Thunder and Ashes

by Z. A. Recht

  Mason could have kicked himself upon hearing that last part. He knew he’d seen something on the roof of the building, and had let the pigeons throw his instinct off-track. He should’ve spotted the ambush before they’d walked into it, and now it was too late, he thought, as they were led deeper into the facility, hands bound tightly, destined for their temporary holding cells.

  The first of the infected that reached Trev had been a police officer. It still wore its uniform, and still sported an ugly, festering wound on its arm. Trev ducked under the infected’s tackle and came up behind it, allowing it to fall forward onto the pavement, carried there by its own inertia.

  The remaining two sprinters were right behind the first.

  As Trev came up out of his duck, he was already attacking, bringing his baton upward in a parody of a golfer’s stroke. The end of the baton caught one of the infected under the chin, and its head snapped back, spraying blood from its mouth. It staggered backwards a moment, off-balance.

  Trev wheeled around, using his own momentum to maximize the striking power of the baton, and brought his weapon slamming into the side of the head of the third infected. The thing’s skull cracked under the impact, splattering blood on Trev’s weapon. The infected fell flat on the pavement with wide, surprised eyes, dispatched for good. Blood pooled around its skull.

  Trev turned his attention to the ex-cop infected. It had regained its balance and spun to face him once more. The rage in its eyes had grown; frustration at being evaded had upped its adrenaline. Trev recognized the look, and was ready when the ex-cop sprung at him.

  Trev jumped nimbly to one side, again dodging the infected’s attack. He used the momentary opportunity to wheel on the bloodied infected he’d uppercutted, bringing his baton down hard on the top of its skull. Unlike the one he’d put down, this one withstood the blow, but went down to the pavement, unconscious. Trev filed that little bit of tactical knowledge away in the back of his mind—he’d have to finish it off when he got a chance.

  The ex-cop turned from its second foiled attack and glared at Trev. It leaned its head back and roared once more, then charged a third time.

  Trev was tiring of dodging the infected. This time, as it reached him, he simply sidestepped, held out one foot, and tripped the infected.

  The ex-cop fell hard onto the street, and Trev could hear the breath get knocked out of the infected’s lungs. He didn’t care. He didn’t give it a chance to draw another breath, much less climb back on its feet. Trev was on it before it could move again, swinging the baton overhanded and bringing it down on the infected’s skull over and over until little remained but a pulpy mess.

  Trev rose from the cop’s body, took a deep, shuddering breath, and steadied himself. Three attackers, three victories.

  Oh, wait, Trev thought. Two victories.

  He took two steps back, eyed the unconscious sprinter, and stomped hard on the back of its neck. A quick, loud snap reached his ears.

  That one won’t be getting back up, Trev thought. Now there are three victories.

  Trev straightened himself out, cracking his neck and shaking the baton free of gore. He was just about to reach down and clean it off on the clothing of one of the dead sprinters when he heard a raspy, gutteral moan echo across the street. Trev froze in place and raised his head, looking off in the direction of the noise.

  Half a dozen shamblers, drawn by the roar of the sprinters, had stumbled into the roadway and were heading straight for Trev. He judged the distance between them and himself, and figured he had a good thirty seconds to kill—then he heard a second moan, and turned his attention to his left, down another street.

  This road, too, was swiftly filling with shamblers. Trev’s eyes went wide and he looked to his right. Even more shamblers were approaching from that direction. Trev rose to his feet and began backing toward the research facility. He had every confidence in his own abilities when it came to fighting the infected, but he knew a losing proposition when he saw one, and a losing proposition was heading toward him right then, numbering several dozen.

  Trev turned, intent on jogging the rest of the way to the research facility and warning the others of the incoming threat. The street leading to the facility had likewise become infested with shamblers. Four of them were already between him and the facility.

  “Well, shit,” Trev murmured under his breath.

  The roar had drawn all of the infected in a one-block radius from the intersection where he’d fought the sprinters.

