“I’ll do the same thing in Sherry’s room.” Cash turned to Roy. “Hold down the front.” He then called to the boy with the bundle of knives. “Go in the front bedroom. There’s a heavy, mirrored dresser already blocking the window. Push the bed up against it and then you get back to your spot at the back door. Get Valerie to assist.”
“Who’s Valerie?”
“Thick chick in the living room.”
Valerie came over and introduced herself to the still out of breath boy.
Before they left the room, the boy asked, “What do I do with these knives?”
Cash answered, “Hold onto one and put the rest on the coffee table in the living room.”
***
It took ten minutes for the tasks to be completed and afterward everyone assumed their posts, Cash asked Grace to try her cell phone and to call as many of the neighbors as she knew.
“Find out who’s at home and who has weapons. I think it would be wise for all of us to be in one place.”
Grace began dialing frantically. Roy ordered Grace’s children to lie down and assured them he and the rest of the adults could offer protection. The kids nodded robotically, but their wide eyes gave away their fear. Their poise vanished minutes later when the electricity went out.
T E N
9:02 p.m.
Jimmy Robinson and his co-pilot, Anna Svenson, were part of the Northern California Police Air Services helicopter crew, and after five years together were known as the best tandem in the ten-unit agency. Jimmy took the job because he liked the adventure of air flight, having made supply runs in Vietnam. Anna joined him on the job six months later, after becoming bored with her previous position as a deputy at the County Jail and having been a pilot in the Coast Guard.
The first time Jimmy heard her accent he thought it added to her charm. His cohorts expressed the notion it “sounded funny,” to which Jimmy responded, “Bet you wouldn’t think it sounded funny if she slept with you.”
They never got the chance to find out. The black man from the bayous of Louisiana and the young woman born of Swedish immigrants made an unlikely duo. Even stranger, the 59-year-old Jimmy and the 34-year-old strawberry blonde had been sleeping together four years.
Jimmy had smooth, brown skin and looked to be in his mid-forties. The statuesque Anna drew the stares of all of her male co-workers and from day one had rejected the advances of all but her chosen one. They kept their personal life together under lock and key, as there was a policy against employee dating. Moreover, their being a “salt and pepper” couple was something else most of their law enforcement brethren frowned on.
He never aspired to be part of what he saw as their “good ol’ boy” network. He figured if they made fun of her accent when she wasn’t around, his skin color would be the next topic of their so-called “humor.”
At ten minutes to nine they received orders to assist the Pittsburg Police department in a search and rescue mission over the Delta. They went into action unsure of what their mission entitled beyond lighting the nearby islands in the delta and scouring the scene for bodies.
“Why did they wait three-and-a-half hours after the fact to attempt a S and R?” Jimmy grumbled. “Unless…”
Their eyes met and Anna finished his sentence for him in her thick Swedish accent. “They want us to recover something else.”
“I’m not recovering any cargo unless I know what’s in it.”
“Why so paranoid?” Anna teased.
“I’ve been monitoring the radio transmissions coming out of that area. Once the military arrived on the scene, they took charge of the information being dispatched. I get leery when the feds are involved. Moreso when they don’t bring in their own people to do their grunt work.”
They boarded their Eurocopter HH-65 Dolphin and followed the curves in the delta, swinging from left to right, with the chopper’s powerful spotlight shining on the murky waters. When the chopper closed to within three miles east of Van Sickle Island, five miles northwest of the train crash site, they were able to see the wreckage from up high.
“Look at what’s happening down there.” Anna said flipping a switch on the control panel and the copter’s infrared cameras brought up a shadowy picture on the dashboard monitor. “Looks like there’s a riot going on.”
“I’ll radio base and see what they want us to do.” Jimmy flicked on the radio. “Chopper zero-one to Base.”
He missed the response, for he heard a ping-ping! noise on the outside of the chopper.
Anna confirmed his suspicions. “Someone’s shooting and I think we’ve been hit!”
