The Tide_Dead Ashore

by Anthony J Melchiorri

  “On me!” Dom commanded.

  The Hunters filed after him as they ran down the stairs and into the house below, through the inner courtyard and past the bodies sitting in a pool filled with algae-green water. Dom kicked the door. It crashed open, falling into the street, and he led the teams outside. A few military vehicles pocked with bullet holes and marred by the silver scars of Skull claws sat abandoned and broken in the middle of the dusty road. They moved between the vehicles; here, at least there was plenty of cover.

  Dom’s heart thrashed in his chest. His bones and muscles ached. He was too old and too injured for all this action. But when he looked at his people—Meredith and Miguel, Jenna and Spencer, Glenn and Andris—there was no chance in hell that he would give up. Not when they were trusting him to lead them out of this mess. Each was bloodied and battered, though none more than Andris, and still they were determined to see this mission through.

  A few Skulls spilled into the street from one of the alleys. One was hunched, prowling with its nose in the air, slitted nostrils flaring as it sniffed for a hint of prey. Its red eyes searched the debris-strewn street, and its head swiveled back and forth.

  Dom signaled for everyone to creep as quietly as possible. He gestured toward an alley filled with what once must’ve been stores. With each step Dom took, he was mindful of the broken lanterns and metal trinkets lining their path. Once-colorful carpets and clothing were now stained by blood and weather. Scarves fluttered around a store with shelves of what looked like some kind of tent-shaped clay pots.

  “Down here,” Dom whispered, taking them around another turn in the alley. He didn’t know exactly where they were headed, but it took them away from the street.

  The ghostly howls of the Skulls echoed down the alley, along with the scratches and scrapes of their claws and the crunch of taloned feet over the glass lanterns the Hunters had already passed. Although they were still pursued by Skulls, there weren’t as many now. They seemed to have split up after having lost sight of the Hunters. The Goliath’s low voice rumbled in the distance, and Dom hoped the majority of the Skull horde would follow it instead of them.

  The Hunters rounded another turn. There were no storefronts here, just doorways and the occasional streetlight hanging by a wire.

  “You okay, Chief?” Miguel asked Dom.

  Dom looked down to where Miguel was pointing. The fatigues around his injured calf glistened in the moonlight. His damn stitches had broken. “I’ll be fine. You take point. Head north.”

  “Aye, Chief,” Miguel said.

  They worked their way through the alley. By this point, Dom heard only the telltale rattle of bony plates from what he estimated were no more than three or four Skulls. He signaled for Glenn and Jenna to hang back with him as the others cleared the path ahead.

  “Take ’em out,” Dom said. “Quietly.”

  “You got it, Captain,” Jenna said.

  The trio waited for a few seconds with their rifles shouldered. When the Skulls came careening around the corner, Dom plastered the first with two shots to its chest then two more to its head. Blood wept from the fresh holes as the creature collapsed. Its brethren fell beside it. One let out a long death rattle. Its fingers twitched. None got up to give chase.

  For a moment more, Dom had the Hunters wait, but the only Skulls he heard sounded farther away.

  They caught up with the others, and Dom struggled to keep pace beside Miguel. He grimaced with each step. Each step was hurting worse, and his nerves were screeching at him to lie down. No amount of adrenaline would make the bullet wounds that had shredded his calf muscles feel better.

  Miguel slowed as they passed into another alley that spilled out into a larger street. He paused, and Dom waited beside him, surveying the road. Like the rest of Tangier, it was filled with heaps of trash. Forgotten luggage and crates spilled open, telling the story of so many people who had tried to take flight. Dom imagined most were now Skulls. He spotted a convoy of military vehicles that had been set up in a sort of barricade at one end of the road. The machine-gun nests were empty and surrounded by spent casings.

  On the opposite end of the street, he saw a couple more amphibious armored vanguard vehicles, or VABs according to the French Army. These VABs were covered in mud, and a fresh trail of wet tire tracks stretched behind them. These weren’t abandoned like the other vehicles in the street. These had just been used.

  Someone else was roaming the streets of Tangier tonight.

