American Infection (Book 2) (3 page)

I called Holly to come, but she continued to bark and growl at some unseen threat. I didn't bother to fight with her as we loaded the supplies onto the boat and helped the girls climb into the bow. Matt followed the girls and hopped into the captain's chair.

Rob and I began pushing the boat into the bay when we heard a yelp and a whimper. We turned to see an empty beach; no sign of Holly. I called for her again, but there was no response. No barking or growling. Just silence. And a voice in my head telling me the cry had belonged to Holly.

When the boat was far enough off shore, Matt started the engine, letting it idle. Melissa and Sarah took Rob's hand and helped hoist him into the boat.

"Holly! Holly, come here girl!" I yelled, sloshing through the water back toward the beach. No response. No dog in sight. I was frantic with guilt.

"Dude, get your ass up here!" Rob shouted. "We won't leave without her, but…"

Before Rob could finish his sentence, the moonlight illuminated a horde of infected thundering down the beach, maybe 50 yards away.

I uttered an expletive before turning toward the boat. I lifted my knees high, crashing through the shallow water, and then leaped to grasp the rail. Rob grabbed both of my hands and fell backwards, pulling me into the boat on top of him. Matt threw it in gear and cut the wheel to the right, moving briefly closer to shore before veering further out.

We watched from a distance as dozens of infected hit the water. They continued to run toward the boat, but gradually slipped beneath the surface as the sandy bottom descended. Apparently they didn't mind getting wet, but they certainly couldn't swim.

"Do you see what they're wearing?" Matt asked, to no one in particular.

I squinted my eyes in an effort to see them more clearly, but it was difficult in the darkness.

"Camo. They're from the base, the training facility," Matt said, answering himself. Now I could make them out. Camo shirts, tucked into camo pants, tucked into Army‐issue boots. Jesus, I thought, if a military base is overrun, how is the rest of the country doing? I knew the answer, but refused to give up hope that I'd reach my parents.

Matt dropped anchor off shore and we waited for any sign of Holly. Eventually the stream of infected stopped, all of them having disappeared beneath the water. As the sun began to rise at our backs, illuminating an empty beach, I acknowledged she was gone. I gave Matt a simple nod. He pulled up the anchor, cranked the engine and headed north.

Wednesday, 10 a.m.

Shades of pink, red and purple had creased across the sky at dawn. An old adage stated "red sky at night, sailor's delight; red sky at morning, sailor's take warning." It was proven true this day. By mid‐morning, clouds had rolled in and begun dumping buckets on the weary travelers. After two days of sweltering heat and inescapable sun, though, no one seemed to mind much. The storm had brought higher waves, slowing our march north, but otherwise was a welcome respite.

The boat felt lonely without Holly prancing around on the deck, resting her head on the knee of whoever she felt needed cheering up. Between Tom, Anne and Holly, we had lost three friends and allies in 48 hours. Putting Holly aside, that was one human casualty per day. I silently wondered who would be next. I was gripped by anxiety as I considered the possibility that our march north had been a suicide mission from the beginning.

There were far fewer boats this far north in the bay. I attributed that to the population density of the surrounding areas. We were almost directly between Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., where two of the four initial explosions and outbreaks had occurred. Perhaps these folks hadn't had time to realize what was happening, to plan an escape. When we had first sailed into the bay, further south near St. Mary's County, there were dozens of vessels, large and small. Since pulling away from our beach camp at sunrise, we had only seen one other boat, far enough to the east that it was nothing more than a speck on the horizon.

By mid‐day we had located the mouth of the Susquehanna River. The city of Havre de Grace sat on the western shore formed by the confluence of the river and the Chesapeake Bay. Much like Baltimore, the city burned. Columns of black smoke flowed toward the clouds. Unlike Baltimore, there was no military presence. No helicopters hovering over the city. No fighter jets criss‐crossing the sky above, dropping bombs on pockets of infected. The occasional gunshot echoed out from the city, but not nearly as many as we had heard passing Baltimore. The residents of Havre de Grace were on their own, abandoned by a government that had bigger problems. And we could only imagine how bad things truly were on land.

