Mass Extinction Event (Book 10): Days 203 to 210

  Copyright 2020 Amy Cross

  All Rights Reserved

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, events, entities and places are either products of the author's imagination or are used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual people, businesses, entities or events is entirely coincidental. No zombies or rabbits were harmed in the writing of this book.

  Kindle edition

  First published: January 2020

  As New York is destroyed, Elizabeth desperately tries to find a way out. She eventually heads down into the subway system, hoping to at least escape from Manhattan, but she soon finds that she's not alone. Deadly creatures lurk in the dark tunnels, and Elizabeth is quickly plunged into a fight for survival. Zombies aren't the only danger, either, as swarms of rats hunt for their next meal.

  Meanwhile, hundreds of miles away, Thomas starts to learn the truth about his sister. Martha might have survived, but she's acting strangely and it soon becomes apparent that she's hiding something. How will Thomas react if he's forced to choose between his sister and his friends?

  Days 203 to 210 is the tenth book in the Mass Extinction Event series. The book ends with a cliffhanger, and readers are advised to start with the first part of the series.

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Day 203

  Day 204

  Day 205

  Day 206

  Day 207

  Day 208

  Day 209

  Day 210

  Epilogue 1

  Epilogue 2

  Days 203 to 210

  (Mass Extinction Event book 10)

  Prologue

  Several years ago...

  Finally, after staring at the USB drive for so long, Joseph slotted it into the side of his laptop and waited for the contents to appear on the screen. He'd already set up a sand-boxed virtual operating system, to protect against viruses, and he'd made sure that his laptop was air gapped from the internet. Still, he couldn't help but worry that someone somewhere would realize that he'd accessed the files on the drive, but he had to know the truth. He had to know what Maddy had meant.

  “I want you to take this,” he remembered her saying, back when she'd given him the drive in the bar. “Maybe I'm just being paranoid, but I want you to hang onto it. If anything happens to me, tomorrow or any time after that, look at the contents of that drive. But not before. Do you understand?”

  He waited, but the drive seemed to be taking time to start up. That, in itself, gave him pause for thought. He almost pulled it out, worried that an infection was already spreading through the laptop, but he forced himself to stay strong. For Maddy.

  “There's one more thing I want you to know,” she'd told him. “I would never kill myself, Joseph. No matter how bad things get, I will never go that route. So if anything happens to me and people claim that I did, I need you to remember that it's not true. It means they suspected me. It means they got to me.”

  Suddenly a window opened on the screen, containing what appeared to be thirteen folders.

  Joseph leaned a little closer and saw that the folders were numbers.

  “Days one to four,” he read aloud. “Days five to eight. Days nine to sixteen. Days forty-six to fifty-three. Days fifty-four to sixty-one. Day one hundred. Days one hundred and one to one hundred and eight. Days one hundred and nine to one hundred and sixteen. Days one hundred and ninety five to two hundred and two. Days two hundred and three to two hundred and ten. Days three hundred and forty-nine to three hundred and fifty six. Days three hundred and fifty seven to three hundred and sixty four. Day three hundred and sixty five.”

  He opened the first folder, and found that it contained an array of documents and schematics. Clicking one of the documents at random, he quickly found himself looking at the details of what seemed to be a kind of virus.

  “What the...” He leaned even closer, squinting slightly to see the smaller parts of the image. “No,” he whispered finally, “that can't be right...”

  ***

  “Leonard Cole,” Joseph hissed, turning and hurrying back to the window so that he could look out and check yet again that nobody was watching his apartment. “Can you just get Leonard Cole for me?”

  “I'm sorry,” the woman on the other end of the line replied, “but Mr. Cole is unreachable at this moment. Can you -”

  “I need his number!”

  “I can't give that to you.”

  “You're not listening to me, this is important! Tell him -”

  “I'm really sorry,” she replied, “but I can't help you. Thank you, and good night.”

  Before Joseph could say another word, the line went dead. He immediately tried to call the number again, only to find that this time he couldn't get through, as if his number had been blocked.

  “Damn it!” he snapped, as he looked out the window again and saw that there was still no sign of anybody outside.

  He waited, watching the shadows. It was late now, gone midnight, and the street was empty. So far, so normal. Still, he couldn't shake the feeling that he was being watched, and he couldn't bring himself to strike that feeling up as mere paranoia. He'd only been through a small section of the information on the USB drive, but that had been enough for him to understand the true dangers of Project Atherius. He was convinced, now, that Maddy had been murdered in order to keep that information hidden away. He was convinced that Maddy had been right.

  Heading back to his laptop, he sat back down and decided to get back to work. He'd already found a note from Maddy, in which she'd explained that she'd only managed to copy a little under a quarter of all the relevant files, due to various security protocols relating to her own access levels. In the note, she'd implored him to make sure that the information got out, and he couldn't shake the feeling that in some way he was supposed to avenge what had happened to her. He tried to focus on the latest file, but he couldn't stop thinking about the last time he'd seen her.

