A New World: Untold Stories (25 page)

Well, storming the front entrance didn’t work and there’s no way in from on top. That leaves the basement.

Max drove around the loop like he was leaving the airport. Just as he entered the on-ramp for the interstate he pulled over and drove down the embankment to a copse of trees. He hadn’t done any stealthy ground work since he left Fort Lewis in 1976 as an army grunt. Back then it was just him and a bunch of other teenagers getting high and stumbling around the woods. He moved down the manmade ravine to a massive culvert. The conduit was so large that he didn’t have to bend over to traverse the fifty-foot passage. It took him a little over an hour to get to the fence surrounding the airport. Figuring that he had about two hours of daylight left, well, maybe an hour and a half, he might just be able to climb the fence in that length of time.

*****

Emerging within a jungle of twisting conveyor belts, Lisa made her way to a catwalk that followed the maze of the baggage delivery system.

Jeez, no wonder they lose so many of the bags that come through here.

She had to duck-walk in most places to get past the intertwined system. Twenty feet below her, she could see a couple of workers. They were wearing ear muffs so she wasn’t concerned they would hear her, but she was afraid they would look up and see her. Her only plan at this point was to get away from the airport without being caught, and call her dad. She was sure he would be figuring another way to get her out and she was afraid he might get thrown into the quarantine just to find her.

Checking her phone for the fourth time since she had slipped out of the baggage claim area, she still didn’t have a signal. She stared at the screen hoping for the magic bars to appear as she ducked an overhead convey. Concentrating on her phone, she didn’t see the control cable lying in her path. Unable to gain her balance, she fell head first off the catwalk. Knowing she wouldn’t get away from a twenty-foot fall without injury, or at a minimum, alerting the workers, Lisa was surprised by the sudden arrest of her tumble. Momentarily confused, she looked about and realized that she had only fallen eight feet. Her belly-flop of a landing was softened by an overstuffed duffel bag.

Thank God for duffel bags and those that stuff them,
she thought as she sucked in air trying to catch her breath.

Checking to see if her fall alerted anyone, she gained her feet after confirming her trip had gone unnoticed. Ahead, she spotted a set of stairs leading off the carnival ride she found herself on. Belly crawling down the conveyor belt, she made it to the stairs.

I just have to make it to the doors over there and I will be out!

“HEY! YOU! What in the hell are you doing down here, hot stuff?” a voice called, echoing in the cavernous area.

One of the guys she had observed earlier was standing at the bottom of the stairs looking up at her.

“You’ve been a very naughty girl” he stated, leering at her breasts.

She spun to head farther up the stairs and paused. Realizing that he knew this place, where the stairs led, and where the catwalks went, he would most certainly catch her. Knowing she really didn’t have any other choice, she turned back to him and smiled.

“Well good looking, are you going to give me a spanking?”

His eyes lit up like he had just won the lottery! “Oh hell yes!”

As his foot touched the bottom stair, a shriek erupted, sounding like a demon that had just received his wings in hell. The noise coursed through the vast underground complex. With the scream, the man’s smile slipped and he was blindsided. A co-worker, still wearing his hard hat, barreled into him.

Lisa watched in shock. To her, it looked as if the attacker’s jaw literally unhinged as he bit into his co-worker’s neck. The sound of flesh ripping as heard through screams of pain as a huge chunk of flesh was torn. Blood spurted everywhere with some splashing on Lisa’s face. The feel of warm liquid spraying on her cheeks and forehead shook her from her paralysis. Without another thought, she turned and raced down the stairs, taking two a time. She ran like the devil himself was at her heels, which she actually thought he might be.

Barely slowing, she plowed through the doors and found herself at the bottom of an outdoor set of concrete steps ascending toward the back of the terminal building. Pausing only for the briefest of seconds, she ran up the stairs almost faster than she had descended. At the top, she found herself on a landscaped berm that led down over an embankment. She pushed her way through the hedges and ran sideways down the hill. Arriving at the bottom, she looked to her left.

