Cayo Elina 36

“Fuck, fuck, fuck.” Elina cursed as they hovered above the wreckage of the transport helicopter. The debris was spread in line almost a hundred meters long. There were zombies pawing among the larger pieces of the helicopter and the tail section, looked almost intact, but half submerged upside down in bayou. A half circle of zombies was standing on relatively firm ground looking down at that section. Behind them another major section of the helicopter was burning, sending up the large plume of smoke.

“Anyone see survivors?” The pilot asked.

“Negative.” Levi answered.

“That group there, by the tail section, what are they doing?” Elina asked.

“They’ve got guns, don’t bring us in too close.” Hector said.

“Roger that.” The pilot responded, barely concealing his scorn for the instructions.

“They’re going to fire on us!” Elina yelled.

A split second later the group below them scattered into the vegetation and started firing on the helicopter above them. They were using light caliber, civilian firearms that had little effect on the military aircraft.

“We’re okay.” The pilot said, “Small arms should bounce, stay away from the side doors, a hit high up might penetrate.”

A loud ‘whump’ sounded and the pilot struggled with the controls. “Shit.” Another trail of smoke buzzed by in front of the windscreen.

“Ricardo! Stop them!” Elina yelled pointed at the zombies down below.

“I’m trying! They’ve got a super with them and we’re too far away for me to get control. Get us out of here!” he shouted.

“Small arms fire from the tail section.” Justin said calmly, “Someone is still alive from our side down there.”

“Then we’re going in.” Levi said, “We have to.”

Things happened quickly after that, another contrail buzzed by close to the door Elina was sitting at, then the entire aircraft seemed to shudder from the impacts of numerous rounds of small arms fire. It sounded to Elina like rain striking the tin roofs of the shacks out on her island during a thunderstorm.

“Hold on.” The pilot dove and angled the helicopter away from the immediate scene of the attack. Elina spotted the old highway and the pilot brought the helicopter down to the tree line, which stopped the pitter-patter on the hull. Banking the helicopter he brought it to a hover a few feet above the old road.

“Are we clear of zombies in the immediate area?” the pilot asked.

Ricardo nodded, “Yeah, they’re all over that way.”

“I’m putting us down.” He landed the helicopter neatly on a raised portion of the median used for emergency vehicles to turn about in. “Lance Corporal, please break out the M240 and set it up on the west pintle mount. I’ll stay with the helicopter while you investigate the crash site.”

Levi yelled at Justin to help him and the two struggled with a heavy crate in the back of the helicopter, Elina unstrapped herself and gave them a hand, easing the burden. They pulled the crate open to reveal an effective looking machine gun, which the three of them lifted onto the mount after opening the side door.

The pilot finished the landing procedure and moved back to load the gun when the others brought up ammunition for it.

Levi looked at the pilot, “I’m not leaving you here alone. Six of us should go, two should stay.”

All of them stood staring at each other for a few moments, before starting to talk at the same time. The pilot quieted them all down with a yell, “I’m not going to pull rank; Corporal Wogsner is right. Two stay, the rest go. I’ll give you forty minutes if I haven’t heard from you by then I’ll lift and bring news to Miami. Don’t expect a rescue mission in any event.”

“Who’s staying?” Elina asked, there were no volunteers.

“I’m going, I have some medical training.” Justin said.

“Shh, we’re both going. One of them is staying back.”

Everyone erupted again, except Gus, who was staring off into the distance.  When he spoke, everyone stopped talking and listened, “The marines go, they have to. Ricardo goes, he can control the shamblers and some of the supers. So it’s among  us three.”

Elina nodded, “Rock, paper, scissors?”

Gus shook his head, “Me or Hector.”

“I don’t want to be split up again.” Hector said with a shake of his head.

“Elina can discern things with her eyesight that I cannot. It’s me or you; you want another chance at killing a few of them or not?” Gus asked.

Hector shook his head slowly, stopped and nodded vigorously. “I’ll go.”

“Get your gear.” Gus told him. Elina gave Gus a curious look and arched one of her eyebrows, “One of us had to stay, me or you, Ricardo couldn’t and we can’t leave our only method of quick escape in the hand of two of the little people, after all.”

“What if Ricardo had volunteered to stay?” She asked him.

“Then, we’d risk it. Good luck, Elina.”

The six people melted into the swampy woods as if they hadn’t ever been there. ‘Of course given how poor my eyesight is these days, it was probably less magical than it looked.’ Gus thought to himself. Turning to the pilot he asked, “What’s your name?”

“George Bennet.” The pilot said, offering his hand.

“Gus Ranum.”

“I know.” George said.

“It sucks for everyone to say that, why couldn’t my fame have come twenty years ago?”

