In less than two minutes, both teams had moved into the dayroom and began breaking up into twos to clear the individual cells. It was over in less than five minutes, start to finish. And best of all, there were no casualties on our side. When the radio started in with a teams calling “Clear”, I finally started to relax. I was impressed with the teams. They’d done well. I grabbed the mic and said as much.
“Good work, people,” I said. “Delta Pod is ours, again.”
I reached over and fired up the exhaust fans as the teams with laundry carts moved in. They would load up a cart with bodies and take them down the elevator and dump them out near the south fence. It wasn’t the best possible solution, but it was the best we could do under the circumstances. Then the task of cleaning the pod for future use would begin. I didn’t envy the people who would be doing that. Frankly, I’d rather face the zombies.
There were close to forty of us inside the jail, not including inmates. But out of that, only about fifteen were in any shape to fight. Out of the fifteen, only about six of us were in good enough shape to run or sustain a long fight. It was sad, but true. There just weren’t that many of us left. Between broken bodies and shattered nerves, we were in no shape for any kind of extended fighting.
If we did successfully rescue the trapped officers, just how many of them were able bodied? Had any of them been bitten? Would they still be human when we got to them? It killed me to think of these things, but I had to consider it. By the time we got to them, there may not be anyone left alive. I knew we had to move quickly. Time was ticking away and each moment we waited could mean the difference between life and death for the officers who were trapped.
“Now, what do we do about the other inmates?”
I hadn’t even considered that, yet. I knew that with the loss of Delta and Bravo, we still had over 300 inmates in our custody. I’d been so focused on saving as many officers as I could that I hadn’t even considered what to do with all of the inmates. I immediately thought of a few things, but had to rule out tossing people off of the roof or just shooting them in their cells. It was a tempting thought, but definitely not in the “good guy” handbook.
“What do you think we should do, sir?” I asked.
The L.T. thought a minute, and then said, “Well, anyone here on a minor offense we should just cut loose.”
“Yeah, I can see that,” I replied, nodding in agreement.
“Fortunately, most of our violent offenders were taken care of when we lost Bravo.”
“So, what do we do with the rest of them?”
“Cut them all loose,” he said, after a long pause. “It’s the only humane thing to do.”
“We may have to face them again as a zombie,” said Andrews, from the control console.
“That may very well be so,” replied the L.T. “But I can’t find a way to justify shooting anyone before they become a zombie, unless it’s in self defense.”
“We could arm them,” said Andrews. “Lord knows we could use the help.”
“True,” I said. “But you won’t find a single one of us that’s comfortable with the idea of giving guns to an inmate and trusting them to watch our backs. I’m sorry, but it just won’t happen.”
“Yeah,” agreed Andrews. “It’s probably not the best idea. They’d probably just turn on us, anyway.”
“If we leave them in their cells,” said L.T., “they’ll just starve to death when the food runs out.”
“Plus, the food will last longer without them,” said Andrews. “How long do you think it’ll last?”
“Hard to say,” I answered. “We’ll probably lose power, first. I’d say a day, maybe two if we’re really lucky before we lose the grid.”
“What about the emergency generators?” asked Andrews.
“Well, assuming the tanks are completely full,” said the L.T. “We should have generator power for about a week. Possibly longer if we can cut power to part of the building.”
“We can shut down all the pods that are empty,” I said. “We’ll consolidate all the people into one pod.”
“I’ll get a couple of people on that, once we clear out the inmates,” said the L.T.
“Gentlemen, I think we have a plan,” I said, clapping my hands together.
“Then it’s settled,” said the L.T. “I’ll have a few officers pull property bags and we’ll release them through the delivery gate.”
“All of them?” asked Andrews.
“Yeah, all of them,” I answered. “I don’t like it any more than you do, but there isn’t really much choice.”
“I’ll see to it while you’re out rescuing those other officers,” said the L.T.
I smiled at him and asked, “How’d you know that I was planning on going out myself, sir?”
“Because I know how you are, Wylie. By the way, how are Karen and the boys?”
“I sent them to the lake. Last time I spoke to them, they were ok. I haven’t been able to get through to them since yesterday, though.”
“Are they safe?” asked Andrews, suddenly concerned.
