Contamination (Books 0-3)

by T. W. Piperbrook

  10

  AFTER LEAVING THE TWO ROCKS Trading Post, the next twenty miles were barren and deserted. Brown rocks protruded into the sky on both sides of the road—mountainous, circular formations that reminded Sam of something he had seen in a movie. Having survived one group of agents, he was able to let his guard down some, but the sense of foreboding was never far from his subconscious.

  “Have you ever been out this way?” he asked Delta.

  She shook her head. “No. The farthest I’d ever been was the trip I took to see you. It’s beautiful out here.”

  “Tell me about it. It’s a shame that it took a goddamn apocalypse to get me out of the house.”

  Delta laughed and swatted his arm.

  “Maybe when this is over we can do some traveling—see the world.”

  “Hopefully there’ll be something left to see.”

  He glanced over at her. Although he had met her just days before, she had already grown on him—so much so that he couldn’t imagine his life without her.

  As he gripped the wheel, staring into the desert, a smile lingered on his lips.

  It wasn’t until he saw the roar of flames in the distance that his face grew solemn.

  “What’s that?” Delta asked.

  “I’m not sure.”

  Sam slowed the SUV to a crawl. Black smoke lined the horizon, spanning the gap between two mountains and swirling up into the sky. Delta leaned forward in her seat, trying to determine what was ahead, and then reached in the glove compartment and pulled out a pair of binoculars.

  “Where’d those come from?” Sam asked.

  “I found them at the store. I stashed them in here before we left.”

  “Good thinking.”

  After staring through them for a few seconds, Delta sat back in her chair.

  “What is it?” Sam asked.

  “It looks like a tour bus.”

  “Is anyone alive?”

  “I see movement, but the whole thing is tipped over on its side. It doesn’t look good.”

  “We’d better check just in case.”

  Sam floored the accelerator. The SUV kicked into gear, hugging the road as they sped closer to the wreck. Delta held up the binoculars and continued to inspect the site, but it was difficult to keep them still with the car moving.

  “I see some people, but they don’t look human. At least, not anymore.”

  “Is the whole road blocked?”

  “No, we can get around. But we may have to go off the road a bit.”

  Sam kept his pace. If there were survivors, they would need to assist—even if it meant battling off some of the things to get to them.

  As the SUV approached the scene, he saw that the tour bus was engulfed in flames; fire lapping at the windows. A slew of the creatures staggered from the wreckage, identifiable by their jagged movements and deformed features.

  Sam halted the SUV and drew his pistol. Even from a few hundred feet away, he could smell the scent of burnt flesh and melted plastic.

  “Do you see anyone?” he asked.

  “No. It looks like they’ve all turned.”

  The two scoured the melting mass, searching for signs of human life. A few of the things began to make their way toward the SUV.

  “Wait a minute!” Delta shouted. “I see someone!”

  She pointed to an adjacent mountain, where a lone figure was stumbling up the side. When the man spotted the vehicle, he began to wave and shout. Several of the creatures switched course and headed in his direction.

  “Shit,” Sam muttered.

  He let his foot off the brake and the vehicle inched forward. The man was on the right side of the road; to get to him, Sam would need to drive off the pavement and up a steep incline. Even in an SUV, the maneuver would be risky at best. If they popped a tire, the creatures could be upon them in seconds.

  “I think I need to head out on foot.”

  Delta looked at him. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”

  “No. But we can’t leave that man out there by himself. He’ll be dead in a matter of minutes. Stay here—I’m going out.”

  Before she could protest, Sam threw the vehicle into park and opened the door.

  “If things go south, get the hell out of here and keep driving,” he yelled.

  He sprinted up the base of the mountain, gun swinging at his side. Two creatures sprang in front of him, mouths open and dripping fluid. He stopped in his tracks and fired off two rounds—one in each of their heads. The bullets found their marks, and the pair fell to the ground.

  There were about ten other creatures in sight. Most were wounded; a few were on fire. When they spotted Sam, they began to amble their way toward him. He picked up speed, not wanting to waste his limited ammunition. One of them lunged for his arm, and he dodged to the side, barely avoiding its reaching hand.

  The lone survivor began to shout louder. One of the creatures had caught up to him, and had taken hold of his leg. The man was still about thirty feet away.

  “Help!” he screamed, frantically trying to unlock its grip.

  Sam darted up the base of the mountain. As he did so, he saw the creature begin to gnaw on the man, tearing off chunks of flesh. The survivor shrieked in pain.

  “Hold on!” Sam shouted.

  He stopped in the dirt, took aim, and fired off a round at the creature. The bullet penetrated its leg, but it kept on. A second creature had reached the man and joined in on the feast. Sam squeezed the trigger several more times, knowing that time was of the essence.

  The shots hit home and the two things fell writhing to the ground. Sam covered the rest of the distance, then stood over the still-moving bodies and finished them off with shots to the head.

  “Oh my God!” screamed the man. “My leg!”

  Sam looked down at the gaping hole in the survivor’s calf. Blood and tendons spilled from the wound, staining the dirt around him.

