But that was none of Cade’s concern so he strapped in and cast a glance at the man to his left. The MultiCam he wore had no rank or insignia. Just an American flag and name tape that read Griffin. Like the mythological Greek creature with an eagle’s head and the body of a lion. It suited the man to a T. His chiseled nose, high cheekbones and dark brown eyes jived with the former part of the creature. His wiry compact frame was all juvenile lion, coiled and ready to pounce. But the man was in his early forties—at least—and Cade swore that he’d seen him before. Perhaps in passing in Iraq or Afghanistan—in the same garb for sure—but without introduction and minus the name tape. DEVGRU or Navy Development Group. In layman’s terms, SEAL Team 6, Cade decided a beat before Cross introduced the man as ‘Griff’ and rattled off who they all knew in common. Information that once Cade cross-referenced in his mind all but confirmed his earlier suspicion.
Feeling his stomach drop as the helicopter rose rapidly and banked hard left, putting Green River out the port windows and in clear view, Cade offered his left fist and bumped knuckles with the fellow Tier-1 operator. As the craft leveled off, Lasseigne handed Cade a comms set identical to the ones fielded by the rest of the team. “Freqs are already set,” he said, pulling a five by seven photo from a pocket which he passed silently across the cabin to Cade.
Cade stared at the photo for a full minute, committing it to memory, then folded it in half and slipped it in his breast pocket.
Lasseigne said, “We’re going to be needing our NODs. No power where we’re going.”
Cade removed his helmet, swapped headsets, and adjusted the boom mic. He checked his night vision equipment and when he was finished, powered them off and looked quizzically at Lasseigne. After a prolonged pause, he said incredulously, “Someplace has power?”
Lasseigne smiled. He said, “Springs has juice now.”
“Wow,” was Cade’s reply. “And it’s been totally cleared of Zs?”
Shaking his head, Lopez chimed in, “President Clay promised power before the first day of autumn. She never said all the Zs would be gone. However, the Second ID and a couple of hundred MARSOC guys who made it overland from Lejeune are taking it to them hard ... making one hell of a dent in their numbers.”
Cade asked, “And the nuke plants?”
“We shut down the ones near enough to Springs to cause any problems. Cooper and Fort Calhoun in Nebraska and Wolf Creek in Burlington, Kansas.”
“How about the Eastern seaboard?”
Shaking his head again, Lopez said, “We’re going to have a slew of China Syndromes on our hands before long. Lost two teams and a bunch of Rangers and a couple of nuclear engineers trying to shut down the ones nearest DC. On the ground, in the heavily urbanized cities from Maine to Florida, the conditions are worse than anyone theorized.”
Cade grimaced and shook his head. Then, resting his helmet upside down on his lap, plugged his comms wire into the overhead jack and said, “Comms check.” After receiving a flurry of ‘copy that’s’ and seeing heads nod around the cabin, he said, “Ari ... is that you up there?”
“That you, Wyatt?” replied Ari, feigning surprise. “I thought Elvira went a little heavy on the stick back there. Did you give up your pre-dawn PT or something?”
“Or something. I’ve been eating real good,” quipped Cade. “Elvira ... that’s what you’re calling this dirty bird now?”
“She works her magic at night and still looks good in the morning,” said Ari.
Cade saw the other pilot chuckling and shaking his head. The reaction to the banter got him wondering if the big man had been exposed to Ari’s entire standup routine yet. Then he decided to add fuel to the fire just in case he hadn’t. “Elvira needs a bath and a couple of hours in the makeup chair,” Cade said. “If you ask me ... looks like Whipper’s been slacking. You need me to go back to Schriever and reaffirm to him how it works?”
“You going soft on us, Grayson?” quipped Cross. “Last I heard Whipper was on his final warning. What’s this crap about giving him a final, final warning?”
Cade made no response. Didn’t want to stoke the fires too much before the long flight.
Suddenly serious, Ari said, “We’ve been running nonstop missions for the last three weeks. Lots of trips back east and south. Can’t go into it right here and now, but rest assured Whipper and the 2As are taking great care with all of the SOAR birds. Besides, I want them to stay in the air, not win best in show at the Concours d’Elegance.”
