The Undead World (Book 5): The Apocalypse Renegades (17 page)

Excitedly, she opened up the paper. There were more of the blue marks. They seemed disjointed, a number was circled here and a letter there, but never was a full line circled. There were twenty-one marks in all, seven letters and fourteen numbers. Every once in a while she could see a very faint line in pencil connecting a letter with two of the numbers.

“It’s a code,” she said, flattening the paper in front of her. The seven letters were either Ns or Ms and the numbers ranged between thirty-three and thirty-six. After gazing at them for some time she made a cranky noise in her throat, disgruntled that the answer to the code didn’t just jump out at her. “It sure is repetitive,” she muttered, growing worried that she would not be smart enough to figure it out.

“What if ‘M’ stood for the first part of the alphabet and ‘N’ stood for the…” She paused as outside the door the sound of someone running could be heard. The footsteps raced by and, only when they faded away, could she breathe again. Immediately, she began searching for a pen to write the letters down; in seconds, she had a sticky note scrawled with her boyish handwriting jammed in her pocket. She put the desk back in order before she slipped to the door and listened. People were talking, loudly but not all that close. She reached for the knob, thinking she would peek to see if the coast was clear, only to freeze with her hand clenched to the brass.

More footsteps were coming closer. Her teeth clenched and her eyes went to squints as the steps drew ever nearer. She was facing the map, and something completely uninteresting caught her attention. She saw that the state just south of Missouri was Arkansas. “Hmmm,” she murmured. That was all the excitement she could muster for Arkansas. There wasn’t a thing in it that she had ever wanted to see or do. Really, the same could be said of Missouri and many of the other states for that matter.

Her left hand rested on South Carolina, another state she knew almost nothing about. Next to her thumb, on the very edge of the map, was a number in red—37. Just above that was the number 36. With a dawning realization, she looked up at the top of the map; on the eastern edge of it, right above her, she saw two letters—EE. “They’re map coordinates,” Sadie whispered, excitedly, feeling a jitteriness in her chest.

In a blink, she had the scratch paper out and was searching the map, trying to find exact spots where the numbers and letters intersected. Each corresponded to a little town but strangely, not one of which landed on the Mississippi River. “That can’t be right.” She checked the letter and number combinations once more and came up with the same seven tiny towns. She then began changing up the numbers, switching them around, only to find she either ran out of map or came up on absolutely nothing.

“Is this a trick?” she wondered. Had her dad set this up, hoping to send Jillybean on a wild goose chase? “No,” she said. That didn’t make sense either. “He would have to assume that I would break in here and that I’d be able to figure all this out.” Her father had too little faith in her intelligence to try that. The answer was simpler: the map coordinates were his stashes, where he kept his hidden goods.

“Then where is the danged bridge?” Sadie went back to the map and stared at it for a long time, tracing the snakelike Mississippi up from New Orleans all the way to Cape Girardeau. There was nothing. Sighing, she turned back to take in the rest of the room, hoping to see something she had overlooked, but there really wasn’t much to it: a fully stocked bar that her father clearly frequented, a couple of leather couches that held nothing beneath their cushions but a smattering of useless coins, and a coat rack with a single, black, leather jacket hanging from it.

On a whim, she went through the jacket’s pockets, feeling like her fourteen-year-old self, scavenging for quarters or a stray dollar or two. The leather coat held only two things of importance: a handful of lint-covered jellybeans and a tiny .25 caliber pistol. Sadie recognized the gun. It was the gun Jillybean had used to kill the bounty hunter. For some reason, Sadie didn’t like the feel of its shiny metal; it made her a touch queasy, and a shiver went up her back as if the gun was cursed.

Cursed or not, she stuck it in her pocket.

It was time to leave. She took two steps to the door when it suddenly opened. Her guard, Mark, filled the opening with his bulk. “You pain in the ass,” he seethed, breathing in gasps and looking as though he were seconds away from keeling over from pneumonia or a stroke or something nasty. He was grey in the face and sweating so much that the collar of his shirt was soaked. He leaned back into the hall and bellowed, “I got her! Down here.”

