Zombies II: Inhuman

Inhuman

Something thumped in the darkness of the warehouse. Thorne awoke with a start his hand grabbing up the .38 that lay near his sleeping bag. Instinctively he closed his eyes once more and reached out with his mind scanning the building for the thoughts of others. A cold shudder ran through him and he grimaced with disgust as he felt the Holes. Thorne had labeled the Dead “holes” after the first time he’d scanned one of them. Their minds were just active enough for him to feel but barren of thought and terrible to touch as the emptiness in them seemed to go on forever. There were three of them close by and moving in his direction from where the warehouse’s main doors led out onto the docks.

Thorne breathed a sigh of relief. He could deal with three of them if it came to that but the warehouse was a huge place with more than one-way out. With luck, he’d be able to dodge them altogether. He got up and quietly gathered as much of his gear as he could with the hope of slipping away long before the dead stumbled onto him.

A burst of wind blew by him so powerful it nearly threw him from his feet. Thorne stood in the shadows wondering what had just happened. Wind didn’t blow indoors. He reached out again to discover the mind of someone else very much alive. It was full of rage at the holes yet there was an underlying sense of pleasure in its thoughts.

Somehow, the mind had just appeared near the holes. Wait… Now there were only two holes… No, all the holes had vanished. Thorne felt a gust of wind on his face and in front of him stood a young man dressed in street clothes holding a machete that dripped blood onto the wooden floor. The man smiled offering him a hand. “Hi, I’m Nate. Couldn’t help but notice you on my way in. I thought maybe you could use some help.”

Thorne looked Nate in the eye and spoke a single word, “Sleep.”

Nate collapsed tumbling over as if struck by an invisible blow to the head. Yanking some rope out of his backpack, Thorne knelt by Nate and hurriedly tied the man’s hands and feet. It was a dangerous chance to take. More of the dead would surely be coming if the ones Nate had slaughtered could find this place yet Thorne didn’t see any other option. If he simply left Nate behind, the young man could prove far more deadly to him the shambling flesh-eaters if what Thorne suspected about him were even partially true. This man had to be dealt with now. There was no way around it.

Nate woke up and Thorne could tell without even touching his mind that the young man was trying to move.

“Don’t bother,” he whispered, “I’ve shut down selected portions of your brain. You’re not going anywhere soon. Oh and you’re also tied up,” Thorne added almost as an afterthought.

“What the hell are you?” Nate asked.

“I was just about to ask you the same thing,” Thorne laughed. “Are you a speedster?”

“A what?”

Thorne sighed. “That’s what they used to call characters in comic books that had superhuman speed. Are you like that? Is that how you got in here, killed the three dead, and got back to me so fast?”

“If I say yes, are you going to let me go?”

Nate’s eyes went wide. “What the hell are you doing man? I can feel you inside my head!”

“Getting ready to let you go,” Thorne told him.

Suddenly Nate could move. He sped up his atoms and vibrated through the ropes which held his hands and feet, snatched the blade he’d dropped, and froze in place as he swung it at Thorne. The blade stopped inches from Thorne’s throat. Nate couldn’t make himself finish the swing. He took a step back and glared at Thorne.

“I wouldn’t try to run off just yet either,” Thorne smiled. “I’d hate to see what happens to someone when they trip if they move as fast as you do.”

“What do you want?” Nate demanded.

“Other than your word that you’re honestly not going to try to kill me again? Let’s start with how you found me. Just what exactly are you doing here?”

“I like to get out and have some fun okay?” Nate waved the machete through the air finding he could move freely as long as he wasn’t thinking of harming Thorne. “Look dude, I just want to go home alright? Let me go and I swear I won’t chop off your head or come after you.”

“You live around here?” Thorne asked shocked that anyone could actually still have a home in the city.

“It ain’t the Ritz but we get by.”

“We?”

“Yeah, we, man. What did you think you were the last one left and all that crap?” Nate mocked him. “There are four of us. We took over one of the local hospitals. We live on the tops floors, made it where the deaders can’t get up. It’s about as safe as anywhere can be these days.”

Thorne caught a glimpse of Nate’s thoughts. “The people you’re staying with, they’re like us?”

“You mean freaks? Sure man, how the hell else do you think we’ve survived?”

Thorne felt more holes or deaders as Nate had called them making their way into the warehouse. “How far is this hospital?”

“Couple a miles north of here, deeper in the city. I can take you there if you think you can make it.”

“How? The city is overrun with those things. There’s no way we can make it by them all.”

“Speak for yourself. I can get by them easy. As for you, I spotted a national guard APC abandoned just a bit down the road. I bet it still works.”