  “We have to get out of here!” Sam yelled. “I’m going to help you up. Grab my arm!”

  The man reached up, clutched Sam’s wrist, and struggled to stand. The rest of the creatures were already advancing up the incline. Sam threw the man’s arm around his shoulders and led him down the slope.

  The two made their way toward the SUV, with Sam firing off shots when necessary to hold back the approaching creatures. When he reached the vehicle, he was relieved to see that Delta had jumped in the driver’s seat. He opened the back door, helped the man inside, and then jumped in after him.

  As soon as the door shut, Delta hit the gas and the SUV raced around the downed vehicle, narrowly avoiding a few of the creatures. When they reached the other side, Sam looked back and surveyed the scene.

  The remaining creatures still staggered off after the SUV, oblivious to the fire that slowly consumed them.

  Cromwell couldn’t remember the last time he had had a full night’s sleep. Ever since he was a child, he had slept no more than a few hours at a time—his mind churning so fast he had to work to shut it off.

  For the last ten years, his nights had been filled with plotting and planning. During these brainstorming sessions, he envisioned the destruction of the old world, the creation of the new, and all the steps needed to get there. Unlike many people, his most productive hours were at night. In fact, his best ideas often came when others were asleep.

  But that hadn’t always been the case.

  During his formative years, Cromwell’s sleeplessness had been a product of fear. To this day, his mind constantly replayed what his father had done to him.

  Even killing the man hadn’t been enough to stop the memories.

  His father, Lieutenant George Cromwell, had been a soldier with the United States Army. During the Vietnam War, he had quickly climbed his way through the ranks, proving himself in battle and winning the respect of his peers.

  During one of his few returns home, he had met a woman named Mary, and on his next visit, he had discovered she was pregnant. George had done the honorab
le thing and married her. After returning to battle, he soon found himself dreaming about his home life, longing for the day when he could see his family again.

  It was during that subsequent tour that George suffered a devastating injury. An enemy grenade exploded in close proximity to his unit, sending bits of shrapnel into his leg. Although the wound wasn’t fatal, it was enough to render him immobile, and after a few months of recuperation, he was honorably discharged and sent home.

  Just a few weeks later, Mary gave birth to their son, Everett James Cromwell.

  The labor had been filled with complications, and it took almost ten hours to deliver the baby. Shortly after Everett was born, Mary had passed away due to an internal hemorrhage.

  Left to raise a newborn baby on his own—and with little help from his own family—George Cromwell struggled to cope with both his injury and his anger. The government checks he received were a mere pittance, barely covering the living expenses for him and his son.

  As time wore on, George’s anger intensified. Since coming home from Vietnam, the world had ceased to care about him—despite years of dedication and service, it felt like humanity had turned its back on him. George began to drink heavily, spending the majority of his money on vices to numb the pain. Even then, those habits did little to quell his anger.

  Before long, his rage needed an outlet, and that outlet was his son Everett.

  When Everett turned six, George began to hit him. It started with spankings, but it soon escalated to open palms. Eventually, George acquired an antique whip at a memorabilia store, and he began to use it almost daily on his son.

  Most of Everett’s punishments were due to trivial things. Leaving his dirty socks on the floor. Spilling dishwater on the counters. Forgetting to clean his room. Any small infraction would earn him a crack of the whip—two if his father was in an especially foul mood. While he was being punished, Everett would receive verbal lacerations as well.

  “You’re no better than the rest of this fucking country!”

  “You have no self-control, no aspirations! You should be ashamed of yourself!”

  Everett began to cope by eating, gaining a few hundred pounds in just a few short years. Although desserts were forbidden in the Cromwell household, he would save his lunch money or trade things to his friends to pay for his junk food habit.

  By the time he was twelve, Everett was large enough to be considered obese, and his classmates consistently tormented him. When he hit his teens, he threw himself into cigarettes and alcohol, soon progressing to even harder drugs.

  All the while, George continued to attack him. Ashamed and embarrassed, Everett kept his father’s secret, never telling a soul about the scars that littered his body.

  When he finally turned eighteen, Everett decided he had had enough.

  One night, after an evening of partying—drunk and high on marijuana—his father had cornered him in the kitchen.

  “You know what you are?” his father had said. “You’re a goddamn waste of air. A fat, useless son of a bitch who doesn’t deserve to live.”

  His father had then retrieved his whip and come after him, chasing Everett around the house until he finally pinned him down on the bed. It was a scene that had happened numerous times over the course of Everett’s life. Normally, the result would be Everett being struck multiple times. Only this time—instead of letting his father hit him—Everett had grabbed the whip out of his father’s hands and hit him back.

  At first, Everett had been shocked by his own actions, but when he saw the look of fear in his father’s eyes, he found himself smiling. For the next ten minutes, he had lashed his father repeatedly, stopping only when the man promised to never lay a hand on him again.

  Over the next few years, Everett began to gain control—not only over his abuser, but over his own body as well. Before long he had quit his former habits, leaving the drugs and alcohol behind and committing himself to a new life of strength and discipline.

