Teenage Wasteland (I Zombie) (12 page)

Mikko wrapped her arms around me and, totally out of character, wept. Frenzy raced to my side and joined the embrace. Kubrick and Fay silently pulled in close. Nicco continued filming, the camera basked in the carnage.

As a group, we made our way back into Asylum, holding off stepping through the doors until the last of the kids were inside. I didn’t bother to wait for Intake or Collections, but slammed the gate shut myself.

The entryway was alive with the polarity of sobs and celebration. I sent my compatriots off to aid those in need. Mikko stood with me as I went from kid to kid, hoping like hell to not find a bite or battle wound too deep to soothe or survive.

We finally managed to dole out every scrap of food we’d brought with us and send the survivors off to their rooms to eat and rest. Mikko and I were about to head up when Nicco called for us. “The camera.”

I turned to see Nicco holding the spy cam we’d planted.

“Movie night in our room. Be there in fifteen.”

I nodded. “We’ll be there.”

Mikko wrapped an arm around my waist and we made our way up the stairs.

>^<

The film crew’s room was set up for some serious multimedia. They had a projector casting its silvery glow onto a stripped-bare wall. On either side of the makeshift screen stood a pair of speakers ready to fill our ears with Dolby delights.

“Where’s the corn, dude?” Kubrick shook his head. “You disappoint.”

“Believe me, if I had popcorn, we’d all be indulging right now,” I answered.

Fay closed the door behind us and we all piled onto the floor.

Frenzy sighed. “Bollocks, I’m knackered. All that fighting takes it out of you.”

“At least we survived,” I replied. “Sure beats the alternative.”

“Survival is relative at this point,” Nicco added.

We all turned curious glances toward the cameraman. It was Mikko who found the only two necessary words.

“Do tell.”

Nicco took us all in before speaking. “Think about it. Are we
really
surviving? Or are we just killing time before the inevitable comes?”

“Well hello, Mr. Nihilist,” I barked.

Everyone turned their attention to me.

Mikko slugged me. “Someone’s been reading too much Kafka lately.”

“Did you two ace the SATs or something?” Fay asked. “You’re, like,
way
smarter than the average teenage bear.”

I smirked. “Isn’t
acing
relative at this point?”

Nicco flipped me off. “You’re a piece of crap, Jingo.”

“But you love me anyway, right?”

“I’ll love you more if you own up to the nerdgasm you just had.”

“Oh, come on. We’re all about the same age. Surely by the eleventh grade you’d heard of Kafka and nihilism. Right?”

Kubrick nodded. Nicco shook his head “no”. Fay stared blankly.

“You went to one of those schools with one giant room, didn’t you, Jingo?” Nicco asked.

My gaze shot to the floor. “Maybe.”

“I’m just messing with you, Jingo,” Nicco confessed.

“That’s been going around today.”

“Are we ready to roll tape?” Kubrick asked. Everyone clapped and cheered.

“Thanks to the great God solar,” Nicco said, “we should have plenty of power for tonight’s entertainment.

“You mean ‘Ra’?” I interjected.

“You’re going to earn a rep…brainiac.” Nicco pulled the curtains closed and doused the room in shadows. He hit the play button on the camera that fed the projector. On the wall before us, the image of Head Collection Row faded into existence. The sound wasn’t great, but it did the trick.

Kids walked by, heading out for a day of hunting down death. Nicco manned the camera and fast forwarded until the last vestiges of youth had made their way beyond the scope of the lens. The first sign of adults found their way onto the screen.

“Stop, stop!” I barked.

“Relax, Jingo, I got this.” Nicco set the camera down and returned to the floor to enjoy the projected movie.

The first thing we saw was a fifty-five gallon drum. One of the collection agents wheeled the barrel by on a dolly. “Where we taking this load?” the agent asked.

A disembodied voice answered. “Who cares? Just drive beyond the zone and roll ‘em out.”

The
zone
was a predefined ten-mile radius surrounding Asylum. Crowbar pronounced everything beyond that range unsafe…so no one dared venture outside of safe harbor.

“What the hell?” Mikko hissed.

“Can you rewind that for me?” I requested.

“Sure,” Nicco replied, and did as I asked.

The same scene played out before us. This time, we let it continue. The first agent rolled the barrel onto a truck, hopped into the driver’s side, and pulled away.

