It wasn’t satisfying, but Adam understood. He didn’t want the Chief to think he wasn’t grateful for the opportunity he’d been given as a young Cadet. But he still felt he could be doing more. This was the Chief, though, and if he was saying Adam’s work was valuable, Adam believed him.
“I get it,” he said. “And promise to do my best listening.” He paused and added, “I promise to be my very best Adam!”
“Tremendous, son. Continue to stay invisible. You will be amazed at what you will learn when people are too dim to see you. Now, have I satisfied you, or is there something else I can help you with since you’re already here?”
Adam appreciated how Keller never made him feel as if his time had been wasted. It made Adam feel like he belonged here. He wanted to ask the Chief about Jack Geralt—someone everyone in City 6 knew about, probably everyone in all the cities, but Adam had felt especially curious about a few specific things after meeting Michael at Nips. Unfortunately, Adam didn’t know how to bring up the topic with the Chief. He didn’t want to open any doors that he wasn’t supposed to, or get Michael in trouble.
“Say it!” Keller joked, trying to mine what Adam held behind his eyes.
“Do you know Jack Geralt?” Adam asked.
“You mean personally?”
“Yes,” Adam nodded.
“Well, yes I do,” Keller smiled with pride. “Would you like to meet him someday?”
Adam nodded, not expecting the question. Meeting Jack Geralt sounded as exciting as it did intimidating. “I would love to!”
“I’m sure we can make that happen … someday. In fact, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if you were chief of City 6 one day, sitting at this very desk. Then you could go to City 1 yourself.”
Adam stared at the Chief. He couldn’t imagine going to City 1, by himself or with anyone else.
“I’m glad you’re asking about Jack Geralt!” Keller turned the compliment faucet back on. “A boy like you could learn a lot from a man like that. No one’s done more to change, or improve, our daily life here in City 6, or any of the cities. Can you imagine what things would be like if we’d never had The Wallings that keep the zombies outside, or allowed just anyone inside the City?”
“No,” Adam shook his head. It was true; he couldn’t imagine it that at all. Life without The Wallings would bear no resemblance to the one he’d been born into 14 years before. “Is the story true? The one about Jack Geralt? How he single-handedly fought off a horde of zombies from City 1, and rode from city to city leading an army against them?”
“Well, yes, of course. At least mostly. The State makes things more exciting, takes out the dreary parts. He was with City Watch, just a young lieutenant, when the zombie uprising started for the second time. As you may know, The Barrens once had many other villages and towns, allowed to live independently from the cities, self-governed. But then the zombie plague decimated them, and the dead rose and attacked the cities. It began near City 1, and at the time, our communications weren’t quite what they are now. So Geralt went from city to city, warning citizens of the zombie plague. It took longer than the history lessons say, and we lost a lot of people, but we erected walls and now everyone’s safe, thanks to Jack Geralt.”
“He must be so old,” Adam said.
“Yes, he’s nearly one hundred and forty, but he has our best science keeping him thriving. Believe it or not, the man doesn’t look a day over fifty.”
Adam swallowed, not knowing whether he wanted to say the next thing in his head, or say nothing more. Certain he would hate himself if he acted like a kid and didn’t speak his mind, Adam said, “I have a friend who said Geralt wasn’t really a great guy.”
“Oh?” Keller raised his eyebrows.
“Yes,” Adam spoke faster, appreciating the Chief’s quiet invitation. “He said Geralt was a crook, and that he did all sorts of bad stuff, but that history teachers buried it because The State told them to. He said the official version isn’t the true one and that the true one would make everyone think differently about The State.”
Keller’s face soured, then a second later smoothed into its usual mottled ugly. He smiled. “Since the beginning there have been those who have tried to soil Jack Geralt’s good name—as is true with all of history’s most significant men. Jack Geralt, like all great leaders, had the burden of doing what was necessary. Thomas Jefferson, one of the Old Nation founders, owned many slaves and regularly raped them—you do know what that means, yes Adam?”
Adam nodded, hating both question and answer, trying not to shudder while accidentally thinking of The Games and rapes he’d seen on TV.
