Nicole simply nodded, keeping her eyes on the list.
“David is in charge of security,” Jared continued, “and he’s a damn fine look-out, too, from what I understand. Don’t you think so, Alec-SUH?”
Alex clenched his fists, wondering if Nicole would keep looking at her lists if he punched Jared in the face.
“Kaitlyn is responsible for the other girl,” Jared looked to Nicole. “Hannah, right?”
Nicole nodded once again.
“She’s kinda a babysitter. Which is good, because some people here are too young to be able to do much else. Isn’t that right, Alec-suh?”
Alex felt his fingernails digging into his palms as they became more and more clammy.
“So,” Jared said, pen in hand, “what is it that you do here, Alec-suh?”
“What?” Alex blurted, angry that he had been asked such a question.
“I’m sorry, did he not understand me?” Jared asked Nicole. “What can you do around here? You know, like a job. Like the rest of us.”
Alex pictured his response: he’d stare Jared down—stare him into silence. Then he’d turn to leave, but first, he’d whip back around and slug him right in the face. Jared would spin, cartoon style, and flop down onto his stupid lists.
But instead, he just turned and left.
“Okay, Alec!” Jared called to him. “I’ll just put a question mark for now, okay? Thanks!”
As he stomped down the hall to visit Shadow—his last loyal friend—Alex noticed that the others were doing their jobs, just like Jared had told them to.
He spent the next few hours with his dog, keeping out of other people’s way. He didn’t want to interfere with their “jobs,” now that they were given them by President Jared and Vice President Nicole. After some time, David came in looking for something. He seemed surprised to see Alex.
“Oh, hey,” he said as he entered. “I thought you went out.”
“What? Where would I go?”
“I dunno,” David shrugged. “Taking Shadow for a walk or something? I dunno. Jared just said that—”
“Well, Jared doesn’t know everything,” Alex snapped. “He doesn’t know much, actually.”
David continued looking around the room. An uncomfortable silence passed between them. Shadow approached David, looking for fresh hands to pat her.
“You know, he’s not that bad,” David said, scratching Shadow behind her ear. “He’s even going to help me move the dead guys from the spikes outside.”
“Good for him.” After a moment, he caught what the other boy had just said. “What? The dead-dead mudmen? I thought—”
“They’re not really made of mud, you know,” David said with a shrug. “They’re just dead, right? Jared says—”
“I don’t really care what Jared says, okay, David?” Alex said, standing up to leave.
David beat him to it as he backed toward the door himself. “Oh. Okay.” He seemed shocked that someone wouldn’t care about what his new hero had to say. “I was just ... letting you know that we were going to take care of it.”
“Great,” Alex said, as he went back to petting Shadow. “Have fun.”
“Um ... okay.” David started out the door, then stopped. “Alex?”
Alex sighed. He really did not want to hear more from the Jared fan-club. “What?”
“Um ...” David said.
Though he wasn’t looking, Alex pictured him glancing awkwardly around the room, avoiding eye contact.
“Pretty soon, I’m gonna set up the SPLICER! It’s finished. I figured, once the dead guys from outside are gone, it would be a good time to get it set up, especially if no more show up.”
“Is Jared helping you with that, too?” Alex asked, still refusing to look at him.
“I dunno. He’s pretty busy, so I didn’t really ask him. But yeah ... I figure it’s probably a two-person job anyways, so, yeah ... if you wanna help with it? You know ... since you helped me with the plans.”
Alex finally looked at him and saw something like sincerity in his face. “Sure, yeah. I can help.” He smiled. “I wanna see if it works as good as you said it would.”
“Oh, it will,” David said, with a grin. “We kinda tested it, but only at, like, half the strength. I’ll put it up to full blast, so that when a mudman ... er, dead guy comes at it—WHAM!”
Alex smiled, excited about the possibilities. “After lunch?”
“Oh.” David looked like he was lost for words. “After lunch, me and Jared—”
Alex sighed and nodded. “Maybe after that, then.” He sat back on the floor with Shadow. He didn’t watch David leave.
