Tankbread 02 Immortal (17 page)

“Eric?!” Else yelled.

“Geffuggow!” Eric shouted. He reloaded his automatic rifle while the evols stopped, confused and overwhelmed by his sudden entrance.

“No!” Else leapt up and shoulder charged Eric, knocking his weapon aside and sending a burst of bullets through the face of the closest evol. “My son!” she screamed.

Eric ripped his gas mask off. “What?”

Else ignored him and spun on the balls of her feet. Her machete sliced through an evol’s skull, shearing the top of his head off and sending blackened brain matter splattering against the console.

The scythe followed, the tip burying itself in the head of another evol, punching through the ear canal. Else levered downwards, twisting the blade and coring the zombie’s brain like a rotten apple, dragging the weapon from her grip.

The evol holding the baby lunged forward. Else dropped the machete from her left hand and scooped her son up, punching the evol in the face with her right fist.

The dead man snarled; the skin on his face split and dripped black blood. Else punched upwards, the heel of her hand crushing the dead man’s nose and driving shards of bone up into the brain. The evol snorted, his eyes rolling up in his head. Else stepped back, cradling her wailing son against her chest as the zombie collapsed, quivering on the floor.

Eric’s automatic rifle barked and another zombie’s head vanished in a spray of dark gore. The last two evols started shooting. Else spun down behind a control console, clutching her son to her chest as bullets ricocheted around the bridge. Eric roared something unintelligible and emptied his magazine into the two dead men. The Captain was caught in the spray of bullets and went tumbling back into the smoke.

“We gotta go!” Eric yelled. “This whole place is coming apart!” The ship rocked with a fresh explosion, the temperature in the bridge rising as the air darkened with fumes.

Else leapt up and ran to Eric. “Has everyone got to the boats?”

“Yeah, that Rache girl gave the fishermen what-for. They’re evacuating everyone right now!”

A hand appeared through the smoke behind her and slammed down on Else’s shoulder, dropping her to the floor. “Take my baby!” she yelled at Eric, thrusting the tiny body up at him. Eric nodded and grabbed the child. “Get him to the boats!”

Else spun around, lashing out with a foot, only vaguely aware of Eric running out the door, her baby squalling as he was carried to safety. Her boot slammed the Captain in the chest. His composure had melted in the heat, a ragged flap of skin hung down from his right temple. The bone underneath glistened a dull grey.

He sank down and ripped Else’s discarded scythe out of the crewman’s head. The curved metal end hung steady an inch from her face. The Captain opened his mouth to speak; instead Else knocked the handle of the blade aside and flipped up onto her feet, snatching up the machete and swinging it at the Captain’s head. He blocked and riposted, the steel blades clanging together as the combatants smashed into each other.

A wall of flame erupted in the doorway; the Captain flinched back. Else pressed the attack, her machete slamming into his shoulder. He grabbed the handle and pulled the blade free. Swinging the other weapon, he forced Else to duck. Disarmed, she backed away across the bridge, feeling the linoleum underfoot bubbling in the heat.

The Captain ran forward, the curved blade rising over his head like an axe. Else leaned back, inhaling with a sharp gasp as the sharpened steel sliced downwards, cutting through her shirt and drawing blood in a long line down her stomach.

Else stomped down on the scythe’s wooden handle, shattering it and knocking the Captain off balance. Grabbing him by the throat, she jammed her mouth against his neck and bit hard.

The Captain howled. Jerking back tore a chunk of meat from his neck.

“It is forbidden!” he hissed. The air he drew in to speak whistled through the ragged hole in his throat.

Else wiped the back of a hand across her mouth, smearing the black blood of him onto her cheek. She spat his sour grey flesh from her mouth. “I’m your ending,” she said, her eyes burning from the smoke. “My children will live on, but you will burn and your bones will rot. The human race will recover and rebuild. I will not rest until that comes to pass. We will purge your kind from the world.”

The air outside the bridge swirled orange and black as a geyser of burning oil burst upwards through the foredeck.

