CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Arcane

Static sounded blurry and loud in the dank room, as Gene sat cross-legged on an old swivel chair. His hand found the knob on the radio, finding a channel that wasn't contaminated with empty waves.

Kenda sat across his on the conference table, hands folded across her chest as she looked at him working the machine. Two men stood behind her, on either side of the table. Soon enough, the static faded, and after a little adjustment, they could hear a familiar voice across the speaker.

'Gene? That you?'

Gene exchanged a short glance with Kenda and the men.

'Yeah,' Gene answered. 'What's the news?'

The voice spoke again, breaking the faint background noise. It was Claire.

'Located the girl. Two soldiers of mine died trying to get her,' Gene closed his eyes for a second, breathing out heavily like he was trying to contain a fit of rage. 'She escaped with that man. Before we could get round to hunting them down half the town's security was on our ass. Had to get outta there.'

'But she's there,' Gene said, an eyebrow cocked as his jaws clenched.

'Yeah,' Claire replied. 'She's there alright. Fits the description perfectly. Can't do shit with the force we have here though. Need backup if we wanna take on the dingy town and the girl.'

'You tellin' me,' Gene said, turning slightly to the window as the chair creaked under his weight. His eyes drifted to Kenda's once, catching them bluntly as he spoke into the mic, 'That you can't take on a town of mud-dwellers by yourself?'

Silence.

Kenda looked out the window, unbothered by his comment.

'It ain't easy Gene,' Claire finally replied. 'This ain't an official military mission, so we got no back-up. Just doin' it cause I respect your ass, and wanted to help you as much as I could. You want to see this through, come down here and get it done yourself. I tried, but I ain't puttin' any more of my soldiers on the line for your dirty work, especially when you ain't payin' me shit.'

'Yeah,' Gene shook his head lightly, his white beard bristling against the nylon of his old windbreaker. 'Guess I'll have to do this by myself for now. Appreciate your help.'

Claire took a moment, like she was pushing aside her agitation in mutual respect. 'You're welcome.'

Gene lowered the mic, and placed it aside on a the table. He stroked his beard with a hand, looking out the window in deep thought.

'What're you thinking?' Kenda asked in a low voice, head tilted to the side as she scanned his face for any clues.

'We got time until winter,' he replied, eyes scanning the horizon outside the window. The light cast shadows across a half of his face, showing only one eye, and his snowy beard that covered his jaw.

'We gotta find the girl before then,' he added, looking back at Kenda. 'How much do you know about them?'

Kenda shifted, meeting his gaze blandly.

'Not much,' she replied. 'Saw them round town a couple of times. Mostly they stayed away from everyone.'

Gene held her gaze for a moment longer, a clear sign of wavering trust.

'The man is old,' Kenda continued, ignoring his accusing glance. 'He's strong. The girl isn't weak either.'

'She's a kid,' Gene said.

'I've seen her kill men with a single blade,' Kenda immediately defended. 'I've seen her take shots better than some soldiers.'

Gene looked unconvinced, but let out a light sigh. Then he gave a light nod. 'The Fireflies are paying us a lot. If we get the girl, we can keep our hold strong for another year here. I'll give you further instructions soon. Go.'

Kenda nodded, letting her arms fall to the side as she turned and walked out the room, followed by the two men.

She walked across the empty hallway, and the men beside her glanced at her occasionally, clearly confused.

'What?' Kenda asked, looking at them sideways, noticing their nervousness.

'Nothin',' one of the men, Remy, replied.

'You got something to say, say it,' Kenda urged, opening the door to the dormitory, where empty mattresses sat on the floor, and a table surrounded by old chairs sat in the center.

'So we really gonna go with this?' the other man asked. His name was Marv.

Kenda let out a loud, long sigh, clearing some papers and debris from the chair and sitting on it. 'Isn't he the leader?' she simply said, picking up some of the papers and going through them. 'We gotta do what he says.'

'Yeah, but . .' Remy exchanged a glance with Marv, taking a seat on the table facing Kenda. She looked at him once, noticed his apprehensive expression and went back to the papers.

'The last mission he sent us on,' Remy explained, shifting uncomfortably on the table. 'Well . .'

'Men died,' Marv filled in, standing in front of her, arms crossed. 'The same town. Thirty men died. And before that, we raided some other bottom-dwelling town and twenty men died.'

