Monsters: The Ashes Trilogy (57 page)

Over the past few minutes, that
push-push go-go
had surged back with
a vengeance, knocking the breath from Alex’s lungs. From its deep
cave, the monster seethed the way a worm eeled under the thin skin
of a too-ripe fruit.

Running out of time.
Her aunt always said that time healed. Yet time
had only brought
her
more people to care about, and lose. The sobs
she kept swallowing back tried climbing her throat. All she wanted
was to howl, break something. Maybe shoot someone.
Stop, Alex. You
are no different from these kids. Focus. There’s still Wolf and Peter. Chris
might be in Rule, too. You have to help them. Tom wouldn’t want to see you
like this. Be strong for him.

“Take this.” Leaning down from the saddle, Alex handed the
Springfield to Luke. Without a rifle scabbard, the more compact Uzi
would be easier to handle. Tucking the guard’s pistol, a blued Colt
Gold Cup .45, into the small of her back, she slotted an extra magazine for both weapons into her cargo pants. She felt a mild ping of
unease that she didn’t have time to search for a Glock, then pushed
that aside. The Colt would do just as much damage.
Just remember to
flip the safety
. Still, not having a Glock felt like a bad omen. “Between
this and what’s in the wagons, you have plenty of food and firepower.”

“If it comes down to that.” The day was coming on fast. In the first
wash of silver spreading over the eastern horizon, there was enough
light to see how pinched and white Luke’s face was. “It doesn’t have
to. Take the tents, a couple wagons, and get out of here.”

“Alex, there are thirty of us. We’ll be easy to follow, easy to catch
again.”
There was no sugarcoating this. “You’d rather wait for Finn?”
“But why can’t
you
stay?” Cindi’s glasses blazed with reflected firelight. “They’re
Chuckies.
What do you care? We’re
normal
. We need
you
more
. Tom would
never
leave. We’re supposed to believe that
there are
good
Chuckies? And Peter, so he’s only half a Chucky—so
what
? Why are you taking his side?”
“Whoa,” Luke said. “Cindi, calm down.”
“What if I don’t want to be calm? This is like helping terrorists!
Just because Wolf didn’t kill you, Alex, doesn’t mean he’s
good
. It’s
like you’ve been brainwashed or something.”
“And you might be right,” Alex said. “But Peter
is
a friend. I have
other friends in Rule. Wolf saved my life when he didn’t have to. That
counts for something, and I have to deal with it right
now
. I have to
go to Rule and
try
to do something, anything, or a lot more people
are going to die, including kids like you. If I can take Finn by surprise,
if I can stop or kill him”—and where was
that
coming from?—“then
he won’t come after you again. Everyone wins.” She paused. “Pretty
much.”
“And what about all those other Chuckies?” Cindi asked.
“They’re at least four miles away. Most are on foot. Plenty of
time.”
“Well, the white Chuckies have horses,” Jasper said, and then, as
if in afterthought: “Of course, if you kill Finn, the network kind of
falls apart and they might not work so well. The signal intensity will
degrade for sure.”
“What? What do you—,” Alex began, but then Cindi interrupted,
“So we keep running is what you’re saying.” The younger girl’s lips
were quivering now. “You’re just
leaving
us.”

Alex felt a twang of impatience. “Oh, for God’s sake, yes, you
run
. You’re not three years old. Step up to take care of yourselves,
because, right now, there’s no one else. Even if I stayed, I am
one
person. I’m not that much older than you and I’ve got . . .” She bit back
the possible words—
cancer, a monster
—before any could jump out of
her mouth.
God, Alex, calm down; she’s just a kid.
Closing her eyes, she
took a steadying breath, then looked down at the teary-eyed girl. “I’m
sorry, Cindi. Maybe Tom
would
stay. That doesn’t make him right and
me wrong. It makes us different. I wish . . .” She pushed back the sudden choke. “I wish he was alive so we could argue about it. But don’t
think this is easy, or that I’m not scared to death.”

No one said anything for a long moment. Then Luke stepped
closer. “What if we wait for you? Tom would want us to.We pack up
and move, say, a mile or so west, into the woods.”

This was the mountain again, the day of the Zap, when she was
saddled with Ellie and terrified out of her mind. She didn’t want all
this on her. Yet if Ellie hadn’t been there, would she have tried so
hard? Ever left the Waucamaw? Every step she’d taken since the Zap
had been because of someone else. She might still be lost if not for
Ellie and Tom and Chris. Even Wolf. All those connections led her
out of those woods, from a very black place, and pulled her from
the brink of a leap where there was nothing and no one waiting but
death.

