Hey Zombies

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The Others

The rain halted the second group of drones from launching. They'd have to be delayed another two days. The first group was able to beat the storm to scan the eastern parts of the Nevada desert. Engineers would have to wait to send the second group to avoid severe rain damage.

Marshall Goose watched as several squads carried the drones from their launch pads back into the storage vehicles several feet away.

FTi Alpha was about 80 square miles of land, the largest of the FTi installations. Marshall Goose lead the brigade that made up FTi's military group, split amongst the eight stations around the country. Goose stuck his head out from the doorway that he stood under, protected from the rain.

"Corporal! How many drones you have left?" He asked from the radio on his shoulder. Out in the rain, a soldier looked at his own radio, grabbed it and clicked it on. A muzzled grainy voice uttered on Goose's speaker,

"We've got just these two units left. We'll break them down and secure them, should take 30 minutes." The soldier out in the rain replied.

"Make it twenty and I'll buy you a beer in the mess hall. This storm is not letting up." Goose replied.

"Yes sir!" The soldier replied joyously.

Goose smiled as he dropped his radio and shut the door. The hallways of Alpha were well lit, there was a bulb every few feet that cast a bright white light, washing out the beige yellow walls in a metaphorical milk. Goose had to squint to adjust his eyes as he traversed. The darkness form the storm had taken a toll on his eyes.

Goose arrived at the central communications room ten minutes later. Beeps, hums, and whirs echoed from the machines surrounding the room. A single soldier sat at his desk, turning a knob and patting the headphones on his ears.

"Parks." Goose called. The soldier stood at attention in less than a second.

"Sir."

"Gimme a full report, specialist."

"Well, we already know about the east coast, Omega was the first to go, around the coastal area where this infection broke out, the other stations out west have nothing to report. Fortunately, it's more proof that the infection is staying on the ground, no airborne contaminant."

"Good...what about Kappa post?

"There is something new you should know...two days ago we received a message from Kappa. After decrypting it, we found out it was an automatic distress signal that was set up to deploy when the perimeter fences went down. We can't get any further outside of Nevada while this rain is delaying the drone launches."

"How long since their last message?"

"Kappa's broadcast went dark long before that...in fact, 48 hours before the outbreak at Omega was the last transmission we received from Kappa."

Goose just stood there, his mind spinning with thoughts and theories...two days before the impending apocalypse begins and the most prestigious branch of FTi lead by his most prominent scientist goes dark...it couldn't be possible.

"Keep digging specialist, you're doing a great job." Goose said.

Elsewhere, a light clicked on in a white room, the reflection made the room brighter with their rays. Jars with murky green liquid sat on shelves that extended across half of the laboratory. In the middle of it, sat a smaller figure gentleman, dressed in a white coat. His eyes were glued to a microscope sitting on the desk in front of him. The man took a small needle filled with a little dose of purple liquid and pressed it on the sample in front of him, lightly pressing on the plunger.

Through his eyes, the scientist saw little blue dots, swimming around in a clear liquid. Slowly, red dots started to slide into view. The blue orbs started to grow frantic as the red ones approached closer. The scientist watched in horror as the red and blue orbs started to merge, forming new purple ones with little black thorns. The scientist gave thanks for a moment that blood cells couldn't scream.

Just then the door opened and Goose entered the room.

"How goes the trials doctor?"

The scientist, named Krieg looked at him, "Not good sir. I've had to redo my experiment several times. I'm running out of ideas."

"Well start over if you have to. Time is an essence here, you should know that. We're losing major cities one by one east to west. Before long we'll have infected in the south and northwest states. Do you have any thoughts on what the hell this thing is?" Goose asked.

"Here's the scary part sir...after seeing the behavior of infected cells and their interaction with healthy cells, I can confirm that Shadow-1 is viral and parasitic in nature."

Krieg's answer left Goose puzzled, "What do you mean?"

"I mean that infected cells appear to move in an automated fashion, but they seem to gain sentience the closer they are to cells that are sterile."

"So they're alive?"

"In a sense yes..." Krieg responded, with doubt.

"And you can't figure out why." Goose confirmed. Krieg nodded with hesitation.

"We'll keep experimenting on it, but we can't find any logical results...we've been testing for weeks."

"Keep going doctor..." was all Goose could utter. The horror of Krieg's results left Goose dumbfounded.

"Everything has a logical explanation, we'll do what we can general." Krieg replied.

Goose nodded and took his leave.

Krieg's discussion repeated in his head like an audio tape. Goose knew he had to save lives, but how could he if no one was communicating. He had a primary respect for Victor during the three years he knew him. He always seemed ambitious, but it felt too assuming to think someone like him could make something as deadly as Shadow-1 and deliberately cause it to spread across the country.

The thoughts continued to cycle as Goose returned to his quarters.

