Jenny Undead (The Thirteen: Book One) (9 page)

“Was he a friend of yours?” Casey
said.

“He was a rapist,” Jenny said.
“He deserved everything he got.”

“Why do you look so sad, then?” said
Casey.

“Because none of that other stuff was
Declan's style. And I could believe Declan didn't do any of it. But
this...I know Munro did this. And if he did this, then he probably
did the rest, too.”

Casey didn't say anything for a while. Finally
he said, “Maybe you're wrong. Maybe Munro really didn't do
all this. Maybe it was someone else.”

“No,” said Jenny, closing her eyes.
“I know he did it.”

“How do you know?”

“Because he told me he was going
to.”

Jenny was calmer on the way
back out. Casey wanted to leave through the tunnel and walk back to
the car up the street. But Jenny insisted on going back through the
encampment, one more time. The
abyss in the pit of her stomach felt like ice. She wished she could
shiver, or cry, or shake in madness and frustration, but she
couldn't do any of those things. She was dead. Emotions were for
the living. Except for rage. That was hers. But this wasn't rage.
This was grief. She had never felt so sad. Like what remained of
her, of the old Jenny, was falling away from the inside out. She
was hollowed out and filled with despair. If Declan had killed all
these people like this, then there was no hope for humanity. Declan
had been the best of the best. If there was no good in him, there
was nothing good in anyone living.

Jenny stopped at the last body. “She's not
here,” Jenny said.

“Who's not here?”

“Lily. I can't find her.”

“That's a good thing, right?” said
Casey. “She's the girl you told to run, isn't she?”

“Yeah,” said Jenny.

“So maybe she got away before this
happened.”

“Yeah, maybe,” said Jenny.

“Can we go home now?”

Jenny looked back, toward the dried blood and
the bodies and her name scrawled on the walls like a child had
taken a crayon to the concrete.

“Jen?”

“I have to see him,” she said, and
her voice sounded hollow.

“Who?”

“Declan Munro.”

The smell of them slapped Jenny in the face as
they left the station. Living. Blood. She could feel their
heartbeats in the pit of her stomach. She knew there were three or
four of them before she saw them.

“Prowlers,” Jenny muttered.

“What are they doing over here?”
said Casey. “Aren't they usually just meant to protect
Expo?”

“Not if someone else hired them,”
she said.

Jenny counted three. They were dressed in
leathers, and all dirty. She could smell old sweat and cigarettes
and grime. And blood. Warm and thick and salty rushing through
their veins.

Thump thump thump thump.

Jenny shook her head, trying to
push away the hunger, the urge, the red. But her vision blurred.
There was a sharp pain on her arm and she looked quickly over to
see Casey looking at her, alarmed. His fist was balled
up.

“Did you just hit me?” she said.

“Yeah,” he said. “Snap out of
it.”

“Look at this little miss,” said one of the prowlers.
He had red hair that hung in his eyes like orange straw. His face
was so dirty that his skin looked gray, though sharp blue eyes
studied her. He scratched at a patchy beard with blackened
fingernails.

“She's hot for a rotter,” said
another prowler, this one with a shaved head. The top of his skull
was pointy and he'd missed a few spots where mousy hair sprouted.
“Do you think your dick would fall off if you fucked a
rotter?” He licked his thin lips.

“They think we're rotters,” said
Jenny. “How do they know?”

“The eyes,” said Casey. “It's
our eyes.”

“Fuck you, Shank,” said the other
prowler. He was older than the other two, with dirt settling into
the lines on his face, and gray streaks in his hair and beard.
“Do you ever think of anything but fucking?”

Shank shrugged. “No.”

“You can't fuck a rotter, shithead,”
said the red-haired man. “You'll get infected.”

“Too bad,” said Shank, looking at
Jenny and smiling unpleasantly. “She looks feisty.”

Jenny held the handle of her knife, looking at
the three of them. What were they doing out here? She eyed the
strip of fabric tied around their upper arms that declared them
hired. But no one ever paid prowlers to go anywhere but around
Expo.

“Hey, I know this bitch,” said
Shank. “She was the one who was talking to Bloody before he
offed himself.”

“So?” said the older guy.

“So,” said Shank, “I think
she's the reason he's dead.”

“Fuck that,” said the redhead.
“He got bit. He was dying anyway.”

“Maybe he wasn't,” said Shank,
looking at Jenny with a hungry look in his eyes. “Maybe it's
all her fault.”

Jenny and Casey took a step back in unison.
Jenny looked beyond the three. Her car was parked behind them. If
she wanted to get to it, she was going to have to go through them.
She looked at Casey.