Tom said we saved each other.
She ran her eyes over the upturned
faces.
Maybe
he
was saving me for this.
“If I can,” she said to Luke, “I’ll be back. We’ll figure this out. But
don’t wait too—”
A quick kick of pain, a fireball behind her eyes. Deep in her mind,
the monster flexed, teased awake, and she could feel it stretching, trying to muscle open that box. She blinked, and it was as if the shutter
of a camera suddenly opened, a third eye—
—
and she is behind those eyes again, in that body she is beginning to
think might be a boy’s and in the heart of the pushpush gogo. High on a
horse, dressed in white, the red storm on the left, and the other screaming:
GOGOGO LET ME GO. Silently streaming over patchy snow, flowing with
the pushpush gogo of the red storm, breathing in the ripe meat smell it wants,
he wants, she craves. In the distance is a high hill and the stark outlines of
a tower—
—then a shift—
—into and through many eyes—
—a shimmer—
—and now, closer still— pushpush gogogogo—she is looking through a
tangled curtain of matted hair. This body is another boy, and he is wild at
the aroma of salt and meat, of prey dead ahead and just up that hill, in the
tower—gogo pushpush—I want I want I want I need—pushpush gogo—
Two rumbling
booms
suddenly cannoned like distant thunder.
Some of the kids let out startled cries. Snapping back behind her own
eyes, Alex saw two faint yellow-orange candles shoot into a pewter
sky due north. The flares faded fast, swallowed by distance, the coming day to her left, and the gleam of the moon, low on the western
horizon.
That tower
. That’s where the Changed boy was focused: the tower,
and men. Meat.
“Go, Alex. Good luck,” Luke said. “We’ll watch for you. Come
back.”
She wanted to say she would, but all those words hung in her
throat. “Stay safe.”
Then she spurred her horse as Buck sprang after, and galloped for
Rule.
Tom wasted ten minutes piecing it together. By then, Jarvis was on
the ground and Chris was trotting down the last flight. On the final
landing twenty feet above the ground, Tom turned a troubled look
back. Those men should’ve been on them, or very close. A fast horse
can cover a lot of ground in no time flat. And yet . . . Glassing the plain
through breaks in the trees, he saw they’d dismounted. Maybe—he
chewed his lower lip—a half mile? Working on . . .
“Tom?” Chris, just below. “What is it? You see something?”
“Yeah, but their backs are to me. Can’t tell what . . .” As a cloud
finally drifted aside to bathe the plain with moonlight, he raised his
binoculars. “Why send only four—”
“Tom?” Chris’s voice was sharp. “What . . .”
“Oh Jesus.” Alarm ripped through Tom’s gut as he finally understood. Two men were kneeling, and now he could see what they
balanced on their shoulders.
“RPGs!” Whirling, Tom planted his hands on the metal guardrail.
“RPGs,
RP
—”
“Jesus Christ, kid,” the bald boy snarled. With dawn filtering through
low-slung evergreens, Ellie saw the creep’s hair was growing back
around spidery scabs. “Give me the damn gun.”
“No.”
Ellie hugged the Savage to her chest. This was so embarrassing. All around, kids, most older and a few younger, were all big eyes
and sniggery mouths. To her right, a tiny girl with a froth of fine,
nearly white hair was cringing, like Ellie had sneezed and gotten her
all boogery. “It’s my gun. Jayden lets me.”
“This isn’t Jayden’s wagon, and I don’t care.” Creep totally freaked
her out. All those eyebrow hoops, and that safety pin, crusted with
old blood, through his right earlobe, not to mention the tongue stud
. . . it was just plain sick, like the kid got off on deciding what part to
stab next. As if life wasn’t bad enough already. “Now hand it over,”
the boy said.
“Lucian, leave her alone.” It was the thin, tired-looking girl, Sarah,
who was driving the swaying wagon as they jounced over humped ice
and sparse snow. “She’s not hurting anybody.”
“Yet,” Lucian said. “You want that gun to go off ?”
“It’s safetied,” Ellie said. Sensing her distress, Mina clambered to
her feet and pushed her snout into Ellie’s stomach while Jet and Ghost
also struggled up to see what was the matter. That started a general
heaving and jostling of the other dogs, which staggered and bumped
kids, who started up with the complaints, and blah, blah, blah. . . .
Maybe they’d let her walk. That would certainly solve the whole gun
thing. Exasperated, she pushed Mina to a sit. “My finger’s not even in
the guard. What do you think, it’s going to go off on its own?”
“All right, listen,” Sarah said,
ho
ing the horse to a halt. Sarah’s
expression reminded Ellie of teachers she’d like to forget: sympathetic about her dad but always saying stuff like
we can’t have that kind
of behavior in class
. “Give Lucian the gun, please? I can’t drive with you
guys arguing and a loaded gun pointed at my back.”
“It’s aimed at the
sky
,” Ellie said. Well, trees: dense forest hemmed
this snaky curlicue of a road. Limbs jutted like fingers trying to lace.
They were making lousy time; she bet they weren’t more than three,
four miles out. If they needed to turn around or move fast? They
were sunk. Jayden was having a heart attack; Ellie saw him in the
driver’s box of that first wagon, his head going every which way, trying to watch everywhere at once. “Even if it went off, which it
won’t
,”
she said, “it wouldn’t hurt anybody.”
“I don’t give a fuck. Don’t make me come back there, kid,” Lucian
warned.
The other kids’ eyes were saucers; a bunch of boys started in
with the elbow-jabs:
Whoa, F-bomb.
Oh, why had Tom put her in this
wagon? She should’ve hopped right out and run over to Jayden’s. “But
I know what I’m
doing
,” she said as one of the boys on horseback
eased to their wagon, ducking beneath branches as he did so.
“Problem here?” The boy, about Jayden’s age, had dark curly hair,
kind of like Tom’s, which was wavy and thick. Ellie thought he even
looked a bit like Tom, and then saw why in this boy’s eyes, which
were smudged with purple and . . . sad. Like Tom’s, even when he
said he was happy to see her. Ellie knew why, too: Tom hurt, all the
time, because of Alex. Ellie only wished she knew how to make that
better.
Maybe if I love him enough, hug him enough . .
.