That way leads back to the runways,
she thought, turning to the right and jogging toward the next line of trees.

Emerging on the other side of the trees, she came face-to-face with a chain-link fence. To the right was the front of the terminal, left led away from the airport. Shrinking back into the tree line to stay out of sight, she fished out her phone. She was surprised she still had it after her fall and subsequent sprint…and doubly so that it was still working. She speed dialed her dad.

*****

Max spent a half hour trying to climb the damn ten-foot chain-link fence. Finally flopping onto the ground on the other side with multiple lacerations, his phone started ringing. Retrieving it, he saw that it was Lisa.

“Lisa, where are you? Are you okay?” he asked, answering.

There was no reply. She had hung up the phone.

SHE HUNG UP THE FUCKING PHONE! WHY WOULD SHE HANG UP?

Max couldn’t believe she would hang up on him like that.

She had to be under some kind of duress
.

He rolled over onto his hands and knees and, using the fence, got to his feet. Frantic with worry, he turned. Fifteen feet away, Lisa was running straight at him. She launched herself into his arms and started to cry.

“I got you, baby! I got you! It’s gonna be okay,” Max said, holding her tight with his own tears starting to form.

They held each other for minutes before releasing.

“Dad, you look like shit. Are you okay?” Lisa said, looking at the lacerations.

“I may live but that’s up for debate at the moment,” Max replied.

With a couple of shoves against his old ass, Max made it back over the fence. Lisa followed, scaling it quickly. She landed on her feet next to him as he sat gasping for air and inspecting his newest wounds.

“You know, sweetie, you could have shown up twenty minutes ago and saved us both a whole lot of pain and discomfort.”

She laughed at him and helped him up. They made their way back through the culvert and managed to reach the Land Rover.

Max started the vehicle, pulled onto the interstate, and accelerated. Pulling his cell phone out, he tried Ryan again. He pulled up his contact list, highlighted Ryan’s name and hit call. The phone rang twice and then went to a fast busy signal. Trying again, he received a recorded message that all circuits were busy. He put the phone down and Lisa filled him in on the details of her ordeal. As she talked, he questioned her about the guy going after his friend. She didn’t think he believed her.

“Dad I am so not making this up!” she said, frustration edging into her voice.

“Okay, Okay. Let’s just find a hotel in the city and bunk down for the night. I’m too tired to deal with getting to the Island tonight.”

They found a Residence Inn and pulled in around 9:45. Checking in, the manager told them to go to their rooms and lock themselves in. He informed them that they were the last ones he was allowing to get a room tonight. Max and Lisa stared at him with some confusion.

“Haven’t you been watching the news?” the manager asked.

Both shook their heads without replying.

Arriving in their rooms, they turned on the TV before doing anything else and started watching the news. The reports were startling. The world seemed as though it was coming apart at the seams. The President had declared Martial Law and ordered all civilians to remain in their homes until told otherwise. The reports came in from every corner of the globe; the vaccinations that had been created were turning people into some kind of crazed killers. Quarantine centers that had been set up had failed. Communication systems were failing due to lack of workers to manipulate the routing and rerouting of signals. More infrastructure systems were being affected by those who were vaccinated and those dying of the flu. At ten minutes after ten, the TV went blank.

Max couldn’t sleep. Lisa had said she had a headache and went to lie down in the bedroom. He first heard the screams and then the god awful shrieks about ten minutes after Lisa had gone into the other room. Remembering what she had said regarding her ordeal, he turned off all the lights and drew the blackout curtains. Their room was on the second floor overlooking the parking lot. Opening the drapes just enough to see outside, he watched the terror unfold for a couple of hours; people being chased down under the street lights. Unable to believe what he was witnessing and not wanting to watch any more, he made himself a stiff drink and sat. With his drink in hand, he stared at the wall in the darkness and listened to the world crumble outside.

