by Brad Knight
“Help me!” Amber struggled to drag Mack into the boat.
“You need to leave him. He’s done for,” said Dr. Bawja.
“Fuck that! Help me!”
“If he doesn’t die from those wounds, he’s certainly infected.”
Amber didn’t have the time or patience to explain why neither of those reasons Dr. Bawja stated were true. Instead she pointed her gun at Freddy. “Help me or I swear to god I’ll shoot you.”
Freddy did as Amber commanded. He jumped off the Sarah’s Gambit onto the docks. And he helped her bring Mack to the boat.
Meanwhile, Dr. Bawja stood on the deck with no idea what to do. There was chaos all around her. She heard a screech that morphed into a roar halfway through. It was coming from above. She looked up to see where it was coming from and saw something on the roof of the cabin that made her blood run cold.
She was looking at what was once a polar bear. Its white fur was heavily stained with blood. Parts of its skin were missing, exposing metallic muscles underneath. Its teeth looked like the tips of steak knives. With glowing blue eyes it stared at Dr. Bawja.
“Doc, move!” yelled Stephanie as she pushed Dr. Bawja out of the way, before she could even react.
Stephanie unloaded her full clip into the meat puppet bear. The shots didn’t put the beast down but it did stagger and stun it. It may have been the sound of gunfire or the prospect of imminent death, but both Simon and Dr. Bawja snapped out of their states of shock and joined Stephanie in attacking the infected bear.
Three sets of guns were enough to knock the bear off the roof of the boat and into the water. But Stephanie, Simon and Dr. Bawja weren’t done. They kept shooting at the beast after it went overboard. In doing so they expended all their ammunition. To them it was worth it.
The undead bear sank to the bottom of the Pacific. All that remained as proof that it was even there was its thick gooey black blood on the Sarah’s Gambit, and the oil like slick on the water.
While the rest of the group fought off the bear, Amber and Freddy managed to drag Mack onto the boat. They put him down on the deck. Simon took the controls of the Sarah’s Gambit.
Simon tried to steer the boat away from the docks, but the vessel only went so far before coming to an abrupt stop. He barely figured out how to drive the thing let alone what was wrong.
“Cut the rope,” said Stephanie. She was referring to the thick rope that anchored their boat to the docks. Dr. Bawja was trying to help the severely injured Mack. Freddy was helping her. The only one not actively doing something was Amber.
She took out her knife and started cutting the rope. She saw something out of the corner of her eye. Walking down the dock towards the fleeing vessel was a man. From his gait and leisurely pace it was clear he wasn’t a meat puppet. When the man got closer, she got a look at his face.
It can’t be. There’s no way. Amber knew the man walking calmly down the docks. The last time she saw him was on the Golden Pony roof. It was Ted Gorman. And he was smiling.
Not willing to take any chances, she stopped cutting and instead used her pistol to sever the rope that kept the boat anchored. As soon as she did, the Sarah’s Gambit jerked forward and they sped out into the Pacific. Before she knew it, Ted was just a little black dot in the distance.
Chapter 12
: The Pacific Northwest
Where do they think they’re going? Ted watched the Sarah’s Gambit disappear over the horizon. The only remaining meat puppet under his command, an infected bear, slowly walked up next to him.
Was that…? No, it couldn’t be. But it sure looked like my favorite duo. How would they have gotten out of Vegas, let alone made their way all the way here? If that was them, there’s no way I’m letting them go. We have unfinished business.
“Are you just going to stare at them, boy, or are you going after them?” Thomas Gorman appeared, standing several feet above the water with his arms folded and his customary cigar in his mouth.
“I’m going after them,” answered Ted. He looked down at the mauled dead body of Karin, floating in the dark blue water. “But I’m not a big fan of boats or the water. So I’ll follow them, but not by sea.”
“By ocean,” Thomas corrected his son.
“Sea, ocean, same difference.”
“No, a sea is…”
“Bye”. Ted walked away from the ghost of his dead father.
