Strands of Sorrow (eARC)

by John Ringo

  But timing was still everything.

  * * *

  “Just in case” they kept a loaded Gunhawk on the hot pad. Good news. Bad news, the crew was sitting in a ready room with the helo in view. They had to be…disposed of. With extreme prejudice. Sophia wasn’t looking forward to what she was about to do. She was deeply ashamed. But it had to be done. For the good of the nation, they had to be removed from the equation.

  “You’re going to love this,” Sophia said, sticking her head in the hatch of the ready room. “You are hereby ordered, as of this moment, to attend a mandatory class on ‘Consideration of the feelings of the Afflicted’ in number six conference room. Now. Well, at thirteen hundred. Conducted by one of the ‘Acting President’s’ staff.”

  “You have GOT to be shitting me!” Lieutenant Commander Wilkes swore.

  “And Da has officially been charged with crimes against humanity,” Sophia said.

  “That we’d heard, Soph,” Wilkes said. “I just… There’s no way it will stick.”

  “I’m under the impression that there’s going to be a compromise,” Soph said. “Da always said all he wanted was a stout ship and a star to sail her by. House arrest at worst. Anyway, orders. Conference six. Sorry. Now, sir.”

  “Roger,” Wilkes said, standing up. “I would rather die a thousand deaths.”

  “But now you really must go,” Sophia said.

  “What about you?” Wilkes asked.

  “As a grounded and soon to be discharged for the good of the Navy officer, I’m exempt,” Soph said. “I’ll just sit here looking at a bird I’ll never fly again.”

  * * *

  “Going somewhere, ma’am?” Staff Sergeant Decker said.

  He’d been waiting at the lowered ramp of the amtrack when Faith walked back from signing for the ammo. He was carrying two very heavy-looking seabags.

  “Just taking it for a test drive, Staff Sergeant,” Faith said.

  “I am not that stupid, ma’am,” Decker said, throwing the bags into the amtrack. “Nor inflexible anymore. And you can either wait around and have this op—whatever it is—blown, or you can enter the vehicle, ma’am.”

  “Decker, they will bust you to dooley,” Faith said, getting in the amtrack. “And throw you in jail.”

  “I am very high-level PTSD, ma’am,” Decker said, raising the ramp. “I have been verified as having a psychotic attachment to my officers, ma’am. The proof being I kept that fucktard Lieutenant Klette alive as an ‘afflicted.’ The worst they will do is stick me in a padded room, ma’am. And they’re probably going to do that anyway, what with the new regime. I’ll drive. You man the guns, ma’am.”

  “Oorah,” Faith said.

  “By the way, ma’am,” Decker said, as he started the amtrack. “What is the op?”

  * * *

  It took about five minutes to walk to the “conference room” which was five tents hooked together. Which was about when Lieutenant Commander Wilkes would know he’d been conned. Sophia waited one minute to walk down the corridor, pick up her flight bag then walk to the bird and get in. There would be no pre-flight. Then she looked at her watch again. Bang on twelve fifty-seven. She looked over to her right and saw an amtrack headed for the water. She hit the start button. The bird was kept warmed. She wouldn’t have to wait for it to get to temp. Everything was in the green. Full power.

  Operation Actions of the Tiger was a Go.

  She keyed the radio and selected the Regiment Combat Ops frequency.

  “Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more,

  “Or close the wall up with our American dead!

  “In peace there’s nothing so becomes a woman

  “As modest stillness and humility;

  “But when the blast of war blows in our ears,

  “Then imitate the action of the tiger!”

  “Very nice,” Olga said over the intercom. “Very touching.”

  “You think you’re going anywhere without us, you are sadly mistaken, Ensign,” Anna commed.

  Sophia just shook her head. No time to argue.

  “Gunhawk Nine, light on the pad.”

  She switched frequencies, pulled up on the collective and was gone.

  * * *

  Getting to the FEMA building had been a nightmare.

