Uncivil War: A Post-Apocalyptic Thriller

by B. T. Wright

  It seemed to Jake that Charlie was so caught up in understanding what Amy heard that he was willing to lose the opportunity with the Army. Jake knew better.

  “Amy.” Jake began moving toward the back wall. “You think you can remember what you heard until I finish with the radio?”

  She nodded. “I’ll never forget. Not for as long as I live.”

  Jake couldn’t put his finger on why, maybe it was just the way was she was speaking, but Amy seemed more mature than when he’d first met her. Probably because she was just a frightened little girl on the street outside his home. It’s not like he actually knew her. Maybe she had always been this mature. Or maybe the end of the world has that effect on thirteen-year-old girls.

  Jake walked over to the radio.

  “Just press this button to talk, then release for a response,” the man said.

  Jake nodded, picked up the microphone and its stand, and pressed the button. “This is Jake Maddox, Special Forces 1st group. We read you loud and clear, United States Army.”

  Though things were about as bad as they could be, the ability to communicate with someone, somewhere else in the country, felt like hope. Jake waited for a reply. Everyone in the room now turned their attention to him. But there was no response.

  Jake repeated his statement. “This is Jake Maddox, Delta Forces 1st group, we read you loud and clear, United States Army.”

  They all waited for a few seconds, but there wasn’t even the sound of static.

  Jess stepped forward, concerned. “Are we too late? Would they move on to a different frequency that fast?”

  Jake’s feeling of hope was quickly replaced with worry. He didn’t think they would move on that quickly, especially since the man said they’d heard a transmission from their frequency just a minute ago, but this much lag in response was not a good sign. And the longer they all stood there in silence, the deeper the worry burrowed.

  Now Charlie stepped forward. “They should have already responded. Tim,” he said to the man at the radio, “is there a problem with the radio?”

  Tim checked the wires, checked the power, then smiled as he started to check the microphone.

  “What?” Jake said. “What the hell are you smiling about?”

  “The button. You forgot to release the button.”

  Jake looked down at his hand and released the button immediately. If he hadn’t cared so much about hearing a response, he probably would have been embarrassed.

  “Nice one, G.I. Joe. Apparently Radio 101 isn’t a course in Delta Forces.”

  The radio barked. “Oh good, you finally released the button.”

  Now Jake was embarrassed.

  “Really good to hear from you, soldier. This is Corporal Jim Banner. Where are you transmitting from and what is your situation?”

  Jake breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Good to hear from you, Corporal. We are at the University of Cincinnati. There’s about twenty of us in a basement full of supplies. Where are you transmitting from?”

  This time Jake was sure to release the button.

  “Best news I heard all day, Jake. You’re my first contact outside of military bases. Glad to find some of us still among the living. Especially a fellow soldier. We are in Mount Weather, trying to see what’s left of this country.”

  Mount Weather.

  Jess’s face lit up. Tyler stepped forward and pumped his fist. Professor Reed was still lost in his own thoughts.

  “Jim, that is damn good news. A woman by the name of Dr. Emily Fraser came in with the president earlier today. I need to speak with her immediately.”

  “I can’t confirm she’s here right this second, but if she is I’ll find her.”

  “Wake her up if you have to. I need to talk to her now.”

  “I’ll be back here as soon as possible.”

  “We’ll be here.”

  Jake sat the microphone down and turned his attention back to his friends. Back to Amy. And back to the new reality that was stranger than fiction. The break in communication with Mount Weather was perfect. By the time they found Emily and got her to the radio, Jake would know what Amy heard.

  He knew what he was about to hear would change his world forever. But he figured that had already happened, so he was ready to bring it on.

  45

  “Put the camera down, professor,” Jess said.

  “This is literally history in the making. We have to capture it!”

  Jake moved from the radio toward Charlie. The professor took a defensive step back.

  “It’s okay. He can record it,” Amy said as she dried her eyes and repositioned her ponytail.

