Black Tide Rising - eARC (25 page)

“Sure, sure. As long as you get clear on why da fuck there so many zombi and why my boys got shot!” Big Mac’s statement had the flavor of prepared outrage.

More yelling yielded to the requisite audio feedback. “Fuck, stop yelling already!” Overture commanded once the Smith stopped the feedback. Instantly his large group quieted.

Colleen swallowed. She knew that a lot of the hostility was directed towards MetBank. Ok, nearly all of the hostility. And most of it was aimed squarely at her, easily recognizable as the only woman attending in a security role.

“First item,” Smith continued. “Between MetBank and Overture, a total of thirty-seven infected were recovered. This represents the largest group of zombies, by a factor of ten, recorded anywhere.”

“In the US?” asked the Cities Bank rep.

“Anywhere,” Smith replied. “Anywhere that we have access to data that we trust. Second, a thorough reconnaissance of the immediate subway platform at the scene showed evidence consistent with the number of dead infected recovered.”

“What the hell?” came from down the table.

“What hemeans is that the amount of crap and trash at the station matches the number of zombies we killed, shithead!” This from the team lead that confronted Colleen.

“Thank you,” Smith injected. “This number is not by itself the total issue. That we didn’t know that infected could gather, and in effect, coordinate a response however automatic is as significant as the number present. It appears that loud noises in certain frequency ranges serve to strongly attract infected. There is general agreement that the sirens on the BERTs, left running, served to stimulate the emergence of the infected group. We have tested this in a limited way by testing sirens and other loud noises near subways. In most cases, no infected appeared, but in two cases since yesterday’s incident, a single infected has appeared if the sirens were left running for more than one minute. More complete testing is precluded by the limited number of assets available to respond.”

“I have asked MetBank’s CSO to present some additional details.” Smith gestured at Colleen’s boss, who stood and started talking.

“My team brought back some more useful information. You need to make head and spine shots in order to instantly incapacitate an infected. In this urban environment, you have to be certain of your backstop in order to prevent ricochets from striking friendly personnel. This is especially true for carbines and rifles. One of my drivers caught a bouncer from the only carbine in use at that time in the engagement, operated by Overture’s BERT.”

“BULLSHIT! I call Bull. Shit. We didn’t shoot nobody but fucking zombies! It was this puta bi…”

Overture’s BERT lead stood up, drowning out the MetBank CSO. This time Overture didn’t intervene, but Ramon stood and put his hand on the shouter’s shoulder.

“Easy, Emmanuel. Let me.” He gently pushed the man back from the table.

“We are sure sorry that one of MetBank’s people got shot. I used to work there, I know those guys. But you know, I am even sorrier that I lost TWO good men because the MetBank BERT couldn’t and wouldn’t coordinate their operations, although I tried to talk their lead several times.” Ramon’s English was precise, perfectly suited to his audience.

“I am sorry that their team lead, standing right there, had one of her boys, also standing right there, put a bullet in the head of one of mine, without checking the diagnosis of infection. I am sorry that their lack of capacity placed everyone at risk. The good news is that we are ready to completely coordinate and deconflict the city wide BERT management.”

Colleen had flicked her eyes around the key players near her as Ramon spoke. Smith was listening intently, and seemed to be making small hand motion behind the podium. Solly had a slight grin, but had his light windbreaker was unzipped and his right hand empty. Her boss was openly pissed and getting ready to jump in. Looking over her shoulder, she could see multiple pairs of Big Mac’s people with clear sight lines to the conference group. Counting under her breath, she realized that there was as many of Big Mac’s “security” as the rest of the PD and BERT tactical personnel combined.

Several people, including the MetBank CSO, stood and tried to talk.

Smith held his hand up. “No, please let him finish. Everyone just hold on for the moment. Mr. Gutierez, please continue.”

Ramon looked startled for a moment, expecting more argument from Smith. Colleen blinked. How the hell did Smith know the name of a mid level guy like Ramon?

“Like I was saying, we are a family. Any of use could have lost these people today. If we work together, it is avoidable. We don’t have to have poor communications and competition. This tragic loss of personnel doesn’t have to be repeated. Our organization will oversee and coordinate all the BERT efforts. We can embed NYPD observes from the NYSI into our operation center to provide top oversight.”

