The Last Outbreak- The Complete Box Set

by Jeff Olah

  Ethan held his position. He released the doors and as they began to close, he slipped back behind the three foot wide column. Taking a deep breath, he couldn’t piece together what this game of cat and mouse was all about. How long was this going to drag out? Why not just drive right through the doors and do whatever it was they came to do?

  Next came the horn. The driver sat on it for a full five seconds and then just waited. When Ethan did nothing in response, it sounded once again, this time for twice as long.

  “I hope I don’t regret this.”

  As the car’s horn sounded for a third time, Ethan stepped out in front of the doors, shouldered his rifle and began parting the doors. It was time to put an end to this. He didn’t want to have to use the weapon, but he felt it necessary to show whoever was behind the wheel that he was armed.

  Through the doors and into the alcove that separated the store from the parking lot, Ethan now recognized what he hadn’t before. He knew the white sedan and its owner; however, the question of why it rolled up into this parking lot—almost five-hundred miles from where he’d last seen it—was still a mystery.

  “Point the weapon at the ground.”

  The voice coming from the driver’s window was familiar, but not who he anticipated. Ethan stared straight ahead, hoping to catch even the slightest glimpse of the man in the driver’s seat.

  “Don’t make me shoot you and then go inside and kill the boy.”

  Nothing was adding up. The voice and the vehicle were both familiar, but for different reasons. Ethan kept the weapon firm against his shoulder, but instead of lowering it, he brought the end of the barrel in line with the windshield.

  Ethan shouted back through the rain. “How about I just end this right now?”

  The voice came again, but now the driver opened his door. “Sure, you could do that, but then you’ll never see your mother, the rest of your friends, or your sister ever again.”

  Ethan didn’t respond. There was too much coming all at once.

  “I get it Ethan, your head is probably spinning.” The driver stepped out and stood behind the door. He wore the familiar white Stetson, drove the same white sedan, but the man standing fifty feet away was most definitely not the man he met back in Green Valley. Gil Walker, the mayor of that little town off Interstate Seventy, was shorter and much wider than whoever this was. Although the voice was still someone he knew, he just couldn’t quite place it.

  “What do you want?”

  There came a slight chuckle and then the man wearing Mayor Gil’s white Stetson, stepped around the door. He also carried a weapon of his own, but held the pistol at arm’s length as he began to approach.

  “Ethan, lower the damn rifle … last chance.”

  “Why don’t I just—”

  The man in the white hat raised his weapon and fired one round into the block wall three feet from where Ethan stood.

  “Next, I kill you and then I go in and torture the boy. Just point the damn gun at the ground. Trust me, you have much more to live for than I ever did.”

  Ethan was confident he could take him out with one gentle squeeze of the trigger. Put the stranger down right where he stood. Figure out the rest once his heart rate slowed to something close to normal. Just end it, end it now and live without the regret of what may happen if he ignored the voice inside his head telling him to kill this man.

  “I know you,” Ethan said. “Don’t I?”

  “We’ve met … but you most certainly don’t know me. If you did, if you had any idea who I really was, you’d have already killed me.”

  The voice, Ethan remembered it now. “Boone?”

  The lanky man wearing the mayor’s hat and driving the mayor’s car nodded. “Yeah, you got it. How about I come over there, out of the rain, and we have a little chat about your sister.”

  152

  Emma couldn’t sleep. She sat in a folding chair with her legs pulled into her chest and peered down at her phone. With little hope that she’d have another chance to send or receive messages, and her battery at ninety percent, she tapped the photo icon and began scrolling.

  Her mother, her father, her brother, her friends, they were all there. Not only in her memories, but in the images and the videos she now valued more than just about anything else. They held every ounce of her emotion, as well as any hope she had for ever seeing them again.

  Stopping at an image of Ethan, she smiled.

  It was almost a year earlier and he had just been given the news that she’d be coming back to Summer Mill for an entire month. Within seconds of her sending him the message, he replied with a single image of himself wearing a smile that stretched from one ear to the other. It was the first time in months she’d actually seen him happy, and now in this forgotten existence, it was the only way she wanted to remember her big brother.

  Ethan, I miss you so much.

  After flipping through another few years’ worth of memories, Emma powered down her phone and turned to Tom. He laid stretched out on the hardwood floor with his jacket folded neatly under his head. The man who’d saved her life twice in one week stared up at the ceiling as he attempted to lose himself to a few hours of sleep.

  “Do you have anyone you’re still hoping is out there?”

  Tom shifted his body slightly to the right and turned his eyes toward her.

  “I don’t really have any family to speak of. I was an only child and my parents passed when I was nineteen.”

  “Friends?”

  “Mostly just industry people. Other actors, some crew, and a few low-level producers, but I don’t think they were really friends.”

  “What about—”

  “Oh yeah,” Tom said. “Bryce.”

  “Bryce?”

