The Alpha Plague - Books 1 - 8: A Post-Apocalyptic Action Thriller

by Michael Robertson

  With every metre they moved deeper into the tunnel, the ceiling got lower. It hadn’t quite become necessary yet, but Matt walked with a slight stoop as if the ceiling were too low already. The oppressive weight of their ever-shrinking space pushed down on him. “Anyway, it’s more than a piece of graffiti,” he said. “It’s the sign of the revolutionaries. It might not be Enfield, but I knew people were still alive. That symbol didn’t look very old. I believe the resistance movement is as strong as ever. We just need to find it.”

  The tension left Louise’s frame and her arms sagged. “You should have been honest with me, Dad. I get that we need to keep hope alive and I would have got behind that, but you need to stop treating me like a child.”

  “But you are a…” Matt stopped when Louise turned to look at him. He couldn’t see her face, but the strong beam of her torch served as an interrogator’s spotlight.

  “We’re in this together,” she continued and avoided the argument. She clearly didn’t want to fight. “Let me decide where I get my will to survive from. I have that will and I won’t lose it, but please don’t lie to me anymore.”

  At first Matt didn’t respond. As they walked, he ran his hand along the wall of the tunnel. Exposed brickwork and damp earth caught his fingers. Maybe he’d find a worm or bug or something. He swallowed another dry gulp, but the taste of muddy rainwater still turned his stomach. Despite the weight of the water bottles that hung from his bag, he didn’t reach around for one. He could get a lot thirstier before he needed to drink.

  “Look,” Matt said, “I’m sorry. It’s really hard for me to accept that my little girl’s growing up. I want you to live a life where you don’t have to worry, but I’m a realist. At some point you may need to stand on your own two feet. I couldn’t protect your mother for always, and I’m sure that’ll be the same with you at some point.”

  Louise stopped and turned to her dad. Blinded by her head torch, Matt didn’t see her hands until she’d grabbed a hold of his. “You’ve been great for me. You’ve done everything you can to keep me alive and given me the best life you’ve been able to. I can see how hard you’re trying and that’s all I can ask for. But you’re right; I need to learn how to survive by myself.”

  Choked by his daughter’s words, Matt finally opened his mouth to reply but stopped dead when he heard a deep hum. “Did you hear that?”

  Louise looked back down the tunnel in the direction they’d come from. Her eyes widened. “A drone.”

  Matt’s pulse accelerated. “More than one.”

  The girl in front of him, the young woman, squeezed his hands. “Oh fuck.”

  Chapter 22

  The soft ground pulled on Matt’s feet as he ran. The heavy bag on his back added an extra weight that sank him deeper with every step.

  Not only did the bag make him heavier, but every jolt ripped fire through his shoulders. Maybe he should just dump the cursed thing. It’s not like the supplies would do them any good if a gargantuan got a hold of them.

  The sound of the drones chased after them in the dark tunnel. It had worked before, so he had to try it again. “Louise.”

  A few steps ahead of him, she pulled up, gasped for breath, and shrugged. “What?”

  Unlike the tunnel before, they had very little space. Matt still pulled her to the ground and dragged his coat over them.

  Huddled beneath it, the pair of them panted like thirsty dogs.

  The hum grew louder.

  The drones got so close that Matt felt the vibrations of them in his chest. With every muscle in his body locked tight, he waited for the swarm to fly past them. But the loud hum remained constant—the drones hovered just metres away.

  Although Matt and Louise waited for a few more seconds, it seemed pretty fucking obvious that they’d been spotted. Matt’s entire being sank, and he released an exasperated sigh. “I’m sorry,” he said to his daughter.

  He pulled his coat away and looked up at the four drones. Each one hung in the air above them. The small red light of their cameras focused down on the pair.

  Exhausted, Matt shook where he sat.

  Then the alarms went off. Four times louder than before, they rang at a frequency that felt like it could pop Matt’s eyeballs.