  “I'll do whatever I can to help you,” he wished he'd told her at the bar. “You can rely on me. I swear, I won't let you down.”

  He realized he'd do anything for a chance to tell her that now.

  Suddenly he heard a loud bang on his door. He slammed the laptop shut and got to his feet, and then he turned to look across the room. Already, he could hear that somebody was waiting out in the hallway, but his heart was racing and he knew that there was no way he could simply go and open the door. For all he knew, there were gunmen waiting outside, ready to mow him down for daring to open the files on the USB drive. Sure, he'd taken all possible precautions, but what if he'd missed something? Or what if his call to Leonard Cole at the Boston Metropolitan Institute for Communicable Disease Prevention and Study had been noticed? He told himself that nobody could have reacted to his call so quickly, but then again...

  He was starting to realize that he was up against some very powerful people.

  Grabbing the laptop, he hurried through to the bathroom and began to open the window. He hadn't really managed to plan very far ahead, but all he knew at that moment was that he had to get away as fast as possible. If these people had murdered Maddy, then it stood to reason that they'd have no problem disposing of anyone who got in their way. There'd be time later to come up with a proper long-term plan, but for now he simply knew that he had to make sure that he stayed free.

  Once the window was open, he climbed out and jumped down into the yard. He looked around, to check that there was nobody nearby, and then he hurried toward the gate at the far end.

  “Going somewhere, Joseph?”

  He stopped immediately, and then – as he s
lowly turned to look over his shoulder – he realized that he already recognized the voice.

  “Hello, Joseph,” Doctor John Marter said, as two armed men waited a little further off. “It's late, and you seem to be heading out. What's up? Does your laptop need to go take a pee in the street?”

  “I...”

  Joseph's voice trailed off.

  “I'm not going to patronize you,” John continued, “by acting as if we both don't know what's going on here. You have some files in your possession, files you've already taken a look at. Those files were passed to you, and you were fully aware at the time that they contained classified material.”

  “No!” Joseph stammered. “I had no -”

  “Not classified by the government,” John said, interrupting him. “This goes way higher than that. Step one here is that you're going to give me the laptop. Don't worry, Joseph, I already know that you didn't copy the files or transmit them to anyone.” He held his hand out. “As a sign of your willingness to cooperate,” he added, “I need you to give me the laptop right now.”

  Joseph hesitated.

  “Or should I have these men shoot your arms off,” John asked, “so that I can get the laptop that way?”

  Joseph looked down at the machine in his hands. He was terrified, convinced that at any moment he'd be executed, and somehow he felt as if the laptop represented his only chance at freedom. At the same time, that plan didn't really make very much sense, and he figured there was nothing stopping the gunmen shooting him already and then simply taking the laptop from his dead hands.

  He looked at John again.

  “Okay,” John said finally, “I'll cut you a deal. If it really makes you feel any better, you can hang onto the laptop. Does that sound better?”

  “I can... hang onto it?” Joseph asked cautiously.

  “Sure. You can keep it on your lap for the whole journey.”

  “Journey?” Joseph paused. “What journey?”

  “Ah,” John continued, “now that part isn't negotiable. You're coming with us, Joseph. Right now. We've got a car waiting out front for you.”

  Day 203

  Thomas

  I remember the sound of this place. The sound of the forest waking up. And as I stand here now in the cold light of morning, I feel something that I haven't felt in more than two hundred days.

  I feel like I belong.

  There's the smell of the trees. There's the smell of the land, of the grass and the forest. I don't know, maybe I'm crazy, but I think there's also the smell of the air. Like, the air around here has its own special smell that you can't find anywhere else. Maybe I'm just imagining that, or maybe I lived here for long enough to pick up on subtle little things. Whatever, all I know right now is that it sure does feel good to be home.

  “So have you talked to her yet?”

  Turning, I see that Katrina is wandering over from the car. I hadn't even realized that she and Riley were awake, but sure enough I see him stretching in the back seat.

  “I'm gonna,” I say cautiously. “Right after I find something to eat.”

  “You're delaying.”

  “Of course I'm not! Why would I do that?”

  “Hmm, I don't know,” she replies, “maybe because last night she seemed so cold and formal with you? I mean, you must have expected something more from your own sister, right? A hug, at least.”

  “She's been through a lot,” I point out. “We all have.”

  “Totally. And at least we've got both our eyes, and both our arms. It looks like she's been seriously hacked up.” She pauses. “I know this is gonna sound weird, Tommy, but you are completely sure that it's her, right? That's definitely your sister Martha?”

  “How can you even ask that question?” I reply. “Of course it's her.”

  “Huh.” She stares at me for a moment, before tilting her head slightly. “Yet here you are, the sun has risen, and you still haven't gone into the forest to find her tent and talk to her. If I didn't know better, Tommy, I'd be starting to think that you know something's not right here.”

