The Apocalypse Crusade 2 (25 page)

“No,” growled Deckard. “You aren’t our leader. I say we vote. Do we pick this place or do we go on and try to find a better spot? All in favor of staying raise your hands.” Eight hands went up while only three remained down.

“Excellent,” Meeks said, when he saw the vote. “You’re going to get what’s coming to you. Kidnapping, assaulting a federal officer, conspiracy to…”

Deckard grabbed him by the lapel. “Shut up,” he snapped. “Burke, watch the girl. Chuck watch Eng. You, Fowler, watch our back and Mrs. Shaw, lead the way.”

“It’s Ms Shaw, really, and you all can call me Courtney.” Her eyes slid from Deckard’s and lingered on Max when she said this. She then went around to the front door of the building and after fishing out her keys, she let them in. “Hello? Lieutenant Pemberton? Renee?”

She had expected to be greeted like
The Prodigal Son
returning, instead Pemberton held a gun on her. “Don’t come any closer, Courtney. Let me see your eyes.” She opened them as wide as possible and he squinted to see if she was infected. Next, he had every member of the group come forward and do the same thing.

Meeks started in as soon as he was dragged forward by Deckard. “I’m an FBI agent and I am being held against my will.”

“Is that so?” Pemberton replied. He looked far from concerned and dismissed the man without another look. He was most curious over Courtney. “Why’d you come back? Too many zombies or too many soldiers?”

“Zombies,” Courtney replied. “Out east there was this long grey wave of them. I bet there were at least twenty thousand of them. There was no getting through in that direction.”

“Heading east?” Pemberton asked, mostly talking to himself. “Would it be wrong if I said: good? I’m sorry but it’s been weird since you left. We’ve seen bands of them for the last few hours. They’re almost always in groups of a hundred or more. Thankfully they haven’t come sniffing too close.”

“That will change if you don’t take certain precautions,” Thuy told him. She began ticking off instructions: “Your windows should be covered in dark cloth or cardboard. Basically anything to reduce the amount of light that escapes. This will be made easier when we institute a strict light and sound policy. Next, you’ll have to treat every…”

Pemberton interrupted: “Who are you?” He turned to Courtney and asked virtually the same question: “Who is this?”

“This is Dr. Thuy Lee from the Walton facility. She’s an expert on the zombies.”

Thuy grimaced at the odd compliment. “I’m not an expert on the infected persons and I highly doubt there is anyone who can make an honest claim of being an expert. That being said, simple commonsense procedures should increase our chances at remaining secure in this facility. The infected persons seem to have retained some of their faculties and thus we should minimize such things as light, noise, movement…”

“And smell,” Jack added.

“Yes,” Thuy said. “Showers should be taken, clothes washed and we should douse the doors and windows with either bleach or ammonia. Food stores and ammunition should be inventoried and all available containers should be filled with fresh water. There’s no telling how long the water will remain on.

Pemberton’s mouth came open. He was not used to being ordered around in his own station. As he failed to make a noise and only stood blinking, Thuy continued: “Mr. Deckard will be in charge of securing the facility. When it comes to the defense of the building, everyone will listen to him. That is not an option. Mr. Fowler, if you will be so kind as to begin the job of cataloging our weapon situation. Lieutenant Pemberton, will you please take charge of the prisoners.”

“Who are you?” he asked again

Thuy gave him a smile, withholding the normal combination of annoyance and condescension she reserved for people who, having not listened to the first response, asked the same question twice. Pemberton’s situation allowed for some leeway. “I am Dr. Thuy Lee. I am the lead researcher at the Walton Facility…or, since it burned down, I was the lead researcher. These people,” she paused to gesture at the thirteen others, “are survivors of, for want of a better word, the
holocaust
we’ve found ourselves in. Though I don’t assume expert status, our collective wisdom and experience constitutes such and our advice should be acted upon without question or delay.”

“I suppose I can see to these three,” Pemberton replied. Thuy was not wrong in guessing that his knowledge of the zombies, other than spying on the roving bands of undead from the safety of the station, was almost entirely secondhand.

