Grants Pass (10 page)

“
Can we come
with you? Me and my daddy?”

“
We’ll talk
about it when you wake up,” I said soothingly.

She didn’t even cry when the needle
went in; she bore the brief pain like a trooper. Domesticated animals always do.

****

There are a lot of ways for
people to die in the post-pandemic world; I’ve seen most of them. The human
race was domesticated a long time ago, and like the cows that need someone to
milk them, or the sheep too dumb to run away from a predator, the humans forgot
how to stay alive without the trappings of their civilization. So they stagger
along pretending they still have some quality of life while their teeth get
loose from scurvy and their bowels get scarred by parasitic infections. Most of
the people who lived through the sicknesses shouldn’t have. They’re just
suffering now, without all the little luxuries they were so accustomed to.

Euthanasia is kinder. It’s quicker.
It takes the pain away. If we don’t let our pets suffer, why should we let people
do it? Part of being a vet is knowing that the thing to do with suffering is
end it, not prolong it just for the sake of being able to say that all your
patients survive. I’m not a moralist. I see suffering, and I end it. It’s that
simple. Human doctors aren’t allowed to have that luxury, but there’s a reason
I never wanted to work with people.

Miranda’s eyes fluttered shut in a
matter of seconds as the drugs took effect, her body effectively sliding into a
comatose state that was deeper than any sleep. I put the syringe away and took
her hand, my index finger pressed against the pulse point of her wrist. Her
heart sped up, fighting against the lidocaine. Her fingers tightened on mine
with no more force than a kitten’s jaws.

She gasped once, sighed, and was
still.

“
See?” I
said, slipping my hand out of hers. “Nothing to be afraid of.”

****

Nathan returned about ten minutes
later, clutching a bag that bulged with medical supplies. I met him at the
office door, motioning for him to be quiet. “She’s sleeping,” I whispered. He
looked past me to where she was stretched out on her bed, expression peaceful,
and believed me.

Outside, in the hall, I offered him
a sympathetic smile, and said, “It’s bad, but she should pull through. I’ve
given her something to help her sleep, and I can show you which medicines to
give her. But there’s a fee for my help.”

The hope in his eyes died like a
switch had been flipped. “What’s that?” he asked, warily.

I held up my bag. “After spending a
year scrounging in all this rust? You need a tetanus shot. Let me give it to
you, and I’ll stay as long as it takes to get her better.”

Nathan laughed, sounding utterly
relieved. “I think I can stand a shot if it gets my baby girl better.”

“
Good.” I
smiled. “This won’t hurt a bit.”

Biography

Seanan McGuire

Born in California, Seanan
McGuire has long been fascinated by the fact that bubonic plague is endemic in
the local rodent population. This explains a lot about her, really. Seanan’s
interest in plagues and pandemics occupies much of her spare time; the rest of
her time is spent taking inordinately long walks and working on her various
writing projects. She is the author of the Toby Daye series from DAW Books. The
first,
Rosemary and Rue,
will be published in 2009, with at least two
more to follow.

Seanan has released three albums to
date. The latest,
Red Roses and Dead Things
, includes a lengthy musical
explanation of why the Black Death wasn’t actually the bubonic plague. No,
seriously.

Like many writers, Seanan is a cat
person, and lives with several Classic Siamese. She watches too many horror
movies, and reacts violently to people asking ‘Is that you, Johnny?’ (It’s not
Johnny.) You can catch up with her at www.seananmcguire.com, where she will
happily geek pandemics with you.

Afterword

As a fan of both pandemics and
California history, I was fascinated to learn that bubonic plague has been
locally endemic since at least 1900. Bearing that in mind, I wanted a
protagonist who’d know the medical ‘lay of the land’ in my home state, and could
really appreciate the devastation. Since a surviving doctor seemed a little too
convenient, I went with a veterinarian.

A lot of our domesticated animals
really can’t survive on their own any more. That got me thinking about what
would happen to most of my friends without their modern conveniences. How many
would make it? How many would want to make it?

