Morgan Rice: 5 Beginnings (Turned, Arena one, A Quest of Heroes, Rise of the Dragons, and Slave, Warrior, Queen)

by Morgan Rice

  “NO!” I scream back. “You can’t stop! Go! GO!”

  Logan shakes his head, sweating. But to his credit, he sticks to the course.

  The gate closes. Logan doesn’t slow, though.

  “Hold on!” he screams.

  Our Humvee smashes into the iron gate, and the impact is tremendous. I brace myself, not thinking we’re going to make it.

  But luckily, this Humvee is built like a tank. I can’t believe it, but the iron gate comes off its hinges and flies into the air. Our windshield is cracked and our hood badly dented, but luckily, we are unhurt. We are gaining on the buses, now only fifty yards ahead.

  I check the rearview, expecting to see the other Humvees behind us—instead, they all slam on their brakes before the open gate. None of them dares follow us. I can’t understand—it’s as if they’re afraid to pass through to this side of the wall.

  “What are they doing?” I ask. “They’re stopping! They stopped following us!”

  Logan doesn’t seem surprised—which I don’t understand either.

  “Of course they stopped.”

  “Why?”

  “We crossed the wall. It’s the wasteland. They’re not that stupid.”

  I look at him, still not understanding.

  “They’re scared,” he says.

  I don’t understand: how can a large group of armed warriors, in machinegun-mounted Humvees, be scared?

  I look around us, take in our surroundings, and am suddenly more wary than I’ve ever been. A chill runs up my spine. What can be so dangerous about this place that a squadron of soldiers in Humvees are afraid to enter it?

  As I lean forward and look closely, I suddenly spot movement. I look up high, and see the terribly scarred faces of Biovictims looking out from all the abandoned buildings. There are hundreds of them.

  Suddenly, the manholes all around us begin to rise. Dozens more Biovictims rise up from the ground. We pass an abandoned subway station, and even more come running up the stairs right at us.

  My heart starts to pound at the sight of these people. There are hundreds of them, charging from every direction. I’ve entered their territory, crossed a line into a place I’m not supposed to be. I have to get to Bree as soon as possible and get us the hell out of here.

  A Crazy jumps up and reaches through my open window to grab at me. I lean back, then wind up and hit him in the face with the butt of my pistol. He falls, his body sliding in the snow.

  The buses swerve erratically in front of us, and Logan follows their path. The motion makes me nauseous.

  “Why are you swerving like that?” I ask.

  “Mined!” Logan yells back. “This entire goddamn wasteland is mined!”

  As if to hammer home his point, there is a small explosion in the road before us, and one of the buses manages to swerve out of the way at the last second. My heart drops. How much worse can this place get?

  “Catch up to her bus!” I scream over the roaring of the engine.

  He floors it, and we close the gap. We’re maybe 30 yards away now, and I’m trying to formulate a plan. As we’re closing in, suddenly, a Crazy rises from a manhole, raises an RPG to his shoulder, and fires.

  The grenade races through the air and scores a direct hit on the black bus. It explodes right in front of us, forcing us to swerve at the last second.

  The bus skids and lands on its side, then bursts into a huge ball of flames. I think of all the girls who boarded it, and my heart sinks. Now there are only two buses left. I thank God Bree was on one of the yellow ones. Now time is even more of the essence.

  “HURRY!” I yell. “DRIVE UP TO HER BUS!”

  We are heading right for the Flatiron building. Fifth Avenue forks, and one of the yellow buses bears left, heading down Broadway, while the other bears right, staying on Fifth. I have no idea which one carries Bree. My heart pounds with anxiety. I have to choose.

  “Which one?” Logan screams, frantic.

  I hesitate.

  “WHICH BUS?” he screams again.

  We are coming up on the intersection and I have to choose. I think hard, desperately trying to remember which one she boarded. But it is no use. My mind is a blur, and the two buses look identical to me. I just have to guess.

  “Go right!” I scream.

  As the last second, he swerves right. He guns it after one of the buses. I pray I have chosen the right one.

