The Dying of the Light (Book 3): Beginning

by Jason Kristopher

  “Sir, this is going to take longer than we thought. They did a real number on this lock when they sealed ‘em in, sir.”

  “How long, Simmons?” the colonel asked.

  “Ten, maybe fifteen minutes, sir.”

  “You have five.”

  “Yes, sir,” the tech said, turning back to his work.

  “Worm,” the colonel said as he walked over to Leland.

  Oh, how Leland hated that nickname. It was so… pedestrian. Someday, maybe one of these yahoos would come up with something better. Of course, the CO could call him anything he liked, and often, “Worm” was the nicest variant. “Yes, sir,” he replied.

  “Prep your gear. If they can’t make it through, I want you to blow it.” No surprise there, since the door was lacking in any sort of exterior handhold or pull mechanism. It opened from the inside and the inside only. The older man leaned in, the smell of his cigars heavy in the air, making Leland’s nose itch. “And just the door this time, eh, hot shot?”

  Forcing himself to remain calm, Leland nodded. “Yes, sir.” You blow up one entryway and you’re branded for life. How was he to know they’d been storing gasoline in that building? He continued grumbling as he pulled the C4 charges out of his pack and prepared them for use on the door, just in case. He didn’t think he’d need it—the techs were good—but the colonel was right: it never hurt to prepare. And it felt good to get the pack on the ground, the straps no longer digging into his shoulders.

  “Eureka,” one of the techs said a few minutes later under his breath. There was a tortured squeal of rusted metal as the retaining bolts withdrew and the door popped open a few inches. Simmons coughed and backed away from the opening. “Sir, we’re in. The air’s bad, and it looks like the power’s out.”

  The colonel nodded. “Prepare for entry. Worm, get your charges set up to collapse this entry. We may need to get out of here in a hurry.”

  Oh, now they were collapsing it? Worm wished this guy would make up his mind. “Yes, sir,” he said.

  The doors were large but set well back into the mountain. He could see a few spots where a well-placed charge could bring down a couple tons of rock and dirt. He motioned to Airman Cockrell, and with her help, they had it ready about the same time the colonel was ready to enter the bunker. He started to hand Monterrey the remote detonator for the charges, but the colonel shook his head.

  “No, you keep it. I want you and Cockrell to stay back and guard our exit.”

  Leland looked around at the other men and women. They were all about to head into what was undoubtedly the most dangerous place on the face of the Earth. If these thirteen badasses couldn’t handle whatever was in there… There was no time to think about that now. Or the creepy fact that there were exactly thirteen of them. “Yes, sir. We’ll take care of it, sir.”

  “Good. All right, everyone, let’s rock and roll. Machetes only until we can’t avoid it. I don’t want the whole damn bunker on our trail. Ready NVDs. We are at MOPP Three as of this moment.”

  The soldiers slid their rifles onto their backs, and drew their long-handled military machetes from hip sheaths. MOPP masks came out of their belt cases and Whiskey team put them on, then lowered the night-vision attachments they also wore.

  “You two,” Monterrey said, pointing at Martin and Simmons. “Get that door open all the way as fast as you can, then follow us. We’re headed for Operations. According to the specs, it’s on this level, a few hundred feet inside and to the right. Everybody ready?”

  “Yes, sir,” the soldiers chorused, their voices muffled somewhat by the masks. The techs each grabbed hold of the door’s edge. The door didn’t move at first, its twenty-year-old hinges squealing as the techs pulled on the edge. The colonel motioned to the two nearest men, and they threw their backs into it as well. They were finally able to fold the outward-swinging personnel door flat back against the main bunker doors.

  The colonel straightened up, raising his machete. “Let’s move, people!” There was a scream from inside the bunker, and a nightmare came barreling out of the dark. It almost ran down Monterrey as it raced for open ground. There was a loud crack, and the creature’s head exploded. The dirt near Leland’s feet kicked up as their covering sniper’s round disintegrated on impact.

  Leland ducked on instinct before he even realized what had happened, and he heard a soft, southern female voice in his earpiece. “Whiskey Actual, Whiskey Five.”

