The first came around the corner and Katie leapt up at it, wrapping her arm around its curved neck and driving the blade directly into the base of the wild horse’s skull. They fell together into the mud, the dead zebra on top. Blood trickled from the edges of the knife, the drops landing on her hair. Katie left it where it was; if she pulled it free, blood would gush from the wound all over her face.
After a stunned pause, the second zebra reacted, bringing up its assault rifle and firing at her. The bullets slammed into its companion's body, making it jerk about on top of her. The corpse protected her, but also pinned her to the ground, helpless under its bulk as the second zebra emptied its entire clip.
Katie struggled to move her arm, to retrieve her M4 from her side to return fire, but try as she might she couldn't move. She closed her eyes, sure she was going to die as soon as the zebra reloaded its gun.
A gun cracked and Katie's eyes shot open. That wasn't an assault rifle. A dead zebra fell into the mud beside her, a hole drilled straight through its head. A panting Tank stood over the corpse.
"Thanks," Katie wheezed. Talking was harder than it should have been, but then again she had just been crushed beneath a thousand-pound zebra.
Tank merely motioned for a terrified looking Holness and Waldheim to help. Together they leveraged the massive corpse enough for Katie to escape.
"The third?" Katie gasped, looking around for the last zebra soldier.
"Already taken care of." Tank hooked a thumb back at the command tent.
"Then let's go." Katie turned, took one step and almost collapsed. Her legs felt like jelly, but she managed to catch herself before she did more than fall to one knee.
Tank helped her to stand again, giving her blood-soaked uniform a worried look.
"It's not mine." She bobbed her head at the zebra that had been on top of her, its back a honeycomb of bullet holes.
Tank's face wrinkled but he nodded. "Let's go."
Katie led with the M4 held at ready, followed by the diplomats, with Tank guarding their rear with an assault rifle he'd looted from one of the dead zebras.
Rather than trying to retreat back the way they'd come, Katie led the group toward the vehicles.
Getting out seemed easier than getting in had been, except that each of her breaths came out a short rasp that only gave her a whisper of air. Katie pushed the discomfort away. There was no time to focus on anything but the mission and escape.
The smoke grew worse as they got closer to the vehicles. Thick black smoke poured from underneath the hood and from the broken windows of one of the big trucks. The acrid smoke made Katie cough. That in turn made her entire chest and stomach flare with hot pain that made her glance down at herself.
Fresh blood trickled in rivulets from underneath her left breast and stomach. It seemed the Zebra's bulk hadn't protected her as much as she'd thought. Adrenaline had covered up the pain of her being shot. Nothing for it now; it was keep moving or die.
Eyes watering, Katie waved the group around the burning truck. They weaved through the fleet of vehicles. Most of them had bullet holes in the hood, or flat, shot-out tires. Katie did find an intact vehicle—a smaller, off-road jeep. The open concept was another bonus as she didn't even have to try to jimmy the doors open.
Katie climbed into the passenger seat, directing Holness and Waldheim to sit in the back, while Tank got in the driver's seat. The dog had a way with machines. He hotwired the jeep into starting after only a few seconds of fiddling with the guts of the steering column.
* * *
As they drove away Katie grew dizzy and slumped over in her seat until she rested against the jeep's door with half her head sticking out the window. Only the cold night air blowing across her face kept her awake.
"Katie, stay with me," Tank shouted at her as he drove.
"I'm fine," she tried to say, but the words came out in a slur, along with a red, bubble-filled foam.
Each time Katie drifted off, the bouncing of the jeep on the uneven ground woke her. The jolting pain made her scream, or at least she would have if she had enough breath in her.
They arrived at the rendezvous point ten hours late, but Katie was just glad they arrived at all.
The hotel was lit up like the Christmas trees Katie remembered from before the war, with lights blazing from every window. Soldiers rushed toward the jeep, pursued by a gaggle of reporters of a boggling array of species, from human to dog, cat, buffalo, and even, Katie flinched, a tiger. They screamed questions at Mr. Holness, Ms. Waldheim, and most surprisingly, at Tank and Katie. Katie found it impossible to make sense of the questions through the fog of pain.
