by C C Roth
Crap, that hadn’t even occurred to me. Here I was ready to jump into a pack of wolves and for what? This guy hadn’t promised us anything.
Watch it. He’s sneaky.
Mitchell smiled charmingly and folded his hands under his chin once more. “I don’t have much to offer you that will be of any benefit right now. But I can offer you something that will pay off in future days to come. There is no chance of our currency system being dissolved, it simply won’t happen. A dollar today will still be a dollar tomorrow. Now you may not be able to spend your payment right away but once the government stabilizes and we can help restore our economy then you, each of you, will have a solid nest egg for all your future endeavors.”
“What’s the size of this nest egg?” Luis asked warily.
“I can offer you $500,000 to be divided amongst yourselves however you see fit.”
No one had ever offered me money for anything before, so the concept was completely new but $500,000 sounded pretty flipping fantastic to me.
My eyes must have been twinkling because Mike stood up before I could agree to anything. “We’ll take you up on the offer to stay here for a day or so and we’ll talk about the other offer by ourselves if you don’t mind.”
“Absolutely, it is my great delight that you be our guests for as long you like. I know you’ll be comfortable here and it just so happens we have a room available for you on the second floor. It is ready and waiting. Karina will show you around our humble camp and provide you with anything you need. I will take my leave so that you might begin your discussion in privacy. Samantha, Gentlemen, it has been a pleasure.”
He bowed his head and guided us out of the office where Karina was waiting in the hallway. She pointed down the long back hall and we followed, still feeling confused about how we ended up in such a bizarre spot. But nothing made sense anymore so, what the hell? Ahead of us was a large kitchen, crammed with bodies hard at work, and on our right, we passed an enormous set of doors that opened onto a fenced courtyard and garden in back of the building. The long open green space was surrounded on all sides by the other brick buildings along the block creating a long rectangular park area which our hosts had turned into a growing space for food. A tiny twinge of homesick had me wondering if Dad’s tomatoes were doing okay. Navin arched his brows and looked impressed with what they had done. It was a smart use of space.
“This will keep us from starving and from having to go out on so many scavenging trips. And it’s been good for the little ones to keep them busy. Everyone here has a job.” She marched down the hall with a purpose, her corkscrew curls bouncing from her topknot as she moved. “Here’s the kitchen. We do three meals a day and the pantry is open for snacks but you have to sign out what you take.”
“The honor system? Really?” Luis asked unconvinced. “How does that work with so many people here?”
“You ever have your little brother rat you out for something? Same principle except imagine you have 100 little brothers. Someone is always watching around here, you get used to it.” She winked at someone behind us and I caught a glimpse of tiny bodies scurrying around a corner, leaving a trail of giggles as they went.
“Huh,” Luis nodded, “yeah, that would probably work, actually.”
Karina pulled a pocket-knife and started rolling it through her fingers, showing off a bit but trying to look bored at the same time.
“Lunch is in an hour. It’s Mac ‘n cheese day so you lucked out. Your room is on the second floor at the end of the hall and the bathroom is up for grabs but don’t take too long or you’ll make enemies fast.” She walked through the middle of us and stopped next to Mike only inches from his face, looking him up and down. “Find me if you need anything.” She grinned and sauntered off down the long hallway making a production of her exit. It apparently worked because the guys were temporarily transfixed on her sway, all except for Wyatt who had held his tongue for so long his face was turning red from the effort.
Here we go.
“Oh my god, you guys what the hell? This is truly bizarre okay, so I admit I might be wrong about the cannibals but there’s really no way to know for sure unless we look around and did you see all those photos on Mitchell’s wall? He is like a legit famous guy or something do you think he really knows the president? Or I guess knew him I should say like really knew him? That is so awesome. Mac ‘n cheese sounds great right now what do you think about—"
“Wyatt!” I snapped.
“Yeah, Sam what’s up?” he was practically wagging his tail in anticipation.
