by Tara Brown
Her fingers find mine. We hold hands as I manage to tilt my head to the right and stare out at the field of unmoving people.
He’s down there.
My shadow man.
I wonder if we’ll find each other in the next life.
It’s my last thought.
Chapter 28
Liam
The world didn't end in fire.
It didn't end in ice.
It didn't end at all.
It changed, becoming a faceless mess.
A horde of death and pestilence.
And mist.
I cannot forget the mist.
Taking everything.
Everything all at once.
But I didn't see it.
I ran before the mist hid me too.
I was alone.
I am alone.
I am forgotten, already before I am known.
My name is lost on the wind, gone before it was spoken.
The poem plays in my mind randomly.
I blink and see the sun above me, peeking through dark clouds.
It smells like rain and the light is making those weird rainbow circles with whatever moisture is in my eyes. I wipe it away. My arm is killing me. What happened?
I blink and shade my face, trying to recall where I am and what the hell is going on.
As I sit up and see the field of dead people surrounding me, I have to take a minute before I remember this wasn't me. I didn't kill these people.
I tried to save them.
She killed them.
Fury and something else, an ache in my chest like I’ve been shot in the heart, fill me enough for me to get up and assess the situation. I’m drenched from rainwater, but I don't remember the rain.
Smoke in the distance, a fire from a crash of some sort, has me more confused. At least it rained so the fields aren’t burning.
“What the hell is going on here?” I spin in a circle, blinking and trying to get my bearings.
Details creep back in. Memories of shit that can’t be real, until I turn in a circle and see the castle proving me wrong.
It is real.
I built a castle. Using zombies. In Canada.
I nod, recognizing that it was a genius plan. Until that bitch ruined it.
Where is she?
Scanning the field of lifeless bodies, I don't see her. But it’s impossible I would. There have to be a thousand people here, if not ten times that amount.
One face does stand out.
Leah. Leah Davis.
She’s lying on the ground and the sight of her head tilted to the right makes me uncomfortable. It’s not exactly remorse but there’s something there. I don't want her to be dead. Which doesn't make sense because I’m pretty sure her being here means she was part of the coup I just suffered through.
Lee is next to her, also lifeless.
That's too bad, I liked them both. Even if they were friends of Lou.
My eyes narrow as I try to find her near them, but she’s gone.
Of course she is. Of course she’s fine.
Someone coughs behind me. I spin to see Lee’s sister sitting up. She wipes her eyes and offers me a scowl, no it’s more than that. It’s real hatred pouring from her.
“How are you still alive?” she grumbles, wiping her face with her soaking wet sleeve.
“I’m like a cockroach,” I mutter and continue scanning the field. More people begin to wake. They’re coughing and making annoying sounds of life.
As they rise one by one, the face I’m desperate to find doesn't.
But hope comes in the devastated gasp that leaves Lee’s lips when she stands. “Lou!” She sees the burning crash site and covers her lips. She starts pushing her way through people and I follow.
But I’m not alone. Lee’s sister is next to me, offering me some impressive side-eye as we hurry after Lee.
A vision of finding a rifle and smashing her in her pretty face with the butt until she stops sneering at me gives me a warm feeling. I’m going to do that after I kill Lou. Right after. I might let Lee live.
Although, with the way she’s screaming, “Lou” and sprinting to what looks like a burning helicopter, I might change my mind.
She gets there way before we do.
She’s frantically searching the wreckage. She’s got her hands on her head. She’s panicking and pacing and holding herself and sobbing. She crouches down and hugs her body, completely lost in despair.
My pace quickens and as I get close, words leave my lips that I don't understand. “No! No, Lou!” I race to the burning metal, rushing the flames to find her there. She’s in the chopper. She’s burning too. Her hair is singed and smoking.
The fire kisses my hands as I try to reach her. She’s facedown in the metal. I’m reaching for her but it’s not to kill her. I need her.
My heart is breaking, a heart I didn't know I had. Feelings I didn't know I could feel. They’re choking me and stopping the air from getting to my lungs. I manage to grab one of her hands. It costs me and I end up screaming as the fire burns my forearm. Yelling from the effort and pain, I lift her out and carry her to the side hill next to us. I collapse onto the ground with her cradled in my arms. It’s the strangest feeling seeing her face. She has a burn on her cheek, it’s already blistered. And she’s covered in soot from the billowing smoke she was in.
“Please don't leave me,” I whisper, rocking her back and forth. “Please don't leave me.” I have no idea why I need this girl, but I think my humanity depends on it.
“Is Tanya there too?” a guy asks. He, Erin, and Lee pull and kick at the broken helicopter until finally one of them carries the other girl over. I vaguely recall her. I don't care if she’s alive or not. In fact, I would trade her life and everyone else’s for Lou’s.
And stupid Lou did the opposite. She traded hers to save the rest of us.
I recall the fight in her and beg the gods, whoever they are, that there is still some of that in her now. I hold her tighter, lifting her into my arms and kissing her forehead.
“Tanya!” A guy comes rushing from the crowd of noisy people. He’s terrified and the pain in his voice doesn’t lessen when he sees her. “No!” He dives to where she’s on the ground. He sobs over her, and for a second I think we might be brothers in this.
