Ground Zero (7 page)

“We couldn’t have pets, and he figured out a way to turn on the porn on our satellite service. One day, a couple of months before he started going after you, he came after me in a way I never thought I’d see my own son do. I had to stand there with a knife in my hand to get him to leave me alone, but even that wasn’t enough until I cut his hand when he tried to grab me. I knew Brian would kill him if he found out, so I didn’t tell him until a few weeks ago when he told me he was going to go looking for answers. As much as I wanted Gerry gone from my sight, I felt it was my responsibility to watch him.”

“You didn’t have to tell me all this,” Mackenzie began. “So why
are
you?”

“Because I want your daughter to know, assuming she’s the one who managed to kill him, that she may have saved my life, too, and maybe countless other women. He would have started with rape, if he hadn’t already. He certainly tried it with me. Then it would have progressed. Most likely to torture and murder. His last two therapists agreed with me, but unless he actually did something to a human being, there was little that could be done. He was an adult by that point, and we could no longer have him institutionalized without going through the court system.”

Mackenzie needed a few minutes to absorb what she was hearing, so she took her time and drank some of the coffee. She almost moaned at the taste.

“How do you people make coffee this good? I don’t get it. I’ve got a really nice machine. I’ve read the directions on the coffeemaker, and on the coffee containers themselves, countless times. I
still
cannot make a decent cup of coffee.” Her words relieved a bit of the tension.

“That’s my wife for ya,” Neil stated laconically. “Always focusing on the real issues.”

“Hey, coffee is going to be a luxury in this part of the world very, very soon. It’s definitely an issue. Especially when I keep ruining it.”

“Salt,” Geraldine responded with a smile. “I always put in a bit of salt. Though I do try to brew it right, too. It makes a difference.”

“When did you guys get married, Mac? Sorry, I mean Neil,” Brian said with a short laugh, when both of them hesitated after opening their mouths to respond at the same time.

“About eight months ago. It was right after I talked to you that last time, and just before the power died in this area. It was already down in most of the cities by then. We got the licence from the town hall in Parry Sound on the Monday morning, and then we were hitched that afternoon. A friend of ours was able to do the ceremony, because she was a JP.”

“I didn’t realize when you were talking to me about her that you two were involved, but it makes sense now. Truth be told, I wasn’t worried much about
why
you were telling me. I was too busy thinking about wanting to kick Gerry’s ass. He might have been named after my wife, but he sure as hell didn’t take any other part of himself from her.” With that they were back on topic.

“I want you to know something,” Mac began haltingly, knowing there was no going back now that she was about to confirm their suspicions. “My daughter has been miserable since that day. Until she went out to check on the sensor alert yesterday, she hadn’t picked up her bow. We had to move it for her when we put up the main building, because she wouldn’t even look at it. This hasn’t been easy for her to live with.”

“Taking a life shouldn’t be an easy thing, no matter whose life it is,” Brian responded. “I volunteered for the CAF when Bush Sr. started that brouhaha in Kuwait, and Canada joined in the fight. I didn’t know it at the time, but it was already winding down by the time I got through boot camp. I was only over there for a month, but it took me a few years to get past what I had to do in that time, and the things I’d seen. No matter who you kill, it damages you.

“Neither of us knew that Geraldine was pregnant when I shipped out. We were very lucky that I was back home in time to be there for her through most of it, but I often wondered if maybe I’d brought home some of that evil and passed it on to my child. Since nobody knows how that works, I suppose it’s as good an explanation as we’ll ever get. I had recovered enough that we were talking about maybe having another baby, when we started noticing that Gerry was a little different.

“At first we put off having more children so we could concentrate on figuring out what was wrong with him. When we knew what it was, we decided not to have more. It’s a shame, really, because Geraldine was a damn good mother to that kid, but we couldn’t risk it. Not just the possibility that we’d have another like him, but also that he might harm a younger sibling.”

“It makes us sound so terrible,” Geraldine quietly stated.

“I don’t think it does,” Mac responded. “I think it’s heartbreaking that you felt you had to make that choice. Very few people are capable of looking at their children realistically, and you did everything humanly possible to get help for him and try to turn him away from that path. I can’t think of a single other thing you could have done. When he became an adult, he made choices that went against everything you tried to instill in him, and they were his choices, not yours.”

Geraldine had started crying, so Brian reached for her hand. He held it up to his mouth and rubbed her forearm with his other hand. Neil laced his fingers with Mackenzie’s. She looked down at their joined hands and then covered them with her other one.

