Mass Extinction Event: The Complete Third Series (Days 46 to 53) (23 page)

Elizabeth

“
This is a total mess,” Toad says as he fiddles with the radio. “It's as if the old fool took a bunch of different systems, grabbed bits of each, and then tried to fit them together like some kind of Frankenstein's monster.”

“
So it doesn't work?” I ask as I hobble over to the table and set down two plates of disgusting-looking tinned meat.

“
Actually, that's the surprising part,” he continues, flicking a couple of switches. “I think it
does
work. I never had Dan Hodge down as an engineering genius, but somehow he managed to rig it up pretty well. I mean, I can't check it right now, 'cause I need to find a way to fit the battery to the main unit, but there seems to be some kind of a charge in there. I figure I can work on it later and maybe get it up and running, and then we can give it a try.”

“
Do you think we can make contact with other people?” I ask.

“
Maybe. If there's anyone out there. He's got a booster unit linked in to the system and it looks to be running through to some kind of antenna, so I think the range could be pretty long, maybe as much as a few hundred miles. I've got to admit, I don't really understand all the work he did here, but there's definitely a chance.” Getting to his feet, he comes over to the table and takes a seat. “Don't get your hopes up, though,” he continues. “Even if I get it working, there still might not be anyone else out there with a similar system. We might get nothing back but static.”

“
I know,” I reply, easing myself into the opposite seat. “I'm not getting my hopes up. I just figure it'd be good if we can try. You never know.”

I pause for a moment, watching as he uses his knife to examine the meat.

“So did you find anything we can use?” I ask eventually.

“
I found the chicken coop,” he replies, “but something had been in and got at them all. Probably a fox. There were a few signs of rabbits, though, so I'm gonna set traps today and see what we can get hold of. Hopefully we can keep ourselves well-fed for the next few days, until we're ready to move on.”

“
Do we really have to move on at all?” I ask.

He stares at me.

“If we don't have anywhere to go,” I continue, “then maybe we should just accept that we need to stay somewhere. Anywhere.” I pause for a moment. “Here.”

“
Here?” he asks incredulously.

“
We can fix it up a little,” I reply. “We can't be picky, can we? We left your farm because the land was spoiled, but if things are better here, then I don't see why we shouldn't hold out for a bit.” I wait for him to say something, but it's clear that he's not very enthusiastic. “I'm tired of always traveling,” I tell him. “These constant journeys aren't really getting us anywhere, and I feel like we're slowly slipping further and further until...”

My voice trails off, and I wait for him to say something.

“Just the two of us?” he asks eventually.

“
Three of us, counting Rachel.”

Again, he seems distinctly unimpressed by the idea.

“It wouldn't necessarily be forever,” I continue. “But it wouldn't be
that
bad, would it? I mean, looking after Rachel is hard enough, but doing it on the road, especially when I'm kinda impaired, is going to be almost impossible. At least for a little while, wouldn't the smartest thing be to just stop and try to get ourselves sorted?”

“
And act like some happy little family?” he replies, as if the idea is crazy.

“
I didn't say that,” I mutter, cutting off a slice of meat and slipping it into my mouth, and then having to force myself not to gag as I eventually manage to swallow it. It's quite possibly the foulest thing I've ever eaten in my life.

“
I'll think about it,” he says, before taking a mouthful from his own plate. I can see from the look in his eyes that he hates the meat too, but he forces himself to swallow.

“
It's horrible, huh?” I say with a faint smile.

“
It's the most disgusting thing I've ever tasted,” he replies.

“
There's a lot of it,” I continue. “The guy who used to live here, he seems to have stockpiled the stuff. I'm pretty sure it's not gonna go off, either. And if it does, maybe it'll even taste better.”

“
So this is what you want to do?” he asks. “You want to sit around here, eating this crap, and hoping that things get better?”

“
Unless you've got a better idea, I think it's our best option.”

He stares at me for a moment, and I can tell that although he doesn't necessarily like my suggestion, he doesn't really have anything to counter it with.

“I'll think about it,” he says finally, before cutting off another piece of the foul meat.

As we sit in silence and continue to eat, I can't help thinking that I might have won him around to my way of thinking. The truth is, I feel as if I need to rest, at least for a little while, and it wouldn't be so bad to spend some time here. All I want, for a short period of time, is some stability, at least while my leg starts to heal. If we have to set off again and carry on with our journey right away, I think I might end up collapsing.

