When Lukas led them to his sister’s hide-out, Elliot was amazed all over again. For once he was glad of his sister’s rebelliousness. Without any of the family knowing it, she had set up her own apartment, complete with furnishings and a small amount of food. Surely she could never have imagined the circumstances in which it was now being used.
After resting and eating with his companions, Elliot began to take stock of what had happened to him. There were questions he needed to ask, though he feared their answers. Finally, he summoned the courage to ask Rose.
‘Where’s Jenny?’
Rose’s eyes grew wide and she swallowed. ‘I don’t know. Mother sent her to the hospital because she was questioning and yelling about what they were doing to you.’
That’s when Fee, the tall warrior woman, spoke up. Her eyes were filled with emotion and her lip quivered. ‘Jenny was the beautiful red-head?’
Elliot felt his heart drop. ‘Yes. Skinny, pretty.’
Fee reached out to Elliot and pulled him to her. Elliot knew what she was going to say. She held him against her chest and he felt as if Fee were holding up his world. He turned his face into her shoulder and cried, ‘No.’
‘I’m so sorry, Elliot.’
He heard Rose screaming then, and went to her. They held each other and mourned their sister. Jenny was gone. But even so, some strange part of his mind, or perhaps it was tiredness, was keeping him calm. It was as if there was a new hole within him, something unidentifiable, and he knew it would never be filled. He would never feel complete again.
Elliot held on to Rose and let her cry herself to sleep. Then he roused himself, aware of another undercurrent in the little room. Katie was looking at Lukas as if he were a springing spider. He had seen her with that face before, back in the Tower, when Elliot had asked her not to kill a small beetle. She had agreed not to, but then had never taken her eyes off it, tracking its movements carefully. Finally, exasperated, Elliot had captured the tiny black bug in a jar and taken it outside. Now Katie was looking at Lukas with the same careful measurement, but it was impossible for Elliot to ask her what she was thinking — there was no privacy here, and he had no wish to cause offence.
Elliot let his eyes grow heavy and stopped fighting off sleep. He felt Katie’s cool flesh next to him, and smiled. They were together again.
KATIE, Tuesday night, autumn, 62 A. Z.
I COULDN’T STOP looking at him. The way his skin felt, the way he smelled, the gentle way he put his hand on my back — all filled me with joy and hope.
But it was also hard to ignore my growing realisation that we seemed to have escaped one set of dangers, only to be faced with another.
I was quite sure the Blue was mad. He wasn’t being completely honest, telling us obvious half-stories, and talking about crap like Destiny and Righteousness. He sounded like a freaky cult leader. Plus, he kept trying to use telepathy to talk to me, and it was scary.
He had told me to eat and go to bed, and it really made me angry. Nobody told me what to eat and when to sleep — not when I was a teenager and certainly not now. So I was sitting gloomily in the corner next to a candle, resting but refusing to close my eyes. Elliot was fast asleep beside me, exhausted. Fee met my eyes. She nodded subtly and made sure I was paying attention, then slowly looked towards Lukas. She looked back at me and mouthed the word ‘Crazy’.
I nodded and raised my eyebrows, as if asking, ‘What do we do?’
She shook her head softly. ‘Escape.’
I looked down at Elliot. He was too tired to move now. ‘Tomorrow?’
She contemplated this for a moment and then nodded in agreement.
Frightening as it was, it was good to have my fears about Lukas confirmed. This Fee had seen something I hadn’t, and I trusted her instincts about him. Somehow we had to get out of the City and away from him — and away from his army of Deads.
LUKAS, Wednesday morning, autumn, 62 A. Z.
OUTRAGE! AFTER ALL I had done for them, sparing them, allowing them to live, and then they did this to me! They’d tied me to my chair as I slept — how could I have let that happen? I thrashed against the ropes and allowed myself to feel the pain as my skin rubbed and broke against the twine. I growled and flipped myself onto my side, and managed to free one leg.
Why would they do this? I was their path to a better way of living. I was going to offer them a pure life, a way to cleanse the world and start it afresh. They could have been the beginning of a new kind of humanity and I would have been their leader, helping them to live with the new rulers of the Earth: the Infected.
