Death Weeps Part 28

"How does this whacko s.h.i.t happen?" Jonesy asked, incredulous.

Uh-huh, that.

Parker tried to reason with a situation that didn't make sense. He opened his mouth to say something and I backed away.

"I know what this means, guys. I know." My eyes searched theirs.

Clyde stepped forward. "We are kin."

Yeah. But there was something more. When I touched on it I recoiled, my opinion set about Parker.

There was no way, it couldn't be.

"Did you ever wonder why this zombie responded first? Out of the entire cemetery? Why Clyde and no other? When your gift was new... untried?" Parker asked, allowing me to fit the puzzle pieces together.

They floated in my mixed up brain, fried by the emotion of the day, the grief of losing Jade an open and seeping wound.

Raw.

"I'm related to you both," I whispered.

"What the f.u.c.k?" Jonesy roared.

Right.

"Okay... wait a second..." John began.

Parker held up his hand. "We don't have much time. We need to get you back to Clara's world."

I was reeling. Why?

He saw the standing question on my face. I couldn't stop thinking about the connection.

"Ask yourself this, Caleb: now that you've saved the sphere-world, how would they get to you, prevent you from interfering? How would they get rid of you without the blame falling on their hands?"

I thought about the marks appearing on Garcia and Jade.

My eyes snapped to Parker's. I whirled where I stood and reached out, grabbing a J in each hand and tore their sleeves up.

They bore star-shaped marks, identical on each, manifesting opposite, one with pale skin, the other, dark.

"Holy s.h.i.t, they're taking my friends out." My mind furiously turned around those that were important to me.

Gramps.

Mom and Dad.

"My parents!" I yelled, turning to the Camaro.

Clyde grabbed me and held me. "Do not. Listen to Jeffrey's plan. It will allow this to stop, put an end to their manipulation."

Nothing would stop it. I shut my eyes and screamed into the still air of the dump. The dead rippled in response to my raw emotion, a call impossible to ignore.

Then I felt a hand on my shoulder and cool water poured through me, soothing my distress.

The dead settled.

I opened my eyes, wrapped in the arms of my dead, I met Parker's eyes.

"You stopped them," I said, my voice shaking.

"Yes."

"Why are they doing this? Why are they hurting my friends, my family... Jade."

"If you're distracted enough, you'll die. You'll snap, lose control, do something so irreversible, they'll be forced to use deadly force to stop you. The Precog has foreseen what you'll be and the future does not include Graysheets, as you call them."

The rest of my friends showed up, filing down the dirt road of trash, the sides like heaped hills of decay. Long-forgotten.

Alex clenched his fists. "What the h.e.l.l is going on here?" He moved toward Parker, all contained strength in motion. And the two zombies stepped forward to meet his purposeful charge.

"No," Parker said.

"Alex," I croaked out, the enormity of the situation making speech almost impossible.

"Caleb... what's wrong?" Randi asked.

I looked at the couple, as opposite as two people could be. "Parker said we've got to go back to the dome-world."

Randi's face was pinched, distressed. "Why?"

I gave a narrow look at Parker. "It's that or you guys all go slowly crazy." Like dominoes falling, I thought, but didn't say.

"Huh?" Tiff said, gumless for once.

"We've been given some kind of... drug. Slow-release is my guess," John said, swiveling his face to look at Parker who nodded.

"An enhancer?" I asked, straightening as Clyde released me.

Parker nodded. "It is a clever application. This drug uses your hidden insecurities and underlying concerns and magnifies them. Toward the end of the drug's lifespan, it can cause suicidal actions in most."

Jade, my mind shrieked.

My parents.

My brain cleared, allowing visuals of their smiling faces, my heart squeezing inside of me, my stomach becoming a burning lump.

"Why would they try to make us all go nuts?" Sophie asked a little breathlessly.

Parker gave a tight smile. "Control."

"a.s.swipes," Tiff muttered and Archer smiled.

"That doesn't explain why we have to do the world-warp thing again," Mia said logically as Bry walked up to stand beside her.

She took his hand in hers and his eyes widened.

I saw it all from out-of-body, like I was floating and untethered to my reality.

I turned to Bobbi Gale, her body pressed against Clyde, those dark eyes of hers never leaving me, having never left me.

