Calvin was unable to locate any gear for packhorse-type operations. The two riderless horses were saddled; what the men didn’t have in their packs was slung over the two horses and secured to their saddle horns to ensure the cargo didn’t slip from side to side. Shannon and Essie came out of the house to see the three men off as Calvin went over some last-minute instructions with Jared and Barry about how to handle the animals.
John gave Shannon a hug and mussed Essie’s hair before swinging easily onto the back of his animal.
Jared picked Essie up and squeezed her tight. “We shouldn’t be too long. You take care of Shannon and Calvin, alright, kiddo?” He pulled the girl in tight so his mouth was near her ear. “Remember our little secret. Don’t tell a soul.”
Essie drew back and looked like she might speak, but Jared slowly shook his head as he smiled at the tiny girl. He put her back on the ground and nodded to Shannon stiffly before turning and climbing aboard his steed. Barry somehow managed to get into the saddle while John and Jared were saying their goodbyes, and sat awkwardly as they climbed aboard their mounts. Barry dipped his chin to Shannon, who smiled back pleasantly.
“Calvin, are there any last-minute tips on these things?” Barry asked, looking a little uncertain for the first time.
Calvin wiped his brow and looked up at the man. “Don’t fall off, and if you do, don’t let him walk on you.”
͠
Nearly five hours later, the three horsemen reached a small ranch, which had a corral and barn.
“We leave the horses here,” John announced. “The rest is on foot.”
“What?” Barry exclaimed. “We can’t walk sixty miles on foot,” he argued incredulously.
“That’s redundant, man,” John said flatly as he dismounted.
“What?”
“Walking on foot…it’s redundant,” John repeated, not bothering to look back as he headed for a gate leading into the corral.
Barry turned to Jared for help. “Did you know we would be walking?”
Jared shook his head. “Doesn’t really matter though. Might be safer walking on foot,” Jared answered, purposely using the same redundancy Barry had used.
“Damn straight it’s safer,” John fired back over his shoulder as he opened the gate. “We have to cross a dense urban area, and the horses would draw all kinds of unwanted attention. People will see them as food and a mode of transportation, if my guess is right.”
“That’s a long walk, man,” Barry said, his voice reflecting resignation, but still showing his displeasure.
John had already scouted the ranch while he and Calvin were out, and knew the corral had a three-quarters-full water trough and a feed station he could fill with hay stored in the barn. They secured the animals inside the corral before filling the feeding station with as much hay as would fit using a wheelbarrow John located inside the barn. After the feed station was full, John filled the wheelbarrow with hay and dumped it on the ground. He didn’t know how long this hike was going to take, and didn’t want to come back to five dead horses.
“How long are we expecting to be gone?” Barry asked, looking at all the hay they were leaving the horses.
“Dunno,” John answered as he heaved the wheelbarrow forward, dumping the hay onto the ground. “Calvin said if we aren’t back in a week, he’ll come down and feed them, but I’d rather that not happen.”
Jared frowned. “Does he plan on driving the Beetle?”
John smiled and glanced at Barry. “Naw, he’ll take Barry’s bike down.”
After the horses were taken care of, the men donned their packs, hefted weapons into place, and began to move slowly towards San Jose. John had studied some maps and decided on cutting straight through the city to the west side, where he and his companions would slip into the coastal mountains that separated most of the Silicon Valley from the Pacific Ocean. John felt their chances of avoiding trouble would be enhanced if they spent as little time as possible in the city.
He, like Bart and Jared, assumed people living in the city would have fled to the hills or out into the valley, but the lack of people they’d seen over the past month indicated otherwise, which worried John. This was a strong indicator that most of the people in the city were either dead or still in the city, meaning they would be more desperate than they had been when he and his team were forced to fight their way out of Barry’s neighborhood not more than a month prior.
After a few hours of walking through the countryside, which included negotiating fences and avoiding properties with structures on them, they reached the crest of a hill that overlooked San Jose and the southern tip of the San Francisco Bay. John dropped his pack and pulled out a pair of binoculars. He scanned the area below, looking for any sign of humanity, and found none. He spent a full ten minutes searching the area, and not once did he see any sign of life.
“See anything?” Jared finally asked.
“Nope, and I’m not sure what that means.”
“I think San Jose had, like, a million people living there before all this. Do you think they’re all dead?” Jared wondered out loud with a sense of disbelief.
“Nope,” John answered, still searching the valley floor with the binoculars. “Humans are a resilient creature. They’re down there—somewhere. We just have to be very careful ’cause my bet is they’re hungry, scared, and a lot
