“Mississippi,” Riker said. “Just saying it makes me hear banjos.”
“Deliverance was set in Georgia, my friend. Mississippi Burning, on the other hand …”
“Very funny,” Riker said. “Put yourself in my shoes.”
Looking down at Riker’s boots, Shorty shook his head. “Both of my feet could fit inside one of those battleships.”
Wrong analogy, thought Riker. “Imagine wearing my skin,” he said. “While driving across Mississippi.”
“Parts of Mobile are burning,” said Shorty. “That leaves us little choice.”
Grunting, Riker said, “Mississippi it is. Just put us in somewhere quiet.”
“You got it, boss.”
“I’m going to heed Tara’s advice and get some shuteye. If you think the Coast Guard is going to give us grief, please wake me up,”
“Copy that,” said Shorty.
“And while Tara is on the forefront of my mind—”
Interrupting, Shorty said, “I know … you want me to stay away from her.”
“Not what I was going to say, Shorty. She’s a grown ass woman. Those are her words, not mine. You mess with her again, though, she’ll likely grab you by your hair and underwear and make you go swimming.”
Steve-O showed up at the sliding door.
Regarding the man, Riker slid open the door and stepped outside. Taking in a lungful of salty sea air, he said, “I was just leaving, Steve-O.” Leaning in real close, mouth an inch from his friend’s ear, Riker whispered, “Keep a close eye on him.”
Steve-O nodded in understanding, then flashed a thumbs-up.
“Captain on the deck,” said Shorty as he slowly nudged all three of Miss Abigail’s engine throttles to their forward stops.
Chapter 38
With a Bolt coming at him from his left and right side, Riker threw the Sig’s safety and leveled the semiautomatic pistol head-high to the one approaching from the right. As he did so, he was also bringing the Shockwave in his offhand to bear on the zombie charging hard at him from his left.
The boy and girl looked to be kindergarten-aged. Teeth bared, twisted faces glistening from the chin down with sticky blood, they converged on him with animalistic hunger in their eyes.
He closed his eyes again. Then, three reports—two sharp and one sonorous—sounded back-to-back-to-back. Before he could see the damage—if any—the speeding slugs had wrought on the zombies, he felt his body jerk and he was mercifully freed from the latest in a long string of very vivid nightmares.
Opening his eyes, Riker couldn’t see an inch in front of his face. The black Pelican cases bracketing his body left and right were just heavy, sharp-edged objects with no visible outlines or discernable details.
He yawned, then drew in a deep breath. The briny nose of salt air tinged with the sweet smell of Hoppes Number Nine gun oil emanating from the Shockwave hit him first. Then, as he dragged the recently fired weapon from its place above his head and tapped its stunted grip two times against the box bed, the chemical odor of cordite clinging to it entered into the mix.
Less than a second elapsed before Riker’s two taps were met by three more from outside. Two short, one long. The latter reverberating in the enclosed space as he exhaled sharply.
Next came a soft metallic click near his feet. A tick after that, as the tailgate was let down, he was bombarded with the angry cries of gulls and the bright, flat light of early morning.
“Come on out of there, Nosferatu.”
It was Tara.
Voice a bit raspy, he said, “Do I have to?”
“You better,” she said. “We have company.”
“Where are we?”
“Offshore of Waveland, Mississippi.”
About ninety miles from Pensacola, thought Riker. Hitting the light button on his watch, he learned he’d been asleep for about six hours.
Since the Shelby’s load bed was long enough from the tailgate to the crew cab wall for Riker to lay flat on his back, that’s how he’d slept.
Gripping one of the ribs running horizontal to the rigid tonneau cover, he pulled himself toward the rectangle of light pouring through the tailgate opening. Having shimmied in fully clothed and with his Salomons on, all he had to do now when his feet hit the deck was snug his Braves hat onto his head and wait for his eyes to adjust.
At once, he noticed they were no longer underway. Gone was the gentle rumble of the inboard diesel that had lulled him to sleep. Normally canted a few degrees to the stern when in motion, Miss Abigail’s deck was now level with the horizon.
