by Giacomi, A.
I put my hands up in the air. I have no other ideas for distracting this very determined man, and what is worse is that more men are on their way. I pray that backup means only two others, but to my disappointment, ten men show up with heavy artillery.
“All these guns for a little old man like me? Vallincourt is going to find this very funny indeed!” I try to joke, but no one laughs. Their guns remain pointed at me until shots are fired outside of the security office.
The men run out to seek the culprit. Eve walks out of the shadows wearing a helmet and holding a gun in each hand. She raises her guns towards the guards, and they raise theirs in turn. For about fifteen seconds, no shots are fired. Each party waits for the other to shoot first. Eventually, one of the security guards loses patience and fires a warning shot at Eve. The bullet skims her thigh, and blood spurts out from the wound, painting the ground.
She lowers her helmeted head to look at the damage, but the wound seals quickly, and in seconds, she is sprinting towards the men and firing. I duck behind a trash bin as the bullets fly through the air. Eve made contact with about half of the men who now lay on the ground bleeding. Within five minutes, she’s out of bullets and tosses her guns at the men. The guards continue to fire, spraying her with bullets that have no effect. One man decides to sprint at Eve, and she very quickly elbows him in the face, shattering his nose and disabling him. The other men have now run out of bullets, and they surround her, waiting to make their move. A couple of them race behind her in an attempt to restrain her, but that proves to be an ill move. She takes their arms and squeezes so hard that the bones snap. The terrible snapping sound rings in my ear as I try to keep my dinner down.
The screams distract the other two men enough for Eve to kick each of them into a vehicle. One of the men’s heads make contact with a parked van, and he is rendered unconscious; the other attempts to crawl away, but Eve drags him towards her and pulls him in close. She lifts the helmet off her head so that he can see her intensely lit eyes as she screams, “Open that fucking garage now, or I’ll eat you, starting with your fucking eyeballs!” The man nods, and it’s unclear if he’s agreeing to do as she says or is shivering out of fear.
She walks him over to the control booth, and he presses a few buttons. As the gates begin to rise, a smile spreads across Eve’s face. She can almost taste her freedom.
She hands me a gun and has me aim it at the security guard’s head. “If he so much as moves, shoot him, or I’ll shoot you both.” She is indeed trying to make it seem like this is her idea and hers alone. I wink at her as she sprints towards the lovely black sports car, keys in hand.
As she revs the engine and flies upwards through the tunnel, Agent Williams arrives at a sprinting pace. When he realizes that Eve has escaped, he turns to glare at me with his burning eyes. As I stare, I see blue veins creep up his neck and onto his face, his eyes grow sullen, and he takes on a much more sinister appearance than Eve ever managed. His anger has clearly made him hungry.
Agent Williams sprints towards us, snarling and baring his teeth. I throw the security guard at him so that I may be spared. When the Azrael Virus takes over, it doesn’t differentiate. Anything that lives is food. As I begin to run back towards the security office, I see Agent Williams attempting to tear the guard apart. He first tears off the man’s arm, feasting on it as the security guard screams and tries to wriggle away. When Agent Williams notices the poor sucker using a pool of his own blood to try and slide away, he tosses the unfinished arm to the ground and grabs the man by the ankles. Agent Williams hovers over the man as blood drips from his mouth, landing onto the guard. It seems as though he is waiting for something, but the waiting soon ends when he selects the next piece he’d like to eat. Agent Williams goes for the head, jamming his fingers into the fleshy thin layer coating the guard’s skull, and pulling, and stretching the skin away from the bone. The man screams in a way you might sound if someone was placing you through a wood chipper. I can hear the flesh peeling away, and I keel over, thinking I may faint.
When Agent Williams has exposed the skull, he quickly punches it, and the guard’s screaming ends. The skull has cracked open like an egg, and bits of brain have blown out of it. Agent Williams scoops pieces of brain out of the open head and eats them as feverishly as someone without food for days. However, when he spots me cowering on the ground, he stops and drops the bit of brain he is working on. I am mere inches from the security room, but shock has made my legs weak, and I stumble without the ability to rise. He marches over the corpse and starts towards me, grunting and twitching his head in a most unnatural way. Nothing human or animal makes those noises. It is as if he’s possessed by Satan himself.
