The Dying of the Light (Book 3): Beginning (7 page)

It doesn’t take much skill or finesse to hit a zombie in the head when its teeth are sunk into your arm.

It was a messy kill, blood and brains everywhere. She scraped what was left of its face off her arm and scrabbled for her medpack, stored in the calf pocket of her pants. She pulled out the QuikClot pack but spilled it as she tore it open.

She groaned and reached for the foam canister in the pack. It wouldn’t help against the infection, but the spray-on quick-coagulant foam would keep her alive long enough to get back to the base. It wasn’t as effective as the QuikClot, but it usually worked.

What would happen after that, though, was a much tougher question.

She stood on shaky legs, leaning against the remaining wall of the store for support. She looked around but couldn’t spot half her equipment, including her bow and pack. She limped and held her arm against her side. As quiet as could be, she searched for her things and found them in the ruins. She stopped by the corpse and made sure to take several pictures with the camera that had somehow survived its one-story drop in her pack. It was getting dark now, so she attached the night-vision device to her mask and began the long trek back to the base.

Eden Blake sighed as she shrugged the pack onto her shoulders. Her parents were going to be pissed.

Expeditionary Force Command
Joint Base Lewis-McChord
Tacoma, Washington

Eden broke radio silence as she approached the well-lit gates of ExForce Command. She wasn’t looking forward to the dressing-down she was sure to get from her CO. She got bit. Failed her test, certainly. She was a liability. She could already hear everything Gaines would say to her, already see the disappointment in his face and those of her parents.

It didn’t help that most of the guards on the gate tonight were her own people, fellow Hunters who hated her for the special treatment they thought she received as daughter of the bunker’s military commander. People who also hated her for being immune when they’d lost so many loved ones over the years.

Some days, she wished she could just run away and never see any of them again. She groaned as the pain in her arm and side reminded her that she needed to get her ass in gear. She sighed and spoke into her throat mic. “Hunter Alpha Four approaching base. Day Code: Zulu Three Charlie Baker. Over.”

Her earpiece beeped once, and there was a faint reply as she trudged out of the clearance zone around the base. “Alpha Four, you are cleared for approach.”

As she got within two hundred yards of the main gate, she came to a red painted line on the pavement and put down her pack and weapons. She pulled off her hood and mask and bent to put them in her pack along with her sidearm. Her bow she let lie on the broken and weathered asphalt. “Halt,” said the amplified voice of one of the guards atop the wall. “Identify and present for inspection.”

She sighed, annoyed at the protocol that made her repeat herself, and called out through dry lips. “Hunter Alpha Four. Day Code: Zulu Three Charlie Baker.”

“Present for inspection.” The toneless reply might as well have come from a machine.

She raised her right arm above her head and raised her left as far as she could, then turned in a full circle. “See anything you like?” she asked, her voice raised. “Now let me the fuck in.” She reached down, picked up her bow and pack with her uninjured arm, and took a step across the line.

A bullet ricocheted five feet to her left, throwing up sparks and stinging her face with chipped asphalt.

“You are not cleared for entry. Stand down or die.”

She threw down her pack and bow, shielding her eyes against the glare from the lights. “Is that you, Foretti? I’m going to kill you, motherfucker! Marquez sends me out there after that. . . that
thing
, and then you shoot at me when I somehow make it back? You’re dead meat, asshole!”

A new voice came over the speaker, one she instantly recognized. “You’re injured, Hunter. You know the rules. Were you bitten?”

“Let me in, Marquez! You know that doesn’t matter for me.” Eden ignored that little voice in the back of her head that questioned this. That was no normal walker out there. What if she was only immune to some of them?

“
Were you bitten
?”

“What the fuck do
you
think?” she asked as she pulled off the bandage. The spray foam normally worked well, but with the extent of her injury, it had failed to stem the bleeding, and she’d had to put on a tourniquet. She could barely feel her arm now and knew she needed to get it treated or she’d bleed out. She was already weak from blood loss and exertion.

“Does it look like a fucking splinter to you?”

She could feel the guns cock all along the wall as they saw the bite mark.

“This is bullshit, Marquez, and you know it. Did you fucking forget who I am? Did you forget what that means?” Her words were greeted with silence, and she knew they were just fucking with her because they had the opportunity. Not in a friendly sort of way, either, but in the way soldiers get hazed and pranked by those who detest them.