Frenzy turned to me. “You said those heads had a purpose…that risking our lives meant something bigger.”

I shook my head. “I was only repeating what Crowbar had said.”

“Yeah, but it was all a lie. They’re just dumping those heads,” Frenzy replied.

Kubrick chimed in. “If that’s the case, then why is everyone playing along with this game?”

My frustration got the best of me. “Because no one knew, dip shit.”

“So what in the crap’s going on here?” Nicco asked.

“I don’t know,” I answered. I repeated the phrase under my breath as my mind scrambled to gain purchase on the slightest bit of logic.

The video continued playing out…only nothing was happening.

“Fast forward, Nicco,” I called out. Nicco immediately complied. The video sped by until the kids returned to check their day’s catch. I motioned for Nicco to allow the playback to continue at light speed. Crowbar came into the scene. Nicco stopped the video, tracked back a bit, and hit play. Crowbar returned to the frame.

“What’s going on?” Crowbar’s familiar baritone voice shouted.

“Massive attack!” an off-camera male replied, his voice laced with fear.

Crowbar ran to a wall and rang the battle bell. Even digitized, the sound sent a wave of panic through my system.

“What’s the bell for?” Fay asked.

Mikko stepped up to the plate. “That bastard rings any time Asylum is under attack. It means that every kid must protect the building.”

“Just the kids?” Kubrick asked the most telling question.

“Yeah,” Mikko answered, her voice the slightest bit distant.

On the screen, a wall of bodies rushed by, some dragging pipes while others gripped machetes or baseball bats.

Standard operating procedure.

“This must be right before we arrived,” Nicco said.

When the last vestiges of youth had vanished from sight, Crowbar came back into view and was met by one of his cronies.

“It’s a beautiful sight, isn’t it?” Crowbar asked.

“Lambs to the slaughter,” the crony answered.

“Better them than us, right?” Crowbar added.

“Hell, yeah. I have to hand it to you, CB, that’s a hell of a first line of defense you got going.”

“Are you kidding me? That’s the only line of defense we need. Those kids will fight tooth and bone to stay alive. They know hope exists within these walls. Hope is the single most precious commodity now.”

“If only they knew, Crowbar.”

“Ain’t that the truth. Let’s prepare for the return of our living, breathing armor.”

“You mean…”

“Return to our quarters like nothing’s going on.”

Both men vanished from view. Shortly after, bloodied and weak bodies returned from battle. Nicco reached over and turned off the video feed. We all sat in silence for a moment, processing what we’d just witnessed.

Words failed me. My mind was a vortex of thought. Not a single logical phrase would make its way onto my lips.

“Why?” Mikko asked, her voice trembling. I wasn’t sure if Mikko’s tone was from fear or rage.

I wanted so badly for it to be rage.

Frenzy stood and turned to me. “So we’ve been serving as that rat bastard’s armor all this time?”

I swallowed hard and nodded. “It looks like…yeah.”

“I’m going to kill that mother…” Frenzy bolted for the door. I jumped to my feet and grabbed his arm.

“There’s no way that ends well, Frenzy.”

He jerked his arm from my grip. “Then what in the bloody hell do you suggest, fearless leader?”

I crossed my arms over my chest. “I suggest we form a plan before barging in on Crowbar unannounced. We go in now, without considering our options, and none of us will survive. Besides, the only way we take him out is with the element of surprise on our side.”

Frenzy relaxed slightly. “I think I speak for all of us when I say I’m all ears.”

nine | chinese whispers

There’s a child’s game we all played, back in elementary school, called
Chinese whispers
. The object of the game was to pass a whisper from ear to ear, and the last person to hear the whisper would speak it out loud. In most cases, what was spoken aloud was not the same as the original whisper.

In our case, I had to hope like hell the last ear to hear the phrase heard it correctly. If not, the plan would crash and burn.

The whisper sent ‘round our little world?

Asylum’s a lie. Crowbar goes down at midnight.

I whispered the two sentences into the ear of the one member of Asylum certain to play along with the game. Kimico Takahashi was a gossip like no other I’d ever before witnessed. No secret was sacred with her. That would certainly work to our advantage. Any time we needed to get word out in some secret, underground fashion…it always started with Kimico.

Current time, nine forty-seven.

