Zenith. Some of our family use voice activated recorders so they can be spontaneous with their thoughts and feelings while experiencing something new and it seems there’s a lot of that! As the search parties extend their reach and others become bolder doing solo treks of discovery, I’ve always feared for their safety and always stress in meetings that at least two for extra eyes and ears should be the minimum just in case, unless a ‘V is present.

  Wilder lived up to his name and unfortunately something may have happened to him. It is mandatory that anyone going out searching, sign the Log and indicate their desired location and stick to it. Gillian, Jagger and Scrub checked out his location last noted on a walkie transmission and found the smashed walkie, Wilders cloths and backpack intact near what appeared to be one of those labs that received frozen embryos to nurture into adulthood. Also, documents are being studied that were taken by Gillian. They returned with the recorder. The Walkie was smashed but the recorder still intact and found only because Wilder had sown it into a small pocket inside the top of his vest. Gillian’s response to that was, what not who. They’re organizing a swat team, the second one since the Café. Here’s his transcribed recording with tail end sounds.

  Wilder. Sometimes I honestly can’t believe this is my life. This isn’t a dream I wake up from. It’s real! When we first had the meeting on the Journal, it seemed like the furthest thing from anything that could possibly interest me. I mean, look at where expressing our thoughts got us and even though this really is different, who will give a fuck when humans go kaput.

  But then things began to change and I was suddenly inside a fantastic sci-fi streaming series, a character and real person, creating my own show! The cameras are mainly on the Keep, perfect name of course, but then as brief departures from the developing norm occurred, there’s the errant knight and his trusty e-printed toy gun, a hidden voice recorder, a camera disguised as a button and walkie, on another mission to explore the dystopian terrain! My inner kids dream come true.

  They all know I go out on my own and have always been totally up front, given them my recordings and the camera shots. They have organized search parties and that’s fine but not for me. There’s so much more to see in quiet searching. I don’t whistle the fears away or talk to myself or make any loud noises but am always learning better ways of the stealth search. I always go solo, following a vague plan on where to go and now since the Dome is up, the extremes in temperature and threats from above are gone but not from inside. I know that.

  But man, it’s a trip, truly! I’m not a ‘V so don’t have super power vision or hearing but I am a trained survivalist who had an online course and an intensive six-week course on my thirty acres in the Adirondacks, both with and without tech. But even though there are similarities, this is a whole new ball game in an alternate universe. Yeah, man still be man but there are countervailing forces that seek to level that playing field and he appears to be fighting back. A fact very few if any know about. One that I heard on the street from two white suits. AI won, held man ransom until he followed its plan to create a life sustaining home for it here on Earth while demanding locating its first quantum computer on the Moon with detailed instructions on how to do that. And it still holds true.

  Part of survival training is working together as a team with someone in charge who knows what they’re doing. Even though Zenith isn’t trained, she’s level headed and makes good decisions. I’ve had private meetings with her and have shared my findings with her, well most. She worries about me but listens to what I say, sometimes relaying something like a location to Jagger.

  I always wear a backpack with all the essentials in case of difficulties. They gave me a walkie so now help is within a half hour away. This one is being recorded as it happens in my little recorder behind the top of my vest. Whenever I hike, I always take precautions. So even though this may sound casual, it never is. Someone or thing could be looking at me from one of the hundreds of windows or ready to spring out from behind a dumpster or drop from a tree. My instincts are good only if I’m on constant surveillance. So far there have been no signs of hybrids other than Dak and a young one but unfortunately something got them when the shield was down. Zenith almost called off all searches due to what might have entered when it was down but I suspect that the danger has always been with us.

  The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

  My destination was a stone church behind where they found the storage units that held a backhoe and large gas tank. This area has a bunch of high brownstones surrounding a small park with a few sculptures and a children’s playground. This area was an exclusive enclave with its own courtyard and cluster of shops that catered to the inhabitants. I was going to bypass it because my desired location was the church behind it but think I heard a noise coming from the bottom floor of the building to my left.

  The tenant parking lot is in the back along with a large dumpster overflowing with what could be medical supplies and empty large bags of animal dry food, bulk packaging for sterile cloth wraps and bandages, syringes, plastic gallon jugs of Clorox, what looked like mats of hair. Looks like a dumpster to a veterinarians clinic. Could be, I guess. Wealthy people had their pets and were willing to spend fortunes on them for show or as status symbols. But with the bad weather we’ve had, the stuff looks new, just thrown in.

  I see what looks like repairs to the lower windows. The back entrance door is open a crack so on high alert I take off my boots and hold the door while I nudge in. I grab the little toy gun and flash light in one hand and tentatively make the first steps inside. Off.

  zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

  Outside after a preliminary search. I may have had a second of hesitancy but I do this because of moments like this. The thrill of discovery comes with its share of adrenaline rushes and this was one of those times. I’m confident there was someone there and they knew I was there so my stay was short. After all I didn’t knock or shout out a hello but these times require caution.

  Lots of thoughts rushing through my head caused by that adrenaline rush.

  The smell of pungent chemicals and cleaning supplies hit me as soon as I stepped through the door. Down a street sized hallway with a parked forklift and empty shelving on both sides was a room full of Cryo chamber’s, the size of a tall telephone booth and others the size of extra-large coolers. On one of the larger ones, a tag said mutation 041333. April thirteenth, 2233? Others weren’t dated but did say hybrid. What’s the difference? That was my first, fuck GET OUT.

  The second came at the end of the hall with three rooms all pretty much the same as you’d see at a vets but slightly modified with different sized cages, including some ten feet tall with dated tags on them, the last entry being, two weeks ago. That’s when I decided to get out. On the way out I pushed open a few more doors, one where the smell of Clorox hit me like a vaporous cloud. On one side were tall robot like things, I think UV disinfection bots with an island of autoclaves down the center. One picture at the end taunted me to go look but I didn’t. And the air ventilation system was working at least in that room so someone was definitely there.

  The other door sent a chill up my spine. A room just like the others but twice as long with cages but this one had what looked like muddy tracks to the other side of the room and out an open door. I thought maybe it was a joke, someone painting foot steps down the center but I didn’t want to take the short time to find out. The ten foot cages were enough. Need to come back with recruitments. I knew instantly that it was a dark lab or a good lab that had turned when masses of people began dying. These things are located across the country. Most aren’t into the heavy research that gets into splicing genes but are where the frozen embryo..

  ‘FUCK!’ A stream of expletives sounds of a fight, indistinguishable sounds and a loud groan….

  Zenith again. Being the first one lost, I am grateful that its taken this long but because of this, we have to understand that just because there’s a shield over us, a lot of what was here before, is still here. All searches are off until this is completely understood and resolved. The SWAT team is preparing to encounter anything and may. The papers taken by Gillian show that for years before civilization collapsed, labs were actively in pursuit of the perfect carnivore that was attracted to decaying human meat for the purpose of either eating or burying the millions of corpses. So, they undress the bodies first? Where do they take them? Are they humanoid? That would explain the missing bodies in the apartment of the café. Hope you are still alive Wilder but if not, rest in peace.