Zombie Fever: Evolution (9 page)

Dr. Greer was right: it was more imperative than ever to get Abigail and Jamie to the laboratory in Canada. The serum inside their veins may be the last chance for humanity.

He pushed forward and began jogging towards the brightly lit restaurants of the jetty, knowing he was exposing himself to an unknown number of dangers. But his message to the girls said, “Meet me at Punggol Jetty at Midnight” and he had five minutes to get there on time.
If everything goes according to plan, I’ll find the girls waiting for me. We’ll commandeer a boat and race back across to the Malaysia side to safety.

Even from a distance, Tomas could see that the expanse of interconnected outdoor dining patios was deserted. Chintzy strings of colored Christmas lights hung from the latticework above the decking. Tables covered in pink plastic material, favored by the restaurateurs serving messy cauldrons of seafood, were surrounded by empty chairs. Canto pop blared from speakers at a deafening level. While the patio looked to have five restaurants, each blending with the other, only banks of fish tanks with today’s catch separated them.

As Tomas carefully walked along the creaking deck, scanning the interiors of the restaurants for signs of life, he noticed that as he passed each restaurant that they gradually became smaller and the resin chairs and plastic covering the tables changed to actual wooden chairs and table cloths and then to fine dining glass tables and sculptured chairs. The further in, the more exclusive the restaurants became.

It was when he was checking the interior of the fourth restaurant, a chic five-star affair, that things got interesting. On the white tile floor under the glaring fluorescents swarming with insects was a long streak of blood. There were no footprints or body, only a streak of blood in the aisle between the tables, disappearing behind the bar.

Tomas looked around for a weapon and the best he could come up with was one of the wooden chairs. Holding the chair in front of him, he made his way into the eatery and stopped for a moment next to the bar. He wasn’t sure if he could hear anything because of the obnoxious music, but he thought he
sensed
something.  Setting the chair down, he picked up a barstool made from metal tubing. He counted to three and stepped around the bar, already swinging the barstool towards his unseen foe.

But there was nothing there.

The blood streak stopped behind the bar, but there was nothing else.

Tomas let out a sigh and set the bar stool down. He grabbed a glass, filled it full of water with the bar’s drink gun and pounded it back.

Clink.

There was the sound of dishes being knocked together in the kitchen.

A thin paring knife used to cut limes sat next to the beer taps. Tomas picked it up, then wrapped a towel around his left hand - the idea being to shove his left fist into the zombie’s mouth, then shove the knife through its eye.

He crept up to the kitchen door and peered through the crack.

There was someone inside. It was a waiter in full uniform facing in the other direction, so it was hard to tell if he was infected. He seemed hard at work, his busy hands out of view in the industrial sink. Tomas watched through the slit in the door as the waiter got all twitchy for a minute then continued with whatever it was he was doing in the sink. Suspecting that the waiter wasn’t in his right mind, Tomas backed away from the door and retreated to the deck. He pulled down a string of lights hanging from the ceiling and cut off a three-foot length with the knife.

As Tomas snuck through the kitchen door, the waiter must have heard a noise because he paused what he was doing and cocked his head.

Tomas froze.

As the waiter waited and listened, Tomas noticed he was missing an ear.

Tomas slid behind the waiter, took a deep breath, pulled the sting of lights over his head and began choking the life out of him. The waiter didn’t put up much of a struggle. He more or less pressed his body back against Tomas and banged on the lip of the sink with his open hands.

When it was all over, Tomas laid him on the ground and confirmed he was a zombie. It was obvious really. If the missing ear didn’t give it away, then surely the missing nose did the trick.

Curious to see what the zombie waiter had been working on, Tomas glanced into the sink. There was a mass of organs, crushed and squeezed into a pulpy mass. Whether the remains were human, animal or fish, it was impossible to tell. But this waiter zombie hadn’t been dining on the gore; the whole scene had the look of
preparation.

