Gnash

by Brian Parker

  “I don’t need to remind you, but I will anyways. We’ve got to be extremely vigilant right now. I want that city thoroughly searched fifty times; every room in every house on every block needs to be checked. Think Hurricane Katrina, but on an even grander scale. All it takes is for one of these things to escape our net and it can re-infect the entire population. Now that things are winding down in D.C. we need to pull a brigade or two out of the line and send them to Indianapolis to help the Brits.

  “Alright Pete, give me the update on D.C.,” the president said as he motioned towards the wall where the briefing slides would be projected.

  General Thompson pushed a button and a close up map of Washington, D.C. and the surrounding area appeared. He cleared his throat and took a sip of water. “Sir, as you can see, here’s the map of D.C. Since the major battle on the 21 when we were attacked by every damn zombie in D.C. it’s been pretty quiet.

  “We don’t know why they attacked along all fronts with the Type Twos and consolidated all the Type Ones in one location, but that was the last time any of them were seen. As you know, we had an SF team ambush and terminate a large group of about six hundred of them out at the National Harbor area. We landed an entire Marine Corps battalion to go in and clear the area, but all they found were bodies. Our Delta boys are good.”

  He was still adjusting to the elevation of Denver, so he took another sip of water and continued, “The Harbor was well away from any of the fighting, so we think the Type One’s were trying to use the mass attack to get away like they did in the Pentagon. They must have known it was the end for them, because all along the perimeter the regular Type Two’s attacked in wave after wave trying to break through, but our infantry boys held firm. Since then, we’ve had onesies and twosies here and there, but nothing even remotely appearing organized or massed. Right now we’re not even seeing the unorganized groups that formed in Indianapolis and our military has slowly moved forward and closed the ring tighter over the past several days. We’ve managed to completely clear and contract the perimeter by about four miles completely around. Right now, we’re stalled because of the radiation that gets more potent the closer to the city you go. Our regular military formations don’t have the specialized, long-term exposure gear that our special ops guys have.”

  “Wait a moment Pete,” the president interrupted. “I’ve been thinking about this for a while and I’ve spoken with several members of our scientific community who assure me that D.C. is going to be a wasteland for several hundred years.”

  “That’s true sir.”

  “Pete, have the military hold what we’ve got, we can’t do any more good in the large groups we’ve got and I don’t want us letting even one of these things slip through our quarantine.

  “Rob,” the president said as he turned to the Homeland Security Director, “Your next task is to build me a wall completely around the irradiated zone but inside whatever the military has cleared. I’m authorizing emergency funds. I want you to shore up the barriers that we already have in place around the region, then we’ll get appropriations from Congress for an actual wall.”

  “Sir, the size and scope, hell the cost, is astronomical…” Robert Griffith began.

  “I don’t want to hear it Rob. Yes, the cost is astronomical, but so is the chance that we have another outbreak or that people will accidentally wander into a nuclear contamination zone. With all the acid rain along the outskirts of the city, people will be forced to move to survive and I don’t want them accidently drifting into the contaminated zone, where possibly millions of zombies could be harbored.”

  The president looked at every member of his cabinet sitting around the table. “This is the right thing to do. Sure, it’s expensive, but,” he slammed his hand on the table with every word to accentuate his point, “It. Is. The. Right. Thing. To. Do.”

  The Director reddened, “Yes sir, we’ll begin right away.”

  “Don’t just begin it, like that damn Border Fence. Finish it. I want the entire DelMarVa area encircled and our citizens protected. Do you understand?”

  “Yes sir,” he nodded.

  “Then once we’re sure that the walls will keep people out and any remaining creatures in, we’ll move in and clear out the city,” the president continued. “I don’t care how we do it, but I want a proposal by Friday outlining the military’s best assessment for clearing the remaining creatures out of the city.

  “Alright, I saw on the news earlier that those damn gangs in L.A. have just about killed each other off completely. Now is the time to send in the California National Guard and police and take that city back. I want L.A. safe for its residents to move back in.”

  Pete Thompson nodded his agreement, “Roger sir. They’ve been chomping at the bit to go in and clean up the city. They’ve been training outside of the city for months whole they contained the violence from spreading, so we can send them on the offensive in only a few days.”

  “Great, I want them moving into the suburbs in two days. This has been a productive meeting ladies and gentlemen, thank you. Are there any alibis?” the president asked as he looked at each of his advisors.

  “Sir, I’ve got one footnote to add since it’s related to the events of April 15,” Rob Griffith said with an upraised hand. “Mike Winters was murdered at the Marion County Jail in Salem, Oregon this morning by another prisoner.”

  “What? How hell did that happen?” President Holmes asked.

  “While he was awaiting trial, he worked in the records division. During a prisoner transfer from another facility, he was there taking notes when one of the inmates recognized him as the man who’d killed the president. The man stabbed out both of his eyes with Winters’ pen before he was subdued. Winters went into shock and died before help could arrive.”

