Dead Air (Book One of The Dead Series) (22 page)

The Joint Chiefs considered this. Up to this point they had focused their energies on dealing with the crisis at hand and had not given much thought to the bigger picture. With renewed
enthusiasm at the thought of America coming out on top after the dead have been dealt with, they leaned forward, eager to hear what the Chairman had to say.

"We would still be dealing with the undead menace when we send expeditions into foreign countries
but we wouldn’t have to worry about world opinion or the threat of nuclear retaliation. In fact, we could deploy strategic, small-yield nuclear devices ourselves as we saw fit. The United States could come out of this as the only super power in the world."

He let this sink in for a minute before saying, "But until Tuesday, we need to hold things together here before they get to
o far out of hand..."

Washington, DC:

Blocks away from the seat of power of the United States lies some of the poorest
, most densely packed ghettos in North America. Although not the worst in the world, they are still a breeding ground for drugs, violence and the other assorted crimes that plague civilization when too many people with too little money congregate in too small an area.

Every large population center in the world has its ghettos, slums and housing projects where entire families share one room and take turns sleeping in whatever space they can find.
Places where groups of addicts congregate unnoticed in abandoned buildings and where the homeless pack the alleys and doorways seeking shelter.

It
’s in these downtrodden areas where the HWNW Virus thrives. Here, law enforcement doesn’t shoot down the dead, for in the slums of America they aren't exposed. The people of Washington D.C. have an ingrained distrust of the police and social services, so most outbreaks of HWNW go unreported. When someone who is infected dies and comes back as a reanimated corpse, they’re free to prey on those around them until put down by an armed neighbor. But incidents in which the dead are disposed of this way are rare. Because of strict gun control laws, most law abiding residents of Washington D.C. can't own a firearm, so they have to treat the walking dead in the same way that they have always treated the junkies, drug dealers and rapists who populate their streets. They lock their doors and ignore the problem.

This worked for a sho
rt period of time after the first cases of HWNW were reported in the nation's capitol, but as the number of dead grew, the living found themselves barricaded in their homes and apartments, now in an even worse situation than when the druggies ruled the streets. When they came out to go to work or to pick up essential food or medicine they weren't robbed, but were set upon and killed or infected and reanimated to join the hunt for the fewer and fewer sources of food left.

In Washington DC, entire buildings were now populated by the living dead, who roamed their halls and rooms in a dazed shuffle. When the food source was eliminated in their immediate area they had not moved on, instead resisting their urge to feed as a more powerful instinct told them
to wait. The herd mentality told them there was strength in numbers.

Similar scenes like this were
being replayed in cities across the face of the Earth.

Although
some of these enclaves of the walking dead were discovered and eradicated, most went undetected as emergency services broke down. In some cases, due to the attrition of first responders such as police, fire and paramedics, huge congregations of the dead were reported but there was no one left to do anything about them. In these instances, the dead continued to propagate unabated.

In one of the first structures in Washington D.C. to have an outbreak of
HWNW, the only ones left occupying its run down apartments were the dead. Over forty zombies wandered about aimlessly, moaning and shivering in hunger. As if alerted by an unheard signal, slowly in ones and twos they started moving toward the foyer and then out into the street beyond. Here they milled with other groups of the walking dead who filed out of the other buildings lining the roadway. Silence fell across the mass of horribly disfigured corpses as they searched for any sign of food. Soon, the streets of DC became filled with these aberrations, slowly turning in circles as they used their senses to seek out the living.

The wind brought a faint trace of smell to the crowd, causing
the zombies to turn in the direction from which the tantalizing aroma of live flesh came. Those dead at the edge of the mass set off at once, quickly followed by the others.

Shuffling towards the smell of food, these
zombies were joined by others who exited homes, offices and numerous low income housing projects until a virtual army of the living dead staggered through the streets of Washington DC. Converging on one location, they pursued and ate any living thing that crossed their path as they headed for the capitol.

The Secret Service, alerted to the swarm of dead heading in their direction, literally picked the President up off the ground as they carried him to Marine One and safety. The President's
personal security detail boarded the helicopter with him, leaving the rest of the contingent to help protect the Nation’s Capitol.

These men and women joined the Mall police and the remnant
s of the DC police, who had been pushed back by the relentless waves of dead, to form a perimeter around the White House and the Capitol. The locals, bolstered by this influx of firepower of the Secret Service, soon secured their positions and put out a steady, accurate wave of gunfire that kept their deceased attackers at bay.

The Senate and House, which had been in special session passing laws dealing with protecting the Constitutional rights of those who had died and then come back to life
, dissolved into a bleating uproar when news of the approaching horde of dead was announced. In a panic, Congressmen and Senators evacuated their chambers to flee into the streets, demanding that the police protect them and they be transported to safety.

They were told that a combination reaction
/evacuation force of Marines had been summoned from their base at Quantico, Virginia and would be arriving within minutes. They were also told that additional helicopters called from across the Potomac were already preparing to land. They just had to calm down and be patient.

This appeased the politicians momentarily
, so they huddled in small groups, looking about fearfully as the sounds of battle raged around them. Only a few of the elected officials offered their assistance in the defense of the town and the people who nurtured and sustained them, but the majority cowered in fear.

