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  Clyde scowled and shook his head as he refused to accept what Billy was saying. "No, that powder is lye. They're using it to help decompose the corpses. Why would they put lye on a corpse if they were hoping it could come back to life?"

  "Because the zombie disease, or whatever it is, has to get into the bloodstream. What better way to make sure that happens than to mix the disease with a bunch of lye? And you said it yourself, when those coffins opened up and that nasty goo spilled out on us, it should've burned like hell, but it didn't. They put just enough lye into that mixture to cause a small wound so the virus could get into the bloodstream."

  Levon nodded and poked his gun into Clyde's shoulder. "See, kid. I fucking knew it."

  "But I'm telling you," said Clyde. "That powder you guys found at the mall wasn't lye. It would've burned if it was. Even if there was just a little lye mixed in, it would've still burned."

  "Exactly," said Billy with a knowing grin. "They didn't need it mixed with lye if the people they were putting it on had bullet holes in them."

  "Goddamn!" Levon stomped his foot and grinned madly as he nearly started dancing. "I don't know why this is so exciting, but it is. It's like some detective movie shit here, dude! Billy, you've got some Law and Order thing going on up in your head."

  Clyde shook his head and continued to doubt the theory. "You guys don't know this is true. Don't get all worked up over this. No one I knew on the Alpha Squad had any idea about anything like this." His demeanor visibly changed and his assuredness softened as something he thought of disturbed him.

  "What?" asked Billy "What is it?"

  "Those people you saw at the mall, the one's dressed in black, did they have a green stripe on their shoulder?"

  "I don't know," said Billy. "Why?"

  "They were probably on the Strike Team."

  "What's that?" asked Levon.

  "They were the first ones in. They were a group of guys that were sent into the city first to clear the streets. Alpha came after to help get the survivors out, and then Bravo was the clean-up crew." He put his hand against his forehead and then bent down as if his stomach hurt.

  "Did you know any of the people on the Strike Team?" asked Billy.

  Clyde shook his head as he straightened back up. "No. They were an outside team. They called themselves The Green Yards, and we only saw them a couple times when we were deployed. They kept us separated from them most of the time."

  "So then they were the ones killing kids and turning them into zombies?" asked Levon with devilish joy at watching Clyde's slow acceptance of the conspiracy that led to the apocalypse.

  Clyde looked up at the stack of coffins. "Lift me up there. If I pull off that lid, and there's no white powder on the bodies, then we'll know the truth."

  "And what then?" asked Billy

  Clyde looked at him and said, "And then we do something about it."

  * * *

  "When can we start running the generator?" Alex set his mug of whiskey on the kitchen table beside the lantern.

  Graves leaned across the table and took the mug. "Courtland only wants us using lanterns until we're sure the military has moved out."

  "Fuck, that could be days. How come he gets to run a generator up in his lab, but we can't have one down here? It's fucking bullshit."

  Graves nodded as he sipped the whiskey. He seethed after his gulp and then coughed from the strength of the alcohol. "God damn. It's been a long time since I've had real whiskey. Where'd you find it?"

  "Out at one of the houses by the amusement park. Courtland wanted me out there sinking any boats I found before it got light out, but I pretty much spent my time sneaking into houses and stealing shit." They shared a laugh. "Fuck Courtland, that guy's got too big an opinion of himself. Besides, I can head out before morning and go sink the rest of the boats."

  "I thought this place was shut down years ago."

  Alex took the mug back and held it between both hands. "It was. But from what I heard, the government shut it all down and forced everyone to move. They said there was a contamination or something here. A few of the houses I went in still have clothes and shit, but most of the places were cleared out."

  "Find anything good?"

  "Not much. Found a half empty bottle of whiskey. That's got to count for something." He spun the mug and watched the liquor slide against the side. "Maybe some of the other guys will bring some stuff."

  "I thought they'd be here by now."

  Alex shrugged and shifted in his chair as he crossed his legs and relaxed. "We had a hell of a time getting out of the city. I heard a bunch of our guys got killed."

  "How many of them are still alive?"

  Alex shrugged. "Who knows? Courtland's the only one left with a com that can speak to our headsets. He's been bitching about how everyone's getting knocked off and he won't talk to anyone with the coms anymore."

  "Yeah, I heard. Courtland says RC sent some fucking assassin out after us." Graves laughed at the thought as he tried to reach out for the mug of whiskey.

  Alex leaned further back and pulled the mug out of Graves's reach. "I saw the kid, and I think Courtland's just paranoid. The kid he thinks is an assassin is like eighteen-years old."

  "When'd you see him?"

  "I was driving the pontoon when we first ran into that family. Trev and Frank jumped on board and tried to steal their food, but it was all poisoned shit. Courtland's convinced they tried to poison us with it by taking it out of the package and sending it off with that chick and her husband. That's what started the whole assassin bullshit."

  "The hot chick that's chained up in the basement? I didn't realize she had a husband."

  "Oh yeah, some old rich fuck."

  "What happened to him?"

  Alex smirked and then set his head to the side as he drooped his tongue out in a comical mime of death. "Trev took him out."

