Death Route

As the characters continue to struggle for survival, they face different situations that make their arduous journey almost unbeareable. Death becomes a really important subject of disscussion between the son and the father. For example, after they both escape the well-mantained house were prisioners were being kept, the father asks his son to kill himself if the "bad guys" catch him:

If they find you you are going to have to do it. Do you understand? Shh. No crying. Do you
hear me? You know how to do it. You put it in your mouth and point it up. Do it
quick and hard. Do you understand? Stop crying. Do you understand?
I think so.
No. Do you understand?
Yes." (pg 113)

This conversation, and the fact that the father abandoned the people that were about to be killed reflects how death has caused a tremendous impact on the man. First of all, its clear that his only priority is to keep his son and himself alive. The rest of the people have lost importance in the man's life since he has lost hope in humanity.

On the mattress lay a man with his legs gone to the hip and the stumps of them blackened
and burnt. The smell was hideous.
Jesus, he whispered.
Then one by one they turned and blinked in the pitiful light. Help us, they
whispered. Please help us. Christ, he said. Oh Christ.
He turned and grabbed the boy. Hurry, he said. Hurry." (pg 110)

The experience of watching these people left the boy and the man shocked and traumatized. After that, the boy continuously asks the man if they are going to die soon and begs him not to lie to him. He also wants to know if they will end up doing the same things as the "bad guys" in the masion did. The dad takes his role as a protective figure to the child, and asures him that even though conditions are tough, they will make it through and continue to be the good guys:

We wouldnt ever eat anybody, would we?
No. Of course not.
Even if we were starving?                                                                                                   We're starving now.
You said we werent.
I said we werent dying. I didnt say we werent starving.
But we wouldnt.
No. We wouldnt.
No matter what.
No. No matter what.
Because we're the good guys.
Yes.
And we're carrying the fire.
And we're carrying the fire. Yes.
Okay." (pg 128 - 129)

But even though the dad keeps telling the son that they are not dying and that they can endure the situation, he knows death is slowly coming upon them, and therefore, has a dream about it:

He was beginning to think that death was finally upon them and that they should find
some place to hide where they would not be found... He'd seen the boy in a
dream laid out upon a coolingboard and woke in horror. What he could bear in the
waking world he could not by night and he sat awake for fear the dream would
return" (pg 129 - 130)