CHAPTER EIGHT
Steven left Serena for the driver's seat after their third intimate session and began driving again.
"We're not that far away, are we?" Serena asked after they had been driving for a while.
"No, but we'll stay near a body of water until I've had enough of you so we can wash off our sins and get started again. But you probably already guessed that." He paused for a few moments. "You have no idea how long I've had to hold this back, Serena, how hard it has been for me—or maybe you do. In any case, I don't know how long it'll take to get it out of my system, but we'll get you to safety soon enough."
Serena didn't know how she felt about him warning her of his impending seductions.
It seemed that he wanted to say more—the air felt heavy with unspoken words, but he remained quiet.
Eventually, the vehicle started slowing down for another stop.
Serena guessed that they had reached the body of water.
She heard him close the door as he left the vehicle for what she assumed was a bath, and then jumped as she heard a shot.
She immediately panicked, worried about his safety, and she ached for a window to look out of.
She knew that Steven was far more than a capable marksman and had most likely killed another Morph, but what if someone had actually shot at him? She didn't know how to drive the APC!
Serena also knew that not being able to drive wasn't the only reason she was worried.
"Steven, are you okay?" she shouted, fighting the urge to leave the vehicle and check for herself.
She knew that he would be furious if she did, and he would probably use it as an excuse to fuck her roughly and angrily.
"Serena, stay inside!" he shouted, and the relief washing over her almost immobilized her as all of her muscles relaxed nearly to the point of turning her into a blob. He was safe.
She sharply remembered how much danger he was in whenever he left the APC—from both the Morphs and careless, trigger-happy surviving humans.
An ache came over her heart at the thought of losing him, and she put her hand on her chest as if the move would stop the sudden, piercing pain.
Transference, she thought. From your husband to him. Besides, you've known him for four years or so anyway—of course you care about him a bit. Plus, who else have you got now?
Serena had no idea of the status of her scattered family members, but she suddenly realized that she had already accepted them as dead; most of the population seemed to be, although she had no idea of actual numbers.
She decided she would ask Steven about it when he returned.
She dropped her hand from her chest and took a deep breath.
She wasn't a zombie—she still had her brains to help her out of whatever mess they had gotten into with each other, and talking about concrete, logical things would keep her feeling like some semblance of her old self.
When Steven joined her in the back of the vehicle, damp and clean, he asked her if she was ready for her turn.
She nodded and got ready to follow him outside.
"I can bathe you if you want," he offered in a voice uncharacteristically tender, and she quickly declined, shaking her head vigorously as she discarded her clothes and slipped into the water.
She tried not to look back at the burning body of the Morph in the distance.
When she was finished, Steven toweled her like before, but he didn't leave her to put on her clothes in private this time, joining her as she stepped back into the vehicle.
She wasn't sure what to do with herself, so she sat there with the towel wrapped around her.
She definitely wasn't changing in front of him, despite the fact that he had already touched, quite intimately, every part of her she was trying to hide.
"Do you guys have any estimates of survivors?" she asked him, towel and body pulled tight, her legs firmly together.
She was glad that he was sitting opposite her, even though his eyes had sort of glazed over at her question.
"Has the whole world been infected?" she asked when he still didn't answer.
She started preparing to ask another question when he finally opened his mouth, and then went on to answer almost every question that had come to her mind over the past few weeks.
"About two months ago, Patient Zero—a voluntary lab rat for the intended viral weapon—got a doctor. His infection lasted only about ten minutes, but that was all the time it took for the now-infected doctor to go on and infect others. It took a while before people knew what was happening or what to do about it, and in that time, a few more doctors got infected as well as other military personnel—among them, a few super soldiers. The super soldiers were responsible for bringing the virus to the public. By the time you guys got word of the outbreak, the military had already spent a week trying to track them down, but they didn't find all of them. What they found was the aftermath of their presence. Turns out, after decades of zombie movies and video games, most people don't actually have what it takes to destroy what looks like another person face to face. That's part of the problem—the bodies start to become contagious within an hour, but the person's physical appearance doesn't start changing for a while—they don't look non-human until twenty-four hours have passed. Before then, the infected person looks the same as anyone who has come down with a really bad flu. So it spread fast. Luckily, so far, it is contained in North America. But chances are that Central and South America aren't far behind. And the Caribbean.
"All planes were stopped from leaving here by day three, so I don't think the virus has reached Europe, Africa, Asia, etc. unless some asshole with a private jet has taken someone infected with him. Anyway, I'll get the updates once we get to the base—my intelligence on the matter is over two weeks old. In the meantime, some of us got a chance to go out and bring back our loved ones while taking out as many of the Morphs as possible. Not all of us, however—only those of us who are immune."
Serena felt her brow wrinkling. Did he mean...?
"Anyway, once we get to the base, it'll probably be all over between you and me," he said. "But you'll be safe there. And I'll be relatively safe, even out there, but who knows?"
Serena couldn't resist interrupting this time.
"Wait, how are you safe while out there? It's like you'd be going to war again!"
He nodded his head. "True, I'm not safe from wayward bullets, I admit. But the Morphs can't get me." He paused. "Like I said, I am immune. There aren't many of us who are. And the government didn't want to risk sending super soldiers who aren't immune out there in case they get turned. Turned super soldiers—and even regular soldiers—are among the deadliest if they survive a few nights, and they found that out the hard way."
"How many of you—immune—are there?"
"We're not completely sure, but at last count it was five—and that's just out of a section of the military population; I have no doubt that there are a lot more like us out there. Anyway, three of us are responsible for bringing back supplies and survivors while killing as many of the Morphs as we can while the other two have been held for studies. Then at some point..." He paused again. "They're gonna call us all back and just start bombing—survivors among the Morphs included."
"Tell me more about Patient Zero," Serena said, not ready to let go of the possibility of getting more concrete facts about their circumstances. "How did he or she get the original infection?"
Steven shook his head. "I've already said too much. To answer your original question, at last count, the turned was rapidly closing in on half the population. Probably at three-quarters by now."
Serena did the math in her head. Just a quarter of a country of over three hundred million were still regular humans? Impossible. She couldn't fathom such a horror.
Then she heard Steven sigh, almost as if in slow motion.
"He really loved you, you know," Steven said. "I mean, he really did. Despite the way he talked to you sometimes and the way you might have felt he was treating you harshly, Gregory put you before everything—even himself. He thought about you first, Serena. Everything he did, he was trying to make sure that you were happy and felt safe, and he lashed out at times when he felt like you didn't get what he was trying to do for you."
Steven's eyes seemed to cloud, but he quickly looked away, and before Serena knew what was happening, he had disappeared into the driver's seat, out of her view.
Serena knew that she had gotten away from what he had probably intended to make another conquering session of sexual submission, but she also knew that it wasn't for long.