Final Dawn: Season 2 (The Thrilling Post-Apocalyptic Series)

by Mike Kraus

  Leonard McComb | Nancy Sims

  9:18 PM, 2038

  Leonard winced and put his arms up in the air as a shield as Richard raised the broken piece of chair leg high over his head. The impact came a second later, though it was not what he expected. Instead of a hard wooden leg from a chair, a spray of warm liquid cascaded down Leonard’s arms, accompanied by a muffled gurgle. Opening his eyes, he saw Nancy standing to the side of Richard, knife in hand as she twisted the blade into his neck, driving it deep into his carotid arteries.

  Richard was frozen in place, his body shaking and twitching and his arms still held above his head as he slowly swiveled to face Nancy before collapsing to the ground. With blood flooding from his body, he managed only a few more gurgles before his eyes rolled into the back of his head and he finally went still. Not unlike Richard, Leonard was also frozen in place, though from shock instead of injury. He stared at Nancy who was still looking at Richard’s corpse, breathing heavily as she gritted her teeth in rage.

  “Burn in hell you son of a bitch.” Nancy’s voice was quiet and slow, but cut through the sound of the storm like a bullet, sending a chill through Leonard’s body like he hadn’t felt before. Noise from outside the room made Leonard turn and he saw two creatures beginning to enter the room. They moved slowly, like they weren’t certain anyone was around, and Leonard seized on their hesitation with gusto.

  Running for the rifle that had fallen near the cots across from the door, Leonard grabbed it and thumbed the safety off. He raised it and fired without aiming, sending two shots slamming into the doorframe and causing the creatures to jump back in surprise. Leonard could feel his rage begin to build once again as the room grew red. Firing precisely over the short distance, the next several shots ripped through the two creatures, sending them tumbling back down the stairs to land in a heap at the bottom. Leonard ran out of the room and Nancy followed, the blood-covered knife still in her hand.

  Together they made their way down the stairs and into the APC, running quickly to avoid the horde of creatures that was circling the building outside. As they jumped in, Leonard saw that more of the structure had collapsed behind the APC, making it difficult to back out the way he came in. Leonard quickly fastened his harness and turned to Nancy.

  “You ready for this?”

  Nancy shook her head, but closed her eyes and held on to a handle on the dashboard as she braced for what she knew was coming next. Leonard engaged the starter on the APC and the engine roared to life, thrumming with power as he jammed on the accelerator. The armored vehicle lurched forward, tearing through the building’s remains like they weren’t even there, including the staircase and opposite wall. Wood, concrete and bricks flew across the windshield of the vehicle as it ripped through the building, destroying access to the upper floors. Several creatures who had the misfortune of being on the wrong side of the building were sent flying into the air as the APC tore through them, spinning on the grass as Leonard fought to maintain control of the vehicle.

  The creatures outside the compound were only dozens of feet away through the barricade, watching Leonard and Nancy as they drove around the lake, heading back toward the road and out of the town. The large horde made no movements to give chase, nor did the creatures hounding the villagers pay them any mind, either. Locked on a single goal, the creatures seemed to be focused solely on eradicating the villagers, giving Nancy and Leonard precious moments with which to escape.

  After they were back on the road, Leonard jammed on the brakes, bringing the APC to a lurching halt in the middle of the street. He looked over at Nancy, checking her wounds and making sure that she was okay. Both of them were still breathing heavily from their ordeal, but they had managed to make it out without sustaining any exceptionally serious injuries.

  Nancy still held the bloodied knife in her hand, gripping it so tightly that her arm was shaking. Leonard gently took it from her, dropping it into the back of the APC before wiping her hand off with the edge of her shirt. The simple action slowed Nancy’s breathing and she looked at Leonard for a long second before reaching over and pulling him in for a hug. Words weren’t necessary as the relief over their escape was nearly palpable. They were both beyond glad to see each other again.

  Overjoyed, Leonard began to laugh, one of his natural reactions to stressful situations. Nancy furrowed her eyebrows momentarily, but Leonard’s laughter was so infectious that she, too, began to laugh. They had escaped the clutches of not only Samuel and Richard, but the army of creatures as well. The darkness outside the APC no longer penetrated into the vehicle, which was instead filled once again with hope, shining brightly in the hearts of two survivors.

  Marcus Warden | Rachel Walsh

  9:46 PM, April 11, 2038

  A noise from below Marcus’s feet made him jump. Raising the pistol, he aimed at the floor as a plate of metal flipped up, revealing the source of the light in the elevator shaft. Rachel’s head popped up through the hatch and she looked around, finally seeing Marcus standing in the corner of the shaft, his hand shaking from nervousness as he tried to steady his aim.

  “Don’t point that thing at me! Get down here and give me a hand. We’re nearly at the generator room!”

