Berserk

by Tim Lebbon

  But did he want to know? Did he really? Did he to? And the answer was yes, had always been yes. That was why Sandra Francis had died at his hand, after all. There was no other reason, and he could no longer pretend that her death had been a necessity. She died because she had refused to tell him how they had made Natasha special.need

  “No,” he said, and Natasha laughed.

  Cole paused. She had laughed! And it had not been down there in the darkness, where lay all the knowledge he denied and the desires he refused to acknowledge. Natasha had laughed out loud, perhaps because she had seen those desires.

  “That was you!” he said.

  “I . . . can . . .” She said no more. He looked down at the bundle in his arms. It had spoken. Not dead, but dreaming, she said in his mind, and now I’m coming back again.

  “No you’re not,” Cole said. He ran on, holding the berserker close to his chest with one hand, grabbing at thin tree trunks and hauling himself up the slope with the other. He dug his feet in, leaned forward, ignoring the pain in his thigh that felt as if his flesh were melting and running from his leg. Soon there would be only bone left but he would push on, because his cause was inbred, it was instinct. Nothing would swerve him from the path, and—

  Then why aren’t I dead already? It’s because you can’t kill me. It’s because you need to know. Kill me now and I’ll always be a mystery, and you’ll never understand why you buried me alive. You killed yourself doing that, didn’t you, Mister Wolf. Didn’t you, Cole? I know because I’ve been to that place in your mind, that underground. And I’ve talked to the shadow of you.

  “What is it?” Cole shouted. He paused, shaking the girl’s corpse and hearing the crackle of weak things breaking. But she did not scream. Instead she opened her mouth and whispered, something so light that it told itself only to the dark. “What?” He leaned closer. The pistol in his belt was forgotten. The sound of pursuit grew louder, but he did not care. Now, here, he would discover a truth that had haunted him for a decade. “What?”

  “They . . .”

  Cole only caught the first word, so he brought her closer to him, turning his head so that she could whisper into his ear.

  “They made me the mother of the future,” Natasha said. She came to life, warm and shifting, and before Cole could let go she had buried her teeth in his throat.

  Cole tried to scream, but he heard it only in his mind.

  * * *

  Tom was being dragged through the dark. The shadow had revealed itself as Sophia as she bent before the flames to scoop him up, but she had changed. Her face was bashed and bloody, her hair matted, one side of her scalp burned and bubbled. And her eyes had changed the most. They reflected the flames and gave back only sadness, as if the fire told her unwanted truths.

  “Lane?” Tom croaked.

  “He’s gone,” Sophia said. “What do you think you were eating?” She held him beneath the arms and he was looking up at her face, upside down. She glanced down and a tear hit his cheek. “Dan as well. My son. I heard him screaming. He couldn’t escape the fire. That’s no way to go, not for anyone.”

  “Eating?”

  “You have silver in you. We’re immune, and Lane’s flesh will help you.”

  “But—”

  “Please!” Sophia said, her voice breaking. “Please, just leave it. It’s done.” She grunted as she dragged him, and Tom wondered why he did not feel nauseous. Why, in fact, he still felt hungry. The red meat was heavy in his stomach, and he could sense the goodness radiating out from there.

  “I was shot,” Tom said. “Cole shot me again. I felt it . . . I can feel it. Heavy, like a block of ice in my chest.” This fresh pain made his back feel like a tickle. “I should be dead.”

  “It’s not easy to kill a berserker.” Sophia hauled him off the road, heading down a slope into a thicket of trees and shrubs. Hidden from the road she set him down and dropped beside him.

  Tom had so many questions vying for attention that for a while he could ask nothing. The tang of meat was still rich on his tongue. His muscles burned, his veins carried fire around his body, and he was sweating so much he thought he must be seeping blood. But Sophia did not spare him a glance. He saw the burning cars reflected in her eyes, as if she were imprinting the sight on her memory.

