The Scourge Box Set [Books 1-6]

by Maxey, Phil

  “You lot?” said Holland as he walked along the row of people and looked at Joel and the others. “You were the last to arrive yesterday.” He stopped in front of Anna. Marina, with Jess and Jasper, stood to her left while Bill and Evan were to her right.

  Marina looked at him directly, not flinching once.

  He moved onto Hickman who was looking more ill than ever to Joel.

  “I know you’re infected, son, but that’s also why I know it weren’t you as the infected huts have the most security.”

  He moved further along, now standing in front of Rachel, Josh, and Max. “Could one of you nerds have taken it? Maybe you’re helping someone else? Tell me and only you get thrown out.”

  Rachel shifted on her feet.

  A baby started to cry.

  Holland moved to Shannon, Donnie, and finally, Joel, stopping in front of him. “I get the feeling that you’re in charge of this group. You probably know who it was, don’t you?” He leaned forward. “Just whisper the name, son, and we can all get on with our day…”

  After a few seconds Holland stood upright. “Screw it—”

  Joel could hear the change in Donnie’s heart rate.

  Don’t do it…

  The young man went to step forward when Hickman did instead.

  The guards around Holland immediately raised their rifles towards the sergeant.

  “It was me,” said Hickman.

  A look of confusion came to Holland who walked back to him. “There’s no way you could have gotten out of that—”

  “I turned last night—” the soldiers aimed their weapons directly at Hickman’s head. “—Had to have blood. I pretended I needed to take a leak then climbed out of the window.”

  Holland still looked unsure. He looked to a man standing near the pickups still. “Alonso! Get over here.”

  The man who spotted Joel outside the hut jogged over.

  “This look like who you saw?” said Holland, nodding towards Hickman.

  Alonso squinted and looked Hickman up and down. “I dunno. Maybe. Like I said, it was dark—”

  Holland waved him away then sighed. He looked at the two guards. “Take him.”

  “You can’t just throw him—”

  Holland walked to Anna. “Keep talking and you’ll be right there with him.”

  Anna bit her lip.

  “That’s what I thought.”

  The guards marched Hickman across the damp grass to the road.

  Joel wanted to run after him. But instead he remained rooted to the spot as they all did. He looked to his left. Emotion threatened to overwhelm Donnie.

  Keep it together, kid.

  The power was turned off to the gate, and then opened. Hickman walked through, took one look back, then kept on walking.

  Joel could tell Hickman hadn’t turned. The man walking away to his demise was still human.

  Holland walked away.

  “How long until we get to move into the town?” shouted a woman as he approached the pickups.

  “Longer than it would have been.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Joel and eight others stood, leaned, and sat in the restroom in the hut.

  Marina looked angrily at the young man opposite her. “What were you thinking?”

  He went to reply but Joel beat him to it. “He’s new to this. Being out in the world and being different.”

  “I can talk for myself!” Donnie looked at Marina. “You all got blood, right?”

  “We could have been all kicked out!” She steadied herself. “I know you’re too young to know this now, but what each of us—”

  “Responsibility! Yeah, I get it. I’ve lived that way my whole life on the farm. I probably get it more than you do.”

  “I think what Marina is saying, is that we have to act together,” said Anna.

  Donnie looked at Rachel, Josh, and Max. “Why they here? They’re not like us. And where’s Shannon? Why can’t she be here if they are?”

  “She’s looking after Jess and Jasper with Mary,” said Marina.

  “They know what we are, so that’s why they’re here,” said Joel. He looked across at the three humans, trying to read them. Most he hardly knew still. Josh stood with his arms folded; a classic defensive stance. Rachel looked anxious as she usually did, and Max looked like he hadn’t a bother in the world which made Joel smile.

  Josh uncrossed his arms. Joel felt that perhaps the archaeologist was sensing he was being judged.

  “All of you are obviously not your typical vamp,” said Josh. “The scourge virus affected you differently to most of the population. That means you’re valuable and—”

  “We need a lab,” said Rachel to the hybrids. “Somewhere we can study your metabolism and how the virus operates within you.”

  “Looking at that Holland fellow, he’s not going to want any part of that,” said Max.

  “Leave Holland to me,” said Joel.

  After agreeing to ration the remaining blood, they all filtered back out, and Joel made his way between the huts to the inner gate. The one which offered salvation.

  He approached one of the two guards. “I need to speak to Holland.”

  “And who might you be?” said a grizzly man lost behind a beard and a winter hat.

  “Joel Garret. Tell him I’ve got information he’s going to want to hear.”

  The man stepped closer. “Mr. Holland is a busy man, why don’t you tell me what you think is so important and I’ll pass it on.”

  Joel smiled. “Or I could wait until I see him again, and tell him you could have told him sooner, your choice…”

  The man frowned and walked away taking a radio from his pocket.

  Moments later the inner gate was opening. The man waved Joel through.

  “Wait here,” he said.

  Joel stood looking at the fields and dilapidated buildings that lived on them. He then noticed movement on the road in the distance, and a few minutes later a pickup was pulling up. The figure inside waved him over.

