by Laken Cane
I read the words aloud, then silently. Over and over, as my mind fought against accepting what my eyes were seeing.
The gods are making more of themselves.
The next words had been smeared so badly they were indecipherable.
--ing women to carry their babies and both for food.
Gods are unkillable.
Run. Hide.
“Shit,” I whispered. I looked down at the little girl. A little girl who’d spent time inside the…the cluster, who’d been exposed to the mutants. “I call them mutants.”
She nodded. “Everyone does. But the big mutants are the gods. The bosses.”
Before everything had shut down and we still got the news on TV and the Internet, the monsters had been called mutants.
No one had called them gods.
No one had mentioned clusters.
But now…
Things had changed.
And we were facing mutants who wanted to rule our world, to rule us, to be gods.
“They’re…intelligent, then,” I said. But really, it was a question.
She nodded. “The gods are.”
“What’s your name, kid?” Because suddenly there was nothing more important than concentrating on something else. Anything else.
“Sage.” She stared up at me, and then tugged my hand. “Let’s go now.”
I shook my head. “No. Hell, no. We’re not going anywhere. If they’re coming, we’ll stay right here until they’ve passed through.”
“They’ll stay for a long time. We have to take everything we can before it’s gone.”
“We should leave. Leave town.”
“They’re too close.”
“How old are you?” Because she no longer sounded six. She no longer looked six, at least not when I peered into her eyes.
“Eight,” she said. “My mother says…” She paused, then straightened her shoulders and continued. “My mother said I was born a hundred.”
“You’re awfully small for an eight-year-old.” I closed my eyes, then blew out a breath and looked at her. I took her bony shoulders and squeezed gently. “I’m sorry. I’m being a baby.”
She’d been through some bad shit, yet there she was, urging me to hurry into town so we could grab supplies before the cluster of gods arrived to steal, eat, or destroy them all.
“Sometimes they search houses for people before they leave.”
“Awesome.” I grabbed a bottle of pain relievers from the shelf beneath the bar and swallowed two of them with a long drink of water. “You’re sure we have time?”
“My mother said we have to get everything before they do. We have to.”
“Okay, hon, calm down. You’re sure there’s time?” I asked, again.
“Yes.”
“All right, then. I believe you.” But I didn’t. How could she know how much time we had? How could she really know?
She couldn’t.
But she was fixated on going to town—her mother had made sure she understood that she should stock up on supplies. Had made it seem like the most important thing in the world.
She was right, though. If the mutants were going to take or destroy everything in their paths, we needed to get what we could before they arrived. Then we’d hide out until they left.
And then…
Mentally, I shrugged.
Then we’d see.
I wanted the mutants to march on and leave me and Crowbridge alone. But life as I knew it had changed. The world had shifted—again—and I had two choices.
I would either learn to live in it…
Or I would die.
Chapter Five
Sage wouldn’t have stayed behind had I tied her to a chair. In the end we walked back to town, and though she didn’t show it, I could feel her anxiety.
I wondered if she could feel mine.
After what I’d learned about the mutants—the gods—I knew I’d never walk outside the house with as much nerve as I had in the past.
With as much innocence.
I didn’t bother weighing myself down with more weapons. I had my machete, the usual blades, and the emergency pistol.
If it came down to me against a cluster, my only small chance at survival was running. Barring that, I could always shoot myself.
Part of me wished I’d never met the kid and her tormented mother. I’d like to have remained blissfully ignorant a while longer.
We didn’t speak the entire walk.
Sage’s disinclination to talk appeared to be contagious. I had no desire to say a word.
I had let her pick out whatever weapons she wanted, and the first thing she’d taken had been a long, silver chain which held a small but heavy bejeweled dragon.
“Oh,” she’d breathed, her eyes wide. “Can I have it?”
When I’d shown her that its wings and tail were actually tiny, detachable blades, she’d been further enchanted with the hideous piece of jewelry. No dolls for Sage. She wanted dragons and blades.
After she’d dropped the chain over her head, she slid some knives into her pockets, then chose a small, uncomplicated revolver to carry.
“I know how,” she said, tersely, when I looked at her askance.
I’d shrugged. “Whatever makes you feel safe is okay with me. Just remember if you shoot it, they’ll hear.”
She slid the gun into a pocket of the too-large, thin coat I’d given her. The days were still too warm for the bulky, heavy one she’d worn. “I won’t shoot it unless they’re about to take me.”
“It’s good to have a plan,” I told her. I patted my pocket. “I have the same plan. Better dead than captured.” I hesitated. “You know bullets won’t kill them, right?”
“I don’t want it to shoot them.” She made her hand into the shape of a gun and put her outstretched index finger to her temple. “It’s for me.”
We didn’t speak again until we reached town. I scanned the area constantly, moving slowly, checking for sounds, movements, voices.
“Can they talk?” I asked her, once.
“They absorb us.” She replied with the automatic blankness of someone repeating something they’d been told. “They learn what we know.”
