Everyone nodded.
“Keep your weapons slung. Right now speed is more important than anything. The guards will try to keep the zoms distracted until we’re clear. After that, we’re on our own.”
“What if we run into a zom?” asked Chong.
“If we do, I’ll see it first. Let me handle it. If it comes at you from the side, Lilah will take care of it.” Tom gave them all a hard look. “I don’t want any heroics. I’m still pissed at you guys for going up on Zak’s porch. You should have called me or Captain Strunk. That’s not exactly the way to be warrior smart. I know you think you’re hotshots, but you are a long way from being real samurai. A skilled fighter doesn’t take needless risks. Do you understand?”
They nodded.
“No,” Tom said sternly, “say it.”
They said it.
The glimmer of light at the tree line had brightened enough for them to see the zoms wandering in the field or standing like statues. Most zoms only moved to follow prey but would otherwise stop walking and stand still. Benny had seen zoms out in the Ruin with years’ worth of creeper vines tangled around their legs. He still wasn’t sure if that was sad or terrifying.
Tom finally gave a grudging nod. He stepped up to the gate.
“Get ready,” he said quietly, then waved to the sergeant in charge of the night shift. The sergeant whistled, and his men immediately started banging on drums and steel pots as they walked quickly north along the fence line. The zoms in the field stiffened for a moment, drawn through whatever senses they possessed by the noise and movement. One by one they turned, moaning softly, their gray-lipped mouths working as if practicing in anticipation of eating a grisly meal, and began shambling up the field. Benny and his friends watched with awful fascination.
“It’s so strange,” said Nix quietly. “How can they be dead and do that? React to sound? Follow? Hunt?”
“No one knows,” said Tom. “They don’t need to eat. They get no benefit from killing. They can go years and years without decaying any more than they already have. No one understands it.”
Chong shook his head. “There has to be an answer. Something in science.”
“As far as we know, all the scientists are dead,” said Tom. “Except for Doc Gurijala, and he was a just a general practitioner.”
“Has he ever examined one?” asked Nix.
“No,” said Tom quietly, so as not to attract the shuffling zoms. “I suggested it to him a hundred times. I said that it might help us understand what they are and what we’re up against. That was not long after First Night, when we still thought there was a way to win. He called me crazy for even suggesting it. I tried him a couple of other times since, but Doc says that science ends at the fence line.”
“What does that mean?” asked Nix.
“It means,” Tom said, “that Doc Gurijala believes that whatever makes the dead do what they do isn’t science. It’s something else.”
Nix cocked an eyebrow. “Magic?”
Tom shrugged.
Chong said, “Magic is fairy-tale stuff. If this is happening, then there has to be an explanation. Maybe Doc Gurijala doesn’t know enough science to understand what’s happening. I mean … this has to be a specialty.”
“Like …?” Nix asked.
“I don’t know. Physics. Molecular biology. Genetics. Who knows? Just because we don’t have anyone here who understands it doesn’t mean that we have to jump right into a supernatural answer.”
Tom nodded at this.
“What about something else?” asked Nix. “What about something evil? What if it’s demons or ghosts or something like that? What if this is something … I don’t know, biblical?”
“Oh boy,” breathed Chong. “What—there was no more room in hell, so the dead started walking the earth?”
She shrugged. “Why not?”
“Impossible.”
“Why?” she challenged. “Because you don’t believe in anything?”
“I believe in science.”
Nix pointed to the creatures in the field. “How does science explain that?”
“I don’t know, Nix, but I believe there’s an answer.” Chong cocked his head to one side. “Are you saying that you don’t believe in science? Or are you saying that there has to be a religious answer? And since when did you get religious? You skip church as much as I do.”
Benny gave Tom an Oh boy, here we go look.
Nix shook her head. “I’m not saying anything has to be anything, Chong. I’m saying that we should keep an open mind. Science may not have all the answers.”
“I keep a very open mind, thank you very much … but I don’t think we’re going to get anywhere looking for answers outside of science.”
“Why not?”
“Because—”
“Enough!” Lilah’s ghostly voice cut through their debate and silenced them. “Talk, talk, talk … how does that get anything done?”
“Lilah,” began Chong, “we were just—”
“No,” she barked. “No talk. Now is the time to run. You want answers? Both of you? Find them out there!”
With that she turned and walked to the gate and stood with her back to them, her spear held loosely in her strong hands.
“Lady has a point,” said Tom. “Not really the time for this kind of debate. Let’s roll.”
He clapped Benny on the shoulder and then walked over to join Lilah. The field in front of the gate was almost clear of zoms now, and the last stragglers were lurching along the field.
Benny gave Nix and Chong a crooked grin. “You two need a referee. Jeez.”
Nix smiled a cold little smile and walked briskly away. The two boys lingered a moment longer. Chong said, “So, where do you stand in all this?”
“Where I usually do,” said Benny. “Without a freaking clue. And right now that feels like a safe place to stand. C’mon, Mr. Wizard … let’s go.”
The last of the zoms was fifty yards along the fence line now, and Tom nodded to the gateman, who quietly lifted the restraining bar. The hinges were always well-oiled to allow for silence. Tom leaned out and peered through the gloom.
Benny stood beside him, watching the shadowy figures move away. In a weird way he felt sorry for the monsters; even sorry that they were being so easily tricked. It felt like taking advantage of someone with brain damage or a birth defect. It felt like bullying, even though that wasn’t at all what it was.
Tom glanced at him. “What’s wrong, kiddo?”
Benny nodded toward the zombies, but he didn’t try to explain. If anyone would understand, it would be Tom. His brother placed a hand on his shoulder.
“I know,” he said, but added, “But don’t let compassion for them trick you into making a mistake.”
“I won’t,” Benny assured him, but his voice lacked conviction, even in his own ears.
