Blackout: Book 3 of The Newsflesh Trilogy Read online

  “George—”

  “Don’t argue. You don’t do well on sleep dep. You never have. Now, go to sleep. You have hours to kill before the sun goes down.”

  She was right. I knew she was right, just like I knew she wasn’t there; she was the part of my mind that gave a damn about keeping the rest of me alive. I still took an unimaginable amount of comfort from the feeling of her hand on my shoulder as I fell backward on the bed, eyes still closed, gear still on, and let myself drift off into sleep.

  My dreams were full of screaming. I saw my team die half a dozen times, in half a dozen ways. Oddly, that helped, because every time I saw one of them get killed, I saw something else that wouldn’t work for getting us into the building alive. We were going to need to be careful, and quick, and never hesitate.

  The light in the room was dimmer when I finally opened my eyes. George was gone, but that didn’t matter; she’d be back, and soon. She always came back.

  I went to the bathroom, splashed some water on my face, and then began the final preparations to depart. I was loading my pockets with clips when a speaker hidden somewhere in the room chimed, and the voice of the Agora said, “Mr. Mason, I apologize for the interruption, but Mr. Gowda has been trying to reach you for the past fifteen minutes. I didn’t want to wake you. Will you accept the call?”

  “If I don’t, he’ll probably wind up coming down here to yell at me,” I said, still working. “Hell, I’m surprised he hasn’t already. I’ll take it.”

  “Thank you.” The Agora went silent, followed by another chime.

  “Shaun?” It was Mahir this time, sounding worried. Business as usual, in other words.

  “Hey, Mahir. What’s up? Aren’t you like, three doors down? This takes ‘lazy’ to a new level, don’t you think? Then again, I just spent the whole day asleep, so who am I to talk?” I couldn’t fit any more clips in my pockets. That was a bummer. I picked up my tablet, clipping it to my belt. There was one nice thing about this particular suicide mission: We’d downloaded floor plans for all the major CDC installations as part of our research weeks ago, right before we followed Kelly into the Memphis office and got her killed. Seattle was a major enough office that we had pretty good blueprints. It didn’t show any secret tunnels, but it had the public areas. At least we wouldn’t be lost while we were rushing off to our deaths.

  There was a time when that thought would have made me uneasy, rather than reassuring me. It’s amazing what has become comforting since the start of the Ryman campaign.

  “Alaric tried to get in touch with me.”

  My head snapped up. No one respects radio silence like a Newsie. It’s practically one of their sacred creeds, right alongside “protecting your sources” and “off the record.” “Did he say why?”

  “No, and that’s why I’m concerned. The message he left was basically ‘you know this matters, or I wouldn’t be doing it,’ over and over. I already tried dialing one of his burn phones.”

  “And?”

  “There’s no response. I’ve left a message and sent an e-mail to one of Dr. Abbey’s encrypted addresses, but—”

  “Do you want to stay here and keep trying to reach him while Becks and I go to the CDC?”

  “What? No.” Mahir actually sounded offended. “I didn’t come this far to be left sitting on the stands when things are finally getting interesting. I do intend to return to my career once I’m no longer a wanted fugitive, and the more I can learn, the better my prospects will be.”

  “You’re a natural-born snoop, Mahir,” I said, and picked up my pack. “You ready to blow this taco stand?”

  “Have you ever even seen a taco stand?”

  “Sure. There was one right next to campus. Are you ready to go, Mahir?”

  He sighed, attempts at levity dismissed in an instant. “Yes. Much as I’m afraid of what’s to come, I rather do believe I am.”

  “Good. Meet me in the hall.”

  “Shall do.” There was no dial tone, but something about shape of the silence filling the room told me that he’d hung up. I slung my pack over my shoulder and turned to head for the door. I didn’t look back. There was nothing there to see.

  Becks’s room was between Mahir’s and mine. I had barely finished knocking when her door swung open. “Yes, Mason?” she asked.

  “You ready to go?”

