Outcasts

by Alan Janney

  I paused. Isaac Anderson was…here. At Chase Jackson’s house. Not at the Outlaw’s house. At Chase Jackson’s house.

  I observed, “You just called me Chase.”

  “I’ve known your identity for several weeks. I tracked you, but never told anyone. Get your stuff.”

  “Wha-”

  He blurted, “Tank’s loose. The Chemist freed him from his cell last night.”

  My heart turned cold. “Katie. Tank will try to see her again.”

  The world came crashing in. I had noticed sirens in the distance. Helicopter blades beating.

  He said, “Even worse, a large force of Hyper Terrorists broke through the military’s barricade fifteen minutes ago. Chosen. We’re trying to track them, but they’re fast. My guess is they are coming here. Soon”

  I woke up in a hurry. Coming here. That meant the Chemist discovered my name. Tank must have told him. And my address. And now his Chosen were on the way.

  Last autumn, the Chemist threatened to kill Katie in front of me. “I’ll pack. You get Katie. The Chemist could have used my address to figure out hers.”

  He pushed me inside and towards the stairs. “I have an agent banging on her door this second, and a helicopter on the way. Let’s go, Outlaw, get your gear.”

  I sprinted up the steps, my focus growing laser-sharp. I needed to alert Samantha. And Dad. Puck must be asleep. I yelled over my shoulder, “Call Shooter! Get her to Katie’s place.”

  “Already done. She’s on her way.”

  “How’d the Chemist get to Tank?

  “Bribery, most likely, and three dead guards. Haven’t had a chance to investigate.”

  I located my duffle-bag beneath a pile of clutter and started throwing clothes and Outlaw gear into it. Anderson inspected my bedroom with interest.

  I asked, “Where did Tank go, any guesses?”

  “Cameras caught him diving into the Los Angeles Harbor and swimming out to sea.”

  “You’ll never get him. He could probably swim to Hawaii.”

  “He’ll have a hard time hiding. Too big.”

  I froze. Something was…here. I felt it. Smelled it. My skin crawled. The disease inside flared to live, like a dog’s hackles rising.

  A kid about my age stood in the bedroom doorway, wearing a red windbreaker, jeans, sneakers. He pointed a gun at Special Agent Isaac Anderson’s back.

  I knew him. In my mind his name was Baby Face. He and I’d met once, six months ago, on the rooftop of Hollywood Presbyterian Medical. He was Infected, in the employ of my enemy.

  His eyes were wide and wild, fixed on me. The gun in his hands shook, and his breath came fast and ragged. He didn’t have the mental strength for violence.

  “Hey kid,” I said. My heart had jumpstarted to a thousand beats per minute. I wanted to help him. I wanted to kill him.

  Isaac turned, startled. His hand dropped to the pistol on his belt.

  “Don’t,” I warned. “He’s faster than you. A lot faster.”

  Baby Face thumbed back his pistol’s hammer. We didn’t move. My body had begun swelling. Pants and shirt growing smaller. In another twenty seconds, his bullets would no longer matter. Fury and urgency were hurricanes inside my skull.

  I said, “You don’t want to do this.”

  He closed his mouth and pressed his lips into a hard line.

  I continued, “I’m leaving. Someone important to me is about to be killed or taken. So I’m going.”

  He shook his head and tried to speak.

  I said, “I want you to come with us. We need you. And you need us.”

  “Outlaw,” he panted. He was sweating, close to tears, battling the same madness as me.

  “You don’t need him,” I said. “You belong with me.”

  “They’re coming,” he whispered.

  “Who?”

  “All of them.”

  Anderson grunted under his breath, “Oh Christ.”

  I said, “You’re better than them, kid. Come with me.”

  He shook his head and lowered the gun. “Go. Go now, Outlaw. Someone has to stop him.”

  “We need your help. You’re with us,” I said. I pulled the duffle bag strap over my shoulder and picked up the heavy Thunder Stick.

  “Run,” he said. “And remember me.”

  Below us, on the first floor, windows shattered. Howls of insanity throttled through hallways.

  Anderson snapped a radio to his mouth and shouted, “Enemy on the premises! Requesting air support!”

