World of Ashes II

by J. K. Robinson

  “What the fuck was that!?” Everyone seemed to shout all at once. For the locals the answer was clear and terrifying, perhaps even more so than infected cannibals eating your face.

  “That’s got to be the nuclear power plant.” Someone said within earshot. The word nuclear went through the survivors on land and in the boats faster than electricity. The people who’d lived in this area already knew the Administration had taken the crisis as an opportunity to shut down all of the industries they considered a vice of a capitalist nation. All the reactors were taken offline, the radioactive materials sent somewhere classified (probably the bottom of the ocean) and the power grid turned over to costly Green plants. No wonder the power had failed so early in the fight.

  Those in charge on land tried to calm everyone, explain that the nuclear materials were gone, but that didn’t help much. The Fukashima disaster wasn’t that long ago, nor the legendary Chernobyl. Everyone was panicking now, some people running toward the boats and others still into the swampy woods. Plumes of smoke rose into the northern sky and against all belief and probability the bright yellow fire of a rocket engine put a guided missile down on the power plant from the west. That was what the explosion was, danger close incoming from ship to surface missiles. Daniel looked toward the Gulf of Mexico and saw what his mind was sure was another illusion. Dozens of ships, fuel tankers, Coast Guard cutters and even what had to be the outline of a destroyer were coming over the horizon. A flight of helicopters rose above the ships like hornets stirred from their nest and pounced on their enemy.

  At first the survivors were excited, hoping for some reason these helos were there specifically to save them. Nothing could be farther from the truth and in only minutes the squadron’s course was clearly to the right of them and towards the inert power plant. Daniel was still looking out at sea instead of at the choppers and was one of only a few who saw the destroyer begin to lob shells from her deck gun. The squadron made a pass over the refugees, the two Whiskey Cobra attack choppers laid waste to something under the tree line just before the last shell from the destroyer hit in a fusillade from one side of the power plant to the other. The rest of the helos were larger, maybe CH-53 variants, but none of them were Army Chinooks or Marine Ospreys, none of them were meant for rescue.

  The bow of the two yachts towing Sonya came around the last row of trees, whoever was onboard could now see the ships at sea. It made sense that Captain Harrisburg would try to make contact, the announcement that she would went over the radio along with an order to establish a perimeter. People weren’t listening, though. Half the survivors were waving at the ships, the other half were distinctly under the impression that they were going to be under attack next and made a mad scramble for the three boats. Granted, there were less than six hundred people at this point, but in a confined space like a small parking lot with water or swamp on all sides it wasn’t long before they were dealing with a stampede inside a corral. Either an alligator or a zombie stuck in the mud startled someone and a shotgun went off. Everyone started screaming, because you know, by now nobody was used to gunfire or something stupid like that. More guns started going off and even more jackasses started panic screaming. The noise was unbearable and confusing.

  Daniel spotted Jose in the crowd, like anyone who’d been trained for it his reaction to gunfire was not panic. His rifle was at the ready while he stood in front of Camilla, protecting her from the masses. A sprinting teenager, holding his backpack instead of wearing it, ran into Camilla and before he was out or arms reach Jose butt-stroked him between the shoulder blades. The teen face planted in the gravel, rolling over his pack like a cartoon.

  One of the yachts tossed its line from the Russian boat and came closer to shore, probably to rescue friends and family. The deep draft caught a shallow rock and the bow lifted out of the water just slightly. Everyone it seemed tried to bum-rush the one yacht all at once, incoming fire from whatever battle was happening around them shook the water and sand. Birds flocked from the area, making a terrible racket as well. The bullhorn on Sonya broadcast Harrisburg’s voice, but Daniel couldn’t tell what she was saying over the commotion.

  A truck with the minesweeper’s large gun on the back drove straight into the swamp, making it a good distance before the engine was flooded with muddy water and the truck began to sink. People were punching and fighting each other, bodies were already laying on the ground. Seeing no better option, Daniel searched for Kaylee in his waking nightmare. He couldn’t see them, or even John’s car in the convoy anymore. People were swimming toward Sonya and even the beached yacht, others were swimming it seemed out to sea or toward the armada on the horizon. Did everyone wake up and take a stupid pill this morning?

