Reading Time
5 hrs 14 mins
How long to read ARISEN, Book Six - The Horizon?
The estimated word count of ARISEN, Book Six - The Horizon is 78,275 words.
A person reading at the average speed of 250 words/min, will finish the book in 5 hrs 14 mins. At a slower speed of 150 words/min, they will finish it in 8 hrs 42 mins. At a faster speed of 450 words/min, they will finish it in 2 hrs 54 mins.
| ARISEN, Book Six - The Horizon - 78,275 words | ||
|---|---|---|
| Reading Speed | Time to Read | |
| Slow | 150 words/min | 8 hrs 42 mins |
| Average | 250 words/min | 5 hrs 14 mins |
| Fast | 450 words/min | 2 hrs 54 mins |
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More about ARISEN, Book Six - The Horizon
78,275 words
Word Count
for ARISEN, Book Six - The Horizon
415 pages
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Hardcover: 415 pages
Paperback: 404 pages
Kindle: 405 pages
8 hours and 25 minutes
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Table of Contents
There are 46 chapters in ARISEN, Book Six - The Horizon. We have listed them below.
| Copyright First published 2014 by Glynn James & Michael Stephen Fuchs London, UK Copyright © Glynn James & Michael Stephen Fuchs The right of Glynn James & Michael Stephen Fuchs to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the authors’ imaginations or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any other means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the authors. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. |
| Title Page ARISEN BOOK SIX THE HORIZON GLYNN JAMES &MICHAEL STEPHEN FUCHS |
| “’Tis but a Tent where takes his one day’s rest A Sultan to the realm of Death addrest; The Sultan rises, and the dark Ferrash Strikes, and prepares it for another Guest.” – Omar Khayyam, The Rubaiyat “Defeat is never fatal. Victory is never final. It is the courage to continue that counts.” – Sir Winston Churchill |
| I Beat You I Beat You The USS John F. Kennedy Commander Drake blinked heavily and shook his head, as he walked himself back through the dark and empty companionways to his quarters from the late watch on the Bridge. It hadn’t actually been his watch. But there also wasn’t any rule against him sitting in on any damned watch he liked, particularly with him nominally being in charge and all. This job had so many downsides, he didn’t feel bad taking advantage of its few perks. Even if some of his people, including the current officer of the watch, obviously wanted to tell him to take his old, tired ass to bed. When the ensigns started ignoring his demands for coffee refills, that’s when he took the hint. Looking around him now at 01 Deck, he found that it had gotten pretty spooky down below, particularly at this ungodly hour. With the number-two reactor back online, they once again had basically infinite power. But, as a matter of policy, lights were kept low in unused common areas during |
| If I Should Wake Before I Die (i) If I Should Wake Before I Die (i) The JFK - Officers Quarters The Biblical Fall of Man is one of the oldest human memories. It was the origin tale at the heart of all three great Abrahamic religions – Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Abraham was a herder and farmer in the Fertile Crescent, the cradle of human civilization, which stretches from Mesopotamia, across the Holy Land, and down to the Nile Valley and Delta. All the way into Africa. Handon woke up smoothly and slowly – despite the frantic action of his own dream. At first he assumed it was this that had woken him. But then he saw that Sarah, beside him on the small bed, was twisting, jerking, and making weak little noises. He reached over to wake her. But then he remembered two things: one, she needed the sleep. And, two: the world out here was a nightmare that might not be preferable to whatever it was that stalked her dreams. She might actually be happier there than waking and remembering wh |
| You Okay In There? You Okay In There? The USS John F. Kennedy Chaos surrounds him. Gunfire and shouting, and the moans and rasping of a million dead voices. Just yards away, a grenade goes off, the thump of the explosion loud in his ears, but still dull. Much too close. The dead scatter in all directions, a mash of bodies that moments before were scrambling to consume the living. There are so many of them he is barely able to process the images as the crowd surges forward again and again, pushed back only by the sheer force of the fire hose that he holds in his hands. He can barely hear the rattle of gunfire, hasn’t really heard it for the last twenty minutes. The noise is just too much for his eardrums and now they relay only the dullest version of the overwhelming sound around him, a thud-thud that resounds again and again. The drums of war. Wesley is vaguely aware of movement to his left, and he turns, his feet slipping, but he doesn’t go down. It’s Melvin, shouting something at him |
| Just Another Day at the Office Just Another Day at the Office Britain, London - CentCom Colonel Robert Mayes was a troubled man. Standing on the balcony that overlooked the huge room that was the CentCom Joint Operations Center – his JOC – and looking out over the heads of dozens of busy ops-desk personnel, he was beginning to see a pattern that didn’t bode well for anyone. Directly across from him, nearly a hundred feet away, was the massive, digital Area of Operations (AO) map, and it displayed the entirety of the south of England. Near the top was London, and down on the far right, amidst a jarring tangle of red blips, was Canterbury and then Folkestone – where he had just deployed a significant portion of the world’s remaining combat troops and heavy firepower. Each deployment was marked with its own flashing star, and they were distributed almost evenly across the bottom of the map. All engaged. All in a slow, controlled, tactical retreat. The problem, he figured, wasn’t the net t |
