The Complete Colony Saga [Books 1-7]

by Collings, Michaelbrent

  At the same time, he was almost yanked right out the back of the Marauder as the air that had been trapped inside found a larger hole to escape through than the hole in the floor. Wind whipped past him and Christopher lurched forward. Grabbed the inside of the tailgate latch. Barely kept from falling out, hardly noticed the flare of pain that blossomed on his palm as he grabbed the hot metal.

  He weaved, right there in the threshold between what safety remained and a headlong pitch onto the burning ground passing below.

  He blinked. Couldn't see. Everything hot. Too hot.

  Something swam in front of him. Black threads in a red tapestry. More blinking. The red continued to swim and waver, but the black threads solidified.

  The zombies. Loping through the trees, following the Marauder in its mad dash to death.

  Christopher heard their flesh popping. Seething as the moisture inside expanded, just as it had done with the trees.

  One of the zombies stumbled. Fell. It didn't get up.

  Christopher acted on autopilot. Not thinking. Muscle memory taking over. He let go of the tailgate and grabbed something flat. Heavy. He pushed it out of the Marauder. It hit. Bounced. Disappeared behind them.

  Another item. Flat. Heavy.

  Push.

  Out.

  One of the creatures was close enough he could see it reaching forward. Running, its features melting like wax and then turning to charcoal and ash.

  A fireball, larger than the ones already blooming among the trees, blazed into being. It engulfed the zombie. The creature disappeared in flame as the gas can Christopher had just tossed out exploded right behind it.

  The explosion pulsed out, catching Christopher and shoving him back like a fevered fist to the chest. Which was a good thing, because he had been about to fall out.

  He flew back. Tumbled into something –

  (Buck he's always in the way why doesn't he sit on a chair like a normal person)

  – then flipped sideways into something else –

  (don't grab her boob she'll kill you for sure if you do that again)

  – and then his head smacked into one of the windows and the world went from red and white and yellow to black.

  75

  THE DARKNESS CAME AND went swiftly, but long enough for things to change radically. The fire was still there, the crackling and explosions of trees bursting within themselves. The heat still washed over Christopher in searing waves.

  Everyone was screaming.

  "What –"

  "Where are –"

  "Are you insane?"

  That last was Theresa, and he realized dully that her arms were around his chest. She must have pulled him in after the gas can blew. But she wasn't letting go.

  Isn't that wrong? Shouldn't she let go? Or at least grab my boob?

  He looked around. Blurry. Everything swimming in and out of focus. Thoughts swimming as well.

  Why doesn't she grab my boob?

  Why isn't she letting go?

  Indeed, he realized that she was pulling him tighter, holding him with surprising strength, her arms closing around him to the point it was hard to breathe.

  And now he saw that everyone was looking in the same direction. Even Buck and Maggie had sat up, and were peering ahead while still holding onto the children and each other.

  Christopher turned his head to look. It felt like it took hours to complete the motion, and he swore he could hear something crackling in his neck. Like bubble wrap exploding inside his head, pop-pop-pop and crinkling crunches.

  Then he finished the move.

  Saw.

  He started screaming, too. "No, no, no, bad idea bad idea bad IDEA!"

  Even Aaron was screaming, though his shout of "Whoa whoa whoa!" sounded more like he was trying to get a stubborn horse under control than like anything resembling panic.

  Only Amulek was silent. His face a stone as he grimly struggled for control of the Marauder, which was now wobbling so hard Christopher felt like he was a mouse being batted back and forth between a cat's paws.

  But Amulek kept it on course.

  Kept it moving forward.

  Straight at the cliff.

  76

  THE LAND IN FRONT OF them just disappeared. A stretch of nothing – no tree trunks to swerve around, no exploding zombies to avoid –

  (they'd be in back though I blew them up, eat that cheese, Buck, don't try to teach a master chef how to make eggs)

  – and then... nothing. The land just wasn't there. And even at this odd angle, peering over Amulek's and Aaron's backs through the small front windshield, Christopher could tell that it wasn't some gentle incline they were heading toward. It was a complete absence of anything that could support the Marauder.

  He had time to scream, "Bad IDEA!" one more time, then his stomach fell out of his body. Plummeted so hard it left him a hollow shell. He cried out, then his body followed after his stomach.

  The fall was shorter than he expected. For some reason he thought he was going to take a Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid-style tumble – fifty or sixty or a hundred feet into nothing. Instead, he barely caught up to his stomach before the Marauder fell on what felt like a pile of bricks.

  Only... do bricks splash?

  In the next moment he felt water coursing around him. The sudden cold was welcome – it both woke him up and made him forget the aches and pains that were shouldering their way into his consciousness. He was on hands and knees in the back of the Marauder, and the water was up to his chin in an instant. It invaded his mouth. He spluttered. Shook his head.

  Something drifted past him. He grabbed it. Yanked it above the rapidly-rising water.

  Hope.

  The little girl had her eyes closed again. Perhaps unconscious, perhaps something deeper and more devious. Either way, he pulled her back from where she had been drifting: the open tailgate of the Marauder.

  The jammer. It's gonna break under water.

  No time to worry about that.

