Crucible: A Post-Apocalyptic Thriller (Next Book 5)

by Scott Nicholson

  Franklin climbed stiffly down into the hole, vanishing without so much as a look back. DeVontay and Rachel were alone with the dying city.

  But was it truly dying? If they’d learned anything here, it was that the alloy couldn’t be destroyed. It only changed form.

  Was it powered by the Zap’s telepathy or did it have some identity of its own? He thought about how the robots and creatures required physical contact with the alloy in order to function. True, the drone-birds managed autonomous power, but they’d been around for a while. They were old technology considering the rapid evolution of the Zaps.

  If the city was powered by the mutants, what about Rachel’s Zap half? Could she draw sustenance from the alloy if she was telepathically linked to it?

  It was a long shot, flimsy on science, but sometimes faith was reason enough to act. He told her what he was doing, assured her he loved her no matter what, and hugged her under the armpits. He stood with a groan of agony and effort, supporting her weight and dragging her one slow step at a time toward the alloy.

  He thought of all the possibilities—the dome would collapse before he left the rubble, the alloy would yield and pull them into its quicksand when he arrived, or it might suddenly change state in a toxic burst of heat. None of the options were bad for someone who’d accepted death. But his all-too-human hope was somehow made even more forlorn and pathetic in the face of a world that had clearly shifted against the human race and actively worked for its extinction.

  When DeVontay finally reached the metal, all signs of the robots were gone, now melded into the uneven surface. He laid Rachel’s body on the elastic alloy, opened her palms, and pressed them against the city’s skin. He felt for her pulse and received only the faintest flutter.

  He called her name and brushed her hair away from her eyes. He was shit for prayers but he tried one anyway, asking God to breathe life into her lungs and oxygen into her heart. In exchange, he would…well, he really had nothing to offer in return.

  When her eyes opened and faint sparks emerged from the dark orbs, he forgot all about the prayer.

  Zap gods required no gratitude.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  When the torch went out, Murray tossed it aside and dove underwater, kicking and paddling, going with the current.

  She emerged some yards downstream, disoriented and gasping for breath. A weak gray light suffused the tunnel. She blinked the slime from her eyes and called to Squeak and K.C. She couldn’t see them, although the ladder hung empty, the obscene bulge of alloy almost reaching the waterline now.

  The Glock still gripped in her fist, she half-ran and half-swan deeper into the tunnel, going with the flow. The creature with the tentacles waited somewhere in this direction, but she would rather wrestle with it than wait for the hidden teeth of whatever had swum toward her upstream.

  The water level rose and the current accelerated as she navigated her way down the channel. When Murray finally touched bottom, the greasy water was over her waist. Guilt wracked her for abandoning the others, but she was confident K.C. would protect Squeak as best she could. And K.C. likely had already gone on ahead, making a snap decision to flee in the fastest manner possible.

  She dove again, making better time when she reduced the friction created from contact with the tunnel. When she came up again, she saw an intersection looming. Staying straight would allow her a faster escape, but she suspected the side tributaries improved her chances of reaching one of the factories. No matter what amphibian or piscine horrors lurked in the water, she was more determined than ever to blow this degenerate silver shithouse to the heavens.

  Murray angled her strokes so that she veered to one side of the current, and when the detour arrived, she rubbed her hand against the side of the concrete tunnel, scraping her skin raw but slowing her progress. She kicked off from the bottom and plunged into the tributary to the left. The water was shallower here, but the conduit was narrower and darker. She jogged along in the knee-deep water, straining for any splashes that might signal an attack.

  Her shin thumped into something soft and rubbery, causing her heart to skip a beat. She swung the pistol in front of her, unsure if it would still fire after getting soaked. But just before she pulled the trigger, the bulging shape bobbed to the surface.

  It was Millwood’s corpse, already pasty white from blood loss and the emolliating effects of the water. Murray half expected it to rise up, zombie-like, and grab her. Instead the body slipped back beneath the glassy surface.

