by M. D. Massey
“S—sorry. So sorry. Do it.”
I drew my sidearm and held it to the side of her head. “Sorry won’t be bring anyone back, but I’ll tell them you said so.”
She closed her eyes, and a tear ran down her cheek. I looked away and pulled the trigger.
SORROWS
The one bit of good news was that Mickey, Anna, and half their Wild Boys had barricaded themselves inside a room, while Colin had somehow managed to hold off any and all comers. I raised an eyebrow at the scorch marks and weird symbols on the wall, floor, and ceiling in the hall outside, but kept my comments to myself. I suspected that the big swordsman and Rabbi Borovitz had a lot in common, and intended to ask him about it in private.
Despite the heroic efforts of all involved, the losses we suffered in the attack were devastating. If Bobby’s Pack hadn’t been around when it happened… well, it would’ve been much worse. I hadn’t been close to many of the settlers or LARPers, but I had gotten to know several of them since we’d taken out the Corridor Pack. Cleaning up after the fight and gathering their corpses for burial was a difficult and trying task.
Gabby’s dog, Ghost, had also gone missing in the attack. We didn’t find a body, so I assumed he’d been taken to become another of the witch’s familiars. Gabby refused to discuss it.
During the aftermath of the attack, the hardest bit was when I came across Janie’s broken, mutilated body. She had run the general store back at the settlement, before the ’thropes had come through looking for Kara. Our interactions had always been friendly and somewhat flirtatious, and to be honest I’d have probably been with her if I wasn’t already attached.
She’d been bitten and drained by a vamp, and after that her body had been torn apart by deader dogs and deaders. I took the sole responsibility of gathering up what was left of her to place it in a body bag for a proper burial. And if I wept a little while I did it—well, there was a lot of that going around, so I don’t think anyone noticed.
I was cleaning Janie’s blood off the floor when the Doc came running down the hall toward me. The Doc never really hurried to get anywhere, so I knew she was bringing me bad news.
“Scratch, we have a serious issue.”
I looked her straight in the eye as I leaned on my mop. “New day, new crisis. Tell me what’s up.”
“It’s the pest control system—it’s been sabotaged. We already have undead roaming the area topside in singles and small groups.”
“Shit—well, it’s not like it’s something we’re not used to dealing with. How’d they break the damned thing, anyway? In fact, how’d they even know about it?”
“The system works as an ultra-high frequency sound emitter, similar to the way an ultrasonic dog bark controller operates. Except, instead of emitting a single high-frequency tone, the pest control system sends out a continuous series of commands—the same way a powerful vamp can give off messages that keep deaders away from their lair. I would imagine that one of the vamps detected the signal and trashed the emitters topside.”
I stuck the mop I’d been using back in the bucket, doing my best to ignore how the water had turned brown with blood and other filth I’d had to clean up. “Damn it—do we have replacements, or a backup?”
“None. The system was experimental when we brought it online after the invasion occurred. It’s one of a kind, I’m afraid.”
“Has the hatch they breached been welded shut yet?”
She shook her head. “Not yet. Everyone has been too busy taking care of their dead.”
I growled with exasperation. “Alright, then have the wolves replace the hatch and cover it with boulders from the outside, and I’ll weld it shut myself as soon as I finish here. We can barricade that hall as an additional safety measure, and that should keep the deaders out for now.”
She crossed her arms and rubbed her cheek with one hand. For the first time, I noticed deep circles under her eyes and worry lines on her face. “The real problem is, they know exactly where we are. What’s to stop them from coming back and ripping open another hatch?”
I ran my fingers through my hair and scratched my head as I made an effort to clear the mental cobwebs away. Lack of sleep was affecting my ability to reason. At least my deader bite isn’t hurting as badly, I thought.
“I don’t have an answer to that question, but we can ask Samson or Colin about that, since they’ve dealt with these things before. For now, let’s secure this place from the most immediate threat, then we can figure out how to go on the offensive.”
