by H. L. Murphy
“Can you make contact?”
“Oh, most assuredly,” the Armorer smiled. “An event of this nature would hardly impact Raskolov’s daily life.”
“Then do so,” White nodded. “We will take his counsel under advisement. Until he arrives, what do you suggest?”
The Armorer smiled darkly.
“Leave the asset in play,” he said, “and I'll make some popcorn.”
Chapter Eighteen
Is it piracy if everybody’s dead?
Quite possibly the single most butt mud inducing situation I could have found myself in was unraveling before me. I was in the middle of a severe thunderstorm while traveling the briny deep in a tiny boat being tossed from towering swell to towering swell. If events ran true to form, if I were caste into the Atlantic I would eventually drown, but I wouldn't die no matter how long I visited the ocean floor. On the other hand, I could take an involuntary swim and end up the guest star of a feeding frenzy featuring the local shark population.
At the helm, James was laughing like a gambling addict given an unlimited line of credit in Vegas. For some unfathomable reason James was having a grand old time, probably had something to do with the tea drinking. Goddamn unnatural brews in direct contravention of nature and moral decency. It must twist the executive reasoning process into viewing storm tossed seas as the newest fucking attraction at the local amusement park. To be entirely honest, I might enjoy this more if so much didn't ride on getting back to the Churchill. And if my goddamn stomach would settle down.
Wait, it wasn't sea sickness making me double over. I hadn't eaten almost the entire day. The much hated protein bar made its appearance as I stepped up next to James. Few things are as challenging as eating a protein bar while fighting not to vomit as your pitifully tiny boat gets chucked around by an uncaring ocean as your best friend decides to reenact his favorite scenes from every film ever made involving sailing troubled waters.
“Hey, Captain Ahab,” I yelled over his continual giggling. “I think the whale got away. Maybe you can ease up a bit.”
“Pussy,” came James’ reply. “How can you not love this?”
“Because of how much water is beneath our fucking keel,” I shouted. “How far is it to the ocean floor?”
“Here?”
“No, not here,” I sneered, sarcasm gushing forth. “Over the Marianas Trench, you asshole.”
“Are you scared?” James asked, sliding the figurative knife between my ribs. “Big, bad Angus Finnegan is afraid of a little water beneath his feet?”
“I swear to god I will make Melinda a fucking widow if you don't shut up,” I spat, clutching at the console as the boat suddenly rose almost vertically into air. My insides all attempted an immediate escape through my sphincter even as our descent began.
“Oh, yeah,” James shouted gleefully. “Bring it on, you cold hearted bitch.”
“Please stop smack talking the ocean,” I said. “I realize I'm anthropomorphizing a non entity into a living breathing, thinking, hating thing, but that doesn't change the fact you are tempting fate, that clapped out whore, and pushing our fucking luck, that cock guzzling thunder cunt.”
“Stop working yourself up,” James said. “I am genuinely surprised you don't have an ulcer by now.”
I was about to explain the probability concerning an extant ulcer when we both spotted the shape looming up out of the darkness. It was enormous, several times the overall size of our launch, and it was moving fast towards us. Or, we were moving fast towards it, I couldn't really tell.
“Shit, get a light on whatever that is,” James barked, and since this very much appeared to be his show I hopped to. Thankfully the launch was equipped with emergency spotlights, complete with idiot proof diagrams on usage. Pitch black turned to less obscuring darkness as I turned the spotlight on a ship, drifting shoreward. I was just guessing at the time, but spotting the enormous, relatively speaking, cannon attached to the deck lead me to believe we were seeing a member of the blockading force. Of course, if that were so why were the lights out and where were the crewmen at? “What do you see?”
“U.S. naval vessel,” I shouted into the cabin. “I think she's adrift.”
Just killing the nautical expressions.
“I have an idea,” James said, and before I could express my disbelief he'd spun the launch about and aimed it at the drifting ship. No, I didn't go over the side. My protein bar, and quite a bit of stomach bile, did. “Oh, yeah, hold on.”
