by J. F. Holmes
A voice barked out of the darkness, “YOU! GET YOUR SHIT AND REPORT TO THE DOCK!” and the woman dropped the pack dejectedly, heading back toward the tent.
“Man, these boys ain’t screwing around, are they?” said the man next to him and held out this hand. “Dale Jonas.”
“Sergeant Paul Badger,” he said, shaking the proffered hand. He hadn’t seen Jonas in the tent last night, so he assumed he was a civilian.
“At ease the talk!” shouted Cahill, who’d already mounted his pack.
“Kiss my ass,” shouted back the civilian. “Man, what’s that dude’s problem? Gave me crap on the barge yesterday.”
Before Badger could answer, Agostine called for them to gather around him. Without preamble, he launched into a short briefing.
“This is going to be a reconnaissance mission north of Glens Falls. We’ll move up Route 4, establish a patrol base, and determine if there’s any undead or human activity. Chief Beck, an intel weenie from Task Force Liberty, will give you a run down on what we can expect.”
A woman stepped forward and delivered a quick, concise briefing. “We have a Predator sighting of an undead horde of approximately three or four hundred moving southward on Route 4. There’ve been additional reports of civilian refugees living in the Adirondacks who’re interested in rejoining civilization, so you may encounter them also. There’ve been attacks on barge traffic between here and Grande Isle, so be aware you may be facing small arms.”
“Our mission,” said Agostine, “is to find this horde, report back, and conduct airstrikes if possible. We are not, I repeat, NOT to engage. Any random undead encountered on the march will be dealt with by my team members, unless you are so ordered.”
“Screw that, I came here to fight,” came a voice from the rear. Again the laser shot out, and the man was ordered back to the dock. He cursed and tried to argue, but Sergeant Yasser walked over with his pistol drawn, and the soldier, cursing them, grabbed his ruck and started walking toward the river.
“Listen to me,” continued Agostine, “you’re allowed to fire in self-defense ONLY. You are not a unit, you’re a gaggle of individuals. If any shooting is to be initiated, it will be by members of my team, or at our command. Is that understood?”
There were enough answers in the affirmative for him to continue. “We’ll be moving out smartly. If you fall behind me farther than fifty meters, you’re out of the selection. Don’t worry, it won’t be hard to keep up with a guy with one leg. You have five minutes to get yourself together.”
Badger thought hard about what he’d been told and immediately started to break down his weapon. He noticed that most of the others were, too. The red laser started shooting out, touching people who were just standing waiting, and cadre moved out, pushing five of them to the side.
“Son of a bitch!” exclaimed Jonas. “HEY, WHERE IS MY FIRING PIN?”
“Congratulations; you passed your second test, those of you who checked. Go see Sergeant Major Bozelli and get your firing pins or whatever else is missing from your weapon.”
Badger felt a bit sheepish; his entire bolt was missing, but the charging handle was there. He retrieved it from a grinning Boz, and slipped it back in, first checking that all the parts were there.
The whistle blew again, and they started off down the road into the darkness. The recruits were down to twenty.
Chapter 299
Steve Hildebrand had seen a lot of things in his time as a war correspondent and knew a combat soldier when he saw one. Walking alongside the marchers, he zeroed in on a woman who seemed to have that quality, the hardness in her eyes, the ever-present scanning. She was older, with short cropped grey hair and a lean stringiness.
“Oh, I’m no soldier,” she laughed when he asked her unit. “Perhaps for the Lord, maybe, but that’s up to Him to decide. I just do my best.”
Oh great, a Jesus freak, he thought to himself, and moved on to another woman. This one was much younger, and was chewing bubblegum as she walked, seeming to have no problem with her pack.
“Excuse me, miss, I’m Steve Hildebrand, and I’m a reporter for…”
She didn’t look at him, which didn’t mean much in the pre-dawn darkness, merely cut him off with, “I know who you are. Fuck off.”
Hildebrand grinned to himself and thought, Now that’s more like it.
“Is that an offer? Because you’re kinda young for me. I prefer women who’re old enough to shave.”
