The convoy crawls east on its last few gallons of fuel. With Francine and Prairie in the cab holding things together, the Takers face a pressing choice: either continue on to Flamingo Springs, taking the chance that an enclave is in fact located there and that its inhabitants will be happy to see them, or stop the truck in the ruins of Salton City and scrounge what fuel they can from amidst the casualty crowds?
Knowing more about the drone and its maker seems to be useful for making this decision, so Ash calls up Avi, an old weapon-dealing contact of his in the Recession, while Billy consults some old military reference manuals to learn more about its components. Avi advises Ash that while the drone is clearly the work of someone who knows his stuff, and has certain strong points as a device (remote-guided munitions and great linger time among them), it would also be expensive to operate without access to reliable hydrogen generation facilities and is only worth about
8 Bounty overall.
Given this relatively low perceived payoff to returning the drone, and the risk of wandering in to Flamingo Springs blind, the Takers elect to instead pin their hopes on scavenging fuel. After a half hour of consulting Ubiq Maps and switching back and forth from old and new satellite and drone photo footage, Francine lands a jackpot: an apparently undisturbed municipal vehicle yard near one of the city's canals, filled with Casualties but apparently also isolated since the Crash. The Takers elect to raid it and gun their sputtering vehicles into the city itself.
The Takers select a peeling strategy to deal with the yard's twenty or so residents. With the help of Hurley and Jason, two volunteers from the convoy, they will pick the padlock on the yard's chain link gate, draw off the Casualties scattered around the vehicles, and then drive the truck in to begin siphoning.
After initially being forced to flee from some roused Casualties, Ash and Hurley proceed to make the peel with no trouble, and thirteen Cs shamble off after them as Billy, Prairie, and Jason each take out one of the remainder and Francine brings the truck in. But just then, something goes wrong, as high-pitched and insistent barking begins to ring out from somewhere within the yard and every Casualty for a block rises from Torpor to investigate - including ten of the thirteen peeled Casualties. The Takers in the yard are sandwiched.
Acting quickly, Francine closes the chainlink gate, which will at least buy the Takers some time safe from the Cs in the street. Prairie, Billy, and Jason keep swinging and shooting, downing Cs left and right and opening a path for Abalene to sprint from the truck in search of fuel. She finds it, and also the source of the barking - a large dog lying in a huddle far back under one of the trucks. After downing a Casualty that leaps on him from a window, Billy sees this too - and, after a brief tussle with Abalene, shoots the dog twice to silence it. Abalene retrieves two puppies from nearby the dog's body, and discovers that it was already wounded and sick with an infection.
Elsewhere, Francine is piling diesel fuel drums onto a dolly and Prairie has blasted a parked motorbike with a flaming crossbow bolt to blind and disorient a large cluster of the approaching shamblers, making them easy targets for the rest of the team but drawing even more attention from the street. Ash and Hurley have, by this stage, looped back and rejoined the team. The diesel is loaded just as the chainlink begins to bulge in under the press of dead bodies from outside, and the Takers roar off just as it caves in.
[Somewhat later, on the road]
No longer needing fuel, the Takers head northeast towards the Chocolate Mountain Impact Area and their rendezvous with Prairie's uncle. Their path is momentarily blocked by a burned-out evacuation convoy which is clogging up an overpass. Francine is able to guide the vehicles past the block by going off-road, but the silhouette of a salvageable mounted weapon on the lead truck convinces a handful of the takers to try for a pickup.
All goes well for a time, as the Takers move along the side of the sand-blown column of blasted vehicles, keeping far away from the reach of the few dessicated casualties still stuck in the wreckage. But with the target nearly in hand, they step into an area where a five shrapnel-riddled Casualties, blown clear when the convoy was bombed, lie dormant under the sand drifts. With C's rising from the sands all around them, the Takers fight a desperate battle to extricate themselves, but Jason is bitten in the face, with Hurley and Billy escaping the same fate by the thickness of a garment alone. The spreading webs of black veins around Jason's wound speak volumes: he is a secret Latent, a biological time bomb that has lain right inside the convoy this whole time.
Before anyone can speak, Billy draws his gun to defend Jason. Ash and Hurley draw on Billy in return, and the four stand motionless until Abalene fires her shotgun in the air and demand that Billy calm down. Billy concedes, kicking his pistol over to Abalene, but seems unrepentant, and even the arrival of his brother Dale on the scene does not help him seem any less firm in his manner to the other survivors. With some indications that the debate about Billy's actions is not over, the Takers return to their vehicle with a heavily bandaged Jason and the salvaged weapon in hand, and all are soon back on the road to Chocolate Mountain.
Presently, the fortified enclave built on the remains of Slab City looms into view. After negotiating what purports to be a complex minefield at its entrance, the Takers are ushered in by a handful of gunmen, each of whom wears the blue and white flag of Guatemala. As Uncle Bob greets Prairie and whisks her away, the rest of the Takers hear one gunman remark to another: "
La Reina is going to love this..."
[Flashback to yesterday: A deserted building in Resettlement Camp 2, outside Ramona]
As the Takers and their dependents are putting the final elements of their convoy together in the last few hours of daylight, Billy and Dale address the boy's fears of leaving the safety of the camps and re-entering the Loss. Billy makes Dale a guarantee: they will reach the East Coast safely, whatever it takes. Later, Abalene shares a concern with Billy: will his complete focus on reaching the East in safety, provoke a moment in which he is choosing between himself and Dale, and everyone else in the convoy?
Tune in next week for Session 3: Not Russian at All!