The two diplomats were rushed into the hotel surrounded by a host of guards while soldiers kept the onlookers at bay.
A good chunk of the reporters streamed after them, but some remained behind with their camera lenses pointed at Katie and Tank.
They stayed even as an ambulance pulled up between them and the jeep. They yelled questions even while Katie was loaded into it. Tank climbed in after her, clutching her hand between his paws as the EMTs stuck a mask on her face. That was the last thing she remembered as the ambulance roared away.
* * *
Tank told Katie the news a few days later, after one of Katie's umpteenth surgeries. Last count it had been up to six, but she was drifting in and out and on pain meds so she couldn't be sure.
Bless his furry heart, he brought in his own personal tablet and sat next to her on the bed to show her a recording of the previous day's newscast from CNN.
The video opened with the standard shot of two newscasters behind a counter. One of the two was a human woman with blonde hair, too much makeup, and a wide, white smile. The other was a lynx with perfectly groomed fur and an even wider and whiter smile than the woman, although his had far sharper teeth.
The screen split, showing the human woman on one side of the screen while random shots of well-dressed diplomats talking to each other across a large table played on the other.
In the clip, Humans sat arrayed on one side, and a variety of evolved animals were across the other. Katie recognized a kangaroo, a panda, a housecat, a Clydesdale horse, a tiny Chihuahua sitting on a stack of pillows, and a black bear. There were more, and Tank paused the video to name the rest—a binturong, a kind of cat from Asia, a fossa, from Madagascar, and a Geoffroy's tamarin monkey, from Central America.
Tank pressed play, and the woman started speaking. "After days of deliberation between representatives of the human race, including the UN, the United States, ASEAN, and others, and the various nations of evolved animals, an agreement was reached and an armistice signed late last night."
At this point the woman stopped talking and the camera panned over to the lynx. "Although the armistice is only for a temporary cessation of hostilities, this is the first step toward a negotiation of peace. A peace conference is scheduled to begin next week, with dignitaries and representatives confirmed from every human nation and almost every species of evolved animal.
Later in this segment we'll be speaking with global diplomatic expert Mr. Wilhelm, about why he is confident that there will be a signed peace treaty in the near future."
Katie slammed the laptop closed before bursting into tears. She cried for Eggen and the world she'd lost when the war started, but mixed with her grief was hope, hope that soon there would be a new world.
Author Biographies
Geneve Flynn
Geneve Flynn is a freelance editor from Australia who specializes in speculative fiction. She has two psychology degrees and has only ever used them for nefarious purposes. Geneve has been a judge for a key Australian horror award and a submissions reader for a leading Australian speculative fiction magazine. She has had her short horror fiction published by KnightWatch Press, the Australasian Horror Writers’ Association, and Oz Horror Con. Her fiction will also be brought out later this year by the Tales to Terrify podcast and Flame Tree Publishing.
She loves tales t
hat unsettle, all things writerly, and B-grade action movies. If that sounds like you, check out her website at www.geneveflynn.com.au or you can find her at facebook.com/geneveflynn.
Peter Talley
Peter Talley, at various times in his life, has worked as a high-school speech team coach, newspaper advertiser, hospital emergency manager, investigator, and funeral home assistant. Born in Ohio, grew up in Iowa, and spent the majority of his time working in Nebraska. He currently resides in Hartington with his wife and son. Peter enjoys writing short fiction and is busy at work on a series of urban fantasy novels.
Russell Hemmell
Russell Hemmell is a statistician and social scientist from the U.K., passionate about astrophysics and speculative fiction. Recent stories in Not One of Us, Perihelion Science Fiction, SQ Mag, and elsewhere.
Lisa Timpf
Lisa Timpf is a retired HR and communications professional who lives in Simcoe, Ontario. Her writing has appeared in a variety of venues, including New Myths, The Martian Wave, Third Flatiron, THEMA, and the Dogs of War anthology.