  Logan floors it, and manages to speed up to the bus. We are now just yards behind it, sucking in its exhaust. The back windows are grimy and I can’t really make out the faces inside, but I do see shapes, the bodies of all those young, chained girls. I pray that one of them is Bree.

  “Now what?” Logan screams.

  I am wondering the exact same thing.

  “I can’t run them off the road!” Logan adds. “I might kill her!”

  I think fast, trying to formulate a plan.

  “Get closer,” I say. “Pull up beside it!”

  He pulls up to the back, our bumpers nearly touching, and as he does, I lift myself out of the seat and crawl out the open window to sit on the door ledge. The wind is so strong it nearly knocks me off.

  “What are you doing!?” Logan screams in concern. But I ignore it. There’s no time for second-guessing.

  Snow and wind whip my face as Logan pulls up right beside the bus. I steady myself, waiting for the perfect moment. The back of the bus is now only a foot away, and there is a wide, flat ledge by its bumper. I brace myself, my heart pounding.

  And then I leap.

  My shoulder slams into the side of the bus as I land on the ledge. I reach out and grab the thick, metal bars. The metal freezes my bare hands, but I hold on tight. The ground flies by beneath me in a blur. I can barely believe it. I made it.

  The bus must be doing 80 in the snow, and it swerves erratically. I wrap one arm thoroughly around the bar, hugging it with all I have, just barely managing to hang on.

  We hit a pothole and I slip, nearly losing my grip. One of my feet dips down and drags on the snow—it is my wounded leg, and I scream out in pain as it bumps along the ground. With supreme effort, I slowly pull myself back up.

  I try to open the back door, but my heart drops to discover it is locked with a padlock and chain. My hand shaking, I manage to remove my gun from my belt. I lean back, brace myself, and fire.

  Sparks fly. The padlock breaks, and the chain clatters and falls to the ground.

  I try the door and it pops open with tremendous force, flying against the wind, nearly knocking me off. I pull myself through the opening and into the back of the bus.

  I now stand inside, in the aisle of the school bus. I quickly hurry down it, looking back and forth frantically as I go. There are dozens of young girls in here, chained to each other and to their seats. They all look up at me, terrified. I scan each row quickly, from left to right, looking for any sign of my sister.

  “BREE!” I yell out, desperate.

  As the girls catch on to my presence and realize I might be a key to their salvation, they start crying, hysterical.

  “HELP ME!” one of them screams.

  “PLEASE, GET ME OUT OF HERE!” another screams.

  The driver catches on to my presence; I look up and catch him starting at me in the rearview. He suddenly swerves the bus hard. As he does, I fly across the aisle and bang my head on the metal casing of the ceiling.

  I regain my balance, but then he swerves in the other direction, and I fly across the other side of the bus.

  My head is pounding, but I steady myself, this time clutching the seats as I pull myself carefully forward, going row to row. I look each way for Bree, and there are only a few rows left.

  “BREE!” I scream out, wondering why she’s not raising her head.

  I check the next two rows, then the next two, then the next two…. Finally, I reach the last row, and my heart drops.

  There’s no sign of her.

  The realization hits me like a hammer: I chose the wro
ng bus.

  Suddenly, I glimpse motion out the window and hear an explosion. I turn to see our Humvee, Logan inside, flying up in the air as it hits a mine. It lands on its side, skidding through the snow. Then it stops.

  My heart drops. Logan must be dead.

  T W E N T Y F I V E

  I take my eyes off the driver for too long, and it is a stupid mistake.

  He pulls out a handgun and aims it right at me. He smiles a cruel smile. He has me.

  He cocks back the trigger and is about to fire. I brace myself. There is nowhere to go. I’m dead.

  Over the driver’s shoulder, a Crazy jumps out of a manhole, aims an RPG, and fires. The missile sails through the air, coming right for us.

  An explosion rocks our world. The noise is deafening, and I am thrown up into the air, smashing my head, as I feel the tremendous impact of the heat. Then my world turns sideways, as the bus crashes onto its side and skids.

  Because I’m the only one standing, the only one not buckled or chained down, I’m the only one who goes flying across the bus. I go through an open window, propelled out of the bus just as it explodes, and the shockwave sends me even farther. I continue soaring through the air and land twenty yards away, face-first in a mound of snow.

