Among the Fallen: Resurrection (26 page)

She stepped away from the gates and leapt over a barricade and checked out the rest of the street.

The remainder of the street was just as much in chaos as it was everywhere else but at the end of the road was a burning gasoline truck. She watched it hypnotized as the dead shuffled through the flames and moments later dropped to their knees. Hundreds of burning, moving cadavers just breaking up as the heat hardened their limbs and ate through their flesh; the tankers flames roaring into the air and lighting up the red sky in a spectacular array of oranges and yellows, billowing smoke far up into the heavens and beyond.

Alex lit up a cigarette and sat in the roof of a squad car in the confidence nothing was getting through neither the barricade nor the flaming tanker at the end of the street. She stared at her shaking hand as the cigarette slowly glowed and its foul yellow smoke vanished into the air. She lifted the box and read the Surgeon General’s Warning to with a sarcastic smile; being the only person on the whole planet that deemed Cancer the least of her problems.

Suddenly, her eyes were drawn to a police van that was backed up against the station outer wall; her sarcastic smile turning into a grin of smugness. She leapt from the squad car and climbed the front of the van and then onto its roof and glared nervously over the wall. The station grounds were empty of any infestation, a few bodies and some intact vehicles but that was it. Alex leapt over the wall and down the other side as quick as she could, standing to her feet and taking a quick look around.

She wandered up the cobble stoned path and stood in front of the iron gates as the deathly crowd awaited her, thousands upon thousands had appeared in such a short time it was terrifying. Men and women mainly, adults; yet if there were children amongst them they were probably hidden or worst still, maybe the children didn’t have enough meat on them to walk after they were ravaged by the dead. She shuddered at the thought as the morbid crowd stood staring at the ground beneath their feet, their skin brittle and wafer thin, wounded and rotting. She turned her head towards the entrance to the station then looked back at them. It was time to move on.

Chapter Eighteen: Lawless

As God’s new creation we actually want to obey His law - not because it gets us anything, but
because of our love for Him. We still say with the Psalmist in his ageless words, “I desire to do your
will, O my God; your law is within my heart.”
Psalm 40:8

18.01: Blackwater Police Department

The BWPD or Blackwater Police Department is the city’s Police force, responsible for imposing the law and keeping the peace within the city. They were until now a well-equipped force, with two elite units, the BSCS and their own SWAT departments. The SWAT dealt with drug raids and other low end missions whereas the BSCS deals with anti-terrorism, crime syndicate investigations and raids as well as the protection of the Beaumont Corporation’s assets whether it be by terrorist or animal rights activists, right through to the theft and information selling.

The BWPD’s main headquarters, the former Town Hall, is situated on Mulberry Street, one of the city’s main streets and also has a Toll and Immigration Centre, nobody enters Blackwater City without identities and car plates logged, but people are free to leave whenever they please. The Beaumont Corporation insists this is for the safety of the residents; however, most claiming it is to prevent the recent flux in terrorist attacks on the Beaumont Corporation headquarters. In recent years, animal rights and environmental activists have attacked the Pharmaceutical giant using explosives, protests and even more sophisticated server hackings. The Corporation has been accused of many things including the unlawful DNA gathering of Blackwater’s citizens, viral manipulation and even using healthy human beings as test subjects for viral weaponry; none of which has been proved nor disproved. In 2010 computer hackers broke through the Corporations encrypted firewalls and obtained information from as far as China. All those involved in the hacking however, vanished from the face of the Earth within twenty-four hours of the alleged incident and no suspects or trial ever went to court.

Because of the population of the city there are also two other smaller precincts located in Challis Hill and on Naccoon Island itself. The Blackwater Police Department is comprised of a few divisions, these include: Patrol, Special Weapons and Tactics or SWAT, The BSCS, Cyber-crime and a K-9 Unit.