Mike gave me a stern look and I was already on his shit list, so I took a deep breath and tried to reel in my temper. “I think you’re right. We don’t really know who these people are yet. Let’s split up and take a look around. Talk to some of the others and see if you can find the cellar where they harvest their victims’ bodies. Extra points if you find a pickled head in a jar.”
Wyatt couldn’t decide if I was joking about that last part, so he nervously laughed and spewed a bunch of gibberish I didn’t listen to as he walked off with the guys. Mike hung back, watching me closely as I rubbed my temples grateful for the silence.
“Why does he bother you so much?” Mike asked.
“Why does he not bother you so much?”
“You make him nervous, Sam that’s all.”
“Nervous, huh? I’d hate to see him relaxed. The guy never shuts up.”
“Give him a break, he’s been through a lot. Not everyone is like you.”
“I know. I’m pretty awesome.”
“That’s not exactly what I meant but sure. We’ll go with that.”
We saw a head peeking around a corner again, actually it was five heads, so Mike pointed to the tall courtyard doors behind us. “C’mon. Let’s check out their garden and see what they have out there.”
I followed him outside but there was no privacy to be found anywhere. The place was literally crawling with bodies. It was warm and inviting and sweet and my entire body was rejecting all of it, telling me we needed to get the hell out and find a creepy, dark corner somewhere so we could be alone. Alone was something I’d been craving more and more of.
You know you’re not really alone.
“Ugh, shut up.”
“What?” Mike asked confused.
“Nothing. It’s just noisy here. Too many kids.”
My cold friend was overstepping. If I didn’t find a way to reel it in, I’d end up a fractured mess constantly muttering to myself.
Mike and I found a vacant wall and leaned up against the warm brick as the sun baked our tired faces. I pulled my mask down again, grateful for the fresh air. Mike must’ve been thinking hard about what to say to me because the little wrinkles in between his eyebrows were bunching together.
“Sam, I know you don’t want to hear it, but this is a bad idea. It isn’t safe, it isn’t worth our lives, and I want us to leave tomorrow.”
“You just don’t like Mitchell, right?” I asked.
“Yes and no. Maybe this guy Mitchell is alright, maybe he really can get us in and out of Quantum safely and maybe Noah is in there and maybe things could work out the way you want. But all those maybes could get us killed. I don’t want to die for a ‘maybe.’ I’d rather keep my promise and get you back home.”
“Home? Just go back to the cabin and hide out? Hoping every day that someone doesn’t find us again? No thanks,” I said crossing my arms defiantly.
“We could go somewhere else, Sam. Anywhere else.”
“It doesn’t matter where we go. This is our best chance at staying safe. You heard him, if we help Mitchell, he might be able to make a difference for people. I can’t just do nothing, not when we can do something to change what’s happening to us.”
“Might. He might be able to change things. There’s no guarantee this election will turn out in his favor. We haven’t even heard about an election. I’m not just taking some guy’s word for it.”
“Why would he lie abo
ut that?”
“Why does anyone lie about anything? You lie all the time.”
“Truth.” I couldn’t argue with that.
“I just don’t understand why you want to walk into what you know is a dangerous situation.”
“Everything is a dangerous situation right now. There is no safe place, Mike. Not anymore. There’s nothing but darkness everywhere I look but the difference between us, is I see it. Why are you trying to pretend it’s not there?”
“Sam, I promised.”
“To what? To keep me safe? Well you can’t. Not anymore. I’m not safe anywhere I go because wherever I go, I’m there. You can’t protect me from myself and you know it.”
I turned away, struggling with what I so badly wanted to tell him, but holding it back because of what it would do to him.
“Look, Mike. I know you hate me right now and you don’t understand me anymore, but I need you to understand this. This is something I have to do. I have this…thing inside me, pushing me. I can’t just go back to the cabin and grow tomatoes, it’ll kill me.”