He stepped forward and Meeks hissed like a snake: “They started this. They are responsible for the deaths of thousands. You should be arresting them. You’re obligated to do so, damn it.”

“Aw, shut the hell up,” Burke said, in an angry drawl. “They’re the good guys, dip-shit. And asides, there ain’t no law left in The Zone. You, me, all of us, are under a fuck-all death sentence for the crime of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, so maybe you should shut your hole.”

Meeks ground his teeth but remained quiet, while next to him Eng shot an eyebrow up. “If there aren’t laws any more, you should let Anna and I go. All we care about is survival and we’d be more help unrestrained. It’s not like we’d run away. And even if we did, why would any of you care?”

“How ‘bout y’all do me a favor,” Burke answered, “and go fuck yourselves.”

“Mr. Burke!” Thuy said, sharply, in admonishment. When he shrugged and grinned, she took that as an apology and then addressed Eng with an air about her that suggested she was looking upon a lesser form of life. “Laws may be in a state of suspension, however common sense is still in force. Lieutenant Pemberton, if you can see them to a cell.”

Pemberton seemed relieved to be following orders instead of giving them and with Burke and Johnny Osgood’s help, he escorted the prisoners away. The moment they left everyone looked back at Thuy. Happily, she assumed command—it was a pet peeve of hers to have to submit to the authority of someone she deemed less intelligent than she was—this constituted the majority of the population.

“Ms. Shaw, I will need a count of everyone in this station. I want names, occupations and any abilities or specialties they may possess. Ms. Glowitz and Dr. Wilson, if you would accompany her, I’d like an evaluation of their physical and mental states. You understand what to look for?”

“Yeah,” Stephanie answered.

The group broke up, hurrying to their assigned jobs. Chuck went with Deckard and that just left the two teens, Cheryl and Benjamin.

“What can we do?” Alivia asked.

Thuy had a task that she would normally assign to the two adults, however Cheryl had the vacuous good looks of someone who had been adorable her entire life. She came across as someone who had never had to rely too strenuously on her intellect, while Benjamin had a slimy, unctuous feel to him. His eyes were those of a pervert’s. While Thuy spoke they roved up and down her body, hungrily and she could tell that he was only half listening; the greater part of his mind was on something else, something lecherous, she guessed.

That left the two teens. They had survived when so many adults had died. There had to be a reason; luck only got someone so far.

“There is something I need from you two,” she said to Alivia and Jack. “I need you to find a room set aside from the others. We need a place to quarantine any more incoming survivors. During the early stages, the disease acts in an insidious manner and out of necessity we have to keep newcomers from intermingling until we know for certain they are disease free.”

“I bet they have an interrogation room,” Jack said. “Like with a two-way mirror. We can use it to keep an eye on them.”

“Go find it,” Thuy instructed them. To Cheryl and Benjamin she said: “Let’s go see the rest of the station.”

It wasn’t much of a building. A squat central block made up the administration and communication areas; one wing held the cells and three different interrogation rooms, while the other held individual offices and the armory. They found the seven dispatchers and the five state troopers who hadn’t dared an attempt to break out of The Zone, sitting together in the break room in the main part of the building.

They were a quiet group, dispirited and afraid. After they had been given a basic check-up by Dr. Wilson, Thuy directed them to start covering the windows and shutting down any extraneous light sources. She then had them bleach the frames of the doors before barricading them. Soon, she had the station as fortified and prepared as it could be.

Then came the waiting.

Time became a heavy weight on their shoulders and it passed with dreadful slowness. Most of them drowsed but couldn’t sleep with the fear building up. Around nine, Deckard set the first watch and then confided in Thuy: “I’d like to be able to talk to the outside world. It feels like we’re all alone here.”

The dispatchers had turned off their radios long before. All that had come over the airwaves had been screams, or the frightened whispers of troopers begging for backup as they were slowly engulfed by the hordes. A number of people had used the frequencies to announce their suicides. The radios had been off for hours.

