by J. Thorn
“People? Are there people on it?”
“No. No, they would have evacuated. It’s freight.”
“What kind of freight? Why didn’t they just drive it backwards?”
“Hundreds of tons of canned goods, heading for Belgium by the looks of it, and they couldn’t reverse the engine. It’s an old one, and no rear engine – and the front-engine type, to the best of my knowledge, wouldn’t be able to push that many carriages.”
“They just left the damn train on the lines, full of food supplies?”
“We were told to evacuate immediately.”
Grews had watched on those cameras over the days that followed, even after the security guard had not turned up for work a few days later, and then not again after that. Grews made it personal somehow.
Further back down the tunnel, a long way behind those few outliers who were far more resourceful, thousands of living and dead were pouring into the tunnel. The living, mostly already infected, running from the dead that followed them. Grews had asked if they could send troops down before closing the tunnel, retrieve the few who had made it nearly all the way along the tunnel, had found the supply train, breached the maintenance corridors and disappeared from camera view… but the answer from on high had been no.
Close that tunnel, Grews had been told.
And then when they’d realized that the tunnel was filling with the dead, word came that it had been hit from the air. RAF bombers undid in just a few seconds what had taken decades of planning and construction. They tried to close the halfway gate, the one that had been put there for this very purpose, but the mechanism failed. The midway failsafe was closing, but it was closing at such a slow speed that it would take hours to shut, and by then the tunnel would be overrun.
The bomber hit the tunnel just three miles from Calais and the evacuation call had gone out to clear the area around the entrance. They had expected the floodwater to come spewing out at such a rate that hectares of countryside might become a marshland. Entire divisions were mobilised and sent to the area to prepare for a massive clean-up of thousands of dead and infected.
Grews had sat in front of those screens and watched, unable to do a single thing, as one by one the cameras blinked out from power loss. He watched as the water flooded different sections, and saw the mass of dead, and the undead, carried forward by the flood.
Thank God we collapsed the tunnel at this end. Or we would have just flushed half of the undead of France onto British soil.
It had been his idea. And it had been done in a hurry. A dozen charges just fifty feet inside had collapsed the tunnel. It might stop the water, he’d thought, and then maybe they could check the maintenance tunnel for those survivors. But orders from above came that the maintenance entrance was to be collapsed, too. No one was to come out.
But something had happened, and he had never found out what. Somehow the half of the tunnel on the English side hadn’t flooded completely.
That had been nearly two years ago.
“Andrew? You still there?”
Grews snapped back to the present. “Yes, I’m here.”
“Are you with me on this? You know that tunnel needs clearing out.”
“Yes. I know.”
“I’d get someone else on it, but you know how things are now. We’re short of officers and men both, with this damn call-up mystery that no one is telling us about.”
“I know. And I need to do this. You know that.”
Bob did know. He had been Grews’ direct superior then, even as he was now, and he’d been the one to decide that those refugees weren’t getting out. What Bob didn’t know was that Grews had seen occasional movements in the unflooded sections of tunnel at the English end even after many months, even after nearly a year, movements that were not always the lumbering and slow trudge of the dead. Sometimes there were even flickers of light down in the darkness. But Grews had never caught any clear view of who they were. But he knew. They were his refugees. The heroic and trapped survivors of the tunnel.
But they had vanished again after the first year, and Grews had presumed they had starved, or succumbed to the undead floating in the water.
He wondered at what point he had become this very different man, when it had happened? He had spent so many years commanding peacekeeping forces and relief missions that his instinct had always been to help where he could. Those instincts had even garnered him a reputation as a soft touch, a weak commander, but back then he had been proud of that. This new Grews had managed to become, somewhere along the way, a man more interested in hiding what he had seen than in facing it.
Why? He knew why. It had been the moment they bombed the tunnel and turned down the chance to help just a few more people get out. That had been the moment he had changed. There had been ample time to send a crew in. He could have saved them.
And then the inexplicably fast zombie that had now emerged from the tunnel. Was it some mystical super-zombie, a claim that had been making the rounds of the rumor mill? Grews for one didn’t believe it for a second, even after the chaos of the night before. But whether or not that was real, all of this meant something new, and stunning. It meant that the refugees who had for a while managed to survive down there were now lost. But maybe now he would get the chance to at least put them to rest.
“So you’ll get this done?” said the voice on the radio again.
Grews blinked. His concentration was fading.
“Yes, of course. I’ll get it done.”
“And you’ll clean up, as well? No damn heroics. They’re all dead things now and you know it. We can’t risk bringing anything or anyone else out of that tunnel.”
“Of course.”
Time to face the ghosts, Grews thought.
BIG JOHN
It came out of the mists, making a low hissing sound as it pushed both air and water before it. Gray and indistinct, its hulking shape slowly resolved through the fog.
“Big son of a bitch,” breathed Predator, standing shoulder to shoulder with the other Alpha operators.
“Only the second of her class,” said Homer, the sole sailor in the team. “And the last.”
“Never say never,” said Predator.
The eight commandos stood in a single rank on an ancient pier, at the border between two worlds – the land and the sea. Britain had come to rule the largest empire the world had ever seen mainly by being a very hardy, and very clever, seafaring nation.
