The camera’s view became obscured as someone entered the cockpit. Alex quickly zoomed out to the full view again, and they watched as the person began to tap commands into a touchscreen near the pilot’s seat.

“Power-down sequence,” Alex noted. “The camera is tapped into the flight computer’s power line. We’ll lose our feed in a minute.”

The person in the cockpit tensed suddenly and dropped to a crouch. The muffled sounds of machine-gun fire thumped through the speaker.

Outside, the gathered soldiers were shooting in all directions. Rapid muzzle-flashes lit up the surrounding trees like lightning.

A human dressed all in black was among the fighters, Russell saw. He quickly realized “human” might not be accurate. The being clawed and punched with terrifying speed. Bodies fell with each blurred swing of the thing’s arm.

Some of the fighters broke and ran, one toward the aircraft and another toward the cover of the trees. But a second creature emerged from the foliage, galloping on all fours. It pounced on the back of the nearest fleeing enemy, and the pair collapsed into a rolling ball of flailing limbs.

The creatures moved like subhumans. Russell knew that, and yet their appearance was very different. They were clad from head to toe in some kind of skintight black outfit.

A bloodbath unfolded on the screen. Russell saw one of Tania’s fighters stagger away from the carnage, his environment suit torn to shreds, both hands clutching at his neck, where blood flowed freely. One of the creatures spotted the man and raced over to him. It swung, raking a hand across the back of the man’s head. The poor bastard collapsed in a sickening heap, dead before he hit the ground.

The man in the cockpit stepped backward, blocking much of the view. A third creature appeared in front of the plane, illuminated fully by the landing lights. The black material it wore seemed to have hardened panels, like armor plating.

As Russell watched, a flash of red light appeared to emanate from the creature’s eyes, as if it had trained a laser on the cockpit window.

Then it jumped.

In a split second the being reappeared right outside the window, clinging to the fuselage. It tilted its head at the cowering man in the cockpit. Then it raised one hand and placed it on the glass. Light erupted from the creature’s palm in a blinding flash. The tempered glass shattered into a thousand tiny pieces, but it held its shape.

A black-clad fist punched a hole straight through the thick barrier. The hand then swiped violently, knocking the shards away, and the creature was inside. It dove on the man and the two fell out of the camera’s view.

The sound of the man in the cockpit being torn to pieces was so revolting that Russell reached out and turned the volume down. Alex sat perfectly still, making no effort to stop him.

Outside the aircraft, the battle was already over. Broken bodies lay everywhere, and the armored, outfitted subhumans were gone, vanished into the forest as quickly as they had appeared. Not twenty seconds had passed since the first shots were fired.

The instruments and screens in the cockpit started to go blank, and the landing lights turned off, plunging the grisly scene outside into darkness.

A second later the feed ended.

Russell swallowed. He realized he’d put a hand on Alex’s shoulder and gripped the man’s shirt in a white-knuckled fist. He let go and stepped back. “What the hell did we just see?”

Alex half-glanced over his shoulder. He opened his mouth to say something, and then snapped it shut and looked back at the blank monitor.

“I mean,” Russell said, “what the actual fuck? And what were those towers?”

“I’m not sure I want to know,” Alex replied, his voice laden with naked dread.

A long silence followed. When Russell finally got his breathing under control, he began to chuckle.

The chuckle turned into a rolling, uncontrollable laugh.

Alex turned to him. “What’s so funny?”

“Tania,” Russell replied. “She. Is. Screwed. Totally, utterly, royally screwed!”

The dire look on Alex’s face only made him laugh harder.

Chapter 16

Darwin, Australia

5.MAY.2283

SAMANTHA TOOK ONE last swig of her cider and flipped the cup over on the bar.

“Done,” she said.

Woon bobbed his head at her, his constant smile almost hidden beneath the long white beard and mustache he wore, both extending down to his waist. He spoke very little English, and Sam knew only a few words of Mandarin. This left their conversations one-sided, with Samantha blathering on about whatever she felt like talking about, and Woon just nodding. His smile seemed painted on, and even if she launched into a lengthy, solemn diatribe about the fates the rest of her crew had suffered, his grin never faltered.

