by David Spell
#
Chuck's house, Northeast of Atlanta, Sunday, 1330 hours
The sound of plates being scraped and water running came from the kitchen. Emily had cooked up a big pot of spaghetti and had directed Scotty in putting a salad together. When Eddie and Andy arrived at noon, they had all eaten, devouring the meal and not leaving any leftovers. Ice-cold beer made the spaghetti go down even better.
Marshall leaned over to Estrada as they ate and asked quietly, "Have you heard from Isabella?"
A cloud crossed Hollywood's face. "I called her Friday evening right before we left DC and left her a voice mail. She texted me later that night and said her flight back to New York had been diverted to Chicago. She's safe but she can't make contact with her family in Brooklyn."
Isabella Rodriguez was the flight attendant that Alejandro had met a few weeks earlier traveling from New York to Atlanta. A man had become infected in the air and Hollywood had been forced to kill the zombie with his knife to protect the rest of the passengers. Isabella and Hollywood had been on several dates, whenever they could coordinate their schedules.
"Thank God she's out of the city," Eddie said. "Hopefully, her family's safe, riding this thing out until we can kill all the zombies."
"Yeah, thanks for asking, Eddie."
After everyone had complimented Emily on a great meal, Chuck made sure everyone had a fresh beer before adjourning to his living room. After they got settled, Emily and Darnell went to work on the dishes.
Chuck raised his bottle. "The first order of business is to remember a fallen comrade."
A hush fell over the room. "Luis was one of the toughest guys I've ever known. He was a badass in every sense of the word. As a fighter, he beat up guys who were twice his size and he never ran from a fight. It was an honor to serve with him," McCain said, toasting their fallen friend.
"I never told you guys about the time Luis choked me out," Scotty said, looking around sheepishly.
"Oh, this is going to be good," Jimmy laughed, taking a drink.
Smith smiled a sad smile. "Yeah, after Chuck knocked me out, I began to focus more on my hand-to-hand skills. Chuck coached me a little and I was feeling pretty confident after a few months of training with him.
"One day, Luis and I were in the gym lifting and I said I'd like to roll with him. I knew he was a black belt and a really dangerous guy but I thought I could take him. I never had any jiu-jitsu training but I'd wrestled and the boss had been training me. Plus, I was like twice his size.
Scotty took a big swallow from his bottle. "So, we went over to the mats and I thought I'd just grab him and pin him. Easy. When I went for the grab, he caught me in a flying arm bar and almost hyper-extended my elbow. I was so embarrassed because he made me tap.
"I said, 'Come on, Luis, you got lucky. Let's go again. He shrugged and said, 'Ok, if that's what you want.' He was so fast. He swept my leg and when I tried to get up, he was on my back and sunk a rear naked choke. I thought I could muscle out of it but the next thing I knew, Luis was standing over me, slapping me in the face, trying to wake me up."
Everybody laughed at the story. "How did we not hear about this?" Eddie asked.
When Scotty looked around at his friends, they could see the tears pouring down his face. "That was one of the things that made him such a great guy. He didn't want to embarrass me so he never said anything."
Everyone wiped the tears from their eyes. Andy spoke up, his voice angry. "I want some payback," he said.
The other men nodded. Fleming had voiced what they were all feeling. McCain felt the same way but, for the moment, he had to keep them focused.
"Definitely," said Chuck. "Luis, the Blackhawk crew, all those police officers, they died in vain. That was some Washington stupidity. Hopefully, a few of the idiots responsible had an up close and personal with a zombie.
"For now, though, we have orders. We're going to be tasked with rescue operations. They're going to get us another helicopter, I hope, and we'll be working with local PDs and whatever feds are still functional to try and save some people in the city or wherever.
"We have until Tuesday to rest and heal up. We'll be getting some more specific orders then. Terrence Matthews is starting tomorrow, if he can get here from Douglasville. He's the SWAT officer who helped me and Luis when we had the big incident out at Six Flags. He called me last week and told me that his little sister was inside Sanford Stadium when all hell broke loose. He hasn't heard from her so you can imagine that he's ready to do his part.
