GENERATION Z THE COMPLETE BOX SET: NOVELS 1-3

by Peter Meredith

  Also, she had to wonder what they would think of Eve. They had caught a glimpse of her the night before—and had cheered when she turned her particular brand of evil on the Corsairs. How would they react when it was one of them facing execution for looking at her in the wrong way? What would they do if she impulsively set fire to their storeroom?

  Judging by the nervous look Jillybean was giving her, Jenn thought they were about to find out.

  “You needed me for something?”

  “Yes, I had to start without you. Sorry, but she was crashing.”

  Jenn was startled to see Jillybean was cutting into Miss Rebecca. She was semi-conscious, her blue-brown eyes fluttering. Mike knelt over her, ready to hold her down just in case the pain of having her leg opened up woke her.

  “Hey,” he said, giving her a wan smile and trying not to look anywhere near the lady’s leg.

  “Hey,” she answered, glad that he was there. She hadn’t come close to getting over her fright and she felt she needed him as much as Jillybean needed her. Reluctantly, she turned away from him. “What do you want me to do?”

  Jillybean’s eyes twitched and instead of answering, she clamped her lips tight, as if she had a goldfish in her mouth and was trying to keep it from jumping out. Jenn understood; Eve had wanted to make some biting comment that would have been embarrassing to both of them.

  “She’s going to be okay,” Jenn assured Jillybean. “You’re doing the right thing.” She had no idea if Jillybean was in fact doing the right thing. In truth, cutting open Miss Rebecca’s leg seemed to be the exact wrong thing. Her leg was fine as far as Jenn could see. It was her arms that were the problem. They were covered in dark, splotchy bruises. It looked as if someone had beaten her.

  Jenn knelt down opposite Jillybean and leaned over the incision. It was small, maybe three inches long, and so far, it wasn’t deep. If this was a mistake there was still time to fix it. She was still staring when a shadow fell across her. The spectators had moved in closer. “Maybe we should clear the area,” Jenn said. “Mike, can you move them back?”

  He was glad to get away and very quickly drove the people back a good twenty feet.

  “So,” Jenn said, trying to sound calm. “What’s going on with her? Something wrong with her leg?”

  Jillybean blinked at the question and shook her head as if to clear it. “Of course not. Oh, I guess it does look confusing. We’re doing a procedure called a venous cutdown. She’s so dehydrated that her smaller veins can’t hold a catheter. In her case they’re thin as tissue paper. So…” She took two retractors and pulled back the flesh she had slit.

  “We cut through a bit of tissue and expose the Great Saphenous Vein, which just happens to be my favorite vein.” She sounded much surer of herself now and although her face was half-hidden by her mass of hair, Jenn could tell the twitch was gone from her eyes. “You have to be very careful. You don’t want to nick it, or the anterior tibial artery, which is this vessel here, the one that’s pulsing.”

  Jenn saw it nestled in a little pond of blood, surrounded by this and that bit of unknown and very disgusting anatomy. She felt her stomach roll. It was a quick roll, however. She was getting used to this sort of thing.

  “Is that pulse supposed to be that fast?” The artery looked like it was attached to some sort of electrical wire.

  “Most definitely not. It’s another sign of severe dehydration. The body makes up for the lack of volume by speeding blood around. Now we tie off the vein distally, meaning away from the heart relative to the position of our incision. When that’s done, we make the smallest opening in the vein, insert the catheter like so and then add one tiny suture to hold it in place.”

  She used a little fishhook-like needle to put the suture in, making big, obvious motions which were quite unlike her. “Now, we untie the vein. If she bleeds, then we might need to put in another suture. If not, we hook up the IV and run her wide open. Now, we close the main incision with some sutures, cover it with a sterile dressing and tape everything down good and tight.”

  Jillybean did all of this, again with large movements. When she was done she looked up with a smile. “I want you to do the next one.”

  “Me? The next one? What next one?”

  She pointed at a child of maybe eight who was lolling in a daze not ten feet away. “I couldn’t, uh let anymore die,” she said in a whisper, her eyes averted.

