Tearing Down the Wall (Survival Series #3) Read online

  Tearing Down the Wall

  Survival Series

  Book Three

  By Tracey Ward

  Tearing Down the Wall

  Survival Series

  Book Three

  By Tracey Ward

  Text Copyright © 2014 Tracey Ward

  Edited by Amy Jackson

  All Rights Reserved

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the author, except as used in book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Characters, names, places, events, or incidents are products of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to places or incidents is purely coincidental.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty One

  Chapter Twenty Two

  Chapter Twenty Three

  Chapter Twenty Four

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  About the Author

  To die would be an awfully big adventure.

  J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan

  Chapter One

  “What do we do?” I ask Trent, my voice barely above a whisper.

  In the flickering firelight his eyes watch me intently, but I know he’s somewhere else. His mind is outside the room, out on the streets, gauging the distance and weighing our options. We both listen to the crunch of feet on loose gravel, the scuff of shoes on asphalt. The drag of the blade over rough ground. When he finally sees me again, I know we’re in trouble.

  “We wait,” he tells me, his voice too loud.

  “Shhh!” I shush him violently, glancing nervously at the broken windows. So far they’re still pitch black. They may be coming, but they’re doing it in darkness.

  “It doesn’t matter, Joss. They know we’re here.”

  “So we’re just going to let them kill us? Eat us for dinner?” I demand. I sit up, going into a crouch and scanning the room for something, anything. “Screw that, Trent. If I’m going down, I’m going down fighting.”

  “If we don’t fight and we don’t run, we may be able to talk our way out of this.”

  My eyes snap to his, shocked. “Are you serious?”

  He nods slowly. The footsteps are coming closer. They’re almost here and my heart is ready to implode.

  “I’ve seen it happen. I’ve seen people taken prisoner by them before.”

  “Pft,” I scoff. “They were probably saved for a midnight snack. Kept warm with beating hearts and eaten later on.”

  “Maybe,” Trent agrees with a shrug, “but what do we lose by trying?”

  I chew on the inside of my lower lip as I debate this really stupid plan. But he’s right and I know he’s right; I’m just fighting it like crazy because I don’t want to be taken prisoner again. I also don’t want to die, and I really, really, really don’t want to be eaten.

  “Okay, but you’re not doing the talking,” I finally tell him. “You’ll get us killed immediately.”

  He raises a skeptical eyebrow, but just like I know he’s right, he knows I’m right. He doesn’t fight me.

  “Agreed. But you won’t do any better. You’re not exactly Miss Congeniality.”

  “No, I’m not,” I admit reluctantly. My eyes go immediately to Ryan. “But you know who is?”

  “You better wake him fast. They’re here.”

  I pounce on Ryan, shaking him violently until he grumbles and moans, his hands flailing weakly to make me stop. But I’m relentless because I’m terrified and I know he’s our only hope. I shake him harder only to be greeted with more grumbling.

  “He’s out cold,” I say, exasperated.

  “You’ll have to—”

  “Knock, knock,” a voice sings from outside.

  A pale face appears in the broken window, grinning when he sees me.

  I nearly scream. As it is, I die a little inside—like Wesley in The Princess Bride, tethered to the machine stealing years off his life. That’s what this world is doing to me: killing me slowly one terror at a time until I’ll be the oldest seventeen-year-old ever to walk the earth. I’ll think I have years left to live if only I can keep my guard up, keep the monsters at bay, but then one morning I won’t wake up because my heart will have given out. And I won’t blame it one bit.

  The face disappears from the window. The second it’s gone, I wish it was back because at least then I know where one of them is. I can hear more people milling around outside the walls. They run their hands along the exterior, tapping lightly as they move, until the entire building feels like it’s humming. The walls are closing in on me and I’m panicking hard. My breaths are coming in short, painful gasps and my skin is nothing but a drowning victim under the sweat breaking out over every inch of my body.

  I’m scared of zombies. I’m scared of the Colonists. After the gun in my face, I’m a little scared of the Vashons. But I have never been so afraid of another living being as I am right now. I always knew I was disgusted by them, repulsed by their willingness to devour another human being like the monsters that stole everything from us all, but I never knew how deathly afraid of them I was. They’re human but inhumane. Living but dead inside. It’s a double-threat enemy I’d hoped to never face.

  Yet here they are now in force.

  “Trent,” I say urgently, not sure what I’m expecting from him. I think I want him to have all the answers and make this go away. I want him to know everything now. In fact, I encourage it. But what I get in response to my plea for God-knows-what surprises me.

  Just as there’s an eerily polite knock on the door behind me, Trent pulls a stick from the fire and lays it on Ryan’s bare arm.

  “What the f—” Ryan cries, jerking into a sitting position.

  He blinks several times, trying to clear his eyes. He looks pissed and I don’t blame him. If Trent ever tries that with me, I’ll make him eat that hot poker.

  “We have company,” Trent tells him.

