"In we go," Logan muttered as we parked in front of the loading bay. I saw Indy at full attention from the rearview mirror, tongue sticking out, eyes glued outside the back seat window, taking everything in.

"Is that a freaking dog!" Yousef exclaimed when he walked past the car, almost spilling the bucket of water he had on his grip.

Logan got out of the car, grinning. "Name's Indy. We rescued him from vectors!"

Everyone loved Indy except for Peter, which wasn't a surprise.

For a split second, I had imagined smoke coming out from his furrowed brows, steam curling out from his lips with when he frowned, would probably breathe fire with the scolding he would lay down on me. Still, Haskell scattered it out of the wind with a high-pitched squeal, noises that I never thought would ever come from him. He ran toward the dog, stopping to make sure Indy wasn't going to bite his hand off, but the dog lowered his head, prompting Haskell to pet him around his scruff, cooing as if talking to a baby. The others heard and went out to the warehouse's storage bay. Once they laid eyes on Indy, they joined in the cacophony of baby noises.

I looked over to Logan, who sported this split-eating grin on his face, and I remembered what he said to me earlier: Dogs are funny, adorable stress relief. And I guessed he was right. Who could deny that innocent-looking face? Since our skirmishes with the Alphas, we were mentally drained (although some of us were good at hiding it), and Indy picked apart that shell, brought out what should be there in the first place. Hell, I smiled, too. After all those nights eating beans and corn out of cans, or with rice without salt or any meats, foraging for food, and not showering for days...it didn't seem as bad.

Jun was the last one to pet the dog, wary of him at first. He felt around his belly (Indy rolled over on his back and stuck his tongue out), frowned and stopped, and then strode out of the room without a word. It didn't take long before he came back with a bag of kibble bites inside an Amazon delivery box; the label swore it's supposed to taste like roasted chicken, peas, rice, and beef flavor. Jun took one of our plastic containers, and dumped two cups in the bowl, and passed it to Indy. The dog didn't wait for permission to eat.

Peter walked up to me, opened his mouth, but I put my finger up to silence him. "Don't even start. I had a bad day."

Peter thinned his lips and grunted. "I hope you know what you're doing."

"We found him on the street chased by vectors and barely could last a minute on his own. I thought we could bring him along as a guard dog."

"Just another mouth to feed."

And that's what I was worried about, too. I didn't say it out loud, instead, "I'm not counting on the day we're desperate enough to eat dog food, and I doubt we ever would. He can. I saw a bunch of Amazon and delivery boxes back there filled with all kinds of shit, and there's still plenty we haven't opened yet. I'm sure we can find more dog food for his taste, maybe more food for us, too."

"Fine. But I'm not gonna pick up his poop or clean his piss."

"No. That's Logan's job."

Peter paused, but I could already see he was more than happy that Logan got the worst job with that glint in his eye. "Oh. That works," he said, sounding as if he didn't care, although too giddy to bring down the decision. He looked over my shoulder, and his mouth dropped. What's he got a problem now? "What the fuck are those?"

I followed his gaze and sighed. "Oh. Those are movies."

"Bren..."

"Relax. I brought some CD cases. We don't have to use up your precious space in the RV. Besides, this will be good for the guys, you know? Increases morale or something."

"We have to focus on the plan."

"It's not all about the plan."

"It is when I'm trying to keep us alive."

"But this is trying to keep us alive." I pointed at the cart full of thee DVD cases and Blu-ray players. I didn't mention it was Logan's idea, to begin with, but I doubt that would help my argument. "There are some days I wish I can forget about all of this, even for just a couple of hours. This might help. Or not. Who's to say?" I shrugged and left Peter standing there because I didn't have the energy to hear what he had to say.

I joined the others in welcoming Indy into our little pack, and the mutt seemed to like it.

By nightfall, Peter and Haskell finished the repairs on Cora, the RV, which meant the TV was also fixed, among many other things, including integrating his fancy Tesla batteries into the system, which apparently took hours and hours to do. We arrived around one in the afternoon, and they never finished until close to eight in the evening. By then, Haskell tested out all the electricity, and Cora was now fully operational. The only thing left to fix was the TV antenna for tomorrow's presidential address.

We started moving our stuff into Cora. Peter and Alfie got into an argument about why the latter was bringing more clothes than the rest of us, which caused our closet to overfill.

"You're not going to one of those Instagram marketing tours, Alfie. You don't need a lot of wardrobe change."

"But...but I like these clothes. I got them off the rack without paying a cent!" Alfie said. "These are Balenciagas, Louis Vuitton, Lacoste..."

