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I snake the SUV between abandoned cars and debris, expecting to run into an impassable section of road sooner or later. Still, I don’t dare take the viable roads Eklyptors cleared for their purposes, not while carrying strictly human cargo.
“What’s your name?” I ask the girl.
“Hannah,” she says from her crouched position at the foot of the passenger seat.
I can’t afford to let her sit where an Eklyptor might spot her. If they see two people but sense only one, they’ll give chase. Our chances are precarious enough riding on these roads. My hope is that the Igniter battle She-Bird mentioned will keep the skies and streets clear for now.
“I’m Marci,” I say.
“Where are you taking me?” Hannah’s question is full of suspicion as if I didn’t just save her life and she decided to repay the favor.
“To safety.”
“Why had they let you go?” She’s surely having second thoughts about putting herself in my charge. Her eyes are wide and scared. She looks as frightened and paranoid as a mouse. But who can blame her? Only God knows what she’s been through, what she’s had to do to survive. Very likely it’s the paranoia that’s kept her alive this long.
It’s a heck of a good question, anyway, one I cannot answer. I got her in the car with a promise to tell her everything, but now that we’re on our way, I don’t have to tell her jack. The situation is too complicated to explain. I can’t tell her I’m a Symbiot. Not when I’m hoping James will take her with him. There are very few Symbiots among James’s ranks, and their identities are revealed on a need-to-know basis. I know only three others: James, Aydan, and Rheema. If there are more within the ranks, they’re hidden from me as well. I doubt IgNiTe, the group of human rebels who openly defy Eklyptors, would appreciate the news. Everyone is doing their best to keep their spirits up; there is no point in giving them more to worry about.
“Well, um . . . I’m a spy.” I can’t think of anything else to tell her. Besides, it’s not a lie.
She shakes her head, looking as if I just told her I’m a hungry werewolf with rabid thoughts of taking a chunk out of her.
“I’m with IgNiTe,” I add, hoping this will ease her fears.
“IgNiTe?!” she exclaims. From the excited ring of her voice, it seems I have quickly risen from werebeast status to saint. “Are you serious?!”
Man, I feel like a celebrity. I nod and keep driving north. The further away from downtown we go, the clearer the streets become and the slower my heart beats. Scouts keep closer to headquarters. Their numbers are limited, and Elliot likes to keep them close. He won’t be happy to learn that two of them are dead. It’s not like he can easily replace them—not when it takes years to morph and grow additional appendages.
Hannah seems content for a few minutes, then the questions begin again.
“But how does that work if . . . if you’re human?”
Smart girl. Surely another reason she’s still alive. She should make a nice addition to James’s ranks. This fight can use every person we can get, especially if they’re intelligent.
“Uh, some of them like to keep humans around, like pets.” My stomach twists. The simple idea of being a traitorous, Eklyptor pet makes me want to retch.
Hannah’s nose wrinkles with a disgusted grimace. “That has to be horrible. How can you stand it?”
I shrug.
“And what if they decide to turn you?”
“It’s a risk, but these are desperate times.”
She puts a hand over her mouth. “I couldn’t do it. I would just . . .” She muffles her words and shakes her head, looking horrified.
“It isn’t easy. I assure you.”
We don’t speak for a few blocks. I’ve managed to take us completely out of downtown, and I’m well on my way to my rendezvous spot with James.
Hannah hugs her legs to her chest and rests her chin on her knees, looking pensive. “Will IgNiTe take me?”
“If you’re willing to fight. If you’re not, they’ll find a safe place for you. One of the underground human communities.”
“They really exist?!” she asks as if I just told her Sasquatch is real, and she can’t wait to meet him. “We heard rumors, but we never saw them.”
“We?” I ask, then immediately regret it.
She stares down and pulls at her jacket as if it’s out of place, which it isn’t. You’d think I would have learned by now. I’ve lost enough people in this fight to understand the touchy subjects.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t . . .” I trail off. There’s nothing to say.
The silence between us is heavy for a long moment, then Hannah speaks, “Mom, Dad, my sister, Josephine, and Mack, our dog.” She worries at a hangnail, pretty much obliterating it.
I don’t want to hear this. I don’t. If she expects wise words from me I have none. If she expects sympathy—I have plenty of that, heck, I even have empathy—but I’ve never been good at expressing it.
“We lived in a condo right on Olive Way. We were at home when all hell broke loose. We stayed holed up in there until the food ran out. About two weeks.” Hannah pauses and takes a deep breath.
The Eklyptors never bothered searching people’s houses. A good number of citizens just came voluntarily at the beginning of The Takeover, believing the lies the beasts spread through the news channels, the ones that said the authorities would provide answers and help. They were like mice crawling inside the lion’s mouth. They never stood a chance, because Eklyptors took control of everything that was important: hospitals, government, police. They had their infected monsters in place, ready to assume power as soon as hostilities began. As for the humans who stayed hidden, Eklyptors knew they would soon have to come out in search of food. The creeps are in this for the long run. So why hurry?
