After twenty minutes of hammering, the pod didn’t give up. They could hear it slowly make its way along the hull above the waterline, looking for a weak spot. Luckily, with a submarine, there is no such place.
Bachman just hoped it was an operational submarine and not a mock up for training. Not because he planned to attempt to pilot the thing, but because a real submarine would be better at withstanding the creatures outside. He could imagine a sub that was never meant to submerge being made from weaker material.
“It’s driving me crazy,” Emma stated while holding her hands over her ears.
“Just pretend its part of the sounds the sub is making,” Bachman said while they moved through each section as they checked for supplies.
The sub is huge; it’s a three hundred and sixty-three foot long metal tube. They found some flashlights attached to the metal wall. They could now move around without worrying about hurting themselves by slamming their head into something.
They find that the submarine has two watertight compartments. The forward section contained the living quarters and weapon-handling space. The aft compartment contains the bulk of the submarine’s engineering systems – power, generation turbines, and drinking water-making equipment.
However, they find only dry food in the messdeck.
Emma was shocked at how big the kitchen was on the sub. She could imagine Peter telling her off for referring to it as a kitchen. The thought made her sad.
There were cupboards filled with dry ration packs, which they consumed while sat on the metal decking with their backs against the cold wall. It was hard to find a section that didn’t have something on it – cabinets, handles, wires, studs, buttons, cases, pipes, and gauges. Every conceivable surface was used for something.
They gulped down warm water from bottles that was stacked in boxes along one side of the messdeck.
The sound of the pod tapping the outside magnified as it passed right over their heads as they sat chewing on ration bars.
“There’s enough food and water to last weeks,” Emma stated.
“Would you want to hide down here that long?”
“No.” She lowered her head. “I hate this place and everything it stands for.” She let out a long breath.
“I know what you mean. A bunker designed to save the American way, while in the process leaving the majority to die.”
“It’s a mockery. A sham. Why pretend to care, to want to save, while just next door they’re creating biological weapons from the very thing they are running away from.”
“Maybe mankind has run its course,” Bachman muttered. “Maybe it’s time for a new era – a new species.”
Emma laughed. “Sorry, I don’t know why I’m laughing. I’m so tired.”
“There are dozens of bunk beds back there. Get some rest. I’m heading there after I check to see if the shower and toilet works.”
He doesn’t mention the fact that the sailors refer to the beds as coffins.
Instead, he said, “As they say, everything looks better after a good nights sleep.”
“No matter how long I sleep; this situation is never going to look better.”
“Amen to that.”
164
Frank, and the others
On the island in the camp
Somewhere in New York State
After they sat down for a quiet dinner, with awkward shuffling of feet under the table, and muted chatter, they were shown where the showers and toilets were, and then their bunk beds. There are no male or female dorms, not for the adults, they were all put into a large hall with beds down both sides.
Frank lay on the bottom bunk below Naomi, purely because no one else wanted to sleep on the same bunk as her.
Frank questioned if she wanted the bottom bunk.
“Fuck you Father. Are you afraid I will fall through and squash you while you sleep?” She stared at him while he turned red and mumbled an apology.
“I just meant–”
“Honestly, I don’t give a shit what you meant,” she said as she heaved her bulk up onto the top bunk with a grunt.
Frank lay staring at the springs above him stretch to their limit. The bed made an ominous groaning sound.
He showered under cold water, but due to no choice, he had to put the same dirty clothes back on. They were told tomorrow they could look through the boxes of clothing, to see if they could find anything that fit them.
The meal warmed his belly, and he felt full for the first time in weeks.
Lasagna with vegetables on the side, washed down with orange squash.
He sat pushing the food around the plate even though he was hungry. It seemed surreal sat around a table with strangers, eating a meal off a china plate after everything they had been through that day. Eating politely with a knife and fork and using a napkin.
I never thought when this day started I would have been through so much. Seen so much death and suffering. All within twenty-four hours.
Even with everything he had seen during his life – all he had committed – the day’s events were still shocking.
Frank rested the bible on his chest. He gripped it tight, as if it would provide the answers he sought. Since finding the Word of God, he found solace from just holding the book, knowing what it contained word-for-word.
He truly believed it had cleansed him of his past deeds. It delivered him from his sinful ways.
At first it was a kind of camouflage, using it to hide behind, a way to deflect his past and stop people from paying too much attention to him – people instantly became quiet and respectful when they saw the white collar and bible.
He started to wonder why. The bible never held any power over him. That is, until he started reading it – studying it. It opened up a whole new world – a world of forgiveness.
He realized there was a way to wash his sins away – his past and misery – his and others.
Frank knew whatever the situation the book had the answer, a rhyme and reason for why evil existed – why people acted badly toward each other. Why the world was the way it was.
