Bestial

by William D. Carl

  He didn’t want to admit it, but he suspected that the whole thing had been germ warfare gone horribly wrong. It explained the government’s sudden preparedness. It also sent shivers down his spine. Germ warfare was something that other nations, crazy-militant countries, attempted to engage in with America. Not something America sought to engage in with anyone else.

  And the American government doesn’t jam cell phone signals so people can’t spew their stories to the media, either, Burns thought sardonically, frowning at the large satellite dishes on trailers behind him.

  He raised a hand to wipe the sweat from his forehead—then realized he couldn’t penetrate the sanctity of the suit.

  “Don’t shoot just yet,” he told his second in command.

  “Sir?”

  “I said not to fire. They’ve anchored, so they aren’t going anywhere. Not yet. Keep one man posted on surveillance, and if they take up the anchor and approach this side of the river, or if they take off downstream, then we take them out.”

  Burns glanced over at the soldiers who were watching the little boat through the night scopes of their rifles. They were mostly young men, and one woman, clean-cut National Guardsmen, weekend warriors with strong ideals and families who loved them and were here to aid the U. S. Army in any way possible. They would consent to any order he gave them, even if it went against their own personal values. They would kill their fellow citizens.

  But it was different when your fellow citizens were covered in fur and rushing at you with sharp claws and teeth. Or when their sanity had fled, leaving crazed husks of sheer instinct. These people on the boat … they were still people, very much like those families back home. Sometimes he hated being the decision maker, despised being in control.

  Raising his binoculars again, he whispered, “What in the hell are they doing out there? What are they waiting for?”

  Overhead, thunder rumbled, rolling from cloud to cloud.

  45

  SEPTEMBER 18, 6:48 P.M.

  The sun had crept very low on the horizon, but the storm clouds distilled most of its light. The group on the tugboat could only see hazy shades of orange swirling through the cloud banks, vestiges of the sunset.

  Rick turned to Andrei. He said, “We still don’t know if that shot worked on you, buddy. I think you’d better move to the side of the boat, just in case you start to change.”

  “I feel no different, not at all,” the Siberian man said, not moving.

  Christian grabbed a long pole used to guide the tugboat toward shore. It had a pronged end, the better to catch itself upon piers or docks. Pointing it toward Andrei’s chest, he said, “I think you’d better do what he says. Just stand close to the edge of the boat. If you don’t change in the next half hour, we’ll know you’re okay, that the serum did its job. If you do change, I’m pushing you into the water myself.”

  “But I will drown.”

  “That’s the general idea,” Rick said. “Please, man, just do it. We aren’t going to hurt you if you don’t turn into one of those things.”

  Rick added, “And hand over the dart gun.”

  Shrugging, the Siberian handed the gun to Rick, who slung it by its strap over his back. Andrei trudged to the back of the boat, and when he reached the edge, he faced the other four people, turning his back on the coal barges behind them. The pointed end of the pole nearly grazed his chest.

  “Like this?” he asked. “This good?”

  “Yeah,” Chesya said, and she moved toward him. “Thank you.”

  “I no think I will change tonight.”

  “I hope not,” she said. “This is all … just in case.”

  He gave her a little bow. “Thank you. You are a nice lady.”

  “And you’re a true gentleman. If this serum works, you know you’ll be quite famous for taking the risk.”

  “If serum works,” Andrei said, “then I go back to village and live with my family. They are more … how you say, important than being famous. They are most important of all.”

  One by one, the little group moved toward the burly man. Chesya hugged him, and Rick shook his hand. “Good luck,” he said.

  “And to yourself.”

  Cathy gave him a bear hug, her arms unable to reach all the way around him. “I hope this turns out just as you wish,” she said. “I’d like to see you back with your family. It’s …” She turned toward Christian; then she completed her thought. “It’s the most meaningful thing in the world. Family.”

  As she moved back, standing next to Christian, who still held the pole in front of himself, the teenager said, “Yeah. Good luck. But if you change, you’re goin’ overboard. It’s just to save the rest of us. No hard feelings?”

