by Jack Kilborn
According to his intel, there were still five likely candidates on the island. Though the ferals had surprised the doctor by proving themselves able to work together, he doubted they would be able to grab all of the new arrivals. Some would survive.
Plincer glanced at the clock. He had less than eight hours to get his hands on them. It would make for a much more effective presentation if he were able to grab all five. But all he needed was a single volunteer.
It was time to send Lester back out to find one.
Martin stared below him, through the leaves of the bough he perched upon. His swollen hands had resisted his efforts to climb the tree, and his ruined cheek resting against the rough bark of the oak tree’s branch made his injury light up every time he swallowed. But he felt lucky to have gotten up in time.
A few moments earlier, in a semi-frantic search for Sara, he’d come upon a group of feral people. He fled before they saw him. Or so he thought. Within ten minutes, the ferals were on his trail, closing fast. Martin ran as hard has he could, not daring to use the flashlight, fearing he’d give his position away. Only moments into the chase, something surprising happened; he bumped into another group.
After his third right turn, Martin’s gut burned with realization. They had him trapped. These insane, witless cannibals had somehow managed to surround him.
With no choices left, he picked a large tree and hoped for the best. The ferals closed the circle and converged, twelve of them total, right beneath his perch. More than expected, too many to be able to handle, less than ten feet beneath him.
The largest man in the group, the one with the ax, grunted orders at the others, pointing in various directions. Then he leaned up against the tree and reached into the sack he had hanging over his shoulder.
Martin couldn’t make out any details, but the axman pulled out a dark round object the size of a football. He brought it to his face and took a bite. The scent of cooked pork wafted up to Martin. But Martin knew whatever this guy was eating, it wasn’t pork.
The axman sat down. He began to really gnaw on the thing, shaking his hairy head from side to side like a dog worrying a bone. Martin’s leg began to fall asleep. The pins and needles sensation grew from a minor discomfort to a spreading numbness. He shifted slightly, anxious to stay quiet, twisting his pelvis so the blood flow could return.
Then his adrenalin spiked, flushing his body with heat, causing every muscle to contract as Martin lost his balance and began to fall.
Cindy knew she was hurting Tyrone—clenching his left hand so tight—but she was too frightened to let go. They ran as fast as safety allowed, heads down to keep from getting lashed in the face by wayward twigs and branches, arms swinging like walking sticks for the blind, so no one head-butted a tree. Cindy had no clue how many pursuers there were, or how close they’d gotten, and she was ready to circle the island ten times before she slowed down to find out.
But her lungs and legs and stamina were casualties of meth, and though she’d been off the drug for a while her body still hadn’t fully recovered. After only a few minutes of running, Tyrone practically had to drag her, and Cindy’s panting was becoming increasingly labored and loud.
When Sara finally stopped, Cindy fell to her knees, pressing a hand hard against the stitch in her side and gasping for air.
Sara came over, and whispered, “Shh.”
Cindy’s face pinched as she tried to get her breathing under control. Sara crawled ahead, up to a bush, and stuck her head inside. It was still dark, but Cindy could see pretty well. She moved her head to the side, so Sara’s shadow didn’t block her vision.
Wait… shadow?
On all fours, Cindy crept closer to Sara. All at once she understood where the light was coming from, and the importance of being quiet.
Somehow, they’d gotten back to their campsite.
Their fire was smaller, the few logs left burning slow and steady. The last time Cindy was here there were two cannibals, eating their fallen friend. Only one remained. The one with the knife and fork and salt shaker. His head was resting on the chest of the dead one, using it like a gory pillow.
Cindy turned her head away before viewing any details.
“He asleep?” Tyrone whispered.
“Can’t tell.” Sara withdrew her head from the bush. “But he’s right next to the tent. That’s where the radio is.”
“I’ll go,” Tyrone said. “I’ll be real careful, won’t wake him up.”
Sara shook her head. “No. I’ll go. You both stay here.”
