Luke glanced back at O’Neil. “If you’re talking about understanding the dynamics of what makes the dead get back on their feet with hungry stomachs…” Luke pushed his glasses back up the bridge of his nose. “No, I haven’t. That’s Doc Gallenger’s area, not mine.”
“I thought you were helping him.”
“Sure, when I have the time. You might have noticed I have been rather busy lately, what with keeping this old girl running and designing these new toys for the captain.”
“It’s not that I don’t trust that Gallenger’s doing his best, Luke, I just thought—”
“What? That having nine degrees in everything from pathology to physics makes me superhuman? That I am supposed to be able to wave a magic wand and save your ass? I wish.” Luke shrugged. “I ain’t God, ya know.”
“I didn’t say that you were. God has a social life,” O’Neil teased.
“You want me to go with you tomorrow?”
“Hell no! Steven would have me shot if I let you off the Queen. You’re the only real brain we’ve got.”
“So you say,” Luke said. “There are plenty of people on the boat who could do what I do around here.”
“Maybe, but not one of them could do it all.” O’Neil got up from the bench. “Just promise me you’ll get to helping Gallenger, okay? We need a way to stop the dead more than we need the weapons to keep running.”
As O’Neil turned to leave, Luke muttered, “Be careful out there, you idiot.”
“I always am,” O’Neil responded with a flash of his teeth, then he was gone.
14
Scott figured Hannah was whacko after what she’d endured, with every right to be, so he let her brood as they walked. The woman insisted on traveling east to the coast, so that’s where they headed.
Scott had managed to get a few hours of blessed sleep while she kept watch, and he counted himself lucky she hadn’t killed him while he dozed. When he woke up, they buried her family and moved on.
“What the heck is that?” Scott asked as he noticed a building ahead of them.
Hannah paused. “It’s a cabin,” she said, and then continued towards it.
“Whoa. What are you doing?” Scott grabbed her by the arm. “We don’t know if anyone’s in there.”
“There’s not. Not anyone alive anyway.”
“How can you be so sure?”
Hannah pointed through the trees. “The door’s been busted open. The windows are shattered. And that appears to be dried blood all over the outer walls.”
Given little choice, Scott followed her into the clearing in front of the cabin. Several bodies, all dead from head wounds, littered the grass.
“Looks like somebody put up a good fight,” Scott commented.
Hannah headed straight for the main door, which dangled by a single hinge. She stepped past it and into the building.
A body missing its legs and arms watched her enter. Old blood stained its mouth and chin. Hannah was sure its tongue had been cut or bitten out; otherwise the thing would have been screaming obscenities at her.
She glanced about the remains of the simple room. Someone had taken shelter in this place, seeking safety in the wilderness just like her own family had done, only these poor people must have been discovered before they could run.
Hannah jumped as a gunshot sounded behind her, sending the limbless monster on its way to Hell.
Scott shrugged as she glared at him. “It was creeping me out, okay?”
The pair carefully searched the place for more of the dead or anyone left alive. They met back in the cabin’s main room, alone.
“We’ll take what we can,” Hannah said. “Food, ammo, whatever, but we’re not staying.”
Scott was too delighted to be put off by her air of superiority. “You’re not going to believe what I found out behind this dump!” He smiled. “Come on, I’ll show you!”
15
The cabin had been a godsend. Scott couldn’t believe their luck. With their stock replenished and their stomachs happily full of canned corn and dried tomatoes, they journeyed east again, much richer. Hannah still carried her .30-.06, which she never set down for a second, but now she also carried a functional AK-47 assault rifle. Scott himself had added a pump-action twelve gauge to his arsenal. Their best find, however, had been the bike. It allowed them to continue traveling off–road, yet much faster.
Scott held onto Hannah’s waist as she throttled the small bike’s engine at over forty miles an hour. She jerked the handlebars from side to side, dodging trees, and Scott wasn’t sure but he thought for the first time since they’d met he saw the slightest smile on her lips.
“If you don’t mind if I ask,” he yelled over the bike’s roar, “why the hell are you so set on going east?”
Much to his surprise, Hannah answered him. “I want to see the ocean one last time before I die!”
Scott mulled over this revelation for a second. “Works for me!” he shouted, and Hannah charged down a tiny hill.
16
The Queen sat in the harbor, motionless and far from the docks. No organized attack had been launched against her yet. Henry O’Neil admired her from a distance as his lifeboat drifted toward the shore. There were four boats, each carrying an equal share of the raiding party.
O’Neil’s heart pounded in his chest. A long time had passed since he’d been on shore. He’d fought numerous battles aboard the Queen and occasionally ventured onto a dock to hold the hordes of the dead back for returning raiding parties, but this was different. He was excited and scared shitless at the same time.
An African American man named Roy sat across from him, loading a shotgun. O’Neil didn’t know Roy well, but he knew him to be a veteran of raids.
The plan was simple. Land on the beach near the warehouses along the dock, hit the shore running, and stock up on whatever nonperishable foodstuffs they could get their hands on; they would then steal one of the boats that lined the port and ferry the goods back to the Queen. This operation would cost them most of the remaining lifeboats, but if they could steal some decent motorboats, it would be more than a fair trade.
Jennifer and Jason also shared O’Neil’s lifeboat. The twins were inseparable. Jennifer was the warrior of the pair. Muscles bulged from underneath the jumpsuit she wore. In addition to the rifle and sidearm she carried, she hefted a machete. She was something of a legend among the Queen’s raiders, and her confidence made O’Neil feel safer.
Jason, by contrast, lacked muscle. He was the party’s medic and an assistant to Dr. Gallenger. The young man’s brow was creased in thought as he checked over his medical kit.
O’Neil held no official rank, having come aboard the Queen after the plague started, yet he was second only to Captain Steven; everyone treated him with respect. He hoped he lived up to it out here where it mattered most.
The lifeboats reached the sand of the shoreline. O’Neil screwed a silencer onto the barrel of his pistol and stepped onto solid ground. His land legs were clumsy, but as he raced after the others toward the docks, he got the hang of it.
The party split up and headed for different warehouses while one group went in search of a getaway boat. There was no sign of the dead, but O’Neil knew it wouldn’t be long.
Within minutes they located a pair of small motorboats, the only ones around that appeared functional, and soon after, men brought the first load of canned and freeze-dried foods. That’s when the shit hit the fan.