Ted took out his satellite phone, the only kind that worked post outbreak. He dialed the number for the Galatea Los Angeles facility. As he waited for his call to be answered, he stepped over the remains of his meat puppet chimps and proceeded to leave the docks.
“Mr. Gorman? Ted?” answered Sebastian from the other line.
“Seb?” Ted kicked the infected chimp with a knife wound to its eye off the dock and into the water.
“Sir? We were worried. The Salt Lake City team said you didn’t meet them at the rendezvous.”
“I did not. There was something I needed to take care of. Which is why I’m calling you now.”
Sebastian was quiet for a few seconds. “What do you need, sir?”
“Reroute the Salt Lake team to me, then send a fully fueled helicopter out to pick us up.”
“And take you where?”
“We are going north, my friend. I have some loose ends to tie up.”
***
“I don’t know if he’s going to make it,” said Dr. Bawja in a concerned and sympathetic tone. She knelt down beside Mack on the deck of the Sarah’s Gambit. His blood sloshed back and forth on the deck as the vessel glided over and through waves.
“He’ll be fine,” said Amber. She got up from beside Mack and looked out over the ocean.
“I don’t think you understand. He’s lost a hell of a lot of blood, and this doesn’t have what I would need to treat his wounds.” Dr. Bawja held up a small plastic box with a red cross on it. The box contained basic medical supplies like gauze and hydrogen peroxide.
Amber didn’t answer. She just kept her eyes on the vast Pacific Ocean. It was the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen.
Mack stopped breathing. Dr. Bawja did mouth-to-mouth, pounded on his chest and did everything she could to resuscitate him. Nothing worked.
Stephanie wiped the tears that were on the verge of falling from her eyes. Part of her was angry at herself. She was supposed to be stronger than that. After composing herself, she stood up and joined Amber near the edge of the boat.
“I’m sorry, Amber. He was a good man. Truly.” Stephanie tried to console her, but the teen was having none of it. She knew that he wasn’t dead. What worried her was how the rest of the group would react when they found out why.
“He’ll be fine. Just wait.”
“For what? I’m sorry, Amber, but he’s gone. Don’t worry though. We’ll be here for you.”
“Give it a second.”
“Give what a second?”
Mack started coughing. It scared everyone on the deck of the Sarah’s Gambit half to death. Freddy almost fell off the boat.
Dr. Bawja quickly got over her surprise and became fascinated by what she saw. Mack’s body started regenerating a nose, cheek and even his calf. She could literally see the different layers of cartilage, muscle, fat and skin form out of seeming nothingness.
“How?” asked Stephanie as she backed away from both Amber and Mack.
Mack tried to speak but his cheek hadn’t fully healed. He waited a minute until it closed at least a bit. His calf knitted itself back together and he managed to stand up with a little help from Amber.
“Can someone explain to me how this is possible? How are you not dead? And how did you…?” Freddy was beside himself. He knew what he witnessed but didn’t want to believe it. It was like something out of a comic book.
“I’m infected,” said Mack.
“You’re what?” Freddy raised his gun slightly. “Did you just say you’re infected?”
“Not like you think.”
�
�That so?” Freddy pointed his gun at Mack.
Amber quickly drew her pistol and aimed it at Freddy’s head. “Put the gun down or I put you down!” From her tone it was clear that she wasn’t joking.
“If you’re infected how are you not one of those mindless things?” asked Stephanie, who tried her best to wrap her head around what was transpiring.
“My god, he actually did it,” said Dr. Bawja. She looked at Mack not with fear, but with fascination. He noticed the difference.
“Did what?” asked Stephanie.
“Ted Gorman. The CEO of Galatea Systems. He took me prisoner and injected me with something. Ever since I can see better, I’m stronger, and apparently I can’t die.”
“It’s because of the nanites.” Dr. Bawja looked down at the deck. She didn’t want to make eye contact.
