by James, Glynn
Handon surveyed them. The guy with the sucking chest wound probably wasn’t going to last much longer, so that would be one problem solved. But several remained.
“So,” Handon said, scanning the group with his frosty blue eyes. “What do we do with you?”
Juice and Ali came up from behind, moving to stand on either side of him. Pred was sprawled out on a bench to the side, his leg extended as usual. Whether they knew it or not, whether they liked it or not… this was a jury.
“These guys are predators,” Ali said softly, in an aside to Handon. Turning aside to Pred, she added, “No offense.”
“None taken,” he rumbled.
Ali edged slightly closer to Handon. “There’s a lot of stuff below – dry goods, food, bottled water, ammo. And a lot of clothing, too. Piles of boots. Fucking creepy.”
Predator said, “Maybe they just took it off the dead. Scavenging like the rest of us.”
Handon didn’t take his gaze off the prisoners. “We know what they’ll say about it.”
Juice shuffled slightly, looking uncomfortable. “There’s something else. When I was diving underneath this thing. I saw wrecks below. The lake’s not that deep here. And there were two or three vessels sunk on the lakebed.”
“Scuttled?” Ali asked.
Juice shrugged.
Ali shook her head. “So these assholes have just been sitting here, like a spider at the center of a web. Waiting for victims to sail by.”
Handon pondered that. They were in fact at a nexus of the main sailing lines. Maybe the other victims were people trying to escape from the mainland to the island. Or just staying alive on the water, going into shore only for scavenging runs. It had worked for the Kennedy. And being in the water was an excellent way to self-quarantine – until, as Alpha discovered when they drifted into shore, it wasn’t. Either way, it seemed to suggest there were more survivors on this continent than they had guessed.
But in the end it was just one more mystery – one they weren’t going to have time to explore or get to the bottom of. Handon tossed his head at the girls. “What about them?”
Ali said, “My gut? They’re not here by choice. They’re prisoners, or at least coerced.”
Handon looked at the two girls. “Well?”
“Yes,” the older girl said. “Please. They made us do it. Everything.”
Handon looked to Ali, who nodded.
It was good enough for him. “Okay,” he said. “You two over here.” They both scurried away from the group of prisoners, and Ali drew her knife and cut the cuffs off the older one.
Handon exhaled. “We don’t have time for a lot of deliberation. Landfall in eighteen.”
“We can’t let them go,” said Ali. “You put these guys back out there, they’re just going to do this shit again. Think of the next people they come across – who won’t be as able to defend themselves. There’ll be more killing, more looting… and more galley slaves.”
Juice said, “I don’t wanna be an executioner. Hell, we’ve already killed most of them. Maybe the rest have learned their lesson.”
Predator said, “Just put them out on the lifeboat.” He gestured over the back rail. Down below, on the fantail, a small Zodiac motorboat hung by ropes from a joist.
Juice grunted. “Without weapons or supplies, it’s the same as killing them.”
Ali started to step forward. “Fuck it,” she said. “I’ll be the executioner.” But she was halted by a new voice.
“Same as killing who?” It was Dr. Park, climbing up from below, and now squinting into the sunlight through his rectangular glasses. And clutching, as always, his laptop.
For a few beats, the others just regarded him in silence.
Verdict
Lake Michigan
In the corner of the upper deck, the older girl sat with her arm around her sister, and stroked her hair. She also carefully controlled her expression – trying to look innocent, and maybe a little traumatized. Nothing was so important now as to play the victim. To try and generate some sympathy.
Miraculously, neither she nor her sister had been hurt in the terrifying gunfight. And the British guy hadn’t seen her going for the loose gun in the pilothouse and pocketing it. That move had been a little crazy, and even she thought maybe her impulsiveness might have taken her too far. But she hadn’t kept the two of them alive this long by being timid or afraid. And she had definitely picked up some tricks from the guys along the way – becoming cagier, perhaps even more of a badass, than she’d been before she started this ride.
