Dust and Decay (Benny Imura 2)

Solomon opened his arms. “Give us a hug, girl.”

Sally did, but gently, hissing a little as Solomon gathered her in his powerful arms. When he heard the hiss he let her go, ranging his eyes up and down and finally taking in the sling and the bandages.

“Whoa, now … what’s wrong?”

“Well,” said Sally, “the old girl ain’t what she used to be.” She told him everything. Solomon listened with great interest. Like Sally, he was an unaffiliated bounty hunter, mostly working the kind of closure jobs that Tom Imura took and doing some occasional cleanups and guard work. He’d come west from Pennsylvania after First Night with his two kids and a ragtag collection of refugees he picked up during the three-thousand-mile trek through what was becoming the Rot and Ruin. Solomon lived in Fairview, where, also like Tom, he had tried and failed for years to get the town to organize a militia to patrol the part of the Ruin that ran along the Sierra Nevada mountain range.

By the time Sally was done telling her story, Solomon was nodding. “This all fits,” he said, “but it’s worse than you know. White Bear’s got more than seventy goons in his crew, and some of them are real gangsters. Actual gangsters from before First Night. There’s two I know will be trouble. Heap Garrison and Digger Harris. Digger used to be a leg-breaker for the Mob in Detroit, and wasn’t Heap with the Russian Mafia? Or that’s what people say.”

Sally made a face. “Nice.”

“I was looking for Tom,” said Solomon. “Ran into Fluffy McTeague over by Coldwater Creek, and he said that Tom was bugging out. Looking for that jet. I thought that wasn’t until next week.”

“He changed his mind. Wanted to get out of Dodge. Why were you looking for him?” she asked.

“To talk him the heck out of going,” said Solomon. “I’ve been hitting the wall trying to get the militia idea to go anywhere.”

“So has Tom.”

“So has everyone who’s tried to do it alone. I wanted to get Tom to agree to be the spokesman for a committee. Make a case to the towns, one after the other. Campaign for it.”

“Might have worked, Sol,” she said, “but it’s about two days too late. Besides, Tom’s got enough to worry about right now.”

“With Gameland, you mean? Is he really going to tear it down again?”

“Don’t know about tearing it down, but he’s going to get that kid back. His brother and the other kids are waiting for him back at Brother David’s and—”

“No, they’re not,” said Solomon firmly. “I just came through there. Somebody torched it. Turned a couple thousand zoms into crispy critters. No trace of Brother David or the girls.”

Sally swore. “God … you don’t think Tom’s brother was burned up, do you?”

“Hope not, but I don’t think so. There were tracks leading off into the field, off toward Wawona. The kids probably went that way. If I’d known that it was only kids, I’d have gone after them. Bad stuff’s happening in the east.”

“I know.” Sally narrowed her eyes thoughtfully. “You said you saw Fluffy? Anyone else around?”

“With all that’s going on? Everybody’s around, and I have half a dozen people out looking for Tom.”

Sally narrowed her eyes. “How fast could you get them together?”

“Pretty fast. But it’d have to be for a good reason. Why?”

“I’m starting to have a thought here.”

“What kind of thought?”

“A dangerous one.”

He grinned. “Tell me, girl.”

FROM NIX’S JOURNAL

Why do zoms eat only living creatures?

Firsthand accounts of zoms say that they will attack and eat any living creature. Humans, animals, birds, insects, and reptiles. No one knows if they will attack fish.

It has been speculated that it is warm, living flesh that attracts the zombies’ appetites, but then how do you explain zoms who eat insects? Insects don’t have much body heat.

Heat alone can’t be what attracts them, because if that was the case they’d continue to feed on the recently dead. But they don’t. Once something has died, zoms lose interest pretty quickly. (It takes hours for a body to cool to room temperature.)