Unity (9 page)

Even when life is glum, there is something about a sunrise that promises a better future. Like a Biblical rainbow over Noah’s Ark. I’m not sure if it’s the warmth, the innate knowledge that all life on Earth depends on it, or if it’s simply because most everyone is still asleep. Sunrise used to be safe. Even in bad neighborhoods.

But not here.

The assumption hasn’t been entirely confirmed, if you don’t include the crash or the tsunami. Still, believing the sun’s promise could prove fatal, I’m up before the others, stretching out the kinks and trying not to dwell on the light show we saw last night. Worrying about something to which answers cannot be found is a waste of brain power. We have more pressing problems.

The first of which, in my mind, is finding Sig.

Or what’s left of her.

Shut up!

My inner voice is loud and has a split personality this morning.

I’m drawn to the cliff’s edge. The jungle below is still in shadow. The sky above is a lightening purple. In the distant West, purple fades to black, the night sky being chased away.

Looking back to the straight line extending out from the river, a yawn becomes something like a wounded vulture call. I choke on the sound, but barely notice.

“What is it?” Gwen says behind me. I hear a twist of fabric and an, “oof.” Then footsteps. Gwen is by my side, hands on knees, breathing hard. “What? What happened?”

“Follow the river,” I say.

I don’t look to see if she’s listening. I know she is.

“Smoke.” She stands up straight. “That’s from a campfire.”

“See the line cut through the jungle?” I point to it. “I think that might be where Transport 37 came down.”

“If that’s them, they don’t know about the bodies.” She meets my eyes. “They don’t know this place is dangerous.”

“I’m going down there,” I say.

“I know.”

“You’re not going to stop me?”

She shrugs. “We both know I couldn’t.”

“But she’s not going alone,” Mandi says, turning us around. “I’m going, too.”

The girl looks wide awake and determined, despite having spent the first day and a half on this island unconscious. And despite being a Base. She’s a little bit of a square peg in a round hole. She’s got the know-how and skills of a Base, but a personality better suited to a Point. But she’s small, and not at all physically imposing or athletic. The Unity ‘Powers That Be’ probably made her a Base with the hopes she could overcome her headstrong personality. Part of her is really good at that, but I can tell she’s not thrilled by the role.

“You need to rest,” Gwen says.

“The boys,” she says, motioning to Daniel and Gizmo, who are still dead to the world in their hammocks, “need to keep working on reaching the outside world. They don’t need my help.” She points at Gwen. “And you need to keep them safe.”

“If anyone is going with her,” Gwen says, “it’s me. I’m Support.”

“And in this case, the best thing you can do is make sure Daniel and Gizmo stay alive long enough to make contact. Your immediate job might be the support of Point, but we need to think long-term now. We need to be strategic. And that’s my job. Plus, I have medical training. If someone is hurt, I can help.”

“You’ll be defenseless,” I tell her, not about to give up my knife or gun.

Gwen crosses her arms. “Hey.”

“I’ll have you,” Mandi says to me. “I don’t need a weapon.”

“You can’t complain,” I tell her. “About anything.”

“Including—”

“Including me.”

“Fine.”

“Guys,” Gwen says. “You can’t just decide this without me.”

“I think we just did.” I pat her on the shoulder and manage to get a hint of a smile out of Mandi. I’m not sure why I care whether or not Mandi likes me, or that she smiles, but I do. Probably guilt over being a jerk to Hutch. Part of me needs forgiveness for that.

“Get one protein bar for us to share,” I say to Mandi, “and the two empty water bottles. We’ll refill them on the way.”

When she hurries off, I do my best to reassure Gwen. “We’re going to follow the river. If we find the transport, we’ll check out the campfire. If we don’t, we’ll leave it alone. Come straight back here. Maybe two hours out, an hour to look around and two hours back. We’ll be back in time for dinner. Speaking of which...”

She nods. “I’ll catch some fish.”

“And keep your guard up.” I look at Daniel and Gizmo. “Don’t let them out of your sight. If you see anyone that isn’t us, hide.”

Mandi returns with a go-pack over her shoulders. “Set.”

“Be safe,” Gwen says, surprising me with a hug.

“Be strong,” I tell her. I flinch when I realize we’ve just repeated my mother’s secret message to me.

“Ugh,” Mandi says, and with that, we head into the jungle, following the path to the river, and then the river down the side of the mountain.

Walking along the river’s edge makes for quick and easy travel. Moving downhill helps, too. But compared to trudging through the layers of green growing along the jungle floor, this is simple. And air conditioned. Compared to the sticky wet air trapped under the foliage, the air along the river is at least ten degrees cooler, and thanks to the lack of trees allowing the sun through, much drier.