Wednesday, 4:45 p.m.

Matt's nautical maps extended about two miles north of where the Chesapeake Bay met the Susquehanna River. We continued up the river, thinking it would take us to Harrisburg, where we would have a straight shot to Allentown, covering mostly farmland. However, ten miles north of Havre de Grace, Rob was the first to spot the dam. Conowingo Dam is five miles south of the Pennsylvania border. A two‐lane road runs across the top of the dam, connecting the eastern and western shores of the Susquehanna. On the western side of the river was a hydro station built to regulate water levels behind the dam, but it appeared abandoned. On the eastern side was a flat, rocky outcrop several acres in size. Beyond the rocks and shallow water was nothing but grass and trees, extending up a hill to meet the road.

"What the fuck?" Matt muttered, under his breath.

"This is OK, Matt," I said, trying to be positive. "We weren't gonna stay in the boat forever."

Everyone knew we couldn't stay in the boat forever. But not everyone was ready to venture onto land just yet. Here, on the boat, we were safe. On land, the infected were in charge. At least that's how it seemed.

Just south of the dam was a small island, maybe three football fields long and one field wide. There were no houses, no signs of life, and ‐ hopefully ‐ no infected on the island. Matt swung the boat around and eased slowly up the bank until Rob and I were able to jump off and pull it securely ashore.

Rob and I helped Melissa and Sarah down onto the rocky beach of the island. The girls immediately crossed the narrow shore and sat beneath the shade of a massive oak. I hadn't realized how exhausted everyone was, and how filthy we had become. We were all wearing the same clothes we'd had on at Matt's house on Monday. The leftover salt of dried sweat formed rings around our collars and armpits. Our shorts had streaks of dirt and sand. And I was pretty sure no one had changed their socks or underwear. I didn't even want to think about that one.

"We're gonna have to abandon the boat," I said. "I think we should stay here for the night, rather than set out on land with only a few hours of daylight left. In the mean time, I'm gonna head up to the road and scout it out."

Rob, refusing to miss out on an opportunity for action, volunteered to accompany me. Matt agreed to stay behind with the girls and try to catch some dinner.

I hopped back onto the boat and found a plastic garbage bag. Rob and I stripped down to our briefs and sneakers and threw the rest of our clothes in the bag, along with two Berettas. We waded into the water, which was much cooler than the bay had been. Chest deep, we began swimming; I worked on my sidestroke as I held the bag over my head. Five minutes and thirty yards later, we reached the eastern bank of the Susquehanna and got dressed.

The eastern bank wasn't really the shore just yet. It was more like a wide swatch of rocks that jutted out into the river. For the most part it was just an extension of the shoreline, but it had pockets of water as though the river continued to run underneath it. Rob and I carefully worked our way across the rocky landscape, simultaneously inching north toward the dam and the road that ran across it. We quick‐stepped the last few yards up a steep slope and carefully walked to the center of the two‐lane road that would lead us away from the river.

It was deserted as far as I could see. On both sides of the river, the road appeared to bend north. I began walking east, away from the sun. I had no idea where we were, but I was certain we were west of where we were needed to be. I heard Rob take a few long strides to catch up, his wet sneakers slapping the pavement.

"What's the plan?" Rob asked.

"We've gotta head east, so that's where I'm going," I replied. "I figure we'll follow this road until we figure out what road it is, first off. And then maybe even get an idea where it goes, if it runs into a town, that kinda thing."

"And if we run into any of those infected?" Rob asked.

"We shoot. But we don't head back to the boat until we're sure there's none following us."

I realized eventually everyone would have to fight the infected, but I didn't want to lead them back to Sarah and the others if I could avoid it.

Wednesday, 5:45 p.m.

An hour later, Rob and I carefully descended the hill from the road to the bank of the river. We stripped down and put our clothes and the Berettas into the same plastic bag, then swam the thirty yards from one rocky beach to another. Before I could get my pants on, Sarah ran over and gave me a wet kiss on the lips. I returned the kiss and tried not to act surprised by such a public display of affection. I had thought we were keeping things low key.

