Chapter Six
I slide forward on the roof, but Dane grabs my arm. “Don’t.”
“We need to do something. We can’t stay up here all day.”
Zombies are clearly an issue here. I just think they may not be the main one.
“We can’t trust them. We might get down there and they kill us.”
I look back down at the three of them. The white woman on the right moves, showing the machete fastened to her hip. She appears to be in her late twenties, same as me, and she has a strange mark on her forehead, a swirling blue shape that I think is a tattoo.
“I’m going down there.” I pull out of Dane’s grip.
He scowls and lunges for me again, almost losing his balance on the roof. Blake clutches at his pack, holding him upright.
I slide back down to the window, muttering my thanks to Otto when he follows and takes my pack. I don’t want to drop it, and I don’t want to lose it if one of them decides to run off with it.
Dane’s right not to trust them, but we have to see what they want. If I’m the only one to take the risk, at least I’m the only one of us walking into a trap.
Not that it matters. I cling to the top of the window frame and drop down, catching my feet on the bottom. The flat is destroyed, what little furniture is inside all torn apart.
Those zombies were ravenous, but more than that—they were furious, too.
Otto passes me my bat. I climb fully into the room and take careful steps across the floor, gingerly stepping over the broken chest of drawers we put in front of the door. The butcher’s shop is destroyed too, glass crunching under my soles from the shattered display cabinets.
The women both look at me when I step out into daylight, but the man keeps his eyes trained on the rest of the team up on the roof. I don’t look back at them. I’m not about to let vipers strike.
For a moment, we take each other in. They’re wearing all black, clothes fitted for utility more than comfort. The white woman has a knife as well as a machete. The man holds a cricket bat, which makes me frown. Wood easily breaks, as proven by everything in the building behind me.
The Indian woman doesn’t appear to be carrying a weapon at all.
“What are you doing here?” she asks, jaw set.
“We’re here to clear the place.”
“Clear it?”
The white woman’s hand has moved to the hilt of her machete.
“Of zombies,” I say quickly. “We clear towns of zombies.”
The three of them exchange a glance. The Indian woman looks annoyed, but at what, I don’t know.
“We don’t have a zombie problem here.”
“You—Didn’t you see them?”
How could they have missed them? They surely could have seen a horde that size from the church. I gesture at the shop behind me.
“Look inside if you don’t believe me. The place is destroyed.”
The white woman swears and dodges around me to slip inside. She swears again as she takes it in, and I look at the Indian woman helplessly.
“Look,” I say. Honesty might help. “I’m Isaac. Isaac Wright. The Citadel sends teams to clear towns so that they’re safe for habitation again. We arrived yesterday, and at first we didn’t find anything, but last night…”
“What did you see?”
“Zombies. Easily hundreds of them.” I can’t say I saw skeletons, too. She’ll think I’ve lost it.
I’m only half-certain that I haven’t. That’s impossible.
The woman sighs. “I’m Nia,” she says. She gestures to the shop, where the white woman is still pacing about and swearing. “That’s Emma, and this is Callum. It’s not safe for you to be here.”
“Yeah, I know, but—”
“You need to leave.”
I shake my head. “We can’t.”
“I’m not asking.”
Callum is looking at me now, too. He’s a really big guy, so maybe that cricket bat is more for show than anything else.
“We can’t . We came in on the train. It won’t come back for a few days.”
Nia sighs and pinches the bridge of her nose. She doesn’t appear surprised, more exasperated. Emma comes back out of the shop and stands by her side.
Dread swirls in my stomach. I don’t like this. They seem more upset that the shop is destroyed than they do at the idea of hundreds of zombies swarming their town.
Do they know the man I saw last night? Does he have something to do with this?
I rub a hand over my face. I’m exhausted. How could he have anything to do with this? Everyone knows how zombies are made.
But the skeletons…
“Fine,” Nia barks. “You all need to come with us. We’ll keep you safe until your train arrives, then you leave and don’t come back.”
“We need to complete this job.”
