Love and Decay, Volume Eight (Episodes 9-12, Season Three) (13 page)

“They want to know why we are here,” she said
again. There was exhaustion to her voice that hurt my heart.

“We need their help,” Vaughan declared. “We
will die if they don’t help us.”

Their eyes got big again when Adela
translated. The leader answered quickly, but Adela had a response
ready. When he finally turned around and gestured for us to follow
I couldn’t figure out what they said to each other.

“He’s worried because they have nothing to
give,” she told us with a quiet voice. “He thinks we are asking
them for food and water. I told him that letting us in their city
was enough, but he doesn’t believe me. He’s taking us to his king
now.
El Rey de la Rata
will have an answer for him about
what to do with us.”

“That can’t be a good thing!” I whispered
fiercely.

Adela gave me a patient smile. “That is what
they were called before the Dead rose. They were called
ratas
. In English you have a word for this… gutter rats.
That is what they were until the infection and everyone else died.
Now the
ratas
rule this area, so he is rightfully their
king.”

Most of the kids stayed behind to watch the
gate, but a handful of them followed along with us, armed and
dangerous. They openly stared at us, watching everything we did and
sometimes imitating our facial expressions or gestures. They would
laugh together at their versions, but it was as equally
entertaining for us as it was them.

Several of them were very curious about the
baby, but Haley kept Lennon out of their reach. Adela tried to tell
them that they were too dirty to touch the baby, but obviously they
weren’t used to listening to anyone tell them what to do. Finally
Nelson stepped in front of Haley and stared them down until they
backed away. He didn’t have to speak. He just looked as mean as we
all knew he could be when provoked.

The kids got the message.

They were also interested in Page. With her
shiny blonde hair and pretty face, she looked like an angel in the
deepest pits of hell.

Hendrix and I had gotten roughed up in our
battle. Nelson, Tyler, Miller, Vaughan, Harrison and King were all
dirty as well. But we had gotten dirty so Page, Haley, Lennon and
Adela didn’t have to. While I was covered head to toe in unnamable
substances, Haley and Page were as clean as they had been this
morning after an impromptu bath in a mountain stream, except for
Page’s short bout of vomiting.

Miller flexed next to Page, scaring off boys
older than him. I caught Hendrix’s lips twitch as he fought off a
smile.

We wove between dilapidated houses that
leaned on each other or threatened to collapse with the next gentle
breeze. We walked across planks of rotting wood that were used as
bridges over the slimy rivers of sewage. The sun rose higher in the
sky and shed light on the gray existence these kids fought to live
through every day.

Every now and then someone would poke their
head out of an open window or door, watching us with that same
stunned disbelief the kids still wore. Older people were mixed in
among the children, but they were mostly the elderly or women. I
didn’t see any men loitering about or carrying weapons.

“Adela, ask them where the men are?” I
prompted.

She did. Their leader replied with a blasé
shrug of one shoulder and monotone explanation.

“He says they left to fight three years ago
and never came back.” Her words settled over us with new grief.

Either they had all died or they’d escaped
this desperate situation. They probably hadn’t thought anyone could
survive here.

They had been wrong. And at what price?

“All of the men left?” Nelson pressed.

Adela repeated the question in Spanish. She
turned back to us and explained, “They were called to defend the
city and work on the roads. He says they never came back.” She fell
silent for a minute before continuing with her own version. “They
were probably the ones that destroyed all of the roads and made
Mexico City the only way through Mexico. They might have been
trapped in other places around the city too. From what I understand
the boroughs are at war. If they were caught in a neighborhood,
they might not have been allowed to leave.”

“But they’ve left these kids helpless! How
have they been eating?
What
have they been eating? What
about water?” I wondered if all big cities were like this? Haley
and I had always tried to avoid the cities and potentially densely
populated areas. The one time we’d been in one with the Parkers, it
had been empty. We had raided a gun store in Oklahoma City, but the
only people living there were Zombies. In America, all of the major
metropolises had been evacuated first.