She exhaled heavily, her mouth taut with worry. “If it helps, I can vaccinate anyone who volunteers. We can consider it a field test, I suppose.”
“We might have to go further than that, Doc.”
“You mean dose them with serum?”
I shrugged. “Sure, why not? You’ve seen how these things move, and how dangerous they are—don’t you think those people deserve every advantage possible to survive?”
She stared at me, long and hard, then finally her shoulders slumped slightly. “I suppose you’re right. But Tony and I agreed long ago that anyone who got the serum needed to be vetted carefully. It’s a lot of power to put in the wrong hands, Scratch.”
Tony had been Gabby’s uncle. I’d never gotten the full details on how he fit into everything, but from the way the kid talked about him, I’d guessed he was a spook before the War. Probably complicit in all their secret testing here at the Facility, too. Gabby had said he’d disappeared after they’d gotten jumped by ’thropes, right before I’d rescued her.
Or before she’d rescued me. It was a matter of perspective, I supposed.
I returned the Doc’s stare, chewing my lip as I considered my words. “When the choices are evolution or extinction, Lorena, is there really any choice at all?”
She took a deep breath and closed her eyes as she let it out slowly. It was clear that this was a tough decision for her. Her eyes popped open as she replied. “Again, you’re right. But it may not take with everyone—you realize that, don’t you?”
“Doc, if we only had half our people juiced, it’d make a huge difference in our chances for survival. Do it.”
I heard a deep voice bellow from somewhere down the hallway, shortly after the ’thropes had secured the broken hatch from the outside. “Who the hell is responsible for allowing the fucking undead—and civilians—into my secure top-secret facility?”
Gabby was standing nearby, and I noticed she perked up at the sound of that voice. “Uncle Tony?” she asked in a loud but tremulous voice.
A lean but solidly built Hispanic man in his early forties strolled around the corner. He had a scarred face that made mine look pretty, short dark hair, and serious, deep set brown eyes. The man had a pair of H&K forty-five caliber pistols strapped to his hips, an M4 rifle slung over one shoulder, and some sort of cutlass or machete scabbarded over the other. He stood about five-foot-ten and had the look of a stone killer. Definitely a spook, I thought.
He locked eyes with Gabby and gave her a nod. “Hey there, mija. Glad to see you’re doing okay.”
Gabby marched up to him and slapped him across the face. Hard. Then, she shoved him with enough force to make him stumble. “You asshole! I thought you were dead. And you left me alone out there, you son of a bitch!”
Then she was hugging him fiercely, pressing her face into his chest and soaking his green BDU shirt with her tears. The man was obviously uncomfortable with the display of affection, but he began stroking her hair and whispering in her ear.
“Hey now, that’s no way to speak of your abuela, mija. If she were here she’d wash your mouth out with soap.” The kid leaned back as if to slap him again, and he smiled and held his hands up. “Relax, Gabby. I’m here now, and that’s all that matters, right?”
She hugged him again, then backed off stiffly. She glanced at me before looking away shyly, wiping her eyes where I couldn’t see. Finally, she composed herself and stood between us in an awkward stance, the way onl
y a teenager could manage.
“Scratch, this is my Uncle Tony.”
I nodded. The man looked at me and half-smiled, half-frowned—an impossible expression that seemed natural to him. “I see you found our lab rat, mija. Hay chingao, but he looks like he’s been through the wringer.”
I kept my face and voice neutral as I replied. “Right back at you, pretty boy. Now that I’ve met you in person, I can see why you and the Doc get along so well. Between the two of you, you might actually have a whole personality.”
He looked at Gabby quizzically. “The Doc?”
“He means Aunt Lorena.”
“Ah.” The man nodded, then stepped forward and held out a hand. “Thanks for looking after my niece while I was gone.”
I had my reservations about this guy, but for Gabby’s sake I shook his hand. “She looked after me as much as I did her.”
