Plague

  They rowed like they were rowing for their lives. And in some ways they were, Sam knew. If the bugs emerged from Dekka while they were in this small boat, none of them would survive.

  Toto groaned, lying on the bottom of the boat in two inches of fish-smelling water. Dekka lay against Sam in the stern. His arms were around her. He whispered in her ear not to give up.

  He could feel them through her clothes. He was careful to avoid the emergent mouths, but he could not avoid feeling the surging horror of insect bodies moving within Dekka’s body.

  “Sam, you promised me,” Dekka moaned.

  “I will, Dekka. I promise I will. But not yet, not yet.” To Quinn he said, “As soon as we reach the dock, go for Lana.”

  “Lana can’t help,” Quinn grunted, never slackening his pace. “She can’t kill them.”

  “She doesn’t have to,” Sam said.

  “I’ll take the kid, Orc,” Drake said. “Where’s Astrid?”

  Orc stared at Drake. So many emotions in his tired, drink-addled brain.

  Drake was the cause of all his problems. If he hadn’t escaped . . .

  But hadn’t he himself just stormed up here to take it all out on Astrid? And yet, Drake’s sadistic, cocky grin made something like steam rise up inside of him.

  “Whaddyou wan’ with the kid?” Orc slurred.

  “Drunk much?” Drake taunted. “Friend of mine wants the ’tard. So, where’s the sister?”

  “Leave her alone.”

  Drake laughed. “Rock boy, I’m not leaving anyone alone. I have an army outside. I’ll do whatever I want with Astrid the Genius.”

  “She didn’t hurt you.”

  “Don’t play the hero, Orc, it doesn’t work for you. You’re a filthy, drunken degenerate. Have you smelled yourself? What do you think you are, her knight in shining armor? You think she’ll give you a big, wet kiss on your gravel face?” He peered closer at Orc as if looking inside him. “Nah, Orc, the only way you ever get Astrid is the same way I get her. And that’s what you were thinking, isn’t it?”

  “Shut up.”

  Drake laughed delightedly. “Oh, you sad, sick disaster. I can see it in your bloodshot eyes. Well, I’ll tell you what: you can have whatever’s left over after I—”

  Orc swung hard, with surprising speed. The rock fist caught Drake a little high, nailing the side of his head but only a glancing blow.

  Still, a glancing blow from Orc was like a sledgehammer.

  Drake stumbled sideways, slammed into the wall, but kept his feet.

  Orc went after Drake, swung again, and this time missed completely. His fist punched a hole in the wall where Drake’s head had been.

  Drake was behind him, dancing away. “You big, stupid idiot, I can’t be killed. Didn’t you know that? Bring it, Orc. Come on you lumbering, stinking pile of crap.”

  Drake lashed him then. It didn’t hurt Orc much. But he felt it.

  Orc lurched toward him, but Drake was quick and nimble. He danced away, slashed at Orc again, and this time wrapped his tentacle around Orc’s neck.

  It wasn’t easy to choke Orc, but it wasn’t impossible. Drake was behind him, pulling as hard as he could, tightening his whip hand like a python, inch by inch, trying to squeeze the pebble skin.

  Orc dug his fingers into the whip hand and pulled at it, tried to tear it free. But it wasn’t working because somehow Orc’s grip was weakening. He tried to breathe but couldn’t.

  Suddenly the whip hand released him.

  The whip hand was withdrawing, shriveling. Orc twisted to face Drake as bright metal bands crossed his teeth. Drake’s zero-percent-body-fat body became pudgy thighs and face.

  “What?” Orc asked, blinking hard. Then he understood. He’d never watched Brittney emerge before but he knew it happened, had heard it happen as one voice gave way to the other.

  “Hi, Orc,” Brittney said.

  “Brittney.”

  She looked around her, confused. Then her eyes fell on Little Pete.

  “So, he is Nemesis.”

  “He’s Little Pete,” Orc said.

  “We have to take him,” Brittney said. “It’s the only way. The Lord wills it.”

  “No,” a voice said.

  “Astrid!” Orc said. “I was . . . looking for you.”

