Emergence Boxed Set, page 82
part #1 of Emergence Series
Reisner waved his outstretched hand in the air, causing Nash, Wexler, and Connelly to step out from their concealed positions, their weapons trained on the three farmers.
“We’re not militia—far from it. I’m part of a U.S. military reconnaissance team. We’re searching for one of the creatures—an alpha who is believed to be in these parts and is most likely connected with the missing teens.”
“Just cool it and lower your rifles,” said the older man. “They’ve probably got more people in the area, and they look like they could shoot the pecker off a chicken from a mile away.” He shifted to his right, giving a nod. “Name’s Tucker, and this is my boy, Leonard.” He motioned to the woman. “Lorraine here is the owner of the farm where we’re all staying—us and eight other folks who found refuge here after Jamestown was overrun during the first week of the virus.”
Lorraine bit her lower lip. “My brother was the owner, actually, but he…he, uhm, and his family, except for my dear niece Abby, they…” She blinked hard then cleared her throat. “They didn’t make it.”
The woman took a step back, using a hand signal to recall her dog. “Good boy, Mancos.”
She looked up at Reisner with desperation in her eyes. “Abby and Mancos are all that’s left of what family I had.” She knelt down, wrapping her arms around the dog’s neck. “What do you mean by abduction? Those things only drag people off to kill ’em and eat ’em.”
“There’s another type of creature—more advanced—kind of the pack leader for them all. We believe he was the mastermind behind the attack at MacDill Air Force Base last month.”
“We heard about that on the ham radio,” exclaimed the young man, his eyes widening. “Were you there? Was it as crazy as they say, with thousands of those creatures hurling themselves over the walls?”
Reisner’s mind raced over the harrowing events on the battlefield, then he quickly drove away the thought of how close they’d come to losing. “More like hundreds of thousands, but the new bioweapon stopped them before any significant breach occurred.”
“So, it is true—you’ve managed to find a way to kill them all.”
“Only the drones—the alphas are another story and not affected by the bioagent.” He lowered his hands, resting them on his rifle. “Look, we can catch up on recent developments another time. Right now, I need to know anything you can tell me about the creatures’ movements through these parts and any other abductions or killings.” He took a step closer to the woman. “And you said someone named Abby went missing—when did this happen and where?”
The woman turned her gaze down, her eyes tearing. “Two days ago.” She pointed to the right. “Abby and three of the adults from our group were venturing out south of here a few miles to trade some goods with another farm down the way. At first, we thought that crazy survivalist Schrade mighta done something to her, but then we found a bunch of tracks in the mud on this side of the river, two miles down—barefoot, like those creatures. They were headed southwest.”
Tucker moved closer to the woman, resting his hand on her shoulder. “We followed the group of ’em, probably about eight alphas, but we lost the trail after they headed into a swamp.”
“What direction is that swamp from here?” said Reisner.
“At that point, it’s west.”
Reisner thought back to the location of the pharmaceutical warehouse outside of Charleston. That would be in line with their direction of travel from here. We have to be closing in on them—on him.
“Why would they be taken alive?” said Tucker.
Reisner wasn’t ready to reveal the other bizarre cases involving children and the findings at Roland’s estate in Savannah. He wasn’t sure himself what kind of horrific undertaking was unfolding right now with the missing teenagers, but he was certain it was going to involve an unpleasant ending, regardless of Roland’s objective. “Not sure, but with your help and your knowledge of the countryside, maybe we can get some answers.”
He raised his left hand and whirled his index finger, indicating that the rest of his team should join him. Reisner felt like they were finally on the right trail and the search grid for Roland was narrowing, but he had to curb his optimism, given the past three weeks of futile missions to locate the creature. Maybe this time.
Chapter 22
“How did you manage to keep all the creatures from finding this place?” said Connelly as they followed Lorraine and the others along the dirt road leading up to their farmhouse, which overlooked a small grazing pasture. Along the way, Lorraine pointed out their sentries nestled on old deer stands in the trees and introduced the newcomers to the others, who were busy working in the barn or the garden.
