The Fall of Society (The Fall of Society Series, Book 1) (17 page)

           
They
were all gathered in the hospital cafeteria, which was at the front of the
building on the north side, and it was just an empty area now with no food of
any kind. All the display tables and drink coolers were empty, but it looked
like it had been cleaned a little. There were still food trays on the floor
here and there, empty soda bottles, and over-flowed trashcans.

           
Everyone
was seated in their own clicks—Joe was with his wife and daughter at one
table, Tom and Anthony were seated at another. Anthony had his new pipe armor
on; it was all painted black and covered most of his body. Tom had a large box
at the table that contained canned food and he had a couple pots set-up over
propane camping stoves that cooked beef stew for everyone. Well, almost everyone.
Ardent and his crew were seated at two tables and they were going to eat
military food—MREs—
meal,
ready to eat
, or as some soldiers called them, Meals Rejected by Ethiopia. Alan
and Donnie were at one table, but they sat at opposite ends. Alan also had his
new pipe armor on, and then Doctor Ceraulo arrived last and sat with them.

           
“Okay,
we’re all here, now what the hell is this about?” demanded Joe.

           
“I
wanted to let all of you know that we’re letting Ardent and his group take the
boat out in back,” Tom informed them.

           
“And
who is
we,
exactly?” Alan asked.

           
“Me,
okay, Alan, I told him that it was okay, but if you really wanna keep that
piece of shit dingy, then fine, keep it, but you can’t fix it, can you?” Tom
shot at him.

           
“Maybe
I can’t fix it, but it’s still hospital property.” Alan countered.

           
“Hospital
property?” Anthony said. “And since when did you own this place, Alan?”

           
“Enough,
little boys!” Joe shouted at them. “What I wanna know is what do you intend on
doing with the boat?”

           
“Yeah,
me, too,” Donnie finally spoke.

           
Ardent
stood. “Once we fix the boat’s engines, we’re gonna put it in the channel in
the back of the hospital and make our way to the naval shipyard on the coast to
find a better boat.”

           
“The
naval shipyard?” Donnie said. “That place has been closed for years.”

           
“True,
but there’s still ships out there, and there has to be one that we can use,”
Bear said.

           
“Use
for what?” Joe asked.

           
“We’re
gonna go up the coast.” Ardent said.

           
“Up
the coast?” said Ceraulo. “To where? Alaska? You’ll never make it.”

           
“Oregon,”
Ardent said. “We’re going to Oregon.”

           
“What
makes you think that it’ll be any different in the cities of Oregon than the
shit that’s here?” Joe said.

           
“We’re
not going to stay in any of the cities,” Derek said.

           
“Then
where are you going?” Maggie asked.

           
Lauren
stood up. “My family’s ranch.”

           
Ceraulo
asked. “And where is this ranch?”

           
“It’s
in the middle of the state, over a hundred thousand acres that’s been in my
family for generations.”

           
“Okay,
but what does that mean for us?” Joe said. “Besides telling you ‘good luck’ as
you sail away?”

           
Ardent
looked at Lauren because it was her call. “Since you guys let us come in here,”
she said, “although it wasn’t wholeheartedly, and you’re giving us the boat, I’m
extending my invitation to all of you as well.”

           
“To
go and stay at your ranch?” Anthony asked.

           
“Yes,”
Lauren answered. “Except for you, Alan. If you come—you can sleep in my
barn, you pervert.”

           
“Okay,”
Alan answered quietly.

           
Tom
shook his head and laughed. “Already, Alan? She just got here, man.”

           
Alan
stretched his face. “Yeah, well…”

           
Ceraulo
was skeptical. “How do you know that we’ll be safer there?”

           
“It’s
probably a hell of a lot safer than this place,” Milla said.

           
“Our
closest neighbor at the ranch is forty miles away,” Lauren explained. “And the
nearest city is eighty-two miles away; we’re pretty secluded there.”

           
Donnie
had doubts—“Let’s say that we accept your offer—how do you plan on
getting that old boat, if you can get it running, into the channel past those
things? Do you think they’ll just step aside and let us play sailor without
trying to eat our dicks?”

           
“We’ll
have a plan by the time we’re ready to leave,” Ardent told them. “We’ll create
some kind of a diversion to lure them away from the back of the hospital so we
can make our escape.”

           
“I
don’t know…” Joe said. “Sounds too risky to me, I think me and my family will
be better off sticking it out here until this thing blows over.” Maggie didn’t
say anything, but the look on her face didn’t agree with him.

           
“’Til
this thing blows over?’” Milla said. “You must be lightheaded? This isn’t gonna
blow over. Last I heard, the infection turned eighty percent of the world’s
population into cannibals that are trying to kill the rest of us.”

           
That
didn’t sway Joe. “I still think we’ll be safer if we just stay here behind
these walls.”

           
“That’s
your choice,” Ardent stated. “But you need to realize two things. One way or
another, those things will get in here, every place that we’ve been to before
this one, where people thought it was
safe,
they got in.”

