from his pine perch. The squirrel chattered briefly, adding its voice to the talk of the forest, and then scampered across the limb, into the upper reaches of the pine, out of sight.

# ~

We traveled on across the state for the next few days not seeing much of anything at all. I began to think we would see no one, and I'll be honest I was not looking forward to seeing anyone either. Seemed like everyone we saw was intent on putting us in the ground or had already come out of the ground. Either way, their intent was the same, making us dead... Hold on a minute.

I'm not alone here. As the night deepens the dead are coming out of the barn and testing the house, doors, windows. No, those bastards can't get in, but I am tempted to let them. Tempted... Won't they have us all eventually? Won't they?

I found a pack of cigarettes so old the tobacco is like dust. Considered smoking one anyway to take the edge off. Got them on the table with me, maybe I will...

So we went to traveling. The days just became a blur. We worked our way across the state and just outside the central New York city of Syracuse we picked up three people. Funny how we found them, but we did, and it changed a lot of what we were doing.

We had stopped in a strip mall, a gun shop that didn't look completely picked over, and like an idiot I had jumped right out of the truck like nothing was wrong with the world at all. It was Lana who spotted the man first...

# FOUR

  1. Central New York

  2. The sight of the man broke the paralysis that had held them, and they both quickly took cover behind an old truck parked in the lot. Johnny began to mentally berate himself for not hearing the sound of the running truck when he had gotten out of the Suburban. Stupid-Stupid-Stupid! He thought as he dropped to the ground and tried to crawl under the old truck.

  3. He couldn't get all the way under it, but he did get under it far enough to be able to look into the open doorway of the sporting goods store. What he could see of it was empty, but he could not see far enough into the gloom of the interior to see whether there was just the man Lana had seen, or others waiting with him in the shadowy store.

  4. "Hey!" a young sounding male voice called from within the store. "Don't shoot, okay? We don't want any trouble with you."

  5. The voice let Johnny and Lana know that there were at least two people in the store, and a few seconds later, they could hear the soft voice of a woman coming from the store as well.

  6. "We don't want trouble either," Johnny called back.

  7. From under the car he could see a jeans-clad pair of legs separate from the shadows, and cautiously walk toward the open doorway. "What do you think, Lana," Johnny whispered, "you believe 'em?"

  8. "Only one way to find out," she replied, as she backed out from under the car and stood slowly.

  9. A young man was standing framed in the doorway, a shotgun resting in his hands. He saw her rise from behind the car, quickly followed by Johnny. His shotgun remained in his hands, but he did not turn it in their direction, instead he seemed to be purposely holding it away from them, and they could both see that he was frightened.

  10. Johnny and Lana both kept their guns turned away, but still they were on guard, as Lana spoke into the silence.

  11. "Look, we really don't want any trouble either. We only stopped because we saw the truck running," she lied. She thought it probably wouldn't be a good idea to let them know they had stopped for ammunition. "We haven't seen any... many," she corrected herself, "people. We'll leave if it's what you want," she finished.

  12. The young man's grip on the shotgun seemed to loosen as she had spoken, he seemed to be less fearful than he had been.

  13. "We haven't seen any good people," the young man said, "but we have seen a lot of bad ones."

  14. Lana and Johnny both relaxed a small amount, and Johnny spoke. "We've run into pretty some bad ones ourselves," he said. He moved from behind the old truck and out into the open. "Can we talk?" he asked. He was careful to keep the machine gun pointed down as he had moved from behind the truck, and he forced himself to keep it pointed at the pavement as the young man seemed to consider what he had said.

  15. The young man had lifted his shotgun from the pavement as Johnny had stepped from behind the old car, now he dropped it back toward the pavement, and answered. "Well, come on, I guess," he replied. The other man they had seen initially and a young red haired woman stepped out of the shadowy interior as he finished speaking. They were both armed, but both kept their weapons pointed down at the pavement.

  16. Johnny looked at Lana. "Well?" he asked. She nodded her head, and they walked slowly toward the front of the store. Once the two groups were facing each other, Lana spoke. "I'm Lana, and this is Johnny," she said, pointing at Johnny.

  17. "Scotty," the older man said, stepping forward, "and this is Dave," he said pointing at the dark haired young man, "and Amber." He paused for a few seconds. "Might have over-reacted, but we haven't seen anything but bad the last few days. Thought you might be part of a group we ran into yesterday... It's hard to tell who you can, or can't trust." With that the man seemed to consider them briefly, and then set his rifle aside.

  18. The man's fear, that had been so evident once Lana and Johnny were standing face to face with him, seemed to melt away. Lana stuffed the machine pistol into her jeans, and Johnny slung the rifle over his shoulder before he stuck out his hand. "Good to meet you," Johnny said, "I think we were beginning to think we wouldn't meet anyone at all who wouldn't try to kill us." Lana stuck out her hand as Johnny finished speaking, and the young man and woman put their own weapons aside and stepped away from the sidewalk and shook the offered hands.

  19. "You from here?" Scotty asked, as he also shook their hands.

  20. "Los Angeles," Lana replied, "heading east, how about you?"

  21. "Texas," Amber, the young woman said.

  22. Her accent was slight, Johnny noticed. "We tried South... South is no good," Johnny said. He looked at Lana who nodded before he continued. "We could all make the trip together," he offered, "It might be a lot safer that way?" Lana echoed the invitation.

  23. "See no reason not to," Scotty said slowly, as he turned his eyes to the couple beside him. "Amber, Dave?"

  24. "I'm for it," Dave agreed. He had a slightly thicker accent, Lana noticed, well, maybe not an accent really, she told herself, he just talks somewhat slowly.

  25. "Me too," Amber said, and a smile lit up her face as she spoke. "No lie. I've been pretty scared, and it'll be good to have more of us, I think."

  26. "I lied," Lana said, and then hastily continued, "We didn't stop because we saw you. We stopped because we need ammunition. We got ambushed, and... Well, we got out of it. I didn't mean to lie, I just wasn't sure we could trust you, and I didn't think it would be a good idea to tell you we were running low, not knowing if... you know..." she finished lamely.

  27. "Don't give it a thought," Scotty said, "can't say I blame you, in fact," he said, as he reached for his shotgun, and opened the breech. "We did too, but there isn't any here. I hoped to scare you off, but the truth is that we're out of ammunition ourselves. If you had been bad, I guess we would've been screwed." He finished by setting the empty shotgun against the door frame, resting butt down on the pavement.

  28. "You mean," Johnny said, "you're out completely?"

  29. Dave said, "I've been out since yesterday, and whatever was in this shop is gone. Somebody cleaned it out."

  30. Johnny and Lana followed the others into the small shop. It took a few seconds for their eyes to adjust to the sparse light inside, but once they did they could see that the shop had been ransacked. Two large glass display cases that had probably held, who knew how many handguns, Johnny thought, were empty. The glass fronts had been shattered into the cases. Racks that had once been likewise protected by lockable glass sliding doors had also been broken into, the thick glass that had once protected them lay inside, but the rifles they had protected were gone. Nothing had been left. The floors were strewn with empty boxes, wads of packing paper, and literature on several types of guns that had been discarded. The glass from the cases was everywhere, Johnny saw.

  31. "Looks as though they didn't leave anything at all," Johnny said.

  32. "Told you," Dave said, as he shook his head. "Somebody got here before us, and it looks as though they weren't about to leave anything behind," he sighed.

  33. "You have any ammo at all?" Lana asked.

  34. "I do," Amber answered, "I've got seven rounds for this 30.06, that's why... well, that's why I hung back when we saw you, you know. I could see you through the window, and... If I had too, I was going to shoot," she seemed embarrassed as she spoke.

  35. "She's the best shot between the three of us," Scotty said.

  36. Dave turned red, but nodded his head.

  37. "Been anywhere else in this town?" Johnny asked, "Maybe there's another sporting goods store around."

  38. "Didn't have the time," Scotty said, "we got here only ten minutes or so before you did."

  39. "Well," Lana said, as she counted up what ammunition she had left for the machine pistol, "I've got one full clip of sixteen, and... Looks like two in this clip, and I'm done."

  40. Johnny had checked over what he had while she was speaking, "Looks like this one is down to ten in the clip, but I've got better than a hundred rounds for the Remington in the truck, that should help us a little. We need to find a place to get our hands on more, especially for that machine pistol," he gestured at Lana's weapon, "and this one," he said holding up the machine gun they had taken from the kid who had tried to shoot Lana, "this is a..." he held the machine gun up so he could read the writing on the side, "Hey, Lana, this say's it'll take nine millimeter bullets like yours, let me see one," he waited until she handed him one that she took out of the full clip, and then compared them side by side. "Yeah, same thing," he said, "this doesn't have a brand name on it though, just says what sort of bullet it takes, everything else has been ground off, see," he held the side of the machine gun up so that Lana could see it.

  41. "That's been converted," she said, "and that's probably why they ground off the serial number, and most likely the model and make at the same time. That's been converted to full auto," she finished. "It does explain something that has been bugging me though. When that guy popped up and let loose on me, I thought he was squeezing those rounds off pretty quick. You can buy that gun, or could, and you could even order the conversion kit, but if you got caught converting one or in possession of one that was converted, big trouble. I've seen a few in my neighborhood though...Just the same, and I'm glad that one fell into our hands, and not somebody else."

  42. Johnny turned the gun over in his hands; his appreciation for it was much greater than it had been. "So what is it?" he asked.

  43. "It's called a Sixteen-Nine on the street," Lana said. "I don't know what it's really called," Johnny looked confused. "Sixteen for the clip," she said, "and nine for the ammunition size. See?" she held up her own pistol, comparing the two side by side. "They're nearly identical, except for that long wire stock on yours. Makes it look more like a rifle. Mine's semi, that one's full."

  44. "And we can swap back and forth on ammunition?" Johnny asked.

  45. "Just on the ammunition," Lana answered, "the clips won't fit."

  46. "Well, with just sixteen bullets wouldn't it run out pretty quick?"

  47. "Not pretty quick, damn quick, like immediately. I think the attraction was speed, sixteen bullets in less than half a second. You can get a larger clip that will hold two hundred."

  48. Johnny turned his head back to the other three who had been listening to Lana talk. They all seemed impressed. "I guess," he said looking around the destroyed shop, "we better get going. Is that truck of yours in pretty good shape Scotty?"

  49. "Junker," Scotty said, "it was nice when we left Dallas, but it's on its last leg for sure now. That's why I left it running; won't start if you don't, and to be honest, I been too damn scared to stop and get another."

  50. "Well," Johnny said, "leave it. We got room in ours for all three of you."

  51. Lana was staring around at the wrecked interior of the shop, it wasn't the damage that bothered her though, it was all the missing rifles, and guns. "Yeah, let's get out of here," she said, "this place gives me the creeps, and I for one don't want to be here in case whoever took all of this..." she gestured at the empty shop, "...returns."

  52. Everyone, Johnny included, looked apprehensively around the empty shop.

  53. "Yeah, let's go," Johnny said hastily, as he turned and walked out the door.

  54. They all scouted carefully around the parking lot, as they walked to the Suburban. Anyone could be hiding in this lot, Johnny thought, as he looked around at the packed parking lot, anyone, anywhere. They reached the truck, Johnny unlocked it, and they all climbed quickly inside. Several sighs of relief were released once Johnny started the Suburban and drove from the lot.

  55. A half mile down the road, Scotty spotted another store and Johnny cautiously pulled into the lot to have a look. He was able to drive up close to the shop, without getting out of the truck. The glass store front, including the doors, were barred by a segmented aluminum pull down door, and the store looked as though no one had yet been in it.

  56. "What do you think?" Johnny asked of no one in particular.

  57. "Don't look as though it's been broke into yet," Dave replied, "gonna have to leave the truck to be sure," he finished with an apprehensive shrug of his shoulders.

  58. Lana pulled the nearly spent clip from the machine pistol, and clicked home the full one. "Stay here, I'll go see," she said, and she was out the passenger door before Johnny could protest.

  59. Johnny shut off the truck and got out. No way, he thought as he jumped from the truck.

  60. Scotty looked from Dave to Amber. "I don't know about you, but they got the guns," he said, as he opened one of the rear doors, and stepped out. He carried the empty shot gun with him as he went. Amber and Dave brought their guns out of the truck with them as well.

  61. Johnny was staring through the segmented burglar door into the interior of the small shop, as Scotty walked up. "What's it looking like, Johnny?" he asked.

  62. Lana was back on the sidewalk, the machine pistol in her hands, sweeping the parking lot with her eyes, Amber and Dave beside her.

  63. "Looks like nobody got to it," Johnny said, "what do you think, Scotty?"

  64. Scotty squinted into the shop. "Hard to tell, but I think you're right, Johnny, it looks good to me. But this door is gonna keep us out, just like it's kept out everyone before us."

  65. "Uh-uh," Johnny said, "not me it isn't." He turned face and walked back to the Suburban.

  66. "Look out, Scotty," he said, as he started the truck and cramped the wheel around to bring it up on the sidewalk. "Saw this on a cop show once, here goes..."

  67. Johnny lined the truck up even with the front doors in back of the aluminum burglar door, backed up, and punched the gas pedal. The rear tires screeched briefly as the truck bumped up over the curb and hit the door. The truck passed through the aluminum door as if it were made of paper and barely tapped the inside glass doors before Johnny locked up the brakes. The light tap on the doors was all it took to shatter the safety glass. Johnny reversed the truck, and backed down off the sidewalk. He cramped the wheel once more, and shut off the truck, leaving it almost where it had been in the first place. He got out and looked over the front of the truck; there was not even a single scratch to show where the massive bumper had connected with the aluminum door and then the glass. He stood up from his examination of the bumper, and was surprised to see everyone staring at him.

  68. "What?" he said. "I told you I saw it on a cop show once. Of course, I didn't know it would work so well," he finished grinning.

  69. "He told me he was a farmer," Lana said grinning. Amber laughed.

  70. "Well folks," Johnny said as waved his arm at the store, "looks like the store's open after all."

  71. Scotty said, "If I ever lock myself out of my house, I guess I won't be asking you for help, Johnny," he broke into a hearty laugh when he finished speaking, and within seconds they all found themselves laughing along.

  72. "Well, let's go get that ammo," Lana said laughing, and they all walked into the shop.

  73. They spent no more than an hour in the shop, before they had completely re-outfitted themselves. They were able to obtain new camping gear, ammunition, and three more of the nine mm machine pistols. They all reasoned they were much more effective than the old single-shot rifles, and shotguns that Scotty's group had been carrying, and the fact that they would all now be able to use the same caliber ammunition was appealing. The shop had contained a great deal of pre-packaged freeze dried foods, and that had also found its way into the rear of the Suburban.

  74. Johnny picked up a canvas strap for the machine gun, that allowed him to keep it suspended from one shoulder, yet easily accessible to him if he needed it. The machine pistols fit easily into leather shoulder holsters, and there were more than enough in the shop for everyone. Johnny debated briefly, and then took one more of the machine pistols, along with one of the leather holsters as well. He had a vague, uneasy feeling about the weapons. He felt as if he had joined some weird sort of commando outfit, instead of belonging to a group who had been nothing more than average citizens just a few short weeks before. He pushed the thought away, and after adjusting the leather shoulder holster, slid the fully loaded machine pistol into it, and fastened the small chrome push-catch across the blued steel grip of the weapon.

  75. They loaded all the gear into the back of the Suburban, including every round of nine mm ammunition the store had in stock, which, Johnny thought, amounted to enough to wage a small war with. After consulting the map they set out once more.

  76. The Tug Hill Plateau

  77. Early Morning

  78. The camp was a makeshift place off an old logging trail. It was dry under the pines where they had set up camp, but the logging road had flooded over at some recent time in the past. The water had receded and left the road a quagmire of mud, steaming in the early morning sun.

  79. They had encountered no major obstacles on the way in. The road in was cracked in a few places, flooded in a few others, but only a few inches of water. They had come in, in a downpour, but the major stuff had held off until after they had arrived and settled in.

  80. Johnny had made to set up his own tent and Lana had stopped him without a word. Her hand fell on his wrist, and before he knew it her mouth was on his, soft but insistent. She pulled back with a slight smile, as she walked away Johnny wondered exactly what the change signaled.

  81. They set up a watch, with extra eyes it was not so bad. Lana took the late afternoon watch, Johnny the first evening shift. The fire was low embers, the small encampment silent when he turned the watch over to Scotty and headed for the tent, she met him on the way and led him away from the fire. She spread a sleeping bag on the damp ground and then took his hand and pulled him down as he stood, unsure of what to do.

  82. "Lana," he breathed.

  83. "Just come with me... Stop thinking, Johnny," she told him. Her mouth found his and he stopped thinking.

  84. Her hands worked at his pants zipper and he found his own hands had already solved that problem as he pushed her jeans down past her knees. His mouth found the hard plane of her stomach a second later, and her hand began to stroke the hair at the base of his neck, pulling him closer as he planted little kisses up across her breasts, teasing her nipples, and then back down.

  85. "Please don't you take this the wrong way, Johnny," she breathed. "Don't you do it," she whispered as she pulled him down to the ground. "Come down here with me..."

  86. ~

  87. The stars were hard diamond chips in the sky as they lay close together. Johnny sat up and lit a cigarette. His heart was a slowing hammer in his chest. He rolled his own cigarettes, everybody did it seemed. There was still plenty of tobacco just lying around behind glass doors and in locked cabinets. Funny how stress made you pick up the poisons again. Gamblers did it, alcoholics did it. Smokers too, he guessed. He wondered briefly how many people had quit smoking to live, only to be killed by what had happened, or the dead, or circumstances from all the fall out. He laughed lightly.

  88. "What," Lana asked.

  89. "Not really funny... Ironic, I guess... I was thinking millions of people quit this to live... They're all dead and here we are."

  90. "Yeah, well, irony was never lost on life... Better give me one of those too," she said.

  91. "This is bad stuff, you know. It'll kill you deader than a cockroach," Johnny told her. Cockroaches had not fared well in the rising of the dead and so it was joke among them if something wasn't doing well. The dead ate cockroaches like they were popcorn. Bad time to be a cockroach.

  92. "Dios, mios. I had not intended to live forever, Johnny, now give me one of them damn things," Lana told him.

  93. Johnny passed her his own and then lit himself another.

  94. "My, God. There is nothing that feels like that," Lana said as she drew the smoke into her lungs.

  95. "Reason it gets you," Johnny agreed. "Hey... I guess we made a little change," he laughed a little.

  96. She looked up at him. "I hate to make decisions."

  97. "Me either, but" Johnny said.

  98. "Yeah... But not now. Let's let things settle out a little more. You are not going anywhere are you?"

  99. "No," he laughed lightly. "Of course not, Lana."

  100. "Nunca te dejaré," Lana said.

  101. "What does it mean, Lana?" Johnny asked.

  102. "It means, I will never leave you."

  103. Johnny nodded. "I feel the same, Lana. I do."

  104. "You better... I broke my own rules."

  105. "You won't be sorry," he stopped as she curled into his side and nuzzled his chest.

  106. "Your scent... Don't you find it is scent that gives you the most comfort? The most feeling of acceptance, belonging? Like, when I became used to you, your scent, I knew I had lost the battle, Johnny. I knew it was over right then."

  107. "But how do I win your heart, Lana. How do I do that?" Johnny asked in a near whisper.

  108. "You just knock at the door, Johnny... Knock."

  109. Johnny reached forward and tapped lightly on her chest with one fist.

  110. A single tear slipped across her cheek. "Tienes mi corazón... You have my heart."

  111. "I didn't mean to make you cry, Lana," Johnny told her in a near whisper.

  112. "Stupido," She told him. "It's for a good reason." She buried her face in his chest. "Whatever this is I don't want to lose it either."

  113. "You won't," Johnny told her.

  114. She looped one arm across his chest and pulled herself closer. "Better not."

  115. He pulled her close with one arm and took a deep pull from his cigarette with his free hand. The stars continued their slow journey across the blackness. He felt her breathing change a few moments later and he held her as she slept.

  116. Morning of the third day

  117. The last few days had bought rain, snow, and what felt like earthquakes or explosions far away. Heavy vibrations they could feel through the pine needle covered ground. No one was sure what they really were, but they were all worried about it.

  118. They had made up their minds late last night, when the rains had stopped to get out of the woods. The truck turned over and started fine. They had spent most of the sunrise checking it over, but they found nothing wrong with it. They should have no trouble driving out of the forest lands.

  119. "If we go, it should probably be soon," Johnny said.

  120. They had spent a great deal of the last few days wondering what was going on in the world. Twice on the first day a slow moving cargo plane had overflown them. They had seen no markings on the wings, but they had both been painted the olive drab of army equipment. They had heard the sound of it approaching early in the morning of the second day, but the engines had suddenly begun to sputter and cough, before it had come into sight the sounds of the motors had died away. A few seconds after that the northern horizon had erupted in a fireball. They had heard nothing more.

  121. The battery powered radio they had picked up back in Syracuse had stopped working. They had hoped for a news update, a lone broadcaster, anything. But it had been solid static across the dial until the batteries had gone.

  122. "It could have been that meteor... I think I read once that a near miss could be as bad as a direct hit. Mess things up the same as a nuclear bomb." Scotty shrugged.

  123. "But they said that would miss us completely," Johnny threw in.

  124. Dave nodded, "Maybe it didn't. Wouldn't be the first time they said something that turned out to be bullshit."

  125. "What? You don't trust your own government," Amber asked in mock surprise.

