Bodies were definitely a mixed blessing—they kept you alive, they focused power, and they allowed you to move about. But they felt pain, and they could be killed.
What would happen to the great and glorious creature called the gaiaphage if this body died?
The truth was, she didn’t know. She might end up like Little Pete, a disembodied ghost. Or she might actually, truly, die. Cease to exist.
They hungered, these bodies. Constantly. It was like an insistent, nagging voice in her head: Feed me. Feed me now!
She found a dead body by the side of the road, a boy. At first glance he didn’t seem to be injured. But when she used her foot to push him over, she saw a chunk of wood protruding from his back near his spine. He might not even have known it was there, and had simply bled to death as he walked from the lake toward Perdido Beach.
Well, one less to kill.
She quickly stripped off his clothing and put it on. It was filthy and stained with blood, but her own clothing was worse and now too small as well. It might confuse her pursuers. She ate some of his thigh, then quickly moved onward. In a while she would try out her speed again. This slow walking was boring.
She reached the highway just as a yellow school bus half covered in graffiti came rattling toward her. It stopped by the side of the road, and a dozen kids climbed out. They were carrying implements and buckets. Two of them manhandled a wheelbarrow out through the back door.
One of them, a girl with black hair, looked up, saw Gaia, and frowned uncertainly. Other kids stared past Gaia and pointed not at her but at the forest fire, which was certainly generating a lot of smoke. Even here, far from the trees, Gaia could smell it.
Gaia walked straight to the group, who were now heading into the field, tossing what looked like fish heads and bones ahead of them. The fish heads were instantly devoured by seething masses of worms, which then allowed the kids to pass unharmed into the field, dragging their buckets with them.
Gaia pulled out one earbud.
“Better get to work,” a boy said to Gaia.
But the black-haired girl, who had been watching her narrowly, said, “I don’t know you.”
“No, you don’t,” Gaia agreed. She didn’t want to alert and panic the others, so she avoided a light show and simply swung a backhand that crushed the girl’s head and killed her instantly.
The bossy boy said, “What the—”
He dodged her first punch; her second one caught him a glancing blow that shattered his arm. He opened his mouth to scream, but he never had the chance. Her hand found his throat and crushed his larynx as easily as crushing a grape.
She tossed his body behind the bus, where it wouldn’t be seen by the kids now moving slowly across the field.
There were ten in all. She followed them at a quick walk, stepping between rows of plants heavy with green pods. She caught up to the nearest girl and punched her once in the back and snapped her spine.
Nine.
The second one had time to yell, however, before Gaia knocked her head cleanly off her shoulders and set it flying to land between cabbages.
Eight.
The shout, cut short, alerted the rest of the workers, who spun and died, died, died as she easily killed three with blasts of green light.
Seven. Six. Five.
BLAM! BLAM!
One of them had a weapon. He fired fast and panicky. Gaia swept her beam and cut him in two.
Four.
No, there was a second gun. Too late!
BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!
Gaia spun around, not so much knocked by the impact as by the spasm of pain. She fell on her back.
“Get her! Get her! Get her!”
BLAM! BLAM!
“I’m out of bullets!”
Gaia tried to sit up, but something inside her was badly damaged, and the pain was extraordinary.
In one ear Social Distortion sang “Story of My Life.” It was a song both upbeat and melancholy.
A girl with a knife rose up beside her. Gaia threw an invisible punch that sent the knife wielder flying.
Sudden noise behind her, feet on soft dirt: Gaia twisted to see and was hit in the chest with a spiked baseball bat.
She grabbed the bat with lightning reflexes, held it, and with her other hand burned a hole through her assailant.
Three.
Gaia pushed herself up and shook her head. She was woozy. Her head was pounding; her eyes didn’t want to focus; her chest hurt. Blood was leaking from her in too many ways.
Unable to see clearly, she swept a beam of light three hundred sixty degrees. Again. Again. A scream cut short.
Two.