  “So long, soldier.” Murray saluted and pushed it aside and continued on her way.

  The distant throbbing grew louder and she saw a soft fuzzy circle of light ahead. The tunnel angled down in a gentle slope, becoming wider so that the water fanned out into a shallower channel. Exhausted and chilled, she was ready to exit the tunnel even if it brought her right into one of the blood-processing vats.

  Even before she reached the end of the tunnel, she knew a factory lay ahead. Its resonant throbbing and clattering was just like the one she had encountered earlier. If her theory of there being five of them was correct, she probably wouldn’t be able to tell if this was the one that had churned Lonnie into human slurry. But it didn’t matter. She was set on committing sabotage or else dying in the attempt.

  As the factory came into view, she reached another service platform featuring a fuse box and pipe junctions. These were from the old world, dripping with corrosion. The platform featured a metal safety rail, and in a darkened recess was a metal door. She thrust her pistol into the waistband of her pants and climbed onto the platform.

  She figured the door would be rusted shut, but it was actually several inches ajar. She shoved it open with a grating creak. Beyond it was darkness, but a faint glow hung disembodied somewhere far below. She pushed the door open as wide as she could to allow in more light, and then she crept inside.

  Murray nearly fell and broke her ankle when she came to the first step, but then she found a railing and clung to it as she eased down sideways, one foot at a time. She had no idea if the Zaps had built the factory in a space that already existed or had carved out a pit to house the construction. She found it odd that the Zaps hadn’t penetrated into the tunnel system. Maybe something about the organic composition of the soil prevented the penetration of the alloy, like oil resisting water.

  Inside the concrete stairwell, the vibration was deafening. She was wary of any surprises waiting in the gloom, such as a fist-sized spider swinging down from the ceiling or a snake uncoiling underfoot. But she reached the landing intact, finding an opening similar to the one from which she’d originally fled a factory with Delores.

  As she studied the facility, she was pretty sure this was a different one. It looked similar in many ways, with the chambers of black-eyed savage Zaps floating in liquid, a half-full vat of thick blood and gore, and a series of multi-armed machines busily spinning and whittling their metallic threads into shape. But the rows of metal Zaps were replaced by a bulging silver-gray ellipsoid of fluid, as if they had all wilted together into a single drop that struggled to maintain its constitution.

  Murray saw no Zaps patrolling the facility and figured it was automated like the first one. Still, she crept stealthily through the whirring rows of machinery, careful to stay out of range of the busy arms. She was looking for the enclosed plasma sink. But when she passed a series of squat boxes that were connected by pipes conveying plasma and came to a junction, she was startled to see someone working on the plasma sink.

  She raised her pistol. But this wasn’t a Zap—he was dressed in grungy cargo pants and a flannel shirt instead of a silver suit. He wore a dark watch cap and had a long, unkempt gray beard. He was maybe five or ten years older than her, plump and shabby around the edges.

  He poked at the plasma sink with a length of pipe, jabbing at it and using the pipe as a pry bar to jimmy his way inside. He cussed at it and banged it a couple of times, but the device resisted his efforts.

  Mur
ray approached him with the pistol aimed at his back. When she was close enough that she would probably not miss, she shouted, “Who are you?”

  The man turned around and glared at her, the pipe raised like a baseball bat. His face was battered and cut, blood in his beard. He looked like a wild man, with his bushy eyebrows and frantic bloodshot eyes.

  “I’m the guy who is going to beat this piece of shit into little pieces.”

  “Where did you come from?”

  The man ignored her, asking his own question. “Anybody with you?”

  “I’m looking for some people.”

  He nodded at her pistol. “You going to keep pointing that at me? I’m a human and you’re a human. So we’re probably on the same side here.”

  She frowned and lowered it by her hip, poised to bring it to bear if necessary. “I’m President Abigail Murray of New Pentagon, on a mission for the Earth Zero Initiative. I infiltrated the city with a squadron and we were trapped inside. Most of them are now lost, I’m afraid.”

