by Jamie Davis
Kurt decided it would be nice to spend some time with Marci. Over the last few weeks, he’d been struggling with some of the feelings he had towards her. She was younger than him by about fourteen years and the daughter of one of his best friends, but there was something about her that clicked with him on more than just a professional level and he needed to figure that out. Besides, what could it hurt to go and just have lunch with her?
Kurt knew deep down he lied to himself. “Sure, Marci. Let me put this bag away and I’ll meet you downstairs. Do you want me to drive?”
“No, I’m pulled up right out front. You can ride with me for a change.”
Kurt winced. It wasn’t that Marci was a bad driver. On the contrary, she was almost too good. She, unfortunately, took a liberal view towards the traffic laws in and around the city of Baltimore and that often left Kurt feeling like he was a passenger in a thrill ride at an amusement park.
Marci laughed.
“What?” Kurt asked.
“If you could see your face right now you’d be laughing with me. Don’t worry, I won’t kill you. I’m an excellent driver. Come on and get in my car. I am starving.”
Kurt cracked a smile and nodded back at her. He might need a little bit of a thrill ride in his life right now. Of course, this upcoming mission might break him of that before long. For now, though, he was happy to just have lunch with his friend.
Chapter 6
The next morning, when Kurt and Marci headed across the city to Highlandtown, the two of them had spent most of the last day together. Kurt had to admit it felt good spending that time with her and not just because they had done a lot to plan out their course of action on the coming mission. It was also because he genuinely enjoyed her company.
As they were buzzed into Jonesey’s warehouse hideout, they found the tech mage hunched over her workbench. She worked with intense focus and initially ignored them. Smoke filled the room with a haze and she puffed away at the cigarette jutting from the corner of her mouth.
Just as the cigarette burned down to the filter, Jonesey reached for another one from the silver case sitting on the corner of her workbench. She used the last embers of the previous cigarette to light the next one.
While cancer had largely been cured by the use of genetically targeted vaccines years before, smoking had mostly gone out of style. But current styles never seemed to bother Jonesey. The elf had been around for hundreds of years and she had her habits. From her standpoint, the rest of the world would just have to put up with them.
She waved the hand holding the cigarette in their general direction as she continued working with her other hand on something resembling a small children’s toy made out of wood. It had the rough shape of a horse about ten centimeters long. “I’ll be right with you. Just wait right there and don’t touch anything. This next bit is a little delicate.”
Jonesey stuck the cigarette back in the corner of her mouth and brought both her hands together over the wooden horse. She leaned back and tilted her face up towards the fluorescent light above her, her silver hair hanging straight back in a ponytail. Kurt heard her muttering something in a language he couldn’t understand.
Kurt knew it was an incantation of some sort. She was a skilled mage in her own right, in addition to her uncanny ability with all kinds of gadgets and technology. Her hands began to glow with a golden light where they hovered over the wooden horse. Kurt's eyes widened.
The horse began to shift and its shape became less blocky and looked more like a real animal with natural-looking curves. When the glow faded away, the formerly crude wooden carving of a horse now resembled a magnificent Arabian stallion so real it startled Kurt. It stamped at the top of the workbench with one hoof while shaking its head back-and-forth as if in a challenge to those assembled watching.
Marci giggled with delight as she said, “that is awesome, Jonesey. You’ve got to show me how you did that. Is it a standard reanimation charm?”
The silver-haired elf turned towards the two of them with a smile on her face. “It’s something very similar to that, Marci, but it also has a bit of a transformation spell to it as well. The place where I get these carved animals isn’t very good at making exact replicas of what I want. That means in addition to animating the toy, I also need to change its appearance to make it look more realistic at the same time. It takes a bit of concentration but at the end of the day I’m satisfied with the progress on this particular project.”
Jonesey reached out and scooped up the wooden horse from the table top. As soon as she put her hand on it, the wooden horse became immobile again, frozen in the position it was in when it last moved. She carried it over to a large wooden chest and lifted the lid.
Inside were all sorts of wooden animals of various sizes and types. All were moving about inside the chest despite the cramped quarters in which they were stored. Jonesey reached in with her free hand and shifted the others around, opening up a small space in the midst of the animated toys. She placed the horse down between a hippopotamus and a bear.
As soon as she let go, the horse reanimated itself and begin moving around in the chest with all the other toys. Jonesey closed the lid and turn back to them.
“Jonesey, that is pretty cool. How many animals are in there?” Kurt asked.
“There are 19 right now. I need to get an elephant done and then the set will be finished.”
“Who’s it for?” Marci asked.“
“My niece is allergic to animal fur of all sorts and has never been to the circus. I thought it would be nice for her birthday next month to bring the circus to her.”
“She’s going to love that,” Marci said. “I know I’d love to have a set of animated wooden animals like that as a little girl. Hell, I’d like to have it now.”
“What would you do with something like that?” Kurt asked.
“I don’t know, maybe I’d just let them wander around my apartment. I mean they’re not real. It’s not like they’re going to leave little wooden pellets all over the floor when I’m not there.”