  “Now or never,” Trev said to himself. He shook out the baton once more and broke into a run, clubbing the first of the shamblers out of the way and dodging between the second and third. The fourth he repeated his wind-up golfer’s swing on, snapping its head back. It tipped backwards on its feet and fell motionless to the street. The way to the facility was clear.

  Trev ran toward the glass double-doors, a hand outstretched to yank them open.

  Several events transpired at that precise moment. Above Trev, the three rooftop guards emerged into the sunlight at the same time Trev disappeared from view below. All that greeted them upon their arrival was a view of the streets and the shamblers working their way, bit by bit, toward the research facility. Below, in the entryway, Jackson and Smith, the two guards Derrick had left behind, were just beginning to relax. Jackson was in the middle of passing a cigarette to Smith when Trev’s hand gripped the door handle.

  As Trev burst into the entryway, Jackson and Smith turned to look at him, surprise etched on their features. A lit cigarette dangled from Jackson’s lips. For a long moment, the men stared at one another—then burst into motion.

  Trev’s mind, still racing at a mile-a-minute from his encounter with the infected, first guessed that these were the soldiers that Mason and Anna had kept speaking of, the ones they were trying to meet up with.

  That thought was dashed when Jackson and Smith went for their pistols.

  Trev dove sideways and skidded to a stop half-behind one of the piles of furniture, fumbling for his own weapon. He freed it from its holster, flicked the safety off, and took aim.

  “It wasn’t easy tracking you down along the way,” Derrick was saying as he led the small group through the twisting, disorienting corridors of the research facility. “All those side roads we had to cover. We figured you’d use the interstate at some point, and that hunch paid off—I guess. Depends on your point of view.”

  Mason wasn’t listening much. He was paying attention to their surroundings. They’d passed a number of offices and some storage rooms but nothing much that looked like any kind of laboratory. He guessed they were on another level—in a basement, perhaps. The facility was only one story, after all. He also paid close attention to the men escorting them. The three uniformed men and Derrick formed a diamond around their prisoners, with Derrick in the lead. Mason was right behind his former partner, with Matt off to one side and Juni to his other. Anna brought up the rear, looking rather dejected at having been caught.

  Matt, meanwhile, was still sawing away at the ziptie that bound his hands together. As Derrick rambled on about their search for Doctor Demilio, he suddenly felt the plastic snap and part. His wrists were free. Matt was careful to keep his expression neutral as he palmed the knife and shifted his grip on it. He kept his wrists held tightly together behind his back to create the illusion of them being bound, and waited for his moment.

  Mason, too, was waiting for his moment. Even with his hands tied, he knew he could take at least one of the guards, given an opportunity. He just hoped his companions would back him up.

  In the entryway, Trev and the two guards opened fire on each other. Bullets ripped into the stacked couches and chairs and buried themselves in walls. One put a spiderweb of cracks in the receptionist’s window. All three parties scrambled for better cover.

  In the hall, the sound of shooting suddenly reached the ears of the guards and their prisoners.

  “What the hell?” asked one, turning to look back in the
direction of the entryway—and providing Matt and Mason with their respective opportunities.

  Mason lashed out immediately at Derrick from behind, kicking the back of the man’s leg and buckling it. Derrick went down with a grunt, and Mason followed up his attack with a snap-kick to the back of Derrick’s head. The man fell forward, stunned.

  Matt slammed his shoulder into the chest of the guard to his right at the same moment, and the pair ran up against the concrete wall. The guard’s head snapped back and hit the wall with a sickening crack. He slid down the concrete and slumped against the wall, unmoving.

  “Mason!” Matt called.

  Mason turned in time to see Matt, hands free, tossing him the small pocket knife. Mason half-turned just enough to catch the blade in his bound hands. He immediately began to saw away at his restraints.

  Juni had thrown herself against her guard as well, but her results weren’t as dramatic. The guard pushed her off of himself and backpedaled, drawing his weapon. The fourth guard, upon seeing the prisoners’ sudden revolt, grabbed Anna and drew his own weapon, holding it up to the side of the doctor’s head. He pulled Anna backwards, putting a few feet between himself and the fight. The guard Juni had bodyslammed fell back alongside his companion, and both guards pointed their weapons at the prisoners.