However, the situation he now found himself in was testing his beliefs to the absolute limit. He was finding it hard to justify the evil. Evil inside man was understandable, accountable. Nature or nurtured explained most situations.
There was no evil in nature, so to speak. Creatures kill to eat, not for fun. A tsunami or avalanche isn’t evil – it doesn’t plan to kill.
But this infection was beyond anything he could justify.
He knew the bible is riddled with plagues that tested the faithful and culled the pagans. God even destroyed his own people on numerous occasions.
The Flood wiped away a whole world of man, apart from Noah and his wife and family. Even though he knew the bible story, he always reasoned it was just that, a story meant to teach and direct. He couldn’t bring himself to believe God would kill so many. Not only allow them to die, but was the hand that caused the death and suffering.
He was shocked when he discovered that according to some scholars, if all the deaths in the bible, which were fully documented throughout, were added up, God personally killed thirty-three million, forty-one thousand, two hundred and twenty people – men, women, and children. Interestingly, in comparison, Satan only killed a mere ten people, which were Job’s seven sons and three daughters, and that was only after God gave him permission to do so.
As he lay on the bunk, with the springs groaning above him as Naomi lay awake puffing on a cigarette, he once again questioned why God would allow the world to be saturated in suffering. Millions dying. Tens of millions more infected – turning, then turning others. An endless chain of suffering.
Why does God allow this to happen? For what reason could he allow it to continue?
Most things happening in the world can be attributed to man’s own greed and want. Money is the root of most of the world’s problems. If people stop to think and reason, they come to the conclusion that things can be mad
e right if man changes his ways.
Very few things are irreversible.
Disease and hunger, he reasons. There is enough medicine and food to be evenly distributed across the world. There is no need for millions to die from starvation while other countries let food go to waste and rot.
Large pharmaceutical companies have the cures for most of the diseases that ravish the world – diseases that can be eradicated and stopped for mere dollars. However, unless you have the money, the medicine is unattainable. For some people, a dollar might as well be a million, they simply don’t have the funds.
Frank’s hands grip the bible harder, as if seeking answers from the black leather binding. He watches ash rain down over the side of the bed.
Over food, they learned there was a large cargo ship anchored out at sea. The lake joined the ocean by a wide river. They ferried provisions and people back and forth, preparing the ship for when they sailed away seeking a safer place.
Supposedly, from when they first found the ship, they have been preparing it. Collecting food and water. Everything they would need to support them all. They wanted it as a main base of operations. They could travel safely around the coastline and send smaller boats out to check for survivors and provisions.
They had all been offered a position on the boat, if they wanted it.
Frank decided he would take the opportunity. Like Noah’s Ark, he would climb aboard knowing it was possibly the only chance of survival he has available.
165
Lindell, and the others
On the island in the camp
Somewhere in New York State
After the others wandered off to shower and find a bed, Lindell and Terrance and Troy stayed to chat with Smokie.
“How ready is the cargo ship?” Terrance asked.
Smokie pushed a piece of food around her smeared plate.
“Everything is in place. We are simply getting as much food and water aboard as we can before heading off. So if the worst-case scenario arrives, we can stay out to sea for months if we have to, while the worse of the infection dies out.”
“Everything is in working order – engines, bulkheads, the lot?”
“As far as we know.
“Alan is our captain, but he’s only ever piloted fishing boats; he’s still trying to work the steering system out.”
Troy piped up. “I spent nine months working on an oil tanker.”
“Really?” Smokie said.
“Don’t get me wrong, I didn’t pilot the tanker or anything, but I know my way around a large ship, and I used to stand in the pilot house sipping coffee with the night watch. I used to chat with him while he checked the controls.”
“We would appreciate you having a look around. Apart from Alan, none of us has ever worked on a boat before, and now we are planning on running a cargo ship.”
“What about fuel?” Terrance asked.
“It is three-quarters full. Which we have worked out will carry us over three thousand miles. We only plan to find a safe harbor or cove that is protected from the ocean and weather, and from where we can anchor it permanently and use it as a manmade island.”
“Sounds like the perfect plan,” Lindell stated.
“Was it abandoned when you found it?” Troy asked.
“Yes. For some reason, there was not one living soul onboard. There was no clue as to why they jumped ship. There was no evidence that the infected ever reached it.” She shrugged her shoulders.
“Their loss is our gain.” She bit down on the last piece of food on her plate. When she swallowed, she continued.
“The top is stacked full of containers, which we are slowly making our way through; it’s just it takes a lot of energy to break into each one. And below deck, there are six holds full of different products. Three is full of canned vegetable oil, which is good for cooking, high in calories, and also for burning. Another is full of china plates and teapots and cups. The last two holds are full of Chinese New Year decorations. Tonnes of them. Ready, we presume, to be distributed across the country for Chinese New Year on February the nineteenth. They will come in handy for burning or insulation. We found the manifest. It was traveling from Malaysia to the port of Virginia. We have no idea how it ended up so far off course?”
