Evolution Z

by Everist J Miller

  Contents

  Title Page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  EVOLUTION Z

  by Everist J Miller

  Copyright 2018

  All rights reserved to the publisher

  CHAPTER ONE

  RAY WORTHINGTON BATTLED a pressing anxiety as his truck approached a construction site. His job was to oversee the erection of a new building in the modest, growing city. His only distraction was the radio.

  "Why replace them with volunteers?" a female interviewer's voice rang from the tinny speakers.

  Everyone's being replaced, Ray thought. At least, if you're an unskilled labourer.

  "We have the ability to control a volunteer's every action," a man's voice responded. "Everything works with precision. No mistakes. They are perfect workers and they come at a modest once off cost with little maintenance. They will build this city quickly with new amenities and the standard of living will go up. It's what people expect."

  I may be able to control the volunteers I operate, Ray thought, but that doesn't mean I can trust them. After all, during the V-Crisis they had been flesh eating murderous creatures. His own wife had been a volunteer, and she had to be slaughtered like the rest. His eight-year-old son had also become a volunteer with ravenous eyes for flesh after a gaping cut from his own mother's claw. There was no saving him. A shotgun bullet had pulverised his brain.

  Ray was of the generation that knew the other name for the volunteers. He couldn't say it; not even in his own head. If he did, he would risk saying it aloud and then he would be tried and punished. Using that word was a crime that carried the death sentence. Instead, everyone was forced to call the fight to the death that ravaged humanity a "crisis".

  "What do you mean?" the interviewer asked. "You're talking around the issue. People also expect to have jobs," she continued. "The volunteers are taking their jobs. There will only be a greater standard of living for the privileged few. What are the rest of society expected to do for food and shelter? Aren't you concerned about that?"

  "These are the jobs no one wants," the man said, his tone dismissive. "The jobs that people want are safe."

  At least a volunteer can't take my job, Ray said to himself.

  "How can you make such a big assumption?" the interviewer asked. "Everyone wants a job and there aren't enough to go around. If I had to, I would get any job that puts food on the table," she insisted. "What about those in the Belt?" she asked.

  The Shit Belt, Ray thought. Why doesn't she just call it that?

  "Those in the belt aren't interested in keeping a job. They're lazy. They wanted to leech off our civil society and not make any contribution. It was their choice to live in the ruins outside our new city and scavenge off our hard work."

  No, Ray said to himself. They do want jobs. They're treated like the garbage of society because they are unskilled labourers that the volunteers have replaced.

  Ray hadn't been in the Shit Belt since the end of the V-Crisis, but he expected that it had changed little. He was close to it every time he inspected the volunteer warehouse for his construction company and that was close enough.

  As his truck approached the work site, Ray could see the volunteers from a distance. They appeared eerily as shadows in black or grey pressure bandages, faces covered like bandits and only inhuman beast-like eyes revealed. Skin suits, like burns victims. Some bandages were tatty and discoloured. Cost-saving measures. They also wore trunk like valves to gas them as a last resort. But that was for show. Gas hadn't been used for a long time.

  A suffocating force nestled into Ray's chest.

  He turned off the radio. He couldn't concentrate on it anymore. He was too close to the start of his awful day. Too much dread. His pale face drooped. His slim, almost non-existent lips pouted. He rubbed at stinging, crusty cuts from a rushed, careless shave, steering with only one bony hand.

  Mid forties in a rut, he realised. But I have the right job for the times, and there aren't many going around. That's why I have to work with the volunteers.

  It was out of fear that he worked with them and he feared working with them.

  He could see them lining up as he parked in the loading zone next to the work site. They had a ragged movement like marionettes. Some of them were scrambling up the scaffolding, swinging and gripping like stick insects. There was a construction hoist on the side of the naked building. The volunteers didn't use it even though the building had grown to seven storeys.

