Cleanliness is Next to Heaven

I never realized just how nice it is to be clean. I waited until dark and snuck out of the garage. I had nibbled on granola and sipped on some juice from my supplies. My stomach was too small to hold much, I'd eat a little, sip a little and doze. Sometime later, I don't know how long, the dogs returned, Luke stretching along my spine and better than an electric blanket and Liz curling up between my neck and shoulder. Being dogs they undoubtedly felt the filth I was covered with was a bonus.

After darkness fell I snuck out -- using the dog door too, just in case anyone had put some sort of a trap or alarm on the garage door. A bit paranoid, I know, but the burned out hulk of my home was all the reason I needed to indulge in paranoia. I never knew why the garage or the houses next to us didn't burn too. Luck is luck, I guess.

I skulked through the neighborhood, the dogs at my heels. They were still uncharictaristically quiet. I scoped out three houses, but passed over each. One had clear signs of current habitation in the form of laundry drying on the chainlink fence. Another was silent, but the dogs growled quietly when I approached it. The third gave ME the creeps, and the dogs were crouched, hackles up. But the fourth seemed empty. When I entered and searched it I saw signs of either a hasty exodus by the family or a ransacking -- possibly both. Fortunately, cleaning supplies had been overlooked in favor of food or things people considered valuable. I had a funny feeling that money and jewelry wasn't going to be worth much now, but what do I know? I haven't even finished high school.

The water in the shower was even hot. I reflected on how much easier it was to feel indulged in a crisis situation. Before this, a hot shower was usually a chore my mother made me indulge in far more often than I felt necessary, now, it was heavenly. Not just to be clean again but to be "normal" if only for a few moments. The family had a daughter close to my age and I was able to scrounge clean clothing. I put together a few more changes of clothing too and returned to the garage to think.

I didn't know how long I'd been out of it and sick. The neighborhood seemed half deserted and the half that wasn't deserted was a bit frightening. Surely there was still a government out there, though. My house wasn't the only burned house I'd seen but most of the houses were still standing. And there weren't any dead bodies lying in the streets or anything. So the question was, find the government and hope for safety or go into hiding?

I looked in the mirror again. The tubes growing in place of hair on my head had opened up into feathery violet antennas, a cross between feathers and undersea-type fronds. They framed the upper part of my face like an exotic headpiece and, creeping even me out, they moved in the still air. Then I looked at the dogs, sitting quietly and alertly at my feet. I never heard of a government run rescue camp yet that took pets, but Luke and Liz weren't just pets, they were family. No, finding whatever government was left didn't seem like a good option, and neither did staying here. Surely someone was doing regular sweeps to remove bodies or take in sick people. I guessed the only reason they hadn't examined the garage was that Luke scared them off. He could be pretty intimidating when he wanted to be.

So I needed to figure out a good place to go -- to hole up and maybe bring others like myself. I heard the angry, frightened voice demanding my house burn again and shuddered. There were undoubtedly more like myself -- what would happen to them?

"You need a place that is isolated and hard to reach." The alien in my head had been silent up until now. "And you need to consider that there are going to be a lot of children and infants who survived the plague but are helpless to move themselves."

"I know a place that is isolated and hard to reach, but it would take a long time to walk there." I thought back at my mental guest. I had a quick glimpse of Jordan, a state park in the middle of the Rocky Mountains -- deep valleys, a strong river, lots of trees and wildlife, but also at a higher elevation and likely to still be covered in snow. It was only March and even though most of the snow was gone in Spokane, I knew it would still cover the ground there. And it took us three or four hours to drive there, which I knew would be a really long journey on foot.

"You need companions and a plan."

"Yeah, I kind of figured that out myself. How the heck am I supposed to find them?"

"You are no longer as you were. The changes are not just in your body, they are in your mind and your abilities. And you are not the only ones changed. Our virus did not just inhabit humans. I don't think the "government" realizes it but animals and plants are effected too. And one more thing -- we need to figure out how to destroy the virus."

"W-what? Why?"

"We are not killers. We never intended to harm others, but we have killed countless in this one city of yours. It cannot be allowed to spread. We would never agree to destroy your world to save ourselves. We must end the virus' ability to infect your world."

"Ummm, I don't think I can do that. I'm just a kid."

"You are more than you know and you won't be alone. For now, eat again, sleep and in the next evening we will prepare to move."

I couldn't argue with that. Showering and dressing had exhausted me. I threw the fouled airmattress and bedding into the remains of my house, inflated my parent's airmattress and pulled their sleeping bag over me, asleep almost as soon as I lay down.