  “No. Take care of your mother. She love you. Even I see it.”

  Rick pulled his Black Widow special and leveled it against the big man’s head. When Andrei looked at him quizzically, he said, “Hey, I’m not taking any chances.”

  They waited.

  The wind picked up, and the water grew more turbulent. The boat rocked beneath them.

  And they waited.

  The light grew dimmer. The orange streaks in the clouds faded to black. Rick eventually had to aim at Andrei with one hand, using his other to grab hold of the side of the boat for balance. The first raindrops fell.

  And still they waited.

  A howl emerged from the depths of the city, followed by growls and more animalistic sounds. The streets of Cincinnati echoed with the noises the creatures made as they changed—the sounds of humans becoming beasts.

  Andrei stood still, watching them, not daring to move. He eyeballed the gun that Rick held to his head. Searching within himself, he tried to find the familiar tickle of the hairs struggling to burrow their way out of his skin. He felt nothing except the pleasant plop of heavy raindrops on his shoulders.

  Cathy shouted, “Look!”

  She pointed toward the shore, toward the city. A dozen monsters emerged from the buildings and paced alongside the river. They growled at the tugboat. One tested the water with a clawed and padded foot and determined it didn’t want to attempt swimming to the boat.

  “How do you feel, Andrei?” Chesya asked.

  “A little scared. But I feel no change feelings. I think I am fine.”

  Ten more beasts joined the others, pacing back and forth along the shore, watching the boat with boiling red eyes.

  Christian lowered his pole. “I don’t think he’s gonna do it. It must have worked.”

  “Sweet Jesus, thank you!” Chesya said, looking up at the sky and getting an eyeful of rain. “We have an antidote.”

  Lowering his gun, Rick extended his hand to the Siberian again. “Thanks for trying it,” he said. “I don’t think I would have had the balls to do it, not knowing how it would turn out. You could have died.”

  “I have been dead a long time now,” Andrei said. Then he swept Rick up in a bear hug and twirled him around a few times. His laughter came out in deep bellowing guffaws, and soon everyone was grinning and patting him on the back. “I go home now!” Andrei cried. “I see my wife and children. I go home now.”

  Laughing, Rick handed the dart gun back to the Siberian, and Andrei hung it from his shoulder. He grinned and patted the rifle.

  Meanwhile, on one side of the river, twenty more lycanthropes joined the others, trying to figure out a way to get to the boat.

  On the opposite bank, Captain Burns was ordering more soldiers to guard the shoreline, and the first creature started to lope across what was left of the Brent Spence Bridge, followed by a dozen others.

  A gunshot rang out, echoing between the metal bridge and the windswept water, blasting the head off of the lead monster. Its body fell off the jagged edge where explosives had blasted the Kentucky end of the bridge into the water, leaving broken concrete and metal rods sticking out of the collapsed section. The creature smacked into one of the rods and hung from the end, like a flag in the wind. Eventually, the corpse twisted too mu
ch. It fell into the churning waters of the Ohio River and disappeared from sight.

  46

  SEPTEMBER 18, 7:05 P.M.

  Captain Burns knew the situation was about to get precarious on his side of the river. The creatures were already amassing on the other side, howling and leaping into the air, snapping their massive jaws. He wondered if they’d already devoured everyone on the Cincinnati side, depleted their food source, if that was why they were so determined to cross to Kentucky.

  The transformation seemed to take less time each evening. Tonight, it happened in the blink of an eye. If he had not prepared for this moment all day, he would have been flabbergasted at how quickly people dropped to all fours.

  Looking at the line of soldiers, a sea of orange in their biohazard suits, their rifles aimed at a point halfway across the bridges, he swelled in admiration for the men and women defending this shoreline. They came from all walks of life: family men, husbands, wives, girlfriends, sons and daughters. They’d grown up in the city or on surrounding farms. The two common factors they shared were that they hadn’t changed into beasts, and they had all rushed to stop the spread of the virus. With a few exceptions, the disease hadn’t radiated beyond the boundaries of Cincinnati proper, thank God. Burns didn’t want to contemplate what would have happened if the government hadn’t moved so quickly.