“You be better off watchin’ my back. If I’m in that tent, lookin’ for the radio, I won’t know if this crazy dude wakes up. But you know that judo shit, can stop him better ‘n I can.”
Sara shook her head. “You stay here, guard Cindy.”
“How’m I supposed to guard Cindy when I can’t even make no fist?”
Cindy touched Tyrone’s shoulder. “The best way to do this is to crawl. You can’t crawl with your burns. But I can.”
“Hells no.”
“No way, Cindy.”
Cindy looked at Sara. “Tyrone is right. If that man gets up, you’re the only one who can stop him.”
Sara looked away. “I…I don’t think I could do that again.”
“Yes you can. You’re strong enough.”
And so am I.
Before she lost her nerve, Cindy scrambled through the bush and into the clearing. She rested her belly on the ground and craned her neck. The cannibal was to her right, five yards away, lying down in front of the tent. His chest rose and fell slowly, rhythmically.
You can do this. You can prove you’re more than just some selfish meth addict.
Cindy crept forward, slow and easy and quiet as a mouse wearing slippers. That was what her father used to say when he took her hunting. The image would make her laugh, which of course wasn’t quiet at all.
God, she missed him. Missed him and Mom so bad. They hadn’t visited her in at the Center, and she couldn’t blame them—Cindy had stolen everything of value in the house, pawning it to get more meth. But now more than ever, she wanted to see them again, to tell them how sorry she was, to promise she’d pay back every cent. She would, too, if she lived through this.
Cindy kept low, eyes darting back and forth between the tent entrance and the sleeping killer. She was so focused on her destination that she didn’t see whatever it was she rested her extended palm on.
But Cindy didn’t have to see it. She knew without looking. It was warm, and wet, and squishy, and she’d helped Mom prepare enough of it that the smell normally evoked pleasant, homey feelings.
This time it didn’t.
Her stomach clenched, and she felt ready to hurl. In fact, she was eighty percent there, mouth already open, the gagging sound working her way up her throat.
But she squeezed her eyes shut and repressed it, forced the reflex down. Vomiting was noisy, noise would draw attention, and that could kill her.
The moment passed. Cindy breathed through her mouth, slow and deep, relaxing her abdomen. Then she carefully lifted her hand off and wiped it on the dirt. Gravel and ash stuck to the moisture on her palm, and she vowed that she would never, under any circumstances, eat liver again.
She adjusted her direction to avoid encountering anything else, and continued forward. But it didn’t matter. The cannibals had been messy eaters, and Cindy’s fingers kept brushing against various bits and parts strewn all over the ground. The knees of her jeans soaked through, and her hands glistened in the flickering campfire. She pressed forward, getting to within ten feet of the tent, eight feet, five feet…
The cannibal grunted, shifting his body. The knife and fork, resting crisscross on his chest, shifted, sliding off and making a clanging sound that to Cindy felt like a shotgun blast. He was now on his side, facing her.
She froze, staring at his still-closed eyes. His cheeks were wet with blood, and little stringy things were caught in his beard. If he opened his eyes it was ove
r. Sara and Tyrone wouldn’t be able to save her in time. Here was a man who ate what seemed to be his friend. What would he do to someone he considered an enemy?
Cindy glanced right. The entrance to the tent was tantalizingly close, but she was too scared to move. She thought she’d hit rock bottom when she’d passed out in a disgusting gas station toilet, a needle stuck in her arm, lying in a puddle of someone else’s urine for hours until the owner discovered her and called the police. But this—an arm’s length from a crazy man who wanted to snack on her—this was the all time low.
Quiet as a mouse in slippers, little girl. Move like you live in the woods.
Cindy tore her eyes away from the killer, locking them onto the tent. Moving oh so slowly she forced herself toward it, hand, knee, hand, knee, ignoring the horrible, slippery things she crawled over, and then, all at once, her head and shoulders were inside the tent, relief coursing through her like the meth she was so intent on quitting.
That’s when Cindy heard the snoring.
The other cannibal was in the sleeping bag.
