Night Beyond The Night (17 page)

“What happened to getting the mustangs so easily?” he asked after she’d whistled several times and there’d been no answering whinny.

“I don’t know,” she said, frowning. “I’ve never had a problem before. Maybe we’ll find a herd somewhere along the way.” She paused, looking toward the southwest. “Looks a little cloudy that way. Maybe there’s a storm coming.”

“Do you want to stay in Greenside?”

“No. I want to get back to Envy.”

Elliott agreed, but he’d learned by now that Jade liked to make the decisions. And since it appeared they were of the same mind, why not let her think she was in charge.

They traveled as fast as they could, following overgrown roads. Elliott concentrated on the journey, automatically observing the environment for recognizable elements from his world—highway signs, Golden Arches, gas stations or drugstores . . . anything that seemed familiar. Those memories, those groundings of days gone by, were few and far between.

And he thought about the women he’d met in Greenside. Mathilda, with the healthy baby boy in her belly. Emily, with a little girl that would be born a month after. Sally, who had arthritis in her hip and knee, which made her move slowly and awkwardly.

And then there was Della. The moment Elliot had laid eyes on her, he’d known it would be bad news. He hadn’t even needed to really scan her, but he did . . . and the moment he realized she had terminal cancer throughout her entire abdomen, he jerked his hands away as if burned.

He felt acute shame afterward, but no one seemed to notice his reaction. The shame was followed by the niggling worry that he’d touched her and somehow quickly absorbed the carcinoma. But he thought about it, wracked his memory, reliving every detail of the moment, and he knew he hadn’t felt that little sizzle of power he had when he healed Jade and Simon. And, now, in retrospect, he recalled having felt a shocklike jolt when he touched the elderly man in Vineland, who’d been dying from an infection.

The problem was, he’d turned from the old man to rebandage Lenny’s cut moments later . . . and look what had happened. He’d come to realize that Lenny had died from an infection—not from the rusty-metal cut, but from Elliott.

So much for “first do no harm.”

Now, a deep tug of depression and grief pulled inside him. It wasn’t that he wasn’t used to diagnosing serious, terminal problems. Hell, he’d worked in an ER and had seen plenty of bad news.

It was that there wasn’t anything that could be done to even make Della’s passing easier . . . let alone cure her. Unless he wanted to die himself.

Or give the terminal illness to someone else. Accidentally.

He hiked along, grateful for the dappled shade of a small forest they’d entered. He wondered if it was safe to touch Jade again.

Meanwhile, Elliott was acutely aware that if he had absorbed anything, whatever it was was growing inside him right now . . . more quickly and venomously than it would be in anyone else.

Maybe he could find another snake. Or a horse. Or even a dog. No, not a dog. It might be someone’s pet. He could touch them, passing on anything that he might be carrying. But wouldn’t that be cruelty to animals?

Did it matter? When a human life was at stake, would it matter?

A thought struck him. What about a
ganga
? Could he pass it on to a
ganga
? Were they living creatures? Would it work?

That might be a solution.

First he’d have to catch one. And it would be fascinating to scan it and find out what sort of creature the
gangas
were. Of course, there was always the danger that he’d scan a
ganga
and accidentally absorb whatever it was that made them . . . well, undead, or reanimated . . . and become that way himself.

What a fucking mess. How many people would be hurt or killed before he figured out just exactly how to control this power?

After about an hour of hiking, they emerged from the forest and found themselves standing at the edge of what had been a huge parking lot. A low, sprawling building stretched in front of them. Random trees dotted the landscape of tall, meadowlike grass.

And in the distance, behind the long, low building, was a large black cloud billowing toward them, “Oh my God,” Jade exclaimed from behind him.

Elliott had witnessed both tornados and cyclones, but he’d never seen anything like the roiling, evil-looking fog. It stretched as far as he could see. Yet the sky above looked like an overturned bowl of oatmeal, gray but unthreatening.

“What the hell is it?” Whatever it was, it seemed to be moving rapidly toward them.