  “Don’t move, don’t move!” they warned. “We’ll wax her!”

  Matt leaned down and grabbed the assault rifle off of the shoulder of the guard he’d bodyslammed and held it up, aiming at the head of the guard who held Anna. The man noticed and ducked back behind her, barely presenting a target. Matt eased his finger off the trigger, unwilling to take the shot and possibly hit Anna.

  “Wax her and you wax the cure you’re after,” Mason said calmly, holding up his newly freed hands and passing the knife off to Juni to free herself.

  Gunfire still echoed through the corridor, hinting at conflicts yet unresolved in the rest of the facility.

  “Take off!” came a grunted order from behind Mason. He turned to see Derrick pulling himself to his feet, a look of rage on his face. “I said take off! Get the doctor away from here, put her in a room, lock it, and guard it. The rest of these piss-ants are expendable.”

  Mason turned to face Derrick. The NSA agent was the deadliest threat in the hallway, and Mason knew it. He wasn’t about to leave his back turned on the man. Over his shoulder he addressed Juni and Matt.

  “Get the doc,” he said. “I’ll handle Derrick.”

  Matt and Juni faced off with the two armed guards. Anna kicked and struggled against the one that held her, but her attempts at escape were futile. The man had his arm wrapped securely around her throat; the more she struggled against him, the more she choked herself.

  “Back off,” ordered the guard holding Anna. He stared down Matt and Juni.

  “Not going to happen,” Matt said, staring down the barrel of the assault rifle.

  Juni felt somewhat helpless next to him, unarmed as she was, but she brandished the pocketknife and tried her best to plaster a feral expression on her face.

  Mason and Derrick faced one another a few meters away. Derrick had finished clambering back up to his feet and was dusting himself off, looking none the worse for wear despite the heavy kick to the back of the head Mason had given him.

  “Shouldn’t have let you stay behind me,” Derrick mused. “Learn something new every day.”

  “Here’s another lesson for you,” Mason said. “Don’t fuck with us.”

  Derrick chuckled, shaking his head. “And who is ‘us,’ exactly, Mason? You’re a lone rogue. You’re nothing.”

  “You’re wrong,” Mason replied. “I’ve been trying my damndest to get Demilio here so she could work toward a vaccine—and now you’re going to just ship her back east. Can’t let that happen, Derrick. We’ve come to far and we’ve lost too much. I’m no lone rogue. It’s you and the rest of your little breakaway faction that’s gone rogue.”

  Derrick’s eyebrows raised a fraction of an inch for a split second only, but Mason caught the microexpression and grinned.

  “Didn’t think I was keeping up-to-date on national politics, did you? Sawyer tell you about the shooter I worked over out on the interstate? He told me some real interesting things,” Mason said.

  Mason and Derrick were now slowly circling one another in the hallway, each looking for an opening in their opponent’s defense and finding none.

  “Oh, yeah?” Derrick asked. “And what did he tell you?”

  “Enough to know that you and Sawyer broke off with half of Congress and formed your own little plan to ‘stabilize’ the country,” Mason said. “From what I heard it’s bullshit. There is no cure. Hell, there isn’t even a vaccine—yet. And you’re getting in the way of us finding even that much.”

  “A vaccine won’t help my infected wife,” Derrick snarled, and suddenly burst into motion. His hand slipped behind his back for a moment and came up less than a second later with a compact automatic pistol.

  Mason was nearly caught off-guard, but he leaned back just far and fast enough to allow Derrick’s first shot to miss. Mason used his momentum to swing around and snap off a side-kick, connecting solidly with Derrick’s arm. The compact pistol went skittering down the hall, ricocheted off of a doorway, and spun into an office. The two combatants fell back from one another, now both unarmed, and dropped into combat stances, hands held out in front of them and legs spread, their centers of gravity low.

