Tomorrow Land (38 page)

 “The zombies,” her father continued. “We didn’t know there would be zombies. The zombies killed them all. The ones who were supposed to survive and help rebuild the world. They never made it here. Any of them. I waited… I went into hiding… I came back… But never anything.”

Peyton’s heart filled with fear as she tried to grasp what her dad was saying. “Supposed to survive?” she whispered. “What are you talking about, Dad?”

“I guess I might as well tell you the truth,” he said, glancing around. “What difference does it make now?” He gave a half-mad laugh.

And so he told her. How he and his friends had formed a secret coalition ten years ago to create a virus that would work to wipe out certain members of the ruling class. How they’d used the AIDS vaccine as a conduit they could manipulate. They’d planned to stage a coup, he said, to take over the government and start anew.

“We were going to save all the children. Rebuild the world. There were fail-safes in place.”

Peyton couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “Fail-safes? And they… what, failed?” she asked through gritted teeth.

Her father hung his head. “Yes,” he admitted. “Once the plague became airborne we could no longer control who was infected. And then there were the mutants. We could have never predicted the virus would mutate some people’s DNA and turn them into monsters. Suddenly those who didn’t get the plague were now at risk of being lunch. Which obviously wasn’t part of the plan.”

“What were you thinking?” Peyton shrieked. “You thought you and your friends had the right to play God? What made you think that was okay?”

Her father gave her a guilty look. “You have to understand,” he protested. “Things were bad and getting worse. We figured starting over was the best plan. We could have made it right. And we meant to save the children…”

“But you didn’t. You destroyed the very world you were supposedly trying to save. You turned those same children into monsters. Who went and killed the rest.” She thought about Spud. About Rocky. About Tank. About Tara. All those wasted lives. All that senseless death.

All at the hands of her own father. The one she’d been risking her own life—along with Chases’s and the children’s—for all this time. Believing in a man whom she now realized was little more than a monster himself.

Her father shook his head but said, “Yes, well, as I mentioned before, things didn’t go exactly as planned.”

Peyton couldn’t believe it. All this time she’d been thinking she was on a mission to help her dad save the world. But he was the one responsible for ending it in the first place. She felt sick to her stomach. All that death. All that destruction. It was all the fault of her own flesh and blood.

She turned to Chase. “Let’s get out of here,” she said. “Back to the Hive. There’s nothing for us here.” No new society, no hope for the future. And no miraculous cure for Chase. It was almost too much to bear.

Chase nodded, silent, and the two of them started back to the boats. But Peyton’s father called after them. “That’s where you’re wrong,” he said.

Peyton stopped. Turned around slowly, not wanting to listen but feeling compelled all the same. “What do you mean?” she asked.

“You still have the data in your head,” he reminded her. “There is still hope to save the world.”

The data. Right. “What’s in my head, Dad?” she asked through clenched teeth. “Tell me once and for all what you put in my head.”

“Why, the recipe to the antidote, of course.” He smiled, looking proud of himself. She didn’t know whether to strangle him or hug him. The antidote? Like the antidote to the plague itself? The answer was in her head the whole time?

“What are you saying, Dad?” she asked, wanting to be sure before she allowed herself hope.

“I’m saying you have the key to everything. To restoring our world. We don’t need any of the others. We never did. We just needed you. All we have to do now is extract the code from your brain and use it to create the antidote. That’s why I needed you down here. We can fix this. We can still fix this.”

She bit her lower lip. “And it can be extracted how?”

“A simple scan with the right equipment should be able to read it. Any working hospital should have what we need…”

Any hospital. Like the one above the Hive. Hope soared through her. “Fine.” Turning back to Chase, she said, “Let’s go.”

“But…” Chase said, looking at her dad. “The cure?”

She glared at her father. “The scientists back at the Hive will be able to extract it just as easily as he can. In fact, it’s the information they’ve been looking for all this time. They have a plan in place and resources to mass produce and distribute. Together we can rebuild the world.” She glared at her father. “Not here. Not at Disney World. But
in the real world
.”

