Run: A Post Apocalyptic Thriller (16 page)

“Billy! Billy are you OK? Oh shit…”

Ali didn’t relish being down in this wet, slimy shaft alone, but it would be infinitely worse if Billy was dead. Then she would be down here with a zombie. She pulled the still lit flashlight from his pocket and shined it on him. In the murk, she couldn’t tell if he was breathing, so she felt for a pulse, and was rewarded with a strong
thud-thud
under her fingers. She heaved a sigh of relief, and panned the white beam in both directions down the egg-shaped brick-and-mortar corridor they were in.

The passageway went both right and left as far as the flashlight illuminated. As she was turning around to check behind her, she whacked the light into one of the ladder rungs and it went out. If she thought it was dark in the basement above, then the black down here was absolute. There was a fleeting moment of panic as she hit the flashlight with her palm, but it came back on.

She could barely discern shuffling footsteps scraping across the manhole cover a few yards above her. The basement was no longer empty.

18

Commander McInerney radiated authority as he addressed the citizens of Alcatraz. He had already discussed the fate of the world, and the pros and cons of using the island as a base for his sub and troops. A few pertinent questions were asked by the group, but one man was proving difficult. Yes, Mr. Martingale was definitely going to be a problem.

“So now we’ve gone from a police state to a military dictatorship?” Martingale demanded peevishly.

“I assure you sir, there will be no dictatorship. I will not attempt to force you into anything, or steal from you, but each person here will need to contribute if we are to survive. If we—”

“Contribute what? Will we be forced into slave labor?”

“Sir, I just told you I would not be forcing anyone…”

“Yes Commander, but what assurances, other than your word, are you willing to give?”

“I’ve given orders for a complement of weapons and ammunition to be given to the police who were here when we arrived. There will be training for these weapons for anyone who desires it. In addition, this man,” the commander indicated a sailor to his left, who stepped forward, “is Lieutenant Commander Pitt. Pitt is an expert on military history and tactics, and is in charge of Hammer Platoon, Detachment Bravo while their OIC and the rest of the platoon is otherwise engaged. Lieutenant Commander, please tell them what you told me about Alcatraz.”

Pitt stood tall and addressed the room with his hands clasped behind his back. “You folks had an excellent idea to get away from the city. There was really no other option. You chose this island because even though the proximity to the mainland isn’t as far away as you would have liked, you have a distinct barrier between you and the Lima Deltas, the undead. It was a good plan, but there are issues. This is a partly cold weather climate near the sea. You’ll eventually need to grow food here, but I’m guessing you don’t have the resources, and maybe not the know-how. In addition, the cold weather and rocky soil on this island could defeat your crops before you start growing. You’ll need to run forays into the city to get supplies, which is a huge infection risk. Then there’re your defenses. For right now, the distance you’ve put between yourselves and the Limas is good, but you have no walls at the beaches. What happens if ten thousand Limas decide to walk across the bay and onto the shore here? They’re dead, so they don’t need to breathe. Did you see Pirates of the Caribbean? Once they figure that out, they’ll come across the bottom and you’ll get invaded. You’re going to need walls, gun emplacements, buttresses, battlements, etcetera. But the most important drawback of the island is that it’s an island.”

This last was met with confused stares, including from Meara and Barnes.

Pitt clarified, “You came here because it’s an island, but you didn’t take into consideration, or didn’t have time to think about, where you could run if you had an outbreak. Eventually, somebody here’s going to die, and there’s no place to run if the Limas are already on the island. You’ve done great work, but there’s still a lot to do, and we are willing to help.”

“But you’ve still parked a nuclear submarine next to our living quarters!” Martingale shrieked.

One of the commandos that had caught Martinez by surprise leaned over to him and whispered: “Is this dude for real?”