“No, you need to leave.” Nia’s tone brooks no argument, and I frown. “Tell your team to come down.”
I bite back a curse. They’re going to like this even less than I do.
Behind my eyes, my dreams of making a better life for myself crumble to dust. If we return to the Citadel without having destroyed a single zombie, it’s not simply that I won’t be able to lead my own team or be paid a little better or find a more private place to live…
No. There are worse fates than all that. The Citadel does not look kindly on failures.
I take a few steps forward so I can see them all sitting on the roof. Otto is the closest, still holding my pack.
“Come down!”
Dane shakes his head. “How do we know you won’t kill us?”
“There are only three of us,” Nia says with a careless shrug.
I eye Emma and Callum again. The mark on her head is definitely a tattoo, judging by the dark blue colour of it.
Three swirls connect in the centre. Callum has the same tattoo, peeking just above his collar.
Staring at the marks for too long makes my eyes feel strange, almost like I want to look away.
“We can’t stay here,” I say, turning back to the shop. “You know that!”
Dane grumbles, but Rae leans around Blake to argue with him, and Otto is already shuffling over towards the window. Rae wins. Blake follows Otto and, one by one, they get themselves and their packs inside.
Dane is the first to storm out of the shop, shoulders set. “I don’t know who the fu—”
Callum steps swiftly between Dane and Nia, wordlessly staring Dane down. Dane swallows hard. None of the anger drains from him, but I see the way he calculates his odds and realises this is another fight he won’t win.
He steps back, jaw clenched. Blake is right by his side. Otto drifts in my direction and Rae keeps Autumn behind her, the furthest from the strangers.
“We aren’t here to hurt you,” Nia says, and I don’t miss the way Emma looks at her, “but you can’t stay here, either.”
“The Citadel—” Dane begins, but Nia shakes her head.
“They don’t reach up here. Now, you have how long until your train comes back?”
Dane doesn’t answer. Blake, ever-loyal, presses his lips together, too.
“Seven days,” I say.
Both glare at me.
“Seven days,” Nia repeats. She looks at Emma and Callum. They don’t nod or answer her, but she seems to read something from their faces all the same. “We’ve room enough for you. Come on.”
“Wait,” Emma says as Nia steps away. “Guns. We shouldn’t allow any weapons at all, but you can’t have those.”
A chill wracks my spine.
We don’t talk about the guns. No one ever does.
They’re not for the zombies. What would the use be?
The sound of a single gunshot would only attract the rest of the horde.
And there isn’t enough ammo in the Citadel to supply every hunter with enough to clear out a population that way, not if they want their own security to remain at its current level.
No. Every hunter is given one gun when leaving the Citadel on a job. That gun contains one bullet. And when we return, we give it back. We give back one gun containing one bullet.
The guns are our last resort.
Dane recovers fastest. Autumn is the only one who looks confused. Seems as though they teach them differently in the orphanages.
“We can’t,” he says.
“You will,” Nia replies. “They’ll be kept safe and returned to you before you get on your train. I promise you that.”
Mistrust floods me, along with uncertainty as to whether or not I’ve done the right thing. It isn’t just that she is a survivor and that I can never and will never know what she’s done to keep herself alive.
It is that I do not know why she knows about the guns. Why do any of them know that? They didn’t seem to know about hunters, about the Citadel.
Nia meets my gaze over any of the others. I’m the one who has to take this leap of faith because there might only be three of them, but the hairs on the back of my neck are prickling like there are teeth at my throat.
They could kill us without a second thought.
I don’t know where the thought comes from. I don’t know what has it dropping like a stone into my gut. It just arrives, and I am certain it’s true.
I reach back to the pocket underneath my pack. When I tug the zip, the gun drops into my hand. It is heavy with the weight of all it represents, searingly cold against my skin, and I hold it out toward Emma without setting my eyes on it.
I never let go of my bat.
“Here.”
She eyes me warily before she takes it and keeps looking at me even once it’s in her hands. Now or never. If she’s to use it, she has one chance. One shot.
