The 40th Day (After the Cure Book 5) Read Online Free Page B

The 40th Day (After the Cure Book 5)
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exhausted. Or clumsy. Marnie was standing still ahead of her, waiting for her to catch up. Christine reached her, gasping for air. The girl handed her a bottle of water she’d packed from the bunker.
    “How close are we?” asked Christine between gulps. The water tasted tinny and warm and Christine fought to keep herself from vomiting. She thought she’d left the morning sickness behind a few weeks before, but the heat and the faint odor of sewage that still clung to them from the tunnels made her nauseous.
    Marnie stared at the map trying to place them. “It’s hard to tell. The map doesn’t have the wall on it. It must have been made before everything.”
    Christine squinted up at the dark Barrier. She didn’t know either. All the panels looked the same and she was used to seeing the other side anyway. “Look, I need a rest, and I’m sure you are as hungry as I am—”
    A woman’s voice floated in the distance and Christine fell suddenly silent. She grabbed Marnie’s arm and pulled her down into a crouch. They waited for a second, and the woman’s voice came again, but it was too far to hear what she was saying.
    “I’m going to go look,” whispered Marnie.
    “No, not alone.”
    Marnie peeled Christine’s hand off of her arm. “You’re too tired, you are making too much noise. I lived out here a long time. I know what I’m doing. I have to see if they are dangerous before we get too close. Stay here, I’ll be back before you know it.”
    “No—” hissed Christine, but Marnie had plunked her pack on the ground beside them and was already moving quickly through the thick trees, the golden sun threading through the shadows as she slipped silently away.
    Christine sighed and sat on the leafy ground, too tired to protest or follow.
    Marnie heard a man’s voice yelling and sped up, running lightly over the knotted, lumpy ground, falling back into the rhythm and instinct of her years at the Lodge. She wished again that she had a weapon. There was a scream of something in terrible pain and Marnie flinched and tripped over a raised root. She went sprawling and heard the man yell again. She was on her feet just as a gunshot was fired. A second and a third, like stronger and stronger echoes came from just ahead as she scrambled forward, sliding into a crouch just behind the tree line. A mound of rubble interrupted the smooth wall of the City. Marnie could see the huge gate she had entered through. It twisted and rippled outward like the steel petals of a giant metal morning glory. A man and woman stood in front of her. They were looking at a corpse in the rubble and the man tried to hand a gun to the woman.
    “It was an Infected and we couldn’t do anything for it,” the man said quickly. “You were right, we couldn’t leave it that way. It would have taken another day to die. We couldn’t—”
    The woman took the gun and then held his empty hand in hers. “It’s done,” she said. She knelt and tucked the gun back into her pack.
    Marnie watched her face. She didn’t look shocked that the man beside her had shot someone, but she didn’t look triumphant about it either. She just seemed tired. Sad. Like Marnie’s mother had looked, the day she left the Lodge.
    As if she had suddenly realized she had come to the end of things. As if she had no choice but to follow the path in front of her, thought Marnie, and her eyes filled with sudden tears, the first she had for her mother in years. The couple was talking about going into the City. Something about destroying the Infection. Marnie listened closely. Did they have a cure? They talked for a few more moments, but turned away and walked down the road. Marnie knew she should run back to Christine, but she was torn. What if she lost them? Why do I care? She asked herself. She was going back to Henry. She and Christine would be safe. She didn’t need to worry about cures or the City or anyone else. Besides, she didn’t know anything about the couple.

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