Fade to Grey (Book 1): Fade to Grey

by Brian Stewart

  “I thought you said he was out of ammo,” Andy said.

  “Yes sir, but that didn’t stop him from beating her brains out with the M4. He was seriously pissed off . . . holding the barrel like a baseball bat and smashing her over and over again. It was . . . intense.”

  Little old lady, wig, in this office—it had to be Miss Fran. Michelle looked down the hallway; the main overhead lights were off but the “emergency exit” and power failure lights were both on, providing a dim but shadowy view. She could see that the doorway between the reception area and this hall was shut. It was just a plain wooden “interior” door though, no real security if anything wanted to get through it. Hopefully nothing would. Besides, she wouldn’t need to go out there anyhow—everything she was after was back here. First things first though. “Let’s go see your lieutenant,” Michelle said.

  Thompson hesitated. “Ma’am, that room ain’t lit up too well, and CC, well, he was really hot the last time I checked him . . . a couple minutes before you opened the back door. I ain’t afraid to go there . . . matter of fact it should be me that goes first anyhow, but if he’s . . . one of them . . . I’d rather go in with a gun that has some ammo. Just sayin’.”

  It was pretty sound logic to Michelle. She handed him her shotgun. “You know how this thing works?”

  “Damn straight,” he huffed.

  Andy nudged Michelle and said, “You want to loan the boy your flashlight?”

  Shit

  She had started to instinctively reach down toward her belt ring, realizing almost immediately that she had left her Maglite out in the truck. It was a mistake—something she should have caught. Michelle mentally cursed herself again and briefly considered going out to get it, but dismissed that thought in favor of the “once and done” philosophy. Get in, get out, get home.

  Andy nudged Michelle again. “Here . . . give him mine to use.”

  She took the offered light and handed it to Private Thompson, who turned it on and held it sandwiched between his left palm and the slide of the shotgun. He turned and walked slowly up the hall, passing the restroom on the left and the storage door on the right. Michelle and Andy followed. A few more steps and they were even with the conference room door.

  Thompson called out, “Yo CC . . . you OK?”

  There was no answer.

  “Hey Lieutenant . . . Calhoun . . . we got some friends here, we’re going to get you to medical, OK?”

  Silence.

  Thompson lowered his flashlight hand to the doorknob, giving it a slight turn to unlatch it before resuming a two handed grip on the shotgun. Michelle had her Glock in her hands—she didn’t even remember drawing it. Thompson used his left foot to push the door open, directing the light into the conference room.

  “CC, it’s Thompson, you OK?”

  Nothing.

  Michelle heard the distant chatter of small arms fire from somewhere outside. It rapidly dropped off, leaving them again in near silence—punctuated only by the hum of the emergency lighting above their heads and quickened pace of her own heartbeat. It seemed the loudest of all.

  She watched as Thompson stepped into the conference room; saw the changing illumination as he swept the light across the area beyond the door.

  “Andy, watch the hallway OK?”

  Andy nodded, and Michelle followed Thompson into the room. They found CC crumpled up in the back right corner; his smashed up and bent M4 across his lap. He wasn’t moving. Thompson approached closer, and his light clearly illuminated the now familiar gray tone of CC’s skin.

  “Thompson, be careful.”

  Thompson stopped about two feet away and leaned forward, nudging the lieutenant’s shoulder with the barrel of Michelle’s shotgun. Nothing happened. He did it again, softly calling out, “Hey Chris . . . wake up man, we’re going to get you to medical. C’mon LT, get up.”

  Lieutenant Calhoun didn’t move, and Michelle watched as Thompson slowly reached down with a bare hand and touched the side of his lieutenant’s face.

  A few seconds later Thompson seemed to relax a little, withdrawing his hand and taking a deep breath. “He’s gone. For good I mean. He ain’t hot anymore.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “That’s what the colonel told us. Well, the medical guy that was with the colonel when we had our pre-deployment briefing this morning.”

  “Pretend I wasn’t at that meeting, because I wasn’t . . . and tell me—quickly—what you mean about being hot.”

  “Ma’am, this morning before my squad deployed, Colonel Jordan had some medical guy tell us what we might expect to find if people were infected. A lot of it seemed like they didn’t know jack shit and were just making stuff up to pacify us and get our asses moving out the door. One of the things though, was what they ‘thought’ about the progression of the infection. Everybody that gets sick gets really hot, and then the bug either kills you and you cool off, or you become one of those . . . ‘things’ and try and chow down on everybody else. If that happens, they said you’d stay hot. I don’t know though, seems like a lot of bullshit to me.”

  “Everything OK in there?” Andy’s whispered voice pierced the silence.

  “Yeah, we’re coming out.”

  Michelle backed out into the hall and filled Andy in on what had happened, as well as mentioning what Thompson had said about bodies staying hot or cooling off.

