The Survivor Chronicles: The Risen (41 page)

"Is that what you think this is, rabies?"
Phoebe inquired.

"No. I think this is something we've never
seen before. Something that was freed from the earth when the
quakes tore it apart and the lava melted ice frozen for thousands
of years. This is something ancient but it shares a common genetic
marker with some of our more modern day diseases and it
can
be cured.
I
was cured. We're just not sure what its
incubation period is and we're using rabies' fast moving timeframe
as an estimate."

"It could move faster than rabies," Rusty
said.

Riley leveled him with a withering stare.
"Victor was sick for weeks before we found him."

"Those were different medicines Riley,
different sicknesses," Mary Ellen said kindly.

"I know that," Riley said but Xander knew
she also wasn't going to give up. "And that's why we'll give John
another dose soon."

She grabbed her gun from where it lay beside
John on the table and stepped away from him. "You should probably
tell everyone what you saw last night," Al said from beside him.
"Some weren't all that believing of Rusty's version of War. They'll
believe you."

Xander nodded but he kept his eyes on Riley
as she moved over to stand beside Carl in a position meant to
defend John from any possible threat. The only problem was that
they both had their backs turned to what may become the biggest
threat in the room. It could be hours before John woke again, they
would know then what it was they were trying protecting.

Moving from the kitchen, he stood in the
doorway as he surveyed the people gathered within the room. One of
them he'd known most of his life, five others he'd only known for a
couple of months and yet they were as close to him as family. The
others, he'd encountered more but they were already becoming an
important part of his life. They may not have gotten off to the
best start with Rusty, but if he and his children proved themselves
then Xander suspected they would be adding more members to their
growing family.

"Al told me about what you saw," he said to
Rusty.

Rusty lifted his gaze from John's body.
"War?"

"Yes," Xander confirmed. Riley and Carl
shifted; they glanced at him questioningly before focusing on Rusty
again. "We saw Death."

"It
is
true," Claire breathed.

"It's true," Xander confirmed and proceeded
to tell them what they'd witnessed last night, and what happened
yesterday with Josh.

"Do you think it left earth after?" Leah
asked anxiously.

"I don't know. Hopefully it was called back
to wherever it came from. Or maybe it's riding through some new
area of the world today."

"The horsemen were never our battle," Al
said. "We could have gone the rest of our lives and never known
they were here. There are other things out there…"

"The sick are dying," Carl said. "Or at
least they appear to be."

"We saw the same thing," Mary Ellen said.
"The human body can't withstand whatever is ravaging through them.
From what we've seen it's only a matter of time before the body
gives out completely."

All of their eyes turned to John's immobile
body on the table. Riley and Carl stepped closer together in an
attempt to shield John but it was impossible to do so completely.
Nancy edged her way in front of Riley and Carl and toward the front
of the table. Carl moved with her, the look on his face saying more
than words that he wouldn't hesitate to take her down if she so
much as took a threatening step toward John.

She reached the front of the table and
crossed herself before falling to her knees. Her hands clasped
before her as she bowed her head and began to pray, or at least
that was what he assumed she was doing, as she never uttered a word
out loud. He felt Riley's gaze burning into him and turned to look
at her. Deep shadows lined her eyes, he knew she hadn't slept in at
least twenty-four hours but her bloodshot eyes were still alert.
Beside him, Al shifted back and forth. Across the way, Claire
hitched an eyebrow up at Nancy.

There may be a God but it didn't seem as if
everyone was willing to forgive him, or her, if Carl and John were
right. Even as he thought it, Rusty turned on his heel and walked
out of the cabin. Xander stared at Rusty's back as he hurried down
the steps and toward the lake. His gaze fell on Rochelle, sitting
on the couch with Freddie's arm around her and Victor pressed
against her other side. She had started to cry the minute she'd
seen John, her tears had only intensified when she'd learned of
Josh's early demise. Her eyes were dry now, bloodshot and swollen,
but they were unwavering when they met his.