  “As ready as I’ll ever be. I’ve been waiting on you.” She was dressed almost exactly like I was: a charcoal-gray T-shirt, camouflage pants, combat boots, and way too many weapons to be on her way to a tea party. Her hair was slicked back in a tight, no-nonsense ponytail. This wasn’t an expedition intended to be filmed and sold by the download. This was serious work.

  She raised an eyebrow at my assessing look.

  “Something wrong?”

  “No. Just thinking how much it sucks that we can’t post any of this.”

  Her grin was sudden, the flash of white teeth there and gone almost before it had fully registered. “Someday this story is going to make us legends.”

  “Only if it doesn’t make us dead,” I shot back, and then winced, waiting for Georgia to say something. She didn’t. I wasn’t sure whether that was a good sign or not.

  Becks looked at me with concern. She’d clearly seen the wince, and was waiting to see what it was going to mean. “Boss?”

  “I’m good. Come on.” I turned to head for the elevator, waving for her to follow me. With barely a moment of hesitation, she did.

  Mahir met us in the elevator lobby. “Are we ready?” he asked.

  “That is a question for the sages, not for us, Mahir,” I said. “But we’re going either way, so what the fuck does it matter, right?”

  He took that answer in stride. None of us said anything as we got into the elevator and rode down to the lobby. The concierge smiled at us politely, like journalists stormed through his hotel every day. I waved, and we walked on, to the van.

  I had unlocked the doors and was about to get inside when Becks caught my elbow, saying urgently, “The jammer.”

  “… shit.” If the Masons could use that thing to track us—still unproven, but still likely—then so could other people. The Monkey’s people had known we had it. That made it a liability if we were going somewhere sensitive, like, say, the CDC. “Got a hammer?”

  “I’ve got a better idea.” She picked up the jammer, dropping her backpack on the passenger seat, and turned to walk back toward the hotel.

  I blinked. “Mahir? You want to logic that one out for me?”

  “The concierge is supposed to be the hotel’s private on-call miracle worker,” said Mahir, hoisting himself into one of the rear seats. “Presumably, she’s gone to ask him if he has access to an industrial-grade furnace of some sort.”

  “Rich people are weird,” I said, and got into the van.

  Becks returned about five minutes later, looking smugly pleased. She hopped into her seat, pushing her backpack to the floor, and slammed the door before announcing, “The staff of the Agora is more than happy to dismantle any unwanted professional equipment we may have, and can promise the utmost discretion in the destruction of the individual components.”

  “Is there anything money can’t buy?” I asked.

  Immortality, said George.

  I grimaced and started the van.

  The Seattle branch of the CDC wasn’t technically in Seattle at all; it was across the lake, in Redmond. The facility was located on part of what used to be the main Microsoft campus, before the Rising demonstrated every possible flaw in their architecture. The CDC bought the site when the rebuilding of the area was getting underway; it was viewed as a major coup, since at the time, having a CDC installation nearby was seen almost as a magical talisman against further infection. That hasn’t changed much in the last twenty years. People would rather live near the CDC than in areas with good schools or excellent hospitals. The CDC will keep the zombies away.

  I chuckled as I drove, largely because laughter stood a chance o
f keeping me from screaming. Becks kept herself busy cleaning and double-checking her guns, while Mahir monitored the GPS. The only conversation consisted of directions, given quietly and with calm efficiency, like we were going to be graded on how fast we got there. The Cat’s instructions included the location of a secure parking garage formerly connected to a grocery store. The store was long gone, but the garage remained, free-standing and abandoned. With the CDC so close, regular patrols checked the area for signs of zombie infestation. We’d be safe there, as long as the roof didn’t collapse on us.

  No one was in sight as we turned off the road and into a back alley that led to the old employee entrance to the parking garage. I parked in the darkest corner I could find, despite the fact that every instinct I had told me to avoid those shadows. Our headlights didn’t catch any motion. I still signaled for the others to stay quiet as I turned off the engine. It ticked for a few seconds before stilling into silence.

