Gone Series Complete Collection

by Grant, Michael

  “We can’t let him die, Orc.”

  Orc stared in the direction Drake had gone. For a moment Dekka wondered if he would go off after him. And a part of her—a part she wasn’t proud of—wished Jack would just die, because he was probably going to anyway and Drake was going to get away.

  “I’ll take him,” Orc said. “You go after Drake. Only don’t fight him until I catch up.”

  “Believe me, I’ll be happy to wait for reinforcements,” she said. And silently realized that by herself she could not possibly beat Drake.

  She began trotting after Drake, his footprints—and two other sets—still barely visible in the fading light.

  Sanjit was now part of a growing crowd of frightened, hesitant kids. He fumed at the delay. Nothing was going right. He should have reached the lake by now. And darkness, real, serious, this is it darkness was coming down fast.

  The second coyote pack struck without warning after the noisy, disorganized gaggle had turned off the highway and onto the gravel road that led to the lake.

  There were hills to the right, and in the distance to the west a dark line of trees that someone told Sanjit was probably the edge of the Stefano Rey National Park.

  The two twelve-year-old girls, Keira and Tabitha, and the boy, Mason, were not the immediate targets. Neither was Sanjit. The coyotes came bounding straight down the road as if sent from the lake. Straight down the road, five of them, bypassed a few larger kids, and suddenly converged on a two-year-old girl.

  The first Sanjit knew of it were the screams as the coyotes began their rushing attack. He started running. He drew the pistol Lana had given him but there was no way to get a clear shot. Kids in panic were rushing back toward him. Others scattered left and right, screaming, screaming, calling one another’s names.

  The lead coyote bit the child’s arm. She cried. The coyote dragged her off her feet and started hauling her off the road. He lost his grip and the child was up and running.

  The coyotes, almost casual, formed a semicircle, ready to take her down for good.

  “Get out of the way!” Sanjit yelled. “Get out of the way!”

  Screams were general now. Dust kicked up. Slanting tea-colored light cast lurid shadows of fleeing children and the yellow canines.

  A second coyote grabbed the child by her dress and began hauling her away.

  Sanjit fired in the air.

  The coyotes flinched. A couple trotted away to a safe distance. The one with the little girl in his teeth did not.

  Sanjit was just a few feet away now, could see blood, could see the coyote’s yellow teeth and intelligent eyes.

  He aimed the gun from just a few feet and fired.

  BAM!

  The coyote let go of the girl and ran off. But not far. Not far at all.

  Sanjit reached the girl just as her sister did. The girl was bloody but alive. And screaming, everyone screaming and crying. Kids had their cudgels and blades out, too late, bristling with fearful threat.

  The coyotes danced eagerly, a pistol shot away. But Sanjit knew he had no chance of hitting one.

  “Get moving!” Sanjit yelled harshly. “If we’re still out here, when night comes we’re all dead.”

  The group of maybe two dozen kids, all huddling close together, moved down the road as hungry coyote eyes watched and tongues lolled, waiting for fresh meat.

  Brianna had been down the road as far as the hills. When she saw kids coming toward Perdido Beach she knew Drake hadn’t passed that way.

  Which meant he might have retreated toward the air national guard base. So she ran there and looked around. And found nothing.

  Which left her baffled. Surely she would have seen him if he were close to the lake. Surely he hadn’t come along the road. And he wasn’t at the base or anywhere between those three points.

  She was tired and frustrated. And worried about Sam yelling at her. Which just sent her off toward Coates, because she couldn’t come back empty-handed. She was the Breeze: she was the anti-Drake, at least in her own mind. And if he was out and about, running free, she was the one to find him and take him down.

  But she hadn’t found him. She had found kids leaving Perdido Beach all babbling about the sky dying, and she’d found that rabbits were proliferating near Coates, and she’d found a dropped jar of Nutella on the line between the lake and the air base and had promptly eaten it.

  But no Drake.

  The sky was so weird. The light so wrong. That blank blackness all around, rising from the horizon to make a new, jagged horizon, it was all wrong.