Before he could stop her, she’d grabbed his bare arm with her fingers. They were cool and firm and he hoped like hell he wasn’t “carrying” anything. “A storm. We call them blackouts. That must be why the mustangs are all gone.”

“It’s too wide to be a tornado, and the sky above it isn’t even cloudy.”

“It just rolls along the ground and destroys whatever isn’t nailed down. I guess it’s like a long, wide tornado. Either way, we’ve got to find shelter.”

Elliott nodded, squinting at the rolling storm. They hadn’t stopped walking, but now they had to pick up the pace. The blackout was moving quickly due east, and Envy was northeast. There was a chance the storm might miss them if they kept on their course.

“Let’s keep going as far as we can,” he said.

“I think we should see how far we can get. We might be able to miss it, or at least get out of the center of its path.” Jade’s voice was taut.

He nodded and they picked up their speed. Elliott grabbed her elbow and helped her to keep pace with his longer, faster stride, half-carrying her. They half-ran, half-jogged, passing small, rundown houses that looked as if they’d been a neighborhood of manufactured homes. Even if they wanted to find shelter now, there wasn’t any safe place.

The storm seemed to pick up steam as well, and it wasn’t long before Elliott felt the rush of wind chilling him through the light T-shirt he wore. He had a jacket in his pack, but he didn’t stop to pull it out. The sting of biting rain began to patter over his head and shoulders. But, it wasn’t rain . . . it was hail. Sharp, icy pellets the size of blueberries. Big, fat
hard
blueberries.

Glancing behind, he saw that the evil cloud now filled the horizon and rose into the sky.
Holy fucking shit
. It was like a tidal wave, rushing toward them. There was nowhere to go.

The storm bubbled and swirled, and looked like a massive purple-black steamroller careening toward them. He guessed it was moving more than ten miles an hour, and on foot, they were lucky to be doing a consistent five.

It was time to find a safe place. Something that could withstand the power of the winds that bent trees nearly double, the pounding of hail, and whatever else the storm would bring.

Leaves and debris—pieces of wood and plastic, branches and bushes—whirled, blowing into them from behind, whipping Jade’s hair as the hail fell harder and faster. Elliott’s nose clogged with the blast of dust, dirt, and something dank and heavy. A roaring sound surged around them, deafening and furious, as the storm rolled toward them.

Elliott scanned the horizon, looking for something promising, shading his eyes from the stinging hail and blinding dust. The little manufactured homes that had stretched in neat rows, overgrown and sagging, had given way to a wide open space that appeared to have been the intersection of two major highways.

But on the other side of the crumbling entrance and exit ramps, he saw what looked like a brick office building. Three or four stories, some glass still reflecting from the windows. “There,” he shouted, pointing, but the word was lost in the maelstrom around them. Jade looked and saw where he was pointing, she nodded in agreement, the details of her face muted by the falling light.

He grabbed her hand and they ran at full speed now, clambering over the crumbling concrete wall that had separated the neighborhood from the roar of the highways, across the empty interstate, leaping over small crevices in the concrete and up and over the jagged slabs of road, and then up a small incline on the other side.

The storm blew and blustered, fast and furious around them, filling his ears and drowning out all other sounds. Then something hard and heavy slammed into the back of his head, nearly sending him to his knees.

“Elliott!” Jade shouted over the roar of the storm, holding fast to his arm, steadying him as he stumbled. Pain radiated down from his skull and for a moment, Elliott’s sight blurred. But then he realized his darkening vision was partly from the storm nearly upon them.

Jade grabbed him around the waist, pulling him up against her slender body, stumbling awkwardly at the sudden addition of the extra weight. But she kept on, her arm solid and strong around him as he blinked, trying to clear his vision and the dizziness.

Something warm and wet trickled from the back of his head, and the pounding had not eased, the world still spun, but when she tripped, he shoved an arm around Jade’s waist and heaved her up against his hip, and ran. His steps wove from side to side, his knees felt as though they were going to give way at any moment, but he ran, with the sound of the freight train of a storm rushing down over him.

Hail pelted them, pounding their shoulders and backs of their legs, the back of their heads and arms, crunching beneath their feet. Debris flew about, slapping up against them, and the sounds of screeching, screaming filled his ears.