"Tomorrow we'll go rent some vehicles and buy equipment for Terrence. If you guys need anything let me know and I'll buy it. We'll hit up Bass Pro Shops and Target Time gun store."
"I don't know about a new guy starting in the middle of all this." stated Jimmy, the surprise evident in his voice.
"Yeah, I know but we need him and he'll fit right in. He's a solid operator and is going to be a quick learner."
Everybody nodded or shrugged. It was always a different dynamic when someone new joined the team. But, they did need him and Chuck had seen him in action.
"Anything else?" Chuck asked.
Eddie spoke up. "Jimmy's going to come home with me. I've got an extra room and he said sleeping with Scotty was worse than fighting the zombies."
Everybody laughed. Andy spoke up. "I can take Chris. Plus, he and my son probably wear the same size clothes." More laughter. It was good to release some steam, Chuck thought.
"Ok. Everybody be here at 1000 hours tomorrow and we'll go spend some of the government's money."
#
Chuck's house, Northeast of Atlanta, Monday, 1100 hours
McCain's wounds still pulsed with pain and his head was still sore, but they had a lot to do today. Terrence had driven the back roads, avoiding the interstates and other areas where Zs had been spotted. It had taken him over four hours to get from the west side of Atlanta to Chuck's house at 1000 hours.
A federal district judge swore Terrence in over Skype as a CDC Enforcement Agent. He was a twenty-nine year old, muscular, African-American who was both nervous and excited. The week before, Terrence Matthews was a local police officer who served on the SWAT team. Now, he was a federal police officer, working for the CDC, being sworn in over the computer in his boss' living room.
Now McCain and his men sat around the kitchen table, sipping coffee and compiling a list of equipment that they needed. All of their supplies and extra weapons were locked up in their offices in the basement of the CDC headquarters downtown. With the city overrun by Zs, it made no sense trying to drive downtown until they absolutely had to. The first order of business was to rent vehicles. Andy had his computer in front of him, searching rental car companies.
Chuck's phone vibrated. The caller ID showed that it was Dr. Charles Martin, the Assistant Director of the Office of Public Health Preparedness and Response at the CDC. McCain pulled the company credit card out of his wallet and handed it to Andy.
"Go online and rent four big SUVs. Get all the extra insurance and I'll be right back."
McCain stepped out onto his deck and answered the phone. "Hello, Dr. Martin. How are you, sir?"
"Chuck, thanks for taking my call. I heard about Agent García. I'm very sorry. I heard some of your other officers were injured. I hope nothing serious?"
Dr. Martin knew of the arrangement and the backing that the CIA provided for the CDC enforcement agents. On paper, they reported to him but he understood that Admiral Williams was really the man to whom Chuck answered. It was no surprise that he was in the loop and knew about Luis' death. In the chaos of the combat on Friday and Saturday, Chuck had not even thought about calling him.
"Yes, sir. Thank you for that. No other serious injuries and I apologize for not calling and giving you an update. It was a crazy couple of days."
"Don't worry about that. Because of your quick notification on Friday of the new attacks we were able to evacuate headquarters without any casualties. But, we may have lost a couple of
people."
"What happened?" asked McCain.
"Do you know Dr. Nicole Edwards? She is one of our top epidemiologists."
"Isn't she the one who's heading up the team which has been trying to develop a vaccine?"
"That's her. She and her team did develop that solution that kills the virus on contact but they haven't made much progress with a vaccine. Anyway, she's missing, along with one of her lab assistants, and one of the security supervisors, Darrell Parker. I got a call yesterday from Nicole's boss, Dr. Patel. Her family hasn't seen or heard from her since Friday. Same story on the lab assistant.
