She’d only taken a few steps when Sirois called her name.
“Red.”
“Mother of God,” she said, rolling her eyes and turning back. “What now?”
“You know how you said the Cough might have been made in a lab?”
“Yeah?”
“Well,” he said, and it looked like it was a real struggle for him to say whatever was trying to come out of his mouth. “I don’t know about the Cough. But the other thing—the, er, tapeworm—it did come out of a lab.”
She raised her eyebrow at him. “And?”
“And that’s all I can tell you,” Sirois said. “Besides the fact that you want to avoid them.”
“I’d already figured that out,” Red said. She started climbing again.
Halfway up she peeked back over her shoulder. Sirois had his back to the hill and was checking both ends of the alley that ran behind the buildings. A soldier came around the corner holding a rifle but he must have been the wrong kind of soldier because Sirois shot him.
She could just see over the roofs of the buildings and into the town now. A plume of black smoke rose from the front of the grocery store (what had they done? Blown up a truck with a grenade launcher?) and she saw what appeared to be hasty fortifications made of vehicles facing one another on the main road.
She resolutely turned her back, because she didn’t want to know. She didn’t want to get caught again. She didn’t want to get dragged into some meaningless fight between men who wanted to control the way this new world was going to spin.
As she crested the slope she couldn’t shake the nagging feeling that she’d forgotten something, something important. Then she remembered that she’d promised Mama she would stay with Adam.
They were supposed to stay together, Red and Adam. Now Adam was gone and it was just Red, Red all alone with a long way to go in a world full of wolves.
CHAPTER 14
Something Wicked
After
I don’t think you should go,” Sam said.
Red said, “I know.”
She’d thought long and hard on it but there was really no other option. Someone was going to have to find out where those men had their base and the size of their patrol circle. It was beyond foolish to bring the kids, so of course Red would have to go by herself and they would stay with D.J.
At least they’ll be safe and warm and fed if something happens to me.
Leaving Sam and Riley behind broke the No Separation rule, which bothered Red because separation within her party had thus far only resulted in loss. And approaching the base camp of a bunch of gun-toting men who kidnapped women and children smacked of stupidity on top of it.
She wasn’t anybody’s Chosen One. She wasn’t here to Save the World. And while she’d managed to defend herself from a few lone wolves she didn’t have the least idea how to manage a pack of them, barring the sudden discovery of superhero skills.
Well, you’re not going to manage them. You’re going to find out where they’re located, and where they travel to every day, and then you’re going to mark those places on the map and avoid them. There’s not going to be heroics of any kind.
“I really don’t like this,” D.J. said.
“Yes, I know, everybody thinks it’s a terrible idea,” Red said. “Including me. But this is what it comes down to—terrible idea number one, which is to scope out the camp and figure out how to avoid them, or terrible idea number two, which is to walk blindly into their net and get scooped up. I’ve already been scooped up once and I’m not letting it happen again.”
“What do you mean, scooped up?” D.J. said, a little indignant. “Do you mean by me?”