Seven Days To Brooklyn: A Sara Robinson Adventure (9 page)

Jumping down and skipping her way back over to her fellow survivors, Sara joins them in conversation. “So, bout time we made our way north.”

“Sure, Sara, got any other local points of interest we should know about before we head on?” Mac is a bit perturbed but does not show it on his face.
 

“Hey, let the kid have some fun. God only knows what she has been through before we got together.”

 
Ava puts her arm around Sara’s shoulder as the two of them walk back over to the motorcycle.

 
“
Nope
! Nothing else interesting in Texas, but as soon as we get up to northern New Mexico, I’m sure we will find something cool. Besides, I’m twelve; give me a break. At least I’m not a dentist.”

Mac lets out a big sigh as he steps back over his bike, kicking it to life once again. Jumping into the sidecar, Sara settles in for another jaunt up the road. She points to the journal again and shows Ava a point on the map that looks as though it is on the outskirts of town.

“That’s where we are going?” Ava ask’s

 
“Yes, me and Dad would fly in here for a hamburger. Gotta be some fuel left in one of the airplanes.”

“Sure, why wouldn’t there be some there? None anywhere else,” Ava answers sarcastically.

Ava starts the bike and revs up the engine before letting the clutch out. Slowly rolling ahead, they pick up speed and are on their way north again. Stop light after stop light gives way to an open highway. Up ahead is a sign with an airplane on it and mileage one. Turning off Highway 285, Mac and Ava navigate the bikes into the airport road and out onto the ramp, where a few defunct airplanes are sitting. Pulling up to the first plane, a Cessna 172, Sara jumps out with a one-gallon plastic milk jug. Walking up to the wing, she reaches up to the sump button on the underneath of the wing and presses it in. Nothing comes out.
 

“Damn!”

Walking over to the other wing, she repeats the process with the same results. Plane after plane, Sara strikes out. Walking back over to Mac and Ava, who seem to be getting a bit better acquainted, Sara glances over her right shoulder noticing something sitting just inside an open hangar. Spinning around on her heels, she turns and runs across the large ramp followed by Mac and Ava. Sara runs up to what looks like a square, metal sink. It is painted red. On one side is printed No Smoking. Flammable Liquid. On the front printed in black block letters is 100 LL. Swinging the lid up and out of her way, Sara peers down into the bottom of the contraption. She can see a few airplane parts suspended by wiring, hanging just above a small pool of liquid. Just then, the fumes hit her nostrils, and she is sure that even dirty fuel will work.
 

“This is Avgas.
Aviation Gasoline
.”

 
Kneeling down, Sara finds a drain valve on the bottom of the square tank. She opens the valve slowly, draining out a gallon of fuel into her jug. “Find another jug; I think there is at least four or five more gallons in here.”
 

Mac and Ava rummage around the hangar and come up with an old metal can that looks as though it holds at least two gallons of aviation solvent.
 

“Here.” Mac hands the jug to Sara.

“Take this one, Ava; we can fill the bikes and then store some for later.” Sara hands up the can as she continues to fill the other jug.
 

Ava takes the jug over to her bike and dumps the smelly contents into the tank, filling it halfway. Returning to the hangar, she takes the other jug from Sara and returns to her bike, filling the tank the rest of the way.
 

Mac finishes the job by filling his bike, and stores the two jugs on the back of his bike for later.
 

“We should get going; sun is starting to go down, and I don’t want to be in town after dark.” Sara knows that the infected survivors thrive in the cool darkness of night, and she is not eager to make this area a campsite.
 

“Yes, smart. Besides, we need to put some miles on, right?” Mac says as he looks over at her with the look of, you are in charge, but I am an adult and am a lot older and wiser than you are.
 

Sara looks back at him and nods her head yes.

