Free The Last Peak (Book 2): The Darwin Collapse by William Oday

stripped bare. They now sat in the Bronco considering what to do next. Clyde needed antibiotics and Mason didn’t relish the idea of returning empty-handed. Another tragedy might be too much for Beth to handle.
    "I don't think we're going to find a store that hasn't been destroyed or picked over," Mason said.
    Theresa chewed on her lower lip and then paused. "What about Fernando's?"
    "You mean that little neighborhood corner mart on Rose and Main?"
    She nodded. "Yeah, it has a little pharmacy in the back."
    Mason could've smacked himself. He didn't remember because he never went there for anything other than a quick gallon of milk or bag of chips. "That's my girl. Thinking outside the big box stores."
    Mason fired up the Bronco and headed out, careful to avoid the tangles of overturned shopping carts and abandoned cars choking the parking lot.
    He drove slowly down the street now that night had fallen. The road ahead was darker than seemed possible. Los Angeles usually had so much ambient light bouncing around on the ground and up into the sky that there was almost no need for headlights. Tonight was different.
    Mason kept the headlights off because the high-powered lights in the sea of darkness would act like a lighthouse, a beacon to whoever and whatever lurked out there in the shadows.
    He waved the small beam of a handheld flashlight back and forth across the road, identifying obstructions and navigating up around them.
    "Dad, why did this happen? Is God punishing us?"
    Mason didn't know if the us meant them in particular or mankind in general, but his answer would've been the same either way. "I'm probably not the best person to ask about God's motives or actions. That said, I don't think a creator would cause this much suffering."
    "Well, then why did this happen?"
    Mason could come up with a few theories. From the overuse of antibiotics that for decades had been creating more and more resistant superbugs. To the accelerating deforestation of the Amazon and other wild places which put mankind into direct contact with various viruses and bacteria that had been out of the evolutionary loop for millennia. The same dynamic wiped out the Native Americans when Europeans arrived.
    From there, he could go even more conspiratorial (and yet no less likely to be true) and consider how governments around the world secretly developed weapons of chemical warfare. Genetically engineered microscopic strains that had the potential to wipe out all life on the planet.
    "I hope someday we find out so we can make sure it never happens again."
    They slowed to a stop at the corner next to Fernando's. They geared up and Mason led the way to the front door. In the light of his headlamp, he tested the wood panels that had replaced the busted out glass door. Nothing so much as creaked. Without making a whole lot of unwanted noise, they weren’t going to get in that way.
    "Let's check around the sides and back and hopefully find an easier way in."
    They skirted around the corner to the right and saw the familiar mural of waves crashing on a beach that covered the brick wall. They kept moving towards the back of the building with Mason scanning his light back and forth and his Glock in the low ready position. Nothing drew his attention nor the front sight of the pistol.
    Around the back they discovered a door partially ripped away from the frame and hanging on by the lower hinges. Through the open doorway, the interior was pitch black.
    What he wouldn't give for some night vision goggles right now. He considered telling Theresa to turn on her headlamp but then decided against it. If they encountered anything, he wanted all the attention focused on him.
    He whispered over his shoulder, “Stay close."
    They crept into the silent tomb with nothing but Mason's narrow cone of light guiding the way. He did a quick sweep as they entered and saw no one. Aside from the crazed mother and her children, they'd seen no other living being all night. They