  We egressed onto the rooftop. The Chosen came like a deranged tsunami, sprinting backyards. Hundreds, still thin from their months in a coma, wearing rags, moving faster than humanly possible. They ran in frenzy, trampling the fallen, vaulting cars, screaming.

  How did they all know where to go?? The sea of humanity surged over the road and spilled onto lawns.

  “Air support is too far. We’re trapped,” Anderson noted.

  “Where’s that chopper?”

  He pointed eastwards. Above the squat houses and commercial buildings and palm trees, a Black Hawk helicopter was climbing into the sky several minutes away.

  Katie’s apartment was half a mile north.

  I had to shout above the screams. “Stay here! They’ll follow me.”

  “I recommend remaining here. We can keep them off the roof.”

  “They’ll swarm us. Some will be Jumpers. I’m getting Katie. Shoot anything that tries to come through that window.”

  I Jumped and landed in the street, barefoot. Savages poured from my home, disintegrating the front wall. They flipped over Anderson’s car. If I didn’t move I’d be swept away like a pebble before a wave.

  I Moved, like an Olympic sprinter on speed with the throttle wide open. The Chosen were fast, but not Outlaw-fast. I raced down the street. Samantha’s truck was parked on the grass at Katie’s building, and her heavy pistols roared from within.

  The Chosen were already there!?

  The trap sprang. They fell on me from hidden spots in evergreen trees, all teeth and claws. Screaming and hitting and scratching. Bodies piled on until the sun blacked out. Dozens. The combined weight crushed me. I couldn’t get to my feet. No leverage, face first, flat on the earth. My arms were pinned. Higher and higher the mountain climbed. My chest couldn’t expand to draw air. The noise was obscene and loud. They bit and tore, white hot pain.

  I couldn’t hit. Couldn’t kick. But I could elbow. I began pumped my arms backwards as far as possible, driving iron elbows into flesh. Harder and harder, faster, farther, like pistons, pulping and moving bodies trapped above me. I cleared space until I could pivot my torso. Finally, a little room. I bucked and shoved at the ground, breaking the human mountain’s foundation, carving out a small cave, large enough to barely get my feet underneath my body. I exploded upwards, over and again, like a volcano trying to erupt, my shoulders and skull punishing anyone above me. Bones broke. Flesh surrendered. Finally I reached blue sky and fresh air.

  The horde focused blindly on me. The two girls raced unseen to Samantha’s truck. Katie still wore her pajamas, pink pants and white tank top, and her hair was tied up. She got behind the wheel and gunned the engine.

  “Outlaw, get your ass over here!” Samantha shouted. She climbed into the truck bed and picked up an assault rifle.

  I roared and tore free from desperate clawing hands. Leapt clear of the mountain. The masses turned like a singular animal and followed me. Truck wheels boiled into dirt and the vehicle leapt forward. Samantha opened fire. Bursts of three rounds each dropping a human being.

  I reached the truck easily. But so did the Chosen. I anchored beside Samantha in the back and wielded the Rod like a sword. Any savage that survived Samantha’s murderous hail of bullets met the Boom Stick, solid thumps to their cranium.

  I needed to pick and stick with a name. Thunder Stick, maybe. I liked that one.

  “Faster!” Samantha called to Katie. Our truck raced out of the suburbs, shedding bodies. The Five w
as dead ahead, under the distant Hollywood sign. Katie cut across a lawn, ruined a hedge of green boxwoods, and squealed onto the entrance ramp. “Faster!”

  We tore onto the Interstate and brought the storm of chaos with us, a black dragon of bodies profaning beautiful Los Angeles. Nearby police sirens wailed. Two helicopters closed.

  My phone rang. Somehow, in the midst of mayhem, I heard and felt it. I knocked on the truck cabin’s rear window. Katie slid it open and said, “I’m a little busy, handsome.”

  “Eyes on the road! Phone’s for you.” I dropped the device onto the passenger chair.

  “Who is it?”

  “No idea. Might be important. Take a message.”

  I turned back to the nightmare chasing us, and heard her say, “Hello, this is Katie. Hi Puck! I’m good, how’re you?”

  My girlfriend is so cool.

