Dust & Decay (Rot & Ruin, #2)(55)

“Yes,” he said coldly, “I’ve seen it. What happened?”

“Kid managed to land a good one on one of the guys. Hit him on the shoulder, and I could hear the thwack all the way up the hill. Then the guys stopped playing and laid into the kid with a will. Whipped the sword out of his hands and beat the living crap out of him.”

“Damn.” Tom thought about the ascetic and intellectual Chong fighting for his life. How brave he must have been, and how terrified.

“By that time I’d had enough, and I’d pretty much figured that the kid must have been your brother. So I came down the hill with a war whoop and sliced myself a piece of those two butt-wipes. Wasn’t all girly about it either. Would have just messed them up some and let the pair of them limp out of here, but they tried to get all fancy on me. It didn’t end well for ’em, and no loss to the world.”

“Wait … you said you took them out?”

“Two freaks like them against me? I coulda done that back in my Roller Derby days, and that was before I learned how to ugly-fight.”

“No, I mean, if you nailed them, then who—?”

“Must have been a third guy. Never saw him coming. I was about to quiet the two freaks when suddenly something hit my arm from behind and knocked me into a tree. Tried to shake it off, but someone came at me from my blind side, spun me and stabbed me. All I saw was a big man with white hair, and then I blacked out.”

“White hair? Sally—could it have been Preacher Jack?”

“The loony-tune from Wawona?” She thought about it. “No, this guy was way bigger. Anyway … I passed out, and when I woke up, the kid was gone and so was the big guy.”

“What about the other two?”

“Still there. Whoever shot me must have quieted ’em and left ’em for the crows.”

Tom sat back and thought about it. “Could the big man have been White Bear?”

She shrugged. “Maybe. This guy was as big as Charlie Pinkeye and his face was all messed up. Burned and all nasty-lookin’.”

“Could it have been Charlie?”

Sally narrowed her eyes. “Charlie’s dead. You killed him.”

“Not exactly,” Tom said. He told her about what had happened after Benny hit Charlie with the Motor City Hammer’s pipe.

“Well, hell … that’s not the kind of news a gal wants to hear when she’s already feeling poorly. You think Charlie’s alive?”

“I don’t know. Did the guy who attacked you do it to avenge the men you killed, or was he after the boy?”

“I … don’t know. But wouldn’t Charlie know this kid’s not your brother?”

Tom nodded. “He knows Benny and Chong both.”

Sally took another swig from the canteen and chewed her lip for a moment. “Before I attacked them, I heard some of what the two punks said to the kid. I heard where they said they were taking him.”

Tom knew what she was going to say and he closed his eyes as if he, rather than she, was in physical pain. “Say it.”

“Gameland,” said Sally Two-Knives. “They were going to try and sell him to the people running that place. Put him in the zombie pits.”

“But you don’t know if the man who shot you is taking him there?”

“No idea.”

“Terrific,” Tom said sourly. “They’ve moved Gameland twice since we took down Charlie’s crew. I’ve been trying to find it … and I don’t have a damn clue where it is. It could be all the way over in Utah for all I know.”

“I don’t think so, Tom,” she said with a cold smile. “When those boys were taunting the kid, one of them told him that he’d be fighting in the pits by dawn’s early light. His words.”

Tom looked out at the darkness. “Damn,” he said softly.





37


BENNY RAN RIGHT INTO A ZOM. THE CREATURE TURNED WITH A SNARL, and white fingers scrabbled for his face. He could feel the edges of broken fingernails scratch him, the dry pads of dead fingers slide over his nose and mouth; and then Benny shoved the zom aside with a cry of disgust. It fell against a second zom and they went down. Others tumbled over them in what could have been comedy if the world was not broken and insane. Zoms snarled and bit at him as he ran.



Slow down, warned his inner voice. He tried to slow himself; he ordered his feet to walk instead of run, but they disobeyed. Nix was sixty paces ahead. Fifty.

Lilah was nowhere in sight. Had she run out on them? Had the zoms gotten her? No … there would have been screams if they’d attacked her. First her war cries, and then … other screams. These thoughts tumbled through his head as he ran. He ducked under white hands, jinked and dodged around zombies who tried to wrap their arms around him. The whole crowd of them was becoming agitated, their awareness drawn to the running meat.

Slow down!

Nix heard him coming and turned to see Benny collide with another zom and have to bash his way out of its embrace. Other zoms turned at the motion, their moans rising in pitch as their worm-white fingers clawed the air for him.

Slow DOWN!

“Benny!” cried Nix in a fierce whisper. “What are you doing?”

He jerked to a stop by the gas pump. The zoms that had been turning toward him suddenly turned to Nix as she began heading toward Benny. You’re going to get Nix killed. He didn’t need his inner voice to tell him that. The zoms nearest to her were already starting to close in. Nix tensed to run.