Pandemic Page 127

The white blades …

The thing wasn’t holding them at all. The blades protruded from behind each wrist, jutted out from torn yellow flesh … and they weren’t blades, they were bones: jagged, pale, as long as its forearm, wicked scythes tapering to hard, sharp points.

Its jeans had shredded at the thighs to make room for rippling muscle, turning the denim into dangling strips of fabric. Its shoulders were broader than any man’s had a right to be, its neck easily thick enough to support the huge head. Long, thin patches of brown hair clung wetly to its scalp, a few more hung in front of its eyes.

It reached up a thick hand, bone-blade pointing to the ceiling, and its fingers pulled down the blue scarf.

… the face …

Cooper’s reality warped and cracked.

“Jeff?”

The monster smiled, showing teeth that had grown wider at the base, and also grown longer, like fangs with the points chipped off.

“COOOO-PERRRR.”

The Tall Man in the red jacket looked at the thing that used to be Jeff. “You know this guy?”

The monster nodded, a motion that made his ma.s.sive shoulders dip up and down as if the thick neck couldn’t quite bend all the way.

The Tall Man seemed pleasantly surprised.

“Well, that’s just f.u.c.king t.i.tties and beer,” he said. He smiled at Cooper. “You can join us. We’re supposed to lie low. Stanton said to find the uninfected and get rid of them, but we’re not supposed to burn or wreck anything.”

That name again. Could it be a coincidence?

“Stanton? Steve Stanton?”

The Tall Man nodded. “Yeah. I actually got to meet him. The others haven’t.”

He said got to meet him as if it was the highest honor anyone could ever hope for.

It all fell into place. It all clicked. Stanton’s machine had grabbed something from the bottom of Lake Michigan. The Detroit incident of five years earlier … the conspiracy theories that some alien s.h.i.+p had been shot down … Blackmon on TV, talking about the medicine … bringing the Platypus aboard the Mary Ellen, and everyone feeling ill shortly afterward … coming to Chicago … the city becoming a living h.e.l.l …

Jeff, getting sick, and now he was … that.

Cooper didn’t know what had happened, but he knew it had started when Steve Stanton walked into JBS Salvage.

So many people dead. A city in ruins. Stanton’s work had killed hundreds, thousands.

But not Sofia … YOU killed her, didn’t you?

Cooper shook away the thought. He had to think, had to get out of this alive. Knowing Jeff had earned respect from the Tall Man. Maybe knowing Steve would bring even more.

“I brought Steve Stanton to Chicago. Five days ago.” Cooper nodded at Jeff. “He was with us.”

The Tall Man took a step back. He looked at the others in an unspoken message of disbelief, then he looked at Jeff.

“You met Stanton?” The Tall Man said. “Why didn’t you say so?”

Jeff nodded again, almost bowed, a motion that made the muscles under his sickly yellow skin ripple and twitch.

“COOOO-PERRRR, MY FRIEND.”

Jeff smiled his shark-toothed smile. Cooper couldn’t bear to look at him anymore. He stared down at Sofia’s body.

You shot her you coward you murderer Jeff is a monster what the f.u.c.k what the f.u.c.k you killed her and that’s your fault but it would have never happened if not for Stanton … Sofia would still be alive … Jeff would still be Jeff.

Fear stabbed through him, made his breath rattle, filled his head with fuzz. He wanted to curl up, shut down, hide and pray these killers would just go away. But far more than that, he wanted to live.

Cooper slid the pistol barrel into the front of his pants. He left the handle out so they could all see it. He had watched them tear a human being apart. If they realized he was lying, he’d suffer the same fate — he didn’t want them to forget he had a gun.

A gun with just four bullets.

He forced himself to look at the freakish thing that had been his best friend. Cooper would save one bullet for Jeff; he wouldn’t let his friend suffer this horror.

The Tall Man brushed his hands together, as if he was dusting them off, done with the whole scenario. He knelt, patted down Sofia’s corpse. He reached into her pocket, pulled out Cooper’s cell phone.

“That’s mine,” Cooper said. “Give it to me.”

The Tall Man stood. He shook his head. “Only group leaders get cell phones, and I’m the group leader.”

He dropped the phone on the floor, then stomped down on it with his heel, smas.h.i.+ng it.

“There,” he said. He smiled at Cooper. “You’ll come with us.”

“Where?”

“To a hotel,” the Tall Man said. “It’s real close. This is pretty G.o.dd.a.m.n kick-a.s.s, if you ask me. It will be great to have someone who knows Mister Stanton as part of our group.”

Cooper didn’t know what to do — if he tried to go off on his own, would they know he was lying? Would they know he wasn’t a “friend”?

The Tall Man turned to Jeff. “Bring the woman.”

Jeff, or the thing that used to be Jeff, walked forward, shreds of his jeans swaying with each step. He reached out with his right hand, slid the jagged, pointed bone-blade into Sofia’s neck, drove it deep into her chest until his knuckles pressed against her shoulder. He lifted her as if she weighed nothing more than a bag of chips. Her arms and legs dangled limply. Her remaining blood slowly pattered down to the red-smeared floor.