“We should run,” said Casey.
“I can't be here.”

“No,” said Jenny. She could feel the
heat coming off of the men. Even from ten feet away she could feel
it. She felt the grip inside her again, the need, the hunger. The
rage. She blinked, but the red stayed. It was growing darker,
stronger.

Thumpthumpthumpthump.

The men were growing excited, their heartbeats
speeding into one long rhythm. Jenny licked her lips. She could
taste them already.

“Stop it, Jenny,” Casey said. He
sounded so weak. Like he was barely holding on.

“Are they talking to each other?”
Jenny heard one of them say. “Maybe they're not
rotters.” She couldn't tell which one was talking. They were
all blending into one. She could barely tell them apart now. She
took a step toward them.

“Run!” she heard Casey say. It took
her a moment to realize he wasn't talking to her. He was talking to
the prowlers.

“What the fuck?” said one of the
men. They were afraid now. Jenny could feel their fear, smell it,
taste it. She kept walking toward them. She let her hand fall away
from the hilt of her knife, letting it sit in its sheath. She
didn't need it. She was vaguely aware of the men pulling out
weapons as they backed away.

“Jenny, stop it,” said Casey.
“You have to fight it! You're not one of them. You're not a
rotter, Jen. You're stronger than this.”

“I'm not,” said Jenny. “I'm so
hungry.”

She felt the red wash over her like stepping
into a warm bath. It felt so good. She let it happen, she let it
take her. And then she was holding something, something warm and
sharp. She looked up to see two men running away, not looking back.
She shrugged off hands pulling at her, grabbing her arms. She
shrugged them off and aimed an elbow at the source of annoyance.
The world was so red and beautiful. Like blood. She looked down at
what she was holding. A man. The bald man with the pointy head.
There was movement in his hands and she felt a muted pain in her
chest. Again and again. He was pushing something into her chest
over and over. He smelled like blood. He was so hot.

Thumpthumpthumpthumpthump.

He looked up at her, stopping
his movements. A small knife was in his hand, covered in darkness.
Her blood, she realized slowly. She was in a fog. A euphoria. She
barely realized her movements until she'd made them.

“You're her,” he whispered.
“The one that Righteous fuck told us about. It's really true.”

“I'm so hungry,” Jenny heard herself
say. And then the red clouded her eyes and she felt herself
floating even as she felt the warmth rushing down her throat and
down her chin. And someone was screaming.

Casey was shaking her and Jenny looked at him
slowly. She felt strange. Like she was in a dream.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?”
he said.

“What?” said Jenny. “What do
you mean?”

“Look at yourself,” said Casey.

The taste in her mouth was both pleasant and
nauseating. She felt different, and after a moment Jenny realized
that she wasn't hungry. For the first time since she had woken up
drenched in animal blood, she wasn't hungry. For a few seconds she
felt happy. Then she felt something sticky on her hands. She
touched her shirt and found it wet and cold and tacky with...

“Blood,” Jenny murmured.

“Yes, fucking blood,” said Casey.
“That's what happens when you kill someone with your
teeth.

“Is it mine?” she said. She felt
like she was moving through water. She put her hand over her mouth,
but took it away with a gag when she remembered it was covered in
blood. She felt something drying on her face, making her skin
tingle as the blood became crusty.

Casey looked away from her like she disgusted
him. “Some of it,” he said. “You'll be fine.
Probably. He won't.”

“Did I...”

“He's dead,” said Casey flatly.

They were sitting in a car.
Jenny's car, she realized. She couldn't remember how she'd gotten
there, but she was sitting in the passenger seat. She remembered
the subway tunnel. The dead thumpers. Her name scrawled on the walls, over and over again.
She wanted to vomit, but she didn't think she could.

“I need to see Declan,” she
whispered.

“Are you fucking listening to me?”
said Casey. “You just killed a man.”

“He was going to kill us first,”
said Jenny.

“In case you're wondering, I took care of
him,” Casey said, finally meeting her eyes again. “He
won't come back.”

Jenny blinked. “Are you saying I'm
contagious?”

“You're fucking undead,” said Casey,
a note of panic in his voice. “What the fuck do you
think?”

“He was going to kill us,” Jenny
said again.

“You're out of control,” said Casey.
“We need to go back to the museum.”

“No,” said Jenny. She opened her
door.

“Where are you going?” he said, his
voice high and screechy.

