The Becoming

by Jessica Meigs

  Cade didn’t answer. Instead, she lifted her rifle and pointed it down the yard toward the empty house next to their safe house, in the opposite direction from Brandt’s position. She aimed at something Brandt couldn’t see, but the fact that she aimed her rifle at all was a solid indicator that something was about to go horribly wrong.

  “Shit, if she’s actually about to fire that thing, it’s fucking serious,” Brandt said out loud. He grabbed Carter by the arm without a moment of consideration for the fact that the man had a gun pointed at him. He motioned to the brunette man, who had yet to say a word. “Come on, we’ve got to go!”

  Thankfully, the two men didn’t question Brandt’s order. As Brandt moved toward the house, his battered combat boots hurrying over the pavement and then the sidewalk, the men followed him to the front porch. Cade waited at the head of the porch steps, her rifle still aimed down the street. Brandt realized that she was lining up a shot, and he sucked in a breath.

  “No, don’t!” Brandt gasped as he stormed up the steps. He stopped behind Cade and motioned with the crowbar for the two men to enter the house. They bolted into the dark interior without question. “The sound of the gunshot will only draw them here.”

  Cade tensed visibly and removed her finger from the trigger she’d already begun to squeeze. She nodded toward the neighbor’s yard. “They’re moving between the trees,” she said. “Hiding behind them and anything else available. Cars, fences, bushes, trash cans, whatever. They’re working to keep me from seeing them. They might be working together. Strategizing or some shit.”

  Brandt caught Cade by the arm and propelled her toward the front door. “We’ll discuss this inside,” he said softly as she moved past him. He let go of her arm and followed her inside.

  The younger of the two men had sat down on the edge of the coffee table, and Carter dumped the heavy bag onto the floor and knelt in front of him. Brandt’s ears registered the sound of the younger man’s breathing. It was hard and fast, his inhalations deep and wheezy; it was obvious the man was in some form of respiratory distress. Brandt wondered if he should offer to help, but the opened front door suggested otherwise. He shut and bolted the door, grabbed the nail gun, and set to work reapplying the boards he’d pried from the door. Brandt would leave the medical problems to those who knew better than he how to handle them.

  “Who are you?” Ethan demanded over the loud thump of the nail gun slamming the last nail home. Brandt set the tool down on the floor and moved into the living room. Brandt was sure that if Ethan maintained the same attitude he’d had before the front door opened, there was going to be trouble.

  Ethan stood in the center of the living room, his arms crossed over his chest in the familiar pose he’d taken on every time he got irritated. There was a hard look on his face as he stared down at Carter, who still knelt on the floor by the coffee table. Cade hovered by the darkened fireplace, her rifle in her hands, her shoulders straight as her wary gaze shifted back and forth between Ethan and the two men. It was obvious to Brandt that Cade didn’t know how to handle the tension in the air between the men. Truth be told, neither did Brandt.

  “My name is Theo Carter,” the older of the strangers said as he rubbed his companion’s back soothingly. “This is my brother, Gray.” He didn’t add anything further as he started to unzip the bulging blue bag at his feet.

  Ethan pulled his gun from its holster and pointed it at Theo. The man halted his motion, freezing and looking up at Ethan with narrowed eyes. “Is he infected?” Ethan asked sternly as he motioned toward Gray with the gun. Theo’s eyes went cold and angry, hard as diamonds, and he clenched his hands into fists.

  “What the hell?” Theo said in exasperation. “No, he’s not infected! He’s got fucking asthma, and he needs his damned inhaler before he suffocates!”

  Brandt had to take control of this situation before things spiraled out of hand. “Ethan, cut it out,” he ordered as he moved into the living room. Ethan’s bad mood had gone on long enough, and it was time either he or Cade reined it in. Brandt grabbed Theo’s bag from the floor before the paramedic could get into it, and dumped its contents onto the coffee table beside Gray. “You’ll excuse me if I search this thing, won’t you?” he asked. “Just as a precaution.”

