“This is a fresh one,” he said as he exited the truck. “And it looks like he was in good shape before he died. He’s fast, so don’t let him get too close. Can you do it, or do you want me to take care of him?”
Miranda hefted the crowbar in her hands, but she didn’t reply right away. After a few moments she said, “I’m not sure I can do it. What if there’s a cure? If I kill this guy, that’s it. He’s dead forever.”
“If you don’t kill him, he may kill you or someone else. If a live person was coming after you with the intent to kill you, wouldn’t you try to protect yourself?”
“That’s different. We came out here intentionally to do this.”
“Look at his neck,” Dan said, getting ready to step in since the ghoul was getting uncomfortably close. “His throat’s been ripped out. That can’t possibly be fixed.”
“No, I guess it can’t,” she said, adjusting her grip on the crowbar, but still looking uncertain.
“Would you want to be like him, walking around after death, killing people and eating them? Do the poor guy a favor and end his misery.”
“You’re right,” she said, taking a deep breath. “I’ll try.”
“Remember, he’s got long arms. You’ll probably need to get him from the side or back so he can’t knock your weapon away.”
“Right,” she said, eyes riveted to the snarling zombie only ten feet away.
~*^*~
~49~
Yucca Compound, Southern California
Madec leaned back in his chair. “I’ve contacted the heads of each region in North America. They’ll pass the word on to the individual communities and also to any local law enforcement agencies in their areas that are still up and running. Rayburn and Hixson will soon be the most wanted men on the planet.”
“Let’s just hope this works,” Bob said, “if they’re even still alive. The way the trail just stopped makes me wonder.”
“It’s possible that they’re dead,” Madec agreed. “But I don’t want to assume it’s the case. We’re checking out several possibilities, but if they are alive, they won’t have any place to hide before long.”
“What do we do now?” Bob asked.
“We wait,” Madec said. “We let the search teams continue their work, and we wait.”
~*~
Lansing Compound
Doune sat on an overstuffed chair in the exquisitely decorated library. He couldn’t complain about the way he’d been treated. He’d been fed gourmet meals and given a lavish room in which to stay. He’d even been offered the company of a woman for the duration of his stay, though he had declined. The Scotch he was sipping would have cost thousands of dollars in the old world. His hosts had provided him every luxury a person could want, in hopes of winning him over to their cause.
A tall, thin man, who happened to be one of Doune’s colleagues, paced the room as he did his best to explain himself.
“Don’t you see the logic?” he asked, wringing his hands in frustration. “Every so often, it happens. It’s nature’s way of strengthening the species. If mankind hadn’t experienced these near extinctions, we never would have found our way to the top of the food chain. Now we are in the perfect position to take advantage of these circumstances.”
Doune had known the other doctor most of his adult life, yet he felt as though he was staring into the eyes of a stranger.
“Have you gone mad, James?” he asked. “As a doctor, how can you condone any of this?”
The other man continued. “This restructuring of our world has been carefully and painfully thought out. We have some of the best scientific minds working with us. They’re all in agreement. If this hadn’t happened, mankind might not have survived its next crisis. We were way overdue.”
“You’re talking about the violent deaths of possibly billions of men, women, and children. How can you possibly justify that?”
“Nick, we didn’t cause this plague. Most of us were opposed to doing anything outside the normal channels, in fact. We thought we could eventually fix the world’s problems through public awareness or changes in our laws. Even those who pushed for a purge, of sorts, would have preferred something more humane. Hell, strategically administered vaccines to keep down the population would have worked just as well, with none of the mess. But the fact remains that when this parasite made its appearance, we were ready for it. We had leaders who were willing to step in, and they had the guts to make tough decisions. Now, we must follow it through to its conclusion, no matter how unpleasant that might be at times. We can turn this tragedy into triumph. Now is the time to prune the human tree.”
“By saving yourselves while others are left outside your walls to die?” Doune asked.
“There isn’t room for everybody, so difficult choices had to be made,” James said. “Those who will help to create a better society have been invited to become a part of our community. Others who were deemed of no benefit to us were not included.”
“What gives you the right to decide who lives or dies? You’re playing God.”
“We’ve been playing God for hundreds of years, Nick. How many of us are alive now that God had already condemned to death?” he asked, throwing his hands in the air. “How many people are passing along traits that weaken our genetic makeup? Would nature have allowed the weak to survive during the Stone Age? Would a blind man have been able to pass along his DNA ten thousand years ago?”
Doune was taken aback by his colleague’s words. “Listen to yourself, James! You’re talking about building a society that is comprised of people with only the specific traits that you deem worthwhile. Don’t you see how wrong and how dangerous that is?”
“We disagree,” James said, becoming more animated as he continued. “Humans are no longer relying on our own strength and skills to survive. We’ve become dependent on tools and technology, which in turn have weakened our species to the point where the next pandemic could have wiped us out, all of us.”