'That's all we been doin' here,' Remy continued, as the two pairs of tired eyes looked down at her. Kenda kept her eyes in the paper, going through the records with wavering interest.

'Gettin' sent to distant places and gettin' killed or shot or bit,' Remy explained. 'We were eighty when we came here a year ago. Now we're less than fourty.'

Kenda put the papers down impatiently and turned towards them. The files clattered on the table as she rested her elbows on them, clearly annoyed. Her eyes were thin, glassy, blazing.

'You knew what you were getting into when you came here with him,' she said. 'You know him. You know what he does and what he stands for.'

'Sarge, we were desperate,' Marv explained. 'Either way, we were dying. But coming here and dying on our terms seemed better for some reason.'

'Well then,' Kenda shrugged, sitting back in her seat. 'You're getting what you asked for.'

'That's what we thought, sarge,' Remy said, looking at her pleadingly. 'But . . this is worse. A month ago Gene shot down a man because he wasted ammo on some runners down the east district . . I-It don't seem right.'

'Look,' Kenda got up, hands folded across her chest as she paced up and down the room, eyes on the floorboards. 'I can't help you. I can only do so much, but I can't stop him.'

'No,' Remy said immediately. He stood up behind her, looking at her as she turned to face him. The light cream curtains billowed behind her, tattered and tainted. A tree swayed in the light autumn drizzle outside.

Remy met her eyes meaningfully, saying much more with his look than his words. 'You can't,' he added.

Kenda felt the sudden turn this conversation was taking, the weight the presence of these men was suddenly bearing on her.

'But we can,' Remy nodded. Behind him, Marv stood against the table, hands folded across his chest as he looked at her from under his eyebrows.

'We just need someone else to trust. Someone else to lead,' Remy explained.

Kenda felt a sudden jolt in her spine, her heart stopped for a moment. Then it sank down, deep down. Her gaze lowered to the floor as she realised the heaviness in his words. She couldn't deny it, she had felt it coming for a while. She had seen it in the way the men turned away from Gene when be passed by, chattered behind his back. The way the men and women had been seeking her out for help on Gene's orders, to ask her and talk him into submission. The very reason she had decided to come here in the first place.

'We got majority with us,' Marv added, as if helping her thoughts into a direction.

Kenda acknowledged his words with a slight nod, her eyes still on the floorboards as she sighed.

There was something else rising in her mind now- a memory, fragments that were blowing into her head like the breeze. Events from two decades ago, of a dank, dark room, of herself standing in front of a broken door as she held a revolver with nothing more than a single bullet.

The screeching from across the hallways. The thumping of footsteps as they came running, and she shut the door, stepping back and falling by the tired, old body of her mother.

'Do it, Kenda. Don't let them get to us.'

The decision she had had to make, weighing the almost empty weapon in her head as infected banged on the door.

Clenching her jaws, swallowing the pain and the dragging lament in her chest as she braced herself, and pointed the muzzle of the gun at her mother's head. The way her fingers were stiff as she pulled the trigger.

The guilt and the sting that tortured every part of her as help arrived minutes later, just when her fingers were going to drive a blade of glass across her own throat.

The years following, when Gene had changed and drifted apart from being a father, to just a commander.

'We just need you to get him into the room,' Marv said.

'No,' Kenda immediately uttered, looking up to meet their eyes with a determined gaze. 'If we're gonna do it-' her voice got caught in her throat for a moment, but she regained it just as quick. '-If we're gonna do it, it's gotta be a fight. No stabbing him in the back. Understand?'

The two men looked at her apprehensively. Remy opened his mouth to say something, but stopped.

'Understand?' Kenda repeated. She blinked once, and the moisture in her eyes disappeared.

The men hesitated for a moment, and then nodded curtly.

'On a dark desert highway, cool wind in my hair,

Warm smell of colitas, rising up through the air . .

Up ahead in the distance, I saw a shimmering light,

My head grew heavy and my sight grew dim

I had to stop for the night . .

There she stood in the doorway,

I heard the mission bell . .

And I was thinking to myself,

"This could be heaven or this could be Hell" . .'