“You really think this is going to work, Jingo?” Mikko asked as she wriggled her little spoon in my bigger spoon. Every muscle in me relaxed into her.

Well…almost every muscle.

“It has to work, Mikko. If this coup fails, I can’t imagine what kind of payback Crowbar would have up his sleeve. We’ve got the numbers; there’s no way he can stand up against hundreds…even if those hundreds are kids.”

“You don’t plan on killing him, do you?” Mikko whispered, her voice colored with fear.

I paused.

“Jingo, you’re scaring me.”

I turned Mikko to face me and brushed my fingertips across the perfect skin of her cheek. “You know that’s not who I am, Meeks. My plan is to exile him out into the Wasteland, beyond the safe zone. Let him find out what it’s truly like out there. He’ll live or die of his own doing. I won’t have the guilty blood on my hands.”

Mikko nodded slightly and closed her eyes. When she opened them back, I kissed her gently on the lips. “I love you, Mikko.”

Her perfect lips curved into a smile. “I love you, Jingo.”

At this moment, this perfect instant in time, I wished I’d scheduled the coup for a bit later.

Like tomorrow.

“The valiant never taste of death but once,” I whispered.

“Shakespeare? In bed?” Mikko replied. “You really know how to turn a girl on.”

I had no freaking idea if she was being serious. “Are you…”

“Serious?” Mikko questioned. “Do you want me to be?”

“Wicked, wicked girl.”

“Isn’t that how you like ‘em?”

“I like ‘em…like you.”

Mikko swooned. At least I think she swooned. At seventeen years old, I couldn’t be so certain I’d ever actually witnessed a full-blown swooning before.

A most foul knocking sounded at our door.

“Mackous interruptous,” Mikko chided.

The knock returned, this time with a bit more vigor, and was followed by a whisper.

“Jingo, we have a problem.”

The voice was Frenzy’s.

I stumbled out of bed, adjusted the embarrassment from my profile, and opened the door. “What the hell, Fren?”

“The whispers have returned, and they’re scared to death.”

“What do you mean?” I demanded.

“I don’t think our soldiers are ready to usurp the king.” Frenzy slipped into the room and carefully closed the door behind him. “Word came back to me that most of the kids are afraid to stand against Crowbar. Rumor has it he’s backed by something far more powerful than his cronies.”

“What are you talking about, Frenzy?” Mikko chimed in.

“I’m talking about the Zero Day Collective. There’s a growing faction of us that fear he has a direct line to them, and the second we revolt, they’ll storm the castle and turn us all into Moaners or Screamers.”

“That’s ridiculous,” I spat.

“Yeah, well…I know that and you know that, but tell it to all those little kids out there, none of whom have ever stood up against a living being. Oh, sure, hand ‘em a machete and order them to hack off the head of a zombie, and they’ll comply without question. But for some of them, this is too much.”

I couldn’t believe my ears. “Frenzy, we’re not going to kill the man…just toss him out on his ass.”

Frenzy pointed to the door. “They don’t know that.”

“The whisper said nothing about murder,” I countered.

“Yeah, but it didn’t
not
say anything about it, either.”

“It’s too late to send out another whisper, isn’t it?” Mikko asked.

Frenzy answered, “There’s no way we could get it out in time for everyone to prepare. We’re just going to have to go with what we know.”

“Which is?” I asked.

“That we’re it…you and I are a two-man wrecking machine.”

Mikko stood. “You mean two men and a lady…wrecking machine.”

“No way.” I put a quick kibosh on the reverie. “I don’t care for those odds. Three teenagers against the man who built this twisted empire? There’s no way that ends well.”

“And the alternative does? Come on, Jingo.” Frenzy slapped my shoulder. “It’s time we finally put an end to this nightmare. The world outside is bad enough. The last thing we need is to drag that hellish landscape into Asylum. You know I’m right.”

“Yeah. And that’s exactly why the three of us can’t do it alone.”

The door to my room creaked open. Nicco’s head popped in. “You don’t have to do it alone. You’ve got me, Kubrick, and Fay on your side, as well.”

Frenzy nodded his head. “Six on one. Better odds, that.”

I considered the options. As much as I hated that we didn’t have the whole of the Asylum Army at our command, I knew this was the right thing. I nodded. “Fine. But the second we spot signs of trouble, we bail. Right?”