ARISEN, Book Fourteen - ENDGAME

by Michael Stephen Fuchs

  Though they hadn’t reached the White Cliffs of Dover yet.

  But he could see them now, the inner prison walls, and they were headed right toward the big wooden double doors in the southwest side, so that was good. Wes made sure and got out the big old-style ring of prison keys, and found the right one as he hit the door. It was a huge old iron skeleton-like thing and he got it into the keyhole on the right, turned the heavy tumblers and shoved – but it didn’t move. Then he shoved the door beside it on the left and it swung heavily but smoothly in. He looked for a latch that would get the first one open as well, but couldn’t find one, and now heard shouting, firing, and moaning coming in fast.

  Sod it, out of time.

  So he stepped out of the way, turned to face out, took up a position with his back to the shut half of the pair of doors, raised his rifle, and started yelling.

  “Everyone inside! Go, go, go!”

  And then he started shooting – as a file of soldiers, men and women, began sluicing through the entrance and disappearing, moving efficiently and fast. They were soldiers, and disciplined, and Wesley guessed it always helped when you were moving through a closing pinhole of escape, barely ahead of a giant incoming herd of ravening dead.

  He took eight shots to drop two runners angling in on them, the second sliding into the mud only a few feet away. A couple of the exiting soldiers turned to shoot, but Wes had it – for now.

  “Keep moving, get inside!” he shouted. They did.

  He scanned the dangerous darkness as rain dripped down his helmet and rifle and soaked his uniform. Part of him wanted to do a headcount of those coming through – he actually did know the exact numbers posted to the south walls. But he also knew they had lost a couple in the fighting down there, and it had been chaos ever since, and it was all happening too fast now. Moreover, and worst of all, he knew if the count came in low, there’d be nothing he could do about it. He couldn’t go back for anyone – the dead were coming over the walls in earnest now, the Common being overrun in real time. And he definitely couldn’t leave the door open while he went to look. No, what he had to do was save everyone he could, get them back inside.

  And then get this door shut.

  This was perhaps more what his job was supposed to be like as a naval officer – having to shut a watertight hatch, dooming the men beyond it, to save everyone else inside. But, changing magazines, he resolved to save everyone he could. And there was definitely one person he wasn’t leaving without—

  “Goddamn, Private, I swear you’re slower than turtle shit going uphill sideways! Move your ass!”

  And there he was. Fick.

  The big, mean, lovely, old bastard slammed into the wall beside Wesley, then turned around and shouted back at the men again to hurry it the hell up. He had not only been the first into the fray in the south – but, despite having overtaken many of the running soldiers, most of whom were half his age, now he was still going to be the last man out. Wes smiled, both to see Fick, and because he could see this was it. That was Fick’s QRF coming in now and that would be the last of them.

  “That everyone?” he shouted, to be sure.

  “Yeah,” Fick answered – but he was already raising his rifle. Because coming out of the rain and darkness behind the QRF was a big-ass runner pack. And it was going to be on them faster than they could all get out and get the door shut. Wesley shifted to his right to block the opening with his body, and started firing as fast as he could, which Fick was already doing, while also shifting right – and though half the QRF had already blasted inside, the other half got the picture, or felt the fetid breath on their necks, and also turned and engaged.

  Now it was the eight of them firing into the teeth of a good twenty runners – but then the pack smashed through their lines like the front rank at the siege of Troy, bodies hurtling and flying, guys getting knocked over and tackled, others spinning to fight ones running by them, all total peril and chaos. Two broke through the QRF, one each locking onto Wes and Fick and coming straight at them as if on parallel rails.

  The one on Wes was already so close he couldn’t miss – but somehow he missed anyway. In that split-second he was reminded that he may have come a long way as a combatant and commander in just a few weeks – but the real shooters and operators had been training on their weapons for years or decades. He missed four times, then his rifle went dry. He let it fall and slapped at his pistol, but he wasn’t going to make it. However, instead of shooting his own attacker, Fick pivoted and took down the one coming for Wes. It slid into him at waist height, jarring but not hurting him.

  The other one plowed straight into Fick, still lively and chipper – and it was a big bastard and Wesley could hear the Ugh of the air rushing out of Fick’s lungs and thick torso as he smashed up against the heavy wooden door behind him, crushed between timber, steel, runner, and body armor. Wes got his knife clear and stabbed it three times in the head, before it finally fell. But instead of looking happy, Fick just spun in place to look at the door behind him, then erupted in fury.

  “Ohhh, just fuck me right in the asshole!”

  This was strong language, even for the Master Guns.

  And then Wesley saw it. That big steel skeleton key, still sticking out of the lock, had broken clean off. There was nothing in the keyhole but the smooth edge of the sheared key.

  Yeah, okay, Wesley thought. Right in the asshole.

  * * *

  Even from deep within the Biosciences complex, Dr. Park could pretty easily work out that something was wrong – that their situation had changed.

  And not for the better.