  “Get in, I’m taking you to see the boss,” said Art.

  As they drove, large warehouses appeared alongside the road.

  “What’s in them?” Joel said, nodding towards the buildings.

  “Mostly supplies.”

  Soon, a mixture of hotels, gas stations, parking lots, and single-story homes gave way to larger versions. A confused mixture of structures seemingly placed with no particular plan, but which tried to catch the eye of those that were always passing through.

  “Where is everyone?” said Joel as they drove down streets with early twentieth-century stores on one side.

  “No idea. Folks usually keep indoors.”

  As they moved from the central part of the town, the buildings spaced out, and lawns and trees replaced the concrete and pylons. Joel noticed a few people moving around in their yards, but the whole place still looked deserted.

  “Not far now.”

  The green expanded into fields once again, and they were moving up a slight incline towards a more forested area. A number of large radio masts peppered the landscape.

  Signs indicated there were superstores nearby, and they passed a large hotel, travelling up a gravelly track. The area looked decidedly more pleasant than the boggy wilderness that newcomers had to stay in.

  Art stopped at a gate. Two guards looked at him, and waved him and Joel through.

  They drove a short distance up a long drive and stopped outside a large house. They both got out.

  Looking back the way they came, Joel realized they were at the highest point in the town, and he could even see the five or so miles back to the huts. He followed Art, past more guards at the entrance, and into the warmer air of a lobby.

  The space was like the outside, mostly white featureless walls, with only the occasional piece of furniture.

  The sound of footsteps came from the hallway which ran alongside a wide staircase, itself curving around to a second floor.

  Holland app
eared, wearing an apron, with red stains. Joel could tell they were blood before he saw them.

  “Joel Garret. I understand you have some important information for me. Information which, for some reason, you couldn’t tell me this morning when I was standing a few feet from you.” Joel noticed most of what Holland said was expressed as a statement, not a question, but he replied anyway.

  “I needed time to think things through.”

  Holland stood a foot away from Joel, standing a good few inches taller. “Is that so. Are you hungry? I’m making a steak meal.”

  Joel enjoyed a good steak even before he lusted after blood, but he shook his head. “Already eaten.”

  Holland turned and walked away. Joel wasn’t sure whether to follow but did so when Art prompted him to.

  They all walked into a large kitchen and dining area combined. Like the hallway, Joel felt like he was walking into someone else’s home, one that did not belong to the man currently turning the slabs of meat over in the pan.

  “You gotta flash fry it, that’s the secret,” said Holland.

  “Chad Holland, head of the Holland crime syndicate. Convicted earlier this year, and should be residing—”

  Chad continued moving the sizzling meat around. “Oh, I was ‘residing,’ as you put it, but then as luck would have it… the fucking world ended. Who would have thought that would have happened? I mean, my cellmate, Clay Cote, he would go on for hours about the secret government, ex-Nazis, and all that.” He looked at Joel. “I know what you’re thinking, and you’d be right. Clay was a little… shall we say light in the head, but bless him, his heart was where it needed to be, and that was with his balls in my hands!” He let out a brutish laugh then continued. “Anyway, good guy. The scourge took him, turned him into one of those things, then we put him down. Had to put a lot down in the prison. After a while, the warden needed us not to be locked up. You know, no guards left and all that. So we got early release, and instead helped to keep the town a few miles from the prison alive.” He held his hands out, one of which contained the meat tongs. “And here we are. Doing just that. Trying to keep this godforsaken shithole alive.”

  He put the tongs in the pan and turned the heat down. “What were you, police? No… something more federal… FBI?”

  Joel smiled.

  “I knew it! Knew it the moment I first saw you.” He opened a cupboard behind him. “You sure you don’t want any? We got a good head of cattle on one of the farms up here.”

  “Thanks. I’m good.”

  “Ah, your loss.” He got the plate and placed the medium-rare meat on it then started to cut small chunks from it while standing. He placed one in his mouth, and his face was so full of delight Joel wondered for a moment if he was actually a hybrid.

  “So, start talking,” said Holland.

  “Have you heard of the Copeland Corporation?”

  “Sure have, they owned a large percentage of the prisons south of the border.” He placed another cube between his teeth.

  “Well, the government might be gone, but the corporation is still around. It’s founder, Daniel Copeland, is not exactly human anymore.”

  “He one of these hybrids?”

  “Something like that… he destroyed the last town I was in…”

  Holland stopped chewing. “Destroyed, how?”

  “He can control vamps—”

  “No one can control a vamp, it’s—” he waved his fingers near his temple. “It’s lost its mind. They got no control, they just want to eat.”

  “A few thousand vamps attacked Haven. It was a town in the mountains, a few miles east of Salt Lake City. Some of us just managed to get away, but the town was overrun.”

  “How do you know they didn’t just come from the city?”

  “Because Copeland was there, directing them…”

  “Like an army?”

  “Yup.”

  He placed another piece in his mouth. “Hmm… and you’re telling me this because you think he’s going to come all the way up here? Why would he do that? Him, and this army?”