Tom patted his full stomach and yawned. He was dog-ass tired, and had eaten waaaaay too much. All he wanted was to curl up someplace and go to sleep. He was even considering doing so right there, in front of the coals. It was warm, and comfortable, and whosever camp this was hadn’t been around for over an hour. If they did come back and get mad that he ate there food, it was their own frickin’ fault for leaving it here.
Sara and Martin would be frantic, of course, if he stayed out all night. But it was their frickin’ fault for playing that stupid trick and trying to scare him. Screw those two anyway. It wasn’t like anything Tom did mattered at this point. The Center was closing and Tom was going off to some frickin’ boot camp. Let them worry themselves to death.
He yawned again, stretched out his arms, and stood, looking for something that would serve as a pillow. There was some sort of cloth near the coals, and he bent down and picked it up, immediately recognizing it.
Meadow’s shirt.
Huh. Weird. But then, Meadow had to be in on the prank too, pretending to get grabbed in the woods. Maybe he was in the trees right now, waiting to jump out.
Tom turned in a full circle, scanning the treeline. It looked just as dark and quiet as ever.
Then Tom did something he almost never did. He doubted himself.
For just a fraction of a second, he wondered if maybe this wasn’t all some big joke, and that there actually were cannibals in the woods. Hell, that mystery meat he just stuffed himself with could have even been a person.
Tom was all about impulse, forging ahead, not looking back. Doubt and guilt existed only as fleeting thoughts. Without his ADHD medication, Tom couldn’t be still long enough to spell the word worried, let alone act worried.
So he dismissed the doubt as soon as it came, rolled Meadow’s shirt into ball, and propped it behind his neck as he stretched out onto the ground, facing a severed human hand.
Tom jerked back into a sitting position, unable to believe what he just saw. He looked again.
A hand. Cooked and fleshy, except for three skeletal fingers that had no meat on them.
Never one to pay attention to his surroundings, Tom twisted around quickly, his eyes scanning the ground for the first time. In short order he found four rib bones, a burned lump that looked like a kidney, and a partially eaten leg that still had the foot attached.
“No way. No frickin’ way.”
He reached out, touched the leg bone.
It wasn’t a plastic prop. It was the real thing. And the blackened, melted shoe still attached had a green Nike swoosh on it, just like Meadow wore.
Tom threw up so hard and fast it felt like his throat was being torn out. That’s when the tall thin man with the camera stepped out of the woods and snapped his picture.
Martin’s lower body slipped off the branch, then his chest followed the lead. He hung in a chin-up position, his feet dangling within reach of the axman sitting beneath him. Martin held this position, his fingers screaming at him, knowing he’d be unable to swing his body back up, and knowing what dropping down meant.
His arms began to burn, then tremble, then unbend slowly, like the air being let out of a pneumatic jack. Below him, the axman continued to gnaw on that large round object. But it was only a matter of seconds until he looked up. Martin knew he was in a vulnerable position, knew his best chance was to swing over to—
The tug was sudden and violent, ripping Martin’s hands from the bough. He slammed into the ground on his side, the shock of the impact making him bite his already injured tongue. Inches from his nose was Meadow’s cooked head, much of his face eaten away.
Martin instinctively rolled left, just as the ax struck where he’d been lying. Martin continued the roll until he had room to get his hands and knees up under him. A moment later he was on his feet, dizzy and hurting, but with his fists raised.
“That was one of my kids,” Martin said softly. “My kids. You think you can kill one of mine?”
The axman was large, powerful, with thick arms and a neck like a tree stump. But when he swung the ax again in an arc aimed at Martin’s head, he showed his weakness. The bigger man was slow.
Martin ducked the swing and kicked out his foot, connecting between the axman’s legs. The he grabbed the ax handle and twisted it sideways, leveraging it from its owner’s thick fingers. Leverage and momentum were a fighter’s best weapons.
