by Bob Howard
“How many times are we going to have to go through this?” asked Colleen.
“I’ll get some more pipes and paper,” said Jean.
Despite the possibilities, Hampton was smiling.
“Jean, hold off on the pipe bombs until we check. It could be that the next door was locked, so our friend in here was just stuck.”
“He’s an optimist,” said Colleen.
Despite the fact that none of us believed we were going to be that lucky, we went up the stairs in a group. The wooden stairs creaked enough to wake the dead, but no noise came from the other side of the door. Also, despite Hampton’s rationale for why the infected was stuck on this floor, the door was unlocked. Nothing stopped it from opening, but the room also wasn’t dark. There were windows on all four sides of the circular walls, and just enough light was coming in from the outside to allow them to see that the room was safe.
A spiral staircase dominated the center of the room, and it went to a trapdoor that stood open. It was at least a reasonable assumption that there were no infected above or they would have rolled down that spiral staircase a long time ago.
There were tables around the walls with equipment of all types. Judging by the assortment of materials, someone had tried to make this place their last refuge. There were boxes of canned food and jugs of water. Batteries, flashlights, propane canisters, a portable cook stove, and best of all, a shortwave radio set.
Tom and Hampton went back downstairs for Bus while the rest of us got busy trying to piece together what we could from the survival gear. There was no power to the cable that ran along one wall to the bench where the radio sat, so there had to be a generator on the grounds near the lighthouse. That wouldn’t do us much good unless it was inside a walled area.
“Maybe we can spot the generator from above,” I suggested.
I cautiously made my way up the spiral staircase. It was metal, and despite my theory that there were no infected dead on the highest level, I walked as quietly up the stairs as I could.
When I reached the trapdoor, I barely poked my head above the floor above and turned in a circle. From what I could see, the huge light was undamaged, and there were no broken windows.
I climbed up the rest of the way, and first I circled the entire floor searching as best as I could, trying to spot the power source for the lighthouse. The sun had completely set, though, and I couldn’t make out anything except the water in the bay. I couldn’t even spot the dock where we had left our boat. There was a catwalk surrounding the top of the lighthouse, but I had no urge to test its state of repair by walking out onto it through a small glass door.
I turned to the immense glass and shiny metal device in the center of the room that could only be the light itself. I had never seen one up close before, and I didn’t have a clue how it worked, but I imagined anyone standing in front of it when it was turned on was either going to go blind or catch fire.
I don’t know what made me do it, but I reached out with both hands and grabbed the light by something that was shaped like handles and turned it. I was totally surprised when it rotated smoothly and silently.
I stuck my head down through the open hatch and called to the others to come up and see the light.
There was less standing room in the top of the lighthouse once we were all up there, but for the moment at least, we were all like a bunch of kids. None of us had ever been in a lighthouse before, and everyone was blown away by how easily the light rotated, and just for the hell of it, we made it spin pretty fast.
“If we could get it to light up, we could at least signal the Chief when he starts searching for us,” said Colleen.
“If it lights up,” said Tom, it’s going to signal more than the Chief.
I let out a sigh and said, “When Jean was trapped on that Russian ship, all she needed was a little flashlight.”
It was totally quiet in the lantern room, as Hampton had called it. He and Cassandra both knew something about lighthouses and at least knew the correct terminology.
It was quiet because they were all staring at me. I was as clueless, as I tended to be sometimes before I realized I was the center of attention.
“When she used the flashlight to signal Mud Island, was anyone watching for her signal?” Hampton asked.
I thought a second and said, “No one would have thought to be watching for a signal if they weren’t hoping to see one, and if the Chief starts searching for us, he’s most likely going to fly right by here. We just have to be ready with our flashlights.”
“There’s one option,” said Hampton. “The second option is this monster sized lantern. If the Chief searches for us, his first chance to see us is going to be in daylight tomorrow. If we spin this lantern when the sun isn’t too high, it should reflect like crazy in all directions, and even if it isn’t reflecting much light, the movement of it should be enough to catch the eye of the Chief or Kathy.”
We agreed to set up watches in case the Chief flew by at night, and we opened the door to the catwalk so we could hear the sound of the Beaver as it approached. A bonus to that thinking was the fresh air that came through the door and then traveled downward to air out the floor below.
Bus was in bad condition when I checked on him the next time. I not only wanted to see my friend survive, I also wanted to avoid the unpleasant consequences his death would cause. As we settled in for the night, I wanted nothing more than to hear the person on watch yell that the Chief was flying by.
We moved Bus into the room where the lone infected had been stranded, and it was a good thing we did because the door to the mudroom didn’t hold. Actually, it wasn’t just the door, it was the wall that held the door. The lighthouse was old, and the base walls were thick and strong all the way to the ground, but the mudroom had been added to the outside of the lighthouse.