  Brandt didn’t bother to wait for a reply as he started to push around the pile of objects on the table. The bag had been packed with an assortment of first aid supplies, both the basic bandages and medical tape and the more advanced syringes and medications as well as a strange metal contraption in a blue canvas roll. Brandt thought it resembled some sort of medieval torture device; it was definitely not something he would want used on him. “What’s this?” he asked as he held it up.

  “It’s a laryngoscope,” Theo said shortly. He snatched the inhaler to which he’d referred out of the pile and passed it to Gray without further elaboration.

  “Ah.” Brandt set the roll back inside the bag. He was still completely lost as to what exactly a laryngoscope was. Rather than continue to contemplate the object, he looked up at Ethan. The older man still glared at Theo; it was obvious that Ethan was far from happy about having additional people in their safe house. Brandt wasn’t exactly thrilled with the idea either; however, he was far from willing to abandon others to the dangerous streets when he could offer them help. He stood, leaving Theo’s supplies, and moved closer to Ethan in case he did something stupid. Considering how unstable the man had acted over the past few weeks, Brandt wouldn’t have put it past him. And since Ethan seemed less inclined to take charge of the situation than usual, Brandt decided to do it himself, even though the last thing he wanted to do was be in charge of anything.

  “My name is Brandt Evans,” he began. He paused as he debated telling the two men his rank and where he was from. But then he shook his head slightly and added, “I’m military. Marines. The cranky bastard to my right is Ethan Bennett from the Memphis PD.” He smirked as he dodged the swipe Ethan made at him and took a quick step to the side, out of Ethan’s reach. “And the lovely but deadly lady over by the fireplace is Cade Alton, formerly of the Israel Defense Forces.”

  Theo nodded a short greeting at Cade, who had remained wordless throughout the entire discussion. She nodded back at Theo solemnly and then moved across the room to join Brandt and Ethan. “We should quarantine them,” she suggested, keeping her voice low as she glanced at Theo and Gray. “Just as a precaution, in case they’ve caught Michaluk and aren’t showing any symptoms yet.”

  “How would we go about doing that?” Brandt asked. As he spoke, he watched Ethan carefully and tried to guess what was going through the older man’s mind. Brandt couldn’t be sure, but given the way Ethan’s eyes narrowed as he stared at Theo and Gray, it wasn’t anything good.

  “I say we kick them out the front door and send them back where they came from,” Ethan grumbled. The man was moody, and the only thing the hardness in his voice made Brandt want to do was punch him in the mouth.

  “That is not an option,” Cade snapped. Brandt was glad to see Cade dishing Ethan’s attitude back to him. Brandt knew that Ethan still didn’t trust him very much, regardless of the time they’d spent around each other and the effort Brandt had put into trying to prove himself to Ethan. As a result, the other man had been reluctant to even listen to anything Brandt had said; maybe Cade could get through to him.

  “Maybe we can shut them up in one of the bedrooms and just keep an eye on them or something,” she suggested.

  Brandt saw one glaring problem with her idea. “None of the bedrooms upstairs have locks on the doors,” he pointed out. “How are we going to shut them up in a room if we can’t lock the door?”

  Cade didn’t speak, but her eyes slid sideways, past Brandt. Brandt turned to follow her gaze. His brown eyes landed on the nail gun he’d left by the door.

  “Wait, you want to nail the door shut?” Brandt asked incredulously. “I mean … seriously? What if the house gets attacked while they’re stuck in there? W
e’d never get that door open in time to get them out.”

  Cade rolled her eyes. “In this house? If the infected attack, we’re done for anyway, because you sealed off all the entrances when we got here. Nailing them into a bedroom upstairs would make them a hell of a lot safer than we would be in an attack. It’s our only option right now. I personally don’t want them wandering around the house if one of them is hiding an injury from us.”

  A hoarse voice interrupted their discussion. “We’re not hiding anything.” Cade stopped talking, and all three turned to look at the two men. Gray stared up at them steadily, his face set in a look of determination. “We’re not injured or infected. If we were, we wouldn’t be here. We’re not bad people, and we wouldn’t bring that virus around people who aren’t sick.”

