by JE Gurley
Biosphere2 was comfortable and safer than his home, but he still did not feel comfortable; in part, because he could not allow himself to do so. Guilt ate at him for even one moment of enjoyment or relaxation. His son was dead, taken by force from his mother while she fought and cried. His wife was a prisoner of the military at some base in California. God only knew what they were doing to her. He could not afford to relax. Each day, each hour, might mean the difference between life and death. He knew Mace meant well and was probably right in delaying their journey. A trip to California would be a monumental undertaking, especially since he did not know Karen’s exact location.
They had been too busy to set up Mace’s short wave radio, but Jeb hoped that they might reach someone on the West Coast with useful knowledge. Although, he had never been one to spend hours before a television or computer, in an age of instant communication and a deluge of information from thousands of sources, knowing nothing beyond what they could see seemed primitive, like living in the Dark Ages. He laughed at the incongruity. Here he was sitting in front of a bank of video cameras inside a wonder of creation, a three and a half-acre space enclosed by glass, and he didn’t know what was happening a mile away.
A slight movement in the corner of one outside screen startled him. He panned the camera and tightened the focus, but could see nothing except cactus and darkness. The moon lay partially hidden behind low clouds and offered little light. He stared at the screen for several minutes, debating whether to alert Mace. Just as he decided to call the others, the object moved again. He looked at the long ears and oversized back legs and smiled – a jackrabbit munching a stalk of grass. Relief swept over him. He watched the rabbit for several minutes, as it sat in contentment eating, but he failed to see a coyote sneaking up on the poor creature until, like a shadow, the coyote fell upon the hapless hare, clamping its jaws around the rabbit’s neck and shaking it until it was dead. Jeb was glad there was no sound. The coyote trotted away with the limp hare dangling from its mouth. The gory scene reminded him too much of the evening the FEMA camp fell.
In spite of the coffee and his restlessness, he was relieved when Mace showed up shortly before midnight to spell him. He winced when he stood up. Mace noticed and asked, “How’s your side?”
“Oh, sore enough to remind me not to be stupid again.”
Mace grinned and settled down in the chair Jeb had just vacated. “I doubt it. We all get stupid sometimes. The trick is to know when not to be.” He wriggled his butt in the seat. “Mmm, nice and warm. Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it,” Jeb mumbled around a wide yawn. “I think I’ll turn in.”
“In the morning, we get to work,” Mace reminded him.
As Jeb limped back to the resident quarters, he decided not to let his wound slow him down. It might seem silly and a bit childish, but he wasn’t about to let Mace show him up.
18
Vince Holcomb and Liz Mears emerged from the power conduit tunnel at the Saguaro Power Plant east of the base into Dante’s Inferno. Orange and red flames billowed into the sky from a ruptured oil tank. The heat was stifling, the air thick with black smoke roiling low to the ground, concealing everything in a dark cloud. Vince struggled to get his bearings in the conflagration.
“Hold my hand,” he called out to Mears over the roar of the fire.
Hand in hand, they crawled across the ground to avoid the choking smoke. Behind them, a tremendous explosion shook the ground. A river of burning oil from a freshly ruptured tank streamed toward them, pouring into the tunnel they had just exited.
“We’ve got to move,” he said.
Crouching low, they stumbled toward the only clearing. When they emerged from the cloud of smoke a hundred yards north of the power plant, they discovered the source of the fire. Illuminated by the light from the inferno, they saw a freight train had derailed just south of the power plant, sending dozens of flat cars into the oil tanks, spilling blazing fuel oil and scattering the contents of the smashed containers on the freight cars from the tracks all the way to the main power station, which was also ablaze.
Eying the wreckage, Vince quickly counted a hundred flat cars blocking them from the interstate. “We have to go around this. We’ll head east toward the CAP and follow it south.”