  126. "Yeah... Well, either way we're back to sticking it out here or going into the closest city to see what's going on... Or somewhere else for that matter," Johnny threw out after a few moments of silence.

  127. "I say we go... Maybe the guard is there, or has been there.," Amber said.

  128. "Can't hide out up here forever," Dave agreed.

  129. "We'll run out of food... At the least we have to stock back up," Scotty added.

  130. Johnny nodded. "We don't know how long this is going to be."

  131. "Or if it still is," Lana added.

  132. "There is that too," Scotty agreed.

  133. "At the least then we should go in and stock up. I mean if no one is there, we can stock up, come back here if it's bad and decide what to do... Get on with the old life if there is someone there," Lana said.

  134. "Seems like we would have heard sirens... Trucks, another plane when that other one went down... Nothing," Amber said.

  135. 'Might not be anyone else... Might have been the last one," Dave said.

  136. "Hey, man. A little positivity wouldn't hurt," Scotty said.

  137. "Just saying is all," Dave said. He wouldn't meet Scotty's eyes and a few seconds later he walked away, making himself busy, checking over the truck.

  138. "Just a kid, Scotty," Johnny said.

  139. "I know... I know... I'll fix it." He walked off toward the truck. Johnny could tell he was disappointed in himself. They were both back a few moments later seeming as though nothing had happened.

  140. "Okay," Scotty said. "Might as well get going..."

  141. "Who wants the front seat... Two," Johnny asked.

  142. "Probably the girls," Dave said.

  143. "Why is that," Lana asked.

  144. "What?" Dave asked.

  145. "Why the girls," She shook her head before he answered. "Well, I'm not a girl, I'm a woman. It was a rough road to become a woman, and I don't want to be called a girl."

  146. "Hey... Peace. I didn't mean anything by it," Dave said.

  147. The silence held for a few minutes.

  148. Johnny laughed uneasily. "We need to get out of these woods... Getting a little stir crazy."

  149. "Well, let's get this place picked up... ... Maybe we'll come back," Scotty said.

  150. "Maybe not. So bring what you want to keep, only make it a small amount," Johnny added.

  151. A half hour later Johnny drove the Suburban down the logging road, sticking to four wheel drive and the sides of the road where he could. Twice he had to make everyone get out and push, and then take a run at a particularly bad section of road before they all climbed in once more. It was late morning before they found route 177. A short time later they found route 11 and headed toward the small city of Watertown.

  152. Watertown: Johnny and Lana

  153. Late Afternoon

  154. The city was a mess. Buildings toppled, streets blocked off with debris, no power and no people out on the streets that they had seen.

  155. Against all odds the outskirts of the city seemed completely deserted. A small mall fronted the interstate exchanges. A home improvement store anchored one end of the mall, a big box store and dozens of other shops filled out the mall, the parking lots were all but empty. At least at first glance. The big box store was deserted, the doors barred, chained and locked. A little work with the tire iron from the Suburban freed up the chains and a nudge from the nose of the truck shattered the heavy glass doors. Johnny and Scotty pulled the doors aside and Johnny drove the truck inside, crunching over the safety glass which had fallen out in one large sheet.

  156. "Might be safer inside," Dave said as Johnny turned the truck around, narrowly missing one check out aisle and faced back toward the doors.

  157. "I think we're stuck here for the night," Johnny said. Stock up, get whatever else we need in the morning and head out. Little gun shop across the street... Truck dealership over at the mall across the street... Should be easy to get what we need." He levered the door handle and stepped down to the ground.

  158. "Company," Dave said as Johnny turned toward the opening.

  159. "Seven or eight... Came out of that strip mall entrance way across the strip," Scotty added.

  160. Johnny turned to Lana. "Shotguns... Rifles in the sporting goods' area. I don't want them to see what we really have, or even use these unless we have to." He lifted one of the machine pistols as he finished. She nodded as she and Amber sprinted toward the middle of the store.

  161. Company

  162. The small crowd of people was armed, Johnny saw, long before they actually reached the wide street and crossed over into their parking lot. Behind him, in the store, he had heard the sound of breaking glass several times. Presumably Lana and Amber breaking open display cases.

  163. "Think they can see us in here?" he asked.

  164. "Probably too dark," Scotty answered as Lana and Amber came back with their arms loaded down with high powered rifles and shotguns.

  165. "Careful," Lana said, her breath coming fast. "These are loaded." A small line of blood ran away from one knuckle as she passed Johnny a rifle that looked like it would be at home slung over any hunters shoulder. He looked her over. "Hang back with the machine pistols... Just in case." She nodded. "You're hurt," he finished.

  166. Lana laughed. "Dios mio. Cálmate, te preocupas demasiado." She smiled and pecked his cheek. "Just glass from a case... It's nothing. You worry too much about me."

  167. "Not a girl," Johnny said

  168. "Or even close," Lana agreed with a smile. She stepped close to the front of the entrance way, still deep in shadow, but just behind the shattered doors, and shrugged her machine pistol from her shoulder.

  169. There were a dozen of them when they came to a stop just thirty feet away from the doors. Women and kids, the old man and a younger guy hanging toward the back. The two men and three of the women were armed.

  170. "We know you're in there," The lead man shouted out. He was an older man, short silver hair, thin, the ragged remains of a suit hanging from his shoulders. "We don't want trouble... Just company... Safety... The nights are pretty bad now. I guess you know." He made to step forward again.

  171. "No... Right there is fine," Lana said.

  172. "I told you, we come in peace." The man said as she stepped from the shadows. Lana re-slung the rifle and picked up one of the heavy shotguns. Scotty moved out with her and a second later Amber and Johnny joined her. The man stopped, staring them down. Johnny motioned to the rest to stay inside.

  173. "Every bad alien movie I ever saw started just exactly that way," Lana said.

  174. "Is that what you think?" The man asked. "Aliens? Well, I'm no alien... I don't know what happened, but I don't think it was alien, or aliens, unless you count the meteor that might or might not have hit us. And I'm obviously not one of the gangs or I wouldn't be out here in the daylight talking to you."

  175. The silence held a long time.

  176. "You hear me?" The older man said.

  177. "I heard you," Lana agreed. "What do you mean one of the gangs? Not one of the gangs?"

  178. The man laughed. A short hard laugh that had nothing to do with amusement at all. "Are you serious?"

  179. "If I wasn't serious I wouldn't have asked," Lana told him.

  180. "But... Okay... Why can't we do this in there? Look at what I have here... A handful of scared mothers with a few children. The young guy at the back is okay. Why don't we do this in there. I don't like being out in the open. It's just the gangs we have to worry about." He looked off in all directions as he talked.

  181. Lana looked over the group and then over at Johnny. "Nothing we can't deal with," Johnny agreed. Her eye's met Amber's and then Scotty's. They both nodded. "So you know, there are more of us inside. Don't be stupid."

  182. "Wouldn't think of it," The old man agreed. "Alan," he said.

  183. Lana just nodded and motioned him forward.

  184. Early evening

  185. They were all gathered around a small fire that Scotty had started for heat and light. The nights were still cold. Scotty had built the fire in an empty fifty five gallon drum they had rolled out from the back. It the smoke detectors had still been working they would have had trouble, but as it was the smoke just gathered high up in the steel rafters and found its way to the outside from there.

  186. "What do you know," Alan asked. "That might be a better place to start."

  187. "Practically nothing," Johnny answered. "Earth quake... Meteor. Everything wrecked and no answers. We've been on our own since Los Angeles... No news... Met Scotty, Amber and Dave just a few days back and they have been on their own too... Maybe know a little more than we do."

  188. Alan nodded. "Okay," He rested his head in his hands for a moment, and then looked up. His eyes were red; the bags under them bruised and heavy. "The second of August... It happened overnight, the first, the end of the first into the second. I don't know what it was, anymore than you do, but I suspect the meteor they said would miss us didn't. Maybe that started a whole chain of events. So, aliens? No. I think our own government did us in though. I can see your view too, because there is something alien about it. About the way we would view it, the way you would view it. A few days later the planes came over. Big Cargo planes. Sprayed blue stuff over the entire city. We thought for sure we were done right then, but whatever that was it didn't kill us, didn't seem to do anything to us... But I wonder, I really do..." He seemed to zone out for a second.

  189. "Alan?" Scotty asked quietly.

  190. He laughed. "Sorry. I need sleep. Sleep is what I need. Gangs," he took a deep breath. "This city, most of the cities I've heard about on the CB are controlled by gangs now. They're out all night rounding us up, the other survivors..." He frowned heavily. "I'll be straight, not much use for other men... 'Less they think like them. Not much use for the children either. Women, gas, cash," he laughed again. "They seem to think a day will come when it will all be worth something again."

  191. "You don't?" Lana asked.

  192. "I don't," Alan agreed. "I think somebody mucked up badly... I can't believe it was all an accident. Washington? Dead. L.A.? Dead. New York? Dead as well. There have been reports of the President being killed. In the end the Secret Service deserted her. The few that remained fled. The whole thing fell apart. And it's no better in other countries from what I have heard on the CB. Some of it could be exaggerated... Could be fear talking... But I don't think so. I think most of it is absolute truth. I think it all failed and we're on our own. That's what I think."

  193. Lana looked over as Amber sprang to her feet and walked away into the darkness of the store. "I'll be back," Lana said. She got up and followed.

  194. "I appreciate the truth, Alan," Johnny said.

  195. Alan nodded. "Upset us too. Nothing for it that I can see."

  196. "Where are you from," Johnny asked.

  197. "Rochester... Haven't heard much from it except there is a glow to the west... Could be they still have power there."

  198. "Hey inside!" This from the parking lot that was now edging quickly toward twilight.

  199. "Shit," Scotty said. "Forgot all about that." He jumped to his feet and headed to the opening, Johnny right behind him.

  200. "Guess we'll have to post a guard or something," Johnny agreed. He stared out at two small groups that stood in the darkness looking around at the deepening shadows. Scotty spoke.

  201. "What is it you want?" Scotty asked.

  202. "What is it we want? Are you kidding me? We want in there, out of the cold, the night." The guy was tall and dirty looking in the fading light, but Scotty supposed they all looked a little rough. "Talking like that ain't gonna get you in here," Scotty told him. "In fact it will get you an invitation to hit the road."

  203. A woman who was leading the second group, off to the right of the first group spoke up. "Look, man. We're all on edge right now. We just want to share your shelter. Manny is not so good with diplomacy."

  204. "Manny?" Scotty asked.

  205. She nodded to the other group, "Manuel... Manny."

  206. "These groups ain't bad," Alan said from beyond the doorway, hidden in the shadows.

  207. "You vouch for them?" Johnny asked.

  208. "No... I won't go that far. I will say I have seen them around... They are not part of the gangs that are all over the place at night in the city. Not these two."

  209. "Good enough for me... Ed? Scotty? Anyone else got an objection?"

  210. "We'll just watch them kind of close," Dave said."

  211. "Okay... Well, somebody better go get Amber and Lana... Just to be safe." He turned back to the parking lot and the two waiting groups. "Slow," he called out. "Slow and keep those rifles pointed down."

FIVE

Johnny

Creepy here. Creepy. I have been sitting here writing this, feeling nothing, or as little as I can feel. I feel like I want to explain it all better. I didn't know that when the end is maybe coming that you really do see your life all over again. Like the past flashing before your eyes, except it is tied to feelings and it hurts. It hurts bad... It is not just pictures of things, or quick flashbacks, it is so damn complex and it feels as much as it shows... I really don't know that I want to finish this for any reason.

Later

It is later. I smoked one of those crappy cigarettes. Holy crap, if that don't clear my head nothing will. The thing about that mall is that we grew close fast. I don't mean Lana and me, I mean the others. Scotty, Amber, Alan... Dave was hard to understand, but he was just a kid. Hard for a kid to be anything at first. He needed some guidance, but he was never going to get that guidance. No... I guess I got to finish. I don't want to but my time is passing...

The next morning I came in from checking the parking lot for another truck, me and Scotty...

Watertown: The Mall

Johnny and Lana

Morning

Amber had risen early to the smell of hot food. A few of the women had begun cooking sometime before dawn, and plates were filled with food. Stew, canned ham, powdered eggs and more. The store aisles were crammed with canned stuff. She looked over at Lana who was eating as fast as she was.

"Pigs," Lana agreed. She laughed. "I had no idea how hungry I was."

"Man oh man. Me either," Amber agreed.

"It is good," Manny grinned from nearby. Amber gave him a smile and went back to eating. The conversation ebbed and swelled around them. What to do, where to go.

They were now ten, a few of the others that had come in yesterday had left when the sun came up, a few others in the mall had made it clear they would not be going with them. Johnny and Scotty were talking to each other as they scooped some eggs onto paper plates and carried some plastic cups of coffee over to the fire and sat down. Lana met Johnny's eyes with her own and he smiled back, and they both went back to their conversations.

They had posted guards all night long, and although there were gunshots further away, and a few fires they could see burning back in the city, the night had passed uneventfully.

Their small group had finally decided to go towards Rochester, New York. Alan had said that he felt it may be their best bet, due to the fact that there were no large military bases very close to it, and the lake levels would be low for a while, so there should be no flooding.

"It's probably dead center of the two major fault lines, and it's further away from the Saint Lawrence," he had ventured.

They had discussed Syracuse, which was much closer, but rejected it when Manny had pointed out that the finger lakes could easily flood the whole area.

Scotty had agreed, and related their own travels, crisscrossing the finger lakes.

Amber had pointed out that Watertown had its own military base and reminded them of the new facility that had been under construction in the old caves under the city. More reason to wonder why the military wasn't here.

"So, we are avoiding the military now?" Johnny asked.

"Makes sense," Scotty said... "We have seen them overfly us, but they have not offered help to us. It's like they know what they are fighting, and that says to me that they are not on our side at all... Maybe involved, in fact."

There is a base here/" Johnny asked.

"That whole complex is probably under water by now," Dave opinioned. "But nobody here got any help from that base or the other big base close by... Manny said it was obvious they had flights coming out of there, but when some others tried to enter the base they threatened to shoot them."

"That true, Manny?" Johnny asked.

Manny nodded. Saw it myself, and there were bodies out there... By the gate... Only a few, and I didn't think much of it, there were bodies everywhere those first days before they started to turn, but after I wondered if they were shot because they refused to listen... To leave..." He frowned and then went to poking at his eggs with his plastic fork. He finally set the plate down on his lap.

"I agree," Ed, another of the ones who had come in the night before added. "Saw it."

Glenn said that he felt the facility was probably destroyed, and had gone on to explain his own belief that anyone in there was either dead or trapped permanently.

"The Black river runs under most of the city, right through a series of old caves. I can't say for a fact, but I think what most likely would happen is that at least part of the cave system would collapse. They're done for, if they're there at all," he had said. "And, no. They didn't have nothing to offer us either. Closed up the tunnel entrances right off the bat... Never saw any of them after that."

"Seen a few military groups out in the city... Bad outfits... Like deserters... Bad as the gangs," Lisa, another of the locals that had come in with Manny added quietly.

"Then we aren't going to look for them to help us... We aren't going to look for them at all," Johnny said quietly. Scotty nodded decisively as he finished speaking.

In the end they had finally decided on Rochester, and they spent some time discussing how to get there. An hour later they were leaving the parking lot in three jeeps heading for Rochester. Lana was in the front driver's seat with Amber beside her. The second Jeep, with Scotty driving and Jan in the passenger seat, Lilly in the back, pulled in behind them. Ed drove the last Jeep, with Dave riding beside him, A shotgun was resting between his knees. Gina in the back seat with her own rifle, a wire stock model that looked exactly like the one Johnny himself carried. Terry on the other back window, a heavy shotgun resting between his legs, and two 45 caliber pistols on a wide belt at his waist. There were a few more hand guns scattered among them, Johnny knew: He, Lana, Scotty, Amber, a few others, but most had stuck to the assault rifles or shotguns.

The rain that had been threatening once again began to fall hard as the small caravan pulled out of the parking lot, turned right on the crowded street, and began to weave through the dead traffic heading out Route 3.

Mexico NY: Johnny and Lana

Late Afternoon

"So, what do you think?" Johnny asked Glenn.

Johnny, as well as Lana, stood facing the road along with Glenn and Alan: They both shrugged.

The group had stopped just ten minutes before, when they had come to the turn off for Route 104 in the tiny town of Mexico, New York. The road was so bad in places that the Jeep vehicles bounced roughly over them no matter how slow they drove.

For nearly ten miles they had been reduced to a crawl as they crept slowly forward down the broken road, passing over the thick chunks of asphalt that tilted crazily into the air. In some places the drops from surface to surface was more than six inches. Nothing the vehicles couldn't handle, but the driving had turned into a slow crawl for long stretches.

They had spent the previous two days bogged down just a few miles outside of Watertown. Torrential rains, thunder and lightning. They had spent two miserable nights in the Jeeps trying to get some sleep. They had started out early this morning with high hopes.

In the last three days combined they had moved no more than forty miles, but the rain had finally stopped and they were hopeful.

They had maps, but the roads and small villages were so torn up that it was hard to find landmarks that could tell them where they were. The occasional highway marker, Village Limits sign, even business signs that listed the name of the town or village, were nearly all they had to go by. By mid morning the rain was back and their spirits had plummeted.

The trees had been winter brown three days ago when they left Watertown, but as they drove through the steady rain more and more green came into view. To the small group of people trying to negotiate the road it had sometimes felt like driving through a jungle. The road steamed where the asphalt had been warmed by the sun earlier in the morning before the rain had come back. The trees, seemingly bent on shedding their winter grays and browns and covering the landscape in green. They had finally stopped to move a fallen tree out of the roadway and then Glenn had wondered aloud if the road would get any worse. They had all stared at the overgrown landscape for a few moments longer, but there was no way to see what may lay ahead, and backtracking now was out of the question. After a short discussion they had returned to the Jeeps and once again set out on the cracked pavement toward the west.

Noon, or what they judged to be noon, found them parked under the tilted remains of a gas pump island: The rain was back, beating on the steel panels above them. The convenience store that had anchored the gas pumps was gone. Churned up earth marked the most likely spot. The air reeked of raw gasoline despite the rain.

Glenn was bent over a map which was spread across the hood of one of the Cherokees. The other two Jeeps were parked beside it, tailgates down as the rest of the group sat eating a lunch of cold, canned-meat sandwiches they had made. Johnny and the others stood talking and studying the map. They sipped at warm sodas and ate, talking between mouthfuls.

"This," Glenn said, "leads straight into Rochester." He pointed with one finger down the roadway as he spoke. "Of course..." he said, pausing to swallow, "there's no real way to know what shape it's in, or how much traffic we'll run into."

They had decided farther back not to take either of the turnoffs that could have shortened their trip, because of the traffic they contained. They seemed to have been more popular, and therefore much more heavily traveled.

Both of the turnoffs had been built after the main route, and had been designed to bypass the larger towns and cities on the route offering a more direct route: Both had been blocked with large tractor-trailers, several of which had been involved in accidents.

They had stopped momentarily to gaze at the scene, walking quietly through the twisted and blackened steel shells. They had expected to find bodies, but none of the trucks had any passengers, dead or alive. They seemed to have been driven by no one at all, wrecked, and then abandoned.

As far as they could see down the road they were now on, there was no traffic at all. The road on the other hand was buckled and twisted for as far as they could see so there would be little time that could be made up. A trip that would take three hours at the outside just a few days before looked as though it would now take three or four days.

In fact the entire small town seemed to be completely deserted. They had met no one as yet, and had begun to wonder aloud to one another whether they were completely alone.

It felt that way. It seemed as though everyone had simply decided to leave at the same time. Perhaps a mass exodus of some sort had occurred. Even so the feeling of being watched was pervasive. Creeping up on nearly everyone one, making them stop what they were doing, quickly lift their heads and look around, only to find no one there.

"It can't be any worse than the alternate routes we've stopped at," Johnny said, staring down the empty road.

"No," Glenn said, and then continued after taking a deep drink from the warm can of soda he held. "This tastes horrible," he said, making a grimace. "Anyway, I would bet that we're going to hit some of that truck traffic again before we get to Oswego. The last alternate we passed, 104 B, comes back into 104 just before we get there, at..." he paused as one finger traced the route on the map, "...New Haven. Have you been there, Alan?"

"It's the gas fumes," Johnny said. "Messes your taste buds up."

Glenn nodded.

"Wide place in the road is all it is," Alan replied, looking at the map as well. "Problem I'm concerned about is Oswego. Mighty damn close to the lake."

"True," Glenn said, "but I don't think we have too much to worry about. It's a good twenty-seven feet above lake level, according to the map. I guess the big worry would be damage from the quake though. Road might be all busted to hell, maybe some buildings down, no way to tell 'till we get there, for sure anyway, but I think we ought to count on a tough time getting through there..."

"...All that truck traffic will be back, and they do a lot of container shipments from the Oswego docks, mostly by train, but a good portion by truck, so that'll add even more traffic. It's also a college town, and even though most of the kids there would've been gone on break, they do run classes' year around... Could be a lot of dead there right now."

"There's another problem too," Alan said. "Although the map doesn't show it, there are two bridges that we have to cross... dead downtown too. I think one's a canal of some sort, and the other spans the Oswego River. You think the quake took them out?" he finished, looking at Glenn.

"It's possible I suppose, but like I said, there's no real way to know till we get there," Glenn replied, frowning.