“You gave him real love,” Mac began again. “You might not think you did, because of the way he made you feel, but you gave him the kind of love that a majority of parents can’t even imagine. You did the hard work to give him his best chance, even when your own feelings were working against you. I don’t think a lot of people have that kind of love in them. Most of us take the easier road. Denial.”

“Thank you for that,” Brian said gruffly. “Geraldine was right about your daughter probably saving a lot more lives than she realizes, and I hope you’ll tell her that we said so.”

“I will. I’ve been trying to find a way to help her deal with it. She didn’t just feel guilt for killing your son, either. She also felt guilty because she seemed to think it meant she felt bad for Neil not being killed, and probably myself, but we both knew that wasn’t really how she felt about it. She just hated having blood on her hands.

“Cam’s always been pretty tough and cynical. When we took archery lessons, then later went to the gun ranges to learn to shoot, I guess she figured she’d be perfectly fine with using those weapons. She wasn’t expecting to feel bad afterward, despite the fact that I tried to tell her it’s never quite what you imagine it will be when you have to kill someone.” Mac realized she would have to explain, when both Geraldine and Brian looked at her in confusion.

“Her father broke in to our apartment when Cam was just a baby. He had a knife that I managed to get away from him when he was distracted. I was standing there holding it when he ran at me. I faced up to it and called the police and all that, even though I was scared shitless. It was written off as self-defense, though they could have called it an accident, too, I suppose.

“To this day I don’t know if I actually had time to turn the knife away from him. I had to deal with the aftermath, and I wasn’t expecting the guilt any more than Cam was. She didn’t know about it until I told her a couple of weeks ago. She only knew he’d been killed while trying to rob someone. She didn’t know it was me. I’ve never lied to her about it, but I didn’t want her growing up with the knowledge that her father had been killed by her mother. Her father had grown up spoiled by his family, and he seemed to think he was entitled to whatever he wanted.”

“Sort of like our Gerry,” Brian said. “Except for the part about being spoiled. If anything, he was a bit deprived because we had to permanently remove most of his privileges. That sense of entitlement, though, seems to be a commonality.”

“I don’t know what it was with some of the kids the baby boomers and our generation raised,” added Neil. “I’m thankful Billy was never like that, and Cameron isn’t either, but some of those overly-entitled shits still sprang from good people. Hopefully we’ll find some answers to those questions before we start repopulating the earth.”

6 ~ Benediction, Perhaps

Cam watched Gilles and Chuck slice off a long piece of plastic sheeting from the roll just inside the door of the ferret building. She was in there helping Kelly and Annette mix up raw eggs with kibble when they came in. The reason for the plastic was well-known to her, and she shuddered at the thought. Chuck and Gilles didn’t look any more cheerful about the prospect than she felt, but Cam was grateful it wasn’t going to be her at the hospital, attempting to transport the body of the man she’d killed.

When her mother had come home the other day from seeing the Newmans, she seemed to have relaxed a great deal about the situation, though she intended to remain on her guard to some extent. Cam was shocked when her mother suggested that she meet with Geraldine, and though she dreaded it, some guilty, self-destructive part of herself agreed to the meeting.

One of her reasons for being in the ferret building was to get a much-needed dose of ferret-therapy, or
ferrapy
as her mother called it. The furry little monsters soothed her nerves enough that she finally felt okay with leaving that afternoon, even though another, saner part of her thought she was being a bit stupid in meeting the mother of her victim.

At least she was getting it over with before they would be seeing what was left of their son. Cam wouldn’t be staying there long, and it had been arranged that Gilles and Chuck would make the morbid delivery an hour or so later. When her mother ducked her head inside the building and nodded at her that it was time, Cam suddenly felt really nauseous. She wasn’t ready for this.

She had to wonder how many people had ever carried on a face-to-face conversation with the parents of someone they’d killed. She sincerely doubted that it had been very common even when the world was fully populated, but then not many people were left, so maybe things would end up being done a lot differently in the future. If that was the case, she could only hope she was never in this position again.

Cam hopped into the passenger seat of her mother’s truck. It was supposed to be a twenty-minute drive, but Cameron didn’t notice a single second of it. She was too immersed in her personal terror.

“We’re here, Cam,” her mother said gently. “I’m going in with you, so there’s no need to panic. I’m also armed.” Her mother bared her teeth in a semblance of a grin, which looked more feral than anything else. Cam couldn’t even open her mouth for fear the contents of her stomach would take the opportunity to escape.

“Look, Cam. They’ve both said he deserved what he got. I told you that. I just think it’ll mean a lot more to you if it’s coming directly from them. Okay?”

