Vampire Apocalypse: Descent Into Chaos (Book 2) (22 page)

“Now wait a minute.” Father Reilly leaned forward as
he spoke but he looked over at Harris before he turned towards
Regan. Harris seemed to be oblivious to what was happening. “Are
you telling me that you have been having secret meetings…?”

“I think it is more accurate to describe it as an
unofficial chat between concerned individuals.” Ian Phelps spoke
from behind Regan and only leaned forward to address the rest of
the table when he had nearly finished. “We did not want to bore the
rest of the committee with trivia.”

“Rubbish,” Reilly spat the words in a fit of unusual
anger. “Is this your plan?” He addressed his question towards Regan
but then sought to involve the rest of the table. He was shocked to
see more eyes drop from his stare than he had expected. My God, he
thought, we’ve been played. “This is totally preposterous.
Everything has to be voted…”

“Oh, I think you’ll find we have enough votes to make
that a formality,” Phelps smirked. “In fact I think you’ll find
that we have already filled the positions that matter.”

“What? But…”

“I wonder what your thoughts would be if you were out
there and not here,” Harris spoke quietly and some of the committee
members had to ask those beside them what he had said.

“That’s not the point…”

“No,” Harris interrupted, injecting an edge into his
voice but keeping the volume low. The room quietened completely as
all the members of the committee turned towards him. “That’s
exactly the point. How many of us here would be free right now if
Dan Harrington had decided that he was too scared to take a chance
to save others? His memory is soiled by the actions of us all.”
Harris paused and looked around the table. Some of the people tried
to meet his gaze defiantly but they soon withered under his intense
stare. People shuffled uncomfortably under his scrutiny and Harris
let the silence draw out until it was almost unbearable. He saw
Regan open his mouth to speak but Phelps motioned for him to stop.
Like a good lapdog, Harris thought.

“We have become complacent and comfortable. It is
this very insular and selfish attitude that led the human race to
this situation in the first place. I don’t profess to have all the
answers but I do know that this is not something we have a choice
in.” Harris paused and took a breath as he surveyed the faces
before him. “Do not fool yourself into believing what you may have
been told; these people are being brought to the border for one
reason only. To be torn to pieces as food for those vampire
bastards as they tear each other apart. I for one cannot, and will
not, sit idly by as this happens. You can do what you want.”

“You no longer have the authority for…” Regan began
as he stood up.

“Authority,” Harris spat the words back at him and
Regan ended up half standing as Harris continued. “Do you think I
care how your precious committee carves up the power structure? It
means nothing if we can’t save enough people to survive.” Harris
shook his head. “Can’t you see that there is no future for us as we
are? We will never survive in this world when the food begins to
run out. The vampires will tear this world apart looking for blood
when they begin to starve. The madness will take them and they will
gorge on every living thing without remorse and without any concept
of tomorrow. Do you really think that our pathetic defenses can
withstand their power? We have to grow quickly or we’re all dead
anyway.”

“That’s enough!” Regan shouted as he banged his hand
on the table and the sharp contrast to Harris’ low voice made
everyone jump. “The people of this community have chosen how they
want their future secured, and they have entrusted me…”

“Oh grow up.” Harris raised his voice for the first
time. “This is not about securing a power base. It’s way too late
for that. This is about the lives of every human left on the
planet.”

“It’s always the same with you, Harris,” Phelps
reached out a hand to Regan and eased him back into his seat.
“You’re like a broken record. ‘We have to save everybody’” he
mimicked as he raised his hands and shook them. “We can’t save them
all, Harris. Accept it. If the serum is working as fast as you say
then it’s already too late. We’ve moved on from your Lone Ranger
days.”

“Phelps,” Harris pronounced the name as if it were a
curse. “We really can’t afford your brand of grandstanding. This is
real, people. It won’t go away just because you ignore it. These
three,” he pointed at Regan, Phelps and the still silent Patricia
Lohan, “do not care for your future. They only care about their
own. The rest of you won’t even have a future if you bury
yourselves here.”

“That’s quite enough, Harris,” Regan stood again.
“You are no longer required to manage our external security; John
Kelly will handle that from now on. The rest of the positions will
be…”

Harris didn’t listen to the rest. He turned from the
table and walked out of the room. It was time to organize his team.
He would tell them all what had happened and let them all make
their own decisions. He was going to the border either way—alone,
if he had to.

It was afternoon and the shadows were already
lengthening. Darkness was only two hours away and they were nowhere
near ready. Falconi watched as the final touches were put to the
huge enclosure that now filled the centre of the town. The humans
already huddled in the centre of the enclosure looked pathetically
small in the huge space but they would be crushed when the others
arrived.

Falconi had accepted the fact that the majority of
the humans would not be here in time for the vampires’ arrival. In
fact it would be another twenty-four hours before all the reserves
got here, but he would have over a thousand here before dark, he
hoped.

He looked at the terrified faces of those humans in
the enclosure and felt nothing. He was no longer human himself. Why
should he care? They had chosen to be food by not joining the
vampire’s thrall army. He was well aware that not all humans had
been accepted as thralls by the vampires. After the serum had
crushed the humans’ will to fight, there had been thousands of
defections by desperate humans promising their allegiance. But by
that time, there had been more than enough thralls and there was a
severe shortage of food. The vampires had ordered all the others
herded into the cages across the country and the serum had soon
silenced their cries of despair. In the last two years Falconi had
learned to ignore any pity he might have had. He had his own
worries and would waste no time on the doomed rabble in front of
him.

The town’s defenses had been rebuilt but they would
not survive a sustained attack by tanks. He had seven hundred men
in and around the town with a further fifteen hundred due over the
next few hours. Transport was their biggest problem and he knew
that garrisons had been stripped bare all over the state,
dangerously so, and the excess thralls were even now being
force-marched here. Thralls were amazingly resilient compared to
what they had been before the change. They would be well able to
jog for miles without a break and still be able to fight when they
arrived.