  “Last time I got this kind of workout I put Sawyer under,” Mason muttered, referring to a hand-to-hand match he’d had with Sawyer when he, Anna and Julie had been trying to escape from Washington.

  “Sawyer didn’t hit the gym six times a week,” Derrick countered, and attacked.

  Derrick launched a flurry of punches in Mason’s direction. Mason held his arms in close, absorbing the blows and keeping an eye on Derrick’s legs. He’d sparred with the agent before and knew a thing or two about his style—throw off his opponent with lots of high attacks, and then leg-sweep him.

  Sure enough, after the last punch had been deflected, Derrick’s left leg lashed out in an attempt to trip up Mason and put him on the ground.

  Mason was ready for it. He blocked the kick and followed up with a quick one-two combination to Derrick’s stomach.

  Derrick recoiled, the breath knocked out of him, and narrowed his eyes at Mason. The ex-NSA agent was in his combat stance, resting on the tips of his feet, ready to spring in any direction. Mason simply held out a hand and beckoned Derrick forward.

  “Come on, asshole,” Mason said. “You wanted a fight, you’ve got one.”

  Mason wasn’t prepared for Derrick’s next move. The agency had taught them a touch of jiu-jitsu, but had mainly focused on simple boxing and basic martial arts. The agency didn’t make ninjas out of its agents—it made artful brawlers out of them. The one thing it definitely didn’t make them was wrestlers, and that was why Mason was surprised when Derrick launched a tackle in his direction.

  Mason, balanced nimbly on his feet, tried to jump out of the way in time and failed. Derrick hit Mason full-force in the chest, grabbing him in a bear hug and bringing him down hard on his back.

  Mason felt his head crack off the floor and his vision burst into bright lights and twinkling stars, then swam drunkenly. The ceiling tiles zoomed in and out of focus. Derrick, straddling Mason’s chest, didn’t let him off so easily. He reared back and struck Mason over and over in the face with balled-up fists, bringing Mason closer to the brink of unconsciousness.

  Derrick’s attacks fell off just before Mason dropped off into the darkness. He stood, eyeing Mason’s bloodied face, and grinned.

  “Looks like this round goes to me,” Derrick said, wiping blood from his knuckles.

  He turned his back on Mason and looked down the hallway. Now, which office did that pistol skid in to?

  Derrick spotted the open doorway and headed toward it. He swung into the doorway and looked around on the floor inside. T
here, just a few feet away from him, lay the pistol, half under a desk. He took one step toward it before a roar of frustration and rage rose up behind him and Mason appeared, full-body tackling Derrick. The two agents crashed into the office, upsetting a coat rack and the pair of chairs that sat in front of the desk.

  “Jesus, you just don’t give up!” Derrick cursed.

  “I get that a lot,” Mason replied, using his opportunity to throw a couple of kidney punches into Derrick’s back.

  The agent arched his back and grunted, gritting his teeth against the pain, and reached out a hand toward the desk. His index finger just barely brushed the grip of the pistol. He felt the blows of another pair of kidney punches and pushed the pain to the back of his mind, focusing on the pistol. He managed to slide it an inch closer to himself and he grabbed it up, blindly aiming it over his shoulder and firing twice.

  Mason saw the pistol appear in Derrick’s hand and rolled backwards off of the agent. The two shots embedded themselves in the ceiling tiles, and bits of dust rained down on the combatants.

  Mason jumped to his feet as Derrick began to rise. He knew he couldn’t let his opponent get in another aimed shot—it was a miracle he hadn’t already been hit.

  Mason tried for another snap-kick, but Derrick pulled his arm out of the way in time. The kick landed on Derrick’s side, and Mason heard a muffled crack. He’d broken a rib or two with that one.

  Derrick rolled over onto his back, pistol held out in both hands as he took aim at Mason. Mason had no real time to react: he simply dove across the room, praying that none of Derrick’s shots would hit him. The first shot took a chunk out of the concrete wall. The second shattered the office’s only window, sending shards of glass flying and leaving a few jagged edges in the windowframe.