by H. L. Murphy
On the bright side, I managed to duck behind a toolbox before the pressurized bottle exploded. On the other side of that is the fact the explosion drove the tool box into me hard enough to fling me back ten feet. My reconnection with the non skid flooring went as well as before, which meant I was now bleeding from my left thigh and my back. Not to mention my clothes were shredded. Yay! More wasted clothes. If I lived long enough, I was just going to be standing around in a pair of boots, a snazzy tactical vest, and my fucking smile.
I wanted to stay right where I was. Just wait right there until hell froze over. Everything hurt, I was exhausted, and I was tired of running. I'd been running since this whole mess started and I was tired of it. Which is why I got up off my sorry ass. If I quit then, gave up, I'd quit forever after. My family would never be safe. I'd never see my Lizzy, or my Hermione, again.
And that, you bunker dwelling mouth breathers, simply would not do.
As I staggered by the smoking, twitching body of Eric Linner I fired a pair of seven point six two millimeter rounds into his chest. Overkill? Have you been paying attention? I should have decapitated the asshole just to make sure, but I didn't have the time. Stumbling through the outer hatch, I just spotted the fleeing sailors going over the side. Moving as quickly as possible, I shambled across the deck less like a zombie and more along the lines of the classic Mummy. Still, I made progress. More because I feared being left behind than any sudden surge of energy or repair of body. I reached the gunwale in time to see James lever Carroll out of the captains chair.
I was just making my own way over the side when one hundred seventy odd pounds of one-eyed asshole slammed into me. I don't know how far the drop from the deck of the ship to the deck of our cabin cruiser was, but I can report the fall time was two seconds short of forever. Not only did I have an eternity in which to fully comprehend my approaching impact, I had time enough to dread the coming agony.
Looking back it's difficult to say which sensation dominated my world, the blinding agony of sudden deceleration against an unyielding surface or the brilliant joy filling me over not blacking out. At that moment, though, I couldn't understand why I was so happy to have not blacked out. A combination of the impact with the deck and the pain filling every corner of my existence neatly shoved all other thoughts out of my head. In fact, were it not for the one hundred seventy odd pounds of asshole laid out across me I might have refused to move until hell froze over.
However, there was the somewhat pressing matter of a body atop mine, and not in a fun, happy way. Pushing and shoving my way through the pain, I rolled the body off me. The body of a man came into view, short hair framed a scarred face adorned with a black eye patch over thin, cruel lips. A sense of recognition reared its head, and I fought to focus my stunned mind on that feeling. I knew this black clad commando wannabe. Was he a friend? It seemed like I'd been doing a lot of rescuing lately, so maybe I'd rescued him too. There was something in that thought, but it didn't quite fit. I'd rescued someone, just not this one-eyed sack of dicks. Well, that's interesting. I automatically assume this guy is a bag of dicks. Why? The rescue. I rescued someone from this bag of dicks…and his sick bastard buddies. El Rapo, the literature aficionado.
In a rush my short term memory kicked back in and launched badly thrown punch at Linner’s face. Without much behind it the punch seemed to do more good than harm because Linner came to in a flash. Reflecting my poor judgement he snapped out a fast left, which grazed my cheek. It stung, but that was all. Instead of repeating the futile attack I switched tactics and swarmed to my feet. On the way up I took another hit to the face, and a glancing blow to the knee. Neither did much more than annoy me, and I proceeded to stomp a booted foot on Linner’s right hand. He screamed, but instead of collapsing the mercenary flipped onto his back in order to launch a kick to my knees. Proving once more I was just a hair faster, I managed to shift my stance just enough to take the kick on my shins. Down I went. Linner swarmed on top of me, one hand grasping for my throats while the other yanked a nightmare of a knife from his belt.
