Gravewalkers: Dying Time Read Online Free Page B

on my perimeter. If your pillow-bot is still taking notes,
have her record that infected don’t get smart, but they can learn
they don’t like being shot to shit.”
    Critias reminded him of the
obvious, “Their wounds heal. I’ve seen this all before, so let me
guess - every time it rains, their scattered body parts start to
twitch and pulsate with all their old hunger and the ones that
crawled off came back freakishly regenerated and even more
dangerous than before. Where they once wandered stupidly into your
cannons, now they have learned to avoid them, but they never
stopped watching you.”
    “ This station is not
really so different from being in orbit,” the colonel argued.
“We’re on the inside and the danger is locked without. They cannot
get into this base or into our reclamation excavators, so there is
nothing to fear but fear itself.”
    “ There is more than fear
to fear, I can assure you,” Critias countered. “Your lack of fear
for yourself I might dismiss as foolish arrogance, but for the
lives of the people under your command, it is bordering on
incompetence. Standard covert reclamation procedures have proven
themselves for generations. Your declaration of open war on the
infected has also proven itself many times, as the path to
destruction. You’re not King Louie.”
    The colonel roared, “This
time will be different!”
    A radio message came to
Critias through his helmet, “This is Doctor Kine on the Homer. Are
you there, Marshal Critias?”
    Critias didn’t know the man
when he answered, “Yes, I’m here, doctor. How can I help
you?”
    “ You are on Earth,” Kine
sounded elated. “You’re at the Chicago reclamation center
interviewing Colonel Walker.”
    Critias played along in an
effort to be respectful to a man of some obvious importance in the
science sector, “Yes, I am, doctor. What can I do for
you?”
    “ Nothing,” Doctor Kine
answered oddly though still happy about their conversation. “I just
needed to verify your location, that’s all.”
    Critias dismissed the
peculiar interruption as inexplicable then returned to his
conversation with Colonel Walker, “Now where were we?”
    “ We were discussing how
the fucking orphanage still thinks they really are King Louie’s
blessing to the preservation of all mankind and how they never have
to listen to anyone.”
    The Marshal Service took
all their membership from orphaned children such was the source of
the nickname. The Grand Marshal commanded all the marshals who
collectively enforced the regulations they called King’s Law, which
the legendary King Louie had set down when he was the original
savior of mankind in the first years of the plague apocalypse; that
was long before the technology existed to escape into orbital
space. In addition to King’s Law enforcement, the Marshal Service
also performed rescue operations for downed pilots and assorted
stranded scavengers. The marshals by reputation had no secondary
loyalties save for the law, the preservation of humanity, and
keeping each other on the rigid path.
    “ You should see this,
master,” Carmen called to Critias. She said master according to her
irresistible inhibitor directives that forced her to, a particular
barrier to her will that activated when he scolded her for talking
too much out of turn. Carmen did her best to sneer when she said
it, but it came out sounding sweet anyway.
    He went over to see the
monitor over her shoulder; it displayed live infrared satellite
scans of the Chicago reclamation center vicinity.
    “ This band here is the
shredded ghoul-meat obliterated by cannon shells,” she pointed it
out with her finger. “It has all gone into regenerative
photosynthetic dormancy. That makes this whole belt warm and green
as summer where it is getting enough water and sunshine. Therefore,
that means all these dark areas are swamps of infectious offal as
well. Their whole perimeter is pulsating undead entrails like
sloppy beach surf.”
    Critias