Chapter 16: 15: REANIMATED

Elias and company were transferred to a rendezvous point, where an armored civilian cruiser that wouldn’t draw premature alarm from anyone in the area awaited them to complete their latest task. A standby pilot returned Captain Havershaw’s body to Silatem HQ and the four men continued on to locate Home Base’s errant ping.

Transition zones were the yellow and green zones within Red Sector dubbed Asylum, since the majority of the residents within fled strife within the wildlands and gained entry into Union as a humanitarian effort. Many of the transition zones stood in terrible shape after the Time Of Trouble due to high levels of toxic ether contamination, remaining abandoned like Silver Rock.

Artificial plots of land decorated those territories, creating a hyper-colorful and almost garish appearance within the worn-down areas. Elias peered at brilliant polymer foliage rustling in the Harvest breeze as Davies steered the cruiser through silent hills and valleys. Another four hours in the field had passed and their crawl through the sectors brought no sign of Home Base’s ping. At that point Elias was ready to submit another update to Home Base—hopefully one of the last for their journey.

“Navigator,” said Elias, turning his attention back to the silver-haired man filing mission logs through the cruiser’s dashboard. “Advise quarantine status of RSZ101.”

Noor remained focused on the rapidly changing data displays. “Silatem’s contractor recommendations are marked as processed,” he said. “Quarantine status of RSZ101 is High Alert. Lockdown pending UIA execution signature.”

“Pending?” remarked Elias. “What are they waiting for—confirmation of the notes from that 18 from a Union source?”

“Yes. The delay’s on Union’s end. It’s our suspended status that’s causing the issue. I see here…” Noor gestured at the projection he was studying. “Zone Commissioner Nolen’s demanding we verify the authenticity of our pings with a signature from Defense before he'll pursue shutdown measures. No lockdowns until the details of that 18 are confirmed.”

Elias scowled. “So the commissioner’s willing to risk the safety of every resident in the sector because the information’s coming from Silatem.”

“The personal note on file states he won’t induce widespread panic over possible system malfunctions. Doesn’t mention Silatem by name, though.”

“Ha.” A blast of gunfire-like laughter filled the cabin from Hudson’s co-pilot chair. “More like ‘e won’t lose millions in tariffs from those Harvest transactions—’specially those Dot sales. Thinks ‘e can stall til’ after the holiday but mate…we’ll be right into the wee hours of the Eve if Home Base keeps assignin’ us to errands. Let’s get this done.”

“Continue the crawl,” said Elias, his mood sour as he moved to the rear of the cruiser and engaged his COM alone. “UIA needs to step in immediately and escalate through the proper channels with Union authority. We can’t let another Harvest become a disaster due to internal politics.”

“Are you contacting the admiral directly?” asked Noor.

“Yes. I’ll run this through as an international UIA asset if I have to. Make sure Silatem’s recommendations are refreshed with that critical flag once every ten minutes. Annoy the shit out of Home Base ‘til they get action.”

“Yes sir.”

The compact cruiser continued its slow exploration while Elias settled on a bench and summoned control projections from his COM. He traced his fingers through interactive space, completing a series of encryption codes in order to reach Heywood, and touched his COM earpiece when he heard the verifications accepted. He activated a sensor next, connecting with the admiral, and found Heywood speaking before Elias had uttered a greeting.

“You’re calling about Nolen,” said Heywood.

“I’m calling about everything,” replied Elias. “Sorry to put this interaction on the record. Had to reach you. Now.”

“Do what you have to do. I’m on my way to the fucker’s house as we speak. Shithead marked himself as ‘away’ for the holiday so he won’t even see our field updates, not unless someone from the Union ministry officially alerts him through emergency measures.”

“Nolen’s up this election cycle. Rest of the commissioners too. Not the best idea for him to sleep on something this big in his sector, especially during Harvest.”

“I’ll go right to him and mess up his day. He’ll sign the order. It’s time to circle back to Madsen too for input—Grimley brought whatever he’s infected with up to the northern zones and that should be a concern for the arbiter as well. We’ll hit every channel we can until we get results.”

“Gut’s telling me these aren’t errors,” said Elias, scanning an update transmitted to him by Commander Reiser, Silatem’s Chief Operations Officer back at their HQ. Their Research & Development department had confirmed receipt and processing of Havershaw’s destroyed corpse, adding a notification of Union’s demand for immediate return of Havershaw’s body into their hands. “Especially not that disappearing reading—that 0981.9 mess that didn’t register on my armor. These pings, this trail we’re on—it’s intentional. Whoever’s hiding on the inside and plotting against us is still on the move. We better act fast before we’re taken off guard another time.”