“I was…I was just getting a drink,” she said. At his appearance she had backed to the bar and now she grabbed the first bottle her hand stole over. It was tequila; she hated tequila. Regardless, she unscrewed the top and took a large swig. It tasted like gasoline and she couldn’t help but cough and splutter.

Mark was grim faced. “If you pull this shit again, I’m going to hurt you in ways that aren’t pretty. You got me? I don’t care who your daddy is. Now, get your ass out of here.”

She left, still clutching the tequila, hoping to use it as a prop and also as a way to calm her nerves. She hadn’t found the bridge but she had found the one thing that could get her and Grey and, if she was very, very lucky, Eve out of there. A gun. It was her ticket to freedom, but only if she had the guts to use it. That was the key to any escape attempt on her part: was she willing to kill in cold blood?

As she passed Mark he reached for the bottle, but Sadie pulled back. She couldn’t commit murder, not if she was straight up sober.

“Ipes! Where are you?” the little girl with flyaway brown hair, hissed in a thin whisper. Her eyes bulged as she tried to take in everything around her at once. She literally jumped at every sound. The night had been nerve-wracking, but at least she had Ipes to comfort her. Now she had a low sunrise creating horrible shadows in the forest. Each was twisted and perverted, becoming horrors that were far worse than any of the zombie-monsters. Her imagination bent her emotions even further and she went from a stealthy creep to a fast-walk.

It was dangerous going so fast, but not so dangerous as the level her voice rose to. “Ipes! Please don’t leave me.” It was just shy of a shout.

The monsters heard. They were made of the same dark stuff as the shadows, which moved and grew. The entire run of forest creaked and snapped and moaned. The sounds came at her from three sides, while in the black water, the river-monsters became louder and clawed at the water trying to get her. “Ipes, what should I do?” There was no answer. She had been mean and scared off her friend, her only friend left in the whole wide world and now she had a bellyful of regret.

Of all her conflicting emotions, being alone was the most dreadful. What good was being happy if you had no one to share it with? And how could you hate, when the only things around you were bugs and plants and monsters? Monsters weren’t people, not anymore. What good was anger when you only had yourself to be angry at?

And how come her fear was a million times worse when she was alone?

Now the monsters were so close that she didn’t dare make another sound. In a growing panic, she ran to a sycamore tree that seemed to throw out branches to hug the girl. Its trunk was wider than a door and its normally grey bark was black and slimy from being so near the river. Its roots were like a hundred undulating snakes; giant ones that arced up out of the damp earth, twisting over themselves before sinking back beneath the dirt once more. She had hoped to hide herself in the darkness beneath the tree, only the monsters found her and charged eagerly.

The first of these fell directly at her feet. The monsters couldn’t navigate the gnarly roots. They tripped constantly, while the little girl was nimble as a ballerina, her sneakered feet having an easy time of it among the roots and the rocks and the grasping grey fingers of the monsters. The direction she ran was unknown to her; she just ran until she was out of breath and still very much alone. She stopped next to a slew of rhododendrons where she hid herself and cried.

Where was Ipes? Where were Neil, Sadie, and Eve? Were they even still alive? And what had happened to Captain Grey? He seemed altogether too tough to kill, which meant he was either still a prisoner or he was out there somewhere; had he abandoned her? That thought left her queasy, and the more she thought about it, something she couldn’t help, the more the queasy threatened to run up her throat and shoot out of her mouth.

“Oh, please don’t throw up,” she whispered, panting and gagging. It sure felt like what was in her stomach wanted to jump right out of her. It sat right at the top of her throat and wouldn’t go away. It was such an awful feeling that she was just contemplating putting her finger down her throat to get it over with, when she heard a very slight rumble on the air. Immediately, she sat up straight, her neck stretched to its fullest. She held her breath and her ears were so attuned to the noise that they practically twitched.

She was hearing cars or, more likely, trucks; and they were coming out of the hills to the east. “It’s the River King,” she concluded. He was coming and because of her he would find his boat completely intact and drivable. “And all the people will be prisoners again,” she said sadly.