  Brandt looked back at Ethan and Cade pointedly, a smirk playing at his lips. “See?” he said as he inclined his head toward the two men. “I think they’re okay.”

  Cade made a disgusted face. “You’re too trusting,” she commented.

  “What can I say? It’s part of my charm,” Brandt joked. He gave her a helpless shrug, even as his smirk spread into a wide grin.

  Despite Brandt’s attempt to lighten the mood, Ethan still looked like he was ready to punch a hole in the nearest solid object. Brandt preferred that it not be him. “I still don’t like this,” Ethan muttered. “I still think we should just put them out.”

  “Tough shit,” Brandt bit back. “I think we could use them, especially Theo. He’s a paramedic. That could come in handy, you know. Because between the three of us, all we really know is basic first aid and CPR.”

  “Precisely,” Cade agreed. She wrapped her fingers around Ethan’s wrist in a white-knuckled grip, right below the knot of bone in his arm. Brandt winced involuntarily; that had to be painful. “We need to have a talk,” she said, directing her words at Ethan. “Because you’ve been acting like a royal pain in the ass, and frankly, I’m sick of it.” She waved her hand at the two men sitting in the room and added to Brandt, “You … I don’t know. Deal with them or something.”

  Cade stormed out of the room, hauling Ethan toward the kitchen. She left Brandt standing in the center of the living room, watching the two newcomers and trying to figure out what in the world to do next.

  Chapter 13

  Cade fumed as she stormed into the darkened kitchen, her hand still in a vice-like grip around Ethan’s wrist. Her teeth were clenched tightly, and her face was set in an unattractive scowl, but she was long past the point of caring. The last month had been the ultimate test of her tolerance as she and Brandt had been forced to watch Ethan pace and mutter and snap at anyone who dared to come into the living room and disturb whatever he had going on in his head. Her tolerance had certainly failed the test; she was only moments away from punching the man in the face as hard as she could. She would have already done it if it weren’t for the very real concern that she would break something in the process. In her hand, of course, not in his face.

  Cade goaded Ethan into the center of the kitchen and let go of his wrist. Her hand had been curled around his arm tightly enough that when she released him, her fingers ached. She flexed them a few times before she crossed her arms over her chest. Once the kitchen door had swung to a standstill behind them, she finally spoke.

  “What is wrong with you?” she asked. Her voice was tight; it almost hurt as it choked its way up from her vocal cords. She dug her fingers into the undersides of her arms, scraping the nails over her skin as she struggled to maintain control. She wanted more than anything to dart forward and wipe the ugly look Ethan was giving her right off his face. Preferably with her fist. Resist, resist, she repeated to herself silently.

  “Nothing is wrong with me,” Ethan shot back. His tone mimicked Cade’s as he glared at her in return. They faced off for several more silent, tense minutes. It didn’t take Ethan long to shift his eyes away from Cade’s. Cade allowed a small, triumphant smirk to spread across her face before she stamped it back down and moved toward him.

  “Don’t give me that bullshit,” Cade warned. She looked him over, from his face down to his feet and back up. She wasn’t happy with what she saw. The man had dropped weight, and he looked too tired and thin. “Don’t tell me ‘nothing’ when I know damn well that you’re not acting like the man I’ve been friends with for the past seven years,” she continued. “You’re not acting like yourself at all. You’re fucking … cold. Hell, I’d even go so far as to say you’ve become cruel.”

  “I have not!” Ethan protested, raising his voice.

  Cade held up a hand to stop Ethan before he could say more and then jabbed her finger hard at the closed kitchen door behind her. “Then what the hell was that?” she demanded, struggling to keep her voice low. “The Ethan I know would never have suggested leaving others to suffer before Michaluk struck! Not when he had the means to do something about it! What is your problem?”

  “Nothing, Ca—”

  “Do not make me repeat myself,” Cade barked. “You know how much that pisses me off.”

  A weighty silence fell between them. It sat on Cade’s shoulders, and she wasn’t sure she could shake it off. Especially not as she watched the way Ethan’s face crumpled. His shoulders sagged, and he looked away from her, almost as if he were ashamed of something. Cade hoped that that something was his behavior. She studied Ethan for a moment more and felt her anger begin to ooze away.

