The Alpha Plague (Book 7) Read online

  Before Flynn could answer, he jumped to hear Brian speak behind him. “Serj is dead. He fell while collecting lead for the community.”

  “For you,” Flynn said.

  Again, Brian didn’t argue with him. A shared look between Brian and Dan, and Dan didn’t question it either.

  “We’re here for you, Flynn,” Brian said as he reached over and touched Flynn’s forearm.

  Flynn stopped dead and glared at the bearded man. He reached down to the baton on his hip and lifted his lip in a snarl.

  Brian removed his hand and lowered his eyes.

  “Look,” Sharon said, “I know you’re upset about Serj, but that doesn’t mean you should come back here and take it out on us.”

  A hard grip on his baton still and Flynn pulled in a deep breath. He could feel the attention of the teenagers on him. They didn’t need to see this. Were it just him and the three guards, he’d cave in every one of their deceitful heads, but he couldn’t do it here. Not now.

  “Flynn!” Sharon said again as he walked away from her. “I demand you talk to me.”

  “I don’t give a fuck what you demand, Sharon.”

  Sharon gasped, and although Flynn didn’t look at them, he heard Brian say, “Leave it.”

  Flynn stopped again and turned around to face the three guards. “Just so you know, you don’t get to demand anything of me ever again, okay? Serj has gone, so as far as I’m concerned, this place needs a new leader.” He looked each of the three up and down. “Because from where I’m standing, we don’t have a suitable replacement.”

  None of the guards challenged him, and when Flynn walked off again, they all remained where they were.

  Chapter Nine

  Flynn entered Home’s foyer on his own and walked down the steps into the canteen. The blue linoleum floor had rips and scuffs all over it. Dents and holes from years of wear and tear, it needed replacing, but no one cared now with the outside a much safer place than it used to be.

  The once white walls showed huge patches of exposed plaster beneath, and what paint remained had either blistered or looked ready to flake off.

  The tables in the vast space were grubby and all shoved into one corner, and the wall of monitors sat as blank, dusty screens. One of them had fallen to the ground when the bracket had given out, and had a spider’s web of cracks across the front of it.

  The corridor towards Flynn’s room had once smelled of bleach, but it now reeked of damp and dust. Daylight shone through the grates up above and a slight breeze ran down from them. With no power, they couldn’t ventilate the place in any other way. It meant water ran into Home when it rained, and it froze in the winter, but at least they could breathe.

  What little strength Flynn had left drained from him when he reached his bedroom door. He grabbed the cold handle and his vision blurred. He’d held onto his grief until now.

  When he entered his room, a candle had already been lit and he found Angelica waiting for him. Even through his teary view, Flynn saw her beauty. He fell forward and threw his arms around her. “Thank god you’re here,” he said, sobbing hard. “I needed to see you. Thank you.” He pulled back and held her face with both of his hands, his lip buckling out of shape as he repeated, “Thank you.”

  Chapter Ten

  Flynn woke up to find Angelica still asleep next to him. The single bed always made for a tight squeeze, but because they still stayed in separate rooms most of the time, it didn’t matter to have a less comfortable night’s sleep once in a while.

  Flynn rolled over onto his back, leaned out of bed, and lit a candle close to them. No windows and no electricity meant the rooms were always dark when the doors were closed.

  Exhausted from the previous day, Flynn remained on his back and stared up at the ceiling. Like the walls in the place, white flecks of paint had come off it and huge patches had fallen away to reveal the plaster beneath.

  The bedding he used was the same duvet and sheet he’d had when he’d moved in with Vicky over a decade ago. Although he hand washed them, years of wear had left them covered in stains and threadbare. He could also feel the springs pushing up through his mattress. At some point he’d have to do like the others had and replace it with sacks stuffed with old rags.

  A deep sigh to his right and Flynn turned to look at Angelica. She had green eyes, so vibrant they made him think of the pictures he’d seen in books of lush rainforests. “I love it when we wake up together,” he said.