  I open my mouth to argue with her, but for a moment I'm not quite sure what to say. Finally, just as I'm about to admit that she might have a point, I feel a fix of grit in my chest and I realize that there's no way I'm gonna let Katrina or Riley or anyone else think that something's wrong with my sister. I'm gonna show them that they're wrong.

  “Fine,” I say through gritted teeth. “I'll go talk to her right now!”

  ***

  Stopping as I get closer to the tent, I see that Martha's already awake. Whereas last night her missing eye was fully visible, now she's wearing a makeshift patch. She's sitting on an upturned crate, and she's reaching down to tie her shoe laces. With only one arm, that's not exactly easy.

  “Need a hand?” I ask.

  Damn.

  I flinch.

  Did I really say that? I can be so epically dumb sometimes. There are so many other ways I could have phrased that question, but I somehow managed to go straight for the most stupid.

  Figuring that I should just shut up, I head over and crouch down to help her.

  “Don't,” she says.

  “It's no problem,” I reply, reaching out to take hold of her laces. “Seriously.”

  “I don't need help.”

  She pushes my hand away, and then she starts slowly fixing the laces herself.

  I watch her for a moment, wondering how to start a conversation, but in truth I feel as if she's simply tolerating my presence here. I don't know whether I was expecting too much from our reunion, but I figured that she'd at least be pleased to see me. Instead, I'm left hearing Katrina's comments drifting once more through my thoughts:

  “I know this is gonna sound weird, Tommy, but you are completely sure that it's her, right? That's definitely your sister Martha?”

  Obviously I know that it's her, but she seems so different. She was always smart, and funny, and kinda sarcastic but also serious at times. She was way more mature than the rest of us. I want to know what's happened to her, but she wouldn't tell me last night and she doesn't seem any more willing to talk now.

  “So when I talked about what happened here,” I say finally, “during that first week or so after everything went wrong, I guess it must have been hard for you to learn about Mom and Dad, and about Joe. I'm sorry if I kinda blurted it all out, Martha. I should've found a more considerate way of telling you how they died.”

  “It's fine,” she replies, as she finishes tying her laces and turns to look at me. “I don't need things sugar-coated.”

  “When I burned the farmhouse down -”

  “It's fine, Thomas,” she says again, interrupting me. “You told me. Now I know. I don't need to hear it again.”

  I try to think of something to say, but I feel as if she pushes me away every time she opens her mouth.

  “You didn't tell me much about yourself last night,” I remind her. “I'm sorry I didn't get back here sooner. How long have you been here?”

  “A couple of months.”

  “A couple of...”

  I pause for a moment.

  “You've been camping out here for a couple of months?” I say finally. “Seriously?”

  “Is that so hard to believe?”

  “I guess no, but... I've been in New York. And Boston. Like I started to tell you before, I've been all over the place, but I was always going to come and find you.” I wait for her to reply, but she seems to be very deliberately not looking at me. “There was just always something happening,” I continue. “There was the stuff in Chicago, then I ended up at Lake Erie, and then I was in Boston and then I had to go to New York, and New York is -”

  “Thomas, you don't have to explain,” she says firmly, interrupting me. “I get it, the world was in chaos. I lost an eye and an arm. You don't think I understand how crazy it is out there?”

  “Of course,” I stammer. “So did you just head straight here from California?”

  She stare
s at me for a moment, before getting to her feet.

  “We'll talk later,” she says, limping past me.

  “You said that last night,” I point out, standing and starting to follow her. “Martha -”

  “I can't just take breaks whenever I want,” she continues, cutting me off. “I have things to do. Surviving here is a full-time job.”

  “I can help,” I tell her. “I'm not the same kid I was before. I'm useful now.”

  “No offense,” she replies, stopping and turning to me, “but I'd rather go do this part alone.” She pauses. “There's an old well about two miles away, near the fork in the river where we used to play as kids. I go there every morning and collect water. I'll bring extra this time, for you and your friends. And we'll talk later, Thomas, I promise. I just need to find a spare moment.”

  She flashes a very faint, very unconvincing smile.

  “Relax for a while,” she adds. “You've been traveling for a while. You must be tired.”

  With that, she turns and walks off into the undergrowth, leaving me standing all alone. I figured that Martha would finally open up to me this morning, but instead she seemed more closed off than ever. I tell myself that I might be reading too much into this, but at the same time I can't shake the feeling that maybe in some ways she isn't the same Martha as before. That whatever she's been through, she's come out changed.

  And that she seems to hate me now.

  Thomas

  As I make my way back through the forest, I suddenly hear footsteps nearby. I turn, just in time to see Mikey pushing his way through a bush. At least he's finally wearing clothes, having taken a set of my father's overalls from the barn.

  “This place is a complete dump,” he says as he reaches me. “We're in the middle of nowhere!”