Earth Zero: A Post-Apocalyptic Thriller (Next Book 2) Read online

  “We are not you,” it responded, diving behind the killing machine as six beams ripped jagged gashes in the wall above. One of the beams danced over Lars and the man quit writhing against his restraints and hung as limp as a sack of soggy corn meal as he was fed toward the flashing blades.

  Rachel crawled toward the swollen barrels of stinking offal, their odor growing stronger as she neared. The putrescent corpses lay just to her right. Beside them she saw a pile of clothing and recognized Tara’s blue blouse and Lars’s tan cargo pants with the rips in the knees. The canvas strap of a backpack poked out from beneath a scuffed leather boot.

  That’s my pack!

  The Zaps must have carried all their gear to Wilkesboro when they captured their five human prisoners. They likely deposited it here once Rachel and DeVontay were isolated and Tara and Lars were restrained. Rachel didn’t know whether the Zaps were overconfident or merely oblivious of the gear’s value. Even now they paid no attention to her, focused instead on the traitor returning fire from behind the death machine.

  She yanked her pack from the pile and flipped through it. Some of the contents had been removed, but her Glock pistol was nestled among packs of dried milk and oatmeal. She didn’t see any rifles in the pile, but Lars’s axe lay amid the soiled clothes.

  DeVontay had seen her discovery and shook his head in disbelief. He was still on the floor, not recovering as quickly as Rachel had. Her mutant abilities must’ve given her some immunity to the effects of the beams, which also explained why the Zaps hadn’t demolished each other despite their protective suits.

  She rolled into a sitting position and checked the pistol’s magazine. It appeared to still be fully loaded with fifteen rounds. She racked the slide back to kick a round into the chamber and listened for Geneva’s voice in the din. The baby screamed shrilly at the Zaps as if blaming them for the failure of the devices to kill the traitor.

  Rachel popped up over the barrel of human viscera and adopted a two-handed stance, resting her elbows against the rim of the barrel. She aimed between the two glowing eyes of the baby and squeezed off three shots, making sure Squeak was not in the firing line. The first round was high and struck the Zap holding Geneva, punching a red hole in its throat. Before the Zap could collapse, one shot glanced off the shoulder of its suit.

  The next pierced the center of the baby’s skull, instantly causing her eyes to go dark as brains and bits of skull rained to the floor. Squeak screamed and backed away as the Zap fell with Geneva in its arms, blood pooling around them on the floor.

  At the same moment, the other Zaps stopped firing. They lowered their weapons as their eyes shifted from bright yellow to smoldering red. Squeak fled out of sight even though Rachel called for her to stay. The traitor Zap emerged from cover and aimed its device at the others.

  “Don’t,” Rachel said, sensing they were no immediate threat now that they weren’t receiving orders from a psychotic creature.

  “I don’t want to kill us,” the Zap said.

  The machine continued to whir and Lars’s feet were nearing the blades. DeVontay staggered to his feet and tried to pull the unconscious man away from the mutilating arms. “Help me here.”

  Rachel kept her Glock trained on the motionless Zaps as she retrieved the axe. She hurried to the machine and gave the heavy blade to DeVontay. He raised it and drew back in a two-hand stance like a baseball batter, still unsteady but determined. He gave a roundhouse swing and drove the blade into the robotic arm clasping Lars’s ankle. The axe clanged against the arm, cleaving it almost in half. It appeared to have no wires or cables inside, as if the alloy was organic.

  He struck the opposite arm and the set of arms wobbled in its overhead tracks. The blades above the steel chute seemed to slice and spin faster as if frustrated at being denied their sport. Already exhausted, DeVontay passed the axe to Rachel and took the Glock.

  Rachel chopped at the two nearest arms until they severed, dropping Lars’s legs to the floor. DeVontay wrapped one arm around the man’s chest, supporting him while Rachel worked on the final two restraints. All the while, the six Zaps stood with their heads tilted down as if they were hibernating on their feet.

