ROT Series (Book 1): The Smell

by Hunter, Damon

  “Come on, do it,” Deke told them as his eyes began to bulge and his jaw began to elongate.

  Each got close. Six of the seven-pound trigger pulls on each of their weapons was deployed but neither could bring themselves to actually pull the trigger.

  Lumpy lowered his gun. “He just saved my life.”

  Ana lowered hers also. “It feels wrong. We could just leave him.”

  Deke bent down and launched himself at the boat. His suddenly larger mouth opened wide to reveal a new set of razor sharp teeth. He was headed right for Ana when a bullet from Katelin’s gun hit him right between the eyes. He hit the side of the boat and slid off into the sea.

  Katelin looked at Lumpy and Ana. “You’re fucking welcome.” She turned her attention to Bar.

  Out of habit Donna said, “Watch your mouth.”

  “Fuck off, Mom,” Katelin told her. “If I can murder people I can use bad words.”

  The look in her daughter’s eyes made Donna decide to address this issue at another time.

  Katelin continued to look at Bar as he guided the boat out into the harbor and opened up the throttle on the small engine.

  “I thought this was a sailboat,” Katelin said to him.

  “It is, but it’s a lot easier to get in and out of the harbor this way. Good thing we have the motor; if we had to wait for me to raise the sails we wouldn’t have made it. It’s not a quick process. I love sailing, but at the moment I’m glad my life doesn’t depend on which way the wind is blowing.”

  Katelin nodded.

  “Once we’re out in the open water I’ll raise the sails,” he told her. “This little motor isn’t going to take us far.”

  “Speaking of going far,” Ana said to Donna, “how is your husband supposed to find us? It’s a big ocean.”

  “Ex-husband, and I have no idea.”

  “How long until he gets here?” Lumpy asked.

  “No idea on that either.”

  Lumpy pointed at the cooler by Bar’s feet. “Don’t anyone make a fat joke about me asking this, but what’s in the cooler?”

  “I’m skinny as a rail and I want to know too,” Katelin said. “We could be out here awhile.”

  Bar opened the lid, pulling out a can of light beer. “No snacks, but we’ve got beer.”

  “Do you think you might have a drinking problem?” Ana asked him as Bar opened the can.

  “Define problem. Anyone else?”

  Katelin raised her hand. Bar looked at Donna, who shook her head no.

  Katelin stood up and went to the cooler, snagging one out of the ice.

  “Looks like Harold was planning a trip,” she said as she opened the can and took a drink.

  As she sat down she looked at Donna, daring her mom to say something.

  Donna said nothing. Instead she got up and got one for herself.

  Bar dropped anchor as they reached the outside of the jetty and cleared the breakers. He then moved to set up the sails. Katelin put down her beer and went to help him, though he seemed to have it under control.

  Ana looked at the city; from here it was hard to tell it had all gone to hell. The infected roaming the beach did not look any different than tourists from out here.

  “You think they have drones covering the ocean too?” Ana asked.

  “Yeah, if they don’t then I’m guessing Mexico does. Canada too, if we were to get that far.”

  “Probably should stay as close as we can to shore,” Bar said. “I’m guessing just like on the road, once we get too far away from the quarantine it becomes open season for the drones.

  “Your husband, I mean ex-husband, coming from the north?” Bar asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Then we ought to go his direction. Shorten the distance he has to go.”

  “Sounds like a plan,” Donna said as she reached in her pocket and retrieved her phone. “Speaking of my ex-husband...”

  She found the text. “He says he is on the way, heading his direction sounds like a good idea.”

  “Then maybe we have a chance,” Bar said. “We’ll both probably be hugging the shore. Chances of seeing each other is good.”

  Donna texted him back:

  “We are in a sailboat heading north. Staying near the shore.”

  “He say anything else?” Katelin asked as Bar demonstrated how to tie the jib line.

  “He wants to talk to you. Something he may not want me to hear,” Donna said, looking at the end of Vance’s text where he asked Katelin to turn on her phone.

  “Tell him I don’t want to talk to him. Actually, if he can tell you how old I am I might talk to him. Otherwise, tell him to fuck off.” Katelin said as she joined Bar back on the deck.

  Again, Donna started to tell her daughter to watch her mouth, but stopped herself. Instead she nodded. She did not text back her daughter’s message. Instead, Donna typed in, “What do you want to talk to her about?”

  Donna looked at the screen and saw the battery was running low. She decided to give Vance a minute to respond before turning the phone off. She could check it later and keep the battery going for a few more hours.Donna stared at the phone as the wind filled the main sail and they began to cruise north.

  CHAPTER 34

  Interstate Five

  Dr. Talbot watched as Donna’s phone came on. He saw that both parties were on the water. They were headed for each other. This did not concern him much. He would have liked to get the ex-wife and daughter and use them to make sure Vance cooperated, but if it did not happen, he was still confident he could capture them all.

  Dr. Talbot still had the convoy of armored vehicles and an elite group of troops backing him. More importantly, he knew where everyone was and they had no idea how close he was getting to them.

