by H. L. Murphy
Acknowledgements
To my dearest beloved, who has faith in me even when I do not.
Any similarities to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.
Fistful of Zombies
Invasion of the Dead Book Two
By H. L. Murphy
Copyright 2016
Prologue
Light, blinding and excruciating, pierced the darkness which had held Eric Linner it's unwilling prisoner for…how long? An hour, a day, a year? With all the sedatives running through his system Linner couldn't be sure. Worse, some useless twat of a nurse had strapped him in place, including his much abused head, making it impossible for the man to glance about.
Dried, cracked lips parted to bellow obscene retribution for the incandescent hell being plunged into his brain through his one remaining eye, but only the faintest of pained moans slipped out. Linner ran his tongue over his lips hoping to ease the desert of his mouth only to find his tongue as bereft of moisture as his lips. The part of his mind not given over to the madness induced by placing himself between humanity and the impossible for nearly a decade recognized his advanced state of dehydration. Survival lessons drilled into him over and over again attempted to launch a red flare of warning to Linner’s conscious mind. A certain level of dehydration was to be expected after surgery, but to be in so advanced a state meant he had gone unattended for some time. Not good.
“Do not attempt to move, Agent Linner. You have been restrained for your own protection,” a voice announced. It was cold, but professional. Simply stating facts with no inflection whatsoever. Generally ignoring the voice, Linner strained his remaining eye to focus on the source of the voice. Yet try as he might, the light was simply too bright and his eye too unaccustomed to coping with it. “I am going to change your I.V. bag, and take your vitals. Do not be alarmed.”
Hands ran over Linner’s arm, removing and replacing the needle,and a single hand clamped over his wrist. Revitalizing fluids rushed into Linner in palpable rushing rivers. Likely the bag contained some additional meds and joy juice. The hand disappeared and Linner heard the voice’s owner move across the room. He desperately wanted to shout, to scream, anything so long as the human presence would remain. Instinctually, Linner understood the entire mission had gone tits up which meant dramatically bad things had followed, and he needed facts, needed to get back on his feet.
“Agent Linner, I am going to insert a straw into your mouth. Sip gently,” the voice commanded. The plastic cylinder pushed past cracked lips to brush against a woolen tongue before Linner managed to seal his lips around it and, with an enormous effort, produce enough suction to taste water. Cool, blessed, life giving water. In all his life, nothing ever tasted so sweet as that minuscule sampling. Over the next ten minutes the voice instructed Linner how much and how often to sip from the straw.
Through the course of his career with KnightStar, Eric Linner had learned, whenever possible, to indulge himself. There was no way of knowing when the next crisis of global proportions would spring up, most probably killing the entirety of Raven Team. Better to live as without regret as possible and not die regretting all the things you never did. That his indulgences were immoral, illegal, and thoroughly reprehensible never once concerned Linner. Those who can, do, while those who can't, cry about ethics. Yet, if the fucking asshole belonging to the voice would let him have more water, Linner would joyously swear off drinking Krug champagne while skinning a hooker alive.
Eventually, Linner felt strong enough to speak a few words.
“Who…are you?” He wheezed out. In response hands once again ran over him, though this time he saw the hands and the arms they were attached to. Whoever was tending to him was wearing a pure white isolation suit. The type of thing usually worn inside an enclosed laboratory when dealing with Level Four contagions. Suddenly, Eric Linner didn't feel particularly well. He did, in fact, feel as though he would shit himself as the full importance of that isolation suit hit him square in the gut.
“I am an operative of James Fitzpatrick,” the voice said as hands unstrapped Linner’s head, and gently moved it from side to side, up and down. With his head free, Linner saw he was in a stark white room, completely enclosed with no windows and only one door. “You were abandoned by the medical team during their retreat from the quarantine zone. Mr. Fitzpatrick, however, learned of your unfortunate condition and sent me to rectify the situation.”
“M-m-my…t-team,” Linner sputtered out.