"What about a boat?" Lana asked.

"No good," Alan replied, "good idea, but the banks are too high. It might be something to keep in mind though. If we have to we can take to the lake and skim around the roads. There are quite a few marinas all along 104, so if we had to go a way before we could get back in, it would at least get us back somewhere down the line, even if the water's still down."

"You think it is?" Johnny asked, looking at Glenn.

"Well, it was farther back. A lot depends on whether the locks in the Sea Way held or not..."

"Hey!" Amber shouted. "Hey don't run off!"

Johnny looked over to see what she had yelled about, but she was standing on the edge of the protected pump area staring back down the road. He caught Lana's eye, but she only shrugged as she walked over to her.

"Something?" Glenn asked.

"Don't think so," Johnny said... "Maybe a mutt or something... Go on, Glenn."

"Okay, So... Oh yeah, the Locks, I don't imagine they could have all been down. I'm not positive, but I think it drops somewhere around twenty-two feet from the Atlantic to Ontario, and the levels of all the lakes are different too. Most people don't know that, unless you live up here of course. I'd bet though that they held, at least so far, or at least the ones that were closed: If not I think the lake level might have already started to rise again, unless... Well, could be like I said before. There could be a whole new river cutting through the middle of the country, and if so I wouldn't want to bet on anything." Glenn drew a short breath and then continued after looking over to where Lana and Amber were talking.

"I got side tracked with that damn fault line right after I read the article about it. You know, one of those things that sort of grabs your attention. Hell, until I read it I wasn't even aware we had any fault lines up here. You hear earthquake, you think California, not northern New York."

"But I thought you said you read about it in school?" Lana said as she walked back over.

"No... What I said was you could read about it in school. I checked it out at the library. You know, I just couldn't believe it, and I learned a long time ago not to always believe what you read in the paper, so I went to the library and asked," Glenn said grinning. "Everything okay, Lana? With Amber?"

"Oh, yeah... Thought she saw someone across the road in that wreck of a diner. Ran as soon as they saw her." Lana shrugged.

"We could go check it out," Johnny said.

"If someone doesn't want to be found, goes through the trouble of avoiding us, maybe it's best to let them be," Alan said.

Glenn chuckled.

"Library," Johnny prompted.

Glenn nodded.

"I am sorry," Alan said and smiled heartily.

"Me too, Glenn," Lana agreed.

"Library," Johnny prompted again.

Glenn laughed. "Okay, library; as it turned out I wasn't the only one interested in that fault line. I had to wait better than a week to get the book I wanted. It was worth the wait though. The book was written by a fellow name of Jack Frederick. Guess he was living somewhere up here at the time. I haven't ever heard of him though. He told all about the fault line, and the locks. Got into a lot of boring shit, and used a lot of fancy words, but the gist of the whole thing was that he felt the thing was getting ready to go at any time. Course he wrote it back in the fifties, and I suppose when nothing happened right away people just forgot it. Till the article in the paper anyway..."

"...He thought it was more likely to go before the big one ever hit California, and I guess writing that book was his way to call attention to it. I'm running at the mouth here, but bear with me and I'll try to get to the point. See, he thought the whole damn continent would crack right down the middle, with a hard enough quake. The newspaper article was aimed at that side of it too. He also thought that it would eventually drift apart, course that goes back to the theory that the continents are not finished moving yet. But he thought it would move pretty quickly initially, leaving a huge gap more than three or four miles wide and running from north to south. If that's true then it'll probably be even worse through the middle states, as the land's all low to begin with."

"So," Glenn continued, after a brief pause, "you'd have one hell of a big river, and then almost an inland sea in the middle of the country. In effect it would pretty much cut the country in half, I guess. Of course, who knows? Science ain't based entirely on fact like most people think it is. It's just a bunch of theories, and whoever gets the most people to believe their particular theory comes out on top, I guess. Thing is a lot of people forget it's just theory and start to believe everything they say. I remember in school being taught about dinosaurs and people living at the same time. Hard science," he laughed.

"This guy though, he did a lot of research on it, and I think the reason no one wanted to believe him was because it's a scary thing to think about. So I guess that's it. It still boils down to the same thing. Maybe, maybe not. We'll never know till we get there, and we ain't going to get there if I keep running my mouth, are we?" Glenn smiled, as he finished.

"You do talk up a storm," Johnny agreed, "but at least it's interesting stuff. I've read about it too, not to that extent, but I have to agree with a lot of what you said. Hell, I'm a skeptic. I rarely believe anything I read," he laughed as he finished.

"I think that's everyone," Alan said. "You get bamboozled a few times and that's it. You think it's all garbage. And," He chuckled a little, "The sad thing is a lot of it still is junk."

Lana nodded. Her eyes cut to Amber who was still watching the wrecked diner on the other side of the road. Shading her eyes to see better.

"Seriously though," Johnny continued, the smile leaving his face. "I still don't know what the hell was going on in those caves back in Watertown, not entirely anyway, and it bugs the hell out of me. Makes me wonder if that had anything to do with this."

"Not likely," Alan said. "If the damage was not so wide spread, say just localized, I would say hell yes, it probably did, but this thing is nationwide, so no. One secret whisper-the-name military base isn't gonna get my vote. I'd say this was a natural event. A meteor and a bad set of circumstances of where it hit at an active volcano site. We might find, once we get to Rochester that this thing is confined to the U.S. Maybe Canada and Mexico, parts of South America, but it doesn't seem it could have affected Europe... Australia. We may be able to expect help from those countries."

"I would like to think that, Alan. I surely would, but I'll need to see it proved," Glenn said.

"Here," Alan said, walking back from the rear of the Jeep. He held a warm six-pack of beer in his hand. "Stole this for us, to wash down the taste of that orange soda."

"Aren't you afraid we'll get pulled over for drinking and driving?" Johnny said, smiling as he opened one of the cans.

"Hell no," Alan said, smiling back. "Of course I ain't the one driving, you are. Don't worry though; we'll post bail if you get arrested."

"Ha, Ha," Johnny said, as he climbed in behind the wheel of the Cherokee, "you'd probably let me sit there."

Lightening forked across the sky and Lana jumped. Amber laughed and put one hand on her arm. "Easy, Lana," she told her. "I thought I was spooked."

"Why?" Lana asked. "The people that might be across the road?"

"Yeah... It was really weird though... I thought," she laughed, "Don't laugh at me. Well, the person sort of lurched across the doorway, like a horror movie Frankenstein or something." She screwed her face up, but she wore no smile at all.

"Yeah?" Lana asked. "Maybe it was just the rain... Or sniffing this gasoline, that will make you see things for sure."

"Yeah... Yeah, what I told myself. Just the way they moved... Maybe they were injured."

"Yeah... Probably were, Amber," Lana agreed. "Could also be dead... Haven't seen many here, but we sure saw enough on the trip from L A."

"Funny though that they would run away if they were hurt." Amber finished. She climbed into the back seat.

"Dead don't want you to see them... Find them."

Lana had also grabbed one of the warm beers and grimaced at the taste as she climbed in beside Johnny, and said, "So, you going to keep this buggy? I mean this was supposed to be a short test drive, and I don't know how I'm going to explain the scratches to my boss."

Johnny reached over and picked up the factory sticker from the floor boards where he had tossed it, after tearing it off the rear window back in Watertown. They had been playing this little game most of the day. After what had happened they were all attempting to lighten one another's moods, and it seemed to be working, at least most of the time, except with Ed. Ed had simply withdrawn into himself, and no one seemed to be able to draw him out.

Johnny let out a long whistle as he looked at the sticker price at the bottom. "I haven't made up my mind yet, lady, do you suppose your boss would mind if I kept it a while longer?"

"No, I guess not," she replied, "but you'll have to keep me along with it," she finished, laughing.

"Oh," Amber said from the backseat and laughed.

"Well, okay," Johnny said, playing along. "I guess that kind of makes the sticker price worth it. What did you say those payments would be?"

They joked back and forth as they drove along the road, and Glenn and Alan joined in from the back seat. It helped to take their minds off their situation a great deal of the time. She seemed to have her wits together, and wasn't afraid to do whatever she had to, to protect herself and stay alive. That was all any of them could do, Johnny thought, just try to get past it to whatever was in front of them.

The whole group had begun to tighten up, he realized. The others had all gravitated towards Glenn, himself, Alan and Lana. They had discussed that. It had made Glenn especially nervous. While it was true he was used to taking charge, this was not the same thing as running a business, he had pointed out, and he wasn't so sure he liked it. He accepted it though, as did the others, although it was a reluctant acceptance.

Eventually the subject turned towards the more serious topic of Rochester, and what to expect when they got there.

"I can't tell you everything about it," Alan said, and then continued. "Most of what I know about it is a couple of years out of date anyway," he said pausing.

"Well, anything you know is more than we know now. For instance, when we get there what's the best way to get into the city? Or should we stay out of it?" Lana asked.

"Well, it's a big city. I think we should go in, but I think we'll probably have to give up the Jeeps, due to traffic. The best thing to do would be to get off 104 when we get to Fairport."

"Fairport?" Glenn asked, looking at the map once more.

"It's a long way around, sort of, but I think it might be the best way in. I think we have to get down in the city, at least at first anyway, just to see what there is. Like Glenn said, who knows? Could be that the police are still there, or at least someone in authority."

"Nice pipe dream," Glenn returned.

"You're probably right," Alan answered, "but I would bet that glow we could see across the lake last night was Rochester, and if it was, that means the power is at least still on. They just gave the okay last year to Rochester Gas and Electric to fire up that new nuclear plant out in Livingston County."

"Where's that," Johnny asked.

"Well, Rochester is in Monroe county, Livingston county starts out past Henrietta, which is a small suburb of Rochester. It's maybe fifteen miles or so away from the city itself, I guess. There was a lott'a bitching when they first proposed it, but it ended up being built anyway. Anyway, I'm starting to sound like Glenn now, I guess. The whole thing's computerized from top to bottom. Oh they have people working there, but they're only there in case something goes wrong, not to run the place. Even if something does go wrong, the computer shuts the whole thing down, not people. They supply electric for the entire city with it, with some to spare. All the excess power that the place produces gets sold to New York City. They built a new plant to handle it downtown, on Broad Street. It's a way from the lake, so if that was Rochester we saw last night, the plant must still be up and running. That means there may still be some sort of control there, you know, police, or something, at least other people I would guess anyway..."

"...You know, I think I am becoming a Glenn clone. I guess I should get back to what I was saying before I started running at the mouth. Fairport looks like the best route in. We can get off at Webster and shoot across 250 straight into Fairport, and from there we have several routes to choose from. There are quite a few loops that surround the city, Can-of-Worms it's called. Most of the traffic would be there. They rebuilt the whole system just a few years back so it would be easier to get around the city. Almost all the old routes in and out were pretty much secondary after that, you know, really light traffic, but all of those routes in should be pretty well open."

Glenn traced the route on the map as Alan spoke. "Looks good to me too," he said. "Looks like we can get pretty much anywhere on the east side of the city from there."

"We can," Alan agreed, "but don't let that map fool you. It's not as straight forward as it appears. I think we'll head out on East Avenue from Fairport. Try that first, and see." Glenn looked for East Avenue on the map, but couldn't find it.

"Thirty-one," Alan said.

"Route 31?" Glenn asked.

"Yes, straight out of Fairport. It's really East Avenue still to me, but I think they list it as Route 31 on the map," Alan said.

"Got it," Glenn replied.

"It doesn't go straight in anymore like the map shows," Alan warned, "They changed it, but it goes far enough to hit Winton road."

"According to the map," Glenn said, "it'll take us north or south, and that opens a lot of ways in to the city."

"Sounds like a done deal," Johnny said, as he turned on the heater in the Jeep.

"Hey," Glenn said, "don't you feel a little guilty driving around in a stolen Jeep?"

"Nope, If you're gonna steal something make it something nice, I always say," Johnny replied, with a smug look on his face. "Besides, it's getting colder out again, isn't it?" he asked, turning the conversation back to something more serious. "I mean I'm from Los Angeles of course, and you always know what it's going to be like there. Cold in the mornings, usually, this time of year. Hot all day long."

"It does stay cooler, or at least it did," Glenn said. "It can get hot in the summers, maybe edge up to the eighties, even low nineties on very rare occasions, but not as high as it was earlier. I really gotta believe that there's another reason for it. It seems to be swinging back to cold again though. Of course it's right back to the friggin' scientists you know," he continued, "only time will tell on that one, I guess. Remember that Japanese island that had the quake about thirty, thirty five years ago?"

Johnny said. "Moved it, right?"

"About six feet," Alan said, "and that was just a quake, not a meteor blast. Who's to say what a large blast like that, coupled with a super quake, or whatever it was, would have caused? Or several large quakes, volcanoes for that matter? I don't pretend to know."

"I don't guess we'll be finding that out right away," Lana said.

"No... More wait and see," Glenn said. "I'd sure like to get my hands on a compass though, but who knows if a compass could tell us much? Probably not anymore, I'd guess. Shit, where the hell can you find a good scientist when you need one?" Everyone laughed, breaking the tension that had been building, as it always did when the conversation turned serious.

"Hey," Johnny said, as he thrust his open hand over the seat back, towards the rear. "You guys hogging all the beer back there? No wonder you're both starting to sound like a couple of fifth grade scientists." Glenn laughed as he passed Johnny another beer. "Your license," he said.

"Guy's?" Lana asked. She waited until they looked at her. "Well, I was wondering, if, well... When we get to Oswego, if we could stop and get some clean clothes? I've been in these for two days now, and if there's no one there, in Oswego, I mean, I'd like to stop and get some clean ones."

Johnny looked down at his dirty shirt; he could use some clean clothes too. And a shower wouldn't be bad either. Aloud, he said, "I vote yes, does anyone know where there's a shopping center, a mall?"

"There are a couple just inside the city limits," Alan said, "They should have just about anything you'd want."

"It would probably be a good idea to stop," Glenn said. "It would give us all a chance to clean up too. Of course that's if there's running water."

"Even if there isn't," Lana said, "there's the lake, right?"

"True enough," Glenn replied, "but we may not be able to get close to it. I'll hope for running water myself." A chorus of 'Me too' greeted Glenn's last statement.

Johnny spread his fingers apart and looked from face to face. "Well, let's get this show on the road."

West of Mexico NY: Johnny and Lana

Early Evening

Johnny had been able to pick up speed once they had left Mexico. The pavement was fairly even, but after the first three or four miles the traffic began to block the highway and they were down to a slow crawl. He could go no faster than ten miles per hour. There were several blind hills, and curves, and abandoned cars and trucks that seemed to be in the least likely places.

The four wheel drive had come in handy, as several times they had to go off the road and into a field, or someone's yard to get around it. As evening fell they drove partway up the side of a concrete bridge escarpment and set up a camp. They were protected by the trucks, sheltered under the bridge itself, yet high enough to see in all directions.

The dead came for them not long after they had set up their small camp for the evening.

Lana was sitting next to the fire, helping some others prepare a small meal when the first of them sprang from the opposite side of the Jeeps where they had been hiding in the thick shadows. Lana had shrugged the fully automatic rifle she had been wearing off her back on a shoulder strap into her hands without thinking. Her fingers automatically brushed the safety off as she ran her index finger past the trigger guard.

She watched in shock as three of the dead leapt from the shadows, clearing the hood of the Jeep they had been hiding behind and came down in a squat on the opposite side without ever touching it. Time seemed to drop from its normal speed to a slower speed all at once. She could see the muscles bunching in one zombies legs as her eyes swiveled and locked on Lana's own. The zombie seemed to scream, but no sound reached Lana's ears

From the squat they had all launched themselves. Lana watched as one hit Amber and drove her to the ground. She was surprised to feel a heavy vibration from the rifle in her hands, and as her eyes came back to track the one that had launched itself at her she saw it disintegrating in mid-air. Even as she turned and tried to track the third zombie she felt a cold splash of fluid strike her face and she closed her eyes involuntarily as she finished her turning. Something heavy hit her and drove her sideways and backwards, but she managed to keep her feet as she bunched her thigh muscles and dove for the edge of the fire where Amber was wrestling with the one that had driven her to the ground. She could see her name forming on the edge of Amber's lips. She had not screamed it yet, but Lana knew she would scream it. A second later she was straddling the zombie's back, yanking her head back by her filthy, matted hair, and planting her knife squarely in the top of her skull. She had no idea when she had gone for her knife, but she was glad that she had. Amber's scream reached her ears long after she had rolled the zombie off her, down the concrete abutment and was settling herself back onto her feet.

There was no time to check on Amber as she spun quickly and tried to take in the entire underpinnings of the bridge in one sweep of her eyes. She watched Johnny swing a tree limb they had gathered for firewood and take another zombie's head off with it. Her eyes continued on. Two dead lay on the ground near Scotty, that was it. Almost everyone had pushed back into the shadows of the overhang of the bridge abutment. Safe... They seemed safe to her.

She heard herself draw in a deep panicked breath as she spun in the other direction, eyes moving, and found nothing there at all. One hand came up and wiped at the mess that dripped and ran down the side of her face as she finished her breath and bent over to help Amber to her feet. She heard herself asking if she had been bitten, but her mind was elsewhere, looking at her shirt, her jeans, her exposed arm: Before she was done looking Scotty and Johnny were there by her side and time seemed to take a fast jump back into its regular framework. Conversation suddenly sped up and voices resumed a regular level where she heard them long before she understood them.

Johnny was looking in her eyes and it took a second to understand his words. They seemed to be spoken so fast. She understood at last. "No... No... Not mine," she told him as Johnny wiped the mess from the side of her face.

Twenty minutes later they were all silently watching the flames leap from the fire. They had built it higher, the circle of light reaching farther, making them at least feel safer. The night was silent, but it had been silent before, Lana told herself.

She let her eyes travel from person to person. No hysterics... No crying, weeping, cursing. It was like they had accepted it as their due in this new world. She wondered over her thoughts, realizing that she felt exactly the same. The fear of just a few weeks and a few thousand miles passed no longer held her. She walked back to the fire and once again began stirring the dinner pot.
SIX

NYS Route 104: Johnny and Lana

Late Afternoon

By the time they reached the outskirts of Oswego the next day, they were ready to stop and rest. Alan pointed out a large shopping center on their left, and Johnny pulled into the mostly empty parking lot and rolled up to the front doors of a large department store. "Thrifty Deal?" he asked Alan.

"Chain store," Alan replied. "You can find a little of everything."

The other two Jeeps pulled in behind them as they were getting out. Johnny walked up to the front doors and tried to open them. "Locked," he said.

"That's okay," Glenn smiled, reaching back into the Jeep. "I've got the key." He handed the jack handle in his hand to Johnny as he walked up to the glass doors.

"Well," Johnny said, "I guess here goes." He swung the jack handle at the door and the glass shattered into millions of green-tinted crystals that skittered across the pavement.

"It's my first real crime," Johnny said, turning around with a large grin on his face.

Just then a loud alarm began to whoop from within the store, and a split second later an even louder alarm, mounted in a steel box above the doors, began to bray into the quiet afternoon air. Johnny, along with almost everyone else, had turned and began to run back towards the Jeep when it went off. The jack handle clattered to the pavement.

"Holy shit," he sputtered.

Lana was doubled over laughing, leaning up against the Jeep for support. Johnny looked at her stupidly for a few seconds and then smiled. Most of the others began to laugh as well, breaking the tension the alarm had caused.

"Y-Y-You," she tried to say, but couldn't stop laughing. "I thought you were going to have a heart attack, Johnny," she said, once she had gained some control. She held her stomach and began to laugh again. Johnny began to laugh himself, along with everyone else.

"Well... it frightened me at first," he protested. He hadn't been the only one, he knew. Glenn's eyes had looked as though they were going to pop right out of his head, he recalled. He seemed to be all right now though.

Glenn walked forward and picked up the tire iron from the pavement. Standing on tip toe he pried the metal box open. He hit the large siren inside with the jack handle, until it finally screeched and then quit. The other alarm inside was still going off. He disappeared into the store, and a few seconds later that one stopped too. Glenn came back outside and peered sheepishly at the small crowd, most of whom had finally stopped laughing.

"If we're gonna do this on a regular basis," he said, "we better pick up some real burglar tools while we're here." Everyone laughed again, but the laughter died down quickly, and once it had they all crunched across the glass and into the store.

The power was off, it turned out. The alarm had been backed up by battery, and had apparently switched over automatically when the power went off. The mood changed once they had gotten into the store. Just the fact that no one did come when the alarm had gone off would have been enough, but the empty store had also contributed its share to their somber mood. It served as a reminder that they still had met no other people at all. They had traveled over seventy miles and seen no one, and it reinforced what had happened in all their minds. No cashiers at the empty checkouts, no police cars screaming into the parking lot to see who was breaking in, there was nobody, anywhere it seemed.

They had gone together through the deserted aisles of the store, unwilling, or unable, to split up. Johnny and Scotty had visited the garden center while the others stayed together as a group. Scotty had spotted what looked like a water tower as they had pulled into the lot, mounted on the roof. It may have rarely held more than a few hundred gallons of rain water at any given time, used to water the flowers and plants the garden center sold. Now it was overflowing, running down the moss covered concrete block wall. The wall was cracked. The tower had never been meant to be over filled and the weight was taking a toll on the wall and the roof beneath the tank. The ceiling below where the tank mounted had caved in, but the steel girders that held the roof looked strong enough.

