“Thank you, sir,” Clutch said.
Professor Caler gave a slight nod and then unzipped his coat.
I pulled out my pistol. It had only one round left in it. I’d always refused to give up that single round in case I needed it for myself, but it felt selfish to hold onto it. I handed it to Clutch. He checked the mag, frowned, and then shoved it into his belt.
Professor Caler pushed open the door and ran with more energy than I’d thought possible. The dogs went after him. I couldn’t watch. I burst out the door and swung my machete like a pendulum as I ran toward the truck. Already at least a couple inches of snow covered the ground, slowing my pace. I knew the others were behind me, and I kept running.
The professor screamed in agony as I opened the truck door. I found myself shoved inside with Jack thrown on me. Jase crawled in behind the wheel, and Clutch jumped into the back. Jase revved the engine and threw the truck into gear. The van moved, and I knew Caler’s sacrifice had saved all our lives.
After I situated Jack in between Jase and me, I looked out the window to see the professor tangled in a rose bush. He writhed and screamed. A shot rang out in the frozen air. The man’s head fell back, and he moved no more.
I looked back to make sure Clutch was safe. He held up a thumb. I leaned back and closed my eyes as Jase slipped and slid out of the parking lot. Jase drove, with the minivan behind us, for about thirty minutes before he stopped, and Clutch squeezed up front with us. It was tight, but he was in no mood to sit in the minivan. I pulled Jack onto Clutch and my laps and checked his temperature every few minutes. “I think his fever may be breaking,” I said after the third or fourth check.
The snow kept coming down, and the winds picked up. We drove at a snail’s pace. Jase recommended we stay at the place where he’d found his truck, but when I mentioned the people we’d seen on horseback, Clutch decided to brave the roads.
I don’t know how many hours passed before Jase pointed. “Home sweet home.”
I smiled at seeing the other trucks parked inside the gates. “We made it,” I said and patted Jack’s chest, only to find it wasn’t moving.
Jack had already died.
FORTITUDE
Chapter XIV
Twenty-four hours later
“It’s perfect,” Deb said as she looked over the baby seat Marco had brought back from the store. Marco beamed with pride as he knelt near her, helping her figure out the new baby seat. “Thank you,” she added as she bent down and gave him a tender kiss. “Did you tell them?”
“No,” Marco replied. “I thought you’d want to be the one to tell them the news.”
Deb looked up at us, her face beaming, and grabbed his hand. “We’re getting married!”
Surprise was quickly washed over with joy. Everyone in the living room cheered.
“’Bout time you manned up the nerve to ask her,” Griz said, grinning.
I hustled over to the couple, and hugged them both. “Congratulations!”
“Way to go. Will you have white cake? It’s my favorite,” Benji said, evidently knowing what weddings were all about. He broke out into the chicken dance, while Diesel and Boy danced around him in mutual excitement.
“We’ll have cake, Benji,” Vicki said, wearing a rare smile.
Deb motioned for the older woman. “Vicki is going to be my maid of honor,” Deb said.
Vicki laughed. “I’m long past being a maid. But I’ll gladly be your matron of honor.”
“Griz is standing in as my best man,” Marco said.
“As long as I don’t have to wear a tux,” Griz said. “Although I would be the finest looking man around here.”
“Justin is going to make it a town event next week. We hope you all can be there,” Deb said.
“We wouldn’t miss it for the world,” I said.
After the celebration simmered down, I headed out to tell Clutch the good news. He’d been with Justin, debriefing him on the last several days’ events while the rest of us had returned to the house as soon as our night in quarantine was over. The Marshall survivors were still in “quarantine,” but really, Justin was keeping them in a separate building until he figured out how to handle them—and the two kids. He hadn’t mentioned the kids to the rest of New Eden yet, and we weren’t talking, though I had no doubt the rumors would quickly spread.
Marco had said the girl yelled until she passed out on the drive back to New Eden. I could only imagine how the two kids must’ve latched onto each other when they were brought back together. I suspected no one would be able to separate them as easily again.
