The Scourge Box Set [Books 1-6]

by Maxey, Phil

  The woman the Copeland Mercs found was only days from death, and the fit, young individuals that placed her in the back of a Humvee appeared like angels to her. She had been given a second chance. After a week of recuperating at a local Copeland base, she found out why she had been given that chance. She was going to help the corporation rebuild America, and after that, maybe the world. Her first job was to go to a camp on the northern border and report back who arrived there. She, of course, asked why she had to do that in secret, why couldn’t those that were at the camp know about the Copeland plan for humanity? She was told they wouldn’t understand. Worse, they might even try to stop the corporation from reuniting the humans that were left. People can be selfish, after all.

  Bee sat in her office looking at the military woman standing in her doorway. “How did you get back here? You’re not allowed—”

  Carla stepped over the threshold and closed the door behind her.

  Bee leaned back. “You can’t be in here…”

  Carla leaned forward on her desk. Bee leaned further back. “I’m working for the corporation too!” Carla whispered. She looked around. “Is it safe to talk in here?”

  Bee looked down, shuffling some of her papers around on her desk. “Please, leave. As you can see I have a lot of work—”

  “Bee! I know you’re communicating with Copeland’s people outside. They told me to make contact with you!”

  Bee looked up, her eyes wide. “They did? Nobody told me you were coming. Am I being recalled? Are they not happy with my work? I have been leaving the notes of who has arrived outside the fence as I was told—”

  Bee’s attention looked at the wall next to the door, at the sound of boots thundering along the small corridor outside. Before she could speak again, the door burst open, and a guard ran around the desk, pulling her up from her chair. Art walked in after.

  “What are you doing!” shouted Bee.

  “We got you, Bee,” said Art. He pulled the radio from his belt. A small light was lit green on the front of it. Carla then pulled her own radio from inside her jacket.

  Bee’s eyes narrowed as she looked at Carla. “You tricked me!” Confusion then washed across her face. “But, how did you know? I have been quite careful—”

  The guard pulled her from the room and into the office area outside. It was empty apart from another two guards, Holland, Joel, and Amos.

  The guard pushed Bee forward until she was just feet from Holland. Her hands fell defiantly to her sides. “I won’t say another word.”

  To Joel, Holland looked like he was at just another day at the office. He appeared to chew a few times, despite the fact that Joel had not seen him eat any gum.

  “You know, about an hour ago, this kid and this soldier lady come to me with a story so crazy that I had to see if it was true just because, well… it was so nuts! You know what I mean, right?”

  She wasn’t sure if she should answer.

  “Anyway. And, I know how crazy it sounds, the kid can read minds! Ha! And this soldier lady, she’s working for that crazy, vampire bastard Copeland—”

  “Was,” said Carla a few yards behind Bee.

  Holland nonchalantly nodded. “Was… and they tell me that the woman that I have put my trust in to look after all the new souls that find their way here, that she’s been working for Copeland since the moment she walked through my gate!” He turned to Art. “Me and Art couldn’t believe it, and trust me, it’s been one of those days.”

  Holland nodded to the guard behind Bee who grabbed her by the arm and started to pull her through the hut to the door.

  “What you going to do to me? I was doing it for all of you!” She looked desperately at the others as she staggered past them and then outside.

  “What are you going to do with her?” said Joel.

  “That’s my business,” said Holland, walking towards the door.

  “Umm…”

  Holland stopped, looking back at Amos. “Yeah?”

  “I can help find out more of what she knows.”

  Holland nodded, and he, the guards, and Amos left.

  Joel went to follow, but Art stopped him. “The boss wants you to move out of those houses. We got somewhere else for your kind to stay.”

  “I’m not being put back in—”

  “No, no, it ain’t like that. You’ll still be free to move around within the camp, but the boss wants all the hybrids, mind readers, and whatever else there is to be in the same building. There’s a former hotel up on eleventh street that is ready for all of you.”

  “What about the others? Max and—”

  “If the scientists want to go with you, they can, but they are free to stay where they are if they want. Their choice.”

  Joel nodded. He glanced back at Carla then turned and followed Art outside.

  *****

  The lobby of the hotel was ablaze with candles, lighting the twenty by twenty space. Candleholders of various designs were perched on the long wooden counter, which greeted guests as they arrived, on the chestnut-colored bureau, near the glass entrance doors, and peppered around the small tables which sat between the low-backed chairs off to one side.

  The air was smoky and Max and Bill were stifling coughs. Around them, in a few rows of chairs which were arranged in a circle, sat everyone they knew and a good number they didn’t.

  To their surprise, it was Joel that started the meeting off.

  “Chad has asked us all here, because he wants us to come up with a plan as to how we’re going to stop this town from being taken by Copeland.”

  “No offence, Joel. But I’m the most senior military officer here. And I already have a plan,” said Carla, resting on one of the three columns that stood within the large room.

  Joel went to respond, but Holland held his hand up. “Let the chick speak. Go on.”

