John Ringo - Under a Graveyard Sky

“I don’t think that’s a zombie,” Faith said, stepping forward.

“Wait,” Steve said. “Just take our time. If that’s a survivor, they’ll keep ten minutes while we make sure we’re safe.”

“Roger,” Faith said.

“I’ve got point,” Steve said, stepping past her. He had to step on the zombie’s body to get down the narrow companionway.

The lower passageway was just as narrow and had a host of hatches. It also was covered in feces. Steve had wondered if he’d gotten his seals seated on the respirator. He knew, now, that he had. Otherwise he’d be smelling all this filth. One of the hatches, leading to a stateroom to port, was open. That floor was covered in feces as well. The sounds were emanating from a hatch forward. Which was covered in scratches and badly battered.

Steve tapped on it with the butt of the Saiga.

“Hello?”

“Hello?” a weak female voice answered.

“Jesus,” Faith said. “Survivor.”

“There goes this salvage,” Steve said. “Miss, we need you to just hang on…”

“…water?”

Faith pulled off her assault pack and pulled out a bottle of water.

“I’ve got it,” she said. “Hey, passing through some water. You gotta open the door, though.”

“…zombies…?”

“We’re innoculated,” Faith said. “And we’ve cleared all the ones in this area. You can open the door. You’re safe. I mean, I’m a girl. You don’t have to worry about me or anything. And the guy with me’s my Da…”

There was a sound of a bolt being pulled and material being moved. Slowly, as if the person moving it could barely manage. Finally, it cracked open.

“Here,” Faith said. She clearly was trying not to react.

The girl was probably a little younger than Faith but was emaciated and haggard.

Faith opened up the water and started to hand it to her, then held it up for her to drink.

“Don’t drink it too fast,” Faith said. “You’ll just puke it back up.”

“Thank you,” the girl said, taking careful sips and treasuring them. “Thank you.”

“Sorry it took so long,” Steve said. Emotionally he’d known that there were going to be survivors on the boats. The law of the sea sort of mandated that they rescue people. Which they’d been ignoring because, well, there wasn’t anywhere to take them and there wasn’t much “law of the sea” anymore.

Seeing the survivor drove it home, though.

“Where’s Charlie?” the girl asked after a few sips.

“The infected?” Steve said. “We…took care of him.”

“Oh…” the girl said. “I sort of thought so. I heard the guns.”

“Family?” Faith asked.

“No,” the girl said, slowly. She seemed to be trying to remember how to speak. “He was the captain. He put the bolts on and told me to lock myself in here after… After Dad…” She started to sob.

“Miss, we sort of need you to stay here until we’re done clearing,” Steve said. “We’ll get you over to our boat as soon as we can. But… You want us to clear up some before you go through. Okay?”

“Okay,” the girl said. “Is there… Anybody else?

“How many on the boat?” Faith asked.

“Four,” the girl said. “Me and…mom and dad and Captain Charlie.”

“Then…no,” Faith said. “You’re it.”

“Okay,” the girl said, tearing up again.

“Just hang in there,” Faith said, handing her the bottle. “Sip this. Slowly. We will be back.”

“Okay.”

“Seven, Away Team,” Steve said over the radio.

“Away, Seven. Everything okay?”

“Nominal,” Steve said. “One survivor. Female, early teen. Noninfected. Will clear before transporting.”

“Okay,” Stacey replied. “We’ll get ready for her. Is it useable?”

“Unknown at this time,” Steve said. “No power. Prep for engineering survey.”

“So you want me to get ready to come over and see if I can get it running again?” Stacey replied.

Steve hung his head. Stacey was never ever going to get military radio discipline.

“Yes, dear,” Steve said.

“Then why didn’t you just say so. Get the survivor back here and we’ll talk.”

Steve and Faith checked the rest of the hatches. A series of homemade locks had been put on them, reinforcing the ones already there. They had to resort to a crowbar to get the master cabin door open.

“Nice,” Faith said, waving her taclight around the cabin. “I don’t suppose I get this one?”

“I’d say that the survivor will get the forward cabin again,” Steve said. “If she wants it. She might be tired of it. Your mom and I in this one.”

“So Soph and I get the little beds again,” Faith said, disgustedly.

“There are probably more cabins in a boat like this,” Steve said. “So at least you should have your own.”

There were a total of five cabins. The master and forward were both queen beds. The two smaller forward cabins had a double in the starboard cabin and bunks to port. The rear cabin had two bunk beds and a day-bed couch. And there were no more zombies.

“I’ll take this one,” Faith said when they found the last cabin. “No zombie poop.”

“We’ll see,” Steve said. “Right now we need to get the remains gathered up and the survivor back to Mile Seven.”

“Captain Charlie” was fairly easy to move, despite the tight quarters. He hadn’t been a big guy before starvation had gotten him. They took him up to the aft-deck, tied some metal they’d found in the engine room to his ankle and heaved him over the side.

Despite his own starvation, the father was a bit more of an issue.

“Take the legs,” Steve said, getting his hands well locked into the corpse’s armpits.

“Why are dead bodies so heavy?” Faith asked, heaving the legs up to clear the railing.

“I’m not sure,” Steve said. “But it’s what they mean by ‘dead weight.’”

The father, like Charlie, disappeared into the depths with barely a splash.

“Okay, this one…” Faith said, looking at the mother’s gnawed and decomposed corpse. She turned her head away and retched slightly.

“Don’t throw up in your respirator,” Steve said. “I’ll get it.”

He got a plastic trash bag and gathered the mother’s remains up. There wasn’t much he could do for the pile of goo that had been most of her intestines. And when he tried to gather it up he found himself retching.

They loaded the bag with more metal and made sure it sank.

“Dear God we commend these people to the depths in the sure certainty that in the end of times the sea will give up its dead, amen,” Steve said, quickly.

“Amen,” Faith said. “I didn’t know you were even a Christian, Da. I knew Gran was Catholic but…”

“The girl’s going to want to know that we did more than just pitch her parents over the rail of their boat,” Steve said. “Besides…keeping up the niceties to the extent you can isn’t hard and enough people think it’s worth it that…it’s worth it. Taking thirty seconds to say a prayer sort of shows that we’re still civilized or something.”

“How’s it going?” Stacey called. The Mile Seven was tied up to the bigger boat with every fender and bolster they had alongside to prevent them from banging together in the light swells.

Steve started to shout through the mask, then keyed his radio.

“That’s the last of the bodies,” Steve said. “We’re bringing the survivor over now.”

“Okay,” Stacey yelled, waving.

Steve changed his gloves before opening the hatch to the cabin.

“Miss,” he said, turning around and squatting down. “Let’s try piggy back. Will that work?”

With Faith’s help he got the girl back onto the Mile Seven and cast her off.