The song played loud into Ellie's ears. Her eyes drifted along the dimly lit ceiling, gauging the wet stains on the wood, the peeled off paint in the corners. She fiddled with another one of Kenda's mix tapes, listening to the one she had found in the cupboard earlier. The fire in the fireplace crackled in front of her feet, and she felt the heat warming her toes in waves.

She saw Joel's form passing by behind her, and she propped herself up on her elbows, looking back at him from the armrest of the couch. Beside her, Johnny was fast asleep on the chair, his head hanging to the side, mouth wide open.

She saw Jen getting her a bowl of chopped carrots and beets. Ellie pulled back one of the earphones and took the bowl eagerly, thanking her.

Tommy was standing beside the window, hands folded across his chest as he spoke to Joel and Maria in hushed tones.

Ellie kept one earphone out on purpose as she chewed on the vegetables, listening to bits of their conversation innocently.

' . . Knew this was gonna happen. Shouldn't have gone to the goddamn military in the first place . .'

'It's done, Tommy. Think about what we do now,' Joel's voice was curt and to-the-point, the way he spoke when he was agitated, but knew better than getting into a fight to prove his point.

'The people will be asking questions,' Jen added, as she joined them from the side, leaning to the side on the wall beside Tommy. 'They'll wanna know.'

'They don't know nothin' yet,' Joel said, his voice a little more patient. 'They got no idea why they were here and what they were lookin' for.'

'Yeah, that won't be problem for now,' Maria confirmed. 'We can tell them they were here because of some bounty or something, for Joel or Ellie. Everybody understands and respects that.'

'Look, that ain't the problem here, the thing is that they know-,' Joel stopped, and the four of them followed Tommy's gaze to Ellie.

Ellie looked at them absently, chewing a bit of beet in her mouth. She looked away immediately, forcing her eyes to the boring fire. Reluctantly, she pushed the earphone back in, letting the music envelope her again. With a deep breath, she got up and walked into Kenda's bedroom, closing the door behind her. She sat in the alcove by the window, looking out at the light drizzle that shook the leaves and branches of a distant oak.

Her eyes drifted down, to her slender, pale fingers, then up to her scar. She traced the irregular mark lightly, feeling the broken, uneven texture of skin that covered it up. She felt the flattened infected growth that lingered in bumps.

The door opened, and Johnny stepped in, awakened abruptly form his sleep. He rubbed his eyes as he closed the door behind him and walked to her, sitting across the alcove on the other end, facing Ellie as she looked at him defeated. She pulled out her earphones and switched off her Walkman.

'I had no idea,' Johnny mumbled, hesitantly gesturing at her scar. 'I-I really didn't. I can't imagine what it must've been like. Sorry . .'

'Don't apologize,' Ellie shook her head, her gaze falling to the scar again.

'It must suck,' Johnny finally said, scratching a side of his head.

'It does,' Ellie smirked wryly, glancing at him once before she looked back at her hand.

Johnny pulled his legs onto the wood, sighing as he observed her keenly. 'So what now?'

Ellie took a deep breath, getting herself to look at him straight. 'I don't know. I guess we gotta leave, or something like that . . Sure as hell can't stay here anymore.'

'Leave?' Johnny uttered, his features falling. 'Like . . forever?'

'I don't know, Johnny,' Ellie replied, slightly annoyed. 'Maybe. Maybe forever. Maybe I can't ever fucking live in a town again, because those assholes will hunt our asses down anyway.'

'Yeah, maybe,' Johnny mumbled in slight agreement.

Ellie shook her head lightly, her fingers still tracing the scar absent-mindedly.

'Hey,' Johnny said in a low voice, eyes fixated on her. 'Do you think . . '

Ellie turned to him eagerly, awaiting whatever he was going to ask her.

'Do you think . . You could just, you know . .' He pursed his lips for a moment, breathing. 'Like, give it up?'

Ellie looked at him plainly, and shook her head confused. 'What?'

'Like just give yourself up,' Johnny rephrased, with a light shrug. 'Go back and let the Fireflies take . . Whatever is inside you . .'

Ellie's eyes narrowed for a moment, her jaw clenched as she breathed out stubbornly and glanced at the window. Her eyebrows scrunched, forming deep furrows above her sharp nose.

