The Sixth Extinction: An Apocalyptic Tale of Survival. (Part Three: Infested.)

by Johnson, Glen

  One night, after Red got home late after a long fourteen-hour shift, her life got even worse.

  Her stepfather, Collin, was not asleep in his normal chair, with the TV blaring and an empty bottle in his hand. At first, she took it as a good sign. For weeks, he slept in the chair, only moving to go to the toilet, or grab a rare bite to eat, or a fresh bottle.

  Maybe he was pulling himself back on his feet; Red remembered thinking. That was until he stumbled down the hallway into the front room. He was naked and crying. He had blood around his swollen groin and on his hands.

  Red dropped the bag of groceries she had collected on the way home.

  “What have you done?” she screamed as she ran passed, knocking him to the floor, as she headed to her sister’s room.

  Her sister lay in bed on her back, with her nightie pulled up over her face. One leg hung off the bed. There was blood everywhere.

  “NOOOO!” Red raced to her side.

  Jasmine was dead. Suffocated by a pillow her drunken stepfather held over her face as he raped her.

  She had two choices, leave, and phone the police, before he returned and tried to hurt her, or make him pay.

  Red stared at her sister’s broken, bloody body. Slowly, like an automaton, Red walked to her bedroom. She was not thinking straight; it was almost an out of body experience. Red unhooked her bow from behind her bedroom door. She notched an arrow, with her sister’s blood still over her hands, and headed for the front room.

  Her stepfather was on his back with his hands over his face, crying.

  “I’m so sorry Jasmine,” he screamed. “You look so much like her!”

  Red ignored his shouting and pulled back the bow.

  He must have realized she was back in the room, because he struggled to raise himself on his elbows, while staring at her through his tear-streaked, drunken, bloodshot eyes.

  “I’m sorry,” he muttered, while spittle dribbled down his stubble covered chin.

  Red released the pressure, and watched the arrow go through his right eye, pinning Collin’s head to the TV cabinet.

  In the background, on the TV, the BBC was reporting on an outbreak of a serious virus in South Africa.

  Red ignored the television. She went to the kitchen and filled a bowl with warm soapy water, and returned to her sister’s bedroom. She slowly cleaned the blood from her sister’s battered, limp body, as tears blurred her vision. She changed the sheets and her sister’s nightie and laid her back in the bed. She then kissed her sister on the forehead.

  Red then packed a few items of clothing, and filled the rest of the bag with food and three heavy two-liter bottles of water. She pulled an old sleeping bag from the bottom of her wardrobe, and then swung her bow and arrows over her shoulder and left.

  The last thing she did was dial the emergency services on the house phone and left the phone off the hook. As she walked out the door, she could hear the operator ask what service was required: police, fire brigade, or ambulance.

  Red had no idea where to go, or what to do. She slowly walked from her home on Barton Drive and headed into the nearby Bakers Park woods. She remembered an abandoned stone shack she found years ago with her sister, hidden by clinging vegetation.

  For five days, she hid, with her phone turned off, avoiding the world, consumed by her grief. On the sixth day, when her water and food ran out, she emerged from the woods to give herself up. However, the world was in chaos, as if her innocent sister’s death was the catalyst that changed everything.

  17

  Doctor Lazaro

  Dartmoor National Park

  Below Dartmoor Prison

  2:32 PM GMT

  Melanie stood with her mouth hanging open as the lift continued its momentum.

  “It was first started back in 1957; it took twenty-four years to complete. Luckily, there was a vast network of caverns riddled throughout the granite bedrock, which were enlarged and shaped. The prison above served as misdirection, enabling enormous amounts of materials and personnel to move back and forth without causing suspicion.”

  The elevator finally stopped, and the door hissed open. Melanie stepped out of the lift into a cavernous chamber.

  “There is room to house two thousand people, with enough food and supplies to last twenty years. There is a freshwater spring providing unlimited water for consumption, washing, and irrigation.”

  Melanie looked up. A vast dome stretched into the distance. It must have been over two hundred foot high. Only a couple of thick glass pillars connected to the ceiling, which was the elevators that joined the underground bunker to the building above.

  From her location, she could see lakes, large parks, numerous housing complexes, and colossal multistory buildings. It was an underground city. The buildings looked dated, as if she had been transported back to the seventies.

  “There is just a handful of technicians down here at the moment, preparing the facility and checking everything is working properly. For the last thirty-two years in has only had a skeleton crew running it. That changed three weeks ago when it became the country’s top priority.” Pride radiated from his voice.

  “I have been working here, collecting, and archiving data for thirty-two years, from when it became operational.”

  Then as an afterthought added. “The two hundred adult candidates and their one hundred children are still in the building above, getting their final checks. Of course, along with support staff, doctors, scientists and military personnel, the number bumps up to just over a thousand. This leaves room for the candidates and their children – once they are of breeding age – to multiply.

