by Laken Cane
“No. Just sneak in and find her. Once she’s safe, you can go back and melt the assholes. Or leave them alone. I don’t care. I just want Sage back.”
Lila jumped to the ground. “Kill the gods, or save the girl.”
“Save the girl,” I said. “Caleb? Save the girl.”
He smiled his quick smile. “Save the girl, then kill the gods.” But his eyes didn’t smile.
“Thank you,” I whispered.
“She’s probably already dead,” Lila said. “And we still have to run this by Richard.”
“He can’t stop you if you want to go,” I said. “Can he?”
“Us,” she said, turning around long enough to toss me a glance filled with glee. “This is your idea. She’s your friend. If we go, you’re coming too. Time you learned about the real world.”
“I wouldn’t think of staying behind,” I said. “And there’s no way in hell Richard can stop me.”
“Teagan, take the dog home. We’ll be there soon.” Caleb’s gaze lingered on my lips, then he met my eyes once again.
He reached out and squeezed my arm, his touch gentle but heavy at the same time.
I couldn’t breathe for a second as my stomach tightened. It’d been…forever since I’d had that feeling.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Lila said. “Are we going to look for the kid or not?”
Clutching the dog, I hurried away.
Richard was in the kitchen when I walked in with the dog in my arms. He didn’t even glance at it. “I found your cellar.”
I set the pup on the floor, avoiding Richard’s stare as I got a bowl from the cabinet. I poured the quiet animal some water, and stood back to watch as he lapped it up. “You hungry, boy?”
“You should have told me,” Richard continued.
I opened a can of Spam for the dog, then cut the meat into chunks. I had bags of dry dog food in the cellar. I’d need to haul one of them upstairs. “I had no reason to tell you. They belong to me.”
“This is a good place to settle down. The supplies are ours—not yours.”
“Settle down?” I gaped at him. “In Crowbridge? I thought you guys were hunters, not looking for a place to live.”
He put a pot on the camp stove, then began opening cans of vegetables. “The plan is to find a good base, one we can stock and fortify. Rebuild. Farm. People will come, eventually. We can’t roam forever, searching for monsters to kill.” He shrugged. “At least, not all of us can.”
I said nothing, just watched him. He was taking over, and I wasn’t sure how I felt about it.
He turned to look at me. “You did a good thing, stocking up the cellar. You really have no idea what it’s like out there.”
I opened my mouth, then closed it, unsure. “You seriously want to build a compound here?”
“This is the most untouched town I’ve seen in nearly two years.” His face relaxed a little, and his stare softened as he gazed over my head at something only he could see. “There’s something about this place.”
“Where did they come from?” I asked. “The mutants. Were they here all along?”
He focused on me, then hesitated, as though sorting through what he should say. Or maybe he was only gathering his thoughts. Maybe he simply didn’t know.
“I have some theories,” he said, finally. “And not just because of the things I’ve seen over the last two years. When things started going bad…”
As he talked, I pulled a blanket from one of the totes stacked against the wall, and made a bed for the dog. I watched him as he turned in circles—limping the entire time—before he finally sank to the blanket with a tired, wheezing sigh.
“What theories?” I asked, finally, when Richard didn’t continue.
“I don’t think they’re some government-created soldiers or lab monsters a group of scientists lost control of. And I don’t think they’re monsters who’ve hidden from us since the beginning of time.”
I sat on the floor beside the dog, my heart beating a little too fast. “What do you think they are?”
His voice was soft, his eyes emotionless, and I could see pain in every line on his face. “I don’t think they’re from here.”
“You mean…like, aliens? From a different world?”
“Yes.”
I put my hand to my mouth. “Aliens?”
“A different kind of alien.”
“What does it mean, though?” I whispered.
“It means they might eventually go back. When they’ve gotten whatever it is they came for, they might go back home and leave us to rebuild our world.”