It was the opposite here. Mexico City had
become a war zone for both the Feeders and the humans. Millions of
people had lived in peace here until the infection. Now those
millions of people were at war with each other and an infection
that had no cure or vaccine.

I felt Colombia calling our name. We had to
get down there. We had to do what we could to eradicate this
disease. I couldn’t stand by and watch these children suffer.

They had survived this long, but at what
price. And how much longer could they go on living like this?

We reached a structure with peeling tan paint
and a slanted roof. The front door hung open off its hinges, the
corner of it stuck in the mud. I glimpsed inside and saw bare feet
hanging off a mattress on the floor. A thin, dirtied sheet covered
a skinny body and mass of disheveled black hair. He snored into his
boney elbow, completely oblivious to the crowd outside his
door.

There was a guard on watch, another kid with
bigger arms and a thicker neck than the other kids. He was older
than the boy that brought us here, but not by much. The guard eyed
us suspiciously and listened to the first kid’s explanation.

We waited patiently while they spoke in their
native tongue and woke their king. He flipped over and Hendrix’s
fast hand moved in front of Page’s gaping mouth.

We slept with our boots on because we were
afraid of something attacking us in the middle of the night.

The Rat King apparently slept in the nude
because that was just how he rolled.

I tried to stifle my giggle while the king
moved around his hovel, reluctantly dressing himself for his
guests. He had no trouble taking his sweet time and flashing us his
goods in the process.

“My poor innocence,” I whined. “I feel like I
just became a woman.”

Hendrix snickered next to me. “Is that the
first one you’ve seen?”

I resisted the urge to punch him. “Are you
kidding me? There used to be this thing called the internet. And
HBO. Just because I’m a virgin, doesn’t mean I’m completely
sheltered.”

He looked at me out of the corner of his eye
before humming, “Not for long.”

My heart dropped to my toes and my stomach
flipped violently. “Wait… what?”

Hendrix winked at me as casually as can be
while I tried not to vomit on his shoes. I was literally covered in
other people’s shit and a gallon of Zombie blood, yet Hendrix
somehow had the ability to turn me into jelly. Into hot and
bothered jelly.

Part of me hoped he at least wanted to wait
until we’d been able to bathe in bleach. The other part of me
shivered with anticipation.

The lanky body of an eighteen-year-old king
stepped into view. He grabbed the doorframe overhead with two hands
and leaned forward. He took in the sight of us while his guard
relayed our circumstances. A slow smile spread across his face,
revealing two gold teeth mixed in with his others.

He tilted his head to the side and with
perfect English said, “Kill them.”

Chapter Three

An explosion of Spanish erupted around me.
Adela frantically pleaded for our lives while the kid that led us
here looked like he was trying to talk the Rat King out of killing
us. The Rat King frowned, but said nothing while his guard pulled
his gun out and pointed it at us.

Adela stepped in front of it, gripping the
barrel with her delicate hands. Nelson put his hand on her shoulder
and tried to pull her back but she shrugged him off without
breaking her desperate plea.

Harrison stepped up and stood next to her.
His brothers all growled at him to get out of the way, but he waved
them off.

I thought he wanted to protect the family,
but the longer he stood there I realized he was watching over
Adela. I glanced at Hendrix, who wore a knowing look.

So Harrison didn’t hate Adela as much as he
pretended to. Either that or he realized how important her
translation services were for our survival.

Either way, at least he didn’t want her to
die.

“Enough!” The Rat King shouted when it was
clear he couldn’t take anymore. He ducked back into the house and
for a moment I had hope that he would take back his order. But then
he reemerged with a bottle of tequila and I lost all of the faith I
had in the kid.

He gargled with it first, spitting it out on
the ground before taking a long swig of the golden liquor. His
throat worked to swallow and he made these very unattractive
glugging noises that I thought might have been for show. When he
was finished, he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and
grinned at us.

Breakfast of champions.