Jimmy slowed the chopper and made a wide arc over the water. He saw the red needle indicating their fuel supply was shifting back and forth.
Jimmy’s voice was calm as he radioed the information. “Chopper zero-one to base. We’ve been hit by gunfire and we’re losing fuel.”
“Chopper one, we will send a fire unit. Tell us where you want to rendezvous,” came the call back.
“Our best bet is Jersey Island.”
“Sherman Island is closer,” Anna told him.
“Too many rough areas,” Jimmy replied. “We won’t have to travel that much further.”
He radioed the Jersey Island coordinates to the dispatcher. “Our ETA three minutes. Over.”
The chopper began to lose altitude. Jimmy looked at the fuel gauge. It was showing less than a quarter tank.
“This is a severe leak, Anna.” He looked at her and for the first time in their five years as crew members he saw fear in her eyes. “We’re going to get as close to Jersey Island as we can.”
“You mean—”
‘We might have to make a water landing.”
***
9:22 p.m.
All Grace found in her house for light was four long, white candles and a flashlight with half-charged batteries. She went to the fridge, emptied the last bit of milk from a plastic jug, refilled it with water and then used a candle to look under the sink so she could retrieve a roll of duct tape.
Tanisha and Valerie looked on as she taped the light so that the lens was flush against the jug. When she turned on the flashlight the living room became aglow. The children were then bundled under blankets, and Jenny sat with them, trying to keep them calm. Valerie, armed with one knife in hand and another in a cardboard scabbard held in place by her belt, stood in the hallway ready to alert all if the bedrooms were somehow breached.
“Any news on the neighbors?” Roy asked.
Grace plopped down on her sofa. “I got in contact with Jake Farmer, but he said he wasn’t helping do shit.” Grace gave her brother a woebegone expression. “Soon as he said it, I heard his window break and his phone fall to the floor.”
“That’s all that growling I heard,” Cash said. “He’s probably been turned into ground beef by now, and it’s just a matter of time before they try and get in here to do the same to us.”
“Any other neighbors home?” Roy asked, peeking out the window.
“Ned Lathan. He has a pistol and that’s it. He said he’ll come if the coast clears, because right now those….those things are tearing at the Lucas and King families on the other side of Valerie’s house.”
“If we can get to Bob’s place, we can snatch up some of his lanterns,” Cash said to Grace. “Call Ned and let him know Roy and I will meet him.”
“No!” Valerie shouted. “You can’t leave all of us women here!”
“Guess you forgot about us, huh?”
The question was posed by one of the boys, a sixteen year old named Duke. He was a stocky kid with a gap in his teeth and had skin the color of caramelized butter. He and the other boy, Noodles, were cousins who were left alone while Noodles’ parents attended an out of town party.
Noodles was a year older than his cousin but twenty pounds lighter. He fancied himself a ladies’ man and wore a gold earring in his left ear that was partially obscured by his shoulder length perm.
“We can handle things.” Noodles made
eye contact with Cash. “In fact, me and Duke got your backs.”
“We’re counting on it,” Roy said.
Grace re-dialed Ned’s number and the two spoke quietly.
Cash addressed the others. “Our first order of business is to further secure this place. Second, we need to make sure we have more light, a radio and ammo.”
“Okay, what do we do about food?” Valerie said, calling from the hallway. “There are ten of us here and we don’t know how long those things will be out there.”
“My sis keeps plenty grub,” Roy said. “Food ain’t a problem. We gotta make it through the night. By then, maybe help will arrive.”
“Okay, we need a radio,” Cash said. . “We’ll need to get some kind of news report.”
“I have one in my room,” Grace answered. “By the way, Mister Lathan said be ready in five minutes.”
Cash checked his gun. “I have four bullets to my name, but the thing is, bullets only slow ‘em up. If they attack us in a pack, ass out.”
“So we’re gonna have to be able to separate them, shoot them one by one, isolate them and saw off their fucking heads,” Roy said bluntly.
