30
High atop his huge crane, Billy watched the small aluminum boat get smaller as it motored across the Bay. He was happy that those good folks were able to make it out of the city safely. Billy loved kids, and to see one of them get torn up by these walking nightmares may have broken him. He hoped that they would make it to Alcatraz with no problems. Caleb would meet Sam, and Noah might come out of his shell if another child besides his brother was present.
Climbing out of the cab of the giant machine, Billy looked down at the crowd of dead faces far below him and sighed. From this vantage point, he could see several work vessels tied to a dock on the other side of the terminal. If he could get the keys to those boats, he could get a lot of people out of San Francisco. Billy now realized that saving the living could be his calling. He did pretty well with the small group of survivors he escorted from the sewers, not to mention his tally was up over a hundred now!
He began the arduous climb down the welded steel rungs on the side of the crane. It was a good six stories down, and at the bottom he would have to face the dead again. The only problem this presented was that it would slow him down. Again, the things didn’t seem to want to eat him. It was something about the hospital that had given the creatures an appetite for fresh Billy, but he couldn’t figure it. Morningside was where one of them first tried to chew on him, but fifteen minutes before that, he could walk among them as if he were an old drinking buddy.
When he reached the base of the crane, he was greeted by a few dozen undead who, once again, came at him with gusto until they were a few feet away, then shambled off. What had he done differently at the hospital than now or before? He went over and over it in his head. A fast one had attacked him and he had killed it. When it was dead, like its friends, it wanted nothing to do with him. Why? He met Ali, and they still didn’t want him, but they wanted her. He remembered a term he had overheard his mother use when she didn’t know he was listening:
Undesirable
. Maybe that was the ticket; he just tasted bad and they knew it?
Billy shook his head and chuckled, which immediately brought three zombies to within feet of him again before they wandered off. He chased them down and grabbed a dead mechanic in blue overalls. “What is it huh? Why not?” The thing looked at him for a second and tried to shuffle away, but Billy held it fast. It even began pushing him away, so he slapped it across the face. Infected fluids covered his hand, and he wiped it on the dead man’s overalls.
Billy had lost an ice axe when he had drawn the dead crowd with him away from his friends, but he still had the other one. He slashed the mechanic across the back as it walked away. If fell forward from the impact, but stood without delay and ambled off.
Sighing, Billy walked in the direction of what he thought was an office. If there were keys to the boats he had seen, they would be in there. He had seen the trailer with windows when he was atop the crane. He walked briskly through the container maze. Turning a corner around a MAERSK container, he ran straight into a zombie, who grabbed him and growled, baring its filthy, broken teeth. Then it cocked its head and let him go. The thing had a rubber tube around its right bicep, and a needle was still sticking out of its arm. “Just say no,” Billy told it, “drugs will really kill you, man.” Billy suddenly stood stock still.
Drugs!
It was after he took the clozapine that the things wanted to tear into him! Eighteen hours later, they didn’t want to munch on him anymore. It had to be the drugs, but why? Ali hadn’t taken clozapine, she wanted risperidone, which was probably another anti-psychotic, Billy didn’t know.
He reached the door to the trailer, but it was locked, and the blinds on the windows had been drawn so he couldn’t see inside. Picking up a loose landscape brick, he cocked his arm back to pitch it through the door window on the trailer when he heard a sharp intake of breath on the other side of the door. Zombies didn’t breathe.
The dead druggie had shuffled off, and Billy was alone in front of the trailer. He got very close to the door and whispered: “Hey, let me in, I’m not dead!” The blinds over the high window on the right parted ever so slightly, and he waved to the window. He heard a quiet
snick
, and the door opened slightly. He crept up the wooden staircase to the door and, looking around first, entered, closing the door behind him.
Once again he was staring down the barrel of a weapon, “Well, if this doesn’t feel familiar,” he said and raised his hands.
“Shhh! Who are you?” asked a terrified boy of about fourteen.
“Billy. Got stuck in here huh?”
