Fallen Metropolis (Omnibus Edition)

by Matthew J. Barbeler

  “You’re not little Ross Fiamingo, are you?”

  The young man smiled. “Yeah, I am.”

  Draco turned his head aside. “Your father would be ashamed of what you’ve done.”

  “My father will always be ashamed of me, no matter what I do. This was my one chance to make a life for myself outside of his shadow.”

  “And you’d sacrifice untold lives for the sake of your own?”

  “The people on this ship were already dead as soon as the infection started to spread. How was I supposed to stop that?”

  “I could try to explain the concept of courage and sacrifice to you, but you wouldn’t understand,” Draco said.

  A Vartalen struck Draco from behind and he went sprawling face-first onto the ground.

  “Enough talking,” the Vartalen said and struck Ross to the ground as well. Ross squealed in pain. “One more word and I will tear out your tongue. Understand?”

  Ross whimpered.

  Draco struggled back to his knees and nodded at the Vartalen brute. Ross stayed on the ground and cowered under his hands.

  It was then that they heard a sound like something tearing through a wet burlap sack.

  Draco looked back at the raised platform in the center of the bridge and saw a gash in the side of the cocoon. Something moved inside. Its arm appeared to be human but ended in large hands with claws at the end of each finger. Other sharp bony protrusions erupted from the red, inflamed skin up to its shoulder.

  Ross laughed nervously. His voice cracked as he spoke. “I think the Captain’s woken up.”

  The Vartalen raised their rifles at the cocoon and fired before the infected Captain had even emerged from it. The bullets did nothing but enrage the Captain. He burst forth from the cocoon and rushed toward the cluster of Vartalen troops. He moved so fast that Draco could barely make out what the Captain now looked like. He slammed into the first Vartalen and eviscerated him from stomach to sternum. The Vartalen’s blue and green innards fell out of him with a wet splash. He frantically tried in vain to shovel them back into himself with his last shuddering moments.

  One of the Vartalen troops tried to slam into Captain Hane, but the Captain backhanded him with his spiked arm, shattering the Vartalen’s faceplate and turning his face into an indistinguishable mess of green blood and pulpy blue flesh.

  Captain Hane stopped for a moment and looked around at Draco Goldwing. Hane’s face had not been changed extensively. The whites of his eyes were yellow, and small lumps of bone protruded from beneath his skin from his forehead to his exposed chest. He wore the tattered remains of his Captain’s uniform. A shredded blue remnant of a jacket remained on his upper half, but his trousers remained largely intact. He had been changed with purpose. He was grown to be a lethal adversary. A protector of the hive.

  Captain Hane looked past Draco and then at Ross. His lips parted, and he roared. Ross began to crawl away as Captain Hane stalked towards him. Bullets from the remaining three Vartalen troops peppered Captain Hane’s back. He roared again before sprinting towards them.

  As Captain Hane turned, Draco saw that the bullets had torn flesh on his back. Captain Hane was not completely indestructible, and Draco hoped that the berserk creature was aware of the bargain he had struck with the central intelligence consciousness below.

  The Vartalen troops had begun to retreat towards the viewing platform at the back of the tower.

  Draco got to his feet and ran over to his rifle. He picked it up and loaded it with a magazine full of armor piercing rounds. Aloysius and Raze both got back to their feet and armed themselves, ready for Captain Hane to finish the Vartalen and come back to deal with them. Raze shouldered the flamethrower tanks again and lit the nozzle up.

  “Captain Goldwing, the Vartalen have a ship on the outside of the hull!” Raze said.

  “We might have a way out of here. Can either of you pilot a Vartalen ship?” Draco asked.

  “I believe I can,” Aloysius said.

  “When Captain Hane comes back, do not engage him. Not unless he lashes out at one of us first,” Draco said.

