by Mark Wandrey
“You know you say that a lot?”
“I wasn’t aware of that,” she said. He looked at her, and she gave him a wink. Alex chuckled and started working the controls. “What’s the worst that can happen?”
“I break the collar from the hull, the ship decompresses, and we die horribly.”
“I always appreciate honesty,” she said.
“If it blows,” he said, “it’ll be quick.”
“Honesty,” she said again. “Ready when you are.” Alex nodded and flipped a control. The RCS fired again. A different set this time. The ship tried to rotate, and the docking collar gave a horrendous screech. “Oh shit,” she said. BANG! Allison gasped and sucked in a lungful of air, convinced it would be her last ever. It took a couple seconds for her to realize she was still alive.
“We’re free,” he said. “Shit, it worked!” He manipulated the controls, the RCS firing as he pushed them away before the wildly-spinning ISS module collided with him. “I’ll be damned!”
“Wait, you didn’t think it would work?” Alison gasped. “What the hell?”
“Well,” he said, “if it didn’t we were dead anyway. Sometimes you just roll the dice.” She glared at him as he stabilized their flight. A couple lights were flashing on the console, and he examined the controls. “We have a slight pressure leak, so I’m going to get our location and start a reentry. We’re not home yet, but at least now we have a chance.” He brought the alien drive back on line, and the ship quickly moved away from the growing debris field which used to be a $100 billion space station.
Alison tried not to freak out as the ship was rocked by increasingly violent shudders, and streamers of white hot plasma flashed across the cockpit. Her breathing became more and more jerky, and she gripped the arm of her seat with white knuckles. Gravity was back, and it was crushing her down in the chair. She was about to scream in fear when she heard something she wasn’t expecting. It was Alex, and he was whistling a song.
She strained to hear over the sound of the buffeting Azanti was taking. It sounded familiar, but he wasn’t whistling very loudly, almost under his breath. She kept trying to catch it until she realized the buffeting was past and there was just the roar of wind past the ship. The sky outside was blue again.
“We made it!” she screamed.
“Never any doubt,” Alex said and winked. He worked the controls, and the ship began a sweeping turn, burning off velocity.
“Where are we?” she asked.
“Just passed over Hawaii, going about Mach Five. ETA the California coast, about 40 minutes.”
“Excellent,” she said, smiling. “Hey, what was that you were whistling?”
“Oh, that?” he chuckled. “‘Pop goes the Weasel.’”
* * * * *
Chapter Nine
Morning, Saturday, April 30
Near Tarpley, TX
“Ready?!” Vance yelled over the crashing of wood and the hundred roaring voices.
“Yeah!” Tim said.
“Go!” Harry agreed. Vance nodded, slid the bolt back, and pulled the hatchway open. Harry and Tim leveled their rifles in anticipation as he revealed the tunnel interior. They all exhaled when the string of LED lights running into the distance revealed it to be empty.
“Thank God,” Ann gasped.
“Harry,” Vance called, “take point!”
“You got it,” the big former Marine said and dropped down to crawl into the tunnel.
“Tim right behind him,” Vance continued, and Tim nodded. “Girls, grab a cart and go behind Tim; I’m taking rear. Go, go, go!” As they began to move, Vance grabbed a belt and slung it crossbody over his shoulder. What it held had been illegal before everything fell apart. The rifle that went opposite the belt had been as well.
When Vance had designed his retreat, he had always known there might be scenarios where he’d be forced to bugout. While designing the bunker under the house, he’d had to take that into account. The cost involved in making the tunnel was too exorbitant to make it more than four feet wide by four feet tall, especially since it was almost a hundred yards long. The cost of digging a 170-cubic yard tunnel had been shocking, to say the least. He’d second-guessed that cost at least a dozen times over the years. But as he watched his pregnant wife take a rope in hand and crawl into the tunnel pulling a cart laden with goods, he was glad for the first time.