A few minutes later, as Toad prepares to head out for another hunting trip, I find myself wanting to ask him what he's thinking, even though I'm too nervous about the answer I might get. I keep myself busy with the dishes, which take a lot longer to clean since I have to balance carefully, and Toad is busy getting his supplies ready. Glancing out the window, I see that the clouds are starting to turn darker, and a cold wind is blowing between the trees. If I didn't know better, I'd say that there's a huge storm coming.

“
I'll only be a few hours,” Toad says eventually, heading to the door.

“
Wait,” I reply, hurrying over to him as fast as I can manage. “What I said about us staying here, it was just -”

“
I know,” he says, looking a little awkward.

“
Do you think there's going to be a storm?”

“
Looks like it. I'm planning to get enough food for two days, so hopefully I won't need to go out again until it's blown over.”

He pauses, as if he wants to say something else, and then to my surprise he leans closer and kisses the side of my face. When he pulls back, there seems to be a hint of tension between us, and almost involuntarily I move toward him and press my lips against his. My heart is racing and I know I should stop, but slowly we start to kiss, and this time neither of us moves away. I can't put my arms around him, since I have to keep hold of the crutches, but I feel a shiver pass through my body as he places his hands on my waist and moves closer, and the kiss becomes more passionate and more intense. Finally, after a few minutes, he pulls back.

“I should get going,” he says.

“
Do you -”

“
I'll be back soon,” he adds, before turning and heading out the door.

As I watch him head off through the forest, I realize that I have no idea what that kiss meant. There's a part of me that wants to believe we might actually have a connection, although I'm also worried that we're just doing this because neither of us has anyone else. I wish he'd stayed and told me what he was thinking, but I guess he's a private kind of person and it might be harder to tease out his feelings. Hearing Rachel start to cry in the next room, I turn and start making my way through to comfort her, but all I can think about is Toad and that kiss. Despite all my misgivings, I want to believe that it meant something to him. At the same time, I honestly don't know how he sees me.

“It's okay,” I tell Rachel as I pick her up. I feel as if I spend half my life telling her not to worry, but I guess there's not much else I can say to her. “Don't cry. Everything's going to be fine.”

Thomas

“
She's been here,” I say as we reach the truck, a little way off from the lake. The door's hanging open, and I'm damn certain it was shut when we left a couple of days ago. “The bitch probably came to take whatever she could get her hands on.”

As soon as I put my hand on the door, I have to pull it away again. It's a cloudless day, and the metal is already hot enough to sear the skin.

Climbing into the driver's seat, I start checking to see if anything's missing. Sure enough, the glove box has been left open, and it's clear that Quinn went rifling through it for anything that might be useful. There wasn't much in there, but I guess she was panicking. As I turn to get back out of the truck, I spot a folded piece of paper on the passenger seat. Reaching down to grab it, I find that it's the stupid drawing she showed me back in Chicago, the one that supposedly came from a dream and convinced her that the three of us should make this journey. Just as I'm about to toss it aside, however, I realize that there's something written on the other side, and I turn it around to reveal a short note:

Thomas, I know what they're saying, but I didn't kill her. I'd never do that. It was one of the others. They turned on Kaylee and killed her, and then they blamed me. I'm sorry I ran, but I knew you wouldn't believe me. I've gone to find the signal. Please don't think that I killed her. I'm sure you know in your heart that I could never do that. You have to get out of there. Don't trust them.

I stare at the note, reading it a couple more times as I try to make sense of the bullshit she expects me to believe. There were fifteen witnesses who all saw her kill Kaylee, and yet she seriously expects me to believe that it's all some kind of big conspiracy against her. I actually feel genuinely insulted that she thinks I'm so goddamn gullible. I'm starting to think that Quinn is seriously wrong in the head, to the extent that she maybe doesn't even recognize reality.

“
Lying bitch,” I mutter, tossing the note onto the seat before shuffling back out.

“
You have a lot of gas here,” Mark says as he climbs up onto the back of the truck. “Food, too. I'm impressed, Thomas. You've really got this thing stocked up pretty well.”

“
I passed a lot of abandoned gas stations,” I tell him. “I stopped at them and grabbed what I could. At first I felt like a thief, but then I figured it was just gonna go to waste. I mean, every road was just totally abandoned. My brother taught me that it was okay, and eventually I kinda saw things from his point of view.”

