Jenny Undead (The Thirteen: Book One) (23 page)

Jenny stood in the doorway trying to understand
what she was seeing. She took a step forward. The lab was big,
bigger than the office. Candles lined the counters, giving off a
flickering light. There were other, empty slabs in the room, too.
The candlelight was catching a reflection on Casey's back and Jenny
took another step forward.

Something was wrong about Casey's body. As
Jenny's eyes adjusted to the light, she saw black marks on his
body. Cuts welled up with blackened blood on his legs, his
buttocks, his arms and...

“Oh my God,” said
Jenny. She put a hand over her mouth, stifling the sobs. She
stumbled up to the slab, a rushing sound in her ears.
“No,” she moaned thickly. “No, Casey, no. I'm
sorry.
I'm sorry, I'm sorry
.”

Casey's back had been opened up, his midsection
lying in black sludge. It dripped off the slab. Protruding from the
inside of Casey's back was what appeared to be chaos. But as Jenny
stared at it in horror, unable to look away, she realized there was
something metal that looked like a small car jack that was propping
up his ribs on one side. Jenny could see where the rib bones had
been cut. But that wasn't the strangest part. It looked like
Casey's spine had been replaced with something Jenny couldn't
fathom. Something that looked like a spine but wasn't. Something
made of metal. Wires burst from the metal, sticking out from
Casey's body like a firework had gone off and then frozen in
mid-explosion.

Jenny remembered the clicking
sound after Lucy had shot her. The steady
click, click,
click
of metal on metal. “What?”
she said, unable to understand. “I
don't...What?”

“Is he...is he gone?” said a weak
voice behind Jenny. She looked around to see Trix standing still in
the doorway. She blinked at Trix.

“You're crying,” said Abel, stepping
past Trix into the room.

Jenny shook her head and looked down at Casey.
She reached down and touched his hair and drew her hand back. His
face had been cut, both cheeks sliced open in a ghastly black grin,
the Glasgow smile spreading his face open.

“It doesn't end like this,” she
said, her voice surprisingly hard, even to her own ears. She
thought of Lucy back at the museum. Saying it couldn't end that
way. Jenny understood now. “This isn't right.”

“Jenny,” said Abel, touching her
arm. Jenny slapped his hand away.

“NO!” she screamed
suddenly. “
It does not fucking end like
this
!”

“Casey,” whispered Trix. Her eyes
were dry, but emotion was plain on her face.

“Jenny,” Abel said again.
“You're not supposed to be able to cry.”

“Fuck crying,”
Jenny said, wiping her face with her arm. “Fuck it all. All
of this was for nothing. If Casey's dead, really dead, what the
fuck was all this for?
What did it mean
?”

“We have to get out of here,” said
Trix woodenly. “Something's wrong.”

“I'm not leaving him,” said Jenny.
“I'll never leave him again.”

“Something's wrong,” Trix said
again.

“Fucking right something's wrong,”
said Jenny. “What was your first clue?”

“They're gone,” said Trix.

“Who's gone?” said Abel.

“The girls,” said Trix. “The
girls are gone.”

Abel looked out past her and nodded.
“Maybe they went to hide.”

“So why can I still feel them?” said
Trix.

“What?” said Jenny. She looked at
Abel, but he had closed his eyes.

“They're gone,” said Trix.
“But can't you feel that?”

“I feel them,” said Jenny.
“But it's not the girls.”

“No,” said Abel without opening his
eyes. “I'm guessing they're much more dangerous than a bunch
of scared teenage girls. They probably motioned them out of the
room while we were occupied.”

“All this just to kill us?” said
Trix. “What kind of idiots are they?”

“They're here for me,” said Jenny.
“You two should go. Hide somewhere. They're not going to kill
me.”

“Fuck you,” said Trix, her usual
vitriol seeming to return. “It's not about you anymore. It's
about us. All of us. We're fucking family.”

“Enough of us have died,” said
Jenny. “Fisher and Grayson and...” she glanced behind
her and quickly away. “I don't want you and Abel to die,
too.”

“That's cute,” said Abel.
“Fuck off.”