  "Speaking of Trev," said Graves with a wicked grin. "Wait'll you hear what happened."

  "Oh shit, what did that degenerate do this time?"

  "He's a pederass."

  Alex closed his eyes and took the last drink from his mug. He set the tin cup down and it rattled in a circular motion before it finally stilled. "I know."

  "You knew?"

  Alex nodded and leaned forward as if ready to tell Graves a secret. "You gotta keep this quiet. Okay?"

  "Sure. What?"

  Alex glanced over Graves' shoulder and into the living room to make sure no one overheard them. "A bunch of the fucks from the Green Yard were pedophiles. That crew was full of rapists and pedophiles and shit like that."

  "But Trev was on the Blue side. How did that happen?"

  "He snuck over when we were getting deployed. He got word that the Greens were headed in after the outbreak and he wanted in on our gig instead. I guess he had a girl he wanted to meet up with before all hell broke loose, or something like that."

  "How'd you find out?"

  "I've got a pretty good memory, and I accused him of being a rat because I'd never seen him in the Blue section before."

  Graves whistled and shook his head at the revelation. "Damn bro. Do yourself a favor and don't tell Courtland that you knew he was a pederass."

  "Why?"

  "Courtland was pissed. I guess he has a big problem with dudes that like to diddle little girls."

  Alex nodded and agreed. "Can't blame him for that."

  "No." Graves was about to let the conversation die off, but something was bugging him. "Still though, I've never seen him react that way. He was seriously pissed. I mean, don't get me wrong, Trev is a degenerate fuck and he deserved what he got, but none of us are innocent. Courtland said something about making sure that the kid didn't get an STD. I think it has something to do with his experiment."

  "That dude creeps me out."

  "You and me both."

  "I never had a problem with him back at the prison, but now I can't stand the dude."

  Graves shrugged. "Maybe there was something in
the food. Like mind control shit. Whatever it was, I think all of us are about at our wits end with that little fucker."

  Alex traced his finger around the bottom of the mug and then licked the remnants of whiskey off. "I know he saved our lives and shit, but that don't mean we should trust him."

  "Well, he sure as fuck doesn't trust us. He couldn't have cared less about what happened to Trev."

  "What happened to him anyway?" Alex scratched the stubble on his square jaw. It had been a couple days since he'd shaved, like everyone else on The Blue Yards team, and it was getting itchy.

  "He tried to rape that little girl that he brought back and she stabbed him in the eye."

  "Holy fuck. For real?"

  Graves nodded and laughed at the macabre memory. "Yeah. It was some nasty shit."

  "Is he okay?"

  Graves gave an aloof shrug. "No clue. He's up in one of the beds. Last I saw him he was unconscious. Must've passed out from the pain."

  * * *

  Laura pretended to be unconscious as the surgeons wheeled her gurney down a hallway. She let her head tilt to the right after the gurney bumped over something and dared to open her right eye enough to spy on her surroundings.

  They were walking beside a plain concrete wall that had a green stripe of paint set just off center. When they passed a hallway there would be a stenciled number of unpainted section inside of the green line and she tried to memorize them. Her mind was still muddled from the drugs and anesthetic that had poisoned her over the past day, but she was determined to find Annie and fought to stay conscious.

  Kim was in Billy's hands now, but Annie was here somewhere. She needed her mother to protect her, and these fools standing beside her gurney had no idea what hell they would fall into if they dared stand in her way.

  Hall 2-05 was stenciled in the green stripe.

  The numbers counted down the further they went and she prayed that they would eventually enter a new area. The surgeons had mentioned that Annie was in a place called Blue Med. She reasoned that the color on the wall indicated what section of the building they were in.

  Hall 2-04.

  "So what do you think is more important to them?" asked the surgeon to her left. "Finding the Blue Yards or saving the Senator's son?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "Do you think they're going to try and track the kid until they find Courtland and his crew? Cause if they do, I doubt that kid's going to live through it."

  Hall 2-03.

  "The Senator was trying pretty hard to get this lady to tell him where they were headed. I bet he's going to try and get to his kid first."

  "Yeah, good luck convincing the General to go along with that. I doubt he'd save his own kid if he were the one headed out to find Courtland."

  The other surgeon chuckled. "Covington's not that bad. He's just all business, all the time."

  Hall 2-02.

  The gurney slowed down and Laura felt it begin to turn. Wherever they were headed, it was no longer toward the beginning of the Green area where she hoped it changed to Blue. If she were going to find Annie, she'd have to get away from the surgeons and head back to that hallway.

  They hadn't cuffed her wrists to the gurney the way they had to the bed, and she didn't want to lose an opportunity to fight back. She had no weapons, and wasn't sure how stunted her strength was by the drugs they'd pumped into her. If she fought back and lost, then they'd certainly never forget to restrain her again.

  She started counting as they rolled down the hall. Thirty eight seconds before they turned right. She started counting again. Sixty two seconds before they stopped and she heard an elevator's chime. If she could memorize the route they'd taken, she could make it back to the hall that might lead to Annie. Laura waited patiently for a chance to fight back - acutely aware that it could be the last fight of her life.

