Dead Calm (4 page)

“I've got a theory,” Tick-Tock said. “Deck seven is
where most of the life boats are, and I counted eight gone: three
on the port side and five on the starboard. I'm going to hazard a
guess here and say that the ship had an outbreak and was abandoned.
We haven't seen any live people yet, so I think we can rule out the
possibility of running into anyone if we go through the hatch on
four.”

“That leaves running into the dead,” Steve pointed
out.

“But they'll be easier to deal with than live people
with weapons,” Susan countered.

“I can come up with a few ideas on things you can
check to see if the ship might be inhabited by the living,” Brain
volunteered. “The only problem is that you need to be on
board.”

“Before we get into all that though, we need to
figure out what's beyond that hatch. Living or dead, we'll find a
way to deal with whatever we run into, but I'd like to know what
the area inside is like,” Tick-Tock said. “You're our resident
cruise expert, Brain. You've been on eight different ships, so tell
me what you know. What's in there?”

Knowing what he said meant life and death to the four
people boarding the ship, Brain thought hard before answering. “If
it's laid out like the other cruise liners I've been on, I'd say
it's storage for water craft. I could make out the outline of a
larger door next to the open hatch. You see, all the cruise lines
have their own private islands where you can rent out jet skis and
kayaks and stuff. When they need to switch out the old equipment
for new, they carry the stuff out with a cruise that's heading
there. I remember coming back in the launch one day, and the crew
was loading a bunch of old, beat up kayaks through a big hatch,
just about where that one is. There were two brand new Sea-Doos
tied up there waiting to go to the island.”

When he finished, Susan asked, “What else is in that
area?”

Brain shook his head, “I'm not sure, and I don't want
to give you the wrong information. Because of the terrorist threat,
the cruise lines quit giving tours of the bridge and mechanical
sections, so I don't know most of the working areas of the ship. I
managed to bribe one of the crew to let me see the engine room
once, but that's on a lower deck.”

“What about the common areas for the guests? What
would be on that deck?” Heather prodded.

“Most of the cruise ships are laid out similar but
not exactly the same,” Brain said. “I've never been on the Calm of
the Seas, but I've been on a couple like it. If I had to guess, I'd
say it's one of the formal dining rooms and the first level of the
main shopping area.”

Mary, who had shown little more than bored
indifference to the conversation, since no one seemed to know where
the spa was, suddenly perked up and said, “Shopping?”

“Yeah, it's a huge area anywhere from four to eight
stories high with all the decks open to the inside. It's full of
shops and clubs and coffee bars. They always have glass elevators
in there too. It's really cool,” Brain explained.

“What kind of shops?” Mary asked with excitement.

Brain opened his mouth to answer but Steve cut him
off. Speaking in a clear, firm voice, he said, “That's not our main
concern right now, Mary. We have more important things to focus
on.”

Ignoring him, she leaned over and laid her hand on
Brain's upper thigh. In a low voice, she said, “You and I will talk
later, sweets.” Then she gave the tech a wink and a smile.

Brain felt his face go hot and knew it was turning
bright red. He opened his mouth to speak. Not trusting his voice
though, he closed it with a snap.

Steve made a mental note to speak with Brain before
Mary got hold of him. He needed to warn the tech that she would
squeeze him for all she could, long before the engineer ever got
close to getting in her pants.

Turning back to the matter at hand, he asked the
group, “Anyone else ever been on a cruise?” Susan raised her hand,
“I've gone twice. But only short little three day runs out of Port
Canaveral.”

Mary narrowed her eyes and asked suspiciously, “With
who?” But Susan ignored her.

Steve said to Susan, “Then you get with Brain, and
between the two of you sketch out a plan showing where everything
is. If it's a guess, then put a question mark next to it. We only
need it until we get somewhere that has a ‘you are here’ map.”

“Those are always by the stairs and the elevators,”
Brain informed him.

Susan nodded in agreement, “It's really easy to get
lost on one of those cruise ships. When we go in, we'll always have
to keep in mind how to get out. You can get turned around real
quick.”

