Convoy 19: A Zombie Novel (15 page)

Private Stenson turned from covering the civilians on the ground, and plunged his bayonet into the head of a ghoul that was feasting upon a civilian woman. He turned to Kelly Damico and nodded toward the Humvees. “Go” he urged as he drove the butt of his rifle into the skull of a zombie crawling towards her.

Kelly nodded, accepting the fact that there was nothing more she could do here. She climbed out the window, lowered herself to the ground, and dashed toward an open Humvee door.

Miguel joined Pam and Carl in trying to pull civilians and fellow soldiers from the fray. “It’s time to go!” he yelled, but the notion seemed as futile as it was obvious. Those that could escape were already hurling themselves toward the vehicles. Those who could not, lay dead and dying.

Carl seemed oblivious to Miguel. “Go! Get up! Get to the convoy!” he screamed at a soldier lying on the ground. The dead soldier stared up at Carl with lifeless eyes; its torso a mangled wet mess from the chest down. “Go! Jump! Run!” Carl fired into a ghoul feasting on another soldier pinned in a corner. The man was already dead, and the first twitches of reanimation were overtaking him.

Miguel and Pam grabbed Carl by the arm and pulled him back. “Sergeant Carl Harvey! We have to go now!” Pam shouted.

Carl staggered backward in their grip. His legs looked wobbly and for a second, Pam thought Carl was going to pass out. There was something strange in Carl. He was exhausted from the struggle, but more than that, he was losing his resolve. Not his resolve to fight the undead, but his resolve to retreat in the face of insurmountable odds, and count himself among those that could escape.

“They’re dead!” Pam screamed. “We need you! Come on! We have to jump!”

Carl paused, considering his options.

“Now!” Miguel bellowed.

“Okay… okay…” Carl nodded reluctantly.

Pam, Miguel, and Carl, turned to face the mayhem outside and took a deep breath as they summoned the courage to drop to the parking lot. With outstretched claws at their backs, the three soldiers hurled themselves to the ground.

Pam landed hard with the sound of cracking bone. Her mind raced in terror as she waited for the pain to hit her – what had snapped? Where was she hurt? Could she still run?

“FUCK!” Miguel screamed as he rolled onto his back gripping his lower leg. His face grimaced in a mask of agony.

Pam and Carl looked at each other with the realization that the sound they heard hadn’t come from either of them. As undead began to rain down from the second story window, Carl and Pam hoisted Miguel to his feet between them.  Each held a pistol in their free hand, and they fired while back-pedaling with their comrade in tow.

Chapter 24

“Shit!” Carl lost his grip on Miguel’s collar and fell backward.

Ghouls poured from the shattered window onto the pavement below. In their mindless pursuit of the living, they followed their prey to the ground – their clumsy bodies hitting the blacktop awkwardly. They fell to the earth with sickening splats or crunches, ignored their injuries, and crawled toward their nearest victim.  The zombies were relentless despite floppy broken limbs and twisted torsos.  Soldiers, civilians, and dead tumbled together in a pile of chaos consisting of guns, knives, teeth, and claws.

Pam—fueled by adrenaline—continued pulling Miguel with one arm, while firing her sidearm wildly with the other. Miguel kicked a pursuing ghoul away with his good leg. He reloaded his rifle and sighting an approaching zombie, grit his teeth through the pain and fired. The back of the monster’s head erupted in a gout of black gore, and it tumbled to its knees.

“HELP ME! PLEASE! PLEAAAAAASE!” A civilian lay on the ground screaming. Pinned beneath a rotting and writhing corpse, she was unable to free herself before two—then three—then five—ghouls joined in tearing bloody chunks from her body.

A soldier who had just jumped to the ground barely regained his footing before two ghouls tumbled on top of him, knocking him back down. He twisted around and attempted to scramble away, but a rotten hand caught his leg.

Carl rolled to his feet and gripped his fellow soldier by the shoulder, pulling with all his might. “I’ve got you!”

