by Ward, Tracey
“I bet on him.”
“You and half the wild.”
“Did you see Seven tonight?”
I frown at him, surprised by the change of topic. “Yeah. Why?”
His eyes are dark, angry. “See her face?”
“The bruises, yeah.”
“And the split lip.”
“She’s got some cracked ribs too. She’s walking soft. Kylee looked the same way a week ago.”
He shakes his head bitterly. “Fucking Bennett.”
“Fucking Bennett,” I agree in a low drawl.
“Give me the chance and I’ll take that guy out back and—“
The room echoes with a loud pounding on the door and Dante reluctantly stands up to go check who’s coming home. Probably some idiot who went out to get laid at another, cheaper gang and lost track of the time. More often than not people don’t stay out after dark anymore. No one thinking north of the equator anyway.
Dante talks into the hole in the door. I’m too far away to understand what’s being said but he gets a frantic reply before he finally opens it. The guy who bursts in is older, easily fifty in his face but his hair is almost all white. It flies in every direction reminding me of a mad scientist in old movies. He’s got a manic look in his eyes and an eagerness in his movements that looks all natural, no mixing required. He’s not a druggy, I’m pretty sure. Just a little crazy.
“Where’s my daughter?!” he demands immediately. “Where is she?!”
“Calm down, old man, or I’ll kick you out of here,” Dante warns.
“I won’t leave without her!”
Natalie appears from the other side of the wall and comes to sit on the arm of my chair. She’s one of the older girls in the Stables, thirty or more, but she’s smart and time is being kind. Put her up in line with the younger girls and she’ll hold her own.
“What’s going on?” she whispers.
I nod toward the commotion. “The old guy’s looking for his daughter. Guess he thinks she’s here.”
“Is she?”
“How do I know?”
“What’s her name?”
“No clue.”
“What does she look like?”
“Nats,” I say irritably. “Seriously.”
“Listen,” Dante tells the old man sternly, “you either calm down or you’re on your ass on the street, and if your girl is here, she stays here. Now are you going to be calm?”
The old man huffs as he straightens his blue raincoat on his body, but he takes a step back. “I won’t leave without her.”
“Let’s talk about that once we figure out if she’s even here. What’s her name?”
“Cassandra. Cassandra Crenshaw.”
“Cassie,” Natalie whispers.
“You know her?” I ask, surprised. “Bennett didn’t tell us he took on anyone new.”
“No, he didn’t. She’s not in the Stables but she comes in a lot.” She casts me a sad look. “She comes in for the Honey.”
“Junky,” I mutter, disgusted. “Perfect.”
“She’s a nice enough girl.”
“For a junky.”
“Nats!” Dante calls in our direction. “You know a Cassandra?”
Natalie hoists herself off the chair. She walks toward them slowly, carefully leaving Dante between herself and the guy. “No, but I know a Cassie.”
“Cassie,” the old man says desperately. “That’s what she goes by sometimes. You know her?”
“I’ve met her.”
“Is she here?”
“Not right now, no.”
His shoulders fall heavily. He clasps his hands together and wrings them over and over again. “I thought she was here,” he mutters to himself. “I was so certain she was here.”
“She only comes in now and then. Most of the time she’s with…” Natalie hesitates, studying the old guy and I understand immediately what she’s doing. She’s gauging him. Whatever gang his daughter has globbed onto, it’s not good. “She’s sort of a drifter.”
“Be straight with him,” I shout across the room. All eyes fall on me but I look at Natalie hard. “Tell him the truth. It’s why he’s here.”
She narrows her eyes at me and shakes her head faintly.
“You want the truth, right?” I ask the old dude.
He nods his head emphatically. “I have to find her. I have to know.”
“Tell him, Nats. Give it to him straight, no sugar.”
She casts me once last set of daggers before turning to the man and softening her stare. “She comes here for the Honey. A lot.”
“You give her drugs?” he asks harshly, taking a lunging step toward her.
Dante moves more solidly between them. “Easy.”
“No, I don’t,” Nats clarifies. “But the Hive does, yes.”
“Where is she now?”
“I’ve seen her in here with a guy named Castor. He’s not a Hive member. He’s a Pike.”
I whistle low and ominous. Bad news all around.
The old man looks at me once quickly without emotion before turning to Natalie. For her he has softness. Gratitude. “Thank you for your honesty and your help.”
“You’re welcome. I hope you find her.”
“As do I,” he says sadly. “Though I fear from the sound of it I may be too late.”
“I hope not.”
I groan in annoyance, standing to leave before I say something that will only rile the guy up again. I leave Natalie and Dante to it because the tender hope-fest they’re all kicking off is only going to bring out the worst in me.
If you shit in one hand and hope in the other, you’ll be left standing like a lunatic with a fist full of feces. Hope is for the crazies. For the Colonists and the religious freaks writing on the billboards and the side of buildings about the glory of forgiveness, clean living, and a working Xbox. It’s for followers looking to be saved instead of fighting to survive.
Hope is for the weak.
The door bangs open and I turn, expecting to see the old madman leaving theatrically, but what I find floors me.