Tomas tried to wrap his head around this. He recalled the zombie he had beheaded the night before dragging the corpse and now this. Two possible explanations came to him: either zombies infected with IHS-2 were passively following echoes of their previous existence or they retained more than mere rudimentary instincts like those infected with the original strain.
This waiter,
Tomas reasoned,
could have been doing waiter duties, only handling fistfuls of gore in the sink instead of fresh veggies or dirty dishes. Or he may have been up to something nefarious, an action oozing out of a darker understanding.

He checked his watch.

12:20 am.

He hoped Abigail and her friend wouldn’t be late and they could skiff across the strait before the Singapore Coast Guard was the wiser.

If they don’t make it, I have to assume they’re trapped somewhere on the island.

Thirty minutes later and he was worried.

He pulled out Abigail’s headshot photo, stared at it, then turned it over and reread the address and directions he had scrawled on the back to her parent’s apartment about five miles south from his current locale. It didn’t make much sense to stand around and wait or to continue hunting for infected at the jetty so he began searching for transportation. He was sure that she was alive. It was just a matter of locating her whereabouts.

She’s a survivor,
Tomas thought.
She’ll find me if I don’t find her first.

Chapter Seven

Vitura International Research Laboratory Ship

Singapore Strait/International Waters

Jayden and Vines marched through the laboratories on C-deck in search of Eli Henry. Aside from the lab geeks, the rest of the crew avoided C-deck like the plague - because, literally, it was full of plague. Since the christening of the VIRaL, Vitura employees, defense contractors and ship crew made it a point to step a bit faster on the landing of C-deck on their way to the decks below. Stories of human experimentation and vivisection floated along the currents of rumor. There were sea tales of dumping masses of bodies in the churning ocean waters. And there were eye-witness reports of zombies being put through the paces in obstacle courses and used as targets in weapons calibration exercises in the antechamber formerly used as a mess hall for the three thousand plus military personnel that used to inhabit the ship. C-deck made it extra difficult, psychologically, to remain on the vessel for yearlong contracted deployments.

Private Vines kept her eyes forward as they marched down the hallway, letting Sergeant Jayden scan the interiors of the rooms for Eli Henry.

Vines was one of the instructors who took civilian personnel assigned to the ship through an intensive, mandatory six-week program to whip them into shape and give them some emergency training in the event the ship ran into trouble on the high seas or one of the many bio-hazards were accidentally released.

She remembered Eli well.

Eli was one of the worst specimens she had ever taught. He trailed behind the other trainees during physical activities and had a notably sour disposition when it came to classroom training. Eli acted as though he were above it and intentionally failed each day’s worth of exercises and instruction. She had recommended his immediate dismissal from the ship, citing his lack of physical ability and insolent attitude. But, lo and behold, he was put through anyway.
Either he has a unique skill that the Vitura higher-ups require or this is a serious case of nepotism,
she had thought at the time.

Even more troubling, Eli had taken an interest in the Hopper theory of flight. One month into their latest deployment, Eli decided he wanted to be trained on a Hopper and, as Vines was the only Master Hopper Certification Instructor, she was assigned to train him. Vines spent every Thursday and Tuesday evening teaching him the controls and how to analyze vectors. On the day very day he completed the last of his virtual training on the Hopper module, he quit, saying he was too busy to actually fly one.

What a coward
.

“There.” Jayden pointed past an open door to a row of desks. She could make out Eli’s greasy red hair and greasier face. He was leaning back on a chair staring at a screen filled with numbers in one of the cubicles, spooning gobs of Neapolitan ice cream from an oversized bucket into his gaping maw.

“I’ll get him.”

Vines walked up behind him and slapped the back of his head with the back of her gloved hand. Ice cream and spoon went flying into the screen, the spoon ricocheting off the top of the monitor and smacking against the back wall of his cubicle. He turned around, more afraid than angry, rubbing the back of his head. “Jeez, Vines. You really had to do that?”

“Get up. Time you earned your wings.” She slapped down an order sheet in the event he became resistant. “This is where you earn your salary, Eli. You’re hopping with us into Singapore to retrieve samples. Read your orders before you start whining.”

