by Sam Sisavath
Wash caught the kid, Chris, also glancing suspiciously at their surroundings. That was a sign she’d been out here before and was well-aware of the potential dangers. Like him and Ana, the teenager was waiting for—anticipating, even—creatures to leap out of the night at them.
Wash flexed his fingers around the 1911. He had a full mag. That was good. He wished he had more, but beggars couldn’t be choosers.
“Wash,” Ana said after a few seconds of walking in silence.
“Yeah?” he said.
“I’m glad you’re still alive.”
“Me too.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I.”
“I didn’t think I’d actually find you.”
“No?”
“Texas is a big state.”
“It’s getting bigger every day.”
“That’s not possible,” Chris said. It was the first time the teenager had spoken up, and it caught Wash momentarily off guard.
“What isn’t?” Ana said.
“Texas,” the kid said. “It can’t get any bigger than it already is. Unless, I don’t know, someone redraws the state maps, but who’s gonna do that now?”
Wash smiled. “I meant it feels bigger now, without as many people around.”
“Oh.”
“How did you end up down here?” Wash asked Ana. “How did you know which roads I’d take?”
“I didn’t,” Ana said. “I guessed and hoped for the best.”
“You shouldn’t have come looking for me, Ana.”
“You shouldn’t have left me in Kanter 11.”
He sighed. He had a feeling their reunion would end up something like this—going back and forth with no resolution in sight. He hadn’t expected the punches, though, but maybe he should have, given their very first meeting.
“You still shouldn’t have followed me,” Wash said.
“I shouldn’t have done a lot of things,” Ana said.
“You’re too stubborn for your own good.”
“Look who’s talking.”
“She’s got a point,” the Old Man said.
Oh, shut up, Wash thought, when in front of them Keith stopped suddenly.
Ana, Chris, and Wash did, too.
All four of them stood perfectly still and scanned their immediate area. The parts that they could make out in the darkness, anyway. Ana had pulled Chris closer to her, while her right hand clutched and unclutched the machete’s handle. Wash took a couple of steps away from the women to give himself room in case he had to shoot, at the same time providing Ana with space to swing the kukri if necessary.
“It’s coming back to finish the job,” the Old Man said. “Did you think it’d actually stay away all night? You heard it, kid. It’s bored now. It’s going to end this. You should have ended it first when you had the chance.”
I did. I shot it in the head. You told me a headshot would kill a blue-eyed ghoul.
“I wasn’t lying.”
I shot it in the head.
“And it stopped the bullet from penetrating with its hand. Can’t exactly blame me for that now, can you?”
Wash looked over at Keith. The Jasper man had his back turned to them.
“Anything?” Wash asked.
Keith shook his head. “I thought I saw something.”
“And now?”
“I don’t see anything now.” He gave Wash a look that said, But it’s out there. I know it’s out there.
Wash agreed, but like Keith, he didn’t put his thoughts into words. He said instead, “Let’s keep going. Better than just standing around out here all day. How far are we from Jasper?”
“You don’t know?”
“How would I know?”
“You were just there.”
“I was running, and it was dark.”
And I was hoping I would never see that place again.
Keith started walking again. “It’s not far.”
“How far is ‘not far?’” Ana asked.
“Not far.”
Ana looked after Keith for a second before turning to Wash and narrowing her eyes. “Charming. Almost on the verge of asshattery.”
Wash grinned. “You should have seen him yesterday.”
“What happened yesterday?”
“He was in full-on asshat mode.”
“I heard that,” Keith said.
“Good for you,” Wash said.
Ana raised both eyebrows at Wash but said nothing.
They walked on, following in Keith’s footprints, but Wash allowed the other man to get ahead of them while still keeping him within sight at all times.
And within close enough proximity for a handgun…
Twenty-Two
Jasper looked different on the return. Of course, this time Wash had the benefit of entering it while conscious, with the man in charge leading the way.
Like most places that had survived The Purge and remained standing—sometimes even thriving afterward—Jasper had returned to its Western roots. There was a single main street in the center flanked by brick and mortar buildings. The barn where Wash had been kept was on the south end, his “prison” purposefully chosen because of its distance from the rest of the population. There were lampposts along the wooden plank sidewalks, but they were dark, which had made it difficult to get a full view of the place earlier—and still did now.
“No lights?” Wash asked as he, Ana, and Chris trailed behind Keith.
Keith led the way, just as he had for the last mile or so. Wash hadn’t realized how far he’d run, but the no-name town was at least five miles west of Jasper. He had only made it halfway before he was intercepted by Keith.
Wash thought he could see curtains moving to his right, along with round shapes peeking out that might have been faces. The windows were protected with metal rebar, and he assumed the doors were reinforced similarly on the other side. Jasper may have struck a deal with One Eye, but they’d had to brave other ghouls in the past, just like every other place Wash had gone through in recent years.
“Lights need fuel,” Keith was saying. “Those don’t grow out of the desert. We got used to it.”
