Green Fields (Book 4): Extinction (35 page)

Ah. That made sense. Stone hadn’t struck me as a particularly unforgiving guy, but he’d hinted at the people who were really in charge of the operation he ran, and they likely hadn’t enjoyed having a possible asset walk out on them. If they’d had people to spare, someone more knowledgeable than Stone would have run the Aurora lab.

“I think I can live with that,” I said. Dom left it at a shrug, not terribly concerned himself.

“If you ever change your mind, you’ll always be welcome here. Any of you, really. You can drop by or leave again any time. As long as you don’t screw with us, you’re welcome. We might have agreed to be part of the network because Wilkes is too straight-laced to call himself dictator of his own little state here, but we don’t share their sentiments. If you ever get itchy to put on a hazmat suit and risk your life in there, you’re more than welcome.” When he caught the look of surprise on my face, he laughed. “I get it. They thought they were being gracious for offering you a leadership position, but you’re like me. You’re a researcher. You like to get your hands dirty, not just analyze results but produce them. You’ll probably help us more if you haul over more solar panels so we can enhance our setup, but we have a pretty sweet dig going on here. We don’t have issues with sharing that.”

“Setup?” That was too good to pass up.

“Yup,” he replied. “We might have the generators here but they are just for emergency use. We produce all our electricity from solar power and water wheels we set up around the compound. That’s where most of the mines are, really. Our blast doors are heavy enough that if we close them, nothing can happen to us. But the panels are vulnerable and we’ve set up too many of them to guard them all. They’re hidden in clearings in the forest, and recessed in the fields around. Means someone has to check them all the time and clean them, but it’s the easiest solution, really. Two of our more automotive affiliated grunts have started working on a portable model of that. So you could, technically, run cars in tandem mode, using conventional fuels and solar powered batteries. How would you like to extend one tank fill to up to a thousand miles? Provided you don’t get stuck in days of rain, of course.”

“You sure you’re not building a new utopian paradise in here?” I asked, only joking somewhat.

Dom shrugged, but I could tell that he was preening inside because of my praise. “We do what we can. Few enough people seem to be interested in trying.”

That surprised me. “You mean the settlements?”

“Who else? They’re happy to let someone else lock them away behind their fences and follow every single directive unquestioned,” he complained. “Don’t tell me you’re not damn resentful of how they treat you? They force their rules on you, and then don’t hold up their end of the bargain.”

I couldn’t help but agree with him, but left it at a grunt. “We were talking with the head of security in Dispatch. She’s trying to enforce new rules. Won’t change much for us, but at least it should keep the traders out of the worst of it.”

Unlike the people we’d met there, Dom didn’t look too enthusiastic. “You can certainly try to enforce change, but I doubt that it will hold. They might readily send you out to play fetch for them, but they don’t rely on you. Dispatch is, so far, the only larger town that tries to be independent.”

“And you?”

His smile turned lopsided. “We’re not a town. We’re the Silo.”

Clearly they considered themselves apart from the others, and I couldn’t say I minded much. “Do you get a lot of traffic here?”

“Not really, but we’re trying to increase it,” he explained. “We’re about done developing our prototype tech, and we need someone to field test it. I get that you probably won’t want to rely on a weapon that’s basically untested, but you might still take it along and use it in a pinch when someone else can cover for you. Same with the electric motors for the cars. We’re still trying to recruit scientists, too, but the drain’s too heavy of late.”

“Drain?” That sounded ominous.

Another shrug. “The government seems to have a good recruitment policy. And New Angeles isn’t helping.”

That name again. “So it’s not just a myth? That place really exists?”

Dom eyed me quizzically. “Sure it exists. We have a chat with them once a week, if we can sync up satellite connections. They’re just so far out there that everyone who’s attached to the hub around Dispatch won’t make it over to them easily. I think they actually prefer it that way. Scuttlebutt has it that when the government approached them, they closed up their doors and wouldn’t even talk, let alone negotiate. A bunch of weirdos, if you ask me, but they might have something going for them. Who knows? They are very close-mouthed. Last week we had a bunch of scavengers here who came up the coast from there. Didn’t get a single word out of them, but they seemed ready to return any time. Considering that most of you folks are rather reluctant to go anywhere except for Dispatch I’d say they got something worth visiting, if you get antsy out there in the wild.”