  “Go ahead, Fayde,” the colonel said, looking unfazed as he walked over to inspect the corpse. He waved at the others to cover the door.

  “Y’all be careful now,” she said. Leland pictured the tall, lithe blonde with the blue-grey eyes and complete lack of emotion. They called her the Ice Queen, and it had nothing whatsoever to do with her being one of the McMurdo refugees. “We’ve got this covered out here, sugar.”

  “Roger that, Whiskey Five. Out.”

  The corpse lay close by, and Leland couldn’t help but take a closer look. It was just like the briefing: a zombie, a walker, but a new and different type that they’d not seen before. This one didn’t appear to be rotting at all but was scarred and disfigured, the muscles under the skin bunched and twisted. It was wrong, in a crime-against-nature sort of way, and Leland wondered yet again why his team had drawn the short straw on this op.

  The colonel was a good leader, if kind of a jerk, and he could see the shocked looks on the faces of his soldiers. “All right, people, we’ve got a lot of ground to cover here, and we’re not going to do it standing around. The briefing from Bunker One was clear. We all know what we’re facing. Now let’s get to Operations and get that auto destruct set! Move out!” The colonel then lowered his own NVD, lifted his machete, and marched through the door into the darkness. The other soldiers followed him, leaving Cockrell and Leland behind. They looked at the empty darkness of the base beyond the door and at each other.

  Leland sighed, pulling down his NVD and readying his machete. Just in case, he checked his upper uniform pocket for the remote detonator, making sure it was still there, safe and sound. If this was where it had to happen, then at least he would go out swinging.

  “Let’s do this.”

  “After you, Worm,” Cockrell said.

  Leland flashed her a grimace. “Kiss my ass, Cock,” he said, then stepped through the door.

  The air stank, even through his MOPP gear, and Leland worked hard to hold down his gag reflex. To her credit, Cockrell seemed unfazed as she stood guard, her rifle at the ready. Leland looked down at his own machete and frowned.

  “He said mach—”

  “If they come back at a run, do you think the cap will care if we’re shooting?”

  Leland thought that over and realized she was right. He re-holstered his machete and pulled the rifle back around but maintained a grip on the detonator. Better safe than sorry. The others had passed out of their sight fast with the complete lack of light, and only the infrared lights they carried provided them enough illumination to see by through their NVDs. The lights were invisible to the naked eye and used for stealth missions.

  “Approaching Ops,” Monterrey said in his ear.

  Good, they were making quick progress. At this rate, they might even be home in time for breakfast tomorrow. Sundays meant pancakes, and Leland loved pancakes.

  “Contact, wes—” One of the operators choked out a gurgle. Leland couldn’t tell which it was, but he knew that sound from prior missions. Someone had gotten bit. And no one had heard a thing.

  “Move, move, move!” Monterrey said. “Secure Ops!”

  Leland looked over at Cockrell, who was crouched in place now, sweeping the darkness with her rifle. He took up a similar position, a little closer to the door. He had to make sure the detonator would reach, after all.

  Sudden gunfire and flashes of bright light from the darkness told the story of their fellow operators, and the radio filled with reports of contacts. “Fall back, fall ba—” Monterrey’s order was cut off, but Leland b
arely heard it over the noises coming from the darkness ahead of him.

  “Contact,” Cockrell said, and she began firing into the darkness.

  Leland still couldn’t see shit, but he fired more or less randomly into the dark as well in the hope that he might do some good. A grotesque face loomed out of the darkness at the edge of his vision, and he put a couple rounds into its forehead. The monster went down but was replaced by another. Two more were going after Cockrell, and he could hear hoots and hollers of others coming.

  “Fuck!” Cockrell shouted to his side, and as he swung his gaze her way, he saw her brought down by two separate monstrosities. Her finger tightened on the trigger of her rifle as they pulled her to the ground, and Leland couldn’t move fast enough to avoid the incoming fire.

  The rounds took him in the legs, shattering the bones in both. He managed to kill the other monster coming for him and watched in horror and not a little pride as Cockrell took out her killers with her combat knife.