The axman grunted, stumbling forward, and Martin did a quick spin, momentum propelling the weapon around, burying the head into his adversary’s shoulder. The axman howled, dropping to his knees.
Martin finished him off, making extra sure the beast was dead.
“My kids, asshole.” Then he headed off to look for Sara.
He was called Kong Zhi-ou in the People’s Republic of China, and was on Homeland Security’s no fly list, so his passport was under the name Sonny Lung. He spoke British English perfectly, even affecting the accent. And he was running late.
There wasn’t much he could do about that at 20,000 feet, infuriating as it was. Kong liked order, and the predictability that came with it. Being on time was something that should be a given, not a wish. But no one had chosen Kong to run this airline, so all he could do was order another cup of tea from the portly flight attendant and try to keep his anger bottled up.
If the pilot was telling the truth—and he was American so Kong suspected he wasn’t—the flight would touch down at Chicago’s O’Hare airport in a little over an hour. Too late for him to catch the connecting flight to Sawyer International. That gave Kong a choice between staying in Chicago for a few hours, then boarding the early Sawyer departure, or chartering a helicopter at O’Hare and flying that straight to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula.
He knew, even at this late hour, finding a chopper would be easy. Kong represented the premier world power, and had that power’s unlimited resources backing him. But he disliked the noise of helicopter rides, and involving more people in this venture meant more trails to hide. So Kong accepted the fact he’d be stuck at the O’Hare Hilton for a brief four hour stay.
Kong didn’t worry whether or not they had a room, because he’d already made reservations. He even arranged for a bit of entertainment, just in case the anticipated delay materialized. Planning ahead was one of the reasons Kong was so successful.
The tea came. Even in First Class it was insipid, almost unpalatable. He sipped it anyway, allowing his anger to build. He’d work it off later, after he landed.
Closing his eyes, Kong thought about the future of his country. China’s military was one of the largest in the world, more than twice the size of America’s. But it was underequipped. Even spending over twenty billion dollars in the last six years on arms wasn’t enough to guarantee its superiority. The war with the West was coming, sooner than many thought, and to win it China needed more manpower and more weapons.
Which is why the meeting with Doctor Plincer was s
o intriguing.
If all worked out, Kong would leave his position as director of the Jinzhong prison system, and take a new, more lucrative appointment with the People’s Liberation Army. He, Kong Zhi-ou, would ensure China could not only ably defend itself from its enemies, but if necessary, conquer them.
Kong didn’t smile often, but the thought of the Western world under Chinese rule brought a tiny one to his lips. He sipped more tea and waited patiently for his plane to land.
The interior of the tent was warm and sour, smelling of fresh blood and old sweat. Though the light was low, on her left Cindy could make out the shape of a person wrapped in a sleeping bag—the dirty, hairy man she’d seen earlier, the one who tried to grab her and Tyrone. He snored wetly, making the hair on Cindy’s arms stand on edge.
Cindy’s first reaction was to back up, get the hell out of there, and she went so far as to lean away. But her limbs stayed put. The radio was in that tent, and it was their only chance to get off this island alive. So she ignored all the voices in her brain screaming at her to leave, and instead inched forward.
There were backpacks to her right, their contents strewn about, probably by Tom. Cindy squinched her eyes, not even sure what the radio in question looked like. Before she rushed bravely in, possibly to her own death, she should have at least asked how big it was. In the dimness she could make out some clothing, a stack of cans, and something square-shaped. Were radios square? She crawled closer to the square thing, keeping the instinct to flee at bay.
The snoring cannibal kept a steady rhythm, every snort a reminder that death was less than three feet away. As Cindy got closer she saw the familiar red cross on the box.
A first aid kit. Tyrone needed this for his hands.
She picked it up and carefully placed it on the ground behind her, near the entrance. Then she began to paw through the discarded clothing.
After carefully setting aside one of Martin’s shirts, Cindy noticed a tiny red light, no larger than a BB. She reached for it, touching something hard and rectangular. Her fingers brushed over an antenna. It was either a very old model cell phone, or…
