Hope's Return

by Jay J. Falconer

  Zimmer smirked. “What was your first clue? The walker? Of course, he was sick.”

  Krista’s voice dropped an octave. “Could have been anything, Rod. Bad back or whatever.”

  Zimmer rolled his eyes. “Sometimes I think you live in a fantasy world, Krista. It was pretty obvious to anyone paying attention.”

  “Yeah, maybe. But everyone has to find a way to cope.”

  “With blinders on?”

  “Why dwell on something you can’t control? Besides, I really didn’t think it was anything serious, other than old age. People use walkers for all kinds of reasons.”

  Liz cleared her throat, then touched both of their arms. “Look, this isn’t about you two. This is about Alex.”

  Krista nodded. “Agreed, but I still can’t believe you kept all this secret. Even from Stuart.”

  “Alex is a proud man who’s endured more than most. This is how he wanted it.”

  “He’s not alone in his quarters, is he?” Zimmer asked.

  “A younger couple volunteered to sit with him. She used to be a school nurse.”

  “Better than dying alone, I guess,” Zimmer said, shaking his head.

  “It’s been getting progressively worse the past few months,” Liz said, “but he asked me to keep it confidential. He didn’t want anyone feeling sorry for him. But now that he’s near the end and Stuart’s no longer with us, it’s time for you to know. And Summer. We have to tell her. Together. I can’t do it alone. It’s going to crush her.”

  Krista shook her head. “I don’t know, Doc. She’s been through hell today.”

  “Which is why I haven’t said anything. Yet. But we need to. Soon.”

  Krista hesitated before she responded. “You’re right. Word’s going to get out. It always does. Summer needs to get in front of it and make a public address.”

  Zimmer agreed. “About everything, not just Morse.”

  “Hey! What’s all that whispering over there?” Summer asked from her chair.

  “Nothing,” Liz shot back, “just filling them in on the treatment for your dog.”

  When Liz turned toward Summer, Krista grabbed her arm, then shook her head with only a slight wobble.

  Liz paused for a beat and nodded, not looking happy about the subtle gesture, then carried the needle to the mutt.

  Krista and Zimmer followed, taking positions next to Liz as she held the tip of the syringe an inch from the underside of the dog’s hind leg.

  Summer let go of the professor’s hand and stood up from the chair. She leaned in and kissed the dog on the forehead, then used a gentle voice when she said, “It’ll only hurt for a moment, boy. I promise. Then you’ll start to feel better.”

  Zimmer watched Liz stick the needle into the mutt’s leg and engage the plunger to deliver the medicine into the animal’s bloodstream, doing God knew what.

  He still couldn’t believe what he was seeing—for a dog. A feral dog that looked like it was about to die anyway, before the injury to its hindquarters.

  He turned to Krista, his previous concern about supplies roaring back into his brain. “What about the prisoners? Are we going to waste even more on them? Or are you going to help me stop this insanity? Our supplies need to be for our people. Nobody else. And certainly not for some mangy animal.”

  Krista answered without missing a beat. “That’s up to Summer. She’s in charge now.”

  “Actually, it’s up to me,” Liz said, “as chief medical officer. When I’m done here, I plan to go to the brig and treat both of them, and I don’t want to hear another word about it. We help all of those in need, just as June Edison would have done. Is that clear?”

  Krista nodded, then her eyes flared an instant later. “Wait a minute! You said both? Only two prisoners?”

  Liz nodded. “In the brig. I’m heading there next.”

  Krista yanked on Zimmer’s shirt sleeve, pulling him toward the door. “There were three, Rod. Three!”

  CHAPTER 9

  Krista broke through the door to the brig with Zimmer right behind her. When her eyes landed on the holding cell ten feet away, she couldn’t believe what she saw: only Horton and Lipton sitting on the cement floor. Both men stood an instant later, looking apprehensive.

  Krista turned her focus to the guard on duty, Nathan Wicks—the same guard who had just been cleared for active duty after his short suspension for manhandling Summer. “Where’s the girl?”

