Ex-Isle

by Peter Clines

  Barry bit his lip. “I don’t think it is,” he said, his voice a bit lower. “I don’t think he minds messing with people, but it never seems to be his end goal.”

  Madelyn patted the cover of the journal three times. Then she reached for the big Ziploc and sealed the book back inside. “Okay, then,” she said. “Maybe a meteor?”

  St. George looked at her. “What?”

  “A meteor. Sometimes they blow up in the atmosphere. Depending on how big it was and where it came down, they might think it was a nuke.”

  Barry pursed his lips. “Not a bad idea.”

  “Wouldn’t we have seen something like that, too, though?” St. George mused. “I mean, if it was big enough for them to think it was a nuke, you’d think we’d see it. Maybe hear it.”

  “We didn’t hear Honolulu,” Barry said.

  “We’re almost two thousand miles away,” said the Corpse Girl. “It could’ve hit the water five hundred miles from here and still be a thousand miles from us.”

  “It’s also possible,” said Barry, “they all just got drunk and fell asleep watching disaster movies.”

  “What?”

  “Y’know, just before their ships lost power. And then in the morning they had to sort out what really happened and just made some bad decisions. Now you’ve got a bunch of people saying, ‘Oh, we saw LA get nuked,’ and really they just passed out watching a bad Sci-Fi Channel movie or something.”

  Madelyn blew a raspberry at him. “So,” she said, “my meteor theory is still the best we’ve got?”

  “Yeah,” said St. George. “But Barry has a point. I’d understand Honolulu, but they told us some people had seen Los Angeles destroyed.”

  “Sooooo,” said Barry, “my theory is back on top.” He returned her raspberry.

  “Okay,” she said, “you can stop trying to cheer me up.”

  “It’s not always about you, y’know.”

  “Actually, I’ve got a question,” she said, looking at St. George. “Did anyone say what they did with their exes?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, all these boats, there must’ve been somebody with the ex-virus, right? Probably a couple somebodies. Are people turning and getting…I don’t know, tossed overboard? Or maybe…”

  “Maybe what?”

  “Maybe put in their gardens?”

  “Ewwww,” said Barry.

  St. George tapped his knee. “Do exes work as…well, fertilizer? How’s that work with all their diseases and everything?”

  Barry shrugged. So did Madelyn.

  Two quick raps sounded on the door before it opened. Eliza pushed it wide and stepped in. She had on a weathered bomber jacket and a different shirt, but the same threadbare and stained jeans. “Morning,” she said. “Hope everyone’s decent.”

  Madelyn scowled.

  “So what’s going on?” asked St. George. “Have we passed your quarantine?”

  She nodded.

  “Can we talk, then?”

  Another nod. “I’m here to bring you to Maleko, our leader. He’s going to help us figure out who you are.”

  Barry sighed. “Still this?”

  She studied his face. “Yeah,” she said. “Still this.”

  St. George managed to keep from frowning. “Is he going to be a little more open-minded about who we are than you?”

  Eliza turned her gaze to him. “What do you think?”

  “I’m starting to think you’re all a bunch of jerks,” muttered Madelyn.

  Eliza ignored her. “Ready to go?” She gestured at the door.

  Barry cleared his throat. “Don’t suppose you’ve found a wheelchair for me?”

  The woman’s head shifted side to side. “No. Couldn’t find one.”

  “Ship this big, all these passengers on board, they didn’t have a wheelchair in case someone broke a leg on the waterslide or something?”

  “Maybe they did. A lot of things have been moved and repurposed. It could be on any of the ships. It might’ve gone overboard in the early days while people were still freaking out a bit.” She shrugged and raised her hand to the door again.

  Barry sighed. “You mind lugging me around again?” he asked St. George. “Just ’til we get outside?”

  “Actually, we’re going to be inside for most of the walk to Maleko,” said Eliza. “You probably shouldn’t…light up.”

  Barry snorted as St. George lifted him.

