She fired once, the laser blast taking the man right in the chest. The blast knocked him backward sending him tumbling to the ground. The huge smoking hole is his chest didn’t seem to be enough to stop him from moving, though. His hands reached out trying to pull himself back to his feet. He was so uncoordinated that he couldn’t quite manage it. He flipped onto his belly and started to pull himself across the floor towards us. His jaw started snapping open and closed as he came, almost in an involuntary reflex. I had a pretty good idea now of what had been chewing on those bodies.
Stepping forward I pulled out one of my pistols and fired one round into his head. The body fell to the floor in a heap. I kicked it one time, to make sure it wasn’t going to get back up. I looked back at Gabe; he had a look of horror mixed with joy on his face. Maze just looked as if she didn’t want to believe it.
“Captain, do you know what this means?” Gabe asked, his voice coming out almost giddy.
I turned to look at him and was surprised to see him smiling in earnest now. “Why don’t you enlighten me?”
“Space fucking zombies, Captain.” He seemed to be excited by the prospect while it filled me with horror. “That’s why the headshot killed it.”
“Seriously. Gabe, that zombie stuff is just in the movies. The super cheesy, late at night kind of movies.”
“Captain, I hate to agree with him.” When I looked at Maze, she just shrugged her shoulders in grudging acceptance. “But he did seem to be very zombie-like.”
“Let’s just work under the assumption that they are infected. The word zombie never leaves this room.”
“Boss, you’re worried about the word zombies making us sound crazy, right?” I nodded to him. “I’m worried about where the rest of them went.”
“Good point.” I reached down and placed the remote connection on the bridge console for Ice. “We still have a job to do. This bird needs to head back to Alphamerix, and we need to secure the company’s data before we can head out.”
“Captain, we should just send the ship back and torch the place.” Maze said.
That kind of surprised me coming from her. She was normally the one being cautious, and I had never known her to be superstitious. I had to take a few deep breaths to calm myself. We weren’t in some kind of horror movie, no matter what we had just seen. I wasn’t about to lose my cool and blow this job. “You know we can’t do that. Not until the data is secure.”
“Fine, but for the record, this is a bad idea.”
“Dually noted. Weapons hot, headshots only.”
They formed up on me, and we exited the ship. “Ice, lock down this ship. As soon as you have its engines online get it out of the system and headed back home. Also, send a message to Quaid. The ship should be treated with a containment protocol.”
“Captain, what’s going on? You sound nervous.”
“I’ll tell you when we get back to the Talon. Also, you need to close the cargo bay doors to the Talon. There is something going on here, and I need to know you’re safe. If anyone approaches the ship no matter their condition keep the doors closed.”
“The Talon is all locked up, and I sent a message to Quaid about initiating containment protocols on the ship.” The comm went silent for a moment. “Just be safe out there.”
“You have my word. As soon as we get the link in place, we are off of this rock.”
The cargo bay of the ship wasn’t any better the second time we had to walk through it. The only good news that we had so far was that the hangar was still empty as we exited the ship. We walked across the room and towards the door on the far side. I wanted this to go quick and easy. Open the door, jog until we reached the control room, place the device, and get the hell out. Whatever happened here, I didn’t want to end up being part of it. The longer we lingered, the more likely we would encounter more of the missing scientists. The last thing I wanted was to see another one of them. In and out, what could possibly go wrong?
“Form on me, unless we run into a group of these things, let’s keep our weapons silent. The last thing we want is for the noise to draw any more of them to us. In and out people.”
Maze gave me a curt nod.
Gabe smiled. “Let’s do this.”
Sometimes I wondered about that kid. What could you do, though? He probably grew up playing first person shooters. This was his once in a lifetime dream scenario, on a little-known planet facing what he thought of as zombies. For the rest of us rooted in reality, the mission was being affected by an unknown variable. That made me uncomfortable, to say the least. I needed to get my team out of here in one piece.
I hit the button for the door and thankfully the hallway was clear. The butt of the rifle felt at home as it rested against my shoulder. I quickly scanned the corridor while moving forward. Picking up the pace was easy when you had a small amount of fear driving your steps. Looking at the blood smeared walls only continued to spike my adrenaline. The severed arm resting in one of the doorways we passed, almost made me reconsider completing the job. It didn’t matter how much they were paying. You couldn’t spend the money if you were dead.
We came up to a T-shaped intersection. Maze and Gabe covered the right-hand tunnel while I turned left. “Clear.” I started to move forward again before I realized they hadn’t confirmed that they were good to go. Slowly I turned back around.
It was Maze that spoke in a hushed tone. “Captain, I think we have a problem.”
Gabe sounded almost giddy when he spoke. “Still think they aren’t zombies?”
Lowering my rifle I stepped between them wondering what had them so transfixed. There was a body on the floor with two other people hunched over it. At first, I couldn’t tell what was happening, but then the reality of it set in. They were eating him. One of them was contentedly chewing on the body’s arm. The other was plunging its hands inside of the body and eating whatever it pulled out.