  “You’re sure?” Jess said. “He doesn’t have to.”

  Amy nodded.

  The professor refocused the camera. “It’s June 30th, 2019. Amy here has heard the transmission of the conversation I have recorded between two unknown beings. And she understood them. She is going to tell us what she heard.”

  Jake watched the professor nod to Amy. All of it felt so surreal. Before Amy began to speak, Jake had a terrifying thought. It wasn’t about what the aliens said in the transmission, though. Rather, his thought was about why Amy could understand it, and what exactly that meant.

  One life-altering thing at a time. He focused, as did the others, on Amy.

  “The first thing that was said sounded like someone was giving an update. They don’t speak like we do, in and sort of order, so I’ll summarize. They said, ‘infiltration complete, armed defenses crippled, very few immune.’ Then the other voice said, ‘begin phase two.’ The response to that was, ‘already learning.’ The other said, ‘are they as weak as they seem.’ The response was, ‘they are fragile, but resilient.’ The other said, ‘will this be enough.’ The response was, ‘too early to tell.’ Then the last thing that was said was, ‘will hold on reinforcements. Find element zero. There has been no recent report. Element zero is our only weakness. Find and eliminate element zero.’

  They all were stunned.

  “That’s it. That’s all they said,” Amy finished, then waited for a response.

  Jess gave Jake a look, then glanced at Amy, then back to him. Though Jess said nothing, the meaning behind her look was unmistakable. He knew she was thinking the same thing he was, that because Amy could understand the transmission, it was very possible she was Element Zero.

  “Thank you, Amy,” Jess said. “I understand how that would be hard to forget.”

  “I know we were already in trouble,” Amy said. “But doesn’t this make it worse?”

  Jake felt like this was all too much for a young teenager. Mostly because it was too much for him, a battle-hardened soldier. “Professor, I need some water. Amy, you could probably use some too, right?”

  “I think we all could,” Jess agreed.

  “Professor?” Jake prompted.

  “What? Oh, yes. Just out in the common area. Bill here can show you. I’m going to upload this video to the computer to make sure we don’t lose it.”

  A man stood up from in front of a computer, ready to take them to get water. Jake walked out with them, and as they exited the long hallway into the common area, he stopped.

  Jess turned around. For the first time Jake noticed how tired she looked. “What is it?”

  The rest of the group turned to Jake when they heard Jess. He waved them on. “Go on ahead. I just need a minute with Jess.”

  The group seemed to think nothing of it, and Amy followed beside Tyler to get some water.

  “You don’t think it’s really possible, do you? That she’s this ‘Element Zero’?” Jess said.

  “I don’t know. She was surrounded by the infected when we first saw her out on my street. Looking back, they had opportunities to get her. Didn’t they? Before I got there?”

  “I don’t know, Jake. I don’t know anything anymore. I mean, aliens?”

  “Amy didn’t actually say it was aliens.”

  “You’re right. She didn’t. She
just rattled off a translation of a takeover in some weird language that no one has ever heard of. Where it was asked if we humans are as weak as we seem.”

  Jake nodded. He knew she was right.

  “What are we going to do?”

  Jake took her hand. “All that we can do. Which is work off of what we know. It doesn’t matter if this is a zombie apocalypse, or an alien invasion, or both. We’ll figure it out. It’s what we do. And if Amy is somehow a part of them, or a part of their plan, then we have our first advantage. We know where she is and they don’t. Maybe we can learn more about them and figure out a way to use it against them. They did say it was their only weakness.”

  Jess leaned in and wrapped her arms around Jake. He gave her a squeeze, then he immediately pushed her away.

  “What is it?” Jess said. “What’s wrong?”

  Jake was already backpedaling. “If Amy is Element Zero, and Element Zero is their only weakness, we have to make sure there is no way they can find out where she is!”

