Chapter 9: The Plan

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The next morning, they were given a miniscule meal. Two granola bars and a small bottle of water was all they had to last them until dinner.

John’s mother gave her portion to Jacob.

“He needs it more than I.” She said as she handed him her granola bars.

They ate in relative quiet. No one in camp really talked much anymore. The truth that things may never be the same started to sink into the hearts of the refugees.

Two more days passed as such and everyone was getting hungrier and more tired. There simply was not enough food going around. Often, there were be fights to try to take the rations of others.

John looked around and saw a couple girls coming back from military tents carrying entire bags of food. When he asked his group why, Sophia responded while chewing on her granola bar.

“The soldiers give them a little extra from their rations if the girls keep them company for the night.” She said. It was the oldest profession in the history of man. John, upon realizing this, was appalled and angered at the military.

He thought they came here to be safe, but all they were given were meager rations and sat around doing little more than act as the playthings of the soldiers.

His image of comfort and security after meeting his mom, his belief that things might be okay, shattered instantly.

“I could go. Bring back some food.” Sophia offered quietly.

“No.” John said quickly.

“I won’t let them do anything to me. I can handle myse-”

“I said no. You stay here.” John almost shouted. He was not going to let her play their game. They had nothing left except their tenacity and dignity and John wasn’t going to let a few extra granola bars change that. Not for him. Not for his group.

“The second we find the chance, we’re leaving.” John decided.

“Leave where? There’s nowhere safer than here.” His mother asked.

“Somewhere. West. Or south, towards Georgia. We could stop by the NIH, pick up David’s mom and head down south to the CDC and see if his dad can give us some answers.” John proposed. It was the most viable way of finding out what had happened but there was a problem.

“That’s hundreds of miles of road, John.” Sophia said. “Who knows how many infected we’d have to fight through to get there.”

“What about West?” Jacob asked. “Isn’t it less populated there? We could be safer there than here.”

The others thought for a moment. Would it be better to go south, looking for answers? Or West, to find safety? The choice was simple, but the matter of finding David’s parents were also important. David made the choice for them.

“We’ll go South-West. We’ll take a detour, heading inland before turning south. That way we can avoid the coastal cities and hopefully stay out of the fallout radius of the bombs that may have dropped on other places.” David reasoned. “Once we go down, we’ll see if dad is alive and...and if not, we go back inland. Set up camp and bunker down until the virus runs its course.”

The others, after thinking about it, decided to go with that plan.

Sophia raised a question, “a bit of a problem with that plan.”

She looked towards the guards patrolling the fence. “I’m pretty sure they won’t let us leave. Plus, we don’t have supplies to last us if we do. I don’t expect to find a lot if we have to scavenge on the way there.”

They agreed. Later, they decided to wait for a few days, gathering as much supplies as they could get, stealing if need be.

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David used to part-time at a mechanics so he offered to help fix the army vehicles in exchange for extra food. With what he got and the little bits and pieces he managed to steal on the job, the group started stockpiling once again.

They needed to hide the supplies from the soldiers and the refugees to avoid gathering unwanted attention.

Sophia had gone to hit the medical tent while Jacob and his mother watched the car.

As for Sam...They let Sam sort out his issues by himself. He came and went on his own.

John walked around the camp. Not many people were walking, most opting to sit around and talk amongst themselves in hushed tones. He was looking for something that would meet his needs.

Just then, he found just the person. She was a brunette with a larger than life bust. She was wearing very provocative clothing and she was making her way to her small red jeep, putting in a bag of supplies into the trunk.

“Excuse me.” John spoke up. The woman turned around and smiled.

“I’m sorry, it seems you’re a bit young for my services.” She said, looking him up and down seductively.

“But if you’ve got what I need, I can make an exception.”

John just threw a bag of food at her feet. It landed with a clatter as you could hear a couple cans clang together.

“I’m not here for that.” John said with a straight face. Keep it together. Don’t look down. Don’t look down. John recited the sacred mantra chanted by most men in the presence of a such a woman.

“Oh? And what is that?” She asked.

“You see that officer?” John asked as he pointed to a man stepping out of a humvee.

“I need you to steal his keys for me.” He said. The woman raised her eyebrows, looking at the food, and nodded.

“Two birds with one stone. It’s a deal.” She replied, walking off to the man’s tent.

“Wait for me, hun. This’ll only take a little while.”

Indeed, she hadn’t entered the tent for more than 20 minutes before she came out. Not very impressive. John secretly said to the officer. It didn’t matter for him though, as he had gotten what he came for.

The woman threw the keys to him and he deftly caught it. He pocketed the keys and nodded towards her and returned to the car.

On his way back, he marked all the supply crates in his mind and decided to go for them on his next run.

He had already stolen sets of army uniforms earlier and they were planning on using that disguise to leave.

The camp was separated into two parts. On one side, the civilians stayed in their cars or in their tents while the other side housed the army. John had walked to the edge of the boundary between the two camps and had asked the woman to steal the keys for the humvee parked along the edge.

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He arrived at the Escalade and found everyone back from their own assignments. David had stolen an entire toolbox and even a radio.

Sophia had somehow got her hands on a lot of medical supplies. That included syringes, medication, painkillers, and gauze. She also had an entire set of surgeon’s tools wrapped up in a leather bag.

John had just a pair of keys. He felt like he was losing somehow.

“Sam?”.

“Bathroom, as far as I know.” David said.

“You got all that in one trip?” John asked Sophia.

She simply shrugged, “What can I say, I have talent.”

