The Survivor Chronicles (Book 3): The Forsaken (19 page)

"What are you talking about?" Xander demanded as he sat up in his chair.

"When you guys left to try and get supplies from the grocery store, we were discussing it. I had completely forgotten about it until now, but Riley how do you treat meningitis?"

"Ah..." her hand was shaking a little as she pulled the book back over to her and began to flip through the pages. "A combination of broad spectrum antibiotics and steroids if caught early enough, otherwise things get ugly. Encephalitis is treated symptomatically but corticosteroids are used to reduce swelling in the brain and inflammation."

"What are broad spectrum antibiotics?" John inquired.

Al held his finger up as he began to flip through his book again. "It is an antibiotic used to treat a greater range of bacteria than more specific antibiotics. Some types of broad spectrum antibiotics are penicillin, amoxicillin, ampicillin..."

Mary Ellen's sharp inhale stopped Al before he could go through the whole list of medicines. "We gave Xander a high dosage of ampicillin and prednisone, which is a steroid."

Riley's hand seized hold of his and squeezed it. He couldn't stop himself from looking down at his chest again as Carol's words drifted back to him.
Was
there something twisting around inside of him?

But that made no sense, he felt fine and if it had been the sickness, or something that had entered him from the bite, they seemed to have given him the right combination of medications to knock out whatever it was. He was beginning to doubt that it had simply been the infection that had made him so sick, but he knew that there was no sickness left inside of him, not anymore.

"So what you're saying is that we could still become infected by a bite?" John asked.

"Yes," Al answered.

"But Lee would have been vaccinated against meningitis? I had to be before I could go to college," Xander said.

"I've been vaccinated too," Bobby said.

"Same here," John told them.

"Yes, but vaccines don't always work, and if this is some kind of super mutated form of meningoencephalitis that has been trapped for thousands of years, then there is no way to be vaccinated against it," Riley said.

"Well this has just been a barrel of fun," John muttered as he leaned back in his chair and folded his arms over his chest.

"There is some good news in this," Al told him. "We may be able to help some of the sick ones. I think some of them may be too far gone, their bodies too ravished and their brains too rotten, but The Lost Souls, the ones just roaming aimlessly around may be savable. We have to find L-Dopa and we are definitely going to need to try and stock up on these antibiotics and steroids. We can survive a bite, if it is transmitted that way, and we may be able to fend off the sickness if we get it. The others, the really sick ones, they may just die off and they may start doing so soon."

Xander didn't like wishing for anyone to die, but he also didn't want to have to deal with those things ever again if he could help it. He wasn't entirely sure Al was right about them just dying off though. They looked gross, they acted completely inhuman, but their movements and their thought processes led him to believe that they were far healthier than they appeared to be.

"Maybe," he said.

"
If
we find the medicine for it," Peter finally spoke. "And
if
we can find these medicines why would we share them with people we don't even know?"

Xander frowned at Peter's words, he actually made a good point but it wasn't one that he agreed with. "I think we're safe from the initial wave of sickness. We must have a natural immunity to it, or our bodies have been able to fight it off. If we can reawaken The Lost Souls we'll have more people, and we'll be better able to fight off the more rabid ones," Al said.

"We'll also have more people vying for our food," Peter said as his feet hit the floor. "If you somehow manage to save more people then you're risking our limited food supply."

Something tickled at the edge of Xander's mind as he stared at the teacher. Shadows played over Peter's face in a way that reminded him of the creepy fortuneteller machines, with the fake wizard inside you could sometimes find at a county fair. There was a fevered gleam in Peter's eyes that made the maniacal laugh the wizards emitted, upon spitting out their predictions, sound in his head.

Xander's gaze slid to Riley beside him. He pulled her a little closer as his other hand fell to the gun at his waist. "If there's something we can do for them, then we have to do it," John said.

"Do you honestly think there is anything that you can
do
for those people?" Peter demanded. "Half of them are eating anything they can get their hands on, and the other half are eating their
own
hair and flesh. Do you think they
want
to be saved? Would
you
?"

It was a fair enough question and Xander pondered it as once again the library became unnaturally still. "Yes," he finally answered as his thumb brushed over the back of Riley's knuckles. "Yes, if there was something that someone could do for me, I
would
choose to be saved. Life, no matter how difficult and awful, is something I would choose to have."