“Agreed. Grimley opened Pandora’s box and we have to catch whatever the hell popped out of it.” An indicator flashed on the COM, signaling Heywood had forwarded an attachment to Elias. “I see you’ve still got no hits on that ping. Check the coordinates I sent you—it’s a safe house located a few hundred kilometers from your location.”

“Agents on a relevant assignment?”

“Codenames Bill and Barbara Dugal. They’re set up to run a minor ether station on the outskirts of Zone 34, tracking sales and shipments. Been there for the past sixteen months. No recent alerts about parasite sightings within the sector but they might be able to illuminate suspicious refugee activity. Give you a lead that can help with those pings.”

“All right,” said Elias. “Are they expecting us?”

“Aye. They confirmed they’re available for a debrief. Keep your company colors cloaked when you arrive and hail them from within the station. Tell them what you need when you connect and they’ll share what they’re authorized to disclose.”

“I’ve inputted the coordinates into our navigation system. Looks like it’ll take…forty-five minutes at our current speed.”

“Copy. I’ll update you on what happens with Nolen.”

“Copy.”

They disconnected and Elias returned to the front of the bridge, confirming that Davies had already adjusted their course and was streaking at high velocity toward the prescribed safe house. Elias sat on the bench once more and huddled over his battle rifle, lids narrowing as he inspected the weapon’s interior mechanisms via synced COM projections to complete necessary repairs.

Davies soon announced an ETA of five minutes while Elias was surveying company notes, advising over COM that ether levels in the air were abnormally high even for the season. Not high enough to flag an emergency response and nowhere near the caution levels of Silver Rock, but high enough that Davies thought the Silatem captain should take note.

“Must be a leak somewhere,” said Davies. “The Dugals have to be aware of that with their equipment. Might find them making repairs when we pull in.”

“Don’t see any maintenance notes or warnings in the UED energy databases,” remarked Elias, glancing over at Noor. “Must be a new issue. Even minor malfunctions are required be recorded.”

“Sixteen pressurized commercial-grade bulk cannisters are nested underground at that station, each one the size of a small home,” said Noor. “If they haven’t moved yet we’ll have to make sure they’re aware of these readings.”

“Right.”

Davies pulled the cruiser up to the ether station, a flat expanse of field housing four tall towers with receptors that gathered ether from the atmosphere, siphoning valuable traces of the element into waiting storage tanks below. The lieutenant settled the Silatem vessel near one of the massive towers, transmitting a patterned hailing signal to the command center to announce their arrival for service. The vessel's sensors blinked within the bridge alerting them of a drop in air temperature, another sign that there was an unexpected flux of the natural Ipirian element in the area.

“Read’s gotta be coming out of one of the pumps,” commented Hudson. “Another twenty minutes at this climb and Civil would be obligated to stop by the Dugals for a mandatory safety check.”

“Twenty minutes,” replied Noor. “That’s rapid.”

“Hails are being received by automated response but are not acknowledged by a live controller.” Davies turned his head to look at Elias. “I can keep hailing, sir, but I don’t think anyone’s home.”

“Stop hailing,” replied Elias immediately, instincts sparked. “Pull up to the station house. Noor, alert Home Base immediately of the ether levels and the lack of response inside. Standby with the cruiser. We’re going in. Armed.”

“Aye, sir,” replied Noor.

Davies placed the cruiser on standby. The vehicle hovered just above the ground and the men grabbed their weapons, suiting up for action. Elias hopped out of the cruiser first with rifle in grip, greeted by the steady chirp of seasonal moon birds nesting in the roof of the station. The warm light of Central’s gleaming perpetual sunset, partially occluded by the building gray of the rain season, warmed his face with humid heat as he scanned the quiet facility.

Hudson, appearing as more of a beast than usual due to the unkempt beard scruffing from his face under his field helmet, landed on the ground after Elias. Davies exited last, his limber frame slipping out of the cruiser with rifle and long blade strapped to his back, and the men approached a small two-storied structure that served as both the commercial area and living quarters for the UIA agents. Elias felt a subtle tingling buzz against the exposed flesh of his face as he moved—yet another physical sign that there was too much ether in the air.

They reached the civilian entry door with little sound. Hudson and Davies took position to the left while Elias moved to the right, holding his rifle aside to press the control panel for entry. There was no response from the system—the control panel appeared to be offline—and a manual attempt to open the door revealed it was sealed tight. Elias motioned to Hudson who wielded the heaviest gauge of weapon to proceed and shifted away to let the commander blast the panel to pieces.

Elias approached again and linked his COM to the panel’s exposed emergency receptors, bypassing the silent alarm they’d triggered with a UIA override key. The door opened automatically with a whoosh and Elias entered first, sweeping the muzzle of his rifle across the space in search of movement. He moved aside to allow Hudson and Davies to enter after him and provide cover while he kept to the northern wall.

