by Rick Chesler
“What?” Marie and Brian both turned, open-mouthed.
“Now he’s stepped in and basically taken control of the only opposition he might have faced.” Alex shook his head in disgust but also grudging admiration. “It’s genius, and before anyone has time to second guess him or try to stop him, he’ll control the satellites, the armies, the aircraft carriers, the nukes.” Alex’s eyes widened with the realization. “Hell, he could even…”
“Nuke our own cities,” Veronica supplied. “In the name of quarantining or preserving the rest of the country from the spread of the infection.”
“Except that wouldn’t be their purpose.”
“What about the rest of the world?” Brian asked, incredulous, staring at DeKirk in a new light, as if the president had just donned the imperial robes of the Emperor from Star Wars.
“I don’t think they will matter much,” Veronica said, “unless we can stop this thing here. DeKirk will have planes loaded with infection vectors ready to go.”
“He’ll hit London, Paris, Berlin, Rome…” Alex closed his eyes and took his hand away from Veronica’s, making a fist. “Moscow, Tehran, Tokyo…it doesn’t matter. They won’t be able to defend against this.”
“All right,” Arcadia snapped. “Working as fast as I can. Would be nice if we had some other hope, but right now we are in doomsday—I’m sorry, Marie—Rapture mode. We train for this, we’re ready for it. The Superbugs, the infectious diseases that might blindside us when we least expect it. Influenza and smallpox almost did us in a hundred years ago. Bubonic plague, Ebola, swine flu. This is nothing different.”
“Except that we’ve lost control of it already,” Marie said. “Look at the screens. Look out the window—if we had one.”
“And,” Brian said dully, “don’t forget the fucking dinosaurs.”
Arcadia stabbed the specimen with another needle, this time drawing out blood, which she brought quickly to a microscope. “Be quiet a moment, and focus here. Something Dyson missed. It looks like the protein sequences aren’t responding to the introduction of the prions.”
“Not responding?” Veronica asked. “I thought the prion things were the aggressors. That they took over, infected, blocked receptors, whatever.”
“They’re the Borg of the microbial world,” Alex said with a loopy grin that no one except Brian shared, and Veronica desperately hoped they wouldn’t high-five each other.
“Yes but in this case…no interest. They’re not…” She looked up, eyes wide. “Bonding!”
“Huh?” Veronica asked, her attention drawn again to the TV where DeKirk had just finished saying something perfectly normal-sounding and confidence-building, like May God bless our nation and our brave men and women as we endure through this crisis…
“It needs a bonding agent!” Arcadia said, clapping her hands and then rushing to a cabinet. “Oh, please let it be that simple!”
“What’s a bonding agent?” Alex asked.
“Something to cause that initial attraction between the protein strings. If they’re not interested, this will bring them together.”
“Ah,” he said. “Kind of like alcohol at a singles bar.”
Veronica rolled her eyes, but Arcadia actually let out a little laugh as she returned with a medicine dropper and a jar full of a clear liquid. “Exactly. It removes the inhibitions, and allows the attraction to commence.”
She returned to the microscope and the blood spatter, again ignoring the zombie specimen—which seemed to be growing more agitated, kicking, thrashing and twisting its head back and forth. Snapping noises and grinding teeth from under the plastic mask did nothing to help Veronica’s mood, but at least the CDC investigator seemed unfazed.
“There, now…” Arcadia peered into the microscope, and the next few moments, amidst the gnashing of teeth and the strains of the National Anthem playing on the TV as DeKirk made his exit, stage left, were tense as any Veronica could recall. She met Alex’s eyes, and she was sure they shared the same thought: the next words out of Dr. Grey’s mouth might spell the fate of human civilization.
Arcadia looked up, wide-eyed, but didn’t give them the satisfaction.
“What is it?” Marie asked.
Without responding, Arcadia grabbed a new syringe, pulled out some of the Dyson solution, then sucked in a few drops of the bonding agent, and returned to the thrashing corpse—and promptly stuck the syringe into a vein in its neck.
She stood back after emptying the contents, and pressed her hands together.
Veronica stepped in closer along with Alex and their hands found each others’ again, and this time they clenched out of need and trust and for the first time in a while…hope.
The zombie suddenly sucked in a huge wheezing breath. Its back arched at an impossibly strong angle until just its wrists and shins were straining against the table, and then just as quickly, all the energy seemed to flee, deflating from its lungs in a huge gasp—and then it sunk and lay completely still.
The vitals monitor—which had been registering brain waves as well as a flatline for heart rate and blood pressure, with values previously almost off the chart—now sunk in a sharp downward spike, then leveled out, flatlined along with the others.
Marie edged closer ahead of the rest, impatient. Her eyes were wide. “Is it—?”
“Dead? Cured?” Alex stepped in too, bringing Veronica with him.
She pulled back though. I’ve seen this movie before. The thing which should be dead but isn’t. And the expendable cast member… She was about to warn Marie. Warn Brian, warn the research director. There was no way, they couldn’t be this lucky, or this good. Dyson’s cure—nothing so worthy of salvation could have come from that unholy monster.