She had to prioritize. What should she heal first? What was killing her?
She lifted her new shirt and saw that the nail wound in her chest was small compared to the bullet hole. And worse still, far worse, was the exploded exit wound where the bullet had come out of her side. She pressed her hand on that and focused.
She blinked tears from her eyes and saw two people running away, already back at the highway, racing toward Perdido Beach. She aimed a beam after them, but there was no aiming now: they were fuzzy in the distance, and she hit nothing.
Killing everyone in the FAYZ was proving more difficult than she’d expected.
Staying alive was proving more difficult.
Why did everything have to be difficult? It was unfair. It was wrong. She was the gaiaphage, and what were they? Weak things made of meat and blood and bone.
Like you, Darkness, just like you.
Gaia gasped. The voice was in her head. His voice. Nemesis. He was seeing. He was learning from her mistake in taking on a body.
That’s right, Nemesis. See how weak a body makes you?
That would confuse him, she hoped. That would delay him. But at any moment Nemesis could make his move, and things would go from difficult to very hard indeed. She didn’t have time to lie here and recover. And Sam and Caine . . .
It began to occur to her then that the outside world might also be difficult to conquer, especially if they were ready for her. Stealth would be demanded. She must escape from this place without the humans outside realizing who and what she was. Once outside she would gain in power. She was, after all, a sort of virus that would propagate. She would attract followers. She would take control of other humans. She would . . .
Conquer.
Gaia, the gaiaphage-made-flesh, lay on her back and stared up at the blue sky.
“Story of My Life” was just ending.
Somewhere, way out there, past the thin shell of atmosphere, past this tiny solar system, somewhere out there in the unimaginable distances of the galaxy, was the place where the gaiaphage had first been conceived.
All that way, all that time, millions of years, to arrive here. To feel blood leaking from a human body into the dirt beneath her.
It could not end like this. The gaiaphage was destined for more, meant to transform. Its mere existence had begun to alter the laws of physics that ruled this planet.
Today the FAYZ, tomorrow the planet.
But right now she . . . it—whatever—was very tired.
“You’re back,” Astrid said to Albert. “I heard you were.”
“Yes. And we’re getting a trickle of food in from the fields already. Some teams have come back in, but I’ve pushed some others back out.”
Astrid nodded. “Probably a good thing.”
“Just probably?” Albert demanded.
“Gaia will come after us. It could be in a day; it could be in ten seconds. Having some of the people in different locations might make it harder for her to kill us all.”
She had called a hasty meeting in what had once been the mayor’s office. It struck her that if the barrier really came down there would once again be a real mayor in Perdido Beach. A week from now, or a month, or whenever, some responsible adult would be sitting here deciding important issues of trash collection and water and curfews and assorted other things that would no
t be life and death.
Albert was there; so were Edilio, Dekka, Quinn, and Diana. She’d have liked to have Jack there as well: he was not especially useful, but he was smart. Lana, too, might have been helpful, but she was busy, to put it mildly.
More, much more, Astrid wished Sam was there. Even Caine would have been welcome. They were facing what was probably the final battle, and she had no soldiers except Dekka and Orc. Dekka was strong and brave, as was Orc, but they were nothing to Gaia.
Astrid had begun to believe that the time had come to plan for after. And now she was afraid there would be no after. The barrier would come down, and the only person walking out into the world would be Gaia.
There was one person she wished wasn’t there: Diana.
It was Astrid’s meeting, but it was Albert who asked Diana the question. “Diana, you’ve been with this gaiaphage-Gaia thing. Everything you know.”
Diana glanced at Astrid, and Astrid saw that Albert had intercepted that look. So had Dekka.
There was a painfully long silence. Now even Quinn and the distracted Edilio noticed.
“Hey,” Quinn said. “No secrets.”
Astrid, as calmly as she could, said, “Tell them everything you know, Diana.”