I ignored the hand going for my throat in order to catch the descending blade. One might have thought one contest between the lighter, smaller Linner and myself would be a foregone conclusion. One would be fucking wrong. The wiry little bastard had leverage and an insane need to end me working double time while I was on my back on a rain slicked deck unable to strike back with any serious strength. About the best thing going for my was my grip on Linner’s knife hand. The phrase ‘vise like’ springs to mind, though I felt the wording lacked the ability to convey the nearly demonic power of my hold. Which left my other hand free to punch, rake, and claw at Linner's face and throat. Still, steely fingers gripped my neck in an attempt to crush my larynx and end the fight. A stalemate with no end in sight unless…
Shifting my weight slightly, I stopped hitting the mercenary and instead took hold of his upper arm. Then, I lifted my left leg into the air high enough to wrap around Linner's head. Roaring with the effort I drove his head back, slamming it into the deck. The impact rang his bell enough Linner released his grasp on the knife which bounced away over the side.
Regaining my feet was next to impossible, James had cast off from the ship and our boat was under its own power which made my footing even more treacherous. Giving up standing I stayed on my knees and pulled my karambit. I considered pulling the long slim dagger, great for thrusts, it gave it up the second the boat hit a rolling swell and I had to cling to a cleat to prevent falling into the ocean. Across the deck, Linner was clinging to a cleat of his own with more or less success. I was struggling back to my knees when Linner, nimble little shit he was, sprung to his feet and threw himself at me, another goddamn knife from Hell’s imagination leading the way. The goddamned thing was two pronged with wickedly curved and serrated edges I imagined would hurt like hell going in, and worse coming out. Rather than find out first hand, I swept my knife hand in a short circular motion. My karambit caught the blade and I parried the strike aside, which left me open for the kick I never saw coming.
As roundhouse attacks go the roundhouse kick is perhaps one of the most effective if it can be delivered with full force. Linner's form was text book perfect, but his footing gave way on the slick deck. That was, hands down, the only reason I wasn't driven off the deck into the roiling ocean.
It still hurt like hell.
Linner and I raced to the deck again, this time without benefit of cushion on his part and without the additional impact trauma of a bag of dicks landing on me. A wicked grin, the kind I imagined he wore while picking out sonnets to carve into people's backs, plastered itself across Linner's face. Since I didn't like what it implied I punched the asshole in the face, square on the nose, and followed it up with a second strike, this time with the steel ring of the karambit. Blood exploded from the mercenary’s nose. Not anywhere near out of the fight, Linner swept his blade out at me. It was a wild swing, not really aimed at anything in particular, but it served to back me up.
I hate knife fighting. It's possible I've mentioned this before. No one wins a knife fight. There are only people less fucked up than others. This reminder is my way of explaining the following bloody exchange. Eric Linner and I cut on one another in a deadly fast flurry of steel and muscle. The one-eyed bastard was wicked fast, but his lack of depth perception was beginning to show. The bloody cuts that appeared as if by magic were shallow, lacking in follow through, while my hits, while fewer in number, dug in. In thirty seconds, the two of us had reduced the other to a bleeding mass of mutilated flesh with the edge going to me.
Give the bastard his due, he was tough as a coffin nail, but I wanted to see Lizzy and Hermione again so I was an unstoppable killing machine immune to pain. At least, that's what I told myself. Truth was, I couldn't register a single point on my body not steeped in agony. In an impossibly short time the both of us would heal completely, and this tussle would begin again. Fading behind us, power chords from the Rump Ranger guit
ar solo hung on the air, filling the space between us. At the crescendo I rushed Linner, who apparently had the same plan because we met sooner than either of us anticipated. Blades flashed, sparks flew, blood fell, and a single shocked scream of pain cancelled out the fading power chords.
I staggered back from Linner, my hand clamped over a wicked gash on my leg. My eyes found the hilt of my dagger, protruding from Linner's chest. Rain washed the blood from the weapon as quickly as it could leak from the mercenary’s heart. It had been a hell of a chance to take, dropping my guard hand to snatch the blade free at the last possible moment.
Linner staggered, slapped ineffectually at the hilt, his body already failing him. Fear and confusion warred for dominance in what passed for his soul, I could feel his emotions hammer at my mind. The connection provided by the virus had been nothing but a problem for me, up to this point. Focusing my hate and anger into a weapon, and tempering it into something lethal with my will, I drove forth into Linner's twisted mind.
