Ghosts: Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse

by Shawn Chesser

  In seconds the trucks were past the feeder road’s blind spot and bouncing into the clearing. Both trucks came to a juddering halt and in less time than it took for the doors to open, Damon and Lev and Jamie were hustling from the Black Hawk towards the F-650.

  Seth watched three of the Raptor’s doors spring open and the Kids and Max exit in a flurry of arms and legs and move as one toward the bigger Ford.

  Like it had just cruised to a stop in an Indy 500 pit, the F-650 was surrounded by bodies and Chief was hauled out and being carried towards the compound.

  In the clearing Brook stopped for a beat and spoke to Duncan, bringing him up to speed on Chief’s condition and Cade’s impending arrival with the dose of antiserum. To which he said, “Is Raven OK?” She shook the bag’s contents and said, “That’s where I’m headed right now. When Cade gets here, have him see to Chief first.”

  Fatigue showing on his face, Duncan nodded and picked up his end of the litter. He looked down on his friend’s face and didn’t like what he saw. The gray-white pallor and the veins made him look like what he was slowly becoming: a living corpse.

  Seth jumped a little from the resonant bang of the compound door blasting open and pranging against the wall. He craned and swiveled his head in time to see Brook, her ponytail bobbing to and fro, take a sharp left towards the Kids’ billet where she’d left Raven hours earlier.

  Then the two-way came to life on the table in front of him. He took his eyes from the monitor to fetch it. He spoke briefly with Duncan then tossed the radio aside, stood up and pushed his chair under the plywood sheet passing for a desk. He moved his rifle and a couple of other things out of the way in order to make a path wide enough for two men carrying a litter to transit the space. Satisfied there was ample room, he stood with his back pressed to the metal wall and held the lone sixty-watt bulb up and out of the way. A few seconds passed and footfalls echoed in the entry and Lev and Duncan hurried by with the makeshift litter nearly scraping the floor.

  In passing, Seth caught a glimpse of Chief, who looked like dog shit warmed over. Suddenly he felt a sudden and uncharacteristic urge to puke. With his jaw trying to lock open and saliva filling his mouth, he sat and put his head between his knees and willed the sensation to pass.

  Brook checked her rapid stride at the turn, took a couple of measured paces and stopped and stood in front of the metal door. She breathed deeply, a half-dozen calming breaths, then rapped lightly and took a step back.

  Someone from the other side said, “Come in.”

  Brook tried to place the soothing, motherly voice. Coming up blank, she nudged the door open and cast her gaze around the room’s dimly lit confines.

  Raven was on the lower bunk right where Brook had left her. A neatly folded washcloth was draped across her forehead, partially concealing her eyes. The person whose voice Brook had heard was sitting, back to the door, on a folding chair and turned as soon as the door hinged open. Seeing the lady up close for the first time, Brook pegged her as late fifties or early sixties. Born when fins on cars were big and families were bigger. The lady nodded and Brook saw a twinkle in her gray-green eyes and a softness to her wrinkled face that instantly set her at ease.

  Without bothering to stand or offer her hand, the lady said, “I’m Glenda Gladson. Your daughter has been in good hands. Heidi is wonderful and Tran is no slouch either.”

  A cold chill coursed Brook’s spine. She said, “Where are they?”

  “Heidi went to see her boyfriend who arrived a few minutes ago. Guess he’s been gone all day.”

  Brook nodded, confirming the situation. She set the bag on the floor and sat on the bed next to Raven’s thigh. She looked Glenda straight in the eyes and asked, “What kind of nursing?”

  The lady chuckled. “There weren’t as many titles in my day. Don’t worry ... I took care of your lovely girl in their stead.”

  Brook said nothing. She touched the bump on Raven’s forehead. Determined the goose egg hadn’t gotten any larger. Then she pulled the thin sheet to Raven’s knees. Leaning over, she saw on her bare chest angry purple bruising that started low where her back touched the bed and spread upward, encompassing most of her ribcage on the right side.

  “We cut her shirt off,” said Glenda matter-of-factly.

