Surviving Extinction - The Extinction Series Book 6: A Thrilling Post-Apocalyptic Survival Series

by Tara Ellis

  From what Jess could make out, it looked like maybe a dozen or so people were milling around the pool of water, while several more were lying in the tall grass. Most of them were elders or the sick, but a couple were the younger Lokono who had stayed to help.

  Peta was shaking her head. “If the fire comes through here, the water isn’t going to be enough to stop it.”

  Jason unclipped his pack and dropped it on the ground. Kneeling, he unzipped it and pulled out a coiled rope. “I’m going to secure this at the top. I think between all of us we can manage to get everyone into the caves. I want you two up there now,” he added, pointing at Jess and Tyler.

  “I’ll make a stretcher,” Slaider said from the darkness. “We can drag people up if we have to.”

  Sahil slumped to the ground next to Tyler, and Jess was shocked at how horrible he looked. The smoke was hitting him hard, and his breathing sounded like a freight train.

  Jason unhooked his length of braided tactical rope from his pack and tossed it at Slaider. “For the stretcher,” he explained. He’d shown the cord to Jess earlier that week and described how it could be unraveled and used for various purposes. “How long ago did Eddy and Kavish come through?” he asked. “If they’re still around we could sure use their help.”

  Slaider frowned and shook his head as he unbraided the rope. “I haven’t seen them.”

  Jason paused with the backpack over one shoulder. “What do you mean? They were supposed to have found you over an hour ago.”

  Jess stood slowly and strained to see into the darkest reaches of the clearing. They couldn’t leave them behind.

  “I’ve been running this trail the whole time, directing people,” Slaider answered, his face grim in the harsh light that Jason was pointing at him. “They never came to the caves.”

  Chapter 19

  TYLER

  Bergi-Olo Caves

  Amazon Jungle, South America

  He was shot. Even with the oozing, burning hole in his shoulder as proof, Tyler kept having to remind himself. He thought of how Jess had looked the morning after being attacked and almost killed by the jaguars. The way she’d kept repeating herself while in a daze. Jason had explained then how they were symptoms of trauma and shock. Although he understood that, as well as the fact that he had a bullet tear through his body, Tyler was still having to constantly stop and reassess himself. He was coming to the same conclusion over and over again, the words echoing in his mind: he’d been shot.

  “Tyler?” Jess sounded concerned rather than annoyed, which was probably a bad sign. It meant he had to look as horrible as he felt.

  “Yeah,” was the best Tyler could manage. He was concentrating on not throwing up again, and the persistent pain radiating from his arm was making it an almost impossible task. He was tired of the constant battle with his weak stomach. He was tired of suppressing his increasingly demanding grief over the death of his mother that he’d been forced to push aside in order to function. He was just so…tired.

  Jess pulled at him, slowing their progress up the slick, rocky trail. “We can stop for a minute, if you need to.”

  Shaking his head, Tyler swallowed down the rising bile and cleared his throat. The smoke was making it raw, adding to the overall impression that his whole body was revolting against him. “Can’t stop,” he croaked.

  He hoped Jess would understand without him explaining. If he stopped, there was a good chance he wouldn’t get moving under his own power again. Tyler had denied any issues when Jason grilled him before they started the climb, but that was nearly a half-hour ago and since then, he was pretty sure the wound in his shoulder had lost whatever insignificant clot it had formed. Fresh blood was running down the inside of his arm and chest, warm and sticky, soaking into the shirt around his waistline. He couldn’t remember how many quarts of blood were in the human body, but it couldn’t be much more than what had already leaked out of him.

  He was weak. So weak, and…overwhelmingly tired. The suffering and endless need to be running either away from or toward an objective that was constantly changing were burdens he couldn’t carry anymore. Because whenever they reached their next goal, the rules would change, and they’d be set loose in the maze again.