Once clear of the plant, they picked their way slowly through the desert toward the Central Arizona Project canal that conveyed water from the Colorado River south to Phoenix and Tucson, their only light coming from the burning power plant now almost invisible wrapped in its shroud of black smoke. When they reached the canal, Vince climbed down the sloped concrete bank and dipped his handkerchief in the frigid water. He crawled back up and handed it to Mears, who used it to wipe her eyes. When she was finished, she returned it to him and he removed the black soot from his face.
“Are they all dead?” Mears asked.
Vince assumed she was referring to their comrades at the base. “I don’t know. Lindsay and Higgins are. I saw them die.” He did not mention running in fear for his life, not because he was afraid of admitting to her his moment of weakness, but because he wanted to be strong for her. She was a strong woman, but he had learned over the last few months that she needed a guiding hand sometimes. “No one is escaping the way we came.”
“Should we go back to the hangar and check if any of them got out that way?”
He remembered the zombies entering the hangar as he, Conyers and Doyles were leaving. “No. It’s not safe. We’ll make our way back to the road and head south to Tucson. If anyone made it, they’ll head that way.”
She nodded her acceptance of his decision, too tired to argue.
It was along walk in the darkness. They intersected the interstate just north of Marana and discovered the cause of the train wreck. The shattered remains of a bulldozer and the three Union Pacific locomotives pulling the train lay in a wash with more freight containers scattered along the tracks. Someone had parked the bulldozer across the tracks, derailing the train. To Vince, it seemed a bizarre method of suicide, but he could see no other explanation for the bulldozer’s presence on the tracks so far from a crossing. Once clear of the wreckage, they stopped for a few hours rest in a house under construction. With the power station in ruins, power was off in the surrounding neighborhood and the gas stations across the interstate. As the sun rose over the Catalina Mountains, Mears, who had slept fitfully, informed him of the decision she had made during the night.
“I’m not going with you to Davis-Monthan, Vinny. Granny’s house is off Gate’s Pass Road. I’ll pick her and Keisha up and we’re heading out of town.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know,” she sobbed. “I don’t care. Anywhere is better than here. I’ll load up with food and water and we’ll just drive. If we go to Davis-Monthan, I’m in the Air Force again. I’m through following orders. If not for . . . if not for my duty, I’d be with my daughter now.”
Vince knew she held him partly to blame, but he could do nothing about that now.
“We should stay together,” he urged. “If we reach the base, we can get an armored vehicle and go to your grandmother’s house. We would have to pass through a dozen subdivisions to get there. That means zombies, maybe hundreds.”
Mears, distraught over concern for her daughter, would not back down. “She’s my daughter, Vinny. I have to go to her. Look,” she said, “You go on to the base. Don’t worry about me.”
He knew he could not dissuade her, but his sense of duty extended farther than simply helping her. He had to go on. Reluctantly giving in, he helped Mears locate an automobile. She decided on a Ford Bronco sitting in a driveway. She kept watch against zombies or an irate owner with his .45 as he hotwired the truck. The sound of it cranking brought a smile to her lips. A multicar pileup just north of the Twin Peaks exchange forced them onto the access road. The extent of the devastation they passed dismayed Vince – burned out buildings, lines of wrecked automobiles and 18-wheelers, corpses. He wondered how much org
anization remained in the city, if this was an example. The military had erected several barricades across the road, but others before he and Mears had crashed through them. The wreckage of an army jeep, several uniformed corpses and several cars riddled with bullet holes indicated that not everyone had succeeded. A deep sand and gravel pit, partially hidden from the road by a pecan grove, contained the smoldering corpses of thousands of bodies, some not completely consumed by the flames. Bulldozers had pushed mounds of excavated dirt into one area, but amid the grisly open grave, zombies fed on unburned bodies. Zombies became more numerous the further into the city they drove, singly and in larger groups.
As he and Mears neared downtown, Vince’s hopes plummeted. One entire neighborhood adjacent to the expressway was in flames. Smoke across the road hampered visibility. In addition, fire had gutted several motels and warehouses. Downtown, smoke and flames poured from the windows of the Bank of America Plaza and the Arizona Hotel.
“This is a bad idea,” he told Mears.
