The Dying of the Light (Book 1): End (18 page)

That doesn’t sound like Tom at all, I thought. Even now, he’d normally be comforting us, too. So either he’s not there, or…

I stiffened, turning to Kim. “Come on.” I said, grabbing her hand and running from the room, pulling her after me. We ran down the short barracks hallway, and I began pounding on Reynolds’ door.

“Come on, Tom, answer me. I know you’re in there. Just open up so we can talk.”

Kim looked at me, worried. Other squad members and personnel were appearing out of barracks rooms and from outside, and Dalton and Rachel popped out of the room next door. Kim stripped off her ACU jacket to cover Rachel, who blushed as she realized she’d left her room in her distinctly non-Army-issue nightwear. She hid behind Gaines, who looked at me in fear. I didn’t see Angelo anywhere, but chances are he was sacked out, dead to the world. So to speak.

No one in the group had ever seen me this focused, this
scared
before, and I think I frightened them as much as myself. I turned to Gaines, and gestured to the door.

“I need this door down now, big guy.”

Dalton didn’t hesitate, trusting in me to know what was right. One well-aimed kick just above the door’s handle, and his massive tree-trunk legs and bare foot slammed the door open, a shower of splinters and a screech of tortured metal announcing our entry. I rushed into the room.

Empty.

“We need to find him. Quick,” I said. “Check everywhere.”

Barefoot, I exploded out of the barracks door, grabbing the first guard I saw as Kim came out after me.

“Reynolds. Have you seen him?”

“Who, sir?” asked the young guard, perplexed.

“Reynolds! Tom Reynolds!”

“Oh! Captain Reynolds headed toward the lake, sir.” I started to run off, but stopped as the guard continued. “Sir, he didn’t look… well, sir, he looked a bit off. And he had his issue sidearm with him, sir.”

Kim and I exchanged glances and took off for the lake. I had a feeling I knew exactly where he was going.

The picnic area was large, but not
that
large. We found Reynolds sitting on top of a park bench, staring towards the lake. I noticed the bottle of Jack Daniels in his left hand, the pistol in his right. Waving Kim back, I approached slowly.

“Hey, buddy,” I said, moving closer.

“Stop right there, David,” he said, putting the barrel of the gun under his chin, clearly intending to stop me. It worked.

I took a deep breath, and sat down on the grass nearby. “Talk to me, Tom. I’m here to listen.”

He looked right through me for a moment, but then brought his eyes to meet mine and I could see them glisten with unshed tears.

“I thought I could do this, David. I thought I could handle it,” he said. I said nothing, merely listening and waiting for him to continue. “During the mission, I was okay. I heard him go down, and I was like a robot. Didn’t feel anything. Just another resource for us, gone in a heartbeat.”

He swallowed, and the tears started to fall. “In the C-17, I was fine. In the briefing room, I was fine. Walking back to the barracks… fine. Then I get to my bunk, and I see all his gear, and…” He lowered the pistol, pointing it at the ground and scrubbing at his eyes with the back of his other hand, spilling quite a bit of the whiskey in the process.

“I lost it, David. I don’t remember when I picked up the gun, but it doesn’t matter. How am I supposed to keep this up? What’s the point? You’ve seen the numbers, you know what’s going to happen. It’s inevitable.”

I took another deep breath, and just listened. Rebecca, my long-gone fiancée, had told me I was a great listener; now was the time to prove it.
That’s a conversation I need to have
, I realized and glanced at Kim standing off to the side.
Speaking of secrets never told. Not going to go well, that conversation
.

Unfortunately, Tom saw the look I darted at her, and grimaced. “See? You have someone. I don’t. Not anymore. Those damned walkers took him from me. I hate them so much.”

“I understand, Tom, believe me.”

“You can’t understand!” he yelled, swinging the gun in my direction. My heart nearly stopped. “No one here can! It’s not just the walkers, either. It’s that asshole Ames. Fucking redneck homophobe.”

This is it. This is where I come in.

