Dead Air (Book One of The Dead Series) (43 page)

Steve wanted to tell his new neighbor where he could
put his gold, but his radio crackled to life as Tick-Tock called, distracting him from the crazy man.

"Now when I say boom
, boom you all say, out go the lights," Tick-Tock sang.

Smiling, Steve pushed the transmit button and asked, "What's the matter, are you afraid of the dark?"

"Nooo, just what's in it," came Tick-Tock's reply.

Heather broke in saying, "Everyone meet on the twelfth floor, over."

"She sounds so professional on the radio," Tick-Tock said, "maybe we should do that."

"Do what?" Steve asked as he headed for the stairs.

"Say over." Tick-Tock replied.

"Do what?" Steve repeated.

"Say over." Tick-Tock said.

"Do what?" Steve said and they both broke up laughing.

"Children -." Heather said.

Steve rounded the corner
and found Heather and Brain waiting by the door to the stairs. Heather gave him a disapproving look, so he smiled disarmingly at her until she finally smiled back. Shaking her head, she said, "Give a kid a toy..."

Tick-Tock and Susan joined them
, and they went over how they would search the offices on the floors that were now almost pitch dark. Deciding they would have to leave the doors open behind them to let light into the dark hallway to augment the weak illumination provided by the emergency lights, they split into two teams of three so that the third person could watch their rear to make sure none of the dead might have waited for them to pass by before coming out. It would take longer to search the building this way but would be safer.

As they discussed the details of their plan, they were unaware of the small figure listening to them from inside the stairwell.

***

For days she had been hiding on the eleventh floor, eating candy and microwave food taken from desks in the offices her daddy leased. Her father had brought her here on Sunday evening and ordered her to wait for him until he returned. He explained that he was going to try and buy them some food
, if he could find a grocery store that was still open. He also reminded her that all strangers were dangers and to stay away from them. She waited as patiently as she could but by Monday afternoon her daddy had not returned, and she had gotten so hungry she thought she would faint. Remembering that her daddy's secretary kept candy bars in her desk, she snuck one out and ate it. Feeling guilty because she’d stolen it, she had written an IOU and put it in place of the missing candy, promising in the note that she would replace the item as soon as she received her allowance. Feeling that she had done the right thing, she checked some of the other desks when she grew hungry again Monday night. Finding a wide assortment of lunch type meals that her daddy's employees had brought in, each time she took something, she left a note promising to replace it.

She had seen on the news that bad people were going around biting each other and she knew this was true. Her little brother had been bitten and had to be taken away after he went crazy and hurt her and her mommy. That was the reason her daddy had brought her to the office. He had said something about keeping her safe until he
could find out more about what was going on with the disease.

She found a radio to keep her company
but was scared by what the people on it were saying, so she turned it off. She kept herself amused by playing games on a computer and reading the stacks of magazines she found in peoples’ desks. Although limited to the eleventh floor, she didn't feel confined because her daddy's office stretched along one whole side of the building. With doors connecting the different rooms, she could move from one end to the other without ever going into the hallway. Her only regret was that she didn't have anyone to play with. She decided it would be awesome to have a game of hide and seek in her daddy's offices.

She had though
t she was alone in the building until this morning, when she heard people calling out as they banged open doors. Remembering that all strangers were dangers, she had crawled into the knee space of a desk to hide.

She heard the voices getting closer and felt herself getting more and more scared. The fear made her need to go to the bathroom
, and she thought she would burst when all of the sudden the lights went out.

The loss of light made her tremble, thinking that in the dark the strangers would rush in and grab her. From out in the hall she could hear their voices as they talked and felt relieved when she finally heard them move away.

She waited until she was sure they were gone and then crawled out and peeked out the door. Seeing it was clear, she ran down the hall, making it to the bathroom just in time.

When she was done, she crept out and looked around. The strangers were gone
, but she knew they'd be back soon to look for her. She felt abandoned and helpless, being a ten-year-old girl on her own, and started to cry. Calling herself a baby, she remembered one of her heroes from the books she read. Nancy Drew wouldn't cry like a baby, she told herself. She'd follow the strangers to see what they were doing and then make a plan. Bolstered by this thought, she crept to the stairs, and after a moment's hesitation, went up.

She heard the strangers
’ muted voices through the door and stopped to listen, excitement flowing through her as she eavesdropped on the conversation. When it sounded like the strangers were going to break up and start searching again, she slipped back down the stairs, content now that she knew their plan. All she had to do to avoid them was go to one of the rooms they had already searched in her daddy's office and hide. Once they finished looking in the other offices, she could come out again.

Quietly closing the door to the stairs behind her, she went back and entered her dad's office. Locking the door behind her
, she cut through the connecting doors and in no time was hidden under a desk in the room next to the bathrooms, where she’d heard the strangers searching when they first showed up. She was so sure she wouldn’t be found that in minutes she was fast asleep.

***

Steve flopped down on the couch and announced to Heather, "That's it. The whole building is clear. Besides Harrison, we didn't find anyone else living or dead."

From her position behind Steve's desk
, she replied, "So you're ready to tackle the next project?"

Steve groaned, "Can I tackle you instead and we can wrestle?"

Heather gave him a half smile and said, "Later. Right now you've got to get Brain working on routing power to the coolers in the deli. When he and I got back a while ago, Mary told us that she went down there to get something to eat and they were off. We've got to get them back on before the food spoils."

Oh shit, Steve thought, why didn't I think of that? Consoling himself that at least they had caught the problem before it became a disaster
, he asked, "Why didn't you just tell him to do it?"