George  laughed, “Sometimes it takes an event to make you famous. But I knew about you before this mission. From way back. You don’t remember me, but there’s no reason you should.”

“Oh?” Gus asked.

“Yeah, I was the pilot that hauled your unconscious ass to the Michael Murphy. I’m not a Corpsman, but I’ve seen a few fucked up people in the past few years. You gotta have an angle looking over you or something.”

Gus nodded, “My insides were more out than in. That was a bad time.”

“I was sure they’d be capping you and tossing you in the drink within hours. But that guy…what was his name?”

“Bill.” Gus said, with the sinking feeling that George knew very well who ‘that guy’ was.

“Yeah, Bill, big brute of a guy, he insisted and then Draper, that Ranger, he backed him up…and wouldn’t you know it, you lived. Made a full recovery too. Is anything out there, Gus?”

“I’m near blind, and I can’t sense zeds like Ricardo. I’d guess we’re pretty much alone for a while though. Why?”

“Gotta piss. Take the gun. Blind, huh? Don’t point the barrel that way.” George said pointing towards the rear of the aircraft.

“I won’t. Watch yourself, even a super can’t sneak up on you if you’re careful.”

“Unless they’re invisible, eh Gus?”

“True enough.” Gus placed himself behind the gun and peeked into the future ever so slightly, keeping half his attention there and half focused on the here and now for when George came back.

The man took a long piss, but he came back just before Gus called out for him. George leaned against the doorframe, facing outwards and listening. He jumped slightly when the gunfire started in the distance. “I thought they were closer than that.”

“It’s probably muffled from all the vegetation. You want the gun back?”

“Does it matter. I heard you can see the future, what happens if I don’t take the gun? Do we end up dead? Zombies?” George asked.

Gus explained to the man that seeing the future wasn’t all it was cracked up to me because so many things changed. George seemed to understand that immediately and nodded while saying, “Yeah, I get that. I could move a step sideways, or forward or back and that could change everything. That brings me great comfort.”

“Really?”

“Of course! It means we have free will, things aren’t set in stone. Now if you told me you saw an unchanging, pre-destined future carved into stone, well I might be tempted to blow my brains out right now, based on what you told me.” George said.

Gus thought about that for a moment and said, “Me too. I never thought of how boring a linear future would be. Free will, I like that.”

“I know why you lived.”

The statement hung in the air between them, mixing with the slightly nauseating smell of burned aviation fuel. Gus shrugged, looking forward ever so slightly for the best way to handle this situation.

“How?”

“No one recovers from being torn up like you were. Not unless they’re a zed. And these days the smart zombies don’t even bother hiding that sort of thing, no need to in Miami. Hell, look at Ricardo! We need him and he sort of likes us too. In his own way.”

“That doesn’t really say what you know.” Gus pointed out.

“Cagey little bastard, aren’t you?” before Gus could answer George held up his hand, “You’re a Maxson, only I, myself, would call you a Billson. One of the many ‘saved’ by Bill after he was saved by Max, not too far north of here, unless I miss my guess. I never did get that part of the story right.”

“That is right, the crater, that’s where everything supposedly went down.” Gus said.

“Figures, every legend needs a good backstory.”

“What do you know about Maxsons?” Gus asked him.

“I’d guess more than you do. You got dropped in Miami pretty damn quick, some of us eventually figured out what happened and we made a list of all of ya’ll. I’ve seen more than a handful of you in Miami over the past eighteen months.”

Gus turned and fired the gun into the woods. George jumped more than a foot and came down cursing, he redoubled his efforts when he couldn’t see anything around where Gus had fired, “What the fuck?”

“They needed some fire support.” Gus said, “If I didn’t fire right then right there Justin wouldn’t have made it back.”

“You can see that?”

“I’m going through the options as we speak. I can’t guarantee it won’t happen again. Sorry. Why would you keep a list of the Maxsons?” Gus asked.

“What the hell else we going to do as a hobby?  If you fire again take it easy on the ammo, those two boxes area l we have.”

“That explains why we didn’t use them to help clear the area back at the base.” Gus said.

“Reloading these things isn’t as easy as you might think.” George said, picking up the dozen or so shell casings that littered the ground. “Especially when no one is making brass anymore and you can fire them off at eight hundred rounds a minute.”

“There’s eight hundred rounds in the magazine?”

George laughed, “No! Only two hundred, you’d burn through that in fifteen seconds. And we only have two hundred more.”

“You’re telling me Perry sent us with thirty seconds of ammunition?”

“Emergency use only.” George lifted the spent casings he held in one hand, “I’ll be reamed out for firing it this much, especially with the goddamned Cuban situation. We’ve been saving our ammo for them.”