| Battlefield Battlefield Britain - Kent Downs Lieutenant Jameson watched as the third helo rose rapidly from the ground, leaned to its left, and then shot up into the darkening sky. With it, the last of the Channel Tunnel survivors were safely away, and on their way to London, where at least they would be far from the front line. For now. For his men, after what seemed like an age of unrelenting combat, there was no such reprieve. In the distance, thunderclouds rumbled and sporadic flashes of lightning flickered like tendrils across the sky. He turned and scanned his unit, One Troop Royal Marines, and did a headcount. Two more of his men had gone down in the fight to break through to the friendly line of Paras holding the dead at bay along this section of the front. Even as he scanned the weary faces of his men, he found it difficult to identify who had fallen, which of those faces he saw every day was now missing. He knew all these men very well, like each was his brother, but somehow |
| Quarantine Quarantine Britain - London No matter how many times he’d seen it, Jameson was still in awe of the battlements of London. From the window of the Chinook, he watched as the wall came into view some thirty miles out. It certainly wasn’t the most beautiful thing created by man. But he doubted there had ever been anything quite as imposing. Not, he thought with a smile, that any zombie would appreciate that. Rising to fifty feet in most places and then up to a hundred if you happened to be standing in one of the gun emplacement towers, and built entirely of concrete and steel, the wall looked like something from a sci-fi novel. They called it the ZPW, the Zombie-Proof Wall, and Jameson often wondered if, even considering how impressive the defenses appeared, it had ever been tested live to deserve such a claim. The Army and a swarm of civilian engineers and builders had been working on it for the entire time since the truth of the disease was discovered, and it had slowly change |
| Rebirth Rebirth JFK - Alpha Berths Ali awoke in the dark of the early morning – alone again, somehow still alone. Last night’s weird but welcome visit from Handon had definitely eased her loneliness. But, like Homer before him, and Pope before that, he had gone. And now the compartment she had once shared with Pope was as quiet, and nearly as dark, as the grave. The only illumination was from the tritium night sights on a weapon stowed away in the corner. It barely lit even a quarter of the room, giving off a feeble and spectral orange glow. She lay still on her bunk for a while, staring at the blackness above her face. On her first night back here, she had almost climbed into the bottom bunk, just because it was easier. But then she found she couldn’t do it. It wasn’t superstition. It was that up here she could pretend that Pope was still sleeping down below her. That he hadn’t gone. In reality, of course, he had gone, and he was now sleeping forever, at the center of their last missi |
| Command Command JFK - Alpha Team Room In the womb of the team room, Ali let the mindlessness of the work soothe her. There was a lot to do – they were all going to have to jump through their own asses to get ready for this next mission in time. But it was damned good to be back with the team – safe, relaxed, out of danger, kitted down, and cleaned up. Even in silence, Ali enjoyed the warm familiarity of their company. And while they were happy to see her, too… they were also giving her a certain look. She obviously wasn’t going to get much of a grace period as regards answering their questions about the Great Homer Mystery. Ever since his dramatic deck landing the day before, with his kids and Sarah Cameron on board, he had been regarded like some sort of Christ arisen. And, since then, he’d been tucked away with his family almost the whole time. And nobody knew where the hell he had been, what had happened, nor how his two small children had survived two-plus years of zombie apocalyps |
| Abandoned Abandoned Britain - Kent Downs The zipping volley of 2.75-inch rockets from the Apache attack helicopter tore into the front ranks of the advancing figures, vaporizing them at the points of explosion. Then, as each warhead sprayed out dozens of five-inch tungsten darts, the bodies that remained were cut down in concentric and overlapping half-circles out to fifty meters. It was like ripples in a pool, or wheat going down under some enormous scythe wielded by a giant. It was also a lot like mowing the grass – except that this shit couldn’t keep growing back forever. There were only so many living people in England. So there could only ever be so many living dead ones. This was small consolation to Captain Charlotte Maidstone, as she zoomed and panned with her helo's chin-mounted camera to assess the impact of her rocket volley. Despite her resolve, despite all her carefully honed professionalism, she couldn’t stop scanning those faces on the ground, thinking about her family. |
| No Fox Among the Chickens No Fox Among the Chickens Britain – West Sussex Alan edged carefully toward the movement in the bushes, his shotgun aimed at the rustling of leaves. This was it, what he had been trying to achieve for days, to finally catch it. The damned thing had been roaming the woods around the farm for weeks now and he’d lost a dozen chickens already. The movement in the bushes stopped, the leaves going still, and he took a deep breath and stopped moving. It must have sensed his approach, he figured, and any movement now would completely screw it up. There was far too much cover here, and way too many bolt holes for it to run to. And if it was disturbed and fled, as it had already done a number of times, then he was likely to miss again. And he’d only get one shot. The dog was so damned fast that if he missed it would be away and running, and out of range before he could reload. If only he’d taken Tessa’s advice and bought a bolt action instead, then he’d have a second sh |
