The Scattered and the Dead | Book 3 | The Scattered and the Dead

by McBain, Tim

  Breathe. Focus on the wind. Let it steady you. It won’t be long now. Just rest a moment, gather your wits, and then move on.

  He closed his eyes. Let his mind go blank save for all but his respiration which seemed to bring a little more calm with every gust of fresh air.

  He thought things were getting better, thought his mind was starting to clear, his legs beginning to regain sensation, just as he fell down to the wood floor in a heap.

  Louis

  Rural Tennessee

  1 year, 54 days after

  Louis grit his teeth. Jaw muscles clenching in little spasms involuntarily.

  He prayed. A silent prayer in his head, though his lips moved now and then. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d done that. Prayed. But he did so without hesitation now. Without qualms or any sense that it was strange.

  Fear had grabbed him around the scruff of the neck and refused to let go. The kind of fear that quickly blurred the line between tension and pain — a sort of creeping soreness, a dull ache manifesting in his upper back, reaching all the way up to the base of his skull.

  He brought a hand to his neck. Brushed the palm along the softest spot at the front of the throat, just beneath the Adam’s apple, and left it cupped there. And then he thought about the symbolic meaning of the gesture. Did he think maybe he could dislodge that fear tensing in his neck? Or was he simply guarding his throat like a frightened animal? Something small. Something powerless.

  Lorraine slept in the passenger seat. Not a peaceful rest from the looks of it.

  A frown etched lines around her mouth. Folds that arched down from her nose, bisected her cheeks.

  Rest was good for her, though. Good for the baby. Better for her to sleep and him to keep watch.

  And he could relax more when she was out, anyway. Didn’t have to work so hard to take care of her.

  He had to keep a brave face when she was up. Had to be strong for her and her baby’s sake. Had to keep expressing that positive mental attitude, all those words about mindfulness and living in the moment. Had to.

  He prayed again. Pleaded with God.

  Spare this woman and her child. Show me a way for them to get out of this.

  He concentrated so hard that he could feel the words throb in his head. Rhythmic vibrations rattling his brain pan. Could feel them transmitted. Sent out into the great void. To oblivion. Where someone would hear them or not. Answer them or not.

  He looked out over the expanse surrounding the car. Let his eyes reach out for the horizon.

  And he tried to make himself look past all those walking dead things, all the ripped out trees, all the trash and muck beneath them. Tried to concentrate instead on the emptiness stretching upward from the ground. When you compared them, there was so much more nothing than something, so much more space than solid objects.

  Most of the universe was hollow. Vast nothingness. Infinite seas of gloom. Endless space that stretched out into the sky, into the heavens. Perhaps.

  And tears wet his eyes. Beads of liquid welling to obscure his view of the sky.

  Good.

  He could only let it out when she was off in the dream world. Better to find some release than keep it all bottled up. Better to find an outlet.

  The wet streamed down his cheeks. Two more rivulets of running water couldn’t hurt anything now, could they?

  Baghead

  Ripplemead, Virginia

  9 years, 38 days after

  “Quiet now. He’s blinkin’.”

  Delfino’s voice. Close.

  Baghead’s eyelids fluttered open. Bright light spilling in. Too much. He squinted, tried to see.

  The dark shape closest to him had to be Delfino kneeling by his side. That didn’t explain who the other two silhouettes were, the ones standing further back. Maybe Ruth could be one of them — the figure on the far right was quite short — but that still left another to account for.

  “You comin’ around now, good buddy? It’d seem you took a little spill.”

  It took Baghead a second to get the words to come out.

  “Yeah, I guess so.”

  “You guess you’re OK, or you guess you took a spill?”

  “I guess both.”

  The bedroom started to come clear around him, that oversaturated color quality that bled everything white and featureless finally receding. He kind of remembered walking the few foot across the room, but it felt distant and strange, like remembering fragments of a fever dream.

  “Where are we?”

  Delfino’s mouth quirked to answer, but he was interrupted.

