by Jeff Thomson
Something is seriously wrong with that kid, Frank thought, then walked the thought back inside his own head. It wasn’t fair. Each person dealt with this crazy shit in their own way. He, himself, went inward, compartmentalizing the fucked-up-ness of it all. Weaver went outward, choosing to make a game out of it. Whatever works in a zombie apocalypse...
They had taken station off the northwest end of the island, near the wreckage of the bridge. He tried not to think about what that bridge cost, and failed. He missed his friend. Dwelling on it wasn’t going to do him any good, though. Fucked-up thing A, goes into compartment B. Close the door, lock it, toss the key over the side. Move on.
Their part of the Grand Plan was successfully underway, as evidenced by the fact of the steadily-growing mosh pit of zombies gathering in the otherwise empty road and lot just to the east of the bridge approach. The lot devolved into a sandy, rocky shoreline, where it met the basin, and several of the infected were being pushed into the water by those behind them - all of whom were apparently trying to get at the Patrol Boat. This was impossible, of course, since they were far enough offshore to require the seemingly drunken mob to swim, which was not a good idea on their part, because:
“The sharks have finally arrived,” Jeri said, noticing the same triangular fins Frank could see.
“Swim call is contra-indicated,” Tim Luton said. “But you never know,” he added. “Dixon, why don’t you go find out?”
SN Dixon Grimes, the fourth member of their undermanned crew, wisely chose to ignore the invitation.
Ah gallows humor, Frank thought. Here in the graveyard of humanity. He shook the silly notion off. Time to get to work.
“Open fire,” he said.
“Cool!” Jeri replied.
77
Rapid Response Boat
Off the Container Port
“Our job...” Lane began.
“Is to rapidly respond to anything that goes horribly wrong?” Jennifer Collins completed the thought.
“Exactly,” he replied. He eyed the girl though the plexiglass lenses of his gas mask. Somehow, he kept getting assigned with women - young women - which, had he been younger, might have been a real boost to his ego, but now that he was older and more settled, and decidedly married, it made him question the rationale. Was it happening because he was older and more settled, or was it some unspoken comment about his own manhood?
Shut the fuck up, Lane, he chided himself. John trusted him, and so it followed that Molly trusted him, and so far - at least for this particular exercise - the new command structure was taking their suggestions.
They were running a lazy zigzag pattern. No real reason for it, except that it gave them something to do. And it allowed him to give Jennifer some training on handling this monster of a small boat, switching periodically with the other new member of the Sass crew, Seaman Sherman Malone.
If they got in any more people, he was going to start needing a program to keep track of them all. Not really. It wasn’t much different from reporting aboard a new unit - in fact this was worse, because at a new unit, he might know one or two people from somewhere else.
The RRB certainly had balls - or perhaps he should use a more gender neutral term like guts or muscle, present company, and all. Or maybe he should just say to Hell with it and go with his instincts.
Collins wasn’t the first female Coastie he’d trained - not by a long shot. And though Samantha Gordon was only sixteen, she wasn’t the youngest person he’d trained - having spent plenty of time with the Sea Scouts, who could be as young as fourteen. And Collins was doing a good job. Malone was doing a good job. They were all doing a good job - a great job, a phenomenal job, given the circumstances, which were as extreme as anything he could imagine. Though this wasn’t hard, this wasn’t dangerous, out there in the middle of Honolulu Harbor, cruising in a lovely, redundant, and safe zigzag.
And then the Assateague opened up with their 25mm. Welcome back to reality, Lane.
78
Sass Two
Honolulu Harbor
“Who’s the worst shot?” Jonesy asked.
“Me,” Harold replied, in less than a second.
“Fuck you,” Jonesy said. “You’re not that bad.”
“I could be,” the young man objected.
“I can knock the wings off a flee,” ET1 Glenn Newby bragged.
Jonesy gave the man an assessing look. “And if we come upon a Flea Apocalypse, that skill might come in handy.”
“Just saying...” Newby said.
