by Jack Hunt
“Problem?” Rayne asked.
“You seem a little keen to want to fight. Don’t you even want to think it over?”
She was dead serious then started laughing. “Tell ’em.”
“We are the only ones that do runs in the city.”
My eyes darted between them.
“You’re telling me out of the two hundred-odd people you have here, that you four are the only ones that venture out?”
“Bingo!” Brolin said, gripping the cigar at the corner of his mouth and squinting.
I shot Wren a look. “And I thought our group was mad.”
She nodded in agreement. “What makes you qualified and not them?”
“What makes us qualified?” Rayne repeated before swiveling in her seat towards the others. “She wants to know what makes us qualified.”
They all let out a laugh.
The whole conversation seemed like a big joke to them. They were very odd. The very mention of how many men Fritz had didn’t seem to trouble them in the least. Perhaps they were suicidal? It wouldn’t have been the first group of insane individuals we had met in our travels. Their clothing didn’t exactly do them any favors, and only made me think that they were two sheets to the wind.
“I was a Navy Seal before this,” Lincoln said.
“Green Beret,” Axel piped up.
Brolin sniffed. “Delta Force,” he added with a complete straight face.
We waited for Rayne to add that she was some CIA assassin. I leaned forward in my chair waiting for her to dazzle us with her confession.
“FBI,” she said.
“Really?” I said with a skeptical eye.
They all burst out laughing. “Ah, I love this guy. You really bought that whole thing about the Delta Force, Navy Seal shit, didn’t you? No, I was a checkout girl at C-town and well, these guys were just college dropouts.”
Yep, they had definitely lost it and by the sounds of it, so had we. These were no warriors. They were just losers from New York who played dress-up once a year at some convention for nerds. Shit! We were royally screwed.
I got up from the table. “Fuck this. We are wasting our time.”
“What?” Brolin said.
I whirled around. “We just lost someone today and tomorrow we are going to lose another person and all you idiots can do is make a joke. Like you aren’t prepared to deal with these people. They will turn your skulls into ashtrays. This is serious shit, not just some convention where you run around and pretend you are some steampunk assholes with attitude.”
Brolin stood up and walked over to me. He came in close, his eyes narrowed. “Let’s not forget, it was you who came to us for help. We said we would. If you don’t want it, there’s the door.”
Rayne got up. “Look, excuse us but we tend to make light of a lot of things. It’s the way we cope with it all.”
Brolin was giving me some serious fucking eyeballing. He wasn’t the only one. Lincoln got up and placed his hand on Rayne. “No. No. If they have a problem, let them deal with it themselves.”
“Huh!” I scoffed and turned around to walk out. Wren stood her ground even as I left the restaurant. I didn’t know until I was a few feet outside that she was still in there. Through the window I saw her talking to them. I didn’t go back in. I was fuming. The last thing I wanted to deal with was assholes who couldn’t see the gravity of the situation. This wasn’t a joke. Lives were at stake. I reached into my pocket and pulled out a box of cigarettes. I tapped it and nothing came out. Fuck! I screwed it up and tossed it. Not even a cigarette left.
When Wren came out I was curious. “What were you talking about?”
“I ironed out the wrinkles you made. They are going to help us.”
“What?”
She didn’t reply but kept on walking past me. That girl continued to surprise me. Now more than ever. I looked back inside and the four of them were talking among themselves. Whatever she had done had worked. But how?
CHAPTER 20
AS NIGHT FELL and we were enveloped in darkness, Lincoln had gathered together two hundred people who were willing to help. I say willing, by that I mean they were willing to show up and listen to what Lincoln had to say. Squeezed into a small church building, the atmosphere inside was tense. I wasn’t exactly sure how many of them truly knew what they were getting themselves into. It wasn’t like they were going to go up against three thousand people. Fritz couldn’t have had more than a hundred and fifty men. Murmurs spread throughout the room as Wren and I came in through a side door. We’d been told by Rayne to give them half an hour with the people beforehand. From outside we’d heard the arguing. People asking, why should we risk our lives for them? Lincoln had made it clear that if anyone didn’t wish to help they could leave. No one was going to be forced into this.
“I hope you have a plan of action as right now we are walking on a tightrope with these folks.”
I nodded and looked out at them. I didn’t have a plan. I hadn’t even begun to think about what we were going to do. I was stressed out and second-guessing everything.
“Quiet down,” Brolin said.
Most of them were men in their late thirties.
“Why should we help you?”
I paced up and down a few times trying to find the words that might convince them. But I realized it didn’t matter what I said, there would be those who would find problems. There were always those who saw the problems and didn’t hear the heart. Instead, I decided to be blunt with them, as honest as I could be.