"They were logged into the computer system and appeared to be working late Friday night/Saturday morning when all hell broke loose. We gave the evacuation order and had security check the building to make sure everyone was gone but now it looks like they may still be inside. Darrell was working at that time, as well, and his family hasn't seen him. They got a call from him about 1:00am Saturday morning saying they were evacuating and that he'd be leaving as soon as he could, but it doesn't look like he ever left the building.
"I spoke to the Director of Security and he had his people remotely view the security camera footage. There was no sign of our missing people but there were a lot of infected people wandering around the outside of the building and even into the lobby. There are some gaps in the video because it looks like there was a power outage in the area to go along with everything else."
Chuck sighed. "And you heard about this on Saturday?"
"I did," Martin answered. "Look, I heard about what you guys were involved in. I knew you'd lost Luis and had several agents injured. I actually spoke to our mutual friend in Washington and he recommended trying to find someone else who could help us since you guys had been kind of beat up. Atlanta Police said they were going to send some of their people over there but it hasn't happened yet. The FBI took a number of casualties on Saturday and said 'no.' I've called the Atlanta offices for the Federal Marshals, the DEA, the ATF. They're cops, for crying out loud! They've all said that they're very sorry but they're focusing their assets in other locations."
McCain did not say anything as his mind was already spinning into action.
"I'm sorry, Chuck. If you can't do anything, I understand. This is the worst crisis that I've ever dealt with. I just hate the idea of some of our people trapped downtown."
"We'll handle it, sir. I'll get right to work. It may take us a few hours to develop a plan and get mobilized, but we'll do everything we can to find them."
"Are you sure? Thank you so much," Martin said, the relief evident in his voice.
#
East of Atlanta, Monday, 1500 hours
There were no air assets available, so that drive into the city was happening now. Andy rented four Nissan Armadas which were delivered to Chuck's house within the hour. Chris pulled up Google maps on McCain's smart TV so the team could look at different routes to their headquarters in Atlanta.
Chuck told Andy and Jimmy that they could sit this one out. They had been busted up pretty good in the explosion just two days before and Jimmy had been shot the day before that. The two warriors just laughed at him.
"Come on, boss," said Jimmy, smiling broadly. "Me and Andy are Marines. Jarheads. Devil Dogs. I've had worse training injuries than this. I survived Paris Island, Iraq, and a bunch of zombie terrorists. We're good to go."
Andy nodded. "I think you're going to need every available gun on this one, Chuck." He nodded at Terrence. "Even the rookie gets thrown into the deep end today."
Traffic was surprisingly sparse. People had already fled or were holed up in their homes. The four big SUVs stayed off the interstate, using Georgia Highway 29 to get them close to their destination. They didn't see any infected for most of the trip south.
Chuck had decided to take all four of their newly rented vehicles. His reasoning was three-fold. They had no idea what they were going to run into and he would rather have too many vehicles than not enough if one or more of them got disabled. Second, he was planning on rescuing three people but there was always the possibility they might encounter others who needed help. And, third, he intended to gather as much of their equipment, weapons, computers, and gear as they could from their offices.
Thankfully, Terrence had some basic equipment. He'd had to purchase most of his gear when he had joined his former police department's SWAT team. He was wearing black BDUs, body armor, and web gear. He had a 9mm Beretta 92F in a tactical thigh holster. For this operation, Chuck had loaned him one of his own personal rifles, a Colt AR-15 Sporter with a collapsible stock.
After driving for an hour, McCain pulled into the parking lot of a big Baptist Church in the little town of Tucker. They were about two miles outside of the perimeter, I-285. The area looked clear and the parking lot was large enough for the men to see anything approaching them. The Nissans lined up and Chuck put Chris, Hollywood, and Terrence on first watch, scanning the area for threats.
Andy pulled out a laptop and set it up on the hood of his Armada. In minutes, they were watching a real-time feed from a drone flying over the area they were going into. At first, everything looked peaceful from thousands of feet in the air. As Fleming zoomed in, however, they saw figures moving all around the CDC headquarters and the surrounding area on Clifton Road. The roadways in the area were full of cars but none of them were moving. Zombies gathered around a few of them, looking inside or slapping the windows.
