Devoured by - (ebook reader browser .txt) 📖

“A new civilization can’t thrive while the other is still in power.”

“You call that a civilization? Those people were just trying to stay alive! You’ve killed them all!” He stepped forward, murder on his mind.

Cass put a hand on his chest. “Wait.”

“The woman is in charge—how cute.”

Lance took a deep breath.

“What new civilization? The group of men up the road?” Cass held the pistol steady.

“Of course. The Minutemen always lead the revolution.”

“Minutemen?” Lance asked. “You crazy bastards have a name for yourself? You think you’re somehow a part of an American revolution?”

“We are the Minutemen. We are the revolution. Don’t you see? Those government bureaucrats did this. Now they can claim martial law and control every facet of our lives. We’ve been preparing for this since birth.”

Lance peered through the window at the people in the parking lots. Two of the spotlights pointed directly in the air, no one at the controls. Another fell dark. In the far corner, close to the stadium, a lone light searched the area, catching Vladdies in its path.

Vladdies and the people they were eating alive.

“The government is gone. Everything is gone! You just killed the only people still alive in the city!”

“We’ll build anew.”

“This was a suicide mission for you, wasn’t it?” Cass asked.

“I prepared to die but hoped to live. I can see on your faces that you don’t have what it takes to survive in the new world. The meek will fertilize our crops with their rot.”

Cass shot him in the leg.

The boom surprised Lance, pounding his ears in the small space of the cabin.

“You bitch! You shot me!” The man grabbed at his limb, face scrunched in agony.

Lance dropped his knife on the instrument dash and grabbed the man’s shirt, lifting him to a standing position.

“Is Ralph your leader? Older man with a nephew named Mike and a gorilla that goes by Tony following him around?”

“You’ve met him?”

That was all Lance needed to hear. “Hope you can swim. Good luck when you get to shore. The night isn’t too pleasant anymore.”

He jerked the man around, pointing his back to the door. He shoved him as hard as he could, sending him over the railing. The man toppled backward, falling to the river below. His arm cracked off the side of the ship, rending at the forearm.

Water enveloped him as he thrashed around, struggling to keep his head above the surface.

Cass and Lance watched him from over the railing.

“What’s going on up there?” Eifort stuck her head out from the first floor.

“Throwing out the trash,” Lance said.

The man flopped around, barely staying afloat. He tried to curse at them, but his mouth took in water. His arms slapped at the surface as he swam toward the shore.

They watched him for a few moments, Lance curious to see if he would make it. They would find out whether drowning or being eaten alive was worse.

He hit the shallow slope of the bank and stood out of the water. His knees were still submerged when something exploded from the shore and grabbed him, dragging his flailing body to the rocks.

The screams only lasted a few seconds.

They watched as the last vestiges of Pittsburgh were torn asunder.

The bright lights of the stadium flashed on, temporarily blinding Lance. He squinted, holding a hand up to help with the transition.

Whoops from a helicopter’s rotors came from the stadium. They accelerated, the sound echoing from the empty seats and decks.

Vladdies crawled up the sides of the Steelers’ home field. They moved across the surface with ease, lunging from one handhold to the next. Their strength and speed still amazed and horrified Lance. What place could be safe from them?

They attacked the banks of lights, tearing and smashing at their rear panels.

“Do you see that?” Doc Brown asked from below. “They’re using strategy, as simple as it might be.”

“I see it.” Lance dreaded what would happen if these things continued to grow more intelligent. Were they regaining old memories, or developing new skills?

The whine of the helicopter’s engine reached a crescendo. It rose from the center of the stadium, already banking east before it cleared the top of the lights.

“I guarantee that’s Reynolds. A helicopter has sat on the field, unused, since we got here,” Eifort said. “They told us it needed repairs, but I always thought he was saving it for this exact situation.”

As the chopper continued to rise, flying over the side of the stadium, a shadow lunged from a bank of lights, clutching at one of the skids.

They were too far away to see the details of what happened next, but the wild way the helicopter gyrated in the air told the story. It fell from the sky in a rapid descent, disappearing behind the far side of the stadium.

The crash boomed over the empty city.

As the final lights of Heinz Field blinked out, they watched as hundreds of the Vladdies swarmed over its surfaces. It resembled a beehive, its inhabitants crawling over the exterior.

Lance and Cass climbed down to the first floor, helping the doc to his feet.

“Sergeant?” Cass stood before Eifort.

“Staff Sergeant.”

“Whatever. There is no way that you guys didn’t know about the infected not being able to go over water, right? They had to have figured that out.”

“Of course. Why do you think the fences ran to the edge of the river?”

“I don’t understand why you weren’t evacuating by boats then. Why wait for helicopters to go back and forth?”

“We were. A cargo ship took several hundred people down the river a few days. It was supposed to return yesterday, but it never came back. I know for a fact that Major Reynolds also asked for help from the Navy and the Air Force. But again, we lost contact during the last week or so.”

Cass swore and stood by the railing, staring into the dark water below.

They went inside through a door at the bow. A broad, two-story dining room occupied the majority of the boat’s space. Tables were scattered about, embroidered white clothes on top, chairs surrounding them. The second floor had a wraparound balcony with more tables sitting by the railing.

Doc Brown walked across the dining room and a small dance floor, heading for a bar in the back.

“You alright, Doc?” Lance stayed by the front with Cass. Eifort followed the doctor, her rifle held at the ready.

“I need to clean this wound. I’ll probably get drunk too.”

Lance didn’t like the sullen tone of the man’s voice. It sounded hopeless. Complete and utter despair. As understandable as it was, the man had been caring for thousands of people just three hours ago; Lance knew that they didn’t have time for defeatist attitudes.

That would get them killed.

“Eifort,” he called out. “See if you can find some food. I’m running on fumes here.”

She gave a little wave without looking back.

Cass said, “Check the rest of the boat too. Make sure we don’t get any surprises.”

“Got it.”

“Let’s see if we can steer this thing down the river a ways.” Lance went back to the ladders and climbed to the cabin, Cass in tow.

People cried out from the shore in terror and pain. Their wails moved around, as if they were being dragged across the parking lot.

“Why haven’t they killed them yet?” Lance asked.

“Maybe the Vladdies are saving them for later. Why gorge yourself when you can save food for later?”

The thought of people being stored in the sewers to serve as snacks during the day horrified Lance. They’d barely escaped that fate.

He shoved his emotions aside as best he could and inspected the controls of the boat. The engine still ran, so he didn’t have to worry about that.

The fuel gauge indicated they had three quarters of a tank.

“I don’t know what I’m doing here.”

Cass found a switch that raised the platform on the front of the ship. She pointed at the big lever on the dash. “You already used the throttle earlier.”

Lance managed to get them in reverse and slowly moved the boat backward, spinning the large wheel to rotate the front end around. After several clumsy seconds of trying to get the boat to stop again, he finally got them going forward.

Heinz Field was a shadow in the dark as they moved by. Lance found a button that turned on the front lights of the boat, allowing him to make sure they weren’t going to run aground.

People continued screaming in the night.

“I just want to get down the river a bit so I don’t have to hear them,” Lance said. “I wish we could do something to help.”

“Me too.”

The Fort Duquesne Bridge loomed over the river ahead, barely visible from the boat’s lights. It remained intact, one of the few bridges the military hadn’t destroyed.

The wreckage of the