I just want to be there to remember it’s my own fucking fault.
I can live with that.
Someone takes my hand.
I look up.
At the top of the stairs. Amanda has me by my wounded hand, holding it in both of hers. Frowning at me.
– You never told me before that you killed my mom.
I open my mouth, words crack as they come out of my twisted throat.
– Long story.
She pulls me down the hall.
– All we have is time, Joe.
Feet are pounding up the stairs. One set? Two sets? Yes. At least. Maybe more. Maybe more than Hurley and Terry got out of the basement alive.
We’re at the door of Amanda’s penthouse. I’m coming back to my body. Vision coming to the mouth of the tunnel, opening up.
– Sela.
Amanda doesn’t look back at me.
– What about her?
– We need her. Hurley. Terry. More.
She shakes her head as she leads me in.
– Oh them. Never mind them. And Sela.
Inside, she tugs my hand, pulls me to her side, points at the sheet covering a body in the middle of the floor, stains soaked through, drenched.
– Sela can’t really help anymore.
She gives my hand a squeeze.
– What a gift you have, Joe.
She pushes the door closed and fastens the locks.
– For hurting the most important people in my life.
– You returned for us as you promised.
– Technically, I mean, yes, technically, you didn’t kill her.
– And Benjamin and I and our child, we are ready to depart.
– If we want to get specific here, and seeing as she’s dead and all that, I suppose we can get as specific as we want.
– Whenever you urge.
– So, specifically speaking.
– Shall we leave now?
– Deli-lah.
Amanda squeezes her forehead.
– Could you please let me talk to Joe without interruptions, please.
Standing near the locked door with Ben, hands on her belly, Delilah raises a finger.
– You may have imprisoned us, but no longer.
– Delilah. Dear.
Amanda pulls out the very large pistol that’s been weighing one of the pockets of her lab coat.
– I have some issues with you right now. So if you don’t, I mean, please be quiet for a few minutes, I’m going to shoot Ben.
Ben raises his hands to his shoulders.
– Hey, whoa.
Delilah shakes her finger back and forth.
– Mere bullets will not slay him.
Eyes still on the covered corpse of her lover, Amanda raises the gun and points it at Ben.
– Dear, I know more about the Vyrus and Vampyres than anyone else on the planet. I mean. Trust me, I know where to shoot him to kill him.
She bites the tip of her tongue.
– Or were you not paying attention to what happened with Sela?
Delilah opens her mouth and Ben drops a hand on her shoulder.
– Baby, be cool.
She pulls back.
– Benjamin?
He raises his hands in higher surrender than when Amanda pointed the gun at him.
– Hey, hey, I’m just saying, Mr. Pitt said he’d come back. And here he is. So let’s just sort it out calmly now.
Out in the hall Terry pounds on the door again.
– Time to open up, Joe!
Ben points at the door.
– Because just walking out there right now may not be the best thing as far as we know.
He looks at me.
– Right, Mr. Pitt?
In a chair, bottle of whiskey in my hand, I lift it as far as my mouth and spill a little inside.
– Having a hard time seeing where to go right now myself.
I lift the bottle toward the door.
– I got Chubby’s daughter tied up in front of the door, Terry! Knock it down or shoot through it and you’ll kill your symbolic baby of the future!
It gets quiet in the hall.
Amanda is shaking her head.
– Mr. Pitt. As if.
She looks at the gun in her hand, shakes her head.
– You got her good, Joe. I mean. I mean. She’d been on rations for. I don’t know. I kept telling her to feed. There was enough for her. But she kept reducing her own so she could spread it around with the membership. As if. I mean, this was way past when we knew where things were going. I’d shown her the math. She couldn’t argue with it. You know. And she just. She wouldn’t accept that most of them were going to starve. Period. She handled the discipline. The euthanizing when someone went over. But she wouldn’t let go and let what was going to happen just, I mean, just let it happen. I gave her everything I could. I would have given her more. But she wouldn’t take it.
She lifts her arms from her sides, lets them drop.
– And then you, I mean, speared her.
Another pound on the door.
Lydia this time.
– I don’t believe you about the girl, Joe. You wouldn’t.
– So come on in guns blazing. Already told you I don’t like the girl, Lyd. Do your worst.
Low conversation in the hall.
Amanda stands over Sela’s body, rocking gently on her own tide.
– She lost a lot of blood. We have nothing left in the reserves. I tried to get her to take a little more from me, but it was just a few hours ago. She just. Hunkered in the corner, growled at me when I came over. At me.
She laughs.
– Like she could scare me. Not.
She wipes at the corner of her mouth with the back of her hand.
– But then she just. I mean. It had to happen right? She just lost it.
She looks at Delilah.
– All that blood. Just across the room. She just.
Delilah points at Sela’s covered body.
– The lioness maddened.
Amanda rubs her face.
– Sela.
She looks at the gun in her hand.
– I just.
She looks at me.
– You knew her, Joe. I mean. Joe. Right?
I nod.
– Baby, you did right. She’d never have been able to live with herself.
Amanda looks at Delilah.
– I mean.
She drops the gun in her pocket and turns away.
– Gah.
A door-rattling knock.
– Miss Horde?
I turn in my chair.
– Hurley?
– It’s Miss Horde I’ll be wantin’ ta talk to, Joe, not yer backstab-bin’ self.
– It wasn’t a backstab. Predo and his guys, they were just there.
– Indeed. Most like.
I close my eye.
Terry, Lydia and Hurley. Only the survivors survive. Way of the world. That it should come to this. And is it any wonder?
I open my eye and see Amanda slipping a key into the top lock on the door.
I rise.
– Hey! Hey!
Delilah steps forward.
– Yes, it is time we departed.
Amanda twists the second lock open.
I try to walk to her and cramp up all over.
– Don’t.
She turns the third lock and steps back and the door swings open.
Terry stands on the threshold, worse for wear, but, heavy feeder that he is, the burns covering the right side of his body are healing fast.
– OK, yeah, Ms. Horde, finally we get to meet in person. We can, you know, we can make some progress here now.