Mercury Striking (The Scorpius Syndrome #1)

by Rebecca Zanetti

  “You don’t know much.”

  “Probably not nearly as much as Lynne Harmony does.” Tace turned and leaned back against the counter, scattering papers. “Is it true? Do you have her?”

  “Yeah.” Jax looked at the collections of drugs, chemicals, and test tubes, which had already been in place in the building. They’d made good use of the facilities, mainly because the compound was situated perfectly to protect and defend. A row of warehouses lined the rear of his territory, backed by an old street and several worn railroad tracks. Then many apartment buildings congregated around an old elementary school that now served as the main hospital for his people. Several businesses took up space with a church in the center.

  The seven square blocks also had held a food distribution center by the warehouses, which was now well guarded. He’d immediately run barbed wire around the entire territory inside the public roads while barricading it with semitrucks, vans, cars, and piles of tires on the roads outside.

  Yet an attack was coming. He could feel it. “Do you have the facilities necessary to study her blood, if she gives it?”

  “If?” Tace asked slowly, crossing his arms.

  “Answer the question,” Jax ordered his chief medic. Now there were three doctors inner territory, but he trusted Tace the most. They’d known each other for almost six months and had fought, killed, and nearly died next to each other during rounds of attacks. The six-foot blond had been on leave from the army when the shit had hit the fan. “Please answer.”

  “No.” Tace rubbed his square jaw. “We don’t even remotely have the resources to study her blood, so there’s no reason to take any of it. Did you see her heart? Is it really neon blue like in the pictures?”

  “Yes.” The CDC and newspapers had shown pictures of Lynne’s heart before the epidemic had spread. “If I can somehow find you the right equipment to take her blood, maybe you can create a cure?” Jax asked.

  Tace snorted. “Sure. I mean, the CDC and some of the smartest doctors on the planet were unable to do so, but why the hell not?” He gestured around the makeshift lab. “Without electricity and millions of dollars of high-tech equipment, the most I can do here is look under an old microscope. There’s no way for us to find any sort of cure in her blood, even if there is somehow a cure that the real CDC missed.”

  Jax exhaled slowly. “No need to be an asshole. Just think about it.” The second they lost hope of survival, they lost everything. “Hope is the dream of a waking man.”

  Tace snorted. “I like that quote better than the ‘we’re all gonna die’ quotes you spouted yesterday.”

  Jax rubbed his aching temple. “I was moody, and now you seem concerned.” Tace was as good-natured as they came, and Jax relied on him to cheer up the troops when necessary, which was more often than not.

  “Concerned?” Tace slowly nodded. “Based on the rumors we’ve heard, you’ve brought a woman rumored to be carrying something more dangerous than the Ebola, AIDS, and smallpox viruses combined with the plague, meningitis, and flesh-eating bacteria into our barely secured home base, and you’re keeping her at command headquarters.”

  “Her knowledge is our hope. Our only hope.” Jax rolled his shoulders. “You know as well as I do that there are a million unfounded rumors out there. Yeah, they say she’s carrying a new, even more deadly mutation of the contagion, but you know that’s probably not true. We know for sure she’s the one person still alive with the best chance of finding a cure.” Though he’d expected resistance from his men, he hadn’t thought Tace would be reluctant. “This could turn the tide.”

  “If you say so.” Tace shook his head. “A betting man would argue that the tide is over, brother.”

  Jax tried to keep his patience, but his teeth still ground together. “Knock it off.”

  Tace, as usual, switched moods quicker than a fox on a hunt. “Is she pretty? In the pictures, she looked hot.”

  Jax slowly shook his head. “You go from calling her a dangerous carrier to asking if she’s good to look at?”

  “Yeah,” Tace drawled. “There’s something sexy about a woman so dangerous she can kill you by biting your finger. Is our great hope pleasing to the eye?”

  Yes. Lynne Harmony was stunning as well as desperately wounded. Delicate and fierce. One hour with her, and she’d brought out something in Jax he neither wanted nor needed—the urge to save her. He couldn’t appreciate what made her pretty, and he couldn’t compromise on the mission. Neither could his men. “She’s a woman who’s been through hell, and she’s a prisoner here to share any information she has learned. Don’t confuse things.”