  “Alright, good to know. Now let’s do what we came here to do and get out,” Andy said.

  “Back there,” Michelle pointed towards the door to the storage room, “that’s where the radios are . . . and some other things.”

  Michelle padded past Andy and stopped at the heavy, single door. Peel and stick lettering spelled out the word “storage” in all capital letters. Smiling to herself, Michelle thought about the memo she had received several months ago. In essence, it stated that all governmental offices were required to comply with federal accounting standards, which included labeling and tracking of all government property. Miss Fran, after firing off a couple chastising emails to the higher ups had then proceeded to clean out the local hardware store of all sticky letters. When she was done, almost everything in Michelle’s office had its name spelled out in gold, two inch high mailbox letters. Garbage cans, file cabinets, computers . . . even the toilet in the restroom had been labeled, although her secretary had apparently run out of the letter “E.” The word “toilet” had been spelled using masking tape and permanent marker in place of the missing vowel. Michelle had gone along with the joke for awhile, politely requesting that Miss Fran remove all but the most practical ones a few weeks later.

  Michelle’s hand was almost to the latch when Andy said, “Wait a minute.”

  He swiveled his neck around to look at Thompson and asked, “Have you been in here, this room I mean, or for that matter any of the other ones back here? And if so are they empty?”

  Thompson nodded before answering. “Yeah, all four of these rooms are clear, you know, secure the immediate area first . . . I wish we would have done that up front.” Andy nodded as Thompson continued, “Anyway, me and CC used his flashlight and swept these rooms first thing after we got back here. They’re all empty, at least of hostiles—although that room there . . .” he indicated the storage room Michelle was about to enter with a slight bob of his head . . . “is a freakin’ mess. Don’t you ever throw anything away?”

  Andy chuckled at the joke obviously made at the expense of her housekeeping skills, but Michelle wasn’t laughing. This was the second potentially fatal mistake she had made in the last five minutes. First the flashlight, and now she had just about blundered into a room that she had no idea if it was clear or not.

  “Get a grip on things girl,” Michelle chided herself. She paused, taking a few breaths to calm her nerves, and then turned the latch. The door opened quietly, but the dim illumination from the hallway didn’t penetrate enough for her to see very well.

  “Thompson,” she whispered, “did you sa
y that Lieutenant Calhoun had a flashlight?”

  “Yes ma’am, but the batteries went down a short time after I got him into that conference room.”

  “Of course they did,” Michelle fumed under her breath.

  “Can’t you just grab the radios?” Andy asked.

  “No, they’re locked in the safe and I’ll need the light to work the combination.”

  Andy grunted and handed Michelle the light from Thompson. Taking it from his hands, she stepped across several piles of filing boxes that were haphazardly scattered in seemingly random piles in order to make it to the safe. Several more piles would have to be moved—or at least kicked out of the way—before Michelle would be able to open the door of the large, Browning gun safe. Andy peeked in, his eyes wide with wonder at what must have seemed to be a disorganized, chaotic jumble of boxes and papers, but was in fact another work in progress. Michelle moved the boxes, and then turned her attention back to the safe—spinning the correct combination and opening it up. Four pelican cases were stacked on top of one another on the right side—she tossed those out to Andy. Then she went for the guns. Michelle’s office didn’t keep an entire arsenal, but they were required to have a minimum on hand for training and operational purposes. The minimum at her office included a pair of AR15’s—civilian version, semiautomatic only, three more Remington 870 twelve gauges—almost identical to what Walter had given her, and several cases of ammo—most of it for the AR’s and her Glock. She scooted closer and grabbed the first of the ammo boxes, sliding it towards her and lifting it out.

  SCHREEEECH.

  Michelle dropped the box and drew her Glock as a metallic squeal from the back door broke the silence. Andy spun as the darkened hallway filled with sunlight.

  “INFECTED,” Andy yelled as he crouched and fired. Kaboom . . .Kaboom. Thompson leaned forward and thrust the shotgun over top of Andy’s head. The muzzle blast momentarily deafened Michelle when he fired. Shaking her ears to clear them, Michelle shoved her head out into the hallway—Glock and flashlight pointed towards the back door. Andy stopped firing as the door screeched mostly closed, once again driving the hallway back into semi shadows. The flashlight faintly illuminated a body lying next to the back door.

  “Damn, my ears are ringing,” she hissed.

  “Mine too—everybody OK?” Andy asked.

  Michelle nodded, and Thompson said, “I think so sir.”

  “Good,” Andy said, “let’s grab these boxes and get the hell out of . . . .” CRASH!

  The door between the hallway and the front reception area splintered. Michelle jerked the flashlight in that direction and saw a bloody gray arm pounding through the remaining frame. A deep hissing and gurgling sound emanated from the ghoul that was smashing his way toward them. With a loud whack, the torn and battered head of the monster burst through the center of the door, pausing for a moment like a ghastly taxidermy mount. Its yellow eyes glared with unchecked rage.

