“What?” Bobby said.
“Earlier,” Kyle said. “Right after you were bitten. You told me not to tell Lane because you knew what he’d do if he found out. But if you want me to shoot you, what are you afraid Lane is going to do?”
* * *
Sound travels clear and far in a world gone quiet. The patter of a man’s footsteps travels four blocks, the slam of a car door more than a mile. Tipped-over trash cans are even louder. The sound of gunfire seems to encircle the world.
It took Lane but moments to figure out that explosion. The roar of rushing water gave it away. The mains under the streets were bursting from the pressure, and the weakest point blew.
The following sounds were even clearer. A shrieking pack of hunters followed by the report from Bobby’s pistol followed by silence.
All this took place at least a mile away, but sound travels clear and far in a world gone quiet.
What he could not know is whether Bobby, Kyle, and Annie were still alive.
Everyone in the store heard the same things, of course. That hysterical Carol lady had no idea what was happening, but Parker and Hughes eventually figured it out and explained it to her. Hughes gave her a bottle of water to drink so she’d keep quiet.
Lane was beginning to change his mind about Hughes. Hughes might be okay. He was smart and competent. Naturally Lane didn’t trust him, and he felt with dead certainty that the lack of trust was mutual, but he might try giving Hughes an iota of latitude to see how he handled it.
But he’d need Bobby to return in one piece for that. Controlling the group wouldn’t be easy with only Roland on his side. He needed two wingmen. The extra guns were locked in the truck outside and Lane was the only one with a key (as far as he knew), but three armed men were much more intimidating than two. Holding off a potential insurrection with just two would be very difficult indeed when it came time for those two men to sleep.
No matter what else happened, though, he had to get rid of Parker. He was not going to change his mind about that. The only question at this point was when.
Lane summoned Roland.
“They should be back by now if they survived,” he said. “Unless they’re injured.”
“Or bit,” Roland said.
“Or bit. Go out and check. See if they’re on the road. And go out there very carefully. It’s been noisy. That pack of hunters might still be out there and they can hear just as well as we can.”
Roland nodded.
“Take two guns,” Lane whispered. “You can give one to Kyle if he’s still alive and you don’t have any choice, but don’t give one to Annie. I don’t trust her.”
Roland frowned. Lane hadn’t shared his feelings about Annie with anyone. “What’s wrong with Annie?”
“I’m not sure. There’s something wrong about her. I haven’t figured out what it is yet, but I will. We’ll talk more later.”
Roland nodded again and slipped outside.
Lane turned to face his prisoners alone.
* * *
Kyle made another quick scan of the area to make sure nothing was coming at them, then sat on the curb next to Bobby and Annie. They could not stay outside, but something had to be done with Bobby. Kyle couldn’t just leave him there.
“He won’t shoot me,” Bobby said. “Lane won’t risk attracting those things with a gunshot unless he doesn’t have any choice.”
Kyle nodded. “Of course.”
“Which means he’ll beat me to death.” Bobby lowered his head and covered his eyes with his right index finger and thumb. “I should never have walked this far. You should have shot me back there.”
“What do you want to do?” Annie said. She sounded like she actually cared. Kyle was surprised at how nice she was being, considering how Bobby had treated her less than an hour ago.
“Just give me my gun,” Bobby said. “I’ll walk a few miles and do it myself.”
“Somebody’s coming,” Annie said.
Kyle drew his pistol, bolted upright, and saw a figure walking toward them halfway between themselves and the grocery store. It looked like Roland. He was walking straight at them with a gun in his hand. Kyle turned slightly to conceal the gun in his own hand.
“Fuck,” Bobby said. “This isn’t good, man.”
“It’s okay,” Kyle said. “I’ll talk to him.”
Roland walked ramrod straight and with purpose.
Kyle waved as if Roland was friendly, hoping to defuse the situation ever so slightly, but Roland kept advancing
Annie stood up and leaned into Kyle. He felt a warm rush in his chest cavity despite the approaching danger.