  Tyler rubbed at his forehead with his good arm as a numbness formed in his legs and began to spread through his body. A fresh surge of fear caused him to slap at his cheek. Hard. He couldn’t feel his feet anymore. He was losing it. His thoughts were becoming sluggish and mixed-up, and he wasn’t going to be able to—

  “Tyler!” Jess was more insistent that time and her hands were grabbing at his back, trying to steady him. “Peta!”

  More hands, taking hold of his left arm and steering him over to a boulder. Leaning against the cold rock, Tyler concentrated on his labored breathing as his vision greyed and his rapid heartbeat pounded inside his head.

  “He’s going to pass out.” Peta’s voice came from far away, like she was talking to him through a long, metallic tunnel.

  “There’s too much blood!” Jess insisted, tugging at his shirt to reveal the evidence.

  Marty’s cold nose pushed at his good hand, and Tyler found that when he forced his eyes to open, he could see his furry face as the dog nuzzled it against his arm. “I’m okay,” he tried to say, but the words came out as hardly more than a whisper.

  “No, you are definitely not okay,” Peta retorted.

  Well, she sounded annoyed. That made Tyler feel better, and he managed to turn his head and look up at Peta as she hovered over his right shoulder, examining the bloody bandages beneath the torn t-shirt that had been hastily made into a sling.

  “Why didn’t you say something?” she demanded while yanking at a belt from around her waist. Pulling the strap out of the loops, Peta squinted and stared up at the last of the trail leading to the caves. They weren’t far from the top, but it was the steepest and most difficult section.

  Tyler followed her gaze and saw a couple of flashlights cutting paths through the darkness near the ledge. Earlier that day, while it had been a little intimidating hoisting himself over the small rocky lip above the waterfall with its limited handholds, it wasn’t that hard. Viresh even managed it easily enough with a little assistance from the scouts that went with them. But in the middle of the night, on the run, and without any strength left, it suddenly seemed impossible.

  Peta wrapped the belt around his arm above the saturated bandage and pulled it tight, creating a tourniquet. “We won’t want to leave this on for too long, but it should be good enough until we get you to the top and Jason can take a look at it.”

  Wincing, Tyler was too far into his pain to even cry out at the extra agony. Grunting, he took a steadying breath and tried to clear his head enough to be coherent. The caves. They were climbing to the caves and away from the fire.

  “If Sahil can make it, I bet you can,” Jess offered, tugging at him. “Come on. I’ll get in front of you, and Peta can push you from behind.”

  Sahil. The eighty-year-old elder, had gone first to organize things up top with two of the younger Lokono who’d stayed behind to help with the evacuation. They were practically carrying the guy on their backs, but Tyler decided it wasn’t worth pointing out that detail.

  Jason belonged to one of the bobbing lights near the top. Aside from the fact that he was already carrying a bunch of stuff and needed to secure the rope, there wasn’t enough room on the trail for Jason to climb back down and around the others to help him. The trail was too narrow. The only way Tyler was going to make it up was to keep moving on his own.

  Glancing behind them, Tyler could just make out the shapes of Devon and Akuba, who were moving almost as slowly as he was. Slaider was still at the bottom, building a crude stretcher to pull up Akuba’s mother and any other Lokono who couldn’t stay on their feet. Tyler was determined that wasn’t going to include him.

  Gritting his teeth, he took another breath and pushed off from the rock. A wave of dizziness threatened to ru
in his plans of bravery, but he fought through it and managed to steady himself with help from both Jess and Peta.

  “We’ve got you,” Peta reassured him. She was literally holding him up by his pants. Grabbing the thick waist of his jeans, she lifted and pushed gently at the same time. “This is where you have to put one foot in front of the other.”

  Taking hold of Jess’s backpack with his functioning hand, Tyler allowed her to drag him while Peta pushed. He lifted his feet and did as he was told, methodically putting them in front of each other, as Marty dashed nimbly around him and bolted in front of Jess to lead the way.

  Slowly, they made progress and the uneven surface under his feet turned from loose gravel to more solid granite. The smoke thinned as they climbed higher and the fresher air made it easier to breathe. Tyler sucked in a blessed mouthful and paused to look back. It was a mistake.