I force myself to my feet and use my fear to propel me into the security room. I lock the door behind me as Agent Williams slams his body against the clear glass windows. The room is a viewing station, so large windows even in the glass door are a must. I know that any glass in this building has been made bulletproof and practically indestructible, but we haven’t had it zombie tested, especially not with the caliber of zombie that Eve and Agent Williams are. I have absolutely no idea if he can enter or not. I back away from the glass and crouch behind the security desk as Agent Williams continues to pound against the glass viciously, smearing it with the guard’s blood and his own saliva.
I am still jittery from fear, but I am also content with the fact that Eve has escaped. It won’t be long before more security shows up and perhaps Vallincourt himself. They will want information about where Eve is heading, and what her plans are, and if she reaches the stone in time and hides it, they will want to know that too. Most likely I will be tortured if they let me live at all. I can try saying that Eve forced me to do all this, but they know I came here for her; I stayed in this building solely for her. I want to help her, and it seems that I have not done enough; perhaps the best way to protect her now will be to dispose of myself, my secrets, and my findings.
I spot a gun on the security desk and pick it up to find it loaded. Perhaps this is the only way. Die now with a final noble gesture or live and perhaps cause more harm or be forced to create more pure forms of the virus, or a super virus, or worse, if there is such a thing. I decide that death is simpler, more practical.
As I place the barrel of the gun to my temple, I see Agent Williams is still thrashing against the glass. A crack has appeared, but the window has not yet shattered. He grins with malicious intent, but it makes no matter; I will soon be free of him too.
As I close my eyes, I think of my wife. I have been given clearance to head home for a bit tonight. I never told Eve, or else she might have never gone through with the plan. As I think of her kind eyes welcoming me home, my final words are, “I’m sorry, dear. I won’t be home for dinner.”
PART 3: RELEASE & CATCH
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
ALEX
I have finally convinced Cam to come home to Little Lake and see Eve’s parents; unfortunately, it won’t be the most pleasant reunion. It has been about two years since they last saw Cam. They ask about him every time I stop by, and my answer is always the same: “He’s just not ready to come home yet.”
Cam and I spent the last couple of years trying to put ourselves back together. Losing Eve ruined him and made me a replacement daughter to the Brenners. I don’t want to disappoint them, so I play the part. I came to dinner often, gardened with them, took Winston for walks, anything I could do to fill the void, I did. I even tried to bridge that gap for Cam; I wanted to be his, but it just never worked. We tried for a time, but it fizzled out. I know he still loves her, and although I seem to like tragically terrible relationships, this is not one I care to keep. Luckily, we were able to fall back into our friendship without any major blips. I suppose the only issue is desire. Cam is the tall, dark, and handsome type; he has a chiseled body that he doesn’t have to work too hard to maintain. It would have been easier to move on
if we hadn’t been intimate. I know he regrets every moment with me; the problem is that I don’t. If he asked for us to go the friends with benefits route, I would do it without hesitation.
Cam will arrive in Little Lake tomorrow. I fix him a bed at my mother’s house like old times. The only trouble is that the house is just about the only thing that remains the same in our little town. My mother has not been the same since my father left. They always had a very tumultuous marriage, but she loved him regardless. It is clear that he did not feel the same; I can relate to that.
Janna walks into the room as I fix the sheets. My younger sister is my complete opposite in every way. At almost sixteen years of age, she is quite simply a teenage dirtbag with a temper. I am always quiet and polite, and I suppose they say that no two siblings are ever the same, not even if they’re twins.
She sits on the bed that I was fixing for Cam, completely ruining the perfect placement of the sheets. “Jesus, Janna, do you mind? Sit somewhere else. I was nearly done!”
She rolls her eyes and sits in the middle of the room on the floor. “So Cammy’s coming home, huh? Why?”