  Angelica smiled but didn’t respond.

  “Thanks for staying last night, I needed the company.”

  Again, she smiled—clearly too soon for words at that moment.

  Yesterday had been too raw for Flynn to talk about what happened with Serj, other than to tell Angelica he’d died. He couldn’t tell her he’d killed him, or what he’d found out about Vicky. What Brian, Sharon, and Dan had done to her. Should he tell her at all? After all, they needed to live in Home still. To cause trouble could seriously backfire on both of them. She needed to know Serj had died, but maybe nothing else. Just as he drew a breath to speak, someone knocked on the door.

  “Hello?” Flynn called out.

  The door muffled the voice of what sounded like one of the younger children. “There’s going to be a service outside in five minutes for Serj.”

  The kid didn’t wait for a response, and Flynn listened to his footsteps run away up the corridor before he turned to Angelica. “A service? What the fuck?”

  Flynn sat up in bed and grabbed his clothes from the day before. When he looked at Serj’s blood on them, he threw them down and picked up some different trousers and a top, muttering to himself while he did it. “A fucking service! Who the fuck do they think they are?”

  Although Angelica sat up in bed and watched him, Flynn couldn’t look back at her. Too angry to talk, he stormed out of his room.

  The grates shone bright spotlights down into the corridor as Flynn walked along it. Dust motes danced in the strong beams from where the kid had run away only moments earlier. Every time he passed beneath one, the summer heat warmed him for a second. Clearly late morning at least, he and Angelica had obviously overslept.

  As Flynn marched through the dusty and dirty canteen, he couldn’t see another soul. Filthy tables, broken screens, and the echoes of what had once been the hub of their community.

  The second Flynn stepped out of Home’s foyer, the sun blinded him and he had to blink against its glare. Not that his restricted vision prevented him from seeing the large crowd gathered there. It looked like all of Home had turned up.

  As Flynn’s sight recovered, he looked at the people and saw them all stare back at him. Some of his anger left him. He couldn’t kick off now. Not in front of everyone.

  Flynn laid eyes on Brian at the front of the group. Sharon stood on one side of him and Dan on the other. Brian nodded. “We wanted to make sure you were present for this,” he said.

  While grinding his jaw, Flynn stared at the three of them. They stood in front of the graves of their children and all the other people who’d died over the years.

  “Okay,” Brian said with a clap of his hands. “I think that’s everyone. As you all know by now, we lost Serj yesterday to a tragic accident in the town.”

  Angelica emerged from Home’s foyer and walked up next to Flynn. When she put a hand on the base of his back, he tensed at the contact.

  “For as long as most of us can remember, Serj has been here. One of the first few people to get let into the place, he’s always been a valuable member of our community.”

  The empty bullshit made Flynn want to vomit and he continued to stare at the bearded man. When he got a chance, he’d cut his fucking throat.

  “Serj was a rock in this community. I considered him one of my greatest friends.”

  It took all Flynn had to refrain from screaming in Brian’s face at that moment. What the fuck? They fucking hated each other.

  “When I asked people what they wanted to say about Serj,”
Brian said, “I got an overwhelming amount of responses, all with a similar tone.” He used his fingers to count the points out. “He was kind, generous, always ready to listen and help. He had a lovely way about him. He was calm and a great mediator. He saw when people needed him and he offered himself freely and without condition.”

  The lump had never left Flynn’s throat, but it swelled to see all the people in the crowd nodding their agreement. Packed together, they all seemed united in their grief for Serj.

  He’d done it by consensus, but Brian had just described Serj perfectly. Another look at the crowd and Flynn saw all the people Serj had touched. The teenagers—who even in such a small society had distanced themselves from it as they managed their rampaging hormones—the cooks, the farm workers, the tailors. Every person there seemed to feel the loss of the great man.

