He dragged. Typically he didn’t, was there something on his mind?
She was able to find a couple of those two wheel carts that had a handle like wheeled luggage. They weren’t in the best of condition, but she cleaned them up and packed them with items she took from the Westin and other items she picked up. They moved easier and carried more than the plastic drug store cart.
She pulled one cart, pen in mouth, map in hand, duffle bag over her shoulder while Jason pulled the other with the guitar over his shoulder. He walked a few feet behind her.
She paused, looked down at the map, pulled the pen and marked off landmarks. It was a tourist style map with businesses marked on it. It was far easier for her to keep track of where they were and where they were headed by landmarks. She marked off another.
Remnants of landmarks were easier to spot than street signs.
“Chernobyl.” Jason said.
“Oh, he speaks.” Nora turned around. “What did you say?”
“Chernobyl. I remember looking at pictures.” He paused and took a sip of water. “I remember in school we learned the eco process.” He walked and caught up to her. “I distinctively recall my science teacher telling me. ‘Look at an empty field. In five years you’ll see this, in ten you’ll see that’.” He shrugged.
“A lot of factors play into what would be overgrown. At least I think…”
“Theoretically and scientifically, this should look like Nashville. Then again, not everyone left Cleveland. Some stayed. We saw that. But Chernobyl, at least the pictures didn’t look like Nashville. No one lived there. Maybe they did and we just didn’t know. Mutants and such.”
“I don’t know what to tell you, Jason.”
“Just idle conversation, I guess. Now that my mind unlocked a lot of stuff.”
Nora felt a little jealous. “You’re remembering?”
“Yeah, the bits and pieces are no longer like memories of movies, I know them now as my life. You?” Jason asked.
Nora shook her head. “My full memories don’t really start until my twenties. Hell, I nearly didn’t remember I was in the service.”
“They’ll come.”
“I hope. I want to remember my parents.”
“What if you remember stuff you wish you wouldn’t?”
Again, Nora stopped walking. “That was a really odd thing to say. Did you?”
Jason pouted and shrugged. “Conversation for maybe later.”
“You’re on. Since we don’t have anything else to do.”
“There’s always Yahtzee.”
“Yeah, you did find that.” She smiled.
They walked for another hour, keeping the idle chitchat alive until they arrived at the lot where they had left the Solar Buggy. They had hidden it behind a building near the overpass and barricade. Roads were too overgrown to drive on.
Nora set down her things and cleared the brush that she used to hide the buggy.
“See, from here…” Jason said.”It looks like Nashville, buried. But when you go in, it’s not as overgrown. Like the pictures of Chernobyl.”
“Oh my God, let the Chernobyl thing go and help me out.”
“I’m sorry. Here, I got this.” Jason walked over. “Take a break. I’ll load the buggy.”
“Thanks.” Nora exhaled and stepped out. The lot was like its own mini wooded area, the concrete lifted in a lot of places. Cars and work vans were left behind. Company property that just stayed when people left. The red building itself was partially buried. Jason was right. Cleveland didn’t look like Nashville because people stayed in Cleveland and just when the annoying thought of Chernobyl hit her she got a good look at the work van. It was wedged in the midst of tall trees. She moved the bushes and walked to the van.
“What are you doing?” Jason asked. “That won’t work for us.”
She grabbed her bottle of water, put some on her hand and smeared it on the back of the van just under the window.
“Nora?”
Without answering or acknowledging Jason, she pulled forth the duffle, grabbed one of the shirts she found at the Westin, wet it down and continued to wipe the rear door. Just a section of it. The license plate.
“Nora?” Jason called her name nearly laughing.”Why are you washing the van?”
“What was the name of Malcolm’s Bio Cam Company in Cleveland? The one that had the footage. Remember he said, the footage from the ball room went to his headquarters in Cleveland.”
“I remember that. I don’t know the name of his company.”
“Do you know his last name?”
“No.” Jason shook his head.
“I do. I remember it from the Genesis units. His name is Malcolm Lowe.” She exposed the back of the van and the name painted on it. “Lowe Metro Security. Bet me this building is it.” She pointed. “The registration on the van… year after we went into stasis.”
“Okay.”
“Okay? For real? This doesn’t excite you?”
“Should it?” Jason asked.
“Yeah, it should. For Malcolm it should.”
“Cool. I’m excited. What now?”
Nora smiled. “Let’s go in.”
Because he resided outside the walls of Salvation and lived pretty much a hermit’s life, Trey was permitted to leave without quarantine. It was believed and known that he would have minimal contact with anyone else. He was asked though to check in using the sky method. The sky method was a means of communication utilizing the old servers and remnants of what was left of the internet.
The word quarantine didn’t sit right with Trey. It bothered him. Were they quarantining his father for fear he would catch something or that his father had something? Trey knew that it didn’t make any sense. If they placed his father in a stasis situation to ensure that mankind would continue on, wouldn’t they give him some sort of cure? An inoculation? Even Trey and his family were given such a vaccine.
He remembered the day well. A group of four men arrived at the house with government identification, but it was an organization Trey never heard of. Then again, he was still a teenager so he didn’t pay attention to that sort of stuff. They were still in shock and experiencing fresh grief over his father’s passing. That was when Trey initially believed his father had died. It was a short-lived belief. The four men triggered disbelief.
When they came, they told his mother that just before Trey’s father left for New York he had been exposed to Typhoid on a recent trip to Puerto Rico. His father had been in Puerto Rico for three days and wasn’t ill, but then again, he went straight to New York after his return.
They vaccinated the entire family.
Up until his father returned, Trey always believed that he received a shot for Typhoid.
But it was the visit of those men that prompted a mental episode in Trey that took him on a different path of grief than his family.
His last encounter with his father was not pleasant. While the others embraced him goodbye, Trey fought with Malcolm.
“But you just got back,” Trey said, watching his father pack.
“I know. I know. Weren’t you listening? This is top secret. I told you about it. This experimental unit can be my retirement. My legacy.”
“I thought we were your legacy.”
“Yeah, well, this legacy will pay for college,” his father said.
“You’re an absentee parent.”
“Really? Really? An absentee parent?” His father laughed. “Pretty mature words coming from such an immature guy.”
“I take care of everyone when you’re not here.”
“And this is a short trip.”