Free Last Stand on Zombie Island by Christopher L. Eger

copy of this.”
    As they entered the Coast Guard Station, Jarvis noticed a dozen station members gathered around a television. While this in itself was not unheard of at a small SAR station, the fact that every Coastie wore body armor and carried either an M16 or a shotgun was. Jarvis felt conspicuously unarmed.
    The Station’s flat screen had the Emergency Alert System’s red white and blue emblem splashed across it. After a year of listening to this is only a test messages in the middle of the night, there now was an actual emergency . The screen scrolled through narrated updates power-point style. Most of the information appeared to be pre-written generic tidbits about health protection and pandemics. The reports had taken to calling the illness Disease-K and it had stuck.
    “Wash your hands often with soap and water. Stay home. The CDC recommends that you stay home from work and school to limit contact with others. Follow public health advice regarding school closures, avoiding crowds and other social distancing measures. Develop a family emergency plan including storing food, medicine, facemasks, alcohol rubs, and other supplies,” the unseen narrator droned.
    Jarvis looked behind him as Chief Hoffman walked up.
    “I liked Al Jazeera better, at least they had the Simpsons on,” the Chief muttered through his moustache.
     
    — | — | —
     

    ChapteR 9
 
 
Gulf Shores
Community Center
     
    They waited at the school for three hours before a convoy of five school buses with MP drivers had come to evacuate Billy, Cat, Sergeant Durham, Spud and the nearly 200 other students, teachers, and guardsmen. Billy noticed that the National Guard hummers who escorted the convoy had machine guns mounted and most of the MPs that arrived with it wore black bug-eyed protective gas masks and rubber gloves.
    The busses drove to the town green where Gulf Shores had its police station, fire department, city hall, and library in four large buildings that shared a common square along 1st Street. Across from the library was the Community Center that doubled as a Red Cross shelter during the frequent hurricanes that struck the coastal town. It was into the Community Center that the Guardsmen herded the children and teachers.
    People from all over the island were collecting there, signing in, and looking for missing family members. A team of haggard volunteers in red vests clung to procedure to keep from being overwhelmed in the moment. Paper cups of coffee and water, along with packages of cookies and crackers, were handed out. A female paramedic was tending every scrape and cut, looking for signs of trauma and shock in the new arrivals. Most importantly, no bodies were anywhere and the site had all of the signs of being one of the last safe places in town.
    Billy signed in both Cat and himself, lying about not having a weapon on him when asked. He scanned the legal pads where other people had signed, hoping to find Wyatt’s name. It was a madhouse. People mingled around, carrying backpacks, suitcases and recycled plastic shopping bags filled hurriedly with food, water, socks, and underwear. Parents were arriving looking for lost children. Children were sitting in small groups talking about anything but what they had seen and been through that morning. People debated whether it was safer to leave the center and head back home, pull stumps and go to the mainland, or to simply stay at the center. Eventually small groups would form and make a choice to either stay or go and live with it.
    Cat had run into a group of her friends from the high school at the center. Billy left her with the gaggle of teens, busy comparing stories. He advised her not to leave the center and that he was going to the police station to try to find out more about Wyatt, to put in an official report. Cat was told to keep her eyes peeled for him or any of his friends that she recognized at the center.
    As he walked across the street and into the police station, he