“Fine,” Thorne answered. “Let’s move. You take the lead but don’t even think about darting off without me, understood?”

Thorne and Nate crept out of the warehouse through one of its street entrances. They stood in the shadow of the building with the sun rising behind them as Thorne took in the scene. The dead milled about. He could see the APC setting in the middle of the road. There were at least three dozen of the dead between him and it and he knew there would be a lot more as soon as they saw Nate and himself.

“Hang tight.” Nate told him. With a whoosh noise and gust of wind, Nate was gone. Thorne heard the APC crank up. Its engine roared to life and its massive wheels rolled over one of the dead as it backed its way into a position to get turned toward the warehouse. Nate must have kicked it into gear because the vehicle roared its way straight at where Thorne stood waiting.

The dead were becoming excited. Dozens upon dozens more of them came out of the surrounding buildings and alleyways pouring into the street. Thorne took aim and downed one of the closer ones with a head shot from his revolver as the APC pulled up to him. Nate leaned out and waved him over. Thorne darted for the cover of the vehicle slamming its heavy metal door into the face of the creatures as he jumped inside. Nate opened up with the anti-personal machine gun on its turret cutting down the deaders around them.

“Stop playing around, damn it!” Thorne yelled at him.

“Ain’t no cause to get riled man,” Nate joked. “Just hit it already.”

Thorne slid into the driver’s seat and the APC plowed through and over the dead as it headed north. Thorne cut the engine as they pulled up to the hospital Nate claimed was his home. There were thousands of deaders in the streets. The APC rocked from the pounding of fists against its armored hide.

“Now what?” Thorne asked.

“Dude, a little faith please,” Nate remarked. “Climb out on top of this thing and I’ll get you in. Trust me.”

Thorne had no choice. He climbed up through the gun turret out onto the APC’s roof looking down into the sea of hungry faces around him. He knew the things were going to flip the APC at any moment. Wind blew over him and he felt Nate’s arms around him. The world became a blur as he was hurled upwards. Nate had darted out of the APC running down the street, dodging the dead as he built up speed then headed back like a streak of lightning taking Thorne in his arms.

He carried him up the side of the hospital and in through a window on the eighth floor. The next thing Thorne knew he was bouncing across the hospital’s tile floor as Nate dropped him and fell to his own knees panting. Nate appeared on the verge of passing out. Sweat dripped from his black hair and he glared at Thorne.

“You weigh a freakin’ ton dude,” he commented.

“One hundred and seventy pounds, actually,” Thorne replied as he started to get to his feet as a hand fell onto his shoulder. He looked up into the face of a stunningly beautiful young woman. She had short brown hair cut well above her shoulders and wore a green dress that was breathtaking. She smiled at him as electricity shot through his body and his world went black.

Thorne awoke in a hospital bed. His hands and feet were bound to the bed by leather restraints. The young woman sat next to him with her hand placed open palmed on his chest.

“Nate told us what you do. Even think about getting into my head and I’ll fry you to a crisp,” she warned him.

Nate stood off in a corner of the room. A tall blond man stood at the foot of the bed looking down at Thorne.

“Welcome to our home,” he said in a voice which was anything but friendly. “I am sorry about the restraints but even such as us can’t take chances these days. You’ve met Nate. The young lady beside you goes by the name of Arc. You may call me Victor.”

“I thought there were supposed to be four of you,” Thorne commented.

“There are,” Victor assured him as the image of a man appeared in the room. His body was transparent and shimmered as it floated above Victor. The ghost-thing waved hello and vanished into the air as quickly as it had manifested.

“Yes,” Victor nodded, “As cliché as it is, his name is Apparition. He is only with us sometimes. As I understand it, he was once like you, Thorne, but upon his death he evolved so to speak. It’s hard for us to communicate with him but I believe he claims his body is still out there on the streets somewhere, perhaps one of the creatures outside this very hospital. We do not know for sure nor does it matter. Obviously, the state he exists in keeps him from helping out much. But what of you Thorne? What you have become surely is rather pointless in a world filled with the dead.”

“I make do,” Thorne informed him coldly.

“Do your gifts work on the dead?” Victor asked. “Or are they truly mindless?”

Thorne remained silent. The girl called Arc glanced up at Victor. “Let me fry him. He’s too dangerous to keep around.”

Thorne stared at her. How could someone so beautiful be so cold? How could she think so little of life in a world where it was so rare?

Victor raised his hand. “You have two choices Mr. Thorne. You’re either one of us or you’re dead. Can you be of use to us? Do your powers work on the dead?”

