by G X Todd
NO.
And the horrible bearded man stepped over him and tried to fire more bullets into his back, even though he was down and not moving.
Not moving!
But the gun made a dry clicking noise again and again and again.
‘Leave him alone!’ she screamed, and this time she could hear herself. She wrenched away from the smelly ginger-haired man holding on to her – he stank of tuna fish, stale sweat and unwashed hair, and Lacey had thought she would puke all over him when he’d first grabbed her – and ran at the one who’d shot her friend, shoving him away hard enough to make him stumble and drop on to his butt.
‘Fuckin’ bitch,’ he spat.
She didn’t want to look down, didn’t want to see what had been done to him, what the bullet had shred into and destroyed, but she couldn’t help herself, she had to look, just in case—
In case what? a small voice asked.
—in case! In case! But all she could manage was a quick glance because, God, there was so much blood, and she suddenly felt hot and woozy, like she had that one time she’d taken a scalding-hot bath while she’d been on her monthlies, and when she’d stepped out of the water the world had gone all psychedelic and trippy, and she’d woken up naked and slumped against the bathroom wall with her grammy bent over her, fanning her with an old copy of Better Homes and Gardens.
She didn’t want to pass out again so she looked away from the Boy Scout fast, and clapped a hand over her mouth to stop the strange moaning sound coming out of her.
‘Jeb!’ The smelly man rushed over to the one she’d pushed on to his butt.
‘He stabbed me, Pose.’ The bearded man said it in a musing kind of way, as if he couldn’t quite believe what had happened. He held up his bloody hands to show his friend. ‘I’m bleeding all over the fucking place.’
Lacey heard her name and turned to find Alex trying to get up, one hand on the wrecked car for balance. She hurried over and tucked herself under the woman’s arm, helping her to her feet. Alex shuddered in long, shivering waves. Lacey noticed blood over the side of her neck and more staining the shoulder of her shirt.
‘I’m OK,’ Alex said, her arm tightening around Lacey’s shoulders. ‘I’m not hurt.’
‘Alex. Alex, they shot him.’ Her breath stuck in her throat and she pressed her face into the woman’s hot neck, drawing in deep breaths.
Alex held her tight, her shivers diminishing, little by little. It made Lacey aware of her own trembling.
‘For fuck’s sake, Posy, stop gawping at him and give me a fucking hand.’
Lacey lifted her head out of Alex’s shoulder. The smelly man – Posy? – stood gazing down at the Boy Scout where he lay crumpled in a broken heap. But at Jeb’s words Posy scrambled to help his friend up, the wounded man cursing and gasping. She felt a surge of satisfaction at seeing the sopping, bloody mess of his shirt. The Boy Scout had got him good.
‘What the fuck you staring at?’
She started and met the man’s eyes. They were dark and mean and filled with pain – but seeing him suffer gave her a fierce kind of pleasure. The words came before she realised she’d even opened her mouth. ‘I’m staring at you bleeding to death,’ she said.
His face went purple and he lifted his gun and aimed it at her. It shook as if his hand were palsied. ‘I’ll fucking shoot you, too, you cock-sucking little cunt.’
His gun’s definitely empty, that small voice said.
‘Your gun’s empty,’ she told him calmly. Too calmly. It weirded her out.
Alex murmured her name, and the arm around Lacey’s shoulders tightened.
‘Oh yeah?’ Jeb’s voice shook. ‘Is that fucking right?’ He fumbled at the gun, opening its cylinder, and emptied the shell casings on to the ground. From his back pocket he brought out a handful of fresh ammo and started shakily loading the brass cartridges into the chambers. He slammed the cylinder closed and cocked the hammer. ‘It’s not fucking empty now, is it, you smart-mouthed bitch?’
‘Jeb . . .’ Posy said timidly.
Jeb turned on him. ‘What?’
‘Boss wouldn’t want us to kill no gals.’
‘I fucking know that. What, you think I’m an idiot?’
‘No, Jeb . . .’ he said slowly.
‘Then shut the hell up and get that dead piece of shit in the back of the jeep already.’
