It wasn’t until he’d been out on his own for two weeks that he came across the first living, breathing people. He’d taken cover in a shitty little house that had creaky floorboards and dusty furniture three days before when a storm had come through and never bothered to leave. Winter was moving in, bringing chilly nights that helped combat the humidity of the day, and being in the house was better than anything else he’d done since leaving the city. His feet ached and were covered in blisters from walking, and he knew he was starting to smell. His beard itched, as did his head, but he couldn’t bring himself to take the time to shave. In fact, he couldn’t make himself do much of anything but sit on the couch and stare at the picture of Amira.
It was the one she’d taken from her house when they’d left. Her parents were in it, as was her younger brother, and she barely looked like the woman he’d known. But the picture and his memories were all he had, and the memories hurt too much to dwell on.
That’s what he was doing when the front door burst open. He had no shoes on and the picture was in his hand instead of his weapon as a group of people rushed inside. They didn’t notice him at first, too preoccupied with getting in and getting the door shut, but the second it was closed one of them was on him.
“Shit,” a man hissed as he shoved the barrel of his shotgun in Jim’s face. “Don’t move. Hear me? Don’t you fucking move.”
Jim barely even blinked, but it had nothing to do with the man’s gun or the order that had been barked at him. It was because he wasn’t afraid. The opposite really, he was perfectly okay with this guy blowing his head off.
“Dammit,” muttered someone behind the shotgun toting man in front of Jim. “It’s bad. They got him. Shit.”
“Shoot me. Just do it,” a third man moaned.
Jim leaned forward, causing the man with the shotgun to push the barrel harder against his forehead. Without thinking, he shoved the weapon away, barely registering what he had done. He was too focused on the scene playing out in front of him. There were four people in all, three men and one woman, and one of them was injured. A guy who couldn’t be more than thirty and was bleeding all over the place had his left shirtsleeve pulled up to reveal a bite on his wrist.
“Kill me,” the injured man said again.
That’s when Jim got up. “Cut it off.”
All eyes turned his way and the guy with the shotgun hopped closer to him, nudging him with the barrel once again.
“Calm the fuck down,” Jim muttered as he stepped closer to the others. “You need to cut off his hand.”
The woman blinked as she stared up at him. “You’re nuts.”
“How do you even know it will work?” the third guy said while the injured man looked up at Jim with hope-filled eyes.
“I know someone.” Jim knelt. “A guy who was bitten and lived. They cut his arm off. It’s been years now and he’s fine.”
The woman looked him up and down and frowned. “How do you know? You look like you’ve been out here for a long time.” She looked past him to the empty room. “There’s no one with you.”
“He’s alive.” Jim reached back and pulled his knife out. It was big, with a serrated side that was perfect for sawing through bone. “Lives in New Atlanta.”
“That where you’re from?” the guy with the shotgun asked.
He hadn’t put the weapon down and having it shoved in his face over and over again was starting to get to Jim.
“Yeah. Will you put that thing down? I haven’t done a damn thing to threaten you.” He nodded to the injured man. “You need to get a tourniquet on his arm and do it fast.”
For a moment no one moved and Jim thought they weren’t going to listen, but then the woman stood and pulled her belt off.
“Let’s give it a try,” she said.
The guy was still bleeding when they got back to the unsanctioned town these people called home, but he ended up living. It made Jim a kind of hero that he hadn’t really wanted to be, and even though he had no real desire to hang around anyone, let alone a town that was still too close to New Atlanta for comfort, he agreed to stay for dinner.
The town he found himself in was nothing more than a group of houses surrounded by an impressive steel wall. There were several gates and reinforced beams inside and out, but as far as Jim could tell, the population inside the wall wasn’t big enough to have accomplished such a major feat in such a short time.
“How’d you do this?” he asked Gretchen, the woman he’d met in the house.
“It was here.” Her gaze moved across the wall slowly. “It was the set for a television show.”
That was when it hit him. Of course. He’d been in prison when the outbreak started, but even inmates had the privilege of watching The Walking Dead. In fact, the show had been so popular that it probably would have been considered a human rights violation to deny them access to it.
“Shit,” he muttered.
Gretchen just nodded. “I know. I was a big fan, lived only a few towns over when it all started. I figured this was the best place to go if I wanted to be safe from zombies. Turns out, I wasn’t the only one.”
“I’m surprised more people didn’t come here.”
“Most headed to Atlanta and the promise of a vaccine and government. We heard about it, but we also knew a few people who had been up there and left. They said there was something off about the man in charge, Star I think his name was.”
Jim nodded. “There’s a lot off about that asshole.”
He didn’t intend to stay, but a day turned into two, which turned into a week, and before he knew it he found that he wasn’t even thinking about leaving. He went out on runs with other people in the settlement, traveling to distant towns in search of anything useful. He killed zombies, learned to hunt game, helped bring supplies in. He worked and started to feel better, but he never forgot, and he never felt whole.
