“First, we even the odds. Then I’ll have a chat with young Mr. Spencer about his hubris.”
“You want me to put a missile down his throat, Chief?”
“Of course not! I want him to call me ‘Dad.’”
“Oh.”
“Hey, Vigi! How many zombies down there, do you think?”
“Hundreds. Maybe a thousand or more!”
Misericordia cackled. “We’ve got lots more ammunition than that, mate!” He fired the big machine gun and it began pounding in his hands. Hundreds of rounds wound through the machine gun, spilling hot brass into the black water below.
The Army of Light stood on the rocky shore as they’d been ordered, growling with growing agitation, but still as statues. The Sutr-Z infected were cut down, cut in half and chopped up.
Only Jaimie, with his sensitive hearing, could detect Misericordia’s demented laughter above the din of the hammering gun.
The big gun paused in its chattering long enough for Vigilax to fire two missiles, one to the North and one to the South, at the edges of the zombie horde. Two hulks of whale carcass exploded into fountains of rotting meat in the moonlight and showered the shore in blood and bone.
Those infected caught in the explosions stumbled and screamed and died in the rain of shrapnel. The rest of the Army of Light held their positions, but each mouth opened and emitted a terrible sound. The Sutr-Z choir was one part gravel, one part pain and two parts rage.
Each of the remaining infected, no matter how dull, recognized the loss of their kind. If the sound they made could be called a song, its title would be Anguish, Frustration, Fury.
Jaimie watched the destruction of his forces and found he was sad for their sacrifice. Each of the infected had once slept in a warm bed and cooked their food and felt joy. They’d all been children who had delighted their parents with first steps and first words. Some of the zombie army were still children.
Perhaps they sensed their leader’s doubt. The ranks trembled and shifted from side to side.
At the lighthouse, Aasa trembled. We’re going to lose control, Jaimie!
Jaimie answered her in thought. It’s time. Give the order.
The girl did as she was told.
Jack shook Aasa’s shoulder. “What’s going on? I don’t understand. I’m trying to reach my son with my mind. I still can’t reach him.”
“It has to go through me,” Aasa said. “If he opens himself up, it’s too much at once.”
“He’d blow a circuit,” Dayo said. “Now is not the time for your son to pass out for a day.”
“What good does an army of morons do us?” Jack asked. “They’re just standing there.”
Dayo nodded her agreement. “I don’t like their song and it seems they only know one. I wish Desi were here.”
The helicopter rose higher in the air to fire on more zombies, killing the infected from the outer edges of the horde and working toward the middle. The Alphas were savage and cruel, but methodical. They whittled the Army of Light down.
“We’ve got to go!” Jack said.
“Jaimie hears you through me,” Aasa said. “He orders you to be still.”
Jack shivered with unspent energy and hugged herself tightly. “This isn’t a battle. It’s a bloodbath.”
Aasa shook her head. “The Art of War states, ‘Let your plans be dark and impenetrable as night, and when you move, fall like a thunderbolt.’”
Aasa did not look away from the battlefield. Jaimie watched the battle though Aasa’s eyes and now he used her voice.
“The five elements of the ancient periodic table were wind, metal, fire, water, and earth. Our attack will be in metal and wind, fire and earth. If that fails — wait. Almost there.”
Aasa reported to Jaimie. He’s coming. Throttle forward, yoke pulled back!
“‘He who is skilled in attack flashes forth from the topmost heights of heaven, making it impossible for the enemy to guard against him,’” Aasa said. “However, Sun Tzu also said, ‘Where we intend to fight must not be made known.’”
Jack took Aastha’s hand. “This so-called Army of Light is getting destroyed. Get ready to run!”
Aastha pulled her hand away and moved to the lighthouse rail to hold her sister’s hand. Aastha said nothing and sent no telepathic message. Her surly frown was rebuke enough.
Aasa spared Jack a glance. “When we put our attention in two places, we lose the power of our intent. Focus your hope on humans.” She smiled. “Dayo, bring me the microphone to the lighthouse speakers now. And Mrs. Spencer? Watch this!”