  Carla ignored the reference to her as a baby bird, and smiled. “Copeland wants hybrids and the other Alkrons.”

  “Alkrons?” said Rachel.

  “In the corporation that’s what we call the different scourge types. The most common are the vamps that ended everything. Most of the human population would have become them and Copeland can control them. That’s his thing, his ability… well and he can fly, but mostly it’s controlling the basic vamps.”

  Max, as well as the other scientists, raised his eyebrows.

  “It would seem you were much further along with your understanding of the—”

  Holland frowned at Max. “Later old-timer, right now I want to hear the plan.” He looked back at Carla. “So, how do we stop him?”

  She took out some simple pull-out maps of the local area, opened one up, and placed it on the large coffee table at the center of the surrounding low-backed chairs. She then took a pen from her jacket pocket and drew a large ring around the town. “So that’s roughly where the fence is, correct?” She looked at Art who nodded.

  Holland leaned back. “If this plan is just build a bigger fence—”

  “No, it’s the opposite. The area you have to defend is too big. At least, you would have to match whatever number of forces he comes at you with, and trust me, it will be a lot. There’s a whole lot of vamps eager to follow whatever he tells them to do. He attacked Haven with—”

  Joel looked up at her. “How do you know about Haven?”

  Her eyes briefly met his then returned to the map. “Because I was there. So trying to defend all that area, you’ll lose before the battle even begins.”

  Holland looked at her. “This is where you tell me how we win, right?”

  She pointed to a complex of buildings beyond the boundary of the town. “That place is how we win.”

  Holland looked at Art then Boyd. “I ain’t going back to that place.”

  “It’s a high-security prison. Multiple layers of fencing and walls. Almost impenetrable. Copeland could attack it with ten thousand vamps and still not get into the inner buildings.”

  “Did you not hear me clearly, gir
l? I’m not going anywhere near that place.”

  Joel’s attention was still on the map. “She’s right. That’s our only hope. We could fit everyone in the town in there. We could survive.” He looked up at Holland. “If we stay out here, we’re all dead.”

  Holland sprang to his feet. “Come up with a different plan.” He turned as Boyd and Art also got up, and they all started to walk to the doors.

  “Lillian would have wanted you to be safe…” said Amos.

  Holland froze then slowly turned around. The guards had stopped pacing. “What you say to me, boy?”

  “Your wife, she—”

  Holland pulled a pistol from his belt and started to raise it towards Amos who was now standing, but before the barrel could be aligned with the young mind reader, all six feet four of Dalton stood in the way.

  The guards raised their rifles at the mountain of a man who seemed to be growling.

  Joel sprang up, and stood in front of Dalton, facing Holland, his gun pushing into Joel’s chest. He looked directly at him. “He’s just a kid, he needs to think before he speaks.”

  The anger that was bubbling just beneath Holland’s sweat-covered face, wavered, and he lowered his gun. He then turned and walked to the doors. “I want a better plan by the morning.” He then left, and the guards all followed.

  Most in the room let out a breath when Holland’s people were gone.

  “Well, that was fun,” said Max.

  Carla walked up to Joel who was still looking at the doors. “So, now what. There is no other plan that involves us living.”

  “We start prepping the prison. Leave Holland to me.”

  “He seemed pretty adamant.”

  Amos stepped forward tentatively. “Umm… I know where they keep all their weapons, don’t know if that helps?”

  Carla looked at Joel. They were both smiling.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Marina turned off the headlights of the truck. In the distance, almost lost amongst the black of night, another set of lights swept across the landscape.

  “Just a patrol, looks like they didn’t spot us. Give it a few more minutes to make sure they don’t return,” said Carla, sitting in the passenger’s seat. Behind them were crates large and small of military grade weaponry. There was still plenty left in the large warehouse that they took the first amount from, but they still had eight hours until daylight, plenty of time to get the rest.

  Getting it over the fence was going to be a bit tricky, but with the strength of the hybrids, and the other Alkrons, Carla and Joel were confident they could get it all out of the camp.

  They had already been driving, keeping to the most shadow-infested roads so not to be noticed while they looked for the lowest part of the fence.

  Where Marina had stopped, the fence was only seven feet high, and the roof of the truck they were in was easily a few more feet above that.

  Joel had already jumped out, and over the fence, and now they were waiting for him to return with another similar height truck to park on the opposite side.

  “You sure he’s going to find another truck out there? Doesn’t seem much out here,” said Carla, trying to make sense of the few artificial blocklike shapes on the horizon.

  “He’ll find something,” said Marina. “There are farms.”

  Carla briefly looked at the woman next to her even though it was almost impossible to see her in the gloom. “You have a daughter?”

  “Yes, Jess. And I look after a little boy—”

  “Jasper.”

  Marina looked to her right. “You know about him?”

  “That was why I was at Haven, to help Copeland get his son back.”

  Marina snorted. “You mean that monster actually cares for his son?”

  “Not sure I would phrase it like that. He sees him as a future heir to his throne. Until then he just wanted to use him to help track his enemies.”