But they ruled the sea no longer.
The supercarrier USS John F. Kennedy (CVN-79) hove into view, dominating the entire horizon like an ocean-going ice shelf, like the God of a hundred thousand sperm whales, and began the elaborate process of docking and tying up.
“Grab your gear,” growled Handon. “Let’s move.”
He knew the Kennedy wasn’t going to risk staying tied up for long. In the ZA, you had to watch your mooring lines, and your anchor lines, like a hawk. One submersible Zulu crawling up them and onto your deck could turn your floating sanctuary into a self-consuming, flesh-rending charnel house. An outbreak belowdecks isn’t pretty.
* * *
The Kennedy was only the second in the new Gerald R. Ford class of nuclear supercarriers to be floated out of Newport News Drydock in Virginia. She was launched nearly a year ahead of schedule – and so just slightly ahead of the collapse of civilization that halted shipbuilding, and virtually all other kinds of building, for the duration. The Ford class was designed to replace the aging Nimitz-class carriers that went into service in 1975. The John F. Kennedy was the second carrier to bear that name – the original being the first of the Nimitz-class carriers, now long retired.
A nuclear-powered supercarrier with an 85-plane air wing and a full complement of nearly 5,000 crew, the new Kennedy stretched the length of the Empire State Building laid on its side, with five acres of flight deck and a control tower (called “the island”) looming five stories over it all. She was fully electric, with twin A1B nuclear reactors that could power the whole op
eration for 15-20 years at sea. She also had her own giant, onboard desalination plant, capable of turning 600,000 gallons of salt water into drinkable fresh water every day. She was a nearly totally self-sufficient floating city. And thus did she survive two years afloat after the fall of civilization.
Before the fall, it was truly said that a carrier strike group could single-handedly win a war against any nation on Earth. Unfortunately, aside from Britain, there were no longer any nations on Earth. And unfortunately for those serving in it, this carrier strike group originally also consisted of a bunch of ships not nearly as self-sufficient as the supercarrier – two Aegis guided missile cruisers, four destroyers, a nuclear-powered submarine, and an ammunition, oiler and supply ship. Half of them had not been as lucky as the Kennedy, going down to infection after port calls, or being abandoned and scuttled for lack of fuel and supplies.
Nonetheless, the miniature fleet that was the Kennedy strike group was an awesome display when she powered into what was left of the Royal Navy Command Headquarters at Portsmouth. She retained awesome capabilities for ocean-going force projection – and now represented humankind’s last, best hope for salvation from the Hell it had blundered into. She breathed hope into the breasts of everyone who laid eyes on her.
Surely any race that could build such a wonder couldn’t be destroyed by a virus? Surely any life force behind this was too strong to be dragged down by death.
* * *
The eight-man operational Alpha team crossed over 50 meters of gangway – then still had a half-mile walk across and down into the bowels of the gargantuan warship. All around them, exterior bulkheads rose to the sky, yawning hatches descended out of sight into blackness, and enormous, ancient, building-sized stacks of machinery groaned, steamed, and clattered. It was like being welcomed aboard some floating city of the gods.
And throughout all this, the operators carried, or pushed before them on rolling pallets, about three times their mass in weapons, ammo, and other mission-critical kit. By the time they were shown their bunks, they were ready to hit them. Their area consisted of a suite of four-man sleeping berths, a briefing room, a staging area – and even a live-fire range, where they were invited to zero their weapons. Like everyplace on Earth, the JFK was a little depopulated.
“The XO’s on his way down,” said the Marine master gunnery sergeant, head of the four-man security detail that brought Alpha aboard. Handon clocked his insignia as that of the Marine Special Operations Regiment. This caused him to raise an eyebrow, but he kept his comments to himself. Ainsley thanked the man, and the Marine team cleared out smartly.
Handon picked out a bunk in a room with Ainsley, Predator, and Juice, tossing his personal gear on a bottom rack, before Ainsley scored it. (In both the British and American militaries, it had long been not so much “rank hath its privileges” but rather “first in gets dibs.”) When Handon turned toward the hatch again, there was a smart-looking naval officer filling it.
“I’m Commander Drake, ship’s XO.”
Ainsley took his hand. “Captain Ainsley, USOC. This is CSM Handon, my first sergeant.”
Drake, late thirties, angular features, immaculately turned out and squared away in tan service uniform and #1 haircut, squinted at this, and his eyes glinted. “I suppose that’s the advantage of a slimmed down service structure. A lot of guys in jobs they’re overqualified for.”
Handon almost smiled himself. He liked this guy immediately. “What was with the MARSOC security detail?” he asked, referring to the Marine Special Operations Command. “I thought Navy MPs, or at least maybe SEALs, would provide shipboard security.”
Drake nodded. “When the shit started coming down, we had recently disembarked two fifteen-man Marine spec-ops teams – Teams 1 and 2, A Company, 2nd Marine Special Operations Battalion. They radioed for pickup, fought their way to the coastline – then swam out to the boat. After a two-week quarantine, we pretty much put them in charge of all security and combat operations throughout the strike group.”