“Oh, for God’s sake, what’s the big secret?” Jack asked.
Dayo answered for Aasa, “Conviction, distraction, sacrifice, surprise, and kerosene.”
* * *
Misericordia slaughtered hundreds. The Alpha fired and fired and fired until he could feel the heat crawling up the barrel of the gun. The muzzle steamed in the cool air.
The Alpha leader turned his head. “We’ve almost got them all! They’ll run soon! That truck by the lighthouse has a hot engine, Vigi! Save the meat in the lighthouse, but send a missile into that truck! Like Lawrence of Arabia, mate! No prisoners! No prisoners!”
Vigilax looked back and laughed. “And no escape!”
If Misericordia hadn’t been looking at his lieutenant as he spoke, he wouldn’t have seen the proximity alarm light up. Misericordia whipped around to see the nose of a seaplane rising behind him.
* * *
George Enfry hadn’t dared to fly into the attack. If he’d shown up on the helicopter’s radar, they would have blown him out of the sky before he got near. The big Twin Otter would have been spotted immediately floating in Poeticule Bay. Instead, George had been forced to wait, far off the coast, until he was told it was safe for him to attempt the ambush. He taxied into the attack.
When the Indian girl told Enfry the Alphas had arrived and were distracted, deep in the slaughter, it was actually a relief.
George hoped to see his wife. “I’m the zombie air force,” he told his dead wife. “I’ve been a zombie a long time…sleepwalking through life, work, our marriage…” As he pulled back hard on the yoke and took off, the Twin Otter’s pontoons left the water for the last time. Full throttle, he aimed the nose of his aircraft, angling up sharply into the helicopter’s rear.
Enfry thought of his mother, her back turned as she washed dinner plates at the kitchen sink. She sang absentmindedly as she scrubbed the soapy dishes. The words to the old gospel came to him. It was called, I’ll Fly Away. He thought he’d forgotten that.
The boy had told him bravery was not required, only action. In the act, the pilot found what courage he needed. He thought he’d squeeze his eyes tightly, grit his teeth and scream into the impact and into death.
Surprised one last time, George Enfry kept his eyes open and watched Death come with whirring teeth. He faced the end, defiant and singing.
* * *
Had he been strapped in, Misericordia would have died instantly. Instead, he burned his hand on the barrel of the machine gun as he pulled himself up from his seat. Misericordia threw himself out the open door and down into the Atlantic.
As Enfry flew his Twin Otter into the attack helicopter, the fireball enveloped both aircraft. The seaplane’s momentum carried both machines forward. They fell amid the zombies. The Alpha’s war machine crashed to earth.
Out the exit door, George, Jaimie thought. He wished the pilot luck. I hope you find what you’re looking for.
The fiery debris lit the kerosene in several tidal pools and flames raced to the rest as walls of flames shot up everywhere.
The lighthouse speakers emitted a click as Aasa keyed the microphone. The Sutr-Z infected received their command. “Bokor says, close!”
Ranks of zombies to the rear of the battleground stepped shoulder-to-shoulder as the flames spread farther and faster. They could no longer be called a horde. The rear flank of The
Army of Light formed a living, burning wall that lit the shore better than the lighthouse could. At its thinnest, the phalanx was three zombies thick, all aflame.
Misericordia emerged from the water to face Jaimie. He’d been battered from the explosion, but his armor and the fall into the waves had saved him. The weight of the wet body armor had almost pulled him down into the dark, but he’d fought his way up from Poeticule Bay’s depths, gained purchase on the wet rocks and scrambled up. He panted hard, but his wounds were already healing.
Misericordia managed a rueful smile as he got his feet under him and began to pick his way through the flaming maze of tidal pools.
“My back against the sea and you with an army of flaming morons. Nice play, boy!” he yelled. “You’re the defender of your species. Bra-bloody-vo! But I will perpetuate my species! That’s nature’s law. You took away my tribe so I’m going to take your family! That’s natural instinct. I’ll make your mother my new queen. Heh. ’Cuz that’s just mean.”
