PLATFORM: FACEBOOK TIMELINE
USER: TYLER JORDAN (Structural Engineer)
STATUS: UPLOADED VIA STARLINK (Signal Strong - High Latitude)
BATTERY: 44% (Charging via Vehicle Adapter)
DATE: WEDNESDAY. DAY 38 POST-EVENT (DAWN).
LOCATION: ARUSHA-NAMANGA HIGHWAY (The "Longido" Stretch)
[Post Visibility: Public]
We are moving again.
The fire at the Mission Clinic is miles behind us now, a fading orange bruise on the southern horizon. We walked for three hours through the banana plantations, cutting our way through wet leaves and thick mud until the green belt of Arusha gave way to the dry, dusty scrubland of the plains.
The geography here changes fast. One minute you are in a lush tropical garden; the next, you are on the surface of Mars. The air is thinner, colder, and smells of red dust and dried acacia thorns.
My chest is a mess. The stitches Nayla put in are holding, but every step sends a jolt of electricity through my ribs. The adrenaline from the explosion has burned off, leaving behind a cold, hollow exhaustion. I feel lightheaded, like I am walking on the deck of a ship in rough seas.
"Keep moving, Engineer," Nayla whispered, her hand gripping my elbow to steady me. "If you stop, you fall. If you fall, you don't get up."
"I know the physics," I muttered, focusing on my boots. Left. Right. Left. Right. "Momentum is the only thing keeping me vertical."
We reached the edge of the highway just before dawn.
This road—the A104—is the main artery connecting Tanzania to Kenya. In the old world, it was a river of commerce. Trucks carrying goods from the port in Dar es Salaam to Nairobi, tourist buses heading to the game parks, daladalas packed with commuters.
Now, it is a river of a different kind.
We lay flat on our stomachs on a rocky outcrop overlooking the tarmac, watching the traffic.
And there is traffic.
In a world where civilization has collapsed, where the grid is down and the cities are burning, the highway is busier than ever. But it isn't chaotic. It is terrifyingly organized.
THE NIGHT CONVOY
"Look at the spacing," I whispered to Nayla, pointing at the line of vehicles moving North.
A convoy of six heavy trucks rumbled past us. They were massive 18-wheelers, the kind used for heavy logistics. But they weren't painted with corporate logos. They had been sprayed matte grey.
"Fifty-yard intervals," I noted. "Perfect spacing. If one hits a mine or breaks down, the others have room to maneuver. That isn't random driving. That is military protocol."
"Who is driving?" Nayla asked, squinting through the gloom.
"The Vultures," I said. "Look at the lead car."
Leading the trucks was a modified Land Cruiser, bristling with spikes and floodlights. The Vultures were the escorts. They were the sheepdogs guarding the flock.
"And the trucks?" Nayla asked. "What is inside?"
I watched the suspension of the trailers as they hit a pothole. The shocks compressed deep and rebounded slowly.
"They are heavy," I said. "Fully loaded. But they aren't carrying fuel. Fuel sloshes. These are carrying solid mass. Dense weight."
"People," Nayla said, her voice cracking. "Like the truck at the bridge."
"Or batteries," I countered. "Or both. It's a harvest, Nayla. They are stripping the south and moving it north. To Namanga."
We watched the convoy fade into the distance, their taillights looking like evil red eyes in the dark. The dust settled on the road, silence returning to the plains.
"We need a ride," I said, trying to push myself up. My arms shook. "Namanga is sixty miles away. In this heat, with my wounds? I won't make it on foot."
"We can't hijack a convoy," Nayla said. "You saw the guns."
"We don't need a convoy," I said, scanning the roadside. "We need a straggler."
THE SCAVENGER'S TRAP
We moved parallel to the road, staying in the cover of the acacia scrub. The sun began to crest over Mount Kilimanjaro to the East, painting the mountain's snow-capped peak in brilliant pink and gold. Under different circumstances, it would have been the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. Today, it just looked like an indifferent god watching us die.
We found our opportunity at Mile Marker 40.
A lone vehicle was parked on the shoulder of the road. It was a Land Rover Defender—the old, boxy kind that can run on cooking oil and prayer. It was painted in faded camouflage.
A man was kneeling by the rear tire. He was cursing loudly in Swahili, wrestling with a tire iron. A flat tire. The universal equalizer.
"One man," Nayla whispered. "I see a rifle leaning against the door."
"He is a Vulture scout," I said, spotting the gear-skull symbol stenciled on the door. "Checking the route ahead of the next convoy."
