The Orphans (Book 2): Surviving the Turned (24 page)

Kristy put a hand on his shoulder, squeezing it. “It’s okay, Greg. We all thought we had another day available with those at home. How could we know what was to come? We went to check out a homecoming rally and ended up with a bus full of bloodthirsty volleyball players, for god’s sake!”

Clary couldn’t think of anything to say. The one thing he was able to do that these kids couldn’t is be flown to a destination and dropped off. The problems weren’t his to deal with. “You kids do what you have to so that you can survive after this. It could be months before they figure out something, and that is if they ever do. You do whatever you have to, and I wouldn’t trust anyone out of your group of friends here. Don’t trust them if they haven’t earned it. You understand what I’m saying here?”

Shaun nodded. “Yeah, that’s exactly what my dad told me. Stay safe, trust those who’ve earned it, and take care of Ellie. I guess almost the same.”

Clary looked at the other men waiting to go in and said, “You make sure you do what you need to. There are going to be some people who survived and they are going to be out to hurt others and to only take care of themselves.”

*****

Aslin followed Phelps out of hearing distance and everyone’s line of sight. When they got out of sight, Phelps gripped both straps on Aslin’s chest, lifting and slamming the man up against the back of a dumpster. “Are you fucking insane? Are you? What the hell is wrong with you? Do you need to seek medical attention?”

Aslin opened his mouth to defend himself, but Phelps, out of character and sitting right at his breaking point, cupped his mouth firmly. “You know what a fucking rhetorical question is. You can’t go promising those kids shit that you aren’t able to deliver on. Do you want to really take them on the plane back to the base?”

Aslin reached a hand up, knocking Phelps’ arm away, moving his hand from his mouth. Phelps reached back for him, and the younger, more fit Aslin blocked his arm and shoved him with both hands, stepping with his momentum. He laid a hard-as-hell punch into Phelps’ chest, making the man stumble backward and off balance to the ground. Aslin was ready to kill; he stood over Phelps with fists clenched. “What is the problem with taking them back? What harm can they do, for god’s sake? Are you that fucking heartless?”

Phelps pushed himself up to the ground, holding a finger up towards Aslin. “You touch me again, and I’ll snap your fucking neck. You’ll be lucky if I don’t have you court-martialed, you ignorant son of a bitch. You think I’m some heartless son of a bitch, don’t you?”

Aslin screamed back, uncaring at this point what anyone could hear. “Prove me wrong! Am I?”

Phelps tried to regain some of his composure, taking a long, steadying breath. “When I was on the phone earlier talking to the base, I told them I had found his son and a small group of his friends. I told them that they were healthy and that they were on their own.”

“Yeah, and what the hell did they say?”

“They said that if I brought anyone but Frank Fox back, they were going to take them off the plane and put a bullet in their head! I tried to tell them that they were just kids and they needed our help, and you want to know what the cold-hearted bastards said to me? Huh? Do you? They said that if they were just kids, that we’d be doing them a favor just taking them out ourselves. That if we brought them back with us, they wouldn’t even be considered as cleared to stay there. They stay here. If we take them with us, they die for sure. I think the best thing we can do for them is leave all of our gear and say that we lost it when we get back. There’s no way anyone is ever going to come back here checking for it. What the hell will they care?”

Aslin said, “This is the American government we are talking about, right? You don’t have anyone else that we can ask about this?”

“It’s orders; we get them, we follow them. We can at least not shoot the group, right? I don’t want to talk about this anymore, and I damn well suggest you don’t bring it up anymore, soldier. You understand the words coming out of my mouth?”

Aslin nodded and they started their walk up to the building. Clary saw this and yelled, “You want the kids to come, or what?”

Phelps motioned to bring them, and everyone hustled to catch up. They made their way up the parking lot, eyes trained on the building and everything around it. There were cars and ambulances in the lot. The ambulance appeared to have been exited in a hurry, as it still had open doors. “So they went in and they didn’t come back out? That doesn’t seem like a good thing.”