  When Matt looked at Louise, her saw her with her hands clamped over her ears, her mouth wide in a silent scream.

  And then it stopped.

  For a moment, the drones simply hovered above the pair. Then they turned around and shot back down the tunnel in the direction they’d come from.

  Matt and Louise stared at one another.

  Matt felt it before he heard it: a shift through the ground. The damp earth seemed to absorb a lot, but not all of it.

  Then another tremor. This time some dirt fell from the ceiling.

  Then another. Louder as the thing got closer.

  Chapter 23

  The ground shook beneath Matt’s feet as he ran. Each heavy thud threw him slightly off balance. The soggy earth and poor light hampered his progress, but he couldn’t slow down. No fucking way.

  When his foot caught beneath what felt like a root, Matt fell forward and landed knees-first. The damp earth soaked through his trousers.

  Although Louise looked behind, he waved her on. “Keep going.”

  He jumped to his feet, wiped the earth from his hands on his top and followed after her.

  The ground shook again. It sounded like thunder chased them; as if Thor were on their tail as he pounded the floor with Mjolnir. A war cry to the gods that Matt and Louise’s time on this earth had expired.

  Each heavy gargantuan footfall boomed louder than the one before. Dirt poured down from the ceiling onto Matt’s head. It fell like rain through his torch light.

  The farther they ran into the tunnel, the more the ceiling closed down on them. Where he hadn’t had to duck before, but chose to, Matt now had to run with a stoop. The pain from his backpack ripped through his shoulders, so Matt slipped the straps free and cast it off. If they made it out alive, they could come back for it.

  Puffed out, Matt gasped for breath in the heady environment, the air thicker with damp the farther they ran into the tunnel. Although, whether he could breathe or not didn’t matter; with a fucking gargantuan on his tail, the only thing that could stop him would be a cardiac arrest.

  “Louise,” Matt called and fought to regain his breath. “Are you okay?”

  Louise gave him thumbs up before she disappeared around the corner in front of them.

  When Matt followed her around a second later, he ran into her. She’d stopped in the middle of the path.

  In front of them, whether it had collapsed or they’d reached the end of the tunnel, stood a wall of earth.

  The ground still shook from the gargantuan footsteps. Each one ran a harder vibration than the one before.

  Matt and Louise stared at it and they both fought for breath.

  The ground shook.

  Urine ran warm and then cold against Matt’s thighs.

  The ground shook.

  Louise started the cry.

  The ground shook.

  The ground shook.

  The ground shook.

  Chapter 24

  Matt turned around and faced the direction from which the gargantuan approached them. He pulled Louise in behind him.

  A large lump of earth fell from the ceiling and broke over Matt’s head. He rubbed the sting as he stared into the darkness and waited.

  With his daughter holding onto his back, Matt took deep breaths to try to still his furious pulse. Louise cried louder than before.

  The same question that Matt had asked himself a thousand times in the past ten years came into his mind. What would Scarlett do? "Louise.”

  She didn’t reply.

  Another lump of mud broke over Matt’s head. He kept his focus on the tunnel. “Louise.”

  Although weak, she forced the word out. “Yeah.”

  “I want you to trust me, okay?”

&
nbsp; Heavy sobs answered him.

  “I want you to trust what I’m about to do. You want me to talk to you like an adult, so that’s what I’m going to do. The fact is… we’re fucked. At least one of us has to go. I want it to be me.”

  She cried harder.

  “The Elite don’t give a fuck about children, and that’s how they will view you. They never have and they never will. So while they never valued children’s welfare, I don’t think they’ll try to kill you either. I want you to hide, okay?”

  The same meek voice replied. “Yep.”

  “Good girl.” Yet another dry gulp, and Matt filled his lungs. It did nothing to calm him down. A large stone fell from the ceiling and cracked him on the head as he stared into the dark. It rocked him, but he shook the dizziness away and managed to remain upright.