"Dead, dead, and dead. I doubt the vectors would care if they're eating someone wearing Gucci. You never know that they might also like that high-end stuff. Maybe people who are wearing Gucci and Armani are considered prime meat to them."

"Now you're just making fun of me."

Peter groaned. "Choose one suitcase and move on. Make sure to pack for something warm and for something light." Peter walked off the bedroom.

I got up from my bed, stifling my laugh as I approached Alfie and bumped his shoulder with mine. "If you must know, Peter is also a brand snob. He's just jealous you got these clothes than him."

"Really?"

"In high school, all he wears are Supreme and Nike."

Alfie chuckled. "I didn't know he's that big of a douche that early."

"Oh, you'd be surprised."

Alfie paused, narrowing his gaze at me. "You're just saying that as a joke, right? He's not really jealous because I got these?"

I shook my head. "No. He's just an asshole."

"No wonder he hates Indy. He has a massive stick up his bum."

Alfie and I laughed it off. In the end, he had to leave two suitcases worth of clothes. Miguel and Haskell gave him flack about it, but Alfie seemed to be taking it in good stride, even joking how he had stuffed a lot of high-end jockstraps and underwear into one compartment and let everyone know they could borrow it from him if they gave him a share of their food. He said, "If you want to feel like a king in the apocalypse, wear clean underwear to protect your precious gonads, friends!"

Jun was the only one who packed the lightest, all in one light backpack that I wouldn't have guessed had clothes in them, much less had knives, survival kits, medkits, and even a neatly folded tarp and foil blankets for emergency shelter. I let him know that he could borrow some of my clothes if he needed them, but Jun merely smiled and thanked me.

Jun found a bolster dog bed for Indy that Alfie swore was an expensive brand. It was kind of funny that the dog had a better mattress than the rest of us. At first, we placed his bed inside the bedroom area where Alfie, Peter, Logan, and I slept, but Indy quickly dragged his bed next to the entrance, seemingly content to stay there.

"That is one smart little mutt," Miguel laughed. "He's still a puppy, so he'll grow out of the damn bed. I don't even know how big he'll get!"

"We'll cross that bridge," I said. I leaned over and petted Indy's scruff. He stuck his tongue out and leaned onto the palm of my hand willingly. "We can always scavenge for bigger ones later. I doubt people are buying them nowadays. You don't mind, right, Indy?"

A soft bark.

"See? He doesn't mind," I said. I caught Logan with this wide grin on his face, and I rolled my eyes. "This doesn't mean I'm still cool with him being here," I told him.

Logan tried to hide his smirk. "Sure. Sure you don't."

"Uh-huh."

Logan tilted his head. "Well, it's still nice of you to pet him."

I scoffed. "Bah. Get off."

"Alright!" Alfie clapped his hands to get our attention. "I guess we should celebrate finishing the RV with a movie! Hey, Pete, can we drink some beers?"

"I don't think that's a good idea," said Peter.

"Don't worry. We'll maintain the one can per day thing. No one drank it yet. Am I right, guys?" A few grumbles of agreement from everyone.

It was a rule in the rail yard that if one wanted to drink alcohol, they could only get one can per day. We lucked out that we found a truck filled with alcoholic beverages that were about to be delivered to the grocery stores and liquor shops before the pandemic hit: their loss, our gain.

Peter turned to me. "Should we?"

I shrugged. "Let the guys have it. The RV's fixed. I doubt we'd be drinking much on the road since we're going to leave most of it behind that truck. I mean, we're not saving a compartment in the RV just for alcohol, right?"

"Except for two bottles of whiskey," Miguel laughed. "I'll keep that in my bag for safekeeping."

Peter sighed, patted me on the shoulder. "Alright, then. We can all get a drink. Long overdue, I guess."

Alfie and Haskell high-fived each other. Miguel and Logan shared the widest grins. "Can we drink two cans instead of one?" Miguel asked.

"Don't push it."

"Well, I had to try."

Logan strode toward the cart filled with DVD cases and pulled out the movie at the top of the pile. "In honor of Indy, we'll be watching Raiders of the Lost Ark!"

——

Logan was right again. The movies were a hit.

We watched three Indiana Jones movies before the battery on the portable player died, and Haskell had to plug it on Cora where the solar panels could recharge it upon sunrise tomorrow. We had plenty of sunshine in the middle of summer.

"We should vote for what movies we can watch every night!" Yousef chimed after the third movie ended. "How about one person picks two movies they like, and we vote which ones we want to watch? All of us can rotate to pick the movies. That way, everyone gets to watch their favorites."