“We’re fine, Greg,” Lucian said, his tone like a boy with one eye
on the playground monitor and the other on the kid whose butt he
wanted to kick.

“Yeah, I guess that’s why the wagon’s stopped,” Greg said in an
unimpressed
uh-huh
way that made Ellie bite her cheek to keep back
the snicker. He cut the girl a look. “Sarah?”

“I
said
we got this.” Heaving to his feet, Lucian stepped onto the
flatbed, brushing past feathery branches to wade through dogs and
kids. Towering over Ellie like a giant-killer, Lucian jabbed a finger
into Greg’s chest. “This is
my
wagon. This kid’s got a gun,
I
want it,
and
you’re
not in charge here,
Greg-guh
.”

“Calm down, Lucian.” Sarah looked like a whipped puppy. “Guys,
look, let’s just settle this and get going, okay?”
“But it’s safetied, right? So what’s the harm?” Greg said.
“Yeah,” Ellie said. This Greg kid was okay. “If we get into trouble,
we’ll need every gun we’ve got.”
“Oh, bullshit.” Lucian snorted. “We get into trouble, ain’t no little
girl .22 gonna save our butts.”
“Fine,” Ellie shot back. “So if I’m not going to save your butt, you
mind if I save mine?”
That
got everyone nudging elbows and whispering again.
I don’t care; you’re not my friends.
She glowered up at Lucian.
“What’s your
problem
?”
“A very good question,” Greg said.
“Greg,” Lucian growled. “Don’t push me, man.”
“Or what? You going to kill me now? You had your shot,” Greg
said.
“She should give it,” the white-haired girl suddenly piped in that
lisping singsong every kid knew:
Okay, but don’t blame me
. She had
to be, what,
six
? The girl clutched a Lalaloopsy doll with a spray of
fuchsia curls. “My mommy said guns kill people.”
About half the kids gave solemn nods, but a trio of boys shrugged
and one elfish, older kid with big ears said, “I don’t see what’s the big
deal. I wish
I
had a gun.”
“Greg,” Sarah said, still with that nervous, whipped-puppy look.
“This isn’t going to change what’s happened.”
“You weren’t locked in a cell, Sarah,” Greg said, but he was looking at Lucian. “You weren’t spit on and punched. You didn’t clean
chunks of dead kid from a church floor, or shovel horse shit with
your bare hands.”
Whoa.
No wonder Chris left Rule. The way Greg and Lucian were
eyeing each other, she had a terrible feeling that neither needed much
of an excuse.
Her closet-voice:
Don’t make trouble, Ellie.
“Fine. Look, I’m giving it.” Fuming, she watched Lucian shuck
the round in the chamber, then work the bolt and empty the Savage’s
magazine.
“There you go.” Lucian had this big nasty smirk all over his stupid
face. Slipping her bullets into a pocket, he handed back the rifle. “We
get where we’re going, you can have the bullets back. And Greg?”
Lucian stomped for the driver’s box. “Thanks for your concern, man.
Now fuck off.”
“Lucian,” Sarah said.
We are
so
not living on the same farm.
Probably wouldn’t give back
her bullets either. Turning, she reached out to touch Greg’s leg. “He’s
kind of a jerk, huh?”
“Fucking heard that,” Lucian said.
“Yeah. Like . . .
seriously
,” Greg said, with a perfectly straight face.
She almost cracked up. “I didn’t mean to get you in trouble.”
“You didn’t. Don’t worry about it,” Greg said, but didn’t smile. As
Sarah snapped the reins and their wagon started up, he let them pull
ahead. “See you later.”
Okay, so Greg seemed all right.
But I still wish Tom was here,
and Chris. I want to go home.
Dragging an arm across her eyes, she
slouched into her parka, digging her chin under the zipper until the
collar was up around her nose, and glared down at her boots.
I want
my daddy and Grandpa Jack and Tom and Alex.
The dogs had settled
down, although Mina kept dropping her chin on Ellie’s lap. “Quit it,”
she said, shoving the animal away. “I’m fine.”
“It’s really safer,” the white-haired girl said. “My mommy—”
“Yeah, well, your mom’s dead, and so is mine, so shut up.” As soon
as the words dropped out, she cringed, and her closet-voice shouted,
ELLIE!
“That wasn’t nice,” said the elfish boy.