  He couldn’t hear any more Driebachs coming his way, but he knew they were out there. The door—and salvation—seemed miles away for some reason, but he thought he could crawl that far. He wasn’t sure the detonator’s signal would reach otherwise. Leland looked down at his ruined legs, the blood flowing across them showing black through his NVD. What was left of Cockrell disappeared as Leland pulled himself backward. Cockrell was buried under the bodies of the monsters that had killed her. Just as he lost sight of it, her body began twitching and moving. Leland cursed, dragged himself faster, and reached for his throat mic with one hand.

  “Whiskey Five, Whiskey Four. Come in. Do you read me?” There had been no response from their sniper despite his repeated attempts. He hoped it was just a matter of the radios not reaching through the shielded door and the ten feet of dirt and concrete on either side of it. “For God’s sake, Fayde, come in!” he pleaded.

  It felt like an eternity before he reached the doorway, but he made it outside. He propped himself into a seated position against the main door. Less than hopeful, he tried the radio once more as he took his rifle in the other hand, pointing it back into the bunker.

  He could hear them coming. He could hear their weird hoots and hollers, their cries that promised nothing but pain and slow, horrible death… or a quick turning. The mutated prion would spread through his system and render him nigh-immortal in mere moments if he let it. He could always off himself first. No way was he going to go out like Airman Cockrell. Lucky for him, his injuries thus far had been from claws, not teeth, so he wasn’t infected yet. Still, he would never walk again.

  “I’ll never do much of anything again,” he muttered as his radio squealed to life.

  “Whiskey Five to anyone. Can you read me?”

  “This is Worm, Fayde,” he replied, laughing to himself as he used the hated nickname. Of course he did, now. “They’re dead.”

  “What? Who’s dead? What’s going on? Talk to me!”

  “Everyone,” he said. “They’re all dead. Those walkers got them. It was quiet at first, like that one that you shot was alone or something…” He coughed, noticing but not caring about the blood that sprayed across his uniform. It didn’t matter now anyway. “They’re coming for me too, Brandy. I can hear them. They’re coming…”

  “Just get out of there! Blow the charges. I’ll cover you!”

  He laughed, then coughed again. More blood. “I’m not going anywhere. Tell them… Tell them not to come back. Just leave us all down here. Forever. Never come back.”

  “What? No, Worm, you have to get out of there!”

  “You tell them, Fayde. We can’t let these things out. They’re not like regular walkers. You tell them! Tell them the colonel said ‘Never come back.’” He glanced up as he saw a hand come out of the shadows in front of him, dragging something behind it on the floor. He didn’t need to see the rest of the body to know it was Cockrell, awake now and ravenous. He ripped off the NVD, turning to look out the open door as he pulled the remote detonator from his pocket. It was a shame that such a pretty day had to be so soul-crushingly hot.

  The last thing Leland Wormwood saw was the bright blue sky of that Mississippi afternoon in July.

  The explosion was deafening and collapsed who-knew-how-much earth and rock. The blast had the side effect of starting a landslide on the mountain, causing even more rubble to cover the massive metal doors.

  Soon, it was impossible to find any trace of the bunker. Only a few outlying fences and the aerials at the mountain’s summit marked the location.

  “Yankee Actual, Whiskey Five.”

  “Go ahead, Whiskey Five.”

  “Sir… they’re dead. They’re all dead.” Even the Ice Queen’s cold façade sounded haunted by the events of the day, and her voice cracked a bit.

  “Dead? How? What the hell happened?”

  “It’ll be in my report, sir. Corporal Wormwood passed along a message from Colonel Monterrey, sir.”

  “What message?”

  “Sir, the message was ‘Never come back.’”

  “I see. Was that it?”

  “Yes, sir,” she said. “That was it. For what it’s worth, I’d listen.”

  “I’ll take that under advisement, Captain. Return to base.”