“How did you find it?” Terrance asked.
“We headed out along the coast in the fishing boat, looking for a safer location. We found the cargo ship. A few days later, we found this island.”
Outside they could hear a hissing sound, then a sharp twang.
Troy turned in his seat to look behind.
“It’s just the nail gun. They are clearing off the bridge. We don’t like too many infected to gather in one location.”
She let the information sink in. The image that someone was out there putting nails through the foreheads of the infected wasn’t a pleasant one.
“In the morning, I will get Andy to take us out to the cargo ship to show you around.”
“Sounds like a plan,” Lindell stated.
“The sooner we get on that ship and away from here the better,” she stated. “More infected have been turning up everyday. Soon, we will run out of nails and gas canisters to power the nail guns, and using the spear is unpleasant when it is so hands-on.”
She stood up and stretched.
“I will go and take a turn with the gun. Lead by example, kind of thing.”
166
Bachman and Emma
On the artificial lake inside a submarine
Zone 9
The underground bunker
Quirauk Mountain, Pennsylvania
Bachman stood beneath the shower for a good twenty minutes, allowing the cold water to wash over him. He didn’t know how to turn the main power on, so he had no choice but to shower with what came out of the pipe. He was surprised the shower even worked.
He found some dark grey baggy boiler suits in the engine compartment, possibly spares for the engineers. He gave Emma the smallest. He found no footwear, so they had to stick to their rubber boots.
Before he went to settle down, and try to catch a few hours of sleep, while being aware that the longer he slept the greater chance the creatures would reach the surface, he decided to check out the Dry Dock that they had spotted on top of the sub.
Apart from the hatch they entered from, there were four other circular hatches that opened up on the ceiling. Only one was different from the other three. One was wide and had a section below with a set of wide steps and a gathering area, where he presumed equipment could be stored.
He climbed the steps and tried the hatch. He was expecting it to need a security code, or something to protect it. However, he reasoned it was aboard a military submarine, what better protection would it need, being surrounded by navy personnel.
With a twist, the hatch clanged open.
Unlike the main sub, once the hatch opened the lighting automatically clicked on as the dry dock powered up.
The circular pod was about forty feet long and nine wide and high. Twenty feet was taken up by seating down both sides. The back was full of equipment and a double hatch to exit the pod into the water. There was also a small spherical hyperbaric chamber to help injured divers.
One section was full of diving gear – air tanks, masks, regulators, flippers, diving belts; pressure gauges, buoyancy compensators, and small alternate air sources.
On strong hooks were two large driver propulsion devices that looked heavy and cumbersome, if he had to drag it out the hatch and drop it over the side in the lake. However, there were six smaller, one-man driver propulsion vehicles that were only about three feet long.
We could don the scuba gear and use one each to get across the lake, away from the creatures outside.
He noticed four small portholes.
Staring out of one, he could see there were dozens of creatures climbing over one side of the submarine, with the pod herding them into a line.
Bachman leaned closer. His breath steam
ed up the small circular window.
It wasn’t until then that he realized the banging had stopped.
Then, with a lurch, the submarine moved slightly, making Bachman have to catch his footing. Then, with a heave, the creatures pushed again, with hundreds of black tentacles gripping the metal hull of the submarine and using the solid dock as a leverage.
Bachman fell backwards, slamming into the hyperbaric chamber, hitting his shoulder. He could hear Emma screaming, as the huge submarine started to roll over in the water.
167
Alex, and the others
On the island in the camp
Somewhere in New York State
Alex didn’t know how late it was. All he was aware of was the screaming and shouting. He quickly climbed from his bunk, fully clothed, and ran to the dorm’s double door. The others were stood around him, racing outside to see what the commotion was all about.
It was chaos. There were infected everywhere.
How did they get on the island? Has the bridge been breached?
A woman swung a machete hitting a teenage female in the back that was about to sideswipe him. Without a word, the woman placed a foot on the creature’s thigh, pulled out the curved blade and continued on.
The rain still poured, washing the blood onto the ground.
Alex spun, just as another group of creatures surged towards him.
A group of women raced from around the dorm, all wielding weapons. They attacked the creatures straight on, no messing, just slaughtering them one at a time with the efficiency of people who have done it a hundred times before.
He could see Mollee racing across the muddy ground, then diving onto the back of a naked male. Two blades sunk into the mans deformed head. She cut it across the throat, to be sure, before racing to the next creature.
Alex turned this way and that. All around him, the infected poured across the island.
“How?” Troy shouted to Lindell.
The Sixth Extinction America Omnibus [Books 1-12] Page 38
