FROM NIX’S JOURNAL
How many people are still alive out there?
Tom says that there’s a network of about five hundred bounty hunters, traders, way-station monks, and scavengers in central California. And maybe as many as two hundred loners living in isolated and remote spots. Sounds like a lot, but it’s not. Our history teacher said that California used to be the most populous state and that there used to be almost forty million people living here.
28
THEY LEFT THE OLD ROAD AND FOUND WHAT USED TO BE A HIGHWAY, so they turned and followed that. Despite the fact that his toe was hurting like crazy and his clothes were thoroughly soaked with sweat, Benny still mustered the energy to look left and right, left and right, checking every shadow under every tree for some sign of movement that could be either zoms or worse.
Charlie’s dead, he told himself, but his inner voice—the less emotional and more rational aspect of his mind—replied, You don’t know that.
He cut looks at Nix, who was also sweating heavily and yet seemed able to keep going, despite the pain and the injury. It wasn’t the first time that her strength amazed and humbled him.
They ran and walked, ran and walked.
During one of the walking times, Benny leaned to Nix. “What the heck was that?”
“Preacher Jack,” she said, and shivered. “I feel like I need a bath.”
Benny counted on his fingers. “We know—what—seven religious people? I mean people in the business.”
“You mean clerics? There’s the four in town, Pastor Kellogg, Father Shannon, Rabbi Rosemann, and Imam Murad …”
“… and the monks at the way station: Brother David, Sister Shanti, and Sister Sarah. Seven,” finished Benny. “Except for the monks, who are a little, y’know …” He tapped his temple and rolled his eyes.
“Touched by God,” Nix said. “Isn’t that the phrase Tom uses?”
“Right, except for them, everyone else is pretty okay. I mean the monks are okay too, but they’re loopy from living out here in the Ruin. But even with different religions, different churches, they’re all pretty much the kind of people you want to hang with during a real wrath-of-God moment.”
“Not him, though,” said Nix, nodding along with where Benny was going with this. “He’s scarier than the zoms.”
“‘Zoms’ is a bad word, girlie-girl,” Benny said in a fair imitation of Preacher Jack’s oily voice.
“Eww … don’t!” Nix punched hi
m on the arm.
They walked another few paces as the road bent around a hill.
“Weird day,” Benny said.
“Weird day,” Nix agreed.
Around the bend were dozens of cars and trucks that had been pushed to the side of the main road, which left a clear path down the center. Some of the cars had tumbled into the drainage ditch that ran along one side. Others were smashed together. There were skeletons in a few of them.
“Who pushed the cars out of the way?” asked Chong.
“Probably a tank,” said Tom. “Or a bulldozer. Before they nuked the cities, back when they thought this was a winnable war.” He gestured to the line of broken cars, many of them nearly invisible behind clumps of shrubbery. “This is a well-traveled route. Traders and other people out here. All these cars have been checked for zoms a hundred times.”
Nix wasn’t fooled, and she gave Tom a sly smile. “Which doesn’t mean they’re safe. We have to check them every time, don’t we?”
Tom gave her an approving nod. “That’s the kind of thinking—”
“—that’s going to keep us alive,” finished Benny irritably. “Yeah, we pretty much get that.”
To Tom, Nix said, “He’s cranky because he didn’t think of it first.”
“Yes, I did,” Benny lied.