Day by Day Armageddon: Beyond Exile

by J. L. Bourne

  After lowering his head so that his eyes were hidden below his ballcap, he said: “Word came down from the top to get and transport specimens of them for research on the flattop [carrier].”

  Insane . . . really? Would the people in charge actually want these things onboard their command ship, no matter how critical the research? Bringing them onto a cutter was one thing, but onboard the acting U.S. military command ship?

  I know that the carrier had a full onboard medical staff and decent equipment for research, but this research could be done somewhere else, anywhere else, away from the military’s leadership. We were getting thin on active-duty military personnel or so I estimated.

  “Why the Gulf of Mexico?” I asked.

  He replied, “Because command wanted the radiated ones.”

  I nearly slugged the man right where he stood for agreeing to follow those orders, but I restrained myself, and he went on to tell me that many smaller ships had been dispatched with extraction teams to the radiation zones of destroyed cities to find specimens for study. I agreed in my mind with the intentions, but not the means or storage of these things. Why did they need them from different areas? This man did not know the answer to that and I was betting the only people who did were on that aircraft carrier. I asked the man how many radiated corpses were onboard; he told me that they had acquired five of them from the New Orleans hot zone.

  I asked him how only five of those creatures could effectively mission-kill the cutter. He stared off into the night and sat there for a minute, not knowing what to say. I snapped my fingers in front of his face, pulling him out of his trancelike state. He then began telling me what I had feared and suspected.

  “These aren’t the same as the others, sir. They don’t decay like the others, they are stronger, faster, and some say more intelligent. I don’t get it. The radiation does something to them, preserves them. The doctors on the carrier think the radiation is some type of catalyst for preserving motor function and regrowing dead cells. Oddly, the regenerated cells are still dead. They don’t understand it, no one does. They won’t admit it, but I know they made a mistake when they dropped the nukes.

  “The creatures on the ship broke out of their restraining straps and killed the three men guarding them. Those men turned and it was all we could do to secure the bridge and get the ship moored alongside this oil platform before we were eaten.”

  He estimated that the ship housed nearly fifteen undead now.

  It was time to act, I supposed. I told the man that I was sorry and that the carrier would not be acquiring their specimens from this ship. We were going to kill them all.

  We lost a Marine in the assault. All in all it took forty-five minutes to secure the ship. It was dark and it would have been suicide for our whole squad to board. I took the Gunny and a seasoned staff sergeant with me. He would have had it no other way. I have recently been informed that he had a spouse back at the original Marine base camp. I can say that he fought valiantly and probably saved both the Gunny and me.

  We carefully boarded the ship by jumping over the mooring lines onto the weather deck. Staff Sergeant “Mac” had the only suppressed weapon in the group. We left the others at home in the event they needed the weapons to defend themselves.

  I was not familiar with the weapon’s handling, so I left it to the Marine. I would have loved to take more than three, but unfortunately we only had three sets of night vision goggles. Mac wasted the two creatures on the weather deck. Those two were part of the original crew. We piled them on the forecastle and proceeded to secure the ship. Using the ship’s 21MC bitch box we were able to establish communications with six surviving crewmembers holed up in the galley. I could hear the sound of the undead in the background through the speakers, relentlessly striking the steel roll-down galley shutter.

  This partition was the only thing keeping the culinary specialists and the ship’s senior officer from being eaten.

  They proceeded to tell us that they had taken down one of the radiated undead with a fire extinguisher and a fire axe. One of the men who had downed the thing was vomiting and weak, probably from exposure. The sailors wore radiation suits inside the New Orleans zone to acquire the specimens, which were no doubt very radioactive and dangerous to be near. The lieutenant told me that the other two were outside the galley partition pounding on the bulkheads. He seemed to think that much of the undead crew was there with them but wasn’t sure if all of them were present on the other side. We crept through the passageway, down the steep ladders. The galley was in the center of the ship, deep below the waterline. As we approached the main deck, Mac whispered that he was going to destroy one of the bright passageway lights so we could continue to have the upper hand. He shot it out, and this change in atmosphere triggered one of those things to move into the open in front of his weapon.

  Mac took it out with two shots. The first shot hit the creature’s left shoulder and did nothing but spatter black, putrid blood on the wall behind. The second shot hit the creature right on the nose, and I suppose just enough of the brain was scrambled to do the job, as it moved no more.

  We dragged it to the corner of the passageway and used zip cuffs to bind its arms and legs just to be sure. We kept lurking through the darkness. Every sound was thunder and every blinking LED seemed like storm lightning. The ship had the familiar smell of mothballs and a tinge of death. We came to a hatch. It was a large steel door used to keep water from flooding adjoining compartments in the event of an attack or emergency. There was a small circle of thick glass no bigger than the diameter of a coffee can on the door where a peephole would be. I looked through and could see the ship’s emergency lighting was on. An eerie red glow filled the small room beyond. I cranked the handle on the door, trying to be as quiet as possible, moving a centimeter at a time. We all winced when the hatch creaked from lack of maintenance. I stopped moving the handle and checked the hole again. I saw movement in the compartment beyond. A loud thud rang through our compartment as something very strong hit the hatch. It nearly opened from the pressure, but fortunately I hadn’t fully slid the handle to the open position.