  Ryan freezes as he listens to the sounds around him: fingers tapping on the building. Faces start popping in and out of the windows, some just passing by, some stopping to smile grimly before moving on. There are women in the group; somehow that makes me sicker.

  The knock sounds at the door again.

  “Who is it?” Ryan asks Trent.

  “Your neighbors,” the man outside the door answers. “We need to borrow a cup of sugar.”

  “To make their People Pies with,” I mutter.

  I hate to admit it so I won’t, not to anyone but myself, but I feel better having Ryan awake. I feel less certain that I’m going to die tonight.

  He frowns at me now, his warm eyes dark in the dying firelight.

  “Cannibals?” he whispers.

  I nod, my mouth tightly strung in a grim line.

  He curses under his breath then jumps slightly when the knocking starts up again.

  “Little pig, little pig, let me in,” the man sings mockingly.

  “Trent thinks you can talk to them,” I whisper to Ryan. “He’s seen people talk to them and not end up dead.
”

  “Not right away, at least,” Trent corrects.

  “What do I say?” he asks incredulously. “Please don’t eat us?”

  “Maybe don’t lead with that.”

  “Lead with what then? The weather? Ask about his kids?” Ryan demands, whispering harshly.

  “Maybe start with opening the door,” I suggest.

  Ryan takes a calming breath, then nods his head.

  “Weapons hidden, give nothing away,” he mutters to us as he stands.

  Ryan, I think it’s important to note, was our reigning poker champion in prison. Even Trent, with his robot’s heart, wasn’t able to beat him. Trent has no tells, no emotional outbursts or giveaways to exploit. Ryan, on the other hand, has many, but most are lies. He’s an incredible actor—or a liar, depending on how you see it. I think it’s one of the reasons he does so well in the Arena. He has a charisma, an easy kind of charm that pulls you in and makes you trust him. Even as he’s taking all your money.

  My blood is rushing in my ears as he turns the door handle. I think someone says something from outside but I can’t hear it, not over the sound of my own fear and panic pounding in my ears. Ryan nods, steps aside, and a man dressed entirely in black walks in. He gives the small room a once-over, his eyes barely falling on Trent and I. It’s something I’m a little insulted by. He’s looking for threats but I just got passed over like I was nothing. Like I’m an office chair or a roller skate.

  The man’s skin is painfully pale. His dark hair is a shock against it where it droops over his forehead, looking clean and shiny. This is how I judge people in the apocalypse: do they have a shower and do they use it? Yes on both counts for this guy, meaning they’re living relatively well. No one showers first and drinks water to survive second.

  “So,” he says quietly, turning back to Ryan with a stern eye, “who are you and what are you doing here?”

  “We washed up on the shore here and weren’t prepared to travel at night,” Ryan says, his voice surprisingly deep and strong. “Not through this territory.”

  “Not through our territory.”

  “No. Colonists’ either.”

  “And how do you know we’re not Colonists?”

  “You knocked,” he answers wryly.

  The man grins. It’s not as horrifying as I thought it would be. Not like when Trent does it. It seems more natural. Easier. Like he does it all the time. I remind myself that the truly horrifying thing about the cannibals is that they look just like everyone else—right up until they’re pan-frying someone’s calf muscle over an open flame. Then you can feel it in your bones, smell it in the air that they are wrong.

  “You were on the ships then? You’re Colonists.”

  “No,” I blurt out. I snap my mouth shut the second I say it, but it’s already done. All eyes are on me now.

  “Really?” the man asks, stepping toward me.

  I see Ryan tense beside him, but then another man steps inside the door to block his path. The first man looks at me intently. I don’t feel as terrified as I thought I would meeting his stare. His eyes are strange, too large and too dark, but they’re not crazy. Not as insane and empty as I expected.

  “Yes, really,” I say, worried my tone is too sharp, but I’m not great at censoring myself. I clear my throat. “We’re not with the Colonists, and before you ask, we’re not with The Hive either.”

  “Are you sure? That was a Hive boat you sailed out on.”

  I swallow, glancing quickly at Ryan. How do they know about the boat?

  “Did it sink?” the man asks. “We lost sight of it in the chaos.”

  “Capsized,” Trent says as a matter of fact.

  “And you left it like that? Uh oh,” he tuts, feigning concern. “Marlow won’t like that. You’ll be indebted to him now. That’s never a good place to be.”

  “You know Marlow?” I ask.

  “I know of him. Never had the pleasure of making his acquaintance.”

  “You’re not missing much.”

  He grins again. “So I hear. Clear something up for me, would you? You sailed to Vashon Island on a Hive boat, but you’re not with The Hive. You clearly aren’t with the Vashons because here you sit, on the opposite side of the Sound. You say you’re not with the Colonies and I’m inclined to believe that. So if you’re not with The Hive, the Vashons, or the Colonies, who are you exactly?”

  “No one,” Ryan says, his voice dead.