A little work had located the thick hose that brought the water down from the tank. A little more work and some duct tape had grafted a shower head to the hose end and fastened it to an over head beam.

Johnny, his hair still wet from the cold shower; dressed in a faded pair of jeans and a blue chambray work shirt, leaned up against the wall outside the garden center with the other men, and waited for the women to come back out. They talked quietly among themselves as they waited.

"You think Rochester will be the same as here?" Dave asked. He had seemed especially shaken by the alarm in the parking lot, and still seemed shook up over it.

Terry stood silently next to Glenn, tapping the heel of one work boot against the cinder block wall. "It does sort of seem like everyone is gone," he said, as he stopped tapping the boot heel and straightened up.

"Could be," Glenn said, solemnly. "It really could be, but I don't think so. I think there are probably people right here in Oswego. They're scared, is all. I can't say as I blame them either, they don't know anymore about what's going on than we do. Even if they saw us come in, I don't think they're about to come running up to say howdy. I wouldn't," he paused, before continuing. "If I saw a bunch of people come driving in, I'd probably want to stay away. No police means there's no protection, and they don't know who we are, or even where we came from, or what we want for that matter. I think though, that there are people. Maybe it's just going to take some time before we all get back together. I just can't believe we're it, I guess."

"I have to agree with you, Glenn," Alan said. "If we were to stay here a while, I would bet we would probably see someone. The curiosity would bring them out, I think."

"I agree," Johnny said. "I was none too keen when you guy's approached us back in Watertown either. I thought about ignoring you, as a matter of fact."

"Glad you didn't, Johnny," Glenn said. The other men nodded agreement as he spoke. "I can see though where a body wouldn't want to. Especially since we were carrying guns, or rifles, at that point. I am glad you did though."

"Think we'll make Rochester tomorrow?" Dave, asked, as Gina and Jan came walking out of the garden center.

"It's not far, only about another sixty miles," Alan answered, "but I doubt it. We will probably get there late tomorrow or the next day sometime, depending on the stalled traffic of course." He seemed to consider for a second. "Maybe longer. The stalled traffic is even heavier and it might be ten times worse than this once we get closer. I mean they may have also taken to the secondary roads, so there may not be any real way to get there in one straight shot anymore."

"That's about what I figure," Glenn chipped in, "at least a few days."

Lana and Amber walked out, and the small group prepared to make a meal and settle down for the night.

Everyone, at Glenn's suggestion, had changed into sneakers or boots in case they ended up walking. They had taken the time to pick up extra clothes, as well as some more canned goods to replace what they had eaten, and Johnny had found some Quick Cold in one of the side aisles.

Quick Cold had only become popular in the last couple of years as a retail item. Before that it had only been used by the medical profession, to transport anything that needed to stay cold, or frozen. Organs for transplant, fresh blood, and countless other things. The plastic bags contained a small stick shaped tube. Johnny had filled three large coolers with soda and beer, and tossed in several of the bags after snapping the small cylinder within, to activate the chemical the bags contained. They had instantly frosted up and began to cool the warm cans. A few minutes later they rolled the trucks inside the store and built a fire for the night. Johnny took the first shift of guard duty with Scotty, just inside the main entrance.

~

Johnny

My hand is cramping, but I am almost finished. The dead are quiet right now. Quiet as in, not scratching, not trying to get in. I was glad about that at first, but after a while it has started to bug me. Makes me wonder what they might be up to. It is something to consider, and something for you, whoever you are, to consider too. One of the things we noticed as time slipped by was that those bastards got smarter... Faster... Like... Okay, Crazy-Town, as Lana would say, like they were evolving. There I said it. I know how it sounds, but it is true. Watch for yourself and see.

So I wonder if that is what this is. Like they are up to something stealthy... Like those bastards cooked up a plan and are putting it in play... Maybe, maybe not, but it can't be long until sunrise. An although sunrise no longer holds them back, they don't readily come out as much. It's like they need that sleep, just like we do, and they are not far from when they used to be humans, and so they have our sleep cycles... Make sense?

Oswego: A small place in New York I had never heard of before. We were there only overnight, but I wish to Christ we had stayed...

Oswego NY: Johnny and Lana

Late Morning

They spent the morning scouring the store for useful items. After they had loaded the Jeeps, they had left the abandoned shopping center and began to work their way through the seemingly empty city, when they reached the first bridge they were forced to stop.

The bridge was still standing, that was not the problem. The problem was that it was packed bumper to bumper with wrecked and burned out cars and trucks. A large city bus also sat within the wreckage. Dave and Johnny scrambled over the cars to see what had caused the huge accident.

At first, it seemed that the wreckage went on forever. But as they neared the second bridge the problem became apparent.

The bridge, or more properly put, the twisted steel girders and huge chunks of concrete that had been the bridge, lay at the bottom of a deep gorge, partially submerged in the water. Reluctantly they scrambled back over the cars to tell the others that were waiting.

"Think we could move them?" Alan asked, as Johnny and Dave returned. "I saw a wrecker back up the highway a bit; we could go back and get it."

"Wouldn't do any good," Johnny said, his voice somber. "The second bridge is nearly gone. Even if it weren't, I don't see this one standing much longer either. We took a look at the underside from the other bridge, and a couple of the pilings are cracked pretty badly. I wouldn't trust it. There is another bridge though, looks like only a couple of blocks over. It's still up, but I can't tell from here whether it has traffic on it, the sides are enclosed."

"Which way, Johnny?" Glenn asked.

"Looked like down a little way," Johnny said, pointing back the way they had come. "Take the next right, and it should be only a couple of blocks away."

"Well," Lana said, trying to sound positive, "let's go find out."

They piled back into the Jeeps, and after some careful maneuvering, managed to turn them around and head back the way they had come. Johnny made the next right and started down the street, while Glenn and Alan, as well as Lana, watched for a bridge on the side streets that bisected the one they were on. Johnny had just slowed to cross a set of rail road tracks, when Lana suddenly yelled out.

"There!" she shouted, pointing down the tracks.

Johnny looked in the direction she had pointed, which happened to be down the tracks.

"Shit, that figures," he said, "a rail road trestle."

The trestle was a newer one, and the sides were enclosed steel with concrete reinforcements. Probably why I didn't realize it was a train trestle, he thought, and then said aloud. "Well that blows that, but there ought to be other bridges. This can't be the only one."

"Actually," Glenn said, from behind him, "it ain't necessarily bad news."

"What do you mean?" Johnny said, staring back down the tracks at the bridge.

"Well, just what I said. It's still a bridge ain't it? It's not a rickety old wooden one either, solid steel and concrete, it'll hold us, and it does cross the river right?"

Johnny looked at the bridge doubtfully. "I suppose so, but... You think we could fit across it?"

"I've seen cars and trucks both on trains," Lana exclaimed, "they would have to fit, or else how could they carry them on the trains without smashing the hell out of them?"

"Good point," Glenn said, "how about you park this buggy, Johnny, and we go take a look at the bridge."

The other two Jeeps parked, and all of them walked off down the tracks to look the bridge over.

The concrete ties, and the tracks that lay upon them, were well supported. Heavy steel girders ran the length of the bridge, and were supported by massive concrete pilings sunk into the river bed far below. Johnny peered down through the ties at the concrete. It was cracked in a few places, but all the pilings seemed still to be firmly anchored in the river bed. "Do you really think it would hold us?" he asked.

"If it will hold a train, Johnny, it will hold us," Glenn replied.

"I mean the cracks, wise ass," Johnny said. "The pilings are cracked. They seem to still be solid, but... I don't know," he finished lamely.

"Tell you what. You drive one, and Alan and I will drive the other two. Everybody else can walk across. I'll go first even. If it looks the least bit shaky we call it off, and search for something else, okay?" Glenn argued.

Johnny thought for a moment before he replied. It might be a good idea after all. Where else were they likely to find a bridge that wasn't blocked off with traffic? The bridge did seem solid, and it couldn't hurt to try he supposed.

"Okay, but I'll start out. You watch, and you damn well better let me know real quick if she starts to go. I'll be pretty pissed if you dump me and my new truck in the river," Johnny finished, smiling widely.

"Wouldn't think of it," Glenn said, solemnly.

"See you on the other side," Lana said, and before Johnny could reply she quickly kissed him. "For luck," she said, a bit breathless. She turned and along with the others started walking across the bridge.

Johnny watched her go. The kiss had taken him by surprise.

"Ah, Johnny," Glenn said grinning, "better close your mouth before the bugs start flying in." Johnny closed his mouth with a snap, and looking a bit embarrassed, walked off towards the Jeep.

Alan threw Glenn a wink, and they both walked out onto the bridge to wait. Johnny started the Jeep, backed around, and drove slowly over the ties towards the bridge, straddling the rails as he went, and he was still thinking of the kiss as he edged slowly out onto the bridge. He looked across and saw Lana waving from the other side. He waved back and then brought his attention back to the truck.

"How's she look, Glenn," he asked out the open window, as he inched cautiously out onto the trestle.

"You might scratch the paint a little, but the deck didn't budge a bit when you eased on to her," Glenn replied. "I don't think they brought too many auto-carriers across this deck though, more like freight cars. You only got a couple of inches on either side."

"Well here goes nothing," he muttered under his breath as he moved further out onto the bridge. "Still okay?" he asked.

"Good as gold," Glenn replied. Johnny was not entirely blocking the bridge, and Glenn and Alan squeezed by on one side of the truck. "We'll be behind you," Glenn said, as he paused at Johnny's window. "I'll wait until you're off, and Alan will wait until I'm off." Glenn looked at both men as they nodded their heads.

"Let's do it," Johnny said.

He eased off the gas and let the Jeep idle its way across the bridge, bumping over the concrete ties as it went. When he reached the other side he angled off the tracks, parked, and walked back to the bridge. He stood quietly beside Lana and watched until the other two Jeeps were across.

Early Afternoon

Once they were back on the main road again, it was late afternoon, and by the time they finally reached the other side of Oswego, they had all agreed to stop for the day.

They entered the small town of Martville, and pulled into a large field. They made a half-way decent meal out of the canned goods they carried with them, and once they tired of rehashing the day's events, one by one they went off to find a place to sleep. They had sleeping bags, and rather than set up the tents they had also brought with them, they all agreed they would rather use the bags.

Johnny watched as Terry walked off in one direction with Gina. Obviously something had sparked with those two, he thought. He sat talking quietly with Glenn and Alan, as well as Lana. When he finally said his goodnights a few hours later, Lana got up, and saying goodnight, walked away with him.

While Johnny waited for sleep to come, he found that instead of thinking of all the bad things that had happened, he was thinking of Lana, and all the good things that could happen.

Route 104: Johnny and Lana

Early Morning

The next morning they were on the road early. The going was still slow, but by noon they were on the outskirts of Alton, a small town about forty miles from Rochester. They were only thirty or so miles from Webster where they would turn off 104, and take route 250 into the small village of Fairport. As they had traveled the last leg of their trip a few others had decided to come with them, the little caravan was growing, and they all felt safer with the larger numbers.

A run-down general store, with two old gas pumps sitting on a chipped concrete island, was all that marked the small town. The low speeds and constant use of the four wheel drive, had taken a toll on the fuel tanks of all three vehicles, so when Johnny had spotted the small store as they passed a sign for the township limits; they had pulled off into the dirt parking area. The others followed him in and lined up by the pumps.

When Lana and Terry, along with Gina, had first picked up the jeeps, they had filled the tanks by siphoning gas from the dealership's underground tanks. It had been a fairly easy process as Terry had worked at a gas station before, and had been responsible for, among other things, checking the levels of the tanks and comparing them on a daily basis to the numbers on the pumps to make sure they matched up. He had known where to look for them. The tanks were fairly simple to access. A long piece of hose slipped down into the tank had been adequate to siphon the gas into cans and then fill the Jeeps.

Terry had found a hand operated pump, mainly used to pump kerosene from cans into small heaters, at the department store back in Oswego, and along with Dave had adapted the crank operated pump to use it to pump gasoline. The adaptation had been simple. A long section of heavy hose had been slipped over the pumps short tube, and held in place with a small hose clamp.

One by one the others were pulled over next to the underground tanks, and quickly filled. Lana had been impressed with the idea. It was a lot better than the mouthfuls of gas they had swallowed filling the Jeeps back in Watertown.

After the vehicles were gassed up they decided to take a short break and eat lunch. They were all getting sick of the canned meat, so they foraged through the small general store to see what was available. Once each had found what they wanted, they had carried it out onto the wide front deck to eat.

Johnny sipped at a cold beer while he sat in an old wooden chair eating a large bag of chips. Glenn and Alan were talking quietly beside him.

"Where do you think the best place to go is?" Glenn asked of Alan. They had been discussing several places where people may have gathered. They were all hoping to find other people once they arrived in Rochester, but until now they had not discussed where to go once they arrived.

Alan answered. "Well, the compass is open. I think it would be a good idea to stay away from the North side though. The whole area has been run down for years, and I'm not so sure we'd want to meet anyone who was still alive in there."

"That bad, huh?" Johnny asked.

"Actually, more than that bad," he replied. "When I was still living there, and still on the City Council, I remember we had constant problems there. The city was always being accused of not caring much about the north side, and to be honest it was based in fact to a certain extent. The city and the council, me included I hate to admit, did let it run down pretty much. Trouble was, when we tried to retake the neighborhoods we couldn't."

"Why?" Glenn asked. "Didn't you have support from the neighborhoods?"

"Not really," Alan said. "Don't get me wrong. There were still a lot of good people trying to live there, but by the time the city stepped in, drugs had pretty much taken over. It got so the police couldn't even go in there after dark. The drug dealers knew it and used it to their advantage. After a while... well, the good people who had tried to change things just left. The last time I was there it was pretty bad. We, myself, and two other board members, decided to take a tour through some neighborhoods ourselves, to see just how bad it had gotten. We had to have a police escort, and even then we ended up seeing only a small part. Most of the neighborhoods were full of drug houses, prostitution, burned out buildings. I'll tell you, truthfully, it scared me. That was one of the reasons I didn't run again and ended up moving to Watertown."

"A lot of parts of Watertown were like that too," Dave said. "I got to the point where I really had begun to hate the place."

"I know exactly what you mean," Alan said. "Don't get me wrong. I'm not glad that this happened, but... who knows how much worse things would have gotten? At least now there's a chance to start over again, maybe."

"You know what really got to me?" Glenn asked. Both men looked at him waiting for him to speak.

"You know where Mobile Alabama is?" they both nodded. "Well, I was down there a few years back to see a buddy of mine I was in the Navy with. We were always telling each other we were going to get together and finally we did. So we were driving down Airport Boulevard, kind'a the main street so to speak, and I was, you know, sort of looking around out the window. Sightseeing, I guess you could say. Anyway, I see this young girl standing in the middle of the island that splits the lanes holding a sign. I figured it was one of those 'Will work for food' signs, but as we got closer I saw it wasn't. I could also see she was pregnant, couldn't have been more than sixteen or so. I asked my friend to slow down so I could read the sign. I couldn't believe it."

"Well, what did it say?" Alan asked.

"Well, it was misspelled, you know, but it said, 'I'm pregnant and abandoned, please help me.' I couldn't believe it, so I asked my buddy to turn around and go back, but by the time he did she was gone. I couldn't believe that things had come to that."

"That's bad all right," Johnny said. "I've seen the other signs, the food signs, but I've never seen one like that."

"I haven't either," Alan said, "but I can't say it surprises me a lot."

"Well," Glenn continued, "that wasn't the end of it, two days later I picked up the paper and there was an article about her in it. I guess I wasn't the only one who had seen her. The police had picked her up earlier, and told her not to stand there with that sign. That was in the morning, and it was afternoon when I went by, so she must have come back. Quite a few people had seen her back there in the afternoon, according to the paper. Well, the thing is that somebody did stop and pick her up, but not to help her. They found her body in the bay the next morning. If they hadn't picked her up the day before, they probably wouldn't have known who she was, but they did, I guess. The story said they had fingerprinted her, and taken pictures too. I guess they arrested her, ain't that a slap in the face? Anyhow, that's how they identified the body... I've always wondered about it. Who would just abandon her in the first place? I mean, being pregnant and homeless? I've always felt that I should have convinced my buddy to stop right there, to hell with the traffic, just stop and pick her up..."

"...So, I've gotten pretty sick of the world myself. It never seemed to stop, and it seemed that people kept coming up with more ways to be cruel. To tell the truth, I'm glad it's mostly gone, I hated it that much."

When Glenn finished they were all silent for a few minutes.

Johnny thought about the food signs. How many times had he seen them? Countless, he guessed, but he had never stopped. He had been, well, sort of afraid to.

"I think we all made our share of mistakes," Johnny said. "I know I did. I wish I hadn't, but I did. I guess maybe things are better, in a way," Johnny finished his beer, got up, and retrieved three cold ones from the cooler in the Jeep. He handed one to each of the men before he sat back down in the chair.

"So," Alan said, easing back into the conversation of where to go once they arrived in Rochester. "North side is out I think, there's no way I'd want to go back in there, especially now. East side is mostly old mansions; East Avenue, Park Avenue. West is made up of mostly poor neighborhoods and shopping centers, and farther out small business. South side is a mix, some places are as bad as the North side, and others are as nice as the east side. Farther out though, it's all malls and big discount stores. I'd say downtown would be a good place to start looking."

"Why?" Glenn asked.

"Just a hunch, I guess," he replied. "But where did you go after it happened?"

"I see your point," Glenn said. Downtown, Glenn thought, was the first place he had thought of going. It made sense to him that it should be the first place to at least check.

"We'll have to walk, at least I'm pretty sure we will," Alan said.

"I believe you," Johnny agreed. "A city that size has a lot of traffic I suppose."

"Unbelievable," Alan said. "An awful lot of it ends up on the Can-of-Worms, but its heavy downtown too. There are still a lot of small companies down there, so I'm fairly certain we'll have to walk down. We should be able to get within a block or two of the War Memorial though, and that's dead downtown. City Hall is across from that, and if there are people, that's where they should be. Of course the only real way to find out is to get there and see."

The small caravan pulled back out onto the highway and continued on a few minutes later. Long before they reached Webster the stalled traffic began to back up, and they lost a great deal of time winding their way through it, or where that was not possible, pulling into the center traffic divider to get around it.

Even the center divider, a narrow, sloped grassy area double the width of the two lane highway, began to fill up with stalled vehicles, and several times they were forced to get around some other way. Fortunately the areas along the highway were crowded with small restaurants, shopping malls, and gas stations; the closer they got to Rochester. And they all had feeder roads. Roads that were mostly empty now.

The parking lots were fairly empty, and they managed to get around the stalled traffic that way.

When they reached Webster it was nearly 6:00 PM, and a light rain had begun to fall. The exit and entrance ramps were packed solid with cars, and impassable: As a consequence they were forced to drive the Jeeps down the side of the steep escarpment to the road below. Some cars appeared to have either been trying to enter or exit using the wrong ramps, and the results had been catastrophic.

Most of the cars were crushed and blackened shells. A large gasoline tanker sat amid the wreckage. The tanker had apparently tried to exit the entrance ramp and had crashed and burned.

It looked as though gas, from the ruptured tanker, had spread the flames under the entire bridge, and everything had caught. Johnny supposed that several of the cars gas tanks had probably exploded too, helping to fuel the inferno.

Once they had negotiated the steep and muddy embankment and driven out of Webster the stalled traffic eased up.

"Most likely everyone stuck to the main routes," Alan said. "I'd hate to see what the Thruway looks like though, it's probably packed tighter than a drum." The others nodded agreement.

Even though the stalled traffic had lessened, they were still forced to detour off the road several times to avoid accidents or vehicles that seemed to have been abandoned in the middle of the road. It was well after 8:00 PM when they reached the four corners in the small village of Fairport, and the sky was beginning to darken. The rain was coming down harder.

Johnny angled the Jeep into a deserted gas station and they all ran toward the door which had been left propped open, thankful they were out of the rain.

They were no sooner inside than the rain began to pelt the tarmac outside in great sheets. The sky darkened rapidly, and a stiff wind kicked up, blowing the trash that littered the streets through the air.

Johnny was staring out the wide glass window when suddenly the street lights began to glow. Within a few minutes they were all glowing brightly, illuminating the wind driven sheets of rain. Lana walked over and flicked on a switch next to the door, and bright fluorescent lights buzzed to life overhead. She clicked on several of the other switches next to the first one, and the outside sign, along with the pump islands lit up.

"Looks like you were right, Glenn," Johnny said. Glenn, grinning, blew lightly on his finger tips and rubbed them on his shirt. "Elementary, my dear Watson," he said, still grinning.

He was still grinning a few seconds later, when Lilly began to point out the window and screamed excitedly.

"Look!" she exclaimed, "a truck, people!"

Everyone quickly crowded toward the windows to look out.

An older Chevy sat at the curb idling, its wipers throwing great sheets of water from the windshield. The darkened side windows gleamed, reflecting back the bright glare of the station lights. Lilly and several of the others were waving through the glass in an attempt to get the drivers' attention.

"Looks like a Suburban... Where did it come from?" Johnny asked, puzzled.

"I don't know," she replied. "I turned around and there it was. Aren't they going to come in?"

"Maybe they're afraid," Lana said, shrugging her shoulders. "They must see us."

Everyone stood silently for a few seconds staring out at the Suburban. It still sat at the curb, and it appeared to Lana that the person or people inside it were not going to come in. Just as she had the thought the car reversed and began to slowly back up towards the entrance to the station.