'I-I mean,' Johnny recovered immediately, noticing the disturbing rage that was rising up in her eyes. 'I-I don't know what the world was like before all this, so I don't care . . But I wouldn't want you to die either. Because that'd suck . . A lot. I was just wondering . .'

Ellie took his words with fiery eyes, fingers lingering on her scar. Her eyes drifted across the rooftops of the town outside the window, the orange and pink hues in the sky as the sun set across the mountains. Her fingers moved away from her scar, closed in a fist, and rested against her folded knee.

'No,' she said, shaking her head lightly. Her voice was deep, firm. She turned to look at Johnny again. The tenacity in her eyes made him nervous, and he gulped. He nodded understandingly.

Her eyes drifted back to the window. Sights of corpses flashed across her head, blood on the streets and limbs torn away from bodies. Empty eyes turned to the sky, mouths dripping with dark blood. She saw the collapsed rooftops across the town in front of her.

Two pairs of eyes flashed in her head - hazel, and grey. Both full of life, both smiling and laughing. One of them died after being bit, the other for no reason at all.

And she couldn't help any of them now.

'Did you get it?' Joel asked in a light voice, as Jen walked in holding a bag in her hand. His hands were folded across his chest, his face turned in anxious worry.

Jen nodded, and looked across the room at Tommy and Maria who were glancing at her nervously.

Tommy walked to her, cigarette smoke rising up from the half-burned stub between his fingers. 'You sure you can do this?'

'Look, I'm no expert,' Jen shook her head, placing the bag on the coffee table in the center. She pulled out the contents one by one, bottles and instruments covered in sterile packets.

'I just have a little practice, that's all,' she said. 'It's been Twenty-two years since my last one, so I'm not making any promises.'

'This ain't funny,' Joel said firmly, hands falling to his sides in fists as he looked at her. 'This ain't no goddamn experiment. You gotta know what you're gettin' into here.'

Jen looked at him and sighed, and then looked at Tommy and Maria. The two of them looked as serious, and waited for her confirmation as she thought for a moment.

Finally, she nodded and mumbled, 'Yeah, I can do it.'

Ellie was laying across the bed, surrounded by five hurricane lamps on the tables and edges of the bed. Jen entered the room, holding a gas mask and sterile gloves.

'You ready?' Jen asked in a low voice.

Ellie looked at her and nodded. Johnny sat beside her, and she exchanged a glance with him.

'You should go, Johnny,' Jen said to him, as she arranged her instruments on the table at the foot of the bed. 'We don't know the situation. Better stay away till I'm done.'

Johnny looked at Ellie apprehensively, and then back at Jen. He nodded, patted Ellie on the shoulder reassuringly and left.

Ellie sighed loudly through her lips, throwing her head back as she looked at the ceiling.

'Will it hurt?' she asked in a low voice, glancing at Jen from the side.

Jen pulled out what looked like improvised wooden weapons and needles, a bottle of alcohol, another bottle of black liquid and rolls of cotton. She spread them out on the table, and the sounds made Ellie's heart race. Jen pulled her gas mask onto her face, covering her face and mouth, so her voice came out muffled.

'Before, we had better ways of doing this, to be honest,' Jen explained matter-of-factly. 'But now, well . . desperate times call for desperate measures. So yeah, it'll hurt and bleed. But hey, as long as you don't move a lot, it should be fine.'

Ellie blinked, looking back at the ceiling. 'That's comforting,' she mumbled sarcastically.

She felt Jen rubbing an alcohol-soaked cotton ball across her scar, and all along her arm below her elbow.

Ellie took a deep, unstable breath, and it was louder than she expected. She nervously put on her earphones and waited, shutting her eyes.

'Ready?' Jen asked. Ellie heard a clatter, and a constant plink-plonk, like something was being dipped in fluid.

Ellie played her music, and nodded nervously. The moment of anticipation seemed like the longest, as she waited for the pain to sting her skin.

'Make it look good,' she added in a breath. Jen chuckled, and mumbled in agreement.

When the first sting of pain pierced her skin, Ellie winced. She could feel blood seeping out around the needle as Jen drew the patterns into her skin, and each prick made Ellie wince even more.

As she lay there taking in the pain, with each sting, the same two pairs of eyes flashed in her head, and suddenly it didn't hurt as much.

The slowly rising, curdling, brimming rage was stronger than any physical pain she could feel.