Transformation: Zombie Crusade VI (15 page)

Luke and Gracie were both exhausted by the time they returned to their tent; neither of them bothered to remove much of their armor before climbing into their sleeping bag. As they held one another close, Gracie smiled and remarked, “We’d be warmer without all of these clothes.”

“Yeah, we would, but I actually want you to get some sleep before the fight tomorrow.”

“You sleep too,” Gracie commanded.

“I will, but remember, I don’t need as much as you.”

“Just make sure you get what you need before heading out. When do you plan on leaving?”

“While it’s still dark if the weather’s good; if it’s really snowing hard, I’ll wait for first light so I don’t trip over anything on my way to pick up Terry.”

“Be careful and kiss me before you go,” Gracie murmured as she snuggled against Luke. She was sound asleep in less than two minutes.

Luke smiled, a bit sadly, as he thought about his wife’s concern. At least for the foreseeable future, he would be in constant danger as he assumed more responsibility in the war. Gracie would be at his side much of the time, but there would be plenty of situations where he would have to undertake missions on his own. And she would worry, as he worried about her when she was away from him. He wondered about the magical process that led two humans who hadn’t even known one another a year earlier to be so uniquely important to each other now.

He had become the most lethal hunter-killer on the planet, and he would do anything to protect Gracie and the people he loved, yet he no longer looked forward to battles the way he used to. Destroying the hunters was a necessity, and while he couldn’t deny the intoxicating power of adrenaline in the heat of combat, he no longer felt self-righteous and celebratory when contemplating his role in the extermination of the infected. He would save the celebration for when he eliminated Matthew Barnes. The hunters were as much his victims as the survivors trying to hang on to their humanity. Luke wasn’t sure what to think of the people working for Barnes, but he knew he couldn’t afford the luxury of trying to sort out the potential “good guys” on his enemy’s team. Coerced or not, anyone working for Barnes was as much a danger to the people he loved as the hunters themselves.

He finally closed his eyes and tried to rest, but he felt an unsettling urgency to get through tomorrow’s battle and get his troops back on the road heading west. Concentrating on Gracie’s steady breathing helped him relax, but as he was drifting off to sleep, his thoughts turned to Achilles in the Trojan War. Like Achilles, Luke was a mighty fighter with a weak spot. He was vulnerable because he loved Gracie, and he depended on her more than she ever realized. His love for her was the force that compelled nearly every act of his new life. She truly was part of him, a part that he actually had little control over. That truth, he realized, was the most amazing, yet terrifying, aspect of his post-apocalyptic life.

Luke was running in full gear—though he realized that he must have forgotten his gloves, and the helmet felt odd. He turned slightly, leapt into the air, and reached up toward the brilliant blue sky. As he caught the ball, a loud roar penetrated the padding of his helmet, and he was instantly running full speed in the opposite direction, past the wildly exuberant Notre Dame cheerleaders. The scene faded as he ran toward the goal posts ahead, and just before the field vanished, he jumped awkwardly and landed on his backside, sinking into a couch cushion and sending popcorn flying in several directions.

Somebody yelled, “Hey” but was shushed by about a dozen voices.

Luke looked at the TV, and a vaguely familiar announcer said, “With the first pick of the third round, the Dallas Cowboys select . . .”

Everything went black for an instant, then Luke was dancing. He gazed into the big brown eyes of his bride, eyes that reminded him of Gracie’s but belonged to a beautiful stranger. As they slowly spun around the dance floor, the room grew hazy, and he heard a baby crying not far away. He turned in the direction of the sound and was almost blinded by the bright light streaming in from the nursery window. A cherubic toddler was standing in his crib, squealing with delight and reaching toward Luke. The room glowed with love and happiness;
this is what
heaven feels like
, Luke thought right before the room began to spin and sirens blared in the distance.

When the spinning stopped, Luke was facing a television in an expensive kitchen, watching the first reports of the outbreak on a local Dallas station.

He suddenly knew where all this was going.
No
, Luke thought desperately.
I don’t need to be here; I don’t need to see this.
He tried to force himself to wake up, and again the world went black. He felt another disquieting falling sensation right before a terrible buzzing sound scrambled his thoughts. The buzzing stopped for a few seconds, and Luke was on a familiar riverbank, cold and buckled over in pain. He threw his head back and roared in agony and defiance. The grief was almost unbearable, and Luke felt his own heart breaking.
Barnes did this
,
and Barnes will pay.
Luke opened his eyes. He was back in the tent, with Gracie pressed up against him. He shivered and pulled her closer. Before this night, eliminating the infected was something he pursued to protect the people he loved and save humanity from annihilation; he’d never really considered that he was also, in a different way, saving the former humans as well.