‘But he’s tall, Jeb. Don’t think I can pick him up by my—’
‘Then get them to help you!’ Jeb waved his cocked gun at Lacey and Alex again. ‘Fuck. Do I have to think of everything?’
Posy nodded like an obedient dog, handed his shotgun to the wounded man and bent down and attempted to lift the Boy Scout under the arms. He didn’t get very far.
‘You.’ Jeb thrust his gun at Alex. ‘Get over there and help. Come on, come on, move it!’
Alex let Lacey go, her hand giving her shoulder a last squeeze, and joined Posy, leaning down to take hold of the Boy Scout’s dusty boots. Even between the two of them they got maybe three yards before the dead man slipped from their grip and ended up in the dirt again. Lacey gritted her teeth. She couldn’t look at him; to look at him would crack the fragile shell she had hastily erected around herself. One glimpse of him lying face down and she would fold inward, crumpling around the pain in her middle. She felt like she’d been booted in the stomach, right in the tender spot under her breastbone, her insides bruised from pelvis to heart.
Jeb watched her, and she in turn watched him, her gaze flicking down every now and then to where he was pressing his arm over his wound. He looked pale. The blood staining his top was dark and wet.
She breathed through her nose in hard little pants. That’s it, she thought. Keep on bleeding, you bastard. Bleed it all out.
The third time they dropped the Boy Scout, Jeb exploded. ‘Fuck’s sake! Just leave him! I don’t have time for this shit! Get their stuff and get ’em in the jeep.’
Posy trailed back and forth, transferring their packs into the back of the jeep. The big black dog back there trailed back and forth along with him, its chain chinking and its snout digging into the packs, snuffling around in them. Posy came to Jeb for his shotgun and kept it aimed at Alex and Lacey as Jeb limped around to the driver’s side and painfully climbed into the back seat. In the open V of the passenger rear door, Lacey looked in at him. His lank hair hung over his forehead in greasy strands, obscuring his eyes; his unkempt beard hid the rest of his face. What little skin she could see was pasty and damp. She didn’t want to get in there with him; it was like being cornered with a dying animal. A dying, armed animal.
‘Get in,’ he ordered, his gun on her.
Lacey climbed into the jeep, sliding her butt over to give Alex room. The door slammed shut after Alex, and Posy went around the front to the driver’s door. Lacey pressed as close to Alex as she could, away from Jeb and the unhealthy heat emanating from him, but once Posy was behind the wheel Jeb leaned nearer, pressing his unwashed body up against her, and jabbed the barrel of his gun into her side. He dug it into the soft flesh under her ribs and she cried out and tried to bend away from him, but she had nowhere to go.
‘Try ’n’ pull anything and I’ll gut-shoot you where you sit,’ he said coldly. ‘In these close quarters, the bullet’ll pass right through you and into your lady friend there. Two birdies with one shot.’
Posy let out a shrill guffaw of laughter.
‘Drive, Pose. I need the Doc.’
Exactly like the Seven Dwarfs.
Evil ones, she thought.
Posy pulled back on to the highway’s slip road, steering carefully around the overturned car as if the act of driving were a complicated task for him, and the jeep steadily gained speed as they came up to joining I20. The shot-out windshield and missing rear part of the roof were a godsend: within seconds the wind rushed noisily through the cabin, dispersing much of the stink and heat that had built up.
Lacey twisted round, biting back another cry when Jeb dug the b
arrel into her side again, but she didn’t care. After not wanting to look, now she had to.
You shouldn’t look back. Looking back does no good.
She looked anyway, until the dusty pile of clothes that was the Boy Scout was out of sight and there was nothing but empty road stretching out behind them.
CHAPTER 2
‘How come you were on our channel?’
The bleeding man’s dark, bleary eyes bored into Lacey’s as if his glare could drill the answer straight out of her. Maybe it could in normal circumstances, but she had no clue what he was talking about.
‘On the fucking CB radio,’ he growled. ‘What were you doing transmitting on our channel?’