She laughed and stuck out her hand. “Lance Corporal Mary Rottencrotch. Make sure you spell it right. C-R-O-T-C-H.”
There was a burst of laughter up and down the line, and the reporter asked her, “Are you sure that’s not with a K? It’s German.”
“Touché! For a shithead reporter, you’re OK.”
“So, what’s your story, Mary?” he continued.
“Actually it’s Vasquez, Maria, one each. UNITED STATES MARINE CORPS!” she ended, raising her voice. From further up the line came a shouted back, “URRRAHHH!” followed by Zivcovic yelling back, “SHUT THE FUCK UP!”
“So,” said Hildebrand, “did you pack enough crayons to eat?”
“Ha-ha, very funny. What do you want to know?”
“Everything, but most especially, why the Scouts? This is an Army outfit, isn’t it?”
“Actually,” she answered, “it’s a part of Joint Special Operations Command. I was Force Recon, Scout/Sniper, but when Seattle fell and the government moved back here, all the overseas missions got canceled, and most of us Marines are on garrison duty in the coastal fortress towns. I want to keep on sneaking and peeking.” She shifted her pack to make it more comfortable and continued, “And this seems like the best chance to do it.”
“Can you tell me your story, before you joined the Marines?”
There was silence for a bit, then she said quietly, “No.”
“OK then, anything else you want to talk about?” he asked, but the joking banter had been broken by making her think of her past. He had seen it many times; the service was a new life, and the old one was well buried.
He dropped back and walked at the end of the column, where Agostine and O’Neill were walking, wearing packs just as heavy as the others’. He couldn’t see any limp in Agostine’s walk, and he wondered at how the man got by with his prosthetic. There had to be a story there. Before he could ask anything, the Scout Commander said, “Not the time for interviews, Steve. Even though this is a secure area, there’s always the chance of an Undead around here.”
“And I hear reporters are especially tasty,” said the redhead. “Lots of fat, especially in their heads.”
“Har har. Don’t make me make you famous.”
“I’m already famous,” she answered. “I’m the hero of Canton, don’t you know?”
Hildebrand was puzzled. “Was there a battle there?” He searched his mind, trying to remember.
Agostine laughed and said, “You’re getting old, Brit.”
“Bite me. It’s from a TV show called Firefly. Only the greatest show ever.”
“Ahhhh, OK then. How far are we going? Where’s this horde?”
Agostine slowed down a bit so they couldn’t be overhead by the candidates. “There is no horde; that was just to keep them focused.”
“So where are we going?” asked the reporter again.
“We’re not going anywhere. Sergeant Yasser and Major Zivcovic are going to lead them around through the hills of Washington County until they all drop. The last ten will make the cut, and from there, we’ll go to the range and see who can shoot.”
Hildebrand was astonished. “That’s it?”
“Oh no, there’s going to be some nice surprises along the way,” answered O’Neill. “Matter of fact, here comes one now!”
The sunlight had begun to appear in the east, stars fading, and the reporter could faintly make out shapes close by on the road. Ahead, there was a brilliant flash of light that left him dazzled, followed by a CRACK that made his ears ring.
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A burst of gunfire was let off almost simultaneously, quickly followed by commands of “CEASE FIRE! CEASE FIRE!”
Agostine jogged forward past several prone figures, until he got close to where he thought the gunshots had come from. “Who fired?” he asked, and one person stood up.
“Fall back to the rear; a truck will be along to pick you up in a few hours. Try not to get eaten.”
“Seriously?” said the man, and the reporter could hear the disbelief in his voice.
“Yes. You were told that no one was to fire unless by command.”
“That’s bullshit! In the Corps, we we’re fired on, we fire back to gain dominance of the situation!” Hildebrand recognized the voice of the man who’d shouted back “Urrrahhh!” to Vasquez.
“That’s nice. Here in the scouts, we have a little more discipline, and we follow orders. Take your ass back to the Marines; I’m sure they’re a fine outfit.”
