Land of Dust and Bones: The Secret Apocalypse Book 7 (9 page)

“It’s possible the EMP from the nuclear
warheads destroyed all the electrical circuits,” Kenji says. “And maybe it took
out all the nano-swarms in the area as well.”

“I guess you have to take the good news
with the bad,” Marko says.

I wonder if this is why the man in the gas
mask launched the nukes.

To
destroy the rogue nano-swarms.

To destroy the company’s communications
within Australia.

But then again who could possibly know what
that mad man was thinking when he set the countdown, when he launched three
nuclear warheads into the sky. I decide
it’s
best not
to think about it. I decide it’s best to just be thankful the nukes were
detonated at an extremely high altitude, and not at ground level.

We collect our weapons and Marko and Billy
lead us out of the oasis. The Evo Agent does not struggle. He does not fight.

Marko’s truck is close by. It’s an old
Toyota Landcruiser with a large covered work tray. Marko orders the Evo Agent
into the back of the tray. He then wraps his head with duct tape, blindfolding
him. Marko tells him to keep his head down.

Kenji, Sarah and I pile into the back
seats. Billy is in the front passenger seat and Marko jumps up into the driver
seat.

“Get comfortable,” he says to us, over his
shoulder. “It’s a long drive.”

“How long?” I ask.

“Hours. Half a day. But don’t worry. I’ll
fix the engine as soon as we get there. We’ll re-fuel and we’ll be back on the
road in no time. We’ll get you home.”

He turns the key in the ignition and the
engine comes to life.

“So what are you people really doing out
here?” Marko asks.

“We’re just looking for a place to live,”
Kenji answers. “Looking for a future. Somewhere safe. Somewhere far from the
infected and the virus.”

“Well, the desert is as good of a place as
any. Problem is, it’s a hard living out here.”

Marko steers the truck towards a relatively
smooth track and continues to pick up speed. Billy turns the music on, cranking
some AC/DC.

He turns the volume up. Way up.

The song is, ‘Highway to Hell’.

And we’re on our way to a place called ‘The
Boneyard’.

My rifle is resting between my legs, but I
hold on to it. I make sure I can get to it quickly if I need to.

The loud music makes it hard to rest and impossible to sleep, even though after
last night and this morning, all my body wants to do is crash.

The tape finally ends. But Billy simply
rewinds and presses play again.

This is the third time he has done this.

We have AC/DC on repeat.

“We’ve been driving for hours,” I whisper
to Kenji and Sarah.

“He said it was a long drive west,” Sarah
answers.

We are once again heading into the sun,
blinded by the light. We are moving away from the town, from our destination.
Moving further away from Jack and Maria and Kim.

God, I hope we left them enough water.

The only thing that makes me feel better
about this situation is that now we are mobile. And once Marko re-fuels we can
drive to the town and then drive to get the others. It means we can be back
together in less than a day, provided we drive non-stop. Which we will. Of
course we will.

I nudge Kenji with my elbow. “So, what’s
the plan here?”

Kenji takes a deep breath. I can tell he’s
been thinking this over. “We help these guys with whatever they need,” he says.
“And then we get moving as soon as possible. Who knows, maybe they’ve got a
spare vehicle back at the Boneyard.”

Sarah leans over. “They’re not going to
just give us a car.”

“They might,” Kenji says. “If we ask them
the right way. If we can make a fair trade.”

“Fair trade? Like what?”

“Food or water would be my guess. But they
also seemed to be pretty interested in weapons. Ammo.”

“We don’t have any food or water,” I say.
“We have nothing.”

“Sarah?” Kenji says. “What kind of food
stores do you guys have?”

“There’s a couple of massive shipping
containers that the military dropped in. Well, more than a couple. There must
be like, an entire football field covered in these containers. And each one is
jam-packed full of food and water. Survival stuff.”

Kenji raises his eyebrows. He seems to be
genuinely impressed. “Wow. The military really went all out with this town.”

“Yeah. But that’s nothing compared to the
walls.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, they not only keep the infected
out, they keep them away. The infected never even come close to the walls. It’s
so weird. They don’t try and climb over, they don’t try and bash or break their
way through. If you hide behind a fence, right? Or barricade yourself in a house,
or building or whatever, and the infected find you, they’ll launch a full on
assault on the building. They’ll break the doors, the windows, everything. They
won’t stop until they get inside. But yeah, the infected have never laid a hand
on these walls. It’s like they don’t even know there are people hiding behind
them.”