Cam nodded jerkily in response, still not opening her mouth. Then she opened the door and got out, so she could get it over with and go home. Brian, and a woman she assumed was Gerry’s mother, came out onto the front porch. Her own mother led the way up the steps, and indicated the woman with a sweeping motion of her hand.

“Cam, this is Geraldine. Gerry’s mother.” Cam turned rigid. She really, really wanted to back away when Geraldine took a step toward her. In fact, she wanted to bolt right back to the truck and drive away. Instead she stood her ground.

Suddenly she was enveloped in the woman’s arms, and she didn’t know what to do with herself. She was
not
a hugger, and this was just frightening.

“It’s okay,” Geraldine whispered to her. “We’ll talk about it a little more later, but I just wanted you to know that it’s okay.” Much to her horror, Cam felt the sobs coming out of her before she could do a single thing to stop them.

“It’s okay,” Geraldine whispered again, and just rocked her until she was done crying. When she finally pulled back, Geraldine held her at arm’s length. Cam could barely see through her swollen eyelids, but she could still see the apparent warmth on the other woman’s face.

“I’m sorry,” she started to say, but Geraldine interrupted her.

“There’s no need for that. Brian was right when he told you that you did what you had to do. There’s more that you don’t know about our son, but for now let me just say you’ve probably saved a lot more lives than you realize. It’s not easy to lose a child, but I think it might have been harder for me to live with him being responsible for someone else losing their child. Your mother brought you here so we could talk to you a bit. From what your mother told us, you’ve been carrying around a lot of pain, and I wanted to ease some of that if I could.”

“I don’t know what to say,” Cam said in a croak through her tight throat.

“There’s nothing you have to say. I’m just sorry you’re suffering because you did what you had to do to protect your family. My husband knows a little something about the guilt from all that, but then so does your mother. They might be able to help you if you let them. All I can do is tell you that nobody blames you for it. It’s not much.”

“It’s kind of everything, actually,” Cam corrected. “I didn’t want to hurt anyone, much less kill someone. You should be blaming me for it.”

“You prevented others from being hurt or killed, and we’ll explain shortly the other reasons we’re not blaming you for it. We recognized our son for what he was, and what he was becoming. We tried to stop it, but that didn’t work out so well. If you want to come inside for a bit, we can tell you the rest.”

“Okay. Thank you,” Cameron responded quietly. Geraldine just smiled and then headed over to her husband’s side. Cam looked at her mother in confusion. She didn’t know what to make of these people. Especially Geraldine. From all appearances she seemed to be very understanding and forgiving, and it didn’t sit right with Cam for some reason.

Maybe it was guilt. Or maybe she just couldn’t understand a parent whose first loyalty wasn’t to their own child, whatever the circumstances. She knew her own mother might kick her ass for doing stupid things, but she’d never abandon her or take sides against her when push came to shove. Then again, she wasn’t a wannabe rapist or outright murderer. Maybe that changed things.

Cam followed them into the house, and by the time Geraldine was finished explaining things about her son, she felt a little bit better about the unprecedented level of understanding from Gerry’s parents. She was still wary of too much kindness coming from anyone, but at least she could sort of see why they felt the way they did. Or the way they said they felt anyway.

“Man, that had to be so hard for you.” It was all Cam could think to say at first. “I mean, mom has a fascination with pretty much everything, and is always reading books about a lot of stuff, and she went through this phase where she studied serial killers. I was in high school at the time, and borrowed some of her books for a class project. I know about the signs and all that.

“I don’t know what I would do if I saw my kid doing those things. I guess exactly what you did. Then again, there doesn’t seem to be a cure for it, since they don’t know why it happens. It’s kind of like a disease or a mutation maybe. These things just happen. Some kids are born with Autism. Some have eyes that are two different colours. Some are sociopaths or even psychopaths. And it’s not like there’s a way to stop it, so obviously it’s not the parents’ fault, whatever the difference is.

“I understand now why you say he might have hurt other women. He tried to hurt you, and then he tried to hurt my mother. It wasn’t a one-time thing with him. I still can’t feel great about it, but it doesn’t feel as selfish as it did before. Does that make any sense?”

“It makes perfect sense,” Geraldine replied, as she patted Cam’s hand. “You believed you were protecting people you know, and to find out it wasn’t just for your own benefit means it wasn’t all about you or your loved ones. I keep going over things, trying to pick apart every little decision I made when he was growing up. If I had done this, would he be any different? Or, if I had done that, maybe.”

“I’ve been doing the same thing for about seven months now. I kept wondering if I had taken away any chance he had to get beyond what he was doing. From what you’ve told me, it doesn’t sound like it, but I’ll never know for sure.”

