“Even the entire U.S. military?”
“Especially the entire U.S. military.”
Dominic sat back in his seat. “Okay, just so we’re clear on what our limits are.”
“I’m not familiar with Atlanta’s layout,” Remy said. “The area we’re going into is the same area the Westin is in, right?”
“It’s not far from it,” Dominic said. “That area of Atlanta was part of the city’s big tourist mecca before the outbreak. There’s a lot of tourist attractions bunched up in that small space and all the big chain hotels to go with them, which means there’s a good chance we’re going to run into some problems.”
“Paint me a picture,” Cade said as she drove the vehicle out of the neighborhood they’d been in and hit the highway. “What attractions are in the area, and what sort of potential crowd can we expect around them?”
“Most prominently, there’s the World of Coca-Cola museum and the Georgia Aquarium,” Dominic answered. “Both of them, the aquarium, especially, were really big tourist draws. The aquarium was one of the largest in the world, so thousands of people went through it every day. Since they’re next door to each other and sold joint discounted tickets to both attractions, a lot of those same people passed through the museum too. When Michaluk got out and reached that area of Atlanta, it was mass chaos in the streets, people dying and getting back up left and right.”
“No shit,” Remy said. Dominic glanced at her long enough to give her a glare before continuing.
“Needless to say, it’s probably one of the more dangerous areas of downtown Atlanta, outside of anywhere near the college campuses, hospitals, clinics, or the CDC itself.”
“Sounds like the whole damn town is a barrel full of fucking monkeys,” Sadie mumbled.
“So what’s our next step?” Keith asked.
“Well, we need to actually get there first,” Dominic said. “Once we’re closer, we need to figure out which route would be the safest to take, though once we get within a certain perimeter of, say, Baker Street, we’re going to be fucked no matter which way we go or how we go about it, unless a miracle happens between now and then.”
“This trip sounds more and more exciting,” Remy quipped. “When’re we gonna get there?”
“Nine or so hours from now, assuming we don’t stop for anything,” Cade said. “If my mapping skills haven’t failed me, that is.”
“I’m going to take a nap,” Remy announced. “Maybe those of us who aren’t driving right now should do the same. That way we’ll all be awake and alert by the time we get to Atlanta.”
“Cade, I can take over driving in a few hours if you’d like so you can rest,” Dominic offered.
“I’ll be fine.”
“Cade—”
“I said I’ll be fine.” There was fire in her eyes and in her voice, enough that Dominic sat back in his seat again and gave her the briefest of nods.
“Fair enough,” he said. “Let me know if you change your mind.” As he said that, he had a feeling that nothing he said or did would make Cade change her mind about anything. She was on a mission to find her husband. She was probably going to work herself to death before all was said and done, and there was nothing he would be able to do about it.
Chapter 14
Ethan mentally prepared for the coming scuffle, adrenaline flooding his veins. The thought of incapacitating three soldiers was ridiculous. They were professionally trained men who were geared toward a shoot-first mentality, and he was a former police officer who, while trained to do what was necessary, had promised the woman he liked that he wouldn’t kill them.
But he’d be damned if he stood by while they killed him or, worse yet, Kimberly.
“Stay here,” he said to Kimberly, his voice low. “Keep behind this tree unless one of them gets too close to you. Then I want you to run. Don’t put yourself in danger. Just go where I can find you again once this is all taken care of.”
Kimberly nodded and grasped his hand for the barest of moments. “Be careful, okay?”
“Of course.” Ethan wanted kiss her in case something awful happened and he never had the opportunity to do so again. He shoved the urge aside. There wasn’t time for sentimentalities like that. He shrugged his backpack off his shoulder and handed it to her, then picked up a large stick from the underbrush. He bounced it against his palm a few times, testing the weight and balance of it, then ducked out from behind the tree, stepping into the soldiers’ lines of sight. All three of them skidded to a halt and raised their weapons to aim at him.
