As her foot hit the deck, her pursuers hit the chair behind her.
They collided with the chair and crumpled into a pile of white rolling plastic and flailing limbs.
Someone threw a piece of glass. It flashed through the air and barely missed the fleeing woman’s head.
‘More,’ pointed Sergeant King, his voice a deep rumble.
Another mob emerged from the gardens beyond the putting green.
They spotted the Marines.
‘Fan out!’ ordered Coleman. ‘Take down anyone who attacks. Don’t let them get close!’
King and Forest reacted instantly. Without hesitation they dashed to intercept the people charging across the putting green.
Myers and Craigson ran toward the rock climbing wall.
The fleeing woman ran straight toward Coleman and Easterbrook.
She was flagging.
The two Marines side-stepped quickly apart, searching for clean shots.
Coleman pumped his XREP-M1.
The new less-lethal weapon had been designed for the military by TASER international. Coleman had never discharged the Extreme Range Electric Projectile at a person.
He targeted a man grabbing for the fleeing woman’s hair.
Crack!
The XREP-M1 didn’t recoil like a normal shotgun. The round only travelled at 300 meters per second, but when it hit, the electro-bolt delivered fifty thousand volts of electricity for fifteen seconds.
Coleman witnessed that effect now.
The man ran into an invisible brick wall. His body hit the deck and shook violently.
Shuck-shuck.
Coleman pumped his weapon, switched targets and fired again. A woman running with a long glass shard collapsed.
The tall female officer wearing the blood-splattered uniform suddenly changed directions.
What’s she doing?
She ran through the water park toward an ice cream kiosk.
‘No!’ Coleman yelled, seeing her plan. ‘This way!’
She’s trying to lock herself inside the kiosk. They’ll trap her in there. It’s suicide.
The woman kept running for the kiosk, and Coleman couldn’t do a thing about it.
Sergeant King and Corporal Forest dodged the hurled missiles.
A kitchen knife flew passed King and embedded point first into the wooden deck.
They’ve lost their minds, thought King.
‘They’ve gone crazy!’ shouted Forest, glancing at the knife.
‘Some are armed,’ said King, raising his rifle. ‘Take them down first.’
The attacking mob looked like regular passengers and crew to King. They looked like everyday people.
Only their faces looked different.
Their expressions were livid. They looked absolutely livid with rage. Maniacal fury twisted their faces into a shared expression of pure hatred.
King began dropping hostiles with electro-bolts from his XREP-M1.
Forest did even better with his longer-ranged weapon.
None of their targets were rising, but it wasn’t deterring the rest.
‘What are they so angry about?’ shouted Forest.
They don’t seem human, thought King. They’re not acting like normal people at all. Not even normal rioters.
Normal people, even angry rioters, would pause in the face of two Marines firing into their ranks. At the very least they’d help fallen companions.
These people did none of that. They just charged forward fearlessly, leaping fallen bodies in their headlong rush to reach the Marines.
They just wanted to attack.
This must be the sickness, realized King. The healthy passengers aren’t rioting. It’s the sick ones. These are the sick people.
‘There’s too many,’ warned Forest. ‘We need to pull back!’
Too late, thought King. Here we go!
A man rushed at King with pruning shears. He was a crew member. He held the shears wide open as though trying to cut King in half.
King swung his XREP around.
He couldn’t miss at this range.
Click.
His weapon didn’t fire. King looked down and remembered that the XREP held fewer rounds than a normal tactical shotgun.
He needed to reload.
Oh, crap. Not right now!
The garden shears raced for his torso.
King lifted his rifle.
Clang!
King’s rifle stopped the blades, but not the large man’s momentum. He slammed straight into King.
King lost his footing.
As he fell, the shears’ blades slid up his rifle.
They slid straight toward King’s face.
When both men landed, those blades would shear off King’s face from chin to forehead.
King braced for impact.
As his back slammed down, King pushed upward with all his strength. The blades slid up his rifle and clipped his helmet, missing his nose by half an inch.
King struck the shears with his weapon stock.
The shears spun away.
As the man’s eyes followed the shears, King reversed directions with his weapon stock and slammed it down into the man’s nose.
The impact knocked the man right off King.
Springing to his feet, King slid two fresh cartridges into his XREP.
A woman swung a putting iron at his head. King jerked up his arm. The lightweight putting iron bent around his arm and flew from her grasp.
King aimed at her torso.
He pulled the trigger and saw the electro-bolt knock the woman backward off her feet. Before she landed, King reached for more ammunition.
He could only reload one cartridge this time.
These new weapons didn’t hold enough ammunition. Forest couldn’t hold back the hostiles either. Most of the hostiles had gone down, but now a man with a long gardening fork tried to impale Forest on its four metal spikes.
King could barely spare Forest a glance. Behind the woman with the putting iron came four people who must have raided a garden shed for weapons.
King had two shots.
Crack! – shuck-shuck – Crack!
