Contagious (39 page)

“
Lucky?”

“
You can get blood from anyone,” she explained. She took her gloves off, snapping the rubber. “Dr. Sheehan said you heal fast.”

“
Yeah.”

“
I’ll keep the rest of this blood,” she said, looking at the vial on the counter. “I might need more.”

“
All right.” I stood, unrolled my sleeve and exited the room. “She’s not that weird,” I told Hayden when we were out of earshot. “I’m disappointed, really. I was hoping for a full on mad scientist.”

He laughed. “No, she’s more socially awkward I guess.”

“
And doesn’t know what a hairbrush is,” I said, again making Hayden laugh. “Has she found anything else in your good blood?”

“
Not that I know of. I’m glad. I was getting sick of her taking so much blood.”

“
What blood type are you?”

“
B negative. I don’t think it really matters though, in terms of being immune.”

“
Right.” I again remembered Padraic telling me that he thought no one was fully immune since the virus could mutate. It made me worry that Hayden would do something careless, thinking he was immune and end up infected.

I got under the cold covers of my bed. Hayden pulled the comforter off of his and joined me. He moved close to me, encasing me in his warm embrace. Everything felt as right as it possibly could.

“
What if someone sees us?” he asked. “What would we tell them?”

“
That it’s freezing in here and we’re trying to stay warm?” I suggested.

“
That is true. Is that it?”

“
Well, yeah,” I said because I didn’t know what else to say.

“
Oh. Yeah, you’re right,” he said flatly and let go of me. “Night.”

“
Night Hayden.” Cold air washed over the emptiness, the contrast from the warmth of Hayden’s skin making me shiver. I wormed closer to him, hoping he’d put his arms back around me. I missed the warmth and I missed something else. I couldn’t help but feel like I said something wrong. Whatever. I closed my eyes and attempted to sleep.

Fuller asked me to run a lesson on yoga, since I was the only A1 who regularly did it. He said it was good and calming and he wanted to ‘expand the horizons’ of his soldiers. Hayden didn’t seem like himself all morning. He was withdrawn and quiet and just seemed sad.

Raeya wanted to show me the new schedules she was working on so I spent the rest of the morning with her. Hayden ate lunch with Ivan and Brock, not looking at me at all. I sat between Raeya and Padraic. I played with Argos, talked briefly with Sonja, and meandered my way to my room. I put a movie in, intending to relax and watch it. Halfway through, I was feeling really restless. It felt good to do yoga again. It had once been a normal part of my routine.

Though it was arctic in here, it was hard to do yoga in jeans and a sweater. I changed into leggings and a tank top, hoping my muscles would soon warm up.

“
You’re very bendable,” Hayden said, standing in the doorway. On my back with my feet over my head, I peered up at Hayden. “What’s that pose called?”

“
Plow,” I answered.

“
Plow? I definitely could see how some plowing could be done,” he said and laughed.

“
You wish,” I joked. I slowly moved out of the pose and stood.

“
Aren’t you cold?” he asked, eyeing the tank top.

“
Yes and no. Yoga gets your blood flowing.”

“
I can attest to that,” he said with a grin. “Have you been into yoga for a long time?”

“
Not really. I joined a group my freshman year in college and kinda went whenever. I like it and it’s something you can do at home, which was nice when I couldn’t afford my gym membership anymore.”

“
You seem like you’ve been doing it your whole life.”

I shrugged. “I’ve been in some sort of sport my whole life. I told you about the martial arts. And I was in gymnastics and cheerleading for awhile.”

“
You were a cheerleader?”

“
For two years. Then I got suspended and kicked off the squad.”

“
You really were a bad child.”

“
Told you,” I said with a grin.

Hayden sat on his bed. “They’re back,” he said and I knew he meant the A1s on the mission. “And they brought three civilians.”

“
That’s awesome.”

“
Yeah. In five days we’ll leave again. It will be me, you, Wade, Rider, and Brock. Ivan’s not going. He’s pissed about it.”