| Those That Remain Those That Remain Britain - Central London Rebecca Ainsley, wife of USOC Captain Connor Ainsley – and now, though not yet known to her, his widow – stood at the window of her front room, staring out into the street below. The rain was beating down on the hunched figures milling around there, and although their street was usually very busy, today it was heaving with people almost to the point of being a riot, and the torrential rain didn’t seem to be helping much. Dozens of them were huddled together, pulling hoods over their heads, or trying to find shelter where there was none, as sheets of storm-driven rain lashed down. It had been bright and fair the day before, and the sun had cheered Rebecca up, but this dreary, gray sky depressed her again. She had five minutes to drink her coffee and shove the hastily made toast into her mouth before heading out. Her two sons would be due at the school in twenty minutes, and the walk was fifteen minutes at least. She hated to b |
| This Old Town This Old Town Britain - Central London The rain beat down on the dirty London square with relentless aggression, torrents hitting the ground and forming a river that ran directly across where the assembled group stood. Hackworth, the unelected leader of the survivors from the Channel Tunnel, cursed as he felt the water seeping into his socks through his shoes. They were new boots, and new socks, and after two years in the dark, wet, dirty tunnel, wearing the same set of clothes, he was not pleased that his new boots were now three inches deep in water. They had already been standing out in the rain for an hour. Sure, he thought, the people organizing all these waifs and strays may be busy, but you’d think they would at least find the hundred or so people gathered in the cobbled area outside somewhere to wait out of the rain. The only person not getting wet at the moment was Josie, the little girl, safely covered up by her mother’s coat, as well as her own. Hackworth admir |
| Black on Ammo Black on Ammo JFK - Hospital “We considered setting you up your own lab, in an unused compartment nearby. But we ultimately decided it was quicker and better just to give you ours. It’s through here.” From the insignia of the woman who greeted Sarah and Park in the front of the hospital, she was a Lieutenant Commander – and a certified flight surgeon. From her commanding demeanor, she also gave the impression that she ran the joint. She wore a service side arm on her hip, and her name tape said “Walker.” She led Sarah and Park through two large examination and ward rooms, then turned left into a side compartment – a slightly more high-tech one. Inside, she turned to face them and carried on speaking. She didn’t hem, pause, fidget, or shuffle her feet. She was rocks. Sarah immediately liked her. “Word came down straight from Drake,” she said. “We’re to afford you every consideration – whatever you need. So we’re giving you the keys to the kingdom. This is our medical lab, |
| Captain America Captain America JFK - Flag Bridge Briefing Room “In other news: CentCom wants us back,” Drake said, after dropping his bombshell about Britain being breached. Eyebrows went up all around the table, but no one else spoke for a moment. “They think Dr. Park and his research data aren’t safe until they’re back in Fortress Britain. I might suggest he’s actually safer here, given current events. But, in any case, they’ve ordered us to steam for Liverpool.” “Not Portsmouth?” the Air Boss asked. “Portsmouth’s about to be under siege.” Fick grunted. “This an order you’re inclined to follow?” Drake shrugged. “I don’t see why we should start listening to them now.” To the best of Drake’s knowledge, he didn’t owe any particular allegiance to CentCom. Still, he knew he needed to try and play nice. Humanity wasn’t going to make it out of this mess if they started infighting, and tearing one another to bits. Still, Drake could feel a showdown brewing. It didn’t seem like CentCom’s ide |
| Consecrate Consecrate JFK - Flight Deck “I’m guessing,” Handon said, into the clean open air rushing around them, “that Sergeant Coulson wasn’t in that meeting just to use that cute Captain America line.” Fick chuckled. The two of them were walking the length of the ship toward the stern, after exiting the meeting and descending the ladder outside the island. “Coulson’s now my senior fire team leader – and effectively my new XO, since Gunny Blane bought it.” Handon looked sideways at him, the stiff breeze ruffling his thick hair. “What, none of the guys you took to Beaver Island wanted the job? I thought they were your favorite fire team.” Fick sadly shook his head, angled down into the wind. “Nah. From that group, only Graybeard is both alive and unwounded. And he sure as hell didn’t want it.” “Smart man,” Handon said. “Bet your ass he is. Not by accident is he still alive.” At the end of their briefing, it had finally been agreed that Coulson would lead two of Fick’s MARSOC fire team |
