Humanity's Edge- The Complete Trilogy

by Paul B. Kohler

  No one spoke, all skittish in front of the vats. They continued to amble toward the back of the lab, where another door led them down a long cement hallway and then into a kind of warehouse stocked with supplies. Mounds of bottled water, countless cans of beans and soup and vegetables, noodles, and—of course—candy, lined the walls and filled the center, towering over them.

  “Shit,” Brandon said, speaking for all of them. “You really are stocked.”

  The survivors began to scatter, perusing the many items and choosing what they thought they needed to head back to the hotel. In the back of Clay’s mind, he wondered what purpose there was in returning to the hotel at all. This area was solid and airtight, hiding them from the outside world. But as he stood before the piles of crackers, Jacobs tapped him on the shoulder, gesturing toward a side room, an offshoot of the greater warehouse.

  Without speaking, Clay followed him, wondering how much he should trust this man if his group was going to survive. Jacobs halted in front of another locked door and entered a code. The numbers buzzed and blued as he pressed them.

  “What is this about?” Clay asked.

  “Your symptoms,” Jacobs said, eyeing him darkly. He shoved open the door and flipped on the light, revealing a skinny lab room. In a small drawer, he found a small tube filled with bead-like pills. He held it up to Clay. “You’re going to need these,” he said.

  “What is it?” Clay asked, hesitant. He remembered that Jacobs had noticed his symptoms immediately, without declaring the cause. “What do I have?”

  “I’m not quite sure what plagues you,” Jacobs said, tilting his head. “But most of your signs point to radiation poisoning.”

  Clay’s stomach dropped. He held the skinny tube in his hands, assessing the pills. “And these will cure me?”

  “No,” Jacobs affirmed. “Radiation poisoning has no cure. There’s just treatment for symptoms. And you’re lucky I have this. It’s another item we’ve been developing. It has shown to be quite satisfactory in removing the radioactive contaminants from the body.”

  Clay nodded. He couldn’t think concretely about this diagnosis. Not yet. It sounded too deadly, and too personal. He popped a pill into his mouth and swallowed it dry. “Okay. Let’s just keep this between us, then,” he said, gesturing to the others in the warehouse. “I have to be their leader.”

  “I know the dynamic,” Jacobs affirmed. He patted Clay on the shoulder, attempting to generate some form of camaraderie. “Let’s join that rest, shall we? See what they’ve found.”

  Clay and Jacobs walked back into the warehouse, discovering that their group stood in a small circle, without supplies, whispering. The moment they saw Clay, they broke apart, their faces grim. Alayna’s lips were tight.

  “What is it?” he asked. “Why haven’t you gathered supplies?”

  “We started to,” Alayna said slowly. “But then we realized that we might very well be some of the last people on earth. And it doesn’t make sense to sleep anywhere that isn’t locked tight, like this lab.”

  Alayna’s words “the last people on earth” seemed to echo through the air.

  Clay nodded slightly, trying to wrap his mind around their new world. They couldn’t be the only survivors, but until they knew otherwise, it was better to be safe than sorry. “Yeah, good thinking.” His shoulders slumped slightly. “Are there sleeping quarters down here, Leland?”

  Jacobs nodded. “Several of our scientists stayed here, before the accident. Their rooms are down the hall. Safe. Tightly sealed. Appropriate for just this scenario.”

  “And then,” Alayna said, “during the daytime tomorrow, we’ll start a hunt around town for more supplies. We can make a chart. See how much we need. Also, see how much freezer space we have. People stay alive in terrible circumstances all the time. And we’ve got the brains to make this work.”

  “Brilliant idea, Alayna,” Norah said. “I’ve been canning things my entire life. I can help with the logistics. And the organization.” She patted Brandon on the back, grinning. “We’ll be proper hunter-gatherers. You hear that, Brandon?”

  Brandon grinned at her and pumping his arm. “If you need anything at all, I’m your man.”

  Alayna grinned, turning her head toward Clay. He was conscious that they’d hardly touched each other all day, let alone spoken. He shivered. As they stood, their new plan stretching before them, they all heard a strange, terrible, unordinary sound.

  The telephone had begun to ring.