And now they had betrayed me and had doomed themselves. I would destroy them. It was apparent to me now that all humans were evil and every last one of them needed to be eradicated.
Katie, my fellow Blue, angered me the most. She was a traitor to her own kind. You forget who you are, I called to her with my mind. I will get you. I will get all of you!
But for now I was completely alone. I used my free leg to push myself, and the chair I was tied to, over to the table. I pulled my foot as far under me as I could, and rocked until I had enough momentum to flip myself over. Now I could see if there was anything useful up on the table.
At first glance, there wasn’t — just an assortment of art supplies, all of which were useless for cutting rope. Then I saw that the paintbrushes were sitting in a glass jar. Perfect.
I tried to focus on my task, but I was seized by bouts of anger. When that happened, I’d lie quietly and call to my brothers and sisters to look for the traitors. Most of them, I knew, would do their best, but would fail. That was okay, I didn’t blame them for the inadequacies of their bodies. My Variants would track them down. They were the elite amongst my soldiers, able to hunt, to speak to one another.
Get them, destroy them, I commanded.
I smiled as I bumped the jar off the table, breaking it into the shards I would use to cut the rope. They thought they could tie me up and escape. Yes, and they’d done it, but they’d soon see. I had plenty of time to catch them.
I sawed through the ropes by holding a broken piece of glass in my mouth. It cut the corner of my lips, but I didn’t care. It was easy enough to sever the ropes, and I felt impervious to pain after all I’d been through. ‘Try to stop me now!’ I shouted to the empty room.
I sent one more thought towards Katie, hoping she was still close enough to hear it: My army is going to kill all the humans and there’s nothing you can do to stop me.
ROSE, Wednesday morning, autumn, 62 A. Z.
ELLIOT WAS GENTLY shaking her awake. He put his finger to her lips and mouthed, ‘Quiet.’ Instantly Rose’s heart raced, and she scanned the room for some new threat. But there was nothing. Elliot pressed his lips to her ear and whispered softly, ‘I’ll explain later.’
She saw then that Fee and Katie were carefully tying Lukas to the chair he had fallen asleep on. Rose turned to Elliot: ‘Why?’
He shook his head again and pointed to the window. Then he looked at her so desperately that Rose decided she wouldn’t question him anymore. She gulped back fear and headed for the rope ladder.
Elliot climbed out the window first, holding the ladder gently so that his weight wouldn’t bang it against the side of the building. Rose watched him scale up to the roof, then steadied herself on the windowsill for her climb. She looked back once more at Katie and Fee, busily tying up Lukas with the rope from Oscar’s and her old emergency rope ladder. Katie looked up briefly and waved for Rose to go. She turned and began climbing as quickly as she could. When she made it to the roof, she could see that the Deads were still moving about. Elliot grabbed her and pulled her down into a crouch behind a storage box. They waited, motionless, barely daring to breathe. Minutes passed, then they saw Katie and Fee crawling up onto the roof. They were hunching low and looking around them. Elliot raised his arm and motioned them over to where he and Rose were hiding.
‘Thank goodness,’ Katie said as she hugged him. Then she looked at
Rose. ‘Good job, lady. Way to be stealthy.’
Rose was still confused about why they were running away from Lukas but sensed this wasn’t the time to ask. She was also a little confused by Katie, though she seemed nice enough. She talked funny, kind of like the old people of the City talked, and it dawned on her that Katie too might be really old, despite looking so young. There was a lot Rose didn’t understand.
‘Now we’re all here, let’s get going,’ Fee said, holding her club ready at her side. ‘This isn’t going to be easy.’
Elliot gave Rose a tense smile. ‘Just stay close, little sis, and we should be okay.’
They snuck their way through the bridges, mostly watching and waiting until the Deads ambled on past them. On several occasions they had no choice but to fight their way through — Fee would rush to the front and throw her club down into the skull of the advancing Dead, usually dropping it with just one hit. If the Corpses approached in a group, it fell to Elliot to pick up the second Dead. He fought well, even if not as cleanly as Fee. Katie was too small to make a direct hit to the head of a Corpse, so she stuck with Rose, holding her arm and escorting her through.
