Extinction War

by Nicholas Smith

  She showed them a clean room and two labs. Each was sealed off with translucent plastic walls. There were various tables and equipment set up inside, but Kate saw only one other scientist working in the space.

  “Where is everyone?” Kate asked.

  Bruno pointed at the scientist in a CBRN suit working in the lab. “It’s just me and Doctor Orlov.”

  Kate had a dozen questions she wanted to ask, but she remained silent, letting Bruno do the talking.

  “There were a dozen of us, all from different countries, at the beginning. The French were leading the project, but one by one we lost members of our team while testing our work.”

  Alarm bells started ringing in Kate’s mind. Horn stepped up next to Kate, apparently sensing something was off, just as she did.

  “What do you mean, exactly?” Kate asked.

  Bruno pivoted away from the labs so she could look at Kate and Horn in turn.

  “We had to use ourselves as test subjects in order to get where we are,” Bruno said. She shrugged. “There was no one else. It was a risk we all took because of the importance of the project. Make no mistake, complete eradication of the hemorrhage virus is the only goal that matters. Anything less would mean extinction.”

  “You tested this shit on yourselves, Doctor Bones?” Horn said, stepping forward.

  “Bruno,” she corrected.

  “Right,” Horn said. “Listen, Kate is a special lady, and she’s six months pregnant, so I don’t want her working in those labs. And I sure as hell don’t want you using her as a lab rat.”

  “We’re not going to do anything to jeopardize her health,” Bruno said. “And I believe the decision is hers, not yours, Mr. Horn.”

  Kate did another scan of the labs. They looked secure, but this wasn’t an ideal place to be doing any sort of research. Had she made a mistake in coming here?

  “Our object here is twofold,” the researcher continued. “First, to find a cure, and second, to study the monsters and help the EUF fight them in Europe.”

  Dr. Orlov took off his CBRN suit and joined them. He eyed Horn suspiciously after sealing the hatch.

  “No, no, no. I said no soldiers,” he said in heavily Russian-accented English. “I told you this how many times, Doctor Bruno?”

  Horn held up his hands and moved in front of Kate. “Whoa! The Cold War’s over, bro. I’m here to help.”

  Orlov fastened his thin gray hair into a ponytail and raised his upper lip in a snarl. “If it were up to me, no American would be allowed on this ship.”

  Horn shot him a cockeyed look as Kate moved between the two men. “Go wait upstairs with your men,” Kate said to Horn.

  “Men? There are more of them?” Orlov said, turning to Bruno.

  “They are waiting on the upper deck,” Bruno said, stepping in. “I made sure of that.”

  “I don’t like this, Kate,” Horn mumbled.

  Orlov raised a brow on his wrinkled forehead at Horn, sizing him up.

  “We were told there would be no soldiers,” Orlov said.

  Kate, sensing things were going to spiral out of control, gently put a hand on Horn’s arm. “It’s okay, you should wait upstairs with your team.”

  He hesitated, and she gave him a reassuring nod before he reluctantly retreated back to the ladder, where he watched for another minute, then moved up the steps.

  “I’m Doctor Kate Lovato,” Kate said, holding a hand out to Orlov in an effort to smooth things over.

  He watched Horn leave and then reached out. “Doctor Andrei Orlov. Pleased to meet you, Doctor.”

  “Likewise,” Kate replied.

  After a brief moment of awkward tension, Bruno waved Kate toward a computer monitor and a desk that held radio equipment. “Now that that’s over, there’s something I want you to hear before we get started.”

  Kate sat in a leather chair in front of the desk and waited while Bruno fired up the computer.

  “We’ve been working with the EUF in multiple cities,” she said. “There’s a soldier in Rome who has been documenting the ongoing metamorphosis of the creatures there. We’ve learned a lot from him.”

  A message played over the speakers in Italian. Bruno translated for Kate.

  “The monsters are emerging from inside cocoons. I’ve come across all sorts of different types, but they all seem to migrate to a colony beneath the Colosseum. They act very much like insects and seem to be obeying a strange rattling noise. I believe there might be some sort of leader or hive Queen controlling them.”

