Holding out his hand to the approaching man, Steve said, “I want to thank you for doing this for us. I don’t think we could have made it all the way to Arkansas on our own.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Rick replied as he grasped the outstretched hand. “You’re helping me out by taking Stacey somewhere safe.”
“I still don’t understand why you think it will be safer for her at a military base,” Steve said. “Fort Redoubt could probably hold off any attack by the Zs as well or even better.”
Rick smiled and said, “It’s not about what’s outside the camp trying to get in, it’s about what’s inside of Stacey trying to get out. Ever since she lost her arm, she’s had to prove that she can do anything that anyone else can do. Back at Redoubt, she’s always volunteering for the hardest missions. I don’t coddle her, but some of the things she tries to do are beyond her. I can’t watch her twenty-four-seven, but if she’s got her ass planted in an Army base, they’ll keep her on a short leash.”
Steve nodded in understanding. Trying to stall for time so he didn’t have to get on the airplane, he opened his mouth to ask an inane question. He hadn’t even gotten the first syllable out of his mouth before he was interrupted by one of Rick’s people calling out, “Dead-asses coming out of the woods.”
Everyone spun to where the man was pointing.
At first Steve couldn’t see anything, but then he spotted half a dozen lurching figures coming out of the brush at the far end of the runway. Not seeing this as a huge threat since they were so far away, he was about to turn back to Rick when a flurry of movement caught his eye. This time, he didn’t have to search to see the wave of dead flooding out of the woods. Hundreds of Zs were coming out of the trees to thrash their way across the overgrowth at the end of the landing strip, with more flooding onto the tarmac from both sides. Within seconds, the dead covered the south end of the runway.
As he spun and climbed up the steps into the plane, Steve heard Rick order his people to get in their vehicles as he ran for the portable generator used to start the engines. Jumping up the stairs, he spun and grabbed the ropes at either side of the folded down hatch. Heaving with all his might, he called out to Stacey, “Zs on the runway. Get us in the air. Now.”
Calling back through the opening leading to the cockpit, she said, “Next stop, Arkansas.”
After flipping the top portion of the hatch down and securing it, Steve looked at the open seat next to Heather. Knowing there was no way he was going to just strap himself in without knowing what was going on, he instead ducked into the cockpit and slid into the open chair.
Stacey glanced sideways at him and asked, “Do you know how to fly?”
“No idea,” he answered.
“Then get the fuck off my flight deck,” she told him.
Ignoring her, he looked out the front windscreen at the wave of approaching dead flesh. In just the short time since they had spotted them, the Zs had made it a quarter of the way down the runway. Worrying that they wouldn’t have enough room to take off, he felt relief when he heard the engine on his side of the plane turn over a few times before catching and falling into a steady drone. Looking out the side window, he watched as Rick Styles detached a cable from the engine and hurriedly wheeled a small generator away.
Reaching down to buckle his harness, Steve called out excitedly, “Let’s go.”
Stacey only smiled and said, “I thought you didn’t like to fly?”
“I don’t like dying either,” Steve shot back. “And if we stay here, that’s a sure thing. If we get into the air, I’m guessing my chances of living will improve. Not by much, though.”
Motion caught Steve’s eye, and he spun his head to see Rick climb into one of the SUVs. Turning to Stacey, he asked, “Where is he going? What about the other engine? He needs to start the other engine.”
Twisting a knob and holding it in place, she said, “Settle down, Captain Sky, I can start one with the other once it’s running.”
With relief, Steve heard the other engine cough to life.
Leaning forward to get a better look at where the dead were, his relief was short-lived when he saw that they were halfway down the airstrip and coming fast. Steve thought back to how they had plowed through the dead with trucks, but this was different. He didn’t know much about aerodynamics, but he was pretty sure that if they hit one of the Zs on takeoff, it would be a very short flight.
Turning to urge Stacey on, he saw that she was securing a makeshift prosthesis to what remained of her arm. When she was done, she lowered its two-pronged end onto the throttle.
“You couldn’t have done that earlier?” he asked.
“I don’t like wearing it,” she replied. “It chafes like hell.”
Looking back to the approaching dead, Steve saw they were close enough now that he could make out individuals in the pack. Dirty and naked, they made a gruesome sight. Some were covered in dried blood, telling him that they had fed on something recently.
Feeling a slight jolt, he looked over to where Stacey was slowly pushing the throttle forward.
At last, his mind screamed as the plane moved forward. Despite not knowing what to do, his hands reached out as if to help. They quickly dropped to his sides, though, when Stacey swung her arm to the right and held the stainless steel prongs a few inches over his crotch.
In a low, growling voice, she said, “If you touch anything, I’ll make you a eunuch.”
Sweat beaded his brow as Steve said in a calming voice, “No problem, Stacey. See, my hands are nowhere near the controls. You’re flying, not me.”
Huffing a quick breath from her nose, she said, “As it should be. You’re some kind of control freak, you know that?”
“Only when my life is in someone else’s hands,” he answered.
Moving her claw back to the throttle, Stacey nudged it forward. The plane gathered speed and swung slightly to the right to line up with the runway. Sunlight glinted through the cockpit glass, momentarily obscuring the dead. When it faded, they were readily apparent. It seemed like every time he looked, the dead were hundreds of feet closer.
Judging the distance to them, Steve asked, “How much room do we need to take off?”
Stacey didn’t answer. Instead, her eyes scanned the dials and gauges on the control panel before saying, “I wish I had more time to let the engines warm up, but oh well…”
Not liking the sound of her, ‘oh well,’ Steve closed his eyes. Feeling himself being pushed back in his seat as the plane started to move forward, he opened them a crack to peek. Ahead, he could see the dead slowly coming toward them as the plane picked up speed. His mind flashed to the equations he used to have to solve in high school as he thought, If a plane full of zombie apocalypse survivors are moving down the runway at two hundred miles an hour, and a group of flesh-eating dead are coming toward them at five miles an hour, what time is lunch served?
