Lies: A Gone Novel (6 page)

“She's saying she can see through the FAYZ wall. She says she can sense the dreams of people outside.”

Lana shrugged.

“We need to try and figure out if there's any truth to it.”

“How would I know?” Lana asked.

“One of the possibilities…I mean, I wondered…I mean, if it's not a lie, and maybe Orsay really believes it…”

“Go ahead, Sam,” Lana whispered. “You want to say something.”

“I need to know, Lana: Is the Darkness, the gaiaphage, is it really gone? Do you still hear its voice in your head?”

She felt cold. She crossed her arms over her chest. Squeezed herself tightly. She could feel her own body, it was real, it was her. She felt her own heart beating. She was here, alive, herself. Not there in the mine shaft. Not a part of the gaiaphage.

“Don't ask me about that,” Lana said.

“Lana, I wouldn't if it wasn't—”

“Don't,” she warned. “Don't.”

“I…”

She felt her lips twist into a snarl. A wild rage swelled within her. She spun to face him. Stuck her face right in his. “Don't!”

Sam stood his ground.

“Don't ever,
ever
ask me about it again!”

“Lana—”

“Get out!” she screamed. “Get out!”

He backed quickly away. Out into the hallway, closing the door behind him.

Lana fell to the carpeted floor. She dug her fingers into her hair and pulled, needing the pain, needing to know that she was real, and here, and now.

Was he gone, the gaiaphage?

He would never be gone. Not from her.

Lana lay on her side, sobbing. Patrick came over and licked her face.

ZIL SPERRY WAS
feeling very good. He'd spent the day waiting for the blow to fall. Waiting for Sam and Edilio to show up at his compound. If they had, he could have made a fight out of it, but he wasn't crazy enough to think he would have won. Edilio's soldiers had machine guns. Zil's Human Crew had baseball bats.

He had more serious weapons, too, but those were not in the compound. Not with that freak Taylor able to pop in anywhere, anytime and see whatever she wanted.

And then, there were the other freaks: that glowering lesbian thug Dekka, the brat Brianna. And Sam himself.

Always Sam.

The compound was four houses at the end of Fourth Avenue, past Golding. The street dead-ended there in a sort of cul-de-sac. Four not-very-big, not-very-fancy houses. They'd set up a roadblock of cars to form a wall across Fourth Avenue. The cars had to be pushed into place—the batteries were
all dead, all except the few vehicles Sam's people kept in running condition.

At the center of the roadblock was a narrow gap, an opening. A square and blocky once-white Scion was in position to one side of the opening. It was light enough that four kids could push it across the opening to block the gate.

Dekka could of course simply lift the thing into the air. That and the rest of Zil's defenses.

But they had not come after him. And Zil knew why. The town council was too gutless. Sam? He would have come after him. Dekka? She would love to come after him. Brianna had zipped through the compound a few times already, using her freak speed to blow past sentries almost unseen.

Zil had strung wire after that. Let Brianna come through again, she'd get the surprise of her life.

Sam was the key. Kill Sam, and Zil might be able to handle the rest.

At noon, when everyone would be scrounging lunch, Zil led Hank, Turk, Antoine, and Lance out of the compound, across the highway, and north to the foothills of the ridge.

The farmhouse. That freak Emily and her moron brother. At first Turk had mentioned it as a place he knew from back, before. He'd attended a birthday party there for the boy named Brother. Brother and Emily were homeschooled, and Turk knew them from church.

Turk had been surprised to find Brother and Emily still there. And they'd all been surprised to find that Emily was a seriously powerful freak.

But they had agreed to let Human Crew hide things there.

So Zil had put up with them, made them promises, given them games they couldn't really play in order to have the farm as a safe house. But when the time came…well, a freak was still a freak, even if she was useful.

Reaching the farmhouse meant getting past the heavily guarded gas station first. Fortunately there was a deep ditch, an open storm drain running parallel to the highway and behind the gas station. There were no more storms, so it was dry and choked with weeds. But there was a path there, and as long as they kept quiet, Edilio's soldiers at the gas station wouldn't hear them.

Once past town they walked down the highway for a while. All the pickers would be in the fields having lunch. No one would be hauling produce to town.

The highway was eerily empty. Weeds grew tall on the shoulders of the road. Cars that had crashed there during the first few seconds of the FAYZ still sat empty, dusty, useless. Relics of a dead era. Their doors were ajar, trunk lids raised, windows often shattered. Every glove compartment and trunk had been searched by Sam's people or by scavengers for food, weapons, drugs….