Phelps asked, “I don't think I need to ask this, but does anyone have any questions of what you should do if you see one of those things in there?”

Shaun elbowed Greg, motioning to his gun. “You got your safety on that rifle?”

Greg shook his head no, remembering the five-minute gun lesson that he had given the other three and said, “Okay, go ahead and flick the safeties off on your guns. Oh, and squeeze the trigger lightly; don’t jerk it. Patrick, make sure you pump that thing after each time you shoot and make sure the bead is on what you want to hit.”

McClellan overheard this and added, “I can’t tell you how much more comfortable I feel that you guys just learned how to use those things today. Just make sure you don't shoot me in the back of the head, all right?”

Ellie said, “We don't like making promises that we don't know we’re able to keep, McClellan.”

McClellan looked around the lobby and pulled on the door; it didn’t give. “It’s locked.”

“So unlock the damn thing,” Phelps said.

McClellan said, “You think that someone maybe locked it for a
reason
?”

Phelps shrugged. “Ask me if I give two shits. You got something on your belt you can open it with, don’t you?”

McClellan shouldered his rifle, brought out an extending baton, and snapped it open with a practiced flick of his wrist. He brought it back and slammed it into the glass, shattering it. He swiped it around the edge, clearing all of it, and leaving only the metal push bar to crawl under. The five SEALs went under it and swept through the lobby like the practiced experts that they were. Aslin asked, “So since all those vehicles are still outside, we know that they are either trapped in here, dead, or one of those things.”

Patrick said, “Couldn’t they have just left with the person who locked it?”

Tina said, “Nope, they’re in here… they have to be, because that’s the kind of day that we are having.”

Clare walked over to the computer terminal at the guards’ desk and started typing at impossible speeds. “Shaun, show me where your dad worked. Did he work out of different labs or different offices?”

              “No, just look for his lab. He has an office somewhere, but I’ve never been to it. He never stepped foot in there; he didn't need to.”

              Clare said, “What? Your dad was too smart to have to do research? He must have been, right? I mean, we are here, the world’s burning and—”

              That was all Shaun needed to hear. He ducked to start running full force toward Clare for a second time, but Greg could see it coming; the rage in Shaun’s eyes was hard to miss when it was fully ignited. He gripped him around the shoulders, picking him up, and whispering, “No reason to get your ass handed to you two times in one day now is there, Shaun? Come on, be the bigger man. Don’t let this D bag get under your skin, man. You need to be able to deal with assholes like this. He’s not the first and he won’t be the last, all right?”

              Clare stood up, trying to puff out what chest he had. “You want to say that again, Greg?”

              Greg put down Shaun, patting him on the shoulder. “Yeah, sure I do. You are a giant asshole, Clare, and if you get exposed, don’t worry; I’ll make sure and double tap you in the damn head.”

              Clare came around the desk, determined not to take any more shit from these kids, who he felt were beneath him. McClellan put up a hand that he tried to smack away. He reached with his right hand, gripping Clare’s uniform tightly and pushing backwards. “You don’t need to start anything. If you’ve got extra energy then maybe you ought to conserve it. You have no idea what you are going to be dealing with today.”

              “Did you hear what he called me?”

              “Yeah, he called you an asshole because you are being a asshole instead of asking questions that might get us what we need, so we can get the fuck out of here.” He released Clare, pushing him back a few feet for good measure. He turned around to see a heaving Shaun. “So, Shaun, can you tell me why your dad didn’t need his office?”

              Shaun pushed free of Greg, who was still keeping himself between the two men. “I was trying to say that he didn’t need to because he was that damn smart. He wouldn’t have given something like this to his fiancé if he thought it wasn’t one hundred percent safe. He was smarter than all of you guys put together. He didn’t need to have help. He needed to have answers and he didn’t ever stop until he had them. He could process so much shit at once that it would make your guys’ heads spin.”

