The Decaying World Saga (Book 1): Tribes of Decay (23 page)

“What’s the fastest way to the safe passage?” Rowan asked loud enough for Himu to hear. “Is it close?”

Himu shifted uncomfortably before replying.

“The soldiers will shoot you on sight.”

“I didn’t ask you that.” Rowan grabbed him by the arm then pressed his knife against his side and urged him to move toward the door. “You lead the way and remember, we may not survive this, but I’ll make damn sure you don't either.”

The inner workings of the facility were alive with movement. Rowan was forced to walk with one arm around Himu to ensure he didn’t alert anyone of their presence. A general alarm was sounding, highlighted by flashing lights at short intervals along every walkway. Most of the soldiers were in a mad dash, rushing off in one direction or another. Hesitation kept Rowan and Garret at a slow pace, each aware they’d never reach the safe passage ahead of Doctor Olric unless they sped up.

“There’s a security station ahead,” Himu said then groaned at the confused expressions of his captors. “Where the soldiers monitor the compound,” he elaborated.

The description was enough to paint the picture and Rowan urged him on. They came to a final split in the central corridor and stopped. A guttural snarl drew the attention back to Garret. He was down on his knees, his arms wrapped around his stomach.

“It burns.”

The declaration echoed down the hall, louder than Rowan’s nerves could handle. He flung Himu to the ground and slid his head out into the split in the hallway ahead of them. One direction ended at a closed door and the other an elevator. The view directly across from them dominated the scene. A railing spanned the length of the hall, opening out to a cavernous space. Countless platforms lined the walls all the way down, most of them connected by stairways. The view in the center of the space dropped into darkness, while the ceiling above was only a few stories higher.

“We have to get down there?” Rowan asked, eyeing the intense drop.

Himu rolled onto his back and sat up.

“Yes.”

“And that’s the security station?” Rowan asked, pointing at the closed door at the end of the walkway.

Himu nodded.

“There’s no telling how many soldiers are in there,” he added.

Rowan had a follow-up question, but movement from the doorway stopped him.

“We’re going now.”

Himu’s response was lost in his throat. Rowan slipped the knife into his pocket, grabbed Himu and pushed him out into the walkway in the direction of the elevator. Rowan turned around and forced Garret to his feet. They started moving with Rowan behind both of them, pressing a hand between their shoulder blades.

“Hey.”

Rowan didn’t turn around. He lowered his head and pushed harder on his convoy.

“Stop, stop now.”

Himu stumbled over his feet and fell.

“Help me.”

Rowan never stopped, pressing on as he dragged Himu with one hand and pushed Garret with the other. A shot rang out behind them and Rowan flinched. One glance told him there were more soldiers than he could count running in his direction.

“I’m on your side,” Himu yelled.

Rowan snapped back and continued forward. Garret slammed into the elevator door as Himu was yanked to his feet.

“Open it.”

Himu hesitated a heartbeat too long and Rowan pulled his knife and jabbed the tip of the blade into his side for motivation. Himu screamed as he moved, slipping his hand over the control panel beside the door. All three figures fell forward when the door slid open. Two rounds slammed into the back of the elevator before the door closed and a moment later the smooth interior was silent.

23

“I’ve had about as much of you as I can handle,” Connor announced. “And unfortunately for you, my father’s waiting for me to depart.”

Mia knew what was coming, but she didn’t move. Instead, she cringed with anticipation. She saw the sequence that followed in slow-moving images. A figure leapt out from the archway connected to Connor’s platform the moment his gun went off. Mia heard the trailing sound of the bullet whizzing by her.

The gunshot was followed by Connor’s yell as the figure slammed into him, sending him over the railing. Connor hit the edge of the next platform down and his leg bent back on itself at the knee. He was left lying motionless on his stomach in the center of the platform. It took two deep breaths for time to speed up in Mia’s mind. It took less time for her to recognize the face of her rescuer standing on the platform across from her.

“Jonah?” Mia’s legs quivered and nearly gave out on her. “Is that you?”

The boy took one last peek over the railing for good measure before looking up at her with a cunning smile.

“It…it’s not possible.”

Jonah appeared to be much more willing to accept that the siblings had extraordinarily managed to find one another. His response was less emotional than hers.

“I thought you were dead.”

A firm grip from Agnes pulled Mia’s emotions back in check for the moment.

“Stay there,” Mia ordered Jonah. “We’ll come and get you.”

Jonah snarled at the directive, but crossed his arms and did as he was told. It took Mia’s group several tries to figure out how to get to Jonah’s platform. They had to backtrack in and out of a number of supply bays before reaching the correct section of the massive central chamber. The insightful trek highlighted a lack of posted soldiers throughout the complex.