We didn’t have time to watch this. As far as I was concerned all of them were dead and beyond our ability to help. It was time to move. We needed to get out of here before those things turned their attention towards us. “Get your head in the game. We’ve still got work to do.” I slapped a hand down on their backs snapping them out of it before readying my rifle again and continuing down the hallway.
Two more right-hand turns and a quick left brought us to our destination. The control room door was closed, and when I hit the button on the panel it beeped but the door still didn’t open. Just what we needed. I pulled out one of Ice’s remote access chips. “Ice, get this door open.”
“Relax Captain, I’m on it.”
“I don’t think I’ll be able to relax until we are a million miles away from here.”
“The door should be working. Something is holding it closed from inside of the room.”
“Is there another way in?”
“The room is a closed system. You could try the vents, but your fastest way in would be to try and force the door open.”
“Damn it. Can nothing on this job just be easy?” I looked over my shoulder at Gabe. “I’m going to hit the button again, try and push the door.” Gabe stepped into position and I hit the button for the door. His shoulders bulged and he grunted with effort as he tried to push the door open. The door opened a few inches and then tried to close again. I stepped in lacing my fingers into the crack and pulled as hard as I could. It moved a few more inches. Gabe released it and got a grip on the lower part of the door bracing his leg into the jam to push.
A single squeal of metal on metal sounded, and we stopped trying to move the door. There was a twelve-inch gap now. “Maze, think you can fit through there?”
“Do I have to?”
“Only if you want to leave.”
“Just don’t let that fucking door close. I don’t want to be trapped in there.”
“Just attach the chip to the console and get out.”
She slipped through the door and into the room. A few seconds later we fell to the floor in a he
ap as the door opened completely. It would have been comical anywhere but here. After disentangling myself from Gabe, I looked up at Maze’s smirking face. “A little heads up would have been nice.”
“Then don’t send me into the creepy room alone next time.”
She had a point. The room was empty except for one body in the corner that wasn’t moving. There was a pistol in the man’s hand. I couldn’t be certain, but I had the feeling it was a self-inflicted gunshot that ended his life.
Gabe walked over to the body and planted a solid kick to its midsection. The body flipped over, and there was a crack in the man’s skull. He must have barricaded himself in the control room and waited for help. When no one came, he took the easy way out. I couldn’t blame him really. If my only choices were being eaten alive and killing myself, I would have made the same call. It seemed that at least a few people had lived long enough to fight back, but the resistance must not have lasted for long.
Maze used one of our remote chips to give Ice access to the terminal. “We’re all set Captain.”
“How long until the download is complete, Ice?”
“Probably another ten minutes.”
“We should just leave the chip and go, Captain.” Maze said.
When Gabe said, “I agree.” I almost couldn’t believe it. He never wanted to leave anything behind. Missing equipment came out of our profits when it had to be replaced. Gabe preferred the credits over his personal safety.
“Captain, I found something I think you should see.” Ice’s voice came over the commlink.
“We’ll look at it back on the ship.” We stepped back into the corridor. “Lock this door. I don’t want anything disturbing our download.”
“Done.” Ice replied.
I pulled the remote chip off of the door, no reason to leave both of them behind. These things weren’t exactly cheap, but I was willing to leave the one in the control room to get back to our ship as soon as possible.
“Same drill, stay silent as long as we can. All we have to do now is make it back to the ship.” I met both of their eyes looking for acknowledgment. I found that and more when Gabe’s eyes darted over my shoulder.
“Ah, Captain?”
I turned to see our two friends from earlier shuffling down the hallway towards us. Their ripped lab coats rippled around them slightly in the ventilated air. Their hands and mouths were covered in blood. They came forward slowly, mouths opening and closing almost like a fish out of water. The thing that scared me the most were their milky white eyes, dead eyes.
The schematics only showed a storage room behind us. There was only one direction we could go. Our weapons would echo inside of the closed space. Anything in this building would know exactly where we were as soon as we fired. I didn’t see another choice. I fired my rifle twice and started running. The echoes of my team’s footfalls were the only indication that they were still behind me.
Chapter Twelve
I could hear them coming now, even over the sound of our rapid footsteps. The shuffling sound of their movement seemed to be getting closer. It must have been my imagination because we hadn’t seen one of them run yet. Two of the zombies stumbled out of a doorway. Our lasers hit them in the chests giving us enough time to jump over their now flailing corpses and continued down the corridor.
Maze’s rifle roared to life behind us. A quick glance back showed three more bodies hitting the ground. It didn’t seem to slow down the horde that was following us now. A few more bodies fell over the corpse on the ground. The rest of the growing horde managed to stumble over them without slowing down.
“Captain, get down!” Gabe shouted.
Dropping to my knees, I heard Gabe’s rifle scream to life behind me. He wasn’t messing around. The shots continued as I looked up to see one last scientist slip through the barrage. I stood up slamming my shoulder into the woman’s chest. She stumbled back a few steps, creating just enough space for me to get my rifle up and fire one shot. The zombie fell to the ground, finally lifeless.