“Peyton, please!” her dad cried, seeming to return to himself. “I never meant it to be like this. I wanted to make things better. For you. For future generations. I did it for you!”

“I chose you once,” she said. “And betrayed everything I loved. Because I believed in you and what you were doing. I thought you were out to save the world. But you were the one who destroyed it. You were the cause of everything—you don’t deserve to be part of the cure.”

And with that, she grabbed Chase’s hand and the two of them walked away, not looking back. Leaving her father behind, as she’d once done to Chris, four years ago.

Chapter Forty-five

It was nine pm and the rain had not subsided. But still, Chris waited. Trey and the other kids, including an ecstatic Anna Simmons, had left eleven hours earlier, headed up to the mountains. But Chris wasn’t going without Peyton. Not without his goddess. And so he waited, praying that she’d come, refusing to believe she’d left him alone.

Headlights suddenly pierced the darkness and his pulse quickened as he wondered if it could be her, arriving at last. Then he saw it was the van and his heart sank. Trey pulled up beside him and popped his head out of the window.

“She didn’t show,” his brother observed. It wasn’t a question.

Chris hung his head. “Something must have happened.”

“Well, hop in. We’ll go head over to her house and see.”

Chris complied, climbing into the passenger seat. Trey revved the engine and they took off down the road. A few minutes later they pulled up to Peyton’s front door. The lights were out. It looked deserted. Still, Chris had to know for sure. He hopped out of the van and ran up to the front door, banging his fist on the wood.

“They’re gone.”

He whirled around. A neighbor stood at the bottom of the driveway, hand folded across his chest. “What?” he asked.

“The Andersons. They’re gone. Went down in some fancy fallout shelter or something,” the neighbor explained. “Left all the rest of us up here to die, I guess.”

Chris stared at him, wanting more than anything to call the guy a liar. “Was…” he started, his voice trembling. “Was there a girl with them?”

“You mean Peyton?” the neighbor asked. He nodded his head. “Yup. She was with her mother. They went down together. Down there for the long haul, I guess. Heard her father say something about four years. Long time to be stuck underground is what I say. Might be better to just get the flu and be done with it.”

The neighbor went on speaking, but Chris was no longer listening. So this was it. She was gone. Even after all they’d been through, all that they’d promised each other, when all was said and done it didn’t mean anything. She’d left him. Made her decision to stick with her family, follow her crazy dad to the end of the world. Leave him behind, waiting in the rain, without even the courtesy of an explanation, never mind an apology.

He couldn’t believe it. He just couldn’t believe it. What had made her change her mind?

What had made her break his heart?

Trey popped out of the driver’s seat and headed over to where he stood. He took Chris in his arms and pulled him close, hugging him with brotherly love. “Come on,” he said, releasing him a moment later and leading him, shell-shocked, back to the van. “We’re going to the mountains.”

Chris got into the van, feeling dead and alone. He stared out the window as they pulled out of the driveway. Watching Peyton’s house as they drove down the street. Hoping, praying, begging he’d see some sign that the neighbor was wrong. That Peyton was there. That she hadn’t abandoned him.

But the house stayed silent. And as they turned the corner, he forced himself to accept that, once and for all, his goddess was gone for good.

He grabbed a bottle of pain killers from the first-aid kit Trey had stuffed in the glove compartment and popped a pill.

Chapter Forty-six

“My goddess was gone for good…”

Chase set the hand-written manuscript down on his lap and looked up. The group burst into applause and many of the Hive members seemed more than a little misty-eyed at the tragic ending to his tale.

“God, that’s so sad,” sniffed a blond woman to the far left that Chase knew as Rhoda. She dabbed her eyes with a tissue. “I remember when my mom died of the plague. I felt so alone. But you must have felt even worse.”

“I can’t even imagine how that must have been,” Starr piped up from her seated position on the floor in front. She was arm in arm with Torn, as usual. “You never talked about it, either.”