  A small crowd waited for them in the hall. Big Steve from the day before. Bald and bearded Devon. Sun-leathered Alice. The two men from St. George’s examination. A new man with a thick mustache. All of them were armed.

  Madelyn focused on the mustached man. “You must be the cowboy,” she said.

  “Cowboy?” St. George looked at the man.

  “It’s nothing,” she said. “He’s nothing.”

  The cowboy smirked at her.

  She glared back at him and shifted her weight so she leaned closer to St. George.

  “You okay?”

  “Great,” said the Corpse Girl.

  The group moved down the dark hall. Light came from an occasional open door. One larger room had skylights. It had been a ballroom once, but now it was piled high with open suitcases and travel bags. All of them were empty. They exited the far side, turned a corner, and headed up a staircase.

  Barry leaned his head in closer to St. George. “Did you notice her face when she was talking about her boss?” he asked.

  St. George gave a slight nod. “Like she was watching for a reaction.”

  “You ever heard that name before?”

  “Nope. Was it Japanese?”

  Barry shook his head. “Don’t think so, unless I’m picturing it wrong in my head.”

  “What are you two talking about?” demanded Steve. His voice echoed in the hallway.

  “Just wondering about breakfast,” Barry answered, just as loud. “Where’d you get all the seeds for those gardens of yours?”

  “The Queen,” said Devon. His head tipped up, indicating the ship they were on. “There were some vegetables in the galleys that survived long enough to get in pots. There were even some seed packs down in the daycare area. Y’know, little kids can plant a bean while mom and dad get drunk in the sun, that sort of thing.”

  The mustached cowboy and one of the others chuckled. It wasn’t a happy sound.

  “What did you do for soil?” asked St. George. “Did one of the other ships have it?”

  “There were a bunch of potted plants on board,” Devon said. “Ferns and crap. We used them for compost, all the dirt went to growing stuff. Then we added in a lot of…fertilizer.”

  “Like what?” Barry asked.

  “Leftover fish parts. Some seaweed.” Devon looked ahead. “Other stuff.”

  Madelyn’s brows went up. “Other stuff like what?”

  Devon didn’t say anything.

  The dreadlocked man from St. George’s examination cleared his throat. “The Chinese call it ‘night soil,’ ” he said. “It’s a pretty classic fertilizing techni—”

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” said the cowboy. “It’s shit, okay? We all have to shit in buckets so nothing goes to waste.”

  “Shut up, Mitchel,” said Steve.

  “It’s what it is. Why’s everybody got to pussyfoot around it?”

  “I said shut up, Mitchel,” Steve repeated.

  “But you couldn’t’ve had enough with just that,” said Barry. “Not even if everyone got a hundred bowls of Super-Colon-Blow cereal. You’ve got a couple of good-sized garden patches there.”

  “We dredge some stuff up from the bottom, too,” said Devon. “Mix it in with everything to make better dirt.”

  Madelyn looked at the man. “From the bottom of the ocean? That’s, like, a mile down. How are you getting anything from down there?”

  “Quiet,” called Eliza.

  She stood before a big set of double doors. They were imitation stained glass, like a church window, mak
ing the image of a leaping dolphin with a crown instead of a religious figure. St. George was pretty sure it was the same logo he’d seen half-obliterated on the ship’s smokestacks, just done in color. On the other side was bright light and movement.

  There were no voices. Not even the low murmur of conversation. Just the dim sound of breezes and a few flags.

  “Maleko’s going to talk with you,” she said. “Show a little respect.” She looked St. George in the eye as she said the name, then shook her head.

  “Is he the king or something?” asked Madelyn.

  “He saved every one of us by bringing the ships together,” she said. “We’d all be dead without him.”

  Barry raised an eyebrow. “Live together, die alone?”

  Eliza nodded. “Exactly.”

  “Told you this was a mysterious island,” he said to St. George and Madelyn. “I bet there’s a pirate ship filled with dynamite around here somewhere.”

  Madelyn laughed.

  “What the hell are you talking about?” growled the cowboy.

  “That show,” said Devon. “The big one, right before everything fell apart. Lost.”