  -19-

  Kara stumbled backward from the freshly turned Portuguese airman. His face twitched and spasmed as he growled at her. His lips tore back into a snarl, and long ropes of saliva spewed out. Red eyes like hot embers glared at her. The way he started and stopped, coming at her in spurts, made her think he was struggling with his turn. As if the human part of him was fighting against the influence of the Oni Agent.

  Her foot caught on something as she backed away, and she fell. The man plunged into the grass to grab her, his jaw working on instinct, and he came up with a mouthful of dirt. He didn’t seem to notice as he pounced again.

  “Help!” Kara yelled. “Someone help!”

  She crab-crawled away and tried to stand. Her feet slid out from under her on the wet grass, and she fell hard again. Maggie tore into the man’s arm, shaking her head to tear into the muscle. The crazed man thrashed and snapped. His teeth bit into her shoulder, and Maggie let go with a whimper. The man tossed the dog aside, and she landed in a heap.

  “Help!” Kara yelled again. The base wasn’t that far away. She could run for it.

  Maggie stood on shaky legs and started toward Kara. But the man was faster, churned on by the rage of the Oni Agent. He tackled the dog. They went down in a ball of fur and talons. Dog and man battled, and for a second, Kara stood there watching helplessly. Maggie would give her life to save Kara. The dog probably didn’t know what kind of noble sacrifice she was making. She was just acting on instinctual loyalty.

  I need to get back to the base, Kara thought. I need to get help. Leave the dog. Run. Save yourself.

  She knew she should do it. Every bit of logic told her so. She was outmatched. The infected man was twice her size. She had no weapons.

  But she would be damned if she let him hurt her dog.

  “Asshole!” Kara yelled. She ran at the infected man, building up speed. The dog yelped and whimpered. Each yowl of pain stoked the fires of anger burning in her chest. With everything she could muster, she cocked back her foot and unleashed a kick that would have made a professional soccer player jealous.

  The man’s teeth crunched with a sickening sound. Several shot out in an explosion of bloodied saliva. His head snapped back, and Maggie scrambled out from under him. Red streaks marked her fur, but the golden retriever didn’t let her evident injuries stop her from protecting her human sister. She stood before Kara, growling and snapping and barking.

  Kara kicked the man in the head again before he could recover. His teeth clamped down on his tongue. More blood flew as he howled.

  One more for good measure, Kara thought. Better to disable this bastard now than to let him wander the base to wreak havoc. She cocked her leg back and unleashed the power stored in her muscles once more.

  But this time the man was ready. He caught her leg and twisted it. She fell flat against the ground, and the man pulled her backward. She fought for purchase, grasping at the grass and dirt, trying to thrash out of his grip.

  She kicked again and again, but she couldn’t muster the same power as before. Then she felt the sting of teeth breaking flesh. Hot blood ran down her leg. She let out a yell of pain and frustration. Maggie snapped at the infected man. He swatted her attacks away, impervious to the bites he was receiving. He’d lost interest in the dog. He had tasted Kara’s flesh, and that was all that he wanted now.

  “Help!” she yelled again.

  Kara’s world started to disappear. She saw a vision of red and black as pain overwhelmed her, adrenaline no longer
able to hold it back. She’d killed Skulls before. She’d survived much worse than this. But she’d let her guard down. She’d been foolish, grown soft.

  This could not be how it ended.

  No. This was not how it ended.

  She twisted in the infected man’s grip. The motion ignited a fresh wave of pain in her savaged leg, but she still tried to aim another kick at the bastard’s face. The nascent Skull did not let go.

  Something exploded from her periphery. Dark shapes crashed into her attacker, and he was yanked away. Kara pushed herself up, gasping to catch her breath. Maggie whined and curled into Kara. The dog licked at her wounds.

  Kara’s attention remained on the infected man. Two Portuguese airmen wrestled him to the ground, pressing his face into the dirt. Another ran up and tied the man’s hands behind his back.

  “It is okay,” a man said. “You are okay now. This man, he hurt you?” The airman’s eyes lingered on her wounded leg before she could answer, and he mouthed an O. “Let us get you to the medic. Can you walk?”

