The Dying of the Light (Book 1): End

by Jason Kristopher

  Maxwell chuckled. “I bet. He’s like that.” He took his seat and allowed himself to bask for just a moment in the unexpected good news, sharing a pleased-as-punch grin with his old friends.

  Soon enough, however, Maxwell took a deep breath and shook it off. “As nice as this is, folks, it doesn’t change anything. We’re still short-handed and things are just going to get worse from here.” He handed Anderson a small packet of papers. “Frank, I want you to share this with the rest of the team leaders, but since Kim’s here already…”

  He stood and walked to the window. “It’s starting next week. Notification letters are going out — hand-delivered, no less — to those scientists and specialists who have been pre-selected to go into the AEGIS bunkers. It details the situation, what’s really going on, that is, and what we’re doing to survive.”

  “Why so early, sir?” asked Kim.

  “We’re giving them the chance to say no, major,” Anderson replied as he glanced over the paperwork.

  “Is that a good idea, sir?”

  “What else can we do, Kim?” said Maxwell. “Lock them up if they don’t agree to go along with us? I’m ashamed to say that the idea was considered, but some of us still remember the stories of our fathers about the Japanese internment camps during WWII. We’re not going to make the same mistake again.”

  “What if they go public with what they know, then?’

  “Then we discredit them. As loudly and as publicly as possible. Make up wild stories so even their own husbands and wives won’t believe them.”

  Kim nodded. “I suppose that could work. Still, if enough of them banded together…”

  Maxwell turned and looked at her, his face as grim as she’d ever seen it. “We can’t allow a mass panic before we officially release the news, Kim. The president has authorized Gardner and his people, and, by extension, us, to use whatever means are necessary to ensure public order until that time. And we all know what that means.”

  Kim was dumbstruck. “But… but that’s monstrous! Killing our own people? Who the hell does he think he is to authorize something like that? What gives him the right?”

  Maxwell raised an eyebrow at her. “We gave him the right, Kim, when we elected him. It’s a national security matter, clear and present danger, that sort of thing.”

  Getting a hold on herself, Kim took some deep breaths. “Yes, sir. I see your point, sir. Permission to speak freely, sir?”

  Maxwell glanced at Anderson, standing behind Barnes, who shrugged.

  “Go ahead, major.”

  “This fucking sucks, sir. And I have to say, I will refuse any order that requires me to fire on unarmed, non-infected civilians, except in self-defense.” Kim was caught by surprise again as Maxwell smiled, winked at her, then pointed to the ceiling and cupped his ear. His office is bugged, thought Kim. Holy shit.

  “Major, in future, I’d watch your tone, even when ‘speaking freely.’” Maxwell admonished, still smiling. “You will follow all orders as they are given, or I will have you arrested. Do you understand me, soldier?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. Then you are dismissed, major.” Catching her eye, he tapped his watch slowly with three fingers. She looked confused for a second and then nodded.

  “Yes, sir,” she said, exiting the office. Maxwell looked over at Anderson, who nodded and smiled, then followed Barnes out the door. As the door shut behind them, Maxwell turned back to the window.

  There’s no going back now, he thought. Let’s hope she’s still the little girl from Arizona that I met all those years ago.

  little girl from Arizona that I met all those years ago.

  Chapter Nineteen

  On her way out of the barracks moments later, Kim was surprised to see Anderson just outside the exit door. “Ready to go, major?” he asked.

  She nodded. “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. Get in,” he said, indicating the waiting Humvee. As she took the shotgun seat, Anderson walked around to the driver. “Helipad 4, private.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Anderson watched the Humvee as it headed off, spraying snow and muck. I hope George knows what he’s doing, he thought.

  As they neared Helipad 4, Kim saw a Blackhawk warming up, the rotors turning slow. It wasn’t until she climbed aboard that she saw Maxwell inside at the controls. He indicated for her to take the co-pilot seat.

  “Sir, I’m not checked out on this aircraft.”

  “Don’t worry about it, major. I’ve had well over a thousand hours in these birds. We’ll be fine.”

  Kim buckled on the extra helmet and settled the seat’s straps around her, snugging them good and tight. She took a deep breath. “Yes, sir. Ready when you are.”

  Maxwell got clearance from the tower and they took off, headed west. As they flew out over foothills, the day turned to evening; the sunset was gorgeous. It looked like Maxwell was also enjoying it, and she realized just how few sunsets she might be seeing for a while. Better make the most of it, she thought.

  Maxwell lowered the helicopter until they touched down in a small meadow, and motioned for her to get out. They stepped away from the chopper and Barnes noticed that he carried a folder in his hand.

  “Long way to come for a briefing, sir,” she said, looking at him with a raised eyebrow.

  “This ain’t your typical mission brief, major. And we can’t exactly talk in my office, or in most of the base, for that matter. Take a seat,” he said, motioning to a nearby rock formation, and sitting down as well.