The soldier screamed in agony as the zombie pulled itself up his leg to sink its teeth into his thigh. He screamed in a mix of rage and pain, fumbled for his sidearm, and emptied his entire clip into the thrashing mass of undead. He popped in a new clip and placed the barrel in his mouth.

“No!” Carl ordered.

It was too late. With a pull of the trigger, the soldier collapsed. Carl let the man slip from his grip, and he backed away. A handful of undead began chewing on the man’s legs.

“God dammit!” Carl turned toward his convoy to come face to face with a half-dozen snarling undead.

“Carl!” Pam screamed as she continued pulling Miguel along the ground.

Miguel and Pam unloaded their weapons at the growing swarm that surrounded Carl. Heads exploded and bodies thudded to the ground, but there were too many.

As zombies were closing in all around him, Carl held his rifle like a club. He was trapped, and taking some monsters with him before he went down was all he could ask for. “Come on!” he taunted. “Come get me!”

The sound of a dozen consecutive pops from above coincided with each of Carl’s attackers falling to their knees before collapsing face-first onto the pavement. Carl looked up in confusion, and his eyes found a young soldier who stood perched in the corner of the second story office window.  Most of the undead that surrounded the soldier were preoccupied with consuming fresh victims. The rest had their attention focused on the escaping soldiers and civilians.

“Stenson!” Kelly Damico screamed from the convoy.

“Get her out of here!” Stenson shouted at Carl. He stood, slammed the butt of his gun into the face of a walking corpse, and changed the magazine of his rifle. Some of the nearby ghouls began to turn their attention towards the Private.

“Stenson! Come on!” Kelly Screamed. A sergeant yanked her inside his vehicle and slammed the door. Two walking corpses reached for the space she had just occupied, but they only stumbled into the car window to leer at her menacingly.

Carl jogged over to Miguel and Pam, gripped Miguel under his arm, and hauled him to his feet. “We need to go!”

Pam holstered her sidearm and wrapped Miguel’s other arm over her shoulder. She shouted into the communications network. “We need a driver in every car!”

The soldiers had retreated to their vehicles. Four mounted guns were now splitting fire between the zombies accumulating on the fence, and the zombies pouring out of the DDC. The mass of bodies pressing against the fence was immense, and over a thousand hissing faces howled at the convoy as portions of the fence began to collapse. The vanguard of undead scrambled over the battered obstacle toward the vehicles.

“It’s giving way!” Someone screamed. The chain links stretched like a fish net, and the struts shrieked as they were pressed to the breaking point.

A civilian woman helped Miguel into the lead Humvee, and Pam dove inside behind him. Carl ran to the driver’s side, opened the door, and was about to get in when he stopped. He glanced around, oblivious to the impending danger, as if he was searching for something.

“Let’s go!” Pam screamed through the communications network.

A series of gunshots rang out from within the vehicle, and Carl turned to see Miguel pointing his rifle out the driver’s door.  Carl turned back around in a daze to see three corpses crumpled on the ground behind him.

“Wake up, Carl!” Miguel shot his commanding officer an angry look. He never had to raise his voice at Carl. Carl was the type of leader he admired, the type of leader whose focus and caution had saved his life more times than he could count. Something had changed though. Carl seemed distant, or a step or two behind real time. “Carl! Get in!”

Tortured metal screamed over the dissonance of rampaging undead, and a huge section of the fence tumbled over. It was followed in quick succession by another and another. An ocean of undead poured toward the convoy. Carl took one last look at the second story office window where several of his men lay dead. The young soldier, Private Stenson, who had remained behind to cover their escape was nowhere to be seen. Carl took a deep breath, nodded silently, stepped inside the vehicle, and closed the door.

“Let me in! Please! Let me in!” A woman cradled her bleeding arm that had been mauled by several bite marks. She banged on the passenger side window. Carl locked the doors and shifted the vehicle into reverse. The woman stumbled forward, tears streaming down her face.

