Forager - the Complete Six Book Series (A Post Apocalyptic/Dystopian Series)

by Peter R Stone

  Madison and I slipped ghost-like across the street and made our way to a building two doors down from the one Anna was using. Taking a set of lock picks from her belt, my companion had the door open in a moment. Continuing to click with tongues, we hurried through the building and out the back door. Another quick run and we were at the back of the restaurant.

  “Okay, Chelsea,” Madison whispered as she got to work with her lock picks again. “We go in and work our way up to the second floor. If you see Anna, shoot on sight, okay? And for goodness sake, try to make your footsteps and breathing quieter or she’ll hear us from a mile off.”

  “I’ll do my best.”

  “Do better than that.” Madison grabbed her phone. “Smithson? Chelsea and I are in place. Tell your men to cease fire in sixty-seconds.”

  “Roger.”

  She turned to me. “I know this restaurant – I’ve been here before. Anna’s in one of the VIP rooms. Now, follow me and watch my back.”

  She pulled open the door and I followed her inside. With a stealthy approach being our best weapon, we ceased making tongue clicks and navigated by touch and the modicum of moonlight that shone through the windows at both ends of the building.

  Assault rifles couched against our shoulders, we crept through a messy storeroom stacked full of wooden crates, past a well-equipped kitchen, and into the eating area. We moved carefully between glossy wooden tables that reflected the moonlight and leather upholstered chairs, senses on full alert in case any Custodians waited in ambush.

  When we reached a metal spiral staircase leading to the second floor, I realised I could no longer hear the bark of Custodian assault rifles. Our sixty-seconds were up. Straining to see the stairs in the dark, we ascended them as quietly as possible, with Madison in the lead and me close behind, holding the railing with my left hand and gun with the right. I felt handicapped since we couldn’t use echolocation. I’m sure Doctor Zhao never intended his genetically modified children to fight each other like this. He would be turning in his grave if he knew Anna murdered several of her sisters just so she could get a ticket out of here.

  The staircase led to another open eating area. There was a large bar in the middle of the room with rows of upturned glasses glinting in the moonlight.

  We had taken only a few steps when it occurred to me that it wasn’t just the Custodians who stopped firing; I couldn’t hear Anna’s sniper rifle either.

  As if reading my thoughts, a black shape detached from the floor beside a leather chair and sprang towards Madison. There was a deafening bang and blinding flash of light as the lithe shape fired a pistol at my companion. There being no need to hide my ability any longer, I sang out with flash sonar, allowing me to see Madison and a very determined Anna, mouth set in a grimace.

  Fortunately, Madison had heard Anna rise up beside her and had knocked her gun to one side with her own, causing the shot to go wide and shatter a pair of glasses on the bar behind her. Grabbing Anna’s pistol with her left hand, Madison swung her assault rifle around and pointed it at her torso. However, before she had a chance to pull the trigger, Anna seized the gun with her free hand and aimed it away from her. She followed this up with a powerful kick to Madison’s wrist, allowing her to tear the assault rifle from her grasp and fling it away. It hit the side of a nearby table and careened onto the polished wooden floor.

  Unsure of what to do, I pointed my gun at Anna but kept my finger off the trigger lest I shoot at the wrong moment and accidentally hit my partner. I just stood there and watched spellbound as the two girls continued to fight.

  Madison gripped Anna’s gun-hand with both hands. She twisted it outwards and forwards, stepped to the side, and slammed her left hand into Anna’s straightened elbow with such force that Anna dropped the weapon. Undeterred, Anna spun towards her arm and delivered a powerful back kick that sent Madison stumbling backwards into the bar. She slammed into it with a grunt but quickly rebounded to a fighting stance.

  I flicked on my assault rifle’s tactical flashlight. “That’s enough, Anna! Lie on the floor and put your hands on your head.”

  Illuminated like a kangaroo caught in a vehicle’s headlights, Anna snapped her head towards me, transfixing me in a menacing glare. “Seriously?” Squinting from the bright light, she still managed to look down at me, even though I was two inches taller.

  “How could you kill your sisters, Anna? How can you be so reprehensible?”

