Z 2136 (Z 2134 Series Book 3) (25 page)

Ana stared at Sutherland as he smiled back.

She’d had a feeling that he might have put two and two together and figured the only way The Station could be working on the cure was if Oswald was there.

When he asked for Oswald over the com, her shocked expression must’ve confirmed his suspicions.

“Please,” Ana said, “don’t hurt him. He’s trying to help. You say you want to bring down The State and give power back to the people; well,
we
want the same thing here. Dr. Oswald is working on a cure that could give us a tremendous upper hand in this war.”

“Yes, he can. That’s exactly what he was doing for me until you and your troublemaking loverboy showed up at Hydrangea and turned two of my top people against me.”

Ana had the definite feeling that something bad had happened at Hydrangea. Maybe a revolt. Sutherland didn’t usually go on raids with his men, at least from everything Katrina had told them over the last few months.

He had always seemed so calm and cool at the camp. So perfectly in control. Even when angry, Sutherland was a quiet sort of vicious. Now he seemed on edge, on the verge of snapping. Standing here, armed with a sword and blaster, men on standby to release the zombie toxin, the man appeared capable of anything.

Ana had to be careful not to push him too far, had to wait for the right moment to strike and take him out.

She looked surreptitiously around the room, trying to formulate how to best use the flash pouch to her benefit.

Sutherland was sitting at Egan’s desk.

Egan was sitting on the floor, per Sutherland’s request, in front of the desk.

Ana was standing, also per Sutherland’s request, in front of the desk where he could “keep an eye on her.”

Horrance was standing guard at the door behind her, with a holstered blaster and his left hand on a shock stick. Horrance was her best bet if she were going to strike first. He was strong but also dim and not likely to think at Ana’s speed.

However, Horrance had also been staring at her like a creep ever since he’d entered the room. With his eyes on her, she wasn’t sure how she could reach the pouch before he saw her. Perhaps, if she were fast enough, she could get close enough to kick him in the knee and break his leg. If she could then grab his gun, Ana could kill him, throw the pouch, then fire at Sutherland before he could regain his sight after the flash.

That was assuming that Sutherland stayed put once the flash exploded. The man was a warrior. He could drop and fire. Or she might accidentally hit Egan. Or Calla and Oswald once they arrived—assuming they were on their way.

She reassembled the pieces of the plan in her mind, but couldn’t put them together before the door opened. Calla and Dr. Oswald were on the other side. They surrendered their weapons, then Calla ran into the room and leapt into her father’s arms.

“Daddy!”

Sutherland stepped around the desk, walked past Egan and Calla on the floor, and smiled at Oswald. “So, Doc, how’s that research going?”

Oswald glared at Sutherland. “What do you want?”

“Want? I want for things to be like they used to be. You, me, Ana, Katrina, Liam, my men, all one happy Hydrangea family working to topple The State. That’s what I want!”

“Leave these people alone, and I’ll come with you,” Oswald promised. “I have no quarrel, Sir. I only want to find a cure. No reason we can’t do that together.”

Sutherland folded his hands in front of his waist.

Ana studied every move, waiting for her moment . . . and slowly starting to second-guess herself.

What if peace could be had? If Sutherland was being honest and all he wanted was things like they were, her actions could cause a needless massacre.

What if he’s our only chance?

Heart pounding, she wished Katrina were with her.

“I’ll go with you too,” Ana said. “If you leave these people alone. It’s not like I have a reason to stay after Liam ran off with that whore.”

Ana said this both to persuade Sutherland and to let Oswald and Calla in on her lie, in case Sutherland started asking questions about Liam.

Holding Calla tight, Egan looked up at Ana. Neither spoke, waiting for Sutherland’s response.

Sutherland turned his gaze to Ana. “It’s so gratifying to see this sudden change of heart. You were both
soooo
eager to leave, fleeing my home like I’m some sort of monster. I serve retribution to City 1 and suddenly
I’m
the bad guy!”

Sutherland laughed.

Ana glanced back at Horrance, still staring at her as if she were lunch.