“Are you serious?” Valerie said.
“I’ll explain what I mean when we get back,” Roy said. He turned to Cash, “I got five bullets in my piece and about forty more shells stashed in Tayshun’s and Devin’s room.” He avoided his sister’s hand-on-hip, white-hot glare.
Cash nodded and cast his eyes upon Noodles, who held his father’s rifle.
“Got seventeen shots left in the clip,” Noodles said.
“We grab Bob’s shotgun and some shells when we get to his house,” Cash said.
Roy opened the door. “Let’s do this.”
Before either man had a chance to second-guess the plan, Roy bolted in the direction of Bob’s house, about fifty yards away. The move caught Cash off-guard, but it didn’t take him long to catch up. After they left, Duke took the flashlight and shined it in the direction of Bob’s place.
Cash and Roy barreled through the door. Cash leaped over the prone body of the dead man and trained his gun on the broken window.
“You get the lanterns and the bullets. I got his shotgun,” Cash said, taking the gun out of the sticky red pool of blood on the carpet. He could hear the growling zombies, but the screams of the Lucas and King families had stopped. Less than a minute later Ned entered. He held a pistol in one hand and a duffel bag in the other.
“Grab the lanterns and let’s get the hell outta here!” Ned yelled. “His bullets and lanterns are in his bedroom closet.”
They heard Roy call to them, “I got ‘em!”
Before they could rejoice, two figures appeared in the door. Ned turned and hit both, but only succeeded in knocking them back a couple of steps. He bolted for the door with Cash and Roy following. He spun on his heels and his next two shots dropped the creatures, but there were four more closing in from their left.
Cash looked up and was overjoyed to find Duke standing in the door, still shining the flashlight. Noodles was firing a shot every three seconds or so, which was just enough to slow the creatures down. He fired six shots in all and when Cash and crew came stumbling through the door, a hyperventilating Grace slammed it shut. Jenny and Valerie pushed the chair and jammed it underneath the knob.
“We’re gonna need something sturdier than this for the door,” Valerie announced.
As Roy set the lanterns on the coffee table, Ned shouted to Jenny and Valerie, “Those lanterns are battery-operated. Turn them on, hurry!”
Of the three lanterns that were brought into the house, only one had fully-charged batteries. The other two offered low-level illumination and Cash suggested that for the time being they be turned off.
Ned tossed his duffel bag onto the floor and took out enough bullets to fill the clip in his .357. Roy sprinted to the bedroom for his ammunition. Grace ran into her room and grabbed her radio.
Cash swung the front door open, knelt and let off two blasts from the shot gun, which took off one of the zombie’s lower leg. Noodles threw open the living room window and fired three of his remaining shots into one of the zombies.
Ned Lathan drew a machete from his bag and shouted for Cash and Roy, to keep the other three zombies at bay. Cash was impressed by the man’s bravery as he ran to the two prone zombies and using all he had, beheaded the things. It took several strikes to get the sharp-edged blade through the cartilage and bone in their necks.
The other three zombies went down, but were by no means finished. Cash hesitated as he saw Miss Lillian Court, owner of the Labrador that Roy killed earlier, step from behind one of the buildings. She was still in her security guard uniform and broke into a sprint for her apartment. Before Cash could shout a warning to her, one creature got her from behind and the other two soon joined in. A nauseated Cash shut the door and instructed Noodles to do so with the window.
“This shit ain’t gonna work,” Valerie moaned. She slid down the wall and landed on her ample derriere.
“Cut out all that gloom peddling, bitch,” Noodles said.
“Watch your mouth,” Grace ordered.
Noodles shook his head and sighed. Grace sat on the sofa, turned on the radio and fumbled with the antenna. Meanwhile Valerie rose and stepped back into the hall to stand guard. Ned and Cash were on the front door and window. Duke and Noodles manned the rear entry. Roy stood guard near the front bedroom (his sister’s), while Jenny remained with the kids.
