Code Frostbite (STORM Book 1) Page 2

  After weeks of wearing Mom down, she finally came around and agreed to support me as long as I promised to pursue getting some kind of college degree in the future. It felt great to have her on board with what I wanted to do, but there was one more person that still isn’t convinced that being in the Navy is the best career path.

  Charlotte and I had had a wonderful relationship up to this point. We had worked extremely well together, with communicating being one of our greatest strengths as a couple. Arguments and disagreements had been few and far between. But once talk of enlisting and future plans came about, the exact opposite had occurred. The last few months had been filled with fighting, yelling and phone calls that more often than not ended with one person hanging up on the other.

  Although they had never been long conversations, Charlotte and I had discussed future plans and the possibility of spending our lives together. I loved her more than anything and at some point, I did plan on making her my wife, but she has repeatedly told me that she could not support my wishes to join the Navy. Being apart for months at a time was not the type of relationship she wants.

  I did understand her side, but it killed me that she didn’t see what I was envisioning. A career path with a foundation laid by the U.S. Navy made perfect sense to me. I never said that I was going to be in the military forever, but I saw this as the best time to serve. Before I got tied down with marriage and kids, I wanted to escape this small town and see the world. What better way to do that than with the Navy? Opportunities and careers didn’t just pop up out of nowhere. That’s why I was taking the initiative and making my life better with this one.

  Before worrying any more about my future with Charlotte, I pulled the car into her driveway. Charlotte, along with her parents, was waiting on the porch. As soon as I stepped out of the car and closed the door, Charlotte ran toward me. My mouth hung open and my stomach plummeted to the depths of my abdomen as I watched her scurry over in a bright pink dress. Her curly blonde hair bounced up and down in a rhythm with each graceful step. I simply couldn’t take my eyes off of her. Her big beautiful smile threw me over the edge as she jumped into my arms.

  “I think you’re a little late.”

  “There was lots of traffic on the way over. You know how busy our town gets this time of night.”

  She backed away a few inches and looked right into my eyes. I was not used to her being the same height as me. Charlotte, on the other hand, is clearly enjoying the extra boost from her fancy new high heels.

  “You know, you really need to get a new joke.”

  She ended the sentence with a kiss on my cheek as her parents made their way over to us. Her Mom gave me a big hug and kiss. Her Dad shook my hand and asked me not to keep her out too late. I gave him my word that I wouldn’t. Charlotte’s parents were the last people I wanted to upset.

  Her father had warmed up to me when he found out that I was going to pursue a career in the military. He himself had served in the Army during the Vietnam War. Charlotte had told me that I was the only one that he has ever discussed that part of his life with. He had told me a few stories of how he’d fought alongside some of the bravest men he’d ever known in those jungles. Unfortunately, he had also mentioned that most of those brave men hadn’t made it back home. His stories only further inspired me to become part of our nation’s armed forces.

  Charlotte and I arrived at the school gym for the dance a short while later. We walked into the hot, crowded room a few minutes before 8 p.m. A band was playing some upbeat music and lots of tables were laden with food. I felt Charlotte’s hand grab mine as she led me over to the dance floor. My body was still tired from the tough practice but a rush of adrenaline kicked in as we started to dance.

  Charlotte loved dancing. I was not the biggest fan of it and I was utterly terrible. Like most people, anything I wasn’t good at was uncomfortable. There are very few places I felt comfortable dancing in and a big crowded room was certainly not one of them. However, I was always comfortable with Charlotte, and I would have done anything to make her happy.

  Although I had aspirations to do great things for myself, keeping Charlotte in my life was one of my top priorities. The decision to serve had not been made without her in mind. I truly believed that this was the best path for us. She was upset because I hadn’t talked to her much about enlisting before I did, but I just knew that this was something I had to do.

  Charlotte and I had a special bond; and that bond was not going to be broken by one decision. We were much stronger than that. She had once told me that she never wanted anything to break us apart. When we had fought over these past months, I reminded her of that statement. She never liked when I pulled that card, but it put things into perspective. Was one fight or one “wrong” move worth ruining everything we have? I wasn’t a fan of using that line against her mid-argument, but it’s ended the fight every single time.

  She continued to use all of her physical strength to pull me onto the dance floor. I felt like a dog that knew it was being dragged into the vet. My attempts to resist were failing, as her crystal clear blue eyes and flawless smile made me give in to her every demand.

  “C’mon, Trent. I want to dance! We didn’t just come here to sit around and watch everyone else have a good time!” “All right, but just a few songs.”

  Tonight was a special night because I knew it was one of our last nights together before I left. Part of me was a little afraid of what challenges lay ahead. I wanted tonight to be a memory that we could both look back on fondly. That’s why tonight had to be perfect.

