But she didn’t budge. Instead, six inches from receiving what could be a life-ending bite, she waggled her arm, focused only on the jaundiced white of the abomination’s right eye.
Two things happened at once: The first turn grasped her forearm in a two-handed grip, pinching the skin and flesh there and drew her in. Then its eyes went wide and Glenda felt an incredible bone-crushing pressure as it got a good mouthful of pink terry cloth overlaying the National Enquirer’s final issue.
Though the thirty-something male stood a few inches taller than Glenda, the knitting needle provided her a ten-inch advantage in reach. And when she plunged the pointed end into its eye, the pop and sucking sound and flood of viscous fluid that coated her hand took her back to Louie’s bedside, instantly reminding her how much this thing called Omega had stolen from her. A twist of the wrist turned the writhing Z into a hundred and sixty pounds of dead weight with its jaw locked tight and ten wrinkled and bloody digits still holding fast.
Taking Glenda down with it, the first turn fell in a vertical heap. Mid-fall she twisted her body to the right and landed face first, the jarring impact blurring her vision and embedding grains of blacktop into her cheek and brow.
Shaking the stars away, Glenda craned her head and looked down the length of her body, between the Hi-Tec’s scuffed toes, towards the distant driveway. Nothing. She was still alone ... for now. So she went to work, frantically trying to free herself. First she tore her arm from its bite with back and forth twisting motions until its head lolled away leaving a number of teeth firmly snagged in the triple layers of fabric, duct tape, and paper. The bony hands, however, were ice cold and locked to her robe in a death grip that took a lot of prying with her fingers and the blood-slickened needle to make let go.
On the lookout for approaching feet, Glenda pushed the corpse from her, rolled to her stomach, and cast her gaze towards the right lane. There she saw nothing but a number of trucks and SUVs and cars loaded down with all of the trappings of folks hoping to relocate far away from the heavily populated cities west of Huntsville. There were no crawling half-corpses, nor could she see shuffling feet cutting the light filtering in between the roadway and the undercarriages. Looking higher, through the grimy auto glass, she noticed nothing moving near the shoulder and ditch on the far side of the inert vehicles.
Satisfied the breached roadblock was free of dead, Glenda cleaned the needle on her robe and put it in its place next to the gossip rag and her forearm. Then she rose shakily and, without looking over her shoulder, continued on her way, eastbound, attacking the two dozen miles to Woodruff one clumsy step at a time.
Chapter 19
While the iPhone charged, Cade sat cross-legged, working his Gerber back and forth in slow and deliberate passes against a whetstone.
Nearby, Tran and Duncan prepared the fire pit for the evening’s feast, stacking seasoned firewood taken from Logan’s stash beside the spit erected over the two-foot-deep hole. The deer carcass hanging from a tree nearby would easily feed the group, but with no way to keep the remaining meat from spoiling it would need to be turned into venison jerky. A task that even taking into account their rustic accommodations, Tran, their resident chef, had nearly perfected. Though there were enough beans, rice, MREs, and freeze-dried food packets stockpiled in the dry storage to see them through the winter and well into the next year, the group conscience was to first live off the land when possible and only eat the stores as a last resort. With Chief and Daymon bagging a deer or boar every few days and Tran foraging for edible plants, the group had been eating like royalty the past three weeks.
Trying to make small talk, something which he was no good at, Cade looked up from his task and asked, “What are tonight’s accompaniments?”
“Deer, deer and ... more deer,” replied Duncan.
“And wild spinach,” said Tran, gesturing at a mound of greens resembling partially eaten oak leaves.
“What are the roots there?” asked Cade as Raven whizzed by on the mountain bike, her breathing unusually ragged and audible over the clicking of the freewheel.
“Cattail root. Grind them into a paste ... like potato.”
“For a former Green Beanie you sure aren’t very perceptive when it comes to what you eat,” quipped Duncan.
“I broke bread with Peshmerga and lived to tell the tale,” Cade said, smiling. “Therefore, I have no reason to ever worry about what crosses my lips.”
