by Tracey Ward
“No.”
“Did you hurt them?”
“Would it bother you if we did?”
Maybe. “No.”
“Hmm,” he hums, not believing me. “They’re fine. Caged, but fine. My guys took them down easily.”
“What guys? Since when is there anyone here willing to fight?”
“Since always. They were just looking for someone to follow. I found another Hive member after you left. Couple of Westies. They had just brought in those Elevens before you bailed. You were worried they were your boy…” His voice trails off as he looks over my head to Trent and Ryan behind me. His face lights up. “Ryan Hyperion? Are you kidding me? That’s your man, isn’t it?”
“Stop,” I mutter, knowing it’s useless.
He steps around me to go to Ryan and Trent. I’m surprised when he offers his hand to Ryan, then pulls him into a half embrace.
“Good to see you, man. I’ve watched you fight in the Arena. Your brother, too. That guy made me a lot of scratch. I’m sorry about what happened to him.”
Ryan nods, his expression guarded. “Thanks.”
“So you’re the guy Kitten is all hot and bothered over? Nice.”
I groan, letting my head fall back until I’m staring at the ceiling. “Why do you have to make everything sound dirty?”
“Speaking of,” he says, turning back to me. I meet his gaze as he looks me over slowly, then whistles softly. “You’re still a Benjamin, Kitten. I’m a little less impressed with Hyperion here. Or disappointed, depending.”
“Depending on what?”
His response is a sly grin.
I want to punch him, but what I feel the most, what knocks the angry hot wind out of my sails, is the fact that I also want to hug him. I hadn’t realized it until now, but I’ve missed him. He’s obnoxious, he’s frustrating, he’s rude, he’s cocky—but he’s Vin, and for some strange reason, I like him. Probably for the same reason I like Ryan and Trent. They’re honest. Annoying as Vin may be, he owns it. He is what he is and he’s not at all sorry.
“So you’re the King now, huh? The new Marlow?”
He shakes his head, his face falling serious. “No. I’m more like the president.”
“I don’t remember enough about life before the fall to know the difference.”
“A king is unchecked power,” Trent tells me. “He can pretty much do what he wants. A president answers to the people. Supposedly.”
“Why supposedly?”
“Depends on if he’s dirty.”
I look Vin up and down. “This one is dirty.”
He smiles at me as he closes the gap between us. “Not as much as I thought I’d be.”
“But a little more than they’d like you to be.”
“They who?”
“The people.”
“Nah, the people love me.”
“What about Marlow?” Ryan asks.
Vin doesn’t flinch. He also doesn’t turn to look at Ryan. He stares at me, his eyes intense and strange. He looks almost angry. “Marlow loves me too,” he purrs.
I narrow my eyes at him, not buying the everything-is-cookies-and-cream act. “Sounds like everybody loves you,” I reply quietly.
He nods in silent agreement.
“But will they still love when you won’t give them what they want?”
“And who am I denying in this scenario?”
“That’s kind of my point.”
“Ask what you’re asking.”
“You know what I’m asking. You know what I’m saying. These people want to be free. Marlow wants both them and the building. You can’t please everybody, so who will you make angry? Who isn’t going to love you in the morning, Vin?”
He leans in close, his breath hot on my face. He smells like candy—like sugar and sweetness, which is just about the weirdest thing ever, but that’s not what worries me. It’s his eyes and his words. They’re both hard and cold, like ice. “Same as always,” he whispers against my skin. “Whoever I screw.”
***
“Your pimp is going to screw us,” Trent tells me.
We’re standing in a small office tucked in the back of the building. Vin has taken it over, putting all of the wasted equipment in the corner—things like filing cabinets, telephones, computers, and inspirational posters telling us to hang in there and be determined to succeed. Thanks, random guy in a stiff-looking suit. I’ll be sure to keep in mind your advice the next time I’m cornered in the dark by flesh-devouring dead.
The cannibals have all been captured and put on lockdown somewhere in the building. I’m not sure what Vin has planned for them and I want to say I don’t care, but I do. I told the cannibals not to hurt any of the Colonists, and now that we’re on the flip side of that, my anxiety is still there. I guess I don’t want bloodshed of any kind, a fact that’s pretty surprising to me. Ask me a few months ago if I cared whose blood was on whose hands and I would have told you that I hope they all kill each other and leave me alone forever. But now here I stand in a building filled with cannibals, Colonists, Hive members, and Lost Boys, and suddenly I’ve lost my edge.
“Yeah, I know,” I mutter.
“Don’t call him her pimp,” Ryan snaps at Trent. “He’s a pimp, not her pimp.”
I glance at Ryan, surprised by his tone. “What’s your deal?”
“Nothing.”
“It’s something.”
“He’s jealous,” Trent says.
Ryan shakes his head in disgust. “Dammit, man.”
“What are you jealous of?” I ask, completely confused.
“He’s jealous of Vin.”
“Trent, seriously, shut up,” Ryan barks.
I frown at him. “Why are you so angry?”
“I’m not angry.”
“He’s jealous,” Trent repeats.
I touch Trent’s arm, hoping he’ll get the hint to shut his mouth for two seconds. “Why are you jealous of Vin?”
