Infused Connections: An Apocalyptic LitRPG Adventure, page 1
INFUSED CONNECTIONS
THE METIER APOCALYPSE
BOOK 5
FRANK G. ALBELO
Copyright © 2024 by Frank G. Albelo
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments
Newsletter
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Epilogue
Afterword
About Frank G. Albelo
About Mountaindale Press
Mountaindale Press Titles
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I want to thank all of you for making it to this point with me. Readers, listeners, betas and alphas, each of you has had an impact in this wonderful work and I want to make sure you know this. Each book is a journey, and here we begin another.
Your time means the world to me. I hope you enjoy your dive into the apocalypse!
NEWSLETTER
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PROLOGUE
Everything was static. Everything was pain. Marcus refused to let his fingers shake as he held the small, frail life in his hand. Their son. The son Clara would never get to meet.
Alexia stood in the corner, doing her best to log the newborn’s information despite the tears in her eyes. June had the unenviable task of wrapping Clara up and wheeling her out. It had been just under an hour since she’d passed, a perfect marker for the final push that had brought their boy to the world. Their Ronan…
His mother gripped his shoulder hard enough to bruise, just to break him out of his drain-swirling thoughts. Her voice was tortured, even more so than when she’d been given her diagnosis before the Fall. “You need to let them check him over. He… He’s being too quiet.”
Marcus could hardly feel his body as it moved. His muscles puppeteered themselves to pass the baby to Ava, who in turn took his Ronan to Alexia. The moment he was out of Marcus’ hands, however, the baby squalled. Something stirred in Marcus, then, as he heard that cry, and all the cold and dark things he’d been contemplating vanished to be replaced with warmth.
It didn’t last.
“Mrs. Metier, the general is requesting your presence,” Tripsen said, walking into the room with no regard for everything going on around him. To the private’s credit, he did pale as he recognized the landmine he’d stepped on. If the sheet-covered body and wailing infant weren’t enough, two pregnant women and a fledgling grandmother bore holes into him. If the medical professionals weren’t busy tending to new life, they would have added their eyes to the count.
As for Marcus… it took everything he had not to look at the man. The warmth his son had kindled from the ashes of despair in his heart blazed as someone dared to encroach on his family. He didn’t know when he’d stood up, or when he’d managed to pin the soldier up against the wall, but he didn’t feel even remotely bad about it.
“You tell that sniveling coward to come and tell my dead wife he wants her mother-in-law to abandon her grandchild,” Marcus spat in his face. Had Agatha not rushed forward and grabbed his arm, he was sure he would have crushed the private’s windpipe. If she hadn’t been so visibly pregnant, he might have even shaken her off and done it anyway.
As it was, Marcus released him and he slumped to the ground. With a fearful look at the grieving madman, Tripsen scrambled away. The peace after that did not last, but Marcus hadn’t been blindsided that time. He gently removed Agatha’s hand from his arm, which she’d kept there intentionally to try to dissuade him from acting, and walked out of the recovery room. On the way out, his mother ran her hand along his back for a moment but pulled it away when she saw the look in his eye. He’d had enough.
The possibility that Clara might not have had to die had Starden not insisted on his mother researching something other than organic adaptabilities to the radiation buzzed in the back of his mind. It wasn’t a guarantee, not even close when it came to understanding the new extraplanetary force that was part of their lives. Yet, it was something he could latch on to. A target and justification for what he planned to do with the strength he’d inherited from his family.
Tripsen hadn’t made it far. There was already a pair of soldiers waiting for the private as he left the medical area. They rushed forward, batons at the ready. The world, as it often did, slowed to a crawl as Marcus considered his options. They were painfully many, considering the people before him had been deemed worthy to survive the end of the world. They had a role to serve, skill sets and discipline that might serve the Bunker. He didn’t feel worthy himself, but he’d come to terms with the switcheroo his father had made in order to save him. And his father would not stand the abuse the soldiers were laying on the other survivors. That thought simplified his options significantly.
The two soldiers rushed forward and Marcus sidestepped the first. His fist, still covered in blood from his wife, found the man’s throat and he crumpled. The next managed to strike across his shoulder, but the muscle and adrenaline dulled most of that pain. His fist broke the man’s nose before following it up with a hit to his solar plexus, both leaving the soldier gasping for air.
