Nano Z

by Brad Knight

  All that stopped Mack from laying a beating down on Eugene was the lack of light to see by. That didn’t last long. Ted’s eyes were the first to glow red. When Mack’s did the same, the room looked well lit. The glowing was some form of night vision bestowed by the nanites in the bodies of the infected.

  Having the ability to quickly heal any wound was useful but didn’t mean that getting shot didn’t hurt. With his new found night vision, Mack watched as his body expelled the buckshot pellets from his wounds. Each little piece hurt as much going out as in. He watched and winced as his nerves, muscle and skin regenerated on their own.

  Mack watched as Eugene struggled to load more shells into his shotgun in the dark. He fumbled, dropping a couple. Before he could finish, Mack rushed him. With one elbow blow, Eugene was knocked unconscious.

  “You’re going to stop there? Finish him off. Trust me, it’ll feel good,” encouraged Ted.

  Mack didn’t listen nor answer.

  “There aren’t any stairs. So I guess we’re going to have to wait for emergency power to come on. Until then, that elevator isn’t going to budge.” Ted flopped down onto the couch in the white room. “Take a load off big guy. There’s nothing you can do about it.”

  Mack didn’t sit down. Instead he leaned up against a wall across the room from Ted. They stared at each other. Ted broke the silence after a couple of minutes.

  “How’d you end up here? I can tell from your accent you’re from Texas. How does a son of the lone star state end up in Vegas?”

  Mack didn’t answer.

  “Okay, I’ll go first. I was sitting in my offices in San Francisco and asked myself ‘where do I want to be during the end of the world?’. There was some internal debate. The answer became obvious, Vegas! I and a team of about twenty scientists and forty private security guys took my jet out here.”

  “Why Vegas?” asked Mack, instantly regretting trying to have a conversation with a crazy person.

  “Way I saw it, we needed to go to a city. The more populated, the better. That way we’d never run out of test subjects. But to be honest, I just wanted to play some poker before we released the nanites and everything went to shit. It’s that simple.”

  That doesn’t surprise me. Only your crazy ass would want to play some poker before killing millions of people.

  “You?” asked Ted.

  At first Mack didn’t answer. Then he caved in. “I’m from Dallas.”

  “Dallas! One of our biggest facilities were down in Dallas. How about that?” Ted was amused by Mack's answer.

  Yeah, no shit. I’m not going to sit here and listen to his nonsense. Amber is still up there somewhere. “This is ridiculous! I’m not waiting here for the power to come back on.” Mack headed towards the closed elevator doors. He managed to wedge his fingers into the space between the doors. With a grunt he was able to pry them open.

  What next genius? Mack stared at the empty elevator shaft for a moment. The only way up was to climb the cables. It wasn’t going to be easy, but he had to try.

  With a short run and a leap, Mack jumped into the elevator shaft. He grabbed onto the cables, mid-flight. His hands slid down them at first, grating the skin off his palms. But he quickly got his grip, then started climbing.

  “You’re just full of surprises aren’t you?” Ted got up off the couch after watching Mack start to climb the elevator cables. He was going to follow but took a detour over to an unconscious Eugene. “This is a mercy,” said Ted before stomping on the former guard’s head.

  Mack felt a shockwave on the elevator cable as Ted jumped and grabbed it. After looking down and seeing the CEO of Galatea systems start to climb up, Mack kept ascending. Finally he reached the elevator car. I need to get in there. He figured there’d be some access point on the top. To get there, he had to squeeze through the two feet between the walls of the shaft and the car.

  Once above the elevator car, Mack kicked in the panel on top and watched as it fell inside. He then followed suit. From the inside, he pried open the doors.

  Mack didn’t wait for Ted. Instead he kept moving, down the hallway that led to the elevator. He glanced at the cell that he passed every day for the previous couple of weeks. Inside was a blood bath. Even under the red emergency lights, he could see the torn up corpses. Only one of the prisoners was still alive. It screeched at Mack but quickly lost interest.

  Do they not attack their own? Can it sense that I’m infected too?

