Condemn (BUNKER 12 Book 2) (18 page)

They're already
inside.

The boys were still a ways off when
they determined the light Bix saw was coming from Adrian's new
church. "Maybe they're working on it," Finn suggested.

"At night?"

"You saw how eager he was to get it up
and working again. Jennifer, too. And if they're really close
to—"

An odd sound reached their ears, both
familiar and unexpected. Neither boy could place it at
first.

"Cheering?" Bix whispered. "It sounds
like cheering."

And by more than just a
few people, too.

"One of Father Adrian's roof-raising
sermons?"

"Good thing there's no
roof."

The man's voice boomed out from inside
the church as they arrived at the clearing. His words were muffled
by the walls and distorted by the wind. Light rose into the
sky.

"Sounds like a freaking carnival
barker," Finn said.

Bix nodded grimly. "Or a religious
revival."

"For just the four of them? In the
middle of the night?"

Keeping in the shadows, they skirted
along the edge of the clearing, circling around until the barn door
opening came into sight. Each step revealed a little more of the
scene inside . . . and swept away any doubt the boys
harbored about the couples' intentions.

There were perhaps a dozen people
crowded just inside. They were shouting and waving their arms in
excitement. Adrian stood in back on the cart and shouted through
his cupped hands. His words were clear enough now for the boys to
understand. He called out numbers, pointing to various individuals
in the crowd. It sounded like an auction. Each cry elicited more
cheers.

He soon stopped, and the hubbub died
away, and the strangers milled restlessly about, as if waiting for
something to happen.

Through the bodies, the boys caught a
glimpse of the cage. The Wraith they had seen earlier was still
inside of it, except that it was now completely naked. The creature
was chained to a long, thick post hammered deep into the ground in
the center of the cage, so it couldn't climb out the open top. It
attacked the fence, eliciting excited shouts from the
onlookers.

Skeletal arms reached through the
openings, trying to get to them. Trying to touch or
tear.

Billy and Luke stood just outside of
its reach. They poked at the creature with the cattle prods, but
the electrical pops were considerably smaller than before. They
must have dialed down the current. Each shock didn't incapacitate
the Wraith, only infuriated it all the more.

"What the hell are they doing to it?"
Bix whispered.

"I don't know."

"I told you it was wrong."

The boys watched in disbelief for
several minutes. "Maybe this is part of the rehabilitation," Finn
wondered aloud.

Bix didn't answer.

The sound of scuffling feet
and muffled grunts forced the boys deeper into the shadows.
"Look,"
Bix whispered,
and pointed toward the lake.

Several rowboats were tied up at the
end of the dock, gently knocking against one another. A man stepped
out of one. He reached down and heaved something large out from the
bottom of the craft. It landed on the dock with a thump and an
audible cry.

"That's a
person!"

"Or maybe another
Wraith,"
Bix said.

"Those men aren't wearing
gloves."

"It's wrapped up."

A second body was thrown to the dock.
It took several men to wrestle each one to its feet and then along
the dock toward the barn. "Clear the way!" they shouted, and shoved
the packages through the doorway. Both fell to the dirt.

"Stand them up," Adrian
cried.

They were pulled upright.

"Let's see them!"

The hoods were yanked off.

"Shit!" Bix cried, before clamping a
hand over his mouth.

"Not Wraiths."

"What the hell are they
going to do?"

"Which one begs forgiveness?" Adrian
demanded.

A man stepped out of the crowd and
studied the two bound men. After a moment, he pointed to one. The
men cheered.

"Finn?" Bix moaned. "Please tell
me—"

There was a sharp
crack!
and a flash of
light, and the cage-bound Wraith fell to the ground and didn't
move.

"No! Please!" the man who had been
selected cried out. "Please, no! I won't do it again! I'm sorry!
Pleeeeease!"

His bindings were removed, then he was
quickly stripped down naked except for his underwear. He struggled
against the men holding him, trying to escape, but they were
ruthless.

"Thirty seconds by my count!" Adrian
shouted.

The crowd started to chant:
"Twenty-nine! Twenty-eight!
Twenty-seven . . . ."

"No! NOOOOO!"
the prisoner screamed.

"Finn! What are they
doing?"

"Shhh! I don't know, Bix."

"Twenty five! Open the
gate!"

"Twenty-three! Twenty-two!"

"Positions!"

"You can't do this to me! Reverend!
You know me! Don't do this!"

"Twenty! Shove him in!"

The men threw the victim inside the
cage and immediately swung the reinforced cage door shut. The man
flew across the dirt and landed with a pained cry. He immediately
tried to climb the chain link. Luke touched the cattle prod to the
wire and the man fell off.

On the other side of the cage, the
Wraith began to stir.

"Seventeen!" Adrian shouted.
"Sixteen!"

"Fifteen!" the crowd chanted in turn.
"Fourteen!"

"Holy shit!" Bix cried. He grabbed
Finn and shook him. "What the fu—"

"Do it," Finn growled, pushing Bix
away. His eyes were glued to the scene inside the barn. "Do it,
man! Get up!"

"Eleven!"

The man stood up. He spun around to
face the recovering Wraith.

"Ten!"

"Do it!" Finn yelled, no longer caring
to keep his voice down.

"Nine!"