Keith J. Hoskins
Keith J. Hoskins is a short-story writer and an award-winning poet. He is currently working on his own anthology: Beyond the Portal, a book filled with altered reality stories. And soon after, he will release a fantasy novel called Kray and the Coveted Seer set in a magical world where good and evil are at constant ends. Keith’s main genres of interest are fantasy, science fiction, and thrillers. When he’s not fighting off dragons or piloting his spaceship through an asteroid belt, Keith enjoys quality time at home with his wife, Donna, his son, Bailey, and their mischievous schnauzer, Harley.
Davyne DeSye
Davyne DeSye writes from a cozy spot nestled at the base of the Rocky Mountains in beautiful Colorado, USA. She is an author of science fiction and historical romance, Carapace (sci-fi) and For Love of the Phantom (historical romance) being her most popular works. For more information, visit www.davyne.com.
Rich Jones
Rich Jones lives with his family in the northeastern United States. He has worked in the healthcare and information technology fields for many years. His interests run to reading science fiction and fantasy, rock and heavy metal music, practicing martial arts and technology in general. He has only just started to publish the writing that he has been doing as a hobby for years. To catch up with Rich, visit his blog at https://richjonesblog.wordpress.com
James S. Austin
James S. Austin is the owner/editor of Tacitus Publishing. He has edited three anthologies—It's a Grimm Life, Haunted by the Past, and Shattered Space. He has published short stories, leads a table-top podcast, and writes for a number of blogs, to include the serial Chronicles of Ballidrous—The Tales of Devryn. When not writing or editing, he spends his time as a traditional and digital artist.
Anthony Addis
Anthony Addis was brought up in the Isle of Man, and went to teacher training college in London. Since then he has taught and lived in Lichfield, Cairo, Kuala Lumpur, and Jakarta.
His short stories have been published in ezines and anthologies, most recently in Twilight Madness. He has also self-published a novella on the Amazon Kindle platform. Rebirth was written after he visited the Kyoto Museum for World Peace in Japan.
He currently lives in Jakarta with his wife, Jane, and their two teenage children. He can be found at @anthonyaddis on Twitter.
Tom Barlow
Tom Barlow is an Ohio writer. Other writings of his may be found in periodicals including The Intergalactic Medicine Show, Hard-boiled Horror, Crossed Genres, Digital Science Fiction, Pure Fantasy and Sci Fi, Coyote Wild, Nebula Rift, and many others, and anthologies including Stories from the New Future, Contact:Stories of the New World, Battlespace and Desolate Places. He is a Clarion grad. Read more about him at www.tjbarlow.com.
T. M. Starnes
When not practicing or teaching Kung Fu, T. M. Starnes is reading or watching horror, thrillers, or sci-fi movies.
T. M. prefers writing in the horror, science fiction, post-apocalyptic, and, occasionally, romance genre. His favorite authors include Clive Barker, Patricia Briggs, Dean Koontz, and Edgar Rice Burroughs.
You can find further anthologies, short fiction, and novels currently available on his author page on Amazon and upcoming news at T. M. Starnes’s Facebook page.
Emily Devenport
Nine of Emily Devenport's novels were published in the U.S. by NAL/Penguin/Roc, under three pen names. She has also been published in the U.K., Italy, and Israel. Her novels are Shade, Larissa, Scorpianne, EggHeads, The Kronos Condition, GodHeads, Broken Time (which was nominated for the Philip K. Dick Award), Belarus, and Enemies. Her ebooks, The Night Shifters and Spirits of Glory, are available from Amazon, Smashwords, etc. She has two new novels forthcoming from Tor: Medusa Uploaded and an untitled sequel.
Her short stories were published in Asimov's SF magazine, The Full Spectrum anthology, The Mammoth Book of Kaiju, Uncanny, Cicada, Science Fiction World, Alfred Hitchcock, Clarkesworld, and Aboriginal SF, whose readers voted her a Boomerang Award. She is a geology/desert/hiking nut. She blogs at www.emsjoiedeweird.com.