“Mother fu…” I began but vomited again as the launch bumped up against the gray steel hull. A thousand separate fates of doom and dread lit my brain up as I felt the hull of the launch slide, grind, against the naval ship. Not a single potential outcome was anything other than bad, truly terrible, or cataclysmic.
“There,” James shouted. “Tie the bowline to the aft deck.”
“Bowline? Aft deck? Sure thing Captain Stubing,” I yelled over the storm. “Oh, hey! Do you think there will dancing after dinner? Cause that Julie McCoy is hot number and I hear she can tango up your flagpole while you're still standing.”
“Quit your bitching,” James said, then added, “and your ass has no chance with Julie McCoy. With a personality like yours, somewhere south of Honey Badger, you couldn't get laid on the Love Boat if it were hosting a prostitute convention, and they were handing out free pussy samples.”
Wow, that was harsh. Had I not been occupied with tying up the launch without falling into the heaving swells, I might have been more offended. As it was, my clothes were soaked, the deck was slippery as hell, and…I was entirely too terrified of drowning at sea to be clever.
“Now what, Captain Bly?” I shouted.
“Lets go aboard and pillage this bitch for whatever we can get,” James suggested. “Surprised you didn't think of this.”
“I didn't think of it because we're in the middle of a goddamn thunderstorm at sea,” I yelled.
“What's life without a little risk?” James smiled, and then I got it. My prick of a best friend was yanking my chain in return for all the crazy I've dropped in his lap over the past few weeks. Ah, what the hell.
“Alright, lets illegally board a United States vessel,” I said. “I'm sure the arbiters of martial law will hand out danish and coffee instead of double ought buck and streams of nine millimeter rounds.”
“Five bucks says danish hasn't ever crossed these decks,” James returns, a shit-eating grin plastered on his mug.
“You have an unnatural hatred of danish,” I said before making my way up the side. You may ask how a lowly zombie killing quasi immortal asshole like me managed to board a United States Naval vessel, and I would answer by citing the unsecured line flapping in the wind. My father, my uncles, and more than a few friends have served in the Navy so I'm aware of the emphasis placed on ‘squaring shit away’. Unsecured anything on a vessel underway has long been considered by the Navy as a sin only slightly less heinous than sodomizing a nun in the confessional. This state of affairs, therefore, did not fill me with confidence as to the condition of the crew or vessel.
The deck of the ship was covered in all manner of debris, all of which had seen much better days. Including a few bodies wedged against bullet riddled crates. Thankfully, though, no one stood at the ready, weapons pointed at my ugly mug. Hey, what do you know? Something’s actually going my way for a change.
Muffled gunfire reached my ears, through an open hatchway. Absolutely nailing the nautical terms. I glanced at the foredeck, then back over the side to where James was hauling himself up. Watching my friend struggle up I decided if we made it back to the Churchill I was instigating regular calisthenics for everybody. No fucking exceptions. Double for me. Jesus jumped up Christ, all those years back when I was thinking through my survival plans I never once considered how physically taxing just staying alive would be. Going into this we may have been Joe Average, but to get through this to a place of reasonable safety we needed to change into Billy Bad Ass in every way co
nceivable. In keeping with my resolution I knelt down and started sweeping the deck over the sights of my rifle. Behind me, James huffed and puffed his way over the gunwale. I tried not to laugh as he flopped onto the deck, mostly because I'd done the same thing a minute ago. Glass houses, stones, get it?
“This…was a…bad…idea,” James huffed before he rolled over and struggled to his feet. Like a trooper with balls of solid brass and the intestinal fortitude of the First Marine division James hauled himself to his feet and shouldered his rifle.
