GENERATION Z THE COMPLETE BOX SET: NOVELS 1-3

by Peter Meredith

  It would boil down to the fact that humans did not wish to simply survive, they wanted to thrive, even at the expense of others. There would be people going after the supplies! Jillybean saw the understanding dawn on her. “Be firm and don’t be afraid. Bring them to me.”

  Jenn wanted to ask: What about Mike or Stu? Why wasn’t she having them do this? Again, she held her lips closed. There had to be a reason Jillybean was sending her, and there had to be a reason she trusted her. The thought buoyed her. Confidently, she grabbed the flashlight, and, out of habit, nearly turned it on before checking herself just in time.

  She was a ghost in the dark. With her small size and her practiced step, she made no sound as she came to the offices. There was light inside, the candles had not been blown out. There were also muted whispers. Jenn could imagine herself jumping through the doorway with her massive shotgun pointed and a look of vengeful wrath on her tiny features.

  Was that how Jillybean imagined the scenario unfolding? Almost certainly not. She expected Jenn to be herself, but also firm and unafraid, neither of which were good descriptors of her current state of morale. Even buoyed as she was, she could only call herself pudding-like and shy.

  The flashlight helped and their reaction to it helped a great deal more. There were three men in the room, two poking through the boxes and one who was just in the process of picking up the pipe bomb. The sudden light had all three men jumping in spasms of fear; one shrieked, one began a panicked babble and Willis, the man holding the bomb, froze in place.

  “If I were you I’d put that down real slowly,” she said, the note of warning in her tone gave her an edgier sound than she had expected. She held Willis transfixed. “It’s a kind of bomb. A pipe bomb.” She kept the light on him until he set it back on the little end table. She then spun the light at the other two, both of whom had M4s slung on their backs.

  “These are ours,” one said, meaning the gun. “They belong to us.”

  “And the food is ours, too,” Willis said. “Them damn Corsairs took all this from us and,” he paused to lick lips that were so thin only a chicken would be jealous of them, “and we should get what’s ours back. That’s what would be fair.”

  Jenn was actually confused by one word. “Ours?” she asked before she remembered how the warehouse people used to live. The fractional infighting, the bickering, the commonplace thievery. Jenn felt a haughtiness come over her, wrapping itself around her; a warm blanket of superiority, because weren’t the Hill People better people? Then she remembered One Shot Saul. His death had been the one topic fiercely avoided and yet it lingered in their minds. Jenn hadn’t needed an autopsy to know he’d been murdered.

  She had been in the operating room with Jillybean and had seen the wound and had listened to the girl doctor as she had prattled on and on about the surgery, the risks, the likelihood of complications, even the possibility of death, which seemed very remote at the time.

  The murder was a big black flag that just hung there in her, shadowing everything she thought she knew about the people she still secretly considered her own.

  Jenn climbed down from her high horse and laid the gun aside. “Look, I understand. Especially after everything you guys have gone through, but I don’t think we’re going to do the usual ‘that’s mine and this is yours’, thing.”

  “That’s probably cuz you guys don’t have nothing,” he shot back. “We are all very happy you came and killed them Corsairs for us but that doesn’t give you the right to take our stuff. Everyone is gonna see that as soon as they come to their senses.”

  Don’t be afraid and be firm. She wasn’t afraid, but she didn’t know how to be firm. She was better at cajoling. “I think that’s just it. They won’t come to their senses if uh, uh…” She had almost called Jillybean by her real name and if anyone started calling her Queen Jillybean her rule would be very short. “If the Queen doesn’t save you guys, and she won’t with that sort of attitude, you’ll all be dead.”

  “Is she really the girl doctor?” one of them asked.

  “Oh yeah. I’ve seen her open a guy up who’d been shot. She pulled out all his guts, found the bullet, plugged like twenty holes and then stuffed all the guts back in exactly as they had been. And look.” She pulled back her own auburn hair to show the series of wide bandaids that covered her stitches. “I got shot in the head and she fixed me like that.” She snapped her fingers, impressing two of the men.

