The strange pod reminded the doctor of the Amorphophallus titanium plant, or the Corpse Flower, as it is otherwise known, due to its odor, which is reminiscent of the smell of a decomposing mammal. It can be found in the rainforests of Sumatra. The plant can grow over three meters tall, with a large purple, wraparound single petal, with the towering, phallus looking bud that grows out of the top.
The black, pulsating pod looks like the Corpses Flowers spathe – that is a sheath to enclose the flower cluster. But unlike the plants he knew of, he wondered what was inside the alien looking black spathe?
From the thick muscular legs, he could tell all the other dead people he had found were males. If this was how fast the new strain worked, then the likelihood of finding anyone alive inside the bunker would be almost impossible.
His legs were weak, and his thirst made his throat raw. He needed water.
Then it dawned on him; he had water strapped across his chest and back. The cooling pads were filled with frozen water, which was now melted.
Bachman leaned against the wall. With a click of each wrist, the thick attached rubber gloves released his hands. He could pull his hands back into the bloated suit, which was a safety measure, in case he had to cut himself free. The inflated suit gave him room to maneuver inside. He pulled a pack from off his chest. With the knife strapped to his inside harness, he forced the lid off the pack. He had to lift the mask, but he had enough air inside the suit to last while he drank. The water was tepid, but it was the best water he had ever tasted. He pulled another pack free and guzzled that one down as well. He replaced the empty packs, and forced his hands back in the rubber gloves, then screwed them back into the catches on his wrists. It then dawned on him. He may have drunk too much and need to urinate soon. He would cross that bridge if he ever got to it.
He stood still, letting the water course through his body, bringing a renewed strength – a second wind.
Bachman considered the pods.
He became complacent over the years. To him, they were just hunks of matter. A plant that needed studying for the government. He worked everyday doing the same experiments, with the same results. He didn’t look at it as being alien, just different. It became matter-of-fact. Just something he did – work – a paycheck.
He knew the history, with Clarkson and everything that had happened. He knew what they were capable of. But there was just one left unfound. He thought maybe the ancients had miscounted, and that there were only six pods.
Maybe one popped, that’s how they knew what they were capable of? He reasoned at the time. Some believed the biblical flood was really a pandemic caused by a pod. That’s why the seventh was never found, it had already been touched. He remembered thinking at the time. Now he knew different. He saw more being grown. So even if the seventh had caused the flood, another would have replaced it. Or do they need replacing after they had released their load, or does it simply grow more? He didn’t know.
After being around the thing for decades, seeing it everyday, he had forgotten just how deadly it was. All because it was behind bullet-proof glass, way underground, did it make it less deadly?
Mankind’s complacently has backfired. We believe we can control everything, and that nothing is beyond our grasp. We have almost become extinct due to one single pod, and now there’re another seven eager to join the fight.
He didn’t even know what would happen if they all managed to reach the surface?
He shook himself and checked his air supply.
Twenty-four minutes left.
He had to hurry if he wanted to stop the pods. The only problem was he had no idea how to achieve that goal.
He continued climbing. Slowly placing one foot in front of the other. The stairs seemed endless. They were the longest flight of steps he had ever climbed.
He passed three more bodies of people who attempted to escape via the only means available to them.
On one section of steps, where two people had fallen together, the roots entwined each other, creating a mass of black tendrils he had to climb over. The roots clung to everything, wrapping around the banister rail and wall. They looked like a rotten creeping vine. He had to grip them to pull himself up. As he did his hand brushed one of the tall black spathes. He was sure something moved under the thick black skin. But he couldn’t be sure because of his thick gloves.
The bodies looked like they had been hit by a grenade. Their top halves were gone.
The roots squirmed beneath his feet and his grip. At his touch, all the small pods growing on them popped, blasting him with spores. He heard them brushing against the plastic of the suit, as if trying to find a way inside.
It was a difficult climb. He hoped, as he got higher, he wouldn’t come across more remains of people. He didn’t know how he would manage to climb over a whole group at once.
A door!
Thank god, he almost shouted.
He knew there was no way he had climbed all the way to the populated part of the bunker. He would be surprised if he was even a quarter of the way. So he wondered what the door could lead to this far down.
76
Alex and Troy
In the truck on Main Street, Mole Town
A military installation outside New York City
Fuck! That didn’t just happen? Alex’s brain screamed. No way did Juan just do that?
There was nothing he could do. Juan was already crushed under a pile of creatures. The noise intensified as they fought to get to the fresh meat.
Juan was the last person I would have thought capable of sacrificing himself to protect others. Or maybe it was the spores turning him mad?
Troy turned to see what the commotion was about. He showed no emotions as he turned back to concentrate on his driving.
The front windshield continued to be pounded. A larger crack appeared. A clawing hand reached in, forced with primal strength. The skin started to peel back as it was trying to reach through. The fingernails were clipped and torn and bloody, looking red raw. The little finger was missing completely; just a bleeding, festering stump remained with a sharp protruding broken bone.