When it reached the station entrance, it pulled slowly up onto the edge of the pavement and stopped.

"What are they doing," Terry asked, sounding slightly afraid.

Everyone else turned towards Johnny expecting that he might be able to answer the question.

"I don't know," Johnny said. "Could be they're afraid, like Lana said."

"Might be better to flick off the inside lights," Glenn said, in a low tone of voice. "It doesn't look as though they intend to say hello." He peered out at the truck.

Lana reached over and flicked off the inside lights.

Almost immediately the Suburban's headlights came on and it pulled ahead slightly, angling the beams into the station interior. The lights flicked up to high beams, flooding the interior in harsh bright light. Almost as soon as the lights had flicked up, the two front doors opened and two shadowed figures stepped out into the rain. The headlights were blinding.

"Listen, man," One of the figures shouted in a deep voice. "You ain't welcome here. You come into the city and you will get fucked up." Silence held, rain drummed against the steel roof. The figures got back into the truck. The headlights winked out.

Tiny spots floated in front of Johnny's eyes and he quickly blinked them away. The truck was backing slowly into the road, away from the station.

"What in hell are they doing?" Dave asked, looking at Glenn. "What the hell was that all about?" he asked again.

Glenn shrugged. "I guess we've been warned... I didn't much like it, I can tell you."

"I didn't much like that either," Johnny said as he looked over at Dave. Glenn stood beside him, his eyes locked on the car.

Once the Suburban reached the roadway it pulled slowly up to the stop sign at Route 250 and once again sat idling, its lights still off. Johnny tried squinting his eyes tighter, to see into the darkened side windows, but they were pitch black, like a limousine, he thought.

"What should we do," Gina asked? Johnny looked at her, and it was obvious she was frightened. In fact, he noticed, everyone, himself included, seemed frightened. Terry was the only one carrying a shotgun in the station and Johnny noticed it.

"Terry, give me that," he said motioning at the shotgun. He shifted his machine pistol more fully onto his back. It would probably be a better weapon for killing, but he hoped to scare them with the shotgun instead.

"Be careful, Johnny," Glenn said, "No telling what they're up to. I don't know if it's wise to go out there."

"Don't!" Lana said, turning to face Johnny. She seemed on the verge of panic.

"Don't worry," he said. "I only want to show them we're armed... maybe they'll take off. Think they're armed, Glenn?" Johnny asked.

"I don't know, but who knows how friggin' long they were sitting out there watching us, if they'd wanted to shoot us they could have easily. The lights in here probably lit us up like a damn Christmas tree," Glenn stated. "I ain't so sure you should be going alone if you're going out there though. I'm going too." Terry and Dave followed them out the door.

The four men advanced slowly toward the truck in the pouring rain. The Suburban stayed put, its engine softly idling, and curls of white exhaust floating up through the sheets of rain. They stopped about ten feet from the still idling truck, and Johnny stepped to the front of the small group with the rifle clutched in both hands. He didn't want to seem too threatening, but he wanted them to see the rifle.

"Hey, you in the truck!" He shouted above the deafening roar of the rain. The taillights flashed briefly as if in answer, and a cold chill crept up Johnny's spine. He shuddered involuntarily. "What the hell is with these guys," he muttered, to no one in particular.

"They are some kind of assholes all right," Glenn whispered. Johnny looked over and saw that they were all shaken. He tried again.

"Hey, what's the problem?"

He had meant for the question to come out strong and loud, but it had not. Instead, the words had seemed to choke up inside him, and had sounded strangled when they had come out. The eerie feeling had gotten stronger, and Johnny noticed that he felt an almost panicky urge to run back towards the station.

He looked at the others, and noticed they seemed to be panicked as well. What the hell, he wondered, as he fought to control the panic. He found himself suddenly raising the rifle and aiming at the truck.

"Don't shoot the bastard," Glenn whispered.

"Don't intend to. I just... I..."

Just after he began to lower the rifle, the Suburban's headlights suddenly flicked on, and the rear tires spun on the slick pavement, smoking and screaming as they clawed for purchase. The engine whined higher in pitch and the big Suburban seemed to jump out into the intersection. Johnny watched as it skewed around sideways on the wet asphalt and roared off towards Webster. A passenger leaned out the window and aimed a rifle at them.

The rifle in Johnny's hands bucked and the rear window of the Suburban burst inward in a spray of glittering black diamonds as it sped away. The shooter ducked back inside. Shapes moved and shifted in the back of the Suburban, maybe as many as half a dozen, Johnny thought, maybe more. No way to know, he decided. The pitch of the motor rose higher, and a few seconds later the taillights slipped out of sight.

"Christ." Johnny said, as his dry mouth tried to work.

"I counted at least eight with the driver and passenger," Glenn confirmed.

Johnny could still hear the Suburban accelerating in the distance over the sound of the rain as it sped away, and feel the heavy pounding blat of its engine in the pavement under his feet. The four men turned away and walked slowly back towards the station in silence.

Johnny stopped at one of the Jeeps before they entered, and waited for the other three to catch up.

"Listen," he said in a low tone, almost a whisper. "I don't think it's wise to scare the shit out of the others. Maybe we should tell them the back was empty. Agreed?"

Terry was still swallowing convulsively, but nodded his head up and down like a puppet. Glenn and Dave both mumbled agreement.

"Terry," Johnny hissed, "snap out of it. It won't do any good if we walk in there with you looking like that." Terry nodded and tried to calm down. "Maybe you can get Terry aside and talk to him, Dave."

Just as Johnny had finished speaking, the door to the station swung open, and the people inside poured out into the rain. Lana, looking badly shaken, walked towards them with her hands folded across her chest.

"They all had guns... The ones in the back, Johnny," she said. "I looked, we all looked, Johnny, when you shot out the back window."

Her voice had risen as she spoke, and at the end she was nearly screaming. Johnny pulled her to him and held her in the rain. To hell with it, he thought, keeping secrets was never one of my strong suits anyway. It's probably better this way.

"Johnny," Glenn said. "I think it might be best if we stay here for tonight, instead of going into the city. I also think we ought to pull the Jeeps inside the service bays for the night... keep an eye on them. Probably ought to keep shotguns or handguns with us from now on too."

"I guess you're right, Glenn. Lana, why don't you and the others go back inside and get the doors up. We'll pull the Jeeps in... Okay?" She hugged him fiercely before she let go and ran back into the station. The three of them quickly drove the Jeeps into the service bays, and then locked the wide doors behind them. They locked the front door to the station as well, and they all walked back into the rear section of the garage bays by a small parts room.

Johnny propped open the door to the parts room, and turned a small light on inside. The bulb was dim, but flooded weak yellow light out into the garage area, it was enough, he felt. If the Suburban came back he didn't want them to be perfectly silhouetted inside the station by the florescent overheads in the garage bay.

Lana and Connie began to fix a cold dinner while the others unloaded the sleeping bags and ice chests from the Jeeps.

Johnny was into his second beer and his heart was just beginning to resume a somewhat normal beat. Terry walked back from the front of the garage where he had been staring out into the rain. They all half expected the Suburban to come roaring back at any second. The shotguns were out of the Jeeps now, close at hand, just in case, but Johnny noticed several of the others had swung their machine pistols around to the front so they would be within easy reach. He couldn't recall when he had done it, whether he had seen someone else do it or he had done it on his own. He knew what it meant though. It meant that life had just gotten a little cheaper. Lana and Connie brought dinner over, and both grabbed a cold drink, sitting down as Glenn began to speak.

"This changes everything," he said to no one in particular. "I don't think it's a good idea to just ignore it either."

Johnny took a deep gulp of the beer before he spoke. "I guess you're right, Glenn and it was stupid to think we should keep it to ourselves. I shouldn't have suggested it." He looked around at the small group of frightened people and his eyes locked on Lana's as he continued to speak. "I thought it would shake everyone up for no reason," he said. The argument seemed empty and somewhat foolish even to him.

His eyes were sad, Lana noticed, and he shrugged his shoulders helplessly when he finished. Silence hung thick in the air for a few minutes until Glenn reluctantly began to speak again.

"I don't pretend to have an answer for one," he said quietly, as he looked around from one to the other. "I guess we can only go with what we know for now. What I mean is what we know from our own personal experience back in Watertown," he waited but no one spoke.

Glenn continued. "Whatever this is it looks a lot worse now than it did then. This little trip has proven that it was not a localized thing. Probably Rochester is gone," he shrugged. "No way to know, but is it worth an armed fight to find out? That sounds nuts, right?"

"No... Sounds sane," Johnny said. "We knew this, I think. I think we knew this. Maybe not that it would go this bad this fast, but I think we suspected... Suspected is a good word."

"Possibly," Glenn replied. He shook his head. "No, most likely. Most likely subconsciously we knew and didn't want to face it. I guess the pretending is over now though... Maybe that's for the best before one of us gets killed taking too much for granted."

Johnny nodded. "I... No, Glenn, I don't think you're nuts, if you are then we all are. I think the world ended. I mean the sensible part we all understood. I don't know what in hell this part is... I mean there has got to be some way to explain or at least understand this."

"You just did," Lana said quietly from beside him.

"She's right, Johnny," Glenn said, "You did. I don't think this is a rational or predictable world anymore. If it isn't, then all that's left, Is simply survival or," he motioned toward the outside, "Death... Let those people tell you how to live... Or Worse. There is no in between anymore, no walking the fence, the gloves are off, just one or the other."

"So what's next?" Gina asked, expectantly.

"If I knew that," Glenn answered. "I guess I would be God. I'm not, so I don't know..."

"...Just to make my position clear though, I don't intend to start waxing religious, but you can bet that I might just start praying. It used to seem superstitious to me. Not anymore. Now it seems important."

Silence hung in the air for a few moments, and Gina spoke up. "But what should we do? Should we go back, or go into Rochester, or should we maybe go somewhere else?"

"I think that question needs to be answered by all of us individually," Glenn replied calmly. "It's not a question one person can answer, and we've pretty much stuck together so far, I can't see splitting up if there's a disagreement. I think we all need to decide together."

"I don't see any reason to go back to Watertown," Lilly said

"I agree," Dave joined in.

"There's nothing there for us," Amber said.

One by one they all voiced their opinions, until only Scotty, Lana, Johnny and Amber were left.

"I don't see the sense in it," Johnny said quietly. The remaining three nodded their heads in agreement.

"So... do we go into Rochester, or somewhere else?" Glenn asked softly as he looked around the cramped garage.

"I for one would hate to think we came all this way for nothing," Scotty said. "I vote we go. If it's bad," he shrugged his shoulders, "we get the hell out and go somewhere else."

Glenn looked back at the small group. "Well?"

Silently, they all nodded their heads in agreement.

"That's that then," Glenn said. "We'll go in the mornin'," he paused. "Tonight though, I think we need to keep watch. I'm going to take the first watch, who's next?"

"Me," Scotty said.

"I'll relieve you," Dave said, "just get me up when you get tired."

"That should see us through the night," Glenn said. "...I think it's best if we all sleep in here tonight, and on this side, behind the trucks. It might be a bit crowded, but I don't want to take any chances." Glenn finished, picked up a shotgun, and headed towards the glass enclosed front of the gas station, the small group began to break apart. Lana spoke up, after most of the others had drifted away.

"Johnny?"

"Ssh," he said, as he put a finger over her lips, "no need." He led her away and they pushed two sleeping bags together in front of one of the Jeeps.

"Johnny?" she said, "I just need to be held."

"I know," he said quietly. "I need to hold you." He took her into his arms and held her as he tried to push the thoughts that wanted to crowd his mind away. Lana slipped off to sleep quickly, but sleep eluded Johnny. He lay quietly thinking, still holding her, until he drifted off to sleep himself much later.
SEVEN

October 14th

Rochester NY: Johnny and Lana

Morning.

He was still holding her when he awoke the next morning. Lana awoke a few minutes after he did. She kissed him softly, and said, "Thank you for not being like every other man I've met in my life. I love you, Johnny, you know that?"

Johnny kissed her back, and then she left to help with breakfast. Glenn wandered over, his eyes bloodshot, a rifle slung across his shoulder.

"Did you see anything last night, Glenn," Johnny asked?

"Zip. I stayed up all night myself, whoever or whatever... They didn't come back."

"I thought you were going to switch off with Ed. You should have got me up," Johnny said.

"Was gonna switch off, but... I don't know, Johnny, there's somethin' strange with Ed. It seems like he's walking around with his head stuck halfway up his ass. I ain't so sure he's gonna make it," Glenn finished in a near whisper.

"It happens, some people can't take it when things get flaky, Glenn. Hell, a few weeks ago I was an old man in early retirement. Couldn't remember half the damn time to go out and get my damn mail." He laughed lightly. "Look at me now... You should have got me up."

"Well, it doesn't matter now," Glenn said. "Besides, it looked like Lana needed you. Looked like you needed her too," he finished quietly.

"I think we all need each other," Johnny answered, "Ed will come around."

Once everyone had eaten they packed up the Jeeps; unlocked the garage doors, and backed out into the already hot morning air.

Johnny left the Jeep and motioned the others out of the Jeeps onto the pavement. The quiet of early morning descended.

"We don't know anything at all about what's next. If, after a night to sleep on it you have changed your mind, it's no sin... No one will blame you if you want to go back... Or even somewhere else." He waited, but no one spoke. No nervous clearing of throats, no uneasy laughter. Nothing. "Okay," he scrubbed at his face and the beard that was growing across his chin. Marveling at how it could be there at all. "I'd say windows down... Rifles loaded and safeties off... Watch... Follow my lead. If I back up and try to get out of there you follow me. Don't turn around, just keep it floored in reverse... Let's just be smart. Maybe those guys were nothing but smoke." The silence held.

"Smoke or not we can't run away," Alan said. He straightened and smoothed his shirt front.

Johnny nodded, looked around once more and then climbed back into the jeep.

They pulled off the service stations paved area; rolled slowly through the intersection and headed into the city of Rochester.

~

Johnny

I took a trip around the upstairs. The boards are all tight, but the night is dragging on and the dead are still too quiet: That bothers me a great deal. I don't know what they are up to. I will be glad when morning arrives, although to be honest it doesn't seem to stop them much anymore. They are getting used to it, if they ever weren't. Maybe it is just my own mind that is more comforted by the daylight...

Had me a little drink. Rummaging around upstairs and found the access panel to the attic. Just a square in the ceiling, but you pull the handle and a set of stairs drop down. No floor up there, just tons of that blown-in insulation, and boxes and crates packed in there sort of haphazardly. I found a case of brandy in between the ceiling joists, dusty, but when did that ever matter when it came to booze. I was afraid it might be gone over. I'm not even sure that is possible. In any case it doesn't taste gone over. It tastes fine. Smooth. It will make the rest of this night easier... I hope it will anyway.

I was telling you about the City, Rochester. I had misgivings and I ignored them. I shouldn't have, but of course after the fact we all see twenty-twenty, as we had gotten closer to Rochester we had found others. They had come out of hiding. Some to say hello, some to warn us, others to join with us. By the time we rolled down East Avenue into the city we had a few more vehicles and more than a dozen more people traveling with us.

The next day...

A Highway

Johnny

Johnny came awake with sunlight streaming in through the windshield of the small car he was in. He looked around at the road. Stalled cars for as far as he could see in any direction he was somewhere outside of Rochester, but where, he wondered. He thought back to Rochester.

The drive into the city in the early morning had seemed uneventful right up until the attack had come. Afterward he had berated himself, cursed himself for not taking the events of the night before more seriously, but he knew that the truth was that none of them had. None of them had, and now he was the only one left. The only one left, and he was alone because of that decision.

They had just passed a large mansion, or what had once been a large mansion on East Avenue: Nearly into downtown when the attack had come. The last vehicle, Ed... Terry, Gina? He couldn't remember for sure, but it didn't matter, they were only the first to go. The truck had blown up behind them. One second it was morning silent, and the next a roaring fireball had erupted from the roadway. The truck had lifted into the air engulfed with flame, and had come back down a split second later a twisted, shattered wreck. The roof ripped open crudely as if a giant can opener had done the job: Glass gone, body twisted. Blackened shapes still moving clearly seen through the flames.

They had all panicked. Johnny had hit the brakes, somehow convinced they had driven over something in the road. Landmines. The word leapt into his mind and kept repeating. The Jeep behind them had rammed into them, Scotty, Lilly, Jan, and that had distracted him further. As he had lifted his eyes he had seen the men squatting beside the once elegant mansion. A rocket launcher on one man's shoulder, and he had known the truth.

His foot had seemed to leap forward of its own accord and slam into the gas pedal, but it was too late. His eyes swiveled back and he saw the rocket leap from the launcher. A second later a black curtain had descended.

He had come to hours later. The vehicles' nothing but twisted husks, still burning in the black night. He could feel the heat from the fires. He had lain for what seemed like a long time trying to orient himself, make sense of what he last remembered, and what he now saw. Time did nothing to sort it out. It still made no sense some time later when he had first tried to sit up. Pain had flared everywhere and the black curtain had descended once more.

The second time he awakened the fires had been out. Heat still came from the blackened shells, but the fires were dead. The moon was high in the sky, bloated, bright silver.

He had moved slower, and while it had been close he had managed to fight past the first pain when he had moved.

His left leg was bad. Not broken, but cut badly, maybe sprung, after all he had lain with it twisted to one side for what he assumed was a very long time. He used part of his shirt to wrap his leg as he let his head clear.

The heat from the fires was still heavy, rolling across the pavement and baking into him. Here and there flames did flicker in some other close by vehicles. Probably, he thought, the only reason the dead hadn't gotten to him. They were still afraid of fire, even if they were losing their fear of nearly everything else.

His head was worse. Pain flared rapidly inside every time he tried to move too fast. It felt like liquid sloshing around inside his head, his brain shifting with it, slamming into the bone cage of his skull, and he wondered if it were true, or just something his mind provided in explanation of the pain. He bent and retched until his stomach simply clenched. There was nothing left to void. As he sat the pain eased enough for him to stand. Standing helped to ease it even more and he began to search.

What was left was hard to understand at first. Pieces. An arm here, a leg there, bones blackened in the wreckage. A pool of blood where his head had lain. No other blood anywhere, and more than enough pieces and bones to make him sick once more.

Vomiting had pulled the pain back full force and he had found himself exiting into the black curtain once again. It was dawn when he had found his way back and a sense of urgency to be moving had set in.

His head was better, but his leg seemed worse. He had set out limping, staggering, but had managed a fairly reasonable walk after a few hundred feet. A shattered convenience store a few blocks down provided bottled sports drinks he rounded up from the aisles. He drank two straight down and his head began to clear. He watched the sun as it began to rise, the street lights winked out: Taking more bottles with him he began to walk back out of the city. Keeping to the back yards and alleyways of homes and businesses.

He looked at the cracked plastic dashboard of the little car now as he pulled his mind back. He had no idea how long he had walked. He had no idea where he was right now. The car was not familiar, but he could recall the morning coming on and a panic as he searched for a place to hide away the day. He could feel heat baking into his hand from his leg when he rested his hand against it, and a low grade buzzing had seemed to fill his head, distracting. The little car had probably looked perfect in the early morning light. The windows thickly dusted, hard to see inside of. Protection from the dead and the living.

He looked down at the car's interior. Key's hung from the switch. He didn't have a lot of hope, but he twisted the key and the starter began to turn over: Slow, barely there, but then it picked up speed in a rush and the car stuttered to life, coughed, nearly quit, and then smoothed out and began to warm up.

The muffler was loud, one side of the windshield was a spider webbed mess, but the gas gauge stood at three quarters of a tank.

He rolled his window down to rid it of most of the dust. A second later he had rolled down the passenger side front window to clear it too. A short windshield session had found no fluid, but the dust had mostly been pushed aside by the rubber blades. Johnny shifted the car into first and pulled from the side of the road bumping over the cracked and tilted pavement as he went.

The driving was slow going, but an hour later he reached the outskirts of the city of Oswego. Had he really walked so far in the last days and nights? How much time had slipped by him, he wondered, but he had no answers. For the last twenty minutes he had been following deep tire tracks that cut around the stalled traffic, and the closer he had gotten to the city the more he had found himself having to slow down and cut around the stalled traffic following the muddy tracks.

He had no idea who had made the tracks, and it made him more than a little concerned. He wound slowly through the stalled traffic, going around where he had to, and he was almost into the downtown section when the car became hopelessly mired as he tried to get around several vehicles blocking the road. It had been close before, but the front wheel drive had pulled the small car through despite the churned up ground. This time it was buried up to the undercarriage, and there was no hope of getting the little car out.

Johnny shut it off, and leaving the keys in the switch where he had found them, walked off into the downtown district.

When he came to the first bridge, he scrambled over the cars, pulling his damaged leg behind him when it refused to flex or bear his weight, and walked to the second bridge. He saw the same scene that he had seen a few days before: The bridge collapsed into the river. A large steel service walk that had run beside the bridge, however, was still intact, and he carefully walked across it to the other side.

He walked slowly down the crowded roadway and eventually out of the downtown section. It had been eerie to say the least.

When he reached the other side of the city, he stopped at a used car lot by the side of the road. An older Chevy pickup sat among the line of cars and trucks that fronted the road, and Johnny walked over to examine it.