Misericordia’s laugh was confident. His wounds had already healed. The monster’s irises shone bright white. His broad smile showed off his fangs.
He stepped around another bright pool of burning kerosene, shielding his face against the heat.
“Shiva’s dead and I’m the king! Time to rebuild my kingdom. Every king needs an heir, boy! I’m going to make you like me, son! Put down the flares. Burning a cross to repel a vampire is silly! You’re embarrassing us both. A cross won’t put me off my food.”
“It’s not a cross. It’s a double cross.” Eguskine Xavier Zubiri lowered the flares from in front of his face, pulled back his hood and crossed the flares at diagonals. He grinned. “It’s an X.”
“Who the hell are you?”
“I’m a fiddle player who made a few mistakes.”
“And what’s your mission, mate?”
Xavier shrugged. “You were supposed to die in the crash.”
“Sorry to disappoint.”
“It’s okay. I’ve done what I can to perpetuate my species, or at least make it worthy of continuing.”
Misericordia scoffed. “You believe in redemption, eh?”
“I did and I do. But even if I didn’t…” He raised the sputtering flares high above his head and stepped into a deep pool behind him. “Xavier was a selfish man. My name is Gus.”
One flare died.
The other ignited the tidal pool’s fumes. Gus burst into flame and ran screaming at the Alpha.
He almost managed to tackle Misericordia and share in righteous immolation. Instead, the Alpha pulled his pistol and, with a shaking hand, shot the flaming man in the forehead at point blank range. Gus collapsed at his feet, a corpse that cremated itself.
Misericordia looked up. Another figure made his way through the labyrinth of fire. Jaimie Spencer walked forward to meet him on the field of battle.
The boy’s hands were empty.
And wonder why gods are so occupied with genocide
Aasa turned to her sister. “You can push the button now.”
Aastha smiled and ran to do as she was told. The lighthouse’s foghorn blasted out two long, low, mournful notes across Poeticule Bay.
Aasa keyed her microphone. “Bokor says ‘Meat!’”
The remainder of the Army of Light emerged from their trance. As one, the remaining zombies ran past Jaimie, heedless of the flames, and attacked. Misericordia leaped to the high rock and made his stand.
The Alpha had taken down hundreds of humans in the Brickyard naked. A small mass of flaming zombies was not like fighting humans, but Misericordia had body armor, several mags for his pistol, and grenades.
From the black rock’s high ground, the vampire played a child’s game he’d once played in school when his name was Wiggins. The game was King of the Hill.
He shot the zombies who got to the rock first. The fallen slowed the rest of the attack. If they could have surrounded him, the Army of Light might have won. Instead, the vampire shot them, kicked them off and slammed their skulls into the rock as they tried to climb up. He broke reaching arms. He pulled the pin on his grenades, shredding the late arrivals.
“Flaming zombie!” Misericordia called to Jaimie. “Isn’t that a cocktail?”
Jaimie stood among the dying walls of flames and watched the Alpha fight. The man born Adam Wiggins, once a soldier in service, was truly a monster now. Ruthless as any unfeeling war machine, Misericordia was a force of nature among the Sutr-Z infected. He felt nothing but contempt for his victims, no more connected to them than a psychotic child destroying an ant colony.
All the monster feels, Jaimie thought, is the joy of domination. His only goals are power and perpetuation. Every thought is savage and primal.
The waves of energy coming from the vampire made Jaimie shudder in revulsion.
His last attacker had been a man from Wilmington, Vermont. The burning zombie had a name once. Jaimie knew every name. This one had been called Don Tate. He’d already lost most of one hand. His groin had been shot to bloody ribbons. Tate had watched his wife get devoured before he was infected with Sutr-Z. He’d lost his son.
Tate had thought he was a good man. He was wrong, but his intentions had been pure. In death, his stand looked desperate and sad, but heroic, too, in its way.
“Useless!” Misericordia yelled at the zombie in glee. The Alpha screamed in triumph as he broke the last attacker’s arm. He pulled his attacker close and ripped out his throat with his teeth. The vampire spat out a chunk of meat and snarled. “Zombies taste like shite!”
