"Radio check," Doc ordered.

Everyone came back with a good check, their voices m.u.f.fled by the HAZMAT hoods. The chopper was hovering high over Lake Ponchartrain and the causeway bridge that spanned the large Louisiana estuary. The helicopter jerked a little. Sam flew the aircraft with his knees while he put on his hood. The helicopter began its descent. The causeway grew larger below them as Sam carefully adjusted alt.i.tude, starting his hover. Looking out the door below, Doc could see that Sam had picked a good spot. There were three creatures on a hundred-meter section of the causeway, plugged on both sides by multi-car pileups. The helicopter hovered between the roadblocks. On either side of the wrecked cars were hundreds of excited creatures looking up at the hovering helicopter, attracted by the noise, hands reaching for the sky.

The creatures began to crawl over the cars to get to the section of causeway directly below the chopper. Streams of undead converged from both directions. The corpses moved swiftly.

The team wouldn't have much time.

The three men hooked up to the helicopter deck and began to descend with their gear. Even as they lowered themselves down, the three creatures contained between the wreckage began to trot over to their landing area. The rotor blast threw radioactive dust particles in all directions. Without the suits, the operators would no doubt be dead from exposure in hours, and reanimated shortly after. Their orders were surprisingly simple. Extract two undead specimens from two different radiated zones: one exposed to medium-level radiation and another exposed to ground-zero radiation.

The second their boots. .h.i.t the ground, they unhooked their lines. Hammer was fifty feet above, working the controls on the winch line; it slowly descended, bringing the hook down to ground level.

The three creatures moved closer.

Hawse shot the runt of the litter and Billy shot another. They wanted the best specimen-they didn't wish to risk a mission repeat if the specimens were found wanting.

The remaining alpha didn't seem to notice that the other two were no longer part of its pack. The three had likely been trapped on this same section of crumbling causeway since the nuke destroyed New Orleans almost a year ago. Doc aimed his gun at the last creature and pulled the trigger.

The Kevlar net blasted forward from the high-pressure pneumatic gun at over a hundred feet per second. It hit the creature, violently knocking it to the concrete. The creature squirmed about, angrily tearing at the Kevlar netting. Hawse ran over to the net searching for a spot free from the creature's teeth and hands. He found one and quickly dragged the thing over to the winch line and hook. The rotor wind continued to whip them about. Sounds of radioactive sand and dust particles ticking at their hood visors were audible, even over the helicopter wash. Making sure the hook was grounded, Doc attached the winch line to the Kevlar netting and backed away, raising his thumb to Hammer high above. Hammer returned a thumb and the winch line began to raise the netted and furious creature up to the bird.

Hammer soon radioed down to Doc. "It's secure."

"Roger, lower the winch. Do not descend. You'll just get more dust in the chopper."

Hammer lowered the winch and pulled the three operators back up into the aircraft. Inside the bird, the caged monster jerked about, gnashing its teeth on the metal. Its white, hollow eyes followed the men while they prepared for the next specimen extraction.

The helicopter lurched toward the ruins of New Orleans to the south, to ground zero. No building or cell tower taller than twenty-five feet remained. The nuclear blast ordered by the government as a last-ditch effort had decimated everything-including the levees. New Orleans was now a decayed, radioactive swamp. Moving south along the sh.o.r.e, Sam and the team scouted a place to extract the next and final specimen.

"Interstate 610 is just below. I won't go as low as we did over the causeway. It's a lot hotter down there," Sam told Doc.

"I don't blame you, Sam. Check out that on-ramp," Doc said, pointing through the c.o.c.kpit gla.s.s.

Sam lowered the helicopter down, closer to the I-610 on-ramp. "Yeah, that'll probably work. You're gonna have to take care of that business down there first."

"Hawse is already on it," Doc said, pointing back to the cargo area where Hawse lay in the p.r.o.ne at the open side door, with a LaRue Tactical 7.62 sniper rifle welded to his cheek. The 10x optic would provide Hawse a crystal-clear magnified view of the situation on the ground. Sam began to orbit around the LZ like an AC-130 Spectre gunship. Hawse went to work. Billy had a shoulder bag full of twenty round 7.62 mags ready to feed the gun.

Looking through the binoculars, Billy started calling out targets and estimated range. "North side of black Subaru Forester, near hood, two-hundred."