Eli read the sheet, his red complexion turning a ghostly pale, “But Vines, I’ve never taken one on a real flight. You know that. Going on a night flight into zombie territory is too much. If the hop doesn’t kill me, I’m sure to be viciously torn apart and eaten. I can’t go. I won’t go. I need to make a call.” He snatched a com-link from the desk and shoved it in his ear. Vines smacked him up the side of the head again and the com-link flew across the desk.

“No time for that Eli. We’re on a deadline. Get your lazy ass out of that chair before I beat you to death in front of your colleagues. Do you want that, Eli?” She grabbed him by the collar, pulled him upright and shoved him towards Sergeant Jayden who was leaning on the doorstop grinning.

The entire way to the armory, Eli griped and resisted and Vines continued to propel him forward, “Why me? I can’t help you. I’m not even a biologist. Can’t you see there’s been a mistake?” he whimpered.

“Never should have trained for Hopper flight, dumbass,” Vines laughed, “That makes you uniquely qualified for this mission--chickens are coming home to roost.”

Jayden stayed back a couple paces. His mind was on their targets. He had allowed himself thirty minutes to study the two girls’ files and as much information about Singapore topography as he could get his hands on. Jayden concluded that the girls were most likely innocent and were merely in the wrong place at the wrong time when they were captured at the field hospital in Mersing. In his opinion, Bertrand was making assumptions and leaps of logic that were astounding when it came to Tomas Overstreet and Qual Pharmaceuticals. He must have lingering anger over Tomas’ infiltration of Vitura San Diego Campus four years ago when he destroyed a large chunk of their research and burned most of the compound to the ground. Not to mention Dr. Greer’s defection. Dr. Greer had been Bertrand’s top scientist, and he took it hard when he found out she was working against the company. In any event, his orders were to take the girls prisoner and bring them back to the ship. And if Tomas happened to show his face, Jayden would also bring him back alive along as a trophy.

Jayden and Vines assembled their gear for the operation, slinging XM-8 battle rifles with plasma torch attachments, standard issue TSD pistols and plenty of ammo. They toyed with the idea of packing explosives but decided against them as this was primarily a retrieval mission.

Meanwhile, Eli was having a devil of a time squeezing into his bio-rated tactical response combat fatigues, his chunky rear end poking over the back of his pants as he jumped up and down trying to pull them on. Then his zipper on the lining of the jacket kept catching in his unsightly belly hair.

The panel above the doorway began flashing green. “Sergeant Jayden, please report to the Jump Deck.” 

“Time to fly.” Jayden gripped Vines’ gloved hand one more time. He had every confidence in her abilities as a soldier. Bertrand had requested her by name and there wasn’t a finer close-combat fighter on the ship or anyone else more capable of attending to their slovenly companion.

Nearly an hour was consumed with checks and rechecks of their equipment. By the time they had geared up and were cleared for the jump, Jayden was on edge and felt a high degree of foreboding at the idea of entering a hot zone with someone as incompetent as Eli Henry.

The three prepped wing-packs hanging on the rail along the wall waiting for their handlers could have been mistaken for parts of the bulkhead. Hoppers didn’t look like much when they were on lockdown. They were only about the size of a military assault pack painted in color-shifting camouflage with long thin wings retracted downward to floor.

Vines saw that Eli’s scientific equipment was stowed tight across his chest and closely inspected his Hopper to make sure it was in tip-top mechanical condition.

Specialist Crawford, the jump technician and Jayden’s longtime poker buddy, gave the all clear to merge with their Hoppers.

Vines helped lean Eli against the first of the packs. When it sensed its pilot, four flexible arms stretched around his torso and two others slid over his shoulders, locking the device securely onto his back. Thin spindles dangling from the bottom found his legs and attached at the thigh and upper calve. The spindles allowed the pilot to walk with some stability while wearing the two hundred pound device and retracted the operator’s legs to a more comfortable horizontal position during flight.