December 13th, 2030

Something moved in the corner of the room—or at least, David’s mind tricked him into thinking it did—and he was glad for the distraction. The concern, if not outright fear, he’d instilled into Juliet had taken its toll for the past five minutes, causing him to pace the length of the room, lost in thought. He couldn’t believe that a Renegade of all people had waltzed into the Morgue, stolen his nuclear warhead replica, and gained information about his location only ten hours ago; and Juliet hadn’t even seen fit to tell him at the time.

Of course, she couldn’t possibly understand the gravity of the situation. She was concerned, certainly, but in her mind they just had to face the facts; the world they’d once known no longer existed. Things were different. If someone wanted to steal a defunct bomb replica then let him. The two of them weren’t using it, anyway.

That’s what Juliet was no doubt thinking. David, on the other hand, was taking the whole situation far more seriously. It was a Renegade, for God’s sake! Add to that the fact that he obviously knew something about David’s work and had claimed he would come back, and they had a potentially huge problem on their hands.

It seemed to David like he and Juliet were being toyed with. It was almost as if a game was being played, started three years ago and put on pause until now, and somehow the two of them were the key players. Whatever the Renegades had planned, they were inevitably and irreversibly entangled in it.

Which meant they had to leave the Morgue.

David had considered the option several times already, coming up with both good reasons and bad reasons for leaving. In the end, he knew it was dangerous to make any journey out of the Morgue and to new territory. If people saw him and remembered him by his face alone—which had been in half of America’s homes three years ago—they were likely to kill him then and there.

Then again, if they didn’t leave the Morgue, God only knew what would happen. The Renegade had claimed he would come back, Juliet had said. Him alone they could deal with, but if he brought any of his friends it might be a more complicated task. Not to mention that, even if David and Juliet did defeat their invaders, the Renegades would notice their people were missing and would send an even larger force.

A part of him played with the idea of being taken alive by the Renegades. They would kill him, that much was certain, but so little was known about them. He could very well discover more than anyone else.

It was a fantasy he had to dismiss. The Renegades had just become their enemies, and they were an enemy that David and Juliet couldn’t defeat on their own. They needed support. Failing that, they needed to disappear once more in the hopes that they could hide away for another three years.

There was no reasonable alternative. They had to leave, and they had to do it before the Renegades came back.

“David?” Juliet called out. Her mind was reeling with the possibilities their prior conversation had just brought, no doubt, but if David wasn’t mistaken he heard concern in her voice above confusion.

He stopped his pacing immediately and looked at her, raising his eyebrows as if to ask “Yes?” She’d always admired that about him; anytime she wanted something he put her desires far above his own. It was one of the noble character traits John had worked into him just before the Accident.

Juliet smiled, confirming David’s suspicion that she liked his instant attention. “I think we should take a walk.”

A walk? David looked back at the icebox. What was she expecting to gain out of taking a walk right now? They were in the middle of what may very well turn into crisis if they didn’t take a walk and never return.

Still, David knew she was only trying to calm him. Before the Accident he’d had his share of breakdowns, especially when Miri and Juliet were both taken from him. He suspected that Juliet simply didn’t want him to fall into that same mindset again. She was trying to protect him from his own tendency to worry far too much.

He loved that about her.

“I see what you’re trying to do,” he said with a knowing grin. “But I’m fine, really. If anything I think you should be taking this more seriously.”

“You get that from your sister.”

David couldn’t help a small chuckle. It was true. He’d always been a deeply grounded person, but Miri’s FBI-acquired solemnity had given him a completely new meaning of the word in grave situations.

Like the threat of the Renegades breathing down their necks. They were both right; David needed to be a bit more carefree and Juliet needed to be a bit more concerned. David assumed that’s why they had each other.

And come to think of it, the sooner they left the Morgue behind, the better. There were very few personal effects that they needed to take with them; everything essential could be carried with relative ease.

That walk was starting to sound like a good idea.

“I think we should leave the Morgue,” David said plainly.

Juliet eyed him like she’d already expected this statement, and she probably had. She was just as adept at reading his mind as he was at reading anyone else’s.

“I know,” she said.

“You’re not opposed to it?” It would be surprising, considering that she didn’t want to upset him too much. But she was far more reasonable than David sometimes gave her credit for, he knew.