She pointed at the glass with two fingers, her thumb up to create a mock handgun. “My tab,” she stated, and winked at him.

Woon, of course, nodded. His eyes, so narrow they looked closed, still managed to twinkle in the dim room.

Samantha climbed off her stool, yawned, and stretched. She dropped to the floor and rattled off ten push-ups in rapid succession, then flipped over onto her back and did the same number of sit-ups.

She bounced to her feet, waved to Woon, and headed for the wide entrance to the hangar-turned-kitchen. Both of the massive doors were open, rolled to either side of the front of the building. This indicated Woon was open for business, but the stools and tables were mostly empty.

A glance at the old digital clock on the wall told her the time in large, amber numbers: 3:14 A.M.

Two scavengers sat at a table off to the side. One had his head down on the table, one arm curled around to block his face. The other flipped through a worn paperback book, its cover weathered to the point of being unintelligible. Sam recognized the second man as Lee, the pilot of a short-range boat. They’d flirted here, once upon a time. She turned toward their table and took an empty seat. Lee’s eyes flicked up to her, then back to his book.

Not even a hello, she thought.

“Lee,” she said.

“G’day,” he muttered, and flipped a page. A greeting used for random strangers passed on the street.

Sam jerked her head toward Lee’s sleeping friend. “Looks like you need a new drinking partner. I could grab us a bottle.”

He glanced sidelong at her then, and some silent deliberation passed through his mind. “Thanks, but I’m okay.”

The lingering effects of Woon’s cider jumbled her thoughts. Six months ago he would have invited her to stay and drink, and within an hour they’d probably be in the cargo bay of his plane, making the beast with two backs.

But not now. No hint at all of that camaraderie.

“C’mon,” she said, leaning forward in hopes of earning more than a glance. “Shots, you and me. We can go to my roof. Dawn is still—”

“I fly at dawn,” Lee said. He dog-eared a page in his book and set it down carefully on the table. “Your orders, remember?”

She did, vaguely. Grillo wanted more output from the crews, and two missions a day was the only solution Sam could find. She doled out Grillo’s requests not based on profit or eagerness, but on things like range, readiness, cargo room, and capacitor charge time.

None of the crews liked it, but they didn’t have much choice. No one had seen hide nor hair of Prumble in months, and anyway the days of picking and choosing missions were long gone. Grillo says jump, the crews jump.

“Maybe we should inspect your bird then,” she said with what she hoped was a coy smile. “A thorough examination, just you and me—”

“Sam,” Lee said with an annoyed sigh, “it wouldn’t be good for others to see us cavorting. Sorry, just the way it is.”

“Cavorting? Jesus. I’m not proposing fucking marriage, I just want a quick tumble. What’s the big deal?”

“Not a good idea, Sam. Sorry.” He picked up his book again and pointedly began to read.

She stood so fast her chair tumbled over backward. Lee winced but kept reading, and with that Sam turned and strode away, the warmth of alcohol in her head transforming instantly to a cold desire for more. She told herself they would come around. Grillo’s plan required time before the rewards would be clear. Until then, she doubted any of the crews would smile and wave at her when she passed, much less jump between the sheets.

“Maybe I’ll go visit Vaughn,” she muttered to herself as she stalked down the center of the runway. She’d used him to escape, only to end up not escaping at all, not really. Grillo had agreed not to punish the guard for allowing her to get away, but she’d not seen Vaughn since then. Perhaps, she thought, he’d be up for some makeup sex.

Samantha stopped walking and hung her head. “Why,” she said to herself, “am I so damn horny all the time now?”

The constant fantasies that ripped through her mind like runaway trains had become an annoyance. She walked on, pondering the reasons behind her distracting thirst all the way to the hangar, the same hangar she’d called home when Skyler ran the show.

