To Sail a Darkling Sea - eARC (14 page)

“If you want boats, you can have boats,” Villa said, waving his hand. “I think I am the only government official you have found, si? Have boats. Except, one, perhaps, we should keep for ourselves. A boat, if it works, has power and such on it and we can pull away from the dock if there are infectado. But if there are more, yes, you can have them. There are always many at San Sebastian De La Gomera. There may be some at La Playa, yes. It has a small harbor but it has the best shipyard on the island. A moment… ”

He turned and talked to the group in Spanish. There was a good bit of arm waving and a bit of shouting but finally it wound down.

“They agree in general,” Villa said. “We will accompany you to La Playa and San Sebastian De La Gomera and see what the conditions there are, as well. We may find others who are familiar with firearms. Diego, he has been born and raised here in Puntilla and has rarely even gone to San Sebastian De La Gomera. He does not really want to leave. But I say we see what the other towns are like, what other survivors there are of the infectado, then decide. I go with you and I am the only one familiar with guns, si? So they go with us then we decide.”

“Works for me,” Chen said. “Can any of you drive that thing? Assuming it works.”

“That is why I need Diego,” Villa said, smiling. “He is captain. So, we eat, yes?”

* * *

“Pretty little town,” Sophia said as the guns ravaged the “infectado.” “But the harbor sucks. Why would anyone put a boatyard in a town like this?”

There were about twenty yachts and smaller boats up on blocks in the small boatyard. It was pushed so far up against a cliff the road past it went through a tunnel. The harbor was barely large enough for the three boats to spread out in their standard formation and they were firing across the jetty instead of down it since the tip jutted straight out to sea.

“You’re asking me?” Faith asked. “Hell if I know. Ask Villa or something… ”

* * *

“We got customers!” Pagliaro shouted.

“Survivors?” Faith asked then racked her weapon at the sight of three “infectado” coming down the road. “Time to stop, Staff Sergeant.”

“Stopping, ma’am,” Derek said. “But if I may, I think Pag’s probably got this, LT.”

“Permission to engage, Corporal?” Pagliaro said.

“Sure,” Faith said, sighing. She’d had it explained to her by the Gunny and Lieutenant Volpe that the job of an officer was to figure out what the unit was going to do
next
. Not kill zombies,
then
, unless there was a specific reason. That was what privates and lance corporals were for. She was starting to wonder if maybe she should have asked to be a private.

“Engage, PFC!”

“Engaging, aye.”

* * *

“Barbie guns,” Faith muttered, tapping her fingers on her crossed arms as Pag and Derek engaged another group of infected.

The small, picturesque, seaside town turned out to be so
complicated
, all the infected hadn’t made it to the harbor by morning. The two teams were running into scattered groups of zombies between bouts of getting totally lost.

She glanced to the side and saw a zombie coming down the alleyway they’d stopped by. Pag and Derek were forward, taking out the group of infected while she, the proper officer, waited in the car for them to get done. She debated if it was her job to tell Pag he had a zombie coming up behind him or what. Finally, she just drew her H&K and fired it off-hand, hitting the zombie in the chest. The woman dropped like a stone. She was blonde which meant probably a tourist stuck here when the Plague shut down travel.

Faith decocked, holstered and checked the mirror to make sure there weren’t any coming up behind. Then she checked her, admittedly light, make-up and touched up her lip gloss.

“You guys done?” she said, leaning out the window.

“Yes, ma’am,” Derek said.

“How’s your ammo count?” Faith asked.

“Fine for now, ma’am,” Derek said, starting up the Fiat. “We’re having to use a lot of rounds as usual but it’s not like we’re in an assault or anything.”

“Barbie guns,” Faith sighed. “Onward, Derek,” she said, pointing forward.

“Did you do something different with your hair, ma’am?”

* * *

“I’m going to declare La Playa as a yellow zone,” Lieutenant Chen said as the sun descended on the cleared town. There had been ten survivors found. None of them were in great shape but they weren’t death camp survivors, either. They’d been gathered on the “local” yacht, the
Estrella De Mar
. “We can immediately transit to Gomera and start the evening festivities, then clear that tomorrow. It’s bigger and may take more than a day.”

