Eden Rising (15 page)

“Yes. India. Where are you? Are you close? Are there others with you?”

He pulled up the list of country codes again. India was 91, not 881. “No, no. I’m in, uh, the US. And not alone.”

“I am so happy to hear that.”

“How many are with you?”

“There are thirty-two of us now.”

He pulled up the protocol sheet for first contact so he wouldn’t miss anything. The first question always made him pause. “Uh, how many of you are, um, sick?”

“Sick? You mean with the flu?”

“Yes.”

“No one. How many of you are sick?”

He knew from experience gained over the last several days that some survivor groups had at least a few people starting to show signs of the disease, so he was relieved to hear Jabala’s people were untouched. Still, she could have been hiding the truth. “We’re okay here, too.” Wanting to probe a bit further, he asked, “You’ve been able to avoid contact with anyone ill?”

“For the most part, yes. But we are safe. We have been vaccinated.”

Leon could feel his chest contract. Vaccinated? Was this St. William Boarding School one of Project Eden’s survival stations?

“Where exactly are you?” he asked.

“What do you mean? I have already told you.”

“Tell me, Jabala, when did you receive the vaccine from the UN?” In his mind, he was already starting to write them off as future Sage Flu victims.

“The UN?” she said. “We did not receive the vaccine from the UN.”

That stopped him for a moment. “Then who gave it to you?”

“My sister’s husband, Sanjay. He stole it for us.”

Leon’s tension eased a bit. This Sanjay had probably gotten his hands on some kind of home remedy, or perhaps some antibiotics from a hospital. Neither would be effective against the virus, but they also wouldn’t be as deadly as Project Eden’s “vaccine.”

“Maybe I should speak to Sanjay,” he said.

“He is not here now.”

“Okay, maybe I can talk to him later, but you need to listen to me very carefully. The people who are claiming to be from the UN are lying. They are not here to help anyone.” Behind him, he heard Crystal enter the room. He glanced back and was surprised to see she was alone. “You need to stay away from them. In fact, you should stay away from Mumbai completely. It’s not safe.”

“We already know this,” Jabala said.

Again, her response caught him off guard. “What do you mean, you already know?”

“Sanjay. He told us the same thing. It is why he and Kusum went to the city. To find out for sure.”

“He and…Kusum are in the city?”

“Yes.”

“That’s very dangerous. They could get—”

“They are very careful. They know what they are doing.”

Maybe, maybe not, but there wasn’t much Leon could do to help them at the moment. “What made Sanjay think they were lying?”

“The UN people are using the same location as the company that spread the disease through our city,” she began.

When she finished telling him about Pishon Chem and the “miracle mosquito spray” Sanjay and others had been hired to douse the city with, Leon realized that maybe the vaccine Jabala’s brother-in-law had given everyone was the real thing after all.

“I definitely need to talk to Sanjay as soon as he comes back.”

“I could send someone to bring him back.”

“No!” he said quickly. “You shouldn’t send anyone else to the city. It’s too dangerous. The most important thing you can do right now is to stay alive, and that means you and your people should stay where you are. Do you understand?”

“Of course. Staying alive is what we are doing already.”

“We’re happy to count you among our new friends, Jabala. We can definitely help each other.” Leon gave her a number that would connect her directly to the comm center. “Call that number anytime you want to talk to us. Someone will always be here to answer. And I’ll definitely check back with you later.”

“Okay. Thank you, Leon. It is good to have you as a new friend, too. Good-bye.”

“Good-bye, Jabala.”

Leon disconnected the call. After staring at his keyboard for a second, he looked over at Crystal, eyes wide.

“What?” she asked.

STATE OF MAHARASHTRA, INDIA

9:51 PM IST

J
EEVAL WHIMPERED, WANTING
to be lifted up, as Jabala set down the satellite phone.

“You are fine where you are,” Jabala said. She wasn’t as fond of the dog as her sister was, but while Kusum was away, Jeeval had become her responsibility.

“Well?” Naresh asked. He had been the one who’d figured out how to work the shortwave radio, and had taken to broadcasting a few times a day the number of the satellite phone Sanjay had found in a building the next town over.

