“I’m no spy. I think you realize that. Your father said to tell you he has my back. We both know what that means.”
A well-shaped eyebrow arched. Mental gymnastics were being performed between the silken braids.
Finally she spoke. “The no-leave rule is non-negotiable. I told you that when you first arrived.”
“I realize that, but these are extenuating circumstances.”
“So you would have me believe.”
“Your father believes me.”
“While I credit Pops with a kind of backwoods sixth sense, I credit my intellect more. The answer is no. Besides, we can take care of ourselves just fine.”
“With a few old shotguns and rifles? What if there’s an army amassing to the north?”
“There’s not. We would know.”
“How would you know?”
She gave him one of Willadean’s appraising looks. “Do you think you’ve seen everything we have or are capable of? Do you think I would blindly trust a stranger just because Pops said he was okay? You underestimate me. It’s usually not wise to do so. The matter is closed, Fergus. Good night.”
He watched her glide away. He didn’t know whether to be annoyed or think about baseball.
Chapter 5
Ray
Ray thrummed his fingers on his desk while he watched the drone footage for the twentieth time. He hadn’t noticed the kids as he live-streamed, but he caught sight of them on the playback. Before the end of the world happened, drone technology had evolved to include FPV — first person view — which didn’t require Wi-Fi or cellular. The drone and the controller utilized direct channels to communicate, and since GPS satellites still orbited the planet, his drones would always be able to find their way home. At least until those orbits deteriorated and the satellites crashed to earth, but he didn’t expect that to happen for at least twenty years. Maybe a hundred.
He used an iPad to watch footage from the memory card. If he hadn’t, he wouldn’t have seen the children.
There were survivors out there in the Smoky Mountain National Park. Seeing them was one of the few moments of pure joy he had experienced since Chicxulub. But that joy soon evaporated, crystalizing into something that felt more familiar. Anxiety. What should he do now? The video revealed two children, likely pre-pubescent. The camera had been recording and live-streaming in 1080 HD, not 4K, so the clarity on the memory card’s playback was less than perfect. He couldn’t tell if they were starving.
Ray knew the mortality rate of the disease: higher than ninety-nine percent. The odds that an entire community or even a family unit would have survived was next to impossible. Any organized groups out there would have banded together post-pandemic. Had the parents of these children survived? If not, had other adults adopted them? Or were they scavenging on their own?
He had flown the Phantom back to the same location the following day, set on 4K Ultra High Def this time. It captured images of deer, elk, and a well-fed black bear. But no people. That’s when the seed of an idea began to germinate.
The Phantom DJI 4 was excellent at maneuverability and boasted one of the best cameras available, but its payload was a meager half-kilo. Before the end, the drone market had been red-hot. The government had recognized the inherent usefulness of cargo drones for emergency situations when large vehicles and heavy equipment couldn’t get to the people who needed life-saving supplies.
The Freefly ALTA UAV price tag was ten times that of the Phantom, but it could haul a fifteen-pound payload. In one trip, it could carry ten MREs to the clearing where he had spotted the children. He planned to load it up, send it out, and drop off its cargo.
Surely the children had heard the drone’s motors. Surely they had recognized what the sound was. Even backwoods Appalachian people must have known about the technology before. If they were curious, they would return to the location where they had been two days earlier to see what was to be seen. Wasn’t it the nature of children to be curious?
It was eight in the morning. He would take Lizzy her breakfast, tend to the spreadsheet, then dispatch the Freefly loaded with not just calorie-laden MREs but some treats as well. The Strategic National Stockpile near Tremont contained two hundred pounds of Pop-Tarts. Strawberry wasn’t his personal favorite — he was more of a brown-sugar-cinnamon guy — but the shelf-life of the fruity breakfast pastry was impressive compared to other ready-to-eat baked goods. He and Lizzy hadn’t made a dent in them.
When he turned the corner of her corridor, he realized he was actually whistling to himself. Normally, Lizzy would begin talking to him at this point, her voice echoing off plastic-wrapped pallets, bouncing down from the cavernous ceiling, then extending an unwelcome, invisible tentacle to his ears.
Today there was no sound except that of his own footsteps.
He double-timed it the remaining yards, his mind scanning a list of possible scenarios. Had she escaped? Would he see the mesh fencing ripped off the cinderblock walls? Impossible. She was brilliant, but not superhuman. And she hadn’t overslept once during the eight months Ray had been bringing her breakfast. In fact, no matter what time of day he checked on her, she was always awake. A few weeks ago, something had propelled him out of a dreamless sleep at 3:33 in the morning. His first thought was of Lizzy. When he arrived at her cell, she had been standing there waiting for him. His stockinged feet had made no sound on the concrete floor, but somehow she knew to expect him. Rather than speaking, she’d given him her trademark smile. A smile that belonged in a Henry Fuseli painting.
He shuddered at the memory, forcing his mind back to the present as he ran. Was she ill? Was
