The Fall (Book 4): Genesis Game

by Joshua Guess

“Damn,” Mason breathed, too low to be heard by the guards at the front of the SUV. Kell looked at him quizzically.

  Mason frowned. “They're real survivors,” he said. “I wanted to get a feel for them in a fight. They're good.”

  Kell bobbed his head in agreement. “How much does that change things?”

  “Not a lot,” Mason admitted. “I plan for worst-case scenarios, but I was hoping they'd be a less capable. Like all those people in the UAS who came out of the bunkers barely able to hold a gun or look at a zombie without pissing themselves.”

  Kell got his meaning. “Because then you might have been able to frighten or intimidate them,” he guessed.

  “Yeah,” Mason replied. “Looks like whoever these people are, they're not going to flinch if it comes to a fight.”

  “Damn,” Kell said. He wasn't the tactician Mason was, nor had he seen the same sheer volume of conflicts, but neither was he naïve. The math was simple, and when it came time to tally the score, it would be bloody. “If we want to get out, we're going to have to kill a lot of people, aren't we?”

  Mason nodded sadly. “Probably. I'll have a better idea once we get wherever we're going. Maybe we'll be able to get enough captives on our side that we can get everyone out with minimal bloodshed. Not likely, but not impossible.”

  Kell hoped so, but for once every part of him was in agreement. His conscious mind, both the emotional part and the separate, rational aspect, sang in perfect harmony. The math here was also simple:

  If it meant making progress toward a cure, those deaths would be worth it. They had to be.

  Kell didn't spend the rest of the trip beating his chest over the inevitable internal struggle he would face by putting the needs of the many over the needs of the few. Mostly because he fell back asleep.

  He woke up when the SUV doors slammed shut—again—but only halfway, in the muzzy sort of in-between of someone who was thoroughly enjoying a nap. Mason elbowed him to full alertness, and Kell took in the sight.

  Whatever he had expected of the place, it wasn't this.

  The vehicles sat in a gravel parking lot straight out of the world that used to be. There wasn't a weed to be found, and the stone itself gleamed almost painfully white beneath the sun. A similarly white building loomed before them. Its exterior was uniformly clad in painted corrugated metal, broken only by a set of heavy steel doors surrounded by a dark red frame.

  Off to the right side of the building stood a fence—or rather, fences. They stood as high as those back at the compound, and it took Kell a few seconds to understand what he was seeing. Layers of chain link had been sandwiched together and raised on thick square timbers. A broad walkway sat between the exterior fence and the one behind it.

  Past that he saw the prisoners. They could be no one else based on the number of them, and the two dozen or so in his immediate field of view worked rows of vegetables. There were no overseers barking orders, no guards watching disdainfully. Just people working. The only sign that the place was anything but a normal community were the uniforms they wore, surgical scrubs in the same shade of pale blue-green.

  “Hmm,” Mason said. “They look fairly happy.”

  “Yeah, they do. I guess that's something,” Kell said.

  Mason grimaced. “No, it's not. Not anything good, at least. Pretty hard to push for rebellion if the prisoners are happy about being prisoners.”

  Kell's eyebrows shot up. “You say that like it's easy, otherwise.”

  Mason gave a tiny shrug. “Won't be my first insurrection.” He pursed his lips thoughtfully for a moment. “Before they pull us out of here, give me the weapons in your sling. We can't risk you getting caught with them.”

  Kell didn't argue as he once might have done. He wasn't afraid to be unarmed. Having a weapon when faced with such overwhelming odds would only be helpful if it came with launch codes. The knife and garrote might be of use in Mason's hands, given that he at least had two functional ones.

  In short order they were removed from the SUV and escorted through the thick front doors. The interior was as neat and clean as the exterior, though with more signs of use. Beyond the small foyer lay tight networks of hallways branching off in several directions. Kell got barely a glance at them before being herded down the hall farthest left.