  “Sorry, Chief. Who?” the 6’6” mountain of man asked, the massive scar across his forehead pinching along its seam.

  “She was in the truck. Where the hell is she?”

  Wicks didn’t hesitate, glancing at the cell then back at Krista. “I can’t say, boss. Security only delivered these two. I’ve had eyes on them the entire time.”

  “Must have taken her somewhere else,” Zimmer said, breaking his silence.

  “Damn it,” Krista said in a terse tone, the beat in her chest thumping hard. “I gave them explicit orders to bring everyone here.”

  Zimmer’s tone turned sarcastic when he said, “Obviously that didn’t happen.”

  Krista took a moment to search her memories, drifting into the scene where a whirl of activity happened all at once.

  First there was Summer and her injured dog walking past her in the barn. Then the strain of Liz arriving unexpectedly and having to explain to her what happened to Edison.

  A moment later, the scene changed again, this time with a focus on Liz’s emotional reaction and her flying past Krista on her way to Edison’s body. Then it showed the lab geeks showing up and her tasking them to help the security team escort the prisoners to the brig.

  When the vision showed the detainees walking past her while they were under escort, she could see the faces of everyone involved, but there were only two that belonged to the prisoners—neither of which was the Scab Girl. “Shit! She wasn’t there.”

  “What?” Zimmer asked.

  Krista turned her eyes to the cell, looking through the bars at Horton. “I was so focused on Liz the whole time, I missed the fact that only these two assholes walked past me.”

  Zimmer shook his head. “The girl was in the truck, right?”

  “She had to be, Rod. Otherwise Summer would have said something. She was back there the whole time, with everyone else.”

  Zimmer’s voice turned sharp. “Unless she helped the girl escape.”

  “You’re reaching, Rod. Summer is a lot of things, but she would never do that.”

  “But if she did that would be grounds for—”

  “What’s going on?” a new voice asked from behind, interrupting Zimmer’s statement.

  Krista turned to see Summer arriving in the doorway.

  Summer stopped and put her hands on her hips. “Grounds for what?”

  Krista didn’t want to answer the question. It would only lead to more questions and raise suspicions, tearing down what little trust Summer had in her. And Zimmer. She decided to redirect everyone’s focus, pointing at the cell. “Helena escaped.”

  “What do you mean escaped?” Summer asked, not waiting for an answer before she turned to Wicks. “It was you, wasn’t it?”

  “No, ma’am,” Wicks said, standing at attention with his chest full and shoulders back.

  Summer looked at Krista. “I thought he was on suspension.”

  “That ended this morning.”

  “And you trust this guy?”

  “Wicks said only two prisoners were delivered and I believe him,” Krista said, remembering a conversation she had with Edison years earlier.

  She had tried to convince the Professor to install security cameras throughout the complex, but the old man denied the request. They would have come in handy today, had she only known and convinced him to spy on the community. Maybe Summer wouldn’t be as tough to convince. She was a rookie leader, after all.

  Summer’s eyes lit up, as did the redness in her face. “There were three in the truck, Krista. I was there.”

>   “Yes, exactly,” Zimmer said. “You were there. Alone. With all three of them.”

  “What the hell does that mean?” Summer asked, also shifting her eyes to Krista.

  “He’s just pissed off like we all are. Don’t pay him any mind,” Krista answered, not wanting to add to Summer’s paranoia, as justified as it was.

  Zimmer never should have said what he did, but there wasn’t time for any of this.

  Krista gave Summer a head nod as more facts surfaced in her mind. “We did leave them alone for a minute or two.”

  Summer paused, her eyes dropping to the floor. They darted left and right for a few beats before she brought them up to Krista. “—when I carried Sergeant Barkley to the stairs.”

  “—and I was dealing with an emotional Liz, telling her about Stuart.”

  Summer stepped to the bars of the cell, putting her hands on the metal as she addressed the bearded man with the injured leg. “You need to tell me right now, where the hell did she go?”

  Horton shrugged. “How should I know? I was blindfolded, remember.”

