To Ruben's extraordinary credit, he hadn't succumbed to eating our horses. He'd been a strange guy, but I didn't think I could imagine a more noble moral gesture than sparing their lives under the circumstances he was in.
We found the horses by moonlight, in the same meadow where we'd left them, healthier than I'd seen them for a long time. Since the first days of Spring, grasses in the undergrowth had shot up, and I found Kaypay grazing heartily.
"It still only affects humans," Ian observed distractedly. "The horses are fine."
I nodded, but said nothing.
My mind had gone mostly numb. I was taking things minute by minute, refusing to let myself peer into the future.
I hugged Ian, and I started to cry.
Everyone was dead or would be dead soon. Chris, my mom, Shawn and Lindsay, even Jake. Even . . . I couldn't bring myself to list Ian yet. My mind was reeling. I wasn't ready to face it.
Ian hugged me back. "It's okay," he whispered.
I pulled away and climbed onto Kaypay.
We rode all night toward the dwellings. Neither of us had said out loud that we should go there next, but we both knew that's where we had to go. We knew what we would find. If Ruben was gone, we had no hope for anyone there. Still, we had to see for ourselves.
Just as the dawn was rising across the hills, we reached the ravine.
Every last one of the cattle had been slaughtered. Their bones lay scatted across the sage brush.
As we descended below the cliffs, the dwellings were perfectly silent.
I visited my mom's room first. She'd died wrapped in her sleeping bag with Ed. I wasn't entirely surprised. And I didn't begrudge her this last happiness; both of them had died smiling.
We checked every last room. The librarian lay in the mechanic's arms. Doug and Janice Bottorff were surrounded by their stiff, smiling children. The Denver teens had huddled together, all four of them. The girl with the pixie cut looked like she'd died laughing.
There wasn't a single survivor.
After checking the last of the dwelling rooms, Ian and I climbed up to the lookout atop the cliff.
It was another beautiful day. Sunlight shone down on the hills and into the ravine. All the snow had melted, replaced by a new green blanket as far as we could see.
"Ian," I whispered. A tear spilled from my cheek onto his collar. "I don't think I can do this," I said. "I keep turning to you, waiting to see you changed, like Chris changed in the end, or even already dead. I know it's coming," I sobbed. "I can't stand it anymore. I can't. I can't face it. And I know I have to."
Ian put his arm around me and held my head to his chest while I cried.
He whispered, "I'm not going to die, Ash."
I pulled away from him. His dark eyes met mine without wavering.
"Don't mess with me like that, Ian," I said. "You are going to die. Don't you get it? You're breathing the same air as everybody else. Snap out of it. I need you to be rational about this. We probably only have a couple of days at most. Then you're going to leave me behind."
Ian hadn't looked away from me while I pleaded with him. Not even once.
"You're breathing the same air as everybody else, too," he said.
The traces of a smile danced around his lips.
Oh no.
It was happening.
Within hours, maybe minutes, Ian would be gone, and I'd be left alone. The last living soul.
My heart raced with terror, falling to pieces like a washing machine tumbling down a mountainside.
"Don't mess with me, Ian." I hit him with both hands on the chest, pushing him away. "You know what Chris said. You know what's going to happen. And I really need you to accept that before you go. Because I need you to see me through what's going to happen all the way to the end. I can't watch you die alone. I need you--the real you--to be with me until your last breath."
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