   Heavy snow fell all through the night, so Luke waited until the hour before dawn to fetch Terry and make the final preparations for their trek to the bridge. The encampment was bustling with activity as the company commanders had their troops clearing their fighting positions and storing weapons and crossbow-bolts for the looming battle. As promised, he tracked down Gracie and kissed her before leaving. His dream had left him melancholy, and he held her tight and close.

Gracie sensed his mood. “Are you worried about something? Our plans aren’t set in stone, you know. If you have any doubts—”

“Our plan is solid, don’t worry,” Luke interrupted. “I’ve just been thinking about all the lives Barnes has destroyed. Every hunter represents an unspeakable tragedy; what he’s done to them is even worse than what he’s trying to do to us.”

“Do you regret what we’re going to do today?” Gracie asked quietly.

“Not a chance,” Luke assured her. “We’re doing them a favor. Do you know anyone who doesn’t have somebody in place to make sure they don’t come back if the worst happens?”

Gracie shook her head. “It’s our worst fear—coming back and terrorizing the people we care about; it would be a fate much worse than death.”

“Exactly,” Luke agreed. “I never doubt that we’re doing the right thing, but sometimes I think about what the hunters used to be, who the hunters used to be, and it’s just incredibly sad.”

Gracie kissed Luke one more time, and made him promise once again that he would be careful. After giving her his word, he climbed back on the ATV and drove off to pick up Terry. Luke’s pack was filled with air-horns, but otherwise he was travelling light as he headed south through the storm. For now, Terry sat behind him; a practical arrangement that kept the young soldier warm and Luke’s eyes piercing the snowy darkness.

The wind was slowing and the temperature was somewhere near freezing, though Luke suspected that those conditions would change once the storm passed. The nearly eight-mile trip to the highway intersection was uneventful, and the rising sun greeted the two shivering humans with nothing more than a gentle lightening of the clouds that carried the snow. During the hour-long ride from the bridge, Luke began to worry that most, if not all, of the infected would be staying in their shelters while the storm raged. But he had no control over that possibility, and hunger was always a powerful motivator for the hunters; if they heard the ATV or the air-horns, they would seek out the source of the noise. If they smelled Terry, they would attack.

Luke drove across Highway 30 and entered the grounds of the depot, where he finally noted a decrease in the intensity of the falling snow. A half mile or so into the base, he and Terry pulled a handful of air-horns out and set one off. The piercing sound seemed to violate the quiet beauty of the swirling snowflakes. Luke wished he had brought earplugs as he slapped a piece of duct tape over the on-button and set the device on the hood of an abandoned vehicle. From there, they followed their tire-tracks back the way they’d come, setting off air-horns at quarter-mile intervals. Shortly after reaching the highway intersection, they saw the first of the hunters.

CHAPTER 13

As he toured the northern California base and endured the monotony of Pruitt’s long-winded explanations of how plans were progressing in the state, Barnes was pleasantly surprised to discover that his orders were being sufficiently carried out in spite of the conflict between Pruitt and Daniels. Pruitt was slow, but meticulous in his micromanagement. That was the main reason the two officers clashed; they had very different leadership styles. Daniels was a warrior who liked to get things done now and worry about the details later. He was well suited to the task of rounding up masses of highly-developed infected from what was left of the tens of millions of people who’d lived in Southern California before the outbreak. Pruitt’s job of organizing settlements and focusing on agriculture in the northern section of the state seemed less significant to Daniels’ macho sensibilities, though Barnes actually considered both tasks equally important to the realization of his long-term goals.

Pruitt had arranged for the fall planting of valuable cover crops in the fertile Northern California soil and overwintering cattle in the vast expanses of rye fields. He’d organized human settlements by county, and then determined what industry and products each area needed to focus on to meet the needs of President Barnes in his effort to reunite the country and establish security and order during this time of crisis. Settlements were told that their full cooperation was necessary to ensure that the United States Army would not be distracted from its primary task, while civilian “witnesses” spread outrageous tales of rogue communities being destroyed by huge packs of hunters that terrorized the countryside. Within a matter of months, each county had become a mini-police state, with feudal-like obligations to President Barnes and his representatives.

Barnes informed Pruitt that his work was adequate, but far from perfect. Livestock production was falling far short of what was needed, and supply routes—whether by land or by sea—were lacking necessary equipment and staff. Barnes was also worried about some intelligence he’d received several days earlier that suggested rebels from Utah were infiltrating a few of the northeastern counties, but Pruitt claimed there was no solid evidence to back those allegations. He even argued that the reports were nothing more than baseless rumors spread by the Daniels camp. So far, he explained, his men hadn’t detected even a whisper of resistance from that area of the state. In addition, Pruitt’s troops had managed to recruit a decent number of able-bodied young men and women from the region in question for official Army training, but their preparation focused more on mundane administrative skills than on actual soldiering.

