The Last Bastion of the Living: A Futuristic Zombie Novel (24 page)

“We need to move. They
’
re getting stirred up,” Maria
said
.

With a grim nod of his head, Omondi
started off
, gesturing for the squad to follow. Falling in behind him, Maria matched his stride. The Chief Defender deftly wove his way through the swaying forms. It was disconcerting how the
Scourge
’
s cloudy eyes shifted to watch him pass. Somewhere in the reanimated brains of the
Scourge
he registered as one of their own. Instead of attacking, they swayed and moaned.

Behind her Maria could hear the others shoving the
Scourge
out of their way. Agitated laughter and low conversation mingled with the growing howl of t
he approaching mob
. The dead forest of flesh around her was constantly shifting, growing increasingly animated as the howling coaxed them out of their malaise.

A few bolt weapons sounded. Maria
looked back
to see a couple of the soldiers
dispatching the undead
. She understood their anger and the unease, but they needed to keep focused on their mission.

“Keep moving. We need to make it to the gate,” she said in a firm voice.

A few of the
ir
faces registered annoyance, but the squad obeyed, trudging along behind her.

The steady stomping of feet over the well-worn terrain became a rhythm to her ears. There were small patches of grass and bushes along the path, but most of the valley had been worn away by the
Scourge
trampling across the ground.

Maria stepped over broken fences, barbed wire tangled around the rotting wood. The cattle and other farm animals had died of starvation after the gate had failed. The
Scourge
had no interest in animals, but there had been no way to rescue them. Their bones stuck out of the ground, the only markers of their passing. Maria was careful to step around the protruding ribs of one creature. It felt odd traveling across the remains of what had once been a prosperous cattle ranch. A human skull imbedded in the earth stared at them as they passed by a rusted vehicle. It was all a grim reminder of all that had gone so wrong with New Eden.

The howls of the
Inferi Scourge
rose steadily behind the squad. Maria cast worried looks at the carrier as it disappeared slowly from view, blocked by the growing crush of the
Scourge
. They
were swarming the carrier.

The
brisk
pace picked up
even more
as the mass descended on their location. Maria kept an eye on her pad, calling out changes in their course as they marched. The
Scourge
heading toward the carrier were a wall of bodies moving rapidly toward the
squad
.

“Shit, look at them,” McKinney muttered.

Maria paused in her steps to watch the horde sweep past their location. The sight of all the bodies pressed together in one big wave of death and destruction was almost too much to comprehend. The
wails
were so loud that Maria could barely hear the comments being made around her.

“Keep moving!” Omondi shouted over the din. “Keep moving!”

The
Inferi Scourge
were already riled up and the sound of
a human
voice caused a ripple of excitement to flow through the crowd. Torn, rabid faces turned in the direction of the soldiers and a large group of the
Scourge
switched
course
to pursue.

“Move!” Maria ordered.

She broke into a run, her pack and weapon beating against her back. Her heavy boots and armor weighed her down, but free of the physical constraints of a living body, she sprinted behind Omondi. The squad ran ahead of the pack
of
Scourge
breaking off from the main herd. The howls of their purs
u
ers grew louder and more desperate.

“They
’
re coming!” someone shouted. “Run faster!”

Maria
’
s heavy boots pounded over the ground as she ducked around the remains of a barn.

“Hurry!”

“They
’
re closing in!”

The voices of the squad were edged with terror.

For a second, Maria lost sight of Omondi, then she burst into a clearing just beyond the barn and saw him
leaping
a low lying fence.

“Stop running!” Denman shouted. “Stop running!”

“No way! You saw what they did to Coleman!” Jameson yelled.

“Stop running! They
’
re drawn to our movement!” Denman
’
s voice was
insistent
.

Maria skidded to a stop.
Whirling
around, she saw Denman standing still, facing the sprinting creatures following him.

“Denman!” Maria cried out, fearing filling her. She was convinced he would suffer the same fate as Coleman before the
Scourge
realized his blood was dead, not living.

A howl erupted from Denman
’
s lips as he flung out his arms. The
Scourge
slowed, their wild eyes studying the man before them. Howling again, Denman
stood still
.

“Obey him!” Maria ordered.

She raised her arms toward the
Scourge
and joined her voice with Denman
’
s. Following their example, the squad
’
s voices rose in an eerie imitation of the
Scourge
howl as they stopped running and stood together.

The
Scourge
stumbled to a stop, their wild eyes scanning the squad. Maria screamed at them, her voice a frightening sound even to her own ears. She clearly witnessed the moment the
Scourge
identified the squad as their kind. The desire to rend flesh and infect vanished from their faces and confusion replaced it. Sluggishly, the group of mangled creatures turned to follow the massive horde trudging toward the carrier.