“Yeah, my dad went for one of the boats a while ago, and he hasn’t come back yet.”
“Can you please point the gun at something other than my face?”
“No. I don’t know you. There’s been some bad folks running around. Live ones.”
‘Well, I just need some boat keys. I’m looking to get some folks out of here, and to Alcatraz.”
The kid’s eyes widened. “We’re going to Alcatraz too! Did you hear that guy on the radio? That cop?” The gun faltered a bit, and he lowered it some.
“No, but I know him,” Billy answered, “detective Meara. You can’t stay here much longer, they’ll find you, and tear this place down to get you.”
“I gotta wait for my dad.”
“How long has he been gone?”
“I don’t know, two hours maybe?”
“Listen, we’ve got to go. Two hours is a long time out there. Your dad would want you to be safe. If you come with me, we can…”
The boy raised the gun again, “I said I’m waiting for my dad.”
Billy brought his hands up again, “Ok, ok, then let me just take a set of keys and I’ll be on my way.”
The boy moved to a wooden locker and opened it.
“Take what you want.”
“Thanks, don’t mind if I do.” The keys were on tags which all had numbers on them. Billy grabbed one that had the number eight and below it in smaller numbers eight-zero-eight on it. He moved to the door, turning his head slightly back toward the boy. “Are you sure you won’t come with me?”
“Can’t. My dad will be back.”
Billy sighed, “Alright.” He put his hand on the doorknob and looked back at the kid. “What’s your name?”
“Dave.”
“Well Dave, if you don’t come with me, you’ll be torn to pieces before morning. I can see you’re on the fence about this, but I promise you, if your father isn’t back by now, he isn’t coming. How many shots you got left?”
“Six in the clip and half a box more.”
Billy took his hand from the doorknob. “Reload now, fill the magazine, then take the last bullet back out, that way it won’t jam. Whenever you get a chance to reload, do it until you have no ammo left, but always leave one round out ok?”
“Yeah, thanks.”
“I’m gonna reach in my bag and get you a bottle of water, don’t shoot me.”
He put his back pack on the floor and unzipped it. Pulling out a bottle of water, he put it on the desk.
“Good luck.” he said, and was out the door in a second. There were no dead in the immediate area, but a small group of them were ambling toward him from a few hundred feet away.
He walked down the stairs and started toward the boats. The dead before him changed their pace from pathetic to focused as they saw his purposeful strides. They moaned and reached same as always, but before they could pass him and go toward Dave’s hiding spot, Billy waded in among them and started playing lumberjack with his climbing axe. The second to last one turned to look at him almost pleadingly, but he buried six inches of titanium blade into its skull, where it promptly became lodged. No matter how he pulled or yanked it wouldn’t come free. Billy considered stomping on the thing until the skull broke open, but then there would be infected fluid all over him. So he’d be gooey, so what? He looked at his bloodstained overalls and laughed, raising his boot. Before he could stomp, he heard a gunshot behind him. He turned and saw Dave sprinting toward him.
“Wait, wait up!” Dave yelled.
“Wonderful,” Billy said to himself and looked around. Sure enough, the boy’s cries and especially the gunshot had been noticed by some of the creatures a bit further off, who immediately came in his direction.
Dave showed up hufffing after fifty yards. Billy looked at him questioningly.
“I changed my mind. Maybe my dad needs help.”
“Good thing you were quiet about it,” Billy told him and pointed to his left. Dave’s eyes widened as he saw the approaching mini-horde. “Come on.”
They ran down a small dock with relatively few infected, skirting the ones who reached for them. They found what they were looking for quickly, the yellow number above the gangway reading simply “8”. There was a chain link gate that would make getting to the gangway difficult. It was, of course, locked.
“Up and over, kid.”
Dave turned and saw the creatures coming. He stuck the gun in his jeans pocket, and climbed the chain link, dropping easily to the other side. Billy followed suit, and they ran down the gangway. There were six small boats in different slots on either side of the dock, and a big blue and white boat at the end moored sideways. Soon the two of them were standing in front of slip 808. It was empty.