“Lookin’ for me?” he called, making sure their attentions stayed on the possible danger in front of them and not on the fact that there should have been two people in their sights and not just one. Then he started to run, moving parallel to the soldiers and further away from Kimberly.
He darted from tree to tree, ducking behind them for shelter, while bullets peppered the trees and shrubbery around him. He waited for them to run out of ammunition, and when there was a lull in the shooting, Ethan decided that was his cue to move. He raced out from behind the tree he’d sheltered behind, straight at the closest of the three figures. He brought the limb up and swung it with all the force he could muster. The hefty stick bashed into the man’s visor and gas mask, slamming both into his face and sending him staggering backwards off balance. He sprawled onto the ground, knocked out cold.
Ethan turned his attention to the other two that were still standing, lifting his branch again and starting toward them. Both were reloading their weapons with an air of franticness that betrayed their calm personas as they stood their ground. The soldier closest to him managed to get his weapon reloaded first, and he raised his rifle, though not in time to prevent Ethan from slamming the thick end of the branch into the man’s stomach, and when the man doubled over with the force of the blow, he jerked the branch upward underneath the man’s gas mask and into his jaw. With one last swing, he smacked the soldier on the side of the head and watched as he tumbled to the ground.
There was one soldier left, and he’d managed to finish loading his rifle. Ethan started toward him as the man chambered a round and lifted his weapon. Realizing he wasn’t going to make it to the soldier in time, Ethan dropped the limb and drew his Glock faster than a human should have been able to, lifting it up to point it at the man’s head.
“Drop the rifle, or I’ll ventilate your skull,” he ordered. The soldier hesitated, and Ethan barked out, “I said drop it.” The soldier lowered the rifle, kneeling to set it on the ground. “Now take two steps back from it.” He obeyed Ethan’s order with deliberateness, and it was then that Kimberly came running up.
“Can you get any more cliché with the lines?” she asked, stopping beside the felled soldiers and divesting them of their weapons.
“Sorry,” Ethan said. “Sometimes I say the first thing that pops into my head. I can’t help it if it sounds ridiculous.” He jerked his chin toward the soldier. “Take your mask off,” he told him. The man shook his head, and Ethan repeated, “Take your mask off, now.”
“I can’t!” the soldier said, his voice muffled by the gas mask. “If I do, they’ll kill me!”
“That doesn’t matter, because you won’t be going back to them,” Ethan said. “Take it off.”
Reluctantly, the soldier reached up and grasped the gas mask, unfastening the straps and pulling it off his face. Ethan raised an eyebrow in surprise when he got a look at the face underneath the mask. The soldier was much younger than he’d expected, around nineteen or twenty, about as green as military guys came. He looked to be of mixed race, maybe Hispanic and Caucasian, dark haired and dark eyed, his face flushed from the heat generated from the limited air circulation underneath the gas mask. He held the mask in his right hand, letting it hang at his side.
“What do you want with me?” the man asked, sounding wary. Ethan could see the terror in his eyes, and he wondered what in the hell the military had told him that would have him so scared to take his mas
k off.
“Information,” Ethan said. “And your help.”
“Why should I help you?”
“Because right now, you’ve got nothing to lose for doing so,” Ethan said. “You’ve said yourself that they’ll kill you for taking your mask off. By helping us, you’ll have a shot at staying alive.”
The man looked at him warily. “How so?”
Ethan paused, trying to decide the wisdom of telling the man what he and Kimberly were doing out in the middle of nowhere, but he didn’t see where it would hurt. This man was at the disadvantage here, not him. So he sighed and explained, “We’re trying to find the CDC.”
“The CDC is gone,” the soldier said.
“There are probably other medical facilities, right?” Ethan said. “Somebody out there has to be operational and working on this virus.”
“Maybe,” the soldier said. “If they were, what would you want with them? If they’ve got a vaccine, they’re not going to give it to you.”