  Chapter 25

  Stood in a shower of dirt, Matt’s heart beat on the edge of a panic attack. The footsteps of the gargantuan boomed like a tribal drum that came for them down the tunnel.

  “I’m sorry I let your mum die,” Matt said. “I’m sorry I didn’t do more to save her when The Elite Army beat her to death.” Tears blurred his sight. “I watched it happen. I watched every brutal second of it, and I did nothing.”

  The footsteps thudded.

  “I was a selfish arsehole. I should have done more.”

  The strength returned to Louise’s voice when she said, “No you weren’t, Dad. You had to let it happen. You couldn’t have risked your life too. Someone had to look after me.”

  The image of Scarlett cradling a pretend baby at Matt from the other side of Parliament square flooded his mind. His tears flowed stronger than ever.

  “You did what you had to do.”

  For the first time since he’d pushed her behind him, Matt turned around and stared at his daughter. Although a watery vision, he saw her clearly—clearer than he’d seen her in a long time. He had to take one last look at his reason for being.

  He then pulled her in tight and squeezed her slim body. “I love you more than I love myself.” He paused as he tried to compose himself. “As long as you survive this, I’ll feel like I’ve won. Don’t give up hope, my precious. Don’t ever give up hope, okay?”

  Louise’s head torch bobbed up and down in a nod, but she didn’t speak.

  “Whatever they take away, they can’t take away the love I have for you. My soul will eternally cherish you, and they can’t do anything to damage that. You’re a young woman now. You can make it on your own.”

  The ceiling shifted and shook above them. What looked like fault lines opened up and Matt had to cover his head to try to find some protection from the mud and rock onslaught.

  Light flooded into their space. A hole had been torn through the ceiling. Blinded by the brightness, Matt blinked several times and rubbed his eyes.

  Once his vision had cleared it took him a couple of seconds to find his words. “What the hell?”

  Chapter 26

  The egghead of a man, still dressed in a suit and with a blue tie pulled tight against his neck, peered down at the pair.

  Matt continued to blink against the magnesium glare of light that shone down on them. It almost created a halo effect around the pudgy leader.

  As Matt’s eyes adjusted, he saw that the leader of the Trojans had company. Seated in a circle, rings upon rings of people ran all the way up to the sky. Just to look at how high they stretched up made Matt’s head spin.

  “Where are we?” said Louise, her voice quiet.

  While he kept his eyes on the old prime minister, Matt replied so only his daughter could hear. “It looks like we’re in the bottom of an amphitheatre.”

  “A what?”

  “A stadium. A coliseum. These people look like they’ve been expecting us.”

  With every second that passed, Matt’s eyes adjusted to the light and his vision cleared. The people in the crowd looked like they’d enjoyed a life of privilege, and despite the state of London, they looked like they still enjoyed that life. Well-dressed, clean, and obviously well fed, the apocalypse hadn’t hit wherever they’d chosen to reside.

  The gargantuan loomed large behind the leader and stared down with everyone else. A huge robot, it stood thirty stories tall at least—taller than even the highest row of spectators. Its jaw, massive and hinged like the scoop on a digger, jutted out. Almost human in form, its jowls had taken on the red tinge of blood from where it had undoubtedly broken many a body with its crocodilian snap. Its large eyes glowed scarlet as if powered by a malevolent entity or fuelled on the blood it had spilled.

  Huge hands as big as busses reached down and pulled more of the amphitheatre’s floor away, exposing Matt and Louise further. Some of The Elite stood on their seats and leaned over to get a better view. Every face Matt saw stared back at him with an expression that sat somewhere between curiosity and contempt. They, without a doubt, expected entertainment of some description.

  The same smug smile that had delivered policy after policy to strengthen the wealth of the few, sat on the Trojan leader’s face. “Well, well, well,” he said like he had a new manifesto to deliver.