  Kate considered the implications. If the soldier’s observations were correct, then it wasn’t necessarily the radiation that was morphing the monsters in Europe. There was something else going on too, something that had a scientific explanation. Her duty on the Thalassa had just become two missions—find a cure for the hemorrhage virus and figure out what the hell was commanding the mutated armies in Europe.

  16

  Calling it the “highway to hell” wasn’t an exaggeration. Fitz sat in the radio operator’s seat of the MATV, staring in awe at the tunnel, which was wide enough for two armored trucks to drive side by side.

  “Turn on the headlights,” he said.

  Stevenson switched them on as they drove down a dirt ramp into the tunnel. The high beams cut through the darkness and illuminated a road that Wormers had carved under the earth—hundreds of them, judging by the fifteen-foot ceiling and wide dirt walls.

  “This shit is bananas,” Rico said.

  Fitz agreed. For a moment, he had almost forgotten that he was still missing his blades. The grim view was that breathtaking.

  This wasn’t just an escape tunnel—it was a graveyard. The monsters that had died from the radiation bombs were everywhere. Some were burned beyond recognition, making it difficult to identify the beasts.

  A mangled Variant lay sprawled in the middle of the tunnel, the headlights sweeping over sucker lips and filmy yellow eyes.

  Stevenson used the cowcatcher to plow the charred bodies out of the way. Bones crunched under the weight of the two-ton armored vehicle.

  “This is amazing,” Tanaka said.

  “Amazing isn’t exactly the word I would use,” Stevenson said dryly.

  “My ancestors had legends about places like this,” said Dohi. The normally quiet man sat in the back seat with his fingers around a necklace with a black stone that Fitz had never seen before.

  “I hate it when you say shit like that,” Stevenson said. “You know how much it gives me the creeps.”

  “Maybe the Variants aren’t man-made monsters. Maybe they’re demons,” Dohi continued. “The Lakota tell of a creature called Two-Face—a half man, half demon with one face that is human and one that is a monster. In some of the legends Two-Face is a cannibal, but in all of them he kills and disfigures his victims to feed his endless appetite. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?”

  Rico shuddered. “I think I liked it better when you didn’t talk so much,” she said.

  “The hemorrhage virus caused this,” Tanaka chimed in. “Sorry, brother, but that’s science.”

  They fell into silence as they drove deeper into the tunnel. The headlights illuminated a mound of dirt that looked like the gritty sand Fitz had lost his blades in. Stevenson eased off the gas pedal.

  “Is that one of the sand traps?” Rico asked.

  “Yup,” Stevenson replied. “They’re everywhere. I almost got lost trying to find my way out of here earlier.”

  “Keep going,” Fitz said.

  Stevenson maneuvered around a ramp of dirt that nearly reached the ceiling and continued deeper into the passage. A veiny, wrinkled arm protruded from the bottom of the pile, the claws reaching out for the approaching MATV.

  “Christ,” Stevenson said. “Do you see that?”

  “Keep going,” Fitz said when Stevenson slowed.

  “You want me to call Command?” asked Tanaka.

  “No, I’ll do it, but I want more intel before I do,” Fitz said. He couldn’
t quite believe his eyes as they continued forward. The creatures seemed to have evolved into something that more closely resembled insects than humans.

  “The Wormers must have dug the tunnels and then created openings above to let the other beasts through,” he said.

  “So those things aren’t traps then?” Tanaka asked. He leaned forward between the seats for a better view.

  “They’re doors,” Dohi said. “Doors to the underworld.”

  “Ba-na-nas,” Rico said, cracking her gum with each syllable.

  “All y’all shut up,” Stevenson grumbled. “I’m trying to drive here.”

  Fitz took out his compass and waited for the needle to settle. They were still headed north, not toward Paris, but that didn’t mean they wouldn’t intersect the zones through which General Nixon planned on leading his advance toward the capital.

  “You got any idea why these tunnels would be heading north, Dohi?”

  Dohi studied the laminated map on his lap for several moments. “There’s not much between us and the ocean besides some towns that were all evacuated months ago.”

  Fitz tried to relax in his seat, but seeing the stumps sticking out of his fatigues reminded him how helpless he was without his blades.

