Season of Rot (29 page)

He dressed and began to search through his
dwindling rations for something he’d be able to stomach for
breakfast.

Suddenly a voice filled the room, startling
him so bad he dropped the granola bar he’d just dug out of the
pile.

“Hello,” the voice said. “My name is Michael
Stevenson. We mean you no harm. Please use the base’s intercom to
respond if you can hear me.”

Kyle raced to the lab’s door and snatched up
one of the two M-16 rifles propped against the wall.

They’d found him. Though he had hoped he
wouldn’t be discovered, some small rational part of his brain knew
this would happen.

“Hello. Please respond if you can hear me,”
the voice continued. “My name is Michael Stevenson. I am a former
director of this facility. Please, we mean you no harm.”

Kyle stood by the lab’s door, knuckles white
from his tightening grip on the rifle. His eyes darted to the
intercom panel on the far wall.

Had they been able to access the base’s
security measures despite his efforts, or were they merely guessing
that someone else was here with them? Were they military or
civilian? From the glimpses he’d caught of them on the exterior
cameras, he was inclined to guess the latter, but if so, why would
they have a former director with them? Was the voice lying about
who he was? If not, then Kyle knew he was screwed. If the man was
who he claimed to be, then surely they’d repaired the scanners and
would know exactly where he was at all times, even if he made a run
for it. Worse, they would know he was alone. Likely there were
armed men already waiting on the other side of the door.

Guessing he had no other option, Kyle set
aside his rifle and walked towards the intercom panel.

#

“Still nothing?” Darren asked.

Mike scowled at him. “You’re sitting right
here. Have you heard anyone?”

“Maybe the intercom in that lab just isn’t
working,” Benji said.

“I very much doubt it.” Mike pressed the
intercom button again and started to repeat his message. “Hello,”
was the only word he got out before another voice came over the
comm.

“I heard you the first few times. What do you
want?”

Mike blinked, taken aback by the eerie, calm
sound of the voice. “Well, for starters we’d like you to come out
and talk with us face to face.”

“I’m sure you would,” the voice answered.
“The question is, if I open the door to this lab, are we going to
talk, or are your men going to put a bullet in my head?”

“We mean you no harm.” Mike tried to sound
reassuring.

“You’ll have to forgive me if I don’t take
your word on that.”

“What’s your name?” Mike asked.

“Kyle.”

“Okay, Kyle. If you don’t come out, we will
eventually find a way to open the door or cut through it. Things
could go badly for both of us if it comes to that. If you’re afraid
we’re military or raiders, we’re not. We’re just people who need a
place to stay. We’re simply trying to stay alive like you are.”

“Answer me one thing, Michael Stevenson: have
the rats won?”

Mike looked at Benji and Darren, then turned
back to the intercom. “Yes, the rats won. We haven’t seen any other
survivors or heard any comm. traffic in a long time. I believe the
human race is nearly extinct.”

Kyle’s laughter echoed through the intercom’s
speakers. “That’s not what I meant. I meant did they win the
war?”

Mike glanced at Darren for help, but Darren
shrugged.

“Didn’t you hear me?” Mike asked Kyle. “The
human race is almost wiped out. I’d call that a victory.”

“Okay,” Kyle said suddenly, struggling to
control his amusement. “You’ve convinced me. Tell your people to
stand down. I’m coming out.”

In the corridor outside of the lab, Warren,
Brent, and Michelle watched as the heavy metal door parted from the
wall and slid open. Behind it stood a man who appeared to be in his
early thirties. He was thin, and unwashed brown hair topped his
head. His features, accentuated by glasses, were narrow and
bird–like, yet attractive in a geekish sort of way. He carried
himself with an air of confidence that usually came from military
training, but his clothes were civilian and dirty, as if they
hadn’t been changed in a while.

The man held out his empty hands in front of
him. “I come in peace,” he said, grinning. “Take me to your
leader.”

Brent and Michelle couldn’t help but laugh at
the absurdity of his statement.

Warren, however, didn’t laugh. “Turn around
and put your hands on the wall.”

