(Alaskan Undead Apocalypse 05) Unwilling Page 4

  Alonzo Martinez, as far from having a military attitude as one could be, answered this time, the gravity of the captain’s actions finally hitting him, “He’s drawing them away from us. He’s attracting them to himself…intentionally.”

  As if punctuating that realization, the shooting coming from the other side of the building had stopped. The battle was over, the outcome never really in question. Sergeant Daniels hoped that it had been quick, but also knew from experience that it seldom was. Maybe the captain had held back one last round for himself and maybe one for the boy too. He was pretty sure everyone else, including the surgeon, were all dead already. Of course, that didn’t matter to the undead who would feast upon the recently deceased as readily as they would the living. The infection’s insatiable appetite was not discerning in the condition of its flesh, so long as it was human.

  Everyone stood as if in a tableau. They all hoped to hear any indication that the captain was still alive. Even steely Sergeant Daniels took a second, his typical stoic countenance softening slightly as he listened and waited.

  Dipping her head in sorrow, Cate managed to say, “Oh my God,” through her tears. “We’re all gointa’ die. We should never have come here. What the hell are we gointa’ do?”

  “Hey! Stow that shit! I expect more from you!” barked Bendtner, his serious eyes fixed on her as she looked up.

  “But…?” she tried but found nothing.

  Bendtner approached her until he cast a long shadow over her and said, “We work the problems one at a time. We get through it together. Okay?”

  After a heartbeat and two breaths had passed without a response, he repeated slightly louder, “Okay?”

  “One problem at a time?” she asked. “And the first is…?”

  “Getting the hell outta here. Now get in the goddamned truck.”

  Cate nodded and smiled as she turned about and climbed into the idling vehicle. Maneuvering her way into the van’s back, she wondered if there would be undelivered packages but found something entirely different.

  It was fairly dark behind the main cab where the driver sat, so she had to use a flashlight. Turning hers on, she jumped back and shrieked loudly when her beam fell upon a dusty pile of bones.

  Martinez, his rifle in his hands and more at the ready than he was, jumped into the van to help if he could. “What? What is it?” When he saw the corpse, he stopped and finished exhaling the deep breath he had been holding. “Is it really dead?” he asked, not sure if he wanted to be the first one to approach it.

  Over his shoulder, he shouted, “Hey. Open the back door.”

  Bendtner replied, his voice still deep and resonant despite his standing outside the van, “It latches on the inside. You’re going to have to do it.”

  To himself mostly, Martinez muttered, “I knew he was gonna say that. Damn.”

  “I got it,” Cate blurted out, surprising both of them. She didn’t wait a single second for fear that she would talk herself out of it. She stepped forward quickly and surely, her foot stepping on something hard and seemingly out of place. Stepping aside, she shined her light down and saw the shiny pistol lying next to the mummified hand. She leaned down and picked up the revolver, surprised by the handgun’s weight.

  With the back door opened, they pushed the dead body out onto the lot with as much care as possible and laid it to rest on a bed of FedEx boxes and envelopes.

  The task done, Sergeant Daniels said to all of them, “Okay. Time to go. Let’s find Providence.”

  Martinez was tempted to ask, and then what? but thought better of it and kept his mouth shut. He sat himself down next to Cate and Veronica in the back of the van and hoped that they were being driven away from danger rather than toward it.

  PART 2

  Chapter 10

  Neil had never considered himself a fisherman though he had read The Old Man and the Sea and understood it, metaphor and all. He had never really thought that qualified as fishing experience or training and he had been proving that suspicion all spring and summer long. In his many years living in Anchorage, he had not pursued many opportunities to go fishing. He’d been out on a few charters with friends but had never really embraced the mantle. It just wasn’t his thing but now that it had become a matter of survival, he was determined to do his part.

  He threw his line in like everyone else but he always pulled it back out empty without so much as a bite. Even pulling out an old boot like in cartoons and old black and white movies would have been something, but he couldn’t even attract those oddities. Every now and again something would tug at his hook but when he excitedly lifted it back out, there would still be nothing there. He was convinced the fish were just fucking with him and by late July or early August he had just given up on the whole venture. For that reason, he left fishing to those who had more luck with it, which was pretty much everyone else including Danny and Jules, the two youngsters from the Midwest who had been orphaned in Anchorage by the apocalypse and adopted by Neil and his disparate group of survivors brought together in their struggle against the undead.

  It wasn’t all bad though, he thought to himself, as he lounged in his hammock beneath the warm Alaska summer sun which was adept at warming more than stairwells. In fact, Neil was convinced his cheeks and forehead had exceeded pink and were heading toward charred red. He should probably get out of the sun, but he couldn’t seem to rouse the energy and his legs seemed unwilling to do it of their own accord.

  Drifting comfortably as if floating on a nylon mesh cloud, Neil was half asleep and thinking, remembering, dreaming about other, familiar but painfully absent faces. Men and women who grew to be brothers and sisters and, in one case, much more. It was her face, Meghan’s with her soft white cheeks and welcoming eyes of blue, that always stalled his searching of the past. Over the months, his visions of her had gone from being tinged with guilt and longing to something approaching painful acceptance. He was just glad to see her again. They had been granted only a short time to share together before this cruel new world took her from him.

