We Are The Extinction: Dext of the Dead

by Steve Kuhn

  Secure Connection

  ……………

  ……………

  Spark2 Secure Shell> open

  ( to ) Spark1

  Connecting to Spark1…

  ……………

  ……………

  Connection established!

  Spark1> Chalmers?

  Spark2> Yes.

  Spark1> Prove it. Give me the pass code.

  Spark2> No.

  Spark1> Because you don’t know it?

  Spark2> No. Because you haven’t asked the proper question.

  Spark1> Fine. What’s the password?

  Spark2> New England Clam Chowder.

  Spark1> Is that the red or the white?

  Spark2> White.

  Spark1> Hello, Chalmers. Before we begin I want you to know that that is the dumbest pass code I have ever heard in my entire military career. From here on out, I will assign them personally. Clearly, you can’t handle being charged with such a task without acting like an eight-year-old child.

  Spark2> Aww c’mon, Colonel. Everybody loved Ace Ventura.

  Spark1> Look, smartass, cut the shit. You’re there to do a job—a very sensitive and highly classified job. Act like it.

  Spark2> Yes, sir. You had something important to discuss, correct?

  Spark1> Yes. Morofsky.

  Spark2> Yes, sir. Are we off the record?

  Spark1> Absolutely. What’s about to be said here can go nowhere else. That’s why I wanted this single channel opened. No more writing between you and me. What is Morofsky up to lately?

  Spark2> He’s been running around here like a madman. Frankly, I don’t think he has enough staff to do everything he’s trying to do. He’s got experiments going in three different containment areas, he’s got the lab running samples day and night, and he spends every second he can with Subject 17. The guy’s not happy with you at all, Colonel. He says you’re asking too much of him and the staff. He told me this morning that he should be doing one thing and one thing only—that’s focusing on a good vaccine using Subject 17 as the template. He’s even threatened to tell the others that you were the one who ordered the improper vaccine to be distributed.

  Spark1> I knew that little weasel was going to be a problem. Listen to me very closely. Under no circumstances are you to allow him to make that known. Tell him to cancel all other experimentation and just focus on Subject 17 if that’s what he wants—whatever will keep him quiet. I have a sneaking suspicion that Kylee’s pregnancy has something to do with her ability to survive being bitten. I only wish she was still alive.

  Spark2> Yes, sir. I’m sorry that I had to be the one to tell you about that. I just thought it would be better coming from me than if you read about it in the journal transmissions.

  Spark1> I meant so that we could run some tests on her and find out if the baby was fully immune and so on. Don’t get soft on me now, Chalmers.

  Spark2> Oh. Yes, of course. Sorry, sir. So, what do we do if Morofsky starts talking?

  Spark1> That would make him a threat to national security—a threat that must be eliminated with extreme prejudice.

  Spark2> With respect, sir, is it a threat to national security or a threat to you personally?

  Spark1> I will decide what counts as a threat to national security, not you. If he talks, we’re finished.

  Spark2> We, sir?

  Spark1> Let me make this clear, Chalmers. There is potential here to not only wield the greatest biological weapon ever known to man as well as a key to a prolonged life. The power that those two things can provide can’t even begin to be measured. As it stands, you are one of only a handful of people that know what is going on here, and I intend to keep it that way. When this all blows over, we will be rich beyond our wildest dreams, and this will all just be an ugly memory. Now, I need you onboard 120 percent. Understood?

  Spark2> Yes, sir. Of course. I just don’t feel comfortable with how many lives we’re ruining for that end result. This outbreak has devastated everyone. Do we really need to begin killing what’s left?

  Spark1> The end justifies the means, Chalmers. Just follow the orders.

  Spark2> I don’t know if I can anymore.

  Spark1> You can, and you will—unless you want to discuss the alternative.

  Spark2> Alternative?

  Spark1> Your wife and son are being held safely in Sector C, as you well know. They are safe because up to this point you have been a model of loyalty and strength in the face of adversity. You are a trusted member of my personal staff, Chalmers. It would be a shame if they had to be sent away, wouldn’t it? Am I making myself clear?

