Their load, while not completely awesome, was beneficial. Some gross stale chips, a few packages of some kind of sweet cake that never expires, and at least ten full water bottles. Their car was full of fuel, with a little leftover for later. The only problem was, Maverick would not shut the hell up.
While the rest of them had been either getting supplies or watching over the car, Jaye had been reading through her book when the sound of someone’s voice broke through the comfortable silence. “Day…1,816…god damn has it really been that long? Christ. I have been checking in everyday, hoping, praying someone out there hears me, but no one will. Because you’re all either dead or don’t have a radio and I’m,” They started to cry. “I’m trying. I’m just trying so hard to survive. But it’s just so hard. There’s nothing left. The plants stopped growing and there’s only one can left...But.” And the voice stopped. She had immediately called for one of the others. Maverick had practically tackled her, wondering if she was alright and when she told him what had happened he still practically tackled her, just out of excitement and to get into the car.
They were on the road and Maverick was holding a steady discussion with the woman on the other end of the line. “What’s your name? Where are you?”
She could barely talk she was laughing so much, crying, whatever else. Val tried not to bother himself with what Jaye had said the woman said. The lady sounded like she was on the brink of suicide, or at least just giving up and calling it all quits. But she also was keeping a record, constantly using the radio on a daily basis to try and talk to someone, anyone. Then he did the math in his head. One thousand, eight hundred, and sixteen days was almost five years. Sixty plus months. It had been such a long time when you really thought about. When you didn’t say to yourself, that it was just five years; that you’d been alive way longer than that, that you could keep going on matter what, that a cure was coming just as long as you believed it was.
“My name is...Sydney, Sydney Peters. I can’t tell you exactly where I am, because I just can’t. But I’m just outside Morgan City. If you tell me when you get there…I can come get you. See if you’re good people.”
“Do you have food? Shelter?”
“Yes. Just. Please get to Morgan.” Maverick tried to ask her more questions but she stopped answering.
He looked to Val, setting the receiver down on its hook. “Are we going? She has shelter.”
“Yeah, and so do we, we just gotta find some.” Beck barked from the backseat. “We’re just going to go completely off track for a whim? What if she’s with a bigger group and they try to kill us?”
Val rolled his eyes, looking into the rearview mirror to glare at the woman. “And why would she do that?” Beck turned her eyes away to stare out the window. Val grumbled and went back to focus on driving. “We should go there. Better than just heading to Houston and hoping that everything there is okay.” He opened the glove box in front of Maverick. “See if you can find a map in there.” The boy nodded and sifted through the junk inside the box. He dropped the owner’s manual, a few napkins, and tissues, on the floor. He pulled out an atlas and opened it up to the Louisiana page.
“Take highway 24 to I-90, and just follow - holy shit.” Maverick shoved the atlas on the side of the seat and reached back into the glove box, pulling out a pistol. “Can’t believe this wasn’t taken.”
“Give me that!” Beck leaned forward and snatched the gun out of his hand. “No use you holdin’ it if you don’t know how to use it.” She removed the clip. “Fully loaded.” She admired the black and silver weapon, turning it around in her hand and checking to make sure the safety is on. “Could be good, just in case you know.”
Maverick grinned. “What kind is it?”
“The one that shoots bullets,” Beck snapped. “Who gives a shit what it is, just as long it works.”
“A Ruger KP-90.” Jaye said, opening up another one of her books.
Beck stared at her. Maverick did the same, turning around in his seat to look at the girl. Val smacked him upside the head and yelled at him to turn back around. He did. “How do you know that?”
“I read a lot.” Jaye rummaged around through the car, pulling out a book much larger than a normal paperback and handed it to Maverick. “Gun books are not an exception.” He greedily took it from her, flipping it open to the first page. She smiled, and sat back, flipping the next page in the novel she was working on reading. Beck tilted her chin up, in surprise and defense. “Plus, it is my gun.”
And just like that, all questions were answered. At least to the boy.
Maverick and Val were pretty open. One was an immature teen who, without the help of others, was going to get himself killed, the other was a semi-responsible, yet stupidly brave, ex-dentist with field training thanks to the apocalypse. But this Jaye girl, little was known about her. They knew her name, her obsession with books, and the fact she had owned a silver Honda pre-end-of-world. They could also just infer that she had left the camp a decent amount of times if she knew exactly how to get to that bookstore and had the key to unlock the chain. Now she knew about guns and even owned one that wasn’t back in the zone? Bullshit was the correct call on that one. She was keeping something from them, and Beck was going to find out what it was.
She planned on talking to the only other adult in the car that she could trust on their next stop. Val had to have some sort of opinion on this.
The houses and buildings started to fade around them, same with the biters, and soon they were on a road with just forest on either side. Beck was beginning to get restless, same with Maverick, who, ten minutes earlier, had complained that he needed to take a ‘major piss’. Val told him to watch his language for some reason, then said he could hold it for just a little longer. He couldn’t. “If you don’t stop right now I’m going to pee on the seats.”