  Aloysius and Raze nodded. They formed up and walked towards the viewing platform. They heard a scream, followed by a guttural roar. Half of one of the Vartalen troops flew out of the walkway and into the bridge. His guts flew through the air after him like the tail of a kite. Draco, Raze and Aloysius rushed around the curved walkway and saw the remains of one Vartalen slumped against a wall. The last remaining Vartalen was trying to clamber up a steel rope ladder that hung down from a vent in the ceiling.

  Captain Hane grabbed the last Vartalen by its ankle and yanked it down. He fell and screamed in pain as his ankle shattered. Captain Hane crushed his head with his bladed fingers. Captain Hane turned toward Draco, Raze and Aloysius. He eyed Captain Goldwing suspiciously, but did not immediately attack.

  “Do you remember the bargain I made with your people?” Draco asked, but did not stop aiming his rifle at the infected Captain.

  “Safe... place...” Captain Hane said.

  “Yes, safe place. You understand.”

  “Understand... Yes.”

  “You will not hurt my crew.”

  “Where... is Fiamingo?”

  “Fiamingo?”

  “Yes.”

  “He’s under my protection. You will not hurt him.”

  Captain Hane’s face contorted with rage. He roared and spat the words out as he spoke, “Must hurt! Must kill him! Killed my.... My... Son! Killed... Killed me! Infec... Infected us!”

  “He is under my protection. You will not hurt him; do you hear me?” Draco challenged.

  Captain Hane exhaled with a grunt. His eyes frantically searched the room as he thought about his options. Draco was amazed at the cognitive abilities that Captain Hane had retained during his transformation, but it chilled him as well. This organism had the capability of completely taking over the mind and body of any other living organism, but it could also reshape them with intelligence and purpose.

  Ross Fiamingo chose the exact wrong time to join Draco, Raze and Aloysius. He rounded the corner of the walkway and Captain Hane sprinted towards him. Draco rushed into Captain Hane’s path and stopped him from reaching Ross.

  “Move!” Captain Hane bellowed.

  “If you hurt him, I won’t save you. I will not take you to a safe place to live peacefully. You’ll have to kill me,” Draco said.

  Captain Hane’s eyes narrowed as he leaned in closely to Draco. “Others will come.”

  Draco quickly rolled backwards, narrowly avoiding Captain Hane’s bladed fingers as the Captain swiped at him. He raised his rifle to his shoulder and fired.

  The anti-armor rounds ripped through Captain Hane from stomach to shoulder, but it barely slowed him down. He stalked towards Draco, who scrambled back to his feet.

  A jet of flame erupted from behind Draco and bathed the monstrous captain in liquid fire. Glass shattered somewhere around Draco as he tried to escape, but Captain Hane was too fast, even while on fire. Captain Hane closed the distance between them far too quickly, and Draco’s rifle had gone dry. He grabbed another magazine and loaded it into his rifle. Draco turned, ready to fire another volley of bullets at the infected Captain, but a piece of steel erupted through the front of Captain Hane’s chest. Captain Hane looked down at the metallic protrusion just as the hook points flicked outward. He was pulled backwards as Aloysius began reeling the grapnel hook back in.

  Aloysius leapt from the edge of the tower, taking Captain Hane with him as he plummeted down into the city.

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  The gateway charge counter read 100%, and the gravity drive was ready to be activated. Veck Simms had programmed his destination, and only needed to activate the sequence to make his escape. However, he found himself hesitating to begin the sequence. His mind turned to Draco Goldwing.

  Draco was not a bad man. He was misguided, surely, but the thought of leaving him deserted in the middle of the Arcturus Sector
did not sit well with some ancient part of Veck who still felt something for his former friend.

  But his need to live and his need to fulfil his purpose outweighed the life of one man whom he may have considered a friend once.

  Veck activated the gateway drive and the dark space in front of the Icarus lit up like a firework. It began as a small spark of light, only a few particles wide. That small point grew and expanded like a blooming flower. The configurations of stars that filled the space in front of them were replaced with another set of stars, as well as a small planetoid that was covered primarily by green archipelagos and blue oceans. The gateway continued to widen until it was large enough for the Icarus to pass through.