Now the weight of the pistol deep in the pocket of her jacket reassured her – because it gave her options. It gave her and her sister a better shot, whatever happened to the others now. For once, she thought, Logan and the rest of the guys had bit off more than they could chew. She wasn’t that surprised. Bullies and tough guys always met someone tougher eventually. She listened to the soldiers debating the fate of the Diablo’s men – those few that remained. She felt bad for them, she really did.
But she and Emily came first, every time.
The only exception might be William, the boy. He was a sweet kid, and had always treated them with gawky kindness, following them around like a lovesick puppy. Now that he might be killed or, just as bad, cast off onto the lake with no supplies, it roused in the older girl a righteous, and rather adolescent, anger. She didn’t have much loyalty beyond Emily. But she guessed it extended to William. He was certainly the best of a bad lot.
And, in any case, she’d take the worst of the outlaws before these humorless military law-and-order types. They reminded her of the big smug cops who used to hassle her, and occasionally grope her, back in their tiny hometown in upstate Wisconsin. All she had been trying to do was survive growing up in a small rural town – where there was nothing to do but drink, smoke weed, and fool around. Just as she was trying to survive now, and to keep her sister safe. Emily could be pretty damned humorless herself, and very straight-edge. But she was still her sister.
And they were all they had left.
She was briefly confused when the Asian guy, unarmed and bespectacled, appeared on deck. She hadn’t seen him before, and he was clearly not the same breed as the others. But she listened very attentively when he spoke – and most especially when the others spoke to and about him… because anything she could learn might help her, and Emily, to stay alive.
And she knew by now that it required all of her wits and resources to keep the two of them one step ahead of the dead – and two ahead of the living.
* * *
After Park asked his deck-silencing question, Predator took the radical step of lumbering to his feet, stick-walking down the deck, and taking the scientist by his arm. He said, “You need to go back below, dude.”
Park resisted him. “Wait a minute,” he said, looking across at the row of prisoners and slowly getting the picture. “Jesus, what about a trial? Or at least some kind of mercy. Why is this okay?” None of the others spoke for a moment, the only noise the wind over the top deck as the boat zoomed forward.
Predator knew that, like most temptations, getting pulled into a debate on this issue ought to be resisted. But nevertheless he said, “Unfortunately, this is the state of nature we’re in now, doc. There are no courts out here. There’s no one but us.”
“And who put you in charge? Gave you the power over life and death?”
Predator sighed. “The sheep did. When they delegated to us the job of protecting them.”
Park squinted. “Wait. Who are the sheep?”
Predator sighed a second time. “Everyone – everyone who’s not a wolf or a sheepdog. But that’s a lecture for another day. With any luck, we’ll have the whole rest of the Apocalypse to shoot the shit…”
Park resisted Predator’s pull on his elbow. And though he wasn’t going to be able to resist it for long, still Ali turned and stepped toward him, looking deeply unamused. When she spoke, her voice was definitely devoid of humor.
“You see that drumstick Pred is hobbling on? You see that bandage on Juice’s head, or the arrow that was sticking out of Henno, or this?” She held her bloody and bandaged left hand and arm in the air. “And you see the two members of this team who aren’t here at all? We suffered these losses going into harm’s way to rescue you, and to keep you safe. You understand that? All for you. And the last thing we need now is a bunch of half-reformed pirates running around loose on the same boat you’re on.”
This was about as agitated as Park had ever seen Ali get. Her negative feelings on things almost always manifested as mordant snorts, head shakes, and general fatalistic amusement. Black humor. She virtually never let the lid come off – or even let it rattle.
But maybe she’d had enough for one day.
Pred looked down at Park kindly. “It’s okay, doc. We just need to keep you safe, buddy. You’re the point of this whole exercise. Plus, you’re not gonna want to see this…”
They’d made their point. On this one, the mission was the man.
And the older girl heard all of it, and followed Park with her eyes as he went below.