Alex closed his eyes. He wanted to think happy thoughts, not concentrate on an arm determined to reach him even if it meant stripping the arm of flesh and muscle. He could see the creatures face pressed hard up against the screen as it used all its strength to reach him.
All he could think about was the creatures outside. He had no calming center to reach for. The acceptance he felt a moment before was washed away when he witnessed the teeth shredding Juan. The last instant when he locked eyes with him, he knew he would take that look to his grave. Considering it would be within minutes. In a way, he was glad he wouldn’t have to describe that scene to Juan’s sister.
How do you tell someone their brother is dead? How do you break the news? How would you start? Hey, guess what, you know you used to have a brother…
Suddenly, there was a new sound above everything else. A roaring sound. Then the reverberating rumble of a powerful machine gun. The burps drowned out everything.
Is it our salvation, or another situation hell-bent on killing us all?
The grasping hand in the windshield froze with fingers arched, as if its owner realized there was an easier target available. In a flash, it pulled free, leaving behind a chunk of wrinkled flesh, as the creature ran and jumped off the bonnet and vanished among the crowd.
Through the pouring rain, Alex could see the other naked creatures getting drawn towards the new sound.
Then Alex saw them – it was Terrance and Lindell. It was hard to tell from the distance through the dirty screen and rain. It looked like Lindell was driving an open-topped jeep, with Terrance stood up behind the .50 caliber, shooting off rounds at the mass of creatures, but making sure he didn’t aim anywhere near the truck, due to the fact the bullets would rip through it like paper.
The infected didn’t seem to care about bullets; they churned towards the new sound, and the fact t
hey could see two people within reach, that weren’t secured behind metal and glass drove them on.
The ground thinned considerably. A few stragglers continued to pound on the container and some on the glass, but the wall of flesh was gone, racing towards the jeep.
With a hard jerk, the truck pushed free of all the dead around its tires, now there was no more to add to them. It shot forward, almost tipping over at one stage, but it soon righted itself with a resounding bang as the container slammed down.
Alex didn’t want to look back, but he felt he owed it to Juan. His sacrifice may have saved their lives, distracting some of the creatures. In the side mirror, he could see four blurs crouching over something. One was pulling at a long string of intestines. Alex looked away.
Troy was twisting and turning the wheel, bouncing over bodies, while always looking for the area of least resistance.
To the right, the buildings still burned. The pouring rain had no effect on the inferno. A large section of the wall collapsed on the street, sending a million embers into the air, like dancing fireflies, and chunks of superheated masonry that tumbled and hissed as it poured over the wet street and bodies. The rest of the building started to crumble into itself, folding like a pack of burning cards. Metal rendered, walls doubled over, as it slowly incinerated in a towering plume of thick black smoke.
Creatures ran and scurried over the burning section that lay across the street. They seemed unconcerned as their hands blistered, and some were set alight. There were now numerous burning bodies charging towards the jeep. Like human torches, they charged unconcerned by the heat and flames that were consuming them.
The fallen section of burning building piled up against the firetruck. As Troy dodged prone and running infected, the side of the large firetruck started to give way under the heat. First, the tires popped, then, just as they were closing on the firetruck, it exploded in an expanding ball of flames and shrapnel.
Naked bodies blasted to the side, vanishing behind awash of superheated flames.
Metal pinged off the side of the container. One bit of steel embedded in the windshield. The screen held. It now had a ten-inch chunk of metal through it that still had a red-hot end that steamed as the rain poured over it.
Troy instinctively swerved to the other side of the street, knocking over a trashcan and clipping a streetlight that buckled and crashed down behind them.
Alex jumped on his seat due to the explosion, which surpassed everything else for a fraction of a second. The fireball lit up the whole street in a gold-orange light. Then as the mushroom of flames abated, the sound of fallen metal could be heard as pieces of the firetruck rained back down onto the street.
Alex couldn’t see where the soldiers had their last stand. Nothing remained. What the creatures hadn’t consumed the flames incinerated.
He could also see Lindell was drawing the horde away from them. As he sped forward, with Terrance shooting back at the infected as the naked bodies ran behind trying to catch up.
Both brothers were soaked to the skin.
Troy ran over some stragglers, making for a bumpy ride.
They were heading for the main gate. Soon they would be free of the town. A place that offered hope and instead delivered slavery and death. As if the world wasn’t hard enough already.
The large bullets were ripping creatures apart. One bullet would take down three or four at a time as it sliced through them with ease.
The jeep sped around corners, as the heavy rain washed down, cleansing the streets of gore.
Bodies were piled along the road, bleeding out; appendages ripped off by a mixture of metal and velocity, and being hit by Troy when they fell or lagged behind.
The tables have turned. They now had the upper hand.
The main gate loomed into view. The tank and other jeep stood silent. There were no soldiers left to operate them, and if there were any around, they had fled.