  “Cho was going to kill you all anyway. What difference does it make who does the deed? Wait – there is a difference – this way I get to go with them.”

  “You think Cho was going to spare you if you killed the rest of us?” I said.

  “Of course.”

  “Didn’t you hear us tell you back at the water purification plant about the Korean children? They’ve been told that their genetic modifications are the result of natural evolution. If those children see you, they’ll know they were lied to.”

  “Not at all. Cho showed me a DNA test taken from a sample of my blood – I’m part Korean,” Anna said.

  “Enough talking, we don’t have time. Lie on the floor and put your hands on your head,” Madison said, reaching for a pair of handcuffs hanging from her belt.

  Anna nodded as though about to comply, but suddenly leapt forward, pushed up my gun, and put my right arm in an arm lock. Putting her right hand in the crook of my elbow, and her left on my wrist, she rotated her arms and forced me to drop the gun. She continued forcing my arm back and I toppled backwards and hit the wooden floor with a thud. She kicked the gun out of my reach and then kicked me in the side of the head. I don’t think she broke anything but my cheekbone hurt unmercifully and I could see spots dancing before my eyes.

  “Seriously, Chelsea?” Anna scoffed before turning around. “Now it’s your turn, Madison. Thought you were the best of us, didn’t you? It always amused me when I watched you take the place of honour in the dojang, knowing how easily I could beat you because I was Cho’s secret protégée.”

  Cradling my bruised face, I rolled onto my side and echolocated weakly so I could watch them fight, even though my vision was blurred.

  Madison just laughed. “You’ve got perfect technique, Anna, but you’ve only fought in the dojang and at the Custodian Academy. You’ve never had any actual hand-to-hand combat experience.”

  Anna moved forward in a combat stance, but instead of engaging her, Madison stepped back, grabbed glasses from the bar, and started hurling them at her. Anna kicked one aside and blocked the next with an open hand, receiving a nasty cut when the glass exploded. Angry, she tried to close the gap, but Madison moved back and kept pelting her with glasses, causing more cuts to her hands and even one to her forehead.

  Screaming out a taekwondo battle cry in frustration, Anna ran straight at her opponent, snapping out kicks and punches. Madison evaded some, blocked others, and then suddenly stepped into her attack. She kicked Anna in the groin, stamped a heel on her instep, and punched her repeatedly in the face – all illegal strikes in taekwondo sparring matches. Anna staggered back, slipped on a shard of glass, and went down hard – right onto the shattered glasses. She shrieked in pain out but somehow regained her feet, face contorted in agony. Plucking splinters of glass from her arm, she glared at Madison with undisguised loathing and then sprinted down the stairs and disappeared. So much for Anna’s arrogant assertion that she could defeat Madison easily.

  “You okay?” Madison helped me to my feet and used echolocation to examine my cheek. “It’s swollen and badly bruised, but not broken.”

  “Don’t worry about me, I’ve had worse. Just get after her.”

  “No need – she left her sniper rifle behind and she’s going to need quite a few stitches if she doesn’t want to pass out from blood loss.”

  As Madison rang Captain Smithson and told him to meet up with us in the street outside, I retrieved our guns. I spotted Anna’s Blaser sniper rifle leaning against a chair near the place she had been hiding when w
e came up the stairs. It was long and rather heavy, but I couldn’t leave it out in the open for Anna or someone else to retrieve it. I would take it with us and give it to one of the Custodians to carry.

  “Right, let’s go,” Madison said, heading for the stairs.

  Reunited with Smithson, the men of Delta Company, and the Undergrounders, we resumed our journey through quiet North End streets to the lab. To my relief, Bhagya came too, her left shoulder heavily bandaged and arm in a sling. She had ditched her assault rifle and carried a pistol now.

  My cheekbone throbbed terribly as we ran, every footfall sending fresh waves of pain shooting through it. I couldn’t miss the frequent glances Ryan sent my way, checking to see if I was alright.

  “What happened to your face?” he had said when we reunited in the street earlier. He had given me a quick once over with the tactical flashlight on his gun.

  “Thought I’d try a facial reconstruction.”

  “Chelsea! Remember me asking you not to take unnecessary risks?”