The carts were landscaping carts. Each of them had four large, oversized wheels and could hold over 400 pounds. After they’d all discussed the situation, it was decided to go with a worst-case bugout plan. Even then, deciding on the cart loads had been tough. There was so much they were leaving behind. The cameras in the garage were out, and the external damage looked bad. They didn’t know what they’d find when they got there.
Inside the tunnel, it was even more cramped than he’d remembered it being when he’d finished the installation work. The contractor had only cut the rough work, shored it up, and covered the walls with waterproof concrete. He’d put the rubber flooring down himself, hung low-power LED lights, and installed the doors at both end. There was even a solar-powered air vent at the 50-yard point, in case they had to use it as a hideout.
The last of the women pulled the carts into the tunnel just as Vance heard a resounding crash of wood breaking, and a snarling, barking voice back at the bunker stairs.
“Shit,” Vance said and crawled into the tunnel. He caught the barrel of the M4 carbine he’d slung over his back on the tunnel top and had to back out a few inches to bend over and clear it. In that time, he heard multiple feet racing down the stairs, along with feral snarls. “Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he moaned as he backed into the tunnel and stretched for the rope attached to the door.
When he’d built the retreat, they’d planned for almost every collapse contingency they could think of. From economic to a meteor impact. From nuclear war to an eruption of the Yellowstone Super Volcano. Hell, they’d even joked about a zombie apocalypse! Then he’d built the bunker under the house with that in the back of his mind, while only voicing the realistic scenarios to Ann when he wrote the checks.
The cost had been so great that his initial plan of a one-inch thick steel vault-style door had been scrapped to save a couple thousand dollars. Two inches of solid oak with metal bands top and bottom had seemed good enough. It would stop anything below a .50 caliber, and the corner to the entrance upstairs made it hard to bring a long arm to bear. Or a battering ram, for that matter. He’d never considered dozens of crazed zombie-plague victims hammering their hands to bloody stumps.
“I still don’t see it,” he said, stretching for the strap and cursing himself for not having a better mechanism, “how could bare hands have pounded through two inches of oak?” He finally nabbed it and pulled just as the first of them reached the bottom of the stairs and searched around. It was a man, powerfully built with wild black hair. He was naked from the waist down. The freak had a damned erection! Blood was dripping from his hands. The door creaked as it swung, and the infected’s head snapped around, and its eyes locked on him.
Vance felt the blood pounding in his ears as he scooted his butt backward and pulled the door as fast as he could. The infected screamed and raced at Vance with astonishing speed. Behind him, Vance could see dozens coming down the stairs to join him. It would take a second to latch the door. But as he pulled it closed, bloody fingers wrapped around the edge, and he knew he was screwed.
Vance braced a foot against the edge of the doorframe and leaned back with the rope. Leverage was on his side, and he saw blood spurt from the fingers.
“Pull out or you’re losing those fingers,” he laughed. Then the unexpected happened. Another set of fingers appeared, heralded by cracking wood, right next to the first set. These fingers weren’t normal, either. They didn’t appear to have flesh on their tips! In fact, the bones were almost like sharpened punches. “Jesus Fucking Christ!” The fingers wedged, and wood splintered as they dug in, and the door began to be pried ope
n. It felt like a hydraulic ram was working on the other side as slowly, inexplicably, the door began to move.
In a panic, Vance craned his head around to look up the tunnel. The LED lights didn’t provide much in the way of illumination, though he could see Ann taking up the rear of the women, and at least half way down the tunnel. Fifty yards, he thought, if I can just pull the door closed…
He pulled with every bit of his torso, arm, and leg strength, and bought back maybe an inch. He could hear rushing on the other side and knew more hands were about to join the battle. He’d lose. It was the feeling of inevitability you got just before a car crash or while watching one of those Russian dashcam videos as a car pulled out into traffic, right in front of a hurtling truck. He was going to die. They’re going to rip the door open and eat me alive, just like the baby in Mexico, he thought. His pulse pounded like a base drum, his lungs worked, and time seemed to slow to a standstill. The rope was slipping.