“We have a vaccine,” Ethan said. The soldier’s eyes widened in shock. “It’s been tested, and it works. We just need to get it into the hands of someone who can actually do something with it.”
“How…how did you get this?” the man asked. “We searched the main CDC offices in Atlanta, and there was no sign of a cure, a vaccine, an antidote…nothing.”
“We’ve had the good fortune to work directly with a CDC doctor for the past seven or so months,” Ethan explained. “He’s been working nonstop on a cure since the outbreak started.”
“What do you want me to do?” the man asked.
“There are probably other medical facilities that are still operational, right?” Ethan said. “You guys are obviously up and running, so somebody has to be working on this virus. I need you to take me to them.”
The soldier’s shoulders sagged at Ethan’s words, as if he were suddenly weary, resigned to answering his questions. “The CDC is bust,” he told them. “There’s nothing in the southeast that is functioning. I do know of a research facility that’s up and running and doing research on the virus to try to create a cure. Maybe they can help you.”
“Where is this facility located?”
“Eden, North Carolina.”
Chapter 15
Brandt mounted the stairs on the other side of the exit door, feeling like his heart was going to beat right out of his chest from sheer nervousness. A cool breeze assaulted him when he reached the top, and he paused to enjoy it, closing his eyes, letting the breeze ruffle his hair. One of the soldiers nudged him in the back, and he took a few steps forward to make room for the others to get on the platform. Then he looked over his surroundings curiously.
Wherever they were, it was somewhere elevated off the ground. He stood on a metal catwalk-like walkway that ran off into the distance, with an intersection of walkways not far in front of him. When he looked down, he found himself staring at a beehive of activity, dozens upon dozens of people bustling about doing all manner of activities that were incomprehensible to Brandt. He glanced behind him, checking to see if the others were there, and he felt reassured when he saw the beautiful woman who resembled Cade standing at the back of the group. He took a deep breath and let the soldiers goad him forward toward the intersection, where he was directed to the left.
Moments later, he stood at the top of a massive wall, looking into a vast expanse of blackness. The wall had to have been at least fifty feet tall, high enough that the wind felt like it was blowing too hard where he stood. At the foot of the wall, he saw a strip of cleared ground roughly two hundred yards wide, not a tree or other sign of life anywhere in it. Beyond that stood large piles of rubble, like all the buildings had been demolished to create a makeshift outer wall. The wall he stood on ran in either direction for as far as his eyes could see, disappearing into the darkness. Spotlights shone over the strip of cleared ground, occasionally panning over to the rubble-wall as if searching for potential attacks. About fifty yards to his right was a massive gate built into the wall, large enough to march half an army through. The sight of it was enough to unsettle him.
“What…what is this?” Brandt asked, mentally grimacing at the faint tremor in his voice.
“What you’re looking at is the ruins that are the remains of the southeastern United States,” Bradford said, moving up to stand beside him. “Hundreds upon hundreds of square miles of wasteland, infection, and death.”
“And plenty of life too,” Brandt commented. “So, what, you’ve built a fortress to keep out the infected? Granted, it’s the biggest one I’ve ever seen, but who cares? There are probably miniature fortresses all over the U.S.”
Bradford stared at him for a long moment, and Brandt stared back, daring him to contradict him as the beginnings of a sinking, nauseous feeling stirred in his gut. Finally, Bradford let out a heavy breath through his nose and shook his head sorrowfully. “Lieutenant Evans, there’s a lot you’re unaware of in this new world,” he said. He beckoned to Brandt and the soldiers. “Follow me, please.”
Despite Brandt’s resistance toward doing anything the man asked him to do, he was compelled to follow.
The major led him across the catwalk back to the intersection, then kept going straight, heading toward what Brandt presumed was the other side of the wall. As they approached it, he heard an odd mishmash of sounds that he hadn’t heard in almost two years radiating from somewhere ahead of him, like car horns honking and traffic rumbling. There was a glow on the horizon, one he hadn’t noticed before when he’d been distracted looking at his immediate surroundings, and his mouth drew down in a frown.
