EAT, SLAY, LUZT: A sexy wild ride through the dark heart of the zombie apocalypse.

by Jillian Stone

  A bottle of hand sanitizer made the rounds, and everyone wore surgical gloves, including the commando on tourniquet with the Maglite. I had one man on suction, using an ear syringe, and another on tongue depressor retractor. I sent a third man up to Chris to raid his paperclip stash. And damn if they didn’t work reasonably well as clamps! Between the four of us, I managed to find the nick in the artery and stitch it.

  The final test was to remove the clamps and see if the stitches held—which they did. I looked up at my surgical assistants. “Voila!”

  Ahmed smiled through glazed, feel-no-pain eyes.

  The first aid kit included saline packs so I washed out the wound and the skin flap before stitching him up.

  “How’s it going, Doc?” Chris asked.

  “The artery is repaired. I’m closing now.” As I sutured the wound, I asked questions. Questions I should have asked him before agreeing to a world cruise together. “Where are you taking me, Captain Oakley?”

  “We’re still going to try for the rendezvous half a mile off the coast of Bahrain. While we’re there, we’ll check out the marinas.”

  “What if all the boats are gone?”

  “We’ll keep going until we find something seaworthy in Qatar. We’ve got fuel to make Dubai if we have to.”

  His confidence eased some of my concerns, and I made a kissing noise into my microphone. I continued to pester him with questions, as I stitched the flap of skin back in place. When I was finished, I cleaned all my instruments, including paperclips, and packed everything up. “Are you allergic to penicillin?”

  Ahmed nodded.

  I rummaged around in the cold sack for tetracycline and loaded a syringe with the antibiotic. I filled another with z-interferon. “You will need to repeat the interferon every six to eight hours for forty-eight hours.”

  Getting his men to pull their lieutenant’s pants down proved to be both amusing and awkward.

  “Am I going to live as a human?” Ahmed struggled a bit with his English.

  “You received treatment early and you’re strong.” I folded his shirt and jacket into a pillow. “Get some rest and try not to worry.”

  “Unknown rider,” Ivan croaked over the intercom. “Five o’clock.”

  The helicopter banked hard and plunged lower. I glanced out the cargo bay doors. We were practically skimming the surface of the gulf waters.

  “His radar is painting. I don’t think he’s located us yet. Do you have a visual?” Chris asked.

  “Negative on the visuial, but he’s coming up fast.”

  I buckled Ahmed onto the stretcher and stationed myself behind Ivan, who was attempting to concentrate on the radar screen in front of him. “Fuck—I’ve lost him.”

  Chris scanned both radar screens. “What’s his base of operation?”

  “Most likely MacMillan scrambled an F-18 off a carrier.”

  “How can planes just disappear?” I asked.

  “Our radar sees dead ahead, but we can hear radio signals from any direction.” Ivan explained. He flipped a switch. “The change in the wavelength of his signal is a good speed indicator. This rider is pretty far out—just luck I caught his chirps for three or four seconds.”

  “We’re coming up on Manama.” Chris glanced back at me. “Let’s see if he’s up for a game of cat and mouse.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  “SEE THAT EVERYONE is strapped in, and take the crew chief’s seat, Lizzy.” Cool and calm, Chris didn’t bark orders. He didn’t have to. Being a noncombatant, it had taken me a while to appreciate the importance of not getting rattled in battle.

  Like, you lived longer.

  I made sure everyone was either belted in or fastened to something permanent before I took a seat behind Ivan. Manama, if I remembered correctly, was the capital city of Bahrain, a small island nation approximately the same size as Tonga in the Archipelago.

  Why that particular factoid stuck in my brain, I have no idea. Before my surgical team had left for Jordan, we’d been given a crash course on the Middle East—some language skills, a bit of cultural information, which mostly had to do with the geopolitics of the region.

  A blur of crystal blue water streaked beneath the chopper. Straight ahead, a cluster of gleaming glass and steel skyscrapers shot up out of the desert. I could only guess at what Chris was up to, but it seemed like the city offered a labyrinth of hiding places for helicopters. Supersonic jets on the other hand, not so much.

