Plague World (Ashley Parker Novel) (35 page)

“I don’t like it… but she says you need to go with us.”

Griff shrugged.

“Got nowhere else to go.”

Nobody looked happy about it, but no one argued either. I was too numb to care. I followed my team through the now empty lobby as the familiar unsteady gait of the living dead could be heard shuffling through the halls.

We hit the lab, and retrieved Dr. Albert, whose main response was irritation at the interruption of his research. From there, JT traced the way back to the tunnel, and then let someone else with better night vision take the lead until we emerged onto the trail.

Zombies were stumbling down the path from above. Rather than engage them, we picked up our pace until we reached the
Zodiac
, still resting above the tide in the little cove and surrounded by territorial seals. Gentry and Tony shooed them away, dragging the boat down to the water. Nathan placed Simone in first, and the rest of us followed.

Gentry took the helm. I handed over the phone to JT, curled up next to Simone and shut my eyes, wondering if I’d ever feel anything but this terrible hollow numbness.

Part of me didn’t care.

Still, when Lil’s hand crept into mine, I took it and didn’t let go until we’d reached North Island.

The cafeteria was unusually crowded as I stood in line to get some food for Lil. She was in one of her downswings, and was holed up in her room. Hopefully she’d agree to eat something.

It’d been a week since we’d returned to the DZN facility in San Francisco. The
Zodiac
had gotten us safely to North Island, where military personnel and the Veteran’s Allegiance boys greeted us. The minute we’d landed, Rooster had taken charge of Simone’s care, rushing her off to the base’s hospital, Nathan close behind.

If the bullet had been an inch further in any direction, and if Nathan had not kept up compression to slow the bleeding, not even the accelerated healing abilities of a wild card would have saved her.

I’d required some cleanup, as well, to prevent my wounds from becoming septic. The treatment didn’t hurt quite as much as the original damage Jake had caused, but it was a close second.

We’d left for San Francisco the next day, after saying farewell to the bikers. I owed these guys a debt that I could never repay. We all did. So I hugged each and every one of them, and didn’t even squawk when Cheeky gave my butt an extra squeeze when it was his turn.

“Stay strong, little sister,” Viper said. “You’ll get through this.”

I wasn’t so sure, but I didn’t say so.

Once back in San Francisco, Dr. Albert holed up with Dr. Arkin, with Simone’s help from the sidelines. It quickly became clear why she’d insisted that we bring Griff back with us. His condition was unique as a vector and a wild card. As such, he was irreplaceable. Hopes ran high that a retrovirus might be created based on Griff’s particular immunity, combined with the properties that made Gabriel responsive to the antiserum. It wouldn’t necessarily cure anyone, but it might help their systems fight off the infection.

If we could slow down the spread of the plague, we might prevent it from becoming an extinction event.

Then there had been Jamie. Poor obsessed Jamie who’d betrayed us to keep Simone safe. I wouldn’t have survived if she hadn’t stepped in and helped me, but I wasn’t under any illusions about her reasons for doing so.

She’d been gone when we returned to San Francisco. No one knew when she’d left or where she went. Simone was devastated, but Nathan told me privately he thought it was for the best.

* * *

I heard Tony’s voice coming up behind me as he and JT got in line.

“Dude,” he said, “J.J. Abrams totally needs to be hung up by his nutsack for the
Star Trek
reboot.”

“Don’t I know it,” JT agreed. “There can be no forgiveness for totally fucking around with the original space-time continuum, Spock or no Spock.”

They fist bumped, Tony looking the most animated I’d seen him since Kai’s death. He’d gotten over his knee-jerk distrust of JT, with reluctant admiration morphing into friendship. The two of them spent a lot of time with G as well, hanging out in the cafeteria and bonding over comics and other forms of geekdom, arguing endlessly over which Doctor Who was the best. Sometimes Gentry joined them but he couldn’t quite achieve the same level of enthusiasm.

He was, however, interested in learning more about parkour, as was Tony. I thought maybe I’d give it a try myself down the line, but right now I couldn’t summon up the energy.

