Fear (Gone 5)

“I guess she’s my girlfriend,” Sanjit said.

Sam fired at what looked like a chunk of hamburger wearing a part of a T-shirt.

“If you’re with Lana, then your family is as safe as anyone. You getting killed won’t help them. You’re with us now. Just one thing: talk freely to Edilio, but no one else. Clear? If kids hear that Albert has bailed…” He shook his head. “I thought better of Albert than that.”

It left a bad taste in his mouth, Albert running away. No doubt it made good business sense. But the word “treason” was on the tip of his tongue.

Backstabber.

Coward.

Astrid was on her way to offer an alliance with a beaten and humiliated “king” and a cowardly “businessman.”

He shoved away the image of the coyotes finding her before she could reach town. There were thoughts too painful to allow.

He had to think, and think clearly, not let his mind be seized and paralyzed by lurid images of Astrid brought down in some lonely place by coyotes, or zekes, or Drake.

He squeezed his eyes shut.

“Are you okay?” Sanjit asked.

“Okay?” Sam shook his head. “Nope. I’m not. The guys I was counting on to be with me aren’t. It was already hopeless. Now?”

“Lana’s still there,” Sanjit said. “And Quinn.”

“Quinn?” Sam frowned. “What’s he got to do with anything?”

“Lana put him in charge. He’s got his people with him.”

Sam nodded, distracted. He was seeing a chessboard in his mind. Most of the pieces he might have played, the powers that might have helped, his bishop sand knights and rooks, were all down or missing. Dekka, Brianna, Jack, Albert, possibly Caine, all down or missing. His steady knight, Edilio, would have to watch over the lake. Which left Sam with pawns.

On the other side Drake. Maybe Penny. The coyotes.

And the opposing king, the gaiaphage, who was so well protected he might be impossible to reach, let alone destroy.

“What was that TV show?” Sam asked, rubbing his face to clear away the smoke of burning bodies. “The one where they vote you off the island?”

“Survivor?”

“Yeah. ‘Outwit, Outplay, Outlast.’ Right?”

“I guess,” Sanjit said doubtfully.

“Outwitted and outplayed. That’s me, Sanjit. You just joined the losing team. I’ve got nothing left. And pretty soon? I’ll be blind.”

“No. Not you, Sam. You’re the only one who won’t be.”

“Sammy suns?” Sam laughed derisively. “They might as well be candles.”

“In the land of the blind the one-eyed man is king,” Sanjit said.

“In the dark the one guy with a candle is an easy target,” Sam countered.

One thing was crystal clear to Sam: his job was not to sit here and protect his charges at the lake. That was a losing move. That was him waiting for the enemy to gather its forces to come for him. Maybe he’d been outwitted and outplayed. He had not yet been outlasted.

Without another word to Sanjit he headed back to the lake.

Diana saw Penny and her knees gave way. She sat down hard in the dirt. She couldn’t breathe.