No way, it was all some kind of unlucky trick, and they couldn’t fall for it. Couldn’t—
But then the impossible happened. Only it was much worse than she had feared.
One moment she registered the shock of hearing something overhead that sent shockwaves all the way down here, something that sounded like a muffled explosion on the order of a bunker-buster bomb.
In the next instant, the lights flickered, the glass doors shattered, the ceiling split open and a thousand tons of concrete, plaster and sand came collapsing down upon them.
34.
Nearly an hour after leaving Washington, D.C. airspace, Major Remington’s F/A-18 streaked into the darkened, smoke-filled skies above Atlanta. Cutting his acceleration, he banked hard, then came in low over the suburbs and into the city, over the Superdome where he could barely make out fires and what looked like a packed stadium…only full of the dead and those feasting upon the soon-to-be-dead.
He tore ahead, then zeroed in on his objective. CDC Headquarters, target of all the other fighters scrambled from nearby locations. Another few seconds and he’d be within range, and hopefully there first, hopefully…
“Target destroyed,” came the hollow voice on his comm. “Direct hit to the lower foundation with bunker-buster AT-201.”
“No…” Remington rose above the plane coming toward him, the one having just finished the mission he had desperately intended to thwart, one way or another. He had imagined verbally trying to call rank on whoever was in the air, and barring that, would have reverted to shooting the other pilots out of the sky if he had to, anything to stop this mission and buy Agent Winters the time she needed to see that bio-solution through.
He banked around a taller building, came in low and saw for himself.
The target was collapsing, tumbling in on itself in a massive scene of destruction. Just…annihilated.
“Son of a bitch, no…” He flew low, into the rising smoke, then up and accelerating, turned and came back around, searching the area, checking the radar, trying to see through the debris and the smoke.
Was there any chance they survived? Could anybody survive that?
He clenched his jaw so tight he tasted blood. Did they make it out first?
The skies flashed r
ed with an explosion somewhere a few miles to the east, where he had seen a contingent of tanks and armored vehicles, some sort of perimeter.
He turned and headed thoughtlessly in that direction, ignoring the next directive that came over his frequency: “All units return to Savannah AFB for refuel and next assignment.”
“Copy, Savannah AFB,” came three replies from the other birds in the air, and Remington saw their units on his radar, breaking off their trajectories and veering out together.
Let them go, he thought. They don’t know any better. Following orders, he thought, and he shivered wondering what their next orders would be. Or would they land, only to be savaged by waiting hordes of undead? Would the faux-president continue to use the human forces at his disposal to knock out key resistance installations and soften the remaining population—all while keeping his brave colleagues in the dark?
Remington couldn’t fathom the depths of the cruel, callous planning, the true scope of the evil that had triumphed today.
He could only do what he knew he had to do.
Disobey orders first and foremost, and second, provide aid to that contingent of humans making their last stand down there, against…
Remington squinted as he flew low over the buildings and avenues, over the apartments and parks and train station, the college campus and the libraries and the burning airport. He saw the mob of faster-than-life figures, dinosaurs loping in and among their ranks, all converging on the makeshift perimeter and the guards holding fast against the legions of Hell bearing down upon them as they protected several hundred civilians, huddled behind cars and barricades.
Remington got on his shortwave and tried to reach anyone down there in charge, promising what support he could give as he buzzed overhead, then prepared for another pass, right over their heads and into the oncoming army of undead.
He armed his missiles, readied the twin machine guns and came in low, sighting for the larger masses—and the goddamned dinosaur things.
He wouldn’t let them advance without shredding their ranks a bit first and providing those warriors down there every chance at survival.
As he prepared to fire, something else caught his attention: something huge showing up on radar. A click ahead, previously lost in the darkness and behind other large buildings and blocks of skyscrapers.
Its enormous head rounded a corner, and Remington got a glimpse of a draconic visage: fiery crimson eyes, a long snout and slavering jaws, crustaceous horns and jagged carapace.
The other side had backup too.
New plan, Remington thought, firing automatic rounds and spitting terror down upon the undead, hopefully shattering enough skulls or at least incapacitating enough of them to give the National Guard an easier time of things.
Got to save the missiles for this other sonofabitch.
He angled up, plotted a new course and armed the heat-seekers, even as the dreadnought reared up and howled out a challenge, sensing its brothers in danger.
Come on, just another second 'til the Sidewinders are armed, and then you’re history again—
A red blip streaked at a 90 degree angle on his radar and Remington had no time to even curse his stupidity—or rue the unfairness of being denied just one touch of good luck.
Another second was all he needed, but it wasn’t to be.
A pterodactyl—something he had almost forgotten all about—soared across and intercepted his fighter like a rival, colliding with its beak and slamming hard and instantaneously ripping the wings and fuselage free. The missile launched but went straight down, impossible to correct, and exploded into the street, obliterating half a block of cars and stores.