“If it makes you feel better, it's for
Casey. You just happen to be his bitch-sister,” said
Trix.

“He killed your brother, Jenny,”
said Abel. “He needs to die. And you need help.”

“Get angry,” said Trix. “And
then get even.”

Trix didn't need to tell her, though. Even as
Trix was talking, Jenny could feel the rage filling her up, the
quiet, soft, furious comfort of red wrapping around her, focusing
her, making her understand what needed to be done. She flexed her
fingers around the knife.

“We need to kill them all,” said
Jenny.

Then the door burst open.

The men looked like the two who had been
guarding Zeke: big, burly men in long sleeved shirts. There must
have been ten of them. Each held a gun in one hand and something
small and white in the other. Jenny frowned. Syringes.

“My brother is dead,” Jenny said,
the words coming out in a growl. She could feel their hearts
beating, almost in unison, but not quite. She licked her dry
lips.

“He was already dead,” said a tall
fat man with a short beard.

“Where's Sully?”

The fat man looked at the other men. They all
looked at the three of them with disdain.

Thump thump. Thump thump. Thump thump.

“He'll be here later,” said the fat man. “Get down on your knees. All
of you.” He leveled the gun at her.

Thump thump. Thump thump.

“And if we don't?”
said Abel. “You're going to shoot us?”

“Not to kill,” said the fat man.
“Just to incapacitate.” He waggled the syringe.
“Daniel wants you alive. Or as close to alive as evil
gets.”

“We don't argue with thumpers,” said Trix,
stepping forward. She hefted the ax on her shoulder.

Thumpthumpthumpthump.

Jenny barely saw Trix move
before she'd lodged the ax into the side of a man's neck. He
screamed, something raw and high-pitched, and shot his gun in the
air. Blood spurted from his neck, drenching Trix in blood. She
opened her mouth. And then chaos erupted.

Jenny felt a bullet shred through her thigh as
she shoved her knife into the fat man's throat. He gurgled as he
tried to scream. He fell hard. Jenny spun away from a gray-haired
man who was trying to stick his syringe into the back of her neck
and slashed him across the stomach, making him lurch back, holding
his guts. She grabbed the next one from behind, her knife nearly
slicing his neck down to the bone.

Shots were being fired all around her. Jenny
felt a few graze her, but she ignored it. Blood was everywhere. She
saw Trix take a man's head off with the ax. Abel stabbed a large
man in the neck, one knife on either side, sinking his teeth into
an apple-sized cheek as the man fell. The meat came away with a wet
ripping sound and Abel screamed a primal scream. Jenny plunged the
knife up under someone's ribs. She heard laughter and whipped her
head to see Abel grabbing at the back of his own neck, blood and
gore dripping down his chin. His eyes were wide as he met hers. He
went down, his chin bouncing on the concrete office floor. Jenny
screamed as she lunged at the man laughing over Abel. Before she
could understand what she was doing, she was on the man and her
teeth were biting down onto flesh and then the red disappeared.
Everything disappeared just for an instant. For one instant, she
was invincible. She stepped back, blood dripping down her chin and
blending into all the other blood soaking her clothes.

There were only three men left, and they were
scared. Jenny smiled at them. The man she had bitten was having
convulsions on the floor next to her and she drove the knife under
his chin, far into his brain. Trix glanced at her, then turned to
look.

“Abel!” she screamed, just as a
bullet hit her in the back. The force sent her flying face-first,
the ax clattering as she dropped it. He had the needle in the back
of her neck before Jenny could even scream. She ran across the room
and slashed at him, fast and hard, giving him cut after cut until
he dropped his gun and fell, bleeding and crying. Jenny turned to
face the last two but she felt the cold metal of a gun on her
temple. The hand holding it was shaking like he had palsy.

“Can you shoot me before I slice you
open?” she said.

“He doesn't have to,” said a voice
behind her.

Without looking Jenny shoved the blade back
behind her and felt it sink into something solid, hot sticky blood
covering her hands. She pulled the knife out and felt the man's
breath on the back of her neck before she felt him collapse onto
the floor. She pulled the knife around so it was in front of
her.