  “Yes, sir.” Brandy Fayde packed up her .50-cal Barrett sniper rifle and climbed down from her perch in the red maple tree. The sap’s pungent odor rose as she scraped her way down and headed for the chopper waiting just over the hill. She glanced once over her shoulder at the mound of freshly turned earth that had been the entrance to Bunker Nine. “I hope they listen this time.”

  New Atlantic Fleet

  Naval Station Norfolk

  Z-Day + 19 years (Two Years Later)

  The reconstruction of the Atlantic fleet was taking much longer than Jeremiah Graves had planned. There were many ships in the harbor and in the surrounding areas, but most weren’t seaworthy. None were up to what he would consider United States Navy standards.

  Not that much of anything was anymore. There was no navy to speak of. He stood on the roof of the reconditioned Atlantic Fleet HQ, looking out over his new “fleet.” If you could call seven ships a fleet, anyway. Jeremiah glanced out toward the mouth of the harbor, past the massive silhouette of the USS Enterprise. Though it still floated, it would be a while before they could get that aircraft carrier moving again. Assuming that they could negotiate a purchase agreement with the tribe of people who inhabited the huge ship… and clear the lower decks of the walkers that had taken up their own brand of residence there.

  As if summoned by his thoughts alone, Commander Jackson O’Reilly joined Graves on the roof.

  “What’s the status on the Enterprise team, Commander?” Graves asked.

  “They’ve tentatively agreed to allow us to take control of it, sir, with one condition. They want us to designate a section of the docks as theirs in perpetuity. Autonomous rule, that sort of thing.”

  “What about the walkers?”

  “They’ve all been secured in the three lowest decks. We can go in and clean them out, but it will take some time and men.”

  “We’ll have to decide if that’s worth it. We could use something that big to transport us, but after twenty years…”

  “That was my thought too, sir. It might be better just to let the tribe have it.”

  Graves grunted. “Maybe so. What’s the status on the Ramage?”

  “She’s—” O’Reilly broke off as the radio in his hand squawked, and he held it to his ear. “Skipper, Ramage is requesting permission to depart,” his executive officer said.

  “I wish I was going with them,” Graves muttered. “A sailor should be on the sea, not stuck on the shore. I need to feel a deck beneath my feet again.”

  O’Reilly didn’t say anything, and Graves didn’t expect him to. His executive officer knew he was just grousing, and what’s more, he probably agreed with him and wanted to get out there too. They were both men of action, men of the wave
s and the sea. They weren’t born for deskwork.

  He sighed and turned to the XO. “Permission granted, Jack, and my compliments to Captain Stockhouse.”

  “Yes, sir.” O’Reilly twisted a dial on his radio and waved to the distant figure standing at the rail outside the destroyer’s bridge. “You’re cleared for departure, sir, with the admiral’s compliments.”

  “Aye-aye, sir,” said the tinny voice from the small speaker, and Graves could just make out the man’s wave.

  The Ramage’s propellers spun and threw up quite a wake as it maneuvered around the remains of the USS Donald Cook. That rusting hulk lay across a great swathe of the entrance to Chesapeake Bay and the naval station. They’d tried several times over the years to clear the wreckage, but it hadn’t been possible, and now Graves saw it as a bonus fortification.

  In any case, they had to get moving if they were going to beat the harsh winter storms across the Atlantic. Though he wanted to go with them, Graves knew that his place as the commander of the new fleet was here at home, not out there on the sea trying to find out why they hadn’t had any contact from Europe or elsewhere in years. Satellites were useless since time had destroyed most transmitting and receiving capabilities. But radios still worked, if not quite as well as before Z-Day, and they’d heard nothing from across the pond.

  Graves had made a promise to David Blake to find out what had happened. He’d promised to send ships to London, Bilbao in Spain—only two hundred miles or so from Madrid—and even to Oslo, Norway. He would’ve promised the man who’d saved his crew from an icy death anything, within reason. Oslo hadn’t been his first choice, but given how cold affected walkers, it was a good suggestion. They were more likely to find survivors there than anywhere.

  USS Ramage was only the first ship to set sail, headed for London. He just hoped there’d be something to show for all this in the end and not too many of his people lost along the way.

  “Godspeed, men,” he whispered.