  Kell was ushered into a small room, alone. As the door closed he expected the sunlight from the hallway—piped in through numerous but thin skylights—would vanish. Here he was surprised again. A dim tube of light hung from the ceiling, looping back on itself and vanishing into the tile overhead again. Kell stared at what appeared to be a faintly glowing rope for a solid minute until he realized it was a section of fiber optic cable.

  The room wasn't bare, but it was sparse. A chair sat in one corner, a spindly wooden thing Kell suspected had never been meant to support men tall enough to smack their heads on door frames. He lowered himself to the ground instead; careful not to jostle his arm as he did so.

  No sooner had he leaned against the wall than someone knocked politely on the door. When the handle didn't turn, Kell bemusedly realized the jailer on the other side was actually waiting for permission to enter.

  Shaking his head, Kell said, “Come in.”

  An older man entered the room, a messenger bag slung across his hip and a folding chair in his hands. The pale light gleamed on his bald pate and splintered across the thin fringe running around his head in what Kell's father had called an 'old guy donut' hairstyle. He was average in every way, with pale skin that hung a little too loosely, something Kell knew came from the rapid weight loss heavier people went through after the end of the world. The skin was stretched, and that was that. It didn't have anywhere to go, without surgery.

  “Hello,” the man said with a curious tilt to his head. “They told me you had a shoulder injury, but is there something wrong with your back or legs?”

  Kell blinked. “Uh, no. Just my collarbone. Why?”

  “You're not using the chair,” the man said, pointing.

  Kell smiled, then worked himself to his feet. He took a small measure of satisfaction as the smaller man grew visibly nervous when Kell unfolded to his full height. Kell gestured at himself. “I figured it would be splinters if I put all my weight on it...” he let the sentence trail, his tone of voice the unused and unique blend people once used on public officials and people in the service industry every day of their lives.

  It was one of those things most people knew how to do, a way of modulating your words to get a particular response. In this case it was an implied question, and the smaller man did not disappoint.

  “Ah, sorry, my name is Bruce,” he said, putting out his right hand.

  Kell glanced at it and shook it with his left, eliciting an embarrassed smile from Bruce. “I'm Kevin,” Kell said, using the name he and Mason had agreed upon.

  “And what's your last name, Kevin?” Bruce asked as he removed a clipboard, a pen, and a small LED lantern from the messenger bag. Kell gave him time to set up the chair and get comfortable, then met Bruce's eyes.

  “Just Kevin,” Kell said, keeping his voice neutral. “I'm not inclined to be cooperative with people who took me prisoner. You seem like a decent enough guy, but you work for whoever they are.”

  He expected Bruce to blanch but was surprised. Instead the older man nodded sadly.

  “Yeah, a lot of people react that way. I wish I could say I did, but I'm pushing sixty and wasn't in good enough shape to be brave.”

  Kell opened his mouth but the words died when Bruce tugged the neck of his t-shirt down to reveal the end of a twisted scar climbing his chest.

  “Huh,” Kell said in a noncommittal grunt.

  The inmates weren't just docile, they were actively helping.

  Mason was going to hate this.

  Nineteen

  Kell ended up answering questions when it became clear that he would stay in the little room until he did so. It wasn't the matter of principle he made it out to be, but an at
tempt to measure the sort of people his captors were. When no threats or pressure beyond being forced to sit in a room materialized, he gave in.

  The questions told him a lot about what the research here was looking for. There were the standard metrics such as age and the like, but a huge number of specific questions that sent his mind racing.

  They wanted to know details about injuries he had suffered, both before and after The Fall. The same for illnesses. There were several inquiries about reproduction, though he lied on those. The memory of his wife and daughter were his and only his. He would not give these people even a grain of truth in that regard.

  From the questions he was asked, it became clear his jailers were on the right track. They wanted to know how his immune system functioned now when compared to before The Fall. It was obvious they were trying to build a data set about how fast people healed, what type and degree of damage they could endure, and a dozen other factors.