“No,” said the man. He was young. A
boy, really. “I have a gun.”

“My brother is dead. Do you think I care
that you have a gun?”

“That was nobody's brother,” he
said, his voice shaking nearly as badly as his hand. “That
was a demon.” And then he fell, too, Jenny's knife lodged in
his stomach. Jenny stood over him.

“He's not the worst monster in the
family,” she said. She bent over him, smiling. “Where's
Sully?” The dying boy shook his head.

“Behind you,” said a whisper in her
ear. There was a sharp pain in the back of her neck and her head
exploded in agony for a long moment. She felt the strength go out
of her body and she went down, her legs refusing to hold her up.
She tried to move, but she couldn't even raise a finger. All she
could do was look and listen. She tried to move her mouth to form
words, but everything in her body was frozen. She was facing Abel,
looking right into his eyes. Footsteps walked around her and
stopped at her head. A face bent over her own and Sully's grizzled
beard came into view. He smiled with gray teeth.

“Hello, Jenny. Thanks for meeting me here.
We're going to have such fun together. It's already been more
entertaining than I had hoped.” He stroked her face with a
rough hand and Jenny couldn't move away. She couldn't punch or bite
or scream or cry. Sully stood up and disappeared from her view. Two
more steps and she saw his boots stop at Abel. He crouched down and
she saw Sully was holding her bowie knife. He bent over Abel until
he was right above his ear.

“They are never going to get her
back,” he said. “She's mine now.”

As the blade disappeared under Abel's chin,
Jenny watched the life disappear from his eyes. And a single tear
rolled down his cheek and mingled with the blood.

“Time to go, cupcake,” Sully said,
looking at her. “We're going for a little ride.”

Strapped to something cold, straps tightened.
Being carried through the basement and out a back door. More men
jostling her, laughing, telling jokes. Doors slamming, metal on
metal. The sound of an engine and then movement. Darkness.

Jenny was in the back of a van but there were no
windows and no way to know where she was going. Declan would look
for her, but how long would it be before he even knew she was gone?
He was probably still sitting in his car looking at the
rotters.

Trix,
Jenny
realized.
Trix is still alive.
But
was she? Jenny tried to remember seeing her after she'd been
injected, but everything had been so chaotic. And Abel. Poor Abel.
He'd been so brave.

But Trix is alive,
thought Jenny.
She has to be.
But
then another voice in her head whispered,
She doesn't know where you are. You don't even know where you are.

It was hard to tell how long they drove. It could have been an hour or a few minutes, Jenny
couldn't tell. The inside of her head was muddled, confused. But after a time, the movement slowed, then
stopped. There was a sound like a chain and then the van inched
forward. It felt like it was going down a steep incline and the
sound of the tires changed to something quieter, like the road got
smoother. A parking garage? It felt like they were going
underground, but Jenny didn't trust her instincts. They could be
anywhere. Chicago was a big city.

They stopped again and this time she heard the
engine turning off and the doors of the van opening and closing.
Footsteps. Muffled voices. Then the back doors opened and Jenny was
being pulled out again, carried by two men who stank of sweat. She
could hear Sully's voice off to the side.

“Put her where I told you to. No more
arguing. Daniel wants her to stay below for now.”

“You're not gonna like it,” said the
man carrying the gurney above her head. “There are cobwebs
and dirt.” There was a sarcastic tone to his voice.

“Don't worry about me,” said Sully.
“Just do as you're told.”

The hinges squeaked as Jenny's slab was carried
inside and placed down carefully. Sully sent the two men away and
she heard them close the door behind them. She was in darkness with
Sully. After a moment, there was a sound of a match striking, and a
flickering light filled the room. Then another match and the light
intensified. He was lighting candles. Jenny tried to move, put all
of her will into moving a single finger, but nothing. When Sully
lit the third candle, she could see a shape painted on the ceiling
directly above her. A sloppily-done cross in white paint. The edges
had run and dripped, giving it an extra dose of creepy.