  As much as Flynn wanted to challenge Brian, he couldn’t. As much as he wanted to go up to Sharon and Dan and bury a knife in their skulls, it would serve no purpose. Not now anyway.

  Then Flynn looked at Janice, one of the farm workers. She hugged her little boy, Adam. The eight-year-old child cried into her stomach, and he saw what this community meant to them. It meant safety.

  The teenagers—every one of them sobbing—wouldn’t last outside Home for five minutes with the rats and nomads about. If Flynn destabilised the community by taking down the three leaders, Home could fall, and the innocent citizens would pay the price.

  “Sharon, Dan, Flynn, and I will continue to run this place and will honour Serj’s memory in every decision we make.”

  The thought of working with those three monsters curled as a tight lump in Flynn’s gut, but the people all nodded in response to Brian’s plans.

  Home might not work for Flynn at that moment, but it worked for everyone else. He needed to respect that like Serj would have. Serj always thought of the greater good.

  Flynn swallowed back the lump in his throat and looked at Angelica next to him. He might not have Serj and Vicky with him anymore, and the leaders of Home were complete arseholes, but at least he had her. Maybe he could make it work here. Maybe he could get his head down and accept the rule of the three vicious bastards up at the front of the group. Maybe some sacrifices were worth it.

  Chapter Eleven

  Pains ran across Flynn’s back and he twisted his body to try to ease them. He’d been sat on his crappy bed for hours, staring at the floor with his head in his hands. He’d only gotten up when he needed to light another candle.

  The naked flame flickered and threw shadows around the room. He watched the movement for the longest time through unfocused eyes. What else could he do? He had to lock himself away from everyone else. Like Vicky had told him on more than one occasion, if he didn’t have anything nice to say …

  The community worked. Hard for Flynn to accept with the crooks running the show, but it worked. It benefitted the majority and he couldn’t be so selfish as to try to take that down because it didn’t benefit him.

  Besides, he had a good woman in Angelica. Someone he could make a life with. Also, Dan and Sharon had every right to be upset about their children, and Brian simply picked a side.

  Flynn would have been pissed if he’d found out one of those fuckers played a part in releasing the virus on the world. They didn’t love Vicky like he did, so why wouldn’t they kick her out?

  Even if Angelica didn’t want to leave with him, they could start a family in Home. The walls made it safe and they farmed enough food to sustain them indefinitely.

  Fuck knew how long had passed. Flynn sat up straight, rolled the aches from his shoulders again, and flipped his head from side to side, pushing his left ear to his left shoulder and then doing the same with the right. A twinge ran up each side of his back with the movement.

  Finally finding the impetus to move, Flynn got to his feet. It had been hours since the funeral. He needed to go see Angelica.

  ***

  When Flynn stepped out into the hallway, he got a better idea of the time of day from the natural spotlights shining down into the space. Not dark outside, but the fading light left a grey haze in the corridors. He’d spent most of the day inside. Many of Home’s residents would be in their rooms by now, including Angelica.

  As he walked along the dusty corridor to see his love, Flynn pulled his shoulders back and straightened his posture. He’d tell her everything, and if he cried, then so be it. She needed to know he’d killed Serj, and to understand why he found it hard to be around Brian, Dan, and Sharon. But he didn’t blame them. Well, he wouldn’t blame them with time, he just found it upsetting to be in their presence at the moment.

  Would Angelica think him a coward if he told her he’d left his best friend’s body to be feasted on by the rats? How would she be able to understand that decision without being there? He couldn’t have carried him back, and to leave him for any length of time was to give him over to them anyway. A shiver snapped through him to think of the hungry, little faces and the way they’d peered down through the hole at him.

  At least if Flynn explained himself, it would help her understand why he’d needed the day on his own. Why he’d walked off without an explanation.

  When he arrived at Angelica’s room, Flynn looked up and down the deserted corridor. In the short time it had taken him to get there, the natural spotlights had darkened a little more.