  Nothing moaned or shuffled in the darkness. We were alone. “Clear,” I said.

  “This place gives me the creeps,” complained Becks. “Is there a reason we keep winding up in places that should have stayed in their horror movies?”

  “I guess I just know how to show a girl a good time.” I opened my door, sliding out of the van. My boots crunched on the broken glass and gravel covering the pavement.

  “Then what are you showing me?” asked Mahir.

  “I’m not sexist. I can show a guy a good time, too.” I looked between them. “You all cool?”

  “I’m cool,” confirmed Becks.

  “I haven’t been ‘cool’ since arriving in this godforsaken hellhole you persist in claiming is a civilized nation. I am, however, ready to go violate a few more laws,” said Mahir. “I believe at this point we’re simply waiting on you.”

  I’m ready when you are, said George.

  “I thought you were supposed to keep me out of trouble,” I said, not caring that Becks and Mahir would hear me. We were long past the point where I could get any mileage out of pretending not to be crazy.

  I gave up.

  “Well, folks, even the girl who lives in my head says it’s time to go, so we’d better get moving. According to the directions, we have a quarter-mile to go before we even hit the fence.”

  “Which means total silence and trying not to fall into any unexpected holes,” said Becks dryly. “This isn’t my first rodeo.”

  “No, but it’s mine, so I appreciate the repetition,” said Mahir. “Is the fence likely to be electrified?”

  “Yes, but that’s what these are for.” I held up a pair of rubber clips. “They’ll bridge the current and let us cut through the wire. We’ll have to leave them behind when we run, but at least we’ll be able to run.”

  Mahir eyed the bridgers. “Buffy’s work?”

  “Dave’s.” I smiled a little. “He’d love this shit.”

  “He’d already be halfway to the fence,” said Becks.

  “Whereas we still need to get moving,” said Mahir. “Is there anything else I should know about the area?”

  “Lots of blackberries, very little ground security according to the Cat’s schematics; they don’t patrol all that much. Once we’re inside—”

  “We run, we keep our heads down, and we pray.”

  “I do love it when you have a concrete plan, instead of making it up as you go along,” said Becks dryly. She pulled a pistol from her belt. “Let’s move.”

  The Seattle night seemed surprisingly bright after the darkness of the parking garage, the moon and the distant glow of streetlights providing more than sufficient light. Mahir lagged at first, but found a pace that kept him between me and Becks, all three of us tromping over the broken ground as quickly and quietly as we could.

  The quarter-mile between the van and the CDC was mostly open fields. We hunched over as we crossed them, running low through the tall grass. No floodlights came on to mark our trails, and no alarms went off that we could hear. Arrogance was working in our favor once again—the CDC’s, not ours. They’d been heroes since the Rising, and anyone who tried breaking into one of their installations wound up on trial for treason, if they were lucky. We’d always come in via legitimate entrances, whether we were supposed to be there or not. It had been so long since their external security was tested that they weren’t prepared for a small group of people who really wanted to get inside.

  The fence was only a few yards farther away than I expected; our map was accurate, if not precise. That was a good sign for the rest of the job. I tossed one of the bridging cords to Becks, jerking my chin toward the fence. She nodded, and we approached together, waving for Mahir to stay back. He didn’t argue.

  I told you he was a smart guy when I hired him, said George.

  I held up one finger toward Becks. She nodded, holding up two fingers of her own. When we were both holding up three fingers, we leaned forward and snapped the bridging cords into place. A bright blue spark arced through them, and the air was suddenly filled with the hot, burning tang of ozone. Becks squeaked, and all the hair on my arms stood on end.

  Slowly, I reached forward and wrapped my fingers through the links of fence between the cords. Nothing happened. Our bridge was successful; the current was no longer routing through this patch of fencing. I gestured for the others to come closer and pulled a pair of wire cutters out of my coat pocket.

  It took only a minute, maybe less, for me to cut through the fence separating the Seattle CDC from the abandoned fields behind it. Then we were onto the manicured expanse of their lawn, running for the building, waiting for the sirens to start going off.