“I don’t think I’ll be joining the festivities this evening, sir,” Faith said, yawning. “Although I’ve mostly been riding around in a taxi, it’s been a long few days.”

* * *

“Oh, Jesus Christ,” Faith said. “Not another one.”

There was a cruise ship tied up to the wharf at San Sebastian De La Gomera.

“That’s not all that big, ma’am,” Januscheitis said.

“It’s not the size that matters,” Faith said. “I’ve got a real case of PTSD about cruise ships. The
Iwo
… you guys had a fighting chance. You
could
fight. You
did
fight. You weren’t locked in your fucking staterooms waiting for help that never came and slowly starving to death. And you were Marines. You sign up to go somewhere Uncle Sam needs people killed. You weren’t on your honeymoon or a family vacation. It’s opening up the compartments and finding the
kids
with arms like
toothpicks
that didn’t even really
bloat
because there wasn’t anything
to
bloat that bugs the hell out of me, okay, Staff Sergeant?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Januscheitis said.

“All that being said, it’s a fraction the size of the
Voyage
,” Faith said. “No real problem. Just take lots of lights.”

“
No Tan Lines
, Division,”
Chen radioed.
“Need to talk to the ground clearance officer.”

“It’s for you, sis,” Sophia said, holding out the radio.

“Division, Shewolf,” Faith said. “To answer your probable question, two to three days depending on infected level. Probably not a lot of survivors at this point. Over.”

“Roger, we will clear ground infecteds
,
then you can proceed to clearance ops on the vessel. After that, the town.”

“Roger, Division,” Faith said. “Glad we brought the heavy stuff.”

* * *

“Shit,” Chen said. “This is not the optimum outcome.”

The chosen spot for engaging the infected with machine gun was what appeared on the charts to be an old jetty, possibly the original harbor or an old marina. There was a shoal that was clearly an old seabreak that came out from land and made a dogleg to the south. There was a small bit of it that still extended above the water at high tide and connected to the land.

Their usual antics had attracted a huge crowd of infected to the spit of land where they’d brutalized them come dawn. Unfortunately, the main jetty to seaward was close enough that more infected had gathered there. He had notionally planned on turning the division around and engaging them second. But when the usual seabirds descended on the carnage left by the MaDeuce, the group had started to mill around and break up. By the time they did the usual bit of picking up their anchors and spinning around to engage, the group would be so spread out it would take forever to hunt them all down with the .50s.

“Division, Shewolf, over.”

Just what he needed. A thirteen-year-old with a question. She probably wanted tips on playing with dolls.

“Go, Ground Clearance Officer.”

“Infected on south jetty breaking up. Request permission to put a couple down by rifle fire. The snacks should keep them around until you can adjust to engage with the Mas. Over.”

Or, he
could
have the Marines shoot a couple…

“Confirm, Shewolf. Good call.”

“Staff Sergeant Januscheitis’s idea, over. Engaging. Shewolf out.”

And she gave credit where credit was due. Chen shook his head and made a note in his personal log.

“There’s a couple over to the left,” he called over the loudhailer. “Don’t stint the ammo… ”

There was a crackle of rifle fire from the
No Tan Lines
. It was nice to have proactive and intelligent subordinates…

* * *

“What is with everybody putting holes in the side of boats?” Faith asked.

The current offense to the lieutenant’s sensibilities was the embarkation port on the port side of the cruise ship. The large port had a gangway that led from the wharf, now clear of infecteds, into the dark interior of the cruise ship.

“So…
Boadicea
?” PFC Kirby said. “Is that Spanish? Sounds like ‘BOHICA’ to me.”

“Are you asking me, PFC?” Januscheitis said. “It at least makes entry easy, ma’am.”

“And I suppose we should do so,” Faith said, sighing. “Lights.”