The man dropped his ruck and sat down on it, and in the growing light, the reporter could see a petulant look on his face. Probably good riddance, with an attitude like that. As he took some notes, O’Neill passed him with a grin on her face, and she whispered, “I’m just getting started!”
Chapter 300
They began dropping out around mile twenty. The hills were short but steep, and once the sun had come up, the humidity set in with a vengeance. When you ruck march, carrying a weapon and a heavy load on your back, it isn’t like regular exercise. The sweat pools in places, then dries, forming rough crystals of salt in your clothes that chafe at your armpits and groin. Where your pack sits on your lower back and the straps dig into your shoulders, bruises and then sores start to develop, and blood can flow. An ill-fitting pair of boots can grow a hotspot that turns to a blister the size of a quarter, which pops, and then the skin starts to slough off. Eventually, for those not accustomed to the life, a trail of bloody footprints appear as your boots start to squish with each step.
The first to go was a civilian, a tough-looking young man who started sweating profusely; as he marched, he got redder and redder. O’Neill walked next to him, and several times asked him if he wanted to drop. He ignored her, just kept up with the grueling pace Yasser was setting in the lead. When they reached the top of a tall hill, he was so out of it, leaning into the slope, that he continued bending down when they crested the rise and crashed forward onto the ground. Rolling over, he struggled to get up with the pack on his back, but fell again, and lay there prostrate on the melting pavement.
“Oh, you poor turtle,” said O’Neill, and kept walking.
“MEDIC!” was shouted up the line, and Doc Swan came jogging back. Together, she and the reporter dragged the man into the shade, and the medic called over the radio for the pickup HUMVEE as she started an IV. The line of men and women kept marching on, dwindling into the distance, disappearing around a bend.
“Hey Colonel,” said the civilian marching next to him, the man named Jonas he’d spoken with the day before. “You said that we were going north of Glens Falls. We kinda seem to be moving a bit east, up into these hills.”
“We’re avoiding a known concentration of undead,” answered Agostine, with a grin in his face.
“My ass, but OK. I guess we just keep walking.” By this time, most of the marchers had figured out that they were on little more than a gut check. Master Sergeant Cahill, far out in front, occasionally looked back at Agostine with a scowl, but he kept on pacing Zivcovic, though both ignored each other.
Around mile twenty-three, another two had dropped out, one leaving bloody footprints on the road before he called it quits, the other just sitting down on a log and chugging what little water he had left. At this point, they’d all just about drained their camel backs and canteens, and most had wolfed down the one MRE they’d been given on their ten-minute break at noon.
Rounding a bend, now down to sixteen, they came to a place where a bridge had once stood. It had obviously been demolished by explosives in the initial fight against the undead. The river, rushing down from the Green Mountains of Vermont, looked like a good trout stream. Packed up against the bank, milling around, were several dozen undead.
It had been ten years since the first plague, and six years since the second. How they survived, no one knew; it was just accepted. Scientific research wasn’t exactly a priority anymore; survival was.
Still, these were in pretty rough shape. Muscles rotted, eyes abraded, clothing falling off. Their ears worked, though. As the marchers crested the hill toward the bridge, the undead turned as one, and they howled that bone-chilling, screeching, piercing wail, launching themselves at the patrol.
Contrary to their earlier guidance, “FIRE!” yelled Zivcovic, and most of them did, taking a knee and opening fire. The undead started to drop, one, two, three, a half dozen, coming closer and closer, the howl getting louder. The gunfire also rose in volume, as well as the curses, then tapered off as magazines were changed; the curses and yells didn’t. At twenty meters, two people turned and fled; one soldier and one civilian. There were about a dozen of the undead left, and still none of the regular scouts had fired, though some of the group risked a quick glance backward at them. O’Neill stood with her arms crossed, and Agostine was digging at some dirt under his nails with a Ka-bar.
“JESUS FUCKING CHRIST, HELP US!” yelled Master Sergeant Cahill, but to his credit, he never stopped firing. Then he stood up and ordered, “SMASHERS!”
