“The scientists.” Haley snapped her fingers to drive home her point. “They hunt down Feeders and take them back to their castle? Otherwise known as a research facility? Maybe?”
Hope bloomed so quickly in my chest, I didn’t have the chance to shut it down or tell it to wait. Could they really be talking about the research facility? Could we really be so close?
We turned the corner and a blast of heat washed over my skin. I blinked against the strange intensity of it and when I could finally make out the blaring but contained fires, I smiled for the first time in weeks.
Fires. Three of them.
They were burning in barrels with turned over crates surrounding them. Blue tarps from old fruit and vegetable stands had been tied high in the air. They created a tent of sorts without sides or doors. Tattered, dirty blankets were shoved to one side of the space, scattered over lumpy mattresses and case-less pillows. These children lived here, in the open air.
I looked around with open-mouthed awe. I couldn’t reconcile what I saw with the reality I had lived with for the last three years. These fires didn’t just warm the air and cleanse the leftover scent of rotting flesh and a decaying world, they signaled something with deeper meaning, they told the story of something that had been niggling at me for weeks.
The fires brightened the darkening sky and announced our presence. They were a lighthouse in the black night and a symbol of humanity. The beds left out in the open showed indifference to the dangers I knew existed and a lack of fear for what could happen in the middle of the night.
These kids weren’t afraid of Zombie-related consequences. They weren’t afraid of warlords stumbling upon them or cannibals hunting them. These children lived in a way that we never had.
Or at least hadn’t in a very long time.
We sat down around the fire and I let the smell of burning wood become healing incense for my soul. Could we really be okay here?
Could we really be safe?
Adela had already engaged their little leader in a conversation. So I sat next to Hendrix and waited for her to translate for us. He took my hand and wrapped my fingers with his strong, firm grip.
Leaning his head toward mine, he whispered, “I’m sorry.”
I turned to face him and found myself deep in the intensity of his blue gaze. “You already apologized.”
The smallest smile lifted the corners of his lips. “I need you to know that I meant it. I need you to know that wasn’t me earlier. I was possessed or something.”
I melted a little with his sincerity. I didn’t expect perfection from him and I certainly knew we were never going to be a perfect couple. But we loved each other and that was all I needed. Plus, it was nice to know that I wasn’t the only one that could mess up.
I ran my free hand along his scruffy jawline and smiled up at him. “Maybe not possessed. Maybe just stressed.”
The breath he let out rattled in his chest, full of emotion and pain. He let go of my hand to hold my face with both of his. He dropped his forehead to mine and closed his eyes. “It hurts,” he whispered. “Every second of every day. I don’t know how to make it stop.”
Tears immediately fell from my eyes. I had no chance of stopping them… not when his grief hit so severely.
“I don’t know either,” I whispered, my voice broken, my heart shattered. “But things will get better.” I pressed my hand to his heart. “This will get easier.”
His lips brushed my forehead and I felt his gratitude to my core. I didn’t know if he believed me, but he wanted to. I wanted to, too. We had been in so many bad situations before, but we’d finally found our bottom.
We couldn’t live like this any longer. We couldn’t survive this kind of pain and the rottenness of this world. Something had to give.
“His name is Santi,” Adela spoke in English again and pulled our attention to her. “He says the people on the hill control the city. He is poorly educated and I have a hard time understanding him, but I think they haven’t seen a Zombie in a very long time. I asked him why they don’t go live with the people on the hill, but he didn’t answer me. I am convinced that these people are the scientists you are looking for, though. He says he will show us the way, but he will not go inside with us.”
“Why not?” Haley asked. She rocked Lennon with determination, in an obsessive way that tugged at my franticness. We needed solutions now. We couldn’t wait.
“He’s afraid of them,” Adela explained. “And I do not know why. He won’t say.”
New nerves clawed at my stomach. I didn’t know how to take that. Should we be afraid too?
I looked at my friends, my loved ones. They’d sacrificed everything on this journey. We’d lost so much and nearly lost even more. Was it worth it to finish this? Was it worth our lives to save others?
“Maybe we should give up?” My voice shook as I addressed the crowd. “Maybe it’s not worth it. We’ve made it this far and we’ve found a city that isn’t overrun with Feeders. We could make a life here. We could rebuild without risking anything more.”
They nodded with me and sat in pensive silence while my words settled in. I was the one that brought them here, but at the same time I wasn’t willing to lose another person I cared about.
Adela added, “I asked them why they don’t live in houses and they said that the houses smell bad. It’s better outside. But I don’t think they know how to clean. We do. We could have our pick of the city and turn it into something habitable.”
I started to like this idea more and more. “We could find weapons again, real ones. We could find something big enough for all of us and arm ourselves. We wouldn’t have to worry about constant survival then. We could learn to garden and hunt like the kids do. Maybe not dogs… but maybe there are other animals around here that we could eat.”
Hendrix slid forward and sat up straight. “It’s possible,” he agreed. “This way we wouldn’t have to dance around other humans. They could just as easily take advantage of us as anyone else. Maybe more so because we are offering them pieces of us. I know we want to help, but at what cost? Would we be forced to give up more than we can afford? What if we…” He looked at his little sister curled up on Nelson’s lap. His voice was barely audible when he finally scratched out, “What if we lost someone else?”
