Z-Volution (13 page)

20.

In the air over Washington, D.C.

Major Remington descended in formation—or what was left of his formation. Starting with six jets in the air, they were down to three. Two crashed into the Atlantic and the third slammed into one of those damned pterodactyls in mid-air, taking out both.

“Three bogies ahead!” Remington shouted, locking the targeting on one. Strafing the bird’s head with machine gun fire worked well, but so would a heat-seeking Sidewinder down its throat. Blow off its arm-like wings and it would still live, but it was going nowhere, biting no one and dropping no more payloads.

These
things
… He shook his head and regained his composure as his colleagues opened fire on the targets.

Damn, they were nimble. The winged reptiles arcing out of the way just in time, their hides taking some damage but not much as they rolled, ducked and split directions effortlessly. It was like trying to swat a fly in mid-air; they knew where the attack was coming from and expertly tilted just far enough out of the way.

“AIM-9s!” Remington called to the other pilots. “Take ‘em down with heat-seekers!”

If we can lock on long enough, that is.
His target lock was lost already, before he could fire. He zipped over a smoking section of Fairfax and passed within visual of Reagan International Airport—where he heard all planes had been rerouted to the country’s interior, to places like Iowa or Mississippi. The streets all along the way, and wherever he could see, seemed peaceful from this level, but as soon as he dipped lower, chaos ruled.

Roads congested and bottlenecked, cars abandoned and blocking any further traffic. Some bodies lying about on the streets or lawns, but mostly…those killed had gotten back up, enlisted in the service of the opposition, minds no longer their own. Great hordes swelled into even ranks and marched with purpose, zone by zone, looking like a colony of ants from this height. Ants with a collective hive mind, serving a central authority figure, branching this way and that, racing through neighborhoods, breaking through windows, rooting out panicked and screaming residents.

Everything here was compromised, and Remington wondered how long it could be until he received an order to start firing upon the city itself? Or would they just call their forces back and send in the bigger guns from carriers at sea, or from NORAD itself?

He banked around again and ascended, mercifully giving his eyes a break and a clear view of the peaceful sky above, but only for a moment and then it was over, back to scanning for targets.

“Where the hell are they?”

“Broke formation and fled,” radioed one of his colleagues in the air. “Looks like they’re weaving around and going low, dive-bombing?”

“No more payloads,” said the third pilot. “I’ve got a visual and I’m in pursuit. Looks like they’re heading toward Pennsylvania Avenue.”

“Shit,” Remington spat. “Take them out, first chance! I’m right behind you, and—
look out!
”

“Wha-?” The pilot couldn’t get another syllable out as a black streaking shape hurtled up from a copse of trees. A ptero that had been perched there, preparing to spring. It crunched hard into the left wing, its beak tilted so it rammed the fighter at an upward angle.

The F/A-18’s wing shattered and the entire fuselage erupted in flames and smoke. Its nose tilted and it went down—veering left, then nose-diving into a ball of fire and wreckage.

“No!” Remington and the last pilot shouted together. Fumbling for control, he tried to lock on to the ptero that had done the damage. Its wing was on fire—another good source of heat for the missile’s tracking.

“I’m locked on,” said the other pilot, who fired immediately, diving from above, and then swooping up. The injured bird hugged its wings to its body and dropped, diving toward a populated section of Pennsylvania avenue… swooping for a convoy of tanks setting up a line of defense.

Oh no,
Remington thought.

The dinosaur opened its wings—one of them still smoldering—at the last second, flattened out, then rammed the lead tank, knocking it sideways.

That in itself wouldn’t have done anything, except the heat-seeking missile right on its tail impacted a moment later, erupting into an enormous fireball of carnage that took out the tank and three of its neighbors, raining searing hot wreckage on a full contingent of soldiers.

Cursing, Remington peeled out, seeking the other three pteros, but before he could locate them something in the river caught his eye. A Coast Guard vessel, valiantly bombarding the shore and a pair of crylos wreaking havoc there, was suddenly upended and capsized.

The shark-thing, Remington saw, and his fury mounted. The word
mesosaur
, one he’d heard in an all-too-quick briefing, flashed through his brain. Did he have time? He could surely bomb that thing and take it out, freeing up the harbor for safe entrance by reinforcements, but his orders were to protect the White House.