  At that, the entire place erupted with the vulgar catcalls of The Elite. It sounded like the recordings Matt had heard from the houses of parliament from the old world. Laughter, guffawing, and general merriment; the chorus of support for any judgment the man chose to deliver, regardless of how deeply their policies damaged the people they were supposed to serve.

  “How do you think you got here, Matt?”

  “What the fuck?” Matt said. “How do you know my name?”

  The leader clasped his hands together and interlinked his fingers. He smiled. “We know everything.” He laughed. “So I’ll ask again; how do you think you ended up here?”

  The audience laughed now too.

  Matt didn’t respond, instead he moved closer to Louise and pulled her toward him.

  “You didn’t take London, by the way; we left. We’ve been wiping out the resistance for years now. One rat at a time has fallen to our heavy axe. Before all of this bullshit, before your so-called,”—he made air quotes—“‘revolution’, we tried to give you some kind of choice within a democratic system. Or at least, we created the illusion of a democratic system. The important point is that we gave you a choice. Sure, we set the parameters, and you never had any influence over how the country was run, but you had some agency in your pointless little lives. And how did you treat our generosity? With a,”—air quotes again—“‘revolution’.”

  While he ground his jaw, Matt pointed up at the smug man. “We never had democracy.”

  “Is there an echo in here?” The audience laughed again. “I just admitted that, but you still had some choice. The illusion of choice is better than no choice, right? When you decided to launch a pitiful attempt to overthrow us, we realised that we’d been too generous to even give you that.”

  Matt looked to the Trojan leader’s left and saw the leader of the opposition party. Such fierce enemies in public, they stood side by side now. Matt had voted for them to try to get the Trojans out of power. He’d been an idiot to believe in any of it.

  Before Matt could speak, the leader continued. “We’d carefully planned a system which gave the little man enough choices to create the illusion of free will. We occupied you with pointless shitty jobs. We created debt to first saddle you with it, and then give you some hope that you could work your way out of it before you died. We even gave you a two-party system and their own time in power in the hope it would appease as many people as possible. But you abused that. Since then, we’ve set out to make a point that we can take that away from you. There are very few revolutionaries left. We’ve hunted them all down and exterminated them. You’re one of the last ones. You should be pleased we let you live for so long.”

  Before Matt could reply, he said, “Since you were born, your life has been shaped by us.” A pause as he smiled at Matt. “We wanted to make that point painfully obviou
s tonight.”

  Matt shook his head then screwed his face up at the leader. “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “Did you notice how many closed roads there were between there and where you are now? How many sinkholes? How many diversions you had to make down alleyways? We led you to the cannibals’ warehouse just so we could destroy them in front of you. You didn’t go there because you knew it, you followed our breadcrumbs. And we did it just to instil more fear in you. Did you notice how the sign of the revolutionaries appeared on the tunnel that led here? How the first swarm of drones in the tunnel ignored you? They have infrared; they knew you were there. We set up a rat run and watched you run it. And we did it all just to prove that you should have been grateful for what we originally gave you. Instead, you abused it and launched a pitiful attempt to overthrow us.” His face reddened and he jabbed an angry finger at Matt. “Your wife burned down Number Ten! What you needed to learn today is that we play the drum Matty-boy. We choose who lives and dies… we always have.”

  “If you have so much control,” Matt said, “then why didn’t you kill me straight after you killed Scarlett?”

  A casual shrug, and the leader said, “We preferred to let you to watch it from the other side of Parliament Square.”

  The air left Matt’s lungs and his legs buckled. He only just managed to remain upright. “You knew I was there?”

  “Of course. We then decided to let you live with the decision you’d made. The reason we’ve chosen this moment to reveal ourselves is because you currently have the strongest bond with your daughter that you’ll ever have. Much longer, and she’ll become more self-sufficient and pull away from you. Nature will push you apart. We thought this would be the most painful time for you.”

  Panic rushed through Matt as the calls of “hear hear” and “right on” echoed through the amphitheatre.