The Rise of Macon: A Zombie Novel (Macon Saga Book 2) Page 19

  Patrick stood, as if it was a done deal, and started heading to the door. He stopped when he noticed James stand slowly, not preparing to leave, but looking to square off. Grace looked uncertainly between the officer and Kyle, not sure what to do.

  "James,” Kyle said, noticing the threatening body language from his friend. "It's okay. It'll be fine. I need you to do something for me though."

  James kept his eyes on the colonel, but gave Kyle indication for him to ask. Kyle continued, "Go get a good meal, a shower and some sleep."

  Now James did turn his head and looked at Kyle. His face, impassive, turned back to the officer one more time, then he gave a nod and walked out of the room without a word. Kyle turned his head to Grace, squeezed her hand and said, "Will you make sure he does that? He looks like death and I'm not going anywhere."

  "I will," she said and walked past the Colonel, who gave her a smile. Patrick threw him a thumbs up as he waited for Grace, then they left and closed the door behind them.

  "Good people you have," said the Colonel, moving into the chair James had left empty. He leaned back and seemed to sink into the chair. James got a good look at the man and pure exhaustion radiated from him. More than tired, he seemed to be drained, though still keeping a smile on his face.

  "How about I give you a run down on everything that's happened and we'll go from there," said the Colonel. Kyle gave a nod and he continued. "It was a virus that hit us. An engineered virus. Apparently North Korea, in one of their underground labs, tried to produce a zombie like virus that would wipe us out before they invaded. Unfortunately, they came pretty close to succeeding. The virus they produced works much like leprosy, it kills the nerve receptors in your brain. Simply put, the people infected don't feel pain. In addition, they added a virus similar to rabies, which stops cognitive thought and increases rage and terror to a point where the brain is fried."

  "The good news is, it’s a simple fix and the vaccine has already been made and widely distrusted. The bad news is that the damage had already been done. Over sixty percent of America's population was affected, the others were immune. But even for those who were immune, especially those in the city, they had to deal with the infected trying to kill them, scavengers and all the bad parts of humanity. We calculate over seventy percent of the population has died at this point. We are the survivors."

  The Colonel paused, letting Kyle take in everything he'd said. Kyle remained silent. He'd known it was bad, even thought it might be exactly as the Colonel had reported it. But to hear it as truth for the first time left him numb. The world he knew, everything he loved; gone. It was a concept he couldn't grasp right now, he wondered if he ever could. As shocking as it was, he felt disconnected from it. Too much had happened in the last week for him be shocked. He lost too much for him to be appalled by the loss of others. Selfish probably, but he couldn't help it.

  "How do we know North Korea did it?" said Kyle.

  "Oh, we've got good Intel on that, after the fact, of course. There's also the little issue of them trying to invade us."

  "Invade us?"

  The Colonel nodded his head. "Yes, we debriefed some of your people and they mentioned a tanker ship that fired on your fort."

  Kyle nodded his head. That seemed like ancient history now, though it happened only a week ago.

  "Well," continued the Colonel, "North Korea, thinking they'd let the disease wipe us out, sent hundreds of container ships packed with soldiers to every major port in the States. Each ship carried thousands of North Korean soldiers, starved though they were. Their targets were military bases, munitions dumps, national and regional governments, manufacturing…you get the point."

  "The one we saw, it was heading towards Wilmington," Kyle said, thinking about its destinations.

  "It reached Wilmington. We've had reports that they've seized the Port, but in their effort to move north towards Camp Leguine, they ran into a sizable group of the diseased. They were all killed or turned."

  "What about all the others?"

  "The West Coast got hit the worst, with major bases, thousands of military aircraft, repair facilities and munitions dumps; all destroyed. We noticed what was going on after it started and took out well over a hundred of the ships, but as of now there are over one hundred thousand North Korean soldiers in our country. Though prepared for the diseased, they still have to deal with the ones here, and that slowed them down."

  "It's insane," Kyle said, caught completely by surprise. He had a thousand questions to ask, but settled for one. "Why are you telling me all this, Colonel? I'm just a civilian now."

  The Colonel gave a tired smile. "There you're wrong. The Vice-President, well, the President now, has reactivated you and since you were still in inactive reserve, you have little choice."

  Kyle had been expecting this, but wasn't sure how to respond. Part of him wanted to go fight and rid himself of being in charge, though the other half wanted to make sure his friends were taken care of.

  "I can see you’re struggling with what to say. The President has been all over the place, even being present when we debriefed your friend Patrick, though he didn't know it." The Colonel laughed at this. "He's going to give you the choice. You can remain a civilian or take a promotion to Captain. If you decide you want to be reactivated, then we have a specific mission, one you might not mind."

  Kyle felt like he was being set up, but being given a choice seemed too good to be true. "And that would be?"

  "The cities on the Easter Seaboard were wiped out by the diseased, but there are still pockets of resistance and millions of survivors spread throughout the east coast. North Carolina is situated perfectly to begin collecting those survivors and creating a "beachhead", if you will, to take back the East Coast."

  Kyle laughed, "Fort Macon?"

  "That's right. Fort Macon is officially being opened again. Oak Island needs to be cleared first, of course, and then the Island will be turned into what we're talking about. We can cover the details later if you accept."

  Kyle knew instantly what he wanted to do. He could have said he wanted to serve his country, help the survivors, or just go out to fight, but he knew he wasn't ready to leave his brother and his brother was at Fort Macon. He just needed some more time.

  "I accept," he said simply.

  The Colonel gave another tired smile and got up. "Good, I'll have a liaison appointed and we'll keep in touch. I'm assuming you'd like to have the young Coast Guard Petty Officer under your command?"

  Kyle jerked his head up at this. Was the Colonel smiling? "Aw, yes sir, if that's alright.

  "I'm sure something can be worked out." He picked up his cover, walked to the door, almost walking out before Kyle caught him with one more question."

  "Colonel?"

  "Yes, Captain?"

  "What about North Korea and the rest of the world?"

  The Colonel’s worn face seemed to fall further. "South Korea, taking a play from their brothers to the north, built a tunnel and invaded, taking out Kim Jung Ill before he knew what was happening. The Koreas are united again, though still being kept separate. The disease hit both of them as well. The rest of the world? Our Intel says every county was hit, to one extreme or another, and now the globe is at war. Before this is over, the geo-political map of the world will look much different."

  Finishing, the colonel slipped out of the room, leaving Kyle to get his head around everything that had happened. He pushed it away, he could only deal with those things under his control, and right now and that was nothing. But soon he'd be heading back to Fort Macon. There was still work to be done.

  The end.

  I hope you enjoyed The Rise of Macon. I love a good zombie story but wanted something other than a bad ass who kills zombies by the leaps and bounds, is impervious to hurt and is more lethal than Superman. I wanted something old school. This is what came out. Hope you liked it!

  I want to take a minute to thank you for paying to read this book. As an avid reader mys
elf I don’t take that for granted. I also want to thank all those who left comments or reviewed The Road to Macon.

  Especially Nickolai who wrote, Thought it was the road to bacon. Really disappointed. I should read further into the title. Next time ginger...Next time. Ok ok.

  Didn't understand it, but it made me laugh.

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  Hope to see you next time!