“We are eternal . . .” the Captain croaked. The lethal elements in Else’s cells were already devouring the parasitic particles that drove his dead flesh.

The floor creaked and the ancient linoleum began to smoke and curl upwards, charring in the heat from the inferno that had spread to the deck below. The Captain sank to his knees, his wide-eyed gaze reflecting the tendrils of flame curling up the walls as the air in the bridge became stifling.

“Not as long as I live,” Else said. She lunged forward, snatching up the broken weapon, the blade swinging in an arc that would have taken the Captain’s head off at the neck. Instead the floor gave way and they both plummeted into an upwelling cloud of fire.

The survivors rowed for shore as the ship behind them shuddered with explosions. Silhouetted against the flaring light they could see the writhing forms of burning people, alive and dead, dropping over the railing into the storm-tossed swell.

Hob pulled on the oars. The small boat had no salvage that would help them on the unforgiving shore. The women and few children huddled together, moaning in terror every time the sky was lit up by another explosion. Hob kept rowing. Land had to be there somewhere; they had disembarked on the right side of the stricken ship.

When the roar of breakers was louder than the death rattle of the ship, Hob yelled at his passengers to hold fast. The small boat rose on a swell, surfing the crest of a breaking wave and powering forward, the oars sweeping through the air, nearly throwing Hob on his back at the sudden lack of resistance.

When the wave passed and the boat dropped, Hob heaved on the oars again. The boat bobbed and the next wave pushed it onto the dark sand of the storm-lashed beach.

“Get out!” Hob yelled, feeling the tug of the sea dragging the boat back out. He rowed hard, trying to keep the small craft straight on. If they turned, the first breaker to hit them would capsize the boat.

The passengers clambered over Hob, jumping into the surf and carrying howling children on their shoulders. Once the boat was empty, Hob shipped the oars and jumped into the freezing water. Wading ashore, he dragged the boat behind him. “Give me a fucking hand!” he yelled. Other survivors came and seized the boat. Working together they pulled it above the reach of the storm surge.

* * *

As the sun rose the wind fell. The people from the ship had spent a cold and miserable night huddled on the beach, terrified of every noise and crack of wind-snapped trees behind them.

Hob crawled out from under a sodden blanket, stood up, and stretched. The lack of movement underfoot made him dizzy. He took a few steps to regain his composure. Opening his pants he pissed on the sand, shivering in the morning chill and the sense of relief.

Small boats and chunks of wreckage were rising and falling on the surf. Other salvage had come ashore and already people were moving about, picking up anything useful and piling it above the high-tide mark.

Looking around, Hob swallowed the fear he felt at the line of trees. The dead ruled the land. His people only came ashore when they needed salvage. Being out here, exposed in the open, terrified him.

Most of the faces he could see were familiar. Holders, fishermen, engineers. They all had a look of shock etched deep into their faces. He guessed his expression was the same.

“Sarah,” he said. Turning in a slow step he looked up and down the beach. “Sarah!” he yelled. Walking down the beach he grabbed the first salvager he found by the shoulders. “Where’s Sarah?” he demanded. The woman shook her head and went back to gathering driftwood.

“Fuck!” Hob swore. Shielding his eyes against the sunlight now reflecting off the whispering surf, he peered out to sea. Only a dark smudge of smoke remained, rising above the horizon. “Sarah?” he asked. There were bodies floating out there; some still moved or clung to flotsam.

“Hey, man, you seen the crazy chick from the land? Else?” Hob turned and scowled at the dark-haired man who looked familiar.

“What? No, fuck off,” Hob said automatically.

“I’ve got her kid,” Eric said, gesturing with a flush of embarrassment to a small group of forlorn holders.

“Which one?” Hob asked.

“She has more than one? I’ve got the boy.”

“How the hell did that happen?” Hob turned away from the wreckage-filled sea and started walking towards where Else’s baby was being comforted and fed by one of the women who had recently sacrificed her own newborn.