She’d had enough of that.

“You know what, I’m done with this,” she said and picked up her pack and bow once more. “I’m coming in, and I’m going to Decon, and if fuckhead Foretti so much as glances at that goddamn gun, I’m going to make him eat it. Or you can explain to my parents why you shot and killed their
immune goddamn daughter
, asshole.”

The nurses and doctor she saw while in Decon treated the wound on her arm as best as they could, though there would always be a nasty scar. To round out the day, she came away with one cracked and two bruised ribs, a sprained wrist, and many cuts and abrasions. Throughout the treatment, all the personnel maintained as much distance as they could. She was a pariah, and not just because of her wound.

Her immunity had been tested in the labs and had proven again and again that she was immune to the zombie prion that had destroyed 99% of the world. But she’d never actually been bitten. After all, that was the only way to know for sure, and who’d willingly subject themselves to that?

The zombie she’d fought and killed out there in the ruins wasn’t a normal zombie. There was something different, something new roaming the ruins. That was clear, and she worried they’d find out that she wasn’t immune to this different version. Who knew, for certain? Only those tests could tell her. She looked down at her bandaged arm and couldn’t suppress a shiver of fear and loathing for her own flesh.

Her CO, Dalton Gaines, escorted her parents to the observation room while she underwent another test. To her relief, Gaines just ordered her to report to him once she was released and left. Her mom and dad, however, waved at her through the glass. She’d almost rather not have seen them. Didn’t they understand that every time they did something like this, it only made her more of a “Daddy’s girl” to everyone?

Hard to imagine why she’d wanted to work outside, away from everyone else, with that sort of attention. It was the last thing she needed. She knew they meant well, but it still made things hard.

“We’re all worried about you, sport,” David said as he sat next to her mother on the bench provided. “It’s one thing to have the tests and everything, but to actually go through it…”

“How do you feel, honey?” her mom asked.

Eden shrugged and tried not to fidget with the bandage covering her lower arm. It itched all the time, so much that it was driving her crazy. “I can’t stand the itching.”

“That just means—”

“I know what it means,” Eden said. “I’m fine. I just want to get out of here.”

“Soon, sport,” her dad said. “Soon. Tell us again about the walker you fought.”

And so Eden began her fifth telling of the story, the same as the last and the ones before that. She was reciting it from memory by now. What was weird was that her parents looked scared. She couldn’t ever remember seeing either one this upset. Eventually, they moved on to how she got back to the base, and she told them of the harrowing trip through the ruins.

She sighed and waved back at them as they left, then turned toward the wall on her bunk. Everyone was going to make her stay here for at least a few days while they confirmed once and for all that she wouldn’t turn. And if she did… well, she wouldn’t have to worry about it then, would she?

It was all too much, just too damned much. Eden felt the tears start, and as much as she wanted to hold them back, to be the strong Hunter, she couldn’t stop them. She was angry at the idea that she might not be as immune as she’d always thought. She was sad that she’d let her parents down somehow, again, even if she didn’t know exactly how. All the emotions of a normal teenage girl raged through her and left her exhausted and sleepy.

As she drifted off, she wondered again what it was about that zombie that made it so much worse, so much tougher. She’d killed walkers before, many times, but none like that. And the reasoning, the intelligence, it had displayed left her with chills. She wouldn’t have slept for a week because of those nightmares. Fortunately or unfortunately for her, the drugs and emotional devastation left her little choice, and she passed out.

Main Research Lab
Bunker Seven
Wheeler Peak, New Mexico

Sabrina Atkins watched from outside the lab as her husband Jim threw yet another dry-erase marker across the room. Never a patient man, Jim had become more and more frustrated recently as his efforts to finalize the gene therapy for the zombie prion continued to fail. His partner in the project, Mary Maxwell, appeared calm. But Sabrina knew she was just as worried, and not only about the cure.

As if on cue, Mary’s daughter Rachel turned the hallway corner, her long, dark ponytail bouncing as she rushed up the hallway. Rachel was of medium height and build, with a figure Sabrina would’ve killed for in her younger days. An upturned nose and ready smile made her into the kind of person guys had once called “the girl next door.”