Do it now. Do it!

“Oh, how I wish things could be like they were. I suppose that would be nice, wouldn’t it, Ana? You could have your father back. Your brother could still be a good citizen inside City 6, and”—his voice went from faux merry-buoyant to weighted by hate—“my people wouldn’t have overthrown their leader.”

Now!

Do it now! He’s about to do something bad.

Ana began to reach back but couldn’t quite finish her too obvious move. She knew Horrance would be on top of her before she could reach the pouch, and she couldn’t take the chance while peace was a possibility.

Oswald asked, “Overthrown? What happened?”

Sutherland yelled, as he pointed to Oswald and Ana. “You, and you, and that cunt Katrina! And that pretty boy Liam!
You
all happened. You undermined my authority. You made me look like a damned fool. And that weasel Connor Vinson staged a fucking coup. That’s what happened!”

Sutherland turned, staring at Ana as if able to read her mind. He stepped forward.

Ice flooded her veins.

He was too close and the pouch too far.

He shook his head. “So I have no home, thanks to all of you. But . . . perhaps all is not lost.”

He paused as he stepped just inches from Ana, his eyes reaching into her soul, searching to discover her horrible plot.

Her leg began to shake uncontrollably. Keller was the last person to intimidate Ana with a gaze, back when he locked her up.

Sutherland’s stare was a hundred times hotter.

He continued, “Perhaps I’ve found a new home. Here.”

Do it! Do it now!

Ana reached back for the pouch, found it, and brought it up to throw at Sutherland’s face.

He was too quick, reaching out and seizing Ana’s hand, sending her pouch to the floor. It did its job anyway.

The bright white flash was immediate and with it came a loud, piercing whistle.

She tried to wriggle free of his hand. But even blind, Sutherland was a step ahead. He punched Ana hard in her chest. She landed on the ground gasping for air.

Seconds later a loud thump was followed by the sound of one of their blasters. Two shots.

The ringing in her ears subsided, replaced by Calla’s shrill scream.

Ana was still gasping, hand on her chest, trying to stand. Horrance shoved her down, then put a gun to her head.

“Don’t move!” he barked.

As blindness faded and shapes returned, Ana saw Egan on the ground, his head melted into the floor.

Calla screamed again and flung herself at Sutherland.

Ana stared helplessly as Sutherland backhanded Calla and sent her sprawling to the ground. Calla hit the floor hard enough that Ana heard the thud of her skull.

The girl stopped moving.

Ana cried out between gasps, squirming as she tried to get the beast off of her. The bastard must’ve weighed 450 pounds.

Sutherland aimed at Oswald, shaking his head. He looked down at Ana, his blaster still on the doctor. “I want you to take a close look at what you’ve done, girl.”

He reached into his pants pocket, retrieved a com, and said, “Release the gas.”

“Release it?” a voice asked.

“Yes. Release it.”

Ana found her breath. “No!”

She couldn’t look at Egan’s corpse, so she stared at Calla, lying on the floor, eyes closed, probably dead.

Please don’t die. Please, Calla.

Blaster still trained on Oswald, Sutherland went and locked the door. “Once the herd is thinned, we can discuss making this our new home and continuing our research.”

Oswald said nothing.

Ana could only cry at what she’d set into motion.

On the other side of the door, she heard the first screams.

Keller and Kern, both in full gray chem suits, approached the truck parked in the woods near the train station with blasters drawn.

Kern, a tall man with greased black hair and a body built by six hours in the body ring per day, looked back. “Open it?”

Keller nodded.

They opened the door and saw an undead young woman hunched over a dead man around her age, entrails and gore littering the floor. The girl looked up, guts dangling from her lips, looking as if she were trying to decide between pursuing the new feast or continuing with her current one.

The girl kept eating.

Kern quietly closed the truck door. Best not to expend ammunition or make unnecessary noise.

Keller looked down at his armband’s screen: footage from one of two hunter orbs he had called in to find Sutherland.