The two brothers plan was to get to the main gate while the soldiers were busy. They expected a few would be left behind to defend the entrance. The place was deserted. Lindell hot-wired the jeep. Then together they took all the ammo and cans of full gasoline out of the other jeep and put into their acquired vehicle. There was nothing they could do about the tank. They would have preferred it, but there was no way of getting in without a key – it was more secure than a bank vault.
Alex hoped the men who had their drips ripped out would have time to gain consciousness and find their families. Hopefully, most of the infected had chased after the jeep and truck, giving those left behind a hope of survival. He hoped the creatures hadn’t found the unconscious men and were feasting on them now.
As lightening flashed and thunder rumbled, the jeep smashed through the fence, closely followed by the truck, leaving the town to its own demise.
77
Doctor Bachman
The underground bunker
Quirauk Mountain, Pennsylvania
Bachman stared toward the door. He didn’t know what to expect. A simple storeroom, where products are kept to keep the stairs clean? Why was it in the middle of practically nowhere? It was halfway between two flights.
The door was locked.
Next to it was a fire extinguisher. He unclipped it and used it to bash the lock on the door. It was difficult in the bulky suit with thick rubber gloves on.
The room, or whatever it was, was pitch dark. As he stepped into it, lights flicked on. He found himself in a long thin corridor. The ceiling was over fifteen feet high, with strip lighting. However, it was a tight fit, being only about four feet wide, which made the inflated suit rub against the concrete walls. With difficulty, he turned and pulled the door closed. The corridor seemed relatively empty of spores.
He was confused as to where it could lead.
It could simply be a service corridor, connecting sections of the bunker?
He was just happy to be walking along on flat ground.
There were no doors on either side. No markings or signs on the walls.
Whoever used this doesn’t need signs to remind them of what it’s for; he reasoned.
As he walked, he tried to use logic.
He started at the communication command center on top of the mountain. There he was taken by elevator to the chemical weapons department, where they experimented on the creatures. Where he also left the main area and found a pit full of the infected. He was then taken further down to the pod room.
He checked his air. Only eighteen minutes left.
The corridor seemingly had no end.
He was getting worried.
Maybe I should have kept heading up? I could be simply walking to an air vent shaft or storeroom.
However, he couldn’t explain why, but he knew he was heading in the right direction, as if subconsciously his mind knew roughly where he was in the bunker.
So far, he knew he had only seen the military side of the bunker. There was a whole section around here somewhere, where the civilians were housed.
He made better progress along the flat ground, and he kind of leaned against the wall to support his body.
After what felt like hours, but was, in reality, only four minutes, he came to another door. This one was open. As he walked through he found his theory was right, before him was a huge circular air vent that vanished up into the distance. He could just make out a series of huge fans slowly turning. He was at the base of the main air vent shaft. It must have been forty feet across. To one side, spiraling up was metal steps. A droning sound reverberated down the shaft as the air filters cleaned the air before pumping it around the bunker.
Jesus! I simply swap one set of steps for another, and I lost time walking down the corridor.
Then he noticed a service elevator over embedded into the wall.
Bingo!
78
Alex and everyone else
In the truck, leaving Mole Town
A military installation outside New York City
Alex slum
ped in the seat. The adrenaline that had kept him going had washed away. He had survived. That instant he felt guilty for those who were left behind – Juan, Phyllis, and Abigail.
One simple turning from the highway caused three deaths of our people and scores of others.
The truck sped up the off ramp to the highway. They still couldn’t continue due to the wreckage placed as a trap. Therefore, Troy followed Lindell as they backtracked along the wide road looking for a turning to navigate around.
There was lots of shouting coming from the container, but the voices were muffled and Alex couldn’t tell what was being said. He just presumed Naomi was winding people up again.
Rain lashed the windows and bounced off the highway. Most of the blood and gore was washed away, leaving just a cracked windshield with a hole.
Alex rolled the window down and pushed his head out. The cold rain felt amazing on his face. He looked back. A tall plume of black smoke rose from the town center. A couple of explosions erupted while he watched, as if waiting for him to look, causing fireballs to billow up into the sky.
Troy maneuvered around some abandoned vehicles that Alex remembered from earlier that day. He found it hard to believe that it was only that morning they rolled down the off ramp.
So much has happened in mere hours.
Three dead; everyone shaken, and all our food and water and bedding gone. All that due to one simple turning from the highway.
The people in the back resorted to slamming on the metal.
There was no infected around, and the road was clear, so Lindell decided to pull over to check on everybody. He pulled the jeep up under a collection of overhanging pines. They kept off a lot of the rain, but it fell in heavy accumulated drops instead.
Terrance stayed behind the powerful mounted gun, scanning the tree line and highway. If anything moved, he would cut it in half with the large bullets.
The Sixth Extinction: America (Omnibus Edition | Books 1 – 8) Page 21