Alex’s arm, already wrapped around Lacey, pulled her in closer. ‘We were going through all the channels,’ Alex answered. ‘Curious to see if anyone would answer, that’s all.’
‘Where’d you get the unit from?’ There was a tight suspicion in Jeb’s pain-filled eyes.
Don’t tell him anything.
But again Alex answered before Lacey could open her mouth. ‘We picked it up a couple weeks back.’
Lacey didn’t know why Alex had lied but was glad she had.
She’s not stupid. Look at him, he’s a murderer.
Jeb grunted, hazily glaring for a moment longer before slumping back with a sharp, hissing sigh.
‘Where are you taking us?’ Alex asked.
‘To see the Boss,’ Posy said from up front. Closed up in the cab with him, Lacey could see the adolescent pockmarks in Posy’s cheeks, his wispy, gingerish beard growing in patches and not doing much to hide them.
‘Shut up,’ Jeb told him, but the words lacked force. He sounded drugged, sleepy. His head drooped a little where he sat, and the gun didn’t jab quite so painfully into Lacey’s side any more.
She glanced into his lap and saw that his blood had seeped down into the denim; a dark, spreading stain across his crotch.
He spotted her looking. ‘Keep your fucking eyes off me.’
She went back to looking out through the windshield. A single tear fell from her eye, on the side Jeb couldn’t see. She silently wiped it away.
‘Who’s the Boss?’ Alex asked. She had leaned forward a little so she could direct her questions at Posy.
‘He’s the daddy to our family. The father to our flock. The—’
‘One more word passes your lips,’ Jeb told him, ‘and I’ll tell the Boss it was you who wasn’t watching Red properly when she got out.’
Posy shut his mouth.
‘Who’s Red?’ Alex asked the bleeding man.
‘Some other troublesome bitch. Who knew the world was so fucking full of you?’ He laughed. It wasn’t an amused sound.
A sign went past. ‘Williamstown – 4 Miles’.
‘You’ll have all the answers you want soon enough – and wish you didn’t, I bet.’ Jeb wheezed another laugh. His head drooped lower, his chin touching his chest.
Lacey shifted slightly, leaning away from Jeb and rocking into Alex. She felt the woman look at her but didn’t turn to meet her gaze; she was too busy glancing down at the gun nudged up against her side.
I wouldn’t go for it, that voice warned. At least not yet.
Over the last few minutes Lacey hadn’t paid too much attention to the internalisation of her thoughts. Mainly because everything had happened so fast, and also because she suspected she was in shock. She had been too distracted to concentrate properly on anything. Now she had the time to listen more closely she was beginning to realise these weren’t normal thoughts. Not normal at all. For starters, it wasn’t her voice she was hearing.
Who says it’s not your voice?
She went cold. She squeezed her eyes shut. No no no, please don’t let this be happening to me. I can’t cope with this happening to me now. Please.
It’s happening. But it’s OK. You don’t need to be scared.
She opened her eyes and looked at Alex.
The woman raised her eyebrows at her.
I think it’s happening, Alex, she thought at her. I’m hearing them. Help me.
Alex didn’t answer, of course. She wasn’t psychic.
You’re not crazy, the voice said. At least, no more than you already were.
‘No,’ she moaned, despair knotting inside her.
Jeb’s head came up a notch when she spoke, but it bobbed back to his chest again within a few seconds. The gun shifted a little more, no longer digging into her side but pointing towards the dash.
I know you’re scared, but you don’t have to be. I’m not going to hurt you, I promise. Now, it’s easier to keep your thoughts separate if you speak them aloud, but it’s less suspicious if we can talk in here. And it’d be much safer to avoid suspicion.
She glanced around at the others again, her heart thrumming in her throat, but no one seemed to be aware that she had a voice talking at her that no one else could hear. Posy was focused entirely on his driving; Jeb was mumbling something under his breath, his eyes closed, and twitching every now and then like a dog does when it dreams of running and killing rabbits; one of Alex’s arms remained wrapped around Lacey’s shoulders, the warmth and weight of it a comfort, while the long, slim fingers of her other hand nervously picked at a loose thread on her jeans. She stared out of the side window, her thoughts a million miles away.
