by Jeff Thomson
He loved his Mom, of course. Who didn’t love their Mom? Losers, that’s who. He even loved his sister, Samantha, although he’d never tell her so in a million, billion years. And his cousin, Molly was just the coolest thing ever - especially when she was showing him that karate stuff. HI-YA! That was awesome! But they were all girls. In fact, all the people down in the Lounge had been girls, except the Nutty Professor (as Samantha called him), and Mr. Spute, who everybody seemed to be mad at for some reason.
There was George Stoeffel, admittedly. But he was twelve, and all he wanted to talk about was baseball (Davy liked football, because his Dad liked football) and - of course - girls. Davy was sure he had the hots for his sister, and that was just gross. He needed someone he could talk to about more important things, and he needed to talk to that someone now, because there was Guy Stuff going on now.
He could have slipped into the Mess Deck to talk to Mr. Stoeffel, or Mr. Perniola, but they were busy, they were nervous, and they weren’t his Dad. He’d always been his Dad’s “Little Man,” and that was important. He wasn’t totally sure what was happening (although somebody had mentioned Pirates) but whatever it was, it was not just Guy Stuff, but Man Stuff.
He was tired of being pushed aside and made to hang out with the ladies and other kids, and his sister. He wanted to prove to his Dad that he wasn’t just his “Little Man,” but a real man, who was able to be counted on and included when there was Man Stuff going on.
So he crept past the Mess deck and headed up the ladder toward the Bridge.
90
“Get your ass up there and take the Bridge,” Old Joe yelled at the only two members of his so-called “gang” still in the RHIB. Eddie Cochrane, the child molester, and Sugar Brown, the whore-killing pimp, looked at him like he’d lost his damned mind. And maybe he had.
He’d known the plan was hosed the moment he heard Hank Lazardo - that crazy bastard - open up with the shotgun. He’d known it was totally fucked the moment he saw Joe-Boy do a reverse one-an-a-half gainer without a twist off the other ship, and land in the ocean with a belly flop. Two very large, very bloody holes were in the kid’s back, as he floated face down, about a half-mile behind them. He could still see the body, in the loom of the moonlight cutting across the calm sea. It was a beautiful night for taking a ship that didn’t belong to them in a zombie apocalypse. He didn’t wonder at the morality of what they were doing. He didn’t really wonder about the sense, though, at the moment, there didn’t seem much. Fucked all to Hell...
Then he’d heard yet another shotgun blast. He couldn’t tell if that was Lazardo doing something else stupid, getting his ass blown off, or taking out another member of the other crew. He had no idea where Skizzy Pete Hannity was, and now he was asking the only two remaining to get up there and maybe get shot. Crazy.
“Are you fucking nuts?” Sugar Brown asked.
Eddie Cochrane barked a laugh and said: “I’ll do it,” and started up the ladder. They watched him climb up and over. They didn’t hear another shot. Old Joe looked at the pimp.
“Don’t look at me,” Brown said. “My ass is staying in the motherfucking boat!”
Old Joe held the RHIB steady beneath the ladder. The other boat wasn’t moving very fast, and the sea was calm, so this was not difficult. Never get out of the boat, he thought, remembering the line from Apocalypse Now. If that wasn’t appropriate.... He swore under his breath and tried to think.
He thought fate had brought him to this place. He thought it was all meant to be. But this wasn’t fate, at all. This was a shit sandwich, and he had no choice but to take a big damned bite.
He heard another shot. Never get out of the Goddamned boat.
91
CS1 Gary King wiped at the flat metal surface of the grill, even though the thing had been clean for the last ten minutes. The whole Galley shined. So what was he still doing there?
Hiding.
The thought popped into his head, and he waited for the pang of guilt sure to follow, but it didn’t. He was scared - more scared than he’d ever been in his entire life. Things were happening, very bad things, and he knew it, and there wasn’t a single damned thing he could do about any of it.
The fear was like a living thing, clawing at his chest, shrinking his balls to the size of marbles. He was a man. He shouldn’t be cowering in his kitchen like a little girl. But he was.
He wiped at the grill again.