  Astrid barely looked at him. “I ran away. But I’m back.”

  “Astrid, God has said He needs Little Pete,” Brittney said complacently. “It’s the only way.”

  “I know you think you talk to God—”

  “No, Astrid, He talked to me. I saw Him. I touched Him. He’s a dark God, a God of deep places.”

  “If He’s a God, why does He need Little Pete? I thought God didn’t need anything.”

  Brittney got a crafty look. “Jesus needed John the Baptist to announce His coming. He needed Judas to betray Him, and Pilate and the Pharisees to crucify Him so that He might redeem us. And the Father needed the Son to pay the price of sin.”

  Astrid felt weary. There was a time in her life when Astrid would have welcomed an opportunity for a theological discussion. It wasn’t as if Sam had sat around with her, debating. He was completely indifferent to religion.

  But this was not the time. The sad creature that was Brittney was just a tool of the malevolent creature she had confused with God.

  In any case, why was Astrid defending Little Pete? She’d been ready to see him die if it meant an end to the suffering.

  “God doesn’t ask for human sacrifices,” Astrid said.

  “Doesn’t He?” Brittney smirked. “What am I, Astrid? What are any of us? And what was Jesus? A sacrifice to appease a vengeful God, Astrid.”

  Astrid had nothing to say. She knew all the right answers. But the will was gone. Did she herself even believe in God anymore? Why argue over a phantom? They were two fools arguing over lies.

  But Astrid still had her pride. And she could not remain silent and let Brittney have the final word.

  “Brittney, do you really want to kill a little boy? No matter what your so-called God tells you, isn’t it wrong? When your beliefs tell you to murder, doesn’t a voice inside you tell you it is wrong?”

  Brittney frowned. “God’s will . . .”

  “Even if it is, Brittney, even if that mutant monster in a cave really is God, and even if you’ve understood Him perfectly, and you’re doing His will, and He wants you to kill, to deliver a little boy to Him so that He can kill, isn’t it wrong? Isn’t it just plain wrong?”

  “God decides right and wrong.”

  “No,” Astrid said. And now, despite everything, despite her own exhaustion, despite her fear, despite her self-loathing and contempt, she realized she was going to say something she had never accepted before. “Brittney, it was wrong to murder even before Moses brought down the commandments. Right and wrong doesn’t come from God. It’s inside us. And we know it. And even if God appears right in front of us, and tells us to our faces to murder, it’s still wrong.”

  It was that simple in the end, Astrid realized. That simple. She didn’t need the voice of God to tell her not to kill Little Pete. Just her own voice.

  “Anyway, Brittney,” Astrid said. “If you want to get to Petey, you have to go through me.”

  She smiled then for what felt like the first time in a long time.

  Brittney, too, smiled, but sadly. “I won’t, Astrid. But Drake will. You know he will. The bugs are all around this building, waiting. And when Drake comes, he will take Little Pete and kill you.”

  The two girls had almost forgotten the swaying, bleary-eyed Orc.

  He moved now with surprising speed. He grabbed Brittney by the neck and waist and threw her from the window.

  “I don’t like her,” he said.

  Astrid ran to the window and saw Brittney lying flat on the ground.

  The bugs turned their blue eyes upward.

  Indifferent to Brittney—who was already picking herself up, unharmed—they surged toward the ruined front door of Coate
s Academy.

  “About time.” Orc laughed. “Let’s get this over with.”

  “Orc, don’t let them kill you,” Astrid said, putting her hand on his arm.

  “You was always nice to me, Astrid. Sorry I . . .” Then he shrugged. “Don’t matter now. Better get out if you can. Most likely this won’t take long.”

  He ran into the hallway. Astrid last saw him as he laughed at the bugs below him, vaulted the landing rail, and dropped down into the swarm.

  “You want Orc?” he bellowed. “Come and get me!”

  The boy, whose name was Buster, tried to get away, tried to stand up and run, but he was far too slow, far too sick. He coughed and stumbled and fell on his knees.

  The bug’s tongue attached to his neck and yanked him headfirst into flashing mouthparts.

  A girl named Zoey coughed, doubled over with the pain of it, and a second later was caught and eaten.