Now and again, gentle rollers caused the deck to loll front to back.
The shore lay a mile or so off the bow. Gone were the palm trees, mangrove, and magnolias. In their place were cypress, black willow, and water hickory, their branches drooping over swampy patches of shoreline that glowed bright green against the darker backdrop.
“Put some pep in your step, Bro. Someone wants to meet you.” Seeing the Shockwave in his hand and the butt of the Sig protruding from the paddle holster in his waistband, she urged him to leave them both behind.
“Aren’t you carrying your Glock?”
She shook her head.
“Where is it?”
Casting a furtive glance along the side of the truck, she said, “I stuffed it underneath the seat. Now come on, or they’ll get suspicious.”
Rising to full extension, Riker peered over the Shelby, toward the bow, where he saw Steve-O armed with the Nerf gun, Shorty by his side and holding an animated conversation with a man wearing a tactical helmet and outfitted in dark blue fatigues. Worn over the fatigues was a plate carrier and chest rig full of magazines. Strapped to the soldier’s right leg was a drop-thigh holster containing a black pistol. In his hands was an M4 kitted out with some kind of holographic optics.
Stowing his weapons under the tonneau, Riker closed the tailgate and dropped to his knees.
“What the hell are you doing?” hissed Tara.
“Something that needs doing,” he said. “Petty Officer Tactical Tony can wait an additional thirty seconds.”
“How do you know his rank?”
“I don’t. Just saw the Coast Guard cutter standing sentinel off of port. There’s a number of classes of Petty Officer in the Coast Guard.”
Under Tara’s watchful gaze, Riker planted his hands on the steel deck, extended his legs, and began knocking out pushups, allocating the first twenty-two as a tribute to the number of veterans lost daily to suicide, then finishing the set for Murphy, Grayson, and Kincaid, all fallen buddies of his. Though nothing close to the number of pushups he’d performed while still a cog in the Big Green Machine, he never did more than twenty-five, thinking to do so would somehow jinx his buddies who still resided on the good side of the dirt.
As Riker was knocking out the pushups, Tara brought him up to speed.
“We’re being turned back,” she said as Riker rose. “Shorty’s trying to talk his way past the blockade.”
Thinking, Here we go again, Riker looked to Tara. Popping his neck, he said, “Beauty before brains.”
No sooner had the words crossed his lips than he saw Tactical Tony craning in their direction and waving them forward.
The man was indeed a petty officer. The subdued insignia patch consisting of a shield above a single chevron put him at E-4—Petty Officer 3rd Class. A large rectangular patch affixed prominently to his plate carrier read USCG. His name tape read Magee.
Petty Officer 3rd Class Magee looked Riker up and down. Even giving up six inches, the Tactical Law Enforcement Team member struck an imposing figure.
Riker looked past Magee. Scrutinized the three additional crewmen aboard the rigid inflatable boat bobbing off Miss Abigail’s stern. All wore side arms. And all but the RIB’s seated pilot held M4 rifles at a low-ready.
Steve-O said, “I gave him permission to board. Don’t worry … I got your back, Lee.”
Shorty shrugged. “The commander of Decisive didn’t give
us much choice. She hailed as I was turning in to shore and ordered me to go dead in the water.”
Magee said, “You’ll need to reverse course. If you don’t agree, I have orders to take you into custody and set your vessel adrift.”
The dull roar of engines on a white and black vessel approaching from the east drew everyone’s attention. It looked to Riker to be some kind of motor yacht. And for a thirty-footer, it was getting it on. The ocean under its bow was taking a beating, the water frothed and hued bluish-white. At the stern, its wake was a single V roiling away at an incredible pace.
Shorty and Riker exchanged knowing glances.
Noting there was no helicopter parked on Decisive’s helipad and that the RIB was not sprouting an M240 Bravo machine gun from her prow, Riker said, “Sure, Petty Officer Magee. We’ll turn back.” Looking to Shorty, he asked, “Where to? Can’t be Mobile. Tara says it was burning real good when you all passed it by last night.”
