Part 20 (1/2)
”Well, hon, it looks like you're fast departing your first trimester and everything is looking great,” Jan said, presenting her most positive tone as she examined the ultrasound image. Onscreen, the baby was deceptively large. Its actual size was a little larger than a grape.
”I'm going to tell him.”
”You sure about that? He probably has a lot going on right now. He's not expected back until February. Tell you what, why don't you sleep on it tonight and then, if you think you need to tell him, ask John to send the message tomorrow. Whatcha think?”
”I think that sleeping on it is always a good idea. I'm just so excited. It's that, well, this is the most positive thing to happen to me since before. Since before . . . you know.”
”I know, honey. You don't have to say it, I know. I'm excited for you, too. Can I ask you something personal?”
”Sure, I mean of course,” Tara said, almost annoyed that Jan would even need to ask.
”Why didn't you tell him before he left? You knew already. Maybe it wasn't official, but you knew. Why not then?”
”I don't know; it just didn't feel right. With so much loss, so many gone-I felt that if I told him, we'd lose the baby. Don't ask me why. I know it's a terrible thing to say, but the only thing we have left to hold on to is life, what little is still out there. I didn't want to jinx it, I guess.” Tara frowned and then started to cry.
”It's okay. Let it out. You're pregnant, this is allowed. You'll be in your second trimester when he gets back. Here are some prenatal vitamins and this book to read up on in the time being. Get excited, you're going to be a mom. Believe it or not, you're the only one onboard that's pregnant. At least the only one I know of.”
”Jan, I can't thank you enough.”
”Don't, I'm here. We've been through a lot. I'll be here for you when you need me. I mean it.”
”Thanks, anyway.”
”I want to see you every week to monitor your progress and make sure you're okay, got it?”
”Yeah, I got it,” Tara replied with a Mona Lisa smile.
39.
Southeast Texas The road was a desolate, unforgiving place. Doc and Disco rode the long curled highway as if on the back of a giant black eel. The continuous potholes, debris, and hulks of abandoned cars and trucks caused near-accidents at every turn. They were not far from their rally point now-a bridge named by the Galveston Island team as the halfway point. Keeping an eye on his odometer, Doc realized that Galveston might have gotten the better end of the deal. The bike trip meter read fifty-five miles when the two men crested the hill that overlooked the bridge spanning the Brazos River.
Doc squeezed the front disc brake, stepping on the rear brake simultaneously, jerking the dual sport bike to an abrupt stop. Both men looked down the hill to the bridge, where they could clearly see muzzle flash erupting from unsuppressed weapons. The flash was like lightning, revealing a hundred creatures clearly engaging the gunmen on the bridge. Doc hoped that the men down there were not the men they were supposed to meet, but he knew that their luck had run out back at the fuel truck.
”Let's ride up and shoot at two hundred meters,” Doc said over his shoulder to Disco.
”Yeah, two hundred meters, and lean the bike against something to keep it running.”
Doc rode the bike down the hill, turned it around, and leaned it in neutral against the sandbag barrier of an old pill box from a time when the living outnumbered the undead and men were still fighting, not hiding.
”Okay, Disco, fire at will. Check your six every five rounds and I'll do the same, staggering on your count.”
”Roger, boss, engaging.”
Both men began to surgically target the heads of the creatures below, using the other group's muzzle flash to avoid fratricide. It was a game of timing and speed. If both teams hurried, they could neutralize the ma.s.s of dead before more replaced them, responding to the unsuppressed report of the weapons on the bridge.
Suppressors dramatically reduced undead response radius, meaning less reaction on Doc's position. Unsuppressed weapons extended the response radius exponentially, reducing the ability to escape before undead reinforcements arrived to replace the fallen. It paid to be fast, and they were.
It took seven minutes of constant shooting by both the hill crest and bridge valley teams to clear the hundred or so undead. After the last creature dropped, Doc and Disco sprinted down the hill to a scene of carnage. Only one man remained standing out of the three-man bridge team. The others were dead or dying from mortal wounds.
They had also arrived on motorcycles.
”Let's get this over with. Those were my friends,” the survivor said to Doc right before moving over to his mortally wounded comrade, administering his last rites.
He whispered a good-bye and took a b.l.o.o.d.y piece of paper from the dying man before shooting him in the head at point-blank range. He didn't face them for a moment, but eventually turned in their direction, face flooded with tears.
”You guys are from the silo?” the survivor asked.
The sounds told of more dead approaching.
”Yeah, listen, we're sorry about . . .” Disco offered.
”Save it, I don't want to hear it. Those bikes were theirs,” the man said, gesturing over to the dirtbikes leaning against the guardrail of the bridge. ”Take 'em. They're full of gas.”
Doc looked at the dead operators in disbelief. When their teammate, Hammer had been killed in New Orleans, it was devastating to the team. Doc still thought of Hammer often and wished he could have done something, anything that day. Hammer's life ended in much the same way as the man bleeding and lifeless on the ground; a bullet from the barrel of a friend.
Doc saw the man's AK-47 underfolder slung across his chest on a single-point sling, a paratrooper model. ”Here bud, take this; you'll need it,” Doc offered, handing over his suppressed M-4 carbine.
The man looked down at the rifle and said, ”Thanks. I'll take you up on it. I hope that your side of the river will treat you better than mine. One of my men flipped his bike off an overpa.s.s on the way here, broke his neck avoiding those f.u.c.king things. We lost our only silent rifle with him. Take my AK-I don't want to leave you in the same boat I was in.”
”Thanks, brother,” said Doc. ”Here's my ammo and three mags, got any seven-point-six-two?”
”Yeah, six mags. Here. Also, this is what I was ordered to bring you.”
The man handed over a military radio with a frequency written on the outside of the case in silver Sharpie. Attached was a small notepad of waterproof paper.
”The radio is tuned to talk to our A-10 drivers at Galveston Island. We've converted the road to an airstrip there and cleared the dead. Some seem to get in anyway though. The notepad is our weekly flight schedule and brevity codes. We've been ordered by the COG to support your missions. You transmit your scouting plan to the boat and they'll notify us of our strip alert times. If you run into trouble that you can't shake, our Hog pilots will be on scene inside of twenty mikes for the troops in contact. They'll literally be sitting in the ready room geared up at the times your teams are out. I'm ordered to tell you that the Hogs are carrying air-to-air IR missiles in their loadouts, too, whatever that's supposed to mean to you.”
Doc quickly thought of the Reaper mentioned in the previous Hotel 23 commander's report, but decided not to mention it.
”One last thing, I'm sure you know that transmitting is a bad idea in your keypad and especially killbox. I wouldn't use that radio unless the devil himself started coming out of the ground with h.e.l.l behind him.”
The dead drew nearer and Disco took shots, thinning them out with the smaller noise radius of his carbine-the only suppressed rifle between the two, now that Doc had donated his.
”Do you have anything for me?” the survivor asked Doc.
”Yeah, here are our reports and copies of some equipment we recovered a week ago, and some other intel.” Doc handed over the package.
”Thanks.” The man took possession and slid it into the leather messenger bag slung across his chest.
”You got a name?” Doc asked the man.
”Galt. Yours?” he replied as he mounted his bike.