Knees popping loudly, Duncan rose, regarded Cade with a serious stare and said, “That bad?”
Cade nodded. Said, “Rotted goat and whatever else was in the stew didn’t agree with me. I had the shits for a week. And crapping in the Hindu Kush has its own particular set of challenges.” He wiped the oil off the whetstone and pocketed it. Cleaned the Gerber with the kerchief he’d used on the stone and slid the black dagger into the scabbard on his hip.
Raven ripped by again with Max in hot pursuit, the Shepherd’s rear paws kicking up rooster tails of dark earth.
“Help us with the deer, would ya?” asked Duncan.
After looking at the iPhone which now showed a full charge, Cade unplugged it from the charger, stood up silently, and followed the two men.
***
Once the deer was trussed and hanging over the fire pit, Cade searched out a quiet place where he could keep an eye on Raven and fiddle with the phone.
He picked a tall fir near the Black Hawk and sat with his back to the trunk. Hitched his sleeves to his elbows then thumbed the phone on and watched the display refresh. On the phone, the background—or wallpaper as he’d heard techy people call it—was a picture of Taryn and an older man. Cade swiped the apps to the left until only one row remained and he could see the important elements of the picture. In it he saw that Taryn’s hair was much shorter than it was now. She wore a wide smile and was leaning against a man whose hair was closely cropped, graying on the sidewalls but still dark on top. Standing half a head taller than Taryn, the forty-something was smiling as well, the darkly tanned skin pinching on his forehead and around his dark brown eyes. Behind the pair was a low-to-the-ground roadster of some sort. Short windshield. No top. Dotted with primer spots and sitting on steel wheels painted black, the ride was more Rat-Rod than some well-to-do Baby Boomer’s trailer queen. It was a daily driver and a work in progress. That was for sure. And it was also obvious to Cade that Taryn was the older man’s little girl. There was no doubt about it. His arm was draped around her shoulder and he appeared to be drawing her in close when the photo was snapped. Cade shivered. He felt like a voyeur looking at one of Taryn’s ghosts—someone she’d never see again and whose ultimate end would most likely forever remain a mystery. Then something far away in the background drew his attention. Behind Taryn and her dad and the roadster, visible above the rooflines of the half-dozen single-story dwellings ringing the cul-de-sac, he recognized the same red rock cliff band Ari had rocketed the Ghost Hawk up the face of over a month ago. Grand Junction, Cade thought as he started flicking backward through multiple screens chock full of colorful icons.
He stopped swiping at the screen when he saw the application shortcut emblazoned with a pixelated gray cog. He tapped the icon and navigated inside the device’s general settings and located the slider for Airplane Mode and swiped it off. He pressed the Home button and locked his gaze on the upper left corner and saw that the tiny symbolic jet was now replaced by the words No Service. Two words he’d hoped to see. Hit with the realization that his experiment was over before it had even started, he thumbed the Home key and watched the red cliffs and hot rod and smiling faces fade to black.
When Raven passed by next, Cade called her over and, once she jammed to a stop, handed her the iPhone and charger. Seeing the sheen of sweat on her lip and a fiery red tint to her cheeks, and hearing the same barely perceptible wheeze, he furrowed his brow and asked, “You feeling OK?”
Though her appearance spoke differently, she nodded and said, “I’m OK. Just hot and thirsty.”
“Then please take these to Taryn and thank her for me. And while you’re inside have your mom listen to those lungs.”
Rolling her eyes, a move perfected only in the last year or so, she bunched the phone and solar panel in one hand and pedaled away.
Cade called out, “Drink some water, why don’t you ... and get something to snack on while you’re at it.”
Once the girl and dog were out of earshot, Duncan slapped his knee and let out one of his trademark cackles. “You don’t need to worry about rotters getting inside the wire.”
Cade looked at the deer and the fire Tran had just lit underneath it. He consulted his Suunto and then humored Duncan with a look and a shrug that said please elaborate.
After taking a small sip from his flask, Duncan shook his head and said with an alcohol-warped drawl, “You know, you’ve got a real firecracker there.”