Hawse exploded the creature's neck and face, sending the head flying on a volleyball-serve trajectory. White fragments of bone sprayed the hood of the Subaru, resembling artwork that might have sold at auction years earlier for thousands. Hawse slowly exhaled just before taking the next shot. Billy kept calling them out and Hawse kept popping their heads, missing some as the helicopter pitched and orbited. This wasn't easy shooting.

The undead were now attracted to the helicopter noise and most had moved away from the target area.

The team needed to be fast, as the helicopter noise would draw the creatures back to the extraction point quickly. Hawse stowed the 7.62 gun and unslung his orange-stripe-painted M-4 carbine. It was easy to lose your carbine in the crowd when everyone carried them. Sam nosed the bird forward and the men once again made ready to rappel into h.e.l.l. Masks were secured in place for the descent as they hovered one hundred feet above the radioactive mess below.

"Okay, hook up, let's get this over with!" Doc screamed loudly into his radio over the rotor noise.

"h.e.l.l yeah. Let's do this. Warm shower here I come!" Hawse yelled as he hooked up and stepped off the helicopter into the wind.

The other two followed, leaving Hammer behind. Their descent was twice as far this time, a prudent precaution based on the radiation levels they were dipping into. The rotor wash wasn't as bad when they touched down, but the deadly particles still swirled in lethal dust devils around their faces.

Billy was looking over at the Big Easy, what was left of her. Most of it was covered in water and radioactive sludge. He could see thousands of creatures slogging through the shallow muck in their direction, waves of them, all converging on the noise epicenter of the rotor blades and helicopter engines. The creatures left a V-shaped wake behind as they waded through the slimy, disease-infested, and radioactive water. All wake tips pointed in their direction.

"f.u.c.king wasteland," Billy said loudly as he readied his AK-47.

The radiated creatures were closing fast.

Hawse raised his carbine, aiming through his ACOG optic. The optic's bullet drop was calibrated for military 5.56 ammunition and the crosshairs were graduated for the appropriate drop. No math required. Just match the width of the ACOG reticle to the creature, aim high for the head, pull the trigger, and down goes the body on the other end-in theory. Hawse neutralized four. Billy went to work with his Afghan-liberated AK-47 war trophy and took out three more.

No one was running suppressed for this mission-there was no need. The helicopter noise eliminated that possibility. Doc took down four more with his carbine, leaving two. He slung the M-4 over his back and reached for the pneumatic net gun, ensuring the capture net was properly loaded and positioned on the gun. Both Doc and Billy shot at the same time. Billy took out the creature that was closing on Doc, and Doc netted his target specimen. Mission accomplished, almost.

They stood in a low stance with their backs to the netted creature and watched as the locust-like swarm of undead approached from all directions. By gust of wind, the winch hook contacted the netted creature, shocking it fiercely. Its eyes bulged, and it bellowed and clawed in anger. The built-up static from the helicopter would have knocked one of the men off their feet if not grounded before contact. Now that the electricity was discharged from the hook, Hawse connected the corpse to the net and watched the captured creature spin about and rise the hundred feet to the helicopter door. The NOLA swarm was building and getting closer, the moans overpowering the rotor blades above. The knee-deep water seemed to boil with movement two hundred meters out.

Billy started to engage with the AK-47. The 7.62x39 round had a bit more punch than Doc's or Hawse's M-4 carbines, but the AK was somewhat less accurate. You couldn't tell with Billy behind the gun-he was dropping them at two hundred plus meters with iron sights.

The creatures were closing fast, hundreds, perhaps a thousand of them now.

Billy noticed a shadow flash by in front of him and jumped away from the group. Both Hawse and Doc were knocked to the ground, the wind pushed out of their lungs-the creature they had just captured and sent up to the helicopter had fallen one hundred feet to the ground, free from the netting, with Hammer in its grip.

Hammer's left arm was clearly broken, a piece of bone jutting from his forearm. Doc couldn't tell if the break was from the fall or the creature's grip. The thing had bitten him severely. His neck was leaking blood in cadence with his rapid heartbeat.

Hammer reached down to his waist to retrieve the only weapon he had on him when he fell-his tomahawk.

The radiated creature wrestled with Hammer.

The NOLA swarm was a hundred yards out.

Tears of fear and rage flashed in Hammer's eyes when he gripped the Micarta scales of the handle and swung the hawk, driving the spike deep into the creature's cranium, dropping it instantaneously. Hammer's mask had been torn off by the creature before he fell-mortally wounded, already exposed to lethal doses of New Orleans radiation.