“That doesn’t surprise me. It’s the last order I gave her before we parted ways.”
“The last thing you told me was to run, pendejo,” she said with a frown.
He shrugged, almost imperceptibly. “Yeah, but you knew we were looking for Sergeant Sullivan. He was the last surviving test subject from the initial Cerberus trials.” Tony looked at me and smirked. “Looks like getting your ass blown off in Afghanistan worked to your favor, Sullivan. If you hadn’t, you’d have probably been with the rest of the test subjects when our base got overrun by the dead.”
“Lucky me.”
“Yeah, well—I know you probably have your panties in a wad over being left in the dark, but you know how Uncle Sam operates. Everything is ‘need to know,’ and a soldier doesn’t need to know shit. Besides, the serum you got is a lot more… stable, if that’s the right word. Some of those boys went batshit crazy after we juiced them. Not a pretty sight. Believe me, you pulled a long straw.”
“How’d you know I took the serum?” I asked.
“The same way I knew this facility had been compromised. Been monitoring what’s been going on all along. We have facilities like this all over Texas—and most of the continental United States. Or what’s left of it. Damned shame about the pest control system, though. That tech’ll be hard to duplicate for a while yet.”
I rubbed my bite scar unconsciously as I spoke. “How much of the old government structure is still in place?”
“I can’t talk about that. Not yet, anyway. And before you ask, I can’t divulge the location of the other secure facilities, either. Vamps have been looking for them since they dropped the bombs on us.” I raised an eyebrow at him. “Oh yeah, they were responsible for that. Bloodsuckers had infiltrated key nuclear facilities the world over through their familiars.”
“You mean those dog things we’ve been fighting?” I asked.
He gave his niece a look that said I was the slow kid in class. “Huh? Good night, but you’re clueless. No, with people. Vamps feed on them and they gain a sort of mind control over them. It’s subtle, but it becomes stronger over time. And then there are humans who want to get turned. Those worthless pricks will do anything for a shot at immortality.
“Once they had all their people in place, all they had to do was release a few warheads, and we stepped in to do the rest. It’s just sheer luck that we figured it out in time to avoid mutual, worldwide nuclear destruction.”
I crossed my arms. “Thanks for the illuminating history lesson, but why are you really here?”
“Besides the fact that you people exposed the location of this facility to the enemy… and you allowed them to get inside?” He leaned in close as he spoke in a whisper. “A working vaccine, Sergeant Sullivan. That’s what the future hope of the entire world hinges upon. And I’m not about to let you and your gang of misfits fuck things up by letting it fall into the enemy’s hands.”
Colin and I were aboveground and outside the Facility, killing any deaders we came across. It was a losing battle, but we weren’t trying to clear the area. We were only clearing the way from one hidden entrance to another, so Colin could “ward” the hatches and doors—whatever the hell that meant.
“You’re telling me the squiggly lines and shit you’re drawing are supposed to keep vamps out?”
“Uh-huh,” he said as he traced impossibly intricate symbols on the surface of a metal hatch. He’d somehow found a bunch of permanent markers that hadn’t dried out, though I had no idea how. He furrowed his brow in concentration as he worked, and while I doubted the efficacy of the drawings, I appreciated the effort.
“What does it do, scare them away or something?”
“Or something,” he mumbled as he continued drawing.
“I’d rather just set up claymores and IEDs at all the entrances.”
“Yeah, but you and I both know the dead would only set them off, then the vamps would know where every entrance to the Facility was located.”
I picked up a good-sized rock and chucked it at a deader’s head that had popped up over a nearby rise. The rock hit the thing cleanly in the temple, dropping it. It did not get back up.
“I know. I just think good old-fashioned munitions are more reliable than all this mumbo-jumbo.”
“Meh, it depends on the enemy. If we were just dealing with normal humans, I’d probably advise going your route. But against vamps? Trust me, you fight the supernatural with the supernatural, whenever possible.”