Magee was watching the yacht’s approach. It looked as if the speeding vessel would eventually cut between Miss Abigail and Decisive. Split the goalposts, so to speak. Or in bowling parlance: totally flub a 7-10 split.
Shorty said, “We’ll play it by ear. A good deal of Pascagoula and Biloxi were dark as well.”
“Power outages?”
“Widespread outages,” acknowledged Shorty.
Magee had dragged his attention back to Riker at just about the same time he received a call from Decisive. After listening to someone on the other end order him to check out the motor yacht, he turned back to Riker. “You are free to make landfall anywhere east of Mississippi. The President has declared a state of emergency. No doubt Martial Law is coming. If you’re smart, you’ll find yourselves somewhere safe to hunker down and ride this out.”
Trying to, thought Riker. Then you came along and plugged yourself into the equation.
Tara said, “There was a marina west of Mobile.”
“That’ll have to do,” said Shorty. Then, looking to Petty Officer Magee, he added, “Thank you for keeping the high seas safe.”
If Magee heard the platitude, he didn’t let on. The RIB was pulling alongside Miss Abigail and the petty officer was already throwing one leg over the rail and reaching for the helping hand offered to him.
Once aboard the RIB and strapped into a seat, Magee met Riker’s stare and stabbed a finger to the east.
Message received.
Riker flashed a thumbs-up.
When the RIB pilot opened up the throttle, the rest of the crew braced and the twin outboards churned the water white.
Riker took his eyes off the retreating boat and looked to Shorty. “They are not the enemy,” he stated. “We do not shoot at them even if they fire warning shots at us. Agreed?”
Shorty nodded.
“Then what’s our play?”
Indicating the wide strip of sandy beach dead ahead, Shorty said, “I still want to put us ashore here at Buccaneer State Park. I’ve used it as a drop-off point before.”
“So you’re going to feint to the east just for appearances and then cut a hard left and charge ashore?”
The RIB was halfway to Decisive, its wake a long white crescent bending out to open sea, away from the ferry. Now a fair distance off the cutter’s bow, the white and black motor yacht had slowed and was in the middle of a long, graceful one-eighty.
Inserting a fresh dip of chewing tobacco, Shorty nodded. “It’ll be a little more than just a quick feint to the east, though.” Wiping his hand on his pants. he added, “I want two things to happen. First, I want to sell our capitulation to whoever may be watching us from Decisive’s bridge. Second, I want to give Magee and the boys aboard that RIB sufficient time to become preoccupied with their new detainee.”
Tara asked, “Can we outrun them if they come back?”
“The cutter, yes,” said Shorty. “By the time they start turning her around, we’ll be well on our way to shore and have a good enough head start.”
With a tilt to her head, she said, “How about the little boat?”
“No way.”
Riker asked, “What’s her top speed?”
“Best guess is that she can push close to thirty knots,” Shorty said. “We can make a little over twenty if I peg all three throttles.” He detailed his plan, assigning each person a role.
“We’re going to have to time it just right,” said Riker. “Even then, we’ll be cutting it real close.” Regarding Steve-O, he asked, “Did you follow all of that?”
Steve-O displayed a thumbs-up. “Affirmative. I got it all, Lee.”
“Tara?”
Nodding, she retrieved the binoculars from Shorty and passed them to her brother.
Taking the wheel, Shorty fired up the outboards and started the ferry turning away from shore.
Raising a hand as a shield against the low-hanging sun, Tara made her way back to the Shelby.
With the ferry picking up speed, Riker lifted the binoculars to his face and trained them on the shoreline. Straight away he saw the reason Shorty wanted to motor a short distance east before committing their turn to the north.
Once used as a military base of operations by Andrew Jackson during the Battle of New Orleans, the flat expanse of treed land was now called Buccaneer State Park.