“Not this way,” he said, shaking his head. Straining for all he was worth, he wrapped the rope around his left forearm several times before letting it go with his right. Another set of bony fingers appeared around the edge at that second and he was almost bent double and jerked through the doorway. Somewhere, deep in his being, Vance found some reserve left and he pulled back as he reached back with his right hand and swung his carbine forward.
Without looking, he swept the safety off, something he’d done in practice a thousand times during trips to his property’s range. Then one more click. He’d picked this M4 for more than its compact size and common ammo. He’d picked it because it was the only fully-automatic weapon he owned. He released the rope and the door flew open. The two who’d been pulling on the door were sent sprawling backward, but there were at least a dozen of them waiting, bending over and snarling at him in the hole.
“Eat shit,” he snarled, and stroked the trigger. Short, controlled bursts, he heard in his head, repeated like a mantra from the former Marine who’d instructed him on the use of the fully-automatic weapon. It’s not a firehose, you only get a couple seconds if you hold the trigger down. Only really useful in close quarters with lots of targets, this situation was where fully-automatic fire excelled.
Vance worked the barrel from side to side as he fired bursts. The gun’s reports in the enclosed space were like hammer blows to his head. He yelled as he fired. The shots weren’t terribly accurate because his left hand was already snatching a magazine from his web gear. Gun smoke billowed, dirt was blown up from the ground and fell from the tunnel walls, hurting his eyes. Brass ricocheted off the tunnel wall and back at him. He shot with his eyes wide in panic, completely unaware of the burning brass landing on his collar and arms, searing flesh.
At least six of them went down, and several more were hurt before the bolt locked open. Vance did one of the fastest mag-swaps he’d ever done in his life, then switched to a two-handed grip. Now he picked individual targets. Each face and torso got a quick burst as they dove at the doorway. At that range, the .223 rounds were devastating. Heads exploded, and torsos were ruptured in fountains of gore.
Then the second magazine was empty, and there were no more monsters immediately visible. Vance shook himself to regain his senses. He could hear Ann screaming in panic behind him.
“Keep going!” he yelled. “Don’t stop for anything!” He reached forward to pull the door closed. He’d punched several holes through it while firing full auto. It looked intact though. He pulled, and the first infected he’d shot stopped it from closing. Blood and brains were everywhere as Vance cursed and kicked at the corpse, his boot heel squishing in the blown-out skull. “Blech!” he said as kept kicking until he pushed the body clear and pulled the door closed. More running outside as he latched it.
“Vance, you okay?” Tim’s voice echoed from down the tunnel.
“Yeah, keep going!” he yelled back, and he started crawling as fast as he could.
“That was a lot of shooting, man,” Tim persisted.
You think? he wanted to yell back, but instead Vance concentrated on making as much distance as he could. He let the carbine hang on its sling, despite that it made crawling much more difficult as it dragged along the ground under him. After about fifty yards, he stopped to rest. Dropping back on his butt, he reloaded the carbine again and looked ahead to verify they’d reached the other end. They had. He could also hear what sounded like animals fighting over scraps. He realized that wasn’t far off. They were tearing apart the infected he’d shot. It sounded like dozens, maybe hundreds of them. God, where were they all coming from?!
“What did you stop for?” Harry yelled. Vance could see him now framed in the doorway, kneeling and holding his rifle cross body.
“Just close the door if I don’t make it!” Vance yelled back, and he continued crawling again. Back the way he came, the door cracked as someone, or something, pounded it with incredible force. “Didn’t I leave you enough to eat?” Vance moaned as he crawled. Another series of blows almost split the door. He glanced back and almost panicked when he saw how badly the door was smashed. He’d only made it another five yards.
Cursing constantly, Vance got to his feet. He had to bend way over and he began to shuffle-step as fast as he could. His back began to hurt right away and every other step he hit his back or shoulders on the roof, but he made much better time.