We started to move forward again when Gabe screamed out. A zombie had grabbed his leg, and its teeth sank into the leather of his boot. The thing started shaking its head back and forth trying to rip a chunk out of him. Gabe took his time, now that the initial shock was over and aimed at its head. The zombies head exploded from the close proximity of the laser blast covering the wall behind us in gore.
“You good?” I shouted as Maze’s rifle continued to fire.
“I’m good, Captain.”
“Time to go!” I shouted over the noises of Maze’s rifle and the horde rushing towards us. The zombies filled the hallway from end to end, and there was no way to tell just how large the group was. There could have been hundreds of them. Maze continued to cover our backs as we ran. I heard the zombies hitting the ground with each shot. “How we doing back there?”
“We need to go faster.” She shouted.
Picking up the pace was easy when the thought of being eaten alive was a real possibility. Maze’s rifle fell silent as we continued to run. Zombies continued to pour out of the rooms we passed joining the ones already following us. “Drop as many as you can when I hit the door.”
Maze and Gabe turned and started firing in rapid bursts as I hit the door. It shuddered in its frame and then slid open. I heard Maze let go of her rifle and start firing her pistols. It was faster than reloading the charge. It took me a moment to realize what was in front of me before the hands reached out trying to grab me.
I brought my rifle up holding it out in front of me and slammed it into the chests of the four zombies trying to come in. Somehow I managed to knock them over. Maze continued to fire behind us while Gabe stepped forward, his rifle slung over his back. He pulled a pistol out from his shoulder holster and ended the four zombies that were trying to get back to their feet.
Ice must have seen us coming on the sensors and opened the large hangar doors. It would have helped to speed our getaway except for the zombies that now stood in our way. My attention was solely focused on the thirty or so zombies that had surrounded the Talon. How were we going to cut through them and make it inside?
“Maze, get in here.” She stepped back through the door still firing. “Ice, lock this door down. An why in the hell is the hangar door open?”
“I was monitoring your communications, seemed like you were trying to make a quick exit.”
“We were, but the ship is surrounded now. Any ideas?”
“I’ve got something in mind just get moving.”
The ship's engines roared to life as we started to run. The pounding on the door behind us grew in intensity. I wondered if the undead could rip that door apart. From everything we had seen so far I doubted it, but I wasn’t going to risk our lives on it. The horde surrounding the ship hadn’t turned around to look at us yet. They seemed more focused than ever on the ship in front of them.
We watched them for a moment and then a louder bang from inside of the hangar reached my ears. They hadn’t made it through the door yet, but it seemed like they were hitting it with more than their hands now. My brain kept screaming at me that this was impossible, but now that I had actually seen it there was no way to forget it. Sometimes ignorance really was bliss.
A few of the zombies turned around as I hit the button to close the massive hangar door. Maze raised her pistols, but I put an arm out and lowered her pistols back down to her sides. “Give her a minute.” A few more of the zombies turned at the sound of my voice. How they heard it over the roaring of the Talon’s engines, I’ll never know. Whatever Ice had planned she had better do it quickly.
The ship spun around in a slow circle knocking most of the zombies to the ground. The cargo bay doors lowered and the ship flew towards us before spinning around again so we could climb in. Maze and Gabe jumped on first, and I quickly followed. “Get us out of here,” I shouted, and the engine roared to life.
“I thought you’d never ask.” Ice laughed into my comm.
I
peered over the edge of the cargo lift, as we started to lift higher into the air. The zombies were already standing, reaching towards the ship as their dinner flew away. It was horrible what happened to these people. I had never witnessed anything so horrific in my life. Not even in the war.
I walked back into the ship and hit the button to seal the door. We made it. All of us were going to be safe. I knew one thing. There was no way I was getting into my shower until we searched the entire ship. My crew wasn’t safe until we knew for sure none of the zombies had made it on board.
“Search the ship top to bottom and all of our hidey holes. I know I’ll sleep better knowing none of those things are riding with us.”
Maze reloaded her rifle and walked out of the cargo bay. Gabe looked at me for a moment and then shook his head. He left out of the opposite side. That left me with the cargo bay. I searched everywhere that would fit a person and few spaces that wouldn’t just to be sure. The all clear signals came back from the crew.
“Grab a change of clothes and shower, and then we meet in the kitchen in fifteen. Ice has something to show us.”
Chapter Thirteen
We were on our way back to Zimmora Station. Everyone deserved a few days of rest before we jumped into FTL. The job was a success, the data had been recovered, and the ship had been sent back to Alphamerix Corporation. All we had to do now was hand over the data and collect our money. This would be our most lucrative job to date. After this, I think the team deserved a week off to spend their hard earned credits. I’d even let them pick the destination, this time.
I took two packets of apple slices from the rehydrator and grabbed an everything bar. Sure the everything bar tasted like shit, but it basically held an entire day’s worth of calories and vitamins. If you could manage to choke it down, you would stay mostly healthy until you could get some real food. The only good news was they were a step up from the military issued rations I had been used to. Eating a slice of apple after each bite seemed to make it a little bit more palatable.
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