“Strange,” Kenji says. “I’ve never heard of
anything like that.”

“And the walls kept out the black smoke,”
Sarah continues. “And those other things. The monsters. I’ve seen so many monsters…”
She trails off. After a while she says, “But again, the monsters stay away.”

I wonder what could possibly accomplish
such a thing. “How the hell could a wall, like,
a wall
, keep away the infected? They’re dead. They’re brain dead.
They’re viral hosts. How is that possible?”

Sarah shakes her head.

“Kenji?” I ask. “Any ideas?”

He shrugs his shoulders. “Who knows what
the military, or the company is capable of?”

Marko turns the music down. “What are you
mob talking about back there? You’re not talking about us, are
ya
? Billy’s ears are burning.”

“Nothing,” I say. “We’re just wondering
what you guys want. Or what you guys need.”

“Huh?”

“We’re very appreciative of your help,”
Kenji adds. “And we’ll do everything in our power to repay you.”

“Mate, don’t worry about it. I mean sure,
we’d love a bit of extra food. Who wouldn’t? But the world has gone to hell.
The way I see it, people can either give up, rip each other apart, start eating
each other, turn on each other. Or we can come together. We can help each
other. Because if we don’t come together, no one is going to survive this.”

“Thank you,” Sarah says. “We have a lot of
food where we’re going. Obviously I’m not in charge of the food. I’m not in
charge of anything. But they’ll understand, they’ll be happy to help you guys.”

“By the way, where are you going?” Marko
asks. “You said you were going to a walled town? I’ve been all over this part
of the world. And I’ve never heard of any walled town. Sounds like something
out of the middle ages.”

“They built the walls in the early days of
the outbreak,” Sarah says.

“Who’s they?”

“The military. I think. Or maybe it was
someone else.”

“Right. So, the walls, they keep the people
and the town safe?”

“Yeah. They keep the monsters on the
outside, and people safe on the inside.”

“Sounds like a dream come true. What’s the
name of the town?”

“Well, I’m actually not allowed to tell
anyone.”

“Fair enough,” Marko says. “I understand
perfectly. You can never be too sure about people. Lot of weirdos out there.
Well, maybe not anymore. But there used to be. Before everyone died.”

He says this and has a chuckle to himself.

“And I’m guessing you had a good reason for
leaving?” he asks.

“Yeah,” Sarah answers. “At least, I thought
it was a good reason.”

The car falls silent.

And I think about how easily Sarah’s story
could’ve been our story. We were reckless, just like her. We did things, stupid
and dangerous things for the people we love.

And we survived.

We made it out of the Fortress alive. We
made it out together.

Sarah was not so lucky.

She had risked her life for someone that
she loved. But she never found him.

Never will

This could’ve been us.

Jack could so easily have died alone in the
desert.

Kim could’ve died alone in the Fortress.

Kenji could’ve been killed by the man in
the gas mask.

Maria and I, there’s no way we’d survive
out here on our own.

We continue driving west, into the sun. I
try and stay awake but it’s impossible. The car rocks me to sleep. I’m not sure
for how long. I’m not sure how much time passed. Not long. The sun is still
bright, the sky is still blue.

And then I hear Billy’s voice. “Look!”

“I see it,” Marko answers.

I wake immediately.

“What’s going on?” I mumble to Kenji.

He points ahead.

There’s a large cloud of dust about half a
mile in front of us. The cloud appears to be moving fast. My first thought is
that we’re being attacked by a nano-swarm.

“Get the EMP grenade,” I say. My voice
croaking. I think I fell asleep with my mouth open.

“It’s not a nano-swarm,” Sarah says.

“Then what is it?”

“It’s a herd of kangaroos,” Billy answers
excitedly from the front seat. “It’s dinner.”

Marko floors the accelerator, shifting
gears. He then turns off the road to head them off. The car bumps over the
rocky desert ground. I’m launched out of my seat and nearly hit my head on the
roof.

“You might want to buckle up,” Marko says.
“And hold on to something.”