“We’ve advanced,” Doune said. “Our species may be physically weaker now, but it is stronger in other ways.”
“That’s the beauty of what we are trying to accomplish,” James continued. “Only the incredibly strong will survive outside those walls, and eventually many of them will earn a place amongst us, genetically mixing their strength with our mental superiority. Think of mankind as a giant forest. We’ve been putting out the fires for thousands of years. Nature hasn’t been able to cull the diseased trees, the overgrowth. The next fire would have annihilated the forest. We have to do the job we haven’t allowed nature to do. Think of this as a controlled burn. We will be able to make sure our species will survive. The next major event would have chosen its victims at random. A person’s intelligence or good breeding wouldn’t have mattered. The most elite, productive, and intelligent humans would have been thrown into the same pool as the dregs of society. We made sure that those who have the greatest potential to contribute to society will survive. When this thing plays itself out, mankind will be stronger. It will be an evolutionary leap never seen before. We’ll be assuring our place as the top species on the planet for thousands of years.”
He paused, looking at Doune.
“We’re not monsters, Nick. We’re philanthropists,” he said, shaking his head before he returned to his chair. He leaned forward, resting his arms on his legs. “What were we supposed to do, watch and wait as mankind drives itself into extinction? You can’t deny our logic. The question now is whose side will you be on?”
~*~
St. Mary’s Hospital, Lansing
“Eric, I’ve been looking for you,” Jack said. “Why haven’t you been answering your radio?”
“I was tired, so I took a nap,” he said.
“You’re supposed to be on duty,” Jack reminded him.
“Well, it’s not like I’m getting paid anymore.”
“It doesn’t matter. We’ve still all got jobs to do.”
“What are you going to do, fire me?” Eric
asked.
“That’s exactly what I’ll do,” Jack said. “You may not be getting paid in cash, but you have a roof over your head and food to eat. If you stay here and you eat the food we provide, you work.”
Eric frowned. “Well, I think that rule sucks.”
“Too bad,” Jack said. “Now, your options are to keep on doing your job, or you can leave the hospital and do whatever you want outside the walls.”
“I don’t have to do security. I could work in the kitchen once they’re done canning all that food.”
“You mean once the heavy work’s done, you could have a job where you have easier access to the food? I doubt Theresa would give you a kitchen job.”
The cook had little patience for Eric, having caught him going through the pantry and refrigerator on several occasions. A lock had finally been put on the door to make sure he didn’t sneak in when the others were sleeping.
“Okay, maybe not the kitchen,” Eric said.
“You could scrub toilets for a while,” Jack said. “They’re always looking for help with that.”
“I was thinking more like administration. I can help run things around here and maybe have one of the offices that. . .”
“We don’t have administration jobs,” Jack said. “The people in charge of different areas all have regular jobs, too. Admin is just a small part of what they do. You know, you and Brandi seem to be the only two here who have a problem with working.”
“It’s not that I’m lazy, it just seems like a waste of my talents to . . .”
“Whatever, Eric,” Jack said, cutting him off before he had to listen to any more. “The reason I was looking for you was that I wanted to talk to you about something. You said that when you left here, they took you someplace, and there was an old man in charge.”
“Right. His name was Henry.”
“Wombat woke up, and he was saying something about an old man being on the roof when everything went down.”
Eric grew pale. “Henry was here?”
“I don’t know. I’m sure there are other old men around, but I’m not sure how many of them would have a close connection with Reynolds.”
“Henry did, for sure. I think they brought Lee in to replace me.”
“So they are connected with the military?”
“No. I told you guys, this place has nothing to do with the military.”
“You told us a lot of stuff, Eric, and it’s hard to weed out which parts are true. So Reynolds left the military? Seems like Lindsey said something along that line, too.”
“I guess. And if he showed up with an old man, it had to be Henry.”
Jack paused in the conversation to send a radio message to Snake, asking him to join them. When Snake arrived, Jack summarized what he’d learned.
“That’s got to be where they are, then,” Snake said.
“So where is this place, Eric?” Jack asked.
“I’m not really sure,” Eric said.
“You don’t know where it is?” Snake asked, incredulous.
“No, they blindfolded me when they brought me in and took me out.”
“I thought you worked for them as a pilot,” Jack said. “Didn’t you fly out of there?”
“Well, just once,” Eric admitted. “I didn’t actually take over the controls on the bird until we were pretty far from the colony.”
“But you weren’t blindfolded when you left that time, right? You must have seen something.”
“I was kind of busy,” Eric said, turning red. “You know, getting ready to take the pilot’s seat.”
“Eric, my bullshit meter is going off,” Jack said.
“Okay, I was sitting in the back with my wife, Kelli. . .”
“Eric!”
“Right. We weren’t legally married, but they called her my wife. Anyway, I was kind of distracted because she was talking to me.”
The look on Jack’s face said he still wasn’t buying it.