"John brought something back for you," he
told her. "Come on, I'll show it to you."

She glanced at John before rising to her
feet. Mary Ellen followed them onto the porch. Rochelle let out a
delighted cry when she spotted the trailer; she leapt off of the
porch and raced toward the trailer.

Mary Ellen glanced at him and then shook her
head. "What are we going to do with a horse?"

"I don't know."

"Where are we even going to keep it?"

"In the trailer?" As if on cue the animal
kicked the side of the trailer again, drawing the attention of
Rusty from where he stood by the lake. "Or not."

"Feed it?"

"That we did think of." He was happy to have
at least one answer for her right now, but he had no idea how long
the food they'd brought with them would last. "The horse was
something John wanted for her and we didn't have the heart to deny
him."

Mary Ellen glanced into the cabin behind
her, then at the trailer. Her shoulders slumped as she sighed.
"Yeah, I understand. Well let's go see this beast."

"He's actually kind of cute."

"Oh well that makes it all perfectly
acceptable then."

Xander laughed as he followed her down the
stairs and toward the trailer. He could already hear Rochelle
talking excitedly to the horse. "Do you think it will bring one of
them
here?" Mary Ellen asked.

"They don't want anything to do with us,"
Rusty said as he joined them on the walk toward the trailer. "Even
if they come for the horse, they won't bother us."

"I really don't need her new pet turning to
ash or whatever else they become," Mary Ellen replied.

Rusty gave a low chuckle and ran his hand
through his hair. "I can understand that."

They found Rochelle standing in the doorway
of the trailer, petting the head of the horse that had calmed down
a lot since she'd entered the trailer with him. It took the three
of them to get the horse off the trailer. They tied together a
bunch of rope, wrapped it around a tree on the other side of the
cabin and secured the horse to it. He had enough room to roam but
was safely away from the ditches surrounding the cabin. Eventually
they would have to figure out a more permanent solution but it
would do for now. Rochelle immediately started brushing the horse
with the brushes she'd discovered in the trailer while she carried
on a one-sided conversation with her new friend. Freddie and Victor
emerged from the cabin and carefully approached Rochelle and the
animal.

Xander savored in their happiness for a
minute. He wanted to stand there and watch them for hours, but
unfortunately there were less pleasant things to deal with. He
turned to Rusty. "Josh's body is in the back of the truck, I need
help burying him. We can do a ceremony later but we have to get him
in the ground."

Rusty nodded. "I'll help you."

"Keep the children distracted," he said to
Mary Ellen.

"I will."

She walked across the clearing to the kids.
When Xander was certain none of them were looking, he opened the
back doors of the truck and climbed in. Rusty helped him unload
Josh's body. They hurried past the cabin and into the woods. Xander
paused to retrieve the shovels leaning against the side of the
cabin before walking deeper into the forest with Rusty. Xander kept
a watchful eye on Rusty as they worked silently together to dig the
hole and carefully placed Josh's body inside.

"Thank you," Xander said to him when they
were finished covering the hole.

"I'm sorry for your loss." Rusty held the
shovel out to him.

Xander bowed his head and took the tool from
him. They walked back to the cabin; Xander returned it to where he
had found it. Spotting them, Mary Ellen walked over to join them.
"Is it done?" she inquired.

"It is," he confirmed. "We'll do something
for a memorial when John is feeling better. There are supplies in
the truck to unload."

Tears brimmed in Mary Ellen's eyes but she
followed them over to the truck. None of them spoke while they
unloaded the supplies from the truck but he worked steadily beside
the two of them. Unwilling to look at it, Xander threw a t-shirt
over the dried blood staining the wooden truck bed.

"Do you intend to stay with us now?" Xander
asked Rusty as they dropped some clothing on the porch.

Rusty frowned and wiped his arm across his
forehead. "I'd like to see if he pulls through."

"Are you hoping he does or he doesn't?"

Rusty did a double take that Xander knew
couldn't be faked. "I don't want him to die. I don't want
any
one to die. I've seen someone
turn and I've seen what those things are capable of."