  There it was again, that nagging at the back of his skull when he thought about how swiftly the Pentagon had deployed troops. Shaking the doubt from his head, he faced the city as the first wave of creatures began to run across the bridges. There were dozens, maybe hundreds of them, an onslaught of teeth and claws, madness made flesh.

  Raising his arm, he shouted, “Ready, men? Steady with your shots. Make every bullet count. Steady … aim … FIRE!”

  As hundreds of bullets whizzed past him, he watched as the first group of monsters were mowed down, red, wet holes appearing across their furry bodies. They toppled onto one another, forming the first of many small fortresses made up of lycanthrope corpses. The next wave of creatures would need to crawl over the obstructions. When they did, the troops would be ready for them.

  As several beasts retreated to the Cincinnati side, Taylor Burns looked through his binoculars at the tugboat anchored in the center of the river. What he saw amazed him.

  “Good job, men!” he shouted over the crack and pinging of ammunition being fired. Another creature fell as it retreated, the back of its skull opening like a ripe cantaloupe.

  To his second in command, Burns shouted, “Hey, Granger. Come over here.”

  The smaller man scuttled over to his superior officer and saluted. “Yes, sir? Seems like a lot of them tonight, and it looks like they’re pretty damned determined.”

  “Why don’t you take a gander out at that boat and those barges?”

  “Sir?”

  “Said the night wind to the little lamb …”

  Tom Granger cocked his head in confusion, peering through the pouring rain. Wiping the water from his faceplate, he raised his own binoculars and squinted through them, adjusting the focus.

  “Do you see what I see?” Burns continued.

  “They didn’t change!”

  “That’s right. You think that’s why they placed themselves securely within our sights? Someplace where we could observe that they were immune to this disease?”

  “Sounds about right, sir. Should we let them float to this side?”

  General Burns chewed the inside of his bottom lip, refusing to display any sign of nervousness. “I dunno. They could still be carriers. If they come over here, we could all be infected.”

  “Not with these suits, sir. We’ve been burning all those bodies over in the parking lots; they were as contaminated as they could be, and still—”

  “Maybe we could have some kind of isolation tent made up. You think you could rig something like that?”

  “I don’t think it’ll be a problem, sir.”

  Burns grunted, then looked up at the Brent Spence Bridge as the next horde of monsters swarmed over their fallen brethren. Gunshots pierced the air, and thunder followed the fingers of lightning that reached toward the Earth. Like the hands of God, playing with His toys.

  Burns said, “Get to it, then. If we can keep them locked in a tent, something pretty damned airtight, I’ll feel comfortable bringing them over. Until then, the poor bastards are on their own.”

  On the choppy water, the coal barges attached to the tugboat swung around like the second hand of a clock, gliding slowly in a semicircle, turning the whole boat to face the other direction. The people on it scurried to secure the tug.

  Then something splashed into the water. Trying to escape the men’s rifles, the beasts were leaping from the bridge. They were landing uncomfortably close to the coal barges.

  “Poor sons of bitches,” Burns said; then he turned his attention to his radio. The uninfected survivors were important enough to report to central command.

  47

  SEPTEMBER 18, 7:18 P.M.

  As the rain came down in sheets, the river swelled with higher and higher waves, which tossed the tugboat enough to make Rick lurch over the railing and vomit into the water. Lightning shot through the air, and thunder followed with alarming volume.

  Everyone leaned against the side of the boat, holding on to the railing. The rain made the varnished wood slick, and they had a rough time keeping a good grip.

  “Oh Jesus,” Rick said, raising his head and wiping his mouth.

  Chesya scowled at him. “Rick …”

  “I was praying, not cussing. We need this shit to stop.”

  Cathy asked, “Do you think they’ve spotted us yet? Realized we’re different from the others?”

