Free Xombies: Apocalypse Blues by Walter Greatshell Page B

already on board were all we had to fear (which was certainly bad enough). But then the Sallie began to tip over on us.
    “Whoa,” people moaned, seeing the rig teeter from the weight of massing bodies. If they hadn’t kept jumping off like lemmings it would have gone already. My heart constricted, and I tried to will the ship to move faster: Come on come on come on . . .
    So close. As the ship’s big rudder fin finally came even with the Sallie, the great crawler tilted past the point of no return. Cracking sounds like gunshots could be heard as its plank bed flexed, and the rear wheels levitated upward. Keens of mass dread erupted from all of us as the front end of the thing dipped into our surge, but still didn’t topple—the banks of tires at its axis gripped the ledge until the last possible instant, until the vehicle was so improbably steep that the audio equipment on its back plummeted through the Ex-humans hanging below.
    “It’s gonna hit the screw, it’s gonna hit the screw,” someone jibbered.
    The Sallie dropped.
    It went loudly, each of its nine rows of wheels slamming first against the concrete ledge, then against the lower wooden pier—BABAMBABAMBABAMBABAM! As it jounced downward, it must have just cleared the giant propeller, because the ringing, fatal blow we were all holding our breaths for never came. What did happen was scary enough: A mound of water engulfed the stern, carrying away Exes but also rows of men. Some of them escaped the propeller and were left bobbing in our wake. We could hear them calling in the dark.
    Not many of us had the energy to be mortified. I couldn’t see if Cowper was still aboard or not, and for the moment I didn’t want to know. A few hysterical kids were being restrained. I understood: At that instant my biggest fear was that someone might include me in their compassion, might slow our flight. I would’ve gladly killed someone like that, even though we were safely out of reach of the Ex mass.
    But there was nothing to worry about. The boat didn’t stop.

CHAPTER EIGHT

    I t was very cold and windy out on the open water; the only shelter we had was each other. Grief sounds threaded the night. A lot of people had to go to the bathroom, but unlike the others I couldn’t just pee over the side. Albemarle, Cowper, and the rest of the adults came forward to see what could be done, which wasn’t much. There was no one from the sub’s crew to appeal to, except maybe hidden atop the conning tower, and they wouldn’t answer our shouts. The searchlight had been turned off. When Cowper’s uniform went by in the dark I grabbed a sleeve.
    “Not now, honey, okay?” he said, pulling away. “Sit tight.”
    Bereft, watching the dark shore recede, my initial flush of gratitude quickly passed, and I began to get anxious. How long did the crew expect us to stay out here? A rough head-count was organized: There were about four hundred people on deck, less than fifty of them adults. At least half the older men we’d started out with were gone. Boys were the great majority, mostly teenagers like me (well, not exactly like me—these were more the suburban-gangsta crowd), who seemed to have the same casual expertise about the sub that other kids had about Nintendo. Sea urchins. Listening to them, I quickly learned that the sub was the boat , the conning tower was called the fairwater or sail , and the leathery black deck was a steel beach . They had prepared for this nuclear orphanage. But obviously something had gone wrong . . . and I, the only female, was to blame.
    “This is bullshit, man,” said the hairnet guy. Turning on me once more, he groused, “This is all your fault. If you hadn’t of come, things would be different. You’re bad luck.”
    Vision swimming with pathetic tears, I said, “What is your problem , kid? I’m serious. Are you off your medication or something? Because even the dumbest knuckle-dragging moron would see that this is not an appropriate time