  It was a massacre.

  Brianna flew like a madwoman, her knife flashed, her sawed-off shotgun barked, but the bugs were up the stairs and pushing inside, smelling the fresh meat in the hospital.

  One of the bugs had grown so big it became jammed and blocked the doorway, but at least one of the creatures had made it inside already, and Brianna could hear muffled screams of terror from down below.

  She darted, bypassed a flashing tongue, leaped over scythe mandibles, and stabbed a bug in both red eyes. Then she stuck her shotgun into the gnashing mouth and pulled the trigger.

  The massive creature shuddered, but did not die.

  Brianna barely leaped aside in time to avoid being caught. And then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw one of the massive creatures rise, turn in midair, and land hard on its back.

  “Caine!” she yelled.

  She threaded her way through the swarm, leaped easily through the wildly waving legs of the overturned bug, and stabbed her knife into its guts.

  Then, into the largest of the gashes she thrust the shotgun and pulled the trigger.

  BLAM!

  Bug guts and bits of shell blew back and covered her. But the legs were jerking wildly now, slower, slower . . .

  Caine had overturned another bug and this one he hammered with a car, lifting and slamming, lifting and slamming, until the creature was a giant mess of stick-legs and goo.

  The creatures turned away from feasting on the sick. There were only seven of the bugs left now, not counting the one that was down in the so-called hospital or the one stuck in the doorway.

  Seven.

  “I’ll flip them!” Caine yelled.

  Brianna picked a piece of bug guts off her cheek and nodded. She quickly reloaded her shotgun and zoomed to mount the latest overturned creature. She was learning as she went along. The creatures had weak spots, one of them was the underside of what would be their chin. She stabbed with her knife, twisted to make an opening, pushed the shotgun into the gaping wound, and pulled the trigger.

  The bug’s head blew apart.

  “Oh, yeah! Oh, definitely!” Brianna cried.

  But Caine had been a bit too slow and now three of the creatures were pursuing him. All three had latched on to him with their tongues and he was yelling his head off for help.

  Brianna dashed down the steps, now slick with blood— human and insect.

  She cut the first tongue and the other two reeled back defensively.

  “Flip ’em!”

  “Trying,” Caine said through gritted teeth. He turned one over but the bugs were learning fast. A second bug charged the first, slid beneath it, and heaved its brother back over onto his legs.

  “Oh, no, we don’t do that,” Brianna said.

  Caine had to back away again as the creatures charged. If they caught Caine, then the battle was over.

  Brianna raced, grabbed Caine’s arm, and yanked him to temporary safety behind a tree.

  Cuh-runch!

  A bug mandible sliced the tree straight through.

  Caine lifted and flipped the creature, but now the swarm was converging.

  “They’ll follow us,” Caine yelled to Brianna.

  “I noticed.”

  “Gas station,” Caine gasped. He was already running, flat out, arms pumping. Brianna caught up easily. The bugs surged after them, crowding the street.

  “You understand?” Caine gasped.

  “Not much gas left there,” Brianna said.

  “Go!” Caine yelled, and Brianna zoomed away. She reached the gas station. There was a heavy padlock on the pump and, to her utter amazement, one of Albert’s people sitting there guarding it.

  “Unlock it!” she yelled.

  “I can’t unless Albert . . . ,” the kid started to say until Brianna laid her knife against his throat and said, “Really no time for chitchat.”

  He unlocked the pump. Brianna grabbed the handle—the hand pump was the only way—and worked it as fast as she could. Unfortunately it wasn’t the kind of thing that worked better at superspeed.

  She grabbed the guard and yelled, “You—pump! Pump unless you want to die.”

  “I don’t have a tank to put it in!”

  “On the ground,” Brianna said. “On the ground. All over the place. Pump it!”

  Gas gushed in irregular spurts from the pump and splashed onto the concrete.

  Brianna zoomed back to find Caine laboring hard and barely staying ahead as he reached the highway. Out in the open the bugs would be able to use all their speed and catch him long before he reached the station.

  “Keep running!” she yelled.