The Patrol division is the backbone of the BWPD containing some of the most recognizable division members in the city. They provide a round the clock service to the residents of Blackwater City with some of the fastest response times in the country, this was due to the Computerized Location System or CLS developed by the Beaumont Corporation; an automated system which deploys officers at key points in the city at the start of each shift, the actual main Police Station itself was often empty. The SWAT unit was created to replace STWP after the unit was disbanded following a disastrous operation in 2008 in which eighteen civilians were killed during the Blackwater Bay hostage crisis. These officers were specially trained to deal with high risk operations. The members of this team were highly skilled in the use of many weapons and are all in top physical and mental condition. The BSCS unit within the BWPD was placed by Beaumont Corporation to tackle hostage situations and terrorist threats. Overall, this unit was similar to its predecessor, the more standardized SWAT unit. BSCS was also specialized in Search and Rescue operations and anything that involved high risk. They were, like their more standard counterpart, both physically and mentally trained individuals with some of its members having a military background. But some claim that their origins have a much darker and elusive purpose displaying almost inhuman feats and stunts getting the mission completed. Another more intriguing point to these mysterious soldiers is the fact that nobody knows their true identities and their refusal to socialize with the rest of the Police Department caused plenty of animosity between the different divisions.

In 2006 the Chief of Police at that time, Richard R Hay was investigated for more than twenty years’

worth of corruption after two Police officers were found dead in the Maryland Apartment buildings just inside the city limits. It was alleged that the security guards who found the corpses forwarded confidential documents found at the crime scene to the local media before any Police cover-up procedures could be initiated. On day twenty-three of the investigation, Hay had a complete mental breakdown and shot dead seven Police officers and nine citizens in the main hall of the Police department before eventually turning the gun on himself. Hay‘s successor, Rudger Milton; turned the force upside-down, putting an end to the corruption that had plagued the Blackwater Underworld for nearly twenty years, drafting in nearly forty recruits and sacking thirty others. The Police force these days does have a friendlier more public face with one in five officers decorated with an award or medal of some kind making it one of the safest cities on the Eastern Seaboard, which in turn made it equally as desirable to live through safety as well as financially.

18.02: Exhibit 35.1976.ALB

Alex thumped the colossal iron gates and stood watching as the creatures slowly gathered on the other side. Their faces were blistered and rotten, their fragile skin pulled away from their mouths like paper, exposing cracked bone and dried up muscle; their stricken faces crawling with flies and vermin. Some were missing limbs, others were even minus pieces of their bodies, chests and faces; yet all were nothing more than awoken carrion; patient and unyielding, drawn to her by the somewhat living and cleaner blood that ran through her veins. She could not help but wonder why they didn’t advance further; they barely moved on the other side, yet easily capable of pushing the down the large gates in such great numbers.

Alex slowly backed away, cautiously studying the cold and desolate yard; its isolated grounds safely secured by giant stone walls, the courtyard lying quiescent and harmless. Police cars noiselessly flashed their blue and red lights around the walls, illuminating the stoned pathway and empty windows as the faint sound of Police radios echoed from within; no speech, no cries for back up -

scarcely a dead static and a haunting silence that spoke a thousand words. The fallen precinct, as far as Alex was concerned was the ultimate and the most irksome reminder of what fell upon the city, it’s decorated and honoured Police officers and enforcers of justice barbarically slain just as easy as anyone else in the city. Their weaponry, efficiency and vast numbers, all accounted for nothing as their blood encrusted uniforms hardened in the cold air as their skin wilted away - the lives that once served to protect; suddenly becoming faceless victims themselves.

She calmly walked away from the gates and inspected the dead officers with a strange sense of curiosity. One was sat up against the wall with a shotgun resting on his lap, his head nothing more than a putrefied mess that seemed to crawl six feet up the brickwork with congealed pieces scattered around his body. Alex pulled a sympathetic face as she quickly realized that as his beloved city collapsed around him, this poor man obviously felt he had nothing to live for, and yet, in the scheme of things around her; he was most likely right. Alex stood and stared towards another that sat in his car; his head dropped back and he too had a self-inflicted gunshot wound to his head; his hand still clutching his hand gun as his empty eyes stared out blankly. Alex frowned with regret, becoming almost jealous of their chosen route out of the city - if only she had it that easy.