  “There is no Home, is there?” he said at last. In his pain, his mind was an oasis. And in his mind loose ends were coming together, and understanding bloomed like a blood-red rose.

  Sophia shook her head. “Natasha’s mother was always so protective,” she said. “How you can protect someone by telling such lies, I never knew. We argued about it. We fought. But Natasha was her child, and really I had little say.”

  “Home is where Natasha said you berserkers come from.”

  Sophia chuckled, a surprisingly light sound against the continuing roar of flames. “Berserkers come from Porton Down,” she said. Tom saw the truth in her eyes, and that truth lay in her humanity. He had seen her as a raging monster and a vicious killer, but now, eyes reflecting the fire of her son’s and husband’s funeral pyre, she was as human as he.

  “They made you,” he said.

  Sophia nodded. “We were normal families. Lane was Army, as was Natasha’s father. They used science, and something more arcane, and they gave us our cravings. They made us monsters. And now Natasha has made you.”

  Tom closed his eyes. “I think she started yesterday. Cole shot me in the back. Natasha kept me alive.”

  “And you her.”

  “She wants me to be her daddy. But . . .”

  Sophia stood and grabbed him beneath the arms once more. “You’ll survive. Now we have to get further away from the road. There’ll be police on their way, and more Army. We’ll be going soon.”

  “Natasha?”

  “She’s fine,” Sophia said. She glanced up at the emerging stars and smiled. “She’s just given Mister Wolf his answer.”

  “Steven,” Tom gasped. “Steven! If there’s no Home, then where’s my son?”

  Sophia looked over her shoulder to see where she was going, avoiding his eyes. “We buried him in a forest in Wales,” she said. “He fed us for a while.”

  * * *

  Cole looked up. Sarah, the image of her parents, stared down at him. She held Natasha in her arms, and in the darkness the little girl seemed to be still again.

  Sarah had snatched the pistol from his belt and was pointing it at his face.

  Cole opened his mouth to speak, but could not. His throat felt cold and exposed, and raising his right hand he felt the truth of that. He touched a part of himself he should never touch, and it sent a rocket of pain into his head. His hand came away slick and bloody.

  “Please, you don’t have to say anything,” Sarah quipped, but she was not smiling. “I’m leaving you here. You’re well hidden. They won’t find you straight away. Too many bodies to scoop up first. Those bastards down there, and . . .” Cole saw the glitter of tears in the berserker teenager’s eyes.

  The little bitch had bitten him. Torn out his throat. And now she was not only not dead, she was more alive than she had been in years. He could not see her moving, could not hear her, but he felt her, rooting around in his mind and burrowing beneath the truth of everything he believed about himself. The streets of his subconscious were growing dark, and not because he was fading away. They darkened with approaching night.

  “Natasha says you might want to know a couple of things first,” Sarah said. “And I agree. It’ll help you in your choice.”

  Choice? The girl lowered the pistol.

  “They made her special,” Sarah said. “That’s why we had to get away, except we wanted Natasha with us. Her father had other ideas, but once we were out there was no way we could go back for her. We thought you’d killed her, Cole. We’ve spent ten hopeless years living between the lines, moving around, surviving. And now . . . this. Thanks to you, we berserkers have a chance again.” She knelt and reached out, thrusting her fingers in
to Cole’s torn throat.

  He tried to scream, but he could only bubble blood.

  “Nasty,” Sarah said. “You should be dead. But lucky for you, they gave Natasha something no other berserker has. They made her fertile.”

  Natasha spoke up then, a hoarse whisper eased somewhat by Cole’s blood in her throat. “They made me contagious.”

  Sarah threw the pistol at Cole’s chest. He gasped, caught it, aimed it right back at her.

  “There’s one round in the chamber,” she said. “It’ll hurt, but unless you’re a very good shot, it won’t kill me. Silver? You’re behind the times, Mister Wolf. But now you have a choice. You think you’re damned. But if you don’t mind knowing the true meaning of the word, maybe we’ll see you again one day.”