FTi Alpha housed almost a thousand people, more were pouring in every day when squads went out and returned with survivors. Goose knew he had to be a soldier, he had to command, but this situation scared him. For a second, Goose remembered he was human. Alpha was only one of three bases still standing. Theta was up north in Idaho, and Beta sat by the coast in Southern California, both were still in human hands as far as Goose knew but he hadn't heard from them in days...Goose proceeded to drift to sleep as the thoughts spiraled in his brain and the rain poured over his head, trickling on the ceiling above him, a clap of thunder was the last thing he heard before his mind slipped into...

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A nightmare from his days in Afganistan woke Goose up in a lukewarm sweat. He looked at his watch. It read 08:12. It was the first time Goose slept through his alarm. Goose put much less effort into putting on his uniform. The days melted together and drained him as every hour passed. Goose let his outfit droop on his body. His tie was a bit loosened.

Meal times were the only times of the day where soldier and survivor felt like humans in their ordinary lives. For those thirty minutes that breakfast, lunch, and dinner were served, everybody forgot that the world was ending around them. The 'cafeteria' was set up in one of the empty hangars after the choppers that were housed there were brought down in the initial outbreak. Food was served in one end while the survivor' housing was in the other half. Goose had to sprint across the pavement to beat the rain which was still drizzling down over the post. It was a bit lighter, Goose assumed the storm was almost finished passing over them. It would be hitting the eastern Nevada deserts real soon.

Goose snuck behind the tables where food was served and snatched an MRE out of a storage bin. He maneuvered through the crowds of people who sat at makeshift tables, chuckling laughing and having a grand time with each other. Goose just wanted a quiet isolated spot to eat by himself. Then he heard a voice.

"General Goose!" cried the young female voice. Goose turned to see Phoebe Heyerdahl sitting with her group, Tai and Mai Hyunh, Stinky Peterson, Harold Bergman, Nadine, and Eugene.

Phoebe beckoned him over, "Come sit with us General!" She said with a smile. Goose stayed quiet and approached her table. He sat down and unwrapped the foil on his food.

"How are you guys doing?" Goose uttered.

"Better now. You guys have a nifty operation going on here." Harold said.

"Yeah, we never got to thank you for your boys coming to pick us up off the road!" Stinky added.

"I was just doing my job...I should apologize for the chloroform and having the lab boys scrub you down when you all got here."

"You were being cautious." Phoebe said, "Don't be too hard on yourself. You got us to safety, that's what counts. We wouldn't have lasted another day out there."

"What were you all doing out there in the first place?" Goose asked.

"We were initially held up in a house, somewhere in Philadelphia, with others from Hillwood. You remember Arnold, don't you?" Phoebe replied.

"Yeah, foot ball headed kid, right? He had the most sense out of all you brats when I subbed for your teacher back in the day."

Everybody chuckled in response to Goose's reference to the past.

"Our group got split up when a squad of soldiers came and took five of us, Arnold included. They said they were affiliated with FTi." Goose's smile faded when Phoebe spoke.

"Did they say which station they were from?" Goose asked.

"Can't rightly remember General." Stinky replied.

"Kappa." Said a voice further down, it was Nadine, sitting next to Mai and Tai whom both nodded in agreement.

"Yeah that was it!" Harold agreed.

"They said they were under orders to retrieve Arnold and four others to bring back to their post. Something called the 'Hades Initiative'."

Goose looked at them, wide eyed...

"What's the problem General?" Eugene asked. Goose was dumbfounded. He hadn't heard those words in years. Goose didn't know any of these kids, but the fact they were now involved, he knew he had to explain something.

Just then, Goose heard someone call out, "General!" He turned to see Parks, his comms officer, standing over his shoulder, he whispered in Goose's ear, "You need to come see this." Then he left. Goose stood up and leaned over the table.

"Find one of the lieutenants and have them escort you to my quarters in an hour." He muttered. The group looked confused. Goose was confident they'd follow through but he couldn't worry now, duty calls.

Goose arrived at the comms station in three minutes. He entered to see Parks adjusting to the radar device he had set up, "What is it Parks?"

"We've got signals from the drones. We received their signal last night but we didn't want to wake you. There's a massive group of bodies somewhere in the north eastern quadrant of the Nevada desert."

"Infected?"

"The heat signals we picked up look clean, our best guess is that they're healthy."

"Great, send a squad to get them immediately."

"There are a couple problems though General." Parks said. Goose looked at him. "The smaller storm cell that hit us last night is just now passing over the desert, we'll have to send ground vehicles to get them, the chop is too much for our aircraft."

"Let's hope they keep a quick pace to get out there then, what's the second problem?"

"These people, they're grouped up near airplane wreckage." Parks replied. Goose looked confused but started to realize...the order he had given two days ago.

"It's the plane that you ordered our artillery to shoot down two days ago..."

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To Be Continued.