* * *

“Okay, this is not quite the carnival of carnage I’d expected, ma’am,” Januscheitis said. Most of the watertight doors on the ship were closed, and while they were finding infected, most of them were long dead. Some of them were, yes, children. And there were some well-gnawed bodies of others. But even that was minimal. The ship looked as if it had been cleared before the Plague took hold.

“Feelin’ the same way, Staff Sergeant,” Faith said. She was even checking cabins. Most of them had either no human presence or dead infecteds. Some of the lower, interior, “cheap” cabins had infecteds tied to beds. Some of them had gotten lose and fed but most had clearly died there. There were some kids and that was always tough, but not many. It looked as if the cruise leaned more to adults. She could handle dead adults. And none of them had the “death camp” look of the dead passengers on the
Voyage
. Which just meant they’d died of dehydration instead of starvation. They were finding essentially zero “dead of dehydration or starvation” clothed bodies. “And not complaining.”

* * *

“Okay,” Faith said. “Again, creepy. Where’d the
people
go?”

The team was on its second day of laboriously clearing the ship. It wasn’t huge but it
was
complicated. And every compartment had to be checked, cleared and marked. What they were not finding so far were either survivors or even many infected. And all the infected they were finding had been trapped in interior areas without food or water. That spelt death for infecteds just as much as humans.

“Up to eight hundred and eighty passengers according to the brochure we found, ma’am,” PFC Kirby replied. “And three hundred thirty crew. I think we’ve counted, maybe, a hundred dead, ma’am? So, I dunno.”

They’d broken up into two-man teams to spread the wealth. It had been a toss-up between Kirby and Rodas to accompany Faith. Staff Sergeant Januscheitis had suggested Corporal Douglas accompany the LT. Faith had pointed out that the
Corporal
was one of their
leadership
personnel, as was
she
, so he should take one of the Lance Corporals or a PFC. Which on its face was pretty hard to argue. Especially when she added “That
is
how we’re going to do it, Staff Sergeant.”

Besides, it wasn’t like she couldn’t do this in her sleep.
Had
done it in her sleep.

“I think this thing is even useable,” Faith said. The ship was in surprisingly good shape. The infecteds hadn’t penetrated into any of the machinery spaces they’d found and except for some minor damage it all looked shipshape. The bridge was in good shape, that was for sure. It had been sealed but they’d found a key-card that would allow access. And there were no infected in it. “Which would be good, since we’re running out of space on the big boats.”

Kirby went to open a watertight door and Faith put her hand on his arm.

“PFC?” She said. “Zombies don’t like… ?”

“Impolite people, Skipper,” Kirby said, banging on the hatch with the butt of his M4.

It was only the four
hundredth
time she’d had to tell him.

There was a distant clanging in response.

“I think we’ve got customers,” Faith said. “Open away, PFC.”

The next corridor would have been pretty darned gross if she hadn’t seen it all before. It was, now, a good sign. Five gallon buckets once full of rations now full of shit and piss. Dead bodies lined up against the bulkhead. The sure sign of survivors. There were four bodies which were still wearing clothing. She knew what that meant. One of a million reasons she hoped she was never stuck in a compartment.

“I’m going to crack the hatch,” she shouted through the watertight door. “I’ll toss in a chem-light so you can adjust your eyes!”

CHAPTER 10

If you weigh well the strength of the armies, and the causes of the war, you will see that in this battle you must conquer or die. This is a woman’s resolve; as for men, they may live and be slaves

Queen Boadicea of the Iceni
Tacitus

“Bloody hell, I’ve never in my life been this happy to see Yanks.”

Second Officer, Staff, Becky Kyle was the senior survivor they’d found. And they’d found a lot of survivors.

“Feel the love,” Faith said. The survivors had been escorted up to a café on the lounge deck. There were some windows with external light but it was mid-line and thus not brightly lit. They were all still suffering from photosensitivity. The café was getting fairly crowded and even some children had survived, which was a rarity. “But I’ll take that for somebody who managed to keep this many people alive. How did you, anyway?”