He zipped ahead, swerved down low, around the Washington Monument, and prepared to make another run down Pennsylvania Avenue, over the remaining fighters and resistance. He would provide air bombardment and weaken the onrushing hordes, using every missile and round at his disposal.

He checked the radar for other aircraft—F/A-18s or enemy fliers. There was Nielson, in the jet, locked in a dogfight with one of the pteros. Six Apache helicopters also entered the fray, coming in fast from the south, bringing a smile to Remington’s lips.

Good, might have time now for a little fishing…

One pass down the avenue, unleash a few missiles, and then he’d bank for the river—

A jarring impact.

NO!

Another one of those damn birds, rising from below, this time behind the cover of a building. It just clipped a tail fin, but it was enough to throw off his balance and send the altimeter spinning. He wasn’t going to make it. Couldn’t rise, couldn’t turn.

Son of a—

He could at least steer and aim down.

There…

A
T.rex
leading the charge.

Remington armed his missiles, all of them. Accelerated—then hit the eject button.

He never saw the impact, never got to witness what he could only have imagined was quite a stellar display of destruction of U.S. government property, an F/A-18 Super Hornet colliding with a
T.rex
, exploding with about 1,000 gallons of jet fuel and four armed AIM-9 missiles.

The detonation, however, lifted his seat and the blast caught his parachute, launching him backwards hundreds of yards…

… out of immediate danger, over the army’s perimeter defenses, and into the encampment fronting the White House.

He tumbled, rolling hard and painfully on his shoulders and knees but then got to his feet, running and stumbling until someone caught him and other soldiers put out the fire on his parachute.

“Nice one,” someone said, and at last he looked up and back—to the huge cloud of fiery intensity and the skeletal thing that stumbled out of it, then literally fell apart, incinerated to dust.

“Took out a damn tyrannosaurus,” another soldier said.

Remington coughed and shook his head, then pointed. “There’s another one. Pterodactyls, too. Patch me through to those Apaches before they’re surprised and taken out.”

Someone raced to comply, getting a transmitter, when Remington heard the first of the choppers.

Relief, however, turned sour fast as two of the war machines went down, attacked from flanking positions by a squadron of pteros almost as soon as they were within range.

“Goddamnit! Get me…”

More screams sounded behind him, more gunfire, and out of the smoke and fire roared the other
T.rex
, and the rest of the zombie horde.

21.

Alex’s mind had trouble processing how quickly and how thoroughly things had deteriorated since he was last outside. He and Veronica stood on the steps outside the CIA building watching a kaleidoscope of strife and civil mayhem. The scale of chaos was like nothing they had ever seen. Where their struggles on Adranos had been set in largely a rainforest environment against isolated contingents of zombies and a few rogue dinosaurs, here they were suddenly in the midst of a concrete jungle in seemingly endless urban disarray.

Somewhere beneath the street, a gas main had ruptured and tongues of flame shot up from the subterranean level through an open manhole cover. Downed power lines were everywhere, many sparking blue arcs of electricity where they fell. The road itself was utter bedlam with vehicles disabled and toppled on their sides making it impassable to normal traffic. There were people about, too, only in most cases, Alex saw, they weren’t really people anymore. Zombies reigned, far more numerous than the living. Worse, they seemed to be capable of more organization than the undead he’d witnessed on Adranos.

There were no more one-on-one attacks; the zombies had somehow learned to assault in coordinated fashion like pack animals—probably like some of the dinosaur species that also rioted through the streets, through an environment for which they were never intended but now roamed as if in complete control. Two zombies would converge on a victim from either side, rather than both of them plodding mindlessly at the human. The behavior was definitely new.

Alex looked at Veronica, who stood by his side, equally stunned as she took in the rampant devastation. “How far is that airfield?”

“Two-and-a-half miles.” Her mouth tugged downward at the corners as she contemplated the significance of that distance through this carnage.

“What choice do we have?”

Alex continued to survey the damage. He was wary of a group of four zombies who had eviscerated an African-American woman wearing a parking cop uniform. Her little scooter car lay turned on its side nearby, ticket book pages loose everywhere, some stuck in place on the pavement by her own coagulating blood, and one—the last ticket she ever wrote—still affixed beneath the windshield wiper of a parked SUV, a citation representing a government now in its death throes.

