Apocalypsis 03 - Exodus

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    “I’m kickin’ it old school,” said Winky. “Try to keep up.” She took off ahead of everyone, waving a middle finger over her head.
    “What’s gotten into her?” asked Peter, smiling at her back.
    “I think she’s stared death in the face and has come back to enjoy life or something.”
    “Maybe getting out of that swamp has something to do with it,” said Ronald.
    “I don’t feel so good,” said Bodo, before leaning sideways to throw up again, falling off his bike into the gravel on the side of the road.
    ***
    We were delayed another fifteen minutes while Bodo was rehydrated and given some bread to calm his stomach. As soon as Bodo looked able to ride again, I pulled him to his feet. Buster danced nervously around, probably picking up on everyone’s worried vibes. I let go of one of Bodo’s hands to scoop him up, putting him in my bike’s basket before letting go of Bodo’s hand.
    “Ready?” I asked.
    “Not really,” he said weakly. “I’m sorry for dis, guyss. Maybe you shouldt go ahead without me. I will stay here and go later.”
    “No way,” I said, standing his bike up and patting the seat. “Mount up. We’re all staying together, and we’re all going now. You barf again and you’re just going to have to keep riding.”
    He took the handlebars and threw his leg over the top of the bike to straddle it. “You are a cruel woman.”
    “Yes. I know.” I got on my bike and pointed at the road. “Go. We need to get on the highway right now. You have five minutes to be on that striped asphalt, so start pedaling.” I felt like a military commander or something, but I knew tough love was the only thing that would get him going.
    Bodo grumbled, but he went. I waited until everyone was moving before I followed. Winky was in front of our crew now and I was in back. It was sad to think that the two of us were looking out for four guys who, unless you counted their contributions as man meat, were more liabilities than assets. I was looking forward to starting the training for everyone again. My classes would be smaller, but that would make it easier to focus on them individually. I put together practice routines as we made our way to the interstate highway.
    Peter dropped back to ride beside me, once we were on the highway going south, negotiating the husks of burned out cars and scattered bits of glass.
    “So what’s the plan?” he asked.
    “Plan? Plan for what? Getting there? Living there? Narrow it down for me.”
    “All of the above, but we can start with the plan for food and water. We have enough for a few days if we stretch it.”
    “Well, you can leave Winky and me out of the meals for the first day. We ate at the Amazons’ place.”
    “You will be telling me all about that, every last detail, as soon as I’m done getting this info.”
    “Maybe have Winky tell it. She’s the baby murderer. It’ll be more interesting from her perspective.”
    “I’m going to pretend you didn’t just say that and move on. Tell me about food and water.”
    “Well, short term, we find what we can and make do. We’re not far from the ocean and the Everglades, so we can fish. Longer term, I have seeds for a garden and Bodo says he can put that together. And I plan to find some cattle and goats and stuff for our meat and milk, and maybe some horses for transportation.”
    “And where will we be getting said livestock?”
    “I hope we either can find it wandering around out on the old ranches, or maybe we can convince the tribes to give us some that we can breed on our own.”
    “So you know how to breed cattle, then?” he asked in a deceptively innocent voice.
    “I’m pretty sure they take care of the breeding part themselves,” I said wryly.
    “Perhaps,” he said. “But to get baby cows, you need a bull. And bulls are dangerous.”
    I shrugged. “So we find a cowboy. It can’t be that hard. We live in Florida; there are ranches all over the place here.”
    “In Miami?”
    Ronald dropped back to listen in on the conversation. “Actually, down in Homestead, there are quite a few ranches. We might get lucky.”
    “Really?” I asked, surprised to hear that. “Ranches?”
    “Yeah. Crazy, huh? I mean, with Miami so close and all.”
    “Nothing’s crazy to me anymore,” I said. “That word really shouldn’t exist for us at this point, considering what we’ve seen.”
    Ronald nodded. “Yeah. Tell me about it.”
    “Okay, so we are going to grow our own