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squad on a mission outside the compound.”
    “You want me to secure a three-hundred-meter freighter with only four men?”
    “Yes, and you’d better get moving. You’re in the air in less than an hour.”
    “How many men can you spare from Cyclops squad, then?”
    Lewis glared at Miller with an expression he suspected meant there was more, but he declined to comment. “None. They’ve been sent outside the compound, too, to clean out a commune of Infected encamped too close.”
    “On whose order?”
    Gray and Lewis didn’t bother replying. They only shook their heads.
    “Besides,” Lewis added. “We can only spare you one chopper. No room for any more men.”
    He didn’t like it, but it seemed he had no choice. “Fine,” Miller grunted.
    “And Miller...” Lewis said as he turned to leave.
    “Yes, sir?”
    “You be careful, son. Something happened aboard that freighter. We don’t know what you’re walking into.”
    “Understood.”
     
     
    T HE HOT WINDS over the East River stank of dead fish. Miller could just make out large eel-like creatures below the waves, breaching the water’s surface and splashing polluted mist like a rotten perfume.
    Beside him sat Morland and Hsiung. Scrunched together in what should have been a four-man chopper, they’d removed the center console in the front to make room for a jump seat. Hsiung, the smallest of them, hadn’t looked happy when she strapped herself in.
    Du Trieux and the pilot, a ruddy-faced man who called himself Smitty, sat comfortably in the back row of the attack chopper. He and du Trieux discussed wind current and air flow while the three in the front sat crammed together, giving no voice to their discomfort.
    Miller hoped it would be a quick trip. With the additional weight, they’d need to conserve fuel for the return trip.
    It was a miracle they’d gotten off the ground at all. Smitty and the launch crew had needed hours to clean out the chopper’s fuel intake and air filters, so they were already behind schedule by the time they got into the air.
    The ship, which had been floating just south of Roosevelt’s Island, was now far down the East River near the Williamsburg Bridge, and dangerously close to striking land as the currents grew more irregular. There was no telling how it would get past Governors Island without thrusters.
    As the chopper approached the freighter, Miller listened over the headset to du Trieux and Smitty chitchat and gripped the muzzle of the M27 nestled between his knees. It wasn’t until the nose of the chopper dipped and Smitty swore that Miller checked out his window and peered down at the freighter.
    There were bodies on deck—and not just human bodies.
    Along with the human corpses—at least a dozen of them—there were also several massive walrus-like beasts lying on deck. Some were obviously dead—missing flippers, heads shattered, bleeding rivers of blood which pooled on the deck—while others took a break from gnawing on the bodies to look up at the chopper.
    “What the heck are those?” Morland asked.
    Hsiung, stuck in the jump seat, couldn’t see, although that didn’t stop her from straining against her belts, trying to get a look. She grunted in frustration.
    One of the beasts opened its blood-soaked mouth and bellowed at the chopper. Miller couldn’t hear the noise over the rotors, but the other pinnipeds on deck waved their heads in response and opened their massive jaws, exposing rows of sharp teeth and two enormous tusks that rose from their bottom jaws.
    “Let’s call them tusk-fiends,” Miller said.
    Hsiung smirked. “Did you just pull that out of your ass?”
    “Works for me,” du Trieux said.
    “Anybody bring armor-piercing rounds?” Miller changed the subject.
    “No,” Morland answered, still looking out the window.
    Hsiung shook her head.
    “I did,” du Trieux answered from the back seat. “But I didn’t bring enough to share.”
    “Alright,” Miller said as the chopper