Had Ipes been there he would’ve made some smart-alecky, chickeny sort of comment to her. He would have told her to run and hide, which sounded absolutely natural and perfect to her at the moment. Really, the last thing in the world she wanted to do was be a hero for
them
. Fred Trigg was a jerk and Joe Gates was mean, and yes, Michael was nice, but the others looked on her like she was a freak.

“But, I’m all alone,” she countered. It wasn’t much of an argument. Alone or not, she had no real plan to rescue them. The most she could hope to do was delay the river crossing. “And without Mr. Neil or Sadie or anyone to help me…”
I shouldn’t even try
, she finished her sentence internally.
Blowing up the boat was just too dangerous
, she rationalized, partially hearing Ipes’ voice in her mind, but knowing he wasn’t there for real.

The sound of the trucks coming closer, for some reason settled her mind and a resolve firmed up in her: no matter what, she had to find Ipes. And when she found him she would apologize and promise to listen to him. And she would promise to be good all the time, if he would only come back to her.

The morning had progressed enough for her to see by and to be seen by. Thankfully, she was dressed in the dirty rags of a monster, and like one, she gimped back down to the river unmolested by the real monsters that were traipsing all over the forest in confusion. Amazingly, she walked right up to Ipes who was sitting in the weeds exactly where she left him. It felt as though her feet had been guided to him by a higher power.

Weak-kneed, she dropped down in front of his big nose and sobbed, “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean none of that stuff about leaving you to rot. I’d never do that.” She paused, fully expecting him to make some sort of wisecrack, but he remained stone quiet and still, his beady black eyes staring without interest at her grass-stained jeans. Timidly, she reached out to touch him, not on his protruding nose which he was sensitive about, but on his sloping shoulder.

He fell over and didn’t move.

Behind her, the trucks drew closer, their sound lending a feeling of urgency in the little girl. “Please, Ipes. I said I was sorry. Don’t be like this.” He still didn’t budge. “Alright, you win. I’m not going to rescue them at all. Here, watch.” She picked up her friend and ran back to where she had left the pack. It was strange. The second she picked him up she found that all her weird emotions and fears faded into the background of her mind. They weren’t gone, but they were easier to deal with.

She found the pack without any problem and set the zebra beside it. “Watch,” she said picking up the C4 and tossing it aside. “See? I’m not going to blow up the boat. Now, talk to me.” He didn’t. He didn’t budge a floppy ear or twitch his spiky mane in the least. He remained frustratingly inert.

“You have to tell me what to do, Ipes,” she begged, holding him up to her face and shaking him gently. He was as still and silent as before and now, in the background of her consciousness the sound of the trucks drew closer, adding to her anxiety with every second. Once more her fears and emotions began to creep up on her, spinning out of control again, yet she retained enough influence over her own mind to keep from screaming at him or dropping him in the river.

“I know,” she whispered, staring around as if afraid to be overheard. “I know what you want from me. We’ll leave. We’ll get out of here. You’re just afraid is all. I get it. I am, too.” The total concept of fear was something she understood better than anyone. The fear she had felt from before had been so all-encompassing huge that it had made her crazy. She hated the notion of “crazy.” People were always looking at her and thinking it. Sometimes it felt like she was branded by the word. She used to blame Ipes. He was always messing with her, getting her to do things against her will…

The thought wasn’t even complete and still it struck a chord of truth in her belly. Her eyes went dark with suspicion. “You’re doing it again, aren’t you? All of that craziness was you. All this…all this was your fault.” Her other emotions faded as anger took over her mind. It was so big it didn’t seem to fit completely into her head. It felt as though some of it was leaking out of her ears or making her tongue taste like half pennies. And yet she still had a sliver of control.

“You did this because you can’t take me over anymore, right?” she demanded, shaking the toy. “Well it’s not going to work! I’m not crazy. You’re the one who’s crazy and that’s what means you aren’t alright in the brain. I know it. And I know this is your fault.”

Finally, Ipes moved. He shook his head as if he were sad at what he was going to say.
You can blame me if you wish but your mind is actually broken. It’s the terrible stress you’re under and it’s getting worse
.

“It’s only getting worse because of you!” she retorted, angrily. “I would be fine if you would just leave me alone.”