Two more deaders came over the rise, moaning and groaning as soon as they saw us. The ruckus they made wasn’t loud enough to bring more of their kind to investigate, but they’d locked in on us. I loosened my sword in its scabbard as I kept an eye on them.
“You just about done?” I said as I unsheathed my sword. We’d been at it for a few hours, and while the scar from my deader bite didn’t hurt near as bad, my arms and shoulders were fatigued from lopping heads off.
“Just about,” he replied, sticking his tongue out the side of his mouth as he finished drawing an intricate series of circles, loop-the-loops, and squiggly lines on the hatch.
The deaders were nearly on us. I stepped forward almost casually and chopped their heads off, then snapped the sword out and to the side to sling most of the goo off the blade. I wiped it down with a few dried leaves, but kept it out as a precaution. I scanned our perimeter, just in case more of the dead showed.
“How are you dealing with your losses?”
He stopped drawing for a moment as he looked down at the ground. “I’d rather not talk about it.”
“Alright.” I turned away from him, and ignored the tingling up my spine that was accompanied by a flash of light behind me. Nope, I don’t want to know. I heard a bit of rustling as Colin stood up.
“Done. That should keep the vamps from ripping off another hatch. If they touch any of these entrances, they’re going to get the shock of their undead lives.”
“If you say so. But it still doesn’t mean they can’t come down here with high explosives, or tanks, or an RPG, and just blow the flipping place wide open.”
He nodded. “True. Anonymity and secrecy were our best defenses.”
“I should have kicked Nadine out at the first sign of trouble.”
“And then what? She’d have run straight to the vamps, told them everything about the Facility and how to get inside, and then we’d be in the same predicament. C’mon, man, we can’t go second-guessing ourselves right now. We need to be thinking proactively, and planning a way to defeat the vamps for good.”
I sat on a fallen log and rested the sword across my knees. “I suppose the vaccine is a start.”
Colin sat on the same log, a couple of feet away and facing the opposite direction. “It is at that. How many of the survivors have taken it so far?”
“All of them, I think. We had one anaphylactic reaction, but the Doc dosed them with epinephrine and antihistamines and they pulled through.” I kicked over a leaf, revealing a large red centipede underneath. “I notice you haven’t had it yet.”
“Don’t need it. I’m… uh… immune.”
“Yep.”
We sat there in silence for several minutes, just enjoying the scenery. Except for the moans and groans of deaders in the distance, I could almost imagine I was camping out at the ranch, before the War and subsequent undead apocalypse.
“Colin, shoot me straight.”
“Sure, Scratch.”
“If they come at us with everything they’ve got, do we even have a chance?”
He thought for a moment as he nudged a stone with his boot. “Not a snowball’s chance in hell. The ones that attacked us last night were young, and not so hard to kill. If they really want us dead, they’ll come with dozens of primaries, ancient vampires like Piotr with powers that absolutely dwarf our meager skills and talents. I tried fighting a vamp like that once, with another powerful but younger vampire beside me. It wasn’t even a contest… not even close.”
“So, we’re pretty much fucked.”
“Yup. May as well change your name to Mike Honcho and spread your butt cheeks for Playgirl magazine.”
I laughed in spite of myself. Cracking jokes in the face of certain death was a universal characteristic among warriors. “Man, I miss Will Ferrell movies.”
“You and me both.”
HOUR
The vamps came again the next night, and the night after that. Best we could tell, Colin’s hoodoo was working. We’d hear a pop and hiss outside a door or hatch in the dead of the night, and then the next day we’d find pieces of vamp all over the place.
Still, they kept coming.
Tony had already left to parts unknown, along with a sample of the vaccine and a copy of the Doc’s research. He at least had the decency to say goodbye to his niece before he left, so I had to give him that. But when I’d mentioned that we could sure use his help when the vamps showed up in force, he’d laughed and simply said, “Yeah, good luck with that.”
