John Ringo - To Sail a Darkling Sea

“Right, the zodiac’s here,” the man in uniform said. “Make your way down the steps, carefully, and into the boat.

The boat wasn’t, technically, a Zodiac. It was a Brig designed to carry four and a driver. Thomas found it interesting that a sailor was calling it a zodiac and not a RHIB. Language changes were already occurring. He pushed ‘RHIB’ to the back of his memory since using the term might betray his cover.

There were six in the group. People needed help getting in. Everyone could barely see.

Thomas waited until the other passengers had found seats before boarding. He stepped lightly onto the boat and dropped into a spot on the deck. He was wedged between an older man on the deck and a fortyish woman sitting on the front seat.

“Wrap the blankets around you if you get cold,” the kid driving it said. “You’re going to have to leave them in the boat.”

The blankets were USMC green wool blankets and already damp. Thomas decided to forego.

“Everyone keeps saying everything’s gone,” the woman next to him said. “It can’t simply be gone. Something had to survive!”

“I don’t know, lady,” the kid said, pulling away from the floating dock. “There’s zombies all over on the land and there’s not much in the way of radio stations. Some ham operators, pretty much. There’s some that say they’re, like, king of some place I’ve never heard of, but there’s not much.”

“Submarines?” Thomas asked.

“There are subs,” the kid said. “So I’ve heard. I’ve never seen ’em but other people have. The boat I’m taking you to used to be owned by some rich Russian dude. He tried to jack the boat that found him. It’s one of the real ‘Navy’ boats. Some of the boats are run by civilians and some of them are Navy. Anyway, the guy tried to jack this Navy boat and a sub surfaced and told him they’d open fire if he didn’t surrender. So then I guess we jacked his.”

“So there are Navy ships?” the woman asked.

“Sorta,” the kid said. “They found a Marine ship, which is where the Marines and a bunch of the loot came from. But it’s still floating somewhere out there. The boats are all salvage. Some of them are Navy, some of them are civilian. Something about who can have what guns. Like, I’m a civilian. I didn’t want the whole ‘three bags full’ thing. But my boss is Navy. But he was an Army dude when he was a kid and he’s never been in the Navy before. It’s all sort of like that. Sort of fucked up but it mostly works.”

“I’m confused,” the woman said.

“Okay,” the kid said. “The boat you’re going to, it’s called the Money for Nothing . It’s got a Navy dude in charge of it but the captain, the guy who runs the boat, is a civilian. But the Navy dude, who’s the operations guy for the squadron, had never been in the Navy before this. So if you’re confused, you’re not the only one. Like I said, it has to do with who gets guns.”

“Controlling legal authority?” Thomas asked.

“That’s it,” the kid said. “Like, they’re clearing out some of the little towns here in the islands and to do that you’ve got to have… what he said. Somebody told me it’s sort of technically an act of war but we’ve got permission from somebody or something.”

“So did you live here, before?” the woman asked.

“Oh, hell no,” the kid said. “I was on a cruise ship, too. We abandoned ship when the zombies took over. I was in a lifeboat that got found by one of the Wolf boats. And let me tell you, that fucking sucked. Being in the boat, I mean. Look, there’s a pamphlet they give you when you get to the boat. Just wait til you read it then ask questions, okay?”

The inflatable pulled up to the waterline transom deck of the yacht and people were helped out. Thomas took the offered hand of a man he pegged as an Indonesian and probably a steward. There had been four stewards and two Indonesian waitresses, initially, in the compartment he’d been stuck in along with six other passengers. Two passenger as well as one of the stewards had “turned.” During the subsequent six months he had, slowly and painfully, “learned” the dialect that was common to the other ten survivors.

He’d never let on that he spoke two other dialects of Indonesian and had been able to understand what they were saying two hours after they’d closed the compartment.

“Hello, my name is Nadia… ”

The young woman was good looking, even beautiful, with a strong Slavic accent. She also was noticeably pregnant. So were the two Indonesian waitresses. Thomas figured even if humanity was mostly wiped out, there was about to be one hell of a baby boom.

“I’m to be your guide for a short time as you get acquainted to Wolf Squadron. The first step being to get you some food and answer any questions. But the food, first. If you could follow me, please?”

They were led into the main saloon of the yacht. It was showing definite signs of wear but it was still more luxurious than any of the compartments on the cruise ship.

“So this is how the other half lives,” the fortyish woman said. Thomas could tell she was bristling a bit at the Russian girl. She wasn’t pregnant which meant she was either fixed or no one in the compartment was interested. Given that there were four other men with her, she was probably fixed.

“There is soup,” Nadia said, pouring a cup and handing it to the woman. “There will be more in a moment but some people have not had much to eat and this helps their stomach. There are three kinds, tomato, chicken and lamb. The Americans generally prefer the tomato or the chicken. Help yourself.”

“Can you… what’s going on?” one of the men said.

“This is always the problem,” the girl said, smiling. “Do you feed the questions or your stomach first. Here is a pamphlet,” she said, picking one up and handing it to the man. “Please to read. Then ask questions.”

Thomas read the pamphlet while sipping a cup of tomato soup. There had been tomato soup in the compartment but hot soup was delicious. Most of the information he wanted was in the first section. Given what his compartment had been like, he could see why there was a waiver on UCMJ actionable offenses. It was probably on a case by case basis, though, he’d have to read the reg.

It brought up the question, though, if he should make contact. The problem being, the most the Hole would have had was a two star Flag Duty Officer. And if he popped up, they’d expect him to take over this jugfuck retired or not. He wasn’t sure he wanted to. There was a reason he’d retired. If he wanted to do anything, it was kill freaking zombies or cruise around on a boat. Not sit in an office and figure logistics. On the other hand, he was getting a little long in the tooth for that. It looked, however, like this was a legitimate operation, if a bit cock-eyed, not a pre-Westphalian militia.

“What about Britain?” one of the men from the group asked.

“There is currently no contact with the British government or any government organizations other than those listed. We recently freed some people from the Canary Islands including a policeman. He is the closest we have to a member of the government of Spain. There is a group called Sons and Daughters of Britain in Exile which meets regularly on Wednesday nights. Their chairman is a former Member of Parliament and is, more or less, the Prime Minister in exile. Although he is quick to point out that all he is is the chairman. There are similar groups that meet on other nights from other countries. On the bulletin board there is a list.”

“So we’re still trapped on these boats,” the woman said.

“Yes,” Nadia said. “For the time being. There have been some small towns partially cleared here in the Canary Islands. The next objective is to clear the US Navy base at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba. The purpose of that is obtaining supplies, equipment and, hopefully, additional trained personnel. Beyond that, the Commodore has said that ‘it depends.’ The eventual goal is to free both the United States and Europe from infected so that we can… restart, yes?”