The convoy inched forward, passing hundreds of bloated corpses lining the street. They had all bled out from Kate’s bioweapon, and crusted blood clung to the sidewalk like red moss. Most of the Marines didn’t seem to notice, but a few of them slowed for a better look. One man bent over and lurched, pulling his gas mask away from his mouth to puke.
A green recruit, Beckham thought. He checked the other Marines, one by one, wondering exactly how many of them had even made it through training before the outbreak hit. Judging by their posture and movements, he decided the most action they’d probably seen was at the shooting range.
1st Platoon was a ragtag group after all, cobbled together from what was left of the Marine Corps. He’d heard the casualty reports from Operation Reaper and should have known. He just hoped these men knew to stay out of his line of fire when shit hit the fan.
Beckham tightened his grip on his weapon, his biceps flexing as he kept the muzzle at a forty-five-degree angle. The gas mask provided two narrow oval views of the post-apocalyptic world they were venturing into. He told himself not to think of this as New York City—it was like any other enemy territory, no different than Baghdad or Fallujah despite what he’d told Horn. The iconic buildings of one of the world’s favorite cities were dark, a grim reminder New York was really gone. And it was probably never coming back.
“Pretty quiet,” Horn said.
“For now,” Beckham replied.
The convoy moved slowly, plowing through the graveyard of empty cars one at a time. The vehicle commanders stood inside the hatches of the Bradleys, scoping the road with binoculars behind the TOW launchers.
The Hudson River snaked along the left side of the street, the calm waters devoid of boats. There were no tourists walking along the road, staring out over the polluted harbor or the seagulls perched on piers. Billboards jutted off the roofs of buildings on the right side of 12th, displaying ads of smiling Armani models and rap stars.
Two blocks in, the wind shifted again. A cloud of black smoke crossed the path of the convoy. The Bradleys groaned to a stop, and the Humvees parked a few feet behind them. Marines fell into line behind the armor. They waited for several minutes before Beckham’s earpiece crackled to life.
“Command has ordered us to continue the mission through the smoke.” It was Lieutenant Gates, and he sounded irritated.
The transmission ended. Beckham glanced over his shoulder and signaled Team Ghost forward. The vehicles disappeared into the black wall, swallowed like they had entered a portal to another dimension.
“I don’t like this,” Horn said.
Beckham watched the swirling cloud. “Me neither, but the smoke messes with the Variant’s senses.”
“Messes with ours too,” Horn said. “And remember what Kate said? Their senses are evolving or something.” Horn adjusted his gas mask with his free hand.
“Just stay focused,” Beckham replied, letting his eyes tell Horn he had the same thoughts running through his mind. Holding his breath like he was about to jump into the water, he followed the rest of 1st Platoon into the smoke. The crunch of the Bradleys’ tracks guided him.
When they reached the intersection at West 50th, the smoke began to dissipate. Beckham searched for the rest of his team. Timbo and Ryan had their eyes and muzzles trained on the buildings nearby. Jinx and Chow eyed the skyline. An eerie gray haze lingered over Manhattan. Somewhere out there, the Variants were hiding.
Waiting.
The Bradleys smashed onto West 50th Street, taking turns pushing cars to the side of the road. Beckham narrowed in on the wreckage. A bloated corpse slumped partially out of the window of a cab. The Bradley on the left reversed and then smashed into the tail of the car, sending the dead driver flying. The body skidded across the concrete and then hit the brick wall of a building covered in graffiti and murals. Its skin burst open, peppering the artwork with gore. Beckham cringed at the sight. He jumped onto the sidewalk and hugged the brick wall lining the right side of the street.
“Where the fuck are those things?” Chow asked over his shoulder. He’d moved to the middle of the street a few yards ahead of Beckham and Horn’s position.
Horn pointed to the skyline. “Maybe the bombers got all of ‘em.”
“I wouldn’t count on it,” Beckham said.
