World War Z_ An Oral History of the Zombie War ( PDFDrive )

imploded one after the other. They tell you it happens too fast for the crew to know; either the
shock of the pressure change renders them unconscious or the explosion can actually cause the air
to ignite. The crew dies quickly, painlessly, at least, that’s what we hoped. One thing that wasn’t
painless was to watch the light behind my captain’s eyes die with the sounds of the doomed sub.
[He anticipates my next question, clenching his fist and exhaling hard through
his nose.]
Captain Chen raised his son alone, raised him to be a good sailor, to love and serve the state, to
never question orders, and to be the finest officer the Chinese navy had ever seen. The happiest
day of his life was when Commander Chen Zhi Xiao received his first command, a brand-new Type
95 hunter-killer.
The kind that attacked you?
[Nods.] That was why Captain Chen would have done anything to avoid our fleet. That was why it
was so important to know which sub had attacked us. To know is always better, no matter what the
answer might be. He had already betrayed his oath, betrayed his homeland, and now to believe
that that betrayal might have led him to murder his own son…
The next morning when Captain Chen did not appear for first watch, I went to his cabin to check
on him. The lights were dim, I called his name. To my relief, he answered, but when he stepped into
the light…his hair had lost its color, as white as prewar snow. His skin was sallow, his eyes sunken.
He was truly an old man now, broken, withered. The monsters that rose from the dead, they are
nothing compared to the ones we carry in our hearts.
From that day on, we ceased all contact with the outside world. We headed for the arctic ice, the
farthest, darkest, most desolate void we could find. We tried to continue with our day-to-day life:
maintaining the boat; growing food; schooling, raising, and comforting our children as best we
could. With the captain’s spirit gone, so went the spirit of the Admiral Zheng’s crew. I was the only
one who ever saw him during those days. I delivered his meals, collected his laundry, briefed him
daily on the condition of the boat, then relayed his orders to the rest of the crew. It was routine,
day in, day out.
Our monotony was only broken one day when sonar detected the approaching signature of
another 95-class attack sub. We went to battle stations, and for the first time we saw Captain Chen
leave his cabin. He took his place in the attack center, ordered a firing solution plotted, and tubes
one and two loaded. Sonar reported that the enemy sub had not responded in kind. Captain Chen
saw this as our advantage. There was no questioning in his mind this time. This enemy would die
before it fired. Just before he gave the order, we detected a signal on the “gertrude,” the American
term for an underwater telephone. It was Commander Chen, the captain’s son, proclaiming
peaceful intentions and requesting that we stand down from GQ. He told us about the Three
Gorges Dam, the source of all the “natural disaster” rumors we’d heard about in Manihi. He
explained that our battle with the other 95 had been part of a civil war that the dam’s destruction
had sparked. The sub that attacked us had been part of the loyalist forces. Commander Chen had
sided with the rebels. His mission was to find us and escort us home. I thought the cheer was going
to carry us right to the surface. As we broke through the ice and the two crews ran to each other