  “Wait.”

  This was a different voice. A woman’s voice. Hard.

  He found her face, finally. The other figure standing over him along with Ruth. Her eyebrows were all creased in the middle, some odd aggression to her stance. She almost looked familiar for a second, but he thought not.

  She met eyes with Delfino. Shook her head.

  “I mean, it ain’t like tellin’ ‘im where we are is going to change anything. He’s here. Only another day or two. Then we’re gone. Quick and easy, like we talked about. What difference it gonna make whether he has a name of a town or what have you? You afraid they’re gonna pry that out of him later, that he holed up in a house in the country to stop his stump from festering?”

  That stern look in her eye softened some.

  “Fine.”

  Delfino nodded. Then he turned back to Baghead.

  “We’re in the great state of Virginia, good buddy. Little nothing town called Ripplemead. Population: almost none. These folks here, they’re good people. This mean one fixed up your, uh, stump. Got rid of the bad tissue. Slapped a fresh bandage on there. Got you a bit of that new stump smell goin’, which is nice. Much like the sweet aroma of a newborn baby’s head, I’m told. But yeah. I guess the hand ain’t growing back. Learned that the hard way. I asked her about it, and she got all pissed, rared up like a mountain lion to better bite my head off. So you’ll maybe want to lay off the medical questions.”

  Baghead laughed a little at that.

  “They’ve got a homestead out here, real nice place. Got a whole mess of kids livin’ here with ‘em, too. Ruth made a bunch of friends and all. She wants to stay on here, and we worked it out. They’re going to take care of her going forward. On the other hand, they ain’t too glad I brung you here, to be honest. Brought, I mean. Brought you here. You being sentenced to death by Father’s cult — a sort of known fugitive, so to speak, with assassins comin’ after ya — well, they just weren’t that excited about the thrilling nature of it all. Couldn’t see the sense of wonder in it.”

  He gestured at the dark-haired girl with his elbow.

  “This one’s been trying to stare a hole into my upper floor since we got here. Eyes pointing laser beams at my dome, dead center at the forehead. Cold black marbles of eyes. Frickin’ shark’s eyes, dude. The hate is that real. Shark level.”

  Delfino pulled his cigarettes out, parked one between his lips, and lit it before he went on. The match scraped in the quiet, a strange punctuation point in the moment. The smoke curled up toward the ceiling.

  “But I did some driving for them a while back, so they owed me. Guess we’re even now. Guess, after this, my welcome’s worn to shit here in humble Ripplemead. So be it. Better to cash in your favors while you’re alive, right? Get your money’s worth.”

  He helped Baghead up from the floor at last and walked him over the bed. Then the two men sort of jockeyed a moment, awkward movements as they couldn’t find a good way for Bags to land on the mattress. He finally just flopped down, a heavy landing that gave him one good bounce before he settled.

  Delfino chuckled at that, and then he turned to address the whole room.

  “Anyhow, I figure we’re all square here. Me and Bags will get goin’ here before long. Shouldn’t be more than two days, like I said. Once he’s well enough to, you know, not collapse into a heap after taking three baby steps. We’ve got pressing
bidness in Father’s camp to attend to. A big meeting, you could say.”

  Delfino

  Ripplemead, Virginia

  9 years, 38 days after

  Delfino was having a hell of a time regaling the group with the heroic way in which he’d saved Baghead’s life, but he was only halfway through the telling when Marissa bustled into the room toting a wash basin and a stack of folded clothes.

  “OK. Visiting hour is over,” she said. “Erin and I have to get this gentleman cleaned up and into a fresh pair of clothes before he konks out again.”

  Delfino and Ruth filed outside, and the girl immediately took off and joined in the horseplay taking place down yonder with the other kids.

  He watched her again and couldn’t help but think that maybe all this had happened just this way for a reason.

  Delfino milled around the back of the house, wanting to hear what the two women would say about Baghead’s progress. When they came out a few minutes later, he pounced.