Three blocks in and there was still no sign of the Variants or survivors. A steady drizzle drenched the convoy as it charged forward. The crusted red blood on the streets pooled and streamed into storm drains. It would only take a few months for Mother Nature to cleanse the city. The corpses would decay, and the rats would finish what the Hemorrhage Virus and Kate’s bioweapon had started. New York City had a shortage of many things, but rats weren’t on the list. He suspected that wouldn’t change anytime soon.
Beckham kept to the sidewalk on the right side of the road, careful not to cross in front of any windows or doors that weren’t boarded up. He had his urban combat senses on now. Every nook and cranny held the potential of a threat. Horn followed close behind him. Jinx and Chow held their places in the middle of the street, with Jinx rotating as he walked to continually check their six. Timbo and Ryan kept up across the street, watching high and low for contacts.
At the end of the block they reached the first high-rises, a pair of modest brick apartments. The Bradley on the left smashed a Honda Civic into the front of the building, blocking the entrance. One less door the Variants could use to ambush the convoy. Beckham sidestepped the crushed Honda and continued on when a drop of heavy rain pinged off his helmet. A few steps and another drop hit his visor. This time he looked up. What he saw stopped him mid-stride.
A body in a CBR suit hung halfway out a window some five floors above, the visor angled down right at him. Beckham locked onto the pale, dead face through the hazy smoke.
There was a blur of motion in the window behind the body. He took a step back and saw a shiny skull buried into the back of the man’s suit.
“Contact!” Beckham yelled. “Fifth floor, six o’clock.” It had to be a recent kill if the Variant was feeding, which meant there were others in the area.
Leaping into the street, he took up position next to Horn. The Bradleys skidded to a stop. The commander manning the TOW launcher in the turret on the left dropped back into the vehicle and secured the hatch. The M242 25mm chain gun squealed as it maneuvered toward the building. Marines fanned out across the road, shouldering rifles and taking up position behind the armor of the convoy.
“Shoot it!” someone yelled.
The Marine Beckham saw puking earlier screamed, “There’s another one!”
He was right. More of the creatures shot their heads out of the open windows to check on the fresh meat gathering outside. Dozens of Variants emerged, their lips puckering and popping.
Before Lieutenant Gates could bark a single order over the comm, half of the platoon was firing their M16s. Beckham and the rest of Team Ghost ran for cover across the street, kneeling behind a car one of the Bradleys had flipped.
The crack of automatic gunfire echoed through the city as Marines emptied their magazines. Bullet casings pinged off the concrete, and wounded Variants fell to their death, smashing into the street with loud cracks. Back in Iraq, Beckham had learned exactly what sound a body made after falling from a tall building. These were no different. Each splattering crunch was as loud as a shotgun going off.
The sky was raining monsters.
“Hold your fucking fire!” came a voice over the net. “Conserve your ammo!”
It was Gates, and he was too late. Most of the platoon was already feeding the building with rounds from their second magazine. Beckham checked on his own team. The men all had their weapons aimed at the high-rise, but none of them had taken a single shot.
A minute later, every single window in the apartment building was gone. Bullet holes pockmarked the brick exterior. A half-dozen mangled creatures lay in puddles of blood on the sidewalk and street.
When the smoke cleared, t
he Marines gathered around the first casualty of Operation Liberty. Beckham shook his head when he saw the body. The kid that puked earlier and then prematurely started the Fourth of July celebration was lying face down on the sidewalk. A panel of broken glass had nearly sliced him in two.
Sergeant Valdez went to work a few feet away, smacking helmets. He swooped down to check the man’s lifeless body. He then pointed at the corpse and said, “This is what happens when you aren’t careful! From here on out, no one fires unless I give the fucking order!”
Valdez checked the dead Marine one more time before storming off toward the Bradleys. The sound of the engines reclaimed the afternoon, and the panic of the first battle faded. Marines fell back into position, some of them looking sheepishly at the ground, knowing they’d just participated in Operation Overkill.
The Bradleys advanced into the next intersection and Beckham motioned his men forward. He passed the body of the dead Marine, pausing briefly to say a short prayer. Two PFCs were standing over the kid. They watched Beckham pass and then glanced back down at their friend.