“Or what? You’ll shoot me? My name is Kyle,
by the way. Nice to meet you too, though I didn’t catch your
name.”

“It’s Warren. Now I suggest you do as I say
before you start to piss me off more than you already have.”

“It figures people like you would survive,”
Kyle said, appraising Warren. “You’re a hardcore soldier and
trained killer, aren’t you, sport? I know your type.”

Warren gritted his teeth. “I’m not going to
ask you again.”

“No, I imagine not.” Kyle turned and placed
his hands on the walls, legs spread.

Warren moved in and patted him down for
concealed weapons. When he saw that Kyle was clean, he stepped
back.

Kyle turned around, looking over Michelle’s
body and drinking it in. He bowed to her. “My dear lady, perhaps
after the guns are put away I might learn your name.”

Michelle noticed she was still pointing her
gun at him and lowered it. “Michelle,” she said apologetically.

Kyle shot a parody of a salute at Warren and
said, “If you would be so kind as to lead the way, I believe your
boss is waiting on me.”

Warren led Kyle through the complex, leaving
Brent and Michelle behind in an attempt to draw attention away from
what was going on. So far only a few people knew about Kyle’s
presence and Warren wanted to keep it that way until they knew for
sure how things would play out. Luckily most people in the group
kept to themselves or at least to certain cliques. Originally the
convoy group had been so large and so hectically nomadic it was
nearly impossible to get to know everyone. People were beginning to
loosen up now inside the safety of the base, but still the odds
were in Warren’s favor.

He and Kyle only passed a handful of people
on their way to the control room, and no one seemed to notice
anything out of place. Warren had left his rifle with Michelle, and
his sidearm was nothing out of the ordinary; the group was used to
him storming around the base with a gun.

Mike, Darren, and Benji were waiting on them
as they entered. Mike stood up from his seat at one of the security
consoles and extended his hand to Kyle. “I’m Doctor Michael
Stevenson, but please call me Mike.”

Kyle took his hand and shook it. “Nice to
meet you, Mike. And who might these gentlemen be?”

Mike introduced Benji as his aide and Darren
as the group’s computer specialist, though the title was a bit of
an exaggeration. “And you’ve already met Warren,” Mike concluded.
“He’s our head of security.”

Kyle chuckled. “I gathered as much.”

Mike offered Kyle a seat and sat down near
him. “We’ve got a lot of questions for you, Kyle. How about we
start with why you’re here? As far as I know, this base was
officially decommissioned when the plague hit, and the operating
personnel relocated or were sent out into the field. A single
person being left here just doesn’t make sense. A skeleton crew or
the sort I could believe, but not one person. Were you stationed
here, or did you come here after things went to hell like we
did?”

“Or we could start by asking who the hell you
are?” Warren butted in. “Your accent doesn’t sound like someone
who’s spent a long time in the U.S.”

“Kyle Weathersby,” Kyle said to Warren. He
sighed and turned back to Mike. “I imagine you want the long
answer. Okay. I am, or rather
was
, a representative, shall
we say, of the British government, dispatched by the United Nations
in attempt to discover the fate of the United States. The U.S. was
one of the first countries to ‘go silent’ as all hell broke loose
around the globe. I set foot upon American soil for the first time
twenty-four hours after my government lost contact. I, along with
my similarly well-armed associates, quickly found ourselves on the
run, fighting for survival, with no way home. Most of the members
of my team died in New York. Those of us who made it out lost
contact with home.

“We set out for your capital and reached it
to join forces with the remains of your leadership, at least those
who weren’t already dead or whisked away to a shelter somewhere.
One of those survivors was a person of some importance in your
C.I.A. He knew of this facility, and a small group of us decided to
head for here since home was unreachable and your nation had
crumpled. I was the only one to make it here still breathing. I’ve
been here ever since, staying alive and using the comm. channels to
listen to the fate of the world above.

“I honestly thought I would die down here
alone before your group showed up. I had gotten so used to the
idea, I hid rather than chance dying at your hands. I couldn’t
bring myself to make a stand against you, knowing how rare human
life is becoming in the world.” Kyle stopped. “Is that enough of an
answer for you or do I need to elaborate?”