“Probably me,” Tara McBride said, shrugging and ignoring the banter. “Made Marksman in boot camp and haven’t touched a gun since.” She might bear watching, Jonesy thought - and not for the obvious reason that her demeanor and carriage were so overtly sexual as to almost make a parody of the idea. And she had a nice butt. None of which was the real issue.
Honest...
The real issue was her give a shit attitude. Such a personality trait was to be expected from any bunch of sailors. The experience of being at sea, of being surrounded by the wonder, majesty, and sometimes terror of Mother Nature, tended to leave people with a sense of insignificance. Against such a backdrop, the small shit of “normal” life shrank to a relatively small, easily compartmentalized ball of who gives a rat’s ass. But she seemed to be taking the notion one or two steps further. It seemed as if she didn’t give a shit about anything, and that could be dangerous. Time would tell.
“Anybody else?” Jonesy asked. The only person remaining, Seaman Apprentice Jerry Nailor, shook his head. “Made Sharpshooter in boot,” he said. “That was only a few months ago.”
Jonesy nodded. “Well, then, at the risk of seeming sexist, McBride, you get to stay with the boat.”
“Aw, man,” Harold swore.
“Deal with it, Harry,” Jonesy said, slapping him on the back. He idled the boat just off the tank farm, on the Eastern shore of the harbor. It sat across the estuary from more or less the middle of the Container Port Pier. The zombies, thanks to the loud hailer and the 25mm auto cannon, were being drawn to the north end of the Port. The theory was that the infected assholes on the east side would be drawn northward, as well, and thus, away from the tank farm. On paper. According to plan.
For once, the plan seemed to be working. Not a single zombie could be seen, either roaming the tank farm, or in the understandably empty areas to the north and south. Real estate on Oahu was some of the most expensive in the world, and in Honolulu, that went double, so empty space wasn’t just frowned upon, it was damned-near blasphemous. Regardless, nobody wanted property that might get wiped out, should the fuel tanks ever explode; hence, the mostly empty spaces.
To the north, lay a large building - probably for maintenance - surrounded by quite a bit of more or less empty concrete. A few vehicles dotted the landscape, but that was about all. To the south lay an even bigger lot, which was also, for all intents and purposes, empty. There were a few rows of some form of rectangular containers, widely dispersed, and serving no purpose Jonesy could fathom. He supposed the Marine Science People from the Pollution Response Team knew what they were, but as they’d sent all of theirs to Midway, there wasn’t a soul he could ask. Not that he cared, of course, but they were headed over there, so it would have been helpful to know what was in them, if for no other reason than to keep from hitting any of it with rifle fire, should it be prone to detonation. That would be bad.
This “exercise,” was LCDR Wheeler’s contribution to the plan. Captain, Jonesy reminded himself. The man was their new CO, and while the occasional slip might be tolerated, before long it would start to seem like an insult, which, also, would be bad.
The point to their mission was fuel. They needed a large supply of it, since the only tanker they’d found so far had been the one capsized on the southern coast of Kauai. The Sass could probably refuel another three times from the tank farm at Port Allen, but then it would be empty, and in any case, the Polar Star needed a much, much bigger
source. This was the closest. The only other viable alternative would be the fuel point in Pearl Harbor, and even though none of them had been over to recon the area yet, Mister Barber and the Bughouse Brit, Harvey Walton, had flown over it a few times.
Jim Barber’s assessment had been: “Think overrun with zombies. Then think harder.”
So, Honolulu it would have to be.
“Sass Two, Sass. Over.” Molly’s voice crackled over the radio. Smart damned move, making her the OPS Boss, in Jonesy estimation. If they’d just shoved her aside, the damage to crew unity might have been as bad as if they’d just shit-canned her. And while the new people more than outnumbered the original Sass crew, they were relative rookies, and so still needed the Sass crew’s hard-earned experience. And while they’d never attempted anything on as large of a scale as they were trying now, they had been through the horror show more times than any of them wanted to count. They were tried and tested, and they’d come out the far end with their sanity still more or less intact. More or less.