“He never even finished his training,” Beckham heard one of them say.
“Neither did I,” the other Marine said.
-15-
Kate trembled with anger.
“What do you mean you can’t get a message through?” she asked.
“Doctor, I assure you, Command is fully aware of the Variant threat in Manhattan. 1st Platoon is well equipped to deal with it, too,” Major Smith said from behind the glass.
“Bullshit,” Kate replied. “The Variants have gone underground. There are hundreds of thousands if not more of them beneath the city!”
Ellis put a hand on Kate’s shoulder, but she pulled away.
“Major, all you have to do is get on the phone and inform Central Command. Tell them I told you. Tell them the Variants are sensitive to UV rays. They’ve developed night vision, or something close to it, and I can guarantee you that they’ve gone underground. New York is riddled with sewers, storm drains, and utility tunnels, not to mention the subways. It’s a trap.”
“You are one hundred percent certain of this?” Smith asked.
“Yes!” Kate said, her voice just shy of a shout.
Smith nodded. “I’ll see what I can do, but I can already tell you General Kennor is plowing full steam ahead.”
Kate sucked in a breath and said, “There are a lot of lives at stake. You don’t want that on your conscience, do you?”
The major paused at that, but then continued walking.
Kate felt a hand on her shoulder again.
“I’m sorry, Kate,” Ellis said.
She exhaled and strode over to Cindy’s station. “Talk to me,” she said, filing the conversation with Smith and her concerns about Beckham and the others away.
Cindy avoided eye contact, her hand tapping nervously on the desk. “We just received new test results from Central. They sent us a video from a lab in Colorado.”
“Did they find the same thing as us?” Kate asked.
Cindy nodded. “The creatures are evolving at an incredible rate. But so far the other teams haven’t found any weakness besides the sensitivity to light.”
Kate gritted her teeth. When the video feed came up on the screen, she saw Cindy was right. The creatures had transformed even further. These new specimens hardly looked human.
The video feed showed a female subject that resembled a shell of her former self. Wisps of thin blonde hair hung off her pale scalp. Veins bulged from her nearly translucent flesh. And her face had gone through a grotesque alteration, her lips fully developed into what could only be called a sucker. If it weren’t for the specimen’s breasts, Kate wouldn’t have known the patient was female.
Ellis broke the silence as the team stared at the monitors. “Technicians here are reporting the same thing with our two subjects.”
Kate sucked in a cold breath of filtered air.
“All of the specimens are expressing traits of species that make them excellent predators,” Cindy added.
“The flexible limbs and joints, the microscopic setae on the skin, the nails, the increased cones and rods in the eyes and the regeneration of cochlear hair cells in the ear,” said Ellis enthusiastically. “Think about how far back those genes could go. We’re talking primordial ooze here. I remember reading about an extinct mammal that—”
“I know, you’ve already told us this,” Kate said. “But unless you can tell me exactly which genes of the twenty thousand plus that make up our genetic code, then I’m not interested.”
Ellis’s cheeks flared red behind his visor and he turned back to his monitor. “Well, I may not be able to tell you exactly which genes, but looks like the first toxicology results finally came through for the blood samples we sent them yesterday. Give me a second to read these.”
Kate raised a brow and joined him at his station. A chill ran through her entire body. She was freezing, terrified, and tense. She desperately wished she could rub her eyes, but her chilly spacesuit made that impossible. She settled for a wrinkle of her nose and a couple rapid blinks.
“Interesting,” Ellis said after a few minutes. “Toxicology found several vital pieces of information. First off, the nanostructures of VX-99 are virtually gone in our new batch of Variants. Seems like Dr. Medford may have created his untraceable bioweapon after all.”
Kate didn’t want to think about Medford or Gibson. “Keep going.”
With a nod, Ellis continued. “Second—and this is fascinating—histology reports show the Variants seem to have lost the taste receptors for sweetness. They are no longer expressing the amino acids responsible. But like cats, they seem to have developed taste receptors for adenosine triphosphate, a molecule responsible for energy found in all living cells.”
