Batten Down the Hatches
Author: R.S. Merritt
Date: 2020-12-02 05:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Horror
Description: The journey to build a new life in the destruction of the world continues. The orphaned trio are forced to fight for one another in a world where corpses litter the streets. A world where adrenaline amped psychotic crawlerz own the night. Hope and love for one another light the way through a dark and dreary world where everyday you survive is a good day. Put your back solidly against the wall and pickup where book one left off. Make sure the wall you're against is solid enough to keep the monsters out.

Crawlerz

Book 2

“Batten Down the Hatches”

R S Merritt

Text Copyright © 2020 Randall Scott Merritt

All Rights Reserved

This series is dedicated to my beautiful wife and family.

Cover Design By:

Harry Lamb

Table of Contents

Chapter 1:  The Longest Layover

Chapter 2:  Slave Drivers

Chapter 3:  Knowing is Half the Battle

Chapter 4:  Early to Rise

Chapter 5:  Life Aboard the Neverland

Chapter 6:  The Lost Ark

Chapter 7:  Improvise, Overcome, Adapt

Chapter 8:  The Fine Art of Seduction

Chapter 9:  Hold My Beer

Chapter 10:  Double Tap

Chapter 11:  Awkward Beginnings

Chapter 12:  The Infection is Airborne

Chapter 13:  Dinner Interrupted

Chapter 14:  Reunions and Revenge

Chapter 15:  Meanwhile Back at the Base

Chapter 16:  Best Served Cold

Chapter 17:  General Quarters

Chapter 18:  Loose Lips

Chapter 19:  Change of Plans

Chapter 20:  If at First You Don’t Succeed

Chapter 21:  Can Do

Chapter 22:  Ship of the Damned

Chapter 23:  Never Tell Me the Odds

Chapter 24:  A Beach Getaway

Chapter 25:  Abandon Ship

Chapter 26:  East Bound and Down

Chapter 27:  The King is Dead, Long Live the King!

Chapter 28:  Just a Flesh Wound

Chapter 29:  Full Speed Ahead

Chapter 30:  Treadmills Aren’t just for Drying Clothes

Chapter 31:  Sardines

Chapter 32:  The Seabrook Island Survivors Club

Chapter 33:  You Can’t Fight the Rip

Chapter 34:  Home Sweet Home

Author’s Note:

Other Books by RS Merritt

Chapter 1:  The Longest Layover

Yue woke up on the hard floor of a military cargo plane.  She assumed it was military based on the spartan and drab interior.  All around her women from the clan were either sitting up rubbing their heads or still sleeping off whatever drug they’d been slipped.  Surrounding them were boxes of supplies.  Several of the boxes looked like they’d been pulled straight out of the clan’s trucks.

“How are you are feeling sweetie?”  A familiar voice asked from across the aisle.  Yue turned her head painfully until she could see it was Charani talking to her.

“Ouch.”  Yue responded pointing at her head.  Charani chuckled.

“Yeah.  Me too.  I didn’t even have the beer or wine.  What kind of psycho spikes a Diet Coke?”  Charani grimaced.

“Where are we?”  Yue asked.  It hurt to talk.  She had the worst headache of her life.  She didn’t say anything, but she’d had the Diet Coke as well.  Boxed wine and Bud Light weren’t the kind of alcohol she got excited about.  It needed to be some sort of icy mixed drink that was more sugary slush than booze before she was interested.

“On a plane.”  Charani deadpanned.

Yue sighed and lay her head back against a box.  She didn’t understand why they couldn’t have just pointed their guns at them and told them to get on the plane.  Why the roofies?  Her clothes all seemed to be on right.  Looking around she didn’t see where anybody looked like they’d been molested.  Not that any of them would necessarily know if they had been.  She looked back over at Charani and asked if she thought they’d done anything to them while they were out.

“Like rape?  No, I asked around and no one remembers or feels like anything like that happened.  Don’t worry yourself about that none.  You don’t feel like anything happened to you right?”  Charani gave Yue a hard look.  A deadly glint in her eye told Yue that if Charani suspected something like that had been done to her then those men better sleep with one eye open.

“No, I was just trying to figure out why they felt the need to knock us out.”  Yue said.  The plane bounced around in the air slinging them all around roughly.  There were a couple of dingy round windows, but boxes had been stacked in front of them.  It was dark out so there probably wasn’t anything to see anyway.  A sinking feeling in her stomach as the plane started descending rapidly.  It felt like they were going straight down.  A couple of the women screamed.  They were all freaking out they were about to die in a fiery plane crash.

The plane bounced on a hard surface before being yanked to a rapid halt.  The plane began taxiing along some sort of runway.  Charani and another woman slid the boxes out from in front of the window so they could look out.  The plane braked to a hard stop knocking the small group of women who’d gathered to stare through the grimy glass off their feet.  The back of the plane started descending to make a ramp down to the runway.  Yue hadn’t been one of the ones in the group looking out the window, so she happened to be the first one down the ramp.  A naval officer flanked by a couple of seamen with shore patrol bands on their arms stopped her at the bottom of the ramp.

Yue was busily looking around trying to figure out where she was.  The bright lights were making it hard to see.  The way the ground was shifting and the fact that she was staring at sailors running around everywhere.  The officer waited for all the women to come down the ramp then asked them to follow him.

“We have a few that haven’t woken up from the drugs yet.”  Charani said loudly.  The officer got a confused look on his face then ordered the men to bring out a couple of stretcher bearers.

“We’ll have them carried to the briefing room.  You were drugged?”  The officer asked.

“Like you didn’t know.”  Charani responded staring into the man’s eyes.  She got in his face to the point the one shore patrolman stepped forward to restrain her.  The officer put his hand on the man’s chest to hold him back.

“I didn’t know.  I’ll find out what happened.  I’m going to have these men escort you to the briefing center.  I’m going to make sure the stretcher bearers show up and have them take the last three women over to join the rest of you.  Then I’m going to check on some things before I meet you all in the briefing center.”  The officer looked at them expectantly for a second before turning on his heel and walking briskly away to take care of the tasks he’d set for himself.

Their escort took them down a hatch into a labyrinth of grey metal hallways and hatches.  The sailors they passed stared at them in shock.  Yue guessed that was due to the decidedly non-military haircuts and clothing the women were wearing.  She thought at first there might not even be any women on the ship.  They passed a pair of women in the dungarees and blue work shirts in one of the hallways though which set Yue’s mind at ease.  She could see how being the only women on a ship with this many men could be an issue.  She’d been worried they were being brought on the ship to scratch an itch.  Especially considering how they’d been drugged and transported.

The briefing room they were left in was large enough for all of them to have a seat.  There were meticulously cleaned whiteboards all around the room.  Clipboards were neatly stacked on a desk in the back.  About twenty minutes after getting settled in the other three women were walked in.  The corpsmen had used smelling salts on them instead of trying to carry them around in stretchers.  The sailors told them to wait there for the lieutenant then left.

They were still waiting for the lieutenant to show up when several sailors entered carrying trays loaded with food and drinks.  The delicious smell of hot coffee filled the room.  Sandwiches and French Fries covered the trays.  Yue started salivating as she and the other women moved in on the trays like a pack of starving hyenas around a barbecue sauce covered chicken.

“You all do remember what happened the last time you ate the food these people gave us right?”  Charani called out loudly.

“Free airplane ride to possibly the safest place on the planet?”  One of the women who normally did the highwire act fired back instantly.  She had to have been thinking about that answer for a little while she’d said it so fast.  She also brought up a very good point.  Yue didn’t think there was a safer place they could be.  At least as far as protection from the infected went.  Assuming the aircraft carrier was sitting in the middle of the ocean.

“You’ve all been drugged and dragged out to the middle of the ocean to be used as party favors.”  Charani said loudly.  This caused more than a few of the women to pause and reconsider if the peanut butter and jelly sandwiches were worth it.

“Not exactly.”  The lieutenant commander who’d met them on the flight deck was standing in the back of the room. He’d been listening to the exchange and getting a bit more frustrated with every word.  The women of the clan all turned around noticing him for the first time.  He told the crew they could leave the trays and coffee.  He asked them all to have a seat once they had some food.  He grabbed himself a sandwich off the tray and poured a cup of coffee out of the provided carafe.  He took a bit bite of the sandwich and tried to take a big swig of the coffee to show them it wasn’t poisoned. The coffee was way too hot, so he just sipped at it instead.  Once everyone was settled in, he went up to the front of the room and waited until he had their attention.

“I’m Lieutenant Commander Watkins.  You’re currently sailing on board the USS Gerald Ford.  She’s a state of the art thirteen-billion-dollar aircraft carrier with a crew of approximately three thousand.  That’s not counting additional passengers we’ve picked up such as yourselves.  You will in no way be treated as ‘party favors’.”  Watkins stressed this last part looking around the room to see if anyone had any questions.  He got quite a few hostile looks and one woman winked at him, but no one said anything.

“First off on behalf of the captain and myself I apologize for the way you were transported here.  We’ve been placed under the command of the Department for the Continuation of the United States.  It’s a department no one really knew existed until this whole mess started.  The President granted them carte blanche since they seemed to have a plan in place for this sort of scenario.  The man who had you drugged was the section leader for the southeast.  I’ve been told it was his call in his section but that as long as you’re on board this ship, you’re safe from anything like that happening again.”  Watkins paused and looked around the room again to see if anyone had any questions.

“What’s happening to the rest of the people we were with?  Our husbands and friends that’re stuck back there.  Will they be ok?  Why’d they only send the women out here?”  One of the women rapid fired questions at Watkins.  Yue had been about to ask a set of similar questions.  How was she supposed to protect her brothers from way out here in the middle of the ocean?

“We have very limited space for passengers.  The only places that are really guaranteed to be safe are ships and islands.  When we put out to sea with orders not to dock at the beginning of this, we had our normal crew.  Since then more VIPs have been added.  The ship’s still about ninety percent men though.  The mission is to survive then rebuild.  We can’t rebuild with a bunch of men.  Or, at least not rebuild another generation.”  Watkins answered.

“Got it.  We’re breeding stock.  What about our men?”  Charani asked angrily.

“I asked and it sounds like your men are being pressed into service for supply runs.”  Watkins answered.  He looked very awkward standing up there now.  This was obviously not going the way he wanted it to go.  Yue almost felt sorry for the guy. He’d been put in a seriously difficult position.

“Now what happens?”  Yue asked when the silence started to drag.  There was a low rumble of whispers that sounded like they might boil over.  Knowing nothing constructive would come from that Yue wanted to head it off.  Hopefully Watkins could rise to the occasion.  He needed to dig himself out of the hole of appearing to endorse a government sanctioned sex trafficking ring.  One that made slaves out of the husbands of the women being trafficked.  It wasn’t a good look.

“Here’s what I know.  You’ve all been treated horribly.  No one on this ship agrees with how you were treated.  The captain wanted me to stress that your guests on this ship.  Not prisoners.  What happens next is you’ll be tested to make sure you’re not infected.  You’ll be isolated in this room until that happens.  If we’d really suspected any infection, we wouldn’t have let the plane land here, but the doctors want to have a look at you.  You’ll be issued uniforms and a berthing area afterwards.  We really don’t have much more of a plan after that.  We were thinking you could stay on as civilians and be given jobs, swear in as sailors if you wanted, or we could drop you off at the first safe refugee area we get close to.”  Watkins answered.  The man was sweating under the harsh glare of the women’s scorn.  These weren’t the type who liked being ordered around.

“Where’s the first safe refugee area?”  Yue asked.

“There really isn’t one yet.”  Watkins answered uncomfortably.  His tone was that of a person who’s doing the best he can under the circumstances he finds himself stuck in.

“So, we actually are prisoners?  I mean if we can’t get off the ship…”  One of the women challenged Watkins.  He was saved from answering the question by the arrival of a couple of corpsmen who started getting everyone lined up.  Unlike the rest of the crew who’d interacted with the women these guys were wearing gloves and masks.  It didn’t make Yue feel great about how well the Navy was setting up protocols to deal with the infection.

Watkins announced he was leaving them to get the checkups and he took off.  The corpsmen had them all get in a line.  They took blood samples and did standard temperature checks and such.  They were told they’d be seen by a female medical professional for female type checkups.  The women made a few bawdy jokes to embarrass the corpsmen.  This was not a shy group of women.  About half of the women seemed to be acclimating pretty well to the odd situation.  This was after all a relatively safe place to weather the apocalypse.  The other half were the ones with the stronger connections to the men who’d been left behind.  They were all bursting with worry for them.

Yue was one of the ones bursting with worry.  She was scheming the entire time they were being cleared by the corpsmen.  She noticed they were focused more on things like lice than if the women had crawler symptoms or not.  Although she supposed the crawler symptoms would look a lot like the flu anyway.  Lice running rampant on a ship this size wouldn’t be any fun.  She had a few whispered conversations with Charani while they waited.  Charani was ready to go as well although she wasn’t as gung-ho as Yue to get off the ship.  She was worried about her vardo and she didn’t like that her freedom had been stolen from her.

They were provided with the same dungaree uniforms the rest of the crew was wearing and assigned berthing areas.  Yue was surprised to see that they were going to be separated into different parts of the ship.  There were only a few areas used for the women’s berthing and they were divided by ratings and other things that Yue had no idea about.  Most of her military knowledge came from her dad’s stories and the season or two of NCIS she’d watched before moving on to Breaking Bad.  Their escort did proudly tell them this was one of the first warships designed to support women in combat.  Evidently that boiled down to there not being any urinals in any of the bathrooms on board.

“You still here?”  Charani asked Yue.  They’d just been told the bathroom equality bit by their escort.  They were being taken to their new temporary home somewhere in the belly of the massive ship.

Yue had been transported back to a simpler time where her brother Drew made fun of her for using the word ‘head’ to describe a bathroom.  She’d only been saying it then because her dad had said it.  Little had she known then how soon she’d be using that term for real. Who’d have ever thought she’d be looking back fondly on the time spent driving a beat to hell car through an apocalypse while cradling her dying father in her arms.  She smiled and shook off those thoughts.  Thinking of her father had just strengthened her resolve.  She’d figure out a way off this gigantic floating prison.  She’d find her brothers and they’d keep right on going with their search for a place to settle in this madness.  This wasn’t her final destination.  This was just a layover.

Chapter 2:  Slave Drivers

Drew gunned the engine on the super silent electric crotch rocket. A high-pitched whine erupted from the bike and he was instantly transported out of reach of the surger who’d appeared out of nowhere.  Beside him LeBron was wobbling around from having pulled off the same maneuver.  Their escort was hunched over the handlebars of his own bike up ahead of them.  The military force serving under Special Agent Leander had been fairly sheltered since the crawlerz spread out across the country.  Drew was pretty sure this was the first time the guy serving as their escort had actually left the safety of the base since this all started.

That didn’t in anyway imply the men weren’t up to the task.  They were all highly trained counter insurgency operatives.  Members of various branches of the special forces.  They’d all been under fire in their past lives.  They just hadn’t ever been chased around in broad daylight by half-naked teens moving with lightning speed to try and bite their heads off.  LeBron and Drew were seasoned veterans compared to the super masculine apocalypse noobs on the base.  They’d both found it amusing when they’d been told the escort was being provided for their protection.  Especially when the first thing the weapons covered soldier had asked was if they’d actually seen a surger in real life yet.

A serious benefit for working for the department was the gear.  In addition to being reissued some of their personal weapons they’d also been allowed to check out a couple of electric motorcycles.  On top of looking pretty badass the bikes packed some serious zoom.  Twisting the throttle sent you silently hurdling forward in seconds.  In true military fashion they’d spent a day being trained on the motorcycles before being allowed to take them out.  This had included a quiz based on a manual with more information about the bikes in it than they’d ever possibly need to know.  At a hundred grand a pop it wasn’t like the custom-made Harleys were cheap.

Between the pandemics, the terroristic bioweapons threats and the fear of some sort of climate disaster the department had been flush with cash the last few years.  Politicians in charge of slush fund money felt pretty good about shifting some of it over to an organization dedicated to keeping the government going in case of a cataclysmic event.  They signed some papers and hundreds of millions of dollars was quietly appropriated and spent on facilities like the one in South Carolina.  Facilities equipped with gigantic EMP proof warehouses with enough gear in each region to hopefully allow the United States to recover from just about anything it was possible to recover from.

None of the members of Blaze’s clan were authorized to see the inside of the warehouse.  They only knew it existed because equipment like the motorcycles was rolled out of it.  Drew had asked a loose lipped guard he’d been hanging out with about it.  The guard had asked him if he’d ever seen the warehouse at the end of the Indiana Jones movie.  When Drew nodded in the affirmative the guard smiled and nodded his head.  Whatever the hell that meant.

Drew stayed behind his brother to make sure LeBron didn’t manage to crash the six-figure cycle.  Leander hadn’t blindly picked them for this mission.  They’d been armed and given valuable tech.  Leander wasn’t going to do that for people he thought may simply take off once he let them outside the gates.  He had their sister Yue somewhere and knew they weren’t going to leave until they knew where she was.  All he would tell them was that as long as they did what they were told their sister would be in a nice, safe place away from all the dangers of the road.  They’d had no choice but to nod their heads and agree to do whatever they were told.  If Drew ever got the opportunity Leander would be up against a wall with a blade to his throat telling them how to find their sister or he’d have a new hole to breathe out of.

For now, they were going to be helping the Department of Magical Mysteries or whatever the hell organization Leander was James Bond of to protect what was left of the southeastern portion of the United States.  Their mission was to give the survivors in this region the capabilities of surviving and fighting back.  Leander’s team would arm groups of survivors and act as the liaison to the rest of the US fighting forces.  For now, the goal was to regroup and survive.  There’d been about five hundred million people in North America when the crawlerz came across the border.  If just one percent of those had managed to survive then there should be at least five hundred thousand people left.  That was more than enough to rebuild given time and a solid defense against the enemy.

A lot of the special forces team were trained on dealing with bioweapons.  A few of them had been to epidemiology training sponsored by the CDC.  LeBron had listened intently as they’d explained that out of the half billion people in the country at least half had very likely made the transition to become crawlerz.  That meant that North America could be crawling with about a quarter of a billion of the supernaturally fast freaks.  No one was retaking the country anytime soon.

Best case they could round up the survivors and start building safe havens.  Walled fortresses the infected couldn’t get into where they could grow food and lead normal lives.  It’d be a few generations before they could actually inhabit most of the country again.  It wasn’t like the threat was going to die out anytime soon.  The original crawlerz in that gigantic crypt in Egypt had been thousands of years old and they’d still been kicking.

Leander had attempted to motivate Blaze’s band of felons and misfits to aid in the cause.  It would’ve helped if he hadn’t drugged them all and taken their women and weapons from them while they slept.  His excuse that he’d been ordered to send the women back to the fleet for their own safety hadn’t set well with the clan at all.  Although they did agree that if he’d just asked them nicely without drugging them it probably wouldn’t have ended well.  An uneasy truce had sprung up with Blaze allowed to remain in charge of what was left of the clan as long as he took orders from Leander.  It was pretty much the way the ex-CIA agent Leander had been trained to build out a rebel army.  Or, at least it was now that he couldn’t just hand them bags filled with cash and cocaine.

They’d been sent out on a trial run to see how well they could work together.  One of the things Leander’s forces didn’t have a lot of was experience outside the gates of their little private fortress.  The clan had that in spades.  This first mission was a road clearing mission.  LeBron had a winch mounted on his bike they were going to use to remove any vehicles on the roads leading to the base.  Taking care of infrastructure like the roads was going to be a critical part of getting the United States functioning again.  Drew imagined Leander had a checklist of things he could start accomplishing.  The dirtbag was probably sitting in his bed at night happily looking for the ones that would take the least effort.  He seemed like the kind of guy who’d like to report to his superiors that he was making rapid progress whether it was real or not.

Drew glanced back over his shoulder confirming he could no longer see the surger.  He slowed down and keyed the mic on the side of his helmet to let the other two riders know he was stopping.  Both of their brake lights come on as soon as he finished his transmission.  He waited on his bike as LeBron and the Marine both performed tight turns on the road to end up sitting beside him.  Drew was loving the helmets.  They could talk to one another and not attract the infected.

“Alright Flanagan you ready to waste one of these things?”  Drew asked the leatherneck who was sitting on his bike staring down the road in the direction they’d left the surger.

“You think it’s still chasing us?”  Flanagan asked.

“They don’t stop until you kill them, or they get sidetracked.  That thing will be running down this road for the next three days.  The reason we’re stopped here is because it’s better to take care of it now when we’re expecting it than later when we’re not.”  LeBron answered.

Flanagan clicked the button to shoot down the kickstand on either side of the bike and climbed off his space age hog.  They stood there staring down the road for a minute before the surger finally appeared from around the curve.  Flanagan nestled his heavy barreled AR-15 into his shoulder and sighted in on the tweaked-out teen speeding towards them.

“You guys normally go for headshots?”  Flanagan asked idly.  He’d been nervous about going out into a world full of monsters from his nightmares.  With a rifle pressed to his shoulder and an enemy charging to kill him he was back in his comfort zone.  He waited calmly for an answer while he tracked the monster charging for them.  It’d poured on the speed as soon as it saw them.  It’d also started screaming out a challenge.

“That’s just in the zombie movies.  Unless it’s an easy headshot, we normally just go for center of mass and put them on the ground.  They die eventually and we save bullets.”  Drew answered.

Flanagan grunted an unintelligible reply before sending a round downrange.  The surger had been in the middle of a leap to try and get to them even faster when the bullet caught it in the gut.  It kept running towards them without even slowing down.  Flanagan waited a second then sent another round.  This one smashed into the monsters chest and put it on the ground.  It started to stand back up then fell to the ground and lie still.

“Well that was different.”  Flanagan said into the mic before getting back on his bike.  He flipped the button to pull the electronic kickstand up then with a flick of his wrist he was hurdling down the road again.

There really weren’t that many cars for them to pull off the roads out here in the middle of nowhere.  The exercise basically let them test out the capabilities of the bikes and get used to working with one another.  Flanagan was happy for the opportunity to finally get off the base.  He’d been pulled out of his team and reassigned to the continuation group about three days after the first group of archaeologists had become infected in Egypt.  Someone in the government had been paying attention for once.  Not that there was a lot they could do about it.

They pulled a grand total of four vehicles off the road. Only one of the cars was really even blocking the road.  They went two hundred miles out and two hundred miles back on a single charge of the custom-made oversized batteries.  Other than the one surger they’d killed they didn’t see any other ones.  It was late afternoon when they pulled back onto the road leading to the base.  Flanagan made the comment that it hadn’t been all that bad.

“That’s because it’s daytime.  When the crawlerz come out at night it’s a whole different story.”  Drew told him as they rolled up to the gate and waited for the guard on the camera to see them and press the button to open it up.  They rode into the base proper once the extra tall gate slid smoothly open.

LeBron saw the gate as an issue.  If they’d been coming in hot with a mob of the infected chasing them then the gate opened and closed way too slowly to keep the fast-moving creatures out.  That could wind up being the base’s Achilles heel.  There was always the possibility the base sported an advanced command center setup with video feeds to watch the surrounding area to prevent that from happening.  Considering the kind of money that the government had dumped into this place that wouldn’t have surprised LeBron at all.  For the moment he just let himself enjoy the secure feeling he got when that gate clicked shut behind them.

Drew was torn.  He’d already been dealing with his sister and brother being taken away from him by Blaze.  He’d slammed them into confinement in a different truck.  He’d been working on adjusting to that situation when they’d rolled into this top-secret base in the middle of nowhere.  These dirtballs had drugged him, kidnapped his sister, and now were making him go risk his life to clear off roads.  The worst part of it all was if they hadn’t kidnapped his sister, he’d have jumped into this effort headfirst.

Drew loved the idea of working with the government to reclaim their country.  If they’d mailed him a brochure to come join the zombie fighting corps, he’d have been all over it.  He loved working with and learning from guys like Flanagan.  Leander was a complete douchebag but that was just something you had to deal with sometimes.  The whole situation would’ve been vastly improved if Leander hadn’t drugged them all and kidnapped his sister.  Holding his sister as a hostage to force him to fight didn’t jive well with Drew’s sense of right and wrong.  He doubted Flanagan or any of the other military men walking around thought it did either.

They rolled their ridiculously expensive bikes underneath the metal awning sticking out from the hangar at the edge of the small airfield.  There were charging ports there they had to hook the bikes up to before cleaning them off and covering them with tarps.  The man on duty in the warehouse came out and collected Drew and LeBron’s weapons.  They each had a special duffle bag to put their personal gear into.  Neither Drew nor LeBron loved the idea of walking around sans weapons in the middle of the apocalypse, but they didn’t have a lot of room to argue.  Drew knew he personally wouldn’t mind shooting Leander in the leg repetitively until Leander told him where his sister was being held.  He’d more than likely let that sentiment show on his face when talking to the ex-spook.

“Hey man.  How do you feel about being part of a group that drugged a bunch of people and kidnapped the women who were with them?”  Drew blurted the awkward question out to Flanagan.  They were in the middle of the dirt field between the barracks and the airstrip.  It’d been bugging him the whole time.  He really liked Flanaghan and didn’t understand how such a standup guy could be part of something sleazy like that.

“You mean besides wishing they’d kidnapped the men and left the women.”  Flanagan snapped back with a grin.  His grin disappeared quickly when he saw the look on his companions faces.

“Those women included my sister.”  LeBron said turning his head to look away.  Unlike Drew he could care less about being in the zombie fighting corps.  He just wanted their family back together again.  He was a bit worried at the hero worship he saw in Drew’s eyes anytime his older brother looked at the special ops soldiers.  Drew had always been looking for a place to belong.  Standing beside those elite fighting men was a good fit.

“Yeah.”  Flanagan stopped walking to look them both in the eye.  “The rest of us were following orders.  That was one hundred percent our fearless leaders idea.  We went along with it because it made sense.  You weren’t leaving here after randomly rolling into our top-secret bat cave.  We couldn’t just kill all of you.  Locking you up’s a waste of resources.  Honestly, I think it turned out pretty good.  Your sister got sent somewhere safe and you guys get to fight beside us for life, liberty, and whatnot.”  Flanagan resumed walking.  Drew and LeBron stayed stationary for a moment considering what the man had just said.  It sucked that it made sense.  Maybe they’d been looking at this all backwards?

The entrance to their barracks loomed in front of them.  One of the special ops guys was stationed outside of it on guard duty.  He looked like the picture of boredom.  He nodded at Flanagan as they got closer.

“Get some?”  He asked.

“Got some.”  Flanagan replied.

“That was some pretty intense dialogue back there.”  LeBron joked after Flanagan walked them through the barracks door.

“We’re going to read each other poetry later.”  Flanagan answered.

They walked down the tiled hallway with their boots echoing loudly.  The interior of the building was much bigger than it’d appeared from the outside.  It’d been built into the side of a hill.  Or the hill had been added on top of it.  Either way you couldn’t tell how large the building was from looking at it from outside.  Flanagan took them past the door to their barracks into the administrative section.  They sat down around a long conference table with a large screen TV set in the wall up at the front.  They hadn’t sat down for more than a minute when Special Agent Leander walked in.

Drew was surprised at how visceral his reaction to the sight of the man was.  He felt his rage-o-meter heading rapidly into the Hulk degrees.  He wanted nothing more than to stand up and knock the stupid looking grin off the face of the man who assumed he owned them now.  As a trained field intelligence operative with a ton of experience in the field Leander saw that look in Drews eyes and instantly recognized it for what it was.  He considered the best way to address it as he walked over to a small cabinet and pulled out bottles of water for each of them.

“Is this poison or just more knock out juice?”  Drew asked.

“It’s water.”  Leander answered crisply.  “How’d the road clearing exercise work out today?”

“It worked out fine sir.  There really wasn’t that many cars to be moved.  I’ll write up a brief later, but we only encountered one hostile.  The bikes held up and performed well.  LeBron and Drew here both know what they’re doing out in the field.  We can learn a lot from them.”  Flanagan answered quickly before Drew could start running his mouth again.

“Excellent.  Any observations from either of you?”  Leander asked.

“The gate sir.”  LeBron said.

“Excuse me?”  Leander turned to stare at LeBron. He patiently waited for him to explain.

“The front gate.  If we’d been coming back with a bunch of surgers chasing us they’d have come through right behind us.  Either you have video and infrared surveillance all around the base or you’re taking a major risk every time you open the gate to let someone in.  Also, what if one of us had been bitten?  We all could’ve been bitten actually.  Not likely but possible.  I think recent events have shown us very clearly we need to plan for the unlikely.”  LeBron answered.  He answered articulately through the clicking noise his jaw made every time he moved his mouth.  That was a souvenir of his initiation into Blaze’s group.

“My career has been built around preparing for the unlikely so I’m in complete agreement with you.  I also get why Blaze said you were wasted out in the field and should be used more as an analyst.  I thought he was just trying to protect you so you could heal up from that smashed jaw.  Turns out he was just telling the truth.  I guess I’m just not used to hearing the truth so directly.”  Leander said leaning back in the generic conference room chair.  The government auditors had allowed the group to buy hundred thousand-dollar motorcycles but no way where they going to allow for the more expensive chairs.

“It must be hard for someone like you to think people are telling the truth.”  Drew parroted innocently.

“Blaze told me that you’re an excellent candidate for field work.  He said it was like you’d been made for it.  I’m assuming Agent Flanagan is going to echo that eval in his brief.  You’ll be a central part of our operations moving forward.  Especially with the field experience you’ve already racked up.”  Leander said.  He was careful to ensure he didn’t let a note of condescension creep into his voice.

“He did good sir.  We can all learn a lot from him and his brother.”  Flanagan echoed his earlier comment.  Coming from Flanagan it sounded much less patronizing.

“Thank you, gentlemen.  For the work you did today and for the work you’ll keep doing to reclaim this land.  Hopefully in time you’ll be able to see why you were separated from your sister.  Incidentally there’s a letter from her in your barracks.  I left it with Blaze to give to you when you got back today.  Hopefully it makes you feel a little better about everything.  Dismissed.”

Drew forgot to even say anything passive aggressive to Leander in his haste to get up and go read the letter from Yue.  LeBron managed to snap out a quick thanks before hustling off after Drew.

“Give me an army made up of men like that and we’ll reclaim this country in a few months.”  Leander said after they’d left.

“Agreed sir.”  Flanagan said before taking his leave.

Leander opened up the folder he’d been carrying with him and pulled out a packet filled with aerial photos and reports.  Sighing he spread everything out on the table and began going through the intelligence trying to figure out the best way to go about accomplishing the impossible.

Chapter 3:  Knowing is Half the Battle

Drew and LeBron restrained themselves from physically sprinting down the hallway.  They didn’t want to be seen as trying to escape or anything.  The men guarding this base typically saw things in black or white.  If they saw what you were doing in that black category there’s a good chance the next color would be red.  For that reason and to avoid giving Leander too much satisfaction they constrained themselves to walking very quickly.  That didn’t stop them from ripping the letter away from Blaze the second he produced it out of his coat pocket.  He was grinning as he watched his two protégées walking quickly to their cots while carefully opening the envelope.

Drew started reading it silently and LeBron punched him in the arm.

“Read it out loud.”  LeBron made a face at Drew showing what he felt about his older brother being a selfish moron.

“Right.  Sorry.  Yeah so she says…”

Dearest Brothers -  How’s that for a fancy salutation?  This letter will be far shorter than the rules I was given around writing you a letter.  Suffice it to say they don’t want us giving away our location.  However, they’re letting us write this letter so we can let you know that we’re in a safe location.  With our government providing that sort of excellent guidance I don’t understand how we ever got in this mess in the first place.  If that sounds a little condescending, you should’ve seen what I wrote in the letter they just made me toss out.

Life’s great here at Camp Icanttellyouwhere.  They have lots of games and I’ve met plenty of new friends.  I miss you both though and hope to see you soon.  Although I’ve been told that’s not super likely to happen.  The place we’re at is probably about as safe as you can possibly get.  Definitely safer than what they tell me you two will be doing.  In short don’t worry about me.  I’m going to be fine and I’m going to be looking forward to seeing you again at some point.  Hopefully not too far down the road.

I’m sick of having to toss these letters out because I accidentally say something to give you a clue where I’m at so I’m going to close this one out now just to make sure I actually get something out to you before the mail leaves.  I know I’d be worried like crazy if you two had been taken away like I was.  I’m even more worried that you’ll get hurt.  From what I understand you’ll be in the thick of it.  Take care of each other.  Remember what dad told us.  LeBron make sure you write me if they let you! (I know Drew will never get around to it)

Love you to the moon and back!

Your Sister!

Yue Tang Clan Forever!

“Well it’s definitely her that wrote it.”  LeBron said chuckling at the Yue Tang reference.  He was sitting on the cot with his brother.  Both of them were struggling to hold back their emotions.  Drew’s voice had cracked a few times reading the letter.  LeBron had been glad Drew read it instead of him because he was losing it just listening.

“How’s she doing?”  Blaze asked.  He’d strolled over after giving them a respectable amount of time to get through the letter and pull themselves together.

“Better than us from what I could tell.  Any clue where they’re actually at?”  Drew replied.

“Nope.  All the letters everyone got were pretty cryptic.  My guess would be on a cruise ship turned into a refugee ship or an island the government took over.”  Blaze said thoughtfully.  They all nodded.  Given the crawlerz wouldn’t cross water those two options made the most sense.  Anywhere in the continental US was a tossup at this point as far as survival.

“Well as soon as we get a chance, we’re getting her back.”  Drew announced.

“Agreed.  We just need to bide our time until we get that chance.  When we finally do get it, we’ll need to be ready to strike fast and hard though.  You two get a good night’s sleep.  It wouldn’t surprise me if our esteemed dictator has a new mission in store for you by morning.”

Blaze wandered off and Drew and LeBron sat on their cots wondering what was next.  Exhausted from an extremely intense day and riding a welcome wave of relief brought on by the letter from Yue they both relaxed.  Drew amused himself with a battery powered blackjack game while LeBron cracked open a bioweapons manual Flanagan had given him to read.  The manual had the words confidential stamped in red on each page.  Flanagan had told him none of the information was really all that secret though.  The military just liked putting stamps on everything.

“Wake up.”  LeBron and Drew both shifted around as Blaze poked them each in succession to try and get them out of bed.  They may be a couple of hardened apocalyptic warriors, but they were still teenagers.  Teenagers aren’t known for their ability to wake up on demand.  Drew was actually famous in the Russel household for being almost impossible to get out of bed in the morning.  Their mom had discovered the best way was to make pancakes and bacon and then wave it around in his room so he could smell it.  If only Amazon sold some sort of breakfast smell creating alarm clock.

LeBron sat up sleepily on his cot watching Blaze vainly attempt to rouse Drew.  LeBron fumbled around under his cot until he found his canteen.  He shook it to determine he had plenty of water left then took a big gulp out of it.  Before sealing the canteen back up he splashed some on Drew’s face.  That did the trick.

“What the hell.  We under attack?”  Drew asked sitting up and looking around for the weapons they didn’t get to keep on them anymore.

“I don’t know.  Leander sent Flanagan to come grab the three of us for a consult.”  Blaze answered in a hushed voice to avoid disturbing the men sleeping nearby.

“What do you mean a consult?”  LeBron asked.  He may have been sitting upright before Drew, but he was struggling to regain full wakefulness.  That government authored scientific manual he’d read before falling asleep hadn’t exactly been the Lord of the Rings.  It’d been a lot more like the Silmarilllion.  A book that even a Tolkien fanboy like LeBron had a hard time beating his way through.

“No clue.  Let’s not piss him off though.  I’d rather have him send for us this way than drug us and have us dragged there.  You guys ready?”  Blaze asked standing up.  LeBron noticed the shadowy figure of Flanagan standing a few feet away for the first time.

An obstinate Drew insisted on taking his time.  Flanagan didn’t seem overly concerned with how long it was taking them to get up and moving.  Of course, Flanagan wasn’t the type who got overly concerned about much of anything.  Once they were finally ready, he led them down the hall back into the administrative area.  They walked to a door that none of them had seen before.  He stuck his pointer finger on the biometric reader and the lock disengaged with a snapping sound.

They walked into a room crowded with video screens and people.  Looking around LeBron saw that the infrared and video surveillance he’d guessed was there had definitely been implemented as part of the base build-out.  It looked like they had visibility up and down most of the roads in the area as well as into the woods surrounding the base.

A large screen in the middle of the massive video wall showed a green tinted dirt field LeBron recognized as the field adjacent to the barracks.  A small pack of crawlerz was sniffing around in the area.  LeBron almost jumped when Leander came up from behind and tapped him on the shoulder.

“They showed up about an hour ago.  They were coming down the road then they turned into the woods.  We saw them on infrared climbing the trees. They jumped right over our twenty-foot-tall fence like it was nothing.  I wanted to see if you three had any opinions on this from your experience out in the field.”  Leander stopped and looked towards the three of them.  He hadn’t called out LeBron specifically, but everyone was pretty much waiting for LeBron to kick off the conversation.

“Where does the power for everything come from?”  LeBron asked.  He had a specific reason in mind for asking.  He’d been curious since they’d gotten here. He saw this as a good time to get his questions answered.  Especially since that answer may be relevant to the question Leander was asking them now.

“We have camouflaged solar arrays that generate most of our power. We have diesel generators that kick on to support us when the solar gets low.”  Leander answered quickly.

“Ok.  If the generators kicked on when the crawlerz were anywhere around that could’ve attracted them.  They’re super sensitive to noise and vibration.  We shot a surger earlier today on the road clearing mission.  It took two shots to put it down.  That noise could’ve attracted the pack out in the yard.  They could’ve just been randomly wandering by and sensed us over here.  There’s lots of evidence out there that they have some telepathic capabilities.”  LeBron stood there staring up at the monitors with Leander staring back at him incredulously.

“I get the generator and the rifle shots.  We’ll need to talk some more later about where you’re getting the telepathy angle from.  What do we do about them?”  Leander asked.

“Kill them or hope they leave.  If they can’t get in here, we could just let them wander around, but they may decide to hide out in the bushes somewhere you don’t have cameras and it could get dangerous hunting them down.”  Drew answered.

“If we shoot them won’t more just hear the noise and show up?”  Flanagan asked.

“That’s why we drove around in trucks.  If you sit in one place for too long, you’re going to be covered in those things.  Once you can’t go outside, you’re stuck sitting inside this hill until you run out of food or die of boredom.”  Blaze said.

“We could always make a break for it during the day.”  Drew added.  Blaze and LeBron both nodded along with that assessment while Leander shook his head in bafflement.  This new world was full of contradictions.  Thinking it through he realized they were going to need to come up with a massive amount of new protocols to be able to use this base as their main area of operations.

“Ok.  Lots of work to do moving forward to make it so that we can utilize this place the way it was intended.  We can meet up and talk through that tomorrow. In the meanwhile, I’d like to go ahead and get those things out in the courtyard taken care of.”  Leander said.

“Why don’t you just get them some pizza and beer?”  Drew said snarkily referring to the way Leander had duped all of them and taken them prisoner.  Leander didn’t appear put off by the idea in the slightest.  He actually looked like he was considering it.

“Do they eat pizza?”  Leander finally asked.  He was genuinely curious.  He also thought if he could just drug the crawlerz life would be a million times easier.

“I don’t know.  Why don’t you go ask them?”  Drew asked back.

“Can we go shoot the monsters now?”  Flanagan asked in an attempt to break the tension.

Leander was stuck on the fact that if they walked outside and blew away the seven crawlerz currently walking around they’d just attract more.  In order for them to complete their primary mission of resupplying groups of survivors in the southeast they needed to be able to operate freely out of this base.  They couldn’t operate freely out of the base if they were constantly under attack.

“Do you have stadium lights?”  LeBron asked.  He was thinking back to a blood drenched living room where they’d opened the curtains to distract the crawlerz so they could easily kill them.

“You mean like they used in the UK to keep the crawlerz out?”  Leander asked.

“Exactly.  We could install those to keep the crawlerz out at night.  If nothing else, it’d make it easier for us to kill them.  I don’t know if they’d just keep coming or not though.”  LeBron stopped talking and looked again at the large monitor on the wall.  The crawlerz skittering around in the courtyard in their weird way was one of the most terrifying things about them.  They looked completely demonic.  The inhuman bursts of speed they could achieve in that awkward crawling position wasn’t the slightest bit natural.

Leander opted to kill the crawlerz before they could burrow in somewhere on the base.  He sent Flanagan to put together a team to clear the field.  There were two main buildings in use on the base.  The barracks which they were currently in and the hangar which they’d never been in.  The hangar sat on top of an enormous underground warehouse according to the rumors they’d heard.  Giant warehouse or not the hangar was where the clans weapons were all being held.  That simple fact excused them from the four in the morning crawler hunt.  Leander seemed to think it’d be a great chance to get his teams bloodied without putting them in too much danger.

Less than twenty minutes after he’d walked out of the room Flanagan was on the overhead speakers giving his status.  LeBron watched the monitor in the middle of the wall as Flanagan and a group of men in full battle rattle stacked up on the door leading out to the field.  That was ten fully armored and armed men going up against seven crawlerz.  At least two of the crawlerz looked to be under twelve years old. One of them was an older woman in a badly stained dress.  LeBron and Drew were both worried the fire team was going to underestimate their opponent.

“Any tactics you normally use when fighting crawlerz?”  Leander asked while they were waiting for the action to start.

“We normally try to be hidden in our trucks way before the crawlerz show up.  I’d suggest you advise your men to be on their toes.  Those things are wicked fast.”  Blaze warned Leander.  Lebron and Drew nodded their heads in full agreement.  The best way to fight a crawler was to figure out where they were hiding at in the daylight and toss a grenade on top of them.  Facing them in an open field was not a good idea.

What really worried Drew was that every time him and his family had fought the crawlerz it’d been in tight confined spaces.  It was one thing to blast away as they came at you in single file through narrow hallways or up a staircase.  Out in the open would be a lot trickier.  The crawlerz were a lot more self-aware than the surgers so you couldn’t just expect them to come running straight at you.  Drew found himself wishing his weapons were in this building.  He felt compelled to go outside and help the men who were about to learn firsthand how dangerous these beasts could be.

“Locked and loaded and ready to engage.”  The voice of Flanagan came out of the overhead speakers.

“Free to engage.”  Leander authorized the attack.

They watched the monitors showing the team approaching the pack of crawlerz.  The men moved forward in a wedge formation to give them each an unobstructed field of fire into the crawlerz below.  They kept moving forward waiting on the order from Flanagan to open fire.  Flanagan was at the tip of the spear.

“Fire at will.”  Flanagan announced clearly over the team comms link that was being played on the overhead in the command center.  The fire team immediately engaged the crawlerz.  Flanagan had told them about his experience with the surger so none of them fooled around on single shot mode.  They were going to make noise regardless, so they opted to go big and get it done.

Five of the crawlerz were cut to pieces before they had a chance to do much more than notice they were being shot.  The remaining two sprang high in the air and came down right beside the wedge of fighting men.  The watchers in the command center gasped in awe at the supernatural seeming leap.  The two crawlerz had leapt higher than they’d have considered possible if they hadn’t just seen it.  They’d tracked it because they were looking down on the battle from cameras suspended off rods high in the trees.  The men in the patrol Flanagan had taken out were looking around wildly trying to see where the remaining crawlerz had disappeared to.  Most of them were leaning forward assuming they were going to have to chase down the monsters.

“Tangos are danger close.”  Drew heard Leander keying his mic to warn the fire team.  He didn’t think it was going to be enough.

One man went down in a blur of arms and legs when the adolescent demon dove mouth first into this inner thigh.  The man fell to the ground pulling the trigger on his rifle in pain and shock.  His bullets struck the armor of the man in front of him knocking the breath out of him.  The final bullet found the space between the man’s helmet and his body armor.  The round severed his spinal cord instantly paralyzing him.

On the other side of the wedge the woman who’d landed there was wrestling with a soldier twice her size.  The soldier was keeping the woman’s teeth away from his body by squeezing her neck as hard as he could.  He could feel the tendon and muscles in her neck snapping and cracking.  She refused to die though.  Right up until Flanagan walked over and shot her carefully in the head with his pistol.  The soldier on the ground tossed the dead body to the side and jumped back to his feet breathing hard.  Flanagan was already moving through the men to get to the kid on the other side.

The kid came straight at Flanagan before he’d taken more than a couple of steps.  He raised his pistol and managed to snap off two shots before the boy hit him face first in the chest knocking him backwards.  The kid rolled right through him, got up and jumped on the man standing next to Flanagan.  The soldier had already lost a big chunk of skin on his arm, so he was pretty much screwed.  Flanagan blasted the boy in the back until he stopped moving.  The soldier scrambled out from under the kid and stared at the bloody rag on his arm that’d been a nicely pressed sleeve a minute before.

“You really think I’ll turn sir?  I’ve heard some people don’t.”  The soldier was freaking out.  This wasn’t like a bullet to the leg or something that made sense.  This was biblical.  This was horrible.  This was a demon possessing your body.

The man the boy had bitten previously had already turned.  In a screaming fit of rage, he charged the men gathered around Flanagan.  There was no hesitation on their part to open fire and shred him before he’d taken more than a couple of steps.  Luckily the poor bastard had screamed, or they may never have even noticed he’d turned.  Another single shot rang out.  Flanagan whirled around to see the man who’d gotten bitten on the arm had eaten his own pistol.  He must’ve felt the infection starting to claim him.

“All tangos KIA.  We have three KIA and one WIA.  We’re going to need stretcher bearers and a neck brace.”  Flanagan said.

“Negative on the assist.  Return to base immediately.  Multiple tangos in route to your location.  Return to base immediately.”  Leander’s voice echoed over the team comms and in the hushed command center.  All eyes in the command center were on the monitor showing the multiple bodies streaking through the woods towards the base.  They were all moving way too fast to be normal humans.  The red blurs barely even slowed at the twenty-foot-tall fence.  Drew tore out of the room to help Flanagan get his men back in.  LeBron was yelling for them to send reinforcements to the door to keep the crawlerz from breaking in.

Drew pounded down the hallway towards the door Flanagan would be trying to get back to.  The hardened steel door was designed to look like a regular wooden door.  It served the purposes of a wooden door assuming a wooden door could stop a bomb blast and was EMP proofed.  Drew ran to the door but couldn’t get it to open.  Blaze joined him a second later to try and help him pry it open.

Outside Flanagan heard the order to return to base and sent his men ahead of him.  He bent down and scooped up the paralyzed man who was bleeding out on the ground.  The man was staring in shock and horror straight into the sky.  He was breathing shallowly but he was breathing.  Flanagan started to run.

He wasn’t running fast enough.  None of the men in the patrol were.  The red blurs indicating the approaching crawlerz looked like lightning bolts compared to the pathetically slow movements of the men running up out of the dirt field they’d just fought for.  LeBron noticed the monitor in the corner showing the entryway to the barracks.  Drew was pounding on the hardened steel door and kicking the access card reader over and over again trying to get the door to open.

“Belay my last.  Fire team disperse.  Multiple tangos.  Base is on lockdown.  Over.”  The men in the field heard the message and knew what it meant.  This operation was FUBAR.  They knew better than to just turn and make a run for it.  They regrouped and began jogging for the hangar.  It was only a few hundred yards away, but it might as well have been on the other side of the moon.

The team in the command center watched helplessly while the demons swooped in from out of the dark.  The crawlerz hit the team hard and ripped them to shreds in no time.  When it was finished the entire team was dead or turned.  LeBron stared in shock at the monitors then left the command center to go talk to Drew.  In the command center Special Agent Leander sat down and watched as the land outside the base swarmed with the oddly shaped shadows the crawlerz cast.  He had no idea where they’d come from, but now they had to figure out how to get rid of them.

Chapter 4:  Early to Rise

The faux gypsy crew was pulled out of bed before the sun came up.  Blaze gathered his crew of groggy misfits in the front of the room to let them know they were going to be going out with the base militia.  They were being asked to clean up the recently infected plus some of the other unwanted guests lurking outside.  They were each issued a sidearm while a handful of them were also provided with rifles.  Their personal weapons had all been stored over in the hangar, so they were at the mercy of the limited gear in the barracks armory.  The hangar was no distance at all normally.  It’d become an infinitely long trek when the ground between here and there began teeming with the freshly turned.

“There should just be the six that turned last night plus whatever surgers came in with the crawlerz.”  Blaze said.  The men of the clan waited nervously for the soldiers who’d be joining them to show up. This was a task they’d gotten used to performing almost daily out on the road.

“For those of you who haven’t had the joy of doing this yet just stick close to Drew and me.  We’ll see you through it.”  Harley said.  His massive biceps threatening to rip the tight shirt he was wearing.

Drew looked up from his bowl of cheese flavored instant grits over at Harley.  He hadn’t expected to be called out like that.  There was plenty of other men in the band just as good as him at doing this sort of thing.  He looked over at his brother.  LeBron had barely been paying attention.  He’d never be called out as the one to stand next to on this sort of expedition.  If anything, he’d be the one people asked to stand back out of the way.  Blaze had been ordered to take everyone out with him though.  Leander wanted the whole base swept clean.

A small group of the special ops guys showed up.  Their leader introduced himself as Petty Officer Zimmerman.  He was a SEAL temporarily assigned to the continuation forces.  He winked at them all when he mentioned he’d been temporarily assigned.  Zimmerman asked who LeBron was.  When LeBron held up his hand the SEAL told him to report to the command center.  He’d be overseeing the base clearing from up there.

“Alright.  The team that went out last night got wasted.  I don’t want to get wasted.  Dying is way up there on my list of crap to avoid today.  Every single one of you has more experience than we do at fighting these things.  Tell me how you think we should approach this.”  Zimmerman shut up and listened.

“The way we normally do it is move in groups keeping our backs to the walls.  We focus our fire on the freaks one at a time.  You’ve got to remember to look everywhere.  They’ll come off roofs, out of trees, even out of the ground.  If you see a funny looking pile of leaves just go ahead and shoot it.  Don’t get bit, but most of all try and have fun.”  Harley gave his standard spiel to the hard-looking men staring back at him.  Drew had heard it all before. He always enjoyed the part where the tattooed giant of a man raised his voice comically high to do the ‘try and have fun’ part.

Zimmerman grinned savagely when he heard it too.  It was a grin that said he thought they were all going to get along just fine after all.  A couple of men entered the room pushing AV carts loaded down with spare weapons from the barracks armory.  It was mostly Glocks and a few M-16s.  There was plenty of ammunition so that was a plus.  It sucked that all the really good weapons were over in the warehouse.  There was a crew of Marines over there as well, but they were being held in reserve.

“Why didn’t they connect the warehouse to the barracks with a tunnel or something?”  Drew wondered aloud.  What he was hoping to hear was Zimmerman slapping himself in the forehead as he realized they had an easy way to go get better weapons.

“It’s on the plans but it didn’t get done yet.  They had a multiyear phased budget to get this place built.  Whoever came up with the phases didn’t construct the tunnels at the same time as they buried the conduit for the power and everything else.  That person was an idiot.  So here we are.”  Zimmerman answered.  At least they weren’t missing the obvious solution.  It sounded like Zimmerman had already gone down that rabbit hole.

“Those things aren’t going to kill themselves.”  Blaze said making sure he had a bullet in the chamber of the Glock he’d picked up.  He’d left the rifles for the men from the clan who’d spent more time directly fighting the surgers than he had.  The men who’d brought the weapons had extra headsets for Blaze and Harley.  If the team could survive until they got to the warehouse, there were plenty of extra ones for everybody else over there.

“Alright.  Let’s get this cluster on the road.  Try not to get bit.  Please don’t accidentally shoot me.”  Zimmerman ordered them around in a deadpan manner that had Drew trying to figure out if the man was joking or not.  They moved down the hallway in a group and waited while Zimmerman talked on his headset finalizing the plan for moving out into the field.  It was obvious the small group of SEALs wasn’t super excited to be going into combat with a batch of felons.  Drew assumed Leander was sending them along primarily to be fleshy distractions for the infected to go after while the SEALs did the real job of killing everything.

They waited while the SEALs talked to the command center guys.  Once Zimmerman had his orders straight, he relayed them to Blaze to pass on to his men.  Blaze told half of them to follow him to the right when they went out and the other half of them to follow Harley to the left.  The SEALS would be in the middle.  The SEALs would form the tip of the spear when they moved forward. They’d proceed across the field to the warehouse once they’d cleared out as many of the infected as they could with their backs to the wall of the barracks.  Zimmerman had actually listened to them on tactics.  Running outside and putting their backs to the wall of the building to face the enemy went against every bit of fire team training the SEAL had. They were lucky they had a leader who knew when to ask for help.

Drew was really hoping the infected wouldn’t live up to all the hype.  All this preparation was beginning to freak him out.  If there really were less than a dozen of the infected moping around outside, then they should be good to go.  The team that’d gone out the night before had been fighting crawlerz. They’d gone out in the middle of the night into the middle of the open field to fight the deceptively fast killers.  That thought reminded Drew they’d be killing Flanagan today.  He was hoping it wasn’t him that had to take the shot.  He’d liked and admired the man.

It was time.  Zimmerman looked back at everyone and told them to lock and load.  Everyone checked their weapons one last time then the front door opened.

“On me.”  Zimmerman said leading them out the door.  The SEALs went first.  Drew heard them start shooting before they were even all out the door.  Blaze went out the open-door right after the last SEAL.  Drew followed Blaze off to the right.  In front of them the SEALs had formed a firing line and were blazing away at the surgers streaking towards them.

Drew turned around to cover their six.  Evidently the SEALs had been pre-warned by command since several of them swung around at the same time to stare up at the roof.  Two surgers came streaking off the roof diving for the men below.  One of the jumpers was torn to pieces in mid-air by the concentrated fire of the men facing backwards.  The other one was much further down the line.  It barreled into the accountant for the circus who was facing the opposite direction trying to figure out how to shoot his pistol. The savage infected and the timid number cruncher both went tumbling out into the field.  Harley went running after the tumbling pair.  Once they came to a stop Harley stepped in and shot the surger in the head.

“Did it bite you?”  Harley asked the slightly balding accountant.  The man stood up fearfully shaking his head no.  The small man was obviously hiding his arm behind his back.  Harley kept poking him with his rifle barrel.

“I’m good.  It didn’t touch me.”  The man said loudly refusing to show his arm to Harley.

It was one of those odd moments in combat when silence reigned.  Nothing was going on except the drama between Harley and the man hiding his arm behind his back.  The man continued to back away from Harley.  Harley brought his rifle up and aimed it at the man.  The hapless accountant should never have been allowed out of the barracks in the first place. Unless the surgers were deathly afraid of being audited he was useless.

“Show me your arm or I’m going to have to blast your ass.”  Harley threatened.  The man swung his other arm up with his pistol gripped in it.  Before he could threaten Harley with it Blaze shot him in the side.  The accountant dropped the pistol and put his hands over his stomach where Blaze had shot him.  One of his arms had a clearly visible bite wound on the forearm.  Harley raised his rifle to finish the man off right as the formerly mild-mannered accountant’s eyes suddenly shone with rage.  The newly turned surger lunged inhumanly fast for Harley’s throat.

Harley snapped off a few shots that put the man on the ground permanently.  Once that little drama wrapped up everyone focused on moving down through the field to the warehouse.  The sooner they cleared the area the better.  Blaze split his half of the team off to go check out a part of the field where the cameras showed several crawlerz may be hiding in the woods.  Harley took his team in the other direction.

Drew followed Blaze into a tight group of trees. The rest of their group walking closely behind them.  Blaze listened intently to the voice in his headset while the man in the command center described where he was seeing the body heat signatures in the bushes.  Blaze pointed at a bunch of briars with oddly shaped piles of leaves and dirt underneath them.  Looking closely, they began to make out hands and feet and pieces of clothing revealing where the crawlerz had dug into the ground to hide from the light of day.  The little copse of trees blocked a lot of the light and with their faces buried like that, they wouldn’t be able to see anything.

