The roads were empty, and I pushed the hunk of junk truck to its limits. I had it up to fifty-five miles an hour as Carey and I cruised down the road. We kept that pace for an hour or so before we came up to a roadside village. I slowed as we approached a little one-pump gas station. The pump was an ancient-looking guy, and when I tested it, gas flowed out. Some of these towns were off the grid, so they would have things to accommodate that. I filled the truck, and after pilfering something to eat and some water from the tiny shop, we were back heading south. I didn’t have a map with me, but I knew the general direction and was confident I wasn’t going to get lost.
The next two hours were much of the same thing. Beautiful countryside, tropical plants everywhere. The humid heat kept my shirt plastered to my skin and Carey panting almost non-stop. I made sure to keep us hydrated. We shared a mango; this time, I had a knife to cut it as I drove. Carey now had a taste for the smooth juicy fruit, and he eyed me as I handed him a piece of it. When I checked the time, it was two in the afternoon and I figured I was still a hundred or so miles from the border.
The mountains were more like foothills now, and it had been a while since those dramatic elevation changes that caused my ears to pop. Carey and I were making good time, but I had to wonder if I would catch up to Mary soon. Unless they were cruising down at seventy, I should have found a sign of them by now. Then it dawned on me that they might have backtracked and taken a less direct way in order to avoid the ships detecting them. That’s if they weren’t caught when I raced down the hillside road like a lunatic. Maybe if I’d just stayed with them… no, I knew that would have just gotten us all caught or killed.
Machu Picchu was seven hundred miles or so away, with some potentially rough terrain ahead. Peru was another tropical and bumpy sort of country. Not only that, I didn’t have the GPS with me and was going from memory for the most part. I would stop at a gas station somewhere and hope they had a map of the country or something to help me along if I needed it. I tried to do the math and figure it out. Seven hundred miles, at an average of fifty miles an hour, would put me at fourteen more hours. I had about five hours of driving light left today, so if I started out at five in the morning, I could be there tomorrow at two in the afternoon. That said, I knew I would have to take surprises into account. Any number of things could happen to me between now and then: tire blowout, road block, ships attacking me.
Since I was just driving and getting a little unsettled, I needed something to occupy my racing brain. I knocked off the average speed to thirty miles an hour and calculated the time to Machu then. Twenty-three odd hours, with five today and a five AM start tomorrow, put me arriving there in the dark. Not only that, but Machu was a way up from the town. There was going to be some all-terraining combined with some serious hiking to get there. Best case, I was walking up the hill there tomorrow night. More likely, I was still a day and a half from reaching the device to turn it off. My palm itched at the thought, but I didn’t scratch it. There was nothing I wanted more than ending this crap, but the closer I got, the farther away it felt.
Carey stuck his head to the window crack I’d left open and his drool strung out behind us. I laughed and he seemed to think it was funny too, judging by the dog smile he showed me. It was hot; had to be over ninety degrees as the sun beat down on the roof of the rust-bucket I was driving. Gas was getting low as we cruised to the Peru border. As soon as I saw a “Twenty Miles from Peru” border sign, the engine made an awful noise, one of those sounds you know there’s no coming back from. Black smoke rose as the engine sputtered to non-functioning. By instinct, I pulled to the side of the road, even though I wasn’t going to impede anyone’s driving.
“Well, there’s another setback, Carey.” He looked at me sideways. “First we lose our friends, sleep under a tree, and then I blow up a truck. I bet this thing hasn’t hit fifty-five in a long time, and I ran it pretty hard today. Probably hasn’t had an oil change since the eighties.” I didn’t even bother opening the hood. Not only did I hardly know my way around under there, I knew I wouldn’t be able to get it going again. I did dump one of my water bottles on the engine to cool it, but quickly stopped as I realized it was making more smoke and wasting my hydration.
I grabbed our supplies, throwing a portion of Carey’s food into my sack, and we left the truck on the road, smoldering in the heat.
SEVENTEEN
The heat was getting to be too much for both of us, and after walking for fifteen minutes in the middle of the road, I moved us to the side of the road where the large-leafed trees shaded us. We had to find a vehicle soon. This road wasn’t a super-used one, obviously, but someone had to be out here.
I wondered about how the ships dealt with isolated places like this. I bet there were people in the world who had no idea the ships were even here until they were being whisked away, green light summoning them into the sky. It would have been so frightening, almost worse than knowing. I also was sure that more than a handful of people had died of heart attacks when they were taken. What a horrible way to go. And what about the people in hospitals, or the ones whose lives depended on medical equipment or pills?
James’ face flashed into my memory and I missed him dearly. My closest friend, the one guy who truly seemed to understand how much Janine had meant to me. I could still hear him calling to me as he floated out of my house.
I would bring him back if it was the last thing I did. That was a promise to him. I couldn’t save him then, but I could bring my buddy back, along with my mother and everyone else.
Pwwwwing! A tree shot bark out behind me, as I heard the echo of a gun down the small valley we were in. Carey perked up and growled, his hackles raised like a cat on the prowl. I looked for the source of the shot but couldn’t see anything. I wasn’t sure what to do. Run? Drop to the ground? Head into the trees?
Pwwwing. Another tree, this time closer. I figured the aliens weren’t using rifles to shoot at me, so I took a gamble. I raised my hands in the air, and walked to the middle of the road, out in the open.
“I’m not armed! Why don’t you come out and we can talk this over?” I called out, hoping that whoever was firing at me could hear me, and wanted to talk.
My heart raced in my chest and sweat ran down my face as I anxiously waited to hear a reply or get shot for my trouble. Wouldn’t that be the way to go? Travel halfway around the world to get shot in the middle of the road, miles from the Peruvian border. I moved to wipe the sweat from my face.
“Stay right there! Don’t move!” a rough, slightly accented voice exclaimed.
I tensed and raised my arms straight in the air. Carey was barking loudly and pacing back and forth between me and the voice. He was trying to protect me. If I didn’t fear for my life, I would have petted him and thanked him for caring so much.
“My arms are up,” I said as two bodies came from the trees on the other side of the road. The man was huge, sleeveless vest revealing tree-trunk-sized arms. The woman was petite but dangerous-looking. Her steps were measured and sleek, like an animal’s.