  She dashed straight at the foremost of the creatures. It snapped at her with its tongue. She grabbed the tongue in midair and, holding on to it as hard as she could, she dived beneath the creature’s legs.

  The bug stumbled and came to a halt, confused. Brianna released the tongue, scooted madly beneath the creature, and came out through its hind legs. She had bought Caine maybe three seconds. No more.

  She took aim at the demonic ruby eyes of the next bug, fired at point-blank range, and blew back to the gas station.

  She zipped past the panicky guard, who was still busily pouring precious gasoline out on the ground.

  Inside what had once been the gas station’s mini-mart, Brianna searched frantically through trash and debris before coming up, triumphant, with a blue Bic lighter.

  Outside she saw Caine, still barely ahead of his pursuers.

  “Get outta here, kid!” she yelled to the guard. “Ruuun!”

  The smell of gasoline was overpowering. It flowed in dark little streams across the parking area, filling seams in the concrete, forming shallow pools in low spots.

  Caine raced past, feet splashing through the gasoline.

  Brianna smiled.

  The leading wave of the creatures hit the gas station, needle-sharp legs stabbing at tiny rivers of unleaded gas.

  The fumes filled the air.

  Brianna knew something about speed. She knew that the Hollywood thing where people outrun explosions was nonsense. Not even the Breeze could outrun a fireball.

  But there was standing around in the middle of a fire, and then there was blowing through it at the speed of sound. There wouldn’t be an explosion, not right away.

  It should work. Especially with a little cover.

  She hid behind a pump and let the first creature draw level. She wheeled, flicked the lighter, and dodged in front of the bug as it ran by.

  Whooooosh!

  It wasn’t a dynamite explosion. But it was definitely a fire-ball.

  A wave of heat singed her hair and eyebrows. A blast wave of pressure that popped Brianna’s ears. But the bug’s bulk had shielded her from the worst of it.

  The leading creature reached Caine, but he had thrown himself into the air and the fireball, the creature, and Brianna all rocketed past beneath him.

  As he fell he flipped the bug over.

  Three of the creatures were caught in the fireball. Fire curled their antennae and cracked their brittle shells. r />
  Two of the creatures were far enough back to dodge around the fire but the heat and the smoke had confused them. They moved away but not fast enough.

  The fire crept down the pump hose, down to meet the heavy gas vapor in the massive underground tank.

  Ka-BOOOM!

  Pumps, concrete, shelter, mini-mart, and the creatures exploded in a fireball that made the first blast look like a damp firecracker.

  Insect parts, twisted metal, and chunks of concrete rained down.

  Only the lead bug was still alive. It lay on its back, kicking in the air.

  Brianna sank her knife into its chin, inserted her shotgun, and said, “When you get to hell tell the gaiaphage the Breeze says, ‘Hi!’” She pumped two rounds into the creature and its head blew apart like a smashed watermelon.

  Chapter Forty-One

  13 MINUTES

  ORC SMASHED HIS bottle against the blue-eyed bug’s head. It did nothing. He hadn’t thought it would.

  The creature swung its mandibles in a wide sweep and caught Orc in the chest. Orc went flying, facedown on the gravel.

  He was winded. Not dead, though.

  He got slowly to his feet. Why hurry?

  “You want me, come get me,” Orc said.

  Three of the monsters motored straight for him. Orc threw a wild punch, caught nothing but air, and was face-down again. This time three ropelike tongues had attached to him and he could no longer stand.

  Astrid screamed.

  “Whatever,” he said, as flashing mouthparts closed in on him.

  • • •

  Jack had run and bounded along through the night. His goal was Perdido Beach. But his mission, while clear, was not sitting well with him.

  How could Sam have told him to throw Little Pete to the creatures? It was crazy, wasn’t it? Crazy? Anyway, it had to be wrong, right?

  He raced up hills and down. He was not quite tireless, but he was very strong and reveled in that strength now for the first time. Jack felt as if he’d been living behind a curtain, not really seeing what was happening around him.

  That had started to change when he found the laptops on the train. Touching live keys again, seeing a monitor glow . . . Even though he hadn’t had time to do much about it, it was like magic, like the magic touch.