Tears streamed down her face, smearing her makeup into dark streaks. "Shouldn't they be rescuing survivors?"
Van didn't acknowledge her hysteria. His own gaze was locked on the mirror. An Apache gunship had emerged from the distant smoke.
They'd pulled deep into the desert, away from the motel's road, but the plume of sand and the deep tracks they'd carved were impossible to hide.
"Quiet!" he barked, not taking his eyes off the growing speck. "They're silencing witnesses! We need to figure out how to survive!"
Jane looked at him, her expression crumbling into despair. "Silencing...? The military should be containing the outbreak!"
"If the order is 'sanitize,' will the pilots disobey?" Van shot back through gritted teeth.
The helicopter's deep-throated whump-whump-whump grew louder, vibrating the truck's windows.
"No... no... we'll be sanitized too?" Jane slammed a palm against the dashboard, denying the reality as it bore down on them. "I don't believe it."
Van's own hope was fading fast. The truck was upgraded, but against a flying fortress armed with rockets and a 30mm chain gun? They were nothing but a moving target.
He braced for the flash of hellfire, the streaking trail of a missile.
Then, the mechanical predator banking toward them suddenly tilted, revealing its underbelly. It executed a sharp, sweeping turn and roared away, its sound fading into the desert sky.
Why?
Van's mind raced, but no answer came.
"It... left?" Jane whispered, staring at the empty mirror, as bewildered as he was.
The truck's radio crackled to life with a local news bulletin. "...massive natural gas leak triggered a catastrophic explosion in the town of Heli, southern New Mexico..."
Van and Jane's eyes met. Shock gave way to cold understanding.
Already a cover story.
"...State government has mobilized the National Guard for search and rescue, but no survivors have been located at the scene... Officials have declared this the most severe natural gas disaster in U.S. history..."
SLAM!
Jane smashed her hand down on the radio, silencing the smooth voice. "Liars!" she screamed, her voice raw. "Murderers!"
Van watched her tears carve fresh paths through the grime on her face. He let out a short, mirthless laugh. "This is the real America."
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The truck sat motionless in the vastness, a speck of metal under the immense sky. Wrapped in thick blankets against the creeping evening chill, the silence between them was heavier than the engine's rumble had ever been.
"I need to go for a break," Jane finally muttered, pushing her blanket aside. She leaned behind the seats, grabbed an empty waste bag they'd used earlier, and shoved the door open.
Van watched through the windshield as she stalked a few paces from the truck, hurled the bag into the darkness, tilted her head back, and screamed.
AAAAAAGH!
It was a raw, ragged sound, torn from the gut.
Van killed the engine. The profound silence of the desert rushed in to fill the void.
He got out, not to yell, but to walk. Twenty paces in the opposite direction, clear of Jane. He drew his pistol, aimed at a clump of distant rocks, and emptied the magazine.
BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!
The reports were sharp, final, swallowed whole by the emptiness. He stood there for a moment, the gun warm and smoking in his hand, the smell of cordite sharp in the cold air.
Jane was staring at him when he turned back, her scream long faded.
"Van..."
He reloaded with a precise click-clack of the slide. "We almost died today. Your country just erased a town. Maybe us, too." His voice was flat. "Screaming doesn't change it. The only thing that matters now is this." He slid the pistol back into its holster. "You freeze, you die. That's the only rule."
He walked past her and climbed back into the driver's seat.
Jane stood shivering-not from the cold-for a full minute. Then, she followed.
They ate on opposite sides of the truck for privacy. Van retrieved two self-heating meals from the cargo. Clean water was too precious to waste on washing away the dried, flaking blood on their hands.
Huddled in the cab with blankets around their shoulders, they watched the plastic containers hiss and belch steam on the dashboard. Jane watched the vapor curl towards the roof.
"Van," she asked, her voice quiet but clear. "Why did you come to America?"
"My uncle. Got a full scholarship to Cornell for his Ph.D. Got his green card. Sponsored my parents and me a decade later."
Jane traced a finger through a rising plume of steam. "Skilled immigration. A success story."
"He killed himself two years after we arrived. His research was stolen. His name was ruined."
Jane's mouth opened, then snapped shut. The reflexive "I'm sorry" died on her tongue, unspoken.
Her eyes drifted to the network of scars on his forearms, visible below his rolled-up sleeves. "It must have been... hard."
Van laced his fingers behind his head, leaning back. "Hard work isn't what breaks people. It's injustice." He looked at her, his gaze direct. "Your skin. Your family's money. They built you a clean window. You never had to see the rot."
He fanned a wave of steam toward her. "I've watched your fellow 'patriots' spit on people who look like me. We've been living on opposite sides of the same coin."
He popped the lid off his steaming meal. "If we'd never come, I'd be getting my master's degree back home right now." He showed her how to carefully unpack the noodles. "Funny. My GPA here was a 4.0. Perfect. But because of my uncle's 'reputation,' no graduate school in this state would touch my application."
Jane, with surprising dexterity, picked up a slice of potato with the chopsticks and popped it into her mouth. She immediately gasped, her eyes watering, and spat it back into the container.
Van let out a genuine, short laugh. "You handle the sticks like a pro, but you don't know to blow on it first?"
Cradling the warm container, she managed a faint, watery smile. "The Chinese food I've had... it never arrived this hot." She studied his profile. "How... after everything you just told me, after today... how can you still laugh?"
Van paused, noodles halfway to his mouth. He set the fork down and leaned back against the seat. "Carrying a grudge is extra weight. It clouds your judgment. To think clearly, you have to let the pressure out." He tapped a finger against a pale, ridged scar on his abdomen, visible through his torn shirt. "If all I had in my eyes was hate back in those flophouses, I'd be dead. People see anger. They tense up around it."
As the last light bled from the sky, a soft chime echoed in Van's mind.
[ SYSTEM ALERT ]
Passenger Engagement Recognized.
Survival Point +1.
[ SURVIVAL POINT MARKET ] is now online.