“Help her!” a child in the back yelled.

Carl ignored the plea, revved the engine, and brought the convoy to face the mass of approaching dead. The bitten woman was engulfed by the lead pack of ghouls. They then slammed against the Humvee windows and leered at the living within. They pounded on the armored trucks with angry fists. Civilians screamed, and machine-gunners closed the top hatches to make the vehicles impregnable. Carl sighed as he spoke, “I’m… I’m pushing through! If I get stuck, someone pushes from behind…”

“NO!” Pam’s face took on a look of terror. She pointed to a narrow alley behind them that was between the DDC and the adjacent building. “Go that way!” The memory of their last desperate push through a swarm of undead was all-too fresh in her memory. If a vehicle broke down this time, there was no help – no air support, no recovery team, no reinforcements. They would be on their own… and that would be a death sentence.

“Okay, disregard that last order. Follow me!” Carl floored the gas, and the vehicle zoomed forward. It smashed into packs of ghouls as it went. He had full faith in Pam, and he also had no wish to relive the bloody mayhem of the previous night.  It had cost too many lives. He jerked the wheel sharply to make a U-turn, and plowed up and over a sand bag fortification. The tires squealed, and the Humvee plowed through more undead. He led the convoy back around to face the alley.

He stopped the truck for a moment. “It’s gonna be a tight fit.” Carl said to the other drivers.

“Buckle up!” Pam added.

The Humvee roared forward. With two simultaneous bangs and a shower of sparks, the right and left mirrors were shaved off. Garbage cans and lingering undead alike were crushed beneath the armored vehicle’s bulk as it built speed.

“Where does this go?” Carl asked, noting that the chain link fence at the end of the alley was looming larger and larger as he approached.

Pam didn’t answer, but she bit her bottom lip.

“Specialist?” Carl asked with a growl.

As the vehicle reached the end of the alley, Carl got his answer. The Humvee crashed through a rusted metal fence and over a ledge that overlooked a small city park. The engine howled, and the vehicle hurtled through the air. Civilians screamed in terror as they felt themselves in free-fall.

The drop was nearly two stories, and the landing was hard. The three-ton vehicle loaded with passengers slammed into the ground with a bang before skidding forward and taking out a child’s swing set. Miguel groaned in pain as he held his leg, and Carl glanced in his center mirror.

“Keep moving when you hit the ground. We don’t want to land on top of each other,” Carl said through the communications network. He continued to press on the gas, and he plowed forward through the playground.

“Hit the ground?” a questioning voice came back over the network.

Four more Humvees, one after another, shot from the ledge into the park below. They drove forward before sliding to a halt. Dust settled, and the crews sat silently for a moment, collecting their wits. Their endurance was taxed, and their adrenaline was wearing thin.

The cacophony of the undead hordes atop the hill echoed through the San Diego streets.  The handful of undead that had pursued them through the alley slowly trickled over the edge and tumbled to the ground.

Pam opened her laptop and began typing.  She pretended to be oblivious to the stare of disbelief that Carl and Miguel had fixed on her.

“Unprofessional, Specialist Grace. Very unprofessional.” Carl spoke over the communications network to let everyone else in the convoy know that it was not his idea to take the escape route through the alley.

“San Onofre is… um…that way.” Pam awkwardly pointed behind her and up a side road that sat perpendicular to the alley that had just ejected the military vehicles.

“Hey, Pam, can we get a warning next time you decide to take the convoy base jumping?” Someone from another vehicle joked over the network.

“Seriously…” Carl shook his head and sighed as he pulled the convoy onto the road and began driving in the direction Pam had indicated.

“At least we didn’t have to drive through that mess of WDs,” Pam shrugged.