Billy looked at the yellow tag in his hand that read 808, then back at the black water.
“Huh.”
“Where’s the boat?” demanded Dave.
“Dunno, chief. And I was doing so well too.”
“What?”
“Skip it. Can you hotwire a boat?”
“No!”
“But you can swim right?”
“What? Are you kidding?”
“Let’s check them, maybe somebody left the keys in one of them.
Dave turned and looked at the gate at the top of the gangway. Dozens of fingers were poking through the chain link, and the entire gate was shaking with the pulls and pushes of the small crowd that had gathered. The gate rattled on its hinges but held firm.
Dave jumped on the first boat on the left, and Billy on the right. No luck. They repeated this until they were standing at the starboard gunwale of the big boat on the end of the dock. Billy leaned to his right to read the name of the boat
RV Plankton Skimmer
. “Wow, dumb.” This boat was much larger than the other work boats moored to dock eight, and they climbed aboard.
There was an A-frame on this boat, and a big winch with a cable going through a massive block suspended from the frame. A dozen or so multi-colored coolers lashed here and there to the gunwales. A big chunk of deck real estate was occupied by a mysterious contraption: gray cylinders made from what looked like PVC, suspended in a circle around a larger round piece of metal. Billy gave up trying to identify the rest of the odd equipment surrounding them.
“What is this, a fishing boat?” Billy asked aloud.
“No, it’s a research vessel. Those are water sampling bottles, and the coolers are for shipping samples.”
Billy smiled. “Ok, Captain Hook, let’s see what’s inside.” The cabin door was locked with a small brass padlock which Billy promptly broke with a long boat hook appropriated from a crevice behind the winch. Opening the door, he went in first, followed closely by his new compatriot. The cabin was relatively small, about twelve feet by eight feet, and there were steps down to a forward compartment.
Billy looked at all the instruments and realized he had no idea what they were for. There were two handles on the far starboard side (but he didn’t know it was the starboard side) near a window, and all the instruments looked like they could be read from there. A big red button sat conspicuously under a yellow plastic molly-guard. It was locked with another small brass lock. He broke the lock, pulled the cover up, and pressed the button. A whirring sound was heard below deck, and the engines fired up.
Billy turned, looking out a window, and saw black smoke billowing out of a port side exhaust. Dave came back in the wheelhouse and told Billy that he had untied the lines mooring the boat. “That forward spring line was on the cleat pretty tight. I almost had to cut it.”
“Spring line?”
“Yeah, the line that goes—”
“Do you know how to drive this thing?”
“Well, my dad has a sport boat with two levers like that. One’s the throttle, and ones like a clutch. He never let me drive though, said I was too young.”
“Well,” Billy said, “You’ve just been promoted to Captain, Captain. Fly yourself out of here.”
“But my dad…”
“I’ll find him, you get to Alcatraz, it’s right there.” He pointed.
“But what about you?”
“I wasn’t coming anyway, I’m undesirable.”
“Huh?”
“Forget it. When you get there, tell everybody Billy says hi.” Billy bolted from the cabin and jumped the short gap between the boat and the dock. He gave Dave a short wave and started walking toward the gangway. “New tally. One.”
31
A modest group of people surrounded a map on a rotten table on Alcatraz.
“We can land here south of Alameda in San Leandro Bay,” Boone pointed to a spot on the mainland as he leaned over the map. “We will go up the river here, and assuming there is little Lima presence, and if we huff it, we could make good time to the depot following this route. It’s a long way.” He traced his finger across a red line drawn in highlighter on the map.
“Barnes, you and your people will stay in the center, and we will move by twos when we have to traverse open areas. We will maintain absolute silence unless you see a danger that no one else sees. We will be on channel six, and all of us, civvies included will maintain radio silence as well as keeping the local chatter down. I cannot stress enough how important it is to be quiet. These things seem to come out of the woodwork if they hear anything, and I want to see as few of them as possible. Unfortunately, we will need transport, and that makes noise.”