I started nodding and couldn’t seem to stop. “We were killed by aliens. They killed our families. Ruined our lives. People who never belonged here came in to destroy those of us the flu didn’t take.” I stared at him. “Did they bring the flu?”
And for the first time in two years, anger—rage—started to smother my fear.
He knew exactly what I was feeling. He knelt in front of me and waited for me to look up at him. “That’s why we hunt them. Why we kill them. Keep hold of your anger, girl. You’ll need it when you take on your new job.”
I twisted my trembling fingers together. “What job?”
“Hunting.”
I shook my head. “I don’t want to hunt.”
He smiled. “You will.” He stood, then walked back to finish making dinner. “You’re young, able-bodied, and sane. You and those like you will spend your lives sending the mutants to hell. You want a purpose, don’t you?”
I widened my eyes, then nodded. “Yes. Yes, I really do. But—”
“And when you need to touch base, this town will be waiting for your return.”
I climbed to my feet, then grabbed a bottle of water. My mouth was so dry I couldn’t swallow. “I’m no hunter.”
“I can read people,” he said, his voice almost pleasant. “And you are a hunter.”
“Why should we kill them if they’re going to go back anyway?”
He glanced back over his shoulder at me. “Teagan,” he chided. That was all, just my name, and tendrils of shame snaked through my body.
“I don’t want to leave Crowbridge,” I said, pacing. Fear made my stomach ache. “You can’t make me.” I was aware, very aware, that I sounded like a petulant child.
“I don’t mean to make you do anything,” he said, patiently. “I’m telling you what I see you becoming.”
“I’m not chasing the gods.”
He shrugged. “We’ll see. And thank you.”
I stared at his slender back. His messy dark brown hair snaked over his collar, stringy and dull. “For what?”
“For helping me decide what to do. We’ll start by planning an attack on the mutants who’re in town before they decide to come looking for humans. We’ll kill as many of them as we can. When that’s done, if we’re still living, we’ll begin creating a place where we—humans—can start over.” He stirred the simmering vegetables and when he spoke again, his voice was so distant I knew he was not really talking to me. “I’ll need you and the other two to spread the word as you hunt. Post signs along highways, send people here. I’ll—”
“There’s one thing we have to do first,” I interrupted. “Before we do anything else. We have to rescue Sage. We’ll sneak into their camp, find her, and bring her home.”
He rested the spoon on the countertop, then turned toward me, slowly and deliberately. He crossed his arms. “No. We’ll attack, and we’ll keep an eye out for her while we’re there.”
“First of all,” I said, immediately angry, “there’s no way you can attack that many mutants without getting killed. Did you see them? There were at least fifty of them that I saw before I ran. Gods, orphans, scouts. They have other human captives, too. Not just Sage. And we’re going to get them out of there. After they’re safe, feel free to go back and get your ass kicked.” I strode to him and poked him in the chest. “But until we get Sage back, you’re not attacking anyone.”
He said nothing, just watched me. Watched me like I was an unreasonable two year old throwing a tantrum.
“You stay here if you want,” I told him. “But Caleb and Lila are going with me. We’re going to save that little girl.”
“We have to kill as many of them as we can,” he said, calmly. “You’re responsible for the girl. You go in after her. The rest of us will attack the mutants.”
“There are three of you,” I said. “Why would you think you could take them on? What makes you believe you have a chance?”
He smiled. “Because I’ve done it a hundred times before. I know what I’m doing. And the mutants will help us.”
I stared, completely confused. “How?”
“The mutants are like vampires.”
The word slithered through my mind like a snake looking for something to bite. Vampires…
I shook my head. “I don’t understand.”
“Their sleep is like a coma. Nothing can wake them. When they sleep, they’re vulnerable. And that’s when we get them. That’s when we go in and douse them with our special holy water.”
I hadn’t known.
I hadn’t known anything. “They…sleep?”
“Yes, they do. And that, Teagan, is when the gods die.”
