He snickered. “In any case, food runs out. All the other crap the people looted before the gang wars—you saw it all in the markets and on their sorry selves,” he added with a glance at the guy he considered promoting, “they trade it all day and night to stay warm or protected, but it’s food and water they need the most.”
“Any of you ever consider growing it?” asked the older Native American in the cell.
The Gamesman huffed soberly. “Oh, I tried. As soon as something grew, someone stole it. Hell, they trampled more they took just to get away with it.” He shook his head. “Too many hopeless souls, too many pitiful excuses. What little I could save I reward my jexes with.” He stood and stepped up to the door, looking the Death Doll square in the eye. “Food and clean water are dwindling commodities in this world, but everybody still needs them … except, of course, for you.”
The proverbial light bulb slowly lit in the Death Doll’s dark eyes, and her pretty little mouth fell open. “You want the tech that keeps me awake.”
The Gamesman smiled at her dead yet keen mind.
*****
Peter shook his head as his jaw fell.
“He’s out of his mind,” Gil said.
“Having you fight in my games would’ve been lucrative if you would’ve played along,” the madman continued while the TERAN gawked at him, “but an army of zombies serving my interests? Now that’s something to build on.”
Peter flipped the transmit switch back on. “Gamesman, listen to me. We’ve tried this before. We couldn’t control them. All they’ll do is turn on you. Trust me; you don’t want to go down this road.”
The crazy fool flipped off the camera without even facing it.
Peter fumed until the door guards walked in.
“As ordered, sir,” Sergeant Burgos said next to the one he had sent for, which made him smile.
“Mister President,” she said. “What can I—” Then her eyes locked on the main screen, just as he expected them to. He felt a spark of hope.
“I have a job for you,” he told her.
*****
“Listen to him,” Cody warned the magnate, though he didn’t think he would get anywhere. “Didi will tell you. Being dead is not—”
One of the jexes smacked the glass and told him to shut up. “She does it, but we can’t?”
“You don’t want that kind of—” Cody started to warn him before he realized what the jex was getting at. “You don’t just want guards like her. You want to be like her.”
The jex sneered at his boss, begging, “Please let me at this honky fucker.”
The Gamesman calmly waved down his minion, then smiled at Cody. “Some of us don’t have a choice. I’ve got cancer, McQuain has H.I.V.,” he waved over his eager jex. “I’ve got guys with Palsy, Parkinson’s, epilepsy, M.S. It’s what we all had in common. Needless to say, there were more of us, but our fallen brothers died to live our dream. We honor their loss every day we live where we belong: on top.”
As frightening as this development was, Cody understood it perfectly. Even despite working with reanimates as long as he had, his own struggles with diabetes had led him to consider that option a time or two. But, then, his condition improved after time away from the poisonous conveniences of the world before the plague.
“You don’t want to do this, man,” Isaac warned the Gamesman with a firm yet concerned tone. “If you knew half the pain she goes through—”
McQuain smacked the glass again. “Shut yo’ damn mouth, nigga. Why you even with—”
Isaac banged on the glass where McQuain was standing, shouting while Hashim, Rachelle, Cynthia, and Craig held the raging man at bay, “Don’t you ever call me a nigger! I don’t care what fuckin’ color you are; I will rip your ass up like a fuckin’ face-muncher!”
McQuain waved off the pissed-off Isaac. “Fuckin’ house ni—”
“No, no, he’s right,” the Gamesman said calmly, which caught McQuain’s sudden ire. “No point in saying what we don’t want said. It’s only fair.”
McQuain almost responded, but he kept his place, instead staring down Isaac like he wanted to bash him in. Isaac looked no less enraged, and certainly not vindicated.
The Gamesman’s patient grin found Didi. “Look, sister, your choice is simple: you surrender yourself or your people die.”
“She can’t help you,” Cody snapped as he pushed off of Heather to reach the door he couldn’t open. “She doesn’t have the tech.”
“She’s got it in her, right?”
“But I’m the one who made it. Take me.”