Instead of soldiers resupplying for a fifty-mile march to New Orleans, what was once known as Jackson Ridge was overrun with dozens of slow-moving walking corpses. The majority of the zombies wandered aimlessly amongst a half-dozen recreational vehicles parked on cement pads just beyond the beach. Past a picket of trees further ashore, shadowy forms traipsed between tents of all shapes, sizes, and colors.
Overturned camp chairs ringed one tent-site’s fire pit.
At another site, an elderly man, his throat a mess of pulped flesh, planted both ashen hands on a camp cooler and struggled to stand. The zombie’s vacant-eyed stare started gooseflesh to pop on Riker’s ribcage.
Continuing the sweep, he came to believe the park had filled up pretty quickly. It looked as if all of the tent-sites were taken, with many more tents erected where they shouldn’t be: On patches of common lawn. Entirely flanking grass beside an empty wave pool plastered with colorful fallen leaves. Some even erected on bare asphalt.
Clearly people had been desperate for a place to sleep away from wherever they’d come.
Yet strangely, only one in ten sites had a vehicle parked in its assigned slot.
People left here with the same urgency as they had arrived, thought Riker as he focused on some movement farther inland.
Through the trees he saw a square, one-story cement-block structure. It sat on a patch of vibrant green grass that contrasted sharply with its drab battleship-gray paint. On the side of the building facing Riker were two gray doors. The door on the left was labeled Men. The other, on the right, was labeled Women. Obscuring most of the wall between the doors was a Coke machine, its signage and buttons darkened.
Standing before the machine and seemingly pressing the raised buttons at random was a young girl. Barefoot and dressed only in floral print pajama bottoms, every inch of the girl’s exposed skin was pale as the face of a full moon.
Sweeping the binoculars back to the RV camping area, Riker spotted a trio of corpses on the ground outside a thirty-foot Winnebago. Each had been shot multiple times in the torso. Center of mass is what the shooting instructors called the prime real estate between navel and breastbone. It was the spot on the enemy’s torso he had been taught to aim for.
Copious amounts of pooled blood on the gray cement told Riker the three men weren’t all the way dead prior to them receiving the headshots that fully punched their tickets.
In the cluttered background, he detected dead things moving among the crush of RVs. A flash of color. A leering face in an open door. Pale hands batting at drawn curtains inside an immaculate Itasca motor coach.
A hundred feet east of the RV-park-of-the-dead was a wide cement boat ramp. Compared to the docks and r
amp at Shorty’s establishment, this facility was fairly basic. Right of the algae-slickened ramp was a simple floating dock with a trio of unmanned sporting boats lashed to it.
Though Riker couldn’t be sure, he guessed the dock extended out thirty feet or more over the water.
Beyond the dock was a parking lot crowded with dozens of pickups and SUVs, most of them still hooked up to empty boat trailers.
It was one hell of an exodus. He figured it probably took place shortly after the ominous Presidential Alert that went out the night before.
All in all, Riker counted more than thirty dead things—by far the most he’d seen in one place with his own eyes since witnessing from the air the hordes of undead amassed in Battery Park on Lower Manhattan.
Having seen enough to know Magee and his crew were now the least of their worries where getting ashore was concerned, Riker passed the binoculars back to Shorty.
“Could have warned me about what’s waiting ashore,” he said.
“Would it have changed your plan?”
“Nope,” said Riker. “Not one bit.”
“Good … because we’ve been seeing those things moving on shore since Mobile.”
Riker said, “Then we better be on our A-Game when we go ashore.”
As Miss Abigail picked up speed and started to drift slowly to port, he returned to the Shelby, fetched his weapons from the load bed, and then climbed into the driver’s seat.
Three minutes, he thought, inserting a fresh magazine into the Sig. A hell of a long time to be stuck between the rock and hard place we currently face.
Chapter 39
Riker’s watch read 6:55. He felt the sun coming through the pilothouse window, warm on his left cheek. Though it was the middle of October, the temperature today would likely flirt with eighty degrees before noon.
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