  We swerved into the HOV, barreling past slower traffic and accelerating to thirty-five miles per hour, forty, forty-five, fifty, and put some distance between us and our pursuers. They couldn’t keep up. Samantha’s rifle clattered to the metal truck bed and she reloaded a pistol. “One more magazine,” she called above the wind. “THIS is why you needed to MOVE!”

  “You were right.”

  “I was right,” she snapped.

  “I know!”

  “You have bite marks all over you. Good thing they aren’t zombies; I’d have to shoot you.”

  “I already have their disease.”

  “Yeah well. Maybe I should shoot you anyway.”

  We staggered and nearly fell as Katie sideswiped a Lexus. “Sorry!” she called.

  “Easy on my truck, Lopez!”

  “Puck is on the phone. He’s coordinating with the FBI. A helicopter is landing a mile ahead to pick us up.”

  “Where?”

  “In the middle of the road.”

  We inspected the pack of animals still chasing us, fifty yards back. Their eyes burned.

  “This is going to be close,” Samantha yelled, now eyeballing the Black Hawk settling northwards. “Tell them to warm up their fifty cal. We’ll need it.”

  Katie’s calm voice drifted back to us. “Hello, Puck? Would you please advise the pilot to prepare his or her fifty caliber machine gun?”

  I observed, “She’s handling this really well.”

  “Nerves of steel,” Samantha nodded. “She’s a tough one.”

  Thirty second later, the Black Hawk landed and immediately stalled northbound traffic. Instant collisions. Our truck ground to a halt three hundred yards away, at the backup.

  I said, “Let’s go.”

  Katie climbed down from the truck and I hauled her onto my back. “Hold tight,” I cautioned.

  “Always.”

  Samantha sprinted into the congestion, and I Jumped. Katie and I launched into the morning haze, twenty, thirty, forty feet high. She gasped and tightened her grip. We soared towards the Black Hawk and then plummeted back, my heart in my throat. I softened our fall, bracing and bending knees at the last instant, surging forward and crumpling car roofs. One more leap and we landed twenty feet from spinning blades.

  “Move, move, move!” Samantha cried. I helped Katie into the metal gunner bay and turned to see Samantha leap over the final car. The closest Chosen were Jumpers and Sprinters, and they burst through the traffic jam twenty yards behind. The pilot swore loud enough for us to hear. Engines roared and we lifted off. There was no .50 caliber machine gun, but the FBI agent at the door began firing his rifle. At ten feet, Samantha Leapt the distance to our crowded gunner bay. She slammed into me but I held my ground, like part of the fuselage.

  Three heartbeats later, the Chosen began Jumping but we were too high. They fell short. Our pilot kept climbing, as though he couldn’t get far enough away from the freaks. We were safe.

  The pilot yelled, “We’re going to get Special Agent Anderson. I hear he’s trapped and lonely on a roof!”

  We sat and panted and trembled on the shaking deck. Below, Chosen scrambled and retreated as police moved in with weapons blazing. The trail of destruction we left was a stain across an otherwise perfect canvas, a rip in the fabric.

  “Well,” I said, taking deep breaths to calm my nerves. “Isaac will have his blood samples now.”

  The FBI agent in the gunner bay stared at me. I bet I looked ridiculous, covered in bites and holding a stick.

  “Hey Outlaw,” Katie said. She smiled sadly. “You forgot something.”

  “What?”

  “To put your mask on.”

  Whoops.

  I felt like I’d been dumped in ice water. The FBI agent was staring at Chase Jackson, inspecting him like a fascinating zoo animal. The Outlaw’s true identity, now exposed. Hundreds of people saw me on the interstate. The media would figure out quickly whose house had been attacked.

  My secret was out. And there was no going back.

  Chapter Five

  Friday, January 5. 2019

  Our Black Hawk touched down at the Los Angeles International Airport, but media had already arrived. The dormant facility’s skeleton crew couldn’t keep out the swarm of incoming press, and we were forced to take off again immediately to avoid the circus. Not even the adjacent Air Force base was safe from cameramen and rabid reporters.

  The pilot called back, “We’re heading southeast. We’ll outrace those bloodsuckers across the city.”

  I shot him a thumbs-up.

  “I flew you last October, sir,” he said. He grinned over his shoulder at me. The helmet visor was down so we only saw his nose and mouth. “Over the Pacific, up to the Greyhound. Special Agent Anderson and I, we make a good team.”