  “I don’t know,” Chesya said. “They look pretty busy. They may not have noticed our little group with all the shooting they’re doing.”

  “How many of those things you think they’ve killed?” Christian asked, his arm held protectively in front of his mother, securing her against the railing.

  “Not enough,” Rick gasped. “Never … enough.” He had to turn suddenly, feeling the bile raise in the back of his throat.

  “It isn’t that bad,” Cathy said. “I was in a hurricane once in a sailboat, when—”

  “I’m not seasick,” he replied between gagging sounds. “I just don’t like the way the boat’s moving.”

  “Speaking of moving …” Chesya said.

  Andrei pointed to the barges, which had begun to swing around. “We are moving!” he shouted.

  Chesya tightened her grip. “Hold on, everybody!”

  The barges pulled the boat around in a semicircle, then stopped with a jolt that dropped Cathy and Christian to the floor. They hurried to grab hold of something as the boat bobbed then steadied, facing the opposite direction of the river’s current.

  “I don’t like this,” Cathy said. “We should be pointed the other way.”

  “You have a suggestion?” Rick asked. “I’d be glad to hear it.”

  “We can’t pull anchor,” she said. “We’d float at the mercy of the river and the storm. The engines certainly wouldn’t help us. They’d probably just burn out trying to pull us the wrong way.”

  A huge wave lifted them, then dropped them against the water. Andrei, losing his grip, slid across the deck. When his body smacked against the back edge, he flipped, and his legs dropped into the water between the barge and the tugboat. Screaming, he tried to haul himself back out of the river as the barge inched closer and closer to the boat, riding the crest of another wave.

  “He’ll be crushed!” Cathy shouted, and she dove forward, sliding on her stomach on the well-varnished deck. When she slammed into the opposite side of the boat, she placed her knees against the railing and grabbed Andrei’s wrists.

  The barge rose above his head and shoulders, and, as if in slow motion, tilted toward him at a forty-degree angle. It slid forward, threatening to cut him in half.

  Cathy caught hold of the dart
gun’s strap, still wrapped around the Siberian’s shoulder, and she pulled, unaware that Christian and Chesya had joined her.

  Chesya grabbed Andrei’s flailing hand, pulling him against the side of the boat, and Christian clutched the man’s shirt collar, lifting the heavy Russian as he would a kitten by the scruff of its neck.

  With a terrible groan and the crack of wood, the coal barge bumped the block and pulley that attached it to the tug, stopping about a foot away from the railing.

  Chesya, Christian, and Cathy pulled Andrei on board. Wood splintered as the pulley was forced against the back of the boat, and the two men and the two women crawled away on hands and knees.

  The boat was taking on a lot of water from the storm. “Rick!” Cathy shouted. “Start the bilge pumps! They’re under the cabin!”

  He yelled back, “Fuck off! I’m not going anywhere.”

  The wood behind Cathy cracked loudly, and part of the ship’s aft was pulled away by the strength of the now-retreating coal barge. It had slammed into the boat with enough force to pull a two-foot chunk out of the side, leaving behind long splinters.

  “Rick, goddamn it, we’re gonna sink if you don’t! And I mean now!” Cathy turned to Chesya, who was huddling next to her, and she apologized.

  “No worries,” Chesya said. “You know what you’re doing a lot better than I do.”

  Reluctantly, Rick let loose of the side of the boat and threw himself down the small flight of stairs. He couldn’t hear his footsteps over the roar of the storm and the incessant pounding of the rain. As he reached the bottom, he realized he was almost knee-deep in dirty water.

  “Oh, here we go again,” he said. “More problems.”

  After a brief search, he flicked a switch on the pumps, and he was rewarded with the sound of water draining back into the river. He leaned forward, catching himself with his arms and heaving a huge sigh of relief.

  Outside, wood shattered and iron moaned as it rubbed against more wood and metal. Rick rushed above deck, blinking at the rain that suddenly blurred his vision.