  Barry gave the bald man a thumbs-up.

  Devon managed a weak smile. “No one likes talking about that too much out here. Sore subject.”

  “Ahhh,” said Barry. “Sorry.”

  Eliza snapped her fingers three times. “Everyone had their fun?”

  She rapped on the glass, and the doors pulled open. Sunlight blasted into the halls. St. George and Barry squinted. Madelyn winced and fumbled for her goggles. The air swirling in was warm and fresh with hints of salt.

  St. George blinked a few times and glanced at the guards near them. They’d had their heads turned when the doors opened. They’d been ready. Expecting it.

  The group moved out into the open.

  It was a big space, somewhere between a huge courtyard and a small arena. A walkway circled it up above. There was a pool at the far end. It wasn’t hard to believe it had once had dozens of sun chairs or some kind of sea-themed aerobics or yoga classes. Maybe all that and more.

  Men, women, and children surrounded them. At least two hundred people. Just as many watched from the walkway above. Their clothes were faded and patched. Most of their hair was long and uneven.

  The people above looked back at him with nervous eyes.

  The Middle Eastern man they’d seen on the helipad stood just off to one side. He glanced away when St. George looked at him. Devon took a few steps back and settled near the man. He leaned his head back, and they exchanged a few words.

  A few pillars of wood helped form a small gazebo-type structure in front of the pool, and beneath it was a large chair on a low platform of wood and steel. St. George recognized it as staging, the kind of riser used for presentations in small venues. It took him a moment to figure out the chair, but he was willing to bet there wasn’t a space on the cruise ship’s bridge for the captain to sit. Not anymore, at least.

  The man next to the chair had his back to them. He stood five foot ten at the most, not much taller than Madelyn, and had long black hair like her, too. His thick ponytail was bound with a half dozen strings down its length. He wore two or three layers, but all the sleeves had been torn off. St. George wasn’t sure if the man’s skin was very tanned or naturally dark. A curling tattoo wrapped around the man’s right bicep, an intricate array of bold lines and triangles.

  He had solid arms, St. George noticed. Not huge, but not thin. A worker, not a gym rat.

  Eliza walked across the open space. A single folding chair sat out in front of the crude throne. She stepped around it and took up a position near one of the gazebo posts facing the heroes. Steve moved to stand across from her. The other guards faded back into the crowd like Devon had.

  Barry craned his neck to look around. “Anyone else getting a vibe that’s less First Contact and more Thunderdome?”

  “I think I am,” said Madelyn, “and I’m not even sure what you’re talking about.”

  “I’m getting some kind of vibe,” said St. George. He looked around the crowd again. Something was off. He tried to look at the crowd the way Stealth would. She’d’ve already picked out the nagging element and deduced what it meant. He looked at the sunburned men and women, the wide-eyed children.

  The children.

  He looked up at the walkway, then around the courtyard again. “All the children are down here with us,” he murmured.

  Barry looked around. “Yeah,” he said. “Almost a third of the people down here are kids.”

  “Why?” said Madelyn. “If they don’t trust us, why are they letting us near their kids?”

  St. George looked back at the throne. The man had turned around. Their eyes met.

  The man looked Polynesian, or maybe Asian. He had large eyes, a small nose, and a stern mouth framed by a square jaw. The ponytail pulled every strand of hair away from his face.

  His clothes hung on him. The threadbare pants and silk shirt were at least two sizes too big for him. Maybe three. A leather vest that could’ve fit Captain Freedom draped over the man’s shoulders, reaching halfway down his thighs. All the loops of extra fabric made St. George think of the baggy ren faire clothes he’d seen sometimes on the college campus he used to work at, back in the days before the ex-virus.

  The man was barefoot on the wooden deck. His feet were smooth. Not the feet of someone who went barefoot a lot of the time.

  He held out a hand toward the chair. “For your friend,” he said.

  St. George stepped forward. Madelyn fell in next to him. “Thanks,” said Barry. He shifted in St. George’s arms and tried to straighten up a bit.