Something big slammed against the galley door to his right, and he jumped - literally jumped - at the sound. What the fuck is wrong with me? He thought. You’re not an idiot, the answer came. You’re not suicidal. But you are a cook. He pondered that for a moment. He was a cook, just a plain old ship’s cook, in a galley, filled with pots and pans and...knives.
He did have knives - a shitload of them. He went to the stainless steel drawer and opened it. The first thing he saw was the cleaver. There was another bang at the door, but he didn’t jump this time. Instead, he picked up the cleaver and looked at it. He went to a cabinet below the prep table and selected one of two, six-inch cast iron skillets, hefted it in his left hand, then looked at the chopper in his right. This was more like it. This he knew. This he could do.
There was a loud grunt outside the door, then a growl, and the sound of something sliding along the bulkhead, heading forward. His balls were still crawling somewhere up into his chest cavity, but he was no longer paralyzed with the fear. He wasn’t wiping at an already clean grill. He wasn’t hiding any more. He was ready.
He saw the face of insanity at the serving window, and decided he wasn’t ready for this, at all.
Manny Manoa stood there, all six-foot-five of him, his face covered in blood. Chunks of flesh hung from his once-white tee-shirt. Another hung from the left corner of his mouth. He was growling. The thing that used to be one of Gary King’s Culinary Specialists lunged its head in through the serving window.
Gary took one step, then two in rapid succession, building momentum. He used that momentum in a great overhand swing as he brought the cleaver down onto Manny Manoa’s forehead. It stuck there, with a sound that might have come from a casaba melon. The result was far, far bloodier. He retreated even faster than he had come forward, backing up until his butt slammed into the pristine grill.
“Holyfuckingshit!” he swore the oath in one continuous word. The Manny-thing teetered for a moment, a confused look on its face. It slowly - ever-so-slowly - toppled over backwards and out of sight.
“That’s enough for me!” he said aloud. Or maybe he screamed it. He didn’t know. He didn’t care.
He spun around, took a chef’s knife from the drawer - the long sucker, with the nine-inch blade. He tucked it in his belt, then reached into the cabinet and grabbed the other cast iron skillet. He hefted them, one in each hand, and gave them both practice swings. Then he got the flying fuck out of the Galley.
92
MK2 Frank Rosseler and MK3 Danny Maury stumbled down the ladder to the Engineroom. It was hot, it was noisy (even through the industrial headphones), and it stank. But it was also home. Being inside the engineroom of a ship was like crawling inside the hood of a car, while the engine was running, and shutting the hood. Of course, there was more room to move around, and the engines (two of them) were a whole lot bigger. But he was used to this; it was familiar; it was home.
They entered Main Control, and found DC3 Mike (Ski) Kiepelkowski chatting with the EO. CWO4 Kinkaid, the Engineering Officer was an odd discovery. Frank almost never saw him down there at this late hour, unless there was some emergency. Officers need their beauty sleep, and this one, in particular, needed all he could get. Frank chided himself for the disparaging thought, then forgot all about it.
“Evening, sir,” he said, removing the hearing protective headphones. “Couldn’t sleep?”
The EO coughed and replied: “No,” but didn’t elaborate. He looked flushed. This observation sent a cold slice of fear through Frank’s spine. Then again, it was getting tow
ards midnight, and maybe the man hadn’t been sleeping. He could sympathize. Frank hadn’t slept in at least two days. Of course, the heart palpitations he felt with every sip of his somethingth cup of coffee probably weren’t helping, either.
“Where’s Moncrief?” Danny asked. He was Moncrief’s watch relief, and so had to get all his information from the young Fireman.
“Doing PM on Number One Main,” Ski said. PM was Preventative Maintenance.
Danny nodded, re-donned his headphones, and exited Main Control, shutting the door on a blast of engine noise. Frank watched him go, then returned his attention to Ski.
“So, what fun are we having tonight?” He asked.
“Number Two MDE is on line, making turns for a blistering nine knots,” The Damage Controlman began. “Number One is on One Hour Standby. The Plant is green across the board. Fuel State is at eighty-nine percent. The bilges are dry as a bone, the shit tank is about one-third full, the gray water is slightly over half, and you get the great pleasure of doing PM on the Evaporator!”