Just when she finished saying that, a whirring sound could be heard overhead, causing everyone in the compound to look for the source. Soon someone pointed to the sky and others looked up as well. There, several jets could be seen streaking across the sky. Their engines howled like an army of angry ghosts. The planes flew past their heads and went towards the city.

John looked towards David, who looked back at him. The same thought was running through their minds.

“They wouldn’t do that...would they?” David asked unbelieving, his facing draining of color.

“Do what?” Sophia asked. David, Sam, and John had been long time fans of hate-loving the overly militaristic approach of some of the United States’ foreign and domestic policies and had cried accusing police state every chance they could. Of course, they immediately thought of one possibility when a military plane approached a city in chaos, or just any city in general.

They were going to bomb the living daylights out of it.

They climbed on the roof of the car and looked as the plane approached the city center.

“You dumbasses, don’t do what I think you’re going to do…” John whispered as he watched the plane fly towards the city.

Large packages were released from the planes as they passed over the city hall.

“You’ve got to be kidding m-” John said as he and the others jumped down from the car, hiding behind the large SUV for cover.

He couldn’t finish his sentence before a blast exploded from the epicenter, instantly sending a shockwave through the city, traversing the dozens of miles to get to the compound.

Since they were far enough away, they were outside the blast radius, but the force of the shock wave and wind alone traversed that distance in seconds and blasted through the camp. The fences simply crumbled under the wind pressure, tents were ripped from their roots, while cars were flipped over.

The small group had leaned on the SUV as hard as they could, trying to stop it from flipping over and crushing them. Despite their efforts, it skidded backwards at least 5 feet, lifting off one end and tipping over dangerously over the group, as they tried to counterbalance the weight pressed upon them.

After what seemed like minutes, but was in reality mere seconds, the winds died down and the car once again crashed to the ground. Around them, screams of pain and groans could be heard from the luck survivors.

Those not so fortunate had simply been ripped from the ground and flung off dozens of meters in the distance. Around them, wreckage and destruction could be seen.

The five sat down against the car, breathing heavily to catch their breath and calm their hearts after that ordeal.

“I thought it’d be something like napalm but who would have thought they’d nuke the fucking city.” David cursed. Indeed, the explosion was equivalent to that of a nuclear blast.

John could not hear David, however. The Rider trio were stunned. Their father had last been seen going to the market to pick up supplies and had not returned. If he didn’t die from the infected, the nuclear blast or the radioactive fallout would surely have finished the job.

John’s father was dead.

John could hear a ringing in his ears as he sat stunned at the realization. He had somewhere buried in his heart, a hope that his father would have already been at the camp, fine and well, by the time John made it, or that he was hiding somewhere safe, waiting for the time to make his way back to his family. But the bomb had taken away that possibility. No one within a ten-mile radius could have survived that blast.

His father’s words were running through his mind.

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“That ball of happiness in your heart will spread as you breathe, filling up your lungs and moving all over your body” His father said the last part while tickling the boy all over, making him giggle wildly.

“And once that happiness is in you, it’ll make you stronger. Stronger than you’ve ever been before. You can do anything and be anything but you need to give the happiness a helping hand. Take the first step, John. And then the next, and the next, and you keep going until before you know it, you’re running like no tomorrow.”

As his father was saying this, the boy imagined the ball of happiness diffuse as threads of light, moving throughout his body and empowering him. He dreamed of running through green pastures as fast as the wind, leaving behind a swirl of light and music. He smiled at this image and the father seeing his son happy again, smiled as well.

“Now open your eyes, John.” When John opened his eyes, he saw his father looking into his.

“That’s all it is, son. Carry the light in you and keep moving forward.”

The boy nodded. His father always knew how to make him feel better.

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“One...two...three…one...two...thr-*sob*” John tried counting but broke down crying.

Whenever he remembered happy thoughts and made that ball of light, it was filled with memories of him with his family and his father.

But now his father was gone and the light inside him had dimmed.

“Dad...I-I don’t have the light in me anymore” He sobbed, clenching his heart. After all the pain and suffering, there was no more light within him to summon. Tears streamed down his face as he looked up into the ash filled sky.

Suddenly a torrent of moments with his father poured into his mind. Memories of his father taking him to the zoo or memories of his father encouraging him, giving him that trademark smile that would make John feel like the proudest son in the entire world.

“I know you can do it, son. You’re strong. Come on.” He recollected his father standing above him, his head outlined by the crimson red of the setting sun. He had been training him for the upcoming race at his school and he had collapsed out of exhaustion, lying prostrate on the ground. When he thought he could not go on, his father had pushed him, sensing the hidden potential within him.

“Get up, bud. Just keep moving forward, one step at a time. Come on, get up. Get up...”

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“GET UP!” David’s yell snapped John back to reality as he looked up. David was dragging John towards the back of the car, trying to put him in. The others had gotten in as well and his mother had taken the wheel.

In the distance, the destroyed fence had provided an opening to the outside world, and several infected had made their way into the compound. In moments, they would be upon the little group.

John struggled to stand up on his legs but they had no power.

“Come on, John. One step at a time. Let’s go.” David encouraged. Hearing the familiar words, John’s consciousness was dragged back to reality and strength slowly returned to his appendages. He moved one leg at a time and with effort got into the back seat with David and Jacob.

Once they were all in they started driving in the opposite direction as the city, towards the back entrance of the compound.

John simply looked back at the mushroom cloud suspended over the city. He only felt a coldness seeping through his entire being. He silently saluted towards the city, in the direction he believed his father rested, and turned back around.

“Sam? Where is he?” John asked.

David simply shook his head. Sam had not made it back when the bomb dropped.