  Brook touched the back of her hand to Raven’s forehead. It was cool to the touch. Which was a good thing. No fever. But her lips were still tinged blue. Which wasn’t. “She has a right side pneumothorax from blunt force trauma,” Brook said, all business. “And a couple of broken ribs, I suspect.”

  “I took a listen. Sounds real bad in there,” Glenda said while she removed Brook’s stethoscope from around her neck and handed it over. “I heard wheezing too. Does she have asthma or allergies?”

  “I’ve got my suspicions.”

  “The crash must have been horrible.”

  “I heard it. It sounded hellacious.” Brook shook her head and shot a pained look Glenda’s way. “The aftermath looked no better.”

  “You look a little peaked yourself,” said Glenda. “How are you feeling?”

  Brook ripped open a foil packet and unfolded an alcohol wipe. “I’m OK to do this.”

  “I wasn’t questioning that,” Glenda said. “It’s just ... the bandage there on your face. And there’s the scratches on your wrist and neck ...”

  “I’m fine,” Brook said. “Has Raven been awake much?”

  “Off and on. More off, though. Last time she opened her eyes was about fifteen minutes ago. She asked about you and tried to sit up and then it was lights out again.”

  Brook grimaced. Looked at Glenda and stated the obvious. “She’s in a lot of pain.” Then she leaned in close, kissed Raven’s cheek. Whispering, she said, “Mommy’s here,” and though her daughter probably wasn’t listening, let alone able to comprehend the fix she was in, Brook went on to explain what had happened and what she was going to do to make it all better.

  Raven stirred a little. Her eyes fluttered and opened and seemed to focus. Then she smiled and whispered, “I love you, Mom.” A coughing fit came and went and tears streamed from her eyes and wet the pillow.

  “I’ll get us some gloves. Where are they?”

  Brook was about to direct Glenda to the dry storage to get two pair but remembered Chief was in there. Not knowing his state, she decided to chance it. Said, “We’ll have to do without.”

  Shaking her head, Glenda replied, “If you insist.”

  Ignoring the connotation and inflection in Glenda’s voice, Brook pulled a syringe from the bag and ripped off its sterile wrapper with her teeth. Took the safety cap off the large needle.

  “We could use a local—”

  “We could use a lot of things. These—” Brook motioned to the handful of supplies spread out on the bedspread. “—are for use on animals. But I’m going to have to make an exception and go with what I have.”

  Glenda said nothing.

  Brook took the bottle of sterile solution and drew a few inches of it into the syringe’s chamber. She felt Raven’s dainty chest, searching for the second and third rib. Traced a line down from the center of her right clavicle to find the second intercostal space. Keeping her finger near the point of insertion, she asked Glenda to restrain Raven. Acting quickly, Brook inserted the needle an inch or so above the chosen rib, looking for a pleural space and the telltale bubbles indicating the needle was in the pleural cavity.

  “Bubbles,” said Glenda.

  Brook pulled the plunger to aspirate the space. Without a catheter or specialized tubing called a stopcock, she had no choice but to evacuate the air a little at a time with only the syringe.

  While Raven fought to move under Glenda’s weight pressing down on her shoulders, Brook extracted the needle, expelled the air, and repeated the process two more times.

  Glenda said, “Wish we could send her to x-ray.”

  Brook answered, “We’re going to have to let time tell the tale.” She ripped open another alcohol
swab and wiped the puncture site. She kissed Raven again and dabbed some sweat from her brow, smoothed her dark hair back and rose. Said, “I love you, bird.”

  Glenda looked up at Brook. Saw sweat beading on her brow and upper lip. Passed her the remnants of Raven’s T-shirt and said, “Are you sure you’re OK?”

  Brook turned and covertly swiped away a tear. She nodded and said, “Will you watch her for a little while longer?”

  “I’d be honored,” answered Glenda. “I’ll treat her like my very own granddaughter.”

  “If my husband, Cade, comes looking for me here. Please send him to the dry storage. If I’m not there, I’ll be in our quarters ... resting.”

  “This place can’t be that big. Wouldn’t he find you eventually?”

  “There’s a method to my madness, Glenda,” conceded Brook. She looked down on Raven and, though it might just be attributed to wishful thinking, swore that the normal healthy color was returning to her lips.

