Outbreak (Book 3): Endplay Page 20

  Whatever humanity the creatures once had was gone.

  What had emerged from the cocoons was not human.

  The game had changed.

  Everyone on the bus looked out the back window as they drove away. The light was beginning to fade, but the scene behind them was bright enough.

  Bright enough that they saw thousands of the alien-things as they stood in the middle of the road. The creatures had all hatched. There were no more shaking cocoons.

  And for most of the survivors on the bus, there was no more hope.

  4

  Alien Mothership

  Earth’s Atmosphere

  The large craft entered Earth’s atmosphere. There was no longer any need to remain hidden. The nations of Earth no longer had the resources, manpower, or means by which to attack the invaders.

  The taking of Earth had gone exactly as planned. Yes, there were a few hiccups here and there, but that was to be expected when taking a planet with semi-intelligent creatures on it.

  All the years of the aliens waiting and watching had paid off. Through decades of watching the inhabitants of Earth, the aliens knew that human beings could be easily defeated. They may have weapons and may be killers, but humanity lacked one important characteristic that the aliens knew would be their downfall.

  Unity.

  All the various nations of Earth always seemed to be at war over what seemed to the aliens to be unimportant. If the aliens had the time, they knew that if they waited long enough, the humans would eventually wipe each other off the face of the Earth.

  But the aliens weren’t that patient.

  The invaders had been exploring the universe for hundreds of years and their numbers were dwindling. They may have mastered space travel, but they hadn’t conquered immortality. Many generations of aliens had lived and died on the huge mother crafts, one of which was inside Earth’s atmosphere.

  The alien species had taken a hard hit when an unforeseeable disease had torn through three of the five motherships. The disease had come from a planet many light years away from Earth, in a remote part of the universe. The planet had seemed perfect. It had a favorable atmosphere, large bodies of water, and hundreds of thousands of various types of flora scattered all over the planet.

  One particular plant was the breeding place of an unknown parasite that’d infected the aliens. The parasite had devastated both the alien’s immune and reproductive systems. When the aliens had finally identified the cause of the infection, it’d been too late. Generations of aliens had been sterilized and had died at very young ages. The parasite affected the aliens’ DNA and had altered it in such a way that the invaders would never fully recover.

  It’d only been the advanced technology of the aliens that had saved them from extinction. They’d used their nanotechnology to stop further deterioration of their bodies, but not even their science could reverse the damage of the parasites.

  This near extinction-level threat had made it apparent that it was too dangerous to keep exploring the universe in one armada. When they’d left the planet, each of the five motherships had gone in a different direction, thereby preventing another future disaster.

  Each ship’s mission, though, had forever changed. Finding a planet with intelligent life on it had been essential, and the aliens knew how rare that was in the universe. So when Earth had been found, the ship had sent a message to the other motherships to let them know they’d found a planet that had everything they needed.

  They’d observed and catalogued all the various life forms on the planet and had studied the human beings in particular. Within six of Earth’s months, they’d known the planet and its inhabitants were vulnerable. The aliens could have developed a virus to wipe all the life off the planet, but they’d needed that life. Instead, they developed a virus unlike one they ever engineered before. This cutting-edge virus was the pinnacle of the alien’s biological and technological achievements.

  They engineered a virus that would first attack the lower life forms on Earth. The creatures called “animals” would begin the infection and spread it to the human. The first generation of infected human beings would be focused on infecting as many other human beings as possible.

  Once the majority of the Earth was infected, the second generation would then emerge. Besides being physically superior to the first generation, the mutated creatures would have a greater connection to The Consciousness. They would be easier to control and would still have some access to their human brain functions. They learned and they matured and would be identifiable by their yellow eyes.

  Inside the second generation, though, the nanites kept working. The nanites altered the infected human beings on a genetic level and infused the remaining human DNA with the DNA of their species. Now the yellow-eyed infected human beings were prepared for the final transformation.

  The aliens watched from afar as their creations secreted the fluid that would trigger the final transformation. Inside the cocoons, the human beings were reshaped, reformed, and reborn. The nanites eliminated the final traces of human DNA. Everything from the skin and internal organs to the fluid in their veins and thoughts in their heads was now alien. Their humanity was wiped out.

  The aliens knew that human beings would believe coming back from the dead was a side effect of the virus. But the aliens knew better.

  The zombies weren’t a side effect of the virus, the virus was engineered to create more aliens. These weren’t human-alien hybrids. The engineered virus eradicated humanity and spawned a new generation of the alien race.

  The aliens ultimate goal was never to terra-form the Earth. Their goal was to bio-form Earth’s inhabitants.

  The mothership that hovered in Earth’s atmosphere watched as their new brood emerged from the cocoons. These new creatures were hungry and would hunt down and kill the remaining first generation of infected humans, as well as the remaining uninfected inhabitants.

  The Earth would soon be theirs. The four other motherships had about another day of travel, according to Earth’s time scale. Once the five motherships were together, the final stages of The Convergence would begin, but The Consciousness warned of a possible problem.