  The site was caged in a perimeter of iron struts. The few well-dressed white-collar workers marched in packs along the planned but narrow footpaths in the young city streets. The struts protected them from being crushed in the unlikely event of falling debris, or from a falling volunteer whose crumbling fingers had perhaps lost their grip on a scaffold. Again, unlikely because they were well maintained, but possible.

  Parking his truck and stepping out, Ray saw the volunteers climbing the scaffolding to the top storey, still a work in progress. Ray remembered that the wooden floor had been fashioned, and the volunteers needed to infuse steel rods that would be swallowed in a wet concrete foundation. The volunteers didn't wear harnesses or helmets. They were fast and strong if well fed. They were organic, expendable robots.

  Ray approached large temporary gates attended by two workmen in snow white hard hats, washed out denim overalls and blinding fluorescent vests. The whole area smelled like engine oil and greasy dirt. Ray slipped on his own hard hat that was worn and littered with dark scuff marks. He greeted the workmen with no more than a nod and burrowed through the mouth of the gates that closed behind him.

  Ray walked across a dirt track to the grey concrete foundation. Reaching the construction elevator, he checked that the main switch was on. He opened the meshed steel landing doors that looked like they could hold a bear prisoner, to reveal the car doors that he was required to peal open from the centre.

  After closing the doors, Ray stepped to the control panel and selected the top landing by pressing numbers on a keypad. They were lucky to have a lift with a keypad. Most only had a joystick, and they were in short supply. The army didn't waste technology on construction equipment. Resources were all geared towards the volunteers.

  The lift squealed to the top storey. It sounded like rubbing against styrofoam. Ray cringed at the sound. When Ray peeled open the car doors, the other operator eyed him as he stepped out.

  The older man, Ray had guessed in his late fifties, was physically restraining a volunteer. The volunteer convulsed.

  "Hi Doug," Ray said. His voice wavered between octaves like a teenage boy at the start of puberty.

  Doug stared with cold blue eyes. He had a pudgy head sitting atop a short, oversized frame. There was a large pool of baldness on his head dotted with raisin-like age spots surrounded by grey shrub. His face was sombre, his expression uninviting. He turned back to his prey.

  Ray said nothing. He watched as Doug pulled the volunteer then kicked it away and repeated the action. Then he punched it in the abdomen.

  "Stop staring, my friend," Doug said to Ray. "I'm just playing with it. It's a little game before work."

  Ray turned his eyes away.

  "And you'd better not tell Mike," Doug said. "This is our little secret."
r />   Ray said nothing.

  Without warning Ray felt a snake like arm gripping tightly around his neck. He felt and tasted salty sweat. Uneven black dots of varied sizes appeared, and he felt light headed. He also felt his head swell like an over-inflated balloon.

  "Say it, my friend. Say that you won't tell Mike."

  Ray tried to speak, but he had no voice. The dots had grown into dark puddles. Then his consciousness was silenced.

  ###

  Ray's eyes opened to blinding sunlight. He raised his hand as a shield. Where was he? He didn't recall what day it was.

  "I'm sorry, my friend." The voice was familiar. Doug was standing over him like an ogre. "I held too tight for your little neck. In case you don't remember, we were talking about that volunteer." Doug pointed at a volunteer sprawled on the ground. It looked like a squashed cockroach.

  The world swirled. Nausea crept into Ray. His consciousness was fragile. Doug appeared single minded and indifferent.

  "You won't tell Mike," Doug said. His voice was soft. "Say it."

  Ray was confused. He remained silent.

  "Say it!" Doug screamed. "Say you won't tell him."

  Ray froze.

  Doug's face was a purple red. "You will repeat what I say. I promise I won't tell Mike. Now you." He scowled.

  "I won't tell Mike," Ray said reflexively in anticipation of violence.

  "You promise," Doug said.

  "I promise. I promise," Ray said.

  "Good," Doug said.