But again, I don't care about his loss.
Mine is all I see and hear and feel.
“Liam?” Leah’s voice lifts my gaze from Lou’s face. She starts to cry when she sees me, hurrying to where I am. She kneels in front of me. She and the despair on her face and my agony are too much. I burst when she touches my shoulder because we have been here before.
“She’s not gone!” I snap through tears. “She’s still in there.”
Leah’s face is exactly the same as it was with Grace. I close my eyes and sob, though I’m so angry I could murder everyone. I want them all to die. But it wouldn't be enough. They would be dead and I would still feel like this. It would change nothing. I would need to find their love and kill it and then we would feel the same.
“Liam,” Leah whispers, “I am so sorry.” She lowers her head and collapses like she is in as much pain as I am. She trembles with agony and I hate her. I hate everyone. Most of all, I hate Lou for making me love her. I hate her for leaving me here.
I cling to her and cry.
The world moves quickly around us.
People come, they cry. Lester shows up. He sits with me but doesn't speak. I suspect he can’t now. I hate Lou for that too.
The crowds move. They pick up the dead and pile them at the far side of the field where there’s a bit of a gravel pit. They build pyres. As they walk by, they gaze at Lou as though they might ask if they can take her. I growl and they move on.
Leah eventually leaves, she takes Lester with her. He still loves her.
Lee sits with me, her eyes are empty. I’ve never seen her look this way. She’s puffy and red and empty.
A guy comes, Kyle, I
hate him. I am actually going to kill him when I get the chance. Him and then Erin. I don't remember why I’m killing her but him I have to kill because he loved Lou. And she is mine. His eyes are red too, like he cried for her. And I want to scream at him and ask what he cried for. He barely knew her.
The crowd around me all begin to cry again when they realize some old man is dead. He didn’t make it through. I don’t know who he is, but Leah is holding his body and crying. There are kids with her, they’re crying too. I don’t know how they can cry for him, when Lou is dead. I don’t know who Milson is, the name they call him as they wail. I don’t care.
The sun is gone. The night sky is filled with stars and she is dead in my arms.
For the second time, I am holding my heart in the body of another person, another dead person. I want to cry about the injustice of it all, but there might be a bit of karma in this. I might have earned this fate. And that's the worst part of it all. That and the fact I will never be with her again.
My arms are tired. My legs are cramping up. I miss being indestructible. But I don't dare move. If I leave this spot, she is gone. And I will never recover from that.
Chapter 29
The field is filled with death and pyres.
Funerals for anyone who is known have been going on all day.
We agreed to light them all at once, but I don’t know if I can do it. If I can light her up and watch her sail away on the breeze.
I’m standing back a ways, staring at the spot where she lies on her pyre, when a small child, a little girl, comes over to me. She has Gus, Lou’s dog with her. He nudges me hello and the little girl takes my hand. She doesn't hold the whole thing, just a finger. My pointer finger.
I’m assuming she’s Joey of the Littles but I can’t tell them apart. The other two are there too but they don't hold my hand. They all sniffle and stare at the pyres.
Gus whines.
My fingers find their way to his coat and I dig in, almost holding him by his locks of rough fur.
He stares up at me, whines once more, then runs to where she’s lying.
The image of Leah holding me as they pried her from my arms is competing for top spot in my mind and playing on repeat. Only I see it in slow-motion. Me falling over sobbing as Leah holds me and I realize the shadow man is gone.
I don't know if he died with her. Did she die to take him from me so I would live on healed? Did she do it on purpose? The memory of being frozen as her lips press against mine, and she sucks all the evil out of me, suggests that’s how it happened.
But there’s also a chance that wasn't real and it’s more likely the bots healed the shadows and I’m just better. The urge is there. The sarcastic and bitter man I was before this all happened is still me. But there’s this weird lightness that seems to smother the fire of hatred.
I almost miss the old me.
Because I don't know what to do with this new me.
The three little girls and I stand off to the side, watching Furgus sit next to Lou’s body. He rests his head on her lap and it’s possibly the saddest thing I’ve ever seen.
A little boy walks over to us, slipping his hand into Joey’s.
“Hi, Mason,” she says softly.
“Hi, Joey. This is Mitch.” He points to the guy next to him. He looks about my age, maybe. His eyes are red and his face is drawn. He doesn’t stare at Lou like he knew her. He stares at Tanya’s body next to Lou’s. He blinks and silent tears trickle down his cheeks. There is no life in him. Like Lee, he’s hollow. Like me.
“Hi, Mitch.” Joey pulls her hand from Mason and offers it to the guy. He fakes a smile and shakes her tiny hand.
“Nice to meet you, Joey. Tanya talked a lot about you,” his voice cracks and I notice the beagle sitting at his feet.
He whines the same way Gus did and runs over. He jumps up and climbs onto Tanya’s pyre, curling into a ball and resting his head on her chest.
The guy, Mitch, sobs quietly.
Joey squeezes my finger and stares ahead again.
People start to come over.
The crowd draws behind us as if we’re the family of the deceased at a funeral.
