Tomorrow Land (9 page)

“Thanks for the offer,” she said at last, “but I have to do this.”

From the corner of her eye she noticed Chase’s mouth dip into a deep frown, his snarky good humor all but disappeared. She wondered if he’d been secretly hoping they could convince her to stay. Maybe that was half his plan, bringing her back here in the first place. The idea warmed her more then she wanted to admit and she wondered what she’d would have done if he had been the one to ask her.

“Okay,” Tank said, his voice accepting the fact that the subject was closed. “But at least stay the night. We’ll hook you up with some supplies.”

Peyton forced her thoughts back to the issue at hand. “Right,” she said. “I’d appreciate those. But I do need to head out first thing in the morning.”

“She’s in a big hurry to save the world, Tank,” Chase said, his voice now laced with bitterness. “Doesn’t need us schlubs slowing her down.”

Peyton stared down at her feet, feeling as if she had been punched in the stomach. She wished there were one sentence she could say, one thing that could make him and his brother understand who she was and what she’d become and why she couldn’t stay. But they’d never understand. She was on her own until Florida.

“Well then, welcome to Hotel Walmart,” Tank announced cheerily, obviously trying to relieve the tension in the air. “Maybe if you’re lucky, Chase, chef extraordinaire, will cook you up some of his special five-star grub. Hope you like reconstituted beef stroganoff. It’s his specialty,” he added.

“Sounds good,” she forced herself to say. “In fact, right now I’m so hungry I could probably eat a zombie.”

Tank’s snorted. “Well, you’ve got half of one right there on your fingertips,” he noted, gesturing to her gunky razor tips. Then he turned to his younger brother. “Hey, Chase, why don’t you make yourself useful and get some disinfectant for her hands.”

“Yeah, okay,” Chase muttered, skulking off to obey. Peyton watched him go, trying not to notice how the taut leather of his pants perfectly molded to his backside. Seriously, the sooner she got away from Chase Parker, the better.

She turned back to the children, who’d gone back to playing. “Why are they dressed like that?” she asked, in an attempt to get her mind out of the gutter.

Tank leaned casually against a nearby pole, looking over the children with amusement in his eyes. “We gave up trying to dress them years ago,” he explained. “It was way too hard to convince them of the whole matching concept, and we eventually realized it didn’t make a difference anyway. No one’s gonna see them who’d care, right? So we just point them in the direction of the children’s department and tell them to go nuts. The older ones sometimes try to recreate what they see in the fashion magazines up front, and the little ones try to mimic the older ones, but basically none of them have any fashion sense whatsoever. Hell, half of them would run around naked if we let ‘em.”

Peyton watched as one of the triplets hit his brother over the head with a plastic baseball bat. “Little savages, huh?”

“You said it, not me.” Tank grinned. He still had that easy smile he’d been known for in high school, a smile that made Peyton feel comfortable and almost at home. Unlike Chase, who put her completely on edge.

“And the makeup?” she asked, taking another look at the “savages” and their war paint. Some of them were really creative.

“Ah, that’s courtesy of my man Rocky. When we first started gathering up the kids, they were all freaked out and scared. None of them would talk to one another; they just huddled in corners, practically catatonic with fear and grief. So Rocky came up with this idea to tell them that we were a special tribe. He had this whole story made up and everything.” Tank paused, remembering. “He told them all members of the tribe needed war paint. Then he hit a Halloween costume store downtown and brought cases and cases of makeup back with him. Painted all the faces of the children, one by one. They loved it. First time we saw any of them smile.” He looked down at the kids lovingly. “Half the time I forget they’re wearing it nowadays, I’m so used to seeing it. Probably looks pretty silly to you.”

Peyton’s eyes rested on the little bleach-blond Asian boy who’d painted red streaks down his cheeks and purple circles around his eyes. He cracked up laughing as the train he’d been playing with shot off the tracks and into the butt of one of the girls who had been sitting nearby. Giggling, the girl charged him, knocking him over and wrestling him to the ground. They were all so happy looking for kids who had lost everyone in the apocalypse not long ago. It was almost hard to believe.

“I think it’s cute,” she said at last. “You guys are really good to them.”