  “So? What’s the prognosis?”

  “The prognosis?” Marissa repeated, seeming to find the word amusing. “The prognosis is that your friend is still quite ill, and he’s lucky he’s not already dead.”

  “OK, but how soon can he, you know… get up and around?”

  “A week. Maybe more.”

  Delfino didn’t miss the flicker of annoyance that crossed Erin’s face at that.

  “Can I go in and set with him for a while?”

  “No. He needs to rest.” Marissa’s face was hard. “You can take him a plate at dinner. But don’t go getting him excited. The more sleep he gets, the quicker he’ll be back on his feet. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Delfino said.

  Marissa nodded and then looked at her watch.

  “Now if you’ll excuse me, he needs his afternoon dose of antibiotics.”

  When she’d gone, Delfino turned to Erin.

  “Damn. She’s an even bigger ballbuster than you, ain’t she?”

  “Pretty much,” Erin said.

  She crossed the yard, stooped over a bucket, and pulled out a damp pillowcase. She gave it a few shakes before pinning it to one of the lines that ran between the house and the shed in back. She’d been in the middle of hanging laundry when Delfino had run outside to report that Baghead had passed out on the floor.

  “Can I help?” he asked, reaching for the end of a large sheet she was trying to hang.

  “I guess.”

  They worked a few moments without further discussion, but Delfino had never been much for long stretches of silence.

  “I don’t suppose you want to hear a joke?”

  “Not really,” Erin said.

  Delfino huffed.

  “Come on, Erin. Can’t you admit that you’re at least a little bit happy he’s gonna live?”

  “Of course I’m happy he’s going to live. It’s not like I wanted him to die.”

  “Well then… there you go. Something we can both agree on.”

  Erin rolled her eyes and continue pinning the sheet to the line.

  “Marcus introduced me to some of the other folk here,” Delfino said. “Had a real good talk with Ned and Katie. Awful nice of you to take them in like you did.”

  “We didn’t take them in,” Erin said, her teeth clenched around a clothespin. “They contribute, like everyone else. Ned was an engineer. He’s been working on a generator. And Katie was a teacher. She does school for the kids most days.”

  “Well, what I’m saying is, I’m real impressed with what you done here. That’s all. Marcus gave me a tour of the gardens earlier. That’s really something. And I heard about what you got planned for next spring,” Delfino said, waggling his eyebrows.

  Erin’s head whipped around to stare at him, her eyes blazing.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Is it meant to be a secret then? Am I not supposed to know you got a mill to make flour and that Marcus is gonna try growing some wheat next year?”

  The ferocity in Erin’s eyes faded.

  “Oh. That,” she said. “No. It’s not a secret.”

  Delfino frowned. He thought at first that her reaction was out of anger. But now he realized it had been fear.

  “What’d you think I was talking about?”

  “Nothing,” she said, shaking her head. “What’s the joke?”

  “Pardon?”

  “You said you had a joke.”

  “Oh shit, yeah. Just gimme a minute to think on how it starts.” Delfino smiled and licked his lips. “OK. So this guy goes into the doctor, right? He’s sitting there on the table, got the little gown on, ass cheeks exposed, pressed to the sheet of paper laid out on the table. He waits like that a long time, and finally the doctor comes in.”

  Delfino lifted a piece of soggy laundry from the bucket and handed it to Erin before continuing.

  “He says, ‘Doc, I’ve got this mark on the middle of my forehead, almost looks like a zit, but it’s been there two weeks, and I swear it’s just a little bit bigger than it was when I first noticed it a couple weeks back.’”

  The joke was interrupted by a small voice shouting Erin’s name. One of the sheets on the clothesline stirred, and then one of the kids pushed through, followed closely by Ruth.

  “Erin, is it OK if we ride bikes?” The girl was a head taller than Ruth, despite them being close in age. Rayne, he thought her name was.

  “Did you finish your chores?”