“I knew as soon as I’d told you about the Renegade you’d want to. Can’t say I agree with you, but then again, can’t say I don’t.”

“You’re with me, then?”

She smiled, bridged the distance between them, then leaned close and kissed him on the lips. “Always.”

David returned her intensity and kissed her again.

When they pulled away, Juliet was smiling radiantly. Their conversation turned more practical than romantic, discussing everything they would need to take on a trek through the jungles of eastern Ohio. The rifle, obviously, and the Renegade’s weapons would accompany them. A change of clothes. A small pack of their remaining medical equipment—gauze, peroxide, immuno-boosters, etc.

They ate another meal of fish and fruit, knowing that they wouldn’t be able to transport any fish meat without their icebox. Any food they needed, they would get on the run.

As for where they would go, that was also something they would have to get on the run. The largest cities were on the coasts, since central northern and southern U.S. had been within the radius of Darrow’s warheads, but they didn’t want to head anywhere that was densely populated.

Juliet suggested they try a large colony for a while. People may have become more concerned with staying alive than remembering who got them there, and it was easier to get lost in a crowd.

No, the threat of being taken by the Renegades would scare anyone into giving up where they lived. They would be too easy to find in a crowd. They had to go somewhere that was just as secluded and inhospitable as the Morgue. That is, if there even was such a place. They’d just have to strike out into the wilds and see what found them.

They went about the next ten minutes gathering what they would need, and once they had everything from the Quarter, David grabbed the rope and leapt down the elevator shaft, straightening his body parallel to the ground at just the last second. His inertia sent him toppling to the floor of the reception area. He stopped rolling about three inches from the head of the nearest corpse.

Somewhat unnerved by how close he’d come to disturbing the dead, David shuddered and mumbled a quick apology. He then set back out for the gun closet, as he liked to call it. The old Remington was there, just as Juliet had said it would be.

David was just checking the chamber and stuffing ammo into his pockets when Juliet made it down to him.

“One good thing about all this is that you won’t have so many opportunities to kill yourself.”

He laughed at what was a sincere statement for her. In fact, he’d very nearly broken his neck the first time he’d tried his reckless jump tactic. He’d have to find something similar wherever they went.

Satisfied that he had plenty of ammo, David gave the box to Juliet, who stuffed it in the pack he’d strapped to his back. He then slung the rifle over his shoulder like the Terminator and took Juliet’s hand in his free one.

They carefully avoided the corpses on the floor and moved silently to the corridor leading to the exit. A bat chirped, hanging directly under the skylight, then flew off into the night, shrieking.

David stood for a moment in the moonlight that poured in from a small gap in the ceiling, letting the romance of the night soak into his being. There was simply something about the darkness of night that couldn’t be explained. Call it insomnia, vampirism, or just moon-driven madness, the night held a special surprise for those who waited to catch the glow of the moon.

David and Juliet caught the mystery of the moon that night, along with the calming and romantic effect it had on their walk. As soon as they exited The Morgue, David faced the sky and drew a deep breath. He closed his eyes and almost smiled, and in the moonlight he felt more comfortable and at ease than he had in a very long time.

Finally the intoxicating effect wore off, and the couple began their trek through the thick woods. David marveled at how much the trees had grown. In places that were nearly flat before he’d fallen asleep, tall trees bounded up to a hundred feet, spreading leaves and branches to form a sort of mile-long canopy along their normal path to Calmant—they would stop there briefly for news. The bushes and shrubs had grown thicker and more abundant in their green needles and leaves, so odd for winter time.

At the halfway point between their home and the village, David and Juliet stopped among the ridge of a hill that easily overlooked the last half-mile of their journey. The hills were a bit more rolling and spherical than David remembered, and there were fewer flatlands for grazing spots. The grass was short and looked freshly cut, and the small stream flowed a few inches over the norm. Juliet explained the water away with the rain they’d been having, but even she was surprised about the grass. They guessed it was just the cold.

The couple reluctantly passed their beautiful spot on the ridge of the hill and continued their journey, David noting everything that seemed out of place. A bush here or a different rock there, a dead log, an uprooted patch of grass; not a single abnormality passed his notice. Even though he’d been in a coma for nearly a month, his mind was still working at full capacity.