“No.” Jaye grumbled.
“Gross.” Beck spat.
“Fine.” They pulled over to the side of the road and Maverick practically fell out of the car, taking his backpack with him. He kicked it off and sprinted into the forest. “Hey! Stay where I can see you!”
Maverick gave him a disgusted look. “No! This is private time.” He hissed, taking shelter behind some of the trees.
“Don’t mother the boy.”
“I’m not. I’m being the responsible one here.” He mumbled, turning the car off. “Give me the gun, I’m going to go wait by the tree line, to make sure he doesn’t get eaten.” He unbuckled, adding, “little shit” to his statement.
Beck shook her head, kicking her door open before Val could even grab his handle. “I am about to vomit in this stuffy thing. I’ll go.” She slammed the door behind her and waltzed over to the trees where Maverick was, and leaned against one of them. “Pee quickly!”
“Don’t talk!” He yelled, his voice cracking with puberty. She snorted and inspected the gun in her hands. It was strange that no one had taken it yet. Even if the car was locked someone walking by should’ve seen it and broke into it, stealing the gun, and even the car itself. What wasn’t Jaye telling them?
She sighed. Then there was this expedition to bumfuck Louisiana because a voice on the radio told them to? It could be a trap. Or worse, it could not be. And they’d get stuck in another ‘Greg’ situation. “Sydney Peters.” She let the name roll of her tongue. It even sounded wrong - fake. She wondered what this Peters lady was planning on getting from them if this wasn’t a trap. Guns? They had one. Company? No one could be that lonely. Whatever it was, she had a bad feeling about it. “You done pissing?” She said over her shoulder.
She only waited a minute with no response before lifting the gun and heading out into the forest. Worst case scenario: he’s been eaten. Best: he passed out from shock because of the events earlier that morning and he had yet to cool down from them, she thought, holding her breath in anticipation. She rounded the set of trees to see Maverick with his hands up.
His pants were up to his waist and buttoned. But his belt was undone and was hanging on his thigh. He gulped and blinked at her. Behind him were three men with shotguns raised at them both. “Put the gun down.” One said. She frowned, looking them all over. All in their thirties, maybe forties. Hand-to-hand the four of them might have a fighting chance. But they had a pistol, some knives, and a hammer she was not willing to let them bring to this shotgun fight. So she set her weapon down on the ground and held her hands up. The man nodded to one of the others in his group and he rushed over to pick the gun up.
Beck resisted the urge to knee him in the face. “We don’t want any trouble.” She said, quoting cops from just about every crime movie. The three men looked at each other.
“Neither do we. We just want to talk.”
Maverick was staring at his shoes. “We have others. They’re waiting for us.” He said without looking up.
“We’re not going to hurt you.”
“Do you have a camp nearby?” Beck asks, folding her arms behind her head. One of the guys is a bit trigger happy and steps forward, nearly lunging at her. The man who had been speaking held him back with his hand and glared.
He nodded. “Yeah. A small one. What about you?”
“We had one, back in New Orleans. Left.”
“Where are you headed?”
She neglects to tell them about their car, or their true destination. “Little Rock.”
The man looks surprised. “Long ways to go.” She nodded. “How many other people you got with you?” She tells him. Two. But she doesn’t specify. Two Russian mob bosses? Maybe. An older fellow and a completely unstable young girl. Probably. Two helpful people in a life and death situation? Yet to be determined. They hold a stable conversation, her and the man, asking each other about their groups. She learns that his group has fourteen people, including the ones there with him. Women, children, the works. They were headed for the coast, hoping that with one side of water they’d have less biters to deal with.
Their conversation stops abruptly when Jaye stumbles into the forest, her hair in front of most her face and her long sleeves balled up in her hands. She stops in her tracks at the sight of the guns. She tries to take a step back and one of the guns is pointed in her direction. Beck attempts to defuse the situation. “She’s with us!” That cools down the men, a little. “Jaye, these people aren’t gonna hurt us. Is Val still in the car?” Perfect. Defused like a pro.
“Yeah.” She turns a sickly pale color. “We should get going.” The unspoken ‘to get the hell away from these assholes pointing their guns at us’ is heard loud and clear.
Beck exchanges a look with the man who seemed to be in charge. “She’s right. Burning daylight sitting out here chattin’.” He gives her a small smile and calls his men to his side. The one who had been holding their gun, returns it to Beck, with the clip out. She takes both pieces and nods her thanks. “Sorry about,” She motions around with her hand to the forest. “Trampling in on your area.”
“And peeing on it.” Maverick adds sheepishly, running after Jaye who was already back on the road.
“If luck permits,” The man says before Beck leaves. “We’ll see you in the future.”
Smiling she puts the gun back together, and shoves it in the back of her pants. “If luck permits.”
ns 15.158.61.20da2