Chapter Thirteen
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked Caleb, after he and Lila came back. “Why didn’t you tell me the mutants go into a forced sleep? That they’re like vampires that way?”
“Not just that way,” Lila said, but she grabbed her bowl of stew and left the room before I could question her. Which was fine with me.
“Talk to Richard,” Caleb said.
“I did. That’s why I know about the sleep.”
“They use it to recharge. If we were to capture one of them and somehow force him to stay awake, we think he’d implode.”
“But I’ve seen them in the daytime as well as night.”
“Here’s the thing. Each cluster is made up of two different groups of mutants. One group sleeps during a one hour window at night, and one group sleeps for one hour during the day. That way there are always mutants guarding the cluster. But.” He lifted a finger before I could interrupt him. “We’ve found that the nighttime awake cluster always has fewer guards than the daytime awake cluster. Maybe ten awake to fifty asleep. And their sleep coincides with our two o’clock. Day and night.”
“That’s our chance,” Richard said, walking into the kitchen, “Our window.”
My mind was spinning. “This is good. This is great.”
They smiled at my excitement. Maybe they were secretly laughing at me, but that didn’t bother me. The possibilities.
“So we can just wait for the nighttime cluster to sleep, then go take them out,” I said. “I’ll search for Sage while you guys are hosing the bastards down.” I clapped my hands, which startled the dog.
He lifted his head, gave a snort, then went back to sleep.
“Teagan,” Caleb said. “You know it won’t be that easy, right?”
“It doesn’t have to be easy. It just has to happen.”
Richard leaned against the sink. “Okay,” he said, finally. We both ignored Caleb’s look of surprise. “We’ll go in to kill, you’ll go in to rescue the girl. You understand you could be captured?” He paused. “You’ll have to stay calm.”
“Right,” Caleb said. “You can’t go into the cluster and freak out.”
I lifted my chin. “Don’t worry about me. Worry about killing the mutants. They’ll be too busy to care about me.”
Richard’s smile was slow in coming, but when it did, it lit up his eyes. “I told you you’re a hunter. Might as well get your feet wet now.”
“Hunter,” Lila called from the other room, incredulous. “Are you fucking kidding me? She’s a princess—not a badass.”
“She’s a hunter,” Richard said. He didn’t raise his voice, but the living room was just beyond the kitchen doorway. She heard him. “You and Caleb will teach her everything she needs to know.”
Lila came into the kitchen and slung her bowl into the sink. “I’m no one’s teacher, and I’m for damn sure not a babysitter. She’ll end up getting us all killed. She’s no hunter. She’s prey. Fucking vanilla scented prey.”
“You want out of the group, Lila?” Richard’s voice was calm, but it was deep, dark, and very angry. Lila seemed to have that effect on people.
She stiffened. “No.”
“Then you’ll help the new girl out, won’t you?”
Caleb said nothing, just stood against the wall and watched us all like a lab tech observing a cage of rats.
Lila slammed past me and stomped back into the living room, but she didn’t say a word.
“They may leave soon,” I said, when the silence became too heavy. “When will we go to town?”
“Probably two or three days,” Richard said. “They weren’t preparing for the trip when I watched them this morning.” He pointed his chin at the binoculars on the bar. “We have some time.”
“But how will I find her?” I put my fingers to my stomach as it began to burn. “They could have stashed her anywhere. In one of the shops or tied to a tree. Maybe she’s with the pregnant women…”
“There are two wagons—one with supplies and one with people.” He looked at me. “If they have your girl, she’ll likely be in the slave wagon.”
I lowered my hand and blew out a long breath. “Where are they traveling to, Richard? Do you think they have a place in mind or are they just wandering the world aimlessly, looking for…food and women?”
“I’ve been following them for two years and I haven’t figured that out. Now that I’m setting up a central hub here, I probably never will. But you three will.”
Caleb straightened. “Central hub? Now? Here?”
