“Dawn is thirty minutes out,” Jones said. “We need to get up on the air as soon as possible. I want to get an assessment of what is coming our way and maybe soften them up.”
Clayton stood off to the side with his arms crossed. “If there are as many as we saw out on the road on the way here, they sure as shit don't have enough bullets in those choppers or in this whole damn place to take them out.”
Jones waved a hand in Clayton’s direction and said, “Don’t be so pessimistic. We can only do what we can do.”
“It won’t save us,” Clayton said.
Jones closed his eyes, and a muscle tensed along his jawline. When he opened his eyes, he fixed Clayton in an unblinking stare. “Clayton, I can’t hear that right now. None of us can. The people inside these walls need to think they have a chance, and we are going to give them that chance. We don’t know how the fires may have decreased the zombie’s numbers.”
“I think the fires may have had an effect,” Garver said.
“See, Clayton,” Jones said. “Garver thinks we have a chance.”
Bradbury spoke up, and his voice had a trembling quality to it. “I’m ready to go give’em hell, Sarge.”
“There you go,” Jones said. “I don’t expect us to do much more than put a minor dent in them, but we might give them second thoughts. Maybe we’ll get lucky and take out some of those smart ones.”
“That’ll be like hitting a needle in a haystack,” Clayton said.
Jones stuck a rigid index finger in Clayton’s direction. “Not one more word.”
Clayton puts his hands up in a gesture of surrender.
“Before we go, I need to check to see if the mad scientists have rigged up anything to allow us to spray that evil shit they have on the zombies,” Jones said.
“Whatever you say, master,” Clayton said.
“That’s enough of that bullshit,” Jones said, narrowing his eyes at Clayton. He looked to Garver and asked, “How many rockets do you have on each helicopter?”
“Eight per bird,” Garver replied.
“Have each chopper hold back two rockets per bird.”
“What are you thinking about?” Garver asked.
Jones cocked his head and said, “Something that is not going to please Eli. Not in the least.”
Chapter 27
Tinkering
“Be careful!” Darke cried out, his voice sounding more like a young girl than a man’s.
“Try to be a little calmer, Doctor,” Doc Wilson said beside Darke.
With his back turned to the group, Emmett threw up a hand for silence. “Geez O’Petes, can you get the caterwauling down to a low ebb> I’m trying to work here.”
Emmet Tanner was older than the rest of the men by at least twenty years, and he had lived more of life than all of them combined. In his long and storied life, he had flown fighter planes over Vietnam, been a crop duster, raised cattle, owned and went bankrupt on two large scale farming operations, and married and been divorced four times.
Physically, he was a big man with hands the size of catcher’s mitts and had a skin so soaked with the sun that it was almost leathery. He wore extra-large glasses with what looked like double thickness. On top of it all, there always seemed to be a mischievous sparkle in his eyes that challenged anyone around him to a dare. What that dare would be was anyone’s guess.
Currently, he held one of the large canisters of TRX-9 in one hand and was trying to mate the nozzle up to a large industrial sprayer. No one in the room saw any sense in what he was doing, but he exuded a confidence that seemed to convey that he had it all in hand. That confidence only spread so far as Doc Wilson and the two scientists stood on the balls of their feet, ready to sprint from the room.
Prior to this step, Emmet had spent the better part of an hour puzzling out how to work out a way to get the nerve agent into the sprayer without killing them all. After thirty minutes of tinkering, he noticed something that none of them saw, and he was ready to put his plan into action.
“All I gotta do is use this extra-large o-ring to cover the nozzle on your can of toxic death and then get all that shit into my sprayer,” Emmett said as his tongue stuck out the side of his mouth. “If I don’t get it right, then I’m deader than a doornail, and you three will probably follow up right quickly.” He turned back to the rest of the group and asked, “And you’re sure that door is airtight?”
“Yes, yes,” Darke said. “Just be careful.”
“Don’t get your panties in a twist,” Emmett said, “I’m in no hurry to walk through the pearly gates.”
He turned his attention back to the task at hand and slowly moved the canister of nerve agent toward the receptacle on the sprayer. There was a slight tink of metal-on-metal that made Darke jump. Emmett put a little pressure on the back of the canister and tried to force it, but that only left him in a no man’s land. If he let off the pressure, there was a good chance, a little bit of the nerve agent would be released. With this stuff, a little bit went a long way.
It was about that time when he wished he had listened to the scientist and put on the biohazard suit, but he didn’t want to look weak. Plus, more honestly, he felt a little claustrophobic wearing something that felt like a cross between a spacesuit and a body bag.
Emmett felt a trail of sweat slip down his back and make its way to the top of his tighty-whiteys. Sweat dripped down his forehead, causing his glasses to slip down his nose.
No matter how delicately he twisted the nozzle on the canister, he just couldn’t get the two containers to mate up completely. Even the slightest leak would kill him faster than you could say, Jackie Robinson, Smokey Robinson, or any damn Robinson that had ever lived.