I couldn’t help but glance in Nate’s direction. Somehow, I got the sense that he wouldn’t be too thrilled going there any time soon. But that reminded me of something else that I was burning to know.

“Do you mind me asking who ‘they’ are? The government, I mean,” I clarified. “So far I’ve only dealt with people who heard something from someone else, and so on. Except for Stone in Aurora, obviously, but I didn’t ask him. He kind of dazzled me with all the intel he was ready to share with me, even though I think most of it is bullshit.”

I wondered if I’d revealed too much, but Dom’s understanding nod made me relax again.

“Honestly? I have no clue. We tried finding out more, but they are really closemouthed. There were a few names mentioned, but I can’t even tell you if any of the politicians are still around. We know that the President and Vice President bit it, but that’s it. Lily said she recognized a few names of scientists involved from her year cooperating with USAMRIID, and we’re pretty sure that there are some CDC people involved, but except for that, your guess is probably better than mine.” At my raised brows he said, “You were the one who released Raleigh Miller’s data.”

“Who was just one scientist of many,” I pointed out. “The more I think about it, the more I feel like my video is the only reason why anyone claims that they are working on a cure. That was his pet project. So much easier to sell than anything else they might be doing.”

Dom’s face lit up at my gripe. “Ah, I smell a conspiracy theory coming. We have quite a lot of them circulating through the Silo. Hit me with it. Maybe it’s a new one.”

That annoyed me a little, but then he had mentioned who the base had belonged to before they had taken up residence here. Probably came with the territory.

“I think they are still fine-tuning their serum,” I said, glancing in Nate’s direction to clarify which experiments I was referring to. “Remember the tech we found? That I mentioned in the video conference. Maybe it’s a little far fetched but one theory is that they are trying to boost the effects, and using tech to lure other zombies to the juiced-up ones.”

Dom considered that for a moment. “That’s a new one, I have to admit. And don’t hate me for saying this, but it’s standing on rather thin ice. Why would anyone want to boost zombies?”

I hated that he latched right onto the one weak point of the theory, but he was, of course, right to do so. “I have no fucking clue. And we didn’t find any other stronger super zombies out there, either. Maybe it was just coincidence. We also didn’t go after a streak because we’re not completely suicidal. My only explanation is that something went wrong. Like, they got a stronger version of the serum but the test subjects turned rather than remain stable like the others. Or they were the rejects or something.” That reminded me that, so far, Nate had omitted telling me what had happened with all the people who hadn’t made it through the program. I’d assumed that they’d simply died, but maybe not?

“And the tech?”

Nate clearing his throat behind me made me glance back at him. He and Wilkes seemed to have finished their discussion and were ready to join us. “Campbell still has it,” Nate offered. “I’ll talk to him about letting you have a look at it. Or keep it. It’s useless to us as it is. Attracting the fuckers is the last thing we want.”

“Sure thing,” Dom agreed. “I know a guy or ten who’ll murder over getting his grubby hands on it. Reverse-engineering microwave ovens to turn them into anti zombie ray guns is only so much fun.” At my irritated blinking he shrugged. “I’m not bullshitting you. They really tried doing that last winter. Works well for de-icing the field upstairs, but not much beyond that. We can maybe build a portable version for you so you can get the cars going in the winter more easily?”

Nate gave him a blank stare for that. “You do realize that once it starts snowing, the roads are a no-go? Just like last year, we’ll find a place to hunker down until the world thaws up once more. Unless we want to switch to dog sleds, and I’m not sure we can find enough food not to have to eat the dogs eventually to prevent starving to death ourselves.”

He got a somewhat chagrined smile from Dom, while Wilkes laughed. “See what I’m dealing with on a day-to-day basis?” the commander asked. “Brilliant minds, all of them. But they’d be lost without us.”

I so did not care for the look Nate gave me, even if his smile was pleasant rather than condescending.
 

“Like you have anything to complain about,” I told him.

He shrugged. “I haven’t slept in a normal bed for thirteen months now. I have no idea whatsoever where we will spend the next winter, or how we will prepare for it. And while almost my entire group is lazing away in front of the video wall my false sense of pride makes me continue to stand around here, debating moot points. I’m not even touching the entire topic where you are concerned. But don’t tell me I have nothing to complain about.”

Wilkes and Dom both seemed to find that incredibly funny, but I didn’t quite see the humor in Nate’s statement.
 

