Plaguelands (Slayers Book 1)

by Jae Hill

  Wounded biologic humans of all nationalities were being brought to the makeshift medical facility. The Kergueleni medics and doctors were processing wounded soldiers rapidly, applying what they officially called “bioplasmic goo” to the wounds. This paste of white blood cells, proteins, free lipids, platelets, and amino acids allowed for almost instantaneous healing of critical wounds: I even watched a man’s arm be tenuously reattached using a rapid surgical procedure and then slathered with copious amounts of the goo. Every patient who’d come in contact with the zombies’ blood or had been bitten was given an injection of hunter-killer nanobots to clear out the infection. The total time from when a patient arrived to when they were in a recovery bed was a matter of minutes.

  But not everyone had survived the long night. The dead were laid out in rows in the camp, covered with sheets, or simply with their armored helmets placed over their lifeless faces. There were hundreds at first, and as the tide of the battle slowed, more and more were brought up the hill.

  Rebekah and I returned to the command tent with General Skygard at our side. We introduced her to Major Christensen, Captain Holland, and Jonah. Everyone was initially very confused by her arrival and the arrival of her forces, but they all expressed gratitude. We might have still won the night without the Kergueleni, but at a much greater cost of life.

  I’d been away from the command tent for hours, but the company commanders had controlled the battle at the practical level, and the command staff at the tent had led admirably. Our forces had now moved east and crossed the river on a counterattack, meeting up with and relieving the Ceruleans who were getting exhausted after hours of direct contact with the enemy behind their front line.

  We started taking inventory of our losses, even as the last throes of the battle raged on. The “Freelanders” and Magic Valley locals had taken the most grievous losses of the night, with almost half of their number critically wounded or killed. The Californians had fared surprisingly well for biologic forces, with about one in every five killed and one in every five wounded. The Cascadian volunteers had taken substantial losses with just under a quarter killed, and many in need of repair. The enhanced-form bodies weren’t meant for direct action against the zombies, as the marshal had once said; as soon the CNS casing was cracked, death was all but assured. The Kergueleni had lost only two of their Cerulean Knights, with a few other “walking wounded” being treated at the field hospital.

  The combined human forces had paid dearly for the defense of the valley, but by the time the sun had risen to midday, the last of the zombies had been obliterated. Kergueleni aircraft plucked dead and wounded humans and enhanced forms from the battlefield before setting the whole grassland ablaze with plasma bombs, trying to burn the pools of zombie blood in order to prevent a disease vector.

  Initial contact with the zombie forces was reported by Colonel Kelly at Green River. A large contingent of Kergueleni soldiers and aircraft departed to augment those forces. Combat air and ground patrols were sent out to pick off the zombie stragglers all along the front ranges of the Rocky Mountains.

  I contacted the orbital task force and requested that they direct their attention to the Green River area. As expected, the zombies there were fighting fiercely with the Californian scouts but, without the ULF broadcasts, they were no longer exhibiting any intelligence or coordinated efforts. Furthermore they were clustering on the east side of the river, setting up a perfect orbital strike.

  I dialed up Marshal Burnham. The signal was relayed from my digibook to Andromeda Rising where it bounced to Luna and then to Mars via tachyon burst. The delay was noticeable and distracting as we spoke, but not impossible to carry on the conversation.

  “Marshal,” I said upon seeing his face on the screen. “We’ve defeated over two hundred thousand zombies here at Highway Bridge. Our central forces are currently engaged with approximately one hundred fifty thousand zombies at Green River.”

  I explained about the destruction of the ULF arrays and the instantaneous impact on the zombies. I described how the battle was devolving into one of attrition until the Kergueleni arrived and ensured victory. I described the coordinated tactics, the bravery, and the losses of all of our allies.

  He sat there, slightly smiling at my good news. When I finished detailing my report, he spoke for the first time.

  “Commander Faustus, I couldn’t be more pleased by your report,” he said proudly. “This is a great victory for humanity. The Senate has been debating a treaty with the Californians all night, and it seems that now we need to consider the locals and the Kergueleni as well. With their assistance and sacrifice, they’ve proven themselves worthy allies. For nearly four hundred years, we’ve not needed to maintain diplomatic relations with anyone outside our own people. Your leadership and cooperation with the outsiders is commended, and will be rewarded, I assure you.”

  “I will relay all of this information personally to President Cohen and to the Senate,” he continued. “I’ll see you soon. Keep up the good work. You have the full faith, confidence, and assets of the Fleet at your disposal.”

  He saluted on the screen with his fist to his chest, and I did the same, before the transmission ended.

  “So what now?” Rebekah asked.

  “We finish up at Green River,” I said, “then we pick up all the pieces.”

  The Cascadians at Green River had given Colonel Kelly a digibook and we stayed in contact with him throughout the day. The Californian scouts and Kergueleni air forces had herded the zombie horde into a cluster on the east bank of the river. The swift, deep river had acted as a barrier to the horde’s movement, exactly as expected. Andromeda’s orbital strike decimated the horde in one blow, and then the Cascadian volunteers crossed the river in dropships, cleaning up the surviving zombies, before the Kergueleni air forces used plasma fire to purify the bloodied land. All told, the central front was a much cleaner victory, with relatively minor loss of life at only four hundred dead allied forces and an equal number of wounded. By evening, the Battle of Green River was over.