One of those cars had been the source of Zil's small arsenal. They'd found the guns, along with two bricks of compressed marijuana and a couple of fat Baggies stuffed with meth. Antoine had probably snorted half the powder already, stupid tweeker.

He was a problem, Zil realized. Drunks and drug addicts
were always a problem. On the other hand, he could be counted on to do what he was told. And if someday Antoine just lost it totally, Zil would find someone else to take his place.

“Keep your eyes sharp,” Hank said. “We don't want to be seen.”

Hank was the enforcer. Weird, with him being a runty little kid. But he had a vicious streak, Hank did. There was nothing he wouldn't do for Zil. Nothing.

Lance, as usual, walked a little apart. Even now it amazed Zil that Lance was part of his core team. Lance was everything the others were not: smart, handsome, athletic, likable.

And Turk? Well, Turk gimped along on his bad leg and talked. “In the end we're going to have to be totally freak-free,” he was saying. “The big ones, the dangerous freaks, we're going to have to take them out.

“Terminate them. With extreme prejudice. That's what they used to say when they meant ‘assassinate.' Terminate with extreme prejudice.”

Sometimes Zil wished he'd just shut up. He reminded Zil in some ways of Zil's older brother, Zane. Always talking, never shutting up.

Of course what Zane talked about was different. Mostly what Zane talked about was Zane. He had an opinion on everything. He knew everything, or thought he did.

His whole life Zil had barely gotten a word in edgewise around Zane. And when he did manage to contribute to the endless family discussions, Zil mostly earned
condescending, even pitying, looks.

His parents hadn't meant it to be that way, probably. But what could they do, really? Zane was the star. So smart, so cool, so good looking. As good looking as Lance.

Zil had realized very early on that he would never, ever, ever be the star. Zane owned that role. He was charming, handsome, and ever-so-smart.

And he was so so so nice to little Zil. “You need some help with that math homework there, Zilly?”

Zilly.
Rhyming with silly. Silly Zilly. And Zane the Brain.

Well, where are you now, Zane? Zil wondered. Not here, that's for sure. Zane was sixteen. He had poofed on that first day, that first minute.

Good riddance, big brother, Zil thought.

“So we take out the dangerous freaks,” Turk prattled on. “Take them out. A few we keep around basically as slaves. Like Lana. Yeah, we keep Lana. Only maybe keep her tied up or whatever so she doesn't get away. And then the others, man, they have to find some other place to go. Simple as that. Out of Sperry Beach.”

Zil sighed. That was Turk's latest idea: to rename the town Sperry Beach. Make it clear for everyone that Perdido Beach now belonged to the Human Crew.

“Humans only. Freaks out,” Turk said. “We're going to rule. Can you believe Sam didn't come after us? They're all scared.”

Turk could carry on like this forever, talking to himself. It was like he had to go over everything ten times. Like he was
arguing with someone who wasn't answering back.

The last part of the trip was the long trudge across the rutted fields. When they reached it there would be nice, clear, clean water, at least, even if there wasn't any food. Emily and Brother had their own well. Not enough water to take a shower or anything because the power was off to the pump, so everything had to be pumped up by hand. But you could drink all you wanted. That was rare in dry and hungry Perdido Beach.

Sperry Beach
.

Maybe. Why not?

Zil led the way up the stairs. “Emily,” he called out. “It's us.”

He knocked on the door. This was surprising because every other time Emily had seen them coming she'd pulled her usual pop-up-behind-you freak trick. Sometimes she played with them, disappearing the house and letting them wander around like fools.

Freak. She'd get hers eventually. When Zil was done with her.

Emily opened the door.

Zil's instincts screamed danger.

He backed away, but something stopped him. Like some invisible giant had wrapped a hand around him.

The invisible hand lifted him slightly off his feet, just enough so that his toes dragged as he levitated inside, past Emily, who stepped aside with a rueful look.

“Let me go!” Zil cried. But now he could see who had him. He fell silent. Caine sat on the couch, barely moving his hand
but utterly controlling Zil.

Zil's heart pounded. If there was any freak as dangerous as Sam, it was Caine. More dangerous. There were things Sam wouldn't do. There was nothing Caine wouldn't do.

“Let me go!”

Caine set Zil down gently.

“Stop yelling, huh?” Caine said wearily. “I have a headache and I'm not here to hurt you.”

“Freak!” Zil spat.

“Why, yes. Yes, I am,” Caine said. “I'm the freak who can smack you against the ceiling until you're nothing but a skin sack full of goo.”

Zil glared hatred. Freak. Filthy, mutant freak.

“Tell your boys to come on in,” Caine said.

“What do you want, freak?”