“We insulated the part of the barn where the livestock are kept with straw bales to reduce their noise.” She lifted a furrowed finger towards the treeline to the south. “The river forms a natural barrier on one side, and there’s only one road coming in. All the swamps in the area make this place pretty hard to reach. Next to Schrade’s place and a couple of others, there are only a few families in the area that survived, and that’s probably because Jamestown was never on the way to anywhere. Plus, we’ve got some motorboats spread along the river, so we can easily escape if this place ever gets overrun.”
“You may want to rethink some of your defenses,” said Porter. “We’ve seen those things swim across rivers and even stay submerged in swamps.
Lorraine and Tucker both gave alarmed looks at each other. “This I didn’t know,” said Tucker.
“We’ve also got a lot of bears in the area,” said Leonard. “And when we don’t see them or their tracks down by the river for more than one day, we know there are creatures coming in to the area. The bears will go after them, since they got habituated to their meat from all the bodies we dumped into the ravine east of here.”
“Smart thinkin’, kid,” said Gomez.
Lorraine opened the front door and invited them inside, then showed them into the kitchen.
Reisner could understand how they had held out here without much need for outside assistance. The stocked pantries in the house and stacks of smoked venison in the rafters were enough to see the small group through the winter. Coupled with a half-dozen pigs penned in the barn and the nearby trout stream, Reisner could see that it was possible to live and not merely survive outside the confines of a militarized zone. It gave him a sense of hope that he, Selene, and Jody would not be consigned to a life at sea.
Reisner sat down at the table across from Lorraine. “One thing I am curious about is this guy Schrade who you’ve alluded to. So, he lives across the property, yet your two groups don’t interact or help each other out after all that’s gone on in the world.”
“We have tried,” said Tucker, resting his boot on a crate. “He’s some kinda paranoid prepper.”
“Aren’t they all,” said Nash.
“He’s like no one I’ve ever met,” said Lorraine. “Even before the pandemic, he was living like the North Koreans were going to be invading, like in that movie Red Dawn.” She raised an eyebrow. “He’s got boobytraps in the ground, security cameras in his trees, and God knows what inside his house—probably a machinegun at each window.”
“And his poor son has to live like a prisoner,” said Leonard. “Nice kid, though a little off.”
“Who wouldn’t be, being raised by a nutjob,” said Lorraine.
“And he didn’t offer to help with the search for Abby?” said Porter.
Tucker shook his head. “We mostly communicate by radio or when we run into each other down by the river to check the fish traps—that is, when he’s not passed out somewhere. His son Nick told us that’s often the case—that boy seems more put together than his old man.”
“Surprised Nick has even made it this long,” said Lorraine, running her weathered hand along the dog’s neck.
“Kids can be remarkably resilient,” said Reisner. “They can bounce back from a lot of trauma.”
“It’s not that so much. He’s sickly—got some kind of unusual cancer,” said Lorraine. “My Abby told me he takes pills for it and that his dad bribed some doctor in Columbia last summer to provide him with plenty of what he needs.”
Reisner felt his neck muscles tense as he glanced over at Nash then back at the woman. “What kind of cancer exactly—do you remember?”
Lorraine looked up at the ceiling, her eyes darting around the old planks. “Vera something or other. I don’t recall the exact name.”
“Polycythemia Vera?” said Reisner.
She shrugged her shoulders. “Could be—not sure.”
Reisner gave her a gracious nod then motioned for Nash to join him on the front porch. They walked outside, habitually scanning the edge of the forest for any movement, but they only saw Gomez and Connelly at their assigned points along the perimeter.
“This is what he’s been looking for—Roland is searching for others like him. If he can’t create more with his abilities by using women or children, then he needs to locate others afflicted by the blood cancer.”
“How would he even know to look out this far? And how would he know to look for other survivors with PV?”