“Go, Sass.”
“How’s it look, Chief?” Her use of his new title sounded wrong, somehow. It wasn’t. Having put the anchors on his collar entitled him to the honorific, but it still sounded weird. He’d always been Jonesy - just plain old Jonesy. Hearing himself referred to with such formality was weird.
“None of the crazy bastards in sight,” he said, knowing full well he shouldn’t cuss during official communications, but he couldn’t help himself. In fact, he hoped that weasel, Peavey was listening.
79
USCGC Sassafras
Honolulu Harbor
“Plan is to go ashore, locate diesel fuel, run a hose from it to the shore, then open our own gas station,” Chief Jones said, in his cavalier voice. Peavey didn’t like it. Molly didn’t care.
“And if you find any unfriendlies?” She asked.
“Slice and dice,” the voice came back over the radio waves. “If that doesn’t work, then we open fire and run like Hell.”
This was, in fact the plan, as they’d laid it out after receiving it from their new CO - just without all the colorful descriptions. Molly knew Jonesy was trying to get Peavey’s goat. Or maybe not that. Maybe he was just trying to see how far he could push the man - see where the line would be drawn. This ran absolutely counter to good order and discipline, but Molly wasn’t much happier than Jonesy to have this pompous, probably incompetent windbag wedged into the team that thus far had been successful.
And okay, sure, they hadn’t always been successful. In fact, there was at least one instance where they were disastrously unsuccessful - and it resulted in McMullen’s death - but even then, the overall plan succeeded. Small comfort. No comfort at all, really, but dwelling on it wouldn’t do anybody any good.
Truth of it was, she wanted to curl up into a corner and weep, but if she allowed herself the luxury, she might never stop. It would be easy. She had a buffer now. She had Wheeler and Montrose between her and the awesome responsibility for the lives of the Sass crew. She could abdicate completely, find herself that corner, and let go. But where would it lead? What purpose would it really serve? And what would happen to her crew?
She looked at Peavey, who stood staring at the radio and fuming. It would lead directly to him.
“Slice and dice?” Peavey asked, his nasal voice climbing an octave.
“Chief Jones carries two machetes,” she explained. “They’ve proven effective in hand-to-hand combat.”
“Hand to hand?” The voice climbed again. It ran along her spine like nails on a chalk board. If it got any more shrill, it’d be high enough to attract stray dogs.
“Zombies are attracted by noise,” she said, starting to realize why the Nutty Professor got annoyed when people didn’t understand what he was trying to explain. Of course, she wasn’t anywhere near as much of an asshole as Christopher Floyd, but she could still relate. “Firearms make noise. Machetes do not.”
“That man’s insane,” he sputtered.
“Probably,” she replied with a smile.
The interior door popped open, and Wheeler walked in, followed by Montrose. The two of them seemed joined at the hip.
“Captain on the Bridge,” she called.
He waved off the formality and said: “What’s the situation?”
“Jones is a lunatic,” Peavey blurted, before Molly had a chance to reply.
As if on cue: “Making the approach now,” Jonesy’s voice came through the speaker.
“He should be relieved,” Peavey declared.
Molly stared at him in disbelief. It was one thing to express doubts to his immediate superior - Molly - but to dance on her head and take the matter straight to the Captain was... She couldn’t even come up with a word strong enough to describe exactly how much of an asshole move it was.
“Sir...” she began, the rage boiling inside of her.
“Lower your blood pressure, Ms Gordon,” Wheeler said. “And you, Mister Peavey,” he began, turning toward the man. “Should concentrate on supporting the mission. Your opinions can wait till everyone’s safely back aboard.”
“At the pier,” Jonesy’s voice said. “Going to radio silence.”
Wheeler looked at her for explanation. “That wasn’t part of the plan.”
She knew he was right, knew this was something Jonesy should have warned them about ahead of time, but she also knew the reason why he was doing it. “It became standard procedure following the death of Petty Officer McMullen,” she lied. “In the same way you turn off all transmitting devices during fueling ops...”