  “I’m not afraid of dying,” he rasped. “I’m going to Heaven.”

  “Really?” Sarah asked, scoffing. “Heaven? That’s as real as Home.” She turned and walked back down toward the burning cars, taking Natasha with her.

  * * *

  They left Cole out there in the night and took Tom with them, but Tom knew that they both faced the same choice. His, he supposed, was made easier, because his heart held nothing like Cole’s unreasoning hatred. And he had Natasha to take care of him, and he of her.

  They hid in the valley for a while – the berserkers Sophia, Sarah and Natasha, and Tom, the man who should have been dead – and then when everyone else came in, they walked out. Police cars, fire engines, ambulances, Army trucks, other unmarked cars, they all flooded into the shallow valley, some of them pausing by the burning cars, most continuing down to the industrial estate. The flaming wrecks of the Chinooks lit the way.

  As they walked through the night, none of them heard the crack of a pistol. But it could have been drowned in the roar of helicopters.

  Sophia’s revelations about the nature of the berserkers were more of a shock to Natasha than Tom. The girl became silent, shivering against him in the small car Sarah eventually stole to drive them to safety, and however hard he tried he could not find her in his mind. She had withdrawn into herself, just as the chance had come to reach out.

  With Natasha gone from his mind, his grief came in, rich and full and heavy. He cried great shaking sobs for his dead wife and son. Jo was the love of his life. And Steven, gone for so long yet still there, a memory refreshed by the renewed hope Tom had harboured. He could not bring himself to hate Sophia and Lane for what they had done, and that felt wrong, because without that his rage had no direction.

  Perhaps one day he would find one.

  He cried also for what he had lost, because he had life. Maybe sometimes he had thought it worthless, meaningless, vapid, but life was for living, and he missed the simplicity of that. A kiss on his wife’s cheek in the morning; watching a pair of nesting birds whilst stuck in a traffic jam; the swaying of trees as a cold northerly wind brought snow; the smile on Jo’s face when she came home to a meal he had cooked; the taste of wine; the feel of sunlight on his scalp; scraps of clouds catching the setting sun and promising a good day tomorrow. And that desire for a life in music, more distant than his dead son and yet haunting him with fading tunes.enjoyed

  “Where are we going?” he asked.

  “North,” Sophia replied, and it hit him like the last line of a mournful song.

  He had no idea what tomorrow would bring. Sunset had passed, leaving only pain and the taste of blood behind. Below all the pain he felt remarkably alive, but he sensed that life now had a whole new set of rules.

  He should have been dead. But life was no longer just for living. He was with Sophia and Sarah and Natasha now – he was infected, as much a product of Porton Down as they – and he had fallen between the lines.

  * * *

  When she awoke Natasha said, “Daddy?” Tom gathered her up and held her to him, and he felt warmth in her flesh, welcomed the way her child’s body shaped itself to his hug. Sophia glanced at him in the mirror, and though he saw tears in her eyes for her lost husband and son, he also saw something else. Neither she nor Sarah smiled – they were too tired for that, too overwrought, too exhausted from the healing process – but still he was sure. He saw hope.

  * * *

  Everything Natasha’s mother had told her was wrong. The berserkers had no history, other than their time at Porton Down. They had no heritage or culture, no place living alongside humanity down through the centuries, and they had no Home. But now that she was with her new family, it seemed as though things had changed. They could create their own place in the world, living between the lines and existing in shadows, becoming a part of legend if that suited them. They had a chance to write their own history.

  And it had only just begun.

  * * *

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Tim’s been published for ten years now, and you can find out loads about him at his website www.timlebbon.net. He’s the author of over thirty books, including the Noreela series of fantasy books (Dusk, Dawn, Fallen and The Island), the NY Times Bestselling novelization of the movie 30 Days of Night, and several books with Christopher Golden, including The Map of Moments and the forthcoming Secret Journeys of Jack London for Harper. He has also written several screenplays and some TV proposals. He won several prestigious awards, and some of my work has been optioned for the big screen. His most recent book is the novelization of the film Cabin In The Woods.