  And if it really did turn dark and stay dark? Then what? Then what for the Breeze? She would be stumbling around in the dark like everyone else. She would go from being important to being just another girl.

  Sam wouldn’t even need her. He wouldn’t ask her to meetings. She wouldn’t be his go-to person. The mighty Brianna. Swift Girl. The most dangerous person in the FAYZ after Sam and Caine.

  She had to get some altitude; that was it. Get the larger view while there was still a view to get.

  She raced toward the Santa Katrina Hills. She blew right past two sets of footprints, registered them belatedly, then raced back to find them again.

  They were quite clear. A pair of boots. And a pair of sneakers. Both leading from the hills in the general direction of Perdido Beach. Neither was big enough to be Drake. And he wouldn’t be heading that way.

  Brianna glanced anxiously at the sky. She couldn’t stay out here. And she couldn’t go back to Sam with empty hands. It would be the end of her. She had disobeyed orders before, but now to be such a failure, nothing but a few dead coyotes . . . and a failure when her powers might be almost useless . . .

  She was nothing if she was not the Breeze.

  She dashed to the top of the nearest hill, a scraped-bald thing maybe two thousand feet tall. She could make out the lake, shimmering strangely in the unnatural light. Turning the other way she could see the ocean. The road was hidden from view.

  What to do?

  Then she saw what looked like a person walking. To the north. It was hard to be sure because of the light and the narrowness of the gap between two hills. But she thought she saw a single person moving.

  Brianna said a prayer that it might be Drake. She had a plan for dealing with him. A plan that would make Sam proud. She was going to slice and dice him and use her speed to spread the parts all around the FAYZ.

  Hah! See if Drake could put himself back together then.

  It would be great. If.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  10 HOURS, 54 MINUTES

  DIANA’S LEGS ACHED. Her bare feet were bloody. Justin was trying to help her but there was no way to ease the pain of bare soles on sharp stone.

  Anytime she slowed or stumbled Drake would snap his whip, and the pain of that was so much worse.

  She couldn’t imagine that she would make it to the gaiaphage alive.

  Diana knew that was the objective. Drake had taken to gloating about it. She’d had plenty of opportunity to think of snide remarks. But each one came at the cost of another slice in her flesh. Or worse yet, Justin’s. So she stumbled along in silence.

  “Don’t know what he wants with you,” Drake said, not for the first time, “but whatever he leaves is mine. That’s all I know. Make some of your witty remarks to the gaiaphage. Hah. Try that.”

  He was still looking over his shoulder constantly. Diana had come to think of it as Breezanoia—a terrible fear of Brianna.

  “She can come zooming up all she wants,” Drake said. “See if she can cut me without cutting the brat. See if she can do that.”

  Drake was spiraling down almost as fast as Diana herself. His fear was palpable. And not just fear of Brianna. The dying of the light scared him, too.

  “Gotta get there before dark,” he muttered more than once.

  Diana realized that once absolute night fell Drake would be as lost as anyone. And then how would he keep control of Diana and Justin?

 
No comfort. They could get away from Drake. Maybe. And then what?

  Diana’s hand went to her stomach. The baby kicked.

  The baby. The three-bar baby. The baby was what he wanted, of course. Diana had no doubt about that. The dark creature wanted her baby.

  When she could take her mind off the agony in her feet and legs and back, when she could suspend for a brief few seconds the crushing fear that bore down on her, Diana tried to understand. What did it want with her baby?

  Why was this happening?

  She missed her step, stumbled, and landed hard on her knees. She cried out in pain, and then screamed as the lash landed across her back.

  In a rage she flew at him. Her fists punched and her fingernails tore but he was far too quick. He punched her in the face. It was not a slap. It was a full, hard punch. Her head swam and she saw stars.

  Just like a cartoon, she thought. Then she fell straight back.

  When she came to she found Justin next to her, holding on to her and crying.

  Brittney was seated a few feet away.

  The circle of blue sky was the color of new denim, and smaller, noticeably smaller than it had been. The sky was a black, featureless bowl.

  “You’re pregnant, aren’t you?” Brittney asked almost shyly.