Leaving the airport behind them, they quickly make the right turn north on Highway 285, leaving the town in their wake. More miles click off in the afternoon light as they pass through another deserted town. A road sign on their way through says Pecos, Texas, Population 8780, but they all knew that wasn’t true anymore. The infected rate of most towns in Texas was nearly 98 percent. Starting in Dallas, Texas, with the first case, followed by the uncertainty and indecisiveness of the bureaucratic federal government and the impossibly hand-tied Centers for Disease Control, the survival rate in the first two months alone was just under 3 percent of those that contracted the initial strain of the Ebola
 
27x virus. Six months later, multiple infectious mutations of the strain have left Texas, Louisiana, Alabama, and Georgia decimated. The few survivors that were seemingly immune by the fact of quarantining themselves in place eventually succumbed to the animalistic nature of the disease through constant attack from advanced infected citizens. Some of these people did not die from the disease, nor did they recover. They were left in a zombie-like stupor, spurred awake by some unwary person who thought the coast was clear, someone trying to make their way out of their house in search of food after their survival supplies ran dry.
 

Just outside town on the north side, the trio passes a road sign: Carlsbad NM 86.

Waving her hand above her head, Sara gestures for them to keep moving north to Carlsbad.

An hour later places the trio just south of Carlsbad. The many rolling hills leave ample spots for them to pull off to the side of the road. Finding a wide spot, Ava turns off the highway and up a dirt road, followed by Mac a short distance behind.
 

“Good idea, sun is setting. I’m hungry anyway.” Sara stretches her arms and yawns as she continues talking with Ava.
 

“Yeah, me too, kiddo. What do you think? Canned mystery meat or possum?”

“I’m going for barbecued possum. Maybe hickory smoked, too.”
 

Sara produces a jar of barbecue sauce, raising it up for Ava to see.

Pulling further up the road, Ava finds another turn off dead-ending a few hundred feet later.
 

“Well, looks like this is a good spot to stop.”
 

Within a half hour, Mac has a fire blazing, ready to cook the animal over a spit he has fashioned out of some small sticks. Hands covered in blood, Sara produces the skinned carcass of the possum, which now looks eerily like a large cat. She hands it to Mac.
 

“Here, you do the honors. I shot your beast; now you can cook it.”
 

“Right. No problem. Have it roasted up in no time.”
 

Mac skewers the gutted animal and has it hanging over the fire. The sun slowly sets off in the west, introducing the orange glow of sundown, followed by a deep blue sky, then pitch black. The stars in the desert shine a bit brighter as if to say, we’re up here watching you. Bellies full of roast possum, they bed down for the night, Sara curled up next to Ava, her head lying on her lap. Within minutes opposite the pair of ladies, Mac is sawing logs, laid out next to the fire.
 

3:45 a.m.

Rain starts to fall, slowly first, then hard enough to wake the group.

“Ah crap, in the desert and we are getting rained on. At least it is a warm rain,” Mac says to Ava.
 

“Is my chauffeur ready to head up the road, or are you waiting for an invitation?” Another snide comment coming from a teenager is all Ava can handle before exploding.
 

“Look, you little twit. If you think we are going to tiptoe around you all the way to Brooklyn, then you’ve got another thing coming. It would be nice if you showed some gratitude occasionally, I don’t care if this is the apocalypse or not.”

A bit stunned, Sara just blankly stares back at Ava for a minute, rain-soaked hair dripping down her face and into her eyes. For the first time in her affluent life of being catered to, somebody has finally stood up to her, and she is not sure where to go from here. Knowing that life is different now, she decides it is time to act a bit more civil. Ava, arms crossed, is still waiting for an answer, which seems like it will never come.

“Sorry.”

“Thanks, that is all I needed. Now let’s get going before we completely melt away.”
 

Ava holds her arm out as Sara walks over to her and places her head on her shoulder. Sara looks up at her, and Ava is unsure whether she has rain in her eyes or tears.
 

“We’re like sisters, aren’t we?” Sara says, with just a hint of a quiver in her voice.
 

“Of course we are; us girls have to stick together.” Ava helps Sara get into the sidecar, pulling the blanket around her, wrapping her up completely from head to toe. Mac looks at the ladies from the seat of his bike before kicking it to life.
 

“Well, are we ready to go yet? Always waiting on a woman, even in these circumstances.”

“Hey, can it. Just because it is the end of the world does not mean chivalry needs to end. Besides, we were just having some girl time.” Ava lashes out at him angrily. Mac sighs and then decides it is better to say nothing more, letting the girls feel as if they won this issue.
 

Sara looks up at Ava before talking again, trying to judge if it is okay to talk to her in a less than cordial way.
 

