Meg walked steadily up the median of the street, alert to any movement from surrounding vehicles. A few of them sported dead bodies behind the wheel, but she couldn’t tell whether they’d been “killed” before or after turning into deaders. One old gentleman in a plaid tam-o’-shanter struggled against his seatbelt, his cheeks rouged and mottled with infection. The front windshield of a Ford F-150 pickup was completely blown out, with three bodies in the front with bloody stumps for heads, including a child about Ramona’s age.
She waved the flag more vigorously as she came within a block of Promiseland. A soldier atop the wall pointed at her and spoke to the gunman beside him. The gunman raised his rifle, aimed in their general direction, and fired. Meg flinched, although she knew if the bullet were meant for her, she’d be dead before hearing the percussion.
Jacob tugged the back of her shirt. “Over by that van, Mom.”
A deader lay sprawled and broken beneath its wheels, shot through the spine but still reaching for them. The gunman had saved them. “They see us,” she said. “They know we’re not…those things.”
He gave her a nudge from behind. “Maybe we can speed it up a little then.”
Meg broke into a jog. This must be what it felt like to be on a battlefield, with bullets flying all around and no one really sure of the objective. Her senses—already heightened to an almost psychedelic edge by stress—kicked into overdrive.
The air carried the acrid tang of gun smoke and distant fires, gasoline from punctured fuel tanks, and a wet, sweetly rich aroma that could only come from eviscerated human bodies. She wasn’t sure if she was imagining it or not, but already the faint scent of rot and decay seemed to permeate the city.
They were close enough to see the faces of the soldiers on the wall. Meg shouted at them to open the gate. Indistinct figures moved behind the metal bars, followed by the rough voices of stern men. The gunfire diminished, falling away to single shots every ten seconds or so. By the time they reached the gate, which was sealed not only by a large steel locking hasp but a thick chain, one man was waiting, rifle at the ready.
“Open up,” Meg wheezed.
“Who are you?” the cold-eyed soldier asked. He barely looked college-aged.
“Meg Perriman,” she answered.
Jacob came up beside her and pressed his face against the iron bars. “She’s a scientist. You’re going to need her.”
“Have you shown any signs of infection?” the soldier asked, maintaining his grim monotone.
“I had some symptoms, but I’m better,” Meg said. “Please. My daughter might be in there. She was sick and—”
“If she’s sick, then she’s not in here.”
Through the bars, Meg could see a number of white tents, trucks, and soldiers in the parking lot and spread across the lawns. One of the tents bore the American Red Cross emblem.
“She’s not just a scientist, Turd Face,” Jacob said to the soldier. “She knows about viruses and stuff. She’s a viral…a virology..a virus scientist.”
The soldier appraised Meg. “Is Jesus Christ your Lord and personal savior?”
“That’s personal,” Meg said. “And none of your business.”
An officer in a field cap came over and asked, “What’s the problem here?”
“This woman claims she’s a scientist, Lieutenant,” the soldier said.
“Is that so?” the lieutenant asked her.
“I have some information that could be helpful. I’ve witnessed two possible permutations of the infection. If we can get some fresh samples, we may be able to isolate the specific bacteriophage responsible for the outbreak.”
“I don’t know what all them one-hundred-dollar words mean, but you can enter as long as you’re not sick.” He motioned to the soldier to open the gate. “But check in with the doctors in the medic tent first, so you and the boy can be cleared.”
Meg and Jacob entered the gate just as someone above shouted, “Hostiles at six o’clock.”
An automatic weapon ripped off a hail of bullets that caused the two of them to hurry to the medic tent. The soldiers were deployed on the tops of trucks parked beside the walls, which gave them a sniper platform. Meg glanced back to make sure the lieutenant was occupied, and then led Jacob around the tent and toward the main building in the churchyard.
“We’re not letting them check anything,” she whispered. She saw a crowd of refugees through an open set of double doors. They entered the gymnasium, where chatter, confusion, and distress held court.