"Because you're the boss and I didn't want to overstep my authority,"
she answered. "Besides, I knew you were almost done, so I figured we could go down with him and then you and I could grab a bite to eat."

Heather could see that Steve was less than motivated so she added, "Then after we're done, I considered dragging you back up here, ripping your clothes off
and having my way with you."

Steve turned his head to look at her
. "Really?" He asked.

She nodded and gave him a half smile.

"Brain," Steve yelled loud enough to be heard at the far end of the suite of offices. "We've got a priority problem, so grab your tools and meet me at the stairs."

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Clearwater, Florida:

Steve looked at the map of the St. Petersburg and Tampa area that Jonny G had taped to the wall of the studio and asked, "That's it, that's all that's left?"

The younger man nodded and said, "Those are the only people I could get on the CB. There might be more out there that don't have access to a radio to hear the message we're sending out or who don't have a CB or a radio to call us."

Disappointed in the low number of pins stuck in the map, Steve asked, "Do these include the National Guard units that Marcia was able to raise on the radio Tick-Tock took out of the MRAP?"

"Those are the ones in red," Jonny explained. "The green pins represent non-military."

Steve had hoped to find a larger amount of people holed up and alive when he set Jonny G and Marcia on a project to try and contact as many survivors by CB and short wave radio as they could. Every hour, whoever was on air would broadcast from KLAM the channel that they were monitoring on the CB and the frequency they were tuned into on the military radio, so Steve expected to be swamped with calls. Instead, he found himself facing a map showing the locations of twenty-seven living, breathing groups of humans scattered across the area. He’d thought the situation was bad, but not this bad.

The song Jonny was playing started to wind down
, so he held his hand up for Steve to wait and turned on the microphone to speak.

"That was
‘Kashmir’ by Led Zeppelin, going out to my loyal listeners on Clearwater-Largo Road. Stan and Miko, glad you're still around. Hang in there and stay tuned to the G-man while I keep you all up to date on the latest happenings in Hillsborough and Pinellas County. I'm taking requests for the last two hours of the show, so contact me now on channel nineteen on your CB and tell me what you want to hear. Coming up, I've got a long, commercial free set going out to the nurses at Bay Front Hospital. Those lovely ladies in white also asked me to relay some information to anyone who can hear me. If you're trying to reach the hospital by foot, don't bother. The area is crawling with Z's. You might be able to make it by car, and if you do, pull into the emergency room turn around and lay on the horn. You’ll be directed to an area with the least amount of dead clustered around it and taken by harness up to the roof. This is the only way anyone will be admitted to the building. They also asked me to remind you that Bay Front is no longer a refugee center. It is still treating people, but for medical emergencies only. Once you're done, you've got to leave. They are also no longer doing house calls. The last doctor who tried it was eaten, so that kind of put the kibosh on that. Tune in at the top of the hour and I'll have all the latest reports from around the Bay area, and don't forget to listen in at six o'clock tonight when Steve Wendell and Heather Johansen give out the latest survival tips. This is the G-man live, and still alive, on KLAM music radio where we play the best classic and alternative rock in the world."

Jonny
cued the next song and leaned back in his chair saying, "You need to get a radio name, man."

"How about Steve
-zilla," Steve suggested sardonically.

Jonny leaned forward as his eyes lit up, "That would be so cool. We could do a voice over on
‘Godzilla’ by Blue Oyster cult so it says Steve-zilla and you could play it at the beginning of your show."

Steve's laugh was cut short by the crackling of the CB. Before Jonny could answer
, Steve said, "Keep trying to contact people, and come get me if you come across anything new." He turned to go but stopped and gave Jonny a smile, "Keep up the good work G-man. We're the last station on the air, so people need us. You're helping them stay alive."

Jonny
sat up straighter in his seat and donned a serious expression as he reached for the CB microphone.

Steve exited the studio and headed for his office. Sticking his head in the door he saw Heather collecting the last of her belongings.

"Ready?" He asked her.

"Just finishing packing," She replied. "It'll be nice to have a little privacy."

Three days earlier, while she and Brain were searching the fifteenth floor to make sure it was unpopulated by the dead, Heather had come across a room that had been done up more like a hotel suite than an office suite. Thinking ahead, she turned to Brain and said, "I've got dibs on this once things settle down around here, and you're my witness that I called it first."

With a slight smile Brain asked, "Nesting?"

Shutting the door and locking it before any of the others could see, she replied, "Something like that. Promise me you won't say anything to Steve before I get a chance to check out what else is in there."

"My lips are sealed, Heather." Brain promised.

She didn't get a chance to explore the suite until the next day and was amazed by what she found.

The outer room she had first seen with Brain was decorated like a living room, with a grouping of sofas and chairs around a huge flat screen television on the right
, and the entire left wall taken up by a mahogany bar and kitchenette. Comfortable leather chairs with lights above them were scattered around, giving the overall effect of a reading room in a gentleman's club. This was further alluded to by bookcases, which lined the entire back wall and were set between three doors leading from the suite.

Even though they had checked this floor for the dead the previous day, Heather was
still cautious as she opened the first door leading off the living room. Shining her flashlight inside, she saw it was a full bathroom with an upright, glass enclosed shower and a six foot jetted tub. She was ecstatic with her find. No more using the twelfth floor's common bathroom and having to take what passed for a shower. Opening the cabinet door of the vanity, she was pleased to find a small water heater.