“I can barely contain my excitement,” Frank replied, with no attempt whatsoever to hide his sarcasm, in spite of the presence of the Engineering Officer, his boss, who seemed to be looking worse by the moment. He stared at him for a bit, before looking back at Ski.
“As usual,” Ski said,” try to get it back on line before people start getting out of the rack, so we don’t have to listen to them bitch about sea showers all day.”
“Roger that,” Frank said, having had to listen to such bitching more times than he cared to count. As long as all the mechanical things were doing what they were supposed to do, nobody said a word - especially not the word “thanks.” But God forbid anything should break down. If anything did, the EO became the Designated Asshole, and the shit rolled downhill from there.
Frank looked at the man, who appeared to be mumbling to himself. He couldn’t hear what the EO was saying, at first, but he began to catch snatches of it, and the more he heard, the more his balls tried to catch the Last Train to Clarksville.
“...against me... ...know they are... ...behind my back...” Kinkaid looked first at Frank, then at Ski, his eyes wild, yet furtive, as if he was trying to hide his paranoia and fear. The attempt was an utter failure. The EO seemed to fixate on Ski, as if the young man were somehow his mortal enemy. “He’s the one...” he said, nodding. “He’s always been the one. Lurking. Behind my back. Stabbing me in the back. Bet he’d like to do that now. Stick me. Stick me right in the back. Stick the knife in and give it a good twist.”
Frank took a couple steps back, his upper thighs slamming into the counter top. Ski, however, just looked amused. It was the worst thing he could have possibly done.
“Thinks it’s funny, eh? I’ll Show HIM!” he shouted, the final sentence getting louder and more like a scream with each word. He leapt at Ski, his fingers curled into claws.
93
EM3 Dan McMullen stretched and yawned. He hadn’t been sleeping, either. There was a lot of that going around. He picked his tool bag off the table in the EM Shop, and started aft, idly scratching at his balls through the material of his work pants.
Tonight, even though he didn’t have watch, he’d been directed to take the Stern Thruster offline so he could work on the panel for it. Why, exactly, it needed to be done in the middle of the fucking night, he had no idea. It could have easily have been done mid-day, but noooo. After all, they weren’t using it. They weren’t maintaining station, like intelligent and sane people who didn’t have any idea when or where they’d get fuel again. Instead, they were steaming the Box of Death at nine knots, slowly but surely sucking their fuel tanks dry.
They’d topped off before they got underway...what? Four days ago? Five? Time sure flies when you’re in an apocalypse, he thought. But the supply was not unlimited. Sooner or later, they’d need more. Sooner, if they kept wasting it.
None of which mattered. What did, was the work he had to do. He yawned again, scratched again, then opened the door to the crew’s lounge, intending to pass through on the way aft to Thruster Control. That, however, was before he saw the bodies, and the blood, and the two crew-turned zombies headed straight toward him.
He ran, as if his life depended on it - because it did.
94
Teddy Spute ran onto the Mess Deck, where Bob Stoeffel and Gus Perniola were standing, guns raised, waiting to respond if any of the pirates got in through the locked watertight exterior doors. He vaguely grumbled to himself that they were wasting their time. No one could get in through those doors without the master key card or the key fob John kept with him.
He didn’t know about Gilcuddy, didn’t know his shipmate was dead. What he did know was that John had exiled him to the shameful position of babysitter, and he failed.
“Have you seen Davy?” He asked, almost yelling.
“John’s kid?” Bob-Bob asked.
“How many Davies do we have on board?” Spute snapped. “Have you seen him or not?”
“No... I...” Bob-Bob stuttered.
Where could that little fucker be? Where would any kid go at the worst possible fucking moment? To their Mommy. But she was below, frantic over the fact she’d lost her little boy. So where does that leave? To their Dad.
“Where’s John?” He barked, already knowing the answer, and heading in that direction.
“Bridge,” Gus said, pointing.
Spute sprinted toward the far passageway. He better be up there, he thought. If he wasn’t, Spute’s life wouldn’t be worth spit. John was a friendly man. He was a kind man. But if his kid got hurt because Teddy Spute had failed to keep an eye on him, then Teddy Spute was a dead man. He reached the bottom of the ladder and began to climb.