“I’m not.”
“He—”
I slap Trent’s arm hard. He finally gets the hint.
“I’m not jealous, all right?” Ryan tells me. “Or maybe I kind of am. It doesn’t matter.”
“It does to me.”
“He was obviously happy to see you.”
“Because I brought help.”
“That’s not why he was happy to see you. And there’s all that Benjamin talk and the way he looks at you.”
“He’s a pimp. It’s what he does.”
“I want him to stop.”
“He never will.”
“Then I’ll never like this guy.”
“You and nearly everyone else left alive. He’s not very likeable.”
“You like him,” Trent points out.
I close my eyes, wishing I could slap him again. “I do, yeah.”
“Why?” Ryan asks.
“Because he’s my friend,” I say weakly, feeling small talking about this. I’m exposing a chink in my armor. They already know I care about them; now there’s this Vin crap on top of it. If they find out I’m stressing over the welfare of a room full of cannibals they’ll probably take me out back and shoot me in the head because this pony has gone lame.
“A friend who’s going to screw us,” Trent points out.
“Maybe.”
“And you still like him?” Ryan asks, amazed and annoyed.
I shrug, feeling uncomfortable. “It’s hard to explain.”
“If you have to choose sides, him or—”
“You,” I say firmly, looking him dead in the eye. “I will choose you. No question.”
Ryan grins slightly, almost grudgingly. “That’s not what I was going to ask.”
“Oh. What were you going to ask?”
“Him or the cannibals?”
“You. Still you. Whatever side you’re on, that’s where I am.”
“Even if I side against him?”
I chuckle. “I assume you will. Look, I’m not good at reading people or de
aling with people. I also don’t have that selfless thing going that you do, so you’re my moral compass. I’ll follow you wherever you tell me to go.”
Ryan raises his eyebrows in surprise. “That’s a lot of faith.”
“I was ready to put my faith in Vin once. Compared to that, you’re a lock. Besides, Trent is stupid smart and he’d follow you to the ends of the earth, so it seems like a safe bet.”
“Unless you go to Canada,” Trent inserts.
Ryan balks. “Why would I go to Canada?”
“My point exactly. It’s cold. I don’t like cold.”
“We should go down to California.”
I shake my head. “Droughts. Fires.”
“Oregon?”
“How is that different from here?”
“Idaho?”
“That’s a worse idea than Canada.”
“You’re determined to hate everywhere, aren’t you?”
“Why does it matter? Are we going somewhere?”
“I don’t know, are we?”
I look at him skeptically. “Are we?”
“Are we?” Trent asks.
“Maybe,” Ryan answers softly.
My stomach churns as my gut tightens. I don’t know what this means for him or for me or for Trent. Is he seriously thinking about leaving here? We don’t know what the world outside of Seattle is like. It could be better, but it could definitely be worse. There could be more compounds like the Colonies, there could be bigger and badder gangs. There could be more zombies than we’ve seen in years or there could be wide open spaces, empty and thriving with life—real life, that doesn’t moan or groan.
It also makes me wonder why we’re doing all this. If he wants to leave, why don’t we just leave? Cut and run. This thing is in motion but there are plenty of bodies ready and willing to carry it out to the end. It doesn’t have be us. They need me to bridge this gap right now, but after that I’m useless. The cannibals have all hinted at that fact. We could leave tonight and never look back. Never remember.
But I know it’s a lie. I know I would always wonder. I would wonder the way the ring still resting on my finger felt heavier the longer I was away. I worried for Vin and the rest of the people in this building every second of every day, and no matter how hard I tried to distance myself from them, I never really left. A part of me was still with them here in this building, trapped and burning to be set free.
“No matter what we do or where we go,” I tell them softly, “we see this through to the end.”
Ryan nods. “Of course.”
I look up at Trent to find him staring out the door and down the hall. I can’t tell what he’s looking at. The long hall is dark and filled with Colonists milling around, waiting for whatever is going to happen to hurry up and happen. Nothing looks unusual to me at all. Whatever has his attention, though, it has it strong. I don’t think he’s blinking.
“Trent?”
“I’ll play follow the leader until it’s done,” he replies, his voice dead.
I frown at Ryan, confused, but if I’m looking for answers I’m looking in the wrong place: his face is a mirror of mine. I’m about to ask Trent what he’s looking at when Vin appears at the end of the hall. People say hello to him as he passes, and generally bask in the glory that is Vin. Women smile, men step aside, and I can immediately see why they fell in line behind him so easily: he has it. It’s the same thing that I don’t have. Never have and never will. The same thing that Ryan has that Trent doesn’t—charisma.
“Thanks for waiting,” he tells us as he comes inside and closes the door solidly behind him.
“What else were we going to do?”
He grins. “I’m glad you’re back, Kitten. I’ve missed that.”
“Missed what?”
“Your bluntness.”
“What happened to the Leaders?”
“See, there it is. Right down to business.”
“What happened to them?” I repeat.
“What do you think happened to them?”
“They’re dead,” Ryan guesses.
I shake my head. “No, they’re not dead. They’re in prison.”
“Why would you think he’d spare them?”