“We tried to talk to the neighbors,” she continues, “but the few that were still there wanted nothing to do with us. One guy even threatened us with a gun, saying we wanted to steal his provisions. The empty units had already been raided by them. We found a few cans of soup, but that was it. So Dad . . . he decided to go out to find stuff to eat. He took Mack with him and made us stay back. It was so hard waiting for him, not knowing if he was all right. We were so relieved when he came back. He ran into no trouble, was even able to fill a backpack with enough food for a few days. Stuff like canned tuna, crackers, and Slim Jims.”
A vivid image of her family huddled together, dividing up the few items, pops into my mind. How many families went through the same? How many are still together?
“Of course, the food didn’t last,” Hannah continues. “Dad felt confident he could go out and get more. He hadn’t run into any problems the first time, so he assured us it would be fine. We still didn’t like it. He had no idea how awful waiting for him had been. I told him we should stay together, but he wanted to make sure we were safe. He said that was his priority.”
Hannah doesn’t need to say what happened next. Her story is charged with the power of an awful punch line.
Her father never came back.
She cries silently. Her hands flutter to and away from her face as she wipes tears off her cheeks and jawline.
I clench the steering wheel and look straight ahead. I doubt there’s a human left on Earth who doesn’t have a nightmare story to recount. I have my share of them, but I’m not burdening her with mine, am I?
What does she expect me to say?
Apparently, nothing because she goes on, oblivious to my discomfort.
“We stayed there for two days, eating little more than cracker crumbs and crying ourselves crazy. Finally, I convinced Mom we had to go out and look for him. In case Dad came back, we left him a note that said we’d be back every night. We packed what we could. Flashlight, matches, first-aid kit, stuff like that.
“We were terrified, but at least we were doing something, instead of just waiting like useless fools. First, we went to the convenience store where Dad went the first time. He’d said there was nothing left there, so it was unlikely he’d gone back, but it was all we had to go by. It was so hard moving through the streets. We kept expecting someone to jump us from every door and alley.” She gives a dry laugh. “I saw people watching us from their condos. They just stared at us from behind their curtains. No one offered to help. No one.”
She lifts her chin and looks over at me. I throw a quick glance her way. The wonder and gratitude in her eyes let me know how surprised she is that someone, namely me, gave a damn and risked everything to save her life.
Yep, it was nuts. Even I can’t believe it, so she should shut up before she makes me regret it.
But Hannah is on a roll, and I don’t have the heart to tell her to stop. Maybe she needs this, maybe it’s therapy. Too bad I’m not a shrink.
“I used my cell phone to navigate us, snapping pictures of the areas we had checked. It’s so odd that phones and TVs and all that crap still works when everything else’s gone to hell.” She shakes her head. “Anyway, it was slow going. We hid and crouched more than anything else. We almost got spotted a couple of times by . . . people driving past. Then, just when we were about to go back home, we . . . we found Mack. He was Josephine’s dog, a good-hearted black Labrador. He was dead. Shot in the head and laying by the side of the street.
“Josephine lost it. She went hysterical, screaming and crying, clinging to Mom. We tried to calm her down, but we couldn’t. ‘If Mack is dead. Dad is dead,’ she kept saying over and over again.
“Then, all of sudden, this man comes out of one of the buildings. He looked furious and dangerous. At first, I thought he was one of them, but he was mad because of the racket Josephine was making. Not like he made it any better by yelling at her to ‘shut the fuck up unless you want the Eklyptors to show up.’
“When Josephine wouldn’t shut up, he tore her away from Mom and slapped her across the face. He looked like he was ready to kill her. Mom and I pulled him away and that’s when he pulled out a gun and he just . . .” Hannah trails off, too choked up by her tears to continue.
The corners of my eyes prickle. I think of Dad, Mom, Xave, all gone. The pain of their absence smarts like a wound freshly opened. It always rides right under my skin, but it hasn’t resurfaced in some time—not when hatred and revenge-lust are my prevalent emotions while living among Eklyptors.
I want to curse Hannah, want to blame her for pouring salt on the wound and reminding me of my own misery and loneliness, but she’s gone through enough as it is. The last thing she needs is my brand of bitterness undoing the little comfort she’s found in pouring her heart out.
After her tears run out, Hannah takes a deep breath and shifts in her spot, one hand digging inside her blue jacket. I look sideways at the exact moment she pulls out a small revolver from the depths of her puffy top layer. I nearly slam on the brakes, expecting her to point the gun at me, but she just lets it dangle between her thumb and index finger.
“I killed him,” she confesses, though not with regret. She sets the gun on the seat at her side, mouth twisted in disgust. “He shot Josephine and Mom, but I . . . I fought him. I took the gun from him and . . . I used every single bullet. I’m still waiting for the guilt to keep me up at night, but the only regret I have is killing him too fast. I wish I’d made him suffer. I wish I’d let him linger, knowing he was gonna die. I’d have loved to see the fear on his face. Does that make me a monster?”
