Rotten (28 page)

“So there are more survivors from that group?”  I joined Princess beside the truck.

“No, they pulled it.  Those guys didn’t know how to cancel the signal with a competing sound wave.  By the way, that was very smart.”  He nodded.  “And they were just shooting and took out half a dozen of our guys when the order went out to kill the signal remotely.  The deadies killed the rest of them, our guys and the survivors.”

“So what happened to the survivors that went back to the compound without a fight?” Rebekah said, leaning against the truck beside Princess.

“Those were the deadies you saw tonight, deadies three point oh.  They’re experimenting with them, trying to get the perfect controllable killing machine.  As I understand it, and I don’t understand much because I am a low man on the totem pole, the first group of deadies were designed to self-destruct within twenty-four hours, some of those short-circuited, zombieing out too soon, or not self-destructing at all, and some of those escaped the control area of Blacksport and Freemont and became the two point oh version.  The tone was the only control we had over them, but if you turned the tone off they were like fifty times stronger than before.  That’s when they decided to chip them, the chip gives them a little more control, but as you saw without the tone they are still fast, strong, and crazy.” 

“So it was the shot we were all supposed to take that turned them?” Rotten said.

“Yeah, the thing was full of nano particles and bots that went straight to the brain and waited for the signal.”

“What was the signal?” Sully sighed and shook his head.

“It was another tone, it went out over every phone, TV, computer, everything that could generate sound, even some of those computerized refrigerators and dishwashers carried the tone.”   

Princess looked at me and raised her brows and I silently agreed with her with a nod.  I didn’t trust Binks either, there was something off about him, but besides his so freely sharing with us, I couldn’t put my finger on it.  “Why are you telling us all this?”

“Why not?  Three months ago I was in college, studying robotics, and then I’m with these guys, muscle heads and freaks.  You think I liked what was happening?  What is happening?  But I quickly discovered there is only one way out of Nexus Security and it sure isn’t with a retirement package, investments, and a pension.  I’ve been stuck in hell for six weeks and I’m damn glad to be out here.” 

“Who is in charge of Nexus Security, who’s the top brass?”  Rotten pulled some folding chairs from the corner of the garage and sat down.

              “Nobody knows that.  Only a few people have access to the lower levels, the majors and some scientists, that’s it.  I think the top brass is down there somewhere, because the majors go down in a special elevator and come up with the new plans.”

“Levels?” Moonshine paced and I wondered how he still had the energy.

“Yeah, maybe seven, maybe a hundred, nobody knows.  I have access to the top three levels, the one you can see from the outside is the first, of course, but it’s just a room with the elevators and the parking bays and warehousing.  The next floor is the dorms, cafeteria, and recreation areas for the muscle heads and some of the geeks.  Research for my field in robotics is on the third floor and I know nothing about what is below that except I’ve seen a couple scientists who work in the lower levels.” 

“So it’s like the hive in
Resident Evil
?”  Moonshine said.

“Yeah, pretty much.  I love that game.”  Binks looked at the screen, and I glanced down to see the vehicle, with zombies in tow, pass the feed and seed we had looted earlier.

“Where does the tone originate?”  Rotten rubbed his eyes and yawned. 

“Would anyone like some coffee?” Mrs. Williams said.

We answered in the positive instantly and in unison and Mrs. Williams and Connie stepped into the house. 

“There’s a sound tunnel, well I guess it’s a tunnel, it comes out through the roof and I don’t know how far down it goes.  Like a chimney, I guess.  It keeps the zombies shut down for about a mile radius.”

“Do you know how to turn it off?  Or cancel it out like we did?”  Rotten got straight to the point.

“Sure, that would be pretty easy.  I’ve been working on robotic sound cannons and tone generators.  I made one that looks like a dog, a real dog with fur and everything.”  He smiled.  “Pretty cool stuff.”

We looked at each other, making eye contact and holding it for several moments.  What was with this guy?  Something was off, but I didn’t feel threatened.  I looked down at Sarah and she shrugged. 

“Will you do it?  Will you turn off their tone?”  Rotten looked at me as he spoke.

“That would be bad.”  Binks stared at the screen and we watched the gate slide open and the vehicle move toward the low building.  It pulled along the side and a door rose exposing a small concrete bay with a thick metal door set in the interior wall.  He parked the mini tank and the zombies in the room, the door lowered, and he closed down the program, looking up at us.

“Can you do it and will you do it?”  Rotten said again.

“That would kill a lot of people, they’ve got lots of deadies on the science floors I hear.  All those deadies going zombie at once?”  He shook his head.  “They wouldn’t stand a chance.”

“That’s the point, Binks,” Moonshine snapped.  “They’ve killed everyone we know, our families, our friends.”

“Oh.”  He looked around at us like he hadn’t even considered that aspect of the equation.  “You could just leave,” he suggested.

“And go where?  Bliss, Texas?” Sully said.

“No, you don’t want to go there, there’s another compound there, another experiment, but the coasts on both sides, the north, and the Midwest are all zombie free.  Stay out of Montana, though, there’s a compound there.” 

“What do you mean zombie free?  The apocalypse is international, we saw the videos from all over the world.”  Rotten said, sitting forward in his chair.