| That's Lunch That’s Lunch JFK - Biosciences Lab Sarah rolled back into the lab on a wave of focus and energy, finding Park at his laptop where she’d left him. “Okay,” she said. “I got five minutes of face time with Abrams, ship’s XO. He pointed out that we’re basically in the middle of the Atlantic right now.” “And?” “And – I quote – ‘there are, it is ardently to be hoped, no goddamned Zulus left anywhere on this vessel.’ So it looks like the soonest anything can be done about a new virus sample for you is in about sixty hours when we hit the African coast.” “So we’re definitely going straight to Africa?” Sarah nodded happily. “Yes. You’ve won that argument. But they’re sending ashore a scavenging party before we get to Somalia, near Cape Town. I’ve gotten Abrams to commit to making it part of the mission profile to do a live capture. If that’s the right expression for capturing a dead person.” “Awesome. And animal test subjects?” “I told him that, too – that pretty soon you’re going t |
| Judy Judy JFK - 02 Deck Mess No one had to pay for anything – it was a military mess, and everything was free. Which was kind of the joke they’d all been making. On the other hand, not everyone got as much food as they might have liked. The shortages were finally starting to bite, and rationing was going into effect. Least pleased with this was Predator, due to the fact that maintaining his gigantic bulk required competitive-eating levels of consumption. “This is some bullshit,” he said, sitting down and balefully regarding the meager contents of his tray. Ali touched his thigh-sized forearm and said, “I’ll get you another one in a minute.” She had only a mug of tea in front of her, as did Henno, opposite. They had all arrived in the same mess at virtually the same time, and had now corralled most of one big table for themselves. Sarah and Handon sat side by side, Emily grabbed a seat down from Juice and Pred, and directly across from Fick. Park was at the end, beside Ali and across fr |
| Aground Grounded Britain - Kent Downs Major Grews was choking, his throat constricted. As he slowly came to, consciousness returning in swirling drifts rather than a sharp edge, he realized that someone had him by the throat and was tightening their grip, slowly. His breath was shallow, and with every second it became harder to breathe, as the pressure increased. Even with this threat he found himself unable to take control of his own body, and a haze hung over his every sense as he fought to break free. It wasn’t until he could no longer draw a breath that his body rebelled, throwing him into the waking world with a violence that sent a tingle of nerves spiking through his arms and face. His eyes flew open, and he tried to put his arms up to defend himself, but there was no one there. He tried again to move, but realized he was pinned down. It was the seating from the back of the helicopter – somehow it had gone from being attached to the floor behind, to being on top of him. The cons |
| Kinemortophobia Kinemortophobia Kent Downs - Crash Site Grews was not a man prone to panic. It just wasn’t his way. To be in command of such a large contingent of troops took a level of control that few people possessed. In his earlier years, before the ZA, he had been in combat many times, and his stoic, deeply embedded calm was one of the reasons he rose so quickly through the ranks. He didn’t falter under pressure, even when he did raise his voice. But something had changed with the coming of the dead that walked. He would never admit it to anyone, but they terrified him, and he had avoided close contact with them at all times. He had been fortunate with his command in the south until the last few weeks. Even though it was the section of the country closest to the continent, and there were always the occasional floaters drifting in to the shore, his border patrols dealt with them efficiently. Only now, days into the biggest incursion of the dead into his territory, was he exposed. A |
| Run the Gauntlet Run the Gauntlet Kent Downs - Crash Site Three minutes was a long time to wait when you were sitting in a downed helicopter, surrounded by the dead, who were angrily pounding on the thin fuselage that was the only thing between you and them. Just inches away from Grews’s face, was a young man who would have been alive a few hours ago. He was dressed in a torn and muddy suit, and had probably been on his way to work when he was attacked and turned. To Grews he looked like one of those young, high-powered arseholes who hadn’t the slightest clue what was going on in the world around him. Still wearing suits, still trying to look smart, with the dead in their billions devouring the planet. The young man had probably looked dapper a few hours ago, with his hair combed, and nice white teeth gleaming. Now half his face was missing, and as Grews irritably watched the thing thudding its broken and bloody hand against the window, he wished he could put the gun to the man’s face |
| Fluids Fluids JFK - Biosciences Lab Ten minutes after Park and Sarah got back to the lab from lunch, Lieutenant Commander Walker, CO of the hospital, stuck her head in. “Just want to see how you two are getting on.” Sarah was on her back behind a cabinet, re-plumbing the pipe on a water purification system, nearer to where Park needed it. He was sitting at his laptop, as usual. “Good timing,” Park said, turning to face the door. “I’m going to need a pretty significant volume of both scintillation fluid, and solvent – toluene, ideally, but benzene or phenol will do. So far, we can’t find any in the lab.” “If we do have any, it’ll be down in Stores. Not the kind of thing we use every day. Hang on.” Her head disappeared out the hatch again. Two minutes later, a compact man in blue overalls and a ginger crewcut appeared. “Hiya,” he said. “I’m Dietz. Lab tech. You need some solvent? Benzene, that kind of thing?” Park nodded, as Sarah climbed out from under the bench, dusting her hands on he |