But we’re not wearing black. We’re a crowd of beaten down and exhausted people who vaguely recall the last eleven months of our lives. We’ve been running and crying and screaming and dying. There’s been zombies and bots and blood that moves on its own. It’s a horror movie or a story from a science fiction TV series. It’s not real. It can’t be.
And yet here we are.
Standing at the grave sites of the girls who ended it all.
They were some of the only people who saw what was happening and knew it was wrong and evil. I was not one of those people. The bots were a perfect creation for me. I still crave that feeling of knowledge and power and healing. Super strength and the ability to do anything I think of. The ability to control everyone and everything.
But there is one thing I crave more than all that.
Her.
I wonder if she knew I would. If she knew that leaving me like this would fix me. It would force me to fixate on her to the point I couldn’t contemplate another thing.
My ability to fixate and obsess is the cure.
That makes me smile bitterly. Celia and my doctors never would have agreed to that. They were never going to cure me. They needed me broken so they had patients.
“I’m sorry for your loss,” Mason says to Joey after a long silence.
“I’m sorry for yours too,” she offers him back.
A woman walks to Mason, resting her hand on his shoulder. She’s familiar to me for a second before I realize where I know her from. Boulder. She was a nurse there. She worked with Celia. Her stare is stuck on the graves. She wipes her eyes and I remember it.
Tanya came into the ER with the wound on her shoulder. She’d tried to cut her bite mark off. Hers was different from everyone else’s. It didn’t heal itself. So they believed she had been genuinely cut. They didn't think she was a bitten. Her mom was a nurse.
It was the first time I met Tanya.
It’s weird how this all came into play. Me, Tanya, Lou. The three most important people in the zombie apocalypse. And Dr. Jacquard, the man responsible for it and for bringing it down.
What a strange turn of events.
I’m contemplating it all when Lee walks to the front of the crowd. She stands facing us, her back to Lou and Tanya.
She takes a deep breath but doesn't speak. She stares and I can tell the life hasn't come back in her yet. It will. She’ll heal. She’s one of those people. She’ll have kids and name them after Lou and Tanya and feel like she has to love on for them. It’s bullshit.
“I didn't know Tanya well at all,” she begins to speak and it’s too quiet for the crowd. Everyone hushes but the soft breeze continues to flicker the grass and wheat around us. “She was crazy brave. And maybe a little crazy.” She forces a smile.
The crowd smiles too. She’s better at this than I would have imagined.
“But I knew Lou well. Very well. She was one of my best friends in the whole world. One of the few people I loved like family, more than family.” She loses the smile.
The crowd is silent.
“And Lou loved Tanya like a sister. So that tells me all I need to know about her. Tanya was obviously an amazing person if Lou loved her. Because Lou was the best person I ever met. From the second our lives intertwined, I was always amazed at how brave and strong and cool Lou was. Everything was for her sister and her dog and her Littles.”
Lee starts to cry.
Joey doesn’t. She’s standing strong with her back straight and her chin held high. I fucking love this kid and I don't know her. The other two little girls are crying and wiping their faces.
“Mr. Milson was the best man I ever knew. He was the grandfather you wished you had. He loved his wife and he loved Lou and the Littles. He saved us so many times.” She blinks and wipes her cheeks slowly. “And then there’s L
ou; obviously, the most self-sacrificing person. She would do anything to help you if she could. No one got left behind.” Lee wipes her eyes. “So if we could take a moment of silence for the two of them, that would be cool. I think they are watching us from up there and sending us all their love.”
She nods her head and walks back to the crowd.
My feet begin to move before I even know they’re walking to the front of the crowd. Joey walks with me. She doesn't look up. Perhaps she understands I need to do this.
I turn and face the crowd, it’s massive. I didn’t realize how many people actually lived.
“Thanks, Lee.” I nod at her. Her sister glares at me. I wish I had enough old me to kill her.
But it’s gone. It died the moment I realized I loved Lou.
“Lou, undoubtedly the love of my life. Which is saying something.” I pause at that and realize these people don't really know me, so they don't care about that fact. “But she was not just an amazing older sister and friend.” I gaze down at Joey who nods. Her eyes are shining like little stars. “She was a true leader. And I think we need to not just remember Lou and her sacrifice, but to honor it. Honor what she gave up. She died so you could live. So we all could. She died because she wanted us to be human and be messy and have free will. She and Tanya gave up their lives so you could have yours. Don't waste it.”
Leah smiles at me through her tears.
Joey and I walk to the pyre where Lou lies.
I drop to my knees, not just because I desperately want to touch her once more but because they buckle.
I take her hand in mine. She’s still kind of warm from the sun that’s faded away.
“I love you, Lou. I will always love you,” I whisper and I mean it. It’s not something someone says because it's the right thing. An empty promise from some asshole who loves you until the next person comes along.
I will always love her.
“I will always love you too, Lou. And I miss you.” Joey sniffles.
Leah finds her way to us, dropping to her knees much more gracefully than I did and leaning on me. “I love you.” She laughs as she wipes her face again. “Your speech was exactly what I expected. Lou was smiling in heaven. I know it.”