  Ray was shocked. Doug had mishandled volunteers all the time. He treated them like rag dolls or punching bags. He had never got so worked up about it before. Maybe he had snapped. Fuck, he had strangled Ray unconscious. Ray was petrified.

  "Are you okay, my friend?" Doug asked.

  That was a surprise. It was like Doug was schizophrenic. First violence then empathy. In any event, Doug hadn't asked an empathetic question in a long time.

  Ray recalled Doug's initial elaborate charm when they first met. It was like being a celebrity. Doug had been his best friend. He recalled one of their first conversations. It had been weird. No one talked as much about the V-Crisis as Doug.

  "It was good during that war," Doug had said. Ray thought it was strange and risky to call it a war. No one referred to it as that anymore, nor should they.

  Doug's eyes had been unfocused as if he was recounting events.

  "How?" Ray had asked.

  "So many people got caught and turned or mauled, but those volunteers couldn't get me." He chuckled. "I killed all of them, my friend. Every one of those things that came at me, I blew away. All headshots. No misses. And it was fun." Doug grinned and turned his eyes again to Ray.

  "Wow, that's fantastic," Ray had said. It sounded over the top but he was nervous and keen to praise Doug. He hoped it didn't sound too over enthusiastic.

  Ray needed to keep the conversation going to allay his anxiety of not being liked. "You must have helped a lot of people," he said.

  Doug frowned. "Why?" he asked.

  Ray had been surprised by Doug's reaction. It wasn't what he expected. He should have known something was wrong with Doug then. "Well, because you killed so many volunteers. I assumed you would have been helping others."

  "No," Doug said. "I was bored. It was a sport. It was the least boring time in my life." Then he lowered his voice and closed in on Ray. "I let them die sometimes," he said. "People. They were perfect bait, my friend. Sometimes they needed to die."

  Ray had gasped.

  "I wish that war had never ended," Doug said. "Maybe it will start up again. All it would take is a few wild volunteers and we could start it again." After a pause he sighed and said, "But I guess they would be too easy to kill. What we need, my friend, are clever ones. More like people. More challenging. That would be exciting." Doug wore a broad toothless smile. "Someone will make it happen. I am sure there are technicians working on it. In the meantime, I'll play with them. Test them. See if something bad happens spontaneously."

  Ray had been apprehensive around Doug ever since that conversation. He thought maybe he had contributed to Doug's later indifference by avoiding him.

  Anyway, Doug didn't talk to him much anymore. He had witnessed Doug's charm only on special occasions when someone new was introduced. Ray was old news. Doug remained aggressively silent most of the time and otherwise appeared indifferent. He generally chose the content of any conversation.

  ###

  Ray's consciousnesses returned to the present. To the violent Doug.

  Suddenly Ray's heart sank. There had been something in the back of his mind. He feared he had told Mike something already.

  Ray's body shivered with a chill. He was almost in tears.

  Doug had been extra violent with a volunteer in the last week. He had punched it in the chest repeatedly until its ribs caved in with a snap. He had left the volunteer damaged on the ground.

  Ray didn't want Mike to think he had done anything wrong. He had spoken to Mike, but hadn't intended to dob Doug in.

  "What is it Ray? I'm busy, okay," Mike had said with his usual impatience.

  "Um," Ray stuttered, "There's a broken volunteer, and I just wanted to let you know what…."

  "What? Fuck," Mike said. "Another one. This is ridiculous. What did you do to it? How did his happen?"

  "No," Ray said breathlessly, "I didn't do anything,"

  "Who then?"

  Ray froze. He had no voice. He didn't want to say.

  "Now that you've raised it you have to tell me, okay," Mike said.

  Ray remained silent.

  Mike's face turned blotchy as if his blood pressure had sneakily risen. He scowled. "It was Doug," he said. "Right?"

  Ray had nodded.

  That scene caused the world to spin for Ray. He felt faint. His heart galloped. Doug would surely find out.