“Shut up, Cody,” Didi hissed at him.
The Gamesman looked somewhere between impressed and amused. Then he grinned at Didi. “I guess the feeling’s mutual, huh?”
Cody wasn’t sure what that meant, but he quivered when he watched the Gamesman approach the security desk and smack the right of two glowing buttons on the center.
The cell door eased itself open, and Cody’s heart sank.
“Take him,” the Gamesman said.
McQuain and another jex marched right up to Cody, but Didi blocked them. They tried to push her out of the way, but she came up with the little knife she had hidden in her left glove and cut the throat of one of them. The other, McQuain, stood in stunned silence until Didi snatched him by the shoulder and yanked him around to place his back to her. She set the dagger against his throat and grinned maliciously. “You won’t touch him.”
Several guns cocked and aimed at random people in the cell with them, but not Cody.
“I don’t need to touch him,” the Gamesman said as if unaffected. “I just need your, uh … special friend to build me more of what makes you … so special. But, if you’re going to be a bitch about it and take a hostage, I’m just going to have to respond in kind.”
Three jexes shoved Gilda, Nick, and Sean into the security room; a fourth held the wounded Paula by the shoulder.
Cody froze worse than if he had been standing outside in the snow.
“If you hurt them,” Didi warned the Gamesman, “I swear I will eat your fucking face off before any of your flunkies can shoot me down.”
The magnate just shrugged with another grin. “Then one of them takes over, and he’ll have your device. Then, of course, they’ll kill all of your friends and torture your boyfriend until he gives them what they want. I’m ready to die. Is he?”
“Brother,” one of the jexes said as he entered the office, “we got a situation.”
All eyes fell to the door as the jex stepped aside and revealed …
“Lavon?” the Gamesman whispered as if the wind had been knocked out of him.
The proud Marine in a clean new uniform glared daggers at the madman. “Ralph.”
Cody’s jaw dropped.
CHAPTER 36
TRIPPED
Lavon had endured the brutal seasons of Fort Carson on her own for two years, rationing what food she could find, exercising to stay strong enough to do her duty despite how little energy she had. Yet her blood had never felt colder than it did now, staring into the ruthless eyes of Ralph Franklin, the corrupt comptroller who had brought her so much misery.
“Sooooo, this is the baby daddy,” Didi said with a grin over her leather-clad hostage.
“You shut up or I’ll kill your people right now,” Ralph snapped at the zombie, pointing at the cell and outside. “All of them.”
Amusement gave way to hatred in the eyes of the Death Doll.
“I got this,” Lavon told Didi, even if she agreed with her scumbag ex. She respected the zombie that helped her, but right now she wanted to slap the smarmy bitch for that remark.
“What are you even doing here?” he growled. “Shouldn’t you be in San Diego, rotting in a federal holding block? That’s what your beloved government does to kidnappers, you know.”
“Save the drama, Ralph. There’s no one here you can manipulate anymore.”
A hand smacked her back sharply, drawing her attention to
a scraggly-looking man who snapped at her, “He’s the Gamesman, bitch!”
She elbowed him in the face, dropping him against the zombie cell to nurse his nose and drawing a lot of aim at her head. “I’m a Marine, bitch!”
She turned to find one of those gun barrels in her face, and the scumbag sneering at her behind it. “You’d better listen to my men, Lavon,” he told her with cold warning in his gravelly voice. Their history now mattered to him about as much as it did to her, which scared her a little. “Ralph died the moment your president ripped his daughter from his arms and banished him into the wasteland. I’m the Gamesman now.”
“Yeah, you were always a proud player,” she said with a brief, mirthless laugh. “If it wasn’t other women, it was poker, slots, races. Was there anything you didn’t steal city funds to play?”
He shoved the barrel against her forehead, hissing through his gritted teeth, “I should splatter your head all over—”
“Go ahead and shoot me,” she dared him. “Then you’ll never get out of here alive.”