  But not Willis. He wore a look like he had just taken a sip of curdled milk. “A queen. It’s ridiculous. We’re Americans, damn it. We don’t do queens and princes and all that crap.”

  Jenn did not think of herself as American. America had died when she was very small and it was never coming back. She felt cheated whenever people talked about it as if she had missed something spectacular. “And we didn’t used to live in warehouses neither, so what? Things change and you’re gonna have to get used to it. You don’t want to make her mad, Willis Firam. The Corsairs made her mad and look what she did to them.”

  “How’d she do it, is what I wanna know?” one of the men asked. “All we heard in here was some screaming and then the bomb and the gunshot.”

  Since there were seven witnesses to what had happened in the room, there was no sense trying to lie. “The Queen is a little mad.”

  “In what way?” Willis demanded.

  “In a way that it’s best not to get her angry. Just trust me on this. Be her friend and she will give you everything she has, but if you get her angry…” The image of the fire sweeping down and destroying Sausalito blinked into her mind. “I won’t say anything this time.”

  The two men with Willis thanked her, however he still had a curl of suspicion to his lip. “But what did she do? How’d she get them to give up their guns? Did you guys overpower them?”

  “You’ll have to wait until the gossip makes its rounds. In the meantime, she wants to see you three.”

  They looked back and forth from at each other in confusion. “Us three? She doesn’t even know us, does she?”

  “She knew you’d be here,” she said to Willis. He mouthed the word How, but lacked the breath for it to be heard. “And she told me to bring back anyone else I found with you. I’ll tell her that you were going to guard the supplies. She won’t believe it, but it’s better than the truth.”

  Of course, she didn’t believe it. Jillybean wore an open smirk as Jenn lied without the least amount of effort or conviction. Mike and Stu had returned from watching over the prisoners and were part of the crowd gathered around the throne. Both made faces and Mike started to grow angry, not at Jenn, but at Willis, assuming he had somehow tricked Jenn.

  “Just a moment, Mike,” Jillybean said, without looking at him. Her gaze was scorching into Willis, whose fake smile turned into a grimace. Her eyes bored into him, stripping away his outer flesh and peering deep inside to where his secrets lay, exposing them. He felt like an ant under a magnifying glass.

  Finally, she drawled, “You must really love your queen to go out of your way to guard her belongings, voluntarily. I applaud that.” Here she gave the smallest of golf claps, her hands so softly touching they barely made a patter. “And I will reward you. I will make you my quartermaster, in charge of all my food, my weapons, ammunition, medical supplies and all the rest. How does that sound?”

  A combination of stark greed and wonderment at his amazing luck came over him and it showed in his wide smile. Instead of being punished, she was giving him a bonanza. He would have the power over who got fed and who went hungry. Who had to go scavenge with one bullet in their guns or with twenty. That was real power! With that much power it wouldn’t be long before he had the true control of her little “queendom” or whatever she was going to call it.

  “It sounds great. I’ll get right on it. I’m stronger than I was letting on to the Corsairs. Jimmy and Rondo are, too. Hey, do you think they could be, like my assistants?”

  She smiled benignly at Willis. “Of course. It
’s a big job I’ve asked you to take on. Jimmy will be our weapons master, in charge of our weapons and ammo, and Rondo will be in charge of medical supplies and equipment, while you, Willis Firam, your main job will be as my commissariat. It’s a very important job, one with great responsibility.”

  “Thank you, thank you,” the three said, almost in unison, bobbing their heads and grinning like foxes who had just been put in charge of the henhouse.

  Jillybean beamed, clapping her hands together. “I’m so glad I can count on people of the highest integrity for these positions. Thank goodness you three aren’t petty, vindictive, little sneak-thieves. Thank goodness you three would never, ever, ever consider stealing a single bullet or the smallest damned crumb off my table. Because if you did…” Their smiles dried up as she suddenly seemed filled with a terrific wrath. “Well, let’s not think of all the terrible things I would have done to you, because that won’t happen, right?”