There was constant pressure being put on the door for hours, and eventually the whole thing collapsed. When it did, we all got ready to go as high as we could because it sounded like hundreds of infected were pushing on the next door. We even considered the possibility that they would be able to push the lighthouse over.
******
The welcoming committee at Fort Sumter wasn’t what the Chief and Kathy expected. Captain Miller was waiting out on the dock with an armed squad in case the Chief wanted to start searching for his missing people immediately.
The only non-military people out on the dock were Olivia, Chase, Whitney, and Sam. Under normal circumstances, they would have been all smiles when Kathy and the Chief saw them, but bad news couldn’t be delivered with a smile.
Olivia and Chase were an African American couple, rescued from the surface of Fort Sumter by their Mud Island friends when they first took control of the shelter. The surface part of the fort was little more than a savage camp where a sadistic band of survivors was holding people in cages. That’s where they were when the Mud Island group showed up.
The other two, Whitney and Sam were hardly more than kids, and they had survived inside the Cormorant at the Coast Guard station for months. They were rescued by Kathy and the Chief when they liberated the Cormorant and put it to good use.
The four friends exchanged hugs and kisses with Kathy and the Chief and broke the news to them about the rest of their friends being missing.
The Chief had listened to the news with a grim face and then gone into the shelter to talk with Molly. She was crying and afraid, but Kathy was able to get her to pull herself together. She told her that everyone was going to need for her to be strong, and that she needed to show she could be strong if she wanted to go outside with them.
Through a series of hiccups and sniffles, Molly described her last contact with her father and the rest of the group. Jean was an aunt to her, and Bus was like her grandfather. They were all family to her, and the radio had gone quiet. She told Kathy that the last time she heard from them, they were entering the bay that went to Georgetown.
“They weren’t having any problems up un
til that time?” asked Kathy.
“No, they were trying to find a buoy they could tow out to the reef where Cassandra’s ship sank, and Hampton said there were plenty where he used to live.”
“Then there was no more contact?”
“No, Ma’am.”
Molly sounded like she was going to cry again, so Kathy distracted her from the topic of the missing friends.
“What are the conditions on Mud Island? Do the camera views show it’s safe to come home?”
“There were a lot of the infected out there yesterday. They were everywhere, but a couple of ships went by, and one of them shot some kind of machine gun at them that killed them all.”
The Chief was paying close attention, and being a former Navy SEAL, he was keenly interested in the appearance of the ships.
He leaned in toward the microphone and said, “Molly, did your dad or anybody say what kind of ships they were?”
“One of them was a submarine,” said Molly. “It was following the ship that shot at the infected. I heard everyone talking about it being a destroyer or a cruiser.”
“Were they flying flags, Molly?”
“The ship in front had an American flag on it. The submarine wasn’t flying a flag, but it was a really big submarine.”
Kathy turned to the Chief.
“What do you make of that?”
“Sounds to me like one of our big ballistic missile subs. It was probably a Trident from Kings Bay, Georgia. I’m glad at least one of them survived. It would make a foreign power think twice about trying to invade while this infection runs its course.”
“Should we try to make contact?”
“I’d leave that totally up to Jim Miller. As far as I’m concerned, he’s the closest thing to a government representative. Martial law was declared one day into this mess, so he’s in charge.”
“Okay, Molly, listen to me,” said Kathy. “It’s getting dark outside, too dark to see. We could go right by them, and even if we do find them, we wouldn’t be able to tell what else is out there. You know how tough they are, so you also know they can take care of themselves. What I want you to do is not broadcast from the radio for the rest of the night. You can listen for them, but there could be someone else listening, so don’t broadcast unless you hear from us or them. We’ll start searching at sunrise.”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
“That’s not all. I want you to watch the cameras and try to keep track of the infected, and I want you to keep an eye out for those ships. Don’t broadcast if you see them. Just note the time and give three clicks on the microphone. Wait one minute and give three more clicks. You got it?”
“Okay, Aunt Kathy. I’ve got it. Over and out.”
Kathy signed off and turned toward the Chief.
“What was that all about?” he asked. “Why do you want her counting the infected?”
“I just wanted her to stay busy until she gets sleepy, so I figured she could count sheep. She’ll probably fall asleep before she gets to twenty. It’s pretty dark out there, and watching those things stumble around through infrared can get boring.”
The Chief eyed Kathy and said, “You know, dads are famous for making things up when their kids ask questions they can’t answer. I have a feeling your dad did that to you.”
“Hey, that’s not nice. My dad always answered my questions,” said Kathy indignantly.
“That’s exactly what I’m talking about.”
The Chief walked away fast enough to keep Kathy from answering, and after a minute or two she had a strange feeling that she understood what he meant. All she could do was grin, because in a weird sort of way she felt like it was a compliment.
******
It was an easy decision to use a helicopter for the search because they could get in closer if they were in a tight spot. Captain Miller wanted to send one of the military helicopters along because of the armament, but the Chief convinced him the search area only required one helicopter at the start. Besides, they were completely fueled for the trip north, and he didn’t want to stop at the airport to refuel if he didn’t have to. He doubted that would be a hospitable place to stop for gas, and they would need to map out locations for the special hybrid fuel used by the VH-92A’s.
