--Winston Churchill
~Guy Granger~
Lower Bay, New York
All Guy could think about was Alice and Kyle. Since the mobile phone amnesty, the men aboard the Hatchet had been coming to him with horror stories from all over the country. His Airman, whose job it was to pilot the Jayhawk, had wept as he’d spoken of his hometown of Carmel, Indiana, which was besieged. His auntie and two cousins were already dead. There were similar reports from enlisted men hailing from Boston, Tallahassee, Newport, and Marietta. Everywhere with a black stone was under attack.
Which meant the whole of America was under attack.
It was Guy’s turn to make a call now, but he sat in his cramped quarters with his cell phone in his lap and hands shaking as he found himself unable to dial.
Just make the call, he told himself. You have a job to do, and this is the only chance you will get to speak to your family. Make the goddamn call, Guy. Find out if Kyle and Alice are okay.
He unlocked the phone and brought up his contacts. His hands shook, but he kept his forefinger straight enough to press his ex-wife’s name and start the call. He placed the phone to his ear and waited.
“Guy, is that you?”
“Nancy, are you okay?”
“No, I’m not okay. What’s going on? Brunswick is under attack. That’s only the next town over.”
“But Durham is okay?”
“Yes, I think so. The local police have gone to help in Brunswick, but things are okay here. They say those stones opened up some kind of gate and monsters are pouring through.”
“I think that’s correct,” he admitted, “I’ve seen the monsters. They’re real.”
“Oh God.”
“Nancy, where are Kyle and Alice? Are they with you?”
“No.”
“Jesus, where are they?”
“They’re in London. You know that.”
Guy’s eyes went wide as he realised. “Damn it. Their school trip was this week?”
“And all of next. I can’t believe you forgot. I suppose I should be used to it by now.”
“Nancy, I’m not calling for an argument. I want to know my family is safe, so just tell me. Are the kids okay?”
“Guy, I haven’t been able to reach them all day. The news said London is under attack.” She sobbed.
Guy almost dropped the phone. His hands shook. “Nancy, when did you speak to them last?”
“Yesterday. It was night time there, but around midday here. They were having fun; said they were going to visit Big Ben in the morning.”
That put Kyle and Alice in the heart of the city.
Guy closed his eyes and tried not to scream. “Okay, Nancy, don’t panic. Give me the details of where they’re staying and I’ll contact the U.S. embassy; see what I can do from here.”
“Thank you, Guy. Clark has tried to get in contact with the school, but hasn’t gotten anywhere.”
The mention of his wife’s lover dispelled some of Guy’s desperation and replaced it with anger. “Is Clark there with you now?”
“Yes, did you want to speak to him?”
“No! I mean, I don’t have anything to say to him. Just stay together and don’t leave home. Things are bad, Nancy, but at least it’s not everywhere. If Durham is okay, then stay put. I’ll try to find Kyle and Alice. Contact you as soon as I hear anything.”
“Thanks, Guy. You stay safe.”
“I always do.”
He ended the call and once again stared at the cell phone in his lap. Nancy was okay, and that was good, but nothing told him his children were safe.
There was a knock at the door.
When Guy opened it, he found Frank standing there.
“My aunt is gone,” he said. “I tried to get a hold of her, but a nurse at the local hospital answered the phone.”
Guy sighed. “I’m sorry, Frank.”
“Thank you. Have you got a hold of your kids? Nancy?”
“Nancy is okay, but Kyle and Alice are in London.”
“Their class trip?”
Guy huffed. “Now I really feel like an asshole. I forgot all about it, Frank. They’re stuck on the other side of the Atlantic, and Nancy can’t get hold of them. I… I don’t know if they’re okay.”
“Of course they are. I’ve never known a thirteen year old boy as grown up as your Kyle. He’ll be looking after Alice even as we speak. They’ll be okay.”
“I hope you’re right.”
“I am. So what’s our next move, Captain?”
“We head for Norfolk, as commanded. We can refuel and get new orders.”
“Sounds like the smart move. You will have a problem on your hands though.”
Guy tilted his head. “What problem?”
“Begins with a T.”
“Tosco? What’s my second-in-command up to now?”
“Some of the men want to leave, go to their families. Tosco told them they could.”
“He said what? I’ll throttle him.”
Frank put his hand against Guy’s chest. “Just stay calm. You can control the situation best by making the most sense. Tosco’s just another demagogue who thinks you run a ship by pandering to your men.”
“Demagogue? Have you been studying the dictionary again?”
“Not a lot to do on board a ship but read. I’ll get the Hatchet moving again. Sooner we leave New York in our wake the better, if you ask me.”
Guy nodded agreement.
They marched up to the pilothouse where they found Tosco and a gathering of enlisted men. Guy was happy to see that none of his other officers had sided with Tosco and were all elsewhere, performing their duties. Tosco held his chin high and squared his shoulders as if he were about to put forward a great speech of noble cause.
