Finest Hour (36 page)

He took another long look at the sky. She was right. They really didn’t have time. Still, a couple of bottles of beer might help to make a questionable decision go down a little more smoothly. He teetered with indecision for a moment, finally letting reason—and Samantha—win the day.

They continued along Canal Road. On one side of the street was the Foundry Branch Valley Park, and on the other, a narrow waterway. After their recent run-in with zoo animals, neither of them entertained the idea of going into the park. Instead, they stuck to the two-lane road, meandering their way north along the river. By the time they neared their destination, the road was cloaked in shadows.

Samantha had been whistling a soft little tune when she stopped abruptly.

“What?”

She pointed an accusatory finger ahead. “Look!”

An old two-story stone house lay directly in their path. It was the first residence they had seen in nearly a mile, and it was a house they both knew well.

Tanner cleared his throat. “Do you remember when I said that you weren’t going to like part of my plan?” He nodded toward the Abner Cloud House. “This is where that part begins.”

“We’re going back to
him
? But why?”

By “him,” she was referring to Dr. Victor Jarvis, the very man responsible for the outbreak of the Superpox-99 virus and the death of billions of people, including her own father.

“You were the one who said we needed him.”

“I was being nice.”

“Sam, think about what we’re about to do.”

“We’re going down into the tunnels to sneak into Mount Weather. So?”

“So, what’s down in those tunnels?”

“An army of zombies, which is why I said it was crazy to go down there in the first place.”

“Right. But what did the good doctor tell us about his blood?”

“His blood?”

He nodded, giving her time to recall their conversation.

“Something about it being the key to everyone getting along.”

“That’s right. Jarvis said that anyone with his blood in their veins wouldn’t be hated by the infected.”

“That doesn’t even make sense. How could the infected know what type of blood someone has?”

“Maybe they can smell it.”

“Smell blood?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know how it works. We’ll ask Jarvis.”

“Even if that’s true, which I’m not saying it is, how does that help us?” What he was proposing suddenly hit her, and Samantha’s face twisted like she was trying to swallow a spoonful of castor oil. “You want us to drink his blood?”

“Of course not. We’ll put it in with a transfusion.”

“Do you even know how to do that?”

“I’m sure Dr. Jarvis will know. Besides, how hard can it be? You poke a needle in each person’s arm and run a little hose between them.”

“Somehow that doesn’t sound right.”

He smiled. “We’ll figure it out.”

“What makes you think he’ll even give us his blood?”

“Who says he’ll have a choice?”

“We’re going to steal his blood? Like vampires?”

“After what that man did, a little blood is the least he could offer.”

“Still, it doesn’t mean that he will.”

“I’ve never had trouble getting blood out of people. You know that.” He started toward the Abner Cloud House. “Now, quit stalling and come on. The good doctor is waiting.”

She paused in the middle of Canal Road, watching as he carefully climbed over the stone wall that buffered the historic building from the street.

Tanner looked back. “You coming?”

For a moment, Samantha was reminded of when they had first met. He had asked her the very same question as the rumble of motorcycles slowly approached in the distance. At the time, he was a total stranger, a giant wearing a prison jumpsuit who in all likelihood had been planning to trade her for a can of beans. She had reluctantly followed him, blindly choosing to believe that he was the lesser of two evils.

The situation had changed, but the question remained the same. Tanner wasn’t asking if she was going to cross the street. That much had been decided when she chose to leave the cabin. What he was really asking was if she trusted him enough to travel all the way to the end of a very hard road.

That too, she thought, had already been determined. She couldn’t say exactly when the decision had been made. Perhaps it was when he had first rescued her from the burning building. Maybe it was when he had saved her from Agent Sparks, or battled the enormous creature in the East River Mountain Tunnel.

No, she thought. It wasn’t any of those times.

Their unbreakable bond wasn’t forged out of his willingness to protect her. If she were forced to pick a single moment when she knew for certain that their fates were forever joined, it was when he had first introduced her as his daughter. He would claim that it had been done solely out of convenience, a way to avoid awkward questions by people who might cause trouble, but she knew better. By identifying her as his daughter, Tanner had made a conscious decision to take her in, to make her his own. And that, she thought, was when they both knew that wherever one went, the other would follow.

Tanner stared at her, clearly wondering what was going on in that mixed-up brain of hers.

“Yeah,” she said, pressing her lips together. “I’m coming.”

The Survivalist adventure continues with
Last Stand…