  “Yes, sir,” Tace drawled. “I think you found her appealing.”

  Way beyond that, actually. The woman had a brain, and he’d always been fascinated by smart girls. Always. “Please concentrate.”

  Tace reached for a drawer and drew out several foil packets to throw at Jax. “Just in case.”

  Jax caught the condoms and leveled him with a hard look. “Are you kidding me? I don’t have time for sex.”

  “There is always time for sex.” Tace flung out his massive arms. “Don’t you get that? If you have a good moment, take it. For now, our best hope is to forget a cure and somehow put off death and craziness with vitamin B.”

  The door pushed open, and Wyatt Quaid stomped inside. “There’s craziness? We have a Ripper?”

  “No.” Jax shook his head, sliding the condoms in his pocket, not because he needed them but to get them out of sight. The room was suddenly too small with all three of them in there. “Don’t eavesdrop. You get things wrong.”

  Wyatt shrugged. “My bad. We have a newly trained squad of scavengers who go out on their first mission tonight. I need you to come give them a talk.”

  Jax stilled. “Where?”

  “Main training facility.”

  Well, at least it was close by. If he went out the rear door of his headquarters, passed the outside showers, crossed a now-defunct street, he’d be at the training facility that used to hold six businesses, including a pawnshop and nail salon. When he’d taken over, he’d gutted the shell, torn down all the walls, and created a training and meeting area. For other people. “I don’t deal with civilians,” Jax muttered.

  Wyatt breathed out, moving his massive chest. “They’re not civilians, they’re scavengers, and they provide a service. A good one. And a test and a question-and-answer session by our leader would go a long way. Consider it a favor.”

  Fuck, fuck, and double fuck. “Fine.”

  “Good. They’re waiting.” Wyatt grinned, his teeth unbelievably white against his midnight dark skin. He was Jax’s main liaison with their territory of about five hundred people, and he rarely asked for favors.

  “Tace, get anybody who understands scientific research ready to work. Wake everyone up if you have to.” The damn clouds were keeping it abnormally dark; otherwise people would be out of bed and ready to work by now. Jax jerked his head toward Wyatt. “You talk to the new guy?”

  Wyatt shook his head. “The guy won’t really talk, but he sure moves like you do.”

  Jax frowned. “Moves like me? What do you mean?”

  “You don’t make a sound. Serious training,” Wyatt returned.

  Yeah, Jax had noticed the guy who’d calmly walked into camp the week before, saying he wanted to help fight outlying gangs and take out the main one, Twenty. He’d been armed with knives and guns, yet had kept his hands free. “What kind of a name is Raze, anyway?”

  Tace whistled. “Not so different from Jax.”

  Whatever. Jax needed to sit down and figure out if Raze was a threat or a godsend. For now, Jax gave Wyatt a look. “Let’s get this over with. Your scavengers had better be ready to do some work and find me fuel and food.”

  Wyatt nodded. “There’s our happy leader.”

  Whatever. Jax shoved out of the room, strode past three partitioned examination rooms and out the back door. Crisp air pummeled him right before droplets plopped
onto his head. “We’re in L.A., damn it. Where’s the sun?”

  “Rainy season,” Wyatt mumbled, following him onto the cracked concrete of what used to be a busy roadway and now just led to the main training facility. Barrels lined both sides of the street, already capturing crucial rain water, while a row of makeshift showers took up the far side of headquarters.

  The world was too dangerous to worry about modesty.

  Jax clomped across the road and empty parking lot and pushed open the main door to what used to be a pawnshop. “I’m glad they’re coming here,” he muttered, crossing into the main area, which was littered with metal tables from a former smokehouse.

  “Of course—they’re on the way. God forbid you go inner territory and actually meet some of the people you’re willing to die for.” Wyatt pulled out a chair and dropped into it, winced, and tugged a knife from his back pocket.

