Isolation by Jones, Nathan (the first e reader .TXT) 📗

of confusion and disapproval. “Hasn't Hal even said “I love you” yet?”

Ellie laughed, leaning over to give Hal's little sister a hug. “It was a joke, sweetie. Sometimes we show our love by actions instead of words, and when someone you care about is exhausted and has a long day ahead, the best thing you can do is help them however you can.”

Ricky nodded solemnly. “That's why we were extra quiet this morning, to let you sleep.”

She gave her son a hug, too. “And I appreciate it, honey.”

Hal shooed the kids back to their schoolwork as Ellie sipped at her coffee and munched trail mix from a bag. As she was finishing up he wrapped an arm around her. “Ready to get back into it?” she murmured, leaning her head against his shoulder.

“We'd probably better.” He sighed. “Hard to believe our wedding is tomorrow . . . I haven't even had a chance to think about it for the last couple days.”

Ellie grimaced; she'd completely forgotten tomorrow was the date they'd set. The time had really flown thanks to all the chaos Jay had caused. “We're going to have to postpone it, aren't we? There's no way we could find time to do it tomorrow, and it would be tasteless to try to make a big event of it under the circumstances.”

Hal rubbed her shoulder. “So we'll postpone it.”

She leaned up and pressed her lips to his. “Not a second longer than necessary,” she murmured. “We've waited long enough.”

Stuffing a last handful of trail mix into her mouth, she went and fetched her radio from its solar charger by her tent. Then, bracing herself, she turned up the volume.

There was a constant stream of discussion going on, people giving reports and asking for help. From just the few seconds Ellie heard while she waited for a lull to speak up, she guessed that the outbreak hadn't slowed thanks to their containment efforts, like they'd hoped.

Just the opposite, from the sound of things.

Well, that was to be expected; all the people falling sick now would've been exposed to Zolos days ago, before they even knew the danger and tried to nip it in the bud. Which meant they could expect at least another day or two of surging cases before, fingers crossed, the outbreak petered out.

She cleared her throat and cut in briskly. “Feldman here. What's the situation?”

Johnny moved her to another channel to reply, quickly filling her in on what had happened while she was resting. As she'd feared, the number of cases had surged to over a hundred, and the quarantine efforts had become even more chaotic and confusing as entire sections of the camp were closed off, while sick patients still needed to be moved to the survivors' camp and supplies needed to be handed out.

Ellie grimly plunged into the thick of things, smoothing out shift rotations and insisting that people who'd kept working when she wasn't there to tell them to get some rest do so now. She also spent some time updating a crudely drawn but detailed map of the camp with all the new zone changes and quarantine areas, then stared at it for a few minutes and did her best to adjust borders and mark Zolos-safe paths so people could still get around.

One good idea the camp's leaders had had while she was asleep was having people do their best to decontaminate the areas around their own tents. They wanted to make sure that the “safe” areas really were safe, at least as much as they could be made under the circumstances, and that Zolos didn't spread any farther than it already had.

It was something they probably should've done right at the start, but better late than never.

She was in the middle of brainstorming with Betty in the survivors' camp for ways to more efficiently house the increasing number of sick, making sure they were properly sheltered and that the volunteers caring for them could get to them all easily, when the radio went nuts.

It was the patrol to the south, warning them that an entire convoy of vehicles was roaring towards the town. At least twenty, an eclectic assortment of cars and trucks and minivans.

Ellie's immediate assumption was Jay, since everything seemed to involve that bald psychopath these days. If so it was reminiscent of when he and the other Wensbrook survivors had first stormed up to Stanberry to yell about their town being scavenged.

Only she had no idea why they'd be coming now; if Darby and the other leaders hadn't been willing to meet their demands before, they certainly wouldn't after everything Jay had done.

Sure enough, the Wensbrook leader's voice soon crackled over the radio. “Darby! Darby, you need to come out and talk to us! Come out and talk face to face, now!”

The man continued for another half minute or so, cursing and making demands, before Mayor Darby's voice finally cut in. “Why would I do that, Mr. Corey?”

“Because you just burned down half my town, and you need to answer for it!”

Ellie shared a shocked glance with Hal and his mom Cara, who had made one of her rare appearances outside her tent to listen in.

“You must be mistaken,” Darby said after a few seconds of heavy silence. “You know Stanberry's policy of closed borders. No one in or out, to defend against Zolos infection.”

“Then maybe it was Statton or some of your other immune thugs,” Jay snarled. “But don't even try to pretend you're innocent of this. Don't even try!”

“I don't need to pretend,” Stanberry's Mayor said coolly. “You may have a bunch of arsonists running around with you, but we're law abiding citizens.”

“Then nut up and come out and let's talk about this face to face!”

“We're not coming out to parley,” Darby said in a tone of finality. “You've proven you can't be trusted, or for that matter even behave in a civilized fashion. And if you try to approach the town to talk to us, no matter