“Cadillac, this is Ops. You can reach the Card Sharks on foxtrot one two three. Over.”
“Roger that!” Rawlings flipped frequencies on his radio. “Card Shark, this is Cadillac Six. Over.”
“Cadillac, this is Card Shark Six. Go ahead. Over.” The voice of the woman commanding the Apaches sounded distant and tinny.
“Card Shark, I need you to severely ventilate that trailer that’s in our lane of fire. The stenches are using it as a rally point, and we can’t see what’s going on over there. Over.”
“Roger, Cadillac. You want us to try and get rid of it or just bust it up a bit? Over.”
“Girl, if you can get rid of that thing, you’ll be my hero forever and ever!” Rawlings shouldered his rifle and resumed firing.
The pile of dead zombies was at least six deep, and those coming over the top were slowed by the mass of bodies. That made them easier to kill, but the bonus was offset by the fact that more zeds were all over the wall. Even though it had been reported to Rawlings that dozens of the dead had impaled themselves on the instruments buried in the berm, thousands more massed behind them, eagerly trampling their immobilized brethren into the dirt as they rushed to the wall. Despite the heavy volume of fire, the zombies pooled against the CONEX containers, the piles growing and growing as the stenches rallied. Soon, several of the piles loomed over the lips of the containers, and the dead spilled onto them. Gunfire erupted as the Rangers tried to hold them back. It was a lost cause. Many stenches jumped off the wall and into the camp, even though the act probably meant a case of broken legs more often than not.
Two Apaches established a hover behind Rawlings’s position. Several bombs slammed into the ground in a regular pattern outside the wall, and in the bright light of the explosions, Rawlings could see the silhouettes of thousands of rotting bodies. The trailer in the middle of the horde exploded as a single fast-moving Hellfire missile slammed into its top. In the blink of an eye, the trailer was more-or-less reduced to a smoldering frame, and its tires burned, bright rings of fire in the night.
More explosions rippled through the horde. The chainguns on the belly of both Apaches opened up, slinging thirty millimeter explosive projectiles into the mass of stenches. It was impressive to watch. The necromorphs basically disintegrated as the rounds walked through them, going down in droves. But many kept dragging themselves over the carpet of corpses even though they had been grievously injured. Even as he continued to fire, Rawlings was aware that the stenches had mass on their side. With the walls compromised, there was no way to hold them back with small arms alone. They would need something more effective.
“Alcatraz Three-One, Cadillac Six!”
The response came back immediately. “Cadillac, Alcatraz Three-One. Over.”
“I need a laser designation from one of the observation towers. Paint the horde coming in through the hole in the wall. We’ll need to drop some munitions inside the camp to break up their attack. Advised when in position. Over.”
“Roger, Cadillac. On it.”
“Hercules Operations, this is Cadillac Six. Over.”
“Cadillac Six, Hercules Ops. Go ahead. Over.”
“Hercules Ops, Cadillac Six. We need a few aircraft with laser-guided munitions on station soonest. We’ll need to bring some munitions into the camp. Advise when we have a platform available. Over.”
“Cadillac, Hercules. Hold one. Over.”
Rawlings spent the time burning through more ammunition, dropping zombies left and right. They were replenished so fast that he might as well have been shooting them with a paint gun. One of the Rangers dropped fresh magazines beside him, as well as several M15 white phosphorous grenades.
Rawlings ignored the rifle ammunition and grabbed the grenades. Even though they were mostly used for signaling purposes—the grenades gave off a good amount of smoke—they also had incendiary properties that could be useful, since their blast radius was approximately fifteen meters. He lobbed them into the approaching herd as fast as he could, one right after the other. When they exploded, the white phosphorous spread out over the ghouls, burning at almost five thousand degrees. Contact with the air made the element glow ghostly white in the night, and Rawlings could literally see the substance land on the zombies and burn right through them. Again, several went down, but it was only a drop in the ocean.
“Cadillac, this is Hercules Ops. We have one F-15 with laser-guided munitions. Where do you want it dropped? Over.”
