The Brightest Darkness

by Kate L. Mary

  “No shit,” Ernie said. “Electricity, running water, real beds. It’s like going back in time.”

  “It’s better than we could have ever dreamed,” Bill murmured.

  Behind him, a gale of laughter floated from the room, followed by the high-pitched voice of SpongeBob SquarePants, and everyone turned to look toward the theater. The door was open, and the silhouettes of the children were visible, illuminated by the glow from the TV.

  “Amazing,” Jessica murmured.

  “We’re not going to kick you out,” I said, drawing everyone’s attention away from the kids. “We have plenty of room, and you’re welcome to it.”

  Bill looked from me to Kellan, who was nodding, and then to Blake. His head was bobbing as well, and it seemed to me that a collective sigh of relief followed the announcement.

  “Thank you,” Bill replied, his voice low and choked with emotion. “Thank you.”

  “We do have a few rules.” Kellan’s tone was measured and slow, but the change was subtle, something I might not have noticed if I didn’t know him so well.

  “What kind of rules?” Not surprisingly, Ernie was the one who spoke up, and behind his damaged frames, his eyes narrowed.

  “Nothing major.” Kellan lifted his hands. “Just precautions.”

  “Necessary ones, I’m sure,” Bill said, almost like he was defusing a situation before it had a chance to get out of control.

  “It’s a way to protect ourselves,” Kellan replied. “For one, you need a code to open the door on the surface, and for the time being, we’re going to keep that to ourselves.”

  “You mean we’re locked down here?” Jessica asked in alarm.

  “Not really,” I jumped in. “You can get out, it’s just that once you shut the door, you’re locked out unless you have the code.”

  “As much as we want to be able to trust you,” Kellan said, drawing the words out, “trust is something that has to be earned, and right now we’re practically strangers. A stranger killed most of us a few years ago, and we can’t run the risk of that happening again. Of someone heading out and bringing people back who might try to hurt us.”

  “Sounds reasonable.” Again, Ernie’s tone was less convincing than I would have liked.

  “Sounds smart,” Bill said pointedly. “I have no doubt that we can earn your trust. And fast.”

  “I hope so.” Kellan focused on Ernie, who didn’t miss it.

  “Everyone is also going to have to pull their weight,” Cade said. “We’ve been busting our asses to keep this place going with only six of us, and we’ve done it, but adding this many more people means we need to produce more of everything. More food, especially.”

  “We don’t have a problem with hard work,” Jessica said.

  Bill chuckled. “If we did, we would have died years ago.”

  “Good.” Kellan returned his smile. “Then I don’t think we’ll have any major problems.”

  Bill nodded, but Ernie didn’t say or do anything to indicate that he agreed. Like Kellan, though, I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt for the time being. No one else in the group seemed anything but friendly—with the exception of Scott, but he came across as more reserved than anything. Not like Ernie, who was obviously used to calling at least some of the shots. Hopefully, he would be satisfied with the routine we already had, which mostly meant discussing major decisions as a group. Kellan had always taken on more of the leader role, but that was mostly because he was more of a planner than Cade and Blake. He wasn’t going to hand everything over to someone we’d only just met. Ernie was going to have to prove himself like everyone else.

  After we’d nailed down some of the details about daily life, we showed the new people around the shelter, starting with the clinic and classroom, and then going all the way down to the storage space on level fourteen. There, Blake showed Bill how he made bullets—a job that would rest solely on his shoulders now that Jasper was gone—and I found myself explaining to some of the others how I made soap.

  Diane, who I was dying to introduce Blake to, picked up one of the bars and smiled. “We always trade for this soap in Altus.”

  “I noticed yesterday when I took a shower in the hangar.”

  She and Christine were studying my ingredients when Blake finally came over to join us, already smiling like he might have had some of the same thoughts going through my head. “You going to introduce me?”

  Behind him, Kellan shot me a wink, and I had to stifle the urge to roll my eyes because I didn’t want any of the new people thinking it was directed at them.

