by Jamie Davis
Kurt hunched over and started following the trail. They had to hurry. They still had to rescue Allie.
Chapter 22
Even though Brent and the four lab techs he picked up outside the company facility had only a one-hour lead on them and were slowed by the baby, it took longer than Kurt expected for he and Marci to catch up. There were several times when the glittering magic trail nearly disappeared and he had to slow to a crawl to make sure he didn’t lose it in the forest.
Kurt wasn’t sure where Brent was headed with the child at this point. He headed due north, cutting cross-country through the forest. There were times when it was almost unnecessary to follow the magical trail. The five adults crashing through the brush left quite a visible sign of their passage in some places, especially when they broke through thick sections of undergrowth rather than going around.
“Where is he going,?” Marci asked. “You saw the map. There isn’t anything in this direction, not even a small settlement or homestead. Am I missing something?”
“Nope. I think he’s just running and doesn’t know how to tell one direction from another. He might even think he’s heading back towards the gate.”
“It’s a lot closer for him to make a run for the enclave of the survivors in the mountains. That settlement is only a few days travel to the west. It’ll take over a week to get back to the gate from here.”
“Yeah, and that’s if you knew which direction you’re going. He clearly doesn’t.”
“Let’s press forward a little faster. Maybe if we’re lucky, we can catch them before nightfall.”
“Fine by me,” Kurt said. “As long as I don’t lose the trail. It’s been hard to follow at times.”
“We have to keep up and gain on them. I say press on as hard as we can.”
About an hour later, the two of them found a pair of the lab techs dead beside the trail. A small group of five infected lay on the ground around them.
“They must have stumbled into the group of zombies and were taken by surprise,” Kurt said.
“I’ll bet they were all surprised. Brent didn’t strike me as someone who possessed a lot of field craft,” Marci remarked.
“That’s an understatement based on what we’ve seen so far.” Kurt knelt down and pressed his hand against the exposed chest of one of the lab techs. He looked up at Marci and smiled. “His body is still sort of warm and it’s pretty cold out here. They can’t be too far away. We’re gaining on them. Let’s keep moving.”
Marci said, “I can follow the trail from here. They ran from this fight and took off northward.” Marci ran forward, following along in the direction they’d been pursuing, taking the lead.
Kurt continued to scan for the magical traces of the baby as he followed her. Whatever method Marci used to track them was on target with what he saw, too.
The next indication they had that they were closing in came when they heard the shouts of an argument in the distance.
Both of them slowed down as they got closer. The voices grew louder until they could make out what they said.
“…I’m telling you we can go faster without the brat.”
“Yeah, let’s just leave the kid beside the tree. Then we can move a lot faster.”
“This kid is worth a fortune,” Brent said. “She represents the only remaining option for us to cure the plague. The secret lab and the research there is compromised.
“Hey, it’s not our fault that you led those people to the lab. Now it’s trashed and everything there is destroyed. If she’s the only antidote here, then let’s just leave her here and go back to Earth Prime. You can have a lab there spin up a new batch of vaccine, right?”
“If I go back there and admit defeat, it’ll be the end of my career,” Brent explained. “She goes with us so we can reach the enclave and proclaim ourselves as saviors of the settlement. Or, I leave you two behind here to fend for yourselves.”
“Just because you have the only gun, doesn’t mean that you get to make all the rules. You aren’t that good of a shot. That’s why two of our friends are dead now.”
“I don’t have to be a perfect shot,” Brent said. “I just have to be good enough to shoot you.”
Kurt and Marci snuck through the woods, moving carefully from one position of concealment to another until they reached the small clearing where the three men argued.
Brent held baby Allie clutched in one arm and pointed his pistol at the other two men who stood across the clearing from him.
“How do you want to handle this, K.C.?” Marcie asked.
“I think we have to work our way around so that we’re behind Brent. If we can do that, we might be able to take him by surprise.”
Marci nodded. “You move around that way. You’re better at woodscraft than I am,” Marci said. “I’ll move a little closer from this side and get in a position where I can handle the other two.”
“Be careful.”
“I will. You, too. I’ll wait for your signal.”
Kurt smiled and slid from tree to tree, trying to crouch and remain low using whatever cover he could. He’d almost reached a tree directly behind Brent when one of the two lab techs spotted him.
“Hey, there’s somebody out there.”
Brent spun around and fired his pistol several times blind into the woods in Kurt’s general direction.
As the gunshots rang out, Kurt heard the unmistakable cough of Marci’s flechette pistols firing their streams of darts.
Kurt ducked around the other side of the tree and came up with his pistol in his hand. He had the weapon leveled at Brent. The other man held the baby out in front of his chest and head trying to block Kurt’s chance at a clear shot with the baby. Behind him in the clearing Kurt saw the other two men laying on the ground their heads a bloody mess from Marci is well-aimed shots.
Marci stepped out of the woods on the other side of the clearing her pistols leveled at Brents back. Kurt shook his head. “No, Marci. He’s got the baby in front of him. The shots will go right through him and hit her.”