| Little Wet Noises Little Wet Noises JFK Stores [10 Seconds Earlier] “Hmm,” Dietz had said, puzzlement in his voice. “That’s weird. I guess I can see how these might have got knocked over in the battle.” He was kneeling at the center of a tiny cone of light, at the foot of some metal shelving, inside the otherwise dark storage room. Liquid still pooled on the deck up to the soles of his boots. And he was holding an empty gallon jug, which had been ripped open somehow, and was now empty of all but a few drops of the benzene fluid it had held. During all this, Park stood in the doorway, with Sarah about two feet inside the dark room. They watched Dietz move around in the thin glare of the flashlight, which Sarah was holding for him. When Dietz held up the deeply scored, nearly shredded jug, Sarah squinted at it – and in the next heartbeat backed away toward Park, shielding him with her body, touching him behind her with her left hand, never turning away. One heartbeat was all she had. Bec |
| Die in Vain Die in Vain JFK - Stores Dilemma. Facing one or more choices, all of them unacceptable – or maybe even lethal. Sarah and Park couldn’t go forward. And they couldn’t go back. But they also couldn’t stay where they were. Because Park was still bleeding. She had stemmed much of his hemorrhaging with her stripper routine and improvised bandage. It was decent enough combat medicine, given the circumstances and the resources they had. But those wounds were still seeping around the shirt, and through Park’s fingers. And, though this bothered her less, she was bleeding, too. The hand wound wasn’t terrible. But it too was wrapped in synthetic fabric, which wasn’t notoriously absorbent. And she could feel blood dripping down her arm now. She wasn’t worried about her own welfare. She was worried about remaining combat effective long enough to get her job done. Which was to get Park the hell out of there. Now that they were stopped, frozen, crouching in the shadows at the end of the ro |
| Dove and Grenade Dove and Grenade JFK - Stores Sarah bowed her head, and pressed her hands together – not in prayer, but in thought. She did feel as if she had much to atone for, getting Park into this shit situation in the first place. But she had to shove those thoughts aside. If there was going to be any time later for atonement, then she had be effective – now. She was going to have to operate their way out of there. On her own. Because waiting this thing out wasn’t working, and wasn’t going to. Calling for help was also a non-starter – making loud noises would have a definite tendency to be fatal. And those wall phones that seemed to dot the upper decks were nowhere to be seen down here. Maybe somebody would wander down eventually. But maybe they would just get themselves infected, and become another hazard Sarah and Park had to navigate. Maybe, together, they would all be the beginning of the outbreak that would take down the whole ship. No, it was down to her. She was beginning |
| Damage Control Damage Control JFK, Flight Deck - Casualty Collection Point Commander Drake physically pushed away the paramedic who was trying to examine him. “I just got creased,” he said. “It’s nothing. See to them.” But medics were used to being forceful when necessary, and this blue-jumpsuited dude with the big med ruck also knew that medical necessity always trumped rank. “You also just got blown up,” he said. “Now lie the hell down. Sir.” Drake sighed and tried to master his temper. He was seriously pissed off, about a wide variety of things now. But, as always, the thing about things was that they needed more than emotional reactions. They had to be dealt with. As his anger and the adrenaline both slowly bled away, the pain from his wounds started to dial up. And Drake suddenly experienced a wave of nausea, as well as a massive headrush, and immediately felt strong hands easing him down to the deck. And that was of course exactly why the medic wanted him to lie down. Because you |
| Voices of the Operators Voices of the Operators JFK, Outside of Stores [Seven Minutes Earlier] Park realized he hadn’t really started breathing again. Not completely, certainly not normally. And he was still looking through the porthole, down the short length of companionway, and out the porthole in the hatch at the other end. He was still staring, even though Sarah had disappeared from view. The frenzied runner trapped in the sealed corridor was still scraping and scrabbling at the inside of the far hatch, though it had now stopped making noise. Or it was making too little to penetrate the seals. Park finally turned himself around, still trying to regulate his breathing, and braced himself for the climb out of there. Back to the light, back to safety. Back to something like normality. If there is even any such thing anymore… But then it suddenly occurred to him, and not for the first time lately, that he had just completely dodged death. And he exhaled with blessed relief, his express |
| Closer Closer JFK, Flag Bridge Briefing Room “Jesus, Commander,” said Fick. “You look like sandblasted shit. Shouldn’t you be in bed?” Drake shook his head tiredly. It wobbled a little on his neck. “I’m fine. I just got creased.” He rubbed his upper arm. “Plus blown up,” Handon rumbled. He personally thought Fick had a point. “Let us take this one.” Fick just shrugged, as if to say, Welcome to the I Just Got Blown Up Club. Drake ignored all this. He was all hopped up on painkillers, most of his body was stiff as hell, and he had bandage pads taped over minor burns and a couple of small shrapnel wounds. But he also had a fresh uniform on, a new side arm – his had gone over the side into the south Atlantic – and a hot cup of coffee, so things weren’t so bad. But, mainly, he needed to be here. He probably could have handed over command to Abrams for a few hours, or a day. But he wasn’t going to. If he keeled over or passed out, Abrams could take it. Right now, he was running this briefing |