The orb floated over an entrance to something. A second later the screen showed a heat map with two men, in older City Watch chem suits, guarding the entrance. Another view showed a solid structure under snowy ground, what looked to be an old tunnel or network. Moments later, orbs identified the structure as a train station with several underground tunnels stretching for miles.

Keller pressed a button on the screen and ordered the second orb to join the first, but for both to stay out of view until he and Kern were in position atop a hill 400 yards south of the entrance.

Keller and Kern reached the hill. Keller stared down through his gun’s scope at the entrance.

Although the two men at the tunnel were wearing old City Watch gear, the orbs did not recognize either man’s ID chip. These men must’ve been Sutherland’s terrorist “Patriot” group.

The orbs could locate no other heat signatures at the entrance or nearby.

Keller pressed a button and ordered the orbs to fire, then watched as their blue blasts snuffed the men in an instant.

“Come on.” Keller raced toward the entrance, hoping the rest of their pursuit would go as easily.

Ana cradled Calla’s head in her lap, watching the girl’s pulsing neck, the only sign that she was still alive. Her head had pounded the floor. While there was no blood, Ana couldn’t possibly gauge the internal damage.

Oswald sat beside her as Horrance stood in front of them, blaster rifle ready to fire. Sutherland was on his com trying to reach someone.

Chaos ensued outside the room: screaming, gunshots, and blaster bolts. A few times someone tried to get inside their locked room—she didn’t know if it was a sad soul seeking escape or the already damned trying to enter—only to eventually stop or die outside the door. Ana tried not to imagine the people she’d eaten breakfast with that morning now turned into monsters and massacring one another—or shot dead.

All my fault. If only I had waited for peace.

Five minutes in hell already felt like an hour.

“They’re not answering,” Sutherland said to Horrance. “I don’t like this. They had one job—to guard the entrance. How do you fuck that up?”

Horrance shrugged. “I dunno, boss. Maybe they turned into zombies?”

“Are you stupid?” Sutherland asked. “We all took the antitoxin, which will keep us safe from the virus for a couple of days.”

“Want me to check?”

Sutherland nodded, then said, “No. Stand here and watch them. I’ll go.”

Sutherland slipped on his helmet, checked his blaster rifle, then the energy clips on his belt. He looked down at Ana. “Obviously you don’t want to go out there. But if you try and escape, Horrance
will
kill you.”

Ana said nothing, eyes down at Calla.

Sutherland said to Horrance, “If they move, kill the little one first.”

“Yes, boss.”

Sutherland left, immediately firing shots into people on the other side of the door.

Ana listened to Horrance’s heavy breath for a few heaves and bellows before she opened her mouth.

“You don’t have to do this, you know.”

Horrance turned to Ana. His eyes were curious.

“Do what?”

“Any of this. You don’t have to listen to Sutherland.”

“Why
wouldn’t
I listen to Sutherland?”

“Because he’s not a good person, Horrance. Not like you. And me. We’re good people, Horrance. Sutherland is bad. He likes to do bad things. Bad things make him happy. Do you understand?”

“Sir likes bad things because they make good things happen later. The end is very good.”

“That’s what he
says
, Horrance. But it’s not true. The bad makes him feel good, so he wants to keep it around. You can’t let him continue. You can stop him. You’re stronger than he is.”

“No.” Horrance shook his head. “I don’t like that. My job is doing what Sutherland says, so that’s what I do.”

It looked like Horrance wanted to say more but didn’t know the words or how to make them come out in order.

“I do the right things,” he finally said. “There is honor in following orders.”

“Of course,” Ana agreed. “But how do you know you’re following the
right
orders?”

Oswald stepped in. “Letting them go is the right thing to do, Horrance. You know that inside. Let Ana take the girl, get the two of them to safety.
You
can do that.”

“No.” The giant shook his head slowly.

Oswald continued.

“You’re not a bad guy, Horrance. We spent time together at Hydrangea. I know who you are. I helped you when you tore your leg in the forest. I was also there when you brought me the little girl in the red dress. Remember her?”