"I take the right flank," Nayla said, pulling the revolver. "You create a distraction."
"I am an engineer," I said, looking at the loose scree and rocks on the hill above the road. "I don't do distractions. I do landslides."
I pointed to a cluster of heavy boulders perched precariously on the edge of the cut-bank, directly above the Land Rover. The soil had been eroded by the recent rains.
"If I can dislodge that keystone rock," I whispered, "gravity does the rest."
"Can you climb up there?" she asked, looking at my blood-stained shirt.
"Watch me."
I scrambled up the slope. The pain in my chest was blinding, hot needles piercing my lungs with every breath. I gritted my teeth, forcing my body to obey. Physics doesn't care about your pain, I told myself. Physics only cares about leverage.
I reached the boulders. I found a sturdy branch to use as a lever. I wedged it under the smallest rock—the one holding the others back.
I looked down. Nayla was in position, hidden in the tall grass near the car. The Vulture was still cursing at the lug nuts, completely unaware that the mountain was about to fall on him.
I pushed.
The rock groaned. Dirt crumbled.
Give me a lever long enough, and I shall move the world. Or at least, I shall crush a bad man's car.
I put my entire weight on the branch.
CRACK.
The stone shifted. Then it rolled.
"Angalia juu!" (Look up!) I screamed.
The Vulture looked up just as three hundred pounds of rock tumbled down the slope.
He dove to the side. He was fast, but not fast enough to save the car. The boulders slammed into the hood of the Land Rover with a deafening CRANG. The windshield shattered. The front suspension collapsed.
The man scrambled in the dirt, reaching for his rifle.
"Don't!" Nayla stepped out of the grass, the revolver leveled at his head.
The man froze. He looked at the crushed hood of his car, then at the woman holding the gun, then up at me sliding down the hill.
"You broke my truck," he said, bewildered.
"I reshaped it," I wheezed, hitting the tarmac. I picked up his rifle—an old AK-47 with a taped stock. I checked the magazine. Full.
"Keys," I demanded.
"It won't run," the man sneered. "You smashed the engine block."
I walked over to the Land Rover. I peered into the crushed engine bay. The radiator was hissed steam, and the fan was bent, but the block looked intact. These old Defenders are built like tanks.
"It will run," I said. "It just won't be pretty."
We tied the Vulture to a Baobab tree with his own tow strap. We left him a bottle of water. I'm not a murderer, even if he is a slaver. The lions or the Simba will decide his fate.
I hot-wired the ignition—the keys were lost in the dirt. The engine roared to life, coughing black smoke and rattling like a bag of bolts, but it turned.
"Get in," I told Nayla.
THE LONGIDO PLAINS
We drove North.
The Land Rover shook and vibrated, the steering wheel fighting me every inch of the way. The smashed hood blocked half my view, so I had to lean out the side window to see the road.
But we were moving. We were doing sixty kilometers an hour. The wind rushed through the shattered windshield, cooling the sweat on my face.
For a long time, we didn't speak. The landscape outside changed from scrubland to open desert. This is Maasai land. Empty. Vast. Beautiful in a desolate way.
"You did good back there," Nayla said softly. She was digging through the Vulture's glove box. She found a pack of biscuits and a first-aid kit.
"I dropped a rock," I said. "Caveman engineering."
"It worked." She opened the first aid kit. "Hold still. You're bleeding through the shirt."
She cleaned my wound again while I drove. Her touch was gentle, professional.
"Why?" I asked, looking at the road.
"Why what?"
"Why are you helping me? You could have taken the bike at the bridge. You could have left me at the clinic. I'm slowing you down."
She paused, holding a gauze pad to my chest.
"Because you see things I don't," she said. "I see a wall; you see a load-bearing structure. I see a vent; you see airflow. I see a monster; you see a biological machine."
She looked out at the vast horizon. "The world is broken, Tyler. If we want to fix it, we don't need soldiers. We have plenty of those. We need builders. We need people who understand how the pieces fit together."
"I can't build anything right now," I said bitterly. "I can barely walk."
"You built a plan," she said. "That counts."
She handed me a biscuit. It tasted like sawdust and sugar, but it was the best thing I had ever eaten.
"Tell me about your sister," I said. "The one we are looking for."
Nayla looked down at her hands. "Her name is Amina. She is younger than me. Soft. She likes poetry and cats. She wasn't built for this world. When the outbreak started, she didn't run. She froze. I had to drag her to the car."
She took a deep breath. "I promised our mother I would keep her safe. And I put a black tag on her forehead and left her in a room to die."