Dr. Helton
Vivian had delivered her baby only a week before, a girl they named Margot, meaning Dr. Helton was forced to do the thing she’d been avoiding: visit Angus. She didn’t want to, but she knew she had to tell him the news or he would never forgive her. Of course, the question of why she cared what he thought about her was one she refused to focus on.
“She immune?” he asked when he heard the news, voicing the question she’d known was coming.
The doctor felt her back straighten. She was as far away from him as she could get and still be in the room, but just the sound of his voice affected her. Made her want to run to him, to touch him and kiss him and—
“She is.”
His face scrunched up like he was going to spit. “You gonna steal her?”
“Nothing has been decided yet,” she said elusively. Already she was inching toward the door.
It was true, but that didn’t mean it hadn’t been discussed. Star had already started calculating how long it would be before they could bring the girl in, which had only led to more talk about Test Subject 06. The conversation had nearly plunged Dr. Helton into a deep depression, and standing in front of Angus, having his angry gaze bore into her as he flung silent accusations her way only made the whole thing worse.
It had also made her flee.
She’d spent night after night following that visit wide-awake and unable to get her brain to shut off, and she swore to herself that she would never see him again. Getting Angus James out of her system was much more difficult than it should be, and she found herself reliving the last time they were together until it hurt so much she was certain it would kill her, but still she couldn’t stop thinking about it. Couldn’t stop thinking about him.
He had asked her to bring his daughter to visit, but Dr. Helton found herself holding off, knowing that visiting him would reopen wounds that had barely begun to close. Still, the more time that passed, the more she ached from being away from him. She found herself in the observation wing more and more often, couldn’t stop from watching him through the window. The gray eyes that stared back
swam with accusations while at the same time mirroring the longing that lived deep inside her, and she felt certain that Angus wanted her to come to him almost as much as she ached to visit. By the time Test Subject 06’s first birthday rolled around, she felt like she would go mad if she didn’t give in.
Dr. Helton hadn’t seen the child since that day in Angus’s cell, and when she first laid eyes on the little girl, slipping into the apartment Helen had been given, the sight nearly took her breath away. Test Subject 06 had grown so much, but what was even more amazing was the striking resemblance she bore to her father. She had his smile, something the doctor had only seen one time, but it was long enough to have thoroughly ingrained the image in her memory. She could picture it perfectly when she closed her eyes at night, could hear his laughter.
Even more heartbreaking than the smile, though, were the eyes that peered up at her. Smoky gray, they were the same shade as the clouds that preceded a spring storm.
“What are you doing here?” Helen asked, her coarse voice shaking with fear. She held the child tighter to her chest as if afraid the doctor had come to take her away.
“A visit.” Dr. Helton took a seat on the couch. “Pretend I’m not here.”
Helen did her best, but it seemed as if she found it nearly impossible not to look at the other woman every five minutes. She and the child ate dinner, then played with some blocks, but it was late and before long Helen had the little girl wrapped in a warm embrace. She rocked the child back and forth, singing Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star in a raspy voice that was oddly beautiful and haunting, and the little girl’s eyes fluttered a few times before finally shutting.
Once she was sure the baby was asleep, Helen laid her in her crib before turning to the doctor. “You’re taking her somewhere, aren’t you?”
The only other time Dr. Helton had visited was the day she’d gone to see Angus, so it made sense that Helen knew why she was there. “Yes, but just like last time, I will bring her back.”
The other woman nodded, relief flashing in her eyes, and then, almost as if the doctor wasn’t there at all, she went about the process of cleaning up their small apartment.
Dr. Helton waited until it was nearly two o’clock in the morning to go, knowing that she had to be careful that no one spotted her. The child wasn’t heavy, but she was so much bigger than she’d been the last time they’d made this trip, and the thought caused an ache to spread through her. It eased a little more with each step she took, though, and by the time she’d made it to the observation wing the ache had been replaced by butterflies. The idea of seeing Angus again, of being near him and watching him with his daughter, was exhilarating.
He was asleep when she slipped into his cell, just as he’d been the other times she’d come to him in the middle of the night. Only this time she didn’t take her clothes off and climb into his bed, but instead nudged him with her foot until he stirred.
“Angus,” she whispered. “I’ve brought her.”
He was on his feet in seconds, standing so close that his masculine form nearly overpowered her senses. She allowed him to take the child from her arms before retreating to the other side of the room, afraid to be too close to the man who had somehow worked his way into her soul. Something that until now she’d been certain she didn’t have.
“She’s gotten so big,” he whispered, staring down at his daughter.
“She has.”
He didn’t look up. “Ain’t she a beauty.”
She was, but Dr. Helton remained silent, too engrossed in watching Angus to talk. The way he looked at the child, as if she were a miracle, made him seem softer than he ever had before. It transformed him into someone else. Someone who knew how to love and who was loved. Someone who wasn’t trapped in this building.