  “It’s almost like a piece of art. Right?” Ted quickly caught up with Mack and stood next to him in front of the cell.

  Mack looked over at Ted, then back at the makeshift cell. He shook his head slowly and moved towards the lobby of the Golden Pony.

  There was a set of double doors that separated the back hallways from the casino lobby. Mack slowly pushed them open, just enough for him to see. He knew that the Golden Pony had been overrun. But he didn’t think it would be as bad as it was.

  Shit. Amber, I hope I taught you well enough not to be in there. I pray you reached higher ground. No one was left alive in the lobby. Meat puppets streamed in through the broken front doors. They trampled the dead bodies of the Golden Pony security team. In other unseen areas, Mack heard people’s screams.

  “What’s wrong?” asked Ted as he watched Mack slowly close the double doors.

  “We can’t go through there.”

  “I’m afraid we’re going to have to. There’s no other way.” Ted seemed elated while he delivered the bad news.

  “Did you not hear me? There’s too many of them. We’d never make it out of the lobby. There has to be another way.” Mack couldn’t see how he and Ted could possibly make their way through the droves of meat puppets.

  Ted smiled and walked towards the double doors. “Don’t be silly. We’re pretty much invincible.” He kicked them open despite Mack’s protests.

  Immediately he heard screeches. The meat puppets converged on Ted and the double doors. Mack had no choice. Sooner rather than later he’d be found. He had to help the man he wanted dead because that was the only way he’d stay alive.

  Ted laughed as he punched and kicked his way into the lobby. Every wound from the infected healed itself. He drew from a never ending well of stamina. The only way he was going to be stopped is if he decided to stop fighting. Drunk with power, that wasn’t likely.

  Mack took a more measured and careful approach. As soon as he passed the threshold of the double doors, he looked for a way out of the lobby. And he found one in the nearby casino floor.

  If I can just make it… In seconds, Mack was attacked. Unlike Ted, who’d never been in a real fight in his life, Mack knew what he was doing. He took full advantage of the newly hardened bones in his hands. Every punch he threw was deadly. Not even the evolved meat puppets could withstand his onslaught.

  As dominant as Mack was fighting meat puppets in the Golden Pony lobby, the numbers he was up against were just too much. It didn’t take long before he felt teeth bite into his arms and legs. That’s when he spotted the weapons of fallen security team members on the floor near his feet.

  Mack managed to shake off enough puppets to bend over and grab an assault rifle off the blood soaked carpet. Once the bullets ran out, he grabbed another gun. The creatures started falling.

  “Get the fuck off of me!” yelled Ted. The CEO of Galatea Systems had a much harder time than Mack. When he entered the lobby it was sans a plan. While he was able to fight them off for a little bit, they eventually swarmed him.

  Leave him. He deserves it. Let them tear him to pieces. See if he can heal from that. Mack had a brief break in his fight. He saw Ted being overwhelmed. And as much as he wanted to, he couldn’t just watch a man get ripped apart alive. No matter how horrible that man was.

  Mack aimed the assault rifle in his hands at the meat puppets on Ted. With a handful of shots, he managed to get enough of the creatures off for Gorman to be able to get up and keep fighting.

  There wasn’t enough time
for Mack to regret saving Ted. More undead were coming his way. He had to move.

  Mack ran towards the adjacent casino gaming floor. Any meat puppet that stood in his path almost got their heads taken off by the butt of his gun. He knew he needed to get there. The search for Amber would start among those slot machines.

  “Hold up!” yelled Ted as he watched Mack run by. Not willing to be left behind, he followed.

  The casino floor didn’t share the little bit of light that barely illuminated the lobby. There were no doors or windows. Without power, the rows of slot, poker and blackjack machines were almost pitch black. Mack’s eyes glowed red and he could see everything.

  Navigating the casino floor would have been easy if the less evolved meat puppets occupied it, as they had vision that was no better than an uninfected person’s vision. Instead, Mack was confronted with a room larger than a gymnasium filled with monsters whose bodies were made mostly out of metal.