  The screen in front of Ivan flashed a series of letters and numbers, most predominantly AGM-114 and there was a shrill beeping noise. “Incoming missile—take evasive—” Ivan never got a chance to spit the words out before Chris banked the chopper so steeply, I thought we were going to roll over, and I’m pretty sure helicopters don’t fly all that well upside down.

  Rockets are so quick, you don’t even sense them. All I know is the missile hit the side of a building. Afterward, I was vaguely aware of a roar and whoosh, but that was the fighter jet as it pulled up and peeled off.

  The concussion blast rocked us forward, while a strong wind of negative pressure drew us backward. The push-me-pull-you effect rattled the chopper to the point I thought the vibration would break us apart.

  I clenched my teeth and silently pledged not to whimper, as a shot of adrenalin threatened to blast my pulse rate into the stratosphere. To calm myself I shifted into some kind of neutral observer reality mode. My vision narrowed and I focused on Chris, who appeared to be taking this air battle one missile at a time. Just like the way he shot zombies. Or jumped motorcycles. Or escaped from a sick and twisted z-base.

  The chopper spun clockwise, in a tail rotor first tumble through the air. I grabbed onto the back of Ivan’s seat and concentrated on not throwing up. We were flying too fast, at the steepest bank imaginable. I wanted to squint or cover my eyes, as we narrowly missed slamming into a towering glass and steel skyscraper. I’d survived three days in the desert surrounded by zombies, but this was so much worse.

  As Chris regained control of the chopper, and decreased speed, he flew us into a dense thicket of massive buildings. One second we’re about to die, the next moment the helicopter is hovering in the shade of two tall spires.

  “Talk to me, Ivan.” Chris scanned the airspace above us.

  Without taking his eyes off the screen, Ivan shook his head. “Nothing yet, but you know he’s going to make another pass.”

  We were semi-hidden under a skywalk between two perfectly matched towers.

  Chris reached over the center control panel and showed Ivan how to bring up thermal imaging beside the radar.

  My nerves felt raw, like they’d been stripped of myelin. “Any photon torpedos, Captain?”

  Chris snorted a laugh. “Not on this bird, Lizzy.”

  “Even if we had them, they’d likely be air to surface,” Ivan sneered. “What about countermeasures, anything in the way of decoys?” He flipped a switch and refreshed the screen. “We’ve got an F-18 at two o’clock.”

  Chris opened a panel on the console. “A few flares and some chaffe.”

  Ivan did not seem impressed. “He’s dropping in behind us.”

  “Chill, Ivan, I’ve got a few moves left.”

  “Less than two miles,” Ivan warned. “Take your time. You’ve got a second to relax before the next missile fires.”

  One of the cool things a hovering helicopter can do is pivot in place. “Found his heat signature. He thinks he’s got us.” Chris rotated the helicopter one-eighty and crept out from under the skywalk that connected the two buildings. He hit a button. “Flares deployed.” Simultaneously, the chopper made a tight turn around the corner of the skyscraper.

  A nanosecond later, the missile took out a nice chunk of a building across the street.

  It would seem missiles are easily distracted and can’t execute ninety-degree turns. I braced for the blast wave, which wasn’t as bad this time, and Chris didn’t stick around for a second launch.

  “He’s goi
ng wing-over.” Ivan appeared to be an amazingly steady, concentrated co-pilot.

  Instead of circling the building, Chris double-backed and slipped under the skywalk again. Not that the pedestrian bridge hid the chopper all that well.

  “Aren’t we a little exposed?” I asked tentatively.

  “We want him to see us, but we also want to fuck with his targeting capabilities.” Chris glanced back. “Hang tough, Lizzy. I got this.”

  Milky zombie eyes actually sparked to life in the radar screen. “Don’t tell me, we’re going to do this dance a few more times. Eventually he’ll come down on top of us, and that’s when we force an overshoot. Kapow—right into the side of a building.”

  “Not bad, Ivan, you should have finished flight training.” Chris fired up the turbines and took off down a narrow corridor between the skyscrapers. “Let’s see if this guy is a Jedi.”

  Chris took us on a rollercoaster ride through downtown Manama.

  “Just so you know, I’ve got a couple of flaws. One of them is I get airsick,” I confessed.

