sound of the quads had all but faded out. All that remained was a faint buzz far away. There were no more yells or gunshots, either. The forest became quiet, but it did not at all feel like a natural calm.
“I don’t understand this,” said Nix.
“Don’t understand what? That guy back there or the whole freaking day?”
“People,” she said angrily. “The world ended, most of the people on the whole planet died… there’s no more reason for people to fight each other. There’s so much farmland we can use that no one will ever need to go hungry again. Even out here in the desert there are berries and figs and streams of pure drinking water. There’s no need to fight. But that’s all we’ve done. First Charlie and the Hammer, then White Bear and Preacher Jack, and now all this. I don’t understand it. When are we going to stop fighting? When are we going to actually want peace? When are we going to stop being so damn stupid?”
Benny shook his head. “I know, it’s crazy.”
“I mean,” Nix went on, “are we being naive about this? Are we just a couple of stupid kids who think that the world should make some kind of sense?”
“I know,” Benny said again. “I was kind of hoping we’d left that stuff behind with Gameland.”
“It can’t be everywhere,” she growled softly. “It can’t be.”
As she said it, Benny noticed that she looked up at the sky, which was just visible through the canopy of juniper branches.
“They said they saw the jet,” said Benny. “That’s something.”
She only grunted, and they walked in silence for several minutes.
Eventually Benny paused for a moment to use the sun and his wristwatch to orient himself. He squatted down and ran his fingers along the topsoil, which was darker than it had been when they’d first entered the forest.
“We should be pretty close to where Lilah went looking for Eve’s parents,” he said. “There’s some moisture in this dirt. Maybe we’re getting near to the creek Eve mentioned.”
Nix nodded, but she studied the woods. “I wonder where Lilah is. Did Chong find her? And where are they both right now?”
“I don’t know,” admitted Benny. “There was a lot of fighting going on back at the field.”
“I didn’t hear Lilah’s pistol anywhere,” said Nix. “In fact, the only gun I heard was that guy Carter’s shotgun. I don’t think the reapers have guns.”
Benny thought about that, and nodded. “I didn’t see any either. That’s something.”
“Reapers,” murmured Nix. “There’s no way that name is going to be anything but bad.”
“No kidding,” he said as they started down the trail again, angling more eastward to follow the richer soil mix. “That Saint John clown didn’t make a lot of sense. Who’s Thanatos?”
“One of the Greek gods of death,” Nix said automatically.
Benny studied her. “How do you—?”
“We studied it in school.”
“We did?”
“Of course. It’s from Greek mythology.”
“I don’t remember anything about Thanatos or Nyx.”
“Well,” Nix said with a sniff, “while you and Morgie were trading Zombie Cards under your desks, some of us were actually paying attention.”
“Okay, then explain to me why a bunch of freaks with knives are running around the woods talking about Greek gods. Did we have a Greek apocalypse, too?”
Nix grinned. “I think your new girlfriend is on Saint John’s team.”
“What?”
“Riot. She has the same tattoos on her head. So did all the reapers on the quads.”
“First, she’s not my girlfriend,” said Benny. “My girlfriend is a crazy redhead with freckles.”
That earned him a small smile from Nix.
“And second, Riot was with Carter. Besides, the woman I saw in the field was dressed like the reapers, and she had a full head of hair. So that doesn’t prove anything.”
“Maybe she wasn’t with the reapers. I don’t know, but the ones on the quads and Saint John had the same kind of skin art as Riot, so—”
“I don’t care. Riot was with Eve’s family.”
A wide gully yawned before them, and they stopped to examine it, but there were no signs of lurking zoms or reapers with gleaming knives. Even so, they moved silently and with great caution, weapons ready, minds alert.
“Well, we have one thing going for us,” Benny said as they left the gully behind them. “We should be safe from the reapers.”
“How do you figure that?” Nix demanded.
“Aren’t you supposed to be the mother of Thanksalot, the personification of death?”
“Thanatos,” she corrected.
“Right. Praise be to the darkness.”
“Ugh. Don’t say that, it’s freaky. Besides, Thanatos’s mother was Nyx. With a
“Right, I’m sure that’s going to make a world of difference,” said Benny sourly. “If we’re attacked, you can dazzle them with spelling and grammar.”
She started to say something back, but Benny caught her wrist and pulled her down behind a tree. Nix started to ask what was wrong, but then she heard it too. The sound of motors coming their way.
Benny drew his sword but kept the blade in the shadow cast by the tree. Nix had her pistol out, the barrel pointed at the lead figure in a line of three quads that bumped and rocked along the forest path. Two men and a woman drove the machines. Reapers, without a doubt.
Benny was acutely aware that Nix had only two bullets left.
Nix thumbed the hammer back, but Benny whispered, “Don’t. Not unless they see us.”
Seconds burned away as the quads tore along the path, the roar of the motors filling the air. Then, a hundred feet shy of where Benny and Nix crouched, the line of vehicles turned and headed due east. The motor sounds diminished quickly; soon the reapers were gone, and an uneasy silence draped itself over the forest once more.
Nix blew out her cheeks and leaned her forehead on her outstretched gun arm. She uncocked the pistol. Benny bent and kissed her on the shoulder.
“They’re gone,” he said as he slid the
Without raising her head, Nix said, “You know, Benny, there was a time — was it only a day ago? — when the sound of a motor would have been like Christmas to us. It would have proved that the world wasn’t dead, that there was something out here to find.”
“I know.” Benny sighed. “And I remember a time not that long ago when we were happy. When we used to laugh.”
Nix raised her head and looked at him for a long moment, her lips parted as if she was going to reply. The look in her eyes was so deeply sad that Benny had to look away to hide the tears that suddenly formed in his eyes.
They got to their feet and continued moving toward the creek. Neither spoke for a long time. Then they found the stream and followed the muddy banks to a small clearing, and there they found the blood-spattered remains of several tents. They stood side by side at the edge of the creek, neither of them willing to take another step up the bank.
“God…,” whispered Nix in a voice that was filled with horror.
Benny spotted something and made himself climb the slope to the camp. He bent and picked up a stuffed rabbit. It was smeared with blood. He held it out to Nix, but she just shook her head.
“There must have been an attack,” he said. “That’s why Eve ran. In the confusion she must have gotten separated from her family. From all this gear, it looks like there were a lot of people here. We only saw her parents and that girl, Riot.”
“Benny, look,” Nix said, pointing to the stream bed. Two bodies lay half-submerged right at the next bend.