Roland finally reached them and stopped and stared at Bobby. Kyle kept his gun out of sight. Bobby looked at his feet.
“He hurt?” Roland said.
“Yeah,” Kyle said.
Bobby said nothing. He rested his good arm on his knees and buried his face in the crook of his elbow.
“He bit?” Roland said and tensed up.
Nobody said anything.
“So he’s bit,” Roland said. “Shit.”
Nobody moved or said anything for a few moments.
“Wait here,” Roland said. He turned to walk away, then he stopped and turned back around. “Where’s Bobby’s gun?”
“I gave it to Kyle,” Bobby said.
“Give it to me,” Roland said and pointed his own weapon at Kyle.
“It’s okay, man, he’s cool,” Bobby said.
“Give it to me,” Roland said again and jabbed the nose of his weapon in Kyle’s direction.
Kyle instinctively raised his hands in the air in surrender, but he couldn’t bring himself to hand over the weapon. He thought about pointing it in Roland’s direction, but he couldn’t bring himself to do that either. Roland would shoot him.
“Just fucking hand it, Kyle. You want to get in a duel out here? You think that’s going to make this fucked-up day any better?”
Roland had him. There was nothing else he could do but slowly set the gun down and step away.
“Good boy,” Roland said as he picked it up off the pavement, never taking his eyes off Kyle’s. “Now wait here and keep an eye on him. I’ll be back in a couple of minutes.”
* * *
Lane cracked open the front door and peered out, but only for the briefest of moments. He couldn’t take his eyes off the interior of the store for more than a second or two in case Parker or Hughes decided to creep up behind him.
Roland was on his way back. By himself.
Christ. Keeping all these people in line was going to be a bitch and a half if something happened to Bobby.
Lane could tell by Roland’s walk that he wasn’t happy. The man didn’t exactly have a spring in his step.
He closed the door and turned back to his prisoners. Carol was hiding in the cooler as usual. Frank was in the bathroom. Parker and Hughes sat on the floor in the back near the Red Bull.
Roland stepped inside and shut the door behind him. “Bobby’s been bit,” he said.
Lane exhaled. He knew it. “And the others?”
“The others are fine.”
Well, that’s just great.
“You know what to do then,” Lane said.
“That’s why I came back,” Roland said. He picked up a hammer and rummaged through the pile of extra clothes until he found the scarf for his face.
“Do it carefully,” Lane said. “And don’t touch him. Do not. Touch him.”
“I’ve done this before, boss,” Roland said and slipped back outside.
* * *
Kyle kept a close watch in every direction. He might be able to handle a handful of those things, but any more than that and he’d have to take Annie back to the store at top speed and leave Bobby alone to his fate.
“He’s going back to tell Lane,” Bobby said.
“Seems so,” Kyle said.
“He’s going to beat me to death with one of those crowbars.”
“I’ll talk to him
,” Kyle said.
“And he’s going to listen to you? He won’t even listen to me. He only listens to Lane.”
“Can’t we at least wait until—you know,” Annie said.
“Lane won’t chance it,” Bobby said. “I’m contagious. So you know what? Lane’s right. And you should step back. You should have just shot me as soon as it happened.”
“I told you,” Kyle said. “We don’t do that.”
“You seem like nice people,” Bobby said. “You’re too nice. It’s going to get you killed.”
Kyle swallowed.
“I’m so sorry,” Annie said. And Kyle could tell she really was. He was sorry too. But if Bobby hadn’t been bitten, he’d still be hostile.
“Look,” Bobby said. “I know Lane. He’s not complicated. And he’s not a bad guy. I know how it looks, but he’s not. Just do what he tells you to do and you’ll be okay. He’ll lighten up if he trusts you. And he’ll keep you alive.”
“Roland’s coming back,” Annie said. “And he has a hammer.”
“Oh Jesus,” Bobby said and covered his face with his hands.
“I’ll talk to him,” Kyle said.
Bobby just moaned.
“I’ll talk to him,” Kyle said again.