  “Yeah, we met the day that everything went to hell. He was running from one of those things and the people who saved me also picked him up. We got out of the city with four others just before everything got really bad.”

  “He’s still with them?”

  “I would think so, I mean it’s only been a few days and there really isn’t anything else out there anyway. Just bad stuff followed by more bad stuff.”

  Emma paused a moment, trying not to sound too pushy. “Is that where we’re going, to find him and the others?”

  “Just as soon as I can figure out how to get us there.”

  “Where?”

  “It’s an abandoned shopping mall, like ten miles or so outside of the city. Harbor Crest, I think was the name. One of the women we rescued had an antique store there before the entire mall had to close.”

  “Had to close?”

  “I don’t really remember the story, but she said something about the building owner running into financial troubles and letting it go into foreclosure a few years back.”

  “Is it safe?”

  “Pretty much … it was all fenced in before we got there so we just needed to reinforce a few areas and then it was just going out and getting the things we needed when we needed them.”

  “And …” Emma paused, “that’s how you found me, when you were out looking for things you needed?”

  Tom sat up. “Yes, exactly. And I can honestly say without a doubt that I’m happy I turned back.”

  “But?”

  “But what,” Tom said. “I like you.” His voice cracked and a big smile slid across his face. “I like you more than I should probably say, but I think you already know that.”

  Emma matched his smile, but didn’t respond. She was at a loss for words, and that made her nervous. Nervous in a way that was uncomfortable. She hadn’t felt this way around a man in years, not since she moved to California and definitely not since coming to work for Marcus Goodwin. There never seemed to be time for those things, but now that she had all the time in the world, and while staring at Tom as he sat six feet away, she was scared of what that meant.

  “So?” Tom said. “What are you thinking?”

  “I … I just … I mean …”

&nb
sp; “Okay, how about you just tell me about you, about everything Emma?” He was letting her off the hook.

  “What do you want to know?”

  “Anything. Everything. Whatever. Just tell me a story. Something about you that would be cool to know.

  “I don’t think there is anything about me that would be considered cool.”

  “Okay, then start at the beginning. We aren’t going anywhere for a while.”

  “This is kind of weird.” She moved out of the chair and sat on the floor across from him, her smile moving up into her eyes. “I’m not very good with stuff like this.”

  “Okay,” Tom said, “how about this … where’d you grow up? That’s an easy one.”

  Emma leaned back against the wall. “I was born in a small town outside of Denver and lived there pretty much my whole life.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah, I told you the story of my life wasn’t going to be very interesting … or cool.”

  Tom rubbed his hands together and sat forward. “Come on, I know there’s way more to you than just that small town in Colorado.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You told Cedric that you were some sort of a scientist, and worked for a billion-dollar tech company. You’ve got to have some cool stories, stuff that the general public doesn’t get to read about in the newspapers.”

  There wasn’t any reason to tell him what she actually knew, but there also wasn’t a reason to keep it from him. What had happened out there nearly two weeks ago couldn’t be changed, and even with all the gruesome details, there was a good chance he may not believe a single word she had to say.

  “I do have a story, but it’s not necessarily cool.”

  “You’ve got my undivided attention.”

  Emma looked into his eyes for a moment and then stared down at her clenched hands. “That stuff out there, all those things, whatever they are …”

  “Yeah?”

  “I worked for the man who created them.”

  Tom shook his head and fought back the urge to laugh. “What?”

  “I worked for a man named Marcus Goodwin. He built a large technology company and then essentially got bored with the day-to-day routine, so he decided he wanted to build something else.”

  “Build or destroy?”

  “His plan was to build a better, more capable human. He believed he could alter certain impulses within the brain that would allow the subjects to respond at an increased rate to specific stimuli.”

  “Don’t know if you’re pulling my leg,” Tom said. “But if you could run that back for me, and in English this time, I promise I’ll try to keep up.”

  “Well,” she said. “In the most basic of terms, he wanted to build a better soldier and then sell what he created to the military. He was consumed with having the project completed, even before all of the inconsistencies were worked out.”

  Tom’s smile widened. “And here I thought you were some computer nerd pecking away at a keyboard all day long.”

  Emma cut her eyes at him. “Wait, you don’t believe me?”

  Now he laughed. “You … are you … you’re actually serious. You’re telling me that whatever the hell that is out there, that you had something to do with it?”

  “Not directly.”

  “You do know how absolutely insane you sound?”

  “Really, more insane than people eating each other?”

  “Okay,” Tom said, “then how did it happen? How did it go from Project Super-Soldier to whatever this is?”

  “It wasn’t quite that simple. The project was in testing for years before I arrived, but over the last three months, I began to hear things were falling part, that there were some horrific accidents. Bodies were piling up and questions were being asked … even from the highest levels of government. But for some reason, we still just kept pushing forward.”

  “This still doesn’t make much sense. How did—”

  Emma shook her head. “It really doesn’t matter anymore. I wasn’t around long enough to make a difference and somehow it got out into the public. Nothing anyone does at this point will have any effect. Things aren’t ever going to be same.”