“You shouldn’t help. If I were in your position, I would be thinking the same. Why should I risk my life for a stranger?” I paused. “If you stay here, you will live. For how long, who knows? I will say this. It will only be a matter of time before Fritz and his men expand out to your region at which point you won’t have a choice. But right now, you do. I can’t convince you to come; neither can I guarantee that you won’t lose your life if you do. This is dangerous. There are no two ways about it. They will shoot to kill. So if you wish to stay, stay. But know this, you are living on borrowed time. All of us are. We don’t know what tomorrow will bring. But if you want to live in peace, then you have to believe that all those people that are in our community are no different than you. They deserve the right to live as much as you do. They deserve the right to not be governed by a dictator.”
“Is it true? Are you one of them?” an older man in the back piped up.
“One of who?”
“Those who are immune?”
I nodded. “Yes.”
“Then why not just hand yourself in and be done with this?”
“Because it won’t end with me. He has no guarantee that he can create a permanent cure from whatever testing he has been conducting, and even if he did create it — don’t think for a minute he’s going to hand it out freely. All I can tell you is that people’s lives are at stake here. The clock is ticking and with every passing hour, our window of opportunity is getting smaller and smaller. If ever there was a time to unite, a time to lay aside whatever perceived ideas you have about us, or the other community, now is the time.”
“And what is your great plan?” a burly man asked with a grin on his face.
“To avoid as many casualties as possible. We have to get to that armory. If we can take that back, we can distribute the weapons to the community.” I paused. “There are two access points by land into the community. These are heavily guarded but you don’t have to breach those points. You simply have to create a distraction. If we have fifty men at each of those access points, we’ll take the other hundred across the water and come around back. All you have to do is create enough distraction, keep them busy, apply pressure and we’ll do the rest.”
“And if people die?”
“Like I said, there is a lot of risk involved here. I’m not going to cherry coat this. Some of you may not return. So decide now what you will do. But again, know this. They will come for you eventually, or you can bring the fight to them before
they do. That’s all.”
I stepped back to allow Lincoln to continue. The men in the crowd mumbled among themselves.
“Can you give us a few minutes?”
I nodded and went back outside with Wren. The sound of waves crashed against the shore and crickets could be heard. Occasionally the ground would light up as fireflies flashed on and off.
“So you think they’ll help?”
“I hope so.”
Ten minutes passed before the doors of the church opened and a steady stream of men came out. They glanced at us before Brolin came out and motioned for us to go back inside. When we entered all that remained were around seventy people.
“These are the only ones that are willing to take the risk.”
“Well, I guess we’ll work with what we have. Split them up between the two access points. That leaves just us six to cross the water. Not exactly ideal but what can be done?”
“It’s dark. If they take ten trucks, there is a possibility they won’t know how many there are.”
“Let’s get to it,” Wren said.
It didn’t take long to load up the vans with ammo and weapons. It would take just under an hour for them to reach the first access point. We would be dropped off in ten minutes at the boat. The time was currently 9:48 p.m.
“Well, I gotta tell you. This is the most action we have had in weeks,” Brolin said, sounding overly eager to start killing people. He adjusted his weapon on his lap and checked the ammo. No matter how we did this, there was a high chance that Jess and the others would be killed. Fritz wasn’t an idiot, he’d already played out a similar scenario before back at the Hive. No doubt he would be on the lookout for me.
A few final checks and we rolled out.
CHAPTER 21
BAJA
I SAT with my back to the wall of the trailer. Inside everything had been stripped out.
A few hours after we had been locked inside, the door opened and they tossed Ethan Winthorpe in. Battered and bruised, he looked as if they had done a serious number on him. What had they hoped to gain from beating the crap out of him? I had to wonder if Sebastian had done it simply as a means to get back at him. He arrived unconscious. Jess had badgered one of the guys outside to give her a bottle of water and a rag so that she could tend to him. I was certain they only gave it to shut her up. When Ethan finally came around he glanced at us and drank down a whole bunch of water before speaking.
“I hate the taste of blood.”
“Seems Fritz loves it.”
“How did you all end up back here?”
“That awesome escape plan went south.”
“Where’s Johnny?”
“If I was him, I would be miles away from here.”
I got up and went over to a small hole in the side of the trailer. I glanced out. Ten of Fritz’s men were sitting around a fire tossing back beers like they were on vacation. “I would kill for a beer about now.”
“Really?” Elijah said. “I would just like to get the hell out of here.”
“No chance of that. They have this place surrounded.”
A few minutes later the door opened and they tossed the rest of the leadership inside. One after another they rolled across the floor bloodied and beaten.
“Guessing you opted not to drink the Kool-Aid?” I asked.
Ben who was looking a little worse for wear got up and went over to Annora.
“Were you aware that your father thinks he can create a permanent cure for bites?”
“He’s not my father. At least I don’t see him like that anymore. And as for the cure. Perhaps he has. Since the apocalypse kicked off he’s been obsessed with finding it.”
“But will the immunes die?”
Her eyes dropped. “The kind of surgery that he wants to do will kill them.”
“But then he would have a permanent cure?”
She chuckled to herself as she wiped blood from her mouth. “There’s no guarantee. It’s all hearsay. The only way he could know for sure is if he had performed the operation successfully. He hasn’t. All of the immunes are already dead from the surgery he’s attempted. That leaves just Johnny.”