| Weight Gain 4000 Weight Gain 4000 JFK - Biosciences Lab Professor Nigel Close did not give the impression of being in the most state-of-the-art lab he had ever enjoyed. He walked in, looked around, and seemed to struggle to keep his nose from twitching. It was transparent to Park that what Close was thinking was: Why aren’t we back at Oxford right now – like I told them we should be? Park almost smiled at this. Because something else was transparent to him: that he and Close had been keeping very different company lately. Close had been amongst academics – and Park had been with the operators. And as a result, he perhaps knew now the value and necessity of making do – of adapting and overcoming. And he knew that if you could not adapt and overcome, then you were totally hosed. Because conditions were always going to change on you. These days, probably for the worse. Basically, Park was not the same man he had been. And he was pretty pleased with the new one he was slowly becoming. He r |
| Back Into the Fire Back Into the Fire Germany - Dusseldorf Eli’s gaze drifted from the view out the window to the girl across the table. He was still chewing on his mouthful of sandwich, but she just sat and looked at him, those big eyes showing the signs of concern only he could recognize. Even in these eight short months, the two had grown so close they could read each other’s body language. “It’s just for three months, you know,” she said, looking back down at her own half-eaten lunch. “And it’s a huge opportunity for me.” He nodded. “I know,” he said. “It’s just that I’m on leave during that time, and, well I kinda hoped…” He looked back out the window. The view from the Rhine Tower restaurant, hundreds of meters above the streets of Dusseldorf, had always amazed him. But today it held none of its usual charm, and the notion of watching the huge world below him go by, totally unaware he was watching it, held no allure. “I’ll be back with plenty of time. You’ll still have half of yo |
| The Gathering The Gathering Dusseldorf - Target Building Jameson stepped over the first body, carefully avoiding the splatter of black blood that had sprayed across the floor behind it, and made his way along the corridor toward the dead end. As he did so, other Marines followed him down from the stairwell and spread out, quietly opening the doors that lined the corridor and scanning the rooms inside. As Jameson reached the final door, while Eli and another man checked the adjacent ones, he heard a short, sharp snap of silenced gunfire from the other end of the corridor. And then it went quiet again. He stepped forward and tentatively pushed open the last door, revealing a once plush office with a large desk, as well as three bodies, all now dried-up husks, upon the floor. No machine, no lab equipment. There was only a copier, and a table with some sort of broken apparatus scattered across it, but nothing resembling their objective. As he backed out again and pressed the door closed be |
| All in Pieces All in Pieces Dusseldorf - Target Building “Okay – stack up and move out,” Jameson said as he began moving toward the next flight of stairs. “First squad, check all the rooms above and make sure that lab is clear. Second squad, down here now. On me.” He took the stairs two at a time and only slowed as he reached the next landing, signaling the first two Marines behind him to flow through and clear the floor. “Eli, is any of that crap up there our objective?” Standing in the middle of the room below the giant hole, and surveying the devastation caused by the collapse, Eli shook his head, even though Jameson was a floor below him. “I don’t see it,” he said across the squad net. “Okay, keep looking,” he said, his voice strained with effort. Even though they had stripped their regular infantry gear down to a minimum to allow for faster movement, the amount of kit they carried still made running down stairs a feat in itself. Jameson hit the next flight, and didn’t bother takin |
| They're Coming They’re Coming Dusseldorf - Lobby of Target Building Jameson watched the front doors, counting the seconds and waiting for their moment to move. Those doors still stood wide open to the outside, and to the locals, and that pain-in-the-ass lone zombie slowly shuffling toward the opening was now barely ten feet away. He had considered just popping it in the head and rushing over to push the doors shut. But he suspected that if he did, all the others would see him, and belatedly work out that they were attacking the stupid side of the building. There were already many more stumbling in from the wider area, and the Marines would soon have more to deal with than the couple of dozen hammering at the windows on the intact side. Fortunately, for the moment, that crowd wasn’t going anywhere. The glass was thick and the dead still hadn’t figured out they could just walk around the side and in the open door. But that single zombie working its way around would eventually either noti |