“Because he already knows that the other alphas around the world became what they are because of their cancer. What he doesn’t know and what he desperately needs is someone who is still human.”
“That’s why he’s been having his alphas test out their blood on so many victims. The medical experiment he began at his estate by transfusing his blood into the woman we found at the greenhouse didn’t work. That would have been the surest route to creating more like him, only he tried to bend nature too far. Now, he’s going back to the root—find others still alive with PV and transform them like he was transformed.”
“He must know we’re closing in on him. So, let’s say he finds this kid and turns him, then what? I mean, what is his exit strategy?” said Nash.
“Good question—one in a long line of riddles that keep rearing their heads,” Reisner said. He thought back to the first intel briefing on Roland, shortly after his recon team returned from Savannah. He clicked on his ear-mic then adjusted the channel on the radio attached to his vest so it would hail the Lachesis. A few seconds later, Pacelle connected him with Selene.
“It’s me—we may have a lead on where Roland is heading next, but I need you to look something up first. The briefing that Captain Jarvis did for us on Roland three weeks ago—it showed him in a photograph that was connected to a fundraiser for a pharmaceutical company. Can you locate the name of the company?”
He could hear Selene typing on her laptop while talking aloud to herself as she sifted through the data files on Whitmore. “Yes, here it is. Just let me enhance the photograph.” He heard the other end grow silent, followed by a long sigh. “You’re not going to believe this, but it’s…”
“Aspen Pharmaceuticals—where Ivins and his team were headed when I last spoke to him.” He stepped off the porch, letting out a long exhale. “For the past three weeks, we’ve been like reactive bug exterminators, coming in with the bioweapon and hitting the hotspots Roland created to draw us away from his location so he could make it to that pharmaceutical facility. All the while, he was performing some R&D along the way on his victims in case his plan to locate others like him didn’t pan out.”
“What? Why would Roland be fixated on Aspen in particular when there are other such facilities around the Southeastern U.S. where he could replenish his supply of the synthetic hormone?”
“It’s not just about the pharmaceutical compounds—he must be after information. His foundation provided considerable money to Aspen for combatting Polycythemia Vera. He knows they’ll have records, addresses, and profiles on the test subjects. He’s after others like himself, Selene.”
“I can follow your logic, but there have to be very few survivors with that affliction still alive. Most of them already turned into alphas during the initial outbreak or were probably just killed by other desperate survivors.”
Reisner looked across the meadow towards the direction of the river by Vern Schrade’s property, his face growing taut.
“Not all of them.”
Chapter 23
The fog surrounding the swamp near Nick’s bedroom window resembled a fleet of wispy ghosts floating across the thick tangle of alder trees. The sun had already been up for an hour, though the oppressive fog made it seem like little more than a gray orb whose presence was unwelcome, as if the heavens themselves had prevented any rays of light from entering their depressing abode. Like most mornings, Nick found it difficult to pry himself from his bed. Normally, his father would have paid him a visit and doled out some lickings with his leather belt for sleeping so long, but he was passed out on the couch in the front room from another drinking binge with his two friends the night before.
As he mulled over all the militant training and preparations that his father had undertaken for so long and then reflected on their self-imposed confinement to the property, Nick wondered if the fog outside was an omen that there really was a hell on earth—and it wasn’t caused by the virus.
So much for Father’s grand utopia after the apocalypse “cleanses the world.” Instead, it had been two weeks of horror and chaos after the pandemic reached the nearby cities, followed by weeks of mind-numbing isolation at their house to avoid attracting any mutant freaks passing through the area. Though Nick had only ever seen one creature from a distance near the river, and that one had been quickly dispatched with a headshot by his father.
The early news broadcasts indicated that the government—every government, in fact—had collapsed, and Nick kept waiting for the self-reliant community of the worthy to arise, as his father had promised. Instead, there were only intermittent radio messages from neighboring farms about sightings of the horrific monsters roaming the countryside. These ominous warnings only made Father demand everyone retreat downstairs into the concrete bunker and remain silent for half the day.