The four wheel drive truck looked to have been used fairly well. It was dented and rusty, but Johnny liked the look of it. He walked around it and looked it over. The tires appeared to be in good shape, wider than most, as well as being tall and aggressively tread. He looked in the corner of the windshield, noted the stock number, and headed in the direction of a small trailer at the back of the gravel lot. The trailer served as an office, and he knew that if the keys were to be found, that was where he would find them.

He hoped the keys would be there and that the truck would start. If not, he supposed, he could cross the street to a new car lot that he had noticed. He would prefer the old Chevy, but if there was no choice he would cross the street and take one of the shiny new pickups that sat on the lot.

He supposed he would even be better off taking one of the newer vehicles, but he didn't want to. Even the old Chevy was newer than any truck he had ever owned, and all the newer trucks he had seen, seemed more like cars than real trucks. Even the Jeeps had been more luxury vehicle than an actual off road vehicle. The old Chevy looked like it had already seen its share of rough roads and would have no problem with them.

He had marveled while walking through the downtown district at how many things had changed in just a few days. The grass was growing. The temperatures were higher again, vegetation seemed to be making a fast grab at every inch of real estate. Like it had only been waiting all these years to take back its own.

He found the keys on a small board in the cluttered office, and headed back to the old Chevy. He had to pump it several times before it would start, but it had eventually caught and started with a large cloud of black smoke pouring out of the rusty tail-pipe when it did. Almost flooded it, he thought. The smoke cleared as the truck warmed up, and he sat and waited for the idle to fall off before he pulled out onto the roadway once more and headed north out of the city of Oswego.

October 16th

West of Mexico NY: Johnny

Things had gone bad fast. There had been two significant earthquakes, one following on the heels of the other. The first time he had nearly wrecked the truck, the second one came as he was pulled to the side of the road trying to ease the pain that had come back full tilt in his head. The truck leapt forward, and then darted sideways; Johnny managed to get his hand out to stop his head from smashing into the dashboard, but only barely. The truck had finally stopped rocking and the world came back into focus. He pulled the truck back onto the roadway, careful of all the new cracks and devastation, and found his way to a small roadside strip mall a few miles farther down.

The lot was deserted. Half the store at the opposite end was collapsed. A small mini mart, a drug store and a pawn shop were still standing; untouched. He had made his way into the small store, found the drug aisle and was surprised to see it intact. The one back in Rochester had been emptied of drugs.

The leg was swollen against the pants material; the rags he had wrapped around it had stopped the blood flow, but had done nothing for infection. He peeled the rags away now, taking a good part of his skin with it, and looked the wound over.

Something had punched a deep hole into his leg. The area that had pulled away was oozing puss now, the skin around it red and swollen. He had helped himself to a bottle of peroxide, some antibiotic cream, iodine and some bandage. He scrounged up a fast meal while he worked up the nerve to work on the leg. He probably wouldn't feel like eating afterwards.

He had no fever, and he counted that as a good thing, but the leg still felt hot to the touch and that worried him. He finished some energy bars and three bottles of water before he limped off to find what he still needed. Two aisles over he found a small knitting needle. The point was sharp. It was wide enough to allow him to push it in to get to the abscess he was sure was there. He carried it back to the aisle then decided maybe something to help with the pain might help. He searched, but there was nothing stronger than beer in the now warm coolers, and that was covered with a gray moss he didn't want to chance touching. The drug store nearby probably had some pain pills he could take, but he wouldn't know how much would be safe. It probably wasn't a good idea to be out of it in this world any longer. Maybe later, he decided. He would have to visit to get antibiotics anyway. Reluctantly he limped back to the aisle and sat with his back against the shelving as he arranged the items he needed around him.

The peroxide came first. He broke the seal and poured half the bottle over the wound. There was some pain, but the bubbling and foam that appeared told him what he had already guessed, the infection was bad.

He spun the top off the iodine, spilled a little into the dimple of the puncture wound and then inserted the knitting needle into the bottle and left it to soak in the iodine. He wasn't positive if it could disinfect it, but he was reasonably sure it could. The pain was intense when the iodine hit the raw wound, but it abated after a few moments. He picked up the needle, but just touching the wound with it sent shock waves of pain up his leg.

He stopped, stretched backwards against the shelving, bracing himself firmly. His breathing was hard and fast, tears had squirted from his eyes and stained his dirty cheeks as they rolled away to his jaw line. Sweat had instantly broke out on his brow. He couldn't stop at a mere touch. He had to shove the needle down far enough to be sure he punctured the abscess so it could drain. He steeled himself, took a deep breath, centered the needle over the dimple and drove it down into his leg before he could think anymore about it. The pain came fast, but his mind shut down almost as quickly.

He had awakened hours later, the sunlight lower in the front windows. The leg was draining freely, fresh blood now, but he could see that the poison had also drained. His head felt better, his stomach more settled. He took his time and grimaced only slightly as he poured first the remaining peroxide into the wound, and then the balance of the iodine. Both hurt, but the pain was nothing like it had been. Antibiotic cream and some bandage and he was finished. He sat, staring down at his hands. Dirt, blood, who knew what else. He made his feet and limped off into the store looking for supplies for the road. A few moments later he was loading them into the passenger side of the truck. A quick search through the drug store turned up antibiotics, an ace bandage that might help, and some vitamins. He didn't know if the vitamins could help, but he was sure they couldn't hurt. A few minutes later he had bent the pawnshop's steel-mesh protective door open and smashed out the front door glass with a jack handle from the truck. The exercise was making his leg hurt, but the skies were turning dark and he wanted to hurry before nightfall came.

The pawn shop was a nightmare inside. Every single cabinet was locked. Even so he found a gun cabinet, managed to pry it open, and left with two semi automatic nine mm pistols and a dozen boxes of ammunition. He got to the truck, debated on the ammunition, and went back to see if he could find more. The problem was he didn't know where to look. He found nothing, but he did liberate a shotgun and a whole case of deer slugs for it. He made his way back to the truck tired out, sweating, his leg aching deep inside. The bandage was soaked through with blood so he changed it as he sat in the truck and gathered his strength.

The leg of the jeans he had been wearing were a tattered wreck. Blood and gore streaked the leg to his boot top. The once white sock stained deep red and black in places. He needed clothes. His shirt stank, and was stuck to him with sweat. His boots, he hadn't really noticed until he had just taken a hard look at them, were melted in places. The leather looked sandblasted and ratty. He took two of the pills, washed it down with water. Next big town, he told himself, he would get clothes.

A light rain had begun as he pulled the truck back out on to the roadway, heading for Mexico as the rain bounced up from the pavement and covered the surface with a gray mist.

Watertown NY: Johnny

The truck was far better suited to the task of driving over the wrecked roads than the little car had been. A few short hours later he stopped for a rest in a small town at a local gas station.

He siphoned gas from the underground tanks, and scrounged a light lunch from the combination gas and food mart, dragged a beat looking aluminum lawn chair out from behind the station, and sat down to eat. He sipped at a warm beer as he ate. He enjoyed it even though it was warm. He finished his lunch and climbed back into the cab of the truck. It started without hesitation this time. He nosed it out of the small station and headed north once more.

As he drew closer to Watertown the stalled traffic thickened, and when he reached the Watertown Center exit a heavy rain began to fall which slowed him down even more. He flicked the headlights on and followed the same muddy tracks that cut into the steep grassy embankment down to the road below the overpass. He slid the last twenty feet to the pavement, and proceeded slowly along the rain slicked street.

He had just passed the Watertown town limit sign, when he noticed the fresh muddy tracks had cut across the road and into a field on the right. He slowed the truck, and let his eyes follow the tracks into the field of standing hay.

A gray pickup truck rested in the middle of the field, at the end of the deep muddy grooves it had cut as it plowed through it. It had slued around at the end, and now sat facing the road. Johnny shivered as a cold chill crept down his neck and into his spine. He couldn't explain the feeling that had crept into him when he had spotted the truck, but it set him on edge immediately. This had to be the same truck he had been following since before Oswego, the tire tracks on the sides of the road.

He stopped, but did not leave the truck, instead he stared through the rain slicked windshield at the Ford. It appeared to have been abandoned after it had become stuck in the field. The rain streamed across the darkened glass of its windows, and down the sides of the gray steel body. He fought the urge to get out and check the pickup. Someone could still be in it, hurt maybe, he reasoned, but he was sure his leg would never allow him to make the trip out to the truck and back. He felt unreasonably positive that the truck wasn't empty, that someone was watching him as he sat idling in the road. He put the Chevy back in drive and drove past, shaking off the chill that had passed through him, and sped up a little as he left the truck behind in the muddy field. It was nearly night, the gray of the afternoon moving toward blackness.

When a set of headlights appeared behind him a couple of miles down the road, he stared at them through the rear view mirror so long that he almost slammed into the rear of a stalled tractor-trailer in front of him. He looked up just in time and managed to miss the truck, but slid off the road and into the front yard of an old, paint-peeled green house.

He narrowly missed hitting the rickety front porch, and fought to bring the truck back under control as he shot past it. He goosed the gas pedal and the truck swung around, clipping several bushes that fronted the porch, but the truck was now angled toward the road. He gave it more gas and steered it back onto the roadway at last.

He looked into the rear-view as he gained the road, and he could now clearly make out the shape of the gray pickup behind him. It was gaining, and when it reached the tractor trailer, it seemed to skim by on the outer edge of the road without slowing at all. Johnny jammed the gas pedal into the floor board and the old Chevy began to shudder as it picked up speed.

He glanced back and as he did the truck blew by on his left in a spray of water that momentarily covered the windshield. Johnny instinctively released the gas pedal and jammed his foot into the brake pedal while working the wiper switch. The old Chevy shuddered in protest and began to slide down the road.

The windshield cleared as it slowed down, and he watched as the Ford spun sideways in the road. It came to rest in the center of the road, blocking it from side to side.

Steam rose from the hot tires. Its black windows gleamed in the light rain as tiny rivulets streamed across them towards the ground; washing away some mud that still clung to the lower body.

Johnny drew a deep breath into his lungs as his own truck slid the last few feet and stopped. He ended up still pointing straight in the right hand lane, about twenty five feet from the pickup.

He reached for the rifle that had slid off the seat onto the floorboard, as his heart beat quickly in his chest. The passenger side window of the Ford slowly lowered as he watched.

The black glass gave way to a dark gray interior, and the young dark-haired kid that sat behind the wheel of the truck slowly turned towards him. Johnny could see his yellow and crooked teeth, from where he sat in the truck as he grinned. Two other faces moved beside him, white blurs in the dim light. His heartbeat sped along crazily, and he fought to control the panic he felt rising inside him. He clicked off the safety on the rifle as he slowly eased it up onto the seat beside him. The dark-haired kid continued to grin, a cigarette plastered into one corner of his mouth, jittering up and down. Talking to the others, probably, Johnny thought. The kid raised his rifle and pointed it out the window at Johnny.

"Hey! Get outta that fuckin' truck, man. Come on, man, get outta there right now!"

Johnny heard the words over the rain, over his own closed windows, but there was no way he intended to get out of the truck. The kid motioned with his head and the two others with him climbed out the passenger side of the truck: Laying their rifles across the hood; aiming carefully at him, Johnny saw, which was completely ridiculous. It was a shot of twenty, twenty five feet. You could do that with your eyes closed. Unless...

Johnny swung the rifle up fast and popped off a shot aimed at the kid at the outermost edge of the hood. The kid flipped backwards with a surprised look on his face. A split second later he was sighting on the second kid. No one had shot back, the driver was still grinning foolishly, but he didn't think that would last long. It was a game to them. They had no idea what they were doing. They were playing roles in a movie they had seen once, something like that, Johnny told himself. He had become convinced that they could see nothing of him staring into his headlights. He squeezed off his shot, aiming carefully and the kid dropped the rifle he had been holding and stepped quickly backward, clawing at his chest and then disappeared from sight.

Had it been him he would not have made that mistake. He would have realized how much of a target he was, but these were just kids, babies, no more experience in life than a few years and a couple dozen action films. Even so a kid could kill you every bit as dead as a full grown man could, he told himself.

The dark-haired kid in the truck finally raised his rifle and aimed at him. It was almost funny, Johnny thought, looking at the rifle jerk and jump on its way up, but the next instant, when the windshield on the passenger side cracked loudly, he was stunned to see a small hole punched through it when he looked. A nest of cracks ran away from it, and small crystals of glass glittered on the dashboard.

He quickly ducked, levered the door open, and dropped to the pavement. He raised the rifle to his shoulder, aimed, and fired. As he did he heard another shot, and felt a stinging sensation in his left leg. The right side of the kid's face dissolved as Johnny's shot found its mark. He saw the spray of skin and blood hit the black passenger side window behind him, as the bullet shattered it almost simultaneously. The young man continued to grin with what was left of his face, he shot once more.

Johnny saw the flame lick from the end of his rifle, as he dropped towards the ground. The shot missed, and he heard the ford's engine whine a few seconds later as the tires began to bite into the pavement, producing a high pitched scream. Johnny dove back up from the ground, and shot once more at the truck, that was now sliding around and heading for him.

He dove back into the Chevy just as the pickup hit the still open door, and tore it from its hinges. It flipped up over the already braking pickup, and clattered to the pavement. Johnny keyed the ignition, and jammed the truck into drive. The tires spun and began to smoke as he mashed the gas pedal to the floor and tore off down the road. The truck slewed around behind him, and began once again to give chase.

Although the truck shuddered in protest, Johnny did not let up on the gas pedal: Instead he kept it jammed to the floor. The truck edged up and past eighty before he eased off.

At just under ninety, the truck rattled loudly, and the large tires hummed as it sped down the road with the gray pickup seemingly welded to its rear bumper. The wind and rain was a heavy roar through the open door. Johnny used the stock of the rifle to smash out the rear glass of the truck, and fired twice into the windshield of the Ford. The windshield blew inward, and the Ford locked its brakes and spun sideways on the road.

The tires caught, and the pickup truck flipped into the air. When it landed it rolled several times before bursting into flames, where it came to rest in the middle of the road.

Johnny mashed the brakes on the Chevy and slid to a shuddering stop in the road, craning over his shoulder, staring out at the burning wreck behind him. As he watched the gas tank caught, and the truck lifted from the road with a loud, Whump! It clattered back down seconds later, scattering parts of itself across the rain slicked roadway as it did. Johnny stepped cautiously from the pickup, and continued to watch as the truck burned.

He was still watching in horror a split second later as the kid spilled from the wrecked car.

The right side of his face was a raw mass of meat, and curls of flame and smoke leapt from his clothing as he tumbled out of the inferno and hit the pavement. The flames on his clothing seemed to flare up as if in anger, and then, within a space of seconds, die out altogether and disappear. Smoke curled from the kid. Johnny stared momentarily transfixed. And then bent over and vomited on the road. He stayed hunched over for a second, before he turned, crawled back into the truck, and quickly started it.

Before he pulled away, he glanced into the rear view, back at the truck. As he watched the flames leapt and flared into the rain filled skies. Johnny shifted into first and drove quickly away.

He pushed the truck hard until he arrived in the city; constantly checking the mirrors, expecting the truck to reappear at any moment. It didn't, and when he almost lost control of the truck sliding around a stalled car in the road, he finally slowed down, afraid that he would wreck the truck, and end up dead, or dying on the side of the road, finishing the job the kid had started.

He turned right at a four corners, passing a small gas station that sat darkened, and headed into the city, still glancing nervously behind him. Just as he topped a small hill he glanced back once more. There was no one in sight so he pulled off into the parking lot of a store and turned off the motor.

He sat for a moment, with the rain streaming in the opening where the door had once been, listening. He half expected to hear the truck's engine roaring towards him. He didn't, the air was silent, save the thrumming of the rain on the steel roof of the truck, as it fell and splashed its way to the ground.

He slowly became aware of the pain in his left leg, as his heart slowed down and resumed a somewhat normal beat again. He stepped out of the truck to the ground, testing the leg. Dark blood covered a large area of the outside pant leg, just below his hip, and the blue denim fabric was shredded and burned. It now matched the lower leg.

The skin was spit open for a few inches, he saw, but the bullet had only grazed the upper thigh. He breathed a sigh of relief, turned and walked towards the store. He took his rifle with him and glancing back at the road listened carefully before he limped to the awning covered sidewalk that fronted the strip mall and entered the store. Nothing.

Inside he slipped off the jeans and clenched his teeth tightly together as he sprayed the wound first with a disinfectant, then poured a full bottle of peroxide over it. He wrapped the leg with clean white gauze, and taped the flap tightly. It stung a great deal, but he was afraid of infection and it wasn't likely he would be seeing a doctor soon, he thought. The other wound had opened and was bleeding freely once more so he changed that too.

He looked out the front glass doors when he had finished, still listening, then stepped outside. He had seen a small shopping center when he pulled in, to the left of the store, and he set off toward it now to replace the bloodied and torn jeans, keeping to the sidewalk, dodging the rainfall where the awning was ripped and tattered.

He picked up two complete sets of clothes, leaving the others where he had removed them in the aisle of the store. The blood had nearly sealed the boot on his left leg to his foot, he discovered, so he pried them both off, washed his feet as well as he could with bottled water to make sure there were no wounds under all the blood, and then pulled on fresh socks and a new pair of boots.

He walked back over to the store, and then back to the rear coolers. He was surprised to find them still cold, and was even more surprised to hear a small fan kick on as he pulled a cold beer from within. He hesitated, then pulled out one more, hearing a generator kick on in the far distance as he let the door swing shut.

He walked back towards the front counter, went behind it, and sat down on the stool that was there, staring out the wide glass windows at the parking lot as he sipped from the can. The rain dripped and drizzled, letting up somewhat.

"Well, I made it this far," he said aloud. He shook his head, lowered his face into his hands and began to weep.

~

Johnny

Watertown NY: October 22nd

The moon is blood red, stained by sunrise which can't be too far away now. I have heard some noise outside from the dead. It's almost a relief to hear it, makes me know they haven't somehow gotten in and are right now sneaking up on me from the basement or something.

I am sick... I don't want to think about that though, I don't....

In Watertown, a few days of rest made a huge difference in how I felt and my leg had responded as I had hoped it would. It was still stiff, something was wrong in the knee, maybe, still is, but I could walk and the more I walked the better I felt. I sat in a chair on the front porch of a house I had moved myself into, drank hot coffee and watched the snow melt and drip from the trees: It had snowed overnight, but once again it was warming.

I had found a truck in the parking lot of the store I was in, managed to get it started and driven it out toward the suburbs. This house had seen better days, but it was still standing, no worse than any others I had seen. It sat a little apart on its lot, and the doors front and rear were steel units. That is what had attracted me to it. It looked defensible to me.

I had seen no one. Not even signs of anyone. Nothing. Bodies, smoke, nothing. Winter was coming and the entire town was covered with snow. I had driven to the top of State Street hill and looked out over the city. Dead. No footprints in the snow. Nothing, and that seemed all wrong. There should be people. What had happened to all the people that had lived here? Had they left? Something else?

There were no clear answers. I had driven back to this place, stopping at a few stores on the way, searching out food and medicines and dug in. There was an old wood stove that had been used to heat the basement. A little work and I got it going. There was a cord of wood that had been stacked outside the back steps that led down into the basement.

The wood stove had heated the house up fine. I spent a few hours looking over the house after that. It was rough. The foundation was cracked and had dropped about eight inches on one side. The house was leaning, but still solid. Maybe a few years of leaning would take its toll. Maybe the next earthquake, if there was one, but for now it was stable, and that was all I cared about.

I had taken another dose of antibiotics, along with three aspirin, and had fallen asleep on the couch in the basement and slept for... I don't know how long, but time didn't really matter a great deal. I slept a long time. I woke to take more water, antibiotics and aspirin. I had finally awakened with the headache and the buzzing gone, the swelling in my leg lessened, and the redness mostly gone when I redressed the two wounds. I took yet another dose of the antibiotics, skipped the aspirin, and restocked the wood stove before I ate a breakfast of canned meat and powdered eggs made on the top of the glowing wood stove.

I had been sitting there trying to figure out what to do. Something, maybe while I had slept, had worked its way into my brain and it would not leave. What if, my thoughts had asked, What if Lana was not dead? What if she had survived? Wouldn't they have wanted to keep the women alive?

It troubled me, because how could I know the truth of it? I had been badly injured, I had looked around, but right then, in the clear light of a day removed by several days of rest I couldn't be sure what I had done, what I had looked at, how well I had searched. Whether she was there, gone, dead, alive. There was no way to know, except... Well, except to go back and find out, my mind had supplied.

I had sat there sipping at the hot coffee looking for reasons to ignore the thought that had just seemed to drop in on me, but I couldn't. I had to go back. I had to be sure. And it wasn't just about Lana, maybe she was gone, maybe she wasn't, but what about the others? Could I really have been the only survivor? Had it been their plan to kill us all or were they looking to take the men out so they could get to the women? That seemed more logical. And yes, there were bones, I remembered, blackened and burned by the fire, and body parts. I could see them vaguely in my mind, but I saw no faces. I saw nothing that convinced me they were all dead, in fact the longer I thought it out, the clearer it became that they had to be alive, at least some of them. I had most likely survived because I had appeared dead. I must have appeared dead. Hell, I had been halfway to dead.

I had sighed, leaned forward, and the legs of the chair had dropped back down to the floorboards of the porch with a loud band. There was nothing for it and no reason to put it off. There was nothing here. This town was dead. Dead as dog shit, as they used to say. I had to leave anyway and I had no intention of heading east so west it would be. And Rochester was west.