“Yeah, for the moment,” I said. “I had them load up the boat with supplies and anchor in deep water. They should be able to hold out a week or more, so long as zombies don’t learn to swim.”
“So, when are you going for them?” asked the L.T.
“Soon, sir,” I replied, honestly. “It may be later today, if I can. It all depends on how quickly I can rescue those other officers.”
“Are you planning on coming back with them?” asked Andrews.
“Yeah,” I replied after a moment. “I can’t think of any place safer, at least for now.”
The L.T. nodded, but didn’t say anything else. I took the opportunity to change the subject. If I dwelled on it for too long, I would want to go get them despite the other things I had to do. It was best to leave them where they were safe, at least for now. As long as they were on the boat, they were safer than any of us. It’s too bad that we weren’t anywhere near the coast. Ideally, if we could take over a cruise liner or something similar, we could live in relative safety. At least, until we had to make a food run.
“Can you reach the Evac-center?” I asked Andrews.
“No can do, Sheriff,” he replied, grinning. “We lost contact with them last night and haven’t been able to re-establish.”
“Do you think they were overrun?”
“I don’t know. It could be that the National Guard pulled them out by helicopter.”
“Then why didn’t they contact us?” I said, and headed for the coffee pot.
“I don’t know,” said the L.T. “We haven’t been able to raise anyone with the National Guard since late yesterday.”
“I have a SINCGARS set in the Humvee,” I said. “I’ll have Wilder try and reach them.”
Right about then, Spec-4 came walking up the stairs.
“Speak of the devil,” I mused, smiling.
I could see her through the one-way glass of Master Control. She’d changed back into her ACU’s, but left her hair down. She was wearing most of her combat gear, but not the vest. As she walked into Master Control, she smiled at us and headed right for the coffee pot. I noticed that she was getting appreciative glances from both Andrews and the Lieutenant.
“So, do you think that transport bus is the way to go?” asked the L.T., turning back to me.
“It’s the only thing we have that’s big enough,” I replied, shaking my head.
“Then it’ll have to do,” he said. “It’s parked out in the delivery area.”
“Good. I’ll take a couple people and head out there to check it out. We’ll make sure it’s ready and see if we can reinforce the windows and doors.”
“It should have a full tank of gas,” said the L.T. “We just had it prepped for a prison run when all of this broke out.”
With that, I headed out with Spec-4 on my heels. The L.T. tossed me the keys to the bus before I got out the door. Once we were outside of Master Control,
she fell into step beside me matching my stride. It was an old soldier’s habit, and tough to break. I still do it sometimes, when I’m not thinking about it. Old habits are sometimes the hardest to break.
“What’s the plan, Sheriff?’ she asked, smiling.
I filled her in on the officers and civilians that we were planning on rescuing and explained about the bus.
“Sounds like a plan,” she said. “Is the bus armored?”
“Nope,” I said, “just a reinforced cage to keep inmates from escaping. It’s not designed to keep things out.”
“Wow,” she said. “This might get interesting.”
“Depends on how you define interesting,” I quipped, grinning.
“Driving through a zombie infested city in a rolling smorgasbord. Yeah, I think that qualifies as interesting,” she replied, grinning. “Not to mention the fact that it isn’t armored and won’t be easy to navigate the streets with.”
“We’ll need to reinforce the doors,” I said. “Most of the windows are way too high for a zombie to reach.”
“I’ll take a look with you and see what we can come up with,” she said.
“Before you do, I have some bad news. We’ve lost contact with the evac-center. No response on the radio. We haven’t been able to reach the National Guard, either.”
She didn’t say anything, but the look on her face said it all. I felt the same way, but didn’t have the words to express the horror at the thought of losing the entire evac-center. Not being able to contact the National Guard might just be that they left the area. The helicopter pilot told us that they were planning on evacuating the area.
“I want you to go out to the Humvee and try to raise the National Guard on the SINCGARS.”
“No problem.”
“When you’re done, come out to the delivery area and help us with the bus.”
When we hit the bottom of the stairs, we found Sanders and Southard waiting for us. I quickly brought them up to speed, while we all grabbed our gear. I sent Southard out to the Humvee with Spec-4, and took Sanders with me out to the bus. We all went armed to the teeth, just in case. Better safe than sorry.
