The End Games

by T. Michael Martin

  A single cloud shaded the sun, then fled.

  Michael gulped, dizzy with confusion and fear. Where was Patrick? Where was here? The view over the top of the basket’s walls was only empty sky, the balloon so elevated he could see neither buildings nor coal company–blighted mountaintops. He sniffed, desperately searching for any clue . . . and what he smelled made him nearly gag. Even inside the suit, the scent of the Bellows—amplified, at least quadruple the worst he’d ever smelled—was overpoweringly, sickly rich.

  “Where . . . where are we?” Michael said.

  Jopek took a final drag and flicked his cigarette out of the basket.

  He’s gonna do that to me.

  Michael held Jopek’s gaze. He held it as carefully as he would hold a bell jar filled with poison gas that could cause a nightmare death at the slightest mistake.

  “Why am I here?”

  The edges of Jopek’s grin hardened. “’Cause you and me got business, Mikey.”

  He drew out from within his jacket a handgun, tugged back the slide then let it bite forward, chambering a round from the banana clip. “Would you like to talk? I’d love to talk.”

  Michael had precisely zero idea what he should say: He wasn’t sure about anything with Jopek just now. He had believed, before, that he understood the captain: that Jopek was nothing more than an army-issue Ron who only wanted to be worshipped and in control, and God help anyone that got in his way. Yet by that logic, Jopek should have abandoned the skinny kid who had aimed a gun at him last night. But I’m still here, strapped in the freaking sky with this psychopath. Michael did not even try to feel his blood; yes-yes and the Game Master had failed him last night; they had been shredded by the cry and claws of an impossibly resurrected boy who carried a virus that now quite probably lived inside Michael. No, Michael couldn’t decipher the captain, not any more than the field mouse can fathom the lion.

  But he had no choice: he nodded.

  Jopek returned it.

  And the air between them electrified.

  “What I want to talk about,” Jopek said, “is a game. I reckon that may sound familiar.”

  “Where’s Patrick?”

  “We’ll maybe get to that, but answer me first: Are you good at games, you bet?”

  “I’m okay,” replied Michael.

  “Don’t lie, now.”

  “I’m . . . very good.”

  “We’ll see, won’t we? Now, as to why are ya here? Last night, I could’ve put a bullet in ya. I could have left your ass behind. But I dragged you outta Hell, ’cause you and me still had business.”

  “What bus—”

  “So here’s the rules,” interrupted Jopek. “The captain asks questions. The kid answers. If you lie, it’s a strike. White lies, half lies, fibs—strike, strike. Three strikes and we find out what that space suit looks like with brains on the front plate and oh, Ramboy, you are in trouble, you know that?”

  Jopek’s eyes glittered.

  “Question number uno: What’s your favorite color?”

  Michael tried to calm his thunder-some heart. “Purple.”

  “Gay, a little bit. Two plus two?”

  Michael answered.

  “Where are ya right now?”

  “I don’t know,” said Michael.

  “No idea? That scare ya?”

  “Yeah, but I’ll live.”

  “That’s your opinion, I guess,” said Jopek. “So where’s ‘Bub’ Faris?”

  Without even thinking, Michael heard himself reply, “Safe.”

  Jopek put a dumbstruck hand against his own cheek. “And how,” he said, “would you know that?”

  Michael breathed deeply—still scared, still bewildered. But for just a second, he felt his brain stretching, searching, and holy crap, did that feel good right now. “Because I think you want something from me.”

  “What the hell could you help me with, you reckon?”

  “‘Business.’ But that’s the only reason I’m still alive. And I wouldn’t do anything for you if Patrick was hurt.”

  Jopek’s mouth slanted into something like disgust. “’Cause you’re such good brudders.

  “Here’s a easy one: you never saw no soldiers. Did you?”

  Michael hesitated. Then shook his head.

  “And you don’t know nothin’ but nothin’ about other units.”

  Had Jopek come back because he wanted Michael’s “information” on where other soldiers were?

  “I ask the questions,” Jopek said, seeing the thought on Michael’s face.