  Chris turned a corner and plunged down to near ground level. “My stomach is still somewhere around the fortieth floor level.” I even sounded queasy, if that’s possible.

  He glanced back. “Just don’t barf on my instrument panel, baby doll.”

  “Jeezus—that fighter pilot just did a vertical climb and rolled into a 180 degree turn. He’s coming right back at us.” Ivan’s head wobbled, so I imagined his eyes were also in a spin. “The motherfucker is a Jedi.”

  I was about to ask if he could use another pair of eyes, but thought better of it. I had no idea how to read a radar screen.

  “He’s locked on—no wait—we’ve got two incoming.” The radar warning system had begun chirping madly. “Ten o’clock and three o’clock. Fuck. I missed something,” Ivan’s deteriorating vocal chords made his speech sound parched and gravelly.

  “Jamming,” Chris acknowledged.

  From the get-go it had been painfully obvious that Chris was pretty much on this own in this dogfight. Ahmed and Ivan did their best to assist, but they were far from battle-trained copilots.

  Chris banked the helicopter and made a last minute hard turn. “Hunker down—this one could be bad.”

  If we had any chance of avoiding the missile or surviving a hard landing, Chris needed me with him, and not whimpering like a frightened crybaby. I shut my eyes and fought off the urge to jump into his lap.

  It helped to concentrate on the roar of the turbines and the steady whump-whump of the rotorblades. When you’re about to die, you sometimes have no alternative but to go zen—think of nothing—float off into space—give your soul a head start.

  The first explosion was close. The surge of air pushed us around, but not wildly so. I opened my eye a crack, mostly because we weren’t dead yet.

  Chris was managing the effects of the blast while trying to read the radar screen. “Where’s number two? Talk to me, Ivan.”

  “Not sure what is happening. No targeting device is locked on us.” Ivan leaned forward to get an eyes-on visual. “It’s got to be right on top of us.”

  Now I had both eyes open, searching the sky. No other fighter jets in sight, except the one making a loop at the end of a steep climb.

  An eerie whistling noise was all I heard overhead. Chris saw it first. “We’re not the target.” Before I could turn my head, the missile swept past the chopper headed straight for the fighter.

  “He’s releasing chaff. That missile is laser guided—surface to air.” Ivan timed his kaboom to the actual hit. In a burst of yellow-orange fire, the sleek, delta winged plane spun off, trailing smoke.

  “Where’d that fucker come from?” Chris’s ask was more of a demand. We all searched the sky as well as the radar screens.

  “The missile looks like it—I’m almost certain it launched from the gulf, but…” Ivan shook his head.

  I leaned over the console. “Ahmed had me turn on his transponder. Can a submarine fire a missile like that?”

  “Not possible, Lizzy. Submarines can’t—” Chris stopped short. “Unless…”

  Ivan’s eyes narrowed. “Unless they surfaced, and used a man-portable.”

  Chris moved the chopper out from behind the glass tower. The Persian Gulf in all of its sparkling glory spread out before us.

  “Whoever it was has got some cojones, taking pot shots at a U.S. fighter.” Chris reached under the console and opened a cabinet, which held several headsets. “Lizzy, get one of these on Ahmed. Ivan, enhance the TFR.”

  Ivan pointed to a rectangle on the radar screen. “Something pretty big is out there—maybe a mile offshore.”

  Chris kept the helicopter hovering close to the ground. “Until we confirm a French submarine is out there.”

  I made my way back into the cargo hold. After that roller coaster air battle, the men were looking a little green around the gills. One of the French soldiers hung out of the crew chief’s window and pointed toward the ocean. He spoke so fast I could only make out a few words in French—but one of them was definitely submarine.

  I sat on the edge of the stretcher. “How are you feeling, Ahmed?”

  Still hazy from the morphine, he gave me a thumbs up.

  “Chris needs to talk to you.” I helped him adjust the headset.

  “Ahmed, are you hooked up?” Chris asked.

  “Yes, I am here.”

  “I need a call sign and coordinates.”

  “One moment.” Ahmed caught my hand. “Could you help me? Inside my shirt pocket there is a small notebook.”

  He shuffled pages and then handed me the pad.