Jonah met Mia in the archway leading out to the platform and the two wrapped their arms around one another. Mia was overcome with a joy she never imagined she would feel again. Jonah buried his face into her shirt and wept loudly as she rubbed her fingers through his hair. She had to push him away to get him to back up. Mia looked down at his swollen, red eyes and it nearly crippled her.

“How did you get here?”

Jonah’s answer knocked the wind out of her.

“Rowan saved me.”

“Rowan?” She said the name like it was foreign to her. It was something she thought she’d never say aloud again. “He’s alive?”

“Yes,” Jonah exclaimed. “He and Garret are here too.”

It was difficult for Mia to process the information. A stream of whispered ramblings slipped from her lips as she tried to find a place for it in her head.

“Alive…here…I can’t.” She finally hit her mark and found the question she was searching for. “Where are they now?”

Jonah shook his head. “I don’t know for sure,” he said. “I escaped, but they were stuck in some place. There was a fight and a doctor,” he interrupted himself, “and this lady we found, they infected her.”

Mia decided that the where and the how might be beyond her brother’s grasp of the situation. She locked eyes with Agnes and quickly decided that her way forward hadn’t changed. Her best chance at escape lied with the remaining tribes locked away in the bowels of the chamber below them. She took Jonah by the hand and turned to face the others.

“Lead the way.”

The group grew in a short time, nearly doubling in size before Agnes made her way to the front. The expanding mass of people added details to the confusing story, helping to piece together where the soldiers were going. By the time Mia stepped out onto the ground floor of the cavern, she was pretty sure she knew what was happening topside. Inputs from Jonah filled in the gaps. None of it prepared her for her first glimpse of the internment area.

A cage rose up from the ground floor two stories high, stretching all the way to the other side of the cavern. Walkways crisscrossed the top of the enormous cage, dotted with strategic posting locations. The posts were abandoned, the soldiers nowhere to be found. Mia peered through the bars at the paltry fixtures that made up the interior village. Heads peeked out from small huts at the approaching group. Agnes brought them to the entrance gate and the flaw in their plan hit the older woman the moment the access panel came into view.

“How do we get in?” Mia asked.

Jonah interrupted before anyone could reply.

“I have this,” he held up Himu’s access card and offered it to Agnes. “It’s not mine,” he admitted.

Agnes took it and slipped it across the front of the panel. A green light highlighted the controls and the gate slid open.

“Aren’t you a blessing,” Agnes said before handing it back to him. “Let’s be quick.”

The group pushed through the opening in a routinely formed line, each one glancing up at the vacant position directly above the entrance. Mia got in line, watching the expanding assembly empty out of the huts to meet the new arrivals. A slow murmur of trepidation washed over the crowd as they realized something was very wrong.

A number of men and women worked their way through the crowd, gathering at the front. Agnes approached them and began a heated conversation in hushed tones. The crowd continued to swell until Mia couldn’t imagine the full number. Their faces were as varied as the specks of sand on a beach. She never would have believed so many tribes endured in a world that only consisted of Cheyenne a few days prior.

“We debate the few petty decisions the soldiers allow us to decide for ourselves,” Agnes said, stepping away from the smaller gathering. “This group is comprised of the remaining council members from each of the tribes, myself included.”

“Do they know what’s happening?” Mia asked.

“Word has spread about an attack on Canaan,” Agnes said. “An attack by a horde of dead and infected the likes this world has never seen.”

An older man from the council members bowed his cleanly shaven head as he approached.

“Your rush to freedom may be nothing more than an assured death for all of us,” he said.

“You’d rather stay here?” Mia asked.

“I’d rather live,” he countered.

The resistance surprised Mia.

“This cage could be our last defense,” Agnes said in a tone more apologetic than defiant.

Something in the old woman’s words struck Mia with profound importance. It took her a moment to place it, but in the end it was Connor’s voice that filled in the blanks. 
It’s part of our defense system
, he’d said.
In case we ever lose the compound.
Her resolve hardened.

“What if there was another way?” she asked. “A way to destroy the attacking horde?”

The old man started to rebut the idea, but Agnes cut him off.

“We’ll listen, but we do not control these people,” she said motioning out over the substantial collection of tribesmen. “It will be up to you to convince them to follow.”

Mia felt they were out of time. She realized most of them were terrified, as terrified as she’d been about leaving her tribe behind to run off with Rowan. The remnants of her tribe were locked away somewhere else underneath Canaan, if they were still alive at all. She had to make them see that they were all now a single tribe. Her gaze went to her brother as she gathered her thoughts. Jonah looked back at her with complete confidence in his eyes.

“You can do this,” he said then squeezed her hand. “I believe you can do anything.”

Mia couldn’t stop herself from grinning at him. She squeezed back then let his hand go. It took her a moment to find the courage to step up in front of the crowd. Mia looked out at the multitudes, each of them waiting for her to give them a reason to hope. She took one last breath before the swell in her heart sparked life into the words she needed to say.