Of course, it wasn’t like he had anything else to remember. To him, the things that mattered were, in order: Juliet, their land, and The Morgue. He would be able to get by without The Morgue, but take Juliet and David would lose hope. He even knew it himself. They’d both admitted that without the other, there wouldn’t be a good enough reason to live. He was hanging on to Juliet as fiercely as she was hanging on to him, finding meaning in life from the love that had grown to bind them. Without that love, there was really no point in living in this world.

Juliet had risked her life for him so many times simply by being with him. She’d taken care of him when the most absurd and mysterious of circumstances had placed him in a catatonic slumber.

It was she who he loved more than life.

David kissed her just before they stumbled upon the village of Calmant.

“What was that for?” she asked, a smile nudging her mouth.

“I just love you.”

She let out the smile that screamed beauty and returned David’s kiss.

They turned their gazes outwards after drawing away, easily spying upon the entire village of Calmant. They said this was one of the larger villages in the east of the ex-U.S., but mostly it was a few farmers scattered among decaying houses and barely surviving between the animals and cold.

If he had to guess, David would say the population was maybe a hundred in this remote refugee camp. Mostly they kept to themselves, too. David had only once had to threaten someone away from The Morgue since he’d made his intentions clear during the Division. They found their own game, hunted in groups, and were no problem as long as they steered clear of The Morgue.

David had watched them once. A group of them. He had been on his way to gather a box of ice from his magic cavern when five of them stepped out to the clearing just behind him. He thought it may have been a predator about to attack and almost shot one of them, but his better senses kept his instincts at bay.

They moved on, and David gathered his ice, but then he ran upon them again on his way back to his gloomy home. They were just sitting there, crouched in the bushes, whispering to each other. David managed to get close enough to eavesdrop on them by hiding in the thick of the most painful thorn bush he’d ever encountered.

“What do you think?” one man said to another by his side. His voice was gruff and his appearance was even worse. Apparently the people of the world didn’t see fit to keep themselves presentable anymore. David thought it was an unruly idea and people should still try to look better than refugees.

“What do I think of what?” the man’s friend replied. He sounded as if he could keel over at any minute from lung cancer.

“The Morguary,” the first man said again.

“You mean mortuary?”

“No, no,” a third man interrupted. He was the only normal-sounding one in the bunch, but his tattered apparel couldn’t even be considered clothing.. “It’s called The Morgue,” he continued. “Haven’t you heard? The guy that made all this happen—basically killed everyone—that’s where he lives.”

“Oh he does, does he?” the second man, lung cancer, said. There was more than a touch of contempt in his voice. “I’d like to show him what we think of murderers around here . . .”

“Do you even know what happened?” a fourth asked. He had one lazy eye, and the other showed clearly that he was touched by the Mad-Hatter himself. “He was supposed to shut down this nuke, but he wanted to save one measly woman’s life instead of seven billion!”

The other men stared at him for a minute, then erupted in laughter. The crazed man was confused as to what the men meant by this, but he began to laugh with them.

They were certainly different than what David remembered ordinary people as. He remembered driving down the suburbs, seeing kids playing and parents reading the paper. Or his paranoid mailman who insisted that the government was having him deliver Communist pamphlets to everyone in Saint Louis.

Those were the kinds of people that made this . . . this life, seem so dull. More accurately, it was the loss of those kinds of people that made the world settle into the kind of gloom and despair it had dug itself into.

“David?” Juliet finally deterred her strolling partner from his reminiscence.

He turned to her and smiled.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

“I was just remembering the old way of life,” he replied, gazing back out over the village. Sound asleep. “Do you even remember newspapers?”

Juliet laughed and squeezed his arm. “What kind of question is that? Of course I remember newspapers.”

“Me too. I was just thinking about them.”

“Newspapers? What for?”

“You got to hang on to something, right?”

Juliet took David’s hand and held it close. He could tell she knew it was true. Just hang on to something to try to believe it could be like that again. In the back of his mind, David knew it was. Certain conditions would have to be met, but it could be done. The world could be put back together.

Juliet interrupted David’s brief optimism by starting down the small hill to the village. Her hand pulled him behind, and soon they had strolled nimbly and silently to the tent farthest from the center of the village. At that focal point a large fire burned and cracked, but the night guard was snoring so loud the whip of the flame was barely audible.

David and Juliet snuck through the tents and around anything that made a form of noise, and after checking the guard—and double-checking him—Juliet guided David to the message board that hung on a post just to the right of the fire pit.

