Weller’s expression suggested he’d rather hug a cobra, but he recapped the thermos and followed. Mellie waited until they were behind a thicket of denuded scrub oak and a lonely jack pine. Then she crossed her arms over her chest. “Something on your mind, Tom?”
“You know what’s bothering me,” he said.
“Yes, I do. So let me be clear. This is not a rescue mission. We need to make sure those monsters do not survive.”
“At the cost of innocent lives?”
“Don’t tell me about innocent lives. You know Daniel and the rest of my kids never made it.”
“But that doesn’t mean they’re dead,” Tom said. “They might have gone their own way.”
“Unlikely.”
“Then has it occurred to you that they might be there, in the mine?”
“Of course it has, but we’ve seen no children. Even if we had, that changes nothing. This has to be done.”
“I don’t know what your problem is,” Weller put in. “You’re not a cherry fresh outta basic. Collateral damage is part of the game.”
“It’s not a game,” Tom said. “This is like storming a concentration camp.”
Weller snorted. “Jesus.”
“No, Weller,” Mellie said. “He’s got a point. But, Tom, those people are dead men walking. If we succeed, some might live. Many won’t, but we don’t have a lot of choices. You’re a soldier. Don’t tell me you never fired on enemy targets when there were civilians around.”
Not as a first choice, no. They were under orders, although his captain had changed his tune after an ambush killed his sergeant and wounded another. Tom hadn’t fired the javelin; that wasn’t his job. But he saw the house cave in and, later, the three small bundles of bloodied sheets. The father was dead, too, and so were four Taliban holed up inside. No one fired a shot from that house ever again.
Now he said, “It wasn’t my call to make then, but this will be. We go through with this, it’s on me.”
“This is a war,” Weller said, like that was supposed to be explanation enough. “Us against the Chuckies. Us against Rule. Taking out that mine is the first step.”
Hard choices. Collateral damage. Mellie and Weller were very fond of catchphrases. “What about the people who have no say? The ones trapped in that mine who can’t get out?”
Weller cursed, then tossed the dregs of his coffee onto the snow. “I’m not debating this anymore. You’re not in charge of this operation.”
“You’re not my CO either,” Tom said.
“Well, lucky me, ’cuz ain’t he dead? In fact, it’s a good bet your entire brigade’s gone, isn’t it?”
The words dropped like hammer blows. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“Because we’re what’s left. I was in ’Nam before your parents were in diddies. There is nothing about war I don’t know. You want to see Alex again? This is how we do it.”
“Weller.” Mellie planted a palm on the old man’s chest. “We need to work together here.”
“Don’t worry about me,” Tom said, roughly. Later, when he was alone, he’d probably put a fist through something, but right now there was Alex to think about. “I’ll do my job.”
“All right then.” Weller’s mouth worked as if he’d like to spit. “No harm, no foul.”
Liar. But he kept his mouth shut. He’d taken his best shot. There was absolutely nothing he could say to this old man that wouldn’t be a mistake right now.
“Oh, Tom,” Mellie said. She reached for him, but he sidestepped and left her grabbing air. Her sympathetic expression slipped then firmed, but didn’t quite leak into her eyes. “We’re all on the same side,” she said.
“Sure,” he said.
68
Cindi feathered the mag on her Big Eyes. “Hunh.”
“What?” Luke asked.
“I think . . .” Yup, she was sure of it. The sun wasn’t below the horizon yet and the light was behind her, so she could see pretty well. The image coalesced and resolved. “Remember that pack of Chuckies, the ones who wear those wolf skins? They’re back.”
“Yeah? How can you tell?”
“Come here.” She waited until he wormed over on his belly and peered through her tripod-mounted binocs. “It’s the flutter. You know, the wolf skin is loose, so it catches the wind? Dead giveaway. It’s still the same girl, but the guy she’s with is new.”
“Okay, I see it . . . whoa,” Luke said. “What’s going on with her face?”
“Dunno.” Either the girl had the world’s worst zit or she was sprouting another eye on her cheek. And who was this new guy? What had happened to the old one? Dead, maybe. Boy, that would be okay. The more Chuckies that bit the dust, the safer they all were. Besides, those wolf-people were a little freaky, kind of Mad Maxy with those wolf skins.
“There are a bunch of new guys with those wolf-people,” Luke said. “Check out the hardware.”
“Yeah, I saw them.” Some serious firepower there: a couple Uzis, for sure, or maybe MAC-10s—she wasn’t that much into guns. One kid wore this very funky bandolier slotted with what looked like huge bullets. Those brass heads must be the size of her fist. “Scoot over. I want to check on how many normals they got.”
