Elements of the Undead: Fire (Book One) (19 page)

“Are you bitten?” Megan asked the man, already knowing the answer. She had to hear the words from his mouth. Tears came to the man’s eyes, and he choked up, but nodded. Megan dropped her head to her chest and stared at the ground, seeing nothing and everything at the same time.

This was the first infection inside the compound in over a month, the first breach under her watch, and not only did it mean the man was as good as dead, but it also gave Pringle ammunition in his argument against her leadership.

“The gate is secure now,” Jack interjected. “But there’s no sign of the sentry.” It was standard practice to post a rotating sentry on the gate at all times. Everyone in the community took a turn.

“Who was on today?” Megan asked. She felt as if she was watching someone else ask the question, floating above, observing a nasty tragedy unfold beneath her.

Pringle thought for a second before answering. Gate security was his domain. “Tony.” Tony had been with the community for about five weeks. A man of few words, Megan didn’t know much about him, but he had always been reliable. “Has anyone seen him today?” she asked.

They all shook their heads.
Great
. She couldn’t help feel that this whole thing was rigged. The timing was too much of a coincidence. “Okay,” she said. “We contained it this time.” She met Jack’s eyes and held them. “Thanks for your quick action.”

He shrugged and holstered his weapon. His eyes revealed nothing, a pair of one-way mirrors on his soul. “What happens to him?” Jack asked quietly, eyes flitting to the sobbing man.

“He’s infected. There’s nothing we can—”

Before she could finish her sentence, Pringle drew his weapon, stepped up to the man, and pulled the trigger. The report echoed through the compound and up the canyon beyond.

Megan screamed. “What the hell was that?”

Pringle holstered his gun and turned to her. “No more fucking around, Megan. It’s time to get serious about this community, and it starts right here, right now.”

Megan didn’t know how to respond to this challenge. Pringle’s unilateral action amounted to an execution of an innocent man. Sure, the man had been infected and was as good as dead anyway, but the community had rules. Infected who were mobile had the choice between taking their own lives or having someone else do it for them. Pringle, in his haste, had stripped him of his rights, stolen the last vestiges of the man’s humanity, for his own gain.

“That’s not how we do things here!”

Pringle stared back at her. “It is now!”

Jack took a step back, out of their direct path. It was all Megan could do not to draw her weapon and shoot Pringle. Right here. Right now. But she knew it would do no good. She would lose the trust of the community, would become, in their eyes, no better than him.

“Guys.” It was Jack. Megan turned to him, her gaze full of fire.

She exploded. “What?”

He stepped forward, putting himself between them, and raised his hands in a sign of peace.

That set Pringle off. “Who the fuck do you think you are?” He took a step forward and shoved Jack in the chest.

Yeah
, Megan thought.
Who the fuck?
But inside, she was glad for the interruption. It gave her a precious few seconds, seconds she desperately needed, to cool off before she did something rash.

“You’re right,” Jack said, addressing Pringle. “I’m nobody, just a guy who has a feeling that you guys are about to do something you’ll regret.” He motioned around them with a slight toss of his head. “In case you haven’t noticed, you’ve got an audience.” It was true. A circle had formed around them; the other members of the community were watching with bated breath.

Megan took a deep breath and steadied herself. “You’re right. Let’s take this inside.”

Pringle glanced around and deflated as he realized the stakes. He shook his head. “Not now. I’ve got to get someone on the gate. We’ll talk later.” He glared, his eyes full of murder, then shifted his gaze to Jack. He abruptly spun on his heels and stalked off toward the fence.

“Thanks,” Megan mouthed to Jack, as Pringle moved out of earshot. “That was close.”

Jack held her gaze for a moment, and then moved toward the dead man. “Let’s get these bodies out of here.”

Twenty-Nine

Later That Night

Cast by the intense moonlight filtering through the security bars covering his window, vertical bars of shadow lined the far wall of Pringle’s room. He was in a prison of his own making, he realized. He was one of the few brave enough to sleep in a room with a window on the outside perimeter. The truth was, without a view to the outdoors, even with the ever-present threat of the undead, he would go crazy. Cursing, he rolled over and scrunched up his pillow as he desperately tried to find a more comfortable position. He had to get some sleep.