“No Sam, getting shot going on some stupid mission is what will kill you. You heard what he said. He wants us because we’re expendable to him. You have to see that.”
“No. I don’t see it like that at all. If Noah could be in there with this group of kids, his family deserves to have him back. That’s why we came here. I have to do this, Mike.”
“You don’t have to. We both know that’s a lie and that’s not what you mean anyway. You mean that you’re going to do it no matter what I say. No matter if I come with you or not, right?” His tone was harsh and so unlike him.
I shifted my weight from one foot to the other and thought about lying. If I just lied, he wouldn’t hate me anymore. If I lied, he would stop being so angry and go back to being my sweet supportive brother. If I just pretended I was someone else then he would stop looking at me like I was a stranger. But I couldn’t. My cold friend didn’t want to hide anymore, and I felt no desire to try.
“Well? What’s it going to be?”
“I’m going,” my cold friend answered for me. The frost in my voice was like a punch to his face and he almost flinched. He turned away and walked back into the colorful building leaving me alone in a courtyard of giggling, oblivious children; their laughter a cruel soundtrack to the scene playing out in my little corner of the world. A tiny part of me wanted to apologize and take it all back but that tiny part of me wasn’t driving the crazy bus that day.
Let him go, he’ll only hold us back.
“Yeah. But maybe I should let him.”
3 Better Alone
Our first hour at the Home for Everyone, was spent snooping and digging up as much dirt as possible. It didn’t matter to Mike that my gut was ready to jump into cahoots with our new host. He needed more. And so, like the inept spies we were, we roamed the building asking questions and listening to conversations with all the subtlety of a wrecking ball. We regrouped outside so we could compare notes, without the burden of wearing our masks and being listened to. We must’ve looked overly conspiratorial to the natives and our huddle earned us more than one suspicious stare. After trading stories, the consensus was that everyone loved Mitchell like a father or brother or at least a truly awesome uncle. Some people thought he was magical and maybe even superhuman. Most of the others knew him from before the outbreak and gave us all the dirt on his life story. He came back to The Home with his family after his stint in D.C., just like he’d said, and essentially he was responsible for saving most of the kids in the house. He was special to every single one of them, not an easy feat, and he apparently never yelled. He was a sucker for World War II books, and he was a hugger. Ick. Several of the older kids said they’d been worried about him since his family passed but he seemed to be managing. Also, he loved peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, a fact I found irrelevant, but our eight-year-old source disagreed. Karina was one of the original kids in the house before the outbreak and Mitchell had practically raised her since she was ten, which explained why they seemed so close. She had even stayed on as his assistant after she graduated so she could still help out while going to college. From the sound of things Mitchell was no joke. He wasn’t a slimy politician posing in photo ops to boost his cred. He was a genuinely good person who saw a need and made a change. He invested his time and money to support children who otherwise would have fallen through the cracks.
“Wow. So, this guy is real? He’s just a good dude that takes care of all these people?” Luis almost sounded disappointed like he was hoping Wyatt’s cannibal theory would have panned out.
“Don’t be too bummed,” Mike said. “No one is all the way good. He has something to hide. Like all of us.” It wasn’t in his nature to be so morose and the pissy glare on his face was aimed right at me.
“Or maybe he doesn’t have anything to hide. Maybe he’s just trying to do some good and he needs some help. Like all of us,” I fired back.
“There are those ‘maybes’ again. Maybe is going to get you killed.”
“Maybe,” I taunted.
Navin looked awkwardly between the two of us and stepped in. “Look guys, either way we need to make a choice. So, what’s everyone want to do? Jump in the middle of some insane quest and look for Sam’s mystery man, Noah, or tuck tail and run home wherever that might be?”
The guys both shrugged and looked to me except for Mike who had his arms crossed and may as well have been pouting. “I vote we thank Mitchell and leave tomorrow for home. This is going to be too dangerous and there are too many unknowns that will get us all killed. We got lucky in Freemont, but this is different. We are not trained soldiers but the people on the other side of that fence are. We won’t make it.” He glared at me as he finished speaking.