“Rachel, honey, would you mind getting the door for me?” she asked as she gestured with the three coffee cups she held.

“Sure thing,” Rachel said, pulling the door open and waving her through.

Sabrina set a coffee cup down near her husband and handed the second to Mary as the older woman released her daughter from the mother-mandated hug.

“Heaven in a cup,” Jim said, breathing in the aroma of the coffee and exhaling with a smile. “I still can’t believe the beans are doing so well hydroponically.”

“Too right.” Sabrina hadn’t visited her Australian home in years, but sometimes those old speech patterns crept up on her. “Boys down there said they’ll have another blend in a month or so, once it’s gone through testing.”

“Just don’t tell anyone else,” Mary said with a laugh as she sipped her coffee. “Otherwise, we’re all gonna end up trucking coffee across the country.”

“They can call me Juan Valdez for all I care,” Jim said, and the older ladies laughed.

“I’ve got some news, mom,” Rachel said with a smile. To Sabrina, it was the smile of the proverbial cat who’d made a meal of the proverbial canary. “I made it. Full qualifications.” She held out a small ribbon of yellow and green, the insignia of a Hunter.

“Oh, Rachel, honey, that’s… that’s great!” Mary took the ribbon and looked it over before handing it back. “When’s your first assignment?”

“I’m going on patrol on Wednesday,” Rachel said.

“That’s great news,” Jim said. “Bill and I were talking about the final solo hunt requirements the other day. Congratulations!”

“Thanks, Mr. Atkins,” Rachel replied. “It was a nightmare, but I managed it okay. Took down three of them, but two were rotten, so I suppose they don’t count.”

Sabrina knew she couldn’t have said, “I’m sure your father would be quite proud of you, dear.” At least not out loud. She would never say that, would she? But there they were, the words pouring out without even a token stop through her thoughts. She blinked, willing the universe to take back the words, and sighed.

“Yeah, um, thanks,” Rachel said. “I think so too, Mrs. Atkins.”

Mary turned away, and Sabrina could see her wipe her eyes. She and went over to her friend and wrapped an arm around her shoulder. Even now, years later, George Maxwell’s absence was still felt by everyone, but most especially Mary. He’d been a giant of a man, and Sabrina felt sure he was the inspiration for the saying about broken molds. They could’ve used his help about now.

“It’s okay, Sabrina. I’m fine. Just tired and stressed out, I guess.”

Jim, always uncomfortable in such situations, stood and shook the young girl’s hand. “Well, I think it’s great. You’re just what we need to whip those guys into shape, I think, and you’re one helluva shot. I’ve seen you on the range.”

“Thanks, Mr. Atkins, I—”

“That’s enough of that Mr. Atkins crap,” he said. “You’re a Hunter now, Rachel. I’m Jim, she’s Sabrina,” he continued, pointing at his wife. “Got it?”

Rachel laughed. “It’ll be weird, but sure thing, Mr.…” she trailed off as he glanced her way, and she smiled. “. . . Jim. Sure thing, Jim.”

“Good, now take your ribbon and get to your party,” he said. He looked at her over the top of his glasses. “You do have a party to get to, don’t you?”

Rachel blushed. “Well, I wasn’t gonna say anything, but yeah, some of the others are getting together…” She looked over at her mom, who smiled.

“You don’t need my permission now, Rachel,” Mary said. “You’re a Hunter. You can make your own decisions.”

Rachel grinned and leapt off the stool to hug her mom before she ran out the door. “Thanks. See ya later!”

“Well, shit,” Mary said, and Sabrina and Jim both laughed. “I mean, I’m happy for her, but I’d hoped—”

“You’d hoped what all parents hope,” Sabrina said as she squeezed her friend’s shoulder. “That their children will never grow up. She’s a tough girl. I’m sure she’ll be fine.”

“I’m sure you’re right, Sabrina.”

“Of course I am,” she said and finished off her coffee. She looked over the whiteboards the other scientists had filled with scrawled drawings and notes. Little of it made sense to her, but it was clear they’d been at it for some time. She’d always been more of a physical scientist—electronics, communications, that sort of thing. She sat down on a stool at one of their workbenches, her chin in her cupped hands and her elbows resting on the bench. “Now tell me where you’re at. And remember, I’m the only one in here without a doctorate, so dumb it down for me.”