* * *
Ali turned back to face the prisoners, as Park and Pred disappeared inside. Her eye went straight to the tattooed, silver-toothed meth-head-looking dude – the flashlight guy, who had bent over her from behind. “Like I said…” she intoned, moving forward like a hammer falling, her palm settling on her holstered pistol.
“Hold on a second,” Handon said, grabbing her arm in turn as she tried to pass him. He scanned the faces of the vanquished pirates. In particular, he was drawn to the face of the very young one, the one Juice had captured. He was obviously just a kid, with unkempt peach fuzz stubble, dirty-blond (as well as just dirty) hair, which lay matted on his forehead. The kid held his gaze for a second, then his eyes crept back to his feet.
“What’s your name?” Handon asked him.
“William,” he answered softly.
Handon looked across at Juice now. Juice’s mission in swimming over to the back side of the Diablo had been, technically, kill-or-capture. Maybe he’d gone with the latter option for a reason. But, in any case, they were out of time for discussing it.
“We’re not slowing the boat,” he said. “Throw the lifeboat out. And throw them after it.” He looked at the girls. “These two can exfil with us. Assuming they want to, and as long as they move fast.” With that, he turned and marched back toward the wheelhouse.
Juice called after him. “Hey, what about the wounded guy? He definitely can’t swim.”
Handon didn’t slow as he answered over his shoulder. “Put him in the boat before you throw it out.” And then he was gone.
And it was done.
Off the Island
Beaver Island
There was way too much for the Marines on Beaver Island to do now. And not nearly enough men left standing to do it all.
But as soon as Gunny Fick stopped being on fire, he climbed to his feet and began trying to formulate a plan. As his hearing slowly dialed back up after the pummeling of the explosion, he realized someone was shouting at him. Shaking his head, he scanned the field. Graybeard was standing in front of him, feeling him up for injuries – but not speaking. Beyond and behind him, he could see Brady’s big, powerful back as he leaned into his weapon – firing both the assault rifle, and 40mm grenades out of the underslung launcher.
He was defending the airfield alone.
Finally, Fick realized the voice he was hearing was in his head. It was Chesney, the Kid, shouting over the squad net. He’d seen the explosion, and was now audibly panicking. Fick pressed his radio transmit button. “Break, break! Clear the goddamned channel.” The voice went silent. But now Graybeard spoke in front of him. His voice was totally calm. But he said,
“The Kid does have a point. What’s the plan now, Gunny?”
Fick didn’t allow himself any more time for head-clearing. There was no time. He said, “When you have to eat a shit sandwich, bite the corner where it’s mostly bread.” Graybeard gave him a big smile in return – a happy warrior.
They were probably all about to die here.
But they were having fun.
* * *
Fick sent Graybeard back into the fight alongside Brady, defending the bomber and runway, then went alone back to the blast site. As he jogged, he weaved like a punch-drunk boxer. That would fade – he hoped.
As he reached the crater, it was obvious their tank of aviation fuel had been chemically transformed into heat and light, and was now lost to them. And just when they were so damned close… Nearby, he found enough of Stan the mechanic to know he wasn’t going to find the rest. There wasn’t even a trace of the co-pilot. But he found Reyes, farther away, lying on his back – and, at first glance, all his parts still seemed attached. He’d been farthest from the explosion, and it looked like his body armor and helmet had saved him. But he had burns on his exposed skin surfaces, and the rest of him was peppered with puncture wounds from shrapnel.
Fick knelt down and, after checking his breathing, got some QuickClot Combat Gauze pads out of Reyes’ blowout kit, and started patching the leakiest holes. While he was doing so, Reyes regained consciousness.
“That’s it,” Fick said, still bandaging. “We’re voting you off the island.”
“Hey, it wasn’t me,” Reyes said weakly. “The co-pilot did it. Vote him off.”
“He’s already gone. Can you walk?”
Reyes grunted in pain as he tried to move his legs. “Not sure.”
“Can you shoot?”
He wiggled his arm and fingers, on the right side only.
“A-ffirm, Gunny. No problem.”