  “The support staff, and soldiers have all had their tubes tied – so to speak. They do not want everyone interbreeding down here, just the final selected candidates and their offspring.

  “It is believed that over the twenty years, at a fixed rate each year, with the candidates, their children, and grandchildren, when they come of age, the number should be up to around the two thousand capacity once it is safe to return topside.”

  Melanie turned three hundred and sixty degrees, so she could take in the whole view.

  “I can’t believe this has been here all this time. Has it a name?”

  “It is the Ark,” Doctor Hall announced, pride radiating from his voice.

  “The Ark?”

  “Our salvation.” He turned and started to walk towards a five-story building.

  “If you follow me, I will explain everything.”

  Melanie followed the thin doctor into the old style, large squat building, along white corridors and through laboratories. The outside of the building was dated, but the inside was a different matter.

  “There is everything here mankind will need to start over,” he said as he led the way.

  “The seeds of every known plant, fruit, and vegetable have been collected. Every known animal has its DNA frozen and stored. Every known medical cure and procedure, every known book, document, and scroll – everything that we have accomplished, discovered, and created, or recorded in the last few thousand years – has been digitally stored, and physically – where possible – for future generations.”

  They walked through a vast chamber that must have been in the center of the five-story building. It had tens of thousands of small sealed doors running up the walls, behind thick glass. A robot with four arms, on long metal cables that allowed it to move to any location in the chamber, was lifting an object from a container that rested on the floor, up into an open hatch.

  “Everything a civilization would need to continue its species is here. And America, China, and Russia, as well as many other nations have their own versions.”

  They passed into another smaller lab. A group of about fifteen technicians was entering information into computers.

  “Just last minute data entry,” he said.

  Doctor Hall reached out a hand.

  “The file please, Doctor Lazaro.”

  Melanie passed it to him.

>   “It will be scanned and entered into the computer. Your cure will be studied at depth in the coming years by a collection of Britain’s top scientists and doctors who will live down here with the Adam and Eve finalist.” He noticed the look on Melanie’s face.

  “Your named was short listed as a possible candidate. We add and delete the doctors and scientist on a yearly basis. You would have been called to a government building in London within the next few months for vetting to see if you have what it takes to be picked for the Ark.

  “But don’t worry, now you’re here when we return to the surface I will have you checked over.” He gave her a smile. “You may still be picked to live down the rabbit hole.” He gave her an even bigger smile. “And because of your IQ, profession, age, and health, you may not get sterilized but might even get the chance to become a breeder!”

  18

  Noah, Red, Betty, Lennie, and the Squad

  Dartmoor National Park

  In the Husky Somewhere Near Princetown

  2:36 PM GMT

  The Captain was concerned. The amount of naked creatures running across the moorland was excessive. There were not enough populated areas across the region to warrant so many of them. It did not make sense as to why they were all out here, and heading in the same direction. He was getting a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach.

  Bull drove the truck down narrow lanes, over bridges, and through a steep valley. They passed through small villages with just a handful of houses. At first glance, they looked normal. However, there were always telltale signs – a broken window, left luggage, or an abandoned car parked haphazardly. Then, as the sound of the engine moved through the hamlet, the creatures would run out of the buildings.

  At one valley, they witnessed a large cloud of spores lazily rolling up the hills through the woodland.

  Echo was cold and tired. She could not wait to reach the safety of the prison and the warm barracks. She wiped rain from the masks faceplate.

  Not long now, she thought; the prison was just around the next valley in the small town called Princetown.

  She hoped Jimmy was okay and responding to treatment. She also knew her father would give her an earful when she returned.

  Echo knew about the underground bunker. She was relocated there two years ago and placed in the Captains squad by her father. Up until today, she had never fired her gun in combat. Her squad simply ferried supplies to the large government compound. She never truly believed the bunker would ever be needed.

  Coco had a banging headache. The straps of the gasmask were digging into the side of his head. However, the last thing he would think of doing was loosen the thing, not after everything he had seen.

  Almost there, he reasoned. I can take it off soon.

  Coco could not believe the day he was having. It was supposed to be a simple drop off and return mission – routine. Then they received the priority redirection to the university. One helicopter and one truck crash later, with fifteen casualties, with possibly another if Jimmy did not make it, and here he was. He could not wait to get back behind the thirty-foot tall, four-foot thick walls of the prison.

  Just give me a hot cup of coco and my bed, he thought; every inch of him was cold and ached. When people first heard his nickname, they presumed it was racial and referred to his skin colour. In fact, it was due to his unusual habit of drinking coco as if it was tea or coffee. A nickname his older brother gave him when he was eight, and it had stuck ever since.

  Lennie still had the tarp over his head. He had lost interest in the surroundings after the horde had attacked them on the outskirts of Bovey Tracy. He sat beneath the heavy tarp hugging Charlie while scratching the little dog under the chin. He still liked it in the back of the truck, but he was starting to miss his grandmother.