  He had been running back and forth from the fabrication facility to the warehouse, overseeing the production, and then the loading, of the Hargeisa vaccine, and trying to speed both in any way possible. Back in the warehouse, every one of the Bio staff, however advanced their degrees, were now all hands on deck doing the manual labor of loading up the kits. The science was done. Now the game was logistics. As the vials of completed vaccine rolled off the line, they were loaded into kits, and the kits stacked onto pallets, which got plastic-wrapped, fitted with a cargo chute, and then rapid-rolled out the door to the plane Hailey had parked out front.

  The sixty-some of them, Park knew, weren’t going to make a very big dent in the 25 million stockpiled kits, not tonight – maybe not ever. But they were moving fast, and they had to try. He couldn’t stop thinking about how every one of those kits was a family that was going to make it through all this.

  He hadn’t been out in front of the building, because he wasn’t as worried about the physical loading of the pallets onto the plane, which was probably going as fast as it could – and was also the responsibility of two loadmasters who were under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Nesbitt. Technically, the whole Bio complex was her command, but it had been Park’s show to run since he arrived, and she’d been staying out of his and Aliyev’s hair. As he darted back into the fabrication facility to make sure the empty cases of vials were being fed in as fast as possible, Park realized he hadn’t seen Aliyev in a while. He also didn’t have time to look for him.

  Because he hadn’t been out front, his only clue to the deteriorating situation – the overrunning of the Common, in fact – was the ambient noise of firing, yelling, moaning, and shrieking, all of it ramping up through the thin prefab walls. But now Nesbitt came and got in his hair for once, sticking her stout body in the doorway of the fab rooms.

  “Don’t freak out,” she said. “But we’re about to be cut off.”

  Park didn’t freak out. But he wanted to see for himself. “Show me,” he said, moving toward the door – but instantly felt a hand on his arm. Then one on the other. The first belonged to his official RMP security guy. And the second was Sarah Cameron’s. Both had been following him around all night like puppies, the only difference being Sarah kept a little more distance. But now she spoke in his ear.

  “Not a great idea to roam around, Simon. Remember Dietz
.”

  Park paused. He wished he could forget. The nice little red-haired lab tech on the JFK had been eaten alive, practically in front of him, making noises Park could never unhear – all because Park had insisted on going belowdecks to get some solvent. But he also knew he couldn’t be paralyzed by what had come before, however bad things had gone.

  Sarah had taken her pistol back after Bio was overrun in the runner invasion. But he still had his crowbar, tucked right in his belt – he wasn’t giving that up. Plus he had three shooters to protect him. He shook free of both hands and headed out the door. When the four of them stepped through the lobby and out the front doors into the halogen-lit darkness and pelting rain, it was like ancient medieval warfare out front.

  The plane was still parked in the same place, practically kissing the building. And lab staff were ferrying the palletized kits out and rolling them up a ramp into the rear hatch – but now they seemed to be doing so with a renewed sense of urgency, plus were covering up their heads as they ran back inside to get more.

  Because arrayed in a big wedge formation covering both the plane and the entrance, but nothing else, were well over a hundred armed soldiers, maybe a hundred and fifty. And the ones in the front ranks were already shooting – at scatterings of dead racing at them across the dark of the Common. Most of the complex was now somewhat lit, but it didn’t need to be for it to be obvious it was no longer anything like secure. There was motion, shooting, and moaning coming from pretty much every direction now. Their sanctuary was gone. And Park didn’t recognize these soldiers, but he also didn’t need to.

  He was just glad they were there.

  An officer trotted up through the hissing of rain and roar of gunfire and saluted Lt Col Nesbitt. Park guessed he must be their commander.

  “Captain Gunn,” Nesbitt said. “Holding okay?”

  “Yes, ma’am. I quite like being in a phalanx. Proper Roman Legion tactics. Caesar would have recognized it.”

  “Utrinque paratus,” Nesbitt said.

  Captain Gunn frowned at Nesbitt’s Latin but Park didn’t know why, and didn’t care. Instead he stepped up and raised his voice over the scattered firing and moaning. “Captain, you’ve been told what’s in the building behind you?”

  He nodded, his wet and angular face serious. “The cure.”

  “So you know what’s at stake. And what you have to do.”

  “Yes. All of us do. Whatever’s required.”

  That was good enough for Park. Also, just then, a shriek tore the night – and a Foxtrot leapt over the front ranks of the soldiers’ lines and almost into their rear. Captain Gunn himself turned and ran toward the incursion, though other soldiers were already swarming, stabbing, and putting it down.

  “Definitely time to go,” Sarah said, putting her hand on Park’s head and trying to hustle him back inside.

  But at the last second, Park resisted. “Wait – who’s that?”

  “Who’s what?” Sarah asked.

  “There,” said Park, pointing at a figure running across the Common – being chased. Of course, there were a lot of figures running across the Common. But Park was pretty sure he recognized that one.

  “Come on,” he said, grabbing the two closest soldiers. Slightly to his surprise, they came with him. He knew Sarah and his RMP guard would follow – both were shouting at him to stop, but they came along. In less than a minute, they all got where Park was leading them, and just in time. And in only another ten minutes after that, they were back inside Bio again, all of them still alive. Park was also smiling. It had been the right thing to do, and he had been glad to see his friend – and to see him off on his mission.

