I interrupted him. “I don’t care what Mitch said. If we’re family, then you’re going to listen to me when I tell you to do something. Get inside now. Don’t make me tell you again.”
“We should grab Mitch’s gun,” Chuck said, “or at least the grenades.”
I shook my head. “His blood is all over them. Don’t risk getting infected. You got enough ammo?”
“I’m good.”
“Then let’s go.”
Tony, Chuck, and I set off down the passageway. They followed my lead. Somehow, I’d ended up in charge. The professor had been right—my journey was changing me. I hadn’t even been aware of assuming leadership. Just like shooting Mitch. I hadn’t thought about it. I’d just done it. Gone were my fears and my hesitation. I moved with an air of self-assuredness that I’d never possessed. My stride had a grim purpose. The gun felt like an extension of my body. My head was clear. So was my conscience.
We continued working our way forward, staying about five feet apart from each other. I kept the point position, Tony followed me, and Chuck brought up the rear. I clutched the shotgun tightly. My hearing had returned and the ringing in my ears was gone, but there was nothing to hear, anyway. Silence engulfed the ship. The only sound was my heart pounding in my head.
“Did you guys see anyone else?” I asked.
“Chief Maxey and Officer Runkle are on the bridge,” Chuck said. “Or at least they were when I went to bed. They were monitoring the radio, trying to raise any other ships in the vicinity.”
“Did they find any?”
He shook his head.
“So, let’s see.” Tony tilted his head from side to side, cracking his neck. “Carol and the kids are back there, safe. The chief and Runkle are topside. That leaves Nick, Cliff, Murphy, and Tran unaccounted for. Nick and Cliff probably went to sleep. They were watching a movie earlier.”
The ship had a small TV/VCR combo unit that the chief and various security guards had used when the Spratling was tied-up in port. With no broadcast or satellite television signals to pick up, our selections had been limited to repeated viewings of The Wild Geese, Clint Eastwood’s Rile Rider, Tom Skerritt in Bonneville, and Delta Force with Chuck Norris—all on grainy old videotapes. Nick, Cliff, and Turn (when he’d been alive) had been known to argue about who would win in a fight—Chuck Norris or the zombies. My money was on Chuck.
“No telling where Murphy is,” Tony said. “And Tran…”
He trailed off. I knew what he was thinking.
“None of us know shit about him,” I said. “We don’t even know if he’s Korean, Japanese, or Chinese. We just think of him as the Asian guy. That’s pretty fucked-up. He deserves a lot better. I mean, think what it must be like for him. A stranger among strangers, left alive with a bunch of people who don’t speak his language. That sucks.”
Tony grimaced. “Yeah, that’s some life.”
“If he’s even still alive,” Chuck muttered. “Let’s face it, guys. We don’t know how many of us are left—who’s dead and undead.”
The passageway ended at a closed hatch. I opened the hatch and stepped in Nick Kontis.
He’d been shredded. Arms and legs pulled from their sockets, head ripped from the neck, body torn open and his insides scooped out. His clothing was nothing more than rags. His forehead and cheeks had been either slashed or clawed. Long, bloody furrows covered the flesh. Nick’s limbs were partially eaten, gnawed on like turkey drumsticks at Thanksgiving. His blood had been splashed all over the walls, and his guts left a trail down the passageway, as if whoever had been eating them had dropped crumbs every few feet. Despite all of this, Nick was lucky. His attacker had succeeded in smashing his skull open and scooping out the insides. His disembodied head would not be coming back. Nick’s eyes stared up at us.
I raised my foot and examined my sole. The blood hadn’t seeped through. I was okay. No risk of infection—if Nick had even had time to become infected before he was ripped apart. Breathing a heavy sigh of relief, I gingerly picked my way through the slaughter.
“Careful,” I warned. “Don’t touch the walls. There’s blood everywhere. Don’t get it on you.”
Tony and Chuck waded around the mess. Something squished beneath Chuck’s boot heel, and he gagged. He examined the bottom of his foot and turned pale.
“Who do you think got him?” Chuck asked.
“Joan or Alicia,” Tony said. “Or maybe both of them.”
I frowned. “How do you know?”
“Look at the scratches on Nick’s face. Those were made by someone with very long fingernails.”
“So that means we may only have to deal with one more zombie; possibly two, if Basil is dead.”
We crept on. At the next hatch was a red emergency phone that dialed directly into the pilothouse. I picked it up and listened to it ring. On the third ring, Chief Maxey picked up.
“Bridge.” he sounded tired and frustrated.
“Chief, this is Lamar. We’ve got a problem.”
“What’s wrong?”
Quickly, I told him what had happened. The chief responded with a string of creative profanity.
“Where are you now?” he asked when he was done cursing. “There should be a stenciled series of numbers next to the hatch. That will give me your exact location.”
I found them and read the numbers off to him.
“Okay,” he said. “Runkle is on his way down. Continue working your way forward. He’ll meet you guys in the middle. I want all of you to check in with me periodically. Use the emergency phones like the one you’re on now. And Lamar?”
“Yeah?”
“Be careful.”
“Will do.”
I hung up and glanced back at Tony and Chuck.
“They okay?” Tony asked.
I nodded. “Runkle’s working his way toward us from the other end of the ship.”
“By himself?” Chuck snorted. “Dude may be kind of a dick, but super-cop’s got balls.”
I opened the next hatch. “Let’s try to find the rest of the zombies before he does. That way, he won’t have to use those balls.”
The ship suddenly jolted beneath our feet. All three of us reached for the bulkhead to balance ourselves. It felt like the chief had increased our speed. When we were sure that the ship wasn’t going to take a big roll and knock us over, we continued on. As we approached Basil’s berthing compartment, we slowed down. The hatch stood open and the light was on inside. Tony and Chuck flattened themselves against the bulkhead. I crept up to the door and jumped through, holding the shotgun at the ready. The compartment was empty. There was no sign of Basil, and no sign of a struggle. The blanket and sheet were rumpled, and the pillow still held the indentation from where he’d slept. His shoes sat on the floor next to the bed.
“No sign of him,” I said, stepping back out into the passageway. “Let’s try the professor’s room.”
We went back through the hatch—Tony in the lead this time. Basil was waiting for us. He must have been in one of the other compartments. He’d probably heard us and had been stymied by the closed hatch. Basil’s corpse was in good shape—no scratches or bite marks. He’d apparently died in his sleep, even as Hamelin’s Revenge coursed through his veins. His mouth was crusted with blood and he clutched a half-eaten heart—probably Nick’s.
“Fuck!”
Tony raised his rifle and tried to get off a shot, but the zombie was too close to him. The rifle became wedged against the bulkhead. Chuck and I were stuck on the other side of the hatch, and with the struggle taking place in the doorway we couldn’t shoot Basil without hitting Tony. Basil’s arm lashed out and he grabbed the rifle barrel. Tony fought to wrench it away but Basil was stronger. He tugged on the weapon and Tony refused to let go. Basil pulled Tony closer. Before he could get away, Basil’s teeth snapped shut on Tony’s nose. Blood squirted out from between Basil’s lips. We heard cartilage crunching, even over Tony’s agonized screams. Tony released the rifle and shoved Basil away. The zombie stumbled backward, taking Tony’s nose, upper lip, and the soft flesh around his eyes with him. Tony’s shrieks became a high-pitched, unending whine. His skin stretched like taffy before finally tearing free. Basil immediately stopped his attack and greedily devoured it, dropping the intestine and using both hands to shove Tony’s ripped face into his slavering mouth.