“I hope so, Takeshi. It’s worth finding out. Just…be careful.”
“Yes. Always. We’re always careful these days.”
More survivors in and around Japan. How many were out there? More than she had imagined, as it turned out. The last year had seemed so dark and hopeless, and there were so many days (and weeks and months) that she thought they might have been the only living souls still moving, looking for safety from the darkness.
“How are you for food and water?” she asked.
“Kinkasan has everything we need,” Takeshi said. “Food, water, even wildlife. We can survive here for centuries. We were lucky. Very lucky. A lot of people weren’t.”
She thought about all those months on the road, the loss of Harold Campbell’s facility in Starch, Texas, and fighting for the island. Luck had a lot to do with it, but sweating blood and tears did, too.
“What else have you heard, Lara?” Takeshi asked. “I’ve been listening to your conversations with the American government.”
He means Beecher. The Colonel from Bayonet Mountain.
“Not much,” she said. “Everything I know was in the message and what I told Beecher.”
It wasn’t the whole truth, but as with Beecher, she didn’t think Takeshi or anyone else listening to them at the moment needed to know everything. While talking to Beecher, she had to constantly remind herself that anyone could tune in.
Anyone, even the enemy…
Dead, not stupid, right, Will?
“I told the others about these blood farms and the camps you discovered,” Takeshi said. “Why would anyone surrender their future like that? I don’t understand it.”
He must be young, she thought.
Before she could reply, a voice she hadn’t heard before joined them. “Sorry to cut in without an invitation, folks, but glad to hear Japan’s still in play.” The voice belonged to an older man with an accent she couldn’t place. “My name’s Miller. Radioing in from San Francisco. I wanted to let everyone know we’re still fighting the good fight over at the Bay, too.”
“Good to hear your voice, Miller,” Lara said. “Where in San Francisco are you?” Then she quickly added, “If you can reveal your location.”
“It’s no secret,” Miller said. “They already know we’re here, anyway. You won’t be surprised to hear this, given your bodies of water theory — well, not theory anymore, I guess — but we’ve been getting by on Alcatraz.”
“The prison?”
“It’s more of a tourist attraction these days. A lot of us managed to grab a ferry when everything went to shit. Pardon my language. You’re right; the bloodsucking bastards don’t seem capable of crossing the water. Their human lackeys, on the other hand, don’t have that aversion. They’ve dinged us up over the months.”
“Collaborators. That’s what we call them.”
“As good a name as any. We’ve managed to fend off every assault so far, mostly because it’s hard to approach the island without being seen and some of the survivors brought weapons with them.”
“How many are on the island with you?”
“A few hundred. Mostly civilians. A pair of ex-law enforcement, like myself.” He paused, then, “So, what’s next, Lara?”
“What do you mean?”
“You started this. What do we do now? How do we take the planet back from these bloodsucking bastards?”
She pressed the microphone to answer, but when she opened her mouth, nothing came out. Instead, she let go of the lever and stared at the radio in silence.
“Lara?” Bonnie said behind her. “Something wrong?”
She shook her head. “No.”
It was a lie. There was something very wrong here.
She didn’t have any answers for Miller, and the fact that he and all the other strangers listening to them at the moment thought that she did didn’t just perplex her, it terrified her.
“Am I going to live, Doc?” Zoe asked.
“I don’t know; you tell me. I’m just a third-year medical student and you’re the doctor, Doctor.”
Zoe smiled back at her. The woman had very deep green eyes. “I’ve never been shot before. It’s…a revelation. Have you ever been shot?”
“Once.”
“Did it hurt?”
“Like a sonofabitch.”
“Good. I thought it was just me.”
Lara helped Zoe sit up on the small bed, then stacked two fluffy pillows between her and the wall. She looked better than yesterday when she first arrived with a hole in her side. Color had returned to her cheeks and her lips didn’t look as deathly pale anymore.
Zoe let out a slightly pained sigh and looked around the room. It was an office that Lara had converted into an infirmary and stocked with beds taken out of a couple of unused rooms in the hotel. The shelves and cabinets were recently restocked with medical supplies that Roy had brought back with him along with Zoe.
“You came here just to check up on me?” Zoe asked.
I needed to get away from the radio, from all the questions, from people who wanted answers that I didn’t have.
She didn’t say any of that, of course. Instead, Lara said, “It’s part of the job description. I don’t have to tell you this, but don’t do anything to aggravate the wound until it heals completely.”
“What about a hot shower? Will promised me a hot shower.” Then, quickly, “I don’t mean with him. I mean, you know, by myself.”
Lara smiled, feeling strangely pleased with the other woman’s awkwardness. “I know. And there’ll be plenty of those later. As soon as you can get up and walk around.”
“You know what they say, Lara. The worst patient is a doctor.” Zoe looked down at the hospital gown she was wearing. It was really just bed sheets that Liza, Stan’s wife, had sewn for them. “Is this…?”
“Bed sheets.”
“Looks better than the hospital gowns I’m used to.”
“When you’re better, you can pick out some clothes. There are more than enough to go around, and I’m sure there will be plenty in your size.”
Lara didn’t tell her where the clothes came from. She, Carly, and the other survivors had brought clothes to the island with them, but a lot of it was already piled high in the basement under the Tower. The shirts and shoes and pants, along with equipment and weapons and ammo, belonged to people who had come to Song Island seeking salvation but had found a nightmare instead. Lara didn’t like reusing those clothes, but Will was right about keeping them so they could focus their supply runs on the essentials like silver, food, and ammo.
Especially the silver. You could never have enough of that these days.
“Where did you go to medical school?” Lara asked.
“LSU,” Zoe said. “You?”
“University of Houston.”
“What are you guys doing in Louisiana?”
“We heard a voice on a radio. It’s a long story.” She picked up a bottle of water and handed it to Zoe. “Bottom line, we’re here now.”
Zoe’s eyes widened when she touched the bottle. “Oh my God, it’s cold.”
Lara smiled. No matter how many times she heard that response, it never failed to amuse her. “You’ll get used to it.”
“Oh my God,” Zoe said again. She fumbled with the cap and took a sip, then sighed with pleasure before drinking some more.
“We have plenty more where that came from.”
“What is this, tap water?”
“The hotel has a huge water purification and filtration system. As long as we have power, we have drinkable water.”