Blaze had them line up in front of the three lumps.  He verified again over the headset he was wearing that this was the only spot nearby showing the heat signature.  He held up his hand and they all aimed their weapons.  He dropped his hand and they all began shooting.  Two of the lumps barely moved after catching multiple bullets.  The third lump came out of the ground like a rattlesnake with it’s tail on fire.  It uncoiled into the firing line like it’d been lying there just waiting for some morons to walk into the woods and mess with it.

They lost another man to the vicious crawler strike.  The rest of the line moving in quickly to kill both the crawler and the unlucky man who’d been struck by the monster.  There’d been no denying the bite mark since the crawler had bit half the man’s face off before going down in a hail of bullets.  The men stood around breathing raggedly.  Each of them knowing it could easily have been them laying in the dew dampened leaves with more holes in them than a colander.  Their blood mixing on the forest floor with that of the filth covered crawler.

The sound of weapons being fired drifted to them from the direction of the warehouse.  Blaze listened intently to his headset then got them all moving in the direction of the gunfire.  Drew saw how Blaze looked back at the bloody man lying on the ground.  To Drew the guy had just been someone he’d talked to a little bit when they’d still been driving around in the trucks.  More recently he’d shared a few communal meals with the man in the barracks.  His death wasn’t much more than a footnote to Drew.  Based on the look Blaze gave the bloodied body it was hitting him a lot harder.

They ran out of the woods towards the road that’d take them to the warehouse.  Blaze took another detour into the woods to take care of a crawler who’d bedded down beneath a pile of construction materials left over from building the warehouse.  This time they were ultracareful and made sure to leave plenty of space when they started shooting.

“Run for the warehouse now!”  Blaze yelled as soon as they were done putting down the crawler. It’d been spending the day underneath a pile of dirt covered two by fours and broken pieces of plywood.  They’d had to shift some of the decaying wood around like a giant game of pickup sticks to be able to get good firing lines on the snoozing monster.  A game of pickup sticks played barehanded with a sleeping scorpion in the middle.

Heeding his own order Blaze dropped any pretense at trying to look in control and took off running for the warehouse.  Drew immediately took off too.  When the guy who’s talking to the guys watching the cameras around the base in a zombie apocalypse takes off running the best thing to do is try to beat him to wherever he’s headed.  It was physically impossible to outrun the surgers. Realistically all you had to do was outrun whoever else was with you to get away.  A key trick to surviving the apocalypse was surrounding yourself with people you could beat in a footrace.

Horrific yells ripped through the air along with the sound of automatic weapons firing.  Blaze pumped his arms and really built up some momentum.  Drew was surprised to find himself having to really pour on the effort to keep up with the older man.  Whatever sweet nothings the command center was whispering in Blaze’s ear must be extremely motivating.  Based on the screams and erratic gunfire Drew could guess where all that motivation was coming from.

They sprinted down the short dirt road leading to the warehouse.  Up ahead a group of Marines had come out of the warehouse and were waving them forward.  The Marines were sporting some high-tech looking weaponry.  The scared looks on their faces showed they were ready to pull the trigger the second they saw anything that looked the slightest bit dangerous.  Drew slowed down to pass through them and into the large open door leading into the hangar that covered the underground warehouse.

The SEAL team was already inside waiting for them.  Blaze ran up to Zimmerman and asked where Harley’s team was.  The SEAL team leader shook his head. He’d seen Harley and his men running for the hangar ahead of them. A couple of surgers had come out of nowhere and hit them hard.  The SEALs had come and put down a few of them as they were turning into surgers.  The rest had disappeared.

Blaze pressed the send button on his headset and asked for a status on Harley and his team.  Everyone stood around as the Marines slid the big door closed waiting to hear what’d happened to the rest of their group.  Blaze and the others with headsets got intense looks on their faces as they listened.  Finally Blaze pulled his headset off to talk to Drew and the others who’d gathered closely around him.

“They’re dead or turned.  Harley fought his way to the other side of the hangar and snagged a bike.  LeBron opened the gate for him and he’s currently hauling ass down the highway away from here.  If he’s smart, he won’t come back.”  Blaze told them what he knew then continued trying to catch his breath.  That run had been the most exercise he’d gotten in years.

Drew let out his breath.  He was saddened to hear about the men Harley had been leading but immensely cheered up to hear Harley had made it.  The only people he’d really become close with from the clan had been Harley and Charani.  He was slowly building up some respect for Blaze. Other than that, most of the circus freaks were people he just didn’t click with.  A lot of that was his lingering resentment about how they’d been captured by Blaze and company to begin with.  Regardless he was glad to hear Harley had made it out alive.  If anyone was going to survive this mess it was him.

Fists slammed into the doors they’d just come through.  Drew was worried for a second.  He felt much better after looking around the hangar and seeing that it’d been built to withstand pretty much anything.  The outside of the building had been camouflaged to look like a rundown rusty hangar.  The inside was state of the art.  There were several vehicles parked inside the large building as well as a couple of small planes.  The middle section of the hangar was fairly open as if it were missing a large piece of gear.  Drew figured that’s where the plane normally went that’d taken Yue away.

“Well.  What we’re doing obviously ain’t working!”  Zimmerman announced to no one in particular.  He looked pissed.  The other SEALs didn’t look happy either.  The Marines who’d come out to let them into the warehouse had done so against orders.  Leander had told them to keep the doors locked so as not to risk the warehouse being breached.  The Marines had replied with colorful language and faked their communications system not working right.  Now they were in a feud with the officers over in the barracks.

“It’s cool.”  The lieutenant in charge of the force recon Marines shared once the cat was out of the bag on what was going on.  “They can’t stay ticked off for too long.  We have pretty much all the food and ammo.  Worst case they demote us and take half our pay.  I can live with that.”

Chapter 5:  Life Aboard the Neverland

The Gerald Ford was built with two nuclear reactors to power it.  She could operate continuously for at least twenty years without the need to refuel.  The only thing the crew and passengers on board the state-of-the-art vessel needed was food.  They’d shipped out over-provisioned with enough supplies to last six months with limited rationing.  A lot of that food being dehydrated.  The reverse osmosis desalination plant could keep them supplied with fresh water basically for forever.

Yue had learned way too much about the huge ship in the orientation course she’d taken along with the other ladies from the clan.  For one thing, she now knew the Navy was infatuated with training handouts and quizzes.  She’d never suspected that before.  She supposed it made sense considering all of the things on board that could kill you.  She’d happily completed the required orientation courses to get her badge laminated yellow instead of red.  The yellow tint earned her a little more freedom to move around the ship.  It also made her eligible to get a job.

Floating around on what was arguably the safest place on the planet came at a cost.  It’d been emphasized in the orientation that this wasn’t a cruise vacation.  They were fully expected to pull their weight whether they opted to join up or remain civilians.  The ship now served under the command of the Department for the Continuation of the United States Government.  It’s mission had changed from leading battle groups across the globe to shuttling supplies along the east coast of North America.  The ship also served as the working capital for the United States government.  Yue had just about peed herself when she ran into the President and his entourage one day on her way to lunch.

Since Yue didn’t want to join up and she had experience waitressing she ended up assigned to the galley.  The regular crew all went through a line to get their meals.  The VIPs on board were way too important to carry a tray around themselves.  They also got to pick the food they wanted versus being served what everyone else was eating.  There was an entire section of the galley partitioned off just to serve the handful of executives.  Yue noted early on that unlike the politicians the ships officers ate whatever the crew was eating.  Even if they did eat it in rooms with a nicer ambiance.

Seafood was a pretty big deal on board.  There was an officer in charge of fishing.  Considered a recreational activity in the past it’d quickly become a vital part of their food supply now.  It wasn’t like they could just pull into a port and have supplies delivered by the pallet.  The fishing officer was working on being able to run nets instead of just using rods to fish with.  If that project was successful it could make the floating island pretty much self-sustaining.

Making the ship self-sustainable was vital for the protection of the government on board.  They may be a useless bunch of overly talkative old people, but they represented law and order.  They represented the American dream.  As long as the members of that hierarchy stayed in place people could keep lying to themselves that this wasn’t the end of the world.  It was just a temporary setback.  Democracy would rise again and all of that.

Serving them their meals Yue often thought the food could have been better used as bait to catch fish.  They needed a leader like the President in the Independence Day movies.  A man who’d rise to the occasion and inspire.  A man who had no problem flying a fighter plane into a gigantic alien laser beam.  Instead, they had the cast of Grumpy Old Men insisting on steak and the finest wine while the sailors on board ate oatmeal.  The men didn’t even finish the steaks most of the time.  Yue was ordered to throw them out secretly so that the crew wouldn’t see how well the privileged old farts were eating.

Disgusted by the hypocrisy of it all and fearful for the safety of her brothers Yue spent a lot of her free time on the flight deck staring out at the ocean.  She wondered if this was how the world ended.  People surviving off the fish caught from the back of the carrier until the reactors eventually failed.  At least the ship they were on would have the longest life since it was one of the newest ones.

She’d heard the sailors start calling the carrier the Neverland one night as she was watching a group of men fishing off the stern.  Once a fun recreational activity it was deadly serious now.  Every fish hooked was a meal served.  Every meal they could rip out of the ocean was a little bit longer they could put off venturing onto land to gather supplies.  Everyone knew once your feet hit solid dirt your life-expectancy dropped exponentially.

There was a chill in the air.  It felt like they were somewhere off the coast of New England.  Yue kept hoping they’d post up one of those video displays like they have on the cruise ships that’d tell her where the hell they were.  It was annoying because there were monitors scattered around that were obviously for those sorts of purposes but for operational security, they weren’t showing their location.  At first, she wondered what exactly the admiral thought the zombies were going to do with the information.  Then she realized that the other countries out there were all trying to survive too.  Capturing a warship that’d make its own water and power for at least the next twenty years would definitely get whatever country did it to the bonus round.

Yue wasn’t just hanging out on the flight deck because she liked looking at the ocean.  She was going everywhere her limited access badge would take her trying to figure out how to get off of the floating behemoth.  Charani and the other women told her she was crazy.  It wasn’t like they could overpower the guards and force a pilot to fly them back to the base.  The base that was guarded by heavily armed special forces warriors who could easily shoot them when they landed.  A few of the women had already volunteered to join up.  It was the path of least resistance for surviving the end of the world in the most comfortable way possible.

The only way Yue would consider joining up was if she thought it’d help her make it ashore.  There were missions launched almost every day.  Yue wasn’t privy to what the missions were being launched for, but she listened hard to the rumors.  The sailors called gossiping scuttlebutt and it was a major pastime onboard.  Whether sitting in the galley playing cards or outside fishing the crew had a hard time not talking about whatever happened to be on their minds.  Especially if a pretty girl like Yue asked some innocent leading questions.

An overly handsy Marine who thought he was going to hook up with Yue was a major source of information.  He’d been out on multiple missions and liked to talk about what he’d seen.  He was under direct orders not to talk about what he’d seen.  Yue knew that because he started every other sentence by telling her he wasn’t allowed to tell her whatever he was about to tell her.  He tried to be cagey but reading between the lines with the lovestruck jarhead was child’s play for Yue.  She made sure to accidentally bump into him anytime she suspected he’d been on a mission.

The Marines were utilized to shore up the defenses around important warehouses and for rescuing people deemed essential to the continuation of the government.  Essential people were those who could either help fight the threat directly or would be needed to rebuild the country once the threat was eliminated.  The Marine described how they’d swoop in on Chinooks and pluck scientists off roofs.  He mentioned several times how all of the bases on the mainland were constantly being overrun.  Establishing a beachhead appeared to be a losing proposition.

That last bit of information was what frightened Yue the most.  Her brothers were stationed at one of those bases her want to be lover kept telling her were constantly being overrun.  That news reinforced her drive to figure out how to sneak on a plane heading for the shore.  Unfortunately, she had no clue where she was or where the planes were headed.  From everything she was hearing she guessed they were somewhere off the coast of Connecticut, but she didn’t know for sure.

She needed to be off the coast of South Carolina when she went ashore.  It was going to be hard enough finding the hidden base for a second time without having to commute from New England.  She didn’t see a lot she could do about it.  The captain wasn’t going to pull the ship over so she could hop off wherever she wanted to.  If she even mentioned wanting to leave, there was a decent possibility her yellow badge would immediately be revoked.  Without that badge she’d be virtually imprisoned in her berthing area.  For now, she saw nothing for it but to keep her ears open and wait for the right opportunity.

The conversations she heard around the fine tablecloth of the President’s table didn’t fill her with a lot of confidence.  After a few bottles of wine and some cognac the mix of flag officers and American royalty liked to talk about the future.  The conversations went off on multiple tangents with a lot of them running straight into brick walls.  Once powerful senators and governors no longer had states to preside over.  The balance of power was obviously shifting.  The men at the table desperately trying to hold on to the limited influence they had left.

Arguably the most powerful person at the table was a tall skinny man with big glasses that everyone called Jeff.  Despite his obvious power and influence he didn’t seem to have a problem with everyone from the server to the President addressing him by his first name.  Jeff showed up for some dinners but not others.  In a world where most of the survivors were holed up in one place or another Jeff got around.  As the head of the Department for the Continuation of the Government he spent a lot of time in the air. He liked to check firsthand on how different approaches were working.  He was a hands-on scientist who’d been hidden away for decades in the bowels of an obscure bureaucracy dreaming up ways to foil the end of mankind.

Jeff had never anticipated the survival of humanity actually depending on him.  It’d been mostly intellectual exercises to him.  Due to the nature of his job he was considered a conspiracy nut by the scientific community as well as the military.  Most politicians had disregarded his numerous reports over the year.  His department had begrudgingly been provided funding because people believed someone in the government should be ensuring the country had a plan to deal with every eventuality.  A career spent investigating the improbable had led to quite a few discoveries the government wanted to keep under wraps.  Throwing a few hundred million a year at the skinny geek in glasses to keep him locked up in the basement with his nerd friends had seemed like a small price to pay to ensure the status quo.

Jeff’s star really started to rise when his department flagged the archeological excavation in Egypt as a potential cataclysmic event within ten minutes of the live feed starting.  No one ever bothered to inform the President that most of the documents Jeff’s team filed were stamped with that same ominous cataclysmic warning.  They assumed no one was going to read them anyway.  It didn’t matter if the title of the document referred to an asteroid that may strike the earth in two hundred years or warnings about viruses and eventual climate change.  It didn’t help that they’d published quite a few plans on how to deal with alien invasions.  These tended to read more like a Hollywood script than a government action plan.

No one cared that a solar flare may wipe them off the planet one day.  At least not once the politicians read the need to invest every bit of the country’s resources for the next hundred years into building gargantuan underwater cities to mitigate that threat.  Jeff and his team had developed plans to cope with political, ideological, natural, alien, and even multiple supernatural scenarios.  If an army of bigfoots ever decided to take over towns in Alaska, Jeff had a plan for handling that.

No one else had a plan.  Jeff’s well thought out strategy for dealing with a pandemic that mutated people into zombie like creatures was well researched. It’d been carefully written in small enough words for the average politician to grasp.  There were even graphs showing how the spread would impact certain areas.  Nothing says official plan like a multicolored pie chart.  A lot of the research was screen grabs off various internet pages.  Years of not being taken seriously had led to a very contagious outbreak of laziness within the small department.  Jeff was immune to the outbreak.  He’d spearheaded using a portion of their funding to sponsor research by the CDC into possible rates of infection.  At the end of the day Jeff’s team had been the first to run up a flag about the Egyptian contagion. On top of that they were the only ones to have a comprehensive plan sitting on the shelf in a binder as to how to deal with it.

Floundering around like a drunk trying to ice skate for the first time the President grabbed the one man who seemed to know what the hell was going on. He’d been impressed enough after talking to Jeff to put him in charge of the whole fiasco.  Jeff had gone from the basement to the penthouse overnight.  He’d been granted the kind of resources he’d only ever dreamed of.  He very quickly transferred large groups of special operations teams to his department and set them to establishing massive hidden warehouses all around the United States.  Jeff was the one who made sure the power plants and other critical infrastructure were shut down in an orderly manner.  Last but not least before infection was even an issue, he had the nuclear-powered ships from the fleet stocked up and put out to sea.  The rest of the ships were used to transfer supplies to secret caches around North America.  It was a herculean logistical task that created an army of paper pushing bureaucrats overnight.

Jeff’s political star was shining brightly.  It was so high that Yue could easily see the danger the oblivious scientist turned leader was in.  Snippets of the conversations she heard around the tables revealed several of the elected leaders had been digging into Jeff’s past.  They’d started sniping at him and asking him if the aliens could be expected soon.  One staffer had managed to uncover the report on the potential bigfoot invasion in Alaska.  That one trumped even the millions of dollars Jeff had poured into investigating things like the possibility of a Vampire Illuminati.  These men were aiming to take him down by painting him as a crackpot conspiracy theorist instead of the whiz kid the President thought he was.

Jeff didn’t seem to have a clue.  He came and went shaking hands with the men who were sharpening their ideological knives to stab him in the back at the first opportunity.  He smiled as they made pointed references to some of the more obscure threats his department had investigated over the years.  Yue didn’t miss any of it.  A natural people person she read the room easily.  While the politicians were obviously in favor of getting rid of Jeff now that he’d served his purpose, the military men loved the guy.

Yue could see why the military men respected the beanpole with glasses.  Jeff was a career bureaucrat who’d probably keel over after running a hundred yards holding a rifle.  He’d seen the threat coming though. Most importantly he had a sound plan to deal with the threat.  Jeff had acted ruthlessly to ensure the defense and protection of the United States.  He was constantly putting himself in harm’s way to protect the interests of the United States.  The politicians were worried about maintaining their power and their status.  It was apparent to everyone on meeting him that all Jeff cared about was saving humanity from this crisis.  That result orientation endeared him greatly to the military elite.

Seeing all these dynamics from her position handling hot bowls of soup Yue came up with a new plan.  Jeff may be a brilliant scientist, but his social skills could use some serious tuning.  He needed an advisor to help him navigate these chum filled waters.  An advisor who happened to have lived through the surge.  An advisor who had a couple of brothers still fighting for the country back on the continent.  If she could befriend Jeff maybe she could leverage that relationship to get LeBron and Drew brought to her.  The more she heard about life on the mainland the more she wanted nothing to do with it anyway.

Life on board a ship that never landed was starting to sound really good.

Chapter 6:  The Lost Ark

“Are you the only ones here in the hangar?”  Drew asked one of the Marines he was standing watch with.  Given how many men they were down in such a short amount of time the Marines had opted to continue defying Leander’s orders by giving all of Blaze’s men back their personal weapons.  They’d also handed out some other cool toys.  Drew was especially excited about the frag grenades and flash bangs.  The armory was huge.  It’d been intended to supply groups throughout the southeast with the means to fight.

The gigantic distribution center was intended to reinforce survivors in the event of anything from a Red Dawn scenario to the violent pandemic they were currently living through.  The team who designed it had actually used a zombie apocalypse as one of the exercises.  They’d never imagined it’d actually happen.  Row upon row of assault rifles were lined up neatly above crates of ammunition and various grenade types.  Need rocket launchers to take out helicopters?  No problem.  One of those crossbows like Rambo uses to take out the enemy quietly.  They didn’t have any of those.  Drew had asked.  He’d pictured himself strolling around quietly killing off the crawler population without them even knowing he was there.

“There’s an administrative area in the warehouse below with a handful of supply and logistics guys.  Otherwise just us.  Why you looking to start a band?”  The Marine asked.  His voice echoed in the cavernous hangar.  It was accompanied by the booming drumbeat of the stirred up infected outside slamming themselves into the sides of the massive building.  The Marines didn’t seem overly concerned about the infected getting in.

“Why’d they bother having the other building here anyway?”  Drew asked.  It was a fair question.  The warehouse had the capability to support everything needed.  The builders could’ve just included a communications center and installed some extra rooms to avoid building the barracks facility.

“Redundancy and security.”  The Marine answered sagely.  The scout sniper may not have much to do with designing military bases, but he knew everything about taking them out.  “If you just have one building it makes it easier to target.  One entrance to align mortars with or settle snipers on.  People coming in and out all the time creates a security concern.  The warehouse part of this base was supposed to be kept secret.  You post guys in the warehouse it’s not much of a secret anymore.  You post them in the barracks building and tell them to guard the warehouse then it allows you to keep the warehouse more secret.  Compartmentalization and all that.  Plus, if we lose one of these buildings, we’ve got the other one to fall back to.  Although the barracks isn’t going to really help us accomplish our mission.”

“These things ever stop beating on the damned walls?”  The other Marine asked.  He was a younger guy fresh out of scout sniper training.  He wasn’t used to living under the constant threat of death like his brothers in arms.

“Nope.  They won’t stop unless they get sidetracked.  Not only won’t they stop but they’ll attract other ones.  That’s why moving around’s so important.  You stay in one place too long you’re eventually going to get overwhelmed.”  Drew answered honestly.  It was still weird to him that no one seemed to get that.

“Luckily we’re pinned down in a building with enough food to last us the rest of our natural lives.  We have enough weapons and ammo to bust out if we really wanted to.  Good luck to those things trying to beat their way through a building designed to still be standing after massive world crushing hurricanes or a nuclear war.”  The more experienced Marine answered.

“If we’re stuck in here much longer, I might let one or two of the female freaks in and take my chances.”  Instead of laughing at what was intended as a joke the three of them actually took it pretty hard.  Drew because it reminded him Yue was missing. The Marines because they were starting to really worry that they might not ever see another woman again.  At least not one who wasn’t trying to rip their neck open with her teeth and not in a fun way.

Another trio made up of two Marines and one of Blaze’s men emerged from the stairs in the corner of the building. They relieved Drew and the two leathernecks he’d been hanging out with.  Drew’s companions took off to go crash in their rooms.  Drew was pointed down the hallway towards the open area his group had been temporarily assigned.  Drew walked into the small space littered with cots and sleeping bags.  Blaze was sitting on the floor with his back against a wall scribbling away in a little notebook.

“Making a shopping list?”  Drew asked sliding down the wall to sit beside him.

“Taking some notes about each of the men who died today.  I started doing it a few weeks back.  I’ve been trying to figure out if I should call it a diary of the dead or a ledger of the lost.  I need to do something to keep track of them.  To acknowledge they existed.”  Blaze said seriously.  Drew was busy trying to catch up.  He’d thought maybe Blaze was doing a crossword puzzle or something.

“You’ve got eight guys here who owe you their lives.  That’s not even counting the women who ended up in a nice safe space thanks to you.  It’s good that you’re doing something to remember the ones we’ve lost though.”  Drew hoped he didn’t sound like an idiot.  He was horrible at consoling people.  An awkward pat on the back was about as good as it normally got with him.  If he’d had any idea what Blaze had been up to, he’d have just said waved and burrowed into the closest cot for a nap.

“Thanks man.  Have you seen all the crap they have down here?”  Blaze asked in an obvious attempt to change the subject.

Drew had not.  Being the first selected for guard duty had meant he got to immediately go back up the stairs and sit in the big hangar for four hours.  The space seemed huge from what he’d seen so far.  It looked like what he imagined a major Amazon distribution center looked like on the inside.  Long rows of shelf after shelf with supplies organized in efficient rows and stacks.  You couldn’t see too far since the lights only came on in the sections people were moving in.  The lighting was currently the eerie red color the military loved to use to safeguard their night vision.

“How big do you think it is down here?”  Drew asked.

“No clue.  I’m going to guess a Costco or two once you consider they probably have at least two levels.”  Blaze said.  He’d set aside his notebook to look around the section they were sitting in.

“You really think it’s that big?”  Drew was trying to picture how that much space could be contained under the relatively normal sized hangar above them.

“They said this place was here to supply the whole southeast of the country with supplies.  If you only have one supply depot for the whole southeast, it needs to be pretty big.  Especially since you don’t know what kind of cataclysmic event that you’re going to end up having to deal with.”  Blaze continued looking around while Drew nodded his head in agreement.  Two Costco’s worth might be an understatement given the purpose of the installation.  Drew was back to picturing the warehouse at the end of the Indiana Jones movie.

“Too bad all this stuff is going to go to waste the way they’re trying to manage it.”  Drew said.  He had an idea percolating around in his head.  He really wished he had LeBron here to bounce the idea off of.  More than likely his brother was already thinking along the same track.

“You mean after the crawlerz rip us all apart?”  Blaze asked.  He was thinking along the same lines as Drew.  If they continued to do things the way Special Agent Leander wanted them done, then this place was going to end up guarded by a bunch of ghosts.

“Yeah.  The way they’re doing this seems really dumb.  We should be based somewhere mobile and just swoop in when we need supplies.  If there’s people here, then the infected are going to end up here.”  Drew was pacing now as he thought through different scenarios.  There really wasn’t a need to have people stationed here.  They’d be better off just coming in as they needed stuff then leaving right away.

“I don’t think Leander’s going to agree to just leave the place unguarded.  This is his baby.”  Blaze pointed out.

“He’s shaking the hell out of his baby right now.  He’s blind and stupid if he can’t figure out this isn’t working.  We can’t keep charging back and forth between the two buildings.  Unless he wants a dead baby, he’s going to have to listen to us.”  Drew said.  He was getting worked up pacing back and forth.  The problem was going to be how did they make the man listen to them?  Leander had thrown them out the front door to fight the surgers in a way that clearly showed he considered them all expendable.  According to the Marines Leander hadn’t even wanted them to be given back their weapons.  Drew thought Zimmerman may have had a say in the decision to arm them up too.

“As the commander of the cannon fodder I can try to talk to Leander, but I don’t know if he’s going to listen to me or not.  We probably need to convince Zimmerman and the Marines first then go from there.”  Blaze looked thoughtful as he considered how best to approach it.

The conversation between Drew and Blaze continued for another thirty minutes. They talked about how to approach the topic with each of the different factions.  They knew they needed to explain it in a way that didn’t preclude them from getting the chance to find out where Yue and the other women had been sent.  The ultimate goal would still be to rejoin them.  So far, they’d narrowed down the potential locations to somewhere in the middle of a large body of water.  They could totally eliminate about thirty percent of the planet as a possibility so that was good.

“Let’s go rattle some skulls.”  Drew finally said.  They’d been talking long enough.  It was time to do something.

“What do you mean by that?”  Blaze asked looking at him oddly.

“I don’t know.  Go talk to the lieutenant or Zimmerman if we can figure out where they’re sleeping?”  Drew said.

“Cool.  I thought you meant go smack around a fire team of Marines and a handful of Navy SEALs.  I was going to let you go try that on your own.”  Blaze said grinning.

Blaze stood up and they started walking down the corridor towards the rooms the Marines stayed in.  They were assuming that’d probably be where the SEALs were bunked up also.  As huge as the place was it seemed like there should’ve been enough rooms for them to fit in somewhere as well.  Either they were so far down the totem pole they only rated cots in the hallway or there was some other reason they hadn’t been invited to the sleepover.

The door needed a badge for them to go in.  Drew and Blaze didn’t rate badges either.  Wondering if they should try knocking or just give up and wait until morning, they were both startled when the door opened.  Drew had to take a step back to let the man get out.  Feeling like a couple of idiots they stepped out of the way as Zimmerman looked at them oddly.  He was probably wondering what the hell they were doing standing there.

“You guys gonna say Trick or Treat or just stand there?”  Zimmerman finally said after they’d all stared at each other awkwardly for long enough.

“We were actually looking for you.”  Blaze said.  He’d recovered his normal cool nature.  Drew was thinking they shouldn’t have run over here to try and talk these soldiers into something when both him and Blaze were in serious need of some sleep.  It was going to be a battle of wits and they were low on ammo.  Drew wished again that they had Yue or LeBron with them.  This was the kind of stuff they were really good at.

“That works.  I was coming down to grab you guys anyway.  We just got off a call with Leander.  Between the lieutenant, me and your brother we talked him into working on a more mobile strategy.  Sitting here’s not working.  Anyway, I wanted to make sure you both got some sleep tonight.  We’re going to meet up in the morning and have a pow wow to figure out the best way to accomplish the mission.  The current plan isn’t working.”  Zimmerman said.

Drew and Blaze stood there like deer in the headlights.  Blaze had once again lost that cool demeanor he pretty much always possessed.

“What time?”  Drew asked finally.

Chapter 7:  Improvise, Overcome, Adapt

“The main armory is on the top level. You never know how fast you’re going to need access to your weapons.  Below that’s a storage level that includes some workshops and the galley and living quarters for overflow from the barracks.  That’s us.  Below that’s the vehicle level.  That level has additional supplies already loaded into trailers for easy transport by truck.  That level also has our gas and diesel reserves.  The level below that contains the generators and power plant for the warehouse. There’s also a massive holding tank full of fresh water.  This place is effing ginormous.  It’s stocked with everything needed to get our corner of the country up and running again.”  The lieutenant finished his summary.

They were meeting in the common room of the living quarters for the warehouse.  Like every other space in the warehouse it was oversized.  They were sitting in a big circle of chairs in the echoey chamber.  A pot of coffee and an open package of Oreos up on the counter.  Everyone looked tired and most of them were in dire need of a trip to the barber shop.  It’d be really hard to convince anyone seeing a picture of them that they weren’t in the middle of an AA meeting.  Instead, the motley looking crew was sitting around trying to figure out how to save their corner of the world.

“What are the workshops for?”  Blaze asked.

“Basically, repair shops for the trucks and prep areas to build shelters and such before rolling out.  All your standard tools plus welding equipment and all of that.  Pretty much a handyman’s dream setup.  We haven’t done much with them yet except for the space to calibrate and maintain weapons.”  Lieutenant Murdock answered.  He had no problem telling them about what the setup was like in the formerly secret facility.  As a leader in the Marine Corps reconnaissance group he was used to working with the locals to accomplish his objectives.  He’d had plenty of training and even some intense real-world experience arming people in third worlds to take the fight to the local warlord.

“Are you thinking about tie wrapping some stop signs over the windows on the big rigs?”  LeBron joked over the conference phone they had sitting on the counter.  The base phone system was getting a lot more usage now that they couldn’t all easily meet up in a room somewhere.  The infected crawling all over the base pretty much eliminated the face to face option for the time being.

“Stop signs?”  Zimmerman asked.

Drew and LeBron then had to explain to everyone how they’d tie wrapped signs over their windows to keep the crazies from bashing into their vehicles.  The Marines and SEALs in the room nodded along.

“Those are great ideas.  I think maybe we could apply that concept to the vehicles we have downstairs.  I’ve got a room full of guys who were more likely to have taken shop than calculus in high school.”  The lieutenant was obviously building out some designs in his head.

“We’re right here sir.”  One of the Marines joked in response to the shop versus calculus remark.

“How many of you took shop?”  Drew asked.  He hadn’t even had the option at his school.  Which was too bad since it seemed like a pretty cool class.  Most of the Marines and SEALs raised their hands with chagrined looks on their faces.

“Calculus?”  Asked Blaze.  He was only joking but it was impressive that a good portion of the men kept their hands up.  It was less impressive when half the ones with their hands up started laughing and put their hands down.

“How about you and yours?”  Zimmerman asked Blaze pointedly.

“Most of mine never made it out of high school to be honest.  You need a tent thrown up or a ramp built though we got you covered.  We had a few guys who could weld but they’re not with us anymore.”  Blaze killed the laughter with his last comment.  His own face growing serious again.

“Do they have welders on the base you sent the women too?”  LeBron asked over the speakerphone.  Leander had been silent throughout the exchange so far.  Drew could picture their fearless leader hovering over the speakerphone ready to slam the disconnect button if the conversation went in a direction that he didn’t like.  Before he could say a word to halt LeBron’s not so subtle fishing exercise one of the Marines blurted out a response.

“You mean the carrier?”  The Marine looked around the room wondering why everyone was staring at him.  He looked confused by the stares at first.  It slowly dawned on him he might have said too much.  He clamped his mouth shut and commenced staring at the floor.

“Yes.”  Leander’s voice finally came out of the star shaped speakerphone.  “They have machine shops staffed by machinists mates and other trades on the carrier.  We can reach out to them to see if they can send us some of those guys. We’re also going to need some reinforcements to help secure the base.  We’ll have to mop up the infected outside before anybody can get in here though.”

The freewheeling meeting lasted well into lunch. They decided to break to eat and let their minds rest.  The Marines had discovered a handful of distractions while based here including a massive library and media room.  Pretty much every movie ever made had been burned to discs and stored for easy access.  On top of entertainment the movie selection also featured a lot of lessons on farming, living off the land, first aid and even epidemiology.  There were recorded lectures on enough topics to earn multiple college degrees.

They debated if they should try and find a learn to weld video instead of flying in real welders from the ship.  Drew killed that by asking which adrenaline-fueled rage monkey they were going to use to test out their handiwork before rolling outside.  As macho as most of them were none of them felt secure enough in their welding abilities to have any real desire to test their first attempt out in a life or death kind of situation.  Having made an ash tray in shop class a decade earlier wasn’t exactly something you kept on your resume.

That meant they were going to have to go back outside to kill more of the infected.  The infected that were crawling all over the warehouse like ants on a discarded Snickers wrapper.  The men in the communications center over at the barracks had a clear view of the warehouse from the advanced CCTV system.  They could tell exactly how much it was going to suck to come out that door.  To their credit the men didn’t spend a lot of time considering the option of doing nothing.

Doing nothing would mean their mission was effectively over before they’d even had a chance to get started.  Doing nothing meant within a few nights you wouldn’t be able to see the warehouse there’d be so many crawlerz trying to get into it.  A big portion of the infected outside were surgers.  Once again Drew and LeBron were forced to reevaluate their theories on surgers.  It didn’t look like they necessarily flipped a switch and became crawlerz as quickly as thought.  If they did then there wouldn’t be so many surgers wandering around outside the warehouse right now.  The biggest issue with that was it meant they couldn’t just sit in the warehouse a few days waiting for it to be ok to go outside during the day.

“Maybe most of them change?  You guys may have just run into some anomalies.”  Zimmerman said hopefully after LeBron and Drew explained to everyone why they didn’t think the gestation period or whatever for the surgers to change to crawlerz was accurate.  They readily admitted they didn’t have all the answers. They could only report what they’d seen.  LeBron was pretty sure gestation was the wrong term to be using but let it slide since Drew had been the one to blurt it out.

“Do you guys have any tanks in here?”  Drew threw out the question hopefully.  You could drive a tank out of here and down the road with a mountain of crawlerz hanging off of it.

“Nope.  That’d make life too easy.  Closest tanks would be at the guard’s armory.  I’m not sure any of us are up to hot wiring a tank.  Be a useful skill but those things are locked down like crazy.  They’re hard to figure out even when you have the codes and keys. Good thought though.  Keep ‘em coming.”  The lieutenant answered.

No one had any more thoughts.  To get the creative juices flowing again Drew asked if they could get a tour.  Zimmerman was volunteered to take them around while the lieutenant and Leander got on the phone to get connected via radio to the carrier.  They were going to see how soon some welders could be flown over.  Zimmerman excused himself to grab a drink and some better footwear.  He’d been walking around the warehouse in his shower shoes.

“What kind of special forces bad ass wears flip flops during a zombie invasion?”  Blaze asked as soon as Zimmerman was out of earshot.

“More important how do we get on the carrier to rescue Yue and the others?”  Drew asked seriously.  Blaze and the others from the clan stared at him like he’d lost his mind.

“What makes you think they want to get rescued?  Me personally I want to get taken prisoner on the big safe boat.  Hardest part of that‘s probably waking up early enough to make sure you don’t miss breakfast.”  Emilio answered.  He was a roustabout who normally got paid to help setup the show and then to drive it wherever they were going next.  Drew had spent some time as his escort when they were still roaming the country in trucks as relatively free men.

Emilio had made a good point.  Drew just wasn’t interested in hearing it.  His sister had been kidnapped and taken away from him.  He fully intended to get her back.  He also needed to get reunited with LeBron while he was at it.  They may only be separated by a few hundred yards of dirt but that few hundred yards was covered with flesh eating fiends.  They needed to work harder on staying together like their dad had wanted them to.  Drew was snapped out of his worries by Zimmerman’s return.

“You guys ready for the tour?”  Zimmerman asked.  He was rubbing his hands together like he was ready to tell them about how the warehouse was originally constructed in 1857 by early English settlers.

In the end the tour inspired a lot of awe at how big the place was, but failed to inspire any brilliant new strategies on how to deal with the mess they found themselves in.  The description the lieutenant had given was pretty dead on.  It was a massive space full of all kinds of supplies.  Drew mentioned it looked like enough food to feed half the country. Zimmerman did some quick mental math. It was probably more like enough to feed the men on the carrier for a few months.  Once the crew on the carriers ran out of food, they’d most likely start pilfering directly from these stocks.  The men in charge wouldn’t let the crew of their ship starve just because these supplies were originally intended for survivors.

Footsteps echoing all around the massive underground facility they saw lots of crates on the main floor.  The floor beneath them was covered in neatly parked vehicles and workshops full of parts.  Ultra-modern looking hybrid trucks sat waiting to deliver their loads all around the region.  Hummers, troop carriers and a few dozen of those electric motorcycles made up the rest of the inventory.  There was a massive elevator built into the floor to take the trucks and Hummers to the hangar level.  Zimmerman told them there was a separate spiral ramp to get the bikes and smaller cars to that level.

They did a quick walkthrough of the lowest level too.  Massive diesel generators were running to produce the electricity the base needed.  Considering the extremely low utilization of electricity the base would easily stay electrified for at least the lifespan of the men currently occupying it.  They could do that without even needing to make use of the solar arrays hidden around the base for providing supplemental power.  Everything they saw was bigger and more modern than they’d expected but nothing stood out as a real game changer.

“Are you thinking that whole tour thing was just to get us out of the lieutenant’s hair for a little while?”  Blaze asked Drew.

Up in front of them Zimmerman made ding-ding-ding noises and told Blaze he’d won the grand prize.  When he asked what the grand prize was Zimmerman announced they’d all won a ticket right back to where they’d started at.  Back upstairs in the lounge the meeting seemed to have died down.

“Where’d everybody head off to sir?”  Zimmerman asked the lieutenant.

“I sent them to try to find nets or dart guns.”  The tired looking officer answered.  “We reached out to the carrier and asked about dropping off welders. They were good with that.  They had another ask though after I told them about the theory you had that the surgers were not turning into crawlerz as quickly as thought.  They want us to capture a couple of live specimens for them to study on the ship.”

“Have they not seen every zombie movie ever?  That never works out well.”  Drew blurted out.  Blaze was nodding along with him.  Everyone turned to stare in disbelief at the lieutenant.  Lieutenant Murdock just shrugged.

“They assured us they’d have it under control.  Those welders that’re coming are building special cages to hold them.”

“You can count me out.  This is dumb.”  Drew said.

“That’s too bad.  Your brother seemed to think if the infected were going to be rounded up and shipped over to the carrier it’d be a good idea for you to go with them to make sure nothing happened.  He brought up all your field experience compared to the complete lack of that everyone else has.  Leander agreed with him.  If you want to get a chance to check in with your sister, you might want to get on board with this plan.”  Lieutenant Murdock said smoothly.

Of course, that changed everything for Drew.  He now saw LeBron’s hand in this.  He wouldn’t be surprised if the idea to collect specimens had come from his little brother.  It was classic LeBron to suggest something that looked like it just benefitted you then have it magically turn into something he wanted once you got into it.  Drew just hadn’t expected the kind of crap LeBron pulled at home to work on the leadership of the United States Navy.

LeBron didn’t even really need to shave yet and here he was convincing the military it was a smart idea to cage up some highly contagious cannibals and transport them to their floating fortress.  It was a risky move that put the lives of the thousands of sailors on board the ship at risk.  The Navy had started it when they decided to drug them and kidnap Yue.  Drew wouldn’t lose any sleep worrying about them.  He was going to lose sleep thinking of how he was going to be flown out to the ship locked in the back of a tiny plane with cages full of the infected.

That was assuming they could catch the damned things to begin with.  The soldiers who hadn’t spent a lot of time fighting the infected were thinking they could inject them with dope or throw a net over them.  That’d work out about as well as frying bacon naked without using utensils.  No way in hell they were going to be able to toss a net over a crawler then pin it down and inject it with night night juice.  You might as well send a man in a wheelchair to run with the bulls.  Despite the insipid lunacy of the entire concept Drew knew he’d be walking into the arena with a trident and net once Murdock made the call to go.  On the plus side, he’d have a team of highly trained warriors backing him up.

Not caring to join everyone else to watch a movie in the breakroom Drew went and crashed out in one of the cots.  He tried not to let it bother him that the military men had put the riff raff out in the hallway to sleep.  He’d seen there were a few vacant rooms inside the living quarters area that must be too good for them to put the circus scum in.  Carefully removing the oversized chip from his shoulder, he reminded himself that if everything worked out just right, he’d be on a plane shortly to see his sister.  He just had to shut up and do his job.

He tried not to think about the fact that he’d be sitting in the back of a plane surrounded by man eating monsters in homemade cages.

Chapter 8:  The Fine Art of Seduction

“All this for that jarhead?”  Charani asked Yue with a smirk.

Yue was at the mirror in the head within their berthing area getting ready for her shift as a waitress.  She’d bought some lipstick and a small military makeup kit from the commissary on board.  It had to be one of the last stores in the world still accepting dollars as payment.  Everyone on the ship was still getting paid in good old American greenbacks.  The store accepted them because the alternative was to just let everyone walk in and take what they wanted.  That wasn’t going to happen on a military ship.  Especially not one the President was cruising around on.

Yue was attempting to up her game for the shift that evening.  Her plan being to make Jeff fall in love with her whereupon he’d send a plane out to collect her brothers.  The problem was she’d never been a big makeup person.  She’d leaned more towards the Tom boy side of the equation when it came to stuff like that.  She liked watching Hallmark movies with her mom, but she’d also routinely missed the school bus during March madness.  She got addicted to staying up late working on her brackets and watching the games.  She could shoot better than both her brothers.

Her absurdly honed skills with a rifle didn’t translate well into applying blush.  The more she tried the more she thought she looked like a clown.  An Asian clown.  Not that she’d ever seen an Asian clown.  Now instead of doing her makeup she was stuck standing in front of the mirror wondering what race clowns typically were.  She’d always assumed they were all white men.  She’d never really thought about the fact that you couldn’t tell what race they were since their faces were hidden behind all that thick makeup.  Charani’s comment about the jarhead completely threw her off.

“Who?”  Yue said staring into the mirror back at a lewdly grinning Charani.  “Oh no!  Not that guy!  Gross!”

“So, you’re not smearing on hooker camouflage to try and seal the deal with that walking bag of hormones?  Good because you could show up in sweats with your arm hair braided and he’d still be in love.”  Charani joked then became serious again.  “Who then?”  Yue came up with a dozen lies she could use.  She trusted Charani though.  The woman had always been a straight shooter with her.

“The guy in charge of the continuation for the country department thing.  The one the President put in charge of everything.  He’s on board and eats in the dining room where I’m a waitress.  If I can get him to like me maybe he’ll do something for my brothers and Blaze and the rest of the guys.  They don’t belong out there in the field.”  Yue said quietly after peeking under the stall to make sure no one had been hiding out in there the whole time.  If the stars all magically aligned and her plan actually worked, she knew she’d have to keep it a secret.

“I guess it’s worth a shot.  Just don’t let that Marine see you talking to the other guy.  He’s liable to get himself arrested punching out the head of whatever the name of that department is.  They seriously need to come up with an acronym or something.  Maybe you can help him with that once the two of you move in together.”  Charani continued to chat with Yue while helping her apply her makeup and fix her hair.  Charani was a veteran of the stage.  She’d done plenty of stints in the dressing rooms getting girls ready to go out into the lights.  She knew how to give a pep talk while making sure the girls looked their best.  She also knew plenty about the ways into a man’s heart.

“Hopefully he notices me this time.”  Yue said looking critically at her reflection.  She couldn’t understand how Charani had done so much to her face in so little time.  She looked more like her natural self now than she did when she wasn’t covered in a layer of gunk.  Instead of trying to change her Charani had accentuated her natural beauty.  She’d sort of smoothed out her face.  Yue hated that she’d never be able to do it herself.  She was also getting super nervous about her plan.

“He’ll notice you alright.  If he can see you through all the other men trying to talk to you.”  Charani said.  She was standing a couple of feet back admiring her handiwork.  Yue smiled nervously at her then tried batting her eyebrows.  Instead of looking seductive she looked like she had something stuck in her eyes.  The next thing she knew she did have something stuck in her eyes.  She didn’t want to ruin the makeup by wetting her face, so she started fanning her eye with her hand.  Charani stared at her disbelievingly with her mouth slightly open.

“It’s ok to say I’m an idiot.”  Yue said on the verge of tears.

“Did you really just hurt yourself trying to bat your eyelashes?”  Charani asked.  It was as if the word ‘bemused’ had been coined specifically for this moment to describe the look on her face.  Yue punched her in the arm and they both started cracking up.  They were giggling like a couple of schoolgirls when one of the crew from their berthing area walked in on them.  The woman gave them a long hard look trying to figure out what was so funny before checking herself out in the mirror and leaving.  The female crew tended to be guarded around the outsiders.  That ticked Yue off since it wasn’t like they’d asked to be there.

“Wish me luck.”  Yue said taking one last look in the mirror.  They tended to frown on people being late to work on the carrier.  The military was super fixated on everyone being on time.

“I don’t think you need any help getting lucky.”  Charani winked at her.  Yue flipped her off and walked out the door.  Her cool exit ruined when she tripped over the bottom of the door as she left.  She plummeted headfirst into the small group of women playing a game of hearts at the table by the door out to the passageway.  The women helped her up.  She attempted to muster the dignity to walk out with her head held high.  Her mental image of herself clashed with reality.  What everyone saw was her running out with her neck at a weird angle blushing so much it looked like she’d applied too much blush.  The women seated around the card table stared after her wondering what all the drama was about.

Yue walked extra fast down the ship’s corridors until she was about halfway to her duty station.  It suddenly dawned on her that in less than thirty minutes she really would be on stage.  It’d be time for her to turn it on.  She’d never in her life successfully impressed a boy to get him to like her.  She couldn’t even remember trying since the Billy incident in sixth grade.  She’d made him a Valentine’s Day card with choose me and a check box on it.  He’d drawn a picture of a butt on it and showed it to all his friends.  Longest day ever.

In the food service room, she lined up with the rest of the servers for the standard inspection.  She may not be in the Navy, but she still had to adhere to their rules.  At least she did if she wanted this nice cushy job versus cleaning toilets all day.  She doubted she’d have as much opportunity to influence the leaders of the free world if they saw her primarily as the Chinese girl who scrubbed their pee off the floor.  That was assuming she even got to scrub important people’s pee.  The people who designed the ship to support a coed crew had opted not to put in any urinals.  Men were already pretty bad at aiming when the bathroom wasn’t swaying back and forth in the middle of the ocean.  The people who design massive billion-dollar war machines were not the same ones responsible for cleaning up the pee stains on the floor.

She passed inspection like she always did.  As much as she fantasized about being a cool rebel, she was a rule follower at heart.  She always just took one piece of candy out of the help yourself buckets on Halloween.  It was just the way she was wired.  Walking out the door with a towel and a pitcher of water she began topping off everyone’s glasses.  Most of the men in the room were important enough to have been waited on the majority of their adult lives.  A few of them were gracious while some were more demanding. The bulk of them ignored the servers.  The pitchers of water might as well be floating around the room on their own.  The petty officer in charge had kicked off this service by reminding them that a good server gets a thank you at the end of the night. No one even notices that a great server was there.

Yue scanned the room for her target.  Jeff was seated at the same table as the President.  There were a few governors and senators as well as their spouses at the table also.  The President looked gaunt.  His slightly reddened eyes sunken back into his head.  He was knocking back bourbon like it was water.  The first lady looked on disapprovingly and attempted to slow him down.  Yue let her eyes slide away from that little family drama and roam down to the awkwardly tall man sitting at the end of the table slurping on a bowl of lobster bisque.

Jeff appeared completely out of place.  The politicians surrounding him were all used to steak dinners and bourbon.  Jeff was used to pizza and late nights of research.  The politicians were used to sending people out to collect data for them.  Jeff had an army at his beck and call, but he still felt like he had to see things firsthand to really understand them.  Everyone was dressed formally while he was wearing a wrinkled button down with a plain blue windbreaker over it.  The windbreaker was too small, so his arms stuck out too far.  His hair was all over the place.  The man was just a mess.  Yue would’ve felt sorry for him if she wasn’t trying so hard to figure out a way to get him to talk to her.

As a server the only conversation she was supposed to engage in was around what type of liquid the important people wanted to pour into their face holes.  She wasn’t important enough to discuss their food choices unless asked directly.  She was strictly a water, soda or iced tea fetching part of the meal.  Her job could be eliminated by setting out large pitchers of different beverages on the table at the beginning of the meal.  Not that any of these people would lower themselves to pouring their own drink.  She was kept busy refilling waters and other drinks.  It took three other servers to handle the alcohol orders.

Yue was racking her brain on how she was going to casually get Jeff’s attention.  It had to be something subtle enough not to draw the attention of the other guests but obvious enough that Jeff would know she was interested in him.  She wanted to get his attention but didn’t want to risk ending up on urine scrubbing detail.  She was worried if she tried something too subtle the socially awkward Jeff might not even notice.  If the petty officer in charge noticed anything she’d be done.

She decided on a smile.  She’d try a smile on the first go around so as not to appear overly eager.  He’d either notice her smiling at him or not. Out of nowhere it occurred to her he might be gay.  She might be trying to seduce a gay man.  The fact that someone as important as this guy didn’t have a wife suddenly seemed less like an opening to her and more like a red flag.  Why would someone with such a sweet government gig not be married?  He was even tall.  Tall and a good job made up for a lot of other character flaws on match.com.  This guy was e-harmony material.  There was no good reason for him to be sitting at a table dumping way too many oyster crackers into his lobster bisque all by himself.

Yue took a deep breath.  She worked on flipping her mindset.  She was great at manipulating people.  Now she was wondering if that was a direct result of the Billy incident.  She was putting way too much thought into this.  She was trying to psychoanalyze her issue with smiling at a guy while she poured his water.  She took a deep breath and set off on a beeline towards his water glass.  She was poised and pouring before she realized his glass was still pretty full.  Rather than overflow the glass she pulled the pitcher up mid-pour.

She’d pulled up a little too late though and the water overflowed the glass onto the table.  Jeff grabbed a napkin and leaned forward to wipe it up right as Yue bent down to do the same.  Overly anxious about the whole interaction Yue bent down way too fast.  The top of her forehead collided with the bridge of Jeff’s nose.  He was slightly off-balance from leaning forward to help wipe up the water.  He threw his hands up to try and stop himself from falling over.  He ended up with a handful of Yue’s left breast.  He immediately let go thrusting himself backwards trying to stammer out an apology as he went over backwards with blood bubbling out of his nostril.

A completely mortified Yue stepped backwards in horror knocking over the wineglass of the senator who’d been seated beside Jeff.  He jumped up with a lap full of wine cussing and wiping at his crotch with a large cloth napkin.  Ignoring him Yue went around Jeff’s fallen chair to see if he was ok.  Before she’d made it more than a step or two a large man appeared out of nowhere and slammed her into the bulkhead. Head spinning from bouncing off the metal wall she watched as another man helped Jeff back to his feet.  He was trying to explain that it’d all been an accident when the senator ordered the man who’d just roughly handcuffed Yue to take her out of the room.

Yue glanced into the room one final time and saw Jeff still trying to explain what’d happened. Another man was trying to help him get his nose to stop gushing blood everywhere.  The man ushering Yue down the hall stopped and took the cuffs off her wrists.  She had tears flowing down her face.  Way too many emotions bubbling over after all that.  She’d just lost her best chance to rescue her brothers.  There was no way she was getting that gig back.

“I’m guessing you’re just a huge klutz, right?  Not some sort of ninja assassin who kills via headbutts?”  The large man asked her.

“I’m just an idiot.  I don’t know what the hell just happened.  Please tell Jeff I’m so sorry.  Tell the senator too.  I have no idea.  I’m so sorry.”  Yue was unable to figure out an appropriate way to apologize for what’d just happened.  She wasn’t even sure what’d just happened.  This had one hundred percent replaced the Billy incident as the new boy trauma in her life.  She hoped all the therapists weren’t dead.

“Ok.  I doubt you’ll be welcome back in the VIP mess hall again anytime soon.  Or galley or whatever they call it on a ship.  I did my time in the green machine before signing up for the service.  We’re going to have you locked down in your berthing area for now while we conduct a quick investigation.  I’m assuming nothing’s going to come from it.  I do need your badge though.”  The secret service agent held out his hand to Yue.  She handed him her yellow laminated badge morosely.  Ten minutes later she was being escorted back to her berthing area by a couple of shore patrolmen.

Charani looked up from her bunk when Yue walked in and gave her a big smile.  She was halfway out of her bunk to ask Yue how it went when the rest of Yue’s entourage walked in.  Yue shot her a look saying to keep quiet. Charani faded into the background when Yue asked her escort if she could use the head before getting in her bunk.  The man nodded at her then spoke briefly to one of the women in the room.  After a brief whispered exchange, him and the other male sailor went back out the door to station themselves outside.  Men weren’t allowed to hangout in the women’s berthing area.

Charani followed Yue into the head.  The room was empty except for Yue who was busy splashing water on her face.  She gave Charani a halfhearted smile.

“I’m guessing it didn’t go as well as hoped?”  Charani asked.  She really wanted to know what’d gone wrong but even more importantly she wanted to be there for Yue.  Plans went sideways.  It happened all the time.  Especially in the times they were living in.  The important thing from Charani’s perspective was surrounding yourself with people you trusted to help you get through this mess.

Yue continued to aggressively scrub the makeup off her face.  When she’d finished, she used a couple of paper towels to dry off and got ready to walk back to her bunk.  Since no one was beating on the door to try and get her to hurry she gave Charani an abbreviated account of what’d gone down in the dining room.  Charani listened attentively and was a good enough friend not to bust out laughing at the description of events.  She even held back from describing it as a couple of trains crashing together into a dumpster fire.

After Yue had recounted what’d just happened Charani got out of the way so Yue could head to her bunk.  All Yue really wanted to do was put her face under her pillow and try to pretend like the last two hours had never happened.  What a complete and total failure the day had been.  The woman who the shore patrol had spoken to about her opened the door to the head and looked over at Yue.

“Once you’re done in here there’s a tall goofy looking guy covered in dried blood waiting to talk to you in the passageway.”  Having delivered her oddly worded message, the woman shut the door and left.

Chapter 9:  Hold My Beer

They waited until the next day to collect the specimens.  The carrier wasn’t going to be close enough to send the plane for a few days anyway.  The planes would be sent with cages for the crawlerz to be placed in.  Leander had tasked the men in the warehouse with capturing the needed crawlerz ahead of the planes arrival.  After a lot of brainstorming, they decided the best course of action was to chain the crawlerz up with so many chains that they couldn’t move. They were putting a lot of their faith in the knockout mixture that’d worked so well on Blaze’s people.

“One more time just so everything’s correct on our obituary.  We’re going to go outside where we know a bunch of surgers are hanging out. We’re going to somehow lure one into our hardened facility then lock the others out while we drug the one that got in.  Once we have it drugged, we’re going to zip tie, handcuff and chain it until we can’t actually see it anymore.  Then the idea is to rinse and repeat with a few more of the monsters.  Some of those monsters being crawlerz who can rip the sides off buildings and jump from the ground to the top of a house with one leap.”  Drew asked Zimmerman.  Zimmerman nodded in the affirmative.  Drew could tell the SEAL team NCO was not amused.

“It’s an evolving plan.”  He answered.

“Ok cool.  Then just so I’m clear on this we’re going to take these highly contagious super monsters on a plane ride to the boat holding the leaders of what’s left of our country?  The only ones who might be able to possibly get us all out of this mess.  The one place that’s safe from these things?  We’re going to fly some of them there in homemade cages?”  Drew kept going.

“A ship.”  Zimmerman corrected him.  “Billion-dollar floating war machines are called ships.  Not boats.”