Thorne frowned. “Kind of, I can sense the dead as well as I can sense the living. Knowing where and how many of them there are around me is what’s kept me alive.”

“Hmm... Like a radar sense for souls. Interesting,” Victor mumbled.

“And they are pretty much mindless. I can’t bend their wills and make them eat themselves or anything if that’s what you’re wondering. There simply isn’t enough left in them to work with that way. I have though on occasion with great effort been able to shut off the senses of one or two of them just enough for me to slip by unnoticed but it’s like trying to drive a car with your hands tied.”

“I see,” Victor announced. “You are better than the norms. You may stay with us if you like as long as you understand that if you touch our thoughts or scan us even passively without our direct consent I will personally rip you to shreds and feed you to the monsters in the streets below.”

“Fair enough,” Thorne agreed wondering how Victor was going to know if he used his powers but he was not stupid enough to ask.

“Unshackle him Nate,” Victor ordered. “Our new brother needs to see his home.”

Arc led Thorne through the hospital’s corridors. It was clear she disagreed with Victor’s choice to let him stay. Thorne could hear the veiled anger in her voice as she showed him around.

“As you can see we’ve made this place livable. We grow our own food both on the roof and in several interior gardens as well. Not that we need to. Nate can acquire almost anything that we need within a hundred mile radius or so. We’ve a well stocked armory that we have put together should we ever need it and a large cache of medical supplies from the hospital itself. The entire top three floors of this building are ours and completely cut off from the rest of the building. If you’re not Nate or a ghost like Apparition, the only way in or out is a long climb. Our living quarters are located here on the top floor. You, Nate, and I have rooms on this side of the building. The other side belongs to Victor.”

“We get rooms and he gets a wing. Seems fair,” Thorne joked.

“Victor needs the space,” Arc growled. She paused in front of a green door. “This one’s yours.”

Thorne glanced inside. The room looked more like a mad scientist’s lab than a place to sleep. There were computers, reams of paper, notebooks and tools everywhere. He spotted at least three devices that appeared to be microscopes of some sort. “Copy,” he muttered.

“Look,” Arc warned him. “You can clean out the junk. Samuel’s gone. The bastard defected. It’s not like you’re going to have trouble finding a bed in this place to drag in here.”

“Who’s Samuel?”

“I’d rather not talk about that okay? Ask Victor if you want to know.”

“What do you mean defected?”

“Switched sides, sold us out, betrayed us- take your pick. We’re at war Thorne and you’ve just joined the winning side. Be thankful for it.” Arc walked off without another word leaving Thorne standing alone outside his new room.

Thorne spent the next few hours getting used to the hospital and selecting a bed for his room. It was work getting the bed dragged into the room and a space cleared out for it. He found himself wondering how Samuel had slept in this room much less lived here. He managed to stack all of Samuel’s notes and things into a single corner vowing to take a look at what they were before he discarded them but now it had been a day and he needed sleep. It had been a while since he’d slept in a real bed and he was looking forward to it.

He stretched out and felt his eyes already beginning to close from exhaustion. Sleep came easily to him but it was far from peaceful. He dreamt of the dead waiting on the streets below. Yellowed teeth, slick with something red and warm, gnawed at him as ragged fingernails dug into his flesh.

A knock that sounded like machine gun fire tore him out of his nightmare. As he awoke he realized Apparition had been with him in his dream. The man had screamed three words over and over again as the dead ripped Thorne apart and the ghost watched on. “Victor…The end. Victor. .. The end.”

Thorne pulled himself out of bed as the knock became even faster.

“Hey man, you dead in there or what?” he heard Nate yell.

Thorne opened the door. Nate stood in the hall with a plate of food. “Figured you’d want breakfast amigo. Victor wants to talk with you pronto so I didn’t think you’d have time to hit the kitchen.”

Thorne eyed the plate, his mouth watering. “Are those real eggs?”

“You bet,” Nate answered. “Snagged them from a farm just outside of the city.”

Thorne took the plate sitting down at one of the room’s worktables.

He shoved a computer to the side and started shoveling the eggs in his mouth.

“Take it easy man. You’re not going to be starving anymore like you were out there.”

Thorne looked up at Nate to say thanks but Nate was long gone.

He took a bite out of a piece of toast and wondered what Victor really wanted from him. He longed to take a look into Victor’s mind but he’d promised he wouldn’t and his life depended on that promise if Victor really had a way to know when he used his gift.

Thorne found Victor waiting for him on the roof. The tall blond man stood like a king on top of the hospital looking out at the horizon.

