Hell's Children: A Post-Apocalyptic Survival Thriller (20 page)

They drove through quickly. Then more trees, then up and down hills along a winding road. Soon, the trees got bigger—much bigger. Had to have been hundreds of years old. The houses turned into mansions. At the bottom of one of the hills, they turned left and proceeded up a curving drive that led to a huge, white house. Jack counted five RV trailers parked out front. There was also a big fire with teenagers sitting around it.

Jack’s mouth fell open at the lights gleaming from every window of the mansion.

“Electricity?”

“This one’s got a generator hooked up,” Tom said. “Lucky him, huh? So listen: these guys are real mean sometimes. Just smile and nod and say
yes
to everything, okay?”

Jack nodded obediently. “Yes.”

“And leave your gun in the car. Nobody’s supposed to have a gun but us Pyros. Cool?”

After a brief hesitation, he said, “Cool.” Then he pretended to put his gun under the driver’s seat.

“Crap, here they come,” Tom said.

From the direction of the mansion, several boys were coming their way, all of them pushing fifteen. Each carried the military-style weapons Jack and his Rippers preferred. Unlike almost every other survivor Jack had seen, they appeared plump in the face, not scrawny and half-starved like Tom and Joey and the ones around the fires.

Tom rolled down his window and whispered back, “Remember what I said.”

O
ne of the
pudgier boys looked in with a flashlight. “What are
you
doing here? You’re supposed to be watching the highway.” He shined the beam in the back seat. “Who the hell is he?”

“I’m, Jack. I’m here to—”

In a loud, official voice, Tom said, “We’re here to see Blaze—super important.”

“About what?”

“Super important stuff,” Jack said, smiling.

“Was I talking to you?” the boy said. “Get out of the car. All of you!”

Grimacing, Tom and Joey got out, followed by Jack on the far side, carrying his pack. The boy came around and got in his face.

“What’chu say to me, punk? Say it to my face, punk.”

He had his rifle pointed down, and he was pushing up against Jack and doing this weird thing with his shoulder, bumping it against Jack again and again. It was such an odd thing to do, Jack couldn’t help himself. He laughed.

“Think I’m funny?” the boy said, faking a bump and taking a swing.

Jack, who’d anticipated the punch, dropped his pack and stepped into it, locking the boy up in a tangle of arms so that neither of them could move. Well, Jack could, a little—not bogged down with a rifle and having years of martial arts experience behind him.

The boy’s ear was very close to Jack’s mouth.

“Listen here, you pudgy little cabbage,” Jack said quietly over the grunting. “If I want, I can snap you in two. If you try for that gun of yours, I’ll kill you where you stand. Got it?”

The boy swore and tried to break loose, but couldn’t.

Jack reached up and squeezed the soft spot behind his ear, bringing a loud yelp. “
Got it?
”

“Yeah, get off!”

Jack gave a final squeeze, earning another yelp, and pushed him away. Casually, he hooked his thumb near where his shirt covered the .40 caliber. Just in case.

The crowd watched excitedly, happy for any kind of entertainment in a world without game consoles and social media. They shouted at the boy to keep fighting, to do something. His face grew madder and madder as he worked himself up to a fatal decision for one of them. It wouldn’t be long.

From the direction of the house, a large boy with flaming red hair pushed through in a cloud of cigarette smoke.

“What the hell’s going on?” Blaze said. “Who’s this asshole?”

* * *

B
laze was big like Brad
, easily fifteen or sixteen, and his red hair was cut flat on top and gelled in a spiky landing pad. His acne, coupled with the evil gleam in his eyes, made him look almost demonic. The effect was added to with every puff of his foul-smelling cigarette.

The one Jack had been fighting shoved him from behind as they made their way to the front door. Boys and girls Jack’s age and some younger crowded around as they came in. There was a sense of excitement in the air. As if any moment something interesting or violent or both might happen.

Everyone gathered in the large living room, which had a single fireplace in it and no stove. Despite that, the room was warm. Looking around, Jack couldn’t believe his eyes. There were space heaters in the corners of the room, as well as a king-size bed pushed up against a window-free wall. The windows had been packed with fiberglass insulation that looked ripped from an attic, and there was a big screen TV in the room showing some kind of monster movie.