  But his smile didn’t last long. They were only just back inside, through the complex, and stepping into the fabrication area… when all the lights went out, and the group was plunged into total blackness. Sarah and the RMP got tactical lights on, but these only confirmed for Park the truly bad news, which he could already hear: the assembly line had shut down. Everything powered had stopped dead.

  “Son of a bitch,” Park muttered.

  That silence was the sound of families not making it.

  * * *

  Facing forward again from the door with the lock that had just been rendered completely fucked, Fick was slightly comforted to see the remaining half of his QRF had at least finished off the runner pack that had torn into them – and he reflected, pointlessly, that being immune at least made zombie fighting suck a lot less. Not only could you get in closer and mix it up, but if you suffered a bite or scratch, you just slapped a bandage on it and kept on fighting.

  Instead of shooting yourself in the head.

  But now they all had much bigger problems. Namely that the goddamned doors wouldn’t close or lock. “Go on,” he said, motioning the remaining half of the QRF toward the open doorway behind them. They disappeared inside.

  Then he bodily shoved Wesley inside as well, and followed him into the little security station in between the walls. Everyone else was already out into the prison yard beyond, having exited out the doors on the other side of the room. Fick turned back to the outside doors, pushed closed the open right-hand one, and looked for some kind of manual locking mechanism, or even latch. Of course there wasn’t one. It almost even made sense – you weren’t usually keeping people out of a prison.

  The door not only swung freely – it swung inward.

  “Zed’s Law,” Wesley said, looking on from behind.

  “Yeah, Zed’s fucking Law,” Fick echoed, but he was already moving to shove the one desk in there, luckily a big heavy one, over in front of the doors. Having done that, he motioned for Wesley to help him pick up the nearby filing cabinet. And as Fick tipped it over into Wesley’s arms and lifted it from the bottom, he said, “But wait! There’s more.”

  Wes just sighed as they dumped the cabinet on top of the desk. When they’d piled up every scrap of furniture in there into a barricade, Fick went to the inside door on the opposite side, which led to the prison yard – and demonstrated for Wes.

  “Here’s one I destroyed earlier!”

  “What?” Wesley said, leaning in and examining. And now he could see what Fick already knew: the whole locking mechanism on these double doors had been torn out, by means of extreme leverage. Wes looked back at him. “Why?”

  Fick sighed and sagged. “An RMP with a damned crowbar. We were in a hurry. But it was my responsibility, and I knew even then destroying locking mechanisms was a shitty idea.”

  Wesley pushed the doors shut – then reached up to a heavy iron sliding bolt-lock on one of them, pushed it closed, then pulled it open again. “Not so bad,” he said. “Still locks.”

  “Yeah,” Fick said. “From the inside. Which means somebody’s got to stay here to lock it.”

  They both turned at the sound of bodies slamming into the outside of the other door, and shoving at the barricade. Both ran forward and put their shoulders into it.

  It held. For now.

  And then all the lights went out.

  * * *

  The Common was a lonely place now. Just dark, rain – and dead. No one living moved anywhere across it. Ironically, with no firing on the south walls, now the dead were climbing up and over it at a slower rate. But still at a steady one.

  When the undead hit the ground on the other side, they divided – presumably to conquer, though who knew what the hell the dead were thinking. Some followed lights, others the smell of the living. Mainly they followed noise. Mostly that meant the sounds of the battle on the north walls, which hadn’t stopped, or even slowed, despite the lost fight in the south.

  But the dead couldn’t reach the north walls of the prison from inside the Common – the south and east inner walls of the prison stopped them. Thwarted, hungry, angry, frustrated, they swarmed up and down the base of the stone walls, hissing or moaning. There was definitely living meat on the other side of them. But, while the rescued expeditionary force was fanning out to take new positions up
on those sections of old prison wall facing in toward the Common, none had started firing yet.

  Other dead peeled off and bum-rushed Bio, and the sounds of firing there, and the thick ranks of meat-creatures out front.

  But there was one other source of noise in the Common.

  That was the big diesel generator – which had been running nonstop ever since the Zulu barbecue at Enfield Power Station in north London had taken out the main electricity supply. CentCom drew a great deal of power, and the generator made a loud racket. But, unlike the power station, it wasn’t surrounded by a spiky fence. The engineers here had never envisioned, or at least not prepared for, a situation in which CentCom itself was overrun.

  And the generator kept on running, and making noise, even as a dozen dead bodies swarmed over it, then a dozen more. They didn’t find anything to eat, but they didn’t stop looking – not until the big piece of machinery stopped making noise. This it did when the engine intake couldn’t get air anymore.

  Starved of oxygen, it sputtered out.

  And with CentCom’s huge power draw, the battery had nothing in it – power from the generator was going straight out as quickly as it was created. So everything in CentCom went black, all in an instant.

  Up on the north walls, the brilliant front-facing spotlights winked out to nothing. In the left and right sectors, the operators and Royal Marines smoothly pulled down their NVGs, turned on their IR aiming lasers, and carried on fighting in the dark and rain. In the center, the Gurkhas and tankers turned on their weapon-mounted lights, those who had them, and stage-lit their sector as with roving spotlights, panning and picking out targets, which were everywhere anyway.