Trying to shut his eyes, Steve found he was unable to keep them closed for more than a second. Giving up, he watched the impending collision. His fear rose as they closed with the dead. The engine noise seemed to roar in his ears. The plane seemed to be moving too slow. The dead seemed to be moving too fast. He felt a scream build up. He could now make out individual details of gore on the dead.
Tearing his eyes away, he looked over to where Stacey was sitting cool, calm and collected in her seat. For some reason, this angered him. He was about to scream at her and ask what she thought she was doing when she said, “Please put your trays in the upright position. The smoking light is off, and the bathroom is closed until after takeoff. Thank you for flying Dead Air.”
Feeling a slight lurch, Steve whipped his head forward to see the approaching dead drop away as the plane took to the air. They were so close that he was sure that he would feel the jolt of impact with one of them that would send the plane cartwheeling down the runway. The plane’s nose rose, and then all he could see was blue sky. They had made it. As his fear of collision with the herd of Zs left him, it was quickly replaced by fear of flying. Gripping the armrest until his knuckles turned white, he shut his eyes.
His mind spun with a thousand thoughts as he wondered if they had remembered to put gas in the plane, would the engines quit, would a wing suddenly fall off, can the dead fly, would they hit a flock of migrating geese…
His fears were not helped when Stacey said out of nowhere, “What are you so freaked out about? That wasn’t so close, I missed that first dead-ass by at least ten feet.”
Steve’s mouth dropped open to reply with a sarcastic comment, but it shut with an audible snap when Stacey banked the plane hard to port, corkscrewing to gain altitude. Despite his fingers already being dug in to the armrest all the way to the metal, his grip tightened.
“Got to make sure that Dad made it out of here,” she told him. After looking in his direction, she added, “If you’re going to puke, there’s bags in the seat pocket on your right.”
Steve could only nod.
As she leveled off at three hundred feet, she said, “Look out your window and tell me what you see.”
Whipping his head to the right for a quick glance before looking back at the instrument panel, he gave a strangled, “Trees.”
“Come on, you wanted to be up here,” she said disdainfully. “If you’re going to be up here, I need you to help me out.”
Forcing his head to turn, Steve looked out of the side window. The sight of the trees and ground passing by gave him a feeling of vertigo, making it feel like his body was falling back into his seat. Shaking it off, he tried to focus on individual parts of the terrain. Spotting a long line cutting through the woods, he said, “I think I see the road we used to get to the airport.”
“Yeah,” Stacey replied, “That’s it. Do you see their Jeeps, though?”
Having something to focus on made it a little easier for Steve to look out of the airplane, but if his eyes strayed to the terrain passing below him, the vertigo came back in a rush. After a few seconds, he spotted what they were looking for.
Leaning forward, he pointed as he said excitedly, “I see them.”
“I figured they would have made it further by now,” Stacey commented.
The airplane dropped suddenly, causing Steve to whip his head forward and scrunch down in his seat.
Stacey laughed and said, “Don’t worry, we’re not going down. I’m just going to buzz them.”
The plane dropped to fifty feet as she flew over the two Jeeps, wagging her wings in greeting.
Climbing again, she said to Steve, “You can quit worrying, I’m going back up again.”
“Up, down, it doesn’t matter,” he replied miserably. “The only difference is that when the engines quit and we fall from the sky at a greater height, I just have a few more seconds to scream.”
After leveling the plane at five hundred feet, Stacey banked slightly to port as she said, “We’re going to check on that herd to the west of Redoubt. I’m going to need you to act as a spotter again when we get close.”
Raising a hand in acknowledgement, Steve said, “Just let me know when you need me to help. In the meantime, I’ll be over here pretending that I’m really on a train.”
The engine’s steady drone was interrupted a few minutes later when Stacey said in a soft voice, “I guess I won’t need your help after all.”
Curiosity overcame Steve’s fear at her tone. Looking out the window, he saw a ribbon of road leading off to the west. Nothing out of the ordinary, he thought to himself. Then he noticed that the road itself seemed to be moving. Thinking it was the vertigo again, he shook his head and looked again. This time, he realized that for as far as he could see, the road was filled with the dead.
His fear of flying leaving him immediately, Steve leaned forward for a better look as he asked, “Can you tell what direction they’re moving?”
“Directly for the fort,” Stacey answered as she leaned forward to turn a dial on the control panel to her right. Pulling her boom microphone closer to her mouth, she said, “Fort Redoubt, Fort Redoubt, this is Air One, over.”
Steve looked around and found his headset, putting it on in enough time to hear, “Air One, this is Redoubt, over.” Even after she cleared her throat, Steve could still hear the tension in it when Stacey said, “You have a large herd of dead-asses numbering in the thousands approaching your location on sixty-three, over.”
“We are aware of that, Air One,” Redoubt answered.
“I’m coming back. The airfield is overrun, so I’m going to land in the open field to the southwest of the water treatment plant. Have someone there to meet me, over,” Stacey told him.
“Negative, negative,” Redoubt answered. “We have been in contact with Commander Styles, and he said to tell you that under no circumstances are you to return. He is aware of the situation, and he said to tell you that if you come back, he will duct tape you to your seat and make you fly to Arkansas. What you are doing right now is more important, over.”
Steve turned to Stacey, opening his mouth to tell her how imperative it was that they get to the base in Russellville. Seeing the internal battle she was going through written on her face, he chose to remain silent. He knew that since it was her home and what was left of her family was being threatened, nothing he said could change her mind. If anything, his pleas might turn her away from him.