“He’s insane.”
“As much as I agree, Ben, what he’s trying to do is end this. Even if he isn’t going to give it away.”
“What’s the point?”
“Control. Power. Having the cure would make him a god. A giver of life. You can’t put a price on that. Whether people love or hate him, they would flock in droves to be around the one who had the cure.”
Ben nodded. “He wouldn’t have to threaten them. They would do whatever he said in order to prevent death.”
“You got it.”
I strolled over. “So how come you haven’t figured out a permanent cure? You’ve been at it a year and we are still no closer to it.”
“It’s not for lack of trying. I could have performed surgeries like what my father wants to do but I would have never placed a person’s life in jeopardy.”
“But daddy dearest would. I bet you must feel real proud.”
She scoffed. “Yeah, he’s the real father of the year.”
“What about your mother?”
“Dead. Long before this all started. I’m glad she never got to see him this way.”
I leaned up against the wall of the trailer. “We are screwed either way. In the slim chance Johnny kills your insane father, we end up no closer to discovering a permanent cure. If he hands himself over, we are in the same boat.”
“Not exactly. There is a chance that my father is on to something. Though admittedly he might be going about it the wrong way.”
“Has he shared it with you?”
“Yeah.”
“And?”
We all looked on, waiting to hear something that might give us some sense of hope.
She shook her head and sighed. “Maybe it can work. I don’t know for sure without placing someone at risk and performing the surgery.”
“You think what he’s suggesting is right?”
“I think it is,” Imara from district six said. “Let’s face it. Without finding a permanent cure, how do we hope to get society back to the way it was?”
“You would be willing to kill someone for it?”
“We are talking about the cure for the human race. The reality is, we are all lucky to be alive. If I knew what humanity needed was contained inside my brain, I would willingly take the chance.”
“Well, that’s you. Your decision. He shouldn’t be making a decision for others. That’s what makes this wrong,” I said.
Elijah got up and started banging against the trailer wall. “Let us out.”
“Calm down. You’re just going to piss them off.”
“I don’t give a fuck. If I’m going to die, I’m not going to make it easy for them. Come on, you fuckers,” Elijah yelled.
From outside you could hear the men laughing. They just thought it was one big joke. One of them fired off a few rounds at the trailer. The bullets snapped overheard and a couple ricocheted off the metal.
I felt Elijah’s frustration, I was struggling to keep my cool. Waiting to be killed by a lunatic makes you think about your life. All the things you could have, should have or would have done differently. I wished I had told Izzy how I really felt. Sure there had been rumors of us screwing around on the beach, or hooking up in some car in the community but those were all false. The truth was, she had never really got over Dax. I would have always been compared to him. I thought about my parents, Castle Rock, Specs and all the good times we had before this. I thought about what I would have done with my life. None of it seemed to matter anymore. The safe zone was meant to be a good thing. And if a person measured what was good by being able to stay alive, then yes, it was good. We had managed to survive a year inside the walls. But it wasn’t home. Home was made up of family and they were all gone. Home was found in friendship and that had been torn apart.
I sighed and slumped down to t
he floor. Where are you, Johnny?
CHAPTER 22
WAVES LAPPED against the boat as we made our way across to Shelter Island. I had a feeling the boat was going to sink. It was only meant to be a three-man boat, maybe four. There were six of us squeezed into the small space weighed down with assault rifles, vests and enough ammo to take out a small army.
When we finally made it to the shore, we hopped out, stayed low and moved forward. My assault rifle was on the ready. We didn’t expect to see anyone patrolling Shelter Island. Those who had patrolled the beaches usually checked once an hour but with everyone’s weapons removed and all the focus placed on section A and the armory, we didn’t anticipate running into anyone for a good twenty minutes. The armory was located at the heart of the community just off Bridgehampton-Sag Harbor Turnpike. It was a small history museum that had been gutted and renovated with steel cages to house weapons. Along with rifles, handguns and grenades there was a bit of everything inside that building. Land mines, rocket launchers and every kind of machete, sword and knife you were liable to find in army surplus and gun shops. Some of it belonged to those who arrived, but most had been collected over a period of a year from homes and gun shops in the city.
We stayed off the roads and worked our way across fields, through woodland until we reached it. There were ten people guarding the place. They weren’t taking any chances. A couple of trucks were positioned outside blocking off the road that led up to the building. Some of the men had lit campfires and surrounded the perimeter with wire. I wouldn’t have been surprised if they had hidden a few land mines in various places to ensure that no one got close. Then again with the way they were acting like idiots, I threw that idea out the window.
In the brush we waited for what seemed like almost twenty minutes. It wasn’t a case that we couldn’t have moved in on them immediately but we were waiting for the other seventy guys to arrive at the access points. If this went wrong, the enemy would swarm us.
Lincoln held up a radio. “Gary, are you in position?”
“We are just coming up. Shit, dude, you didn’t tell us how many there were.”
