But Amy didn’t say a word. Instead, she hid her face behind a fall of matted blonde hair.
“You can’t be serious,” Sinna said.
Nate gave her a grave nod. “I am.”
“You can’t mean to walk across the city with Tam in tow!” The short, half-Chinese, half-Portuguese barista hadn’t spoken since her boyfriend had to be put out of his misery a couple of weeks ago. Poor Jimmy. A bad fall, a broken leg, and the resulting infection had put him half in the grave.
Tam couldn’t handle it. She’d sobbed hysterically while Jimmy had screamed in pain and fever-induced delirium. When Connor had done what needed to be done, Tam had just…stopped. She’d turned catatonic. Nothing got a reaction from her. She ate when hunger drove her to it and drank when they gave her water, but that blank haze in her eyes never lifted. It probably never would.
Nate ducked his head. “We may need to leave her behind.”
“How dare you!”
“Sinna, there’s nothing left. What do you want me to do?”
She pushed to her feet, clutching her spoon like a weapon. “If you’re so eager for death, then turn that gun on yourself and blow your own goddamn head off. You have no right to decide who lives and who dies.”
Nate stood to match her. “You think this is easy for me?”
“Yes. I think you’re just itching to get rid of us and go off with your buddies over there.”
David scrambled up, too. “Now that’s not true! Tell her, Nate.”
Ignoring him, the former soldier sighed tiredly, his handsome face creasing with lines of strain. “I could have done that any day,” he said, and in a softer tone added, “Why do you think I keep coming back?”
That was as close to a declaration as she’d ever allow him to get. Tam was as good as a walking corpse. At thirty-four, Amy might have been Nate’s age, but she was vicious when approached, and as long as she had Matt with her, some last shred of human decency kept the men away.
But Sinna was still young, and she had no one, which made her fair game. Nate watched her all the time; she felt his gaze on her so often, she’d almost gotten used to the feeling, akin to warm slime oozing along her skin. She’d allowed him to look because his attention seemed to keep the others at bay, and he’d kept his own distance when she’d pushed back, almost out of courtesy, as if he’d appointed himself her knight in shining armor, willing to wait for her to make the first move.
If that status quo was changing, then Sinna was in deep shit.
Taking a step back, she prepared to thoroughly lambast him, when Amy spoke up. “He’s right, Sinna. We need to go. Now, while we still can.”
Sinna shook her head.
Old Isaac sat up on his pallet. “Listen, I don’t like it any more than you do, but the fact is, we ain’t gettin’ any younger, you know what I mean?” In his late fifties, Isaac was physically the weakest, with bad knees that locked up, making him limp if he moved around for too long. Whenever Nate and his crew went out to gather, Isaac guarded the door. He should have been the voice of reason among them. How could he agree to this?
“Isaac, what if you can’t keep up?”
“Thought about it. I’m willing to take the risk.”
“So we’re going to sacrifice the old and weak, so the rest of us can live? Amy, what if Matt falls behind?”
Amy started rocking the boy. He heard what they discussed but, with a sick sort of trust, he never said a word in opposition. He’d never known a world without his mother, and as long as Amy made decisions for him, he’d never make one on his own.
“How about we put it to a vote?” David suggested, adjusting the frames of his glasses. Sinna didn’t know why he bothered wearing them. The lenses had gotten smashed out years ago.
Sinna looked at each of them in turn—all people who’d seen the worst of what humanity could do, who’d watched their world get torn apart. The eight of them could very well be the last people anywhere on Earth, and they had nothing left to fight for. Except for Tam and Matt, every one of them looked ready to walk out and risk becoming a banquet for Grays.
Maybe they were right. Maybe it was time to move on.
“No,” Sinna whispered in defeat, “you win. We’ll leave.”
Nate’s shoulders sagged, and he smiled, raising his arms to hug her. Sinna stepped out of his reach, disgusted by the gesture offered like a treat to an obedient pet.
His smile dimmed somewhat, but he must have interpreted her retreat as fear because he said, “Don’t worry. I’ll keep you safe, I promise. And Tam—”
“I’m not leaving her behind,” Sinna decreed. No way in hell would she walk out of here and leave that girl to the monsters.