And even though the Strachan property across the river had a dozen skilled outdoorsmen and farmers living on their land, Father wanted nothing to do with them. “Most of them are liberals who’ll just try to force their ideas upon us. And if that ain’t bad enough, they’re all Lutherans. We are free men, not subject to any government, religion, or anyone else who wants to impose their will on others. Besides, we got enough food and supplies here to outlast this global purge, and in a few years, we will be the ones left standing.” That was his father’s usual response to any suggestions about interacting with others, and it just further drowned Nick’s dreams of escaping this mosquito-infested hellhole.
Vern Schrade had always told Nick that his small chosen group of militia would be the sole survivors of the virus—except most of them died during the first week. Some died trying to get to their family members across the region, while others were just never heard from again. Vern, his two militia friends, Dax and Jamison, along with each of their whiny eleven-year-old sons; that was his social community. Nick yearned to speak to someone—anyone—his age or from outside their self-delusional group.
Nick heard the two boys, Ned and Ryan, giggling in the other bedroom and knew they were probably rifling through their dads’ porn stash again. What with the snoring of the hungover adults in the family room and the lewd comments from the boys, Nick felt like his room was shrinking. He slipped on his pants and boots then rushed to the window, unlatching it and swinging it open. He sucked in the cool morning air wafting in from the swamp, hoping it would wash away his headache.
He glanced down at the mud and saw some fresh raccoon tracks heading down the hill to the left towards the river. He climbed up on the window ledge then slid down to the ground.
“Nicholas,” said a faint voice to his right. It had a melodic ring to it. He walked towards the sound, which seemed to emanate from the swamp.
He heard it again, then saw someone step from behind the massive oak tree. Nick narrowed his eyes, making out the slender figure in the fog, then his eyes flew wide when he realized it was Abby. Her red hair was hanging over her soft shoulders, and she moved slowly towards him, the same way he walked when he was hunting deer.
“It’s so good to see you,” she said, her appearance more radiant than he remembered.
Nick wondered why she wasn’t shivering, dressed only in jeans and a t-shirt, then he noticed Abby was walking in her bare feet, stepping like a cat over the leaves. The fog had thickened, and Nick felt like the trees around her had become apparitions. He was unsure if someone else was with her.
Though he was transfixed by her alluring beauty, he felt like something was wrong. How did she get around the mantraps buried in the ground along the fence, and why’s she moving like that?
Abby stopped fifteen feet from him, her nose slightly upturned as she sniffed the air. “There’s someone you should meet, Nicholas. He’s come a long way to see you.”
“To see me? Who—what are you talking about? Abby, are you OK?”
Nick backed up as she began to slink towards him again. His stomach was feeling queasy, and an icy chill ran down his spine as he noticed that the birds in the area had stopped chirping. Nick turned to run and slammed into a tree—no, something else. He looked up into the blackened face of a deformed creature. It looked like something that had climbed out of the primordial ooze of the swamp. Before he could do anything, the gnarled fingers on its only hand rushed up to his throat. He felt himself being lifted off the ground. Nick tried punching the monster in the face, which caused it to shriek as its carbonized skin crumpled like an eggshell. He fell to the ground, deftly removing the folding knife from his right pocket then springing to his feet, flicking it open like his father had shown him during so many punishing training sessions. As he went to drive the blade into the creature’s ribs, he suddenly felt something vise-like around his neck. The knife tumbled from his grasp, and he felt like his windpipe was going to splinter apart at any second as someone from behind held him in a chokehold, their powerful arms making it impossible to get free. He thrashed his feet, trying to kick at the disgusting burnt figure before him, but she had backed out of range. Nick found himself losing his strength as the chokehold increased and his breath diminished. It was only when he saw Abby’s face appear on his right that he stopped resisting.
