Nicole stood there, still as a statue, and I noticed that there was something in her other hand. I had to look twice, certain that the emergency lighting was playing tricks on my eyes. She was clutching an aerosol can of industrial solvent—the kind used for loosening rusted bolts or lubricating machine gears. The cap was off and a small, plastic straw was sticking out of the nozzle. Her fingers were wrapped tightly around the canister, and her thumb remained on top of the nozzle at all times. Her hand was still trembling slightly, and the can jostled against her thigh. When I looked closer, I saw that her legs were shaking, too.
She’s terrified, I thought. All I’ve got to do is wait for her to turn around, and then…
I eased my hand behind my back, slowly reaching for the razor knife.
“Hello?”
I held my breath.
“Hello?”
Nicole’s voice sounded very small and afraid. I stopped moving, and waited. After a moment, she spoke again. This time, she whispered.
“Pete? Are you there? It’s me. Nicole. If you’re in here, just listen, okay? I don’t want to hurt you. I don’t want any part of this. Not anymore. I’m sorry that I went along with it. I don’t know why I did. You were always really sweet to me. I guess I was just scared, and I didn’t want the others to turn on me instead. I know that sounds terrible, but it’s the truth. I’m sorry.”
I have to admit, I was moved by the sincerity in her voice. Yet still I hesitated. A part of me wanted to call out to her, to let her know that it was okay and that she had nothing to fear from me, but a bigger part of me remembered my betrayal at Drew’s hands. This could be another trick—some scheme devised by Chuck and the others to lull me into a false sense of security, and then, when I came out of hiding—straight into the refrigerator I’d go, chopped and butchered like a side of beef. Instead of coming out, I waited. My muscles began to cramp from sitting still for so long, but at least my dizziness had finally passed. My headache throbbed in time with my pulse.
“Pete? Are you there?” She sighed, and then her voice grew louder. “Oh, screw this. I’m being silly. He’s probably still upstairs. Or dead.”
A severe cramp shot through my calf. I bit my lip to keep from crying out, but Nicole must have heard my intake of breath, because she gasped and took a step backward.
“Pete? Is that you? Did you hear what I—”
“Nicole?” Another pair of legs appeared in the doorway. I couldn’t see their owner, but I knew that it was Damonte by the sound of his voice. “Anybody in there?”
She hesitated before answering. “No, I thought I heard something, but it’s empty.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah.”
“What’s up with the can?”
“I’ve got a cigarette lighter,” Nicole said. “If I came across Pete, and he wouldn’t listen to reason, then I figured I could make a blowtorch out of it.”
“How do you do that?”
“Didn’t you ever do that as a kid?”
“Hell, no. My mother would have beat my ass. How does it work?”
“It’s easy. You just press down on the nozzle and hold the flame into the stream. You just have to be careful not to get the lighter too close to the can or it will blow back on you.”
Damonte grunted in appreciation. “Check you out. You’ve gone all Rambo and shit.”
“Well, we’ve got to make due, don’t we? It’s not like we have any guns.”
“No, I guess it isn’t. I wish to hell we did. I’d feel a lot better with a gun in my hand, given what’s going on. Speaking of which, nobody has come down from upstairs yet. I set a trap around the stairwell door just now. Put some glass bottles and aluminum cans and stuff around the door. If he comes through, we’ll hear him. I locked the door, too, so he’ll have to make even more noise if he tries to get in.”
“Do you think the others are dead?”
“The one’s upstairs? I don’t know. Like I said, they’re not back yet. Maybe they’ve got him cornered and are waiting him out. Maybe they captured him and are just taking their time coming back. Or maybe… what you said. In any case, I figure better safe than sorry. I locked the incinerator door, too. Just in case Pete tries to come down that way. I figured that makes more sense than having Phillips and I walk around down here, waiting for Pete to show.”
“Yeah,” Nicole said, “that didn’t make a lot of sense. And Chuck didn’t seem too happy when I told him so.”
“Speaking of which, Chuck told me to tell you that he wants you to go back to the dining room. He’s already in there. Emma is in there with him.”
“What about Susan?”
“She’s hiding out in one of the dorm rooms. He sent Phillips to find her and bring her back to the dining room, too. Chuck wants all three of you in there with him.”
“I don’t care what Chuck wants. You see what’s happening here, don’t you, Damonte? We’re all going crazy—Chuck worst of all. I know exactly why he wants us to stay in there with him.”
“Yeah, well I ain’t too crazy about it, either. Like I said, he wants me and Phillips to stay out here and patrol the hallways, waiting for Pete to show up. How do you think I feel about that?”
“Not too good, I guess.”
“You’re damned straight I don’t. That’s why I locked the doors and set the traps. I’d rather be in the cafeteria with you all, truth be told. You saw what Pete did to Drew and Dave. That shit was vicious. It made your little blowtorch there seem like a toy.”
“Then why stay out here? Why not just ignore what Chuck tells you?”
“Because I’m more scared of Chuck than I am of Pete. So are you.”
“No, I’m not.”
“Yeah, Nicole. You are. Have you gotten a good look in his eyes? You’re right—what you said earlier. Chuck is crazy. He’s not playing around here. That’s why I’m going along with things. Better not to piss him off. And besides…”
His voice trailed off. I watched Nicole walk toward him.
“Besides what?” she prompted.
“Well… I was going to say that even though he’s crazy, Chuck is still right. I don’t like it, but he’s right about eating Pete. We’re out of food. We’re starving to death. We’ve got to do something.”
“Yeah, but murder?”
“You voted for it, too, Nicole.”
“Maybe so, but it doesn’t even matter now. Chuck said we’ll… he said that we can start with Drew, Dave and Krantz. And any of the others Pete might have killed. That’s enough. Nobody else has to die today. If we can preserve them, that’s enough to last us for months, as long as we ration the… meat… carefully. We don’t have to keep up the hunt.”
“Chuck doesn’t agree. And to be honest, after seeing what Pete has done, I’m inclined to agree with him. Like I said, you voted for this, too. I’m thinking we made the right decision, choosing Pete the way we did. He’s a fucking serial killer.”
They stepped out into the hallway and Nicole closed the door behind them, muffling their voices. My temples throbbed and a muscle in my jaw twitched. I sat there until their footsteps had faded, and then I eased myself out from under the table, grimacing at the pain in my joints and muscles as I stood up again.
Damonte’s final words echoed in my head. A serial killer? Is that what I was? Was that what I’d become? The post-apocalyptic wasteland’s version of Ted Bundy or The Exit or Jeffrey Dahmer? Me? That was ridiculous. I mean, sure, I’d killed some people. In truth, I’d killed a lot of people. A lot. And those things weighed on my conscious the moment I allowed myself to slow down and think about it. The guilt crushed me, just like the regrets I felt over Alyssa and Hannah. But they’d left me no choice. Why couldn’t they see that it had been in self-defense? Nicole was seeing it now. Why couldn’t Damonte and the rest? I didn’t want to kill anybody, but they’d left me no other option. If any one of them had been in my shoes, even for a moment, they’d have reacted in the same manner. None of them would have just offered themselves up as a sacrificial lamb. None of us were Jesus. We weren’t going to offer up our flesh and our blood for the others to partake in, thus granting them life via our death.