by Dawn, M. K.
Dawn of Humanity
Decay of Humanity Series Book 4
M.K. Dawn
Copyright © 2021 by M.K. Dawn
All rights reserved.
No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher or author, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law.
Contents
Title Page
Copyright
1. Chapter One
2. Chapter Two
3. Chapter Three
4. Chapter Four
5. Chapter Five
6. Chapter Six
7. Chapter Seven
8. Chapter Eight
9. Chapter Nine
10. Chapter Ten
11. Chapter Eleven
12. Chapter Twelve
13. Chapter Thirteen
14. Chapter Fourteen
15. Chapter Fifteen
16. Chapter Sixteen
17. Chapter Seventeen
18. Chapter Eighteen
19. Chapter Nineteen
20. Chapter Twenty
21. Chapter Twenty-One
22. Chapter Twenty-Two
23. Chapter Twenty-Three
24. Epilogue
Chapter one
Axel
Snow fell from the sky at an alarming rate. If it continued, it wouldn’t take long before the roads were covered, and then, they’d be screwed.
Again.
Axel forced his eyes from the window and on to Britney as she shuddered in her sleep. The pained expression broke his heart, but it wasn’t anything new. In the month and a half since cult leader David overran their farm, killed their friends, and infested Britney’s oldest son, Carson, she had suffered from debilitating PTSD.
The small group of survivors had done what they could to accommodate her, but everyone, including Brit’s sister, Sloan, was growing antsy.
When they had made the decision to leave Montana and head for Hollywood in hopes of starting a new life, they had estimated they would get there in a couple of weeks.
How wrong they had been.
“What does that sign say?” Archer slowed the Humvee to get a better look.
Sloan leaned closer to the windshield and wiped away the fog blocking their view. “Welcome to Utah.”
“Wow,” Axel rubbed his temple. “An eight-hour trip done in four weeks. Must be some sort of record.”
Archer met Axel’s eyes in the rearview mirror. “The snow and lack of fuel is kicking our a—” His eyes drifted to Molly, one of Britney’s eight-year-old twins. “Butt. Not sure what the hell else we can do.”
Britney squirmed again with a muffled cried. Another bad dream.
Axel ran a hand over her hair in an attempt to soothe her back to a more peaceful sleep.
It didn’t work.
The scream Britney let loose sent Molly into hysterics.
“Fuck!” The Humvee swerved, and Archer struggled to get it back under control. “Son of a bitch. She’s going to have to stop doing that.”
Sloan patted Archer’s arm. “It’s not her fault.”
“I know how PTSD works,” Archer said through clenched teeth.
“Mommy?” Molly reached out and placed a hand on Britney’s arm, giving her a hard shake. “Mommy? Please, wake up.”
Axel hated to see the toll Britney’s illness had taken on both the kids. “It’s okay, kiddo. She’s just sleeping. We have to be strong for her, remember?”
Tears stained Molly’s cheeks, but she nodded. “Okay.”
Britney cried out again, startling herself awake, and she gagged.
“Pull over.” Axel banged on the back of the seat. “She’s going to be sick.”
Archer parked on the side of the road and killed the engine even though it was near freezing outside. “Make it quick.”
“Come on, babe.” Axel guided her out of the truck and into the snow. “Fresh air will help.”
Britney collapsed on the ground and dry heaved several times while Axel patted her on the back.
“Stop it.” She slapped his hand away. “I’m fine.”
“The hell you are.” Axel squatted next to her. “You’re having nightmares every time you close your eyes. That’s if you sleep, which is rare. You don’t eat. You barely get enough water. I can’t even fathom how much weight you’ve lost. And your relationship with the kids—”
“Don’t you dare speak to me about my kids!” Pain wracked her face, and she doubled over, arms wrapped tightly around herself. “It hurts so much. I don’t think I can keep goin’ like this.”
Molly poked her head out the Humvee window. “Mommy! Come back inside. There are monsters!”
Axel jumped to feet and scanned the area. Molly was known for her dramatics, but these days, one couldn’t be too careful.
“There’s nothing out there,” Archer called from the truck. “I got your back, but the snow is coming down, so you might want to think about heading back.”
“Brit.” Axel grabbed her by the arm and helped her to her feet. “Come on, back in the truck before we freeze to death.”
Angie, one of the last of the remaining survivors of the farm, came jogging up from the other car, her long black braid white with snow. “Everything okay, sugar?”
Britney nodded. “Fine. Upset stomach.”
“Really, now?” Angie placed a hand on her jutted hip. “Is that what you want me to tell your scared little boy?”
Molly’s twin, Blake, had taken to riding in the second vehicle with Maria, Sam, Angie, and his best friend, Tyler, who lost his mother in the attack at the farm, leaving him an orphan.
“Tell him whatever you want.” Britney climbed into the back of the Humvee and winced when Molly threw herself in her mother’s arm. “I’m fine, just give me some room, will ya?”
Her mother’s rejection hit Molly hard. “Fine! I’m going to ride in the other truck with Aunt Angie!”