This a rhetorical question, right? She must know the answer. Except she looks up at me, her blue eyes full of fear for what my answer might be.
“You might be asking the wrong person.” I take the next right and notice a car ahead of us. The way is fairly clear on this road. The obstructing debris—shattered glass, broken down cars, chairs, and tables from the nearby restaurants—have been moved to the sides. I don’t warn Hannah or remind her to stay low. She’s scared enough as it is and wouldn’t risk even a small peek out of the window.
“Why do you say that?” she asks.
I sigh and bite down my response. Butt out, those are the words that come to mind first, but I make an effort to be civilized. The fact that I live with animals doesn’t mean I should act like one. I would have answered her that way before The Takeover, but only because at the time she would have been able to find someone else to bond with. Post-Eklyptors, not so much. The going is tough. People who love you and understand you drop like flies at your feet. Now it sort of feels like any stranger you meet can be your friend, as long as they’re the human kind, that is.
“Because I happen to know real monsters. To me, you’re just a girl.”
The car ahead of us turns onto another road. I don’t get to feel at ease for long, though, because another one appears; this one headed in our direction in the opposite lane. It’s a couple of blocks away, so I still don’t say anything. Instead, I look for a way to turn, but the intersecting streets are barricaded. I clench my jaw.
Hannah rests a cheek on her drawn-up knees. Blond hair spills to the side, tangled and dirty. She looks like she hasn’t showered in weeks and, judging by the red circles under her eyes, hasn’t slept much either.
“I keep thinking maybe Dad’s out there, somewhere.” Hannah closes her eyes as if she’s having a daydream. I think she is.
“Stay down,” I say behind my hand. “A car is going to pass by. Don’t freak out.”
Hannah holds her legs tighter, going rigid with tension. I keep my left hand on the wheel and the right one on the gun on my lap. When the car passes—a red BMW—I exchange a glance with its passenger. From here, he looks perfectly human, but my head buzzes, letting me know he’s an Eklyptor. He nods and keeps on his way. I breathe a sigh of relief.
As long as we don’t encounter any morphed creatures with super noses or thermal vision, they won’t detect Hannah. If we run into more scouts, however, we’re screwed. I worry at the leather steering wheel with a sharp thumbnail, leaving marks behind.
We ride in silence for a few blocks. We run into a few other cars, but we pass them without problems, although not without considerable heartburn. For the most part, the drivers look perfectly human, except for one with colorful, butterfly-like patterns on her skin.
The older Eklyptors who have managed to develop useful traits are higher in the pecking order. They were the commanders for the different factions during The Takeover. The newer Eklyptors are the regular “citizens.” They are the ones keeping things going, showing up to work to make sure the cities they stole from us don’t fall apart. So the further we move away from downtown, we should be less likely to run into enhanced beasts. I relax a little.
Finally, I turn onto 15th Avenue East, the road that leads to Lake View Cemetery and my rendezvous with James.
“We’re almost there,” I say.
I stop at an intersection. A car comes to a sudden stop on the opposite corner. My gaze locks with the driver’s. I wait for the buzzing to begin. It doesn’t. I judge the distance between us. The guy is close enough. My head should be buzzing.
He’s human!
My eyes widen in surprise. When he notices my startled expression, his eyes grow as wide as mine and, in the same instant, he steps on the gas and sends his tires screeching and smoking. His car, a white truck, seems to sit still on the spot for a moment, revving, then tears down the street, going from zero to sixty before I blink. I watch him fly by the front of my SUV and disappear down the intersecting street like a bat out of hell.
“Wow.” In spite of everything I’ve seen since I learned about Eklyptors, I’m surprised by this. It’s too terrible an example of what our once-trusting society has become. It makes me wonder about how it used to be. Did we really use to sit next to each other at the movie theater? Dine in crowded restaurants? Shake each other’s hands and say “nice to meet you”?
“What is it?” Hannah asks in a trembling whisper.
“Nothing. It’s fine. Just another used-to-be dying in front of my eyes.”
I move forward, knowing that guy is feeling pretty stupid right about now, though he’s probably also breathing a sigh of relief.
We arrive at the cemetery a few minutes later. The main gate is open. I drive through it slowly, the speedometer needle barely moving from zero. I stop by the same statue of a virgin where I met James once before, the day he took me to The Tank for the first time. I look around but don’t see him anywhere.
“Stay put,” I tell Hannah, then open the door and step out of the car.
A few clouds float above. They are gray, full of the threat of rain. The sun hides behind one of them, and I wish it wasn’t so. A cemetery has enough gloom as it is. A heavy silence seeps from the tombstones and saturates the air. My soul goes quiet and still with respect for the dead. My heart finds a certain peace at the thought of at least some of us being in a better place.
The peace doesn’t last that long. Only until a gust of wind whirls around the SUV and ends up right behind me.
I stiffen. “Hello, James.”
“Guerrero,” he says, pressing one arm around my neck and a gun to my temple. “Hands up.”