  “But why me?” She wanted to say: Haven’t I done enough? but the child might have heard and besides it seemed selfish.

  “It makes sense that someone else knows a thing or two.” Her smile dimmed and her eyes couldn’t seem to rise to Jenn’s.

  Jenn was casting about for an excuse when a hand reached out and grabbed her wrist. It was Miss Rebecca. It had only been a few minutes and she was already feeling the effect of the fluids. “Take me with you. Please. I can’t be left behind.”

  Jillybean had no trouble looking her in the eyes. “I won’t leave you behind, don’t worry. I’ll make sure you’re safe, no matter what.”

  It didn’t take a genius to read those lines. “What about the rest of us?” Jenn asked. “Will we be safe? And where will we be safe?” She knew they would be safe in any direction except for southwest—that was the direction of the dark veil she had seen just before the crows had come.

  “The barge will be perfect in your old stomping grounds,” Jillybean said, finally able to look her in the eye. “In the San Francisco Bay area.”

  For the second time that day, Jenn felt the world spin and go grey as she pictured the horde of rats and crows feeding on the dead. San Francisco was almost perfectly southwest of them.

  Chapter 29

  Jillybean caught Jenn as she fell, laid her down and studied her with her penetrating blue eyes. She was bent over Jenn and in her haze, she thought Jillybean was going to kiss her—and she did in a way. Jillybean touched her lips to Jenn’s forehead and muttered, “No fever.”

  She then took up Jenn’s wrist, checked her pulse and declared it, “Normal. Could you describe your bowel movements for me?”

  Mike Gunter took that exact moment to hurry over, having seen Jenn suddenly slump over. Jenn went red in the face. “No, I will not. They’re fine and I’m fine. It’s just I saw something earlier. A sign and…”

  She stopped as the room seemed to just freeze. Whispered conversations ended abruptly and the only movement was the swinging of every head in her direction as all eyes were focused squarely on her. Jillybean, Mike, Diamond, Johanna, the poor, thin ex-slave Shaina Hale, and everyone else. They were all staring so unabashedly that it went beyond the border of civility and deep into being rude. Worse still, there was also what could only be called a religious fervor in many of their eyes and she knew that whatever she said would be taken as gospel.

  Jenn faltered under the pressure, unable to finish her sentence. What if she were wrong? What if the smoke was just smoke and the crows were just crows? What if they followed her blindly and she led them straight to their deaths? What if they found out the truth? What if they found out that she was just a girl? What if they found out how unlucky she was?

  Jillybean saw the sudden indecision and the fright in her eyes. “We’re not going to discuss this here,” she said, softly. “We’ll talk once we have finished our work.”

  “Yes, that’d be good,” Jenn agreed, looking down and away, anywhere but at the many hungry eyes. She was so eager not to be the center of attention that she pointed at the boy in the delirium. “You said he’s next?”

  For a second, Jillybean hesitated, wishing she could sit Jenn down and stamp out the ridiculous supernatural notions pervading her mind. But there was still the greater good to think about, although just then the idea of using the people’s sad gullibility against them, felt like the greater evil.

  She needed them to go to San Francisco and she needed them to get there quickly. If Jenn’s vision could be used to get them there faster, she would have to embrace it. If not, she
would resort to logic. In other words, she had to “play” Jenn like an instrument and it would take a delicate hand. Jenn was no fool.

  “Yes, and we have one more after him. We’ll need Mike’s help to hold them still.” Jillybean laid out a recently sterilized surgical set and, for just a moment, Jenn had the hope that she would just go ahead and do the procedure herself. Instead, she held out a scalpel. “We start with the first incision. Feel for the pulse as a landmark.”

  Jenn’s soft fingers, sensitive as they were, had great difficulty picking out the boy’s faint pulse. She didn’t need to ask to know this was a bad sign. He was fading into death. “Maybe you should do…” Jenn began to beg. Jillybean shoved the scalpel into her hand without saying another word. The naked meaning of the movement was obvious: the boy’s life was her responsibility.