“Dead,” the voice said with no emotion. Linner collapsed within himself, unable to process the depth of what he'd heard. Raven Team, dead? After everything they'd faced together. All the…things they had faced over the years, and now they were dead.
“H-h-how?” He asked, his words coming with greater ease.
“A single man,” the operative turned his masked face to consider Linner. “A man you reported as being dead. After your dead man shot you and Jace Smythe he ambushed the rest of your team. Which is why I am here with you now.”
“What?” Linner demanded. The dead punk had killed his team? Not possible. The dead punk had been dead. In the back of his mind Linner heard Jace telling him to double tap the punk in the head just to be safe. Linner, of course, hadn't done it. He hadn’t wanted to spoil his mood with the dead punks brains all over the place. Jace was dead, the whole team was dead because Linner couldn't be bothered to follow protocol.
“That's right, Agent Linner,” the operative said calmly. “You see, you have been blessed with a second chance. You shall reconstitute Raven Team. Then you will hunt down, capture, and deliver Angus Finnegan to Mr. Fitzpatrick.”
Chapter One
I woke from a dream where wombats and weasels had taken over Congress and were busy dictating new laws concerning the resurrection of and maintenance of the Newtonian universe. To tell the truth, it made a lot more sense than what Congress had been doing before Outbreak Day. Can’t really say I understood the squeaks and bizarre noises they made, but with flowcharts and emphatic gesturing they managed to get the point across. Besides, they were small, furry, and extremely cute, and were entirely open about the fact they were cut throat predators. Unlike Congress.
My wife and daughter were still ensconced in dreamland so I gently rolled out of bed and quietly got dressed, grabbed my gear, and slipped out of our cabin. I paused long enough to strap on my not so snazzy tactical vest before heading for the top deck. Early morning dew hung over everything while a thick fog obscured the coastline. From time to time I made out the din of battle as gunshots rang out, punctuated by the roar of the undead and the shrieks of the dying. Two days into the zombie apocalypse and the human race wasn't doing so well. I had always held that in the event of a military invasion of our home soil my countrymen would form up into semi organized fire teams and fight back. Perhaps that would be different. Per chance facing an enemy that felt fear, feared death and the oblivion that awaited on the other side made all the difference in the world. The undead don't feel fear, they felt nothing at all except hungry. Worse, unless you put a zombie down with a brain shot the horribly crippled piles of rotting meat would melt together to form an even more terrifying undead eating machine intent on pulling your spleen out through your asshole. The amalgams, as I called them, was the universe’s way of telling you how much it hated the very concept of you as an idea, and desperately wished to erase you from existence. Thanks a lot, universe. Couldn’t just send a rogue comet, sudden magnetic pole reversal, supernova, no, not the universe. The universe sends a fucking virus designed to turn every living, breathing human being into an uncaring, unfeeling, self-replicating nigh
tmare to remove us as slowly as fucking possible. On top of that suck salad, is the Zombie Queen. An intelligent zombie with psychic control over all the little zombies. Yay!
I dropped to the deck and pumped out push-ups with my not so snazzy tactical vest on. Placed on the deck, next to my right hand, lay my short barreled Kalashnikov pattern rifle. Yeah, yeah, how can I walk around with that commie POS and expect to hit anything. Well, my rifle and I make out just fine. As is evidenced by the fact I'm still alive and so many others aren't. Now I'm sure some of you basement dwelling internet trolls slipped away to a bunker full of AR-15s, cans of ammunition, and MREs till the sun goes nova. However, unless you mouth breathing bunker fairies have hiked your Twinkie munching asses through the Florida swamplands with your precious ARs, and then killed half a dozen mercenary assholes your opinion is as useful to me as a dick sandwich.