“Baby,” Britney reached out for her, but Molly was already gone. “God dammit! What the hell is wrong with me? I love my children. I swear I do!”
“Don’t worry, I got her.” Angie rushed after the crying girl.
Sloan leaned over the back of the seat and took her sister’s hand. “We’re going to work harder to find you some medication. I can’t imagine every pharmacy along the way has been ransacked to the point they no longer have any sort of drug that would help. Don’t give up.”
Britney laid her head back on the seat as tears streamed down her face. “If you say so.”
“Let’s get back on the road and find somewhere to crash for the night.” Archer rotated back to face the front and started the engine. It sputtered and died.
That didn’t sound good. Axel crossed his arms on the back of the seat. “Engine get too cold?”
“I don’t know.” Archer tried it again. This time, it didn’t even attempt to turn over. “Son of a bitch.”
“What do you think could be wrong?” Sloan asked.
Archer raked a hand through his hair. “Hell if I know. The thing has been beat to shit. None of the dashboard works so it could be a number of things: empty gas tank, low oil, the battery. No way of telling really until I look under the hood.”
“And if it’s any of those things besides an empty gas tank,” Axel added, “we’re fucked.”
Sam strolled up to the passenger side, and Sloan rolled down the window. “What’s the hold up?”
Archer popped the hood. “We’re about to find out. Axel?”
“Coming.” He gave Britney a quick kiss on the forehead. “Rest. I’ll be right outside.”
She waved him off. “I’
m crazy, not deaf.”
Axel learned not to argue with her when she was in one of her moods. Instead, he let her snide remark go and joined Sam and Archer at the front of the truck. “Well? What do we think?”
“Fucked.” Archer slammed down the hood.
“Are you sure?” Axel was pretty good with engines. “Want me to take a look?”
Sam paced the length of the truck. “Not unless you can pull a couple of new spark plugs out of your ass.”
Being on the road for so long had put everyone on edge. Smart-ass comments were no longer taken personally. “What now? We can’t all fit in the car. And I don’t think it’s smart to leave our supplies.”
Archer blew out a long breath. “Sucks we had to leave the other truck behind.”
Vehicles were a hard commodity to come by. If they ran, it didn’t take long before the old gasoline screwed up the engine.
“What now?” Axel glanced back at the Humvee and two women inside.
“Sam,” Archer said, always one to take charge of a difficult situation, “grab Maria, Angie, and the kids and bring them to the Humvee. That thing offers more protection from the cold than the car.”
Sam, who spent most of his time at the farm bickering with the Council, didn't do much arguing these days. “Then what?”
Archer looked to Axel who nodded. The two men had grown close over the past few years—like brothers—so much so that they were able to anticipate each other’s thoughts.
Sam cocked an eyebrow. “Want to tell the rest of us the plan or should we play twenty-questions?”
“Me and Axel will search the area for a place to hole up until we can come up with another plan.” Archer rounded the truck.
“Are you nuts?” Sam pointed to the sky. “It’ll be dark soon.”
“Which is why we need to get moving.” Axel headed for the truck to get his gun.
Sam followed Axel. “You go out there and get killed and we’ll all be screwed.”
“Do you have another suggestion?” Axel asked, opening the back door.
Britney glanced between the two of them. “What’s going on?”
Axel wanted to pull Britney aside and talk to her in private but guessed that wasn’t going to happen. “The engine’s shot and there’s not enough room in the car for all of us and our supplies.”
Sloan twisted around to listen but did not interpret.
“Okay.” Britney wrung her fingers together. “What are we going to do?”
Archer opened the door opposite of Axel. “We’re losing daylight.”
“What’s goin’ on?” Britney demanded, her nostrils flaring. “What aren’t the two of you telling us?”
“Brit,” Sloan extended her hand toward her sister, “slow, deep breaths.”
She slapped her sister’s hand away. “Stop coddlin’ me like I’m a damn child. Is it too much for me to ask that my husband is honest?”
Axel knew this wouldn’t go well. “Babe, listen. Archer and I have to go find us some shelter or we’re all going to freeze to death when the sun goes down.”
Her eyes darted to the woods. “You’re going out there?”
“We don’t have a choice.” Archer leaned over the seat and pecked Sloan on the lips. “The others are going to come sit in here with you guys. Safety in numbers and all.”
Sloan gave him a weak smile. “We’ll be all right. We have weapons and the security the Humvee provides. It’s you and Axel that need to be careful of the infested.”
It wasn’t long ago that the infested remained mostly dormant during the colder months, but not anymore. They are just as active now as they had ever been. Sloan suspected they were evolving to become a more deadly hunter.
“We will.” Archer gave her a final squeeze before turning to Axel. “Ready?”
Axel wrapped Britney into an unrequited hug. “Try not to worry. We’ll be back soon.”
***
The sounds of Molly’s cries still rang in Axel’s ears as he and Archer disappeared into the forest. Leaving the kids had been one of the most difficult things he’d done in a long time. Before Carson’s death, Britney had already struggled with anxiety. The apocalyptic world they now lived in had that effect on a lot of people.