I saw things there. Things that haunt me. Things that terrify me. Whatever he was now, Linner had once been a truly brave man. A brave man who hurled himself against dark things which have no name and no place in the world of man. My world, already a waking nightmare, just became infinitely more horrifying.
At the center of Linner's mind, the center of his consciousness, I struck my blow. I shattered his conscious mind with the spear of my hatred, my fear, and my anger. The scream I heard was not a physical one, his lungs weren't working anymore, but a psychic one. It filled the connection we shared, it became the whole of our existence, and was gone. In my own mind again, I watched as Linner's knees buckled and he fell into the ocean. Gone, forever. Even if his body survived, Eric Linner no longer existed. His form would be cursed to wander the face of the world, without thought or meaning. Forever.
In the darkness, at the edge of the horizon, a presence touched my mind. The touch was the red of blind rage; tempered by purpose and I knew Zombie Green was still extant. And now he knew I was as well. I think that knowledge pleased him.
I was so focused on my nemesis, I almost didn't sense the silken caress which attempted to slide past my defenses. One thing the Zombie Apocalypse had taught me, however, was to never focus so thoroughly one thing that you missed everything else. This touch I knew as well, and I wanted nothing to do with either. With the last of my strength, I closed my mind against the connection.
Strong hands caught me as I fell to the deck, pulling me beneath the protection of the cabin. Blood loss finally caught up to me. I lay unmoving, fighting down a rising gorge. Someone shoved a protein bar into my mouth, and I chewed weakly. Yet the more I chewed, the better I felt, so I applied my flagging attention to the task at hand. Five minutes later I could sit up without vomiting my lungs out. Progress.
When we spotted the Churchill, I was standing again. Ready to continue the fight. Just in case, though, I ate another protein bar.
Now all I had to do was convince Farrah Fuckwit to give up the location of the supplies and find the missing engine parts. Though given the state of the weather, maybe the engine parts should come first. Then maybe I could negotiate the supplies in exchange for a one handed couch dweller.
Interlude Eight
The Green Room
Dane Kincaid came awake not slowly, but all at once. Surviving in the Quarantine Zone had ingrained the ability to wake instantly regardless of how much or how little sleep he'd gotten. After all, sleepy time Tommy got eaten alive while bright and early Bobby slew bodies and got bitches. Glancing around, Dane found himself safely tucked into a comfortable hospital bed in a room devoid of either undead or bitches. Laying back and taking stock of the innumerable aches and pains reporting themselves, Dane was glad for the lack of company. He doubted he'd have been able to deal with either.
Fuzzy memories began to move into focus, allowing him to relive the desperate escape attempt. They had been so close to making it out. So close. If not for the titan, Gaunt and he would have made it. No. That wasn't quite right. It wasn't the titan that landed him in bed.
Then it came back. A helicopter, no, not just any helicopter, but the helicopter. The AH-99 prototype supposedly in the middle of flight testing before the world fell apart. It had been flying, and it had been dropping ordinance like the day of judgement. Did that mean the military decided to take back the Quarantine Zone? Good news for survivors if they had.
Dane glanced around again, this time looking for any indication as to whether Gaunt had made it or not. It would suck to lose his friend after everything they'd been through.
Nothing. Not a scrap of his clothes, weapons, or gear. The room was sterile in an almost military fashion, which started him thinking. Had the military gone to the trouble to recover him and Gaunt? Why? What possible use could either of them be? No, scratch that. Dane knew the military first hand. There were always shit jobs that needed doing with a distinct lack of volunteers.
“Hey,” Dane croaked out. While the collected deserts of the world had not been deposited in his throat, Dane certainly couldn't tell the difference. “Hey. Look, thanks for…saving me, but…I don't want to join back up.”
Silence.
Dane searched for a call button, but came up empty.
“Great,” he croaked. “How am I supposed to let anyone know I'm awake?”
The door swung open without making a sound and a tall, older man with stark white hair walked in. Where Dane had expected fatigues, this man wore grey slacks, a white button down shirt, blue striped tie, black wingtip shoes, and a clean, pressed lab coat.