“Good,” Fick said, ungently patting down the last bandage with a fist bump. “Because we’re out of shooters.”
He grabbed an arm and a leg and pulled Reyes up into a fireman’s carry – which was a damned impressive thing to do with a man who outclassed him by thirty pounds and four inches. Reyes swallowed a scream of pain into a throaty groan. And as Fick staggered back toward the plane, he saw Graybeard pivot and begin firing around him, to one side then the other. They were obviously being pursued. But Fick didn’t have time to deal with it.
Getting Reyes into the plane and all the way back to the tail section almost killed them both. But after Fick shoved his pummeled body into the tail turret, and heard those twin 50-cal machine guns start up, he knew it was all worth it. It was like beautiful music. Fick even imagined he could hear the dead screaming and coming apart, though that might have been his fevered imagination.
And he wasn’t done ratcheting up their firepower, either. When he got from the tail back to the midsection, he tore into one of the supply crates stowed against the bulkhead. Inside it were XM29 prototype assault rifles, hundreds of which they had stumbled upon in the hangar at Naval Air Base Oceana in Virginia. It was a dual weapon – a 20mm smart grenade launcher up top, with a full-auto 5.56mm carbine beneath. It also had a computer-assisted sighting system with integrated laser rangefinder, thermal vision, and night vision capabilities.
And Fick had brought three of them.
He hadn’t issued these to his team, because you couldn’t rely on any weapon you hadn’t trained with, and you didn’t change the equipment of meticulously trained men right before a battle. But he had brought them along for the pilot, co-pilot, and mechanic – who weren’t trained at all, and thus might as well have something that made a really big bang. All just in case things went so far to shit that they needed everyone on the ground shooting.
Obviously, things had really, totally gone to shit.
Fick decided he didn’t mind some really big bangs himself. As the aircraft vibrated around him from the roar of the twin 50s in the back, he unclipped his trusty M16, and clipped in one of the XM29s in its place. He then refilled his mag pouches – the new rifle took the same 5.56mm STANAG magazines as the old one – then also jammed in a bunch of five-round magazines of the 20mm grenades
this beast also took. Then he shoved a bunch more in a bag, grabbed a second rifle, and went forward to the command section of the plane.
And he hauled out the pilot. Once he got him outside, he had him check the fuel level of the number-one wing tank. The pilot said he thought it was at about seventy-five percent.
It wasn’t enough.
* * *
Graybeard didn’t pause firing, but he did look back over his shoulder as Fick emerged with the pilot. He was only a few feet from the tail of the bomber, from which the badly wounded Reyes was nonetheless mowing the grass out front with the dual 50s. Graybeard shouted to Fick, “Hey, what happened to keeping one pilot safe?”
Fick spat on the tarmac. “If we’re all dead, it doesn’t matter whether anybody can fly the damned plane.” He turned back to the increasingly alarmed pilot and gave him a 15-second course of instruction on operating the XM-29. He then hung the bag of ammo over the guy’s shoulder and positioned him where he was least likely to blow up anything important, or anyone still alive, with the grenades. Then he grabbed Graybeard.
“On me.”
Graybeard nodded and fell in behind, continuing to fire steadily toward the northern flank. But with Brady still in the fight and unwounded, the Kid up top – plus now Reyes on the twin 50 and the co-pilot also piling in – their position at the bomber looked like holding a while longer. The putrid dead bastards were really piling up now, forming a flesh fence that the new arrivals had to climb or fall over to get to them.
But climb over it they did, and Fick saw heavy opposition ahead as he jogged forward. Hearing the pilot popping off 20mm explosive rounds behind him, he figured he’d give that a spin himself. He pulled the hulking sci-fi-looking rifle tight into his shoulder, powered up the active sight – then pulled his eye away again, to check out the buttons on the outer edge of the trigger guard. These controlled which weapon the single trigger fired. He punched the one labeled ‘HE’, sighted in again – and triggered off five of the little airburst grenades in a flat trajectory toward the line of dead heading toward them.
