Arisen, Book Six - The Horizon

by Michael Stephen Fuchs

  She then pulled her long-sleeve running top over her head. She was wearing only a sports bra underneath, and Park saw something like abdominal definition, which he noted in a detached way. She ripped half of one sleeve off, starting it with her teeth, and put the smaller bit of fabric aside. She then lifted up Park’s shirt, and wrapped her shirt around his waist, over the wounds in his external obliques. She then tied it off – tight. He gasped as the pressure made it harder to breathe.

  Only then did she take the leftover sleeve and wrap it around her own wounded hand, holding it in place with a clenched fist. She didn’t have time to attend to it any more closely. She grasped Park by the shoulders, turned him around, and pointed him toward the exit, which was a long way up at the other end of Stores.

  The hot pain in her hand was a distraction. But Sarah was thinking clearly enough, and knew she had to do three things, and do them right now. First, the two of them had to get away from the Foxtrot in the compartment before it finished with Dietz, or got bored with him. Second, they had to get away from the site of all the shrieking and gunfire. Because where there was one of these bastards, it was extremely likely there were others – their whole job was to make more of themselves. And others would be drawn by the noise. Finally, she had to get the two of them the hell out of there, and up to a higher deck and to safety.

  Scratch that, she thought, as the damp air chilled her bare skin. I have to get HIM up to safety.

  She knew her own welfare was very much of secondary importance. Her only significance right now was doing her job – which was, beyond any question, protecting him.

  She leaned in, pressed her mouth to his ear, and breathed: “You get in my back pocket. And you stay there. Got it?” He nodded weakly in response. And then she set off, leading the way, and glancing over her shoulder every two seconds to make sure he was still behind her.

  The towering crates and deep shadows loomed and lunged at them as the two fast-walked, her just ahead, him just behind, both of them trembling now. As Sarah charted their course and set the pace, she tried to balance the risk of being overtaken from behind, versus the danger of stumbling into new trouble ahead.

  At the end of a long age, which was also somehow a timeless mental blur, they found themselves approaching the end of the rows of pallets. Out beyond that was the open and slightly better lit area. And on the far wall beyond that were two things of critical interest: the hatch that they’d used to enter; and, just outside it, the other stairwell, the one Sarah had seen on their way in.

  It still didn’t go the way they’d come from. Only now, Sarah emphatically didn’t give a shit.

  Any way out of there was the right way.

  But as she padded forward and Park staggered to the end of the rows of containerized crap… they pretty quickly saw that there was a third thing out there, which was of more than critical interest.

  It was a sailor, in the familiar blue-and-gray camo working uniform that they had both seen worn all over the ship. He wasn’t obviously wounded in any way.

  But he didn’t have to be.

  Because he was standing there by himself, not going anywhere or doing anything, half in shadow, one shoulder a bit lower than the other – and twitching or lightly jerking, at short and seemingly random intervals. Otherwise, he just stared ahead, at an arbitrary point low on the bulkhead.

  Worst of all, he – it – stood less than fifteen feet from both the hatch, and the stairwell just outside it.

  Sarah and Park were cut off.

  No, scratch that, she thought, tiredly, suddenly feeling the stark physical exhaustion that follows a full-body adrenaline wash. Not cut off.

  We’re trapped.

  Die in Vain

  JFK - Stores

  Dilemma.

  Facing one or more choices, all of them unacceptable – or maybe even lethal. Sarah and Park couldn’t go forward. And they couldn’t go back. But they also couldn’t stay where they were.

  Because Park was still bleeding.

  She had stemmed much of his hemorrhaging with her stripper routine and improvised bandage. It was decent enough combat medicine, given the circumstances and the resources they had. But those wounds were still seeping around the shirt, and through Park’s fingers.

  And, though this bothered her less, she was bleeding, too. The hand wound wasn’t terrible. But it too was wrapped in synthetic fabric, which wasn’t notoriously absorbent. And she could feel blood dripping down her arm now. She wasn’t worried about her own welfare. She was worried about remaining combat effective long enough to get her job done.