  They were slightly above the canopy of the Amazon, and what had only been a glowing haze and suggestion of fire before, was now a vivid scene of long, wicked flames clawing at the sky as it devoured the trees. It had a malevolent life of its own, throbbing and pulsating with a power beyond comprehension. Howler monkeys were screaming in the distance, a different sort of chant than from earlier in the day. It was a wail driven by fear and desperation. Clouds of birds were taking to the sky in advance of the blaze, turning the smoke into a churning, roiling mass of motion that made it hard to distinguish them from the expanding inferno. It was a scene from hell, and what made it worse was that only days earlier most people would have called it paradise.

  “No…” Jess moaned, having turned to look at the same time. “It’s everywhere!”

  The world was on fire. Or it at least looked that way, and it was getting close. Too close for Tyler to be slowing them down. His father’s voice came to him, then. From a time when being dragged out of bed early on a Saturday morning was Tyler’s biggest concern. They would go jogging every weekend, whether he wanted to or not. It was one of the few things his dad ever demanded from him. While Tyler always groaned about the “together” time, in truth, he’d grown to look forward to the mornings they had alone together with nothing but the sound of their pounding feet and the shared experience. His dad was much faster, so he’d created a cadence that he’d chant over and over again, encouraging Tyler not to stop: “Onward, ho! Onward, ho! Not much further left to go!”

  Standing there on the trail, with the burning jungle at his back and sacred caves above him, Tyler could hear his father singing the ridiculous tune and knew that somehow, they were still connected. That from thousands of miles away, he had no doubt his dad was still alive, urging him on.

  “Go!” Tyler shouted, forcing his feet to move again.

  Within a few minutes, they had reached the ledge, and Tyler was relieved to see that Jason had stopped to help pull them up. Another flashlight darted against the walls of the cave behind him as Sahil and the other Lokono moved around inside. According to Viresh, there were always torches left in spots on the walls, but they must not have been lit, or perhaps had burned out from when the rest of the tribe went through earlier.

  “He’s bleeding again,” Jess said as she turned and took Tyler’s hand to help pull.

  Jason opted to grab him by the straps of his backpack, and hauled him up off his feet and onto the ledge next to him in one fluid motion. Tyler understood then why Jason had insisted he wear it when he’d put it on him and cinched it down tight before they left.

  Frowning at the makeshift tourniquet, Jason gave the flashlight to Jess to hold for him and then quickly went to work undressing the wound. Based on the number of grunts and other unhappy sounds, Tyler figured it didn’t look so hot.

  “Over there,” Jason directed, pointing at the wall of the cave, near the opening. Turning to Devon, who was helping Akuba get settled, he tossed the coil of rope to him. “Can you find something to secure this to?”

  Marty was getting increasingly antsy as Jason got his med kit from his pack, so Jess knelt down to try and console the dog. He kept staring into the darker depths of the cave and whining, his body quivering.

  “I’ll make a new pressure dressing, but we’re going to need to keep you still for as long as possible, so a new clot can form,” Jason explained as he pulled out a length of gauze and an ace wrap.

  A torch flared to life from somewhere in the cave. The amount of relief it provided helped to calm Tyler’s nerves so he could steady his voice enough to answer Jason. “Yeah…sure. But I’m already feeling better. I just need to sit for a few minutes.”

  Peta and Jason exchanged a look. “It’s going to have to be longer than a few minutes,” Jason insisted. “Or else it’ll just open back up again.”

  “It’s going to take some time to get everyone else up here, anyway,” Peta added.

  “Something’s wrong,” Jess whispered.

  They all stopped and looked at Jess. To say something was wrong was a giant understatement, but the way she’d said it implied it was a new kind of wrong. Considering where they were, Tyler didn’t want to know what would qualify for that sort of rating.

  “With Marty,” Jess explained when she saw they were all staring at her. She was holding the German Shephard with both arms wrapped tightly around him, and he was continuing to shake uncontrollably while staring at the back of the cave.