“Martin Luther King Jr., practically a saint, was a serial womanizer. Yet, history rinses those men’s misdeeds to highlight their more important accomplishments. I’m sure Jack Geralt stumbled occasionally on his way to changing the world.”
The Chief looked almost grateful. “I’m glad you ask questions, Adam. They are healthy—the more you understand the world, the easier it will be to find your place. The Chief’s eyes bored into Adam’s. “Who said this about Jack Geralt?”
Adam felt suddenly icy, wishing he’d never said a thing about a friend. His guilty heart pounded, and he felt cut in two—half of him wanting to protect Michael, the other half (or maybe more) wanting to please Keller and show him what a great City Watch spy he had already become. It wasn’t like Adam had a lot of friends, so Keller would know the guilty party without thinking too hard.
Still, Adam couldn’t open his mouth. He stared across the desk at Keller, willing himself to speak through a mouth frozen shut.
“Who said it?” Keller repeated, his voice still pleasant like a song. “Who asked you these questions?”
Adam could feel the Chief’s assessing eyes all over him. Though Adam felt bad doing what he was about to do, the part of him that was growing fastest—the part The State said had so much potential—wanted to do the right thing. That, Adam knew, wasn’t protecting Michael. Even though he was a friend, he had also said bad stuff about Jack Geralt, and probably thinking similar things about The State, since he hadn’t been at all happy for Adam that he had found his home with City Watch.
Adam had already decided to do the right thing and tell Chief Keller. He was just chewing his words first so they came out in the right order. Keller nudged him.
“I promise I won’t say anything, or get this person into trouble. This is between you and me, Adam; whoever it is will never ever know you said a word.”
Adam said, “It was my friend Michael. He doesn’t seem happy that I’m with City Watch, so whenever we get together—we have dinner at the arcade a couple of times a month, usually at Nips—I always try telling him how well things are going for me, and that I’m happy, but he always makes me feel a little bad for feeling good.”
Adam was sure Keller would be angry. But the Chief didn’t seem angry at all. Instead he laughed. Loudly. Almost like a bark. He stood, still laughing, and pressed a button on his desk. The wood was replaced with a white computer screen and a blinking circle in its center, the kind Adam had seen, but never used, at the Academy.
Keller didn’t explain his laugh. Instead he said, “You should be careful who you trust, Adam. There are snakes in every patch of grass, and on both sides of The Walls. This is exactly why Jack Geralt, The State, and the cities must remain vigilant.”
“I’m not sure what you mean,” Adam said, suddenly scared.
“I’ll show you.” Keller said. He gestured over the screen, and said, “Michael confession.”
A video started to play.
It was Michael, in the Chief’s office, speaking to someone off camera.
“I want to report a spy,” he said. “His name is Liam Harrow. I’m afraid he’s getting my friend Ana in trouble.”
CHAPTER 14 — ANA LOVECRAFT
Ana woke up so slowly that she thought she might already have turned. Though she had never been a zombie, Ana wouldn’t have been surprised to find that this
was what it felt like inside their minds: soupy, no up or down or left or right. Ugly. Inner torment blossoming.
Searing pain reminded Ana of her arm, but she didn’t want to open her eyes because she thought that would make her burning lids hotter, and didn’t want to look at her arm because she could already picture it in her head: black, cracked and blistered, festering as her body readied for its inevitable change.
Ana inhaled, trying to absorb her surroundings. She sensed Liam … and something else. Something below.
The realization shocked Ana fully awake.
She and Liam weren’t alone, nor facing a single interloper. There were many of them, likely members of one of The Bands that swarmed The Barrens, robbing and raping and leaving their every encounter for dead. Bandits were no less lethal than zombies, but were far smarter, organized, and harder to counter. There were at least 12 that Ana could see. Her cold shakes said there were more.
Ana turned to Liam. His jaw was set, eyes were fixed on her. He was already awake, and aware of the danger.