Marcus heard the thundering of steps and turned just in time to see the Taser leveled at him. He sacrificed an arm to take the tase on his palm, which left him enough time to clock the shooter before he could pull the trigger. Another soldier brought out his and Marcus caught that one too… just a tad slow. His breath shuddered as his heart skipped a beat, but it didn’t stop him from headbutting the second shooter on the chin.
Down on one knee, he plucked the Taser barbs with shaky hands and panted as his muscles protested his demands. When Tripsen returned, pistol raised, Marcus knew he’d drawn the short stick. When the man continued closer, placing his gun against Marcus’ head while keeping his body far away, the fire in the Metier flared.
“You stupid, musclebound id—” Tripsen didn’t get to finish as Marcus grabbed the gun and aimed it up. Two shots rang out, raining concrete dust on the two of them. The burn of the barrel barely registered on his palm, because Marcus had struck the private’s bruised throat again. He did not get up and Marcus stared mutely as his chest stopped rising and falling at all, nail marks lining his throat where he’d attempted to catch a breath while Marcus watched on with dead eyes.
He barely moved as a full squad arrived, tased him right over the heart, and dragged him up the stairs to the top level. The man he’d really wanted to remove from his mortal coil was pacing in front of an inconspicuous, blank wall. Marcus knew the truth of what the wall actually was, and for the first time since his wife had passed, he knew fear.
“You can’t take me away from him!” Marcus roared, muscles straining against the handcuffs and men holding him down. Despite everything, the men holding him had to call in support when he kicked the knee out from the closest guard. The snap of the joint was sickening and the soldier howled in pain. “You killed her!”
A fist crashed against his face, throwing up stars as he tried to realign his thoughts with the murder coursing through his veins. “And you killed that private.”
“All you fat pigs are doing is strangling this Bunker. One less of you will only improve all your chances,” Marcus snarled, face pinned to the ground as the soldiers dogpiled him.
He was burning sadness for energy by the minute, the pale face of his wife and her final smile as she gazed at Ronan for the first and last time. It was too much. One of the men above him managed to dislocate his shoulder and the last of his fight went out with the injury. Yet, he didn’t cry. Those feelings were for Clara, and for his family, not for the corrupted dregs of the old society that had somehow made it into the Bunker.
When Starden saw the fight gone out of him, he motioned at the wall. The two-foot-thick slab rose silently, revealing the small, rising chamber beyond. “Your mother determined that the radiation has stabilized on the surface. We felt it prudent that someone go investigate before we risk our people. Thank you so much for volunteering, or should we call it a punishment?”
“Big words for such a small man,” Marcus said, glaring as the soldiers threw him roughly to the other side of the wall.
The general made a dismissive gesture with his hand, and a pack was thrown at Marcus’ feet. The look of pure disdain on the man’s face soured any hope Marcus had of remaining with his son. “This should keep Ingrid happy. Don’t bother coming back until you have enough intel on the surface to make me forget you murdered one of my men.”
Marcus burned the faces of each soldier into memory as he sat still beyond the wall. It shut, once again silently, but all Marcus could picture was a tomb closing over his family. He knew he would come back, and when he did, there would be hell to pay.
“Because the life of one of your people should never have a price.” His voice was eaten up by the concrete and the darkness, but it didn’t make the strength of his commitment any lesser. His voice dropped down to a whisper as he pictured the people in the medical room. “Please take care of him, Mom. Do what I was too bitter to do properly.”
That was when the tears finally fell.
CHAPTER ONE
A Brusque Approach
“What are we waiting for!?” Daniela shouted as we stepped out of the tower.
“Danny, we can’t go off half-cocked,” Samuel said, reaching out to try to take her hand. The brunette yanked her hand out of the way with all the speed her Q6-boosted mobility allowed.
“Half-cocked? How about half-cooked! You saw what they did to him. What are they going to do to Dai now that their prisoners have escaped?” she asked, drawing looks from the rest of the expedition members that had been trying to keep busy while we spoke with Devon. I was sure some of them had overheard with their enhanced perceptions.
“Just give me a second to think, Daniela,” I shouted, poking a finger in her face. Admittedly not my best move as she smacked it away, nearly tearing the phalange off. The moment it took for me to wince and curl my fist back was all the time she needed to activate her
She was off. Repeating the meteoric dash she’d used to catch up to Devon, all that was left in her wake was a heat wave. The air-attuned in our expedition group looked to me as Daniela fell out of sight. I shook my head. Were my teeth not enhanced by my Quake Osseum, I was sure they would have been ground to dust as I restrained my urge to yell after the woman. I could hardly blame her; she’d already been holding back due to the bridge construction.