After Alex ate his own lunch—a bowl of cereal and half a can of peas and carrots—he took a plate of canned ham to Shadow. She quickly lapped it up; evidently, she didn’t understand the value of rationing. He took the same meal he had eaten into Kyle’s room. Since they had found him, he and Nicole had split duty on bringing the dazed boy food and checking in on him.
Kyle hadn’t had any more outbursts, or attacked anyone again, but he didn’t react much to anyone at all. If they left some food behind, he would eat it. When they came back, they usually found the bowls or plates destroyed, and some of the food splattered on the walls and floor. No one was really sure why. Kyle was just ... different.
Alex remembered once when he was at his grandmother’s house, he saw a cat run under her back patio. When he tried to call the cat out, it hissed and screamed at him even when he offered it food.
“What’s wrong with your cat, Gramma?”
“It’s not my cat,” she replied, helping him to his feet.
“Well, whose cat is it?”
“No one’s.”
He didn’t understand. Someone had to own it. “What’s wrong with it? Why won’t it eat?”
“It’s just her way,” his grandmother answered. “She won’t come out unless she wants to. Not even for me, and I’ve been feeding her for months.”
“Why do you feed her, Gramma? Maybe she’ll get fed by whoever owns her.”
She smiled at him. “No one would feed her, honey. She’s feral. She takes care of herself because no one else does. Now, come on inside. She won’t eat if anybody’s watching.” She led him inside and gave him a meal, and he quickly forgot all about the cat under the patio. Until now.
“What’s wrong with him? Is he sick or just dumb or what?”
Jared was standing in the doorway.
“There’s nothing wrong with him,” Alex answered, with disdain. “It’s just his way.”
“Yeah, well, what else is his way?” Jared asked, entering the room. “If he’s just eating and sitting around while the rest of us do stuff—well, not all of us.” He smiled at Alex as passed him. “That’s just not fair, is it?”
Alex watched him approach the small, seemingly-vacant boy.
“What are you doing?” he asked, as Jared stood over Kyle.
“I’m just gonna talk to him.”
“He can’t talk.” Alex wondered if this was just Jared messing with him more, or messing with Kyle, or just plain ignorant.
“Of course he can talk!” Jared laughed. “He’s not a friggin’ baby!” He nudged Kyle with his foot. “Hey! Hey kid! What’s up? You can talk, right? You’re not retarded, right? Or are you?”
Kyle did nothing. Jared shoved him a little harder.
“Knock it off!” Alex said, grabbing Jared’s shoulder. When Jared stared back at him, he realized it was the first time he had ever stood up to the bully.
“Fuck off, Alec,” Jared said, pushing him away. “You shouldn’t mommy him like this. I know you don’t have a lot of experience with moms, but still.”
Alex didn’t know what to do. He could stand up to Jared, but it might not have any effect other than getting shoved around some more.
Jared nudged Kyle much harder—bordering on a kick. “Come on, kid. Stop fakin’!” He kicked again. “Stop being—”
The words caught in his throat
as Kyle suddenly leapt on top of him. Alex almost couldn’t believe his eyes. After the briefest flash on Kyle’s face—like he finally noticed something was happening—he was in the air, then on the ground with Jared between him and the tile. He screamed into Jared’s face, clawing at him.
Kyle’s face was pure rage. Jared’s face was nothing but fear.
“Get him off! Get him off! Jesus Christ, get him off!”
Alex took a step forward, his instinct to help taking over, but he stopped himself. Looking at Jared—the boy who had caused him so many problems over his life—lying on the floor, totally at the mercy of a boy less than half his size, he realized there was no rush. Kyle wouldn’t actually hurt Jared, just scare the crap out of him. Alex smiled, hoping that Jared would wet his pants or at least cry.
“Alex! Jesus Christ! Get him off me!”