The previous statement brought a laugh from Jonesy. She headed back to sit at her workbench.
Kurt laughed, too. Marci had a way of making everything seem delightful sometimes.
“Jonesey, did Trent send you the details on what we’re dealing with?” Kurt asked.
“Yeah, he said it was a zombie run?”
Kurt nodded. “That’s right, and I’ve seen the video of some of the infected. These are some fast-moving undead. They’re not the run-of-the-mill shuffle around in slow motion zombies like I’ve seen in some places. Apparently, the virus that reanimates the bodies in this world is quite energetic.”
“Hon, that means you’re going to need a little bit more firepower than usual. How long do you expect to be on the other side?”
“At least two weeks,” Kurt replied.
“That’s a long time and a lot of ammo if you run into trouble. Too much standard full metal jacket ammo to be practical to carry and still outrun a fast zombie.”
Kurt nodded. “Exactly. Honestly, it’s going to be a bit of a trade off because we’re going to have to carry quite a bit of food and other supplies with us, too. It would be nice not to be loaded down with so much ammunition that we couldn’t move.”
“Any details on the undead themselves?” Jonesey asked. “What I mean is, what does it take to kill one of them? Is it the standard headshot or will any lethal damage do the trick?
“According to what I’ve been told by the client, it’s the latter. One headshot I’ll do the trick for sure, but significant torso trauma will also finish them off.”
Jonesey tapped her chin in thought as she got up and crossed to the other side of her workshop. She reached up and swung open a small metal panel in the wall. It hid a keypad beneath it. The elf tapped in a code and there was a buzzing sound and a hiss as if trapped air under pressure was suddenly released into the room. A large section of wall next to the hidden keypad popped open, sh
elves and all.
Jonesey gripped the exposed edge and pulled it back. The entire section of the wall opened revealing a fully stocked armory room with various sorts of weapons, legal and illegal, large and small, stored on the other side.
The elf beckoned for Kurt and Marci to follow her into the other room. On the way through the doorway, Jonesey picked up a large black duffel bag and begin placing items from the shelves and racks around her into the bag. Kurt nodded as he watched her pick up various types of weapons. He saw her place a couple of frag grenades into the sack. She also added a few blocks of plastic explosive and some detonator cord for breaching doors and walls, too. She finally reached the rear wall where a rack held rifles and handguns of all sorts.
“I think a gaussian flechette gun might be the direction you want to go. The ammunition is lighter than a standard lead hollow-point and the damage they cause at velocity should be plenty enough to stop a charging zombie, especially if you’re on target with your rounds.”
“Oh, I’d like to have one of those,” Marci cooed pointing at a flechette pistol. “I got the chance to fire one a month or so ago. It was quite handy, given the situation Kurt and I were in.”
Kurt shook his head at her description. She was referring to the time she killed four gangbangers while she worked to open a closed gate with her magic. He was now running from a biker clan because of that situation.
“Anything else a little less lethal?” Kurt asked.
““You don’t need less lethal, Kurt.” Jonesey pointed to the rack beside her. “Zombies call for lethal weapons. This is not a situation where you need to be all high and mighty about your squeamishness about killing.”
“That’s what I told him,” Marci said. “They’re already dead, right?”
“Exactly. Now what I’d suggest is this Z-27 model.” Jonesey picked up a small bullpup rifle design, with the magazine behind the trigger allowing for a shorter overall weapon. “It’s not the latest military-grade flechette gun of its type, but it’s small enough to be carried in tight situations and it uses the same ammunition as the pistol by the same manufacturer, so Marci can have both.”
Jonesey reached up and pulled a second identical gun down from the rack. The barrel end opened up in a rectangular slot at the end to discharge the flat metal arrowhead shaped darts. Inside the stock, a magnetic coil, powered by a strong battery and capacitor, accelerated the tiny metal darts to hypersonic speeds.
Even though they were of insignificant mass by themselves, the speed with which the darts flew enabled them to carry significant stopping power. A burst of the darts fired into a human target would turn its entire chest cavity to ground meat. Kurt reluctantly took one of the rifles from Jonesey and Marci eagerly grabbed the other one.
She moved down the row and grabbed two matching pistols, along with the companion holsters that would fit their standard tactical gear. Marci preferred a holster on her hip while Kurt favored a shoulder holster rig. At least, he had when he still carried a gun.
“Do you mind if I pick up a second pistol?” Marci asked.
“No, not at all. Here,” Jonesey said as she handed Marci a pistol identical to the first one. Marci held one in each hand while she had the rifle slung across her back. Kurt reached over and took the black duffel bag from Jonesey and held it open for Marci to place the weapons inside. “We’re going to need to keep these out of sight when we leave the building, Marci. Let’s put everything in the duffel bag for now.
Marci frowned but dropped her pistols and the rifle in the bag Kurt held.
Jonesey picked up another duffel bag from the shelf nearby and began putting all the flechette magazines in it she had on the shelves. The bag bulged so much, he doubted she’d be able to shut it. Kurt raised an eyebrow in question.
Jonesey just looked at him. “You said you weren’t going to be able to resupply, right?”