The man ran at the Wraith just as it
lifted its head. The crowd screamed "Seven!" The creature stood
unsteadily. The naked bodies slapped against each other. The Wraith
flew into the wire and fell to the ground.

"Six!"

"Do it!" Finn screamed. Bix tugged on
him, pleading with him to run. But Finn didn't seem to notice.
"Goddamn it, kill the Wraith!"

"FOUR!"

The man grabbed the creature by its
head and dragged it into the center of the cage. He wrapped his
legs around its body for leverage and tried to twist. The Wraith
was fighting back now, its strength returning.

"TWO!"

They wrestled. Then, just as the crowd
cried out "ONE!" the Wraith's body went limp. The man was
underneath. He heaved the dead creature off with a desperate
cry.

"ZERO!" the crowd screamed.

The man stumbled away from the corpse.
He fell against the wire, but managed to hold on. "Let me out," he
panted. "LET ME OUT OF THIS CAGE!"

The crowd stilled and went
silent.

"Goddamn it, Adrian! I did it, okay? I
killed it. Am I forgiven? Please, let me out."

"No. You took too long."

The man stumbled back, collapsed. He
threw his hands up to clutch at his head.

"Finn!"
Bix whispered into his friend's ear.
"We have to go. Now!"

"No, wait!"

A high, keening cry escaped from the
prisoner's throat, rising until it shattered like glass, leaving
nothing but a thin, dry whistle in its wake.

"Sorry," Adrian said. "But you are not
worthy of salvation."

A gleeful cheer rose from the
crowd.

"Finn? We—"

"Yeah, I know. Let's get the hell
outta here."

He stood up and turned around, only to
find Bix having some kind of seizure. A moment later, his friend
collapsed unconscious to the ground.

Bix sat up, groaned in agony, and fell back onto the cushion.
"Where am I?"

"The house. Try not to move, sweetie,"
Jennifer quietly told him. She rewet the washcloth in the bowl on
the floor and reapplied it to his forehead. "I'm afraid you got a
double zappin before I realized it was you two and not a couple of
ferals."

Bix shot her a surprised look, then
glanced over at Finn, who was pacing across the worn carpeting
between the couch and the doorway. He looked like a caged
lion.

All the lights in the room were
ablaze. Jennifer had turned them on after arriving ahead of Finn,
who had carried Bix's slumped form over his shoulder the entire way
back. Adrenaline had given him the strength, but now his body shook
from the exertion.

"Goddamn it," he growled at Jennifer.
He opened his fists and shook out his cramped fingers for the
hundredth time. "You need to tell us what the hell is going on
here."

Jennifer sighed unhappily. "I knew we
shoulda told y'all the whole truth, but Adrian believed the
demonstration would be more than enough to process for now. He
planned on tellin y'all in the mornin."

"Telling us what?" Finn demanded.
"What truth? Huh? That you're using the Wraiths to murder innocent
people? That truth?" He pointed at the woods. "That it's all some
sick game? We believed you! Instead, you turned out to be some kind
of . . . depraved . . . ." He
sputtered, unable to find the right words.

"I know what it looks like, Finn, but
we ain't depraved. We're tryin to save those poor creatures,
rehabilitate them."

"Infecting others sure as hell doesn't
look like rehabilitation! It looks like you're making more of them.
And how does inciting someone to break a Wraith's neck help save
it?"

"Justice, Finn. That man sinned. And
that feral was already too far gone to be saved. The only humane
thing left to do was to put it out of its misery."

"You could just shoot it in the head!
It's faster and cleaner. People should not be getting their kicks
watching an execution!"

Jennifer stood up and crossed the
room. For the first time, she looked exasperated. "Shootin is too
easy," she said, her voice thick with emotion. "It's heartless and
it's cruel exactly because of how fast and clean it is. There ain't
no personal commitment to it, no thinkin, just doin and movin
on."

Finn stepped back in stunned
disbelief. "What the hell are you talking about?" he cried. "Those
things are animals! You call them that yourself. You call them
ferals! Like rabid dogs, and you shoot rabid dogs to put them
down."

"Sit down, Finn," she snapped, finally
reaching the end of her patience. "Sit down and listen for a
moment."

"No!" he roared. "I need you to
explain what we just saw back there! Tell us why a bunch of people
cheered on while Father Adrian — I can't believe he thinks
it's God's work — while he threw an uninfected man inside a
cage with a Wraith. How is forcing someone to choose between
becoming one of them or being torn apart by it saving anyone? It's
not God's work! It's horrible!"

"That man we put inside that cage
wasn't innocent. He betrayed his neighbor, stole his food. And for
that he needed to be punished. It's about doing right."

"Right? What do you know about
right?"

"Y'all may think this is the wild west
again, that there ain't no laws, but that ain't true. Without laws,
we'd all be animals, no more different than the ferals out
there."

"So that was punishment?" Finn
collapsed into a chair, squeezing his head in his arms. "Why?" he
cried. "Why make him do something like that?"

"Because that's how we keep order,
Finn. Everyone understands it. Everyone knows that if'n you break
the law, then you'll be punished. It's a deterrent. You get a
chance to redeem yerself. Ten seconds is more than enough time.
Everyone gets at least fifteen. Only the truly repentant will be
saved."