The acting Deputy Police Chief appeared to perk up.

There is a shot…
Colleen thought.

“We recognize that we have been harvesting more, heh, raw materials for the critically needed medicines that all of our organizations and indeed the entire city must have. We propose to sell your companies up to thirty percent of our total production at cost if we can directly manage ALL of the BERTs and are given access to the facilities AND staff at Mt. Sinai.”

…and that is the chaser
, she finished silently.

Murmurs, then louder conversations spread throughout the meeting. Colleen met Ramon’s eyes. He looked directly at her without expression. The BERT team lead, Emmanuel, smirked greasily over Ramon’s shoulder. Overture still sat, lighting a cigar and looking supremely at ease.

Smith spoke again. “That is a very interesting offer, and provides a lot of things for us all to think about. However, speaking for the financial services groups now present and for those whose proxies we hold, I think we need a day to confer with our regional officers and respond authoritatively.”

Overture waved his cigar expansively, while keeping a grip on his walking stick. “Sure mon. Tomorrow is good.”

“Wait a minute, I want to respond!” Another bank rep stood up angrily.

Smith easily deflected the comment. “Joe, not a problem but can you table this just for now? Let me talk to you right afterwards. We can get a sense of how all the banks are feeling. Bear with me, ok?”

The plainly aggravated speaker looked less than sure, but subsided.

Overture turned to the small group of city officials. “Mr. Assis’ Mayor, would you like to be talking after this? I can tell you more details. ’Course, your police are welcome to join.”

Colleen saw Smith gathering up his opposite numbers by eye, so she was ready when her CSO waved her towards the entrance. Solly cooly brought up the rear.

Smith and CSOs from half a dozen banks, all of them running their independent collection teams, were gathered on the landing.

“Gentlemen, I don’t know how far you have made it towards your minimum required dose stock for the critical staff that you need to run operations outside the City. Bank of the Americas has not completed its topline requirements. Nonetheless, I very much doubt that maintaining operations while being under the city approved oversight of Big Mac will yield much further progress,” he said.

“First things first! Why the hell did you close debate up there? You don’t speak for all of us!” Colleen’s boss replied.

“Item the first: I hope that you all got a good look at the number of men that Overture brought along. I have been looking into the spread and martial capabilities of his group since he told us how many trucks he was running,” Smith started. “Item the second: do any of you really think that the city staff and PD are hearing this proposal for the first time today, at this meeting? I don’t, and I think that it is nearly all wrapped up. Pushing back now could lead to a…less advantageous negotiating position. If you are certain that you want to work for Overture, your best chance is to get clear of this meeting now, consult with your boards and then decide.”

“What about you?” asked Cities Bank.

“We’re still twenty percent short on primary personnel and fifty percent short on likely dependents. We need a few more days of collection, and we may take them up on the offer to buy the balance, if quality is high. I don’t see us working for them under any circumstances. If we jump, we have to move our processing area to a jurisdiction that might not be as…flexible. So we collect as long as we can. Gangs I understand. Zombies are the larger unknown.”

A few other banks representatives nodded.

“We’re similarly situated at Goldbloom,” the CSO there stated. A thirty year gold shield from the NYPD, he looked stunned at the turn of events. “But we already shifted half of our key personnel from the West Street trading floor across the river to the Jersey City secondary. I am not confident that we can predict when the bridges and tunnels will become…a problem.”

Colleen looked across to Brooklyn. She saw the Staten Island ferry still plying its route, outbound from Manhattan. There were no tour boats to Ellis or Liberty Island visible, or much other river traffic for that matter.

Her boss spoke again. “I can’t see our management ceding control of our BERT’s to a known criminal. How long before the Oveture gang has some sort of quasi police status?”

“It’s worse than that,” Colleen spoke up in front of the assembled leaders of the New York City BERTs. “I think that I saw one of their teams snatching a possibly uninfected person. We have all heard rumors about what happened to the Triad BERT. Big Mac has many more teams than we do. If the police give them legitimacy, there isn’t much margin for our teams’ safety. Problems could find themselves becoming…vaccine.”