“I will take her, then.” He pointed at Adela.
“If you want to live, you must give me her.”

Vaughan let out a long-suffering sigh.
Clearly he had no patience for this. “You can’t have her. We don’t
bargain with people.”

“Well,” the king countered with his thick
accent, “then I will have to kill you. That is my way.”

“We’re all armed,” Vaughan explained, leaving
out the part where we weren’t armed very well. “You have one guard
on you. We’ll kill you before anyone can come to help you.”

The Rat King did not look pleased with this
revelation. He turned to the kid that brought us here and
backhanded him roughly. He started shouting at him in Spanish,
hitting him until the kid covered his face and cowered. Hendrix
stepped up with his guns on full display and the king backed off
slowly.

“He is very stupid,” the king explained. “All
of these kids are. They don’t speak English. They don’t know how to
read. The only thing they can do is shoot. They are lucky that is
enough for them.”

“How do you know English?” Vaughan asked
carefully.

“Drugs,” the king said simply. “Before… all
of this. I ran drugs to your country.”

From drug mule to king. This was a success
story in the making.

“Why do you want to kill us?” Vaughan
pressed.

The king eyed our weapons. I watched his
thoughts flash across his face, as if he were deciding what to say.
“You’re here to take my kingdom. I will not let you.”

“We don’t want anything from you,” Vaughan
explained quickly. We’re just passing through. We were attacked and
your people let us in and saved our lives.”

“You don’t want anything from me?” The king
considered Vaughan’s words, but it was obvious he didn’t trust
them.

Vaughan shook his head slowly. “Nothing. We
just want to keep going.”

“Keep going where?” He took another deep swig
of his tequila. Color returned to his pallid cheeks and his eyes
grew glossier with each drink.

“We’re trying to get through the city,”
Vaughan explained. “We’re looking for a man named Tomás.”

The king nodded along and said, “I know
Tomás.”

Adela jumped in. “There are lots of men by
that name. We are looking for one in particular.”

“I know which one you’re looking for,” the
king chuckled.

“How?” Adela narrowed her eyes on him. “How
could you possibly know that?”

He shrugged. “Because there is only one Tomás
that matters. He took
la
catedral
.”

I watched Adela meet Vaughan’s gaze. She bit
her bottom lip and raised her eyebrows. She had no idea if that was
the Tomás we were looking for. But Diego seemed to assume the same
thing the Rat King did. There was only one Tomás that mattered.

We needed to get to that Tomás.

I didn’t know how far away the
catedral
was or if Tomás would even be willing to help us
once we got there, but we were pretty much out of options.

Again.

“Can you point us in the right direction?”
Vaughan asked without revealing how desperately we needed him
to.

“For the girl,” the king grinned. He chugged
at the bottle while his lecherous gaze swept over Adela. I
shuttered for her and decided that if he tried to lay one finger on
her, I would shoot him myself.

“You’re not getting the girl,” Vaughan
growled. “Give it up.”

Adela lifted her chin and spoke in Spanish. I
thought that was strange at first because the king could speak
English so there was no need. Until I picked out the word
Diego
. I realized she was using her connection with him to
protect herself.

Smart girl.

The king’s expression flashed with fury and
he replied with something I would have translated like, “You think
I care about him?”

Whatever Adela said in return must have made
the Rat King start to care because he dropped the subject.

“Fine,” he said. “I will send Miguel with
you.” He nodded his head at the boy who had brought us here. “Since
he is so eager to help you, he can show you the way.”

Adela translated for Miguel, since it was
apparent the king wasn’t going to. Miguel shook his head
frantically and spoke in fast Spanish.

“He says he does not know the way,” Adela
translated for him. “He’s never left this place before.”

The Rat King sighed heavily. “Fine, I will
send Luis too and Flora. Together they can figure it out.” He
translated for Miguel, then turned to us and said. “There are
tunnels you can use until you reach
Zócalo.
The
y
should be mostly free of Dead.”