  “I need some help,” Kara said.

  “Of course.”

  The man offered her a shoulder, and Kara leaned on it.

  “My dog?”

  Another man scooped up Maggie. The dog whimpered slightly but held still, and together they limped back to the base. The pain in her leg wasn’t as excruciating as Kara had expected. The scars along the side of her face itched, reminding her of the closest brush with death she’d survived. She had truly put her body through the wringer. Just like any of the Hunters. Just like her dad.

  She steeled herself as they walked. She had no room to complain. She had just survived another bout with a Skull and lived, whereas so many millions of people hadn’t been so lucky. As she entered the medical clinic at Lajes Field, she wondered if her luck might be running out after all. There were a few patients in the beds already. No one seemed injured, but they were sweating profusely, their faces awash in pallor. Dread weighed Kara down like a stone wrapped around her neck.

  “What...what’s wrong with them?” she managed to say.

  “It is a flu,” the man she was leaning on said. “Or maybe food poisoning. We are not sure yet.”

  Kara had seen these symptoms before. “Have you told Dr. Winters?”

  “We did not want to bother the doctor. It is not nothing, but—”

  The man paused. He seemed to suddenly understand what she was really asking. At once the blood drained from his face. He deposited her into one of the beds and sprinted from the clinic with no further explanation.

  ***

  “We’ve got to get over there,” Lauren said, seated at the chart table across from Thomas. “We just found out a new strain of the Oni Agent is present at Lajes. It’s only a matter of time before the whole island is covered in Skulls again.”

  “Shit.” Thomas rubbed a hand over his shaved scalp. He looked out over the dark horizon to their east as if he could see Morocco. “That means we’ve got to leave Dom and the others out there. I don’t feel great about that.”

  “What’s the range on the helicopter? Can we still get to Dom if we need to?”

  Thomas shook his head. “It’d be tight. Really tight. Not room for error...but shit, what am I saying? If we save Lajes, we’ve got access to better air support than anything we can launch from the ship.”

  “Yes, yes,” Lauren said, more enthusiastically now. She needed to be on the ground at Lajes. But first she had to convince Thomas. “We’ve got to go. If this outbreak gets out of control ...” She let the words trail off. Judging by Thomas’s expression, she knew that he knew what was at stake. “You think Dom is going to approve?”

  Thomas laughed. “You tell him Lajes is at risk of falling. Tell him the place where his girls are staying is about to be overrun from inside. What do you think?”

  Thomas picked up a handset and called Chao in the workshop, relaying what he and Lauren had discussed. “Let Alpha and Bravo know we’re pulling back to Lajes. We’ll still provide air support if it’s needed, but they’ve got to factor in the extra time.”

  The engines began growling as they set their course for the Azores. They slowly accelerated into the night, plowing through the dark waves.

  “I’m always telling Dom how I want to be back in the action,” Thomas said, “but between you and me, I’m too damn old. I’d rather we take out the infection at Lajes with your kind of shots instead of guns.”

  “Me, too,” Lauren said. “Can you put me in touch with Ronaldo? I want to get things rolling.”

  “Can do.” Thomas picked up the handset again. “Lajes, this is Thomas Hampton of the Huntress. I need Colonel Ronaldo immediately.”

  Thomas handed Lauren the headset. The line crackled.

  “Ronaldo here.”

  “It’s Dr. Winters,” Lauren said. “We need to set up a quarantine and contingency plan now.”

  “I am listening.”

  “The Huntress is en route. You need to do exactly what I say, because if you don’t, if one mistake is made, this is going to get out of hand very quickly,” she said.

  “Dr. Winters, I—”

  Lauren continued as if the colonel hadn’t spoken. He might be in charge of an entire air force base, but this was her domain now. “If anyone shows any signs of fever or subcutaneous hemorrhaging—”

  “Any what?”

  “Discoloration in the sclera. Red eyes.” Her thoughts were zooming ahead of her words. Every second counted, and she feared they wouldn’t get to Lajes soon enough to make a difference. “Anyone who seems sick needs to be quarantined. They must be secured. Tied down, behind bars. Whatever you need to do.”