“What is this?” Brandt asked. Then he caught a glimpse of the world on the other side of the wall, and his heart felt like it stuttered to a stop. He gripped the metal railing in front of him, his knees weak, his breath catching in his throat at the awe-inspiring sight in front of him.
A small city was spread out before him, its streets brilliantly lit by street lamps, its buildings’ windows glowing with the familiar yellow light of civilization that he hadn’t seen in two years. Cars trundled down the road, and if he squinted, he could make out the silhouettes of people on sidewalks, moving in and out of several buildings, laughing and conversing among themselves. Though there were military personnel everywhere, the city, wherever it was, was the very picture of tranquility, like its inhabitants were unfazed by the infectious menace rampaging through their world.
The sinking feeling in Brandt’s gut spiked. He turned away from the sight and faced Bradford, his face feeling tight as anger surged to the surface. “What the hell is this?” he demanded, jabbing a hand at the sight before him as best he could, considering his hands were still cuffed together.
“This is Eden, North Carolina,” Bradford said, absurdly calm in the face of Brandt’s anger.
“How did…how is…how does…?” Brandt sputtered. He was unable to formulate a complete sentence in his anger and confusion.
“How does it look so normal?” Bradford suggested. “Because it is normal, at least insofar as it partially serves as a military base. This is FOB Eden, where we’ve been doing research on the viral contaminant in the southeastern United States since shortly after its outbreak.”
As Bradford spoke, things started to slot into place in Brandt’s mind. The wall he stood on, the references to quarantine, how everyone kept referring to the “southeastern United States.” All of it started to add up to a story he didn’t want to hear, one that made his stomach churn with nausea.
“The virus never went worldwide, did it?” he managed to ask without vomiting. “It was contained, wasn’t it?”
Bradford sighed. “For the most part,” he said. “There were isolated incidents around the U.S. and parts of Europe, but we managed to stop the virus’s spread and keep it from spreading any further. We learned a lot of lessons very quickly from the southeast’s fall.”
“What about the survivors in the southeast?” Brandt asked. “Have you been launching search
-and-rescue operations? Is that why some of the roads have been cleared?”
“No, unfortunately not,” Bradford said. “Some of the major roadways have been cleared to allow for troop movements, but there aren’t any rescue operations. Those were suspended when the extent of the infection’s spread became evident. Instead, we focused on quarantine measures.”
“Quarantine measures?” Brandt repeated.
“Extreme quarantine measures,” Bradford clarified. “As someone who’s been involved in that sort of thing at the CDC, you should understand what sort of extremes the quarantine measures took.”
Brandt didn’t have to take the time to think back on what had happened to him when he’d been a test subject for what had become the Michaluk virus. He remembered the chaos that had occurred when the virus had slipped out, when the federal government had ordered the complete shutdown of the testing, including the eradication of all the test subjects. It was only thanks to the CDC doctor Derek Rivers that Brandt was still standing. A lot of good men and women had met their deaths that day, and they hadn’t deserved to be cornered and shot like they were rabid dogs.
Brandt stared at the man, the full meaning of Bradford’s words setting in, and his queasy stomach finally gave up the ghost. As the magnitude of the major’s words wormed its way into his brain, he leaned over and puked on the walkway right at Bradford’s feet, bracing his hands against his knees, his stomach heaving and bile exploding from his throat. The major took a step back with a sound of disgust, a sound that pushed Brandt’s nausea away and replaced it with cold, seething anger. He straightened and launched himself at the man, wrapping his hands around Bradford’s throat and squeezing.
“You son of a bitch!” Brandt snarled. “You left us all for dead!”
Bradford’s fingers scrabbled at Brandt’s hands. Brandt clung even tighter to his throat, trying to choke the life out of him as the faces of his deceased friends flashed through his mind.
The Becoming: Redemption (The Becoming Series Book 5) Page 9