Zournal (Book 5): Feeling Lucky? Page 23

  There was some movement beside me and Wilson whispered at me. We had a brief conversation around a plan. We couldn’t wait until morning because then the Zombies would all be able to see us again and they’d overrun us on the beam. We couldn’t use the pulley system because it was electrically powered and the controls were down on the ground. There might be a way to manually undo it but none of us knew how that would work and even if we did we couldn’t slide over a hundred yards on a metal cable and expect to survive. If we did figure out how to turn it on or off the noise would give us away.

  The only real option we had was to try and sneak back down the catwalk and make it across the floor and out the door passed all the sleeping Zombies. It wasn’t a great option but it beat the one where we sat up here until we eventually died. I needed to stop putting myself in situations where one of the choices was death. Wilson confirmed a few more Zombies had fallen off the catwalk and that a bunch had banded together in different areas to try and sleep. There were still some moving around but as long as we didn’t bump into them we should be fine.

  We needed to rescue the girls and get the nukes back to but one step at a time. I felt like this was going to bury us and Wilson opened up to me a little bit. He asked if I’d ever seen any movies or heard about hell week or anything to do with the Seals. I’d seen some stuff on Discovery and watched the movie with Demi Moore. That was about the extent of my knowledge.

  “Hell week is part of our training where they push you beyond what is endurable. You’re literally put through hell. No one makes it out of hell week by picturing the end of it. They get through it by doing one thing at a time. They focus on not ringing the bell that gets them a hot shower and a warm meal. They focus on paddling another few feet through the freezing water. They do three more steps on the march where their feet are turning into open wounds and their skin is pale white and frozen. You get through that week and it certifies you don’t have any quit in you. From everything I know about you and Ann and even Reeves, I don’t think you guys have any quit in you either. Let’s get this done. One step at a time.”

  Wilson must have done well in the motivational speaking portion of officer training. He was right though. One step at a time was how we were going to make it through this. Literally, one step at a time. I wondered if they had to walk blood and gut covered I-beams surrounded by Zombies while carrying a drugged out Golden Doodle in this hell week of his. Ann had extended her bag of tricks in the pharmaceutical enterprise to tranquilizers for dogs for just these types of scenarios. I hoisted the big fur-ball up into my arms like a baby and proceeded to venture out onto the narrow walkway.

  Entry 44: We Have a Winner!

  In the realm of stupid plans there has rarely been one so ill-conceived as that of trying to talk across an I-beam hundreds of feet in the air surrounded by insane cannibals while carrying a big-ass dog. I was proceeding at a snail’s pace by slowly putting one foot in front of the other to ensure I was still on the beam. I mentally cussed Wilson, Daisy, myself, Zombies in general, the darkness and the manufacturer of I-beams with every step. The only plus to all of this happened to be the fact that I couldn’t really see anything. It made my fear of heights slightly less of a factor.

  Then I figured out I could see the open hangar door. It was outlined in star light or moonlight or magic pixie dust or something. Whatever it was outlined in it was far below us. I stopped looking at it when my mind started replaying watching the Zombie fall off the I-beam in night vision. I realized since we’d drugged the dog I’d be carrying her for the next couple of hours at least. That sucked. I wondered if we could just hop in the Hummer and try to drive out instead of the sneaking out plan. The sneaking out plan had sounded a lot better before I got stuck being the dog taxi. My arms were getting stiff. To make everything even more fun, in the near past the dog must have helped herself to a garlic covered pile of crap judging by her breath.

  I also fell off the damned beam when I hit the end of it and ran into the metal bars that ran around the catwalk. I felt someone taking the dog out of my arms. It felt weird to be happy about getting onto a catwalk full of Zombies but after the death defying dog walk I’d just been on the ability to walk on something with a railing seemed glorious. I slipped in between the railings and stood on the side waiting to be told where to step next. The deal was we would only step where the person in front of us stepped. We had the two NVGs and the Seals were wearing those so the rest of us were stumbling around blind.

  Walker was directly in front of me. He had taken Daisy since he could see and I needed to put my hands on his shoulders and follow along and that wasn’t going to work while I was holding a dog. We started moving down the catwalk towards the stairs. We stopped at one point for about twenty minutes. I stood there like a good boy wondering what the holdup was. Then I heard bodies hitting the floor below. In the darkness, I couldn’t be sure but I assumed we’d run into a pile of the Zombies and Wilson was flinging them off the catwalk. They seemed to take it pretty well.

  There were a couple of times they yelled or moaned before I heard them impact. Down below some of the Zombies were getting stirred up and moaning a little bit as well. Probably due to having the other Zombies falling on them. Walker turned and handed me the dog and went forward to help clear the way. He came back about ten minutes later and whispered we were to stay on the right side of the catwalk as close as we could. I pressed up against the railing and started walking. Walker had ignored me trying to hand him Daisy to carry. Smart guy.

  We made it down to the ground that way. Periodically stopping for the Seals to commit some murderous path clearing. I was pretty much ready to fling Daisy over the railing by that point. All thoughts of getting her a snausage after this were gone. The only thing I was going to try and find for her were some doggie lifesavers. It did feel good when my feet hit the bottom of the stairs. Standing on solid ground was heaven. Now, we just needed to make it across said solid ground and out the hangar doors and find a good place to go hide while we figured out how to get the girls out of the truck.

  Walker took Daisy again. I felt like I floated the first few feet across the floor without having the furry mutt breathing in my face and weighing me down. At some point, she’d also pissed on me based on the wetness on my jacket. It wasn’t even close to being the grossest bodily fluid sprayed on me today though.

  We slowed down as we got to the hangar door. Looking at the Zombies piled all around us I gave up on my dream of being able to drive the Hummer out of there. Instead, I was handed Daisy again and we headed for the weeds beside the road. We went fast and low and when we got in the weeds we crawled. I half-crawled while Reeves and I drug Daisy along. She finally woke up long enough to give me some hope she’d be able to walk but then she laid down and went back to sleep after we all waited about ten minutes for her to walk in a circle and take a dump. Walker was staring at us like we were crazy for going through all this hassle for a dog. He was probably right.

  We kept going in the weeds until we made it to another road. The sun was coming up by that point. We lay in the ditch waiting for the other two Seals to meet up with us and pick us up. Wilson had ordered them to go find a vehicle and come back and pick us up.

  I leaned over and told Wilson we weren’t leaving without rescuing the girls. He gave me a hard look.

  “I’m not giving up on them either. What I am doing is going back to base, picking up a small army and coming back and killing all these fucking Zombies so we can rescue those girls and get those nukes back.”

  That sounded good to me. I looked down the road and saw a car coming our way.

  Authors Note:

  Thank you for staying on the journey with me. I’m enjoying the hell out of seeing what obstacles Steve and Ann face on their journey to a first date. I’ve always been a huge reader but I’m finding I can get just as lost in my own head when I’m writing. I really see the characters and live the adventure with them.

  If you are enjoying thes
e please leave a review. It really helps and I really love the feedback. If you’re not enjoying these I’d love to know why you are on the fifth one? Pretty optimistic holding on like that to a series J

  Thank you for all the support and I hope to see you all again in Zournal Six to see what happens next!