The only downside is the river’s noise. When it’s not rushing, it’s gurgling. There could be a marching band sneaking up on us, and we wouldn’t know it. But the opposite is true, too. No one is going to hear us coming.

And after an hour of silent hiking, even I feel comfortable enough to talk. “You don’t have medical training, do you?”

Mandi hops from one water-smoothed rock to another. “I brought Band-Aids.”

“Why did you really come?”

She hops again, perching atop a stone after landing on it. “I don’t trust you.”

The grit beneath my feet grinds to a stop. “You don’t trust... What do you think I would do?”

“You mean besides ditch us?” she asks.

“Why would I do that?”

She rolls her eyes like the answer is obvious. “In a situation like this, the easiest way for a Point to survive is to go solo. Support and Base are like pack animals. Safety in numbers. The odds of one of us surviving goes up if we’re in a group. But you...you have no reason to stay, and we all know how you treated Hutch.”

“I didn’t know how things worked. No one told me about Support. Or Base. Nothing. They were just labels without meaning to me.”

“Uh-huh.”

Mandi’s jabs get under my skin with the ease of a mosquito’s proboscis. If she’d been clinging to my arm, I might have actually slapped her just the same. But she’s keeping a safe distance.

“Listen,” I say, “If I wanted to leave, I could have. I could right now, and there would be nothing you could do to stop me.”

She leaps off the stone with surprising speed, gets right up close and stares up into my eyes. “You want to put that to the test?”

I’m not remotely impressed or intimidated. The staring contest lasts for five seconds. I end it with, “This is great, I’m stuck on an island with a girl who has short man syndrome.”

Her smile comes and goes in a blink, but I saw it.

“Look, as much as you might want to be, you’re not a Point. Or Support. That wasn’t my call. And if the people who gave us these jobs are any good at theirs, maybe you should just embrace it and see what you can do.” I sigh and turn away. “Now let’s—”

My hip suddenly feels lighter.

The gun.

When I turn back around I find the weapon pointed at my chest. Mandi has tears in her eyes. She’s serious. But I’ve been here before.

“I’ll give you three seconds to kill me,” I tell her. “And then I’m taking it back.”

I countdown in my head, reach out and put my hand on the top of the handgun. She’s still holding it. Still has her finger around the trigger. If I tried to yank it away, it would fire for sure.

“I understand now why you’re not a Point,” I say. “You don’t want to kill anyone. Even if you think they deserve it.” I pull the gun and her finger squeezes the trigger. But not far enough. She gasps and yanks her hands away from the weapon.

“Are you nuts?” she says.

I holster the weapon. “Aren’t all Points?”

“No,” she says. “Not at all!”

“Then it must just be me.” I turn my back to her again and climb atop a large, angled stone, like a sacrificial table that’s lost its supports on one side. The moment I reach my full height, I drop down onto my hands like I’m about to start doing jump-burpee pushups.

As I crawl back up to the edge of the angled stone, Mandi lies down beside me. “What is it?”

I don’t answer. I just slide myself upward and peek over the top of the stone. The jungle ahead of us has a long, straight line carved through it. Rows of trees have been knocked over, all lying down facing away from us. The cleared path leads downhill several hundred feet, angling away from the river. At the far end is a long gray cylinder that looks even more like a school bus when it’s on the ground.

“We found it,” Mandi whispers, sounding amazed. “You really weren’t leaving.”

“You really thought I was?”

She has no reply, which is confirmation enough.

“Look at me,” I say, and I wait until she does. “That is
not
who I am. I don’t leave people I care about. Not ever. Got it?”

“Okay,” she says.

I watch her eyes for a moment, until I’m satisfied she believes me, and I believe her. Then I get up and head for the wide path carved through the jungle by a crashing transport labeled with the number 37.

I’m coming, Sig.

We run through the ravaged trail, leaping over fallen trees, climbing over exposed boulders and ducking under suspended piles of debris. I’m surprised when Mandi keeps up with me, but then I remember she’s been running the obstacle course at the Unity carrier far longer than I have. And with that thought comes the realization that all that testing and training might have had real world applications. But how could they know we’d find ourselves in a situation like this? Three weeks ago, I couldn’t have imagined it.

Fifty feet from the transport, I slow down. “Mandi.”

The girl continues past me.

“Mandi!” My shout comes out more as a loud hiss, urgent, but not loud enough to be heard very far past the walls of vegetation surrounding us.

