Death's Awakening

Chapter Forty-Five: Crash

He'd been waiting all morning for the three from his dream to arrive.

He was trying to imagine what it would feel like for them. Who knows where they'd been hiding out since this whole thing began. What they'd lost or what they'd been through. And here they were; headed to what they thought was a safe zone.

They were going to be majorly disappointed.

Crash had watched as the first of the military convoy had arrived. That was first light, just as the sun was peering over the horizon. They had set up a perimeter using tanks and concrete barricades they'd brought in on a truck.

The survivors had started reporting soon after. They came in cars, trucks, on foot. One lady even pulled up on a golf cart.

By noon, the area was buzzing with activity. The whole process was surprisingly organized with survivors checking in and being examined on one end, then being assigned a number and a basic supply kit in section two. Finally, they made their way to the final section where they were asked to wait until the first of the convoy started heading back to the safe zone.

Crash had managed to hack in to the central communications system of the entire United States Military. Through there, he had been able to locate the group that was assigned to McLean. With a few simple pieces of code, he now had access to every computer, every radio, even every cell phone of the military personnel in that unit.

It was amazing what he'd become capable of in the past week.

He still didn't completely understand how or why it worked, but his mind was able to communicate with any machine. It was as if they were people he was talking to on a forum, only they weren't people at all.

If he wanted to get into a person's cell phone, he simply reached out to the phone with his mind.

It sounded insane, but it was real and it was awesome.

And what made it even more amazing was the fact that all of the power in the greater D.C. area had gone out two days ago. No one in an entire fifty mile radius of his neighborhood in Trinidad had power.

Except him.

He'd simply told the machines to all work and they did. He could even unplug his computer from the wall if he wanted to, and it would still work.

So here he was in his crappy basement apartment with all these luxuries no one else had. Of course, he was glad to be below ground with no windows. That way, if anyone out there was looking for a place to pillage and plunder, they wouldn't know what he had down here.

He paced behind his computer now, waiting for the three to arrive. It had to be soon.

The evac site looked like a war zone with its mangled, half-eaten bodies and downed zombies piled on top of each other.

There had been a group of survivors, but they got the heck out of there as soon as they could. On the radio, the acting commander had said he didn't want to risk losing any further survivors, but Crash thought the guy was probably just scared to death and wanting to get the hell out of dodge.

From the corner of his eye, Crash saw movement on the screen. He leaned over the desk, planting his palms on the top of it as he watched the screen closely.

Was it them?

A van pulled up and three living, breathing humans got out, their faces stricken with fear and sorrow and confusion.

Yes, it was them. Two girls and a guy. All three about Crash's age. Maybe a little younger. But it was them.

The blond guy walked over toward where the check-in had been and Crash sat down, prepared.