  When Everett turned twenty-one, he decided to give himself the best birthday present he could think of. Using his father’s own whip, he strangled George Cromwell and buried him in the Utah desert.

  Even though he had despised his father, the man had been right about one thing. Humanity had been on a steady decline for years.

  What his father hadn’t known was that Everett Cromwell would be the man to fix it.

  11

  AS THE SUV PULLED AWAY from the burning wreckage on I-191, Sam eyed the wounded man next to him. The survivor’s leg had been ripped open, exposing a wound inches deep, and the man wailed in pain.

  “What’s your name?” Sam asked him.

  “M-my name is Jim,” he said in between breaths. “I was the driver of that tourist bus back there. My leg feels like it’s burning up…”

  “Hold tight. We’re going to help you out if we can.”

  Sam climbed into the front seat, digging through the glove compartment for supplies, but came up empty-handed.

  “We’re going to have to stop somewhere,” he said to Delta.

  She nodded and gripped the wheel. Ahead, the road offered nothing but mountains and rock, the interstate desolate.

  “I’ll keep my eye out,” she said.

  Sam moved into the backseat again. He reached into the rear of the vehicle, grabbing a bottle of water, and found a clean t-shirt under the seats. He began to clean the wound as best he could, and then instructed the man to hold the garment on his leg.

  “Th-thanks for getting me out of there,” Jim said. “I would have been done for.”

  “No problem. It’s the least we could do. What happened back there?”

  “We were originally on a sightseeing tour, but after hearing about everything happening in the southwest, I was trying to get us to Salt Lake City. Everything was going fine until one of my passengers went nuts and started tearing into people. I’ve never seen anything like it. Before long, the whole bus started acting crazy. They even tried to pull me out of the driver’s seat while the bus was still moving. I didn’t even have a chance to stop. The wheel spun out of my hands and I lost control. The next thing I knew, I was crawling out of the bus with those things coming after me.”

  Sam digested the information.

  “How long have you been on the road?”

  “About a week.” Jim stared at him, his eyes red and watery. “It’s spreading, isn’t it?”

  Sam nodded.

  “We think we know who’s responsible. Well, maybe not who exactly, but we know where this whole thing is being coordinated from.”

  “Is that where you’re headed now?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, I’d be happy to go with you. I’m just not sure how much help I’ll be.”

  Jim stared at the t-shirt on his leg, which was now drenched in blood.

  “How are we looking, Delta?” Sam called up front.

  “I see a building up ahead. I’m going to stop.”

  Sam peered out the windshield, noticing what looked like a commercial lot on their right.

  “Have you heard from anyone else lately, Jim?”

  “I haven’t been able to get through to anyone for a day or so,” the bus driver said. “Nobody knows where we are, and even if they did, they’re probably too busy with problems of their own.”

  The SUV began to slow down. A few seconds later, Delta pulled into a gravel parking lot and let the engine idle.

  Outside the car was a single white building constructed of painted brick. The roof was worn and dilapidated, and the door had been left open. Several beat-up looking cars surrounded the lot, and by the looks of them, none appeared drivable. A sign out front indicated that the place was an auto-repair shop.

  “I’ll get out and see what I can find,” Sam said. “You two stay in here.”

  Jim winced at him. “Don’t worry. I won’t be going anywhere.”

  Sam grabbed his pistol and left the vehicle. He crept forward, loose stone crunching underfoot, and locke
d his eyes on the front door of the building. There were no other exits in sight. Two windows were on the front wall, but both had been covered in white spray paint and he was unable to see through them.

  The door creaked on its hinges, swaying inwards in the subtle breeze. If the place was inhabited, the owners didn’t seem too concerned about security. As he approached, he could see that the inside contained more cars, most in the same condition as those outside. A few were raised on blocks, and tools were scattered across the garage floor around them.

  Sam stepped through the doorway, avoiding a pile of screws that had been spilled across the interior. Like most of the places they had come across, the garage appeared to be without power; the only lighting was provided by the filtered rays of sunlight that penetrated the windows. Sam scanned the building, but as far as he could tell, the place was vacant.

  Immediately to his right was a glass window looking into a small office. The room contained a desk, a computer, and a smattering of papers. The door leading inside had been propped open with a brick. At the far end was a bathroom, discernible only by a hand-written sign taped to the door.

  Sam walked into the office and headed for the bathroom. With luck, he would find a first aid kit inside—or at least some spare towels to help stop the bleeding on Jim’s wound.

  When he reached the bathroom door, he paused just outside of it, listening for signs of movement from within. Hearing nothing but silence, he flung the door open and pointed his gun inside, aiming it at a sink and a toilet. On the wall was a shelf, on top of which were several unused towels. He saw no first aid kit.

  With a heavy sigh, he grabbed the towels and headed back through the office.

  Noises emanated from outside.

  When he stopped to listen, he realized that someone was calling his name. It sounded like Delta.

  Immediately afterward, he heard a gunshot.

  Sam dropped the towels and ran.

  When Hopper returned to the control room, his heart was pounding so hard he thought it might explode. He sat in his chair, wiped the sweat from his brow, and tried to focus on the monitors in front of him.