  In the distance, the towering North Hessary Tor communications mast, bristling with satellite dishes and antenna, soared six hundred and forty-three feet into the sky, which land-marked Princetown from miles around.

  Betty was hot – very hot, but she dared not pull the blanket off her head. She could feel the spores moving through her body; changing her. If they found out now she would be dumped by the side of the road, and Lennie would refuse to leave her. She would try to hide it for as long as possible. She was an old woman; no one thought it strange that she had slept since getting in the truck.

  Betty tried to keep her eyes shut, but she could not stop blinking, and her throat was raw.

  “Almost there,” Bull announced, just in case the three passengers in the back had never been to Princetown before. “Just over the next hill,” he stated.

  And about time, Bull thought. He was hungry and cold. And once I get there, and get down into the bunker; I will not have to leave again for twenty years. I will be safe. And how hard will it be to look after a group of placid breeders.

  The truck drove over an arched stone bridge. A collection of naked bodies floated face down in the watercourse; they obviously drowned in the powerful rapids up the river, while trying to cross.

  The Captain was wet, and his left knee was killing him. The supply run was supposed to a simple there-and-back mission. He was meant to drop off supplies to the Britannia Royal Naval College in Dartmouth, and return with twenty candidates who had been collected at the Naval College awaiting safe transport. Instead, he had lost fifteen of his squad and was returning by truck with four random civilians and a dog. He knew they would not be allowed to enter the Ark, but at least they would be safe behind the four-foot thick walls of the prison, at least there; they had a chance.

  At least I’m brining Echo back to her father. I would hate to think how the General would react if I had lost her along the way.

  Princetown is the highest elevated settlement on the moors – the unofficial capital – which is why it was chosen for the underground bunker. There were only two roads leading into the small town, and Bull was driving along the one that crested the brow of a hill, before running down into the valley.

  Bull slammed on the brakes.

  “Jesus!” Bull shouted.

  Everyone, apart from Betty hiding under the blanket, and Lennie under the tarp, could see why Bull had skidded to a halt.

  Coco and Echo’s view was the best, stood up in the back of the truck.

  Below, in the distance, stretched out around the bowl of the valley was Princetown. It was a small town with a square and housing in long neat rows. The prison dominated the view; a large collection of tall imposing granite buildings set out orderly inside the soaring walls. Outside the fortification were numerous bulky warehouses and a large car park.

  However, this was not what made Bull slam on the brakes. Thousands of naked bodies were converging on the small town, running across the fields and down the streets, all heading towards the large circular prison, as if being guided by a hive mind to the same location.

  19

  Doctor Lazaro

  Dartmoor National Park

  Below Dartmoor Prison in the Ark

  2:38 PM GMT

  “Picked?” Melanie asked, as the technician was scanning her findings into the database.

  “Yes. Not everyone is automatically chosen due to education and breeding, there has to be a complete physical as well. They wouldn’t want someone with a heart defect, or diabetes to get through the screening.” Doctor Hall swung a chair around.

  “Once Brigadier General Hay contacted General Philips and announced you had found a blocker; it was cleared to bring you and your findings to the Ark.” The thin doctor chuckled.

  “No one seriously thought anyone would actually succeed in finding a cure. The centers all over the country were there simply for show, to calm the population, to make it look like the government was doing something, while the Ark was being prepared. Even though the Ark was kept on standby, no one knew one of the pods would be activated.

  “Please sit, we shall wait for the scanning to finish, then you can check the document over to double-check everything is in
place.”

  Melanie was tired, hungry, and confused. She just wished the nightmare would end.

  She sat on the chair and rested her face on her hands. Realization was slowly sinking in.

  “The government has known for decades,” she mumbled into her hands.

  “Oh yes,” Doctor Hall said, thinking Melanie was talking to him.

  “It’s the worlds best-kept secret. For obvious reasons,” he stated. “Just think of the panic that would ensue if everyone knew what was happening. As far as they are concerned, this is just a pandemic, which would be over in weeks, like the swine or bird flu. Moreover, as they watch the TV, they believe it will not affect them. It’s just numbers and reports on the news.” He stopped to think for a second.

  “Mind you, I think they would have worked it out by now. However, it is too late to do anything. Everything is in place.”

  “You said all the governments know?” She looked up with tired eyes.

  “Not all, only those who are allies with the countries in question, or who know about the pods.”

  “You mentioned Clarkson found the first.”

  “Yes, in the fabled Shangri-La, high in the Tibetan Mountains. He obviously didn’t know what it was, and luckily an avalanche hundreds of years prior had closed the valley off from the outside world, so when one of the sherpas touched the black, pulsating pod, and released the spores, it didn’t spread any further than the enclosed valley.

  “An expedition was sent to discover what happened to Clarkson and his crew the following season. None returned. Their location was left with a village elder down at the base of the valley in case of trouble. That group also vanished without a trace. But now the British government knew their general location.