by Blake Crouch
“Pilcher has a hundred and sixty people living inside the mountain.”
“There are four or five hundred of us.”
“They’re armed. We’re not. Look, I didn’t tell you what was going on so you’d ask me to blow everything up.”
“I won’t live like this.”
“What do you want from me, Theresa?”
“Fix it.”
“You don’t know what you’re asking.”
“You want your son growing up—”
“If burning this town to the fucking ground would make things just a little better for you and Ben, I would’ve torched it my first day on the job.”
“We’re losing him.”
“What are you talking about?”
“It started last year. It’s only getting worse.”
“How?”
“He’s drifting away, Ethan. I don’t know what they’re teaching him, but it’s stealing him away from us. There’s a wall going up.”
“I’ll find out.”
“You promise?”
“Yes, but you have to promise me something.”
“What?”
“You won’t breathe a word of anything I’ve told you. Not a single detail to anyone.”
“I’ll try my best.”
“One last thing.”
“What?”
“This is the first time we’ve been together in Wayward Pines without the cameras watching.”
“So?”
He leaned over and kissed her in the dark.
They walked through town.
Ethan felt freezing motes begin to strike his face.
He said, “Is that what I think it is?”
In the distance, the light of a lonely streetlamp became a stage for snowflakes.
There was no wind. They fell straight down.
“Winter’s here,” Theresa said.
“But it was just summer several days ago.”
“Summer’s long. Winter’s long. Spring and fall shoot past. The last winter went on for nine months. The snow was ten feet deep at Christmas.”
He reached down and took hold of her mittened hand.
Not a sound in the entire valley.
Total hush.
Ethan said, “We could be anywhere. Some village in the Swiss Alps. Just two lovers out for a midnight stroll.”
“Don’t do that,” Theresa warned.
“Do what?”
“Pretend we’re in some other place and time. The people who pretend in this town go mad.”
They stayed off Main, kept to the side streets.
The houses were dark. With no woodsmoke in the valley, the snow-streaked air carried a clean, rinsed quality.
Theresa said, “Sometimes, I hear screams and screeches. They’re far away, but I hear them. He never mentions it, but I know that Ben hears them too.”
“Those are the abbies,” Ethan said.
“Strange he’s never asked me what the sound is. It’s like he already knows.”
They walked south beyond the hospital on the road that purported to lead out of town.
Streetlamps fell behind.
Darkness closed in.
A fragile quarter inch of snow dusted the pavement.
Ethan said, “I paid a visit to Wayne Johnson this afternoon.”
“I’m supposed to take him dinner tomorrow night.”
“I lied to him, Theresa. I told him this gets better. I told him it was just a town.”
“Me too. But that’s what they make you say, right?”
“Nobody can make me do anything. It’s always a choice in the end.”
“How’s he doing?”
“How do you think? Scared. Confused. He thinks he’s dead and this is hell.”
“Will he run?”
“Probably.”
At the edge of the forest, Ethan stopped.
He said, “The fence is about a mile straight ahead.”
“What are they like?” she asked. “The abbies.”
“Like all the bad things you have nightmares about when you’re a kid. They’re the monsters in the closet, under the bed. There are millions of them.”
“And you’re telling me we have a fence between us and them?”
“It’s a big fence. Has electricity going through it.”
“Oh, well, in that case.”
“And there’s a few snipers up on the peaks.”
“While Pilcher and his people live in safety in the mountain.”
Theresa walked a few steps down the road, the snow collecting on her shoulders, on her hoodie.
“Tell me something. What’s the point of all those pretty little houses with white picket fences?”
“I think he’s trying to preserve our way of life.”
“For who? Us or him? Maybe someone should tell him our way of life is over.”
“I’ve tried.”
“We should all be in that mountain, figuring something out. I’m not living the rest of my life in some psycho’s model train town.”
“Well, the man in charge doesn’t share your view. Look, we aren’t going to fix this tonight.”
“I know.”
“But we will fix it.”
“You swear?”
“I swear.”
“Even if it means losing everything?”
“Even if it means we lose our lives.” Ethan stepped forward, opened his arms, pulled her in close. “I’m asking you to trust me. You have to go on like nothing has changed.”
“That’s going to make my psychiatrist appointments interesting.”
“What appointments?”
“Once a month, I go to an appointment, talk to a shrink. I think everyone does. It’s the only time we’re allowed to open up to another human being. We get to share our fears, our thoughts, our secrets.”
“You can talk about anything?”
“Yes. I thought you knew about these meetings.”
Ethan felt his hackles rising.
He pushed the rage back down—it wouldn’t help him now.
“Who do you see?” he asked. “A man? A woman?”
“A woman. She’s very pretty.”
“What’s her name?”
“Pam.”
He closed his eyes, drew in a deep, cold shot of piney air.
“Do you know her?” Theresa asked.
“Yes.”
“And she’s one of Pilcher’s?”