"It could get you killed," I had said aloud. And it could, I agreed with myself, but that made no difference either. I had stood, drained the cup and set it down empty on the rail. A half hour later I had been winding through the stalled traffic of Arsenal street; heading out route 3 for Rochester...

EIGHT

Rochester NY: Johnny

Johnny sat quietly in the dark, his weapons gathered around him. He had gathered them from their own arsenals and they hadn't even missed them. They, the people running this section of Rochester, might think they had their act together, but they were nothing but amateurs. He had looked the weapons over several times. Thought out his plans more than a dozen times. There was nothing left but to do it.

He had seen enough to know what was going on in Rochester. The entire city had been divided into territories by different gangs. He had watched the city for the last two days and nights. Walking boldly where he wished in the daylight, sticking to the hard shadows through the night. He couldn't ask for a better picture.

The power was on still. He didn't know how that was possible or why it was possible, but in the scheme of things it made his work easier. People with lights weren't so concerned with people sneaking in. The lights gave a false sense of security at night. He had worked his way in and seen everything he needed to see, and then made his way back out in the gray light of morning that first day. Since then he had slipped easily back and forth across their lines as if they didn't even exist.

He had started with the wreck. It sat where he had left it, on the outskirts of the city, near the downtown entrance from East Avenue. He had spent the best part of two hours going over it and there were more than a few things he had missed.

The first, and major thing, was that the Jeep he, Lana and the others had been traveling in had not been directly hit. The one behind them had also not been directly hit... Scotty, Jan, and Lilly had been in that Jeep.

Both Jeeps had been destroyed just the same. There was a large area of asphalt gouged out, and the tar had melted around both vehicles. The fire had been serious and had probably killed anyone who had not escaped the Jeeps, but some of them had escaped the Jeeps. More than just him.

There were bones, blackened, and wet now from the near constant rain. The body parts he remembered seeing were gone, the dead, wild dogs, it didn't matter what had taken them. Even so there were not enough bones to account for everyone. It didn't mean that Lana was one of those that had made it out, it only meant some had. So he had set out to find out who might have survived and where they were.

The second night had paid dividends. He had followed a group returning on foot with a woman they had traded for and slipped right back into their protected area along with them. From there he had simply followed those they had bought in as they were pulled and shoved along the streets to a two story house off Culver Avenue.

The house was guarded, but it was guarded to make sure no one escaped, not to keep people from slipping in. And even that was slip shod. It was late the next day before he had seen her, and he had wept freely as they had dragged her from the buildings front door along with Scotty, Amber and a few others he didn't recognize. Either the others were somewhere else or they had already been killed or traded.

He had shuddered to think of what they might have been through over the last several days as he had made his escape and then finally decided to come back. It was too much guilt to take in, and so he shut it down and followed them as they were dragged through the fresh snow, barefoot he saw, to another building and turned over to armed men there.

His mind had screamed, 'Do something! Do something right now!' But his common sense had fought it down. That would be suicide. It would benefit no one. It would surely get him killed, and probably Lana and the others too if they realized that he had come here to free them.

They had not been long at the building, those that had bought them had stood around talking, low tones, subdued, it seems they were none too happy about their own circumstances. It had been on the way back, after they had brought them back out and were headed back to their prison, that Johnny had overheard part of their conversation.

Scotty was alive because he had told them he had skills with carpentry. They needed skilled workers. So far he had refused to work for them. They had beaten him several times. Most likely they would kill him soon if he didn't give in. He was probably holding out, enduring the beatings, hoping for some way out for the women, for himself too.

Lana and Amber were a different story. They had been brought over to be looked over by a rival gang who might purchase them as part of some trade. From the sounds of the conversation they had liked what they had seen. The deal would go down tomorrow if they decided to go with it: If he intended to get them out alive it would have to be tonight.

It had not taken long to gather what he needed. He had found weapons of every kind. Rifles, pistols, knives, hand grenades even. He had gathered them and bought them to the small wooded area in back of the house next door where he had been hiding watching the prison. There was nothing left to do.

A few minutes before, the guard had changed. The night shift consisted of only two guards, and they were already sharing a joint together out back of the building. He heard their low voices and laughter as he worked his way out of the woods, bringing only what he needed, around to the front of the house.

He hesitated at the front door. He was fairly certain there was no one inside, but he couldn't be positive. Anyone could have slipped in while he was out gathering weapons. He closed his eyes for a moment, shifted the pistol in his hand slightly, and then reached down and turned the knob.

The door swung open to a dark interior. Cold, no heat... No sounds. He stepped inside.

Rochester NY: Johnny

Midnight

It had almost gone without a hitch. It had taken him a few minutes for his eyes to adjust, but once they had he had set off through the house. He thought back on it now as he bent his weight to the shovel, digging more out of the bottom of the shallow grave...

As he had searched his ears had begun to tell him things too, they were upstairs, he could hear small creaks as body weight shifted on the floors above him. He could hear weeping from somewhere above him too. The sound made a sob catch in his own throat before he choked it back and headed for the stairs.

Scotty had been out in the open, tied to a post for the railing. Johnny had caught him in the process of trying to fight his way free. His mouth was gagged, but he immediately stopped his struggles when Johnny came into view at the top of the stairs. Johnny bent forward carefully, the step creaking loudly, and cut the bonds on his wrists. A second later he was passing Scotty a pistol as he worked to free his jaw up. Johnny passed him a canteen, and Scotty sipped carefully, his lips blistered and cut, before he handed it back. His voice was scratchy, rusted.

"Kill the ones out there?" Scotty asked in his whisper croak. His eyes were hard.

Johnny shook his head. "They're getting high... Won't be a problem... Where are the girls?"

Scotty nodded and headed down the hallway with Johnny following. He stopped in front of the door. "One of them went in a little while ago... Probably... Probably..." He shook his head, unable to continue.

Johnny whispered, "Don't lose it... We'll go on three, fast, but don't let the door make a lot of noise. Try to stab him, not shoot... Don't want to alert those others." He held Scotty's eyes until he nodded.

Johnny turned the knob slowly and counted down quickly. His shoulder hit the door but it didn't give completely, just flexed, cracked loudly, and then sprang back at them. He cursed under his breath. "Take it down, take it fucking down," he whisper croaked."

They both hit the door with their shoulders and it shuddered, splintered and finally crashed opened. The guard inside was waiting, a gun in one hand, the form of a nude female beside him, a vague shape tied to a radiator across the room. The woman's hand rose and pulled the gun back and down. The gun went off as they were tackling the man, and then everything went bad fast.

Johnny drew his knife across his throat to cut off a scream that had begun, but even he knew it was too late. Scotty scrambled up and made his way to the radiator and began untying the woman there. Johnny bent, pushed the man aside and saw Amber. She moved quickly and he pulled her to her feet. They were out the door seconds later, all armed with the pistols Johnny had bought, all ready, scrambling down the stairs two at a time. The front door burst in as they hit the bottom of the stairs and the two men that burst through never stood a chance. They ran over the top of them as they were still falling and spilled out into the night.

The whole area was on alert. The guards were out, dogs running everywhere, Johnny saw, but the dogs were no problem. It wasn't like the movies, the dogs didn't know who they were looking for.

They had managed to make it three blocks north, nearly out, before Johnny realized that Amber had been hit. She stumbled, he pulled her to her feet, but she stumbled again and when he looked back he saw the blood that covered her entire side and soaked her leg. Her breathing was harsh, ragged, and blood leaked from her mouth. There was no time, he bent and took her over his shoulder, hearing her cry out in pain as he did, but there had been no other option. They had made the blockade a few moments later and had, had to stop while they tried to figure a way around.

There were too many of them. Two dozen standing watch, but they were not trained to do it. Most of them had never hunted, didn't know how to watch, what to look for. Johnny had laid Amber on the ground and Lana had pulled her into her arms and held her, both crying silently. Behind him, several blocks back at the house where they had been held, the grenades he had rigged to a timer finally went off. The men scattered, ran, started to regroup and then began to run through the streets back to where they had been. Johnny and Scotty picked up Amber together and ran through the darkness, sticking to the deepest shadows for the next half mile until they were well beyond the city and the gangs that were out looking for them.

Johnny and Scotty collapsed onto the ground breathing hard, spent, while Lana held Amber as she died. Dawn had not been far away so they had taken refuge in a nearby house and waited the day away. No one had come near. They had rested up during that time and when it was dark once more they had left the shelter and brought Amber with them...

Johnny bent to the shovel once again. They had all taken turns, it was nearly done. He took a deep breath, stepped away from the hole and the others nodded. A second later they were lowering Amber into the hole.

She was dressed in clothes the Lana had taken from a house just a short time before. A long dress, her face pasty white and smeared with dried blood, but peaceful nonetheless. A half hour later they were back in the house ransacking it, looking for anything that might help them. They had a half mile to travel, a short distance, Johnny had thought when he had hidden the truck he had driven here in, but a long walk now that he knew there would be others out looking for them. They left a short time later and made their trip to the falling down garage next to a flattened diner where Johnny had hidden the truck.

The house had given them virtually nothing. No water. No food, a couple of coats and that was it. The truck was a welcome sight with its cache of food and water, and they had spent the next hour just sitting quietly, eating, replenishing their fluids, not talking.

"You were dead," Lana said at last. "The guy went over, kicked you, was going to shoot you in the head, but he decided not to because you were dead." Her eyes were bright, tears perched on the lids ready to fall. They fell as Scotty spoke.

"I couldn't do anything, Johnny. Nothing."

Johnny caught his own emotions. They had been right on his sleeve for days, it seemed. He took a minute and composed himself.

"Alive. I was alive. I came to and thought all of you had died. I was in bad shape, bleeding, leg messed up... I thought you were all dead." He stopped, gained his composure once more and then started again. " Later, back in Watertown, I couldn't remember if I looked well enough, if I made sure you were dead, but I decided I didn't. I didn't, and it ate at me." His throat tightened up and he had to stop. "So I came back," He said at last.

Lana came to him and hugged him. "Thank you," she said. "I am so glad you did."

Scotty nodded and they all fell silent once more. Lana wiped at her eyes and then stood and walked away. "Sorry... They were about to trade us... Amber..." She choked. "Amber and me." The tears nearly overtook her once more, but she fought them back.

"I was thinking west when I left Watertown... Now I don't know," Johnny said half to himself.

"East coast... West coast," Scotty said. "Doesn't matter does it?"

"Except we came from the west... We know the west is bad," Lana said.

"Okay... So we go east... Toward the coast. We get there and decide what's next." He looked down at his leg. Blood had seeped through the bandages. "Leg's shot," he said by way of explanation. The silence held for a second.

"I should look at that," Lana said.

"Later," Johnny agreed. "Ready, Scotty?"

"Yeah. Yeah I am."

"Okay, let's get going. I want to be as far away from this damn place as I can be by daylight tomorrow." A few minutes later they were running as fast as they dared in the moonlight, heading east.

The old farm house

Johnny

We had stopped in a little town on the outskirts of Rochester toward evening that day. Trucks, food, something a little more substantial to travel with, and ammunition was always high on my list. I had my doubts about whether we would ever see the east coast. My leg was injured badly. There was nothing I could do for it except do my best to ignore it. I think I was simply happy that Lana was alive. I wasn't trying to think too far past that.

We were stopped in the back lot of a truck dealership loading a truck that Scotty would drive. Two trucks would be smarter than one, we had decided. If one broke down we would always have the other as a backup. I never saw the woman at all until she stepped out onto the moonlit asphalt, and I nearly shot her when she did...

Central New York

The woman stood shadowed by the edge of a pile of rubble. She had watched the three for several minutes now as they packed up their vehicle, obviously getting ready to leave the city. She needed to go herself, but were they the right ones to travel with? Two men and one woman, but the woman didn't appear to be anything more than an equal, not held against her will. It was probably the best chance she was likely to have. She stepped out into the moonlight and the conversation suddenly stopped as everyone froze.

"We should be..." The man stopped in mid-sentence as Alice stepped out into view. He swiveled quickly to face Lana, placing his body between her and the other woman.

Alice raised her hands quickly, out and away from her body. "I've got nothing," she said. She remembered the small pistol she had tucked away almost as soon as she had spoken the words.

The woman stepped around the first man, and the other man had shifted to face her more fully, probably while she had been paying attention to the first man. A well oiled team, she thought. They had spent time together, it was obvious.

The woman motioned to the first man, "Go ahead, Scotty." The man stepped forward, pushed his own weapon around to hang from his back on the leather strap that held it. His hands settled roughly on her shoulders and he began to pat her down.

"There's a bulge there," Lana said quietly. She motioned at Alice's jeans where the crotch bulged slightly.

Scotty's hand stopped suddenly, just below where the shirt overhung Alice's waist. He felt her tremble. "It's small... I've been scared. Just something for safety," Alice told them.

"But you said you had nothing," Scotty said as his eyes held her own.

"What is it?" Lana asked.

"Says she's got a piece in her... I guess, her panties," Scotty lowered one hand and carefully felt the small gun. Lana was at his side when he looked up. "Really small," he said and shrugged. Lana passed him her pistol. "Keep it on her."

Lana reached forward and freed the buttons that held the fly of Alice's pants. She reached in and came out with a small .22 pocket pistol. She looked it over.

"Five shot... .22 Mags," Alice said.

Lana looked up. "I can see that. So why didn't you say something?"

"Your man was on his way down. You spotted it." She shrugged. "Look. I'm alone. I had to have something. This town may look dead, but it's far from dead. I'm just looking for a way out. The road. Leave this place. It's been... It's been bad." her eyes seemed to cloud at the end. "Mind? It's a bit cold." she looked down at her open fly.

"Go ahead," Lana said.

Alice buttoned the fly back and then took a deep breath. "So?"

"So, What's your name," Lana asked.

"Alice... You?"

"Lana... Johnny, Scotty," she nodded to each with her head. "I guess she's okay," she told Scotty. Scotty lowered the gun and then handed it back to Lana a second later.

"We're headed for the city," Johnny told her.

"Syracuse?" Alice asked.

"No... New York... Manhattan," Johnny said quietly. "Why should we make room for you, Alice. Especially since you didn't want to tell us about this gun?" He had taken the pistol from Lana and was turning it over in his hand. It was very small and didn't seem capable of doing much harm.

"It will kill you well enough," Alice said as if reading his thoughts. "It's a bad world. You need another shooter. Who knows what you're going to run into between here and there." She paused and then nodded at the pistol. "You can see I'm resourceful." She met Johnny's eyes when they swung suddenly up to her own. "I'm not dangerous unless someone is trying to hurt me," she finished quietly.

Johnny raised his eyes to Lana and Scotty. They both nodded. He looked back at her. "Guess you're in, Alice," he told her. He tossed the gun and she caught it in one hand.

"I like it, but here," Lana said retrieving a rifle from the back of the truck. She tossed it to her lightly.

"Zero to sixty?" Alice asked as she looked over the rifle.

Lana pulled a clip from a pouch at her side. She frowned. "Guess so," she said as she tossed the clip to Alice. "I guess so." Alice socketed the clip home as she nodded.

"Okay," Johnny said. "Looks like you have a passenger for that new truck, Scotty."

Lana nodded and they all piled into the truck. Johnny turned it around and started back out to the strip.

On the road

A nameless town

The streets seemed deserted, the buildings dusty and empty. Most of the main street was gone, what buildings remained perched on the edge of a yawning chasm. They approached carefully and looked down to see a small stream flowing across the floor of the cut some forty feet below: Emerging from a dark smudge on one side and flowing under a huge rock overhang on the other. Moss grew on some rocks near the stream. It had an air of permanence. The imagery below looked like something out of a wilderness camping guide.

"Looks like one of those forever-wild things... Hike the Appalachian trail or something," Alice said. She let her eyes wander upward where the buildings perched on the edge of the abyss, as though waiting to plunge down into the small, peaceful stream far below. "And then you have this," she raised her arms to encompass the buildings where they sat. "Surreal."

Scotty nodded his head. He stood from his crouch and looked around at the buildings. "Deserted, I guess." He had no sooner spoken the words than gunfire erupted and shattered the quiet afternoon air. He dove for the ground, remembered where he was, but too late. He hit the slope to the bottom of the gully and rolled toward the bottom. Halfway down his head struck a small rock outcropping and he stopped wondering about the gunfire and where it had come from.

Alice lunged for the gully, but Johnny grabbed her just as quickly and pulled her toward one of the buildings Lana had run for. Already she had made the doorway and stood beckoning to them. Johnny pushed Alice forward toward the building and then leapt the short distance to the cover of the corner of the building. The leap was too much for his still healing leg and he collapsed in agony just within the shadow of the building.

"Johnny!" Lana from the shadowy interior of the building, Alice crouched next to her.

Behind him he heard running footsteps approaching, he motioned for Lana to go before he pushed himself over onto his back to face who ever this was. The pain flared bright in his leg as he used it to turn himself over and he almost passed out. He got his gun up and pushed himself up on one elbow ready to fire. A second later a figure ran around the edge of the building and into his line of fire. He hesitated only the briefest of seconds, but it was long enough for the young girl to bring up her own weapon and fire. Johnny's pistol roared as he felt a stinging sensation on his neck, and he watched the young girl twist backwards and slam off the inside corner of the brick building as his bullet found her. As quickly as the noise had begun the afternoon turned deadly quiet. No sounds, the vague gurgle of the stream as it flowed far below in the gully, nothing else. Johnny put one hand to the side of his neck and bought it away bloodied. "Great," he muttered to himself. He turned slowly, used one hand to get his good leg under him and stood from the sidewalk he had fallen on. Lana spoke from behind him and he nearly jumped before he could calm his staggering heartbeat down and respond.

"Baby... Baby, come on," Lana whispered again.

"I told you to go," Johnny said tightly as he limped toward the darkened doorway of the building.

"And I didn't," Lana said every bit as tightly.

Johnny made the doorway and looked around at the darkened interior. "Where did Alice go?"

"Ran back toward the pit when you went down. I... I couldn't stop her, Johnny," Lana told him.

"Of course not... Wouldn't have stopped me if it was you down there either." He sighed.

"Jesus, you're bleeding bad, Johnny, really bad," Lana told him. She pulled her t-shirt over her head, wadded it up and pressed it against the side of her neck.

"Feel funny," he said, "Sleepy... Hey, no bra, that's..." The lights dimmed down suddenly; winked out completely, and he spiraled down into darkness.

Full dark

"I wanted... I wanted you to know it... I wanted you to know... Know it," Johnny said. His words were garbled and barely intelligible. His eyes snapped open in the darkness, his breath caught in his throat, and he began to sit up. Lana placed a hand against his chest, leaned close and whispered into his ear.

"Lay still, babe. Lay still... Be quiet... Something is out there... Someone... Quiet." Her hand kept firm and steady pressure against his chest and he sank back down to the floor. It seemed he was barely holding onto consciousness, his eyes kept rolling up into his head.

"Goddammit," Lana exploded. A second later her machine pistol began to chatter. Johnny sank back down into unconsciousness.

The Gully

Scotty's eyes flew open in the darkness. Something... Something had awakened him... He had been asleep and something... Close by a woman screamed and the sound of a semi automatic weapon firing fast came to him. The scream tore off abruptly, reduced to a series of gagging, pleading sounds, and then nothing. He tried to move and nearly grayed out from the pain that flared in his left arm. Something, he thought, was broken or badly injured. He tried again and this time it responded better. Dislocated, he told himself, as he grimaced to bite back the cry that wanted to slip past his clenched jaw. He whimpered slightly from reaction and the expenditure of energy, and grasped his left wrist firmly with his right hand. A second later he was pulling and twisting slightly. A sharp pull, a sharper twist. Once, twice and he was on the edge of passing out. He drew several deep breaths and tried a third time and the shoulder slipped back into place. He fell back against the moist earth and closed his eyes, intending only to gather his strength for a moment, but his eyes betrayed him and he spiraled away down into the dark.

The Vacant building

Lana made her feet and duck walked forward to where the two figures had crumpled to the ground. The one, a woman, half her lower jaw missing, one leg hanging by a thread and blood pumping out of her at an alarming rate, was snarling softly and crawling toward the road where a second woman lay breathing hard. She reached her and rose on one elbow before lowering her face and beginning to bite with what was left of her shattered jaw. The woman laying in the street began to scream, Lana switched to single shot, stood and walked up behind them and shot them both. The one on top still whimpered and snarled, almost sounding as though she were pleading, before Lana shot her one more time and she collapsed: Silence at last. Lana faded back into the shadows, listening, but the night remained quiet.

She returned to Johnny who had slipped back down into a deep sleep once more. She had given him morphine, a small shot. They carried it. She had debated doing it, but he needed it. He had opened up a large section of his neck and the bleeding was heavy. She had to stitch it and she couldn't have him waking up halfway through that. She had looked with dismay at the dirt grimed into her hands and under her fingernails. Infection was a real possibility in this world. She had drenched the whole area with a full bottle of peroxide, something else they carried, stitched the wound with dental floss, and then sprayed it down with a once popular spray antibiotic. She had managed to force three penicillin pills into him and got him to swallow them down, out of it as he was. There was nothing else to do but wait it out. He had lost a great deal of blood, but she had not been able to get him to swallow again, the water just poured out the sides of his mouth when she gave it to him.

She took his head into her lap now and held him. Watching the black and silent night, her machine pistol across her lower legs. Safety off and ready.

