Yesterday's Gone: Season Three (THE POST-APOCALYPTIC SERIAL THRILLER)

saw what had held Boricio’s attention — Brent and the little girl.
    “What happened?” she said.
    “The fucking Gestapo here killed the girl’s momma because she was infected. They’ve got orders, kill on sight, and POW! that’s just what they did. Apparently, the girl didn’t know because the Brawny Man over there didn’t have the balls to do it, so Brent, who knew the girl and her mom, said he’d break the news.”
    “Jesus,” Mary said.
    “But I wasn’t fucking crying,” Boricio said. “And even if I was getting a sniffle, it’s only ‘cuz Rip Van Creepy here broke me!”
    Boricio looked over at Luca, who was staring at Brent and the girl, head titled like he was trying to read the tattoo on a stripper’s left tit from the cheap seats at a strip joint.
    Luca started walking toward Brent and the child.
    “Where the fuck is he going?” Boricio asked Mary.
    Luca kept walking, even though he must’ve heard Boricio.
    Luca walked up to Brent and the girl, now sitting beside one another at a table. Brent’s arms were wrapped around the child, and her eyes were on the tabletop. Boricio followed, out of curiosity, hoping like hell he wouldn’t see any more sad shit that would agitate the dust situation in the room.
    Luca stood an inch from the girl and said, “Hi.”
    Brent looked up at them as if to ask, “Really, now?”
    Boricio shrugged, as if to say, “What am I gonna do; the old fucker’s senile.”
    The girl sniffled, then wiped at her eyes, looking curiously at Luca.
    “What’s your name?” he asked the girl like an ancient Mr. Rogers catering to newly grief-stricken children.
    “Emily,” she said through her tears.
    “My name is Luca,” he said. “I heard that your mom died?”
    Jesus Christ, Luca! Way to be sensitive! Fuck, dude! Good thing you hop, skipped, and jumped right through dating age, with an opening line like that!
    Boricio stared at Mary and Paola, both wide-eyed and loudly wearing their shock.
    “Would you like to see her again?” Luca asked. “Just to say good-bye?”
    “Yes,” Emily nodded, crying.
    Brent looked up at Luca, and seemed like he might be gearing up to punch the old man-kid square in the jaw.
    Boricio shook his head and looked at Mary, prompting her to intervene before Luca said something even more astonishingly stupid than he already had.
    Maybe he is getting senile.
    Mary said, “I’m sorry,” and put a hand on Luca’s shoulder. “Let’s give her some time. She just found out.”
    “No,” Luca said, shaking his head and shrugging Mary’s hand from his shoulder, then turning with a surprising awareness to look the little girl in the eyes. “She wants to see her mommy.”
    Everyone shifted uncomfortably as Luca sat across from Emily, stretching his hands out, open palmed. He said, “Can you put your hands on mine?”
    Brent glared as if Luca was about to pull some phony bullshit psychic reading routine to exploit the child’s tragedy. For all Boricio knew, he was. The boy had clearly lost his marbles. Before Mary could gently pull Luca away without making a scene, Emily slipped her hands onto his.
    Every eye was turned to the four clasped hands.
    Paola looked at Mary and Boricio, then whispered, “He knows what he’s doing.”
    “Shut your eyes,” Luca said, closing his own.
    Emily did.
    As she did, Boricio felt something shifting inside him, some force or energy was the only way to describe it, swelling so much it felt like it might pop from his body. Then he saw the light bleeding from Luca’s hands — from his fingers and into the girl’s.
    “Oh my God,” Mary whispered.
    The same soft glow was wrapped like a blanket around Mary and Paola — the two other people Luca had brought back from the dead.
    “You’re glowing,” Mary said to Boricio, her eyes wide as she looked at him, then at her daughter, and then herself.
    Boricio looked down, but couldn’t see the aura around himself like he could see it around Luca and the girls.
    Emily said, “Mommy?” then a wide smile spread across her face.
    Boricio saw a slight Asian woman in his mind a moment before he heard her voice.
    “Emily,” she said.
    Woah, what the fuck?
    “Mommy, are you alive?”
    The woman was suddenly sitting there, right where Luca was, like a ghost superimposed over his body.
    “Oh, Baby,” she said, reaching out, her spectral hand grazing Emily’s cheek. “You’re okay.”
    Judging from the stone on Brent’s face, he wasn’t seeing