“Sinna—”
“She can walk on her own, and she’s quiet. I’ll guide her if I have to, but I’m not letting her stay here to rot.”
Nate’s mouth twisted. In the three years she’d known him, he’d never shown a hint of temper; ever the level-headed soldier with a gun. Now, he seemed to seriously contemplate choking the life out of her.
Sinna refused to back down. There were some lines she refused to cross. She had to believe there was still good in people. If they left someone defenseless behind to die, they’d be no better than the monsters everyone feared so much.
“Fine,” Nate growled when Sinna wouldn’t let him win the staring contest. “Get some rest, everyone. We leave in the morning.”
2: Sinna
I dream of Gerry—her face, her smile, the creases of her wrinkles when she laughs, explaining some ancient concept of satire. I dream of her reading beautiful words from books that will never be read again. I hear her tell me I may be the last to learn in this way; that civilization has shattered, and what few pockets remain whole will be on par with cavemen. I understand all this, which pleases her. She tells me she loves me. I am her world, her sunshine.
But she calls me Sigma Nine.
Something is wrong.
And then the Grays come, and she screams…
~
Sinna started awake, slapping a hand over her mouth to stifle a scream. No loud noises. Not ever. Intellectually, she knew it wouldn’t matter; Grays were so hard of hearing, she could blare heavy metal music through a bullhorn and they wouldn’t notice. Still, that subconscious evolutionary mechanism built into her DNA whispered to stay hidden. Stay quiet, and don’t make a move.
She wheezed for air, chanting to herself, Calm, calm, calm. Years of practice had honed her instincts. She slowed her breathing, calmed her heart, though her senses remained on high alert as she scanned the dim room. Not quite day yet, but close enough. The sun had come up recently. High time to get moving.
The others were rousing as well, faces grim, but determined.
Nate checked his weapon, Connor inspected his knives. David shoved his baseball bat with its handle cracked down the middle through his belt like a sword. It was all for show. If Grays showed up, he’d probably die before he could wrestle it out to use.
“How are you feeling, Isaac?” Sinna asked.
“Creaking,” he said with a gap-toothed grin. “How you doin’, beautiful girl?”
“Let’s move out,” Nate ordered, taking a stand by the door. Last night, he’d explained the formation he expected them to keep: Nate would lead to scout the way, with David behind him as second, followed by the women, Matt and Isaac after them, while Connor took up the rear to sound the alarm if anything moved.
While Amy smoothed out Matt’s shirt, Sinna went over to Tam. She wasn’t usually this sound a sleeper. “Rise and shine, Tammy girl. We’re going for a walk.” She gave Tam’s shoulder a shake. “Tam?”
Nothing.
“Tam…”
A harder shake made Tam roll onto her back, head turning toward Sinna. Blue lips parted, sightless eyes wide open.
“No…”
Her pasty-white skin had already cooled, but rigor mortis hadn’t set in yet. Sinna pressed her fingers to Tam’s neck in a pointless gesture
, shaking her head in denial. “What did you do?” she whispered.
“Come on,” Nate said, “we’re burning daylight.”
Sinna’s world narrowed to a point. Tam’s eyes stared at her in accusation. Blood roared in her ears, drowning out indistinct voices that could have come from either within or without. Part of her mind said the others were rallying, demanding to know what had happened to the poor, defenseless girl lying so still on the floor. But she didn’t hear. She didn’t feel anything except a rage so powerful it filled every cell of her body from head to toe, and finally made her move.
Sinna stumbled to her feet. “What did you do!” She blindly shoved Amy and Connor aside to lay into Nate. “You son of a bitch, you killed her!” She struck out, kicking and hitting, but Nate deflected her blows, slapped her flailing arms away with laughable ease.
One good grab, and Nate wrenched her arms behind her back, pressed her chest to his. His hand nearly covered the back of her head as he forced her face against his shoulder in some caveman attempt to comfort her. “Shh!” he hissed. No loud noises—ever.