Chapter 25

Dr. Henry Damico set his small suitcase at his feet and sighed. He was not a materialistic person, but in packing for his trip, he realized that all the clothes he owned—indeed all his worldly possessions—were now stuffed neatly into what amounted to a carry-on bag. Had he considered he would never see his home again, he would have packed for something more than a weekend trip. It seemed absurd to yearn for the small luxury of being able to choose from more than three outfits. Already the threads were starting to fray, and the knees of his pants and elbows of his shirt were almost worn through.

How long do clothes really last? Were people with the skill to make textiles a critical need he had overlooked? There were people out there with only the clothes on their back. How long could the fabric of thirty-some thousand people last in ocean air? His mind wandered as he gazed out over the aircraft carrier’s landing deck.

Helicopters of varying shapes and sizes sat next to fighter jets that, Henry noted, were not as numerous as when he had first arrived on board the U.S.S. Ronald Reagan. A group of soldiers and sailors slowly loaded cargo onto a Chinook Helicopter that would eventually transport Henry and a dozen other men to the U.S.S. Boxer – an amphibious warfare ship that had been largely converted into a floating refugee center.

The cool sea breeze felt good, and the fresh air made Henry realize how much he had gotten used to the dank smell of mildew and body odor below deck. When he returned, Henry decided, he would have to make a point of getting more fresh air.

The sound of rotors preceded a green Iroquois helicopter’s arrival. It landed on the carrier deck, and six marines poured out…carrying two stretchers. They rushed toward Henry with alarming urgency, a marine medic held two IV’s in the air as they went. A man dressed in civilian clothes chased after them. His shirt was drenched in blood, and his face bore a look of anguish.

The marines rushed past Henry, and one of the soldiers broke off to intercept the civilian man before he made his way into the ship. “They’re in good hands, sir. Docs will have them stitched up in no time. Are you okay?”

Henry could see, as the civilian man came closer that his face was broken and bruised, and there was a deep gash in his right arm. Instinctually, he took a step forward to help and if necessary—inspect the man for bites. The marine seemed to have things under control, however, and Henry forced himself to stay out of the situation.

The marine removed some gauze from his backpack and began wrapping the civilian’s lacerated arm. The two men then began to move in Henry’s direction. As the marine worked, he looked up and acknowledged Henry…but continued tending to the civilian’s wound. “Okay, I’m gonna take care of this quick, so that you don’t bleed all over sick bay…and then you can see your kids.”

Henry allowed silence to linger for a few minutes before speaking. “What happened?”

“There’s a riot aboard the Sapphire Cruise ship.” The marine answered nonchalantly.

“They stabbed my kids!” The civilian man continued. “I tried to… I tried…” The man broke down into tears and was unable to continue.

“Come on, let’s see your kids,” the marine offered. The man’s sobs persisted, echoing up the steel corridor as the two men disappeared below deck.

“That’s a damn shame.” A familiar voice startled Henry.

He wheeled to face Senator Allan Nostrum. The overweight, balding man clutched a brown suitcase and frowned at Henry. Henry did not enjoy being startled, but he managed to calm his rising anger before responding in an even tone: “Yep… damn shame.”

The Senator held Henry’s gaze. He was a good deal shorter than the Doctor was, but the Senator carried himself with the presence of a much larger man. “The captain of the Sapphire’s been begging the Admiral for a security detail for over a month. Those marines were just over there inspecting the situation. Lucky they were there, else that man and his kids would be dead.”

Henry considered asking Nostrum how he knew about the Sapphire, but he arrived at the answer almost as soon as the question entered his mind. Nostrum was a politician with a knack for building networks of contacts. While Henry was busily solving the world’s problems, Allan was cultivating his power base. “Good thing I guess…” Henry replied, wary of the predator in his midst.

“There are gonna be a lot more riots. There are not enough soldiers to spread around. We’re gonna lose a lot more ships – civilian and military – before we make it to the Gulf.” Nostrum continued in his smooth New England accent. “A lot of people…”

“We’ll have to consolidate the civilian fleet into the larger vessels to maintain security. It’s all in my report,” Henry replied.