“This will be bad for us, going into town this early. At least with the rain, they will not be able to smell us, but they will hear us coming way before we see them.”
 

“Okay, we will just keep going until the sun comes up. No need to stop anyway, right, Mac?”

“Yes, you got it, Ava; we can go right into Roswell, no stopping.”

The two bikes make their way back down the dirt road that has turned into a muddy mess with small rivers running down the middle and sides. Lurching left, then right, Ava has a hard time keeping the bike centered on the road as it slips around. Mac, however, has gained more than adequate skills in one day to be lucky enough to only slide off the road three times on his way out.

Turning to the right where the muddy road meets pavement, Ava lets out a yell, “Woo-hoo!” as the bike and sidecar slip in the mud.

She looks back and sees Mac slide sideways coming onto the road and then wobble back and forth as he gets the bike back under control.

CARLSBAD 15

Sara points at the sign they just passed, looking over to see whether Ava saw it. A thumb-up gesture from Ava satisfies Sara’s interest long enough for her to go back to the task of pulling up some tunes on the iPod. Minutes later, the riders enter the town and are a bit shocked to find it deserted. Riding further into town, block after block, window after window, they see no signs of life. No lights coming from the shop windows, no noise except the steady patter of rain falling on the road and the low whine of the motorbikes. Looking over at Ava and Sara, Mac yells, “Looks like nobody is home.”
 

Just then the trio make a ninety-degree left turn onto West Pierce Street and are stunned to see a group of people six blocks ahead of them, blocking the road out of town. They stop the bikes and look behind them, noticing another small group forming at the other end of town where they had just ridden through.
 

“Don’t think we can just ride through them.” Mac says to Ava.
 

“No, probably not going to work. There has to be at least ten in front of us and fifteen to twenty behind us.”
 

Ava watches as Sara dismounts and is gearing up for battle. Placing the pistol back into her belt at her waist, Sara pulls the bowie knife out of the backpack and straps it to her leg. The sniper rifle is broken down and half-sticking out of the backpack, but is not much use in close quarters combat, so she leaves it packed up. Her speed and precision shocks Ava.

“You guys drive around town a bit; I’ll take some of them out from the roof of that building behind us.” She points to the roofline above and behind her. Mac and Ava wonder if Sara has decided to abandon them or use them for bait.

“Go. Before they get too close,” Sara yells as she slings the backpack onto her back and runs to the rear of the building, down through a narrow alleyway. As she rounds the back corner of the building, she sees a dumpster next to a drainpipe coming off the roof. Jumping up on the dumpster, Sara shimmies her way up the slick, four-inch drainpipe and onto the roof, the steady rain completely soaking her body. Setting the backpack down, she quickly assembles the rifle and scope, leaving the silencer off the rifle. Over to the edge of the building, she looks down and sees only the bike with the sidecar attached. What she was unaware of while getting to the roof was Ava’s plan. Ava had jumped off the bike and hastily hashed out a plan with Mac.

“I’ll drive. You ride on back. As soon as we find a board or pipe, we can play some mailbox baseball.”

Mac looks at her like she has gone completely mad.
 

“Mailbox baseball? What the hell is mailbox baseball?”

“Just get on; I’ll explain in a minute.”
 

Their departure is none too soon. Both hordes of bandits have already started running to them as fast as they can, armed with a menagerie of weapons. One thug has a scythe that has the handle cut off, sharpened to a razor’s edge. Another is wielding a 3-foot two-by-four, which has been whittled down like a baseball bat but has barbed wire wrapped around one end and nails protruding. The rest are carrying anything from shovels, to pickaxes, to short pieces of chain.

The crack of the .308 rifle fills the air, dropping one of the first thugs in his tracks, but does not dismay the group to stop their advance. Turning down a side street, Ava guns the bike, looking all around for a weapon. Up ahead, part of the gang has also run down an opposing street and is trying to cut them off. Shifting gears again, Ava picks up more speed while Mac is hanging on for life. The rivers of rainwater squish out in front of the tire as they pass three of the thugs within spitting distance and narrowly avoid a haircut by the scythe-wielding psycho. Making a series of left turns, Ava brings the bike back onto the main road and sees her opportunity to get a weapon. Pointing with her right hand, she yells to Mac to pick up the weapon as they drive by.