She wanted to ask Liam how long the bandits had been down there, if they had said anything, and what Liam thought they should do. But before she could say a word, the closest bandit—a sunken eyed man with a gleaming skull—took a step toward the tree and crossed his giant arms across his chest, as if to prove he needed no weapon. He licked his lips like the monster she knew him to be and laughed.
“Well, well, looky what we have here.”
Episode 3
Chapter 15 — LIAM HARROW
Liam looked over at Ana, and he felt helpless as the bandits circled the tree’s base below.
He could see the surprise dilating her eyes, waking slowly blinking into the raw shock of an inescapable threat. He had said nothing, not wanting to startle Ana awake. He knew she would wake on her own, and he could see she was already calculating, her mind dancing between the disaster below and the one on her wrist.
At the front of the pack, the leader—a large man with a monster’s sneer—licked his lips and laughed. “Well, well, looky what we have here.”
Liam turned from Ana to the bandit, peering down over his branch and locked eyes with the man as he narrowed his squint. Liam said, “If you wanted us dead, we’d be dead already. So what do you want?”
The leader laughed, then turned to his men and encouraged their chorus. Guffaws and cackles quickly multiplied, rolling a shaking terror across an otherwise quiet dawn.
“Loaded my gun last night before closing my eyes,” Liam promised. “That’s 14 shots, and I’m an ace whenever I pull the trigger.”
The leader spoke, his voice a bag of rocks, “You’d be lucky to squeeze two before we blast you from the tree.”
“I only need one.” Liam winked at the leader, his gun drawn and aimed at the killer’s head. The leader smiled, looking satisfied, as if tearing the meat of fresh challenge from its bone. He stepped toward the tree, smiling, baiting the skinny man stuck up in a tree with his shooter.
And now Liam wasn’t sure what to do. He was only good for whatever he had in his bag: weapons, supplies and nothing more. The bag held a few of Duncan’s homemade surprises, but the bandits couldn’t possibly know their value or their threat, or they would have already shot Liam from the tree. Besides, there was no way to use what was in the bag—if he so much as inched toward the zipper, one of the barrels aimed at his head would surely start spitting.
Unlike Liam, Ana was safe … at least from death, and only for a while. But Liam had heard the stories of what bandits did to women they captured.
Once down from the tree, she likely would be forced to travel with the bandits as a sex slave until she was too used up to drag anymore, at which point they’d leave her for dead. Of course, Ana might not even have that chance. The moment someone in The Band noticed her wrist—which they couldn’t see from where they were standing below—they’d likely shoot her where she stood, not wanting to chance having in their midst something they couldn’t control.
Liam had feared this exact scenario while slowly falling asleep the night before, feeling Ana’s fevered heat as she lay on the branch beside him. He pictured them surrounded, as they were, and had designed several scenarios for such an attack. In Liam’s prearticulated sequence, Ana was shielded. Her branch made for flimsy cover, but she sunk behind it enough to bar any clear shots. Logic said that would buy Liam a few seconds to clamber up a branch, where a billow of smaller branches and fat leaves waited to veil him, and lend the advantage of a superior shot. Liam was an ace shot, and just as he’d said, he had 14 bullets in the gun, which was handed down from his grandfather, and another 14 in the gun in the back holster that was hidden beneath his black vest—enough to even the odds against any Band.
Any Band but this one.
This Band was the largest Liam had ever seen or even heard about. They usually traveled in packs of a dozen or so, but this one had at least twice that number, and that was just the members Liam could see. Not that it mattered—he hadn’t moved his eyes from the leader long enough to count. Judging from their grimy clothes, unkempt appearances, ugly looks, and many weapons, this band was full of broken men looking only to inflict their pain on the world. He could kill a few of them, but that would only begin the nightmare for Ana.
There was only one thing left to do …
“She’s hurt bad,” Liam said, nodding toward Ana. “Real bad. Was bit by a zombie just yesterday. We were traveling with another group of eight, but we were exiled after April was bit. We can’t go back. She’s no use to you; neither am I. Let us be, and we’ll go on our way. No trouble, Sir.”