John stumbles in naked as a baby and covered in blood. His eyes are wide, filled with panic, and his hands shake near his throat. Or what’s left of his hands.
The fingers on his left have been chewed down to the bone.
Natalie jumps back with a scream as he falls forward and collapses at Dante’s feet. I lurch forward, get hold of her arm, and send her stumbling into the lobby behind me. I hear her scream for help but we don’t need it. Dante and I both have our weapons in hand – me with my knife and him a long, dark length of pipe. He circles John’s body slowly, watching him closely as I move in across from him.
“I’ll get him,” Dante tells me. “You got my back?”
“Yeah, I got you.”
“Don’t let him bite me.”
“Don’t let him get up.”
“He wasn’t bitten by a monster,” the old guy says.
I hesitate, my heart in my throat but my body stalled out by the guy’s mellow tone.
Dante risks a glance at the old guy. “Are you blind?”
“Not yet,” he answers calmly. “I can see his body and his hands appear to be the only place he’s bitten.”
“Meaning he’s still bitten.”
“But not by a one of them. They had him incapacitated long enough to peel the flesh from his fingers along with the clothes from his body, and that’s the only place he was bitten? In case you’ve never noticed, the dead don’t care for fingers.”
He’s right. I remember the first time I stepped out into the new world. The bodies everywhere, piles of bones and blood and not much else. But always the fingers. Finger bones and grape jelly. Dark hair and soft skin.
I lock the memory down before it can fully form. Before I see her cough. Before I raise the gun for the last time.
“By what then?” I demand, glaring at the old guy.
He shrugs. “My guess would be a human.”
&n
bsp; “That’s crazy.”
“Yes, it is. But desperate men do crazy things.”
Dante looks at me over John’s naked ass pointed at the ceiling. “What do you think, Vin?”
I shake my head, flexing my fingers around my knife. “I don’t know. He’s right about the fingers, but people doing this? I don’t know.”
“Roll him over,” the old guy suggests. “He’s alive. Wake him up. Ask him.”
Dante licks his lips nervously. “Marlow would tell us just to kill him.”
“Yeah. He would,” I agree. “But he’s not here, is he?”
“You want to risk it?”
“I want to know if there are living people out there eating each other. Kind of changes things a little.”
“Yeah, you’re right.” He swallows hard. “Same deal. You got my back.”
“Sure.”
“I wasn’t asking,” he says, kneeling down slowly next to John.
He grabs his shoulder and rolls him over quickly, his pipe raised and ready. John flops over with no resistance, his arm flapping hard onto the stone floor and his head lolling to the side. Dante smacks him a couple of times, making him groan. Finally his eyes flutter open and he stares up at Dante with a glazed expression.
“Who did this?” Dante asks. “Who attacked you? Where are the guys who went with you?”
“Dead,” he whispers. “All of them… dead… eaten.”
“By zombies?”
His eyes close, tears escaping the corners and coursing down his cheeks. “No.”
“By who then?”
“The… the park.”
“The people in the park?” I ask skeptically.
“Yes,” John mumbles, his face contorting as he clutches his mangled hand and starts to sob uncontrollably. “They’re cannibals. They’re all cannibals!”
We send for Marlow. We kick the old guy out before he gets there and we stand guard over John as he lays there naked and crying. I wish he’d go out again, slip into shock and shut up because the crying is making me uncomfortable. It’s not something you see in the wild, not from anyone hard enough to survive it, and seeing a guy I respect curled in a ball on the floor crying his eyes out is messing with my head. Part of me wants to help him but how? How the hell do you help a guy who swears up and down he watched all of his buddies get eaten alive, sat at a table while another dude made a feast of his fingers, and then was set free to spread the healing word of Hannibal Lector? There’s no Hallmark card for this. There’s no making that right.
When Marlow finally makes it down to the lobby John gets hysterical. It takes forever but he finally calms down enough to repeat what he told us to the boss. Marlow listens patiently to his story about his team being eaten alive by the people in the park and then sends for Doc. He has a blanket brought in and draped over John to cover his naked body and he leaves Andy with him to help the doctor when he gets there. The rest of us he pulls aside deeper into the lobby.
“You think the doc can fix him up?” Dante asks Marlow quietly.
Marlow shakes his head, his eyes dark. “No. He’s broken. Finished. I’m going to tell Doc to put him down.”
“Like a dog?” Yenko asks sharply.
“No. Like a man who is in a tremendous amount of pain, both physically and mentally. We don’t have enough pain killers to get him through this and even if we did it wouldn’t matter. What they did to him will leave him scarred for the rest of his life. The best we can do for him, for our brother, is to let him go peacefully and without pain.”
“He’s right,” I agree, looking each of them in the eye; Dante, Yenko, Mike, and Hector. “There’s nothing else we can do for him and he can’t make it in the wild with only one hand crapping himself every time he sees a shadow. If it were me, it’s how I’d want to go out. No pity and a little fucking dignity.”
“Yeah,” Dante mumbles deeply. “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”
Marlow turns to him, moving straight to business. “Take a team to the park. Clear it. Kill them all.”
I scowl at him. “Tonight?”
“Immediately. All of you are. You’ll destroy their little shanty town and kill every person you see.” He looks at me hard. “Are we clear?”