  Chapter 65

  The phone rang a second time, echoing throughout the lab. The sound was ominous, coming from another, very distant world. Alayna’s eyes were upon Clay, waiting for him to make a move.

  “Who would be calling?” Clay finally spoke, turning to Jacobs.

  Jacobs shrugged sharply, as nervous as the others. He took a step back, gesturing. “The cell towers were shut down days ago, but I didn’t think of the landlines. It could be anyone from the outside.”

  They were all silent as the phone rang a fourth time. Clay shivered as he picked up the receiver. He swallowed and didn’t speak, waiting for sound on the other end of the phone. It was like listening to a seashell.

  Immediately, the phone began to blare in a robotic voice. “Greetings, valued customer. We would like to announce that you’ve won a trip to Cancun, all expenses paid. Congratulations! All you have to do—”

  Clay dropped the phone back to its cradle. He didn’t speak for a moment, until, suddenly, a slight smile stretched over his face. He turned to his fellow survivors.

  “What was it?” Alayna whispered. They’d been unable to hear.

  “A robocall. Telling me I’d won a vacation. How exciting,” Clay smirked.

  “Damn,” Ralph said, his face crinkling. “It’s the end of the world and we still can’t escape those solicitors. Won’t they leave us the hell alone?”

  Brandon chuckled and Norah grinned. “You got that right,” she agreed. “Won’t leave me alone, even in this little hole in the ground. But I’ll take that vacation, if they’re offering.”

  Clay didn’t respond, allowing her joke to hang in the air. He stood in quiet contemplation, gazing down at the phone, remembering what Jacobs had told them. The landlines were unchecked.

  Ralph scratched at his growing white goatee and walked forward, lifting the phone. “Call my brother, maybe,” he said, sniffing. “Over in North Carolina.” He waited for the tone and then dialed. He paused, bringing all the survivors to stare at him, panicked, knowing they were about to learn so much.

  But he shook his head, hanging up. “It’s busy,” he said. “That guy. He talks on the phone all the goddamn time. Probably just talking about the weather. Doesn’t know what I’m up to. Haven’t spoken in years.”

  Norah came, next. She dialed a number—her daughter’s—and stood, waiting. But she shook her head, wordlessly.

  “Busy?” Clay asked, already sensing the worst.

  “Busy,” Norah agreed.

  They continued, much like this, dialing all the numbers they could remember. Everyone except Brandon. He seemed to slowly distance himself from the crowd, both emotionally and physically.

  “Oh, come here, dear,” Norah said as tears began to run down his face. She pulled him into a warm embrace, his sobs increasing in intensity as he lowered his head into her shoulder. “There’s no one left for you, is there?”

  Brandon shook his head, barely perceptible to the others. “If it makes you feel any better, hon, I’ll be your family,” Norah said, her eyes sad, and it was clear she was fighting back her own tears.

  “Thanks,” Brandon said as he righted himself, glancing around the room where all eyes were upon him. “I—I’ll be all right. I’m sure I have a distant cousin twice removed out in the world somewhere.”

  “For what it’s worth, champ, I think we’re all a little bit family now,” Ralph added, wiping a speck of dust from the corner of his eye. “I know we’ve only just found each other very recently, but I
think I can speak for the rest of us when I say that we’re here for each other.”

  The rest of the group nodded and smiled warmly. After only a few silent moments, it was Clay’s turn at the telephone.

  Clay felt numb as he dialed Valerie’s number, knowing he wouldn’t hear her voice on the other end. Immediately, after the busy signal began, he slammed the phone, sensing Alayna’s eyes upon him. He ignored them, quivering.

  “Did all of you dial cell phones? Or did you dial landlines?” he asked then, trying to find reason in this madness.

  “Cell phone, course,” Ralph said.

  “Cell phone,” Norah agreed. “I don’t know anyone with a landline any more. No one but me.”

  Alayna stepped forward. “Are you thinking all the cell phone towers are down, not just ours?”

  “Not sure,” Clay said, staring down at the phone’s face. The black buttons were menacing, now, offering so much disappointment. “I wonder if I can check my voice mail.”

