Fallocaust (The Fallocaust Series) (79 page)

“Greyson left him in charge for... three days.”

Reaver stood with a smile on his face, he held out his hand and as he did Sadii ran up to him with a megaphone There was a whine and a crackle, before his voice could be heard loud and clear through the entire square.

“My dear residents!” My chimera said, he swept his hand out in front of him. “This town meeting... has been called to order.”

Reaver

I watched the faces of the people in the crowd below me, a mixture of all expressions but everyone was staying in place and being obedient. I took a step forward and held the megaphone to my mouth.

“Now, as everyone knows. I am in charge of Aras as of late and I have had been dealing with troubling news.” I deliberately paused to add a little drama to it. “Plague... Trideath.”

That was my hook and they snapped at it. The crowd below me exploded in a frenzy of panicked voices and nervous cries. Their heartbeats raised and joined together in a continues beat that sounded like the wings of hundreds of insects. I felt my chest tingle and my body go light. It was difficult to hide the smile but I managed.

“You killed the Kerry’s though.” A man spoke up over the crowd. It was John Tulley the winemaker. “It’s been contained.”

“Yes, John. I did execute the Kerry family, for your safety I didn’t wait until they were crawling with maggots like
others
may. My faction and my people have decontaminated and cleaned the Kerry’s to what would surpass the best of our abilities.”

I could feel the tension die from the crowd as they sighed with relief. That would be short lived.

“But we have another problem,” I spoke into the megaphone. “Three of our prisoners Karl, Irvine and Cam decided to murder and consume one Sophie White last night, who infected her self while robbing the Kerry residents with the same Karl and Irvine.”

I let this sink in, and enjoyed the energy of the people amplify with each personal realization.

The infection wasn’t contained! Oh no!!

Their fear trickled through our surroundings in such a thick electricity I swore I could see it. Everyone was speaking, everyone was shouting, crying, holding their mouths in panic. Their fear was acting like its own infection. People I had seen calm just moments ago were talking to each other in rushed, desperate voices, a look of absolute dread on their faces.

Husbands consoling wives, children clinging to parents. Their sea of white faces stricken and pale stretching back to the very edge of the square. They looked like grey and brown worms writhing in a wound, desperate for any consolation, any hope, any chance to rid themselves of such a bad feeling.

“You have my husband Harold.” The woman I had seen my first night in charge called. “I want him home before court. Greyson’s law says there is court for each crime. I demand a trial for him!”
I spoke into the megaphone again. “This woman is right. It is Greyson’s law to hold court for every crime, but there is a problem with that. We have three men infected and four men who had been housed with them. Because of over crowding it is assumed they are infected as well. So there are decisions to make,” I said, my eyes moved across the crowd. “Do we risk criminals infecting the rest of us? When there is a ninety percent chance they have trideath as well?”

I turned around and nodded at Redmond, without another look he turned and walked from the platform towards where we had the trucks waiting. When Matt saw him leave he glanced up at me for my orders and I gave him a nod too. They both knew what to do.

“I will leave it up to you, my people, because your opinions are important.” I laughed in my own head, they were such idiots. But I was learning a lot from being mayor, and one of the most important things I had learned is that idiots like the illusion of choice. “Do we wait until Greyson comes back to do his court dates to try men caught red handed?  Do we wait knowing they could spread the plague to everyone with so much of a sneeze?” A gross over estimation, trideath wasn’t that infectious but they didn’t care.

“Infect your sons, your daughters, our elderly and our able bodied working men and women? Eat your food, drink your water, all while coughing, dying, vomiting and pissing their plague? Aras, are we not smarter than that? Have we not learned from past experience? Aras... my people... are we not more important than criminals?”

The rush I felt when they started to cheer was almost orgasmic. The tingling in my chest grew stronger and spread to my entire body. I felt light as air, I felt almost intoxicated. I raised my hands and took in a euphoric breath as they cheered harder. I closed my eyes for a moment and just enjoyed it.