"Nah, if that happens, then we'll be watching rom-com," Haskell said, looking at me. Everyone grumbled how they didn't like watching those, either.

I turned toward Haskell, pretending to be offended. Does he think...? "For the record, I don't like those kinds of movies. What? Is it because I'm gay?" I said jokingly. Everyone shifted uncomfortably around me.

Haskell didn't take it that way, cheeks reddening so fast like he was about to burst. "I mean...no...I didn't say it like....fuck."

I let out a chuckle. "Relax. We can watch those Marvel movies. I'm always down for those."

Peter sighed and whispered, "Thor can fuck me up with his hammer any time." Everyone heard him.

I gasped and picked up a crumpled paper on the ground and threw it at him, trying to hide my smile. Peter had probably drunk too many beers, though he only had one can in his hand.

Peter laughed and threw the paperback at me. "What? I didn't say anything!"

"We still heard it, you idiot," I said.

"Well, I get to pick tomorrow's movie then, and no, Pete, it's not the Thor movies," Miguel announced, grinning like a child in a candy store. Peter scoffed, trying to hide his reddening cheeks. Miguel pulled out one of the DVD cases from the pile that hadn't been put on the CD case yet, and let everyone see the cover. "The Mask of Zorro. Antonio Banderas. Action-packed with high-stakes adventure, sword fighting, romance, and most of all, it got heart."

"Is there a Thor-like character in there?" Haskell asked, sporting the widest grin.

"Fuck you, Hoss," Peter said, flipping him off.

Miguel rolled his eyes. "Fuck both of you and get your horny asses out of here."

Logan and Alfie quickly agreed to it, swearing how awesome it was. I hadn't seen it before. It looked like an old movie, so I shrugged, thinking to myself that I'm always down for the classics. Plus, it'd be nice to see something new—er, old for this matter. "Hm. Sounds fun."

"What's your second movie?" Yousef asked.

Miguel puckered his lips. He picked up an old movie from the '70s with bad cover art, supposedly some romance about a guy with angel wings, girl-on-ghost romance, and something about an afterlife, titled Heaven Can Wait. Miguel knew what he was doing, and once we put it up for a vote, it was clear what we were watching tomorrow.

"Alright, everyone. Let's turn up for the night. I'll take the first watch," Peter announced.

It was the first night when I never heard anyone had those awful nightmares; no one screamed throughout, tussling and turning. Only this serene silence descending, unnerving to listen during my watch, neither hearing a soft or fearful groan from everyone.

Logan dragged his sleeping bag next to me. We had been sleeping next to each other for some days now. I lost count on how many. "I forgot to tell you a joke," he said.

I smiled. Logan always does this, and a tiny part of me looked forward to hearing them. He had told me about bookkeepers becoming presidents, of inheritance necklaces fought over by greedy sons, dolphin sex, and about a lazy snail who got ran over by a car. I wondered what he had for tonight?

"Alright. Let's hear it," I said.

Logan smiled. "Okay. One summer, two men—one single and one married with a baby—goes hiking up the mountains for an all-guys trip. In the afternoon, they come upon a thicket in the underbrush when one cries out, 'Snake! Snake! Run!' The married man only laughs at him as he instantly recognizes the sound in his house. He says, 'Oh would you relax! It's just a lost baby! Can't you hear the rattle?' And he goes into the bush to rescue the child."

I snorted, grinning. "Well... that's not half bad."

Logan rolled his eyes. "Bah. I'll try harder tomorrow."

And we went to sleep.

To my surprise, Indy moved to sleep next to Peter, perhaps he sensed that the man never liked him, but at the end of the night, Peter had his arm around the little mutt, soundly asleep (Peter never admitted that it happened, denying even my full witness account).

It was also the first time I never saw the dead man's face floating in the water as I looked down, watching as he struggled for breath. In fact, I never dreamt at all. In this world, that was a blessing.

And yet, there were other things to think about.

The nation (and the rest of the world still standing) held its breath, waiting for the word from a new president they had undoubtedly not voted for or even had heard of. It was Independence Day, so mostly everyone wondered and rightfully concerned about the manner of speech he was going to use: a violent, uproarious call-to-arms? A veiled attempt at solidarity? Somber yet hopeful? Throwing accusations against foreign and within? A gesture of isolationist or globalist unity? Or to strike fear, perhaps? After all, the latter worked well in the past.

But what everyone was eager to know was about the state of the government: Does it still exist or not?