“Because it’s what I would have done. They’re a liability but they’re valuable, but the big question is what are you going to do with them?”
“It’s already happening,” Vin confirms. “We’ve been using them to keep up communications with the other Colonies. We rotate them. Put each of them on the radio at different times to keep up appearances that everything here is business as usual.”
“How long do you think you can keep that up?”
“Not much longer,” he admits, taking a seat. “We’ve been buying time, that’s all. It’s not a permanent solution by any means.”
“What’s your plan then?”
“You.”
I can’t help but laugh. “Me?”
“You were always the plan. Well, except for when I was the plan. You’re what we’ve been stalling for. We’ve been waiting for you to come back with reinforcements. You were supposed to come back with The Hive, but I guess you had other plans.”
“You mean Marlow had other plans,” I say sharply, bristling at the implication that I didn’t do my job. “We went to him. I stood in the center of his filthy lair and I told him everything. I even showed him your ring, and do you know what I got in return?”
“A ride up a brown creek without a paddle?” Vin asks knowingly.
“Winner, winner.”
“I’d like it back, by the way.”
“What? The boat?”
“Hope you can swim,” Ryan mutters.
“No, not the boat,” Vin says impatiently. “The ring.”
I slide it off my finger and toss it to him. He catches it easily. When he slips it on his own finger, I swear I see him relax. As for me, my hand feels oddly empty without it.
“So you brought me savages in place of soldiers?” he asks.
“I brought you what I could get. We even went to Vashon Island looking for help.”
Vin sits up straight, suddenly very interested. “For real? You hit up the Vashons?”
“We tried.”
“And how’d that go?”
“We ended up in prison,” Ryan tells him frankly.
“And now they hate us,” I add. “Colonist boats showed up out of nowhere so they assumed we were spies. We barely made it off the island alive.”
“Colonists showed up how long after? Days? Weeks?”
“Days. There was a fight out on the water. The Vashons won. We barely survived it. The boat Marlow lent us sank, we ended up on the Colonist shore, and that’s when we were found by the cannibals.”
“And the cannibals took you in like the compassionate, social butterflies that they are?” he asks sarcastically.
I scowl at him. “No. They took us prisoner.”
“You’ve been to jail a lot lately,” Vin chuckles. “Do you want me to lock you up for the night? Will you feel more comfortable?”
“They took us to their city under the streets,” I continue. “That’s when they offered to help us.”
“And why would they do that?”
“Because they hate the Colonists as much as anyone else—maybe a little bit more,” Ryan tells him.
“They told us about the arrangement,” I snap.
I shouldn’t have brought it up, not now, but I couldn’t help it. It was out of my mouth before I even knew I was saying it.
Vin looks at me blankly. “What arrangement?”
“The one in your stables. The one with the babies.”
I’ve never been afraid of Vin, and there’s no visible reason why I should be now, but there’s something in the air that changes then. It becomes hotter. Tighter. I feel it burning and turning in my lungs, not filling the space the way it’s supposed to. It’s more like a living, angry, writhing thing threatening to strangle us all with each breath.
&nbs
p; A scream cuts through the air and the tension. It’s gut-wrenching, and for a brief, crazy moment I wonder if I made it. The tightness in the room and in my chest make it completely possible, almost probable. But then I hear running outside as Vin leaps from his desk and sprints for the door, and I know it wasn’t me. It’s coming from farther off in the building. Somewhere downstairs.
We follow Vin out of the office, down the stairs, and into the open sleeping area. He stops there, his eyes scouring every corner of the room like a wolf sniffing the air for its prey. The scream sounds again and we’re on the move. I know where we’re going now.
The showers.
Chapter Eight
When we reach the door to the showers we find a crowd already forming. Vin shouts once, just a bark of a noise, and the crowd immediately thins to let him through. I’m amazed by it, but the amazement is short-lived. When I enter the room behind him, my amazement turns to horror.
The floor is bathed in blood. Vibrant red. Living. Warm. The walls are sprayed in a mist of rusty red that’s running down the gray surface, dripping onto the floor, and racing down to move toward the drain. It looks like the little rivulets are trying to get back to the source—to find their way home, but home is just a memory. The heap of red gore and white bone barely resembles a human body anymore. It’s been gutted from the center, desecrated to the very edges.
At the edge of the mess is a woman I recognize from the sewing rooms. She’s on the floor on her knees in the corner, as far away from the body as she can get. She’s sitting silently with her hand against her mouth, her eyes watery and wide. Several people are sitting with her as she shakes uncontrollably.
I hear someone in the hall vomit on the floor—coughs and heaves, the splash of their dinner hitting the cement. Someone else gags. Footsteps run away. It’s then that I realize just how sheltered these people are. There was a time when a sight like this was as common as bird poop; you couldn’t turn a corner without coming face to face with this stuff.
“Who is it?” someone asks tremulously from the corner.
I look at the thin delicate wrist, one of the few sections of skin still intact. It’s a woman.
“Can you tell?” I ask Vin.
He shakes his head.
Ryan steps up beside me. “This is the room we came in through. It was clear when we got here. Joss, Trent, and I were the last to leave it.”