They had climbed down the last ladder and were about to make their way out of the City when they heard an unfamiliar noise behind them. All four spun around to look. A white-haired Gunslinger and a teenage boy stood on the road.
‘Are you okay?’ the man called.
‘We don’t want any trouble from you, Gunslinger,’ Katie answered.
The Gunslinger smiled and said, ‘I think I’ve heard your voice a couple of times before. It’s nice to finally see your face.’
Rose had no idea who the man was, or what he was talking about, but Katie visibly relaxed, and motioned their group towards the Gunslinger.
‘Where are you headed?’ he asked.
Katie looked past him and pointed to the desert. ‘Anywhere but here. You?’
The Gunslinger nodded and looked in the direction Katie had pointed. ‘Same. But we’ve got no horses and there’s just the two of us.’
‘So what are you saying?’ Katie asked.
‘Well, I reckon we’ve got dangerous times ahead, and you could maybe use a couple of extra hands fighting off the Deads. And, to be honest, we’d be safer with you as well.’
Katie narrowed her eyes. ‘Joining forces?’
‘That’s what I’m asking, ma’am.’ Virgil stared at her intently.
Fee moved up beside Katie and whispered in her ear. Katie listened, then nodded to Virgil.
‘Okay, let’s go.’
They took off running as best they could with their weapons and hastily-scavenged supplies, but were forced to walk when Rose lost her breath or stumbled. Though no one complained, she was well aware that she was the slowest of the group and struggled to keep up.
The Gunslinger and Fee fought off most of the Deads they came across, and the teenage boy and Elliot helped too, when it was necessary. But soon Rose was too tired to keep walking, and the Gunslinger and Elliot took turns carrying her. She burned with shame at her weakness, but she didn’t know what she could do. Finally, the Gunslinger turned back to the group and said, ‘We need to start thinking about somewhere to hole up for the night. We’ll never survive out in the open in these suburbs.’
‘How about a bank? Will that do?’ Katie asked.
‘As long as it’s secure and not too far away,’ Virgil said, and raised his eyebrows. He was clearly impressed.
Katie led them down a side street, and they were lucky — only a few desiccated Corpses came at them. Fifteen minutes later, they stood in front of a rectangular brick building with bars over its windows.
‘It’ll have a vault, if we’re really threatened. But I think the bars on the windows will probably be secure enough for us to stay in the main room.’
Virgil went to enter first, but Katie stopped him.
‘Hey, I’m immune to them. It’s better I go and see if there are any Zombies trapped in there first.’
Virgil and Fee helped her open the heavy doors, and she slipped inside.
‘Look at these shadows,’ Fee said, frowning. ‘If this place doesn’t work, we’re going to be in the dark soon.’
Elliot grimaced. ‘We’ll make it work,’ he said.
Rose closed her eyes and willed Katie to hurry. She could feel the last of her strength and warmth seeping away. She sagged against Elliot, and felt him catch and pick her up.
Moments later, she heard Katie call them. ‘Come on.’
Rose felt slightly stronger once she had been brought inside and given a blanket. They were in what seemed to be the bank’s main room. Its walls were covered in peeling paper and the carpet on the floor was thick with dust, but it was secure and the doors strong. Rose watched the others walking around, double-checking for safety, and felt the tension in her body ease. She was bitterly thirsty but had no energy to get up and look for something to drink. And she didn’t want to ask one of the others for their canteens, so she closed her eyes and tried to think of something else.
She wanted to ask why they were running from Lukas, who had seemed to be so kind to them, but she was afraid to know. She didn’t think she could bear another shock.
At last the place was properly barricaded, and the teenage boy came over to sit down next to her. Rose didn’t want to be the first one to talk. Let him be the one to introduce himself, she thought.
The boy fidgeted a bit and shifted his position, but the silence and tension still didn’t make him speak first. Who was he that he could just sit there like that?