The undead fought in sporadic mini-bouts over what was left of the meter maid. Their heads were looking around more now, no longer riveted to the gory meal. Alex froze with a jolt of adrenaline as one of them, wearing a stained and tattered three-piece suit, actually made yellow-tinged eye contact with him.

“Veronica?”

“Yeah.”

“We’ve got to move.”

Wordlessly she slipped off the steps to their left, signaling for him to follow. He crept after her, unable to resist glancing back at the suited zombie. It was a mistake, for the additional eye contact incensed the creature, who stood with a grunt and actually lifted an arm in Alex and Veronica’s direction. Alex turned around in time to see two zombies step out from behind a rental box truck missing a front wheel. One of them had an umbrella sticking out of its thigh and walked with a severe limp a few steps behind the other, which gave Alex a pang of sadness upon seeing a young woman who must have been of high school age wearing a man’s leather jacket.

Then he heard the staccato
rat-tat-tat
from Veronica’s AK-47 and the former cheerleader was cut down in a hail of lead, parts of her face speckling the yellow siding of the truck. Veronica ejected one magazine and replaced it with another she’d picked off a fallen SWAT guy. Alex focused on locating the suit zombie within the sights of his pistol. It took him four shots, but he ended up dropping the oncoming threat with a bullet to the forehead.

“C’mon. Main highway’s over there. Look for a working vehicle with keys.”

Most of the cars and trucks were overturned or had obvious defects. A few, though, were simply parked and locked, such as the SUV with the ticket. He could probably smash a window and try to hotwire one, but meanwhile more zombies were pouring into the area. It would be a real battle with no guarantees.

They made their way down the street and turned onto a larger one. In the intersection, a small platoon of National Guardsman was set up as a mobile command center. They had a large militarized RV-type vehicle, armored and with serious firepower as well as an array of antennae on the roof. Parked around it were a few Humvees and a large square tent, open with men inside gesturing as they yelled into phones and stared wide-eyed at screens.

And with good reason. There weren’t quite as many zombies here as the street with the CIA building, but two crylopholosaurs were holding court around the intersection, stamping on cars, rushing at people, braying into the night.

“I’m so sick of those damn things,” Alex commented to Veronica.

In response, she pointed silently at a Humvee with no doors or windows and a machine gun mounted in back that was just rolling up to the RV. Four soldiers occupied the seats with a fifth manning the gun, firing off controlled bursts into the dinosaurs. They watched as the driver put it in park but left the engine running. He and the other four soldiers jumped from the vehicle and made for the RV, firing off rounds at zombies from handguns and automatic rifles as they went.

Alex tapped Veronica on the shoulder and nodded toward the Humvee.
Our ride?
Her eyes widened in response. Normally, it would be inconceivable to steal an armed military vehicle in the midst of a manned field station, but they had left Normal far, far behind. She glanced around the area, especially at the tent and at the RV, before nodding.

“You drive, I’ll handle the gun.”

Alex nodded his approval and she went on hurriedly. “Head down that street there…” She pointed past a building on fire and a toppled street light. “…and then take the next left.”

Alex studied the route for a couple of seconds and gave a resolute nod. “On three…two…run quiet!…one, go!”

The pair dashed toward the Humvee. They reached it without incident and Veronica jumped into the back with the mounted gun while Alex took his seat behind the wheel. As soon as he sat down, the two-way radio in the vehicle blared with some technical chatter, causing him to jump in alarm.

“Go!” Veronica urged.

He put the Humvee into gear and rolled quietly at low speed out onto an unobstructed portion of the street. Alex was about to floor it when he saw an old man desperately trying to fight off three zombies with a cane in one hand and a pocketknife in the other. The man turned in circles with shaky, uncertain movements while the undead attackers outpaced him in all directions. Alex pulled up to the fracas.

“What are you doing?” Veronica swiveled the gun around on the back of the hummer, looking for signs of serious trouble.

“Helping this guy out.
Hey c’mon
, jump in!”

The old man dodged between the circle of zombies with speed that belied his age, probably triggered by the sight of help arrived. He flung himself into the passenger seat and muttered words of thanks as Alex got back on the road.

“Alex, what if he’s been bitten?”

“We’re going to drop him off at the next safe-looking place we see.” Then, to their new passenger, “Hey, you okay?”