“Come with me, Vinny,” she replied. Her face had gone pale at the sight of the pyre. Her request, whether meant simply to dissuade him from attempting to reach the base, or as an invitation to stay with her was tempting. His duty and his heart battled for dominance, but he could not ignore his fourteen years as a sergeant.
“I can’t, Liz. I need to see.”
She exited at Speedway and stopped the car. “This turns into Gate’s Pass. You can find a car and go on. Take Mission Road south to 22nd Street. Head east. It will take you to the base.”
As Vince got out of the truck, he said, “I’ll be back in four hours max. If you change your mind, meet me here.”
As Mears drove away, he knew he would never see her again, and he silently wished her luck. He found a Toyota that had the keys still in the ignition and half a tank of gas. Their brief exchange, as he had told Mears goodbye, had drawn a crowd of zombies. He had let Mears keep his pistol. Now unarmed, he threaded his way through the creatures with the Toyota, hitting a few, but avoiding most for fear of damaging his car. He took Mission Road as she had suggested, driving into the opposite lanes when necessary. He turned onto 22nd but had to backtrack around a stalled train blocking the road.
When he finally reached Davis-Monthan, the gates were open and the security shack empty. He took that as a bad sign. Dozens of jets, some still armed with bombs and missiles, lined the fields, but he saw no living personnel. By the number of empty aprons, he knew some jets had managed to take off, but the burned out remains of a crashed F16 Falcon on the runway was an ominous sign. Replacing the normally active base personnel were hundreds of military issue-clad zombies scavenging dead bodies, entering and exiting buildings sniffing the air like hunting packs of animals. He parked the Toyota beneath a tree and continued on foot to attract less attention. Fire had severely damaged many of the buildings and others showed signs of damage from explosions. The overwhelmed base personnel had put up a fight, but one they were doomed to lose, as those they killed quickly rose from death to attack them. He investigated a barracks, but the gruesome sight of half-eaten corpses and ghastly blood trails of bodies dragged away from their beds made him sick to his stomach. He tried the telephone in the recreation room, but got only a dial tone. A noise outside the window alarmed him. He crept out quietly.
For over two hours, Vince scoured the base for signs of life, but he saw only zombies. Most moved randomly, often forming small groups that formed and reformed as individuals joined or left. Others traveled in smaller, more cohesive bands of ten or twelve, always led by a male who directed the others through grunts and physical intimidation. When a secondary male challenged the leader of one band he observed, the leader attacked the challenger viciously, killing him in a deadly battle lasting less than a minute. The others quickly devoured the loser. Vince hoped the zombies all formed sides and ate each other until last man standing.
Vince realized he was alone and unarmed among hundreds of walking dead seeking human flesh. He did not need a decade of Air Force training to tell him that his position was untenable. He needed a weapon, preferably one with some punch and the best place to find weapons would be the Security Forces headquarters. Since he was unfamiliar with the base, having only been there for a few hours upon his arrival from Dover AFB in Maryland before transportation to Red Rock, he located a base directory in a chaplain’s office in the base chapel. To his dismay, the building housing the Security Forces was on the opposite side of the base. He knew he would never make it safely being on foot. Returning to his ‘borrowed’ car, Vince prepared himself for the ride of a lifetime.
Stealth was out of the question. Too much open space lay between him and his destination to make it there without attracting unwanted attention. The Toyota proved more durable than he thought, mowing down zombies like a scythe through straw. Some pursued him, while others stopped to eat their own dead. He reached the Security Forces building, knowing he had little time to rush in, secure a weapon and retreat to the safety of his car. Part of his job became easier when he saw the gaping hole in one wall just large enough to accommodate the Toyota. He drove full speed until he reached the damaged wall, then slammed on the brakes, neatly plugging the gap like a cork in a bottle.