That was long enough. He didn’t want Jared to defend himself and hurt Kyle. Alex got behind Kyle, put his arms around the small, flailing, clawing arms, and picked him up in a bear hug. Jared scrambled backwards as Kyle hung in Alex’s arms, still kicking and screaming.
The others arrived.
“What the hell is happening?” Nicole yelled, coming into the room.
Before Alex could explain what Jared had been doing—provoking if not downright attacking Kyle—Jared spoke up.
“Alex got that kid to attack me!” He glared across the room at the screaming child. “He’s crazy! He shouldn’t be here! I was just trying to talk to him, and he went nuts on me! Look at my face!” He showed his fresh scratches and the trickle of blood coming from his nose. “He’s fucked! Attacking people for no reason!”
“It wasn’t for no reason! He—”
“It doesn’t matter! Shut up, you’re only making him worse!” Nicole patted Kyle on the head, trying to calm him. He screamed nonsense and tried to bite her.
“Jesus, he’s trying to bite her now!” Jared shouted, now on his feet. “He’s one of those fucking dead guys! We gotta get rid of him!”
“He’s not going anywhere! He’s fine! You’re an idiot, and you shouldn’t have kicked him and—”
“Alex!” Nicole yelled, then quickly fell into a whisper with the same amount of threat in it. “Stop it. Now. Get out of here. Now. You’re making this worse.”
“But—”
“Stop.”
Alex put Kyle down, and Nicole held him the same way, making sure he wouldn’t get hurt or hurt anyone else.
“Yeah, Alec,” Jared sneered, “get out of here so we can—”
“You too, Jared,” Nicole said, calmly. “You’re just as bad. Go. Everyone go. He needs to quiet down.”
Jared looked at each of them before stomping away. “Come on, David. Let’s go get rid of those dead fuckers outside.”
Alex wanted to smirk at Jared’s little tantrum, but instead he was frozen, looking into David’s conflicted eyes. David looked at his sister, then at Alex, then quickly followed Jared.
DAVID
“I do not get those guys,” Jared complained. “They treat me like shit, but they have some fuckin’ crazy kid, and he’s, what? A saint?”
David shrugged. He felt uneasy about the whole blowout that had just happened upstairs. Jared had even frightened him a little, but he knew he didn’t want to be in the situation any longer, which is why he was now outside doing something he had been dreading for days.
Also, he didn’t want to look lame in front of Jared. And they hadn’t seen any mudmen—other than the one that Alex claimed to have seen at Hannah’s house—in a few days. Things might even be clearing up, getting better.
“How do you put up with that bitch?” Jared asked, as he grabbed onto one of the piked mudmen and pushed it off.
“What?” David asked, confused. He hadn’t been paying attention to most of what Jared had been saying. He was still afraid to touch a mudman with a board, so he was both awestruck and disgusted that Jared did it with his hands. At least he was wearing gloves.
Jared motioned over his shoulder to the upstairs window and shook his head with disgust. “Them!”
“Oh,” David said, looking up at the window. He saw Alex looking out from the bedroom. “Them. Yeah. They’re ...” He didn’t know what to say. Clearly Jared didn’t like them, but they were his friends, not to mention his sister. “They’re not that bad.”
“That’s bullshit,” Jared said, as he wiped some of the black goop that covered his gloves on to his heavy coat.
He took his gloves off and walked around the pikes to the crumpled mudmen. He crouched down beside the one he had just pushed off.
“What are you doing?”
“What does it look like?” Jared replied with a sneer, as he dropped the gloves on the ground and pulled back the creature’s filth-encrusted coat. “I’m checking to see if this guy has anything good on him.”
“Oh,” David said, trying very hard to not hyperventilate, “Um ... why?”
“Jesus,” Jared said, pulling his hands out and glaring at David. “If it bothers you, just keep an eye on the windows up there. Those shits will want anything good I find. If they don’t know, we can keep it, all right?”
“Oh,” David said, glad to have the excuse to turn away from what he saw as the grossest example of grave-robbing he could think of. “Yeah. Sure ... that makes sense.” He spat out a fake chuckle as he looked up at the window. Alex was no longer watching them.