He felt along the sleeves of his shirt while he answered. “Not bitten. Not really okay, either. I always said I dreaded the boredom they say comes with old age, but I’d take a long night in the nursing home any day compared to this nightmare. You in the Army?” He gave Alex and Veronica’s dirty and blood-splattered civilian clothes a doubting stare.

Alex cracked a smile as he responded while gunning the engine. “Don’t ask don’t tell,’ pal, okay?” He made the left Veronica told him about and saw a relatively calm stretch ahead. He pulled over and looked at the man.

“This is where you get off. Zombie Free Zone, at least for now.”

“Where are you guys heading?” The old man didn’t try to disguise his reluctance about leaving the safety of the vehicle.

“That’s classified, sir,” Alex said with all the seriousness he could muster. “But believe me when I say you wouldn’t have a good time where we’re going.”

“I suppose not,” the man said, stepping out of the truck.

“Get inside somewhere and wait this out,” Veronica advised.

“One last favor?” the man called up to her. He looked around, forlorn and lost.

“What?”

“Shoot me with that big gun of yours.”

At length, Alex replied, “Just go inside, sir, you’ll be all right.” But inwardly he wondered how true that statement really was. Veronica swung the hardware away from the man, toward the intersection they’d just turned through.

“Seriously. I’ve had a good life, until recently. Everyone I knew was already dead before any of this happened. Only reason I’m outside is because a bunch of those crazies got inside the home and tore it to pieces. If things don’t get back to normal, well then, you saw back there what’s going to happen to me. You saved me this time, but next time I’ll be on my own. I’d much rather you just cut my damn head off with that big gun of yours than go through what I was about to with those ghoulish things.”

He walked around to the opening of the gun barrel. “I’m joking, but really I’m not.”

“Alex!”

Looking away from their sad previous passenger, Alex recognized the tone in Veronica’s voice, that tone that said, regardless of the words it carried,
bad shit is about to go down right now.

Alex had been looking ahead through the windshield, where all was clear. Looked nice and drivable, only a couple of upended vehicles that could easily be maneuvered around. He twisted around in the driver’s seat and looked out the back, where the old man was still looking around, despondent and suicidal.

But that wasn’t what held his attention.

Around the intersection, they could see the head of a
T. rex.
Just the head, sticking over the corner of a two-story building, looking down on them on this street while the bulk of its body and its feet were still on the other street. It had the same rotten-looking hide as the one they’d barely escaped from on the runway at Adranos, and even from this distance the yellow tint to its eyes was clearly distinct.

“I see it. Time to go.” Alex turned around to put the Hummer into gear.

“Alex! It’s moving!”

He didn’t need her to tell him because he could hear the gigantic lizard’s feet slapping the pavement as it hopped around the corner to the street they were on.

“Help!” the old man cried out as he dropped to his knees before the rampaging beast’s approach. “Now!” He broke down into uncontrollable sobs, his face in the pavement.

The
T. rex
saw the Hummer start to roll and jumped toward it, head low to the ground. The old man glanced back as he heard the Hummer accelerate away, then swung around to look at the dinosaur.

Veronica aimed the heavy gun at the tyrannosaur, unleashing a frightening bullet hose of fire the likes of which she had no experience in controlling, rounds that punched into the reanimated animal’s muscular chest while a few bullets went stray and wide into upper level edifices on their right side. The terrible lizard halted its forward progress mere feet behind the old man, who was now crying softly while covering his face.

The
T. rex
made a sharp hissing noise that reminded Alex of an air brake on a bus. He glanced at the creature in the rear view mirror as Veronica tore into it with a fresh volley from the mounted 50-cal. The shots were finding their mark, pummeling the massive reptile in the head, beginning to open the skull up entirely, when Alex drove through a large pothole that had escaped his notice while he looked into the mirror.

The resulting motion had the effect on Veronica’s gun of jerking it first up—where the rounds skewed skyward—and then sharply back down, stitching along the reptile’s body and lower still, where they found the head and body of the old man. He did an involuntary, violent dance from his kneeling position on the street while the projectiles ripped away the back of his skull.

Then the
T. rex
stumbled—tripped, really—and toppled, landing on the old man and crushing out of him whatever vestiges of life remained.

“Oh God,” Veronica said simply, knowing the old man could no longer hear her, and knowing that he had gotten what he had asked for, but it wasn’t her choice to make. “I’m sorry.”

She would have enough wrenching decisions to make going forward without making them by accident for other people.