Weapons lay everywhere, most of them beside mangled corpses of men and women, wearing the Security Forces eagle flash on their blue berets, bearing the Latin words Defensor Fortis, Defending the Force. Vince had always considered the motto a joke, like something a Jedi Knight from Star Wars would say, but seeing the bloodstained blue berets and the mangled corpses on the floor brought a tear of pride to his eye. They had fought bravely and died cruelly. Hearing the scrabble of feet outside the building growing louder, he removed the 9mm Beretta and holster from one corpse and picked up an M16A2 automatic rifle from the floor, wiping the blood staining the grip on his pants. A broken box of extra clips for the M16 sat on a nearby desk. He filled his pockets with extra ammo and got back in the Toyota.
At first, the wheels spun as he stepped on the gas and he thought he had wedged the car in too tightly to back out, but with a shudder that did the paintjob no good, it broke free, plowing backward into a mass of zombies. They clawed at the doors and pounded on the windows with their fists, but their futile efforts did not slow him down. He put the Toyota in drive and headed away, with the zombies trailing. Davis-Monthan was finished as a functioning base. He held out little hope for other bases throughout the country. Satisfied he would find no help, he left.
* * * *
Mears’ commandeered Bronco was not at the Speedway/I-10 exit when he arrived. For two long and tense hours, he waited, staying low in the car to avoid attracting the attention of wandering groups of zombies. Through the mirrors, he watched them searching buildings, attacking weaker members of their own bands, and inspecting cars for food. He knew they would soon get around to his, but he waited. By the end of the third hour, he knew Mears was not coming. Too many things could have gone wrong – she had located her family and had decided not to retrace her drive and escape through Gate’s Pass over the Tucson Mountains into the desert beyond, she had not made it to her grandmother’s house, she had found her family dead and killed herself, she had found them dead and continued alone. Whatever the reason, he was alone.
For the first time in his life, Vince was indecisive. He had no home, except the Air Force, and no family or friends. Was life in a post apocalyptic world worth living? He eyed the Beretta considering his options. He could end it now and become food for the undead. He could wage war on zombies, a war he suspected he could not win, only prolonging what amounted to option one, or he could do what he had always wanted to do, why he had joined the Air Force in the first place – travel. He could turn into a modern Josephus or Livy, chronicling the fall of mankind in his own opus magnum. It might become one of the least read books in the history of literature, but the idea of describing what he saw, channeling his anguish and sorrow, perhaps the angst of all mankind, into words on paper. H
e would be a witness to the destruction of civilization, and if he were lucky, the rise of it again on the far side of the Apocalypse.
Vince had no deep felt religious beliefs, but he hoped some kind of deity or god was watching, even if from afar, taking pity on the tattered remnants of a once great civilization, and moved by his/her sorrow, offer a helping hand in man’s hour of need.
19
Inside the Emerald City of Biosphere2, the days slowly melted one into the next and became weeks. Christmas passed unnoticed and uncelebrated. The small band of survivors spent hours each day maintaining the enormous facility. The complexity of the various systems and biomes were beyond their grasp, but they managed to keep the place running by hard work and luck.
Jeb became more and more withdrawn, eager to continue his search for Karen, but reluctant to force the others from the security, they had recently found. Mace and Renda moved in together, a move he had expected, but it spurred a little jealousy in him at first. He quickly reminded himself that he was a married man and not a rival for Renda’s affections, only deepening his own emotional rollercoaster ride. His mood swings came as no surprise. He had survived the first three stages of grief – Denial, Guilt and Anger. Depression was the logical fourth stage. No amount of bargaining, no shifting of blame, no tantrums of rage would bring back his dead son and missing wife, but he would not allow the fifth stage, Acceptance, to deter him from his search for her.
He could live with pain. It was something Jeb had not expected. Never exposed to such an overwhelming barrage of despair in his sheltered, upper-middle class niche of society, he had floundered at first. However, he used his training and experience to focus his anger quickly into a weapon he could wield, rather than allowing it wash through him like a raging flood, drowning what he had once been. He held no illusions that his task was formidable and perhaps futile, but he would never give up hope. He knew Karen was alive, felt it every invisible touch that he imagined was her hand reaching for him, and in every whisper that was her voice calling his name.