by Riley Flynn
The pistol raised. It pointed down at Byrne. No quarter. Byrne’s eyes widened, the chewed-up arm lifting a hand to try and block the bullet. Alex pulled the trigger.
He shot through the man’s palm and into his head, ripping his cheeks to shreds. Byrne collapsed back, his knee twitching.
Alex fell to his knees and dropped the gun. His stomach wretched, his muscles ached. Pain of every kind hit him all at once. But no regret. Not this time. Killing Byrne hadn’t felt good or triumphant. Just essential. Important.
The sun was setting over Tinker Cliffs.
The whole world was turning dark.
Chapter 41
Blood. It couldn’t all have been about blood. Blood and money. A different kind of disease. Alex dragged Byrne’s dead body to the edge of the cliff, across the flat stone and beneath the winter stars.
After everything, he felt empty. Exhausted. There wasn’t any relief yet, not when the job wasn’t done. Not before he’d had time to process everything.
Finn limped along next to him. The dog had been knocked down, beaten. Still a puppy, in so many ways. But alive. Hurt but alive.
“I know how you feel, buddy.”
Alex stood on the edge of the cliff. He had undressed Byrne’s body and had undressed himself. Nearly naked beneath the burgeoning moon, he shivered as he switched their clothes.
In the moonlight, Alex found wounds he didn’t even know he had. Bruises and cuts. Places where he’d moved through the thorny bushes of the forest and hadn’t noticed the scratches. Too much adrenaline. But Byrne had wanted blood.
“We all get what we want, Finn.”
The dog sat down, licking at his injured paw. Alex was too scared to sleep. Too scared to give the ghosts their chance. He didn’t want to dream. Instead, he ran a knife along the back of his arm. Long and shallow. He began to bleed. Starting at the edge of the forest, he walked slowly across the flat stone, leaving a trail behind him which shone like a black diamond under the night sky.
One, two, three drops.
Byrne had said they hardly needed anything. If his name was on a list, people would come looking. Let them believe. Alex dribbled the blood right up to the cliff edge, saving the worst of it for the body now wearing his old clothes.
Alex left his arm lingering over the dead man. Whoever tested the blood on the top of the cliff, it would lead them right up to the edge. If they checked at the bottom, they would find traces, mixed in among the mess. Maybe the rain would wash it all away. Maybe no one would even check. Then it wouldn’t even matter.
The computer still sat on the stone floor. Whirring and chirping, screen still warning the user of the tracking program. Was anyone even listening anymore? According to Byrne, he and Root had been acting alone. No need to worry anymore. Maybe.
Alex looked at the screen, actually read the information this time. Names, addresses, dates of birth. Hundreds of people. Maybe thousands. He looked at the flash drive. The red light was blinking beneath the black plastic. Tracking. He looked closer. The blinking illuminated the greasy outlines of fingerprints. Lots of them, piled on top of one another.
He picked up the laptop and carried it over to the body. Picking up a hand, he placed a finger on top of the light. The whirring and the chirping stopped. The blinking stopped. The tracking stopped. SECURITY DISABLED, the screen read. Something to read later. He removed the flash drive and kicked the laptop over the edge.
The list of names.
The immune.
The chosen few.
Whatever information he had, let them come and get it.
The blood coursing through his veins was special, somehow. Alex didn’t feel special. He felt broken. Battered. Beaten into a pulp in every single respect. His body was a mess, his mind was worse. His knotted muscles and open wounds were nothing compared to the searing pain and confusion which had taken hold in his thoughts.
If this was what being special was like, Alex didn’t want it. Maybe he was immune, but he was still infected with doubts and self-loathing.
Ripping apart an old T-shirt and wrapping it around his forearm, Alex tried to stop the bleeding. Byrne’s fatigues were too big. The Kevlar vest could be adjusted, at least. He checked the pockets, went back and did the same for Root. Between them there was nothing. Guns, radios, and the keys to their car. It would do.
He pushed Byrne’s body over the cliff edge. He didn’t wait to hear the thud. A body hitting the ground like that? It would probably explode into a thousand tiny pieces anyway. A meal for the crows and the rats and whatever else was left living in these woods.
* * *
Packing his bag, Alex walked down from Tinker Cliffs. Finn followed. They didn’t walk fast. Not that Alex could have if he’d wanted to. His body hurt. Every injury, every moment of pain from the last few weeks was catching up with him. He was so tired.
The Cadillac couldn’t be far away. There was only so far they could drive it up the trail. Stumble down that far and he’d run into it.
It was parked exactly where he expected. A blacked-out SUV at the side of the road, complete with bullet holes and torn metal scars. Alex tried the keys. They worked. But he couldn’t drive. Instead, he climbed inside the back seat, gathered Finn in with him, and slept.
* * *
Alex could have slept for days and he would not have noticed. For all intents and purposes, he was dead to the world, curled up inside the abandoned car. While he had been asleep, Finn slept beside him. Warm together. Cold outside.
They ate breakfast even though it was late in the day. The men had food in the car. Military meals, much like those Timmy had packed. These were American. More modern. Not that it mattered. Alex and his dog ate like they’d never tasted food before in their lives. Together, they worked through three meals. Carry on like this, Alex thought, and I’ll fill out these clothes in no time.
The only problem was the car. It worked. It worked fine. But gas was low and the power was lower than that. Fossil or electric, this Cadillac wasn’t going far. Alex popped open the packet of gum and drove it as far as he could, ignoring the flashing lights and sounds which told him to pull over. He chewed the whole way. A soldier’s trick, he told himself. Cam would be proud.