His biggest worry was that all of these resources
would not actually be here for when Wentworth arrived. And while he
knew he could not have done anything more, he worried that
Wentworth would not be satisfied and that he would simply rip him
apart in a fit of anger. There was no way to be sure, so he merely
turned from the enclosure and looked up at the sky. There was a
stiff breeze coming from the north and he could smell something in
the air. He noted a huge bank of cloud roiling across the sky, its
black core pregnant with rain, and he shivered. There was snow on
the way. He sighed. A storm was coming, in more ways than one.

“I’m coming too.” Sandra forced herself from the bed
and began to pull her clothes from the cabinet in the corner.

Harris didn’t try to argue. He knew there was no way
to dissuade her. And, if he was honest, he was pleased to have her
with him. He would need everyone he could get. He was certain that
his team would already have been told to stand down by the
committee but he had to come here first.

“Aren’t you going to argue?” she asked over her
shoulder as she struggled into her clothes.

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Harris smirked and watched
her bare skin as her nightgown slipped before she had managed to
get her trousers on.

“One word,” she grunted as she overbalanced and
nearly fell.

“That’s what I’ve always loved about you,” Harris
laughed, “you were always so graceful.”

“Bastard,” she said as she finally managed to stop
herself falling and straightened up.

“Oh, and your eloquence, of course,” he added as he
dodged one of her shoes as it flew from her hand.

“What’s happening, Peter,” she asked, suddenly
serious as she turned toward him.

“People are scared,” he answered as he handed her
shoe back. “It’s too much for them to cope with. The vampires, the
serum, survival, food shortages. They can’t cope, so when somebody
offers an easy ride they jump at it. Can’t really blame them”

“I can blame Regan,” she retorted as she straightened
her hair.

“It’s not him,” Harris sighed. “It’s Tweedle Dum and
Dummer pulling his strings that are at the root of this.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Nothing for now,” Harris answered and turned to
leave the room. “First we’re going to see if we can save a few of
the people that are coming to the border. If we survive that then
I’ll worry about the politics. It’ll all change after tonight
either way.”

“What do you mean? How will it change?”

“Come with me,” he answered cryptically. “There’s one
more thing to do here before we go to the others.

“So that’s it.” Harris finished, sat back in his
chair and regarded April and Steele.

“Is that all you want?” Steele laughed.

“I was going to do it myself, but with the current
escalations I…”

“Are you sure you’re doing the right thing,” Steele
interrupted him. “I mean, telling the vampires that we exist is a
huge risk.”

“I know.” Harris wiped at his forehead. “I just can’t
see a way around it. We have to stop them using the serum though or
we’re all dead anyway. It may take a little longer but we’ll all
die regardless. Besides,” he paused as he looked Steele in the eye,
“it’s really only a matter of time before someone notices that you
never came back from your mission here and send someone to
investigate.”

Steele looked at Harris and could see what the
decision was costing him. He may have decided what was best but it
was obvious by his pale complexion and his haunted mien that he was
still not completely comfortable with what he was doing.

“Is this all we have?” Steele indicated the four of
them in the room.

Harris shrugged. “I’m hoping that I can get a few
more to help. It all depends on how quickly Phelps can lock down
the complex, so we have to move quickly.”

“I’ll need to take most of the fuel the camp has if
I’m gong to get there, though.” Steele raised his eyebrow. He knew
what that would do to the community. They had little enough fuel as
it was to power the generator. If he took what he would need to
travel almost to the far side of the country he would have to leave
them dangerously short for the rest of the winter.

“I know,” Harris replied with a heavy sigh. “I don’t
think we have a choice, though. There’s too much riding on
this.”

“You’re not going to be popular around here.”

“With any luck we’ll both be killed. Then all they
can do is spit on our graves,” Harris laughed.

The men jumped as April slammed her hand on the table
to attract their attention and then gesticulated madly. Harris had
no idea what she was saying but her hands moved with such grace
that he was mesmerized. Her face was scrunched up in concentration
and her eyes burned with anger as she directed her focus at
Steele.

“She says we’re both mad,” Steele repeated after she
had finished.

“I’d say she said a lot more than that,” Sandra
arched her eyebrows and then winked at April. “We don’t really have
a choice, love,” Sandra said as she reached for the girl’s
hand.

April managed a quick series of hand gestures before
emotion took over and she buried her head in Sandra’s shoulder.

“What did she say?” Harris asked.

“She asked what she would do without me.” Steele
sighed heavily and laid a hand on her head with surprising
tenderness.

“You’ll never be alone while we’re here,” Sandra
assured her but forgot that the girl could not see her lips, so the
words, if not the sentiment, dissipated impotently into the
air.

Steele pulled the girl gently back from Sandra and
repeated her words in gestures. She nodded weakly but all present
knew that it was little solace for April.

As the four of them left the hospital they were
shocked to see ten fully armed men and women in full armor and
packs standing in their way. For a moment Harris thought that Regan
had sent them to arrest him but then he saw the smiles on the faces
of the soldiers and he relaxed.

“We heard you were going off half-cocked again so we
thought we’d tag along.” Rodgers grinned at him and Harris couldn’t
help laughing at his friend’s return to form.

“You realise this goes against the committee’s
orders.”

“Oh, you mean the other raids were actually
sanctioned?” Rodgers raised his eyebrows.

“There are different levels of disobedience.”

“No there’s not,” Warkowski thundered as he hefted
his rifle. “I take my orders from you, Harris, not any
committee.”

“Didn’t expect to see a law abiding cop here,
Tanner,” Harris joked as he spied the ex-lawman.