I tromped through the six inches of snow that covered everything in a pristine white. My smile stayed glued on my face, despite the cold and despite having seen two men die only a day ago. Marco and Deb proved that good things could still happen in this new world.
Even though the baby wasn’t Marco’s, for all intents and purposes, he acted as though he was the father. Whenever Deb needed to go to the clinic or was too sick to pick up her rations, Marco was there, as though they’d been married for years. That was only one example of how things had changed since the outbreak. There were no longer things such as dating or drawn-out engagements. Life had no guarantees, especially now, and everyone knew it.
Their wedding would remind us that happiness wasn’t extinct, a reminder each one of us desperately needed. Benji, with his innocent child resilience, had always been our poster child for a future that was worth protecting. Marco and Deb also belonged on that poster.
By the time I reached Justin’s house, the cold had seeped through my skin, and I shivered. I jogged up the steps and walked inside. Justin was in his dining room—where he always was—with his two assistants, Clutch, Zach, Dr. Edmund, and Dr. Gidar. It was a full room.
Clutch glanced up while the others were deeply engaged by the papers on the table. “That should work nicely,” Dr. Gidar said as he ran his finger down a list of handwritten items.
“We’re working out a setup for Dr. Gidar to do his research,” Clutch said. “I think we can make it happen without putting New Eden at any risk.”
“That’s nice,” I replied before my smile grew.
“What is it?” he asked.
“Deb and Marco are getting married.”
His brows rose before he nodded and grinned. “Good for them.”
“So, it’s official then,” Justin said. “That’s a relief. I wasn’t going to be able to keep it a secret much longer. This will be the biggest event New Eden’s ever had.” He sobered. “We could use the good news. Folks can cope with not having a Thanksgiving feast. Losing Jack will be harder. He’s been with us since the beginning. Hopefully, Dr. Gidar here can make it so we don’t lose anyone else to this godforsaken virus.”
“Well, there are no guarantees,” Dr. Gidar started, but he didn’t continue, because the door burst open and about a dozen residents hurried inside and fanned around the room.
“There are zeds inside New Eden?” a woman asked in a shrill voice.
“You’re going to get us all killed,” a man from the back called out.
“Calm down so we can discuss this,” Justin said.
“Not until you get the zeds out of New Eden.”
Yelling erupted.
Clutch came to his feet, pulled out his sword and slammed it against the table. The sound of metal on wood reverberated through the house. “Enough!”
The newcomers silenced.
Clutch continued. “I would never allow anyone through those gates who I felt was a risk to New Eden. Those two kids may be different, but whatever they are, they sure as hell aren’t zeds. At least not zeds like we know them to be. Dr. Gidar here believes they are the key to creating a vaccine for the zed virus. I don’t know about you, but I for one would like to see that happen. These guys have been working all morning on a plan, which I’m sure they’d be happy to share with you.”
He sheathed his sword and pushed through the crowd. I followed. Once we were outside, I kept pace with him. “Wow, I didn’t realize you were a diplomat.”
“Irrational people drive me crazy,” he said. “I’ve never gotten why some fly off the handle without thinking.”
“Because they’re being
irrational
,” I joked. “It’s a curse of being human. We’re all doomed to act irrationally every now and then.”
He smirked. “Speak for yourself.”
I bent down, grabbed a handful of snow, and threw it at him.
“Hey!”
I jumped back, laughing. Clutch started making a snowball, and I did the same. We threw about the same time; mine hit his chest, while his hit me right in the head. “Oh! That’s mean.”
He laughed.
The ground rumbled, and I girded myself as though an earthquake was coming. But, this was Nebraska. Earthquakes didn’t happen.
Clutch looked around. “What was—”
A house at the edge of town exploded into a ball of fire.
I gasped and brought my hand over my mouth.
“Fire!” Clutch shouted. He looked back at me, his eyes wide.
I knew mine were just as wide, because I was thinking the exact same thing.
We had no working fire truck.
We burst into action at the same instant, and we took off toward the fire. I had no idea what caused it. Had someone bombed us? What else could cause an explosion like that?
Justin came running up by us. “It’s the gas lines! I heard about this happening at another town. We have to shut all the lines off. This fire will keep going wherever the gas goes.”