  Daniel was sure he saw John’s pristine old Cadillac between two heavy trucks, a crowd of people blocked his view and the next second he saw nothing but more running people where the car had been. Someone ran into Daniel and the next thing he knew he was eating pavement like the skinny guy who’d bumped into Camilla. He tasted blood, one of his teeth was definitely loose, more blood filled his mouth and he coughed out what tasted like slimy pennies.

  He was about to stand up again when the zipping sound of bullets flying overhead made him instinctively stay low. In the bright daylight sky he could see the smoke trails of the tracers, hear the screams of people hit and yet to be hit. Who was shooting at them!?

  What looked at first like another horde of zombies was flooding onto the small river’s northern shore. When Daniel’s vision cleared he could see from where he lay that these were not zombies. Few uniforms were more recognizable than Cuba’s. Flat green pants and shirts were usually associated with third world nations, those ruled by petty dictators, usually Communists. Since there was little chance North Korea was invading, Cuba made more sense. They carried Ak-47s and were not shy about who they shot at. Already the yacht that had been run aground was on fire, her sides strewn with blood and burning material, wounded and dying crawling in the neck high water to escape in any direction they could. Many were now pounced upon by alligators or had simple drown.

  Daniel grabbed his sidearm and rolled into a prone firing position behind a concrete parking bumper. There was very little he could do from across the river with an M9, he probably didn’t hit anyone, but it made him feel better and seemed to rally others to take cover and shoot back too. The firefight must have attracted the attention of the squadron of helicopters because the staccato chatter of rifles was replaced by the whopping thunder of rotor blades hovering directly overhead.

  Heavy brass shells fell from the rotating guns mounted to the turret under the Cobra’s chin, tracers that were so close together it was unimaginable another five rounds were in between them. The line of phosphorus from each chopper was so clear one could have walked from the ground to the cockpits and back again. The enemy soldiers, as there was no other way to describe them, made a push to get below the gray attack chopper’s guns and made it to the edge of the minesweeper Sonya. The decks were too high to climb, but on the port side the sunken truck was still next to her hull and threatened to be an easy access to the boat. Daniel ran out of ammunition for his sidearm and crawled around looking for a rifle, burning his hands twice on spent 30mm cannon shells. He was helpless to cover the crew on the boat when the green clad enemy stormed aboard like pirates, or so many invading rats.

  That was when tragedy struck in the middle of an already bad day. Sonya was a Russian ship, and it was easily conceivable Cuba might have access to Soviet era arms. Both helos broke formation, circled once in a counter and clockwise loop, reformed and sent two wire guided missiles from each chopper straight into the side of Sonya’s castle and hull. The ship exploded and broke apart in fireballs, the concussion reaching the survivors at point blank range. They were all instantly deafened, the ringing in Daniel’s ears made him nauseous as bits of flaming ash rained down amongst the smoldering debris scattered across Fort Island.

  Everything was a haze after that,
Daniel could remember throwing up at least twice, then the sharp pain of what he suspected was a gunshot to his side. After that it was just voices, the thunder of helicopters, the freezing cold of what he was sure was looming death from blood loss, and then… nothing.

  Chapter 9

  In every good blackout scene the hero wakes up to the sound of beeping medical equipment, the first sign before the picture comes into focus that the good guys have indeed saved the day. Daniel’s first conscious thought, disbelief, was only because the smell of death brought him out of his near-coma rather than the soothing beeps of a heart and O2 monitor. He blinked, trying to look around but felt his eyelids crusted over. He tried to reach for them, but found his arms were actually restrained, his legs too. His first instinct wasn’t to call out, though. If he couldn’t move the last thing he wanted to do was make noise so a zombie could eat him while he lay defenseless. He took a breath and worked on trying to open his eyes, which became its own problem when he realized one eye was bandaged over. It hurt horribly to move either and eventually he quit.