“That’s the part you have an issue with?”  Drew asked incredulously.  He’d do anything to get Yue back.  Endangering thousands of people on the ship she was being held prisoner on seemed a little excessive though.  Especially since he had no idea how to get her off said vessel once he arrived.  She could very easily become one of those few thousand who ended up either dead or infected.  It wasn’t like she was being held on a boat full of Nazis.  She was on the last bastion of American strength on the globe as far as Drew new.  The Marines had been pretty free with the information sharing once the cat was out of the bag on the carrier.

The problem of how to get the drugs into the infected had been batted around as well.  The powdery chemical was stored in multiple cannisters in the section of the warehouse containing boxes of pharmaceuticals.  Blaze, Drew and the rest of them were very interested in what exactly was contained in that chemical concoction.  They’d peppered the Marines responsible for mixing it up with a laundry list of questions.  The Marines had no clue other than it was similar to Rohypnol.  Rohypnol being the formal name for the mixture commonly known as the date rape drug.  The reason for the large amount of it stored in the warehouse was for precisely what they were doing now.  Collecting large numbers of unwilling human specimens in the event of a pandemic.

No one had anticipated having to collect specimens that had superhuman strength coupled with an uncontrollable rage.  There were no dart guns stored on the shelves.  Tranquilizer darts like the ones used on elephants would’ve been nice.  They had the sedative they needed but the delivery system was lacking.  All they could think to do was subdue the infected by beating the hell out of them with bats then use a hypodermic to inject the drug manually.  They’d spent some time carefully duct taping syringes to the end of long poles for that part of the operation.  They just hadn’t worked out how to press the plunger on the syringe once they had the needle shoved in the target specimen.

If the infected ate and drank like normal people, they could’ve just sprinkled it over some pizza and left a poisoned six pack on the doorstep.  Blaze and Drew hadn’t been amused at that joke since it was obviously at their expense.  Standing in front of the door with syringes full of knock out juice and a rifle loaded with rubber bullets Drew wondered what horrible things he’d done in a former life to deserve this.  They couldn’t think of a great way to capture the infected, so they were going to open the front door and just go for it.  With awesome plans like this Drew no longer wondered why so many of the base defenders had died in such a short amount of time.

“What’s the plan again?”  Drew asked Blaze.  On top of the rubber bullets they were also sporting body amor and facemasks courtesy of the riot gear they’d found.

“Zimmerman’s waiting for the guy at the barracks in the communications center to tell him there’s one walking by the front door.  We open the front door and beat the crap out of it then jab it with a couple of the syringes.  Once it’s out we secure it with chains and cuffs.  Once tied up we bag it and throw on some more tape just to be safe.  Should be fun.”  Blaze answered sarcastically.  He was sweating profusely in the thick padding they were wearing.  If it was thick enough to make him sweat like that, he hoped it was thick enough to stop the surgers from biting through it.

“I guess he got the call.”  Drew muttered raising his rifle and wishing it was loaded with real bullets.  He still couldn’t believe they were doing this.

Zimmerman ran his identification card over the RFID reader beside the door and the lock snapped open with a loud click.  The SEAL next to Zimmerman pushed the door open and went straight out of it ready to let the rubber bullets fly.  The rest of the team went out looking like an armed conga line.  Drew saw their tango tearing across the field straight at them.  The SEAL in the lead calmly aimed his rifle and proceeded to demolish the surger’s face with a stream of high-powered rubber bullets.

Moving quickly the rest of them swarmed the surger before it could recover.  The blood covered face of the middle-aged male surger lying on his back in the dirt seemed harmless enough.  The rubber bullets might be intended to be non-lethal but half a magazine of those straight to the face couldn’t be good for you.  They got two needles into the man’s thigh before Zimmerman raised his fist in the air and ran for the entrance to the warehouse.  The rest of them immediately scrambling to beat him there.  A fist in the air and the guy with the radio in his ear hauling ass for the door could only mean one thing.

There were a lot of surgers coming to join the party.  They’d anticipated that might be the case.  Plan B was to shoot up the ones they dropped then wait for the heat to die down before going back out to retrieve them.  They’d just hit the infected guy with the smashed in face with about three times the dosage needed to put a regular person out of commission for a day or two.  What that’d do to the infected they had no way of knowing.

The surgers came tearing around the side of the warehouse too fast to be ignored.  The SEALs sent a hailstorm of the rubber bullets at the fast-moving attackers and quickly ducked back into the warehouse.  Despite being the first one back to the door Zimmerman was the last one in.  He posted up beside the door making sure the rest of the team made it in.  One of the SEALs on his team slammed and locked the door as soon as Zimmerman dove through it.  Almost immediately the walls and door began taking a pounding as the surgers outside did their best to get in.  The visibly frazzled NCO ignored all that noise and began talking rapidly into his radio.

“Ok.  We have a few minutes to catch our breaths.  Once we’re ready they’ll open the door over at the barracks and shoot off a few rounds.  We’re hoping that’ll get the surgers to run up that way long enough for us to pull in the one we just tagged.  Any questions?”  Zimmerman asked.  Drew shrugged. He knew there had to be issues with that plan but was preoccupied wondering if Blaze was going to have a heart attack.  Blaze wasn’t exactly out of shape, but he wasn’t in wearing SWAT gear to outrun a swarm of uber zombies shape either.

“Maybe you should sit this next round out.”  Drew offered.  He was already looking around for Zimmerman to tell him they needed to pull someone else in.

“Maybe you should shut up.”  Blaze wheezed.

“No, he’s right.  We’ve got some other people we can swap you out with.  There’s no reason for you to go out there a second time.  You cover the door and get ready to help secure the tango when we drag it in.”  Zimmerman ordered.  He’d appeared out of nowhere to see how Blaze was doing.

“Whatever.”  Blaze wheezed back defiantly.  His bravado completely undermined by the fact that he was still trying to catch his breath.  Drew wanted to ask Blaze if his left arm was numb and offer him a baby aspirin.  Rather than embarrass the cardio challenged gypsy king anymore Drew got to his feet and followed Zimmerman back over to the door.

“Ready when you are.”  Drew announced.  He’d already replenished his ammunition.  In addition to the rubber bullets he had a few magazines of the real stuff shoved in his pockets.  If they started getting overwhelmed, he wasn’t planning on dying while shooting rubber bullets like an idiot.

“Cool deal.  I’ll let them know to fire off a few rounds.  Once they let us know it’s working, we’ll get out there and grab the one we tagged.  You grab a leg and I’ll grab a leg.  The rest of the team will cover us while we drag it inside.  Once we get it inside, we’ll have the people in here bag it.  Make sense?”  Zimmerman asked seriously.  This was life or death stuff where the slightest screwup could have deadly consequences.  Drew nodded his understanding and stepped back out of the way to wait for the signal.

He didn’t have to wait long.  A few minutes later Zimmerman was motioning for him to stack up on the door.  Drew was pulled up in the front of the line behind Zimmerman this time.  If the diversion had worked there shouldn’t be any surgers outside.  The comm room people from the barracks building had verified that for them already on the CCTV.  Drew took a deep breath as Zimmerman scanned his badge to unlock the door a second time.  Way too soon after their last interrupted outing Drew found himself running towards the comatose body on the ground.

The men on the team spread out in a wedge behind them.  If they saw any surgers they’d gauge on the fly whether it made sense to capture or kill them.  The goal was to get a couple more in case they accidentally killed them trying to capture them.  No one was looking forward to the next phase of this job which was going to involve capturing a couple of crawlerz.  They hadn’t decided if they should try and dig them out of the bushes or wait for night yet.  The smart money was on digging them out of the bushes.  Leaving the safety of their shelter at night was suicide.

Drew hustled over as fast as he could move in the thick body armor and squatted down next to the comatose surger.  Once Zimmerman had waddled over to join him, they each grabbed a hairy leg and ran backwards for the door.  They were halfway to the door when the first shots were fired.  Their little expedition had not gone unnoticed.  A handful of surgers were running towards them from across the field.  Another couple had emerged out of the woods.  The SEALs walked backwards slowly shooting rubber bullets at the approaching targets. If they managed to put all six of the surgers on the ground it’d be a good chance to grab the rest of the specimens that they needed.  They could finish off the leftovers with some mercy shots to the head.

Drew ran backwards right into the wall. That was his cue to get out of the way and let Zimmerman drag the body the rest of the way through the open door.  Drew followed along while the SEALs left outside tried to see if they could knock out the specimen collection early.  As soon as Zimmerman had the body about ten feet into the warehouse Blaze and a couple of others pounced on it.  They wrapped it up with a long chain, tie wraps and handcuffs until it looked like a metallic mummy.

One of the more depressingly realistic supplies they’d located on the shelves had been a stack of large boxes filled with thousands of body bags.  They’d removed twenty of the bags to help hold the infected they were rounding up.  They were planning on double or triple bagging them once secured.  Blaze and Drew were currently trying to get the first surger into a bag while Zimmerman and a couple of the Marines went to see if the SEALs outside needed any help.

“Wait a second.”  Blaze said dropping the head of the surger onto the floor.  Drew stood there breathing hard wondering what the hell Blaze was doing.  He watched curiously as Blaze put his hand on the surger’s neck and moved his fingers around.

“What’s up?”  Drew asked.  He had a sinking feeling he knew the answer already.

“I think we killed this one.  Maybe too much of the Rohypnol?”  Blaze said with a shrug.

“Could’ve been the rubber bullets fired on full auto right into his eyeballs.”  Drew said sliding around for a better look.

“Ok well help me get all this crap off this one so we can use it on the next one.  Hopefully they don’t kill the next one.”  Blaze said starting to unlock the cuffs they had around the surgers wrists and ankles.  Looking towards the front door Drew saw the team pulling in a few more of the knocked-out Dawn of the Dead cast.  He was relieved when Zimmerman gave the all clear and they locked the front door.  A minute later something outside was banging on the wall again trying to get in.

Drew and Blaze grabbed the cuffs and the long length of chain to help with the live ones laid out by the front door.  Blaze checked a few of them.  None of them seemed to have a pulse.  Seeing what he was doing Zimmerman checked as well and couldn’t find one.

“Did we kill them all?”  Zimmerman asked frustrated.

“We just need to throw a massive rave and hand out lots of ‘X’.  World will be ours again by morning.”  One of the SEALs said in frustration.

“Now what?”  Blaze asked tiredly.  He knew better than to think the rugged manly men around him were even considering giving up.  Blaze personally was ready to crawl into one of the body bags himself and take a nice long nap.  Based on the one movie he’d seen about the SEALs though he knew taking a nap right now would be tantamount to ringing the ‘I quit’ bell during SEAL training.  If Demi Moore could get through all of that garbage, then he could put off taking a nap for another hour.  Not thinking much of it he yawned really big.  He looked up to find everyone staring at him.

“I’m sorry.  Is our life or death operation to try and save the world boring you?”  One of the SEALs asked disdainfully.  None of the military men seemed to have taken much of a liking to the obviously hippie leanings of Blaze.  Blaze was a smart man.  He normally didn’t make a lot of verbal mistakes.  This time due to the stress and his tiredness he let words tumble out of his mouth without any sort of filter.

“Nah.  Your mom just kept me up way too long last night.”  The words were followed by dead silence.  Blaze realized too late that most likely the SEAL who’d uttered the words in response to his yawn had lost his parents in all this mess.  The overgrown camouflaged trained killer of men was in Blaze’s face in three quick strides.  Wondering how bad it was going to hurt when the big man hit him Blaze forced a grin and stood his ground.

Drew slid over closer to jump in if Blaze needed help.  The overly muscular SEAL got right in Blaze’s face.  Drew looked around but it didn’t look like Zimmerman or anyone else was interested in stopping the pounding Blaze was about to get.  Blaze stood his ground.  The big SEALs face suddenly split into a crooked smile.  He swung his hand to slap Blaze on the shoulder a few times.

“I think I may like this hippie piece of trash.”  Blaze smiled back at him and everyone let out a collective breath.  Drew was just hoping Blaze wouldn’t say anything else stupid like that.

“Your mom sure does.”  Blaze pushed his luck as far as he could.  The SEAL howled with laughter.  It broke up the tension in the room completely.  Right up until Lieutenant Murdock barked at them all to get a grip.  Reminding them they still had a mission he waved Zimmerman and his own senior NCO over to discuss strategy with the men up in the barracks.

“What should we do with the bodies?”  Drew asked the group of men standing around.  They all looked at him then at the bodies then back again.  Finally, one of them sighed and said they should work on moving them over by the door so they could sling them out the next time they went out.  They worked together to get the bodies stacked up like a pile of fleshy firewood then they all wandered off to rest.  They knew it wouldn’t be long before they’d be ordered out that door again.

Chapter 10:  Double Tap

It turned out the infected recovered quickly from large doses of Rohypnol.  While recovering their heart rates became almost imperceptible.  This was one of the reasons the crawlerz had such long lifespans.  The disease opened up the parts of the mind that regulated the body’s nonessential systems, that allowed them to focus their energy on the healing process.  In the case of having a foreign toxin injected into them their bodies immediately went to work on burning that off enough for them to return quickly to their normal psychotic murdering state of mind.

The men in the warehouse lined up by the pile of bodies to get ready to go back out into the field.  They needed to clear out the majority of the dozen or so surgers outside while hopefully capturing a couple of them.  Zimmerman would be leading them out again.  Lieutenant Murdock was working the radio to coordinate when the guards in the barracks should shoot off a couple of distraction rounds.  They wanted the surgers running in the other direction when they came out the door to take them down.  Rather than administering the Rohypnol they were going to just knock the surgers out and secure them in the dirt before dragging them back in.

While the SEALs and a handful of the Marines were getting in some target practice on the infected Lieutenant Murdock wanted to get the corpses of the Rohypnol poisoned zombies thrown out.  Once everything else was done they’d burn the bodies to keep them from contaminating anything else.  Zimmerman and his crew went out the door along with Drew. Blaze and the remaining circus macabre crew joined the lieutenant to quickly cart out the supposed corpses.  Blaze and one of his guys were halfway to the front door when the surger they were holding went from dead weight to kicking and screaming.

They dropped it and ran.  The surger popped up off the ground and flung itself on the man who’d been carrying it by the feet with Blaze.  The man hadn’t been issued riot gear since he wasn’t expected to be leaving the floor of the hangar. He had no protection from the teeth ripping into his back.  Murdock got his pistol out in time to kill the surger while it was still munching on the screaming victims back.  The man rolled over clutching his bloody shoulder and begging not to be shot.  Murdock shot him.

Seconds later Murdock was on the ground as the pile of bodies by the door exploded to life.  A spitting screaming red eyed mass of hellish insanity spreading faster than seemed possible.  The demons ripped into the unarmored and armored in the hangar alike.  Murdock killed the surger who’d taken him down and reached up to gingerly rub the side of his own head. The side now missing an ear and a big flap of scalp.  He pointed his pistol at the back of the head of a surger eating a man on the floor and pulled the trigger twice.  Once to kill the surger and once to make sure the surger’s victim was dead.  Then he ate his own gun and fell to the ground.  A final act to protect the depot he’d been charged with defending.

Blaze ran full speed out the door into the middle of another fiasco.  Fresh off the success of having put down six surgers earlier the team thought they could easily handle the dozen outside.  That dozen had come fast and hard taking out two of the SEALs in the first wave.  The surgers were absorbing the rubber bullets and still coming.  The sound of weapons going fully automatic came from every direction as desperate men flipped the switch.  Blaze craned his neck and saw Drew sitting on a downed surger’s back working a pair of handcuffs onto it.  The surger suddenly regained consciousness and began bucking like a wild bronco.  Drew went flying onto his back with the surger spinning around on its stomach to come after him.  It was slithering like a deranged serpent with its hands and feet cuffed together.

Blaze ran over and shot it in the head.  He was way past rubber bullets and trying to take demons prisoner.  This insanity needed to stop now.

“The pile of infected inside came back to life!  They’re attacking everyone inside!”  Blaze yelled over the sound of nearby gunfire.  A thoroughly rattled Drew was staring at him trying to understand what Blaze was attempting to tell him.

“Who’s dead?”  He asked.

Before Blaze could answer Zimmerman passed by them yelling for everyone to fall back.  One of the SEALs was trying to pull a buddy off the field.  The man had sustained a dozen bite wounds from the three infected who’d managed to walk right through the automatic weapons fire thrown at them.  Tackling these things with rubber bullets was like bringing a knife to a gunfight.  A dull knife.

“The infected are in the base!”  Blaze yelled at Zimmerman’s back.  Zimmerman looked over his shoulder then sped up to get back in the hangar and see what Blaze was talking about. A Marine came running out of the door as Zimmerman approached.  The man was running fast.  Zimmerman sidestepped not realizing until too late the Marine had been infected.  He went down shooting with the Marine riding him like a spider monkey having an affair with a football.  Another couple of newly infected came out the door.  The newcomers scrambled to the ground to get their teeth into a struggling Zimmerman.

Screaming at the top of his lungs Blaze charged the pile of cannibalistic pigs rooting around in the entrails of their former leader.  Drew dropped the magazine of rubber bullets out of his rifle onto the ground and slammed in the real deal.  They’d gone from trying to gather specimens to trying not to die.  Men were dying all around them.  The SEAL who’d been pulling his battle buddy off the field suddenly screamed when his former friend bit down hard on his thumb and started chewing.

Drew emptied his magazine and slammed in another one. Blaze had picked up a rifle off one of the KIA and was shooting sparingly since he didn’t have extra ammunition on him.  Surgers were storming out of the warehouse door and running for the pockets of men still on their feet.  For no apparent reason the bulk of the surgers ran for a group of three SEALs who were spread out in a triangle facing outwards trying to put down all the infected coming for them from the other side of the field.  Drew was wondering if he should help them when Blaze yanked him towards the open warehouse door.

“If we don’t get in there and seal the place up it’s going to be a total loss!”  Blaze yelled.  He saw where Drew was looking.  “They’re big boys they can take care of themselves.  Plenty of bad guys for us to kill in the warehouse!”

Feeling like he might be doing the wrong thing Drew followed Blaze as they snaked their way past mortally wounded surgers who were still lurching towards them.  They leapt through the front door into the warehouse where multiple surgers were running around.  Drew didn’t see anyone still uninfected in the huge space.  He started shooting.  A second later he was joined by Blaze. Blaze had found another rifle on the ground with a mostly full magazine.  A third rifle joined them when one of the Marines emerged from the office behind them.

The Marine should’ve stayed hidden.  Less than five seconds after stepping out of the closet a surger came into the warehouse from the open door to the outside looking for the source of all the noise.  It spotted the Marine and took him out before the Marine ever even saw the danger.  Spinning around at the sound of screaming Blaze mowed down the surger and the Marine.  Drew ran to the door leading outside and slammed it shut.  He’d been worried about not having a badge to scan to lock it, but it snapped locked by itself once closed.

“Were they all dead out there?”  Drew asked scanning the room for more tangos to take out.  It appeared the rest of them had already run outside.

“No clue.  If they kill all the infected out there, then they can knock politely, and we’ll let them in.”  Blaze answered in between attempts to catch his breath.  He raised his hand when Drew walked towards the door intending to exit and see if anyone needed any help.

“Out of my way.  I’m going back out there.  They may need help.”  Drew said.  He was trying hard to do the right thing.  Even if opening that door to hell again sounded like the worst idea ever.  Nothing good was on the other side of that doorframe.  There was nothing out there but death.  Of course, the inside of the hangar looked like someone had dropped the contents of a morgue into a gigantic blender then dumped the resulting chunky mess all over the floor.

They were relatively safe inside the fortified hangar.  If it’d been nighttime, then Drew would’ve been more concerned.  With the possibility of the craftier crawlerz having snuck into the warehouse they’d have been forced to do a much more thorough search.  To the best of his knowledge the day walking surgers weren’t the sneaky ambushing types.  With the surgers what you saw was what you got.  A super-fast adrenalized killing machine that’d come screaming straight at you with its mouth wide open.  Drew would take that every time over the way the crawlerz were able to restrain themselves and stalk you.  He’d take that every day and twice on Sundays.

Drew let his M-16 dangle from his shoulder strap.  He pulled out his pistol and held it loosely in his hand.  Their enemies were way too fast to try and out draw them.  There was a few more shots fired outside followed by suppressed screaming then silence until something started beating on the door.  Drew moved forward to see if it happened to be someone who was still alive and uninfected.  The rage filled inhuman scream that split the air told him it wasn’t worth the effort of checking.

Just like that him and Blaze were all that was left of the force protecting the warehouse.  A bunch of half-naked freaks with inhuman speed and strength had taken out the extremely capable fighting force that’d been in charge of guarding this facility.  If these men couldn’t survive then what hope did the rest of humanity have?  Not that the rest of humanity would think it was a great idea to leave their impenetrable fortress to play tag with the insane man eaters.

Drew walked around until he identified Lieutenant Murdock.  He had to nudge the head with his boot to make sure it was him.  The back of the lieutenant’s head was one big hole and the skin had gotten loose on the front of the skull too.  He was able to tell it was him though.  Gagging at the stench of death he bent down and pulled the radio away from Murdock’s body.  He fought down his rising gorge to grab the pistol Murdock had used to cure himself of the infection.  He’d stripped plenty of rotten corpses, but the freshness of Murdock’s mixed with having known and liked the man made it grosser.  Kind of like eating a hamburger made out of a cow you’d kept as a pet.  It’s different when it’s not just a hunk of anonymous meat.  Probably why no one really keeps cows as pets.

The radio was silent.  That wasn’t abnormal at all.  When someone stopped answering you stopped transmitting until they did answer.  This was for a very good reason.  The person who stopped transmitting may very well be hiding from a ravenous pack of the infected who’d rip him apart if they found him.  You didn’t want your radio check to be the reason someone died.  Drew picked up the radio wondering what the code was for complete failure.

“Barracks actual this is the warehouse. Over.”  Drew said with the transmit button depressed.  He’d heard the soldiers here talking enough to know that barracks actual was the way to call Leander.  The actual part meant whoever was in charge of that unit.  There’d been multiple units before but now the call signs had been trimmed way down.

“What’s your status warehouse?  Over.”  The voice on the other end of the transmission was an unknown one to Drew and Blaze.

“Everyone’s dead.  Mission failed.  Blaze and Drew are the only two left alive.  Over.”  Drew transmitted.  He felt like that was a pretty succinct explanation that summed up the complete mayhem that’d just occurred.

“Warehouse say again.  Over.”  The voice came back disbelievingly.  Drew sighed.  He felt like he’d summed it up pretty good the first time.  Now that the adrenaline was dying down, he had the shakes.  He was freaked out.  He was in a massive hangar surrounded by the dead.  He’d almost died.  Blaze looked like he wanted to roofie himself.  That might not be a horrible idea.  Otherwise he wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to sleep again.

“Everybody.  Is.  Dead.  Over.”  Drew enunciated loudly into the radio.

“10-4.  Standby warehouse.”  The voice responded.  Drew shrugged.  It wasn’t like they had many options other than standing by.  He wasn’t trying to open the door and walk outside again anytime soon.  Hearing someone yelling, he turned his head quickly to look over towards the door. Blaze was facing away from him screaming at the wall.  More precisely Blaze was cursing out the monsters outside who were back to banging on the wall again.  At the sound of his voice they tripled their efforts.  Drew wasn’t sure what Blaze was trying to accomplish but if it made the man feel better to yell at the wall then that was fine with him. It wasn’t like they were going to be able to get in.  Luckily for the starving infected outside the idiots inside the nuclear bomb proof zombie fortress kept walking outside and shooting at them with nerf bullets.

“Hey Blaze.  You done yelling at the wall?”  Drew called out when Blaze paused in the middle of his diatribe to catch his breath.  After all that the poor guy could probably use a lozenge.  Blaze turned around to face Drew.  His red face glistening with the tears he’d shed.  For the first time it dawned on Drew that Blaze was surrounded by the corpses of his family.  Blaze collapsed onto the ground and knelt in the middle of his dead band of faux gypsies.  He’d been the leader and father figure for the roustabouts and misfits laid out all around him in the grotesque poses of death.

“I killed them all.  I killed them and I let the women get kidnapped.  They trusted me to save them.  This is all my fault.”  Blaze stuttered out around big gasping sobs as Drew walked over towards him.  Drew had no idea what to say.  He needed LeBron or Yue here to help out with this.  He kept his mouth shut rather than risk saying something stupid.  He sat down next to Blaze and pulled his own knees up to his chin.  He wrapped his arms around his legs and kept his grieving friend company.

“Warehouse one this is barracks actual.  Over.”  Leander’s voice crackled out of the radio startling Drew and Blaze out of their contemplative states.  Blaze had been remembering his friends.  Drew had been busy trying to think of a way to get LeBron and himself on the plane back to the carrier.  Although he suspected at this point someone should probably go ahead and call off the whole crawler hunt idea.  It just wasn’t working out.  Considering how screwed up this operation had gotten it made it seem like an even stupider idea now to bring the infected specimens back to the ship.  Might as well dress the pilot up like the grim reaper while they were at it.

“Barracks actual this is warehouse one.  Blaze and Drew.  Over.”  Drew said.

“Good to hear you made it Drew.  LeBron recognized your voice earlier and let me know you were still alive.  I don’t think he took a breath the whole time we’ve been watching you guys over the CCTV.”  Leander said.  Blaze and Drew both idly looked around the top of the hangar for the cameras.  Little black domes way up on the roof looked back down at them.  It also answered the question on why LeBron had been so happy to hear his voice. The cameras were so high up the picture probably wasn’t super clear.

“Yes sir.  Thank you, sir.”  Drew said.  Blaze gave him a look and then reached over to wipe the brown off of Drew’s nose.  Drew knocked his hand away and told Blaze that they needed to suck up some if they wanted to convince Leander to put them on that plane.  That was the only way Blaze was getting reunited with his people and Drew was ever going to see Yue again.

“Drew can you tell us what happened?  Were the surgers who were stacked up all given the injections?  Why weren’t they chained up?”  Leander fired questions fast and furious.  Drew waited until he was done and then answered as best as he could.  When he was done the response that he got back wasn’t what he expected.  Leander got back on the radio and told him they still needed to get a couple of specimens before the plane got here.  He made it clear it’d be up to him and Blaze to do it.  The only way that they’d get a seat on the flight out to the carrier was if a few of the infected were in the hold along with them.

Blaze stared at Drew in disbelief.  Drew didn’t notice because he was busy staring at the radio in his hand in disbelief.  The surgers had just taken out almost twenty-five men.  The majority of whom were highly trained special force operators.  Now 007 up in the barracks was putting it on a circus administrator and a kid who hadn’t finished high school yet to save the whole operation.  Leander must be completely desperate.  Or, he just didn’t care if Blaze and Drew also died at this point.  He’d decided they were expendable, and he could afford to roll the dice with their lives.

“Now what.”  Blaze said leaning back to rest on his hands.

“I guess we need to go roofie us up some surgers.  We’re going to have to get them all packaged up and ready to go.”  Drew said.

“You sure know how to party.”  Blaze said getting up and dusting off his hands.  He was busy looking everywhere except at his dead friends.

“Don’t worry.  Once we get a couple of freaks tagged and bagged, we’ll get these guys all into bags too.  We’ll be sore tomorrow but I’m not going to leave them lying around like this.”  Drew said.

“What about the guys outside?”  Blaze asked.

“Yeah unfortunately I think they’re pretty much screwed.  Vultures gotta eat.”  Drew answered.  He felt for the men who’d fallen out there, but no way was he going to get himself killed trying to give them all a proper burial.  If Blaze wanted to that was all him.  Drew planned on kidnapping a few of the walking dead, mummifying their friends in body bags, getting a drug enabled good night’s rest and catching the first plane out of there in the morning.  It was also the only plane, so he really needed to make sure they had their payment ready to go by then.

Chapter 11:  Awkward Beginnings

Jeff stood in the passageway nervously waiting for Yue to come out.  He’d come by to apologize to her.  Standing in the passageway with his blackening eyes and swelling nose he realized apologizing might seem weird.  He’d just been enjoying some soup when she overflowed his water glass leading to the incredibly painful series of events. He still had a hard time connecting the dots on what’d actually happened.  She’d broken his nose and put him on the floor.  He still should’ve stood up and kept the secret service agent from dragging her out like that.  That’s what he was there to apologize for.  He wanted her to know he felt horrible about how she’d been treated.  He felt even worse that it’d taken him so long to insert himself into the situation.  They were treating her like some kind of terrorist.

“I’m so sorry.”  Yue emerged from the passageway with the apology spilling out of her mouth.  The words were out of her mouth before she’d even seen how messed up his face was.  Mortified she tried to think of something else to say.  A simple ‘I’m sorry’ seemed pretty inadequate considering Jeff looked like he’d accidentally wandered into a UFC cage match.

“It’s ok.  I actually came down to apologize to you.  I should’ve stopped them from taking you out in handcuffs.  Your face looks really good though.”  Jeff blurted out.  The second the words were out of his mouth he wished he could reel them back in.  Your face looks good?  Where’d that even come from?  Yue wasn’t sure what to say to all of that.  She needed to strike fast though.  This guy was the golden ticket for her brothers getting off the mainland alive.

“I’m glad you think my face looks good.  Yours looks pretty horrible.”  Yue cringed internally.  Calling him ugly should do the trick.  Why was she getting so tongue tied around this guy?

“I noticed how pretty you were the other day.  I was hoping I hadn’t messed up your forehead by ramming it into my nose.”  Jeff replied. Once again hating on himself for sounding like an idiot.  He wondered how long they could keep up a conversation composed completely of random embarrassing thoughts.

“You noticed how pretty I was the other day?”  Yue asked.  She ignored the shore patrolman behind Jeff. The seaman was going to get eye damage from rolling them so hard.  He was joking around quietly with the other shore patrolmen.  When he noticed Yue looking at him, he stopped and unsuccessfully tried to wipe the smirk off his face.  Dude thought he was hilarious.  Jeff was too busy looking like a deer caught in the headlights to even notice the comedy act behind him.

“Ohm yeah.  When you were there.  You know when you first showed up at our table.  I did think that.  So now I’m glad your face isn’t messed up.  Mine is but it wasn’t anything special to begin with.  I’ll have to make up a manly story to go along with the black eyes.  The truth isn’t going to cut it.  Not on a ship full of Marines anyway.”  Jeff was rambling.  He was desperately trying to work out how to bring this extremely off the rails conversation to a close.

“Apology accepted.  I guess I won’t be seeing you again.  I doubt I’m allowed back in the dining room again ever.”  Yue said looking up into Jeff’s eyes.  She thought about trying to bat her eyelashes but the last time she’d tried that it hadn’t ended well.

“Would you like to go back for dinner tomorrow night?”  Jeff asked.  He shocked himself with his own boldness.  The look of confusion on Yue’s face wasn’t reassuring.  He stood there smiling nervously at her until she figured out that he’d just asked her out.

“You mean with you?”  She asked.

“Yes.  You can be my guest if you’d like.  My date?”  Jeff said a little less smoothly this time.

A few minutes later Yue was back in the head in her berthing area again.  Charani was staring at her while she brushed her teeth.  Yue was grinning like the Cheshire cat through a mouthful of toothpaste while Charani shook her head slowly in disbelief.  Neither of them could really believe that Yue had accomplished her goal.  Teeth brushed Yue told Charani good night and slipped into her bunk to get some sleep.

She woke up the next morning well rested despite having her sleep disturbed in the middle of the night.  Being taken off the dining room roster meant she was back to being unemployed.  Her yellow identification card had been returned to her in the middle of the night.  A sailor had woken her up and sent her out into the passageway to be greeted by an unsmiling secret service agent.  He’d handed back her identification and told her she was good to go as far as they were concerned.  She’d sleepily asked him if that meant she had her job back.  The man had shrugged and left.  Her gainful employment was evidently not a concern of his.  She went back to sleep wondering if the toilet cleaning gig came with knee pads or if she had to provide her own.

Excited for a full day with nothing to do Yue hurried to get dressed. She threw on the uniform of the day and walked out into the passageway.  She supposed she could go try to find out what her new job was going to be.  She was afraid they’d assign her to something that may interfere with her dinner plans though so opted to skip out on that for now.  Worried that someone may come to tell her what her new assignment was she decided to spend a few hours wandering as much as her yellow tinted badge allowed.  After everything she’d gone through to get this date, she wasn’t trying to miss it.

After a quick breakfast she went up to the flight deck to hang out.  The air was slightly warmer which she took as a sign they were heading back south.  She’d tried to figure out what direction they were going by looking at the sun.  LeBron could tell the direction and time of the day by doing that.  When she’d told Charani that she’d gotten one of those pitying looks she was learning to loathe.  In a patronizing voice she’d been told that if she just looked to see which side of the boat land was on, she should be able to figure out which way they were going.  Charani had made it sound so easy a cavewoman could figure it out.

Yue had nodded like that made any sort of sense and changed the subject.  Like most millennials she needed Siri to tell her how to get pretty much anywhere.  The only person she knew who could do the navigating by the stars thing was LeBron and that was pretty hit or miss.  She was pretty sure he’d just gotten lucky a few times leading them around while he stared up in the sky like he was the reincarnation of Magellan.

She missed her brothers.  Just thinking of all the fun that her and Drew could be having making fun of LeBron’s star gazing right now brought a smile to her face.  She could close her eyes and imagine LeBron’s stuffy retort.  He’d know exactly what direction the ship was moving.  He’d probably have a pretty good idea of where they were in relation to the coast as well.  Or at least he’d say he did.  Then Drew would ask him if he remembered why he’d driven the wrong way on the interstate that one time for like an hour if he was so good with directions.

The teasing never stopped between the three of them.  Well at least it wouldn’t now that their parents were out of the picture.  Nancy hadn’t been able to abide them making fun of one another. She’d liked to say they should be building each other up since the world would try hard to tear them all down.  Bart was as likely to jump into the teasing as he was to tell them to shut up.  She missed them both so much.

She missed her life.  She missed feeling safe.  She didn’t even know where to start counting the things she missed.  Leaning against the side of the bottom of the ship’s superstructure she let herself get emotional.  The wind whipped the tears off her face almost as soon as they appeared.  She stared across the dark blue water to the land just visible on the horizon.  She wondered how bad it’d gotten ashore and how her brothers were doing.  She stared at the distant land wondering how the hell she was supposed to know which way they were going just by staring at the land passing by.

“Trust me you’re better off on the ship than over there.”  A voice broke Yue out of her trance.  Startled she turned around and saw it was the Marine who’d taken a liking to her.  He was dressed in full on battle rattle with a big pack on his back.

“Over there’s where my brothers are.  Where they are, I should be.”  Yue replied smiling.  Despite herself she’d come to enjoy her conversations with the cocky Marine.  He’d absolutely despise hearing it, but he’d managed to worm his way right into the friend zone.  She’d told him about her brothers and how they were helping out at one of the bases.  His eyes revealed he realized his mistake at implying how dangerous it was over there.

“I’m sure they’re fine.  Based on what you told me that base is way better protected than the other ones I’ve seen.  It’s hard to get people out of the old mindset of fighting guys with guns.  Fighting these things isn’t like fighting a traditional enemy.  You know that.  You’ve fought them.  It’s completely insane how fast they are.”  The Marine tapered off.  He realized he’d gone down the wrong road again for someone whose brothers were trapped over there.  Yue decided to show him some mercy while digging up some intel.

“Are you going on a camping trip this time?”  She asked referring to the pack he was wearing.

“Word is we’ll be gone for a while.  You’re going to have to make it through the days without my bright eyes and manly jaw here to cheer you up.”  He made a silly pose and winked at her.

“I’ll try to survive.”  She deadpanned right back at him with a smile intended to take the sting out of her words.  The tough acting leatherneck was probably only a year or two older than Yue.  Maybe that’s why she wasn’t into him she thought wryly.  The two guys she’d had her eyes on since the world had gone to hell had both been about ten years her senior.  She wondered what it said about her that she kept going after the alpha males.  Well, neither Blaze nor Jeff were what you’d traditionally call an alpha male.  Both of them had been in positions of power and had something to offer her though.  Was she doomed to be an apocalyptic gold digger?

“Hey, I’m positive your brothers are good to go.  I may even see them for all I know.  We’re going in to reinforce a base and we’re headed south so you never know.”  The Marine said mistaking her distraction for concern about her brothers.

“If you do see them make sure to tell them both I miss them.  I’m hoping to see them soon.  Maybe you could shove them under your seat and bring them back with you.” She joked.

“If they’d let me I would.  For sure.  Who knows maybe it’ll happen?  Anyway, I’ve got to go.  I’m already late and they seriously frown on lateness around here.  I’ll see you when I get back?”  He said.  He leaned forward and was rewarded with Yue ducking her face quickly out of the way to give him a hug and send him on his way.  She watched him walking quickly towards the other side of the carrier.  By the look on his face, he’d finally figured out that he was solidly in the friend zone.

She hoped he’d still come around and talk to her.  She knew she’d miss him if he didn’t.  It was a huge ship with a crazy amount of people on board, but she still spent most of her time alone.  Other than Charani there really wasn’t anyone else she spent a lot of time with.  She was hoping to change that with Jeff.  She may be looking to use him to get her brothers rescued but she also kept catching herself thinking of him in a decidedly non-friend zone kind of way.

She looked at the watch she’d gotten from a trashed jewelry store to see what time it was.  It was a gorgeous watch that would’ve been way out of her price range pre-apocalypse.  If nothing else the end of times was making stylish accessorizing much more affordable.  She shook her wrist hoping the little hands were just stuck.  When the tiny dials failed to move, she sighed and wondered what she was supposed to do for the next eight hours while she waited to go to dinner.  Resigning herself to a whole lot of staring at the ocean she slid down to sit on the hard deck.

Chapter 12:  The Infection is Airborne

“Good afternoon sleepyheads.”  A tall Marine with a clean-shaven face was standing over them.  Blaze and Drew looked up sleepily from the couches they’d passed out on in the breakroom.  They were both exhausted.  The light the Marine had turned on when he walked in yanked them forcefully out of the depths of an exhausted slumber.  Looking over at the clock on the wall Drew saw they’d been asleep a whopping three hours.

“Dude must be from the ship.”  Blaze said sleepily. He slid his pistol back carefully into the holster on his leg.  The Marine standing by the light switch never knew how close he’d come to being shot.  Blaze had kept the pistol he pulled hidden under the banket he’d thrown over himself before passing out.

“How’d you know that?”  The Marine asked curiously.

“All the Marines stationed here got killed already.  I’m guessing you’re the replacements.”  Drew said simply.  He yawned and stood up to make coffee ignoring the Marine’s incredulous look.  He was exhausted.  They’d managed to tag two crawlerz right before it started getting dark.  Then they’d spent most of the night shoving bodies into bags and dragging the bags around to form neat rows.  Drew had no idea why they’d felt the bodies being lined up like that was so important.  As soon as the sun came up, they’d opened up the door again to hunt the surgers in the field.  They’d gone full auto and carried out spare rifles to make short work of the handful of surgers still left alive.  Aiming mostly for the legs let them inject a few of the ones that survived.

“Yep.  That’s us.  That field out there looks like something out of a movie.  One of those Civil War ones where they pan across all the dead soldiers in the early morning mist at some major battleground.  I thought this base was supposed to be secure.”  The Marine paused as a few more men walked in including an officer.  The lieutenant walked over to where a barely awake Drew was attempting to figure out the coffee pot and nudged him out of the way.

“I’ll take care of this.  Looks like you’ve been pretty busy already.  I’m assuming the body bags wrapped in chains and duct tape are the specimens you collected?”  The lieutenant asked while filling the filter up to the rim with coffee grounds.  The smell of the coffee grounds had already perked Drew up.

“Yes sir.  We stopped duct taping the bags when we ran out of duct tape.  We’ve got two crawlerz and three surgers ready to go.”  Drew said impatiently waiting for the coffee machine to do its magic. He willed the machine to drip faster and provide him with the piping hot bean juice he so desperately craved.  The lieutenant asked him to describe how they’d captured the creatures and Drew went through the explanation.

“Are you sure they’re alive in those bags after all that Rohypnol you shot them up with?  We took a look at the bags and they’re not moving.”  The lieutenant shifted his gaze back and forth from Blaze to Drew for clarification.

“Feel free to unwrap them and check.  We can always call the ship and ask them to send more Marines.”  Drew replied without thinking.  He really just wanted to drink coffee and get back on the uncomfortable military issue couch for a quick three-day nap.  Realizing what he’d just said he waited to see what the lieutenant’s response would be.  It would’ve been a lot easier for the lieutenant to let it slide if Blaze hadn’t started laughing.

“How about if I have you and your boyfriend check?  We can always go find some more scumbags to replace you two.”  The lieutenant said getting in Drew’s face abruptly.  Unsure what to do Drew looked over at Blaze for help.  Blaze shrugged back at him then broke into a huge yawn.  The other Marines in the room were looking on with interest wondering if they were going to get to see a brawl.  It wasn’t every day they got to see an officer act like one of them.

“No disrespect sir.  It’s been a long night.  Those things are pretty hard to kill.  I’d assume a couple of them are alive still, but I wouldn’t want to be the one responsible for taking them out of the bags and putting them into the cages.  I was thinking we could just roofie them again when the time came to unwrap them.  Stick the needle right through the tape and the bags.  Once those things wake up and sense people around, we’re going to be wishing we had more tape.”  Drew said trying to placate the irritated officer.  The lieutenant took a deep breath and backed away from Drew.

“I knew a few of those Marines who are carved up out in the field.  I might even know the ones you have wrapped up in duct tape and chains waiting to be delivered back to the ship.  You joke but right now the enemy outnumber us a million to one.  Every man we lose just makes the odds worse.  Especially since the men we lose turn into those things half the time.  Sorry I overreacted.  Have some coffee and forget about it.”  Drew nodded at the apology and slid past the lieutenant to get to the coffee pot.  He really needed to make a habit of not talking when he was sleepy.  Yue and LeBron had both complained the first month or two he’d lived with them that he was a massive bitch when he first woke up.

“Were there more surgers out there when you landed?”  Blaze asked curiously.

“There were a few wandering around.  We went ahead and took care of ‘em.”  One of the Marines said.  The tension had drained from the room as everyone was now primarily focused on getting caffeine into their bodies.  The tension spiked back up a couple notches when an odd sound suddenly filled the room.  One of the men saw that a triangle shaped phone was flashing and reached over to hit the answer button.

“This is Special Agent Leander with the Department for the Continuation of the United States Government. I’m assuming you’re Lieutenant Wilcox from the USS Ford?”  Leander said over the speaker phone.  Drew and Blaze weren’t surprised at all that Leander knew who was where in the building.  He’d probably been sitting in his bunk watching them on his iPad all morning.  It seemed like the creepy guy kind of thing Leander would do.

“That’s correct sir.  We’re here to provide security for the base and assist in your mission.  My orders are to report to you and send the specimens back with the plane.”  Wilcox answered.  Drew’s ears perked up.  He’d been under the impression he’d be getting to fly back with the plane.  Time to see if Leander would come through for him or not.

“Ok.  Are you taking additional supplies for this run?”  Leander asked.  Typically, the planes that landed here didn’t go back empty.  The thousands of men on the carrier required literally tons of supplies daily to keep going.  Providing it by air wasn’t the most efficient way to move large amounts of supplies but it was one of the ways they did it.  Why waste a flight to and from a supply base if you had the opportunity to chunk in a few cases of beans?

“No sir.  The specimens are a high priority cargo.  We’re supposed to send them back along with a couple of men to make sure the transport is successful.  I’m assuming that means these two guys right here.  They should take a crate of the Rohypnol with them now that I’m thinking about it.  I don’t know if they have it on the ship or not.  They can use it to keep the specimens sedated.  We have cages on the plane to put them in but why take any chances.”  Wilcox said.

“Sounds good lieutenant.  Make it so.”  Leander said before disconnecting from the call.

“Does he always say that?”  One of the newly arrived Marines asked.

“Nope.  That’s new.  He must’ve found a box set of Star Trek or something.  Not much to do here besides watch movies and wait to be killed.”  Drew answered before remembering he was supposed to be watching his mouth.  It looked like Blaze may have something to add to the conversation as well.  Before it could go downhill any further Wilcox interjected himself forcefully into the conversation.

“I need you two to get the duct taped body bags on the dollies.  For your sakes I hope you didn’t kill them wrapping them up like that.  The men up there are going to escort you out to the plane and help get the infected loaded in and secure.  You’ll escort the bodies back to the ship then help unload them once you arrive.  You’re getting this little break from the nightmare so that you can be interviewed about what you’ve seen so far.  Any questions?”  Wilcox asked clearly not expecting to get any questions.

“What happens to us after they interview us?”  Blaze asked.

“I have no idea.  I didn’t know you two were the ones going back with the infected until a few minutes ago.  I assume they’ll either keep you on as crew or drop you off at a camp somewhere.  Either way it’s a better life than this one.  I’m going to need you two to hurry or you’re going to miss the plane.”  Wilcox replied before turning to leave.

“Could my brother go with us?”  Drew blurted out the question then wondered why he felt so weird asking it.  When you thought about it.  It was a perfectly valid question.

“He up at the barracks?”  Wilcox asked.

“Yes sir.”  Drew said feeling a sudden surge of energy.  If they could all reunite and live happily ever after on the carrier that’d be the best possible scenario.

“I’ll check.  I’m talking to Leander again in a few minutes.  I’ll ask him.  Now get up to the hangar and get those things out the door.”  Wilcox ordered.

“Yes sir.  Thank you, sir.”  Drew said.  He was overdoing the sirs, but he had some disrespect from earlier to make up for.  Plus, if this guy could talk Leander into letting LeBron fly with them out to the carrier, he’d call him whatever he wanted.

Up in the hangar the Marines had already strapped the man-sized bundles to five dollies they’d pulled out.  The men had used copious amounts of duct tape to fasten the already well taped body bags to the dollies.  Considering two of the bags were bouncing around he totally understood the jarheads reasoning.  He didn’t want to get caught pushing a dolly when a very excited crawler managed to burst out of a bag either.  No one wanted to be there when these butterflies of death finally emerged from their dark plastic cocoons.

“There’s no way this is going to work out well.”  Blaze said walking slowly towards one of the dollies.  Drew nodded and followed him over.

The Marines standing by the dollies laid out the plan and everyone got positioned by the door.  Five of them would be pushing dollies while five others would be escorting them. The escorts would kill any surgers that got close.  A seasoned Marine they all addressed as Gunny would be leading the little expedition.  Drew waited until the last possible moment.  He wanted to give Wilcox enough time to have asked Leander about LeBron. Seeing they were about to be starting the parade he asked Gunny if he could check with Wilcox to see if his brother would be joining them from the barracks.

After a quick back and forth between Drew and Gunny the sergeant went back into the office where the phone was and made a call to Wilcox.  Drew watched hopefully from outside the room.  He didn’t want to get his hopes up but why wouldn’t they be willing to send LeBron back with them?  LeBron wouldn’t just be able to answer questions about their experiences so far, he’d be able to offer up insights that anyone in charge would be able to appreciate.  Drew’s excited grin disappeared at the negative expression on Gunny’s face as he hung up and walked over.

“Sorry.  The guy in charge wants to keep your brother around for now.”  The news was a gut punch to Drew.  He recovered quickly enough though.  LeBron was fairly safe here.  If the two of them were in a room together and could talk, he knew LeBron would want him to get on the plane.  They needed to know what was going on with Yue.  This could very easily be their one and only chance to find out.  Burying his frustration Drew took his place in line.

A minute later Drew got out of line to hand his badge to the Marine in the front of the line.  Otherwise they’d have to call the barracks to get them to remotely open the door.  The Marine snagged the badge and looked down at it while he was waiting for the order to open the door.  Seeing the last name on the badge he looked appraisingly at Drew.

“You happen to have a sister named Yue?”  The Marine asked.  Drew stopped where he was.  He’d been walking back to get in line.  Hearing the Marine ask the question like that a cold chill went down his spine.  Expecting the worst, he turned quickly to look the man in the eye and find out what he knew.

“I do.  Have you seen her?”  Drew asked.  The Marine smiled.

“Pretty much every day.  She told me if I saw you to tell you she misses and loves you.  Same to your brother who I’m guessing is getting left behind?”  The young Marine was going to have to figure that out for himself.  Gunny started yelling for everyone to get in line forcing Drew to abandon the conversation and get back to his dolly.  His obsessively duct taped burden was fairly vibrating with energy trying to break out.  He hoped those cages on the plane had been well constructed.  His faith in duct tape was rapidly fading.

A minute later he was running out the hangar door pushing his wriggling burden while the Marines guarding them took out the lone surger standing between them and the plane.  At least the number of surgers seemed to be going down.  Not that this base in the middle of nowhere with its fancy cameras and highly armed defenders could be used as an example of what was going on across the country.  The surger population may have fallen off substantially but the crawlerz were increasing exponentially.  Infrared scans of the base showed the woods and other areas the crawlerz were burying themselves in glowing bright red from their body heat.  It’d be suicide to leave the safety of the buildings here at night anytime soon.

Pushing the dolly as fast as he could across the muddy weed covered earth Drew made it to the plane waiting on the tarmac.  A man in a flight suit was standing at the top of the ramp holding an AR-15.  Judging by the look on the man’s face he was ready to rock out with that rifle if needed.  It was also pretty obvious he wasn’t super excited about someone loading the infected onto his plane.  It was a scenario straight out of a ‘B’ rated zombie movie.  All they needed now was Samuel Jackson to get pissed off about all the mother effing zombies on the mother effing plane.

“Why are you smiling?”  Flight suit asked Drew as he hustled up the ramp.

“Just thinking about what Samuel Jackson would say about all this.”  Drew said.  He fully expected the comment to fly right over the flyboy’s head.  Instead flight suit’s demeanor completely changed as he slid into a respectable impression of the infamous snakes on a plane line swapping out snakes for zombies.  As soon as he was done his face snapped back to all business like nothing had ever happened.  All things considered the guy was getting a five-star rating so far from Drew.

In the cargo hold of the plane there were five neatly lined up cages.  The cages had been attached to the floor and ceiling of the plane with chains.  Each of the cages was sitting there with its door wide open.  The cages were big enough to wheel the infected into them without having to remove them from the dollies.  That’s exactly what everyone did.  Once the infected had all been secured the Marines left out the cargo door. Flight suit took one final look at the cages then went to tell the pilot they could take off.  The ramp slammed shut leaving Blaze and Drew alone in the belly of the plane with five pissed off infected.

“I think this one might get out of the bag.”  Drew said watching in amazement as the monster he’d carried into the plane went so spastic the tape was flying off in big strips.  Not that it was going to do the diseased freak any good.  The cages that’d been loaded to take care of transporting the specimens looked like they’d been built by experts.  The plane shuddered and began to roll down the short runway.  Drew caught Blaze staring at his watch.

“You have a date?”  Drew asked curiously.  Personally, he just wanted to lean back against a wall somewhere and go to sleep.  Blaze gave him a big grin at having so easily walked into what he had to say.

“I just wanted to be able to note the exact time the infection became airborne.”  Blaze said somberly as the plane suddenly clawed its way off the surface.

Drew completely ignored the comment rather than give Blaze the satisfaction.  Inwardly he thought the joke hit all the marks as far as dark humor went.  Seeing he wasn’t getting any sort of reaction out of Drew Blaze announced he was going to stick the infected with another round of the knockout cocktail.  Drew sat up to help as Blaze counted out five of the syringes from the box they’d been given.  Each of the needles was premixed and ready to go.

“You lay back and enjoy the flight.  I’ll handle the jab job.”  Blaze said waggling his eyebrows comically.  It was so stupid that Drew cracked a smile.  With no further concerns Drew made himself comfortable while Blaze walked over to the first cage.  The comedic look on Blazes face slid off like a mask revealing an expression of bitter hatred and loss.

Chapter 13:  Dinner Interrupted

“I’m sorry Yue but you’re going to need to get with whoever assigns jobs and see if you can get another position.  After last night I don’t think they’re going to let you near the VIPs again.”  The senior chief in charge of the VIP dining area was staring at Yue oddly.  She could tell he knew something was odd but that he was having trouble figuring out exactly what it was.  He was probably completely confused considering Yue had shown up dressed for a date versus being in the uniform she’d been provided for serving the guests.

“I’m actually here to have dinner with Jeff.”  Yue said.  She’d meant to announce it strongly and have her words reverberate off the haze grey bulkheads.  Instead, she sounded like a little girl asking her teacher for permission to go the bathroom.

“The Jeff that you almost killed giving a refill?”  The senior chief in the crisp uniform asked incredulously.  Yue noticed a few other members of the crew had wandered closer to listen in on the conversation.

“That’s the one.  He asked me to join him here tonight.”  Yue said trying to maintain her composure.  She could feel her cheeks starting to flush.  She really started to sweat when a man in a dark suit and tie showed up and stood beside the chief.  It was one of the secret service agents who’d interviewed her when she was escorted out the previous evening.

“I’ve got this senior chief.  Why don’t you come with me?”  The secret service agent nodded in the direction he wanted her to walk.  The senior chief looked relieved to not have to deal with that bit of social awkwardness anymore.  He disappeared into the galley to make sure the food prep was going well.  The secret service agent walked with Yue into a small office where he had her sit down.

“Can someone please let Jeff know I’m going to be late.”  Yue said.

“I have a man taking care of that right now.  The thing is you’re not going to be late so much as not making it in there at all.  How we let you serve in there to begin with is a glaring hole in our security processes.  We have no idea who you are.  That dining room is filled with what’s left of the leadership of this country.  The man you put on the floor last night has been described as our best hope of coming out of this mess alive by some very smart and important people.  If he did invite you here for some reason, then he made a mistake.  My guess is he might have done it out of pity.  Honestly everyone feels sorry for you.  The general consensus is that you’re a super nice person who had an epic klutzy streak.”  The secret service agent stopped the patronizing drivel to listen to his earpiece.  Yue sat there silently fuming while the agent held a quick and hushed conversation using way too many acronyms and codewords.

“Who’s Big Bird?”  Yue asked once the agent was done ignoring her to talk into his hand.  The agent continued to ignore her.  Before Yue could come up with a suitably condescending thing to say to the infuriating man in the dark suit the door to the small office swung open.  Yue looked over curiously as another man in a dark suit entered.  Walking in behind him was Jeff.

Jeff ducked to make sure he didn’t hit his head on the door and entered the room.  Noting his height and general gawkiness Yue made some connections in her head.  She was about to ask about her hunch when Jeff started talking.

“Hey.  So, we’re going to skip the dining hall tonight and hit the flight deck for a steel beach picnic instead if that’s ok with you?”  Jeff asked.

“How come Big Bird?  They scared I’m going to spill hot coffee on the President?”  Yue asked sweetly.  Jeff looked over at the two agents who were watching with interest.  They both suddenly became very interested in looking at files.

“How’d you know they called me Big Bird?”  Jeff asked casting another accusatory look over at the agents. Both men redoubled their efforts to locate much needed information in those pesky files.  It was Yue’s turn to look slightly uncomfortable.  How do you tell somebody it was pretty easy to figure out they were the one someone had code named Big Bird?

“How do we have dinner on the flight deck exactly?  I don’t think Uber eats is a thing anymore.”  Yue had decided if Jeff and everyone else could avoid direct questions then so could she.  Jeff laughed at her obvious redirect.

“Trust me.  I’m an expert at logistics.  Uber eats has nothing on me.”  Jeff said.  He turned and held the door open.

“Am I free to go or do you still need to see my papers?”  Yue asked the agents.  She slipped into a German sounding accent on the ‘my papers’ piece.  She thought it was witty but neither of the hard-looking men in the dark suits seemed to appreciate her attempt at humor.  One of them nodded dismissively at her and the other told Jeff to let them know if he needed anything.

Jeff had Yue stand in the passageway while he went to go check on their food.  When he came back, he was carrying a big cardboard box.  The top was open on it, but he was so tall Yue couldn’t see into it.  Jeff saw her trying to look and laughingly held it up even higher.  The two of them navigated the various passageways until they finally went through an open hatch that took them out near the stern of the ship.  Jeff carried the box over to an area painted yellow and sat down.  A man wearing a white shirt ran up as they were getting situated.  He seemed completely confused that two people in civilian clothes were looking to have a picnic on the flight deck.