Barnes fully expected his hunter-armies to start dying off within a few years, and they would need to be replaced with human troops that knew how to do more than take inventory in a supply depot.  Still, that wasn’t until Phase II of the restructuring, and while Pruitt was incredibly annoying, he was also exceptionally loyal. After carefully considering the pros and cons of his subordinate’s abilities, Barnes decided that Pruitt’s short-term usefulness was sufficient for the moment. He decided that it was time to personally check on Andi and Thelma’s new residence—a pair of executive suites in what had been a luxury inn on neighboring Alameda Island. The hotel was being repurposed to serve as his west coast presidential headquarters, and Barnes was anxious to see how the renovation was progressing.

A large pack was approaching the highway at an angle from the southeast, their silhouettes easily visible through the increasing light and slowing snow. The hunters’ howls upon sighting humans on the road brought answering calls from three more nearby locations. As soon as Luke was sure that he and Terry were several hundred meters ahead of the closest flesh-eaters, he sought out a defensive position where they could increase the creatures’ frustration. He slammed on the brakes just in front of a wrecked pick-up truck and ran back to the empty bed.

The danger of the situation led Terry to forget military protocol. “Are you crazy? What the hell are you doin’?” he shouted through his helmet.

Luke bellowed his reply as he motioned for Terry to join him. “We’re gonna make sure those hunters let their friends know there’s fresh meat on Highway 8—now get up here, put your spear together, and back me up!”

Luke set half a dozen arrows against the tailgate as Terry joined him and screwed the two-piece travel-spear together with shaky hands. They didn’t have long to wait. The pack that had initially sighted them moaned and howled in anticipation of food. Luke allowed them to close within thirty meters before he released his first arrow. A relatively squat but muscular alpha dropped into the snow as the broadhead crashed through his nasal bones before slicing an inch-wide path through his brain-stem and cutting his spine nearly in half. Within seconds, Luke had killed four of the next five pack-members before turning to watch Terry deal with the last monster. The creature roared its defiance and rage as it launched itself at the young soldier; Luke was prepared to step in if necessary, but Terry handled himself just fine. He neatly punched the tip of his spear into the airborne creature’s eye-socket before flipping the corpse aside.

The blasting air-horns made it difficult to hear anything else, but Luke was certain that creatures were howling from nearly every direction. “Nice work,” he shouted to Terry. “Let’s move back a bit and try for a repeat performance.”

The two fighters doubled back on the ATV, setting off more of the strategically placed air-horns along the way. Luke chose another location to engage hunters in direct combat, but this time he told Terry to stay with the ATV and be ready to move out at any second.  Terry didn’t like the plan; he was idling alone in the narrow lane cleared for travel, while Luke trotted off and disappeared between two crashed SUVs.

Luke didn’t go far, and he didn’t plan on losing sight of Terry. He scrambled to the top of a semi and peered in the direction of the depot. A steady stream of infected were making their way down the highway, but they weren’t making good time due to the snow and ice. Luke didn’t sense any hunters in the immediate area yet, and he remembered that they’d passed a few high-end model cars whose horns would still work when the vehicle was off. Even if the creatures no longer sensed he was prey when he was in their presence, they would likely associate any body in a car as a potential meal. He decided that he could still bait the flesh-eaters if he only allowed them to get a brief glimpse of him as he crawled through cars, slammed doors, and honked the horns of any Lexus or Porsche he could find.

Luke looked back at Terry and sighed. Leaving the young man for any length of time simply wasn’t an option. As he jumped to the ground, Luke felt more than heard a rumbling sound—it was Zach and one of his soldiers working their way up the road on their own ATV.

Luke sprinted back to Terry and noted that the snowfall was increasing in intensity again, though it could have been a wind gust stirring up what had already fallen. Zach pulled up behind them and quickly stripped off his helmet. “Dude, we thought you might want a little help out here. It’s pretty boring back at camp.”

“This wasn’t part of the plan, Lieutenant,” Luke pointed out, though he wasn’t sure if he was annoyed or not.

Zach grinned. “I’m trying to show initiative so I can move up to Captain, but we can head back if you don’t have anything for us to do.”

“Stay here, and keep your eyes and ears open,” Luke ordered. “I don’t think you’ll have any visitors before I get back, but I’m going to take about 10 minutes to thoroughly scout the area.”

Luke’s first thought had been to head down the highway to rile up the steady stream of infected already following the auditory breadcrumbs toward the promise of food. He had no idea how long the horns would last, and he needed to maximize the number of hunters responding to the bait. He was also concerned that if he didn’t speed things up, the entire plan might fall apart.