"You didn't know," I said.
"I should have known," she whispered. "I'm a nurse. I should have seen that she wasn't turning. She was just... catatonic with fear. The Alphas took her because she was easy prey. And now... if she is in that truck..."
"We will find her," I said, gripping the steering wheel. "We are going to the Hive. We will tear it apart brick by brick if we have to."
THE GHOSTS OF THE ROAD
As we drove deeper into the Longido district, the signs of the "New World" became more frequent.
We passed small villages that had been burned to the ground. The scorched earth scars were black against the red soil.
But we also passed things that terrified me more than the destruction.
We passed Construction Zones.
In the middle of nowhere, miles from any town, there were crews working on the road.
But they weren't human crews.
I slowed the Land Rover, staring in disbelief.
A group of fifty Simba were filling potholes with rocks and dirt. They worked in silence. They formed a line, passing rocks from hand to hand. They weren't shambling. They were working.
Standing over them, watching from the shade of an umbrella tree, was an Alpha. He wore a reflective vest over his tattered suit. He held nothing but a long stick. When a worker slowed down, he didn't hit them. He just pointed. And the worker moved faster.
"They are maintaining the road," I whispered, the horror cold in my stomach. "They are keeping the supply line open."
"Slave labor," Nayla said. "The dead working for the dead."
"It's efficient," I said, my engineer brain recoiling. "It's a zero-cost workforce. No food. No sleep. No pay. Just endless labor until the body falls apart."
We drove past them slowly. The Alpha turned his head. His yellow eyes tracked the Land Rover. He didn't signal an attack. We were in a Vulture vehicle. To him, we were just part of the system. We were authorized traffic.
He turned back to his crew.
I floored the accelerator. I wanted to put as much distance between us and that nightmare as possible.
THE GATE OF NAMANGA
Three hours later, the sun was high in the sky. The heat was brutal, radiating off the tarmac in shimmering waves.
The sign ahead read: NAMANGA BORDER POST - 5 KM.
"We are here," Nayla said, sitting up straighter. She checked the rifle.
"We can't just drive up to the gate," I said. "If this is the Hive, it will be heavily guarded."
I pulled the Land Rover off the road, hiding it in a dry riverbed about two miles south of the town. We covered it with acacia branches.
We hiked the rest of the way, climbing a rocky ridge that overlooked the border town.
Namanga is—or was—a bustling border crossing. A chaotic mix of trucks, traders, and tourists moving between Tanzania and Kenya.
We crested the ridge and looked down.
My breath caught in my throat.
It wasn't a town anymore. It was a fortress.
A massive wall had been constructed around the town center. But it wasn't made of concrete. It was made of shipping containers. Thousands of them, stacked five high, welded together to form a steel ring around the immigration offices.
Towers had been built at the corners—scaffolding structures manned by figures that looked too still to be human.
And in the center of the town, rising above the containers, was something that defied logic.
It was a tower. A chaotic, spiraling spire made of scrap metal, cars, rebar, and wire. It looked like the Tower of Babel built from the wreckage of the apocalypse. It twisted three hundred feet into the air.
At the very top, pulsating with a rhythmic green light, was a massive array of antennas and satellite dishes.
"The Signal," I whispered. "That's where the broadcast is coming from."
"The Hive," Nayla said, pointing to the base of the tower.
Through my binoculars, I saw the trucks. The convoy we had tracked. They were driving through a massive gate in the container wall. They were driving straight toward the base of the metal tower.
And around the tower, the ground was moving.
Thousands of them. A sea of grey. An army of Simba standing in perfect concentric circles, facing the tower, swaying slightly as if in prayer.
"There must be ten thousand of them," I said.
"And my sister is in there," Nayla said, her voice steel.
"How do we get in?" I asked. "That wall is fifty feet high. The gate is guarded by an army."
Nayla looked at me. She pointed to a drainage culvert that ran from the hills, under the road, and disappeared beneath the container wall.
"You're the engineer, Tyler," she said. "You tell me. How do we break into a fortress made of steel boxes?"
I studied the wall. I studied the drainage. I studied the swaying tower of scrap metal.
"We don't break in," I said, a plan forming in the dark corners of my mind. "We knock it over."
"Knock over the wall?"
"No," I pointed to the unstable, spiraling tower in the center. "We knock over the antenna. If we cut the signal... maybe we break the trance. Maybe we turn the army against the masters."
I looked at Nayla.
"We are going to bring the whole thing down."
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