accompanied us; he didn’t know how unnecessary he was. I was so weak I couldn’t have run a hundred feet, let alone escape from the ship or swim to shore.
We came to a brightly lit room with large windows that looked out onto the flight deck. In the middle of the room, an army officer worked at a computer surrounded by several other machines, including a printer. It was the first computer I’d seen up and running for over a year. A friendly civilian took a couple of pictures, while a soldier politely took my fingerprints. I had the strange feeling that, after a year living as a fugitive in the Wild West, I was back in the system without the slightest idea what that system was.
“We’ll have your documents ready in a few minutes, sir,” said the soldier, typing quickly at the computer. “ID, access passes, ration card—everything you’ll need to live in Tenerife. Meanwhile—”
“We’ll talk,” Alicia Pons broke in, “and bring each other up to date. How’s that sound?”
“Great idea,” I said, a bit sarcastically. “I’d love to know what the hell’s going on around here.”
“Follow me,” said Pons. “In the next room, we can talk privately Plus, I think they’ve prepared some refreshments. That’ll help pass the time.”
When we entered the next room, my eyes grew really wide. Neatly arranged on a table were trays of fresh fruit, sandwiches, fresh-baked bread, and a Spanish omelet. The heady aroma of steaming coffee filled the room. Back in Vigo, all I’d eaten was canned food, so that spread looked like it was from the fanciest restaurant in the world. It took all my willpower not to pounce on the table like a crazed Hun.
“Please have a seat. Help yourself,” Alicia Pons said, as she filled a cup with strong, boiling-hot coffee. “You must be hungry. Take anything you want.”
I thanked her then attacked the tray of sandwiches, while Ms. Pons sat back and studied me. I took that opportunity to steal a look at her, too. She was in her thirties, medium height, with auburn hair, slim, with delicate features. All in all, a good-looking woman. She was dressed in a navy uniform, but no hat; her thick hair was gathered in a bun at the nape of her neck. I spotted a gold wedding band as she unconsciously tapped a blue pen. She seemed fragile, but one look in her eyes told me that this woman was resolute and brave. All the soldiers, officers, and civilians treated her with the utmost respect. She clearly carried a lot of weight around there and knew how to command that respect.
“So…” she began, reading a paper on her desk. “One physician with a fractured septum, and one with a fractured arm and dislocated shoulder. Care to explain what the devil was going through your head?”
“It was an accident,” I said, my mouth half-full, as I grabbed another sandwich. “The arm, I mean. The nose, well… I didn’t think I’d hit him that hard.” I paused, a little embarrassed. Her bright, blue eyes drilled right through me.
“You and your friends have told us an amazing story,” she said, leafing through a stack of papers on her desk. “A Russian ship, an exploding briefcase, a refuge in a hospital, a city in flames, a two-thousand-mile helicopter flight…” She looked up and smiled. “Your life certainly hasn’t been boring over the last few months.”
“It’s been pretty rough,” I mumbled with my mouth full of sandwich. My eyes flitted over all the dishes on the table.
“It’s been rough for everyone,” she replied, looking over more papers. Among the mountain of files, I spotted several photographs of me, Prit, Lucia, Sister Cecilia, and even Lucullus. In one aerial shot, we were running down the runway at the Lanzarote Airport, a mob of Undead on our heels.
“Everyone here has a riveting story to tell. Some are funny; most are dramatic. Yours surpasses them all by a mile, believe me.”
“Just trying to stay alive,” I said, reaching for the coffee pot. “Like everyone else.”
“Believe me, you folks did remarkably well. In fact, you’re the first survivors from the Peninsula since Operation Judgment. That alone makes it even more amazing.”
“Operation Judgment?”
“The evacuation of the remaining Safe Havens on the Peninsula, ten months ago.” She looked at me strangely. “You don’t know what’s happened in that time?”
“I haven’t bought any newspapers lately, Lieutenant Pons,” I answered as I bit into an apple, letting its juice run down my chin. “Where I’ve been, there weren’t any newsstands open.”
“Captain.”
“Excuse me?”
“It’s Captain Pons, but most civilians call me Mrs. Pons. You were saying?”
“Well,
Alicia Pons froze. My outburst had taken her by surprise. Then she threw her head back and laughed uncontrollably. For a moment, her lack of respect pissed me off, but her laughter was such a breath of fresh air and so contagious, she finally got a smile out of me.
“I’m really, really sorry. Please forgive me,” she said, her smile still shaky as she tried to regain her composure. “Our situation here is so complicated, sometimes I forget how ridiculous and drawn out the procedure is. I understand your anger, but please, relax. You’re among friends. Believe me. Let’s start again.” She reached her hand across the table. “I’m Captain Alicia Pons, but you can call me Alicia.”
“Nice to meet you, Alicia.” I relaxed a bit. “You know my story. Would you mind telling me what the hell has happened in the world?”
“Of course,” said Alicia, a more serious look on her face. “I warn you it’s not a pleasant story. Far from it. The world you knew is gone and now we have… Well, wait till you’ve heard everything.”
For a moment, I thought back, a little amused. Just a few months ago, I’d had a similar conversation on another boat with another “captain,” a conversation that started me on a journey that took me to the brink of death. I hoped this conversation would take me to some place more pleasant.
“At first no one took it seriously.” Alicia poured herself another cup of coffee. “During the first week, there wasn’t any reliable information. Putin let himself be swept away by the predictable Russian paranoia and declared a total blackout on the matter. You probably remember that the news was full of… nothing. Governments around the world were in pretty much the same boat. No one knew a thing. The Russians had a stranglehold on information and Western governments knew more or less the same as CNN.”
“How’s that possible? There’re satellites…”
“Satellites are only machines that take pictures. Humans ‘look’ at those pictures and interpret them. But before you can find something, you first have to know what you’re looking for. Back then, no one was looking for Undead in satellite photos, since almost no one thought they existed. Don’t forget that Dagestan was—
“Eight days? It took longer than that for things to get ugly. Why didn’t someone do something in the meantime?”
“Simple. They didn’t believe the report,” she said staring into her coffee cup. “After 9-11 and the nonexistent weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, U.S. officials questioned the accuracy of CIA reports. So when someone reported that the dead were rising from their graves and attacking the living, it sounded like a bad B-movie. No one took it seriously. They wasted some very crucial weeks.
“But the Americans knew something was brewing. And not the Ebola or Marburg or West Nile viruses—or any of the excuses the Russians gave that first week. And that
“I remember it well,” I cut in. “Army medical battalions were supposed to collaborate with the Russians to