  The creature on the other side obscured the red lighting behind. Its face was pressed against the thick glass and it was banging its head in a futile attempt to get to us. Every fiber in my body was telling me to leave and not open the thick steel door. We could still turn back and survive. There were men down there and I knew that every hour they stayed in proximity to the radiated creatures meant they were an hour closer to their death. I told the sergeant that I would slam the latch open, then he would pull the rip cord that I had attached to the door, yanking it open.

  As there was no use in being quiet about it anymore, I used no care in forcing the handle to the open position. I slammed it home and Mac yanked the cord. The door flung open and the creature came through. Luckily for us the creature was not accustomed to shipboard life and promptly tripped over the knee knocker, landing flat on its face. Expecting this thing to take its time getting up, I readied my weapon for careful aim. I did not get what I expected. This creature was on its feet fast. This was one of the preserved dead from the New Orleans zone. It lurched toward me and my goggles seemed to crackle like a late-night hometown TV channel that had just finished the national anthem. The last thing I saw was its bony claw reach out before intense light blinded me and I heard the action of Mac’s suppressed H&K.

  I felt the air move and heard a loud thud as something hit the steel deck. I pulled off my NVGs. As my eyes adjusted to the bright light, I saw Mac’s Surefire torch lighting up the compartment. Using two mops from a nearby bucket, Mac and I pushed the creature into a corner and tried as best we could to stack heavy objects on top to incapacitate it like the other creature we had dispatched—again, “just in case.” We could not zip cuff the thing, as the radiation was likely at a deadly level. We took no time getting out of this area and through the next. Anywhere this creature had been was probably unsafe. I know it was my imaginatio
n, similar to the feeling of your head itching when someone mentions lice, but I could almost feel the heat of radiation on my face and neck.

  The next compartment was clear. Only one more steel door separated us from the galley area. We were now facing two problems. First, our NVGs were “snowing out” due to some sort of electromagnetic or radiological interference, and second, the heavy steel door was in fact cracked open slightly. The only real barrier that separated us from the bulk of the undead in the galley was a long, dark corridor and a half-open steel door. I could see their shadows moving through the crack beyond the door. From where we were watching, the door was roughly ten meters away.

  The only thing we could do was bust in there and shoot them. No special tactic, no smart way to handle it. I hated this and wished for a better method. We approached the door. I stopped Gunny and Mac and we checked our weapons. No safety, and no inhibitions. We had eighty-seven rounds ready to go between us. More, if we needed to reload, but we all knew if it came to that we were going to die anyway.

  We checked our clothing and tried to cover as much skin as possible. As near as I could figure, there were at least ten in there, and at least one of the special type. This hatch opened outward, away from us and toward them. I gave the signal and the Gunny kicked it fully open. It slammed against the bulkhead and locked into place. Inside this room were eleven undead corpses. They were all banging on the metal partition and didn’t notice us at first until I took a preemptive shot. I killed three before the rest took notice. I had hoped that one of them was the New Orleans creature. We began to shoot, three-round bursts. Limbs, jaws, shoulders and teeth were flying everywhere. I was careful not to aim in the direction of the partition, in case one of the sailors stood near. We were down to three when I heard a loud scream from over my right shoulder. It was Mac. He was bleeding from his face, and one of the creatures was standing behind him attempting to bite him.

  I looked again . . . it was the same creature we had shot two compartments back. The one we didn’t touch, but tried to incapacitate. It hadn’t died. I emptied the rest of my magazine into the creature’s head. It fell, most of its head missing. I was almost overrun by the last of them when Gunny took care of them for me as I tended to Mac.

  The bite wasn’t bad. It was actually not his face, but his ear. The creature had bitten part of his ear off. Mac was breathing heavily and going into what I would have described as shock. I asked Gunny to look after him as I went to check for survivors in the galley. This was no time to screw around. The ship wasn’t safe and would need a scrub-down before it could ever be used in a normal capacity again. I rapped on the steel shutter, asking if anyone was alive. I heard a series of mechanical clicking sounds and the door next to the shutter opened up and they started pouring out . . . living. One of them looked pretty bad. It was the one who had the hand-to-hand altercation with one of the New Orleans creatures.

  The ship’s OIC was present, and I informed him of the situation. He knew it and hated to admit it, but he had no choice but to abandon this ship and hold out on the rig until we could get support from carrier HQ. We got the hell off the ship, with Mac and the sick sailor being first priority. Mac was a dead man. The other man had not been bitten and only needed decontamination treatment. I wasn’t certain whether it was too late. On the way out, I stopped off in the one of the ship’s heads and ripped the soap dispenser off the wall. I took a roll of paper towels as well. We were finally topside. It was still dark outside. It was only 0300 hrs. Mac and the sailor were in no shape to climb to the platform where the other survivors waited. We rigged a makeshift harness and pulled them up one at a time. I never really knew this Marine, but that doesn’t change my sadness. As the acting commander it was my duty to travel to the camp where his wife lived and tell her the news. Although I had no flag to present, it didn’t change the need to fulfill my obligation to Mac, as he is and always will be a United States Marine.