  He was still lying in comfortable repose when Danny ran out of their cabin shouting, “Neil! Neil! Call! From them! Sounds important! Neil?”

  Shaking off the opioid-like haze caused by the sun and his mind’s wandering, Neil tried to sit up but stopped after his efforts seemed to be for naught. He felt like an elephant caught in the world’s largest butterfly net.

  Giving up before sacrificing all of his remaining dignity, Neil answered, “Can you bring it to me?” to Danny as the boy ran across the lot in front of their cabin which was quickly becoming their home’s front yard.

  Holding the phone to his ear with one hand and shielding his eyes from the sun with the other, Neil said, “Hello, and to whom am I speaking?”

  The smile on his face underwent a transformation from good-humored smirk to hopeful grin and finally to incredulous glower as he listened. The sun suddenly seemed uncomfortably bright and unbearably hot, so he sat up without a hint of his previous struggle. Both his mind and body were focused and serious. The edge in his disposition, his constant companion for all those many months but recently enjoying a much-earned sabbatical, returned in a flash, evidenced by the serious tide which swept into his otherwise friendly blue eyes.

  Emma, who had also stayed behind from today’s fishing excursion, emerged from around the cabin where she had been making use of their outhouse, caught Neil’s eye and could sense immediately something was not right with the world. That was, in Emma’s slanted opinion, simply the way of things; don’t get too comfortable, because the rug is ready to be pulled from under your feet at any given moment. If you were always prepared to be disappointed by the unfolding of the universe, then you rarely were. Perhaps, it was a negative view…a glass half empty attitude, but, given the fragile state in which the world found itself, she felt like she was entitled. Could anyone blame her for thinking that things didn’t have a tendency to work out for everyone like in the storybook romances and cartoons that Disney used to market?

  She suspected, even at an early age, that the happily ever after endings either didn’t exist or were reserved for other people. Unfortunately, her opinion was not changed as she grew. When the apocalypse did finally strike and the dead began their war against the living, she found herself to be terrified but not horribly surprised. The one trick she did not see coming was finding love in the terror; at least, she thought it was love…it felt like love. Despite her resistance, she couldn’t help it.

  He had been a doctor at Providence Hospital where they both used to work. Their interactions, if that is what they could be called, were minimal at best in the world before. Luckily, she found herself in an increasingly dwindling group making their escape from the hospital with him, Dr. Caldwell, leading them.

  Her affection for him was not necessarily born on that fateful morning, but him having such a significant hand in saving her life helped her notice him. Later, he and Neil had led their group all across Anchorage, moving from hiding place to hiding place, as they fled the waves of the dead. She respected his courage and his wisdom; they all did, including Neil, who leaned on the doctor when making decisions.

  In little time though, her respect for him grew and, what was more, she could sense that he harbored special feelings for her, too. And they lived happily ever after…she wished.

  Unfortunately, the world had other ideas for them. She’d let her guard down though. She had let hope sneak in, undetected. It found a corner of her heart and set up shop, baking warm, hopeful expectations. Her happiness was cut short with all the suddenness and subtlety of the guillotine’s blade falling. Dr. Jonathon Caldwell was bitten and infected
by the same malicious organism which had destroyed all of Anchorage. Once again, she felt airborne after the tug of the rug from below her, upending her world just when it seemed that she had finally caught a break.

  Consequently, she had returned to what was comfortable and predictable. She expected no favors from this world or this life and knew that she would have to fight tooth and nail for everything and everyone around her.

  For months, things had been going well. They were well-fed and provisioned. They slept comfortably and safely at night and had no real wants, aside from having the world returned to what it once was. Most of them had gotten beyond that. The two kids with them, Danny and Jules, only had infrequent nightmares now, their dreams and nights more restful and peaceful.

  She figured it was about time for this kind of a phone call. Shaking her head and looking at the ground, so as to avoid eye contact with Neil, who still mustered the amazing ability to have hope regardless of having suffered just as much as she had. More amazing still, he had borne the weight of leadership through all of it and hadn’t lost his faith in their ability to survive. She couldn’t bear to see the new wounding apparent in his eyes with whatever horrible news was being delivered.

  Motivated as much by selfish shame as by courage, Emma lifted her eyes and the rest of her head to look at Neil finally. She could tell the message he was getting was not encouraging, so she sat next to him to lend her support. That was what you were supposed to do but she had never really understood why. Maybe it was a proximity thing.

  Neil shifted uncomfortably in the hammock, almost toppling the two of them over backward, and moved the phone from one ear to other so that Emma would be able to hear better.

  From the phone, a soft female voice continued, “We dispatched a team of specialists to Anchorage to trace the virus’ origins. We wanted to catch up with it. Maybe figure it out. With that information, we can…maybe we can beat this thing.”

  Nearly exploding into the phone, Neil demanded, “Jesus! You sent them to Anchorage on a maybe? What were you thinking?”

  There was a pause during which Neil shared a disgusted, disbelieving look with Emma whose own expression remained absent and vague, but definitely not surprised. As she listened, she was ruminating on the predictability of life.