She looks back at me, an argument in her eyes, but then she sees the gun in my hands, and stops. The weapon is currently aimed at the ground. It’s not meant as a threat to Mandi. But it’s an obvious reminder that we might not be alone here. If there are other people still on this island, this crash site and the campfire this morning, might have attracted the attention of less savory people. We need to be careful.

Mandi waits for me to catch up, and I do something I wouldn’t have considered earlier this morning. I unsheathe my knife and hand it to her. It looks big and awkward in her small hands, but she accepts the weapon and holds it out in front of her.

“Just keep the blade pointed away from you,” I tell her. “In case you trip.”

An eye roll confirms that she’s heard me.

The breeze sweeping in from the river behind us shifts, reversing direction for just a moment, but it’s enough.

Mandi and I both stop, wincing at the foul, meaty odor.

“What is that?” she asks.

I’ve never smelled dead people before, but I’m pretty sure that’s what is assaulting my nose. Whoever is inside the transport is not only very dead, but they’ve been baking inside a metal oven warmed by a tropical sun for two days.

“Wait here,” I say, and I step forward. We need to do this quickly. I’m focusing equal parts of my attention on the surrounding jungle, on the festering transport and on not barfing from the smell of it. We’re vulnerable and distracted.

The transport is right side up, its rear hatch lying open.
Someone got out
, I think. I hope. It could have just as easily been knocked open during the crash. I glance back through the debris field, most of which is ruined jungle, but there are parts of the transport’s hull lying about as well. While Transport 36 crashed into shallow water and sand, Transport 37 tumbled through the jungle. Instead of surviving one jarring impact, trapped inside solid foam, the passengers of 37 would have been thrashed about, trapped in an out-of-control centrifuge.

I step around the open hatch, watching the jungle, but not because I’m afraid of attack. I’m afraid to look. I’m going to see dead bodies, that’s a given. But unlike the skeletons in the field, these are going to be fresh. Recognizable. And maybe—probably—one of them will be my best friend.

Buzzing flies from inside the open transport confirm the smell’s origin. The island is already working hard to reduce the dead to bones. The sound sends a quiver through my body. My teeth vibrate. My stomach lurches. I can
taste
the dead now.

Get it over with,
I tell myself.
Just look and get the hell out.

I hold my breath and turn.

The inside of the long transport is in shadow, but sunlight reflecting off the treeline behind me illuminates the interior with a light green tinge.

I can see everything.

Every detail.

And it’s far worse than I imagined.

There are four dead bodies, bloated and still seated, two on either side of the transport. Gaps between them suggest that some people are missing. It could also be that these people were spread out. They could all still be here.

My confusion comes from the dark red mash covering the walls, floor and ceiling of the transport’s front half. If not for the bits of things that are recognizably human—bones, clothing, a face—I’m not sure I would have realized they were bodies. The rapid expanding foam system must have failed in the front, revealing what happens to the human body without it. This wasn’t a centrifuge, it was a blender.

I stagger back, hand over my mouth, scanning the four visible faces one last time. Sig isn’t one of them, but that doesn’t mean she isn’t in there. The amount of...material…suggests that the human slurry holds more than one body.

“Allo, love.”

The loud voice freezes me in place. It’s a man. British accent. Something about the tone tells me he is not a kind person.

“Turn ‘round. Nice an’ slow. Twitch, and she’s dead.”

She?

Mandi!

I turn slowly, shifting my gun around my leg and behind my back. My heart pounds, its thud muted by the buzzing of gorging flies. Mandi quivers in the man’s grasp, his dirty hand wrapped around her mouth, crushing her cheeks. The knife I gave her lies on the ground by her feet. For a blink, my mind descends into blind rage, but the man sees it and says, “Ah, ah, ah. Wouldn’t want to put a hole in sweetie’s chest.”

That’s when I see his gun, the barrel pressed against the side of Mandi’s ribcage. The weapon looks a lot like mine, but all handguns that aren’t revolvers look the same to me. He hasn’t told me to drop my weapon. He hasn’t seen it. But it’s essentially useless anyway. I’d either miss entirely or shoot Mandi myself.

The man gives me a once over, grinning while biting his lower lip. His head is shaved on the sides and a dirty mop on top. The hair might be blond, but it’s hard to tell, because it’s also full of mud. His shirtless body is also caked in dirt, but I can see tattoos beneath the grime. Tattered red pants that have been torn short are his only real clothing. Even his feet are bare. The man looks savage. Primal.

He gives two quick whistles and calls, “Biscuit!”