“So they can talk.”
“Yes.” She hesitated. “Most of them. Some of them can’t because their brains are hurt. They’re not good absorbers. Some of them are dumb.”
Those must have been the ones I’d experienced. They hadn’t seemed particularly intelligent or thoughtful and I couldn’t imagine one of them speaking.
It was my turn to hesitate. “How long did they have you?”
She didn’t answer, and I didn’t push.
We went first to the grocery. “In and out,” I said. “Fast as we can. We’ll fill one cart—no way you can push one back home.”
“Get a car,” she said, and frowned at me, like I was the stupidest person she’d ever seen.
“You know noise brings them running, Sage.”
“The orphans will know the gods are coming. They…hear each other. In their heads. They won’t be here to hear us because they’ll run to meet their masters.”
“Orphans?”
“The…” She gestured, searching for the right word. “The loose ones. The ones that can’t absorb. The dumb ones.”
I put a hand to my chest and stared at her. “There are different types of mutants?”
“Yes. The gods are smart. You can’t run from them and you can’t kill them—not even with that machete. They’re too fast and strong. All you can do is hide.”
I stared at her. “How old are you, again? No way you’re eight. No way.” I didn’t really want to think about what she’d just told me.
Her eyes sparkled for a second and she lifted her chin. “I’m wise. It’s why I’m called Sage.”
“How did your mom know you were going to be so sage?” I grinned at her, but she wouldn’t look at me, and she didn’t reply to my question.
The kid was unbelievable, there w
as no doubt. But the mystery of Sage made me uneasy.
“The forsaken,” she went on, “will unite. They’ll rebel. Someday.”
“The forsaken—you mean the loose ones?”
She curled her lip, then thumped her chest with a small fist. “We, the forsaken.”
Holy shit. I stared at her, my mouth open. “Sage…”
“Get a car,” she said, and something about her stiffness, her absolute stillness, freaked me out.
“Are they coming?” I whispered, a hand to my stomach.
“I told you they were.” She frowned at me.
“I mean like now.”
She shrugged. “We should hurry.”
There was a row of homes across the highway from the mall. “Come on,” I said. “There are cars in nearly every driveway. The keys will be inside the houses.”
We rushed across the street to the homes. “Pick one,” I told her.
She immediately pointed at a black SUV. “That one is big.”
“Good choice.” I picked up a rock and knocked out the glass beside the front door, then reached in to unlock it. Once inside, I found the keys in a tray in the entryway, but as I turned to leave, Sage hurried deeper into the house.
“What are you doing?” I asked her.
“Supplies.”
It wasn’t a bad idea. Didn’t matter where we got supplies, as long as we got them. I followed her into the kitchen, and she began filling a bag as I fished a cardboard box from the pantry and loaded it with as much as I could carry.
I worked quietly and quickly, concentrating on the task, as did Sage. At the back of my mind was a niggling worry about the girl. I wasn’t sure what it was, other than the fear that she’d get hurt or I’d lose her or something horrible would happen and I’d be responsible for another child’s death.
It bothered me. It was like a word on the tip of my tongue that I couldn’t quite grasp. It danced teasingly just out of my reach.
The house was full of goodies and I wanted them all. Before the little girl, I hadn’t reached the point where there was nothing left. I thought I’d had time.
Time had run out.
Now fear of losing food and supplies combined with the sharp terror of the incoming group of mutants made me a cringing, fearful person who couldn’t wait to return to my home where I might be safe.
Might be safe.
“Do you know where they came from, Sage?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know.”
I paused. “You don’t know anything at all about them?”
Again, she shrugged. “I think in the ground.”
Then she refused to say anything else about it. Probably whatever she’d seen and heard was a big ball of confusion in her mind, and she wasn’t sure of anything.
We cleared out the house with grim determination, making several trips to the car before we were finished. Afterward, we climbed into the SUV and for only the second time in two years, I drove a car.
I wasn’t very good at it, but I’d gotten some experience driving when I had to help cart corpses to the burn piles. When the world went crazy, those who were able and sane pitched in to help those who weren’t.
We found only two more houses holding anything of value, and then we gave up on the houses and went to the mall.
We loaded the SUV down with everything we could get in. By the time we were ready to leave, there was barely enough room for the two of us to squeeze in.
Sage was surprisingly capable. She didn’t need to be told what to do—the kid grabbed a cart and threw everything in that she could reach, then left the full cart for me to shove to the car while she loaded up another one.
She was small, but she was strong and fast.
And when I roared down the highway toward home, not one mutant appeared.
“We’ll go back for more tomorrow,” I said, as we unloaded the car.
Sage nodded. “Okay.”
“How long before they get here, do you think?”
“I don’t know. Not today.”
“Like three or four days?”
“I don’t know.”
“But how long do you think, Sage?”
“I don’t know.” She sounded like a child—a grumpy child—which relieved me in a strange way.