It’s not an entirely inappropriate question, but her prying still infuriates me. “Yes, Janna, he is! Perhaps because he misses it here, perhaps because he has people he loves here!”
Janna giggles. “Doubt it!” she says maliciously with a smirk. “If he loved people here, he would have come sooner. Not right when she’s gonna die. Does he even know Mrs. Brenner’s dying? Does he even give a fuck?”
“Shut up, Janna!” I hiss. “No, he doesn’t know yet. When he finds out, he’ll be devastated. Don’t act like you know him. You don’t!” What makes me angriest is the fear that Janna could be right. What if Cam just simply stopped caring about all of us? Perhaps he is dead inside now, and there is no hope of bringing back the old him.
“You know it’s really pathetic how you love a guy that doesn’t give a shit about you! Haven’t you ever read that book He’s Just Not That Into You? That’s you, sis. You’re that sucker who thinks he cares. Get a clue!”
I don’t know what gets into me, but that is the final straw. I walk over to Janna and grab her hair and drag her out of the room into the hallway. She’s screaming and crying, and I don’t even flinch. “Fuck you, you little shit! You always have the nicest things to say, don’t you? Stay away from me until you learn to say something kind. I don’t even want to see your face until then! Got it?” I hiss as I release her, leaving her on the floor of the hallway with tears staining her cheeks. I head to my room and slam the door behind me so hard that I worry it may come off its hinges. It takes me a good half hour to calm down. My heart pounds and my breaths are quick and panicked. I know I should not have done that, she was right to an extent, but she didn’t have to be such a brat about it.
I feel remorse for the entire fight. Janna owes me an apology, but I am her older sister. I should know better than to listen to her. She is still trying to grow up, to find herself, and our whole family situation isn’t helping. I will apologize later. For now, I just want to sleep.
***
When Cam’s car pulls up to the Brenner house the next day, I am already inside trying to calm Mrs. Brenner. She isn’t the type to want to worry people, but it has to be done. It is better to tell Cam now than have him find out when it is too late. It’s hard to say goodbye when they’re already gone. Some people don’t have that luxury. Some people are there one moment and gone the next. Mrs. Brenner has been given three months as a rough guideline, might be more, might be less, but when you put an expiration date on someone, it tends to force them to complete as many things as they can before they kick it.
Cam is on that list. Mrs. Brenner desperately wanted to see him since her fatal diagnosis. I can’t blame her for wanting to tie up loose ends, but it seems like there is something more.
After peeking out the window and finding Cam, I head back into the kitchen to inform Mr. and Mrs. Brenner. “He’s just arrived. Why don’t you two head on over to the front room? I’ll get some snacks and tea together and meet you in a moment.”
As soon as he hears someone at the door, Winston goes sprinting with excitement. He is the first to greet Cam with canine kisses. Cam then hugs Mr. Brenner as I join Mrs. Brenner on the sofa in the front room. Mrs. Brenner smiles at me with her sunken face and squeezes my hand with joy. I can feel every bone in her hand, and I find it difficult to share in her joy.
When Cam comes into the room and views Mrs. Brenner, he looks about as old as he was when I first met him, a young lost high school boy, still innocent, still vulnerable. I suppose seeing Mrs. Brenner brought him back there. She was like a mother to him over the years since he lost his at eleven years old. Mrs. Brenner treated him as one of her own, and he was always over for dinner, or events, or sleepovers. I know the moment he sees her that all the memories flood back. I see the pain in his eyes as he scans her shriveling body; this is not the woman he remembers, and soon memories will be all we have left to us.
Cam already knows what the news will be; everyone knows what death looks like. It takes so many in the form of cancer. Mrs. Brenner goes on to explain anyway about her condition and that there is nothing left to do, perhaps some of the most devastating words one can ever hear. When there is “nothing” left, what follows is suffering, the suffering of the dying and the suffering of those who love them, and the suffering continues until the last breath. It is only after death that we can attempt to heal, if we even can.