  Spark2> Crystal, sir.

  Spark1> I mean it, Chalmers. Your country needs you right now. This is war. War is never pretty, son. We’re counting on you.

  Spark2> Yes, sir.

  Spark1> Good man.

  ……………

  ……………

  Spark2> Quit

  Connection closed on port 5651

  ……………

  ……………

  Would you like to open another connection?

  Spark2> No

  Entry 121

  The guy was lying there in the middle of the road surrounded by five or six of them. He was alone. A huge chunk of his leg was missing, and it was bleeding heavily as he kicked them back the best he could. No telling what his wound was from. The only weapon was on the ground on the other side of the incoming bernies, so he was pretty-well fucked.

  We stopped D-Prime and bailed out, giving the trailer a good bang on the side to let the others know they needed to get out. Kylee gave the jeep a little gas and slammed into three of the dead—not hard enough to damage the vehicle or anything, but enough to send them sprawling to the pavement. The man cried out, “Oh, thank God! Please. Kill ’em. Get ’em away. I have to get to my son.”

  I was on the approach to lend a hand as Cutty tore into the three that were left surrounding the guy on the ground. He hacked into one of their skulls, but one of his machetes got wedged in pretty good. It slipped from his hand as the geek fell. The bernie landed on the man, lying across his midsection. Cutty cursed the situation angrily, snapping, “Bitch! Dull ass muh-fucka! Just sharpened dat thing the otha day, too!”

  Unfortunately for the guy on the ground, that dull blade would be his ultimate undoing. It stuck in the bernie’s skull, but didn’t make it all the way through to the brain. As soon as the creature landed on the man’s gut, it started chewing. The guy screamed in pain and fear at Cutty, “Get it off me! Get it off me!”

  I couldn’t quite hear Cutty over the screaming, but I could tell he was megapissed off. He reached down and grabbed the geek by what was left of its shirt, pulling it away with his free hand and slinging it to the ground. In the same motion, he swung his wielded machete, cleanly decapitating another one of the impending dead. He held the biter captive by pinning its head to the concrete with his boot while dispatching the second of the three. Finally able to focus on the last threat, Cutty took his remaining machete, turned it backwards and brought its blunt edge down hard onto the one lodged in that geek’s skull, driving it the rest of the way through to the brain.

  Murphy and Kylee had made short work of the three she hit with the jeep by the time the others and I were in working distance, and not a single shot was fired. Hook lit the cigar stub in his teeth and took a long pull off his meds before blowing the skunky smoke into the breeze. “He’s done.”

  We gathered around the man and took a long look at him. His stomach was torn open awfully, and he was bleeding some seriously dark blood. We could see through the gaping hole only for a moment before the cavity filled with blood and overflowed, sending it down his sides and onto the ground, pooling under his back. Murphy nodded agreement with Hook and added, “Damn. Took a hunk of his liver, too.”

  Kylee noted, “At least he’ll bleed out before the fever and all that. Even still, he’s gonna go slow unless we do something.”

/>   The man gasped as he entered into shock and started to shiver. Tears trailed down his temples and fell to the ground from his ears as he stared back up at us, trying to plead for help. He managed to say, “My… my boy… he… needs his gun. Get his gun for him? Take him with you.”

  I didn’t see any boy anywhere around. None of us did. Kid must’ve ran off to save his own ass or something. Who knows?

  Lilly knelt beside him and looked at him for a short moment. She began rifling through his pockets, digging for anything useful: bullets, food, anything. She was all business about it—cold. She popped up when she was through and handed a pocketknife off to Kylee along with a couple of rifle rounds. Kylee accepted them kindly without a word.

  Cutty spat on the ground, still pissed off, and said, “My fault, y’all. I thought I had it put down. I’ll take care of him.”

  Putting a hand on Cutty’s arm for a quick second, Hook told him, “Ain’t your fault. With or without us, he was as good as dead. I’ll put him down if you don’t wanna.”

  Cutty waved him off in a ‘no big deal’ kinda way.