I buckle my seat belt as quickly as I can.
Kenji and Sarah do the same.

“What the hell are you doing?” I ask

“We’re hunting,” Marko answers. “We
gotta
eat.”

“These herds move around from place to
place,” Billy explains. “They go where the water is, where the food is.”

“Maybe we should follow them,” I say.

“We don’t have the fuel to follow them,”
Marko says as he drives over a ditch.

The ground is getting more and more uneven.
The car is bouncing around quite violently. The Evo Agent in the back must be
getting thrown around.

Suddenly, Marko hits the brakes hard and
we’re all thrown forward. He unbuckles his belt quickly and Billy hands him his
rifle. He rests the barrel of the rifle on the hood of the car. He takes
careful aim.

There’s no messing around, there’s no
wasting time.

He fires one shot.

It is all he needs.

In the distance we see a kangaroo on the
edge of the herd drop to the ground, skidding and tumbling along.

Billy claps his hands. “You got him!”

Marko jumps back in the car, and hands his
rifle to Billy.

We speed off again, towards dinner. I’ve
never eaten kangaroo, but people have told me it’s tasty as long as you cook it
right. My stomach begins growling again at the thought of fresh cooked meat. In
a matter of minutes, Marko has driven over to the kangaroo and we’re all
standing around it.

To my surprise, it is still alive.

Billy retrieves a hammer from the glove
compartment of the Landcruiser. He turns to Marko. “Can I?”

Marko nods.

Billy smiles and says, “Thank you, thank
you,
thank
you. I won’t let you down.”

“Just get on with it, would
ya
?”

Billy wastes no time. He stands over the
dying, scared kangaroo. It is still trying to scramble away. But it can’t.

Billy raises the hammer. He aims for the
head, the skull. He aims for the brain.

He only needs one hit.

Marko and Billy strap the dead kangaroo to the hood of the car. We offer our
help but they don’t need it.

They have done this before.

In no time at all we’re back on the road,
heading west. An hour or so passes and once again, exhaustion gets the better
of me. I tell Kenji I’m probably going to fall asleep. I tell him this so at
least one of us is awake, so at least one of us has some idea of where we’re
actually going.

“Sleep,” he says. “We don’t know when we’ll
get the chance again.”

I am thankful for Kenji’s vigilance. But
I’m also a bit worried.

We
don’t know when we’ll get the chance again…

We have an important couple of days coming
up. First, we need to find the walled town. And then once we find the town, we
will need to convince whoever is in charge to not only give us a car, but also
enough fuel to get the others and get back.

And then we have to convince them to let us
stay.

The uncertainty of all of this is scary and
terrifying. My life and my friend’s life will be in the hands of other people.
I mean, right now, our lives are in someone else’s hands. This whole situation
is stressing me out. And this uncertainty, it’s the last thing I think about
before I fall asleep.

Unfortunately, sleep does not last long
enough.

It never does these days.

The car comes to an abrupt stop, waking me.
I don’t think I was fully asleep, but I wasn’t fully awake. I had been in this
weird in-between state, half aware of my surroundings, half-asleep. One foot in
the dream world. One foot in the real world.

“What is it?” I ask, rubbing my eyes,
shielding them from the setting sun. “What’s wrong?”

My first instinct is that something is
wrong, even though I have been asleep, even though I have no idea what’s going
on. This is my first instinct because something is always wrong. Nothing is
ever right.

Sarah leans forward, looking out the front
windshield. “Where are we?”

Marko turns the engine off. “Need oil. Car won’t
make it otherwise.”

“Plus, this place has got plenty of
supplies,” Billy adds. “Food. Medicine.”

“What kind of mine site is it?” Kenji asks.

“Wait,” I say. “This is a mine site?”

“Yeah,” Marko answers. “I think it’s a coal
mine. But I’m not entirely sure. Anyway, the reason they’ve got so much stuff
on hand is because this particular mine relied one hundred percent on FIFO
workers. These are guys that fly in from all over the country, they work for
three weeks straight, and then fly out. They go home for a week. Rinse, repeat.
So all the workers, right? They all had to sleep and live on site. And that
means plenty of supplies for us. We’ve found some really good stuff here
before.”