Remington spun and spun, unable to scream, grunt or even cry out in agony. The auto-system kicked in and with the next 360, as he wildly cartwheeled and had no idea if he was on an upward trajectory or down, unable to read his gyro, the eject seat blasted out and shot him flying into the night, free from his plane and from the winged monstrosity howling at the escape of its prey.
Remington had a fleeting moment of serenity as he sailed over the tortured cityscape, looking back at his jet—bursting into an orange fireball and killing the ptero. He saw the hulking dreadnought thudding in the opposite direction, slouching toward Bethlehem? The thought crashed through his mind giddily, just as he realized his chute wasn’t opening, maybe because he had just crunched through the glass wall of a fifty-story bank building.
His helmet cushioned the impact somewhat, but then he barreled through the drop ceiling, which served to slow him down until connecting with a girder, twisting and dropping back onto the office floor and tumbling another thirty feet, knocking over office chairs and desks until coming to a stop in a darkened cubicle with a picture of smiling family members overlooking a pile of work folders, tomorrows to-do list which would never get done.
Remington tried to move, but couldn’t feel a thing, couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe.
Everything turned black, the curtain closing on his life, and his daughter’s face appeared for a brief moment as she pulled away from him, eyes downcast and a tear slipping free.
The world was burning, and the dead held sway across all.
As he descended into the darkness, he held onto one thought, desperately clinging to it for all he was worth…that the cure, if there was one…was buried here in this city along with him.
Because like all buried things lately, nothing stayed down for long.
END
To be continued in JURASSIC DEAD 3
Read on for a free sample of The Valley
In a dystopian future, a self-contained valley in Argentina serves as the ‘far arena’ for those convicted of a crime. Inside the Valley: carnivorous dinosaurs generated from preserved DNA. The goal: cross the Valley to get to the Gates of Freedom. The chance of survival: no one has ever completed the journey. Convicted of crimes with little or no merit, Ben Peyton and others must battle their way across fields filled with the world’s deadliest apex predators in order to reach salvation. All the while the journey is caught on cameras and broadcast to the world as a reality show, the deaths and killings real, the macabre appetite of the audience needing to be satiated as Ben Peyton leads his team to escape not only from a legal system that’s more interested in entertainment than in justice, but also from the predators of the Valley.
PROLOGUE
The Valley
Argentina
The Year 2079
With the exception of a few renegade clouds floating above the canopy of trees, the sky was a perfect blue. The air was muggy with a syrupy thickness, the humidity steaming. In tropical brush so dense and with leaves as large as elephant ears, Jon Jacoby hacked his way through the thickets with the blade of a machete, swinging errantly knowing that the distance between two points was a straight line. And to get to the Gates of Freedom, Jon had to cut a swath through the jungle’s core if he was to survive.
Emily Anderson was behind him holding a Glock with a bullet in the chamber and three in the magazine. Their beige jumpsuits, declared to be the property of the Argentina Department of Corrections, with ADOC stenciled on the backs, were torn and badly soiled. Rorschach blots of sweat circled beneath their armpits and backs. The bangs of their hair stuck wetly to their brow. Razor-thin cuts and slashes marred their faces and their hands, the blood having crusted and caked into scabs. And their jumpsuits were beginning to hang on them like drapery, the two having lost so much weight.
It had taken them five days to cross the valley, which was surrounded by 80-foot sheer walls, straight up with no foot- or handholds, and no promise or means of escape.
When they were less than 100 yards away from the Gates of Freedom, Jon and Emily hunkered low in the jungle brush, listening.
The shape of the Gates was an arch, and the top bullet-shaped, with chiseled lettering above the entranceway: YOUR FREEDOM IS BUT A FEW STEPS AWAY.
“The gate’s closed,” Emily whispered. When she started to rise and head for
ward, Jon lashed out and grabbed her by the forearm, stopping her. “What?” she asked.
He set a forefinger against his lips, shushing her. Listen!
In the brush to their left something moved, causing the elephant-sized leaves to shake and betray its position.
They were not alone.
The thicket and brambles to their right began to sound off, a rustling.
Then Emily’s eyes started to the size of communion wafers and her face began to crack, her eyes welling with tears. They were so close, she thought. So . . . close.
And now they were being flanked.
As she raised her firearm, Jon gripped the machete until he was white-knuckled.
“We have to make a run for it,” he told her. “A hundred yards.”
“We’ll never make it.”
“We can’t just sit here, Em, and let them close in.”
And then a tear slipped from the corner of her eye and tracked slowly along her cheek, then to her chin where it dangled precariously for a moment before dropping. “We were so close, Jon” she whispered. “All this way . . . Forty miles. The last two.”
Jon looked deep into her eyes, and leaned forward until their foreheads were touching. She was right, he considered. They started out as a team of twelve, all able-bodied, all convicts of the ADOC having a singular goal: to live. Some died the moment they stepped inside the valley. Others perished during the night as nocturnal creatures dragged them into the darkness with their screams growing distant, and then gone, the cries dying abruptly. Others simply disappeared.
He sighed. “So close,” he said softly. “So . . . close.”