“It’s terrible!” a soldier known as Nick said, sobbing like a baby. “You waiting there, all alone, in the rain…”

Chase laughed. “You guys!” he cried. “Remember, this is only the beginning!” He rolled his eyes. “The story obviously has a lot more to go. And it only gets better from here.”

“Obviously!” Peyton declared as she stepped into the conference room. “Four years later and this lucky guy not only gets the girl, but his very own happy ending.” She grinned at Chase. “Sorry I’m late for writing club,” she said. “Council meeting ran long.”

“No problem.” He rose to greet her with a hug, meeting her eyes with his own. Her own real blue eyes, no longer hidden by spheres of silver. She’d had her implants removed, in her fingers, as well, though he knew she could probably still kick his ass if she tried. “I was just reading my manuscript. Not a dry eye in the house. I think it could be a best seller.” He laughed. “If there was any e-book publisher left to upload it.”

“You gotta write the rest,” David said, cuddled up in a corner with Helga. The two of them had been married three weeks ago and were totally in the honeymoon stage still. “I want to hear what happens when Peyton comes out of the fallout shelter. It’s all very
Casablanca
.”

“I will,” Chase said, grinning. “I promise.”

“And I’ll write my side of the story, too,” Peyton piped in. “After all, I had reasons for what I did. I wasn’t the evil bitch this one sometimes makes me out to be.” She poked him in the side playfully and he chuckled.

“We know, we know,” Chase replied. “You had to save the world and stuff.” He kissed her on the nose to let her know he was just teasing. She kissed him back.

The dinner bell rang and the Hive Writers Club gathered their things, exiting the room. Soon it was only Peyton and Chase left behind in the classroom.

“How are you feeling?” he asked, looking deep into her eyes, glad he could once again peer into their depths. See her expression of love when she looked back up at him. He loved the blue of her irises. Her very human irises.

“I feel great,” she said. “Never better. And you?”

“I’m great, too. A little sore, but good, all things considered.” As a member of the rehabilitation team, Chase spent long hours above the surface each day hunting for Others who had been cured by the antidote team. When the survivors regained their humanity, they were confused and lost and scared. It was Chase’s job to round them up, give them an explanation and bring them home. A pied piper of sorts, just as his brother had been before.

It had been almost a year since the scientists first extracted the antidote recipe from Peyton’s head. They’d cured Chase of his own infection—he’d demanded they use it on him first, as a test in case it didn’t work. After that it was all about production, creating mass quantities of the antidote to be distributed above ground. Over the year they’d cured an estimated four hundred Others, integrating them into Hive society. The underground city was bursting at the seams these days and there was much talk of going back above ground. Rebuilding the world, one town at a time.

“And your father?” Chase asked, leading her out the door and into the dining hall.

“I visited him in the prison this morning before the meeting,” Peyton told him. “He’s getting better every day. I think the meds are really helping.” She sighed.

Chase gave her a rueful smile. He knew it’d been hard on her to turn him in. To report the part he’d played—her own flesh and blood—in destroying the world. Luckily the council had been understanding of Ian’s obvious mental breakdown and illness. They gave him a comfortable cell where he could live out his remaining days and plenty of rations. And to his credit, he’d more than earned his keep and tried to make amends best he could, offering the Hive scientists valuable insights into the plague and the antidote. Without him, they wouldn’t have been half as far along as they were. For that, even Peyton could allow for a small shred of forgiveness, even though Chase knew she was still humiliated and embarrassed about the whole thing.

“We’ve all made mistakes,” she’d grudgingly say. “Some bigger than others. But if we want to survive as a species, we have to stick together and move forward.”

“He may have been misguided,” Chase reminded her gently, “but he really did want to save the world. And here, he’ll have his chance. We all have another chance.”

“Right,” Peyton agreed. “In the meantime, we worker bees will just keep plugging away.” She grinned.

“You find it impossible to rest, don’t you?” Chase teased her. “Always working toward the next big thing. What are you going to do when everyone’s cured? When your mission is finally over for good? What then?”

“Well, Chris Parker, I can tell you one thing,” Peyton said with a laugh. “I’m sure as hell not going to Disney World.”