Peter's eyes seemed as empty as deep space as he pinned Xander with his gaze. "There is also survival of the fittest and only the strong survive. Right now they're occupied with eating themselves, or simply starving to death. If you succeeded in reviving them you're creating more enemies for us, more people that we will have to worry about and possibly fight with."

"But, they're people," Riley said softly.

"They're a threat."

"Ok wait," Al said as he rose to his feet. "First of all, there is no guarantee we'd even be able to find any L-Dopa, let alone know if it would actually work. There is no reason to fight over a purely hypothetical situation. If an opportunity happens to arise in the future we can discuss it then, but it's pointless to do so now."

Peter's eyes darted over them before finally settling on Al again. "You're right, but let's keep it hypothetical," he muttered before retreating behind the desk.

Al remained standing for a minute before sliding into his chair once more. Xander wanted to say something but he was well aware of the fact that Peter's eyes were still focused on them. He got the same impression from the others as they shifted awkwardly and ruffled some paper. Carl remained standing, his arms folded over his chest. Shadowed by the brim of his hat, his eyes were riveted upon Peter.

"We
will
help them," John said under his breath.

"Shh," Carl hushed him.

"Let's make a list of all the medicines that would work. That way if we run across them we'll know which ones to take," Al suggested as the extended silence began to stretch awkwardly.

"Yeah, that sounds like a good idea," Riley said.

Riley switched to a new page in the notepad and began to write as Al listed the antibiotics. Xander tried not to be obvious about it, but his gaze was repeatedly drawn back to Peter as the teacher's eyes remained riveted upon them. He was becoming increasingly convinced that whatever was going on with Peter was what Carol had been trying to warn him about.

John,

John placed the last of the books into the trunk of the Cadillac. He'd purposely set the first aid book on top of the pile, if recent events were any indication it was the one they would end up using the most. He stared at it, wondering if it would even help them if something really bad were to happen again. He noiselessly closed the lid of the trunk and rested his fingers against it. He knew it wasn't a matter of
if
something bad were to happen again, but
when
.

His gaze drifted back to the library door that had been propped open as Riley shuffled out with an armload of blankets. He hurried to help her before she tripped over the edge of the blanket and ended up needing the first aid book before they even pulled out of the parking lot.

Xander and Carl were standing at the back of the truck keeping watch when John and Riley approached them with the blankets. "Almost ready to go?" Carl asked.

"Almost," Riley answered.

Al and Mary Ellen appeared in the doorway next with Rochelle close on Mary Ellen's heels. "Where's Peter?" Carl asked Al.

"Heading for the bathrooms with Bobby, Josh, and Donald the last time I saw him," Al answered.

"Maybe we should just leave him," John muttered.

Riley shot him a fierce look before she tossed the blankets into the back of the truck. "We're not leaving Bobby," she told him forcefully.

"No of course not," John assured her. "But that guy is really starting to creep me out."

"Which is why he's probably attached himself to the others," Carl said. "I think he suspects that some of us have become not so fond of him."

Al glanced between them before turning to look at the library. "Maybe he is a little more unstable then I'd originally thought," he said as he rubbed at the gray stubble lining his jaw.

"He's more unstable then all of the Looney Tunes combined," John told him.

Carl adjusted his stance to look over at the library doors. John searched the deserted town but the only movement he saw was a scrap of newspaper blowing across the street before catching on a small elm tree beside the road. In his head he could hear really bad horror movie music playing as he studied the motionless windows of the buildings surrounding them.
Where had they all gone?

"Are you going to continue to ride in the car with him?" Carl asked Mary Ellen.

"Rochelle, put this stuff in the car," Mary Ellen said as she handed her daughter a bag of food supplies.

Rochelle's face scrunched up, she hesitated as she glanced around at them, but when no one else spoke she turned and walked over to the car. "She's a tough kid," John said.

"I know she is," Mary Ellen told him as she turned back to the others. "And I'm sure she suspects, or knows, most of what went on between her father and I, but her father is dead and I'm not about to say anything bad about him in front of her."

John frowned as he leaned against the truck. "What does her father have to do with anything?" Riley asked.