“Well, I try to teach ‘em stuff,” Tank explained, his face shining with pride. “We set up a little school in the café and meet for a couple hours a day. I hit the library down the street and got a bunch of books for them to read. I’m not the best teacher in the world, for sure, but I figured it was better than nothing. Right?”

She was impressed. “Definitely. They are the future, right?”

“Damn straight.” After a moment he added, “Gotta take a leak. Be right back.” He gave her a small wave, then walked off down a nearby aisle. She wondered how they took care of bathroom issues with no running water. Things were so different here, outside the safety of the bunker.

Her gaze found the children again, marveling at how well Tank had taken care of them. He was a good guy. A survivor and a provider. Her father could use people like him down at Disney World, she’d bet: dependable leaders who could get the job done. Once she joined her father and got settled in, she’d have to see if there was a way to bring this entire group down. She’d get the kids in school, give Tank a real job in whatever new society was being built. And Chase would come along too, she supposed. And maybe, just maybe, they could find a way to begin again. If he wanted to, that was.

She felt a tapping on her leg and looked down. A scrawny little girl, about six years old, with big brown eyes and black-colored braids, looked up at her with a curious expression on her war-painted face. She was joined a few moments later by the bleach-blond Asian boy.

“I’m Darla,” the girl declared, pointing to herself. “And this is Red. Who are you?”

Peyton crouched down, dropping to Darla’s eye level. She gave them her best smile. “I’m Peyton,” she said. “Nice to meet you.” Should she hold out her hand? No, her razors were still flared and covered with goo.

Darla squinted at her. “What’s wrong with your eyes?” she asked, pointing at Peyton’s lenses. “They look freaky.”

Peyton tried not to bristle. Darla was just a kid, she tried to remind herself, and kids were brutally honest about that kind of thing. Especially kids who had grown up with no society or parents to teach them proper manners. Still, she couldn’t help but squirm a little at the callous comment. Back at the shelter it had been easy to avoid mirrors, to pretend she was just a normal, everyday girl. But out here, amongst regular people, she knew she stood out like a sore thumb. A freak of nature. Or science, to be more precise. Ugly and disfigured and probably grotesque to a pretty little girl like Darla.

She realized the two children were still staring at her. “They’re special lenses,” she forced herself to explain, willing away the tremble in her voice. Truth be told, she’d rather go one-on-one with a flesh eating zombie than take on a couple of curious six-year-olds. “They help me see better.”

“Well, they look weird,” Red pronounced, reaching up to try and touch them. Peyton managed to dodge his hand, her stomach roiling. She quickly rose to her feet, trying to still her pounding heart. Her cheeks burned in humiliation and it was all she could do not to flee the store altogether.
They’re just kids
, she reminded herself. But it didn’t quench the feeling of being violated, exposed.

“Hey, don’t you rug rats have anything better to do than pester our guest?” Tank demanded, reappearing. She hadn’t heard him return. “If not, I suggest you start peeling potatoes for dinner.”

“What
ever
,” Red retorted, sticking out his tongue.

“Whatever,” Darla repeated like a parrot.

“Oh, yeah? Is that how we speak to our elders?” Tank dove for the two children, grabbing one in each arm and whirling them in a circle. They squealed in protest. “You know what the punishment is for ‘whatevering’ me, don’t you?”

“No!” Darla begged. “No, Tank!”

“Oh yes,” he said, grinning wickedly. He set them down. “Tickle torture!”

They both screamed.

“You’ve got three seconds to get out of here and spare yourselves my wrath,” Tank said. “One, two…”

The children scattered. Tank nodded. “Thought so,” he said. He turned back to Peyton. “Sorry about that. No manners. Little
savages
, just as you said.”

“Who are little savages?” Chase asked, making Peyton turn again. She hadn’t heard him approach, either. He handed her a few wet-naps.

“Who do you think?” Tank replied.

Cheeks flaming, Peyton ripped open a wet-nap packet, trying to regain her composure as she wiped down her blades. How much had Chase and Tank overheard of the conversation between her and the pair of children? And what did
they
think of her… enhancements? Were they thinking exactly the same thoughts as the kids—but were just too polite to bring it up?

“You need to teach those brats some manners,” Chase declared. “If I hear one more of them ‘whatever’ me, I swear to God…”

Tank laughed. “Reminds me of Tara, you know,” he said, watching Darla and Red wrestling in the corner. “Every time one of them says it, I feel like she’s back with us.”