As the first
huge CH-47 transport helicopter came into view, an argument between two Senators both claiming a seat on the evacuation vehicle turned into a fistfight. Others, seeing that they might have to get physical to secure a seat, prepared to do battle with their fellow politicians. None found it strange that they would fight each other to the death to escape but not fight against the zombies to save the city or aide its defenders.

When the
first evacuation helicopter touched down, the elected officials rushed forward as one and mobbed the transport, biting and clawing each other like the things they were trying to flee. A few of the chopper’s crew tried to push some of the politicians off but found themselves pulled out of the transport and trampled by the crowd. The junior Congressman from California forced his way into the cockpit and pointed a pistol he had taken from a dead police officer at the pilot’s head while screaming at him to take off. The pilot hesitated, so the congressman shot him in the neck and turned the pistol on the co-pilot.

Not wanting to argue with the insanely terrified man, the co-pilot started rolling the helicopter forward, trying to get a running start to help gain lift for the overloaded aircraft. The wheels left the ground, but as more elected officials climbed in through the open hatches or grabbed onto the helicopter like le
eches, the aircraft started swaying from side to side. The pilot increased power, but due to lack of maintenance caused by budget cuts initiated and approved by the very people in the helicopter, a hydraulic line burst.

Out of control, tilting to the side and gaining speed as it roared only feet above the ground, the
CH-47 crashed into the mobile command center the police were using to anchor their defenses. The resulting explosion sent a wave of burning wreckage into the perimeter of law enforcement personnel, scattering those it didn't kill instantly.

With their line of defense now shattered, the call went out for the defenders of the
Capitol to fall back to the White House and use its outer fence as the new perimeter. In the ensuing confusion, a few Congressmen who lagged behind, or froze in terror, were set upon by the advancing dead to be torn apart as they squealed.

Forming a new line of defense, the human remnants put out a withering fire that pushed back the dead. A standoff of sorts ensued that would soon be broken by the arrival of the Marines. With their overwhelming firepower
, they would decimate the dead and retake the city.

Three members
of the House of Representatives, who in the chaos of the helicopter explosion had been cut off from their brethren, found refuge in the back of one of the armored vans that had been abandoned by the mall police in their forced retreat. They could hear and see flashes of sporadic gun fire coming from the White House and knew safety lay in that direction, the problem arose in how to get there.

The
Senior Representative from the State of Massachusetts proposed they drive the van through the crowds of zombies to the White House, thus saving themselves from certain death and consumption at the hands of the flesh eaters surrounding them. This was met by debate from the others as to the pros and cons of the plan.

What if they struck and
killed one of the dead? Would they be liable? Who would drive? And when that person was decided on, who would get to ride in front with him?

And the most important question posed by each man, how will I profit personally from these decisions?

This discussion could have gone on well into the night if a zombie with dreadlocks down to his waist hadn't spotted them conducting their circle jerk. Clawing at the front windshield, the Rasta dead soon attracted the attention of other dead who swarmed the van en masse.

Seeing this, the Repres
entative from Massachusetts decided to overrule his fellows by jumping into the driver's seat and throwing the still running engine into gear. Flooring the gas, he ran over dreadlocks and two other living dead as he steered wildly in the direction of the White House. With the taxpayers footing the bill for his chauffeured Lincoln Town car, the Congressman was not used to having to drive a vehicle. In a series of fits and starts he would over-speed before braking suddenly, throwing the two men in the rear around like dice being shaken in a cup. On one of his braking maneuvers, two zombies latched onto the push bar at the front of the van and started raking their hands across the windshield. This further unnerved the already panicked Congressman, so he swerved wildly as he bounced onto Pennsylvania Avenue before flooring the gas again as he shot toward the wall surrounding the White House. Fishtailing, he regained control and sped off, paralleling the perimeter barrier.

Trying to find a gap in the fence that would lead him to safety, the Congressman took his eyes off the road for an instant. As he did this, he leaned over and turned his head to tell the others in the back to hang on. His twisting movement caused the van to yaw right and strike the curb at sixty miles an hour. The right front wheel bounce
d up as the rear end spun around, flipping the armored van onto the fence and tearing out a section forty feet long. Coming to rest upside down, the vehicle exploded, carving out another twenty feet.

Amazingly, the three politicians survived the crash
but were now being slowly roasted alive. Their screams of pain and terror were like a beacon to the dead.

Converging on the breach, the dead avoided the flames as they swarmed onto the Presidential grounds by the thousands. Through she
er weight of numbers, they rapidly overwhelmed the defenders and were soon inside the White House itself, eating police and politicians alike. With nowhere left to run, the small remnant of humans not killed in the initial assault forced their way onto the roof where they secured the access doors behind them to await rescue.

One of their number, a lobbyist for the insurance industry, had been bitten in the original melee'
at the capitol and hidden the wound from the others, not wanting to be left behind or executed. Cowering behind a heating duct, the virus took him and turned him. He emerged from his hiding place and staggered over to a stairway door, which he unlocked and flung open, letting his kinsmen onto the roof.

The pilo
t of the lead Blackhawk dispatched to relieve the siege of Washington D.C. hovered over the scene of carnage that was the White House. Everywhere he looked, inert dead bodies were being torn apart and eaten by animated dead bodies.

Diverting the rest of his flight to the Pentagon
in order to secure that structure, he flew a search grid over the area as he looked for survivors. After a fruitless hour of this, he noticed his fuel was getting low and radioed for permission to return to base, adding to his request that there was no one left alive on the ground.