  Veck saw his freedom. His destiny. But he could not bring himself to fly through the gateway just yet. As soon as the Icarus passed through, the gateway would close behind them. The Metropolis Seven would not have a gravity drive on board. Once through the gateway, he would be beyond his former friend’s reach.

  He had to say his goodbyes.

  Veck opened up the main communication channel. He opened a comm channel with Draco and said, “Hello Draco, how’ve you been?”

  For a moment Draco did not respond. When he did, Veck could sense the anger in his voice even though Draco tried to hide it, ‘Veck. What are you doing on the Icarus’s comm channel?’

  “I wanted to give you the decency of saying goodbye. I’m the Captain of the Icarus now, and I’ve activated the gateway drive.”

  ‘Veck, please. You don’t know what’s going on here. There’s an infection. We need evacuation. Some of the passengers survived, and they’re loading onto the evacuation shuttles as we speak. We’ve taken control of the ship, but we need your help.’

  “It doesn’t sound like you need my help. It sounds like you’re doing fine on your own. Ever the hero, you are.”

  ‘You don’t understand! If this infection reaches an inhabited planet, every single race in the galaxy will become infected. We’ll all be destroyed!’

  “All the more reason for me to not allow you back on board the ship. I don’t want to risk myself, the little mouse, her sister or the pilot.”

  Silence. Then, ‘Where’s Nook?’

  “He tried to be a hero. You know how I loathe heroes.”

  ‘You claim to represent the best of the human race, yet you embody all of our worst traits.’

  “Oh, don’t give me that right now, Draco. I’m trying to be decent here and give you my farewell, and you go on and try to guilt trip me. If you’re going to do that, then I may as well close the comm channel right now and be done with it.”

  ‘No! Veck! We need your help!’

  “I never took you for a beggar. I expected better of you Draco,” Veck said. He closed the comm channel.

  He pushed the thrusters forward and headed towards the open gateway.

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  On board the Metropolis Seven Draco didn’t have time to think. He could only react. He started to climb the steel cable rope that hung from the ceiling. He looked back at Ross. “If you want to live, you’ll follow me. You’ll come back to New Earth and you’ll face your punishment. If not, stay here on the ship and die. The choice is yours.”

  Ross’s cheeks flushed, but he dutifully ran over to the bottom of the ladder and started climbing.

  “Captain!” Raze said with surprise.

  Draco snapped his head back down and his face lit up. Aloysius hovered just outside the shattered viewing platform

  “Al’s batteries must have recharged! I thought we’d lost him!” Raze said.

  Suddenly Aloysius dipped in the sky and the thrusters on his feet and hands cut out. They re-engaged quickly, and he regained altitude. The thrusters erupted with light as Aloysius went to full burn. Raze stepped aside from the hole in the glass as Aloysius homed in. He landed awkwardly and tumbled heavily. Aloysius rose to his hands and knees, but they gave out on him.

  “Al!” Raze exclaimed and went over to join his side.

  “I’m fine,” Aloysius said, “but I’ve used most of my battery reserves. I just need a moment.”

  “Will you be able to fly the Vartalen ship?” Draco asked.

  “Yes,” Aloysius said, “That won’t be a problem.”

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  The Eden’s Hill MagLev station was built on top of a hill, with short cut grass on its gently sloping sides. A stone path wound up the hill to the MagLev station itself, and it was flanked by fruit trees and rose bushes. The fruit trees had been picked clean over the previous weeks by the survivors, and most of the rose bushes had been trampled by the wandering fleshlings. Compared to the torso-centipede monster he had witnessed only moments before, Vynce thought the hill was one of the most beautiful things he had ever seen.

  They passed the hill and continued down the road. They came to an intersection littered with small single-person passenger vehicles and motorcycles. Jaxon headed across the intersection and towards a small building that had a wire mesh security screen covering its front entrance. It was the entrance to the evacuation shuttle hangar.

  “I need a security officer up front with me now. Anyone?” Jaxon asked.