Roland was coming at them fast and angry. He had a pistol in one hand, a hammer in the other, and a scarf wrapped around his neck.
Annie leaned into Kyle. This time he did not feel a warm rush. He felt revulsion, not at her but at what he knew was going to happen.
“What’s the scarf for?” Annie said.
Kyle was pretty sure he knew what the scarf was for.
Roland stopped when he reached Bobby. “Step back.”
“Make it painless,” Kyle said.
“I’ve done this before. Step back.”
“I didn’t ask if you’d done this before. I said make it painless.”
“Motherfucker,” Roland said and pulled back the hammer as if he’d hit Kyle if he didn’t shut up and step back.
Kyle and Annie stepped back.
Roland pulled the scarf up and covered his mouth. “He won’t feel a thing,” he said, this time in a more civilized tone. “He’s my friend, and I’m not a sadist.”
Bobby turned away from Roland and showed him the back of his head. He covered his ears with his hands and said, “Do it.”
Annie hugged Kyle and buried her face in his chest so she would not have to look. But Kyle was certain she heard it.
And when Roland was finished, the scarf over his mouth was flecked with blood.
* * *
Annie took the small knife from Bobby’s belt when Kyle and Roland weren’t looking. It took less than a second. It came right off because it was held in place by nothing more than a strap and a snap.
CHAPTER SIX
Lane ordered all the men but Roland into the cooler for the night. Carol and Annie were allowed to sleep on the floor near the bathrooms, but Hughes, Frank, Kyle, and Parker couldn’t be trusted, especially not in the dark, not when Roland and Lane were down a man and needed to sleep.
Hughes took it in stride. He wasn’t planning to move against Lane or Roland in the night anyway. They’d be on guard. Sure, it was dark. One would be asleep and the other one tired, but they’d be on guard. They’d expect an attack and be ready to shoot.
The best time to strike would be when Roland and Lane are distracted, preferably by a pack of those things. They couldn’t possibly make it all the way to Olympia and then up to an island without running into a pack or even a horde. That’s when Roland and Lane would go down.
So what did Hughes care if he spent the night locked in the cooler? All he wanted was sleep. Roland and Lane wouldn’t sleep well—that was for sure—but Hughes would. In the morning he’d be fresh and rested and ready to kick the shit out of sleep-deprived Roland and Lane.
Frank grumbled under his breath about being locked up. Hughes understood. Kyle cringed when Lane padlocked the door. Hughes understood that, as well. But Parker banged on the door and shouted that Lane was an asshole. That, Hughes did not understand. That was just stupid. Parker might make an outstanding foxhole companion, but he was no good at all under purely psychological pressure.
The cooler was big enough for everyone to spread out. It was a long rectangular metal box about the size and shape of a shipping container. Hughes and Frank took spots on the floor near the back. Parker sat by the door, no doubt so he could bang on it some more when he got mad. Kyle stayed up there with him. Those two were always fighting. Kyle was perfectly welcome in the back away from Parker and his combustible attitude, but those two had some issues to resolve. Hughes could hear them arguing in low voices. Maybe they’d come to terms. They’d better, or Hughes would crack their heads together once Lane was out of the way.
Hughes lay on his back on the steel floor and laced his fingers behind his head. Frank stuck a Maglite between his teeth so he could use two hands to move some boxes out of his way.
“Ain’t this a bitch,” Frank said.
“S’all right,” Hughes said. “Just try to get some sleep. Rest up for tomorrow.”
Frank took the Maglite out of his mouth and kicked the last box out of the way. Then he shut the light off and fidgeted while trying to get comfortable on the floor. The cooler was pitch black now, so Hughes closed his eyes. He saw spectral purple afterimages on the back of his eyelids.
The electricity had been off for a long time. The walls and the air inside had long ago adjusted to the ambient temperature in the store, which wasn’t much different now from the ambient temperature outside, which was getting colder by the day. Still, Hughes felt just a tiny bit colder inside the cooler. It was probably just his imagination.
Frank finally stopped fussing around and got still. “I wonder if the president got bit,” he said in the darkness.