Steve remembered seeing a can of blue marine paint in
the storage locker next to the shower. They could mark their path
out as they went in. That way, there'd be less confusion if they
were trying to find their way out while being chased and hauling
ass.

To Brain and Susan, he said, “Get going on that
map.”

“We’ll have it in an hour,” Brain promised.

“Take your time, and get it as accurate as you can,”
he told him. “Besides, we have something we need to do first.”

“What's that?”

“See if we can get the dead to commit suicide,”
Tick-Tock answered with a laugh.

***

After they finished their first circuit of the ship,
Heather said, “There's something I noticed.”

“What’s that?” Steve said before putting two fingers
in his mouth and letting out a sharp, piercing whistle.”

“I only see a few Z’s on each balcony, and they seem
to belong together.”

Tick-Tock said, “Belong together?”

“Yeah, like those two right there.” Heather pointed
to a balcony containing a male zombie oozing black puss out of a
dozen wounds on his chest and neck and a female zombie, who slumped
to its right from a large, crescent shaped gap chewed in her
side.

“They’re both dressed in night clothes. He's wearing
pajama bottoms and she's wearing a nightgown. And then, just one
deck down, are two Z's dressed in formal clothes.”

“That goes along with what I guessed happened,”
Tick-Tock said. “They had an outbreak and first tried to deal with
it by quarantining the sick in their rooms.”

“And when the disease spread, they started closing
off entire decks,” Heather interjected. “They tried to contain it
for as long as they could.”

“But we know that doesn't work,” Steve put in.

“So they bailed,” Tick-Tock finished.

All three of them looked at the ship as if it
expecting it to speak to them, to let them know that their theory
was correct. Instead, they saw a zombie on deck ten climb up on the
railing and reach out to them before falling to the water
below.

“Got one,” Tick-Tock commented.

“Only a thousand more to go,” Steve said dryly.

“How deep is the water here?” Heather asked.

“Don't know,” Tick-Tock replied. Tapping the depth
finder mounted above the steering wheel, he added, “This only goes
down to six-hundred feet and it's maxed out. My guess is that the
pressure will crush them long before they reach bottom. But who
knows how the dead react to atmospheres. They might end up walking
around on the bottom for decades.”

As they watched, two more of the dead fell overboard
in their vain attempt to reach the living. Heather closed her eyes
as the second one hit. It had been a child of about five or
six.

Seeing her reaction, Steve said, “They're dead, and
they'll make you just like them if you hesitate. They're not people
anymore, and we can't let ourselves think they are or we're
through.”

Heather took a deep breath and let it out slowly
before saying, “I know, I know. When they were coming at me in St.
Petersburg and at the bank building, I never thought about the fact
that they'd once been human beings with lives. I just took them
out. It's just that, from this far away they don't seem to be a
threat.”

“They will be when we go on board,” Steve pointed
out.

Heather locked eyes with him and said in a determined
voice, “Then we better get rid of as many as we can while we have
the chance.” Turning to face the ship, she started waving her arms
wildly in the air while shouting, “Over here you ugly bastards.
Come and get it. Come to mama you freaks of nature.”

Tick-Tock started hitting the horn button as Steve
put two fingers in his mouth and let out a long, shrill whistle.
Two hours later, Heather asked in a hoarse voice, “How many do you
think we got so far?”

“A couple hundred at least,” Steve answered, “Some of
the ones who jumped from the upper decks landed on the lower ones,
so we can't count them. If the fall doesn't destroy the brain, then
they'll be right back up again, dragging themselves by their hands
if their legs are broken.”

Susan and Brain had come up on deck after they
finished the map and took turns zombie baiting. Steve wanted to get
Mary up on deck to do her part, but when Tick-Tock said that even
the dead wouldn't want her, he laughed and discarded the idea.

Let her do whatever she wants for now, Steve thought.
But when we hit land, she better pull her own weight or she might
find herself left behind.

As the sun beat down and the day grew hotter, they
became exhausted despite taking regular breaks. Finally, Steve
suggested they pack it in. Checking his watch he said, “lt's about
noon thirty.”

