Tommy Nightmare (Jenny Pox #2) by JL Bryan Page A

do our best,” Schwartzman said.
    “Questions?” Artleby looked at Schwartzman,
then at Heather. “Are you following all this, Miss Reynard?”
    “Oh, I think I’m keeping up, thank you.”
Heather narrowed her eyes just slightly.
    “Good.” Artleby rapped his knuckles on the
table, as if hammering a gavel to call the meeting closed. He stood
up and shook hands all around. “I’m off to chat with the National
Guard commander. Then look up who governs this ratty little state.
Thank God for Wikipedia, am I right?”
    Lansing and Schwartzman faked a little
laughter.
     
     
    Later, Heather tried to text her husband, but
her cell phone got no reception.
    She tried using her hotel room phone to call
him. She couldn’t get an outside line.
     

Chapter Nine
    Jenny found the flyer stuffed in her mailbox
the next day. The words were bright red, and the seal of the
Department of Homeland Security was printed at the top.
     
    BY U.S. GOVERNMENT ORDER:
     
    All residents and visitors in Fallen Oak must
report to the Fallen Oak High School gymnasium within the next 96
hours for emergency medical screening. Participation is mandatory.
Screening facility will be open continuously for the next 96
hours.
     
    Due to the quarantine, emergency supplies of
canned food, prepackaged meals and water will also be distributed
at the school to Fallen Oak residents.
     
    Jenny ran inside. Seth was eating a hot dog
topped with baked beans and mustard, a ghoulish invention he called
a “bean dog.” They’d raided Seth’s house for food while they were
out. Since it was within the quarantine zone, nobody had stopped
them, but Jenny was uncomfortable with how many National Guard and
other official vehicles were out on the roads, and how few of
anybody else. The bigger the situation grew, the smaller she
felt.
    “We have to do this.” Jenny put the flyer in
front of him.
    “Are you kidding?”
    “We’ll go late at night,” Jenny said. “When
there aren’t many people.”
    “Why, Jenny?” Seth said. “You know we don’t
have anything. We never get sick.”
    “I have something,” Jenny said.
    “Are you still talking about handing yourself
over to them?” Seth asked. “That’s a really, really bad idea. What
do you think they’ll find?”
    “Maybe they’ll find the Jenny pox,” she said.
“And a cure for it. Or an immunization. Or something. If somebody
put some real science into understanding it, maybe I could figure
out how to control it better.”
    “But that’s not what will happen,” Seth said.
“I bet they try to make a weapon out of it.”
    Jenny had a flash of memory from the time
when she was dead, tangled in weeds at the bottom of Ashleigh’s
duck pond. She’d glimpsed one of her past lives, riding in a
galley, dressed in a hooded cloak against the freezing sea air, on
her way to cripple a foreign city with a plague. She was doing it
for somebody else, some king or emperor. It was her job.
    “Maybe,” she whispered. “But they might
help.”
    “And didn’t all those pregnant girls see you
drown in Ashleigh’s pond?” Seth asked. “As far as anybody knows,
you’re dead.”
    “You, too,” Jenny said. “Oh, wait. Everybody
who saw you die is…gone now.”
    “But everyone will flip out when they see
you,” Seth said. “I’m sure the girls told everyone you’re
dead.”
    “While we’ve been holed up here for two
days.” Jenny looked out the window, to the hilly woods behind her
house. “What will they think?”
    “The same thing they’ve thought about us for
months,” Seth said. “Ever since I saved your dad in that tractor
accident. Witchcraft, Satanism and that book from the Evil
Dead movies.”
    “The Necronomicon? ” Jenny said. “What
does that have to do with anything?”
    Seth shrugged. “Those are cool movies. We
should have grabbed the DVDs at my house.”
    “Anyway, Ashleigh and Dr. Goodling aren’t
around to whip up that witchcraft bullshit anymore,”