  “Major… Kim… the full extent of what I’m about to tell you is known only to two people other than you and me: Commander Anderson and the president. There are others who know some of it, but the whole enchilada is just between us. Is that understood?”

  Kim nodded. “Understood, sir.”

  “Good,” he said, and handed her the file. He watched her as she opened it and paged through the information inside. Her expression darkened with every page, until he could see that she was shaking with rage. “Damn Gardner. Damn him straight to hell.”

  “Calm down, major.”

  Kim looked back up at him, and Maxwell recoiled, if only a bit. I’ve never seen her this pissed off, he thought. And it’s only going to get worse. He held her gaze until she sat back and took another deep breath and calmed down, at least somewhat.

  “There’s something you haven’t seen yet, Kimberly.”

  “Is it worse than that smug, self-centered, arrogant and idiotic bastard actually selling zombies to the North Koreans? Or deliberately experimenting on our own people?”

  “Yes.”

  She snorted, and he continued. “Maybe not for the world, but for you, yes. There is worse.”

  She sobered, then glanced down. “Do I want to keep going?”

  “As your father,” he said, “I don’t want you to. But I know you, and I know you couldn’t live with yourself if you didn’t know it all. I just want you to know before you go down this particular rabbit hole that I’m here for you, and so is Mary. And Johnny.”

  Kim nodded. “That means a lot.”

  “Good.”

  As she continued to read the file, Maxwell could see she was getting upset again, and then suddenly she stopped as she reached what he knew would either send her over the edge or galvanize her into action. He hoped it was the latter, but you could never tell.

  It was a full-size 8x10 glossy image of a brightly-lit cell, with a small prisoner standing in one corner. There was no bed, no toilet, nothing other than four blank walls and some chains leading to the diminutive figure’s wrists and ankles from rings bolted into the wall.

  Kim looked up at Maxwell, and the tears in her eyes shone with the reflected sunset’s light. “How could he? Is he even human?”

  “We just got this a couple days ago. That’s why you’re hearing about this now.”

  “You know this… this is what broke David, right? All the other stuff he could handle, but this…” She reached out a ha
nd as though to stroke the hair of the small boy pictured on the page. “Oh, Eric. Oh, God.” Dropping the folder on the ground, Kim staggered off, wrapping her arms around herself to ward off not the cold mountain air, but the chill from inside. Maxwell started to follow, and then stood where he was when Kim stopped a few yards away and fell to her knees.

  She has to win this fight on her own, he thought. I can’t help her with this.

  He was never sure how long they stood there like that, his adopted daughter in pain and suffering while he could do nothing but watch. Eventually, Kim stood up and wiped her eyes, then came back over and helped Maxwell collect the remnants of the file.

  “His experiments were what caused that lab tech that Chauncey got hold of to turn so quickly, weren’t they?”

  Maxwell nodded. “That’s what we believe. He and his people have modified a sample from Eric to attempt to make a version of the disease that makes walkers faster. We believe the idea was to use them as biological weapons. Chauncey was one of their first experiments.”

  “What does Eric have to do with that, though?”

  “We believe that because of the hormones in children’s bodies, especially as they approach puberty, the prion acts differently on their systems. Rather than causing them to deteriorate and slowly putrefy, it appears to stimulate muscle growth and adrenaline reflexes, making them much faster.”

  “No wonder he wanted us to capture them ‘alive.’ He needed more subjects.”

  “Exactly, and he needs more fast ones if he’s going to make them adequate biological weapons. Imagine the terror the average walker would cause if it was dropped on a unit… then picture a whole squad or platoon of them… then imagine how much worse it’d be if they could all move that fast.”

  Kim shuddered at the thought. “When did you know, sir?” She paused, and reached out to him. “Oh God, was Mary– did she– she couldn’t– ”

  Maxwell shook his head. “No, she didn’t know and she wasn’t a part of it. She still doesn’t know. Gardner sectioned off part of the lab with those he could trust to work on his little side projects, and she never got in. The fact that he did that was enough to raise some red flags for her, though, and she let me and Frank know, too. She helped us as much as she could, but I wanted to spare her this.”

  “She deserves to know the truth.”

  “She does. And I’ll tell her. Eventually. But right now, I need her focused on helping to get the research ready for transport, and keeping Gardner in the dark about everything, even if she doesn’t know she’s doing it.”

  “But you and Frank. When did you two figure it out?”

  “Frank and I suspected something from the beginning, actually. How could anyone meet Gardner and not think he was up to something? The day he arrived on the base and took over from Mary — this was while 1st team was inactive — we started getting a nasty vibe from him. But we never had anything concrete. Not until he went off the deep end and tried to get me court-martialed or transferred after I fought him on the whole Tremaine thing.”

  “He didn’t!”

  “He did. He went all the way up the chain, as far as he could. Which is pretty far, considering. The Secretary is practically in his back pocket at this point.”

