Plague

“Sent her? Who sends Brianna out to get into a fight? She goes on her own. Anyway, it’s not like you’ve left us with anyone else.”

Albert had the decency not to say anything to that.

“You know, you guys put me in charge. I didn’t ask to be in charge. I didn’t want to be in charge. Sam was in charge and all you guys ever did was give him grief,” Edilio said. “You two, especially.” He pointed at Albert and Astrid. “So, okay, Astrid takes over. And then Astrid finds out it’s not so much fun being in charge. So it’s like, okay, let’s get the dumb wetback to do the job.”

“No one ever—,” Astrid protested.

“And me, like a fool, I’m thinking, okay, that must mean people trust me. They asked me to be in charge, be the mayor. Come to find out, I’m not making decisions; Albert’s making decisions. Albert’s deciding we need to find more water and sending our two best fighters off into the countryside. Now I’m supposed to fix everything? It’s like you go, ‘Fight a war,’ but you sent my army off on a wild goose chase.”

“The water situation’s worse than you realize,” Albert said.

“Listen to yourself, man!” Edilio exploded. “Why don’t I know what the water situation is? Because you run all that and you don’t tell me. You don’t tell me what’s going on and then you send Sam off on a nice walk. You know, Albert, you want so bad to be the big man, the Donald Trump of Perdido Beach, why don’t you go deal with Drake? Why are you coming to me?”

He was starting to fantasize about using his gun on Albert when Taylor suddenly appeared in the room. Everyone jumped about six inches.

“Jeez, would you stop that?” Howard yelled. “Give me a heart attack.”

“Hunter’s dead,” Taylor said without preamble. “It was these . . . these things. They came crawling up out of him and were eating him, oh God, I mean, it was like . . . I mean he was crying and Dekka prayed with him and he tried to fry his own brain just like he did with Harry only I guess it didn’t work, I guess he couldn’t do it, so Sam . . .” She swallowed. “Anyone have some water?”

“What about Sam?” Astrid demanded.

“He did it for him. Sam. I mean, he . . . Hunter was, you know . . . so Sam.” She pantomimed raising her hands, like Sam, like he would do when using his power.

Astrid closed her eyes and crossed herself.

“Rest in peace,” Edilio said and crossed himself as well.

“Sam burned the boy?” Howard asked. Then, bitterly sarcastic said, “Yeah, you all pray to Jesus. Because Jesus is really providing a lot of help here. Sounds to me like Sam was the one doing what had to be done.”

“Look, I need a glass of water or something,” Taylor pleaded. She sat down on the floor, leaned back against the wall, and started crying.

Edilio pulled open a drawer in the big desk. He had a water bottle, but just an inch was left in it. Reluctantly he handed it to Astrid, who passed it to Taylor.

Taylor drained the water. “That’s not all. Sam sent me to give you a message, Edilio. He said, ‘Tell Edilio I couldn’t kill the bugs.’”

“The things that came out of Hunter?” Howard asked.

Taylor closed her eyes. Tears squeezed out and rolled down her cheeks. “Yes. The things that came out of Hunter. Sam shot them, you know, with his light. But they’re like, reflective or whatever. Anyway, it didn’t kill them.”

“Sam can burn through a brick wall,” Howard said. “What kind of thing is it he can’t kill?” Then he answered his own question. “Something very nasty.”

“Taylor, bounce back and tell Sam to come back to town,” Albert said.

“I’m not going back there!” Taylor cried.

“Whoa,” Edilio said, holding up both hands. “Hey, you don’t decide this, Albert. You don’t give orders. I’m the mayor, and there are four council members here. You, me, Ellen, and Howard.”

Albert looked like he might argue, but Astrid stepped in. “Taylor, what did Sam say he was going to do next?”

“He said something about going to take out the cave where the greenies live. Where Hunter told them they are. That’s why I’m not going back. You didn’t see those things crawling out of Hunter, eating him alive.”

Suddenly Albert jerked. Like someone had stuck a pin in him. “I forgot. I was busy . . . I was . . .” His eyes were fearful. “Roscoe. Roscoe was bitten by one of those things in Hunter. He told me, I didn’t think that . . .” He looked at Astrid. “When Hunter was delivering his kills. Roscoe said something under Hunter’s shirt bit him. I just forgot.”

From outside there came the sound of a bellowing, anguished roar. Then the sound of smashing glass.

“Orc,” Howard said.

“See if you can find him, talk to him,” Edilio said. But Howard was already on his way out the door.

No one spoke for a few minutes. They heard another smash, more like metal this time.

Edilio used the silence to think. Orc drunk and on a rampage. Well, it wasn’t the first time, but it was bad. Orc had become an asset lately. If he was back to being a danger again then that was very bad news. More likely it was just temporary and Howard would get him under control.

The Roscoe thing was bad. Very bad. Edilio knew what he should do. And he didn’t like it.

As for Drake, well, that was the real problem, that and the water.