Zombie Killers: Ice & Fire (14 page)

Chapter 2

I met them at a field a few miles south of Halifax two days later. As soon as they got off the CH-53, I pulled their patches off of their OD jackets, which matched my own. Then I grabbed them in a bear hug.

Ethan pushed me away and asked, “What the hell is going on?”

“Yeah, why did we just pay that pilot eight ounces of gold to fly us from Maryland to Canada?” inquired William.

“We’re getting out of here,” I said to my cousins. “Grab your bags, we have to leave now. I’ll explain everything on the way.”

We piled into a Jeep I had “borrowed” and headed back towards town. Ethan was driving, I had shotgun, and William was in the back with the bags. As we pulled away, the big military helicopter lifted off. I can’t imagine how the pilot was going to explain his extra trip to his superiors, but for a half pound of precious metal, I’m sure he would find a way.

“So what have you guys been up to since I left?” I asked.

“We have been working with the river patrol boats along the Chesapeake.” Ethan replied.

“We each spent some time back west training. He went to some advanced field medic thingy, and I went to some marksmanship thingy.” William chimed in.

“I survived a helicopter crash a few weeks ago, and had to hold out until a rescue chopper showed up, but other than that, I’ve just been doing these speeches. But I’m done with that now.”

“So you finally got permission to start back up IST-5?” William asked.

“If that were the case, do you think we would have had to get smuggled into Canada?” Ethan retorted as he maneuvered the jeep around some debris on the poorly maintained road.

“I found us another job. We are going to meet a friend by the harbor, and he’ll give us the details. How’s Task Force Raven looking?”

“Not great. Supplies and manpower are scarce; it’s all being diverted up North. Something big must be going on near New York. There has been an increase in anti-American activity all around the Virginia part of the Bay, too. We’ve lost a couple of patrol craft in that area, and they probably weren’t all caused by zombies or mechanical failures.” William said as Ethan concentrated on avoiding the worst of the potholes.

“Sounds rough. How are CWO Magann and the rest of the crew?”

“They’re all doing well. They got us to the chopper, so we could get up here. The
Sterett
has seen better days, though. There just isn’t enough crew on her to maintain the ship. Plus, someone dropped several mortar rounds or something like that on her the other week. The ship is fine, but the fact that someone is launching artillery at a Navy destroyer is disturbing.”

“Any idea who did it?” I asked.

“If command knows, they haven’t told any of us. They aren’t going on the offensive, either; they’re pulling people back.”

“That bad, huh?”

“Yeah, that bad.”

With that somber revelation, conversation ceased as we drove through Halifax towards the waterfront bar. I ducked down, trying to remain incognito behind my sunglasses, even though it was an overcast day. Ethan, William, and I all had different dads, but they were brothers, so although our features were similar, I was confident neither of them would be mistaken for me.