  Kim snorted. “I don’t know who to feel sorry for, there.”

  “I know what you mean. Problem is, Gardner and his cronies managed to snag some of the top spots in Bunker Five — the president’s bunker, in Pennsylvania — using his connections.”

  “But not the president, sir?”

  Maxwell grinned. “Nope, although Gardner thinks SecDef has his ear. He’s our man, though, and saw right through Gardner’s bullshit as fast as Frank and I did.”

  “So what’s the plan, then?”

  “We’ve got a few high-placed friends in various outfits. Frank has been getting in touch with them for a couple of weeks, and getting them ready to move against Gardner’s people. We’ve identified quite a few — most of them, we think — thanks to Lansford, but Frank’s also been cozying up to Gardner just in case.”

  “That storm-out a while back?”

  “All part of the plan. Gardner brought him in on some minor things after that, thinking he could turn him, since Frank was so obviously pissed.”

  “When do we move?”

  “We’re biding our time, waiting until everything’s in place. We’re going to need concrete evidence of more than just some experiments on walkers to take Gardner down for good. We have a lot of evidence, but it’s all circumstantial. We don’t have anything on him directly. We’ve got eyes on him almost all the time, though. So it shouldn’t be too long. He’s arrogant and over-confident, and we’re using that against him.”

  “Good. How can I help?”

  “I’ll need you there when it all goes down, Kim. I promise you’ll be a part of it. But, for now, what I really need you to do is get David back to us. Now that we know what sent him over, I’m thinking we can bring him back. Talk to Forrest and see if she’d be willing to give you a hand. Maybe something familiar can help.” Maxwell sighed and put a hand on her shoulder.

  “Where I’m really going to need your help, though, is when and if we do get him back: one way or another, he’s going to find out about Gardner, if he doesn’t know already.”

  “Shit. I hadn’t thought of that. He’s going to… well, sir, I wouldn’t want to be Gardner.”

  “I know he’s going to have other ideas about what needs to happen, and that’s the problem. Gardner’s the only one who knows where all the bodies are buried… in this case, literally. We need him alive. I’m asking you to see to it that he stays that way.”

  Seeing the expression on her face, his own softened. “I know that won’t be easy, and I know I’m asking you to make a supremely difficult choice. But it has to be done. We have to do this the right way, Kim.”

  Kim hesitated. “Sir, I…” She paused. “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. Now let’s get back. I’m freezing my ass off out here.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “So that’s the long and the short of it, Morena,” said Kim, sitting on the edge of Morena Forrest’s bunk in the barracks. Michael played on the floor as the two women talked.

  “So you think that seeing us brought back memories and sent him into a catatonic state?” asked Morena.

  “Mary and I are fairly sure of it.”

  “And you want Michael and I to talk to him, to try and break him out of it?”

  “Yes. We need him back, Morena. He’s still the most experienced one of us, and he’s in a unique position to help us fight this war.”

  “I’m not sure this is a good idea. What if he gets attached to us, or somehow wakes up and thinks that I’m… Rebecca? Or that Michael is Eric?”

  “I have to admit that the thought crossed my mind, and Dr. Adamsdóttir thinks it’s a possibility, but a very remote one. And we have to try.”

  Morena looked at Michael, so happy in that moment, and realized what she would give to stay in that happiness forever, with no thoughts of zombies or the end of the world or any of it. But that can’t happen, she thought. Not for any of us. Not anymore.

  Kim put a hand on Morena’s shoulder, recapturing her attention. Kim had tears in her eyes, and couldn’t seem to bring herself to speak. She looked down, picking at her nails. “It’s more than the mission, though,” she finally said, her voice breaking. “I need him back, Morena. I miss him.”

  Morena took one of Kim’s hands and held it tightly. “I know, Kim. I know. But this…” She sighed, and released Kim’s hand. “I… I’ll think about it. That’s all I can promise you now.”

  Kim wiped the tears from her eyes and smiled. “That’s all I can ask. Just don’t take too long thinking it over. We don’t have a lot of time.”

  “Is the new subject ready?” Gardner asked one of the faceless — at least to him — technicians who populated his labs. He looked through the glass at the walker. The suit and tie were all but sh
reds at this point, but it still stood tall and gruesome.

  “Yes, sir. We’ve prepared the new training room as per your orders.” The technician swallowed. “Sir, about this configuration…”

  Gardner turned to the technician, bringing the full force of his glaring persona to bear on the hapless little man. “Yes?”

  To his credit, this tech was braver than the others who’d worked here in the past. “Well, sir, it’s just that if the soldiers aren’t very careful, then this sort of configuration could lead to an accide…” He broke off as Gardner moved forward, overshadowing the small man by a good six to eight inches. For the flash of a second, the technician thought he saw anger pass across Gardner’s face; it was like looking into the pits of Hell itself… but it was gone, now.