His eyes narrowed over his sneer, which slowly gave way to a grin before he raised the barrel to the sky. “Bold words. Would that be Peter who’s backing them?”
“The President wants to end this without bloodshed,” she said dutifully, even if she wanted nothing better than to shove that sawed-off he fondled into his mouth and pull the trigger. “He’s willing to give you a proper security detail to help protect whatever crops you want to grow.”
He scoffed. “I’ll bet he wants a percentage.”
“He doesn’t need it, just like he doesn’t need you in here threatening what he’s trying to do. There’s a lot more going on here than just you, you know, but he swears it will all go to shit if you keep pressing for TERAN technology.”
The bastard chuckled at her. “TERAN? What’s that?”
“It’s what made her,” she patiently informed him with a point at the Death Doll. “I have no idea why she’s the … charming thing she is, but no other TERAN has ever shown her level of civility or care for life. Apparently, their hunger always takes over.”
“She’s right, you know,” Didi said, then smiled darkly at her hostage. “I even had to eat the last guy who threatened my people.”
The hostage quivered in the zombie’s grasp.
“I don’t see you chowing down on any of them,” Ralph replied with a wave at her cellmates.
“You have no idea the pain I endure just holding my ground, the discipline I need to keep my people safe from me.”
His thick, manicured brows flew up. “Enlighten me.”
The Death Doll spoke earnestly, forbiddingly. “Imagine someone shoving a small dagger into your brain, which sends shocks throughout your head that set your skull on fire and never go away. Then you find you can’t feel a single thing you touch, and you realize all that pain in your head is an emptiness your body is too dead to satisfy, no matter what you do. It’s like the low of a drug addict that no hit or shot will ever soothe again … and all that’s just the physical part!
“The emotional impact is far worse. These shocks that wake your brain force you to remember every single detail of your life you thought you had forgotten or repressed, including the horrible things you did to people in life and death just to take the pain away for a few lousy seconds. Feeding on flesh is a high, don’t get me wrong, but it only lasts as long as you’re chewing. You’ll be content to eat the entire world, but once they’re gone … that’s it. You’re alone, you’re hurting, and the only thing left for you is to die alone. Now, eating the whole world may sound impressive, but no one will be around to kiss your ass for it. You’ll be what you condemned the world to be: nothing.”
A hush fell over the office, save for the guttural growls of the horridly dissolving zombies in the next cell. Lavon’s gut churned, but she held steady.
Ralph stepped back and placed his hand over the left cell release button on the desk. “Let McQuain go,” he told Didi, “and bring your pale buddy out here now, or I open the other cell and my men shove your people in with those things.”
“Don’t do this,” Lavon pled. “Listen to her.”
The bastard aimed that sawed-off at her. “I should make you join them,” he said coldly, which made Lavon bristle, “but you’re going to run a little errand for me. You’re going to go back downstairs and get for me everything this man needs,” briefly waving his weapon at Sergeant Montgomery, “to make TERANs … and my daughter.”
Her eyes widened. “You might as well shoot me. I won’t let you touch her, let alone go near you if you’re planning to—”
Two hands suddenly shoved her at the open cell door. She barely caught her footing in time to slam into the side. Her shoulder exploded upon impact, driving her to her knees as she nursed it.
“You’ll do what the Gamesman says,” came from a scraggly-looking lackey with a gruff sneer, “or you’ll die. It’s that simple.”
Ralph let out a faint laugh. “He’s a little overzealous, but he makes a good point.” He touched one of the buttons and grinned at Didi again. “What’s it gonna be?”
The Death Doll stared down the scumbag with all the loathing Lavon felt for the bastard, then removed the knife from the minion’s neck and shoved him back at his boss. “You really don’t want to do this,” she warned him while the freed minion snatched her little knife from her.
“Well, let’s see,” the so-called Gamesman said with a roll of his eyes. “I’ll still be conscious, strong, and virtually immortal. I won’t need as much, so I won’t need to protect as much. I won’t have to worry about getting eaten, starving to death, growing old, or bundling up for the weather ever again. Not seeing a downside, here.”