  They’d stopped by the Washington Monument to change. She couldn’t board the amtrack in full clearance rig without the mission being obvious. There were still a buttload of infected in DC. In keeping with orders, they had not engaged them. But they didn’t want to be sitting outside the building changing.

  So all her gear, and the staff sergeant’s, had been in the seabags.

  Then it was just a matter of shaking their trail of infected and finding their way through the blocked streets to FEMA. The likelihood that the President of the United States was there was low. But it was the only shot they had of getting this ungrammatical idiot out of power.

  The FEMA building was a massive right trapezoid with dark brown windows bounded by C Street and Virginia Avenue. The ground floor had been lined with shops and the main entrance was a walkway between the FEMA building and the flanking Holiday Inn on the 500 block of C Street; the Virginia Avenue side was blocked by a retaining wall.

  There were, sure enough, three LAVs parked higgledy-piggledy on the street. But no Beast. Some armored SUVs were nearby but no limousines per se.

  They’d come this far. They weren’t going back.

  There were infected filtering out of the building, blocking the walkway entrance.

  “Gunhawk, Ground,” Faith said. “Can you clear the poor innocent bystanders?”

  “Will do,” Sophia said, bringing the Gunhawk in to hover over the amtrack. “Whenever you’re ready.”

  “Let’s roll, Al,” Faith said.

  “Aye, aye, ma’am,” Decker said, opening up the passenger hatch. There was an infected right outside and he blew him away with three rounds of 5.56. “This is gonna be a hot one, ma’am.”

  “Just the way I like it, Staff Sergeant,” Faith said, getting her knees under a full-sized ruck full of ammo and hoisting it up. It was going to be nearly impossible to scrum until they’d blown some of it off, but she figured they were going to need it. Heavy as a motherfucker though. “Gunhawk,” she grunted. “Start the music.”

  The Gunhawk opened up with all four miniguns, shredding the infected blocking the walkway as Olga and Anna covered the sides. The door miniguns could aim almost straight down and they walked the rounds out from the amtrack, littering C Street with zombies.

  “Maxim Four:” Faith said, dropping out of the track. “Close air support covereth a multitude of sins.”

  Second Lieutenant Faith Marie Smith and Staff Sergeant Alfred J. Decker, USMC, marched forward into a scalding deluge of spent brass…

  CHAPTER 27

  About twelve months earlier:

  “I told you we should have used the LAVs in the first place, Special Agent!” Vice President Rebecca Staba said as they boarded the vehicle. Her limousine was high and dry on a pile of infected bodies. “Marine!”

  “Ma’am!” the Marine PFC sitting next to her in the Light Assault Vehicle barked.

  “Are there any spare weapons?”

  “Ma’am…” Special Agent Jerry Phillips started to protest.

  “Spare me, Special Agent,” Staba snapped. “Zombie apocalypse. These Marines are unvaccinated, unfortunately. Some of them, sorry, will turn. And I am NOT going to be unarmed in a zombie apocalypse!”

  Staba had been one of those compromises that you have to make in politics. The former lieutenant governor of Oklahoma, she had not been near the top of the rankings in the primaries. She was not beloved of the Republican Party leadership, she got not only zero support but constant criticism from them, and she was frankly hated by the media and her much more “nuanced” and “bi-partisan” running mate.

  What she did have was a massive following among the “Guns and God” conservative base. And
since the former governor of NY who had won the primaries was looked upon as not much more than another Republican-In-Name-Only, he needed the shoring.

  A former high school math teacher who had gotten into politics to try to get some sense into education, Vice President Staba was a mother of four children with a husband who was a successful businessman in his own right. She had once supplemented their income in the early days of the marriage as an NRA fire-arms instructor. She invariably had more people show up at her rallies than her running mate. Which did not enamor him more. The fact that she was an “over-endowed” smoking-hot blonde who was never seen in public other than fully made-up and well-dressed was constantly criticized by the news media. The snarking, mostly by female commentators, about her make-up, hair and wardrobe was half her coverage during the primaries. Fuck ’em. She looked good and liked it that way.