  It took Diana a few moments to make sense of things. Drake was not here. Drake couldn’t be here so long as Brittney was.

  Whip Hand was not here.

  Diana climbed quickly to her feet. “Come on, Justin, we’re out of here.”

  “I found some rocks,” Brittney said. She held up a good-size rock in each hand. “I can hit you with them.”

  Diana laughed in her face. “Bring it, zombie freak. You’re not the only one who can find a rock.”

  “Yes, that’s true,” Brittney said. “But it won’t hurt me when you hit me. And you can’t kill me.” Then, as an afterthought she added, “Anyway, I’m not a zombie. I don’t eat people.”

  “Why are you doing this, Brittney? You were the one fighting us at the power plant. You were on Sam’s side. Or don’t you remember that?”

  “I remember,” she said.

  Diana’s mind was turning at top speed. If she told Justin to run back toward the lake, how far would he get before the darkness closed in? Which was worse? To wander alone in the dark until he fell off a cliff or was scented by a coyote or wandered into a zeke field or . . . or . . . or . . .

  “Then what happened to you? Why are you helping Drake? You should be fighting him every time you get the chance.”

  She smiled and Diana saw the broken wire sticking out of her braces. “I can’t ever fight Drake, you know. We’re never together.”

  “Exactly. So whenever he’s gone you can—”

  “I’m not doing this for Drake,” Brittney said earnestly. “I’m doing this for my lord.”

  “Your . . . Your what? Your what? You think God wants you to be doing this? Did you go stupid on top of being undead?”

  “We each must serve,” Brittney recited, like a lesson she’d learned a long time ago.

  “And you think Jesus wants you to do this? This? Threaten a pregnant girl with a rock? That’s your religious theory? Jesus wants you to help a sadistic mental case to turn me over to a monster? I must have missed that part of the Bible. Is that part of the Sermon on the Mount?”

  Brittney looked at her, very serious, and waited until Diana had run out of breath, if not scorn.

  “That was the old God, Diana. That God was before. He doesn’t live in the FAYZ.”

  Diana felt like choking the girl. And if it would do any good she would, and gladly. She wondered if she could stun Brittney long enough to get away. Surely a big rock would at least stun her.

  But unfortunately everyone knew the story of what had happened when Brianna fought Drake. She had sliced him up like a butcher with a hog. And yet, he had survived. The same would be true of Brittney. And Diana didn’t have a machete.

  “God is everywhere,” Diana said. “You were a church girl; you must know that.”

  Brittney’s eyes were bright, eager, as she leaned forward. “No. No. I don’t have to follow an invisible god anymore. I can see him! I can touch him! I know where he lives, and what he looks like. No more little children’s stories. He wants you. That’s why we came for you.” She made a chiding face. “You should be excited.”

  “You know what? I’m ready for Drake to come back. He’s evil, but at least he’s not an idiot.”

  Diana stood up. So did Brittney.

  “Justin,” Diana said.

  “Yes?”

  “See the place where the hills end? The lake is just past that. Start running.”

  “Are you coming?” Justin cried.

  “Right behind you. Now, run!”

  Brittney didn’t come after Diana, although Diana swung on her again. Brittney ran after Justin.

  She caught him easily. Diana tried to grab Brittney, but a pregnant girl running in the sand . . .

  Brittney hugged Justin to her with one arm. In her free hand she held a sharp rock very close to Justin’s chattering, fearful mouth. It was a heartbreaking parody of maternal protectiveness.

  Diana remembered again who Brittney had once been. The brave, decent girl who refused to disappoint Sam and Edilio.

  It was Diana, along with Caine and Drake, who had made this Brittney. They and, of course, the Darkness. What a fatal little group they had proved to be. Look at the damage they had done, she and Caine and Drake. And the gaiaphage.

  Now here they were on their way to a reunion. Diana, and Drake, and the gaiaphage. And Caine’s role would be played by his son or daughter.

  She had wanted so badly to escape it all. For that briefest moment she believed she had changed Caine. And that was when they had created the baby inside her.