“Sir.  There’s an inbound flight and flight quarters will be sounded soon.  I’m going to have to ask that you go eat somewhere else.”  The white shirted man said inelegantly.

“I know.  I ordered the flight.  We should have at least an hour before it gets here though.”  Jeff responded patiently.

“Plus, we’re not allowed to eat in the dining hall.  Or, at least I’m not.  Mostly because of what I did to his face.”  Yue followed up.

“Uh.  Can I get your names?  I just need to verify with my chief.”  The white shirted man was struggling to deal with the decidedly abnormal situation.  He was obviously relieved when he saw an older man in a white shirt walking towards them.  Based on his reaction it was his chief.

“Why are you letting people have a picnic on my flight deck?  Do you not understand your job?  It’s not that hard.  We’re in charge of safety.  What part of safe includes having a picnic on a flight deck during wartime?  Do you want to let them shoot the guns too?  Get out of my sight.”  The chief immediately ripped into the junior enlisted man.  Before the man could skulk away Jeff coughed loudly to get the chief’s attention.  Yue thought that was pretty brave.  The angry Filipino looking chief scared her.  The guy appeared very hard core.

“Hey chief go easy on him we aren’t a situation he’s used to dealing with.”  Jeff said loudly.

“Why are you still on my flight deck?  Are you deaf or just stupid?  This is an active flight deck.  This is not a park.  I need you to pack up your picnic basket and be gone before I have to get security out here.”  The chief was keeping the profanity in check only because he wasn’t sure who the hell these people were.  Who dressed in civilian clothing and had the gall to assume they could have a little picnic up on deck?

“It’s fine.  We can go find a spot down in the hangar bay to eat instead.”  Yue said.  She wasn’t intimidated at all, but she did feel bad for the sailors having to deal with her and Jeff wanting to break all their rules.  More importantly, she was starving.  She couldn’t eat if someone was going to stand over her yelling at them the entire time.  By now she was dying to find out what was in the box.  One major disadvantage of being fired from the VIP dining room waitress gig was she wasn’t going to be able to eat food off their plates anymore.  The regular galley didn’t have the fancy shrimp cocktails and all the fresh vegetables and fruit.

“Are you sure?  Chief where can we go that won’t freak everyone out.  I need to be here to greet the plane that’ll be landing in about an hour, so I don’t want to go too far.”  Jeff asked.  The chief looked completely out of his element.  He also seemed like he might blow a gasket or something if they didn’t get off the flight deck soon.  He took them inside the superstructure and into a room with some tables and a large coffee station in it.

“It’s the chiefs break area.  No one will bother in you here.  If anybody asks who said you could eat in here, just tell them it was me.”  The chief pointed at his name tag then left.  His body language very clearly expressing what he thought about them.  Dismissing the latest incident Jeff started piling food on one of the tables.  Yue’s mouth watered when she saw the bowl of freshly cubed pineapple.  She thought she might have actually squealed in delight when he put a big bowl full of the jumbo shrimps and fancy cocktail sauce in the middle of the table.

“You never told me how you guessed they called me Big Bird?”  Jeff went for an awkward opening line as he pushed her a paper plate and one of those plastic collections of cutlery over.

“I’m assuming because you’re so tall?”  Yue said.  She left off the part about him being a bit on the gawky side.

“That’s what I like to tell myself too.”  Jeff replied smiling broadly at her obvious discomfort.  He pulled out two bottles of ice-cold soda and handed her one.  The conversation dropped off completely as they spent a few minutes focused on the feast laid out in front of them.  Once she’d worked the edge off her hunger Yue slowed down so they could talk.

“You must be pretty important to rate getting a box full of food this good at a moments notice.”  Yue said smiling and sipping at her soda.

“Well.  I’m extremely important of course.”  Jeff joked.  They both laughed but the laughter was a bit forced.  After saying it out loud they both realized the truth was that Jeff really was very important.  It was his plan being followed to try and save the world.  He normally ate dinner at the same table as the President.  “I may be connected politically but the chief who threw this together for us was the guy you used to work for.  When I told him that it was for you his eyes lit up.”

“Whatever I did to make his eyes light up I hope I can repeat it.  This stuff is ridiculously good.  Definitely beats the hell out of a dented mystery can ration per day.”  Yue said.  The conversation turned towards the time Yue had spent on the road with her dad and brothers.  Jeff asking questions and showing tons of empathy at all the right times.  Yue unthinkingly repeated some of the jokes they’d made early on about the President’s speeches.  Looking up from her slice of blueberry covered cheesecake she saw her comments had hit Jeff pretty hard.  It suddenly struck her that she was talking to the guy who’d been instructing the President on what he should do and say.

“It was hard.  When it all started no one knew what to do.  The only plan out there that made any sense was the one I’d put together with my team.  We were the only ones who’d really considered this as a possibility.  We were constantly scanning for the beginnings of events we hoped would never happen.  It was all an intellectual exercise really.  A way to stay employed and keep living off the taxpayers.  None of it seemed real.  We were fanatical about it though.  We were like an insanely enthusiastic Dungeons and Dragons group.  None of us were really ready when it actually happened though.  I think of all the people who died because we followed my plan.”  Jeff stopped and put his soda down.  An alarmed Yue saw that Jeff had tears pooling up in his eyes.  That wasn’t a great sign that she was rocking this date.

“Your plan may end up saving us all.  It was impossible to save everybody.  You could’ve loaded up all the ships on both coasts and it wouldn’t have been enough.  You did what you had to do.  No one could’ve done any better.  We all saw what happened to Europe.”  Yue had a hard time finding the right words.  The plan Jeff had concocted was the reason both her parents were dead.  It was the reason she was out here on a giant warship eating shrimp cocktail while her brothers were both stuck back at camp charnel house.  His words and the plan he’d delivered had led directly to the massacre of hundreds of millions of innocent people.  That was a lot of guilt to carry.  Hopefully he wasn’t Catholic.

“Sorry.  I didn’t mean to get quite that dark on our first date.  There’s not a lot of other stuff to talk about really, I guess.  It’s like the elephant in the room of every conversation.”  Jeff said using the tiny napkin that came with the plastic silverware to dab away at the tears pooling up in his eyes.

“It’s a herd of elephants and they’re stampeding straight for you.  I get it.”  Yue said stretching her arm out across the table.  Jeff saw her hand and put his big mitt in her delicate palm.  He smiled when she intertwined her fingers with his.  Yue was starting to get confused about what she was trying to accomplish here.  The main goal was still to free up her brothers, but she wasn’t having to work very hard to like Jeff either.  Telling herself to make sure and keep her eyes on the prize she held his hand in a comfortable silence while they both took the time to study the other.

“You know your beautiful right?”  Jeff said.  Yue smiled back at him.

“Is that your best line?  You want to try again?”  She asked him with a big grin splitting her face.

“I’m sticking with that one.  What do you think about me so far?”  Jeff asked.

“Is this one of those speed dating things?  We have time you know.  It’s not like we have anywhere to go.  I mean do you even own a mirror?  You might want to wait until the swelling goes down to ask how you look.”  Yue joked.

“I’ve got to sink my claws in fast.  You’re on a ship with a few thousand single sailors. They’re going to be staring at you like you’re an ice cream truck driving past a weight watchers meeting.”  Jeff said as he shoved all of their garbage back into the box.  They’d managed to make it through the entire meal without anyone barging in on them which was a minor miracle.  Jeff was thinking if someone did bust in and saw the garbage all over the table that they may have to endure yet another dressing down.  He could always do something crazy like put the President on the phone to tell the person off but that wasn’t a card he wanted to play unless he really needed it.

“Woah.  Are you saying I’ve got my pick of a few thousand single sailors and I’m up here spending all my time with some dude nicknamed Big Bird?”  Yue said pretending to look out the window in the hopes of seeing a few sailors jog by shirtless.

“I think I’ve got an ace in the hole as far as that goes.  I can give you something those other guys can’t.  At least not most of them anyway.”  Jeff said continuing to clean up the mess they’d made.  Assuming this was all building up to some silly macho joke Yue decided to lay into it like it was a ‘knock knock’ joke.  Faking a very impressed face she put her hands up to her face.

“Oh really.  What is it that you can give me that the horde of desperate sailors can’t supply?”  Yue asked.  She helped wipe the table off then sat sipping on her soda waiting to see what was next.

“Ok.  I haven’t been a thousand percent honest with you.  I might have reviewed the secret service files on you.  The ones they put together on anyone who’s going to be near the President or other VIPs.  They have a lot of info in there like who you’re related to, what your known associates think of you and any known love interests or weird ideologies.  You know all that kind of stuff.”  Jeff said.  He looked like he was about to break into a cold sweat.  Yue was wondering where all this was going.  It wasn’t like she had anything to hide.  Except maybe for the reasons she’d pushed for this date in the first place.

“When exactly did you read this little spy report on me?”  Yue asked.

“I asked for it right after the first dinner service where you waited on us.”  Jeff said simply.

“I’m confused why you think being a creepy stalker makes you more of a catch than all those sailors with their cool hats and bell bottoms?”  Yue was still trying to piece together why his reviewing her dossier would have any impact on their relationship.  He seemed pretty sure he had an ace in the hole.

“Well.  Long story short after I read it, I went ahead and shifted around a plan I had in motion to lead to this moment.”  Jeff said dramatically.

“Ok.  Seriously.  Just go ahead and say whatever the hell it is you’re talking about.”  Yue gave Jeff her best shut up or put up look.

“Well.  I meant for both your brothers to be arriving here in a few minutes after we finished dinner.  Instead, we’ve managed to get one brother on the plane and your ex-boyfriend.  From what I gather the ‘ex’ part of that may not be extremely final.  Completely up to you to figure that piece of it out.  It’d suck big time but I’m willing to back off if that’s what you want.” Jeff said.

Yue was in shock.  This incredible man had researched her and moved heaven and earth to rescue one of her brothers.  She was kind of curious who the ‘ex’ boyfriend was.  Her only guess based on the people that the secret service could’ve interviewed was Blaze.  She still had her work cut out for her.  She still had to rescue either LeBron or Drew but, in a few minutes,  she’d be seeing at least one of them.  The Blaze thing had never really been real, so she wasn’t too worried about that.

She was still holding Jeff’s hand.  She pulled on it hard enough to force him to get up and come around the table to her.  She looked up at him and he bent down and they kissed.  She’d expected their mutual clumsiness to result in more damage to their faces, but they seem to have found their rhythm.  The kiss was a solid ten.  It might not rate that on the Princess Bride scale, but it was pretty solid on the Yue scale.

Chapter 14:  Reunions and Revenge

“You ok man?”  Drew asked Blaze.  Drew had slept most of the trip out to the carrier.  Considering he was stuck in a small space filled with psychotic maneaters he surprised himself by being so cavalier about where he chose to nap.  It’d worked out ok though.  The dull roar of the engines and the monotony of the flight had lulled his exhausted self quickly off to snoozeville.  The duct taped bags of infected humanity had started bouncing around again, but it wasn’t like they were ripping their way out of their constraints anytime soon.  Even if they did, they’d still have to rip apart the solid steel cages they were in.  It was the kind of solid heavy metal construction people would feel comfortable jumping into during shark week on the southern tip of Africa.

“I’m good.”  Blaze answered wiping away tears.  He didn’t look good.  He looked like he’d just had to shoot Old Yeller.  He also looked a little crazier than normal.  The scary part was how quickly he wiped the tears away and slapped his game face back on.  His years of showmanship giving him amazing control over how he presented himself.  You never knew when you were dealing with Blaze and when you were dealing with a character Blaze had created for some specific purpose.  The first time they’d met him he’d been wearing a top hat and ringmaster get up.

“I know you lost a lot of friends and everything.”  Drew began trying to console Blaze.  Blaze politely looked at him waiting for him to finish.  Drew had no idea what to say next.  Everything sounded fake and stupid in his head.  You couldn’t say the word condolences out loud.  It didn’t even seem like a real word.  It was just something Hallmark put on the cards in the funerals and loss section.  The fake word was written all over cards that were less than three feet away from cards with pictures of kittens in bikinis on them.  It was what you said to people you didn’t really know when someone died that you didn’t really care about.

“You really do suck at this kind of stuff.”  Blaze said smiling and swooping in to give Drew a manly hug.  Drew accepted the hug happy to be let off the hook.

“Are we landing?”  He asked Blaze.  It felt like they were descending.  The airplane had been buffeted around a lot more than Drew was used to from the very few times he’d flown commercial.  He assumed it was because the military didn’t really care as much about comfort.  Kind of like the way cruise ships had the stabilizers on them to keep passengers from actually having to feel like they were at sea.  Maybe civilian airplanes had the same sort of concept?

Blaze was saved from guessing by the appearance of flight suit walking out of the cockpit to verify the cargo was still intact.  If anyone was going to know what was going on it was the Samuel Jackson impersonating green flight suit wearing guy who got to sit next to the person actually flying the plane.  Hoping for some details on what was going on they greeted him as cordially as possible.  They were told to sit down and strap in once their visitor had confirmed the cages were still securely locked in place.  Flight suit disappeared back into the cockpit leaving Blaze and Drew facing the wrong direction on a set of flimsy seats right next to one of the cages.

“Every zombie movie ever says this is a bad idea.”  Drew said nervously staring at the cage next to him to make sure the crawler locked inside hadn’t managed to figure out how to get out of it’s restraints.  Considering how powerful they were it wasn’t entirely impossible.

Blaze glanced over at the cage and shrugged.  He seemed entirely too calm.  Drew considered asking him for a few of whatever happy pills he’d snuck on board.  It was difficult to reconcile the sight of the calm man sitting next to him now with the grieving wreck he’d woken up to not so long ago.  This wasn’t baseball though.  There was plenty of crying in the apocalypse.  Plenty of it happened for no apparent reason at inopportune times.  There was so much grief and confusion and loss floating around that people just got overwhelmed.  Drew had found himself in a similar broken-down state a few times as well. He knew where Blaze was coming from.

Drew’s stomach suddenly dipped like he was on the worlds stupidest roller coaster.  It felt like they were dropping out of the sky.  Drew tried looking around to see if they had floatation devices.  Flight suit hadn’t bothered standing at the front of the plane telling his passengers all about how to survive an ocean landing.  Come to think of it flight suit had been a horrible flight attendant.  He could’ve at least offered them some peanuts and a beverage.

They were dropping faster now.  The plane swooped up like the roller coaster it felt like they were on was starting a loop de loop.  Drew was happy he hadn’t really eaten anything in a while.  A mouthful of barf gushed out of his mouth and down the front of his shirt. He was pretty sure it was mostly just coffee and puke flavored water.  Much better than the chunky stuff.  The plane slammed into something.  Drew screamed.  The plane slammed into something else.  Drew stared wildly around waiting to see water start pouring in.  He worked feverishly at his seatbelt.  Tugging it off he jumped up and sprinted to the door leading into the cockpit.

The door opened before he got there.  A startled looking flight suit had his pistol half raised while Drew was asking him how they got the raft out.  Flight suit put the pistol down.

“What raft?  What are you talking about?  What’d you spill on your shirt?”  Flight suit asked.

“Didn’t we crash into the water?  I puked.”  Drew said slowly looking around.  A whirring noise behind him indicated the ramp was being lowered.

“We landed on the carrier.  That’s why I told you to sit down and strap in.  It can feel like you’re crashing if you’ve never done it before.”  Flight suit explained.  The man was starting to look amused now.  That instantly pissed Drew off.  He completely forgot about the fact that he’d been willing to give this guy a five-star review at the beginning of the flight.

“Yeah.  That feeling like you might crash part of what you just said.  You could’ve said something about that earlier.  You know we’re stuck in a tiny room full of crawlerz right?  This is already a pretty tense situation.”  Drew said starting to get fired up.  Blaze must’ve sensed it because he pulled Drew over to help him make sure all of the cages were still bolted down correctly.

“Just chill dude.  We’ve been brought to the floating paradise of the privileged few.  The beautiful people.  The ones judged worthy to survive the end of the world.  We play our cards right we could join them.  Or sink this boat and swim away on our backs with our middle fingers in the air.”  Blaze whispered.

Drew wondered how Blaze thought they’d be able to swim backwards with both hands extended out of the water.  Of course, Blaze also thought he could singlehandedly sink this floating city.  Compared to that some fancy swimming wasn’t that big of a stretch.  Bemused by the mental images the ideas conjured up Drew scooped down to pick up the box of knockout juice they’d brought with them.

“Should we hit them again?”  Drew asked holding the box of roofie powder up.  The bags inside the cages were jerking around again.  At least four of them were.  One of the bags hadn’t moved at all since they’d originally wheeled it into the cage on the plane.  Drew was thinking four out of five was pretty good.  Especially considering the technique that they’d used for capturing the crawlerz. Shooting them in the legs then injecting them with enough experimental drugs to knock out an elephant wasn’t the FDA approved method of taking prisoners.  It wasn’t like the Geneva convention applied to these things though.

“Probably not a bad idea.”  Blaze said.  “Unless we manage to kill them by injecting them too many times with this stuff.  Let’s let the big dogs decide once they get a look at these hefty bags of humanity.”

As if in response to what Blaze had said a loud motor started whirring. The ramp descended slowly down to the flight deck.  Once their eyes adjusted to the bright lights being shone on the plane, they could make out a small crowd of people gathered outside.  A good portion of those people were aiming weapons at them.  Understandable considering what their cargo was.  Flight suit and the pilot had been keeping the carrier informed as to the status of their cargo, but this wasn’t something you took chances with.

“I still don’t get why they think this is a good idea.”  Drew whispered out the side of his mouth while doing his best to appear non-threatening.

“These arrogant bastards think they can get away with anything.  They’ll get theirs.”  Blaze shot back barely bothering to whisper.  Drew glanced over sharply and saw that Blaze wasn’t wasting a lot of energy trying to appear friendly.  Like their lives weren’t already complicated enough. They moved to the side to make way for the group of Marines jogging up the ramp to inspect the cargo.

“All secure!”  One of the Marines called out to the men outside.

The entire section of the deck they were on started lowering itself into the belly of the carrier.  One of the Marines laughed when Drew let out a startled yelp.  He really wished people would start saying something before the machines he was on did things that made him think he was about to die.

“Wow.  That was pretty manly.”  A familiar female voice piped up from the bottom of the ramp where the crowd of people all seemed to be enjoying his discomfort.  Drew was about to tear into the smirking girl at the bottom of the ramp when it clicked that it was Yue standing there smiling up at him.  She looked weird in a pair of dungarees and the light blue uniform shirt she was wearing.  Drew waited until the plane stopped moving then walked down the ramp to give Yue a big hug.  Blaze was right behind him grinning with his arms spread wide.  Yue gave him an awkward half hug pat kind of thing that wiped the grin right off Blaze’s face.

“Which one of you is Drew and which is Blaze?”  A tall gangly man in a set of slightly wrinkled khakis asked.  He’d stepped forward immediately after the awkward hug between Blaze and Yue.

“I’m Drew.”  Drew said stepping forward and shaking the man’s hand.  He shot Yue a quick look and noticed she looked a little flushed.  It suddenly dawned on him he might be meeting Yue’s newest crush.  That wasn’t going to help with Blaze’s current fixation on these people having taken everything away from him.

“Hi I’m Blaze.  Any idea what happens next here?”  Blaze had stepped in to shake the tall man’s hand.  Blaze’s face was lit up in a genuine looking smile.  Knowing how he really felt about all this Drew was amazed once again by the guy’s acting acumen.

“Good to meet you both.  I’m Jeff.  We’re making up most of this as we go along honestly.  We’re going to follow the standard protocol for isolating the specimens you brought us with a couple of updates due to how dangerous they are.  Basically, we’re going to have multiple guards behind sealed off hatchways pointing guns at the cages and each other twenty-four hours a day.  I think we should be doing this on some base on land personally, but I was overruled.  Anyway, we’ll get them isolated then run tests to find out more about what makes them tick.  We need to know our enemy better.”  Jeff said.

“I’m with you on thinking it’s a bit risky bringing those things aboard the ship.  I figured you guys would have that part covered.  Do you know what we’re supposed to do?  The two of us?  They mentioned we’d probably be interviewed after we served as escorts for the living dead.”  Blaze asked.  Drew watched Blaze nonchalantly throwing out the questions.  He was still trying hard to reconcile the calm, friendly non-crazy Blaze he was seeing now with the wild eyed, tear covered, Navy hating Blaze of not too long ago.

“Oh yes.  We’ll get you hooked up with the officer on duty to get you bunks assigned and all of that.  You’ll be our guests for the first few days while we pump you both for whatever information you can provide.  After that it’ll be up to you and logistics honestly.  Keeping thousands of people aboard a ship at sea like this is going to keep getting harder to sustain.  Short term you’ll be asked to join some sort of work crew and you’ll also both have the opportunity to sign up if you’d like but that’s not mandatory.”  Jeff explained.  He was still talking to them, but a good portion of his attention had shifted to the plane’s ramp where the Marines and a group of sailors were working on carefully off-loading the cages.

The body bags inside the cages were jerking around like Houdini was about to pop out of them.  Drew watched wondering if maybe they should’ve dosed up the crawlerz one more time after all.  All he could picture was one of the bags bursting open and a crawler somehow getting its teeth into one of the people loading the cages onto the olive-green forklift.

“Nerve wracking, right?”  Yue asked him.  She’d slid up close to Drew as Jeff walked away to supervise the unloading operation.  Drew noticed she’d made sure to keep her distance from Blaze.

“Jeff?”  Drew asked under his breath.  He wanted to verify his suspicion but didn’t necessarily want Blaze in on that conversation.

“Yep.  He’s in charge of basically everything around here.  How’s LeBron?”  There was so much noise from the unloading and the other activity around them that it was unlikely anyone who cared would hear what they were talking about.  Blaze had walked away to give them some space once it became apparent Yue was no longer interested.

“LeBron’s good.  You remember the special agent who had you drugged to make the kidnapping easy?”  Drew asked casually.

“I think it’s called being shanghaied when there’s a boat involved but yes, I vaguely remember the douchebag.”  Yue replied wryly.

“He’s got some serious man love going for LeBron.  We’re going to have to pry him away.”  Drew said.

“What do you mean?”  Yue asked looking shocked and worried.  Drew realized what he’d just said.

“Not that kind of man love.  More like the kind where he thinks LeBron is super smart and sees him as a serious asset. He isn’t going to let him go without a fight.”  Drew clarified.

“Ok.  That makes sense.  We need to figure out how to get him here or get us there.  Any thoughts?”  Yue asked.  She was watching the cages get driven away.  They didn’t have a ton of time.  Jeff had given her a quick wave as he left with the cage transports to make sure the packages were properly secured.

“I think the most obvious thing is there’s already two of us here and there’s only like five crawlerz on this ship.  There’s like a billion crawlerz on land.  I like the place with the free food that’s pretty much crawler free personally.  If your new boyfriend’s in charge of everything I say we swing for the fences to try to get LeBron shipped out here.  Leander may want to hold on tight but he’s also an order following bureaucrat. He wouldn’t go against a direct order.”  Drew said.  Yue nodded along.  Those were all excellent points.

“Boyfriend huh?  You work fast and aim high.  Was your first date before or after the roofies wore off?”  Somehow Blaze was standing right behind them.  He’d obviously been listening in.  He didn’t sound super pissed.  More like he was making casual conversation and joking around.  Yue didn’t take it well though.

“At least he didn’t send a bunch of idiots out on motorcycles to try to kill me and my brothers because he wanted our car.”  Drew thought Yue raised some pretty good points there.  Blaze just smiled and nodded.  A little bit of the crazy had leaked back into his eyes.  Before anything else dramatic could happen, a sailor showed up with orders to take them to get settled in.  Drew made some quick plans to meet up with Yue later then him and Blaze followed the sailor through the labyrinth of the ships passageways to find out where they’d be sleeping.

Chapter 15:  Meanwhile Back at the Base

LeBron stared intently at the wall of monitors as Blaze and Drew dollied the trussed up infected into the cargo hold of the waiting plane.  The Marines not pushing dollies formed a wedge around the cargo bearers to protect them from the random surgers sprinting at them from the woods.  LeBron didn’t take a real breath until the plane’s cargo ramp had gone up and his brother was airborne.  Leaning back in his chair he took a second to look around the room at the rest of the men. None of them noticed his attention as they were all still focused on the Marines getting back safely to the hangar.

“They asked for a couple of escorts to go with the plane back to the carrier.  They wanted locals with experience in the field.  I sent Blaze and your brother instead of you since they were both in the hangar already.  I think you’re too good of a resource to risk on a fifty-yard dash through the meat grinder out there.”  Special Agent Leander sat down in the swivel chair at the long table next to LeBron.

“I get it.  We’ve all got to do our part right sir?”  LeBron said.  He hoped his voice didn’t reveal all the emotions he was working on hiding.  He was truly alone now on this base.  Drew was jetting off to meet up with Yue while he was stuck here.  Stuck in a place where the average life expectancy once you went outside rivaled that of a house fly.

“Don’t worry about it.  I’m sure your sister and the rest of them are fine.  That ship they’re headed for is a hell of a lot safer than this base.  Not that we’re not safe as long as we stay underground and keep the doors locked.”  Leander was watching LeBron’s face closely for any reaction.

“Thanks sir.  Yeah, I assume they’ll be fine.  Just kind of rough being split up.”  LeBron said.  His emotions were starting to overflow at this point.  He found himself fighting back tears.  He really wished Leander would leave him alone.  This whole situation was getting incredibly uncomfortable.

“They’ll be fine.  What’s going to become very important very soon is getting our mission moving again. Sitting here buried under metal and dirt we’re safe but we’re not doing anything to help all the people out there who need us.  You seem like you’re a couple of steps ahead of the game every time we have a planning session.  I want you to keep that up.  We’ve got the Marines who just flew in to help out along with a few Seabees mixed in with them.  Those guys can fight but more importantly they can weld.”  Leander said enthusiastically.  LeBron took it that Leander was sold on cobbling together the Mad Max automotive aftermarket assault weapon additions.

“How do I fit into that?  What do you want me to do?”  LeBron asked confused.  Why was the head of a top-secret military base bothering to talk to him?  He was barely old enough to take his driver’s test.  Leander was a veteran agent who’d been given guidance and training on carrying out this mission along with the experience he had from similar missions. Not that there was anything that’d really compare to what was going on now.

“You’ve got field experience.  That’s got a ton of value.  Those guys who went out the door yesterday with your brother and Blaze.  The ones from the hangar.  Those guys were all special forces types.  They make movies about how bad ass those guys are.  Yet at the end of the day after multiple engagements it was your brother and Blaze who were still standing.  That’s the value of experience.  Your job is to speak up immediately if you see us doing something stupid.  We’re here to help save the lives of everybody in this region.  I need you to help us do that.”  Leander finished.

“I’m with you sir and happy to help but I still don’t get why you don’t just follow whatever plan you were given?”  LeBron asked.  He wondered if Leander had given any thought to how he was going to enable a kid like LeBron to have a voice around all of these much older, much more experienced operators.  It was one thing to tell him to speak up it was another to give him a platform.  Based on the frequency and quantity of dumbass mistakes he kept seeing he’d be able to find out shortly whether they’d really listen to him or not.

Leander slapped him on the back and walked away to get some coffee and talk to the officers on watch.  That left LeBron alone at the monitoring table staring at the closed hangar door and the empty tarmac.  The only things to see outside right now were the decomposing bodies of the dead liberally sprinkled around the base.  There was a small mountain of bodies in front of the hangar door where a lot of the fighting had taken place.  The guys there had been dumping bodies in that location as well.  They’d planned on dumping a few gallons of gas on top of the pile and saving a ton of money on cremation expenses.  Mount Morbidity had grown so large now that setting fire to it would be a real danger to the hangar.

Left to his own devices LeBron stared at the screens and began thinking about what their next steps should be.  Despite what Leander had just told him he doubted anyone was going to ask him to help plan their operation.  If he had a vision in his own head for what it should look like though he could more easily critique whatever plan the rest of them eventually came up with.  He needed to keep up the good impression Leander had of him.  It was the only thing keeping them from handing him a gun and sending him out on whatever the next suicidal operation they dreamed up was.

The way LeBron saw it the first thing that had to be established was a safe way to deliver supplies on land.  Ideally, they’d just do that via parachute from high flying airplanes.  Keeping air strips open for more than a few flights was hard though since the noise and activity invariably attracted a large number of crawlerz.  If the surgers would all hurry up and morph into crawlerz that’d solve a ton of tactical challenges.  Life would be a lot easier if moving around during the day was pretty much guaranteed to be safe.

Launching supply missions from the carrier would make a lot of sense if they could figure out how to keep the carrier stocked with enough supplies for it to work.  Since it was nuclear powered it could cruise up and down the coast for the next twenty years without needing to refuel.  LeBron made a note to ask how many operating carriers they had that could be used for this.  They could stage supplies on islands and have the cargo transferred to the carriers when they were in port.  Then the supplies could be flown off of the carriers and air dropped to where they were needed.  That made a lot more sense than trying to operate from a base on land. Trying to reliably transport supplies from this base would be pretty rough via trucks.  Even if the Seabees did turn them into really cool looking fighting machines.

Leander made good on his promise as the operations of the day began to wind down.  He motioned for LeBron to join him as he and the senior leadership left the operations center to head into a conference room.  LeBron took one last hard look at the monitors as the sun set over the installation.  He shuddered at the site of the crawlerz swarming the base like a swarm of cockroaches.  The crawlerz would spend the night trying to find a chink in the base defenses that’d allow them in.  LeBron really hoped they didn’t find one.

Walking down the hall behind the group of much older men LeBron continued to bounce ideas around in his head.  He was trying to think of different ways they could achieve their mission.  At the end of the hall they ducked into a conference room that already had a couple of people sitting in it.  An audio call had been made to conference in the new guys down in the hangar as well.  LeBron sat in a chair in the corner after grabbing one of the boxed-up dinners a man dropped off for them.  It was grilled cheese and soup and it was delicious.

The conversation quickly became centered around how they were going to distribute the supplies in the warehouse most efficiently to survivors.  This was leading to a long discussion with the leader of the Seabees who’d come over with the Marines.  He was talking about how they could weaponize the vehicles and shore up the cab with welded on metal grills to keep crawlerz out of it.

“Are you all sure the best use of this base is as a distribution center?”  LeBron asked.  The question slipped out of his mouth before he’d really intended to say anything.  He’d been planning on sitting back and absorbing as much of their plan as he could before interjecting his thoughts.  It was just getting a little frustrating hearing them repeat the same ideas over and over.  The ones that were all doomed to fail.  They weren’t seeing the forest for the trees as his dad liked to say.

“What do you mean?”  Leander asked in a politely inquisitive way.  Everyone else turned to look over at him.  The men on the other end of the phone line were silent.  They’d either hit the mute button or were sitting around down there staring at the phone waiting for him to speak.  Luckily it wasn’t a video conference so the newcomers couldn’t see how young he was.  The people who could see him were already familiar with how smart he was.  Most of them were eager to hear what he had to say.  There were a few who looked irritated to have to take time out of the meeting to listen to someone so young.

“The mission is to enable the survivors in this region to being retaking the land. Do you really think this one base can function as the sole distribution center to accomplish that?  We’re literally covered in crawlerz.  More surgers show up here every day.  We can’t afford to have trucks coming and going all the time.  Not yet.  Eventually enough of the surgers may morph into crawlerz that we can travel all we want during the day.  We’d just need to make sure we have somewhere safe to rest at night.  The trucks provide that security.  That’s how the survivors I was travelling with were able to stay alive.”  LeBron stopped talking to look around and see if anyone had any questions or wanted to shut him up.  Instead of disapproval quite a few of the men were nodding their heads in affirmation.  He took that as a positive sign.  Leander gave him a look indicating he should continue.

“We have a safe delivery mechanism for supplies sitting out in the ocean right now.  The carrier is nuclear powered so my understanding is it can go up and down the coast without needing to refuel for a couple of decades.  Hopefully this doesn’t last that long but those mummies in that tomb in Egypt were a few thousand years old at least.  That shows these things don’t die without help.  It’d be extremely dangerous and resource intensive for us to distribute supplies from here.  Instead I think we should focus on sending out teams to figure out where the survivors actually are.  Then we have planes from the carrier airdrop supplies to them.  If you come across survivors willing to take orders you bring them back here and they can live in the warehouse.”

Lebron wanted to keep talking.  The more he said things out loud the more his brain was kicking in.  He hadn’t really considered bringing the survivors back to the base until he said it out loud.  Once he did it made perfect sense.  Why transport supplies to whatever hole the survivors managed to hide out in when they could share this massive base with them instead.  That’d allow them to utilize the supplies much more efficiently too.  Plus, they could take some of the people they brought back and send them out to find more survivors.  Eventually they could send them out to loot and farm.  They’d just have to wait until the surgers all died out.

His audience listened attentively while LeBron continued to muse out loud.  Realizing he’d been talking for a long time without stopping to ask if anyone had any questions LeBron stopped.  He was slightly put off by the way everyone in the room was staring at him.  One or two were scoffing at what he’d said but the rest of them looked like they were sold.  LeBron thought that they should look convinced since everything he’d just told them made perfect sense.

The meeting followed the new course that LeBron had set.  The men sitting around until late into the evening brainstorming and working on action plans.  They were coming up with concrete ideas for building a future.  You could almost taste the morale turning positive in the room.  For many of the operators in both the rooms LeBron’s inspired monologue had felt like that turning point you sometimes feel in a battle.  That point where something clicks.  You know you’re going to win.  You’ve knocked the enemy on their heels and they’re going down.

LeBron felt that energy too.  He was carried along with it like the rest of them.  They huddled around flip charts and maps while less than thirty feet above their heads the crawlerz started digging.  The men in the operations center saw what was happening through the CCTV system but weren’t overly concerned.  If the crawlerz made it down through the layers of rock and tightly packed dirt they’d be met by the concrete and steel infrastructure of the base.  They noted it in their logs and the duty officer made a point to write it on the whiteboard in the items to tell Leander about section.

LeBron went to sleep that night with a strange mix of hope and despair sloshing around in his head.  The hope was from the energy coming off the men when they’d planned the next steps in bringing LeBron’s vision to life.  The despair was for his own personal loss.  The friends he’d made who were lying dead out in the field.  His mom and dad dead and left behind.  The loss of his brother and sister weighed the heaviest on him. He hoped what he was doing here would turn out to be powerful enough that he could somehow maneuver it into bringing his family back together sooner rather than later.  He couldn’t imagine trying to live out the rest of his life without them by his side.

Chapter 16:  Best Served Cold

“We’d like you to fill out these forms and then we’ll do a video interview as well.  We’re looking to document everything we can.  The more data points we have the more we can put together an accurate picture of the epidemic.”  The fat man bulging out of his suit rattled off the directions with an air of boredom.  Drew had been sent to be interviewed while Blaze was scheduled for the following morning.  He was in an area of the ship that’d been turned into a combination science lab and data collection center.  In this section of the ship white lab coats were more common than dungarees or camouflage.

Drew bit back a couple of responses that popped into his head at the annoying air of indifference the scientific slob displayed.  He reminded himself that he didn’t know what other people had been through.  This man had lost people too.  Statistically speaking at this point everyone should have collected a few horrifying stories around what happened to them back on dry land.  The exceptions being the sailors on board who’d never even seen the infected yet.  Since the carrier had set sail before everything fell apart a lot of the men on board had never experienced any of it personally.  It must be hell stuck on board not knowing what happened to your family and friends back on shore.

Drew spent the next hour filling out the forms.  A lot of it was like taking a multiple-choice test.  They even had the scantrons there for him to bubble in with a number two pencil.  In the end there were a few sections that were more essay like but those were limited.  Drew finished and gave the forms back to the man once he returned.

“Those don’t seem like they’ll do much more than validate what you should already know.”  Drew said as he handed over the scantrons.

“That’s right.  We have our working theories about why the infected attack, when they sleep, how they can be killed, how quickly the virus spreads and all of that.  We’re trying to quantify that by asking a statistically valid set of witnesses to record their observations.  That’s the standard part.  Next will be the video interview part. I’ll walk you through an interview that’s designed to get us new data as well as additional validation.”  The chubby lab rat answered.  His tone was more than a little pompous.  The guy must’ve come straight out of an ivory tower to get on the carrier.

“What have you figured out so far?”  Drew asked.  He wasn’t really expecting an answer.  He was expecting the guy to tell him to wait for the book to come out.  He was asked to wait a second while the scientist flipped on the video camera.

“We’ve actually figured out quite a bit.  The main point of this interview is for you to tell us if you’ve seen anything that contradicts our theories.  That make sense?  If so, would you mind stating your full name and date of birth as well as the city and state you were in when this all started.”  The scientist asked leaning forward.  He lost the bored look he’d had earlier.  He must like doing the interview part.  Drew provided the requested information and waited impatiently for the promised answers.

“Based on interviews and observations we’ve come to the conclusion that the metamorphosis from surger to crawler can occur in as quickly as two days or take as long as a few months.  This seems to correlate to how many other victims the attacker has bitten.  The length of time to transform from a surger to a crawler has gotten steadily longer since patient zero in Egypt.  Any of that sound like something you’d like to dispute or back up based on what you’ve personally witnessed?”  The scientist asked.

“No that sounds about right.  The surgers are taking forever to transform in some places and it seems to line up with what you just mentioned.”  Drew said.  He sat back waiting for the next question.

“There’ve been reports of surgers and crawlerz both displaying signs of intelligence.  In most cases it’s been like they’ve acted on muscle memory to open doors or use a hammer or try to drive a car.  Have you witnessed anything like that?”

“I haven’t seen any car driving zombies.  I’m pretty sure that’s something I’d remember.  Nothing else is coming to mind.  They can’t swim.  Not sure if you have that documented or not.”  Drew said.

“To be honest the surger wasn’t driving the car.  The story I heard was that it was sitting in a parked car looking straight ahead turning the steering wheel back and forth.  We’ve heard the swimming thing recently.  That’s great information by the way.  Our men in the field can use all the advice about the surgers weaknesses that they can get.”

“Absolutely.  What else you got?”  Drew asked.  The questions kept right on coming.  Now Drew understood why Blaze wouldn’t have had time to go after him.  It looked like he was going to be in this little interview room for quite a while.

Blaze meanwhile was laying in the bunk he’d been assigned running scenarios in his head.  He kept flashing back to zipping his people into body bags.  His people who’d been sent out into the field as cannon fodder.  Sent by the same man who’d drugged them and kidnapped half his troop.  That man hadn’t been acting alone though.  That man had orders from above.  Orders that came from this ship.  Orders that completely disregarded the lives of Blaze and his men.  The leadership of this ship had murdered Blaze’s family and they could care less.

Blaze was ready to make them care.  He rattled around the needles in his pocket. He was extremely careful not to poke himself by accident.  They were the same needles the knockout juice had been in.  The syringes they’d used to quiet down the infected on the plane.  While Drew had been sleeping Blaze had reused those needles.  He’d gone to the cage of one of the most active crawlerz and jabbed it five more times.  Only this time instead of injecting it with the knockout juice he filled the syringes up with the infected blood instead.  He’d wrapped the syringes up in a glob of duct tape and shoved them in one of his pockets once done.

He’d bet once they landed that all eyes would be on the five infected in the cages.  He’d bet correctly.  While everyone was uber focused on the infected neatly tucked away in body bags behind solid steel cages the real threat to the ship had walked off to be rudely rejected by Yue.  Seeing her with the tall man in charge of everything told Blaze instantly that Yue must be in alignment with the men who’d ultimately been responsible for his family being slaughtered.  He kept up the pleasantries and fake smiles throughout the abbreviated onboarding process he was put through.

They were medically evaluated and found to be fine.  They told the medics that they came direct from one of the bases which eliminated them having to be quarantined for a day.  They left out the part about the infected having been swarming all over the particular base they’d just come back from.  The medic was sloppy in his questioning and only half paying attention otherwise they’d have been quarantined.  Blaze just saw it as another point in favor of carrying out his plan.

Having made up his mind Blaze put on the identification badge that’d allow him to get to the main galley.  He couldn’t go anywhere else on board the ship without an escort.  He’d been shown where the galley was earlier and noted the hundreds of men and women eating in there.  He shrugged into his clothes and walked over to the bunk next to his.  He moved the curtain to the side just enough to confirm it was man sleeping on his stomach.  Blaze dropped to his knee and pretended to fall into the bottom rack.

“Sorry!  Sorry!”  Blaze yelled apologetically rolling out of the bottom bunk where he’d plunged the contents of the syringe deep into the sleeping man’s butt cheek.  The sleeping man was awake now trying to figure out why his butt hurt, and what the yelling was all about.

“What’s going on?”  A petty officer walked around the corner to ask.

“I tripped and I think I stabbed him with my glasses.  I’ll go grab him a bag of ice.”  Blaze said pretending to be completely flummoxed.  The petty officer nodded vaguely trying to figure out what was up.  The man in the bottom bunk had slid out and was rubbing his butt with one hand.  He looked up accusingly at Blaze.  He just wasn’t sure what he was accusing him of.  Stuttering out that he’d run to the galley and be right back Blaze took off running out of the berthing area.

Blaze walked quickly down the open passageways towards the sounds and smells of the large galley.  His heart was pounding away like crazy.  He’d just condemned an innocent man to death when he stabbed the sailor.  That man didn’t have anything to do with the deaths of his people.  The only thing he could think of now was to keep going with the plan.  If he wanted to get the people who were responsible, he needed to turn this whole ship into a nightmare.  Knowing he was a walking dead man he committed completely to a final act of vengeance.

A wiry looking sailor was sitting at a desk by the door to the galley checking everyone’s badges against an iPad he was using to log individual meals.  The duty station was new. It hadn’t been setup to stop people from hoarding food or eating too much.  It was actually intended to try to catch those who weren’t eating at all.  Depression was running rampant on a ship full of people who knew their loved ones were most likely dead.  There’d been multiple suicides already.  Men had just taken that final step off the flight deck in the middle of the night and never been seen again.  Others walked around with everyone else but were crumbling apart on the inside.  Those people tended to not bother with things like eating.  The ship’s psychiatric staff had recommended making them check in for meals and the captain had ordered it to be so.

“Hey man you need to check in.”  The young seaman stuck on duty at the door looked up expectantly for Blaze to tell him his name.  Instead, Blaze swung his arm out of his pocket and jabbed a syringe into the young door guard.  The seaman tried to jump backwards to get away from Blaze.  He got stuck and tripped over his chair though ending up on the ground with the syringe dangling out of his arm.  He pulled it out and stared at in horror.  Somehow, he intuited exactly what’d just been done to him.

A few people by the door had noticed and were trying to figure out what was going on.  One of those people stood up and came forward.  Blaze pulled another syringe and plunged it into his own arm then hit the plunger to send the ancient Egyptian demon plague zipping into his own bloodstream.  They were going to kill him anyway so he might as well sacrifice himself as part of his own plan.  He ran towards the person who’d been coming for him.

“Hey Blaze, are you alright?”  Charani asked stepping froward.  She’d been wrapping up dinner when she saw her former boss storm into the galley and attack the man at the check in desk.  Blaze looked up at her. She saw recognition warring with something else in his eyes.

“Run Charani.  Get to the flight deck.  I’m letting loose the mother of all Gypsy curses on these gorger bastards down here.”  Blaze said with drool leaking out of his mouth.  Charani saw the syringes in his hands and the mad look in his eyes.  She noted the use of the gypsy words.  She ran for the door as fast as she could.

Blaze turned and ran the other direction.  He ran towards the sailors at the closest table. They were getting to their feet trying to figure out what was going on.  A few of them approached the crazy looking guy running at them.  Once they noticed the syringes they turned and ran the other way.  Knowing he was on borrowed time Blaze sprinted for a table where the people were still sitting down.  Most of them had their backs to him.  They were just starting to look over their shoulders to see what was going on when Blaze leapt the last few feet to bury needles in two of their backs.  He plunged one of them while the needle snapped off in the other ones back when Blaze fell to the ground.

One of the men reached down to help Blaze up.  It was an automatic reaction to seeing someone fall flat on their face.  The thing that came up off the floor and sank its teeth into his finger wasn’t Blaze anymore.  Seeing nothing but lights pulsating around him.  The intensity and frequency filling him with a horrible and terrible fear Blaze’s primordial attack mechanisms kicked in.  The virus alternated between kicking him in the fear and the starvation synapses.  Rocking and rolling the parts of his brain that were responsible for his sanity until they snapped.

The man Blaze had bitten ripped his finger out of Blaze’s mouth and took off running.  He’d end up turning in the medical bay.  The man Blaze had managed to stick with the needle turned before he made it all the way out of the galley.  The seaman by the front door turned at almost the same time as Blaze and began attacking the people at the table Charani had been sitting at.  The man who Blaze had snapped the needle off in didn’t turn from the broken needle.  He eventually turned from the massive bite to his cheek and ear from Blaze.  That man took off running for the engineering barracks.  He was three minutes from turning.

It only took a few minutes before general quarters was sounded.  In that few minutes of chaos and confusion the infected managed to get to almost every section of the ship.  Ironically enough the one section that was prepared to defend against the infected was the lab which the five infected from the base had been transferred to.  Thanks to the extra security precautions there the Marines were armed, and the hatches were already dogged down.  Most of the rest of the ship wasn’t so lucky.

In the VIP section the secret service agents had no qualms with killing the people charging madly at them.  Suicide bomber, zombie or guy with extreme diarrhea sprinting for a port a potty if you ran wildly in the direction of the President you risked getting shot.  The secret service has contingency plans for their contingency plans.  A couple of senators didn’t make it, but the President and a handful of the others were immediately secured in a small closet.  The agents who sealed them in were ripped apart. The passageway filled up with the infected leaving no way out.  The infected in the passageway began pounding on the thick wooden door.

Up on the bridge the infected burst in while general quarters was being announced.  The captain and the XO were both bitten in that initial attack.  The Marines rallied and massacred their way through the surgers until they were able to seal off the decks below.  Unable to press any further they stood around in groups wondering what to do next.  They at least needed to rescue somebody who could sail the ship.  There hadn’t been any flight ops planned for that time period so most of the crew had been below decks. The Marines had been on the flight deck doing their evening drills.

The captain and the XO had been up on the bridge planning out the next day’s operations.  They’d been together since they’d gone earlier to inspect the lab area and make sure it was secure.  They weren’t the only ones who died or were turned thinking that this must have originated from those infected locked in the cages.

All told Blaze’s plan took out well over a thousand sailors, Marines and politicians in the first half of an hour after he launched it.  Other than the politicians those were all sorely needed resources for the survival of humanity.  The surger formerly known as Blaze ended up stuck in a small passageway outside the VIP area with about ten other infected members of the crew.  The grey walls of the passageway ending on each end with dogged down hatches.  Assuming no one opened the hatches then this would serve as their tomb.  Blaze had gotten his vengeance.

Chapter 17:  General Quarters

“General quarters!  General Quarters!  All hands man your battle stations.  Reports of an outbreak on board.  General quarters!  General quarters!”  The alert boomed across the ship.  The amped up voice coming out of every speaker throughout the massive military machine.  People stopped what they were doing and ran for their battle stations.  Many of them ran right into the infected that were already sprinting down every major passageway on board.  This had been a drill on board in the very recent past. Many of the sailors took their time assuming it was a drill once more.

Drew looked across the interview table at the scientist who’d been quizzing him on what he thought the crawlerz ate.

“Is this for real?”  Drew asked.  The scientist shrugged with a worried look on his face.  He must’ve thought it was real enough to halt the interview for now and go check it out.  He opened the door to the passageway leading to the lab next door and stepped out.  Drew got up to follow him just in time to see a dungaree clad surger pounce on the obese scientist.  Considering the little interview room just had a regular door Drew opted to make a run for the lab instead of trying to lock himself in.

He got there right as the Marine standing guard at the front of the lab shot two surgers point blank.  The Marine spun and aimed his rifle at Drew.

“Not a crawler dude!  Not bit!  Let me in!”  Drew yelled with his hands in the air.  The Marine shot twice more.  One bullet passing Drew so closely he felt it burn the tip of his ear.  The Marine yelled at him to get inside.  Not needing to be told twice Drew jumped over the lip of the hatchway to get into the lab area.  Another Marine helped the first Marine slam the hatch shut and dog it down.

All around the large open lab doors and hatches were being slammed shut.  The lab was in the shape of a big rectangle with a cage in the middle. The cage in the middle held the five smaller cages the test subjects were in.  Marines and men in lab coats were spread out all around the perimeter.  They were all trying to figure out what the hell was going on.

The loud staccato sound of an AR-15 being fired multiple times erupted inside the space.  The sound echoed like thunder off the bulkheads of the enclosed area.  Drew and everyone else were spinning around in circles trying to figure out what was going on.  The Marines were aiming their weapons at anything that moved.

“It’s cool.  One of the lab guys got bit.  I had to waste him.”  Yelled out one of the Marines.  The rest of the Marines settled immediately upon hearing that.  Unlike the guys in the white coats the Marines chosen to guard this room all had plenty of field experience.  That’d been a major piece of the criteria for being selected for this detail.  They didn’t want anyone who was going to freeze up just because they were suddenly in an enclosed space with a bunch of crazy people with superhuman strength trying to eat them.

Drew began walking the perimeter of the lab.  He took pains to make sure he looked as nonthreatening as possible.  The Marines were all understandably very jumpy.  When startled they tended to react by killing things.  Drew was doing his best not to startle them when he saw a tall figure in khakis on the other side of the lab.  Forgetting he was trying not to startle anyone he began jogging in that direction.

Wham!  His teeth rattled in his head as a mountain of a Marine slammed him into the bulkhead.  Drew could taste blood where he’d bitten his tongue.  Looking up he saw Jeff had glanced over to see what the fuss was.

“Drew?  You can let him go staff sergeant.”  Jeff ordered walking over and grabbing Drew’s hand to shake once he saw it was really him.

“Hey.  Is Yue here?”  Drew asked.  His head was pounding.  He should’ve known better than to jog like that in the direction of someone so important.  He was lucky the Marine had opted to slam him into the bulkhead instead of just shooting him.  His head didn’t feel lucky though.

“No.  She should be back in her barracks by now.  Hopefully she’s somewhere safe.”  Jeff said in a worried voice.

“What happened?  How’d they get out?”  Drew asked curiously.  From where he was standing it looked like all five of the bundles of death were still securely locked in their cages.  He couldn’t imagine what kind of colossal screwup could’ve led to what was happening.

“No idea.  No one has even come into contact with any of the ones you brought back.  Everyone gets a medical screening when they land on the carrier.  Considering it only takes one to three minutes normally for the infection to kick in it’s not like anyone can really hide it from the corpsmen.  By the time the plane lands they should be stark raving if they got infected on land.  If you or Blaze or one of the flight crew on the plane had been bitten, we would’ve detected it.  I don’t know where this is coming from.  With all the research and processes we put in place we still aren’t safe.”  Jeff looked like he needed a Big Gulp full of vodka and a place to lie down for a few hours.  Given the circumstances Drew could understand why.

“How do we get out of here?”  Drew asked the question that was swirling around in his head.  He was already putting together a plan.  It consisted of getting out of the lab and saving Yue then not dying.  Plan might not be the best word for it.  He had goals.

“That’s going to be an issue.  One of the reasons we picked this area to build the lab in was because it’s not easy to access.  We’re going to have to fight our way out.  I don’t know that we have enough ammunition to actually make it.”  Jeff explained.  The staff sergeant was leaning in listening.  He was the head of the lab security detail.

“Hey sir.  We humped a ton of ammunition down here.  Fighting our way out shouldn’t be an issue.  As long as the whole ship hasn’t been overrun.  I mean where are we fighting our way to exactly?”  The staff sergeant asked.  Drew looked over at the man in amusement.  Leave it to a bunch of Marines to drag down a ton of ammunition to guard five infected who were locked in cages.  Looking into the lab and counting the bags that were moving around he verified one of them was still limp.  That meant him and Blaze had only successfully gotten four out of five of the specimens to the ship alive.  Not that it mattered.  At this point the ship was literally crawling with fresh test subjects.

“Excellent question staff sergeant.  There’s a phone in the main office.  Let’s go see if we can’t get ahold of someone who can tell us what’s going on.  I’m a little concerned no one’s followed up on the announcements over the paging system.  We should be hearing all kinds of orders by now.”  Jeff said walking into the main office section of the lab and hitting the speaker button on the phone.

No one answered any of the numbers Jeff tried from memory.  He pulled up the ship’s website.  Drew looked on over Jeff’s shoulder.  It was pretty depressing that the ship’s website was pretty much what the internet had been pared down to.  It was packed with useful information like what was being served for lunch and what time to expect the sun to go down.  There were links to click if you were depressed and a suggestions box sailors could leave messages in if they had ideas.  Jeff clicked around for a little bit hoping to find a link for the cameras he knew to be all over the ship.  Unfortunately, the cameras would be a security issue if an outside party could access them so had never been added to the internet site.  Jeff had no idea how to access the internal site that would let them view the live feeds.  None of the Marines or other researchers had access either.

“Should he be in here?”  The staff sergeant asked Jeff quietly while subtly pointing at Drew.  It wasn’t quiet or subtle enough that Drew missed it.  He supposed he could see where the staff sergeant was coming from with the question.  Where everyone else was wearing Navy uniforms or the white lab coats of the researchers Drew was wearing a hoodie and a pair of camouflage pants with jungle boots.  The carrier must have a pretty active barber shop as well judging by the haircuts he saw around him.  He could barely remember the last haircut he’d gotten.  If you could call Yue hacking away at his hair with a pair of safety scissors a haircut.

“I’d be happy to leave if you don’t mind clearing the way for me to hop on a plane.  Is there a ship’s directory on this site?”  Drew asked.  Jeff whispered something to the staff sergeant to get him to stand down before clicking around to see if he could find a directory.

“Found it.  Who were you thinking we should call?”  Jeff asked scrolling down through the multiple pages of numbers for the different departments on board the ship.

“Everybody.  We need to know how widespread this is.  Like the staff sergeant said we need information.  If it’s just this section of the ship, then we may be cool.  If it’s the whole ship we’re screwed.”  Drew answered.  He was also thinking if it was just this section of the ship then at least Yue was safe.

The familiar whirring sound of a printer warming up and spitting out pages filled the space.  Jeff handed a few pages to Drew then another few to the staff sergeant.

“We’ve got three phones in here that I know of.  I say we each take three pages and beat our way through this.  Circle anybody who answers and ask them how many people they have in their location, what weapons they have and how many of the infected they have around them.  Also see how they’re set for food and water.  Try to get their names.”  Jeff ordered.  He didn’t bother to wait and see if his orders were followed.  He immediately pressed the speaker button and dialed the first number on his list.  Seeing they were all still standing there he waved his hand ordering them to get to it.

Drew ended up at a desk setup to watch over the lab area.  He had his three pages in his hand as he sat down and stared at the phone.  One of the Marines had walked over with him.

“Hey man.  I’m going to go out on a limb and say your kind of new to shipboard military life?  Not super familiar with things like the way we talk on board the ship or where stuff’s located at yet?”  The Marine asked.

“The front’s called the bow, right?”  Drew answered.

“No worries.  You’ve been here like a day.  I’ve been stationed on this thing forever and I still get lost.  How about I do the phone calls.  I think that may work out better.”  Drew moved out of the way to let the Marine sit down and let his fingers do the walking.

An hour later they were all crammed back into the main office with Jeff.  The operation had been successful as far as gathering information.  It wasn’t the operation’s fault that the information kind of sucked.  Most of the people who’d answered the phone were in a similar situation to them.  Trapped in some room in the ship with the infected right outside their door.  Most of them didn’t have any weapons.  Many of them didn’t have access to food or water either depending on where they’d holed up at.

Halfway through calling they’d found out that the flight deck was clear.  If they could make it up there, they’d be safe.  Of course, the reason it was clear was due to the Marines and others on the flight deck securing every possible entrance to get topside.  Even if they made it there, they wouldn’t have access to food or water until they retook the ship.  If they even bothered to retake it.  It’d be a long and dangerous process to clear the ship out.  If they didn’t have the crew to operate it then what was the point?