“She’s pretty much his second in command. You can’t tell her anything about tonight. Or your chip. You understand? Nothing. Our family would be killed.”
“Okay.”
“Has she ever inspected the back of your leg?”
“No.”
“Has anyone?”
“No.”
He checked his watch—2:45 a.m. Nearly time.
He said, “Look, I’ve got someplace to be. I’ll walk you home.”
“Seeing Kate again?” she asked.
“And her group. Pilcher’s dying to know what they’re up to.”
“Let me come.”
“I can’t. She’s expecting just me. If suddenly you show up too, things could get—”
“Awkward?”
“It could spook her. Besides, she and her people might have killed someone.”
“Who?”
“Pilcher’s daughter. She was a spy. Point is, I don’t know if they’re dangerous or not.”
“Please be careful.”
Ethan took his wife’s hand and they turned back toward home.
The lights of Wayward Pines looked hazy through the snow.
He said, “Always, my love.”
17
Standing in the forest among the pines, she thought there was nothing prettier than snowflakes falling through night vision.
Ten years ago, there’d been a forest fire three miles from the center of town. She’d stood in the burning trees watching embers rain down from the sky. This reminded her of that day, except the snow glowed green. Burni
ng green. Each flake leaving a luminescent trail in its wake. And the floor of the forest and the road and the snow-covered roofs of the houses in town—they all glowed like LED screens.
The snow that had collected on Ethan’s and Theresa’s shoulders glowed too.
As if they’d been sprinkled with magic dust.
Pam didn’t even have to hide behind a tree.
As far as she could tell, Ethan hadn’t brought a flashlight, and it was so dark out here in the woods, beyond the reach of streetlamps and porch lights, that she had no fear of discovery. She needed only to stand in total silence, fifteen feet away, and listen.
She wasn’t supposed to be here.
Technically, she’d been sent to observe the new arrival, Wayne Johnson. It was his second night in Wayward Pines, and night two was historically a night for runners. But she was starting to think that Wayne might fall in line faster than the projections. That he wouldn’t pose any significant problems. He’d been an encyclopedia salesman after all. Something about the nature of his profession, at least to her, suggested conformity.
So instead, she’d slipped into the empty house across from Ethan’s Victorian and dug in behind the curtains in the living room with a straight-on view of his front door.
Pilcher would be pissed that she’d abandoned her mission. There’d be a little hell to pay on the front side of this decision, but on the back—when her boss had finally calmed down and heard her out—he’d be thrilled with the results of her choice.
She’d done it before with Kate Ballinger. Staked out the woman’s house at night for two weeks before she finally caught her leaving. But tracking her and her husband had been another story. Pam had lost her soon after when Kate had literally disappeared underground. She’d tried to convince Pilcher to let her devote some real resources, but he’d shot her down since Alyssa was already on the case.
How’d that fucking work out for you?
Her opinion, the old man put up with way too much shit from his sheriff.
She didn’t get it. Didn’t understand what it was exactly that Pilcher saw in Burke. Yes, Ethan could handle himself. Yes, he had the skill set to run the town, but Jesus, no one was worth the trouble he’d put them through.
If it was her call—and one day it would be—she’d have dealt with Ethan and his family two weeks ago.
Chained Ben and Theresa to the pole beyond the fence.
Let the abbies come for them.
Sometimes, she fell asleep imagining the screams of Ethan’s son, picturing Ethan’s face while he watched his boy, and then his wife, eviscerated and eaten before his eyes. She wouldn’t feed Ethan to the abbies, though. She’d put him in lockup for a month, maybe two. Hell, maybe a year. However long it took. Make him watch and rewatch the abbies devouring his family. Keep the footage rolling on an endless loop in his cell. The screams turned up. And only when the man was broken in every way imaginable, when his body had wasted itself into nothing but a shell for a shattered mind, then, only then, she’d release him back into town. Give him a nice little job—maybe a waiter, maybe a secretary—something subservient, boring, soul crushing.
Of course, she’d check in on him each week.
Hopefully, if she’d done it right, there would be just enough of his mind left to remember who she was and all that she had taken from him.
And he would live out the rest of his days as a pathetic scab of a human being.
That was how you dealt with men like Ethan Burke. With men who tried to run. You annihilated them. You made them a horrifying example for everyone to see.
You sure as fuck didn’t make them sheriff.
She smiled.
She had caught him.
Finally.
This fantasy that she’d been dreaming about as she lay in her room inside the mountain struck her, for the first time, as achievable.
She wasn’t exactly sure of what to do next, of how to use this ammunition to realize that dark, beautiful fantasy, but she would think of something.
It made her so happy.
Standing in the dark between the pines with the burning specks of green falling all around her, she couldn’t make herself stop smiling.