“Tell me if you see Dad or Ramona,” Meg said as she scanned the hundreds of faces sitting on bleachers or else resting on cots lined up in a long row. Others were queued up at a long table that served bottled water, snacks, and cold meals in pouches. At another table, a woman in a FEMA jacket was bandaging a toddler’s arm.
“How are they going to fit the whole city in here?” Jacob asked.
“They won’t have to,” Meg said. “Most of the city turned zombie, and most of the rest are dead.”
“Hey, look,” Jacob said, pointing into the crowd. “There’s Skateboard Boy and that girl from the apartments.”
“Looks like the army took his skateboard away.”
Jacob gave a tentative wave in their direction, but neither of the two saw it.
Meg led Jacob to the FEMA official, who glanced at Jacob and asked Meg, “Where’s he hurt?”
“Nowhere. I want to offer my services.”
“Are you a doctor?”
“She’s a scientist,” Jacob said, but Meg stopped him before he could mispronounce “virologist.”
“I was at Toolik Field Station when the outbreak likely started,” she said. “I think I might have information on the origin of the virus.”
The FEMA official was skeptical. She finished applying the bandage, patted the toddler’s head, and waved at the child’s mother to pick him up. Then she said, “You’re a long way from Alaska.”
“That’s part of the story,” she said, presenting the security ID she used at research labs. “I might be the reason it’s spread so fast.”
The woman gave a grim shake of her head. “You better tell it to somebody who can make a decision. Come with me.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
The view from the church roof wasn’t the best in the city, being only sixty feet above street level, but Specialist Rocky Maldonado had a clear view of the Capitol District. Black smoke billowed up in multiple columns that twisted together and formed a thick haze that merged with the encroaching dusk. Flames were visible in the concrete canyons beyond, reflecting off glass windows in ten thousand mad sparks. A squadron of jets skated over Raleigh from the south, flying low over the half-dozen skyscrapers with their navigation lights barely visible.
Maldonado turned away from the grim scene, focusing just a moment on the surrounding bloody streets before turning his attention back to Sonia Thorpe, who was huddled up with Col Hayes, Sgt. Jackson, and one of Reverend Ingram’s assistants. He’d stayed by Sonia’s side since entering the compound, partly because he wanted to know what was going on and partly because he found her fascinating. He’d known some strong women in his time—his wife was his favorite example—but Sonia had an instinct for deftly maneuvering through traditionally male power structures.
“We’re carpet-bombing the west end to create a firewall,” Col. Hayes said to Sgt. Jackson. “Once we cut off their reinforcements, we can work our way out and clean up the mess.”
“But they’re making their own reinforcements,” Sonia said. “Every time you kill somebody, they come back deader.”
“It’s a numbers game, Miss Thorpe. Even if we have to kill everybody twice, eventually we’ll come out ahead. Or at least buy some time until we come up with some answers.”
“Don’t you think we should get some answers first before we kill thousands of innocent people?”
Col. Hayes gave an exasperated sigh. “Look, I know you have civilian authority on paper, but until we est
ablish some turf, you’ve got nothing to administer.”
Jackson, noticing Rocky standing by and listening, ordered him to help with a machine-gun nest. He joined a crew stacking sandbags along the roof parapet while two soldiers assembled and belt-loaded an M2 Browning. A round from the .50 caliber machine gun could drill a fist-sized hole in a human and pierce most non-armored vehicles. Rocky thought the roof wasn’t the best tactical placement for a machine gun, but nobody asked his opinion.
“Some deaders got in the compound,” one of the soldiers said to another.
“Yeah,” his neighbor replied. “There’s a stack of them around back. Throw ‘em on the burn pile.”
“Not all of them turned,” said a third as he shoved a khaki sandbag into place. “They’re putting down people who show any symptoms at all.”
“Bullshit,” the first one said. “You don’t turn unless you get bit.”
The third man shook his head. “Some get infected and go that way. Somebody had to be the first to turn, didn’t they? Unless they bit themselves.”