This was Virginia. These were town names he recognized. Places he had been before. Towns where his friends had moved to and his father had visited every now and then. The air outside, as night pulled in, was freezing. But Alex rode with the window open and the car heater roasting his feet. The air smelled familiar. Like home. He didn’t need a map.
* * *
The Cadillac spluttered to a halt ten miles north of Roanoke. Alex used the freeways now. He didn’t care about drones or eyes in the sky. He didn’t care much about anything at first but every turn of the tires in the car had kindled his excitement. He was on his way to see his friends.
But there were nerves, too. No longer was he just another number, just another person. As Byrne had said, something about Alex was different. An aberration. But if they wanted his blood, he told himself, they could come and take it. They could milk him dry. They could try, at least. He was too close to home to slow down now. But he needed fuel.
Like every other freeway, abandoned cars sat along every roadside like fire hydrants lined city streets. Ready and waiting. Emergency use only. Once the Cadillac was done, Alex spotted a car in the distance and walked toward it. An ancient station wagon. Dead woman at the wheel. He rolled her out, laid her in the long grass, and took her keys.
She hadn’t had much gas either. Hardly enough for another mile. The dead didn’t make long term plans. The living, panicked, hadn’t thought ahead.
Alex rode the station wagon till he found another car. A truck, lowered with the big wheels. Blue. Well-kept. Roll away the dead and let them drive you home. Carry on like this and he’d be at the farm soon enough.
But it wasn’t quick. He had to stop and sleep, those times when the days just caught up with him. Twice, he found a new car that didn
’t carry him far enough. Alex found himself walking slowly down the roadside, searching for his next vehicle.
Not a quick journey, but an easy one. So near the end, every footstep, every stolen car, every road sign brought him closer to home. Alex allowed his thoughts to run ahead of him.
Timmy, Joan, and Cam. All waiting for him at the farm.
They would already have pulled back the white sheets from the furniture, would have found out what state Eames had left the land in. They would have gathered wood for the fire and found the rope swing beneath the oak tree out front.
Alex could see himself as he walked up to the house, as he opened the door, as Timmy shouted with surprise, as Joan ran across and handed him Sammy’s ring, as they ate dinner together around that old heavy table, as they washed up the dishes just like he’d done as a child, moving the plates from the sink into the drying rack.
Sometimes he had to stop. He was worried, walking between cars, that it would not be exactly as he imagined. It might be better, he told himself, but it might be worse. Sammy, Alex knew, was off limits. Don’t even think about her. Not about her or anyone else in the area. Only people who were alive and waiting. Everything else could wait.
Two days later, his tired muscles beginning to rekindle their energy, Alex found himself in luck. Twenty miles from the farm, walking past a bridge he’d seen a million times, he found a beaten-up Chevy with hubcaps and a tank of gas. A broken-down car barely fit for the road. No one inside. Keys already in the ignition. And she ran.
Alex sped toward the farm. Fifty miles an hour, eighty. No speed limits in the new world, no one to stop him. Ten miles away, his thoughts turned to his friends. Maybe they’d cut away the overgrown weeds from the field, started thinking about a crop of corn. Maybe they had found a shed full of tools and got straight to work.
The wind blew into the cabin through the open window. Five miles away. Two miles. One mile. Alex was at the end of the dirt track which led up to the farm. He gripped the wheel tight. Just drive, he told himself. Don’t think. He couldn’t help seeing the overgrown plants which had taken over the fields. Fertile ground, he told himself, probably too fertile. He passed the oak tree with the rope swing.
No. Don’t even think about it. Get to the house. Get to the front door. Get in there and be happy.
Alex came to the end of the road and the dirt crumbled as he slammed on the brakes. The car came to a halt right outside the old farmhouse. He didn’t even look around: focus only on the door.
He ran across the yard, up the steps to the porch, and reached the front door. Finn ran behind him, barking.
Knock, he told himself. Play it cool. Pretend like you’re some travelling salesman or something. Make them laugh. Make them smile. He hammered the door with the ball of his fist.
“Open up, open up!”
Finn barked again. Alex smiled; he couldn’t help himself. Home. Maybe he was almost happy.
“It’s me,” he shouted, hammering at the door. “Open up!”
He heard the lock click. The chain sliding into place. The creak of an old door opening.
“Who are you?” said a face, appearing in the gap.
Alex didn’t recognize the voice. He didn’t recognize the face. Doubt began to stampede through his mind, chasing away any excitement that had settled.
“Where’s Timmy? Joan? Where’s Timmy?”
The face vanished. The muzzle of a shotgun appeared. Alex heard movement from inside the house. Why hadn’t he cased the place first? A dumb mistake. So stupid. A man appeared around the corner carrying a machete. A tall, muscled man in a heavy coat.
“Who the hell are you?” the man shouted, trapping Alex up on the porch.
“I-I’m Alex. Alex Early. I used to live here. My friends… my friends should be here.”
The door opened behind him. The man with the machete looked over Alex’s shoulder.
“Put him with the others.” A quiet voice. Calm. Reassuring.
Alex turned to plead his case to this person. A mistake. An error. They had to understand. He heard the creak of footsteps up the porch steps as the door slammed shut. No one home.
A blow caught Alex on the back of the head and the world turned black.
Thank you from the Author
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