I remember Maria and I had come across a
guy who said he was a FIFO worker. We had found him in a barn in the middle of
nowhere. He was dying. He’d been attacked by a nano-swarm. He had just killed
his friend. A mercy killing. And for some reason, he felt the need to tell us
how he had lived his life. It was like this weird deathbed confession.

He completely opened up to us, Maria and
me, to complete strangers. He even told us that he had cheated on his
girlfriend. I guess he had a guilty conscience.

Anyway, after he had confessed his sins, he
died.

I wonder if he’d worked at this mine site.

“Where’s the actual mine pit?” I ask.

“Well, according to that sign,” Marko says.
“It’s about a mile away.”

“Have you checked it out?”

“We’ve had a quick look at it. But we
haven’t actually driven down into the pit or anything like that. Why do you
ask?”

“We found a mine site a while back,” I say.
“Smaller than this one, I think. But inside the mine pit, it was full of bones
and animal carcasses. And something else.”

Marko takes the key out of the ignition and
opens his door. “Don’t worry. There’s nothing like that here.”

He seems pretty confident that the mine is
actually deserted. And I guess it is. I mean, if it wasn’t, they would’ve been
attacked before. And they probably wouldn’t be so eager to get back here.

“So what do we need?” Kenji asks.

“Oil,” Marko says. “For the engine. Maybe
some fuel. If we can find any.”

“Oil?” I ask. “Have we damaged the engine?
Is it overheated?”

“Not yet,” Marko answers. “But if I keep
pushing the engine, it will over heat. And trust me, we do not want that. We’ve
still got a long way to go.”

“And we don’t want to be walking around out
here,” Billy says.

“If
we can find anything else,” Marko adds. “If there’s anything left,
consider it a bonus.”

Marko had driven the
car to the entrance of the mine’s grounds. We were in front of what used to be
a boom gate for both an entry point and an exit point. Both boom gates had been
snapped off.

Next to the boom gate
is a solitary signpost with three signs, pointing in three different
directions. The actual mine pit was to our left, and the village, the living
quarters, were to our right. From what I could see, the village appeared to be
made up of demountable, temporary buildings. The cheapest possible
accommodation. The bare necessity. There was an airfield straight ahead, which
I’m guessing was used for the actual flying in and out of the workers.

“We should probably
head towards the pit first,” Marko says. “This is where we’ll find the
maintenance sheds. They should have engine oil on hand. That’s our best chance.
If they don’t have any lying around, we’ll have to check the work trucks and
cars. Last time we were here, all or most of the vehicles were parked out the
front of the maintenance sheds.”

“Are we alone here?”
Kenji asks. “Are there any infected people around?”

“We’ve been here a few
times before, haven’t had any trouble. This place is so isolated, they must’ve
evacuated the workers early on. They probably wanted to get home to their
families when it all started going bad. It’s a shame really. Their best chance of
survival would’ve been to stay right here. I think this boundary fence was
electrified once, just like the Boneyard.”

“How many times have
you been here?” I ask.

“Only a few. We’ve
raided the food supplies over in the village a couple of times. We’ve taken
most of the water. But there might be some left. Hopefully the maintenance
sheds will have plenty of supplies. If not, we’ll have to think of something
else. We might have to drain the engine oil from one of the work trucks, or if
worse comes to worse, we’ll have to take one of them. Provided any of them
work.”

“Why would that be a
bad thing,” I ask.

Marko shrugs his
shoulders. “I like the Landcruiser. I’ve grown attached to it. It’s old, but
it’s reliable. And besides, after we saw that flash in the sky, everything has
been breaking down. Stuff just stopped working. Cars. Trucks. The electric
fence.”

Kenji nods. “Like I
said earlier, anything electrical, anything that uses an electrical circuit, if
it was outside, if it was exposed when those nukes were detonated, they will no
longer work. The EMP fries the circuitry.”

“What if any of the
cars were parked inside the maintenance shed?” Sarah asks. “Will they still
work?”

“Maybe,” Kenji says.
“If it formed enough of a protective barrier from the pulse.”

Billy turns around in
his seat. He looks excited and anxious. Nervous yet happy. “How many bullets do
you guys have?”

“Why do you need to
know how many bullets we have?” Sarah asks.

Billy looks at Marko.

