The Turning

by Thomas Key

  Chapter Thirty

  The two Air Force black hawk helicopters landed with no further issue. An assortment of base personnel met them at the tarmac. From heavily armed MPs to doctors and mechanics. As Ken and Ashmore disembarked, they saw Jaylin, Rachel and Isabel waiting for them. Isabel immediately ran for Kenneth, hoping to scoop him up in her arms and never let him go. Her pace slowed as she saw his eyes meet hers. He turned around though, their eye contact only brief enough for her to see pain in those deep brown eyes. Her run became a walk and then she stopped entirely as she watched Ken and Ashmore pull the lifeless body of her friend from inside of the helicopter. Isabel’s hand went immediately to her mouth and tears began to fall like a pipeline coming straight from her heart as she realized what was going on. Jaylin and Rachel behind her were in shock as well, watching the events unfold. A medical team was immediately at the helicopter and loaded Atencio onto a stretcher. Ashmore was pushed back, away from her dead friend. The team took her, directly to the ad hock hospital and left Ken and Ashmore behind. The numbness of the events of the past few days veiled whatever happiness they had hoped to have upon arrival home. Six military police officers, heavily armed reached the helicopter and began to escort the four black clad men to waiting holding cells. Ken and Ashmore watched them leave, as they too were ushered forward in another direction and into the medical wing. Mandatory checkups were all that they could expect for the next few hours. It wasn’t the homecoming for them that anyone had ever expected. Isabel was swept up in arms alright, but it was not Ken’s. It was Rachel and Jaylin who huddled together with her, their tears cascading down like a waterfall of epic proportions.

  As was a newly-founded tradition, the base held a memorial service, required for any base personnel or civilians that perished after the fall. Each human life was significant and each loss of one was a tragedy. The base brass and civilian council understood this. Work detail came to a halt and anyone who knew Atencio was present for the ceremony. A graveyard had been constructed outside of the base to the south, with already over a hundred crosses handmade with names stenciled into them. A fresh grave was dug for Atencio, with her casket being made out of simple 2x4’s which the base managed to find in good supply. The wood was cut and patched together to make a deathbed that pre fall would have fetched a very inexpensive price, if any at all. Considering that the entire world had fallen apart though, it was the best that they could do. As storm clouds reached the base, a preacher spoke about the turmoil of life and death and as they walk through the valley of death, they shall fear no evil. Ashmore tuned that out, as she stared at her dead lover. It was not until Kenneth, freshly released from medical spoke up. “Alyssa was what many of us would consider a great friend. Someone who while she’d complain about damn near anything, would always come through for us. She was a kind soul and had, in the end, sacrificed herself for people that she loved. She saved many lives, and had helped to make this place what it is today. The world is darker without her rays of sarcastic sunshine. She will be truly missed,” he said, grabbing a shovel to his right. The 21-gun salute rang out into the silence of the day, the crowd around the casket stood and watched quietly and respectfully. Taps began to play, the song long played in honor of fallen heroes encompassing everyone’s souls as they stood as it began to sprinkle and the clouds began to unleash their own tears onto the earth. Ashmore stayed stock-still, refusing to move a muscle as she watched her closest friends begin to bury the small petite woman with whom she had spent many adventures with. The one who had helped her out of her darkest place after she had lost all that was dear to her. As the coffin below was covered with dirt, she felt a part of herself being buried with her. Many in the crowd looked on, watching her, rather than the actions being taken by the burial detail. As the last of the pile was moved onto the grave, and people began to move away, back to their duties, she stood like a statue in a park, staring down. Many minutes later, Ken touched her shoulder. She, at first, tried to shrug it off, but he came around full speed and hugged her with all of the strength that he had. At first, she was stiff and refused to truly feel the embrace. Like a germophobe being touched by someone with a cold, she resisted it with all of her being. People though are not slaves to their own mind; they tend to be slaves to their heart. As this strong man, her dear friend held her, the dam broke. The flood of sobs erupted like Mount Vesuvius. The pain rocked her like nothing else had in her entire life. Even the death of her family had not felt this soul wrenching. Maybe it was that she had almost nothing left until she had nothing. Ken held her for what seemed like hours and she let out every ounce of water left in her system. Coming up dry, she whispered a “thank you” to Ken as she turned and headed back towards the residential area. The sorrow and pain that she felt flow through her quickly turned to anger as she took step after step. Lightning and thunder erupted overhead as she swore that she would get her revenge. Ashmore and Ken too would be joining the raid. Ashmore would not let those responsible get away with it. Not if she could help it.