A man with a steel rake and a woman with a wicked-looking pruning saw collapsed in twitching piles. A second woman tripped over their bodies. A gardening pick skittered from her hands across the deck.
The last man jumped over the still-twitching bodies and threw a short shovel like a javelin.
His aim was dead on.
Worse, King hadn’t expected it.
The shovel hit King clean in the chest. The tool couldn’t penetrate his body armor, but the impact knocked King off-balance precisely as the man lowered his head to charge.
Thuuump!
The man struck with the strength of someone twice his size. King stepped back to plant one boot and correct his balance.
His boot found nothing but open air.
Shit! I’m falling! Where’s the deck?
It certainly wasn’t behind him. All he saw was water. A torrent of white water!
The surf simulator!
He hadn’t realized he’d retreated this far.
Locked together, the men toppled into the water.
SPLASH!
King’s rifle tore from his grasp. The powerful current tossed the men downstream like a couple of dried leaves. Completely underwater, King felt his back sliding rapidly along the bottom of the pool.
Suddenly King was airborne.
The surf simulator spat them into the air and...
SPLASH!
...dumped them into a second pool.
As they hit the water, King kicked off the man. He glimpsed his rifle sliding along the bottom.
Quickly! Grab it!
King reached down, snatched up his rifle, and broke the surface at exactly the same time as the crazy psycho.
The man charged through the waist-deep water at King.
King looked down at the strange shape in his hand.
I didn�
�t pick up my rifle. I picked up the shovel!
Improvising, he swung the shovel two-handed like a baseball bat.
The shovel was three feet long and felt perfect in his hands.
Clang!
The flat shovel blade impacted the man’s head so hard he landed half-in, half-out of the pool.
King studied the shovel with new respect.
But only for a moment.
In his peripheral vision, movement caught his attention.
He looked around.
A woman on the pool’s edge swung a gardening pick at his head.
King lifted the shovel, but not fast enough. The crazy woman was already halfway through her attack.
King could neither move his head nor block the attack in time.
He turned his head and braced for impact.
The projectile that struck the woman was larger than a conventional bullet. Hitting her squarely in the chest, the projectile flattened and distorted into a two-inch-wide disk. The impact was enough to break ribs and compress her sternum, but not enough to penetrate.
More importantly for King, the force knocked her backward.
Her gardening tool swished past his head so close he felt air turbulence. The woman collapsed backward.
Her head hit the deck.
She didn’t move a muscle.
Forest dashed along the edge of the pool.
His running shot had just saved King’s life.
King surged from the pool.
Forest tossed him back his XREP. It wasn’t wet. It must have landed on the side of the pool.
‘You dropped this,’ said Forest.
King caught the rifle, but didn’t discard the shovel.
He wouldn’t be caught unarmed again.
Erin had never been so pleased to see men with guns.
Running through the ship, she had encountered more and more sick passengers. By the time she reached the water park, a small army of insane people pursued her.
If she stumbled, they would catch her.
If she took a wrong turn, they would kill her.
Only her knowledge of the ship had kept her alive. When she reached the water park and spotted the Marines, her physical reserves were spent. She was flagging desperately, drawing on pure willpower and adrenaline to keep ahead of the incensed mob.
Had the Marines arrived a minute later, she’d have stood no chance.
Even now she realized she couldn’t reach them in time.
She couldn’t reach the Marines, but she could reach the ice cream kiosk.
Cutting left through the water park, she prayed she wouldn’t slip as fountains and water features spurted water all around her. Ahead, both of the kiosk’s serving shutters gaped wide open.
She heard a Marine yelling at her, but his voice was muffled by her own ragged breathing.
This is my only chance.
She glanced back and counted five crazies chasing her.
Reaching the kiosk, she leaped up and grabbed the handle of the second roller shutter. She hauled the single shutter down. She didn’t have time to shut them both. The Marines had bought her only a few seconds. She dashed around the kiosk.
The side door stood open.
Thank God.
She ran inside and pulled the door shut.
Smack!
The door slammed on someone’s fingers.
Erin heard fingers breaking. The broken fingers tightened around the door and began pulling. Another hand appeared beside the one Erin had crushed.
Erin gripped the door handle with both hands and began a tug-of-war to keep the sick passengers out.
The door crept open by degrees.
She braced one shoe on the doorframe and pulled at the handle with all the strength in her arms and back. Slowly the door began closing again.
Suddenly more hands grasped the door from outside.
The door began creeping open. She couldn’t hold it!
She looked over her shoulder, scanning the kiosk for a fire extinguisher.
She couldn’t see one.
Her entire body shook as she lost the battle to keep the crazies out.
When a hand reached through and grabbed her wrist, she knew the door was lost.
At least four crazies were outside the door now. She’d counted five of them chasing her toward the kiosk.
She needed them all at the door when she made her next move.
Her next move was a simple one.
She let go.
She just released the handle so the door catapulted into the faces of the people trying to kill her.
It worked.
The door shot open with enough force to knock anyone on their ass. The hand on her wrist tore away. She heard painful grunts and the sounds of falling bodies.
