Outcasts (3 page)

I am the Outlaw, trouble-maker extraordinaire, a globally recognized firebrand, beloved or vilified depending on the day, Time Magazine’s Person of the Year, Los Angeles’s masked avenger, and definitely undeserving of Katie Lopez.

After a few minutes, I joined the dance.

“About time, handsome!” she called above the throbbing music.

“Just enjoying the view.”

“Close your eyes!” she laughed, our fingers lacing. “Listen to the beat and dance stupid, like no one can see you!”

So we did, with Cory and Lee, four friends colliding and laughing with closed eyes. For sixty minutes pretending like the world wasn’t caving in. Like a madman didn’t have full control of downtown Los Angeles. Like we were normal and happy.

During the final slow song, Katie grabbed handfuls of my shirt and tugged me close. Her mouth was hot in my ear. “You’re wearing the cologne I bought you. I wish this dance would never end, mi novio.”

“Except for all these people staring, my love.”

“You’re right. I want you. And I can’t have you with these spectators watching.”

“Maybe Lee can electrocute them all.”

She snickered into my shirt and began nipping at my neck, small playful bites. “Grow for me, Outlaw. I like it when you swell. Get taller so your shirt rips.”

“No,” I laughed and gently pushed her mouth away. “Clothes are expensive. Plus, it’s not time. People can’t see me do that. Not yet.”

Her resplendent face clouded a shade. “Soon?”

I nodded. Soon. Soon the world would discover Chase Jackson’s dark side.

She sighed, “All will change then.”

“It already has.”

“You’re still mine. Mine alone. But soon I’ll be forced to share Chase Jackson with seven billion others.”

“I’ll always be yours alone.”

“Let’s never tell the world.”

“The world is going to figure it out. Sooner or later. Regardless of what we do.”

“Later, then. I covet my time with the world’s savior.”

At that instant, our hushed conversation was interrupted by screaming. Not the usual party screams; these were horrified cries. The crowd, over a hundred bodies, surged backwards like a tide. Katie and I fought against it, pushing towards the noise.

I smelled the nightmare before I saw it; the sharp bite of gasoline.

Hannah Walker.

The cheerleader was here, dressed in tight white linen pants and a white linen tunic. She wore no shoes. Her hair was a shock of short blond pixie spikes. Her limbs were rangy and strong, and she held Andy Babington by the throat.

Uh oh.

My fellow students freaked. The dead’s come back to life! They stampeded into far corners, eyes wide, trampling each other.

Hannah, a beautiful and popular cheerleader during her time at Hidden Spring High, was dead. At least that’s what the world assumed. I wept at her funeral, same as everybody else.

Unbeknownst to us, she’d been essentially murdered and remade by a mad physician. Not dead. During the previous couple months she made a handful of public appearances but no one realized it was the deceased Hannah Walker.

Her secret was certainly out now, however.

She was insane. She was Infected and impossibly strong. She could set herself on fire and endure the flames. And she was here for me.

Her eyes calmly inspected the multi-hued chaos. Andy struggled in vain, his tiptoes scrapping against the hardwood. Her grip was iron. He had ten or fifteen seconds left before losing consciousness.

Katie stopped me with hands on my chest.

“Let me go to her!” she shouted above the screams. “You stay!”

“
What?!
”

“You go outside and wait! Only come back if I need you!”

“No way.”

She asked, “Where is Samantha??”

“Off somewhere with Puck!”

“This could be
bad!
She’s here for Chase Jackson. If Chase isn’t here, she might leave!”

“I can get her outside.”

“And maybe hurt a hundred people! Let me try first! Please! I don’t want the world to see what you can do. Not yet.”

I hesitated.

She shouted, “Plus! We don’t want Hannah to know…who you are. I’ll stop her. Now go!”

I didn’t go. But I did hide behind a corner, so I could watch. My stomach knotted and my hands shook. Her reasoning was sound, but I would take Hannah’s head off if she threatened Katie.

She fought her way past terrified classmates. “Hannah!” she cried. “Hannah Walker!”

Hannah turned her cold eyes on Katie, and I nearly fainted. I squeezed the corner so hard the wall broke beneath my fingers.

Katie touched her. She took Hannah’s face into her hands. “Hannah Walker. Do you remember me? I’m here. Katie. Katie Lopez.” Katie was emotional. I didn’t blame her. Tears spilled out of her eyes. “Hannah, sweetie? Can you hear me?”

Hannah spoke. “Katie Lopez.” Her voice was a harsh rasp, painful syllables.