If she knows about the guns, she knows that, too.
“Thank you,” Nia says.
Fury roils in Dane’s eyes. Blake doesn’t even try to hide it.
I shake my head. Truth is, we need these people who’ve survived here far more than they need us.
I think they’ve lied about the zombies, and I’m certain they know more than they’re letting on about the Citadel, and I know the only way we survive this week is to cooperate right now.
I’m ready for more than mere survival. I’m ready for a better life. Hope is a dangerous thing, and that’s why I’m being pragmatic about my choices.
I think.
Otto surrenders his gun next, just as reluctant as me, as does Rae. Autumn hands hers over easily. She doesn’t understand the weight of it. She’s never been trapped, considered the last possible moment she could take it out and save herself.
Save part of herself.
I squint up at the church. The sun is bright today, as though overcompensating for yesterday’s gloom, and I think of the broken, burst-open graves.
Maybe guns don’t matter in this town anyway.
“This is a bad fucking idea,” Blake says and slaps his gun into Callum’s hand. Dane is last. He glares the entire time but doesn’t say a word.
“Good. Thank you,” Nia says once they’ve gathered them all. “Come on. We’re going up to the church.”
Sweat beads at my hairline as we make our way up to the graveyard. Hushed voices reach us from the church, carried on a soft breeze.
Dane walks a step or two behind Nia and Emma, who have done nothing but ignore him this entire way. Callum is behind me, bringing up the rear.
“Who’s in there?” I hear Dane ask.
“There are more than just the three of us,” Nia replies.
“But where would you—” Blake begins, then snaps his mouth shut.
I look back at Callum. “The locked door?”
He doesn’t smile. I would trust him less if he did. “Yes.”
“How did you keep it locked?” We would have heard if someone were holding it shut on the other side, and that wasn’t even the problem. Blake just couldn’t unlock it, and no matter how much I dislike him, I’m willing to admit that he can usually get in or out of anywhere.
Callum looks at me, but he doesn’t answer, and then we’re walking into the church, so I don’t ask a second time.
Nia’s right that there are more than just three people living in Gravesend, but that doesn’t mean there are many of them. I count twelve people in here, not including any of us, and not one of them looks younger than me.
Neither of them looks older than Nia, either.
“They’re coming up here ?” a woman asks, stepping forward. She eyes us not just with suspicion, but with disgust.
Others murmur. The air thickens with hostility, and I suddenly don’t like that Callum is at my back. Fifteen in total, counting Nia and the others. Our odds aren’t great, especially considering Emma and Callum have our guns—we wouldn’t use them as our defensive weapons, but they might.
“Seems like it,” a deep voice says behind us.
Immediately, the church falls silent. The voice is male, rough, and carries an air of authority that makes me shiver. I’ve no doubt Nia is in charge of this town. It’s clear from the way she’s led us up here.
The owner of this voice means something else to the people in here. If he’s not respected, he’s feared.
Only…
I glance back. Light blinds me, giving me only his silhouette as he walks into the church. When he moves further in, shadows coalescing into a familiar face, my stomach drops into my boots.
His pale, angular face is already imprinted on the backs of my eyelids. His eyes meet mine and hold, and I feel a sick jolt of something that has my muscles tensing, as though I’m not sure whether I should run or move even closer.
“This is Mason,” Nia says. Her eyes are tight. “He’s been… investigating the zombies this morning.”
“Pleasure to meet you,” Mason says but never takes his eyes off me. He’s far too pale, despite the fact he’s been out in the sun, and his high cheekbones and prominent nose give him a sharp, haunted look.
“Investigating?” Dane asks. His disdain is evident in his tone, and Mason blinks the slow way a cat might, taking his eyes from me only after a long moment.
“Yes.” He deigns to look at Dane, it feels like, and I feel that same jolt as before at the haughty expression on his face. Something has its hooks in my belly, has my heart thrumming against the cage of bones that surrounds it, and I struggle to catch my breath. “And who exactly are you?”