“No, no it isn’t.  They just changed the feeds inside the infected areas so the people would think that, it’s psychological, it takes away the will to fight if you think there is no escape.  With some redirection, filters, and computer graphics it was easy to do.  The folks in the compound control all media coming in this area and have since a couple days before it started.”

“What about that Jason Adams guy on the radio and those other people we heard broadcasting?” Moonshine said.

“All media inside is controlled by the compound.”

“What in the hell are you saying?”  Moonshine pulled Binks up from where he sat on the concrete and lifted him off his feet. 

“It’s normal out there, Atlanta, Charlotte, Boston, New York, Los Angeles, Dallas, Denver and on and on are all normal.  No zombies, no nothing, same as it ever was.” 

Moonshine finally ran out of energy, dropped Binks, and slowly lowered himself to the ground.  “What the fuck?”

“How do you know?” Rotten sat back in his chair looking as stunned as we all felt.

“We’ve got the regular TV and Internet in the compound.  Out in the world every thing is the same as it was.  There’s war in the Middle East, a famous actor died and last night they showed a live memorial where all his actor friends talked about him, and there was a catfight on a red carpet beforehand with a couple wardrobe malfunctions.  That video had over five million hits by this morning and I watched it a few times myself.  No one out there has a clue what’s been happening in here, so you can just drive out of here and in a couple hours you’ll be in the real world and back to normal.” 

“Coffee’s ready,” Mrs. Williams called down from upstairs.

“Come on.”  Sully pointed the pistol at Binks.  “Get your case and lets go upstairs, I need a drink.”

Binks folded up the device, latched it, and preceded us up the stairs.

“It’s a trick,” Princess whispered.  “It has to be a trick.”

Moonshine tied Binks to the chair and while Princess pulled the last bottle of wine from the pantry, and Sully grabbed a bottle of whiskey, pouring a shot in his coffee, we set the table upright and sat down.  We didn’t say anything for a few minutes, looking at each other with wide eyes.  It didn’t seem possible that the rest of the world was normal, but in another way it made perfect sense.  My mind reviewed the events of the days involuntarily, the deadheads, the deaths, the burials, chopping the heads off fifty something zombies, and I knew we would never be normal again, even if the rest of the world was. 

Princess looked around the room at the furniture piled against the glass, at the guns and knives set on every surface, and at us decked out in the duct tape costumes she’d made, and laughed without humor.  I saw fear in her eyes.  “The world may be normal out there, but we sure aren’t, not now, and I don’t think we ever will be again.” 

Rotten picked up the bottle of whiskey from in front of Sully and turned it up.  He took a long swallow, set it down, and coughed.  “It doesn’t matter, and it doesn’t change what we have to do.  We have to turn off the tone and leave them with their monsters.  Will you help us do it?”  He turned to Binks.

“Yeah, okay.”

“Just like that?”  Princess turned in her chair to face him.

“Sure, I pretty much figured out I wasn’t going to make it out of there alive, this may be my only chance.  I need my computer, and a beer if you have one, I can do it from here.”

“By remote?” Highland said.

Binks nodded.  “You know if we do this it might really cause the zombie apocalypse?”

“The apocalypse is inevitable, especially with people like this alive, people who think nothing of killing hundreds of thousands for an experiment, this is a battle that has to be fought and won.”  Rotten took another hit from the bottle, stood up, and untied Binks.  “Is there anymore beer left?”

“They’re warm, but I’ll get him one.” Mrs. Williams slipped into the pantry.

“Don’t you even want to talk about it or vote on it?”  Binks set his case on the table.  “You may be causing the end of the world as you know it.”  He lifted up the top part of the case to display the screen and controls, and then pulled a laptop from a drawer in the bottom. 

“Has anything changed?”  Rotten looked around the table at us.  “I mean, everything has changed, and changed again, and then changed back again.” He laughed softly and bitterly. “But is anyone having second thoughts about killing the men in black?”

“Nuke their sorry asses,” Moonshine said.

“They’ll never stop if we don’t,” I said.

“They killed our parents,” Rebekah said.

“They killed my daughter,” Beth said.

“We have to do it.”  Mrs. Williams set a can of beer on the table beside Binks.

“Yeah, we want to do it and we all agree,” Rotten sat down beside Binks.  “Do it.” 

Binks took a long swallow of beer.  “Okay, if you’re sure.”  He opened the laptop, powered it up, and finished the beer while he waited.  “I wouldn’t mind another beer, they don’t allow alcohol at the compound and this is going to take a few minutes.”  

Mrs. Williams brought him another can while he pushed keys on the laptop, and on the screen built into the case an image of a laboratory appeared.  Binks typed in the words, “Wake up, Binkster,” and in the corner of the room we saw a large dog sit up and the view on the laptop became the dogs eyes.  He opened another window on the small computer and a waveform appeared.  “This is their tone.”

By this point we had all gathered around Binks and were staring at the screens in amazement.  On the big screen we watched the dog walk across the room and on the laptop we saw a bunch of animals from cats and bunnies to turtles and snakes sitting on a shelf and they opened their eyes and looked at the dog.  The animals looked as real as any you’d see in nature.  The bunnies had tall ears and fur, the snakes had scales, and a large gray cat swished its tail back and forth.