  “Oh yeah,” Glenda said. She plucked a plain blue book with gold lettering on the spine off the floor and handed it to Brook.

  Brook took the book and asked, “What’s this?”

  “It’s a book I think Duncan is going to find very useful when he returns.”

  More tears were forming so Brook avoided eye contact with Glenda. She said, “I’ll make sure he gets it.” When she opened the door a blast of cool air hit her face. When she closed it at her back she felt all alone in the world. She stood there wiping the tears and looking at the book. Read the title: Alcoholics Anonymous. She dried the rest of the tears, tucked the book under her arm, and stalked off towards the entrance.

  Once there, she stood in the anteroom in front of the closed door and listened hard. Nothing. There was no whining jet turbine. No thumping of rotors carrying up and down the valley. Then the door hinged open and before she could react Heidi entered the gloom and ran head on with her.

  All Brook could do to keep from hitting the deck was drop the book and clasp the taller woman’s forearm, and then right there in the tight confines they did a clumsy little dance.

  A little startled, Heidi said, “Thanks. I guess I was in a little bit of a hurry. How’s Raven?”

  Brook released her grip and said, “She’s stable for now.”

  “I only left her for a second—”

  “No need to apologize.” Brook paused for a beat. The sounds of excited voices filtered in through the cracked door. Nothing else, though. She scooped up the book. Then, after a pregnant pause, she said, “I’m the one who owes you an apology for my attitude earlier. Life’s too short to sweat the small stuff.” She rooted in her cargo pocket and handed over the sample packets of Celexa and pantomimed zipping her lip and tossing the key away.

  A little taken aback, Heidi looked at the offering and said, “What’s this?”

  “Something that might help.”

  “I’ve been an asshole ... why?”

  “I know that wasn’t the real you. Besides ... I owe you for watching my girl.”

  “You and Cade were instrumental in me and Daymon reuniting. And for that I figure I still owe you.”

  “Cade ... yes. Me? No effin way. I just let him go and do his thing. It’s easier that way.”

  “So if you’re back and Glenda is with Raven ...”

  “Go,” Brook said, pointing at the door. “Be with your man. But wait ... give this to Duncan first thing.”

  Heidi looked at the book. Turned it on its side and read the spine. She looked up and smiled and stuffed the blister packets in her back pocket, then opened her mouth like she had something more to say. But no words came out. Instead, a tick later, she pursed her lips, did a little pirouette and was out the door.

  Brook watched her go and stayed in the foyer until she heard the door open and close again. She turned on her heel and, passing through the security container, she peeled a sheet from the rapidly thinning legal pad and asked Seth for a pencil but got a black Sharpie instead. You’ve got one shot at it, Brooklyn. Better not screw it up. With a steady throbbing starting up behind her eyes, she thanked the man and padded off to the Grayson billet.

  Once inside, she closed and locked the door and stood in the inky black listening to her heart beat. She found the hanging string after the second swipe for it and yanked the light on. Pulled over the folding chair and positioned it near her bunk. She placed the sheet from the yellow pad on the seat and emptied her pockets of the sat-phone and two-way radio, the latter two which she put on the bed next to the pillow. Slowly and methodically she stripped off her MOLLE gear and gun belt and placed them along with the Glock on the floor underneath the chair. She sat on the bunk and unlaced her boots and nudged them under the bed. She took a calming breath, pulled out the pen and, using the seat of the chair as a writing surface, jotted down a message and capped the pen.

  After a short internal debate she decided to leave the light on. Safer that way for all concerned.

  Exhausted, hungry, and feeling shaky, she stretched out on top of the sheet. Lying there she realized her hands were trembling and felt a little numb, like she’d been out in the cold for an extended period sans gloves.