He didn’t remember falling asleep but he woke with a start. Something, or someone, was banging into the walls of the building. The tremors and sound was faint, but they were there. He looked out the window and saw hundreds of people running back and forth between the buildings. As he watched, one person ran at full speed into the side of the complex their room was in. Bam! No sooner had he felt the vibration from the impact, another would do the same thing.

The phones didn’t work, the TV didn’t work, but he still hadn’t tried his laptop. Plugging in his air card, he couldn’t find a signal. He tried the hotel’s wireless network, no luck. Max was finally able to get onto the internet after hooking into the hotel’s hardwired internet connection. He looked at his watch; it was 2:45 am. Opening his email, he saw a message from Ryan. He opened it, read it, and wrote a reply to tell Ryan that they would meet at Sarah’s place tomorrow. He was moving the cursor to the send button when he lost connection.

I woke up to what sounded and felt like a car wreck. There wasn’t even time to process that I must have passed out as my head banged into a steal bulkhead. My shoulder then smacked into a girder. I reached up and grabbed onto it to stabilize myself as I felt the ferry shudder and buck. After a moment, the shifting and crashing stopped. I felt my head and my hand came away sticky.

I must have split my noggin.

Then, remembering the encounter I had with the freak in the Guard Uniform, I shuddered and felt nauseous. I lean back against the bulkhead and took stock of my injuries. Probing, I couldn’t find a wound on my head and, although I took a pretty good shot to the shoulder, I didn’t think I had broken anything. The blood was from the Zeke last night.

Zeke. Yeah, that’s a good name for them. Not Zombies like Romero, but fast and vicious.

The ferry took another jolt and I grabbed the stanchion next to me. The ferry had either run aground or into another vessel. I rose shakily. Finding my hammer, I cavalierly opened the hatch. I had it with this shit. I was either going to make it or not. I was not going to just sit around locked in a room and waiting to die of thirst.

Stepping out, I had to shield my eyes from the glare of a brightly shining sun. I looked around the car deck. The vehicles were jammed together like a pile up on the interstate. There wasn’t any sign of the freaks but I wasn’t about to let my guard down. Holding the hammer, I cautiously made my way to the bow.

The ferry was wedged up against what looked like an abandoned pier. The superstructure had smashed into a metal building connected to the pier. The Humvee that I was headed to last night, when I was so rudely interrupted by its occupant, was sitting with its nose through the big steel chains that blocked the vehicle exit lane. I opened the door ready to bash anything that jumped out.

The driver was in similar shape as the not so fat lady upstairs. The stench was worse than a dead whore in a Mexican brothel. I stepped back and looked in the cab from a greater distance. It wasn’t much better, but at least I was able to stop gagging. I walked around to the back of the Humvee and opened it up.

Halle-frickin-lujah!

I stared at the most beautiful thing I had seen since I left West-By-God-Virginia. A crate of M4 carbines, four cases of MRE’s and a box of 24 grenades. These guys must have been taking supplies to a deployed unit on Whidbey from the armory in Seattle when all of this came down. After more searching and gagging, I came across a box of utility vests and six bags of loaded magazines for the M4’s. The M4’s were straight up basic carbines. There weren’t any fancy scopes or stocks, just Plain Jane killing tools with standard sights. I checked the magazines to find that, although the rifles were not special, the ammo definitely was high quality, 62-grain ballistic-tipped 5.56 rounds. I pulled an M4 out of the crate, cleared it, and dry fired. These were virgin rifles, never deployed or assigned. I was having difficulty not crying like a two year old on Christmas morning. I also found the driver’s vest stuffed behind his seat. It had four M1911 .45 ACP magazines in it.

Shit! This meant he had a pistol on him, and I have to find it.

 
I dug around behind his seat, dry heaving the entire time.

It’s not here. Damn, I guess I have to search him.

I tried to be respectful but my eyes were watering and snot was running from my nose. My stomach was already sore from dry heaving so much. Then I saw the pistol, down on the floor in an inch of coagulated blood and chunks of flesh.

“I’m sorry buddy, but I need this more than you do, Thank you for your service and God rest your soul
.”