“You have no idea,” I said as I spotted one of the aforementioned bodies twitch and begin moving. As it stood up, I could see several bullet wounds stitched across the undead creatures torso. Worse, I recognized the uniform. The latest addition to the undead chorus line was styling in the universally hated naval pattern BDUs the sailors despised and Congress wouldn’t fork over the cash to replace. Somehow, some way the infection made its way to the blockading fleet and this floating delivery system of major whip ass was overrun. To say I was ambivalent over the suffering of my jailers would have been the understatement of the century. I doubt anyone alive could tally the number of innocent people killed by this ship. With entirely more pleasure than I should have felt, I put a steel jacketed round through the crewman’s head.
The report split through the fury of the storm, drawing out a few more of the undead crew. The moaning, shuffling undead walked out into the driving rain, which, I'd noticed, had picked up volume and force. Before I began the undead execution, I noticed some of the undead were sporting Russian style uniforms. Then James opened fire and events unfurled from there. Between the two of us the undead pricks fell in the approximation of good order, and I moved up to the open hatchway. As I passed each corpse, I dropped a round through the dead men’s skulls, just in case. Within the steel encased passage I switched from my rifle to trusty M1911a1, it being easier to maneuver in tight spaces. Moreover, once removed from the torrential downpour I realized how throughly soaked I'd become. Rain water penetrated every layer of clothing on my body, up to, and including my boots. Which I hate more than just about anything. The boots squelched with the shift of my weight and left watery prints as I moved down the passageway. Behind me, James sloshed into the sheltering passage.
“Can I offer a suggestion?” He said quietly, almost as if he was afraid to speak.
“What?” I asked, scanning the dark before me.
“Rain slickers, or heavily oiled trench coats,” James said.
“Wouldn't have done anything today but weighted you down even further,” I said, moving slowly forward. “I think we've skipped over thunderstorm and into hurricane.”
“Bite your fucking tongue,” James whispered.
“Where's your sense of adventure, Captain Ahab?” I sneered. “Thought you loved the rolling seas and driving rain.”
“Running up and down a few swells in a cabin cruiser is one thing,” James acknowledged, “but if the weather is going that bad on us, we need to get aboard the Churchill as soon as possible.”
“Can't argue with you there,” I said. “But you were right about this tub maybe having stuff we need.”
Ahead in the darkness I heard, but couldn't see, someone shuffling along. Looking over my shoulder, I spotted the greenish glow from James’ NVG and motioned in the direction I'd heard the movement. James scanned for the theoretical person for a few seconds before he began to back up rapidly, his rifle coming to his shoulder.
Goddamn it.
Out of the darkness came dozens of undead in a frenzied, roiling mass of grasping hands and gnashing teeth. The ragged scraps of uniform suggested a fairly even mix of American and Russian service members. Judging by the overall poor condition of the undead, no one had gone quietly into that good night, but had raged to the last against the dying of the light.
Yeah, I know. Hardly an original thought and I think I butchered the poem, but the sentiment fits. On the other hand, my high school English teachers would be blown away by the simple fact I could even recite that much. They would not be so amazed by my response to the approaching undead.
I opened fire.
In swift, but carefully aimed shots I took down enough of the front runners to cause the runner ups to trip and fall, slowing the advance of the mass. I turned to run, but spotted James hustling back towards me. At first I thought he'd rallied his courage and came to finish the job next to me. Then I spotted the first of many sprinting undead chasing James back from the exit.
We were cut off, and about to be crushed between two forces. Either the enemy had just lured us into a trap, terrifying idea, or we had been so stupid as to gift wrap ourselves for the undead, nearly as troubling a notion.