  “FERAL!” Michelle yelled as she braced her shoulder against the wall and fired. Thompson swung the shotgun and pumped several rounds in that direction as the ghoul shredded the remaining door and started down the hall. Michelle could see the impacts tearing his flesh as the rounds smashed into him, but he kept coming—clawing along the wall and pulling himself closer and closer. Finally, one of Thompson’s shots took out the fiend’s knee, and she heard—or rather sensed—that Andy had moved up and was firing also. Two more shots and her slide locked back. She dumped the empty magazine and grabbed another off her belt—slamming it in and hitting the extended slide release with her thumb. Thompson was screaming obscenities at the creature as he continued to fire, and by the time she was back on target, the creature was down. One of Thompson’s or Andy’s shots must have hit the feral in the head or neck.

  “Well,” Michelle huffed out between adrenaline charged breaths, “that was fun. We should try to do that more oft . . .”

  BOOM!

  The explosion of Andy’s shotgun firing almost made Michelle jump out of her skin. She spun around and saw him facing the other way; toward the back door where a second body now lay. Shit.

  “WHAT IN THE HOLY SHIT PILE WAS THAT . . . WHAT THE HELL’S A FERAL?” Thompson shouted, his voice tinged with fear.

  “Keep your voice down, private,” Michelle hissed as she reached into her pocket and handed him more shells for the twelve gauge. Andy was reloading as well.

  Andy stepped down the hall toward the metal door, moving around the dead bodies as he did. The door was not latched, and he peeked out to the right, the only direction he could see without opening the door further. He slid back a bit and Michelle saw him jockeying for position to view out the bullet holes in the metal door. Apparently satisfied he retreated back.

  “I can’t see anything, but I don’t really have a good angle to look all around. That said, if were gonna go, I’d recommend we light a fire under our asses and get moving.” Michelle whispered her agreement as she handed more shells to Thompson.

  “Pull the back door shut until it latches,” she said to Andy. He moved down the hall, stepped around the bodies and pulled the handle until the door closed with an audible click.

  Andy came back and Michelle whispered, “OK, I need ten seconds in my office, and then we’ll pull back to here. After that, you two get to cover my ass while I stack the guns, ammo and radios near the back door. Let’s try and do this quietly people, alright?” Andy nodded and Thompson said, “Yes ma’am.”

  Michelle let them lead the way with the shotguns as she held the flashlight over her head, pointing toward the opening where the feral had torn through the door. As soon as they passed her office door, their trio stopped. Enough light was trickling in through the front glass windows—or where they used to be anyhow—that they would be able to see any movement.

  “You both ready?” she asked.

  “Go,” Andy replied.

  Michelle took the flashlight and darted into the office. True to her word, she was out in less than ten seconds, and they slid back down the hallway in a close triangle formation. A few feet from the storage door they stopped. Andy whispered something to Thompson that Michelle didn’t catch, and they took up firing positions—one standing, one kneeling. Without wasting another second, Michelle started grabbing boxes of ammo and hoofing them toward the back door. In three minutes she was breathing heavy and sweating, but all of the safe’s contents were stacked by the door. Sporadic gunfire outside had started with her first trip, but tapered off to the occasional shot by the time she had finished.

  “We’re stacked and ready,” Michelle said as she crouched down and picked up the Glock magazine she had dropped earlier.

  “OK,” Andy said, “tell me if this sounds reasonable. You and I take over guard duty. I’ll look through the bullet holes in the door and if it looks clear, I’m going to open it and give you a STOP or GO after a quick look around. If it’s a go, I’m going down to the truck and unlock it while Thompson grabs the first load of supplies and you cover the hallway. Once the doors are open Thompson will bust ass and take everything down to the truck while you and I are keeping everybody alive.”

  Michelle looked at Thompson and asked, “Is that OK with you?”

  “Yeah, but I got two questions ma’am.”

  She waited.

  He continued, “First thing is what if he yells stop after he opens the door . . . what’s the plan then? And secondly, if everything goes good and we get to your truck with all the gear, where the hell are we going to?”

  Michelle looked at Andy, then back toward Thompson as she answered. “If the call is stop, then we shut the door again and take up positions watching in that direction . . .” she indicated toward the splintered door, “until we re-evaluate.” Everybody nodded and she continued, “If we make it to the truck safely, we’re going to head back toward my house. Andy, do you remember the way we came in?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Just follow it back and I’ll tell you when to turn.�
�

  Michelle looked at both of them, searching for further questions, but they were silent and still. “OK then, let’s do this.”

  They moved back toward the metal door with Andy leading the way. Once in position, Michelle maneuvered the flashlight so it was shining down the hall on the door where the feral had busted through.

  Thompson handed her the twelve gauge, and the remaining shells he had for it. “It’s topped off . . . safeties on.”