  The tricky part would be getting them out of the water, but he was already forming some ideas. The only thing not in his favor was if they somehow got out of the quarantine zone. While his methods were entirely fine in the lawless QZ, even his most ardent supporters in TMRT would frown on him doing this outside quarantine.

  Major Cook had chosen to go in the other car to debrief the non-immune TMRT member they evacuated. Dr. Talbot was tempted to find out if she was also immune; she must have had something going for her to make it out there where others did not.

  Having Mikey bite her could be interesting. But though they were under his command, he did not picture the soldiers on the mission being okay with this. The lawlessness of the QZ that allowed him to operate the way he did also meant a mutiny would probably go unpunished if they decided to take things into their own hands.

  He did not know the TMRT man who was in the car with him; stationed here on the off chance Mikey somehow got free, he only really dealt with Major Cook. He motioned the man over with a wave as something on the screen he was watching caught his attention.

  When the man reached him Talbot asked, “How far out in the ocean does the QZ spread?”

  “A mile at most, but probably less,” he said. “I’m not sure. There aren’t as many drones patrolling the water as there are patrolling the land, but if anyone crosses the line they’re going to be toast.”

  Talbot pointed at the blip on the screen, superimposed over a map of the coast, showing where Donna’s phone was. “How close are they getting to catching a missile?

  The soldier leaned down to get a good look. After examining the ship’s position for a second, he said, “I’d say unless they get a whole lot closer to the shore, quickly, they are not long for this world.”

  Dr. Talbot was wondering if he could use this, perhaps contact them and get them to come to shore, when the blip on the screen disappeared.

  “Looks like they didn’t make it,” the soldier said.

  “Perhaps,” Dr. Talbot replied. He hoped they were gone. If he could not use them, they were just a complication.

  CHAPTER 35

  Interstate Five

  A car back from Talbot, Ashley was beginning to get concerned. Talbot may ha
ve wondered if she had some immunity to the rot that allowed her to survive, but her true special ability was she did not ignore her instincts and trusted them completely.

  Her instincts told her something was wrong. Listening to the voice inside of her head telling her something was wrong had gotten her through three tours in the Middle East and one doomed mission into the Quarantine Zone. She was not about to ignore it now.

  “Where are the survivors you rescued?” she asked one of the soldiers.

  He looked at her, but said nothing.

  “Seems a simple question,” she said.

  “There are no simple questions, and I’ve found giving answers where it is not my place to say is bad for me.”

  “How is it not your place to say?”

  He turned away from her. Before she could press on, the man named Cook sat down beside her, saying, “Leave him alone.”

  “Do you want to answer my question?”

  For a second it looked like he might, but instead he said, “No.”

  “I’m not some civilian.”

  “Ask Dr. Talbot. It’s his show.”

  Ashley sensed this was as good as it was going to get. The avoidance of her question seemed to confirm the voice in her head’s suspicion.

  “One more question, unrelated.”

  “You can ask.”

  “Can I have a weapon? Like I said, I’m not a civilian.”

  “Why?”

  “Why? How about we’re the middle of the QZ, surrounded by infected.”

  “You are officially off the clock. Let us do the work. You’ve earned a break. My men will keep you safe.”

  “What if they can’t?”

  “We are an elite unit—”

  “So was mine. You’ve been around, you know shit can happen, and if it does it will happen fast.”

  “I’ll think about it. We don’t stop for awhile yet, so you should be fine until then. Relax.”

  Ashley decided not to argue, but the last thing she could do was relax.

  Looking at Major Cook, she had a feeling he was not taking his own advice.

  CHAPTER 36

  The Pacific Ocean

  Vance took the wheel while Holiday peed off the back of the boat. Holiday had given him a quick tutorial, and Vance was confident he could drive the boat without any problems.

  Vance said he would drive awhile; Holiday was clearly exhausted. He had not recovered fully from the wounds he’d received back in San Francisco. Still, he insisted on driving the boat apart from short breaks.

  Concentrating on driving the unfamiliar vehicle, Vance almost missed his newly charged phone vibrate in his pocket. He risked running into something in the open ocean and looked at the screen.

  “Take the wheel,” he told Holiday, and he punched in his ex-wife’s digits.

  CHAPTER 37

  Oceanside Harbor

  Donna was about to power down her phone when it vibrated in her hand. She was surprised to see Vance was actually calling instead of just texting. They both preferred text and email to actually talking.

  “Eric…” she began.

  “Turn your boat around, get back into the harbor,” he told her, wasting no time getting to the point. “You are in drone range.”

  Donna lowered the phone and looked at Bar. “We need to stop right now.”

  “Doesn’t work that way, but okay. Mind telling me why?”

  “Drones. He says we need to go back to the harbor.”

  “Okay, but does he know what a shit show it is back there?”

  Donna put the phone back to her ear.

  “I heard him,” Vance told her. “Stay in the water. We will come to you.”

  It was hard for Donna to make out what was being said, but she could tell someone else was talking to Vance.

  “Meet us by the refueling dock,” he told her.

  Bar was already turning the boat around when Donna told him about the refueling dock.

  “One quick thing,” she asked, “what did you want to say to Katelin you couldn’t say to me?”