“I've been waiting for this so long,
Jenny,” said Sully. He was right beside her. She tried to
turn her head to look at him but stared at the cross on the ceiling
instead. Sully reached out and smoothed her hair back. “You
must think me awful, to play you like that. But I assure you, it
was all business. Well, most of it was business. Some of it was
just for fun.” There was a sound like clinking silverware and
she felt the straps being loosened, clinking as the buckles hit the
floor. A whoosh of air accompanied by a grunt as Sully sat on what
Jenny assumed was a padded chair.

“Don't be afraid,” he said in a tone
that reminded her of the doctors her mother had taken her to as a
child. “This may be unpleasant for you at first, but I think
you'll grow to find as much enjoyment in it as I do.” Jenny
heard a soft clink and Sully stood up and walked around to the
other side of her. “I'm going to want a look inside you
eventually,” he said, “but let's take advantage of this
time we have alone together, shall we?” There was a ripping
sound and Jenny felt her clothes being cut away.

“Let's start slow,” said Sully.
“No need to rush it. He lifted her hand slowly, lovingly. She
wanted to rip it away from him, to scream as she cracked his head
against the wall. But all she could do was lie there. She felt
Sully's oily lips on her hand. “This is going to hurt,”
he said. “I wasn't sure at first, so it's a good thing I
practiced first. My little experiment failed, but I still learned
quite a lot. He wasn't nearly as strong as you are. I'm not going
to blame myself for losing him before I could turn him into you.
Your pain receptors will be comparable to your brother's, though.
Such a funny thing. Your organs don't work, but your nerves are
still fully-functional. Don't you think that's funny?” There
was cold metal on Jenny's arm and then her insides lurched as
Sully's blade cut into her nerves, excruciating pain shooting up
her arm. In her head, Jenny screamed. She felt the tears running
down into her hair.

“There now,” said Sully. “That
was the first one. What should we do next?”

It seemed weeks before Sully finally left her,
but Jenny knew it had probably only been an hour or two. He'd left
the candles burning and she stared at the cross above her. She
tried to contemplate what was going on here, why the Righteous were
involved with Sully, but after a short while she gave up and just
focused on the fifteen or so throbbing wounds on her body. A moan
escaped her lips, the sound surprising her. Slowly, she
blinked.

Focusing all her energy, she forced her eyes to
move. At first, nothing happened. Then, slowly, painfully she moved
her eyes to the right. She was in a dirty little room. Tables had
been set up against the walls, where a few grubby-looking candles
guttered. The floor was packed dirt and the walls looked like
cinder blocks covered in green, mold or moss or vegetation. She
moved her eyes further, straining to see. A crate had been upended
to use as a small table, on top of which, meticulously laid out,
sparkling and clean, were medical tools. Scalpels and saws and
other tools all laid out perfectly in line.

The door opened and she shot her eyes back to
the ceiling. She tried to move a finger, a toe, anything to move.
She had to do something. She couldn't stay here, not for another
second. Footsteps came toward her and a man's face came into view.
He was kindly-looking, with pink cheeks over a gray beard. He had a
syringe in his hand, which he held in front of him. He frowned at
her, taking in the carnage Sully had done to her body.

Jenny forced air into her lungs. “Help
me,” she said in a croaky whisper. She sounded like the
rotter who had bitten her back on that horrible train. He had said
the same thing to her. “Please,” she said, her throat
burning. “It hurts.”

The man looked at her for a long time, his brow
furrowed. Then, seeming to come to a decision, he grabbed her arm
roughly, pulling her onto her side. As she felt the needle sink
into the back of her neck, she finally moved her fingers, grabbing
onto the man's hand that grasped her arm. He jumped, pulling the
empty syringe out and dropping it on the floor. He stayed frozen
for a moment, Jenny on her side, having no choice but to stare at
his stomach as her body froze up again. After a moment, the man
gently laid her on her back again, the cross coming into view once
again. He didn't move for a long time. Finally Jenny heard the
scuff of his shoes on the dirt floor.

“I'm sorry,” he whispered, almost
too soft to hear. “God forgive me.” His footsteps
receded and then the door clanged shut.

And then Jenny realized she wasn't going
anywhere.