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“Had it?”
“Nah, it was pretty empty. There were a few employees and tourist types that were taken down by it. They were wandering around looking confused and hungry by then. The other inhabitants, though, that’s why we had to leave. That’s what was messed up. Kev and I couldn’t handle that nightmare.”
“What nigh— Oh no, those poor animals!”
“Yeah. Every last one of them starved in their cage. Some had eaten others and it wasn’t always the animal you’d think that was left last.” He shivers quickly and shakes it off. “Can you imagine what the prisons were like?”
“Maybe they let the prisoners out.”
“I doubt it.”
“I’m not so sure about that.” I mutter.
“Why do you say that?”
“Because it seems like most of the people out there belong in prison.”
He nods in agreement. “You’re right. But that’s just the way things are, I think. Kill or be killed kind of thing. You get so used to fighting and killing the zombies, maybe it doesn’t seem so crazy to kill other people anymore. At least to survive.”
“Is that how you feel?”
He shrugs, looking away. “No. Maybe. I’m not go
I pause, unsure if I should ask the next question. I don’t know if he’ll answer and I don’t know if I want him to. But messed up as I am, I’m not coward.
“Have you?”
He meets my eyes now, challenging me with them. “Have I what?”
“Have you killed another person?”
“Yeah. I have.” he replies bluntly, his eyes unflinching.
“I haven’t.”
“I know.”
I scowl at him. “How do you know?”
“Because you’re looking at me like I’m dangerous. Like I’m questionable. If you’d done it too, if you knew what it was like to be backed that hard against a wall, you wouldn’t be judging me now.”
“I’m not judging you.”
“Yes you are. And it’s okay. I’m not proud of it, not like the psychopaths out there that do it for fun. But I’m not sorry either.”
There’s a long silence that I have no idea how to fill. I look anywhere but at him, unsure where we go from here. After this, what is there to talk about?
“Don’t be scared of me.” he says quietly.
My eyes shoot to his, surprised. He’s looking at me with steel in his gaze but there’s something else there too. Something almost sad.
“I’m not.”
He nods once. “Good.”
“Does it bother you that you’ve—“
“Can we go outside?” he asks, standing up suddenly. “The rain has stopped. Maybe we could hit the roof? I’m feeling closed in here.”
I look around the massive room we’re sitting in with its twelve foot ceilings and nearly total lack of walls and I wonder what the hell he’s talking about. But I don’t ask. When we head for the door I pause for a moment, debating, then hold up a finger to him.
“Wait.”
I dig around in my backpack, searching. What I need is so small it fits in my two coat pockets, making it easy to hide it from him.
“Okay. Let’s go.” I say, hurrying up through the hatch.
When we get to the roof I immediately check the rain bucket and I’m relieved to find it far fuller than it was before. Water is my worry, far bigger than my concern for food.
“You’re good?” Ryan asks, watching me smile at my bucket.
“For a bit, yeah. I still need to go get more tomorrow.”
“I won’t drink anymore.”
“Don’t be stupid. Of course you can drink some.”
“I don’t want to make you go out to the watering holes if you don’t have to. They’re dangerous lately.”
I haven’t told him I have other water sources. That I don’t go to the holes. Ever. They’re communal type areas where water pools (old fountains, swimming pools, etc.) where people go to gather rain water. They’re dangerous no matter what, but for someone like me living alone and fending for herself, they’re a nightmare. A death sentence.
“Have you seen a lot of Risen there?”
“No. We don’t go there very often. We do what you do – capture the rain – but on a much larger scale. But we’ve heard things from other gangs. Stuff about what’s been going on at the holes.”
“What’s happening?”
“Roundups. A lot of them.”
The Colonies. They perform roundups of the survivors in the wild, a lot like a dogcatcher picking up strays. It’s not voluntary. Not anymore. If they find you, especially if you’re young, they’ll take you by force back to one of the compounds and keep you there. It used to be they rumbled around town in their trucks and called out over loudspeakers for people looking for sanctuary to join them. They offered a warm, dry bed, larger meals than a lot of us could remember ever eating and safety from the infected. All you had to do was follow them like the Pied Piper out to their compound where you’d work to pay your way.
Now, though, it isn’t so merry. Now they scour the city in run down vehicles that run silently, electric most likely, and snatch people off the streets. They write messages on old billboards and on the sides of buildings trying to drum up new recruits.
Be part of a community again! Serve a purpose!
We have doctors! Nurses! Teachers! Farmers! All we need is YOU!
They promise everything under the sun to get us to join willingly. They single out young people, advertising working generators and game systems on large TVs. Hot showers. Hot meals. Milk! That right there, even on my strongest of days, could almost persuade me to go along with them. But I never do. Something just isn’t right about it. They act like they’re trying to save us, saying we are lost and they would return us to the fold where we’d be safe and sound, but I don’t know these people. Not one of them. How can I be returned to somewhere I’ve never been?
“What do you have in your pockets?”
“What?” I ask, blinking at him. I hadn’t realized I’d zoned out.
It’s getting really late, I’m getting tired and I need to sleep. But I know I won’t, I can’t. The comet is still shooting across the sky and I don’t want to miss it.
“You pulled something out of your bag before coming up here.” Ryan says, gesturing to my pockets. “What was it?”
I smile with excitement and step closer to him, eager to show him. If he thought the TV was cool…
“Is that—does it work?” he asks, staring at my open hands.
“Yeah, it does. I wasn’t kidding before. I use the bike to charge it.”
“I thought you were being a smart ass.”
“Well, I was.” I admit, carefully plugging a short black cord into the top of the iPod in my hand. “I don’t have a hairdryer or a cell phone.”
“Or a fridge or oven?”
“Nope, sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry, just turn it on.” he says excitedly. His eyes are bright with anticipation. “I haven’t heard music in… God, in forever.”
“You guys don’t have any power?”
“Not really. Just some broke down solar panels that hardly work anymore. And no one has stuff like this,” he says, pointing to the device as the screen lights up. It makes our faces glow a bluish-white in the near perfect darkness. I worry for a moment, thinking it’s like lighting the Bat Signal up here. If anyone is watching the skyline, they’ll notice. They’ll know we’re here.
“Here,” Ryan says, stepping close to me and wrapping his arms around me lightly. The iPod is pressed between us, the light of the small screen now mostly trapped. “Better?”
“Better.” I mumble, keeping my head down over the screen as I scroll through it. I can feel his heat coming up out of the neck of his jacket. His chin and cheek are brushing against my temple and his breath is in my hair, warm and ticklish.
“Do you have batteries in the speakers?” he asks, his voice rumbling right beside my ear.
I shake my head slightly and hook the speakers to the belt loop on my jeans. “No. They don’t need power. They’re not very good, but—“