“I can’t believe you guys left these pieces of shit up here so long,” he heard Jared say from behind him. “They stink like shit. Probably lead a bunch more right to ya. They love the smell of shit. They—” He started screaming.
David jumped and whirled. A mudman had Jared pinned against the barricade; two more were a few feet from them. Jared screamed as he tried to shove the thing away, but because of all the blood and filth on the ground beneath him, it was a losing battle; he couldn’t get any traction.
David froze, expecting at any moment to watch his new friend get eaten right in front of him.
It ended with a quick THUD and a SPLAT!
The sound made David realize he had closed his eyes, though he didn’t remember doing so. When he opened them, Jared was still pinned against the barricade and the mudman still stood over him.
No. No, he realized, the mudman now lay on top of the one Jared had been looting. It was Alex who stood in front of him. He held a board; one end splattered in blood where he had just crushed the head of the mudman attacking Jared.
“Get inside,” Alex yelled. “Now!”
Jared jumped at the first words, then scrambled to his feet, slipping in the entrails that had spilled under the barricade. When he was around it, he bolted, tears streaming down his face.
David stood, still frozen, as he watched Alex slowly move around the barricade, keeping his eyes on the approaching mudmen. “Come on, David,” he said calmly, over his shoulder. “We gotta get inside.”
With that, the two boys slowly crept away from the creatures, then ran to the centre, slamming the door behind them.
ALEX
Alex wasn’t sure where Jared had gone, and he didn’t really care. He hoped Jared would be so freaked out by his near-death experience that he ran past the building completely and out of Alex’s life forever. At least until everything went back to normal. Thinking about it, Alex realized that he would actually accept Jared as a part of his life if it meant that everything went back to the way it was before.
For now, he was glad to have a break.
David didn’t want to talk about what had happened outside; the fact that he had let his guard down. Even though the mudmen went for Jared first, it could just as easily have been him attacked from behind. Alex wasn’t sure if David was in shock, or just wanted to ignore it. Maybe it even inspired David—seeing the creatures so close again, so ferocious and terrible. Whatever it was, David just wanted to get to work on the SPLICER!
They carried all the individual pieces down to the lobby. David claimed that once th
e pieces were outside, they would just snap into place. With the blade secured it would be, as he put it, “ready to slice and dice.” Looking at the pile of screws and tools David was taking with him to assemble the contraption, Alex knew it would not be that simple. However, he liked the idea of having something to do—a distraction from the events of the day so far.
After checking the area carefully, and suiting up in double their usual armour, they started taking pieces outside—just outside—the door. Though they didn’t say anything, both boys knew neither wanted to get too far from safety.
David checked with Alex on every move he made. At first, Alex thought nothing of it. Then, when it continued, he assumed that it was just David needing to be told that he was right. After what had to be the tenth question, Alex realized David was looking to him for leadership. The more he thought about it, the more confident he felt. He had saved a life—two lives, really. And one was the life of someone he didn’t even like! Even Nicole hadn’t done that. As much as she claimed to dislike him, Alex knew he was growing on her. In fact, it was likely that she, too, was looking up to him now. Perhaps they all were. He was practically a hero. That’s why David had asked him to help with this important task. Because important tasks went to important people.
Shadow went out with them—every hero needs a loyal companion. Alex walked her a few feet from the door. At first, he tried to avoid looking at the pile of mudmen in front of the barrier. He quickly realized, however, that ignoring anything in the area around him wasn’t smart; that’s how Jared had almost gotten himself killed.
Thinking back on it, a little part of him wished he had just let it happen when he saw the mudmen approaching from the end of the street. He couldn’t call out to Jared and David—that would have brought others. He could just do nothing, and a major problem in his life would be gone—forever! That thought had stayed with him for a few seconds before he found he was heading downstairs, his weapon already in hand. He just didn’t have it in him.
Rise of the Mudmen Page 27