Humanity's Edge- The Complete Trilogy

by Paul B. Kohler

  “Well, well,” the general said, his voice deeper than Clay remembered it. “If it isn’t the man of the hour. Sheriff Clay Dobbs.” He said the word “sheriff” sarcastically, as if it was a made-up title in a world he’d constructed. “To be frank, I thought I’d never have to deal with you again. I thought you’d been squeezed out long ago. Better that than me having to flick you away, like some sort of fly.”

  Clay crossed his hands over his chest, impressed by the sheer magnitude of the general’s God complex. “You really think you own the world, don’t you?”

  “Own it?” the general asked. “Clay, there is no world but this one. This one right here, between these barriers. Do you know how I know that?” He gave Clay an ominous smile, then barked at his soldiers, “Get everyone off the bus! Disarm them. Take everything they have.”

  The soldiers boarded the bus, yanking Megan, Lane, Alayna, even Maia out roughly and pushing them into a line. Clay told himself, over and over, that it wasn’t yet time to lose his cool. Maia blinked at him from the line, her bottom lip quivering. He reminded himself that she was his number one responsibility. If nothing else, he would make sure she lived. He’d die making sure of it.

  Clay turned back toward the general, lifting an eyebrow.

  “I suppose you don’t want to know why I came all the way here? Just to shoot the shit, you probably think?” Clay said.

  The general guffawed. The sound was unnatural, like metal scratching against metal. Clay’s stomach twisted.

  “Someone’s coming after you, General,” Clay said. “Someone with numbers much higher than yours, and—as far as I can tell—more weapons. You'll have no chance against them when they get here. They’ll take everything you’ve got. And the leader, Malcolm? He’s probably crazier than you. Although I can’t say that for sure.”

  The general assessed Clay for a long moment, his grin growing wider, more sure. He laughed merrily, seeming to mock the way normal, happy people laughed. With their body, their soul.

  But within seconds, he was upright once more, snapping his fingers. The larger of the two bi-pass doors opened behind him, revealing a troop of maybe a hundred soldiers. They were shadowed, gaunt, almost skeletal. And as they marched forward in precise unison, Clay’s heart sank.

  Each ‘soldier’ was a former human. Each was a crazed. And they seemed to be at the total and complete mercy of the general, who remained staring at Clay with a kind of horrible, mind-bending arrogance.

  Chapter 65

  The soldiers marched: left, right. Left, right. The greyish tone of their bodies was incredibly apparent in the light, as they emerged from the shadows of the warehouse. Their eyes were volatile, wild, filled with all the emotions Clay felt. Stirring madly. Making his insides scream.

  KILL HIM, the voices cried. EAT HIM. MURDER HIM.

  The words were so deafening that Clay couldn’t ignore them. They felt personal. He could understand the unique voice and personality of each of the walking corpses before him, and he was sickened by all that was lost in to the world. Faced with the man who’d made this all happen—the general himself—Clay felt rage. A murderous kind of rage.

  But even as he his mind swam through his incredible, intense fit of anger, Clay noticed that he could “feel” the pull of the device the general was using as well. His feet twitched beneath him as the crazeds’ feet landed. His elbows twitched with theirs. More than once, he felt himself pulled forward, his physical body yearning to join their ranks.

  LEFT. RIGHT. EAT. FLESH. TEAR. BONE. LEFT. RIGHT.

  As sweat began to pour down his cheeks and forehead, he felt a hand on his bicep, holding him back. He looked back into the eyes of Lane. She gave him a knowing nod, muttering, “The device. It can control you, too. Can’t it?”

  Clay hadn’t the time to answer. The general began to brag. “This isn’t all of them, Clay. I have several hundred more. And as soon as we round up more of them—rather easy in this new environment—I’ll have the best army the world has ever seen. An army unrivaled by anything in Ancient China. The Greeks? They would have been slaughtered by the likes of my men. God knows, these soldiers? They’re fighting machines. They yearn for nothing else but flesh. Even now, standing there, they’re licking their lips. They want to rip into each and every one of you. But I’m holding them back.”

