Plague Year Read Online Free PDF Page B

more time. Like they need more samples.”
    “We’re still better off waiting!”
    “Could be forever.”
    Along with two couples and several loners, Cam, Erin, and Sawyer made up the fringe of the gathering, Manny hovering nearby. Most or all of these people would go, Cam thought. In comparison to the rigid, defensive stance of Price’s group, their postures seemed more natural.
    That this was a minority shouldn’t have surprised him.
    McCraney had busted his glasses nine weeks ago and would need a hand-holder, because the best replacement they’d found barely let him see ten feet. George Waxman had lost an eye to the nanos last fall and refused to venture below the barrier since. Sue Spangler was six months pregnant, big now, too big to make it even if she’d wanted to take the risk—and her lover, Bill Faulk, had good reason to stay. Same for Amy Wong and Al Pendergraff and their infant son, Summer.
    Standing beside Price, Lorraine directed a burst of words toward her own faction rather than the group at large. “We’ll never make it across the valley. Look at him, he barely got here and he’s not half-starved!”
    Cam said, slowly, “There’s nothing on this peak for us. Not a group this size. Not more than a few people.”
    “Let ’em stay,” Sawyer muttered.
    “Hollywood needs at least a couple weeks’ rest before we go. We can strengthen up, eat most of our supplies.”
    “No,” McCraney said.
    “We need those rations!” Price took one melodramatic step forward and Faulk and Doug Silverstein moved to back him.
    Emotion wrenched through all the impassive faces, ugly, urgent. Waxman and one of the loners backed off quick, but Cam strode into the center of the gathering, strong with adrenaline.
    He was never more aware of the difference between his skin color and all of theirs than in moments like this—it actually seemed to have weight, especially on his face, his broad cheekbones—and he wondered fleetingly what showed in his expression. If they would misinterpret his fear.
    “Listen to me,” he said.
    I found it in that luxury cabin with the deck overlooking the river , Sawyer had told him. Remember that? The place was a goddamn paradise, twenty feet of sofa cocked around a stone fireplace, double-pane glass, a giant oven, and two water heaters fed by propane tanks. They’d stumbled through jamming ski gear and canned goods into already-heavy backpacks, blotting the polished oak cabinets with flecks of skin and red fingerprints. Things were getting tight , Sawyer said. That fuck Loomas had started hoarding food, Price was talking about elections again. I figured a .38 and two boxes of shells might be more help than a few extra packets of Saltines.
    “There is nothing here for us.” Cam kept his voice soft and level. “We’ve barely lasted this long. You know that. Trying for the next peak is a gamble, but it’s our only choice.”
    Price jabbed his index finger at them. “You can leave, we won’t stop you! But you can’t eat all the food!”
    Cam wanted to hate him. It would have been easier. Yet these were good people, mostly, the cream of the crop by definition. Fighters. He had bled with them, shared utensils and huddled for warmth with them. Their sins were the same. So it was right to try to save them.
    It was a way to save himself.
    Cam needed to balance all of the wrong that he had done. If he could start over, live better, he might have some chance at forgetting everything that had happened up here against the cold, open sky.
    But Price looked over his shoulder to face his own faction, exactly as Lorraine had done. “Nobody is eating more than their regular rations!” he shouted.
    Another of the loners, Bacchetti, stepped to Cam’s side before even Sawyer or Manny. “Our food,” Bacchetti said, grungy teeth flashing through his mess of beard. Cam hadn’t heard the man speak in days, had long since written him off, and now his heart leapt with strange pride.
    It was a