“
Right, his ankle. Do we usually go with the same people?”

“
Yeah. It’s easier. You get to know each other and their style. It makes working together easier.”

“
That’s good then.” I sat next to Hayden. “Want to watch a movie with me?”

He smiled and nodded. “Sure.”

-Chapter 15-

The next five days passed as normally as they could at a bomb shelter turned zombie safe house. The five of us loaded into our cars, Hayden and me in his truck and the other three in a silver SUV. We were on a seek mission, looking for survivors. Our orders were to go northeast, but no farther than Pennsylvania. I thought it was odd but Hayden told me that going farther was just too far. I also tried to convince him to ask Fuller to change our mission to exploring the Florida coast.

We were given ten days. None of us were too crazy about being away from the compound for that long, since it meant ten days of no showers, cold food, cold weather, and constant stress.

Orders were orders. None of the boys questioned it. Our plan was to drive eight hundred miles or so and end up somewhere in South Carolina. Depending on what we found, we’d use the rest of the time canvassing the state. It would be a twelve hour drive and we planned to drive straight through. Since we didn’t want to reach our destination in the dark, we left at nine that night.

Hayden drove first. Every now and then we’d see the glowing of eyes in the headlights. As if it was a sick game, I’d lean out the window and bury a bullet in the skull of a crazy. Zombies milled about as well, but their eyes died so long ago there was nothing left to catch a reflection. We sped along in the dark, passing bodies, ruined towns, and remnants of human life.

“
Maybe it was better,” I said quietly.

“
What was better?”

“
Maybe it was better Zoe went the way she did.” I opened the window, catching glimpses of body parts scattered along the road, a bloody trail leading to an ever hungry monster, munching on human flesh. “This world isn’t…won’t…ever be the same.”

“
Someday. It will end someday.”

“
So will we,” I said hoarsely.

“
They will go first.”

“
Are you sure?”

“
No. But I want to believe it,” he said.

We passed what was left of a church. The sign out front spoke of God’s mercy on the holy. There was no mercy left. Everything felt weird. I closed my eyes, letting the cold air smack me in the face. Hayden pressed the button to close the window.

“
Are you alright, Riss?”

“
Yeah. It’s just…pointless. I mean there are how many of us left? We will never repopulate the country. We will never be able to get things back to normal. There’s just not enough left. And it’s weird to think about, but what if there really wasn’t anyone left. Would the zombies be around forever? No one would be here to kill them. They’d have free run.

“
And if there is a God, why isn’t he doing anything? How can he sit up there and watch us starve and be scared and have dead fingers rip open our bodies and eat our insides? And, even if we kill every single zombie, we will still lose people. We will dwindle down to nothing. People get sick, we don’t have good medical care. And getting old. Yeah, can’t stop that. Sure, we can all pop out a few, but that takes time. It takes time to get pregnant, it takes time to grow a baby, and even longer for that baby to have a baby. I…I just don’t see it working. And why? Why live? What do we have to live for?”

Hayden opened his mouth to say something but stopped. His face was set on the road ahead. “I don’t think anything I say will change your mind. We have to keep going. We have to believe things can get better because we are left. We can’t lay down our weapons, spread our arms and welcome death. We found you, we’ve found others, and we will keep finding others. I won’t go back until we do. Even if we pass the ten days. I promise you, Orissa, there are more people out there. And I will find them for you.

“
No, the world won’t be the same. Ever. Not even in a hundred years. No one will forget this, hopefully. Like all diseases, it will always have the ability to cause panic and be a threat, but think of all the old diseases that we don’t worry about anymore. And, this country started out with a few hundred settlers, right? Things won’t be ok, but they will be better. I promise.” He put his hand on mine. “I want to make you happy, Orissa Penwell. And I will do whatever it takes to do so.”

I curled my fingers around his. “I almost believe you.” He didn’t say anything but kept a hold on my hand. Six and a half hours later we switched places. Hayden rested his hand on my thigh, reassuringly giving it a squeeze every few minutes until he drifted off to sleep.