  When Lars was free, Rachel dropped the axe and ran after Squeak. “Come on,” she ordered the Zap, who stared down at Geneva’s shattered little body as if its final betrayal was sinking in. The meat machine in the next room had gone about its work as if nothing had happened, as had the 3-D printers in the large foyer.

  Rachel found Squeak by the building’s entrance, slumped with her hands over her eyes as if that would erase all the things she had just witnessed.

  “Are you okay, honey?” Rachel said, kneeling beside her.

  The child didn’t answer, but that wasn’t surprising, considering the way her mother had frightened her into constant silence.

  This close to the street, the hum of the plasma sink was even louder, the subtle vibrations of the floor buzzing like a low electrical current. The intensity seemed to be building to a crescendo that Rachel didn’t want to be around to experience. She could already feel it sapping her again.

  “Watch the street,” Rachel said to the Zap.

  DeVontay came shuffling toward them, one shoulder and arm supporting Lars. The man was conscious but nearly delirious, and he was half-dressed as if DeVontay had to force clothes onto him. But his axe dangled by his side.

  “It’s okay now.” Rachel gently removed Squeak’s hands and held them until the girl looked at her. “We’re going to get you out of here.”

  “Mommy?” the girl said, the word barely distinguishable because of the girl’s strained diction. Squeak had been an infant when the solar storms wiped out civilization, and in Tara’s misguided protectiveness, she’d raised her daughter to communicate only though vocal clicks and the sounds that had resulted in her nickname. But someone had been teaching her language.

  Geneva.

  Rachel didn’t want to lie to the girl. Amid all the horrors of the apocalypse and the urge to live in denial despite the harsh reality of their future, lying was perhaps the worst sin of all. So she answered indirectly. “We can sort that out later, once we’re safe.”

  “We should leave before the others come to see why the machine is broken,” the Zap said.

  “Now we’re the ‘we’?” DeVontay asked.

  “I can’t stay here now. I’m not part of them anymore.”

  “You saved us for the second time,” Rachel said. “I’d say you belong with us if you want to come along.”

  She helped Squeak to her feet. The girl was maybe six years old and only weighed fifty pounds, but Rachel wouldn’t be able to carry her far. When she tried to hoist the child, the Zap put a hand on her shoulder.

  “Allow me,” it said. Rachel couldn’t be sure, but she thought she saw dark round circles in his flaming eyes, like the ghosts of pupils.

  “Is that okay?” Rachel asked Squeak.

  She nodded. “I like bright eyes.”

  “Bright Eyes,” Rachel said to the Zap. “I like that, too. If you’re going to be part of the gang, you need a name.”

  “Bright Eyes!” the little girl said with a delight that was welcome after the grim and grisly battle.

  Rachel wondered what the child had experienced during the two days she’d spent with the Zaps. Eventually she’d have to ask, but Rachel was appalled to realize the child seemed to have benefited—she spoke, projected emotions, and was more self-confident. Rachel was ashamed to think her mother’s loss might serve the child well.

  DeVontay had collected their packs, and Lars waved his axe as he limped along. “If I had any strength, I’d smash that damned murder machine to little pieces,” he said.

  “We would just build another one,” Bright Eyes said. “Not me, but the others.”

  Rachel checked the street from the concealment of the shattered glass door. “I don’t see anything.”

  “I can shield us as long as we’re near the plasma sink,” Bright
Eyes said. “It serves as a wave amplifier and increases our abilities. That’s why Geneva didn’t have to speak in order to communicate.”

  “What about…those others back there that tried to kill you?”

  “Geneva forced them to act. Once she was dead, they had no direction. Since Geneva had all the other infants killed, no one is left to command them.”

  “So we’re safe?”

  “I wouldn’t say that,” Bright Eyes said. “In unknown circumstances, anything can happen. And the plasma flow is accelerating. The sunspot activity must be high.”

  “Let’s boogie,” Lars said. “If you’re sure we can trust this guy.”

  “I’d bet my life on it,” Rachel said. “Again.”

  As they crept onto the street, the pulsing and throbbing of the mighty Zap energy source echoing off the ruins, Rachel realized she was betting all their lives on it.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  When Franklin reached Stonewall, he found a town so empty and bleak that he regretted ever leaving his compound.