  Which was to get Park the hell out of there.

  Now that they were stopped, frozen, crouching in the shadows at the end of the row, Sarah could see the dark, shining drops of blood hit the toes of both Park’s boots, and her own, before rolling onto the deck around them.

  She had by this point pulled the two of them back into the shadows – just far enough that they could still see the Zulu standing by the exit. Sarah was really, really hoping that it would just move off on its own. But she knew from her two years of experience in the ZA, most of it in close proximity to a whole town of them, that they rarely just moved off on their own. When there was no prey, nothing to draw their attention, they went dormant. They just hung around.

  Damn our luck, she thought. But she knew that cursing their luck was about as useful as praying to God. While both could be soothing, neither would get them anywhere.

  Thinking about it, she guessed this one had been drawn by the ruckus at the other end of Stores – but then lost the trail when things went quiet again. And she knew it was likely to stay here, in its supremely inconvenient position, until something caught its attention again. What she didn’t know, but really needed to figure out… was what kind of zombie it was.

  If it was a simple Zulu, one of the walkers, then she and Park could just dash around it, out the hatch, and into the companionway beyond – and then slam the door closed behind them. Simple, and relatively safe. But somehow Sarah couldn’t believe their luck was that good.

  If, on the other hand, it was a Romeo, one of the runners, then maybe one of the two of them could get past it and out before it sprang on them. One but not both.

  And if it was a Foxtrot November, the so-called “fucking nightmare”… well, then they were in serious trouble. Because if they tried to sprint past it, one or both of them were going to go down. And it would be very hard at best to control which one of them it would be.

  So. Suddenly Sarah realized she actually did have time for comparative necro-zoology. In fact, she had nothing but time for it. Because this question was one of life-or-undeath importance. And neither of them were getting out of there until they figured it out.

  It was down to them – to save themselves.

  * * *

  Handon watched as the small plane did the crab-crawling routine that allowed it to land on a carrier’s angle deck – a runway that was slanted thirty degrees off the center-line of a ship steaming directly away from the plane’s approach. Whoever was at the stick was exhibiting a lot more skill at this than Homer had a couple of days before.

  Handon could also now make out that the plane was a Beechcraft Super King Air, a small twin-prop plane that held thirteen passengers, or the equivalent in cargo. It was an American-built aircraft, but the UK military had a number of them in its fleet. Handon figured it was the biggest thing they had that could manage a carrier landing. He also figured it was either tricked out with extra internal fuel tanks, or else had refueled in mid-air. There was no way its normal range extended this far from Britain.

  Anyway, the pilot was a pro, that much was obvious, as the plane’s rear wheels bumped down, its tailhook caught the second wire perfectly, and it radically decelerated amid screeches and smoke.

  And, at that point, Handon realized something else very surprising – that someone was watching this from between his legs. Isabel had grabbed him around the knees and was trying to peer t
hrough the crowd, as the plane dropped to deck level. Handon immediately hoisted her up with both hands – she probably weighed less than his rifle – and plopped her down on his shoulders. He looked back down and saw that Ben had appeared at his left hand, looking jealous of his sister’s viewing platform. But Homer, also emerging out of the crowd, squatted down and let Ben climb up on his back.

  Drake watched the three of them rock up with an amused grin. This really was turning into some kind of carnival, or barnstorming show. But of course he couldn’t suppress his own smile. Smiles, in fact, were radiating out through the crowd in concentric circles, like ripples in a pond, as people turned and spotted the two elevated kids.

  They were like some kind of tactical smile delivery device. And every bit as contagious as any bioweapon.