  The following morning, the small group of friends met at the dining hall. Quietly, they ate, and spoke short bouts to one another, but each of them was reserved. It was the calm before the storm and they all knew it. That night, they would be raiding the compound. The transport helicopters being used for the mission were kept under doubled 24-hour armed guard. They were taking no chances with more sabotage. The mission was a need-to-know, and a large majority of the base simply did not need to know. That left their discussion about the upcoming mission hushed and muted whenever anyone else walked by. It might have been comical to see the group become silenced each and every time someone passed behind them while they ate, and would no doubt raise some eyebrows and peak some curiosity. It didn’t matter though. In twelve hours’ time, they’d be on the move, and no one short of God and all of His angels could stop them from getting their revenge on the assholes responsible for so many deaths around them. It was time to get a piece of their attackers, and they were ready for it.

  Several hours later, hundreds of miles away and deep underground; an infected man made its move. For the unfortunate medical tech who happened to pass by and hear racket come inside of a holding cell, it would be his final mistake. The infected waited for the man to open the door before pulling the tech into the room, biting deeply into its corroded artery. The man's screams were quickly silenced as his life fluid drained in mass amounts. He slowly fell to the floor with the infected holding onto him tight, like a leech to a river swimmer’s foot. Once the blood stopped pumping, the rather intelligent infected pulled the keycard name tag off of the corpse and swiped it against the reader. It took only four tries for the light on the pad to turn green and the door to unlock with a light click. The smarty pants slowly entered the hall, and began to swipe the keycard again and again against every keypad that it came across as it roamed the halls. Each door opened, with more infected filling the halls behind it. Their time had finally come.

  Two hallways from the loose infected, Shepherd lay, his restraints still in place, and the machine continuously pumping serum 128 into his left arm. While he himself was unconscious, the virus within him was not. The constant supply of infection had overwhelmed his body’s defenses. His mind and some could say even his soul were on the run, and the Z bug would not miss the opportunity to spread. Possessed by the entity attacking him, his head turned slightly as the sound of commotion from down the hallway caught his attention. A minute or two later, the keypad for his room lit up green and opened. The smarty pants infected entered, with fresh blood dripping from its mouth. It looked at Shep curiously, and walked to the bed. Shepherd watched the infected approach with grey, almost black lifeless eyes. The smarty sniffed at the man below it as it decided to take a bite or not. Zombies, or even the living infected had an unquenchable appetite after all. A snack served on a silver platter would be greatly appreciated, any time, day or night. Its facial expression soon turned to confusion as it looked into the restrained man’s eye
s. They stared at each other for what seemed like an eternity. Shepherd looked down at his restraints, and smarty slowly pulled on the wrist bands until they became loose and opened, releasing Shepherd’s right arm. His left arm and then his feet were eventually free. Shepherd stood, with smarty watching his every move. The man he used to be was nowhere to be found as he stared at the mirror on the opposite side of the room. Shepherd grinned, a dark humorless smile reaching across his face as he walked to the mirror. Placing two hands against the glass, his smile changed to a growl as he followed smarty out of the room and into the chaos beginning across the compound.