  A woman in a wheelchair was brought to the front of the crowd. She had lost her left leg from the knee down, and her right leg from the hip. Her husband pushed her wheelchair for her. “What do you need?” she asked.

  “I need you to override the security protocol that’s locking this door down. Then, after everyone’s inside, I need you to initiate a complete lockdown protocol. Make sure that nothing can get down into the hangar, all right?”

  “I can do that,” she said. Her husband wheeled her to the security console on the side of the building. She leaned forward and grimaced with discomfort as she pressed her right index finger to the screen. It read her fingerprint and blinked green.

  “Lift security profile alpha. Emergency situation. Evacuation required.”

  ‘Understood, Officer Starling. Lifting security profile alpha now,’ the console said. The mesh door started to rise.

  Jaxon ushered everyone inside as quickly as possible.

  The horde of infected was uncountable now. The smaller fleshlings that tended the webs in the apartment building nests had joined them. They crawled over, through and around the infected and tended to them. Vynce saw one of the creatures secrete a lumpy red paste on a jagged wound of one of the infected passenger’s necks. The paste began to reconstitute the skin and muscle that had been lost.

  Jaxon waited next to Starling until everyone else was in the hangar. Ava stood just inside the door. She refused to move until Jaxon was inside and safe too. After everyone was in Starling stopped. “Initiate security protocol omega.”

  The mesh door immediately started to roll back down. Her husband pushed her under it before it had a chance to close completely. When the mesh door was closed and locked into place, another thicker metal door slid down from the outside, sealing the exit.

  They all followed the corridor down into the hangar bay. The hangar was only half-full of evacuation shuttles, and more than half of those that did remain were visibly damaged. There was no telling how many of them, if any, still functioned.

  The shuttles were wide, flat and shaped like arrow heads. They had four powerful ion thrusters that also acted as landing gear. They were each fitted with their own medical and on-board facilities. Due to the nature of space travel, each shuttle had enough oxygen on board to last up to three years with a full complement of passengers. Of course, if it did take that long to be rescued, running out of oxygen would be the least of their worries. They would run out of food and sanity much quicker than that.

  There were two rows of evacuation shuttles. They flanked both sides of the walkway. Some of the survivors had started to inspect the closest few shuttles, but they were both unfit for travel.

  “Everyone, I need your attention for a moment,” Jaxon said. His voice boomed, amplified by his suit augmentations.


  The survivors all turned and faced Jaxon as he spoke.

  “I need everyone to do something for me. We need to get organized, and we need to do it quickly. We need to get off this ship before those things out there decide they want to come with us. Firstly, those of you who are carrying food and medical supplies, I need you to gather everything together next to that shuttle over there,” Jaxon said. He motioned to the shuttle with the destroyed ion thruster.

  “With our numbers, we’re going to need three working shuttles. We need to divide up by people who are infected, and people who aren’t infected. As I’m sure you’ll agree, we cannot risk exposing the general populace to this infection. Those who are infected will wait by that ship over there.” He motioned towards the shuttle with the hull breach. “They’ll wait for further instructions. Are we clear?”

  A murmur of approval spread through the crowd. A number of those who were infected began to mill around the shuttle with the hull breach. Others emptied their packs of supplies next to the shuttle with the destroyed thruster.

  Doctor Harris dug into her bag and pulled out a snap-on wrist band and a red marker. She snapped the band closed around her left wrist and used the marker to make a thick red scribble.

  She held up her left hand. “See this? This means I’m infected. Every one of you will have to come to me for a full-body scan and be given a wrist band before you can leave this ship. Even you,” she said to those who had already identified themselves as infected.

  Doctor Harris scanned the people who came to her and handed out wrist bands to each person. She marked those who were infected with a red band like hers, and those who were clear in green. She told everyone who passed as clean that they would need to go through another scan before they could enter a shuttle for evacuation.

  Doctor Fewster and Doctor Cooper had begun to take inventory of the food, water and medical supplies while Jaxon, Ava and Vynce searched for a working shuttle.