  “FMN Suffren. 26.2285 degrees north, 50.5860 degrees east.” I repeated the coordinates and then slipped the notebook back inside his shirt. “Try not to get too excited—but your ride may be here.”

  Ahmed flashed a smile of relief, even joy. “Stay with me, please.”

  “Of course.” I checked his vitals while we waited.

  “U.S. Black Hawk calling FMN Suffren, acknowledge.” Nothing but radio static and a few modulations as Chris tried different frequencies. “U.S. Black Hawk calling FMN Suffren, attendez, sil vous plait.”

  “U.S. Black Hawk, this is Suffren, over.”

  Ahmed and I exchanged a look I will never forget. “Yes!” I whooped. “You’re going home!”

  “Stand by, FMN Suffren.” Chris answered. “I have Lieutenant Mahabub, and his team on board. Go ahead, Ahmed.”

  While the commando leader reported in, I prepared some of the z-interferon for travel. “Chris, if there’s a medic on board, I’ll need to speak to him.”

  I was quickly put in touch with their medical officer and explained Ahmed’s condition, as well as the z-interferon protocol. “For now, he is stable, and even though the drug regimen is experimental, we started the treatment very early. His prognosis is excellent.”

  Several of Ahmed’s men got him into the litter basket, and secured to the hoist cable. I mostly stood by and watched, listening absently to Chris help Ivan with the auto-hover. “The sea is fairly calm—but this automatic system will fail if the altimeter can’t read the surface. It will literally turn itself off. It takes a few seconds to reset—so don’t panic. Just keep her nice and steady until I reach the control panel beside the cargo door.

  Once we were hovering over the submarine, Chris left the cockpit and helped prepare the winch and the drop lines. Ahmed was the first to leave, strapped into the litter basket.

  “Tell the captain thanks for saving our asses.” Chris leaned closer for a bro handshake.

  Ahmed smiled. “So—we are even now.”

  I tucked a Styrofoam package under his good arm. “Hang onto this, your life as a human depends on it.”

  “Do you think we still have a home to go home to?” he asked.

  I avoided answering him. “Where is your home?”

  “In the south of France—near Carcassonne.”

  “The south of France is lovely. Al
l those fields of sunflowers and lavender.”

  “Where I come from there is a very large castle—a fairy castle with pointed roofs on the turrets.”

  “Like Disney World only real.” I sighed.

  His laugh was soft. “Au revoir, Lizzee.” My name sounded cute with a French accent.

  I squeezed his hand. “Bon voyage, Ahmed—be well.”

  We said our quick good-byes to the rest of his men. “Akam, Hamza, Abu Abdullah—go with God.” It was one of the few Arabic phrases I knew, and it was all I could manage as they dropped the high-lines onto the deck of the submarine.

  Oddly enough, or not so oddly, I was already missing them. I turned to Chris. “Could you hold me?” He pulled me into his arms, and held on tight. “Anytime, baby.” Strong, comforting arms rocked me for several wonderful seconds. “Put your smile on and wave good-bye.”

  Some of the commandos were already below surface, the few still on deck waved back. I wondered if good-byes in war were always this hurried, this lacking in sentiment.

  Chris pulled me over toward the open door, and I helped him secure the ropes and the litter before we returned to the cockpit.

  “Outstanding, Ivan.” Chris watched me buckle up. “You too, Lizzy—you okay?”

  I turned my thumb up.

  Chris didn’t smile all that much, but when he did, it was dazzling. “Then let’s blow this third world, zombie-infested hellhole.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  CHRIS BANKED THE helicopter and flew south, keeping the chopper close to the ground and off radar. I pictured a map of the Middle East and began in the north. Jordan, Israel, Lebanon and Syria—then Iran, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia, along with all the little oil-rich fiefdoms of the gulf coast. The line up went something like Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Oman, and if we swung west, toward the Gulf of Aiden, we’d reach Yemen, or what was once Yemen.

  I leaned over the center console in the cockpit. “Are you navigating with SAT NAV or is your fallback a sextant?”

  “As long as satellites keep whizzing around the planet, we’ll have slightly unreliable SAT NAV. But if we ever run out of power,”—he shot me one of his dare-you challenge smirks—“it wouldn’t hurt to brush up on your compass reading skills.”