Some instinct stopped him even as he began to raise his hands. It was as if JT Hammond stood behind him and bent to whisper advice in his ear. JT, who was more of a father to Dez than her real one had been. JT, who was, very likely, the best person either of them had ever known.
She needs to be strong, Trout imagined he heard JT say. She needs to take these kids home.
Trout took a breath and let it out.
“Asheville, huh?”
“That’s what Sam said.”
“Okay,” said Trout, “then it’s Asheville.”
He did not dare ask what they would do if the infection had reached Asheville. That was a war they could fight on another day. If they had the chance.
For now, Asheville was a direction.
It was far away from Pittsburgh.
It was in the mountains, so maybe that would be something.
Trout didn’t know and really couldn’t make any guesses. It was a direction, a place to head to. And that felt much better than having a place to run from. So much better.
They heard a sound like thunder and looked up to see more aircraft. Helicopters this time. Dozens of them.
Maybe hundreds.
Black Hawks and Apaches. And the big cargo choppers, the Chinooks. An armada of the air. Powerful, threatening. They filled the sky, flying in waves, heading north, and the clouds seemed to fall back before them, revealing blues skies that offered at least the illusion of promise.
Trout wanted to feel hope when he looked at them, but it was slow in coming.
“The storm’s over,” he said, hoping it meant more than a weather report.
Dez watched the helicopters fly across the clearing sky.
“Will it be enough?” Trout asked.
Dez shook her head. “I don’t know.”
After a thoughtful moment, Dez nudged the camera bag toward him.
“I told you, I don’t—”
“You need to file a report,” she interrupted.
“Why? What’s the point?”
Dez bent and unzipped the case, removed the camera, studied it, and found the record button. She rested a finger over it. “This isn’t everywhere yet,” she said. “It’s spreading, but it isn’t everywhere yet.”
“I know, but—”
“You need to tell people, Billy. You need to keep telling people. You need to tell them everything we know. What it is. How it spreads. How to fight them. Everything.”
“Who’s going to listen?”
Dez shrugged. The drone of the helicopters was fading to a rumor in the sky. “What does it matter? Somebody will. Maybe if all we do is get the word out to a few, that’ll matter. Maybe we’ll help some people get through this.”
“We’ll get through it.”
Dez smiled faintly and nodded. “Then it’s on us to help whoever we can. However we can. Everything’s going to shit, Billy. We can’t be a part of that. We can’t be a part of the end. We have to be a part of whatever survives. We have to help people so they know how to fight back. Am I … am I making sense?”
He stared at her for several seconds, watching her eyes, seeing the lights deep inside the blue. Loving her for this.
“Yes,” he said, “you’re making sense.”
After a while Dez took his hand. Then Billy Trout reached out and pulled her gently into his arms. Not to comfort her.
He kissed her with all the heat and hope and love that he had left inside.
The kiss she gave back was scalding.
When they stopped, gasping and flushed, Trout murmured, “I love you.”
She said, “Now, Billy? Really? God, you’re such a girl.”
Laughing out loud, she walked back to the bus.
CHAPTER ONE-HUNDRED THIRTY-FOUR
SUNSET HOLLOW GATED COMMUNITY
MARIPOSA COUNTY, CALIFORNIA
Tom Imura ran and the night burned around him.
The darkness pulsed with the red and blue of police lights; the banshee wail of sirens tore apart the shadows of the California night.
The child in his arms screamed and screamed and screamed.
Tom clutched little Benny to his chest. He could feel his brother’s tiny heart beating like the flutter of dragonfly wings. His own felt like a bass drum being pounded by a madman. Sweat ran down his chest and mixed with the toddler’s tears.
Tom turned once and saw them.
He saw her first.
Standing in the window, her arms reaching toward him. She was so pale, so beautiful. Like a ghost in a dream. Her dark eyes were wide with terror, her mouth shaped words that were lost in all the noise. He knew what those words were, though. Just one word really, said over and over again.
“Go!”
Tom ran. He felt like a coward.
Tom Imura, the police cadet. Tough, top of his class. Tom, the martial artist, with black belts and trophies and certificates. Tom, the fighter.
Tom, the coward.
Running.
“I’m sorry!” he yelled, but he was sure Mom didn’t hear him.
And then he saw the other figure. Paler, larger, infinitely stranger, coming out of the shadows of the bedroom, reaching as Mom had reached, but not reaching for Tom and Benny. Those pale hands reached for her. For Mom. Reached for her, and dragged her back into darkness.
With all of the sirens and gunfire and the pounding of his own heart, Tom could not have heard her screams. He could not have.
And yet they echoed in his head. In his arms, Benny kept screaming.
Tom screamed, too.
Pale shapes lurched toward him from the shadows. Some of them were victims—bleeding, eyes wide with shock and incomprehension. Others were them. The things. The monsters. Whatever they were.
Tom had weapons in his car. His pistol—which he wasn’t even allowed to carry yet because he didn’t graduate from the police academy until tomorrow—and his stuff from the dojo. His sword, some fighting sticks.
Should he risk it? Could he risk it?