The memory’s weight pushed the giant’s gaze to the floor.

“
You
brought her to me, Horrance. When those men were drunk,
you
stood up for her.
You
were the one who brought all three of the men to me. You dragged them across the base and down three floors, beaten to pulp, with five broken limbs between them.”

Oswald continued, “I remember treating the men. I felt angry because you couldn’t just kill them. They were bad guys, but you weren’t allowed to do what should’ve been done. You were following orders. You remember what happened after that, right, Horrance?”

Horrance looked back up at the sound of his name.

“Her body was found mutilated a few days before she was going to testify against them. No one ever found her killers, but I think you and I know who was responsible for that. Don’t we, Horrance?”

The giant nodded, slammed his fist into the opposite palm, and snarled, “Fuckers!”

Oswald stood and walked toward him. The giant lurched forward, his whole body on full alert. “Stay back, Sir!”

Oswald raised his hands in the air. “I don’t mean any harm, Horrance. I just want to talk.”

Horrance looked uncertainly at the doctor. Oswald held his hands higher and somehow made his scarred robot face seem kind.

“Do you ever wish you could do things over, Horrance? Has there ever been a time when someone else has had the last word, and later you think of something you wish that you had said
back then,
when you were actually having the conversation. Do you ever wish you could do stuff over, Horrance, so that
you
could have the last word?”

Ana watched Oswald waiting for his response.

The giant nodded. Oswald smiled.

“Don’t you wish you could go back and do the right thing with those men? Kill them before they had a chance to kill the girl?”

Horrance nodded again.

“But you couldn’t. Because you were following orders.
Sutherland
’s orders. You were trapped. You wanted to do the
right thing
but your inner Horrance knew that what you were being told to do was
wrong.
Now’s your chance to do it right the first time. You want to do the right thing, don’t you?”

Horrance nodded . . . then surprised Ana.

“But I can’t. I have to follow my orders. That’s the most right thing.”

“No, Horrance. It isn’t.” Oswald turned from the giant to Ana. “Get up, Ana, and take Calla out of here now. Horrance is going to do the right thing.”

“No,” Horrance said, now furiously shaking his head. “No, don’t do that! You stay.”

Oswald spoke calmly. “Leave this room, Ana. And take Calla with you. Horrance doesn’t want to regret anything later. He wants to do it right the first time—now. Go,” he repeated. “Leave this room, Ana. And take Calla with you.”

Horrance looked confused, turning his eyes from the doctor to the girls, then to the door.

“No!” he yelled again.

“Go, Ana.”

The doctor said it so calmly, Ana could only obey. She stood, trembling, hoping the giant wouldn’t shoot her, then gathered Calla into her arms.

She crossed the room and waited by the door, looking back at Oswald.

The doctor went to the table and picked up a blaster. He held it like it was hot, delicate and high.

“I’m going to give this to Ana so she doesn’t get harmed. It’s for outside this room, to protect herself. She’ll die with no way to protect herself. You don’t want that, Horrance. We want Ana to live. No regrets. No do-overs for later. Let’s do the right thing now, the first time.”

“No.” Horrance looked like he was getting angry. Maybe Oswald was pushing him too far.

“Come on, Horrance. You can do better than this.
You are
better than this. Ana is going to carry Calla out of here. You’re going to let her because you’re a man who won’t just shoot two innocent girls. They never did anything to you, nor would they do anything to anyone. They are nice people who don’t deserve to die. Especially because you were following orders that you don’t want to take.”

“Don’t go,” Horrance said.

Ana’s heart raced. She still wondered if maybe Oswald was pushing Horrance too far.

She looked down at Calla, paralyzed by the fear of a wrong move claiming the girl’s life as she’d cost Calla’s father’s.

“Go!” Oswald cried out, now like an order.

Ana took the gun, nodded at Oswald, and hit the green button to open the door. Then she carried Calla through it, holding the blaster under Calla, hoping she could aim and fire without dropping one or both.

Still in the room, Horrance ordered them to stop. His bark sounded like a blaster would follow.