  She rubbed them together and blew on them a couple of times, then grabbed ahold of the upper bunk supports and shook the bed as hard as she could. Pleased to find it both sturdy in build and stable on the floor with her body weight added, she thrust a hand into her right thigh pocket and came out with a handful of zip-ties. She sat up and fashioned six of them loosely into three identical pairs of handcuffs. She slipped her feet into one pair and cinched them tight. Then she zipped one pair of cuffs around each wrist and tightened them down. Using a couple of the loose ties, she secured both cuffs to the bed’s vertical support farthest from the door, bit down on the ends one at a time and yanked them tight, removing as much of the play as she could. Lastly, she thrashed and bucked atop the thin mattress, trying to free herself.

  Satisfied she was going nowhere—alive or undead—she slid her left hand close to her right, rolled onto her side facing away from the door, and drew her bound legs up tight against her chest.

  As she lay there thinking about Raven and Cade and all of the good times they had shared, a lightning bolt of pure mind-numbing cold coursed through her body, momentarily paralyzing her.

  In a matter of seconds she could feel nothing in her hands and feet, and a sensation, like her skin was being slowly peeled away, began creeping up her four limbs.

  I’m dying, she thought. I’m really dying.

  A spasm wracked her body and her fingers and toes curled up tight. As the pounding behind her eyes increased from a heartbeat-like rhythm to a rapid-fire strobe of pure unadulterated white hot pain, the likes which she’d never experienced before, she inadvertently bit down on her tongue and mercifully lost consciousness.

  Chapter 71

  Thirty minutes after the desert transfer, and with, by Cade’s rudimentary calculations, roughly fifty miles yet to cover, the VF-22 Osprey began to descend slowly. And as Cade looked out the window and watched swaths of wide-open desert and the occasional lonely copse of trees blaze by, a woman’s voice came over the shipboard comms and all but confirmed what he already knew. “Thirteen mikes to insertion,” she said. “Am I putting my bird down or should we kick a fast rope out for Mister Cade Grayson?”

  In his side vision Cade saw the loadmaster staring at him. When he turned to face the man, he realized the Rangers were staring at him as well. A long couple of seconds rolled by, then a few half-smiles broke out and some of the men flashed him a thumbs up.

  The loadmaster, a fireplug of a man with thick trunks for legs and arms that looked like they belonged to a MMF fighter, approached Cade and leaned real close. Loud enough to be heard over the incessant droning of the twin Rolls-Royce engines, the man said, “Your reputation precedes you. And now I know why Major Ripley signed us all up to ferry you from the middle of nowhere to the middle of Bumfuk Egypt. What’s your preference ... rope or wh
eels down?”

  Loudly, Cade said, “Rope.”

  The loadmaster, whose name tape read Tanpepper, flashed a thumbs up and said, “Thanks for your work out of Schriever.”

  Nodding, Cade said, “Thanks in advance for getting me out of this bird ASAP.”

  Tanpepper nodded and went about attaching one of the coiled thirty-foot-long fast ropes to an anchor point near the rear ramp.

  Some of the Rangers were still casting glances Cade’s way, which made him think they were the ones who’d kicked the shit out of Bishop’s men a few weeks ago. He wished he knew for certain so he could thank them for doing the heavy lifting that allowed him to roll in unscathed to interrogate the waste of skin. But he didn’t have time nor the energy. Getting to the compound was first and foremost on his mind. And rolling around in there trying to break free from where he had stuffed them was the memory of Desantos fighting the good fight against Omega before ultimately succumbing to the indiscriminate little virus. To have gone up against long odds so many times before and come out the other end the better for it and then end up going out the way he had was extremely hard for Cade to wrap his mind around—even after the passage of time and distance.

  Over the comms Cade heard: Five mikes. He saw Tanpepper prepping the rear ramp for deployment. The loadmaster held up four fingers. Cade thought: Hang on, Brook. He checked the sat-phone one last time. Saw no new messages. So he read the last two again. The oldest of which read: Jenkins is dead. Chief was bitten and doesn’t have long to live. My fault. Then, as if Brook had been fighting some internal battle or contemplating taking her own life to somehow, however misguided the notion was, atone for the perceived transgression, the final message, sent thirty seconds after that first gut punch, consisted of only six possibly life-changing words that read simply: I was bitten also. Hurry back!

  Tanpepper was now holding two fingers up, like a peace sign, and the ramp had started the slow movement downward.