“Fucking bitch,” he cursed for the thousandth time. “Why can’t she see that she just doesn’t have what it takes to run a community this size? Is she blind? That breach today should be all she needs.” He slammed his fist down on the bed.

The breech.
He couldn’t have planned it better if he had tried. Unfortunately, he had had no hand in the event. It was just one of those things. Still, it had worked out well for him...sort of.

Putting a bullet through the infected man’s head, well, that had been a stroke of pure genius. He had always felt that letting the infected choose their own death was ridiculous, a stupid bow to a civilization that no longer existed.
You get bit, it’s over.
He just hoped someone would have the balls to do the same for him if he was ever in that situation. Coming back as one of the undead was the worst fate he could imagine.

That won’t be a problem
, he decided with a devious smile.
There’s a whole camp full of people itching to put a bullet in my head now.
The thought calmed him. This new world needed people like him, even if they didn’t know it yet. Someone had to make the hard decisions, and they had to make them without hesitation. Or they would all die.

There was another reason for Pringle’s anger, one he loathed to admit—Megan’s repeated rejection in the face of his most charming advances. It was obvious, he thought, that they should be together, yet no matter what he did, or how much he turned on the charm, she wouldn’t give him the time of the day. And now… now, this new guy Jack showed up. It was obvious Megan had something for him. The way she looked at him… the way her eyes lingered on his. Any moron could see she wanted to fuck him.

Every time he saw them together, he wanted to reach out and grab her by the shoulders, shake her and scream, “Can’t you see? I’m right here in front of you!” But it was no use. She would have none of it.

With an angry sigh, Pringle gave up on sleep and pulled a ragged copy of Sun Tzu’s
The Art of War
and a flashlight from beside his bed, thumbed to the dog-eared page in the middle, and resumed reading. Never a big reader before the uprising, Pringle had been surprised to discover he had a voracious appetite for the written word. He was in the middle of four separate books at the moment, a combination of management and military strategy as well as law enforcement guides, all acquired during supply raids. It was the words in those books that had finally convinced him to make his play on Megan, along with a deep-rooted sense that he could do it better if given an opportunity. The books would fill that gap, he figured, provide the details on how to achieve his goal.

The simplest solution was to kill her, just make her go away once and for all. The problem was, so far, he had been unable to figure out how. He had come close after the breech, and if it weren’t for that bastard Jack, he would have finished her off in the courtyard, taken control, and turned things around in a hurry. In hindsight, he was glad that hadn’t happened. If there was one thing he had learned from Sun Tzu, it was the value of patience. He was close. It was only a matter of time.

The main problem was perception. If he killed Megan and was discovered, he would be cast from the community at best, and at worst, killed on the spot. Despite his reservations about her leadership abilities, she had a loyal following, people who would die for her. That, he could not afford to ignore. He sighed and tried to focus on his book.

As he turned the page, there was a knock at his door. Cocking his head, he listened to see if it was repeated. It came again.
Who?
He had a vision of Megan coming to his room in the middle of the night to relinquish her power. He dismissed it.
Unrealistic.
There was another knock, more insistent. It wasn’t a woman’s knock.

“Hold on, hold on,” he said as he crossed the room. “Who’s there?”

“Woo,” came the answer.

Pringle opened the door a few inches and peered through. “What do you want? It’s late.”

Woo looked up and down the hall, as if he expected someone to come along at any moment. “Can I come in? It’s important.”

What the hell?
He couldn’t sleep. He figured he might as well see what the kid wanted. He opened the door wide, and Woo entered, glancing over his shoulder one last time.

Pringle motioned him to a chair on the far side of the room. “Drink? I’ve got tequila and water.”