  “Keep walking,” Brittney said, actually stroking Justin’s face with the stone. “Please.”

  It was not Drake. The distant figure Brianna had seen was not Drake. It was Dekka. And Brianna had raced up within shouting distance with her machete out before she realized.

  She skidded to a halt.

  Dekka was covered in blood from hand to elbow, with sprays of it across her face.

  “Where have you been?” Dekka demanded without so much as a hello.

  Brianna sheathed her machete and decided against answering. “What’s with the blood?”

  “It’s your boyfriend’s,” Dekka grated.

  “My what?”

  “Jack. He went after Drake by himself. Drake cut his throat.”

  Brianna stared at her. “Are you nuts? Jack went after Drake? Jack doesn’t do things like that.”

  “He does when there’s no other choice,” Dekka said.

  Dekka kept looking past her. Brianna kept doing the same. The world was ending, Jack was hurt, maybe dying, maybe dead already, and they were being awkward.

  “Drake has Diana and Justin. He’s heading toward the mine shaft, toward the gaiaphage.”

  Brianna shook her head, feeling like she was missing something. “Who is Justin?”

  “Where were you? You were supposed to be within earshot. Sam shot off some rounds and no Brianna.”

  “I was looking for Drake,” Brianna said defensively.

  Dekka glared pure fury at her. “You don’t love Jack. You don’t even care about him, do you? You haven’t even asked how he is.”

  Brianna actually took a step back. “Why are you hating on me?”

  Dekka’s jaw actually dropped. It would have been almost funny, if it wasn’t Dekka. “Are you that clueless? How do you not understand how irresponsible you are? Right now Orc is running back to the lake with his hands barely holding Jack’s blood in. And Drake is probably whipping Diana across the desert.”

  Brianna shook her head violently. “That’s not my fault! That’s not on me! I was out looking for Drake.”

  Suddenly Dekka’s bloody fist was flying straight for Brianna’s nose. Brianna easily sidestep
ped and Dekka stumbled forward.

  Brianna was too astonished to hit back.

  Dekka wasn’t finished. She actually kicked at Brianna. This unbalanced her completely and she fell heavily on her side.

  Suddenly Brianna found herself in a column of floating sand. She tried to run but there was no solid ground beneath her. Gravity was suspended.

  That did it. Brianna yanked out her sawed-off shotgun and leveled it at Dekka. “Put me down or I’ll shoot you!”

  Dekka had gotten to her feet. “You would do it, too, wouldn’t you?” She waved her hand angrily and Brianna dropped two feet back to earth.

  “Do you ever think about anything besides yourself?” Dekka yelled. To Brianna’s amazement there were tears in Dekka’s eyes. She wiped them away so violently it was like she was slapping herself. She left a smear of blood, like red paint.

  “Hey, I’m sorry or whatever,” Brianna said hotly. “What do you want me to say? I hope Jack’s okay. And I’ll kill Drake if I get the chance. What do you want from me?”

  Dekka’s face was an ugly mask of emotion, unreadable to Brianna. Aside from it being obvious that Dekka was mad about something.

  “Four months and you haven’t even said anything to me,” Dekka said.

  “I’ve talked to you,” Brianna said. But she looked away as she said it, suddenly even more uncomfortable. She could deal with anger. Need was something different.

  “I told you—” Dekka began before her voice choked off. She took a few seconds to master it. Then, unable to meet Brianna’s eyes, she said, “I thought I was done for. I mean, I don’t scare easy. The pain . . .” That stopped her again; then she shook her head angrily, like she was pushing through it. “It was bad, that’s all. And I was dying. I should have died. But I didn’t want to die without telling you.”

  “Yeah, whatever,” Brianna said, shifting from side to side and just about unable to resist the desire to go tearing off at a hundred miles an hour.

  “I told you I loved you.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “And you said nothing. Nothing. For four months.”

  Brianna shrugged. “Look, okay, look.” She swallowed hard. “Look, besides me you’re the bravest, toughest chick in the FAYZ,” Brianna said. “I mean, I always thought we were like sisters, you know? Like badass sisters.”