“Ari’s sugar-coating it. It’s been pretty hairy lately,” added Cross. “Good to have you back, bro.”
“Given the circumstances, I’m glad to be back working with you again. Think you can give me a redacted Cliff’s Notes version of the last three weeks?”
Cross leaned forward and said, “I’d rather let Griff bring you up to speed. He was there at the start.”
Save for the crew chief who was keeping an eye on the ground flashing by on the starboard side, all eyes swung from Cross and parked on the seemingly reserved Navy SEAL.
Griff twisted the boom mic out of the way, leaned in and spoke loud enough to be heard over the turbine whine and muffled rotor thump. He prefaced his firsthand account by starting at the beginning and pointing out how quickly comms had been lost in the Middle East. Blamed it on an unknown number of EMP devices being popped off over Israel and Saudi Arabia by still unknown actors. Then he said, “We were pulling a special reconnaissance mission on a couple of high level AQ types in Karachi, Pakistan when the shit hit the fan.”
Lasseigne asked, “Biters?”
“Not at first. Just after we received confirmation of the use of EMPs, our local who was highly trusted by the agency started getting agitated. Totally unlike him. Then his face went white and he ripped off his headset and said all he was hearing on the police scanner was adam khor. He said it over and over to himself adam khor, adam khor while shaking his head and cycling through all the known frequencies searching for something. Finally, he pulled it together a bit and said there were reports of widespread cannibalism in Peshawar, Abbottabad, and Lahore.”
Cade said, “Adam khor?”
“It’s Urdu. Translated it literally means man eater. Then the local said very ominously ‘It’s here,’ mentioned something about his wife and kids and was out the door.” Griffin shook his head. “No way of stopping him. He had those crazy eyes. We had to let him go.”
The helicopter made a slight course correction and Cross said, “Griff ... tell em how you got out.”
“Quick as we could,” said Griffin. “Put on our man dresses and scooted.”
There was a long pause. Five seconds. Ten. Then twenty slipped by and Cade watched the man absentmindedly kneading the pair of tactical gloves he’d been clutching. Working them like a set of worry beads as he stared out the port side window at the slick red rocks of Moab passing by and radiating an ethereal measure of warmth six hundred feet below the stealth helo.
Finally Griffin met Cross’s gaze and his jaw took a hard set. “We were split into two teams of four. Opposite sides of a thoroughfare where we could cover ingress and egress of the HVT’s safe house,” he said. “We watched our targets squirt. They sped out of there in a half dozen white Land Cruisers like their seventy-two virgins were in trouble somewhere and needed help.” A ripple of laughter went around the cabin. “Five minutes later we got a call confirming this cannibal thing and were given the details not one of us could comprehend ... nor believe. At first.”
“Been there,” said Lopez, performing the sign of the cross over his chest.
Griffin sighed. Said, “You know. It’s too bad the virus really took hold during daylight hours. If it had been after dark we could have just used our night vision and boogied on out of Dodge without having to tangle with so many of them.”
Knowing how the debrief after the debrief helped him get his keel straightened out after a mission, Cade asked, “How far did you get before encountering Zs?”
“J
olly and Diesel got bit before we made it three blocks. The adam khor, as we’d heard the Zs called, were everywhere. Skinny little walkers biting anything that moved. We were still following Rules Of Engagement. No one was shooting and we didn’t know the full scope of Omega yet. We only killed the few Zs that attacked us ... which at the time we still thought of as just sick locals. So we forced our way into a closed shop and I bandaged my teammates.” He paused for a few seconds then went on, “Jolly was bit on the neck. Had a nicked carotid. He bled out and died in the shop so I put him on my shoulders and carried him the rest of the way. By the time we rendezvoused at our vehicles ... less than twenty minutes had passed and ... craziest shit I ever saw happened. Diesel, who was still ambulatory, fell down and stopped breathing. He died just like that from a couple of bite wounds on his arm.” Griffin paused again.
“Take your time,” said Cross, handing over a bottled water.