  I’m surprised by his answer but then I remember that it’s true—that I did that to him. He’s no longer a Hyperion because he betrayed them for me and that’s going to eat him up inside. That was his family—a piece of his life with his brother—and I’ve taken that, giving nothing in return. But he’s not no one. Even standing in an empty room without a weapon or cent to his name, he’s so much more someone than I’ll ever be.

  “Well, whoever you are, you need to come with us.”

  “And if we don’t?” Ryan asks.

  “You will.”

  It’s not a threat exactly, it’s more like a truth. One I feel in my gut. He’s right, we’ll go with them because we don’t want to die and it doesn’t even have to be said that that’s what will happen if we resist. We all know it. I can feel it and they can probably taste it and there’s no sense in denying it.

  I stand slowly. Trent does the same in my peripheral but I keep my eyes on Ryan. He’s watching me rise and I’m worried that I can’t read his face. He’s gone into Arena mode: he’s a fighter now, dead and calm inside. I envy him that. I recognize that trick as one I used to be able to perform, but my skills have slipped or fallen entirely away and I’ll never be able to do it again. Even now as I look at him I can feel emotions swirling inside of me. I feel scared, anxious, protective, angry. And it’s all for him.

  We’re led outside into the dark and the cold. We leave our fire burning inside and I have the fleeting, ridiculous thought that we should put it out before it burns the building down or draws someone to it. But it’s not my home and the moths are already here. The damage has already been done.

  I fall in line behind Ryan as we head out the door. I’m startled by the sudden silence, the cease of raps and taps on the outside of the building. It’s so perfectly synched that the lack of sound unnerves me as much as it did when it started. I’m beginning to think these people share a brain.

  “Weapons,” someone ahead of Ryan says curtly.

  I unhook my knife and toss it to the ground toward the shadowed voice that demanded it. Then I slowly pull my ASP free, running my fingers over it lovingly as I ache inside. I just got her back. How many times can we be separated before it’s the last?

  I glare at the man in front of us, holding up my ASP for him to see. “I want this back.”

  “Toss it with the others,” is his cold reply.

  “Do you understand me? I want it back.”

  “When?”

  “When we leave.”

  “Who said you will?”

  I suppress a shiver along with the urge to whip the weapon out to full length and crack it against the guy’s face. He’s taking shape as my eyes adjust to the darkness. He’s not that big. He’s actually almost my height, not that much meatier. I’m not used to fighting the living but I’m suddenly curious how I’d do. The more I can see of him, the more convinced I am that I can take him. But I can’t fight all of them and neither can Ryan or Trent, so I slowly lower the baton to the ground where I let it fall with an echoing clatter.

  “I’ll leave,” I tell the guy as I stand up straight, “and when I do, you’re giving that back to me.”

  I can’t be sure, but I think he grins.

  “This way,” the lead guy says, taking off without looking back.

  As the cannibals fall into formation around us I realize I’ve misjudged their numbers: there are more than I thought. They seem to materialize out of the darkness as we move and I’m glad I stowed the urge to fight. Even if we were twice as many, we’d never have fought our
way out.

  I keep my eyes on Ryan’s back, his broad shoulders leading me forward and blocking out the world ahead of us. It makes me nervous. I’d rather be the lead, see where I’m going. Know what I’m walking into. I’m going on a lot of faith following blindly behind him like this, especially with Trent and all his height pacing so close behind me. I start to feel caged and crazy. I’m surrounded on every side and I can’t see and I want to run or fight or scream, but I keep it locked inside. I keep my eyes on Ryan and I remember sleeping beside him. I remember him between me and walls, me and doors, me and danger. I remind myself what it feels like to press my back against his and trust that whatever is coming behind me is irrelevant. It’s already dead because he’s there.

  I remind myself to trust him the way he trusts me. All the way.

  Chapter Two

  We walk through the streets silently without any light. I’ve done this before—it’s not that big of a deal in a neighborhood you know, but I don’t know this one. Not at all. Not even a little. I don’t come south of the stadiums. To move through this area is to be close to the Colonies, and while I can see their lights blazing closer than I feel comfortable with, I know the real trouble is what you don’t see. Not until the van rolls up on you silently and people snatch you off the streets. But the way the cannibals walk us brazenly through the dark, I wonder how much of a threat the Colonists are to them. Maybe the Colonists give them as much space as the rest of us. Maybe no one likes the idea of being eaten for dinner, least of all by someone living.

  Without a word, Ryan stops. I slam into the back of him, and as his hand reaches back to help stabilize me, I wait for the impact of Trent to sandwich me between them. It never comes. I feel clumsy, blind, and a little helpless. The helpless is what pisses me off the most.

  “Why did we stop?” I ask, brushing Ryan’s hand away.

  Before he can answer there’s a sharp screech of metal on metal. When I break formation to look around Ryan, my gut clenches.

  One of the cannibals is using a horrifying hook weapon as a giant crowbar to pull a manhole cover up out of the street.