Jack couldn’t help but disapprove of all that gasoline wasting away for no good reason. Especially with everyone shivering outside in the RVs. If he were in charge, they’d be inside the house, where it was warm.

“The new kid’s a tard! The new kid’s a tard!” shouted the boy he’d been fighting, trying to get the others to sing along.

Nobody sang along with him. If anything, they looked like they didn’t think much of their obnoxious companion.

Blaze flopped down onto a big black couch next to a scantily-clad girl. Her expression looked permanently bored, verging on annoyed.

“You’re messing up the show,” she said.

“Tom, right?” Blaze said, ignoring her.

Tom nodded. “And he’s Joey. My cousin.”

“Shut up a minute, Tom,” Blaze said absently, stroking his hairless chin. He took a puff from his cigarette and exhaled loudly. “You left your post to bring me this kid here—the tard. What for?”

The boy who’d started the name-calling laughed overly loud at this, and one or two others joined in. If Blaze thought it was funny, they did too. The girl rolled her eyes and waited with suffering patience.

“He’s got a lot of great stuff,” Tom said, swallowing nervously.

“Blaze, seriously, you need to see this,” Joey said, turning to Jack. “Show him what you got. Show him.”

With an indulgent smirk plastered across his pimply face, Blaze turned to Jack and said, “Well, tard?
Show
me.”

Jack hoisted his pack toward Blaze and said, “Have a look for yourself.”

Some of the others made
woooah
sounds, as if Jack had somehow challenged the big leader—insulted him, even. Which he hadn’t, of course, but that didn’t matter.

Blaze rolled his eyes, refusing to bite. “Shut up while I look at this.” He opened the pack and rooted around, then dumped out the pills, cookies, cans, and candies onto the table in front of him. The pack was big, thanks to Jack’s Mom, who’d wanted something large enough to stuff the whole world into. Fully packed with junk, it weighed about thirty-five pounds.

Blaze whistled appreciatively, then looked at him sideways. “Why haven’t you eaten it yet?”

Jack shrugged nonchalantly. “Eh, you get tired of the sugar after a while. Too much gives me heartburn.” He’d never had heartburn in his life, at least he didn’t think so, but nobody knew that.

“What about the pills? Those
definitely
don’t get old.”

Jack shrugged. “I hurt my head the other day, see?” He showed them Freida’s stitches. “I’m better now, though. You can have the rest. Plenty more where those came from.”

A look of greed stole over the pimply redhead. He gestured impatiently at the crowd. “Everyone, out. Except you, Eddie. We’re gonna talk with the tard, here.” When nobody moved right away, he raised his voice. “
I said get out!
”

They jumped as one and scrambled out the front door. Tom and Joey, too. The girl seemed to know she could stay and didn’t get up. One other person stayed behind—a slender, mean-faced boy with a striped cap and a pistol on his side.

The boy smirked, his expression full of contempt. “What you looking at, freak-tard?”

Miguel had mentioned Eddie—one of the higher-ups in the gang, and not particularly friendly.

Jack was considering how best to answer when Blaze said, “Leave him alone. Actually no, come here. Take a look at our new friend here. What’s your name, dude?”

“Jack.”

“Have a look at Jack, Eddie. Is he … does he look familiar?”

Eddie came over and made a big show of looking him up and down. Apparently he wasn’t impressed. “Looks like a wimpy freak-tard. All freak-tards look the same to me.”

Blaze was shaking his head, staring at Jack with a weird look in his eye. “Something about you, man …”

Jack smiled innocently and bided his time. They’d never met before, though Jack of course recognized him from the two occasions he’d seen him. The first time, before fleeing his house, and later that night when Blaze murdered one of his own gang members. He was obviously trying to psych him out—probably did it to everyone he met.

A moment more and Blaze said, “Eh, it’ll come to me. Always does. So come on, where’d you get all this? What’s this about a stash? And don’t lie, ’cause I’ll know.”

Jack had seen people like Eddie and Blaze before. Usually at the mall where his dad took him people watching, but sometimes when he made his rounds through neighborhoods leaving flyers on doors for his knife-sharpening business. He’d observed them with an analytical eye, sizing up their strengths and weaknesses automatically as his dad had trained him.