There was a millimeter of a discrepancy between his Frankenstein mess of connectors that just didn’t match up. At least by using only two hands. If someone could pinch the rubber o-ring on the back of the sprayer, then he could see it working, but he knew he wasn’t growing a third arm anytime soon.
“Fellas, I’ve run into a slight problem,” Emmett said.
Darke let out a gasp, and he pivoted his body to make a run for the door.
“I’ve got the canister and the sprayer just about connected,” Emmitt said, “but one of the o-rings I’m using needs pinched a little to loosen things up, and I’m all out of hands.”
Holloway asked, “So, what you are asking is for one of us to come to assist you, correct?”
“Well, yes indeed, I would,” Emmett said. “And you’d better do it soon because my hands are getting a little sweaty here, and things are getting slippery, as in slippery when wet.”
Darke turned to Hollaway and said, “Well, I think you have more lab experience, so you would probably be a better fit.”
“You have more knowledge and experience with nerve toxins, so it might be best if you did it,” Holloway said.
“Fellas, we can have a master debate here,” Emmett said. “I just need one of you to come over here and give me a hand.”
Doc Wilson let out an exasperated breath and said, “I’ll do it.” He broke from the two scientists whose faces were filled with relief and made his way to beside the hooded lab bench where Emmett was working.
He carefully moved in beside Emmett and asked, “What do you need me to do?”
“You see that big rubber o-ring on the back of the sprayer?” Emmett asked.
“That black one that looks like a big gasket?” Doc Wilson asked.
“Yeah, that one,” Emmett responded. “I need you to pinch it with a little force to open up the sides so that I can slide this baby in.” He tapped his index finger on the nerve agent canister.
“How much pressure do I need to do?” Doc Wilson asked.
“You ever delivered a baby?” Emmett asked.
“Yes,” Doc Wilson replied.
“Just enough to open her up to allow the baby out without causing any tearing, only this time the baby’s going in.”
“Okay, I think I have it,” Doc
Wilson said, but perspiration dotted his forehead because he had never delivered a baby that would kill him in an instant.
Cautiously, he reached in between Emmett’s two big hands and placed his index finger and thumb on the o-ring that Emmett had directed him to.
“Ready?” He asked.
“Yes, on three,” Emmett said. “One, two,--”
Three got interrupted by a loud knock at the door that caused the two scientists to actually jump in the air. Darke even let out a little yelp.
Two more loud knocks followed, sounding almost the bass drum beats.
“Somebody want to get that?” Emmett asked.
It took Holloway a few seconds to recover from his fright, but he scuttled over to the door and opened it.
Clayton stepped into the room and immediately said, “The Sarge wants to know when you’re going to have his poison gas ready.”
“It’s a nerve agent,” Holloway said.
Clayton waved a hand in the air and said, “Whatever voodoo, dark magic bullshit death nerve gas you have, we need it, and we need it now?”
Without looking Clayton’s way, Emmett said, “We don’t have it ready.”
“We need it,” Clayton said insistently.
“Well, we don’t have it ready,” Emmett said, “And I still need to devise a method to force the spray out a good distance from the sprayer, or else it will fly back into the chopper and kill everyone on board. Do you want that?”
“Hell, no,” Clayton said. “I want the gas.”
“Please, Clayton,” Doc Wilson said. “We need more time,”
“We don’t have more time,” Clayton said, crossing his arms across his chest.
“We are at a very delicate moment here,” Doc Wilson said. “In fact, if I release the pressure I have on this o-ring, gas might leak out and kill me and Emmett, then the three of you.”
Clayton jumped back toward the door and said, “Why in the hell didn’t you tell me that when I walked in?”
Holloway said, “Suffice it to say, we aren’t ready to deliver the device right now.”
“Sarge ain’t going to like it,” Clayton said as he put his hand on the door handle, but something in his body language said he just wanted the hell out of the room.
“Sarge will just have to live with it,” Emmett said. “Tell him we’ll be ready for the second sortie.”
“There may not be time for a second trip,” Clayton said.
“Then you go to war with the army you have, rather than the one you want,” Emmett said. “Now, get the hell out of here before my sweaty hands slip off one of these things.”
Clayton jerked the door open and was out a second later.
“Ready, again?” Doc Wilson asked as the dots of sweat on his forehead had turned into an all sheen.
“Ready or not,” Emmett said. “Give her a squeeze, Doc.
Doc did as he was told, and Emmett grunted a little as he put gentle but firm pressure on the back of the canister. No discernable progress was being made for a few seconds, but then suddenly, a sucking sound followed by a pop, and the two devices latched together.
“Well, holy shit,” Emmett exclaimed, “It worked.”
Doc Wilson slumped forward and had to put out his arms to keep himself from collapsing on the bench.
He asked, “Can we get it to them?”
“No,” Emmett said. “I wasn’t kidding about not having enough power behind the sprayer to deliver the gas a decent distance. At least, not yet, but this was the hard part. I have an idea for an injector system that I can whip up in no time.”
“How much is no time?” Doc Wilson asked.
“An hour,” Emmett said. “Two tops,”
“We are on a clock here.”
“Have a little faith, Doc,” Emmett said.