Sinna didn’t care. She writhed in his hold, bucking to get free and making no progress whatsoever as he rocked her like a fucking child.
From the corner of her eye, she saw Isaac had pushed to his feet, but David held him back. Not that the old man could do anything anyway. He kept looking between Tam on the floor and Sinna in Nate’s arms, shaking and unsteady on his feet.
Sinna seethed, pinned so tight, she could barely breathe, let alone fight. Amy was crying as if it had been her own child murdered. Too fucking late! Where had that compassion been last night? Where had her righteous anger been when Nate had sneaked across the room, stepping over Amy and Matt, so he could snuff Tam out? Had Amy heard him? Had she grabbed her baby boy and turned away?
“I made a judgment call,” Nate snapped at them, squeezing Sinna until her nose felt one pound of pressure away from breaking. She could smell her own blood, and it made her livid. “She wouldn’t have made it anyway, and she would have cost us more lives. I couldn’t allow that.”
“This ain’t right.” Isaac shook his head, voice trembling. “It wasn’t your call to make.”
“Don’t look, baby,” Amy sobbed to her son. Sinna imagined the woman rocking Matt in the same way Nate rocked her now—to subdue. Nothing about Nate’s hold offered comfort. He only clutched her as he did, because the moment he let go, she’d kill him. Every second he held her, Sinna’s skin burned with hate. She couldn’t stand his touch.
With a muffled scream, she wriggled to gain some leverage, then hiked her knee up, managing to tap Nate’s privates just enough to get him to release her. “Murderer,” she snarled and, curling her fingers in, punched him with all her might. The satisfaction of seeing his knee hit the floor buffered the pain that radiated from her wrist. “How long before you put a bullet through Isaac’s head because he slows us down?” she demanded. “Or Matt’s, or Amy’s?”
“Nate,” Connor warned, “shut her up.” He’d drawn two of his blades, staring at Sinna through small, mole-like eyes. One word from his leader and he’d do it himself—permanently. Sinna itched to knock some sense into him.
Nate motioned for Connor to stand down as he picked himself up. “What’s done is done,” he declared softly, spitting blood. He assessed Sinna as if seeing her for the first time, but did not engage again. “I’m sorry,” he told her, “but here now, or out there later, Tam was already dead. It was only a matter of time. She was a friend to us all, and I, for one, would have been grateful for a bloodless death like that.”
“You should have told us that last night,” Sinna snapped. “I would have obliged you.”
Connor took a step forward, but Nate’s glare stopped him in his tracks. Noted, she thought. She wouldn’t be turning her back on either of them.
“You killed her,” Isaac said. “You did. You chose to end a life, and that’s on your soul, son. No one else’s.”
Amy murmured to Matt, removing both of them from the discussion.
“Fine,” Nate said. “I concede to that. And I consider the matter closed.” He looked directly at Isaac, hand on the butt of his rifle to make it clear he wouldn’t tolerate further arguments. Then he turned to Sinna, though addressed all of them. “Now, you’ve got a choice. Come along, or stay behind. What’s it gonna be?” Gone was the knight in shining armor. There was nothing left of him but a soulless soldier about to head into battle knowing a certain percentage of his unit would die.
He knew, and he was okay with it.
Sinna gaped as understanding dawned. No, not just okay. He was planning on it! “You’re bringing us along as bait!”
Nate shrugged. “Any one of us could be bait. That’s the strength in numbers, babe. It ups your odds of survival. Gives the enemy somebody else to shoot at.”
Amy occupied Matt with some bullshit assurances while her son nodded listlessly. They could be the next to go. Or Isaac, who was even now massaging his right knee. Connor was the blade. Nate would want to keep him alive as long as possible, if for no other reason than as an additional guard, and would protect him over anyone else. With the weak ones down—as Nate said they would be, sooner or later—David and Sinna were the next expendables.
This was the choice Nate had put before her: sacrifice the others to save herself, or play the martyr and go off alone. For a moment, she was tempted. Oh, how tempted! She had plenty of know-how to evade Grays, and she could scavenge or hunt to sustain herself. But if she left, there’d be no one to look after the weak ones. Nate would throw them to the monsters in a heartbeat, if he thought it would “up his odds.”