Guy didn’t give him a chance to utter a single word. “I understand that some of you want to leave,” he said, wiping the smug expression from Tosco’s face as he took the upper hand and addressed the issue before it had a chance to be raised. Tosco would not get the opportunity to play hero and put forward the concerns of his men. “But I would remind you of why you are here: You are enlisted men of the United States Coast Guard. You are not trained killers, like the Navy. You are not merchantmen or fishermen. You sail the Seven Seas not as pirates. Every man and woman aboard this ship signed up to be a hero, and today we saved over thirty civilians from a terrible fate. For that, they will thank us for the rest of their lives. You probably think that earns you the right to disembark this ship and go searching for your families. Perhaps it does. Yet, I ask you to think carefully, because the moment you step off this ship, you cease being heroes at a time when the world needs heroes more than ever. As long as people are in need of help, it is our duty to stay aboard this ship and do what we signed up to do. Something terrible happened today, and our country is relying on us to minimise the damage. If we fail to protect our homeland, then what do our families even have left to live for? America is a country forged by brave men and women. The moment we stop fighting for our freedom is the moment we lose it. I, too, have a family, but I will remain aboard the Hatchet and do my duty. I ask you to do the same. We are heading to Norfolk, and there we will rearm and refuel. What will happen beyond that, I do not know, but I suggest that those of you that pray do so now. Pray for us all.”
Before anybody replied, Guy turned to Frank and gave his orders. “Sail us out of here, Chief Petty, and don’t stop until I say so.”
~Rick Bastion~
Devonshire, England
Rick still had the injured woman in his arms, but now Sarah had passed out on the floor beside him. Keith was frantic trying to call Marcy while everyone else in the pub paced up and down. The news report said they were at war—not just Britain, but the entire world. Where had the creatures come from? What did they want? Was it all some kind of media conspiracy? Other than what he’d seen on the news, Rick had witnessed none of it for himself. He’d walked to the pub only two hours before, and it had been a normal
evening. It wasn’t until this injured woman had collapsed in front of the bar he saw anything wrong first hand.
“The paramedics are here,” somebody said, and Rick looked up to see a man and woman entering. Both wore green NHS jumpsuits, and were quick to rush over to help. There was no mistaking the haunted look in their eyes.
“What happened to her?” the female paramedic asked as she started examining the unconscious woman.
“I have no idea,” said Rick. “She just ran into the pub and fell down.”
“Something bad is going on,” said Keith. “It’s all over the news. My wife isn’t answering her phone. Something’s happened.”
“We know,” said the male paramedic, whose bald head was slick with sweat.
“What do you know?” asked Rick. “Anything we don’t?”
“This woman is dead.” The female paramedic said. She went to stand up. “We can’t help her.”
“What? You haven’t even tried,” said Rick.
“She has no heartbeat. I’m sorry. Usually, we might try to do something, but we had another seven emergencies called in on our way here. We’re the only ambulance in the area, and we have to spend our time where it can do most good. This woman has been dead too long.”
Rick looked down at the woman whose head he’d been holding for fifteen minutes and saw the truth of it. The amount of blood that’d leaked from her chest had formed a massive puddle on the wooden floor beneath her, and her arms were the colour of chalk. She was cold.
“Can you help Sarah?” he asked. “She passed out from the shock.”
The female paramedic took something from her kit bag and waved it beneath Sarah’s nose. She winced and began to stir. “She’ll be fine. Just give her a few minutes to wake up.”
“We have to go,” the male paramedic urged.
“What do we do with her?” asked Keith, pointing to the dead woman.
“I’ll inform the coroner,” said the female paramedic. “Just place a sheet over her and wait for someone to come.”
Rick eased the dead woman’s head down onto the floorboards and stood up. He retrieved his pint from the table and downed half of it.
The paramedics disappeared out the door, which left the people inside the pub to stand around anxiously. Nobody knew what to do. Rick wondered if he should go home or stay where he was.
Screaming from outside.
Rick stared at his brother. “What now?”
“I don’t know. Just close the door.”
Rick nodded, went over to do so, but couldn’t help glancing outside at the car park. The ambulance was parked right outside, its lights chasing away the shadows of approaching night. The paramedics were nowhere to be seen.
The screaming had stopped.
He took a tentative step outside the pub and looked around. The front of the ambulance faced him at an angle, its large rear doors hanging open. He couldn’t see inside from where he stood, but the paramedics must be in the back.
Who had screamed?
“Hello? Is everything all right out here?”
The sound of movement from the ambulance drew him forward another few steps. It took a handful more until he had moved around sufficiently to face the rear of the vehicle.
Something horrible glared back at him.
It was a man, but also a monster. His eyes were cloudy and white, lips cracked and bleeding. He looked dead.
“Are you okay?” asked Rick, not knowing what else to say.
“I am your end,” the dead man hissed. “I will use your hollowed skull as a latrine.”
Rick noticed the bald paramedic lying on a gurney in the back of the ambulance. His neck had been twisted around and broken. This monster had murdered him and would do the same to Rick. He turned to run, but the dead man leapt out and grabbed him, cold hands seizing his throat. Rick fought back the only way he could—with his legs. He lifted his right foot and stamped down on where he hoped a kneecap would be, and the dead man howled and collapsed sideways. The icy fingers slipped from around Rick’s neck and allowed him chance to stagger away.