  Part of the large expanse was illuminated by the one torch. The flickering light exposed Sahil sitting next to the largest of the hot springs, while the two Lokono that had carried him were moving toward the dark side of the cave, weapons raised as if they’d also heard something.

  Jason leapt to his feet and started to reach for his own gun, but the warning came too late.

  From the furthest reaches of the cave, two gunshots exploded. The sound filled the space with a deafening crescendo, as both of the Lokono men fell to the ground.

  Chapter 20

  PETA

  Bergi-Olo Caves

  Amazon Jungle, South America

  The shots were thunderous in the resonating chamber of the cave, and a massive wave of confusion engulfed Peta as she tried to make sense of the sounds and the scene that was playing out in front of her.

  Jason had a much different reaction. As she stood frozen, he wrapped his arms around her chest and lunged sideways. Throwing her to the floor of the cave, Jason covered her with his own body before she’d even registered what had fully happened.

  Shooting. Someone was shooting at them. Or rather, at the Lokono. Peta could see their still forms lying in the dirt not far from where her own face was pressed into the ground.

  Jason rolled away and shoved up onto a knee, the Glock already in his hand. Blinking rapidly, Peta scrambled to retrieve her own weapon, but her fingers weren’t responding and felt clumsy. She was having a hard time thinking straight as the ringing in her ears faded.

  “You might want to reconsider that, Dr. Hunter.” Davies spoke from the back of the cave, where the oily darkness made it impossible to see anything distinctive.

  Two of The Cured appeared in the pool of light behind Sahil, both armed with rifles which were pointed at Jason. A faint clicking sound preceded a small burst of flame from the opposite side of the cave, exposing Madeline as she held a lighter to one of the dug-outs in the wall that housed another torch. The orange glow rapidly expanded to reveal two more Cured also holding weapons as they stood over the unmoving Lokono at their feet.

  “How?” Peta hadn’t meant to speak the word out loud, but her confusion was growing, making it hard for her to function. Of all the potential dangers they might have faced in the burning jungle and dark caves, encountering Davies there wasn’t something she’d even considered. It didn’t make any sense.

  “Why are you here?” Jess screamed, sounding close to hysterical. She was sitting on the ground next to Tyler, holding on desperately to Marty as he barked and pulled against her. “Haven’t you done enough? Just leave us alone!”

  Tsking, Davies stepped out into the li
ght. His clothes and feet were muddy but he still had an air of perfection about him. “I’m afraid that isn’t possible. Not anymore.”

  Jason slowly lowered the gun, but only part of the way, as he stuck his other hand out in a placating manner. They were clearly at a disadvantage and not in a position to challenge Davies directly, so Peta followed his lead and left her own weapon, with its last two bullets, holstered.

  Watching Peta as she got up onto her knees, Davies motioned to the tunnels behind him. “You failed to consider how I’m the one that financed and participated in the aerial surveillance that led to the creation of the topographical maps you no doubt used to find your way here.” Walking to the edge of the largest pool of water, he stared down at his reflection for a moment before lifting his head to reveal a small sneer. “I’ve known about the cave system within this mountain for years, though I’ll admit to never having been on the ground, or else I might have also discovered the Tan Presi Rutu and avoided this whole charade from the beginning.

  “Unfortunately, you were alerted to the fire sooner than I expected. While it took us some time to get here through one of the other openings, it’s merely an inconvenience. It will take days for the Lokono to make their way back to town from where these tunnels ultimately let out, and my followers will be waiting there for them. And you…” Davies narrowed his eyes as he stared at each of them in turn. “I think it’s time we had a more direct conversation.”

  His mild display of anything other than arrogance was a new development that caused Peta to wish she’d gone ahead and drawn the Glock. If Davies was suffering from advancing brain damage and falling victim to his own growing desire for more power, he was even more dangerous than before. Bringing his people through some offshoot of the cave to intercept them after setting the fire was evidence enough. He was becoming increasingly irrational, and was willing to risk his own life in pursuit of something closer to revenge than an organized plan.