  Her intense devotion to her Christian faith, the Second Amendment and her “large” family was pretty much the rest of her coverage. Never in a good light.

  The staff sergeant across from her unclipped his M4 and thrust it out.

  “Locked, loaded, on safe, ma’am!”

  “Not your own, Staff Sergeant,” Staba said. “You’re going to need it.”

  “Here, ma’am,” Phillips said, defeated. He opened up a ZIP bag and pulled out an MP5. “Also locked and loaded.”

  “And not on safe I see,” Staba said, safing it. “Now, who’s got one for Dave?”

  “I’m fine, honey,” Dave Staba said. “I’m sure some will turn up.”

  Among other actions that had seriously pissed off her detail, the Vice President had ensured her family was aboard the LAV before she boarded. Most people had come to the conclusion that in a reverse of an earlier First Family, Dave Staba was the brains of the outfit. He’d been her political manager for most of her career and was the “back room” dealer. He was not the brawn. Capable, mind you, but not the “in your face” type.

  “Are we gonna be okay, Mom?” Sherry said. The youngest didn’t sound traumatized so much as curious.

  “We’re going to be okay, sweetie,” Rebecca said, leaning forward. “We’ve got Devil Dogs to keep us that way…”

  “Can I get a weapon?” Thomas, the fifteen-year-old asked, raising a hand.

  “Not unless we really need to,” Rebecca said. “And if we really need to, yes.”

  “Ma’am…” Phillips said, shaking his head.

  “Tommy has more firearms training than most members of Federal Law Enforcement, Special Agent,” Staba said. “He is not the level of the detail but he is proficient. If we have to dismount, and if there are weapons available, he and Dave and Christy will all be armed. Sherry is not ready, yet. That is not for discussion.”

  “Roger, ma’am,” Phillips said, wincing as the LAV bumped over something large. “Continue for the FEMA building.”

  “Can we make it to C Street?” Staba asked.

  “Ma’am, unlike your limo, we will make it to C Street if we have to drive over cars,” the staff sergeant said.

  “Oorah,” Staba said.

  * * *

  The FEMA bunker was, unsurprisingly, well designed. Besides a very large fuel supply, generators to maintain power and pumps and all the usual food and medical supplies, it had “recovering power” exercise systems. The stationary bike, Stairmaster and rowing machine were all connected to mini-generators similar to those in a Prius which fueled the massive banks of batteries. All the lights were low-wattage LEDs. More or less continuous use of the exercise equipment could even keep up with the sump-pumps. Especially important given that the bunker was barely below water line for DC. The toilets were hooked up to water-recovery systems designed originally for the cancelled NASA Mars mission. They used hand power to run them.

  It was also occupied. By about twenty FEMA managers and their families. In a bunker designed for twenty, total. With the addition of the Marines, detail and the family… Things were tight. And only the detail and the family were vaccinated. Or so they thought. As it later turned out, the FEMA managers had “procured” vaccine for their families. Where and what type they were reticent about. She wasn’t going to bitch. She’d have turned every infected in the world into vaccine.

  The first order was that everyone unvaccinated was to secure themselves. One of the Marines had already turned on the trip. That was unfortunate but on the bright side it gave Dave a weapon. The efficacy of the vaccine was proven when Thomas was bitten subduing one of the Marines. He got very sick but recovered.

  Food was an issue. The bunker was stocked for five years. With even the shortest possible rations, they had at best a year and a half. The Marines had volunteered to evacuate the bunker. And Staba stomped her foot on that. They’d all make it or they wouldn’t.

  Then there was another issue, sort of: it wasn’t bad food. One problem of long duration missions like “being stuck in a bunker in a zombie apocalypse” was called “food ennui.” People just got sick and tired of the same damned crap. The would stop eating and eventually succumb to malnutrition.

