The Pandemic Sequence (Book 3): The Tilian Cure Read Online Free PDF

group. Since learning of Mike’s decision to allow Michelle to travel to the island, Erik had yet to put off his mask of anger. He had shouted and argued vehemently with Mike before finally distancing himself from the group’s leader and placing a wall of silence between them. Michelle, though of better color and myopic in her tasks, was still possessed with bitterness and anger, made worse by Erik’s continued attempts to dissuade her from her course of action.
    Even with the others accepting Lisa as one of their own again, Mike was unable to dislodge the feelings of mistrust and suspicion that seized him whenever she was within his line of sight. With the exception of Matt—and Mike’s small dog Gazelle, who bounded loyally alongside her owner—the other members of the team were rife with barely contained negativity. In all, he realized it was the least auspicious start to the journeys.
    On the third morning, the vehicles were loaded with the last remaining bits of gear, and the group of five found themselves at the moment of departure. Though Mike expected Erik to make one last plea to Michelle, he instead wrapped her in a strong embrace for several minutes, as he whispered parting words in her ear. Matt and Mike exchanged handshakes, and the boat captain traded an awkward farewell with Lisa. Having no experience with her prior to the past month, Matt was clearly unsure how to engage with her.
    After breaking his hold of Michelle, Erik joked lightly with Matt, and she stepped forward to Mike. Before he could speak, she gripped him in a tight hug that pushed the air from his lungs. He could hear the soft sobbing as she pressed her head against his shoulder. In that moment, his memory ripped back to the studious young girl that had sat in his class. The images of the years he’d known her flashed in a storm behind his tightly shut eyes. Her meekness when she asked for work that first morning of the virus, the undaunted perseverance in the early days of escape, her unending heart as she worked to ensure that first the mountain camp and then New Cuba was fed and nourished. The girl he knew—the woman he now held—had perhaps been the strongest of them all. Joy had been a fleeting sentiment over the years, but Mike Allard felt it now as he understood how lucky he was to have seen her survive and grow, a privilege he had been denied with so many others.
    “You be careful,” he told her, feeling every bit the worried parent.
    “I will.” As she pulled back from him, she looked up and searched his eyes. “You understand why I have to do this?”
    “I do,” he answered with sincerity. “I just wish it hadn’t come to this.”
    “Look after Erik for me,” she said with a wry grin. “He has a habit of getting himself in trouble.”
    Laughing, Mike replied. “Some things never change.”
    Michelle raised herself to her toes and placed a soft kiss upon his cheek. “You have to forgive Lisa,” she whispered in his ear. “She’s as much a victim in all this as we are.”
    The farewells at an end, Mike watched as Michelle spared a moment to cuddle Gazelle before she and Matt boarded the Humvee. The truck, with boat in tow, rumbled to life and slowly made its way through the parking lot before disappearing along the tree-lined road. A funereal moment of silence passed before the three figures left behind loaded into the waiting vehicle and set out upon their own journey. Shifting the Humvee into gear, Mike thought with a mix of somber and expectant finality: The end is beginning.

Chapter Three
    If not for the near constant bouncing of the vehicle, which apparently found every pothole along the road, Michelle could have fallen asleep in the passenger seat. It was all she seemed able to do as of late, sleep. Since Andrew’s death, a heavy weight had settled itself upon her spirit, exhausting her after even the most minimal of tasks. Her chest ached more each day, from both wracking sobs and emotional emptiness, and