“I read your report,” Nostrum answered. He moved to the doorway and peered out at the soldiers loading the Chinook helicopter. “You have a forward-thinking mind, Henry. That’s good.”

Henry was reminded of the patronizing tone he had endured while working in the department of Health and Human Services as an analyst. He had almost forgotten about it. He had learned to ignore it, but after months of being the man in charge, the sting came back all at once. He struggled to keep his anger in check. “You can call me Doctor, Senator. Doctor Damico.”

“Then what will I call your wife when I meet her?” he smiled a toothy smile. “I can’t call you both Doctor Damico. That must be so confusing at cocktail parties.”

“What do you want?” Henry asked impatiently.

“Me? Nothing, I’m just waiting for my ride.” Nostrum responded in a tone that feigned hurt feelings.

“You’re going to the Boxer?” A sense of sadness washed over Henry. He had hoped to spend a couple days alone with his wife, and the thought of having to keep an eye out for a nosy Senator was not appealing.

“The Boxer? No, I’m getting dropped off on the Horizon Pacific container ship. The captain has had his underwear in a bunch since we pulled an Imminent Domain on him and started distributing his cargo of food to the fleet. I’m going to see if I can smooth things over.”

Henry set his jaw and nodded in reluctant approval. The resources on many ships had been commandeered by the military for a variety of purposes – food stuffs, supplies, fuel. The captains of those vessels had become entitled astonishingly quickly. There were no active ports in which to dock, and the corporations that owned the freight were defunct or dead.  In their minds, they were the de facto owners of their cargo. They imagined themselves, in part, as new wealthy nobility who had inherited their fortunes by default. Small ocean-borne feudal societies had already begun to spring up – complete with courts comprised of the ship’s crews and protected by mercenaries or civilians willing to pledge fealty as “knights.” However, the military had stepped in to inform those captains that not only were they not the twenty-first century kings they fancied themselves to be, but they would also have a permanent military presence on board for security and distribution of goods. Once the illusion was shattered, those ship’s captains and crews had been thrust into a rocky relationship with the military. If not for the ever-present threat of the walking dead, the Mexican military and marauding pirates, many ships may have likely attempted to abandon the fleet.

Henry turned away from the senator and stared out over the tarmac. The world was becoming a very strange place, and men like Nostrum had a knack for navigating it. It was frustrating to see someone thrive amidst the chaos for which they were in part responsible.

“What do
you
want?” Nostrum repeated Henry’s question back to him.

Henry hesitated before answering. He had been operating on autopilot for so long he hadn’t really considered the question. “I want to see my wife.”

“Of course… but what do you
want
?” Nostrum stressed the word, indicating that his question was meant to be much broader than the answer Henry had given him.

Henry wondered if he should answer. Was Nostrum looking for leverage? Was he probing for information he could later use against Henry? He decided to give an answer that was both honest and something Nostrum already knew. “I want to get as many people to the Gulf of Mexico as possible, reestablish land-based civilization, and take back North America.”

Nostrum chuckled. “That’s a good answer, Henry. A lot of people, they’d answer that they want the undead to go away or their loved ones to come back. Everyone wants those things, but that’s not going to happen. You want real things, attainable things. That makes your dreams more than fantasy. You can achieve your dreams. That’s healthy.”

“My dreams would be much easier to achieve if incompetent politicians would get out of my way and let me do my job.” Henry answered bitterly. “What do
you
want? To float here until we’re overrun or run out of food and supplies? To go to war with the Chinese and get us all killed?”

“Sirs…” A young sailor barely in his twenties had approached them. “We’re going to be taking off soon.”

“Oh look!” Nostrum picked up his suitcase and gingerly stepped toward the helicopter. “My ride’s here.”

Henry glared at the Senator, but he picked up his own suitcase and followed. The two men got into their seats and buckled in. The rotors roared louder and louder until the ungainly helicopter, piled high with boxes and bags, took off.