  For the next thirty minutes, they drove down the winding passages until they came to an intersection that split off into three smaller passages like veins from an artery.

  “Which way?” Stevenson asked.

  Fitz held up the compass. He pointed to the tunnel on the right that was heading east, toward Paris.

  The MATV chugged forward, headlights flitting over roots hanging from the dirt ceiling like skeletal chandeliers. The new tunnel was much narrower, and there were no corpses here.

  A few minutes into the drive, Fitz saw something else hanging from the ceiling.

  “Halt,” he said.

  The truck’s headlights penetrated the inky darkness and captured the bottom of a white sac attached to the dirt roof. Apollo let out a low growl and sat up in the back seat.

  “What is that thing?” Rico asked.

  “Dohi, Tanaka, check it out,” Fitz said.

  Apollo bared his front teeth in a warning growl as the two men stepped out of the MATV. They turned on the tactical lights attached to their suppressed M4s and moved in front of the vehicle, where they directed the beams at the translucent sac. In the glow, Fitz saw what looked like a snake inside a cocoon.

  Suddenly, it moved.

  Rico gasped and cupped her hand over her mouth.

  “Sweet baby Jesus,” Stevenson whispered.

  Fitz didn’t know what to say. He scooted forward as Tanaka and Dohi raked their lights back and forth, revealing more of the sacs. The entire tunnel was covered with them. Goo dripped off the skin of the cocoons and webbed to the ground.

  “Looks as if we’ve figured out how the Variants are mutating,” Rico said quietly.

  “How do you mean?” Fitz whispered back.

  “It’s like when a caterpillar turns into a butterfly,” Rico replied. “Somehow, the radiation must be speeding up the changes we’ve been seeing all along. What doesn’t kill them mutates them.”

  Tanaka and Dohi moved farther away from the MATV, their lights crossing over the cocoons that clung to the walls, ceiling, and ground like eggs. The skin of the sac hanging in front of them bulged as the soldiers approached. The snakelike creature inside slithered and wiggled. Several of the other cocoons had already burst, leaving behind hollow skins that looked like plastic.

  “There have to be hundreds,” Stevenson said. He glanced over at Fitz. “We should start thinking about getting out of here, man.”

  Fitz scooted his thighs up to the edge of his seat. He put one hand on the dashboard and signaled to Tanaka and Dohi with his flashlight.

  “Are those the monsters?” Alecia asked.

  “Yeah, sweetie, those are the monsters,” Rico said.

  “Cut one open,” Fitz said over the comm link.

  Tanaka pulled out his Katana and approached the closest cocoon. Quickly, he sliced it open and backed away as a tiny Wormer sloshed out. It crashed to the ground in a waterfall of goo.

  “Kill it, bro,” Stevenson whispered.

  Tanaka impaled the monster through its misshapen head, pinning it to the dirt like an insect thumbtacked to a board. Blood gushed out into the pool of yellow goo.

  The dying creature let out a high-pitched screech that reverberated down the passage. Tanaka and Dohi raked their beams across the darkness. All at once, the other cocoons wriggled.

  “Get back to the truck,” Fitz said.

  Tanaka and Dohi backed away with their rifles shouldered. When they were back in the vehicle, Fitz turned in his seat and said, “Get the flamethrowers.”

  Both men climbed into the back and prepared the weapons while Fitz pulled out the radio receiver. The sacs were all moving now, the creatures inside stirring.

  “Turn off the lights,” Fitz said.

  Stevenson did as ordered, and darkness flooded the tunnel. He flipped his night-vision goggles over his eyes and watched Tanaka and Dohi slip back into the tunnel wearing their flamethrowers.

  They stood on the left and right side of the MATV, where they lit the torches on their gas-operated weapons. Small flames shot out, appearing green in Fitz’s vision. The glow flickered eerily over their armored features as they stepped away from the MATV.

  “Hold for orders,” Fitz said over the comms. Then he lifted the radio receiver and pushed it to his lips. “Lion One, Ghost One. Do you copy? Over.”

  A cocoon stuck to the wall about a hundred yards away on the right side of the passage split open, exposing the shell of the monster inside.