Nobody said anything. The reality of Hendrix’s words punched us all in the gut and we had to emotionally adjust before we could move on.
I had just decided that our new plan was the best plan when Page spoke up. “No,” she said simply. She jumped off Nelson’s lap and stood in the middle of us. “No,” she repeated.
Nelson chuckled at his little sister’s uncharacteristic defiance, “What do you mean no?”
“We’re not this… this selfish,” she answered. “We don’t give up and we don’t walk away from a challenge.” She turned in a circle, meeting each of us with a fierce gaze. The fire blazed behind her, illuminating her blonde hair with an orange glow, lighting her blue eyes with pure, white light. “We’ve come this far. We lost Vaughan. We’re not going to give up now and walk away. People need us. These people could use us to solve this problem, to make sure nobody has to die from a Feeder bite again. We can’t quit now. I can’t quit now. I have to do this.”
Hendrix stood up too. He towered over his young sister, showing her who was in charge. “Page, you don’t know what you’re talking about. You don’t understand that we could lose more than Vaughan. They could take everything from us. They could take you from us.”
She tilted her head and lifted an eyebrow. “You would never let them take me from you.” She waited for him to disagree. When he didn’t, she pushed on through a thick, wobbly voice. “I trust you, Hendrix. I trust all of you. And I don’t just trust you to keep me safe, I trust you to save the world. You are my heroes. You have kept me safe and saved my life every single day for as long as I can remember. You can’t stop now. The world needs you. I need you.”
“Nothing like having yo
ur ass handed to you by a five-year-old,” Harrison muttered.
Page whirled on him. “I’m nine. And cuss jar.”
I laughed before I could help it. She was right. And so was Harrison. We just got our asses handed to us by a little girl who knew more than she should about a world that shouldn’t exist.
Tears wet my lashes again, but this time they were from pride. I was so proud of this girl and the person she was becoming. Everything that could go wrong went wrong for us and yet she remained wholesome and innocent. She somehow remained good, despite being surrounded by so much bad.
“Then it’s settled,” Hendrix announced. “We’ll continue on as planned. Page has promised to protect us.” She spun around and looked helpless and terrified until Hendrix winked at her to let her know he was teasing.
The smile that lit up her face was one of the most beautiful things I had ever seen.
“They can light fires and skin and cook dogs, but they don’t know how to clean?” King addressed the crowd. “Bullshit. They don’t want to clean.”
We followed his focus to watch the kids expertly skewer dog meat over the open flame. The flesh crackled in the heat, letting off a unique odor that I wasn’t sure about.
“You okay with this?” Hendrix asked Nelson across the fire.
Nelson nodded, “We’re in.” He thought about it for a minute and added, “If they touch my child, I’ll kill them all.”
Hendrix sucked in a deep breath, “You are not alone in that.” He turned to Tyler and repeated the question, “Are you okay with this, Ty?”
She didn’t turn away from staring at the fire. “I don’t care what we do.”
I felt Hendrix’s unease as it shifted through his body. “Tyler, you might not care now, but you will someday. I need you on board or we’ll do something different.”
Tears tracked down her cheeks. She never took her eyes off the fire. “I’m okay with it then. Whatever it takes to eradicate these bastards.”
Hendrix made eye contact with Harrison, then King, then Miller and finally Adela. They all nodded their consent. We were in agreement.
“Santi will take us whenever we’re ready,” Adela assured us.
“We’re ready,” Hendrix decided.
“We’re almost ready,” Harrison interjected. “Just as soon as I’m not willing to gnaw my own arm off. I need to eat.” He took a piece of meat when it was offered to him and immediately chewed off a large bite. After a moment, he said, “Not too bad, for you know… dog.”
Two hours later, he had a different opinion.
“It hurts so bad,” Harrison wheezed. “Why did I need to eat?” He bent over and clutched his stomach. “Why did I think that was a good idea?”
I had my own stomach issues to deal with, although I hadn’t eaten nearly as much as King and Harrison. God, dog did not agree with me. Not in any way. “I think this is going to kill me. Nobody can survive this.”
“I should have eaten my own arm,” Harrison whimpered. “It would have been easier to digest.”
“Enough,” Hendrix commanded. I looked over to find sweat beaded across his forehead and his shoulders jerking with pain. This had hit us all hard.
I doubled over in pain. Cramps sieged my insides and threatened to tear me apart. I had never felt like this before. We had eaten some awful food during our last year on the run, but I’d never experienced anything quite this aggressive.
Bile pushed up my throat and for a few glorious seconds I thought I could puke this poison out of me. The feeling passed and I whimpered with frustration.
King groaned and clutched his stomach. “They did this on purpose,” he accused. “This is how they trap their victims.”
Hendrix gave him a hard look, but King didn’t apologize. We were all too miserable to take orders. The dog had decided to eat us from the inside out.
“This is how the pioneers died,” Nelson added unhelpfully. “They shit themselves to death. Just like this.”
“Cuss jar,” Page gasped.
