Zombie Battle (Books 1-3): Trinity by Jacqueline Druga

believe that was what they were dealing with. Never in all of his imagination did he think he would be dealing with the walking dead.
    But they weren’t really dead. They couldn’t be. Not if they were moving and acting.
    He finished the phone call, and leaned back in his chair.
    Before he released the grip on his phone, he placed one more call.
    “Saul? Saul I didn’t think I’d hear from you,” Irma said concerned.
    “I’m on a plane so we may not have great reception.”
    “A plane.”
    “On my way back to Atlanta.”
    She breathed heavily and the ‘hiss’ of it carried over the line. “Thank God. Thank God. Everything must be fine then. You’re coming home.”
    “Actually, Irma,” Saul paused. He wasn’t going to say much, not at all. He couldn’t. Not on a government phone, but he knew if he said the right words, the right way, that would tell Irma enough. “Actually they are about as strange as strange could be.”
    He ended the call, bringing the phone to his lips in thought.
    A clearing of the throat drew him from that moment and Saul turned around.
    Steven stood before him. He had been in the back of the plane with the infected that they were bringing back to the states. He looked drawn, something wasn’t right.
    “Captain? Are you okay?”
    “I heard you mention the word ‘strange’”
    Saul nodded. “I was speaking to my wife.”
    “It’s about to get stranger.”
    “I don’t understand,” Saul said.
    “Neither do I. But that boy, Juan?”
    “Did he get violent?”
    “No, Sir.” Steven shook his head. “He’s crying.”
    <><><><>
    Medication that rendered a person semi comatose was shipped immediately to the site in Peru before scouting teams were sent out. Platoon leaders were each given ample injections of it.
    The orders were simple. If a soldier became injured through bite or scratch of an infected, they were to immediately turn themselves into whoever was in charge, and receive the injection.
    Slowing the cardio functions slowed the virus, enabling more time to be cured.
    Jack scoffed at that, so did Spc. Carlson. Relying solely on movie information, both conveyed to each other that they didn’t think anything could stop a zombie transformation. However that was fiction. It was never dealt with in ‘real life’.
    Or was it.
    “How do we know?” Spc. Carlson asked Jack as they moved through a wooded area.
    “True.”
    “I mean, it could have happened before. And it was contained. You just never know. Plus, we do have cool technology with medicine.”
    “True.”
    “What are you doing?”
    Jack was busted. He gave a smile to Carlson. “Trying to get a signal.” He held up his phone.
    “Yeah, well, you just spoke to your wife.”
    “I know, sorry.”
    “Please keep focused. We’re up front, we don’t need something jumping out at us.”
    Jack nodded. He was searching for a signal because he had to abruptly end his talk with Lil. He wanted to tell her so much. He was certain she knew he was worried. Telling her, ‘If I don’t come back …” said a lot. But he had to end his call and he did so without letting her know what was happening. He wanted to.
    Jack figured out a coded way to do so, he prepared a simple text. One that couldn’t come back negatively to him as if he let secret information out, and one his wife would understand with a little thought and know exactly what was happening. .
    But he couldn’t get a signal to send it out. The text sat in his phone in the ‘outbox’ folder.
    Spc. Carlson said something else. Jack didn’t understand. “What was that?” Jack asked.
    “I said,” Carlson looked back. “I think there’s a village about two more miles from …”
    He stopped. Jack was only two feet behind him. Carlson stopped and didn’t move.
    “Hold up,” Jack called out, lifting hand. “Carlson?”
    “It broke the perimeter.” Carlson whispered. “I was hoping they contained it. But it broke.”
    “What do you mean?” Jack