  * * *

  Sarah carefully calmed her mind, trying to remain operationally effective. As she attempted to methodically catalog the resources available to them, the first one that occurred to her was: Park himself. She was here with the guy who was supposed to be the world’s expert on the zombie virus. Pulling him a little further back into the shadows, she put her mouth to his ear and breathed, “How can you tell a Romeo from a Foxtrot?”

  With her lips touching his ear, she could feel him trembling. But he nodded his head, turned it, and put his mouth back to her ear. And he whispered:

  “If it starts running four-minute miles and then jumps twenty-five feet onto your head, it’s a Foxtrot.”

  As profoundly unhelpful as this “expert” advice was, Sarah was still heartened. If he was making a joke, and a pretty decent one, then he was still in the fight. She made a joke of her own, though she kept it to herself:

  Great. It turns out I’m actually here with the world’s expert on getting killed.

  And, with that, she exhaled in relief, as the obvious solution hit her. When you can’t go forward, and you can’t go back… then you bloody well go around. She pulled at Park’s elbow, but he resisted.

  “Come on,” she whispered in his ear. “We’re going back.”

  Park’s eyes went wide. “Back there?”

  “Only halfway.” She tugged again, he relented, and they headed back into the dark, twisting, and terrifying maze.

  When they had covered about half the distance back to Dietz and the Foxtrot, which was freaking Park out, on top of him already being light-headed, they took a left. And they made for the big cargo elevator rising up along the outside bulkhead. When they got there, Park started breathing again.

  Sarah hit the Up button.

  It didn’t light up.

  Nor did any machinery sound from inside – up above, or anywhere else. She jabbed the button another dozen times, and they stood there, slightly crouching, and casting around them in the dimness in all directions. They waited for what must have been, or certainly felt like, over a minute.

  Finally she gave up, mentally replaying what Dietz had told them up in the lab: “…if by some miracle the cargo elevator’s working.”

  Goddammit.

  Now she had to get them back under cover. But first she looked around, climbing up on a three-foot crate. She figured there had to be some other way out of there. But she hadn’t seen any on their first time through; they had lost their only local guide; and she was disinclined to go stumbling around in the dark with a wounded man, looking for exits that might or might not exist. Not least because, if there were two zombies down here, it was impossible to rule out there being more.

  Okay, she thought. Next stop – the last stop. They’d just have to go back to the exit and check again. Maybe it had left.

  It had not.

  But at least it still hadn’t sensed them. Though she couldn’t count on that lasting forever. Particularly if they kept moving around. And, almost as critically, she had to get Park to the hospital. He was already visibly paler, and his forehead was beaded with sweat, despite the chill down there.

  Think, dammit. Use your head.

  The next obvious possibility was simply taking out the one blocking their path. Sarah felt again forlornly at the empty spots on her belt, where her weapons used to live. She cast about, then walked a few paces around the immediate area, looking for a knife, a pole, a piece of rebar – anything she could use to fight with, to destroy a brainstem.

  The best she could manage was a discarded plank from a half-rotted pallet base. It might do some damage to a head – with the right person swinging it. But Sarah’s right hand had been tagged pretty good – and was feeling weaker and more numb by the minute. She simply didn’t trust her grip enough to swing a blunt-edged weapon. Not when everything depended upon it.

  A swing and a miss could doom them.

  There might be something pointier inside the pallets that surrounded them. But those were all sealed up tight with heavy plastic wrap – and she’d need at least a knife to get into them. In which case, she’d already have a knife.

  And there was simply almost nothing else lying around. The whole place was weirdly squared away. Damn the sailors and their work parties and ship-shape ethos. But even as she thought it, she knew she wasn’t really mad at them.

  She was mad at herself.

  What the hell had she been thinking – coming down here unarmed? What was she doing bringing Park here at all? Dietz had sworn the ship was secure, and had been armed himself, so it sounded reasonable at the time – surely one armed guy was enough. But of course you could never absolutely depend on anyone but yourself. And because of what had seemed like an innocuous series of decisions, they now found themselves in a very, very serious situation. One they might not get out of.