“Yeah, but that’s a lot of ammo.“
“Those guns fire at a pretty high rate. You’re going to burn through ammo quickly if you get into a dust-up with any significant zombie numbers. My suggestion is, while you’re still fresh, carry as much ammo as you can and maybe stash some of it along your return trail. It might come in handy on your way back out and if not you can always grab it and carry it home with you. I will refund you for anything you return in good condition.”
“Actually, Jonesey, I’m not that worried about cost on this one," Kurt said. “There’s a company paying the bill and they have pretty much given me a blank check.”
“Which company is it?” The elf asked.
“I haven’t gotten the name of it, yet. I’ve only received an agreement that they’ll pay any fees in full upon receiving the invoice.”
“Sounds sketchy to me,” Jonesey said. “I wouldn’t accept credit. Make them pay upfront for everything you need to buy.”
“I’ll submit an invoice on this as soon as I get home. I’ll make it clear they have to deposit the credits in our accounts before we head through the portal. Does that satisfy the conspiracy theories floating around your suspicious mind?”
“You can disparage my intuition if you want. It’s not my ass on the line. Just remember you can bring back any unused ammunition for a refund.”
The three of them left the armory room and Jonesey sealed off the wall panel behind them. Kurt was amazed at how tightly the panel sealed. There was no sign of any seam or evidence that the door and room behind it even existed. Jonesey was very good at what she did. Her craftsmanship was always excellent, even in the construction of her lair.
“All right, Jonesey, this looks like this is enough. We’ll get on the road. I’ll make sure to get that payment through to you in the next few days.”
Jonesey had already sat back down at her workbench and pulled another project over in front of her. She waved her hand in his direction, dismissing them. She’d already moved on to the next thing on her list. Marci picked up the bag Jonesey’d carried out of the armory and Kurt grabbed the bag with the grenades and the flechette guns. They both zipped them up and looped the handles over their shoulders, carrying them out to where Kurt parked his black electric SUV on the street.
The neighborhood wasn’t very nice, but everyone around knew not to piss off the crazy elf who lived in the warehouse. Her customers were generally safe from any harm and Kurt’s SUV was unmolested.
They threw everything in the back and headed across town towards Kurt’s apartment. It was time to finish assembling their kit and tactical gear. They had to prepare to leave for the portal the next day.
Kurt hoped they didn’t need all the ammo Jonesey had given them. He thought it might be a jinx against them to carry so much in with them and not rely on moving quickly and quietly to evade the undead.
Still, it was good to be prepared for the worst. Kurt drove back through the late afternoon traffic and thought about the upcoming mission as Marci sat in the passenger seat next to him, humming a pop tune along with the radio. They’d be back to work and deep in the middle of it soon enough.
Chapter 7
Kurt left the gear in the black bags packed in the back of his SUV when he parked back at his apartment. Marci would be coming over the next day first thing in the morning so that they could head up to Philadelphia together. They were supposed to meet at the gate’s location just west of the city at approximately ten in the morning. Kurt hoped they could be on the road by seven.
After they finished the final details on their tactical rigs, Marci went home. It was late and Kurt grabbed a quick sandwich before heading up to bed.
He had a fitful night’s sleep. He wasn’t sure what it was that kept him up, but he woke shaken and with more than a little concern about the upcoming mission. While killing a zombie wasn’t technically against his personal vow against killing, in his mind, it was close enough to make him uncomfortable.
Even so, he didn’t want to let anyone else on the team down. He’d do what needed to be done and deal with the personal fallout
later as necessary. He didn’t want any friends or colleagues dead or injured, especially not Marci.
After he woke up too early for the third time, Kurt gave up and got up from the bed, unable to sleep any longer. He went through his gear bags one more time to make sure he had everything packed. Dr. Nboto had gotten back to him to let him know that there were several abandoned homesteads and towns along the trip. They were uninhabited but did contain some food stores that could be used to help support their journey both in and back.
That meant he could lessen the load a little. He still packed about a week’s worth of food in the kit, which always added enough bulk to be worrisome. Kurt decided to repack the gear one more time while he waited for Marci to arrive. He was going through the pack a second time when she got there right at 6:30 in the morning.
“Morning K.C.,” Marci said as she came up to the apartment. “I’m going to head down and throw my bag in the back of the SUV. Is there anything else you need me to grab while I’m on my way down there?”
“No, I’ll be right down.”
Kurt checked around the apartment to make sure everything was in place and that the security system was fully engaged. Trent had the code to let himself in in case there was any kind of trouble. Hopefully, the upgrades to his security set up were enough to keep the gangbangers out while he was gone.
Picking up his pack, Kurt headed downstairs to the basement to finish loading up the SUV with the last of the equipment.
Marci checked over her weapons with the tailgate to the SUV down. She had several magazines of flechette ammunition spread out across the rear of the tailgate.
She taped several of them together with black duct tape. The open ends of the connected magazines faced opposite each other. All she had to do with them in this configuration was flip them over and reinsert the connected full magazine to reload quickly in a tight situation.