Denman slowly rotated a
bout
and raised his finger to his lips. Nodding, Maria motioned for the squad to continue their trek.

No one dared to speak as the gate loomed in the distance.

Chapter 17

The sun had peaked in the sky and was starting its descent when the squad finally made it to the outskirts of the remains of the settlements surrounding the city. Time had eroded the structures, reducing them to mere heaps of ruined metal and plastic. The perimeter fences had long ago been knocked over and flattened into the ground.

“It
’
s so freakin
’
huge,” Jameson said in awe.

“Unlike someone we know…” Cruz joked.

Jameson threw her a nasty look before returning his gaze to the gate. “Seriously, that thing is massive.”

Maria was just impressed as he was. The closer the squad moved toward the massive gate that cut off the only pass to the valley the more intimidating it became. It was a towering testament to the engineers who had constructed the last hope of humanity within the valley. The gate was set into a steel and cement wall that rose ten stories above the valley floor. The door itself was high and wide enough to allow the large trucks that brought in the building blocks used to construct the city.

“There is no way the
Scrags
pushed that door open,” Cruz decla
red, anger tingeing her voice.

“How thick was it?” McKinney asked.

“Twelve feet,” Maria answered.

“Wow,” Jameson said. “No way in hell the
Scrag
assholes
got in on
t
heir own.”

“Which means someone
had to have
let them in,” Denman pointed out.

“What kind of moron would do that?” Cormier asked.

“A moron with an agenda,” Denman answered, then hurried to catch up to Maria. In a lower voice, he said, “What if we can
’
t repair the gate?”

Maria gestured with her chin back toward Holm. “We have someone specially trained to deal with it, remember?”

Denman
’
s face scrunched up, the freckles across his nose standing out against his grayish complexion. “I know I wasn
’
t around for the training the month before transition, but we don
’
t appear to have much margin for error.”

Maria smiled ruefully. “No we don
’
t. That is why we can
’
t make any more mistakes. We can
’
t fail.”

Sighing, the medic shook his head. “We already lost one life and were
almost
attacked again. Being
Boon
isn
’
t enough to survive out here
,
I fear.”

“Then we stay sharp,” Maria said briskly. “We didn
’
t all give up our lives to be
Boon
just to come out here and fail.”

“I didn
’
t mean to-” Denman started.

“This is day one. We
’
re adapting. We
’
re learning.
We
can
do that.
They
can
’
t
.”
Maria motioned toward the
nearby
Scourge
staring blindly.

Falling back, Denman was swallowed into the ranks of the squad as Maria continued forward. Keeping her e
yes on Omondi
’
s back, she didn
’
t look behind her. She knew what she would see
: t
he anxious faces of her squad and the
Scourge
swarming the carrier in the distance.

And beyond that the city they were desperately trying to save.

* * *

The gate station came into view nearly an hour later. It felt as if they had been jogging toward
it
forever. The sun was even lower in the sky now. The whole day was slipping away as they pushed through the
Scourge
pockets and ran past the ruins of the old settler
’
s
homes and farms.

As they hit an old, cracked road
,
Omondi burst into a full sprint past the looser packs of
Scourge
. Maria
stuck
close to his heels, pumping her arms and racing against the
gust of
wind hissing through the open gate looming
before
them.

Beyond the gate were the high summits of the mountains.

It felt as though they were at the edge of the world.

Several crashed tiltrotors lay in wreckage near a turn in the road. The craggy outcropping hadn
’
t allowed them to get
very close to the station. The aircraft and its crew
had obviously been overrun by the
Scourge
and crashed. Another testament to a failed attempt to close the gate. Since the gate failure, so much had gone wrong in the city.

The chain
-
link fence around the gate station w
as
torn down, the rusted metal twisted into ragged teeth. Omondi leaped over a snarl of fence and pounded up t
he drive to
the concrete and steel facility.

Maria couldn
’
t take her eyes off the world beyond the gate. She could see an old road, gnarled with weeds
,
descending downward and out of sight. The mountains beyond the gate were topped in snow and thick clouds.
She was mesmerized by the sight of the world beyond the valley. It was like a dream.

“Generator over there,” Omondi called out, motioning.

“Got it!” Holm hoisted the heavy pack on her shoulder and kicked open the chain-link gate into an enclosure tucked into the side of the building.

The mummified remains of the guards who had worked at the gate were scattered across the walkway leading up to the guard station. Only bits of armor and mummified limbs tucked into thick leather gloves and boots remained of the men and women who had witnessed the failure of the gate.

“We
’
ll need the codes to open the door,” Maria called out to Omondi as he
dashed
up the stairs to the main entrance. She yanked out her pad to access the information.