Woo considered the offer. “Tequila.” From a half-empty bottle of Patrón, Pringle poured out two healthy shots and handed one to Woo. Drinking with the kid certainly wasn’t what he had planned for the evening, but why not? He had nothing better to do until morning. And maybe the tequila would help him sleep. He had a fleeting thought,
What if the kid is coming on to me?
He took a step back, putting some distance between himself and the young man.

Woo sensed his discomfort and laughed. “Shit. Sorry. Don’t worry. I’m not here for that. Not at all,” he said, shaking his head emphatically.

“Then why are you here?” Pringle’s curiosity was piqued. “It’s late.”

“I saw you and that woman Megan arguing earlier.”

Pringle let out a sharp laugh.
“
Yeah? So did a lot of people. It happens.”

Woo smiled. “I think I may have an answer to your problem.”

Pringle downed his tequila in one gulp and refilled. “I’m listening.”

A conspiratorial smile blossomed on Woo’s lips. “I need your assurance—”

Pringle cut him off with a chop of his hand. “No assurances. Tell me what you came to say or get out.”

Woo looked back at the door, as if reconsidering his decision. Then he turned back to Pringle and started talking. The next half hour flew by as Woo gave him the details on Hollister’s group, painting a picture that filled in all of the holes Pringle saw in his current life, from the no-bullshit approach to community relations to her plans for expansion across the Southwest. Pringle peppered him with questions throughout, growing increasingly excited as Woo had answers for everything.
Either this kid is a master bullshit artist
,
or these guys have already figured things out
. Finally, he ran out of questions. He poured them each another shot of tequila, and then reclined in his chair, drumming his fingers on the arm.

Woo had revolutionized his understanding of the new world, provided the answers to his most vexing questions, and most importantly, given him hope, a new lease on life. His head reeled from the potential. Just forty miles away was a group of people who shared his approach to the world. He struggled to maintain a poker face, to keep his excitement from the teen.

“So what do you need from me?” he asked cautiously.

Woo grinned. “I’m glad you asked...”

Pringle leaned forward, unable to contain his excitement anymore as Woo laid out a plan so simple, so devious, he wondered why he hadn’t thought of it himself.

Thirty

Megan awoke slowly, her semiconscious
already sifting through the events of the previous day. The conflict with Pringle weighed heavily on her. She knew she would have to do something soon, make some movement toward a compromise; otherwise, they were all doomed.

Her thoughts turned to Jack. He intrigued her. She replayed their exchange after the zombie incursion. It had triggered something lurking deep within. It made no sense, yet somehow his presence felt
right
at a primal level, his quiet strength, the way he held his ground against Pringle’s challenge, the casual manner in which he met her gaze, his eyes filled with a lingering sadness. She wanted to be close to him. No. She
needed
to be close to him. To
be
with him.

Her face grew hot; she blushed. A devious smile blossomed on her lips. Almost without thinking, she slipped a hand beneath the covers, tracing her fingers along the plane of her belly, then pressing them to the warmth building between her legs. She closed her eyes, imagining Jack above her. For the briefest instant, some small part of her attempted to dismiss the fantasy, to relegate it to a simple infatuation. But it was no use. Her desire triumphed, and she abandoned all pretense at control, succumbing to the rush of the moment. She began to touch herself, slowly at first, then increasing the tempo. Her breath came in ragged gasps. Sweat broke out on her forehead. Her vision dimmed, pinpricks of light flashed at the edges, and then it snapped back into stark clarity as she reached climax. A small moan escaped her lips. She shuddered. “Jack…”

Megan lay still for what seemed an eternity. She panted softly, basking in the afterglow with her eyes closed and a contented smile lingering on her lips. As her euphoria began to fade, she found herself wondering ‘what if’?
What if Jack feels the same way? How would it work? Could it work?
She opened her eyes, her smile crumbling.
It’s impossible
.
Or is it?
She chewed her lip, considering her predicament. Everything was different now.
We’ve all done things we never would have done before. All of us. Some worse than others.
Regardless, she could easily imagine the look of disgust on his face when she told him of her past.
Revulsion. Condemnation.