  It was only one goddamned zombie between them and safety.

  But one was all it took.

  It didn’t matter that it was the middle of the day, that there was bright sunlight falling on the flight deck, or that there were hundreds of armed friends within a half-mile radius. Because that flight deck was a hundred feet above their heads, and there were thousands of tons of steel between it and them, and all of that may as well be a million miles away in another time.

  And in that impotent, frozen moment, she struggled to keep hope from draining out the bottom of her and into the bilge tanks below – which was the only thing between them and the pitiless black sea that surrounded them on sides, and was much closer than the sunlight up above. And Sarah Cameron was left with a single crushing thought. And it was this:

  If Dr. Park dies down here in this damp, horrid hold…

  …then I will have sacrificed my husband, and my own son, for nothing.

  She had let them die, and she had to live with that.

  But she couldn’t bear to let them die in vain.

  That would be too much.

  * * *

  The aircraft rolled to a stop a few feet from the big nylon barrier net, which had been put up at the end of the angle deck – just in case. Tailhook or no, however skilled the pilot, this was still a large and unusual aircraft to attempt a carrier deck landing.

  The mixed crowd actually broke into applause – they knew what skill the landing had taken. Isabel clapped her little hands above Handon’s head. He gave her tiny ankles a squeeze, and they both watched the two big propellers start to spin down. Yellow-shirted aircraft handling officers raced forward to secure the plane with wheel blocks and chains. And then the passenger door at the rear of the fuselage cracked, withdrew slightly inside, and then swung open. Finally, stairs began to emerge and descend.

  Only seconds after that, the pilot’s door at the front popped open, and a man climbed down from the cockpit. He descended facing away from the crowd, but when he hit the deck and turned toward them, Handon could see that he had a long, wild, and curly black beard, covering most of his face and descending to mid-chest. That was unusual. When he pulled off his helmet, he revealed a tightly-wrapped white turban.

  That explains it, Handon thought.

  The pilot was a Sikh. There hadn’t been a ton of them around Fort Bra
gg, but Handon had been around the world, and he knew there were many in Britain – a hangover of the Raj, the British empire in India. This guy looked so traditional, Handon half-expected him to be wearing a scimitar, or at least a curved dagger. And then he saw he actually was – the little curving scabbard was taped to his chest rig, which also held his side arm in a shoulder holster, and spare magazines on the other side. Pilots rarely wore anything on their belts, for fairly intuitive reasons.

  Handon had an instant impression of this man as a warrior.

  But now three other men, very different in appearance, descended the ladder from the passenger compartment. They weren’t wearing flight suits, nor dress suits, but the sort of “adventure travel” fashion favored by civilians going on military attachment – khaki cargo pants, zip-up fleece jackets, desert boots. All three wore glasses and carried fat satchels, which presumably held laptops, and perhaps other research materials. Handon didn’t have to stretch too far to guess that these were the British bioscientists.

  Drake stepped forward to greet them, briefly looking around for Park, who was still MIA. No one followed the three scientists out, and Handon wondered if they didn’t have some kind of military handler. But then the dramatically bearded pilot walked over and began speaking with Drake. And Handon got the sense he was doing double duty. Maybe there were issues with the max payload of the plane. He knew there was supposed to be a lot of scientific equipment on board, the weight of which Handon couldn’t guess.

  And then, in the next few seconds, his sense of this Sikh pilot as a warrior grew enormously – and unexpectedly.

  Gunfire rang out, stark and violent, cracking through the windy air over the carrier’s surface.

  And bodies started falling and hitting the deck.

  Instantly, Handon handed Isabel over to Homer behind him, who was already crouching down and covering Ben with his body, and now extended that coverage to the little girl. In almost the same motion, Handon pushed forward to the front of the crowd, which had begun to startle and surge. These were veteran military personnel, so they weren’t all running away from the shooting, but enough were to make Handon the spawning salmon.