He led us below to a small locked compartment and pulled out a ring of keys. “We do have small arms on board for just in case, but like I said they aren’t top of the line.” He pulled the moonshine out of the bag, slid them into his uniform cargo pockets, and passed me the bag. “Feel free to take anything that will fit in this in addition to a rifle.”
I was struck by how similar this situation was to that scene in Boondock Saints. Marion and I walked into the compartment, which was stocked with tactical stuff; most of it outdated, and began rooting around. “Chief,” I called out the door. “I know you said your stuff is outdated, but what in the world are you doing with an M-14?”
He stuck his head inside the door “The skipper used to let the guys go swimming back when we were after pirates in the Indian Ocean before all this bullshit. We had a gunners mate in one of the boats with that on the lookout for sharks. Go ahead and take it, no one is going get a swim break any time soon.”
“No thanks chief, it’s a little hefty for our line of work.”
Instead I passed Marion am AR chambered in .22 and began putting the magazines and a few boxes of ammo into the bag. I managed to sneak in some 5.56 to replace what Ethan and William had traded, and some 9mm for my carbine. There was no .45 for my sidearm. I also grabbed a pair of M9 pistols and some mags and ammo for Marion. I could also use the mags in my carbine, so I grabbed a few more.
I loaded some other gear and a camelbak into the bag, thanked the chief and headed back to the mess deck to see if there was any chow left or lady sailors for that matter. I hoped Ethan and William didn’t already have the pick of the litter. Then I thought what’s the point, Markus has already made his rounds, and I certainly don’t want his sloppy seconds.
Discouraged by that thought, I decided I wasn’t that hungry yet. On the way back to our berths I ran into Markus, so I did what any good commander would do in this situation and decided to conduct a little experiment.
“Hey Markus, I’ve got some stuff to do, would you show Marion around and introduce her to everyone.” I did not get the impression that Marion was the type of person to be easily seduced, but I wanted to see how she would react to Markus’ advances anyway.
I stopped in our compartment, dumped my gear on the floor, and changed into my running shorts. Sterett was designed with hangers for two helos, but due to shortages she had only one. The extra space was set up as a makeshift gym. It was actually pretty well stocked with equipment and I jumped on a treadmill for two hours of Zen.
Before all this started I was a cross country runner, I ran marathons and those obstacle races like Tough Mudder and even a zombie themed race called Run for Your Lives. Now running was pretty much the only way I could unwind. I don’t care what Mel Brooks says, it’s not good to be the king.
Chapter 7
After I ran my leisurely 13 miles I decided it was time for a nice hot shower. I went to the head, set my cell phone alarm for 3 minutes and jumped in under the water. The one good thing about only having half the normal crew was that I could take twice as long for my Navy shower.
From there I got dressed, the usual, jeans and a t-shirt, loaded .45 tucked in its holster out of habit, and headed for the mess deck. On the way I passed Baublitz lying under some sort of machine, maybe a dynamo, or condenser, while a sailor passed him tools. Bull had been in the hanger/gym power cleaning an absurd amount of weight.
I went out onto the main deck and Ethan and William were there with Marion helping her get a feel for her modified rifle, and taking practice shots at zombies on the shore. The two of them were ribbing each other constantly.
I crossed to the other side of the ship and stepped through another door. In the corridor I ran into Markus just as an attractive female marine (I know, I didn’t know they existed either) shook her head and walked away from him. I asked, “Markus, where did you get that black eye?”
He said, “Man, I don’t wanna talk about it,” and turned to walk in the other direction.
That was the first time I had ever know a woman to reject him, well I guess it was the second time that I knew of, because I had a pretty good idea who gave him the shiner. As soon as he was out of sight I laughed for good long while.
This mission had been more of a vacation so far, it was the longest I’d gone without being threatened by a zombie or Reaver in at least a year. I was just starting to feel good and believe that I was a great leader. On the mess deck Walls was reminiscing with some other Marines about his time at Gitmo. I walked over to the serving line. There was a salad bowl on the counter that reminded me I was supposed to do something… but what?
“Oh shit! I left that rabbit in my gear several hours ago!” I exclaimed as I grabbed a literal handful of salad and ran from the compartment amid stares of confusion.
One of the stewards yelled after me “You can’t take food from the mess deck!”
The door of our berthing compartment was wide open. I went in and began to frantically search, waving a leaf of lettuce around. “Here bunny bunny bunny, who’s a good bunny rabbit?” no response (do rabbits ever respond?) Penny wasn’t where I had left her, in the dump pouch of my MOLLE vest heaped on the deck. I couldn’t decide if that was a good thing or a bad thing.
After searching our berthing compartment and finding no sign of Penny I decided she must have gotten out. I walked to the open door and wondered if she could even jump over the knee knocker. She must have been able to. I started to search around the passageways and opened doors to see if I could find her.
Eventually I reached a dead end with an open hatch in the deck, I was thoroughly lost, and not even sure if rabbits could use ladders, but I went down anyway. There was only one door, it was closed, and I opened it. Inside it was dark and didn’t smell like the rest of the ship, and then I saw eight red points light up in four pairs. They started moaning.
I jumped back through the door and went to close it, but the zombies were already coming out. A marine guard slid down the ladder screaming “Don’t open that door!”
Too late. I don’t know where he had been, but he certainly wasn’t where he was supposed to be. We both drew our pistols and started firing. We got off two rounds a piece, maybe three, and dropped the first two zombies, but the rounds that missed started to ricochet around the compartment. If we had hollow point rounds this would not be an issue, but we did not.
I don’t know if the guard was hit by a ricochet and stopped shooting, or if the ricochets just made him cease fire and that’s how the zombies got to him, but one way or another he went down under a zombie. I started moving backwards, but tripped over some nautical device which was protruding from the deck. The fall knocked the wind out of me and my .45 went flying.
As I struggled for breath I fumbled for the Gerber pocket knife in my back pocket. Just as I retrieved it a zombie dropped on top of me. I swung the knife into his forehead and put a divot in its putrid skin but the blade did not penetrate. Stupid, stupid, that part of the skull is one of the thickest, I knew that.
I was holding it by the neck with my left hand and it was using all its weight to push itself closer and closer to my exposed neck. Too bad I didn’t have one of those uniforms with the Kevlar sewn in and the neck guard.
This time I swung the knife at the corner of the skull. The blade buried three inches deep, directly behind, and at a right angle to, the eye socket. I tried to pull it out, but it was stuck. The last remaining zombie stood up and began to move towards me, then the marine guard stood up and also began to shamble in my direction.
I pushed the body off and stood up; looking frantically for a weapon as the two zombies came closer.