“When the plague was announced, the government put us in quarantine,” Third Officer Darren Arras said. “It was already on the island but they locked us down, anyway. We… segregated the infected. We tried to manage them but… ”

“We ended up taking them into some of the empty economy cabins,” Kyle said then shrugged. “There wasn’t much we could… ” she frowned and shook her head.

“We found them,” Faith said. “If it’s any consolation, New York City had warehouses that looked like that.”

“The quarantine wasn’t so much lifted as things just started falling apart,” Kyle continued. “Some of the passengers left the boat to find someplace on land. The ship’s officers left with some friends on a yacht.”

“Gotta love the loyalty,” Januscheitis said.

“Normal,” Faith said. “Same thing happened on the
Voyage
.”

“
Voyage Under Stars
?” Arras said. “I’m glad I wasn’t on
that
bloody floating abattoir.”

“Abat… ” Faith said. “Oh, slaughterhouse. Yeah. Pretty much covers it.”

“The team only got about a hundred people off the
Voyage
,” Januscheitis said, then gestured at Faith. “The Lieutenant… ”

“Not important,” Faith said. “How did you manage to keep so many people alive?”

“First Officer Zastrow,” Kyle said. “When it came apart, the First Officer requested passengers and crew fall back on the stores compartments. We… secured ourselves. There were water spigots from the main water stores. As long as that held out… ”

“We did the same thing on the
Iwo Jima
,” Januscheitis said. “But there was no plan. Just chaos.”

“I’d like to officially say as a representative of what is left of the United States Government that you and your crew did one
hell
of a job,” Faith said. “Better than any group we’ve found so far. In one of those stores compartments, I regret to tell you, the infecteds gained control. But you kept a lot of people alive. More than anyone could think possible.”

“We had to… ” Kyle said, then looked away. “There were some people, passengers and crew, in our compartment… ”

“That couldn’t handle the strain,” Januscheitis said. “And had to be dealt with.”

“Which is one of the reasons we hold to ‘what happened in the compartment, stays in the compartment,’” Faith said.

“One of our stewards kept trying to open the door,” Arras said, wincing. “We couldn’t keep him from trying. And we couldn’t keep him tied up all the time. Finally, there was an… incident.”

“What happens in the compartment, stays in the compartment,” Januscheitis said. “We’ll get some of the ‘Welcome to Wolf Squadron’ brochures printed up. Mostly it’s about making sure that people don’t think that what happened in the compartment is still okay after you get out. As soon as we’ve ensured the ship is free of infected, you can have the run of it.”

“However,” Faith said. “There is the issue of usage. And support. We’re almost entirely marine-based at this point. We’ve only cleared a few of these small towns and they’re only rough-cleared. We need people to help and we need this ship to tote those people. We’re running out of room with the ships that we’ve got. Which is good, it means more survivors. But we still need this ship. It’s in good shape compared to most we find and it’s fully ocean capable. So… ”

“I can’t exactly contact the owners for permission,” Kyle said, drily. “I’m not sure how the passengers will take it.”

“I generally start with ‘it’s better than being eaten.’” Faith said.

* * *

“Is your Lieutenant as young as she looks?” Kyle asked Januscheitis when they had a moment alone.

“Younger,” Januscheitis said. “Thirteen.”

“Bloody hell,” Kyle said. “How does one become a Marine lieutenant at thirteen?”

“Well, it helps that her father is the senior officer that’s not trapped somewhere and is acting Commander Atlantic Fleet,” Januscheitis said. “But mostly it’s a matter of being one of the four people who cleared the
Voyage
of infecteds. And from what they said, about half the passengers and crew survived. As infecteds. How’d you put it? ‘Bloody abattoir.’ They went through twenty thousand rounds of ammunition in three weeks.”

“Oh,” Kyle said, clearly envisioning what the blindsided battle must have been like in the cave-black caverns of the massive “super-max” cruise liner. “Hell. That had to be… ”

“Clearing this was a walk in the park for her,” Januscheitis said. “You can tell she’s happy we found so many survivors and bored with the few dozen infected. There’s a video of her boarding the
Voyage
that’s both frightening and hilarious. She gets repeatedly dogpiled by infected and comes up over and over again, having killed them all. Which is why we call her Shewolf and us big, tough devil-dogs follow her around like, well, puppies.”

