Love Bug

by Goodhue, H. E.

  The sun sank lower in the sky, painting the woods in purpled shadows. It was strange, something Xander had never experienced. Sure, he had been in the woods before, but that was in the perfectly manicured parks scattered throughout the Stele. Those were little more than paved paths flanked by decorative trees with colorful blossoms. Where Xander currently found himself had been left to grow unfettered by the meddling hand of man for centuries. Trees, as wide as three men, closed in on him. Anything could be hiding behind those trunks or in those darkening shadows. Xander had all of these thoughts, but none of the emotions to feel the fear. Rather, he simply accepted them as fact. His Em-Pak merrily chirped away as he picked his way closer to the scene of his mother’s death.

  “Finally,” Xander said, having grown weary of the repetitive scenery of the woods. The twisted remains of the limo lay before him, a slight patina of rust on the upturned underside trying desperately to absorb the dying rays of the setting sun.

  Broken glass crunched beneath Xander’s shoes as he looked over the crash. It really was amazing that anyone had survived, let alone both Cora and himself, but Xander pushed these thoughts aside, allowing them to be cleansed by his Em-Pak. He was here for a purpose, a reason.

  Climbing through the shattered window, Xander stopped to marvel at the amount of blood that had dried on the inside of the vehicle. It really must have been something to see, those disgusting Reds gunned down by a brave ERC officer. Xander still refused to believe Cora’s ridiculous story about Remmy killing the Reds with a rock.

  The limo had rolled over onto its roof, setting everything upside down. Xander cast a quick glance into the rear area where he had ridden, but saw nothing of value, just the litter of his mother and sister; surely, nothing worth taking with him. But the dashboard was a different story. There was most definitely something worth finding there.

  Xander dropped to a squat on his knees, ignoring the pain that jabbed at him as he knelt on bits of broken safety glass. Grabbing the glove box, Xander yanked with all his might, but it refused to open. His Em-Pak beeped angrily.

  “Come on,” Xander grunted as he pressed his foot against the dash for leverage. With one final growl, he tore open the jammed glove box, but his foot shot sideways, colliding with the steering wheel. Xander felt his heart stop as a blaring blast of the car horn filled the field.

  “Damn it,” Xander cried and began feverishly sorting through the contents of the opened compartment. “Yes!” He grabbed the small radio, no bigger than a deck of cards. He remembered when his father had told him that all ERC vehicles were equipped with an emergency radio. It could be used to send an SOS signal or to radio the nearest ERC office, but he would need to get somewhere away from the camp, away from the forest and anything else that might muddy the signal. Xander’s mind began to work overtime, trying to fit together the pieces of his plan. He was only going to have one chance to do this.

  “Hey kid!” the guard yelled. “What the hell are you doing in there?” He pointed with the barrel of his rifle.

  “Not as stupid as I thought,” Xander smirked and slipped the radio into his sock before pulling his pant leg back into place. He crawled out of the wrecked limo. “Remmy knew where this was. I thought he might have gone here to hide. Seemed like a good place. Don’t you think?”

  “Yeah, I guess so,” the guard agreed, “but you shouldn’t be running off like that. There could still be Reds around here.”

  “Oh,” Xander exclaimed, feigning the concern of which he was incapable. “We should probably get back to the camp then, shouldn’t we?”

  “Let’s go,” the guard snapped. “And keep your eyes peeled on the way back for any sign of Remmy or the Reds, okay?”

  “Of course,” Xander smiled, his voice syrupy and sweet. These Emos were exactly as stupid as he thought.

  -28-

  The Emo camp buzzed with a mix of suppressed anger and sadness. No loss was easy, but Remmy being taken hit everyone hard. Cora tried to comfort Remmy’s mother, but with no practice, she found herself doing little more than uttering a few sentences and crying alongside the woman. Maybe that’s what it was supposed to be like Cora wondered? Maybe in moments like these there was no point in trying to string words together? They would probably fail to capture the magnitude of the loss or situation, so why bother? Cora sat with Remmy’s mother until she became exhausted from her crying and slipped into a fitful sleep.