  “You have ears, don’t you? You must have heard something.”

  “Not with Helena,” Horton said, looking as though he was proud. “Think about it for a moment. She’s been out in the Frozen World, alone, all this time and somehow, she’s survived. That should tell you everything you need to know about who you’re dealing with.”

  Krista joined her boss, though she didn’t make contact with the bars, only peering at Lipton. “You’re apparently some kind of know-it-all. Why don’t you tell us what happened?”

  “Yeah, right,” Lipton said with a twist of his mouth, motioning to Horton. “Like he said, that girl’s a ninja and we couldn’t see dick.”

  A pause hung in the room until Lipton spoke again, this time laughing as the words left his mouth. “Looks like you geniuses were outsmarted by a scrawny little cannibal. Now that’s what I call funny. Scab Girl: one. Braintrust: zero.”

  Zimmer grabbed Krista’s arm. “A Scab Girl? Are you kidding me?”

  “No, I’m not kidding, unfortunately,” Krista replied, wishing she could deny it. She motioned at Horton and Lipton. “We found her out there with these two.”

  “They tried to ambush us, but it didn’t work,” Summer said to Zimmer. “Lipton was holding the gun.”

  Zimmer let go of Krista’s arm and angled his head back, apparently in shock. “Female Scabs?”

  “Yeah, who knew?” Summer said.

  “Not us, obviously,” Krista added.

  “Just for the record,” Horton said. “That girl—she saved me. More than once after Frost left me out there to die. She’s not like the others.”

  “Like they care,” Lipton snapped, rolling his eyes. “You just don’t get it, do you?”

  “They need to know, because she’s not who they think she is.”

  Lipton shook his head, looking annoyed, before turning his attention to Krista. “There’s something else you might find interesting. That little old Scab Girl has stretch marks around her midsection. Layers of them, by the looks of it.”

  Zimmer threw up his hands, shooting a piercing look at Krista. “She was pregnant?”

  Krista nodded but didn’t respond.

  “That’s right, folks, they’re breeding,” Lipton said. “Just what the world needs, more ravenous meat-eaters.” He pointed to Wicks, standing at attention. “Other than Mr. No-Neck over there.”

  “If there’s one Scab Girl, there’s probably more,” Zimmer said.

  Lipton smirked, looking at Horton. “Well, what do you know? They actually get it. I didn’t think there were any brain cells still functioning in this place.”

  “Speaking of which, where are we, exactly?” Horton said, his eyes gazing up at the ceiling as he surveyed the brig and its support structure.

  “Obviously, we are somewhere deep underground,” Lipton said. “You can smell it in the air.”

  “I know, but where? Don’t we have a right to know?”

  Lipton smirked, looking amused. “Good luck with that argument. They’re never going to tell us shit. Or trust us.”

  “That’s all thanks to you. I told you the ambush was a bad idea,” Horton snapped.

  “Sure, you say that now. But I don’t remember you raising even a hint of a protest when we were out there freezing to death.”

  Krista ignored the men, keeping her focus on Summer. “Helena knows our location, boss.”

  Summer nodded, tucking a lip under. “We have to find her.”

  “Before Fletcher does. If someone reports a Scab Girl running loose, he’ll send out search parties.”

  “Or the rest of her kind follows her back here,” Zimmer said.

  “You should take me with you. I can track her,” Horton said.

  “Why should we believe you? You’d say anything at this point,” Krista said.

  Horton pointed at Summer. “I tracked you, didn’t I? Couple of times.”

  “I thought that was the fat Rambo guy?” Summer asked.

  “Who, Slayer?”

  “Yeah, that asshat.”

  “He was team commander, but I did all the tracking.”

  Summer brought her focus to Krista, her eyes indicating she was looking for advice.

  Krista shrugged. “No way to know for sure. Even so, it’s a bad idea.”

  Horton continued. “Seriously, I know how she thinks. You need me out there.”

  “That’s the last thing we need,” Krista said, wanting the man to shut the hell up.

  “Without me, there’s no chance you’ll ever find her.”

