Apocalypse Ground Zero: Refusing To Leave Home

I stared at the missing section of the map.

Someone had torn it carefully considering everything.

The missing section had been removed with a blade. A straight cut ran along the edge, clean enough to show that whoever held the knife had taken their time. They wanted Gu Han to keep the route to the pumping station while making sure he never saw where the tunnel went after that.

They wanted Gu Han to know how to reach the pumping station.

But they didn’t want him to know what came after. "That seems healthy," I muttered, rolling my eyes.

Zhenlan looked at the torn edge before checking the stack of envelopes again. "There may be another copy."

"Gu Han kept records of everything else," I grumbled, really, really not impressed. What was the point of keeping records if he didn’t keep records of the actually important things?!

"He may not have received one." Because of course Zhenlan was the logical one.

But that was worse.

Gu Han had been arrogant enough to write down every stupid thing he did, but even he hadn’t known where the tunnel ended. He had followed instructions, sent people underground, and waited for someone else to tell him what happened next.

And yet, somehow, that made him even less impressive.

Yuche emptied the rest of the lockbox across the SUV hood. Most of the papers were useless now that Gu Han was dead. Lists of food. Ammunition counts. Names of people he planned to move between houses. Notes about which families complained too much and which men could be trusted with weapons.

Lingyun looked over from the truck seat near the ruined wall. "Anything worth burning?"

"Most of it," I replied, which made him sit up straighter.

Yuche, on the other hand, ignored him and kept sorting.

The people from the cul-de-sac had started moving around us more carefully now. No one came close enough to interrupt, but several watched from the yards while others carried water toward the marked survivors.

The woman with the broken leg had been moved onto a door someone tore from one of the houses. Two people held it level while a third tried to straighten the blankets beneath her.

They were doing a terrible job.

Still, none of them asked me to fix it.

That made them smarter than Gu Han.

The zombies outside the barricades were still a problem, but they had stopped moving as one group. Zhenlan kept the northern road covered with lightning whenever too many reached the metal, while Chenghai moved between the widest openings and threw bodies back into the street.

Yuche had raised enough barriers around the cul-de-sac that the people inside could probably hold the area once we left.

Probably.

But I wasn’t staying long enough to find out.

The old bite in my calf had settled into a deep ache. The newer threads were gone, but something still pulled faintly through the direction of the pumping station.

Not enough to drag zombies.

Just enough to annoy me.

I hated being annoyed.

Zhenlan found another envelope near the bottom of the lockbox. This one had no date on the front, only a small black mark shaped like a circle with a line through it.

He opened it and unfolded a single page.

There were no names.

Only instructions.

Do not enter the western section. Deliveries stop at the second gate. Marked subjects must remain alive until transfer. If they die before collection, leave the bodies and withdraw.

I read it twice.

"Transfer where?" I asked under my breath.

"They didn’t give a location," Zhenlan said.

"Of course there isn’t." Because, once again, the universe hated me.

The page included a rough drawing of the pumping station. One entrance sat above ground near the old filtration building. Another opened into the eastern tunnel beneath it.

Two gates had been marked inside.

The second gate was where Gu Han stopped.

Whatever happened beyond that point belonged to someone else.

Chenghai returned from the northern road and stood beside me, blood and grey matter covering one sleeve. He looked down at the paper without touching it.

"How many deliveries?"

Yuche counted the marked envelopes. "At least six."

"People or bodies?"

"Both."

Lingyun leaned back against the seat again. "That pumping station is starting to sound unpleasant."

"It’s underground, full of infected people, and connected to something that collects them," I pointed. "What part sounded pleasant before?"

"I was trying to stay optimistic."

"You set optimism on fire months ago."

"That was an accident."

It probably wasn’t, but I didn’t care enough to argue.

Zhenlan placed the pumping-station map on top of the others. "We shouldn’t enter today."

I looked at him.

He didn’t tell me I was tired or that my leg hurt. He didn’t need to. The cul-de-sac still smelled like burned zombies, broken drains, and whatever had leaked out of the fused creature. Lingyun’s vest was dark beneath one side, and Chenghai had spent the last twenty minutes throwing dead bodies into walls.

Even Yuche looked tired, although he would deny it if anyone asked.

Going into an unknown tunnel immediately would be stupid.

I disliked that Zhenlan was right.

"We go home first," I said. "Then we figure out what’s past the second gate."

Lingyun raised one hand from the truck seat. "Excellent. I would like painkillers and food."

I looked at him, refusing to admit that I was seriously concerned about the man. "Then it’s a good thing I have a lot of both," I replied.

Yuche closed the lockbox and floated it into the back of the SUV. The maps and envelopes followed, stacked neatly enough that nothing could disappear on the drive home.

The man who had asked whether I was taking over approached again.

He stopped farther away this time which was definitely smart of him.

"We found nine people alive beneath the houses," he said. "Three are in bad condition."

"Then help them."

"We are."

"Good."

He shifted his weight. "What do we do about the tunnels?"

I pointed toward the broken entrances. "Close them."

"With what?"

I looked at Yuche and the man immediately corrected himself. "Right," he continued, frantically nodding his head.

Yuche pulled metal from the ruined trucks and bent it across the open basement entrances. He didn’t seal the prisoners back inside. The survivors had already been carried into the yards. He only closed the paths leading deeper beneath the houses.

The hidden tunnel under Gu Han’s largest house took more metal than the rest.

Something moved far beyond it while Yuche worked.

A slow scrape travelled through the ground, then disappeared west.

I felt it through my roots.

Whatever lived below wasn’t finished.

It was only moving away.

The man beside me heard the sound too. "What was that?" he demanded.

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