“One of our guys turned,” Rocky said. “I put a bullet between his eyes.”
“Was he bit?”
“Yeah. And he died before he turned. I swear to God, he was dead, and then his eyes opened and it was like he was looking ten miles through me. Like he didn’t see me at all, just saw something he needed to sink his teeth into.”
“I haven’t been that close to one,” the first soldier said.
“Let’s hope we get to stay up here,” the second one said. “It’s pretty safe. Even if those things get over the walls, they won’t be able to climb up here.”
“Unless they take the elevator,” said the third soldier with a broken-up grunt that passed for a chuckle.
Rocky checked his cell phone and found there was no signal. He’d tried to call home a dozen times but received no answer. He forced his thoughts away from images of his family fighting for survival, or worse—blotched with infection and aching for the taste of raw flesh.
Rocky glanced back over at the officers and Sonia. A woman emerged from the roof access, escorted by a FEMA official. A boy followed after them, ignoring the guard who ordered him to stop. The three joined the officers and made introductions.
Rocky patted the third soldier on the back. “You guys got this job in hand. If any deaders come up the elevator, use the M2 on them. Just make sure they’re dead first.”
“They’ll be dead first and second,” he replied as Rocky headed toward Sonia and the others.
He knew he was disobeying orders, but the command structure was hopelessly shattered anyway. He’d be happy to stand for a court-martial if they survived all of this. Besides, it was getting dark enough that the sergeant would have difficulty making out his features, and the non-com seemed plenty distracted regardless.
The new woman was talking about the virus using big words that appeared to frustrate Hayes and Jackson. Rocky didn’t understand much of it himself, but he gathered she was some type of researcher. Hayes in particular appeared to have little patience, but Sonia defended her with passionate gestures, raising her voice so that the other soldiers looked their way.
“You’re worried about your little piece of the action,” Sonia said to the colonel. “But until we find the cause of this outbreak, there’s no victory. Just a bunch of killing.”
“This isn’t a pissing contest,” Hayes thundered. “My orders are to hold this ground and then expand the perimeter. Until we do that, we don’t need any politicians fucking things up.”
“This isn’t political,” the researcher said. “It’s medical, it’s scientific, it’s life-and-death.”
“If you’re so smart, then why did you get caught in the outbreak like everybody else?”
“Because my daughter was sick. And we went looking for help.”
Rocky felt a pang of sympathy. If the girl was sick, chances are she’d either turned into a zombie or been shot down. That made him think of his own kids again. Were they at the mercy of people like Col. Hayes? Of people like him?
One thing was sure: He’d rather have people like this woman searching for answers than following a scorched-earth policy. She was right. They couldn’t slaughter their way to winning, because the dead were endless.
Hayes seemed to succumb to the two women, or perhaps he was frustrated and wanted to be rid of them. “So you have your data from Alaska?” he asked the researcher.
She pulled out her phone. “Just some back-up files, but it’s enough to get started until we can locate the samples I had shipped here. Maybe I can link up with Toolik, too.”
“Air traffic’s gone all to hell, and obviously nothing much is moving on the interstate. But if you can do some good, then we can try to get you to CDC in Atlanta.” He glared at Sonia. “But only if you go with her.”
Rocky stepped closer to the group, and Jackson arched a churlish eyebrow. “I’ll volunteer as escort.”
Hayes nodded in approval, not realizing he’d overridden Jackson’s orders. “All right. I’ll call in a Lakota from Fort Bragg. The helicopter should be here in twenty minutes. It’ll be full dark then. Make your way down to the parking lot. Sgt. Jackson, have them clear a landing zone.”
“Yes, sir,” Jackson said, motioning the group back toward the access door. “This way, ladies.” He emphasized the last word as an insult to Rocky, who didn’t give a shit.
“I’m not leaving until I know my husband and daughter are safe,” the researcher said.
“Give a description to Sgt. Jackson and we’ll work through the crowd,” Hayes said. “But I can’t spend any more resources on this. Now go.”