  Art’s radio burst into life. He took it with him back outside.

  Joel and Holland were alone.

  Holland pointed to the patio doors. “There’s two guards a few feet away outside the doors, not that I need them, right, Joel? You and me are friends?”

  “Sure.”

  “So, what’s Copeland’s plan? You think he’s a threat to our little town?”

  Joel moved forward and sat on one of the stools. “From what I know of Copeland, he’s going to want to wipe out the last remaining camps. He’s not human anymore, and he wants them all gone.”

  Them… shit…

  Holland opened the refrigerator door and pulled out an already open bottle of white wine, pouring some into a small glass then taking a sip. “And you have seen him control these vamps?”

  “Yup.”

  “Then I guess we better—” He stopped as he saw Art return to the hallway, and then the kitchen. “—What is it?”

  “Some new arrivals at the outer gate. Army types.”

  *****

  Anna had watched the three Humvees each containing four soldiers move through the gate into the quarantine area while Joel was somewhere else. At first, she thought they might have come from Cheyenne Mountain, but Rachel and Josh said they carried the wrong insignia.

  The officer in charge of the eleven others looked like a tough individual. Anna had been around enough soldiers by now to recognize those that garnered respect from their peers, and this woman had that air about her. She wondered how they would adapt to life in what was, essentially, a prison camp.

  They had been placed in the hut just a few yards from their own, and she watched as they sat and milled around between the camping beds. The blinds on the side that Anna was on were quickly closed when they saw her looking at them.

  Lee sat on the bed to the side of hers. “What’s your take on the new people? Marina said they were soldiers?”

  Before she could reply, the door to the long hut opened, and standing in the doorway was the assured-looking woman she had seen earlier.

  Hardin was closest to the door, laid back on his bed reading an old weathered newspaper. His eyes remained on the print.

  Anna got up and walked forward to her. “Hi, I’m Anna.”

  The woman held her hand out. “I’m Carla Antos.”

  They shook hands.

  “Would you like some water? We have some in the kitchen area at the back,” said Anna.

  Carla smiled. “Sure.”

  They both walked past the others. Most of whom were silent.

  “How long have you been here?” said Carla.

  “Few days. I saw you arrive earlier. You’re soldiers?”

  “Err… yeah or were. Now, I’m not sure what we are.” She took the plastic mug with water from Anna, and smiled. “Thanks. Where did you come from before?”

  “Down south. We travelled quite some way to get here.” Anna gave a faltering smile. “Still don’t know if it has been worth it.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Those that run things are pretty strict about who they let in and not…”

  “I can understand them wanting to quarantine new people.”

  “It’s more than that… anyway, hopefully we shouldn’t have to wait too much longer. You were fighting vamps?”

  “We were stationed in a base in Montana, got overrun. We were the only ones that got out. We heard about this place over the radio so made our way up here.”

  “Well, I’m sure they will welcome soldiers… if you’re not infected.”

  Carla took another sip. “Were any of your group infected?”

  Anna paused. “There was a soldier with us.”

  “Oh, yeah? Where was he stationed?”

  “He came from the Cheyenne Mountain base.”

  Carla nodded. “We heard that place was overrun. So, he was infected?”

  “I’m afraid so. He was
a good man, but he was escorted out.”

  “That’s harsh, but understandable. There’s nothing you can do for them, and you can’t predict when they will change.”

  “No…”

  The door at the front of the hut opened once again, and they both looked in that direction. Joel was standing in the doorway. He exchanged a few words with Bill and Rachel then moved to the kitchen. He extended his hand to Carla.

  “I’m Joel, you’re part of the new group?”

  “Yeah, I’m Carla,” she said, shaking his hand.

  Joel poured himself some of the water from the jug but remained silent.

  “I should be getting back. But nice meeting both of you.”

  Joel and Anna smiled, and watched as she let herself out.

  “What happened with Holland?”

  “Went well.” He walked back into the main room, Anna followed. Everyone expectantly looked at him.

  “You all need to get your stuff packed up, we’re moving into the main camp tonight.”

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Daniel Copeland looked at the senior group of individuals he had arranged around the specially constructed conference table.

  The table wasn’t the only new and unique feature. A lot of the headquarters building had been enhanced, and the rest was in the midst of being rebuilt to better represent what a seat of government should look like. The new architecture wasn’t bright and shiny, full of hope and entrepreneurial spirit as the old cluster of buildings had appeared before. No, these structures looked more organic as if they were born from the minds of medieval monks who had discovered the latest technologies.

  The corridors inside were warm and lit by only minimal lighting as Copeland preferred it, and the walls and ceilings were further apart to accommodate larger beings.

  He could tell Adrian was uncomfortable sitting in the high-backed arched chair. That amused him.

  The head of the science department cleared his throat. “We have further identified some of the other Alkron types, but they are proving hard to locate, being so rare…” Copeland’s head slowly rotated to look at Adrian. “Umm… but it’s only a matter of time before we locate those specimens.”