  FEMA’s response was to acquire long-duration foodstuffs from, well, all over. Many nations besides the U.S. made long-duration food supplies. And FEMA had a “test and share” program with other nations. There were German rations, British rations—surprisingly good—Indian, French, Chinese, Italian, stuff from Singapore which was…all sorts of different nationalities. The Chilean rations included a small bottle of not-bad wine. MREs were right at the bottom of the list.

  The problem was not eating too much. Not enough rations. But they also had to have the energy to run the exercise machines.

  Greatest weight loss program in history. If she ever got out of the damned place she was planning on starting a weight loss program based on it. Her butt was in the best shape it had been in years.

  Of course…that was if they ever got out.

  The Marines had had to fight their way in and lost people to bites. Being Marines, as soon as one was bitten, he took the rearguard and stayed. Semper Fi, Marines. Semper damned Fi. They’d also used up most of their ammo. She’d used up all but a five rounds for the MP5. The detail was out. Nobody had had the concept of fighting their way into a bunker in the plans. And, honestly, there wasn’t any way to carry enough ammo to fight through all the infected. There were a zillion of the bastards.

  The bunker was hooked into the building’s security feeds. They could see what was happening. Naked zombies just…took over. And they were everywhere. In the streets. In the lobbies. In the hallways. In the corridors outside the bunker. The Marines estimated that after a month the LAVs probably wouldn’t start right up. And even if they had enough rounds to get to them…where to go? Most of the cameras had failed with the power. The only two remaining, internally powered by the bunker, were outside the main door and the secondary door. They were using the intervening space to hold the bodies of those who turned. After a while they turned off the light at the outer door. There was nothing to see but infected and it was just wasting power. From time to time they turned it on and waited. Eventually, the corridor would fill with infected. They timed it and started to get a feel for how bad it was. At first the corridor filled in less than five minutes. After six months, it was up to ten. And so on. It was all the intel they had. Still far too many to attempt a breakout even if they knew where to break out to.

  The bunker was supposed to have continuous communications. No joy. All the comms were down. Damaged, inoperable or nobody on the other end, nobody knew. They couldn’t even get anything from the radios on the roof. As far as they could tell, they were the only remaining humans on the planet. Well, sentient, uninfected, humans. There were plenty of the other kind.

  * * *

  “Is someone humming?” Rebecca asked, calmly, looking up from her iPad. Fortunately, she had thousands of books stored on the device. And she finally had all the time to read that she could possibly want.

  Humming was verboten. Lots of things were verboten. Sh
e blessed the fact that they had chosen the FEMA bunker. Everyone, the Marines, the detail, her own family and the FEMA people understood the importance of allowing people their personal space in both body and other forms. They couldn’t continuously take showers but people maintained hygiene. They might talk but they used “inside” voice. They didn’t hum. Singing was only for the few, including Rebecca and Sherry, with really good voices and only as part of a group thing that was planned. You didn’t do things that might annoy others. It was too tight. Everyone not only “hot-bunked” but “hot-sat.” There weren’t enough horizontal spaces, even on the floor, for everyone. And everyone understood that.

  “It’s more of a rumble, ma’am,” Staff Sergeant Jason Cordova said musingly. The staff sergeant, NCOIC of the detail supporting the Secret Service in extracting the Vice President, was one of the survivors. Which had been a good thing. He had a font of good jokes which had taken a while to come out. Things had just been too damned grim for too many months.

  It was one year and three days from the date the President had announced the Plague. They had been in the bunker just over ten months with no clue what was going on except the slow and unsteady decrease in infected drawn to a light like moths.

  Whatever it was, it shortly went away.

  “Do an exterior infected count,” Rebecca said, looking back to her book.

  Special Agent Phillips flipped on the exterior light and waited. And waited… And waited…

  Rebecca was trying not to be too curious. Everyone was acting as if they were doing something else.

  “We have full corridor, ma’am,” Phillips reported. “Thirty minutes.”

  “That’s a big change from just last month,” Rebecca said.

  “Not enough of a change to break out, ma’am,” Phillips said, turning off the light.

  * * *

  There was another rumble, closer, the next day.