“Hercules, can they speak to me directly? Over.”
“Roger, Cadillac. But they’ll need one of the Air Force guys to lase the target for you. Over.”
“Negative, Hercules. I have my own people preparing for that. Push the F-15 driver down to my frequency. Over.”
“Roger, Cadillac. F-15 is call sign Hustler. Stand by for him. Over.”
“Roger that, Hercules.”
“Cadillac, Alcatraz Three-One. Laser designator in position, what do you want us to sparkle? Over.”
“Stand by, Three One.”
“Cadillac, this is Hustler. Over.”
Rawlings had never been so happy to talk to an Air Force puke in his life. “Hustler, this is Cadillac Six. We need you to drop munitions inside our camp. Understand you have laser-guided munitions. I need to know what their blast radius is. Over.”
“Ah, Cadillac Six, Hustler. Roger, I’ve got twelve GBU-12s loaded with Mark 82 warheads. Look for a blast radius of around two thousand feet. Over.”
“Roger that, Hustler.” Rawlings paused to fire at more zombies. “How long to put one on target? Over.”
“Cadillac, I put one anywhere in the zone within forty seconds, but the camp is a no-fire zone. Over.”
“Alcatraz Three-One, Cadillac.”
“Cadillac, Alcatraz Three-One. Over.”
“Alcatraz Three-One, paint what’s left of that semi-trailer that’s inside the camp from your position. Let me know when it’s illuminated. Break. Hustler, Cadillac Six. You’re authorized to conduct the mission, I’m lifting the no-fire zone for you. Understood? Over.”
“Cadillac Six, Hustler. Your call. Over.”
“Cadillac, Three-One. Target is being lased. Over.”
“Hustler, Cadillac Six. Do you see a sparkle inside the camp, by the eastern wall? Should be the remains of a semi-truck trailer. Over.”
There was a long pause. “Cadillac, this is Hustler. Roger that. I see the laser, but it’s kind of close to the leading edge of troops. You sure you want it there? It’s going to ring some bells. Over.”
“Hustler, Cadillac. Drop it there. Advise when the weapon is on the way. Over.”
“Roger, Cadillac. Look for something in forty seconds. Over.”
“Card Sharks, Cadillac Six. You guys might want to drop back a bit. Break. Hercules Ops, we’ve got a five hundred pounder coming in, about three hundred meters west of the gap. That is inside the camp. I say again, that is inside the camp. Notify all commands. Over.” Rawlings stood up and cupped his hands around his mouth. “Air strike inbound, our position! Stand by to take cover!” He turned and repeated the warning in the other direction.
“Cadillac, this is Hustler. Delivery underway, expect it in fifteen seconds. Over.”
“Fifteen seconds!” Rawlings shouted. “Inbound in fifteen seconds! Stand ready to take cover!”
The troops kept firing. There wasn’t much time to get behind better cover, and there were no opportunities to protect themselves as long as the stenches kept rolling in. They would have to keep shooting until the very last second. Rawlings ignored his own order as well, and when he shouldered his HK and resumed shooting, the zeds were less than fifty feet from his fighting position.
The bomb went off.
The din was thunderous, and the shock wave sent zombies and troops alike flying through the air. Most of the zeds were torn apart by the blast, as they were exposed to the full brunt of its fury, whereas the soldiers and sailors were at least partially protected by their rev
etments.
Rawlings was thrown against the wall of sandbags behind him, and his breath left him in a rush. However, he managed to keep his grip on his rifle. He pushed himself to his feet and peered through the swirling dust. The semi-truck cab was on fire, burning bright and strong, and most of the floodlights were gone. A good-sized crater lay where the trailer had been, and surrounding that was a spreading ring of bodies and body parts. Around him, wounded men groaned, and for a long moment, nothing moved.
Then, a new surge of the dead flooded in through the gap in the wall.
“Here they come! Resume firing!” Rawlings shouted. “On your feet! Man your positions, and resume firing!”