“All right, so I just wasn’t paying attention, okay?” Eric admitted.
“Now that I believe,” Jack said with a sigh.
~*~
Whispering Springs, Nevada
Dan stepped closer, ready to intercede if he had to.
Miranda surprised him by lunging forward then sidestepping to move behind the dead man. Before the ghoul could turn around, she cracked him across the head then did it again. When the body fell, Miranda stepped away and dropped the crowbar, her hands shaking violently.
“Good,” Dan said, surprised. “That was perfect. You just need to stay calm.”
“That was horrible,” she said, bending over with her hands on her knees. Her pale blonde hair hung free, almost covering her face. She took a deep breath. “I just committed my first murder.”
“No, you didn’t,” Dan said, turning to see how close the others were. “He was already dead, just a shell that was being controlled by a parasite. You did him a favor by putting his body to rest.”
“I guess that’s a good way to look at it,” she said, straightening again, “but I’m still shaking.”
“Walk it off,” he said. “I’ll handle the next few if you’re not ready.”
“Thanks,” she said. “Maybe I can pick up some pointers from watching you.”
Hixson picked up the crowbar, but rather than waiting for the dead to arrive, he took the offensive, moving forward to drop the closest ghoul with one swing. He put the second one down with a kick to the knee, allowing him to move on to another. This was a woman with long hair, which was held back in a band. Tossing the crowbar aside for a moment, Dan grabbed the dead woman by the ponytail, holding her head back so she couldn’t bite him. It didn’t stop her from clawing at him, but his thick clothing protected him from her nails.
“By the way, you may want to wear a hat when you’re out here,” Dan said to Miranda. “They’ll grab your hair just like this, and they won’t let go.”
He took his knife and drove it into the woman’s eye, stilling her at once.
“Come over here, Miranda,” he called, walking back to the zombie whose knee he’d broken.
Miranda approached cautiously, standing next to Dan over the writhing body.
“Here’s a chance for you to stab one in the eye, so it’s not a shock when you have to do it later.”
“Do I have to?” she asked, looking unsure.
He handed her the knife and put a large boot on the creature’s chest to hold it down.
“I want to know that you can do this if you need to,” he said.
She hesitated, but when she looked up and saw others coming toward them, it seemed to give her all the incentive she needed. She plunged the knife deep into the semi-dead man’s eye, then pulled the weapon back out with a sound that even Dan found sickening.
“Disgusting!” she yelled, handing him the knife back.
Hixson noticed that she wasn’t shaking anymore, and he pointed to the crowbar. “Get to work.”
Miranda went after the next two with a little less hesitation. Since more were moving their way, Dan jumped in to help with the knife. When a woman about Miranda’s size approached, he traded weapons with Miranda and told her to try the knife. She paused for a few moments then finally moved forward with the weapon raised. When the woman grabbed for her, Miranda stumbled back, unable to get close enough to take her shot.
“Knock her arms away like I showed you!” Dan yelled.
Miranda circled the snarling zombie, looking nervous about moving closer. Finally, she made her move, knocking the left arm aside and lunging forward to slam the blade into the woman’s eye socket. She managed to keep a grasp on the handle as the body dropped, and she quickly turned to prepare for the next one. This time it was a male, and he was slightly bigger than Miranda.
Dan watched carefully, once again ready to step in. “Can you handle this?”
“I’ll try, but if I have problems . . .”
“I’ll be right here,” he said. “Just be sure to hold him back wi
th a straight arm so he can’t bite.”
When the infected man reached for her, Miranda knocked his arm away and stepped in close with the intention of driving the knife into his eye. Before she could do it, he grabbed her with his other arm, and she panicked, dropping the knife as she struggled to free herself.
Dan was there in seconds, grabbing the knife and driving it into the side of the dead man’s head.
When the corpse hit the ground, Miranda went with him, but she quickly managed to untangle herself, and get to her feet again.
“Damn,” she said, breathing hard. “That was terrifying.”
“Their bodies don’t work quite as well as they did in life, but some of them are still strong, especially the fresh ones that aren’t too damaged. You’ll have to really watch out for those.”
“What should I have done differently with that one?” she asked.
“If they’re bigger than you, take them down before you kill them. Or use the crowbar. Don’t get close to them with the knife unless you start to feel more comfortable.”
They stayed another hour so that she could learn as much as possible in a real-life setting. By the time they’d killed everything within reach that needed to die, they were both ready to leave.
“I want to check out the pass, if you don’t mind,” she said.
“Sure. I’m curious to see how well they blocked it.”
Miranda crossed the highway and followed the power line road that paralleled the highway toward Las Vegas. Eventually, the highway and power line road were both blocked by a mass of vehicles jammed between a mountain pass. She stopped the truck, and they got out to walk a little closer.
“I don’t even want to know how many dead might be on the other side of this mess,” she said.
Dead, But Not For Long (Book 2): Pestilence and Promise Page 44