The gunfire in the distance grew more intense, it was clear who was firing from the sound, the military personal were firing M-16s and the others had a variety of civilian small arms. Gus figured out that the steady thump-thump was coming from Levi’s shotgun, interspaced with the occasional sharper crack from the same area. George, watching Gus listen said, “That’s Levi’s revolver. A good old fashioned .357 six shooter. He loves that thing, but he only pulls it out if shit really hits the fan. You want to give them some more cover fire?”

Gus shook his head, “I can’t see any good place to shoot.”

George laughed, “See. That’s a good one. I’m glad they left me here with you, Gus, you’re interesting and we have so many things to talk about.”

“Like where I’ve been? What I’ve done? If I’ve made a few Gussons?”

“It’s not all about you, Gus. Let’s turn the focus back to me for a minute, if you don’t mind.”

Gus grinned and nodded, at least George wasn’t a dumbass. ‘My momma always said, better a smartass than a dumbass any day of the year.’

“Okay, good, so you want to know something?” George paused until Gus nodded, “Sure you do, everybody likes knowing things. I’m one too.”

“A smartass?” Gus blurted, without thinking.

George sputtered and yelled, “No you idiot! I’m a Maxson too. So is Levi, so is Justin, so was Sidney. Perry sent a lot of us up here to get this mission done.”

“What? How?”

“Add a why and you’ll almost have the answer.” George said.

Gus pondered this for a moment and softly said, “Perry’s building a set of super soldiers.”

“That’s what we think. I’m an old timer, like you though. I got shot up in…hell, I’m pretty sure it was this Venom.” George said patting the side of the helicopter. “I managed to get it down on the ship okay, but it was in better shape than me. Bill was still onboard and Perry knew what was going on. Pilots rank special treatment; I guess he had to beg Bill to save me.”

“I’d have thought Bill would have been saving everyone at that point.” Gus said.

“Oh no, no way.” George answered shaking his head, “There had been some deaths, brought on by the infection, so he stopped passing it on all willy-nilly. I was a match, obviously, or I’d be true dead.”

“How many of us are there?” Gus asked.

“Hundreds. One of the doctors came up with a test that can tell if you’re compatible or not. It’s not a hundred percent reliable on the false side of things, but it is on the true side of the equation.”

“Whaddya mean by that?”

“The test can tell right away if it won’t kill you, a hundred percent accurate in that regard. But some if it comes up negative…well the Maxson might kill you or it might not. All the positives are Maxsons now. Everyone else carries a vial of the stuff in suspension, if you get too wounded you’re supposed to infect yourself. We’ve saved a few people who otherwise would have died that way.”

“Jesus.” Gus said.

“Yeah. The next race of super humans. Think of how many dictators would be thrilled to know we’d finally succeeded.”

“We don’t know anything about it though. It could cause us to be sterile or die in five years…”

“Who’s worried about five years from now? We want to live through tomorrow and it gives us an edge. Makes us stronger, faster, better than we were before.”

Gus’s eyes narrowed perceptibly and he looked on George with suspicion, “Isn’t this a military secret or something? Why are you telling me this?”

“You need to understand something, Gus. I’m not a traitor. I love my country and my fellow Americans….but it’s gone Gus, it’s all gone. Nothing will ever be the same and someone has to stop him.”

“Stop who?”

“Perry.”

“Why?”

“He’s got an air born version of it. He was planning to dose parts of Miami loyal to our cause if the Cubans attacked.” George said.

“They’ve already started to attack!”

“Yeah. I know. They’ve got a bridgehead on the south end of town. The Boone is at the north end. It’ll take them a long time to work their way north. They won’t attack by sea, even stuck in port the Boone has enough weapons to take out most of their ships. Plus we have the three helicopters, uh, two now.”

“So you think he’ll go through with it any day now?”

“I think he’ll wait to see how things go, if we push them back, he might not do it at all.”

“What’s the death rate on the Maxson?”

“Right around forty percent.”

“That’s worse than I thought.” Gus said.

“About twenty or twenty five percent test true, the other seventy five percent are a crap shoot.”

“So what do you want me to do about it?”

“Me and some of the guys think we have the following options.” George ticked them off on his fingers as he listed them, “First; do nothing. Play dumb and let it take its course. The ones who survive will be better able to protect themselves. Second, fight like hell and throw the Cubans back before anyone does anything rash. Third, change commanding officers. Option four, destroy the payload. Fifth, get the people out of Miami. Sixth, whatever you come up with.”

“Why me?”

“Isn’t it obvious? You can see the future. So tell me, Gus, what should me and the people I know, do?”