  “That makes more sense.”

  Silence briefly returned.

  “Umm…”

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m sorry about what happened at Haven.”

  “I’m sure the people that died there and were driven from their homes will be happy to know that.”

  Carla sighed and looked away, back into the darkness.

  More silence.

  “So, why the change of heart?” said Marina, still looking out of the side window to the fence nearby. “You seemed to enjoy selling out the human race.”

  “It wasn’t like that.”

  “Wasn’t like what?”

  “I took no pleasure in helping Copeland. Until Colvin died, I thought that maybe Copeland could be persuaded to do the right thing, that the corporation could help stabilize things until what was left, if anything, of the legitimate government could step up.”

  “How’d that work out for you?”

  “I’m here now. I’ll help you stop him.”

  “Good to know…” Marina picked up the noise of rubber, and rattling. “There’s someone coming…”

  Carla looked around. “Where? I don’t see any headlights.”

  “On the other side of the fence.”

  They both leaned over and watched as two dark rectangular shapes slid up to the fence near them. A figure got out, and in an instant leapt to the top of the shape at the back. He then hopped over the fence.

  Joel approached the truck as Marina opened her door.

  “All I could find was this pickup and a horse trailer.”

  Carla nodded. “Looks good, we should be able to get everything in there. Let’s start.” She banged on the metal wall behind her head, and the back of the truck opened.

  Dalton, Evan, and Kizzy jumped out.

  Joel had previously questioned the usefulness of the skinny young girl in helping them carry the two hundred pound crates to the back of the truck, but then watched amazed as she trebled in size to be as large as Dalton.

  Marina backed up the truck to as close to the electrified fence as she could get.

  Forming a human chain, Dalton and Kizzy lifted the crates up to Evan and Marina who carried them across the roof of the first truck, stepping over the gap, then onto the roof of the trailer, where Joel and Carla helped them down to the ground, and into the back.

  Luckily the headlights which they had previously spotted did not return, and Marina parked the first truck behind some trees, then leapt over the fence and jumped in alongside Joel. The others were in the back and soon they were heading towards the prison.

  Carla could hear breathing, but couldn’t see anything in the dark of the trailer.

  After a few minutes of silence she pulled the small flashlight out of her jacket and switched it on.

  Dalton was leaning back with his eyes closed, Kizzy was examining a flash grenade, and the young man she didn’t know was staring off into the distance.

  “So, you have been with Joel for some time?” she said to Evan.

  Evan looked at her surprised. “Err… yeah. Since Bellweather where I lived.”

  The trailer bumped along whatever country road they were on, causing Carla to tighten her grip to the crate she was sitting on.

  “You were in the army before working for Copeland?” said Kizzy, tossing the grenade back in with the others.

  “Yeah, I was a second lieutenant.”

  “What’s he like?”

  “Copeland?”

  “Yeah.”

  Carla went to talk but stopped, there were no easy definitions of her former boss. Her thoughts were too clouded by her hatred of him. “He’s someone that we need to stop.”

  The trailer slowed.

  Everyone but Dalton stood and tried to see what they could through the small slits at the side of the trailer.

  The backwash from the headlights just about gave enough light to see the first of three substantial metal fences. Unlike the hastily put together barrier that surrounded the town, this stood twelve feet high, and had barbed wire across the top.

  Upf
ront, Joel and Marina watched carefully as they drove through open gates and onto a forecourt.

  Joel slowed the pickup to a stop, the headlights illuminating the gray concrete outer wall of the prison. A secure-looking door sat at the bottom of it, and just visible in the gloom a few hundred yards away, at each corner, were circular towers.

  “Looks more like a European castle than a prison,” said Marina. They were the first words she had said since they set off.

  “If we can secure this place, we might survive whatever Copeland throws at us,” said Joel. He pushed the door open and walked to the trailer. “I’m going to check out inside.”

  The metal gate to the trailer swung back and Carla jumped out with Dalton. In her arm was an M4 rifle.

  Dalton kept on walking past Joel towards the door.

  “I’m coming too,” said Carla.

  Joel nodded then looked to the others. “Keep watch for any vamps. If you see anything, honk the horn.”

  Evan nodded.

  Joel looked into the complete black of the night around them. Even though the prison was located in the center of miles of boggy ground, with the occasional forest breaking up the landscape, there were no sounds of frogs crackling or any movement of birds. The world around him was devoid of animal life.

  “You coming?” said Carla at the main entrance to the prison.

  He ran and caught up with her, stepping over the threshold of the thick metal door and into a wide corridor.

  Carla swung her flashlight’s beam around to a scene of ruin. Glass lay scattered across the otherwise smooth floor. It belonged to a small office off to one side. Further along was a tangled mess of metal gating, and beyond that, gloom. Joel leaned through where the reinforced window would have been. A filing cabinet along with a computer screen laid on the floor, both covered in torn books and pieces of paper.

  “Where’s Dalton?” said Carla, pointing her light into the corridor.