Jeff had pulled Drew aside when he got ahold of Yue.  She was holed up with a small group of women in one of the berthing areas on board.  They had water and some food but were pretty much stuck without any weapons to fight their way out.  Surgers were literally beating on their door.  The commander of the Marines up on the flight deck was working on a plan to clear out the infected in a manner that made sense.  He had to balance who was most critical to save based on their strategic importance, set of needed skills and how long they could be expected to survive with the supplies available wherever they were stuck at.  It wasn’t an enviable position to be in.

“Do we wait to be rescued or blast our own way out?”  Drew asked loudly.  He was worried due to how important Jeff was that resources would be wasted on them that’d better be served rescuing Yue.

“We should be able to move down this passageway to these stairs and move up.  We’d want to coordinate with the Marines topside to let them know we’re coming.  We need them to let us out once we get there.  They’ll probably want to meet us to make sure we don’t lead out a parade of the infected.”  The staff sergeant said.  He was running his finger along a laminated picture up on the wall showing the escape routes in the event of a fire.  Too bad they didn’t have one showing where to go in the event of a zombie apocalypse.

“If we have the resources to do it, I say we go ahead and secure this area.  No need to have the men up top come down and save us if we can do it ourselves.  I’m actually going to give them a quick call with orders to that effect now.  Plenty of other people around for them to save.  Sound good staff sergeant?”  Jeff asked.

“Yes sir.  We’ll have you and the white coats stay behind while we clear the passage.  We shouldn’t be too long.  Once we have a path cleared, we’ll come back for the rest of you.”  The staff sergeant said tentatively.  On seeing multiple affirmative nods, he gathered the Marines together and talked tactics with them.  After explaining the plan to his team, they lined  up on the main hatch ready to roll out.  They were just waiting on the go ahead from the forces on the deck above.  Jeff made a few phone calls then let them know they were clear to proceed.

Drew watched as the small group of Marines flung the door opened and ran into the passageway to bring the fight to the enemy.  The cacophony of multiple weapons firing was overpowering for a few brief seconds before the hatch was slammed shut.  The muted sounds of weapons firing could still be heard but now it sounded far away.  There was nothing to do now but wait.  Drew paced back and forth wishing he had a weapon.  He had the location information for where Yue was stuck.  He needed to get out of this locked metal box he was in so he could make sure she got rescued.  He’d heard Jeff passing along that location information to the Marines topside but there was no real way to know if they were following his orders or not.

The hatch was spun open from the passageway side. The guttural roar of the infected could be heard along with the sounds of a pistol being fired.  Two Marines jumped through the hatch landing on the hard metal floor inside.  Another Marine stepped through cradling his blood covered hand.  The staff sergeant stepped backwards through the hatch swapping out the magazine on his rifle.  An infected sailor leapt through the cloud of bullets the sergeant was putting in the air.  A couple of the bullets ripped through its body without slowing it down.  The staff sergeant and the infected fell backwards into the lab space.

Drew knocked a white coat out of his way and rushed to the hatch.  He slammed it shut and dogged it down even as arms and hands were being thrust inside.  Once he had the hatch secured, he turned quickly around to see what was going on behind him.  The Marines who’d jumped through the hatch finished knifing the hell out of the infected who’d been chewing on the staff sergeants ears.  The staff sergeant sat up with blood streaming from the holes on the sides of his head where his ears had been.

A horrified looking Marine stood in front of the sergeant with his kabar in hand.  The sergeant nodded.  The Marine plunged the Kabar repeatedly into his former bosses neck and chest.  Tears streamed out of the Marine’s eyes as he screamed out loud.  Each thrust of the knife blade lending itself to another impassioned outburst of violent screaming. Another Marine finally pulled him away from the bodies on the ground.  They all stood transfixed by the sight of the mangled corpses.

Loud screaming erupted from behind them.  Turning around Drew saw the Marine he’d noticed cradling his blood covered hand had his face shoved into the neck of one of the lab techs.  The infected Marine maintained his lovers embrace on the lab tech for another couple of seconds until something told him to shift.  The one Marine left standing took off running for the infected with his knife in his hand.  The Marine who’d killed the staff sergeant pulled himself together when Drew grabbed him by the shoulder and shook him.

“Where’s the ammunition?”  Drew asked loudly.

“We ran out.  There was too many of them.  They’re too fast.”  The Marine said through the veil of shock settling over him.

“Is there extra in here?”  Drew asked patiently.  He ignored the screams coming from behind him.  The Marine seemed to finally understand him.  He pointed at one of the small supply closets.

Drew picked up the sergeant’s rifle and ran for the supply closet.  He said a quick prayer that it wasn’t locked and tried turning the knob.  The door opened easily.  Inside he saw ammunition boxes with loose rounds and a couple of magazines that were preloaded.  He grabbed one of the magazine and slammed it into his newly acquired weapon.

Shutting the closet door, he looked across the lab and counted five infected in the lab now including another Marine.  It was probably the moron who’d rushed the surgers with just his Kabar knife.  Drew strode purposefully towards the group of infected shooting them in the back as quickly as he could line up the shots.  He was joined by the remaining Marine who’d pulled himself together to help out.

The infected surged towards Drew and the Marine with lightning fast speed.  Standing their ground, the pair of them made every shot count.  Once the active threats were on the ground the Marine and Drew walked over the bodies of the dead to get to the men who hadn’t been able to hide out in time. The petrified scientists were huddled under lab tables and behind file cabinets.

The Marine walked into the group of men and began shooting anybody he saw who looked like they may have been bitten.  Lab techs and scientists scurried out from under chairs and desks in fright.  Drew put a hand on the Marine’s shoulder and got him to put down his rifle.  Together the two of them checked the remaining survivors for any signs of infection.  Jeff and the others came out of the locked rooms they’d hidden in for protection to help however they could.  Mostly it was helping to move all the bodies into the central space that’d been reserved for the five infected locked away in their cages.

When the work was complete Drew found himself sitting in the main office again with Jeff and a couple of others.  Everyone soaked in blood and sweat.  A haunted hopeless look glimmered dully in the eyes of the shell-shocked men.  The unspoken question reverberating around the room.

Now what?

Chapter 18:  Loose Lips

Yue, Charani and a few more women huddled around the card table in the female berthing area.  Looking out of place a young seaman was sitting on the deck against the far bulkhead.  Charani had come tearing back from the galley screaming for everyone to get inside the berthing area and shut the door.  She’d grabbed the young man by the back of his shirt and dragged him out of the passageway into the room behind her.  No one had understood until they heard the screams echoing down the passageway towards them.

Charani had almost immediately pulled Yue to the side after making sure the door was closed and locked.  She’d gotten as far as saying it was Blaze when Yue grabbed her by the shoulders and forced the freaked-out gypsy queen to breathe.  Once Charani had calmed down enough to listen Yue held her close and made sure no could hear her.  Yue whispered forcibly in her ear that Charani was to keep her mouth shut about what she’d seen.  If Blaze really had done all this damage, then the people on board the ship wouldn’t be super willing to trust the people associated with him.  Charani recognized the truth of that immediately.  They hugged each other hard while working on regaining their composure.

It wasn’t long before they were standing around the phone dialing for help.  Someone eventually directed them to the flight deck operations line where a Marine noted their location and asked a few questions about how they were doing.  The Marine asked if they had any wounded and if they had access to clean drinking water.  Once he’d verified that he told them to stand by and hung up.  They stood by staring at one another for almost twenty minutes before the phone finally rang again.  The two closest women both tried to hit the speaker button at the same time causing them both to miss. Laughing nervously one of them tried again and they all crowded around to listen.

The frazzled Marine on the other end of the line informed them that they’d be rescued once their location worked with the way they were planning on clearing the ship.  He assured them it wouldn’t be more than a few hours.  They’d be free by morning at the latest.  Telling them they could call this number back again if their situation changed, he hung up.

“So, we just play some cards and get some rest while those things run around outside?”  One of the women asked.

“Pretty much.  Unless you want to run outside and fight them with your dirty socks and a toothbrush.”  One of the other women answered her.

“If her dirty socks don’t do it your drawers sure will!”  Another woman joined in on the banter.  She must’ve been a bit too loud as suddenly the door to their area shook hard as something slammed into it.

Everyone instantly shut up.  The lights were turned off.  They backed away in terror from the door that was shaking in its frame every time it was hit.  Holding their breaths, they prayed silently for the monsters to just go away.  Tears welled up in more than one woman’s eyes.  Charani and Yue in particular felt stupid.  They knew you had to stay quiet to stay alive in a crawler covered world.  They were seriously out of practice.  If they didn’t get their act together soon then they might not ever make it off this ship.

Yue made sure the door to the head was propped open.  Worse case if the main door was breached then they could fall back into the head and wait it out in there.  She realized she was being dumb again.  It wasn’t ‘if’ the door was breached but rather ‘when’ the door was breached.  The door wasn’t going to last much longer with the beating it was taking.  Once the door came down the infected would be presented with a room full of tasty treats standing around in the dark screaming at one another.  Someone had to take control in here.

“Get in the head.  Pass the word.  Everyone needs to grab blankets and any supplies they want and get in the head.  Make sure everyone whispers it just like this.”  Yue whispered to Charani.

Not waiting to see if Charani followed her instructions Yue wandered around in the dark room whispering the same directions to the sailors she saw standing around.  All of them took her word for it and went to gather what supplies they could out of their bunks.  She was squatted down in front of the young male sailor Charani had rescued when the phone rang.  It was the normal volume for a phone ring, but it sounded as loud as a foghorn to Yue.  Cursing under her breath at having made yet another stupid mistake Yue and one of the sailors moved rapidly for the phone.  The sailor got there first and pulled the handset out of the cradle.

Seeing that was taken care of Yue got to work on pulling the base of the phone off the wall.  If the cable behind it was long enough, she wanted to move the phone into the head.  They needed a way to communicate with the Marines planning the search and rescue operation.  They needed to let the guys topside know that they were now hiding out in the head since the crawlerz would be occupying their berthing area in the very near future.  She didn’t want the search party to think they’d all been killed and just keep going.  If the team sealed off this section of the ship, then they’d be stuck with a bunch of overly handsy infected sailors between them and the exit.

Yue pushed the phone up and down on the wall until something snapped and she was able to take it off.  The cable behind the base of the phone was about three inches long.  Not only could she not take the phone with them into the head she also couldn’t get it to go back on the wall.  The little plastic piece that slid over the wall mount had snapped off when she’d muscled it down.  A conga line of women carrying blankets and other random crap snaked behind her. The women all intent on putting another door between themselves and the monsters beating their way in.

Yue was starting to panic. The panic made dealing with the phone even worse.  The sailor who’d pulled the handset out of the cradle suddenly remembered she was holding the phone.  She answered it in a hushed voice while watching Yue rub the phone base up and down on the wall like an idiot.  Yue was aware of how stupid she must look but didn’t seem able to stop.  It was like she was stuck in a loop in a nightmare.  Holding the phone on the bulkhead and pushing on it wasn’t going to get it to stick.  The sailor listened to the voice on the other end then reached over to hand Yue the handset.

“It’s for you Yue.”  The sailor whispered smiling.  Yue didn’t have it in her to wring out an answering smile at the moment.  Especially since it was about the five millionth time that she’d heard someone say that.  All five million times the person saying it had a similar look on their face.  Like for some reason that horrible pun was any kind of creative or funny.  Wondering if the sailor was just screwing with her Yue put the phone receiver to her ear.

“This is Yue.”  Yue cringed when she said it knowing how confusing that sentence could be to whomever was on the receiving end.  The thought flashing through her brain for the millionth time that her parents should’ve given her a new name when they adopted her.  They could’ve stuck with the same theme and gone with Sue or something.  She’d been a baby it wasn’t like she’d have ever known.

“Hey.  It’s so good to hear your voice.  Are you ok?  Is it safe there?”  Jeff’s voice was barely audible over the sound of the surgers slamming into the door.

“Not really.  Can you let the guys topside with the guns know that we’re going to be in the head in here and that the infected are working overtime to try and get us?  It’s so good to hear your voice too!  We’ll be good.  Just get the Marines down here fast.”  Yue told her new boyfriend.  She would’ve hung up and called for a rescue herself except that Jeff had a lot more sway than a recently fired waitress.

“I’m on it.”  Jeff said.

“Hey Yue, just wanted to say I love you and be safe.  I’ll see you soon!  Jeff needs this phone to call for your rescue team now so bye!”  Hearing Drew’s voice and knowing he was ok brought tears to Yue’s eyes.  She looked around and realized no one was still in the main berthing area.  Charani and another woman were standing by the door to the head waving at her to hurry up and join them.  Their only hope at this point was that the surgers didn’t figure out there was another door to bust down anytime soon.  Hoping the Marines made it to them before the surgers found the door Yue sprinted inside the head and sat down in the crowded space.

They’d barely got the door to the head closed and locked when the door in the other room gave out.  They experienced a solid forty minutes of sheer sweaty terror sitting in the cramped space with everyone trying to be as quiet as possible.  No one spoke or coughed or breathed harder than necessary the entire time.  They all knew the slightest noise could be the death of them all.  They could clearly hear the surgers ripping apart the other room trying to get to the humans they sensed to be close.  None of the surgers seemed able to figure out the whole door to the bathroom thing until one did.

A loud rap on the door caused one of the sailors to let out a terrified yelp.  She immediately slapped her hands over her mouth, but the damage had been done.  That one yelp brought an onslaught on the door.  The flimsy wooden door that was the only thing standing between them and starring in their very own slasher film.  The women all scurried as far away from the door as they could.  A few of them crowded into the stalls.  Yue and Charani were crammed inside one of the shower stalls.  Charani pulled the shower curtain closed to shield them.  All that was going to accomplish was going to be making it a surprise when they were about to be mauled.  Yue supposed that might be better than watching all of the murder that was about to happen.

The door was smashed open.  The room filled with surgers ripping into the screaming women.  Charani and Yue held each other and waited to die.  Each thinking maybe if they just stayed quiet the demonic beasts might not notice them.  Not that anything could really be heard over all the screaming in the room.  It got even louder when gunfire ripped into the room.  The bullets smashing the porcelain sinks and ricocheting off the metal bulkheads of the small space.  The large mirror covering the wall over the top of the sinks exploded into a tinkling rain of skin piercing shiny shards.

The shower curtain was flung open and a Marine in full assault gear looked down at the horrified women.  The barrel of his weapon stayed pointed at them as he ordered them to get on their stomachs on the deck.  When they didn’t move fast enough, he screamed the order again and put his finger on the trigger.  Spit flew out of his mouth. He screamed at them to lay down or die.  They hit the blood covered floor face first shivering in fear and relief.  The room smelled like piss and blood.  The lights had mostly been shot out so there was the ambience of a haunted house.  The dead bodies of their bunkmates took on the look of discarded mannequins in the dim light.

The Marine kept them on the floor for a full five minutes while he poked around the room looking for other survivors.  The rest of the Marines who’d assaulted the surgers in the room pulled out to continue clearing out this section of the ship.  When the Marine finally told them that they could get up they realized the blood had begun congealing to them.  It made a sick sucking noise when they got up.  Looking over at Charani Yue realized they needed to ask a quick favor.  As disgusting and macabre as it was, she felt like it was something they needed to do.

“Do we have like two minutes to rinse off and throw on some different clothes?”  Yue asked.  The Marine looked her up and down then glanced over at Charani.

“You all look like that girl in the Steven King movie.  Like if it was more diverse.  I’ll be outside.  You’ve got three minutes.  Hurry up.”  The Marine turned on his heel and left.  Yue stood there with her mouth hanging open.  Even though she was the one who’d come up with the idea she still thought it was pretty dumb.  She’d never expected their rescuer to actually let them do it.

“How bad do we look that he agreed to that?”  Charani asked.

“Let’s hurry.  This is probably the stupidest idea ever.”  Yue said.

They rushed to get clothes and towels.  They stripped as they hustled back into the bathroom. Neither of them took more than a minute to soap up and let the water wash the blood off of them.  The floors of the shower stained red as the bloody water circled the drain.  Hissing at each other to hurry up they toweled off and threw on fresh clothes.  Leaving the blood-stained towels on the floor they rushed out to where the fully kitted out Marine was talking on the phone with his back to the bathroom door.

“We’re ready now.”  Yue said to get his attention.  The sooner they could get him to escort them topside the better.

“Cool.”  The man said turning around to check them out.  “Follow me.  Stay close.”

“Who were you talking to?”  Charani asked.  Yue didn’t know if Charani really cared who the man had been talking to or if she was just trying to take her mind off the scenes of death all around them.

“My sergeant.  He wanted me to check in with him once we had you out on deck.  A VIP is interested in making sure you’re safe.  Evidently someone pretty damned important to have gotten us sent down this passageway ahead of schedule.  You two are lucky.  You’ve got a guardian angel looking out for you.  I hate to think if it’d taken us a few more minutes to get down here.”

A few more minutes and they’d have been just as dead as everyone else in the small room.  Yue hadn’t looked closely at the bodies, but she knew each one would have a few extra holes in them to make sure they stayed down.  The Marines leading the search and rescue efforts were the ones with experience leading the raids on land.  They all knew better than to let these things get behind them.  As long as you kept them in front of you and had plenty of ammunition you had a chance.  Once they got around you forget about it.

They walked through a passageway carpeted in the bodies of the lost.  In some places they had to work hard not to step on a corpse in order to proceed.  The sound of automatic weapons fire echoed down the passageways.  Their escort took them up two sets of ladders past multiple guards and finally out a secured hatch onto the flight deck.  Once on deck they were immediately marched over to a room that’d been commandeered to serve as the new comms center for the ship.

Their escort reported in at the door and told them who he had with them.  A minute later a major in camouflage with a pistol hanging off his hip emerged from the communications room.  He walked over to them taking in their wet hair and general look.  Shrugging off the questions he undoubtedly had he stopped to talk to them.

“I’m assuming you’re Yue?”  The major asked addressing Yue.

“Yue is me.”  Yue replied back.

“There’s a lot of dead people on this boat.  We lost a few Marines going in to rescue you and your friend here.  My tolerance for people trying to be cute is very low right now.”  The grizzled major admonished her.

“Sorry sir.”  Yue replied chagrined.

“Stay up here.  Stay safe and stay out of the way.  We don’t have the manpower to rescue you again.”  The major said walking away.

“Excuse me sir.  Have you seen Jeff?  The man in charge of the Department for the Continuation of the country.  Or something like that?”  Yue asked the major’s backside.  He stopped and responded without turning around.

“We’re sending men to get him soon.  He ordered us to go after you first.”

The major continued walking away from a stunned Charani and Yue who now knew why the major had such an attitude with them.  Jeff was thinking with his heart instead of his head.  Yue was grateful for that since otherwise she’d be dead, but it must make life a lot more difficult for people like the major to try and plan out a way to methodically retake the ship.  Suddenly the few minutes they’d taken to shower seemed extremely selfish.

Chapter 19:  Change of Plans

LeBron swung his legs over the edge of his cot and stretched.  Looking at his watch he saw that he’d slept until almost noon.  If he didn’t have to pee so bad, he felt like he could keep his eyes closed for at least a few more hours.  He stood up and walked past all of the empty cots in the large room.  Each had been cleared of the personal gear that’d been sitting on them.  The rows of empty cots looked like the white crosses at Arlington.  Row after row memorializing the fallen.

He finished up in the bathroom and got himself dressed.  Wondering why no one had been sent to wake him up he walked out into the hallway.  He swung by the small galley and helped himself to a cup of coffee and a can of Pringles.  The small can of Pringles had been taken out of the personal supplies of one of the men who hadn’t made it.  He could still picture the guy joking that he was saving the can because one day it’d be worth a fortune.

LeBron shoved the can of Pringles into his pocket and continued down the hallway towards the operations center.  He sipped on the hot bitter coffee as he walked.  The caffeinated beverage serving its purpose of slowly making him feel alive.  The timing worked out such that he felt like himself by the time he entered the operations center.  He wondered if he should’ve bothered getting out of bed when he noticed the faces and demeanor of the people sitting around the room.

“I was wondering when you were going to wander in.  We kept you up way past your bedtime last night.”  Leander said waving his hand at LeBron to come sit down beside him.  LeBron sat down wondering to himself what was going on now.

“Good morning sir.  What’s everybody acting so weird for?”  LeBron asked pulling out the tube of chips to munch on.  He only had them out for a second before he slid them right back in his pocket.  It’d be too weird crunching away on chips in the somber silence pervading the room.

“Check out the monitors.”  Leander said while watching LeBron closely for a reaction.  Knowing he was once again being tested LeBron turned his attention to the monitors everyone was staring at.

“It’s just the base right?  The top of it.  Why’s it all dug up like that?  Oh.”  LeBron once again had talked himself into a conclusion.  This time the conclusion wasn’t an epiphany around how they could better complete their mission.  This time it was a reluctant understanding that they may not be as safe as they’d thought they were.

“The duty officer logged about a hundred crawlerz digging in above us last night.  There’s no telling how deep they made it.  We can’t see into the holes from the angle we have the CCTV coverage at.  We may try an overflight with a drone later to take a closer look.  They’re still out there in the dirt above us.”  Leander said.  That explained why everyone was so freaked out.

“They can dig all they want but they can’t get in, right?”  LeBron asked.  He really hoped he wasn’t about to find out about some Achilles heel the base had.  Even if there were some minor flaw in the design it wasn’t like they were being hunted by super geniuses with laser beams.  This wasn’t the attack on the Death Star.  This was a bunch of brain warped freaks with rage issues digging into the dirt to try and get at the humans they sensed below.  A herd of overgrown rabid gophers attacking a military base built to withstand all kinds of natural and man-made disaster scenarios.

“The hangar was built to be bomb proof.  We’re in the support building for the hangar.  Can they get in?  Probably not.  Do I want to stake our lives on being in the building that’ll probably keep the crawlerz out when the guaranteed crawler proof one’s a few minutes of brisk walking down hill from here?”  Leander trailed off see sawing his hand in the air.

“What do we lose by moving there?”  LeBron asked.

“Mostly just this room.  We’ll be flying blind without the AV hookups in here.  Everything else is redundant with what’s already in the hangar.”  Leander was thinking along the same lines as LeBron.  He didn’t say anything though waiting for LeBron to think it all the way through.

“We move everybody to the hangar except for a skeleton crew that focuses on this room.  We make sure they have a big pile of bullets in case they need to shoot their way out.  At some point really soon, we ask those Seabees if they know how to wire the video feeds so that we can see them in the hangar instead.”  Leander was nodding along with what LeBron was saying.

“Alright.  We’re making the transition over to the hangar in three hours.  Meet up by the front door with your gear unless you’re looking to hang out here and see if the walls keep them out or not.”  Leander dismissed LeBron and left to go take care of the details around moving the majority of the people over to the other building.

LeBron walked dejectedly back down the hallway.  He regarded the walls with distrust as he walked.  He wondered how close to breaking through the concrete block the crawlerz actually were.  With their ability to tap into their adrenal glands to max out their strength if they dug deep enough to be able to strike at these walls then the walls wouldn’t hold.  LeBron was no architect but looking at the walls closely they looked to just be concrete blocks.  Closing his eyes, he could picture the concrete block frame being put together then covered with hundreds of tons of earth and rock.  He couldn’t think of any valid reason the hangar would’ve been built any differently.

He was looking forward to cornering one of the Seabees and trying to understand better how the buildings here were built.  That was now a critical piece of knowledge they needed.  The hangar may very well be bombproof the way it was built but was it crawler proof?  Especially now that the devils were doing double duty as diggers.  It was uncanny how the infected kept sniffing out where they were hiding.  It didn’t say a lot for humanities long-term chances of survival.

Staring down at his cot he wondered what exactly Leander had meant about gathering his gear.  He normally carried his gear around with him every time he got out of bed.  He’d definitely be making sure to do so from now on.  Visions of crawlerz busting through the walls as he walked down the hallway would ensure that.  He grabbed his pack and threw it across his shoulder.  The backpack held most of his worldly possessions.  Realizing he needed weapons and ammunition LeBron went in search of the Marine in charge of the armory.  No way was he going to try to sprint across the corpse littered fields outside without a weapon.

The door to the armory was locked tight with no one in sight.  LeBron bounced around the offices and hallways for a few minutes looking for Leander.  He didn’t see Leander anywhere but did run into a senior non-com who agreed to hook him up with some weapons.  The guy looked like a walking armory himself, so LeBron felt like he was in good hands.  They went down to another small office where the duty officer grabbed a spare key to the armory and walked them down to it.  He opened the door and gave LeBron carte blanche to the neatly stacked rows of weapons on the walls inside.

Thirty minutes later LeBron was quietly sitting in the back of the operations center staring at the monitors again while waiting for the order to leave.  He felt much better now that he had the comforting weight of a Glock on his hip as well as the AR-15 leaning on the wall beside him.  The monitors showed they might not need to rely on the weapons at all to get down to the hangar.  If they could move quickly and quietly enough then this whole transition to the other base may turn out to be a non-event.

LeBron let his mind wander back to the books and movies he’d enjoyed around the zombie genre.  He’d done this exercise multiple times trying to correlate what was happening in reality back to the fictional depictions of what a return of the living dead would look like.  How simple would it be if just smacking these things in the head with a baseball bat took care of them.  The movies never showed the real effort that went into actually murdering someone by hand.  It was intense and obscene and would have quickly elevated the whole genre to the adults only section of the rental booth.

It was also loud.  Unless you decapitated one of the infected, they made a lot of noise dying.  On top of the noise you made shooting them or whacking away with a baseball bat or shovel or weed whacker or whatever random weapon worked in the video games.  They didn’t just fall to the ground silently and slowly fade off the screen.  They went down screaming and trying to claw their way back up to attack.  They didn’t care about pain.  They weren’t scared of the person who’d just shot them.  They were nightmares wrapped in the flesh of your neighbors.

“I see you found someone to let you in the armory.”  LeBron was snapped out of his musings by Leander.

“Yes sir.  I wasn’t planning on trying to make it down to the hangar by talking those things out of eating me.”  LeBron joked.

“Alright.  Make sure you’re by the door at fifteen hundred sharp.  We’re rolling out on the dot.  I’m hoping it’s a contact free crossing but if not, we’re bringing an excessive amount of firepower with us.”  Leander turned and walked away without waiting for a response.  The special agent in charge of the forces here was more than a bit preoccupied.  Considering his mission was crumbling around him while psychotic killers tunneled into his base LeBron chose to not be offended by the curt dismissal.

“At least you’re getting out of here.  I get to stay and see if those things can get in or not so that’s pretty exciting.”  One of the uniformed men who’d been watching the monitors had been close enough to overhear the short conversation between Leander and LeBron.

“If they get in at night you might want to lock yourselves inside the armory or something.  It’s going to take a ton of firepower to get out of here if they get in.  I wouldn’t hang out too long either.  Wait for daylight and make a break for it.”  LeBron said seriously.  Everyone knew it was suicide to go outside at night now.  There were way too many crawlerz around the base. It didn’t matter how well armed you were.  Any weapon short of a tank wasn’t going to get you very far.

“Good luck with the hundred-yard dash of death.  The worlds gone crazy right?”  The man spun back around to his post once again leaving LeBron feeling like he was being way too easily dismissed.

LeBron lined up in the front corridor at the appointed time with the group that was already there.  They waited as the rest of the barracks personnel headed to the hangar showed up.  Only a skeleton crew was being left behind to man the operations center.  LeBron wondered how that’d impacted the morale of the ones chosen to stay behind.  It wasn’t like Leander couldn’t have chosen pretty much anybody to sit there and watch the monitors all day.  There were no real special skills required or anything.  At least not anything that couldn’t be taught in an hour or two.  Everyone being left behind must know they were considered expendable.

“Sucks to be one of the ones left behind.”  LeBron said as an aside to the man in line next to him.

“They’re not really being left behind.  Everyone had the chance to volunteer.  Everyone over eighteen anyway.  We’d have all felt bad leaving you behind.  Leander gave the rest of us a choice though.  Stay here and watch the monitors or get on the short list for volunteering to go out in the field.  We’ve got a lot of guys who are scared to leave the barracks after watching all the crap that’s happened outside.  Those guys couldn’t wait to volunteer.  No matter what might end up slithering in while they’re stuck here.”  The man answered.  LeBron considered himself corrected.  It sounded like Leander might actually know his men better than LeBron had given him credit for.

LeBron hadn’t realized how terrified he was personally of leaving the barracks until the door opened and everyone rushed out.  These weren’t the special forces operators that’d gone out previously.  A lot of these men were in logistics and intelligence.  Most of them had way less experience than LeBron with running around with weapons.  None of them had killed anywhere close to the number of surgers LeBron had already put down since the pandemic hit their shores.  Only a few of them had even dared to go outside the barracks since they’d been sent here.  Especially since the barracks became a hot spot for the infected.

Once outside the illusion of safety the barracks offered the openness of being outside was putting everyone on edge.  Agoraphobia had spread rampantly through their ranks.  When you spend day after day watching video screens showing people being ripped apart by demons who streak out of hiding faster than should be humanly possible it gets to you.  That fear had dug it’s claws in deeply.  It was the main reason so many had volunteered to stay behind and continue their duties in the operations center.  Not many people knew this, but Leander had actually received more volunteers to stay behind than he needed.  A handful of the men making the crossing had desperately wanted to stay behind.  Despite having seen the crawlerz digging in all around them.

The run proved gloriously anticlimactic.  The men who’d arrived the day before to reinforce the base had done a good job clearing the area.  There were more crawlerz hiding in the dirt than anyone wanted to think about but the rising tide of surgers had ebbed for now.  They must’ve all been killed off or finally made the transition to crawlerz.  Whatever the case LeBron was just happy that they made it all the way down to the hangar without needing to fire a single shot.  The way the men in the group were waving their rifles around LeBron was beginning to think friendly fire may be a bigger threat than the infected.

Everyone started breathing again once the door closed behind them and they were gathered inside the cavernous hangar.  After living in the tight confines of the barracks for so long the hangar felt ridiculously huge.  Almost like they were still outside.  Looking at the faces of the men around him LeBron could tell a few of them wouldn’t feel safe again until they were assigned some tiny sleeping quarters somewhere that they could wedge into.  Leander immediately left with a few of his senior staff to go setup the alternative operations and communications center.  They needed to make sure the carrier knew they were still alive, and the base was still functional.

They should be able to keep up the same level of communication from here as they had at the barracks.  They’d just be blind as far as being able to watch what was happening outside.  Hopefully the perceived danger of the crawlerz tunneling into the ground turned out to just be them all being overly cautious.

“You LeBron?”  A large redheaded man with a serious case of five o’clock shadow asked.

“That’s me.”  LeBron answered.

“Not sure why I really even asked.  Not too many black teens wandering around in civilian clothes.  I’m Master Chief Mattison.  You can call me Vic or Victor when we’re not being super formal.  Mostly you should just call me master chief, so you don’t weird out everyone not wearing a Penn State hoodie.”  The red headed warrior said with a grin.  He stuck his hand out and LeBron reached out for a bone grinding handshake.  Victor had the handshake you’d expect from a man who’d spent his life in the worlds hotspots swinging a hammer in between fighting off the enemy.

“What were you looking for me for?”  LeBron asked curiously.

“According to the CO you’re the one who has the ideas that’re going to save the world.  My job’s to take your ideas and turn them into reality.”  Victor replied.

“Cool.  Let’s grab a couple of waters and head downstairs to get started.  Probably shouldn’t procrastinate too much if we’re in charge of saving the world and all.”  LeBron said turning in the direction of the stairs leading downwards.  He’d never been in the hangar physically before, but he’d stared at it through the CCTV cameras so much it felt like he’d actually been there.  Kind of a weird technological déjà vu.

Chapter 20:  If at First You Don’t Succeed

“Hey you ok?”  Drew opened the door to the small office Jeff was in.  The tall man was hunched over the desk with the lights turned out and his head in his hands.

“Is that a real question?”  He asked without even looking up.

“Yeah.  I mean this all sucks but we’re alive.  Yue’s alive.  We need to fight our way out of this coffin shaped lab and up to the sunshine.  We need you to be able to do that.”  Drew said.

“’This all sucks’ doesn’t really begin to cover it.  You just got here.  Your sister’s alive so you’re happy.  I had friends on this ship.  People I’ve known for years are now laying in a bloody pile on the floor out there.  The plan I built to save the world depended on this ship.  The President and every other VIP we had onboard.  They’re all unaccounted for.  I have no clue who’s in charge anymore.  They were a bunch of pricks but at least they held everything together.  We can’t even fall back on the CO or XO for this ship because I just found out they both got turned into surgers then shot in the head by the Marines.  But yeah.  Let’s fight our way to the flight deck.  Then we can stand there and watch the world go down in flames while we try to figure out how to sail this ship.  I don’t suppose you happen to be a certified nuclear reactor operator?  Yesterday we had a ton of those nerds.  Now the only one we have is the one trying not to fall asleep in the engine room.  The rest are either dead or on the hunt for fresh brains.”  Jeff had gradually gotten louder during his tirade.  By the end of it he’d sat up in his chair to turn around and glare at Drew.

For his part Drew was thinking the next time he was close to a library he was going to grab a book on interpersonal communications.  He obviously needed to improve his communications skills.  Here he was again proving he had the empathy of a rock.  He started to back out of the room to give Jeff space. If what Jeff said was all true though then they couldn’t afford to let the man just sit in a dark room and pout.

“You like my sister, right?”  Drew asked.  Jeff was thrown off by the question.  He’d been ready to unleash on Drew.

“Yes.  I do.  She’s hopefully been rescued and taken to the flight deck by now.  I’d love to call up and make sure she’s ok. If the rest of the leadership on board is dead though then it won’t look good if I keep calling to ask for a status on my girlfriend.”  Jeff said.  His head was going back into his hands as he slowly turned back towards the desk in the dark room.  Drew was losing him.

“My sister, me, everybody left alive on this boat’s depending on you.  You helped put this all together in the first place.  You know what it means to have to make cuts and make sacrifices.  Don’t give up now.”  Drew finished feeling like he’d crossed the line well into drama queen territory.  He was also making some pretty big assumptions off the limited knowledge he had about Jeff’s role.  By the way Jeff reacted to his words it looked like he might have said something right though.

“Alright.  If you promise to stop talking, I’ll try and figure out what we can do next.  Do me a favor and go count up who we have left.  Find out which ones know how to shoot.  I’m going to find out if anyone can pull up the camera feeds and tell us what we’re going to have to do to fight our way out of here.”  Jeff reached for the phone which Drew took as his cue to get to work.

Glancing around the lab space wasn’t filling Drew with a lot of hope.  Most of the Marines responsible for guarding the area had gone out earlier with the staff sergeant.  Of the ones who’d made it back only two were still standing after all the screwups with the infected who’d breached the hatch.  About a dozen lab techs and scientists were standing around in their white lab coats.  Only a couple of them looked like people Drew would be comfortable handing a gun too.  Which was good since they only had a handful of weapons to hand out anyway.

Drew and the two Marines dutifully circulated around the room to try and see which of the nerds in the white coats had any experience with firearms.  They weeded out the ones who just felt like they should be given a weapon by explaining that the men with the weapons would lead the way out into the hallway.  At the end of the day only two of the white coats had any experience with guns and were willing to go out the hatch first if need be.

There were a couple Drew considered throwing out the hatch first as human shields after talking to them.  The discussions quickly sliding into a one-sided conversation as the scientists whined that the Marines were supposed to protect them not the other way around.  Drew found himself in the awkward position of keeping the peace between the two remaining Marines and the arrogant scientists.  One of the senior scientists was especially arrogant. He didn’t hold back in blaming the whole situation on the sergeant who’d failed at clearing out the hallway.

“You do realize these guys you’re insulting right now are going to be the ones keeping you alive once we go out that hatch, right?”  Drew told the man to try and shut him up.  That’d led to a whole other sidebar where half of the scientists announced they weren’t leaving the lab until the passageway outside was cleared.  Rubbing his temples in frustration Drew walked back over to the office Jeff was in.  He got there right as the arrogant scientist he’d dealt with earlier was storming in to speak to Jeff.  Rather than get in the middle of all that Drew picked a spot outside the office and stood there listening.

“You don’t expect us to go out in that passageway with the soldiers, do you?”  The scientist asked.  His tone of voice clearly showing what he thought of that idea.

“I’m having a rough day here Neb.”  Drew heard Jeff say.  Drew assumed the guy’s name must be Neb.  He hadn’t gotten far enough in his earlier conversation to get his name.

“We’re all having a rough day, but you still can’t expect us to run out there and die.  We all saw what happened the last time the soldiers went out in that passageway.”  Neb said.  His voice taking on a wheedling tone.

“First of all.  They’re Marines not soldiers.  Soldiers are the ones in the army.  You probably don’t care about the difference, but I assure you they do.  In case you haven’t noticed they’re all fully capable of beating you to a pulp while eating a ham sandwich at the same time.  Secondly, we’re getting to a point where a soldier, sailor or a Marine is about ten times as valuable as a scientist.  If you want to sit here and wait for the passageway to be clear I don’t care.  You’re not super valuable to me anyway.  I don’t see you whipping up a vaccine soon enough to turn the course of this infection.  We won’t be sending anyone back to get you so if you don’t come with us then you’re on your own.  I’m going to be assuming command of this ship and the forces on it so there won’t be anyone you can call to send help.  Do what you want but quit whining.  I simply don’t care.  Science has failed us.  You have failed us.”  Jeff said.  He said it loudly.  He said it right into Neb’s shocked face.

Drew was wishing he’d walked in with Neb.  He hated that he was missing the facial contortions that must be showing up on the arrogant asses face.  He wanted to be sitting in the corner with a tub of popcorn.  He didn’t bother hiding his smirk when the man walked out.  Both of the Marines had also fully enjoyed the show.  Jeff hadn’t tried to be quiet and the door had been hallway open.  Neb’s associates worked to distance themselves from him when he walked back over towards them.  Drew had minimal doubt that Neb would be bringing up the rear of their party when they went out the hatch.

“Drew, you out there?  Come on in and bring in those Marines you were talking to.”  Jeff’s voice drifted out of the office.  Drew and the two Marines walked in on him feverishly scribbling a set of notes in a notebook.  They waited patiently until he’d finished.  Without any additional preamble once he was done writing Jeff leaned back and asked Drew to give him a sitrep.  Once Drew was done Jeff leaned back and once again put his head in his hands.

“The plan still to try and bust out of here sir?”  One of the Marines asked when the silence had drawn out longer than was comfortable.  In way of an answer Jeff spun the monitor around so they could all see it.

“I finally got access to the cameras.”  Jeff said wanly.

The monitors showed the passageway outside their door as well as multiple other passageways and spaces on board the ship.  Ships were compartmentalized so that sections could be sealed off in the event of fire or flooding.  An unintended benefit of compartmentalization should’ve been the ease of restricting the movement of the infected inside the ship.  The ship builders probably hadn’t war gamed that exact scenario, but it still should’ve worked.

It hadn’t worked.  Hatches that should’ve been secured weren’t.  The infected had free reign over most of the ship.  They were blocked from getting topside by closed hatches and there were some sections that’d been closed off.  For the most part the thousands of crawlerz now haunting the passageways of the ship had unfettered access to roam wherever they willed.  They’d be able to quickly move through the ship in the direction of the sound of gunfire.  That wasn’t even taking into account the rumors of a psychic connection that formed between the infected.

“That’s a lot of crawlerz.”  Drew announced unnecessarily.  He just felt like he needed to say something.  If they were able to hit three crawlerz every time they shot one bullet, then they’d make it maybe a hundred feet down the passageway before being overwhelmed and shredded.  Considering it realistically took a half dozen bullets to put a single crawler on the ground their situation wasn’t looking good.

“Ideas?  So far, I’ve come up with we can go in the passageway and die, or we can sit in here until we run out of food and die.”  Jeff said.

“Have the guys up topside come down to rescue you sir.  The rest of us aren’t worth the risk but you’re the closest thing we have to a commander, right?  If you order them to come down, then they’ll come.”  The younger Marine said hopefully.

“As far as I know I’m the commander now.  I’m not going to order a bunch of men to kill themselves trying to rescue me.  We need to come up with a workable plan.  A way to sneak past them would be great.  If we were closer to a ladder, we might be able to pull it off.  They’re still sending SAR teams down everywhere they can to rescue people that are trapped.  I‘ve ordered them to rescue as many people as they can with minimal risk.  We just happen to be in a place that is maximum risk.”  Jeff looked like he’d written them all off already.

“What about sneaking past the infected to the ladders going up on deck?”  Drew said.  He honestly had no idea where he was going with that.  He was hoping it’d get the creative juices flowing and they’d figure out a way not to die.  The way everyone was staring at him made him wonder if maybe he shouldn’t have said anything.  He gamely kept his mouth shut hoping someone might come up with something other than telling him he was an idiot.

“We could get above the drop ceiling and crawl through there maybe.”  One of the Marines said tentatively.

“If the infected hear us in the ceiling they’ll be on us in a second.  Plus, we couldn’t get past the firewalls up in the ceiling.  We’d have to drop down.  We’ve got too many people in here for it to work.  It‘d have to be like just one or two of us.  Also, we’d have to be ninjas or Bruce Willis to pull it off.”  Jeff responded.  He said it quickly enough that it was obvious he’d already thought through that scenario.

“The ship being open.  We’re considering that a disadvantage because it means the infected can get anywhere pretty quick.  What if we made a bunch of noise in a far corner and everyone on this side made a run for it.  Then vice versa?”  Drew said.  He was thinking back to all the other diversionary tactics they’d pulled off since this started.  The infected may have the reflexes and strength of superheroes but no one was worried about them outscoring everyone else on the SAT.  The crawlerz wouldn’t think twice about hauling ass across the ship to get to the source of something that sounded like the human prey they were constantly hunting.

Silence around the small room.  Drew looked around waiting for someone to beat down his idea.  Jeff and the two Marines were all experienced out in the field.  They’d all been there and done that since the crawlerz crossed the border.  Drew watched as glances were passed around the room.

“That might work.”  Jeff said.

“Really only one way to find out.”  The older Marine said with a lop-sided grin.

“Aright.  Well.  If it’s an experiment, then we’ll be the Guinea pigs.  If we make it then we can probably use the same idea for everyone else.  It’s not like the crawlerz are going to figure out what we’re doing.”  Jeff said.  He seemed to have regained some of his confidence.  He leaned forward and immediately picked up the phone to set the plan in motion.  There were speakers setup in zones all over the ship.  He’d just have them page an area on the other side of the ship and yell a lot.  If it worked well enough, they may even be able to seal off the bulk of the infected in one area of the ship.

“Make sure you tell them to contact anybody in that area and let them know not to leave whatever hiding space they’ve found once the screaming starts.”  Drew reminded Jeff.  Jeff nodded and repeated that advice to the Marine officer on the other end of the line.  When he was done, he hung up the line.

“When do we go sir?”  The older Marine asked.

“We roll out at the top of the hour.  They’ll start the screaming five minutes prior.  We’ll verify on the cameras that the coast is clear. As long as it looks good then we’ll roll out.  Go grab everybody and tell them it’s about time.  I’ll give the final order once I verify the coast looks clear.  I know we’re looking to arm everybody, but we want to make sure no one gets a gun who’s going to shoot it unless absolutely necessary.  Understood?”  Jeff stared at the three of them.  They all got it.  If someone pulled the trigger prematurely, then the infected may choose to ignore the screams spewing from the overhead and rush back towards them.

“Aye sir.”  The Marines sounded off and disappeared to get everything in order.

“You good Drew?”  Jeff asked.

“Absolutely.  Let’s get this done.”  Drew answered and walked out to help the Marines get everything ready.

Like most of the decisions he’d made recently it wasn’t like he really had a choice.  Survival was the true north he oriented his decision making on.  Right now, the next step in survival looked like getting up onto the flight deck.  If he could get up there with Yue, he’d consider that a huge win.  If not, then he’d at least die trying.  Either way he wasn’t the type to be content to just sit there until they resorted to cannibalism themselves to stay alive.  Wouldn’t that be ironic?

Chapter 21:  Rolling the Dice

“Alright.  Coast is clear.  Let’s do this.”  Jeff announced getting out of the chair in the small office.  He walked into the main area of the lab and made sure everybody was ready to roll out.  A few of the scientists including the one who’d given Jeff a hard time didn’t make eye contact. They might not be thrilled with the idea, but they were all lined up to follow the Marines and Drew out into the passageway.  Jeff walked to the front of the line and took his place to lead them all out the hatch.

“You sure you shouldn’t be in the middle of the group?”  Drew asked.  He didn’t want the new leader of the free world who also happened to be his sister’s boyfriend to get killed on his watch. He also wasn’t sure how proficient Jeff was with the M-16 he was carrying.  Whoever was in the lead needed to be good or they’d just get in everyone else’s way.  Based on how comfortable he looked carrying it he might be ok with it.

“No worries.  I’ll bravely lead us out into the hallway I just verified is completely empty. As long as I don’t trip and shoot myself, we should be good.”  Jeff said sarcastically.

That shut Drew and the others up.  They moved quickly to get the hatch opened and get on the other side of it.  Drew letting one of his dad’s favorite phrases guide him as he went.  Slow is smooth and smooth is fast.  He’d never really understood that until he’d wound up in situations like this.  Now he was way too familiar with the meaning and intent behind it.  He kept moving with the repetitive sound of screaming coming from deeper in the ship grinding on his nerves.

Jeff led them down the passageway making plenty of room for everyone to leave the lab behind.  Once everyone was out Jeff motioned for the last man in the line to close the hatch.  The last man being one of the few white coats in the crowd they’d decided they could trust with a weapon.  Jeff began moving forward again once the hatch was shut.

Their luck held until they were close enough to see the ladder leading to the flight deck.  As they moved forward there was a sudden flash of movement from the side.  A crawler who’d lost the use of both legs lunged at Jeff.  It was using its arms to propel itself forward.  It’s legs dangling behind it uselessly on the deck.  Jeff turned but before he could get his rifle aimed Drew and one of the Marines had already riddled the crawler with multiple shots.  Behind them a few of the scientists yelled out in surprise. Suddenly there was a mass movement forward as all the men they were escorting ran for the ladder leading outside.

From down the passageway hatred filled screeches came echoing back.  The distraction of the screaming voices ripped off from a random horror flick playing over the speakers on the other side of the ship weren’t enough to keep the surgers enthralled.  Not when they heard the sound of weapons being fired.  The sound becoming even more of a crawler magnet by the added shouts of fear from the scientists.  Their fear was palpable enough for the crawlerz to pick up on it.

“Everybody back in line.”  Jeff ordered before giving up and walking quickly towards the ladder up ahead.

The first victim screamed behind them as a crawler slammed into the back of the group and pulled one of the scientists down to the ground.  The technician with the rifle in the back of the group took a couple of shots before another crawler pulled him down.  That was just the beginning of the onslaught.  A steady stream of crawlerz crashed into the scientists.  All of whom were now screaming and running for the ladder.  The ladder leading up to a still secured hatch.

“This way!”  Jeff shouted and ran around the men banging futilely on the bottom of the hatch.  A big group of the scientists were shoving one another around trying to get on the ladder.  The crawlerz were coming from everywhere now ripping into them.  Drew and the Marines along with a handful of the more astute men in white coats followed along in Jeff’s wake.

They shot as they ran putting crawlerz down on the deck.  Deafening screams from behind them as the men on the stairs were pulled down and devoured.  The demons normally getting in a few good bites before the shift happened.  If a single crawler got more than a few victims in a row, then it passed less of the infection per bite.  That meant that the third or fourth victim typically didn’t survive. The crawler would keep gnawing at them if it never sensed the change that came when the infection was transmitted.

The small group around Jeff started moving forward slower as the number of crawlerz coming at them increased.  The two Marines who’d taken up the rear guard were firing constantly to hold off the crawlerz and surgers moving in their direction.  Massive booms ripped the corridor apart.  Fire and shrapnel tearing through the spaces ripping flesh from bone.  Drew was blown off his feet by the shock waves from the explosions.  He felt himself picked up and pushed backwards towards the ladder.

Coughing and sneezing big bloody gobs of snot Drew collapsed in the cool night air on the flight deck.  He rolled over on his side gasping for breath watching as a couple more men emerged from the hatch before it was closed and dogged back down.  All around him the men who’d been rescued were laid out on the ground.  Watchful Marines stood close by ready to shoot them immediately at the first sign of infection.  One of them handed an extremely grateful Drew a bottled water which he downed in one long swallow.

Sitting up Indian style he watched as Jeff walked away with a few of the senior Marines.  It was well into the evening, but they still had the bright lights turned on topside.  They didn’t want any crawlerz to sneak up on them if they managed to escape.  Drew rubbed at his eyes.  The team that’d rescued them had dropped in tear gas and smoke to help with fighting through the infected and rescuing them.  Drew was just happy he’d figured out what was going on before trying to shoot at their rescuers.  That probably wouldn’t have ended well for him.

“Thanks for rescuing my man.”  Yue said sitting down next to him.  She completely ignored the Marine guards who’d formed a perimeter around them in case any of them suddenly went into surger mode.

“No problem.  It’s not like I had other plans or anything.”  Drew replied.  Yue already had her arm around him.  Her eyes welling up with tears of relief.

“I’m tired Drew.  I’m so tired.  I thought this place was safe.  I want LeBron safe.”  Yue dissolved into sobs against Drew’s shoulder.  He awkwardly patted her on the back.  He was wondering when he’d started looking like the kind of guy people should confide in.  He felt completely inadequate.  He had no idea what to say to Yue to make her feel better.  He was pretty damned tired himself.

“We’ll get back to LeBron.”  He said for lack of anything else to say.

“Even if we do then what?  This crap isn’t stopping.  I think this pretty much proves that no where’s safe.”  Yue was saying the exact same things that Drew was thinking.  He wished she’d stop saying the things that were in his head and then waiting for him to make her feel better about them.

“Beats me.  You’re the oldest.  I think you’re the one who’s supposed to figure it all out.”  Drew said smiling.  Obviously, they’d figure it out together like they always did.  They were still alive because they were an exceptional team.  They’d evolved into a place where they relied on each other’s strengths to get by.  Being separated like this felt unnatural.  It was like they were each missing a chunk of their own body.

“We need him here for this.”  Yue said.  She was done sobbing. She sat up watching as the group of men including her new man disappeared into the superstructure.  She reflected it hadn’t been that long ago that her and Jeff had come out of that superstructure with nothing more on their minds than setting up a steel beach picnic on the flight deck.  That seemed like a million years ago.

Drew was silent.  He totally agreed with Yue that LeBron would be a major asset to them with all the weirdness going on.  There were so many moving parts to this cluster that he wondered how Jeff would even know where to start.  They were on a gigantic floating nuclear power plant that was filled to the brim with the infected.  Popping any of these hatches risked the flight deck being flooded with the killers.  Once the infection started spreading up here it was all over.  The biggest thing they had going for them was the fact that there was a few hundred heavily armed Marines wandering around on the flight deck with them.

When you were in it deep it was always nice to have a few hundred men behind you who were well armed and could shoot straight.  Drew hoped the saying about every Marine being a rifleman was true.

“I don’t see many sailors.  Just Marines everywhere.”  Drew said to Yue.  He’d realized something was off as he was looking around.

“Maybe because the sailors are up in the bridge driving the ship.”  Yue said dismissively.  Drew waited a second watching Yue’s face.  He could tell when the issue he’d brought up percolated to the top of her thoughts.  Both her eyes opened comically wide and she let out a little gasp.

“You think we should pay a visit to Jeffie Poo?”  Drew asked.  Yue nodded and got to her feet.  She pushed past the guard trying to keep them both in the perimeter and waved impatiently for Drew to follow her.  Drew walked past the guard ignoring the hard stare and the weapon pointed at him.  The Marine let them go but Drew thought the hole at the end of the rifle barrel was going to make a cameo in his nightmares.  He’d been less scared of some of the infected who’d come at him than he had at the cold, dispassionate sight of the dark round hole at the end of that gun barrel.

With Yue in the lead they set off in a beeline for the door they’d watched Jeff disappear through earlier.  Yue was walking just a little too fast which must’ve caught the attention of the guard standing at the door.  Not quite aiming his weapon at them he ordered them to halt.  Once they’d stopped, he asked them their business.

“We’re here to see Jeff.”  Yue said not thinking.  The Marine stared back at her.

“The tall guy in the khakis.  Supreme commander of the Department of Continuity or something.  Anyway, we need to see him.  Yue here is his significant other.  I’m her brother.”  Drew wondered why his mouth just kept going like that.  From the looks he was getting both Yue and the guard were also wondering what his problem was.

The Marine told them to stand still and stepped backwards to take the phone out of the hardened wall mount it was in by the door.  He sat his rifle down making a big deal of showing how easily he could still get to it.  He put the handset up to his ear and dialed a number.  Picking up his rifle he aimed it a little more directly at the two of them.  Drew wondered exactly what the guy thought they were going to try.  The guard sat there waiting for a couple of minutes then lowered the rifle barrel.  He hung up the handset and opened the door for the two of them to go inside.

Yue gave Drew a hard look which he interpreted as she wanted him to let her do all the talking.  Given his recent bouts of verbal diarrhea he had no problem with that.  He followed her into a room that had a couple of men in it.  A young man in full battle rattle came over and offered to escort them up to the bridge.  The way he said it was polite, but it was obvious the offer was really more of an order.

Up on the bridge they finally found Jeff.  He was deep in conversation with a few officers.  All of whom were Marines.  The bridge was covered in blood. There’d been a fierce fire fight in the space based on all of the bullet holes.  Jeff saw Yue and excused himself to hurry over to her and Drew.

“It’s so good to see you made it out.”  Jeff said to Yue pulling her in for a quick hug.

“I bet.  There’s only like seven women on this ship and you managed to snag one for yourself.  It’d suck to lose her now.”  Drew said.  He meant it as a joke, but it came out a little off sounding.  He backed quickly away so that Yue wouldn’t be able to hit him.  He reminded himself to focus on using his mouth as nothing more than a hole in his head for breathing.

“I bet the other six would be super excited if I hadn’t made it out though.”  Yue said.  Drew puked a little in his mouth.

“What’d you have to tell me?  The message I got was you had something you thought I should hear right away?”  Jeff asked in a worried voice.  He obviously didn’t want any more surprises today.  Drew had a sudden wild compulsion to blurt out that she was pregnant.  He wondered if it was all the recent near-death experiences that were making him act like an idiot.  He managed to keep his mouth shut this time and let Yue respond.

“We were sitting out on the flight deck and Drew mentioned how many Marines there were.”  Yue started to explain.

“Right.”  Jeff said not seeing where she was going with this.

“It dawned on me what he was getting at was he didn’t see any sailors anywhere.  I said that was because they were up here driving the ship.”  Yue said then looked around the bridge.  Jeff sighed as he saw what she was doing.

“That’s what we were just talking about before you got up here.  Most of the ship’s officers were ripped apart in the first twenty minutes of the outbreak.  The crawlerz hit the bridge here especially hard.  They also went through the officers quarters like a tornado.  At this point we’re hoping we can find someone alive who can sail the ship.  The engineering officer down in the reactor room may be able to help if we can’t find anyone else.  The guys down there are pretty much stuck though.  Unless we can kill our way through a ton of the infected.”  Jeff said exasperated.  The situation took the FUBAR acronym to a whole new level.

“If nobody’s driving the ship how do we know where we’re going?”  Drew asked unable to contain himself.  He was ok with that for this question.  It was a very valid question.

“We don’t.  Right now, we’re barely treading water.  We’re launching some ops to pull out people who can help.  There’s a lot of people stuck below who weren’t infected.  That trick with the overhead speakers is going to help a lot with rescuing them.  Which is good since otherwise we’re going to be stuck on this thing until we run aground somewhere.”  Jeff said.  He meant it as a joke, but nobody was laughing.

“Did we rescue any pilots?”  Drew asked.

“There’s some stuck below in their quarters.  We’re hoping to get them.  Even though the bays with the planes stored in them are pretty much surrounded by crawlerz.  I don’t know how useful the pilots are without access to the planes.”  Jeff said.