A dog emerges from the jungle, though to describe it as a dog doesn’t really do it justice. The Irish wolfhound is like a horse with canine teeth. On all fours, it’s taller than Mandi. On its hind legs, it would be much taller than me. Its shaggy gray fur looks like the man’s hair, and I realize that if it laid down, it would blend in perfectly with the forest floor.

Biscuit doesn’t do anything outwardly aggressive. No snarling, growling or lowered ears. But it also doesn’t take its pale gray eyes off of me. Not for a second. It is locked on target.

“You’re a fit bird for a Point,” he says. I’m not sure what that means, but the way he’s looking at me when he says it makes me uncomfortable. “Fancy the hair. Not quite regulation, so you must be fresh meat, eh?”

He squints at me, waggling the gun in my direction for a moment. “Why’d they send kids like you to a place like this, I wonder.” He shrugs. “S’pose all that matters is that you’re here. Thanks to Unity for the early Christmas gifts, right?”

A network of tattoos on the man’s arm, the colors dulled by grime, leads to a triangle that started as a symbol for hope, but has become a harbinger of death, violence and betrayal. At some point in the past, this man, who I suspect is no older than twenty, was part of Unity. The orange sides of the Unity brand identify him as a Support.

His head twitches. “Say, what
is
the date, love?”

“December twenty-fifth.” I lie, but the man is clearly insane, and the date might distract him. To what end, I have no idea. Anything to keep him talking, maybe let his guard down.

The man freezes in place, his bit lower lip smiling like a Halloween mask. Then he bursts out laughing. The dog doesn’t even flinch.

Mandi is crying now, her tears rolling over the man’s hand, leaving clean streaks.

“We’ll be okay,” I tell her, and the man’s laughing stops.

“Okay?” He swishes his mouth around like he’s sucking on a lollipop. “Nothing is okay anymore. Did you
see
the sky last night? They’ve come early. Like Christmas! Oh, Christmas tree. Oh, Christmas tree.”

The gun against Mandi’s ribs points downward while the man sings.

“How lovely are your—” The man’s eyes snap toward me before I can lift my gun up and around my back. But he sees the violent intention in my eyes.

“No,” he says. “No, no, no. You’re no good. Spoiled meat.” He sniffs the air. “I can smell you from here. You and your spoiled friends. Not like the others though. They’re still fresh. Tasty.” His voice shifts, sounding almost childlike. “But those are for Quinlan. He gets them first.” He squeezes Mandi’s cheeks harder, making her cry out. “Always first!”

He cranes his head from side to side, looking me over again, this time in disgust. “You’re trouble, love. I can see it in your eyes. A real Point. No breaking you, is there? You’re already broken.”

He giggles.

“Don’t look so surprised. You’re all the same. Bad meat. Tough and bad.”

“Please,” I say, and I’m ashamed of the quiver in my voice. “We’ll come with you. We’ll be
your
friends. Not Quinlan’s.”

I’m desperate. Trying to stall what’s coming. The man’s intellect is questionable. Probably malleable. Broken by whoever Quinlan is. Turned into this strange creature of a man.

He bites his lip again, laughing a hiss through his teeth. “
My
friends.” The leer in his eyes returns. “
My
meat. Ohh, that sounds...” He looks behind him. “The others will know. Bugger. They...” Back to me. “
You...
You see? Cor, blimey, you nearly had me, you did. But I ain’t daft, despite appearances to the contrary. And Quinlan, he’s
my
Point.”

The gun returns to Mandi’s ribs. He looks at her with hungry eyes, then to me, and then to the dog, Biscuit. The beast is stoic and silent, waiting. “Points are bad meat. Spoiled, like I said. But Biscuit isn’t choosy, are you, mate? And it’s a small island. Grub can be tough to come by.”

The man whistles three times and shouts, “Din, din.”

The dog is suddenly alert. It’s ears perk up. Mouth open. Tongue unfurled. Drool dangling.

“Go get ’er!” the man says, and the dog barks so loud and deep that I can feel it in my chest.

What happens next is all instinct. There isn’t time for thought. I just act.

I spin with the gun, lifting it.

The man sees it and shouts, “No!”

But it’s too late to stop the wolfhound’s assault, and my defense.

The dog lunges.

My finger squeezes the trigger.

A loud bang is punctuated by a yelp that seems impossibly high-pitched for an animal this big.

The dog lands in a heap at my feet, its head a bloody mess.

“Biscuit!” the man shrieks, and a second gunshot punches my ears.

And it’s my turn to scream. “Mandi!”

A puff of pink bursts from Mandi’s chest. The bullet snuck between her ribs, slipped through her body and emerged from the other side. And then she falls, discarded, like meat, by the man now turning his gun toward me.