He threw the infected man, once known as Don Tate, off the high rock. Blood spurted in pumping gouts from the zombie’s torn neck as he thrashed and gasped.
Misericordia landed atop the infected, grabbed him by the ears and smashed the back of his skull into the ground. Then he did it again and again and again. It was a demonstration for Jaimie’s sake. Misericordia only stopped when the dead man’s ears ripped off.
The boy took a deep breath and looked away. “I…I want to talk.”
Misericordia snarled and launched himself at Jaimie. The boy landed on his back hard, the monster atop him.
Jaimie felt the heat of the growling beast’s fetid breath on his neck, its fanged maw hovering inches above his jugular.
“You know what I am.” Misericordia’s hands pinned and squeezed the boy’s shoulders tight against the unforgiving rock. “I am the bloody king. Ha! No! I am the King of Blood.”
Jaimie turned his head, closing his eyes to the beast’s white-eyed gaze.
The monster bared its teeth in a rictus grin, eager and aching for human blood and meat. “What am I, boy? What am I? Tell me what I am and I’ll make you a prince! I’ll make you my son, the first in a long line of hunters. First there were the victims -- that’d be your kind. Then came the rampaging zombies. They have the right idea but they aren’t so smart. Then came the superior species: Alphas. Then there’s me. I am the new dominant species. Apex predator.”
Misericordia pushed up Jaimie’s chin, exposing his neck further.
“You and I? We’ll feed on those two little girls together and you’ll know what real joy is! It’s the highest high! We’ll make a new tribe! They called us Alphas, but when you feed on the young vampires, you’re the pinnacle.” He slapped Jaimie. “Hey! Look at me! Worship your new father!”
Jaimie took a deep breath, opened his eyes and met Misericordia’s gaze, four inches away. Jaimie forced himself to speak. “I had a father.”
“I’m your father now. Say it and I’ll give you the bite that changes everything. I’ll make it easy for you, Dream Boy. Just say the magic word. Greatness is a virus that burns through you and leaves only perfection. Say the magic word. Say it! Say it!”
Jaimie nodded. Tenderly, the boy put his hands on either side of the vampire’s head.
“What’s the magic word, Jaimie?”
“Next.”
Misericordia felt a drop in his energy, but he
didn’t have time to discern its meaning. In confusion, the monster hesitated a few seconds.
“Imperare sibi maximum imperium est. To rule oneself is the ultimate power.”
“What?”
“Mine is a mind virus,” Jaimie said. He closed his eyes again. “Spread the infection.”
The invitation was a sweet whisper, but the floodgates to the world’s pain were thrown open with a shattering bang as the boy plugged the monster into all the power of the Nexus. The mindfield’s energy ripped through Misericordia’s brain.
Everything Jaimie had witnessed came at once. All the terrors of the dead and the damned filled the vampire’s consciousness in a devastating blast.
Misericordia would finally understand the terror of every one of his victims. The vampire would feel wretched pain rip through his impaled liver as he understood Shiva’s agony. The memory of her torn abdomen became his opened guts. He felt the loss of his baby. He felt the sudden invasion of cool air through the gaping cavity that had been Shiva’s torso.
The Alpha would feel the fear as every nerve ending of his being rebelled against being burnt alive. He knew every element of every second of Dr. Daniel Merritt’s torture and the heat of the dead man’s humiliation.
Misericordia would feel the widening of every terrified child’s eye, every bone break, every thought and emotion of every victim, living and dead. Every sweet drop of blood he’d reveled in would taste like battery acid on the monster’s tongue. Each victory would become a defeat, as every image and sense and agony crawled, clawed and slithered through his consciousness and squeezed.
Pain is too small a word to describe the depth and breadth of suffering’s many dimensions. The monster would finally know every name and feel the shame of every sin. In a moment, Misericordia fell from zenith to nadir. The apex predator would be helpless.
This Plague of Days OMNIBUS EDITION: The Complete Three Seasons of the Zombie Apocalypse Series Page 92