So there’s Mercy. She’s doing what
she’s trained to do: ending pain. The question is whether what she’s doing is
moral, and, if it isn’t, why is it moral to do that to animals?

Plus I like being able to write
about plague.

Men of Faith

Ivan Ewert

I‘d never killed a man, not even
after the world went to hell. But so help me God, Preacher would have been my
first choice. In the dark of night, when everything was quiet and we were all
huddled around the fire, I could hear the fluid rattling in his chest; hear
that awful, sickly sound of a man struggling for breath. He said it was asthma,
or apnea, or whatever the hell it was, and Sarge and Bo believed him.

Not me. I figured he was catching.

“
You’re
dreaming,” said Bo when I brought it up. “Flu’s gone. Killed everyone it was
like to more than two months back, and I don’t think it’s headed back up
anytime soon. Burned itself out, the way I figure it. Besides, it moved quick,
remember? Preacher’s been snorting and snoring like that since the day we
picked him up.”

“
Maybe it’s
a new strain?” I asked, but Bo just laughed. He knew I’d barely managed to stay
awake in class back at Pat Henry High, and I should’ve given it up there. “I’m
no doctor, but I know that stuff like that changes. Mutates, right? It changes
and becomes something different.”

“
Hell, Dave.
Look at him. Preacher ain’t exactly the type to fight something serious off. If
it was the flu, he’d be dead. End of story.”

I looked back towards Preacher.
There he was, nose in that Bible and barely watching where he walked. That
pigeon-chest kept on swelling and collapsing like a blood blister, probably the
only kind he’d ever raised. Never done a day’s work in his life; never got a
callous. Never even raised a sweat except trying to sleep at night.

“
Still don’t
like it,” I said. Hell, I couldn’t help myself. “No reason to bring him along,
and believe me, the folks up at Grants Pass aren’t going to listen as nice as
you do. I’ll bet they throw us all out to the wolves the minute they hear him
trying to breathe.”

“
No reason
to bring him along?” Bo laid a thick finger along his nose and gave a solid
farmer’s hanky. “I think you’re wrong. Just hold on, and put up with it a
while. You’ll see. I’ve got plans for Preacher.”

Now, as much as I didn’t like
Preacher, I trusted Bo. He was the only good foreman we ever had; he listened
to us when we were telling the truth about needing a day off but busted your
balls when you called in with a hangover. You just couldn’t lie to him and make
it stick. He could tell just by the sound of your voice if you planned to spend
the day fishing and watching hockey, or if you really needed the time to look
in on your grandmother. After the first time I tried pulling something, and he
gave me the business for it, we never had any trouble.

He could fight, too. Only time I
ever saw Bo lose his temper was the day he found out his wife Jenny was
sleeping around with one of the regulars at the Riverside. Bo knocked him cold
inside of five minutes, and Jesus, even then we had to pull him off the guy. He
was cool about it the next day, filed for divorce and never looked back, but I
sure saw what he could do to someone in his way.

That’s why I called him up, once my
folks passed away from that flu. That was three months ago — back in July, when
the world started falling apart faster than a politician’s promise. I was low,
just like everyone else who was still standing. It was like the world had
ended, but you were left…and you were numb.

After a hell of a week spent trying
to get them buried, I tracked down Bo. Figured if he was still alive, he’d have
some kind of plan put together, and he’d need some guys watching his back to pull
it off. Hiking halfway across the states through a Great Plains winter wasn’t
what I had him pegged for planning. But if that was the way it was, then that
was the way it’d be. You pick your guys and stick with them.

So I kept my mouth shut and just watched
the river as we walked along. The Musselshell wasn’t much compared to the
Yellowstone, but skirting Billings had probably been a good idea. The last few
cities we tried getting through had been nothing but trouble. Even Miles City
wasn’t any kind of treat. Of course, that’s where we picked up Preacher.