  Jax sat and leaned his elbows on the metal table. Dawn had finally arrived, and even with the storm, a barely there soft light flickered into the room, making lanterns unnecessary. He’d worked with Wyatt for six months, and he trusted the man with his life. For now, they could get back to business. “Any indication the woman was followed here last night?”

  “No. The area surrounding us is secure.” Wyatt grabbed a pencil and twirled it on his dark fingers, one of which held a Super Bowl ring. “Where is the woman, anyway?”

  “My quarters, under guard.” Jax leaned back. “She was barely standing up, she was so tired. Probably has been traveling hard, hiding out, trying to keep from being seen.” He’d get her entire story later, when he had time. Right now, he had fires to put out. “I’ve ordered the soldiers who saw her blue heart to stay quiet for now and not share with the rest of the group. Are you with me on this one or not?”

  “I’m with you.” Wyatt focused intently, a six-and-a-half-foot ex-linebacker for the San Francisco 49ers who now shot a rifle as well as he used to hit quarterbacks. “If the Twenty gang finds out we have her, they’ll attack.”

  Jax had been expecting an attack any day. “They want our medical supplies anyway. Keep the patrols up and keep everyone prepared. They’re gonna hit us soon.”

  “I know, and I’m worried about the Mercenaries.” Wyatt grimaced, stood, and held his stomach. “Ah, I’ll be right back.”

  Jax snorted. “Did you eat the burned soup?”

  “Shut up.” Wyatt turned and ran for the door.

  Poor guy. Human digestive tracts had gotten lazy with civilization. Jax leaned back his head and shut his eyes, allowing the quiet to center him. He’d created family in the military, as close to family as the gang of his youth and the survivors he now led. Wyatt had been his first trusted soldier in the new world.

  Jax had caught the illness in Afghanistan and had watched the bacteria kill most of his unit in dust-filled tents with medical personnel who had died right along with them. The second he’d regained his health, he’d hopped on a transport home, where hell had already descended.

  He’d learned his brother had been killed months before by a bullet, and since he had no family left after Scorpius, nobody had told him.

  He drifted deeper into the past as he waited for Wyatt to return.

  Buildings crumbled like they always had in the rough area of L.A., and shadows lingered, like before, waiting to harm. But these were different. Jax wandered down the street, looking for survivors, when the patter of gunfire stopped him cold.

  The small distribution center. Shit.

  Dodging into a run, he hurried around rusting cars to the warehouse, finding a group of Twenty gang members firing on a huge black guy wearing a bloody football jersey. The man looked familiar and seemed to be protecting the warehouse.

  Keeping out of sight, Jax had angled around to the back, only to find a bunch of elderly people and kids hiding in the warehouse near a barrel of what looked like toasted oats.

  The gang would kill them without a thought.

  Jax hustled by them, gun out, and inched up behind the football player’s side. “I’m with you.”

  The guy half turned, a wild glint in his dark eyes. “You sure?”

  “Yep. Jax Mercury.” He angled farther and fired, clipping a Twenty member in the side, having given up his allegiance the second he’d taken his oath in the military. “You have any combat experience?”

  “Wyatt Quaid. No.”

  “From the Niners?” Jax took aim and fired again. A yelp of pain filled the afternoon.

  Wyatt fired and hit the dirt. “I used to be.”

  “Go left, and I’ll go right,” Jax said, shifting into command mode. For now, he had a mission, and he’d win it.

  “Jax?” Wyatt asked, yanking him back into the present.

  “Is your stomach okay?”

  “No.” Wyatt grimaced. “You ready?”

  “Yep.”

  The back door to the cavernous space opened, and a group of fifteen people filed in. They wore torn clothing but had jackets and hand-stitched patches on their arms showing they’d completed the training for scavenging. Jax breathed out. “Fuck, they’re young.”

  Wyatt winced. “No shit.”

  “They’re supposed to at least be sixteen years old,” Jax muttered.

  “They are.” Wyatt stood. “Line up.”

  The kids, and there was no doubt they were kids, formed two lines of ten. Jax shoved to his feet, eyeing them. A couple kept his gaze, while several more dropped theirs to the floor. “How many sections are there inside our grid?” he asked.

  “Seven,” a blond girl in the back said.