“You will when you endanger your daughter,” Sergeant Montgomery warned him. “Infected if not eaten.”
The scumbag just smiled at the medic like he was amused. “Do you really think scaring me will change my mind? Haven’t you learned yet that nothing scares me?”
“You looked pretty scared against the wall in your arena,” the redheaded girl taunted.
Ralph silently chuckled. “Yeah, you all really surprised me with that one. I hadn’t been that thrilled in so long. I should thank you for it. Put all her people in there,” he shouted.
The leather minions roughly corralled all of Didi’s people out of the lab and shoved them into the cell, which quickly became cramped. A lanky redhead didn’t let that stop him from pushing through everybody to take hold of the wounded brunette.
“Do your buddies out there care as little about the side-effects of my tech as you do?” Didi challenged him. “I assume that’s how you talked them into this whole invasion.”
“Better that than dying of a damn cold,” the lead lackey snapped. None of the others argued or even looked scared. The determination on their harried faces chilled Lavon to the bone.
Ralph lightly tapped the left button on the desk, scowling at Didi. “Don’t keep me waiting.”
After another defiant yet pointless staredown, Didi carefully put Sergeant Montgomery’s arm around her shoulder and helped him walk out of the cell.
“Good choice,” Ralph said as he grabbed a pencil and a pad of paper from the desk and handed it to the injured soldier. “Make a list of everything you need from this place to make us all like your girlfriend, here. Lavon’ll get it.”
Sergeant Montgomery stared down the bastard, but his pained huffing betrayed the strength he tried to show. “If I don’t?”
The Gamesman nodded toward his guards, two of which seized each of Didi’s arms and held her at bay, forcing the Sergeant to prop himself on the desk to stay on his feet.
“We take it from your girlfriend and reverse-engineer it ourselves,” the Gamesman answered. “It can’t be that complicated.”
“What does that mean for the people downstairs?” Didi asked, not struggling against her human restraints in the least.
Ralph grinned at the zombie. “Remember when I said
I was building for a bigger picture?”
The Death Doll’s eyes widened. “You’re not going back to Denver. You’re going to take over the mountain, kill all these people.”
“Rule,” the Gamesman corrected, “and I’m surprised you care. They left you in this cell and you—” The jerkoff paused, his eyes widening almost as much as his grin, which really started to make Lavon nervous. “Search them,” he ordered, pointing at Didi and Cody before telling his tall minion, “McQuain, check her.”
McQuain yanked Lavon back out of the cell and frisked her, smiling with every motion and making her blood run almost as cold as if Ralph was doing it. The lackeys holding Didi searched her while two others patted down the sergeant, neither coming up with anything, but McQuain found the pistol Lavon had smuggled in her cargo pocket.
Ralph took the pistol and scoffed at Lavon. “What were you going to do with this? Shoot us all? Is that why Peter sent you up here?”
Lavon glowered at the bastard.
The Gamesman closed his eyes and shook his head with that huge grin of his. Then he locked eyes with Lavon. “You’re going to get my daughter and all the materials he tells you,” he said, pointing at the sergeant. Then he told Didi, “Sorry, Death Doll. It’s a shame we couldn’t work together but, as the old song goes, I will survive.”
“No, dumbass,” Didi growled, “you’ll be dead like you wanted. Allow me to assist you.” Then, she shoved Lavon into the left cell with her people, slammed down both cell buttons, and tackled the sergeant over the desk, both falling behind it.
The door to the cramped cell closed on Lavon and the Death Doll’s people.
McQuain fired at Didi, but a melting zombie suddenly appeared and bit into his neck. He screamed as he collapsed, letting off another round that put one of the other minions down.
Lavon just watched the lifesaving horror unfold in the safety of confinement.
*****
The Gamesman gawked in stunned silence as his men were eaten alive before him by the dissolving corpses rushing out of the now open containment cell. A few of his men managed to blow some heads off, but they all fell nonetheless.
Exodus Page 31