  They were all moving. The Marauder was drifting under/around them. And with that realization came a bit of understanding.

  We're in a river. Kid drove us off a cliff into a river.

  "You're kidding me." The words came out without his really thinking about them. They sounded slurred, drunk. He took a deep breath – a wasted effort since he swallowed water again and ended up sputtering. Though that cleared his head a bit more, and that was the result he'd been hoping for, so he counted it as a win.

  Something grabbed him. Buck. "You okay, Christopher?" Christopher nodded. Buck pulled something over. Maggie, who had a drenched and unconscious Lizzy clutched to her shoulder. "Idiot drove us into the Pacific Ocean."

  "That's ridiculous, Clucky. This is clearly the Atlantic."

  Buck growled.

  Something surfaced. Aaron. A cut streaming pink down his face, the red of it diluted by the water that surrounded them. The cowboy held an unconscious Amulek, his bad fist curled around the teen's chin in the classic drowning rescue position.

  Buck looked at Amulek. "Lucky he's out or I'd deck him."

  "He saved us." Aaron looked around. The water was within two feet of the roof. Still streaming in. Frothy, freezing.

  Christopher's teeth wanted to chatter. He refused to let them. Not until Buck started showing the cold.

  The Marauder was still drifting. No telling exactly how fast, though Christopher got a sense they were moving forward at a good clip.

  "Saved us?" Buck sputtered as foam leaped into his mouth. "How is trying to cook us then drown us 'saving'?"

  Aaron pulled Amulek toward the tailgate. Toward the water streaming in. Leaving.

  "He drove through the fire at a thin point, which kept the zombies away – at least for a while. And he drove us in here where we wouldn't get cooked, in case you didn't notice."

  Buck growled. "He had a lucky case of crazy."

  Aaron stopped moving outside long enough to stare at Buck. "I barely know this kid, b
ut he doesn't strike me as the type to 'go crazy.'" He shook his head. "He knew the forest was thin, he knew the river bent this way. He saved us." He gripped the roof of the tailgate. "But if you don't get out of here, we're going to die just the same."

  Buck slogged toward the tailgate. Holding Hope with one hand, helping Maggie fight the drag of the incoming water with the other.

  Christopher tried to stand. Feet touched the floor of the Marauder. Then he slipped. Went under. Theresa grabbed him. Hoisted him above the water. Only a few inches between the water and the roof. "Deep breath," she said.

  Then she pulled him under.

  77

  THE "SWIM," SUCH AS it was, was awkward. Christopher had one arm around Theresa, she had one arm around him. Like the world's most extreme three-legged race. Only this one ended not with hand-made blue ribbons and a wide variety of potato salads, but with either death or life as the only rewards.

  It was only a few feet from inside to outside. Inches. But it took forever. The water shoved him back, back. Theresa kept them going. Toward the end he finally felt a modicum of strength return to his limbs, but even with that he was by far the weaker person on the strange team.

  And to think she was trying to kill me only a few days ago.

  I'm growing on her.

  His thoughts still weren't moving in the right directions, he knew. Scattered. Confused.

  But he was coming to himself, a bit at a time. By the time they surfaced behind the Marauder, he felt like something approaching himself again. A very bruised, painful self – but himself, all the same.

  The Marauder was cruising downstream, its hood barely breaching the water's surface. It stayed tilted up for another moment, then it fell. Disappeared.

  The current caught Christopher. Swept him away.

  He and Theresa clung to one another.

  First base!

  The levity was dampened by the suspicion that he was going to die here. They were kicking against the current, getting nowhere.

  Then something caught him. Jerked at his collar. Dragging him to the side.

  He twisted, sure it was a branch or something that was going to turn a bad situation to a worse one. That had been the pattern since the Change, and he saw no reason it was likely to change in the future.

  So he was surprised when he saw Buck. Holding to Aaron, who was holding to Amulek. The teen must have been shocked awake by the water, and now he was holding to a huge root that grew into the side of the cliff they had just come rocketing off of. Maggie had herself twined around another root, holding onto her daughters. Keeping their heads above water.

  Buck curled his arm in with a grunt, drawing Christopher slowly to him. Christopher felt panicked movements on his other side. "Relax!" he shouted. "They've got us!"

  He felt the motions slow, then cease as the words penetrated Theresa's terror. He looked at her, saw her peering at him. Traces of a smile tugged at her lips. "I know, I'm a sexy sight," he said.

  "I just didn't want your face to be the last thing I saw," she said. But her smile didn't go away.

  Buck pulled them to him. Then Aaron drew the group to him. Then Amulek pulled the entire knot of survivors to the side of the cliff. His muscles stood out in huge relief, turning him from a good-sized teen into something of near-mythic appearance. Christopher could almost hear Mo's voice in his mind: "Of course. He is Māori."

  The thought made him sad. He missed the big hunter. Tried not to think of what he must be going through – either a horrible Change to something that would strip him of all that made him so good, or a slow death as he starved without the use of his hands.

  He failed.

  So many lost. How many more?

  Buck reached out a long arm and snagged another tree root. Added his strength to Amulek's. Then Aaron threaded himself into the roots, and then Christopher and Theresa.