“How do we turn off the gas?” I asked as we ran.
“There are shut-off valves outside every house,” he replied. “Wrenches should work. Spread the word, starting with the houses near the fire.”
“Do the gas lines go to the silo?” Clutch asked.
“No, the silo is on its own grid. Generators and propane tanks only,” Justin said.
“Good,” Clutch said. “I’m familiar with gas shutoff valves. I’ll start turning them off. Cash, you tell everyone you can to get their valves shut off and fast. And then tell them to head to the silo. They’ll be safe there.”
“Okay!” I yelled and slowed down. I looked from side to side and had no fucking idea where to go first. When I saw Zach headed our way, I ran up to him and passed along the info. He headed west, and I headed east. I ran to each house. Most people were already standing on their porches, making my job easier. But, many were like me and had no idea where their shutoff valves were located. “Just find it already!” I yelled and moved on.
I kept running, even though the snow slowed me down, and I had no real plan of who to tell first, so I set up a path that would bring me to house Twenty-Six. When I reached it, everyone was already standing outside. “Turn off the gas shutoff valve!” I yelled, my voice coarse from the smoke tainting the air.
Frost nodded. “I was suspecting that was the case, so I already turned off our valve and told our neighbors to do the same.”
“What do we do now?” Vicki asked.
A second explosion rocked the town. This one was in the center of town, nowhere near the first explosion, and I prayed Clutch was far from the deadly blast. The fires were spreading from both explosions, and smoke had blocked out the sun.
I looked back to Frost and the others. “Get to the silo!”
I jogged down to warn the next houses, but a third house exploded less than a block away, and I found myself trying to run faster, only to stumble and fall onto my knees. I climbed to my feet and stared at people running in the street. Clutch came running at me, a wall of smoke and fire behind him, and I blinked to make sure it was really him.
He didn’t stop until he reached me. Even then, he pretty much plowed into me and pulled me to him. “Are you hurt?”
I shook my head. “I’m fine.”
“We need to get to the silo,” he said and grabbed my hand. “There’s no stopping this.”
We quickly caught up to the others. Jase and Hali were in lead, both of them like gazelles in the snow. Frost held Benji’s hand, and Vicki hustled alongside them. Marco and Griz were helping Deb walk as quickly as she could, which wasn’t nearly fast enough. The silo was on the other side of town, with fire and likely more explosions between us and it.
We made it about two blocks before Marco stopped and turned around. He pointed and said something, but Deb shook her head. “I can keep going.”
Marco sprinted toward a wheelbarrow on the front porch of the house. “Hold on a second. I’m grabbing this for Deb!”
Everyone slowed and then stopped.
Marco grabbed the wheelbarrow, looked up and grinned while he stood on the front porch. “Got it!”
The house exploded outward, engulfing Marco in its flames. Glass shards shot from the windows. Heat blasted my face and burned my eyes. Debris pebbled my skin.
“Marco!” Deb screamed. She lunged toward the fire, but Griz held her back.
“God,” Clutch muttered, and he tried to take steps toward the house, his arm covering his face, but the heat forced him back.
The flames licked out from the house. Still, I faced the house and tried to find Marco. I swear my mind still saw him standing on the porch, holding the wheelbarrow, but I knew it was an illusion. There was no sign of Marco. The explosion hadn’t thrown him from the house. He had to be still up there, enveloped within flames that I could feel the heat of from sixty feet away.
Clutch returned and grabbed onto me as though I was his lifeline, and I sobbed, still watching the house.
“We have to go,” Griz said softly to Deb.
“No, no, no,” she said over and over again before she collapsed and Griz caught her.
The others had gathered around her, also searching for Marco. Jase had gotten closer to the house than Clutch had, but even he had to back off from the growing flames.
Griz carried Deb, his features clenched as though it was taking everything to hold back his pain. Like automatons, we left Marco behind. We weaved around streets and walked toward the silo. As we walked by the church, its cross burned radiantly, and its organ played an unholy tune of misshapen, dying notes.
We passed some people moving more slowly than us, while others hurried around us.