Afterburn: A Post-Apocalyptic Thriller (Next Book 1)

by Scott Nicholson

  Franklin rubbed his crusty beard, found something solid there, and pulled it out and inspected it. Stephen thought he was going to eat it for a second, but the man flicked it to the concrete floor. “Not a bad idea. That reduces the chance that he’ll do something crazy while we’re away. But I still don’t like leaving Marina behind. It kind of feels like we’d be surrendering the bunker.”

  “So?” Stephen said. “I know we’ve worked our asses off to turn this into a home, but what do we have, really? A hole in the ground.”

  “A place where you can sleep at night without creepy critters gnawing your eyeballs out in your sleep. That counts for a lot in this world.”

  “We can all move back to your compound. You’ve had that many people there before, and so far you haven’t been gobbled up, either.”

  Franklin looked at the painted window and the two-dimensional promise it offered. “I’m used to the peace and quiet.”

  “We could chip in with the garden and the livestock. We could produce more than we eat, and you’d have an extra set of eyes to watch your back. Plus, it’s not on the map, unlike this place. The army would never know it existed.”

  “That’s the other thing. You heard the man. The army’s mobilizing, at least what’s left of it. This might be the last stand of the human race. You really want to sit that out?”

  Stephen occasionally debated Franklin about the possible tactics they could employ against the mutants, usually while playing chess. The theories were wild and wholly uninformed, since they really knew nothing about the enemy and how the Zaps might’ve mutated over the years.

  What did their civilization look like now? What was their behavior? How many were there? What kinds of weapons would it take to defeat them?

  In the end, those had been intellectual exercises about as useful to their lives as the outcome of their chess games—checkmating the opponent’s king brought a moment of satisfaction and pride, but you immediately set up the pieces for the next game.

  “If you really think we have a chance—the human race, I mean—then we should just offer the bunker to support the cause,” Stephen said. “And we should enlist if they’ll let us. I mean, you’re probably too old to be any use—”

  “You just shut that fresh little pie-hole there, you runt. I’ve got more scalps on my belt than you got hairs on your chest, so don’t be counting me out of the fun.”

  Stephen grinned. One sure way to get Franklin to go back on his own principles was to challenge his manhood. “You sure you could handle taking orders from the government?”

  “Oh, hell, you’re right. They’d probably store my name on a list somewhere in New Pentagon, so that when all this is over they’ll have a place to send the tax bill.”

  “I don’t think we’ll have to worry about that for a long, long time, old man,” Stephen said, relishing the idea more and more. There were uniforms in storage, although they’d mostly chosen to scavenge civilian clothes from the houses in the valleys below.

  He pictured himself buttoned down and ramrod straight, a helmet on his head, maybe even some brass insignias on his chest. Marina might think he was hot.

  But I can’t leave her behind. She’d have to join up, too. And where does that leave the others?

  “I might even get a haircut,” Stephen said.

  “If it gets a few inches off that shaggy, flea-ridden mop of yours, then that’s mission accomplished in itself.”

  “I’m in,” Stephen said. “But I can’t make a final commitment until I discuss it with Rachel and DeVontay. Which means we have to find them.”

  “All right,” Franklin said. “I’ll talk to the captain and see if he can spare a couple of men. Offer our support, make some plans, and do our part to make the world safe for democracy. Holy shit, I can’t believe I’m saying this.”

  “One other thing,” Stephen said. “We need to cut a deal with him about Kokona. It’s weird enough to be declaring war on her people when we’ve been taking care of her all these years.”

  “Yeah.” Franklin nodded thoughtfully. “Kinda like a bunch of white slave-owners signing the Declaration of Independence and then patting themselves on the back for being so noble.”

  “Let’s win back the world first, and then we can worry about the paperwork.”

  “Fine with me,” Franklin said. “You start packing, then get some sleep if you can find a bunk. I’ll deal with the captain.”

  “Cool. Meet at the door at around six o’clock?”

  “That’s oh-six-hundred to you, soldier. May as well start learning the lingo.”