For several minutes, they watched the Zs walking out in the middle of the street or down the sidewalk. Occasionally, one or two would stop in front of one of the nearby businesses.
"Look at that," Eddie said, pointing at the screen.
They saw several figures shuffling out the front entrance of the CDC. Two others passed them, walking inside.
"How'd they get in? The front gate should be closed. They act like they own the place," said Jimmy.
"I guess they do now," said Chuck.
A fence surrounded the CDC compound which took up close to a city block. The front entrance was protected by an electric metal gate. Normally, security had to let visitors in. The rear driveway led to the employee parking decks. CDC employees could swipe their ID cards to gain entry. Both entrances were standing opening and the infected were wandering around the buildings.
"What about the parking decks, Andy? If we can get in there undetected, we can slip in the back door, do our thing, and then get back out."
"I'll zoom in on the rear and we can take a look," said Andy.
"I like your optimism, boss," said Scotty with a smile and then a laugh. "I think this is going to be a lot of fun. It kind of feels like an Iraq mission, riding dirty in a convoy, looking for the bad guys."
Terrence stared at the large, bearded man. His face looked like he had been dragged behind a car. There were stains on his black uniform that looked a lot like blood. The last time he had seen Scotty and Andy was that day a couple of months before when they had stopped a van load of terrorists on the interstate west of Atlanta in his jurisdiction. The two CDC agents had gotten into a shootout with the terrorists and both officers were wounded. Scotty had still managed to wreck and disable the suspect's van against the median wall. Fleming and Smith had then taken down the bad guys before seeking medical help for themselves.
Smith saw Matthews looking at him. The big man winked at the new officer. "Good times, huh?"
Terrence could not help but smile. "Sure, man. Good times."
Scotty slapped him on the shoulder, almost knocking him over. "You're going to love working with us."
"Well, good news and bad news," said Fleming. "The bad news is that there are Zs in the back, too. The good news is that there aren't many, at least that we can see. There might be some inside the parking deck that we can't see. That's probably our best bet. Any way we go, we're going to be in contact."
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Back into the Belly of the Beast
Security office, CDC HQ, Monday, 1500 h
ours
Dr. Nicole Edwards was beyond scared. In the dark office, however, she had prayed for the first time in years and made peace with God. Nicole had accepted the fact that she was going to die in this small, windowless room.
The last few days had been a blur. Friday night, she and her lab assistant, Salman Kumar, were working late again. She was pushing her team and herself to find a vaccine for the bio-terror virus.
They had been so engrossed in their experiments that they had not even heard about the explosions a few miles away. As her team started trickling out of their lab for home by 6:00pm, one of her epidemiologists called Nicole and told her about the chaos that was taking place in Atlanta, Washington, and New York. She said that traffic was a nightmare as people were taking surface streets instead of the interstate, hoping to avoid the chaos near downtown Atlanta.
Edwards and Kumar decided to keep working, but they did turn on the television that hung on the lab's wall, to monitor what was happening. Edwards felt like they were finally making progress on a vaccine. It appeared that they had found a compound that seemed to slow down infection times in their lab mice. In some cases, the mice were not turning into zombies for several hours as opposed to the minutes that it had been. It wasn't much but it was a start.
She and Salman kept getting distracted by what they were seeing on television. The video from the news helicopters and from reporters who had managed to get into the area, as well as from citizens shooting video on their phones, was terrifying. This was worse than anything she had ever seen. What was it going to take to contain this attack?
By 10:00pm, the two scientists finally gave up trying to work and went to the break room down the hall. Many of the third shift workers were glued to the TV there, also watching events unfold. Nicole had a sudden realization that Chuck McCain and the other CDC officers were out there somewhere, trying to help wherever they could.