Lacey shook her head. She wasn’t going to engage with this thing in her head. That way lay madness. Frequently, at the end, she had caught her grammy talking to herself, mumbling to people who weren’t there, flapping a hand next to her head as if trying to bat away an annoying insect. Lacey had always believed it was a genetic thing and, though she was only sixteen years old, she might have even considered that dementia was getting an early start on her, its fingertips grazing, searching out a better grip for later on. But not any more. It was a voice, exactly like Alex had described. It was the same thing that had caused everyone to lose their minds and kill themselves.
You’re not losing your mind. Trust me.
Lacey closed her eyes, didn’t like the darkness behind her lids and quickly opened them again. What if it made her do something crazy?
Panic raced up her spine at the thought. She didn’t want to hurt anyone!
Calm down. You have all the control in this. I can’t make you do anything you don’t want to.
So far it was only talking. She didn’t feel any anger or evil intent from it. But that didn’t mean she should trust what it said.
Just try and clear your mind. Please. If only for a moment. We need to talk.
If she spoke to it she could ask where it had come from, what it wanted from her. Her grammy always said that ignorance often led to fear. You had to understand something before you could gauge whether it was worth being afraid of or not. And if she didn’t like what it said, well, she could deal with that when it happened, right? One step at a time.
Just concentrate on thinking about nothing. It’ll help.
Taking a deep breath, she stared at the pebbled plastic of the dash and, before she knew it, it began to blur. She panicked and lost concentration. Her mouth was so dry it was practically impossible to work up any moisture. She swallowed painfully.
You’re doing really well. Keep breathing. Think of your mind as a blank slate, a black chalkboard waiting for words to appear on it.
She wished it would stop talking. A creeping fog seeped in from all sides, the brightness of the outside world dimming at the edges, like it did when she was on the verge of being asleep. Sounds and smells grew faint. The same fog slipped into her ears and nostrils.
Good. Very good, it said in a soothing voice.
She directed her thought deeply inwards, imagining her head as a bottomless, black well, the words jagged and jittering and boldly white with her fear, floating down into the dark.
– What do you want? Who are you?
She waited, but there was no answer, and again she considered the possibility that her mind was already lost.
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I’m just a voice. I’m not here to harm you.
She jolted when the car bounced over a rock, and her concentration fled, the noise of the world rushing back in – the blowing wind, the racing engine, the jangle of the heavy chain in the rear as the dog moved around – all of it assaulting her senses.
She clamped her eyes closed and tried to shut it out. It took her a full minute to quieten her thoughts.
– But where did you come from?
The reply came quicker this time. Where does life come from? It just comes into being. Not here, and then suddenly there. Poof, like magic.
– What? You’re telling me you’re magic?
If I can’t be explained by science, then I must be magic, right? But we’re getting off topic.
That wasn’t an explanation, and she was beginning to think she was being talked down to, like she was some stupid kid. She bit down on her anger.
– So why are you here?
It seems I need to be somewhere. There wasn’t much time to deliberate all the pros and cons. I had limited choices.
– But what are you? What do you want?
Want? I don’t want anything. I’m as surprised by all this as you are. I’ve never heard of anything like this happening before. You shouldn’t tell these people about any of this, Lacey. It’d put you in danger. You must listen to me.
It knew her name! Fear and frustration pounded thickly through her temples. In fact, a whole mess of emotions was building up inside her, a ball of pressure in her chest that was rising up to her throat.
Are you going to cry? The voice sounded appalled at the possibility. Then Lacey had to wonder how a disembodied voice could project the feeling of being appalled through to her, but she was feeling it, all right, and it was another emotion on top of all the other emotions already engulfing her. There was too much going on in her head and, honestly, having just her own thoughts in there was more than enough, but now she had hers and this other’s and her feelings were shooting off all over the place like an out-of-control garden sprinkler.
‘I’m not gonna cry, you asshole,’ she said, but angry tears were already flooding her eyes.