“Just like her mom,” proffered Cade.
“What I wouldn’t give to find a firecracker like Brook,” said Duncan, his voice trailing off as he stared at the sputtering fire. There was an uncomfortable silence. Cade looked over at Tran who simply shrugged. Then, apparently realizing how creepy his statement had sounded, Duncan stammered, “No ... no ... no ... I meant a firecracker like her ... but with a decade or two more mileage on her chassis.”
Cade smiled at the mileage on her chassis part of his statement. Then he beckoned Duncan over and whispered in his ear, “Number one ... make sure Brook doesn’t hear you compare a woman’s body to a pick-up. Number two ... you ought to think about laying off the Jack. We launch at first light—” He looked at the Suunto and quickly did the math—“fourteen hours, give or take. We need to refuel first at Morgan then we fly southeast to our objective.”
“Objective?”
“All I have is a waypoint in the desert.”
“What then?”
“We wait.”
Arms outstretched, Duncan bobbed his head like one of those dolls.
Recognizing the universal gesture meaning tell me more, and having already decided to wait until the morning when they were in the air, Cade simply shook his head no.
“Fuck it,” said Duncan, spinning the cap off the flask, the lid clinking as he tilted back and drained the last of the bourbon. He held the pose and let the final few drops hit his tongue before spinning the cap back on and stowing the flask away in a pocket.
Cade mouthed, “No more tonight. I need you sharp because there’s rumored to be a pot of gold waiting for all of us at the end of this mission.”
Intrigued by the sound of things, Duncan said, “No problem. I’ll be good to go at zero-seven-hundred.”
You better, thought Cade as he stalked off towards the compound. A half-dozen yards away he slung his carbine and spun around and walked backwards. “Oh seven hundred,” he bellowed. “Hundred bucks says you’re late.”
And when he turned back around, a knowing grin spread on his face due to those last five words, which were calculated and uttered as a direct challenge meant to activate Duncan’s compulsively competitive nature. Craps or blackjack. Baccarat or Texas Hold ‘Em. Horses or dogs. Just so long as the action was there, the method of delivery didn’t matter to a self-professed compulsive gambler like Duncan. And though the former Vietnam-era aviator was wise to it or not, Cade had just surreptitiously provided that action.
And he didn’t feel a shred of remorse for doing so.
Chapter 20
From the viewing angle, which left everything on the screen rounded on top and pinched at the edges, Nash knew that the satellite which had captured the days-old footage she was viewing had been locked in a bad orbit at the edge of its effective range. Still, she took note of the warship’s spacing, paying close attention to the dozen or so vessels coming in over the horizon. The largest on the right she’d been told by one of her analysts was the Liaoning, China’s newest aircraft carrier, which had been rushed into commission even before sea trials were completed. Surrounding her were half a dozen support ships, big and boxy and riding closely alongside. Spread out farther, both left and right, were the picket ships, a frigate and a couple of corvettes, plus the standout near the carrier, a stealthy Guangzhou-class destroyer of the same name whose sole role was to provide anti-sub as well as anti-air protection for the carrier.
Already privy to the outcome of the carrier group, she fast-forwarded and found the satellite footage shot over the Eastern Seaboard and paused it at a predetermined time stamp and counted the vessels. The destroyer was there, plowing ahead in calm-looking seas, a jagged white V spreading out from its bow. Next to it on the right was a single Chinese missile frigate, the Hunong, and on its right was the unmistakable black rounded hull of a very long Russian Borei-class submarine, the Yuri Dolgorukiy. That it was riding the surface with impunity so close to Norfolk was very troubling. More so was the company it was keeping.
Nash forwarded the hours-old footage until she recognized the Chesapeake Bay. The sub was nowhere to be seen as it had submerged shortly after it was spotted next to the other two surface ships; however, it appeared to Nash and was already confirmed through new imaging that the frigate and destroyer were entering the bay apparently intent on making a landing on U.S. soil. She watched the two vessels moving at a cautious pace until they were just offshore from Naval Station Norfolk where, presumably, they were trying to draw some kind of response. Which Nash knew wouldn’t be coming. The ships still at dock were ghost ships, their crews either dead or among the ranks of the undead.
