2. The Road
Staying Human
The world outside the swamp is worse
We woke up stiff and sore the next morning at the rest stop. Sleeping in the vehicles wasn’t exactly comfortable, but it beat the swamp floor. I broke out the MREs with all the enthusiasm of a man sentencing his friends to prison food.
“Beef stew,” I announced, handing them out. “Definitely rejected by Ethiopians.”
The old Army joke landed about as well as it ever did. Everyone ate quickly and quietly. The only saving grace was the coffee I still managed to brew on the Coleman stove. Small rituals. They matter more now.
We broke camp fast and got back on the road. The mood was purposeful, but the easy confidence we’d had leaving the swamp was already starting to fade.
The further north we drove, the clearer it became: the world outside our little green fortress had gotten much worse. Burned-out towns, looted stores with broken windows, abandoned cars pushed off the roads. In one small crossroads town we passed, fresh Walker activity was obvious — bodies that hadn’t been there long, and a few still moving in the distance.
Early afternoon we stopped at a roadside gas station that still had fuel in the underground tanks. While Tom and I worked the hand pump to fill both vehicles, the others kept watch.
They came out of nowhere.
A dozen Walkers burst from behind the station and the wrecked cars nearby. They were moving fast and more coordinated than anything we’d seen before. One seemed to be the leader, right at the front of a tight wedge of ugly Zombies.
The fight turned chaotic fast. Raych’s rifle cracked, Sarah’s Mossberg boomed, and even Mikey got in a couple rounds from his .410. One of the damn things got way too close to Tom and I while we were still pumping gas. I transitioned smooth and fast to my Wilson Combat 1911 and put two rounds into its zombie mug.
No one got bit. No one got scratched. But it was closer than any of us liked.
We finished fueling in record time and got back on the road, the mood in both vehicles noticeably quieter.
Later, while Raych drove, I rode shotgun and stared at the ruined landscape rolling past. “They’re getting smarter,” I said. “Faster. Working together. If that keeps up, staying human is going to get a lot harder.”
Tom’s voice came over the walkie. “My boys are out there somewhere. We need to reach that data center.”
Raych glanced at me, her small fierce smile tempered with concern. “You still think it’s the right first stop?”
“I do,” I said. “If there’s anywhere left that might have answers… or power… it’s there.”
Mikey was quiet in the back of Tom’s truck, trying hard to act brave. Sarah kept a protective hand on his shoulder. Tom’s grief showed more clearly now, the weight of not knowing about his sons pressing down on him.
The convoy rolled north as the day wore on. The smoke plumes on the horizon seemed thicker. The road felt longer.
We’d left the swamp behind.
Now we were finding out just how dangerous the rest of the world had become.
Bougie Apocalypse
A serialized military-flavored post-apocalyptic pulp story about heirloom beans, De Buyer carbon steel skull-crackers, good coffee, and refusing to let the apocalypse win.
#BougieApocalypse #TheCough #StayingHuman
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