The group of officers had turned around and were staring back at Jeff.  He was obviously needed back over there to authorize whatever operations they were coming up with.  He excused himself with a quick kiss for Yue and a back-pounding hug for Drew.

“We’re so screwed.”  Drew said leaning back against the bulkhead.

“When are we not?”  Yue asked him with a shrug.

Chapter 21:  Can Do

“So, what are we building here?”  Master Chief Mattison AKA Victor asked LeBron.  LeBron looked around at the small team of Seabees staring attentively back at him.  They were meeting on the level of the warehouse the vehicles were parked in.

“We need to make these vehicles crawler proof.  They need to be capable of being beat on by a large mob of insanely strong humans for days at a time without the occupants dying.  Following the beating they need to be able to continue on their journey.  They’ll be used to transport people as well as supplies and weapons.  The people they’ll be transporting may be either refugees or our own men.  We’ll be using these to recon areas we suspect survivors are gathering in.  Any high-tech tricks you can think of to aid in that mission would also be good.”  LeBron hoped his ideas were making sense.  Based on how the men were nodding along with him he must be doing ok.

“We’re a construction battalion not a bunch of mechanics but I think we can figure it out.  Anything else?”  Victor asked.

“There’s another thing I was thinking of that might be more up your alley.  We need to verify this building is crawler proof.  We don’t want what’s happening at the barracks up the hill to happen here.  We also need to build living areas for any refugees we bring here.  This place looks big now but add in a few hundred refugees...”  LeBron said opening his arms to indicate how packed it’d start to get.

“Sounds good kid.  I was wondering why Leander had us talking to a kid.  Now I know.  We’ll take care of the difficult parts first.  The impossible stuff we’ll work on later.  I assume hardening the vehicles is the first priority?”  Victor asked trying to get his mind wrapped around the tasks being set for him.  As a master chief in the Seabees he wasn’t used to taking orders from someone LeBron’s age, but game recognizes game.  The boy had some solid ideas and that was all that mattered.

LeBron hung out helping the Seabees get organized. They had plenty of questions about the recon missions he was envisioning.  LeBron spoke freely but tempered his feedback with the warning that none of his plans had been officially authorized yet.

“I think we’ve got enough to keep us busy for a few days at least.  Why don’t you go meet up with Leander and make sure we’re on the right track?  This is good stuff kid.  I see why you’re still alive.”  Victor said setting down a massive bundle of steel rods he’d just unloaded from a green forklift.  He was a hands-on type of manager.  Which was a good thing since there were only a handful of men there to help.

LeBron walked past the rows of gear and vehicles in the massive underground warehouse to get to the staircase leading up.  He ran up the stairs two at a time to get to the next level quickly.  He walked past groups of soldiers who were getting the space organized.  He noted several were taking the opportunity to get some rest.  He remembered hearing his dad say multiple times that you could always tell the real soldiers because they never passed up a chance to take a nap.  You’ve got to get your sleep when and where you can.  You never know when you’re going to be spending the next twenty-four hours wide awake doing your best to kill the enemy.  You needed to be alert when that happened since the enemy would also be doing their best to kill you.

Weaving his way through the crowd standing in front of the communications room LeBron finally located Leander.  Leander was standing beside the radioman who was attempting repetitively to raise the carrier on the radio.  He must’ve been getting frustrated as he slammed his hand into the base of the machine and started cussing.  Then he began fiddling with knobs and doublechecking everything. It looked like it must be the tenth time or so he’d checked everything based on the aura of frustration surrounding him.  Leander leaned back and looked around the room finally spotting LeBron staring at him from the door.

“Let’s take a walk.  I need to clear my head.”  Leander said walking over to where LeBron was standing.  LeBron nodded and followed Leander out into the warehouse.  The motion sensitive lights coming on as they walked down the aisles piled high with supplies.  The supplies that they needed to somehow get into the hands of the survivors in their region if there was to be any hope of the regular human race surviving here.  LeBron imagined there were islands out there where the inhabitants fended off anyone trying to land to avoid getting themselves infected.  Those islanders would live on in happy isolation while the rest of the world died.

“What’s going on with the radio?”  LeBron asked after they’d walked a couple of rows in silence.

“We can’t raise the Ford.  We’ve tried two different radios and multiple frequencies and we’re getting back nada.”  Leander said.  LeBron’s analytical mind quickly crunched through likely scenarios to quickly come up with the worst-case one.

“We just sent a plane with five of the infected to the carrier?  You don’t think that’s it?  I mean the infected were wrapped up in body bags, duct taped like mummies and locked in solid metal cages.  I don’t really see how that could’ve gotten screwed up.  We even had Drew and Blaze in the plane to make sure nothing happened.”  LeBron said.  Even as he listed out all the reasons there shouldn’t have been a problem, he was busy thinking through all the ways it could’ve gone wrong.

“We both know it was a risk.  The people on that ship.  Most of them haven’t even seen a crawler in real life.  They took off on that cruise to nowhere before everything went to hell.  They knew what was coming and what they had to do.  They were smart until they got stupid.  That’s what I’m thinking anyway.  Maybe your brother got bit, and no one noticed.  Not even him.  Maybe Blaze did something stupid.  Who knows?  When they landed, and the door came down we both know how fast the infected can move.  A hundred Marines on the deck waiting for the door to come down might not have been enough.”  Leander said.  The tension and frustration obvious in his voice.

They continued to pace along in silence.  Each lost in their own thoughts.  There was no way to know if the Ford never answered them.  Had they doomed the carrier by complying with the order to send the infected test subjects?  Were his brother and sister still alive?  There was nothing to be done now.  All they could do was wait and hope the carrier reached back out to them at some point.  Maybe it was just a coincidental technical issue with the radios.  Weirder things had happened.

“Did you meet up with the master chief?”  Leander finally broke the silence to ask.  LeBron nodded.

“Yes sir.  We went down to the garage level and talked strategy.  I gave him the vision we’ve been talking about.  Where we switch it up and send our men out to retrieve the survivors instead of just trying to supply them.”  LeBron answered.

“So, they’re doing the upgrades on the trucks then looking into ways to shore up this base.  Not that we can do much with crawlerz all over the place.”  Leander said.

“One thing I was thinking was that we should lend every available hand to the Seabees.  Let the master chief use them to get as much work knocked out as possible.  Our guys may not know how to weld or whatever, but they can all carry stuff and drive trucks.  They can hand the people welding whatever they need to make the work go by faster.  They can run wire and stuff like that.”  LeBron said.  He was thinking of the master chief wasting his time moving steel rods around.  That was something one of the Marines could be doing.  They needed to work out anyway.

“Makes sense.  I’ll get some men assigned to him as soon as we get back.  Pretty much everyone who isn’t on guard duty can help out.  Probably make guard duty a lot more popular.”  Leander said smiling for the first time.  If given a choice between carrying a ton of steel rods around or sitting beside a door upstairs staring at the wall for four hours most people would take staring at the door.  Assuming the likelihood of what they were guarding against coming through the door was minimal.

“We should look into getting lights setup again.  The bright ones that put off the same kind of light as the sun.  We string those up all over the place we can keep the crawlerz from getting too comfortable out there.”  They had plenty of power why not put it to use?  He’d actually brought this up before.  Leander must’ve remembered because he shook his head ruefully.

“Hindsight, right?  So many things we could’ve done differently.  Stadium lights or whatever we need are going on my shopping list.  I’m hoping once we get the first couple of vehicles put together that we can send out some scouts to recon and forage for anything we don’t already have in this underground super Costco.  Considering the size of this warehouse I’ll take another look to make sure we don’t already have stadium lights. That actually wouldn’t surprise me at all.”

They continued walking in companiable silence eventually descending down to the garage level. While they were there Leander received a status report from Victor.  Not a lot had been accomplished in the hour since LeBron had left.  The Seabees had been busy working on cataloguing what supplies they had to work with.  They were happy with the tools and workstations that’d been created for use in the base.  They were ecstatic when Leander offered up more hands to help them out.  Seeing that the master chief knew what he was doing Leander took LeBron back upstairs.  He wanted to start finding people to ‘volunteer’ to help out the Seabees with the manual labor portion of the tasks they’d taken on.

LeBron was making himself a coffee a little bit later in the breakroom outside the operations center when a man came running out of the operations center and asked him if he knew where Leander was.

“I think he’s still rounding up people to help out the Seabees.  I was going to have a cup of coffee then go down there too.  He has one of those portable phones on if you want to call him.”  LeBron sat down the coffee mug.  The man looked completely freaked out.  He nodded at what LeBron had told him before turning around and rushing back into the operations center.  Finishing his coffee prep in record time LeBron hurried in behind him to see what was going on.

Everyone inside was sitting around the conference phone in silence.  The phone had the red lights on around the base signaling they had it in mute mode.  They were still sitting around staring a few minutes later when Leander walked in holding the little WIFI phone they used inside the hangar for communications.  The units were notoriously unreliable.  Government procurement at its best.  Probably another example of the lowest bidder getting the contract.  You get what you pay for.

Getting what you pay for was going to be an even bigger problem with the supposedly bombproof barracks up the hill.  The men sitting around the conference phone had been talking to the men up in the operations center doing a routine check.  They stayed in constant touch since the men up the hill had full access to all of the video feeds.  The men from the barracks had reported that dirt was drifting down from the ceiling in several places.  They’d even seen the walls bulge out a few times.  The obvious answer to the question of what was going on was that the crawlerz had finished digging and were now trying to get in.

“Do you think it’ll hold?”  One of the men in the room with Leander asked.  They’d muted so as not to cause any noise on the other end that may attract the crawlerz.  The men on the other end weren’t saying anything for the same reason.

“Dirt coming out of the ceiling and the walls moving around doesn’t sound good.  Did they say if they saw crawlerz out in the field earlier?”  Leander asked.

“Yes sir.  Standard report that once the sun went down the whole place started crawling with ‘em.  Like a swarm of roaches is how they described it.”  It was how it’d been described multiple times by multiple people.  Watching on video that’s just how it looked.  As the sun went down the crawlerz would ooze out of their hiding spots and begin to scurry busily around on their endless quest to spread the infection.

“There’s no way we can get to them before sunup.  They need to make sure they’re in the most secure room.  I was thinking the armory personally.  It’s more isolated than some of the other rooms and it’s full of guns.”  LeBron said.

“You can talk to them if you need to sir.  They’re switching the audio over to the duty officers blue tooth headset.”  One of the men said.  Leander nodded and hit the mute button to unmute the phone.

“This is warehouse actual requesting barracks comm center status over.”  Leander said succinctly into the mic.

“We’re all in the operations center.  Dirt’s falling from the ceiling.  We can hear those things beating on the walls.”  A very hushed voice responded.  The duty officer was definitely in consideration for an Oscar for most dramatic sitrep of the year.

“We can’t get to you tonight.  Too many crawlerz between here and there.  Recommend you abandon the operations center and shelter in the armory until morning.”  Leander said.

“Yes sir.  The banging is getting louder sir.”  The subdued voice of the duty officer reported.

Nothing else was said as they muted the speakerphone again. Every man in the room listening intently as the men on the other end of the line formed up to make a run for the armory.  The rapid breathing of the duty officer the only thing they could really hear.

There was nothing besides that harsh breathing sound for a couple of minutes then a muted scream could be heard over the line.  The loud sound of gunfire clearly discernable over the sound of the duty officer yelling for everyone to run for the armory.  Leander and the other men gathered around the phone in the warehouse all held their breaths.  Each of them imagined the chaos happening up in the barracks.

It was nothing but gunshots and harsh breathing until another loud feral scream was heard.  A scream of pain filled the communications room.  It echoed out of the speakerphone and reverberated off every wall.  The men listening recoiled in horror and sadness.  Each knowing it could’ve been them ordered to stay and stand guard over that facility.  None of them had really thought the crawlerz would be able to get in.  At least not so soon.

“The OOD’s dead.  I grabbed his headset.  We’re locked in the armory but they’re banging on the door pretty hard.  Request assistance over?”  A hopeless young voice came out of the speakerphone.  Feeling like the worst kind of voyeurs they all knew the answer.  They knew they’d be sitting there intently listening when whoever it was talking to them over the headphones was ripped apart.  They’d hear those last screams.

“Negative.  We’re unable to assist at this time.  We may be able to offer rescue in the morning.  Can you hold out that long?”  Leander asked.  He didn’t bother muting the phone again.

“No sir.  They’re getting in.  We’re not going to wait.  We’ve got enough ammunition to carve a decent hole through them.  We’re making a run for it now.  If you’re able to let us in, we’ll knock on the door when we get down there.”  The headphones made a loud noise as if they’d been thrown down on the ground.

“You’ve got this Marine.  Give ‘em hell.”  Leander said quietly with his head bowed.  There was no way those last few men would be able to make it all the way down the hill at night with the hundreds of crawlerz out there.

Gunfire blasted out of the speakerphone.  The screams of the damned and the screams of the screwed mixing together as the doomed men went out in a blaze of glory.  LeBron sat and listened with the rest of the men until the screams and gunfire eventually died down.

Chapter 22:  Ship of the Damned

Yue and Drew slid closer to the knot of men around Jeff.  They both wanted to hear what the men were saying as it could have an immediate impact on them.  One of them was arguing that sending in Marines to try and rescue a big portion of the crew all at once was too risky.  He felt like they should stick to the plan of easy rescues while they slowly secured different sections of the ship.  The problem with that approach being the number of people who’d starve to death waiting to be rescued at the rate they were moving.

The final call was Jeff’s to make. He’d kept quiet and listened carefully to both sides.  He brought up a few more points like prioritizing trying to find people who knew how to operate the ship.  Right now, they were just kind of bobbing around in the ocean.  If there was a storm or they got too close to land, then they were screwed.  If both of those things happened simultaneously then they were dead.  Everyone agreed that finding someone to sail the ship should be their highest priority.

Consensus reached Jeff made some notes on a clipboard then signed off on it with a flourish.  An aide took the clipboard to a second lieutenant standing by the phone who immediately called the officer on the deck.  Referencing the notes on top of the clipboard he relayed the orders and waited for the officer on the other end of the line to repeat them back to him.  Once that was done, he hung up and waited for his next task.

The tight little group of officers gathered by the windows looking out over the stern facing portion of the flight deck.  The Marines rushing around below looked like a bunch of ants from up on the bridge.  Drew pointed out to Yue that the Marines were pausing outside one of the hatches that’d been closed.  The monitors on the bridge came on showing the complete insane asylum the inside of the ship had become.  The infected rushed back and forth growling and gnashing their teeth.  They could sense humans all around them but were unable to get at them.  Their frustration making them even more frantic than normal.

The second the speakers started pumping out Metallica the crawlerz took off running.  They moved so fast they seemed to just vanish from certain areas.  Thirty seconds later the lead Marines in the fire team came storming down through the opened hatch and started securing hatches along the passageway.  They were being careful to secure their flanks before moving forward.  To get to the level the survivors were currently holed up in they were going to have to fight.  It’d be a much easier trip down if they only had the infected coming at them from one direction at a time.

Heavy seabags filled with ammunition were lowered down from above.  They needed enough to carve their way through the massive piles of infected flesh standing between them and the survivors they were tasked with rescuing.  Once the fire team leader had the go ahead to enter the next passageway it was go time.  Weapons went hot and war faces were switched to on.  A quick buddy check of everyone’s body armor and the hatch into the next passageway was jerked open.

The men going in couldn’t see the monitors showing the sudden surge of the infected.  To the men watching on the bridge it looked like the passage suddenly just filled up with crawlerz.  The Marines had jumped into an empty sewer pipe right as someone flushed every toile above them.  Their rapid expenditure of a ridiculous amount of ammunition did nothing to stop the onslaught.  They might as well have been shooting a pellet gun into the water for all the good their bullets did.  The crawlerz swarmed over them then overflowed into the adjacent passage the Marines were using as their staging area.

The Marines in the staging area were shooting as they ran for the ladder to escape.  The men on the deck were ignoring orders to seal the hatch since they could see their battle buddies coming up the ladder.  Two of the Marines made it out screaming for the guards to shut the hatch.  The Marines at the hatch were already swinging it shut when a crawler erupted out of it.  The Marines swung the hatch as hard as they could trapping the crawler.  They shot the crawler in the face but were now having to fight the other crawlerz struggling to get out.  They couldn’t get the hatch shut with the one crawlerz body wedged into it.

Men were laying on the top of the hatch as the monsters below slammed into it trying to open it.  The body of the crawler who’d gotten stuck was being ripped in half by the violent motion.  A few more men came and added their weight to the top of the hatch. That helped make it stop moving around so much.  One of the men was trying to get the latch to lock into place.  He was only inches away from making it happen when one of the Marines who’d escaped suddenly howled with bloodthirst and jumped on the top of the dog pile.  He started biting and digging into the human pyramid that’d formed to try and secure the hatch.

The pile dispersed as the men jumped out of the way of the ravaging surger.  The Marines brought their weapons to bear on the newly turned surger and the other men who’d just been bitten.  Without those men standing on the hatch the crawlerz pressing to get out suddenly had very little resistance.  The hatch doors flew open and the crawlerz hit the flight deck going about a million miles per hour.

The Marines around the perimeter held their fire at first.  Jeff was barking out orders for everyone to start shooting immediately.  The crawlerz continued to spew out of the open hatch.  Like acidic pus from a lanced boil bubbling up to destroy everything it touched.  The flight deck erupted into a massive battle.  Everyone was firing.  The crawlerz were leaping high into the air and coming down behind the firing lines.  The infected were moving so fast that most of the shots fired missed them completely.  Even when hit they just kept coming.  If it wasn’t a mortal wound it didn’t slow them down.

The dead were piling up on the flight deck.  Even as the men who were bit turned and attacked their former ship mates.  It was bedlam below.  A bloodbath that very quickly turned into a one-way battle.  The Marines going back to back before being ripped apart by the crawlerz.  All of them dying or being turned in a pile of their own spent brass.  It was horrific and loud and over way too soon.  Hundreds of men dead or infected. The tide of the battle turned because of the men guarding the hatch trying to do the right thing.

In less than twenty minutes the situation had gone from hopeful to an even higher level of totally FUBAR.  The flight deck was covered with infected running back and forth.  The infected ripped apart the corpses of those who hadn’t turned fast enough.  Silence reigned supreme on the bridge.  No one could believe how quickly everything had gone wrong.

“Charani.”  Yue gasped and put her head on Drew’s shoulder as silent sobs racked her body.

“We have to abandon ship sir.  No way we can take her in now.  Even if we find someone who can sail her how would we tie off the mooring lines?”  One of the Marine officers asked.  He started to add more doom and gloom. Looking at the stricken faces around him he stopped.  He’d just realized that no one on the bridge needed him to tell them how screwed they were.

“If we can get somebody on the phone who knows how to sail the ship couldn’t they just walk us through it?”  Drew asked.  He was kind of wondering why they hadn’t gone that route originally.  Other than the fact that they wanted to rescue everyone.

“Start calling.  I want every phone on this ship called and the people who answer I want catalogued.  I want their ratings and locations.  We need to come up with a plan and we can’t do that without knowing our resources.”  Jeff ordered.

“Yes sir.  We have that list sir.  Assuming no one on it has died in the last few hours which might be a pretty big assumption.”  One of the Marines replied.

It turned out the list had actually been maintained on a laptop on the other side of the ship at a little portable desk.  The group updating it had been saving it over the ship’s WIFI to a shared folder that’d been setup.  By the time they figured out how to get to the file and read it Jeff was on the verge of a meltdown.  They could’ve just called the numbers on the list and reconfirmed everything already instead of goose chasing the no longer current list.  He scanned the three neat rows and immediately picked up the phone and started making calls.

An hour later they had a senior chief on the line who was checked out on navigating and sailing the behemoth.  The senior chief was handed over to a couple of the Marines who focused on learning everything they could about the myriad of buttons, levers and dials they were staring at.  With that major item checked off Jeff grabbed a cup of coffee and walked back to lean against the bulkhead next to Yue.  She smiled at him and asked how it was going.

“Well.  You saw we found a guy who can help us steer the ship.  He’s never actually steered the ship since he’s new but that’s fine.  At least he’s trained on it.  Assuming we can figure out how to steer the ship we have thousands of infected now crawling all over her.  We’re pretty much prisoners up here in the superstructure. Even if there was a way to bring up a plane, we couldn’t actually get to it.  Not that it’d matter too much since we don’t have any pilots handy.  My working plan is to take this gigantic zombie covered floating nuclear power plant and run us hard aground.  If we hit hard enough it should throw off the infected.  That may give us time to get on the lifeboats and make our way to shore.  Of course, if we do that, we’re basically abandoning the hundreds of sailors stuck inside the ship right now.”  Jeff answered straight faced.

“When we come steaming in full ahead and run aground that’s going to make a lot of noise.  Probably attract even more of the infected.”  One of the Marine officers standing behind Jeff brought up.  He’d obviously been eavesdropping.

“What if we just smashed into something instead of running aground?  Or ran aground a few times just enough to fling off the bulk of the infected?  Then we backed up and went somewhere else?”  Drew asked trying to think of a solution to their dilemma.

“We have a couple of grunts sailing a nuclear carrier via an eight hundred number for support.  I don’t think we’re pulling off anything fancy.  We’ll be lucky if we actually end up within a few hundred miles of where we’re aiming at.”  Jeff answered.

“Where are we aiming for?”  Yue asked.

“North America.”  Jeff said smiling.  Seeing his gallows humor wasn’t winning him any points with Yue he told her Charleston was the current target.  It was close to one of the bases and the closest place to where they currently were.  The Marines and the senior chief were working on plotting a course to get them there now.  They didn’t want to move too fast since they wanted daylight for when they got there.  Drew snapped his fingers.

“That’s it.  All we have to do is wait for the bulk of these things to turn into crawlerz then they’ll hide in the ship when the sun comes out.  They hide while we leave.”  Drew said.  Then the confident look slid right off his face.

“Yep.  We leave a whole lot of sailors to starve to death locked up in their quarters.”  Jeff said.

“We could play the music through the speakers and give them a chance to make a run for it.  We’d just have to coordinate it right.”  Drew said.  There was a way out of this mess.  They just needed to figure it out before everybody died.

“Where are they going to run to though?  We’ll still have all the infected topside to deal with.  We can’t wait for them all to transition over.  A lot of the people below don’t have that kind of time.”  The Marine officer interjected again.  He wasn’t doing it in a mocking way at all.  They were all brainstorming and trying to come up with a solution.  Drew noticed a few derogatory looks being shot their way by the senior officers standing on the other side of the bridge.  They were probably pissed that Jeff had left them to go hangout with his girlfriend and her kid brother.  The fact that he was actively working with them on a plan and excluding the senior military men in the room wasn’t a good look politically.  Yue noticed almost immediately and tried to signal to Jeff what was going on, but he was completely oblivious.

She finally just whispered in his ear that he needed to get the other men involved in their impromptu planning session.  Jeff walked over to the group of men and expanded the brainstorming circle to include every man in the room who wasn’t actively trying to learn how to drive a multi-billion-dollar boat.  Standing in front of the group armed with a freshly opened set of dry erase markers Jeff started facilitating a brainstorming session that the lives of everyone on the ship depended on.

He tried not to look down on the flight deck while they talked.  The sight of the demonic horde rushing back and forth below tended to strip away what little confidence he had that they may come up with a plan that’d have any chance of working.

Chapter 23:  Never Tell Me the Odds

“It seems like a nuclear sub with a team of Navy SEALs on it would be able to come up with something to help us out.”  Yue commented.  They were nearing the end of the brainstorming session.  They’d checked in with the men manning the radios and uncovered a few tidbits such as the fact that a nuclear attack sub was shadowing them.  Even Jeff had been surprised to hear about that.

Unfortunately, no one could think of a way the SEALs or the sub in general could help.  If they made the call to abandon the ship, then the sub may be of some assistance.  Assuming they survived the plunge and made it past the crawlerz trying to catch them.  At the end of the day it was iffy whether or not the sub would even want to pick up a bunch of possibly infected crewmen.  They were there in case a VIP needed to be taken off.  The President had actually been spotted on camera.  He was full-on infected and currently trying to beat his way through a solid bulkhead with his face.

They hadn’t located the Vice President or any of the other VIPs.  Not that it really mattered since there was no way to rescue them even if they could find them.  They’d tossed around every option they could think of.  What they’d come up with seemed like it might actually be doable.  They were relying on the sub to communicate and coordinate most of the plan with the ground and air forces they needed.  It still needed some serious tweaking, but it seemed a little more promising than ramming into the beach and hoping for the best.

Pilots from a base up north were making their way to Charleston where they’d commandeer a couple of attack helicopters. Once they had those, they’d fly them to a small unpopulated island off the coast.  Once the ship was close enough to the island, they were going to anchor her in place.  At least they were if they could figure out how to deploy the anchor. Once anchored the attack helicopters would fly over and shoot the infected off the flight deck.  Assuming that didn’t catch the ship on fire or anything the helicopters would then begin transporting survivors to the island.  They’d rinse and repeat letting as many of the infected come out onto the flight deck as possible.  They’d start in the evening to lure out the crawlerz along with the surgers then hopefully by the time the sun was up the people locked away inside would have a chance to make it on deck.  They’d play the loud music by sections to attract the infected and run the evacuations by the numbers.

The plan had holes in it big enough to sail the carrier through.  The crew had been trained on abandoning ship, but it wasn’t something they’d ever actually expected to do.  Especially not while being chased by man eating freaks.  Once off the ship they’d still need to figure out how to get to the island.  It wasn’t like the helicopters could carry them all.  It wasn’t like they had a ton of time to come up with better ideas.  The people down below without access to water were going to pass out from dehydration soon.  That included the exhausted men in the engine room responsible for keeping the reactor up and running.  Once the reactor scrammed, they’d be dead in the water.  Literally.

“There’s always the chance that the helicopter shoots them all right?  Then it’s pretty much just deciding what outfit to wear to the beach.”  Yue said to Drew after the brainstorming session.  It’d become obvious the senior military men no longer appreciated their presence or welcomed their ideas.  Not that it mattered as long as Jeff thought they were needed but neither Drew nor Yue saw any reason to push it.

“Yeah or the helicopter shoots us or sinks the ship somehow.  I have no idea how attack helicopters work.  I should’ve spent more time on the internet looking at stuff like that and less time looking at.  Uh.  Other stuff.”  Drew replied with a careless shrug.  Yue rolled her eyes at him while studiously avoiding looking down at the insane mob partying below on the flight deck.

Out of the corner of her eye she caught a different sort of motion.  One of the infected had managed to make it up onto the catwalk that wrapped around the exterior of the bridge.  Yue watched as it slunk over and stared into the bridge.  Once it realized people were inside it began beating on the glass hard enough to freak out everyone in the room.  A Marine was dispatched to deal with it.  A minute later the beasts bloody brains decorated a section of the window.  The sound from the shot was sure to cause more of them to attempt the leap up to the catwalk.  There was a ladder going all the way down to the deck but so far none of the infected seemed to have figured that out.  When you had a vertical leap of around two stories you didn’t really need anything to help you reach the stuff on the top shelf.

Yue cringed when it occurred to her that the stuff on the top shelf was them.  Every one of those monsters down there wanted nothing more than to bounce up to the bridge and pop open a bottle of uninfected human.  As if on cue two more of the infected appeared out on the bridge catwalk.  The Marine checked his rifle and went back outside.  Another Marine was assigned to watch the shooter and make sure he didn’t get bitten.  His orders were to leave the guy locked out for a solid two minutes once the job was done to make sure.  At some point they were hoping to stop making dumb mistakes.

“How many times does he have to be the one to do that?”  Yue asked watching the Marine shoot the two who’d just showed up then calmly shoot another one in the head who was trying to climb over the railing.

“Until they stop jumping up here or he dies I’m thinking.”  Drew said.  He was just happy he wasn’t the poor bastard standing out there.  It wasn’t a position with long term potential for growth.

They continued steaming along.  The idea around dropping the anchor was eventually discarded.  They’d considered it to try and keep the carrier from becoming a hazard by breaking up and radiating part of the coast.  It would also have been nice to have it as a resource they might be able to come retake once they got organized.  A little more discussion around the potential pitfalls of trying it and all the officers agreed with Jeff it wasn’t worth it.  Especially since it didn’t sound like they’d be able to do it anyway.  Yue and Drew hovered in the background trying to overhear as much as possible without annoying the frazzled officers.  Most of the men in the group were confused by why the young woman and her kid brother were hanging out on the bridge anyway.

“We’re so screwed.”  Drew whispered to Yue who just nodded along.  On top of everything else they were both beyond exhausted.  It wasn’t like you could take a nap in the middle of all this.  The Marine on the catwalk was now shooting at infected every couple of minutes.

“Not as screwed as that guy.  No way he can keep that up much longer.  I’m going to see if Jeff can send someone out to help him.”  Yue said starting to break away from Drew and head towards Jeff.

A flurry of gunshots and the screams of the Marine outside stopped her.  She was too late to save him.  Two Marines who’d been waiting by the door went out to take the place of the man who’d just been taken down.  Another man got up and locked the door behind them.  Yue shook her head slowly in awe of the sheer brass balls of the men she’d just watched calmly walking out on the catwalk like they were on their way to grab a burger.  She leaned back against the wall and watched the hands on the clock slowly ticking away.

She realized she must’ve nodded off when she heard Jeff asking her how she was doing.  Considering she was sleeping standing up less than ten feet from where a couple of Marines were steadily murdering infected who could jump like giant fleas, she was doing ok.  Looking over to see what Drew was up to she saw he’d actually slid all the way down the bulkhead. He was sitting on the deck with his head tilted back snoring away.

“I’m good.  What’s going on?”  She asked while trying to unkink her seriously screwed up neck.  Humans weren’t meant to sleep standing up.

“Same old.  The helicopters are on the way out to the island.  We’re on our way to the island.  At least we think we are.  The senior chief is saving all our asses.  He’s been talking us through how to do all of this.  Even gave us some more ideas on how not to die.”  Jeff joked.

“Those are ideas worth exploring.  How about the guys on the catwalk?”  Yue asked.

“Swapping them out every thirty minutes so they stay frosty.  It’s pretty much a nonstop shooting gallery out there.  Most of the infected can’t make it up and over the railing so the guys are just blasting them off when they get a grasp on something.  They’re attracting a lot of attention though.  I’m worried a whole wave of those things may jump at the same time and overwhelm them.”  Jeff answered.  They stared out the window as one of the Marines walked over to the railing and blasted a couple of shots off directly below him.

“You get any sleep lately?”  Yue asked Jeff.  Judging by his sunken eyes she was pretty sure she knew the answer already.

“Plenty of coffee up here.  It’s the one thing the bridge is actually well supplied with.”  Jeff answered.  It would’ve been much more convincing if he hadn’t broken out in a giant yawn halfway through his response.

“How much longer do we have before the helicopters get here?  Maybe there’s time for you to take a quick power nap.  It’s not liked this day’s going to end anytime soon.”  Yue said.  She was getting a little anxious about the fact that she didn’t think anyone was taking the time out to sleep.  Except of course for Drew who sounded like a hibernating grizzly bear in desperate need of a CPAP machine.

“Helicopters inbound sir.”  A man called out loudly from the front of the room.

“I’ll grab that nap later.”  Jeff said with a grimace.  He turned around and walked back towards the front of the bridge.  Yue started to wake Drew up then changed her mind and let him sleep.  If there was anyone who could sleep through a high-powered aerial attack on a bunch of screaming infected it was her brother.  She was going to need him fully awake and alert if this actually worked.

“Sir they’re requesting permission to fire.”  The man on comms called out loudly.  He didn’t realize Jeff had walked almost all the way over to where he was.  He jumped an inch or two when Jeff tensely gave permission from right behind him.

“Everybody down!”  One of the officers yelled.  That reminded everyone to duck.  Considering a couple of attack helicopters were going to be sweeping the ship with machine gun fire at a few thousand rounds per minute putting their heads down was probably a great idea.

A minute later the world got lit up as the helicopters started blasting away at the monsters covering the deck.  The noise was insane.  Especially when a few stray rounds struck the superstructure.  After a few minutes of steady firing the helicopters switched to more directed fire.  They were targeting individuals and small groups now rather than just trying to clean out the entire mob.  The men on the bridge stood back up to assess the situation.  Yue started to get up and was asked to get back down again.  Rather than risk having her head blown off by a random round because she wanted to be a tourist Yue took the request to heart and sat back down.  Drew had barely even moved during the attack so far.

“What’s going on?”  Yue asked the Marine who’d told her she might as well be safe and stay on the ground.

“There’s one helo on each side of the ship.  They’re blasting the hell out of the crawlerz bouncing around out there.  There’s a ton of the bastards pouring out of the holds.  They look like a bunch of demonic fire ants on meth.”  Yue nodded her appreciation for the colorful report.  She’d picked a very descriptive jarhead to ask.

She lay on the ground beside Drew doing her best to remember what the next part of the plan was.  She’d been pretty skeptical that the helicopters were going to show up in the first place.  She was now doggedly wracking her overworked brain to recall what phase two of this operation was supposed to be.  She sat there trying to figure that out until she realized she hadn’t heard any gunfire in a while.  She looked over at the Marine she’d been talking to.  He winked at her and left to take his turn out on the catwalk.

She stood up and stretched walking over to stand near where the tight group of senior officers had gathered to watch a fire team sprint across the deck.  The men were rushing to secure the hatch that the infected had been seeping out of.  A couple of scout snipers had moved out onto the catwalks.  They were picking off isolated crawlerz who’d somehow survived the murderous onslaught of the two attack helicopters.

The fire team was wading through blood and body parts to get to that hatch.  They’d come out of the bottom of the superstructure at full speed.  It was only a matter of time before more of the infected came bubbling out of that opening.  The faster they got to it and got it sealed up the sooner they could all relax and plan out the next phase.  They’d initially thought they’d need to have the helicopters come back a few times to draw out all of the infected.  That first pass had been so successful they were reconsidering.

About halfway to the hatchway it was determined that this was more of a glass half empty kind of situation.  Crawlerz began to stream out of the opening. The screaming cannibals made a beeline for the fire team.  The officer on comms with the fire team glanced over at Jeff for authorization.  He approved with a curt nod of his head.  The officer then ordered the fire team to fall back to the superstructure.  Yue was left wondering what the hell they’d been thinking trying that in the first place.  Evidently these guys needed sleep even worse than she thought or there was something she didn’t know.  Probably a combination of the two.

The fire team fought their way back across the corpse covered flight deck to get back inside the superstructure.  They were quarantined on the bottom level until it was obvious that they weren’t infected.  On the catwalks above the snipers continued taking out the infected until they were ordered to cease fire to conserve ammunition.

“Now what?”  Yue asked Jeff when he finally made a pitstop at the coffee machine.

“We stick with the original plan.  It just may take a little longer than we thought.  Keeping the helicopters fueled up is going to be a little rougher than anticipated.  They’ve got to fly all the way back to the Charleston airport.  There’s a boat with a couple of SEALs on it who were supposed to move the fuel to the island but that’s hit a snag.  Like they literally hit a snag and the boat got stuck.  So, they’re working on that.”  Jeff said in between sips of coffee and barely suppressed yawns.

“Why’d we try to get the hatch closed then?”  Yue said confused where that failed mission fit into the big picture.

“If we could seal off the flight deck, we could send some men in to pull out the aviation fuel hookups for the helicopters and fill them up right here.  That’s obviously not a valid option yet.  It was worth a shot though.  The people trapped below are starting to fade.”  Jeff finished off sadly.  The weight of that responsibility weighing him down.  Yue realized that’s why Jeff couldn’t sleep.  Not when the people trapped below had an expiration date fast approaching.

Now that the desperate attempt by the men to seal off the hatch had been explained Yue felt better.  She’d really been hoping it wasn’t just a random gesture caused by some kind of infighting between the officers already starting to hover around Jeff again.  She caught a couple of glances that made her aware that taking up the commander’s time right now wasn’t appreciated.  She excused herself idly wondering what Jeff’s title actually was now?  There didn’t seem to be any questioning by the men in the room that Jeff was the one in charge.

With a thousand mutilated cadavers draining blood onto the flight deck and the sun still a couple of hours from making an appearance Yue let herself slide back down to the floor next to Drew.  The helicopters would hopefully get back in time to do one final run before the sun came up.  That way they’d be able to knock out the bulk of the crawlerz who had access to the flight deck.  After that they were going to start popping hatches and seeing how many people, they could rescue using the music over the speakers tactic.

Scared to go try and find a quiet corner on a different level Yue made herself as small as possible and leaned into Drew.  She shut her eyes wondering if she’d be able to sleep.

Chapter 24:  A Beach Getaway

“Hey LeBron.  Head upstairs.  Leander wants to see to you.”  The master chief put the phone back in the cradle and went back to work.  Given how time sensitive everything was they were working around the clock.  Men could sleep as they needed it.  The loss of the barracks was all the motivation most of them needed.  They wanted to get these trucks finished so they could begin an inspection of the base itself.  No one wanted to live out the nightmare scenario that’d taken out the garrison up in the barracks.

LeBron finished carrying the big box filled with screws and washers over to the workstation and set them down.  He didn’t bother saying anything to the master chief since the man was focused on attaching the metal cage they’d constructed to the frame of the truck.  Wondering what it was Leander wanted to talk to him about he turned and jogged towards the stairs.  As he jogged, he contemplated the likely reasons for the summons.

By the time he got to the top of the long flight of stairs he was winded.  He’d sped up as he realized the request to see him in person very likely had to do with the status of the carrier.  The only thing he could think of off the top of his head that’d require an in-person meeting was if Leander needed to tell him something had happened to Drew or Yue.  There were a million other reasons Leander may have sent for him. That one was all LeBron could think of as he flung open the door to the stairwell and jogged down the corridor into the operations room.

“Thanks for coming up so fast.”  Leander said when LeBron skidded to a stop in front of him.  He stopped so fast that his sweat threatened to fly off him onto Leander.  LeBron had tried to report in when he’d first arrived.  He’d been breathing so hard no one could make out what he said.  Luckily a lot of the things on a military base are ritualistic so all he had to do was make noise at the right time and everyone knew what he was trying to say.  When you were breathing that hard you could be excused for not standing at attention.  He also got cut some slack since he wasn’t old enough to vote yet.

At Leander’s insistence LeBron took a minute to recover.  Looking around the room he noticed the increased level of intensity at which everyone was working.  Men were running in and out and using the phones way more than normal.  A lot of them were also running over to Leander with questions.  LeBron found himself having to impatiently wait a couple of minutes before being able to get back in front of the base commander.  Finally, Leander shifted his attention back to LeBron.

“I’ll say this fast because we have a lot of work to do.  We finally got through to the Ford.  They reached out to let us know they’re coming in hot.  They may need us to pick them up off a little sandbar by Charleston.  The crew did get infected. It’s so bad they’re abandoning the ship.  Your brother and sister were both still alive when we talked with them.  They’re expecting to hit the beach sometime tomorrow with an unknown number of Marines and crew.”  Leander rattled off the earth-shattering information to LeBron.  LeBron felt his knees go weak first with relief then with worry as Leander spoke.

Yue and Drew were alive.  They might not be in the in the best possible situation, but they were breathing and not craving a bit of long pig.  LeBron pulled himself together.  It sounded like he may be playing a part in making sure they stayed that way.  There’d be a lot of planning needed to successfully carry out a mission like this.

“What’s the plan then sir?  What can I do?  When do we leave?”  LeBron fired off his questions.  He was already wishing Leander had just talked to him over the phone.  If there were things that they needed the Seabees to be doing, he could’ve told them directly instead of wasting thirty minutes running up and down the stairs.

“That’s why I needed you up here.  We’re working up a plan.  They don’t know how many people are going to make it off the ship.  It could be fifty or it could be a few hundred.  No matter how many it turns out to be, a lot of them are going to be in bad shape.  Food and water’s at a premium.  There’s still hundreds of them trapped in different sections of the ship hiding out from the crawlerz.”  Leander stopped talking and looked at LeBron to get his take on what they should do.  LeBron was used to this game.  Leander liked to hear his people’s ideas without influencing them by saying what he thought first.

“The trucks aren’t ready to go quite yet.  Helicopters would be best anyway.  Except after a few trips there’d be nowhere to land because of all the infected they’d attract.  If they could get from that island to an airport and find a plane to land here that’d probably work out better.  I don’t know if that’s possible or not.  I’d say we pencil in them flying here in as big a plane or helicopter as can fit on the runway as plan ‘A’. We can keep the Seabees building out the trucks and loading them up with supplies as plan ‘B’.  If the air lift can work that’s best but be ready to roll out and get them if we need to.”  LeBron said thoughtfully.

“Agreed.  Except I’d like to go ahead and get that convoy rolled out as soon as the trucks are ready.  That way we can stage them as close to the beach as we can get them.  It may take longer to get there than we think.  The roads are mostly clear based on the last aerial reports but there’s a lot of variables once you leave the base.”  Leander said.  It was true.  The best laid plans typically fell apart as soon as you were confronted with the enemy.  People trying to kill you were annoying that way.

“Makes sense sir.  You want me to take a second look at how they’re armoring up the trucks and make sure they focus on those?”  LeBron asked.  He didn’t think Leander had called him up here just to validate the high-level strategy.  There really weren’t that many ways to get a group of stranded people from one spot to another in the middle of an apocalypse.  He knew he was stretching on the double check of the master chief’s work too.  He might as well offer to taste test an iron chef’s spaghetti sauce.

“Actually, I want you to roll out with the first truck and be my eyes and ears.  There’ll be a couple of Marines with you, but you’ve got more field experience than any of the other guys here.  I’ll make sure they know to listen to you.  I want to put your survival instinct to work for us.  You good with that?”  Leander didn’t look like he expected any sort of pushback.  After all he was sending LeBron out on a mission to save his siblings.  LeBron may not have as much combat experience as some of the Marines on the base but none of them had rolled through the zombified southern states in a convoy of trucks.  LeBron had done that with Blaze.  That type of experience could be the difference between success and a messy bloody death.

“Works for me sir.  Thanks for letting me go out after them.”  LeBron started backing away.  Now that he had his orders, he was ready to go.  He hated the idea of anything slowing him down knowing his brother and sisters lives may depend on him being there.  Of course, if option ‘A’ worked out all he’d be doing was sleeping in the back of a truck for a few days while crawlerz whacked away on it.  Yue and Drew would actually beat him back to the base in that case.

“You’re the right resource for the job.  Stay frosty out there.  I have a feeling option ‘B’ is going to be the way we end up going.  Nothing’s easy anymore.”  Leander said as way of dismissal.

LeBron left thinking by the time he got down the stairs the plan may have changed again.  That’s the way plans went now a days.  When you’re skiing down a mountain in the middle of an avalanche you have to go with the flow.  That’s what this felt like.  There was probably a million better ways to do what they were trying to do.  At some point you just had to pick a plan and run with it.  Of course, if a better option popped up you had to be flexible enough to jump that way.

If they had more intel on the state of the Ford they could come up with a better plan.  LeBron assumed Leander was thinking the same thing.  He was pushing to get LeBron and some others out in the field just to have some assets he could use if needed.  They were going to provide that flexibility to accommodate for whatever ended up happening.  It wouldn’t surprise him in the least bit for the plans to change again before they even left the base.

If everyone from the Ford was coming to the base, then Leander was going to be knocked down a few rungs as far as his position went.  That’d be interesting to watch play out.  As far as LeBron was concerned the leadership of the carrier had already shown themselves to be a bunch of idiots by sending for the infected guinea pigs anyways.  Shaking his head at the lunacy of everyone’s actions LeBron walked out on the floor where the Seabees and Marines were now working in fast motion.

He’d been hit by a wall of sound as soon as he opened the door.  Drills, hammers and anything else that could be used to bash metal into place were being played together in a symphony of loudness.  The composer of all this chaos stood in front of a truck that they’d just finished attaching a cage too.  Looking at the strong steel cage bolted on over the doors and windows LeBron could tell it’d be a pretty solid shield against the infected.  It was like they’d built out gigantic custom metallic lobster traps and fitted them over the cabs.  You had to go through a locked section of the lobster trap to even get access to the doors for the cab.  Those had been covered with a second layer of bars as well.

“Looks good master chief.  How much longer until this one’s ready to roll?”  LeBron asked.  He had to repeat himself so that Victor could actually hear him in order to get his question answered.

“A few hours.  Need to reinforce the bars and put something across the front to shunt the infected to the side.  The trailers should be fine.  We added a layer of sheet metal inside them anywhere they looked a little thin.  We have the Marines stocking them up with first aid, water, food and extra ammunition.  What’d our fearless leader have to say?”  Victor asked.

“I get to head out in the first truck you finish to help get the survivors from the ship back here.”  LeBron said simply.

“Do you even have your driver’s license?  Hopefully someone has put some thought into who’s going to be driving these things.  Any news yet on how bad the Ford got hit?  How many are going to make it off?”  Victor asked.  LeBron was still processing the fact that they needed to find people who could drive trucks.  He shook his head at Victor’s question.

“If Leander has details, he’s not sharing.  If it’s bad enough that they have to abandon the ship, then it must be really bad.  Otherwise they could’ve just flown the crew here.  Or at least as many as they could before they ran out of gas.  It sounded like everything’s just all screwed up. It must be really bad.”  LeBron said.  He started to choke up thinking of his brother and sister stuck in the middle of what must be all kinds of carnage.

“Yeah.  Well one step at a time.  Go see if any of those jarheads know how to drive a truck.  If not, I have a guy who can show them.  I guess I can spare him to train your guys.  If no one can drive the damned things, it’s pretty pointless building them.”  That sounded like a good action plan to LeBron.  He immediately left to figure out which Marines were being assigned to roll out with him.

Multiple phone calls later there was a group of ten Marines plus LeBron getting a quick tutorial on how to drive one of the big rigs.  On top of learning how to change gears and what all the other nerd knobs and doo hickeys did they also had to figure out how to drive with the giant metal lobster trap hanging around them.  Typically, they’d have liked some time to drive these around outside and iron out the bugs.  Unfortunately, any bug ironing was going to need to happen out in the field.  Out in the field where they’d be surrounded by millions of the infected.

Most of those millions were petrified of the sun though. As long as it was a nice bright day, they should be able to cruise over to Charleston easily enough.  They’d hoped to ride out at dawn, but it didn’t look like they were hitting that timeline at this point.  There were still people tweaking the cage and LeBron saw sparks flying off the far side of the first vehicle from where someone was still welding.  They’d just brought the massive elevator down to roll the truck out onto.

“Where are we at master chief?”  LeBron asked the remarkably calm looking man busy doing a dozen things at the same time.  He must have a doctorate in multitasking.

“I think we’re about ready.  You think you and your team are good for driving it?  You put any thought into any other gear you might need?”  Victor asked.

“Tons of ammo, extra weapons, food and water, first aid supplies…”  LeBron wandered off.  He felt like he was missing something.

“We threw some rope and a couple of outboard motors and an inflatable attack raft in the back too in case you need it.  A stack of sleeping bags and some other junk.  If you need to make room just ditch the crap.  This place has plenty.  If you’re ready to roll let’s do this.”  The master chief walked over to the phone and called upstairs.  LeBron turned around and went to grab the two Marines going with him.

Thirty minutes later they were at ground level parked in front of the hangar door ready to get going.  The Marine driving the truck was one of the few with actual experience driving a big rig.  His grandfather and father had both been independent truck drivers.  He’d been headed down that path himself right out of high school before getting the urge to sign up for the Marines.  LeBron was riding shotgun while the other Marine coming with them was tucked away in the back with a radio.

One thing LeBron had thought of that they didn’t have were the cameras like Blaze had placed on his trucks.  Those had made it a lot safer to open the doors.  It was nice to know ahead of time if there was something hiding under the trailer ready to jump out and bite your leg.  Victor had scrounged around but webcams had been one thing they weren’t able to find.  They added the stuff they’d need to build that out to their wish list.  They needed to send someone to loot a Best Buy.

The final challenge they faced was leaving the hangar.  Once again, all the CCTV equipment being located up in the barracks didn’t help them out.  That Best Buy trip kept moving higher up the priority list.  They had to open the hangar doors all the way to drive out.  Holding those doors open long enough for them to leave wasn’t a duty anybody wanted.  Carrying around metal rods for the dudes downstairs was going to become a real popular option soon.

End of the day it was pretty anticlimactic.  Every Marine on the base got called up to guard the area when the doors were finally opened.  The one surger who’d been hanging out by the doors got shot so many times that if the impact from the bullets hadn’t killed him, he’d have probably died of lead poisoning.  LeBron felt like the crawlerz were staring at them from the forest and the empty barracks space.  The final little screw you from losing the barracks came when they figured out that they’d have to drive through the closed gate to get out.

The cage around the cab held up well bashing them out.  LeBron was wondering why a military typically so preoccupied with building redundancy into everything had only wired up one button to open and close the gate remotely.  No one knew of a way to do it on the gate itself.  It wasn’t like the fence was doing much to discourage the surgers and crawlerz from coming on the base anyway. LeBron didn’t see it as any kind of major loss when they smashed it open.

Out on the open road again sitting high in the cab of the truck LeBron was sure he’d have another attack of agoraphobia.  Instead he found himself feeling strangely comfortable.  It felt good to be setting out on an operation he had such a personal connection to.  He’d felt lonely when Yue was sent away to the carrier then felt deathly alone once Drew boarded the plane to leave as well.  His newly found sense of calm was coming from the fact that he was going to have them with him again soon.  He just had to drive back and forth across a state that was going to come alive with the supernaturally strong living dead once the sun went down.  He really hoped the master chief hadn’t taken any shortcuts when he welded the truck together.

Chapter 25:  Abandon Ship

“All hands prepare to abandon ship.  Instructions will be piped to all hands over the speakers.  All hands hold steady and await further instruction.  Once called proceed to the nearest hatch to get on deck.  Be advised you may have to fight your way out.  Once on deck the sun is out but keep your guard up.  Place both hands in the air once on deck to identify as an uninfected.  Failure to do so could result in being shot.  Follow orders immediately to be quarantined.  This is not a drill.  That is all.”

The orders boomed out over the overhead speakers on every level of the ship.  The already frantic infected began rushing around even more at the sound of the human voice echoing around the passageways.  Up on the bridge they were watching the insanity belowdecks in all its 4K glory.  One glance up at the monitors and Yue was longing for a nice black and white old-fashioned CRT tube instead.

“So, do we like jump off the boat now or how does this work?”  Drew asked sitting up and trying to rub the sleep out of his eyes.

“About time you woke up.  You know you slept through a couple of helicopters attacking the ship with gigantic machine guns, right?”  Yue said looking lovingly down at the sleep rumpled hair of her brother.  He had a huge red mark across the side of his face where he’d been using his arm as a pillow.  His neck was glistening from the drool that’d dripped down his chin.

“Holy crap.”  Drew said in shock looking down at the massive drifts of the dead on the flight deck below.

“Yeah it’s been pretty bad.  They sent out a team to try and seal off that open hatch and they had to give up and run back.  There’s still a zillion of those things inside the ship.  You can see them on the monitors.”  Yue motioned to the monitors scattered around that were showing scenes from different sections of the ship.  Drew stared in awe at the gruesome scenes before slowly turning his attention back to Yue.

“What now?”  He asked simply.  He wanted nothing more than to be off this ship.  With his feet on dry land he had a million options.  Here he felt like he had one.  A long drop followed by a lot of swimming.

“We’re going to start calling up sections and see how it goes.  We’ll call up enough to fit in here with us then when the helicopters get here, they can take them to the island.  Depending on how many people make it up here alive we may have to get the healthy people to actually go over the side with rafts.  We’re close enough to the island that they can pretty much float over and make it.  The sub is going to help anyone out that can’t.  They won’t let them in the sub, but they’ll let them ride on top of it.”  Yue said.

“I get all of that but what about us?  We swimming or flying?”  Drew asked.  He was at the coffee station putting a filter into the basket and dumping in a pack of the grounds to make a fresh pot.  He’d studied the little bag of coffee grounds carefully to make sure he wasn’t making decaf by accident.  There really should be some sort of standard universal color code for that.  Once certain he’d dumped in the good stuff, he pressed the button to get the coffee started.

“It depends on what happens in the next few hours.”  Jeff appeared out of nowhere.  He’d probably smelled the coffee beginning to brew.  Yue was beginning to wonder if her new man had any blood at all in his coffee stream.

“What do you mean?”  Drew asked.

“I’m thinking we’re going to be using the helicopters to ferry a lot of the wounded out of here after we make sure they’re not in the middle of turning into a crawler.  If we get a lot of survivors, then we’ll start flinging life rafts into the water.  It might not be a bad idea for you two to be ready to make a jump for it.  Right now, we’re drifting slightly west, so you’d want to jump off the starboard side for your best chance.  When you hit you want to hit feet first and go in as streamlined as you can.  A lot of men try and hold their package.  From this height that can be painful enough when you hit to make you forget which way to swim.  You don’t want to swim under the carrier by accident.”  Jeff explained.  He was talking to Drew, but his red eyes were focused on the slowly filling coffee pot.

“How do we request the helicopter option?”  Yue asked.  She was obviously not excited about jumping off the flight deck.

“If everything happened to go super smooth, we’d be able to land the helicopters on the deck and spend the day ferrying everyone off.  Then it’d basically just be whoever was left when it started getting dark who’d have to jump.  Even then we could probably just leave them here overnight and restart operations in the morning.  If we have the hatches all secured, then we don’t have to stop once it gets dark either.”  Jeff said.

“When’s the last time anything went smooth?”  Drew asked rhetorically.

“Exactly.  That’s why I’m telling you to guard your goods when you jump.  I don’t want to hear about it if you forget.”  Jeff said smiling.

“I don’t get it?  How many more of them are there down there?  The flight deck is covered in bodies.”  Yue said.

“Yeah, a lot of those bodies are the Marines who were already up on deck when this started.  The bulk of the crew is still trapped below.  The infected and the uninfected.  The hangar is literally crawling with them.  I don’t know how some of them are ever going to make it out.  Especially the guys down in the engine room.”  Jeff got that far away look in his eyes again. He gave Yue a quick kiss before heading back to the front of the bridge with his cup of fresh hot brew.

“Well that wasn’t super reassuring.”  Drew commented.  He found a slice of window for him and Yue to look out of while they sipped at their coffee.  The carnage below was obscene.  Drew was happy they were up far enough from the deck that it was difficult to make out any real details.  As the sun started beating down it was going to start smelling really bad out there.  Assuming it didn’t already.  Even on the open deck of a ship at sea that was a lot of rotting meat.  Too much for the steady sea breeze to easily wash away.

Surgers scampered around the drifts of the dead.  A few of them tried to scale the superstructure.  The Marines stationed on the catwalk patiently waiting to kill any that made it far enough to become an actual threat.  There were guards pacing around the bridge catwalk as well as the flight operations catwalk up above.  The infected on the flight deck were beginning to congregate around the base of the superstructure.  That made sense since that’s where their prey was.

“Now hear this.  Now hear this.  All personnel in the forward section prepare to engage and evade to reach the flight deck.  Forward hatches to be thrown open on my mark in ten minutes.  Once on deck put your hands in the air and follow directions.  Please be advised you may be requested to immediately abandon ship.  If so head for the starboard side to disembark.  That is all.  Repeating this message in one mic.”

The announcement of the first formal attempt for a subsection of the crew to escape sounded throughout the ship.  The phones on the bridge had already been ringing non-stop.  Now it looked like a telethon was being hosted.  The crew below were calling up to report they couldn’t leave the areas they were in because they were surrounded by the infected.  Most of the crew trapped below had no weapons that’d be useful against the amped up demons.  You couldn’t expect to hit a crawler in the face with a broken pipe and survive.  The crawler would just spit out a couple of its teeth then proceed to rip you apart.

If they couldn’t get out, they were ordered to stand by for now.  It was hoped there’d be time to get back to them.  They started pumping Metallica into the aft sections of the ship to try and get the infected to all move in that direction.  Judging by the monitors it was working pretty well.