  * * *

  The pain was excruciating. Fleeting consciousness tortured him and he flailed at the bed every second he was awake. His screams weakened into whimpers, but his anger had turned to hate.

  Trev wasn't dead yet, and that little bitch would pay for what she did.

  CHAPTER EIGHT - THE CURE

  The bodies were clean.

  Clyde's heart sank as he stared at the corpses in the plastic coffin. There was no lye placed over them, adding evidence to Billy's theory that the powder carried the disease.

  "Well?" Levon grunted as he held onto Clyde's ankles from below. The paramedic was perched on Levon's shoulders to give him the height needed to inspect the containers.

  "Nothing."

  "What do you mean, nothing?" asked Billy.

  "There's no powder on them."

  Billy nodded and didn't seem as delighted with his victory as Clyde expected. "I guess that settles it then."

  Levon bent down and let Clyde jump off his shoulders. "What do you think they're planning on doing with this load?" He knocked on the side of a coffin.

  "Maybe dump them somewhere," said Billy.

  Clyde pursed his lips as he looked at the mounds of containers that filled the barge. He shook his head in disagreement as he tried to decipher what the military was planning. "Can't be."

  "I agree with the kid," said Levon. Clyde hated it when Levon called him 'kid' since they weren't that far about in age. It felt as if Levon was doing it on purpose as an insult. "It doesn't make any sense for them to turn a bunch of these things into zombies and then cart the rest of them off to dump somewhere."

  "What do you think they were planning?" asked Billy.

  Levon bent down to retrieve the gun he'd set on the deck when he helped Clyde up. Billy had the other pistol and it was shivering in his hand as the chill night air tried to freeze the droplets of water that clung to his nearly nude body.

  "There's something I can't stop thinking about," said Levon as if ignoring the conversation they'd been having and moving on to a new subject. "Reagan said that these things die within a few days. Right?"

  "Yeah," said Billy. "That's why they were fencing them off instead of just killing them."

  "That shit didn't make sense to me. Cause if you were trying to cause a genocide, you'd want it to last more than a few days. I couldn't wrap my head around that, until now." Levon crossed his arms and seemed elated with his deduction reasoning. "Do you guys remember that tsunami in Thailand a while back?"

  "Yeah," said Billy. "What about it?"

  "I remember watching the news and hearing how the biggest problem they had wasn't just the water; it was the bodies."

  "How so?" asked Clyde as he began to accept Levon's conspiratorial thought process.

  "Disease. If you throw a bunch of dead bodies all over the place, you'll end up spreading disease." He pointed his gun at the coffins. "These things aren't just eating people to death, they're walking disease factories."

  "So you pretend to bury them in these coffins," said Billy. "But the whole time you know they're going to come back to life. Fucking hell, Hero. I bet you're right."

  Levon pointed the gun away from the coffins and toward the cabin at the end of the barge. "I'd bet damn good money if we look around this boat, we'd find some bags of that lye shit. They were going to park this barge next to someplace that wasn't dealing with the infection, and then pour their magic zombie dust on these things and boom." He raised his arms to exemplify an explosion. "It'd be better than a fucking nuke. You could wipe out a small country with a barge like this."

  Billy let a devilish sneer creep over his face. "Or an island full of fake cops."

  Levon's glee at uncovering the conspiracy faded. "What're you thinking?"

  Billy hurried up and headed for the cabin. "Come on, let's go. We need to find where they stored that powder. Then we need to find a life boat, and some clothes. And if we're lucky, we'll find a funnel and a drill."

  Levon jogged to catch up and sounded worried when he asked, "What for?"

  Billy stopped and turned to look at Clyde and Hero. He smirked as he placed his index f
inger against one of the coffins and spun it as if it were a drill. "I've got a plan."

  * * *

  "Mommy," said Toby as he shivered in his cage. "My body hurts."

  "I know, sweetie." Gwen held Kim in her lap and they had the towel that the girl was brought down with draped over them to stay warm. The cops had dressed Kim in the clothes she'd been wearing earlier and let her keep the towel to dry her hair. "It'll all be over soon."

  "I think I'm dying."

  "Don't say that, honey. You'll be fine."

  "I can't move my fingers."

  That startled Gwen. "What do you mean?"

  "I keep trying to move them, but they won't." He was sobbing as he tried to explain the sensation. "They feel tingly, like they fell asleep."

  "Maybe you just need to change your position."

  "I did, but they still feel like this. They've felt this way for hours." He was too weak to whine and seemed morbidly content with his condition. "I think I'm dying."

  Gwen set Kim down on the floor beside her and stood up. She knew that she couldn't get to the cage and instead decided to scream as loud as she could to get someone's attention. "Help!" She continued to scream until there was movement on the floor above.

  The door to the basement opened and Gwen recognized the glow of light in her hazy, blurred vision. "My son is hurt."

  "What's wrong?" asked the man's voice. It was the leader of the group, Courtland.

  "He says he can't move his fingers. Can you please just give him another dose of the cure already? He's been through enough, and I've done everything you asked. Please just help him."

  "Tell me your symptoms," said Courtland as he moved closer to Toby's cage.

  "My fingers are tingling and I'm having trouble moving them."