  It made Kell's heart sing, because it meant the chances of finding something useful had been raised significantly. He had no doubt about his own research, but honest examination of the facts meant admitting that his pool or subjects had been too small to do anything like approach a cure. There just wasn't enough data, and not enough points on the map to guide him in the right direction.

  After the questions were over, a pair of guards took him down a different hallway which ended in a large room tiled from floor to ceiling. A younger man waited there with a large bag stuffed with fabric the same blue-green the rest of the prisoners wore, as well as several empty bags.

  “I'm Trey,” the young man said, swiping a fall of golden curls from his forehead. He gestured for the guards to take their places outside the room, and the men complied.

  “First thing, we're going to get you a hot shower,” Trey said. “I'm going to take your clothes and armor. We clean them before we put 'em in storage, so when you get your bags when you leave they won't be stale and gross.”

  The words and tone were earnest, but Kell raised an eyebrow. “You're telling me I won't be staying here forever? You're going to let me go?”

  Trey shrugged. “That's the plan. We aren't keeping people here for fun, man. We're trying to fix this thing.” He set the bags down and fished a clipboard from inside one of them. These people were organized, that was sure. “I'll take an inventory of your stuff for you to give to the next station.”

  Kell sighed. Excited as he might be to see what information could be found, the surprising amount of bureaucracy involved in being taken prisoner was tiring.

  He did as he was told, shucking off clothes that had begun to stiffen and possibly attain sentience and handing them out to Trey.

  “I'll need that sling,” he said before stepping into the shower stall. “Or a sling, anyway.”

  A towel that had seen better days hung on the outside of the shower door. Inside sat an irregular bar of soap—probably homemade—and an equally ragged wash cloth. He turned on the water and tested it gingerly and almost cried out in surprise.

  It was hot.

  Nice.

  The long habits of a survivor not to waste resources warred with the even longer habit of a man who enjoyed a nice long shower and hadn't managed many in recent history. Kell soaped and scrubbed himself with gusto, careful to avoid agitating the skin around the healing incision over his collarbone.

  He didn't linger. While Kell doubted there would be any serious consequence to taking advantage of the chance to enjoy one of life's little pleasures, he also had no desire to test the patience of the guards while stark naked and defenseless. It was with mild regret that he turned off the water and toweled himself dry.

  The bag of scrubs hung on the inside of the bathroom, and Kell dressed himself. It was painful given his healing shoulder, but doable. There were brand new underwear included, which was a small blessing, though the lightweight shoes were woefully undersized. He tossed them back in the bag.

  Trey frowned at Kell's bare feet when he stepped through the door. “You can't walk around like that.”

  Kell wiped a stray drop of water away as it rolled down his cheek. “Unless you have some size fifteens, I don't have much choice. Or you can just give me my boots back.”

  “I'll look and see what we have in stock,” Trey said. “For now, yeah, take your boots.”

  Kell slid them on and laced them up with careful boredom on his face. The boots looked absolutely normal, but like many survivors he made sure to keep a few surprises tucked away in all parts of his gear. Getting them back was a stroke of luck, if not stupendously helpful.

  “Please take him to the next station,” Trey said to the guards. He handed the clipboard to Kell.

  Kell glanced at the paper and was surprised to see it filled with neat, tiny handwriting. The kid had covered his bases. “How many more of these stations do I have?”

  “This is the last one before we send you to the bunks. Or probably to the mess, this time of day. Get some food in your belly before you rest. Once you see Dr. Rawlins, you're done.”

  Rawlins turned out to be a tall, broad man in his late thirties. His skin was light brown over his soft middle-eastern features. He studied Kell's paperwork from behind a desk piled with folders.

  They sat in a room equal parts laboratory, office, and exam room. Kell fought to keep relief off his face when he belatedly realized that his story would only hold up until someone took an X-ray of his ribs. One of the first things Rawlins had done was complain about the lack of imaging equipment, expressing a desire to see how the ribs had healed for himself.