He paid no attention to the thousands of dead who wandered about below. “I trust you slept well,” Victor stated not even bothering to glance at Thorne.

Thorne moved to stand beside him. “It was certainly a change from being down there.”

“Thorne, I am not going to lie to you. The room you are staying in belonged to my father, Samuel. He hurt us all badly.”

“Samuel,” Thorne answered. “Arc mentioned him yesterday. She said he betrayed you, switched sides.”

“It’s true. The world may be dead but we’re still at war, Thorne. I’m not talking about the dead. They are seldom a real threat to such as we. It’s the norms that are the danger and it’s them that my father left us for.”

“You mean people? There are still people left alive out there?”

“Yes. The last great holdout of mankind lies just beyond this city. When we first took shelter here my father approached them and sought an alliance with them. He thought that together we could start over, bring the world back from its knees rather than merely watch it slide slowly into death’s waiting arms as it is now. But can you guess how they reacted?”

Thorne shook his head.

“They came for us Thorne like a mob hunting down Frankenstein’s monster. They called us freaks. They feared us more than they did the dead. Some of them even blamed us for the dead tearing their way out of the ground. They sent a group of heavily armed killers in place of a diplomatic party to eliminate our threat to their existence once and for all. They broke into our home, wounded Nate and Arc before I could intervene and would’ve killed us in cold blood if they had been able. I fed them to the dead in pieces. It was clear to me then, Thorne, that if the world is to be reborn, it must be people like us who take charge.

“My father disagreed. Even then he couldn’t be made to understand the truth. We held a meeting and the other four of us of agreed that we would take the norms sanctuary by force. They would be made to see that we were not a threat. They would serve us and help us begin again. My father would have nothing of it. Outvoted though, he had little choice but to go along with our plans. When the day came, he turned on us. You see Thorne; my father is a tele-mechanic and a genius. He understands machines in way no one can. Even in this barren world I have seen him create technological marvels beyond anything mankind ever achieved in all its glory.”

“So how did he stop you? I mean there are three of you and Nate alone is like an army. It doesn’t sound like his gift was aggressive enough to handle you guys.”

“Oh, my father didn’t use any powers against us. As you say, his gift was not of that line of abilities. He had built ways to stop us, fail-safes if you will to keep us in line. He saw us as the great betrayers of mankind not himself. He took out Nate first with a net actually able to contain him. He used the hospital’s sprinkler system against Arc. It was brutal. She took days to recover. He even hurt me.”

“Hurt you? Are you invulnerable? Is that your gift?”

“I am many things,” Victor turned to face Thorne staring into him.

“He’s building them an ark.”

“An ark? I don’t get it.”

“He’s building an ark to leave this world behind for the stars. He must be stopped before they allow him to lead them into the void. Nothing awaits mankind up there but death as surely as if they stayed here without our hands to guide them and keep them safe. Will you help me save the human race Thorne?”

“How? I’m just one person Victor.”

“Samuel doesn’t know you exist. It’s unlikely he has devised a way to counter your power. You can kill him with a thought Thorne and afterwards your gift will make you the perfect watchman to help keep the norms in check until they see the truth of things. You would have a chance to create a paradise with me unlike any this world has ever known. Eventually I believe we’d even be able to reclaim this entire planet from the rotting grasp which holds it now.”

Victor watched Thorne thinking over his words.

“I’ll do it,” Thorne agreed but even as he spoke the words he reached out subtly trying to touch Victor’s mind. He had to know if Victor was sincere in his desire to start over and rebuild or he if was just a madman bent on gaining power for himself. He felt an unnatural wall around Victor’s mind and knew he had made a mistake.

Victor’s eyes glowed red with anger. He grabbed Thorne by the throat with a single hand lifting him into the air and dangled him above the horde of dead below. Thorne fought against Victor’s hold on him but the man’s grip was like steel and his flesh felt more like metal than skin. Thorne strained to reach into Victor’s mind. His eyes went wide as he realized why he couldn’t. “You… You’re not alive,”

Thorne gasped.

“I am sorry you feel that way,” Victor said calmly. “Things would have been far easier for us all if you did not.” Blood stained Victor’s fingers as they dug into Thorne’s neck. “My father felt the same after he finished me but I am more alive than any of you will ever be. This is my world now Thorne. Goodbye.” Victor whispered sadly and released Thorne.

Thorne screamed looking up at the thing that called itself a man as he fell to the streets below. The dead fought over his splattered remains in a frenzy as Victor wiped off his hands and began planning how to defeat Samuel on his own once more. The battle to come would be bloodier now but it was a small price to pay to make his visions real.