She stood up and approached the main path that led to the giant doors into the building. It soon became pretty evident that there was only one way she could go, and that was through the precinct itself as the hundreds, if not thousands of flesh hungry cadaver’s outside had her cut off. She turned and stared at the blood splashed doors of the Police Station, gazing upon the empty bullet casings and ammunition clips that surrounded it; signs of yet another last stand that had come to nothing -

which left Alex with very little confidence in her own solo abilities.

She cautiously leant to the side of the door and tried to peer through the dark windows. She squinted and wiped the glass with her cuff, but to no avail. They had clearly been barricaded on the inside, leaving her blind on the outside and she suddenly grew very fearful of the idea of entering the precinct. As Alex’s stomach sickened with mistrust and paranoia, she took a few steps back and looked up at the gothic and elaborate precinct - it stood silent and callous; its walls centuries old and vast, it waited for someone to enter; a potentially lethal death trap to all those stupid enough to have no other choice. The American flag blew in the wind on the roof and a banner of the B.W.P.D

emblem hung down the side, soaked and heavy; it almost summoned her, and yet, strangely - it warned her too.

“Fuck it!” she cursed as she quickly realized that there was no other option available. She strolled back up to the entrance and grasped the door’s large bar handle and pulled the door open, coughing violently as the smell of rotting flesh hit her face and screaming in fright as millions of flies suddenly barged their way past her. As she ran from the entrance waving her arms desperately, the wall of insects suddenly vanished into the sky and left her unambiguously shocked and repulsed, driving her to the ground coughing and spluttering, rolling around and hysterically shaking her matted hair as the flies eventually disappeared.

Alex eventually calmed as she gasped, wiping her eyes and she smearing her upper lip with more vapor-rub; taking in the menthol and masking the nastiness around her with huge desperate breaths. She stared up at the sky with a huff as the insects quickly vanished; suddenly waving a few strays from her face with irritation. She calmly brushed her clothes down and approached the megalithic doors again, slowly pulling them open and stepping inside.

Alex looked over the ostentatious lobby curiously as she stepped into the dark hall, slightly startled as the doors behind her suddenly slammed shut. The walls were covered with paintings, oils and landscapes; tall gothic stone statues decorated the support pillars and archways. Alex looked over the dark gothic hall taking in its surrealistic beauty, its fine oak varnished work stations and cluttered desks magically glimmering even in such dimness. Huge masses of bound electrical cables crawled around the walls and blood splashed flags draped from the barricaded and blacked-out windows. At first glance, the precinct appeared empty and Alex sighed with a gasp of relief, watching the shadows quivering and sulking over the hall in front of her.

Suddenly, she slipped and grabbed the door frame, quickly balancing herself and clearly startled.

Slowly, she lowered her head, looking at the black glistening floor with a strange and untrusting feeling. She pulled out her lighter and immediately lit up the darkness around her, the black floor suddenly a deep glowing red. Alex knelt down and touched the ground inquisitively and watched as her finger broke its congealed surface; her finger unexpectedly coated in a vile smelling blood. Alex stood with a grumble of bewilderment and lifted her foot, her trainers thick with red mucus as she dragged the congealed skin away from the surface. She groused in disgust, cursing as she pulled the skin from her foot and flicked it to the ground arrogantly, swiftly gazing up at the pitch black ceiling above her. She glared up into the darkness and tilted her head with a lost expression of doubt; the darkness above was plagued with grey shapes and strange outlines that she couldn’t quite make out.

Suddenly, a drop blood hit her shoulder and she quickly wiped it off, curiously gazing into the darkness as the sound of random drops tapped all around her.

Alex swiftly pulled out a cigarette and lit it calmly, searching the wall beside her with her flame and puffing away silently until she discovered a set of light switches. Immediately, she hit them all then turned back to the main hall as the whole area hummed with electricity briefly, the wall mounted lights switching on sequentially and then the lights above, only then revealing what was once blind to her. Alex stood frozen and her face aghast, glaring up at the ceiling as her cigarette slowly fell from her mouth, dropping into the blood at her feet.