“That motherfucker?” I said. “I’ll kill him. If Anderson doesn’t do it first. What’d he do now?”

“No, it’s not…”

“Screw that,” I said, interrupting him. “We’ve got too much to deal with without having some bigoted shithead causing more problems.”

“It’s just a couple taunts, David. He’s obviously trying to control…”

“Bullshit!” I yelled, as angry as I’d ever been in front of Tom. “I’m tired of this shit. He had his one warning, as far as I’m concerned. I’m going to fuck this asshole up, right now.” I stood, moving quickly to Tom’s side. At this point, he was so amazed to see me this angry, he wouldn’t have noticed a full marching band behind him. He barely flinched as I took the gun from him, racking the slide. “I’m gonna find him, and when I find him, I’m gonna kill that motherfucker, because this is just too much.”

I turned to storm off, and got about three paces before I heard a very unexpected sound behind me: laughter.

“Oh, you marvelous bastard,” said Tom.

I turned, the pistol held at my side, pointing down.

“Bastard? What did you just call me?” I said, hoping against hope that it had worked.

“You are one crafty son of a bitch, David Blake,” he said, all but falling off the park bench as he stood up and took a swig from the bottle. “You had me going, there. Totally, 100 percent fooled.”

I handed the gun to Kim as she came up next to me, and she turned to head off the crowd who had crept up, including our Alpha squad teammates.

“Why, Mr. Reynolds, whatever do you mean?” I asked, affecting my best — and worst — ‘southern belle’ accent.

Drunk though he was, Tom was still in possession of some of his faculties. “You got the gun away from me.”

“I did.”

“Because you never get mad.”

“Hardly ever.”

“So I was surprised.”

“You definitely were.”

He laughed again, and hugged me so tight I could barely breathe. “Thank you.”

“You realize, of course, that I may have shit my pants when you pointed that gun at me.”

“Just means you’re a pussy.”

“Fuck you, man,” I said, laughing, and I was relieved when he joined me. “We need you, Tom. All of us, even that asshole Ames, though he doesn’t know it. Don’t quit on us now, dude.”

He looked at me, and I had the sense that once again, that I was being weighed and measured. I must’ve passed the test, because he nodded and smiled. “Okay. I’ll stick around for a while. After all, someone has to save you from yourselves.”

“Kiss my ass, ya fuckin’ queer.”

“Ha! Now you’re gettin’ it!” One arm around my shoulders, and the other around Kim’s, we walked back towards our squadmates, who crowded around us. Tom slapped Gaines on the back, glancing at the now fully-attired Rachel, who rolled her eyes and smiled.

Obviously one of those new bunking situations was working out well, I thought.

Back in the barracks, I sat back down on my bunk, Kim next to me. I wrapped my arms around her and pulled her close. She suddenly looked up at me, worried.

“David, you’re shaking! What’s wrong?”

I put a hand out in front of me, and I marveled at how shaky it was. “Must be adrenaline, I guess. I’ve never been so scared.”

“How’d you know what to do?”

I snorted. “I didn’t have a
clue
what to do, Kim. I wanted to shout at him, to slap him, to tell him anything that would help. He either had to stand or fall on his own, and then I realized that if I could just get to him, just snap him out of that world of grief and pain he’d built for even a second, then maybe I’d have a chance.”

“Well, it worked.”

“Yeah, I guess it did.”

She looked at me sidelong for a moment, and I couldn’t read her expression. “Seems like Dalton and Rachel are doing well, doesn’t it?”

“Yes, it sure does. Of course, she
is
pretty hot, so…”

I laughed as she pinched me and smiled, and then it was her turn to laugh as I tickled her relentlessly. Her giggles had turned into pleas for mercy when there was a loud banging on the wall from next door, and we heard the voice of Powell.

“Keep it down, ya lousy sons-of-bitches!”

Kim and I both turned to the wall and echoed each other without meaning to. “Fuck off, Powell!”

We collapsed laughing, and Powell swore. A few seconds later, we heard his door open and close and his retreating footsteps down the hallway.