I didn’t have the energy or interest for much of anything these days, other than taking care of Lil, whether she wanted me to or not. The affection she had shown me after Gabriel’s death ebbed and flowed, depending on her mood of the moment. The bad guys had given her tranquilizers at the Cabrillo Point facility, but Lil being Lil, she’d held them under her tongue and spat them out. So when JT had stumbled across her in a cell, she’d pretended to be asleep, and had almost broken his nose before realizing who he was.

She was taking her meds now, but the betrayal she’d felt for me had left its mark, even though a part of her realized I’d been doing it for her own good. I learned not to take her mood swings personally.

It helped that I was still numb, my feelings encased in a bubble that distanced me from everything and everyone. Nothing seemed quite real. When I interacted with people, I made all the right and polite responses, but my emotions were so muted that I felt like a cardboard cutout of myself. Even talking with my parents, making sure they were safe, hadn’t felt the way I’d hoped it would.

In a way, that was fine by me. I didn’t really want to feel, because I knew once I did it would hurt so badly I might not want to live.

Lil still needed me, though. That gave me purpose, even if sometimes it was just to scoop out the litter box. So for now, I’d focus on her. As long as she needed me, I could stay in this safe zone of emotional null.

For her sake.

I took my tray, balancing it carefully as I threaded my way past the tables and people toward the door. Just before I reached it, I noticed a woman, mid- to late-thirties, with short brown hair, dressed in scrubs and a loose black T-shirt. She was sitting at a table by herself, staring blankly into a bowl of soup. She held her spoon in a loose grip as if she’d forgotten it was there. I glanced down, and caught my breath.

She had deep indentations, now healing with shiny scar tissue, which went up and down both arms. Jake’s one surviving victim from Redwood Grove. The last time I’d seen her, she was covered with raw, seeping wounds. It was a wonder she was still alive, and a minor miracle that she’d retained even a semblance of sanity.

I hesitated, then decided to take the plunge. I sat down across from her. She looked at me without interest. I pulled my sleeves up, revealing the divots Jake had sliced out of my forearms.

“Got a real nice one on my stomach, too.”

Her face shadowed with understanding and pain. She reached out wordlessly, putting a hand on mine and squeezing gently.

“You, too?”

“Yeah.” I nodded. “Same guy.”

She swallowed hard.

“I’m sorry.”

“I am too,” I said. “No one should have to go through that.”

“I still dream about it sometimes… about him.” Her face contorted with the memory.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

She looked at me for a moment, and then nodded again, slowly.

“Yes. Yes I do,” she said. “I can talk to you about it. You’ll understand. And if I don’t… if I keep it inside me, it will eat me alive.”

She took a deep breath, and then continued.

“When they set up the military barricades, I had to get home, back to Redwood Grove. So I took a back way, to sneak around them.” Her eyes were distant as she remembered. “When I got home, there were bodies everywhere, but they wouldn’t stay dead. I panicked, locked myself out of my car, so I ran—made it to a friend’s house a few blocks away, Janet. We got in her car, tried to drive up to the college, but there were a bunch of those things on the road, and Janet got scared. Turned the car around and drove up into the mountains.

“We found the house up there, the one where—” She swallowed, the muscles in her face twitching. “That man… Jake was there. He invited us in. Said we’d be safe.” She looked up at me, eyes wide. “He waited until we were sleeping. I think he drugged our food or drinks. We woke up fastened to tables… we couldn’t move. He fed us enough to keep us alive.

“Sometimes he remembered to stop the bleeding after he’d—” She stopped. Her fingers clutched convulsively.

“He ate us, you know,” she said simply. “Ate us. Little bits at a time. He’d apologize, even cry a little. Say he was sorry over and over again. But he wouldn’t stop. No matter how much Janet or I screamed.”

“I know.”

She shook her head as if to clear it.

“Yes, I imagine you do.”

I put my other hand on top of hers.

“You’ll be glad to know that he’s dead,” I said. “
Really
dead. He can’t hurt you or anyone else again.”

She gave a convulsive shudder and shut her eyes.

“Thank God,” she whispered. She opened them again. “I’m sorry, I’m forgetting my manners. I’m Betty.”

“I’m Ashley,” I replied. “If you ever want to talk again, just ask for me.” I got to my feet, wanting to get Lil her soup before it got cold. Then suddenly my brain did a somersault, and I turned back.

Betty’s Beads.