I wish that was true. You may not realize it, but I’m helping you to cope with everything. I left you alone and look what happened. Those crazy emotions and weird thoughts you were just having was all you. If I wasn’t here it would be a thousand times worse
.

Jillybean squinted at him, her brows coming together in worry. “What are you saying? Are you saying I’m really crazy?” There was a hint of fear in her voice that caused her to the clip each of her words as though they were frosted in ice.

The zebra didn’t pull any punches.
Yes. Your mind is injured. It’s broken. It’s just like the rest of your body; it can be hurt. That’s the bad news, the good news is that it can also heal; it just takes time and rest.
This made no sense to her. Jillybean knew perfectly well what she needed: she needed Sadie and Eve and Mr. Neil to be with her again, and Captain Grey too. Ipes shook his head, gravely.
I don’t think that’s going to happen. I’m afraid we’re on our own again. I think your friends are all captured
. As evidence the trucks drew closer, their rumble growing louder.

“No,” she whispered, her lips drawn into a line. “I can stop this.”

Stop what exactly?
Ipes asked, and now it was his turn to be suspicious.

“Everything.” The declaration, made with such surety came with a feeling that she couldn’t grasp completely. It was like cogs coming together or a zipper meshing smooth or like a band snapping into place—her mind was hers again. Yes, it was desperately fragile, and the edges were chipped in parts and gummy and loose in others, but the bulk was intact and she knew she had to try to rescue the group, just like she knew Ipes would make excuses not to. “Don’t say it,” she said. “I know it’s dangerous.”

And?
Ipes asked, raising one of his stripes that he frequently called an eyebrow but really wasn’t.

“And I know that blowing up the boat won’t accomplish much, but it’s better than doing nothing at all. It will at least slow them down.”

Ok, so you slow them down, and then what?
That was the real question that she didn’t want to think about because she didn’t have a real answer. Ipes knew this.
But you have to think about it. You’ll be risking your life, and to what purpose? To what end?

The only answer within her was the kaleidoscope of whacked out emotions that she had felt before. They were still there, hiding beneath the thin membrane of her will. Every time she considered the possibility of failure, her mind would go off-kilter and thump like an old record caught in a scratch loop. There was only one thing to combat it: hope. She had to hope or she would end up quitting on everything, including life.

She pushed hope to the forefront of her mind and picked up the C4 and the rest of her belongings. Ipes started to say something but she didn’t think her fragile mental state could handle even the least hint of resistance. It felt like her mind was glued together, and not superglued either. It felt like she had the lightest coating of kindergarten grade Elmers keeping it from crumbling away.

“I’m doing this and you had better help me.” There was a threat in there, one that felt a lot like mutual suicide if the zebra thought about rebelling again.

I will. It’s not like I have any choice
.

“You don’t,” she told him. Now she had determination, just a breath of it to go along with her hope. It met a test right off the bat: the black water of the Mississippi looked like it was sprouting grey arms and the occasional bobbing head. It was cold and disgusting, like she was wading into a soup of congealing disease
They were still there
.

If you don’t puke, I will
, Ipes said.

“You can’t puke,” Jillybean replied in a breathless whisper just as the water reached her upper thighs. “Because, you’re not…” The remainder of the sentence could not be voiced. It could not even be considered. Too much of her personality, too much of her Freudian Id was invested in the concept, in the reality of Ipes as an actual being, and not as a fragment of her personality. To actually say,
because you’re not real
would mean she would have to accept that she was alone in the world.

The zebra glossed over the near faux pas, while he pointed out the closing river
monsters. Don’t forget to moan
, he reminded her.

She moaned in a disgusted, guttural manner until the monsters’ attention focused elsewhere. They began to stare at the barge with hunger in their dead eyes. The lone guard was standing now at the bow, watching for the approaching trucks. A thousand eyes were on him, allowing Jillybean to slink deep into the water looking like just another monster. It wasn’t long before she found herself relaxing. Her camouflage was top-notch and, as a ‘tadpole’, she was a good enough swimmer to float downstream unnoticed by everyone and everything.