David quickly glanced over the village again to make sure they hadn’t been spotted, then returned to the—

What?

David rapidly shifted his gaze back to the hills, alert and focused. The moon bounced just overhead, creating the illusion that the mound of dirt and grass was lined with silver, but beyond that there was nothing. Not a trace.

Odd. David could have sworn he saw something on the crest of the hill.

Juliet gave him a look that asked the very question he’d like to know the answer to: “What?”

He shook his head and she understood that he’d probably just seen a ghost. They returned to the message board.

There were scattered notes all over the slab of wood, most of which were written by the people in the village stating agreements for bartering. Someone needed a lighter and was willing to trade a day’s breakfast for it. David found that one amusing. Smoker, probably.

A few more notes were simply scribbles of writing left by Runners, none of which held any consequence, but one note in particular caught David’s eye. It was designated with the insignia of the Centrals, which only marked papers the Centrals thought worthy of attention. The note started off with an introduction by a runner. David had never actually seen that before.

This letter was left here at Capital sometime early Tuesday. The author calls himself simply “Judge”, but we can advise you: the message is disturbing, and most likely written by a disturbed man.

The world is evil. It’s time to show them a thing or two. No one has that simple flair of the old life. People are so shallow. To find a deep person is a rarity indeed. Remember that.

Evil has even been corrupted. You can’t even be evil anymore without a small slice of good. That’s not evil, okay? That’s called being a wimp. You even wanna be evil, go all the way. If not, stay as a do-gooder.

Good is the one thing that hasn’t been entirely corrupted. Yet. We’ve still got purely good people here among us. But even that’s all going to change. Soon. Believe me. It’s all going to change.

Everything has been corrupted, even corruption. It’s time to show them a thing or two.

~Judge

P.S. There’s no need to even ask for an autograph. You’ll get one soon. Believe me. Believe.

The note intrigued David. Whoever this Judge character was, he sounded both mentally ill and a little bit interesting. He was right; there weren’t deep people anymore. And his fascination with good and evil sounded a little bit like an obsession. Possibly even the kind of obsession that creates the criminally insane.

There was more to the letter, David saw, so he read intently.

In other news, another colonist from the Central American city of New Canton has been stolen, and a dark silhouette was seen near the time of the kidnapping. It’s been speculated that perhaps the “Judge” is this same figure, but no evidence has come to conclusion. Also, the Centrals have been in a special meeting since sometime early morning, December 12th, 2030. They wouldn’t say what the meeting was for.

Beside him, Juliet finished reading the same note and looked at him as if to ask what in the world it meant. The answer was obvious—someone had gone crazy, driven that way with the life they’d lived. It wasn’t so uncommon. People who had watched the world be killed around them while they lived had plenty of reasons to go insane. David was actually a little surprised this was the first true case of mental illness he’d heard of in the past three years.

And then a light went on in his brain.

This was it; this was what he had wanted to do in life, wasn’t it? Helping people work out their psychological problems? This Judge, whoever he may be—because the Judge was simply a persona, no doubt. There wasn’t any possibility he was actually a judge—was suffering from a severe mental illness and required help. If he didn’t receive it, he would lash out like all mental patients eventually do. Whether he would turn violent or not David wasn’t able to say, not without an evaluation.

But this was his calling. He had to find the Judge, which meant he had to go to D.C., the Centrals’ base of operations. It was unlikely that the Judge would travel far, so he was currently residing somewhere in the District of Columbia or very nearby, in Virginia or Maryland.

So they headed out for Capital.

Juliet looked over at David and knew exactly what he was thinking. There was that fire in his eyes again. He’d found something that supremely interested him and he was already determined to do whatever it took to get what he wanted.

If the letter written by the so-called “Judge” was any indication, David thought he’d found someone who needed his help. A psychotic patient who required immediate treatment before he turned volatile. Possibly even violent.

David looked Juliet in the eyes and smiled, his green eyes sparkling. He took Juliet by the hand and began walking east, out of the camp.

Toward Capital.

Toward D.C.

Juliet wanted to pull her hand away in protest, but she had to follow along until they reached the woods, otherwise she risked waking up the entire camp. With every silent step contradiction screamed at her, telling her that this wasn’t at all what David assumed it was. The guy was probably a complete wacko; a nut job who would try to kill the Centrals and then be summarily gunned down by their bodyguards. David didn’t need to get involved.