The sun was just making an appearance above the horizon, but the executive helicopter was already warmed up. Captain Miller leaned closer to the Chief’s ear and said something Kathy couldn’t hear, but she thought the Chief turned a little red in the cheeks.
Kathy put on a headset and got his attention.
“What did Jim want?”
“Nothing,” he said. “He just said he would appreciate it if I would take off straight up instead of the way I did the first time.”
“Oh, you mean that thing you did when you went left, then right, then turned around in a circle before you went straight up? I thought you meant to do that.”
“I did mean to do that. You always circle to make sure you’re clear on all sides.”
Kathy thought about it then asked, “Was that a dad answer?”
The Chief lifted the helicopter straight up, then tilted it forward and headed out toward the sea.
Kathy was laughing despite the fact that she felt like her stomach fell on the floor.
They were flying straight at the sun until the Chief passed the end of the jetties, and he made a hard turn to the left. As the crow flies, it was less than sixty miles from Fort Sumter to Georgetown. The Sikorsky 76D could travel three times that distance in one hour, so the Chief pushed it up to its maximum speed for just a few minutes.
A few miles down the coast from the entrance to the bay that led to Georgetown, he brought the helicopter down to treetop level but stayed out over the water.
He hovered above the jetty with the bird facing inland, and Kathy began scanning the area with her binoculars. She was watching the water, but when she scanned to the right, there was a lighthouse in her field of vision.
“This has to be the shortest search and rescue mission in history,” she said.
She pointed at the white lighthouse that stood out brightly with the sun reflecting off of it from the east. Kathy and the Chief had both silently hoped their friends had made it to the lighthouse. As often as they had passed the entrance to the bay, they were well aware of its location, and they knew their friends would have tried to get to the lighthouse if they were stranded in the area.
“The search part of it, yes, but the rescue part might have to be by air. Check out the ground around the lighthouse.”
Kathy surveyed the area and let out a low whistle. It seemed like a horde had marched out onto the spit of land surrounding the lighthouse and they were all wondering where the people went.
“I wonder if they knew what was outside when they went into the lighthouse. That crowd is as big as an outdoor rock concert down there.”
The Chief pointed toward the small dock where they had left the boat and the path that ran from the dock to the lighthouse.
“They left a trail of bodies, so I’m sure they weren’t stopping there because they wanted to. Does the windshield on the boat appear to be half gone to you?”
“Sure does. Something went wrong, and the lighthouse was their only choice.”
******
We were expecting to hear the Beaver approaching, and we were going to scramble to the lantern room to start spinning the huge lamp. The sun was at just the right angle to the lighthouse for us to put on a show, but something was different. Jean was on watch and started yelling for us to get up there with her.
The de Havilland Beaver was noisy, but in a really deep throated roar. The sound we heard was powerful, but it was a higher pitch. It was kind of like the difference between a Mustang GT with chrome pipes and one of those cars in the Grand Prix.
Everyone was falling all over each other to get up the stairs, but we eventually all crowded into the lantern room and got ready to spin the light. Jean pointed out toward the jetty, and we all stopped movin
g. There was a blue and white helicopter flying straight at us at low speed.
Even before it was close enough for us to see who was in the cockpit we knew it would be Kathy and the Chief, and they deserved a welcoming celebration.
It didn’t take more than a couple of words, and everyone got the idea. We started rotating the light, and as it spun smoothly around, the mirrors inside caught the sunlight and reflected it toward them.
Although it was something we did because we were overjoyed to see them, it also told them we didn’t have a working radio.
Colleen disappeared into the room below and came back with a notebook she had found in a desk drawer. It seems like I can never find a Sharpie when I need one, but Colleen magically produced one and wrote in big letters, “DOC INJURED. STRETCHER.”
The Chief maneuvered the helicopter as close as he could to the lighthouse and Kathy held up a sign written on the back of a page she had ripped from a manual. It said, “STAY PUT.”
When we gave a thumbs up in their direction, the helicopter banked away sharply and headed south. We all smiled at each other as silence settled over us. We were ready to celebrate, but our friend Bus was still unconscious, and we were all getting worried.
It felt like time was dragging by when we saw the dots appear in the distance. As they grew, the sound of their engines reached us. We had expected the Chief to come back with a helicopter, but we didn’t expect this. Two big helicopters were flying straight at us.
The helicopter in the lead hovered in close, and we saw the big US NAVY letters on the side. The side door slid open as the craft hovered in above the lighthouse, and one of Captain Miller’s men slid down a rope onto the catwalk.
It turned out to be one of the women in Captain Miller’s squad, and she yelled over the buffeting wind of the rotors that she was a medic. She wanted to see Bus before they tried to lift him out.