“Not to worry, Mr. Kincaid,” the smiling man said. “We've been monitoring your vitals closely. Your injuries were extensive, and the medics who found you weren't sure you'd make it.”
“Gaunt,” Dane managed to wheeze out his friend's name.
“Oh, don't worry,” the man reassured Dane. “Mr. Gaunt is still among the living though not in much better condition than you. Air to ground missile ordinance does tend to make quite the mess of flesh and bone. Now, I'm going to check you out. Standard stuff really, but important for our records. After that I imagine you could use some water?”
“Give me a glass of water and I'll fucking kiss you,” Dane gushed.
“Well, maybe we'll skip the second part,” the man laughed as he examined Dane's cuts and bruises. Out came a stethoscope. Instructions on breathing. Soft, warm hands caressed his throat, searching for swelling. All in all, the check up took about five minutes. After which, a nurse came in with a plastic cup and a carafe of ice water. Two cups of ice water later, Dane began to feel normal again.
“Thanks for saving us,” Dane offered. “Never should have gone in there.”
“Try not to concentrate on the negative,” the doctor suggested. “Best to remain positive during recovery.”
“Okay,” Dane said, then realized he didn't know the man's name. “Say, what do I call you?”
“I'm Doctor White,” the doctor said, smiling in what he knew was a reassuring way. “Now, you need to rest. We went through the entire surgeons arsenal saving you and then tried a couple experimental procedures to keep you alive. It may not have been ethical to do so without your consent, but on the other hand you're still here so maybe it was the right thing to do after all.”
“No complaints here,” Dane said. “If you see Gaunt, can you let him know I'm okay?”
“Of course, Mr. Kincaid,” Dr. White beamed. “Now get some rest. There's a lot of work ahead of us.”
Doctor White stepped out the room still smiling though it dropped away within five steps. Subject A was demonstrating remarkable progress incorporating Strain Two-Seven-Two-B. That was good, better than they had any right to expect.
Subject B, however, was another story entirely.
Heightened aggression, increased strength, near complete command refusal, and, worse, genetic aberrations had begun to manifest. So far it seemed limited to fresh growth centered on the canines. So much s
o the subject’s canines, upper and lower, could more accurately be termed fangs. Although the subject was admitted with a shaved scalp since the introduction of Strain Two-Seven-Two-B the subject's hair has grown to a length of twenty centimeters.
Drawing a deep breath, Dr. White stepped into the subject's room. As always, Subject B lay in restraints upon his bed. He thrashed violently the moment he later eyes upon the doctor. White smiled, a cruel thing without warmth or kindness. Subject B may end up a failure, but even failures teach one a great deal.
“Nurse,” Dr. White called over his shoulder. “Have Subject B taken to the Green Room. I think we'll try Level One indoctrination again.”
“Of course, doctor,” the nurse acknowledged.
Perhaps this time the programming would take. Strain Two-Seven-Two-B, originally obtained from the Black Forest in Germany in nineteen eighteen, could prove to be the weapon they needed to counter the undead sweeping across the globe, but not if the damned subject continued to reject the indoctrination programming. A mindless killing machine was worse than useless, it would turn on his comrades just as swiftly as the true enemy. If only the KnightStar council had listened to him sooner. As things stood, Dr. White was rushing through research which should have taken decades and hoping for the best. Well, hope was not a plan nor a course of action nor a viable strategy by which one saved the human race.
To add to his misery, Dr. White had watched as Agent Linner had apparently died at the hands of his target. It wasn't the loss of the asset which disturbed the good doctor. No, it was being forced to stand by and do nothing as the target slipped away, again. Worse, the target had sailed away from shore, into an approaching hurricane.
Dear God, a hurricane. And not just any hurricane would serve to further complicate the doctor’s life, oh, no, it had to be a category four hurricane about to grow to a category five. Reports indicated this storm would be a city killer. Not that it much mattered to the residents of the Quarantine Zone, seeing as most of them were now undead.