  “This isn’t good,” commented Ted as he caught up with Mack. They both stared at the substantial challenge in front of them.

  “You should’ve picked up a gun,” said Mack before he started firing on the red eyed, almost metallic walking dead.

  Ted laughed. “You’re probably right.” The mad CEO went over to the nearest slot machines and broke off their pull levers. With a broken, jagged ended lever in each hand he proceeded onto the casino floor.

  Mack took out as many undead as he could with his assault rifle. But he had limited ammunition and the creature’s metal skulls were hard to penetrate. Fighting them would be a long drawn out affair. And he didn’t have the time.

  After dropping his almost useless assault rifle, Mack dashed towards one of the exit signs. Any meat puppet that got in his way received a running punch to their head. Luckily, as evolved as some of the infected were, he was faster.

  Ted tried to follow Mack. But the sadistic CEO didn’t make it more than five feet before something cold and strong wrapped around his midsection. Ted looked down to see metal cable like tendrils around his waist. He tried to pry them off but couldn’t. When he followed his bonds to their origin he saw a meat puppet with a twisted appearance unsettling enough to scare the sociopath.

  The puppet that snared Ted was infected during the initial outbreak. No clothing was left on its body. Rotten flesh could only be found in small strips. Its head was tilted to the side with a grossly extended jaw, screeching at its prey. One of the puppet’s arms split open with tendrils extended and wrapped around Gorman.

  Goodbye Ted. It was not at all nice to know you. Mack reached the exit sign. Before going through the same door Amber had less than an hour before, he watched as multiple meat puppets mobbed the CEO of Galatea Systems. The bastard didn’t even have a chance to scream.

  Mack found himself in a long hallway that led to a door at the end. Above the door was a sign that read “Stairs”. He told himself that Amber must’ve made it that far. To find her, he’d have to follow her footsteps. There was only one problem. Or more accurately, three.

  A humanoid meat puppet and two puppet dogs were at the end of the hallway. They stared at him for a moment. Then they charged.

  Mack was without a weapon. His own natural strength was enhanced by the nanites in his blood, but would that be enough to take on meat puppet canines? There was little time to think about it. He was about to find out just how much the microscopic machines had changed him.

  The first dog pounced. Mack tried to push the demonic mutt away but failed. Sharp metal teeth clamped down onto his forearm. He attempted to shake it off but there was no freeing his arm.

  The second dog tried to bite down on one of Mack’s legs. Luckily he saw it coming. With a hard kick to the monster’s head, he managed to stun the puppet. That allowed him to focus on the creature clamped down on his forearm.

  Mack started slamming the dog on his forearm into the walls in the hallway. When that didn’t work, he swung his arm down towards the floor, like he was hammering a nail. The puppet dog yelped and let go. Not willing to let his canine foe regain its senses, he stomped its head to death.

  The second dog lunged for Mack’s neck. He caught it in midair by its jaws. With a grunt, he pulled the jaws apart and split open its head. Relieved, he let his guard down and forgot about the third, humanoid meat puppet.

  Before he could react, the last puppet was on top of him. It was abnormally strong and overpowered the nanite enhanced Mack. One of the creatures’ hands jerked around erratically. The end of its finger tips split open. Long, sharp nails slowly pushed out of each.

  That’s not good. The meat puppet tried to forcefully bring its spike like nails down on Mack’s chest. He managed to catch it by the wrist. But that didn’t stop the attack. Slowly, the nails elongated and stabbed into his chest.

  Mack tried to get the monster off of him but the spikes through his chest nailed him down. The creature leaned forward till its face was only a couple of inches away. He could smell the nauseating aroma of rot.

  The meat puppet on top of Mack opened its mouth wide. Under the monster, Mack could hear bones dislocating and breaking. It appeared that the puppet was trying to open its mouth wide enough to chomp off his face in one bite.

  Mack let go of the meat puppet on top of him, and with two free hands he grabbed the creature’s head. With all the strength he could muster, he twisted. It took a little work, but he managed to break the puppet’s neck.