The soldiers instantly obeyed, drilled by long habit, and dropped their weapons in sling, pulling out whatever blunt objects they’d armed themselves with. Most carried an aluminum-handled, steel-headed mace, designated the M-13 Personal Combat Weapon. They instinctively formed a line, side-by-side, but the civilians milled about behind them, unsure what to do. That’s when another broke and ran.
The undead got within ten meters, and a steel cable lifted off the ground in front of them, spilling the foremost onto the ground. Cagle and Johnson appeared on either side of the road, firing into the struggling mass with their modified M-4s, and the veteran soldiers slung their maces, picked up their rifles, and joined them. It was over in less than a minute.
“How many ran, Brit?” asked Agostine.
“Um, one military and two civilians.”
“YOU HAVE FIVE MINUTES TO DO WHATEVER YOU NEED TO DO!” yelled Zivcovic, and he flipped his ruck over his shoulders and onto his back, waiting impatiently.
Sergeant Yasser spoke quietly in his reserved way, but in protest. “Colonel, I don’t think that was a fair test of the civilians. Their instinct is to run, to hide.”
Before Agostine could answer, O’Neill spoke. “That may be, but when I first joined the team, I had to break that habit too. Matter of fact, Jonesy dragged my ass back over his shoulder when I walked off a range. It took me a long time to get past the lone survivor bullshit, but we don’t HAVE that time.”
The reporter was furiously taking notes, and O’Neill leaned over, whispering “J-O-N-E-S-Y.”
“She’s right,” said Agostine. “With the war finally winding down against the Mountain Republic, there’re going to be a lot of areas of the world to explore, and they’re going to need the teams more than ever.”
Hildebrand was intrigued and asked, “Where, exactly?”
“Anywhere. Bringing civilians back to the settled states, recovering National Assets, probing for military action, whatever some General or politician gets a hair up his ass about.”
“You seem a bit bitter, Colonel,” said the reporter. In answer, Agostine just hiked up his pack and walked away.
“Wouldn’t you be,” answered O’Neill for him, “if you’d walked through the valley of death, and left almost everyone and everything you ever loved there, emerging unscathed?”
The reporter jogged forward to catch up with the line of marchers, asking several of them questions about the action they’d just participated in. Were they scared? Why hadn’t they run? Did they fear the undead?
“Shi
t yeah, I fear them,” answered one young man with an 82nd Airborne patch on his shoulder. He also had another scroll velcroed over the “AIRBORNE”, a simple number written out, “THE TEN THOUSAND”.
“You’re one of them, aren’t you?” asked Hildebrand, “one of the ones who marched back from the Mexican oil fields?”
“Damn straight, and if that crazy sumbitch Zivcovic thinks he’s going to walk me into the ground, he’s got another thing coming,” answered the soldier, then spit a long stream of tobacco juice on the ground. “Wouldn’t want to fight him, though.”
“I’d love to interview you sometime about the march, Sergeant…Badger.”
Another stream of spit, and he said, “Paul Badger.”
“Liar! His name is Honey Badger, and he don’t give a shit!” said Vasquez from behind them.
“Hey Vasquez,” shot back Badger, “you ever been mistaken for a man?”
“Nope, have you?” she said, scraping undead blood and goo off her boots with a stick.
“QUIT BULLSHITTING, YOU STUPID AMERICAN FATASSES, WE MARCH!” barked Zivcovic, but he actually sort of smiled.
Chapter 301
Perching on sodden tree roots deep in the middle of a swamp did little to stop the incessant whining of mosquitoes or provide shelter from the leeches. They crawled up your legs, and if you didn’t have your pants bloused properly, you’d wake up in the morning with the fat black creatures sucking on your privates. The mosquitoes, well, when it was your turn off watch you wrapped your spare t-shirt around your head and did your best to ignore them. Sleep never really happened.
Doug Cahill was miserable, but there was no way in hell he was going to quit. The smirking from Zivcovic and Bozelli irritated him, but what was really getting to him was the quiet confidence of all the training cadre. It seemed like they expected to him to fail and didn’t care one way or another. It was very different from the other service schools he’d been to, where there’d always been some expectation of learning, and you could recycle.