Mary Ellen glanced over her shoulder to make sure Rochelle was out of hearing before she turned back to them. "I spent all of my adult life afraid of Larry, and trying to figure out a way to escape him, but he's gone now. I refuse to be scared of anyone who isn't trying to eat me anymore, and I'm not going to back down from anyone."

John shifted uncomfortably and looked around at the others. He knew that not all relationships were great, knew how awful some of them could be. Even his parents, who had been deeply in love with each other, had been tempted to kill each other a time or two. But his mother had never been frightened of his father; in fact, he would have put money on the fact that his father had been more afraid of his mother when she was in a mood, but then John had been too. His mom had been as sweet as pie most of the time, but cross her and she was scarier than an ogre guarding a bridge.

"I'd still prefer if you rode in the truck," Carl said. "I don't trust him."

"I don't either," Mary Ellen admitted. "But no, I'm staying in the car. I'd like Rochelle to stay with you though."

"This isn't the same as Larry, Mary Ellen. This is a man that might very well be spiraling into madness due to what is going on around him," Al said.

"You're right it's not the same. Larry was an ass at heart, but Peter was a good man once, or at least he seemed to be when we first met him. Peter may be cracking under the pressure, or he may simply need some time to get his act together again. I'm not willing to give up on him though, not yet."

She was a better person then he was, John decided. He wouldn't ride in the car with that guy or be anywhere
near
him if he had the choice. In fact, after last night John pretty much considered Peter a lost cause. He didn't know what was going to happen with Peter if they ever did find some L-Dopa. He did know that
he
wasn't going to let people die if they might be able to save them.

"Can we at least agree that if we find something that could help people we are going to use it?" John asked.

Carl stepped forward as Peter and Donald emerged from the library. His hand moved toward the gun at his side before dropping down again. "We'll do what we can," Carl said briskly.

"Yes we will," Xander agreed and stepped in front of Riley as Peter approached them.

Josh and Bobby followed behind the other two and joined them at the back of the truck. John glanced at the serene streets again before hitting the side of the truck. "Let's get out of here," he said. "Maybe we can make it out of Connecticut today."

"That would be good," Riley said.

John couldn't take his gaze away from Peter as the man covered his eyes against the harsh sun. Sensitivity to light was one of the symptoms, but as he studied Peter's haggard features he didn't see any of the other symptoms on the man. It wasn't sickness that was affecting him, John was certain of that.

He tore his attention away from Peter as Rochelle arrived at his side. Grabbing the handle of the passenger door, he pulled it open and waited for her to hop inside. He climbed in beside her and slammed the door closed. He grabbed the bag of Twizzlers off the dash, pulled one out and bit into it. Even the familiar taste of the much loved licorice couldn't relax him as he braced his foot on the dashboard.

"You guys really don't like Peter, do you?" Rochelle asked as she snatched the next Twizzler out of his hand.

John shot her a look but dug into the bag and grabbed another one. "We didn't say that."

"I'm not blind and I'm certainly not stupid," she said. "There's a reason my mom doesn't want me in that car."

"Well kid you don't exactly smell like roses right now," John told her.

"I still smell better then you on your best day!" she retorted.

He grinned at her as he bit into his Twizzler. "You are a kid after my own heart."

She rolled her eyes at him. "You're not getting me off the topic."

"I didn't think I would. No, we're not very fond of Peter," he admitted to her.

Carl glanced over at him but he didn't say anything as he drove around a tree that was blocking half the road. "Why not?" she asked.

John shrugged and looked to Carl for help but Carl just shook his head. "This is all you."

"I'm not really sure, there's just something about him," he told her as he handed her another Twizzler. "He seemed like an ok guy in the beginning, but I think he may be a little off right now, it's probably just the pressure of everything that's going on."

"Yeah, I guess," she said. "I wish my mom wasn't in the car with him."

"She'll be fine," Carl assured her.

Rochelle didn't say anything more as she leaned back in the seat. Carl pulled into the parking lot of a small grocery store behind Xander and drove by the broken glass door. "What do you think?" Carl asked as he stopped the truck in front of one of the shattered windows.

