"We're alive, Fran. Ogunport is a town of around 3000... Now, taking into account we can't be the only survivors, and it isn't exactly smart to broadcast one's position..." Harold began...
"Is that why you're driving Old Man Hudson's cadillac around town?!" Fran shot back.
Harold looked back at her hurt.
"He's not going to miss it. He died three days ago. Besides, it's better we take the cop-car." He replied.
"Cop car?!" She asked incredully.
"Yep. Got it from the roadblock. There's two dozen of them... and.. some really bad stuff. We can't go north. Maybe west is okay. See, I have this theory, that if anyone is fixing this thing, it has to be the CDC. If anyone's working on a cure..." Harold trailed off.
"Someone's got to be working on a cure." He concluded.
"Is that where you got that gun?!" Fran asked, a bit scared.
Harold looked back sheepishly.
"Yeah... Well, fuck, Frannie, they were dead! They weren't using it!" His face turned beet red, and flushed.
"Can... I have one?" Fran asked.
"I'm worried about you, Miss Goldsmith. You swallowed a bottle of pills not four hours ago. Who's to say if I give you that gun..." Harold began..
"If I wanted to find a gun and blow my brains out, who's to stop me from just going up to the same roadblock and picking up a pistol, Harold? And by the fucking way, don't call me Miss Goldsmith!" She screamed, indignantly.
"So what do you want me to call you?" Harold asked.
"My mother, Miss Goldsmith, is dead, you insensitive asshole." She spat at him.
Harold looked at her, sullen, and replied "I was just trying to be glib. I didn't mean anything by it. "
"If you love me, then love me. And by that, I mean keep your distance." Fran stated, harshly.
He felt hurt at that, and looked away.
"I do love you. I don't... I don't know what to say to that." He replied, and began to walk off aimlessly into the distance.
"Harold! HAROLD! Wait a minute!" Fran shouted after him. He kept walking.
"Listen, Fran... We don't have to go together to Vermont as a couple... But we can go as a team. For all we know, we could be the last two people alive in the state. It's unlikely though. Though... so is that... you and me are the last two people alive in town." He sighed, and checked the rounds in his pistol. If Frannie and himself were alive, statistics indicated that they were not, could not be the last people alive. He knew on a conscious level that after a collapse of this level, they would be in danger.
"Fran, have you ever fired a gun?" He asked.
"Uhm... No." She replied.
"Neither have I. But just by running the odds, there are people alive who have. We need to figure it out. I've..." Harold paused, and briefly laughed, in a self-defacing manner.
"I've played video-games, and I've seen my share of movies." He cringed at what he said.
"Oh, good... Just press a button to reload them..." Fran laughed.
"That's exactly what I'm getting at. This isn't some game. We're fighting for our lives, and... we need to atleast practice." He led her to the police station.
Harold knocked on the window of the Ogunquit PD.
"Hello?! Is anyone alive in there?!" He shouted. No answer. He opened the door. It was unlocked.
"This is wrong." Fran stated.
"When the federal government comes asking for a bill for damages, I will pay it in full. Until then... We need to take precautions. Besides, there could be all sorts of supplies, things we might need in there." He replied.
"We need to find the armory. Guns, body armor, ammunition, all of what we need to make the trip up to Atlanta." He scratched his head and lit up a flashlight. Harold put on his face mask, and gestured for Frannie to put hers on too.
"This is going to stink to high heaven. God knows how many people they had in the cell before everything went to hell." Harold held his gun high, and his flashlight in the other hand. They passed a policeman who had drowned to death on his own phlegm. Eventually though, they found it. A sign overhead read "ARMORY". A foot hung half in and out of the doorframe.
"Frannie, take my gun and wait outside." Harold said.
"Don't do anything stupid." She responded.
"I won't." He looked at her as she was an angel.
"So what if... what if the government comes back?" She asked.
"You think that's going to happen? We're in a small town. It got here somehow, and it killed..." Harold looked off into the distance, and exhaled.
"They shut off communications a week ago. A week and a half ago, I was reading about this this in Los Angeles, New York, New Orleans. If the projections of the death toll are accurate, there's... maybe three million people left in the United States."
"Jesus, do you have to sound so non-chalant? Harold, why do you always have to seem so maudlin? Why do you always have to speak like you're something out of an old movie?! This is not cinema, this is real life. Everyone we know is dead." Frannie said, flushed.
"That means i's just us, Fran. You and me. Us against the world. Now, take off the safety on that pistol, and wait out here. If you here gunshots, well... Use your best judgement." Harold tossed Fran the keys to the cop car, and though he didn't really believe, he gave a prayer.