“You
do
know who
Boadicea
was, right?” Kyle said.

“No,” Januscheitis said. “We figured it was Spanish or something.”

“Really?” Kyle said, obviously trying not to laugh. “Seriously… ?”

* * *

“Okay, so, mission for today is… ” Faith said, then paused, flicking off her safety. “Kirby, two steps left.”

“Two steps left, aye,” Kirby said, taking two steps to the left.

Faith lifted her AK and fired twice.

“Clearing this town,” she continued, flicking her safety back on as the two infected that had been loping down Paseo De Fred Olsen dropped. “Which obviously needs some additional clearance.”

“Ma’am,” Januscheitis said, raising his hand.

“Staff Sergeant?”

“Point of order. Found out what ‘
Boadicea
’ means. Sorta funny story… ”

* * *

“Command, Team Two.”

“Command,” Faith said. She could hear the crack of rounds over the radio call from Januscheitis team.

“We’ve hit a big concentration of infected on... Calle Mahona or something. About fifty. Oh, and we’re sort of lost… ”

“Can you break contact?” Faith asked, waving for Derek to stop.

“Roger,”
Januscheitis said.

“Try to rendezvous at… Calle de la Era. It’s back towards the port. There’s a little square on the map. We’ll meet you there.”

“We’ll try to find it,”
Januscheitis said.

“We’ll set up a kill zone there,” Faith said. “Try to lead them back.”

“Don’t think that’s going to be a problem… ”

“See if you can get this thing turned around, Derek.”

“Aye, aye, ma’am.”

* * *

“So why don’t we use .308 as a rifle round?” Faith asked looking through binoculars at the oncoming infected tumbling before the MG240.

“It’s heavy, ma’am?” Januscheitis said, taking a sip of water. It had taken the team some time to find their way around the twisty streets of the town and back to the square at the intersection of Calle De La Era and Calle Del Guincho. “It overkills?” he added as one of the tracers passed through an infected and pinged into the distance.

“There is no such thing as ‘overkill,’ Staff Sergeant,” Faith said.

“There is only ‘Open fire’ and ‘Reloading,’ yes, ma’am,” Januscheitis said. “You can carry more five five six. And, yes, I am doing the math, ma’am. Given five rounds of five five six, it would be less weight to carry three oh eight. You can’t fire it on full auto. But nobody who has any sense fires full auto anyway. I dunno, ma’am. One of those mysteries of the military, I guess.”

“I suspect it’s some deeply laid plot,” Faith said. “There were Pentagon weanies involved.”

“There usually are, ma’am,” Januscheitis said. “I think they’re all winnowed down.”

“And I can see survivors waving from a rooftop,” Faith said, lowering the binos. “Now if we can just figure out how to find them in this maze… ”

* * *

“Hello!” Faith said through the bullhorn. “This rescue is courtesy of the American taxpayers and the United States Marine Corps… ”

* * *

“Where the hell are these all coming from?” Derek asked, reloading.

“See all these little alleyways?” Faith said. She’d unassed from the little Toyota SUV they’d been using and was covering the rear.

“It was sort of rhetorical, ma’am,” Corporal Douglas said.

“Who gave you permission to use a three letter word, Corporal?” Faith said, dropping three infecteds with three shots.

“Freaking
Barbie gun
!” Kirby shouted, as the infected continued to stumble forward despite putting what felt like half a mag into him. “
Die
already!”

“Oh, let me handle this,” Faith said, turning around. She dropped the remaining five infected forward and dropped her still partial magazine for a reload. “I swear five five six is designed to just piss bad guys off.”

“I’m starting to see what you mean, Skipper… ”

* * *

“Any other issues?” Lieutenant Chen asked.

