The Harbinger Break (27 page)

  
Hopefully.

  
For now, Sam decided that he'd keep the recording to himself and use it to persuade the remaining addicted, when at least a portion of the country had already withdrawn–hopefully leading to the astatine removal from the salt and some sort of programs developing to help save the rest.

  
He felt content, and now he could focus on his second task: killing Pat Shane. He told Ron and the others that he had somewhere to be and, with a wave, returned to his car.

  
But should he kill Pat? Now that time had passed and his initial rage had subsided and fear for his safety had magnified, he wondered whether the act of killing Pat was noble, or selfish. He knew he might need him in the future, but Pat was crazy–he was seconds from killing Claire, not to forget himself as well.

  
Sam thought about what Pat had said about tremendous good and tremendous evil.

  
Well, killing Pat certainly fell under one of those, whichever one though, Sam was unsure–but his path was set, and he resolved once again to kill Shane.

◊   ◊   ◊

   Nick Robins kissed Belinda Scott again, certain now that he wasn't who he'd thought he was.

  
She was a striking woman–petite, dark red hair, long legs, full lips–all things Nick had noted even before he'd realized he might be straight. She smiled at him as she pulled away.

  
"Nicky Nick Nick," she said. "From openly homosexual to home-wrecker. How's it feel doing this as my husband is downstairs, protecting us?"

  
"Bad, actually," Nick said, and shook his head. "Should we be doing this?"

  
Belinda laughed. "Who cares? We're probably going to die anyway, and isn't it exciting?"

  
He shrugged. "Kind of…"

  
She grinned and kissed him again, "Of course it is."

  
Nick really enjoyed kissing her. In his life, he'd only been with one person, a man–and that had made him feel just plain uncomfortable.

  
He'd considered himself gay for the first time in middle school–relatively early too–when bullies, posing as his friends, confronted him. He hadn't many friends back then, and didn't know better–didn't know to suspect that someone acting nice might've only been pretending.

  
"So you have two moms?" the tallest bully, Ryan, had asked innocently.

  
"Yeah," Nick replied, naive, thinking they were just being friendly.

  
The bully smirked. "So you know that means you're gay, right?"

  
Nick shook his head. "I didn't know that."

  
"Well, it does, man. So are you gay?"

  
Good question. It took over fifteen years to deduce an answer to that, a question which had pervaded almost every aspect of his life. A deduction he only made in this moment with Belinda, and he kissed her again, hard, as she began to stroke his upper thigh. Only the second time someone had touched him there.

  
The first time had been with a guy was in college. He'd become friends with a guy in class, who invited him over one day, saying he was throwing a party. Nick arrived, surprised at finding himself the only guest, and instead of going out the two stayed in and, as his friend had put it, got wasted.

  
And their talk turned from one topic to the next to dirtier and dirtier until his friend exclaimed, "you've honestly never done
that
to yourself before?"

  
"No," Nick said, giggling in drunken stupor. "I've never even thought about it."

  
The memory of what happened next caused Nick to cringe in retrospect, and most of it was a blur, but he could remember his friend and himself messing around, and that one moment–ugh–and his eyes were closed and his friend saying repeatedly, "you're probably just too drunk, don't worry about it," and Nick, panicking, stood up, and excused himself. He left, and he remembered how his friend had chased after him, and tried comforting him as he stumbled back to his own place. The entire memory made Nick want to puke.

  
He slid his hands beneath Belinda's shirt while kissing her, shoving her backwards, and she giggled as she fell onto the bed under his sudden rush of passion.

  
He'd dropped out of college soon after that incident, and spent the next ten years drifting from town to town, doing minor jobs here and there, confused, lost, and depressed. He'd gone to Land's End on the coast of Georgia one dark day, remembering from his youth a specific cliff overlooking the ocean, remembering how beautiful the view was, and how that seemed like a fitting place for him to end it all.

  
The cocktail of drugs he'd ingested and injected probably should've killed him anyway, but he didn't want to be found, he just wanted to disappear. The thought of his moms standing over his corpse and crying brought shivers and chills to his mind, and he'd rather them think he just went somewhere far away than finding out the truth.

  
Then he saw the man at the cliff. At first, Nick thought that the man might've been a ghost–considering the rumors of hauntings in the area. In retrospect he knew he'd just been hallucinating. The man stood perilously close to the edge, and Nick, his suicidal ambitions forgotten, approached slowly.

  
"Hey," he'd said.

  
The man turned. "Hey."

  
Nick raised an eyebrow. "You thinking about jumping?"

  
The man didn't respond at first. He'd turned back towards the water, staring out, and Nick walked over and stood next to him.

  
"Yeah," the man choked. Nick noticed a tear roll down the man's cheek. He'd went to wipe it off, but his hand had caused the man, who was not real but a hallucination, to vaporize.

  
Belinda stroked his cheek now, bringing him back to reality. "What are you thinking about, hun?" she asked.

  
"Just–" Nick said, then paused, exhaling and wondering. "Nothing."

  
The hallucination hadn't returned, but Nick had stood at the edge of Land's End for over an hour, hand outstretched as it had been to wipe the man's tear, and listened to the waves crashing to the rhythm of his heart. He knew then he wouldn't jump, that he wouldn't die–resolving that the hallucination was either God or an older version of himself.

  
Maybe the only reason he didn't jump that day was because he needed to be there in however many years to convince his past self not to.