“Yes! Hannah, I thought you were dead. Do you remember me?”

“Katie. Lopez. I remember.”

I whispered, “No. Hannah no. Please don’t remember everything.” Not everything!

Hannah’s eyes whipped up and she scanned the room. Did she hear me?

“Hannah, sweetheart, can you let Andy go? You’re hurting him.” Katie had one hand on Hannah’s face and the other on her arm. Hannah’s face was a melted and rebuilt version of her former self. Still beautiful, but now waxen and stretched. “Hannah? Let go?”

“I remember him,” she angrily indicated Andy. Andy was turning blue.

“Hannah, hold my hand. Please release his neck. Let him go and hold my hand. Hannah. Hannah now.”

All our classmates huddled against walls, creating a circle around the two girls and Andy. No one breathed, including me. Pop music still throbbed.

Hannah threw the college quarterback with a flick of her wrist. He landed in the crowd, bowling over several seniors. She watched emotionlessly. Then she cradled Katie’s cheek with her hand. I wanted to scream.

“Katie,” she whispered.

“Yes.” Katie’s voice wavered. Her Latina accent was stronger because of the stress. “Your friend Katie. Do you remember? We were friends?”

“Where is Chase?”

“We were friends,” Katie repeated desperately. Hannah appeared to be teetering on the edge of sanity, the edge of detachment and anger. “Do you remember being friends with me?”

“You are here.”

“I am here, Hannah.”

“The beautiful Latina girl.”

“You’re so sweet, Hannah. We were friends.
Are
friends.”

“Chase’s…friend. I was always jealous. And angry.”

“We used to give each other advice about boys! Do you remember?”

“You were there, Katie. My last night. You were there.”

By now a dozen kids had called the police. We had a very limited amount of time. I should probably text my father, the senior police officer on the Hyper Humanity Apprehension Team, but I didn’t want him here. Hannah would kill him. Easily.

I wonder how many kids were recording this on their phones.

“I was there, Hannah. You were so brave. We went together.”

Hannah said, “You were there. The fire. Where is Chase?”

“I’m glad you’re here. Can we go for a walk?”

“Katie.” She quit looking at the room and she locked her eyes on my girlfriend. Her voice was a scrape of steel. “Where. Is. Chase.”

“Chase is not here.”

“I smell him.”

“Chase left, sweetie. He was here earlier.”

“I get lost,” Hannah said, and her voice broke. She dropped to a crouch, unable to support herself. Her face crumpled, and she spoke in strange sobs. Katie knelt and held her. “I can’t find my house. I can’t find him. I don’t remember. So tired. So much fire.”

“Don’t be sad, sweetie. Sweet Hannah Walker. I can help.”

“I followed. Him. Here. His scent.”

“Hannah, can you let go of my hand? Please?”

“His house is close. But I don’t…”

“My hand? You’re hurting me.”

“He promised.”

“Hannah.” Her voice was urgent with pain. “Let go. Now.”

She released Katie’s hand. I retreated back behind the corner, my heart a jackhammer.

Hannah whispered, “Don’t leave. Please.”

“I’m not, sweetie.” Katie started waving the kids out of the room, using her injured hand. Carefully and quietly the high school students filed onto the back deck or up the stairs to the front door. “Where have you been living?”

“Where ever I want. I sleep a lot. I can smell Chase’s cologne.”

“Do you remember when we used to eat lunch together?”

“Yes,” she laughed, a short rough snicker. “I remember. Before the fire.”

“Let’s go for a walk, Hannah. Out of this house. Maybe we’ll see Chase.”

My phone buzzed. PuckDaddy, the world’s foremost computer hacker, was calling me. I slipped a bluetooth earpiece into place and answered the call, but I didn’t speak. Hannah would hear.

“Chase? Hello?? You there?”

I tapped the earpiece twice.

“Chase? Can you hear me?”

Two more taps.

“Can you speak?”

More taps.

“Okay. I’m tracking these 911 calls and texts. Is Hannah Walker there?? That’s what the calls are saying. Samantha is en route, but she’s ten minutes away!”

“Hannah,” Katie was saying. “Let’s move outside.”

“No.”

“Hannah, let’s go for a walk? You and me.”

“No.”

“I want to. It’ll be fun. It’s a nice night.”

“He is here, Katie.”

“Who?” Katie asked, growing frantic. “Andy? Andy is here, but you don’t need him. Chase might be outside.”

I stood near a wall of bookshelves. I retrieved two heavy metal bookends, projectiles in case I needed them.