  “Ethan?” she questioned.

  Ethan didn’t look up at her. “I want … no, I need to go back to Memphis.”

  Cade stared at him. An eyebrow slowly raised, seemingly of its own accord, as she took an involuntary step back. “You need to go back to Memphis why, exactly?”

  Ethan hesitated and looked down at the floor between the two of them. Cade was oddly reminded of a school-boy on the brink of facing down a punishment for something he’d done wrong, and the impression left a sour taste in her mouth. She didn’t like how … reduced Ethan seemed to have become. She studied his face as she crossed her arms once more. When she finally spoke, her voice was as soft and gentle as she could make it in the face of her remaining irritation.

  “You want to go back to look for Anna, don’t you?”

  Ethan blew out a slow, heavy breath. He nodded with a reluctance so obvious that Cade had to resist the urge to slap him as her anger tried to well back up in her. He finally looked up at her, and his eyes were shiny, enough so that for the horrifying moment that passed before he answered her, Cade wondered if he’d actually been fighting tears. “I just have to know, Cade. I can’t deal with not knowing.”

  “Well, you’re going to have to,” she snapped. It came out more harshly than she intended, but she didn’t regret the tone she had taken with him. Far from it. Cade was past the point of losing patience with Ethan, and she could only hope the hard stance she took with him would knock some sense into his obviously scrambled brain. “You have to deal with it, Ethan! You don’t have a choice!”

  “Yes I do!” Ethan growled. For the first time in the conversation—and only the second time in their friendship that she could remember—Ethan raised his voice at her in anger. “I can go back and look for her!”

  “She’s dead, Ethan!” Cade said as she struggled to maintain her own cool. She wasn’t going to lose her temper in front of him; she refused to give him the satisfaction. “You heard Lisa. She was in the hospital when it burned. She’s dead!”

  “What if she’s not?” Ethan shot back. He did nothing to restrain his own anger as he took a step forward to match the one Cade had already taken toward him. “We don’t know for sure, Cade! We didn’t see her at all! We just left. How do I know she was even actually in that damned place? She could have been … hell, I don’t know, hiding somewhere or something!”

  “You’re grasping at straws, Ethan! She’s dead!” Cade hadn’t meant to raise her voice, but the last two words came out in a shout. Silence dropped between them like an anvil again as they s
tared across the small space between them. Cade realized that she was panting in her anger, and she struggled to control her breathing before she ended up hyperventilating. She clenched her fists at her sides and dug her nails hard into her palms as she fought to maintain control of her emotions. She never lost it, not like that. She’d spent years honing the ability to keep tight control over every twinge of fear and anger and hopelessness that she felt. She didn’t know what had come over her, but she wasn’t going to be the one to back down. And she wasn’t going to let Ethan ruin every fragment of self-imposed training she’d ever had.

  Ethan, for his part, looked stunned and hurt by Cade’s words. Before he could say anything, Cade spoke up once more. This time, her voice was quieter, more steady and more in control. She sent up a silent word of thanks as she began.

  “Ethan, you can’t go back, okay?” When Ethan opened his mouth to interrupt, Cade held her hand up to stop him. “Wait, let me finish.” She paused to gather her thoughts, piecing them together one by one, and then she continued. “You haven’t been acting like yourself for the past month. Yeah, you were okay when we were initially getting the hell out of Dodge and trying to find your mother, though you acted like an ass to Brandt, and I doubt even you would argue that. But ever since we settled down here in Tupelo, you’ve been driving both of us absolutely insane. You’re cold, you’re distant, you’re careless, you have your ass eternally on your shoulders, and whether you want to hear it or not, you’ve become almost cruel.” She used the word again, even though it pained her to admit it. “You are not the Ethan I know. The Ethan I know would never have even considered suggesting sending two people back out into danger when he had the means to help them. I would ask what the hell has happened to you, but I’m pretty sure I already know the answer to that.”