The sky had grown even spookier, with the dim glow of the fires casting crimson smudges along the dark bellies of the clouds. The tallest building in Raleigh was aflame, spitting off sparks like an obscenely massive Fourth of July firework. Shadows moved in the murk beyond the church, evoking gunfire from the panicky soldiers deployed along the walls.
The boy, who’d remained silent all this time, took the researcher’s hand as they went downstairs to the elevator banks. Sonia thanked Rocky for volunteering. Keeping his voice low so Jackson couldn’t hear, he said, “I’m just happy to get away from these psychos.”
Just as the elevator doors opened, the overhead lights blinked twice and then stayed out for several seconds. When they came back on with a low hum, Jackson said, “Power grid’s on the blink. Figured it was only a matter of time.”
“Maybe we should take the stairs,” Sonia said. “I’d hate to be stuck in an elevator and miss the chopper.”
Jackson waved an annoyed hand. “You’re the boss.”
They were silent until they reached the landing on the third floor. The stairwell was otherwise unoccupied, and the muted gunfire added a strange, hollow resonance along the concrete sleeve of the aperture.
Rocky put a reassuring hand on the boy’s shoulder. “You’re not nervous about flying, are you?”
“Heck, no,” the boy said. “Wait until I tell the kids at school.”
The optimism of youth, Rocky thought. This kid assumed things would be back to normal next week.
The researcher introduced the boy and herself to Rocky as they made their way to the second floor. Rocky heard the worry in Meg’s voice as she spoke of her husband and daughter. Sonia tried to call her own boyfriend, but the network was still down. Jackson spoke into his radio, ordering a landing zone for the helicopter.
The lights blinked.
Then darkness.
Jackson was just signing off when the lights went out for good. Black dropped like a solid sheet of the deepest corner of space, suffocating and cold and unknown.
After their collective gasp faded, Jackson said, “Hands on the rail, everyone. Hold on to the person in front of you.”
Rocky touched Meg’s leg, flinched away, and lifted his hand higher. He grazed the grip of the pistol stuck down her waistband. There was more to this woman than met the eye. He clutched
a fistful of her blouse and waited until Jackson gave them the order to head down.
“Slow,” he said. “One step at a time.”
Sonia held up her cell phone like a flashlight, and Rocky followed suit, but the handheld devices did little to penetrate the murk. A door creaked open below them, letting in a scant wedge of lesser gray that framed the silhouette of a person.
“Hold it open,” Jackson shouted. “We’re coming down.”
But the silhouette stepped inside and the door swung closed. Jackson cursed under his breath and told everyone to keep moving. Meg paused and Rocky bumped into her, knocking her into Jacob, who said, “Ow!”
In the ensuing hush, they heard the sandpapery scuffing of steps along the stairs.
“Who goes there?” Jackson said. “If you’re Army, I’m ordering you to identify yourself. If you’re not Army, I’ve got an M9 with a full magazine all ready for you.”
Rocky didn’t think the sergeant would actually shoot a civilian in front of the others. But then he heard a low growl that sounded like something that had crawled up from Satan’s sewers. Then came a thud and a groan, and Jackson squawked in pain.
The muzzle of his M9 flashed hot yellow and the discharge sent a loud shock wave rolling up the stairwell. Jackson fired twice more, and in the stroboscopic flashes of light, Rocky saw a long-haired woman burrowing her face and hands into Jackson’s abdomen.
The women screamed, and so did Rocky, but the boy pushed his way past Rocky, dragging his mother back up the stairs. Jackson gurgled in the dark, his breath wheezing away to the soft supplication of a final surrender. His intestines squelched as the thing dug into the sergeant’s body cavity for organs. The slobbery chewing of the deader snapped Rocky from his daze and he grabbed Sonia away from the struggle.
After urging her up the steps, he fumbled for his M16, which he’d casually swung over his shoulder. Now he regretted his lax attitude. He should’ve known nowhere was safe, not even in the heart of this Christian fortress.
Arize (Book 1): Resurrection Page 17
