Most of the crowd echoed the cheer and howled. The exes opened their mouths in a silent shout.
“Eight more youngbloods,” he roared. “They done their duty, shown their loyalty to the SS. They’re in!”
A small line formed at the edge of the stage. Three Latinos, two Asians, two African-Americans, and a white girl. They were bare-chested except for the woman in her bra.
The first one walked onto the stage, very small next to Mighty Joe. The ex unwound one of his bandannas as a bodyguard grabbed the young man’s forearm. Beneath the green cloth, the huge palm was pitted and slashed. He made a fist, shook his hand a few times, and the wounds glistened wet.
The female bodyguard pulled out her machete, cleaned the edge between two fingers, and pulled it across the fledgling Seventeen’s hand. The man gritted his teeth as blood swelled up. The monstrous ex reached down and the bleeding limb vanished within his huge fingers. “One of us,” he rumbled. He took the hand away and slapped his palm down on each of the man’s shoulders.
The youngblood’s legs trembled under the impact and he nodded his head. They guided him past the giant to an old woman who washed out the wound and sponged the gore from his shoulders. Her peroxide foamed on his skin. The bodyguard was already slashing the next palm.
“Deliberate infection,” mused Stealth. She lowered the camera.
“Followed by immediate disinfection. If this is patient zero, maybe he’s got some purer strain of the ex-virus. Could be why some come back smart. He obviously is.”
“Perhaps. I do not believe it is an ex,” she said. The infrared monocular was pressed up to her eye again. “Its body temperature is seventy-one degrees. Twenty degrees higher than the average ex.”
“And almost thirty lower than the average human,” said St. George. “What the hell is he, then?”
“I am not sure.”
“Doesn’t look like he’s got universal appeal, either.” Half the mob shifted on their feet, not cheering with the hardcore Seventeens near the stage. The crowd members toward the back studied the ground or cast wary eyes at the ritual the huge ex was conducting.
“I would guess many of them did not realize they were sheltering with a street gang, let alone one led by a monster. They were looking for safety.”
The ex turned to the group that had crossed the stage. Each of them had tied their hand in a swatch of green even as he rewrapped his own. “You’re in forever now,” he bellowed. “All of you. Even if you die, even if you come back, you’re always a Seventeen.”
He slammed his hands together once, twice, three times. The crowd picked up the applause. The youngbloods caught dozens of backslaps, head rubs, and arm punches.
“Getting close to two years since I got this,” Mighty Joe continued. “Two years since I became the biggest boss in the city. Getting bigger and badder every day.” He flexed arms like beer kegs and the crowd whistled and shouted.
“Everybody went down except us. The Bloods, the Crips, the XV3s. The police caved, the Army caved, even the fucking Marines went down. And we’re still here and we’re deep!”
He punched the air again. The Seventeens in the crowd howled and raised their weapons. A few shot at the sky. The exes threw up their arms. A low chant worked its way through the crowd and faded just as quick.
St. George tilted his head. “What are they saying? Ammo?”
“I believe they were calling him master of Mary. I am not sure of the refer …” She paused and her body stiffened. “That is not patient zero.”
“How do you know?”
“A connection I should have seen earlier.” Her words were almost lost in Mighty Joe’s next bellow.
“We’re the best, the strongest, the fucking chosen of God,” the ex told the crowd. “It’s why we lived, they died, and now they’re with us.”
He threw an arm out to the caged exes. They returned the salute.
“We’re the rulers of the new world. This whole city is going to be our turf. There’s only one thing keeping the SS from being absolute kings of Southern California—that fucking fortress of freaks holding down Hollywood.”
St. George shifted.
“You all know I’ve got business with one of them. A lot of you do, too. I’m gonna carve my name in his chest, gouge out his fucking vampire eyes, and wear his skull as a necklace for my two-year anniversary.” He pounded his chest with a fist like a gallon milk jug. Hundreds of dead hands slapped their rib cages in solidarity.
Stealth’s eyes went from the stage to the exes and back.
“This is it. I want everybody gunned up and good to go. Tonight our army marches north. We’re throwing down and wiping out the last of the old world.”
“What army?” muttered St. George. “Most of these people are kids and grandparents.”
Mighty Joe threw up one last salute and stepped down from the stage. He drifted through the crowd, giving knuckle punches and backslaps as he went.
In the cage, the walking dead performed an odd dance. Their legs shifted like a massive, macabre chorus line. Their arms raised, swung, and shifted. Three hundred moved as one.
“The exes are not copying him,” Stealth said.
“What?”
“They are in perfect synchronization. All of them. They are not copying him, he is controlling them. He is exerting some level of control over every ex here. At least a two-block radius.”
St. George watched as Mighty Joe turned his head to speak to one of his bodyguards and the cageful of exes did the same. Three hundred heads shifted to the right.
“That is why they do not need strong cages.” She nodded at the dispersing crowd as she slid the camera back into her utility belt. “Amo de la marioneta.”
“What is that?”
“What they were saying. Puppet master. He is controlling all of them.”
“Damn straight I am,” bellowed the dead giant.
The clatter of rifles filled the air.