We’d generally holed up in churches
along the way. They’d have been picked clean of everything worth a nickel long
before we came in, but like Bo says, it was still the safest place to spend a
night. It took a certain kind of coward to rob a church, and they weren’t the
kind to stick around once they’d finished. So Sarge and I, we took the sides
with our shotguns like usual, since you can’t be too careful, and Bo walked on
in.

It was the strangest damn thing to
see those candles going. First time I’d seen anyone praying in a church since
the fall. I guess it might be different other places, where folks could hunt
for their food or try and live off of canned goods from grocery stores and
warehouses. But travelling through farm country, most of the living were out
until dusk trying to get in as much of the seed as they could. There was plenty
of ground going fallow, but with autumn half over, those people that were left
were working like crazy to get the wheat and barley planted. Not a lot of time
to light candles — and not a lot of time to waste on your knees.

There he was, though, casting a long
shadow across the aisle, down before the altar. He was praying right out loud,
praying forgiveness for the folks of Miles City, for Montana, and all of
America for bringing down the wrath of God. Sarge gave me a look, and I gave it
to Bo, but Bo just stood there and listened until Preacher stopped. Then he
gave a cough, and walked forward a piece.

“
Excuse me,
preacher. We didn’t want to disturb your prayers, but I was wondering if we
could rest here the night. Been walking all day and it’d be a favor to us all.”

Preacher turned around, and that’s
when I first saw that swollen, puffed-out chest rising and falling. First saw
those cracked glasses. I didn’t like anything I saw, and I sure as hell didn’t
like the look he was giving Bo.

“
There’s
nothing here worth having,” he said, real nervous.

“
Not looking
to take anything but a piece of sleep.”

“
You’re
carrying guns.”

Bo nodded. “Like I say, we’ve been
walking. It’s a bad time to be wandering without them if you’re a stranger in a
town. Boys, set the guns down. We’re not in any trouble here, and I don’t care
to make any for the Preacher.” He turned back to the Preacher then. “Let me
tell you our story.”

And he told him. Flat out, no
hedging. Told him about our ganging up in Minneapolis, how he heard about
Grants Pass and the girl’s crazy dream. About bringing all these random folks
together to this little valley town for the common good. About the importance
of having someone around to be a leader.

“
Now, I know
we’re not the types she was looking for when she spouted off on the Internet,”
he said. “But we’re the types she’s gonna need. Folks who used to spend their
whole day behind a computer don’t know how to set up a house, or straighten a
roof. They don’t know how to fix pipes or set up a water system. They might get
a couple engineers, but you can’t tell me there’ll be a lot of guys who want to
do the grunt work there. That’s where we come in. We’re just looking for honest
work, and we’re working hard to get there.”

The Preacher had holstered his
fish-eye now, and he was looking Bo up and down, real steady. Then he took
another rattling breath and said, “Why walk, when there are plenty of cars to
be taken?”

“
You want me
to tell you I wouldn’t take them?” Bo shook his head. “I’d be a liar. We did
manage to hotwire one back when we started, and I’ve thought on it plenty
since, but the roads aren’t real safe. Saw enough B-movies before the collapse
to know that much. We’ve been sticking close to Route Twelve for a long piece
now, but far enough away to hear anyone coming and get down in a ditch. We’re
not angels, Preacher, but we’re not looking for trouble, either. We just want
honest work.”

That got him a nod. “All right…but
why go so far? Oregon’s a long way from Minnesota. I’m sure there are other
towns that would be happy to take on a few strong backs. For that matter, some
of the locals here could probably manage with a few more men.”

“
Are you a
real preacher?” Bo asked bluntly. The question put Preacher off, but he nodded.
“All right then. I figure you know a little something about waiting for a
reward, and working toward it.

