Star Road (45 page)

It made no difference.

They simply continued moving forward, crawling and writhing on the ground, making better progress than they did walking upright.

If a body was split in two, both halves continued their grim movement forward.

“I hate to say it, but it looks fucking hopeless,” Ivan said.

Which is when Sinjira opened her pain-glazed eyes. Mere slits. Hazy, as if she had been sleeping or was drugged.

She raised her gaze to a dark corner of the cavern—a narrow opening that led off to one side, seemingly back into the mountain itself.

“That way,” she said, her voice no more than a croak.

Jordan, struggling to carry her, ignored what she said.

But Ivan heard the urgency in her voice and said, “What do you mean?”

He looked at Ruth, who was also following the conversation. They were approaching the bottom of the mathematical steps, which they could navigate, now knowing the secret, assuming the pattern hadn’t changed.

But they were moving so slowly, the undead army would be all over them, tearing at them before they were halfway up.

And would they infect them with the same nano-machines, turning them into ... who knew what?

Maybe,
Ivan thought,
that’s when we turn against each other like they did, in a mad and ultimately futile struggle to survive. Even death wouldn’t be a release.

“Trust me,” Sinjira said. “They’re already ... inside me. I
know.
Go
that
way.”

Jordan was simply soldiering on, carrying Sinjira and intent on only one thing—getting out of this cave.

Ivan tapped him on the shoulder.

“Jordan.”

Ruth was still looking at him, fear written all over her face, but also something else ... Determination.

Then louder: “Jordan.
Stop!
She said—”

Sinjira could barely raise her head.

“I can
feel
another way out. A hidden passage. Over there.”

Another slight nod.

“Our only chance, gunner,” Ivan said.

Jordan was clearly torn. For him, forward was the only option. Always.

Not back, and certainly not
deeper
into the darkness.

“I—”

Sinjira was barely able to speak.

“I can
feel
it.”

Then a nod, as the gunner turned.

Annie looked to Rodriguez, who had run ahead, toward the stairs, no doubt thinking if he was out front, he’d be safe.

Maybe he’d be the only
one
they
wouldn’t
get.

“Rodriguez, no. This way!” Ivan shouted, but Rodriguez froze.

The army of undead was only meters away.

Their animated body parts and old bones made a clunky carousel of sound, and the stench in the air was nauseating.

Rodriguez didn’t move.

His choice,
Ivan thought.

But then, finally Rodriguez took a step back toward them.

Jordan was already clambering up to the side toward the dark opening Sinjira had indicated.

Except as Ivan followed, with Annie a few paces behind, he had to wonder at her words.
“They’re already inside me.”

The nano-machines?

Could they also lead her in the wrong direction?

Could what they were about to do actually seal their fate by luring them into a dead end where there was only one way this battle could end?

We’re about to find out,
Ivan thought, resigned.

Jordan and Sinjira disappeared into the narrow opening.

Ivan looked at Ruth, Annie, and Rodriguez.

His expression said it all:
It’s anybody’s guess.

And they followed them into the darkness.

~ * ~

44

A HUMAN SACRIFICE

Ivan looked back at the
others following him into the tunnel, scrambling in the dark. The way ahead sloped steeply upward, the path littered with massive boulders with sharp jagged edges. Only weak flecks of the blue light here.

Just enough light so they could see the handholds ... and where to step.

This could be a way out,
he thought,
but it feels like a trap.

Jordan, laboring with Sinjira in his arms, still turned and tried to get off a few blasts, but her dead weight was having an impact on him. Wearing him down.

And the way everyone clustered together as they moved as fast as they could through the tunnel made getting clear shots at the advancing horde almost impossible.

They needed time to regroup.

Ivan could see only one thing to do as the army of undead followed them.

“Jordan—”

The gunner looked at him.

“Give me two grenades.”

Jordan smiled thinly.

“Hero time?”

Ivan said the next words as if it was so clear, so obvious.

“If we don’t stop them here, we’re all dead.”

Jordan let Sinjira slip down to the ground. She looked totally exhausted, her face marked with the intense pain.

“My grenades,” Jordan said, “my job.”

“We don’t have time to discuss this.”

Annie joined them but remained silent, other than breathing hard, letting the two of them argue over who was about to die.

Then a small voice from the ground spoke.

“Jordan ...”

Stopping them cold.

Sinjira held up the stump of her arm.

Even in the dim light, they all could see the shiny flakes of the nanomachines spreading past the tourniquet and up to her shoulder.

~ * ~

No one said a word.

The next voice was hers.

“Doc,” she said. “Hit me with a stim.”

Rodriguez fumbled in his backpack, but Jordan got between them.

“There’s no way in hell you’re going to—”

“Hit me ... with ... a
god... damn... stim!”

By this time, Rodriguez had fished a small packet from his backpack.

He looked from Annie to Ivan to Jordan and then to Sinjira. Her face was set in a rictus of pain.

“Do it!” she said between clenched teeth.

Ivan watched Rodriguez rip the package open and take out a needle.

Annie looked down the slope and said, “They’re almost here. We have to—”

Staring at Rodriguez, Ivan nodded, and Jordan, seething with fury, stepped aside.