“I think at least five,” Luke said, making room. “The way they kind of walk, you know? All shuffly?”
“Uh-huh.” She eased her eyepiece into focus, then said, “Oh boy.”
“What?”
“I think there are two kids. Like, you know, old enough to be Chuckies.”
She could hear Luke’s eyes go wide. “Really?”
“Yeah.” Up till now, she’d never seen any normal kids walking into that mine—and now here were two. They were still too far away for her to make out much detail, but she thought one was a girl. The other kid wasn’t walking right. Hurt? Maybe.
“What’s up?”
She jumped, then looked over her shoulder at Tom, who was staring down at both of them. God, he was quiet as a cat. “Nothing,” she said, hoping Luke would keep his trap shut. Mellie said Tom needed to focus: Don’t make him feel worse about this than he already does. Telling him about two normal kids suddenly being on the Chuckies’ dinner menu would not be cool. “I mean . . . you know.”
A frown crept over his face. “You okay, Cindi?”
“She’s okay,” Luke said. “We were just looking at the wolfpeople. They’re this tribe into wearing wolf skins. We think something happened to the lead guy, that’s all.”
“And there are more Chuckies than we thought,” she added. “Like they hooked up with some friends and all came here together, you know?”
“Oh.” Tom was quiet a second, then said, “Luke, we better get going. I want to be in position by the time the moon rises. See you soon, Cindi.”
“You bet, Tom.” Okay, if she was honest, she knew that the fluttery feeling she got whenever Tom was near was incredibly lame. Like, hello, she was twelve. But Tom was so hot, with those dark blue eyes and wavy hair that was this incredible shade of brown with a lot of red, like really expensive cinnamon. And muscles. Like, real guy muscles. And he was so brave. No way she’d make things worse for him. “Be careful, okay?” She cringed as soon as the words were out of her mouth. Of all the things I could’ve said, that’s, like, complete girl.
“You, too.” Tom’s expression remained serious. “Things go bad, you get out of here, okay? Don’t let Mellie talk you into sticking around.”
“Nothing’s going to go wrong,” she said. “Good luck.”
Something swept through his face, fleet and fast. “Yeah,” he said, but the tight smile looked more like a grimace. “Luck.”
Much later, Cindi saw something that changed her mind about those two new kids. The one she’d thought was a girl definitely was, and probably a junior or senior. Nice hair, too: long and red. She’d kill for hair like that. Anyway, the girl, Red, was helping this seriously good-looking blond guy. But what got Cindi’s attention was when Red suddenly pulled up at just about the same moment as the wolf-girl, the one with the messed-up face and blonde hair.
That was when Cindi knew for sure: Red wasn’t a prisoner. She was a Chucky.
Well, thank goodness she hadn’t said anything to Tom. The knot in Cindi’s gut unraveled. If Tom had found out, he might not have gone through with bombing the mine. But there was no doubt in Cindi’s mind now. Only Chuckies acted like dogs catching a scent. So Tom and Luke and Weller blowing Red and her friends into eensy-weensy pieces was fine.
Oh, Red, Cindi thought, and smiled. Sucks to be you.
69
The mine complex was like a ghost town or something out of a news report on Iraq or Afghanistan, cluttered with decayed and bombed-out-looking buildings that were mostly broken shells of native stone and red brick. In the distance, south and east, the rusting girders of a steel headframe reared. But it was when she caught her first glimpse of the entrance to the mine that Alex was certain. She’d seen this before in all those photographs on the display table in that lake house. Why the Changed would gather together in the first place was anyone’s guess, but if they kept to the familiar, then coming here made sense. This must’ve been a favorite hangout, not only for the kids from Rule but for those of surrounding villages and towns. Actually, the scene reminded her, crazily, of a huge high school courtyard mobbed with students just before that final morning bell.
End of the road. She trudged along, following the sashaying sway of Spider and Leopard in their wolf skins. She should’ve been frightened, but she was too tired. Her shoulders ached from Daniel’s weight, and she was drenched in a hard sweat. She’d practically carried him, semiconscious and feverish, these last ten miles. He’d only dragged along, his boots scraping over snow, like a malfunctioning robot. The closer they got, the more the heavy smog-stink of boiled roadkill clogged the air, churning into a general fug. She could feel her throat trying to close against the oily stench. She spat, working to clear her mouth, but the fetor was stubborn and had glued itself to her tongue.