Jenny Undead (The Thirteen: Book One) (16 page)

Jenny grasped the tarp and closed her eyes. She
had to leave her emotions behind. It was important to remain
objective so she could not just look, but see what was on the other
side. She braced herself and pulled violently on the
plastic. There was a ripping sound from above and the tarp ripped
partway from the ceiling. She pulled again and the Underground was
before her, dark and rancid and wet with humidity. She took out her
knife and sliced at the plastic. With a dull thump, it fell to the
ground. If she had the time, Jenny would have burned it.

She was about to turn the flashlight back on
when she felt it.

Someone was coming.

Before he had taken two steps into the
encampment, Jenny was on him, her hand on his throat. She shoved
him against the wall and the world turned a shadowy blood-red. She
couldn't fight it. She was so hungry that every part of her ached.
Her teeth were on his neck when he spoke.

“Jenny.”

She froze, her mouth at his neck. His heart was
racing and she could feel his blood pumping. She wanted that blood.
She wanted all of him. But something stopped her. That voice. Jenny
receded from the red world, and came back to darkness. The man's
neck tasted of salt. He tried to move but she was stronger.

“Do it,” he said. “Just
fucking do it, Jen. I'm dead anyway. I've been dead since you
left.”

She lifted her head slowly, afraid to see him.
Afraid to see his face. He couldn't see her like this. She had
tried so hard to keep herself from him, and now she had nearly
killed him. She looked at her hand as if it were an alien thing. He
fell to the ground when she let go of his throat. She took a step
back, feeling dizzy.

“Declan,” she said. He looked up at
her, his eyes slits. Jenny could feel the anger rising from him.
“You shouldn't be here.”

He stood up, his large frame towering over her.
How had she overpowered him?

“What are you?” he said through
clenched teeth.

“Just get out,” she said.
“Leave me alone.”

“No,” he said. She turned but he
grabbed her bare arm. He let his hand rest on her skin for a few
seconds. She could see his eyes widening in the dark, his jaw
slackening. He pulled his hand away. Jenny closed her eyes. His
revulsion was worse than anything she had been through. She would
rather he hated her than be revolted by her.

“You know what I am, Declan.”
Jenny's voice was slow and tired. “You already know. Please
don't make this more difficult. It's already so hard, Deck. I can't
handle much more.”

“You're cold,” he said.

“Yes.”

“But, you're not one of them.”

“Yes, I am,” she said. “I'm
just another rotter. I'm just less stupid. Now leave before I hurt
you, okay?” Her voice wasn't angry. It was as gentle as she
could make it. Jenny didn't want to do this. She wanted him to
stay, would always want him to stay. But if he did, she was
honestly afraid of what she could do. She could forgive herself for
a lot of things, but hurting this man was not one of them. Again
she felt the odd sensation of breaking open and finally recognized
it. Her heart was breaking. Her cold, dead heart.

She could feel his eyes on her, burning into
her. “It's you,” he said.

“I'm not her,” she said hoarsely.
“I'm a monster.”

He was quiet for a moment. “You could
never be a monster,” he said.

“Don't be stupid, Munro,” Jenny
said, making her voice hard. “I will rip your throat out at
any moment. I'm a fucking animal. I'm untrustworthy and
unpredictable. And
I'm not her
.” she shook her head.
“Not anymore,” she said softer. “Jenny is gone,
Declan. You should accept it. Move on.”

She moved away from him, holding onto the
makeshift table for support. She felt about to collapse. Any
strength she had was gone. Jenny felt like if she looked at him, if
she was close to him, she might just fall over. Or worse, that she
might attack him again. It was so hard to control the hunger. She
felt something on her face and reached up to wipe it off. It was
wet. Wetness coming from her eyes.

“This is impossible,” she whispered.
It must have been blood or some other disgusting fluid. Jenny
flicked on the flashlight and shined it at her fingers. The liquid
glistened clear in the light. She touched it to her tongue and
tasted the salt. “What...?”

Declan was suddenly in front of her. She looked
at him, the fierceness gone from her. She shook her head, unsure
what else to say.

“You're crying, Jenny,” he said.

“I can't be,” she said. “Dead
people don't cry.”