  “Vaguely. But seriously, fighting Anna was like taking on a threshing machine,” I said at last.

  “Anna did that to you – where is she now?”

  I quickly explained how Madison bested her but still managed to escape.

  “We’ll see her again, then.”

  “No doubt.”

  “Good. Think I’ll have a little word with her.”

  “I think you’d better take Madison’s advice where Anna’s concerned. If you see her, shoot her without any hesitation, okay?”

  “I’ll bear that in mind.” He moved closer. “And you bear in mind what I said about not taking risks. Don’t want you getting hurt again, okay?”

  His concern for my wellbeing touched me, warming my aching heart just a little. After the emotional and psychological pain, I was subjected to over the years from my mother and sister, the inmates at the prison, and some of my sisters, Ryan’s loving care always surprised me. Deep down, however, I felt unworthy of his affections. I could hear my mother’s voice in the background, telling me that I was worthless and would amount to nothing. I also felt a pang of guilt accepting his affection and concern in light of his father’s little talk. How would Ryan react when he found out about that? Would he insist on defying his father so we could still be together? If so, he would be deluding himself. There was no way I would marry him without his family’s approval, or without mine, for that matter.

  We reached our goal at the crack of dawn. The frigid darkness of a seemingly endless night was slowly being pushed back by the sun’s golden rays. The Genetics Laboratory, with its one-way reflective glass walls, seemed out of place set in the midst of posh North End apartment blocks. It was an imposing sight in the oppressive gloom of the early morning, its mirror-like surface reflecting the surrounding buildings and sparsely placed streetlights.

  We approached it from the west, using all caution as we advanced in single file on the southern side of the street. We stayed as close to the buildings as possible to avoid the streetlights and gain some measure of cover. Strangely, we hadn’t encountered any further resistance from Gamma Company on the way. Something was off.

  When we drew level with the lab on the other side of the road, Madison signalled the unit to come to a stop. She summoned the Undergrounders and told them to get ready to take out the foyer’s windows with their pipe bombs. The rest of us knelt or stood at the ready, guns aimed at the foyer just in case Custodians were defending it. Ryan stood behind Madison and me, watching over Bhagya. He had supported her all the way here, since she was so weak. She was pale, her brow covered in sweat, and clearly in great pain from the bullet wound in her shoulder.

  Madison lifted her hand, about to order the Undergrounders across the road and begin their assault, when my phone vibrated. Someone was calling me.,

  “Hold up, Madison,” I called softly as I lifted the phone to my ear.

  “Chelsea?” The speaker’s voice was tinged with hope.

  “Romy? You’re alive! Where–”

  “Listen! I just overheard Dr. Jeong talking on the phone to Cho. The chancellor gave him the order to release the virus so he’s on the way to the lab right now – you can’t let them get inside! They’re going to release the virus into the town’s water supply.”

  “Don’t worry, we just arrived at the lab ourselves. We won’t let them get within a mile of the place. Now tell me, where are you? Are you hurt?”

  “I’m in the lab, but there’s not much I can do by myself apart from listen in to the phone calls.”

  “Okay, keep your head down; we’ll be inside before you know it.” I looked to Madison, who was watching me carefully, having overheard my conversation with Romy. “You got all that?”

  Madison nodded, turned back to the lab, and dropped her hand to give the order for the Undergrounders to commence the attack. Glancing warily at the reflective walls of the lab, the men ran onto the road carrying pipe bombs and lighters. They were halfway across when the stillness of the early morning air was shattered by the sound of vehicles approaching at high speed.

  Looking back the way we came, my heart leaped into my throat when I spotted two boxlike Bushmasters round a corner and thunder towards us.

  “Take cover and target the roof gunners!” Smithson bellowed. Delta Company Custodians trained assault rifles on the approaching vehicles and opened fire. The Undergrounders abandoned their attempt to cross the road and ran back towards us.

  Bullets from over two-dozen assault rifles peppered the vehicles, only to skip harmlessly off their amour. Closer now, the Bushmasters returned fire – not with assault rifles fired by roof gunners, but with something far worse. I squinted in the poor light, and then my stomach did a back flip when I realised the vehicles had been modified. Each sported an ugly but functional homemade armoured turret equipped with a light machine gun, a belt-fed 7.62mm MAG58.