“
I don’t
know if they’ll let me in when we get to Grants Pass. I don’t even know if
anyone actually made it there. But if they do, they’re going to have a lot of
different folks from a lot of different places. I might not have gone to school
much, but I can respect the folks who did. I figure they’re like to have a
doctor, or at least someone who studied some. They’re like to have a couple
business folks, who might be good to have around for trading in case anyone
wanders through with goods to sell. They’re like to have just about every kind
of person you can find on the internet, but like I said, there are two kinds
that don’t spend much time there: folks who are used to just working, and folks
who know the word of God.”

Preacher looked at Bo while I looked
at Sarge. I didn’t mind preachers as a rule. I went through Sunday school just
fine and showed up at Ascension Lutheran for the holidays. We were barely
making twelve miles a day as it was, though, what with staying off the roads
and needing time to find food. Adding someone soft to the group was just going
to cause more delay, and I could see what was going to happen if we got caught
in a Montana winter. Figured by my count it was early October already, and that
was just asking for trouble.

“
Hey, Bo…” I
didn’t get to finish.

“
Hold up,
Dave. I want to hear what the Preacher thinks about working hard to get to an
uncertain reward.”

That was the only time I saw much
life in Preacher. He could tell he was being sparked, and he gave this kind of
wet and wheezy laugh. “You’re not going to get a rise out of me that easily.”

“
Maybe not.
But what kind of rise are you gonna get from the good folks here in Miles City
when winter comes?”

“
What do you
mean?”

Bo shrugged. “Have you been helping
them plant? Help them bring the crops in?”

“
A little.”

“
A little.
Then, Preacher, you’re like to be entitled to a ‘little’ food. What are you
living on now? Canned stuff, I bet, out of the local Super Value or whatever
grocery chains you had up here. Now, come December, you might still be getting
fed. It’ll be the first Christmas since things collapsed, and folks are
probably gonna want to stay in good with the Preacher. But you and I both know
that it’s not gonna be easy getting any fresh food before April.

“
How well do
you think you’re going to fare in February, or in March? When the canned
stuff’s run out and your neighbors are running out of wheat? Are they gonna
remember that you were praying for their souls all through the harvest? Or will
they just remember that you stayed inside the whole time, letting them break
their backs in the fields?”

Preacher looked a little doubtful,
but Bo kept on. “Maybe I’ve got them wrong. Maybe they’ll be persuaded by
Easter coming up, or maybe they’re just more religious here than I’m used to.
Maybe they’ll bring you fresh bread every morning until the day you meet Saint
Peter. But it’s nothing I’d bet money on. You might know God, but me? I know
people.”

That was it, I could tell. There’d
be a little more back and forth, but Bo had put the fear of man into the raspy
little loafer. There was more I wanted to say, a lot more, but Sarge motioned
me to come outside before I had a chance to spill. We weren’t like to be
missed, so I followed him. Those crazy blond curls nearly spilled into his eyes
now, and as skinny as we’d been getting on canned beans and fresh rabbit, he
looked more like a washed-up rock star than ever before.

He stayed real quiet, just staring
across the street, so I finally spoke up. “What do you think?”

“
Bo knows
guys,” he said. “He knows how they think, and he knows how to talk to them.”

“
Yeah, but
we hardly got enough food for the three of us. And winter’s on its way. This
preacher doesn’t look like he could walk a mile without stopping to rest. He’s
gonna slow us down.”

Sarge looked out across the
darkening town. “Yeah, I bet he will. But Bo knows what he’s doing. Always has
before. I don’t see him screwing up this time.”

“
I’m not
saying he’s screwing up,” I said, a little frustrated. Sarge wasn’t the
sharpest knife in the drawer. “I’m saying he hasn’t thought of everything, that’s
all. Adding another guy’s a great idea if he’s in good shape, but this guy?”

Sarge shrugged again. “Hell if I
know, but Bo’s got his reasons.” And that was the best I could get out of him
before Bo called us back in to introduce us to Preacher. We shared some hard
bread and canned beans, bunked down in the pews, and that was the end of it. It
was over three weeks ago, and I’d been right — we were moving slower since Bo
talked Preacher into coming along.