The Killing Floor

The math is simple. She has a one in three chance of becoming infected within the next few minutes. She remembers standing in the ruins of a hospital a long time ago, holding a gun against Todd’s head after he was cut by the teeth of a monster, while Ethan counted down on his watch and then pronounced him clear.

Now it’s my turn.

He adds, “If anything happens, I will cure you. I swear I will.”

“Thank you,” she says.

“Thank you, Wendy. We’d all be dead if it weren’t for you.”

She stands and dusts her knees slowly, carefully, aware of a tingling in every inch of her body. Turning, she sprints toward Toby, needing his arms around her, the one place in the world she feels safe outside the Bradley’s gunner station.

Instead of extending his arms to embrace her, he pulls his mask off and falls to his knees, his shoulders shaking. Steve and Todd look away, too stricken to speak.

“Why?” Toby asks her. “Why, Wendy?”

She falls to her knees and puts her arms around her man, providing what comfort she can. “You know why. You would have done the same.”

“It’s not worth it,” he sobs. “They can all die except you. Me included. But not you.”

“There’s a good chance I don’t have it.”

He takes a long shuddering breath, gathering his strength, and puts his large arms around her. She nestles against him, feeling safe again.

“Tell me it’s nothing,” she says.

“How long until we know?” he asks her.

“Five minutes, maybe. I don’t know for sure. Where are the others?”

“Yang and Guthrie are helping the soldiers. They don’t know you might have the bug. Cruz and Noel didn’t make it.”

“Bury them deep, Toby.”

On the road, it is common practice to burn the dead so the monsters don’t dig them up and eat them. The alternative is to bury them extra deep. It’s considered a high honor.

She says nothing, her ear pressed against his barrel chest, listening to the rhythmic beat of his heart. Then she becomes aware of ghostly wailing in the distance. The sound appears to have no source. It seems to come from everywhere. Then the foghorns join in with their sad lowing that ripples through the air.

“What is that?” Toby says.

“They’re mourning him. The Infected. They’re mourning Ray Young.”

“I love you, Wendy.”

“I love you, Toby.”

She says it repeatedly, hoping she will take the thought with her when she crosses over.

Then she stiffens in his arms.

Cool Rod

Rod finds Davis’s body, scattered across the sidewalk as if a pack of wild dogs had fought over it for an hour. After Arnold, Davis was supposed to be in the safest place in the operation. Shaking his head in anger and sadness at the waste of a good man and a reliable soldier, Rod pockets the man’s tags and brings the field radio back to the Stryker, setting it on the ground.

“Davis is dead,” he tells Arnold. “Back that way.”

“I’ll get him, Sergeant,” the soldier says, sounding strangely subdued. They are all humbled by what they have endured and accomplished this day.

“Bury him deep,” Rod tells him. “Find Sergeant Wilson and ask him if he minds our boys sharing the hole he’s digging for his people.”

“Will do, Sergeant.”

He wonders how the dead will ever find peace. He grew up in a small town near Dallas with his parents and grandmother. Sitting in her rocker, his granny often told ghost stories from Mexico, Rod’s favorite being the little boy who haunted one of the oldest restaurants in Mexico City. The little boy was often spotted running through the kitchen walls, and would call the restaurant on the phone repeatedly, asking the staff to play with him. The boy choked to death at one of the tables in the forties, she explained, and that is why he cannot leave this world for the next. He died in violence, and is confused; he thinks he is still alive.

The world will be filled with ghosts by the time Wildfire is done. Angry ghosts of both the normal and the Infected, wondering why they died, demanding justice.

The bodies of the dead hoppers, which in life exuded a smell best described as sour milk cologne, are already starting to stink like rot. He wonders if they will leave ghosts as well.

Christ, I’m tired. The sooner we can be rid of this cursed place, the better. I want to go home.

Sosa ignites the flamethrower, sending an arc of fire across Ray Young’s remains, the bodies of his guards and Fielding, and the truck. Anything his spores might have come into contact with. The scientist tosses a garbage bag filled with clothes into the flames, and steps away.

Ray Young is gone now. All that is left is a few vials of blood and chunks of flesh in a cooler, one of them still eerily pulsing and alive, looking for its host.

These tissue samples, packed in ice, might hold the key to beating Wildfire. The organism, Dr. Price explained, hides in plain sight, disguised as something else, something common. Using the tissue samples he collected, he hopes to unmask it once and for all. And once unmasked, it can be defeated. He can make no guarantees, however. It might be another dead end, another trick.

It’s out of Rod’s hands in any case. The mission is almost over; another will begin upon his return. The war goes on. His next step is to report the action up the chain of command, and receive orders. Either he will be told to drive the samples to Fort Detrick, or more likely, given the possibility the specimens might decay, they will send a helicopter.

Then Rod can go back to the fighting. The idea of getting up tomorrow morning and doing this all over again, day in and day out, makes him want to lie down and quit. His boys deserve better. Unfortunately, there is nothing else.

He watches Dr. Price sitting on the ground, holding his head in his hands, and thinks: It’s your war now too, Doc. You against the thing in the cooler. Have courage, man. We are all counting on you.

It’s time to bring this mission to an end.

¦

Rod finds the designated channel and initiates contact. The radio/telephone operators recognize his call sign but pass him around, unsure what to do with him. Finally, he finds himself talking to Corporal Carlson, who hands him over to Major Duncan.

“Message follows, over,” Rod reports.

Send message, over, the Major answers.

“I send ‘Typhoid Mary,’ over.”

Code for mission accomplished.

Next he will say, “Immunity failed,” which means the subject is dead.

Then he will say, “Frankenstein found,” which means they obtained viable tissue samples.

Finally, he will provide map coordinates and say, “Antidote rising,” a request for air units to come and extract Dr. Price and the samples, and take them to Fort Detrick.

Rod glances at the twilight sky, hoping the day has enough light left for an air extraction. The birds will have to leave soon, or Rod and his people will be driving to Fort Detrick.

The radio dips into white noise, over which Rod can hear shouting in the background.