Samuel gave me a worried look. The question went unspoken, but perfectly clear on his face. Are we going after her?
“Of course we are,” I groaned. With a practiced motion, I opened the communications section of my implant and reached out to Igor. His response came back a second later.
“I’m standing twenty feet away,” the orc complained. “Why the comm call?”
“Get the Fists organized. You lot are going after Danny. I need to talk to Devon some more before we know how to proceed, but I need you to keep her alive,” I said, continuing the conversation even as I turned around to head back to the observation tower. I motioned Sam to follow me. “I can’t very well talk to you with my back turned so this is a bit less rude.”
“Fine. Squeeze pretty boy and hurry up. I don’t have enough hands to hold this shit pile together.” With the crude arm joke and a huff, Igor cut the call and started shouting orders outside the tower.
I kneaded my forehead as I tried to think about how best to approach the situation. We weren’t dealing with Tendrils, but humans, and just that complicated the situation. Not for Danny. I shook that thought out of mind and refocused. She wasn’t hasty enough to get into a fight she couldn’t win, but she was hasty enough to roll a snowball large enough to cause an avalanche if someone wasn’t keeping track of her. With the delicacy of a bull storming a china shop, I entered the little partition that had been given to Devon.
“Don’t gotta tell me twice. What do you want to know?” the elf asked, propped against the back wall.
I was almost surprised by his directness and lack of pain-in-my-ass-ness, but a look at his face spoke volumes. He was worried for Daniela, because despite how long he’d known her, he knew she was the literal definition of a loose cannon. His foot was twitching as if itching to run out after her, but the bags under his eyes and the bruising I knew was hidden under his clothes hinted as the line the elf was skirting with the
“Tell me exactly what happened when you went scouting,” I said, waving my hand at the ground and forming a bench with
The man cleared his throat and immediately started a deluge of information. The first parts were the standard fare associated with scouting, a slow sweep of the area in a semi-circular fashion. He talked about encountering a few new species of wildlife that he’d not encountered even in the Wilds between territories to the south. Him and Dai quickly identified a pattern where boar-like creatures took up the western region of the approach; the rest was free for nature to take its course…Until it wasn’t.
“These farms were massive,” Devon said, sweeping his arms and wincing as he tried to pantomime for emphasis. “I’m talking the size of Wildwood. The edges were irregular, since it looked like some creatures were nibbling at the produce, but just what we saw would be enough to feed the town five times over for a season.”
“Their population must be much larger than the Allied Towns,” I mumbled to myself, scratching at my beard in frustration. This was all extremely relevant information, but I could practically hear Daniela shoveling down the sands of the hourglass with each moment. If only she would have given me a little time! If she isn’t dead when we find her, I’ll put her in the ground myself!
“Ding ding ding. We didn’t push further north up the road—the fields were too exposed and we wanted to make sure we had a good picture of everything else,” Devon continued, taking my pause to mentally berate my childhood friend as an opening to continue. “This time, however, when we swung southwest, we didn’t encounter boars. Well, I should specify. We didn’t encounter just boars.”
“Please, Devon. Under other circumstances, I would appreciate a dramatic pause,” Sam said, urging the elf along.
“Right, sorry. Boar riders. The group of humans that nabbed us had tamed the car-sized boars and used them and their skills to nab us. They spoke English, but mostly they used what I think was old world sign language between each other. What was concerning about them wasn’t the cavalry aspect of the attack, though that was scary considering how fast Dai and I are, it was that the group of six had Tendrils, Afflicted, and Fallen in their midst!”
My brain screeched to a halt at the man’s words. It was a bad sign of the greatest magnitude. Tendrils indicated an Aberrant, and one with decent support if regular un-turned humans were working with it. What its endgame was—if it was similarly subverting the leadership of this northern city—was a primary concern.
“What were their Quotients?” Sam asked as I tried to process what a city totally subverted by the Aberrant would do to our fledgling society.
“All but one were Q4. Their leader, the main reason we got caught, was a Q5 life foliage fae. Hard to get out of the area when the area doesn’t want you to. They spotted Dai through his mist cloud, and when I tried to free him, the Afflicted… teleported to me? It was some kind of lightning-based skill, and then he was there next to me. The rest involved a lot of shouting and threats before they put these spoked collars on us; if I had to guess, they were the same ones their boars were wearing.”