  * * *

  Preview of:

  TONIA BROWN’S - BADASS ZOMBIE ROAD TRIP

  One

  Somewhere just outside of Buhl, Idaho

  Dale Jenkins snored like a wild animal on the prowl. At first he chuffed in great swells of exasperated grumbles, mounting and climbing those scales of throaty growls until, as if spying his dream prey, he peaked with a gargantuan, heart-stopping roar. At the apex of this outburst, his snore would stall, his sleep engine seizing as Dale choked and sputtered. After this minor struggle, he would settle down again, and the whole process would recess for a few moments of blessed peace. Before long, the grumbles would begin anew, escalating into growling, and so on and so forth. Windows shook in their sashes, neighbors beat upon the walls, small animals wailed in the streets, and Dale always snored on in utter, somnolent bliss.

  * * *

  Jonah eyed the slumbering giant seated beside him in the car, and wondered how he was going to stand a whole week of being so close to that racket. Dale snored and snored, drawing deep, rattling breaths that drowned the sound of the car’s engine with their magnitude and power. Tired of the perpetual motion of this snoring machine, Jonah sighed—extra long and extra loud—but it was no good. Dale, dead to the world, as it were, sat with his arms crossed, shoulders slumped, and head resting to the left. This put the sleeping man’s mouth—that terrible instrument of throaty bellows—aimed directly at Jonah’s ear. Unable to stand one more snort, Jonah poked the sleeping beast in the ribs, mid-roar. Dale coughed and sputtered, then shifted his weight from one rump cheek to the other as he rolled away from Jonah and returned to his slumber unperturbed.

  “Wake up!” Jonah shouted, and gave Dale a punch on the arm for emphasis.

  Dale awoke with a start, leaping in his seat far enough to bang his head—which wasn’t very far, considering the few scant inches between the tall man’s crown and the Focus’s roof. “What? What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing.” Jonah shrugged. “I’m just… lonely.”

  Rubbing the top of his head, Dale winced and asked, “Lonely? Jesus, Jonah. I thought we were going off a cliff or something.”

  “This is our first official out-of-state gig. Don’t you want to be awake for at least part of the trip?”

  “I think I’m bleeding.” Dale stopped rubbing his head long enough to stare at his palm before returning his fingers to the wound. “I’m definitely bleeding.”

  “You’re not bleeding, you idiot. And you’re not listening to me, either.”

  “I’m listening. And I reminded you before we left that I fall aslee
p on long trips. You’ve been around me long enough to know that.”

  “We left the house ten minutes ago. You drive longer than that for a beer run. This duo thing is never going to work if you don’t take it more seriously.”

  “Band,” Dale said, following this with a wide, cavernous yawn. “Stop saying duo. We’re a band, not a duo. Duo sounds gay.”

  “I said duo, and we are a duo because the word ‘band’ implies a lot more members. Not just two morons playing guitar.” Jonah lowered his voice as he mumbled, “And not very well.”

  “Hey!” Dale protested. “We play plenty good between us. If you’d practice more instead of spending so much time at work, we’d be even better.”

  “One of us has to have a real job making real money, or we’d be out on the street in a month.” It was an old argument, and one Jonah knew neither of them would win anytime soon. But he fell into the routine all the same. “We can’t all be professional bums.”

  “I’m not a bum.” Dale straightened, ever so slightly, again a hard feat given the small space between his head and the car’s roof. “I’m a musician. It’s just hard to find work.”

  “Not if you are willing to actually work. As in work work. As in get your hands dirty washing dishes or cleaning out toilets work.” Jonah watched as Dale yawned yet again. “Speaking of not working, why are you so tired?”