  The creature formerly known as Fi had warned that the human survivors had stolen the four vials and were back in their bunker.

  Just another obstacle that must be dealt with.

  When the scout ship had crashed into the ocean all those years ago, it not only had the engineered bio-nano virus on board, but also carried something more valuable.

  As a result of that seemingly innocuous parasite, the aliens’ immune systems were compromised to the point that even the common cold that was so prevalent on Earth could kill them within days. The scientists onboard the scout ship were the best of the best, and in addition to the engineered virus to eliminate the human race, they’d also created a serum that would inoculate the aliens to every pathogen found on Earth.

  The aliens needed those vials back, and they intended to get them before the other motherships arrived.

  At any cost.

  Chapter Nine

  1

  I-71

  Five Miles Outside Spicewood Springs

  The man saw a billboard advertising Schoepke Springs not long after he walked past a sign that welcomed him to Spicewood, Texas. On the billboard were happy families camping and swimming in natural springs. The man paused for a second as he stared at the billboard. The warmth in his stomach grew warmer.

  This place, he thought. This Schoepke Springs is where I need to be.

  His journey had been a long one, but something told him that he was near its end. He smiled as he walked toward Spicewood. It wouldn’t be long before he reached the town’s center, and then he would continue to Schoepke Springs.

  It felt good to smile, especially after what had happened the other day. As he’d walked along I-71 out of the city of Austin, the cocoons he enjoyed watching wither and die had begun to shake. He’d known that whatever life was housed
inside was ready to break free.

  All around him arms and legs punched through the membranes of the pods, and he stood still at one point to watch one completely free itself. The man had never seen anything like it. There was no describing it other than saying it was wholly “alien.” Nothing about it resembled anything human, especially its eyes and mouth.

  One look into its eyes and at its death-filled mouth and the man knew the thing that stood in front of him was a killing machine. This new creature stared at the man and almost looked confused as to why he wasn’t running away. The creature took a step toward the man and then stopped. It sniffed the air and immediately turned and ran away.

  As the man continued his journey, he took pleasure in watching these new creatures run away in what looked like fear.

  The man still didn’t know who or what he was, but he knew he was powerful. Powerful enough to repel the alien-things around him, anyway.

  The man smiled again as he continued to his destination.

  2

  Sub-Facility, Schoepke Springs

  Spicewood, Texas

  “Why the hell would you take those vials?” Rickard screamed.

  “I thought the whole reason we were up there was to find something to help us fight those bastards,” Stefan said as he defended his actions.

  “Don’t scream at him!” Wilder barked at Rickard. Then to Stefan he said, “Nice job. I didn’t even see you grab them.”

  “What do you think they are?” Jennie asked. “They kind of remind me of laboratory samples.”

  “For all we know, those could be pure samples of the bio-nano virus,” Rickard said, “and you just brought them down here.”

  “Can we study them?” Wilder asked. “Do we have the equipment to safely study what’s in these vials?”

  “Not really,” Howard answered. “Whatever is in those vials would require a lab fitted to handle biosafety level four-type contaminates. We don’t have anything even remotely close to that down here.”

  “Hell, we didn’t have anything close to that up there,” Jennie added, jabbing her thumb toward the level above.

  “Okay,” Wilder said as he considered his next move. “Let’s take a step backwards, then.” Turning to Rickard, he said, “I think it is time you fill us all in on what you know. No more bullshit and secrets. You hear me?”

  “What, Wilder,” Rickard said smugly, “no threats?”

  “No threats this time,” Wilder said. “I know threats won’t make you open up. But don’t you think it is time to tell us the truth? You’re not scared at all, and that tells me you know the big picture. Fill us in. We all deserve to know and see the big picture as well.”

  Rickard shrugged. He went on to tell them about the alien craft that’d zipped across the planet back in the mid-1950s. He told them about its crash and recovery in 1979 and how they’d found samples of the bio-nano technology onboard the craft they recovered.

  “Hold up,” Wilder interrupted. “Go back a second. So you find something onboard the craft that I’m assuming was in the same kind of vials that Stefan swiped, and you just opened them?”

  “Of course not,” Rickard said, annoyed. “Just like what Howard said before, we opened the vials in a military biosafety level four containment lab. The sample inside was completely innocuous, but the eggheads found the nanotechnology in it. It was light years from anything we were doing at the time.”

  Rickard looked around at the others and continued. “We kept the sample in that military lab and sent the rest of the craft to our friend Josef.”

  “Yes,” Josef said in agreement. “My grandfather Heinrich agreed to house the object and study it… not that there was anything to study.”

  “How do you mean?” Cheryl asked.

  “For years--hell, decades--we couldn’t so much as scratch the surface of that damn thing,” Josef said. “The only thing we could do was perform various temperature and pressure experiments on it. We knew it was used for deep space travel, but we couldn’t even find something that resembled a propulsion system.”