When they had gone far enough into the woods that she wouldn’t wake any of the villagers, Juliet took her hand back from David. He turned, wondering what was wrong.

No. He knew exactly what was wrong.

“What is it?” he whispered.

Juliet looked into his eyes, jaw firm. “We can’t go there.”

“Oh, Juliet, I—”

“David, I’m telling you. I have a feeling about this. First the Renegades and now this wackjob Judge . . . I don’t think we should go to Capital.”

She hadn’t actually thought about how the Renegades might be involved before saying it, but now that she had, it made perfect sense. Perhaps the Judge was a Renegade himself. If Juliet’s encounter with the one yesterday was any indication, they were a class of psycho all their own.

But David was stubborn, and he had that look about him. The one he’d had when he and John had rescued Juliet from two dozen mercenaries and rode out yelling joyously at the top of their lungs. This was what he thought he was meant to do. If he couldn’t stop the end of the world, he could at least help clean up some of the mess.

David took Juliet’s hands softly again and held them in both of his. She already knew that he was about to come up with the most logical and persuasive argument he could.

“Juliet,” he smiled lightly. “I love you, and you know that from the depths of my heart all I want to do is protect you. But I’ve thought about it a lot since the Accident—it was my fault, even if we try to convince ourselves it wasn’t. I created the troubles that man’s facing and it only makes sense that I could help him with them.”

“David, I know you feel sorry, but you can’t let that obligate you into helping people.”

“It’s not an obligation,” he whispered softly, still grinning barely. “It’s what I want. Just think about it—we’ll go to the Centrals themselves and say that I want to investigate the Judge and the Renegades. They may not be too happy to see me, but they can’t refuse a chance to get rid of their two biggest problems.”

The Renegades? What had he cooked up involving them?

“The way I see it is this: with the Centrals’ help, we may be able to start a network of our own to inform people about the Renegades’ tactics and use that against them. They aren’t superhuman, after all, they just have fear on their side. If we can show the people that the Renegades are nothing to be feared, we can stop the threat altogether.”

The plan had some merit to it, but he was forgetting the fact that they would be easily hunted down by the Renegades and that Juliet didn’t like making themselves celebrities. She voiced exactly this.

“We will be protected,” David countered, voice hardly more than an echo. “We’ll have to demand that they protect us because of my infamy, with the general population and with the Renegades.” He stopped, not sure how to go about the part about Juliet not wanting to be in the limelight again.

“You can’t think of any good reason to expose us, though, can you?” Though she knew that she was going to give in anyway, Juliet had to put up a fight.

“Saving lives and stopping the threat of the Rens isn’t enough?” David asked.

“I’m more worried about you,” she told him. “I don’t want you to start off on some grand quest again only to have your heart crushed a second time. I don’t want to see that happen to you.”

He adored her concern for him, she thought, but it didn’t stop him.

“Juliet, I love you so much,” he said, barely even voicing the words. “I’ll always have you, remember? You’re enough for me.”

His words brought water to her eyes, even if they were somewhat sappy.

“But if I can help any of the people whose lives I’ve destroyed, I want to help. Give me this chance, please. If it doesn’t work out, I promise, we’ll go live in an abandoned shack in the mountains somewhere, just us and our family.”

“Family?” This was the first time he’d ever mentioned having kids voluntarily, and it brought a surge of joy to Juliet.

“I’ve been thinking,” he breathed. “I love you more than anything, and the only thing you’ve ever asked me for is children. I want to give that to you. Besides, it might be fun to have a little David Junior running around.”

Juliet couldn’t resist the joy that spread through her with David’s simple statement. There was the possibility he was just saying he wanted to have kids to please her, but she didn’t think so. His eyes were glowing with the prospect at having a son or daughter, and he’d never yet lied to her. He was serious.

And he was right. Though Juliet had said they shouldn’t be obligated to help anyone, they were in a way. And it would make David happy.

“Okay,” she said, letting the smile fade some. “We’ll go to Capital. And we’ll try to see about speaking with the Centrals.”

David’s face couldn’t have possibly been brighter. His boyish smile was infectious.

“And we’ll start a family,” he added. “As soon as all this business with the Renegades is over, we’ll start a family.”

He squeezed Juliet’s hands tight and kissed her.

They set off toward the East, toward D.C.