  Inside the observation room, just on the other side of the mirror, stood Sydney. Trembling, with a hand over her mouth in horror, she watched her prized test subject being unleashed onto the world right before her eyes. This can’t be happening, she repeated in her head as she watched the scene unfold before her eyes. The keypad to her right beeped green. She turned slowly, feeling increasing terror rise within her. A figure entered the room, and gently let the door close behind it. Although darker than the cell in the observation room, it was still bright enough to see with perfect clarity who it was. Shepherd stood before her; his grin plastered on his face. His grey eyes watched her every move. “It’s not my fault. They made me…” she started. His grin fell away and he slammed the glass with his fist, causing a crack in the mirror. Her mouth immediately slammed shut and she backed away from the man, no, the creature before her. Every step that she took backwards, he took one forward. Her back came to rest against the cold concrete of the wall behind her. “I can make you better,” she said, trying a different approach. He tilted his head slightly, like a dog would do when hearing a strange noise. “Yes, I can make you better. Just let me go, and I’ll make it happen.” He took another step, until they were almost nose to nose. His breath was warm, with a hint of a smell of something that she could not place. She shook with fear, sweat and tears falling in rivulets. She turned her head as he brought his head near her, sniffing her ear, and then her neck. “I do like you, they made me pretend… I...” her sentence was cut off as he sunk his teeth deep into her neck, and held her tight as she struggled. The previously wonderful breasts pressing against him once again, only to be the last time. She punched him again and again, trying to get free but he held on tight, like a dog in a fight for its life. She slowly began to lose consciousness and fell into him, her body shaking. He ripped upward, pulling tendon and meat upwards as he did so. Sprays of blood splattered the glass like a shower curtain in an old horror movie. Shepherd took his time with her, much more time than was necessary. The elation at having ended her life in return for the pain she had caused him helping to spur him on. Several hours he spent in that observation room, savoring every single bloody moment of it.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  The raiding party took off shortly before sunset, with the goal of giving the outpost as little opportunity for noticing them as possible. The group had strict radio silence, and flew by night vision. The pilots were trained for this, but most of the passengers were not. Nearly riding the dirt at some points, they flew low, much to the chagrin of the passengers. Rachel held on for dear life, harkening back to the time when her own helicopter had gone down over the desert and depositing her right into enemy territory. That whole trip could have ended far worse for her than it did. If it hadn’t been for Shepherd’s shenanigans, and his rescue, she had no doubt she would have met some horrible fate. That thought led her to think about him once again. The man who stole her heart. It felt like such a long time since she had seen him. Her fiancé, the man who always seemed to have a witty, sarcastic answer for anything. The man who steer any conversation towards sex in the most awkward and hilarious ways. The memories of their previous home at the apartment complex in downtown Albuquerque, the onslaught that forced them from that home and led them to Cannon AFB. The times they sat together and told each other about their favorite memories. The time Shepherd had told her when he slipped on a treadmill at a gym due to him forgetting to double-knot his shoes, and how scraped up his knee was. That had made her laugh out loud. She had seen him run and could picture it completely. Sure enough, he still forgot to double-knot his shoes, even after that event. The time when he walked around his store in a blow-up dinosaur costume just to hand out candy to kids on Halloween. All of the crazy stories that he shared about working in retail. Don’t let anyone tell you that retail is easy. From stories of thieves sticking sub sandwiches and wine down their pants to the time he had to hogtie someone who kept trying to fight him while waiting for the police to show up, and the time someone brought a bucket of human feces and dumped it into a toilet in the women's room, requiring him to use a dustpan to shovel it into a second toilet just to get the first one to flush. Rachel smiled at that. He would do everything needed and more. He was a provider, a giver, and she missed him. She missed him so much. The tears that always seemed to be just under the surface made their appearance and she tried with all of her might to push them back deep down. A single tear fell from her right eye and she quickly wiped it away. He was most likely dead now, somewhere in the middle of nowhere. Out of fear, out of concern for the others in her party, she left him. She had abandoned him. She felt that to her soul and knew it would be a skeleton in her closest for the rest of her life. She should have gone back, should have said fuck off to the others and looked for him. She shook her head to clear her mind, not wanting to go down that road once again. She would wear the ring that he had given her until the end of time. They hadn’t been married; she knew. That did not change the fact that she had felt as if their souls were intertwined. That they were meant to be. As her fingers moved the ring back and forth on her finger, she stared out over the expanse of the New Mexico desert. The occasional barren tree or cactus rushing by outside of the open door. Not a light could be seen anywhere in the distance. The miles swept by as she stared out the door, her hair being tossed around every which way as the wind tore through the crew area.