“So you’re military?” Warren asked.

Kyle shook his head. “No, I was a field
operative. There’s a difference. I was an agent, not a
soldier.”

Warren glowered at him.

“Does it really matter?” Mike asked them,
taking control of the situation again. “Kyle, you said you had been
listening to what was going on out there. Is the rest of the world
as bad off as we are here?”

“Do you even know what’s happening?” Kyle
asked.

“Are there people still broadcasting?” Darren
interrupted.

“No.” Kyle’s voice became flat and cold. “I
hadn’t heard anything for a few days before you arrived.”

“So the rats rule everything now?” Mike
asked, praying he was wrong about the answer he expected to
get.

“No. They’re at war with the other factions
of Hell.”

The room fell silent. Kyle felt their eyes
burning into him, and finally he continued. “The wolves are still
trying to complete their hold of Canada. The squids rule the seas
and most of the islands. The bats are facing pockets of human
resistance in Russia. The snakes have pacified Asia and are already
making strikes against the bats, which hasn’t gone well for them if
the human accounts are to be believed. I haven’t heard anything
about Australia, and South America has been silent since days after
the U.S. fell apart. As to my home, it was holding out against the
dead, but the last word I got were my orders to come here.

“The only constant in all of it is the dead.
Each group of demons, or whatever one chooses to call them, seems
to use the dead as their primary foot soldiers in their secondary
war against us. So with the demons at war and humanity nearly gone,
I would be forced to say that if anyone ‘rules the world,’ as you
put it, it would be the dead.”

Mike leaned close to Kyle. “Stop it. I am
sorry for whatever happened to you, but there are no such things as
demons. Hell doesn’t exist. Everything that’s happening out there
is the combined result of a virus and an aberrant evolutionary
spike in the rodent species.”

Kyle held his ground. “Believe what you wish.
I don’t care. I’m just telling you what I’ve seen and heard. Hell
has been loosed upon the earth, and because of where we are, we are
going to die. Maybe not today, maybe not even for a year or two in
this base, but we are going to die. Unlike most of the other
factions, the rats just want us gone and they’ll stop at nothing
until their borders are clear of our infestation.”

“Mike, we’ve all seen those creatures with
the rats,” Darren argued. “Warren and some of his crew even
nicknamed them demons. He may be telling the truth.”

“Or he may be completely crazy! We have no
way to verify who he is or any of his claims.”

Kyle reached into his pocket and slapped down
his U.N. identification card in front of Mike. “And I recorded some
of the transmissions I spoke of. If you haven’t fired them while
jury-rigging the base’s systems, I suggest you listen to them
yourselves.”

Warren watched Mike closely. He could see
that the man refused to accept anything Kyle had told them, but as
much as his own instincts told him not to trust the U.N. agent,
Warren had to admit his story had the ring of truth about it. “What
do we do, Mike?”

“Lock him up until we figure out what’s
really going on.”

“Mike,” Benji interjected, “we can’t do that.
He has rights.”

“I’m not suggesting we kill him! I just think
we should keep an eye on him until we know he’s not crazy. For his
sake and our own.”

Kyle said nothing, resigning himself to the
group’s judgment.

“I agree with Benji,” Darren spoke up. “This
guy knows this place better than we do. Frankly, we could use his
help, and he hasn’t done anything.”

Mike turned to Warren. “I want you to find
somewhere to lock this man up and make sure he stays there.”

“Sorry, Mike, they’re right. We need him. If
there’s a chance he can get this base fully online and the main
doors locked down, he’s a hell of a lot more use to us here than
tucked away somewhere. Everyone else deserves to know he’s here as
well, and what he knows too. We’re all in this together.”

“Did any of you listen to the crap he claimed
was happening? Demons, Hell on Earth—I mean, my God, come on.” He
slammed his fist into the console beside him. “He needs to be
locked up.”

“Benji,” Warren said, “get the group together
for another meeting. I want all of us there, understand?”

Benji nodded, though it pained him to go
against Mike.