  “Blake, this is Christine,” I motioned to Bill’s daughter, “and Diane.”

  “Nice to meet you.” Blake beamed, but to my surprise, he wasn’t looking at Diane. He was looking at Christine.

  She was a good deal younger than him—twelve years, I’d guess—which was why the two of them together hadn’t even occurred to me. Plus, there was something about the limited interaction I’d had with Diane that reminded me of Emma. They had similar no-nonsense, outspoken personalities, while Christine was more reserved. Maybe that was what Blake needed, though. Maybe he and Emma had butted heads because they were both so outspoken.

  Back upstairs, a small group of us headed to the control room where Cade and Emma were keeping watch so we could talk the Andrew situation over. Bill joined us—I could already feel him fitting into our group nicely—as well as Ernie and few others. James, Jessica, Diane, and the quiet man, Scott.

  “There was no sign of Andrew while we were gone?” Kellan asked, his gaze moving from Blake to Emma.

  “None.” Emma, who was sitting on Cade’s lap, apparently forgetting all about her promise to make things easier on her ex, was the one who answered. “I barely took my eyes off those screens, and the only thing that moved were the animals and a few tumbleweeds.”

  “He must have given up,” Kellan mumbled, but his frown said he didn’t believe it.

  “If he still wanted to get his hands on Harper, he would have shown up by now, right?” I looked around.

  Others nodded, but like Kellan, Bill was frowning. “I don’t know the guy, but based on what you’ve said, I don’t think you should let your guard down yet.”

  “He might have decided to try to regroup,” Ernie added. “Maybe recruit some new people?”

  “Yeah,” Kellan mumbled, his eyes on the cement floor.

  “So what do we do?” Blake asked.

  “Lay low.” Kellan looked up, focusing on the screens once again. “We go out only when necessary and always in a group. Stay armed. Keep an eye out. If he’s going to make a move, it won’t take him long, but I think Bill’s right.” The statement earned him a frown from Ernie, but he didn’t acknowledge it. “Andrew’s not the type to give up.”

  “So we just hang out inside the shelter?” Scott asked, speaking up for the first time.

  Unlike our group, who hated being cooped up, Bill’s people seemed thrilled by the idea, and it made sense. A few days of relaxing inside an air-conditioned shelter, watching television and playing pool, probably sounded like a dream come true after nine years of apocalyptic horror.

  “That’s what we do,” Kellan said.

  Bill chuckled and shook his head like he couldn’t believe their luck. “I don’t know if we’re going to be able to figure out what to do with ourselves, but we’ll give it a shot.”

  The bite on my arm, still covered by the bandage, throbbed, reminding me I had something else to take care of. As the group began filing out of the room, I caught Cade’s eye and lifted my brows in a silent question, knowing he’d get what I was asking. He gave a slight shake of his head, and I let out a sigh. He hadn’t told Emma I was immune, which left it up to me. Blake, too, had no idea, and I couldn’t let it go any longer or someone in Bill’s group would let it slip. They needed to hear it from me.

  Blake was turning to leave when I called out, “Can you hang back for a minute? There’s something I need to talk to you
and Emma about.”

  Both Blake and Emma froze, and Kellan, knowing what I was going to say, leaned against the wall and crossed his arms. He was close to me, ready to show support, but staying back so I could take the lead, and I appreciated it. This was my story to tell, even if Emma was going to be as angry with him for keeping it from her as she would be at me.

  With my friends’ eyes focused on me, I found it difficult to think, and I lowered my gaze to the cement floor.

  “What is it?” Emma asked. “You’re scaring me.”

  “Regan.” Kellan’s calm voice made it easier to look up, and when I did, he nodded. “It’s okay.”

  It’s okay. It’s okay.

  I repeated the words a few times, clinging to them, knowing he was right. Jasper made me promise, and if there was anyone in this world I would have kept a promise for, it was him.