At the five-minute mark one of the helicopters appeared and began blasting away at the surgers out on deck.  The other helicopter showed up a minute later.  In addition to pulverizing the infected with large amounts of direct fire the two helicopters also kicked out a bunch of large crates.  Over the radio they let Jeff know that the boxes were full of ammunition and grenades.  Jeff thanked them for the party favors and ordered them to stand by to cover the men coming out of the hatches.  They couldn’t have those men go straight to the helicopters since they may be infected.  They absolutely couldn’t afford to lose either of those helicopter pilots.

One of the helicopters hovered while the other turned around and took off to refuel.  The pilot had noted the need for ferrying people back to the island.  The helicopter he was currently flying was intended for transporting crew, ammunition and the guns to kill the enemy with.  The last time they refueled he’d spotted what looked like a couple of Chinooks back on the airbase though.  If he could get one of those up and flying, then they’d be in businesses.  They could fit around sixty people on one of those bad boys.  They were forgiving and rugged enough to easily land on a flight deck covered in piles of bodies.  Jeff had approved.

Everyone stared as the remaining helicopter took out a few infected who popped up out of the open hatch on the stern.  The fire team down below took off to open hatches on the forward section of the flight deck.  As they threw them open orders were piped into the forward section of the ship to proceed as planned.  The message was kept short and sweet to keep from attracting the infected back to the forward section.  Eyes on the bridge were glued to the monitors.  Doors were thrown open as the desperate crew rushed into the passageways and made their way towards whatever hatches were closest to them.

The plan worked great for about the first ten seconds.  On monitor after monitor after that the terrified crew could be seen colliding with the ravenous crawlerz.  Moving with preternatural grace the demonic infected danced lightly down the passageways.  Mouths wide open they sang a lustful song of hatred as the desperate sailors fought them and each other to survive.  The panicked men and women began running in multiple directions at once.  Some of them turned and ran back for the shelter they’d just left.  Others doggedly continued towards the ladders for the hatches leading to the promise of safety.  Very few made it.

The fireteam stood by for the order to shut down the hatches.  The helicopter was flitting around like a gigantic mechanized hummingbird occasionally spitting streams of hot metal at any surger who decided to come up topside to see what was going on.  In the end only a couple of dozen sailors from the first section made it out the hatches.  Hundreds had tried and died in the tightly packed corridors.  The monitors showed the blood covered faces of the ghoulish infected as they fed on the flesh of those who didn’t turn fast enough.

Those that did turn began popping out of the open hatches.  The fire team was given the order to seal the ship back up.  Moving quickly and liberally utilizing the fragmentation grenades dropped off by the helicopters the Marines were able to get the hatches sealed with minimal incidents this time.  Mostly because the demons below were busy feasting on a buffet of the dead.  The grenades being dropped in those tight spaces helped a lot as well.  Not even the super strength lent to the infected via their overactive adrenal glands was enough to let them withstand a frag to the face in a such a tight space.

More of the infected came out of the hatch at the stern of the ship than emerged from the ones in the forward section.  The snipers on the catwalk and the helicopters rapid fire machine guns made mincemeat out of them.  The grenades took out the monitors in multiple critical areas.  At this point Jeff wasn’t stressing too much about that.  He was more concerned with not puking at the horror show playing out on the monitors.  One of the Marines on the bridge had his head in a trash can already.  Watching the gory feeding frenzy was beyond repulsive.  One by one the feeds were switched to the rear section of the ship.

“Those crewmen that made it.  I want to make sure they’re being quarantined.  If any of them show any signs of turning, order the men not to take any chances.  We’re going to try something different with the rear half of the ship.”  Jeff said a little too loudly.

“We going to try not getting everybody eaten alive in this next section sir?”  The Marine who said it was a young man who’d just graduated the scout sniper school before this all started.  He was also the one who’d had his head stuck in the trashcan to barf up his breakfast.  His eyes grew huge when he realized what he’d just said out loud.  It was obvious that wasn’t supposed to have gotten out of his head.  If the situation wasn’t so horrible the look on the young warrior’s face would’ve been hilarious.

The room was shocked into silence.  The young Marine having vocalized what they were all thinking.  Their half ass plan had just killed hundreds of their shipmates.  The man who’d been ultimately responsible for the order to initiate the failed plan looked like he’d seen a ghost.  He was pale as paper.  Yue wanted to go to him but was afraid the men would perceive that as an act of weakness.  Everyone waited respectfully while Jeff took a minute to breathe and get his balance back.  The people they’d watched die on the monitors were dead.  The only thing they could take from that failure were the lessons they’d learned.  They had to come up with a better plan this time.

“We need to let the ship breathe.  Let’s pop open the rear hatches and get as many of those things to come out as we can.  The more we can kill before we tell the crew to come out of hiding the better.  Let’s give our guys more of a chance this time.”  Jeff said.  He completely ignored the comment the young Marine had made.  The Marine’s face reflected his relief at not being called out.  That look lasted about five seconds. A senior officer tapped him on the shoulder and walked him out to the catwalk.  Through the window they could all see the wicked dressing down the guy got.

The helicopter could only hover for a short time before it would have to leave.  With that in mind Jeff gave the order for the fire team to proceed with opening the hatches.  By looking at the monitors he was hoping they could instruct the fire team which ones it’d be best to be prepared to chunk some grenades down into.  The one hatch already open was still an option for the infected to pop out of as well.  Jeff knew the surgers were going to probably take a week at least to convert to full on crawler mode.  With so many people being infected the bulk of them would be moving towards that crawler mode slowly.  At least based on what they knew so far about how it all worked.

“Does it bother you that the plan is changing every five seconds?”  Yue whispered to Drew.

“Plan seems like a pretty strong word for opening the doors and telling everyone to make a run for it.”  Drew whispered back.  It wasn’t completely fair.  The attempt had been made to lure the monsters to the other side of the ship.  It just hadn’t worked out.

“You think it’s going to work better this new way?”  Yue asked him.

“I think the sooner we get off this floating nightmare the more likely we survive.  We need to get back to check on LeBron anyway.”  Drew whispered back to her.  Yue nodded realizing in shame she hadn’t given LeBron much thought in the last twenty-four hours.

“Here we go again.”  Drew said pointing to where the fire team was running in a tight formation towards the hatches.  They were flinging them open and tossing in grenades then moving to the next one.  They left a man at each hatch until they’d opened all the access points available.  They reformed and ran like their pants were on fire to get back to the relative safety of the superstructure.

Their fear was warranted.  The infected began pouring out the open hatchways.  A trickle at first that quickly became a flood.  The helicopter and snipers were all firing at will now.  Blasting away with everything they had as the demons flooded the flight deck.

“At least LeBron is nice and safe back at the warehouse.  Surrounded by supplies and probably watching a movie right now.”  Yue said while bullets showered down on the deck below.  The bullets carving easily through the tender flesh of the infected crew of the Ford.  The men fleeing into the superstructure below were no longer in any sort of formation.  They were each running for their lives across the treacherous slaughterhouse.

“Yeah.  I’m just happy he’s not anywhere near this mess.”  Drew said quietly.

Chapter 26:  East Bound and Down

With their route clearly marked on the map the Marine driving the truck put the hammer down and they fairly flew down the asphalt.  More than a little concerned with how fast they were going LeBron kept a lookout for any infected who may decide to come at them head on.  Giant lobster cage or not a two hundred-pound surger smashing into the front of the truck would make a big mess.

“I wonder if they put extra window cleaning fluid in?”  LeBron said.

“What?”  The Marine driving looked over at LeBron with a confused expression.  It was the first thing LeBron had said since they’d bashed their way out of the compound.

“What’s your name?”  LeBron asked ignoring the Marine’s confused looking expression.

“Ciccone.  You can call me Mikey though.”  Mikey said.

“Cool.  I’m LeBron.  Like the basketball star but shorter and a million times less good at basketball.”  LeBron said.

“Great to meet you LeBron.  Now what’s up with the windshield wiper fluid?”  Mikey asked.

“As fast as we’re going if we hit a surger it’s going to burst like a water balloon filled with Campbell’s chunky goodness. The whole windshield will get covered in yuck.  Once you do that a few times you’ll be right there with me on wishing we had more wiper fluid.  Especially once there’s so much crap on the windshield you can’t even see the road anymore.”  LeBron explained.

“Is this about the windshield wiper fluid or are you just trying to tell me I’m driving like an asshole?”  Mikey said grinning and slowing the big rig down some to take the next turn.

“A little bit of both.”  LeBron said with an echoing grin.  “I’m worried about how well the cage is going to hold up if we hit a pack of infected head on.”

“If we hit a whole pack of them head on it won’t matter because we’ll have to stop anyway.  No way we have enough wiper fluid for that much yuck, right?”  Mikey joked.  He continued to slow down until he was only going slightly faster than LeBron considered safe.  That was a huge improvement over the insane speed they’d been going before.  LeBron realized he’d been holding his breath.

“You been outside the fence much since this all started?”  LeBron asked.  He was detecting a trace of nervousness in Mikey’s cocky facade.

“Nope.  I’m a complete noob.  Spent most of my time on the ship except for a detail guarding a supply depot on an island.  Still not sure what we were guarding it from.  Maybe they didn’t know the crawlerz couldn’t swim yet?  Or they were worried about bands of survivors stealing it?  Who knows?”  Mikey said shrugging.

“Ever see any action before this all started?”  LeBron asked.

“You realize I’m only like six years older than you right?  You already know I drove a truck a couple of years.  I did boot camp then a tour over in the Middle East.  Got spit on by a couple of camels.  Otherwise nothing more exciting than a few bar fights.  Except for the little skirmishes you’ve seen us in around the base.  I’m not expecting FedEx to drop off my silver star anytime soon.”  Sensing Mikey was getting a little heated LeBron refrained from asking any more questions along those lines.

“Thanks for slowing down.  We should be able to make up some time once we get to the highway.”  LeBron said wondering what Mikey was going to do when they were finally confronted by the infected.  He guessed they’d find out soon enough.

“No problem.  My sergeant already told me to do whatever you said if I wanted to live.  Living happens to be my number one priority so feel free to speak up anytime I’m being an idiot.  I have no issue with listening to the voice of experience.  If we run into some angry camels though I’m in charge ok?”  Mikey said.

“What if the camels are infected?”  LeBron asked playing along.  A stricken look crossed Mikey’s face.

“There’s freakin crawler camels now?  Animals can get this crap?”

LeBron was quick to reassure him that he hadn’t personally seen any infected animals.  He didn’t know that it was impossible, but he hadn’t seen any.  The back and forth between the two helped pass the time.  Before they knew it, they were out on the highway.  LeBron was pretty amazed they’d made it that far without running into any surgers.  They expected the surger population to be pretty low by now, but this was way better than anticipated.  Of course, it just meant there’d be even more crawlerz to contend with once the sun set.

They had a three-hour drive ahead of them under normal conditions.  Whatever normal meant now.  Assuming no crazy herds of infected camels or massive mobs of surgers showing up they should make decent time.  The only real concern while the sun was out was any groups of survivors who thought ambushing a military truck might be a good idea.  The irony there being that the base had been established to provide groups of survivors with the supplies they needed.  LeBron hoped that those who needed them didn’t get in the way of them rescuing his brother and sister.  That was the priority mission now.  Whether or not any desperate survivors would see it that way would hopefully remain an unknown.

The highway was as deserted as the smaller country roads had been.  Broken down vehicles had been shoved to the side in a few places.  There were no major traffic jams.  Everyone had plenty of warning the apocalypse was coming so there hadn’t been a major need for last-minute road trips.  For the most part people had been able to get where they thought they’d be safe with time to spare.  Then they’d died or been infected there.

LeBron only saw one surger on the entire drive down the highway.  It stumbled out of the woods as they were driving by and gave chase.  He watched it fall further and further behind them in the side mirror until it eventually disappeared.  Mikey remarked that was at least one surger they didn’t have to worry about.

“That thing will keep running after us until its legs fall off.  Unless it gets distracted by something else before it catches us.  Once they get your scent they don’t stop coming.  Which means when we stop to sleep for the night or pull over to pee it could show up again right when we’re not expecting it.”  LeBron said.  Mikey had mentioned wanting to learn as much as he could.  LeBron was happy to oblige him.  The more everyone knew about the threats out here the more likely they all were to survive.

“You just keep making this little Sunday drive more and more exciting.”  Mikey said.  LeBron almost laughed out loud when he caught Mikey staring into the mirror like he expected the surger to pop up again at any second.

They drove on talking about different things.  LeBron ended up telling the whole story of him being adopted and they joked some more about the whole LeBron thing.  Mikey understood a little better after that part of the discussion why LeBron was so gung-ho to be part of this mission.  He had his brother and sister to rescue.  It was smooth sailing until they got to the part where they had to turn off onto a smaller road to continue towards the coast.

At the bottom of the ramp where they needed to turn left there was a small pileup of wrecked cars under the overpass.  It looked like a couple of pickup trucks had been driving too fast and collided with a minivan coming from the other direction.  They were going to either have to get back on the highway to go up an exit or attach the winch and pull the wrecked vehicles out of the way.  As big as their truck was, they could probably just push the wrecked cars out of the way.  That would be risky since you never knew which pieces and parts might fall off the wrecks when you ran into them.  Those loose parts could flatten a tire really fast.  It’s not like they could call AAA.

“What do you think boss?”  Mikey asked looking over at him.

LeBron was busy tracing his finger over the atlas they’d brought with them.  The roads on this part of the atlas where super skinny grey lines indicating they were little two lanes.  He saw another way to get where they were going but it passed over a couple of rivers. The road they were on now looked like it just had to go over one of the little squiggly blue lines.  The fewer bridges they had to cross the better.

“Let’s get the guy in the back to winch the cars out from under there.”  LeBron replied.  He couldn’t quite place which Marine had actually jumped in the back.  Whoever it was had periodically checked in over the radio, but LeBron wasn’t having any luck attaching a face or name to the voice.  A few minutes of coordination over the radio later LeBron found himself standing on the hot asphalt next to another noob leatherneck who reintroduced himself as Mitch.

The name Mitch seemed out of place on the muscular blond Marine.  Shrugging off that oddity LeBron stood off to the side with his rifle while Mitch ran the cable from the winch over to the wreckage. LeBron turned in a complete circle to survey their surroundings.  The second he’d left the shelter of the truck he’d mentally switched over to defensive mode.  He felt naked and exposed standing in the middle of the road.  He knew how fast a surger could appear and take him out.

Sensing something was wrong LeBron stopped his circular motion to check out what Mitch was up to.  The Marine had wrapped a cable around the fender of one of the trucks so they could pull it out.  It’d be an even easier task if he could shift the pickup into neutral.  Mitch walked into the darker shadows under the bridge to see if he could do that.  LeBron slowly walked towards Mitch to provide more accurate cover fire if needed.

Mitch stood under the overpass yanking on the crumpled door to the bright yellow pickup.  What kind of person buys a bright yellow pickup anyway?  LeBron raised his rifle to his shoulder.  He stared through the sights at the pickup and the area around Mitch.  Something didn’t seem right.  Mitch must’ve sensed it also as he suddenly stood straight up and looked around.  Not seeing anything he went back to trying to get the door open so he could shift it into neutral.  There was a flash of movement from the top of the overpass.

“Get back!”  LeBron screamed at Mitch.

Mitch looked up from the door then immediately spun around groping for his rifle.  A dark shape flew through the air and slammed into him.  Mitch and the crawler that’d hit him both smashed into the side of the bright yellow pickup.  They bounced off the truck and rolled around in the dirt.  Mitch had his hands locked around the skinny crawler’s neck.  He was squeezing for all he was worth.  LeBron took off running towards them to try and help.  He tripped and tumbled right into the fight.

Springing back to his feet LeBron put the barrel of his M-16 on the side of the demon’s face and pulled the trigger.  He looked up right as another shadow slammed into his own legs knocking him to the ground.  He hit and rolled as fast as he could into the daylight.  The child crawler avoided following him into the bright sunlight.  Instead it launched itself at Mitch who’d just shoved the corpse of the other dead crawler off himself.  LeBron rushed over to help him again, but Mitch got the drop on the much smaller crawler this time.  He put a few holes into the infected adolescent from point blank range.

“All right man!  Nice shooting!  Now get out here.  Screw this bridge.”  LeBron shouted.  He was looking around for any additional threats that may be coming at them thanks to all the noise they’d just made.

Mitch walked out slowly stopping a dozen paces from LeBron.  He held his hand up in the air.  It was covered in blood.  Something looked off about it.  LeBron focused and realized Mitch was missing a finger.  On closer inspection the finger was still there it was just bent back and dangling off a thin strip of flesh.  The bone was fully exposed.

“Do you think this is ok?”  Mitch asked holding up his hand.  The shock obvious in the way he spoke and the paleness of his skin.  It was not ok.

LeBron wondered if maybe he’d shot Mitch in the hand by accident.  That’d explain the dangling finger.  That’d keep him from having to kill him.  He’d been the one to come up with the plan to move the cars.  They could’ve just gone around.  Maybe Mitch would be fine?

Mitch noticed that LeBron had his rifle aimed right at him.  He started to go for his own rifle but ended up just staring at it.  He was looking at it like he had no idea what it was.  LeBron took a couple of steps back.  He had to be sure.  Up in the truck Mikey was watching in horror.  He’d been friends with Mitch for a few months now.  They’d been on plenty of the same guard details.  Even to a noob like him it was pretty obvious what was playing out on the deserted debris strewn street in front of him.

LeBron waited.  He made sure to keep plenty of distance between himself and Mitch.  He didn’t want to kill Mitch while he was still Mitch.  He waited for the head to snap up and the teeth to gnash together.  He waited for that eerie low growl that haunted his nightmares.  Mitch was gone.  A demonic surger now stood in his place.  LeBron didn’t hesitate to put the creature down.  Breathing hard from the adrenaline and fear he walked over to the winch and hit the button.  The tires didn’t move on the wreck, but the winch worked to drag it out regardless.

LeBron watched sadly as the ruined yellow pickup slid out from under the bridge.  As a bonus the car the pickup had crashed into also came skidding loudly out at the same time.  Mitch had died for no reason.  Like so many others in this screwed up world.  Once the wrecked vehicles were out of the way LeBron moved Mitch over to the side of the road and covered him with some of the parts that had fallen off the vehicles.  The pragmatic part of him was happy to be removing the possible tire gouging parts off the road.

Once he was done with covering Mitch up as well as he could under the circumstances he climbed back in the cab with Mikey.  Without another word Mikey drove them carefully under the bridge and they continued on their way to the coast.

Chapter 27:  The King is Dead, Long Live the King!

This time they were more cautious.  They monitored each passageway and alerted groups individually by phone when they should make a run for it.  They no longer bothered telling people to bring makeshift weapons.  Unless they had a gun their best defense against the infected was to not be seen by the infected.  Jeff ordered the men to proceed slowly and methodically with the evacuation. They were going room by room and individual by individual.  It was during this monitoring process that a discovery was made.

They got locked out of the monitors when the Marine controlling them went on a break and unthinkingly shut down the computer station he was at.  No big deal except that he hadn’t been the one who logged into it originally.  That guy was dead.  They called down to one of the rooms a couple of the ship’s officers were still alive in. Jeff ordered them to give up their usernames and passwords.  When they logged back in, they noticed they had access to a lot more cameras.  When they asked, they were told since it was a coed ship there were varying levels of access to keep anybody from doing anything stupid.  Evidently the system was setup so that only certain individuals could peek at the shower areas.  Rank hath it’s privileges.

“So now we can see in the women’s berthing areas on top of a bunch of other places we didn’t have access to before.”  The Marine was explaining to Jeff what’d happened when the man at the workstation behind him suddenly held his hand up in the air.  Wondering if he really expected to be called on like they were in English class Jeff coughed loudly and pointed at him.  All eyes turned to look at the excited Marine bent over a video screen.

“It’s the VP sir!”  The Marine said pointing at the miserable looking politician hunched over on the deck in a large closet filled with cleaning supplies.  There was a deep sink in the corner for washing out mop buckets, so he had access to drinking water at least.  There were also a couple of corpses in the room with him.  He’d pushed those over to the side so far that they were barely visible on the camera.

Jeff and everyone else crowded around the monitor and began hurling questions at the Marine who’d located the Vice President.  There were a lot of cameras on board.  A lot of them hadn’t been accessible before they got the higher-level password.  A good number of them just hadn’t been checked yet either.  They had a very limited number of people to look at all the different cameras.  The VP was a deck below the main hangar bays.  Peering over the map of the ship Jeff traced out the best path to get to him.

They used the cameras to take a look at the best route to take through the ship to rescue him.  It was crawling with cannibalistic crewmen.  Lives were going to be lost to rescue the VP.  Jeff looked at the map contemplating what he should do.  Was risking the lives of four or five Marines worth pulling out an old politician?

“We have a team we can send sir.  I can have them start working up a plan.”  One of the important looking Marines said.  Drew had nicknamed him Jack because he looked just like Jack Nicklaus in that movie ‘A Few Good Men.’ Jeff continued staring at the diagram.

“How many men do you think it’ll take to safely pull him out?”  Jeff finally asked.

“We have enough to get him out sir.  We’ll just need to work up a plan.”  The Nicklaus looking Marine answered.  He seemed uncertain as to how to answer the question.

“How safe will it be for the men we send down to get him out?  What do you think those casualties look like?”  Jeff asked.

“He’s the President of the United States now sir.  We can’t just leave him down there.”  Drew was waiting for the right time to jump in and yell that none of them could handle the truth.  Realizing he was actually thinking of doing that he put his hand over his mouth.  He didn’t want to be dragged out on the catwalk and dressed down like the Marine earlier for not being able to keep his thoughts safely locked in his head where they belonged.

“Of course.  Carry on.”  Jeff finally said.  He never turned his head from the small map of the ship he was pretending to scrutinize.  Yue saw his shoulders slump though.  Sending men to die was never an easy thing to do.  Sending men to die when you didn’t think the mission was worthwhile must be even harder.  Based on the short exchange she’d seen Yue was thinking Jeff didn’t think the VP was worth it.

The Jack Nicklaus impersonator was right of course.  If they left their constitutionally appointed next in line down there to die, then they might as well throw out the whole concept of rebuilding the United States.  Once you had the military doing things like standing around twiddling their thumbs while the next President slowly starved to death next to a shelf full of buffing wax the American dream could safely be proclaimed dead.

A small planning team was thrown together with some of the more seasoned operators.  Jeff let the captain of the submarine following them know they’d located a VIP.  He was hoping he could offload the guy straight to them.  He knew the Vice President.  Where the President had been a courageous self-made man adept at navigating the Washington politics the Vice President had been a third-generation politician. The VP had come from a family descended directly from a famed robber baron.  Where the president had to be shown why it was needful to let the United States succumb to the infection the Vice President had been all about securing special privileges for the elite and wealthy.

The Vice President was an old money slimy politician who only cared about himself.  At least so far as Jeff had been able to infer from the limited time he’d spent in the other man’s company.  It killed Jeff that at least one or two of the valuable assets they sent down into the depths of the ship to pull out the VP probably wouldn’t make it back.  Any of the men on that rescue team were worth twenty DC politicians.  Especially one like the VP.  He’d been way more concerned with how his friends had been doing than with how the country was doing.

Jeff had been forced to divert valuable resources away from building out the warehouses like the one in the south region to help with the VPs connected friends.  There were numerous depots that’d been outfitted to get rich connected people through the dying times.  Those bases had the full protection of the US military as well as stockpiles of weapons and supplies.  They’d been setup as little self-sustaining cities.  It was amazing what could be accomplished on short order with billions of dollars and the support of the government.

Jeff knew he had no choice in the matter.  If he ordered the rescue team to stand down, they’d probably just go anyway.  The kind of man the VP was if he found out Jeff had told the men to stand down, he’d declare him a traitor and have him shot.  No matter what his personal feelings were about the VP the man was next in line for the mantle of leadership for the United States.  The USA may be more of an idea right now than a reality.  However, with the might of the surviving military and the caches of supplies they’d staged around the country with some luck and hard work they could get back to something like normalcy.  If not now than within two or three generations at least.

He took a sip of his coffee and noticed it was cold.  That meant he could head over to the coffee pot and get himself another cup.  More important it meant he’d be able to take a quick Yue break.  He’d just met her, and they’d really only had that one date, but he felt like there really was something there.  He already depended on her.  He hoped she was more than a temporary crutch.  He also hoped she didn’t see the failure in his eyes that he felt in his heart at giving the order to collect the VP.  Yue met him at the coffee station and poured him a fresh cup.

“Hey, you can pour without spilling.  There’s hope for you yet.”  Jeff joked.

“Maybe I spilled on purpose.  You ever think of that?”  Yue said with a flirtatious smile.  Drew turned and walked away wanting no part in this scene.  The age difference alone between his sister and Jeff was enough to make him want to start throwing punches.

“Did you?”  Jeff asked curiously.  If she’d managed to pull all of that off on purpose, she’d missed her calling.  She should either be a spy or a world-famous actress.  The next 007 had been stolen from the world of motion pictures by the arrival of the infection.

“Nope.  Complete accident.  I was hoping to get your attention though.”  Yue said.  She’d gotten close enough that his coffee breath was starting to make her have second thoughts about him.  Luckily, he was so tall she wasn’t getting a direct hit.  She thought about asking him to maybe look away from her while they talked.  They really should have some mints at the coffee station.

“Really.  Romantic walk on the catwalk?  I need some air.”  Jeff asked her.  He stuck out his arm for her to hold once she nodded her agreement.

Rather than stroll around the bloody one looping around the bridge Jeff took Yue up to the air traffic control catwalk.  Standing there leaning against the safety railing Yue got a good look at how high above the deep blue sea they were.  She also had a nice view of the sandy island they’d be making their way to later.  The strong wind whipped her hair painfully against her face until she pulled it back into a ponytail.  Jeff watched in amusement while she got that taken care of.  The two snipers stationed up on the catwalk migrated over to the far side to give the two of them some space.

“Not a fan of the VP?”  Yue asked once she had her hair situation taken care of.  Jeff looked momentarily surprised then smiled sheepishly.

“I didn’t realize I’d made it that obvious.”  He said fighting to keep his voice low enough to keep the snipers from eavesdropping while loud enough for Yue to hear him over the wind.

“There’s a chance not everybody in the room picked up on it.”  Yue said sarcastically. She put her hand on his arm to lessen the impact of the words.

“It was that bad?”  Jeff said.  Both his hands were resting on the railing of the catwalk.  His knuckles turned white as he gripped and ungripped the steel bar working the stress out.

“Yeah, pretty much.  I don’t think you were talking any of those gung-ho dudes downstairs into leaving the new President behind no matter how much of a prick he is.  They’re going to go get him.”  Yue slid her hand up on his bicep and gripped it tightly to get his attention.  “Some of them may not make it back.  They all know that.  It’s what they do.  It’s not your fault.”

“Thanks.”  Jeff said embracing Yue and giving her a slightly more passionate kiss than usual.  He broke it off when he remembered there were a couple of enlisted men standing less than fifteen feet away from them.  When he glanced over both men were doing their best to be looking in another direction.

Ignoring the men who were busy ignoring them they embraced in the wind far above the sea for a few precious minutes.  The moment was etched into their memories forever.  Yue couldn’t imagine a more perfect embrace had ever happened in the history of hugs.  With a sigh Jeff finally broke the spell by moving his arms away. He told her it was time they headed back downstairs.  The snipers behind them didn’t even notice they’d left.  They were too busy shooting the growing number of infected popping out of the hatches below.  It was like playing a weird game of whack a mole with devils popping out of hell.  The memories etched into their heads were of the grossly contorted faces of their infected shipmates. They had to stare into the faces of each one as they put the crosshairs on them to take them out.

On the bridge the mood was somber.  The lower level of the superstructure was at capacity.  They were going to start sending the healthier crew members up the ladder after their quarantine time to sit in the air traffic control tower.  The plan for how they were going to rescue the soon to be sworn in President was good to go.  It was basically a full-scale assault on the spaces leading to the closet the VP was hiding out in.  They’d be sealing off hatches as they went to create a secure route to take the VP back through as well as to protect their flanks.  They’d seal up the hatch they went down into the ship through to keep the infected from following them down.

Amazed by the audacity of the men who were ready to jump into the belly of the ship and fight their way down through multiple decks filled with these lightning-fast killers Jeff approved the plan.  It wasn’t like there was going to be a better one.  At least not that he could come up with.  This is what these guys did.  The problem was a good portion of their tactics were predicated on the enemy reacting a certain way.  This enemy definitely didn’t react the way they were supposed to.  A lot of the rules of warfare were based on the idea that most people have a deeply ingrained fear of being hurt.  The crawlerz could care less.

The lieutenant and gunny sergeant leading the rescue team left the bridge immediately once Jeff approved the plan.  They met up with their men on the crowded deck level of the superstructure and stacked up on the door.  They went out right as a small group of the crew who’d just made it out onto the deck came in.  The rescue team moved quickly to the hatch and waited for the signal to move in.  Back on the bridge the man on the monitor station doublechecked the passageway they’d be hopping down into.

“Be advised there are multiple tangos in the passageway.  Recommend a frag before you drop in.”  The man on the monitor advised over the headset communication device he was wearing to talk to the team below.  A small crowd of officers was gathered in tightly behind the communication lead.  They were listening intently to his words while they watched the monitor and tried not to second guess the tactics.  The grenades destroyed the cameras.

“Be advised rescue team the grenades have taken out the camera.  We have zero visibility.”  The man on the monitor let the team know.  They acknowledged and entered the hatch in a single file line.  Drew watched them disappear into the dark hole.  When they were all out of sight, he turned around to see what was going on at the monitor station.  They had the next passageway pulled up that the team should be moving into.

The man on the radio was letting the rescue team know there were a couple of tangos in the next passageway as well.  This time they watched from the enemies point of view over the monitors as the stairs suddenly filled up with the body armor covered elite warrior rescue team.  They moved smoothly forward with half of the team splitting off to cover the passageway in the opposite direction.  Barrels spewed long streams of fire as the men moved aggressively at their targets.  For their part the infected ran right into the barrage of hot lead with zero hesitation.  Their massive adrenaline surges carrying a few of them all the way to the men shooting them.  Even with massive wounds drenching the deck with their blood they kept coming.

The team secured the passageway and methodically advanced down the next set of stairs taking out more of the infected as they went.  The monitors didn’t have audio, but Drew could imagine how loud the passageways must be with the Marines firing almost constantly into the screaming psychos running and jumping at them like suicidal drunken acrobats.  That constant firing was going to take its toll on their ammunition supply.  Drew was beginning to wonder if they were going to have enough to make it all the way to the VP closet.

The Marines had one spot they couldn’t clear out and lock down as they passed through it.  They had to come down beside the main hangar and take a side passage to get to the level the VP was at.  It was the same level the former President was still wandering around on in his eternal quest for brains.  Or at least it’d be an eternal quest until the ship sank or one of the rescue teams clipped him.  Drew wondered if killing the President would make swearing in the new President easier from a legal standpoint.  He didn’t remember anything from that Netflix series with Keifer Sutherland about how the line of succession worked if the President got turned into a zombie.

The rescue team went through the open space in a flurry of automatic weapons fire.  It was the only place on their route they were going to have to worry about coming back through.  They’d have to give it some time for that area to clear out.  The open space the team had just passed through filled up like the front couple of rows at a major rock concert in less than a minute after they passed through it.

The men around the bridge let out a collective sigh of relief when the cameras showed the team crashing in and securing the room the VP was in.  Drew assumed they still called him the VP until he was sworn in and became the P.  There appeared to be a quick argument between the VP and the lieutenant but then one of the men bent down and tossed the bloody body of an older woman across his shoulders.  The lieutenant came across the radio and advised they had the package and were beginning exfiltration on their mark.

The only part that really required a mark was the part where they had to go through the unsecured section of the hangar.  The man on the radio moved his mouse around until he was able to control the speakers on the far side of the hangar as a group.  He started making noises like he was calling a dog.

“Here crawler, crawler, crawlerz…”

It sounded dumb but it worked.  Now all they had to do was install an overhead paging system across the entirety of the USA and they’d be able to easily send groups of the infected wherever they needed to.  The rescue team rapidly transitioned through the vacated space and into the cleared-out passage up the ladder next to it.  On the monitor they saw a couple of explosions as the passageway the rescue team had gone into was sealed off from the inside.  They must’ve tossed out a couple of frags for the hell of it.

Then it was over.  The VP and his corpse bride had been rescued.  He was sworn in on the bridge to a round of applause.  His first official order as President was for someone to find a coffin for his dead wife.  Then the newest President of the United States put his head down in his arms and cried.

Chapter 28:  Just a Flesh Wound

“Now what?”  Mikey asked.

It was a valid question.  The bridge they needed to cross to get to the rendezvous point wasn’t there anymore.  There were just some random support beams and piles of concrete sticking up out of the fast-flowing river.  Someone had gone through the trouble of having it blown up.  If the residents had done it before the infection spread to their area it may well have saved them.  If the military had done it afterwards to try and establish a safe haven it still may have helped many of them to survive.  Either way LeBron wasn’t seeing a way for them to drive around it.  They could backtrack but he had a sneaking suspicion they’d find the other bridges had received similar treatment.

“We’re going to need a boat.”  LeBron said hesitantly.  He was thinking they could ditch the truck and take a boat to the little island rendezvous point.  That was going to require finding a boat.  They had the inflatable assault raft in the trailer, but he wasn’t sure what kind of range that thing had.  It wouldn’t do them much good to make it to the rendezvous point then not be able to make it back to the truck.

“When do you think the next truck will get here?”  Mikey asked.

It was like he was reading LeBron’s mind.  He’d just been wondering the same thing.  If another truck happened to pull up right about now it’d sure make life easier.  They could leave a couple of men to guard the trucks that way.  LeBron supposed they should start trying the CB radio to get in contact with the next truck.  He kind of doubted they were in range yet though.  It took time to build the cages and prep the trucks.  He wasn’t expecting to see the next truck for another four to six hours at the earliest.  It may be even longer since no one was going to try driving once the sun set.

“I’m not sure we have time to wait for them to show up.  We need to make contact with the crew from the ship.  They’re expecting us, so I want to make sure we’re there on time.”  LeBron answered slowly.  He wasn’t really clear as to what their next steps should be.  He wasn’t a fan of leaving their nicely outfitted truck full of supplies sitting here on the side of the road for any random survivor to take.  The only saving grace being the reinforced vehicles were meant to keep people out.  If those people were psychotic cannibal freaks with extremely diminished cognitive capabilities.  If a regular guy with a set of bolt cutters stumbled on the truck they were screwed.

“It’s starting to get kind of late right?”  Mikey reminded him.  The shadows were stretching out longer.  It wouldn’t be safe out in the open pretty soon.  LeBron looked down at the map and did some mental math.

“Yeah, even if we found a boat to use, we wouldn’t make it there until after dark.  This river looks like it wraps around everywhere.  I don’t know that we’d be able to find an island in the ocean in the middle of the night.  I say we do a quick search around here to see if there’s a boat we may be able to use in the morning then we turn in for the night.  We can hit it again first thing in the morning.” LeBron said.  He hated saying it.  Any sort of delay could be the death of his brother and sister.

“Makes sense.  Hopefully the next truck shows up soon.  Maybe by morning we’ll have us a convoy.”  Mikey said.  He was staring off the side of the bridge.  You could see the overgrown yards of the multimillion-dollar homes lined up along the river.  Each of them had a dock extended out over the water.

“Let’s get down there and see if we can find one that we can figure out how to get started.”  LeBron said.  He’d walked over to stand beside Mikey.  Seeing what Mikey was staring at he’d also started checking out the homes along the river.

It took the rest of the day to confirm that every single one of the expensive boat houses were missing the actual boats. Exhausted and defeated they drove across the road and up a long driveway to a home without a million-dollar river view.  As they pulled in at the end of the drive, they noticed a trailer holding a nice-looking tarp covered boat sitting in the backyard.  Mikey shut down the truck and opened his door to go check it out.

“Let’s wait until morning.”  LeBron said once he’d gotten out as well.  It was way too dark outside for his comfort.  They hadn’t seen any of the infected all day. They’d seen the standard signs of the apocalypse sprinkled around everywhere though.  All of the random destruction that popped up in this world they were stuck living in.  The obvious things like missing windows, cars in ditches, decomposing bodies in odd places.  There was also that weird hum in the air.  That constant feeling of being watched.  LeBron thought it could just be his own paranoia, but Mikey said that he felt it too.

They locked up the cab of the truck and circled around to the back to lock themselves in for the night.  The sound of a table being knocked over in the house they were parked beside freaked both of them out.  Mikey dropped the keys in the dirt.  LeBron came close to putting a few rounds into the house.  The only thing that held his trigger finger back was the thought of all of the noise that’d make.

Mikey finally got the padlock off and they hopped up in the back.  Once inside they used the bars welded to the floor and ceiling to secure the doors.  Once they were safely tucked in, they flipped on the electric lantern hanging on the wall.  The pile of sleeping bags revealed by the light beckoned to them both.  They’d just started laying out a couple of the bags when the first crawler slammed into the side of the trailer.  It hit so hard LeBron thought that maybe a tree had fallen on top of them.  He knew immediately what it must really be when the hits kept coming.  Pretty soon the strikes were coming from every direction.

“They can’t get in, right?”  Mikey said nervously looking around.  In a few places the walls of the trailer were rippling where the crawlerz were slamming into it.  It made LeBron happy the master chief had felt the need to bolt some extra sheet metal to the insides of the trailer.

“I hope not.  The other trailers I used to sleep in weren’t anywhere near as solid these and they held up fine.  Probably wouldn’t be a horrible idea to sleep in shifts though.  Keep an eye on the walls until these things give up and leave.”  LeBron said.  He left out the fact that the crawlerz slamming into the trailer were the loudest ones he’d ever heard.  They must be hurling themselves through the air like horizontal cliff divers.  Knowing they were completely oblivious to their own bodily pain he wasn’t going to be surprised in the morning to find a few bodies scattered around the oversized driveway.  They’d literally break their own necks trying to get at them.  They also wouldn’t just give up and leave.  Not until the sun came up and forced them to seek shelter anyway.

“Cool.  You sleep first since you’re used to this crap.  I don’t know how the hell you sleep through something like this.  I should’ve brought some pills or a bottle of something.”  Mikey said nervously.  He absolutely looked like he could use a drink.

Mikey woke LeBron up at around three in the morning.  The crawlerz were still banging into the trailer on a regular basis.  Neither Mikey nor LeBron had said a word since planning out their sleeping schedule earlier.  True to form the crawlerz were able to tell they were there whether they made any noise or not.  It was freaky.  Especially when you paired it up with that weird energy and sense of being watched.  LeBron sat miserably in the middle of the trailer rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.  Mikey passed out as soon as his head hit the floor.  His fear wasn’t enough to continue to fight off his body’s need to sleep.

The attack on the trailer slowed then stopped altogether as the sun came up.  LeBron had found a corner of the door where a tiny little gap let him see the dawn creeping in.  He said a quick prayer like he did every time he lived to see the sun come up.  It was a habit he’d gotten into over the past few months.  One he was sure his mom would’ve approved of.  It was her face he pictured when he prayed which was the main reason that he kept doing it.  To stop now would be like letting her go and he wasn’t ready to do that.  Not yet.

Seeing that light filtering in he walked back to nudge Mikey awake with his boot.  He then jumped backwards to avoid getting pummeled by a freaked out Marine.  Mikey didn’t handle being woken up abruptly by feeling something poking at him very well.  Once they’d both calmed down from that unexpected excitement, they made sure their weapons were ready to go and went back to the doors.  Wishing once again that they had video cameras on the outside of the trailers LeBron worked the first steel bar out of its groove to open the back door.  Mikey stood back a couple of feet with his rifle to his shoulder ready to kill any infected that made an appearance.

They pulled up all the steel bars and swung the doors open.  The area they were in didn’t seem to have any surgers in it which was a great thing.  It meant they didn’t have to shoot their way out of the trailer.  It was nice to occasionally have some good luck.  Mikey started to hop down off the truck to the ground below.  LeBron grabbed him by the shoulder before he could get out.

“You need to jump far enough that if there’s a crawler curled up under the trailer they don’t decide to go after you.  They don’t necessarily sleep the day away.  A lot of the time they’re just lurking around.  Or maybe they wake up when they sense us coming by.  That’d explain that weird energy we both keep feeling.”  LeBron whispered.  Now that the sun was up, he probably didn’t need to whisper.  Old habits die hard though.  Especially old habits that’ve kept you alive in a world filled with death.

“Got it.  Jump far so I don’t get Hungry Hippoed by a crawler.”  Mikey said.  He tried to say it nonchalantly, but LeBron saw him physically gulp at the thought of a pile of crawlerz writhing around underneath the trailer.

He took a few steps backwards to get a running start.  That was probably overkill.  LeBron hoped it didn’t end up with him supporting the large Marine the rest of the day as he limped around on a twisted ankle.  He held his breath as Mikey jumped.  It wasn’t pretty.  He tried to jump way too far.  Fear and paranoia propelled him through the air like a cheaply constructed mannequin shot out of a cannon.  His arms and legs waved around wildly.  He hit the ground and immediately tumbled into some kind of drunken somersault.

It would’ve been hilarious except for the very real threat of pale bodies swooping out from under the trailer at superhuman speed to rip the flesh from his body.  Also dampening the hilarity was the fact that Mikey was carrying an automatic weapon.  He’d jumped with his finger on the trigger and a full magazine slammed in.  LeBron wondered if he should lie down on the floor of the trailer to prevent Mikey from shooting him by accident.  He overcame the urge for self-preservation and maintained his overwatch position in the back of the trailer. He kept his rifle trained on the area where Mikey came to rest.

When nothing moved and Mikey didn’t accidentally shoot him LeBron let himself relax for a second.  Mikey went to a knee once he recovered from his overzealous jump.  He did a thorough inspection of the underside of the trailer.  He didn’t see any crawlerz hanging out underneath it which made him extremely happy.  LeBron hopped down and together they cleared the area before focusing in on the reason they were parked there to begin with.

The half-hidden boat trailer they’d seen sticking out of the backyard was conveniently complete with tarp covered boat.  Judging by the expensive looking house LeBron assumed the boat was going to be decent.  Him and Mikey worked together to try and get the cover off of it.  The bungee cords and ropes and levers conspired against them.  After a couple of minutes of screwing around their knives came out and the tarp was shredded.

“This thing’s huge.”  Mikey said stepping back to take in the oversized adult toy they’d just unwrapped.

“It’s really on the smaller side as far as boats go.  I think it just looks huge because it’s out of the water.”  LeBron said.  He was wondering how they got it in the water.  There was probably a boat launch around somewhere, but he had no idea how that worked.  He was pretty sure normal people didn’t haul a boat trailer with an eighteen-wheeler.  He didn’t see them being able to slowly back the boat in.  He looked over at Mikey who looked as dumbfounded as he felt.

“Let’s check the radio and see if anybody else is here yet?”  Mikey finally suggested.

“Yeah, I think we may need to phone a friend on this one.  It figures we’re here to rescue a bunch of sailors and neither of us know how to work a boat.”  LeBron said.  He wished for the millionth time that the internet was still up.  He could’ve probably YouTubed everything they needed to know in under ten minutes.  As it was, he had no clue.  They hadn’t even been able to figure out how to get the tarp off without resorting to knives.

Walking over to the cage to climb up into the cab LeBron wanted to smack himself in the forehead.  The first thing they should’ve done this morning was reach out on the radio to see if anyone else had made it here yet.  The tarp could’ve waited.

“What the hell?”  Mikey said.  The words shot out of his mouth at the sight of the side of the trailer they’d spent the night in.  He’d been so focused on the bottom of it he hadn’t seen the side of the olive-green trailer yet.  LeBron knew immediately what he was talking about.  It was hard to believe that human beings could’ve made the oversized dents in the side of the trailer using nothing but their own bodies as projectiles.

LeBron left Mikey to gape at the massive dents.  He unlocked the access piece of the cage so he could crawl up into the cab.  He grabbed the radio as soon as he was in the cab and reached out to see if anyone had joined them yet.  He didn’t get back a response after the first broadcast so tried again.  Mikey crawled up in the cab and joined him in listening to the nothingness coming back at them.  They were about to give up and go stare at the boat a little longer when a voice crackled on the radio.

Twenty minutes later another truck pulled into the driveway.  The crew driving that one had stopped before getting to the demolished bridge.  They’d spent the night in their trailer and been understandably freaked out by all the action.  Over the radio they’d confirmed one of the men in their truck had spent his summers working on boats up in New England.  That sounded promising.  At least until the guy admitted he’d never actually had to put a boat in the water.

“This can’t be that hard.  We’ll figure it out.”  Mikey said exasperatedly.

The first thing they ruled out was attaching the trailer to one of their big trucks.  There was just no way they’d be able to use it to back a boat into the water and launch it.  Especially if the launch area was a tight squeeze.  Assuming the owner of the house must’ve had a way to move his boat they decided to break in the garage and see what kind of vehicles may be in there.  The small team formed up and burst through the front door of the large home ready to do damage to anything that got in their way.

LeBron was relieved that the foyer and the great room turned out to be the right kind of boring.  Nothing attacked them and other than some obnoxiously purple sparkly throw pillows on the ground there wasn’t anything in the house to indicate anything bad had ever occurred there.  It wasn’t like the throw pillows were extremely ominous.  They just stood out since the rest of the house was ridiculously tidy and elegant.  The house must’ve been a seasonal residence that wasn’t in use when the infection struck.

LeBron was feeling pretty good about the house as they tromped through it looking for the door to the garage.  At least he was until he spotted the missing slider off the side of the kitchen.  It looked like the Incredible Hulk had come along and smashed the sliding door assembly out of its frame.  In front of them was what appeared to be a laundry room leading out into a pitch-dark garage.  They could tell it was pitch dark out there because the door was hanging off of a single hinge.

LeBron’s combat instinct went to full on red alert.  He wanted to wrap his arms around the Marines in front of him and yank them all out of the house.  He caught a glimpse of glowing red eyes staring back at them from the inky darkness inside the rectangular hole where the door was barely hanging on.  He ignored his intuition for a critical second telling himself it was just his nerves.  His fear of looking like a freaked-out kid in front of these veteran warriors clamping his mouth shut.

The Marine on point clicked on his flashlight.  The bright white beam painted the inside of the garage.  A large red pickup truck surrounded by a writhing pile of deathly silent crawlerz popped into view.  The crawlerz skittering in all directions like a giant pile of pale cockroaches when the light hit them.  Cussing, screaming and weapons going off in complete disregard for their training the tight group tried to surge backwards out of the cramped laundry room.  Terror had them tightly locked in its icy grip.

The instincts that’d helped keep LeBron alive kicked in now.  Cursing himself for not calling out the warning when it first hit him LeBron spun and ran for the hallway.  Once he was in the well-lit great room he spun around and brought his own rifle to bear.  The deafening noise of multiple weapons being fired inside the home rolled over him like a wave in a waterpark.  You knew it was coming but it still surprised you with its power.

Mikey and another man came running down the hallway.  They were both yelling at LeBron to get down.  A second later the house exploded.  Both of the Marines had pulled the pins on grenades and rolled them in the general direction of the garage.  One of the grenades had landed inside a very expensive washing machine.  Now it was a pile of shredded metal.  The grenades had the desired effect of subduing the crawlerz coming at them.  The only reason the two of them had escaped was the bulk of the beasts had gotten entangled with the corpses of the lead Marines in the tiny space.  A feeding frenzy had slowed the onslaught enough to allow them to toss the grenades and make a run for it.

Outside in the grass the newcomer bent over and puked.  Mikey was hopping on one leg trying to see how bad the shrapnel that’d ripped through his calf had hurt him.  He had blood all over the bottom of his pants but appeared to be ok otherwise.  An uncontrollable desire to ask him if it were only a flesh wound was pounding inside LeBron’s head.  He won the internal struggle to keep that thought to himself.

“We’ve got to get out of here.”  LeBron said to the others.

“Is it ok if I finish bleeding first?”  Mikey asked sarcastically.  The yacking Marine ran out of stomach stuff to hurl and went down on one knee beside Mikey.  Now LeBron wanted to make a crack about there not being time for a proposal either.  Once again, he managed to keep his mouth shut.  He had no idea what was going on with his brain.  He was all over the place.  He needed to focus, or he was going to be spending his afternoons as part of a mostly naked pile of insane cannibals locked inside someone’s blacked out garage.

The newcomer had pulled out a bunch of gauze and a tube of something.  He cut off Mikey’s pants leg and went to town on getting him bandaged up.  The big flap of skin dangling off his calf was pretty gross.  LeBron thought he might be the next to hurl.  The image of a sizzling steak had popped in his head when he saw the pancake sized flap of hairy blood-soaked skin.

“What about the boat?”  Mikey asked.

“We can’t stay here.  We’ve made way too much noise.  We’re going to have to find another boat.  Hurry up and mount up.  We need to get out of here before this place turns into surger central.”  LeBron said running over to make sure the back of their truck was shut tight before climbing into the cab. He sat there nervously tapping his fingers on the dash waiting on Mikey to join him.  His mind now focused on the task of getting the big rig rolling back out of the driveway.  They had to find another boat and they needed to do it fast.  His inner voice was screaming at him that he was running out of time.  He’d ignored that voice back in the laundry room.  He didn’t intend to make that mistake ever again.

Chapter 29:  Full Speed Ahead

Jeff was in a chair beside the newly sworn in President when the sound of gunfire erupted from down below.  Orders were immediately shouted to lock down the bridge.  Doors were slammed shut and secured.  The monitors were tuned to the insides of the different levels of the superstructure.  Visible in the corner of the deck level room of the structure was a pile of the freshly dead.  Two Marines with smoking guns stood a few feet from where they’d just mowed down the group of men and women that’d come running in after the President.

“Why are we letting possibly infected people into the same part of the ship that we’re in?”  The shrill voice of the panicked President asked.

“We’re securing them first in the quarantine area below sir.  Any sign of infection and we take care of them sir.”  An officer answered the President’s question.

On the monitor a body shot out of the pile of the dead and took down one of the men holding an M-16.  The intertwined pair collapsed to the floor like long lost lovers.  The other Marines standing guard on that level walked forward emptying their magazines into the contaminated pair.

“Take care of them huh?”  The President answered sarcastically.  “I don’t want to see another member of the crew drag their possibly infected bodies into this part of the ship until I’m off this damned boat.  Is that understood?”

“Yes sir.”  The officer said and turned to relay the orders.

Down on the flight deck a small group of survivors was running towards the superstructure. They were expecting the doors to open and let them in once they got there.  They’d be expecting it because that’s what they’d been promised.  It figured the only incident from an infected crewmember making it into the room below had happened immediately after the newly sworn in President was in a position to watch the monitors.  A surger broke out of the hatch the fleeing crew members had just come out of and gave chase.

“Sir.  Where should we direct the crew to go then?  We’re hoping to have a Chinook landing here shortly to start offloading the survivors.”  Jeff said.

“I never really understood what the President saw in you Jeff.  Why don’t you stand down and let me run things now?  We’ve got a lot of military men up here in this room who can focus on things like where the infected crew can go hide until they turn and eat each other.”  The newly sworn in President said dismissively.  In a couple of cavalier sentences, he’d just stripped Jeff of his official power.  He’d made sure to say it loud enough that the whole bridge heard.  Even though they were all pretending not to be listening.

“Yes sir.”  Jeff said quietly and walked back towards the coffee station.  He’d have thought shedding all of that responsibility would feel like a massive burden had been lifted from him.  Instead, it just felt like he was letting everyone down.  He was turning over control to a cowardly old money bureaucrat.  Yue was waiting for him by the coffee pot.

“Excuse me sir but the President has requested you leave the bridge.”  A young officer appeared to pass along the order.  Jeff nodded and turned towards the door that’d take him up to the air traffic controller level.  Yue and Drew followed along behind him as they made their way off the bridge and up to the tower.

Once up in the tower they were escorted to the section reserved for the crew who made it out of the ship.  The President had moved quickly to make sure everyone was informed that Jeff no longer had any official standing.

“Do you think someone told him you weren’t too excited about sending people down to save him?”  Yue asked.  They were gathered in their own little corner of the tower.  All of them gazing out over the stern at the ocean behind them.  It was starting to get rough out there.  There were a lot more whitecaps than there’d been even an hour ago.  A light rain had started falling.

“I don’t know.  Maybe.  Word travels fast on a ship full of career politicians.”  Jeff said.

“What politicians?  I thought you and the VP were the only two left and I don’t really count you as one.”  Drew said.

“That bridge full of senior officers below.  At a certain point merit no longer has much to do with getting promoted.”  Jeff explained.  Drew nodded his understanding.  He’d never really given it much thought, but it had the ring of truth to it.  He remembered a friend of his who’d gotten into the Naval Academy at Annapolis.  The kid was a straight ‘A’ student.  He’d been the captain of the football and wrestling teams at their high school.  He was also an Eagle Scout and did all sorts of JROTC and charity events.  Even with that kind of resume he’d been rejected when he first applied.  His dad’s cousin happened to be dating a Senator at the time.  A couple of phone calls to tap into the good old boy network and all of a sudden, he was accepted.  All so a Senator could show off to a divorcee he’d met a month prior on match.com.

“You think that storm’s coming this way?”  Yue asked.  She pointed at an ominously dark horizon featuring thick black clouds stacked one on top of the other.

“Where’d that come from? That looks bad.”  Drew said in a worried voice.  They didn’t really have anyone driving the ship.  They were just sort of puttering around in a big circle on cruise control at this point.  A cruise to nowhere was how the sailors put it.

Jeff stared out at the angry looking wall of clouds on the horizon.  He breathed in deeply and wished the Marines had heeded him when he hadn’t wanted to rescue the VP from below.  He could guess exactly what the man was going to do in this situation.  He wasn’t disappointed either.  Twenty minutes later the massive Chinook set down in the middle of the flight deck.  A group of approximately forty men ran across the tarmac to board the helicopter.  The snipers outside on the catwalks kept up a steady barrage on the surgers that popped out occasionally.  The group boarded the helicopter which lifted back up, hovered over the ship for a minute, and then was gone.

“We were ordered to stay up here.”  Drew said.  He was watching Jeff making his way to the ladder going down to the bridge.  Neither Drew nor Jeff seemed overly concerned about what their new constitutionally appointed leader had told them to do.

“The guy who ordered us to stay here just took the helicopter and left.  He probably took all the senior officers with him.  I’m thinking they left some numbskull in charge down below with orders to wait for the helicopter to come back.  Only it’s not coming back.  The new President will just have them fly him all the way to the warehouse or whatever other secret base they have setup around here.  He won’t care that he’s signing all of our death warrants by doing that.”  Yue said.  She hadn’t moved yet.  Drew grabbed her hand and dragged her behind him as he went after Jeff.

“You’re probably right.  At this point I’ll help Jeff just to piss off that Presidential prick.  Let’s go.”  Drew said.  Yue shrugged and followed along behind him.  She was normally an extremely optimistic person, but this was starting to look really bad.  The glass was half empty and had poison in it and it was on fire.

On the bridge Jeff was yelling at a much shorter man who was yelling right back at him.  They were conducting this yelling match in front of a thinned-out audience of men now on the bridge.  Drew and Yue hung to the side to watch.  The rain was starting to beat down harder on the windows.  The snipers on the catwalks were continuing to take almost constant shots at the surgers on the flight deck below.  The bright flash of lightning followed seconds later by the rumble of thunder brought the bickering between the two men to a halt.

“The President isn’t coming back.  I know him.  He’s a superficial prick.  This ship’s done.  We have to get everyone off it.”  Jeff said as calmly as he could under the circumstances.  The Marine the President had placed in charge struggled through a brief series of internal conflicts.  He’d just been ordered by the POTUS himself to stand his post and wait for additional orders.  The President had assured him they’d be back to help them abandon ship.  The Marine wasn’t a fool.

“How the hell do we get everyone off?”  The Marine asked.  He’d resigned himself to the possibility of a court martial.  He’d rather be convicted than cremated.