“Maybe,” he said, “what we
think we know doesn't apply here.” He reached up and wiped a
tear from her cheek. He only hesitated for a moment when he touched
her cold skin this time, and he didn't shrink away. Jenny stepped
away from him.

“You need to go,” she said.

Declan studied her. “Why won't you let me
help you? Do you realize how long I've been looking for you? What
I've been through to get back to you?”

“You don't want me,” said Jenny.

“What happened, Jen?” he said. There
was a note of pain in his voice that made Jenny's chest ache and
break all over again. “Where did you go?”

“Declan,” she said, “have you
hurt anyone?”

“What?”

Jenny reached for a lantern on the table and
slid it towards her. “Did you hurt anyone?”

She saw his Adam's apple bob up and down as he
swallowed. “Yes,” he said after a moment.

“Did you kill anyone?”

“Yes,” he said, his voice barely
above a whisper. “I'm sorry. I was so angry when you...when
you disappeared. I didn't know what to do with myself. And it just
happened. I came here and everything went kind of red and when it
was over I was covered in blood. And he was dead.”

“He?” said Jenny.

“Yeah,” said Declan.

“And then what?”

“And then nothing,” he said.
“All these people were screaming and then I ran away like a
coward. I went home and I was finally able to sleep. It's sick, I
know, but he was the reason...the reason you died, Jen.”

“Are you talking about Joshua?” she
said.

“Of course. Who else?”

“Joshua didn't kill me. His wife
did.”

“Oh,” Declan said weakly. He put a
hand to his mouth. “Oh Jesus.”

“He was a rapist and a murderer,
though,” said Jenny.

“Did he ever–”

“Rape me?” said Jenny. “He
tried. I kicked the ever-loving shit out of him.”

Declan smiled and the pain in Jenny's chest
deepened. “That's my girl,” he said.

Jenny grabbed a box of matches lying nearby,
struck one on the cinder blocks that formed the base of the table,
and lit the oil lamp. She raised it over her head. The entire room
came into view for the first time.

“Look,” Jenny said.

Declan frowned at her, but turned to see. She
watched him take in the room, his knees buckling a little as he
absorbed the scene in front of them.

“What the hell is this?” he said,
his voice low and breathless. He stepped forward slowly, looking
down at the bodies, black and crawling with maggots. He turned
around, seemingly overwhelmed by the number of rotting corpses.
Stepping around them he noticed the walls, and reached out a hand
to touch Jenny's name, scrawled in dried blood. Some of it flaked
off when he touched the letters. Declan turned around and looked at
her.

“Who did this?” he said.

“You don't know?” Jenny said.

“You think this was me?” he said.
“You think I killed all these people?”

Jenny didn't answer, just returned Declan's
stare.

“I didn't do this, Jen,” he
said.

“You haven't been yourself lately,
Declan,” she said. “Maybe you blocked it
out.”

“The fuck I did,” he said. “I
might have gone a little off the deep end, but I would never do
this. There are women here. Girls. How could you think I would do
this?”

“You killed Joshua. You said you
did.”

“Yeah, because I thought he killed
you.”

Jenny looked down at Joshua's unrecognizable
remains. He was nothing but a pile of garbage now. It didn't even
look like a body, just a pile of filthy clothes.

“It's not just this,” Jenny said
without looking at him. “There was a girl who I met here.
Lily.”

“Okay,” said Declan.

“Joshua raped her. Over and over again.
She couldn't have been more than sixteen. Maybe seventeen. But she
was so sweet, Deck. She got pregnant.”

“Fuck,” said Declan. “I'm glad
I killed him.”

“Me too,” said Jenny. “He was
a fucking stain on humanity. But that's not my point.”

“Make your point then,” he said.

“You know those rotters we saw? Some were
in Detroit, and we saw some when we rolled into Chicago. Nailed to
poles like Jesus, left to rot away in the most horrible way
imaginable. All sliced up and disfigured and all they could do was
scream.” Declan was watching her. “I found Lily like
that. Only she wasn't a rotter. She was alive. Barely. Someone had
sliced her up and then nailed these spikes into her wrists and
feet. A rotter had ripped the fetus out of her belly. She died
right there in front of me, and there wasn't a fucking thing I
could do about it.”