“
Absolutely,” he replies, looking through the bags of food that I got from the gas station where I found George. “You chose wisely, too. A lot of this stuff is going to last for a long time.” He pauses, before turning to me. “Thomas, I know I have no right to ask this, but the community -”

“
Take it,” I tell him.

“
Are you sure?”

“
We have to share,” I reply, before turning to look across the nearby field. To be honest, I'm a little confused by the fact that Quinn didn't take anything else from the truck, but I guess she was in a hurry to get away. She must have taken her laptop and run off through the field, heading toward the spot where she thinks the signal is based. I thought that tracking her down would be easy, but now I'm starting to think that maybe she got a pretty decent headstart. Still, there's no way she's going to escape. By the end of today, I'm going to get hold of her.

“
The people are really going to be grateful,” Mark says as he sorts through the bags, pulling out candy bars and bags of potato chips. “I know it probably sounds crazy, but stuff like this could give them a real morale boost.”

“
We have to keep going,” I say, keen to make sure that we don't lose focus. “While we're standing here, she's getting further and further away.”

“
So which way do you think she went?” he asks.

“
West,” I reply, scanning the horizon in a vain attempt to spot something that might help.

“
There's a lot of west out there. Care to narrow it down a little?”

“
She's got that stupid laptop,” I continue. “She's using it to try to work out the source of the signal, but I think the battery should have run out by now. I don't even know if she was
actually
getting closer or just fooling herself. I could tell there was something wrong with her, but I never thought she was properly insane. She's probably not even going in a straight line. That goddamn laptop'll be leading her in circles.”

There's an awkward pause, and when I turn to Mark I can see that he's not convinced.

“So what's the alternative?” I ask. “Should we just let her run off and get away with it? You said yourself that we need to set an example for everyone else. If we let lawlessness rule, there'll be other deaths. People have to be shown the rules sometimes.”

“
And what exactly are you planning to do if we catch up to her?”

Reaching into the back of the truck, I grab Joe's old toolbox. Once I've got the lid open, it only takes a few seconds for me to find the hunting knife he used to carry for protection. I remember begging him not to ever use it on someone, and at the time I thought he was this dangerous, heavy-drinking thug; now I understand, however, that he simply felt that he had to defend himself. A man shouldn't go out into the world without some kind of protection.

“Thomas -”

“
It was my brother's,” I reply quickly.

“
But still -”

“
It's just so we've got something to use in case she turns violent,” I tell him, as I hitch the knife to my belt. “You saw what she did to Kaylee. I don't know what's got into her head, but she might have lost her mind. I'm totally prepared to take her back to the lake and let everyone pretend to hold a trial, but if she turns on us, I want to be ready for her. I've killed people before, so I can do it again, especially...” I pause for a moment, surprised to hear these words leaving my mouth. I guess I've changed a lot over the past few weeks. “Don't you think it should be an eye for an eye?” I ask eventually. “You heard what the others said. Kaylee was gasping for air as she died. She knew what was happening. Quinn didn't show Kaylee any mercy, so why should we show
her
any?”

“
Because we're not animals,” he replies solemnly.

“
Yeah, we are. We're humans, and humans are just another type of animal. I'm all for being civilized, but sometimes there's a danger you take it too far. If you don't want to come with me, you can just take the stuff from the truck back to the others and I'll be back as soon as I've tracked Quinn down. I understand that this isn't really your fight.”

“
I'm coming with you,” he replies. “Someone has to -”

I wait for him to finish.

“Someone has to make sure I don't just cut her down in cold blood?” I ask eventually.

“
That's not what I was going to say,” he replies, obviously lying.

“
Really? 'Cause you'd have been right.”

He stares at me for a moment.

“Come on,” he says eventually, “it's a hot day. We should try to find some shade as we walk, otherwise we'll end up getting our brains fried.”

As he turns and heads west, I take a deep breath and try to stay calm. Mark obviously thinks that I'm some kind of bloodthirsty monster, and he might be right. Still, it's only because I want to make Quinn pay for what she did to Kaylee, and I have to admit that I hope she puts up a fight. Right now, I
want
to use the knife to finish her off, so I hope she gives me an excuse. With the sun burning high and bright above us, I turn and follow Mark. We set out across the field without say another word to one another, each lost in our own thoughts. Somewhere up ahead, Quinn is dancing around with that stupid laptop, but if she thinks she's going to get away with murdering Kaylee, she's wrong.

I'm coming for her.