Griffin cracked the seal and slugged half of the water down in one pull. He capped the remainder and went on, “No way we’re leaving our bros behind. So we put their bodies in the trunk. Halfway to the docks they both came alive back there. They’re kicking and moaning real loud ... both of them are crammed in Cog’s trunk when we hit a checkpoint at the dock entrance. What was usually manned by one keystone cop lackey is now being manned by half a dozen hajjis trying hard to encourage us with their AKs to go elsewhere. Because he has a fair grasp of conversational Urdu, Cog’s in the lead car and he isn’t taking no for an answer. He gave one guard all the local currency he had to let us through. I watched the hajji pocket the wad, expecting him to play it off and go about business as usual, but he went ahead and waved us through. Both cars ... didn’t check Cog’s trunk or ours or ask any of us for papers. Didn’t seem to care. We found out why a few seconds later. Around the corner are more soldiers in hazmat suits and they have six or seven cars pulled over. People are zip-tied and lying on the ground, foaming at the mouth and fighting the cuffs like crazed animals ... which wasn’t far off. Shit, we thought we were home free. The six of us that were left were about to get out of the biggest shit storm we’d ever seen. Made Fallujah look like a kid’s birthday party. Adults eating kids in the street ... just tearing in and ripping out their guts. There were people getting run over, seemingly on purpose—”
Interrupting, Lasseigne said, “So you had an American-flagged ship waiting off shore?”
“No ... some CIA guy on a fast mover was going to scoop us up at the docks. Thirty-eight foot Scarab off shore racer, supposedly. Didn’t matter, though. The Pakis in the level four bio-suits wanted us to strip before going any further. All of us had passed for locals dressed like we were, but they wanted us to first prove that none of us had been bitten.”
In a knowing tone, Cade said, “Tattoos...”
“We all had em. Some specific ... most not. No way we’re taking off our Paki pajamas, so Nilla, who’s driving our Suzuki, takes out the three nearest with his Sig and the shit goes from zero to a hundred in one breath. I’m in back of the Suzuki when the shit starts hitting the fan and Stewie and Cooper fire up the Hajjis from the Hyundai ahead of us and we’re all on our way. But by now ... so is the rest of the line ahead of us.”
Cade said, “They all panicked?”
“Yeah. Two or three drivers popped the clutch so to speak and tried to drive away. That’s when the cops ... or ISI ... that are left start sprayin' them and us down and then Snip buys the farm ... and he drives the car right over the cops. Grinds a few of them into the road. That’s when they got Coop and Stew. Had to be a hundred rounds peppered their little Hyundai. Then the trunk pops open and I see Diesel roll out. He’s six-two and all muscle and pale as a ghost. Unfazed, he walks through a hail of bullets. Pieces are falling off of him and he’s jerking forward and ... and then he just lifts this little brown fucker into the air and eats his face off. Then Jolly ... he’s not green and he’s no giant. He’s this wiry white guy who tans good and can grow a full black beard in a week ... looks just like a native when he’s in country. Anyway, he’s out of the trunk now and walking all stiff and he’s white as Elvira’s ass—” He cracked a sad half-smile at the visual. “Jolly, he distracted them and didn’t even know he was getting our backs. But there wasn’t time to put them down,” said Griffin, again shaking his head. “We had to leave ‘em there tearing shit up.”
“I know the feeling,” said Cade. “I had to make the same decision ... had to leave a good man behind at Grand Junction Regional.”
Griffin said nothing.
Cade sees that the SEAL is sweating. No doubt reliving the moment as if he was still there. More statement than question, he asked, “So you and your other two teammates made it to the Scarab.”
Shaking his head, Griffin said, “Negative. Just me and Nilla. One round found Snip. Right in the head. Golden effin BB. He died instantly. I know this ‘cause I was wearing his brains.”
The helicopter made another course correction and Cade said to Griffin, “Just you and Nilla made it to the Scarab?”
“Yep. We get aboard and below deck and the spook, who has already bribed the dock workers to look the other way, he takes us just to the other side of international waters and kills the engine and we wait. Had a lot of time to think about how everyone died and how we couldn’t bring their bodies out. And all that time while we’re lolling and seeing Paki patrol boats we’re trying to wrap our minds around everything and we can’t make the shit we saw jive with reality. Still hard to believe five weeks after the fact.” Griffin went silent again.
