While the others loaded what supplies we were taking with us into the vehicles, I made my way to the command tent and requested to speak with the captain. A hard-eyed staff sergeant kept me waiting a few minutes and glared at me hotly enough to let me know my presence was unwelcome. I glared right back. After what had befallen my family, I did not give a baboon’s swollen red ass about his opinion. Finally, Morgan poked his head out of the tent and waved me in.
“What can I do for you?” he asked, moving to sit behind the folding table that functioned as his desk. He shuffled a few papers around and picked up a cup of coffee.
“We’re leaving,” I said.
The coffee stopped halfway to his face. He stared at me a long instant, then said “Leaving?”
“Yes, along with most of the others in my group. Lance is staying behind, as well as Tyrel and Lola. The rest are coming with us.”
He put the cup down and folded his hands on the desk. “I’m sorry to hear that. I really am. When are you leaving?”
“In about half an hour.”
He stood up and came around the desk to offer me a hand. “I wish we had met under better circumstances, Mr. Hicks. You’re a good man. I could use a hell of a lot more like you. And for what it’s worth, I’m terribly sorry about what happened to your stepmother.”
“Thank you, Captain.”
“Is there anything I can say to make you change your mind?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“Well then, best of luck to you. I hope we meet again someday.”
“Good luck to you too.” And with that, I walked out.
On the way back to the campsite, I thought about the subtexts of conversations, the subtle ways we communicate on various levels when we speak to each other. There are cues you can detect in things like body language, facial expression, and tone of voice. If you live long enough, and if you are observant, you can learn to read the messages beneath the surface. Morgan had said all the proper things, made all the proper gestures, and his spoken message had been one of regret. But judging by other things, the facial tics, and inflection of voice, and the briskness of his movements—not to mention the way he seemed not at all upset by my departure—regret was not foremost in his thoughts.
If I had to guess, I would say the captain was relieved.
*****
“So here’s the deal,” Mike said, reading from a list scrawled in his hasty print. We were stopped on the side of the road, engines idling on a hillside a mile from the convoy. Our vehicles consisted of one of the Humvees from BWT, Blake’s Jeep, and Mike’s pickup truck. Dad let the folks from the RV encampment keep his Ram, and we let Tyrel and Lola have the other Humvee.
“We have enough food for two weeks if we’re careful,” Mike said, “and twenty gallons of fresh water. So supplies aren’t a problem right now. Worst-case scenario, we can hunt or scrounge what we need. As for medical supplies, we’d all have to be shot, stabbed, drowned, blown up, beaten half to death, and partially dismembered to run out. And if that happens, we’re all fucked and it won’t matter anyway.”
“What about weapons?” Dad asked.
“Weapons are as follows: Seven M-4 carbines, four MP-5 submachine guns, various pistols, my sniper rifles, two hunting rifles, and one M-249 SAW. As for ammo, we have three-thousand rounds of 5.56 loose, another thousand belted for the SAW, eight-hundred rounds of nine-millimeter, five-hundred rounds of 7.62, a hundred rounds of .300 Winchester magnum, and two-hundred rounds of .45 ACP.” He patted the Colt 1911 on his hip. “Additionally, we have two M-203 grenade launchers, fifty 40-millimeter HE rounds, and fifty frag grenades. Equipment wise, we have our tactical gear, four suppressors for the M-4s, one suppressor each for the MP-5s, four sets of NVGs, two pairs of binoculars, and the optics for our rifles.”
He tossed the piece of paper into the back of the Humvee and stared pointedly at my father. “The rest we donated to the fucking Army.”
Dad shrugged. “Seemed like a good idea at the time.”
“No sense crying over it now,” Blake said. “We have enough to get us to Colorado. That’s the important thing.”
I sat on the tailgate of Mike’s truck, the warmth of Sophia’s thigh next to mine, and thought about all the gear we had taken from BWT. When we set out, we’d had enough hardware to outfit a small army. Now, we were down to a fraction of what we had started out with, and to make things worse, we were still at best a couple of days away from Colorado Springs. Not to mention the fact a soulless rapist had nearly killed me and driven my stepmother to take her own life. All in all, it seemed our experience with the United States Army had been a shit deal.
“Anyway,” Mike went on. “We’re good on food, water, and ordnance, but we only have enough fuel to get us maybe three-hundred miles if we’re lucky. After that, we’re on foot. Personally, I’d rather not take the chance.”
“What do you suggest?” Dad asked.
“I’ve been monitoring radio chatter from the convoy. They got word from Colorado Springs that I-25 has been cleared all the way south of Raton, New Mexico. My guess is they’re going to go south on 56 for a while, then cut west on 87 and pick up the interstate from there. They have all the fuel and supplies they need to make that trip.”
“Which means what for us?” Sophia asked.
“It means if we want to stay out of the Army’s way, the first thing we need to do is stock up on fuel. Best place to get what we need is Boise City. After we do that, we head north on 287 all the way up to 24 and approach Colorado Springs from the north.”
“What’s between here and there on that route?” I asked.
“Not a whole hell of a lot. Farms and road towns mostly. Anybody living in that area has probably evacuated already. Might be a few holdouts, so we’ll have to be careful. Other than that, it should be an easy trip.” He leaned against the Humvee and crossed his arms, staring in the direction of the convoy. “That said, I’d feel a hell of a lot better about this whole thing if we hadn’t given away damn near all our supplies.”
“Mike, we can stand around whining about what we don’t have,” I said flatly, “or we can get a move on. Personally, I vote for the latter.”
Dad and Mike swiveled their heads in unison. Any other time, there would have been an angry retort from one or both of them. But it had been less than twenty-four hours since I’d buried a woman I loved as much as any son ever loved his own mother, and I could feel the strain of it radiating from me. Consequently, the two men bit down on whatever they wanted to say and simply nodded. Sophia’s hand closed over mine.
“It’s okay, Caleb,” she said. “Everything’s going to be okay.”
“No, Sophia. It’s not.” I jumped down from the tailgate and opened the driver’s side door. “Are we ready to go or what?”
We went.
FORTY-ONE
Hollow Rock, Tennessee
“I lost my parents a month after the Outbreak,” Miranda said. She reached up a hand and swatted at a low-hanging willow branch as she and Caleb passed it. “The Free Legion killed my brother.”
Night had fallen, and they were walking back to Miranda’s trailer. Caleb had paced himself with the drinks, but still had a buzzy, glossy feeling in his head. He put an arm around Miranda’s shoulders. “If you want to tell me about it, I’ll listen. No pressure.”
Miranda said nothing for a while. She held Caleb’s waist and leaned against him as they ambled down the street. She’d had nearly as much to drink as Caleb, but possessed less than two-thirds of his body mass to tone down the effect. He had warned her to slow down, but she waved off his concerns with a flick of a long-fingered hand.
They passed the center of town and the general store, then rounded the corner to Miranda’s street before she spoke again. “I’m originally from Nashville. Did I ever tell you that?”