Handon didn’t have to ask why. MARSOC Marines were drawn from the Marine Corps Force Reconnaissance community – the very best of what’s already a smart, deadly, elite outfit. They were notoriously bad hombres, as cunning as they were lethal. When you had fighters like that, you let them do your fighting.
“You guys might have cause to particularly appreciate that they’re here. They’re the B team for your mission – and also your QRF if you get in trouble.” Handon made a mental note not to piss them off, in any inter-service drinking contests that erupted. “But that’s getting into material for your first briefing. Which I’m going to give you whenever you get yourselves squared away. You squared away yet?”
Ainsley and Handon shrugged, ducked their heads at the hatch, and followed him to the briefing room. No time like the present.
JUST DON'T USE THE Z WORD
Predator and Juice watched their commanders go, then took advantage of their absence to more advantageously arrange the compartment. Juice took a brass spittoon out of his ruck and placed it carefully in the near corner.
“You brought that?” asked Predator.
“It’s gonna be a long passage. And swabbies get pissy if you spit on their freshly-swabbed decks. It’s either that or sleep up top.” Just as he tossed his head toward the hatch, a shadowy figure glided by. Juice stuck his head out into the passageway. “It’s your girl again. Wait a minute…”
“What?”
“Whoever she’s fooling around with is back at Hereford. Right?”
“Maybe she met a nice naval aviator. Iceman or some shit.”
“In five minutes?” Juice looked disbelieving.
“You said it yourself – she moves fast.”
“Or maybe she’s shtupping anything that lives.”
Pred gave him a very unamused look, then touched his toe to the deck between them. “That’s the line right there, buddy.” Alpha was very much an in-group – as was humanity itself at this point. However, when the shit really came down, loyalty would always be to service and to unit. Predator and Ali were Army – and both Delta. You didn’t fuck with that.
“Sorry, man,” Juice said, taking half a step back. “I’ll change that to ‘killing everything that’s dead’ and I think I’ve got it about right.”
“Much better,” said Predator, punching Juice in the shoulder – a blow that would have knocked most normal men down.
* * *
Pope and Henno were still squaring away kit in their berth, while Homer was, as so often when off duty, God only knew where. Ali had simply evanesced, also as usual, disappearing and reappearing in different places, never seeming to move through the solid 3D world, but just ghosting her way around the aether. This ability was half the reason for her status as last best sniper in the world. The other half was that she virtually never missed, out to ranges of 2,000 yards and beyond.
“Looks like we’re in for some heavy weather,” said Pope, stuffing clothing in his footlocker.
“What’s that?” asked Henno. “The ocean crossing?”
“No. When we get there. Chicago. Three million walking corpses, in a high wind.”
“Don’t mind the wind. And the corpses we can handle.” Henno stuck his face into his open ruck, before adding, “As long as your boss doesn’t mind slotting ’em before it’s too late…”
Pope almost let this pass entirely. But he took a chance that he could smooth something over, rather than stirring it up. “How do you mean, brother?”
Henno came out with a double handful of his stuff, then sighed. “Sometimes I get the impression Handon is a little slow on the trigger. Something more than ammo conservation and noise discipline. You know what I mean?”
Pope did, actually. He just nodded, letting Henno go on.
“Made some remark the other week. Sumint that sounded like he thinks there are people still alive inside the dead bastards.”
Pope propped his rifle in the corner and took a deep breath. He lower
ed himself down onto the lower bunk, steepled his fingers, and pinned Henno’s eye. “You want the backstory?”
“Aye,” Henno said. “I always want to know about aught that might get me killed.”
Pope paused before going on. “I served on one of the Task Forces with Handon, in Iraq.”
“TF135.”
“Or whatever it was designated that week.” A mixed special mission unit (SMU) of Tier-1 and other special operators, plus a support, intel, and aviation apparatus, the Task Force, and another like it in Iraq, had been charged with hunting HVTs – high-value targets. This meant the worst of the worst of al-Qaeda, the Taliban, al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia, the Mahdi militia – tangos galore. Tango being the military slang term for terrorists. Pope went on.
“At that point, we were doing this incredible tempo of ops – out every night on kill-or-captures, bringing intel back, crunching it for the next target, then going out again. Sometimes several times a night.”
“Yeah, you were the ones kicking down all the doors – and killing all those civilians.”
“A few, unfortunately.” Pope knew how the Brits viewed the American ethos – which valued aggression more than caution, or public relations. “We went out one night to take down a safehouse. Hardcore AQ types, the intel said. Handon pointed out that this village had never been anything but helpful to us, no reason to think they were harboring AQ. Intel disagreed. We went out, it turned into a big firefight, we ended up killing everyone in the building.”
Henno didn’t look surprised by any of this.
“Next morning,” Pope said. “A bunch of the villagers came out to the patrol base, carrying the bodies of young men we had killed. Handon wasn’t supposed to talk to them, but he did. A couple of grandmothers, tear-stained and half-crazed with grief, convinced him their grandsons were good kids who’d just gotten in with the wrong crowd. But now they were dead.”
“Yeah,” Henno said, “that’s the kind of shit you find out when you actually talk to people before shooting them. So Handon got religion or something because of this?”
