But Gus was serious. “That’s why we’re picking up people. We don’t need old ones or sick ones—but every young, healthy person is a potential citizen of the new order.”

Suddenly it wasn’t funny—if it had ever been. She had been preoccupied by the problems of the moment, and hadn’t thought it through: people were going to die. Including her own family, if she didn’t get through in time to warn them. Had she herself been picked up because she was a woman of childbearing age?

“Make sense to you?” Gus asked, averting his gaze.

It made sense, all right! These two hoped to build a captive kingdom! Would she have been accepted as a candidate if she had not been pretty? Ha-ha! “I believe I’ll get off at the next mountain,” she said.

Gus made a gesture of laissez-faire. “It has to be voluntary, of course. But you’ll drown, here.”

The awful thing was that it was true. She would drown, if she didn’t get out of Florida in the next few days. And as the nature of the disaster became apparent to the surviving populace, a woman alone would not be safe. From either the weather or the people.

“If you really believe that the world in this vicinity is coming to an end,” she said, “why aren’t you worried about your own folks? You do have folks?”

Gus wasn’t fazed. “My dad farms in the mountains. My brother was captain of his school swimming team. They can take care of themselves.”

“And yours?” she asked Thatch.

Thatch didn’t answer.

“He knows we can’t save anyone else until we save ourselves,” Gus said. “If there’s a break in the rain, then maybe we can look about.”

“A pragmatic philosophy,” she said. “It confirms my opinion of you. How about dropping me off when you hit the Appalachians, then?”

If Gus caught the irony he didn’t show it. “Sure enough. But you’re eating our food and using up our gas. You’ll have to earn your keep.”