  The memories of Ivan rampaging through the ship came back to her in a flash. He’d merely had a scratch, but it had only been a matter of hours before he’d lost all semblance of the trained soldier he’d once been, morphing into a rabid predator who had almost killed Glenn and Divya. That had been just one man. For all she knew, most of the people stationed at Lajes were already infected with the new strain of the Oni Agent they’d found in the dog.

  “I can’t emphasize this enough,” Lauren said. “If you even suspect someone might have the Oni Agent, you’ve got to isolate them.”

  “I understand,” Ronaldo said. “We already have at least six suspected cases. How long will it take for them to turn?”

  “I’m not sure. Anywhere from a couple of hours to a day or so. It depends on several different factors, including the strain of the Agent, the patient’s immune system....”

  “Okay, okay.” There was a beat of silence. “Captain Holland told me you have a cure. For my men and women who are already sick, can you cure them?”

  Lauren hesitated. The Phoenix Compound’s ability to resurrect someone infected with the Oni Agent depended on how far it had progressed and how damaged the brain was from the prion component. “It’s my hope that we can. But we must act fast. We’ve found that inducing a coma slows the progress of the infection and can greatly improve the prognosis. If anyone starts showing any outward signs of aggression, I’d advise your medical personnel to immediately place them in a coma.”

  Ronaldo sighed. “That may be difficult. We have only a few paramedics and nurses. The doctors did not make it through the initial days of the outbreak. We are not exactly equipped for more advanced procedures.”

  A pit formed in Lauren’s stomach. She had seen their medical clinic briefly before. It wasn’t much larger than the ship’s, and their supplies would be limited. There were nearly two hundred people on the island. Lauren might need to treat them all.

  “Okay.” Lauren took a deep breath. “We’ll establish a secondary clinic aboard the Huntress. In the meantime, gather all the information you can on those who have been infected. We need to figure out how they encountered the Agent. Water sources. Any unusual behavior. If we find out what’s going on, maybe we can stop the spread.”

  “Understood,” Ronaldo said. “We will begin the investigat
ion immediately.”

  “Good,” Lauren said. “When we get there, my epidemiologist, Sean McConnelly, will lead the search for the source.”

  “Very well,” Ronaldo said. “I thank you for your assistance, Dr. Winters. Is there anything else we should do in the meantime?”

  Pray, she wanted to say. Instead, she said, “Just follow the protocol I gave you, and you should be safe until our arrival.”

  Lauren ended the call. Six individuals at Lajes were already infected. If they couldn’t find how the Agent was spreading, Lauren could only imagine how quickly the entire base would fall as the inhabitants tore each other apart.

  She wished Divya were here to help. The doctor was no stranger to setting up clinics in dangerous settings, and her expertise would be invaluable in dealing with the outbreak. But Divya was somewhere over the Atlantic or maybe even in the US by now, delivering the samples of the Phoenix Compound needed to start manufacturing the therapy Stateside.

  Lauren was all too aware that the Huntress’s own capabilities were extremely limited. And now, with the Agent spreading through Lajes, those limits were about to be tested.

  -20-

  The air smelled of damp earth intermingled with a hint of decay. Fog swirled between the trees like ghosts searching for the living. Shepherd pressed the rifle to his shoulder, desperate to see past the obfuscating haze. All around him, the world was a mess of gray and green. Trees seemed to jump out of the rolling clouds. Leaves crunched underfoot no matter how carefully he tried to step. The crispness in the air told him winter was biting at autumn’s heels.

  A line of men and women limped behind him, some assisted by their comrades. Divya and Navid carried Matsumoto between them. The Weavers helped transport Terrence even as Connor clung to his mother’s shirt as he walked, tears trickling from his eyes. The midshipmen guarded one flank. Rachel scanned the woods with a fierce expression on her face, and Rory held a handgun despite his splinted wrist. Costas directed the Portuguese airmen to fill in the gaps of their defensive lines.