“You have no idea…”

Martingale continued: “Now that we’ve learned there may be no spare parts for your reactor coming, how can we be sure we all won’t die of radiation poisoning, or any other nuclear factor?” He stabbed his index finger at McInerney, bypassing Pitt altogether, “You’ve said we can use your help, but you really work for us anyway! We are the American people, and you swore an oath to protect our way of life, from all enemies, both foreign, and DOMESTIC! If you think for one second that we…”

“Mr. Martingale, SHUT UP!” McInerney was incensed. “You seem to think that some agency is going to sweep in and make this all better! Well, all the people manning those agencies are stumbling around looking to cannibalize the folks they were sent to help! They’re dead! All of them! The country you knew is GONE! We are here because we, just like you, have no place else to go.”

The commander took a deep breath and seemed to visibly calm himself. “What we are doing here is discussing options that will be mutually beneficial to all concerned, and your constant interruptions and outrageous accusations are not helping. If you have any
intelligent
questions or anything
intelligent
to add, by all means do so. If not, please do not waste our time.”

Not giving Martingale time to interrupt, McInerney turned to the Lieutenant Commander: “Lieutenant Commander Pitt, if you would conclude please?”

“Thank you, sir. As I was saying, it’s almost July. If we want to survive past September, we will need to foray into the city and get some things. Specifically growable foods, tools, and construction supplies. We need to make a wall around the scalable portions of the beach. It won’t need to be huge, just something we can use to hamper the progress of the Limas, maybe six to seven feet. Also, and this is tremendously important, we will need to fashion weapons, probably pole-arms of some sort.” Pitt held up his hand to alleviate the oncoming questions, “Ammunition is a finite resource, especially as there aren’t any more factories in production. We should only fire our weapons as a last resort, conserving as much ammo as possible for any crowds we may encounter, in an attempt to alleviate getting swarmed.”

Pitt continued, “I believe that the first thing we do should be to isolate people to the cells, with a mechanism—”

Martingale went berserk. “I KNEW IT!” he screamed. “We’ll all be slaves to their agenda!”

He carried on for a moment longer before Anna Hargis stepped up and punched him in the face. Martingale staggered back, holding his assaulted nose.

“You’re going to get us killed and I won’t have it,” Anna yelled. “We all almost died getting here, and now you want to spit in the face of the best help we could possibly have? Are you an IDIOT?” She raised her fist as if to give him a second wallop, and Martingale cringed, but Dallas grabbed her by the waist, lifting her effortlessly as if she were a child.

Dallas held her up as she struggled momentarily. Everyone looked between her and Martingale until she regained her composure. Dallas gently allowed her feet to touch the floor again when he was certain her killing mood was gone. “Ya made yer point, kid. He ain’t gonna be mouthin’ off for a spell.”

Sporadic hooting and applause went through the crowd, and a slew of children, Rick’s daughter Sam among them, came from the next room to see what the hubbub was about. Sam was engaged in an imaginary conversation on her now useless cell phone.

Rick stepped up and quieted everyone with his raised hand. “Alright people, this is exactly what we don’t need. Fighting amongst ourselves is how we die. We need to work together. All of us. Please, no more fighting, and if anyone wishes to be heard, I’m sure the Commander and the Lieutenant Commander will take constructive questions at the end. Lieutenant Commander?”

Pitt was not smiling.

“As I was saying, and please let me finish before you interrupt, I think that putting people in cells by family is the best way to contain an outbreak here on the island. We can construct simple locking mechanisms that a human could figure out but not a Lima. This way we can each egress the cells when needed, but a potential infection risk is already quarantined. Nobody is locked in but the Limas.”

Nods of agreement and some small banter went through the crowd. This guy seemed to have it all figured out.

“Are there any practical questions?”

A little boy, who had wandered into the meeting holding the hand of a young woman, stuck his hand in the air.

Now Pitt did smile. “You in the front?”

“Can I go in the submarine?”

Pitt glanced at McInerney. “That could be arranged.”

The rest of the children’s hands shot up instantly.

“I think we can take everyone aboard who would like to visit,” said McInerney, “perhaps in small groups.”

Sam stepped forward and spoke to her father. “Daddy, Mommy wants to talk to you.”

Rick smiled. “We’re almost done here, honey, we can play in a minute.”