“I say we are more important, I say we are above these law breakers. Why put us at risk, for what? Scum, lessers, people below us? People our taxes are paying to incubate a deadly plague that could kill us all?”

With another eruption of cheers, I raised my hands to the grey, overcast sky, the megaphone still in hand and listened to them cheer. I smiled, and it wasn’t forced. I had them, they were mine.

“Aras...” I spoke, I turned around and watched the truck back up to the fountain. In the back were the seven, tied up with rope as I had asked and gagged. All of them shocked, scared and petrified. “You are my court of law, my residents are my council. Tell me... do we exterminate?”

“Yes! Yes!”
They all continued to shout. Arian hands shot up and pumped the air and as Redmond and Hollis started tying the prisoners by their necks to the rusted out swing seat. I could hear muffled screams and grunts as the condemned struggled. I turned back around to the crowd. Now the very last hook.

“It is decided then?” Burn the infected?” I said loudly into the megaphone, the cheering intensified. “Well Aras? Burn the infected?”

Like I had hoped they started saying it back to me, and in moments it was being chanted. The residents over a hundred of them continued to raise their hands. A roaring mob, demanding their justice. I watched the crowd as they chanted. Looking up at me like I was their new god.

“Burn the infected! Burn the infected!”

A portion of them looked nervous, and a few were even shouting ‘
no’
, but their voices were easily drowned out by the masses. Harold’s woman was crying, but two people beside her were talking sharply to her and she was cowering. The others were a small number and not enough to turn the tide.

The parasites were pleased, they were caught up in the fear and in lower levels the excitement that a mass gathering always caused. I could have said anything right now and they would go for it.

“Burn the infected!”
“Criminals burn!” I shouted and sure enough they started shouting that too.

Mickey and Matt appeared, both with trolleys being wheeled in front of them. One had a barrel full of sticks, the other a barrel full of refuse and coal soaked in fuel. They placed them down in front of my thrown together stage. I felt their excitement raise as they saw what was about to happen.

Mickey looked nervous but Matt was loving it. The crowds eyes were on them. Mickey reached into his pocket and pulled out a match, he lit it and threw it into the barrel. The top immediately burst into flames.

“If you are for the extermination, send up the  head of each family and grab a stick,” I said into the megaphone. “Light it on the flames and approach the stage. Everyone clear a way for them and let them pass.”

I could see movement in the sea of people as the men approached me. I turned to Hollis who had secured the last of the prisoners.

“Hollis,” I said away from the megaphone. “Bring our bull cook to the stage, once they’re dead I want three prepared for consumption. The other four take them to Gary.”

Hollis gave me a nod, he had been very cooperative during all of this though he had never voiced approval directly. His obedience was proof enough he was all for what I was doing.

Redmond had been the same way, not once did he disagree with me or tell me this wasn’t a good idea. He wanted it as badly as Hollis and I did, they both just didn’t want to admit it out loud. Morals were so funny, but it would save their asses if Greyson disagreed with my methods.

The seven were strung up by their necks, their feet barely able to touch the ground. The chains wrapped several times along the rusty swing set. Their eyes were uncovered but their mouths gagged. The black grease I had made Redmond smear on their faces had made them look like rats.

They stared at me and cried muffled pleas that would fall to no ones ears but their own. Though with the amplified noise around us I doubt they could even hear their own thoughts.

“Criminals Burn! Burn the infected! Criminals Burn!”

I gave all seven a smile and walked in front of them, the mob on one side of me and the condemned on the other.

I saw a flicker of fire and turned my head to observe over fifteen men watching me for orders. Each holding a stick. The fuel soaked rag I had gotten Mickey to tie to them burning a deep orange flame. There were no more sticks left. I laughed in my head as I saw Sadii’s husband Rudo holding a paint stirring stick that he had managed to keep a small flame on.

“What are we waiting for,” I said into the megaphone. I stepped away from the prisoners and waved a welcome hand towards them. “BURN THEM!”

“BURN THEM! BURN THEM! BURN THEM!”