After several seconds, Grace was able to tune in a channel, but the volume could only be heard by those within a few feet of her.
“…We at KGO news have been following this story all night, and this bulletin has just come in…”
E L E V E N
9:47 p.m.
After Pederson signed off from the videoconference, Benton, Crossfield and Greenbaum held a separate meeting. Benton, a former the CIA Weapons Specialist, told the others that he felt betrayed at not being informed from the beginning of The SR-7-Zombie Factor Chemical Weapon Project (as it was officially known).
“Great timing, bringing me in after things reached disaster status,” he growled. “Chemical Weapons testing is something I’ve forgotten more about than you two will ever know.”
“Put your prick back in your pants. This isn’t about who was or wasn’t in the loop,” Crossfield pointed out. “You were brought in on an advisory basis only.”
Benton had known about the project at along, but acted as a shadow on the periphery. While it was Pederson who cared for the baby, Benton was the absentee father. It was his hope that no one would discover his behind the scenes role and that any fallout would have no impact on his career.
Greenbaum had her own complaints and let them be known. “My organization has personnel at ground-zero completely unaware of what they are being exposed to, and what consequences will unfold if that leak isn’t quelled.”
“This is the sort of thing we’d normally test on foreign soil,” Benton insisted. “My agency has done this sort of thing before.”
“Your hindsight serves no useful purpose,” Greenbaum said. “As you know, I suggest this chemical be disposed of and all R and D ceased. It has been an abject failure and a waste of hundreds of millions of dollars.”
Benton gritted his teeth at what he perceived as her know-it-all tenor. “You couldn’t be more mocking if you broke into a Billy White Shoes Johnson touchdown celebration.”
Crossfield added his viewpoint to the mix. “Olivia, we can’t throw away what’s potentially the most important military advantage in history. With continued research, we could perfect SR-Seven. Who knows, this accident could be just the learning tool we need.”
“I respectfully disagree,” Greenbaum countered.
“Try to see the big picture. Think of the edge a successful version of SR-Seven would give us on the battlefield against the Chinese or the Russians. It’s easy for you pencil pushers to dismiss military weaponry because of its high price
tag and occasional botched tests, but the price of freedom shouldn’t come with a ceiling.”
Greenbaum’s mouth twisted to one side. “This chemical has exposed everyday Americans to God knows what. We’ve had innocent people killed, jailed, and now there are reports of this shit turning people into homicidal maniacs who can only be stopped by burning or beheading. Can you imagine the havoc if that stuff is in the California delta? That’s drinking water for twenty-two million people!”
Benton countered, ‘According to reports from the crash site, a small amount leaked into the water and some got into the air. There is no evidence that this is harming people or animals outside of ground zero.”
“Bullshit!” No one was more surprised by Greenbaum’s language than she was. “We have reports of zombie killings from a town twelve miles away from the crash site. There is no other explanation for this except it being airborne and spread by rainfall…”
“Speculative!” Crossfield insisted.
“…The storm over California is one expected to dump precipitation as far east as Nebraska, the Dakotas and Minnesota. We need to prep for a worst-case scenario.”
“And your suggestion is just what?” Benton fumed.
“Place scientists along the path of the storm to measure the chemical content of the rainfall.”
“Do what you gotta do on your end,” Benton insisted. “Crossfield, gather any remaining SR-Seven and get it under lock and key.”
“I’ll have my guys confiscate the rest of that chemical crap and we’ll bury it so deep in the Nevada Desert, Satan will be the only one worried about its side effects,” Crossfield said with a confident smirk.
“First things first. You need to place everyone responsible for this fiasco in custody.”
“Everyone?” Crossfield looked as if he might burst into laughter. “There’s only one man who can be held responsible and that’s Pederson. He killed the others who knew about the shipment.”
“We need to put him under surveillance. Loose lips sink ships, and we don’t know what Pederson might say if he decides to try and save his own ass.”
Zombie Factor Page 6