The dead man bellowed. He reached out his hands to try and grab Rick again, but every time he tried, he crumpled to the ground as his broken leg folded.
“Is it safe?” came a voice.
Rick glanced upwards to see that the female paramedic was lying prone on the roof of the ambulance. A bad scratch parted her left eyebrow, but she seemed otherwise okay. “What are you doing up there?” he said. “Come down and help-”
The dead man tackled Rick around the waist, dragging him to the ground. Before he could react, his enemy had straddled him and was back to squeezing his throat. “Submit to slavery, worm, and you may get to live out your days as a foot licker.”
Rick struggled, tried to bring his legs up to kick the monster off of him, but he couldn’t get any leverage. Every second, the pressure in his head increased and made it impossible to focus on anything else other than trying to get a breath.
“Your men will be sodomites, your women whores.”
“Well, doesn’t that just sum up the 21st Century?” Keith appeared over the dead man’s shoulder, holding what looked like an old iron fire poker. He brought the metal rod down two-handed, like a barbarian wielding a broadsword, and shattered his target’s skull, caving it in at the top so that it resembled a grizzly heart shape.
Rick swatted the hands away from his throat and gasped uncontrollably, even as his brother and the paramedic dragged him to his feet.
“There are more coming,” cried the paramedic.
Clutching his throat and still struggling for air, Rick glanced across the car park and saw that more of the dead men were indeed coming. They lumbered down the road like zombies, but were cursing and shouting threats. One of them brandished a tree branch like a spear.
“Get inside,” Keith urged. “Now!”
The three of them hurried back inside the pub, closing and locking the thick wooden door behind them. The helpful businessman understood that danger was on its way because he quickly dragged a table over to act as a barricade.
Rick staggered over and finished what was left of his pint, then slumped over the table while Keith took charge. He told them what was coming and that they all needed to find weapons. It was good that he was being proactive, because nobody else was. Rick least of all. He could do nothing but close his eyes and wish it wasn’t all happening.
“R-Rick?”
Rick opened his eyes and glanced to the side. Sarah had woken up on the floor and was propping herself up on her elbows. She looked bewildered. “What’s happening?”
He knelt beside her. “We’re in a spot of bother.”
“The monsters are here, aren’t they?”
Rick nodded.
“Are we going to die?”
He looked at her face and couldn’t bear to tell her the truth; so he lied. “We’ll be fine. My brother already took care of one of them.”
Sarah smiled at him, but she looked more likely to cry than laugh.
“Why aren’t they trying to get inside?” asked the female paramedic, whose name turned out to be Maddy. She peeked out of one window through a gap in the curtains.
“Because they don’t want to end up like their friend,” said Keith, patting the iron poker that he had not put down since bashing the dead man’s brains in. His bravado might have been masking the fact he still couldn’t get through to Marcy.
“It’s because they’re smart,” Rick muttered as he worked on his fresh pint. “They’re figuring out the best way to get at us.”
Maddy folded her arms. “Then we have to be ready.”
The businessman, Steven, clutched an iron poker, identical to the one Keith had. He waved it in the air as he spoke. “Whatever is out there picked on the wrong people.”
“This isn’t time for bravado,” said Rick, staring into his pint. “The thing that attacked me wasn’t human. It was like a zombie, only it spoke. It hated me, hated all of us.”
/> Sarah plonked herself down on a chair next to him. “We need to get help.”
Keith pointed his poker at Maddy. “She was supposed to be our help.”
Maddy sighed. “On our way here, emergency calls came in from all over. Only reason Tom and I made it here was because you people were the first to call. I wouldn’t hold up much hope of getting any more help. I’ve got a feeling that emergency services are inundated right now. Poor Tom…”
“Then we stay here,” said Keith. “We batten down the hatches and arm ourselves. The Army will get a handle on this eventually. That thing that attacked Rick was easy enough to kill. Wherever these things came from, they underestimated us.”
“I need another drink, Diane” said Rick, suppressing a dire need to belch. The barmaid fetched him one.
“I don’t think getting drunk is the answer,” said Keith.
Rick held up his fresh pint. “You go ahead and be the hero. I’m going to get pissed.”
Steven waved his poker again. “We need to stick together and stay focused. You’d be dead if your brother hadn’t helped you.”
“I would be too,” said Maddy. “Thank you.”
Keith lifted his chin and squared his shoulders. “Just doing what anyone else would have. I’m sure my brother would do the same.”
Rick sighed. “So what do we do?”
“We get ready,” said Keith. “Those things try to get inside, we do everything we can to stop them.”
Maddy nodded. “Sounds like a plan.”
Everyone agreed, and within minutes, they all had weapons. Rick, Steven, and Keith clutched iron pokers from the pub’s three fireplaces, while Diane and Maddy wielded knives from the kitchen. Everyone else went with whatever they could find, ranging from jagged beer bottles to a baseball bat found hidden beneath the bar. It was just in time, too. The attack began not ten minutes later.
The fight came not to the front door, but to one of the windows. The thick double-glazing did not shatter, but crumpled inwards a piece at a time. Everyone formed up, weapons at the ready.
Hell On Earth Box Set | Books 1-6 Page 9