As Doc and Hawse recovered and pulled themselves off the ground, Billy grabbed clotting agent from his med kit and quickly slapped it on Hammer's neck. He applied a bandage to put some pressure on the wound. It would at least buy him some time.

Before anyone asked, Hammer laboriously held his neck wound and said, "They're strong and fast. Ripped . . . right through the net."

Some blood dripped from Hammer's mouth as he spoke.

Hammer looked over to Billy. "Trade me." He handed Billy his b.l.o.o.d.y tomahawk and Hammer took Billy's AK. "We still got a mission. I'm not gonna last long. I'll let one through so you can bag it. Reload that net gun and let's go."

Doc was shaken by Hammer's ghostlike appearance. He had no clue as to how Hammer kept conscious. Doc compartmentalized the horror of seeing his teammate's life force fade in front of his eyes. He'd somehow save the emotions for later.

The three hugged Hammer and shook his hand before saying good-bye. There was no time for more. Hammer nodded to all three and turned to engage. He managed to get to the nearest front of undead and began shooting.

Doc reloaded the net gun and radioed up to Sam, "Bring her down or we're all dead!"

Sam didn't bicker. Inside of thirty seconds, the helicopter was hovering ten feet above the team, kicking dust, debris, and walking dead everywhere.

Hammer fought with everything that was left in him, emptying his magazine, allowing one creature through to attack the others near the hovering helicopter. Doc bagged the creature and all three men hurriedly dragged it inside the flying machine. Hammer was right-these radiated abominations were stronger than anything he'd encountered. It nearly breached the fresh net in the time it took the three of them to throw it in the steel cage. It was now no mystery how the second specimen got through the net; it had a hundred feet of winch ascent to rip and claw before getting to Hammer. Doc estimated that the strength of the second specimen must have been many times that of the first from the causeway.

The rest was a blur. They had both their snarling, powerful specimens securely stored in the hardened, part.i.tioned steel cages. The helicopter gained alt.i.tude. Doc asked Sam to hold at two hundred feet. The team watched the scene below as Hammer was making his last stand against the undead with only his knife. He stabbed and slashed and killed three more before they rushed him. Doc moved to the rack, grabbed the scoped LaRue 7.62 and went p.r.o.ne. Through the gla.s.s, he confirmed that Hammer was dead, the creatures viciously feeding on his warm, radioactive remains. Anger shot through Doc's body and he cursed them all to h.e.l.l before paying final respects to Hammer with a sniper round through his skull. Hammer would not become one of those things down there. He hoped that Hammer would have done him the same courtesy. Doc looked out over the decimated and decaying NOLA skyline.

Doc sat up in his rack and checked his watch out of habit. It was 1400. He was confused for a second. Is Hammer alive? Where am I? he asked himself until the total recall made a retreat back to the dark nook of his mind. Doc was back in his Hotel 23 bunk, where Hammer was dead and the undead still ruled.

11.

Kil, Saien, and Monday stepped into the secure compartmented information facility. There was nothing special, no supercomputers whirring in the corner, no real-time video satellite feeds for an army of a.n.a.lysts to sift through. The equipment was old and overengineered. Kil entered a room marked SSES.

The four men that had fast-roped onto the sub with them were inside.

"I know this place," said Kil.

"How so?" Monday asked.

"Transmitted a few messages to SSES in better times," Kil answered reluctantly.

"Well, we're not exploiting many foreign signals in here these days. We still have a linguist spinning and grinning in the corner over there when we need him, but no one seems to be transmitting much of anything anymore."

"What's he speak?" asked Kil.

"Chinese."

"I guess that'll come in handy in a few weeks, huh?" Kil probed.

"Yeah, maybe sooner. Sit tight-you'll be happy to know that the navy still runs on PowerPoint in the apocalypse. We'll need to boot up our systems and log in to the standalone JWICS computer before we start. Might take a minute."

Leaning over to Kil, Saien whispered, "What's JWICS?"

"It's another Internet, one you've never seen and likely never heard of. It wasn't a secret that the government had it before this went down. It's just a secret what information is shared on it. Nothing too conspiratorial; back in the days before this, you could get most of it from mainstream news or other online sources."

"Like who killed Kennedy and all that?"