Lila crept back into the kitchen, a hand to her stomach, her eyes too wide in her pale face.
Richard nodded. “There are more supplies and untouched homes here than in any town we’ve seen in months. It’s time. You three will hunt mutants and lead people here. Put up signs.” He looked at Caleb, then Lila. “It’s time.”
They looked like the world was coming to an end—again.
“What’s the big deal?” I asked. “Crowbridge is a great place to settle. It’s a good place to farm.” I waited, but they said nothing. “It’s a good place.”
“We’ve been together almost since the beginning,” Caleb said. “And…”
“And now the band is breaking up,” Lila finished. Her flippant tone couldn’t hide her sorrow.
“I’ll be right here,” Richard told her. “And you’ll be back.”
“Yeah,” she said. “Sure.”
The silence was harsh. I expected them to hug, to shed a few tears, to say some sort of goodbye even though the parting had yet to happen.
They did none of those things.
Caleb sniffed, then walked to the table to pick up his water gun. When he began pouring alcohol into the chamber, then his two tanks, Lila joined him.
Quietly, they began to prepare their weapons.
“Fill your tanks, Teagan,” Richard said. He sounded weary.
“They’re still full. I haven’t used them.”
“You’ll always need extra—if you come across a large group, you can run out of alcohol fast. Fill some tanks, holster a machete, and…” He shrugged. “Get ready to fight.”
“Get ready to die,” Lila growled.
I walked to the table. “I’m not dying.”
“Without these you might.” Richard handed me a tiny plastic bag. “Put these in before we enter their camp.”
I poured the items out, and could feel myself paling. “I’d forgotten,” I whispered.
Earplugs.
Lila laughed. “An infant. You won’t last five minutes out there.”
The mutants’ death cry disabled me. Maybe this time wouldn’t be so bad, but I couldn’t take a chance that it would.
Richard walked toward the l
iving room. “They won’t shut out the screams completely, but they’ll muffle them. You’ll do fine.”
“Thanks,” I told Richard.
“I’m going to sleep,” he said. “Wake me in two hours. Tonight Caleb and Lila can take you to get in some hunting practice.”
Caleb nodded.
“Going to pop your cherry,” Lila told me. “Fun, fun. God, I hate newbies!”
In just a couple of nights, I’d be in the midst of the gods, fighting for my life and searching for Sage.
I stared down at my earplugs and water guns, unmoving.
Earplugs and alcohol against dozens of mutants. Of course, it helped that most of them would be asleep.
“Change your mind?”
I snapped my head up at Lila’s voice. “No.”
“Scared?” She smiled, but it wasn’t a nice smile.
“Yeah,” I said. “Yeah, I’m scared.”
“You’d be stupid not to be scared,” Caleb said. “I’m afraid. Every damn time we go to face them, I’m afraid. If you become a hunter, you will always be afraid.” He looked up from his work and met my stare. “Can you handle that?”
An image of the pregnant woman I’d killed came out of nowhere and slammed into my brain. I cried out and staggered backward, forgetting, for one second, where I was.
Caleb was suddenly in front of me, gripping my upper arms. “Are you okay?”
“She’s fucking brain damaged,” Lila said, steadily filling her tanks. “Told you.”
I pulled away from him. “I…” I swallowed hard, then took a deep breath. “Just bad memories.”
He nodded. “Will you be all right?”
“Yeah. Yes. I’m fine.”
I looked down when something pressed against my legs. The dog stared up at me, his brow furrowed.
“Awww.” I knelt and wrapped my arms around him. “It’s okay, boy. I freaked you out, didn’t I?”
“Give him a name.”
I glanced up at Lila, surprised. “What?”
“Give him a damn name.”
I stared at her a moment longer. I settled down on the floor, my legs crossed, and pulled him to me. “What should we call you, little guy?”
Names meant something, and no matter how much of a hurry Lila was in for the dog to be called something other than boy, I wasn’t going to rush it.