Wheeler nodded. “Understood.”
“Well I don’t understand,” Peavey said, but neither Wheeler, nor Molly chose to enlighten him.
“Are we ready for our part of this?” Wheeler asked.
Peavey, in charge of all Deck Operations, who should have answered, who’d been flapping his gums about anything and everything, whether it directly concerned him or not, remained silent.
Molly answered for him. “Barrels are secured on the Buoy Deck, and the crew is awaiting your command.”
Wheeler smiled. “Always wanted to say this,” he said. “Make it so.”
80
USCGC Polar Star
22.369566N 163.904285W
“The residents were...reluctant...to receive the vaccine,“ LT Carrie Scoggins said to the assembled meeting in the Wardroom of Polar Star. “The leader, a man named...” She consulted her small, green, military-issue notebook. “Edmund Evans, kept going on about Posse Comitatus.”
“Fucking idiot,” Master Chief Wolf said under his breath. He was mumbling, as usual, but everybody heard the words.
“Ability of the accompanied?” LTjg Carol Kemp asked, loosely translating the Latin phrase. “What?” Who said classical education was wasted? What it had to do with the topic of this meeting, she had no idea.
The Helo had flown a mission to French Frigate Shoals, as it had to each of the little specks of land on the far end of the Hawaiian Archipelago, to assess the suitability for the atolls to house survivors and/or supplies. If, as the Sass said, there were hundreds, if not thousands of survivors waiting to be rescued in Honolulu, they needed places to put them, as well as the ability to keep them supplied. With four small ships (even the Star was small, compared to the wide Pacific) the problems involved would become acute in a hurry.
“Posse Comitatus Act,” LCDR Stubbelfield said. “Eighteen Seventy-something? End of Reconstruction?”
“Bullshit,” the Master Chief grumbled.
“It restricts the Federal government from using the Army to enforce local laws,” Stubbelfield explained. “Though what that has to do with French Frigate Shoals...?”
“He claimed we had no right to arbitrarily use - as he called it - his island any way we damned well pleased.” Scoggins said. “And he cited the Act as legal basis for his argument.”
“Bullshit,” Master Chief grumbled again. “Doesn’t apply to the Coast Guard.”
<
br /> “The Master Chief is correct,” Captain Hall said.
“In his diplomatic way,” CWO4 Vincenzo piped in, to general laughter. CDR Swedberg performed his Executive Officer duty by scowling, but Carol doubted he put much sincere feeling behind it.
“In any case,” The Captain said, bringing the hilarity to an abrupt end. “This Mister...” He looked to Scoggins to fill in the blank.
“Edmund Evans,” she replied.
Hall nodded. “Is wrong on three counts.” He held up a single finger. “The Act doesn’t apply to the Coast Guard, because of our Law Enforcement authority, which the other branches do not have.” He raised a second finger. “Also, the President declared nationwide Martial Law before everything went to Hell. To the best of my knowledge, he never rescinded that order.” He glanced around the table to see if there were any dissenting opinions. There were not. “And if none of that works, there’s always Eminent Domain.”
“And fourth,” Vincenzo said. “How is he going to stop us?”
The assembled officers instantly split themselves into two groups: one in agreement, one not. There didn’t appear to be any middle ground.
The Captain held up a hand to put a stop to the argument before it had any chance to build steam. This wasn’t, after all, a Democracy. A ship at sea was a kingdom unto itself, and the Captain was absolute monarch, forever and ever, amen.
“That, sir,” he said to Bobby V. “As tempting as it might be, as easy as it might be, is the absolute last thing we can do, if we want to have any chance of rebuilding our nation. We cannot do it by force.”
81
M/V Point of Order
09.28387N 164.172875W
“If they don’t like it, shoot the fuckers,” Blackjack said. He stood on the Bridge, with Hennessy, McCabe, and the Aussie, Dirk Parker. The natives - or, in this case, the remaining crew of the USS Paul Hamilton - were refusing to do as they were told. “Join or die. Same as with everyone else.”