  “Are they going to kill those things or not?” Alecia whispered.

  “Shhh,” Rico said. “It’s okay. We’re safe in the truck.”

  “That’s not a Wormer,” Fitz said when he saw the creature fighting to free itself from its sac.

  Stevenson strained to get a better look over the steering wheel. “Looks like one of them Beetles to me.”

  The speakers crackled with the response from the Twenty-Fourth MEU. “Ghost One, this is Lion Three. Go ahead, over.”

  Fitz wasn’t expecting Major Domino’s voice.

  “Sir, I have new intel for Lion One,” he said after a brief pause.

  “Copy. Go ahead with that intel, Ghost One.”

  Fitz hesitated as a claw burst through the skin of a cocoon to the left of Tanaka. An arm popped through, and a second claw tore another opening in the sac.

  “Lion Three, we’ve located a tunnel heading northeast,” Fitz said. “And we’ve come across what appear to be cocoons—hundreds of them, containing mutated monsters.”

  He lowered the receiver. The other members of Ghost all waited anxiously for their next orders. He could hear their heavy breathing in the darkness.

  “Ghost One, this is Lion One. You found that army?”

  It was Bradley, and he sounded more short-tempered than normal. Fitz was about to respond when the MATV jolted.

  “Stand by, Lion One,” Fitz said.

  “What the hell was that?” Stevenson asked.

  Fitz lowered the radio, knowing exactly what was under the truck.

  “Dohi, Tanaka, watch your six,” he said over the comm frequency. Then he grabbed his M4 and rolled down the window. He looked through the bars covering the open window to see a mound of earth rising past his door, the fins of a Wormer cutting through the dirt. The beast was heading right for Dohi.

  Fitz pointed his rifle through the bars and fired a three-round burst at the fins. The floor split open and a trio of tentacles thrust outward, writhing in the open air. One of them shot toward Dohi, who ducked at the last second.

  “Shoot it!” Stevenson shouted.

  “No!” Rico yelled back. “They might hit us!”

  Both of the soldiers outside backed away from the Wormer as it worked to free its body from the ground. An armored head cr
ested, followed by the long, wrinkled body with shriveled arms hanging from its sides. It stood on two muscular legs and whipped its tentacles at Tanaka.

  He countered the attack with a slice from his blade that cut one of the six-foot-long tentacles in half. It gushed green blood like a fire hose, painting the MATV with the sticky substance.

  Fitz moved his gun, but he couldn’t get a clear shot with the bars in the way. He opened the door and propped the gun in the gap, lining up his sights on the Wormer’s back, just below the armored fins. It screeched in agony as Fitz blew gaping holes in its soft flesh.

  A tentacle hit Dohi in the leg, wrapping around his calf, and then pulled him to the ground. Another cocoon split open on the wall, then another. One by one, the monsters burst from their white coffins.

  “Ghost One, Ghost One, do you copy?” asked a voice from the radio.

  Fitz went to line up another shot, but the Wormer that had Dohi whipped another tentacle toward the MATV. Stevenson pulled Fitz back into the truck, saving him from a slap to the face.

  Tanaka engaged the Wormer with his sword, slicing Dohi free and opening the beast’s gut and chest with three quick thrusts.

  On his feet again, Dohi turned with his flamethrower, and together, the two men torched the tunnel. Fitz closed the door, rolled up the window, and flipped up his NVGs to watch the long orange flames coat the walls.

  The beasts that had managed to make it out of their cocoons thrashed in the dirt, flesh sizzling in the heat, while the thin, fleshy walls of the cocoons that hadn’t yet hatched sizzled and then exploded like popcorn.

  “Toast those fuckers,” Stevenson grumbled.

  Fitz finally brought the receiver back to his mouth. “Lion One, Ghost One. Sorry about that. Over.”

  “What the hell is happening out there, Ghost One?” Bradley said.

  “Sir, those cocoons started to hatch. My men are torching the tunnel now.”

  Dohi and Tanaka were slowly retreating to the truck as they continued to spray fire over the passage. There was another long pause of static before Bradley came back online.

  “Ghost One, what are your coordinates?”