  The next few days were spent in camp just south of Highway Bridge. The locals from Magic Valley made several trips out to thank us, to bring home-cooked food, and to help tend to the wounded. The Kergueleni medics even treated some of the sick and wounded locals who hadn’t been involved in the combat.

  Rebekah went into town to visit her great aunt, Leah. I considered going with her, but coordinating the after-action logistics was even more difficult than coordinating the battle. It was a skill I wasn’t prepared for, so I called on some Fleet officers from Halberd to come down and help run the operation. Leading, I had learned, wasn’t about doing things, but rather surrounding myself with good people and trusting them to do things.

  Halberd had also sent down four warrior forms to guard one very important prisoner. Two of them stood guard outside the tent and two of them kept watch on him inside at all times.

  I pushed open the flap to the tent and he smirked at me.

  END GAME

  “I was really surprised to see you leading this,” the Reverend sneered at me. “But I guess with all the robots dead, they needed someone to do their dirty work.”

  I walked over to him and decided to wipe the smile off his face. My first punch landed across his nose, swinging his head violently to the left. My next one landed on his chin and whipped his head back to the right. His eyes went wide with fear as I pulled back for another, but then he started smirking again.

  “Where’s Persephone?” I asked.

  “How should I know?” he said nonchalantly.

  “Because you do,” I replied. “I know you do.”

  “And why should I tell you anything?” he snarled.

  “Because if you do, you’ll be blessed with a life in prison or a quick return to your space-god. If you don’t, this is going to take a very long time.”

  “You don’t frighten me, child,” he snapped. “You seem to forget that only a few months ago I had you in
a cage.”

  “And how quickly the tables have turned,” I retorted.

  “How quickly they could change again,” he said slyly.

  I held up a pen and a pad of paper that I’d gotten from the Californians, then slid those across the table toward him.

  “You’re a man who likes to talk,” I said coldly. “So tell me everything, in as much detail as possible. As long as you’re writing, you’ll stay alive.”

  He looked at me, then at the two giant metal robots staring at him from either side of the room.

  “I guess all our sins catch up to us someday,” he laughed. “Don’t forget yours.”

  Disgusted to be in his presence, I left the room, as he started scribbling.

  The damaged Cascadian enhanced forms from Highway Bridge and Green River were evacuated by dropship to the Yellowstone Preserve, where the research center had been temporarily converted into a makeshift repair facility. Each robot body had been individually built to mimic the original dimensions and movements of the organic user who had been transplanted into the body, so the repairs weren’t as simple as attaching a new arm where one had been torn off. The nerve cells had to be replicated, a new custom arm built, and then surgical attachment of the nerves and fluid tubes. It was much more complex than healing a human, especially considering the way the Kergueleni healed with their “goo.”

  Rebekah rejoined me and we went with Captain Holland and a few other Cascadian officers to Yellowstone to visit the wounded. I use the words “wounded” and “damaged” interchangeably, because while they are technically damaged robots, they’re still also wounded humans. While we were in one of the warehouses that served as a makeshift hospital ward, I heard a commotion behind me. I turned around to see Marshal Burnham standing there, shaking the hand of a damaged man whose synthetic skin had been chewed away from his face.

  “Marshal!”

  I walked briskly over to him and saluted, which he returned.

  “Commander Faustus,” he said, “you’ve done very well. President Cohen sends his regards…and this.”

  He withdrew a shiny, platinum seven-pointed star, suspended from a ribbon of the light blue, white, and forest green colors of the flag.

  “This is the Cascadian Order of Valor,” he said proudly, “our nation’s highest award. For your defense of the Republic, for your forging of new alliances, and for your bravery in combat, you have been given an award that’s been received by only four other souls since the founding of the Cascadian Republic.”

  I touched the silky ribbon, and then he pinned it on the left breast of my blue Fleet uniform. I noticed now how strange it looked to have the uniform and insignia of a Republic Commander with no other service ribbons than the highest honor the country could bestow. I was about to thank him, but he continued speaking.

  “I also bring you an accepted treaty, drafted and ratified by nearly a full count of the Senate of the Cascadia Republic, to make a lasting peace with the California Republic on the terms they proposed. I further bring instruction from that same lawmaking body, with the insistence of the President of the Republic, that you are to enter into negotiations for a lasting alliance with the Dominion of Kerguelen and the people of the…ahem…Free Lands. So be it resolved.”

  I was speechless. I stared at the medal on my chest. I stared at the marshal. At Rebekah.

  “Thank you,” I whispered.

  “And finally,” he said, “I have a message recorded here from President Cohen in Tharsis City.”

  The marshal withdrew his digibook and played the video for me.

  “Pax Faustus, son of the great Herodotus Faustus and the admirable Juno Faustus, I thank you for your great service to the Republic in its most desperate hour since our nation was born under fire over four hundred years ago. I wish to relay that the government of the Cascadia Republic grants you a clemency from the crimes under which you were previously under investigation, and you have completely fulfilled your obligations under your agreement with the late President Sandstrom. You are once again eligible to undergo your transformation, once you are free of your current duties as commander.

