Broken Lands (Benny Imura 6)

“Really? With all the helicopters and planes they have, how come they didn’t know about the Night Church and the reaper army? I mean, okay, Captain Ledger knew some, but even he had no idea how big their army was . . . and that was an army. Some zombie animals wouldn’t be even a blip to them.”

“You have a point to all this or are you just talkin’ to hear yourself talk?” asked Riot irritably.

“I do,” said Chong. He pointed into the mist. “We don’t know anything about what’s out there. We don’t know if there are more animals like this. We don’t know if there’s maybe a whole other place like Asheville, maybe in New England or Montana, or Canada. All that radiation we saw, and the toxic chemical spill? You saw what it was doing to the plants. Put that in the same pot with the fact that we know for sure the scientists were experimenting with mutagens, and then tell me if there isn’t a real chance that a zombie gorilla isn’t the worst thing we might see. Remember those lions in Nevada last year? Or the rhino in California? What if they turned zom? Maybe it wasn’t zoms who overran Asheville. Maybe it’s something we don’t even know about yet.”

“Okay, so now we’re scared,” said Nix. “So what? We were scared before.”

“Maybe,” said Chong, “we haven’t been scared enough. The world here is different than where we came from and I, for one, don’t want to make the mistake of assuming I know what’s what. There could be things out here we’re not ready to face.”

And as if in answer to his words, a scream slashed through the mist, rising high into a shriek of unbearable agony.

It was a human scream.

72

DESPITE THE NEED, THE HUMANITY, and the urgency of the scream, they did not immediately go running into the forest. The mist was like a wall, and Chong’s words of warning had not been erased by the cry. The infected gorilla was still there, a reminder even in death.

“Where is it?” whispered Morgie, turning first one way and then another. He had his bokken in his strong hands.

“There,” said Nix, pointing to their left.

“No,” said Lilah, looking straight ahead. “There.”

That direction was where the gorilla had come from. Benny glanced down at the blood on its fangs and hands. Nix and Riot did too, and their eyes met as understanding flooded in.

“That thing attacked someone else before it came after us,” he said.

Lilah shook her head. “Or it has a mate who is hunting someone else.”

“Crap,” said Morgie.

There was another scream, and this time it wasn’t a wordless howl but a definite plea in a man’s desperate voice. “Oh God . . . help me . . .”

Benny was moving before it finished.

“Wait!” cried Morgie, but Nix and Lilah plunged into the mist right behind Benny. Chong drew a breath, fitted an arrow, and followed. When Morgie turned to appeal to Riot, she was gone. He hadn’t seen her fade into the fog. Morgie lingered for a moment longer. “We’re all going to die out here,” he said, repeating what he’d said before they left Mountainside. This time they felt less like a complaint to his ears and far more like a prophecy.

Even so, he gripped his wooden sword and followed.

• • •

Up ahead, Benny moved as quickly as he could through the mist, but it was like running through a dream. The screams rose and fell, and the fog distorted them, making some cries sound like they came from right where he was, while others seemed far away and in a totally different direction.

Lilah caught up and passed him, and he let her lead, trusting her judgment far more than his own. Nix touched Benny’s shoulder to let him know she was beside him, and they moved together.

“Please, God . . . help me . . . oh God . . .”

The cries were continuous now, and Benny was certain they were getting closer to the source. The fog was thinning too, the farther they were from the stream. He could see trees taking shape as more than rumors, and their solidity steadied his feet and his mind. Some, though; not entirely.

Chong’s words echoed in his mind. Maybe we haven’t been scared enough. There could be things out here we’re not ready to face.

“Thanks a bunch,” Benny grumbled.

“Here!” called Lilah, and a split second later he heard her scream too.

• • •

“Lilah!” bellowed Chong as he appeared out of nowhere and pushed between Benny and Nix before vanishing into the mist ahead.