  “No.” Michael shook his head. “I never saw any soldiers. It was just me and Bub.”

  Jopek asked, “Then how did you do it?”

  “Do what?”

  “Coulda swore I said I ask the questions! Coulda swore it!” Jopek said, giving a vicious, bitter laugh. “How did you live in this world, all the way to Safe Zone?” Jopek asked.

  Why is he asking this? “I don’t know.”

  “Well. Hey. Strike one.”

  Michael’s eyes flicked to the gun, any yes-yes feeling he’d had falling away. “I just . . . did,” he said. “I kept us pretty safe. If somebody was just watching us, they might have gotten worried. But just because they wouldn’t have known.”

  “Known what?”

  “What I could do.”

  “Which is?”

  Michael hesitated again. He saw himself through Jopek’s eyes right then: trapped; outplayed; the loser.

  “I thought—think—I could just breathe and like, understand things. Almost feel what was coming.”

  “Is that how you knew the answer about where your screwed-up brother is?”

  It felt like pushing on a bruise. But Michael nodded.

  “And why do you play The Game?” said the captain.

  “To help pass the ti—”

  “Strike two!”

  —Jopek’s hand, huge and meaty on the pistol—

  “—to protect him! To protect him.”

  “What from? Boo-boos? Diarrhea?”

  “No—look, you know everything, you know all this, why do you want me to say it?” Michael blurted.

  “And what do you think would happen at The End of The Game?” asked Jopek, ignoring Michael’s question . . . and smiling.

  What the hell? Had Jopek returned because he wanted to understand The Game?

  “We win,” Michael said falteringly. “There’s a party.”

  “Search party?”

  It was as if Jopek was forcing him to read his journal aloud. “An . . . Ultraman party.”

  “Except it didn’t work that way, huh?”

  “No.”

  “Why?” Jopek said. He looked eager.

  I can’t lie.

  Michael said: “Because of you.”

  “Now here we go!” crowed Jopek suddenly. “Speak it. Say that shit, Michael!”

  He leaned forward: his stool was about to tip, supported by only thin blades of wood.

  He’s pissed.

  A whisper of thought, coming from the back of Michael’s brain: . . . keep making him pissed . . . .

  What? NO!

  “SPEAK IT—”

  “We all would’ve been safer without you, Jopek.”

  What are you doing? Look at him! He’s not just pissed, he’s freaking deadly right now!

  Good!

  What? Why?!

  Because you’re right about Jopek: he’s just like Ron. Jopek isn’t a genius; he just got lucky last night. Piss him off, like you did with Ron, and Jopek will get sloppy, yes-yes.

  Michael did not totally trust yes-yes, but he could not help but think, Maybe this is The End—Beat Jopek, beat the final Boss, and I can save everyone.

  Jopek’s composure shattered. “You think you’re so smart?”

  Michael made himself smile. “You don’t want me to answer that.”

  “When did you start thinking that?” Jopek growled. “When did you start thinking you were better than me?”

  Oh
my God, is this why he kept me alive?

  To try to show me—and himself—that he’s “special”? That he didn’t just get lucky last night?

  Yes!

  The things that shot across the basket next weren’t Jopek’s bullets.

  They were Michael’s words, tumbling, tumbling:

  “The first second I saw you, seriously, I thought, ‘Look at that Shortbus Kid, I bet he asks me to tie his shoes.’”

  Jopek was booming to a stand and his eyes were fiery with anger and joy, side-by-side like complementary poisons. Jopek tried to pull back the hammer of the pistol with a clumsy-with-emotion hand. He tried again. Got it the fourth try.

  “Strike thr—”

  “It’s not a strike; it’s just true. Are you too stupid to get that?”

  Jopek slammed Michael sidelong into the wicker wall of the basket, and the moment was so yes-yes that Michael had to fight to keep himself from shouting victoriously.

  Jopek panted.

  “Heyo, the truth stings,” said Michael.

  The basket swung and swung in the sky.

  Jopek aimed the gun at Michael’s heart . . . and opened his fist.

  The gun dropped between the V of Michael’s feet, bouncing once before settling.