  “How kind of you,” Clay snapped.

  The general stopped the march, giving Clay time to regroup and regain control. After a deep breath, Clay pushed himself forward, stopping just feet from the general’s face.

  “But these aren’t your soldiers,” Clay said.

  “What the hell are you talking about?” the general asked, his eyes flickering dangerously.

  “They aren’t yours. They still belong to themselves,” Clay said. He’d never verbalized this opinion before, but he somehow knew their truth. “You have to see it in their eyes. There are humans inside those monsters. Beneath that urge to eat our mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters. Our accountants and our farmers and our truck drivers … the people who fell victim to this hellish science fiction trap. The one you set in motion, General.”

  “Enough!” the general said, clearly disgruntled.

  “Oh, you didn’t want to be reminded of what you did to humanity?” Clay asked, his eyes blazing. “Because I think you should think about it. I think you should think about it every second of every day—”

  Then Lois was beside Clay, staring into the ranks of the crazed soldiers. She stuttered, “You—you’ve done it.” Her face blanched. “You really did it. Your plan. It was all you. The reason for the secret labs …”

  “Of course, Lois,” the general smirked. “Look at you, putting the puzzle pieces together,” He gestured toward Lane, Marcia, and Leland, with another gleeful, and somehow ominous look. “And now that my top scientists have found their way back to me, I can move things to the next level. We have so much in production. So much! We just need more expertise to perfect these devices.”

  Lane drew back, suddenly terrified. In Clay’s mind, a million tiny images flashed by—their time on the open road, of Lane protecting Alex, of Lane helping him learn to control the crazed, of Lane fighting beside them, each and every second, just to stay alive.

  He’d be damned if he let the general destroy his group like this. He’d be damned if he let the general win: taking her bright and able mind and using it for such evil. Too much had happened.

  As he stood there, his face turned a blotchy, tomato red. His fists clenched, his knuckles whitened. He could see nothing but bright white streaks. And just as it had before …

  He felt his thoughts tighten and then leap away. The heads of three crazed soldiers suddenly popped, brains spewing across the cracked pavement. Lois shrieked and covered her mouth, in an attempt to stop her own vomit. Clay felt both tears and sweat on his cheeks. As another of the heads burst, like some kind defective fourth of July firework, Clay fell to his knees, gasping.

  The general watched all this, stroking his chin. The four crazed that Clay had destroyed fell to either side of their lines, their limbs splayed.

  “Interesting. Very interesting,” he mused.

  Clay tried to calm his unsteady mind. He didn’t want to murder another one of them. He didn’t want to smell another spray of brain matter, or spilled guts. Gasping, he shifted his eyes toward the general, who was staring at him.

  “Men. Gather everyone. Take the scientists to the lab and put everyone else in the brig.”

  The human soldiers separated and began to divide them up. Clay felt utterly helpless, and his exhaustion made his arms feel like spaghetti.

  “But Sheriff?” the general continued, his eyes glittering. “Don’t get too comfortable. Sounds like we’ve got quite a bit to talk about. Quite a bit, indeed.”

  Chapter 66

  Three of the soldiers herded them toward the side of the warehouse. Clay forced himself to move, watching helplessly as one of the soldiers took Maia’s upper arm, leading her
and Brandon somewhere else. With a lurch of fear, Clay cried out, “Where the hell are you taking them?”

  The general raised an eyebrow, clearly loving the way he could control Clay—like a puppeteer and a puppet. He cackled. “Contrary to what you might believe, I’m no monster, Clay. They’re children, for humanity’s sake. I wouldn’t throw them into the brig. That would be just cruel.”

  The irony of his words gave Clay pause. He had no ready response. His eyes followed Maia as far as they could. Another soldier was guiding Lane, Leland, and Marcia toward the lab, jabbing Lane in the back with his rifle. She stumbled at each thrust. Without even seeing her face, Clay sensed that she was crying quietly. Her allegiance to their troop was apparent. But now she was a tool in the general’s game.