  “A president, huh? I heard about you. I can’t believe they’d try to prop up the government even after the end of the world. No surprise, I reckon.”

  Murray peered at him. “You’re Franklin Wheeler.”

  “Damn. Don’t tell me the FBI is still keeping watch lists even in the apocalypse.”

  “I was with some of your people. K.C. and Squeak and…Millwood’s dead. I don’t know where the others are. I lost them in the tunnels.”

  Franklin visibly brightened with the news. “K.C.’s still alive?”

  “Maybe. I don’t know. There were creatures in the tunnel.”

  “Damn.” He tapped the plasma sink with his pipe. “Let’s sabotage this scrapheap and go find them.”

  “But won’t that blow up the whole city?”

  “Sure, but we can’t just leave it here like this. Maybe we’ll get lucky and the tunnels will hold.”

  “I could try shooting it,” she suggested. “But bullets seem to get absorbed, and this stuff is thick.”

  “Risky. You might get a ricochet. Besides, I’d rather rig it so we have a little running start before it blows. Don’t take this the wrong way, but I’m not ready to give my life for my country.”

  “Have you heard of Directive Seventeen?”

  “Rumors,” Franklin said. “Sounds like some bureaucratic double-babble bullshit.”

  “Your political opinion doesn’t matter. It means I have the authority to sacrifice your life for the good of the human race.”

  “Well, you’re the one with the gun. But let’s try not to die first and see if we can avoid that whole situation.”

  Murray joined him in examining the machine. Its exterior shell was seamless and smooth, like a large dirigible, but there were transparent portals set in its surface, radiating the blue glow of the plasma reaction. The tubes and pipes that disseminated the energy throughout the factory featured no connection seams or bolts, either. It was as if the entire assembly had been cast out of a single piece of material.

  Or it grew and shaped itself that way.

  Murray mentioned the idea to Franklin, who agreed with it. He told her about the can opener they’d used to free themselves from the bunker. She shared her theory that the ground somehow served as a mollifying property and perhaps that was why the machines in the subterranean factory weren’t decaying as fast as the city above.

  “So they have created a stronger material than the alloy,” he said. “I just don’t know where to find it.”

  “Maybe it’s hiding in plain sight,” she said.

  “You mean, like down here in the factory?”

  She nodded, scanning the rows of machinery. Then she snorted at her stupidity. “Of course. Look at those little arms that are shaping the material. The stuff’s melting as fast as those little blades can shape it, but these things were cranking out the robot Zaps by the dozens before.”

  “That means those blades are sharp and strong enough to cut the alloy.” Franklin squinted at her with new interest. “Damn, I’m impressed. No wonder they made you president.”

  “It’s not a job I wanted, but somebody had to do it.”

  “The next problem is getting those blades to stop.” Franklin tried poking his pipe into the blur of pistoning and swiveling arms, but the lead was chewed and chopped away within seconds. He released it and a short stub of the pipe dropped to the alloy floor.

  “A bullet won’t penetrate the plasma sink, but maybe it can break one of those arms free,” Murray said.

  “Worth a shot,” Franklin said. “Pun intended.”

  She held out the gun despite her Directive 17 threat.

  Franklin shook his head. “I’m a feminist. Besides, you’re the boss.”

  “No wonder K.C. is so fond of you.”

  “Well, I hope to hear that from her personally pretty soon. Let’s do this.”

  Murray leveled the gun, not really aiming so much as pointing it into the center of the blur of activity. She didn’t know how many rounds remained, or if it was still too damp to fire. But when she pulled the trigger, the gun popped, and so she fired a few more times, shell casings clattering to the floor. Bullets pinged and whined inside the machine, but already the series of arms seemed to flail and rock a little, like a washing machine thrown out of balance.

  They began banging together and several flew free from the assembly. One came directly toward Murray, but she managed to duck away. It brushed against her hair before clanging against a liquid-filled chamber and dropping to the floor. Franklin collected it and tested the blade against the floor.