Rodriguez leaned down and prepared to inject Sinjira in her good arm, but with a heavy effort, she shook her head and then tilted it to one side, exposing her neck.

A bulging vein caught the scant light.

“Here,” she said. “It’ll hit quicker.”

A moment’s hesitation.

“Just fucking
do
it!”

Then Rodriguez touched the vein with the tip of the needle. As everyone watched, the auto-plunger shot the stimulant into her bloodstream.

All the while, Jordan was shaking his head.

His eyes glazed.

Just then, the first of the shambling army of zombies turned the corner and witnessed a scene that would have appeared—if they had any thoughts at all—to be the group of humans waiting to die.

~ * ~

Ivan watched Annie move closer to the undead, mowing down the first row, sending their revived body parts flying.

Thankfully at this range and when totally shattered by the pulse blasts those body parts stopped moving.

Maybe they have to be close to those vines,
he thought.

A faint trace of hope as he turned to Sinjira who—amazingly—was standing up.

She looked at Ivan and Jordan, then at her arm and the discoloration creeping up past her shoulder now.

“Give me the grenades,” she said to Jordan.

He shook his head.

“Hell no. You’ll die.”

Ivan had figured out something that must not have dawned on Jordan yet.

Sinjira knew it was already too late.

She pulled the chip from the node in her head, the stim giving her the strength to stand, to move.

To Ivan: “Take this. I got it all.”

Annie, down below, shouted, “There’s more coming!”

“All
of it?” Ivan said, astounded. Did she mean—?

Sinjira struggled to talk. She probably had only seconds left of coherent conversation, but it was clear what she was thinking.

“When it was floating overhead,” she said. “I recorded the Star Road Map. It’s all there.”

She pressed the chip into Ivan’s hand, his fingers touching hers in the exchange. They were ice-cold.

To Jordan, she said, I m already dead. The ultimate trip, they say, right? That’s why they save it for last.”

“You don t have to do this,” Jordan said, his voice cracking. “We can get you to the medical facility—”

“Stop
it. You’re only making this harder for me.” She swayed on her feet, struggling to stand. “Let me stop them. Let me give you a chance.”

And Ivan saw in Jordan’s eyes that he—Jordan—finally accepted her logic.

Annie’s pulse blasts were deafening in the narrow tunnel.

Jordan handed the two grenades to Sinjira.

She smiled and then, leaning forward, kissed him on the mouth.

“Y’know ... we could have made some interesting chips together.”

The she turned to Ivan and said, “Now get everyone the hell out of here. Just follow this tunnel. Trust me. It’ll get you out of here.”

Ivan nodded.

He yelled down to Annie, who was kneeling and ready for the next wave of undead to charge them.

“Annie!”

As Annie scrambled back, Sinjira, looking unsteady on her feet, started walking down to meet the army streaming toward them. Kyros, hanging in the back, was shouting commands, urging them on.

Ivan started up the incline as fast as he could go. Jordan, unencumbered by Sinjira, was guarding the rear, making sure Annie made it up the slope.

Annie was a short distance behind him. Jordan waved her to hurry, shouting, “Go! Get the hell out of here!”

Ruth helped Rodriguez keep up with the retreat.

The Seeker showing that she had a level of strength maybe she didn’t even realize until now.

~ * ~

More twists and turns, more climbing, making their way as fast as they could through the narrow tunnel until up ahead, Ivan saw a faint trace of light—daylight. It
had
to be an opening.

Nearly there... Hope.

And then—as if to remind everyone of the price they were paying—an orange flash lit up the tunnel behind them, followed by the concussive blast of a thermite grenade.

Sinjira,
Jordan thought, genuinely pained by the thought of her sacrifice.

They kept running, the ground leveling out now ... the opening ... the cave mouth of the hidden entrance.

But Ivan tensed and looked back the way they had come, waiting to see and hear the second blast.

And then it came—flashing and roaring—too close.

Rocks and dirt fell from the ceiling, and a wave of searing heat rolled over them, charring their eyes and lungs.

For an instant, the explosive cloud filled the cave, obliterating the walls and the entrance.

Ivan was sure that the second blast was going to bring the entire mountain down on them.

They all ran as a deep-throated rumble of shifting stone and earth filled the cave.

As the smoke cleared, Ivan saw only a few more meters ahead the odd glow of the sun beaming down on the mountain’s side.

All of them were coughing, their ears ringing. They waved away the swirling dust as best they could and staggered out into the open as a dense cloud of dust belched from inside the mountain.

Jordan—the last to leave.

He held his pulse rifle at the ready, but there was no need. The ceiling of the cave had come down, sealing off Kyros and his undead army, at least for now.

Ivan stood and watched with the others as Jordan finally turned and walked away.

Ivan waited, looking at Jordan, not wanting to break the silence.

Finally: “That was a brave thing she did.”

“She saved our lives,” Ruth said.

Jordan looked around at all of them, his mouth a thin line on his dirt-smeared face.

“That’s the thing about people,” Jordan finally said. “You just never know.”

Then Ivan, with Jordan at his side, went back to the cave mouth to make sure it was sealed.

“Nothing’s getting through that,” Ivan said.