  At least the solitude of his mountaintop hideaway was peaceful and relaxing despite the dangers. Here, the silence was practically a scream. Sure, the river gurgled and splashed, the wind played in the dying leaves of the trees, and a loose piece of tin banged on the roof of a shed, but beneath those sounds lurked the great and terrible absence of noise.

  No lawnmowers buzzing, no children laughing as they played in the water, no truck engines rumbling, no radios playing four-beat pop with awful lyrics. No old men sitting out front of the convenience store playing checkers and griping about Republicans or Democrats or whichever party happened to be ruining the country at the moment, no young ladies in skirts and sandals whose calves made men of all ages smile a little, no blue-haired old ladies gathering in the First Baptist Church to stitch the quilts they would send to needy families on the other side of the county.

  Stonewall wasn’t haunted by the ghosts of all the people who had died there. No, Stonewall was haunted because of all the things it no longer was. All its years added up to nothing but abandoned houses, dead cars, and skeletons decked out in rotting clothes. Franklin could only imagine how desolate and depressing a large city would feel, because even this little community’s emptiness was nearly unbearable.

  Princess didn’t seem to mind, though. She lifted her head and flared her nostrils as she sought luscious grass in the ditches. She swiveled her ears to listen for danger, but she wasn’t tense beneath him. The mare seemed to sense that Franklin wasn’t much of a rider and she was careful not to dislodge him from his precarious perch.

  Figuring the town was already well-scavenged, Franklin had detoured west a couple of miles to search houses along the ridge. He’d found a single-shot Winchester rifle and a box of bullets as well as more food, which he’d packed into a couple of gunny sacks and draped over the horse’s back. He’d opened a can of applesauce and poured it in a saucer for Princess to lap up, and she’d been in high spirits ever since.

  Franklin dismounted in the center of town. He’d heard tales of Stonewall from the others, but this was his first visit. In the distance he could see the metal huts and sheds behind a chain-link fence where DeVontay and Stephen had been held against their will by a rogue band of survivors. The ransacked convenience store was losing its roof, and the windows were grimed with a gray film. The yard of the outdoor-recreation shop held canoes that were half full of brackish green water, and a row of rusty bicycles with flat, rotted tires were parked in a rack along the front of the shop.

  The doors to the church were open, but he didn’t need to go inside. Rachel and DeVontay had told him the pews were full of dead people. At least they’d been struck down in the House of the Lord, and Franklin hoped the parishioners derived some comfort as they died at the hands of their merciful God. He didn’t like to think about God’s motives, but the changes to the world seemed far too malevolent to have been the work of nature or chance.

  Franklin left Princess grazing in an overgrown yard while he gave Stonewall the once-over. He cupped his hands and called Rachel’s and DeVontay’s names outside the post office, despite the risk of attracting predators. He received no answer besides the loud silence. He scanned the sky for those bloodthirsty metal birds, but all he saw were plenty of crows and the occasional blue jays, wrens, and goldfinches. Possessing a weapon gave him some comfort, although with a single-shot, he’d have to hope that no predators would attack him in packs.

  Once he completed his dismal scouting mission and accepted that no one was here, he had to decide whether to head back for the bunker or keep looking. He didn’t like leaving Marina stuck with Kokona and the military unit, but at least she’d be safe. Plus he couldn’t stand breaking the news of Stephen’s loss to her. It would be bad enough telling Rachel and DeVontay, but if the girl had given any part of her heart to the boy…

  His dread of Marina’s tears convinced him to head just a little farther west, maybe ten miles or so. The road more or less followed the river so he wasn’t likely to get lost. Given the lack of winged killers, he felt safer out in the open and the October weather was far too nice to be locked away inside a dark house.

  His rump was sore from riding but Princess didn’t show any signs of exhaustion. At one point, Franklin urged her into the shallow water at the river’s edge, and she kicked and gamboled along the slick rocks for a couple of minutes. Then Franklin saw a sinuous shadow in the deep currents and hustled back to dry land.