"I'm not exactly a fan of grocery stores anymore," John said as he studied the glass littering the sidewalk and the shadowed interior of the store.
Is it worth it to go in there for a possible can of beans and some stale bread?
He wondered as he scanned the debris that was scattered across the sidewalk. There probably wasn't any beans or bread left anyway. "I doubt there's much we can get from in there."

"There could be something though," Carl said.

There could be, and though it may only be a can of beans, it was a can that they didn't have. He was grabbing for the door when movement within the store froze his hand on the handle. A shadow flickered over the walls before moving with rapid speed toward the broken windows. Judging by the shadow, whatever it was that was coming at them was on all fours as it ran forward. He was really hoping it was a dog but instinctively he already knew that it wasn't.

His hand fell away from the handle as he reached up to lock the door. "There's someone inside."

Carl was shifting into drive as a person's head popped up over the window frame. His eyes were more bloodshot then an alcoholic on a bender for a month. His gaze searched over the vehicles before coming to a rest on the truck. "I think you had better drive," Rochelle said as she lowered her hands into her lap. "Now."

John couldn't agree more as mottled red hands, with broken fingernails, wrapped around the brick wall of the store. Blood seeped from the man's sliced palms as glass from the frame dug into them. The strange new human didn't seem to notice the blood though as he lifted himself onto the wall and perched like a cat. That hideous rash had spread over the right side of his face, but the left side remained strangely untouched. It was like some sort of gruesome mask where one side displayed what had once been a healthy man and the other revealed the monster that he had become.

The man's bloodshot eyes focused on him. For one prolonged minute, John was certain that the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde across from him was seeing straight into his soul. That this man was searching for something within John, searching for some answer that John didn't have, or searching for some connection to his humanity that had been taken from him. John pressed his fingers against the window as he stared at the man across from him.

The man rose and leapt off of the wall. John's heart lurched into his throat as the man began to approach the truck at a loping run.

"Carl..." he started.

The truck surged forward as Carl finally hit the gas. Xander had already moved the car and was driving out of the parking lot when they caught up to him. John looked in the mirror at the Caddy that Donald was now driving. The man that had emerged from the grocery store charged at the car but Donald managed to swerve around him. John winced as the man threw himself forward and bounced across the parking lot before rolling to his feet and continuing to chase after the car.

"Damn," John muttered as he bit into his Twizzler again. "They're definitely persistent lunatics."

"I really hope this cabin is going to be safe," Rochelle whispered. "It would be wonderful to simply just be for a little bit, to have a roof over our heads and a place to lie down."

"That sounds even better than sitting on a beach with a rum drink in my hand," John confirmed.

"I think I might make myself a rum drink when we get there," Carl said.

"Make that two," John told him. "With an umbrella."

Carl offered him a listless smile as he drove onto the sidewalk and down a few front lawns to avoid some toppled poles and wires. "That sounds yummy," Rochelle said.

"Stick to the Twizzlers kid," John told her as he handed her the bag.

She frowned at him but took the bag. "My teeth are going to fall out."

"It's a good possibility."

He leaned back in the seat to take in the passing scenery. It was nice not to see the complete destruction in this town that had been waged throughout Massachusetts. Smoke curled on the horizon, but it didn't look like it was a raging inferno and they were heading in the opposite direction of the smoke. At first he was so focused on the blaze in the mirror that he didn't realize the scenery around them had begun to change. He frowned and sat up straighter as they turned onto another street in what had only minutes ago been a completely lifeless town.

They drove by the burnt remains of a few homes. What looked like a massive airplane engine was lying on top of one of the homes, with its tail in the side yard. A few seats had been scattered across front yards and in the middle of the road. "Is that a plane?" Rochelle inquired.

"It was," he confirmed.

Rochelle shook her head and dropped the bag of candy on the dashboard. The neighborhood around them didn't have the same devastation that had been wrought on a lot of the neighborhoods in Massachusetts, but the atmosphere had definitely changed since they'd left the library. The front doors on most of the homes were open and the windows had been busted out of most of them. Blankets, shoes, clothes, some chairs and even a few TV's were scattered across the front yards in a haphazard manner.

"I'd say that these homes have been picked through pretty thoroughly," Carl said.

"Were we planning on stopping?" John asked.