  Jake turned away from Jess and began sprinting back down the hall. If Emily came back on the radio and he wasn’t there, the professor could say the wrong thing. Since they had no idea what capabilities these beings had, they couldn’t chance it that they could be listening in somehow–monitoring the airwaves. There was no such thing as being too careful. Not with what was at stake: the very fate of humanity itself.

  Jake threw open the door and his exact fear materialized in front of him. Charlie was at the back of the room, the microphone in his hand.

  “And we have someone here that was able to translate it, she could understand—”

  “Stop!” Jake shouted.

  Charlie jumped and nearly dropped the mike. His finger slipped off the button.

  “Professor? Are you there? Is everything all right?”

  Jake heard Emily’s voice through the speaker.

  “What did you say?” Jake stalked toward professor Reed.

  “I––I was just relaying that I was right, that it was a conversation. That I wasn’t crazy.”

  Jake snatched the microphone from his hands. “We can’t talk openly about this. What if they’re listening?”

  Charlie backed away. “They can’t . . . They can’t hear this radio, can they?”

  “I don’t know, but it’s not worth finding out, is it?”

  Jake pressed the button. “Emily? It’s Jake. No more talking about this over the airwaves. Understand?”

  A squawk. “Jake! You’re all right! Thank God you made it! When they came and told me you were on the radio, I ran as fast as I could!”

  “Emily, no more discussion about what Professor Reed is saying, okay?”

  “But how can we fight this without knowing what was said?”

  “You can hear it in person. Get the helicopter here, and I’ll bring Amy to you.”

  “Jake, did you just say Amy?”

  “Yeah.” Jake stopped talking and let go of the button.

  “Jake?”

  If the infected man had said the name Amy back in that house, they were already looking for Amy. Which confirmed that Amy was the one they called Element Zero. Which means if these things could listen in on this radio communication, Jake had just made an even bigger mistake than the professor did.

  “Jake, the infected woman we captured said the name Amy too. Jake, what is going on?”

  As soon as the radio fuzzed, Jake pressed his button. “No more talking! No more names, no more information. We are here waiting for the helicopter. Let me know when it leaves, and I will see you soon. We can discuss everything then. But no more talking on here!”

  “Okay but we—what?”

  The transmission stopped. When Emily said ‘what,’ it sounded as if she had turned away from the mike to talk to someone else. Jake pressed the button. “Emily? Are you there?”

  After he released the button, there was a break in the communication. The silence seemed to go on forever.

  “Is something wrong with the radio?” Jake asked the man that had been working it.

  Tim checked everything. “It should be good to go.”

  He pressed the COM button again. “Emily.”

  Released.

  Pressed it again. “Emily!”

  Finally it barked back at him. “Jake, I’m so sorry. They just informed me that there is no way to get to the helicopters here right now. The airfield has been overrun with infected. The soldiers that were guarding it are dead.”

  Jake’s stomach dropped. He felt sick.

  “Jake?”

  “I heard you. We’re on our own.”

  “The president will have someone come get you, I know he will. It just won’t be from here. Not right now. I will let you know as soon as I hear anything. I’m so sorry, Jake. How long will your supplies last? Can you make it okay for a while? Just in case it takes some time?”

  Jake didn’t know what to say. If someone or something was listening to all of this from the beginning, they not only knew where Amy was, but they now knew where the president was as well. The two of them needed to stop this communication right then. It might already be too late.

  “Emily. Stop talking on here about people’s names, titles, and whereabouts. We can no longer communicate this way. It’s too dangerous. I’ll figure something out and get back to you.”

  “Okay. All right. Someone will always be here by the radio when you need to communicate.”

  “Here too. Be safe. And consider getting the POTUS the hell out of there if it’s possible. I don’t know who knows what anymore.”

  “I’ll tell him. Stay safe.”

  “You too, Emily.”