  They never did.

  I never thought of myself as a coward before all this. I actually thought I was kinda brave. Choosing to live in the middle of nowhere, where I could be attacked at any moment. But I was lying to myself. I was never brave at all.

  I also wasn’t nearly as stupid as the people I love tend to be. So I suppose that’s something to reassure me as I wave from the window while they all march off to die. God, Buffy, why did you have to hire me? I could have worked for some other site. I would never have gone through any of this. And if you had to hire me—if God insisted—why did you have to go off and leave me to deal with all of it alone?

  —From Dandelion Mine, the blog of Magdalene Grace Garcia, August 1, 2041. Unpublished.

  Hey, George. Check this out.

  —From Adaptive Immunities, the blog of Shaun Mason, August 1, 2041. Unpublished.

  Twenty-one

  Either Dr. Kimberley and her team were monitoring me or their timing was uncannily good, because no one came into the room until I was done crying. I was drying my tears on the sleeve of my shirt when two of the technicians stepped through the door, arguing with each other in low, urgent voices. Neither of them looked in my direction.

  “Hi,” I said, just in case they didn’t know I was there.

  “Hello, Miss Mason,” said the female technician, waving. I still couldn’t see her face, but I recognized her voice. Kathleen. “Is everything all right?”

  “I don’t know if I’d go that far, but things have been worse.” I stood, the muscles in my calves protesting the movement. I’d been sitting still for too long. Everything had started to stiffen up. “Ow, damn.” I bent double, kneading the muscle of my left calf with both hands.

  That’s probably why the first bullet missed me.

  The shooter was using a silencer. There was a muted bang, too soft to be a proper gunshot, and the technician who entered with Kathleen staggered back, slamming into the wall. A red stain was already spreading across the chest of his formerly pristine white lab coat. He looked down at it before raising his head and looking at me, mouth forming a word he couldn’t quite push all the way out into the world. It was George.

  It took the sound of his body hitting the floor to make me start moving. In my experience, once a person goes down, they don’t stay down for long, and when they get back up, they tend to be more inte
rested in eating the flesh of the living than they are in finding out who shot them. I darted forward, grabbing Kathleen’s wrist and yanking her away from the body.

  “Come on!” I shouted.

  “What?” She looked toward me, eyes wide and terrified. “George—”

  “Is dead! Now, let’s get out of here before he decides to wake up and make us dead, too! I’ve been dead; you wouldn’t enjoy it!” I dragged her toward the door on the opposite side of the room, somehow managing to babble and shout at the same time.

  The second shot was as quiet as the first. Kathleen suddenly collapsed, the dead weight of her body pulling her hand out of mine. I turned, looking back at her, and at the hole in the middle of her forehead like a third, unseeing eye. Unlike George, she wouldn’t be rising. A shot to the head kills humans and zombies the same way: stone dead.

  Suddenly aware of how exposed I was—and how alone I was—I drew my own gun and ran out of the room as fast as my legs would carry me. Gregory was in the hall outside, running toward the room that I was running away from.

  “They’re both dead!” I shouted. “What’s going on?”

  “We’re blown!” He put on a burst of speed, closing the distance between us. He grabbed my wrist, turned, and ran back the way he’d come, hauling me the way I’d been hauling Kathleen right before she was shot.

  Sick terror lanced through me as I struggled to keep up. “Is it my fault?”

  “Not unless you called down a full security team while you were trying to get through to the outside world.” Gregory didn’t slow down. “Save your breath. I don’t know how long we’re going to need to run.”

  I didn’t answer. I just ran. Terror had my body flooded with enough adrenaline that I wasn’t in danger of falling down from a cramp in the immediate future. That was the good part. The bad part—aside from the unidentified shooter or shooters—was that I wasn’t out of shape so much as I had never been in shape. My mind remembered hours of exercise, both in the gym and in the field. My body had less than two months of experience. Not the sort of thing that builds endurance. My lungs were already starting to burn, signaling worse things to come.