  A hundred yards away from the large warehouse there was another. Two of the soldiers pushed the door open, revealing a wide-open expanse with a concrete stairwell off to one side, leading down and out of sight. Clay felt like a cow being herded to slaughter as the soldiers chivvied them to the staircase, and then down into the darkness below. Their movement remained constrained, preventing Clay from establishing any semblance of an escape.

  The room was nearly equal in size to the space above, save the voluminous ceiling. On the far side, Clay could see the brig. It was nothing extraordinary, but it was enough to house dozens of prisoners easily. When they were closer, he could see several different cells. Their bars were sturdy, thick, and each cell closed at a corner, locked with what appeared to be a large skeleton key.

  Megan slid up beside Clay. “I can’t believe you got us in this fucking mess, Clay,” she muttered. “Although knowing you, you lackluster sheriff for all those years …”

  Clay kept his lips pressed together. He tried to remember exactly what he’d thought would happen upon their arrival. But now, exhausted from the destruction of the crazed, and being separated, again, from Maia, he could muster no response. He felt the rifle prod his shoulders, pushing him into the first of several cells. He dropped on a bench in the corner, bringing his hands to his forehead.

  “Fuck,” he yelled, as the other members of his crew were filed into cells of their own. They huddled together at the far end of each cell, eyes darting around like frightened animals. Rex, like Megan, was staring at Clay with hooded eyes, blaming him. And all the while, Clay felt the urgency of Malcolm’s clan coming: their guns prepped and their minds energized, charged by Malcolm’s charismatic rage.

  They would be faced by an army of the general’s crazed: all burning with the desire to tear into their flesh. And somewhere in the middle—between the bullets and the rotting flesh, would be Clay’s team. Certain to be destroyed in the chaos.

  And it was all his fault.

  Chapter 67

  Maybe an hour later, Clay remained perched at the edge of his cell, unmoving, unspeaking. He could hear several of the others around him, clearly despondent. Agnes seemed worried about Brandon and was whispering to Hank, “Do you think if I reason with the general, he’ll bring Brandon over here? I mean, I’ve taken such a liking to him. I feel like a mother figure or something. I want to make sure he’s being …”

  Clay tuned the chatter out, which gave him a moment’s reprieve. This feeling that his people were human first. That they were worried about one another, rather than simply angry at his decisions. But another wave of fear reminded him that his daughter was alone as well. She was still so terribly thin, weak—having to take frequent naps. The minute the attack began …

  He needed to get close to her.

  Smashing his fists on his thighs, he jumped up and began to pace his cell, alerting everyone to his anxiety. They said nothing, allowing the silence to hang heavy. After several minutes, Clay heard a crack at the door into the brig. The door swung open, and three armed soldiers came in. One pushed the key into Clay’s door.

  “You’re letting us out now, huh?” Megan asked sarcastically.

  “Just him,” the soldier said. “And I think ‘out’ is the wrong term, here. Trust me. You don’t want to go where he’s going.”

  Clay forced himself not to look at his crew. He didn’t want to see the fear in their eyes—or, worse, forgiveness.

  The soldiers escorted him back up the stairs, and across the grey tundra just outside the warehouse. The grass was grizzled like an old man’s hair, burnt up beneath the sun. It crunched under his feet and he wondered if anything would ever grow again.

  “Pick up your feet,” one of the soldiers ordered.

  Angry, Clay snapped, “Only if you tell me what you’ve done with my daughter.”

  The soldiers didn’t answer, and Clay could do nothing but follow, past the first warehouse toward a smaller facility, and then down another set of white-painted stairs. This basement had a single door, with a latch like a submarine’s, sealed tight. The lead soldier un-cranked it, revealing a gleaming white laboratory. Bulbous brains, twisted and grey, floated in jars around the large room. And deep in the back, Clay could make out Lane’s bobbing, brown ponytail.

  Immediately, he felt a jolt of happiness. At least the three of them were still all right. Apparently, they were necessary for the General’s plan.

  To the right, elevator doors slid open and the general and two guards stepped out. The general gave clay a look that invited Clay to say something he’d regret.