  With a shrug, Hook walked over to the rifle and picked it up, at which point the man turned his head slightly to ensure the weapon was in good working order for his son.

  I took the shot. I put him down.

  It wasn’t about who was going to carry the weight of another death. I didn’t do it because I wanted to be merciful, either. Truth be told, I just wanted to get the fuck outta there. The end result was going to be the same anyway, so why the hell were we even standing there talking about it? Put his lights out and move on. Not our fault. Not our problem.

  On the way back to the truck, Hook passed the rifle to Lilly and told her, “This looks to be about the right size for you. Once we’re back on the road, I’ll show you how this one works. Just keep yer fingers off the trigger and the safety on like JC taught ya.”

  Alyse stood still, causing Murphy to turn around and ask her, “You comin’ or what?”

  She said, “What about the boy? His son?”

  Murphy took a look around, as did Kylee, before answering, “I don’t see a boy. Do you?”

  Alyse huffed impatiently and crossed her arms. “We have to at least look around and try to find him.”

  Murphy turned his back to her, saying, “We just did.”

  She stomped back to the trailer in a huff, clearly frustrated with the decision.

  You know what bothers me the most? The more I replay the scene in my head, the more I don’t want to be that guy. I guess we could’ve comforted him and told him it would be all right or whatever, but instead we were discussing who was gonna kill him. That’s some pretty heavy shit—not so much for us, but for the poor bastard lying there about to die. You would hope that someone would tell you something positive if you were lying there in a puddle of your own blood. Instead, he had to listen to us exclaim how he was dead already. He had to feel Lilly going through his things. He had to wonder which one of the strangers he was looking up at was going to be the one to put a bullet in his brain. And then he had to wait for it.

  I bet that sucked hard.

  What have we become?

  Who am I?

  Who are Murphy and Kylee anymore?

  Cutty?

  Fuck ’im…

  Better him than me.

  What about the kid?

  What kid? I didn’t see any kid.

  Entry 122

  Finally. It took nearly twenty-four hours to get my shit back. They took my journal, my clothes, all of our weapons, D-Prime, the jeep, everything. I still have no idea where the others are yet.

  I’ve been told that I’ll be able to talk to them once they clear decontamination, which fuckin’ sucked, by the way—standing there, butterball naked, while some douche-nozzle in a lab coat poked and prodded me, taking pictures of scars, scrapes, cuts, or whatever. Then I had to stand in some shower thing while they sprayed me with near boiling water. It was humiliating.

  We were hoping for a warm welcome and maybe a pat on the back for making it this far. We were hoping for a hot meal, a proper shower, maybe a cute nurse to look us over. Instead, we’re being treated like prisoners. I’ll spare you the cavity-search details, but I will say that a reach around woulda been nice.

  Lilly had the worst time. I’ll get to that, but mark my words; if I get a chance to see the grunt that took her from Kylee’s arms and shoved her into the exam room, I’ma break his fuckin’ jaw. She should’ve been able to stay with one of the girls. I’m worried about her.

  We had an outright verbal brawl with Alyse after the situation on the road back there. We hadn’t seen her get pissed up until that point, and while she remained emotionally in control, she was well fired up. Shit, she even told me and Murphy that we were “morally dead.” She told us that we had forced her hand by leaving without a thorough search. I dunno. I get what she was saying, but we’re a group. We can’t just be expected to cater to one opinion. And frankly, Hook and Alyse haven’t been with us all that long compared to the others.

  Truth is, Alyse is kinda worthless. Sure, she’s nice. She’s got a good heart, a little medical knowledge, but we were good with Murphy being our medic from time to time. So, what does she offer? What does she come to the table with? A Bible. Whoopity-fuckin’-doo-da-day! That might help Cutty through a rough patch here or there, but if you ask me, she’s just another mouth to feed. We keep her along because she’s Hook’s sister—period. Hook is the real gem. He’s proven his worth on more than a few occasions, and the guy’s got balls of stainless steel. Alyse… meh… Lilly likes her, I guess.