“The president of what?” Hughes said.
“Of the country,” Frank said.
“The hell you talking about, the president getting bit?”
“Can you imagine him chasing his staff around the White House?”
Hughes chuckled and shook his head in the dark. “Frank, my man.”
“Go ahead and laugh, but it’s not funny. Just about every famous person you’ve ever heard of has either been bitten or eaten. Think about it. Stephen King. Justin Bieber. John McCain. Bit. Imagine getting chased in Hollywood by Arnold Schwarzenegger after he’s been bit.”
“Jesus Christ, Frank. The president hasn’t been bit. He’s in a bunker somewhere.”
“Okay, but Arnold Schwarzenegger isn’t in a bunker somewhere unless he dug it himself in his yard.”
“Go to sleep, Frank.”
“I can’t stop thinking about this stuff.”
“Then think about it quietly, okay?”
Hughes’ back hurt. Sleeping on the floor wasn’t doing him any favors. He rolled onto his side to relieve the pressure, but the pain just moved into his shoulder.
“A buddy of mine used to work summers as a mechanic down in Antarctica,” Frank said. Hughes sighed. Frank was not going to be quiet anytime soon. “They even sent him to the station at the South Pole once. How awesome would that be?”
Hughes just wanted to sleep, but he didn’t want to be rude and couldn’t get comfortable anyway. Frank wasn’t the smartest person around, but he was an okay guy, and anyway he was Hughes’ friend.
“You want to go to the South Pole?” Hughes said. He had no idea they had a station down there.
“Well, kind of,” Frank said. “I mean, it would be cool, wouldn’t it? That’s not something you see every day. The guys at the South Pole station are probably fine.”
Yes, Hughes supposed the scientists at the pole probably were fine for the time being. “Until they run out of food and fuel. Nobody’s going down there to get them.”
Hughes imagined himself stuck in Antarctica. What would he do? Would he even try to get back to the warm parts of the world, or would he hold out on the ice as
long as he could until he died peacefully? Freezing to death had to be better than getting chewed up by teeth. He imagined a team of scientists braving the most hostile conditions on earth and actually making it back, only to return home to—this.
“You know it’s winter down there in August?” Frank said.
Yes, Hughes knew it was winter in August on the bottom half of the world. “So I guess it’s spring for them now that we’re going into November. How many people are down there?”
“I don’t know. Not a lot. They have a pretty small crew during the winter. My buddy left at the end of the summer. Most people leave then. The ones who stay are hard-core. Everybody goes a little bit crazy. My buddy says they have a name for it. They call it going toast.”
Going toast. Hughes liked that. Going crazy was going toast. He wasn’t sure what it meant, exactly, but he liked the sound of it.
Everyone left in the world was probably going a little bit toast.
Carol? Jumping at her own shadow and cleaning everything over and over? Toast.
Annie? Toasted, for sure. The biggest catastrophe in the history of the species had just laid waste to the planet, and the poor girl couldn’t remember a bit of it.
Parker? That guy was still in the toaster.
And Lane? Lane was burnt toast. Burnt and black and stinking up the whole kitchen.
Hughes was sure he’d go toast himself soon enough. Somehow he hadn’t already. Mostly because he didn’t feel anything anymore. Then again, he could be kidding himself. Maybe feeling nothing was his own way of going toast.
He couldn’t help but wonder if his family might still be alive if they lived in New York or Chicago or Houston instead of Seattle. Because the only places in the world hit harder than Seattle were Calcutta and Moscow.
That’s where it started. In Russia. Some dinky Arctic research town in Siberia was the first to get hit. A scientist up there was bitten by what everyone thought was a rabid fox. The guy turned and then bit his doctor. Since he was the only doctor around, they flew him to Moscow for treatment. The doctor bit a dozen passengers on the plane. He ripped a woman’s throat out with his teeth before a mob jumped him and bashed his head in with a fire extinguisher. After they emptied the plane, it was absolute mayhem at Moscow’s international airport.
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