Wash shot a quick glance over his shoulder at the wall of darkness behind them. They were hours away from morning, and there could have been one or two—or a hundred—ghouls out there watching him back and he wouldn’t know it.
“We know at least one ghoul is watching us, don’t we?” the Old Man asked.
One Eye.
“Oh yeah, he’s definitely not going anywhere tonight, kid.”
Let him come.
“Be careful what you wish for!”
A door opened in front and to the right of them, and a man holding a shotgun stepped outside a dark building. He was wearing pajamas and a winter coat and had a long white beard. The wooden floorboards creaked under his weight.
“Keith,” the man said, “what’s happening? Who’re they?”
“Go back inside and lock your door, Jim,” Keith said.
“Who’re they?” the man named Jim asked again.
“Don’t worry about them. Go back inside, and do what I say. Make sure everyone else stays where they are, too.”
“You gonna tell me what happened? All the shooting stopped.”
“Dammit, Jim, do what I say for once.”
Jim grunted, and Wash thought he was about to keep arguing but must have thought better of it, because he disappeared back into his building. Wash glimpsed a woman, also with white hair, peering out at them from inside just before Jim closed the door.
“How many people do you have here?” Wash asked Keith.
“Fifty-two,” Keith said. Then, “Fifty-one.”
Ana gave Wash a questioning look, and he mouthed back, “I’ll tell you later.”
They continued following Keith, who led them a few more meters before stepping up onto the sidewalk and to a small red one-story building that didn’t look like anything special. At least nothing that would indicate t
his was where the leader of Jasper spent his days and nights.
That leader took out a key, unlocking first the security gate over the door, then the door itself. “Inside,” Keith said, holding the door open for them while his eyes roamed the darkness.
Ana and Chris went in first, but Wash lingered next to Keith.
“It’s out there,” Wash said. “You know that.”
“No shit,” Keith said.
“Just wanted to make sure we’re on the same wavelength.”
Wash slipped into the building, and Keith followed. There were two pieces of lumber leaning against the wall nearby, and Keith picked them up and slid them over the door, using latches to hold them in place.
“You expecting trouble?” Wash asked.
“Like you said, it’s out there,” Keith said.
They stood in what looked like a spacious studio apartment with a fireplace in the back and a kitchen next to it. Another door on the left was probably either the bathroom or the closet. If the exterior hadn’t looked particularly outstanding, the interior was just confirmation.
Keith walked over to a lantern on the kitchen counter and struck a match, then put the fire to the wick. As light slowly filled the room, it occurred to Wash that they might be in the only building in the entire town that had any lights on whatsoever.
“You sure that’s a good idea?” Wash asked.
“It already knows we’re here,” Keith said. “Damn thing’s been watching us for a while now.”
Ana gave Wash a startled look before turning to Keith. “It was out there with us the entire time?”
“Either it or one of its black eyes,” Keith said. “Probably one of the black eyes. Point is, it knows we’re here. It knows what building.”
Ana glanced over at Wash with a Should we really be standing here with this crazy asshat? look.
“There’s not exactly a lot of choices out there,” Wash said. “This is the best option. It also just happens to be our only option.”
Ana didn’t look convinced.
Wash turned to Keith. “What about the others? The other fifty-one people in town?”
“Fifty,” Keith said. “I’m fifty-one.”
“Fifty. Fifty-one. Whatever.”
Keith went to the kitchen and opened a fridge. There were no lights and no electricity to keep anything inside cool, which explained why the bottle of water he took out and tossed to Wash was warm. Keith kept one for himself.
“There’s three of us,” Wash said.
“Share,” Keith said.
The Jasper man walked to an armchair in a corner and slumped down with a heavy grunt. It was next to a pallet with what looked like a comfortable mattress on top of it that Wash hadn’t seen earlier in the darkness but was hard to miss now with the candlelight. Keith drained his bottle of water and leaned back, looking for all intents and purposes like a beaten man who had already accepted his fate.
Wash didn’t have to twist his bottle’s cap very hard to open it. The plastic seal was already broken.
“It’s purified,” Keith said when he saw the way Wash stared at the bottle. “Relax.”
Yeah right, relax, Wash thought as he took a small drink before handing it to Ana. She did the same, then passed it over to Chris.
The two women walked over to one side of the room and sat down on the floor, leaning back with tired sighs against the brick wall. Wash exchanged a look with Ana. She’d wiped most of the blood off her face and chin, but not everything. It was difficult to see all the specks in the flickering light of Keith’s lantern, but it was obvious she was hurt in more places than just the ones he could see.
He walked over and crouched in front of her before taking out the bottle of painkillers that Lyla had given him. He shook one out for himself—there were a dozen or so left inside—and handed the rest over to Ana.
“What is it?” Ana asked.
“Painkiller,” Wash said.
“But what is it?”
He shrugged. “Don’t know, but it works.”
Ana turned the bottle over, looking for a nonexistent label.
“It’s good stuff,” Wash said.
“How good?” Ana asked.