  He dialed into his cellular service provider, waiting for his outgoing message. After a pause that seemed to stretch on forever, his prerecorded voice began. He stopped the recording by punching in his password easily—his daughter’s birth date—and then waited, hearing the robotic woman tell him that he had seven new voice mails.

  “Seven,” he mouthed to Alayna, gesturing to the phone.

  “Oh my god,” Alayna whispered, her shoulders tense.

  Seven felt like too many. Seven felt desperate.

  Clay shifted his weight against the lab’s block wall, gazing out, his eyes becoming bleary.

  Chapter 66

  The first was from Valerie. Her voice wasn’t as light and friendly as he was used to, but it was her, and that was enough to cause his breath to catch.

  “Hey, baby,” she said. “Wanted to tell you we made it out past the edge of town, but just barely. Strangely, traffic is at a standstill. We’ve not moved in nearly an hour and there’s no sign of that changing. Several of that wretched colonel’s military cars have been blazing along the side of the road. I tried to wave one of them down to see what was going on, but they nearly ran me over, not even slowing to avoid me. Maia and I are staying positive though. She’s still feeling warm from the flu, but we’re going to schedule manicures just as soon as we pull into Austin. I’ll get them painted that deep red that you like. Anyway, just thought I’d keep you updated. Maia and I both love you to pieces and can’t wait until we’re together again.”

  The next message was a bit more urgent. Valerie’s voice was high-pitched, nervous—the one she reserved for those nights when he was a bit tardy after a shift. She worried about him. Always, to her worry, Clay had said, “It’s just Carterville. We’ve moved here because it’s safe. You know that.”

  “Hey, Clay. It’s me again,” the message began. “I know you’re busy. But if you could call me as soon as you can, I really need to talk to you. They lied to all of us. As soon as we got moving again, they wouldn’t let us off the road. We tried to turn onto highway six, but they had roadblocks put up. Now we’re about to head into Helen, and from what it looks like from here, there are more roadblocks ahead. I really need to hear from you, Clay. Please call either Maia or my cell. Love you lots.”

  Concern caused Clay’s brow to furrow, and he could feel the questioning eyes beat upon him from the group surrounding him. He pressed on.

  Valerie sounded terribly hurried on the third message.

  “Clay, I’m officially freaking out here. They’ve taken Maia to the infirmary because of the flu. I told them that she’d be fine with me, but the army doctor was insistent that they could help her.” He heard her take a shaky breath. “And that bastard Colonel Wallace seems to have gotten his way after all. Everyone from Carterville has been quarantined here in Helen. They’re not letting anyone leave. God, Clay. I’m so scared. I know you’ll come when you can, but please make it quick.”

  Clay felt an impending sense of dread as the fourth message began, and then the fifth, and the sixth, all explaining that things were getting worse—that she needed him there.

  Around Clay, the other survivors craned their necks, trying to listen to the messages. But the words were only for Clay.

  Finally, the last message began, with a great howling from his beloved wife. “OH GOD, CLAY,” it began, turning into a screech of fear. “OH GOD. I DON’T KNOW WHERE YOU ARE. But hurry. I don’t know what’s going on, but the entire town’s gone crazy. The colonel said that you knew all about this. Is that true? People are talking, and rumor has it it’s the whole world. Oh god, Clay, and they still won’t tell me what happened to Maia. God, Clay. I really need you.” As she spoke, Clay could picture her beautiful, tired eyes. He could remember the first time they’d kissed as teenagers, how he’d inhaled the scent of her and tucked her close to him in the back of his car.

  The message crept on, and Clay had the sense that she was staggering around, her eyes manic, her voice lost to hysteria. After what seemed like an eternity, Clay began to hear gunshots in the distance. His wife screamed a final time—a gut-wrenching scream that forced the blood to drain from Clay’s face.

  He couldn’t speak. He tapped the phone, forcing the message to play once more. And then again. He tried to get a sense for her surroundings—for any sense of hope. During the third run-through, he made eye contact with Alayna and then hit the speaker function on the phone, blaring out Valerie’s scream to the survivors.