  I swallowed and forced my mouth to open. “Yesterday, after the fire started and we fled the hangar, a horde moved in. It was chaos because there was so much smoke, and during the commotion, a zombie managed to get a bite out of me.”

  I pulled the bandage from my arm to prove I was telling the truth. Not because they would think I was lying, but because I felt like they needed the visual proof or the reality of the whole thing wouldn’t sink in.

  Emma let out a gasp, her hand flying to her mouth. “Oh my God.”

  “But you’re okay?” Blake asked.

  “I’m okay,” I assured him, and then took a moment to swallow my fear. “It wasn’t my first bite.”

  Blake’s mouth dropped open, but he said nothing, as if words were impossible to grasp at the moment.

  At his side, though, Emma shook her head like she didn’t believe me. “What are you saying?”

  The story poured out of me then, and I told them all about the day Kellan and I went fishing, how I was bitten, and how Jasper swore me to secrecy. Blake’s expression was thoughtful as I spoke, but Emma’s eyebrows pulled together more with each word out of my mouth until she didn’t look a thing like herself.

  When I stopped talking, she got to her feet. “I can’t believe you never told me.”

  “Jasper made us promise,” Kellan said before I could respond.

  “But why? Did he think we would put you in danger?”

  Cade took Emma’s hand. “It was to protect us all. To keep Regan safe, but also so none of us could ever be forced to use the information against her.”

  “That’s ridiculous.” Emma jerked her hand out of his. “Why would we use the information against her? Why would we put her at risk?”

  “Sometimes,” Kellan said, “you can’t control the situation you find yourself in.”

  He was talking about what had happened with Harper. How Andrew’s men had ambushed us, stripped me, threatened to use my body unless Kellan told them everything. He’d given in, and he wasn’t the only one who would respond that way. If I had been in the shelter and Cade and Emma out there, he would have turned me in to save her. I knew it as surely as I knew I would have done the same to protect Kellan.

  “I can’t believe you’re immune and you never told me,” Emma said softly, the hurt radiating from her words.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, “but it was what Jasper wanted.”

  Silence fell over us. Emma stared at me like I was a stranger while Kellan rubbed my back. Cade shook his head, and Blake stared at the floor, his ratty old hat pulled down to cover his face so it was impossible to guess what he was thinking.

  Finally, after no one spoke for a long time, he looked up. “Well, I guess you’re about the luckiest person alive.”

  “How so?” I asked, not feeling the least bit lucky with Emma staring at me like I had betrayed her.

  “You survived the virus, the love of your life survived the apocalypse, you stumbled across a luxury shelter, and now we find out you can’t be killed by a bite. It’s like you won the end of the world lottery.”

  “You forgot the fact that I managed to make the best friends a person could ever have,” I murmured, still looking at Emma.

  She pushed past me and left the room without uttering a word.

  Cade sighed as he stared at the door she’d just disappeared through. “She’ll get over it. She’s just hurt.”

  I nodded, understanding, but also thinking she was being unfair. She felt like we had no secrets, like we were something more than sisters, but it was an impossible standard to live up to. No matter how close we were, both physically and emotionally, we would eventually have secrets. It was inevitable.

  14

  With a whole new group of people living in the shelter, we were going to be able to reduce how long each of us had to be on lookout, cutting it down from five-hour shifts to two-hour shifts. Before we could do that, though, we had to train Bill’s group on how to pan the cameras around, turn on the audio in case they saw something outside, and how to sound the alarm if anything did happen on the surface. To expedite the process, we each had a few people join us on our regular shifts, and when it was my turn, I found myself in the control room with Christine, Diane, Tracy, and Becky.

  Since I’d decided to play matchmaker, I’d already spent a good amount of time talking to Diane back at the hangar, and Christine always seemed to pop up whenever we were talking to her dad, but this was my first chance to really interact with the sisters, Tracy and Becky. So, after showing the four other women the basics, we spent the shift sitting in front of the monitors on chairs we’d dragged up from the computer room, talking.