  ###

  Ray shivered. "I'm fine," he said to Doug, his voice wavering. He felt nauseated at the thought of Doug finding out what he had told Mike. He hoped that Mike would be subtle about it, but subtlety was not Mike's strength. Nevertheless, he had to put his fears aside and get on with his work. Otherwise Mike would go ballistic.

  Ray backed away from Doug to pick up and secure his harness. Doug was smiling, his threatening eyes fixed on Ray.

  Ray locked his harness but remained anxious about whether it was secure.

  Doug was the only person around that could check. There was no one else except for the volunteers. The volunteers had no brains to help Ray. They were shells of what were once men and women.

  Which would win, his fear of Doug or his trepidation of free falling off the building to his death?

  "Can you check me Doug?" he asked, his voice uneven. Doug's expression immediately transformed. Again, he looked on the cusp of rage.

  Doug observed Ray with a piercing stare. Ray's eyes dropped reflexively as if he'd been splashed with sunlight. Doug huffed and puffed as he ambled over, his short chubby arms at his side and his fists clenched. His face was beetroot red. He snorted. To Ray, Doug's demeanour conveyed a repressed violence.

  When he got to Ray, Doug handled him like an object; a piece of meat. Like before. Ray felt dirty as Doug's hands molested him. "Anything else I can do for you, my friend?" Doug asked. "Maybe I should stick a feather in my dick and dust your clothes." Again, a threatening stare and heavy breathing. His breath smelt sour like off milk. Doug made his way back to direct the crane operator.

  Ray's head dropped, and he buried the impulse to cry. You're fucking weak, he told himself. He gritted his teeth, pursed his lips, walked back to his work area, shoulders slumped, head down, sighing.

  After a moment, he lifted his head reflexively from a mild vibration in his ears. It was the hard hat alerting him that the volunteers had assembled. They appeared on Ray's 'Heads Up Display', or HUD for short, that their presence automatically activated. The HUD transformed the world into a live colourful video game. All that wonder from a concentrated
beam of light projected from a recess in his helmet on to the lenses of his eyes. It superimposed computer graphics on to real-world objects and people. And, of course, volunteers.

  Ray selected a volunteer in front of him by drawing in the air a misshapen, almost unrecognisable circle around it with his index finger. The attempted circle flashed a fluorescent yellow beckoning for a command. Large inflated buttons then appeared at the bottom of the display embedded with pictures representing the various tasks a volunteer could undertake. Ray pressed the button representing the task he wanted to assign to the selected volunteer. He could assign tasks to each volunteer separately or he could select a group of volunteers by circling them at once, in which case the circle turned orange. He could then press a virtual button to assign a task to the whole group. Each volunteer's headset interpreted the tasks.

  Ray knew the functionality of the volunteers' headsets inside out. The headsets were the only things that made the volunteers useful and safe. Without the headsets they would be uncontrollable savage beasts, like in the days of the V-Crisis.

  There used to be more labourers and fewer volunteers. Now there were the volunteers, crane operator, Doug, Mike and Ray. Mike was the boss. Ray was responsible for the volunteers completing their tasks on time and to the required standard. The so called 'manager'.

  Ray hated the responsibility of micro management. As he lost focus buried in his thoughts, a volunteer changed from green to blue on his HUD. Its task was complete. Ray had to check its work and assign it another task. In the meantime two more volunteers turned blue on Ray's HUD. Now he had three tasks to check and the same number of volunteers to reassign. He sensed they were getting more efficient but assured himself that was impossible.

  "Hurry Ray. We can't have them idle." It was Mike. His pale face with an untidy, greying beard appeared in the top corner of Ray's vision on the HUD. "I want you to clear those three tasks in the next ten minutes."

  Ray was flabbergasted. So you won't give me enough time to do a proper job but I'm still responsible if something goes wrong? He felt pressure in the middle of his chest as if someone had buried their heal in it.