“They had me hanging from a rope inside a barn for twenty-four hours. As soon as I got out, I ran nearly two—maybe three—miles to where you were. And I don’t feel a thing.”
That last part wasn’t entirely true, but Ana was convinced and shook out two of the pills for herself, then spent a few seconds looking them over, too. Like the bottle they came in, the white pills had nothing on them to indicate what they were.
She gave him a doubtful look.
“Trust me,” Wash said.
She downed both pills with the leftover water from the bottle.
“Can I have some?” Chris asked.
Ana took out one and passed it over to the teen.
“Just one?” Chris said.
“That’s all you need,” Ana said.
“My bones hurt.”
“Are they broken?”
“I don’t know. They feel broken.”
“You could still walk just fine. So they’re not broken.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. All you need is one.”
The teenager frowned but took the small white pill and swallowed it down with water. Unlike Wash and Ana, she grimaced at the taste.
“Where did she go?” Keith asked from the other side of the room.
Wash glanced over. “Who?”
“Lyla.”
“East.”
“That’s it? East?”
“I don’t know the area. You dragged me here while I was unconscious, remember?”
“Technically, I didn’t drag you here,” Keith said.
“Drag you here?” Ana said, raising both eyebrows at Wash.
“Long story,” he said.
“Of course it is.”
Wash stood up and turned to Keith. The Jasper man was firmly planted in his corner armchair, the nearby light reflecting off his placid face. His AR leaned against the wall next to him within easy reach, not that he seemed to be in anything even remotely approaching an alarmed state. Keith still had that resigned look about him.
“Do they know?” Keith asked.
It took a second or two before Wash understood the question.
He shook his head. “No.”
“Know what?” Ana asked.
“Why ol’ One Eye’s got such a hard-on for him,” Keith said. He stared at Wash. “The way it talks about you, I got the feeling it was very personal. So what’s the story?”
“Yeah, Wash, what’s the story?” Ana asked.
Wash didn’t answer them right away. How much to tell? How much to leave out? Could they really understand if he spilled everything? He’d learned a long time ago that civilians could never fully grasp what slayers did or why. Oh, they knew the superficial stuff—the PTSD, the revenge factor. But they never dug deep under the surface. Most of them never cared to try.
“Well?” Keith said when Wash didn’t say anything.
So Wash told them, but not everything.
When he was finished, Ana said, “Jesus, Wash.”
“Hell of a story,” Keith said. “And you’re right; they do like to play games. I’ve seen that up close and personal.”
“I thought you’d be pissed after what happened out there,” Wash said.
“I am.”
“You don’t look pissed.”
“It is what it is.” Keith shrugged. “I was—really pissed, I mean—when it didn’t drop the way you said it would.”
“You didn’t shoot it where I told you to shoot it.”
“Besides the point,” Keith said, waving a dismissive hand. “I was angry, until I saw it running away. It ran away.”
“It ran away?” Ana said.
Wash nodded. “It ran away.”
“But you missed.”
“I didn’t miss. It blocked my shot.”
; “It blocked your shot? How did it block your shot?” Then, before Wash could say it, “I know, I know, you’ll explain later.”
He smiled and turned back to Keith.
“I saw it flee,” Keith said. “It didn’t fight back. It didn’t attack. It ran away from there as fast as it could. It was afraid,” he repeated, like he couldn’t believe it unless he said it again. “I’ve never seen them afraid. I’ve never seen it afraid before.”
Then Keith smiled.
Wash wasn’t sure how to respond to that. It was partially comforting—Keith wasn’t mad, and he wasn’t going to shoot Wash anytime soon—but at the same time, there was a slight unhinged quality to that smile…
“I missed, and so did you—” Keith said.
“I didn’t miss,” Wash said.
“—but we scared it,” Keith continued. “It’ll come back. Probably tonight. Definitely tonight. It’s a long, long way to morning. It won’t forgive me for what I did. That’s a given. But now I know I can kill it.”
“All it takes is one shot,” Wash said.
“The brain.”
“Put a round in its brain, and it’s goodnight, Irene.”
“Yeah,” Keith said, and grinned.
“Who’s Irene?” Chris asked.
“It’s the title of a song,” Ana said. Then, to Wash, “You said it’s going to come back. Here. Tonight.”
He nodded. “Yes.”
“There’s no doubt about it,” Keith said.
“It was hurt, and it fled, but it’s going to recover,” Wash said. “And when it does, it’ll come to finish what we started.” He stared back at Keith. “You were at that town. The one that was on fire. How many ghouls does it have left?”
Keith thought about it before answering. Then, “The guys who set up the ambush got a lot of them. More than I thought they would.”
“He’s right,” Ana said. “I saw dozens of dead nightcrawlers. They were using silver bullets.”
“So how many does that leave?” Wash asked Keith. “How many can it still throw at us? It has to be a limited number.”
“It is,” Keith nodded.
“You got a number for me?”
Again, Keith thought about it.
“They’re coming here?” Wash heard Chris asking Ana, the teenager almost whispering the question.