  The next logical thing to do was try to undo the restraints. That idea ended just as quickly as he had thought of it when he felt the restraints tighten. They were zip-ties and nothing short of a knife or scissors was going to let him go. The sounds of voices nearby and footsteps in a metal hallway made Daniel clam up. He barely breathed now and concentrated on not flinching.

  “…resting for now.” A male voice said. “We’re out of anything I could use to keep them under until we arrive at Gitmo. There’s not enough morphine for surgery or enough-”

  “I get it.” The second voice, a female said. “We’re due in two days, can you keep the critically injured alive until then?”

  There was a pause, then the male voice responded, “Commander… With all due respect, most of these people are not Naval personnel. They’re civilians and enemy prisoners of war, they need treatment at a larger facility, and now. We could be at Gitmo in six hours if we alter course, less if I could get an authorized medevac from the base hospital.”

  “There’s enemy activity in the area. I can’t authorize an unarmed flight.” The commander responded. “We need to be on that picket line, Lieutenant.”

  “I’m not arguing duty, Ma’am, but with all due respect I have two hundred and fifty some-odd wounded, half-starved refugees and a quarter as many Marines who’ve lost limbs to prevent infection. Lance Corporal Ellis had his leg amputated below the knee… only by amputated I mean his squad leader chopped his leg off after he was bitten with the dirty, dull axe their Humvee had in the back. It was not a clean cut, Ma’am. It took three swings and more or less smashed the flesh apart and ground the bone to red pulp in the process. He alone requires so much anesthetic and antibiotics that we will be out before noon tomorrow. I’m begging you, Commander. The other ships can cover down, I spoke the chiefs and they say our engines will be fine running at flank speed long enough to get to Gitmo and back.”

  “I appreciate your initiate, Lieutenant, but don’t go stepping on my toes.”

  “I thought that was my job, Ma’am.”

  Daniel wasn’t paying enough attention to holding still and his foot twitched. Instantly the game was up and the man who was probably a doctor had a flashlight in Daniel’s eyes, or should he say eye. He got nothing out of his right eye and a flurry of panic set over him.

  “Calm down, calm down. You’re fine. You’re safe here.”

  “I can’t see.” Daniel admitted, his breathing getting heavier. He had no idea his throat was this dry.

  “Just some crusty eye-boogers is all. Here...” The male voice said, wiping the eye with a warm wet cloth from a nearby sink. “You have a bandage over your other eye, there was a lot of swelling, but you should be able to see out of it again.” Daniel’s good eye opened and he got his first look at these people. To his everlasting relief they were wearing US Navy uniforms. He had miraculously been rescued, but what about Jose and Kaylee and all the others?

  “What ship is this?” He managed to ask.

  “USS Winston S. Churchill DDG-81. She’s a guided missile destroyer.”

  “I know what Navy designations are for ships. My dad liked to sail.” Daniel tried to sit up and failed, forgetting he was tied down. “Why am I restrained?”

  “SOP.” The female said. Daniel glanced at her uniform, a silver oak leaf, the insignia for lieutenant colonel in the Army, she’d be one rank below captain in the Navy. “Direct order from the CDC and Joint Chiefs of Staff. Anyone who’s in a hospital and unconscious is to be restrained. We know more about the virus now, and this is probably unnecessary.” Captain Ogden, as her nametape read, used her own pocket knife to clip the zip-ties. “But rules are rules. It probably saved some lives in the beginning, no need to get sloppy now.”

  “Thank you, Ma’am.” Daniel took a deep breath and decided to out himself. “My name is PFC Daniel D. Sawyer, Wyoming Army National Guard. I was trapped in Florida, I promise I’m not intentionally AWOL, Ma’am.”

  The lieutenant, who was the male doctor, and the Commander both nodded in appreciation. “What was your MOS, Private?” Captain Ogden asked.

  “Eighty Eight Lima, Ma’am.”

  “Watercraft Engineer?” She smiled. She was pretty, for a woman in her fifties.