Chris Rawding raised his hand. Boone looked annoyed, “Yes?”
“Commander, I used to work here,” he indicated a location on the map near where Boone had pointed initially. “There’s a surf shop across the street, and they also had dirt bikes for rent. They would be louder than walking, but way faster.”
“
Lieutenant
-commander. And that’s actually sound intelligence, son. We might be able to use those bikes to quickly skirt any traffic jams or bug out quick if there are large concentrations of Limas. Good work, we’ll head there first. Ok, assuming we’re able to appropriate the bikes or other transport, and assuming the roads aren’t totally jammed, it won’t take but an hour to get from A to B. Once we’re at the depot and have made sure the LAVs are functional and fueled, we will radio back to base and obtain partial coordinates to the ammo dump.
“Partial coordinates?” asked Dallas.
“Affirmative. We will get the location in stages on a different frequency than six, and only I will get the updates. If’ I’m killed, the next in command will re-acquire the newest coordinate and you will proceed from there. Are there any questions?”
One of the SEALS stepped forward, “Sir, approximately when will we lose radio contact with base?”
“Commander McInerney assures us that we will be able to maintain contact with SATCOM radio until we reach the mountains here,” he indicated another spot on the map, “as long as our radios are still in good condition. After that, the interference from the mountains could block transmission or receipt of signal. The skipper has also told me that the ammo is on this side of the mountains, so we should be good. Anything else? No? We leave in three hours. All preparations were made last night and this morning, and the boats and gear are ready. Weapons will be distributed to the civvies when we depart.”
Anna’s eyes lit up. “Weapons?”
“Yes. You didn’t think I was going to let you cross an entire nation crawling with undead with nothing but a crochet needle did you?” Snickers from the SEALs, and Anna smiled too. “This was what the weapons training was for yesterday.”
Anna nodded in affirmation, remembering how much fun it had been to fire the black gun with the silencer on it. One of the SEALs had told her that it was a suppressor, and silencers didn’t exist, but she would always call it a silencer. She hadn’t hit shit for the first ten tries with the gun, but after that she got pretty good.
“Alright, if there are no more questions, I suggest you say your good-byes and get mentally prepared. Assemble on the dock with your tactical gear on in two and a half hours. I would like to see you,” Boone pointed at Chris, “and you,” he pointed at Anna, “for a moment in private.”
Barnes looked concerned, but he filed out with everyone else just the same. When the three of them were alone, Boone sat in a rickety chair and put his face in his hand for a second before looking at them with tired eyes.
“Are you two fucking crazy?”
Anna and Chris looked at each other, bewildered. “What?” asked Chris.
“Why the hell would you want to come with us? This is going to be damned dangerous. I guarantee that if we make it to Boston, we won’t make it there without casualties. You’re just kids, for Christ’s sake.”
Chris spoke up. “Lieutenant, I’m twenty three. How many of your SEAL team are older than me?”
Boone shook his head. “Bullshit son, they’re trained killers, the best in the world. They’ve gone through BUD/s training, SQT, which is advanced ‘How To Kill Shit’ training, and more training, and then probation on this team under my supervision. Then they put that training to use by going to the worst places in the world and doing the best anyone could do. You got two hours of weapons training, and an hour of hand to hand. Odds are you’re both gonna die. Stay here.”
“I’d be dead if it wasn’t for Rick Barnes,” countered Chris. “He’s my friend and I’m going.”
“Me too!” Anna agreed.
“Fine then. As the detachment commander, I have final say on any op pertaining to my men. This is one of the few times I can tell an Admiral to fuck off if I think the op should be run differently.” He sighed. “I admire your resolve, both of you, but what I said is probably true: you’re gonna die. Shit, we’re probably all gonna die. Do you still want to come with us?”
“We’d be dead already if Rick didn’t risk his ass so many times to save us.”
Boone shook his head in acquiescence. “East dock, in two point five.”
“We’ll be there.”