“Better hurry,” came the far-too calm voice of the former Marine. Vance looked and saw Harry on one knee, his weapon now against his shoulder. As he looked on, Harry raised the barrel and sighted. He heard the door behind him shatter and Harry fired a second later. Vance felt the supersonic crack of the bullet passing within inches of his head the same instant as a meaty ‘smack’ sounded behind him as the round found its target. “Keep moving!” Harry yelled.
“Like I’m going to stop,” Vance said.
Harry fired several more times. Always single shots. Vance stopped looking back, even though he couldn’t help but try and analyze what each shot had done. Some sounded like they’d bounced off metal in the tunnel or hit the door, others more like they’d torn into flesh and bone. Once he heard a strangled scream that sounded like a woman. He tried to ignore it.
Then he was just a few yards from the end of the tunnel and Harry was moving aside to make room for him. Vance’s back was screaming in protest as he slouched through and finally stood upright again. The fifty yards felt more like five hundred! In the second it took him to turn around, Harry and Tim were already starting to swing the door closed. He knelt and looked down the tunnel, and almost screamed. Dozens of them were racing down the tunnel, half crouched, moving almost like chimps would as they loped down the tunnel.
“Wait!” Vance yelled before they could get the door closed.
“What?” Tim asked. “We only have a few seconds!”
“We’ll never hold them,” Vance said. Harry looked and nodded.
“He’s right. Can we barricade it?”
“Nothing down here,” Vance admitted. They were in a ten-by-ten basement about twenty feet below the garage. There were a few storage boxes, but nothing that would slow down the infected’s relentless attacks. “Drop a few of them,” he said as he took his rifle off to get at the other sling.
The two men let the door swing back open and levelled their own M4 carbines. They weren’t fully-automatic, like Vance’s, but they could still put out devastating fire. At the back the women jumped and jerked as the rifles boomed while they loaded the freight elevator with the contents of the three trailers. Tim and Harry both emptied their thirty-round magazines and began to reload. Vance retrieved what he wanted and moved forward.
“When I throw these, you two slam that door and then get to the sides! Ladies, to the sides as far as you can go!” Harry, the only veteran among them, looked at what Vance had in his hand and his eyes got huge.
“Fuck!” he said, then yelled out of instinct. “Fire in the hole!” Vance pulled the pins and lobbed first one, then another M67 grenad
e.
“Close it!” Vance yelled, and the other two men swung the heavy wooden door closed. As the door swung closed, Vance saw one of the infected snatch a grenade from the floor and look at it. The door slammed closed, Tim threw the heavy steel bolt, and both men spun to the side. Vance almost forgot to move himself but did so at the last second.
The two grenades totaled nearly a pound of Composition B explosive, and they went off within a fraction of second of each other. The small four-foot by four-foot tunnel focused the blast forces, and the only place for it to go was along the tunnel’s length. The explosion blew the heavy wooden door clean off its hinges and sent it flying across the space like a Frisbee to shatter against the far wall, just feet from Nicole Price’s head.
“DAMN!” Tim yelled, because he was nearly deafened by the thunderous explosions. The room filled instantly with dust and smoke and there was the sound of falling rocks for several long seconds.
“Where’d you get those grenades?” Harry asked once they could hear each other reasonably again.
“It was a deal a few years ago,” Vance explained. “Let’s just say that neither side of it would have been approved by the government.”
“Well, we’re in no place to complain,” Tim said, his wife staring at the wood stuck into the rock wall that had almost taken her head off.
“Here,” Vance said, carefully removing four of his remaining six grenades and giving two each to his friends. “They’re heavy as shit, anyway, and scared the hell out of me.”
“We were always very respectful of them in the Corps,” Harry said as he placed them in his web gear. Tim watched how the former Marine did it and copied him. He had to move a pair of magazines to make it work. Vance examined the tunnel; it was completely collapsed less than thirty yards away. A tiny bit of morning sunlight was filtering through the tons of debris.
“It almost killed me,” Nicole said, still staring at the tunnel door, her knees visibly weak. Tim went over to console her while Vance squared-away his gear. He replaced his empty magazines from an ammo can full of them on one of the trailers, then went to the elevator controls.