  The room was silent and Jenn could feel the eyes on her once more. She made her first incision, barely drawing a line in the flesh—it wasn’t deep enough, forcing her to cut again.

  Jillybean only nodded, her lips perfectly sealed. With the incision made, Jenn looked up at her, expectantly. Jillybean only gazed back, reflecting the same look right back at her until Jenn said, “Can you hand me the retractors, please?”

  A nod and the retractors were handed over. This was how the entire procedure went. Jenn would look over at Jillybean might nod but said nothing, forcing Jenn to do everything. When she finally reached up to turn on the IV she felt like passing out all over again. The fluid ran into the boy and the small bleeder caused by her shaking hands clotted over with just a little pressure.

  “And now you sew him up,” Jillybean said, her first words in half an hour. Suddenly everyone was talking and smiling. Mike handed Jenn a handkerchief which she used to wipe the sweat from her forehead which had been hanging there in growing beads.

  Jillybean made her work on the next child, a girl of seven who was awake. She stared at Jenn with languid, apathetic eyes before the procedure, but came alive with a shriek of pain at the first incision. Once again, Jenn had cut too lightly and was forced to cut again. The girl cried out again and Jillybean tut-tutted her.

  “Screaming will only bring the dead,” she said. “Do you want that?” It was a hard thing to say to a frightened, sick little girl, and yet they lived in a world where stoicism was an absolute necessity. All the adults around them—they were pressing in close again—nodded and gave the girl disapproving looks.

  The girl bit down on the collar of her shirt and Jillybean gave her a smile. “Only the tough grow up to be beautiful young women. You are tougher than you look, I can tell. And either way, the hardest part is over. There’ll be a little pinch here and there and a poke, but soon we’ll have you fixed up and feeling better.”

  Jillybean then turned to Jenn. “It’s why we work quick and smart. I don’t know if you attended me when I said the scalpel blade should be inserted a quarter of an inch.”

  “I did, I swear, but…”

  The “but” was sadly obvious. “But you didn’t want to cause pain. This is understandable but not laudable in that it demonstrates a true weakness of character. Sometimes, as a doctor, or say a queen, we have to set aside those feelings. Sometimes, we have to cause some pain and suffering if we wish to save the body as a whole.”

  Jenn found it an odd thing to say and what was even more so was the way Jillybean stared, her eyes boring in at her with unrelenting ferocity, almost as if she wished to imprint the words physically into Jenn’s mind. “I get it,” Jenn told her, wishing to get back to the surgery.

  “I hope you do,” Jillybean said, “because it’s the hardest lesson of all.” She cast a furtive glance in Mike’s direction and saw he’d been paying close attention—and that was good. The lesson had to be heard and understood by him as well.

  Having laid her foundation, Jillybean nodded to Jenn to proceed. As the girl’s leg had been bleeding in a steady trickle this entire time, Jenn was happy to. This time the procedure went quickly. Jillybean kept up a constant dialogue with the girl, chatting easily and taking her mind off the dipping scalpel and the fishhook needle.

  The only complaint the girl had was when the fluids rushed into her system. “It’s cold.”

  Mike hurried to get another blanket and had to push through the little crowd to get back. He covered all of her except her single leg which he just noticed was bowed. The boy’s leg had been as well.

  “Can you fix that,” he asked, pointing.

  A momentary flash of anger washed over Jillybean and Sadie nearly leapt out of her to snap at him for being so crass, because now everyone was pointing and whispering, making the girl go red with embarrassment. Fortunately, the cure for the disease in one so young was easy.

  “Yes. It’s only a case of rickets.”

  Having her disease named was something at least and the girl was guardedly optimistic. “What’s a rickets? Are those worms? There was a boy named Milty who got with worms that made his legs getted bowed worser than mine and he died.”

  “You don’t have worms. What’s wrong is that your bones have become soft due to a vitamin D deficiency. That means you haven’t been eating right or spending enough time running around and playing out in the sun. The cure is to get you outside as much as possible and to supplement your diet with Vitamin D pills which I picked up this morning. It’ll take a few months to a year before you’re good as new.”

  “Good as a new what?”