  Your courage and your leadership has shown most of us in the government that you don’t need an enhanced body to be a great person or a person of importance, and that in some ways, the enhanced form is a hindrance to the very things that make us human. Such that we are a human race with very little humanity left, we are also the titular Cascadia Republic, but with a strongly diminished presence in that Cascadia region due to the atrocities and horrors committed upon us in the last few weeks. The world has changed, seemingly overnight. Foreign relations must now be had. Borders must be drawn. Treaties must be enforced and trade must prosper once more. The great cities and communities of the Republic must be repopulated by a new migration to Earth for the first time in the history of the planet. It’s a time of great change for the Republic, for the Earth, and indeed for the human race.

  I ask for your support in one more role to benefit the future of the Cascadia Republic: to serve as our ambassador to a new Terran League, a global body which we would like to see established to further the cause of international relations on Earth. We propose building an international, demilitarized, and cosmopolitan city where the Rogue River meets the Pacific Ocean, on the newly established border between the Cascadian and Californian Republics, and with port access for the Kergueleni ships. I also charge you to strike out across the planet with our new allies, finding societies who would like to join this Terran League and rejoin the collective human race. We’ll be installing a series of ultra-low-frequency emitters to ensure that we push the zombies back across the continent in the other direction, and we can begin reclaiming the planet for humanity and the Cascadia Republic.

  I thank you again for your continued service.”

  The marshal put down the digibook and spoke again.

  “This isn’t a robot planet anymore. It’s a human planet, again. We only have a few thousand humans—Outcasts and rejects, mostly—scattered across Cascadian lands. Only a few dozen enhanced forms. With the zombie threat still out there, and other Earthly nations more powerful than our presence, it’s going to take diplomacy and a…‘human touch’ to create an alliance to safeguard the future.”

  “The repopulation of Earth will begin immediately,” he continued. “A new Senator will be elected from among your formal population and a non-voting Observer to the Senate will be elected from the Outlands. Of course, you’ll keep your rank as commander as long as you hold your office as Ambassador to this proposed Terran League.”

  I was stunned.

  “Sir, there are people who wait their whole lives—long, long lives—for a position like this. I’m just a kid.”

  “No, Pax,” Burnham said, smiling that waxy robotic smile. “You’re a man, and you’ve already led an alliance to victory. Anything less would be an insult.”

  Rebekah was smiling and quietly clapping her hands.

  “I am honored by your offer, sir,” I said proudly, “and I humbly accept.”

  “In the interim,” Burnham said, “we’ll be assigning a new chief administrator to help oversee the repopulation efforts. He or she will formally report to the Senate Colonization Committee, but he’ll be subordinate to you on all matters of foreign affairs.”

  “I’ll admit, I’m unclear what a chief administrator is,” I said. “We’ve never had one before.”

  “Oh, we have them on all colony planets,” Marshal Burnham laughed.

  “Earth is just a colony now?” Rebekah asked.

  “It seems silly, I know,” he replied. “But we’re instating a quarantine of the planet that may last some time. No biologics may leave until otherwise notified. We can only hope to protect the rest of our society from Persephone’s virus and C-virus by keeping them contained on Earth. It doesn’t make sense to have your capitol on a quarantined world.”

  I was insulted at first. Angry, actually. We were becoming prisoners on our own plane
t, and relegated from being the center of the human universe to being “just a colony.” But then I realized that ever since the bulk of human population had moved beyond the elevator, we had basically been “just a colony” of a galactic people with some nostalgic reason to call Earth home. Now, with the decimation of the enhanced-form population on the planet, there was only pain in calling it the capitol of anything.

  “The permanent and perpetual Capitol of the Republic will be moved to the planet of Theron, actually, outside of this solar system. We’ll keep running things from Mars for a while, but Theron has a much larger population and is essentially the industrial and economic hub of the known universe. I hope to see you there someday, Pax Faustus.”

  He saluted me one more time.

  “You’ll receive further instructions and be given whatever resources you need to maintain the glory of the Republic. The only thing we’re taking from you is the title of capital, and we’re returning to you the name of the city of New Vancouver. I’ll be at FleetCom on Luna if you need anything from me.”

  With that, he turned and departed, shaking the hands of a few more wounded soldiers on his way out.

  Shaking their hands, I noted.

  I still had mixed feelings about this recent turn of events, but I’ll admit, I’d rather be here with Rebekah and the ghosts of my friends and family, than crated up and unwrapped on some far away alien world like Theron or Alternis. I still had to think about undergoing the surgery and transforming, what that would mean to Rebekah and me. Though I’d been too busy to deal with it, I still had to contend with the painful loss of most of my friends and family.

  Suddenly a rush of emotions washed over me and I just felt tired…very, very tired. There was only ever one thing I liked to do when I felt so overwhelmed.

  “So what are you going to do first, Mister Ambassador?” Rebekah said, kissing me and then nuzzling my ear.