18
Ethan stood on the corner of Main and Eighth in front of the double doors that opened into the four-hundred-seat opera house. The building had been locked up for the night, and through the glass, the lobby was dark, none of the framed movie or Broadway posters visible. Performances were held on a semi-regular basis—music recitals, community theater, town hall meetings. Classic movies were shown on Friday nights, and every two years, mayoral and city council elections were held here.
Ethan checked his watch—3:08 a.m.
It wasn’t like Kate to be eight minutes late to anything.
He buried his hands deep in his pocket.
The snow had stopped. The cold was merciless.
He shifted his weight between his feet, but the movement did little to warm him.
A shadow appeared around the corner of the building and moved straight toward him, footsteps squeaking in the snow.
He straightened—not Kate.
She didn’t move like this and wasn’t nearly as big.
Ethan clutched the Harpy in his pocket, thinking, I should’ve left when she was five minutes late. That was a sign something was wrong.
A man in a black hoodie stepped in front of him.
He was taller than Ethan and wide through the shoulders. Wore stubble on his face and reeked of the dairy.
Ethan slowly tugged the folder out of his pocket, working the tip of his thumb into the hole in the blade.
One flick, he’d have the knife open.
One swipe, he’d have the man open.
“That is a very bad idea,” the man said.
“Where’s Kate?”
“Here’s what’s going to happen. First. Knife goes back in your pocket.”
Ethan slid his hand into his pocket, but he didn’t let go of the knife.
He recognized the man from his file photo, but he’d never seen him in town, and in this moment, outside in the cold and his nerves beginning to fray, he couldn’t recall his name.
“Second. See that bush?” The man pointed across the intersection of Main and Eighth toward a large juniper. It loomed behind a wooden bench—a bus stop that had never seen a bus. Just one more artificial detail of this place. Once a week, an old woman who was losing her mind sat all day long on that bench, waiting for a bus that would never come.
“I’m going across the street now,” the man said. “Meet me behind that bush in three minutes.”
Before Ethan could respond, the man had turned away.
Ethan watched him trudge across the empty intersection as the overhead traffic light changed from yellow to red.
He waited.
Part of him screaming that something had come off the rails—should’ve been Kate here to meet him.
That he needed to go home right now.
The man reached the other side of the street and disappeared behind the bush.
Ethan waited until the traffic light had passed through three cycles. Then he stepped out from under the awning and started into the street.
Crossing, he finally remembered the man’s name—Bradley Imming.
Up and down Main, all was quiet.
It unnerved him—the stark emptiness of the street. The dark buildings. The single traffic signal humming above him as it cast alternating swaths of green, yellow, and red onto the snow.
He arrived at the bench, moved around the bush.
Something bad was going to happen.
He could feel it.
A premonitory thrumming behind his eyes like a warning bell.
He never heard the footsteps, just felt a warm push of breath against the back of his neck a half second before the world went black.
His first instinct was to fight, his hand digging back into his pocket, probing for the knife.
The ground hit hi
m hard, the side of his face shoved into snow, the weight of what must have been several men crushing down on his spine.
He smelled the sweet, rich funk of the dairy again.
Bradley’s voice whispered in his left ear, “You just settle right on down.”
“The fuck are you doing?”
“You didn’t strike me as a man who would willingly wear a hood. I read you right?”
“Yep.”
Ethan strained, one last-ditch effort to force his arm out from under his chest, but it was no use. He was thoroughly immobilized.
“We’re gonna take a little walk around town,” Imming said. “Get you good and disoriented.”
“Kate didn’t say anything about this.”
“You wanna see her tonight or not?”
“Yes.”
“Then this is how it has to be. These are what you call nonnegotiable terms. Or we could just call the whole thing off right now.”
“No. I need to see her.”
“We’re gonna get up now. Then we’ll help you up. You aren’t gonna take a swing at me or anything, are you?”
“I’ll try to restrain myself.”
The weight lifted.
Ethan caught a desperately needed breath.
Hands grabbed him under his arms, hauled him onto his feet, but didn’t let go.
They led him out into the intersection of Main and Eighth, Ethan clinging to the sense that he was facing north.
Imming said, “Remember Pin the Tail on the Donkey? We’re gonna spin your ass around, partner, but don’t worry—we won’t let you fall.”
They spun him for a good twenty seconds, fast enough that the world went on spinning even after they had stopped.
Imming said to the men, “Let’s take him that way.”
Ethan was dizzy on his feet, swerving like a drunk stumbling home after last call, but they kept him upright.
They walked a long time, far past the point of Ethan having the foggiest idea of where he was.
Nobody spoke.
There was only the sound of their breathing and their footsteps in the snow.
Finally, they stopped.
Ethan heard a creaking sound, like something opening on a rusty hinge.
Imming said, “Just a heads-up, this part’s a little tricky. Turn him around, boys. I’ll go down first. And check the knot on the back of his hood again.”
When they’d turned him a hundred and eighty degrees, Imming said, “We’re going to lower you onto your knees.” The location of his voice had changed, almost like he was underneath Ethan’s feet now.