  “Yep,” he said. “This will do it, but it might take a while.”

  He started cutting into the plasma sink, sawing the blade back and forth. Progress was slow, but bits of alloy peeled away and the gap widened. His forehead sweated with effort.

  “They killed my granddaughter,” Franklin said as he worked. “Or maybe I killed her.”

  “Sorry to hear that,” Murray said. “But put the blame where it belongs: this world killed her.”

  As he worked, he told her about the events in Wilkesboro and how Kokona had triggered a chain reaction in the plasma sink. After maybe fifteen minutes, Franklin was nearly knuckle-deep in the shell that housed the plasma sink. Murray tapped him on the shoulder and held out an open palm.

  “Let me finish the job,” she said. “You’ve got some people to find.”

  He gave her a dubious look. “You sure?”

  She gave him the pistol and he passed her the blade. “I was born for this,” she said.

  Franklin didn’t hesitate, heading for the stairwell entrance. He bent and picked up one of the arms that had broken free of the machine. Just before turning at the junction, he called back, “I hate politics, but you have my vote if I ever get the chance.”

  Then he was gone.

  She set to work.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Rachel was soon strong enough to sit up.

  “I feel weird,” she said.

  “Good,” DeVontay said. “Because you are weird.”

  She looked around at the ruined houses on one side and the humps of alloy on the other. The city stood tall and firm as before, even though the buildings lacked any of the details that had been etching themselves in the walls. Her head throbbed in rhythm with the machines, even though her pulse was so slow that she had to concentrate to ensure it was still there.

  “Last thing I remember is you fighting the carrier, and Mouse making his robots attack us. And I gave Kokona to Franklin.”

  “We won. We kicked Zap ass all the way to Timbuktu and back.”

  “Don’t tell me I died again,” she said. “I don’t think I can handle that.”

  “No, but it was close.” DeVontay embraced her, letting out a sob. “I almost lost you, and I can’t bear that. Not just for me, but for us.”

  She cupped his head in her hands and brought his lips to hers. After reveling for a few blissful moments, she pulled a
way. “The dome…it looks like it’s fading a little.”

  “Because the babies are dead,” DeVontay said. “Nobody left to hold it all together.”

  Rachel realized the hollow feeling was the absence of Kokona. Even when the Zap baby wasn’t invading her brain, Kokona’s influence was powerful and addictive. And despite her loathing for the way the baby had cruelly manipulated and exploited all of them—especially her—she was troubled by the great emptiness inside her. It was like losing a Siamese twin or suffering a miscarriage.

  She surveyed the bleak and empty expanse of the Blue City. “Where is everybody?”

  “They went underground. K.C., Squeak, and Millwood. Franklin…he tried to kill you. When he killed Kokona, I mean.”

  Rachel considered this, dismayed by the bitterness in his voice. “He did what I wasn’t strong enough to do. He did it because he loves me.”

  DeVontay shook his head, pursing his lips in anger. “He did it because he was just like those shitty little mutants. He needed to win.”

  “DeVontay, listen.” Rachel hugged him with all her strength, exploring this new physical and emotional condition free of Kokona. “He loves me. I don’t doubt that for a second. Just like I don’t doubt you.”

  “If you say so.” DeVontay motioned toward the ruins. “He went underground down a hole somewhere over there. Said there’s a big tunnel network running beneath the city. The rest of them are down there, too.”

  “You didn’t leave me, even though the dome might fall and the city might collapse,” she said.

  “I tapped you into the plasma,” DeVontay said. “Like jumping off a car battery. I figured there was enough residual Kokona inside you to connect with the electromagnetic field.”

  “I do feel energized,” she said, rising to her feet and pulling DeVontay up with her. His weight was no problem for her, and she wondered what other mutant powers she might possess. She glanced at the nearest building and focused on it, trying to bend and shape it with her mind. But all she got was a headache.