  The girl should’ve been planning for college and going to dances, not memorizing the layout of their territory. “Good. How many sections outside to the west?”

  “Fifty sections straight west,” a kid barely sporting a goatee said from the left.

  “Good.” Jax walked back and forth in front of the line. The kids were smart so far. “Do you ever go out of your ordered area?” he asked.

  “Only in extreme situations to avoid Rippers.” The blonde spoke up again.

  “What’s a Ripper?” Jax asked.

  A couple of the kids chuckled. “Zombies,” one muttered. Jax cut a hard look at Wyatt.

  Wyatt shook his head. “Zombies don’t exist, dumbass.”

  The kid with the goatee shot an elbow into his buddy’s gut. “We know that. First of all, zombies aren’t real.” He stood at attention. “Second of all, if zombies did exist, then they’d be what was left over after a human died. The person dies, and then the zombie bug takes over. Everyone who ever watched The Walking Dead knows that.” He sighed and looked down at his feet. “And third, zombies don’t exist in real life.”

  “That was number one,” his buddy drawled.

  “No shit.” The kid rubbed his eyes. “But if they’re still human, it seems like we could reason with them.”

  Jax rolled a shoulder. So long as the kids knew how to scavenge and how to defend themselves, he had to send them out. “You have to understand that the bacteria does not always kill human beings; sometimes the patient survives, but the Scorpius bacteria still remains within the body, stripping a small part of the brain. The contagion alters brain activity in everybody who is infected, but only turns half of the folks into killers. We don’t know why. It might have something to do with oxytocin, which is a chemical we think relates to empathy. Some folks lose it all, and some only part or none.”

  The kid nodded. “So there’s no hope for Rippers.”

  “No.” Jax kept the kid’s gaze. “Don’t try to reason with them. There are two main types of Rippers. The first is organized and intelligent like a serial killer. If one of these attacks you, it’s planned, and they have bad things in mind for you. The second is disorganized and just plain crazy, and they’re more likely to rip you apart like an animal. Run from either.”

  The kids started to shuffle their feet.

  Jax put a bite into his voice. “When you’re out on a mission, your goal is to
be as quiet as possible. Don’t be seen, and definitely don’t be heard. What’s your motto?”

  “Shoot first, question later,” the kids said in unison.

  “Good.” Jax clasped his hands at his back and walked toward a small girl, another blonde, this one with bright blue eyes. What was her name? Haylee. Yeah, that was it. Her mother, April, worked as a cook at the soldier headquarters. “Who’s the enemy?” he asked softly.

  Haylee kept his gaze. “Everybody not in Vanguard.” Sadness and determination lifted her chin.

  “Yes. Out there you’ll find Rippers, rival gangs, and just ordinary people willing to kill you over a bottle of water. You wouldn’t be wearing that patch if you weren’t fit and prepared to fight.” He’d set the training requirements himself, and they included learning how to fight hand-to-hand, with a knife, and with guns. The kids were as much soldiers as scavengers, but he needed supplies more than protection right now. “We require medical supplies, food, water, and gas. Go out and find some.”

  Haylee drew in air. Her eyes held both an old wisdom and a desolate acceptance. “To what end?”

  Jax paused. “That’s a good question. Right now, it’s to survive. The bacteria is still running its course, Rippers are either getting reckless or planning big, and rival gangs want our supplies. For now, we fight.”

  She swallowed. “For now.”

  Smart kid. “Then hopefully we find a cure or at least a way to live with the infection, and we build anew.” Including some sort of civilization.

  “But now we fight,” she whispered, her face too pale.

  He tried to infuse confidence and arrogance into his voice. “And we win.”

  The kids stood at attention and then slowly filed out.

  Jax eyed Wyatt.

  “I know. They’re young and have no clue what a Ripper will do.”

  Yeah, but who did? Jax loped toward papers taped to the west wall where the entire seven square blocks of his territory had been painstakingly drawn. The outside buildings had all been fortified with turned-over trucks, vans, and other vehicles. Kids and the elderly were in the dead center near the hospital, which used to be an elementary school, and the current food depot, which had once been a small grocery store.