“Noon thirty?” Heather said with a laugh.

“Twelve thirty,” he corrected with a smile. “It gets
dark around seven. If we go aboard the Calm of the Seas at around
four, it’ll give us time to look around before it gets dark.”
Turning to Brain, he said, “Let’s take a look at the deck plan you
and Susan drew up.”

They crowded around the sketch as Brain explained
what they'd come up with. “On the level where you'll be going in,
we're almost certain you'll be right next to one of the main dining
rooms and one of the kitchens. On every cruise I've been on they're
always on the lower decks.”

“Why?” Heather asked.

“Less back and forth motion than you get on the upper
decks,” Susan explained. She was about to add that if they ever
booked a cruise, they should reserve a stateroom on one of the
lower decks to help prevent seasickness, when it suddenly struck
her that no one would ever book a cruise again in her lifetime. Or
even Cindy's, she added as an afterthought. Depressed at this
sudden awareness of how the world had changed, she stayed quiet for
the rest of the meeting as her mind went over the hundreds of other
things she would never be able to do again.

Brain continued the narrative by saying, “Past the
formal dining room you should find the lowest level of the Centrum.
When we were zombie baiting, I took a good look at the hull and saw
the outline of another hatch further forward of the open one. This
is where you board the launch that ferries you to their private
island. This area will be past the Centrum.”

“What's past the Centrum?” Tick-Tock asked. “More
shops?”

Brain and Susan exchanged a glance before Brain said
with disappointment, “Neither of us is sure on that one. Susan
stayed on the ship when she went out and I only took the launch
once, and it was years ago on my first cruise. Mom liked to hang
around the casino and I mostly stayed with her.”

Tick-Tock saw that Brain wore an expression like he'd
just missed an easy field goal that would have won the Super Bowl,
so he slapped him on the back and said, “Don't sweat it Pork Chop.
You've given us way more info than we had before. Like you said,
we'll find a map near the stairs or the elevators, so we should
find one in the Centrum.”

“If we go in that far,” Steve said. After looking at
the rough sketch again, he added, “When we first go aboard, we'll
be right next to the dining room. This means the kitchen won't be
too far away. That takes care of food and water. Since we'll be
entering the area where they store the jet skis, then they should
keep fuel somewhere around there. I think on our first excursion we
should keep it simple. Get in, take a quick look around, grab what
we need and get out. We’ll try to find a map so we can plan for any
later foraging expeditions, but today we grab the necessities and
haul ass. I don't want to get too far into that ship until we know
what's what.”

Tick-Tock agreed, but he pointed out that there were
many other items they needed that wouldn't be found near the
entrance.

“If everything goes good today, we'll plan on going
back in tomorrow,” Steve promised. “Then you can explore to your
heart's content. If it looks secure enough when we check it out
today, we might even be able to move aboard for a few days.”

With the plan in place, Steve went over everyone’s
assigned positions. “Brain, you've got the wheel. Keep Cindy below
with Mary. Once you drop us off, back up a hundred feet so none of
those things drop down on you. Hold your position and listen for us
to call you on the radio.”

“Gotcha,” the tech replied.

Indicating Susan, Heather and Tick-Tock, he said, “We
move just like we did when we cleared the bank building, two people
to a team. We can adjust our positions as the situation
changes.”

Remembering what happened the last time Tick-Tock and
Susan were left alone when they searched the bank building, he
added, “We all stick together no matter what. Heather and I will be
in the lead. If anyone does get separated and can't contact the
others, then head directly for the hatch.” Turning to Brain, he
said, “Keep an eye out for anyone in case they lose radio contact.
You'll have to come in and pick them up.”

“What'll Mary be doing?” Susan asked. “The usual,”
Steve replied.

“As little as fucking possible,” Heather
finished.

They all laughed as the sailboat passed around the
stern of the cruise liner. Tick-Tock looked up and read its name
aloud. “The Calm of the Seas.” Turning to Steve, he said, “You know
that once we take her, we can rename her what we want?”