  She snapped out of her gaze just as they entered line of sight of the compound. The pilots passed the word on that they were almost at their destination. One minute until they’d disembark and seek vengeance on the wrong doers of the world. That was the way Rachel saw it. She was ready to get back at those that had caused them all so much grief. The four black hawk helicopters slowed with a tilt of the front of the aircrafts upwards. The movement caught Rachel off-guard, and she felt slightly nauseous. The aircraft evened out, and then plummeted almost straight down towards the earth. It landed with a thunk, and a “Go go go!” was shouted from all around the inside of the bird. Everyone piled out, rifles at the ready. Besides a simple and ordinary chain link fence, she saw nothing that resembled a base of any kind. A small concrete entrance sat alone with a single metal door barring their way. No lock on the exterior of the door was present. Natalie and Cassandra took the lead, smashed the door inwards in just a moment, and led the way down the stairs and into the facility. As they entered the stairwell, they heard the unmistakable sound of an alarm. The blaring noise was louder the lower that they got. “They know we’re here,” Sergeant Emsley whispered as she stood behind the two air guardsmen. They filed down the stairs, with other squads behind them on the upper levels following them down. They came to a guard post and a much heavier steel door. The door was locked, with no one visible through the small window. Cassandra and Natalie began placing charges along the hinges of the door. The group took cover as the two women stood a ways back and grinned at each other while Natalie pushed the button on the detonator. The door exploded, with shards of metal flying in every direction. One of the pieces just barely missing Cassandra. She ducked as it clanged against the stairs to her right. She stood and smiled. “Well, butter my butt and call me a biscuit, that was close.” Natalie fist bumped her with a laugh and they made their way forward. The guard post was completely void of guards. That, in itself, was odd enough. The flashing red lights lit the hallway past the line of desks an
d lockers. Several rifles were missing from opened cages lining one wall. Camera feeds showed on several monitors of the outside perimeter, which still showed men and women filing down the stairs. “What the hell?” Elmsley said as she looked over the room. “I guess we don’t have a welcome party,” Isabel said quietly. Rachel nodded as she too looked on. Slowly, the group continued down a narrow concrete hallway. Blood coated the right wall, and a corpse of a heavily armed soldier lying flat on the floor. Elmsley held up her hand, signaling everyone to hold up. She approached the body and looked it over. Multiple bites were evident, with large chunks of meat missing from his exposed arms and legs, and neck. “Infected,” she said, loud enough to get the point across to the group. She pulled out a large combat knife and stabbed it into the eye of the corpse, making sure to twist it around to scramble as much of the brain as possible. This one would not turn. She pulled the knife free and wiped it on the corpse’s camo shirt. She then stood and motioned for the team to follow. They entered another stairwell, and then another hallway that guided them to a split hallway. On the right was a sign that said simply, ‘Hanger’ and another that said ‘Receiving.’ Elmsley pointed both directions, and two small squads entered each of those hallways as the main group continued downwards. She heard gunshots from the groups above and one by one, they responded to her radio calls with muffled “Clears.” Those teams would roll through those assigned rooms and then follow the main group back downwards once any hostiles were taken care of. The lead group continued downwards and soon arrived at another juncture. This one read ‘Housing’ and ‘Medical.’ Corpses by the dozen littered the hallway leading out of the housing wing. The main group then split into two more groups, one sweeping the medical wing and one the housing. The housing group immediately met with resistance and began to fire into a small group of infected huddled over the body of a petite woman, as they pushed each other aside to get at whatever fresh meat that they could. The pop pop pop of rifle rounds could be heard by the medical group as they began to clear room after room. Each room that they came to was unlocked. In four rooms, they found nearly completely devoured corpses. All four had been in the same area, Section C as it was listed on the ‘you are here’ display. One of the last rooms in the wing caught Rachel’s attention. The door was unlocked, like all of the rest. As she entered, moving her rifle from left to right as she and two others cleared it, she felt something. She couldn’t describe it, had she been pressed to. She felt a familiar presence in the air. A machine with a large batch of black liquid sat alongside a soiled hospital bed. Restraints sat wide open, with a clipboard still attached to the front of the bed. She approached it curiously, and pulled it from its hook. A wide assortment of notes was scrabbled all over the sheets. She could not tell what a majority of them meant. It wasn’t until four pages down, she saw photo. A photo of someone that she recognized. Shepherd. “Oh my God,” she whispered to herself as she read what was written.