Killian

My mouth was dry, my hands were trembling. What I was seeing happen below me was a thousand times more terrifying since realizing who my boyfriend was. I was watching him become someone Greyson and Leo had been trying to prevent. I was watching a creature hatch from the waster orphan I had always thought he was.

I swallowed, feeling my anxiety brim inside of me. I watched with dread as the residents all walked onto the stage with their burning sticks. At the beck and control of their new chimera mayor.

No... you aren’t even sure, it could be something else... there could be another explanation.

But I wasn’t stupid... it was painted all over his paled and perfectly handsome face.

My stolen chimera had his hand in the air, egging on the crowd and chanting with them. Riling them up to the point where they were acting more like ravers than arians. Controlling them as I had seen the chimera brothers control Skyfall and the factions they were in charge with. From Elish to Garrett, Kessler to Artemis, they did what they were born to do and did it well. I didn’t know what Reaver had originally been born to do but from what I was seeing it probably involved controlling and killing people.

I had only seen maybe twenty of the residents leave and all of them were either women with small babies who were getting upset by the noise or the elderly. Everyone else was staying for the show, even young children. This would serve as a valuable lesson to them, though whether the lesson was I wasn’t sure. Don’t challenge Reaver’s authority might be a good one.

Especially when he eventually did come into power.

Now I shuddered at the thought. He was no longer my wasteland orphan, he was my sociopathic chimera. My hands had been wrung and gripped so hard they were bruised, tender and in some places bleeding.

Reaver was right... my god he was right, he could never be leader. Did he know this is what would happen to him? No, there was no way of him knowing. Perhaps he knew that his hatred for the residents would eventually affect his leadership. That he would in turn abuse his power to see just what he could get them to do. Was that a part of his genetics? I wish I knew more about these genetically engineered disciples of Silas.

“BURN THE INFECTED!”

He had them... my god Reaver had them. My quiet, introverted, people hating boyfriend had manipulated the entire town to burn seven men alive for crimes ranging from stealing to breaking and entering.

In not even three days.

This was bad. We needed Greyson and Leo here, we needed someone who knew what Reaver was pre-disposed to.

But... was it? In a law sense it was bad, but look... they were all guilty, we knew that. They had all been caught red handed and had been trouble makers in the past. Was what he was doing really that ruthless or was he just getting done what needed to be done? He was right, Greyson wasn’t here to hold court and they were diseased. Reaver might be dark hearted and cruel when he could be, but he was also rational. He just didn’t have the morals to stop him like most people did.

Maybe I was over thinking this. Not all chimeras were evil, Elish seemed cold but nice. He had treated that cicaro of his with respect when I had met him briefly at our house in Tamerlan, and Garrett the leader of Skytech was suppose to be a nice man too.

I was confused, I tensed my hands together. I could hear Asher breathing beside me, quick and excited. I didn’t want to glance at him, I was afraid of the shock and bewilderment I would see in his eyes. What did he think of me now? I was dating this guy and all he was seeing was well... the carnage and chaos that was happening below us.

I looked back down and saw the wood smouldering and burning around the seven. Strips of painted house siding and ceiling beams all bundled around them, sticking out in all directions like stacks of quartz. The dry wood burned well and quickly.

As the crowd chanted and my showman egged them on.

Behind him the prisoners started to struggle trough plumes of grey smoke. Thrashing their heads from side to side and contorting their dangling bodies in feeble attempts to get free. The men with the torches stood on stage and watched, some turning and saying things to each other before laughing.

Then one guy lit his stick again and held it to one of the prisoners heads, lighting his greasy hair on fire. Another joined in and held it to one’s clothing. They smouldered and started to burn, now I could hear their screaming.

I wondered which one was Cam, the guy who had tried to rob me. Reaver had their faces blackened with used cooking grease, and their clothing too. He was dehumanizing them, making them look more like the people we ate every day and less like the ones they ate with. Making it easier to justify their actions perhaps? I don’t know. From the way the people chanted and shouted I think they would have burned a fully groomed man in a suit and tie right now.