Cassie Alexander - Deadshifted

His chin twitched up in challenge. “What the hell else can they be?”

I didn’t have an answer for him. “I don’t know.”

He gave me a teenage snort, unsurprised by my idiocy. “Yeah, well—let’s go on the tour.”

We canvassed the room quickly in all its depressingly repulsive glory. The healthy people, volunteers like me or people who’d been trapped when they’d arrived with relatives, had looked haggard. They’d seen too much too fast with too little preparation. It was one thing at the hospital where eventually you became inured to horrors and had coworkers’ support to fall back on; no one, could have warned these people what would happen on their cruise. Even in nursing school, they’d babied us a little at first. These poor people had gotten steamrolled.

Their number included this boy, who, despite his bravado and his penchant for black, was clearly out of his depth. I was sure on Xbox Live he had a lot of swagger, but nothing in his video game world had prepared him for this much actual death.

Most of the volunteers ignored me, too tired to care. A few shot me dirty glances as I hunched over to look into their relatives’ faces to make double-triple sure that none of them was Asher.

One of the volunteers I surprised accosted me. “What are you looking at?” He had a wig cap and makeup on from a prior night. He moved to block my view of his friend, who was slouched over and also had fading makeup, but who looked much worse for the wear.

“I’m searching for a friend of mine is all. Sorry.” I waved my hands to defuse the tension.

He deflated a little, lined lips pursing. “Me too.” He reached down to brush a sweaty lock of hair away from his friend’s forehead. “For your sake.”

I nodded and stood. The boy at my side was still sullen. “Did you find them?” he asked, despite the fact that he’d been with me the whole time.

“No.”

“Lucky you,” he said sarcastically.

I followed the boy down an empty staff hallway at the back of the restaurant. “Where’s the crew? Aren’t any of them ill?”

“Raluca’s got them quarantined separately down below where there’s no windows or decks to jump off.”

“Good idea,” I said and got no response. “My name’s Edie,” I told the back of his head.

“Rory,” he said without slowing down.

“Who wrangled you onto this boat, Rory?” I knew he hadn’t made the call to go anywhere tropical—he had even less of a tan than I did, and with his lack of vitamin D he must have been approaching rickets.

“My parents. Who became zombies and died horribly,” he said completely deadpan. “They wanted to get me out of the house. Any more awkward questions?”

“Nope. Sorry.”

“Whatever.”

He pushed through another set of saloon doors, and we entered a huge industrial kitchen. Rory led me around countertops and tables, all shining stainless steel, until we reached a massive ice machine at the back. He rummaged off to one side and returned with an empty trash can, which he handed to me. “Only take as much ice as you can really carry. It gets heavy by the end of the hall.”

Without gloves, we reached into the machine’s belly and scooped the ice out by hand. It wasn’t long till I couldn’t feel my hands anymore, which was good because then it didn’t hurt. Scraping out handfuls of ice, hearing the sound of it drum and settle on the bottom of the cans—my actions fell into a rhythm with my thoughts. I was glad Asher wasn’t here—but where else could he be?

Rory touched my arm with an icy palm before whirling and startling me.

There was a shadow behind us—I saw its reflection in the ice machine door.

“Hey!” Rory shouted as I turned more slowly.

“Hey yourself,” the shadow shouted back. A man stepped out from behind a rack of dangling spatulas.

My breath caught in my throat. Nathaniel. I put a nearly frozen hand to my face.

His eyes narrowed at the sight of me. “Good to see you again—Edie, was it?”

I kept my hand in place as it froze me. This Nathaniel was the older one with the slight belly, the weaker jaw—not the younger specimen Asher had imitated perfectly on his way out yesterday.

“We ate dinner together the other night. Before this nightmare began,” he clarified for me.

I put my hand down slowly. “I remember you.” I wanted to say more, but I wasn’t sure how. Have you seen my boyfriend? The last time I saw him, he was imitating you, didn’t seem feasible, no matter that it was true. “How’s Liz?” And a second later, when I remembered I wasn’t supposed to know that Thomas had died, “And your son?”

“Died. Both of them.”

“Why’re you here?” Rory asked, staring him down.

“I got trapped down here, with everyone else,” Nathaniel answered, with an irritated tone.

“You weren’t eating back here, were you? Like the others who’re getting sick?”

“No.”

“Then why aren’t you out there helping?” Rory demanded.

I decided to cut in. “Do you know anything about this? About what’s going on?” I tried to sound confused, hoping he’d let some small clue drop.

“Of course not,” Nathaniel said.

What were the chances he’d just come out and tell me about his nefarious plans? He wasn’t some villain by way of Scooby-Doo. I wanted to confront him, but I didn’t want to blow my chance at it—I didn’t think I’d get more than one shot.

Rory looked back and forth between us and then stared at Nathaniel again. “So what were you doing back here?”

“I was tired. They wouldn’t let me back upstairs. I was taking a nap.” Nathaniel pointed behind himself and off to the side.

“With everything that’s been going on—you’ve been taking a nap?” Rory said, his voice rising. He had a lot of anger and no place for it to go.

Nathaniel took offense and spoke in clipped tones. “I had a long night.”

I placed a cold hand on Rory’s arm to hold him back, just in case. Rory was tense a second more then shrugged me off.

Nathaniel patted down the collar of his jacket and then straightened his tie. I didn’t have proof of anything, and I couldn’t let on about anything that Asher’d told me. Before I could think of what to say he jerked his chin at me. “Where’s your doctor fellow?”

To lie, or not to lie? Given what Asher’d been doing, I probably should lie—but my hands weren’t the only thing that were numb. I decided to answer honestly. “I don’t know.”

Nathaniel’s lips pursed at this, and his brows rose. “Well, well.”

“Have you seen him?” I blurted out. I felt like a little kid asking Have you seen my puppy, mister? minus a handmade sign. I hated myself for putting him in a position of power over me—but if I didn’t ask him, and if it somehow managed to be just this simple, I’d hate myself even more.

“No. Why would I?” He yawned and shook his head, as though he was still waking up.

At the yawn, Rory snapped. “I don’t know if you noticed, but everything’s going to shit and the rest of us aren’t getting to take naps.” Rory pointed up the hall like he was chastising a dog. “Go back in that restaurant and ask Raluca where you can help.”

Nathaniel gave Rory a cold smile. “Make me.”

A moment passed between them like gunslingers in an Old West showdown, and I would have bet all my money on Rory, his anger lashing around him like a whip. Maybe sensing this—that Rory’s irrational heat was sharper than his cool pride—Nathaniel subtly backed down and snorted dismissively before walking away.

He was rumpled, but not distraught. I believed that he’d been napping, yes, but not that he’d seen two loved ones die. Whereas beside me Rory’s loss was etched on his face and held in his hands, clenched into fists at his sides.