Hunger (Gone 2)

“I’ve eaten venison,” Lance said. “It’s good.”

“Has to be better than dog,” Antoine said. “Although I’d eat some more dog right now, if I had any.”

“What do we do?” Lance asked Zil.

Every eye, even Lisa’s, turned to Zil. “What do you think we do?” Zil asked rhetorically, stalling for time.

“We go get him!” Antoine said.

Zil slapped Antoine on the shoulder and laughed. “Yeah.” Then he high-fived Hank. “Good work, man. Venison is on the menu.”

“Right after we hang Hunter,” Hank said.

That stopped the conversation cold.

“Say what?” Lance asked.

Hank looked coldly at Lance. “You think the freak is just going to give us the food? He’ll kill us, if he gets the chance. Freaks don’t care about us, don’t care if we starve. Anyway, he’s a murderer, right? What are you supposed to do with a murdering freak?”

Zil swallowed hard. Hank was pushing this thing too far. It was one thing busting on Sam, trying to get some respect for normals.

To Zil’s relief, Lance spoke up. “Dude, I don’t think we want to, like, kill the guy ourselves.”

“It was Zil’s idea,” Hank said. “That first night. Why did we have a rope with us if we weren’t going to execute justice on Hunter?”

The rope had not been Zil’s idea. But should he admit that? He’d just figured on giving Hunter a beating. He wanted Hunter to cry and confess that he’d stolen that last shred of beef jerky. He hadn’t been thinking about actually killing Hunter. That was just talk.

“You think Sam and Edilio and all of them are going to let us just execute Hunter?” Lance argued.

Hank smiled. It was a strange, little-boy smile. Innocent. “They’re all gone. Dekka’s at the power plant, right? And Sam and Edilio just blew out of town in that Jeep. The whole bunch of them, off trying to deal with Caine, I guess.”

Zil’s heart was pounding. His mouth was dry. They weren’t really going to do this, were they?

But Hunter had meat. And how else were they going to get the food from Hunter?

Turk said, “We can’t just take out Hunter.”

“Right,” Zil blurted.

“We have to give him a trial first,” Turk said.

And Zil found himself nodding. And he found himself grinning, like that had been his idea all along. And maybe it had been. Maybe it was what he had known in his heart had to happen.

Yes, Zil told himself. You’re soft-hearted, but you know it’s what’s got to be, Zil. You know it’s what has got to be.

Every face was turned toward him expectantly. Lisa, not so bad looking, really. Not when she smiled at him like he was some kind of rock star.

“We’ll have a trial. Because the Human Crew is not just about doing random violence,” Zil said, sounding as though he believed it. Setting aside the fact that random violence, smashing windows and such, was all they’d done so far. “This has got to be about justice. Otherwise the other normals, our people, will be weird about it. So, we have to have a trial. Then we deal with Hunter. Give him justice. And we share some of the deer meat around, right?”

“Yeah,” Lance agreed.

“Bring kids over to our side,” Zil said. “It’ll be like, hey, Zil gave us justice and food.”

“It will be the truth,” Turk said.

THIRTY-SIX

01 HOUR, 8 MINUTES