At last they gained the top of the incline. The world was dark as night, and Elliott could see hardly any details, but as they dashed toward their sanctuary, he caught sight of a large, gleaming object next to the building.

Jade saw it too, and stumbled against him, her eyes suddenly wide and white in the darkness. “
Oh no!
” her mouth said soundlessly, her shout lost in the pummeling wind. Her fingers suddenly dug into his arm, her face a mask of shock, and she tried to stop him.

But Elliott pulled her along as a massive tree branch . . . no, a whole fucking
tree
, roots and all . . . sailed past them and crashed into the brick building. Wood splintered, shooting everywhere as he scrabbled for the door, pulling on the sagging metal, and shoved her inside, where the roar and the wind became muted, and the blast shook the walls and floor.

She grabbed his arms and slammed a hand over his mouth, shoving her face up against his neck. “Strangers,” she hissed into his ear. “Did you see the truck? The Strangers are here!”

And just as her furious whisper registered in his ears, dulled by the roar of the storm, he saw the black wave descend over the building in a great surge. The metal door slammed open, and he grabbed Jade, dodging away from the vortex that suddenly filled the space.

Just great. Out of the frying pan, and into the fire.

Five weeks After

Despite his injury, Theo seems the same as ever. So glad to have my twin back.

Noticed a strange thing today. Some of the bodies that were on the streets are gone. Disappeared completely.

Maybe some animals took them off, but so many are gone it seems odd. Very strange and a bit frightening.

Working with Greg Rowe and Thad Marck to divide up the tasks of scavenging, organizing, and infrastructure more effectively. Everyone is so haphazard, we need to be more organized. We four (now that Theo is back) seem to be the most able and willing to figure out the big picture. Most everyone else is still in shock.

No one goes out at night. Have heard the roar of lions and tigers, and other unidentifiable animals.

Still have power. Still no Internet.

Theo wants to find a satellite to hack into. Would never admit it, but I think he could do it faster than me.

So glad he’s back.

—from the journal of Lou Waxnicki

Jade and Elliott pressed against the wall, away from the raging storm and its weapons of hail, branches, and miscellaneous debris; whatever it could gather up and hurl in its madness poured through the open door and swirled haphazardly around the room.

Feeling around in the dark, still battling the sharp ache in his skull, Elliott found a metal door that swung wildly in the blustering storm. Praying that the Strangers weren’t on the other side of it, he slipped through and pulled Jade along as the wind slammed the door closed behind them.

The pressure on the opposite side held the door closed now, and Elliott felt for Jade in the flat, unrelieved darkness. The storm’s roar was even more muted, and he strained to hear and see. Groping blindly, but unwilling to move about for fear the floor was unstable or had collapsed, he felt the rough brick wall, damp and soft with mold.

“Jade,” he whispered quietly, feeling it was safe to do so, for he couldn’t see anything—let alone the glow of a crystal from a Stranger. If they were here, they sure as hell weren’t in this room.

“Here,” she said, low and to his right. The syllable was barely discernable beneath the rumbling storm. He reached out, and at last, felt a cool hand brush over his bare arm. Elliott found her, his fingers closing over her narrow wrist and the three beaded bands she wore there.

He told himself he had no choice but to pull Jade close to him so he could speak low in her ear, and gathered her into his arms. The wall behind steadied him, and though his head was still pounding, and sticky when he rested it against the masonry, Elliott had a moment of pure pleasure, just holding her as the storm crashed and battered around them.

Feeling the warmth of her skin, the damp of her clothes, the silky brush of hair over his cheek . . . not to mention all of the other attributes that had attracted him since he’d first caught sight of her barreling to the rescue on that horse . . . the soft brush of lips against the hollow of his throat, the swell of breasts pressing into his chest, the curve of her bottom. Even in the midst of the mildew and dampness, even after the wild wind tossing her hair, he smelled the fresh lemon there.

His heart, which had been racing from the adrenaline of their mad dash, began to pound in an entirely different rhythm. He closed his eyes.