The car was at the end of the block. He had the keys, but the streets were clogged with emergency vehicles. Even if he got his gear, could he find a way to drive out?
No. Buildings were on fire. Fire trucks and crashed cars were like a wall.
But the weapons.
The weapons.
Benny screamed. The monsters shambled after him.
“Go!” his mother had said. “Take Benny … keep him safe. Go!”
Just … go.
He ran to the parked car. Benny was struggling in his arms, hitting him, fighting to try and get free.
Tom held him with one arm—an arm that already ached from carrying his brother—and fished in his pocket for the keys. Found them. Found the lock. Opened the door, popped the trunk.
Gun in the glove compartment. Ammunition in the trunk. Sword in the trunk.
Shapes moved toward him. He could hear their moans.
He turned a wild eye toward one as it reached for the child Tom carried.
Tom shouted in terror. He lashed out with a kick, driving the thing back, splintering its leg. It fell, but it was not hurt. Not in any real sense of being hurt. As soon as it crashed down it began to crawl toward him.
It was unreal. Tom understood that this thing was dead. It was Mr. Harrison from three doors down and it was also a dead thing. A monster.
Benny kept screaming.
Tom lifted the trunk hood and shoved Benny inside. Then he grabbed his sword. There was no time to remove the trigger lock on the gun. They were coming. They were here.
He slammed the hood, trapping the screaming Benny inside the trunk even as Tom ripped the sword from its sheath.
Three terrible minutes later, Tom unlocked the trunk and opened it.
Benny was cowering in the back of the trunk, huddled against Tom’s gym bag. Tears and snot were pasted on his face. Benny opened his mouth to scream again, but he stopped. When he saw Tom, he stopped.
Tom stood there, the sword held loosely in one han
d, the keys in the other.
Tom was covered with blood. The sword was covered with blood.
The bodies around the car … more than a dozen of them were covered with blood.
Benny screamed.
Not because he understood—he was far too young for that—but because the smell of blood reminded him of Dad. Of home. Benny wanted his mom.
He screamed and Tom stood there, trembling from head to toe. Tears broke from his eyes and fell in burning silver lines down his face.
“I’m sorry, Benny,” he said in a voice that was as broken as the world.
Tom tore off his blood-splattered shirt. The T-shirt he wore underneath was stained but not as badly. Tom shivered as he lifted Benny and held him close. Benny beat at him with tiny fists.
“I’m sorry,” Tom said again.
He gathered up what he could carry, turned, and with Benny in one arm and his sword in his other hand, Tom ran into the night as the world burned around him.
CHAPTER ONE-HUNDRED THIRTY-FIVE
EAST COMPTON
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA
“This is Billy Trout, reporting live from the apocalypse…”
The car sat in the middle of the street with the radio playing at full blast.
All four doors were open.
The voice on the radio was saying that this was the end of the world.
There was no one in the car, no one in the streets. No one in any of the houses or stores. There wasn’t a single living soul to hear the reporter’s message.
It didn’t matter, though.
They already knew.
ALSO BY JONATHAN MABERRY
NOVELS
Code Zero
Extinction Machine
Assassin’s Code
King of Plagues
The Dragon Factory
Patient Zero
Joe Ledger: Special Ops
Dead of Night
The Wolfman
The Nightsiders: The Orphan Army
Deadlands: Ghostwalkers
Watch Over Me
Fire & Ash
Flesh & Bone
Dust & Decay
Rot & Ruin
Bad Moon Rising
Dead Man’s Song
Ghost Road Blues
V-Wars (editor)
V-Wars: Blood and Fire (editor)
Out of Tune (editor)
NONFICTION
Wanted Undead or Alive
They Bite
Zombie CSU
The Cryptopedia
Vampire Universe
Vampire Slayer’s Field Guide to the Undead (as Shane MacDougall)
Ultimate Jujutsu
Ultimate Sparring
The Martial Arts Student Logbook
Judo and You
GRAPHIC NOVELS
Marvel Universe vs. Wolverine
Marvel Universe vs. The Punisher
Marvel Universe vs. The Avengers
Captain America: Hail Hydra
Klaws of the Panther
Doomwar
Black Panther: Power
Marvel Zombies Return
Rot & Ruin
V-Wars: The Court of the Crimson Queen
Bad Blood
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jonathan Maberry is the New York Times bestselling and multiple Bram Stoker Award–winning author of Code Zero, Dead of Night, Patient Zero, The Pine Deep Trilogy, The Wolfman, Zombie CSU, and They Bite, among others. His work for Marvel Comics includes The Punisher, Wolverine, DoomWar, Marvel Zombies Return, and Black Panther.
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
FALL OF NIGHT. Copyright © 2014 by Jonathan Maberry. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
www.stmartins.com
Cover design by Rob Grom
Cover photograph © Shutterstock.com
eBooks may be purchased for business or promotional use. For information on bulk purchases, please contact Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department by writing to [email protected].
The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN 978-1-250-03494-6 (trade paperback)
ISBN 978-1-250-03495-3 (e-book)
e-ISBN 9781250034953
First Edition: September 2014
Visit stmartins.com/jonathanmaberry
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