"They know about the kinship now, Caleb. It makes everything worse. When they found out through DNA testing, your relation to Parker... to Clyde, they flipped. Then the Precog identified your possible future...." Gale said, obviously having received the lowdown from Parker.

"What?" John asked, frowning.

Parker sighed and his zombies shifted, their smell wafting in the air. I saw Mia cover her nose. Parker and I were unfazed.

The dead didn't smell any longer. They just were.

"It is the parallel reality. You understand that precept?" Parker nailed Terran with steady eyes.

Terran gave a terse nod. "Of course."

Of course he would, he was John. John of the mondo brain.

"I began to suspect that Caleb and I were blood relations back that first time. When the government ent.i.ty I work for wished to acquire you. Study you." His eyes met mine, then he cast them down, when they rose I saw the shame that infused them, devoid of other emotion. "They've had me since those first trials. They paid my mother some hush money and that was that. I didn't get the placebo..."

"They took you before you were emanc.i.p.ated?" Archer asked.

Parker rolled his eyes. "You should all understand by now who we're dealing with? They are without scruples. If it advances their goals, nothing will be an obstacle."

"How are we related?" I asked, curious despite the circ.u.mstances.

"Family tree revelation later, Hart," Jonesy said when I was on the verge of answers.

I scowled and he pointed to the livid mark on his forearm, perfectly outlined in an eight-pointed star. "I'd like to be crazy on purpose, bro. Instead of, like... against my will if you feel me."

Jonesy logic.

His brows rose to his nappy hairline, the tight black cap of hair framing an expressive face. An expectant face.

"It'd getcha outta babysitting, Jones," Tiff said, smacking gum that had miraculously appeared in her mouth.

Jones frowned at her. "Micah stinks like c.r.a.p all the time but she's okay."

Tiff barked out a laugh.

Jonesy's scowl deepened. "I'm not going soft, Tiff."

"Uh-huh," she said, blowing a screaming pink bubble.

"Okay," Parker held up a hand to stop the bantering, wearing an expression of disbelief.

I could see where Parker would have some of that but my friends were pretty well inured to events that ranked on the Weird s.h.i.t 'o Meter at this point. On a scale from one to ten, this was like... maybe an eight.

But there was time, oh yes there was.

Randi, Ms. Inter-dimensional Travel Queen asked the right question, "Right... so, why do we have to go back to the dome-world?"

"Sphere," John corrected absently.

"Whatever, John!" Tiff said, snapping her gum.

"Because, the Zondorae brothers have the antidote to the enhancer. They alone can save your friends. Everyone."

"Wait a sec," I held up a finger. "Why didn't they just nail me with the drug. I'd go bats.h.i.t and everyone would be happy. I'd do myself in and they'd blame it on my," I thought about it for a moment, "inability to cope with my AFTD."

Jonesy barked out a laugh at my wording.

"You're unprecedented AFTD," Archer added, giving Jonesy a look to get serious.

Like that'd happen.

I nodded to him. Yes, it was that. Whether I liked that distinction or not, it was what it was.

"Because it would be investigated. This was always smoke and mirrors, Caleb. All your friends would go insane, slowly, in different ways depending on their individual weaknesses and insecurities. In this way, it could be blamed on their abilities, not you. It really was a flawless plan."

We looked at Bry, the only mundane.

He ripped his sleeves up to reveal unmarred skin.

"I'll be d.a.m.ned," Garcia said, arriving just then and getting a clear look at the smooth muscled forearms that Weller had shown us.

"Not a good position to be in, Dear Sir," Clyde said with gravity, his light hazel eyes holding the wisdom of ages in them, all of it leveled like a laser beam at Garcia.

Garcia's eyes flicked to his and he swallowed. "You're right."

Clyde nodded in acknowledgment, his studious eyes taking in Garcia's position, noting that he kept a wide berth around the pair.

Garcia's worse possible move would be to come within a meter of Bobbi Gale. Clyde would not take well to that.

At all.

Even now I could feel his intent swell, contained.

For the moment.

"This won't work, Parker," Bry said, his tone said, obviously. "We chucked all their nasty s.h.i.t in the bonfire in that world. The Guys with Gills made sure it got burnt."