“Why did you sneak past the quarantine?”

She looked at me and smiled sadly.

“I needed to get home to my daughter. But I never did find her.”

I let my breath out in one long exhale. Put the tray down and took Betty by the hand, practically lifting her out of her chair.

“Come with me,” I said. “I’ve got someone you’ll want to meet.”

A few minutes later we stood outside Lil’s room. I rapped on the door.

“Hey,” I said, my pulse racing. “It’s Ash.”

No answer, so I opened the door and pushed it open, sticking my head inside. Lil was in her usual position on the bed, curled up in a little ball under the covers, with only the top of her head sticking out. Binkey and Doodle were on sentry duty on top of her.

“Hey,” I said again, “I’ve got someone who wants to see you.”

“Go away,” she said, voice muffled by the bedclothes.

Betty stuck her head into the room.

“What cute cats,” she said. “They remind me of…” And then she stopped.

“Lily?” She stepped into the room.

The covers slipped off of Lil’s head and shoulders as she slowly sat up, an expression of almost painful hope on her face.

“Mom?”

Betty nodded, her face and throat working convulsively as she stared at her daughter.

“Mommy?”

Betty tried to speak, but the words wouldn’t come. A sob burst forth as she held her arms out. With a wordless cry, Lil catapulted out of bed, causing the cats to scatter as she threw herself into her mother’s arms and began to cry in huge, wrenching sobs that wracked her entire body.

Tears stung my own eyes as I backed out of the room, shutting the door behind me with a quiet click. I stood in the hallway for a moment, then slowly walked away from her room, trying to ignore the hollow feeling inside as I realized Lil would no longer need me.

* * *

I walked aimlessly for a little while, ignoring the people I passed, most of whom I didn’t recognize anyway. Without any forethought, I made my way up to the main level and from there, to the main elevator that went to the glassed-in crosswalk.

Once up top, I wandered over and up the stairwell that led to the rooftop where the helicopter had taken Gabriel and Dr. Albert away. I sat down in the middle of the makeshift helipad, wrapping my arms around my knees and hugging them close to my body. I stared straight ahead at the cement wall in front of me, my eyes focusing on a zigzagging crack in the cement that looked as if it had been left by Zorro. Then I put my head down on my knees and cried.

I cried until my head hurt and my throat was raw from the loud, keening sobs that ripped their way out of me. I cried for Kai, for Mack, the Gunsy Twins, Carl, and Red Shirt, whose name I’d never bothered to learn. For Aimee and her daughter. I cried for my old boyfriend Matt and my roommate, for everyone who’d suffered because of misguided altruism, greed, and arrogance.

Mostly, though, I cried for Gabriel and for myself, and for the chance we’d never have to find out what the two of us could have had together. I cried until my eyes were swollen and my head throbbed. Until the tears finally stopped coming, dissolving into the occasional hitching sob until even those died off, leaving me hollowed out to my very core.

Then I wiped my eyes and nose as best as I could with my shirtsleeves, then wrapped my arms back around my knees. I don’t know how long I sat there like that. Long enough for the sun to fade down into the horizon, a cold wind picking up and biting through my clothes. I didn’t care, though. I barely even noticed it. If I was lucky, I’d catch a chill and have it turn into pneumonia and die.

Not fucking likely, thanks to my sturdy immune system. But I could hope.

I heard the sound of footsteps coming up the stairs and out onto the rooftop, crunching across the asphalt as they came toward me. I stayed where I was, still hugging my knees and staring at the mark of Zorro. Griff sat down next to me and silently handed me a bottle of water. I took it without saying anything, unscrewed the lid and took a sip.

We sat in a strangely compatible silence for a while longer. Griff reminded me of a cat, the kind that did exactly what it wanted, when it wanted, its sense of loyalty predicated by its needs from moment to moment. I still wasn’t sure if he should be considered a hero or a villain in all of this. Arguments could be made on either side, I suppose.

He’d saved my life, but let the rest of the team get taken without trying to help. He’d gone after Lil and brought her back alive, because he’d promised me he would. And he’d come through for all of us in the end.

“Thank you for finding Lil.” My voice cracked as I broke the silence between us, throat still raw from the tears. I took another sip of water before continuing. “I really didn’t think I’d see her again.”