"We all have."

"You really were bitten?" Rusty
inquired.

Mary Ellen dropped some more clothes on the
porch as Rusty asked the question. She glanced nervously at Xander;
he stared at Rusty for a minute before bending down and rolling up
the pant leg of his jeans. He didn't sense anything hostile from
Rusty, just curiosity and some disbelief. The scar from the bite
mark was still red and puckered but it had healed well considering
what it could have been. Sadness flickered over Rusty's face as he
stepped back.

"It was pure luck," Xander told him. "That
we combined the medications we did. We could have tried a million
other combinations but Bobby had had poison ivy and knew about the
steroids, and I was allergic to penicillin."

"And Bobby is?" Rusty inquired.

"He was a friend of ours that didn't make
it," Mary Ellen answered.

"Al told me one of you had become sick. Was
he the one the girl with the gun said she put down?"

Xander rolled his pant leg back down.
"Believe it or not there was a time when she'd never even touched a
gun. Riley's an amazing person, with a big heart, but she's a bear
when it comes to her friends and we've lost too many of them while
trying to get here. And no, Bobby was overtaken by some of those
things. Lee was another friend of ours who became sick and she was
forced to kill him."

"I think we've all had a bad time of it,"
Rusty said and turned away from him.

"You lost your wife?" Xander guessed as they
all walked toward the truck again.

"Yes, and others."

He didn't elaborate and Xander didn't press
him. There was no reason to exchange horror stories, to pick at old
scabs and rehash things that could never be changed. It wouldn't
bond them closer, wouldn't make them trust each other any more.
That would take time and shared experiences.

With the truck unpacked, they gathered in
the cabin to eat lunch. Uneasiness grew in Xander as he watched
Nancy rise and walk over to the window before returning to kneel by
John. She did it two more times in the short period he was inside.
She'd never been completely stable but the revelation of the
horsemen had rattled her even more.

Xander stayed with Riley and the others for
a little bit but eventually he wandered outside again. He couldn't
take the alternate praying and anxious pacing anymore. He had to
get away from John's unmoving, sweat covered body. Perhaps they
should all be praying but he was convinced it would only fall upon
deaf ears. There had probably been more praying over the past
couple of months than over the past ten years combined. He doubted
many of those prayers had been answered.

He wasn't about to curse God though, it
would be useless. He assumed the force that had struck down most of
its creations was as completely apathetic to them as it had been
all along. No prayer was going to change that now.

Riley reluctantly gave up her position as
guard after a couple of hours to Al, but even she couldn't deny she
could barely stand anymore. Xander was glad to get her out of that
stuffy cabin and away from the others. They went down to their spot
by the lake. She tried to fight it but she fell asleep in his arms
within five minutes of settling down.

Xander held her against him as he watched
the sunset over the water. He didn't look up when Rochelle, Victor,
and Freddie settled in around them and sat silently. The warmth of
Rochelle's shoulder pressed against his gave him some comfort. She
drew her knees up and hugged them to her chest. A twig breaking
announced Donald, Claire and Mary Ellen before they stepped around
the rocks and spread out around them. Riley's breath warmed the
skin on his neck, she didn't stir but he knew she was awake when
her lashes fluttered open against his neck.

It didn't matter if some large mystical
being had decided to destroy the world. Sitting here, watching the
colors of the sun spreading across the water, with a person he'd
always loved and others that he'd come to love and care for deeply,
he knew he'd found a little piece of heaven. It wouldn't last, not
with everything they still had to face, not with John's life still
hanging precariously in the balance, but to have this moment was
something precious. Something that he cherished as he held Riley
closer against him.

Rochelle's head dropped to his shoulder when
sleep claimed her. He could sense the exhaustion in those around
him but none of them moved as night descended. Tomorrow they could
deal with things; tonight was for them and the crickets chirruping
loudly around them. An owl hooted in the distance as the moon's
rays began to sparkle across the water.