Mack turned his attention to her, but she wouldn’t look at him. He thought it was because of his nose reforming on its own on his face, but it was something else, something more familiar. It was guilt.
“Do I have to ask?” Mack knew that Dr. Bawja was hiding something. But it was up to her whether or not she’d tell him and the rest of the group.
“I’m sorry.” Dr. Bawja switched her gaze from the deck to the endless waters around the Sarah’s Gambit.
“For what?” asked Stephanie, who just got over seeing Mack’s body heal itself and his revelation that he was infected. She cautiously stepped forward towards the doc.
“It’s my fault.”
“What is?” Freddy kept his distance from Mack, but was just as curious as the rest of them.
“All of it. All of this. It’s my fault. I made this possible.”
Mack was a smart man. He started piecing things together in his head. His conclusion? Dr. Bawja worked for Galatea Systems. Or at least she used to. Though he had no idea what she did and how serious her crimes were. Whether they were intentional or not.
“I… I used to work for them, for Galatea.” Dr. Bawja was so ashamed with herself that she couldn’t look her group in the face, out of fear that she might have made eye contact. “I never worked at Los Angeles Mercy. I worked at the Galatea Los Angeles facility.”
“You’re shitting me.” Freddy felt betrayed. Between Mack’s revelation and Dr. Bawja’s, the Hispanic teen was liable to blow a gasket.
No one else in the group said a thing. Some were angry. Others were surprised. Mack was neither. He was curious and wanted some answers from Ted’s former employee.
“What’d you do for them?” asked Mack.
“I helped develop the aerosol based delivery system for the nanite virus.”
“Those guys from Galatea, they were after you weren’t they?” Stephanie, like Freddy felt betrayed.
“Probably. Yes.”
“Why would they care what happens to you?” Stephanie pushed for more answers.
“The virus. They don’t want anyone left alive to know that they are responsible for it. There are still soldiers out there, military. If they knew that Galatea was behind all of this, there’d be, well, for lack of a better word, war.”
“And so they want to silence you,” said Mack.
Dr. Bawja nodded.
“Did you know?” asked Stephanie.
“What they were going to do? No. No one did. At least no one outside Mr. Gorman’s inner circle.”
“Then you have nothing to be sorry about,” said Mack. “I’ve had my fair share of run-ins with Gorman. He tricked you. Did the same to me and Amber. Not to mention all those poor souls back in Las Vegas.”
“I guess you’re right but…”
Amber cut off Dr. Bawja. “But nothing. You stuffed up in your past life. Most of us have. Time to move past that.”
“So we’re all one big happy family again?” remarked Freddy. “Great. Now can we clean Mack’s blood off the deck? I don’t want to get infected too.”
“It’s my blood. I’ll take care of it,” said Mack.
***
The Sarah’s Gambit headed north. Simon eventually got the hang of steering the vessel. He taught the rest of the group how to steer so that he could take a rest, because they had been on the water for a while.
Night came. Nobody on board the Gambit predicted how dark it would be out in the ocean after the sun fell and the moon rose. To make things even blacker, rain clouds concealed the stars. They could see the lunar glow through them, but that was all the natural light there was.
Simon climbed into one of the boat’s two beds below deck. Amber and Freddy slept in the other. Mack insisted that they position themselves in opposite directions in the hopes of deterring any funny business. He and Stephanie stood watch on the deck. Dr. Bawja took the helm.
The group gave the impression that they forgave Dr. Bawja. Some even said it. She didn’t believe it. There was only one way for her to deal with the guilt, at the wheel, alone.
At the helm, Dr. Bawja found the quiet required to search her own thoughts. Out in the open water, life was simpler. Only a handful of things mattered. None of the nanite virus infected horrors. All Dr. Bawja had to worry about was not sinking the ship.
“You have any idea where we’re going?” asked Stephanie. She sat across the deck of the Sarah’s Gambit from Mack. Both of them sipped on bottles of water they found below deck.
“Not really. North, I suppose.”