Most of the survivors of the
Boadicea
were pitching in with a will to help clear it. A survey and recovery team, including a master mariner and a qualified engineer, were on the way from the Squadron. The Division was to stay in place until they arrived.

There had been thirty-two survivors found in San Sebastian De La Gomera. Together with the survivors from La Puntilla and La Playa, that made forty-eight survivors from a total of about four thousand inhabitants. Which was bloody awful.

“Patrick tells me we’ve sustained what appears to be a deadline,” Sophia said, raising her hand. “Oil pump for the tranny is out. He can probably jury-rig something, but there aren’t any parts in any of the parts places here in Gomera for it. And it would be a jury-rig. I’d hate to have it crap out on us at sea. You know how rough it can get.”

“I’m sure,” Chen said, drily. “I find this convenient, Lieutenant. Wouldn’t have anything to do with a really sweet seventy-five, would it?”

The marina of San Sebastian De La Gomera was huge compared to La Puntilla or La Playa. And it still had quite a few boats in it. Most were sailboats, which the flotilla couldn’t use, or small “fast” boats, outboards or inboard outboards. But a few large motor yachts had been left behind. And one of them, a 75' Maiora,
Bella Senorita
, was just sweet as hell. Benefits included that it was in working order and hadn’t been torn up by infecteds. Not to mention the marble counters and hot tub.

“Well, sir, that’s a point I hadn’t considered,” Sophia said, seriously. “We
could
use a bigger support boat for the Division, sir.”

“There is salvaging and grand theft, boat, Lieutenant,” Chen said, shaking his head. “I think your father has been teaching you bad manners.”

“Such as stealing a five-hundred-
million
-pound cruise liner, Lieutenant?” Staff Officer Kyle said.

“Point,” Chen said. “Officer Villa, you’re the only surviving government official we’ve found. Your call.”

“It is a
very
nice boat… ” Villa said, musingly, rubbing his chin and letting the Lieutenant sweat. “But the government of Spain willingly cedes this fine boat to the United States Navy in thanks for the clearance of its towns on the island of San Sebastian De La Gomera. And, besides, there are others… ”

“Approved,” Chen said. “Mission orders. Division One is to rendezvous with ‘Mechanical Clearance Division One,’ whatever that means, in Santa Cruz de la Tenerife harbor in two days.”

“You are going to try to clear
Tenerife
?” Kyle said. “Good luck. It’s not a big city but it is a
city
, not a small town.”

The island of Tenerife was clearly visible from Gomera, the massive Teide volcano, nearly high as Mauna Loa, reared up above the snow-line in the distance. Given the basically tropical nature of the islands, the snow-capped mountain was quite a sight.

“We’re just providing support and possibly doing a landing depending on conditions,” Chen said. “At least, that’s what I got. But we’ll be pulling out tomorrow when the recovery teams are supposed to arrive. Is there anything that absolutely needs to be done between now then?”

“There are more weapons and ammunition coming with the support ships?” Villa asked.

“There are,” Chen said. “M4 rifles and an ammo supply. Do you have anyone who can use them?”

“There are two former soldiers among the survivors here,” Villa said. “I know them. They are trustworthy. We can ensure the security of La Playa. I would prefer to be here but it is… large for such a small force. And there are some of the people from the cruise ship who wish to stay as well… ”

“The… I don’t know what you’d call it, sir, but we’d call it a ‘strip mall’ by the ferry dock would make a very solid defensible position,” Januscheitis said. “The upper stories could easily be used as quarters. The downstairs has a bit of glass, but that’s reinforcible easily. And as you ensure the clearance you could probably spread out. Just the little strip center by the Marina Society or whatever would be plenty of room for the time being. Or the ferry building. Again, good defensible position if you board up those ground floor windows.”

“I’d arm up everybody,” Faith said. “You’ll need to think in terms of defense from the infecteds for a while. And it’s hard to know when one will turn up. Just three people out of fifty is… I mean, give them some basic training then I’d arm up
everybody
.”

“There are problems,” Villa said, shrugging. “I will keep your advice in mind.”