Push-ups completed I flopped onto my back and began the sit-ups, oh joy of all joys. I hate sit-ups, but not nearly as much as I hate running. If I were being totally honest, I hated exercising for the sake of exercising. I had always much preferred hard work to keep my waistline acceptable. Plenty of strength building there, plus when it's over you've accomplished some task or other. Just how I was raised, I guess.
Sit-ups done, I snagged my rifle and got to my booted feet. Yup, booted feet. I haven't owned a pair of running shoes in decades. Aside from the fact I hate running, I've mostly worked in heavy maintenance professions requiring steel toed boots. Holding my rifle close to my not so snazzy tactical vest I set off at a slow jog along the port side of the freighter, headed aft. If we weren't stuck in the zombie apocalypse this running shit could kiss my ass, but we were stuck right in the goddamn middle. To keep my family alive, and myself out of the teeth of the undead, I needed to suck it up and run. Well before I was ready for them I had reached the stairs and was struggling to mount them at speed with all my gear. Something most of you bunker dwellers probably don't fully comprehend is that ten topped off magazines for a Kalashnikov pattern rifle are heavy, and they only get more so as you run out of steam.
This shit sucks.
You know what sucks more?
What?
Getting eaten alive by a horde of zombies. Run faster, fat boy.
Drop dead you asshole.
That is no way to talk to yourself.
Neither is calling me fat boy. Dick.
Okay, true enough. Still, you need to suck it up and run. Just because we're out on the ocean blue doesn't mean you can slack off. Your family still needs you to protect them.
Thanks, I hadn't worked that out by myself.
Then why are you on the verge of quitting?
No, I'm not.
Look who you're talking to. You want to quit and go fry up a pound of bacon and just forget about this running bullshit.
Bacon does sound like a really good idea.
See? What did I tell you? Quitter.
When the hell is bacon not a good idea?
When you're visiting a mosque.
Point. On the other hand, asshole, visiting a mosque isn't likely to happen anytime soon.
You can't quit, Finnegan. With the Navy out there bottling us up, sooner or later you will contend with more than just the undead.
KnightStar.
Them too, I suppose, but my train of thought was more along the lines of Lord Humungus.
Where do you come up with this stuff?
You're talking to yourself, so it's somewhere in this rats nest you call a brain.
The Road Warrior. No more gasoline anywhere. If that's true, how the hell is everyone still driving all over the fucking Australian outback?
A little fuel here, a little fuel there, but remember the people under siege had found a way to process more fuel. All that death over fuel. Seems kind of silly until you realize there won't be anymore fuel deliveries. No fuel means no cars, no cars means no more food deliveries, and no more power from fuel burning power plants.
I guess those people never heard of biodiesel. Wish like hell I learned how to manufacture it. Even with the down sides, it could tremendously extend our fuel supply.
Why not download the information?
Because the goddamn government, or the military, take your pick, have shutdown access to the Internet inside the quarantine zone. The Internet, cell phone reception, at least two radio broadcasting stations I was aware of were bombed out of existence. Those asshats are serious about maintaining a communications blackout.
I guess that means you need to find a hard copy with step by step instructions.
No fucking way. No fucking way am I setting foot back in the Q zone.
It's not as if we don't need other things anyway. Carroll was just going on and on about needing a new fuel pump for the starboard engine. And there are currently enough supplies in the galley to take care of all our needs, but in a few months it won't look so good. Food, parts, and don't forget all the ammunition you’ve expended so far. Ammo doesn't grow in the ocean.
Mother fucker I hate being right all the goddamn time.
It's a burden I admit, but better right than dead.
Christ on fire, I had a complete conversation, argument, and resolution with myself, and somehow still lost the fight. I am so fucked.
My internal dialogue over for the moment, I turned my full attention back to my run. Somehow I had completed four full circuits of the vessel without puking my guts out. Yay me. Still, I had a point. While we weren't using much diesel fuel just trolling up and down the treasure coast at less than a knot an hour the fuel tanks weren't bottomless. To refuel the ship we needed either a secured site, or the ability to produce fuel ourselves. Which would mean a trip to the book store, in a city crawling with undead, trigger happy survivors, and God alone only knew what else. Then came the spare parts Carroll swore we needed to have on hand. No problem, we’ll just descend another circle deeper into hell. After which we go on a suicide run for more ammunition, which, if I was honest with myself, we needed.