“I’m just here to make sure he doesn’t escape again.
“You heard the girl, Brent. She’s not going to let you escape. Why don’t you put your gun down and give me the baby,” Kurt said as he reached out with one hand towards the man. Brent switched his aim and pressed the pistol against the side of the baby’s torso. “If you take another step, I’ll shoot her. I swear I will.
Kurt stopped and held up his free hand, palm outward. He never lowered his pistol, though.
“I’m stopping, Brent. I’m stopping. Listen, there’s got to be a way around this. You can’t run with that baby all the way back to the portal to Earth. You’re by yourself. Who will keep guard at night and take care of the baby at the same time?”
Brent’s face screwed up into a grimace. He apparently hadn’t considered that when he came up with the idea of using the baby as a human shield.
“Brent, I know you feel like there’s nothing you can do. But look, what’s the worst thing that will happen? All you have to do is testify against the company. The cops and prosecutors will probably give you a sweet deal.”
Brent shook his head. “You don’t understand. They set up the operation with a cut out so that it looks like it was all my idea. That’s why I had to come along on this mission. It was the only way to clean up the loose ends and try to salvage something from it. Once the CDC got involved there was no way for me to completely cover everything up.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Kurt said. “You still hold most of the cards. I know Shareen Henderson, the captain of the GEU that originally contacted me. I can talk her into offering you a deal.”
Kurt hoped Brent couldn’t tell he was lying. There was no way Shareen would do Kurt any sort of favor. She was likely to just want to throw the book at both of them, catching Kurt on some kind of conspiracy charge.
“I can’t go back with anyone else. I have to do this on my own. I have to figure this out.”
&
nbsp; Kurt could see Brent getting more and more desperate. He jerked his head around in spastic motions, searching the forest as if he could find a way to run away without getting shot.
Kurt had a sinking feeling there was only one way out of this. He couldn’t trust Marci to do it. She was a decent shot but not this good. Kurt ground his teeth in anger. He was about to go back on a promise he made to himself a long time ago about taking another human life. It pissed him off. However, it was that anger that increased his resolve. He wasn’t going to let that baby die.
Kurt waited until Brent shifted his grip on Allie to look in the opposite direction again. Every time he did that, his arm holding the baby dropped a little lower. Kurt knew this was going to have to be a deadly accurate shot. He hadn’t worked out in the shooting range for a while. He hoped his muscle memory was up to making it.
Brent turned his head, the desperation increasing the pace of his frantic searching for a way out. Kurt was running out of time.
As soon as Brent turned to look to the right and the baby shifted downward again, Kurt snapped his pistol up in a two-handed grip and fired two snap shots.
The back of Brent’s head exploded outward in a spray of brains, bone, and blood.
Kurt ran forward as the body slumped to the ground. He dove and managed to catch Allie before she landed. He rolled over, cradling her in his arms and lay there, panting and staring at the sky through the leaves of the trees overhead.
Marci walked over and stood looking down at him from beside Brent’s body.
“Damn fine shooting, K.C. I didn’t know you had it in you?”
“I’m not sure I do anymore, Marci.” The trembling in his hands had started again, just like it had after that mission all those years ago. “I’m not sure I do.”
Chapter 23
The two days after recovering the baby were almost peaceful and serene. Kurt and Marci encountered none of the bands of roving infected they’d seen so often farther to the east. The two of them were able to make good time cross-country, despite taking the time to care for Allie. Kurt let Marci carry her most of the time. He had to hide the hand tremors he still had on occasion after killing Brent. It worked out and he got to see a different side of Marci. He was surprised at how tender she was when dealing with the newborn baby.
At the end of the second day, Marci remarked, “You know, K.C., I’ve never really thought much about having kids until now. I wasn’t sure they were in the plan for my life or not. Now, though, I don’t think it’s as bad as I thought it’d be.”
“You seem like a natural, I have to say,” Kurt observed. “I think some people might think you were Allie’s mother given how at ease you are with her.”
Marci smiled at the compliment. “You’re not that bad yourself, dude. Did you and Clara ever consider having kids of your own when the two of you were still together?”
Kurt shook his head. “No, we hadn’t talked about kids much and then things kind of got awkward between us as it ended. Then it wasn’t a good time to even think about it.”
Kurt changed the subject. He didn’t want to talk about Clara around Marci. Even though she knew both of them from when she was younger, Kurt’s feelings for Marci had changed and he didn’t want his ex coming up in their conversations if he could help it.
“Why don’t you get some rest and I’ll take Allie from you for the first guard shift. I’ll watch until midnight or so and wake you for the second shift if that’s all right.?”
Marci smiled. “Sure, that’s fine. How much farther to the enclave?”
“We should get there tomorrow afternoon, or early on the day after. We can’t be that far. It all depends on whether they’re still in the location marked on the map. Remember there was a chance they might have headed into the mountain hunting lodge.”
“Jeeze, I hope not. How much farther is that?” Marci asked.