And we’re back. The moment he promised, the test to make sure I understand my place. I’m surprised it’s come around again so fast but I actually prefer the way it’s happening. Two hours ago I would dig in my heels and argue with him about killing everyone in the park. Two hours ago it was senseless, it was murder, but with John on the floor and three other guys in the ground I’m down with it. I’m game.
So we go. Despite the late hour, the dark night, and our better judgement, we go. Yenko, Hector, Mike, Dante, and I lead eight other guys out into the wild and we head for the park. It’s across town which makes it even more exciting. We come across a few pockets of undead, clearing them quickly and silently, and part of me gets a little thrill out of it. Running in a pack like this reminds me of the patrols. Of the strength in my body and the ability to use it. I haven’t felt like this in a long time, too long, and I smile as I run. As I use my knife and my speed, my skill.
It’s amazing how alive killing makes you feel.
When we near the park we slow, going stealth and low to the ground. Sweat builds on my back under my shirt from the exertion of the run and the fight but also from anxiety. Images of John’s hand flash across my eyes. The tears on his cheeks. I have no interest in finding out what it’s like to be that broken and the first person who steps from the shadows trying to show me will be in for a big surprise.
“It’s empty,” Andy murmurs.
“How can you see that far?” I whisper incredulously.
He shrugs, avoiding my eyes. “I have good eye sight.”
“Even in the dark?”
“Guess so.”
“I can’t believe they went native,” Yenko mumbles, crouching next to me. “They’re the last people I ever thought I’d be scared of.”
“Makes you think twice about attacking them, doesn’t it?” Andy asks, his voice quiet and deep.
I look at him in the dark, wishing I could see him better. I don’t like his question. Not what he’s saying but how he’s saying it. How comfortable he is with all of this. With where we are when even a big dude like Yenko is rolling with his ears back.
“What’s the plan?” Mike whispers to me nervously.
“We search it,” I tell him with resolve, turning my back on Andy. “We sweep it as a team. No one goes out of sight of the man next to him. We’ll start at the trees, comb it south.”
“And if we find anyone?” Andy asks.
“You heard the boss. We kill them.”
I know he’s angry even if I can’t see it. I can feel it and I’m oddly glad for it.
“There are children here,” he reminds me hotly.
“What’s your point?”
“You’d kill a kid?”
“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” I answer evasively.
The truth is that I don’t know. I’ve killed zombie kids before. A lot of people have trouble with that but I never have. They’re not innocents. They’re not anything, not anymore. They’re dead little monsters and when it comes down to a matter of my life or theirs, I choose mine. I imagine I’d feel the same if it was a living kid too.
We creep through the shadows into the trees at the north end of the park and I can see right away that Andy was right; the place is empty. We need to sweep it anyway because I know Marlow will ask and I’m not into the idea of coming back out here again later tonight. Just to be safe and because I know the man we work for, I grab a handful of dry corn husk, build a small fire in the low grass behind us, and I strike a piece of flint over the top of it. It catches easily and Dante helps me spread it until the grass is burning, then the base of the trees nearby.
I put my back to it and motion the other men forward. “Let’s move.”
We walk through the fields with th
e fire burning behind us. Things are tense when we pass through the tall corn stalks. The chill in the night air has my hair on end, my arms covered in goosebumps that tickle and make me flinch every time a waxy green leaf drags across my skin. I’m listening to the sound of footsteps on either side of me, the crackle of fire behind me, the endless darkness in front of me, and it’s so claustrophobic it’s maddening. I feel blind and scared and it makes me infinitely angry.
When it’s done, when we reach the trees lining the south side of the park and we haven’t found a soul, we turn back toward home. We don’t wait to watch the fire finish the park because we know it will. It’s an inferno eating through everything and if anyone managed to hide inside it while we walked through, they’re dead now.
I’m glad to put the park behind me but I’m nervous too. Where did they go? Last count had them at almost forty strong. They were here just a couple hours ago when John’s crew came through, and now nothing. No one. No trace of them. Not a light in a building or a cough down an alley. Not a kid crying. How does that happen?
How do forty people disappear into thin air?
Chapter Twenty-Two
Trent
Breaking into the Hive should be hard.
It’s not.
Breaking into the Hive should be frightening.
It’s not.
I imagine it’s the fact that it’s so incredibly easy to do that takes the sting out of it – pun intended. There should be Hornets everywhere, up and down the corridors, in the catwalks, on every floor, but they’re nowhere to be found. A guard sits at the front door as always so of course I don’t go there. I can’t knock, say I need to get inside a pro’s room after hours, and no, I don’t have any money. It’s a foolish plan and I have a much better one.
I’m going in through the air ducts.
The aquarium is a big building. In its day it had both hot and cold air pumping through its veins at the appropriate time of year. Those large, metal veins that trace through the building – every corner of every floor – and connect to the large heart standing tired and rusted on the west side of the building. Unused and broken.
It’s loud when I force my way inside one of the ducts. Metal groans and screams, protesting change, but once I’m inside I’m not worried. Even if anyone comes looking now, they won’t see me. I’m already in.