Mrs. Brenner shocks me when she pulls out a few items that she would like us to have, former possessions of Eve’s. I am handed a bag and slowly pull out a series of old photos. Eve, Cam, and I stare back at me. We were so young and carefree. My eyes blur at the sight of them. The next thing I pull out of the bag is Eve’s favourite teddy. It still holds her scent, and I hug it close and pretend as though my best friend is right here with me.
Cam’s gift is next. Mrs. Brenner hands him an envelope. Strangely enough, Eve’s writing appears on the outside of it; she had written Cam’s name on it. Mrs. Brenner admits that she hasn’t opened it and is very curious as to its contents, as are we. Cam gently opens the envelope and pulls out a red stone. My words catch in my throat as I view the same stone that Dr. August showed us years ago. It glows as if it is lit on fire from the inside. Cam looks at me, astonished. We both recognize it, but we can’t very well tell the Brenners that it is somehow connected to Eve’s true fate.
Cam covers it up nicely by telling them that the stone is of sentimental value. He explains that he and Eve viewed it as a good luck charm.
The rest of the visit goes smoothly, and Cam promises to visit again in a week’s time. We bid the Brenners farewell, and I am desperate to get in the car with Cam and talk about the red rock that is now in our possession. Why did Eve leave it here of all places? My mind races with possibilities.
When Cam stops the car, we are sitting in the parking lot of our favourite park. We haven’t been here together in the longest time; it is simply a painful reminder of when the three of us were still together. My chest aches as I think of Eve. I want her back just as much as Cam does, but searching for her will only get us in deep shit.
Cam finally works up the courage to take the red stone out of his pocket. It glows like heated coals. I dare not touch it; somehow I feel it will burn me or change me somehow. Cam examines it closely, then asks, “Why did she leave me this?”
I have no answer for him. Perhaps it is simply a keepsake to let Cam know that she still loves him. Wherever she is, I can be sure she is thinking of us. I mean, she came back to check on us when she heard about Cam, so I know she cares and she is still watching somehow. But then that leads me to wonder why she hasn’t come to see her mother yet? How can she stay away now? I’m a little disappointed as I think of Eve’s absence until I realize that she might even be in danger. What if they are keeping her from us? I don’t want t
o share these fears with Cam. I promised Eve that I would keep her visit a few years back a secret, and I have. But now that I have a concern, I wonder if I should spill the beans and tell Cam everything. He will most likely hate me forever. Friends aren’t supposed to keep secrets from one another.
As we discuss the red stone, Cam asks, “Do you think this rock would help us find her? Like lead us to her? Maybe she wants us to find…”
I press my finger to his lip in order to silence him. The whole “what if” sort of pondering will only lead to more pain, and I worry he will pick up his drug and alcohol addictions again.
“Cam, I think she left it to us as a protection charm. I remember Dr. August having a theory about the stone warding off evil. Maybe that’s all it is. Eve’s not coming back, and if you could have heard the way she spoke the night she left, you would know she doesn’t want to be found.”
Cam grows angry and pushes my hand away. “Yeah right, Al. She wouldn’t want to know her mother is dying? I think she would! Maybe this stone is a way of contacting her in case of an emergency!”
I roll my eyes at Cam. He is so adamant that the stone will lead us to her that he even begins talking to it as if it is some sort of two-way radio.
“Cam, stop it! The fact she gave you that stone means she had been planning her departure! Don’t you get it?”
I see his face crinkle as he refuses to cry. I don’t want to hurt him, but I need him to be realistic about this whole thing. This whole fantasy of finding Eve is going to get him killed. I decide to soften my harsh words by adding a single truth, “She loved you, Cam. She didn’t do this to hurt us. She wanted us to be safe. Don’t be angry with her.”
He laughs sarcastically. “Loved me? Al, you don’t leave behind the people you love.”
He has a point, but I simply refuse to believe that Eve could leave us and forget about us altogether. She misses us too; she just doesn’t have the luxury of having everything return to normal. She will never be normal again, and she wants to give us a chance at having a regular life, rather than living in constant fear.