At mid-morning, as his passengers napped or munched on survival rations, Les wished for coffee to give him a jolt of caffeine. No one had found any in the truck they’d looted. He wondered if there were any stim shots in the box of medinjects they’d found because even with the AI doing its share of the driving, he was getting exhausted and he was sure Ethan was the same. He’d trust Devora to drive this bus if it came to that but he wasn’t too sure about any of the others.
He blinked and sat up straighter as something in the forward vids caught his attention. “Roadblock ahead,” he commed to Ethan. “Get your armed passengers ready.” He slowed the bus and shouted over his shoulder, “Roadblock ahead. If you’re armed, take a window seat and be ready but hold your fire till I see what’s going on. If you’re unarmed, get on the floor in the center of the bus.” The position offered no safety whatsoever since this was a school bus, not an armored personnel carrier, more’s the pity, but at least they wouldn’t be immediate targets.
He met Devora’s eyes in the mirror and flashed her a confident smile he wasn’t feeling. “Probably locals trying to discourage newcomers. I’ll assure them we’re headed for Glastine.”
“Right,” she said but he heard the doubt and fear in her voice. “It could be Ruger and his men.”
“I think they’d straight out attack,” he replied. Now the bus was closer, he assessed the blockade, which appeared to be several heavy duty trucks and a couple of massive pieces of robo farm equipment. Impossible to ram his way through with the bus. He didn’t much like the looks of this.
He stopped the bus about five yards from the barricade, taking note of the individuals posted with weapons. “Give me Jenny’s towel,” he said to Devora.
She scrambled to their seat and handed him the towel with a puzzled expression on her face.
“Peace flag,” he said. “I’m going out to talk to whoever is in charge.”
She dug her fingers into his arm. “Be careful.”
He leaned over to kiss her briefly. Addressing the rest of the passengers, he said, “Devora’s in charge while I’m out there. Hold your fire unless I signal by dropping the flag, or if I get shot, understand?” He waited for the nods of acknowledgment and then cracked open the bus door slightly, sticking his hand out with the towel waving. As there was no immediate hostile reaction, he squeezed through the door and stepped onto the pavement.
“We’re refugees going to the camp at Glastine,” he called out. “All we want is to be on our way peacefully.”
The people he could see stared at him in silence, weapons trained on him and the buses.
“Is there someone in charge I can discuss this with?” Les asked.
“Drop your weapon and come forward,” yelled a woman in yellow coveralls. She gestured with her blaster. “No funny business.”
“I’m unarmed,” he said, which was true. He’d left his projectile gun on the bus. There was a knife in his boot but he wasn’t planning to reveal the weapon or to use it. The force arrayed against him was overwhelming. He walked forward as ordered until the woman motioned again.
“Far enough,” she said.
An older man stepped out from behind one of the huge agri robos. “You got a name, bus driver?”
“Les McDaniel. And you?”
“Perry Norwood. You’re a long way from Rosewater,” he said. “That mean it fell to the infected? Or to human vermin?”
“The infected,” Les said. “To my knowledge we’re all that got away. We’re heading for Glastine, to the refugee camp there.”
“You went through Verner’s Ford?” the man asked.
“Yes. Had a bit of trouble there, ran into a few thugs who work for a guy named Ruger. You know of him?”
“Oh yeah, regular piece of trash all right. Killer, rapist, no redeeming qualities. You realize this road goes basically right past where he’s camped?”
“I do but there doesn’t seem to be any other route,” Les said, voicing the frustration he’d had earlier. “Colonial authorities didn’t exactly construct a network of highways and bypasses up here in the north.”
“No, they sure didn’t Probably never envisioned a situation like the one we’ve got.” Head tilted, Perry surveyed him. “Right now Ruger and the good folks of Millerville are engaged in a war. Trust me you don’t want to get in the middle of the hostilities and you don’t want to try to drive through the city either. The residents ain’t in a hospitable mood right now.”
“What alternative do I have? You gonna call in a flight of flyers to take me and mine to Glastine?” Les tried to keep the bitterness from his voice.
“As it happens I do have a proposal for you,” Perry said.
“I don’t know if my people want to stay here,” Les said.
The man laughed, as did the people behind him, on the barricade. “Hell, son, that’s the last thing I’d ever offer you. I got a full complement of family, friends, ranch hands and people I trust up at my place. We’re dug in, we’ve got the high ground and we’re situated to survive this damn mess. Got surprises for Ruger or the Millerville council if either one tries to come at us. Don’t figure the infected are gonna find their way to my doorstep but if they do, we’re ready. I ain’t letting some random group of refugees anywhere near my place. No offense.”
“So why are we standing here on the highway then? Why barricade the road and stop us? We’re running on fumes. We’ve got nothing worth taking—we barely escaped with our lives at Rosewater.”