Despite her exhaustion, Courtney flipped through the channels, and as she did, her brows clouded over. “What the hell? Renee, get over here. Try to find an open net.”

“What is it?” Deckard asked. “Static?” He’d had a sinking feeling in him that had grown as the day progressed. It coalesced around what he figured would be the inevitable solution to the problem of the zombies: nuclear weapons. A heavy dose of radiation would wipe out the Com-cells and every zombie in The Zone.

“No, not static,” Courtney said, her eyes slightly out of focus. “It’s the radio channels. I’ve never heard them so full. It’s like there’s a thousand conversations going on. It’s mayhem.”

General Collins was living within the mayhem. It felt like a river with a current so strong that it simply swept him along; no matter how he fought back, he was powerless against it.

His command and control of the perimeter was almost nonexistent. The radios were all but useless. Every frequency was jammed with soldiers squawking like birds. Privates were trying to contact their sergeants, demanding more food and ammo and reinforcements. Sergeants were trying to find their men who were scattered without rhyme or reason along a perimeter of a hundred and twenty miles. Half the officers were trying to find their NCOs, while the other half were leading stray bands of men—there were conflicting orders coming from every direction and so much chatter that it was impossible to tell who was who.

With his headquarters company wiped out, General Collins had only his Blackhawk and Lieutenant Colonel Victor to rein in his division. He went back to staring at his tactical display, not knowing how he was going to untangle the mess in front of him. The worst of it was Colonel Montgomery’s 50
th
brigade. Even with the two-hundred helicopters constantly in motion, he had men and equipment strung from Kingston to the Jersey shore.

And yet, somehow he was holding the northern section of The Zone against thousands. Part of that was due to the fact that he had been reinforced by Governor Stimpson. That had been an odd meeting for Collins. Stimpson’s trademark tan looked to have faded overnight and he couldn’t seem to stop smiling even when Collins had given him an update on his appalling number of casualties. He just went on smiling, his very white teeth showing more and more, as if the politician in him had sprung a glitch.

After Collins had begged, practically with his hands clasped together, Stimpson had taken a cue from the Connecticut governor and had militarized every law enforcement officer in the state and sent them flying to The Zone. This had added to the complexity of the situation since no one knew to whose command they belonged and for how long they were expected to remain and where they were going to get ammo for the myriad of weapons they had brought with them. Montgomery had the idea of using them as a reserve force, but as evening fell, the fighting heated up and he was forced to throw them into the line piecemeal.

On the west side, with the Hudson River acting as a deterrent, things were quiet enough for Collins to begin moving men from there to reinforce the north and south lines.

On the eastern side, things were simply too far gone. The governors of Vermont, Massachusetts, and Connecticut had halted their men at the border and had made it clear that since Stimpson had basically thrown them to the wolves by not protecting that area, they would not send in any forces to participate in joint operations. Each would protect their own citizens only.

There was a lull on that front that wouldn’t last. Recon photos showed a great wave of undead slowly but surely baring down on the men crouching behind their improvised fortifications. Connecticut would be hit first and they were the most vulnerable.

All told, five thousand National Guardsmen were rushing into position. Unfortunately, fewer than eight hundred were infantrymen. Augmenting this force was a smattering of companies including the four hundred members of the state’s ceremonial militia and a thousand police officers armed with pistols and shotguns.

Collins thought their lines would crumble under the first onslaught. He directed his Blackhawk to the Connecticut border at full speed. It was a thirty minute flight and during that time, he was forced to listen as the FEMA director made pie-in-the-sky estimations of the Agency’s ability to mobilize and how they would have the first supplies rolling by morning. Collins wanted to ask how that was possible since four states had closed their borders and Pennsylvania would surely follow suit shortly.

Everyone in the northeast was on the verge of panic. In the face of an unprecedented media blackout, the President’s canned responses to softball questions had not been convincing and now a good portion of the thirty million people in the New York area were packing up and heading south. No one knew where they would all go, but that wasn’t Collins’ problem. His problem was that he had to listen to the FEMA director for another minute.