"No way," Kil said, briefly reminded of his mother. She'd had a habit of asking him about those kinds of conspiracy theories, considering his vocation. "Nothing like that, just regular old sensitive information. The good stuff was on the White House Situation Room LAN or on some intranet in some unmarked Northern Virginia building. I never wanted access to that. Fewer fingernails I'd lose if I got shot down somewhere."

Monday stepped to the front of the room, interrupting Kil. "Good afternoon. For those that don't know me, my name is Commander Monday. I'm going to talk to you for a bit before you go through the formal read-in process. I can count the number of times I've given this brief on one hand. For the four of you from our special-operations community-I want to thank you for your service."

One of the men nodded a response from the back of the room.

Monday gestured to Kil and Saien. "Also, for those of you that don't know . . . these two survived on the mainland for almost a year. Pretty remarkable, considering the odds."

"Bulls.h.i.t," one of the other men muttered.

Monday continued. "Let's get to business. It may seem a little unorthodox for a naval intelligence officer to just come out and ask, but please raise your hand if you believe in G.o.d."

Neither Kil nor Saien raised their hands; only one from the other group broke from the majority. Kil wanted to, he just wasn't quite ready.

"I see. I suppose that might make this at least a little easier in some ways. You see, what I'm about to tell you cannot be untold. I'm going to be saying that again in the next few minutes. You must understand that from childhood to adolescence to adulthood many of you were raised on certain paradigms and unshakeable principles-established cultural norms. The sun rises in the east and sets in the west, what goes up must come down, the house always wins, etcetera, etcetera. Sometimes when we are exposed to template-altering data that cannot be refuted, it has odd effects on the mind. Do any of you remember the day you discovered that there was no Santa Claus?"

Everyone in the room nodded that they remembered, even though Saien didn't.

"Well, imagine that multiplied a few dozen times." Monday paused for a long minute, looking at each and every man in the room. "This may be the last time I say it or I may say it a hundred more times, it depends on if I think you need to hear it again. Once you are told this, you cannot be untold. Do all of you understand this?"

They all nodded as if they might, but Monday didn't seem so sure.

"Okay, that's it. You're about to get punched in your philosophical gut. I've reviewed your records, all but yours, Saien, but we've already discussed that. You're only seeing this by the direct authorization of the admiral, and subsequently, this boat's captain. If it were up to me, you wouldn't be here, I want that to be clear."

Saien gave no reaction to Monday's statement. The four special operators whispered back and forth. Kil couldn't understand what they were saying.

"All right, here goes."

Monday activated the display. A yellow banner at the top and bottom of the large, wall-mounted LED screen showcased numerous warnings.

"The overall cla.s.sification of this briefing is top secret, SI, TK, G, H, SAP Horizon, and everything else you can think of. I'd like to welcome all of you to the Horizon Program." Monday clicked to the next slide.

08 JUL 1947-Recovery Activity Uintah Basin, Utah T O P S E C R E T // CRITIC CRITIC CRITIC.

YANKEE 08 JUL 1947.

FROM: SECRETARY OF WAR.

TO: PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.

SUBJECT: RECOVERY ACTIVITY.

VESSEL RECOVERED. FOUR IN CONTAINMENT. ONE ALIVE, EN ROUTE, WRIGHT FIELD.

DECEPTION OPERATION UNDERWAY. DEBRIS STAGED, ROSWELL, NM.

. . . PATTERSON SENDS . . .

T O P S E C R E T // CRITIC CRITIC CRITIC.

12.

Somewhere Inside the Arctic Circle-Outpost Four Minus 70. Cold enough to freeze a man's bare face in seconds. Life existed here at U.S. Research Outpost Four at the mercy of technology and fifty-five-gallon diesel drums. Nearly a year had pa.s.sed since the dead broke the known laws of nature and physics. The remaining survivors of the outpost were now inside their second wintering over without resupply. Most of their forty-five-man crew had abandoned the outpost last spring, choosing to hike a hundred miles south to the nearest thin ice and what they hoped might be pockets of surviving civilization. Most of them were never seen again. A few did wander back to the outpost, perhaps out of instinct or habit. They looked the same as all the others: milky white and frosted eyes, heads frozen forward, hungry.

Outpost Four experienced the fall of civilization one high-frequency transmission at a time. High frequency was the only semi-reliable means of communication this far north. The sat-phones had worked in the first months after the anomaly, but they eventually failed as satellite orbits decayed with the rest of technology dependent upon a complex and fragile infrastructure.