  
He became religious, and when he'd heard about the small somewhat-religious development nearby, it seemed a plan that was bigger than himself, and he moved in immediately. He hadn't been financially stable enough at the time to afford Sherwood Hills for long, but felt deep down that God would provide, and He had.

  
Nick became fast friends with Belinda Scott, who not only got him a job he loved, but who was the first person he'd ever been so open with, whom he could express his doubts with. She suggested a test of sorts, to determine his sexuality, which led them down their infidelity path, first with minor kissing, and now stepping it up a few notches.

  
About time too, Nick thought as he unclasped Belinda's bra.

  
"Take it off," she whispered.

  
He took both ends a pulled it down, letting the bra fall to her waist. She pushed him onto his back and kissed down his chest. As he watched her, his skin tingling with pleasure.

  
A small bubble of fear rose to the surface of his mind, and he found himself wondering when Bernard's shift ended–but as her hand deftly unbuttoned his pants and she looked up at him with her big brown eyes and grinned, the curiosity vanished and was replaced by a grin of his own and the thought that he finally, certainly understood himself.

  
She unzipped his fly and he closed his eyes as the thought of her husband shrunk to a blip in the depth of his subconscious.

◊   ◊   ◊

   Brandon Holt watched his opposite house guard mirror, Bernard, leave his post–and at that moment he decided his shift was up as well. He wanted to wait until someone volunteered to replace him, but found that he'd begun to fade an hour before, and had since been forcing himself to stay awake. He entered the house and found Mark Herman standing behind the kitchen counter drinking a glass of water.

  
"Is it my turn to stand guard now, Brandon?" Mark asked.

  
"Yes."

  
Mark nodded, placed his glass onto the counter, and walked outside, taking the gun from Brandon as he did so. Something about the way he moved irked Brandon, and he was glad that he wouldn't have to be the only one awake with that creep for much longer.

  
He wondered if the professor was awake. It had been Brandon's idea to not let Shane stand guard, thinking that the other side wouldn't hesitate to take him out, given the chance. But even though Shane had never left the house, he was never around either–an observation that concerned Brandon slightly.

  
He wasn't the kind of person to doubt himself, but that didn't mean he'd avoid precaution either. He looked at Jack Evans, asleep on the couch, and grinned at the odd manner which his friend slept–eyes slightly open and mouth ajar.

  
Opal and Jordan Wood were likely asleep in the guest bedroom–Sandra Evans was guarding the east street, Marilyn Herman the west street, and Mark, of course, the porch.

  
Jack must've just been replaced by Sandra, seeing how himself and Jack began their shifts at the same time. But who had Marilyn replaced? The Woods had taken multiple day shifts so they could have a few hours together at night–and it couldn't have been anyone else–it must've been Mark. He must've just finished a shift, and willingly took over the porch.

  
Strange guy, Brandon thought.

  
He'd planned to pass out on the couch perpendicular to Jack's but decided to find the professor first, if anything simply because he wanted have a conversation about Mark's strange behavior. He checked upstairs first, but found Jordan and Opal Wood sound asleep in the guest room. The bathroom door was open and the bathroom empty, as was his master bedroom, and Brandon began to grow anxious.

  
He descended the stairs and on a whim turned to his garage. If Shane wasn't there then he'd likely run out to either of the wings, possibly to talk, and if he had, Brandon would be upset. Going out to the wings for a social visit was a huge unnecessary risk.

  
He opened the garage door and flicked on the light, but found it empty. So he's out on a wing, Brandon thought–but when something caught his eye, he stopped.

  
On his workbench in the garage was a large device he'd never seen before. It was a cylindrical motor looking thing, with wires and fuses jutting out at random intervals. Brandon stepped closer and saw attached to it was the small head of a digital watch, blinking 12:00 repeatedly. He felt his pulse quicken with his understanding–there was no mistaking it–his breath stopped in his throat and he stepped back, feeling like he was choking on his esophagus.

  
What he found was a bomb.

  
He heard the door open and then shut behind him, and he turned.

  
"So you finally found it," Shane said, knife in hand–and for some reason one eye closed. "I'm sorry, Brandon–but I can't take any chances. You have to understand."

  
Brandon checked his periphery for anything he could use to defend himself, and eyed a large wrench on the work bench.

  
"So you're the alien," he said, attempting to stall.

  
"No. But one of you might be, so I have to kill all of you. I'm sorry."

  
"I can prove I'm not an alien," Brandon said–anything to give him time.

  
"You can't," Shane replied, and at that moment shut off the lights.

  
The room was pitch black aside from the faint green glow of his garage door light. He grabbed the wrench, remembering exactly where it was, then dropped to the floor and scuttled backwards as quietly as possibly.

  
"Jordan and Opal are dead, aren't they?" he asked. Maybe he could locate Shane by his answer.

  
"Yes. Everyone is now dead, aside from you."

  
His voice seemed to be bouncing off every wall at once, and Brandon begged his eyes to adjust, staring as hard as he could, mentally willing himself to see.

  
He realized at that moment that when he'd looked in on Jordan and Opal, they hadn't been asleep–they'd been dead. And while he was looking for Shane, Shane had been outside killing Sandra Evans and Marilyn Herman on the east and west streets. Brandon saw it in his mind so clearly. Shane had then returned and killed Jack and Mark. It would've been simple for him, seeing how Jack was asleep and Shane could have easily snuck behind an exhausted Mark, who'd been facing the opposite direction.