  The moment the scream halted and the message stopped, Ralph punched his fist into his open palm, wrinkles pinching between his eyebrows. A sense of doom settled over the room—another low after a slight high. Clay clutched the phone to his chest, hearing his wife scream over and over again. He couldn’t bring himself to stop.

  Chapter 67

  After several minutes more, Alayna came forward, taking the phone from Clay, and dropped it to the counter. She grabbed onto Clay’s shoulders and shook him, attempting to bring him back to reality. “Clay!” she cried. “Clay. There’s nothing you can do from here. Come on.”

  From here, Clay played over and over in his mind. Around them, the other survivors had grown hysteric. Brandon leaned heavily upon his knees, quivering. “It’s all over. It’s all really over,” he said to himself.

  Norah pushed her cane forward, her eyes to the ground. Ralph began to speak to himself, muttering Connie’s name and some other unrecognizable gibberish. “So, it’s true,” he finally said for all to hear. “They’re all dead now. And—”

  “Maybe not,” Clay spouted, stepping back. “Maybe they’re not dead. We can’t know that.”

  “We heard gunfire,” Brandon said, scoffing. “What else do you think happened? You have to see the reality here, Clay. You’re law enforcement. You know the world.”

  But Clay shook his head vehemently. “That gunfire doesn’t mean that Valerie’s dead,” he said, beginning to pace. “Sure, the military had guns for the infected. Not for the innocent.”

  “Who’s to say that your wife wasn’t infected?” Ralph asked, his eyes far away.

  “She didn’t sound infected,” Clay argued. “She wouldn’t have called me if she was. That’s not how this works.” He said it with certainty, internally knowing that the more time passed, the less he seemed to know. He turned his eyes toward Jacobs, but the scientist had backed toward the corner, almost hiding from the rest of them.

  “They were surely just killing the crazed,” Clay declared with finality. “No one else.”

  Daniels burst forward then, chiming in. “Well then, does that mean you think that people are generally alive outside of our quasi-safe zone? Outside of this contained energy field? Even with all those crazed monsters out there, infecting each other, tearing into one another?” His eyes were fierce, bright. He was shifting into action mode, as he’d been trained. And Clay’s inability to “see the truth,” in Daniels’s eyes, wouldn’t get in the way.

  Clay breathed heavily. His mind raced, turning the images of his w
ife and daughter over and over in his mind. They had to be safe. They had to be okay. He remembered teaching Maia to shoot a gun just the year before, how she’d blasted through the center of the target. He’d told her she was a deadeye. She’d rolled her own eyes, scoffing slightly, but accepted the compliment. “Whatever, Dad. Not like I’ll ever need it.”

  God, how wrong they’d been. Wrong about everything. Wrong about the very way in which he spent his life, spent his time. He felt Alayna’s fingers at the nape of his neck, kneading at his skin—a reminder that she was still there for him, body and soul. But this assurance felt dead.

  Jacobs stepped toward the phone, finally making an effort. Clay looked at him as if he were alien. He lifted the phone and addressed the survivors. “It doesn’t do us any good to panic,” he said.

  “What do you care?” Brandon asked then. “You were perfectly fine allowing us to die before. You didn’t even tell us about the location of the bomb until it was almost too late. It’s like you want the world to end.”

  “And you started all of this!” Ralph sneered from the corner. His face was pale, gaunt. He looked older and more ragged with each passing moment.

  Jacobs gave them a simple smile. “If you want to point your finger at me, that’s perfectly fine. I know every someone needs someone else to detest. And I’ve become that persona.”

  Alayna sneered. Clay turned toward her, lifting a finger. “Let’s listen to what he has to say,” he said.

  Jacobs continued seamlessly. “I think we should call another lab. A friend of mine works in Minneapolis, and I heard from him as recently as four days ago. He was perfectly fine. Microwaving a frozen dinner, in fact, and minding his own business. No sign of crisis.”

  A small spark of hope lit in Clay’s heart. Jacobs dialed the number then pressed the speakerphone button, his eyes grey and blank. The phone blared out a ringing sound as it connected to the tucked-away lab in Minnesota, but no one answered. Thirty seconds of wait turned to two minutes, and still the survivors’ eyes remained upon Jacobs.