“Why are you telling me this?” said
Declan softly.

“I told her to run,” said Jenny.
“It was my fault. I told her to run and she did. She listened
to me. If she hadn't, she would have died quickly. But because of
me, she suffered more than you can imagine.”

“You think I would hurt a kid?” said
Declan. “You think I did that to her?”

“I thought it was the Righteous at
first,” said Jenny. “I thought they were making a
point. Maybe they were. But a tiny part of me wondered if it could
be you. And there was this.” Jenny gestured around the
room.

“And what do you think now?”
Declan's voice was tight.

“I don't know,” she admitted.
“I don't fucking know who would do this, or why. But I don't
think it was you.”

“You believe me?” he said.

“I think,” she said, “that
someone tried really hard to make it look like you did this. And I
want to know why.”

Declan seemed to relax, some of the tension
going out of his shoulders. “You think your friend's murder
is connected to this?”

“I don't know,” said Jenny.
“It's weird, though. I get this feeling like all this fucked
up shit is...”

“What?” said Declan.

“It's stupid,” she said. “It
doesn't make sense. But I feel like it's because of me.”

Declan was quiet for a long moment. She felt him
watching her. After a time, he came over and hopped up on the
table, the wood groaning under his weight.

“I saw you,” he said quietly.
“When you found that girl. I followed you from the lab. After I
saw you.”

“You followed me?” said Jenny.

“I had to know,” said Declan.
“After all this time of being angry and crazy and...it was
like I was in this black pit. I couldn't see anything around me.
But when I saw you, it all melted away. All the darkness and pain
and rage – God, there was so much rage – it all melted
away when I saw you. All I could see was you. So I followed you. Of
course I did. I needed to know if you were alive or a rotter or if
you were even real. And I saw you find that girl. At first I
thought you were going to do something horrible. I knew your eyes
were funny, and even though you talked to me, I thought you were
probably a rotter.”

“I am a rotter,” she said.

“No,” he said. “You're
not.”

“I want to eat you right now,” she
said.

“But you're fighting it,” he said.
“Rotters don't do that.”

“So you saw me,” she said.

“You will never know how hard it
was,” he said, “not to go to you right there. When I
saw how much you were hurting. When I saw you kill that rotter to
keep it away from her, I knew it was you, Jen. I just knew. And I
knew I would do anything to try to help you.”

“Why didn't you?”

Declan shrugged, looking pained. “I saw
the guy you were with. He looked, you know, undead. I don't know. I
guess I was a little scared.”

“You?” said Jenny.

Declan smiled. “Not like that,” he
said. “I wasn't afraid of fighting or getting
hurt.”

“That was my brother.”

Declan nodded. “Of course it was. Well, it
wasn't him I was afraid of. Not really.”

“You were afraid of this,” said
Jenny. “Of me. Of what I'd become.”

“No,” he said. “That's not
it.”

“Then what?”

He swallowed. “I was afraid you wouldn't
want me. That you would run away again. That things had changed
between us. I've tried so hard, Jen. But I can't be in this world
without you. It's just not in me.”

“You're just grieving,” she
said.

“No,” he said. He
slid down from the table and faced her. “Please tell me you
know how I feel.”

“Deck, I can't be with you. Not anymore.
Look at me. I'm a zombie. I smell dead, I look dead, and until a
few days ago I couldn't feel anything but the intense need to rip
living things apart with my teeth.”

“I saw you cry, Jen. Rotters don't cry.
There's something going on that we don't understand. Maybe it has
something to do with your mother.”

“How do you know about that?”

“You told me,” he said.
“Remember that night we found that bottle of
tequila?”

“Oh,” said Jenny. “Shit. I
don't really remember anything from that night.”

Declan laughed. “Yeah. I know.”

“I told you?”

“You told me everything,” he
said.

“You never told anyone.”

“Of course not,” he said.

“You didn't show it.”

“How would I show it?” he said.

“I don't know,” she said. “You
didn't hate me for it.”

“So?”

“Why not?”

He shook his head. “You're the only one
worth talking to. You're the only person I care about. Jenny,
you're the only person worth saving. You've got to know I feel that
way. A little dark family history isn't going to change
that.”