“A conversation,” Caine said. He spread his hands, placating. “Look, you little creep, if I wanted you dead, you'd be dead. You and your little crew of losers.”

Caine had changed since the first time Zil had seen him. Gone was the smart Coates blazer, the expensive haircut, the tan, and the gym-rat body. Caine looked like a scarecrow version of himself.

“Hank. Turk. Lance. 'Toine,” Zil yelled. “Come on in.”

“Have a seat.” Caine indicated the La-Z-Boy.

Zil sat.

“So,” Caine said conversationally, “I hear you're not a big fan of my brother, Sam.”

“The FAYZ is for humans,” Zil muttered. “Not freaks.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Caine said. For a moment he seemed to fade, to draw in on himself. Weak from hunger. Or from something else. But then the freak pulled himself together and, with visible effort, plastered on his cocky expression.

“I have a plan,” Caine said. “It involves you.”

Turk, showing more nerve than Zil would have expected, said, “The Leader makes the plans.”

“Uh-huh. Well,
Leader Zil
,” Caine said with only minimal sarcasm. “You're going to like this plan. It ends with you being in total control of Perdido Beach.”

Zil sat back in the recliner. He tried to recover some of his dignity. “Okay. I'm listening.”

“Good,” Caine said. “I need some boats.”

“Boats?” Zil repeated cautiously. “Why?”

“I kind of feel like taking an ocean cruise,” Caine said.

 

Sam went home for lunch. Home being Astrid's house. He still thought of it that way, as hers not his.

Actually her own house had been burned to the ground by Drake Merwin. But she seemed to take ownership of whatever house she was in. This house was home to Astrid and her brother, Little Pete, Mary and her brother, John Terrafino, and Sam. But in everybody's mind it was Astrid's house.

Astrid was in the backyard when he got there. Little Pete sat on the deck steps playing with a dead handheld game player. Batteries were in very short supply. At first Astrid and Sam, both of whom knew the truth about Little Pete, were scared. No one knew what Little Pete might do if he went
into a complete meltdown, and one of the few things that kept Little Pete pacified was his game.

But to Sam's surprise, the strange little boy had adapted in the oddest way imaginable: he just kept playing. Sam had looked over his shoulder and seen a blank, black screen. But there was no knowing what Little Pete saw there.

Little Pete was severely autistic. He lived in a world of his own imagining, unresponsive, only rarely speaking.

He was also far and away the most powerful person in the FAYZ. This fact was a secret, more or less. Some suspected a part of the truth. But only a few—Sam, Astrid, Edilio—really grasped the fact that Little Pete had, to some degree, at least, created the FAYZ.

Astrid was stoking a small fire in a hibachi set atop a picnic table. She had a fire extinguisher close at hand. One of the very few that had survived—kids had found them a lot of fun to play with in the early weeks of the FAYZ.

From the smell, Sam concluded she was cooking a fish.

Astrid heard him but did not look up as he approached. “I don't want to have a fight,” she said.

“Me neither,” he said.

She poked at the fish with a fork. It smelled delicious, although it didn't look too good.

“Get a plate,” Astrid said. “Have some fish.”

“That's okay, I'm—”

“I can't believe you lied to me,” she snapped, still poking at the fish.

“I thought you didn't want a fight?”

Astrid shoveled the mostly cooked fish onto a serving dish and set it aside. “You weren't going to tell us about Orsay?”

“I didn't say I—”

“You don't get to decide that, Sam. You're not the only one in charge anymore. Okay?”

Astrid had an icy sort of anger. A cold fury that manifested itself in tight lips and blazing eyes and short, carefully enunciated sentences.

“But it's okay for all of us to lie to everyone in Perdido Beach?” Sam shot back.

“We're trying to keep kids from killing themselves,” Astrid said. “That's a little different from you just deciding not to tell the council that there's a crazy girl
telling
people to kill themselves.”

“So not telling
you
something is a major sin, but lying to a couple of hundred people and trashing Orsay at the same time, that's fine?”

“I don't think you really want to have this debate with me, Sam,” Astrid warned.

“Yeah, because I'm just a dumb surfer who shouldn't even be questioning Astrid the Genius.”

“You know what, Sam? We created the council to take pressure off of you. Because you were falling apart.”

Sam just stared at her. Not quite believing she'd said it. And Astrid seemed shocked herself. Shocked at the venom behind her own words.

“I didn't mean…,” she started lamely, but then couldn't find her way to explaining just what it was she didn't mean.

Sam shook his head. “You know, even now, as long as we've been together it still surprises me that you can be so ruthless.”