Kurt shrugged. “I have no idea. It could be just a few days, or it could be up to a week. These mountains are pretty broad. Let’s not buy any trouble for ourselves, though. We’ll probably get there and everyone will be right where we expect them to be.”
“I hope you’re right. We don’t have a whole lot of powdered milk left for Allie. And we haven’t passed a farm or settlement at all since we left the lab.”
“We’ll have to make it work,” Kurt said, trying to convince himself as much as he did Marci.
Kurt’s prediction of the location of the enclave turned out to be correct. Around noon the next day, they reached a valley with a town in the center of it.
There was a wooden palisade all the way around forming a formidable wall capable of keeping out even the most determined zombie. There weren’t any zombies around, though. Clearly, the people here had made an effort to clean up their neighborhood.
“There it is, Marci. Just like I said.”
“I can see smoke from some of the chimneys. They’re still here,” Marci said. The relief showed in the way her voice cracked at the end of her words. It had been a long, difficult journey.
Kurt smiled and reached out to put his hand on Marci’s shoulder. They both had grown a lot closer over the last two weeks. Caring for the baby during the previous three days had made their bond even stronger.
Marci smiled at him and then started down the hill towards the settlement. The gates opened when they reached the palisade.
A kind-looking man with thick, grey hair met them as they approached. He and his wife were the leaders of the settlement and they both seemed surprised to see the two of them. “I can’t believe you two traveled all this way from wherever your homestead is. A nice couple like you might have had a better chance heading for the gate.”
“We’re not really a couple,” Kurt explained, glancing Marci’s way. “I mean, not like that. We are part of a rescue mission that came to bring you an antidote for the virus.”
The woman stepped forward. “I am Doctor Anne Marie Jenkins. You said you had the antidote? Where is it? We can use it right away.”
Kurt shook his head. “No, the antidote is here,” he held up the baby. “This is Allie. Her mother was a doctor from the CDC who found out she was immune to the plague. She was on her way here to help you develop a new vaccine when we were attacked by a large group of the infected. She died after giving birth to young Allie here. She told us at the very end that a new vaccine could be synthesized from a sample of Allie’s blood.”
“That might work,” the Doctor Jenkins said. “Here, let me see the baby. I want to make sure she’s healthy and well before we start prodding her and trying to draw even a little bit of her blood.”
Marci stepped forward, a concerned look on her face. “How much blood do you need? I mean you’re not going to…?”
The doctor laughed. “You don’t need to worry, my dear. I only need a little bit of her blood to synthesize a vaccine if she’s truly immune. All I need to do is introduce the correct antibodies into our drug synthesizer system. The proto-stem cells inside will take care of the rest and be able to grow as much of the vaccine substance as we need.”
Marci sighed with relief and reached out to touch Allie’s tiny arm one more time before the woman turned and left with the baby.
“I bet you two are exhausted,” Quenton Jenkins, the enclave’s leader said. “It’s quite a trek all the way from the portal and you look like you’ve seen some action.”
“We have,” Kurt said. “We also have important information you all should probably be aware of. Is there somewhere we can go and talk,” Kurt asked.
“Right this way. We can talk in our home. It’ll give you a chance to get something to eat and clean up a little.”
Kurt and Marci followed the gentleman to his home while Kurt figured out how to tell him that all of this death and destruction around him had happened because of a company’s corporate greed and double-dealing with the world’s charter.
Over the next few days, Quenton saw all of the computer files they’d recovered from the dead securi
ty team. When Kurt coupled it with the information they’d gotten from Brent and from the secret lab, he became red with rage.
“Don’t they realize how many of my friends, my neighbors, and my family I’ve had to bury? Do they know how many people I knew that I had to shoot down after they were already dead because of this?”
“Believe me Doc I am as angry at them as you are. None of this had to happen and I am as willing as you are to throw the book at them. Once you get the antidote worked out, we will be happy to accompany you and anyone else who’d like to come along while we head back towards the gate.”
“That would be nice,” Quenton said. “I need to have a few words with the authorities. If Aranis violated their word in the charter, that means the title to this world automatically falls back to all of us.”
“That sounds like justice,” Kurt said, nodding. “If that’s true, you should be able to get financing based on the world's natural resources to fund an entirely new wave of secondary settlers and homesteaders.”
“Yes, and those of us who survived the plague will be primary stakeholders. We’d be able to rent or sell all of the land here to the newcomers. It’ll be a huge windfall to the survivors, though it will not make up for everything and everyone we’ve all lost.”
“Of course not, Marci said. “We lost good people getting here, too. I think everyone here needs a chance to start over.” She glanced over at Kurt when she said that for some reason. He tried to figure out what she might mean by that look in his direction when she said that.
“How long will it take your wife to synthesize the vaccine? We’ve been here a few days already. It might be nice to figure out how quickly we can head back.”
“She mentioned to me this morning she was almost finished. As soon as she has the initial doses, we can give some to the representatives we’re sending back with you. We can all head back to present our case to the authorities.”
“Excellent,” Kurt said. “I’m getting a little itchy, and need to get on my way home.”