  Cora quietly slipped out of the tent and found Remmy’s father standing outside with a few other men. When he saw Cora, he stopped talking and walked over to her.

  “Thank you,” Remmy’s father nodded. “She always wanted a daughter, but having kids was so risky. I’m sure that meant a lot to her. I’m really bad at that kind of stuff.”

  “Doesn’t mean it wouldn’t help,” Cora responded, but immediately wished she had kept her mouth shut. Emotions were making her words faster than her thoughts and she had no way to control them. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to –”

  “No, no,” Remmy’s father cut in. “You’re right. It’s cowardice, not a lack of skill that keeps me from trying to comfort her.” His eyes glistened from the nearby fire and tears began to roll. “I guess it just feels like if we don’t talk about it that it’s not really real then. You know? Like if, we don’t say anything that Remmy might just come walking right into the middle of camp. I don’t know. It’s stupid, I guess.”

  “Not really,” Cora replied. “I can understand not wanting to talk about it, but she needs you.”

  “I know,” Remmy’s father nodded. “You’re right.”

  “I’m going to see Samuel,” Cora added. “You want me to come by after and check on her?”

  “Thanks, but I’ll take it from here,” Remmy’s father said sheepishly and then added, “What I said before, Cora, I meant it. I really think Remmy loved you.”

  “Thanks,” Cora nodded, “I hope he did.”

  Cora turned and began walking through the camp. Every group she passed would fall silent as she passed. Were they blaming her for Remmy? Cora wanted to scream at each and every one of them that she felt responsible enough and didn’t need their judgment. She hoped that Samuel would have some advice, some small piece of wisdom that would make what she was feeling slightly less terrible.

  The hospital tent was empty, all patients having been patched up and loaded into vehicles just in case the Reds returned. Samuel sat at a table in the rear of the tent, a small gas lantern throwing a golden glow around his stooped figure like a halo.

  “Samuel?” Cora asked as she stepped into the tent. She still found it strange to think of him as her grandfather and had yet to use the word. Her entire life had been shaped by Samuel’s fake death and sitting down with him still felt a little like conversing with a ghost.

  “Back here, Cora,” Samuel waved, not looking up from his work.

  “What are you doing?” Cora asked, not really interested in his work, but looking for any kind of distraction.

  “We’ll get to that soon enough,” Samuel smiled, “but why don’t we start with how you’re doing.”

  “Terrible,” Cora muttered as she kicked at some invisible object on the floor with the toe her boot. “Remmy’s dead and it’s my fault. How else should I feel?”

  “It’s not your fault,” Samuel said, “You can’t put that on yourself, Cora. If you do, it’ll destroy you. I promise you that I know where that road leads.”

  “What do you mean?” Cora demanded.

  “Look around you, Cora,” Samuel motioned with his arms. She got the feeling he was speaking about things far larger than the tent and even the camp. “All of this is my fault. My creation made all of this. How many people died because of what I made? How much blood is on my hands?”

  “But you were only trying to help,” Cora argued. “How could you have known the ERC could totally screw up your invention?”

  “And how could you have known that Reds were near the waterfall?” Samuel asked. He had a way of get
ting Cora to see his point, of guiding her there without forcing it or making it seem condescending. “Neither you nor Remmy knew the Reds would be there. You can’t blame yourself for things beyond your control. Life is full of unknown variables and we have to do our best to deal with them.”

  “Yeah,” Cora muttered, her voice devoid of conviction. “But he never would have tried to slow the Reds down if I wasn’t there. If I hadn’t been there, Remmy would have just outrun them and warned the camp. Remmy would still be alive if it wasn’t for me.”

  “I know that’s how you feel right now,” Samuel extended a hand and placed it on Cora’s shoulder, “but that doesn’t make it real. And besides, who said Remmy was dead?”

  Cora tilted her head. Samuel had always seemed a bit odd. How could he not be a little strange considering the insanity that shaped his life? But claiming that Remmy was still alive was not only insane - it was cruel.

  “Why would you say that?” Cora growled with more intensity than she intended.