Nash pinned her hair up and donned a navy blue ball cap emblazoned with the Air Force insignia and continued watching as the destroyer launched a gray helicopter from its fantail. Adjusting her hat, she plucked the phone from the cradle and punched the autodial button to the Tactical Operations Center. When Jensen answered, Nash asked that the live feed from the satellite in orbit high over Norfolk be placed on the largest monitor front and center. She replaced the handset and closed the laptop. Stowed the nearly full bottle of tequila and glassware and closed the filing cabinet drawer on the way to the door.
Stepping into the carpeted hall, she thought to herself, Let’s see how our interloping commie friends fare against their welcoming party..
Chapter 21
Shortly after leaving the roadblock and the dozen hollow-eyed immolated corpses behind, Glenda started to acquire rotten traveling partners. Obviously thinking—or not—that she, the gray-haired corpse, was onto something, tramping ahead with her newly perfected undead limp, the motley crew arrived in dribs and drabs.
The first joined when Glenda was coming to the end of a long, flat, and forgiving stretch of SR-39 flanked by fencing and fallow fields. Dragging a greasy mess of entrails, the upper half of a corpse scrabbled from the ditch and onto the roadway, fixed her with a milky gaze, and started clawing its way east. Then, just fifty yards further where the grade steepened, the second Z, an emaciated and pustule-covered forty-something male, had emerged suddenly from behind an early model Chevy van sitting on four flats. With one bony hand planted on the van’s wildly painted side, the thing stood stock still, regarding Glenda hungrily through clouded eyes.
Be the dead.
The mantra worked up until the moment Glenda was within a yard of the undead male and then, suddenly, as if she’d tripped a photo-electric-eye in a fun-park haunted house, the putrid horror lunged into her path. The bathrobe absorbed the impact and before she knew it she and the emaciated corpse were limping lockstep shoulder to shoulder. Almost touching. Dangerously close. So close in fact that Van Man, as she decided to call him, cast a shadow eclipsing Glenda’s and in her left ear she could hear clearly the constant clicking of teeth and rasps and moans triggered by the wind rippling the tall grass growing up alongside the road.
Be the dead.
***
Sometime later, on the lee side of the long uphill climb Glenda had dreaded since leaving Huntsville, the half-man crawler fell from sight and was replaced by zombies number two thro
ugh five.
The quartet had been standing statue-like and, from a distance, they initially struck her as plasticized cadavers posed in mourning over one of their own. Like escapees from the Body Works exhibit that traveled the country from museum to museum before the Omega virus brought the very things of someone’s macabre imagination to life.
The unmoving zombies each occupied a point of the compass forming a near perfect box around a long dead corpse that had already given up every last scrap of meat to the undead weeks ago—and the hard-to-get-to morsels, presumably, to the carrion birds and maggots since. Unlike the dead ogling it, the thing on the ground was but a hollow shell. Clumps of gray hair littered the pavement around its eyeless skull. Strips of fabric stiff with dried black fluids clung to the few remaining scraps of brittle, sunbaked dermis.
Of the group standing about the corpse, three were smaller and decayed to the point where making a determination to sex was impossible. The fourth, though stooped, was taller and definitely female judging by the flaccid breasts still constrained by remnants of a threadbare underwire bra.
As Glenda limped by with Van Man shadowing her closely, she wondered, Why the vigil? Were they a family once? Was the taller one their mother? Mombie? Stifling a chuckle, she fixed her gaze on a spot on the ground and plodded ahead.
Drawing up alongside the ghastly scene, Glenda saw the inert figures in her side vision and was about to thank God she wasn’t on their radars when, inexplicably, and in unison, the four first turns made a sound like brittle fallen leaves skittering ahead of a sudden gust of wind. A tick later the one she’d deemed Mombie performed a clumsy, three-part shuffling turn to her right and, with the smaller Zs glued to her hip, fell in behind Van Man.
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