“We could have spent more than a single day in Dispatch,” I said. “Considering how much they all fell over each other, singing our praises, they’d likely have left us an entire house for a week, if not a room at the brothel. But you couldn’t get back on the road soon enough.”

Nate gave me a surprisingly quizzical look. “Too many people.”

“What?”

He shrugged. “There were too many people there. Made me uneasy. If Dispatch is the alternative to being out alone on the road, I’d rather fend off zombies with a stick.”

Only that our sticks mostly went boom. I couldn’t quite deny that the crowds had been not entirely unproblematic.

“Here still too crowded for you?” I asked, not quite without an edge to my tone, but also hard-pressed not to laugh him in the face.

Nate’s smile was more knowing than I liked, but then it was probably not hard to guess why I was fishing for information.

“Unless the good people here want us gone soon…” He paused long enough for Wilkes to shake his head before he resumed. “We can stay a couple days so you can get your raging science boner on. I’m sure the others will find something to occupy themselves with.”

“I’m not—“ I tried to protest, but his smirk made me cut off.

“Bree, you don’t have to decide between us and them. We all can’t change who we really are. Catch up with them. Wow them with your wit and knowledge. Get annoyed because here, contrary to Aurora, you might meet people who are easily your intellectual equals. Maybe that will make you appreciate us grunts again once we’re back out there. Have some fun. You’ve earned it.”

That sounded too good to be true, but then I wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth. “Okay. Just let me know when you get bored. I might have a remedy for that in mind, too.”

Nate gave me a pointed look before he turned back to Wilkes. “So what was this about weapon mods?”

Dom and I looked after them as they walked back toward the command center before he gave me a sidelong glance. “Want to see something cool?”

“Always,” I confided, surprised that I was actually excited about this, whatever it would turn out to be.

We ended up spending four days in the Silo. I’d expected at least some grumpiness from the guys—they might have gotten some much-anticipated attention of the female persuasion in Dispatch, but likely not as much as they’d wanted. Here it was just cursory drills and lots and lots of watching TV and playing console games on the huge screen. As much as they might have complained about the lack of female company—there were a couple of women in the Silo, of course, but none of them keen to get too friendly—entertainment of another kind proved to be a satisfactory substitute. I couldn’t help myself—I spent way too much time in the labs, but made a point of joining my people for breakfast and dinner at the very least. Most of the people here did, unlike the scientists of Aurora, turning the meals into veritable community events. There was no clear separation between the different branches of research and work happening here, but also not to the soldiers. I couldn’t help but feel that if I ever got tired of living on the road, the Silo would make a great alternate home. I wondered if I should broach that subject with Nate, but decided to refrain from it. He was levelheaded enough that he was already thinking about the coming winter, as the talk with Wilkes had proven, and I was sure that he didn’t need my observation to come to the same conclusion.

Still, we were visitors, no doubt about that, and not just because none of the Silo residents was marked. With all similarities that we shared, there was still a certain disconnect. The odd remark, the surprised look at some detail that had become second nature to us—subtle, small differences, but impossible to ignore. They weren’t quite as oblivious about life out there as the townspeople, but after a few days I started to wonder if any of them, even their soldiers, would survive outside for long if they had to. Sure, with their extensive surveillance camera coverage and the minefields, they had dug themselves in here good and could easily weather virtually anything, but if their defenses ever were breached, they were screwed just the same. And Wilkes at least seemed to be aware of that, showing himself very happy when we suggested a few upgrades. Except for the labs, that was; my snarky remarks, few and far between as they were, weren’t well received. Then again, I couldn’t help but feel slightly offended when it took less than three hours for several of the local PhDs to tear apart my academic record and pretty much point out that my fame—from that video—wasn’t deservedly mine, as I hadn’t actually been involved in the research directly. It was kind of a relief that someone finally pointed that out, but of course I couldn’t keep my bristling ego in check. Nate wisely held his tongue when I was back with him within hours of disappearing into the labs, insisting that I didn’t need to hang out with the science nerds that much after all. The Silo didn’t have a jacuzzi, but they had a huge water heater and running water, and we made ample use of the facilities, not always in their intended way. At least Wilkes seemed impressed by the fact that I wasn’t just a useless piece of ass in a lab coat but could easily hold my own. After Aurora, it was positively weird to be, again, judged by my actions rather than my record. Oh well. Couldn’t say that was a bad thing.