Lieutenant Colonel Victor gave him an excuse to hang up: “You have another call.”

“Listen Rebecca, I’ve got to go. You know your agency better than I do. Use your best judgments.” He didn’t know if what he had said was true. She was a political appointee and had never run even a hotdog stand on her own.

The next call wasn’t any better. “This is FBI director Ron Gallarti. I need to talk to you concerning certain individuals…”

“Just one moment,” Collins interrupted. With a glare and holding a hand over the mike, Collins punched his assistant in the arm. “Why, in God’s name, would you put this guy on the phone with me?”

Though Collins was in his early sixties, he was still a big man and his knuckles seemed to have hardened with age. Lieutenant Colonel Victor’s arm went dead from the blow. He tried not to let it show how much the punch had hurt. “You’ve been dodging his calls for three hours now. From what I hear, he’s influential with the President. Maybe you can use that.”

“For your sake, I hope so,” Collins said, and then released the mike. “Yes, Director, what can I do for you?”

“First I need you to answer my calls. You’re not the only one who’s busy around here. And second, I need the suspects that you have detained. Doctors Lee, Holloway, and Eng. Two are believed to be foreign nationals who are responsible for this act of terrorism and the third is, at the very least, an accessory.”

Collins had no clue what the man was talking about and as much as he wanted to apprehend whoever had created the zombies, he didn’t have time to play detective. “We have a couple of hundred people who have escaped from the quarantine zone penned up on the football field at West Point. You are welcome to them once it’s been deemed they are healthy. Now, I have to go…”

Director Gallarti interrupted: “No. These people are being held at your command post.”

“Then you won’t have to worry about a trial. My command post was overrun hours ago. Everyone was killed. Now, since I can’t be of any further use, I have work to do.”

He hung up and was about to apologize for hitting Victor when his assistant pointed at the computer. “You have three more calls in the pipe. This one may be important, it’s the Director of the CDC.”

As the woman had less actual knowledge of the Infected Persons than Collins, the call wasn’t important and yet it was necessary. “We’re sending a fourth team by chopper. They should arrive any minute,” she told him

“A fourth team?” Collins couldn’t recall the first team that had been sent, though he vaguely remembered a few people in blue bubble suits hanging around one of the tents at the command post.

The CDC Director’s voice grew sad. “Yes, two yesterday and one today. They were supposed to have gone to your command post but we haven’t heard from them at all. We’re worried something happened to them, so we are sending this crew to your headquarters.”

“In Troy?” Collins asked with little hope in his voice. The first crew undoubtedly died alongside his men and if the second crew had gone to the command post, they were as good as dead also.

“No, your field headquarters. I have the map coordinates as just outside the town of Poughquag. Is that right?”

Collins put the heels of his palms hard into his eyes before answering: “No, damn it. That was overrun. You need to call your men back, do you hear me?”

“I can’t,” the Director replied in a high voice. It sounded to Collins like she was about to puke. “Cell service is down and the radios are a mess. Can you do something from your end?”

“Me? I…” Collins broke off looking at his display. His was the closest Blackhawk to Poughquag, however a detour there would mean he wouldn’t arrive in time to help with the battle at the Connecticut border. There was no telling what sort of shape the citizen-soldiers were in and just at the moment, they were far more important. “I can send another helicopter after them. It’s the best I can do.”

Perhaps because she didn’t realize the distances involved, the CDC Director gushed out a: “Thank You.”

When he could hang up gracefully, he asked Victor: “Scare up a bird and a few soldiers and send them to Poughquag. We have a CDC crew to rescue.”

“That’s in The Zone. You know that.”

Collins knew and he knew that because of the fuel situation and the distances, the closest Blackhawk was forty minutes away. They would be long dead by then. “Make sure they go in full MOPP gear. And don’t have them dally. If the CDC crew isn’t within a hundred yards of the command post, they are to pull up stakes and get out of there.” Once the order was given, he had to turn his mind away.