  46

  The next morning came and went. No helicopter. So did the next morning––day three––and Jake had just poured himself a cup of coffee after checking with the watchmen. They let him know once again that no helicopter had come. That wasn’t good, but what was worse for Jake was that he checked with the radiomen too, and there was still no word from Colt. It should never have taken his brother that long to get to the Cheyenne Mountain Complex, and Jake was doing everything he could to keep the worst out of his mind, but after seeing things like Tom getting his throat chewed out, it was hard for his mind to go anywhere else.

  After a full day without running from infected, everyone was all rested up, well fed, and well hydrated. Ready for the next move. But Jake knew they weren’t really ready for a next move. Not for what was coming. That’s why when the first morning had passed without a helicopter coming to take them to Mount Weather, he began training select members of Professor Reed’s group. Training them for the trek they were going to have to make to Mount Weather, Virginia. By land.

  He had been communicating with Emily. They talked in as much code as they could. They even said some of the more sensitive things in pig-Latin. But Jake wasn’t counting on anything, or anyone coming to help him. As he had many times over the years with the Army, he instead was preparing for war. He began training Jess, Tyler, Amy, two of Bryan’s men, and three others that were willing to make the journey with them from Charlie’s group in everything from weapons to tactical movements and defensive hand to hand combat.

  The thing he couldn’t train them for was the evolution of the infected. Because he had no idea to what level they had evolved. If how far they’d progressed in one day was any indication, he believed they would be completely up to speed by the time he and his crew hit the road. The longer they waited to move, the more complete the infected’s capabilities would be. Which Jake planned to treat them like any other threat he had ever faced, like they were as capable as any of the best soldiers in the world. Preparing for less would leave them even more vulnerable than they already were.

  The problem was, his “team” wasn’t ready. They had a lot to learn, even to get the basics down. Bryan was good––he was a Marine––but his two men and the three others were weak. In the meantime, one of the members of the group was a technology expert. They sent out
small drones with even smaller cameras just before nightfall yesterday, capturing a look at campus. Overall it was quiet, which made Jake even more nervous. After listening to Amy’s translation of the conversation where the aliens had stated, “move on to phase two”, Jake figured that even though he didn’t see any infected on campus, they were most certainly plotting. Or they at least were making sure they were familiar with all of their host bodies’ cognitive and physical functions. It further reinforced that the longer Jake waited to move Amy, the better prepared the infected would be.

  Jess, Tyler, and Amy were comfortable in the basement of what they now knew was the library building at UC. Everyone had been very generous in taking them in and making them feel welcome. Professor Reed was busy helping plot a course to Virginia which stayed off the main roads. Emily was still maintaining that a helicopter would be coming, but she still couldn’t say when. She mentioned there were several bases with working helicopters and planes, they just couldn’t mobilize yet. They were all still fighting to keep the infected at bay.

  Jake knew these things were going to just keep coming. He just didn’t know what they wanted. Whether it was extinction, or making Earth their own, it didn’t really matter to him. His job was the same either way; keep them from winning. The first step in that would be securing Amy, and letting people much more knowledgeable than him help understand exactly what she was, and how they could use her to fend off the aliens. Once he got Amy to Mount Weather, he could then be made aware of the situation around the country, which Emily explained there were more people reporting every hour.

  Jake knew a war was coming. It was inevitable. And he was built for it, maybe better than anyone else left on the planet. All of that would have to wait. His first mission was clear, and that was his sole focus. Get Amy to Mount Weather.

  Day three down in the bunker was going to go just the same as day two had. He had already made love to Jess––the rest of the day he would be spending every hour on a different aspect of combat training. When Jess and Tyler weren’t training, they would be working with Charlie to continue to perfect the course to Virginia and work up a supplies list that would sustain them weeks on the road if necessary. The most difficult was the Beritrix. None of them knew why it continued to keep them from turning into one of the infected, but a daily dose did. Those doses, however, were running low. It would already be gone if everyone had been taking it. But the air filtration system that Charlie had used a lot of the university-allocated money on was doing the trick for the people not on Beritrix.