She froze. Oswald had been wrong.

But Oswald continued. “You don’t want to shoot them. You’re doing the right thing, Horrance. You don’t want to regret anything later. You don’t want to think about it every night. No regrets to keep you from sleep, Horrance. You can come with us, if you want.”

Just keep walking! Oswald is buying us time. Keep walking.

Ana’s back was still to Horrance as she put one foot in front of the other, hoping that Oswald was right, and that he’d be following shortly.

“You can come with us,” Oswald repeated to the big man.

Ana continued forward, looking down the corpse-riddled hall, strewn with dead men, women, and children. No guards, no lurking zombies, no stray fire behind her.

The coast was clear, but Ana didn’t know where to go.

She needed Oswald.

“Thank you, Horrance, for doing the right thing.” Oswald sounded slightly closer.

She took another step.

“You should come with us,” Oswald suggested again.

“No. Come back right now,” Horrance pleaded, sounding on the verge of tears.

“No,” Oswald said. “
You
can come with us, Horrance. You don’t have to stay with Sutherland. You can be free. With us. We’ll find the cure. No regrets, Horrance.”

Horrance had nothing left. “Come back” was barely a puff.

“Thank you,” Oswald called, now right behind Ana. She jostled Calla in her arms. The girl was starting to feel twice as heavy and three times as awkward.

Oswald was at Ana’s back. He said, “Thanks for doing the right thing, Horrance. You’re a good man.”

Ana thought she could feel Horrance’s anger dying like wind . . .

Blaster fire scraped frayed nerves and an otherwise silent tunnel. Ana turned to see Oswald standing behind her, a hole through his chest. His eye was open, startled, as he fell to the floor.

Ana looked through the space where Oswald had been and into Horrance’s horrified eyes. He looked down at the gun as if it had fired on its own, then back at Ana, eyes big and sad, face knotted in confusion.

Ana tightened her grip on Calla, then turned and ran. Horrance called “Come back!” three times, louder each time, but the next blast didn’t leave his gun until after she had cleared the hallway.

Ana raced until she found the secret panel that led to the stairwell that led to the room she’d been hiding in with Oswald, Calla, and Elijah just before all hell broke loose.

She hoped Elijah was still in there and hadn’t locked her out. The door opened as she touched the panel to its right. She went inside, immediately pressing the red lock button on the inside panel.

She turned to find Elijah on the ground, curled into a fetal position, shaking. Her heart dropped like a stone.

“Elijah?”

The boy looked up, eyes like two marbles on fire, face caked with early forming scabs, saliva drooling from the corners of his mouth.

Elijah leapt at Ana, almost hissing. She had forgotten he wasn’t immune.

She cried out, turning herself around and dropping on top of Calla to form a barrier between her and the boy. The gun clanged to the ground.

Elijah rolled right off her back and fell to the floor.

Ana gently laid Calla down. Out of the corner of her eyes she saw Elijah spring up.

Shit!

The gun was three feet away, Elijah five feet past that.

Whatever human part of him that had yet to surrender to the monster must’ve recognized Ana’s intention to get the blaster.

He ran toward her.

Without time to think, she dug her foot into the floor and propelled herself straight at the infected boy. Seconds away from his wide-open mouth, she brought up both her hands, grabbed his shoulders, and used his weight against him, spinning the almost-zombie aside as she fell to the ground atop the blaster.

Ana grabbed it.

He lunged at her.

She brought the gun up and fired, hitting Elijah’s gut and slicing him in two. His torso sailed past Ana, his legs fell in a bloody tangled heap.

Ana fell back against the ground, sighing in relief. As she did, the boy’s head and arms twitched, and blood poured from his severed trunk, the hot stench of putrid guts souring the room.

Ana’s stomach spilled onto the floor.

She cried out as the vomit left her body. She turned and crawled over to Calla, pulled her body into her chest, and held the girl, still sobbing.

Sutherland’s voice came over the intercom.

“Come out, come out, wherever you are.”