The soldiers and sailors roused themselves and followed his instructions. Rawlings dragged a wounded Ranger away from the front line and passed him off to another group of Rangers. He was surprised to find that the hasty battlements that surrounded the cash were only a few dozen yards behind him. Had they really been pushed back over five hundred meters? He was shocked to discover that was indeed the case.
“You men, come forward and help with the wounded!” he shouted to the second echelon of troops behind him. Instead, they started firing past him.
“Sir, watch out!” one Ranger screamed.
Rawlings instinctively hunched as he spun around. The first line of troops—the ones he had just left to drag away the wounded soldier—was literally overrun by a wave of zombies, most of them fast movers. Some of the zeds had guns, and they fired back into the second line of troops.
Rawlings felt a bullet slam into his chest protector, driving him back a step. He shouldered his rifle and fired, but the horde was too close. Even though he took down five of the stenches in just as many seconds, and the Rangers behind him took down even greater numbers in the same amount of time, it was a losing proposition. When his magazine was emptied seconds later, he pulled the trigger on the forty-millimeter grenade launcher slung beneath his HK416’s barrel. The single high explosive round leaped out of the launcher, armed itself after flying eight feet, then slammed into the chest of a zed at nine feet. The grenade went off, exploding the zombie into tendrils of necrotic flesh. As its remains collapsed to the ground, the rest of the horde rolled right over it.
“Hercules, this is Cadillac. We’re overrun outside the cash.” As he spoke, he pulled his pistol and popped a .45 caliber round through one zombie’s head.
Before he could shoot again, the stenches piled on, taking him down in a flurry of teeth.
22
McDaniels heard Rawlings screaming over the radio as the stenches tore into him. The sound was horrifying, and as it dragged on, McDaniels had plenty of time to look around the operations center. Captain Chase, despite his size and usually unflappable demeanor, looked as though he was about to vomit. Other operations personnel were obviously horrified, and they sat frozen at their stations. The rest, the more battle-hardened vets like Switchblade, continued to press on, doing what they needed to do. But McDaniels knew everyone had the same thought running through their mind: Am I going to go out the same way?
Then, blessedly, something keyed off Rawlings’s microphone, but not before the thing moaned around what was probably a mouthful of raw, bloody meat.
“All right, people—let’s get out of here. Captain Chase, get an update on the situation at the western wall. If it’s reasonably secure, get the portable command and control radios out there and set up. Let’s make sure all of our video intel is being broadcast over encrypted wireless, so we can continue to use it on our laptops and tablets. Do we have any drones in the air?”
“Yes, sir, they’re run out of a topkick on the airfield,” Chase said. “They’re secure as long as the airfield is.”
“Well, it’s not going to be that way for very long.” McDaniels nodded to the monitors that displayed feeds from the wall cams. The stenches were starting to approach the western wall in greater numbers, and the fifty or so defenders that remained there were going at it full-time, as were the snipers in the observation towers.
McDaniels rose to his feet, motioning for the rest of the operations center staff to do the same. “We’re out of here. Let’s get those civilians on whatever helos are coming, then let’s fill up the MRAPs. We’re about to go on a road trip.”
***
The airfield was total chaos. Humvees, trucks, fuel tankers, and Special Forces on ATVs and dirt bikes moved everywhere. The last few helicopters were spooling up, getting ready to lift off. Walking across the airfield, McDaniels saw Regina Safire climbing into a helicopter. He didn’t think she had seen him, but before the soldier standing outside the aircraft closed the door, she stuck out her arm and waved. McDaniels waved back as he dragged Lenny along after him. He wished he had been able to give her a proper sendoff, but there just wasn’t enough time. If things worked out, perhaps they would meet again—if the zombie plague ever ended.
“Hey, Dad, watch the arm!” Lenny pulled against McDaniels’s grip, but McDaniels simply squeezed Lenny’s arm even harder as he hauled him across the converted parking lot.
“If you’d listened to me before, you wouldn’t have had to go through this. But now, you’re getting out of here, son.”
“I’m not leaving until you do, Dad!”
McDaniels caught the attention of one of the ground personnel handling the helicopters and waved toward the nearest chopper. The soldier received his meaning and walked to the idling.