  A look at her door and Flynn saw where the paint had blistered away a long time ago. Like many of the doors and walls in home, the white glossy coat had come off to expose the wood beneath. Angelica had purposefully picked it away in the shape of a heart.

  Flynn smiled at it. At least he had her in his life still. He knocked, the loud rap running both ways up the corridor.

  The soft voice of his love whispered from the other side, “Come in.”

  One final breath to settle the nervous butterflies and Flynn entered the room. It didn’t matter if he cried in front of her. She’d seen it already, and he should be upset with everything that had happened.

  To see her standing in the middle of her room—her candles casting an orange glow over her beauty—lit Flynn up. The sadness of the day had slightly duller edges already, and he smiled at her radiance. “Angelica—”

  “Wait,” she replied, cutting him off.

  Flynn frowned at the turmoil he saw play out on her face. “Wait?”

  “Before you say anything,” she said, “I need to tell you something.”

  A chill ran from the top of Flynn’s head down as if ice had just been dumped on him. He’d felt the same chill when he’d read the letter from Vicky. The same chill when he’d watched his dad get dragged into the river. The same chill when he’d had to kill Serj. When he’d listened to the rats rush down to eat his friend. The chill that told him his life would change at that moment. He shook his head at her and the grief of the past few days rushed forward, wobbling his words. “Don’t say it, please.”

  A deep sigh and Angelica looked down at her feet while wringing her hands. “It’s not you.”

  “Fucking hell! After two years you’re going to use that bullshit line?”

  When she looked up again, she glared a resolve at Flynn that forced him back a couple of paces. It showed him her mind had been made up. Whatever they’d had, they didn’t have it anymore.

  “Okay,” she said and glared at him as she clearly let out her pain, “it is you. Mostly. I can see you have a lot of things inside you to work out. I can see how your parents dying, and then Vicky leaving, has fucked you up. And now, losing Serj on top of everything … that’s a lot to deal with. I can see how you have something wonderful inside you. Something great to give to the world, but you never give that to me. You never show me who you are. You never let yourself be vulnerable in front of me.”

  “What was last night, then?”

  “That was the first time, Flynn.” Her voice broke and her eyes glazed with tears. “You’re really hard to love.”

  Although Flynn wanted
to reply, he didn’t.

  “You’re too distant. You’re removed from everything around you. At first I thought you were cool—mysterious even—but after two years, you’ve barely let me past the surface. I need more from a relationship.”

  After he’d shot a puff of air through his pursed lips, Flynn said, “And to think I was coming here to open up to you.”

  “By spending the day locked in your room? Besides, this isn’t about today, or now. This is about two years of neglect. Now is far too little far too late. I can’t be in a relationship with you, Flynn. I need something more from the person I love.”

  Flynn opened his mouth to reply, but she cut him off. “I was waiting in your room when you got back from going out with Serj because I wanted to finish it with you then. But I couldn’t, not with the state you were in.”

  The entire room spun and Flynn moved over to lean against a wall as he looked at his love. His heart kicked like it would burst through his chest and his body temperature rose. The lump in his throat solidified as a tumour from a lifetime of devastated relationships. And then he saw it. Something in her eyes. Sadness, sure, but he saw something else. Guilt … betrayal. Nausea turned over in his stomach. “It’s Larry, isn’t it?”

  Instantly on the defensive, Angelica jabbed a finger at Flynn. “Don’t you dare blame Larry for this.”

  She looked like she wanted to say more, but he’d heard enough. Flynn shook his head. “Fuck you,” he said through clenched teeth. “Fuck you and Larry. I hope you’re fucking miserable for the rest of your pathetic fucking lives.”

  Maybe he wanted a response. It would have been something to see his words hurt her, but she didn’t give it to him. Instead, she stared at him, the glaze of tears gone.

  Flynn turned around and left her room. He slammed her door so hard it rang through the entire complex and kicked up a dust storm in the grimy corridor. Fuck her and Larry. Fuck everyone in Home. He didn’t need them anymore.