  “I doubt that. We’re pretty good at finding people on our own.”

  “Well, she’s not exactly people, now is she?” Horton asked in tone that sounded rhetorical.

  “True,” Zimmer quipped, looking at Krista. “He’s got a point.”

  “We’ll find her. Count on it,” Krista snapped.

  Horton threw up his hands, his face twisting a bit as he spoke. “Even if you do, she’ll never come in willingly. You need me to talk her down and convince her to come in peacefully. I can do that. She trusts me.”

  Krista looked at Summer, then back at Horton. “Even if I decided to break protocol, which I would never do, that ankle of yours would just slow us down.”

  Horton lifted his leg and put it down. “It’s not that bad. Really. Just need your medic to patch me up and throw in some pain meds. I’ll be good to go.”

  “I hope you realize there’s zero chance Helena stands up to Fletcher’s interrogation,” Lipton said. “I’ve seen what that man can do. You have no idea.”

  “He’s right. She’ll talk,” Krista said to Summer.

  “Or grunt,” Lipton added, beaming a twisted smile. “All depends on your definition of talking.” Lipton peered at Wicks, scanning his size from bottom to top. “I’ll bet Gigantor over there would understand what she was saying. He looks grunt-capable.”

  Krista shot Lipton an intense stare, holding it for a full beat. “You think this is all funny, don’t you?”

  “That it is, ma’am. Sometimes life provides you with a little unexpected entertainment. I’d say this situation qualifies. It’s all about doom, gloom, and boom around here. Gotta love it.”

  “What’s wrong with you? We have families here. Women. Children,” Krista said, wanting to send a sharp jab his way, but she held it back.

  “That was Edison’s first mistake. One of many, I’m sure. Just look at you three right now,” Lipton snarked, his face pushing in close to the bars with his hands on either side. “It’s nothing short of comical. I can literally see the smoke rising from your ears as you try to wrap your minds, as insignificant as they may be, around what’s really happening here.”

  Zimmer stepped forward and landed a punch on Lipton’s face. The blow caught the scientist in the jaw, sending him backward in a stumble, his butt landing on the floor in front of the cot along the back wall. “I’ve heard just about enough ou
t of you!”

  After Zimmer whirled around, Krista sent him a single head nod, appreciating his quick response. He did what she couldn’t.

  They say rank has its privileges, but not in this case. Not when every cell in your body wants to pummel a mouthy asshole standing right in front of you, running his gums for amusement, all the while taking shots at everything you stand for.

  Horton walked over and helped Lipton off the cement and to his feet, then returned to the front of the cell. “You really need to listen to me. You don’t know who you’re dealing with out there. She’s not some helpless cannibal. I can help you bring her back without anyone getting hurt.”

  “You need to give it a rest,” Krista said, waving a finger at him. “No chance that’s ever going to happen.”

  “So just give it up, already,” Zimmer said, faking a punch at the man behind the bars. Horton flinched before Zimmer spoke again. “You’re going to spend the rest of your days in that cell, so you might as well get comfortable.”

  “You were right,” Summer said to Krista in a downtrodden tone.

  “About what?” Zimmer asked.

  Summer took a deep breath before she answered him. “We should never have brought them here. Krista knew something like this would happen. Damn it, I should’ve listened.”

  CHAPTER 10

  Summer made it up the stairs and to the surface inside the barn, skipping over the top-most step as she exited the silo.

  Krista was right on her heels with Zimmer somewhere below, his feet only taking one step at a time instead of two.

  When Summer turned for the transport truck, Krista caught up and passed her on the left, using one of those freakish Olympic fast-walker techniques, her hips rolling in conjunction with her arms.

  Summer tried to match Krista’s style and speed, but couldn’t get her shorter legs and less-experienced hips moving fast enough. She broke into a full sprint instead, tearing past Krista in a rush of wind.

  Seconds later, she tagged the tailgate on the truck first, then whirled around with a mile-wide grin on her face, watching Krista arrive a moment later, her face blanketed with an intense grimace.