Apocalypse Ground Zero: Refusing To Leave Home

The man remained in front of the farmhouse with both hands above his head.

He looked thin, dirty, and terrified enough that I doubted he had walked into the field because he wanted to steal one of Chenghai’s vehicles. Then again, people had done considerably stupider things since the apocalypse began.

Chenghai turned off the engine but kept one arm around my waist.

The sudden quiet made the field feel much larger. Grass moved around the track, birds called from the trees, and the stranger stood in the open doorway wondering whether we planned to use him as another obstacle.

"Why are you standing in the track?" I called.

The man looked down at the flattened grass beneath his feet. His face changed when he realized where he had stopped. "I’m sorry," he sputtered, looking at both me and Chenghai. "I just panicked."

"That doesn’t make it a better place to stand," I replied, scoffing.

He took several quick steps toward the farmhouse, then stopped again as though moving without permission might get him killed.

Chenghai unfastened the belt around us and lifted me from his lap. He placed me in the passenger seat before climbing out of the vehicle.

His hand brushed my knee as he passed. "Stay here," he whispered, kissing my forehead softly.

I looked at the man, who still had his hands over his head. "I think I can take him."

"I know."

Chenghai shut the small door beside me and walked across the field.

He didn’t reach for a weapon. He didn’t need one. The stranger seemed to understand that too, because his hands moved even higher when Chenghai approached.

"I don’t want trouble," the man said. "I thought the place was empty."

"It was this morning," Chenghai replied.

The stranger swallowed. "I came in after you left."

That explained why Chenghai hadn’t found him while setting up the track. It didn’t explain why the man had chosen a farmhouse with half a roof, broken windows, and three strange vehicles parked in the field.

Maybe he had looked at all that and thought it was luxurious.

After all, standards had dropped significantly since the apocalypse hit.

Chenghai stopped several feet away. "Are you armed?"

The man slowly lowered one hand and pulled a rusty knife from his waistband. He placed it in the grass, then removed a small screwdriver from his pocket.

After a moment of thought, he also put down a metal spoon.

I leaned against the side of the vehicle. "Were you planning to fight us with that?"

The man looked at the spoon. "I forgot it was there."

Chenghai glanced back at me and his mouth moved slightly.

At least one of us was trying to take this seriously.

The stranger told us his name was Fan Bo and that he had been travelling alone for nearly a week. He had seen the farmhouse from the service road, found the cellar dry, and decided to sleep there until the afternoon heat passed.

Then Chenghai and I had arrived and started driving through the field like we were trying to kill the grass personally.

"I stayed downstairs," Fan Bo explained. "I thought you might leave."

"You could have kept doing that," I pointed out.

"I needed to use the bathroom."

I looked toward the farmhouse.

Half the outer wall had collapsed.

"You could’ve gone anywhere."

"I wasn’t thinking."

That was becoming obvious.

Chenghai looked over the man’s clothes, the small pack near the doorway, and the dried blood along one sleeve. "Were you bitten?"

"No." Fan Bo pulled the sleeve higher and showed a shallow cut along his forearm. "I caught it on the window."

The injury had already begun scabbing. No black veins, rotten skin, or Devourer mouth hiding beneath it.

Boring.

Chenghai nodded toward the farmhouse. "Stay inside until we leave."

Fan Bo lowered his hands. "You aren’t taking the house?"

"We don’t want it."

"The vehicles?"

"Ours."

The man’s shoulders dropped with visible disappointment.

He had definitely been considering stealing one.

Fan Bo looked at the little off-road vehicle, then toward the battered red pickup. "Do all three work?"

Chenghai’s face remained calm, but I knew that look. He was deciding whether the question deserved an answer.

"They worked before you arrived," I said.

Fan Bo immediately looked offended. "I didn’t touch anything."

His eyes moved toward the red pickup.

Chenghai followed them.

The man gave up. "I only checked whether it had fuel."

"Did it?" I asked.

"A little."

"Then why are you still here?"

"I don’t know how to start it."

That was probably the only reason the pickup remained in the field.

Chenghai walked to the vehicle and opened the driver’s door. He reached beneath the steering column, adjusted something, then turned the key. The engine coughed twice before starting.

Fan Bo stared at it.

Chenghai stepped away and held the door open. "Take it."

I looked at him. The pickup had been part of the course, but we still had the off-road vehicle and the military transport. Losing the slowest one wouldn’t ruin anything.

Fan Bo didn’t move. "You’re giving it to me?"

"You need to leave before dark."

That finally got him moving.

He grabbed his pack, rusty knife, screwdriver, and spoon before running toward the pickup. Chenghai stopped him long enough to put one container of food and two bottles of water inside.

Fan Bo climbed behind the wheel, then leaned out the open window. "Is there anything I can do for you?"

I looked down at the mud covering my clothes, then at the track behind him.

"Don’t drive through the big puddle."

He glanced toward it. "Why?"

"Because I want it."

Fan Bo nodded like that made perfect sense.

He drove toward the service road, keeping carefully to the edge of the field so he wouldn’t touch any part of the track. The pickup disappeared between the trees a few minutes later.

Chenghai returned to the off-road vehicle.

I watched him climb into the passenger seat. "You gave away one of my date cars."

"You weren’t going to drive that one."

"I might have."

"It barely turns."

"That could have been fun."

Chenghai reached across me and tightened the strap beneath my helmet. His fingers brushed my chin before moving down to the belt.

"We still have two."

I shifted into the driver’s seat and placed my hands on the wheel. "What happens if another homeless man walks out of the farmhouse?"

"I’ll move him."

"With the vehicle?"

"If necessary."

That was more like it.

Chenghai fastened his own belt, then rested one hand on my thigh while I started the engine.

This time, he didn’t pull me onto his lap or guide my hands. He stayed beside me and let me control the vehicle alone.

I pressed the gas carefully.

The vehicle rolled forward without trying to throw us into the grass.

Chenghai’s fingers tightened once against my leg.

I looked at him. "See? I learned."

"You haven’t reached the first turn."

"That sounds like a lack of faith."

I drove into the turn faster than I should have.

Mud sprayed over Chenghai’s side.

He wiped a streak from his cheek and looked at me.

I smiled sweetly through the helmet.

His hand slid higher on my thigh as the track opened ahead of us.

Apparently, he had found another way to distract me.

I pressed harder on the gas anyway.