Peyton startled at the mention of their adopted sister’s name. She’d almost forgotten…

Chase scowled at his brother. “I thought we agreed not to talk about her anymore.”

Tank’s expression fell. “Come on, Chase. Ignoring her death won’t bring her back. We should celebrate the time we had with her. After all, she was—”

Chase held up a hand. “Whatever, guy. Do what you want. Say what you want. I’m going to get Peyton her supplies and then go play ball.”

“Oh, no you don’t. It’s your turn to guard Spud,” Tank corrected. “Rocky’s been on guard duty since early this morning.”

“Oh God, you still got a guard on him?” Chase cried, rolling his eyes. “That’s ridiculous. It’s been two weeks. He hasn’t changed a hair on his head. He’s clean. He’s fine.”

“We don’t know that. He could still change.”

“What’s wrong with him?” Peyton asked, curious.

“Spud got a tiny bit nicked up by one of the Others a couple weeks ago when we were out gathering food,” Chase explained. “So Tank here put him in jail.”

“Quarantine,” Tank clarified.

“The guy’s been in the supply closet for two straight weeks,” Chase argued. “And he’s totally fine.”

“What about that infection on his inner thigh?”

“It’s just an ingrown hair. Or a boil. You know Spud never bothers to use soap when he bathes. He’s dirty. But that doesn’t mean, he’s… you know.”

Peyton shuddered, knowing all too well, in fact.

“Maybe he’s immune like you, Tank,” Chase suggested. He turned to Peyton. “Tank here’s been bitten by Others about three or four times now, and he’s completely fine.”

“But you never know who’s going to be okay and who’s not,” his brother interjected. “So we put anyone bitten in quarantine. To monitor them.”

Made sense. “And your friend was bitten two weeks ago?”

“Yes. About that. And he’s fine. Totally immune,” Chase claimed. “I saw him this morning and he was doing crossword puzzles.”

“I want to keep him two more days,” Tank insisted. “We’re better off being safe than sorry. I don’t want him transforming in the middle of the night while we’re asleep and eating the other children.”

Peyton shuddered. Monsters that ate children. Monsters that were children eating children. The sooner she got to Disney, the better.

“What about you?” she asked Chase. “Are you immune?”

He shrugged. “Don’t know. Never let one get close enough to find out. I’m called Chase for a reason, as I mentioned.”

“You’ve been lucky,” Tank reminded him. “But luck doesn’t hold out forever. Especially for people as foolhardy as you.”

“Whatever.”

“See? You’re as bad as the children.”

Chase stuck up his middle finger, then grabbed a nearby shopping cart and whirled it around. The wheels squeaked in protest. “Come on, let’s go get your supplies,” he said to Peyton. To Tank he said, “I’ll relieve Rocky when I’m done.”

“Fine. Just don’t come crying to me when he rips you a new one.”

“It’s fine, Tank. I’ll deal. We’ll only be a few minutes anyway.”

Chase made the cart do a wheelie and then pushed it down the aisle. Peyton followed, a little disconcerted. She didn’t get him. He acted angry one moment then completely blasé the next. What was up with him? Neither personality fit what she remembered. He’d been a sweet, earnest boy who’d sacrifice everything if only someone asked.

Of course, in a way she
had
asked. And he’d sacrificed. And then she’d rejected that sacrifice without ever offering an explanation. It was no wonder he acted a bit resentful. She’d likely feel the same way.

He turned left, pushing the cart in front of him. Away from the laughter and light, the store started seeming a bit spookier. With only Chase’s dim flashlight working, Peyton activated the night vision option on her implants in order to drive away the imagined ghosts. It was then that she realized Chase was looking at her strangely.

“What?” she asked, her cheeks heating again, wondering if he was looking at her implants.

He shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess I just can’t believe you’re actually here. I never thought I’d see you again.” He tossed a large backpack into the cart, followed by a water purifier and some bottles. He paused, then added, “You know, after you stood us up and all.”

She stifled a sigh. Here came the anger. The fury he’d been holding inside for four long years. She deserved it, she guessed. She deserved all of it and more. But that wouldn’t make his violent emotions any easier to handle. She wished there was a way to move on without a discussion. She wished…