“I know.” Pulling in a deep breath, she turned to the little girl.
“Sorry. That was really mean.”
“Mmm-hmm.” The girl’s eyes were moist blue pools. Her lips,
delicate as rose petals, quivered as she dropped her face into her doll’s
crazy, silly hair.
Would she ever learn to keep her big mouth shut? Laying down
the Savage, Ellie put an arm around the little kid’s heaving shoulders.
To her astonishment, the tears she’d held back streamed over her
cheeks, too. “Don’t cry. I just get mad sometimes.”
“
I
get mad
all
the time,” the elfish boy said.
“I miss my mommy.” The white-haired girl used her doll’s hair
to wipe her eyes. “I keep waiting for things to get better, only they
never do.”
“They will,” Ellie said, trying to jam in a whole bunch of
ohwow
she really didn’t feel. Grandpa Jack always said to look on the
bright side, only everywhere Ellie turned, it was still dark, even in
the middle of the day.
Engage brain before tongue,
her dad always said.
“Remember how awful it was in the beginning, when everything
went crazy?”
“It’s still bad now,” said one of the elbow-jab boys. His buddies
nodded.
“Not where we’re going. We have cows and sheep, and there are
lakes. Hannah knows about plants, and I catch lots of fish.”
“You fish?” The elfish boy looked impressed. “Can I come?”
Too late, she remembered Eli and Roc, still down there somewhere.
Never fishing
there
again.
But she said, “Sure.” All the kids were
looking now, and smiling, like she’d brought in this great show-andtell. She gave the little girl a squeeze. “Really, things will be great—”
From somewhere far behind came two thundery rumbles. Every
hair rose on Ellie’s arms. Gasping, she sat straight up and turned to
look the way they’d come, as did all the children and the dogs, too.
The wagons stopped rolling; the horses ceased clopping. While the
forest was still gloomy with dissolving shadows, slashes of bright
light showed through the trees to the east. Due south, Ellie caught
brief, bright pillows of pulsing orange light.
“Oh.” Sarah’s hand was over her mouth. Beside her, Lucian had
gone so pale his stubble looked like dirt. “Oh God,” Sarah said.
The dogs began to bark. All around, kids were jabbering: “Wow.”
“What was that?” “Did you
see
that?” “Is it a fire?” At her elbow, the
white-haired girl had her hands clapped to her ears and squeaked over
and over again, “What was that? What was that? What was that?”
“Explosions!” The elfish boy’s voice rose above the general gabble.
“Like
bombs
.”
Tom does bombs.
She was trembling. So much fear and dread coiled
through her body that when Mina suddenly let out a frenzied, furious
volley of barks, she almost sprang out of the wagon. “Mina, stop!”
Twisting, she buried her face in the dog’s neck, not really registering
right away that the dog was wildly trying to pull away.
Please, God,
please, not Tom, not Tom, not—
“Hey. Hey, look.” It was the white-haired girl, her voice now a
wavering whisper no more substantial than a faint breeze and so soft
Ellie was the only one who heard. “Everybody.”
I don’t want to look anymore.
She kept her head down.
It never gets
better. Everyone dies.
When Mina suddenly growled, Ellie looked up
and said, “No, Mi—”
And stopped.
Everyone else—everyone, that is, except for the now growling dogs and the white-haired girl—still stared back the way they’d
come, and they were all talking at once. Many kids had begun to cry,
although above the din, she thought she heard the old doctor’s voice
drifting back from Jayden’s wagon: “What is it, Daisy? Where? Jayden,
son, I think we got trouble. I think—”
Oh boy, I think he’s right.
Their dogs and the little girl were riveted
to the trees on their left. The little girl was so terrified she’d stopped
crying. Barely daring to breathe, Ellie inched her eyes west, away
from a new day—
And saw stark silhouettes slip from behind tree trunks that, in
such bad light, you might mistake for fence posts. Or dead trees.
Except posts didn’t move. Trees didn’t have arms or legs.
Or teeth.