  As soon as he got up, Mack started stomping on it's head. He didn’t stop until black goo oozed out of every orifice on the thing's head. When he was done, he examined his own wounds. The black blood that he normally saw when he killed the infected was now the same that ran through his veins.

  Move. Don’t waste another second. It could be the difference between Amber living and dying. Mack stumbled and limped towards the stairs as his wounds started healing themselves.

  Chapter 15: Going Up

  The group of Golden Pony residents that Amber joined stopped just a couple floors from the top of the casino. It consisted of Spencer and two other men. She didn’t know why, but the men made her uncomfortable. They were in one of the hallways, scrounging for any weapons or ammo they could find at the armory station.

  This is ridiculous. Why are we stopped? And where the hell is Mack? Amber leaned against a wall in the hallway near a corner. She was supposed to keep watch.

  Amber didn’t see any meat puppets coming. But she did hear the whispering of Spencer and the other guys. She only caught brief snippets. But what she did pick up didn’t sound good.

  The group that Amber was with gave her looks. She recognized them. She’d seen expressions just like them before, at the rodeo arena. They were looks of lust and anger.

  Unwilling to ever be used by anyone ever again, Amber waited for none of them to be watching. When she found an opening she slipped away. As she tried to silently make her way back to the stairwell, she unslung the crossbow from around her shoulder and held it at the ready.

  I need to go back down. Mack must be down there somewhere. Amber paused for a moment after entering the stairwell. She had a very brief internal debate before heading down the stairs.

  In the familiar stairwell, Amber heard the screams of people dying and the screeches of meat puppets. Then she heard footsteps coming up towards her. When she tried to look over one of the railings and see who or what was coming, she could only see a silhouette in the red emergency lights.

  Amber stopped descending the stairs. She knelt in a corner and aimed her crossbow. Whatever came up those stairs would be met with one of her bolts.

  The top of a shuffling silhouette came into view. After exhaling slowly, she put her finger on the trigger. Before the approaching being could reach the landing, she let a bolt go.

  “Ah, son of a…” Amber heard a voice that she doubted she’d ever hear again. It was Mack’s voice. That meant she just shot her protector.

  Mack reached the landing that Amber was on.

 
“Fuck, I’m so sorry. I thought you were a puppet. I didn’t know…” Amber dropped her crossbow and stood up.

  “Nice shot,” laughed Mack before ripping the bolt out of his shoulder.

  “We have to clean that up and put a bandage on it,” said Amber.

  Mack held out his hand in a gesture to stop her. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll be fine.”

  Amber gave Mack a puzzled look. She just put a crossbow bolt in him. And he was acting like it was nothing but a scratch. Her joy in seeing him, alive, soon pushed those questions out of her mind. She hugged him tight, as if he would slip away if she let go.

  “Where have you been?” asked Amber with her face buried just under Mack's uninjured shoulder. “I don’t care. You’re here now.”

  “We can’t go downstairs. There’s hundreds, maybe thousands of them down there. No, we got to go up.”

  Amber let go of him, and picked up her crossbow. “Where are we going to go then?”

  We installed a dispersal system up there for our new and improved nanites. The words of Ted Gorman ran through Mack’s head. That guy was a kook. But he was far from stupid. He must’ve had some kind of escape plan.

  “We go up,” said Mack. He didn’t give any time for Amber to argue.

  They trudged up the stairs. They were three floors away from the top, and from there they’d try to find roof access. With Mack leading the way and Amber following, the duo went up two floors quickly. There was only one more to go.

  I hope there’s some way to… Mack swung around when he heard Amber yell. A group of three men, led by Spencer, burst through one of the doors and grabbed the teenage girl. They seemed angry. Unfortunately for them, she had a guardian who was more than human.

  Mack jumped down the handful of stairs between him and Amber. Seconds after his feet hit the landing, he grabbed the nearest man. Effortlessly, he threw the man down the stairwell. The next man was on the receiving end of a life ending punch. All that was left was Spencer.