Maybe, she thought, it’s because I’ve not seen any combat in two months. Perhaps some part of her had grown addicted to the tension and violence beyond the aura and sought to fill the void in other ways. Or maybe it was because she was no longer living with four men. Skyler, Jake, Angus, and Takai were all gone now. The bond they’d shared had been something different. Primal, sure, but born of a shared reliance on one another to survive. None of them had ever shown her attention of a physical kind, and she’d never sought it from them.

She laughed aloud at another thought. Maybe I’m just suffering from twitching ovaries. She was twenty-three, too young for such concerns in a pre-disease world. And now, all bets were off. The idea of birthing a child into the hell that humanity now lived in seemed foolish at best.

Besides, Samantha had no desire for motherhood. Three times in the past five years she’d been asked, sometimes subtly and sometimes directly, if she thought an immune woman would give birth to children with the same attribute. She doubted it, but the question was pointless. She had no intention of being the guinea pig in that experiment. Though she knew of no other immune women, she did not want to be a lab rat.

The hangar depressed the hell out of her. With no aircraft dominating the vast floor, it felt like an empty cavern. Add to that the lack of her crew mates, and it served only to remind her of everything that had been lost.

As she did most nights, Samantha pulled the blanket and pillow from her bunk, tucked them under one arm, and made her way to the roof. She left her tent behind, this time, the sky being devoid of rainclouds now that wet season had made its usual swift departure.

The stars were bright and clear tonight, and a half-moon provided plenty of light by which to move. She laid out her blanket and pillow, stripped to her underwear, and fell asleep under the stars only after a quick and lackluster session of pleasuring herself. Up until a few weeks ago she’d engaged in that activity only a few times, those needs fulfilled by the regular brush with danger, the proximity to and the dealing of death. Lately, though, it seemed she could not find rest unless she coaxed her body into some release, however limited it might be.

She awoke shortly after dawn to the sound of her name being shouted.

When she opened her eyes, the morning sun lanced into her eyes like lightning bolts. Samantha winced, and rolled onto her side, pulling the blanket over her. The motion made her head hurt, despite a tame night at Woon’s. “Fuck off!” she shouted back.

“Come down here. I have something to discuss!”

Grillo’s voice. Bloody hell.

Frowning, Sam threw the blanket off and pulled her clothes back on. A stained white tank top, black cargo pants, and steel-toed boots with bright yellow stitching. She rubbed the back of her neck as she stalked across the roof, weaving her way between planters flush with ripe fruits and vegetables. Her stomach grumbled despite the hangover, and so she plucked a ripe plantain from a heavy branch, peeled it, and devoured the bland fruit in three bites. At the cistern she filled a bucket with cool rainwater and dunked her head in it, twisting left and right violently until she couldn’t hold her breath anymore. Water flew in an arch when she yanked her head from the bucket, and she kept her eyes closed as the runoff flowed down the sides of her face, letting some of it flow into her mouth. This she swished from cheek to cheek while she wrung her blond hair out and knotted it into a quick braid.

“Good enough,” she growled, and trudged down to the hangar’s catwalk. From her room she grabbed her favorite black vest. It was laden with pockets and made of a stiff woven nylon. A patch on the left breast bore the Australian “Special Operations Command” logo. There’d been another patch below it when she found the garment, bearing some soldier’s last name, but she’d torn that off.

Zipped up, the vest constricted around her torso and made her feel even taller than she already was. Something about the stiff, tight material served to give her confidence, and a certain swagger that made people listen.

At the front of the hangar she punched the red button that hung from a chain by the doors, causing the big barriers to roll back with a loud gnashing of gears and pulleys.

Grillo stood just outside, in front of a black armored truck. He wore a business suit, as usual, and gripped a ledger of some sort in his left hand. “Good morning,” he said.

Two similar trucks were parked behind his. She noted that each had both driver and passenger seats occupied.

“What’s with the caravan?”

“Safety in numbers,” he replied.

Samantha grimaced. Grillo’s relentless drive to subjugate the roofers around Nightcliff, and their gardens, was often discussed by the scavenger crews. A few seemed to fall every day. The leaders of those enclaves were once a steady source of business.