  Capable of sustained fire that could dish out 800 rounds per minute, the machine guns mowed down Custodians and Undergrounders alike. The heavier bullets and rate of fire made short work of bulletproof vests and helmets. Some men dropped without a sound; others screamed as limbs were all but amputated and torsos torn apart.

  Recalling that Bhagya was standing behind me, I spun and pulled her to the ground with me so that we were lying prone beside the stairs leading to an apartment block’s foyer.

  Meanwhile, standing side by side like warriors of renown, Madison and Ryan unloaded an entire clip each at the lead Bushmaster.

  “Now we’re in trouble – the turrets are bulletproof,” Ryan spat.

  I saw Madison eject her gun’s spent magazine and slam another home. But instead of firing, she grabbed her phone and called someone. “Aika! Answer!” she shouted.

  “You need fire support?” I heard Aika’s small voice reply.

  Madison began to reply, but before she could get a word out, a line of bullets from the trailing Bushmaster stitched a row of bloody holes across her midriff. She crumpled to the sidewalk, her gun clattering noisily beside her.

  “No!” I shrieked, reeling from the terrible realisation that Madison had been struck down. Slinging my rifle over my shoulder, I put my hands under her shoulders and pulled her towards the building. Ryan put away his weapon and helped me.

  We half carried, half dragged her over the three steps leading into the apartment block’s foyer and hurried her inside until we were out of sight of the Bushmasters. We laid her carefully down on a white marbleised floor shot through with gray and black, just visible in the weak nightlights set in the ceiling. I forced my gaze to her midriff and instantly regretted it. Her stomach was a bloody mess, having been pulverised by several bullets. I was struck by an unnerving sense of déjà vu as I remembered seeing my brother in a similar state after he’d been shot in the stomach.

  I glanced at Ryan and he shook his head, confirming my worst fears.

  Struggling to breathe, Madison reached feebly in my direction. “The baton’s yours now, Che
lsea,” she said, spitting out blood.

  “No, Madison!” I took her outstretched hand and held it tightly. I couldn’t believe this was happened. Ethan said there would be casualties, but this was too much to bear.

  Madison tried to speak again, but there was a rattling sound in her chest as she laboured to draw another breath. Her strength left and she fell still. Screaming out in grief and rage, I lay her limp hand on the floor and fought against the massive waves of despair that tried to overwhelm me. I closed Madison’s lifeless eyes, memories running through my mind of the times I spent with her in the lab before she disappeared with Ethan. She was the first to stick up for me when the other girls gave me grief. She was our leader, in rank and ability, yet never looked down on me, even though I was the last to join the Specialist unit. I remembered the light I saw in her eyes when we met again in the water purification plant, because she too was free of the Round Room’s conditioning. She had still been Madison, but warmer than before and possessing a vibrant vitality of spirit.

  And now she was gone.

  I was vaguely aware of Bhagya kneeling beside me. She placed her good hand on my forearm and though she spoke, I had no idea what she said. Ryan was still there, watching me with eyes moist with tears.

  Madison’s voice suddenly burst loud and clear in my mind. Snap out of it, Chelsea. Fight now, grieve later.

  Taking a deep breath, I pushed the grief and rage aside, then took the earpiece from Madison’s ear and phone from her pocket.

  “Aika, you there?” I said, noticing the call was still connected.

  “Where’s Madison?” the Japanese girl asked.

  “I’m sorry, she’s…she’s gone.”

  Silence, punctuated by slow breaths.

  “And you are?”

  “Chelsea.”

  “I see. Okay, where are you?”

  “In front of the lab. We’ve got a situation – they’ve sent Cho to release the virus, but the Bushmasters transporting him here have got armoured turrets.” I edged slowly back towards the foyer’s entrance until I could catch sight of the Bushmasters. They were parked sideways outside the lab’s front door. Several Custodians and Undergrounders were still shooting at the vehicles, but without effect. The sustained return fire from the turrets was much more deadly – more men screamed when they were hit.