  “Of course,” said the man. “We’re not savages.” He had a confident, strong voice. One used in front of crowds a lot. This crowd, at least.

  St. George settled Barry into the chair. Madelyn tapped his side. When he turned around, the man stood just a few yards away.

  “So,” the man said, projecting the word, “my lieutenant says you claim to be the Mighty Dragon.” He glanced at Eliza.

  A low murmur passed through the crowd.

  “That’s right,” said St. George. “And I’m guessing you’re Maleko?”

  The murmur became a low rumble.

  The man—Maleko—nodded once. “I am,” he said. He studied St. George’s face the same way Eliza had, but he played his expressions big, like a stage actor. Or someone working a crowd. “Could you offer us some sort of proof of your claim?”

  St. George focused on the spot between his shoulder blades and pushed himself up into the air. He went up until he was level with the walkway, then shot fifty feet higher and drifted back down. The rumble of the crowd became gasps and whispers. “Him” carried up to St. George again and again.

  As he sank past the walkway, he took in a breath, let it tickle the back of his throat, and let flames drift out of his mouth again. He looked up and puffed out the last of it as a small fireball. Shrieks and cries echoed up to him.

  His boots hit the deck next to Barry’s chair. A few children were sobbing. The adults were wide-eyed. Maleko glared at St. George with a stone face.

  “Sorry,” said St. George. “The kids back home get a kick out of seeing me do that.” He turned to the crowd. “I didn’t mean to scare anyone.”

  Adults were whispering. The murmuring had started back up. Some of the kids calmed down, but most of them were still crying.

  Where were their parents? Why were all the kids standing alone? Why wasn’t anyone holding them or wiping noses?

  Maleko took a breath. His face softened. “And back home,” he asked, “is where?”

  St. George glanced down at Barry, then back up to the Polynesian man. “We’re from Los Angeles,” he said. “There’s a few thousand survivors there. We’ve made a large safe zone we call the Mount.”

  Maleko didn’t smile, but he looked satisfied with the answer. Content. The murmur climbed back up to a rumble.

&nbs
p; Courtyard seemed like an all-too-appropriate term for the space they were in.

  “I’m telling the truth,” he said, raising his own voice to the crowd. “I’ve heard what you think happened, that there were bombs, but it isn’t true. We’re from Los Angeles. The Mount is right in the middle of Hollywood.”

  “And we show movies on Friday nights,” said Barry. “Kids get in free, but the popcorn still costs way too much.”

  “How can you sit there and make jokes about it?” snarled Eliza from her post. “Do you know how many people died in the bombings?”

  “I’m going to go with ‘What is none, Alex,’ ” said Barry, “since they didn’t drop any bombs.”

  Eliza sucked in a breath, but Maleko raised a hand to cut her off. He walked back to his big chair and picked something up. “This was in your bag,” he said. He held the desert-tan box up for the crowd to see. “Care to tell everyone what it is?”

  St. George sighed. “It’s a radio beacon. There should’ve been a solar charger with it.”

  “There was,” nodded Maleko. “Very small. Not much bigger than a pack of cigarettes. Easy to hide, I’m sure.”

  Another uneasy rumble pushed and shoved its way through the crowd.

  “More like very light,” Madelyn said. “We couldn’t carry a ton of stuff with us out here.”

  Maleko didn’t look at her. He lowered the beacon so it was between him and St. George. “What were you going to do with it?”

  “We were going to give it to you,” said the hero. He looked up at the crowd. “To all of you here, so we’d be able to find you again.”

  “So you’d know where we were,” Maleko said. “So it could lead people to us.”

  The people around them muttered and whispered. Some of them pointed.

  “Oh, frak me,” Barry muttered. He looked up at St. George. “I’m all for helping out, but how much more of this are we going to sit through?”

  St. George cleared his throat, and a wisp of smoke drifted between his lips. “I don’t know what’s going on here,” he said. “I don’t know why you all feel threatened, why you’re insisting I’m dead. But we’re just here to offer our help. To let you know you’re not alone.”