And who could blame them when, at any moment, a monster whose sole purpose was to infect the human body, turning them into whatever it is they were, could jump out. The word zombie never fit quite right. Alien felt silly, though it might have been more accurate since this parasite came from a meteor.
Long ago, they settled on the infested. Sloan’s idea, and it fit because that’s what the bastards did. Destroyed everything human within and used the body as a host.
“You okay, there, man?” Archer kept his voice low. “A lot on your mind?”
Though they should probably stay silent to not to draw attention to themselves, it was something they all struggled with these days. Any sort of noise made them jumpy. Talking was a way to distract them from the horrors hiding in the shadows. “Yeah, just worried about the others. I hate leaving the kids when they’re upset like that.”
“They’ll be okay. Sloan, Sam, and Angie are excellent shots.” Archer stopped at a nearby tree and marked an X in the bark. “Got a compass but better to be safe. Something we learned in survival training in the military. Always have a backup plan.”
Axel’s eyes darted to the small openings between the dense trees. “We couldn’t have stopped at a worse place.”
“I don’t know.” Archer led them farther into the forest. “There were remnants of mailboxes and fences along the road. That’s a good sign for houses out here.”
“There were?” Axel kept his eyes peeled behind them and to the left, while Archer did the same to the front and right. “I didn't notice.”
“You got a lot going on.”
That he did. But so did everyone else. “I thought she'd start getting better by now,” Axel admitted. “I’m not sure how much longer we can…” He didn’t want to speak the words plaguing his mind. “It’s a lot. Not just for me and kids but for the whole group.”
Archer marked another tree. “Back in the military, I knew a lot of guys who suffered from PTSD. Shit sucked and took a lot of lives but many recovered as well.” Being with Sloan, who never held anything back, had worn off on Archer. At times, he tended to say what was on his mind even though it hurt. “Sorry, I know that doesn’t help.”
“No,” Axel took a turn marking the next tree, “it’s not like that hasn’t crossed my mind a thousand times. I assume the guys that recovered did so because of meds and therapy and shit like that?”
“Most but some dealt with it on their own. Had families that needed them and, I don’t want to say sucked it up, but found a way to live with it.”
Maybe that could be a way to get through to Britney? Remind her how much her kids needed her to stick around. “Guess not much we can do about it now.”
“Slash”—Archer’s nickname for Sloan—“said she’ll keep checking pharmacies in the towns we pass through. Hopefully, we’ll come across something soon. At least something to take the edge off.”
One could only hope. “Damn, this snow is coming down hard. If we don’t find some shelter soon, we’re going to have to head back.”
A twig snapped in the distance, and both men readied their weapon.
“See anything,” Archer whispered.
Axel shook his head but continued to scan the area.
Snow crunched and birds scattered.
“Watch out!” Axel managed to shout just as an infested sprung from the tree line.
Chapter two
Sloan
“Do you have any threes?” Tyler stared at Molly for a couple of seconds before asking her again. “Molly, do you have any threes?” The ten-year-old possessed more patience than Sloan ever had a child.
“What?” Molly batted her green doe-eyes.
Tyler gave her a small smile. “Threes? Do you have any?”
“Oh.” M
olly checked her cards and handed him one. “Here you go.”
“Thanks. Your turn, Maria.”
A few towns back, when Angie had suggested they grab some travel games from the Walgreens they scavenged, Sloan had thought them to be a waste of space. She soon learned how wrong she was, seeing how excited the kids had been to have something to do. With the world the way it was, Sloan tended to forget the needs of small children differed from those of the adults.
Sloan switched her attention from the backseat card game to Sam, who sat in the driver’s seat reading a book, then to Britney whom she shared the passenger seat with.
Britney gazed out the window in the direction Archer and Axel went emotionless. If she worried about her husband, her face didn’t give it away.
“Do you see anything?” Sloan asked in a hushed tone so she didn’t draw unwanted attention from the children.
“No.”
Britney’s flat tone pained Sloan more than she cared to admit. Her older sister had always been the bubbly, lighthearted, fun-loving one of the two. Even after their mother died when they were young, Britney had been the one to bring life back into their solemn house.
“The sun will set soon. I’m certain they’ll be back before then. And with good news.” The Humvee held some heat, mostly due to the eight people crammed inside, but once the sun disappeared, it would become dangerously cold, for the children especially.
Britney rotated her head to face Sloan. “You don’t know that. We have no idea what’s goin’ on out there. What’s hidden in those woods waitin’ to attack.”
“Yes, I’m well aware of the dangers they may face, but we have to remain positive. Isn’t that what you always told me?”
With a roll of her eyes, Britney returned to the window.
If Sloan were not a trained medical professional and did not understood the complex nature of Britney’s PTSD, she might have smacked her sister on the back of the head and told her to get over it. But little good that would do.
“What was that?” Sam snapped his book shut and wiped off the fog building on the window.