  Flames rip through the air, searing my back, but I roll in the snow and put them out. I feel the tremendous heat of the waves of fire behind me.

  The entire bus is up in flames, on its side, in the snow. The flames must rise twenty feet high. It is an inferno. My heart drops as I realize that no one could possibly survive that. I think of all those innocent little girls, and I feel sick.

  I lay there in the snow bank, trying to catch my breath from the smoke. My head spins, and I hurt more than ever. It is an effort to sit up. I turn and set my sights on our Humvee. It sits there in the distance, at the base of the Flatiron building, on its side, like a dead beast, two of its tires blown off.

  Logan. I wonder if he is alive.

  I claw myself to my feet with my last ounce of strength, and manage to hobble his way. He is a good fifty yards away, and it feels like I am crossing a desert to reach him.

  As I get close, another manhole opens up, and a crazy suddenly sprints right for me, holding out a knife. I reach down and raise my gun, take aim and shoot him in the head. He lands on his back, dead. I take his knife and put it in my belt.

  I check over my shoulder as I run, and several hundred yards back I spot a group of Crazies charging right towards me. There must be at least fifty of them. And all around them I see more manholes open up, more Crazies crawling up from the ground, running out of the subway stations, scurrying up from the steps. I wonder if they live in the subway tunnels. I wonder if any subways are even still running.

  But there is no time to think about that now. I race for the Humvee and as I reach it, I find it’s destroyed, useless. I climb up on it and open the driver’s side door. I brace myself as I look in, praying I don’t see Logan dead.

  Luckily, I don’t. He is still sitting in the driver’s seat, buckled and unconscious. Blood is splattered on the windshield and he’s bleeding from his forehead, but at least he’s breathing. He’s alive. Thank God he’s alive.

  I hear a distant noise, and turn to see the Crazies getting closer. I need to get Logan out of here—and fast.

  I reach in, grab his shirt, and begin to yank him up. But he is heavier than I can manage.

  “LOGAN!” I scream.

  I pull harder, shaking him, afraid the Humvee will blow any minute. Slowly, he begins to wake. He blinks and looks around.

  “You okay?” I ask.

  He nods back. He looks stunned, frightened, but not seriously injured.

  “I can’t get out,” he says back in a weak voice. He struggles with the twisted metal of his seatbelt buckle.

  I climb in, reach over him, and jab at the buckle. It’s jammed. I check back over my shoulder and see the Crazies are even closer. Fifty yards and closing in. I use both hands, pushing it for all I have, sweating from the exertion. Come on. Come on!

  Suddenly, the buckle snaps and the seatbelt whips back. Logan, free, rolls over, banging his head. He begins to pull himself out.

  Just as Logan sits up, his eyes suddenly open wide, and he reaches out with one hand and roughly pushes me aside. He raises a gun with the other and takes aim just past my head and fires. The fire is deafening in my ear, which rings badly from it.

  I turn and see he’s just killed a Crazy, a few feet away. And the others are only thirty yards behind him.

  The Crazies are closing in fast. And there’s no way out.

  T W E N T Y S I X

  I think quickly. An RPG lies in the snow, a few feet away from the dead body of a Crazy. It looks intact, never fired. I run to it, my heart pounding. I only hope it works—and that I can figure out how to use it in the next few seconds.

  I kneel down in the snow and scoop it up, my hands freezing, and hold it up against my shoulder. I find the trigger and take aim at the mob, now barely twenty yards away. I close my eyes, pray it works, and squeeze.

  I hear a loud whooshing noise, and a moment later I’m knocked backwards off my feet. The force of it sends me about ten feet, landing flat on my back in the snow. There’s an explosion.

  I look up and am shocked at the damage I’ve done: I managed a direct hit on the mob, at close range. Where there were dozens of bodies a second ago, there is now nothing but body parts spread over the snow.

  But there is no time to revel in my small victory. In the distance, dozens more crazies crawl up from the subway stations. I don’t have any more RPGs to fire, and don’t know what else to do.

