2222, Chapter Fifteen: The Coming War

3 Years ago, United States.

Charles Goodwell strapped in his seatbelt, motioning for his driver to move. From the radio came weather warnings, but it didn't bother Charles at all. it wasn't his problem. He was rich enough to pay someone else to worry about it.

All he wanted right now was to get home to his family… well, if he was being honest with himself, he wanted to go home to his hot tub.

Charles Goodwell started off as a good man with a good idea, as many rich men do. What his idea originally was doesn’t matter anymore, lost to time and a devil called progress. All that matters now is that he made money.

Every once and while the car would lurch, like a loser in a boxing match, the winning opponent the Wind.

He made it home safe. His papers were in order, his house spotless (He was very particular about keeping his house clean. Most were afraid to even try, but eventually he paid a large enough sum to convince some damned soul to clean for him. Often he grew angry and criticized some imagined flaw, but not today).

His wife was, as she often was these days, in bed. They’d had eight doctor visits in the last seven days, each specialist more expensive than the last.

None of them could identify what was wrong.

They’d ordered her to cease all contact with her family members or the outside world, but Magpie Goodwell had never been a listener. Today, though, she hadn’t left her room. Charles didn’t mind, didn’t care. He slept in the spare room, it was no trouble. He’d been doing it even before she’d gotten sick. Ever since their second child and the subsequent miscarriage, a rift had formed in their marriage, a rift that they tried hard (and failed) to hide from their kids.

Their oldest, Adelle, was 21. Moved out, gone to college, dropped out after a year and cut herself out of her family’s life forever. Every once and a while she’d ask for a check, but there were no Thanksgivings, no Christmas dinners.

Ricky was only 5. He’d grown up hearing legends of his older sister but had never actually met her. His life was spent in constant fear of ending up like Big Sis, even before he’d entered kindergarten.

In preschool, there were accidents. From birth, Ricky had earned the label of “sensitive,” another word for “undiagnosed autism that his parents didn’t want to deal with.”

Charles loved Ricky, but he could be… a lot. And when Magpie had the miscarriage, she’d lash out at anyone and anything… especially Ricky. Their marriage just kept taking hit after hit.

Charles was tired. He was tired of being married to a sick, probably dying woman. He was tired of managing her mood swings. He was tired of dealing with Ricky and tired of regretting Adelle.

He was tired.

As soon as he allowed himself to think this, yells started from Magpie’s room. He couldn’t at first tell who the yells were coming from, his wife or her caretaker.

It was the caretaker.

Jenna Lang yelled for someone to come, because Magpie was dead.

And then, she began screaming for help herself.

When Charles made his way up the steps, he found Jenna locked in a position of terror forever, eyes glassy and throat dripping blood.

His wife, similarly glassy-eyed, had blood dripping from her mouth. But there were no wounds. It was Jenna’s blood. As she watched Charles, he watched her back. She was dead. Her chest did not rise and fall, her skin was pale and tinted with the stench of decay. There was a wet spot on her hospital dress where the bodily fluids had made their dramatic exit in her final moments.

This was the beginning of the end.

And Charles knew it.

Present day

“So you are the one they call Brun,” Charon says. “You’ve become quite the hot topic among the dead lately.”

Brun doesn’t respond, but he lifts his head at the mention of his name.

“Tell me, Brun. What is it you want? You’ve raided six of the zombie camps in the last week, and killed everyone inside. Your own kind. Why?”

At this, Brun can’t resist laughing, a terrible, mocking sound, deep and full of dark certainty.

“Everything must go.”

“This isn’t a liquidation sale, Brun. Lives are not for sale.”

“Why do you care so much, Charon?”

“I am merely a diplomat, trying to find a compromise.”

“Compromise is impossible.”

“Compromise is impossible, but only if we cannot find a way to unify. If we unite as one, we can show humans that we are a force to be reckoned with.”

“They’ll kill us all. And then they’ll keep killing themselves. Little by little. There’s only one way to stop the carnage.”

Charon’s pleasant demeanor slips for a moment.

“Peace?”

“Death. Everything must die. And it will. It will all end soon. The war is nearing its climax. Extinction is on the horizon. Brace yourself for the coming war, Charon. Because it’s coming. And you won’t survive. None of us will.”

Charon sighs.

Some people are just dead set on violence. Even the apocalypse can’t change that.