  The sisters, who were twenty and eighteen, could have passed for twins. They had identical blue eyes, creamy white skin, and thick, black hair. The only difference was that Becky, the younger of the two, was shorter and not quite as thin, and they had different hairstyles. Even more striking than their appearance, though, was how similar their personalities were. They were bubbly and giggly, and talked more than anyone I’d ever met, making it difficult for anyone else to get a word in. Diane smiled fondly at them and rolled her eyes when she caught my gaze, while Christine made no indication that she even noticed their incessant chatter. She seemed content to sit back and listen without saying a single word.

  “I need to know about Blake,” Tracy said about halfway through our shift. “Single, I’m guessing?”

  For the first time, Christine’s expression changed, and curiosity shimmered in her dark brown eyes. She really was a striking person, with high cheekbones and full lips that were accentuated by her short hair. I had to bite back a smile when I thought about her and Blake. They might have seemed like an odd couple to me, but there had obviously been an instant attraction. Good. He deserved some happiness.

  “Ummm…” I gnawed on my bottom lip while I tried to decide what to say. “He’s single. I mean, he and Emma were together for a long time, but not anymore.”

  “Really?” Diane said, somehow managing to jump in before the sisters. “That must be awkward.”

  “It’s had its moments, but they’ve worked it out.”

  I started to shrug to let them know it wasn’t a big deal but turned when movement on one of the screens caught my attention. Becky had started gushing about how cute Blake was, but I barely noticed, too distracted by my pounding heart as my mind shifted gears, my fingers itching to sound the alarm as I imagined Andrew and his men on the other side of the fence. Only, it wasn’t them. It was a zombie.

  We got them from time to time, drawn here by the animals, probably. They would slam their bodies against the fence, trying to figure out how to get to the goats, and eventually a couple more would join them. Once there was a handful, we’d go out and get rid of them. Not only did we not want to draw attention to the shelter, but we also wanted to make sure the fence stayed sturdy, and a mass of the dead could weaken it and put us at risk.

  “Zombies,” Christine said, cutting through the sisters’ chatter.

  The room fell silent as I panned the camera around. She was right. More than one of the dead had found its way to th
e fence. Three, from what I could see.

  “It’s okay for now since there aren’t many. We can take care of it in the morning.”

  Becky frowned, her drooling over Blake forgotten. “We?”

  “Whoever.” My focus was still on the surface when I shrugged, but I turned to her as I said, “We take turns.”

  “I’m not going out there.” Her dark hair was piled on top of her head in a messy bun, and it bobbed a little when she shook her head. “The guys can do that.”

  Tracy nodded in agreement, her chin length hair swishing as she did.

  I looked at her, and then over to Diane—who rolled her eyes—then Christine—who shook her head to indicate that she didn’t agree with the sisters. Apparently, Becky and Tracy were the type of women who liked to hide in the shelter and let big, strong men take care of them.

  No, thanks.

  “Emma and I go out plenty,” I said.

  It was only kind of a lie. Yes, I wanted to go out and help, but Kellan had always been too protective to let it happen often, although, now that my secret was out, I was determined to overcome that. How many times over the past year had I wanted to scream at him that I was immune when he stepped in front of me, determined to shield me from danger? Hundreds. I’d always kept my mouth shut, though, the promise I’d made to Jasper keeping me quiet. But that was over now, thank God.

  By the time Kellan and a few of the new people—James, Ernie, Scott, and Bill—came to relieve us, my head was pounding from Becky and Tracy’s constant chatter. Christine hurried out, only pausing to exchange a few quiet words with her dad, and Diane followed. The sisters trailed after them, still talking.

  When they were gone, I exhaled and slumped against the wall. “I feel like I spent three hours with the Gilmore Girls.”

  Kellan winced. “Ouch.”

  I’d forced him to watch the show with me a few times, and he’d hated every minute of it, saying all they did was talk and it made his head hurt. Until now, I hadn’t understood what he meant, but the pounding in my temples made it clear why he’d refused to continue watching it after only four episodes.