Jeff was struck dumb by the question.  How the hell were they going to get everyone off?  Jumping overboard and swimming to rafts had been feasible when the weather had been cooperative.  With this massive storm coming on it‘d be mass suicide.  He took a look at their position on the charts spread out on the navigation table.  He was thinking the island they’d originally targeted was going to be useless now as well.

“Normally for a storm like this the idea would be to run out to the deep water and ride it out.  We’ve got an engine room surrounded by crawlerz.  We don’t have anyone on the bridge who has experience sailing this thing.  Standard operating procedure isn’t going to cut it.”  Jeff said thinking fast.  There had to be a way out of this mess.

“What if we go back to the running aground idea?  We do it right now.  We go full ahead straight for the mouth of that river and see how far we can shove this ship up it before she sticks.  Then we jump off and swim for the banks?”  Drew brought up his idea in a questioning way to let the others rip it apart as they would.  He was hoping if he presented it vaguely that they may feel better about owning the solution themselves.  He didn’t want them questioning how desperate they must be to consider the plan of the youngest person on the ship.  There were multiple men on the bridge with tattoos that were older than Drew.

“We aren’t going to be able to save the ship anyway.  If she’s turned over in shallow water, we might be able to come back and strip all the supplies out of her once the weather settles down.”  One of the men standing around brought up.  He was shot down quickly since the ship would still be full of crawlerz.  Once they managed to get off this thing none of them were too worried about coming back for salvage.  In economic parlance this ship and the supplies on board were now literally considered a sunk cost.

“What happens when we hit the bottom?  Does the ship just stop?  With this weather would we be able to jump for it and live?”  The questions started flying around.  Questions none of them had the answers for.  They called up the senior chief who was still stuck below.  They were hopeful he’d have insights.

A brief conversation with the senior chief later they didn’t know much more than they had before they talked to him.  It turned out running an aircraft carrier aground to try and survive a zombie outbreak on board wasn’t covered in the standard training the crew received.  The engineering room was full of equally unenthusiastic opinions on the likelihood of the running aground plan working.  They were quick to point out that if something did happen then smashing nuclear reactors apart on the coastline probably wasn’t the healthiest lifestyle choice they could make.

“We’re running low on time.  Once this storm hits, we’re not going to be able to get off this ship no matter where we are.”  One of the men in the group pointed out.  Everyone turned to stare at Jeff.  Evidently the President hadn’t been able to take away all his power with just a couple of sentences.  A natural leader is a natural leader and in times of emergency his words are going to be heeded.

“Plot a course for the river that comes out by the little island we were trying to make it to.  We’ll go full steam ahead and try to ram up that thing as far as we can get.  The second we’re stuck it’s every man for himself.  Abandon ship and try to get to shore.  It’s going to be hell out there on that flight deck now that the sun’s going down.  Turn on every light we have.  Maybe it’ll give the crew below more of a chance.  I also need volunteers to stay in the cat walks and shoot as many of the crawlerz as they can.”  Jeff said.

His words spurred action.  They all felt the ship kick into high speed.  The bow felt as if it were lifting into the air.  In the dying light they could make out a very respectable rooster tail being kicked up behind them.  The sub had disappeared around the same time as the President had flown off the carrier.  Not that it’d attempt to follow them where they were going anyway.

It wasn’t long before the sailor with his face shoved into the radar system yelled out that they were getting close.  Another sailor staring at the machine for plotting the water depth was screaming out course corrections as he tried to guide them into mouth of the river.  An alarm was sounding over and over in a robotic voice informing them to immediately make course corrections.  The men in the engine room had already flipped the battle mode switch to on. That meant none of the automated safety systems would interfere with this maneuvering.  The man at the communications station picked up the handset and typed in the code for an all-ship page.

“All hands brace for impact.  All hands brace for impact.  On impact abandon ship.  Be advised this ship is being abandoned.  There will be no rescue parties.  Every man for himself.  All hands brace for impact.”  The communications officer kept repeating the same message.  He’d have loved to give an estimate of when the big ship was going to smack into the floor of the ocean, but they had no idea when it was going to happen.

Then it happened.  The ship simply stopped moving.  Everything else kept going.  Drew had been holding on to a metal grip on the side of some equipment.  His hand slipped right off. He smashed his face into another piece of metal equipment.  Around him he heard others getting beat down similarly.  Physics can be a real bitch.

Spitting out blood and nudging a loose tooth around with his tongue Drew climbed unsteadily to his feet to see what was going on.  The first thig he noticed was how weird the ship felt.  He assumed that was because they were wedged into the seabed now instead of bobbing around freely like they were used to.  The next thing he noticed was the almost imperceptible tilt they were at.  The ship hadn’t settled smoothly in the seabed.  They were definitely in there at an angle.  He looked out the windows but all he could see was wind whipped rain lashing them.

The bridge slowly came back to life.  The men picked themselves up and wiped off their bloody faces with their shirt sleeves.  It was obvious to all of them that trying to go out in this mess and jump overboard to swim to shore was straight up suicide.  Jeff immediately urged the communications officer to pipe that information around the ship.  They didn’t want to see a mass exodus attempted now.  A plan that’d made sense to all of them five minutes prior now seemed like the dumbest idea in the world.

“Kill the lights in here.”  Yue said.  Everyone looked over to see what the young woman was talking about.

“It’s going to attract the crawlerz.  They’ll come at us like moths to a flame.”  Drew stated loudly.  That explanation did the trick.  The bridge turned to just the pale red glow as the overhead lights were immediately extinguished.  It wasn’t going to be enough.  Everyone who’d been around the crawlerz knew it wasn’t going to be enough.  The strengthened glass that’d held its own against surgers wasn’t going to withstand the crawlerz.  They could jump higher and hit harder.

“They’ll be here soon.  I think we need to find somewhere better to spend the night.”  Yue said quietly to Jeff.  She didn’t want to freak everyone out.  Even though the exact right state of mind for the situation they now found themselves in was to be completely freaked out.  All of this because they’d pissed Blaze off.  That was a secret Yue was planning on taking to the grave with her.  She just hadn’t expected the grave to be coming for her quite so fast.

Chapter 30:  Treadmills Aren’t just for Drying Clothes

Staring at the map scored a zero on the helpfulness scale.  There just wasn’t another way to do this.  They needed a regular sized truck to haul the boat down to the water and they didn’t have one.  None of them wanted to try breaking into another garage anytime soon.  It wouldn’t matter in a few minutes anyway since the house the boat was at would be hosting a surger rave.  No way a bunch of the freaks didn’t show up after all the noise the Marines had made blowing up the garage.

“Where to?”  Mikey asked.  His leg may be torn up, but he was still the better one to back the big rig out of the driveway.  The pills he’d popped had taken care of him worrying about the severe pain.  The way he was slurring his words had LeBron hoping they actually made it out of the driveway.

“Let’s go down the street to the last house and park down by the dock.”  LeBron said.

“Ok but we already checked that one for a boat.”  Mikey reminded him.  He sounded confused.  Either because of the strange request or because he’d popped an extra pill.  Given the trauma from the botched garage entry and the general suckiness of their situation the relief promised by those tiny white pills was pretty alluring.

“It’s time for a Hail Mary.  I’m going to get the raft out of the back and take it across the river to see if any of those houses have a boat rigged up and ready to go.”  LeBron laid out the new plan he’d just come up with.  The idea had come to him while he was staring at the river.  Whoever had taken all the boats from this side wouldn’t have had any reasons to get rid of the boats on the far side.  If the infected managed to get on that side of the river they should actually be encouraged to get in a boat and leave.  It was unlikely someone recently bitten would be able to get a boat going and get across the river anyway.  This bridge had been destroyed a while ago though.  Probably at the very beginning before people really knew how any of this was going to work out.

“If you’re trying to get that done today take Gus.  I don’t know how much help I’m going to be.  Feels like my boot’s full of water.  Pretty sure its blood.”  Mikey said as he hit the brakes too hard a couple of times at the edge of the driveway.  His eyes had a glassy faraway look.  As soon as he had the truck parked Mikey put his head on the steering wheel.  A moment later he was out cold.

Thankful they hadn’t ended up parked in the river LeBron maneuvered his way out of the cage.  He looked up to see the other Marine, Gus, was pulling in beside them.  These houses had ridiculously large driveways.  Together the two of them dragged an unconscious Mikey out of the cab and got him situated in the back.  LeBron was rapid fire telling Gus the plan while they got everything situated.  Gus pointed out if they could find a truck on the other side then they didn’t necessarily need a boat.  They could drive the whole way to the island from there.  The crew from the Ford may wind up scattered all along the coast anyway.  It’s not like they’d hang out for too long on an overgrown sand dune.

Mikey was in bad shape. The next truck that was supposed to meet them hadn’t made it into radio range yet.  LeBron didn’t think they had time to wait.  His stomach was twisted in knots with worry.  They made sure Mikey was comfortable and pulled out the assault raft.  They dragged the heavy raft down to the water and figured out how to inflate it.  It had excellent instructions written right on the side of it.  LeBron really wished civilian contraptions were the same.  Like the tarps on boats for instance.

Sealing Mikey up in the trailer Gus took control of the little outboard. They made short work of the trip across the river making landfall at the public beach access on the far bank.  A few docks that needed a coat of paint and a large sandy parking lot sat beside the highway. The road became whole again on the other side of the river.

“You sure about this?”  Gus asked.  He was going to be dropping LeBron off in the middle of nowhere while he went back to watch over Mikey.  LeBron looked around.  There was no real sign of civilization anywhere except for the road.  He had no clue how long he’d have to jog before finding a vehicle he could use.  There’d been a bike back by the other house but both tires had been flat on it.  He had an extremely heavy pack strapped to his back.  The contents being almost exclusively small shiny explosive objects.

“I could use the exercise.  I’ve been cooped up back at the base forever.  Probably should’ve used the gym a little more.”  LeBron said.  He wasn’t sure about this at all.

“Ok.  Stick to the main road and turn on your radio the top of every hour to check in.  If the other truck shows up, we’ll float across and come up the main road to help out.  Hopefully with some mountain bikes or something.  You might want to rub some Vaseline on your nipples to avoid the chafing you’re about to get.”  Gus advised.  He smiled at the expression on LeBron’s face before hopping back in the raft with a halfhearted wave.  LeBron turned and began jogging through the sandy parking lot in parallel with the highway.

He was seriously kicking himself before he even got out of the parking lot for not taking advantage of the treadmills in the gym back at the warehouse.  He was sweating in places he hadn’t realized he could sweat in.  He was also flashing back to the Vaseline comment. He was indeed going to be suffering from chafing.  Unfortunately, it was an even more sensitive area than his nipples that had him concerned.  By the time he got to the end of the parking lot he was barely even walking fast.  More of an inspired trudge than the valet jog he’d been trying to maintain.

He was daydreaming about shooting a ton of crawlerz.  The more of them he shot the lighter his pack would get.  Thinking of the pack getting lighter made him smile.  He’d almost convinced himself to dump out some of the bullets when a familiar mechanical sound hit him from the distance.  He stopped pretending to walk fast and stared up into the sky.  He was rewarded a minute later by the sight of a huge helicopter flying by.  He watched it as it banked and made its way inland.  It was a big machine that could easily carry fifty people he estimated.

He wondered if Yue and Drew had managed to worm their way on board.  That’d be pretty ironic if he was killing himself trying to get to them and they’d just flown over him.  Especially if they were on the way back to the base he’d just left.  He’d know soon enough one way or the other.  He jogged slowly past a beat to hell general store.  His back killing him from carrying the pack he’d opted to torture himself with.  He didn’t see any vehicles that looked like they might run so he kept going.  He walked past the burnt-out husk of a large garbage truck.  There had to be a good story there.  Garbage trucks didn’t just spontaneously combust as far as he knew.

A couple of hours later he found a house with a detached garage right off the side of the road.  The best thing about the garage was that it had regular sized windows placed all around it.  The windows allowed him to see inside the well-lit structure and verify he wasn’t walking into another crawler nest.  Inside the fancy garage there was a pickup truck and one of those upgraded golf carts.  The golf cart looked like it could handle any kind of terrain thrown at it.  Most importantly a golf cart wouldn’t make that much noise.  That was going to be critical since he was going to have his back to the ocean soon.  He’d rather not advertise his presence by rolling up in a pickup truck if he could sneak in on a golf cart.  The solar panels on the roof even had him optimistic the cart may have a full charge on it.  He was gaining a newfound love for rich people and their environmental virtue signaling.

Cart or truck he was hopeful he wasn’t going to be trudging along with the damned pack weighing him down much longer.  He’d take either option at this point.  He also needed to go find some new clothes since the ones he was wearing were drenched in sweat.  He knew he’d probably passed right by a hundred houses by now.  The trees towered over the road in most places.  Because of that he’d been unable to tell if there were houses near him or not.

None of the windows or doors opened on the garage when he tried them. He hadn’t expected them to, but it was always best to try the easy way first.  He’d gotten lucky enough in the past that he always tried to check first now.  Drew would’ve already broken a window and been putting the garage door up.  They’d had their fair share of arguments over the best approach.

LeBron took his pack off.  He took his soaking wet undershirt off and wrapped it around the barrel of his rifle.  He used that to break open a window as quietly as he could.  Then he threw the glass shard covered soaking wet shirt to the ground and pulled a fresh one out of his pack.  He had some extra clothes strategically shoved in the bag to try and keep the noise down from all the bullets bouncing around when he ran.  Acutely conscious of the rapidly fading daylight he got the window open and scrambled into the garage.

He opened the truck door first and was treated to a blast of obnoxiously pungent air.  The cab of the small pickup contained the body of a dead woman.  She’d been shot a few times at close range based on the holes in her slowly mummifying body.  The obviously illegal tint on the windows hadn’t let him take a look inside before he’d cracked the door open.  Even if he could find the keys he was leaning towards the cart after seeing what was in the truck.  He closed the door and went to check out the golf cart.

The golf cart was plugged in with its key sitting in the cupholder.  LeBron unplugged it and let the retractable cord zing its way back into the cord hole on the side of it.  He closed the little cover to hide the cord and began looking on the ceiling for the emergency release to open the garage door.  He walked around the cart randomly smacking the garage door opener on the wall as he did so.  The garage door hummed and shook and then did what garage doors are supposed to do when you press the button to open them.  Loving the way this solar obsessed homeowner had outfitted their garage LeBron hopped in the cart and drove it out the door.

It began to rain as he loaded his bulging pack into the passenger seat of the cart.  He made sure his rifle and pistol were in easy reach and took off down the road.  The cart went way faster than he’d expected it to go.  Now he just needed to figure out how long the charge would last.  His head was on a swivel as he kept a lookout for any random surgers who might come at him.  The nice thing about the truck would’ve been the enclosed space he’d have been traveling in.  A nice solid metal door was a lot more protection than the open air he had now.  Fast or not when a crawler poured on the speed, they’d be able to catch the cart with plenty of energy left to attack him.

Between the rain and the increased distance, he couldn’t raise Gus the next time he tried checking in.  Dropping the radio into the opening in the console he focused on driving in the increasingly heavy bursts of rain.  He was running low on power and sunlight when he finally made it to the ocean.  He knew he was right across the sound from the small island the survivors from the aircraft carrier were supposedly making for.  He stood by the road looking out over the dark ocean but couldn’t see anything.  Strong gusts of wind drove the rain into his eyes.

It was dusk.  It was dusk and the clouds were rolling in effectively blotting out the sun. LeBron didn’t have time to screw around.  Being out at night was a death sentence.  You’d never see the crawler that stealthily stalked you from the darkness before surging forward with preternatural speed to end your existence.  Looking around nervously LeBron jumped back on the golf cart and headed a little further up the main road.  He couldn’t believe he’d let himself get caught out like this.  His fear for the safety of his siblings overriding his own survival instincts.

Soaked to the bone from the rain pouring sideways into the golf cart he turned off the main road and saw what looked like a big building in a parking lot.  He was hoping it might prove to be big enough for him to find a closet or something to lock himself up in for the night.  He drove his cart under the large overhang in front of a large revolving glass door.  The door was locked so pushing on it didn’t have the desired effect.  It was too late to even think about doing something stupid like shooting out the glass.  The last thing he wanted to do was draw attention to the fact that there was a human out here messing around.

He gave up on the revolving door and started trying doors and windows one after the other.  When none of the main ones worked for him, he ran into the bushes to try some of the windows on the side.  He put his hands up against a small window and pushed hard.  Nothing happened.  He pivoted to move to the next window.  The curtains moved around and out of nowhere a young girl was staring at him.  LeBron’s first thought was she was a crawler.  He came dangerously close to shooting her.  Stopping himself before the barrel of his rifle was fully extended, he motioned for her to open the window.

The girl disappeared to be replaced by an exasperated looking older man with thinning white hair and a scraggly beard.  Based on the resemblance LeBron was thinking it could be either her father or grandfather.  Whoever he was he unlocked the window and stood back for LeBron to climb in.  LeBron ran back to the cart and grabbed his bag and radio after signaling to the man he’d be right back.  He pulled himself in through the window and stared expectantly at the man.  The girl was shyly hiding behind the man now.

“Close that window and follow me.  Do it fast.  What kind of idiot are you?  Don’t you know better than to be caught outside at dark like that?”  The man asked before turning and walking briskly down the hall with the girl by his side.

LeBron hurried to get the window closed then turned to follow them.  He was really hoping they had a nice secure place to crash for the night.  He totally agreed with the man’s assessment of him being an idiot.

Chapter 31:  Sardines

It stunk in the enclosed space they were all wedged into.  Jeff had ordered everyone to move down into the small section of the superstructure on the deck level. It was a windowless rectangular box intended to be used as a wide passageway.  It was standing room only in the excessively cramped space.  The smell of body odor and the musk of death heavy in the air.  They couldn’t open the doors as the flight deck was covered in crawlerz.  The massive storm was whipping gigantic waves into the carrier as well.  There was a very real fear they may come off the beach and drift out to sea.

“Well, this plan keeps getting worse.”  Drew said to Yue.  They were face to face way closer than appropriate for a brother and sister.

“Remind me to bring a bag of breath mints into the next apocalypse.”  Yue said.  Between her boyfriend’s extreme coffee breath and Drew’s dragon breath she was pretty serious about finding a bag of mints somewhere.

“I’ll take your death breath over smelling those bodies any longer.”  Drew replied.  The men guarding this part of the structure hadn’t had time to get rid of the corpses of the infected they’d massacred earlier.  They’d been waiting for an opening to drag them over to the side of the ship and throw them off.  If they just threw them outside the door it made for a buffet spread for the crawlerz.  That wasn’t how they wanted to treat the bodies of their former shipmates.

“On the bright side at some point we have to make a mad dash for the side of the ship and make a jump for it.  Your football skills should help out.  You’ll be dodging those things left and right.”  Yue joked.

“More like I’ll be blocking for you.  I’m more worried about the jump than I am about the running.  What if this storm drives us up on the beach so we break our freakin’ legs when we jump?  If the beach is there the infected will come right after us.  There’s still a good mix of surgers and crawlerz so it won’t even matter if it’s daylight.”  Drew worried.

“How are my two favorite sardines holding up?”  Jeff pushed himself through the crowd.  His height making him tower above the others as he powered his way through.

“What’re you so happy about?”  Yue asked him when he finally made it all the way over and positioned himself behind Yue so he could wrap his arms around her from behind.

“We’re alive.  Against all the odds we’re alive.  When the sun comes up in the morning, we’re going to run like we’ve never run before and then take a huge leap of faith.  If we’re still alive tomorrow night, I’ll be even happier.”  Jeff leaned down to rest his head on Yue’s slim shoulder.

“Can I have some of whatever drugs you’re taking?”  Drew asked seriously.  Either their fearless leader was a complete psychopath, or he was a genius who’d thought far enough ahead to hide a few valium in his back pocket.  Drew was hoping it was the latter.  If any situation ever called for something to help with a little escape from reality it was this one.

“No drugs.  This sucks but I don’t see how it could get much worse.  We sit in here for the night then we make a mad dash in the morning.  Not much we can do about any of it right now.”  Jeff said.  Yue and Drew turned to stare at him in complete astonishment.  Had he really just said it couldn’t get any worse?

As if on cue the deck shifted beneath them.  There were loud banging noises as things shifted around in the ship.  The squeal of tortured metal as stress was placed across welded seams in ways that were most definitely not supposed to happen.  The ship felt for a moment like they were back at sea then everything went sideways and stopped with a massive impact that vibrated every wall in the ship.  For a second that lasted an eternity it felt like the entire ship was going to roll over.

Then the shaking stopped.  They weren’t pulling a Poseidon adventure.  They were definitely not normal though.  The passage was resting at what felt like a ninety-degree angle but was probably more like thirty degrees.  Jeff and Yue wedged themselves against the side to keep from falling down on the people below.  Everyone was trying their best not to trample those below them.  Looking down Drew saw the officer who’d agreed to follow Jeff’s plan shooting daggers out of his eyes up at Jeff now.  The people at the bottom of the passage were screaming for people to get off of them.

The ship shifted again.  More creaking and ominous squealing followed by the passage resting at an even more awkward angle when it stopped this time.  The people at the other end of the passage were now getting the crap kicked out of them as others landed on them.  The corpses of the dead infected were making their way down through the crowded passageway.  Gravity lending them the power to still horrify the uninfected.

“Climb towards us!”  Jeff screamed down into the tunnel of tortured souls beneath them.  It was a vision straight out of hell.  A long hole eerily illuminated by the red lights of the ship with the tortured souls of the damned doing their best to climb over one another to get out.  The screams of those trapped on the bottom as the oxygen was squeezed out of their bodies by the weight of those above.

A rush of wind.  The sound of the storm suddenly filled the space.  Salt air and wind washing the air clean of the putrid stench of death and fear.  Rather than be squashed to death someone on the other end of the passageway had popped open the door to escape.  Not a horrible idea if it hadn’t been for the hurricane currently tossing the ship around like a rubber ducky in a bathtub with an overactive toddler.

Five men on that end of the passage were immediately lost into the darkness.  Tugged out by the force of gravity above and the suction of the wind below.  Their bodies spinning like tops across the rain-soaked deck before smashing into the railing that ran around that side of the ship.  Their bodies either getting pulverized against those tight metal stands or bouncing off to be hurled into the angry sea on the other side.  The others by the now open door hung on for dear life.  They slowly climbed upwards.  They were trying to use the bodies of their shipmates as ladders in their desperate struggle to survive.  More fell as they pulled their shipmates loose in their panic or the men they were trying to use as ladders threw them off.

It continued for what seemed like forever.  The screaming and crying and loud prayers.  No one’s more devout than a soldier in a foxhole when the artillery starts flying.  Everyone in that passageway found religion over the course of the long night.  Much the way an alcoholic swears off liquor the morning of a horrible hangover.  Promises made and soon to be broken.  At one point the wind died down.  The noise outside subsided to a normal level.

“Is it over?”  Drew asked.  His arm quaking from holding his position against the bulkhead.  His feet both asleep where they were wedged under a metal box that was part of the fire control system.  He was really hoping that once he needed them his feet would be able to come back to life quickly.  He had no doubt he was going to need them.

“Probably just the eye going over us.”  Yue said sleepily.  One thing about growing up in Florida was you learned a lot about hurricanes.

“Is Jeff ok?”  Drew asked.  It was a solid question since it looked like Jeff had lapsed into a coma.  He’d lashed himself to a pipe running up the wall with his belt so he wouldn’t fall.

“Yeah.  That lack of sleep finally caught up with him.  He’s fast asleep.  I’ve been holding him up for the last couple of hours.”  Yue said.

Drew thought about switching places with her to give her a break.  Before he could figure out how that’d work the sound of the howling wind filled the passageway again.  The eye was either tiny or the storm was moving at record speeds.  There wouldn’t be time now to switch positions.  Especially since half the people left in the passageway were casting covetous glances up towards their spot.  If they slid even a little bit, they’d likely find themselves stuck in a less admirable piece of real estate.  Drew just wished someone had thought of closing the damned door before the wind kicked back in.  He supposed whoever had been closest to the opening had considered it but decided not to risk getting sucked out into the hellish night.  Understandable.

He wedged his feet in a little tighter and did his best to follow Jeff’s example and relax.  No matter how hard he tried he couldn’t fall asleep.  His body had run out of the capacity to be scared any worse than he already was.  Anytime the ship seemed to move that ice cold terror ratcheted right back up his spine. After a while though he was starting to find it all pretty boring.  It was complete misery.  He couldn’t wait for it to be over.

He wanted the sun to come out and the sea to be visible through the open door below.  He wanted to get off this cursed ship and get his feet back on solid ground.  Then they could go find LeBron and escape all this craziness.  Maybe a cabin up in the mountains somewhere.  Kill deer and bear or squirrels and raise corn or whatever.  They could live their lives.  Hanging out with these soldiers and dealing with all these politics was going to get them all killed.

The wind gradually tapered off.  The light of a new dawn eventually peeked in through the open hatchway below.  It was all so gradual no none really noticed at first.  Worn down by the extreme adversities they’d faced it was hard to feel optimistic about the storm ending.  Drew wouldn’t have been overly surprised to find out it was just the hurricane changing directions.  Like it’d decided to go back out into the ocean, and they happened to be in the eye for a second time.  He didn’t think that could happen.  He did know the meteorologists were never right about where one of these massively unpredictable storms were going to end up.

“I think it’s over!”  One of the men down by the open hatch yelled up into the space.  A few of the other men shouted questions and one even let out a whoop of excitement.  It was a minimal amount of noise but enough to attract the attention of a surger prowling the storm swept deck.  It immediately sprinted towards the sound of its prey.  With no fear of falling off the steep deck it went around the superstructure until it found the open hatch and pulled its way in.  A short line forming behind it as other surgers began to gather.

The shouts of joy turned quickly to shouts of pain and fear.  Recognizing the screaming below for what it was Drew yanked his feet out from under the metal box he had them wedged against and slapped Yue and Jeff until they woke up.  Everyone in the passage was now scrambling up the passageway towards them.  Drew had no doubt the surgers would eat their way right through that crowd in no time flat.

Gunshots were competing now with the screaming.  Jeff was working on getting the hatch open.  As soon as it was open, they all went out.  Drew and Jeff stood beside the door while Yue stepped back to aim a pistol she’d snagged from somewhere at the opening.  Seven men made it out before a snarling surger stuck it’s head up into the sun.  Yue put a bullet in it even as Drew and Jeff slammed the heavy metal hatch down on it.  The Marines they were surrounded by all had their weapons out and ready.

They sprinted to the edge of the superstructure and looked out across a short expanse of crystal blue ocean at the nearby beach.  The water was still stirred up from the passing storm but from this height it seemed doable.  All around them they saw surgers moving forward to press the attack.  The Marines were shooting constantly to keep the murderous maniacs at bay.

Jeff bent down and unlaced his boots.

“What are you doing?”  Drew asked.

“I went to a survival course and they made us jump in a pool with our clothes on.  Swimming with your clothes on sucks.  If we don’t die when we jump, we’re going to need to swim fast as soon as we hit the water.  These things are going to be jumping off the ship to try and get us.”  Jeff explained.  The Marine’s ignored him although a few were visibly distracted when Yue got into the spirit of it and stripped down to a t-shirt and panties.

“See you guys on the beach.”  The Marine in the lead said and took off running down slope for the side closest to the beach.  The rest of them took off after him.  Slowly fanning out as the ones with rifles gravitated towards the back of the pack to provide protection for those without.

The distance to the water was going to be less than at sea since the ship was tipped over on the seabed.  They pretty much flew down the steep incline.  There was no time for hesitation when they got to the side of the ship.  To hesitate was to lose your momentum and risk being caught by the surgers who were hot on their tails.  With bullets flying everywhere and the sound of the surf pounding the nearby beach Drew leapt off the side of the ship.  He was already in the air when he thought to worry about if the water below them was deep enough for jumping from this high.

He found out a second later when he plunged into the icy water with his hands firmly positioned to protect his groin. He quickly submerged further below the water than he’d ever gone.  He stuck his arms out to try and slow himself down.  Suddenly he was aware of his missing boots.  He wondered if those would’ve helped with the shock when he hit the bottom.  He never hit the bottom.  His descent slowed and he immediately started stroking for all he was worth towards the sunlit surface above him.

Expecting a surger to land on him at any second he powered through his desire to float on his back and try to regain his breath.  Instead, he swam hard to put distance between himself and the ship.  Around him he heard bodies slamming into the water and assumed those were the surgers leaping off after them.  They normally avoided water but in a hot pursuit down the side of a slippery flight deck they weren’t going to hold back.

Once he was far enough from the ship, he treaded water and called out for Yue.  His relief at hearing her answer him made him forget to tread water for a second.  He accidentally took a big gulp of the Atlantic and launched into a coughing fit.  Yue swam over and stared at him with concern which made him bust out laughing.  None of which was conducive to trying to tread water and conserve his energy for the long swim they were now faced with.

“Hey there’s going to be rip currents and undertow to contend with.  Especially since we’re at the mouth of a river immediately following a hurricane.  The storm surge has to come back out.  Save your energy and go with the flow.”  One of the Marines was lecturing them on how to survive.  Jeff paddled over and joined them in their little swimming circle.  A few of the other Marines were circling around now as well.

Feeling optimistic that they might make it to the shore alive they began the long swim.  All of them buoyed up by the fact that at least they’d escaped the gigantic floating death trap the carrier had turned out to be.  Flipping over to float on his back and check out the ship Jeff said a quick prayer for the hundreds of men and women still stuck inside the ship.  Hopefully they’d be able to battle their way out as well.  There was nothing more they could do for them now.  They’d live or die by their own muscle and wit.

Chapter 32:  The Seabrook Island Survivors Club

The island LeBron had ended up on was home to the retired rich.  Many of them were old money with family names that could open doors in the highest circles of southern aristocracy.  These people had multimillion dollar homes on the golf courses with breathtaking views of the ocean.  Half of them were typically vacant as they were just used for long weekend beach getaways.

In addition to the old money there was a good bit of new money in the area as well.  This money came from tech as well as from construction.  Big pharma was also well represented on the island.  The brilliant young CEO of a pharmaceutical startup had obtained his doctorate from Cornell in epidemiology.  He’d been particularly interested in how fast a global pandemic could spread.  His thesis had included multiple models inclusive of a ‘fun’ example he used based on a popular zombie movie.

He’d been freaked out when the news of the infection spreading in Egypt first aired.  He’d immediately started making phone calls and investigating.  Most of his contacts thought he was crazy.  A lot of the people who’d dismissed his calls as paranoia died wishing they’d listened to him.  He wasn’t old money, but he did have one solid well connected contact on the island at least.  One person who’d won the election for the ultimate in petty bureaucratic offices.  She’d run unopposed since no one on the island was up for losing such a petty election, so all refused to throw their name in the hat.

His wife was the President of the Seabrook Island HOA.  She was also his biggest champion.  No matter how far-fetched his ideas may seem she was always one hundred percent behind him.  On this particular topic it took about a day for her to hit that one hundred percent support but once she committed, she was in all the way.  She just had to make sure he wasn’t drunk or sick or something before she started calling the world to tell them she needed help keeping a global pandemic from reaching their ultra-exclusive country club gates.

The HOA meeting was held monthly in a room with a gorgeous beach view on the second floor of the swanky country club.  You couldn’t buy a home on the island without joining the club.  You didn’t have to actually go to the club or use the facilities, but you did have to pay the five grand per month in dues.  The nervous couple waited until everyone had been served a drink or appetizer to get the meeting started.

The wife introduced her husband who ran through his research and presented his plan as a well thought out series of actions.  Thirty minutes later they were still attempting to convince the people in the room that they weren’t joking.

“You want us to blow up the bridge?  How would we get off the island?  What if there’s a hurricane?”  An elderly woman with way too much jewelry on whined.  She looked dismissive of the entire idea.

The meeting definitely didn’t start off the way they’d envisioned it.  The pharma executive presented a condensed epidemiology 101 course to the group.  The majority of the group finished their food and politely left the meeting.  A few stayed though.  One was a serial tech entrepreneur, and another was a self-made multimillionaire in the construction business who’d started off helping his dad frame out houses in the summers as a kid.

“Everything came from that first meeting.”  Amita said quietly to LeBron.  She was the tech entrepreneur who’d been at the HOA meeting to give a status on how her prototype solar powered security cameras were working around the island.  She’d wired the entire island with the cameras that one of her companies was looking to sell to various government agencies.  The idea being to camouflage them and place them in national parks so people could capture scenes of animals in their natural habitat.  There were some obvious Big Brother applications as well, but every technology has good and evil uses.  Long living self-powered wireless cameras that could be ruggedized and placed pretty much anywhere were of great interest to a variety of organizations.  Amita had downplayed the easy access piece to keep her offer of a free surveillance system from being turned down by the media averse country club crowd.

“I think Amita and I were more inspired by the idea of the pandemic coming for us at first.  We weren’t true believers in that first month.  We started putting some thought into what we could do though.  I had my granddaughter staying with me while her parents were off on safari over in Africa.  It was a trip they’d been talking about for years.  They never made it back.”  Carl added.  He was the construction worker who’d made it big.  He’d used that talent to build safe rooms into the houses around the island. His company had won the contract and as part of that deal he’d gotten himself a prime piece of real estate to call his own.  The safe rooms had been intended for protection from hurricanes, but they turned out to be pretty effective against crawlerz as well.

“What happened to the doctor and his wife?”  LeBron asked.  It was nice to be sitting in a room having a conversation without worrying about being overheard.  The large shelter built into one of the conference rooms at the country club was crawler proof for the most part.  It was intended to provide protection for a large group of people if they happened to be caught here during anything from a bomb threat to a hurricane.

“One of our neighbors was a retired admiral who got paid to consult with the pentagon.  Basically, a fat seven figure salary to occasionally take old buddies out to play golf and talk them into certain vendors for huge contracts.  That sort of thing.  He made a couple of phone calls and three hours later there was a couple of explosions and the bridge wasn’t there anymore.  I think that gave everyone a false sense of security.  A few days later some infected ripped through a bunch of people in broad daylight.  I’ve tracked down how they got here since then on the video system.  They were on a boat that just floated across from the other side of the river.  It was completely random.”  Amita supplied a little more backstory on how so many of the islanders were still alive.

Looking at the tablet Amita was passing around LeBron could see furtive shapes moving through the lashing rain.  The rainstorm he’d come up through had turned into a full-on hurricane.  The trees on the island were bending over like they were trying to touch their toes.  No one else seemed overly concerned about the storm.  LeBron on the other hand wasn’t just thinking about them.  His brother and sister were on a ship covered with the infected trying to get to a small island in the middle of a hurricane.

“Can you look out in the ocean?”  LeBron asked.  To answer their inquisitive looks he went ahead and explained why he was there.  He’d been vague about it previously although he wasn’t sure why.  He’d thought they may be pissed about a few hundred sailors coming to camp out on their peaceful little patch of paradise.

Amita hit some buttons on her tablet and then stared into the rain coated lens of the camera mounted on the top of the country club.  She couldn’t see anything through that one so started trying others.  She finally gave up after one of the cameras she was trying to look through lifted off into the air.  The camera was mounted solidly to the roof that’d just been blown off one of the homes.

“We might have a problem.”  Amita said explaining what’d just happened to the roof on the home that was closest to the ocean to Carl.  She shook her head when LeBron asked her if she’d seen anything that looked like a ship.  All she’d really seen was rain and glimpses of the raging surf.  She hit some buttons then handed Carl the tablet so he could watch the roof blow off.  Carl grunted and began pacing back and forth.

“What’s the problem?”  LeBron asked.  Mentally he was ticking off all the possible answers to his own very vague question.

“These houses were all built to withstand up to a cat 5 hurricane.  We’ve gone around and made sure all the doors and shutters have been shut in every house.  This storm’s something else.  I’m not too worried about the wind but the storm surge could be an issue.”  Carl said.  He left them to go sit in an overstuffed recliner where his granddaughter bounced up into his lap demanding a story.

In addition to locking down each of the houses against storms they’d also sent men out every day to thin out the crawlerz on the island.  They’d used the high-tech surveillance cameras to locate where the crawlerz chose to spend the day then sent men to exterminate them.  Even with their heightened sensitivity to sunlight the infected would still spring out of whatever dark hole they’d burrowed into when they sensed a group of uninfected approaching.  It was dangerous but necessary work.  If this hurricane tore down all the homes, then their hard-fought liberation of this island would all be for nothing.

Tossing around scenarios in his head for what the sun would bring in the morning LeBron laid down in the cot he was told he could use.  He slid his pistol under his pillow and put his pack down by his head.  For all he knew these people were planning to slit his throat as soon as he fell asleep to take his guns and ammo.  He fully intended to sleep with one eye open.

Amita poked him a few times at dawn to wake him up.  LeBron jumped up with a start knocking his pistol onto the ground.  Amita stared in amusement at him while he slowly collected himself.  She bent over and picked up his pistol then handed it back to him.

“Nightmares or trust issues?”  She asked him with a smile dancing across her lips.

“Both.  Sunup?”  An embarrassed LeBron asked.  His embarrassment soon forgotten when Amita nodded that the sun had indeed risen.  His thoughts immediately turned to getting outside to take a look and see if he could locate the ship.  He rolled out of the cot and shrugged his way into the heavy pack.

He took the heavy pack off a minute later after Amita explained they were going to have to dig their way out of the wreckage of the country club before they could get outside.  The storm had pretty much destroyed everything.  What the wind hadn’t wrecked the storm surge had demolished.  If it weren’t for the hardened storm shelters Carl had built into the different buildings, they’d probably all be dead.  She had a few cameras that were still accessible, but they weren’t showing anything useful since they were either submerged or buried in rubble.

An hour of manual labor later LeBron was able to squeeze out through the wreckage of the club.  It was now a muddy wreck.  You could just make out the fact that it’d been a building the day before.  Carl emerged a minute later and handed him his pack.

“Let’s take a walk.”  Carl said stepping down into the knee-deep water covering what used to be the stately driveway.

“Cool.  I want to go check out the ocean and see if there’s any sign of the ship yet.”  LeBron said.  He was hoping not to see anything actually.  If they’d come to close to shore during that storm last night, he didn’t see how they would’ve kept from running aground.  Once they were pinned down, they could’ve been beaten apart by the massive waves.

“This whole place was wetlands when it first got developed.  I guess when we slink out of here later this land will go back to being a swamp.”  Carl said as they walked.  At the end of the driveway, they waded through more water until they got to what was left of the beach.  Seeming extremely close to them was an aircraft carrier resting at an odd angle right off the coast.

“Do you know where we can find a boat?”  LeBron asked a stunned looking Carl.  He’d walked LeBron out here to get the young man to see his fantasy of an aircraft carrier pulling up on the beach wasn’t going to happen.  Now he was trying to answer LeBron’s boat question, but no words would actually leave his mouth.

Chapter 33:  You Can’t Fight the Rip

“I think we’re further out than when we started.”  Drew complained.  He wasn’t quite as bummed as he could’ve been.  They’d lucked into a half-inflated raft and some other buoyant objects.  Flotsam that’d either fallen off the ship or been swept out to sea by the receding storm surge.  If he’d had to keep swimming this entire time, he doubted he’d have made it.  The younger Marines with them swam like dolphins but the two older ones had obviously been neglecting their exercise regimen recently.  Laying across the half-inflated raft with Yue while they doggedly kicked their feet wasn’t too bad.  Although he was pretty sure they were as likely to wash up on a beach in Australia as they were to reach the beach they were kicking for.

He could feel the sun beating down on him, but he was uncontrollably shivering.  He was going to get hypothermia and sun poisoning at the same time.  His parched throat told him that dehydration was also trying to get up in there as a potential cause of death.  He noticed Yue’s eyes were closed so he poked her in the side to wake her up.  Her open eyes reflected the misery he felt but they also revealed she wasn’t dead yet.

“We there yet?”  Yue croaked out.

“Almost.  Just keep swimming.”  One of the Marines sang out through chattering teeth imitating Dory from Finding Nemo.  Looking over Drew saw the Marine was floating on his back with his head resting on the raft.  He had his hat pulled down to shield his eyes from the sun while he napped.  He was one of the men with the survival training.  If he’d given up, then they really were screwed.

Drew rolled over on his back and looked towards the ship.  They’d drifted a considerable distance from it.  Mostly thanks to the massive rip current pulling them out to sea.  The island they’d hoped to land on appeared deceptively close.  It was also almost completely under water still.  Coming to the peak of the wave they were currently on Drew saw a light reflect off glass in the water around the carrier.  Not sure what it was he’d seen he asked Yue to borrow her pistol.

Her eyes popped open as she frantically looked all around them for the dorsal fin that she thought he needed the pistol for.  Drew would’ve laughed but didn’t think his parched throat would be able to handle it.  Instead, he stuck the pistol up in the air and pulled the trigger three times.  The cussing all around him a reminder that it might’ve been a good idea to let everyone else know he was about to shoot a gun right next to them.  When he explained why he’d done it they all got hopeful for a few minutes.  When nothing happened, they all began to slip back away into their own worlds.

Drew kept up his enthusiasm slightly longer than others.  He put his head down finally and just surrendered.  He let his body float in the water.  Focusing on that sensation of weightlessness helped him avoid fixating on how thirsty and cold he was.  His attempt at slipping away peacefully was ruined by the arrival of a Boston Whaler throwing up a wake all over them.  Gagging and spitting out water he looked up at the obvious mirage.  He laughed at the tricks his mind was playing on him and put his head back down in his arms.

Strong arms reached down and fished him and the others off the raft.  Most of them were in a hypothermic fugue state by that time.  The small sports boat suddenly crowded with the half dozen half drowned shipwreck survivors splayed out on the deck.

“We’ve got to get them back to shore.”  LeBron said looking down at the blue lips and half-closed eyes.

Carl nodded and pushed the throttle all the way forward.  The tough little boat breaking through the large swell with ease.  Carl handled her with the ease of a veteran sports fisherman.  He was one of those special people who could actually sit down and watch the fishing tournaments on TV.

LeBron went around rubbing the skin of each person.  A couple of the Marines were coming out of it and helping now as well.  One of them directed LeBron to help him get everyone’s clothes off.  LeBron stopped and looked at him wondering if the hypothermia had impacted the man’s brain.

“He’s right.  We can use our body heat to help warm up the ones who aren’t waking up.  We need to do it now.”  A tall gangly man was in the process of pulling off his sister’s t-shirt.  She wasn’t really wearing much anyway so not a big deal.  LeBron helped get one of the older Marine’s pants off while keeping an eye on the tall guy to make sure he wasn’t trying anything weird with Yue.

They were in the river headed for the wreckage of the dock they’d found the Boston Whaler wrapped around when another boat came cruising towards them from further inland.  In the midst of everyone scrambling to find weapons LeBron recognized the occupants of the other boat.  He told everyone to stand down.

“Somebody knows how to party!  Where’s our invite?”  Mikey yelled when he saw the pile of bodies in the boat and figured out that they were living people.  A pile of naked dead bodies in a boat is a completely different kind of party and not one he had any desire to be invited to.

“Hello there beautiful.”  Gus said pulling off his jacket and gallantly tossing it over to a shivering Yue.

“That’s my sister.”  LeBron said.

“I was talking to the tall guy in the whitey tighties.  Can you pass my jacket over to him?”  Gus joked.  His face was dead serious though.  LeBron realized he was wearing dry clothes and a minute later pretty much everyone was hanging out in their underwear.  LeBron, Carl, and Gus were all mostly naked with their dry clothes being used as blankets for the rapidly dethawing people in the boat.  Mikey was the only one allowed to keep his pants on since his leg was still all messed up from their battle to escape the garage.  LeBron had told him to stop trying after he almost fell out of the boat attempting to take his pants off.

“I can’t believe it’s you.”  Yue said as she disengaged from the bear hug Jeff was giving her.  LeBron eyed the tall man suspiciously.

“It’s ok’s they’re going steady.”  Drew said rolling his eyes behind the height challenged couple.

Mikey took them all the way up the river to the house where the trucks were parked.  There were three trucks crammed into the driveway now.  They’d let them know they were coming.  Men were standing on the end of the rickety looking dock with steaming cups of coffee and a stack of blankets.

“Ok.  Get these guys comfortable.  We’ll be back.”  LeBron said.  Jeff helped the others up and onto the dock leveraging his height to assist.  Then he grabbed himself a blanket and hopped back down into the boat next to LeBron.

“I’m going too.  We need to keep up the laps around the carrier.  There’s still a lot of people trapped inside.  If we’re not there when they jump, then they won’t make it.”  Jeff said.  Carl got them moving at a safe speed through the debris choked river down to the inlet.  Gus and Mikey followed directly behind.  Carl had the homefield advantage. His ease with the sports fishing boats made him the natural leader in this situation.

Jeff filled in LeBron and Carl on what’d transpired to take the proud carrier down.  A massive military weapon that was the pride of the fleet.  It hadn’t gone out with a bang but with a moan.  Taken out by an ancient bioweapon.  LeBron and Carl listened in awe as Jeff described the carnage and horror experienced aboard the ship.  Jeff put the VP to President part of the story as nicely as he could, but it didn’t take a genius to read between the lines there.

“That was the helicopter I saw fly over right before it began to rain.”  LeBron said.  That sweaty hike across the island already a distant memory.  There was no telling where the fancy golf cart had ended up at during the storm.

“I guess you noticed the helicopter left but he didn’t bother sending anyone back to help the rest of us.”  Jeff said.  No longer bothering to force them to read between the lines.  He was so sick of politics at this point.  The world was literally dying all around them and morons like the new President were still making power plays.

“You guys drop me off.  I’m going to let my granddaughter know I’m ok and get some more guys on boats to come help with the rescue effort.  I’m assuming one of you can figure out how to drive this boat?”  Carl asked.  They both nodded.  Carl didn’t seem convinced.

“We’ve got this.  We’ll see you when you join us out there.”  LeBron said.

“Wear your lifejackets and don’t aim straight for the survivors.  You won’t be doing them any good if you run over them.  These things don’t stop like a car does.”  Carl said.  He seemed to be reconsidering if he should leave them in charge.  Jeff assured him they had it covered and shoved off from the pier.  He accidentally went in reverse about twenty yards before figuring out how to go forward.  Doing his best not to make eye contact with Carl he then steered them out into the channel.  Following in the wake of Gus and Mikey who were full speed ahead out towards the massive shipwreck.

When they’d made it out to about a hundred yards distance from the wreck they slowed down. Each of them went a separate direction slowly trolling to look for survivors.  Surgers stood on the edge of the flight deck staring down at the boats with hate filled eyes.  They seemed to intuit that even with their adrenaline pumping they couldn’t reach the hated humans.  LeBron was looking up at them when the heads on every surger along the deck suddenly snapped to look in the direction of three desperate sailors hauling ass for the railing.

LeBron got off a couple of shots before Jeff put his hand on his shoulder.  From this distance bobbing around on the boat it wasn’t likely he’d hit what he was aiming at.  The last thing he wanted to do was accidentally snipe one of the men making a run for it.  The three of them were making a valiant effort.  The surgers converging on them from every direction.  Two of the men made it to the side. One of them was ripped backwards out of the air as he jumped.  The other man leapt like an Olympic diver and disappeared into the ocean with two of the surgers tumbling into the water after him.

“Don’t get too close to the ship!”  LeBron said as a reminder when Jeff revved up the engine and took them in the direction the diver had disappeared under in.  Jeff nodded and spun the wheel to avoid doing that.  A huge splash directly behind them as one of the surgers tried their luck at jumping aboard.

The escaping sailor popped up.  He was cutting through the water straight for them.  He’d spent some time on a swim team somewhere given the impressive speed he was making.  Although LeBron thought with that kind of hell behind him, he could probably doggie paddle faster than a dolphin on crank.  The sailor came up beside their boat and stuck his hand up.  LeBron grabbed his hand and had him halfway into the boat when he suddenly yelled and jumped backwards.

Jeff looked back to see what was going on and saw that the crewman had used up the last of his humanity to make it to their boat.  At some point while LeBron had been hauling him aboard, he’d been inconsiderate enough to allow his body to succumb to the infection flowing through his veins.  LeBron had sensed it and let him go before the newly infected could get his teeth into the hand helping him aboard.  Unfortunately, the surgers other hand had found a tight grip on the side of the boat.  His adrenaline packed body tugging him easily aboard.  He was welcomed aboard by the gunfire of both Jeff and LeBron.  Neither of whom were in the mood to conserve ammunition.

The corpse of the infected sailor hit the deck looking like someone had shoved a couple hundred pounds of bloody ground beef into a sailor suit.  LeBron and Jeff stared down at the bloody mess for a second.  LeBron jarred by how close he’d just come to becoming one of those evil things.  He’d been holding a surger’s hand.  It didn’t get much closer than that.

“That was close.”  Jeff said taking a half step towards the corpse to make sure the surger was officially dead.

A huge splash threw water up on both of them.  It dawned on both Jeff and LeBron at the same time that no one was actually driving the boat anymore.  Spinning around they saw they’d drifted way too close to the carrier.  Close enough that the surgers above were starting to jump for them.  A loud smashing noise as one buried itself in the dashboard.  The throttle snapping off under the weight.

LeBron and Jeff jumped backwards like they were at the front row of a Gallagher show and they’d completely forgotten to bring a tarp.  The innards of the infected spraying out in every direction on impact.  Jeff was spitting like a madman since he’d had his mouth open at the exact wrong time.  LeBron was much more freaked out about the fact that they were getting closer to the ship every second.  More splashes sounded all around them and another surger smashed into the deck.  The two of them were trying to figure out if they should stay aboard or abandon yet another boat.

Another surger smashed into the back of the boat ripping a hole all the way through the hull.  The boat began to sink.  That settled that.  Jeff told LeBron to jump off and swim for it.  Then taking his own advice he dove off and stroked as hard as he could through the swell away from the carrier.

“Seriously?”  Mikey said once they had LeBron and Jeff on board.  Even Gus was shaking his head in disbelief.

“Hey just glad you were able to get out of there.”  Gus said to cover up for Mikey being way too straight forward.  Neither of them quite understood what Jeff’s role was now in all of this.  They continued to circle the carrier futilely looking for any other survivors who may have made it off.  A few more boats showed up and Mikey waved them over.

“You guys rescue anybody yet?”  Carl called out seeing that Mikey and Gus had a couple of extra bodies in their boat.

“Just LeBron and Jeff!”  Mikey called back unable to help himself.  He kept his big grin up right until LeBron gently kicked him in his injured ankle.  That shut him up and wiped the grin off his face.

Carl stared over at them for a minute.  It was plain as day that he was full of questions.  Finally, he just shook his head and piloted his own craft in the opposite direction to keep up the search and rescue operation.

Chapter 34:  Home Sweet Home

They circled the shipwreck for three more days.  No more non-infected were seen.  At the end of three days, it was assumed that everyone on board was either dead or too weak to try and get out.  Jeff offered the opportunity to any of the survivors living on Seabrook Island to come back with them.  He told them about the warehouse and what they were trying to accomplish.  Of the thirty something people still coming around for regular meetings at the demolished club most of them accepted.

One of the men who didn’t accept was one of the few lucky enough to have his family with him and still alive.  His house had withstood the brunt of the storm.  They had food and water to last them the next six months stored down in their basement.  There was even more they could now work to dig up out of the wreckage of the other homes.  He chose not to bet six months of guaranteed survival for his family against the uncertain future he saw with them on the road.

The survivors who were staying agreed to keep a sharp lookout over the next few weeks for any survivors making it off the ship.  Jeff promised them they’d come back in a month or two and bring supplies to pay them back for anything they used helping out survivors.  At that time if any of them changed their minds they’d be free to come back with them as well.  With that piece all tied up in a pretty bow they loaded up the trucks and headed back to the warehouse.

They left first thing in the morning to avoid getting stuck out on the road after dark.  Sitting in one of these trailers while the crawlerz attacked it was a traumatic experience.  Considering they were transporting families that included small children they wanted to avoid having to deal with any of that.  Amita had hooked up a TV and DVD player in the trailer powered by rewiring an overhead dome light.  The kids were all sitting up in sleeping bags watching a Disney movie with magical princesses and talking snowmen.  Amita was going to be worth her weight in canned spam. Or whatever the equivalent of gold was in this new normal.  Possibly wet wipes?

Jeff spent the roughly four hour drive up in the cab on the lead truck wondering exactly what he was going to say to the President when they reported in.  Their fearless leader had taken off in the helicopter after demoting him and leaving him to die.  He was pretty sure the man wasn’t going to be happy to see him again.  He knew for sure he wasn’t going to enjoy seeing the pompous bastard again.

They pulled into the base through the gate they’d bashed open leaving and parked the trucks in a row over by the doors leading into the warehouse.  The open door and bodies scattered around the field told Jeff what he needed to know as far as why the warehouse hadn’t returned any of their radio transmissions.  Sitting on the tarmac was the Chinook helicopter that’d carried the President from the carrier to the warehouse.  Jeff went through all the radio channels again and they blasted the truck horn once for good measure.

All the noise managed to generate was the appearance of a handful of surgers.  The surgers came running out of the warehouse and immediately jumped up on the cages surrounding the cabs.  LeBron was sitting in the cab of one of the trucks with Mikey. They were both saddened to see one of the surgers was Victor.  Mikey recognized a few more of the men from his team as well.

“I wonder if prioritizing the trucks was such a great idea now.  I bet the infected came through the walls here like they did in the barracks.”  LeBron said sadly.

“I’m not leaving them like that.”  Mikey said and proceeded to roll down his window and yell for the surgers to come at him.  Pretty soon he had a crowd of the surgers hanging off the cage three feet away from him.  Their arms swinging wildly through the holes in the cage to try and get at him.  For the first time it dawned on LeBron that if they ran into a bunch of little kid crawlerz they might have an issue. Toddler sized crawlerz could easily slip right through the holes in the cage.  The sharp retort of Mikey’s gun in the cramped confinement of the truck’s cab pulled LeBron out of his musings.  He made sure his magazine was full then rolled his window down to get to work as well.  He was with Mikey on not letting their former friends wander around soullessly for all of eternity.

Jeff waited patiently for them to finish before picking up his microphone and keying it to transmit.

“Well, this was a bust.  Let’s try and fuel up on the tarmac once we’ve thinned out the surgers.  Once we’re topped off there’s a top-secret VIP location about six hours from here.  It has plenty of supplies and basically everything we need to live long happy lives.  That’s where we go from here.”  Jeff let go of the mic.

“These VIPs going to be ok with us crashing their post-apocalyptic party?”  Mikey asked over the air.

“They’re not going to have a choice.”  Jeff responded in a voice that didn’t leave any room for argument.

The trucks lined up on the tarmac by the diesel pumps.  The men piled out with weapons held high and went to work thinning out the surgers.  Not even stopping at the gas station was easy anymore.  Luckily, they had plenty of snacks packed in the back for the long road trip ahead.

Author’s Note:

Thank you so much for continuing this journey with me.  As we all continue to journey through this global pandemic, we all grow closer.  Just one big human race slowly beating our way through this crud.  All of us going through similar struggles between school, work and trying to live our best lives.  Many of us dealing with the sadness of relatives and friends who’ve passed or are in the hospital struggling with this disease.

In our case my family has always been into doing homeschool and I have the privilege of being able to work wherever I can find a power outlet and a flat surface.  It hasn’t been a huge adjustment for us thanks to those pre-existing lifestyle choices.  It’s still scary.  Plenty of people in the high-risk category in my family plus a newborn bouncing around with us everywhere we go.  In the midst of all this I spend my time imagining a world a million times worse off and putting that down on paper as an escape from the reality we all face daily.  It can be a bit surreal.

Thank you again for the kind words, awesome reviews, and for picking these novels as your escape.  Please leave a review if you’ve enjoyed them.  It’s very much appreciated.  Now to continue on to Book 3 where some good old boys are about to find out their network is very much dated.

Other Books by RS Merritt

Try an excellent 7 Book Series built around a Zombie outbreak:

Zombies!

Need more Zombies?  Check out the 6-Book Zournal series:

The Zournal Series

Looking for something a little different?  Try the Son of the Keeper Series:

Son of the Keeper