  “Never,” Willis said.

  “Exactly. But to be on the safe side, you know, so that you are never accused of anything of the sort, you will keep a running inventory of everything we have—in writing and these books, as well as your properly kept storerooms, will be subject to frequent inspections and audits.”

  Frequent inspections and audits? “Great,” Willis said, blinking dazedly, feeling as though she had pulled the rug out from under him. It turned out that the job he had volunteered for wasn’t nearly as powerful as he had assumed. He was to be a clerk. And there was going to be paperwork. Books. His stomach turned at the thought.

  Stu Currans was nodding, appreciatively and Mike wore an open grin, while to their right, Bubbles, looking somewhat lost, gave out a weak laugh. She really didn’t have much of a clue as to what was going on. First, the new queen had smiled at Willis, and that was good, then she had glared like she wanted to peel his flesh off with her teeth, and that was bad. Now, others were smiling and the queen seemed satisfied. She just wanted to be liked, so she laughed, not expecting the new queen to even look in her direction. But she did. To Bubbles’ dismay, the satisfied look dimmed, replaced by sadness.

  “What are we going to do with them?” Willis asked. He leered openly at the two slave girls who’d been standing off to the side, clutching themselves. “I ask as a professional. They are property. You know, goods and services. I’d say they fall under the uh, jurid-diction of the quartermaster.” He was grasping at straws, hoping to find some way to make his miserable position better.

  “The word you want is jurisdiction and, no they are not property. We will not keep slaves. Temporary slaves, penal slaves, for want of a better name, will be under my control. All other slaves are hereby freed. Stu, if you will see to that?” She waved him closer and she whispered in his ear, “Separate them from their former owners. Find a place for them to stay.”

  “There may be some bad blood because of this,” Stu warned.

  She sighed. “Yes, evil begets evil. But it has to stop somewhere. Oh, I was hoping to make you my chief law enforcement officer. I hope that’s okay.”

  Stu honestly didn’t know what to make of the offer or really of anything that was happening. She had taken this queen business by the bit and was running with it full out and it was great, from a certain point of view. These people needed her. They needed her intelligence and her unrelenting energy, but what would happen when Eve came back? Would she tear apart all of Jillybean’s hard work out of spite? Would it be one step forward and two back? More than likely.

  “I’ll do it,” he said, feeling as though he really didn’t have a choice. She had a velocity to her, an impetus that carried people along in her wake that was impossible to stop.

  She seemed relieved. “Good. Good. I didn’t want to presume.”

  “You come in here and make yourself queen, but you didn’t want to presume?” Stu laughed at this in the soft way of the Hill People. She laughed as well and then Bubbles laughed which killed it.

  “Start with these two,” Jillybean said and then turned her sad eyes to Mike. “I need the boat brought in and unloaded. Take the four prisoners. Also, Willis, Rondo and Jimmy will help and I’m sure they know a few others who are stronger than they look. Once that’s done, I’m going to need a cleaning station set up and…”

  From that restless mind poured every step necessary to get her kingdom up and going. It was a long list of steps; an exhausting sounding list, and those around her grew tired just listening to it for it was already getting late in the evening. When Jillybean realized she had been speaking aloud without let up, she caught her tongue.

  “We’ll do our best,” Mike said, and left with Stu and the others to begin their labors. Others drifted away, afraid to be caught up in work they were sure they lacked the energy to endure. Three that remained were Jenn and the two ex-slaves. Jillybean waved them closer and saw, that up close, with the stronger light of the fire full in their faces, they were much older than she had supposed them to be.

  Both were in their mid-thirties while she had assumed them to have just scraped the lower edge of their twenties. It was their make-up and style of dress which had formed the illusion of youth.

  They were properly nervous being this close to Jillybean. After all, they had been in the room when Eve had threatened to blow them all up. In fact, Johanna Murphy, the rail-thin woman who’d had her nearly nonexistent breasts thrown out the entire time, had actually wet herself when Tony had fired that big gun of his. She had thought: this is it, and had been sure the crazy girl was about to blow them all to hell.