  Stephen snapped off a salute and they entered the hall. Stephen took a last look inside, and even its eight-by-ten perimeter seemed way too large without Rachel and DeVontay in it. He closed the door behind him, promising they would be sleeping here by this same time tomorrow.

  Most of the doors were closed along the narrow hallway, although someone was clattering around in the mess area opening some pouches for a midnight snack. The telecom room was open, the flickering lights of the monitors spilling out onto the floor.

  Then the light was interrupted by a silhouette. The captain rushed from the room and glanced toward the bunker’s entrance, then back at Franklin and Stephen.

  “What’s wrong?” Franklin asked.

  “Those parts on the desk,” Antonelli said. “From the bird. Did you take them?”

  “Why would I do that?” Franklin asked.

  “What about you?” Antonelli said to Stephen, eyes narrowing in suspicion.

  Hmm, maybe I need to reconsider signing up under this clown.

  “I don’t know nothing,” Stephen said.

  “Well, they’re gone. All gone.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  “You’re the only one of them,” Kokona said to Colleen.

  “What do you mean?” Colleen asked.

  She gently unrolled the bandage covering Huynh’s shattered leg. The main laceration ran from just under his knee down to six inches above the ankle, but most of the damage was in the center of the lower leg. She hadn’t attempted to set any of the shards of bone, since that would require surgery, but the outer edges of the wound were already a shade of deep red going toward purple.

  “All the others are afraid of me,” Kokona said. “Not you. You’re more curious than anything.”

  Colleen was a little afraid, but she was glad it didn’t show. She credited her veneer of bravery to the knowledge that Mark was counting on her. So was Huynh. And maybe in a way, all the others were, too.

  “We’re grateful you want to help our friend,” Colleen said. She arranged the few medical implements on the coffee table beside the betadine, alcohol, and water.

  “Especially since he’s a human?” Kokona asked. The baby laughed, a melodic, gleeful sound that was in the same high pitch as her voice.

  “She’s kind of blunt,” Marina said, sitting on the bunk across from Huynh and holding Kokona in her lap.

  “I see that,” Colleen said. “I appreciate it, since we don’t have much time to spare.”

  “He’s stable,” Kokona said. “So tell me about yourself. How did you wind up here?”

  Colleen started to protest and insist they had to proceed right now, but she didn’t have any authority or power here. If she knew what to do, she’d already have done it.

  “Recently, you mean?”

  “Start with the storms,” Kokona said. “I don’t know anything before that.”

  Colleen thought back to those days just before the world changed, utterly and for all time, and she almost panicked when she realized most of those memories were lost. Well, not exactly lost, just so buried that she had difficulty accessing them. Much of the past five years had been spent on moment-to-moment survival, and nostalgia seemed like a luxury she couldn’t afford.

  Now you’re starting to think like Mark. Maybe you’ve been spending too much time around him.

  But if the brilliant, mutant baby wanted a little entertainment bef
ore they got down to the task at hand, Colleen would do it. For her duty and for Mark.

  “I was public relations rep for an airline,” she said. “Do you know what airplanes are?”

  “Yes, she’s not a dummy,” Marina said. “She reads a lot.”

  “Be nice, Marina,” Kokona said. “She can’t help it. I’m the first Zap she’s ever met, I bet.”

  No, I’ve met, them. But none like you.

  “I worked in D.C., lobbying federal agencies and officials for the airlines,” she continued. “On safety regulations and those kinds of things that add cost to business. When the solar storms started, we had major airline problems. The air traffic controllers reported regional communication outages, and then planes started dropping out of the sky. We didn’t know until later that the EMF bombardment had scrambled their navigation systems and fried the electronics that controlled the engines. Of course, shortly after that the power grid failed and we were all in the dark.

  “I was actually at Reagan Airport when the worst wave hit, and a landing jetliner rolled off the runway and into the terminal. It exploded, and the jet fuel scorched dozens of people around me. I ran, but bodies were still dropping even when I was well away from the fire. That’s when I saw the first Zap.” She checked Kokona’s expression and couldn’t decipher any emotions. “It’s okay to call them ‘Zaps,’ right?”

