Wayward

Page 69

He kept a lookout for the officers—they’d be dressed in black and wielding machetes—but he never saw them.
Ethan turned onto First, headed south out of town.
In the road beside the pastures, he stopped the Bronco.
Turned off the car, stepped outside.
The phones had stopped ringing, but the noise of an assembling crowd was growing.
It dawned on him that it was in this exact spot, four nights ago, that he’d discovered Alyssa Pilcher.
God, how quickly it had all come to this.
Wasn’t quite time for him to make his appearance, but soon it would be.
Are you still running, Kate?
Have they caught you?
Are they dragging you and your husband toward Main Street?
Are you afraid?
Or on some level, have you been long prepared for this?
Ready for this nightmare to finally end?
On the outskirts of Wayward Pines, it was cold and dark.
He felt strangely isolated.
Like standing outside a stadium and listening to the noise of a game.
In town, something exploded.
Glass bursting.
People cheering.
He waited fifteen minutes, sitting on the hood of the Bronco with the warmth of the engine coming through the metal.
Let them gather.
Let them go mad.
Nothing would be done without him.
No blood would be spilled.
When Pam opened her eyes, it was dark.
She was shivering.
Her head throbbing.
Left leg on fire, like something had ripped a chunk out of it.
She sat up.
Where the f**k was she?
It was freezing and dark and the last thing she remembered was leaving the hospital after her final therapy session of the day.
Wait.
No.
She’d spotted Ethan Burke’s Bronco heading south out of town. Followed him on foot…
It all came back.
They’d fought.
She’d lost apparently.
What the hell had he done to her?
When she stood, the pain in her leg made her cry out. She reached back. A large piece of her jeans had been cut away, and a nasty, open wound oozed down her left thigh.
He’d cut out her microchip.
That f**king motherfucker.
The rage hit like a shot of morphine. She felt no pain, even when she started running away from the fence, back toward town, faster and faster through the dark forest, the electrified hum dwindling into silence.
The sound of screams in the distance stopped her.
Abby screams.
Many, many abby screams.
But something wasn’t right.
How could there be screams coming from straight ahead?
Wayward Pines lay straight ahead.
In fact, she should’ve reached the road by—
Shit.
Shit.
Shit.
She didn’t know how long she’d been running, but she’d been running hard, running right through the pain. She’d come a mile at least from the fence.
Not far ahead, in addition to the screams of what sounded like a massive abby swarm, she heard movement coming her way—limbs breaking, sticks snapping.
And she could swear she even smelled them, an eye-watering, carrion stench growing stronger by the second.
In all of her years, she had never wanted to cause someone pain so badly.
Ethan Burke hadn’t just cut her microchip out.
He’d somehow stranded her on the other side of the fence, out in the mean, wild world.
Ethan climbed back into the Bronco, fired up the engine, floored the accelerator.
Tires squealed on the pavement as he launched forward.
He sped into the forest, took the big looping curve that brought him back on a trajectory toward town.
The speedometer read eighty as he blasted past the welcome sign.
He took his foot off the gas, let the RPMs die.
On Main Street now, and still a quarter mile from his destination, but already he could see flames in the distance, the buildings all aglow with firelight and the kinetic shadows of the crowd.
He passed the hospital.
Four blocks from the intersection of Eighth and Main, he was steering around people in the road.
Something had been thrown through the storefront glass of The Sweet Tooth and kids were looting the candy.
This was all acceptable and expected.
The crowd became denser.
An egg broke across the passenger-side window, yolk running down the glass.
He was barely moving now, people constantly in the way.
Everyone costumed.
He steered through a group of men dressed up in drag, lipstick garishly applied, wearing their wives’ bras and panties over long johns, one of them armed with a cast-iron skillet.
An entire family—including children—had ringed their eyes with dark eye shadow and painted their faces white to resemble the walking dead.
He saw devil’s horns.
Vampire teeth.
Fright wigs.
Angel wings.
Top hats.
Sharpened canes.
Monocles.
Capes.
Vikings.
Kings and queens.
Executioner masks.
Whores.
Now the street was wall-to-wall.
He laid on the horn.
The sea of people begrudgingly parted for him.
Inching along between Ninth and Eighth, he saw other storefronts vandalized, and up ahead—the source of the flames.
People had pushed a car into the middle of Main and set it on fire. Its windows now littered the pavement, shivers of glass glittering in the firelight, flames licking out of the windshield, the seats and the dashboard melting.
Above it all, the traffic signal cycled on obliviously.
Ethan shifted into park and killed the engine.
The energy on the other side of the windshield was dark and volatile—an evil, living thing. He studied all the ruddy faces in the firelight, eyes glassy with whatever bathtub gin had been stockpiled and passed around.
The strangest thing was that Pilcher had been right. Clearly, the fête spoke to them. Met some deep, consuming need.
He glanced into the back of the Bronco and checked his watch.
Soon.
Wool padding had been stitched into the inside of the headpiece, and it fit him snugly. He reached over and locked the passenger door, although he doubted that would make any difference in the end. Grabbing the stinking cloak and the bullhorn, he opened his door, locked it, and stepped out into the fray.
Broken glass crunched under his boots.
The smell of liquor spiced the air.
He donned the cloak.
Pushed his way into the crowd.
People around him began to clap and cheer.