Chapter 3

The three of us walked into the pub and sat at the same table I had
been at the other day. After about a minute, the small, muscular guy I had met before swaggered out of the bathroom and joined us at
the table. He was much shorter and thinner than any of us Pollocks, but he
was clearly well built. He had a fair complexion and a boyish face,
which looked at least ten years younger than his actual mid-twenties
age.
“G’day mates.” He said as he approached, then, after sizing each of us
up, he said, “This country has a smaller gene pool than I thought.”
“It’s because we are related. These are my cousins, Ethan and
William,” I said to him, then turned and said “Ethan, William, this is
Adam Soley, formerly of Her Majesty’s Special Air Service”
“Good to meet you. Had to ask about your resemblance, I was afraid all
our colonies had the same kind of inbreeding as Australia.”
“Formah col’nies, gov’nah,” Ethan corrected, in his best cockney accent.
“You know, the ones that won those world wars,” William added.
“When you finally decided to join the fighting,” Adam retorted, before
turning to me and adding, “Touchy bunch; let’s get down to business.”
“Right. The reason I called you guys up here is because I’m leaving,
and I wanted you to come with me. I’m done with being a propaganda
tool.”
“Well, you are a tool. Where are we going?” William asked.
Adam continued with the details, “I run a private security detachment
which specializes in protecting ships from piracy. Because of our
relative safety from zombies, England has been a major transportation
hub these past couple of years. The new arsenal of democracy, if you
will. However, piracy has been a major issue of late, so I’ve been on
the lookout for some chaps to help me guard container ships sailing
through the North Sea. The last group of chaps I sailed with got into
a bit of a scrap with the locals, and are being detained, so I need a
new team.”
“When do we sail?” asked Ethan.
“Later today,” I responded.
“Let’s do it,” said William.
“Ace!” said Adam, in what I assume was some sort of exclamation of excitement.
We got up to grab the bags from the jeep, and head down to the dock,
when two guys in American ACU’s pushed through the door.
They didn’t take notice of us sitting in a dark corner of the fairly
crowded bar, and instead, walked up to the bar. The bigger of the two said to the bartender, “We are looking for
someone who went AWOL a couple of days ago.”
Ethan silently moved over to the door and checked outside, then turned
back to us and shook his head, indicating there were no more MPs
outside. He continued to watch our backs and keep open our escape route. Adam was walking towards the bigger MP at the counter.
Reaching into my pocket, I pulled out my taser and handed it to
William. He flipped the safety off and concealed it under his jacket,
as he walked up to the counter, next to the smaller MP. I reached down to my waist and thumbed off the safety on my 1911.
Better safe than sorry.
I walked up behind the two MPs, who were now showing a rather
unflattering picture of me (Of all my pictures, why do they always use that one?) to the bartender.
 

Tapping them each on
the shoulder, I said, “Excuse me; I believe you left the headlights on in your Humvee.” They
looked at me dumbfounded for a second, trying to process their great
good fortune. This took no short amount of time for them to do. As
much respect as I have for the military, I find security personnel
tend to be strong like oxen, and smart like tractors. That is to say, I
don’t think either of these MPs had a double digit IQ.
After a few seconds of stunned silence, the smaller MP reached out to
apprehend me. William pushed the button on the taser, and jabbed it
into his back with a crackling sound. He spasmed to the ground, and
William tased him again for good measure.
Meanwhile, the bigger MP finally started to react, only to be set upon
by Adam. The small Englishman jumped up on his back and wrapped his
arm around the MP’s neck, then held on like a bull rider at a rodeo.
After half a minute of thrashing around and comically groping at the
diminutive foreigner on his back, the big soldier fell to his knees, then crumpled forward onto his face. Adam rode him all the way down.
“Bloody brilliant!” he said.
“I don’t want any trouble,” said the bartender holding his hands up
over his head.
“Sorry about that” I said, genuinely sympathetic. “We’ll be out of your
hair in a minute, and you won’t hear from us again.” I laid a gold broach I had been saving as currency down on the counter for his
trouble, and turned to walk out.
Adam and William were taking the MP’s pistol belts and searching their
pockets for other useful gear. I walked out with Ethan to search their
Humvee.
No sooner had we started going through the stuff in the bed of the
vehicle than the radio crackled to life.
“Any sign of him? Did you find him yet?” Came the unmistakable high
pitched whine of Lt. Dimick’s voice, micro managing as always.
I keyed the button and responded in my best Chris Farley voice “Lt.
Dimick, come in. We have information to suggest the fugitive boarded a
helicopter bound south earlier today. Over.”

“
Hahaha, I have him now. Get back to base, I’m going after him.” came
the nasally, evil laugh and scheme. I turned off the radio and set about scavenging supplies from the
vehicle, as Adam and William joined us.
Ethan came around the side of the Humvee carrying several cases of
5.56 ammunition. “Someone grab the SAW from the turret ring.”
Since my hands were free, I grabbed the M249, and we piled the loot into
our borrowed jeep and headed for the cargo ship.
“I can tell, I’m never going to have a dull moment with you Yanks.”
Adam said mirthfully.
“Yeah; you hired us to protect people from pirates, and here we go
looting U.S. military equipment and escaping out to sea.” William said, calling our attention to the irony of the situation.
“At least we aren’t being impressed.” I said.