“It’s just a
precaution,” Marko says. “Just in case we get ambushed. Just in case the
impossible or unthinkable happens. You guys have been around long enough. You
probably know better than anyone that if bad stuff can happen,
it will happen
. We want to know that you
guys can look after yourselves. And we want to know that you can cover us if
you need to.”

“We’re good,” Kenji
answers. “We can take care of ourselves. We’ve got a magazine each for the
rifles. Thirty bullets. Plus we each have a handgun.”

I try and keep a
straight face, but Kenji just lied. He just lied and I’m not sure why. Kenji
and I have two magazines each for our rifles. Sixty bullets.

Marko smiles. “That’s
good to know.”

Billy jumps out of the
car, waving us forward.

“Let’s go,” Marko
says. “We’re on foot from here. Need to give the engine time to cool down.”

If we couldn’t find any oil, if we couldn’t
make sure the engine wasn’t going to overheat, then there was a high chance it
would break down. If that happened, if we couldn’t find another working car,
we’d have to walk the rest of the way. I did not want to walk. We didn’t have
time.

We jump out of the Landcruiser. My legs are
weak and stiff. It takes me a few minutes to stretch them out. Billy runs
ahead, disappearing behind a row of what appear to be office buildings.

“Is he OK?” I ask Marko. “I mean, should he
be running off like that?”

“He’s fine,” Marko says. “He was a cattle
driver when he was younger. He learnt how to hunt and track when he was a
little fella. Trust me, if anything is a miss, he’ll know. He’s like a blood
hound.”

“Should we be worried?” Kenji asks.

“Nah. Like I told you, we’ve been here a
few times. It’s been uneventful so far. But you never know.”

We arrive at the first of the maintenance
sheds. According to Marko, this is where he’ll find the engine oil. Parked outside
were about five work trucks. They were all numbered. The trucks appeared to be
in good condition.

“Maybe we should drive back and get the
others,” I say.

“Yeah,” Kenji says, nodding in agreement.

“You’ve got more people out there?” Marko
asks.

“One of them is injured,” I say. “We had to
leave him behind. There’s no way he’d be able to walk all this way.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“But if any of these trucks are working,
we’ll need to double back, we’ll need to go and get them.”

Marko furrows his brow. “I don’t think that
will be possible.”

“Why not?”

“We’ve checked most of the cars here. It
looks like someone has come along and taken out all the spark plugs. And most
of them have no fuel because we’ve funneled all the fuel out of their tanks.
And like you said, if that flash in the sky was a nuclear warhead, and it
created an EMP, then none of them will be working, even if we somehow found the
sparkplugs, and then filled them up with fuel.”

Both Kenji and I knew it was a long shot,
but we wanted to try anyway.

Marko told us to find out for ourselves.
All the trucks still had their keys in the ignition.

I knew it was probably too good to be true,
but we had to see for ourselves. So Kenji moves up to the first truck and turns
the key in the ignition. As predicted, nothing happened.

“Told you,” Marko says. “You might as well
try the other ones while I get the oil.”

Marko moves inside the maintenance shed,
disappearing from view, while Kenji and I make our way along the row of work
trucks.

I tell Sarah to keep watch.

Sarah says we’re wasting our time.
“Scavengers would’ve taken these cars if any of them were working.”

It doesn’t take us long to realize she’s
right. None of the trucks worked. All the engines were dead.

Marko quickly finds what he’s looking for.
He has a couple of five gallon containers of engine oil.

He hands one to Kenji.

“Let’s go,” Marko says. “I’ll put this oil
in the Landcruiser and then we’ll check the village. We’ll be on our way in no
time at all.”

Billy appears from the rear of the shed. He
is smiling. He is excited. “All clear over at the village.”

Kenji takes one of the containers of oil
and we follow Marko back towards the truck, back towards the village.

Billy runs off ahead.

But then Kenji grabs me. “Just be careful,”
he whispers. “Keep your eyes open.”

“Why? What’s wrong?”

“Billy’s rifle was hot.”

“Hot?”

“It’s armed. He’s got the safety off.
Something is wrong.”

“Maybe he’s just being cautious,” Sarah
offers.

“No. I think he’s expecting trouble. Be
ready.”

“For what?”

“For anything.”