“But we’re going anyway?”
Mack swallowed almost half the bottle of water in a single gulp. He wiped an errant trickle from his mouth. “Yes, we are.”
“Why?” Stephanie knew there wasn’t any reason other than it gave them something to do. She asked anyway.
“The further north we go, the less people we’ll run in to. That’s the theory anyway. Truth be told, I don’t know what we’ll find or where we’re ultimately supposed to end up. I’m flying blind. Just like I have been since this all started.”
Stephanie got up, and walked across the deck. She sat down next to Mack. “Ever since all this happened, I think it’s normal to be lost. None of us know what we’re doing. At least you have some semblance of a plan.”
“A plan? I guess you can call it that,” laughed Mack.
“So…”
“So?”
“What happened with you guys after you left me and my brother at the cabin?” asked Stephanie.
“Jesus, where to start?”
Stephanie slowly leaned over and put her head on Mack’s shoulder. She wanted to see if he’d be okay with it. He was. “How about you start after leaving the cabin?”
Mack smiled. “Okay, well as you might’ve already guessed, we headed out west. It took some driving and long walks but we made our way across the Rockies.”
“The Rockies, huh? They’re supposed to be beautiful. I always wanted to see them.”
“They were beautiful. Except for the infected moose. And the forests full of meat puppets. Other than that it was great.”
“Your sarcasm isn’t appreciated.”
Mack kept smiling. “Then we moved on to Nevada and the desert. That was… unpleasant. We got picked up by some guys who took us to Las Vegas. Did you guys go to Vegas?”
“Can’t say that we did.”
“There was a colony of survivors there living in a casino. They had running water, flushing toilets, lights and food. It seemed too good to be true.”
“I’m guessing it was,” added Stephanie.
“You guessed right. Turns out it was a front for the Galatea lab below the casino. I pried into what was going on there and was taken prisoner by the CEO and leader of the colony, Ted Gorman.
“While I was a prisoner I had to listen to that psycho Gorman go on and on about what he did and why. Apparently he wanted to make humankind stronger. So he released a nanite virus.”
“Nanites?”
“Little microscopic machines. His company made quadrillions, maybe more of them. Who knows. His machines failed. Instead of liberating people from illness, injury and age, they consumed th
em and turned them into those things out there. They made them into meat puppets. Nothing but dead flesh animated by nanites and slowly transformed into something more machine, like them, then human.”
Stephanie was quiet for a little while. She looked up at Mack. “So… all of this was because of little microscopic machines?”
“Surprised?”
“A little bit. Not because of the size. I figured it had to be some kind of virus. But I didn’t imagine that we even had that kind of technology.”
“I can assure you that we do. Or maybe Gorman was lying. I wouldn’t put that past him. But he really had no reason to.”
“After Vegas you two kept heading west?” asked Stephanie.
“Indeed we did. After everything went to shit in Las Vegas we needed something good. We needed some hope to keep our spirits up. So we came to Los Angeles and that brings us up to the present.”
“Why do I feel like you’re leaving some stuff out?”
Mack started petting Stephanie’s hair. It wasn’t in a weird way like she was a dog or cat. He did it in a loving way, a sweet way. She was receptive to it. Then he asked the inevitable question. “How about you? How did you guys get all the way out here?”
“Us? Fair enough. After the cabin my brother and I didn’t really know what we were going to do. We were scared. It was the first time we were on our own in a very long time. I mean, we were picked up and taken to the arena shortly after the outbreak. In many ways, it was all we knew for months.
“We didn’t have any real experience fighting those things, or other people. We didn’t know how to survive out there on our own. We grew up in the fucking suburbs. What survival skills did we have?”
“But you guys were okay. How?” Mack was genuinely curious.
“We didn’t have much of a choice. Staying in the cabin wasn’t an option because we ran out of food. Neither of us knew how to hunt or what plants were edible. If we were going to find food we’d have to leave and find some in a city or town.