  Gunny shot Mac in the back of the head two hours after we returned to the rig. He had already passed out from the infection and was not far from turning.

  This mission ended the next day, with radio contact being established with the carrier battle group. I relayed a message to command through the radio operator at Hotel 23 and informed them of the situation and location of survivors here. Using salt water from the Gulf and the soap and towels, we attempted to decontaminate Petty Officer Tompost. We left the men with every bit of our food and water and departed the oil rig after making sure a rescue was en route. We also left the sailors a functional radio in the event help didn’t show. The only thing we had going for us were a few full cans of diesel and a spot to refuel on our charts. It was a two-day trip back. I brought Mac back home wrapped in canvas strapped to the exterior of LAV number two. I made sure he wouldn’t return, but his wife didn’t deserve to have his body thrown into the Gulf. He deserved a proper burial.

  19 Aug

  2350

  Day before last I made my trip to the Marine base camp. This is one of the many reasons that I wish I were not the senior man present at the facility. I took four men, including the Gunny, and one LAV. Correction, there were five men. Mac was with us in a pine box, covered by an American flag. The flag wasn’t easy to come by, as it took forty rounds of ammunition and ten years of my life terrified away from me to get it. It was the least I could do. Tara asked to come with me to comfort the widow. I told her that it wasn’t a good idea, of course. Besides, this world is so full of death and doom. Mrs. Mac wasn’t the only one to lose someone, but I still felt for her. There weren’t many pre-existing relationships left here in the apocalypse.

  I didn’t have a formal uniform and the nearest uniform shop was out of business. I knew it really didn’t matter. It was a solemn moment when I handed the widow her tattered one-sided flag. I didn’t know what to expect. I had never had the honor of doing this. In the movies, the widow always hugs the guy who gives her the flag and they both have a somber moment. All I got was a cold stare and a feeling of hatred. Who am I to blame her? If I can somehow be an outlet for her emotions, then it’s fine by me. I do know that I feel bad about what happened. He was a good man.

  RIP Staff Sergeant Mac.

  Exodus

  21 Aug

  2057

  22 Aug

  HQ has not responded to my recent communiqué. I have released a radio message preparing the other camp for evacuation. This comes after a thirty-six-hour swell of undead near that area. It will take them two days to transit to this location with women and children. Here at Hotel 23 we are busy finding supplies to expand our safe boundary so that we can house the extra occupants. There is no way we can accommodate them all inside the facility; it simply wasn’t built for so many. The other camp has lost eight people since I ordered a contingent to be stationed here. I cannot help but think animosity may exist. Apparently one of the civilian males was allowed to hunt for deer last week and returned with nothing to show for it but a bite from one of the creatures. The man hid the bite for fear of quarantine or summary execution. He turned in his sleep three days later and took the lives of two other civilians—three if you count the young girl who was executed because she was bitten and getting sick. They didn’t shoot her like an animal. They gave her a morphine overdose, and after her heart stopped they immediately drilled a small hole in her head above her left ear to destroy any chance of reanimation.

  When this type of thing happens, I lose sleep. I know that millions have died in a much worse manner than this over the past months, but it always hurts to see a young child get taken by this sickness. I don’t really even know if that is what it is. Some seem to think so.

  While monitoring the daily message traffic coming off the archaic dot matrix printer, I saw a message I had been expecting. The ballistic missile submarine that had been submerged since before the plague was forced to surface yesterday. That was the last sanctuary of real death.

  The last known place on the planet where men could die in peace
. . . until it surfaced.

  The man who had died of natural causes and had been stored in the freezer came back after only two hours of exposure. Luckily, they had it strapped to a crate of low-grade beef. The ship’s cook discovered it when he went down to the freezer to retrieve the last of the ship’s food stores. The cook nearly had a heart attack when he walked by the corpse and noticed its head tracking him across the reefer, gnashing its teeth.

  The submarine intends to follow the battle group until it can acquire enough food to stay submerged for a useful amount of time. Its mission now, instead of blowing up large foreign cities, is to scout coastal areas and discourage piracy on the high seas. The status messages that are sent weekly state that most of the nuclear ships won’t need to be refueled for twenty-plus years. After that, all bets are off. I doubt there will be enough qualified people to refuel them even in one hundred years.

  I’m sending all our LAVs out tomorrow to meet the other survivors at the halfway point and to escort them the rest of the way here. From that point it will take every man, woman and child to expand our safe boundaries. We will have no choice but to make perilous trips to the surrounding interstates to retrieve concrete barriers so that we may better fortify our compound.

  Tara and I have been spending more time together than ever since my return from the Gulf. Dean has been dubbed the official teacher of this compound. Of course there are only two children to teach, but soon there will be more. Annabelle is allowed to attend class, on the stipulation she does not bark and disrupt the instruction. I sat in on one of the classes last night. Laura is becoming pretty decent at her multiplication tables. Danny is a little better due to age. She is learning her sevens and Danny is up to division and fractions.