  “Narrative license,” Kokona said. “Feel free,”

  “No offense. I don’t know what you call yourselves.”

  “We don’t call ourselves anything. We just are. But we understand your need to categorize us and make sense of things. Please go on.”

  “There were a couple of soldiers just in from Afghanistan, and one of them had a pistol. You’re not supposed to take guns on planes, but I’m lucky he didn’t follow the law. They saw Zaps attacking people and they basically saved me and a few others. I stuck with them until they found some other soldiers, and soon we were part of a new military force.”

  “You joined?”

  “I wasn’t forced to join, but it was the first sign of organized social behavior I’d seen since the apocalypse.”

  “Strange that you consider it an apocalypse, but for us it was a genesis,” Kokona said, her hands clasped fetchingly under her chin, her eyes twinkling. “Omega for you, alpha for us, I suppose.”

  “I suppose.” Colleen couldn’t tell if she was being taunted or not. She decided not to divulge any other information of their movements since, or anything that might give away their troop strength and strategic goals. “So that’s my story. I trained and was assigned to Capt. Antonelli’s unit and we ended up here. How about you? Why are you not with the others of your kind?”

  “I volunteered, too,” Kokona said. “As an ambassador. I came with the humans so they would stop killing the rest of us. After all these years, they’ve probably forgotten me.”

  “She’s part of the family now,” Marina said, giving the child an affection kiss on the forehead that made Kokona giggle with pleasure. “My little baby sister.”

  “That’s sweet.” Colleen wanted to learn more, in case any of the information was helpful to Mark, but her immediate task was saving Huynh. “Can we go on with the surgery? How is this going to work, anyway, since your hands…since you can’t hold the instruments? Are you going to tell me what to do?”

  “Surgery?” Kokona said with a laugh. “That’s so primitive.”

  “Well, what do I do?”

  “She does it with her hands,” Marina said. “You should’ve seen her heal herself when she got shot. It was pretty cool. Freaky, but cool.”

  Healing herself? Hands? What exactly IS this?

  Colleen had prepared herself to be ready for anything, but some things were just too incomprehensible to contemplate. Mark hinted the Zaps might have powerful weapons they couldn’t understand and that those horrible bird-machines might have been guided by some sort of mental power. If the Zaps could control matter, then why shouldn’t they be able to repair damaged tissue made of cells?

  Huynh gave a deep gasp and lurched up slightly as if suffering a seizure. Colleen turned and placed a finger on his neck, checking his pulse. She didn’t have time to apply the blood-pressure cuff and check his dangerously low readings. It took all her energy just to pry his teeth apart and make sure he hadn’t swallowed his tongue.

  She sensed Marina beside her, holding the baby down to the Vietnamese soldier’s leg. Her little brown hands reached out as if to play patty cake, never quite making contact with the scalloped flesh.

  Huynh’s pulse jumped beneath her finger, giving a sluggish surge before trailing away. She put her ear to his chest, unable to believe he’d slipped away just that fast. She heard a couple of faint beats and was prepared to give CPR when she saw his eyes roll up and go completely blank, all spark drained out of them.

  Even if she managed to revive his body, his soul was already gone. “Never mind, Kokona,” she said. “He’s dead.”

  But Marina still held the baby in position, its tiny little eyelashes flickering. With the baby’s eyes closed in concentration, the room was much darker, illuminated only by a single small bulb. A hot, metallic odor filled the room. Colleen could’ve sworn she saw sparks fly between the baby’s plump palms and Huynh’s damaged skin.

  Kokona’s eyes must have snapped open because the room suddenly filled with an intense brilliance that resembled the nightly auroras. Colleen blinked against the radiant green glare, trying to make out what was happening. Huynh jerked again, his torso nearly rising off the bed.

  But he’s dead…

  “Kokona?” Marina said, and she sounded as bewildered as Colleen felt. Then the room went dim again and Kokona collapsed in Marina’s arms as if falling unconscious. Marina hugged the baby to her chest, murmuring “Are you okay?”