  The only thing that kept me from telling her to shut the fuck up was when she said, “If that boy is out there… unarmed and alone… just lost his father… possibly the only person he had… he’s not just going to die. He’s going to die scared. Would you want that for Lilly? And now I have his blood on my hands because I could’ve done something, but you guys wouldn’t let me.”

  I probably could have come up with something clever to say, but I didn’t have to. She buried her face in her hands and sobbed. The conversation ended itself. What more could be said, really?

  The silence that followed was only broken when Murphy pointed and announced, “There it is!”

  There it was indeed. As we crested a hill, our goal sat within our grasp—a sprawling complex with high, red-brick walls topped with razor wire. Towers posted with snipers kept the dead that wandered in at bay, leaving them littered on the sandy gravel outside. From our approach we could see that the facility had multiple buildings within its walls, and it looked well populated—a literal desert oasis.

  We stopped and got out of the vehicles to take in the sight. All the tension from the previous days melted away, and we were happy for that moment. Cutty shook Hook’s hand and pulled Alyse under his arm in a half hug. Kylee smiled at me as she picked up Lilly and gave me a big hug, too. Squished in the middle of the two of us, Lilly squirmed and said, “Ick! You’re smushin’ me!” It was amazing. It really was.

  Murphy brought an old pair of binoculars to his eyes as we celebrated around him. “I was afraid of that.”

  With five words ,Murphy took the wind right out of our sails. Kylee asked curiously, “Afraid of what?” as he offered her the binoculars.

  As Kylee took a closer look, Murphy clarified for the rest of us, saying, “No civilians. Just lab rats and military.”

  Cutty tried to remain positive, offering, “Maybe dey all inside.”

  Maybe. I remembered Murphy’s first days with us and reminded the others, “Murphy spent how many years in a place like that? And when he decided to leave, it wasn’t under the best circumstances.”

  Murphy gave me a look and added, “That’s the understatement of the century, Sally. I hate to piss in everybody’s cereal, but I don’t like it.”

  I’d be remiss if I didn’t tell you that the idea of a bowl of cereal and some ice-cold milk came to mind. I haven’t had milk in forever
. I used to hate milk by itself, but damn… sitting there on a Saturday morning, watchin’ some cartoons as a kid, munchin’ on a bowl of Frosted Flakes or some other sugar-coated shit was awesome. I joked, “If I actually had a bowl of cereal right now, Murph, a little piss wouldn’t stop me from me eating it. I’m goin’ in.”

  Cutty agreed, saying, “Hell yeah, nigga. Ain’t no way I’m tryna spend one mo’ day out dis bitch right hurr. Ain’t dat right, baby girl?” Lilly scowled at him until he corrected himself, saying, “Oh, ma bad… Ain’t dat right, ma’am?”

  She grinned at that and nodded.

  We began to make our way back into the vehicles with Murphy protesting and warning us, “It’s not a good idea. We should post up here for a while, watch it for a bit.”

  No one paid him any mind. We just kept getting ready to roll out.

  Alyse looked over her shoulder, shooting daggers at Murphy. “Doesn’t feel so good when you’re on the other side, does it?”

  The huge, metal gate clanked to life when we stopped and got out. Kylee had the presence of mind to tie an old tee shirt to the barrel of her rifle and wave it around, but that didn’t stop them from treating us like some sort of domestic terrorists.

  A group of about twelve men in uniforms rushed out, armed to the teeth, and held us at gunpoint. I mean, look, there was a time when I would’ve been shittin’ bricks, but honestly, it was a ‘whatever’ moment for me. Sad to think that I couldn’t even count how many times I’d had a gun pointed at me in the past few months. I guess you can really gauge how screwed up everything is when a gun pointed at you is the least of your worries.

  One of the men stepped forward and authoritatively told us all, “Move along. You’re not welcome here.”

  Murphy took the opening to bolster his own position, saying, “You heard the man. We’re not welcome. Let’s go.”

  Kylee was having none of that. She stepped forward and demanded, “We’re here seeking sanctuary, nothing more. Let us pass.”