  Exhaling deeply, Marcus nodded wordlessly and descended down into the elevator car after Rachel, using a three-foot long ladder attached to the side of the hatch. Though the elevator wasn’t at the bottom of the shaft, it was at the precise floor where the generator room was located. Inside the elevator, Rachel had jammed her knife in between the car’s doors, mimicking Marcus’s prior method of forcing them open. She leaned in against the handle, struggling to put enough force on it to crack the doors open. Marcus leaned in behind her, giving a quick push on the handle. The extra force was all that was required, and the doors gave way enough that Marcus and Rachel could open them the rest of the way by hand.

  Sitting at the top of a T-shaped set of halls, the elevator opened up into a long corridor extending straight out, with an equally long set going left and right. Whispering to Marcus, Rachel crouched low in the elevator, extinguishing her light and peeking out into the hallway. “Stay close from here on out. Don’t make a sound and don’t fall behind, either. The generators are just a hundred feet down this hall, and I don’t feel like getting stopped by any of Doe’s muties on the way.”

  Marcus nodded, his breathing more calm and relaxed now despite the physical exertion required to open the elevator doors. Getting off of the elevator shaft’s ladder and back onto solid ground had relieved him more than he realized, and he was incredibly grateful to be back to walking through the dark hallways with vicious creatures waiting to attack around every corner. “Ready when you are.”

  Satisfied that there were no creatures nearby, Rachel hurried out of the elevator, moving to the left wall of the hallway in front of them. She kept her shoulder pressed up against the wall as she moved, illuminating their path with only the occasional two-second flicker of her light to ensure they weren’t about to run into any obstacles on their way.

  In between bouts of darkness, Marcus could see that the halls in this section of the building were grey instead of white, though they lacked the damage that was done to the laboratory facilities a few floors up. The feel of the corridors was much rougher and less sophisticated than the laboratories, which wasn’t surprising given that heavy machinery was in use and didn’t require the immaculate sterility of the laboratories. Without knowledge of the generators on this level there would have been no reason for the nanobots to come down to this level, much less destroy it like they did other parts of the building.

  Rachel stopped after a moment and gestured at a door on the opposite side of the hall. With her light on low, she approached it cautiously and slowly turned the handle, relieved when it gave way instead of being locked. Marcus stayed behind her right shoulder as she slowly opened the door, revealing the vast interior of the backup generator room. At first, Rachel kept her flashlight off, scanning the pitch black
interior from top to bottom to make sure there wasn’t any sign of a blue glow. Satisfied that they were alone, Rachel turned her light on low and moved inside the room, gesturing for Marcus to close and lock the door behind her.

  Two stories high and several thousand square feet of floor space were filled with massive diesel generators. Interspersed between them were reinforced steel tanks filled with tens of thousands of gallons of fuel, similar to those placed in the ground at gas stations. Massive pipes routed fuel into the generators, while rows upon rows of electrical cabling were strung together from the generators and routed into different parts of the ceiling, walls and floors. The room was deathly quiet, which was unusual given how much equipment was visible in just the narrow beam of Rachel’s flashlight. The sight of so many massive machines lying silently was uncomfortable to Marcus for reasons he couldn’t quite pin down.

  “Come on, we need to find the control panel. Look for a small workstation, near the back somewhere.”

  Marcus and Rachel split up across two different rows in between the diesel generators. Rachel turned her light up to the brightest setting, illuminating Marcus’s path enough for him to walk without tripping. Marcus felt his skin crawl in the silence of the room as the echo of every footstep became a potential ambush by one of the creatures.

  Rachel was the first to spot the workstation situated at the back of the room, inside a small booth. She and Marcus hurried inside, taking seats at two chairs positioned in front of a row of computer monitors. Behind them, a hand crack was embedded in the wall next to a small fuel gauge, a large red button and series of lights, all of which were dark. Rachel quickly scanned the back wall and then turned to the workstation, verifying that it was all intact.

  “Okay, everything looks right, I think. My last time down here was months ago, so I’m a little foggy on the details.”

  Marcus pointed to a sign mounted over the hand crank that read Pre-Ignition Startup. “I’m guessing this is step one, right?” Rachel nodded and Marcus stood up, taking position at the hand crank.

  “Yep, that’s it. You’ll need to turn that wheel for a few minutes to prime the charge, then we’ll have enough power to turn on the startup generator and let the computers take it from there.”

  Marcus grunted as he began to turn the hand crank, fighting against the heavy resistance offered by the steel object. “Why can’t we just flip a switch to turn all this stuff on?”

  “Well, it’s not that easy. These generators can’t just turn on by themselves. You have to have a series of smaller step-up generators that come online in a controlled sequence to get them online properly. Really, when it comes down to it, this room is more like a small power station than a generator room. That’s how we had it explained to us when we were brought down for the mandatory training sessions, anyway.”

  Marcus didn’t answer as he put all of his energy into turning the crank. After several revolutions, one of the lights next to him began to glow red. Further revolutions caused an orange light to flicker to life, followed shortly thereafter by a green one. After the green light came on, he instinctively stopped turning the crank, turning to Rachel for the next step.

  “Does this mean it’s ready?”