Eric fell into step beside him. “Well, it’s a long story. Ya see, she came to me and asked me to blow up the ship. So we did that, and she was fightin’ with the crew and the Captain on the bridge. I came in through the window. She told me to take the boy and get to the boats . . .” Eric trailed off as Hob finished processing what he was saying and turned to glare at him. “You blew up the fuckin’ ship?”

Eric swallowed hard. “It was an accident?” he suggested.

“Fuck me,” Hob muttered. “That bitch turns up and the entire place goes fuckin’ crazy. Where’s that cunt thinks she’s in charge?”

“Rache?” Eric offered.

“Yeah, her.” Hob had a direction for his anger now. It would be good to work out his fears on Rache’s whimpering flesh. He strode off along the sand, glaring at the knots of survivors as he passed.

“Else had a point,” Eric said, hurrying after Hob. “We weren’t doing so well. I mean, okay I was doing fine, but you lot. You holders and engineers, your situation was pretty much shit.”

“We were fucking safe there!” Hob snarled.

“Yeah but there’s more to life than being safe,” Eric muttered, not willing to risk a physical confrontation with the enraged Hob.

“Rache!” Hob roared.

A figure stood up from a small campfire, handing a wrapped bundle to one of the women sitting cross-legged next to her. Rache’s skin was still stained with oil, but much of it had washed away, leaving her with a grey pallor, much like the dead.

“Whaddya you want, Hob?” Rache asked, her body language set to fight.

“Where’s that fuckin’ bitch and where’s my daughter?”

Rache hesitated. “You mean Sarah?”

“Yes, I fuckin’ mean Sarah and that crazy bitch that got us in this fuckin’ mess.”

Rache looked up and down the shoreline. Bodies rose and fell on the long regular breath of the ocean. She yearned to be out there, riding that swell and fall. Sailing over the horizon until there were no more horizons. “I haven’t seen them,” she said finally.

“Is that her kid?” Hob said, stabbing a finger in the direction of the campfire.

“Yeah, and Lowanna, the abo girl Else had with her,” Rache replied. Hob made to push past her, but Rache stepped up in his face. “You go near that baby girl or Else’s boy and I fuckin’ swear, Hob, I will feed you to the first dead fucker I can find.”

Hob’s knuckles cracked as he clenched his fists. Rache’s eyes never wavered from his. After a moment he snarled something and turned away.

“Fuckin’ asshole,” Eric muttered when Hob had stalked out of earshot.

“Rache,” Cassie, a survivor from the campfire, said as she approached. “What are we gonna do for food?”

“We’ll just . . .” Rache looked from the sea to the tree line. “Get everyone together. Gather the salvage. We’ll make some weapons and then we’ll go find some food. All of us. Together.”

First Cassie and then Eric walked away, stopping at each group of huddled people to pass on her instructions, to share the hope that Rache had given them.

The sand melted into glass under the intense heat. It glowed from banana yellow through to cherry red. A cycling, vibrant palette of colors that made the swirling plasma seem almost alive. Then the water washed over the burning sand and it screamed.

Else sat up, her eyes flaring wide and then snapping shut as the full glare of the morning sun hit her face. Her body was a crawling mass of burnt skin that hung in peeling strips. As a fresh wave beached itself, the water washed over her wounds with a searing agony that birthed a new shriek of pain.

Moaning, she climbed to her feet and backed away from the hissing surf. The beach was littered with washed-up wreckage. In the distance the remains of a small fire smoldered on the sand.

Else focused on that; walking in that direction gave her something to do. She had lost her son and Lowanna. Tears welled and stung on her raw cheeks. Through her blurred vision she saw the footprints and marks where salvage had been dragged up and piled above the high-water line. She wiped her face, hissing at the sting. Someone had been here, different feet. Else walked on down the beach, following the meandering trail of footprints. The trail widened as more people came together, joining the ragged procession. Else saw where they stopped, milled, and stood watching as some altercation took place in the sand. Then they moved off again; this time the footprints headed towards the tree line. Else knew the river lay beyond the narrow forest of mangroves. Whatever the survivors had in mind, they were heading towards an area overrun with feral dead and even more dangerous, feral crocodiles.