  We danced away one song at a time and after two hours of non-stop moving, we sat down to take a break. Of course, as soon as we sat down, they started playing Can’t Fight This Feeling by REO Speedwagon. I was not into music as much as Charlotte is, but I knew that this was one of her favorite songs. I caught my breath and glanced over at her. She was doing her best to hold back her thoughts, but I could read her face too well. I knew exactly what she wanted. Standing up, I grabbed her hand and took her back to the center of the gym. We got as close as we could to each other and slowly swayed to the soothing beat. She placed her head gently on my shoulder and I leaned in to kiss her on the cheek. I loved her so much. There was nothing I wouldn’t do for her. All I wanted was for her to be as happy as she has made me.

  After a few minutes of swaying, I heard a quiet sniffle. Charlotte took her head off my shoulder and quickly wiped her eyes. Out of nowhere, emotion appeared to be crippling her as she was now on the verge of tears. She tried to talk, but nothing came out of her mouth. Something was wrong. My mind immediately concluded that she was crying because I as going to leave. The fear of us being apart must have been taking over her.

  Within seconds, my heart started beating faster and I could feel my face getting red. This was all my fault. What was I thinking? Running off and joining the Navy was going to ruin everything we had together. Was that really worth it? Huge tears were now streaming down Charlotte’s face as people were now staring in our direction. Not knowing what else to do, I grabbed her and rushed out of the gym. I found a safe, empty hallway where we could talk without anybody seeing us.

  “Charlotte I’m so sorry. I know you don’t agree with what I’m doing, but I have to go. I’m sorry. I really believe that this will be a good thing for us. We can still make everything work out. After boot camp, I’ll get assigned to a base and then you can come live with me. I’ll probably have to ship out but we can make it work. You know I will do everything I can to give us the best life possible.”

  The tears got bigger. Her face was a mess and she stared at the ground. I couldn’t tell if she had even processed everything I had just said. I gently took my thumb and tilted her chin up while brushing a few strains of hair off her face.

  “Charlotte, what’s wrong?”

  She shook her head from side to side and returned her eyes to the spot on the ground to where she had been staring before. Whatever this issue was, it was bad. More h
orrible thoughts raced through my mind. Were we not even going to get a chance to try to make it work? Were we just going to end this amazing journey as a couple now?

  Her body continued to quiver and I braced myself for the worst. She took a deep breath. Whatever she was about to say wouldn’t change how I felt about her. Even if she ended it right here, I would find a way to come back to her. I’ll find a way to rebuild what we had. She means the world to me. Nothing can ever stop me from loving her. With her eyes drenched, she looked up at me with the most intense and painful look I had ever seen on her face.

  “Trent, I’m pregnant.”

  Mayhem brought Trent back to reality. His eyes shot open and he found an oxygen mask dangling in his face as the plane took a hard lean to the right. Frantically, he looked around and saw Sophia fighting for her life with a large man on top of her. Without hesitating he unlatched his seatbelt and lunged at the assailant. The two of them landed in an empty row of seats and Trent pinned him down.

  However, his hold didn’t last very long as the assailant’s superior strength whipped his body across the cabin like a rag doll in response. Trent’s head slammed into the overhead compartments before his body hit the deck of the aircraft, hard. Screams plagued the air as he slowly regained focus and got back to his feet. Sophia desperately sprinted toward the back of the plane and Trent knew exactly where she was heading. They were only allowed to use their weapons in extreme circumstances. Judging from the chaos around them, this was clearly a time where that force was needed.

  With three men in tow Sophia continued to push aside scared passengers occupying the aisle. From their condition Trent could easily identify the four men in pursuit of him and Sophia. Their skin is flushed and foam floodedout of their mouths like waterfalls. They looked like typical targets, however, Trent couldn’t understand how they had turned so quickly or why their eyes were bright red.

  No warning of a thermal outbreak had been sent to them, yet somehow these men had made it to Stage Four in their infection process already. Notice of their status should have been received hours before Trent and Sophia had even gotten on the plane. It didn’t make any sense, but how they had come to be like this was not the issue now. All that mattered was putting down these four targets before the rest of the plane became infected.

  Trent followed in Sophia’s path toward the back of the plane. All the passengers were terrified and moving around in every direction. The aisle quickly became polluted with frantic people of all ages. In the distance, Trent could see Sophia’s ponytail swinging back and forth as she was still trying to get to the lavatory. The men were viciously pushing people out of the way which baffled Trent. Why they had chosen to ignore dozens of fresh humans in pursuit of Sophia was behavior Trent had never seen from an infected person. Usually, they attacked anyone with a pulse, yet these ones seemed as if they were only interested in getting to her. Trent knew that there was very little time to waste before the situation got exponentially worse. They needed to put these men down, and fast.

  Sophia was tackled hard to the floor by one of the large men which resulted in a spike of screams from the passengers. Trent found himself only twenty feet behind, however it might as well have been a mile. He watched one of them hold her feet while another attempted to tie her up. He had to get to her before they bit her. Although, none of them appeared to be trying to infect her. Rather, they were tying her up which was once again uncharacteristic behavior from infected humans.