I shoved canned food into the pantry. “We’ll go back tomorrow, then we’ll lie low and wait for the mutants to pass through.”
“The gods. The mutants aren’t as scary.”
“Whatever.” I turned to face her, my hands on my hips. “How long will they stay in town for their little pillaging and plundering party?”
“A long time.”
But what was “a long time” to an eight-year-old? When I was that young, a day was an eternity.
“Until they get everything they want,” she added, making things a little clearer.
“Sometimes,” I told her, “I think about loading up a car and just driving. But I couldn’t drive forever, could I?”
“I’m hungry,” she said.
I sighed. “Okay. Let’s finish unloading the car and then I’ll make some dinner. Deal?”
“Deal.”
But she looked pale and tiny, and her hands shook when she handed me a can of green beans.
I opened a can of milk, grabbed a box of sugary cereal, and poured them into a huge bowl. “Go sit down and eat, honey. I’ll take care of the rest. Won’t take me long.”
She didn’t argue. She sat on the couch, and before she was halfway through her cereal, she fell asleep.
It’d been a very productive day. I finished unloading the car, locking the door behind me each time I brought in another bag or box of supplies.
I’d learned to be careful.
Not because of the end of the world, though. I’d learned to be careful long before the world ended, and locking a door was a habit I wouldn’t shed anytime soon.
After I’d filled the pantry, I clicked on the battery-powered lights in the cellar, then carried the rest of the supplies down to the well-stocked room.
There was one thing left for me to do, and I wanted to get it done before nightfall. I left Sage a note just in case she woke up and found me gone—though I doubted she could read it—and then I hurried to the Johnson’s to find her some clothes.
I was back home in less than twenty minutes, carrying two bags of clothes and shoes I figured would come close to fitting her.
I stopped at the couch, then leaned over to kiss her forehead before falling into my own bed. It’d felt good working all day. Had made the time pass quickly.
Having company didn’t hurt.
But that night I dreamed of mutants and blood and pain and Robin, and when I woke up, sweaty and disoriented, I decided no way in hell were we making a return trip to town in the morning.
Because in my dream, the mutants had me. Worse than that, they had Sage.
So we weren’t going back to town.
She was mine now. My kid, my sister, whatever.
My responsibility.
And I was not going to let anything happen to her.
But by the light of day, my decision to stay home disintegrated beneath the brightness of the sun, the very clear realization that we’d need every bit of the supplies we could find, and the insistence of the strange little girl.
Chapter Six
The sound of the car engine made my stomach clench. It wasn’t a loud car, but the town was even quieter. Any sounds that weren’t birds or wind stood out in all that quietness.
That day, even the birds were silent, and the wind didn’t blow.
I took a deep breath and pushed it out slowly, hoping my anxiety would go with it. “It feels different.” I looked at the kid. “This day.”
She said nothing.
I was pretty sure she could feel the difference in the air, same as I could. Maybe more.
She wasn’t a regular kid. Obviously.
And she’d already gone back inside her shell.
“What’s wrong, Sa
ge?” I asked.
She kept her face turned toward the window and never said a word. I hoped that when we got to town and started working, she’d cheer up a little. Her silence made me nervous.
Funny how quickly I’d gotten attached to the sound of another person’s voice.
I didn’t speak again until we reached town, and then only to caution her to stay alert and let me know the second she heard, saw, or felt anything at all.
She gave me a terse nod that sent her red curls into her face, and then with a weary sigh, she grabbed a cart to begin the long process of once again filling the car with supplies.
When we were finished with the grocery store, we’d head to the pharmacy and then the farm and feed store. I wanted to get everything that was left—not that there was a lot.
“I’ve been lucky,” I said, “that this town hasn’t been looted or burned by roaming humans. There haven’t even been many mutants here.”
She didn’t reply, but I knew what she was thinking.
That was about to change.
We sat in the car and had our lunch. “After we eat,” I told her, “let’s go to the pharmacy and clean it out.”
She nodded. “Get medicines.”
“Yes.” The child could use some vitamins. “I’ll get some gummies for you.”
She looked at me blankly.
I pointed across the street at a cute red car sitting in one of the driveways. “When we need to switch out this car, we’ll take that one. I like red. It’s bright and cheerful and…”
“What?” she asked, when I trailed off.
I reached out to turn the key in the ignition, and then, I groaned. “The gas tank’s almost empty!” It simply hadn’t occurred to me to check. “Damn it.”
“Drive fast so we can get home before the gas runs out.”
I laughed. “Okay, honey. I’ll drive fast.”
She nodded.
I sighed. “I’ll drive as far as I can, then return for the stuff when I have another car. One with gas.”
She climbed from the car to stand in a patch of sunlight.
I downed the remainder of my water then joined her. “Let’s go.”
“You go. I want to stay in the sun while I can.”
Her words hit me in the stomach and knocked the breath from my lungs. I couldn’t have said why, but her voice, her words, and her eyes held something so dark and ominous I knew without a single doubt she was seeing either the future or her past.