Morning

Her eyes blinked rapidly, she drew a deep gasping breath and then came fully awake.

Alice stared around the ravine at the gray light that was beginning to paint color back into the world. Rock, sand and water. Moss on some rocks. She puzzled the information over and over again in her head. Rocks and water... Rocks, water, moss, sand, rocks... Moss, water... The realization of where she was come to her as she remembered the events of the day before. She rose to her scraped and blood crusted elbows and then to a sitting position. Her back felt sprung, maybe it would hurt more later, but for now she could deal with it. Her heartbeat seemed a little odd. Too slow, something, but it wasn't skipping beats or anything so she dismissed that too. She sat, shaky, and let her mind come more fully back to herself before she raised her head and took in her surroundings more fully.

Hypothermia, her mind said, and she was cold, very cold, there was no heat in the ground down here. That could explain the heart beat seeming to be too slow, hypothermia did that. Her mind seemed determined to keep up a dialogue with her as she studied first one side and then the other side of the ravine.

Her eyes slipped over a dirty bundle of rags where they lay half in half out of the water and continued on before she realized they were no bundle of rags, got to her feet and stumbled the thirty feet or so to where Scotty lay partially the water.

Her fingers, stiff though they were, felt at his neck for a pulse. He moved as she jabbed her stiff fingers into his neck.

"Jesus... Jesus, Alice... That hurts. That hurts," Scotty said. His words started out mumbled but grew a little stronger as he spoke. "So damn cold," Scotty finished. His lips were blue tinged and he was cold to the touch.

"I know, I know. I have to get you out of this water. Going to move you," she told him as she made her own feet, fought the dizziness that threatened to down her, and bent once more, wrapping her arms around his upper chest and dragged him backwards. Scotty called out a second later and then lapsed back into unconsciousness once more. Alice struggled to pull him back farther away from the water and then let him go, sinking to the ground herself and breathing hard. A few minutes later she had caught her own breath and was checking herself over for injuries. Obviously, she told herself, they had both tumbled down the ravine. Him first, her as she tried to follow.

One side of her face was a ruin of scrapes and crusted blood. Her mouth was numb on that side, but that had been the side against the ground so that was no real surprise. She flexed her jaw experimentally and it seemed to work fine. One knee ached, but did not seem to be swollen. Her tailbone hurt, no way to check it now, but she assumed it was most likely black and blue. Right ankle hurt a little: Could have been the way she slept on it too. No way to know, but it was also not swollen: She was bruised, a little battered, but no big deal. She needed warmth and she would be fine. She turned her attention to Scotty.

Bruising on his jaw line and temple on the right side of his face and scraped up skin in the same place. What wasn't scraped up was deeply bruised. Probably where his head collided with something on the way down to the bottom. His shoulder felt larger on one side, but she was able to move his arm with no problem.

"Hey," softly from above, but she nearly jumped out of her skin.

"Oh my God you scared the shit out of me," Alice whispered.

Lana only nodded. "He okay too?"

"No," Alice said softly. "Too cold... Have to get him out of here... Warmed up."

Lana nodded and then disappeared for a few seconds. "Okay... Listen, I'm going to get the truck. I should be able to winch you up with that."

Alice felt at her pocket for the keys, but as she looked down at her pants the pocket was gone, ripped from the fabric of the cargo pants. "Keys are gone," she called up. Lana swore lightly under her breath.

"Stole our truck... Plan B," Lana called down after a few minutes. "I don't know how to hot-wire a truck or a car... Johnny is out, so I'm going to go look for something that will run, get a rope and come back here and get you out that way. Hang on." Her face disappeared from the top of the embankment and then was back a few moments later. "Water," she called down. "Don't try to catch it." She took her time, aimed, and then tossed first one and then two more bottles down. They landed with a hard thud not far from where Alice sat with Scotty's head pulled into her lap. "Drink... You don't want to get dehydrated too," Lana told her with a tight smile. "I'll be back as soon as I can." She disappeared before Alice could speak.

"Come on, come on," Alice said as she slapped at the side of Scotty's face. She finally got him to open one eye, pulled his head slightly higher and got him to drink half of one bottle before his head sank once more into her lap.

Afternoon

They were all huddled around the fire Lana had built inside the small sidewalk area under the overhang of the doorway. There was very little room, but there was a building at their backs and a wide view of the downtown area and the edge of the ravine a few hundred feet away.

"We have got to get out of here," Lana said. The day was slipping away. She had no doubt that whatever it was that had attacked them last night, plague victims, would be back tonight once the sun went down. She had only a dozen bullets for her machine pistol. Johnny's pistol had a loaded magazine, nine, and Scotty and Alice had both lost their weapons on their fall into the ravine. Someone had smashed the windows on their truck; all the ammunition was long gone.

"Bad straights," Alice said.

"Very," Lana agreed. She eased her lap out from under Johnny's head, and rose to her feet. She had found an old minivan that she had used to get Alice and Scotty out of the ravine. It ran well enough, and had nearly a half tank of gas. It would have to do. She had already transferred what foodstuffs there had been and supplies they could use from the truck into the minivan, and packed it carefully along the sides of the rear windows. The rear seat had folded down, and there was space to lay both Johnny and Scotty out in the back. The problem was that neither of them was conscious and they were both big men. Not an easy task. Alice had been banged up too. One side of her face was going to be covered with spectacular scars. Lana had dug the small pebbles out of it, washed the dirt away and disinfected it. There was nothing more she could do. She didn't know if Alice was up to the work or not.

"Think you're up to it," she asked now. She looked up at the sky. "The longer we wait the worse it will be. The day's getting away from us."

Alice nodded. "No, but I will have to be. Let's do it." She rose to her own feet, steady now, where just a short time earlier she had been shaky. She had warmed up nicely, and she saw that Scotty had as well. His breathing had become something closer to normal, even, no rattle in his chest or gasping that she was afraid she would hear. He slept deeply.

Lana had pulled the small van close to the building earlier. She went to it now, opened the rear hatch and returned to where Alice waited. They decided on Johnny first. Johnny was the heaviest and it might be better to get the heaviest out-of-the-way first.

It took more than twenty minutes before they managed to get Johnny securely into the back of the van. They had both collapsed to the pavement breathing hard, not wanting to do anything else, but after only a short break they had forced themselves to their feet once more. The longer they sat, the deeper the weariness had moved into them: Settling into their bodies.

Scotty had been no trouble at all. Maybe it had been the first tugging and fighting to get Johnny into the van, or maybe he was just that much lighter, but he was easily positioned into the back of the van. They both collapsed to the pavement once more. Breath ragged, lungs aching and burning, sharpness resting just below their rib cages, a feeling Lana had always acquainted with running too fast, too hard. She took her time, slowed her breathing, dragged Alice to her feet and walked back and forth in front of the building until her heartbeat resumed its former slower beat, and the sweat began to dry on her skin. Only then did she slow and rest against the hood with Alice.

"This is so hard," Lana said. She burst into tears, but fought them back just as quickly.

Alice lowered her head into her own hands and a few sobs slipped past her hands before she got herself under control. "Better go," she said aloud as she raised her tear streaked face.

Lana nodded, moved around the truck and opened the driver's door with a rusty screech.

~

Johnny

New York

It was October 26th when we got to this farmhouse I now find myself in. We had parted ways with Scotty and Alice long before we hit the coast. I had seen the irony of our trip even then. Thousands of miles to end up in a farmhouse once more, only on the opposite coast now. It would have seemed ludicrous if it had not been so damn serious.

By that time we knew how bad it was with the dead of course. We had had run ins with them often enough to know they were winning the battle in the cities. In fact we avoided the cities then with a passion. You could smell the death and corruption on the wind. And I was sure if I could smell them they could smell us. Food was harder and harder to find. Safe places were also harder to find. I sometimes believed that they were allowing us to live, we weren't escaping them and living, and there is a difference.

Then came the big push from the dead and I got caught unprepared. We found ourselves prisoners in the farmhouse. Instead of a place of refuge it became our prison and what few supplies we had ran out.

I had siphoned the gas from the tractor out in the field. Between that and what had been in the truck it was enough. I made her go, and I cannot make you understand how hard that was to do for both of us, but the truth was I couldn't get around well. My body had been through too much and I spent most of my time in pain or physically ill. Whatever was happening to me didn't seem to have a cure. I convinced her to go after Scotty and Alice. It took a few days, but those same nights of listening to the dead try to get in at us helped convince her. That was two days ago, and I thought she was away and free.

I don't know what happened. I'll never know. Did she get ten miles down the road before they got her somehow? Only a mile? How did they do it? I'll never know. I only know she came back to me last night. Dead already. A zombie. Already reeking of death.

"Johnny!" In the night. Her calling my name and it pulled me up from sleep with dread, fear, but hope that there was some sort of plausible reason why she was out there calling my name in the night.

"Johnny! Please... Help me!" A single knock fell on the door and nearly caused me to burst into tears right then. I rushed to the door.

I had thrown the bolt on the door and had it halfway open before I realized what a fool I was. It was too late then. She was on me before I could close the door. She was strong. So damned strong, and she knew where the gun was and tried to stop me from getting to it.

I got it, but I hesitated too long for the last time, looking in those eyes that were her eyes yet weren't her eyes at all and she got me. She lunged and took a chuck of flesh out of my shoulder. I got her in the stomach with two shots, and then one more, after I reloaded, in the head.

I buried her this morning, but even as I did I had this strange urge to taste her. Just a small bite. Who would know? I was shocked that I had, had the thought. Shocked that I had continued with the burial and had not eaten her. I've been sitting here writing my story out since then. They've come around, I told you. I can hear them. It was the noise of them digging her up earlier that I heard and thought had come from upstairs. I suppose they dug her up. I just bet they did. I should have kept her for myself, I think. But, God, what am I thinking? What?

I can feel it working its poison in my body. My sense of smell is incredible. My eyesight sharp. I'm hungry. It's like something that is trying to drive me... Own me... I can't stand it. I can't. I...
MAJOR CHARACTER BIBLIOGRAPHY

ANNIE

Annie came to the others after being rescued from Sin and Murder, two gang members, in a gun battle that left two people dead (Book One). Annie's rescue is what set off the battle between the North side and the Public Square crews, and that ultimately dragged Mike, Candace and the others into the fight.

Annie was in school before the world went crazy, that's the way she thinks of it, the world went crazy. As the series matures Annie becomes one of the major characters. Even early on, in the first book, you can see her willingness to speak out, to be involved, and you can see her loyalty. Annie is still a child, sixteen , when the series starts.

Although it isn't expressly written it seems clear that it was Annie who kept Brian and Janelle safe in the midst of the violence and chaos they were forced to live in...

BEAR

Bear is the leader of the Outrunners just as Mike is the current leader of the Nation. Bear will lead the Outrunners through all the coming books. He, Beth, Billy and Pearl are the heart of the team. As the books progress, Mike Collins himself will take a turn as an Outrunner.

Bear came from New York where he lived with Donita before the plagues began. He is loyal. He is a loner and prefers to be. He and Donita were a couple, although she no longer remembers that life and he does not know what has become of her. He and Beth have formed a relationship that they will need to depend on.

In later books the Outrunners will have their own place in the Nation society. They will live somewhat apart from the others, and an air of awe and mystery surrounds them. Bear does his best in the future to reinforce that.

It is Bear and the Outrunners that will become the bridge between The Nation and its biggest rival, The Fold. It is also the Outrunners who will eventually unravel the mystery of how the Zombie Apocalypse became to be. They will protect The Nation, search out weapons and stock piled foodstuffs, and they will fight the Zombie Plagues. Bear is the key to all of it. The one man who lives on the edge and likes the view there. With Beth he is the major force behind the Outrunners, who keep the Nation safe and allow the society there to live in relative peace in the valley.

BETH

Beth is quite often Bear's voice of reason. She is not the sort of woman who feels a need to be helped, or told what to do. She is a leader. She has strong opinions. She doesn't consider the loss of her arm to be a disability.

In many ways she is very much like Candace, Strong, Independent, Secure in her abilities. She is an important part of the Outrunners, not just a figurehead. And she will become an important part of The Nation. She is a singer, lyricist and that will bring her into closer contact and friendship with Candace who enjoys the same things. She misses L.A. Sometimes, but she loves Bear and the life they have, along with the security The Nation provides its peoples.

BILLY

For the time being, Billy will remain wherever Bear is. He is very loyal to him, The Nation, and the Outrunners. In the novel Billy Jingo we learn much more about him before the plagues, where he came from, what his life was before the apocalypse.

Once Billy met Pearl his goals, plans, and future outlook began to change. He realized he finally had someone that he needed, not just wanted. And he realized that that need was returned to him from her.

In the future books the two of them will have their own goals and plans that may eventually take them away from the Nation.

BOB

Bob doesn't say much about Bob. What we know comes from Janet, or observed behaviors and talents that are related to us from other characters.

We Know it is Bob who has the dream to start the Nation. His dream is not a new dream he has had it for years, believed in it for years. I wonder if Bob was thought of as fanatical back in the old world. He probably was.

Bob has knowledge of farming, living off the land, herbs, food that can be harvested from nature and how to do it. Bob has that knowledge because he took the time to learn it from his Native American brothers. He has taught a great deal to Janet, but it will be Bob that everyone depends on to know what to do in almost every situation: Farming; Living off the land; Herbal medicines; Preserving meat; making leather. The list goes on.

Bob is trained as a mechanic, but he is one of those people who know how to do almost anything they put their mind to. If Mike is the leader, Bob and his knowledge are the backbone.

Bob is very laid back. He is uncomfortable with praise. He is against violence, but when it came down to it in the standoff that ended in Annie, Janelle and Brian being freed, Bob didn't hesitate to kill the gang member Murder. Tom was still thinking about the situation. Bob sized it up and reacted. That speaks to Bob's character, consistency. It can be seen in almost everything he does.

CANDACE

Candace Loi would have started her new career as a dancer on the 11th of March had the world stayed the same. She had been working at a club on the north side of the city of Watertown New York run by organized crime. She had danced a few times, but had been relegated to tending bar because the club manager did not want her to throw her life away on dancing.

Her Grandmother Pan (Deceased) had lived in Watertown for years. Candace had Lived in Syracuse where she hoped to follow her father into Law Enforcement. She couldn't afford the college courses so she moved to Watertown where she believed she could dance, save the money for college, and no one would be the wiser.

She is Nineteen at the beginning of the series. She is strong willed, knows what she wants, and goes for it. She is an excellent shot, but on more than one occasion she showed restraint, didn't shoot when she could have. The few times she has killed someone she had no choice. Even so she didn't hesitate.

Her confidant early on is Jan. Jan took her under her wing. But once Patty comes into the picture she and Candace begin a relationship that grows in unexpected ways.

The most commented thing about her is her tattoo that begins on the back of her left hand, flows up her arm, across her breasts and then down across her stomach and beyond.

The second most commented upon thing about her are her looks influenced by her father who was African American and her Mother who was Japanese.

She wants to be pregnant, she can see herself as a mother, and she sees salvation for the world in children. She is a musician, singer/songwriter. She was told more than once that she could have made it as a musician. She, once they are somewhat settled down, but even as they travel, begins once more to write music and lyrics.

She and Mike Collins are the two main characters in the novels.

Other Information

In the Novel Billy Jingo Candace has a small part as a cashier in a grocery store.

In the Novel Alone she also has a small part as a cashier in that same store.

In the novel Kat and Pat she has a small part as a dancer that reveals a little more about her first few months in the club than chapter one of the first book shows us.

JESSIE

Jessie Stone brings a real doctor to the nation. She is level headed, pragmatic, and straight forward when it comes to her needs and her beliefs, but she also has a humorous side.

Jessie was serious when she told Mike that she wanted him. And, although Mike turned her down she did not change her mind. The feelings she had did not go away, in fact they grew stronger as she came to understand the leader of the Nation as he guided them back to the valley.

She set out from Washington State to form a haven like the Nation. She and her followers called that place The Fold.

The months ahead will determine Jessie's place in the Nation, and quite possibly change several relationships in the process.

MIKE

Mike Collins is the leader of the people and remains the leader through nearly all the novels.

We know Mike used to do Web Design work, that he had a great deal of money in the old world, but that he was unhappy (He says so in retrospect). He had no girlfriend and was pretty much wrapped up in making money that he didn't need. He just socked it into a bank account and left it there, when he explains this towards the end of book one he gives the impression that knowing that money was there (He talks about a few million dollars) was a big deal to him, as though it may have ruled his life.

Mike didn't set out to be the leader. It was the dynamic formed by the relationship with Candace that pushed him into that role. As though the relationship bought the responsibility with it. Later in the series the role is a bigger responsibility than he wants to handle. The people he's responsible for number in the thousands, and continue to grow.

Mike is mixed race, Native American, White, African American. He spent some time on the streets as a kid. Candace is his first real love.

Later in the series Mike will go through many changes, first trying to find himself, then trying to find his place in life. His search may take him away from Candace.

Other Information

In the novel Alone Mike has a small part finishing up some computer work for one the main characters.

PATTY

Patty comes into the series in the first book and becomes Candace's best friend immediately. She admits in her diary writings that she has never had a friend like Candace.

She doesn't tell us much about her life in the old world. Married, divorced and married again and that was on the verge of failure too.

She talks about Ronnie in some of her writings as if he is all she ever wanted, but in some of her writings she's not so sure. In a few of her writings she seems to be hinting at some sort of realization she has come to too late. That may become clearer in the later books.

In any case she is completely devoted and loyal to Candace, and she plays an important part in the lives of all the characters right to the end of the series.

Patty plays one of the Title Roles in the novel Kat and Pat. In that book she reveals a great deal about herself in her previous life.

PEARL

Pearl comes to us from England. She doesn't say how she happened to be in the United States when the apocalypse started.

She made her way to The Nation with another group of people and met Billy shortly after. It is only after she is there for some time that she reveals information that she has about the apocalypse.

Pearl likes her life with Billy, but she longs for England, and wonders what has become of her home. For now she is content to be a part of the Outrunners.

RONNIE

Ronnie came to us in the first book already involved with Patty and seemingly happy with his situation. There are references to conversations between him and Mike that cemented their relationship, but no actual written record of those conversations.

Ronnie is Mike's right hand man. Mike says he is a completion of himself and he depends on him and seeks his advice. Mike discuses nearly everything with him. Several times he and Candace are the only ones that Mike takes into his confidence or seems to trust with the really big things.

We know Ronnie came from Pritchard Alabama. Pritchard is a small city on the outskirts of Mobile Alabama. He came to Watertown to build houses for the Army base expansion and stayed.

He is a carpenter by trade. Quiet, solid, loyal are apt descriptive words for him. His relationship with Patty probably would not have happened had the world not changed drastically. Patty was waiting for something else she didn't even know she was waiting for at the time. Ronnie saw her regularly, they lived in the same apartment house, Ronnie lived in 2c, patty lived one floor below in 1b. They both shopped at the same supermarket on State street, Ronnie didn't like to shop at all. But as often as he saw her in passing he never asked her out, although he admits he had thought about it a few times.

TIM

Tim is Patty's brother, or at least that is the way she presents him and he doesn't correct that perception. A little more on that down the road...

Tim is really not much more than a kid when we meet him in the first book. When Annie comes along he is immediately attracted to her. They are both about the same age.

Tim looks up to Ronnie. He views Ronnie as the man who came along and saved himself and Patty. Most likely that is exactly what happened as they were on the North Side and would have been picked up by the North Side gangs before long. Traveling with Ronnie probably stopped that from happening. Tim looks at him as an older brother he never had. Stability in a bad situation.

Tim also looks up to Mike and Mike is fond of Tim. That is evidenced in the things Mike trusts him with.

TOM

Tom Evans comes into the first novel as a man who really doesn't know himself. He goes from a position of leadership to last in line for responsibility once Mike Collins is leading.

He felt cheated at first when Candace went with Mike. His belief was that if things could have stayed the same she would have ended up with him, not Mike. He doesn't want to leave Watertown at first but eventually he comes around to the realization that he can't stay. Still, he remains in Joel's shadow.

He is a skilled Mechanic. He shows that he has a little more depth than he normally shows in his journal entries, especially after Lydia is killed.

THE NATION

The Nation is situated between the former states of Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, and extends to the East and West as well as it grows.

That settlement is the heart of The Nation, but The Nation is not the only group of survivors vying for control of the former United States. The Fold is another group that will eventually come into conflict with The Nation, but there are others they will have to deal with as they grow and begin to take new territories.

Although The Nation will always remain headquartered in the valley, not all the main characters will. As they grow they will spread out across what is left of the North American Continent, and that is when the real problems with other survivors will come.

THE FOLD

The fold is peopled by the survivors from the Earth's Survivors Settlement Earth Books. They initially start their settlements on what remains of the west coast, but soon move away from the coast and the continuing earthquakes.

They resettle at an oasis in the desert and become The Nation's greatest rival, even enemies.

The two groups will finally face off against each other in all out war in the later books.

ALABAMA ISLAND

Joel and Haley remain the leaders of Alabama Island for quite some time, but eventually their leadership is relinquished in the wars. Alabama Island is peopled and run by important characters from The Nation, it rivals Rapid City as a Nation City. For a time it rises above all the other societies.

RAPID CITY

Rapid City was established by people other than The Nation. At one time a Zombie stronghold, it was wiped out each time it was reestablished. Eventually The Nation will gain a stronghold there and Rapid City will become a gateway into the south, and Alabama Island beyond.