Jenny didn't answer, but instead stepped out of
the car. She could feel the air on the wetness that soaked into her
clothes. She knew that she should have cared about the prowler that
she'd killed, but she just didn't have it in her. Not anymore. She
felt numb and heavy, a big chunk of ice-cold iron freezing up her
insides. She was starting to feel hungry again. She walked around
to the driver's door and opened it. Casey glared up at her.

“Get out,” she said.

“Fuck you!” said Casey. “You
get in.”

“Get out or move over,” said Jenny.
“I've got the keys.”

“You can't see him, Jenny,” Casey
said. “This is a bad idea.”

“I seem to be full of those,” she
said. “Are you getting out?”

He continued to stare daggers at her, but leaned
over, wiping the blood off the seat with his sleeve before scooting
his thin frame over the gearshift.

Without a word, Jenny started the car, ignoring
the grinding noises, and drove away from the subway. She spat pink
out her window. The taste of blood stayed with her. She tried not
to like it.

Declan's street was blocked off with cars and
debris and plant life. Jenny knew the crew had chosen this place
just for that reason. They had a tendency to blow up federal
buildings in the beginning. Before it was impossible to find
explosives or gunpowder; before it was a pointless act. It soon
became apparent that no one would ever use those federal buildings
again. Anarchy was pointless because the world was chaos. Soon
after, he met Jenny.

She parked at a safe distance on the street. She
didn't want to come in at the alley. It was a good way to get
killed. She didn't want to run into Lucy or Veronica or Beacon.
Only Declan. She just wanted to know he was okay. That her death
hadn't sent him off the deep end.

Casey wouldn't shut up.

“When are you going to get it, Jen?”
he said, following her out of the car. Jenny squinted down the
street. She could see the slate blue house two blocks down.
“Munro will kill you before you get a single word out. He
doesn't care that you're still you. He only cares that you're a
rotter. And you're fucking covered in blood. He's going to murder
you on sight.”

“You seem to know an awful lot about
him,” Jenny said.

“Damn straight I do. I've seen him in
action before. He killed a dozen rotters like it was nothing. I've
heard stories of him doing worse, too. He'll kill us.”

“Go back to the museum,” Jenny said.
“I'll take my chances.”

“No way,” said Casey. “I'm not
leaving you with that psychopath.”

Jenny rounded on him. “You know, I've had
it up to here with your fucking Munro diatribe. Why do you hate
Declan so much? Have you met him? Did he murder your girlfriend?
Steal your lottery ticket?”

“I hear things,” said Casey.

“You hear things,” Jenny repeated.
“Like what for instance?”

“Like he knows about The Thirteen,”
said Casey. “And he's sworn he'll find us and wipe us
out.”

“Declan didn't know about The
Thirteen,” said Jenny.

“Maybe you don't know him very well. Maybe
he got involved with you because of who you are.”

“Declan didn't even know about Mom,”
said Jenny, “let alone that I was some science lab freak
whose mother caused the end of the world. When I met Declan I was
living on the streets and trying to survive. I had fewer friends
than I could count on one hand, and even fewer that wouldn't kill
me for a pair of shoes. So don't tell me that Declan didn't love
me. And don't tell me that he's a monster, because no one who can
feel that way about another person is a monster. He made me feel
like I could do anything. Anything, Casey. He would have fucking
died if he thought it would save me. So don't you ever tell me
Declan Munro was some kind of boogeyman. Because he's the best man
I've ever met.”

Casey nodded. “Fine.”

“Who told you all that stuff,
anyway?” Jenny said.

“I got a guy,” said Casey.

“You've got a guy?”

“Yeah, so? I can have a guy.”

“It's the goddamn zombie apocalypse, and
you have a guy?”

Casey shrugged. “Just this guy who comes
and gives us information. He's the one who told me you'd be in the
Underground. He must have gotten his days wrong.”

“We are going to finish this
conversation,” said Jenny. “But right now we have to
run.”

“Why?” said Casey.

“There are rotters coming up the
street,” she said, nodding behind him. “Fresh ones,
looks like. We have to get out of here.”

“I guess I didn't tell you,” Casey
said. “The rotters won't bother you any more.”

“What?”

Casey shrugged. “Why would rotters care
about other rotters? We're dead, remember?”

“Oh,” said Jenny. “That makes
sense, I guess.”

“They have this herd mentality,”
said Casey, watching the two rotters come toward themƒ. One of them
was wearing a Northwestern sweatshirt, the other was female, her
blond hair tangled and caked with blood in spots. “They can
sense other...dead people, I guess. They like to travel in
packs.”

