Page 12 of A Wilderness Within

“I salute him, whoever he is, but it would be like finding a needle in a haystack, and he’s likely just one man. What good would it do?”

“What good would it do?” she echoed, a tightness gathering in her chest. “Lincoln, this is about survival. Not just for a few but for all of us. Don’t you get it? We need to be coming together.”

“You ran from me,” he reminded her softly.

“Because you scared the shit out of me, and I thought you wanted to rape me.” She stared at his face, but he didn’t meet her gaze. “There have to be good people still out in the world. Isn’t it our duty to find them?”

His jaw worked as he took a long moment to respond. “I’m done with duty. I served years in the service, lost good men, and none of it fucking matters anymore. I’m looking out for just me now.”

“That sounds awfully lonely,” she whispered. She wondered how she fit into his world, and at the same time also wondered if she even wanted to.

They reached the couch downstairs, and he set her down with that gentleness that always surprised her.

“How long has it been since you’ve seen a survivor other than me?” she asked while he tried to truss her up in blankets. She swatted his hands away when he attempted to tuck the blankets up to her chin.

“How long?” He gave up when she swatted his hands away again and walked over to the window. Night had eclipsed the sky, and battery-powered lanterns lit the kitchen. She noticed he had pulled the curtains on most of the windows. Was that to hide their presence? A prickle of fear rode beneath her skin. Was there something out there he feared? Or was she the one who should be afraid that he was hiding her away?

“The last person I saw a few weeks ago was infected. He died.”

“Did you know him, or was he a stranger?”

“I knew him,” Lincoln said. “He was a good man.”

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. He glanced away. She wished she could read his expression, but it was hard to tell because of his beard.

“What about you? When did you last see someone?” he asked.

“About two weeks ago. I saw this woman walking down the street, holding a bundle…a baby. But…” Caroline choked down the rising horror she felt as the awful memory came back. “But the baby was gone. Dead. It was turning to dust and bones in her arms, and she was too far lost in her grief to notice when I tried to talk to her. I’ve…I’ve never seen anything like that before. A grief so deep that it embedded itself inside your mind. It’s worse than any virus. It kills hope…killseverything.”

Lincoln dragged a hand through his hair and stared out through the one curtainless window. “Almost everything is dead now. We are but the ruins left behind.”

4

@CDC: Our researchers have traced the Hydra-1 virus back to a microbe found in horseshoe bats in China. Bats have unusual immune systems. Their hollow bones, like those of birds, don’t produce immune cells in their marrow like other mammals. Therefore, they can carry exotic and unique microbes that sometimes merge with ones found in mammals and can mutate into pathogens that can be transmitted to humans.

—Centers for Disease Control Twitter Feed

November 19, 2019

Lincoln suppressed a shudder at the thought of Caroline having witnessed something so awful. He’d seen terrible things, things that would give even the devil himself nightmares, but he had been trained to deal with them. Soldiers were no stronger than civilians like Caroline. They reacted the same inside to anything awful, but they were trained to push aside any feelings until it was safe to deal with them, long after the threat was over. But nothing in his years on Delta Force had prepared him for the end of humanity.

During a supply run a few days ago, he’d passed by the stadium that hosted the College World Series, and he’d seen the small city of medical tents and stretchers. The endless rows of bones and mummified remains covered the field where the Red Cross and FEMA had tried to set up triage stations. He’d seen the bodies in the streets, the bodies in cars in the middle of the freeways, in the hotel rooms, and in houses. The looks on the faces of the ones who still bore a passing resemblance to people were emotionless, their slack features empty in a way that would haunt him forever. As he’d stood watching the wind whistle through the medical tents on the baseball field, he felt something fracture inside him. He’d given up. He had let go of his hope forever…until he had seen Caroline.

In the midst of all these endless wintry skies, Caroline had burst into his life like a bright beacon of hope that poured in through the clouds, like brilliant and defiant sunlight. She was his hope, his only hope which meant he could never let her go. He’d protect her from the world. She’d likely hate him for trying to protect her, but he wasn’t going to back down. Like a wild wolf who’d come across a helpless kitten, he’d somehow defied the urge to be a predator and instead would protect her like the sacred discovery she was.

He hadn’t known what to expect when he’d come to the surface, but to see humanity had vanished had frightened the hell out of him. Any survivors he could only assume had lost their compass of morality, leaving them directionless resulting in lawlessness. This new world would have only one rule: fight for survival, fight for your needs to be fulfilled, whatever those needs were. Hunger, thirst, lust, greed. He’d expected to come across a war band straight out ofMad Maxrather than someone like Caroline.

We had so many warnings…so many trumpets sounding that the walls of Jericho were tumbling down. Epidemics had struck before, but nothing like this. The proverbial levee had broken, and the floodwaters were rushing over it with no end in sight.

We will all succumb and drown in the darkness of our hearts.

He glanced over to her now. She was watching him, and her hazel eyes were almost brown in the dim lights.

She looks so young, so innocent. How the hell has she survived this long?

“Where were you when it started?” he asked.

She didn’t immediately answer, but the shadows flashing across her eyes warned him that whatever answer she was about to give him wouldn’t be the full story. The horrors she’d seen would stay inside her.

---