“No Daddy, she said it’s important.” She held the cell phone at arm’s length toward Rick.

Rick took the phone and put it to his ear listening. There was nothing. Frowning, he looked down at Sam, holding the phone out for her to take.

“That isn’t funny, Sam. Try not to do that again, OK?

Distressed, Sam took the phone. “But daddy!”

Rick was beginning to respond when the phone rang.

19

Doc Murda contained his rage as best he could. A United States nuclear attack submarine? Obviously that was difficult to contend with. The momentum had shifted, and not in the direction he wanted it to. Murda had lost quite a few soldiers to misfortune, or perhaps due to his anger. Would the outcome of the battle have been different if he hadn’t let the cat out of the bag prior to the attack? Probably. Sour grapes though. There was no re-do on this one, his soldiers were dead.

In addition, as he grilled the occupants of the boat that had not been sunk, he couldn’t come up with a plan on how to take Alcatraz with it being guarded by one of the deadliest weapons of modern warfare. Yes, this would take some thinking.

“So it just exploded?”

“Yeah,” Masta G answered, “there was this warning from a guy named McAllister, or McNamara or something, but we all thought it was the people on the island talkin’ shit. Then the other boat just blew up. That same guy told us to leave, and we did.”

“I understand.”

Murda looked at another man. “And what about the missiles?”

“We can’t figure out how to make them work. There’s instructions on the sides, but when we follow them, the little green light don’t come on like it’s supposed to.”

“A green light?”

“Yeah Doc, the instructions say that a green light needs to be on, or it won’t shoot.”

“So you’re telling me that you can’t fire my missiles because of a green light that won’t light?”

“Well, yeah.”

“I see. So while the attack crew was risking their lives, and in fact dying to take a fortified position guarded by no less than a nuclear attack submarine, my engineering crew was foiled by a broken light?”

The man backed up a step, looking warily around. “I… I’ll figure it out!”

“Unnecessary. Pee Wee, would you please escort this fool out?

Before the man could bolt, Pee Wee’s gigantic arms wrapped around his frame. The man thrashed about, but Pee Wee hefted him as if he were a child. A skinny child. Pee Wee walked to the stained window with the struggling man in a crushing bear hug. He pinned the hapless banger to the wall with one massive hand, while he opened the big stockroom transom with the other. The moans of the undead outside became louder as the glass opened. The giant picked up the smaller man one last time and pitched him out the three story window of the warehouse loft. The unfortunate man let loose a short scream before his impact with the street below.

Pee Wee closed the window and latched it before folding his arms and standing silent once again.

“Imbecile. G, Pee Wee, would you please accompany me to the missiles?

The three gangers took the metal stairs to the warehouse floor, where several of the men from the surviving tug sat on the floor or in tattered old chairs looking dejected.

Murda gently put his hand on the shoulder of one man who looked up with poorly-concealed apprehension.

“You men are heroes,” intoned Murda. “You couldn’t fight a submarine with a tugboat. Retreat is an option when facing an overwhelming force, always remember that.”

A few of the men looked at each other crossways.

“While I do not condone failure, you had no choice but to come back here. Do not despair, we will achieve our goals my brothers.”

Murda, Masta G, and Pee Wee continued across the warehouse floor to the area reserved for munitions storage. They approached four wicked-looking green tubes, one of which was propped up on a tripod. The top of the cylinder sported a large sighting mechanism and yellow lettering stenciled on the side of the tube read: BGM-71F TOW 2B.

Murda got down on one knee and put his finger to smaller lettering, reading the arming instructions, moving his finger as he read. He walked around the missile a few times, touching a panel here, and clicking a button there. He lifted a red safety cover and clicked a silver toggle switch. A small red light on the sighting mechanism flashed to life, but the large green light on the missile itself remained dark. Murda tapped the light twice with his index finger and it sputtered, then glowed brightly.

“Idiot,” he said, and rolled his eyes. He flicked the toggle back down and re-covered it with the safety switch. Murda looked up at Masta G and smiled a toothy smile. “Now we’re in business.”