It was Katie who broke the silence. She grinned and said, ‘It’s good to see you two already acting like an old married couple.’
Rose gaped at her. Was this boy Xavier Santos? It must be. Her face flushed and she tried to think of a suitable response.
Xavier managed it first. ‘This isn’t how I imagined we’d meet for the first time.’ He looked down at his hands and frowned briefly. ‘I’m sorry it has to be like this. Nice to meet you finally in person, anyway.’ He looked up and smiled politely, then stood and walked towards the Gunslinger.
Katie laughed out loud. ‘Sorry, sorry for laughing, but that was awkward. I’m so happy I’m not a teenager.’
Rose wasn’t amused. Her first meeting with Xavier was meant to be special and beautiful. Instead, they were running for their lives, her hair was tangled and her clothing covered in filth, and she was the weakest and most helpless of their party. How was she ever going to talk to him now? Why hadn’t anyone told her who he was?
VIRGIL, Wednesday night, autumn, 62 A. Z.
VIRGIL WOKE TO a gagging sound, then a haunting, ‘Oh no, oh no …’
He leapt up and instinctively grabbed his machete. Fee was standing and at the ready a split second later. Their eyes strained in the dark to see what was happening, but it didn’t take more than a few seconds to understand the damage.
It had been Elliot’s turn to guard the group while they slept, and he must have stood too close to the bars on the window. Virgil’s stomach turned when he saw what had happened.
‘Where? Where?’ he asked, running over to him.
Tears were streaming down Elliot’s face, and he motioned to his shoulder. ‘What can I do? It’s only small, I think. It barely got me. What do I do?’
Katie was up now, and she let out a long slow moan. She ran to Elliot and held him in her arms, weeping.
Virgil hung his head. ‘There’s nothing we can do except—’
‘Try to cut the bite out,’ Fee said. ‘Now. It’s not much, but I’ve got some instruments here that might do the trick.’
Virgil watched Fee carefully unwrap a small leather bundle she had taken from her medical pack and walk towards Elliot. ‘Lie down, now,’ she said.
Elliot dropped to the ground and Katie helped rip his shirt off. Fee apologised briefly, then sliced into the skin just above his collar bone. Elliot screamed and Virgil helped to pin him down. The wound Fee was making
was deep and bled heavily, but she tried to reassure Elliot she hadn’t cut anything that would kill him. She worked steadily, moving with his thrashing, until she had cut away a piece of skin the size of a small lemon. By that time, Elliot had passed out from pain and lay slumped, his head in Katie’s lap.
Virgil was shaken but kept his face impassive. Elliot’s screaming had filled the room with tension and desperation, but when he’d blacked out and his screaming stopped, his sister’s crying had replaced it. She stood like a ghost, her eyes wide, screaming, until Xavier had gone to her to try and calm her. It didn’t work. Finally Xavier put a blanket over her head as if she were a frightened animal, and hugged her to the ground. Virgil heard him say, ‘Enough! The yelling isn’t helping anyone.’ Virgil couldn’t help but smile.
‘Now what?’ he asked Fee.
The woman sighed and looked down at Elliot’s pale, bloody body. ‘We wait. Maybe he turns, maybe he dies, maybe he becomes like Katie. It was our only option.’
Virgil nodded and thanked her. The woman fought like a Gunslinger, yet was a nurse. He was grateful she was part of their team.
‘Oh, and take this.’ Fee handed Virgil a small bag of herbs. ‘Mix a pinch of it with a cup of water and give it to Rose. It’s the same sedative I gave the one-armed Blue at the City.’
Virgil nodded again and did as he was told.
Then they waited. Virgil was usually good at this, but the hours dragged almost unbearably as he paced the room, listening to Elliot’s loved ones crying for him, mourning what could happen, pleading with him to be strong and pull through. Elliot’s face burned with a temperature, but he didn’t convulse. Fee said that this was a promising sign and that his body was fighting.
Virgil was restless. He wanted to get to the Tree Sanctuary, but it was already too late in the day to leave the suburbs, and too dangerous to travel by night, in any case. They’d have to stay another night. The thought of it filled him with dread.
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