Blaze said, “Well, Jack? You gonna say something? I’m starting to get pissed off.”

He’d thought he could handle people like this when it finally came to it. In Carter’s case, he’d gotten the drop on him, and he’d had the backing of Greg and Lisa. On trips to the mall with his dad, he’d been safely protected by the customs of civilization, where nobody carried a gun except police or soldiers. Now here he was, no parents, no police officers, half-dressed girls smiling at him like they wanted him to smile back, and guns everywhere he looked. He’d never been so far out of his element before.

Eddie said, “Answer him, dummy. He asked you a question! Don’t you got sense enough to answer a question?”

But he
trusted
his parents. In all their field trips and all their lessons, everything came back to one thing: motivations. People always wanted something, even if it wasn’t real, like money or cupcakes. Greg and Lisa wanted his friendship, and all the benefits of that. Tony wanted a strong leader, and Steve wanted safety for himself, Molly, and her baby. And every day, people wanted food and a place to sleep and protection from the cold. The wild bunch outside wanted the security offered by brutes like Blaze more than the uncertainty of striking out on their own.

“Dammit, kid,” Blaze said through clenched teeth, “speak up or Eddie’s gonna beat the shit out of you. That’s what Eddie does.”

So it didn’t matter that he was a total fish out of water on this one, because everything was exactly the same. The rules of the game hadn’t changed, only the pieces. Eddie could look as tough and mean as he wanted and nothing would change that. Blaze could be huge and spiky-haired, smoking cigarettes and acting scary as all hell, and that girl could keep freaking him out staring at him like that. None of that mattered, because his compass had found true north at last, and it wasn’t moving.

“That’s it,” Eddie said, smacking his fist. “I’ll make him talk.”

The boy approached languidly from behind, not bothering at guile or speed, secure in his superiority, at home in his environment. Which is why it was easy to duck his slow, ponderous haymaker and jab him hard under the ribs, dropping him gasping to his knees. Jack’s old karate instructor would have been proud. He probably wouldn’t have approved of the follow-up kick to the ribs—bad sportsmanship—but some things couldn’t be helped.

“Oh, wow!” Blaze said, laughing, clapping his hands. The girl’s eyes widened slightly, but that was it. “Eddie got the crap kicked outta’ him by the new guy.”

Eddie struggled to his feet, gasping for breath and holding his side, eyes raging.

Calmly, Jack indicated the contents of his pack, now strewn on the table. “There’s a whole room full of this kind of stuff, all the way to the ceiling, with almost nobody guarding it. Just a few kids with hunting rifles they can barely use. I’d hoped to enlist the world-famous Blaze and his so-called
Pyros
to score more food and drugs than they’ve ever seen. But if this guy’s the best you have”—he looked derisively at Eddie, throwing back the same scorn he’d received since showing up—“then maybe I made a mistake.”

Eddie launched himself forward, arms outstretched. Jack sidestepped toward the table, hooked it with his foot, and tugged it in front of him. Eddie slammed into it shin-first and toppled over. Jack kicked him in the same side as last time, causing his breath to whoosh out in an involuntary scream.

To Jack, Eddie’s motivations were clear: regain whatever reputation he’d lost after squirming around on the floor like that. It wouldn’t be long until he pulled that pistol on his side. To head that off, Jack kneeled on his back, popped the clasp on the holster, and pulled it free.

Sure, he could have shot Blaze if he’d wanted to. He could have done that with his .40 caliber, still hidden under his shirt. But it wouldn’t serve any purpose. Also, he was tired of killing, even though he’d learned he could do it without throwing up. He felt guilty about what he’d done to Ray—and later, at the Dragsters’ headquarters. A little worried, too. That wasn’t who his parents had raised, or the person he wanted to be. For now, though, it was who he needed to be if he wanted to help his friends.

Blaze’s eyes had gone very wide at the sight of the stranger he’d been pushing around brandishing a pistol and nobody there to protect him.

Jack smiled innocently, placed the gun next to a package of peanut butter cookies, and said, “What do you say we stack this place high with canned food and happy pills?”