“So that explains their desire for flesh,” Cindy said. “They’ve been reprogrammed as carnivores.”
“Yup,” Ellis replied. “Plus, endocrine cell signaling is causing an increase in the stem cell population within dermal and bone marrow tissues.”
Kate squinted. “So we can explain their healing ability and their affinity for the protein in meat.”
“Correct,” Ellis replied.
“So what?” Kate asked, irritated.
“Think about it, Kate,” Ellis said. There was a note of almost manic enthusiasm in his voice. He pulled up a stool next to her. “These changes are occurring at a cellular level and are happening very quickly. The Variants aren’t just evolving; they’re adapting. All of the epigenetic changes we have seen are just part of the overall picture.”
Kate nodded, once, then twice, then more rapidly. Ellis was right. The changes they were seeing were the result of something they couldn’t see with their naked eye.
“Can’t we find a way to turn those genes off?” Cindy asked. “I mean, wouldn’t—”
Ellis cut in. “I’ve thought of that. Which is one reason I’m so interested in which genes the VX-99 nanostructures activated,” he said, glancing at Kate with a raised brow. “Epigenetic changes have been reversed before, but we’re talking about single cell cultures and turning off one easily identified gene. But changes at this scale and magnitude?”
Pausing, Ellis shook his head. “I’m not even sure if that’s possible. It’s simply beyond the realm of modern medicine. It would be like trying to devolve a human back into an ape.”
“I’ve said it before. There’s no bringing these things back,” said Kate. “The Variants have evolved into an entirely new species. We have to focus on killing them, not treating them.”
“Contact!”
Beckham waited for gunfire that never came. The convoy rolled to a stop. Sandy-brown armor protruded out of the haze like some sort of prehistoric creature.
A large man in a CBR suit emerged from the wall of gray haze. He walked past the armored vehicles and then stopped in front of the Humvees. Marines surrounded him with shouldered rifles.
Beckham balled his hand into
a fist, and his men halted.
The man stumbled away from the vehicles with Sergeant Valdez shadowing him. “Stop where you are!”
Whoever it was, he kept walking aimlessly down the street like he hadn’t even heard the sergeant.
“What the fuck is wrong with this guy?” Horn asked.
“I have no idea,” Beckham replied. He gripped his submachine gun.
“Stop or we open fire!”
Beckham’s earpiece flared to life. “Strike teams, don’t let this guy escape. Proceed with caution.”
With his muzzle angled at the concrete, Beckham approached the man. They were only about twenty yards apart now. “Sir, we aren’t going to hurt you. Please, stop, and put your hands above your head.”
The man continued walking, unfazed by the small army surrounding him.
“We’re here to help you,” Beckham said, letting his MP5 hang from his chest. He raised a hand. “Please, Sir, we are here to help.”
The man suddenly froze. He tilted his filthy, bloodstained visor and stared at Beckham. Then he wiped a sleeve across the pane of his helmet, revealing a freckled face. He stared back, unblinking.
“What’s your name?” Beckham asked.
The man flinched and said, “You can’t help me.” He turned and scanned the Marines surrounding him. “None of you can help me!”
That was good, Beckham thought. At least he had the guy talking now. “Calm down, man,” Beckham said. “What’s your name?”
His hands trembling, he looked at Beckham and said, “Rex.”
“You a doctor?”
The man looked down at his suit as if he didn’t realize he was wearing it. “No, I was a firefighter before…” He paused, his gaze shifting to the skyline and focusing on a cloud.
“Are you by yourself? Where is everyone else?”
The man let out a nervous chuckle. “Meg thought we could get out of the city. So did Jed. They thought we could run…”
“Rex, tell me where they are,” Beckham said. “The other survivors.”
“Jed’s dead,” Rex said. Then he pointed straight down at the pavement. “And Meg’s down there with everyone else that tried to escape.”
Extinction Edge (The Extinction Cycle Book 2) Page 17