“This way,” I shouted over the thunderous report of my pistol. I pulled James down a side passage which led to a staircase, don't know the nautical term for stairs so staircase it is. Down the stairs we practically ran, sparing the absolute minimal attention to safety. At the bottom, I spun and fired twice at the lead zombie. The first shot clipped its left ear, sheering it from the creatures skull, but the second round slammed into its forehead, mushroomed out as the hollow point passed through its brain, and exploded out the back. The body collapsed at the head of the steps, then flopped onto the top stairs. Behind it the undead scrambled to clamber over their fallen comrade, more often than not falling on their asses and sliding across the metal steps preferred by sadists everywhere. You know the kind of stairs I mean. The steps are hydraulically stamped from a single flat of metal. Some asshole of an engineer took time off from fondling himself with thousand Island salad dressing to design these nightmare things. You see, the stamping process causes a gripping pattern to be imprinted. Sounds good you say? You've obviously never walked up or down these hellish things. They are intentionally designed to grip the sole of your shoes in such a fashion as to cause excessive wear and to cause the shoe to stick causing a fall and should your sole not hit square on the step it will slide off the step causing a tender part of your leg to scrape over the ridges. What these demonic things did to the zombie’s face shouldn't really be repeated, even here. Suffice to say, I shot the wriggling thing in the head and, amazingly, did less damage to its face than the stairs.
Without missing a beat, the growing mass of undead pressed forward onto the bodies of their fallen where they immediately proceeded to lose their footing and fall. Since I had no desire to be bottom man in that cluster fuck I hauled my sorry ass down the passageway and through a hatch, hooray for nautical terms. James came through a second after me and threw his weight into closing and sealing the hatch. I think genuine nautical people call it dogging the hatch, but I still know fuck all about sailing.
“Remind me I need to leave well enough alone,” James huffed as he stripped a spent magazine from his rifle, pulled a fresh one from his vest, and slapped it into place.
“You need to steal a fucking suppressor for that bitch,” I yelled over the ringing in my ears. Firing the forty-five in an enclosed steel box was bad enough, but James had to add to my hearing loss with the damned SCAR.
“Stop bitching,” James shouted. “It's no worse than riding in my Firebird blaring the new Metallica album.”
“That was fifteen fucking years ago,” I countered while I checked my own weapon. I holstered my pistol and shouldered my rifle. If James was intent on using the SCAR, I was going to go deaf no matter what steps I took to reduce the noise so I might as well pull out the artillery. “Goddamn things seem a little more coordinated than usual to you?”
“Yeah, I was hoping you’d point that nasty little fact out,” James snarled. “This situation wasn't nearly shitty enough just knowing these walkers are on the high side of zombie high school’s graduating class, what I really needed was for you to verbalize this nightmare.”
“Suck it, buttercup,” I spat, actually spat on the floor. “We need to press on. If these walkers can work a two pronged attack, then they can work out a flanking maneuver.”
; “Full of all kinds of good news, I see,” James quipped.
“Oh, it gets better, comrades,” a voice in the dark announced. “These undead mother fuckers set this ship on its course, then fucked up the controls.”
Complete butt mud inducing moment. In the darkness, beyond where I could see, was what I assumed to be a Russian voiced by James Earl Jones, if James Earl Jones had smoked two packs a day and had crushed granite rocks with his jaw for fun.
“You brought them back down here after Ivan worked so hard to draw them away,” the voice continued. If his voice was any indication I never wanted to see this guys face. Possibly for the good of all mankind this guy should just skulk in the shadows so his probably hideous face is never used to horrify the unwary. “So I think maybe you owe us, da? I think maybe you play bunny rabbit, da? Maybe you lead those mother fuckers away so we can leave this ghost ship, da?”
“No,” I said, and opened fire.
Chapter Nineteen
Foreign Relations
I squeezed the trigger as rapidly as possible while displacing into James hard enough to knock him sideways, sending him sprawling behind a set of large wooden crates. Good thing too since my unseen conversationalist fired a three round burst into my chest. Luck being a fickle bitch at the best of times showed her true colors by grouping all three shots into my left rib cage, directly in the unprotected area. White fire stitched across my ribs, with one line of pain sliding between my ribs and into the soft, squishy parts not designed for rough handling. I staggered from the hits, hunching over instinctively. This actually turned out to be a good thing since the next trio of shots cut through the space my head previously occupied. Not at all able to straighten up, I followed the downward convulsion into a dive for the relative protection of the crates.