The closest man, still looking up at Liam and smirking, said, “No one just ‘goes on their way.’” After a pause, though, he added, “Where’s she bit?”
“On her wrist, Sir.”
“How bad is it?”
“Like I said, it’s bad. Real bad. I expect she’ll probably turn by afternoon. She’s my girl’s kid sister, so I’d planned on staying with her until the end, then use one of my 14 bullets—that’s all the eight of ’em left us with. We lost my girl, Ashley, during the skirmish, after falling into a horde outside The Outback. Ashley’s the one who bit April.” Liam nodded toward Ana again. “If we hadn’t lost Ashley, she would’ve fought for us to stay, I’m sure, and they probably would’ve listened on account of the group’s leader being Ashley’s brother, but as soon as she turned—right after she bit April on the wrist—I had to shoot her in the head, because that’s what I always promised Ashley I would do.”
“I didn’t ask for your damned life story. I asked—”
“Sorry, Sir, I just don’t know how to stop talking once I start, especially when I’m nervous, and you’ve got to understand, we climbed up here last night to stay safe from the zombies. I sure didn’t expect to wake up and see folks like you aiming guns! I get it, we all need to survive out here, and to stick with our own, you don’t know us and you’ve got no reason …” he paused, then leaned even further over his branch and lowered his voice. “What I’m trying to say, Sir, is that if you can see to letting me go, I’ll make sure she doesn’t give you any trouble.”
The killer grunted, “No deal. You’re as dead as she is.”
“I’ll give you my gun, my bag—no bullets, but they left us with plenty of food—and April. All I’m asking is that you take her instead of me and let me go on my way.”
Ana, eyes wide, whispered, “What the hell are you doing?”
Liam winked at Ana, then reached over and grabbed his bag, resisting the urge to tear it open, shove his hand inside, and throw anything from a sonic nug to a zombie pineapple down at The Band (he’d been ignoring the nug in his back pocket, knowing he only had one shot). He slung the pack over his shoulder, made a show of thrusting the gun into his waistband, then climbed down the tree with his back to who-knew-how-many-guns before dropping to the dirt, not too far from the killer’s feet.
Liam walked straight up to the leader.
�
��Please,” Liam said, begging. “Just let me go. Like I said, I can help. Make sure she isn’t a problem.”
“And how are you going to do that?” the killer asked, interest—or maybe curiosity—creeping onto his face.
“Same way I always do.” Liam smiled, then turned to the tree and yelled, “April!” Nothing for a painful half minute, then Ana peered over her branch and stared down, bug-eyed.
“April, sweetie?”
Ana said, “Yes,” but her yes sounded like old syrup, slow from the bottle.
Liam said to the leader, “She’s slow. Makes for dull conversation, but she’s great to have around. She’ll do anything, and never tell no one. We did stuff all the time and April never said nothing to Ashley, not once for the two years we were doing it. Sometimes you’ve got to give her something extra, like some of your rations, but if you can find a pretty rock—there’s plenty out in these parts—she’ll take that. But it’s not like you’ll be needing to keep secrets from her sister, so you should be fine. Your real trouble will come if she gets spooked, and that happens easy. April’s a party, but not if she’s scared. If she gets the terrors, well then, she bites and screams and scratches. She’s all animal, and not in a good way. I’d tell you this anyway because I don’t wanna die, but that don’t make it not the truth: shoot me and you’ll ruin her for good. But,” Liam lowered his voice to a conspirator’s volume and leaned toward the killer, “if I call her down and introduce you, I’m sure April will play nice. I think that’s a fair trade, and you seem sharp enough to agree.”
The bandit was looking at Liam, assessing.
“Gimme the gun, and the bag,” the bandit leader commanded.
Liam thought about resisting, but didn’t dare. Not yet. He retrieved the gun from the front of his waistband and handed it over, grip first, keeping his eyes on the man. He then pulled the bag, slowly, from his shoulder and dropped it to the dirt.
The leader grabbed the bag and handed it, along with Liam’s gun, to one of his fellow bandits, who took them, but resisted the urge to root through the bag just yet.
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