“It’s a mess,” he remarked over the team link as Hudson and Davies spread out to continue the inspection. Elias glanced at the shattered system equipment behind the main kiosk amid piles furniture and debris strewn about. “Command kiosk’s trashed. Must be why the hails went nowhere. Someone got here before we did.”

“Dugals knew yeh were comin’,” said Hudson, examining the western side of the mess they’d encountered. “Maybe they let someone in thinkin’ it was yeh. Could be whoever was using that pump and left it leakin’.”

“Yep.”

“No sign of them anywhere here, Captain.” Davies kicked an overturned chair out of his way as he circled around the kiosk. “No blood either.”

“Not here.” Elias cleared the last corner of the commercial area of the station house before facing the hallway leading to the rear. “Residential portion’s upstairs. Need to check that too.”

Elias signaled to Hudson to repeat the breaching procedure, bypassing the emergency receptors within the panel with an override key to gain them entry. He led the way down a hall to a narrow set of manual steps exiting to the second level, climbing the steps at a slow pace and keeping his firearm aimed ahead.

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The search continued along the second floor and Elias forced doors open as they moved, hearing Hudson and Davies clear the spaces behind him as he continued. They encountered more disarray but there was still no sign of the covert UIA agents anywhere. Elias pricked his nose when he caught the scent of something familiar wafting from a distance away. The smell grew stronger after the men turned a corner, however Davies was the first to vocalize what they were about to encounter.

“That smell,” said the lieutenant over the team link. “Blood. Trace readings already. We found it. Found them.”

“Not confirmed it’s them yet. Stay ready.” Elias remained focused on a partially-open door a few meters ahead of him. “Dead space on the EM but that means nothing at this point.”

“Aye.”

He paused at the open door, waiting for Hudson and Davies to take position. Every muscle remained still, ready for his next burst of action. He counted to himself silently.

3…2…1…

He bolted through the door with rifle aimed, sweeping the area and swallowing reaction as his peripheral vision spotted blood everywhere—along with a nude female corpse splayed out on the bed in the center of the room. Red streaked the walls and floor in heavy streaks and pools of fluid. He kept low as Hudson entered next, spotting another body in the corner bound to a chair and gagged, clothes torn with wounds displayed, a male forced to face the bed where the other body lay.

“Fucking hell,” remarked Davies as he joined them inside. “Fucking…hell.”

Elias took a moment to re-scan the area with closer precision, absorbing every tiny detail with practiced eyes and memory. He logged evidence of the scene with his goggles and his gaze darted over the body on the bed—a woman, her throat and torso sliced open with a blade. Gunshot wounds tore her apart further, spaced around her body with intent to keep her suffering from the damage as she died. Pieces of whatever Elias imagined happened there interlocked in his mind to form a story that made sense.

“Say hello to Bill and Barbara Dugal,” said Davies, circling the bed with firearm aimed. “Or…what’s left of them. God…damn.”

“They dogged ‘er,” commented Hudson. “Blood between ‘er legs. Wounded ‘er when she was up, probably by surprise—yeh don’t get a pattern like that if she’s already down. They used a blade to ruin ‘er more. Bet they’ve got that tainted blood, if they’re gettin’ off on the torture. Drinkin’ it up like top shelf Dot through the ether, and there’s more of it out there now. Red’s wet, Captain—so this went down on our way ‘ere.”

“No bites,” replied Elias bluntly. “No signs of feeding. This wasn’t done for blood—not that way. No. It’s a message.”

“To you?”

“Maybe. I’m the one getting auto-assigned. I’m the one being led. That missing ping was fucking bait to waste my time. Bill and Barbara would still be ali—well.” Elias paused before continuing. “Secure the scene. Time to get CDPD involved. If the quarantine requests come from a Union source then we should get results. Commander—”

“Aye, sir.”

“Advise Mr. Noor to prepare for sample collection. We’ll be marking this mission 18 and heading right for Capitol City the minute support arrives. Time to petition Ministry Of Justice ourselves regarding an official response to yet another potential rebel uprising within borders.”

“Aye.”

Elias grimaced on his third inspection of the agents. The blood was slick. If they’d arrived a bit faster, maybe even minutes faster—or if he’d contacted Heywood to get the tip to stop by sooner instead of spinning his wheels looking for a ghost. Or, if it turned out Elias was the one that brought the Dugals bad fortune—

He narrowed his lids, shaking his head as he stared at Barbara’s lifeless, blood-filled eyes—her accusing stare and frozen scream. He let her go. Let both of them go. He had to let them go. Never a good idea to tread down the path of what he could have, or should have, done. Not once matters were settled.

“Hello!”