  Jillybean did a double take, thinking that the question might have come from inside her head but there was only the stirring of vulgar whispers in there. “It’s an expression meaning you’re going to be okay.” She stood as she heard Stu’s boots approach. They came at such a tired clip that she feared to see his face. He’d been up for over thirty hours, working doggedly to make sure her new reign went as smoothly as possible. When he came into the light of the candles, he was as haggard and drawn as if he had just walked across a desert.

  His face lit up when he saw her. “It’s working. Come see.”

  Because of the heavy curtain he had erected, they could hear the splash of water before they could see it. He pulled back the curtain and there, jutting from a break eight-feet up on the warehouse wall, was a hanging hose that poured water in a continuous stream.

  “Willis and the Corsairs are getting the empty water bladders. But it works. It really, really works.”

  “I don’t understand your surprise,” Jillybean said, putting her hand out and touching the cold water. “Hmm,” she murmured, as she envisioned a simple manner to heat it without first removing it from the hose. “No, copper piping, duh. Coiled of course…”

  “Is it raining?” Diamond was suddenly at her elbow, gazing at the end of the hose.

  Again, Jillybean felt the slippage in her mind at the sheer stupidity of the question. It’s not that stupid, she berated herself. A primitive culture such as this would indeed collect rainwater and funnel it inside.

  “Look out!” Willis snapped, as he and one of the Corsairs dragged in a stack of empty bladders. Diamond skipped out of the way. Jillybean did not and was nearly stepped on by Willis, who went on, “And no, it ain’t raining. That there is the working end of a pump I built. Uh, I mean we built.” He had just caught sight of Stu and Jillybean.

  Stu’s stare was so hard that Willis wouldn’t look up until it softened. “We didn’t build anything,” Stu said, speaking loudly. The crowd that had been watching the minor surgeries had followed them and were now gaping at the running water as if they had never seen such a thing in their lives.

  “The Queen built it,” Stu told them. This had eyebrows shooting up since they had all seen her just as plain as day working on the sick folks. “She built it in her mind,” Stu explained, touching his head. “I watched her take a pencil to a barren piece of paper and, just like that, she drew this.”

  He held up the drawing she had made. The little crowd jostled to see it better as if they were in the presence of a Rembrandt and not a quick
sketch. Sketch or not, Stu had been impressed at the time and when that water came bubbling up he had been doubly so. In his twenty-one years he had never seen anything like it or her.

  When she had crowned herself queen, he had thought the worst, but it seemed that she earned the title more and more with every passing minute.

  “How’s it work?” Mike asked, taking the drawing and puzzling over it. “Is this water from upriver? All that way?”

  “Yes,” Stu answered for Jillybean, who was tired and could hear the whispers growing inside of her. She knew that soon they’d lay siege to her mind. She needed rest, but her people needed some sort of explanation.

  “It’s clean water. It runs through a dozen filters so there’s no chance of contamination. The pump action is simple physics based on the properties of direct lift powered by the kinetic energy of the river. Anyone could have done it. Now, if you don’t mind I have a big day tomorrow.”

  She caught Stu’s eyes as she started to push through the small crowd. “Take me to bed.” This caused a general whispering from the crowd that mingled with the voices in her head. “I meant put me to bed, you know walk me out to the boat.” When he fell in beside her, the whispers quieted.

  The two stopped next to Jenn, who was fetching soup for some of the weaker patients. “We’ve set up a shower of sorts in the corner,” Jillybean said, jerking her thumb back over her shoulder. “Once Willis has filled the water bladders, I want everyone to shower. I don’t want you running around, so appoint a shower captain who will make sure everyone comes out squeaky clean. Tell them it’s the Queen’s orders.”

  Jenn stopped, the steam from the hot soup rising across her pale face and turning her auburn hair limp. How did they have so much water everyone could shower? That thought was almost swallowed up by the next: Was a shower part of the sign she had seen? The feeling, no, the certain knowledge, that death was coming closer and closer, was so great that she was afraid that everything was connected to it somehow.

  “I’ll put Johanna Murphy on it.”