Benny shook his head. “No,” he said. “We don’t.”
• • •
A terse hour later the story was told. The jet and the wrecked airplane. The mutagen and Archangel. Sanctuary and the American Nation. Joe Ledger. Slow zoms and fast. The Night Church and Saint John. Brother Peter. Benny, Nix, and Chong took turns telling different parts of it. Benny tried to read Solomon’s face, but the man was too practiced at keeping his emotions and reactions in check. Morgie was a different story—Benny could read everything on his face. Shock, doubt, horror, pity, and fear.
When they got to the part about Haven, Morgie looked like he’d taken a physical blow.
“My cousins are there,” he said. “They work in the feed and grain store.”
No one felt the need to correct the tense of that word to “worked.” It was an unnecessary cruelty.
Solomon straightened and walked a few paces away, his fists on his hips. “Three days, you say?”
“Maybe four,” said Chong. “It depends on how long they stay at Haven.”
“Forty thousand of them,” murmured Solomon. “Holy mother of God.”
“And all those zoms,” said Morgie. “The fence will never hold.”
“No,” agreed Nix. “But it might not matter.”
Solomon turned sharply. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Nix touched Benny’s arm. “Tell him what you have in mind.”
Benny outlined his plan.
“No way, man,” said Morgie. “That’s crazy.”
“I know.”
“It’s impossible. No one would agree to that.”
“They could just do nothing and let the reapers kill them,” said Benny coldly.
Solomon sat down next to him on the log. He sighed.
“This is your plan?” he asked.
“Nix put a lot of twists in it.”
“It’s his plan,” said Nix, and Chong nodded. Even Lilah agreed.
“You’re just a kid, Benny,” said Solomon, but even he didn’t sound convinced. “How did you get from Mountainside to here?” It was a question about distance traveled that had nothing to do with geography or the length of time they’d been on the road. Everyone knew that. “Tom would never have thought of something like this.”
“I’m not Tom,” said Benny, and those were very hard words to say. Nix took his hand and squeezed his fingers.
“No,” said Solomon, “you’re not. And frankly, I don’t know who you are. You’re certainly not the kid who left Gameland a couple of months ago.”
“No,” said Benny. “He died somewhere out in the desert.”
His comment wasn’t meant as a joke, and no one took it that way.
Solomon ran a hand over his shaved head. “You really want to sell this plan to the people in town?”
“If they can think of another way to stop forty thousand reapers,” said Benny, “I’m all ears.”
“Even so . . .”