           
“That’s
back when there was nineteen of us,” Derek added.

           
“The
other thing,” Ardent went on. “Is that you’re gonna run out of supplies, and
when you do, then what? You gonna go outside to your local supermarket?”

           
“So,
what, you have a buffet at your ranch?” Joe asked Lauren.

           
“Yeah,
we live off the land there, we have plenty of livestock and acres of fertile
ground to plant crops with,” she said.

           
“Sounds
like Heaven,” Joe sarcastically said.

           
“What
about water?” asked Maggie.

           
“A
river runs through our ranch, and we have wells, along with a water filtration system,”
Lauren answered.

           
“Count
me and Corina in,” Maggie said.

           
“We’re
staying here,” Joe told her.

           
Maggie
gave him defiant eyes. “You’re staying here, but I’m taking my daughter out of
this hell.”

           
Tom
made his call. “Listen, me and my brother are going with them. We won’t be able
to take all the supplies that I have in my trailer, so whoever stays, is
welcome to it.”

           
“When
do you plan on leaving?” a humbler Joe asked.

           
“Not
sure, maybe two or three days,” Ardent said. “It depends on when we fix the
boat motors and they’re in bad shape.”

           
“So
who’s staying?” Tom asked and nobody said anything. “It’s settled then, we’re
getting out of here, all of us.”

           
They
began to eat and talk amongst themselves; they had plenty to talk about now.
Ardent and his crew began to eat their MREs, Tom couldn’t help but notice as he
spooned warm beef stew into his mouth from his paper bowl. “You guys sure you don’t
want some of this stew? It’s a lot better than that plastic military food.”

           
“Thanks,
but we’re fine,” Ardent told him.

           
“Yeah,
we’re cool,” Derek assured him.

           
“I
don’t get it, why not have some?” Tom put to them. “This stew is almost like a
home-cooked meal compared to what you guys are having.”

           
“Exactly,”
Bear said. “In case you haven’t noticed—we’re at war and anything that
reminds me of home right now will weaken me, and I could make a mistake that
will cost me and possibly others in my group, our lives.”

           
“It
will weaken
us,
” Derek added.

           
Bear
continued. “We’ve made this far because we work as a unit and watch each
other’s backs.”

           
“What
about the others that were in your group that didn’t make it, how’d they die?”
asked Anthony.

           
“They
were thinking about home,” Ardent said somberly.

           
“I’ll
relax and have some of your stew when we’re all at Lauren’s ranch, and I don’t
see any of those ghouls down range,” Bear remarked.

           
“Were
all of you in the military?” Tom wanted to know.

           
“Just
me and Bear,” Ardent said.

           
“Army?”
Tom asked.

           
Bear
was insulted. “Please. We’re Navy.”

           
Maggie
was curious about Milla and Derek. “How did you two meet?”

           
“Us?”
Derek said and smiled. “You tell her, baby.”

           
“I’m—”
Milla corrected herself. “—I was a bounty hunter.”

           
“Oh,
so you two were a bounty hunting team?” Maggie said.

           
Lauren
smiled, along with Ardent and Bear.

           
Derek
chuckled. “Uh, yeah, you could say that.”

           
“You’re
not a bounty hunter?” Joe asked him.

           
“Nope,”
he answered. “I’m the bounty.”

           
“I
don’t get it,” Joe said.

           
Maggie
spoke to Milla. “You’re a bounty hunter that went after him and you two fell
for each other, is that it?”

           
“That’s
the gist of it,” Milla answered.

           
“Oh,
but that’s not even the best part!” Derek said. “A few years ago, I got
arrested for possession of marijuana, and I missed my court date because I was
high, I mean—
really
high! So
the bail bond company sent a bounty hunter after me…” Derek pointed to Milla
and grinned. “…She found me pretty easy because—”

           
“You
were high?” Maggie cut in.

           
“Yes!”
Derek said and pointed at Maggie like she won a prize. “And the second that I
saw her walk through my door, that was it. I was hooked.”

           
“I
wasn’t,” Milla said.

           
“No,
you weren’t, baby,” Derek admitted. “But I was in love and on a mission. After
I got out of jail, I tracked her down and asked her out.”

           
“I
said, no,” Milla told them.

           
“She
did, but I was persistent, and I kept asking and she kept saying no, and then
she disappeared and I couldn’t find her, so I came up with a brilliant plan.”

           
“Brilliant,
honey?” Milla said.

           
“I
thought it was pretty smart. It worked, didn’t it?”

           
She
smiled. “It did.”

           
Maggie
was curious. “What did you do?”

           
“I
smoked some pot in front of a public library, and when they arrested me, I
skipped my court date, on purpose this time, and guess who they sent to come
and get me? Guess!” Derek said proudly.

           
Maggie
didn’t have trouble. “Milla?”

           
Milla
grinned. “Me.”

           
“Yes!”
Derek said.

           
“And
you asked her out and she said yes, right?” Anthony joined in.