  “Hardly the public trial we expected in this case. Does the media know yet?”

  “They’ve agreed to sit on it until you can make an announcement, or until the 10 o’clock news, whichever comes first.”

  “Let them break the story, then we’ll have Ramón make our announcement during the daily press briefing tomorrow morning. This doesn’t leave the room, but I’m glad that the fucker’s dead. He sacrificed his morals, violated his oath and quite possibly helped set off this entire sequence of events. I would have preferred that we tried and sentenced him to death in federal court, but ultimately justice has been served.”

  The president smiled again, “Alright, let’s move forward. Agent Winters’ death helps to close out this negative chapter in our history. I appreciate your hard work and personal sacrifice during this period. I that know many of you lost loved ones, friends, colleagues, homes and your old way of life and you’ve been able to put your grief aside and do what your nation asked of you. We need to continue to encourage each other so we can then go out and hearten our nation. We will rebuild where we can and America will be stronger after this.”

  Again, the president looked around and stood up. He waited until all the chairs were done rattling as his cabinet members stood up with him and then said, “Thank you. You men and women are the strongest people I know. You were absolutely the right people at the right place and time. Now, let’s get back to work.”

  ***

  23 December, 1640 hrs local

  Donnelly Family Farm

  Ozona, Texas

  Grayson sat back from the computer monitor in shock. He reread the email one more time then unplugged the laptop and carried it into the next room. Jamie lay on the couch absently munching on a plate of strawberries while she watched a special Christmas edition of a sitcom on Grayson’s parents’ television. His mother Reba sat in her rocking chair knitting little socks for the baby, who was due in three months.

  “Hey babe, I’ve got something important to tell you,” he told his new wife. They’d gotten married a few days after they arrived in Ozona from the refugee camp in Indiana. As soon as they were able, Grayson had called his parents and let them know he was alright and bri
efly described what they’d been through in the city. His father, Doug, insisted that he and Jamie come to Texas to get their feet back under them until the government was able to provide the compensation package. Grayson posed the invitation to Jamie and she’d accepted right away. After Jessica died, she didn’t have any close relatives left alive, so she was excited to meet Grayson’s family.

  They’d stayed at the camp long enough to ensure that Bill and Carrie Downs made it out of the city and between the four of them, they spent an entire day with several of General Clarke’s operations staff passing along the tactics, techniques and procedures that they’d employed to stay alive in the city during the last six months. The Brits had been given the go ahead to clear the city and they wanted to know how best to deal with the zombies they would face on the ground before they went in. Grayson was impressed with the level of detail that the staff officers wanted. Clearly the British planned to rely on any intelligence they could gather, something that he’d not witnessed during his time in the Army. American servicemen tended to get as much information as possible, then disregard it and use brute force to maneuver forward and develop the situation. Both methods had their benefits, but he assumed the British method would be less costly in lives.

  He and Jamie had hugged their friends goodbye before the government shuttle took them to the airport. Everyone agreed to keep in touch, but Grayson had been around a while. They would be friends on the internet, maybe even send a few emails every once in a while, but for all practical purposes, they’d probably never see each other again.

  The little town of Ozona was about three hours away from the airport in San Antonio and they’d expected to have to rent a car to get there, but they were surprised by Grayson’s parents and younger sister when they arrived at the airport. After a brief introduction between Jamie and his family, his father had hugged him fiercely and the old Marine’s eyes teared up. They’d thought they really lost him this time. His mother and sister had practically mobbed poor Jamie with hugs and questions, then his sister, true to form, had embarrassed the hell out of him by announcing that she always thought Grayson was gay because he had never brought a girl home since high school.

  Grayson and Jamie were married by the JP[37] on December 1 and since then, time had passed pretty quickly. Grayson and Jamie both had to submit proof of life statements and fingerprints to their various financial institutions in order to prove that they were alive and not part of the estimated 14 million dead. Eventually, they’d satisfied their banks’ inquiries and been allowed access to their accounts, upon which Grayson discovered a large interest charge on his credit card account that had continued to grow while the account was in limbo. He’d called to get the charges reversed, but was flatly refused since he had, after all, not paid his last bill in full before the due date. God, he hated dealing with banks!

  Jamie was still in the process of dealing with the insurance company for the loss of her sister’s house but unfortunately, that would probably end up being a long-term fight since technically, the house survived the zombie infestation. Even though the city was still under quarantine, legally the insurance company wasn’t obligated to provide payment, yet. There were already survivor resources popping up on the internet and there appeared to be a strong lobby in Congress for individuals who’d lost their homes to force the insurance companies to pay the claims.

  In early December the government finally admitted publicly that there had been an outbreak in Indianapolis and that there were less than five thousand survivors. They assured the public that the city had been cleared out by our British allies and General Clarke became a minor celebrity overnight. The city was still quarantined for the foreseeable future though since there were so many bodies that needed to be incinerated and President Holmes wanted the city completely checked multiple times to ensure that there weren’t any zombies hiding somewhere that could end up causing another outbreak.