For once Diana did not see the need to be difficult. “Gaia’s body is growing fast. She needs food constantly, and she doesn’t care where she gets it. She doesn’t seem to have powers of her own, really, except for what she had as the gaiaphage: the power to reach directly into minds, especially of moofs, people with powers, and especially those she’s been connected to in the past. She can cause them terrible pain and fear and—”
“Caine? She can hurt Caine?” Dekka asked.
Diana nodded. “Probably, yes. And me. Everyone but Lana.”
“Lana?” Astrid pressed.
“Gaia hates Lana. Somehow Lana was able to shut her out. Another thing,” Diana said, carefully avoiding Astrid. “Gaia’s powers are borrowed, or derived, or whatever big Astrid word you’d like to use. They aren’t hers. She said if she kills Sam she won’t have his power anymore. Or maybe it’s just that it’s easier if . . . if Sam is alive; I don’t know. I don’t know.”
“That’s why she didn’t kill him, or Caine, when she might have,” Astrid said. If she could shut Diana down now, she might still be able to manage the conversation. “So, suggestions? Ideas?”
“Astrid,” Diana said. “Little Pete.”
“What about him?” Albert asked.
Diana started to stand up, obviously felt the pain in her battered body, and remained seated. “He’s Nemesis. That’s what Gaia calls him. He’s the one the gaiaphage really fears. That’s why she’s killing everyone: to keep him from being able to take a host body, like she did.”
“Well, I don’t know how helpful that is,” Astrid snapped. “I don’t know how we’d . . . I mean, that’s useless information.” She sounded shrill, even to herself.
Dekka said, “What is Little Pete? Are we sure he still exists? Maybe Gaia’s just nuts.”
Again, every eye was on Astrid. She could feel it. “What about Gaia’s feelings for you, Diana?”
There was an uncomfortable silence. Dekka broke it. “Astrid, this isn’t the time for you to be Pete’s protective big sister.”
“I want to know what Gaia feels about Diana,” Astrid shot back. “It might be a vulnerability we can exploit.”
Edilio had said nothing. Now he spoke. “That creature murdered dozens of kids, including Roger. We need to know everything. No secrets, no evasions, no lies.”
Astrid glared at him, but she couldn’t make it work. She ended up turning away.
“Diana’s told us what she knows,” Albert said coolly. “Your turn, Astrid.”
“I threw Petey to his death,” Astrid said quietly. “I did what I had to do; it was the only way to force his hand, to make him destroy the bugs. I killed him once. Now you’re asking me to . . . to . . .”
“We’ve all lost people,” Quinn said softly. “We’ve all been through hell. And we’ve all failed at times. Everyone in this room has scars on their body and worse ones in their . . . well, souls, I guess.”
“We’re a bunch of sheep waiting for the tiger,” Albert snapped. “There’s only one question: are any of us going to walk out of here alive?”
“Maybe you should run back to your island,” Astrid said with a vicious edge. She glanced up to see something she’d never seen before: Edilio, his face transformed by dark anger. She took a step back.
He said, “Talk, Astrid. Now.”
Astrid swallowed hard. She tried to think of something to say and failed. She was not strong enough to say no to him. She felt her resistance crumble. She felt her own surrender. The coolly logical part of her mind noted almost sardonically that Edilio had a superpower after all: being Edilio.
“Yeah,” she whispered. “Okay. Little Pete is alive. I can’t explain it; believe me, I wish I could. When I was with Cigar, in the dark, waiting for the end, hearing Cigar scream from what Penny had done to him, Petey talked to me.”
“Your imagination?” Albert suggested.
Astrid shook her head. “I can feel him sometimes. Poor Cigar could see him, a little, at least.”
“Gaia sure thinks he’s alive,” Diana said. “She says he’s weaker being separated from a physical self.”
“So we need Little Pete to pull a Gaia, take a body,” Albert said. “Fine. How do we do that?”
Now it was Edilio’s turn to flinch. Astrid had already followed that line of reasoning to its obvious conclusion; he had not. And now that he understood it, he didn’t like it any more than she did.
