By the time the bus left the city behind and emerged onto a deserted stretch of highway, Les was dripping in sweat and his stomach was in knots but there were no infected anywhere in his vidscreens so he counted it as a win. He kept his eyes peeled for a place to pull over and steered into the first rest area he found, bringing the bus to a halt.
Turning to face the people packed onto the bus, he said, “Where in the seven hells am I going now? Anyone got an idea?”
“Get out of my way,” Lally said in a tone he’d never heard from her before. Usually her speaking voice was sugary sweet. She elbowed her way through the aisle, people making themselves into human pretzels to give her room to pass. “Is it safe here?” she asked Les when she reached him.
“Yes, ma’am, but we need to keep a sharp eye out just in case.”
“All right, everybody off the bus,” she said. “You too, Les. We’re fixing to have a meeting.”
He opened the door at her impatient gesture and she stepped to the ground. He wished the security guards or roadies could have gone first, to make sure it would be safe but that was Lally, imperious as a queen. She’d changed clothes while he was driving like a maniac and looked fresh as a daisy, makeup newly applied. She’d loaded up on jewelry too, with one arm covered wrist to elbow in bangles and beads and jewels. Lally thought of her baubles as armor of a sort, or trophies—the display gave her confidence, he’d heard her say more than once in response to criticism for display of wealth. She didn’t wear them onstage because the sound messed with her music. Her stage persona was another kind of armor anyway.
Les got off the bus last, to find Lally standing on a picnic table, two of the roadies stationed on either side, clutching personal blasters. The weapons wouldn’t do much good against a swarm of infected but they’d deter humans well enough.
“All right.” Lally nodded at him. “First, I want to thank Les McDaniel here for saving my life back there. Now I know we’re all sad about the ones we lost tonight but we got to keep going. Item one, anybody here get bit in the melee?”
People exchanged glances nervously.
“He’s got blood on his shirt,” a tech said, pointing at Les.
Surprised, he tugged at his tee shirt to see a few splatters on his ‘Lally World Tour’ tee shirt. “I tried to save Cindy the backup dancer,” he said with a shrug. “But she was already bit pretty bad.” Unhappy about the way people were staring at him, he whipped off the tee shirt, not caring about displaying his hard earned muscles and tattoos. “Need me to get naked?” he asked in a taunting tone, putting his hands on the fastening of his jeans. “Any of you know how to drive the damn bus?”
No one spoke up. “Yeah, thought not.” He grabbed his shirt off the ground and pulled it over his head despite the blood splatters. He’d try to remember to grab a fresh tee shirt from the merch containers in the cargo compartment later.
Eventually it was determined that two people had been bitten. Neither one had spoken up but people around them pointed them out.
“I’m sorry but we’ll be leaving you here,” Lally said in an uncompromising tone, her point emphasized by the menacing way the roadies pointed their weapons at the pair, a backup singer and a stranger no one knew who’d come along with the group. “You can go ahead and leave now.”
The group watched silently as the pair walked away down the road, the singer sobbing and the unknown man cursing Lally in colorful terms.
”Unpleasant but we can’t take chances,” Lally said, rubbing her arm and making the bracelets jingle as they clashed. “Now, to answer Les’s question, where are we going? Anyone have any good ideas?”
A few people called out destinations, most of which were totally impractical in Les’s opinion. There was no point in going to any of the big cities where the flu was raging. For the most part the passengers were silent, with nothing to offer. Finally Irv, a young roadie spoke up.
“There’s a town, well hardly even a town, small, up north a few hours from here,” he said. “I lived there as a kid for a few years when my Dad worked as a ranch hand. It might be safe. It’s pretty isolated. Thing is, one family runs the place. First Landing snobs, you know. Last I heard, the son and heir was making like a warlord, organizing shit and running things. If you talked to him, Miss Lally, I bet he’d let us stay.” The man cleared his throat. “People will do anything for you.” His tone was worshipful.
Lally gave him one of her best stage smiles, which Les had seen her flash at an overeager fan many a time. “Now we’re talking.”
“This flyspeck town got a name?” Les asked, pulling out his handheld and opening the navigation app.
“Rosewater.”
He scanned the app while the crowd waited. “Good roads between here and there,.” Les said finally. “Probably a four or five hour drive if we don’t run into any trouble.”
Lally held out her hands to the roadies and the men lifted her from the table as if she was an angel descending from the clouds. Lally made everything a show. “Rosewater it is. Come into the cabin with me, Irv, and tell me more about this local boy turned warlord.”
“Jonny Fafield,” the roadie said in a tone making it clear he wasn’t a fan. “I can tell you plenty about him. He made my time at school up there a pure misery.”
“You can get it all out of your system by telling me about it,” she answered with a grin, taking his arm. “Let’s move it, people.”
Chapter Two
A month ago…
Usually Devora Sims enjoyed the break from her daily routine when a training requirement took her into New Damarkal, the nearest city of any size to the tiny town of Rosewater where she lived. Her job as a police dispatcher wasn’t demanding, given the nature of the town. A few burglaries, some drunk and disorderlies, a couple of domestic disputes…rarely any big crimes. She loved being in the know, although she was extremely careful what tidbits she shared and with whom. Sheriff Davis wouldn’t stand for any careless gossip on her part.
Being part of the police force, even in a place like Rosewater, meant she had to keep up her training certifications and once or twice a year she’d get to go to New Damarkal on the town’s credit, stay a few days, meet new people and see the sights. She’d expected this trip would be as much fun as usual but the three day class was cut short to one and a half days, two of the scheduled presenters cancelled and the room was only about a third full. Some of the people she’d looked forward to catching up with the most weren’t in attendance.
Still her hotel room was paid for and when she called the sheriff he told her to go ahead and stay. “You can observe police procedures in the big city while you move around for the next day and a half,” he’d said with a wink.