  The man had skimmed over the personal history quickly but took his time with, of all things, the list of Kell's belongings.

  “It says here you have a jacket with armor sewn into it,” Rawlins said with a barely-there southern twang.

  “That's right,” Kell said.

  “Was that custom work?”

  Not sure where the conversation was going, Kell played along. “Yeah. One of the people I used to live with made molds and cast these plastic discs in them. Thin but tough, the kind of plastic they used in car engines. Took a while to wire them together into a coat, but once that's done all you have to do is sew a shell over it. Lot of survivors have something like it.”

  Rawlins glanced at him over the clipboard. “A lot of fighters do, yes,” he said. “In my experience even large communities don't waste custom gear like that on people who can't do the damage of three people.”

  Kell shrugged and got a jolt of pain for his trouble. His sling had been taken for cleaning, Trey promising to have it to him before lights-out. “I can handle myself. Or could, rather.”

  Rawlins nodded thoughtfully. “Of course. People who couldn't to one degree or another generally died out years ago. What I'm curious about is whether you're going to be dangerous. You come in with a full body set of armored clothing, but you're hurt. So maybe we don't have to worry about you, at least for a while. Your friend has scars head to toe but sports a t-shirt and cargo pants. I would think he'd have learned his lesson about wearing protective gear.”

  “Can't help you,” Kell said.

  Rawlins set the papers down on his desk, growing the pile slightly. “I didn't imagine you would. I just find it odd, and I don't like odd. Whatever you might think of us here, we're not monsters. My singular goal in life is fixing this mess.”

  Kell's lip curled. “Even if it means kidnapping innocent people.”

  “Absolutely,” Rawlins said with a nod. “The human race numbered almost seven billion just five years ago. We lost nearly half that number in a matter of weeks. Weeks. The attrition rate only slowed because the major population centers took the brunt of the casualties. The dead needed time to spread out and continue feeding. Now? Who the hell knows. There could be as little as a few million people alive, worldwide.”

  Kell clenched his jaw. The logic was sound, of course. He himself tended to think along the same lines, though he was unwilling to compromise his personal m
orals to the degree Rawlins was.

  “It's not just rebuilding we have to worry about,” Rawlins continued. “In addition to an almost total lack of modern medicine, people face everything from starvation to exposure because we're not well adapted to coping with things like freezing temperatures without technology. Every person who dies from disease or anything else is a loss to humanity as a whole.”

  Kell knew what Rawlins was going to say before he said it. It was obvious.

  “I have to cure this goddamned plague just to give us a chance,” the doctor said. “Just to even the playing field. If that means taking the people who can help me do that from their homes, yes, I'm comfortable with it. It's worth it to make sure our species makes it through this choke point.”

  It had the sound of a practiced argument, which made sense given the number of people Kell was sure Rawlins had given it to. And while the logic of it struck uncomfortably close to home, even resonated with his own thoughts about coming here in the first place, there was an essential difference he couldn't ignore.

  Kell had been—and still was—willing to kill any number of Rawlins's men to get the research kept here. He would lose sleep over it. Those deaths would haunt him for a time. But he could do it because at the root they were people who ruined lives to get what they want. They snatched men and women who had survived hell itself from the scant comfort they had managed to carve out for themselves.

  Rawlins saw things more starkly. There was right and wrong, and in his mind he was doing right. That meant everything that didn't go the way he wanted was wrong.

  It was a dangerous way to look at the world. Almost megalomaniacal. And not without precedent.

  “History is full of people who were sure what they were doing was for the greater good,” Kell said. “The scariest kind of person isn't the guy who'll mug you for what you have and shoot if you resist. It's the guy who'll kill you for what he's certain are good reasons. People like that can't be reasoned with.”

  Rawlins smiled, a shallow expression without any real mirth in it. “Dead is dead, Kevin. What matters is how much good can come from it.”