  “Because, I think he might still be alive,” Samuel stated matter-of-factly. “That’s what I’ve been working on.” He motioned towards his computer. A large digital map covered the screen. Colored dots, red, blue and yellow were clustered across the map.

  “What is that?” Cora asked.

  “I’ve been tracking the movement of the Reds with these red dots, the ERC with the blue ones and other camps like ours with the yellow,” Samuel explained. It felt weird to think of the camp as ‘ours’, but Cora suddenly realized that she had come to think of it as hers, as her home. “I figured that there had to be some sort of pattern to the Reds and that they couldn’t be so random. It’s also a good way to keep tabs on the movement of ERC troops.”

  “How?” Cora asked. It was amazing to see how many yellow dots were on the screen. She would have never imagined that so many Emos were nearby.

  “I hacked into an ERC satellite,” Samuel grinned. “I had helped program the thing, so it wasn’t really that difficult.”

  “But how can you tell the difference between the groups?” Cora gasped. “They’re all just people aren’t they?”

  “Well, yes,” Samuel nodded. “But there’s a slight temperature variation between the three. You see the virus raises the Reds’ core temperature to over one hundred degrees, also adding to their red appearance. Em-Paks have the opposite effect, decreasing the core temperature. You never knew the difference, but those early citizens who were harnessed later in life used to complain constantly about feeling cold. Then there’s us. We’re within the normal range for human beings. Once I routed a patch program into the satellite, it was easy to zero in on certain temperature signatures.”

  “Aren’t you worried that the ERC would find out how to do the same thing?” Cora demanded. “You could have just made their job that much easier.”

  “True,” Samuel responded, “except for the fact that I triple encrypted the program and attached a failsafe. It’s completely hidden in the coding for other programs, but if they ever find it and try to hack the file, it will self-destruct and disable the entire satellite. It’s safe, Cora. I’m not making the mistake of underestimating or trusting the ERC ever again.”

  “The map is impressive,” Cora admitted, “but what does that have to do with Remmy?”

  “This,” Samuel smiled and zoomed in on a large section of red dots. A small, faint yellow dot could be seen amidst them. It was very close to a single red dot. “I think that yellow dot might be Remmy.”

  “How could that be?” Cora’s voice cracked. “The Reds don’t take prisoners.”

  “No,” Samuel agreed. “They usually don’t, but that too has been something that I have been thinking a great deal about lately. You see, after you arrived, I knew that the Reds had changed, evolved, if you will. They had never worked in unison before, but it was naïve to believe that the virus would never mutate. That’s what viruses do, right?”

  “Sure,” Cora shrugged. She had no idea what Samuel was talking about.

  “Viruses change constantly,” Samuel continued, “so it stands to reason that the Reds might change as well. I believe that they have become more than screaming, mindless monsters and that they are developing, possibly even creating their own society.”

  “Seriously?” Cora questioned. “The ERC always taught us that the Reds were like rabid animals.”

  “And what did they teach you about Emos?” Samuel smirked.

  Cora felt her face flush, those prickly waves of heat dancing on the back of her neck and cheeks. “Yeah, I guess that’s a good point.”

  “So I began to consider how the Reds might develop their rules, their way of life,” Samuel said. “And the only logical foundation I can think of which the Reds would base their culture upon is fighting. They surely are becoming or have become a warrior society.”

  “What about Remmy?” Cora demanded, growing tired of the long-winded explanation.

  “You said that he grabbed a rock,” Samuel answered, “that he turned to fight. My guess is that he fought and somehow this meant something to the Reds. Maybe they respected Remmy for it. They must have captured him and taken him back to their camp. I have been monitoring this group for a while now because their movements seemed more organized. There had never been anything other than red dots. That is, until the day after you and Remmy were attacked. I’m not a gambling man, Cora, but I’d be willing to bet that Remmy is there.”

  “So Remmy is still alive?” Cora almost shouted.

  “So it would seem,” Samuel smiled. “Now all we have to figure out is how we’re going to get him back.”