  “Yes ma’am. I won’t lie, the job was kind of a sham. My mother is a Colonel in the Air Force, or was, I don’t know now…” Daniel trailed off, feeling dizzy but closed his good eye and righted himself. “Sorry, that was personal, not relevant. I was on vacation to see my father in England when the virus struck DC, Ma’am. I tried to make it home, but through one evacuation or another I ended up in Crystal River, Florida.”

  Lieutenant Ellis folded his arms. “How long were you there, Soldier?”

  “Since DC fell, Sir… I don’t remember the date.”

  “Well, you get some rest, maybe your bandages can come off soon.” Commander Ogden left the room and went somewhere, wherever. It was her ship after all.

  Daniel was allowed to stand, and Lt. Ellis personally escorted him to the makeshift medical bay in one of the cargo holds. There Daniel was greeted by almost a dozen people from Crystal River, Camilla and Jose among them. Daniel had never been more elated to see his Battle Buddy, like a second and even more powerful reunion than the first.

  “Kaylee. Have you seen Kaylee?” Daniel asked as soon as the bear hug was over. “I saw them on the island.”

  Camilla looked at Jose, neither of them seemed to know. None of the others did either, but they all remembered clearly seeing the Marines drag Chief Kuzma away after they ran biometrics on everyone. Daniel didn’t like the sound of that. Kuzma might be a whoremonger and a drunk, but he had been one them, he’d fought alongside them and never once acted like he was the invader.

  Daniel went up to one of the Marines standing, or rather sitting guard over the civilians. “Excuse me, Lance Corporal, is there anything you can tell me about the Russian non-com that was rescued with the rest of the survivors from Crystal River?”

  The Marine looked up from a copy of Mad Magazine he’d probably already read a million times. “Sorry, Sir, but that’s above my paygrade.”

  Daniel nodded, “I’m not an officer, I still work for a living. I’m a Soldier, I was just stranded here with these people. I understand if you can’t tell me, but if you know anything…”

  The Marine leaned forward, “Look, Doggy, I don’t know shit. But if I did, I’d say he wasn’t who he said he was. Was that clear enough?”

  “Got it.” Daniel walked back to Jose. “Do they know you’re military yet?”

  “Yeah. They would have known you were too a lot sooner if it weren’t for your face, bro. It was all fucked up.”

  “Trust me, it still is. I can’t see out my left eye.” Daniel sat on one of the makeshift benches. “Exactly what the fuck happened to me, man?”

  Camilla had that story. She finished putting her hair in a ponytail while she talked. “
We found you after the helicopters stopped shooting. You were covered in bullet shells, one of them was burned to your face.” She reached out and checked his bandages. Camilla was the nurturing type. “I didn’t want to pull it off, but there wasn’t much choice. When they sent a rescue helicopter I made them take you with us. You may not have an eyebrow anymore.”

  “Thanks.” Daniel was truly humbled, but not super excited about drawing his eyebrows on for the rest of his life. “Who were they fighting? Who were those people on the other side of the river?”

  “Cuban Regulars.” Jose knew that one for sure now. “They have a few of them in the brig. They were trying to steal nuclear materials from the plant, the Navy caught ‘em. Apparently that battle you saw at sea was the larger armada this ship is attached to.”

  “I heard them saying they want to make port at Gitmo to offload the wounded.”

  “Good. Maybe they’ll let us off too.”

  “You can go.” Daniel said quickly. “I need to find out what happened to my parents. If these guys are what’s left of the Government, I need them.”

  Camilla and Jose looked at each other, then whispered, then turned back to Daniel. “We go where you go.”

  U.S.S. Winston S. Churchill made port at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base late the next day. The ship was towed directly to a dock and the civilians allowed to disembark. Before Daniel could get what little he had ready to go he was stopped by a Sailor he hadn’t met before.

  “Excuse me, Private Sawyer?” He asked. They were probably the same age, though this guy’s thick rimmed standard issue glasses, or BCG’s*, made him look like a real nerd. “Commander Ogden requests your presence in the CIC.”

  “Me?” Daniel looked confused. “I’m traveling with them, where can I meet up with them after?” He gestured to Jose and Camilla.