Just another day in the quarantine zone.
Involuntarily, my eyes drifted out to sea, where the blockading naval forces were stationed even though I couldn't see them. What made it plain they were there? Simple. On the second day of our aquatic exile I watched a one hundred fifty foot cabin cruiser worth more than my life leave the Jupiter inlet, headed for open water. The very moment the cabin cruiser violated the no fly zone absolute fiery hell descended on it like the wrath of an extremely pissed off and retribution seeking god. This scene was replayed hour after hour, day after day until everyone finally got the point. Do not violate the quarantine zone.
Wherever the hell those bastards were, I sincerely wished them the worst case of scorching hemorrhoids ever. Intellectually, I understood the military had orders to contain the infection by any means possible. I understood the need to stop the spread of the undead, oh, how I understood, but what fucking asshole doesn't comprehend that the undead don't pilot boats, don't drive cars, and can't fly aircraft? From infection to conversion takes between five to ten minutes. Even if the pilot of a boat had been bitten, it would have been impossible to make their way out of the marina. Christ on fire, it takes longer than that to taxi an aircraft onto a runway. If there had been any infected on board there wouldn't have been any living left to fly the plane. All those people, they were uninfected and they died trying to escape the infection. It's occurred to me from time to time that one of those poor sacks of flaming meat might just have had the answer to this nightmare, and some itchy trigger fingered asshole ejected them from their meat suits. I don't like to think about it because it pisses me the fuck off and I start going about how to sink a missile destroyer, but no matter how I plan it through it just doesn't end well for me and mine.
It’s interesting to consider that before Outbreak Day the gun grabbing fucktards were going on and on about regular citizens owning “weapons of war” by being able to purchase an AR-15. Having watched surface to surface, air to surface, air
to air, and surface to air missiles abso-fucking-lutely obliterate everything they struck, how the fucking hell are AR-15s supposed to compare to Hellfire missiles? Cluster bombs? GAU-8 Avenger 30mm, hydraulically driven seven barrel Gatling style cannons? Helicopters? F-35 tactical superiority fighter jets? What fucking difference does a thirty round magazine make against that?
Kiss my lily white ass.
The government had we miserable peasants outgunned and out maneuvered for more than a hundred years. It's only now, during the zombie apocalypse I can fully appreciate just how large the arms gap really was. I can't help but say to myself a lot more good might have been accomplished had the Navy turned their arsenal of complete atomization against the Zombie Queen, and not the poor slobs running for their lives. Not that going over that ground again will help in anyway whatsoever. The situation is what it is and if I'm going to get us through this I should focus on coming up with a plan that doesn't involve being eaten alive.
“I don't know what you're scheming,” James spoke up from behind me, damn near scaring the shit out of me. Literally. I nearly shit myself as my best friend just fucking materialized behind me like some anime ninja. Completely shocked there isn't a dissipating cloud of smoke around him. I gonna staple a fucking bell to his chest so I at least have a seconds warning to lock my sphincter up. “But I recognize that look on your face. You are debating something stupid.”
“Yeah, I was gonna tell Melinda that since she can't shoot she needs to cook and clean for the men folk,” I muttered as James stepped up next to me. He stifled a laugh, and handed me a cup of coffee.
“That's not stupid,” he corrected with a sneer,”that's suicidal.”
“Think so?” I asked. James does a lot of things remarkably well, coffee wasn't one of them. Still, it fulfilled all prerequisites. It was hot, fresh, and brimming with caffeine.
“Dude, she would yank your nut sack off like a paper towel,” James explained around a bottle of water. “Then beat you to death with your own testicles.”