“I’m really glad we had this chance to talk, Cam. If you ever feel up to coming to visit us, you’ll be welcome at this house.”

Cam could only nod, because her throat was a little tight again. She had such a hard time with kindness, understanding, or sympathy. They seemed to trigger her emotions when she was feeling vulnerable, instead of soothing her. Geraldine squeezed her shoulder.

It seemed like the right time to say goodbye, so Cam thanked them and headed back to the truck. Her mother stayed behind for a moment, presumably to explain that Gerry’s body was on its way. It was not a conversation Cam wanted to be a part of, so she was relieved her mother waited until she was at a discreet distance before saying anything.

On the ride back to the farm, silence filled the cab of the truck until they were rolling to a stop in front of the tree that housed the hidden fingerprint scanner for the concealed gate. She was suddenly very grateful for the extra layers of concealment and security her mother had implemented. Not to mention the new cameras they had already installed to fill in the gaps. Cameron was also having major second thoughts about her mother and Neil sailing away to Cleveland in the next few weeks. This really didn’t seem like the time for it.

Her dad wasn’t exactly reliable companionship or security these days either. She’d tried to talk to him about it, but he would only say he wanted to live out in the bush for a bit. Cam couldn’t argue that it seemed to do him some good, because he usually came back pretty content, but she needed him right now, just like she needed her mother.

“Mom, is there any way you could postpone your trip? It’s dangerous. You have no idea what’s out there on the water or in the cities or towns along the way. You have no idea what you’re doing when it comes to sailing, and it could take a lot more than the few weeks you were planning on. Do you even know which way the current flows, or how to sail against it? What if you can only go one way?”

“We’ve been over this, Cam,” her mother said, more than a little exasperated. “If Kirk was going to die without insulin, would you say we shouldn’t do everything we can to get him some? I’ve been planning for the need to make insulin since long before this all happened. You know that. I made sure I had the instructions printed out from how it was made by the guy who discovered it, just so I could be sure I’d be able to help Ian. He’s my best friend. I’m not letting him die when I can do something to prevent it.”

Cam didn’t want to worry her mother, since she understood she felt she had no choice, so Cameron kept quiet about all the things that were picking at her peace of mind. Besides, it was just a feeling, which was nowhere near enough to convince anyone, not even herself, that there was any kind of problem. She would just have to take steps while they were gone to ensure her own safety, along with everyone else’s. No more making impulsive decisions, either.

“We’re going to try to convert the motors on one of the boats to operate on vegetable oil, Cam, like we’re planning with at least one truck. Gilles is looking into it, and if anyone can make it work, he can.
If
he can, that means a much easier trip, and potentially a faster one. Particularly if we have to go against current or wind.”

“If he can. Is that the brainstorm you were referring to before?”

“Yeah, but I didn’t know if it was possible. It wouldn’t be if Gilles hadn’t already looked into it years ago for his own vehicle. He at least knows the principles behind making it work, which is a lot more than I know. He’s a much more able mechanic than I am, and I know dick about diesels,” her mother finished.

“That’s a first! Don’t you know something about everything?”

“Not quite, though it would be nice if it were true. I really wish humanity had made it to the point of having the ability to upload knowledge and information directly into the brain. I’d have gotten my doctorate in everything.”

“Then you’d have nothing left to learn. What on earth would you do with yourself?”

“Very funny. What I’d do is use the knowledge, of course. Like they say though, ‘If wishes were horses, beggars would ride.’ Not every dream can come true, and I’m grateful enough to be alive for the moment, and have everyone I care about still alive, too. That’s more than a lot of people can say now,” her mother said, and Cam could hear the sadness in her voice.

“I figure, if those people were stupid enough to believe nothing bad was happening, and that they didn’t need to prepare, the world is probably better off without them in the gene pool. Granted, without you as my mother, I probably wouldn’t be here either.”

“The problem is, it wasn’t just smart people preparing for this, even if it was the smart thing to do. There were paranoid and violent people, too, training in survivalist camps. Most of those were probably a joke, unless they had someone with actual military experience doing the teaching. Thankfully we haven’t run into any of those types. Just some ordinary, run-of-the-mill cannibals,” her mother said, with a twist to her mouth.

“Well, I certainly feel better about you leaving now. Thanks for reminding me.”

“You really think they’re going to walk in exactly this direction for about thirty or forty kilometres? Please. Besides, you’ve got the extra cameras now, and plenty of firepower. We already had enough of that before Gilles showed up, but he added tremendously to our stockpile, as did Chuck. We’ve got at least five handguns between us, in addition to all the long guns.