Part 29 (1/2)
”Brace for impact in ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three . . .”
The s.h.i.+p slowed as if someone had pulled some kind of magical brake, or the screws had been somehow reversed. It was moments before the carrier slammed into the Floridian sandbar, rending steal, throwing men and equipment about in a Wizard of Oz chaos tornado of flesh and metal. Heavy ground support equipment, forklifts, and jet aircraft snapped their tie-down chains, skidding across the deck, slamming into the raised jet blast deflectors and catwalks. Many men were thrown over the side into the clear blue waters.
John was jolted back into focus by Ramirez's screaming voice: ”Dude, it's just us! Let's move!”
John stumbled to his feet, looking over his shoulder. He shook his head and brought his eyes into focus. Tara waved in the distance, just as they had planned before the impact. Everyone was fine from his clan, except Will, who was still missing.
Ramirez threw the hatch lever and jerked the door open quickly. He immediately shattered the skull of one of the creatures that lay on the darkened deck.
”Turn on your gun light, John. It might get dark.”
Another shot was taken, this time behind John, where one of the things stumbled to get back up from the s.h.i.+p's recent impact.
They didn't have much time now. The creatures were recovering from the jolt.
”Radio is just a few more frames inboard,” John said, taking the easy shots at the undead-while they lasted.
John moved with intent, systematically shooting, trying to avoid the ricochet of Ramirez's carbine. He raised his weapon to take out a creature that sprung for him out of a ready room door-and hesitated.
The creature was William.
”Oh G.o.d, Will. I'm sorry.” For a microsecond, John imagined there might be a small residue of intelligence left. Will's pursed lips and howling call for John's flesh solidified the impossibility. John pulled the trigger, splattering Will's brain, along with his memories, and love for Jan and little Laura, all over the bulkhead.
Before Will's inert body hit the steel deck, John caught a glimpse of a b.l.o.o.d.y piece of paper protruding from Will's s.h.i.+rt pocket. Without even thinking, he s.n.a.t.c.hed it up, stuffing it into his back pocket. He would never read the words-they weren't his.
Outside the radio room door, John fought a well of tears, pressing the numbers into the cipher lock. The magnetic locking mechanism clicked. Both men kicked the door wide and began shooting into a room full of the undead. Chunks of flesh flew, and creatures thumped onto the steel deck. Both men thought of retreat, but knew that lives depended on regaining control of this room. Shot after shot, they mowed down the undead. John moved into the next section of the radio room and secured it without much resistance. The s.h.i.+p's SATcom transceivers had been damaged by struggle and previous last-stand gunshots.
”Ramirez, these radios are going to need serious repairs. Let's clear this deck and report topside.”
”Roger that, I'm with you.”
The men soon became aware that they had killed most of the creatures on their way in. The crew had been successful in closing off or compartmentalizing most of the s.h.i.+p when the outbreaks were first reported. Cleansing teams would need to clear s.p.a.ces slowly-compartment by compartment.
Even though this level of the s.h.i.+p was devoid of the undead and relatively safe, John and Ramirez were very lucky to feel the Florida sun again. They could hear the thumps of undead fists sealed off behind heavy doors and through nearby bulkheads. John climbed to the top of the ladder first, heading straight for the Hotel 23 camp section of the flight deck.
The note he took from Will burned inside his back pocket as he approached Jan.
”Jan, where is everyone else?” John asked.
”You didn't hear? They ordered everyone to abandon s.h.i.+p. Everyone is headed for sh.o.r.e; the last of the crew is boarding the elevator. I stayed behind to make sure you were okay. Don't worry, Annabelle is with Tara and Laura.”
John began to tear up at the thought of Jan staying behind for him and at what he had had to do to Will-and the news he would break to her. She knew already though-somehow she could see a thousand miles through him.
”I'm sorry, Jan. I had no choice.”
Jan collapsed onto the rough nonskid deck, cutting her knee, bawling her eyes out, cursing G.o.d and everything good.
”I'm sorry, Jan. I'm sorry,” he kept saying as he held her, rubbing the back of her head, trying to do what he thought might make her feel better in some incremental way.
”I would trade places if I could. I know what it's like to lose someone you love, and I wish I could trade places with Will right now,” John poured from the heart, meaning every syllable.
A few minutes went by before Jan was able to pull herself together enough to stand. John doctored her knees with the med kit from his pack before they rode the last elevator down to abandon s.h.i.+p.
As the elevator whined and descended John spoke. ”Look, I know this may not be the right time, but I have something that doesn't belong to me. I didn't look, it was in his pocket,” John said, handing the folded piece of paper to Jan.
She wanted no part of it, but couldn't seem to stop herself from unfolding the battered note.
The evacuation of USS George Was.h.i.+ngton was complete.
55.
Hotel 23-Southeast Texas The four Phoenix operators gathered around the workbench deep inside Hotel 23 with the flight recorder hooked to power and plugged into the laptop with the scavenged cable.
”Okay, me and Hawse have been working this orange box for twelve hours. I'm tired as h.e.l.l, but I think we might have figured it out,” Disco claimed to the group.
”What was the holdup?” Doc asked, anxious to return the cable topside so they could bring burst comms back online.
”I had to activate a combination of various ports on our computer to get it to speak to the black box. Previously installed security protocol shut down the USB access to our system. I had to go into the bios and rewrite some of the access parameters. Tough thing to do without having the Internet handy. I had to trial and error quite a few scripts.”
”Let's pull 'em, what are you waiting for?” Doc said impatiently.
”Hang on. I had to reboot; she's coming up now.”
Disco logged in to the system and executed the software sent to them by the carrier before it went dark. A series of progress bars and boxes appeared and shuffled on the screen, indicating that the program was siphoning the flight recorder's data.
All of it.
”This might take a few minutes. We're getting more than the waypoints. Looks like we're pulling the alt.i.tude, heading, airspeed, AOA, practically everything you'd see on the c.o.c.kpit instruments. Thousands of data points.”
Disco clicked on another program, opening up the system's mapping software. ”Good old FalconView PFPS. Not the most high-tech software but it's d.a.m.n easy to use. As soon as the geo-cords are all downloaded we'll load them into this software and see the entire flight path from preflight to crash site.”
After five minutes of processing, the data was finally extracted from the black box. Disco transferred the GPS waypoints into the FalconView file folders and began to see the flight path in graphical format.
”Let's see . . . according to the black box, this aircraft originated in Utah.”
”Can you get more specific than a state?” Hawse quipped.
”Yeah, I can. The maps are loaded all the way down to the TPC or tactical chart level on our system. Let me zoom in more.”
Manipulating the software, Dis...o...b..ought the viewpoint down to a higher resolution. ”Drum roll . . . the aircraft took off from an airfield in the Uintah Basin. Zooming in further. Gimme a sec-okay, the aircraft took off from a strip three miles southwest of Fort d.u.c.h.esne, Utah. Getting the exact grid coords now.” Disco copied the grid coordinates of the first waypoint on paper and took screen captures of the area.
Doc stood nervously over his shoulder. ”Double-check those coords, Disco. h.e.l.l, triple-check them.”
”Why? We have the screens. What's the deal?”