Chapter 4

My first transatlantic voyage started out uneventful enough. Despite
assurances from Adam that there were no threats on board, I still
couldn’t sleep that first night. (Totally because I was concerned
about having zombies on board, like I had found on
Sterett,
and not at
all because I was seasick.) Eventually, I roamed the entire ship in
order to satisfy my curiosity. Once I finally found my way out of the
forward cargo hold, I made my way back to the compartment where the
four of us were bunking. Eventually I got to sleep.
The only other eventful thing to happen in the North Atlantic occurred the
next morning when Adam brought his dog, Trooper, in to meet us.
Trooper is a two year old English Beagle; short, excitable, and
extremely muscular, and, like Adam, was a small specimen.
No sooner had Trooper entered our room than he started baying and
howling in that uncontrollable way hounds do.
Everything was fine, until someone opened the bathroom door in our
compartment. Penny, my brown Flemish Giant rabbit, came bolting out, and
Trooper took up the chase excitedly. If Trooper was confused about seeing a rabbit that was as big as he
was, he hid it well. For thirty seconds or so, it was pandemonium in the
little compartment, as the four of us tried to catch the two twenty-five pound
animals which were running and jumping and ducking around our gear and
the Spartan furnishings.

Ethan said, “If you don’t get a hold of that stupid dog I will shoot it; the rabbit too.”

“Don’t hate on Troop, he reminds me of our old family dog, Snoopy.”
Finally, Adam caught Trooper by his nylon harness, and I was able to corner
Penny and hoist her up onto the top bunk, out of Trooper’s reach. Trooper sat on the deck and howled up at Penny mournfully, until he was
removed from the room. Trooper would have to spend the rest of the
voyage confined to the main deck, while Penny would rule below decks.
The third pet aboard ship retained her ability to roam free. Blur is
a fat old striped cat with nine lifetimes of experience hunting mice
and rats. If she wasn’t dozing in a passageway underfoot, she was
a probably below deck fighting the infestation of rodents common to
cargo ships like this. Ethan really took a liking to Blur, who could have cared less if
everyone on board was dead. He hated Trooper, but William loved the
unruly hound like it was his own.
The ship was not carrying much cargo. Container ships like this
carried cargo from England all over the world, but usually returned
empty. Oil tankers, on the other hand, came empty from England and
returned full. Most of the oil still being produced in Canada and
Alaska probably went to England, in exchange for the other supplies and
manufactured goods needed to continue the war on the undead.
The voyage was supposed to take a little under two weeks. We sailed
from Halifax northeast in an arc under Greenland and Iceland, towards
the British Isles. In peace time, we might have made for the Clyde, or
somewhere else in southwestern England, but since the outbreak began,
all shipping was diverted to the one-time naval base at Scapa Flo.
That was the one point of access to the United Kingdom. Incoming ships
would be searched by the Royal Navy and quarantined, before being
unloaded, loaded, and sent back to sea.
With the exception of a minor hurricane, the first ten days of the trip
passed uneventfully. We didn’t have any special jobs on board, but we
helped out as best as we could. I spent most of one day replacing
burnt out halogen light bulbs. The others helped out too, as lookouts. One day we repainted a compartment, first chipping away the old paint and rust, then putting an endless number of coats of different stuff, probably all lead based, on the bulkheads.

The food was some of the best I’d had in a long time. I don’t know if
you’ve ever tried Bangers and Mash, but it is to die for, especially
after living off of MREs and expired C-rations.
We had plenty of time for exercising, and Trooper would run with us for
endless laps around the main deck. He didn’t much care for pushups and
sit ups, and he couldn’t do a flutter kick to save his life, but he
loved getting in our way as we tried to do them. Ethan threatened to shoot Trooper nearly every time he saw him, but William wouldn’t let him.
We spent hours at a time throwing a football I had saved around the
main deck, in the age old past time of the Szimanskis. Adam started out throwing like a girl, and almost lost the ball over the side, but he got pretty
good at it eventually. He tried to teach us the European version of football,
but it didn’t involve throwing anything, and none of us were ever able to
get the soccer ball away from him.
It was the best fun I had had in a while being on the ship, but as the
voyage neared its end, we were all starting to become restless.