Loud squawking from the corner of the room caught the attention of the hunters. Amid the mess of overturned furniture stood a cage on a pedestal covered with a white blanket, unnoticed at first since it was heavily splattered with blood like everything else. Elias swung the rifle into one hand and approached the pedestal, ripping the blanket away to reveal a gilded cage.

A large and well-fed bird hopped around inside, bristling a brilliant array of long green, gold, and purple feathers from its squat, fat body. Elias recognized the breed at once, since he’d read its listing within the Altirian Elite catalog the same night he ordered his fireplace. A Sunayan jeweled talking parrot with a tufted feathered crest on its head, one that expanded whenever it spread its wings, squawked when Elias moved his face closer.

“Hello, Dugal!”

“Surprised the bird’s still alive,” said Davies. “Must have kept its mouth shut the whole time this was going on.”

Elias rose to full height again. “If it kept its mouth shut then it heard everything. This breed’s genetically enhanced to store spoken information.” He rested his hand on the cage. “Should be a way to make it spill its record using the right frequencies.”

“Taking the bird?” asked Hudson.

“Yeah,” said Elias. “Get it on the cruiser.”

Elias walked aside to engage his COM and contact Heywood while Hudson moved to retrieve the parrot’s cage. A sharp crackle struck the bud in his ear and he frowned as he looked at the device’s display. He paused when he spotted the same nonsense digits—0981.9. Before his eyes the numbers scrolled back down to dead space.

The sound of a choking gasp sent a chill through his body. He lifted his head to find the source.

“What the hell?” he uttered.

Hudson reared back when Barbara Dugal—or what was left of her—pulled herself up from the bed with slow, jerking movements. She sat up slowly and bowed over as if she were going to fall.

Elias swung his rifle back to aim. A loud rattle to his left spiked his attention aside. Bill Dugal was up too at the same moment, still strapped in his chair but active nonetheless, face warped and ghoulish with distorting mutation. He sprung at Davies with rapid force, startling the lieutenant, and Davies whipped around to fire without hesitation.

Barbara leaped off of the bed with the same blinding speed. She hurled herself at Hudson with feeding fangs bared, screeching in full rabid rage. Elias blasted Barbara off-course mid-air and turned back to Bill, watching as Davies smashed the long blade through the agent’s face and skull.

Hudson disabled Barbara with a high-caliber blast to the chest and as the commander moved to restrain her motionless form, the gaping wounds they’d inflicted sizzling from the impact. Noor rushed in after them, prepping the NAV kit for sampling, and joined the team link.

“What happened?”

“She reanimated, Mr. Noor,” said Hudson, his voice raw with new adrenaline. “She was dead and she came back. Changed. That’s not how this works. If yer alive yeh turn from the infection. If yer dead yer dead and that’s the end of it. Parasite’s gotta have a spark to suck off and mutate that way. Doesn’t create life, only takes over what’s already there and destroys it. Rules are real fucking simple. Somethin’ wrong here.”

Noor turned his head to peer at Hudson. “What do you mean, reanimated? She was fully dead and she came back? How are you sure she wasn’t infected before she rose again? If she was rabid before she was attacked then death’s no guarantee—”

“I meant exactly what I said, yeh little shit—evidence was right in front of my fucking face,” snapped Hudson. “She—and that other one—were still and peaceful enough until they weren’t. Were they waitin’ on us to finish inspectin’ before wakin’ up to say ‘ello? Thought yeh were the brains ‘ere, yeh needlin’ little overanalytical—”

“Commander!” barked Elias, glaring at Hudson from behind his goggles. “Control yourself or I’ll control you. Got it?”

Hudson grunted but calmed himself. Somewhat.

“Eh…sorry, Captain,” he said.

“Not in the mood,” replied Elias. “I’ll fuck up your whole goddamned decade if you’re out of line like that again. Don’t test me. Not today.”

“Acknowledged.”

“Rapid mutation and now reanimation, apparently,” said Noor, the navigator’s mask shifting toward Elias. “Reaction times and conditions volatile. The infection’s evolved, if these changes are proven true.”

“Looks like Grimley was just the start of the fun.” Elias slung his rifle on his shoulder. “Keep this under control. I’m heading back to the cruiser.”

“Aye, sir.”

He passed by Noor and Hudson as they worked on processing Barbara, glancing aside at the body as if she might rise again. Termination, a stake through the heart, as humanity learned to do when they first encountered the seemingly-immortal Ipirians—was sure to put the poor girl to rest from the parasite within her. But he needed her in one piece, just like the others he’d collected during their bizarre series of Home Base missions. It was his duty to return both ranked agents to Union for processing.

Despite all they’d learned of the parasite, reanimation had never been one of the features of the infection. Saluktu was fucking right—and Elias cursed Grimley for that.

There’d be no Harvest celebrations with family and friends that year. Not for Elias. Not for anyone.

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