              Phelps cleared his throat, ready to move on. “So can you show us where we need to go once we get a look at the security camera?”

Phelps pointed to Clare, motioning to the camera console. “Show us, would you?”

Clare nodded, straightened his fatigues, and picked up the security chair before taking a seat. He pulled up the floor Frank worked on and brought up the hallway. “Oh my god. Would you look at this?” He looked up, seeing that he had everyone's undivided attention and brought up the hallway on the main monitor, showing the gore on a 32-inch television. “Would you look at that, for god’s sake? There was something that happened in that hallway.”

Kristy said, “Was it the three bodies, or the blood and guts splattering the walls and floors that gave it away?”

Shaun peered at the screen, pointing. “You see that fat guy who has an axe handle sticking out of his skull? That looks like my dad’s lab assistant, Rogers, who was probably helping him with the formula they were modifying.”

Phelps looked, seeing this and said, “You think he and your dad had a fall out?”

Shaun pointed and said, “Can you zoom in on that, please?”

Clare hit the plus button focusing in on Rogers. Shaun said, “Check out the arm on him. You see that patch of skin missing from it? They all have that. If you see it, shoot the person in the head. They have blood that comes lightly from their eyes too, but you can't do any good with this guy.”

Clare said, without thinking before he spoke, “Yeah? Why’s that?”

“Well, it would seem that, quite possibly, the giant axe handle coming out of the top of the guy’s head would be the answer for that, don’t you think, Clare?” Greg said. He looked at the rest of the guys. “Isn’t really the smartest guy you all have, right? Like, he is just the computer specialist and can… I don’t know… tie his shoes really well or something.”

Clare looked at the head more closely, thinking that there was no shortage of blood on the man’s head. He looked back at Greg, who was sitting back with a grin. “Yes, thank you for pointing out the obvious, Greg.”

Phelps said, “It looks like we are clear, though. There isn’t anything else wandering around up there that we need to worry about. At least it doesn’t look like it from here. Clare, you stay down here. You radio us or hit an alarm if you see something that looks like it’s going to kill us, all right?”

“Roger that; keep your radios on five.”

Greg was looking at Patrick, who still was looking pale. “Can Patrick stay down here with you? He still doesn’t look too hot.”

“Wow. Thanks, Greg. You are quite the flatterer, you know that?”

Greg shrugged. “Well, if you want me to say something flattering, I can always think of something sweet to say to Kristy.”

“Stay on task here, Greg,” she said.

“I am always on task, Kristy.”
              Phelps thought of the number of people and realized there was no way all these kids needed to come upstairs with them. The more that were there, the more of a liability each of them was going to be. Phelps said, “There are too many of you kids out here to go up with us. Shaun, Greg, you can come with us. You are the only ones who are able to shoot. The rest of you can wait in the lobby; it seems, overall, the safest thing.”

Clare held up a hand. “Sir, sorry, but I’m not a damn baby sitter. Can’t you just send them home?”

“We don’t have a home, ” Ellie said.

Clare opened his mouth and Phelps yelled, “Just keep it shut, Clare, you aren’t going to say anything intelligent. I’m not sending these kids to a home they have not found yet, unless you think that we are done with the truck, which leaves Shaun and Greg here without a ride. I’m sure there is a semi or two lying around here, but I have issues believing either one of these kids can drive one of those eighteen wheelers outside.”

Ellie said, “Sorry, but I’m not staying down here waiting while the people I care about are walking around some part of the building where there may or may not be zombies, with the only protection being a SEAL team that doesn’t actually seem to care if we live or die.”

Phelps said, “I’ll bring them back; don’t worry, kid.”

“If I lose him, then I don’t have anything left to worry about.”

Shaun looked at Ellie; her eyes were saying don’t go. He knew that he needed to go—that his life wasn’t nearly as important as the world’s. “I’ll be okay, Ellie. We will be back down in like twenty minutes. Christ, I got four guys, and they all smoke. You don’t think we can get away?”