“Katie,” Samantha gasped. “Are you lying?”

“Hannah-”

“You’re lying, Katie.”

I moved into the room, ready to throw. Enough of this.

Samantha stood abruptly, facing the open front door, facing away from me. I heard it too. Sirens. The sudden move knocked Katie over.

“Katie, did you call police?”

“What? No, Hannah. I don’t have my phone with me.”

“We are friends, Katie. I will come back if I can.”

Hannah
Moved
. She went through the front door, a white streak, a phantom, and the students screamed.

I rushed to Katie. “Are you okay?? Are you hurt?”

“No.” She was still on the ground, crying. She flexed her fingers. “I’m fine. Nothing broken. That was
scary
.”

“What??” Puck blurted in my ear. “Is Katie alright?? What happened?!”

I said, “That was incredible, Katie. So brave. I about hyperventilated.”

She smiled weakly and touched my face. “Some secrets are worth keeping.”

The distant sound of cars crashing came through the front doors. I bounded the stairs and slid to a stop on the stone walkway in the front yard. Lights flashed two blocks away, turning the night blue and red. Three cop cars were parked in the intersection. One smashed in, like it’d been stepped on by a giant. Or an angry cheerleader.

“She’s gone,” I said.

Puck asked in my ear, “Who is? Hannah?”

“Yes.”

“Hey Nobody,” Andy Babington called. He staggered onto the lawn, holding his throat. “She was here for
you
, freak. Where were you? Way to let your stupid girlfriend do the work.”

“She saved your life, Andy. So close your mouth.” I walked back inside to fetch Katie and take her home.

“You’re an idiot, Jackson. I hate you. You ruin everything.”

Well. He wasn’t wrong.

Hannah Walker, the pretty white girl from Glendale who died in the Compton fires, was alive and at-large. Although media outlets were overrun with wild stories and viewers grew somewhat numb to this bizarre new world, the Hannah Walker reappearance story dominated headlines, largely because she made a beautiful page one photo. Students were interviewed. Photographs examined. Puzzle pieces put together, and the conclusion reached that she had been the football mutant’s attacker in November. She had somehow survived the fire, and now she roamed free.

“Dad stationed a patrol car in front of our house,” I reported.

“Doesn’t matter. Not enough.” Samantha Gear shook her head. “You need to move.”

“I don’t want to move.”

“She knows where you live, Chase. Well, kinda. Even if she forgot, she’ll locate it again.”

“I wish you’d just find her.”

She growled, “I’ve tried. Tracked her everywhere. That scent of hers is hard to miss. Followed her for miles, but she slips away. Like she knows I’m coming.”

Samantha Gear is striking. Like most Infected, she’s ramrod straight and muscular. She is pretty the way an eagle is pretty. Her hair is short in a style that Katie once identified as a bob. She’s also one of the most dangerous people alive.

We were sitting on leather captain chairs inside PuckDaddy’s futuristic mobile headquarters. He’d purchased the nicest RV money can buy and invested another $300,000 transforming it into a rolling computer lab, constantly utilizing local wifi hotspots, ten different cellular signals and direct satellite feed. He paid four drivers to shuttle him around America. They worked in pairs, a week at a time, swapping shifts every twelve hours, paid so handsomely they never questioned the arrangement. From this data hub, Puck monitored and accessed all the digital earth.

He rarely used the bed, spending twenty-four hours a day at his machines. They brought him sanity, he explained. He slept once every four days, habitually in his chair. Only one time in two years had he ventured outside his RV, and that was to eat Thanksgiving dinner with us. Being away from his computers had visibly drained him and he returned after two hours.

Puck’s legs were gone, starting at mid-thigh. He still hadn’t explained. He sat on a swivel chair inside a cone of technology. Four keyboards, each with two monitors, at his fingertips. Above the eight computer monitors were ten television sets, tuned to news programs or security camera feeds. He could type on different keyboards with each hand while watching television. He was Infected, and the disease manifested itself in this bizarre fashion.

Samantha and I watched live satellite camera feed on the big screen television above our chairs. We could see the entire military barricade surrounding Downtown. Highway 101 and the Five bristled with patrolling jeeps and machine-gun checkpoints. This enemy-occupied territory was unlike Compton, which had been an entire city’s populace taken hostage. Downtown Los Angeles was largely evacuated before the Chemist and his forces moved in. Instead of a hundred thousand captives allowed to freely roam the streets and live their lives, five thousand hostages were stashed in the towers and held at gunpoint.