She spun and dashed deeper into the kiosk. The narrow structure measured only fifteen feet long.
The refrigeration booths were running, but the ice cream hadn’t been restocked. As the first crazy charged through the doorway, Erin lifted out a large steel bucket of rum and raisin ice cream and hurled it at the man’s head.
In the confined space, he had no way to dodge. He raised his arms, but the heavy steel bucket knocked him back into the people behind him.
The impact only bought Erin a few seconds.
This is it, she thought. I can’t stall them any longer.
She had the knife tucked into her belt, but she didn’t pull it out. It couldn’t help her now.
As the first man dove at her, Erin leaped up and slid across the smooth, stainless steel service counter.
As she slid over the outer edge, she reached up and grabbed the roller shutter’s handle.
Using her body’s momentum, she slammed down the shutter from outside the kiosk.
Her shoes hit the deck.
She heard fists pounding on the shutter from inside the kiosk, but her plan wasn’t done. Dashing around the kiosk, she kicked the door shut.
She backed from the kiosk as the passengers trapped inside went berserk.
Did I trap all five of them?
Hyper-alert, Erin hadn’t realized she’d ducked until the weapon struck the kiosk door above her head.
Waaaaang!
It dented the door.
The croquet mallet had nearly crushed her skull against the kiosk. The croquet mallets on the First Lady of the Sea were over three feet long with leather-bound handles and brass cappings over their wooden heads.
The man swinging the mallet looked strong enough to crack Erin’s skull with one hit.
She didn’t give him a second chance.
Taking advantage of his miss, she sprinted toward her very last option.
Craigson fired nonstop.
None of the demented passengers had reached them.
‘What the hell is wrong with these people?’ yelled Myers, dropping another passenger with an electric shock from his XREP-M1.
Craigson loved zombie movies, but he’d never seen anything like this.
These people emanated more aggression and unquenchable fury than anything he’d ever seen in a movie.
The women looked every bit as hostile as the men.
Mostly barefoot, the passengers charged with no regard for their own safety, running over broken glass as though it were tissue paper.
The elderly passengers sprinted and jumped with baffling speed and agility.
Craigson scanned for the other Marines.
King and Forest had intercepted a second group of hostile passengers beyond the water park.
Captain Coleman was running toward an ice cream kiosk. Craigson glimpsed the tall, blond officer slide out the kiosk’s serving window and haul down the steel roller shutter in one fluid action, cutting off her attackers.
Craigson couldn’t help but be impressed.
‘Look,’ Myers shouted. ‘Easterbrook!’
Easterbrook stood in the path of a dozen charging passengers. Instead of following the Captain, he seemed to have frozen up.
&n
bsp; Craigson and Myers reacted instantly. They dashed toward Easterbrook. They needed to get closer for their rifles to be effective.
Easterbrook fired into the charging pack.
He hadn’t frozen up. He was holding his ground, trying to divert the last group of crazy passengers from Coleman.
Easterbrook fired four more shots into the mob. Two targets dropped instantly.
One passenger returned fire.
It was a bottle.
The bottle flew so fast that Easterbrook barely turned his face away in time.
Smash!
The bottle exploded against his helmet.
Before Easterbrook recovered, the passengers engulfed him.
They buried Easterbrook with their bodies.
‘Holy shit!’ swore Myers.
Craigson fired on the run. He couldn’t miss. The insane passengers covered Easterbrook like swarming ants.
Myers fired too. Together they dropped another five hostiles before reaching Easterbrook.
The five remaining passengers suddenly abandoned Easterbrook.
They weren’t fleeing.
They’d spotted a new target.
Craigson rushed in and knelt to help Easterbrook, hoping his injuries weren’t critical. The crazies had only swarmed over him for a few seconds.
Craigson stared down in shock.
Easterbrook was bleeding out everywhere. His throat was torn apart.
God, did they bite him? Did they bite his throat out?
Craigson saw a pen.
A fountain pen was jammed deeply into Easterbrook’s throat. The pen had been used like a dagger. Its sharp point had severed both of Easterbrook’s jugular arteries and torn massive holes in his trachea.
Craigson applied pressure.
Blood squirted from between his fingers.
Easterbrook choked and gargled.
‘Quick. Use these!’ Myers shoved medical supplies at Craigson, and just as quickly Craigson applied them to Easterbrook’s throat.
‘Hold on, Easterbrook!’ yelled Myers. ‘We’ll get you to the chopper. You just hold on, brother!’
Craigson looked in Easterbrook’s eyes to see if he understood.
At that moment, Craigson saw Easterbrook die.
One moment Easterbrook was looking at the sky, his expression lost and confused, and the next his open eyes weren’t looking at anything at all.
They were lifeless.
‘Easterbrook!’ shouted Myers.
‘We weren’t fast enough,’ said Craigson.
HAYWIRE: A Pandemic Thriller (The F.A.S.T. Series Book 2) Page 6