“I've noticed that, believe it or
not,” said Jenny, thinking of her heart thumping in her ears
as she waited for the pack of rotters to pass her by. The rotters
were trotting toward them. They stopped about three feet away and
tilted their heads like they were trying to listen. “What are
they doing?” Jenny said.

“Maybe they're sensing living
nearby,” said Casey.

“Like Declan's house?”

“Could be,” he said. “Jen,
please don't do this. We just found each other again. I won't try
to stop you – I don't think I could if I wanted to –
but think about what you're doing. You're dead. He's alive. There's
a balance to the world. It's not in his nature to accept the
...abnormal like us.”

An old rotter walked past, lingering for a
moment next to Casey before stumbling toward the other two. Then
another, even older and looking like it was barely held together.
With the really old ones it was hard to tell if they were male or
female, and this one looked on the point of falling apart. The four
were headed straight for Declan's house.

“I have to lead them away,” said
Jenny.

“To keep Munro safe?” said Casey.
“When has he ever needed protection from rotters?”

“I don't think Declan is himself right
now,” said Jenny. She started to walk toward the rotters. The
two younger were standing on the street in front of the house. The
other two were nearly there. Jenny ran down the sidewalk, toward
the house. She was a half-block away when the door opened. She
froze, unsure what to do. Declan walked out alone and panic rose
inside of her. After all her talking, she didn't know if she could
stand him seeing her like this. She touched her face and wiped
at dried blood. Did she really want him to remember her
walking-around-dead? She backed into the shadow of a dilapidated
porch. The railings had rotted and broken, and a porch swing hung
by one chain, the other end sitting sadly on the peeling and
weather-abused structure. Jenny peeked around the corner to watch
Declan. He was holding an ax and striding toward the rotters. He
spat on the ground.

The rotter in the sweatshirt came at him first.
Declan sent the ax straight through his face. The rotter fell hard.
Declan spun around and easily lopped off the blonde's head. Jenny
heard it make a wet thudding noise as it rolled into the gutter. In
seconds, the two old rotters were disposed of, Declan hardly a blur
as he took them out. He stood panting and looking around at them,
leaning on his ax. Then, like a horror film, the first rotter, his
Northwestern shirt now covered in greasy goo that was pouring out
of his face, rose up and walked, seemingly half-paralyzed and
dragging his left foot, towards Declan. Declan smiled, then he
smashed the ax down on the rotter's head. He fell and was
still.

Declan stood over the fallen rotter. Jenny
squinted. Declan looked like he was shaking. Then he raised the ax
over his head and sent it smashing down on the dead rotter. He
screamed with every blow, like something drawn from deep inside
him, raw and broken. Jenny flinched with each blow and if she could
have cried she would have. She wanted to go to Declan, to put her
arms around him and tell him she was okay. She was imperfect, but
alive. Sort of. The rotter was in pieces, his smashed face nothing
but a pile of rotten flesh. Declan threw the ax away from him and
fell on his knees down on the ground. He started to punch at where
the rotter's face used to be. He was saying something over and
over, and Jenny strained to hear.

“
You took her. You took her. You took
her
,” he was saying, his voice growing
hoarse after a time. When he was spent he sat back on his heels. He
looked at his hand, covered in dark sludge. Jenny thought he was
going to cry then, but he didn't. He started to laugh. It was quiet
at first, but grew louder and more maniacal, until his laughter
echoed down the street and off the houses around him.

The door of the house opened again and a woman
stood silhouetted against the light inside. Declan was silent when
he saw her.

“Is everything okay, Munro?” said
Lucy's voice. She sounded strange. Jenny realized Lucy was afraid.
Lucy was never afraid.

“Go back inside,” Declan said
coldly. “I don't want you here.”

Lucy seemed to pause in the doorway for a
moment, then the door closed again. Declan sat there in the street,
surrounded by rotter guts. He did cry then, deep, racking sobs.
Jenny crept through the twilight back to the car where Casey was
waiting. Casey opened his mouth to say something, but Jenny shot
him a look that silenced him.

“I don't want to talk about it,”
said Jenny. They waited in silence for Declan to go inside. She saw
him rise from afar, so small from this distance. He trudged into
the house and slammed the door. Jenny started the engine and drove
away.

She wasn't afraid of what Declan might do to
her. She was afraid of what she would do to him. Jenny was afraid
that if Declan saw her now, it might just break him
permanently.

She gunned the engine and headed back to the
museum. She glanced at Casey as they rounded the corner. “Now
tell me about this guy of yours.”