Wyatt jumped in, “Yeah, that sounds good. I like that plan, Mike is right and there is no way this guy can guarantee us anything in fact it works out better for him if we don’t make it out alive because then he doesn’t have to explain anything away if people start asking questions not to mention we haven’t seen what’s in the locked room in the basement—"
I raised my hand to silence his yammering. “I’m going. If you all are coming with me, great. If not, good luck getting home.”
I searched their faces for a response. Mike was lousy with annoyance. Navin was with me and the others nodded their consent.
“So, it’s done. I’ll tell Mitchell tonight.” And with that I turned and walked into the kitchen for a double helping of mac ‘n cheese. The guys would follow me, I just knew it and Mike would calm down soon enough and fall in line. He was only trying to protect me but the sooner he realized that was no longer his job the better off we’d be.
We don’t need him getting in our way. My cold friend was relishing in the animosity between me and my brother.
He disappeared during lunch, so I was left listening to Wyatt and Luis argue about what we were going to find inside the Quantum lab. The theories started with a genetically engineered superpower army designed to take over the world and ended with animal experiments that sounded a lot like an episode from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Boys were ridiculous sometimes, but they sadly weren’t too far off from reality. We’d already seen firsthand what our government was willing to do to find a cure for Avian-X, so a mutant army wasn’t all that farfetched.
I pushed some food around on my plate and drowned out their conversation as best I could. Something just wasn’t sitting right with me. I should have been excited about the fight we were going to take to that lab or about the money we would be getting after. Or about the possibility of finding Noah alive and returning him home. I should have been bouncing around in anticipation of getting to use my rifle against these crappy kidnappers ruining people’s lives. But I wasn’t. I had a knot or something that had parked itself right in the middle of my chest and it wouldn’t budge. It was probably guilt trying to rise up from some hidden corner of my empty soul; a miniscule conscience particle th
at had somehow survived the hostile takeover by my frigid companion. Dammit.
Navin nudged me with an elbow. “Hey, you gotta give him a break, Sam. He’s your brother and he just wants you safe. That’s kind of his job you know?”
“Yeah, I know.”
“You might feel better if you apologize.”
I scowled at him like he was nuts. “Apologize? Why should I apologize?”
He couldn’t hold back his laugh. “Because, Crazypants, that’s what people do. When you hurt someone’s feelings you say you’re sorry. Didn’t you go to kindergarten?”
“Yeah, but I didn’t have a lot of friends.”
“Shocking. Truly, I am shocked by that information.”
“The thing is I’m not sorry. Things are different now and he doesn’t like it. He doesn’t like not being in charge of me anymore. He needs to get over it.”
Navin arched his eyebrows in exaggeration. “In charge? I’m guessing no one was ever in charge of you. Not really anyway. Just say you’re sorry even if you’re not. You’ll both feel better and you can stop sulking. It’s weird seeing you try to have emotions and it’s kind of freaking me out.”
I smiled a little and I had to admit, the thought of fixing things with Mike was making me feel a little better. “Okay, yeah. I’ll talk to him.”
“Just don’t be so much of…you. Try to be nice.”
“Thanks,” I said with a glare.
Navin was a good guy. He cared about seemingly everyone and had one of those unbreakable inner forces urging him to do good. We were polar opposites in almost every way, so it was weird we were getting along so well, but he just sort of got me. And he was turning out to be super fun which made my days way less boring.
After another nudge from Navin, I searched the house in hopes of settling things, but Mike was nowhere to be found. Not in the back courtyard, not in our room, not in the basement rec room. I thought for sure he’d be down there playing video games, already making 20 new friends, but I found nothing other than a bunch of noisy munchkins running around. I was getting annoyed. Here I was, all ready to apologize and he couldn’t even show up to witness me being gracious and forgiving. Jerk.
