Cruising 9

“Lance!” Tom yelled, pointing at Carl, who stood, frozen, halfway up the rope.

Lance turned to follow Tom's gaze, raising the rifle as he did so. “Don't move!” he shouted at Carl.

Carl stood like a deer in headlights, and stammered, “Wh-what?”

“You should be dead!” Tom accused.

“I...I can explain! Don't shoot me!”

Between the two men, Angela crouched down a little lower and asked, “What the hell is going on? Why are you pointing the gun at him?”

“His name is Carl, he's a preacher from...Minnesota?” Lance said.

“We know all that, without him we wouldn't have made it here, he drove some of the zombies off for us!” Angela said.

“How'd you meet him?”

“He met us. We were on the main lobby level and he was hiding behind the bar. Paul thought he was a zombie at first, he was all bloodstained.” Tom and Lance exchanged a quick, knowing look.

“What?” Angela asked.

“Nothing. Yet.” Tom said, “What do we do with him?”

“Well ah would rather have him where we can keep an eye on him than running around loose.”

“What's the hold up? Can the next guy come up now?” called Paul from below.

“Almost.” yelled Tom, then to Carl, “You come up here, we won't do anything to you.”

Carl nodded, started climbing and said, “I told you I could explain, and I will.”

“Well, until we get to that sir, you need to go up top.” said Lance gesturing with his rifle towards the ladder as Carl climbed over the railing.

“Okay, the next guy can come up.” Tom called.

The next man up was Paul, he was tall and lanky, well over six feet and sported a crop of short blond hair. He had some sort of bag slung over his shoulder that looked like a gym bag stuffed full of something.

“Hi! I'm Paul Lee, you can call me 'Paul'.” he said, shaking everyone's hands as he made it to the deck, then he called down, “C'mon up Erik!”

The rope grew taut again as the man below started climbing.

“Where is Carl?” Paul asked.

“Up top, he needed to get some air.” Lance explained, pointing with one hand to the ladder.

“How you doing Mary Beth?” Paul asked the woman, who was still crying  near the door to the bridge.

“Fine, that Tom saved me, I froze up on the rope...The rope!” she yelled. Everyone had been looking at her when she spoke, now they turned back to the rope, or rather where the rope had been. A man's scream came from below them, followed by another yell from further down, then silence.

“You son of a bitch!” Tom yelled leaping for the ladder.

“Careful Tom!” Lance yelled running after him.

“What the fuck just happened?” Paul asked.

“The rope got loose, Erik fell.” said Angela, pointing to the empty railing.

Tom made it up the ladder in two bounds and saw Carl leaning over the railing, looking down the front of the ship. Carl turned around to see Tom's shotgun pointed at his face, Lance climbed up the ladder to stand on the deck and prevent anyone else from climbing up.

“I...I tried to grab the rope, it came undone really fast, I didn't catch it.”

“Sir, that’s just bullshit. I tied that mahself, ain't no way it came untied.” said Lance, “Tom, don't do nothing foolish.”

“He's one of them, first Dan, now Erik.”

“We don't know that.”

“What the hell are you doing, let me by Lance.” said Paul from the ladder.

“No sir, you just stay put, see, we know 'Carl' here, don't we Carl?”

The preacher nodded.

“What? How? You mean from earlier, on the cruise before everyone got sick right?” asked Paul.

Tom shook his head, “No. It was after.”

“He was with us, helped us get by a bunch of zombies, like Angela said he did for you. Only there were four of us then. What happened to Dan?” asked Lance.

“He, well he didn't make it.” said Carl slowly.

“Tell us what happened.” Tom said.

“It's hard to talk with the barrel of a gun in my face.” Carl replied.

“Harder with a shotgun sized hole in your head.” Tom responded.

Gulping, Carl nodded and stammered, “Dan and I went down in the elevator, the doors opened up into the main lobby. There were zombies there. They got Dan.”

“And you just got away?” Tom asked sarcastically.

“I did, praise be to God. The zombies didn't touch me.”

“Bullshit.”

“Look Tom, they don't bother me for some reason, they just leave me alone. Maybe it's because I am a man of God?”

Lance was the one who said “Bullshit.” this time, “A whole mob of them? And you just drove them back, but couldn't save Dan too? We saw you push 'em back on basketball court, so something ain't smelling right here on the pig farm.”

“You gotta believe me, it...everything I said was the truth!”

“Oh, I believe that. I just don't think you told us everything, did you?” said Tom, “Hey Paul, what was Carl here wearing when you ran into him?”

“A bloody t-shirt, shorts, flip flops.”

“Was he all covered in blood?”

“Pretty bad, but c'mon man we all get some splatter on us when we kill them. Poor Mary Beth got hit bad when I shot that one with the flare gun.”

“Lance, what do you think?”

“I think he untied the rope and let that Erik guy fall to his death, I think he ate Dan. I think he's one of them.”

“No I am not! I am not one of them!”

“So what do we do with him...it?” asked Tom.

“Shoot it.”

“I...uh.” Tom started, then remembering his conversation with Lance earlier he shrugged his shoulders and said, “Okay, you want to turn around Carl?”

The preacher stood upright and faced the gun barrel directly, “No. I will face my fate square on.”

Tom stepped back next to Lance, putting him six feet from Carl, and then carefully aimed the shotgun.

“You can't just shoot him!” yelled Paul, making an effort to get up the ladder onto the deck. Lance pushed the young man back down with his foot.

“Stay outta this please. We know what we are doing.”

While Lance was distracted Paul threw himself to one side and came around the short deck at Tom. Tom, however, was not fooled and fired the shotgun, hitting Carl in the right shoulder and flipping the man completely head over heels where he lay still on the deck.