Grim looks answered her statement.

* * *

Colleen readied her crew for the night patrol. Officially, ROE was unchanged.

“OK guys, I know that you know official ROE. Here is the No Shit ROE. No sirens. No subways. No Central Park. No parking garages. If we get stuck in, and we see more than two infected, we go hot. We avoid any confrontation with other BERTs. If Big Mac wants our infected, we give them up. We will respond to direct threats defensively.”

She looked at Erich. “Erich stays IN the truck with one of the rifles. Clear?”

“Clear.”

She was relieved that he didn’t try to argue.

“Solly, you and I move as a team. We stay close to the truck. If we have relocate, the truck comes with us. No chances, minimize risk. Do you guys have any questions or comments? No? Good. Mount up.”

Their radios were tuned to the PD and Guard channels. The Army had pulled most of their people out of subways after the shoot. They had positioned several eight wheeled armored trucks at key points, to what purpose Colleen couldn’t say.

As they drove north along Broad, poking into the side streets that meandered unpredictably, south of Canal, Colleen tracked her surroundings while Solly scanned his side.

“Was it time to jump tonight? Bring back a load. Tell her guys, and then demand her vaccine and money from the CSO? Would he accept her departure? Could she convince him? Was it worth it to risk staying too long?”

Outwardly she was calm, like her rock, Solly. Inside, she was starting to squirm.

The radio started to chatter about the crowd at Sheep Meadow in Central Park being larger than usual, some band or other. Solly called out a possible infected a few blocks later. Female, black, stripping her clothes off haphazardly and screaming. By now the signs of infection were familiar. In a minute or less she was going to start getting bitey.

A screech of brakes and Erich neatly stopped right next to her.

Like a machine, Colleen and Solly dismounted.

“Ma’am?” Solly called. The infected looked up, eyes wide and bright. A low growl replaced the earlier screams.

“Tase her,” Colleen said.

They shot the infected simultaneously, and smoothly bagged and zip tied her. As they maneuvered the infected to the truck’s rear gate, the bank’s BERT radio relay on Colleen’s shoulder sounded.

“Any units, this is MetBank Zero Three. We are at Union Square with three infected in the back. We have three Overture trucks boxing us in, and lighting us with spots. Need immediate support!”

Larry’s voice was clear. Colleen’s guts churned as she heard the fear in his radio call.

“Zero Three, Zero One enroute. Four minutes. Lock the doors, don’t get out. If you can ram clear do it. If they ask for the infected, say yes and kick them out the back and leave. How copy?”

There was no reply. Colleen repeated her call, struggling to modulate her voice.

“Zero Three, Zero Three, acknowledge!”

She switched to the all bank shared channel.

“Any BERT, this is MetBank Zero One. We are responding to a help call at Union Park. Reports that contractor BERTs are confronting one of our units. Request support.”

A moment later two radio calls stepped on each other. All she could make out was, “…Golf Actual…”

She broke in. “Break, break—station Golf you are go, all other stations wait one, please.”

“MetBank, this is Two Golf, Golf Actual with you.”

Colleen checked the call sign chart. She was talking to the CSO from Goldbloom.

“Golf, Zero One, can you support our unit at Union Square? They are not answering calls at this time. We are several minutes out. Ouch!”

Erich had driven over a tall curb to bypass a light and Colleen smacked her head against the passenger window. She missed the next couple calls.

Then she heard: “Zero One—yeah, we are about to turn into the square. We see three, four, five trucks. Looks like they are loading…fuck! They are loading BERT personnel in the back of their truck!”

“Golf, can you engage?”

“Shit, shit—taking fire! Joe turn le…” The Goldbloom transmission stopped.

Solly didn’t need to check the GPS. “Two minutes, maybe less. Are we doing this alone?”

Colleen though furiously. If her guys were alive, they weren’t going to stay that way. But they were her guys. Five to one odds were bad—but if she shot first? She couldn’t just leave them, could she? A little voice in the back of her head started whispering
I told you so’s.