His second thought reassured him that he had nothing to worry about. Before he could see them, Luke sensed a large and fast moving pack closing in—the hunters from the depot. The plan was working after all.

Positioned between Oakland and San Francisco, Alameda Island had once been the bustling home of over seventy thousand Californians. In the earliest days of the pandemic, before most people realized the extent of what was happening, a paramilitary organization called Red Eagle quietly and efficiently took control of the island. The inhabitants were evacuated and/or relocated, by force when necessary, and the island became a militarized safe-haven for a pre-selected group of influential individuals and their families. On his way to the scenic inn where he’d sent Andi and Thelma several hours earlier, Barnes chuckled with satisfaction as his driver cruised through the silent streets of the previously trendy shops and five star restaurants.

As the president of the United States, Barnes represented security and hope to the well-connected new citizens of Alameda Island. He estimated that the population was now substantially under a thousand, but he couldn’t settle on a better estimate until he knew how many cooks, nannies, gardeners, and other laborers the upper-crust had deemed necessary to maintain their comfortable survival. None of the civilians were visible during the late afternoon drive across the island, but the robust military presence required Barnes to pass through two security check-points. At each stop, Barnes was requested to inspect the troops—soldiers, in dress uniforms, assembled in formation while a small band played patriotic tunes behind them. The counterfeit president played along, though he found the process tedious. He made a mental note to find out who had advertised his unscheduled trip; clearly a demotion was in order.

It was beginning to grow dark by the time Barnes reached the inn overlooking San Francisco Bay, but the newly installed solar arrays and wind turbines on the island had no trouble providing power to the greatly reduced population. In any event, a nearby biomass power plant was still functional, though, according to Pruitt’s records, it was perpetually in need of maintenance and repair. 

Barnes was greeted in the lobby by a twenty-something female officer. “Mr. President, it’s an honor to meet you, sir,” she stated crisply as she slightly bowed. “I’m Captain Forrester. The kitchen staff is at your disposal, of course; they currently have an excellent selection of oysters, dungeness crab, sole, and halibut, as well as
Châteaubriand and broasted chicken. Lieutenant Cruz can escort you to the Presidential suite,” she nodded toward a nervous-looking young soldier hovering near the elevator, “and he will arrange to have your meal set up wherever you wish.”

I suppose glorified waitress is an acceptable position for a female officer under my command
, Barnes thought. “Thank you, Captain—” He’d forgotten her name already. “I would very much like to settle in before making any dinner plans.” He joined Lieutenant Cruz and forced a cold smile. “Lead the way, Lieutenant.”

It was a very short ride to the second floor
of the low rise inn, but Barnes was pleasantly surprised to find that there were few guest rooms left on this level. His presidential suite was large and luxurious, obviously newly renovated to create a living quarters fit to temporarily house the president of the United States. Barnes decided that Pruitt’s attention to detail could clearly be useful under the right circumstances.

He turned to the jittery young lieutenant. “Deliver a decent bottle of red wine to my older guest, with my compliments. I’ll take my dinner in the main dining room in half an hour. Inform the younger woman that she’ll be joining me for dinner; I’d like you to be her personal escort, Lieutenant.”

“Yes, sir!” the officer replied enthusiastically while his feet remained firmly planted in place.

Barnes rolled his eyes and snapped, “Get moving—you have your orders.” The young soldier sprinted to the door and disappeared in a matter of seconds.

Luke noted that the wind had finally made up its mind following the passage of the front that had brought the heavy blanket of snow to the region. In a matter of minutes, steady gusts from the northwest increased in intensity and swirled the existing flakes into near white-out conditions.

He knew that some of the infected were close, but he was still surprised to see a large alpha, followed at a short distance by his pack, emerge from the churning whiteness to the east just thirty meters away. These creatures weren’t howling or snarling, and when the leader looked at Luke, it simply cocked its head and made a small questioning grunt. When Luke didn’t respond, it began to slowly walk towards him.

Luke kept his drawn bow pointed at the huge male sliding his way, but he
knew
that the creature posed no threat to him or his friends this morning. This entire group was not a “normal” pack of hunters. A small fire began to burn in the pit of Luke’s stomach as he slowly released the tension on the string and lowered the bow. He raised his visor and locked eyes with the lead hunter; he sensed something familiar and unsettling in their connection. The creature stopped about ten feet away and continued to stare into Luke’s eyes. Whimpers were coming from the direction of the watching pack, but Luke had no idea what the purpose of the noises was; they almost sounded frightened. The leader grunted again in the same questioning tone as before, as if it was asking Luke what to do.