| Last Stand Last Stand Target Building - Eighth Floor Landing The creatures hurled themselves up the stairs with a furious force, and directly at Jameson and the three other Marines left holding the stairwell. They were like nothing he had encountered before. He was used to runners, and had fought them a number of times. Those were fast, but they were still clumsy, and so long as he just overclocked his nerves, he could manage them with little more effort than the slow ones. But these dead bastards pouring up the stairwell toward him now, straight into the teeth of their full-auto fire, weren’t having any problems negotiating the stairs, or one another, in getting to them. They were locked on, and wired tight. They came in waves, a dozen or so at first, and then more with each wave that followed, clambering over the bodies of the already fallen with a malevolent intensity that Jameson could see clearly in their eyes. In seconds, he had burned through three magazines and was wondering wh |
| Just Hanging Around Just Hanging Around Target Building - Elevator Shaft Every muscle in Jameson’s body screamed in protest as he gripped the cables, trying desperately to slow his descent, but still he plummeted too fast down the cold, dank, and pitch-black shaft. He knew that in seconds he would hit the roof of the elevator car, which he remembered was all the way down on the ground floor. Ten stories, or would it be nine? He squeezed harder, feeling his gloves, which were made for fast-rope descents, heating up and burning. They were protective enough on nylon rope, but on steel cable? He could feel the heat increasing on the palms of his hands, but gradually he began to slow. Dank air rushed past his face as the darkness below still sped rapidly toward him. The flow of air slowed as he finally, and painfully, came to a stop and just hung there, breathing raggedly and wrapped around the cable with both hands and both legs. He felt something shift at his waist, and his heart jumped a |
| Open Up and Say Argh Open Up and Say Argh Target Building - Elevator Shaft It occurred to Jameson that if the thunder of bombs landing a hundred yards away during the Canterbury air strikes hadn’t completely screwed up his hearing, then sitting at the bottom of an elevator shaft as an Apache blasted the hell out of the building and pulverized the entire ground floor with rockets and auto-cannon fire certainly would. These thoughts kept him company as he crouched, huddled over the hatch that when opened would allow him to drop down into the elevator car below – and, from there, out into the foyer of the building. This was nothing like the cracking of a small-arms infantry engagement. No, this was a dozen or more zipping and thunderously exploding rockets, punctuated by hundreds of high-explosive 30mm rounds from her auto-cannon, all impacting around the entrance to the building, and in some cases, from the sound of it, actually exploding in the lobby. The thunderous roar of breaking gla |
| Night Falls Night Falls JFK - Officers Quarters Handon’s head hit one end of the thin pillow within a second of Sarah’s hitting the other. “Well, that was a hell of a day,” he said. She shrugged, as well as she could from her horizontal position. Handon turned to watch, her bare shoulders suddenly becoming objects of intense interest to him. “I’ve had worse,” she said quietly. She pulled her arms out from under the blanket. Her right hand was wrapped in a white bandage, with a small dot of bright red at its center. “Let me take a look at that,” Handon said. “Yeah – like I’m going to unwrap it and expose it to infection, just to satisfy your morbid curiosity.” When he didn’t answer, she made her tone more serious and said, “It was just three pellets – one in the base of the index finger, two in the top of the hand. They’re out now. It’s healing. It’s fine.” Handon was thinking, Not her trigger finger at least… Sarah exhaled contentedly, and rolled on her side to look back at him. They h |
| Noise Noise JFK - Bridge The two suicides were reported to Drake first thing, as he strode onto the Bridge for the early watch. Waking him had been discussed. But there was nothing he could have done. Those people were dead. “Goddammit,” Drake said, scrolling through the two reports with his thumb. “So one body…?” “And a note for the other. But he’s AWOL from his duty station, and a search failed to turn him up. Presumed overboard.” “Goddammit,” Drake repeated. “What’d the note say?” The ensign stood over his commander, but respectfully back a few feet, and he hesitated before answering. “It said: ‘I’m done here’.” Drake almost said Goddammit again. But he restrained himself, just cursing mentally. He only had one more question. “Anyone we can’t do without?” “Not really, no.” Drake exhaled with relief. But then he recalled the thing that was really haunting his dreams lately, and also many of his waking hours, perhaps in part because he hadn’t yet told a soul about it. It was his last |
| Lay Your Burdens Down Lay Your Burdens Down JFK - Front Edge of the Flight Deck The horizon swelled and grew uneven. After days of being nothing but flat, featureless, perfectly smooth ocean in every direction, now the hazy gray and brown features of the African coast emerged slowly out of the horizon in the southeast. They were approaching the coast at an angle, having cut diagonally across nearly the full length and breadth of the Atlantic. And after days at sea, and the long ocean crossing, there was something profoundly reassuring about the sight of dry land. As word spread, crew members of every rank, rating, and description, a significant chunk of those not on watch, thronged up onto the flight deck. They came to watch Africa appear. At the very front, Handon stood with Ali and Homer, plus Ben and Isabel. Handon had tried to convince Predator, Juice, and Henno to take a break, as well. God knew they’d earned it. And Handon felt like their mission planning and prep for Somalia was |