The worst part? The others knew it, too. But in their desperate circumstances, they had no one else to turn to. They put all of their trust in the murdering son of a bitch with a gun, because they had no other choice.
Bile rose in Sinna’s throat, but she ruthlessly pushed it down. Isaac had no more fight left in him, Amy and Matt were effectively null and void, and Connor would leap at the chance to get rid of extra baggage. They’d all do as ordered.
Sinna looked to David, who clutched the knob of his bat, eyes transfixed on Tam’s lifeless body. He hadn’t said a word this whole time. Shock. There’d be no help from him. Once again, she was defeated.
When she still hadn’t answered—because she refused to dignify Nate’s decree with any sort of response—he turned his back on her and headed for the door. Everyone filed behind him in formation as they’d been instructed, except for Sinna, who waved Connor on with a mocking bow so she’d be the last one out.
Nate checked the stairway, then signaled it was safe. Together, they crept up to the main level of the rectory where thick dust covered the once-gleaming wooden floor in a dull grayish-brown. At the pulpit, the massive crucifix had been broken into three parts, the metal form of Jesus bent over the altar beneath the weight of his wooden cross.
Nothing had been disturbed. Nate and his crew always used the same path going in and going out, always stepping into their own footprints. No marks indicated anyone else had been there in a very long time.
It meant nothing. Or at least very little. The real danger was outside.
It took Nate, Connor, and David together to remove the bar and open the wooden double doors. The hinges groaned so loudly, Sinna held her breath, expecting to hear screeches at any moment. When nothing happened, Nate stepped out, big commando man taking the lead, and all of them followed behind.
First time in months Sinna had seen the outside world, and it was an eerie feeling. No sounds—no animals, birds, or even insects. Buildings had been burned or looted long ago. Cars had crashed left and right; rusted wrecks and jagged pieces of metal littered the road. Every so often, something would flit across a window above, and Sinna’s heart would skip a beat, until she recognized it as the movement of a drapery or piece of clothing.
They followed the street until they hit a makeshift barricade barely tall enough to obscure what m
ight have been on the other side. It made Sinna’s chest ache. The wall wouldn’t have slowed Grays down, and whoever had toiled so diligently to build it would have died in seconds when the packs came hunting. Structures like this only attracted them.
Nate slung the rifle across his back and climbed up to help the rest of them. They hoisted Amy up first, followed by Matt. Isaac took a little more time, but he managed.
Then Nate held a hand out for Sinna.
She wouldn’t take it. Instead, using David’s shoulder, she levered herself up on her own, shoving past Nate on her way across. He caught her elbow, no doubt ready to say something. But one look at her face and he changed his mind, using his hold to help her down instead.
“David,” Nate said when they were all across, “go check inside those stores over there.”
David frowned. “What?”
“There might be food.”
“You want me to go by myself?”
“One will attract less attention than two.”
“By that logic,” Sinna chimed in, “we should all split up now and go our separate ways.”
Nate speared her with a venomous glare. “Be my guest.”
She raised her chin and glared right back. “Come on, Dave, I’ll go with you,” she said, without taking her eyes from Nate.
David wrestled the bat from his belt and adjusted his glasses. God, if a single Gray showed up, they were dead.
“Wait,” Nate growled and, cursing under his breath, reached into one of his many pockets to pull out a hand gun.
Sinna frowned. “How many of those do you have?”
He checked the magazine, snapped it back into place, and handed it to Sinna. “You know how to work this?”
“What, now you want to share? Did you guys know he had an extra gun?”
“Jesus, Sinna, what is your problem?” Connor griped. In daylight, his ugliness was glaring—an asymmetric brutish face with a flat, wide nose, one nostril visibly bigger than the other, and Cro-Magnon brow bones over small, deep-set, freakishly pale green eyes so close together they were nearly lost beneath his bushy eyebrows. His teeth were crooked, which gave him a slight lisp and the illusion of fangs he liked to bare to intimidate. Not a face you wanted to wake up next to.
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