Free HAYWIRE: A Pandemic Thriller (The F.A.S.T. Series Book 2) by Shane M Brown Page A

quarters action. Neither seemed wounded. The female officer looked at Easterbrook’s body.
    Her eyes didn’t register any surprise.
    She’s seen this before , realized Coleman.
    ‘I’m Erin Robinson,’ said the woman, still sounding breathless. ‘First Officer Ben Bryant sent me. He needs your team to help coordinate the evacuation.’
    ‘Wait,’ demanded Coleman. ‘What the hell is going on here? These people weren’t rioting. They were trying to kill you!’
    ‘They’re trying to kill everyone!’ replied Erin. ‘There’s a sickness on board. It spread overnight. It’s sent half the ship crazy. Psychopathic. We’ve already started evacuating, but it’s a nightmare in there. We need your help right now!’
    Coleman had a dozen questions.
    Pulling the map from under his body armor, he asked only one.
    ‘What do you need us to do?’
    The woman pointed at the map. ‘Here are the cabins. Here are the lifeboats. We need to get as many people from the cabins to the lifeboats as possible.’
    Myers pointed at the hundreds and hundreds of little rectangles on the map that indicated cabins. ‘We’d need a hundred Marines to do that.’
    Coleman studied the map, searching for where five Marines and a civilian officer could make the most difference. In seconds he recognized the patterns. He could see the paths the passengers would be taking. He could see the bottlenecks that would cause the most carnage. In a moment he broke the complex patterns down to what could be achieved with a small force.
    ‘Listen up!’ Coleman barked, tracing his finger across the map. ‘King and Forest. Go straight to the starboard lifeboats. Get those boats filled and away as fast as you can. Right now! Hustle! Go!’
    King and Forest dashed off across the deck toward the stairs.
    Coleman moved his finger on the map. He looked at Myers and Craigson. ‘This intersection is critical. Passengers need to pass through here to reach the lifeboats. If it becomes a bottleneck, they’re all dead.’
    ‘That’s the ship’s atrium,’ nodded Erin. ‘He’s right.’
    Coleman said, ‘I need you to keep it clear. Get as many people through as possible. If you lose this position, fall back to the lifeboats.’
    Myers and Craigson nodded and dashed off.
    Coleman pushed the map back under his body armor. He knelt and took Easterbrook’s special ammunition.
    ‘What about me?’ asked Erin.
    ‘You’re with me. Are you a bridge officer?’
    ‘No. The bridge is locked down. I’m the hotel manager.’
    ‘Okay,’ nodded Coleman. ‘Let’s move. Stay right on my heels.’
    ‘Where are we going?’
    ‘Portside lifeboats,’ replied Coleman. ‘You ready?’
    Erin nodded.
    Coleman dashed off with Erin right on his heels.
     
     

     
     
    Justin glimpsed a lifeboat ahead.
    Thank God. We made it.
    He pushed his mother’s chair faster. They’d used ramps to reach this deck. His mother navigated ramps faster with Justin pushing. He swung his mother’s chair around the last corner and stopped.
    What he saw sent fear surging through his gut.
    The crazy passengers had reached the lifeboats.
    People were fighting everywhere.
    Justin could barely tell the sick from the healthy. He saw a man wildly swinging a suitcase to clear a path for his pregnant wife. Closer, a young woman stood with her hands over her ears, staring down in panic at two men wrestling at her feet. Everywhere, everyone was fighting with a ferocity that Justin hadn’t imagined humans capable.
    Bare yards away, two men fell over the balcony. Justin never heard their bodies hit the water.
    His mother pointed.
    ‘That one, Justin. Let’s go!’
    Justin’s mother was pointing at a full lifeboat. The boat had already begun lowering from the deck.
    His mother shot forward so quickly that Justin lost his grip on her chair. He raced after her, jumping over a fallen man that his mother had deftly swerved around.
    ‘Open the door,’ yelled his mother as they reached the