Bruce Golden
Bruce Golden’s short stories have been published more than 150 times across twenty countries and a score of anthologies. Asimov’s Science Fiction described his second novel, “If Mickey Spillane had collaborated with both Frederik Pohl and Philip K. Dick, he might have produced Golden’s Better Than Chocolate”—and about his novel Evergreen, "If you can imagine Ursula Le Guin channeling H. Rider Haggard, you'll have the barest conception of this stirring book, which centers around a mysterious artifact and the people in its thrall." You can read more of Golden's stories in his new collection Tales of My Ancestors, which has been described as "The Twilight Zone meets Ancestry.com." http://goldentales.tripod.com.
Madison Keller
When she was young, Madison Keller wanted to be one of the X-Men. While that dream never came true, her dream of writing did. Now she is the author of several epic fantasy novels and a plethora of short stories spanning multiple genres. When not writing she can often be found bicycling around the woods of the Pacific Northwest or at the dog park with the original Kerka, her adorable Chihuahua mix. More of Madison Keller's work can be found on her website, www.flowersfang.com.
Richard A. Shury
Richard A. Shury is from New Zealand, but has been haunting London for some time now. He likes to travel, and dreams of writing professionally. Recently, he's had a few successes, which he hopes are the calm before a storm. Call him a part-time optimist. Find him @RichardShury.
Other Works from TANSTAAFL Press
Enter the… Series from TANSTAAFL Press
Enter the Apocalypse
Thirty-two authors from all over the world have created a wide range of apocalypses for your reading pleasure. Within the pages of this anthology, you will find exceptional works focusing on hungry zombies, virulent viruses, nuclear missiles, malevolent fey, vindictive aliens, challenging crustaceans, and more — each of these maelstroms creating massive disturbances within human society.
While works of holocausts tend toward a uniform darkness, Enter the Apocalypse contains a number of catastrophes that are humorous enough to cause hysterics and others that are so black as to cause the devil himself to shrink away.
Enter the Aftermath
Continuing the theme started with Enter the Apocalypse, TANSTAAFL Press brings you another anthology of the end of mankind as we know it. In this volume writers were asked to explore the height or burnout of a disaster. Thirty-eight international authors offer dominating warlocks, ironic phone calls, thoughtless kaiju, frozen ecology, survival mutations, misbehaving aliens, and even two disparate takes on artificial intelligence - just to name a few. Enter the Aftermath provides insights into all humanity and even some non-homosapiens that we anthropomorphize. Come inside and enjoy the darkness and humor woven by our storytellers.
Novels by Tom Gondolfi fr
om TANSTAAFL Press
An Eighty Percent Solution—CorpGov Chronicles: Book One
In a world where corporations suborn governments as a part of good business practice and unregistered humans can be killed without penalty, Tony Sammis, a midlevel corporate functionary, finds himself unwittingly a pawn in a guerilla war between a powerful cabal of business leaders and an elusive but deadly underground movement. His final solution to the biological terror unleashed mirrors Tony’s own twisted sense of justice.
Thinking Outside the Box—CorpGov Chronicles: Book Two
Winning one war doesn’t seem to be enough. Tony Sammis and the Green Action Militia are once again thrust into the center of a conflict that will change the lives of everyone in the solar system. This time they are allies with the fledgling CorpGov and even the United States government against the ravages of the corrupt Metropolitan Police force. The GAM and their allies are fighting a losing war with few soldiers and even fewer weapons. Behind the scenes, a humble and unsuspected power block lurks with its own axe to grind.
Self-interest, romance, freedom, and a lust for power simmer together in this chaotic soup of tension, intrigue, assassination, and war.
The Bleeding Edge—CorpGov Chronicles: Book Three
Tony Sammis and Nanogate lead a patchwork alliance that includes the nascent CorpGov, Green Action Militia, the president of the United States, the Pacific Northwest Mob, most of the megacorps and the United Brotherhood of Bodyguards. The war the CorpGov alliance knows they can’t win has begun, but they are no longer fighting to win. Tony and Nanogate know they may not survive, but they intend to deliver the most grievous wounds they can. The most dangerous animal is one with no hope.
Enter the Rebirth (Enter the... Book 3) Page 44