95
Molly heard the commotion on the Bridge, and knew what it was: LTjg Bloominfeld had turned. She’d gone outside to “check the weather,” precisely because she knew he would be turning. She couldn’t have known when, but it didn’t change the inevitability. And in so doing, in abandoning the Bridge, abandoning Jack Ross and Seaman Borgeson, she’d become a coward. A pang of shame sliced her heart, as she realized she didn’t even know Borgeson’s first name. But she had readily - eagerly - abandoned him to the fate that had become all-too familiar in the last couple of horrible days.
She was a coward, and she was compounding her cowardice by staying outside, instead of investigating the commotion inside. Forget that she already knew what it was. Forget that members of her crew were being killed as she was wallowing in self-absorbed guilt.
Fuck that. She said to herself. Grow a pair, Molly Gordon.
Ignoring the anatomical impossibility of her admonition, she thrust open the watertight Bridge door and ran inside.
96
EM3 Dan McMullen burst through the watertight door onto the Buoy Deck, running faster than he had in his entire life. He’d escaped the crowd of crewmen-turned zombies in the Crew’s Lounge, slipped past the two others busy killing Seaman Siemen and Seaman Apprentice Pierre Milancent (from New Orleans, don’t you know), in the passageway through After Berthing. He’d managed those without pissing his pants (or worse), but now he had four more zombie-crew behind him. DC1 Devon Holdstien led the pack, followed by EM1 Darius Sinstabe, his boss - the fucker who’d told him to take down the Stern Thruster at fucking midnight, for no rhyme or reason. FN Gabriel Carnegie was behind him, SN Peter Donelly behind him, and bringing up the rear was SKC Duane Robinson, a new arrival, making it five fucking zombies running after him.
He didn’t bother trying to close the watertight door. There wasn’t time. He turned around the end of the port ladder, grabbed the rail to swing himself onto it, and kept right on running. The zombies ran with him.
He had to think, had to do something to slow the fuckers down, or he was going to be zombie-chow. He snapped a look over his shoulder, saw Devon Holdstien’s face level with his right boot, and kicked out, without thinking, without planning, and - most importantly - without mis
sing. The Damage Control-zombie screamed in rage and pain, and pin-wheeled its arms to stop itself falling backwards, so Dan did the only sensible thing he could do, and kicked the fucker again. It did the trick.
Like dominoes on an incline, one zombie fell back into another, and into another, and the creatures bent on Dan McMullen’s death cascaded downward and backward onto the Buoy Deck. He didn’t wait around to verify the fruits of his labor. He kept running.
97
BM1/DECK Dennis Hurdlika awoke in agony. The back of his skull felt like, well, like someone had smashed it through a false bulkhead. His shoulder hurt, and a cursory examination (because cursory was the best his pain-addled brain could manage) showed him a bloody bite mark where his left shoulder met his collarbone. He’d been bitten. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he knew this was bad, knew this was the worst possible thing. But his brain didn’t seem to be working right.
He felt fuzzy-headed. This was most likely the result of cranial trauma, he reasoned, gingerly touching the back of his skull, and feeling immense relief when his probing hand did not come away covered in blood. At least he had that going for him. With a groan (which may or may not have sounded more or less like a growl), he slid upward along the bulkhead until he stood on unsteady legs. He looked around.
The first thing he saw was a long smear of blood. It looked black in the red light of the passageway, but he knew it had to be blood. He knew this, because the smear ended in what could only be a handprint - a very large handprint. Manny Manoa, he thought, then couldn’t connect the thought to any specific memory. His head wasn’t working right.
The next thing he saw was John Mad Dog Kennedy, lying in a heap on the deck, ten feet down the passage. His head looked like a smashed pumpkin. Glancing the other way - aft - he saw two more bodies, lying four feet apart. He couldn’t tell who they were; didn’t really want to know. All he did know was rage. These were his boys, his babies, his crew. Someone or some thing had killed them, and oh my dear God did that piss off BM1/DECK Dennis Hurdlika.