  He was two miles out of Stonewall when the shot rang out.

  He could’ve sworn he heard the bullet fly over his head like a metal bumblebee, but given the shape of the slopes leading down to the valley, he could easily be mistaken. But now being out in the open didn’t seem so desirable.

  Franklin nudged his knees against Princess’s flanks and twitched the reins, guiding her into a copse of birch saplings. He slid to the ground, dropping his rifle and nearly falling, expecting at any moment to feel the rip of hot lead in his chest.

  Why the hell are they shooting at me? Do they think Zaps ride horseback? This ain’t the fucking Planet of the Apes.

  He scanned the ridge in the direction from which the shot originated. Several houses were partially visible among the trees, but the top of the ridge was a more likely bet. The report of the gun hadn’t echoed as it would have if fired from inside the valley.

  Nightfall would likely offer enough concealment for him and the horse to make their escape, but that was at least eight hours away. With the river at his back, he couldn’t risk traversing it given the slimy creatures that slithered beneath the foam. Franklin had no desire to crouch in the woods all day, because the noise was likely going to attract all manner of predators and maybe some Zaps. And there was a slim chance that his would-be killer had seen Rachel and DeVontay.

  Or had already killed them.

  Franklin collected a fallen branch and removed a handkerchief he’d collected to use as toilet paper if necessary. He tied it to one end of the stick, ran it out into the open, and gave it a wave.

  I hope the international sign of “surrender” still works.

  He accompanied the gesture with a shout. “Hold your fire. I’m one of the good guys.”

  There was half a minute of silence during which Princess restlessly scraped at the ground with her front hooves. Franklin expected a number of responses, including a full volley of automatic-weapons fire. What he didn’t expect was a lone female voice:

  “If you’re so good, why are you by yourself?”

  Franklin thought it over before answering. The apocalypse had inadvertently solved most of the problems of equal rights—humans of every gender had the equal right to die horribly. So it wasn’t inconceivable that a woman was head of a gang. Or she could be the spokesperson in a ploy to have him let down his guard. But he was betting she was all alone, too.

  “I could ask you the same thing,” he yelled.

  “I never said I was good.”

  “Y
eah, judging by the way you tried to kill me, I kind of figured that.”

  “That was a just a warning shot. Although you’re so awful ugly, the bullet might’ve gotten scared off and headed for the woods on its own.”

  Franklin pulled the white flag back in and neatly folded the handkerchief, squirreling it away in his back pocket. After a moment, he answered. “You can have this crappy little town all to yourself. I just want to ride on out of here and head west.”

  “Just one problem with that. You’re Franklin Wheeler, right?”

  Does she know me? Or maybe Rachel?

  He doubted anyone from Before would recognize him now, especially given his years of seclusion before the solar storms struck. He was older and heavier and his beard was wild and gray, and he wore a navy blue watchman’s cap that covered much of his forehead. That hat was a fairly recent accessory, something Rachel had given him for Christmas a couple of years ago. Franklin used to think the holiday was just a chance to worship at the Church of Walmart, but since they could only mark a calendar now by guessing at the winter solstice, he was okay with celebrating renewal of any kind.

  “Depends,” he answered.

  Definitely on the ridge, maybe a hundred yards up. Must be on the watch for something, or she would be hiding in one of the houses.

  “I figured you’d survive. A weasel like you always knows when to slip through the hole in the fence.”

  “Have we had the pleasure of meeting?”

  “Yeah, but you wouldn’t remember. It’s been twenty years. The Wings of Eagles.”

  Franklin hadn’t heard that term in twenty years, either. It was a fringe libertarian group that existed mostly via cheap Xeroxed newsletters and mailing lists cobbled from ads in Soldier of Fortune magazine. Franklin had attended a couple of their gatherings on Roan Mountain in Tennessee but had discovered they were comprised of the same paranoid UFO believers, thinly veiled white supremacists, and conspiracy theorists as all the other so-called freedom movements he’d been involved in. But one thing those gatherings were famous for was their untaxed moonshine and low moral standards.