  Jopek lunged at him: he keyed open the handcuffs, then hurled the cuffs over the side of the basket in a glittering arc.

  “Who do you think you are? Think you’re better, let’s see it, let’s play! Move, gunslinger! Sling! Sling!”

  Michael gaped. At the gun between them. The gun in the pool of shadow between them.

  “N-no,” he faked.

  Yes, he thought. Yes!

  THIS IS IT! This was what Jopek was! Jopek was stupid, Jopek was jealous, and this was the final standoff the Game Master had promised Michael!

  Jopek’s breath rose to the high canvas. “Go for it. Draw. Sling it! Let’s us see who’s faster, see who’s better!”

  “No,” said Michael.

  “Sling!”

  “I was kidding before,” Michael lied.

  “I wasn’t.”

  “Captain!”

  “—Caaaaaaapppptttaaaaaaaiiiiiiinnnnn—” called Bellows a world below.

  “Suh . . . ling . . .” Jopek whispered. His voice was hoarse, and for a hovering, trembling moment, Michael felt pity for him. Almost. “Sling,” Jopek said, collapsing into the stool, thudding his head against the first aid kit that hung on the wall.

  “Jopek—Captain—Horace, I’m not going to shoot you,” Michael said in what sounded like desperation. “Let’s just talk this out like two grown-up dudes.”

  And that was when Michael made his move for the gun.

  The world clicked into yes-yes as he kicked the gun toward himself, straight into his space-suited hand.

  Jopek shot up from the stool, shouting.

  Michael knew, absolutely, that Jopek was going to strike him. He braced for it. He had taken everything a world of corpses had: he could take anything Jopek could offer and still get him to lower the basket and let him go free.

  Jopek’s fist leapt—

  —but not at Michael—

  —because it went for the first aid kit. He grabbed it and the kit clammed open, so for a second the red cross blazed before the sun like a sign, and out of the case spat—no, no, doesn’t work that way—a large, black pistol that Jopek had hidden and now snatched from the air. The gun in Michael’s hand began loudly clicking. Empty, he thought, fool me twice oh my God NO, and the basket exploded beside his head. Michael’s screams were trapped in his space suit and he could only hear the missiles revving past his skull while Jopek laughed and shot at his head, Which is how you kill people who were too slow and became Bellows, like me—

  —I was wrong—

  —Jopek isn’t like Ron—

  Jopek’s eyes were blastingly bright with intelligence.

  With cunning.

  With bad genius.

  Smart! He is smart! His secret is that he is smart!

  “Hey,” said Captain Jopek. “You missed me.”

  No accent, Michael thought.

  “Who are you?” Michael said.

  The captain’s face flamed: new mask, same fire.

  “Don’t you know yet, Mikey? I’m whover I damn well want to be.”

  Michael paled. “Are you . . . even a soldier?”

  “What I am,” Jopek replied, “is better than you. I want you to remember that.

  “I want you to know that I put a kill switch on that Hummer, so even if you’d gotten out of the Capitol last night, you never would’ve gotten away.

  “I want you to know that there are no other survivors in Richmond, you goddamn dumbass, ’cause every Safe Zone except mine got overthrown last week.

  “I want you to know that this world is my world, and the only reason you breathe in it is because I let you.

  “Every day of my life I have known that this new world was coming down the pike. You breathe and you think you can feel the future, Michael? No: I AM the future.”

  Michael tried to back away but the balloon only bucked. “You’re—you’re lying,” he said, his stomach falling. “There are other people.”

  Jopek reached into his jacket, pulled out a stapled collection of crumpled white papers. Michael recognized it instantly: the list that Jopek had shown Michael that had Mom’s name on it; the registry of all those who had checked into the Charleston Safe Zone.

  Now Jopek pushed the CONFIRMED DECEASED list at Michael’s face.

  Michael’s chest swooned. “No please no,” he moaned, and tried to look away.

  Jopek grabbed Michael’s chin through the space suit, forced his face back.

  Highlighted in yellow: Michael David Faris, killed 11/24 (KIA; Infected; Security Patrol)

  “Wh-what?” said Michael.