  The feds came through almost immediately for the survivors that had cleared the city through the Shelbyville refugee center. They’d each been provided with enough money to last for years if they were smart and since they hadn’t decided where they wanted to settle yet, neither Grayson nor Jamie had gotten a job. Their short term plan was to stay with Grayson’s parents until the baby was born in March, then begin looking for a new career and move to wherever that took them. Grayson assumed that he still had his Department of the Army civilian job, but he had little interest in returning to that lifestyle.

  Yesterday, he’d been thinking about the men and women who survived Indianapolis and all his friends in the military that he’d been to war with over the years. He wondered if he’d ever see them again and if they would actually end up keeping in touch like they promised. Those thoughts finally led him to a darker place, a place that he’d purposely locked away and thrown away the key after the nuclear detonation. He thought of Emory Perry and her death in Washington D.C. He’d kept himself from thinking about her while he fought to survive and strengthened his relationship with Jamie and his budding family, but now that there was time to reflect, his thoughts wandered to that dark place

  It hurt to think about her and he talked to Jamie about his feelings towards his former fiancé and her loss. Surprisingly, she wasn’t upset or mad. In fact, she’d actually encouraged him to open up and talk to her. It was very difficult for him in the beginning, but eventually, he was able to get his thoughts organized into words so the two of them could have a conversation. Jamie recommended that he go to the survivor website that the government had set up. Every little bit helped people to cope with grief, maybe by actually placing Emory’s name on the wall of those killed in the D.C. attack, it would help to ease the pain he’d held inside for so long.

  So they pulled out the laptop and together they searched through the site until they found the victim’s wall. Grayson was surprised to see his own name listed in the “D” section. Jamie said she’d email the administrator later and let them know that he was alive so they could remove his name, but today was all about helping Grayson to heal. He’d clicked on the button to submit a new name and entered Emory’s name, former address and estimated date of death.

  Now, he’d gotten a reply from the website and it wasn’t anything that he’d expected and his emotions warred within him. He was excited by the information in the message and yet he also dreaded the possibility that it was a mistake and that telling Jamie would upset her and cause some type of problem with the baby. She was so little anyways and her belly was huge, the doctors had allowed her to continue walking for fitness, but had restricted anything like the strenuous yoga exercises that they’d regularly practiced when they were at Three Pillars. This bombshell he was about to drop might actually end up doing her harm, but he knew that he couldn’t keep it from her.

  Jamie set down the strawberry she’d been preparing to eat and picked up the remote to turn off the television. “What is it honey?” she asked as she scooted up against the arm of the couch to make room for him near her feet.

  He set the laptop on the coffee table next to the bowl of strawberries and gently lifted her legs, sat down and placed them back on his thighs so he could massage her swollen feet. “Oh, this must be serious. You’re starting off with a foot rub,” she teased. Reba nodded and muttered something under her breath about men.

  “Well, I don’t know how to tell you, so I’m just gonna put it out there and see what you think. I got a reply from Gone, But Never Forgotten, you know, the memorial website that we posted Emory’s name to yesterday?” he said as he stared straight ahead and ground his thumb into the pad of her foot.

  “Oh, good. Did they post her name to the site?” Jamie asked.

  His mother stopped knitting and looked over to him. She still knew her son better than his new wife did and could tell that something wasn’t right. “What is it Dear?” she asked.

  “I got an email back from the administrator,” he said as he leaned forward to pick up the laptop. He scrolled d
own a little and began to read, “It says, ‘Who is this and why did you attempt to post my name to the memorial wall? I’m sorry that you’ve been mistaken about my death, but I assure you that I am not dead.’ It’s signed Emory Dawson with the name ‘Perry’ in parentheses.”

  “What!” Jamie said as she pulled her legs off of Grayson and put them on the floor with more effort than she’d meant to.

  “Hey, careful with the baby Honey,” he admonished.

  “Is that supposed to be some kind of sick joke, or do you think she’s actually still alive?” Jamie asked as she jabbed her finger towards the computer.

  “I don’t know. I mean it’s possible that she survived, but I can’t believe that it could be true. I mean she was at ground zero for a nuclear explosion and then the city, hell the entire region, was overrun by zombies. There’s no way she’s alive.”

  Jamie began to cry. “What are you going to do? I mean we just got married, I’m going to have the baby soon, I don’t want to lose you,” she pleaded.

  He reached over and pulled her to him. “What are you talking about? You’re not going to lose me. I’m going to reply to this email and figure out the truth about Emory, but that’s not what you’re talking about is it?” He didn’t give her a chance to respond before he said, “Listen, I love you. Even if she is alive, that isn’t going to change things between us. You and I were meant to find each other in that hellhole up in Indiana. You’re the mother of our child for Christ’s sake.” He glanced over at his mother and absently said, “Sorry,” as he remembered past transgressions and consequent slaps for taking the Lord’s name in vain in the presence of his very Baptist mother.