  Behind me I hear a noise of smashing metal and turn to see Logan standing on the hood of the Humvee. He lifts his leg and kicks at the machine gun mounted to its hood. Finally, it comes off. He picks it up. A chain of ammo dangles from it, which he wraps over his shoulder. The gun is massive, made to be mounted on a car—not carried—and looks like it weighs over fifty pounds. He holds it with both hands, and even as big as he is, I can see it weighing him down. He runs past me and takes aim at the new group of crazies. He fires.

  The noise is deafening as the machine gunfire rips through the snow. The impact is remarkable: the huge bullets tear the incoming crowd in half. Bodies drop like flies wherever Logan aims the gun. Eventually he stops shooting, and the world returns to its still, snowy silence. We have killed them all. For now, at least, there are no more Crazies in sight.

  I survey this canvas of destruction: there is the destroyed black school bus, taken out by the RPG, the destroyed yellow one, lying on its side, in flames, bodies are everywhere, and our Humvee is a shell beside us. It looks like the scene of an intense military battle.

  I follow the tracks from the other bus, the one with Bree on it. They forked left at the Flatiron.

  I chose the wrong bus. It’s not fair. It’s just not fair.

  As I study the scene, catching my breath, all I can think of is Bree, those tracks. They lead to her. I have to follow them.

  “Bree’s on the other bus,” I say, pointing at the tracks. “I have to find her.”

  “How?” he asks. “On foot?”

  I examine our Humvee and see that it is useless. I have no other choice.

  “I guess so,” I say.

  “The Seaport’s at least fifty blocks south,” Logan says. “That’s a long walk—and in dangerous territory.”

  “You have any other ideas?”

  He shrugs.

  “There’s no turning back,” I say. “Not for me, anyway.”

  He examines me, debating.

  “You with me?” I ask.

  Finally, he nods.

  “Let’s move,” he says.

  *

  We follow the tracks, walking side by side in the snow. Each step is a fresh burst of hell, as my calf, so swollen, is beginning to feel like a separate entity from my body. I hobble, doing my best to keep pace with Logan. He is weighed down by the h
eavy machine gun and is not walking too quickly himself. The snow is still coming down in sheets, the wind whipping it right into our faces. If anything, the storm feels like it’s getting stronger.

  Every few feet another Crazy pops out from behind a building and charges us. Logan fires at them as they come, mowing them down one at a time. They all hit the snow, staining it read.

  “Logan!” I scream.

  He turns just in time to see the small group of Crazies attacking us from behind and shoots them down. I pray he has enough ammo to get us wherever we need to go. My gun only has a single bullet left; I need to save it for a desperate moment. I feel so helpless and wish I had rounds of ammo myself.

  As we pass another block, several Crazies jump out from behind a building and charge us at once. Logan fires, but doesn’t see the other Crazy, attacking from the other side. He’s coming too fast and Logan won’t make it in time.

  I pull out the knife from my belt, take aim, and throw it. It lodges in the Crazy’s forehead and he drops to the snow at Logan’s feet.

  We continue down Broadway, gaining speed, moving as fast as we can. As we go, the crowd of Crazies seems to thin out. Maybe they see the damage we are doing and are wary of approaching. Or maybe they are just waiting, biding their time. They must know we will run out of ammo and will eventually have nowhere to go.

  We pass 19th street, then 18th, then 17th…and suddenly, the sky opens up. Union Square. The square, once so pristine, is now one big, untended park filled with trees and waist-high weeds sprouting up through the snow. The buildings are all in ruin, the glass storefronts shattered and the facades blackened from flames. Several of the buildings have collapsed and are nothing but piles of rubble in the snow.

  I look over, checking to see if the Barnes & Noble I once loved is still standing. I remember the days when I would take Bree there, when we would go up the escalator and lose ourselves for hours. Now I am horrified to see there is nothing left. Its old, rusted sign lies facedown on the ground, half covered in snow. There’s not a single book left in the shell of its windows. In fact, there’s no way of knowing what it once was.

  We hurry across the square, sidestepping rubble as we follow the bus tracks. All has become eerily quiet. I don’t like it.