“No, we don
’
t,” he answered in a grim tone.

Maria hesitated in her action
.
Omondi stood in the gaping doorway of the station. He
stared
inside with an expression that was difficult to decipher. Maria tucked away her pad as she climbed up the stairs and joined him.

The sunlight illuminated only part of the lobby, but it was evident there had been a battle. Bullet
holes
festooned
the walls. Only armor suits revealed where the guards had fallen. But what Omondi
was
glowering at
was a
message left long ago scrawled across the wall in green paint.

“Gaia is free of the human scourge,” Maria read aloud.

“What does it mean?” Cruz asked
,
joining them. She ran a gloved hand
over her short hair,
perplexed.

The rest of the squad gathered behind them.

“The Gaia Cult,” Denman said with a sigh.

“What
was that?” McKinney
’
s confusion was
matched
by
a few others.

“In the last days of human world, the Gaia Cult rose up to declare that Mother Earth, Gaia, was purging humanity. They said
humans
were a virus,” Omondi explained. “They believed that once the last human had died,
the Scrags
would die, too. And then earth would be saved from us. They even claimed responsibility for the
ISPV
being released in Paris, London, and Moscow.”

Maria had remembered the Gaia Cult being briefly touched on in world history, but now she knew they would have an even bigger entry. They had compromised the last settlement of the living. Stepping into the lobby, she activated the light on her wristlet and flashed it over the simple rectangular room. The plastic furniture was stained with time and blood.

“Holm, status on that generator,” Omondi said into his wristlet.

The answer was the lights flickering on.

The room was rectangular and bland. The posters on the walls and
style of the
furniture indicated it had probably been some sort of recreational room for the guards. Omondi crossed the room to another doorway. It was also open. A desk had been wedged into the doorframe to keep it from closing. Sliding over the obstruction, Omondi disappeared into the next room.

Maria followed.

Monitors sprawled across one wall
with a work station sprawled under
the bank of screens
.
Sprayed over the monitors and the work station were the words “Gaia has reclaimed the world.” Bodies were
caught under
the
chairs and some of the monitors had bullet holes punched through their dark faces. Now that power had been restored, the flat screens revealed the view from beyond the valley. Cameras
began to transmit images
from the long road winding up the pass. Even the cameras at the
base
station at the
bottom
of the mountain
range
were operational.

“They would have seen the approach of the
Scrag
horde that attacked,” Maria remarked.

“Whoever did this,” Omondi pointed at the message, “must have killed the guards.”

“The communication hub was completely destroyed. That
’
s why there was no warning and the city never could regain remote access,” Denman said, touching the wires spilling out of the destroyed workstation.

“But what brought the
Scrags
here?” Maria reached out to an operation console and began to quickly search through the recorded files.
“This area is very remote.”

Holm climbed over the desk in the doorway and joined them at the workstation. Her face was tense with concentration as she started her diagnostic on the gate.

A few of the squad members filed into the room behind them or lingered near the open door. Maria glanced at them, but said nothing. They were all in a state of shock. It had always been possible that sabotage had been behind the gate failure
,
but to see that it had been the Gaia Cult had stunned everyone.

“What did you find?” Omondi asked Maria, lingering over her shoulder as she searched.

“The cameras were recording until the generator failed. According to the timestamps, the generator went off just after the gate opened.” Maria continued to scan the files, her fingers darting over
the
interface.

“That fits with what I found,” Holm said. “The generator was sabotaged. The batteries were ripped out of it.”

“Someone killed the guards, destroyed the communication and remote operations hub, and opened the gate,” Omondi said in disbelief.

“Whoever it was didn
’
t live very long after doing all that.” Maria activated a screen showing a man and a woman yanking the batteries out of the generator and the screen going dark.

“Fuck,” someone muttered behind her.

“They did this on purpose then died,” Omondi said in a low, angry voice. “They butchered
their own
people and almost destroyed the last hope of humanity.”

Maria pulled up more recordings. They told the atrocious tale of the ultimate betrayal. The base camp camera
footage
clearly revealed several trucks full of people luring a massive crowd of
Scourge
behind them
. The people inside were yelling, but Maria didn
’
t get the impression it was with fear, but with rapture. Each camera along the road recorded the same vehicles moving purposefully toward the gate just ahead of the horde of
Inferi Scourge
.

“They led them here.” Holm shook her head,
swinging
her long blond braid
s
.

There were even children in the trucks. Maria could see their frightened faces
while
the adults around them cheered with joy as the gate loomed before them. Sliding more camera views up onto the monitors, Maria watched the ascent of the Gaia Cultists and the
Inferi Scourge
. Now that the time frame was established for the arrival of the
Scourge
at the gate, she was able to swiftly find
the recordings from the guard station.