Those were the first words I had spoken out loud since this all began. My voice sounded harsh and brittle, uncaring, but honestly, I was deeply grateful to this young man who had given his life doing his duty.

I retrieved my backpack from the trunk of the rental car and charged my cell phone from the laptop. It was probably a moot point but I had pictures and voicemail on that phone that I didn’t want to give up. There still wasn’t any service and I didn’t think that AT&T would be coming back anytime soon. I crammed as many MRE’s into the backpack as I could after tossing the laptop and all its accessories back into the trunk. Even if there was some chance I might be able to use it again, it was just more shit that took up room. Right now I needed food, water, and ammunition. I had a one liter water bottle in my pack and knew that water was number one on the list of things I had to find. I thought about going back to get the bleach but the mere thought of going back in there and facing the unknown darkness made me forget that idea as quickly as it formed in my mind.

Finding an old rusty ladder on the pier that was reachable, I climbed it with great amount of huffing and puffing. I hurt in places that I didn’t even know existed and was tired and sore, but there was no rest in sight. I had to find some transportation and get to Sarah’s. It was eleven o’clock in the morning before I found a vehicle with the keys in it. As an added bonus, it had nearly a full tank of fuel. The downside, the previous owner had expired while sitting behind the wheel. The mess he left me was disgusting but I cleaned off the seat as best as I could after dragging him out. I found a blanket in the back and used it as a seat cover. Unlike the story about Los Angeles I read on the internet last night, the roads were fairly clear. I didn’t have a clue as to why, but I wasn’t about to complain.

The car I had taken was a Chevy Malibu with a GPS navigation system built in. I wasn’t sure if it would work, but after typing in my niece’s address it came right up with a route. As it turned out, the ferry had beached just north of Edmonds. The pier was no longer in use; there wasn’t even an access road. I had to climb a fence, cross two railroad tracks, and climb another fence before I arrived at the parking lot. A sign identified the place as Haines Wharf Park.

The GPS indicated that it was only a half hour to Woodinville where I hoped to find Max, Lisa, and Sarah’s group. The trip was uneventful and enlightening. The only places where there was any congestion appeared to be the off-ramps that led to hospitals. Once on the 405 interstate, I could maintain about thirty miles per hour. Slowing to miss a few abandoned crashes and several bodies cost me some time but I pulled up to the house just after noon. The garage door was open and there was a single SUV parked in the driveway.

Looks like Max didn’t get my message,
I thought, pulling in.

I sat in the car hoping someone would come out of the house to greet me. After ten minutes with no signs of life, I got out of the car. The entire neighborhood seemed abandoned. I saw the curtains on the front of the house move.

Did I just see that or am I losing it?
I thought as the front door opened and Max stuck his head out.

“Hey, Little Bro!”

I ran around the car and bolted for him. I was never so glad to see anyone in my entire life and planned to bear hug him.

“Whoa man, hold up,” he said, holding up both arms, palms facing me.

I skidded to a stop.

“Why? What’s wrong?” I asked, confused.

While still holding up his arms he said, “Sarah left a note. Tim and Peter died two days ago. Sarah and the other three kids left the same day and went to Meg’s.”

Then he hung his head. “Lisa is sick man. She looks real bad, I don’t know.”

His shoulder shook as he stood sobbing. I walked up and grabbed him into a bear hug. He tried to pull away but he was in no shape to rebuff the support I offered.

He whispered, “I don’t think she’s gonna make it, Ryan. And I don’t know if I want to.”

Just then a C130 roared overhead. I ran back into the yard waving my arms. There was no use shouting as I knew from my time as an air crewman on a Coast Guard C130 that you couldn’t hear the person next to you, let alone someone fifteen hundred feet below. The aircraft didn’t turn or acknowledge that it had seen me. I turned around and walked back to the house. Max said that I shouldn’t be there, that I would be exposed to the flu if I came in.

I chuckled and put my arm around his shoulder. “Max, as you always say, in for a dollar…in for dime”