  “But that latch was already opened when we got to the craft,” Wilder said. “There’s no way you missed that for over a decade.”

  “Of course not,” Howard said defensively. “We think that latch popped open after you set off the EMP blast up there.”

  “Wait,” Steele said. “I thought an EMP blast was supposed to fry anything electrical?”

  “It most certainly does,” said Josef, “but we aren’t really dealing with a ‘74 Chevy Nova now, are we?”

  “So the EMP blast woke that thing up?” Wilder asked.

  “We believe it did,” said Josef.

  “Back up a second,” Wilder said as he gathered his thoughts. “I’m no astronaut or expert on interplanetary travel, but that object up there doesn’t seem big enough for deep space exploration.”

  Wilder caught Josef shoot a glance over at Rickard.

  “That’s because the object you entered is only a piece of a larger craft,” Rickard said.

  “Larger craft?” Wilder repeated. “Just how big is it?”

  “It is… big,” Josef said.

  “When we salvaged the crashed alien ship, part of it broke off and sank back into the ocean. It went into a deep chasm that we just didn’t have the technology or means to recover it from at the time. We marked the location and planned on recovering it in the future.”

  “I feel a big ‘but’ coming,” Steele said.

  “But,” Rickard continued as he shot a nasty look at Steele, “the submerged craft kind of salvaged itself.”

  “What the hell does that mean?” Wilder asked.

  “Five years and change after it sank back in the ocean,” Rickard explained, “the damn thing just floated up to the surface.”

  Everyone stood and silently stared at Rickard.

  “Yeah,” he continued, “that was pretty much our reaction. So we swooped it up and secured it.”

  “Where is the rest of the craft now?” Cheryl asked.

  Wilder again caught Josef and Rickard exchange nervous glances.

  “It is, um… it is here,” Josef finally said.

  “Here?” Howard blurted out. “You’ve had the main craft here this whole time and you never told us?”

  “What was the point?” Rickard asked. “Both objects seemed dead.”

  “Until the EMP blast, right?” Wilder added.

  “Did the other craft also come alive after the blast?” Wilder asked.

  “We don’t know,” Josef said. “We don’t have it hooked up to any sensors.”

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” Jennie shouted in a burst of uncharacteristic anger. “That thing could be alive and buzzing with life for all we know. Where the hell is it?”

  “There’s another large warehouse connected off the garage,” Josef said.

  “How the hell do you know there aren’t any living creatures in it?” asked Steele. “That warehouse could be filled with those bastards from upstairs.”

  “It is safe,” Rickard said too confidently. “There’s no life in that craft.”

  “How the hell can you be so sure?” asked Stefan.

  “Because we already met the aliens that were inside it,” Rickard finally said.

  3

  The Warehouse

  Sub-Facility, Schoepke Springs

  The large craft hummed and sent and received information to and from the mothership that had entered Earth’s atmosphere. The craft acted as a beacon to the mothership while the mothership updated the crashed scout ship on where they were in the invasion.

  The mothership updated the scout craft about the vials that were taken by the humans. The scout craft did an immediate diagnostic of the five life pods in the smaller object. The pods had been untouched and the occupants inside them still slept.

  The plan had been altered to make the retrieval of the vials the priority.

  The large band around the scout ship hummed to life and began to vibrate. T
he vibrations penetrated through the miles of rock and limestone that surrounded the warehouse and helped the mothership pinpoint exactly where the scout ship was.

  The aliens in the mothership honed in on the coordinates and set a course to Schoepke Springs.

  4

  Two Miles Outside Marble Falls, Texas

  Everyone on the bus remained quiet after the attack in Round Rock. Riker knew everyone hurt from losing Stewart and Emily. Riker had made Hector and Teagan promise they wouldn’t tell any of the others about what had happened to Emily. How do you tell people that there was a worse monster onboard the bus than anything they’d encountered outside of it?

  “What the hell are we going to do?” Teagan whispered to Riker.

  “I don’t know yet,” Riker said. “I don’t know how we can flush out whoever the murderer is without giving away what we’re doing.”

  Teagan looked at the others on the bus. She was pretty sure Murphy wasn’t the killer. He had been behind the wheel of the bus between the time Emily had run off and when they’d found her body. She also knew it wasn’t Riker or Hector. Both had been with her during their search for Emily. Whoever did those things to Emily had to have time.

  Teagan’s eyes fell on Noonan.

  Just look at him sitting there, she thought. It has to be Noonan. How the hell could he just sit there like nothing happened? He’s more monstrous than anything outside this bus.

  But as she scanned all the faces in the bus, she thought about how every person was a survivor, and how each of them had done horrible things to stay alive. They were all murderers, and Teagan knew she’d done things she never thought herself capable of.

  Teagan vaguely remembered a quote by a philosopher who’d said that if one wasn’t careful when fighting monsters, there was a danger in becoming a monster. They’d all fought monsters. How long before they would become what they hated most?