  “Yes,” Rayne said, holding her chin high. “I collected eggs and fed the dogs and helped Marcus weed and mulch the strawberries.”

  Erin bent down next to Ruth.

  “Have you ever ridden a bike?”

  Ruth chewed her lip for a moment before shaking her head.

  “That’s OK. Rayne here is an expert bike rider. She’ll show you the ropes.” Erin stood to her full height again and addressed the other girl. “Your old bike is in the shed, the one with the training wheels on it. Ruth can ride that. And your old helmet should fit her, too.”

  “Can we go up to the big hill on the main road?” Rayne asked.

  “No. I want you to stay out front here.”

  When the girl pulled a face, Erin sighed.

  “If I get a minute later, I’ll take you guys up the hill. OK?”

  “Yes!” Rayne said, celebrating as if it was a definite thing. “Come on, Ruth!”

  The girls took off in a mad dash across the lawn.

  “She’s the basket baby, is that right?” Delfino asked. “The one someone just up and left at your front door?”

  Erin stared after them for a few seconds and then returned to her task.

  “That’s right. Nine years ago, almost. Hard to imagine her fitting in a basket now. She grows like a weed.”

  Delfino shook his head.

  “You ever wonder where she came from? Who her people were?”

  Erin moved to a different section of clothesline where the items hanging were fully dry.

  “I used to,” Erin said, tugging a pair of pants from the line and folding them. “But now I figure she was meant to be with us. That’s how it feels anyway.”

  Delfino glanced over to where the girl was buckling a small purple bike helmet on Ruth’s head.

  “I suppose you’re right about that,” he said. “Anyway… I was in the middle of a joke, wasn’t I?”

  “The patient was telling the doctor about the weird zit-thing in the middle of his forehead,” Erin reminded him.

  “Ah, yes,” Delfino said, rubbing his hands together. “So he tells the doc that this little bump, it seems to be getting bigger. ‘Well, let me take a look,’ the doctor says, and he looks, and he squints, and he looks harder, and he gets out a magnifying glass and he looks closer still. And then he mutters something under his breath, and he gets out a book and starts furiously flipping through the pages, a grave look on his face. So the fella sitting there with his ass cheeks out is concerned. He says, ‘What is it?’ and the Doc shushes him
, still flipping through this medical text like mad.”

  Erin pulled a clothespin from her mouth.

  “How long is this joke?”

  “I’d be to the end by now if I didn’t keep gettin’ interrupted,” Delfino said.

  Erin rolled her eyes but gestured that he should continue.

  “So like I was saying… he’s dragging his finger along the line of words in his book and sort of nodding to himself, and he comes back, looks at the forehead nub again with the magnifying glass, and he’s still nodding. Eventually, he says, ‘I was afraid of this. I’ve never seen it before in real life — never thought I would, in fact — but within six to eight weeks time this spot on your head will grow into a full human penis.’

  “The fella’s mouth drops open. ‘A… full… human penis?’

  “‘I’m afraid so.’

  “‘I mean… Can we remove it?’”

  Erin was shaking her head now, smirking a little. Delfino thought that was a good sign, knew he had her on the hook.

  “The doc did one of those inward gasps through his teeth, all sharp sounding. Clucked his tongue a few times as though doing some mental math.

  “‘I’m sorry to say there’s no corrective action we could take, no medical recourse at all. With the proximity to the brain, surgery would be too big of a risk. No… I’m afraid, nothing can be done.’

  “The fella blinks. He can’t quite believe what he’s hearing. And he says, ‘So you’re telling me, that in a month and a half, I’m going to wake up in the morning and look in the mirror and see a full-size dick growing out of my forehead?’”

  “‘Oh, lord no. You won’t see it,’ the doctor says. ‘The balls will cover your eyes.’”

  Erin snorted and then laughed, really laughed. It’d been a while since he’d heard that laugh, and Delfino thought maybe this whole thing with Baghead might actually end up repairing the damage that had been done.

  Father