Read Crusade (Eden Book 2) Online
Authors: Tony Monchinski
“She’s right,” Sonya said. “What about your jobs? You’ll need council approval for this.”
“The council can kiss my ass,” Tris said.
“We are the council, Sonya,” Isaak said.
“The council will approve this,” Panas said. “We’ve got proof there are still people alive down there. They’ll approve.”
Gwen was sipping her last beer of the night by the cooler, listening to the conversation from across the room. Steve walked over to her and got himself a beer.
“They’re going to do it, aren’t they?” she asked him.
“Yup, back to Brooklyn.” He guzzled the beer and let out a huge burp.
“You’re disgusting. And it’s Queens. You’re bent, you know that?”
“No, I’m Steve. My roommate is Brent.
“So.” Steve extended the index finger of the hand gripping his beer and touched Gwen’s ring finger. “Is there a Mister Evers?”
“No…not any more.”
“Oh, hey, I’m sorry.”
“No, it’s okay.”
“No, really, listen. I’m not the big asshole you probably think I am. I’m not the big asshole these guys will tell you I am. Don’t get me wrong. I am an asshole. I’m just not that big of one.”
A smile crossed her face.
“Are you going down to the city,” she asked, “with them?”
“Fuh-uck that.”
“That’s how I feel.”
“You’re not going, are you Daddy?” Torrie was awake and stood tugging on her father’s hand. “You’re going to stay here with me, right?”
“Nothing’s going to hurt your daddy, baby.” Sonny picked her up and held her in his arms, “You don’t worry.”
“But there’s got to be, what, millions of zombies out there?” Mickey said.
“No.” Panas shook his head. “Probably
billions
.”
“We can’t let that stop us,” Danny said.
“Now that’s what I’m talking about!” Chris agreed.
“Sometimes you sound so much like Tris it’s scary,” Hayden told her twin brother.
Singh opened his mouth and started to say something about “council” but Tris cut him off, “Council will approve this.”
“Look,” Julie said, “I know we’re new around here, but how can you be sure about this?”
“In addition to the security teams stationed around Clavius City,” Sonny said, “we send out search and rescue groups.”
“Search and
rescue
?” Mickey asked.
“There’s other people—survivors—out there,” Sonny said. “In the towns and cities. We try and find them and bring them back if they want to come back. If they can come back.”
“What does that mean, if they
can
come back?”
“I’ve been out there guys,” Panas said. “It isn’t pretty. We had it relatively good in Eden.”
“We had it good in Eden, Panas?” Mickey said. “We were starving to death, man.”
“At least we weren’t eating each other.”
“
Ohhhh
.” A look of disgust crossed Mickey’s face.
“We find people out there...” Sonny gestured beyond the walls of the recreation center, beyond the sentries and trenches and security teams of Clavius City. “You’d barely recognize them as human.”
“Doesn’t take someone too long to go native again,” Danny said.
Hayden looked at her twin. “How would you know?”
“Look at Steve.”
“And they’re not all friendly, either,” Singh said, “like those people you met weren’t.”
“That’s why Tris was so ready to throw down with you the other day,” Sonya said. “Aside from her sweet and calm disposition I mean.”
Tris mouthed
fuck you
to the blind woman.
“Listen to all of you,” Bear said. “You sound like you’re getting ready to go down to the city with an army. This is a rescue mission, am I right? Or is it a war?”
“We’re going down there to see if there’s anyone left in Eden,” Tris said coolly. “We expect resistance.”
“Yeah, but better to go in with a small team, make as little noise as possible, and get out fast.”
Even though Tris was drunk she didn’t look upset that Bear had challenged her because she knew he was correct.
“Okay, then here’s how it’s gonna go,” she spoke up. “Here’s how I’m gonna’
suggest
it go at council, and I hope you all agree with me. We go in—no more than seven of us. Any married men or women, anybody with children, you’re out. Sonny, you’re out—”
Sonny looked like he wanted to say something but looked at his daughter.
“Danny, you’re out.”
“No, Tris—”
“Danny!” Hayden grabbed his arm.
“No, Danny. There were millions of people living in Manhattan. We’ve gotta expect most of them are zombies now, and we have to expect casualties.”
“I’m in,” Biden said. “I lived there. I know the people and the place.”
“Fuck that. I lived there too,” Panas said. “I’m in.”
“No, not both of you,” Bear said. “I’m going so at least one of you is staying behind. Preferably both.”
“Bullshit, Bear,” Panas said. “Come on.”
“Flip a coin,” Singh said. As Biden and Panas were both drunk it sounded like a good way to solve their conundrum.
“Bear…” Julie tugged on the man’s arm and looked in his eye. They had just got here and they were lucky to be alive. What the hell was he thinking?