  But the crazy girl had only smiled. The bullet had come so close that little tufts of her hair had fallen onto her shoulder and she had only smiled. It took a lot to impress Johanna. In the last dozen years, she had seen a hundred guys as tough as Tony had been; she’d seen her share of bare-knuckle fighters and quick-draws and big talkers—and had been raped by quite a few of them. But she had never seen anything like this girl.

  Johanna couldn’t stop staring at her.

  “What are your names?” Jillybean asked. “Your real names from before.” In a shy voice Johanna gave her name, but Bubbles looked confused by the question.

  “Diamond is the name I had before. I-I was a dancer. You know, a dancer for men. Like an exotic dancer.”

  Jenn did not know what that meant, thinking she was a foreign sort of dancer. Jillybean had crossed the entire continent and knew many things she wished she didn’t, the knowledge of what an exotic dancer was being one of them. “And you’d like to keep the name, Diamond?” Diamond nodded, afraid that if the queen could take her name, there was no telling what else she could take.

  “And you, Johanna what did you do before?”

  It took Johanna a moment to remember there had been another life before this one. Back then, she used to like to say she was a “persistent undergraduate.” For five years of partying college life she had always been preparing to fling herself in one direction or another. Then the dead came and instead of flinging herself anywhere she was dragged here and there. No one ever cared about the school she had gone to or the odd jobs she had worked back before. All they cared about was that she was too small and timid to fight, too easily fatigued to hunt. and too weak to till the land.

  The first group she’d been with had been annihilated, and the second enslaved. After that she went from being human baggage to being human chattel, her worth diminishing with every rape and every sale.

  “I was in school.”

  “For?”

  “Different things,” she said, feeling dreadfully ashamed. There was little left to her now save for the knowledge she was able to please men. Being freed by the queen had quite untied her mind which was awash in fear.

  “That’s good because we will need someone with a knowledge of many different things. For now, you and Miss Diamond will be our assistants.” The two women glanced at each other, both clearly afraid they wouldn’t be able to handle the job. “It’ll be okay. We’ll show you what needs to
be done. I will initially be working triage. I’ll need Jenn to start the IVs going. Everyone I send to you will need one.”

  Now it was Jenn’s turn to worry she wouldn’t be up to the task. Jillybean put a hand on her shoulder. “It’s a piece of cake. You’ll see.”

  They found an empty section of the vast warehouse where there was little but dust, a clutter of old trash, and a line of pallets leaning one upon another like half-fallen dominoes. This was to be their hospital. They left the two ex-slaves to set up lanterns and to arrange the medical supplies and lay out the clean sheets brought from the Saber.

  Theirs was the easy job. Jenn followed Jillybean into the heart of darkness where the smell staggered them despite their masks. Five minutes before, Jenn would have claimed to have had unlimited faith in Jillybean’s powers as a doctor but then a woman came staggering from the shadows, looking like a creature partially in the nether-world already.

  “You should sit,” Jillybean said, starting to pull off her backpack, but the woman would not hear it. She shook her head, drool swinging in an arc. She pulled them further until they came to one of the great sixty-foot tall shelves where the people slept like bees in a hive. The woman tried to mount a ladder but lacked the strength and could only point a ghostly hand upwards.

  Three stories above the concrete floor, where the stench had formed a distinct haze, they found the woman’s child, a scarcely human stump of a creature all aglow with fever. Each section of the shelves was big enough to hold a little dresser, stacked with boxes, a few hanging items and a mattress. The boy’s mattress was sunk in, holding the child in a brown pool of his filth.

  “Guhh,” Jenn said, gagging on the septic air. It permeated her mask, and slunk right up her nostrils, turning her an ugly shade of green. It was then that things began to grow dim and thoughts became fleeting. Jenn felt as though her soul was trying to leave her body, to get away from the horror in front of her.