Page 3 of Marked Omega

There is a moment of silence, and then a reply comes back. The voice is flat and scratchy with radio static.

“Acknowledged Sword of Fire. Preparing to open the gate. Please hold.”

Sara and I both lurch forward against our seatbelt harnesses as Bishop brings the transport to an abrupt stop. The heavy treads of the tires crunch to a halt on the weathered rockcrete pavement. Leaning forward in my seat, I gaze out through the dusty windshield.

Now the wall looms over us. Fifty feet of pitted steel paneling, the old rivets trailing brown rust where the rain has dripped and corroded the metal.

High atop the imposing structure, dark-clad security troops move about on the parapets. Every twenty yards or so are stationed massive 50-caliber machine guns on tripods aimed into the zone on the far side of the wall. Some of the troops appear to be shouldering sniper rifles, grenade launchers, and even flame throwers.

Is all that firepower really necessary to keep the beasts on the other side at bay? The thought makes me shudder again.

Then I notice a sound. I feel it deep in the marrow of my bones before my ears actually pick it up. It is like a low, excruciating groan. The sound of massive gears cranking back the impenetrable steel gate.

Slowly the broad metal surface slides aside until all that’s left is a gaping maw revealing the quarantine zone. To my surprise, the landscape on the other side of the wall appears identical to the side we are on.

Somehow, I thought Hell would look different.

Well, I know better than that. I know all about the feral Alpha beasts that are lying in wait on the other side.

“You may proceed, Sword of Fire,” the comm unit hisses.

“Acknowledged.” Bishop glances back at us passengers in the rear-view mirror. “All right, we’re going in.”

The transport lurches forward slowly, tires grinding against the pavement.

Going in.

The phrase is accurate. The quarantine wall surrounds an enormous area comprising hundreds of thousands of square miles, containing the twisted mutants and keeping them from escaping into the outside world.

But somehow, it feels like the other way around. I have a feeling that I have spent my life inside the protective barrier of the civilized world, and now I am venturing into the outer darkness.

A shadow passes across the blast resistant arma-glass of the vehicle’s windshield as we roll beneath the arch of the gate. As soon as the back tires have passed the threshold, the gate immediately begins rumbling shut behind us.

That feeling of terror returns, sitting heavily in the pit of my stomach like I’ve swallowed a chunk of ice. I resist the temptation to melt it with another nihiloxin tablet. I need to keep my wits sharp from here on out.

Bishop hits the throttle, and we speed ahead down the road.

After a minute, I turn to look back at the wall receding behind us into the distance. Already the troopers manning the 50-cal guns looked like small black bugs.

This is it. We are in the zone.

CHAPTER 2: LILY

“Levels?” Bishop grunts as he steers.

A few miles in, the highway became too clogged with the rusted-out carcasses of cars left behind during the cataclysm, so Bishop took us off-road. Now the vehicle is jolting over the uneven terrain, rocking me violently in my seat harness. I glance over at Sara, and she is clutching the arm rest of her own seat tightly. Even with that nihiloxin in her system, she’s rattled as hell, and I don’t blame her. I’m right there with her.

Dr. Lucian, on the other hand, seems totally at ease. Even though he’s shaking and bouncing in his seat up front, he manages to tap the glossy screen of the data slate that he’s holding in his lap, scrolling through an array of tables and digital charts—information streaming in from the sensors mounted on the roof of the vehicle.

“Looks like the levels are at…three fifty,” he calmly answers Bishop. “We still need to go a little deeper.”

Bishop nods and jams the accelerator down even harder.

Three hundred and fifty. He must be talking about the levels of omega contamination outside the vehicle right now. That’s high enough that we would all become warped mutants within a matter of minutes were it not for the protective shielding built into the armor of this vehicle.

Close to the barrier wall, the radiation levels are low, almost zero. Certainly not enough to lead to mutation. Still, the wall guards wear environmental gear as a precaution. But the closer you get to ground zero, the contamination levels and the risk of mutation increase quickly.

Ground zero. That’s where the cataclysm started nearly a century ago.