  “Yeah! Huh!” laughed Jopek. “It’s almost like somebody faked the list!”

  “Why the hell did you lie? About everything, about who you are?”

  Jopek cocked his head, as if vaguely amused.

  “The same reason as you,” he replied. “Because I want to.”

  That’s not true, hissed Michael’s mind. None of this is. Oh God, it can’t be. Mom. Mom can’t be dead—

  “All right, buddy, let’s get down to business.”

  Jopek seized Michael and thrust him up, forcing his face over the edge of the basket, and the stench of the Bellows sailed up at him like ripe disease geysering from a well.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  A thing can hide right in front of your face, Michael had learned, if you’re searching for something else. So at first, Michael almost didn’t trust what he was seeing.

  They were in downtown Charleston.

  The unbroken sky had been an illusion: Michael had mistaken the smooth, blue front of a Rush! Fitness for the open air. He and Jopek had not been high up in the balloon, either, no more than fifty feet in the air. Which seemed impossible when you considered how far away those thousands of Bellows had sounded.

  Except it was not impossible. Because there weren’t thousands of Bellows roaming the Charleston roads below. The road was covered in Bellows, yes . . .

  But all the Bellows were dead.

  Actually dead.

  Sprawled blindly and choking the road, like the aftermath of a massacre.

  “What the hell happened to them?” Michael finally managed to say.

  “Head wounds. All of ’em,” replied Jopek. He reached up and turned off the hot-air balloon’s burner. They began descending toward the Hummer, which the balloon was tied to.

  “You killed all of them?” Michael said. But as they got closer to the ground, he understood immediately that these monsters, which had overtaken the Capitol last night, had not been destroyed by a gun. The Bellows’ head wounds weren’t bullet holes, all circular and neat: the holes in their skulls were ragged crescents, cleaved into their foreheads or above their ears, a ruptured chaos of black blood and bone.

&nbs
p; They were bite marks.

  “My guess? That little boy—that new Thing—got hungry in the night,” said Jopek as the balloon touched down and settled atop the Hummer: he got out, tucked the pistols in his belt, secured the balloon with something like heavy-duty bungee cords, and turned off the balloon burner so it would begin to deflate. A moment later, Jopek climbed down off the side of the Hummer, and Michael followed him. “By the way, Michael,” he said, unlocking a gun case in the front seat and pulling out his AK, “you say a word about the other Safe Zone, and I’m afraid I’ll have to kill you. And I’ll make it hurt.”

  And he was Jopek again—or at least the person Michael had thought of as Jopek: redneck voice and cocky smile.

  Michael nodded. He felt dazed by the Bellows’ massacre. But he still did not understand something basic about his situation: “If I’m infected, why did you bring me?”

  But right then, Holly and Patrick got out the double doors in the back of the Hummer. Michael hadn’t expected to ever see them again. It seemed miraculous and absurd, the way they casually unloaded, as if their car had just pulled into a rest stop.

  “Hey, Bub,” Michael said, voice uneasy. “Like my new outfit?”

  Patrick whispered to Jopek, “Still the Betrayer?” Jopek nodded, ruffling Patrick’s hair. It was the same thing Jopek had done yesterday in the Hummer outside Walgreens, and back then, Patrick had look pleased. But Patrick flinched tensely this time. There was something haunted in his face: that dread-filled and desperate searching for something to believe. Patrick looked like a windup toy whose key has been turned too many times, as if the gears that had supplied the power to carry him through this nightmarish world were drawing tighter, tighter, tighter. And if just a couple more things went wrong for Patrick, Michael knew his brother was going to break.

  “’Morning,” said Holly. Her arms were folded across the belly of her blue hoodie. The skin under her eyes was puffy and red; she wouldn’t quite look at him. Her voice sounded small: he didn’t know if it was just the faceplate, but Holly had never sounded so far away.

  “H-hey,” Michael replied.

  Not: I’m infected, help me, help me.

  Not: Holly, why the hell did you have to tell Jopek about The Game?

  Not: Why didn’t you just leave with me yesterday?