| Love This Book? Love this book? Share the love, support independent authors, and make us your best friends forever, by posting a quick review on Amazon. Thanks! – Glynn & Michael Want to be alerted when the next ARISEN book is released? Sign up for e-mail alerts and we’ll keep you updated. (And we’ll never share your address or use it for anything else.) You can also hang out with other readers and fans, plus the authors themselves, by joining the Official ARISEN Series Community on Facebook. Finally… every time you volunteer your time to recommend our books to friends, family, colleagues, and loved ones, that’s what allows us to keep writing for a living – because it’s word-of-mouth that sells books, period. Which means it’s you we have to thank for having careers. And that is a debt that can never be repaid. THANK YOU. |
| Also available in audiobook! This title also available as an AUDIOBOOK performed by the incomparable R.C. Bray (Totally free with Audible trial!) Listeners rave about the ARISEN audiobooks: “RC Bray is a god of narration” … “Fuchs and Bray combine to create a perfect storm of story-telling. These two are a force to be reckoned with” … “Heart-stopping prose delivered by a very impressive actor” … “Honestly if Bray read the phone book I'd download it” … “R.C. Bray makes each and every character come alive in a unique way. Get this audiobook RFN!!!” … “the best narrator in the business. If you've not listened to this series then you're missing out” … “Absolutely a freaking thrill ride from beginning to end. I could not stop listening.” |
| Thanks and Acknowledgements Thanks and Acknowledgements Michael This author wishes to thank Anna Kathleen Brooksbank, Sara Natalie Fuchs, Richard S. Fuchs, Virginia Ann Sayers-King, Valerie Sayers, Alexander Montgomery Heublein, Matthew David Grabowy, e, Slayer 155, and Michael and Jayne Barnard, for their indispensable support. Critically, my thanks to Amanda Jo Moore (“Ugh!”) and Mark George Pitely (“My advice? Cleansing fire.”) for making this work stronger and making me a better writer (and a better human being). Thanks to Bruce, Wanda, Alec, and Brendan MacDonald Fyfe, for their amazing examples of lives directed by purpose, compassion, and service. Finally, my warm thanks to Jane and David Brooksbank for the N. Yorkshire writer’s garret, and all the veg – and for Isobel and Ben. My sincere thanks to Glynn, for hanging in with me. I don’t always make it easy. (Where’s the counseling and therapy for writing partners?! Definitely money to be made there.) As I put it during one of ou |
| Prequels and Spin-Offs With ENDGAME, the world-shattering climax & conclusion of the ARISEN epic, the main series is complete. But… The story doesn’t end here. Across the entire overrun world, two whole years of ZA remain to be explored, and many of your favorite heroes will return, in forthcoming prequels and spin-off mini-series, including: ARISEN : Raiders and ARISEN : Operators To be alerted when these adventures are available, sign up for e-mail alerts from MSF today! |
| One troop of beyond-Tier-1 operators – gone completely off the reservation. One platoon of stalwart Army Rangers – pledged to protect them, but now pushed too far. And 10,000 relentless Syrian regulars, headhacking Islamist militias, desperate ISIS and al-Qaeda remnants, bloodthirsty Iranian agitators, and hyper-lethal Russian Spetsnaz pipe-hitters… who all just want them gone. |
Description
With over a half-million copies sold and a 4.7/5.0-★ average on over 5,000 reviews, the ARISEN series is said by readers to be: "astonishingly good" ... "jaw dropping" ... "edge of the seat, nail biting, page turning mayhem" ... "terrifying, heroic, and tragic" ... "Riveting. Absolutely riveting." ... "relentless" ... "I couldn't not give it 5 stars. It is simply OUTSTANDING." ... "possibly a genre defining series" ... "Watch out Walking Dead - if this series ever comes to the little screen you are destined for second place" ... "the best post-apocalyptic military fiction there is" ... "totally stunning in its originality" ... "In the zombie genre, there simply isn't a book that comes close to these." ... "pure genius" ... "thoroughly engrossing, taking you on a wild ride through utter devastation" ... "Staggeringly good - the most consistently excellent franchise in zombie literature."In ARISEN, Book Six – The Horizon:THE OPERATORS FACE THEIR DEMONSMission complete, Alpha team enjoys their first chance to breathe and tend to their humanity. But the darkness leaves them alone with their demons – and those who have found love may yet learn that it is fatally incompatible with duty...THE CARRIER FACES UNIMAGINED THREATSThe JFK steams for Africa, despite rumors of lone Zulus still wandering below decks. But when Dr. Park and Sarah Cameron are trapped in an isolated compartment, they learn that one Zulu can kill you just as dead as ten million – while up on the flight deck, a lone assassin inflicts horrific damage on the hopes for a cure...LONDON PREPS FOR HUMANITY'S LAST STANDAmarie and the Tunnelers find themselves resettled in a chillingly post-Apocalyptic London, where mini-outbreaks are hushed up, and the displaced will cut your throat just to take your shoes – all as history's largest fixed fortification goes up along the M25 ring-road around the Capital...THE ROYAL MARINES DROP INTO HELLLieutenant Jameson and his battered Royal Marines launch by air to retrieve a rare biomedical device, which is indispensable to developing a vaccine – but which lies buried at the center of a perilously rotting structure in a city of millions (all dead). When the walls come down, and the horde descends, Jameson may be the last man standing – and his only chance of survival lies with a lone Apache pilot who refuses to obey her orders to abandon him...Hope survives – but the story of humanity is not yet written... Read more