Tom gave his shoulder a squeeze, then turned to the others.
“Okay—remember what I said. Keep low, move fast, and don’t stop until you’re in the trees. Ready? Let’s go!”
One by one they slipped out through the gate and ran at full speed to the bank of purple shadows beyond which the morning sun was rising.
Benny turned once more as they ran. The guards had closed the fence, and the town of Mountainside was locked on the other side. Everything he knew, nearly everyone he had ever met was behind that fence. His home, his school. Morgie. All of it was back there. There had been no teary farewells. If Tom had said good-bye to Mayor Kirsch or Captain Strunk or any of the others, Benny hadn’t seen him do it, and no one had come to the fence line to see them off.
It was everything that was wrong about Mountainside in a nutshell. Just as the people inside acted as if there was no world beyond the chain-link wall, they would probably write Tom, Nix, and Benny off as people they once knew. Like the people who died on First Night. The people in town would deliberately forget them; it was easier than imagining what might be happening out here in the Ruin.
In a way, Benny and the others would be dead to the people in town. Would the townsfolk become dead to Benny? Would their memory die in his heart?
He hoped not.
He slowed a little as he ran, searching the span of the fence, willing Morgie to be there. Just to wave good-bye. It would heal everything, fix everything.
The fence line was the fence line, and nobody waved good-bye.
Benny turned away and made himself run faster.
The five of them made no sound, and within a few minutes even the sharpest of the tower guards could not see them. The forest appeared to swallow them whole.
PART TWO
DOWN THE ROAD AND GONE
Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.
To keep our faces toward change and behave like
free spirits in the presence of fate is strength undefeatable.
—HELEN KELLER
17
THEY RAN DEEP INTO THE WOODS, FOLLOWING A PATH THAT WAS ALWAYS kept clear for the traders who brought in wagons of goods scavenged from warehouses and small towns throughout that part of Mariposa County—or what had been Mariposa County before First Night had invalidated all the old maps. As the sun rose it was easier for Benny to avoid stepping in the wheel ruts. Chong, who was much less coordinated, tripped several times. Lilah helped him up each time, but instead of it being an act of kind assistance, she growled at him, and each time she shoved him forward a little harder. Nix caught up to run side by side with Benny, and they both grinned back at Chong. He mouthed some words at them that made them laugh and that would have shocked Chong’s parents and earned a sharp rebuke from Tom.
After a half mile Tom slowed from a full-out run to a light trot, and a mile later eased down to a walk; and finally stopped for a rest. Benny was winded and walked around with his hands over his head to open his lungs up. He was sweating, but the exertion felt good. Nix’s face glowed pink, and her skin gleamed with a fine film of perspiration, but she was smiling.
Chong went over to the side of the road and threw up.
Leaning on her spear, Lilah watched with unconcealed contempt.
It was not that Chong was frail—he had trained as hard as everyone else and his lean body was packed with wiry muscles—but he never reacted well to sustained exertion.
Benny patted Chong on the back, but as he did so he bent down and quietly said, “Dude, you’re completely embarrassing our gender here.”
Between gasps Chong gave Benny a thorough description of where to go and what to do when he got there.
“Okay,” said Benny, “I can see that you need some alone time. Good talk.”
He wandered off to stand with Nix, who was taking several small sips from her canteen. Tom came over to join them.
“Chong okay?” Tom asked.
“He’ll live,” Benny said. “He doesn’t like physical exertion.”
“No, really?” Tom grinned and gestured to a fork in the road. “Soon as everyone’s caught their breath, we’ll go that way. It’s high ground, so we’ll see fewer zoms today. Tomorrow we’ll see about going downland to where the dead are.”
“Why?” asked Nix. “Wouldn’t it be better to avoid them completely?”
“Can’t,” said Lilah, who had drifted silently up to join them. “Not forever. Dead are everywhere. Even up in the hills.”
Benny sighed. “Swell.”
“Are we going to hunt them?” asked Nix, her eyes wide.
Tom considered. “Hunt? Yes. Kill? No. I want you to be able to track them, but I mostly want you to be able to avoid them. We can go over theory from now until the cows come home, but that’s not the same as practical experience.”
“Sounds wonderful,” muttered Chong as he joined them. His color was bad, but better than it had been during the last quarter mile of their run.
“It won’t be,” Tom said seriously. “It’s going to scare the hell out of you, and maybe break your heart.”
They looked at him in surprise.
“What?” Tom said slowly. “Did you think this was going to be fun?”
They didn’t answer.
“You see, this is one of the reasons I wanted to bring you out here,” Tom said. “When everything is theoretical, when it’s all discussion rather than action, it’s easy to talk about zoms as if they’re not real. Like characters in a story.”
“They’re abstract,” Chong suggested, and Tom nodded approval.
“Right. But out here they’re real and tangible.”
Benny shifted uncomfortably. “And they’re people.”
Tom nodded. “Yes. That’s something we can’t ever forget. Every single zom, every man, woman, and child, no matter how decayed or how frightening they are, no matter how dangerous they are—they were all once real people. They had names, and lives, and personalities, and families. They had dreams and goals. They had pasts and they thought they had futures, but something came and took that away from them.”
“Which is another one of the mysteries,” said Nix under her breath.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” said Chong, and nudged her with his elbow. She grinned and nudged him back, harder.
Tom said, “We don’t know how far we’ll have to go to find the jet. If we find it. We saw it fly east, but it could have landed anywhere.”
Benny winced. “Ouch.”
“No, don’t worry about that part. We’ll find some clues. Other people will have seen it too, and there are people out here. We’ll ask everyone we see … but a lot of those folks live in the downlands, and there are large parts of the country that don’t have mountains. So it’s pretty likely we’ll be where the zoms are. No way to avoid it.”