  “Let me check her,” Colleen said, reaching for the mutant, but Marina turned away. She could see light leaking from the baby’s closed eyelids, so Colleen took that as a sign of life and energy.

  But poor Huynh. She’d been a fool to think the baby could help, despite all of the Zap’s intelligence. Sometimes even the most gifted surgeons couldn’t salvage a patient, and here Colleen and Mark had hoped an infant could manage the job.

  “You shouldn’t have,” Marina said to the baby.

  “I know,” Kokona said in a high, clear voice. “But I did anyway.”

  Colleen checked Huynh’s pulse once more, and it was still absent. She ascribed the jerking motion to a reflex, an early sign of impending rigor mortis.

  “Is that all you need?” Kokona asked Colleen.

  “Yes, I can handle it from here. Thanks for…trying.”

  “I’d wrap the wounded leg so the others don’t see. They won’t understand.”

  “Sure,” Colleen said. “Maybe you two should go get some rest. I’ll take care of things here.”

  After Marina carried the baby away, rocking her gently, Colleen pulled the blanket over Huynh’s face. They would have to remove the body in the morning, but perhaps with the elimination of the birds, they could grant him a decent burial.

  She was exhausted and suffering from claustrophobia. The room was oppressive, with the stench of Huynh’s wound and that strange burnt-hair electric smell cloying the air. She was putting away the tools and the antiseptic when she sensed a whisper of movement behind her.

  The blanket rose, lumped in the shape of a head and torso sitting up.

  The blanket slid down and Huynh’s face came into view, fraught with shadows in the poor lighting. He opened his eyes and stared at her as if not recognizing her.

  “Private Huynh?”

  His mouth parted in a long sigh, and his breath was foul, as if he’d taken a final lungful to carry into the coffin and now had to relinquish it.

  Huynh leaned forward as if he didn’t have the strength to support himself. Colleen caught him, not quite believing he was back among the living. But his breathing was steady as she laid him back against th
e pillow. He stared past her at the ceiling with an expression of weary wonder as if he’d just returned from a long trip to a foreign land.

  Colleen wasn’t sure Huynh could hear her, or if he was in a strange delirium, but she soothed him anyway. “Just rest now, Private. Help is on the way.”

  She regretted the lie instantly. There would be no helicopter evacuation, no ambulance with siren blaring, no hospital emergency ward. No doctor. No recovery.

  No hope.

  You should’ve just stayed dead. Mutants may be intelligent and different, but they can’t play God.

  She debated giving him a morphine injection. The shot might kill him, but was that the worst possible outcome? He didn’t seem to be suffering, though. His eyes closed again and he almost looked like he was smiling.

  Someone knocked on the door. She remembered Marina had covered the window, and the room was likely so dim no one could see in anyway. She lifted the makeshift curtain and saw Mark.

  She let him in and he gave her a fleeting hug. “What happened?”

  “Nothing. Just some lights. From her eyes, I think.”

  “She’s just playing games. Taunting us.”

  Mark moved to Huynh’s bedside. “How is he?”

  “His heart failed for a second, but it could’ve been seizures. I don’t know. I’m way over my head here.”

  He squeezed her shoulder to comfort her. “You’re doing the best you can, and that’s all we can do. What do you think?”

  “I’ll stay with him, but I need to get some sleep. I’m starting to get a little spacey. I can’t trust my perception.”

  “Okay, honey. If he makes it to morning, then we’ll figure out the next step.”

  Colleen sagged against him, wishing they were camped under the aurora-veiled stars instead of this suffocating concrete box. “I love you, honey.”

  “I love you, too, Colleen. You’re more important to me than…whatever it is we’re doing here.”

  Colleen felt a cheap glow of victory, followed instantly by a tidal wave of shame. Mark’s sense of duty was one of his most appealing aspects. It made him confident, reliable, and sexy. And she was emasculating him by poisoning his will, weakening his commitment to the ideals he held most dear.