We reached what was left of Greenville, South Carolina, around ten the next morning. There were zombies—lots of them.

“
Hopefully that means there are no crazies,” I mumbled. “Some silver lining, I know.”

“
Time to start the count,” Hayden told me with a mischievous smile. I retrieved a high powered rifle from the back, opened my window and took down three S2s. Rider came over the walkie-talkie saying those didn’t count. Hayden laughed, told him to stop being a baby and that the two of us would still beat the three of them.

We drove up and down the streets, picking them off one by one. Hayden said it would take forever to make this part of Greenville safe enough to explore, and that he had an idea. He radioed Rider and told him to follow us. We drove into the middle of downtown, stopped, and opened the windows. Hayden turned on his IPod and cranked up the volume.

The zombies snarled and groaned, limping and dragging themselves in the direction of the music. I fired rounds into four zombies, emptying the magazine.

“
Hang on,” I said, getting out of the truck, my arms full of guns and ammo. I jumped in the back, loaded the machine gun and fired. It was a rush, using a gun with that much power. Brock and Wade crouched in the back of their SUV, shooting zombies through the back window. When they drew too close for comfort, Hayden drove forward, gunning the gas too hard and making me misfire. I waved at Rider to get him to drive in front of us; I didn’t want to accidentally shoot them.

Bullets showered the crowd, zombies dropping, others tripping over their secondly dead bodies. A tiny piece of dread disappeared from my heart every time blood and brains splattered from a zombie’s rotten skull. I could hear Hayden cheering from inside the truck as he watched the blood bath.

“
Hold on!” he yelled and made a sharp U-turn, stomped on the gas, and sped right past the zombies. He held his left hand out of the window, pulling the trigger on his pistol, hitting a fast moving S2. We rocketed down an alley, the obnoxiously loud country music drawing out zombies like fan girls to a Justin Bieber concert.

A gaggle of zombies pushed against a chain link fence, one that had been put up in hopes of keeping the infected out. The wire acted as a cheese grater, slicing the flesh from their soggy, festering arms as they reached through. Hayden kept driving and I kept shooting. If anyone was alive and bunkering in this desolate town, they’d know we were here. Once the numbers weren’t so vast, Hayden followed Rider to a mall parking lot.

The mall seemed nice; when I saw a sign for Pottery Barn, I was tempted to go in and grab some décor for Raeya. I didn’t think the guys would go for it.

“
Hey,” I said, jumping out of the truck. An idea hit me that I couldn’t ignore. “Have you ever seen that movie where people hide in the mall from zombies? Maybe we should look inside.”

“
Why not?” Brock agreed. He slugged a backpack on, loaded his rifle and nodded.

“
While we’re in there,” Wade began, adjusting the scope on his gun. “We need more movies. I’m getting sick of what we have.”

“
Yeah,” I said with enthusiasm. Looking at Hayden I said, “We watched the same comedy three times last week. And I’m getting insoles because these shoes are really uncomfortable.”

“
Why don’t you get new shoes?” Hayden asked, raising an eyebrow.

“
I suppose. I like the boots though; they’re more or less bite-proof.” I looked down at my poor leather boots. I had spent a whole month working extra shifts (back when I had a job) to earn the money to buy them. They were scuffed to hell and stained with God knows what.

The five of us walked into the mall without the slightest drop of trepidation. Again, I was feeling cocky. Last time I felt cocky, Hayden and I came close to being blown up. The glass doors weren’t locked, nor were they broken or streaked with bloody hand prints.

That had to be a good sign, right?

We walked through Macy’s. It was startling to see that the emergency lights were still on. A lot of bigger companies and stores switched over to solar power during the Depression as a way to save money, so it probably wasn’t that uncommon. As tempting as it was to check out the shoes, the store was too big and too full of displays to feel safe. Rifles raised and ammo at the ready, we silently slipped through. Unscathed, we made it in. We stood at the mouth of the store, looking down the long mall halls. To my right was a Coach store.