“Probably going to sleep in the motor pool,” I snickered.

Kim turned to me, and the moonlight coming through my window framed her beauty as she pulled her t-shirt off over her head. “Now that he’s gone…” She smiled as she pushed me back on the bed, and then squealed as I flipped her over and kissed her.

They say that there’s a connection between sex and death; I’m not sure if it’s true, but I certainly wasn’t going to find out tonight. The base alarm sounded, the loud “whoop, whoop” of the general alert startling me out of bed so fast I dumped Kim on her ass on the floor.

She didn’t even blink as she pulled her shirt back on, along with the rest of her uniform, and she was out the door with me as we mustered in front of the barracks. Commander Anderson came running up to us, and Kim saluted. Anderson returned her salute.

“Well done, Barnes. We’ve had a breach in the lab section. Outfit your team and get them over to Building 8 ASAP. The other teams are gearing up, but they’ll be backup.”

“Yes, sir!” Kim said, turning to me even as I was giving the order to gear up.
A good XO knows when to give orders, and when not to
. Kim had taught me that.

“Alright, you heard the man. Gear up! Two minutes!” I joined the rush into the barracks, and grabbed my gear and Kim’s as Anderson continued the briefing. I was proud of our team as we reassembled with twenty or thirty seconds to spare, ready for action. Anderson had vanished, evidently gone ahead to take charge of the situation or to meet with the colonel. Kim looked us up and down.

“Team! Prepare to move out!” We moved into marching order, and I was filled with pride once again as we readied ourselves. “Move out! Double-time!”

We made it to Building 8 in less than four minutes, passing through the perimeter that had already been set up by the other teams. Kim stopped us at the main entrance to the medium-sized building. “Bravo and Delta squads, cover the other two exits.” Janet Turner and Jake Powell took their squads off to either side of the building, and Kim turned to Greer, Charlie squad leader and CO of 2
^nd
Team. “Greer, take the fire escape on the west side. Wait for my signal for entry.”

Maxwell trotted up with Anderson in tow as Greer and his team moved out. Anderson raised his radio and the alarm finally cut off.

“Major, we have a serious situation here,” said Maxwell.

“Yes, sir. I assumed so, sir.”

Kimberly was in her no-nonsense mode, but Maxwell chuckled all the same. “Of course. Apparently one of the technicians responsible for feeding Chauncey got lazy, and got bit.”

We all sucked in an involuntary breath at that point, realizing what that could mean for the rest of the lab personnel.
Hopefully containment held. I don’t want to have to shoot any more friends.

“Unfortunately, despite the guard hitting the alarm, the tech managed to get out. Apparently the motor on the secure door was faulty and it didn’t close fast enough.” A guard was always on duty near the Army version of a ‘panic button,’ and all the doors were supposed to close super-fast and automatically. The system was supposedly tested on a regular basis, but sometimes maintenance wasn’t done.

And now we’ve got a brand-new specimen. Won’t Gardner be happy.

“He’s locked in the main specimen room for the moment. You’ll go in and take him out, along with anyone else who’s been compromised.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Well, major, don’t let me keep you.”

Kim didn’t even redden. “No, sir. Alpha squad, move out!” We entered the main doors into the brightly-lit corridors of the scientific heart of AEGIS. Moving fast, we headed towards the rear of the building, where the specimens were all kept. As we passed the main corridor, I noticed the door to Dr. Adamsdóttir’s office. It was closed and locked, and the lights off; I hoped that she had left for the evening already.

Suddenly we heard screaming from the direction of the specimen room. “Charlie Six, go,” Kim whispered into her mike, and waved us forward. We picked up the pace. As we reached the outer door for the room, Reynolds and Gaines covered the hallway, and Eaton and I readied ourselves as Kim reached for the door, Martinez on its other side. Another scream blasted forth from inside, but none of us were fazed; we might as well have been made of ice for all the effect it had. We had a job to do; nothing else mattered.