“Have you done this before, Private?” Henry asked.
“No, well, yes sir… in a compromised DDC but not aboard a ship,” Tobias replied.
“Okay then, you have an idea of what to expect. If you need a hand or have any questions, you just ask me, okay?”
“Yes, sir,” Tobias nodded.
Henry felt the tension within the room diminish slightly. Even the military security seemed to walk easier knowing there was an experienced doctor in charge. In truth, as much as he had wanted to help fellow triage staff, he had acted more for his own sake. He always felt better and performed better when he knew someone was relying on him. Certainly, the wounded would rely on him to do his best to save their life, but it wasn’t the same. Henry wasn’t so much a natural leader as he was a natural authority — he always projected a confidence in his decisions, even when he didn’t feel that confidence himself. His heart slowed at the thought that—whatever the next few hours brought—the men and women in this room would be looking to him to inform their decisions.
He fished into his pocket, pulled out his cellular phone, and flipped it open. The cellular networks had been down for months, and even if they had been up, the aircraft carrier itself was impervious even to the most sophisticated electronic signals. Still, he thumbed through his contacts to the name of his wife — and punched the letters into his clumsy text message.
“I love you Kelly,” he typed before hitting send. The message wouldn’t send, but he had to go through the motions anyway. He hadn’t seen or heard from his wife in far too long, and the vague hope that maybe she’d get his text was enough to give him a small measure of comfort.
The chaotic shouting and hurried noise of the first arriving casualties echoed through the hall outside. Rescue helicopters were beginning to land, deploy their bloody cargo, and then take to the air again in a cycle that would last through the rest of the battle and well afterward. Henry could feel his adrenaline rise in terrified anticipation and he turned to look at Audrey and Private Tobias.
“We’ll do fine. I’ve got your back,” he reassured them. “Ready?”
The two nodded back.
Chapter 3
Dr. Kelly Damico gently nudged the shoulder of the sleeping man curled in his cot. His chest rose and fell almost imperceptibly beneath a thin blue blanket. “Liam?”
Liam stirred, and then slowly opened his eyes. It took a moment for him to recognize the silhouette speaking. “Hey, Dr. D, I was dreaming. I was dreaming about… home.”
“How are you feeling?” Kelly whispered. Liam was but one of over a dozen patients in various stages of terminal illness that had sought refuge within the Tierrasanta DDC. Some slept soundly, others shifted restlessly in their cots, but all were hooked to medical equipment that carefully monitored their vital signs. When the apocalypse began and the public health system broke down, critically and terminally ill people had been shuffled between hospitals and hospice care before finally arriving at various DDCs around the city. Nurses, doctors, and clinicians, who were charged with the responsibility for screening occupants, rationing access to healthcare services, and managing supplies and medicine, were also thrust into a moral grey area: in a world where the dead rose to murder the living, what should be done with the terminally ill? It was hard enough to turn away someone who had clearly been bitten by the walking dead and had only a few hours or days before the infection took them. Working in a DDC, required staff to make impossible decisions, but dumping a dying cancer patient into the street to be torn apart so someone else could have their cot, simply wasn’t going to happen.
“I’m tired. Let me sleep,” Liam replied. Liam was in his late thirties, and he had spent over two years on the organ donor list waiting for a kidney. When the dead stopped staying dead, organ donations ceased, and everyone on earth waiting for a liver, lung, or heart, was served a double dose of hopelessness. Not only was the world falling apart, but they were also guaranteed to join the mindless legions tearing it down eventually. As bleak as things were, and despite all the horror around them, someone who was healthy could still cling to some tiny shred of hope. For the extremely ill, there was none.
Kelly wondered if she should have simply tried to transport Liam while he slept. “We have to move you. Just lie still and we’ll carry your cot with you in it.”
Liam had months to prepare for the inevitable. Since being removed from dialysis, he had deteriorated gradually, but Liam had been healthy enough to stay with the general population. Now, his vital signs were getting low enough that he needed to be quarantined for everyone’s safety.
“I’m going back to sleep,” Liam sobbed. He knew why and where they were moving him. The abandoned space connected to the clinic had been a music store, and once the shelves and racks were moved, served as an additional living quarters for the Tierrasanta DDC’s seventy-nine occupants. Within the back office area, was a soundproofed room that had been used to record music or shelter office workers from the trendy pop tunes blasting up front. Today, it was an execution chamber.
A soldier at Liam’s head and one at his feet carefully hoisted his cot up, and they quietly made their way through the room of sleeping people toward the office hallway. Kelly led with her flashlight. She was glad, at least, that the darkness would hide her tears. Liam, she knew, would die relatively peacefully. As the toxins in his blood built up, he would slip into serene unconsciousness and pass away — dealing with the terminally ill was bad enough, but it was the toll this task took on the few remaining soldiers that was unbearable. A few weeks ago, a convoy had arrived and requisitioned the bulk of the remaining ammunition. Up to that point, the deceased would be shot in the head to ensure they would not reanimate. They would then be removed from the soundproof room, and dumped out a window onto a pile of corpses that was well out of view of anyone within the DDC. It was a barbaric task that had visibly numbed all involved. Now, low on ammo, the soldiers had taken to using combat knives to do the dirty work, and it was a responsibility that they drew straws to avoid.
The soldiers set Liam’s cot down in the soundproof room and then left in silence. A third soldier stood in a far corner, knife in hand, with an emotionless expression on his face.
Kelly placed a reassuring hand on Liam’s shoulder and felt his body shudder with sobs. “If you need anything, let the guard know.” She then turned to the soldier who stood ready to do what needed to be done. Since the nightmare began, she had gotten to know each of the warriors who protected the DDC from the wandering dead outside. “Private Stenson, if you need anything, let me know.”
Private Stenson nodded. Everyone had seen the living transform into the living dead, but this was different. There was something that deadened the soul watching the weakest and most vulnerable lay helpless, as death took them and the infection of undeath took control. The quicker it happened, the better, and the quieter, the better. Liam, she hoped, would be both quick and quiet.
She left the room, closed the door, and tiptoed down the dark hallway. She contemplated Private Stenson as she made her way past dozens of sleeping refugees crammed into every conceivable space. He had been with the first military group to arrive — terrified, confused, and green as an 18-year old soldier could be, but he hardened quickly. Months passed and when it eventually became clear that the war against the undead would be lost, he had called his parents in Nebraska. Soldiers were deserting in droves to protect their neighborhoods and families and he wanted to get an idea of the situation back home.