“Call it, Panas.”
“Heads.”
“Tails, sucker. I’m in!”
When the three roommates walked back to their place that night, they were worn-out and in varying states of drunkenness.
“Hey, Steve-O,” Chris said. “You ain’t going with us, to the city?”
“No, I’m not going.”
Brent didn’t say anything.
“But you don’t go you’re like breaking up the fellowship. The three amigos, man.”
“Look, you’re going, Brent’s going. Zeds gonna have his hands full. Plus think of this: you guys go, who’s gonna clean the apartment?”
Chris considered it but thought it was a little strange, as Steve rarely lifted a finger to clean the apartment.
“Besides, I got a chance at number five hundred and forty-five.” He stuck his tongue out and flicked it up and down.
“Oh, that Gwen-chick.” Chris nodded. “She’s real pretty.”
“Yeah, she is, isn’t she?”
Brent knew if the shoe were on the other foot, if he or Chris were staying behind, Steve would be the first to bitch about
bros before hoes
or some bullshit. But Brent also knew that this was about more than a woman with a broken arm. Brent would never call him on it, but he knew Steve. Steve was scared. He’d been scared since that day at the convoy when he’d been scampering around on his hands and one broken ankle like a retarded crab and Chris had saved his ass.
“Yeah, might be good you stay behind,” Brent said. “You go away for a week Gwen might be moved in with Singh by the time you get back.”
“Oh, hell no.”
Brent didn’t think badly of Steve for not wanting to leave the safety of their haven. He would miss his roommate on the road, but if Steve’s heart wasn’t in it, there was no need to drag him along.
“Mark my words. By the time you guys get back, I’m in like Flynn.”
“Walk, Michael.” Eva prodded the sick man forward, away from the Jeep, through the snow.
Michael cried openly. He was not ashamed.
Eva and Lauren had come to the hospital and woke him. They’d told him to get dressed quickly and come with them, assuring him his wife and child were okay. He had done what they had said and they had walked him right out of the hospital, past a security guard who had nodded at them, into the Jeep and through the gates, out of Clavius City. The crew manning the gates had waved to them and as it dawned on Michael what this was about he realized the two women were not alone in their sin.
“I’m not going to beg you, Eva,” he stammered between his tears, plodding through the snow.
“Then don’t.”
“Think of Patty. Think of Max, for God’s sake.”
“I am.
Move
.”
He walked through the snow, his ankles cold and wet because he wore no socks and his pants rode up over his sneakers. Lauren had parked the Jeep such that the headlights illuminated their path through the woods. She walked slightly behind and next to him, loosely gripping that MP-40 of hers. Michael couldn’t see Eva but knew she was behind him.
“Stop here,” Eva said when they had gone a couple of hundred yards from the road.
He halted and breathed, the tears streaming down his cheeks. Above him the trunks of the trees reached to the moonlit sky.
“Eva—” started Lauren but the other woman cut her off with a look.
“Will you take care of Patty and Max?” He managed to ask as calmly as he could.
“Yes.”
“They’ll be fine,” Lauren said.
“Good.” He nodded and looked out into the dark. He thought about his wife and how they had met in high school. The day Max had been born, all pink and wrinkly and screaming and Michael had cried and—
Eva raised her M16/M26 to her shoulder and sighted down the barrels.
—when he had started pre-school when he was three. They had bought him a little lunch box with the
Teletubbies
on it and he had—
She fired the assault rifle once and the bullet punched through Michael, knocking him face down to the snowed over earth.
He made a noise and started praying,
Our father who art in heaven
—
“Shit.”
He was down but not out. As she walked up to him he was crawling forward.
—
hallowed be they name, thy kingdom come thy will be done on
—
She leaned over and fired another 5.56 mm round point blank into the back of his head. She stood up and turned around. There was no remorse in her eyes that Lauren could see, no anything.
On the ride back to Clavius City, Lauren drove.
“That’s it, Eva.” She mustered up her courage to confront the other woman. “He was the last one.”
“He was the last one for now,” Eva said. “There’s always someone else.”
“No, I mean, that was it. For me. Forever.”
“Uh-huh.” Eva dismissed her.
“You’ve heard Singh and Malden. The plague isn’t always contagious. We’re safe. Sonya and the kids—”
“Sonya and the kids are
my
concern. And that’s why we do this. What, your conscience is bothering you all of a sudden?”
“It’s been bothering me for a long time. People like you—”
“Well, you know what, Lore? Wake up in the morning and go to your little work council or whatever and do your job assignments and
people like me
will continue to do what has to be done to keep you and everyone else in Clavius safe so they can wake up in the morning and—”