He ignored the other two phone calls and stared down at the black beneath the gunship. There were no lights. There seemed to be no life. Then far ahead, he saw lights like white stars on the black background of the earth. The pilot headed right for them. It was the command post for the Connecticut National Guard. The chopper hovered in the air as the pilot searched for a clear area to land. All available space was taken up by army vehicles of every conceivable nature, including a few ugly old
Gamma-goats
.

There were even four Strykers and three of the boxy M113 armored personnel carriers. Collins almost sighed in relief at the sight of them. A site was found for the Blackhawk and once it was set down, Collins and Victor huffed it down the road to where a number of tents had been set up. “Where’s your commanding officer?” he asked of the first soldier he came to.

“In one of them,” the soldier said and pointed toward the tents.

“No shit,” Collins said, and then strode past the man. He didn’t have time to ream anyone out. The first tent was a makeshift armory and a mob of soldiers and policemen were trying to get in. The second was a med-tent where, already, a number of men were inside complaining of maladies to keep them off the line. These men needed reaming out more than the last but again he left in a huff. The fourth tent in line was the Battalion CP. It was crowded with fourteen men.

Victor announced him: “Tent! Ah-ten-hut!”

The men were slow getting to their feet. Most were curious, but a few were angry that some over-decorated ass-hat had come to make the convoluted and dangerous situation more so. Collins understood all too well and, had this been an exercise, he would’ve done his smiling thing, and asked a few questions and left, but this was real and he had been living it for twenty hours and in a way, he’d been living it for twenty five years.

“At ease,” he said. “Who’s the officer in charge?”

A small man of about thirty stepped forward and snapped to attention. “I’m Lieutenant Colonel O’Brian of the 1
st
battalion, 102
nd
Infantry, assigned to the 87
th
Infantry Combat Brigade.”

“And that makes you mine,” Collins said. When O’Brian opened his mouth, Collins sneered it shut. “I know your orders, son. You are not to leave the state, but you are still under my command.”

“Yes, sir,” O’Brian answered, visibly upset. Again, Collins understood; it was rare for a Lieutenant Colonel to have independent command and any officer worth his salt craved the opportunity. “Let me show you my dispositions.”

A large computer monitor sat on a folding desk; its screen was taken up by an enlarged map of western Connecticut. Problems jumped out right away, but Collins refrained from saying anything until he had taken in every detail. “14
th
CST? What is that?”

“Civil Support Team,” O’Brian answered. “It’s a team of experts who advise the civilian authorities concerning WMD threats.”

Collins kept his shoulders from slumping by the slimmest of margins—more non-infantry soldiers. Almost the entire Connecticut National Guard was made up of them and the interesting thing was, not a single one was under his actual command. Legally, he could only command the men of the infantry battalion because they were attached to the 87
th
, but not the MPs and the medics and the CSTs, however he didn’t have time for legalities.

“Ok, I see what you did, holding the center with your infantry companies and, yes I see the east-west highway is important, but your other forces may not hold, in fact they will not hold. Look at this line from Mount Algo to the Massachusetts border all you have there are two companies of medics and a few hundred policemen.”

“It’s the least populated part of the state, sir.”

“It won’t stay that way for long, son. When a thousand IPs come up against policemen with pistols they are going to run right over them and your flank will be turned, just like that.” He snapped his fingers in O’Brian’s face. “Here’s how we’re going to do this: you will break up the infantry battalion, right down to squad level. You will then attach two squads to each of the other companies to stiffen their spines, so to speak.

Since the idea was unorthodox and would require a ton of work in a short amount of time, the assembled officers eyed each other with little shakes of their heads. Some even began whispering to each other, something that had General Collins growling: “Shut your mouths. You can bitch later. Right now, I’m not done. We will also pull back all the men you have on the east side of this long lake. We will situate them both north and especially south to protect the approach to Danbury. It will strategically shorten our lines and allow…What?”