Free Reset (Book 2): Salvation by Jacqueline Druga

conscious and his body shook with a steady cough.
    Meredith, hand still over her mouth crouched down. “He’s sick. Look at his eyes. He has whatever Bada has.”
    “Or Bada has what he has,” John said. “It’s the chicken and egg thing. “
    ‘Where did he get the MRE?”
    “That’s an easy answer. Look at his clothes.”
    Meredith lowered the blanket a little more. The sick man wore the white over shirt and drawstring pants. The same exact clothes that were left for John, Meredith and the others when they came out of stasis. With the MRE, the clothing, it was obvious he was rebirthed through Genesis. He wasn’t part of their group, so where did he come from? Wherever it was, had to be close.
     
    <><><><>
     
    “They’re all here,” Jason finished sorting and counting the playing cards as he sat at a table in the employee lunch room.
    “Good and …” She stepped back from the old vending machine. The glass was covered with a black substance and dirt. When Nora popped the cover with a screwdriver, the inside looked as if time and the elements never touched it. “Holy cow it’s filled.”
    Jason laughed.
    “How long do you think it’s been?”
    “Since they filled the machine?”
    “No, since everyone left.”
    Jason shuffled the cards. “Well, the letter at your house was at least fifteen years after we disappeared. Rick was living there, so it has to be another fifteen or twenty. At least.”
    “You think?”
    Jason tilted his head. “It’s a very wet area. Snow, rain, humidity. So it could be ten. But honestly, that much growth, I can’t see it being any less than ten. I’m sticking with twenty. I saw the pictures of Chernobyl.”
    “You are obsessed with that.”
    “That’s the only one I know.”
    Nora walked to the table. “There was an amusement park here in Ohio called Geauga Lake. It was overgrown too. I loved looking at the pictures. Just can’t believe I’m living it now.”
    “Me either.” Jason noticed Nora looking again at the wallet size double frame she found on Malcolm’s desk. “Why do you keep looking at Malcolm’s family?”
    “Because I have no pictures of my own. Rick took them all. Everything. Every picture. If for anything, I want to get to Salvation to get pictures. It’s hard to process, you know. I mean. It’s been almost two weeks since I saw them. Alive. How am I supposed to believe they are dead? It doesn’t feel it. It’s like we’re on this apocalypse vacation and I need to get back home to share the adventure.”
    “I’m sort of feeling that way,” Jason said. “But I saw my wife’s grave, my daughter’s grave.”
    “You didn’t see them, though. I feel guilty for not being torn apart, for not feeling grief as badly as I should. I lost my child. But I just don’t believe it.”
    “Will we ever?”
    “It will never be real. I’ll miss them terribly. I do miss them now. I just don’t know if I’ll ever miss them as if they died. It’s too surreal. Enough serious talk, go pick your poison for our game.”
    Jason grumbled and stood. “What did you get?”
    Nora quickly covered her vending machine items. “Not saying. I’m playing high stakes here.”
    “I have news for you that vending machine food is at least twenty-five years old. It’s all high stakes.” He stood and walked to the machine. “Back to what we were saying.”
    “No, let’s not.”
    “One more thing. Okay? Just know … how you feel, is justifiable. Whether it will change, we don’t know. It may. It may not. Only time will tell. Like I mentioned when I did my sermon for you.”
    Nora laughed.
    “What? What’s so funny?” Jason returned to the table hiding his items from Nora’s sight.
    “Well, don’t take this the wrong way. Maybe it was better when you were standing before a huge congregation or something.”
    “Better?”
    “Yeah, more moving.”
    “I’ll have you know, I was a great orator for God.”
    “I’m sure. Plus, the way you look probably