  “Thank you, Grandpa!” Cora cried as she wrapped her arms around Samuel. The word felt natural, like it had always been waiting to be spoken. Samuel, her grandfather, had given her hope. It was small, but it was hope. Remmy was alive, surrounded by Reds, but alive. Cora had never felt hope before, had never known that airy, lightheaded feeling that made anything seem possible, but it came naturally to her. She would rescue Remmy and bring him back. He had saved her and she owed him. She would see him again and kiss him again. She loved Remmy. She knew it before, but her heart screamed it now. With these feelings, Cora could accomplish anything, even the impossible task that was saving Remmy from an entire army of Reds.

  -29-

  “Time to eat, Remmy,” Jessica grinned, her shark-like teeth glittering like polished ivory in the moonlight. She held a crude wooden bowl with some sort of brown stew lazily steaming away in the middle of it.

  “I don’t want that,” Remmy snapped, “get that crap away from me.”

  “Suit yourself,” Jessica shrugged. She stepped into the shack and shut the door behind her. In the darkness, Remmy was tempted to pretend that she was still his friend and still the girl he used to know, but the moment she talked, cutting apart her words on rows of dagger-like teeth, the illusion was shattered. “You’re only getting food because you’re going to fight tomorrow. Trust me, in the arena, you’re going to need your strength.”

  “I’m not fighting for your amusement tomorrow,” Remmy spat from where he slumped against the wall.

  “Amusement?” Jessica chuckled. “Well, yes, I guess it is what passes for entertainment around here, but that’s not the real reason you’ll be in there.”

  “So, then why am I?” Remmy demanded.

  “To prove yourself,” Jessica explained. “You showed some real promise when you dropped Tam with that rock. He’s second in command around here, probably will be the chief one day, if Hatch ever let’s him. Besting one of our toughest fighters is what saved your life.”

  “Lot of good that did me,” Remmy said darkly.

  “If you hadn’t done that, you’d be dead and would have been taken for food,” Jessica answered. “You have a chance to prove yourself tomorrow, to fight hard enough to change. You’ve got a chance to become one of us. When you get in there tomorrow, Remmy, you need to fight, to get angry. Allow the change to happen.”

  “
You mean become infected,” Remmy snapped.

  “Look at it however you need to,” Jessica stated simply. “Remmy, you have a shot, a chance to live. It’s more than we give most people. If you refuse to fight, there’s only one outcome.”

  “What the hell do you care?” Remmy grunted. “You’d just as soon eat me.”

  “Circle of life,” Jessica shrugged. “Do I want to eat you? No, I’d rather you joined us. But will I eat you? I will if you leave us no other choice. We’ve all got a right to live and to survive. But, Remmy, I’m still me. I’m still Jessica. The change doesn’t erase everything. I still remember what it was like to be your friend. That’s why I’m trying to help save you, Remmy.”

  Remmy paused before he answered. Was it possible that Jessica really was trying to save him? Did she really want to keep him safe and this was the only way she knew how?

  “Or we could speed all this up and I could kill you right now,” Jessica lunged forward, spilling the stew and gnashed her teeth together mere inches from Remmy’s neck. He heard the loud clack of Jessica’s pointed teeth and felt the air move across the exposed skin of his neck. Jessica rocked back onto the floor, a wicked toothy grin stretched across her face. “Relax, Remmy, I was only kidding! You earned your chance in the arena. You’ll get a fair shot, just like I did.”

  “You went into this arena?” Remmy asked, some small memory of Jessica triggering a spark of concern. “What did you have to do?”

  “I was put in the arena a few years ago and what I had to do was win. It’s what you’ll have to do tomorrow, if you want to survive,” Jessica said, as if she were simply reporting the day’s weather. “It’s how we keep our numbers up.”

  “Um, okay,” Remmy grumbled. “Can’t you just make more Reds instead of throwing innocent people into your arena?”

  Jessica laughed as she played with the empty bowl and spoon. “It’s not really that simple. For a while, we thought that it would be possible, but there were too many unknowns. There was no way to know if the baby would be born one of us or if we’d have to wait and turn them. But then none of those questions mattered because we finally pieced together that the virus leaves us incapable of having children.”