“The man said the same thing Sanjay told us, that the UN is not the UN,” she said.

“Sanjay did not tell us that. He said
maybe
not.”

“Well, the man on the phone did not say maybe, so I think Sanjay’s instincts were correct.”

“Based on a conversation with someone you have never met,” Naresh pointed out.

“I feel that he spoke the truth. You do not believe him?”

“I could not hear what he said, but if this is what he told you…” Naresh paused, and shrugged. “I believe him, too.”

“Then why did you fight me?”

“I did not fight you. I merely pointed out something that needed to be taken into consideration.”

Grunting in annoyance, Jabala looked away.

While she had been concerned when Kusum, Sanjay, and the others had left, she was extremely worried now. What if they ran into trouble with these people claiming to be with the UN? What if they needed help?

What if they needed help right now?

Ap, ap, ap
, Jeeval barked, pawing at Jabala’s leg.

“Jeeval, not now!”

She pushed the dog away harder than she meant to, sending Jeeval tumbling backward into Naresh’s chair. Jeeval yelped as she scrambled back to her feet.

Jabala immediately knelt down and stroked the dog’s head. “I am sorry. Are you okay?”

A whimper, followed by
ap, ap.

She picked up the dog. “Good dog,” she said. With her free hand, she picked up the satellite phone and looked at Naresh. “How does this work?”

“A signal comes down, and—”

“No. That is not what I meant. Does this have to stay in one place, or can it move around like a mobile phone?”

“Of course it can move around. Do you see any wires?”

“Why are you being difficult? Does it have other equipment that needs to travel with it, or is this it?”

“What other equipment would it need?”

She bit back her frustration. “I will assume that the answer is no.”

“Well, it does have a charger,” he said. “The battery does not last forever.”

“And where is that?”

13

SHERIDAN, WYOMING

8:33 AM MST

“M
Y DAD WAS
right,” Rick said, his eyes narrowed to slits. “All you want to do is take what’s ours.”

The teenager was sitting on the bed of the motel room he and Ginny had been put in after the previous evening’s events. Matt was surprised they hadn’t tried to get away. Of course, if they had, they would have found one of Matt’s men stationed outside.

“All we want to do,” Matt said, “is get out of town. But the only way that’s going to happen is if we clear the roads.”

“So you’re going to just take one of our snowplows.” It was amazing how little the kid’s lips moved as he spoke.

“
Two
of your plows,” Matt corrected him. “And one of your cargo trucks to haul gas in.”

Rick’s uninjured hand unconsciously rolled into a fist. “They don’t belong to you.”

“That’s why I’m asking.”

“And if I say no?”

“That would be disappointing.”

“You’ll still take them, won’t you?”

Matt stared at him, his expression neutral. “Rick, do you realize what’s going on?”

“I know you’re going to steal our stuff.”

“I mean, the bigger picture?”

Rick glared at Matt for a moment before looking over at his cousin by the window.

“I asked a question,” Matt said.

“Lot of crazy things going on.”

“That’s one way to put it.” Matt adjusted his position on the end of the bed. “The human race is dying. There’s not a lot of people left. If we’re all going to survive, we’re going to need to work together. So, yes, we will take those vehicles, but they will still technically be yours because the two of you are coming with us.”

“Like hell we are,” Rick said.

Matt leaned back. “So you’d rather stay here? What happens when you run out of food? Or don’t have anything left to burn to stay warm? Maybe you make it through this winter, but what about the next? Any prepackaged food you’ll find will have gone bad by then. You’ll have to spend your entire summer growing food for when things get cold again. Do you know how to farm? Do you know how to store food so it will last the winter? Do you really want to bet your cousin’s life on that?”

“We can take care of ourselves!”

“Can you?” Matt looked down at Rick’s bandaged hand. “You’re lucky we have medical personnel with us to take care of that. What happens when you’re out in the field, using a piece of equipment you’ve never used before, and you slice open your leg? Or what if you get sick? I’m not talking Sage Flu. Out here, by yourself, pretty much anything could kill you.”

Silence.