  Trent finally made it through the crowd and set his sights on the closest man tying up her feet. After everything he and Sophia have been through, there was no way he was going to let anything bad happen to her. He launched his body into the closest man and pushed him right off of Sophia. They landed just a few feet in front of Sophia and Trent immediately felt a sharp pain in his back.

  “Trent! Get our guns! Hurry!”

  Trent got back to his feet once again and dodged around the two other men. Hurdling over the last row of seats, he grabbed the lavatory door handle and swung it open. A rush of adrenaline hit him as he reached for the overhead and ripped through the tiles as fast as he could. A silver case immediately fell into his hands and burst open, spilling its contents onto the floor. There wasn’t enough time to assemble Sophia’s rifle so Trent quickly grabbed his pistol and loaded it. Within the next few seconds, he stepped out into the aisle and unloaded the magazine solely on the second man pinning down Sophia. Blood spurted in every direction as he fell motionless to the floor. Trent smiled and confidently said to himself; “He is not going to be a problem for us anymore.”

  Sophia broke loose from the bonds that they had failed to fasten on her and ran back toward Trent. She aggressively made her way into the lavatory and began scrambling to assemble her rifle while Trent searched for his next target to shoot at. Unfortunately, the three remaining men disappeared into the crowd. The gunshots sent the passengers into an even bigger state of chaos than they were already in earlier. Seeing those men in a cramped space like this one was bad enough, but not knowing where they are was truly a scary thing.

  The pilot came over the loudspeaker and urged the passengers to remain calm. He also informed them that the plane would be making an emergency landing, but that news did not make the situation better. Scanning the crowd of people, Trent saw his worst fear come true. In the corner of his eye, he caught one of the original infected men taking a huge bite out of one of the passengers’ arms. It was only a matter of minutes now before the whole plane suffered the same fate as the passenger that had just been bitten. Trent looked back at Sophia, who had just finished putting her rifle together, and realized that two Stormers with limited ammunition were by no means capable of handling a situation like this. But that wasn’t going to stop them from trying to contain the infection.

  Trent took a step forward and tried to take aim at one of the newly infected passengers. He shot one in the arm before losing his balance due to a rash movement by the aircraft. Sophia popped up behind him with her loaded rifle and assessed the chaotic situation. Both took a few shots in an attempt to eliminate more of the newly infected people. Without much success, Sophia tried to move forward a few rows to get a better angle. An infected woman lounged at her, forcing her back to her original position. Trent shot her in the head and watched blood splatter across the window behind her. Sophia thanked Trent for the back-up and then ran back into the lavatory.

  “What are you doing? Get back out here!”

  “We can’t do this alone!”

  Although it was technically breaking protocol since they were still airborne, Sophia began the process to request backup. They weren’t supposed to broadcast outbreaks in confined spaces with civilians present and without a cyber defense unit monitoring their calls, they ran the risk of someone intercepting the signal. Just then, one of the newly infected teenagers charged at Trent, forcing him to fire off two more shots, swiftly putting an end to her existence. He went to fire another shot when his pistol clicked open, indicating a lack of bullets. Trent requested that Sophia hand him another magazine as she yelled into the V-pod, requesting to break protocol.

  Trent’s mind froze for a second as he watched people turn from ordinary citizens to raging monsters. Every corner of the plane seemed to be infected now. Adults, teenagers, children. The infection wasn’t sparing any of them. In only a matter of minutes, the plane has become a lethal threat to humanity.

  With his remaining bullets he shot at every one he could, but after ninety seconds of shooting, he realized that there were too many targets. The tiny suitcase they had managed to smuggle on the plane didn’t have enough ammunition to put fifty of them down, let alone the rest of the plane. Trent stepped over two bodies, advancing forward for a moment. Sophia tried several times to get a signal out with no luck and decided to resume shooting. She placed her rifle on top of a suitcase that had fallen from the overhead rack and began eliminating people one by one. There were only two hundred and thirty-nine people on this pl
ane but now it felt like there were thousands. The infection had completely taken over and there was no one else left to infect except for the two of them, and hopefully the pilots.

  Simultaneously, everyone turned toward Sophia and Trent. There bloodshot eyes made contact with theirs. Both Sophia and Trent took a deep breath, understanding the nearly impossible likelihood of them coming out as the victors. The sole purpose of their careers was to prevent these people from ever seeing the light of day; even if that meant sacrificing themselves. These people weer already gone. The only thing that could be done now was to prevent them from taking more innocent lives.

  Bodies continued to hit the floor but a deafening click stopped Trent from advancing any further. A click that no Stormer ever wanted to hear when facing the enemy in a battle. Trent looked back at Sophia, who was now fighting a young infected kid with her knife. He assumed that she must have been out of ammunition as well. Trent sprinted back toward the lavatory and pulled Sophia away from the person she was fighting with.