  He took the bait. “Goddammit, General. Whatever you want to do to me, make sure that Maia’s protected. That’s all I ask.”

  The general snapped his fingers. Marcia, Lane, and Leland arrived at his side, all three red-cheeked. Lane’s eyes were bloodshot, as if her crying had continued the entire hour they’d been apart. Marcia’s normal temperamental attitude had been glossed over by fear. Her eyes were downcast.

  “And tell me, Clay. How would you have me ‘protect’ your girl? You would have me let her go, is that it? Let her roam around outside, unable to defend herself? The poor girl probably doesn’t even know how to shoot a gun. I bet you’re regretting that, now, aren’t you?” the general asked, leering at Clay. “Poor, weak, little girl. All hungry and tired. Guess you’ll have to take your chances on my generosity, won’t you? Guess it’s your only option?”

  Clay knew the general was right. Regardless, his fists raised. Two of the guards reached for his arms, pulling him back. Clay’s mind stirred, making him dizzy. “What’s your grand plan, anyway, General? Once you get your big army going, what’s the next step? Just gonna sit here in your ivory tower?”

  The general clicked his tongue. “Well, isn’t this something. The bigwig sheriff doesn’t have a clue what I’m getting up to, does he? Hah. Well, frankly, Clay, I’m disappointed. I would have thought you assumed I’d already been speaking with the other world leaders. They’re ready to buy devices as quickly as we can make them. Ready to control their own armies of the dead. This is the future, Clay. This isn’t just business. It’s the way the world spins now.”

  Clay seethed. He strained trying to get free from the soldiers. “Is this how you get off? Playing war games with crazed monsters? Is this your power trip? The undead?”

  The general reached behind his back, drawing one of the devices. He pointed it at Clay’s heart. Before Clay could scream his protest, the general cranked it up.

  Clay felt it instantly. Electricity, up and down his arms and legs, trying to drag him closer toward the general. He mustered up his energy, clenched his fists, and fought it. His eyeballs bulged from his sockets as he pushed against it, trying to stay in place. Even the General’s soldiers had released their grip from his arms, watching his struggle. It was just Clay versus the device.

  And somehow, it was working.

  “Goddammit,” the general muttered, upping the setting. The moment he did that, Clay felt himself drop to his knees. The world around him spun wildly. He attempted to steady himself, to pull himself upright. But the general continued to rail the device’s energy at upon him.

  Then, Clay saw only darkness.

&nbs
p; Chapter 68

  Clay tossed and rolled on the ground, every inch of him in pain. A scream escaped his throat, but he could hardly hear it over the thoughts of the crazed just outside. Somehow, his scream was only adding to their chorus, their inward agony.

  While he writhed, the general motioned two of his guards to take him. They did, yanking him from the floor and tossing him on a chair. Clay saw nothing but bright spots when the general shut down the device down. But before he could recover, the soldiers had shackled him to the chair, clamping his biceps and forearms. He strained, feeling his skin break. Small droplets of blood appeared.

  “You bastard!” Clay gasped. “Let me go. You can’t just treat people like—”

  The general snapped his fingers. “Marcia. I told you what to do, and you better goddamn do it.”

  Crying openly, Marcia inserted a needle into Clay’s forearm. Clay watched, petrified, as she pressed the plunger in then pulled needle from his skin. Nearly instantly, his legs grew lax. Two soldiers pushed a large metal cage into the room. Inside, a crazed thrashed against the wire mesh, ramming its skull against the sides, its blood-soaked hair whipping around. It bared its teeth, biting its own lips and digging into the scabs. Clay stared at the strange being, trying to read the once-man’s thoughts. Trying to “feel” what was going on behind his eyes.

  But the general interrupted his concentration. “Do something,” he ordered. “Like you did before. Pop his head off, anything. I want to see.”

  “No,” Clay said with finality. “Absolutely not.”

  “Ha.” The general leaned closer to him. “What could I do to get it going for you, Clay? What would make you obedient?” His eyes danced. “What if—hmm. What if I bring that pretty daughter of yours in here and let the monster loose? Would that help you, Clay? Would that encourage you to do what I want?”