“Sorry,” Nelson muttered.
“That’s not true,” Harrison argued, but it sounded more like a plea than anything else.
“What do you think dysentery is, dude?” Nelson grunted. “People die of that shit.” King snorted a laugh and Page shot him a dirty look. “Sorry,” he said again. “Cuss jar. Got it.”
Adela patted my back. She had declined the dog, but hadn’t bothered to warn any of us. Consequently, her stomach was still intact and we had decided to accuse her of being in cahoots with Santi and his gang of murderous children.
“Santi says we’re almost there,” she said soothingly. “It’s just at the top of this hill.”
I moaned something in response, feeling half delirious with the pain. She took my hand and pulled me toward the top of a steep hill. The pavement was surprisingly smooth and I was thankful that I could shuffle along without fear of tripping. If I fell, at this point, I might not ever get up again.
We stumbled our way up the rest of the distance and came to a stop in front of a stone wall that stretched high over our heads. I took a slow breath and forced my body into standing. The knife in my hands slipped to my fingertips as I put all of my strength into straightening my back.
For a second, I forgot my agony as I faced the imposing building protected by the massive wall that would keep almost everything else out. Thick barbwire ran along the top of it, three levels high, and in front of the barbwire, long spikes poked skyward every two inches. The message was clear.
Keep out.
An iron gate stood in the middle of the wall, shut tight and locked with heavy chains. On the wall, near the hinges, sat a video monitor with a fuzzy screen. A red light blinked in the corner.
I squinted at the electricity and tried to reconcile the phenomenon with what I had seen of the rest of the city… and the country… and the continent… and the world.
It didn’t fit.
Intense curiosity moved me forward until I stood before the buzzing screen. A blue button nestled next to the blinking light, daring me to push it and find out if anyone lived here.
“The research station?” Hendrix asked in a low voice next to me.
Another cramp attacked my gut and I leaned forward, resting my head on the cold iron. I breathed through it and waited for the pain to pass. It took another minute before I could stand again.
“I think so,” I gritted out to Hendrix. “There’s only one way to find out.” My finger hovered over the blue button while I waited for Hendrix to stop me or talk some sense into me or do anything but leave this up to me.
“They might have a cure for liquid diarrhea,” he mumbled instead.
I laughed, surprised by his sense of humor. “Then this whole trip has been worth it.”
He elbowed me gently, “Go on,” he coaxed. “Let’s see if anyone’s home.”
With a shaking finger, I pressed down on the blue button and waited. Then waited some more.
I wondered how shocked the people inside the station were to get visitors. It was clear that the children wanted nothing to do with them, but I didn’t know how many people roamed these city streets. They could be barraged with visitors and individuals seeking their help and medical expertise.
Or they could be an isolated culture that thought they were hidden away from the rest of the world.
“Who are you?” a voice barked at me through a scratchy speaker.
I was too surprised by the question to censor my response. “Who are you?” I demanded.
There was silence for a full minute before anyone responded. I had just started to realize I had made a colossal mistake when a tightly accented British voice said, “Since you’re knocking on my door, I expect you already know who I am.”
I frowned. I didn’t know exactly who it was on the other end of this speaker, but I had an idea of what he was up to in there. I looked at Hendrix and waited for a piece of wisdom to fall from his lips.
His brows furrowed and he shrugged
his shoulders. So much for that piece of wisdom.
“If you’d let us in, you might find that you know who we are too,” I said cryptically into the speaker.
More drawn-out silence before he came back with, “I highly doubt that. We don’t get much news this way.”
I pressed my lips together. I was used to our reputation preceding us. It had never worked in our favor before, but I was hoping this would be different.
Then again, how I expected them to know about us all this way from Apocalyptic-civilization was beyond me. It wasn’t like they got the End of the World Times or Zombie TMZ. We had finally traveled beyond our notorious reputation and found people completely unaware of the havoc and chaos we brought everywhere with us.
Hendrix leaned forward, taking over the blue button and filling in explanations I was too addled to come up with. “We’re people that can help,” he explained. “We’ve heard what you’re up to and we think we can add to your research.”
The British response was quicker this time, “And what kind of research do you think we’re up to here?”
Hendrix wiped at the sweat on his brow and I could tell he was fighting to stay standing. “You’re looking for a cure.”
“A cure to what?” the voice shot back.
“To the infection,” Hendrix answered just as quickly.
“And how do you think you can help with that?” the crisp voice demanded.
Hendrix held my gaze and with a straight face and conviction I didn’t know he had, he announced, “We’re immune.”
I could hear the shock as it rippled through the airwaves between us and the building. Finally the mystery voice asked in a rasping voice, “Immune to what?”
“To becoming Zombies,” I finished. “We’re immune to Zombie bites.”
“That’s not possible,” the voice argued. “We’ve tested it on hundreds of-”
“We are,” Hendrix cut them off. “You can see for yourself. We’re immune.”
“But how did you… how did you find us?”
Hendrix and I shared a small smile. They were starting to believe us. I hadn’t expected it would be easy for them to trust us, but I hoped that our experiences and the Parker blood would hold some weight over whether or not they decided to work with us.