“Rick,” Ginny said. “I think we should go with them.”

“Shut up,” Rick told her.

“I don’t want to die,” she went on. “He’s right. We will if we stay.”

“I said, be quiet!”

She took a couple steps toward the bed. “What if no one else comes by? This might be our only chance to get away.”

“We’ll be
fine
on our own!”

Ginny bit her lip, clearly not agreeing with him, but Matt could see the will to argue with her cousin—someone she’d been putting all her faith in up to this point—draining away.

“You won’t be fine,” Matt said. “Ginny knows it, and you do, too.” He stood up. “But I’ll tell you what. If you want to stay, you can stay.”

“What about our vehicles?” Rick asked.

“Two plows, one cargo truck go with us. But we’ll pay for them.”

“With what?” Mick scoffed.

“I’ll leave you a high-powered field radio. Maybe someday you’ll want to try to reach someone.”

“Doesn’t seem like a very fair trade.”

“You’re right. It isn’t. I could probably find a dozen plows within a mile of here, and twice as many cargo trucks. A good, working radio? That’s what’s hard to find. It’s worth more than all your vehicles combined.”

Though a sneer was still on Rick’s face, there was also uncertainty in his eyes.

Matt held out his hand. “So, do we have a deal?”

“For something you’d take anyway?”

“I’d rather do it this way, man to man.”

Rick looked at the proffered hand, and finally took it. “All right. It’s a deal.”

“Good.” As Matt released his grip, he turned to Ginny. “If you have anything you want to bring along, you should go get it now. We’ll be leaving soon.”

“Whoa!” Rick said, jumping up. “Ginny’s staying with me.”

“You think so?” Matt asked. “Ginny?”

She looked from her cousin to Matt and back. “We’ll die if we stay here,” she said, her voice not much more than a whisper. “Rick, please.”

“We’ve done fine so far,” Rick said.

“For a
week
,” Matt pointed out.

“We have to go with them,” Ginny said.

Rick stood motionless for a moment. “Okay,” he finally said. “That’s fine. Go with them. I’m staying.”

“What?” Ginny said. “No!”

“You want to go, you go. But I am staying.” He turned to Matt. “When do I get my radio?”

__________

B
RANDON WAS MISSING
yet again. They’d been packing up their things in their room when he said he had to check on something, and left. Josie ended up having to load not only her and her father’s bags, but her brother’s, too, into their Humvee.

When she returned to the room and he was still not there, that was it. Enough.

“Brandon!” she yelled as she stepped back out onto the walkway. “Brandon, where are you?’

Around her, the others moved in and out of the rooms as they prepared to leave. She asked a few if they had seen her brother, but no one had. She was about to start a room-by-room search when Brandon came out of the door to the motel office. In his arms was a blanket that appeared to be full of something.

She marched toward him. “What have you been doing? It’s almost time to—” She stopped in the middle of the sidewalk and stared at him. “What happened?”

Across the right side of his jaw were two thin lines of blood. Scratches.

“What?” he asked.

She pointed at his face. “That.”

He touched the wounds and looked at the blood on his fingertips. “Oh, uh, yeah. Nothing.”

“Nothing? That’s not nothing. Did you fall?”

“No. It’s nothing. I’m o—”

The blanket he was holding began to twist as if something were squirming inside.

Josie took a quick step backward. “What have you got in there?”

Looking defeated, Brandon said, “I couldn’t just leave him there.” He peeled a portion of the blanket back, and revealed the head of a tan, very scared-looking cat.

“Where did you find him?” Josie said, moving in for a closer look.

“Chloe and I found him yesterday when we searched the motel,” he said. “Please don’t tell Dad.”

“You think he’s not going to notice?”

“I mean, don’t tell him until after we get started. It’ll be too late then.”

Josie moved her hand cautiously over the cat’s head. Its eyes followed the movement, but when she began stroking the area between its ears, it seemed to relax some.

“Fine,” she said. “I won’t say anything. But if he gets mad, I don’t get in trouble for this.”

Brandon smiled. “No, of course not. It’s all my fault.”

She petted the cat a few more times. “Does it have a name?”