  The woman on the phone continued, her feminine voice trying defiantly to distance itself from the amorphous, white blanket of electricity that accompanied the signal, “They were thinking…” a pause with a resigned sigh, “We thought.… Neil, we’re in bad shape. Nothing seems to be working. We stopped them at the Mississippi but that’s only temporary. We didn’t actually stop them so much as the river did. We all know it’s only a matter of time. I don’t…you already know how bad it has been and how much worse it could be. We’re trying everything.”

  She continued, “Someone came up with this idea. It seemed sound and didn’t appear any crazier than anything else we’ve tried. Satellite images made it look like Anchorage was…dormant was the word that was used. And, like I said, anything was being considered.

  “Some of the best medical minds we had…um…have agreed to…well, they agreed that the risk was worth the reward, so they agreed to try.”

  Growing anxious and wanting to get beyond the preamble, Neil said impatiently, “Why exactly are you calling us? I don’t suspect this is our ticket outta here. You can’t land a jet anywhere near us and you’ve said for months now that you don’t have a ship near enough to send in helicopters. So where do we figure into this master plan?”

  There was a quiet pause when the obviously intended script had been disrupted by Neil’s question and doubt. He could still hear breathing, electric and synthesized, through the satellite phone receiver, so he knew their connection had not been broken. Then, he heard movement…shuffling, a hand-off.

  Sure enough, the next voice he heard was that of an equally impatient man. “Mr. Jordan, the jet we dispatched to Anchorage for all of us…for you too, touched down on the tarmac but we immediately lost contact with them.”

  “I wonder what that could mean?” asked Neil coldly. “Who are you? I’ve never spoken with you before. Why the change?”

  “My name is Colonel Evan Poole and I’m responsible for tactical extractions.”

  “Tactical extractions?”

  “Getting good people out of bad spots.”

  Again, there was a quiet pause. The cheekiness of Neil’s original attitude was steadily fading. He didn’t have the stamina to keep up the act.

  Colonel Poole continued, “We have a team in Anchorage that needs help and they need it now.”

  Neil protested, “But they’re soldiers. We’re not. We’re just normal people. None of us knows how to fight. Not really. We’d just be another liability to you.”

  “Can we cut the bullshit, Neil? You’re not normal people any more than these are normal times. You do know how to fight. You learned on the job and proved it beyond a doubt. We’ve all heard what you and your ‘normal people’ accomplished in Alaska…completely on your own. Jesus, Neil, we need what you can do.

  “And for the record, half of the team that volunteered to go to Anchorage were civilians. Just like you, only they aren’t, are they? They haven’t fought their way out of the belly of the beast the way you have.”

  Neil, losing the initiative in the conversation, found something in that last sentence on which he could focus. “You’re right about fighting our way out and there’s no way in hell that we’re goin’ back. Anchorage is the dead’s. It’s no place for the living. Not anymore. You can’t possibly want us to go there.”

  “No. No, I don’t, Neil,” answered the colonel.

  Surprised by the response, Neil asked, “No?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. I don’t want anyone to go there, but I need your help. It’s as simple as that.”

  “Simple?! Simple?! Nothing about this is simple.”

  “Finally we’ve found common ground, Neil,” came the colonel’s somber reply.

  Having reached that point, the conversation continued forward, focusing on specific details, challenges, and possible resources that could be brought to bear. It was all details, much of which was a blur to Neil. The mere thought of returning to Anchorage aroused in him a flood of tragic images. Of death and dying and slaughter. They had come so far and lost so many, and now this.

  Hanging up the phone, Neil couldn’t help but lose himself in a spiraling maelstrom of memories.

  Many of those earliest memories were hazy, as if he was seeing them through cloudy water. It had all started at Providence Hospital with a little boy who had been bitten by something partially embedded in ice and was infected with a mysterious lethal virus. The infection and its relentless fever stopped the boy’s heart despite the best efforts of the hospital’s emergency medical staff but his brain, twisted and violent, continued to turn. Moments later, awakened with a homicidal and cannibalistic rage by the virus, his eyes opened and he attacked all those in his path, spreading the terror’s reach with each bite.

  All those bitten, died and all those who died, became another monster bent on killing and eating all those within reach. The bloodbath quickly extended into and throughout Anchorage until the streets ran with blood. Nothing anyone did in those early hours seemed to have the slightest effect on the spread. No response seemed to stem the tide and so it rushed forward, sweeping all those caught in its path into its voracious jaws. The only two roads out of the city, one north and one south, became bottlenecks, jammed with terrified refugees desperately fleeing the widening nightmare.

  Neil and a small, evolving group split their time between running and hiding all through Anchorage in the first months of the apocalypse. Looking for that safe refuge or a way out, they finally ventured out of Anchorage only to find more of the same in the communities outside of the city. It seemed as if the whole world had succumbed to the undead onslaught.

  The safe haven they sought revealed itself as a remote cabin on an island in the Prince William Sound outside of Whittier Harbor. It was to that cabin that they were finally able to retreat, though their group had changed substantially by then.