  Tom sat forward and ran his hand through his hair. “What are you saying?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know what?”

  Emma didn’t have an answer. She now regretted even bringing it up. He wanted to know something about her and for whatever reason she decided to start with the one thing about her life that she was hoping to forget.

  “I’m sorry, Tom.”

  “I’m not sure what we’re even talking about, but I don’t think there’s any reason to apologize.”

  She didn’t respond.

  “Okay,” Tom said, “what else is on your mind?”

  Emma breathed out slowly and turned back toward the window. Attempting to force a smile, she said, “It’s raining.”

  “What?”

  “Outside … it’s starting to rain.”

  153

  His suite was nearly silent as he lay on the zero-gravity recliner listening to Bach. Without moving his head, he cracked his right eye and peered down at the backlit screen. Eighty-six percent. He wouldn’t need to charge the phone again before morning, and after leaving the building, he would no longer have any use for the six-week-old device.

  James Dalton thumbed the volume and began to drift off as the sounds of Toccata in d minor filtered through his earbuds. He felt his body going heavy and his mind wandering away from this world. He again found his way to the perfect white sand beach that only existed inside his mind. He sat on that beach alone, away from everything and everyone, warming his face against the radiating midday sun. This was his perfect world. Where only he existed and only he had access.

  Resting on that perfect beach in his secluded paradise, Dalton could taste the salty air and could feel the waves crashing along the flawless shoreline only a few short strides away. He smiled at the whitecaps and regarded the pod of dolphins that darted through the crystal blue waters like children hurrying off to school.

  Falling deeper, Dalton dug his feet into the warming sand. He looked south along the beach and found their familiar faces. A group of three elderly gentlemen. They walked toward the aging pier, rods and reels slung over their shoulders, carrying buckets of chum. One by one, they stepped from the sand to the dusty concrete, nodding and offering a warm smile.

  He’d never seen these men, only in this world and they were always the same. The first two with long greying beards, floppy cargo hats, and dark as night blue jeans. They were nearly bookends. The third, he was always the third, was a bit younger than the others. The man—clean shaven, well-dressed, with an ever so slight limp—was almost a duplicate of his own father. Or maybe it was his father, but here Dalton had no intention of ever approaching his distant friends, he only wanted to enjoy their relaxed nature.

  Regarding the men with a smile and nod of his own, Dalton turned back to the crashing waves. He was falling further again as the last few notes of d minor played to an end and the sun above began to dim. He felt a struggle between the two worlds as a deep stretch of cloud cover quickly ran in overhead and the men on the pier began packing their things.

  Without opening his eyes, he reached for his phone and grabbed nothing but a handful of pressed white cotton. He traced his hand from left to his right, moving along his waistband and then up the right side of his body, only coming to find the end of the audio cable.

  Dropping his hand over the side of the contoured armrest, Dalton leaned to his right and felt along the commercial grade carpeting with no luck. Desperately attempting to stay grounded in the world that only he knew existed, he laid back in the chair and breathed slowly and deliberately in and out, in and out.

  The beach again began to warm, although back on the pier, the men with the rods and the reels and the chum continued to pack away their supplies. He wanted to call out to them, to ask them to sta
y put, to ask that they continue with their routine, because it was so detrimental to his own. Although he knew he couldn’t. There were rules with his world, rules that he had set for himself and for anyone or anything that he allowed to enter.

  With a sigh, Dalton relaxed himself. He continued watching the men as they started back down the concrete steps and out onto the warm white sand. The third man, the one who could have passed for his father, stepped out of line. He was breaking the rules, the rules Dalton had created. But how could that be?

  The man let the others walk away as he turned and started toward him. Dalton tried to call out. He wanted to tell the man that he was only a creation of his own mind and that this wasn’t allowed.

  As the man got closer, his smile turned. He looked different with each step forward and his mouth opened. He was going to speak. This was not what Dalton wanted. He had not allowed this, but somehow it was happening.

  “Dalton,” the man said, “wake up.”

  Dalton shook his head at the man, because that’s the only thing he could do.

  The man spoke again, his face contorting with each syllable. “Get up out of that chair before I pull you out!”

  The voice was familiar, so was the new face the man wore. And as the image of the beach, and the sand, and the sky and the beautiful sun began to fade, Dalton realized that the voice and the man weren’t in that world at all.

  Snapping his eyes open and staring up from the chair, he looked right into the face of Marcus Goodwin, absolutely the last person he wanted to see at that particular moment. It took a few seconds for his vision to crystallize, but when it did, he quickly shifted his weight forward and moved the zero-gravity chair into its upright position.

  Pulling his earbuds out, Dalton stepped away from the chair. He straightened his shirt and then his tie, looking up at Goodwin. He waited a beat before speaking, hopeful that the tension he imagined between the two would evaporate.