As we passed the break-room, Ian Shane and Johnny Bowman came out. Both of them had a pistol on their hip and a long gun in hand. Bowman had an M-16 and Shane had a Remington 870 shotgun. They both looked like they were looking for something to do. Far be it from me to disappoint them.
“You boys look like you’re about to have some fun,” said Bowman. “Want some company?”
“Sure,” I said. “The more the merrier. We’re going out to check out the transport bus.”
“Why?” asked Shane.
“Yeah,” said Bowman. “Don’t you have an up-armored Humvee out in the intake area?”
“Yeah, but it ain’t big enough to do what we need to do,” said Sanders.
“We’re going after some trapped officers and civilians,” I said. “About twenty of them, all told.”
“Yeah, I imagine you can’t fit all of them into a Humvee,” said Bowman. “Not even clown-car style.”
“Want to come with us?” I asked. “We could use the extra hands.”
“Hell yeah,” said Bowman.
“I’m in,” agreed Shane.
They fell in beside us and we stopped at the back door to wait for Master Control to open it. Before they did, I got on the radio and asked for a camera sweep of the back lot. It might not see everything, but it would at least warn us of any large groups of undead that had managed to get inside our perimeter. We wouldn’t have much trouble taking on a small group of zombies, but a large group was another matter entirely.
“All clear,” said 700.
When they buzzed the door, we still went out tactically. By unspoken agreement, we stepped out onto the back dock and “cut the pie”. That is, we each took a section and swept it in a pattern that interlocked together.
“Clear,” we each said, in turn.
Securing the doors behind us, we moved out to the bus weapons at the ready. First, we swept around the bus to make sure no zombies were behind it or under it. Then we cleared the interior. Once we were satisfied that it was empty, we started checking it for weaknesses. It didn’t take us long to identify the worst of them.
Only two glaring weak spots leapt out at us, and that was the doors. The emergency door at the back could be opened from the outside, and the window could be easily reached from the ground. The front sliding door could be forced from the outside, if it was hit right. We were going to have to work on both of those spots before we left the gate.
I sent Sanders back inside for a tool kit, while the rest of us talked over ideas. He returned about fifteen minutes later with a tool box, a box of zip cuffs, and several rolls of duct tape. Southard and Spec-4 were right behind him. From the looks on their faces, I doubted that they had good news.
“Any word from the Guard?” I asked Spec-4.
“Nothing,” she replied. “Dead air, that’s it.”
“Damn, I was afraid of that,” I said, shaking my head.
“I found some redneck repair tape,” said Sanders, holding up the duct tape and grinning like a big kid.
I welcomed the sudden change of subject. No contact with the Guard or the Evac-center was bad news, but it didn’t necessarily mean that they’d been overrun. It just meant that we couldn’t contact them. I would assume the worst and hope for the best, though. They might have evacuated the survivors and pulled out the last of the National Guard. I’m not sure why they didn’t try to contact us here at the jail, though. There were several of our officers there that knew that we were here.
“What have you got in mind, big guy?” I asked, already dreading the answer.
“Easy,” he replied, grinning from ear to ear. “We just pop off the handle on the emergency door.”
“And what about the window?” asked Spec-4, looking quizzically at the back of the bus.
Another big goofy grin ensued. Cal worried me when he got that grin.
“We just take a piece of that plywood over by the dumpster and duct tape it over the window,” he said, nodding towards the trash cans.
Southard looked like he wanted to smack Sanders, right then and there. I knew he wasn’t going to do it, though. There were far easier ways to commit suicide, but smacking Cal Sanders would certainly be one of the fastest. Heck, I wanted to smack him for it, but I wouldn’t try it either. I didn’t think Cal would really kill one of us for it, but why take the risk?
“No, no, hear me out,” he said. “We cut a piece down to fit over the glass, and then we open the door and go around and around it a bunch of times with the tape. It’ll be tough as hell to get that off there.”
Sadly, I could almost see it working but I didn’t want to bet my life on duct-tape.
“How about this?” said Spec-4. “Do what he says with the plywood, only instead of using the duct-tape, we drill a few holes in it and screw it on with sheet metal screws.”
Ragnarok Rising: The Awakening (Book One of The Ragnarok Rising Saga) Page 19