  I yelled, “Then I know we’re in good hands.”

  “I’ll fly you anywhere, sir!”

  “Careful what you wish for.”

  “Name’s Mike Matthews.” He jerked a thumb at himself. “The Outlaw’s personal pilot!”

  His enthusiasm surprised me. One reason I wore the mask was because I assumed I’d lose everyone’s respect when they saw my face and my youth. But Mike Matthews looked straight at Chase Jackson with unabated trust. That was reassuring. As if reading my thoughts, Katie nudged me and winked.

  Anderson was on his phone the entire time, updating us with a hand over the receiver.

  He told Katie, “Highway Patrol is escorting your mother to her sister’s. They’ll both be taken to a safe house near San Diego.”

  “Thank you,” Katie said. She visibly unclenched, some of the stress draining out of her. Her eyes vacantly watched the palm trees below as wind tossed strands of her hair.

  “Outlaw, we have a police detail staying with your father. He refuses to leave active duty, but he’ll start sleeping at the station.”

  Samantha Gear sniffed her approval. She was texting with Carter and PuckDaddy.

  Anderson continued, “He’s seen pictures of your destroyed house. He says you’re grounded.”

  We all laughed. Especially Samantha.

  But it wasn’t true. The days of being grounded were over. Chase Jackson was no longer a high school student. This helicopter would fly where I ordered, and everyone aboard would blindly follow my lead.

  The blind leading the blind.

  What would I do now?

  Katie. She’d always been my north star. Keeping her safe, my priority. But she’d reject that now. She possessed an innate sense of right and wrong, of justice, and she’d never allow herself to be a distraction.

  Her fingers found mine and squeezed. Samantha quit texting, crossed over to our side of the gunner bay and squeezed next to Katie, pinning her between us. “Now what, Outlaw?”

  I shrugged. “McDonalds? I haven’t had breakfast yet.”

  Katie pinched me. “Be serious.”

  “He is,” Samantha said. “Our bodies burn calories at a murderous rate. He and I will go into shock soon unless we eat.”

  “What fascinating monsters you are,” Katie commented. “I wish I could cook for you.”
>
  Anderson had apparently been listening in the middle of orchestrating a symphony through his cellphone and his two radios. He held one to his mouth and said, “Anyone got eyes on a McDonalds? Special request for breakfast sandwiches.”

  “And coffee.”

  “And chocolate donuts.”

  Katie said, “And yogurt and granola. …what?? I don’t need all those additives. Wearing tight pajamas on a helicopter requires dietary sacrifices.”

  “You are quite eye-catching,” Samantha agreed, inspecting Katie’s outfit and then her own. Samantha wore cargo pants, a shoulder holster, and her black shirt was splattered with blood. “I’m as attractive as a garbageman in this.”

  “Not true,” Katie protested. “You’re so fit, you’d look good wearing actual garbage. I wish I could take video of all this. It’d be Instagram gold.”

  Anderson ordered food while I retrieved a pair of jeans from my duffle and tugged them on over my shorts. My red bandana partially pulled out from a side compartment. Should I put it on? I felt exposed without it, especially in a helicopter.

  Samantha glared down at the rotating earth. “We’re going to Los Alamitos.”

  “Where?”

  “Los Alamitos, the Joint Forces base in Orange County.”

  Anderson covered the receiver and said, “Bingo. You’ll be safe there. I know a guy.”

  We thundered straight towards a broad emptiness in the suburbs of eastern Los Angeles, a brown expanse of runway strips and military housing. The Los Alamitos campus was enormous and ugly. “It’s perfect,” Samantha observed.

  “The whole world is wondering where this Black Hawk is going. Including my supervisors. And I’m not telling them. And these guys,” Anderson jerked a thumb at the quiet agent with an assault rifle and at the pilot, “aren’t spilling. The secret will get out soon, but I think we’ve bought a few hours. Maybe even a day or two.”

  “Perfect,” I said. “Anderson, we owe you.”

  “Hell yeah you do. But we gotta hammer out a plan of attack. And soon.”

  I asked, “The Chemist is in Los Angeles?”

  “He was last night,” Anderson nodded.

  Samantha frowned and said, “How do you know?”