  Christopher looked around. The river was a good three or four hundred feet across. And fast. There was no way any of them could cross it without some flotation device at the best of times. Let alone crippled, with a few unconscious kids to watch out for.

  At his back was the cliff. Twenty feet high. No way up. And even if they could somehow figure out a way to climb, he heard the crack-crackle-pop of the fire above them.

  How long until it burns out?

  How long can we stay here?

  The last was the most important question. His teeth still wanted to click together. And in spite of his best effort, they started chattering. Almost in the same instant, Buck started shivering as well.

  Waiting for me to start first, I bet. Real mature, Clucky.

  Buck looked at him. Then at Maggie. Her lips were blue. She was shivering. So was Theresa. Amulek seemed unconcerned by the cold water – but then, he'd probably freeze to death with that same impassive look.

  "He is Māori."

  Shut up, Mo.

  Aaron wasn't shivering yet, but Christopher could tell he was going to start soon.

  There was a fire above them, separated by a cliff.

  The opposite shore was too far to get to – and now that Christopher looked closely, it was scorched and blackened with fire as well. Even if burned over, it was probably too hot to walk across.

  The fires of Hell all around.

  And in spite of that, they were all going to freeze to death.

  78

  "HOW DO WE GET OUT OF here?" said Buck. His teeth turned every other word into a seven-syllable exercise.

  Amulek looked up. Shook his head: No clue.

  That made Christopher feel oddly better about the whole situation. He had expected the kid to make some sort of floating yurt using fish skins and algae. The fact that even a Māori was lost in this situation....

  So me and Buck aren't the only mere mortals in the group, after all.

  Of course, that means we're all going to die, so it's kind of a wash.

  He turned around. Looking for something that could get them out of this. Not sure what he expected to find – it wasn't like there was a cliff-side Big 5 Sporting Goods along here where he could grab a kayak and a few wet suits.

  Behind: a dirt wall. Wet roots and moss wrapping their way up and through the soil.

  Everywhere else: rushing water. The only break in the river was a bit of white water with what looked like a gray rock sticking up. When he looked closer he saw it was the back end of the Marauder, just barely peeking above the surface. The valiant thing had given its life to get them this far, and they were all going to freeze to death.

  Guess it's better than frying or being Changed.

  Only it wasn't. Because if they died, that meant the queens would be reborn – reinserted – in someone else. The king, waiting inside a little boy's body, would have them in his power. Would wait until one killed the other, and then....

  Christopher didn't know what would happen next. Maybe there would be some new creature, born inside the bodies of Derek and whatever unlucky host joined in that unholy union. Bursting forth from the children's bodies, shedding them like snakeskins. Beginning a new race – a species so alien that its motivations could never be fully understood.

  Perhaps the zombies would remain, roaming the earth. Perhaps they would all die, their purpose fulfilled.

  But no matter which it was, the result for humanity would be the same: extinction.

  "We're dead," said Theresa. Her gravelly voice sounded lower than usual. Almost ugly in her despair.

  Christopher realized he still held her hand in his. He squeezed it. "We're not going to die. You still have to kill me for grabbing your boob again."

  She managed a wan smile, though it only turned her upper lip upward. Her lower lip was shivering so hard her jaw looked like it might dislocate. "I think that's a moot point."

  "We're not going to die," insisted Christopher.

  "Pretty sure of that, aren't you?" said Buck. He was doing what Christopher had done a moment ago: looking around. And Christopher could tell his friend was finding
just what he had found: nothing.

  "I'm telling you, we're not going to die."

  "How can you be so sure?" said Theresa. Her voice was challenging, but at the same time there was something behind the despair, the impotent rage at death come to call.

  "Because we can't die." Like the rest of them – other than Amulek – Maggie was shivering. But her voice was firm. Unwavering. No room for doubt in her expression or her voice. She looked at her girls. "If we die, then it's all over."

  "Preach it, girl," said Christopher. "We'll make it. Save the world. Be heroes. Free drinks for life. And I'm not the only one who knows it. Right, Aaron?"

  He looked around.

  Buck, Maggie, Theresa. The girls.

  Him. But....

  "Where's Aaron?"

  79

  EVERYONE LOOKED AROUND.

  No one saw anything.

  "Where'd he go?" Buck said. He spun in place, looking everywhere, even turning to the cliff as though Aaron might have dug himself in there somehow.

  "I don't know!" The conviction that they would make it – somehow – melted away from Christopher in an instant. Aaron was gone. But he couldn't be gone. There was nowhere to go. Unless –

  "He got pulled under." Theresa sounded like she was on the verge of crying.

  She's become one of us.

  Fate.

  But how could that be? What was the end-game, if whatever had brought them together was just doing it so they could be torn apart, one at a time?

  Christopher wondered if this was God's way of reminding them He existed, then punishing them in the next moment for forgetting the fact in the first place.

  The Lord giveth, the Lord taketh away.

  If that's the case, then the Lord sucketh.

  "Buck, hold onto my leg," said Christopher. For once, the big man didn't argue. Just grabbed Christopher's foot when he lifted it above the water.