She didn’t say a word the entire time she was there. Angus held the child, whispering to her so quietly that even Dr. Helton couldn’t hear him, but he never woke her. For nearly two hours they stayed that way, each of them lost in a world of emotions that were much too complicated to name. It was a peaceful visit. Perfect.
She almost hated to put the visit to an end, but as dawn grew near Dr. Helton knew she had to. Soon the scientists who lived in this building would return to the labs and the guards would wake to start their day, and the longer she stretched out this visit, the more likely it would be that she would get caught.
“I have to go,” she said, getting to her feet.
Angus stood too, not taking his eyes off the girl. “You gonna bring her back?”
“As soon as I can,” she said.
He nodded as he eased the sleeping child into the doctor’s arms. It was dark in the cell, but she could see the emotion in his eyes when his gaze met hers. “Thank you.”
She swallowed. “You’re welcome.”
It wasn’t what she’d wanted to say, but it was the only thought going through her head that she could put words to at the moment, so it would have to do.
She turned away from him, her legs as heavy as her heart was as she once again left him alone in his cell.
The time with Angus had slipped inside her, making it difficult to once again focus on her job. Not that it mattered all that much. The family had become her number one priority and they had been quiet since Amira’s death and the destruction of the Colorado settlement. Whether they’d resigned themselves to their fate or were in denial she wasn’t sure, she just knew that Jim had fled the city, taking the job of a zombie slayer he’d assured Amira he didn’t want, and the others were no longer talking about leaving New Atlanta.
Though Star rarely left his office, he was involved in nearly every decision that was made inside and outside this building. He chose which stories would go in the National Newspaper and which laws would be enforced, carefully considering every detail in hopes of keeping the people living in this settlement in line. So it was no surprise when he called her into his office to run an idea by her.
“The population has seen a major increase over the last few months,” Star began. “We’re getting crowded and it’s become impossible to build new housing units fast enough. Not to mention the fact that we don’t have a lot of room to expand. I don’t want to send just anyone to the prison settlement in DC, though. We need to be selective about who goes there.”
“The shantytown seems to be working out,” Dr. Helton said.
Star lifted his eyebrows and she began to wonder if she’d said something wrong. She felt out of sorts. Drunk or drugged, she wasn’t sure which; she just knew she didn’t feel like herself anymore.
“Yes.” The way he drew the word out seemed to emphasize the fact that he expected more out of her. “But it’s also ripe with illness. The people are living in squalor, and even though we both know I have no problem letting people suffer, I’m afraid it’s going to cause illness to spread through the settlement. One we can’t control.”
“Then why not release one you can control?”
The words were out before she’d had a chance to think them through, but saying them was almost a relief. Not only was it a good idea—she could tell by the gleam of appreciation in Star’s eyes—but it also made her feel more like herself. She’d been afraid that her growing feelings for Angus had stripped her of the edge she needed to continue her work, but they obviously hadn’t.
“That’s an idea.” Star folded his hands on the desk in front of him as he nodded. “What do we have?”
“There’s a flu,” she said. “Something we developed a few years ago. We have the vaccine already and it can easily be administered to anyone we want to stay healthy. Once the right people have been safeguarded against illness, we can release the flu on the general population and let it run its course.”
“It has a survivability rate?”
“Yes.” Dr. Helton thought back to the bug she’d worked on before the outbreak. “Sixty percent was our best guess.”
“Good.” Star nodded three times. “Yes. Taking out forty percent of the population will
help with our overcrowding problem. Make it happen, will you?”
She stood, suddenly grateful to have something other than Angus James to occupy her mind. “I’ll take care of it.”
Dr. Helton
Test Subject 06 had just turned two, meaning they’d taken yet another visit to see Angus. This time he’d risked waking the girl, giving him a chance to watch her toddle around the room. She was speaking now, only a few words here and there, but enough that she and her father were able to sing a few songs together, although the girl’s version sounded nothing like it was supposed to.
For days after the visit Dr. Helton couldn’t get the image out of her mind, Angus singing with the child, the two laughing and smiling together. It ate away at her, made her desperate to change the course she was on. The girl had been created for the sole purpose of being a test subject and it had been Dr. Helton’s idea, but thinking about it now made her ache inside and out. Knowing that it would rip Angus apart, that it would hurt him more than anything ever had.
There had to be another way.
That’s how she came up with the plan to create a new vaccine. Of course, it wasn’t actually a new vaccine, but a virus specifically designed to infect a fetus. She and Star had talked about what needed to happen to create the type of creature they wanted, how it would have to be a hybrid of some kind, half human and half zombie. It was during that conversation that Dr. Helton had realized the best way to achieve it: while the child was still forming inside the mother.
Twisted World Series Box Set | Books 1-3 & Novella Page 59