  “I have no idea what you are talking about.”

  “You asked her to turn on her phone.”

  “I did, I have a tracking app on it. If her phone is on, I can find you.”

  “You did what? How?”

  “I worried about her.”

  “You know remembering her birthday might be a better way of showing it.”

  “How would that help you and her right now?”

  Donna had no answer except to say, “All of us are running out of battery.”

  “Keep it off then, unless you can’t make it to the fuel dock.”

  “Fine, we’ll talk about this later though,” Donna said as she turned her phone off.

  “He say what he wanted to talk about?” Katelin asked.

  “No,” Donna said. She figured if she told her about the tracking app, the phone would end up in the Pacific. As much as she didn’t like him putting spyware on their teenager’s phone on the sly, they still might need it.

  CHAPTER 38

  Interstate Five, Oceanside

  The light blip came back on. Dr. Talbot saw the boat with the ex-wife and daughter turn and head back toward the harbor.

  Talbot opened the channel on his two-way radio and told the driver, “Head for the harbor.”

  He then opened a channel to Major Cook. “Gear up. We are about to make a stop.”

  CHAPTER 39

  Oceanside Harbor

  Bar guided the boat into the harbor via wind power and then switched to the small engine as they approached a floating dock with a single gas pump. It was off the shore by a good twenty feet, and only a narrow walkway connected it to the land.

  It was on the opposite side of the harbor from the shops and beaches. There weren’t any infected on the fuel dock and very few milling around the parking lot on the shore. Bar anchored the boat and he and Ana dismantled the walkway while the others kept watch with guns in case a vampire rotter made an unwelcome appearance. With the walkway sinking to the harbor floor, they were reasonably safe on the fuel dock. A vampire rotter could make the jump, but the amblers could not get to them.

  Since they were there, Bar busted the padlock on the pump and filled the gas tank on the sailboat’s small motor.

  He had just finished when he heard the approaching convoy. They all stopped to watch Dr. Talbot’s armored vehicle plow its way through everything in its path. Soon enough, it had reached the land directly opposite the dock.

  Soldiers manned gun turrets on two of the three vehicles. The small band of survivors expected them to be scanning the area, taking aim at the infected. Instead, the big guns were pointed directly at them.

  “For our safety, we must request you drop your weapons,” a voice said through an unseen loudspeaker. “We are here to evacuate you, but we cannot do that if you are armed. Please leave your weapons in the boat and step onto the dock.”

  “I don’t like it,” Katelin said.

  “They’re here to help,” Donna said, pointing to the TMRT logo on the side of every vehicle.

  “Even it they aren’t,” Bar said, looking at the big guns pointed toward them, “I don’t think this is a fight we can win.”

  Everyone put their weapons on the deck inside the boat and then all stood on the fuel dock.

  The doors opened and soldiers poured out. One held a ladder, which he extended across the gap. A man not in uniform emerged from the middle car.

  “Glad to see you all,” he said, “I am Dr. Talbot. I assume two of you are Eric Vance’s wife and daughter.”

  “Ex-wife,” Donna told him.

  “Yes, ex-wife,” the man said. “I believe the ladder works best if we take you one at a time. Since Vance is one of our own, why don’t you two go first.”

  “Go ahead,” Donna told her daughter.

  Katelin made her way across.

  Donna looked at Ana. “Go ahead.”

  “He wanted you to go.”

 
; “That ‘one of our own’ thing is bullshit. You’re younger, you go.” She turned to Lumpy. “You can go next. With your injury, you should have gone first.”

  The man in the lab coat did not look happy to see Ana come across, but he did not protest.

  With his leg busted up, Lumpy was having difficulty getting across. One of the soldiers met him halfway.

  He was just about across when a woman came out of the second car carrying a big machine gun. She pointed it at the man in the lab coat.

  “Everyone be still,” Ashley said.

  “Get inside,” Dr. Talbot told the two girls. “She won’t harm you.”

  He was right. Ashley said, “Don’t,” but held her fire as the two girls went inside Dr. Talbot’s vehicle.

  “Where did you get the gun?” Major Cook asked.

  “The driver. He can’t take a punch.”

  “I’m not sure what you hope to accomplish here,” Dr. Talbot asked as the soldiers all trained guns on her.

  “I hope to keep my friend’s ex-wife and daughter alive.”

  “By stopping their rescue?”

  “Rescue my ass,” she said. “You’ve been in the QZ for weeks. You should have a truckload full of survivors. Where are they?”

  Talbot did not answer.

  “What were you worried about Vance finding out? Why do you think he’s running from you?”

  “In some ways, you are so smart,” Dr. Talbot told her, “but in others so dumb. You are a good soldier, but so are they, and there are four of them, not counting the men in the machine gun nests and the drivers of the transports. You cannot win.”

  “I’ve heard that before.”

  Major Cook swung his rifle around so he was aiming at his own men. “I’m sick of this shit.”

  Dr. Talbot looked at the other men. They seemed unsure. With everyone so close together, the machine gunners could not get involved.

  “They hang traitors these days, Major,” Talbot told Cook, as he backed onto the transport. No one fired a shot as the door began to close.