  Rachel looked up from a sheet of paper she had found on the desk. “Yes, perfect! Now just push that red button there and this system should come online.” Rachel held up the paper for him to examine. “Most of this is coming back to me. We should have the main power back online in about fifteen minutes.”

  Marcus examined the sheet as he stood in front of the button, skimming its contents. Containing a condensed version of the operating instructions for the generator room, it outlined the precise steps required to bring the entire system online from a dead stop in less than twenty minutes. After handing the paper back to Rachel, he held his finger over the button, pausing dramatically before he pushed it.

  “Here goes nothing!”

  Leonard McComb | Nancy Sims

  9:30 PM, April 11, 2038

  A few moments passed with Leonard and Nancy laughing over their escape before they remembered that they weren’t entirely out of the woods. Nancy nervously pointed at the passenger side rearview mirror, seeing movement in the distance that shone silver in the flashes of lighting. “I think they’re getting closer, Leonard.”

  Leonard threw off his harness and jumped into the back of the APC, checking to see what supplies were left. Two boxes of dried and canned food along with several gallons of water were loose in the back, and though Leonard searched in every nook and cranny, the only weapon he could locate was the rifle he had taken from Samuel. He pulled the magazine out and counted the bullets left in it, closing his eyes and leaning his head back against his seat once he finished.

  “We’ve got enough food and water for a few days, but all we have is this rifle and seventeen rounds.”

  Leonard turned the APC slightly in the road to get a better view behind them. He had initially hoped that they might be able to scavenge a few weapons from some of the town’s buildings before leaving. However, the creatures that were previously paying no attention to the vehicle had started to wander closer, watching it intently.

  Not willing to risk their safety, Leonard twisted the steering wheel back around, pointing the APC toward a makeshift gate at the end of the road. “Screw it. We’re out of here.”

  The APC thundered forward toward the gate, turning the thick wooden planks into splinters. While Leonard drove, Nancy dug around under her seat, locating the map they had obtained before entering the village. She laid it out on the dashboard and leaned up to locate their position. “Looks like we’re right here.” She pointed at a spot on the map, turning on an overhead light so Leonard could glance over and see it as well. “If we follow this road for another hundred miles, we should run into a city where we can try to get some more supplies.”

  Leonard nodded and switched off the light, a distraction in the darkness that surrounded them. The storm overhead was massive, stretching far into the horizon. Lightning was still bouncing from cloud to cloud, occasionally arcing down to the ground. There were enough light poles and trees near the road that Leonard wasn’t overly concerned with the vehicle being struck, but even if they were, it wouldn’t do much—if any—damage.

  It would likely be hours before they were out of the storm, and even longer before they could search for food, warm clothing and—most importantly—weapons. Leonard looked over at Nancy to ask her a question but stopped, smiling slightly as he saw her asleep, her head leaning against the window of the vehicle. Leonard wanted to ask her about what happened with Richard, but right now sleep was more important. With a vast horde of creatures in the area, Leonard kept the APC moving as fast as possible, trying to get as far away from the town as possible.

  Without the supplies required to make it to Alaska, Leonard began to worry about their chances of surviving in the cold weather, especially as they traveled across the empty plains. Nonetheless, he tried to remind himself that there would be more stores that had survived the bombs, and that—somehow—they would find more food, fuel, weapons and gear for their trip. The delay at the town had cost them dearly, and Leonard hoped that they’d be able to make it to the Alaskan shoreline before the nuclear signature disappeared.

  Rachel Walsh | Marcus Warden

  10:02 PM, April 11, 2038

  A low frequency hum came from the wall behind the button and Marcus shuffled back a few paces, watching the wall warily. A series of lights on the console in front of Rachel began to light up and Marcus turned around and sat back in his chair, still keeping a watchful eye on the wall. Rachel held the instruction sheet in her left hand as she punched in commands on the control panel with her right, reading the results out loud.

  “Okay, the startup generator’s at one hundred percent. In a few seconds, it should—”

  Overhead lights began to switch on, flickering to life as they filled the cavernous space with a welcome flood of bright white light. R
achel smiled, not bothering to finish her sentence. Feeling invigorated by their success, she continued through the instruction sheet.

  The method for starting the generators was practically foolproof, but Rachel was taking no chances in following the directions laid out on the sheet. Designed for emergency situations not unlike the one they were in, the generator systems were designed so that they could be operated with a few simple command inputs on the control board. While the system was originally designed to be remotely activated and controlled through the push of a single button, an excess of security modified the design. Department heads were routinely brought down into the generator room every few months and reminded how to operate the machinery, though none of them—including Rachel—ever expected to actually need to use the system.

  “Now we wait for two minutes for the computers to scan the generator’s onboard computers to check for faults. If everything is green, they’ll automatically start powering up.”

  Marcus reached under the console inside a cabinet, examining it for any sign of supplies or weapons. He pulled out several pairs of thickly padded ear muffs with a built-in microphone and volume control. “Here,” he said, handing a pair to Rachel. “You might want these on when the generators fire up.”