Not surprisingly it was Diana, with some of her old snark back, who clarified. “So we’re saying Astrid should tell her little brother to go all exorcist on some sacrificial lamb, then get him or her to kill the kid I gave birth to.”
This was followed by another long silence.
Astrid almost didn’t dare to think, lest someone somehow read her thoughts. Because there was another way. If Caine and Sam should die . . .
She focused to see Edilio making eye contact with her. He gave the slightest of nods.
Yes. He had seen the other path.
The silence in the room was profound. The choices were sinking in. Find a sacrifice for Little Pete. Or kill Sam and Caine.
Still looking at Astrid, Edilio said, “Dekka, Quinn, come with me. I’m getting anyone who can shoot. I’ll put everyone who has a gun into a window or doorway around the town square. We’ll fight her here.”
“Without Sam and Caine and Brianna, too, you won’t win,” Diana said.
“Yeah.” Edilio nodded.
“Listen to me,” Albert said, placating, knowing he was speaking the unspeakable. “None of us likes these choices, but that’s what we have. Right? We have what we have.”
“Maybe,” Edilio said. “But there are things I’ll do, and things I won’t do. I’ll die trying to keep people alive. But I won’t do murder.”
He slung his rifle and marched from the room with Dekka and Quinn in his wake.
NINETEEN
25 HOURS, 29 MINUTES
SAM AND CAINE saw the school bus. It wasn’t a particularly unusual thing, really: the last of the gas was occasionally parceled out to get kids to this, the farthest out of the farming areas.
But there was something too silent about the bus and the field. If the bus had brought kids out here, then they should be seeing them.
They found the first body lying facedown, leg stretched out into the dirt, face on blacktop. Something very, very powerful had smashed the body and then ripped off one leg. The remaining leg wore a red sneaker.
“She’s not that far ahead of us,” Caine said. “She’s probably going straight down the highway.”
“If we run . . .,” Sam said, though he felt too tired to last long running.
“You go right ahead and run. I’ll take the bus,” Caine said.
“Ah. Yea
h, that would be better. Have you ever driven a bus?”
Caine shook his head. “No, I have not.”
“Strangely enough,” Sam said, remembering the long-ago moment of terror and competence that had earned him the nickname School Bus Sam, “I have.”
Lana heard the sound of the door opening and someone clearing their throat. Without looking up she said, “I can’t take any more messed-up kids!” She had been running in a sort of desperate relay race, going from person to person in the room, out in the hall, in the room next door, laying on hands, trying to keep the worst hurt from dying, parceling out a minute here, five minutes there. It was working. Except for the two who had died because she hadn’t gotten to them in time. No one else had died. Yet.
The throat clearer at the door turned out to be Astrid. Lana looked sourly at her. “You want something?”
“Do you have a minute?”
“Do I have a minute? Sure, who do you want to have die while we chat?”
Patrick came padding up to Lana and nuzzled her, as though sensing that his master was on the edge.
Lana had a hand each on a boy, maybe twelve, and a three-year-old girl. The boy was burned over half his body, the clothing melted into the bubbled and cooled flesh. The girl had lacerations on her face that would ensure she would never be a pretty girl again unless Lana healed those wounds.
Astrid squatted down in front of Lana, who was herself cross-legged on a big cushion she dragged from casualty to casualty.
Lana had great respect for Astrid’s loyalty to Sam. She had great respect for her intelligence. And she had even come to respect her toughness. She had never quite decided that she liked Astrid.
“The gaiaphage,” Astrid said.
“What about it?”
“Diana says—”
“Is that witch in town? Great. Are you trusting her?”
“She brought us useful information. She’s been with Gaia. Her daughter.”
Lana snorted derisively. “There is no Gaia; there’s only the same Darkness there’s been since day one.”
“Diana says she—okay, it—hates you.”
Lana barked out a laugh. “Yeah? The feeling’s mutual.”
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