From the air, the fleet looked unlike anything Henry had ever seen. Destroyers and cruisers patrolled a wide perimeter. Large groupings of civilian vessels were huddled together like floating neighborhoods. Smaller yachts and fishing boats sat next to larger cruise ships. Further inside the perimeter sat the container ships and supply frigates that were vital to the fleet’s survival. At the center of it all, sat the U.S.S. Ronald Reagan Super Carrier, looming like a mighty giant over its domain.

The view was impressive, but there were other, more ominous sights as well. Here and there, undead floundered helplessly about in the ocean waves. Abandoned and capsized vessels dotted the sea, their broken and half-submerged carcasses floating aimlessly through the military perimeter. Oil fires of sunken ships, gasoline slicks, garbage bags, and human filth – the sum of the waste that thirty thousand people can produce—covered the ocean like a watery garbage dump. The fleet truly was a floating city with a complete lack of plumbing or trash collection, and the blue water carried a brown and green tint.

As quickly as it had taken to the air, the helicopter landed on the deck of the Horizon Pacific container ship. Henry sat patiently while the marines and sailors unloaded cargo.

Nostrum unbuckled himself from his seat and stepped onto the deck. A heavy set man with a gray beard approached the Chinook. He had his arms wrapped around two attractive young women in bikinis, and he wore a gaudy gold ring on every finger. With a red-faced toothy smile, he extended a hand in greeting. “Senator!” The man said with the rough voice of a life-long sailor. “It’s good to see you again… you didn’t have to bring the squaddies, though. I would have sent an escort to get you.”

Henry had heard the derogatory term ’squaddies’ before, but not in a long time. Ever since the military became the difference between life and the undead, they commanded a level of respect among the civilian population that was unassailable. It took a special kind of degenerate to insult the Navy in private, let alone in their presence.

“Captain.” Nostrum took the man’s hand, nodded, and seemed about to continue speaking, when the boisterous man shoved one of his women toward a soldier who had just set down a large sealed black box.

“C’mon, boys! Stay a while. We got beer! Food! Women!” The man chuckled.

The soldier caught the woman. Her face was expressionless—almost sad—as she ran her hand up the inside of the marine’s thigh. The soldier released her, pushed her gently away, shook his head, and returned to his work.

“Men?” the captain grinned. “I know about you navy boys…”

“Captain, I’ll meet you on the bridge momentarily.” Nostrum interrupted as he watched the woman the captain had pushed scurry away between containers. “I need a moment with Dr. Damico.”

“Eh? Dr. Damico?” The Captain turned his attention to Henry who sat quietly in the helicopter. “Well… nice to finally meet the Admiral’s butt boy. Here!” He shoved the other woman toward the helicopter. “Have a blow job and stop taking my loot!”

The woman began to climb into the helicopter with Henry. Now that she was closer to him, he could see the unmistakable outline of bruises on her face and arms. Makeup had been caked on to cover the abuse, but—in the bright sunlight—it was plain to see. Henry made eye contact with her and shook his head. “Get out,” he ordered. A feeling, part pity, part anger, and part helplessness, washed over him. He slowly shifted his gaze to meet the captain’s as the woman climbed back out of the aircraft.

The captain’s grin vanished from his face as he met Henry’s icy stare. “This is
my
loot, Captain. You’re just watching it for
me
. Do not abuse that privilege.” Henry was almost surprised at the words coming out of him. For the first time, he felt the intoxication of power and how it could be seductive. He was both horrified and excited by the sensation. “There are plenty of people who can do your job. Just give me a reason to replace you.”

Nostrum broke in. “Captain, I’ll see you in a moment. Please…”

The Captain gaped for a moment, unaccustomed to being spoken to in such a manner on his own ship. He was about to protest, but thought better of it. Wordlessly turned on his heels and walked away.