The helo had been in the air for thirty minutes and everyone had been listening to the story with rapt attention—especially Cade, who had been privy to little, save for the missions he was on, up until three weeks ago—and had been totally in the dark since. “So who picked you up?” he asked.
“The USS Texas, a Virginia Class attack sub, she surfaces right beside us in broad daylight in the Arabian Sea with no apparent concern about being spotted. So we ditch our ride without scuttling it and board the sub. That was Z-Day plus two ... and it got worse after that. The Texas sets course for, we were told at the time, Hawaii. I figure it should be pretty safe there but the commander tells us as soon as we’re underway that it’s a shit show there too. Pearl is holding their own ... but the virus jumped from the mainland already. Came on commercial airliners and was spreading like wildfire.”
“Same in Portland, Oregon,” said Cade.
“D.C. fell like a fat lady on roller skates,” said Cross. “Fast and hard, and though I feel nothing for the lobbyists and most of the government types inside the Beltway ... it hurt to watch it happen.”
Lopez said, “Frisco and L.A. and San Diego didn’t last long. I lost a lot of family—”
Lasseigne said through clenched teeth, “New Orleans, I heard, looked like it did after Katrina ... minus the missing roofs and boats thrown up on shore. Again people were looting and killing and FEMA and DHS were nowhere to be found. Then my girl leaves a message saying the biters were everywhere. Talked to her only once after that ... just prior to the phones going down. She was scared to death and I’m hundreds of miles away protecting the lowlifes in D.C.” He shook his head and pounded a fist on his thigh. “Nothing I coulda done to help her. And I have no idea where she is now—”
Griffin said, “The quick spread that swallowed everyone up I think can be attributed to normalcy bias. The notion that the first responders were going to swoop in and right the ship is what did most of the population in.” He shook his head and looked around the cabin. “Just like our man in Karachi, nobody had an inkling of the true nature of the virus. Thus the danger wasn’t real to them. Hell, half of the crew on the sub were talking like everything was going to be fine and their families would be waiting at Pearl when the boat docked. Wasn’t the case, though—”
Lopez asked, “Where’s the Texas now?”
“No idea. I got off and caught a Galaxy to Springs. I presume she was resupplied and is out hu
nting our new enemies.”
“Back to your story, Griff. Nilla ... what happened to him. And who are our new enemies?” asked Ari, who had obviously been listening in over the comms and whose pay grade wasn’t high enough to afford him more intel than what he’d already seen from the air during the dozens of missions he’d been on since Z-Day.
“Nilla got a little bite when we were fighting our way out of the store. More like a scratch from a canine tooth we figured later. But it was enough to kill him slowly. He got sick and was put into four-point restraints in the infirmary. Later I heard someone call the way he turned a ‘slow burn.’ Lucky him ... he wasn’t around when the shit hit the fan again.”
Cade said, “Again?”
Ari said, “New enemies ... let the man talk.”
“We rendezvoused with the Fifth Fleet near New Guinea and then inexplicably we’re about facing and word is we’re heading back towards the Torres Strait to go silent and escort a boomer ... never heard which one, though. Not long after that the Fifth Fleet is in an all-out surface engagement with both remnants of the Chinese North Sea fleet and a few destroyers and frigates of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet.”
Cade found himself sitting on the edge of his seat, straining against his shoulder straps. So much for the Cliff’s Notes version. He wanted to know as many details as possible. “What happened then?”
“Kicked the shit out of them,” Griff said, all serious and unsmiling. “Tomahawks flying everywhere. Thirty or forty Marine FA-18 Hornets in the air and taking it to them.” Griffin went silent again.
“Sorry I asked,” said Cade, looking out the window and seeing the terrain had changed from smooth horizontal wave-like rock flows to knobby spires and arches eroded from the earth, monuments all eons in the making.
Meanwhile, two hundred miles away at FOB Bastion, Jamie and Lev were in the same single-wide Cade and the Kids had spent the night in weeks ago. The wall-mounted AC unit was rumbling and their weapons were in pieces on a blanket spread out on the floor. There was little small talk; for a long while both seemed content to solemn introspection until Jamie brought up the sailboat full of survivors anchored in the Pineview Reservoir.
Ghosts: Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse Page 18