“We’ve all lost so much.” The murmuring came to a sudden stop as her voice rose above them. “Our families, our tribes, and everything we’ve ever known. You’ve been fighting for your lives every day that you’ve been here and I’m asking you to continue that fight with me. If we stay here, locked away in this cage, death will find us for sure. It doesn’t matter if it comes from the infected, the walking dead, or the soldiers who threw us in here.”

She pointed at the open gate and her voice soared.

“You have a chance, we have a chance. We may die in this fight, but we’ll fight together for our freedom. We’ll fight together for a chance to feel the sun on our faces in the morning light. Fight with me. Fight with me as one people. Fight with me and we will free this united Canaan tribe once and for all.”

♦

Rowan braced for conflict. The elevator door slid open and he was greeted by a faint hum and a wide, dim hall void of movement. He pushed Himu out of the elevator then helped Garret stagger into the hall. The elevator door closed the moment they stepped out and Rowan guessed the next time it opened that it wouldn’t be empty.

“How much further?” he asked, grabbing a hold of Himu’s arm before he could get away from him.

Himu tugged against the grip, but stayed put. “The entrance to the containment area is at the end of this corridor,” he looked back, “but you’re far too late.”

Rowan made sure Garret was ready then shoved Himu, ignoring his barb.

“Get going.”

The corridor bent slightly ahead with a single door on the exterior side. They reached the peak of the bend before the entrance to the containment area came into view at the far end.

“Where’s this door lead?” Rowan asked as Himu tried to continue as if it wasn’t there.

“It’s just an administrative passage,” he said and attempted to keep walking, but Rowan pulled him back. “It leads up to the first of several warehouse and storage levels. It doesn’t matter,” he insisted, “the door can’t be opened without an access card and if you’ll remember, I don’t have one anymore. So, unless you’re going to convince one of the soldiers to give you theirs, you can’t open it.”

Rowan gave in and started forward. The entrance to the containment area covered the entire far end of the passage. They came to a stop in front of a control panel inlaid in the wall beside the entrance. Garret teetered as they stopped then collapsed where he was. Rowan forced Himu to his knees then turned his full attention to Garret.

“You got to get up,” he said. “We can’t get stuck out here.”

Garret looked up at him with eyes as black as night. The blood had drained from his face, producing a disturbing vision of the infection raging inside his body.

“I’m done for,” he said.

Rowan inspected the panel’s controls. Several small lights blinked to life. His education didn't allow him to decipher the writing above each of the controls.

“Get it open,” he said then pushed Himu to act. “Get it open, now.”

“What’s the point, you barbarian?” Himu asked as he got to his feet. “You’ve cornered yourself. The soldiers will follow you down and finish you off. What does it matter if it’s out here in the hall or inside there?”

Rowan slipped one hand under Garret’s arm and forced him to stand. He used the wall to assist him then held the knife out where Himu could see it.

“Then what do I need you for?”

Himu’s eyes widened as he looked down at the blade. He kept his mouth shut and typed on the panel. The process didn’t take long. Himu announced his completion by taking a few steps back and gazing at the door. The center split opened at a slow, but steady pace. A familiar sound crept from the opening in the door the moment it parted. The moans made the hair on Rowan’s neck stand on end. A familiar stench followed the sounds. The dead were close.

Rowan ordered Himu to help Garret walk then kept the two of them in front of him as they entered. The interior of the containment area was as large as the holding section he and the others were thrown into upon their arrival. The view from the entrance platform looked down on a floor space comprised of dozens of individual cells, each crammed full with flesh-hungry zombies.

The dead broke into a chorus of moaning desire at the sight of fresh meat. Hands slipped between the bars of every cell, reaching out toward the entrance. The dead pressed in on one another with such force that the bodies tore from the pressure against the bars. The full sight of it caused Rowan to pause as he tried to control the horror racing through his views.

An extensive row divided the containment area in half. Two figures moved between racks of towering equipment lining both sides of the central column. The wide-shouldered body easily identified one of the figures as Dr. Olric; however, the other was something altogether different. A long pole linked the two together. One side of the controlling device ended at a strap, firmly lashed around the throat of what appeared to be a young boy.   

Rowan started running before he knew what he was doing. The eyes of the dead followed him as he circled the chamber, lashing out at him as he past. His mind told him that the boy couldn’t be Jonah, but he wasn’t thinking clearly enough to shake the fear that he might lose him again. It wasn’t until he reached the midpoint of the containment area and started down the stairs into the central row that Dr. Olric caught sight of him.

Rowan leapt down the stairs and dashed between the equipment. He came to a sliding stop with Dr. Olric’s escort staring him dead in the face. The boy that once controlled the mind of this monstrosity was long gone. It looked at Rowan with pitch-black eyes, its lips parting slowly, revealing the mangled lines of skin and muscle connecting the jawbones underneath.