Chapter 28
Airbourne
Jones didn’t like the news Clayton carried back, but he knew they were out of time. They had to get the choppers in the air to check the status on the approaching horde. He thought they might try to persuade the smart zombies to take their undead friends in a different direction. If not, then maybe they could soften them up if that was even possible.
The two helicopters lifted off easily in the pre-dawn light and hovered over the Sanctum as they got their bearings. Below them, the area teemed with activity, with most of it being on the westward side. To Jones, they looked like ants moving around on the ground. If he had to be honest, there was a little voice in the back of his head that told him to turn the helicopter around and head east as fast as the thing could fly.
But he knew he couldn’t do that. People down below depended on him and his men to do what they could to stave off this seemingly impending disaster. People he cared about.
No, there was no running. He would stand and face down this menace with the rest of them.
He scanned the area below, spending most of his time watching the west side of the Sanctum. People stood atop the walls, looking off in the distance, but the rain and tree cover cut off any view.
“Take us up higher,” Jones told Garver. “I want to know if we can see anything out there.”
Garver said, “Yes, sir.” He clicked on his comms and told Bradbury they were heading up a few more hundred more feet. He pressed the controls, and up they went, feeling lighter than air.
They hit a thousand feet in the air, and that gave them a decent line of sight to the west. Even as light as the rain was falling, it still cut visibility to a degree.
Off in the distance, along the curving state highway leading to the west, Jones could see a dark mass covering the roadway. It spread back for what seemed like a mile or two.
The slightest hint of the sun coming up behind them provided a modicum of illumination. The mass bobbed and weaved, oozing slowly along more like dark lava than water, but it was coming.
“Sweet Jesus,” Clayton said, his voice sounded weak.
“There you have it,” Garver said.
Bradbury spoke to Garver over the comms, and Garver said, “Yes, that is the horde. You hold steady now.” There was a pause, and Garver said, “That’s good.”
They hovered in the air for a few more seconds before Garver asked, “What are your orders, sir?” He had fallen in his mode as a pilot. He served his commander and did what he was told. Maybe he had his own little flavor or spin, but he was a chain of command sort of man.
“Take us over the river,” Jones said. “I want to see how it’s running.”
Garver relayed the order to Bradbury and pushed on the stick, pushing the helicopter forward at a downward angle. It only took a few seconds to get them over the river, where Garver put the chopper in a hovering pattern.
Clayton leaned forward and said, “It’s running high and hard.”
“That she is,” Jones said. He sucked in a breath and let it out slowly. “I had a different order in mind about how I wanted to handle things, but I think I’m going to change things up a little.”
“What are you talking about?” Clayton asked.
“Give me the comms, Garver,” Jones asked.
Garver reached forward and handed over a headset with a microphone boom on it. Jones slipped it on and clicked a button, then said, “Can you hear me, Bradbury?” After a brief pause ,he said, “Good.”
Jones stopped for a moment and looked to Garver. After a long pause as the rotors spun loudly above them, beating the air, he said, “Garver, Bradbury, listen up. I’m going to give you an order that you are going to think is a little crazy, but I need you to trust me on this.”
Garver’s eyebrows went up, and his expression became guarded.
“I was going to do this on the way back, but we could get a little over-eager with the rockets when we finally engage the horde.”
“Jonsey,” Clayton said, “What the hell are you thinking?”
With the comms open, Jones said, “The rain has dampened the fires we set, so I think that we’ve gotten all we are going to get out of them. I’m
hoping to hell that it peeled some of the dead off that horde, but we may be able to use fire and water to help us out.”
Clayton looked down at the raging brown waters of the river rushing along, surging up the banks of the river. His eyes followed the river until it passed under the main bridge coming into the city from the west.
He said, “You’re not thinking what I think you’re thinking, are you?”
“They’ve got to go,” Jones said.
“All of them?” Clayton asked.
“No, just the ones on the west side,” Jones said. “We need to have some rockets to engage the enemy later.”
“Now, I’m the one who is perplexed,” Garver said. “What the hell are you talking about?
His question hung in the air for a long three seconds before Jones said, “We need to take out the two bridges on this side of the city.”
“Are you crazy?” Garver said.
“Eli is going to be pisssssed!” Clayton said, drawing out the last word.
“With the water running the way it is from the rains, it might deter some zombies from coming into town,” Jones said. “If there is something I’ve learned, it’s that the zombies are afraid of fire and running water.”
“That didn’t stop the ones that came into town earlier,” Clayton said.
“But the water was low, and the river wasn’t rushing the way it is now,” Jones said.
“I don’t like this,” Garver said.
“You’re here to follow orders,” Jones said. “Bradbury, you with me on this?” There was a brief pause, then Jones said, “Good. You take the Richland Street Bridge, and we’ll take the Stimson Avenue Bridge.” Jones paused and said, “Roger that. Then we meet back here.”
Garver shook his head back and forth in disbelief.
“It’s the way it’s gotta be,” Jones said.
The Deadland Chronicles | Book 4 | Siege of the Dead: Page 13