As Rob and I sat around the grill, polishing off the leftovers of Matt's catch, we described our outing.

"I think we might have gotten lucky," I began. "That road up there, that's Route 1."

"Route 1?" Matt asked, a hint of recognition in his voice. "That runs into…"

"West Chester, I know," I interrupted. "Way I figure, we've gotta be just a couple miles from the PA border. We can follow Route 1 east and it should take us right there."

"How?" Melissa asked. "We're not walking the whole way, are we? That'll take days, weeks."

"There's a town about a mile down Route 1," I continued. "We didn't go all the way down, cause we didn't wanna attract any attention. But we saw a used car lot, and there's gotta be cars in town."

"How long do you think it'll take to get to West Chester from here?" Melissa asked. I could tell she wasn't grasping the severity of our situation. It wouldn't be a simple car ride.

"Listen," I said. "Even losing Tom and Anne, I'd say we've been pretty lucky so far. But you guys saw Baltimore, you saw Annapolis. Hell, even that little shit town where the river started. There's a pretty damn good chance we don't make it out of West Chester, if we even make it there in the first place. Once we're on land, I have a feeling things are gonna get real bad real quick."

Melissa was looking down at the ground. I hadn't meant to sound like I was attacking her, although that's probably how she took it. I really just wanted everyone to understand what we were about to encounter. I wanted everyone to be on board with our decision to find Matt's parents, and then my own. I wanted everyone to know that this was the absolute final opportunity to back out.

I continued, "I think tonight we need to look at what we have, and what we can carry. Most important are the guns and ammunition. After that, I think we need to get a good night's sleep. Everything changes tomorrow."

Thursday, 7 a.m.

The rocky beach had been too difficult to sleep on, so we had all spent the night on the boat. At first light, Rob and I jumped out and pushed the Wakesetter back into the river, then waded in after it and hopped on. Matt guided the boat to the eastern bank, where Rob and I hopped back off to pull the boat to shore.

Permanently disembarking from our home for the past three days, we took everything we could carry. Water bottles were refilled with river water; probably not the cleanest choice, but it was better than nothing. After all the ammunition had been placed into backpacks, the remaining space was filled with the water and canned vegetables. Rob carried his tactical rifle, as well as Anne's Sig Sauer. Matt carried his own rifle and Melissa carried her father's rifle. Sarah and I each had a Beretta. We considered carrying the fishing poles, but decided their usefulness had lapsed. From this point forward, we'd likely be scavenging.

Rob led us across the rocky outcrop and up the slope to Route 1 above. Thankfully, the road was still deserted. I was relieved, having come to expect surprises.

Shortly after the bend in the road, Route 1 became three lanes; two lanes heading east and one lane heading west, back toward the bridge. The added width of the road made me a little more comfortable, as dense woods grew right up to the pavement on either side. The likelihood of infected waiting in the woods for a random ambush was low, but I was still tense from our escape off the beach near Aberdeen Proving Ground.

A few minutes later, we came to a used car lot named "Car Capital." It was one of those beat‐up old trailers converted into a business, with about eighteen cars in the lot. Red, white and blue flags hung from a string that encircled the entire dealership twenty feet in the air. A sign in the window claimed "Bad Credit, No Problem." A dozen sedans and six minivans from the 1990s sat in the parking lot. This was the kind of place that probably didn't want you to test drive their vehicles before purchasing them.

"Beggars can't be choosers," Matt said, speaking to the look on Melissa's face.

Matt crossed into the lot and began looking inside the cars, first a Toyota Corolla then a Ford Taurus. He shrugged, then looked back at the group.

"We'll check inside for keys," Matt said. "We can keep an eye out for a better deal, but as long as it runs, it's better than walking."

Rob turned to look at me and I waved him forward. Matt and Rob walked up to the entrance, which used to be someone's front door before the tenants moved out and a car salesman turned the place into a lemon lot. Rob tried the knob but it didn't budge. He stepped back and gave a swift kick just left of the handle. Wood splintered as the door burst open. The sound was much louder than I cared for, and I scanned the surrounding area. Rob's action hero antics didn't appear to have immediately attracted any visitors.