McDaniels spun Lenny around so they were facing each other. “I’m going soon enough, but there’s a nuclear weapon headed this way, boy. Your mother might be able to lose one of us and survive, but both would kill her. Now get in that Goddamned helicopter!”
“Dad—”
McDaniels didn’t give the boy an opportunity to finish. He dragged him toward the helicopter, one of the Night Stalkers’s MH-6M Little Birds. There was an open space on one of the pods mounted to the side of the aircraft. McDaniels pushed Lenny onto it and strapped him in between two other civilians. The Night Stalker ground handler came over and double-checked everyone’s straps. He shot McDaniels a thumbs-up when he verified Lenny’s bindings, then grabbed the Mossberg shotgun Lenny still carried. He pointed it downward between Lenny’s feet and gave him a thumbs-up, then pointed at the spinning rotor disk overhead and shook his head. Don’t shoot the rotors. Lenny nodded. The ground handler stepped away from the aircraft and signaled the pilot.
McDaniels wished he had time to say something to Lenny, something profound or fatherly, but the chopper had to get out while it still could.
The Little Bird’s rotors sped as the pilot rolled on the power. Lenny shouted something. McDaniels couldn’t make out the words, but he could read lips enough to know Lenny was yelling I love you.
Before McDaniels could respond in kind, the Little Bird climbed into the dark sky, where distant stars and the nearer anti-collision lights of dozens of attack aircraft gleamed.
***
“Okay, we’re done here.” Captain Berry stepped back from the road roller. He switched off the welder and passed it to one of the other engineers. He climbed into the Caterpillar vehicle’s reinforced cab and slammed the steel plank-reinforced door shut. “Try and pull off the planks!” he yelled from inside the metal and glass enclosure.
The soldiers tried, but were unable to remove the planks or open the door. Nor could they reach through the holes in the planks to get at the glass. Berry opened the door and stepped out of the machine.
“About as secure as we can make it, Sergeant Major,” he said to Gartrell, who stood nearby. “We should get started on the other one.”
“Don’t worry about it, sir. This one’s good enough,” Gartrell replied.
“We’ve got two of them. We might as well use both.” Berry pointed to the second olive-drab road roller that stood thirty feet away.
“We don’t have the time, Captain.” Gartrell nodded toward the far side of the airfield, where the MRAPs were coming to life. As the last helicopter c
leared the airfield—the Army UH-60, stuffed to the gills with civilians—the MRAPs rolled across the area in a single line. Troops started herding the remaining civilians inside them, while other soldiers climbed onto the vehicles. The vehicles equipped with cupola-mounted weapons were spaced equally throughout the convoy, at the front, center, and rear.
“So they’re moving the MRAPs and loading up passengers,” Berry said, generally unimpressed. “Big deal. We can still get the—”
Gunfire broke out on the far side of the airfield. Gartrell saw several necromorphs go down on the pavement as they shambled toward the bright lights from the deep shadow surrounding the abandoned civilian tent farm.
“Tell you what, Captain. Why don’t you get aboard that roller and position it by the gate?” Gartrell pointed to the area of the wall he was talking about. “Be ready to go as soon as it opens, because chances are good there’s not going to be a hell of a lot of time to start rolling before zed comes through in enough numbers to screw things up.”
“Hey, hold on now.” Berry looked back at Gartrell. “If I’m the one who’s going to be driving this thing, I have some things I want to know first.”
“Such as, sir?”
“These things are meant for level roads, not varied terrain. If nothing else, they were never designed for rolling through a bomb crater. In other words, what happens if I get stuck out there?”
“We’ll have to adapt and improvise,” Gartrell said.
“Sarmajor, that’s just not good enough,” Berry said. “I have a wife and kids in Oakland, and I want to get back to see them.”
“And we’ll do the best we can, Captain. If you get stuck out there, you’ll have a buttload of Rangers, Special Forces, SEALs, and close air support only moments away. All you have to do is not open your doors until we get there and take control of the situation.”
The Rising Horde, Volume Two (Sequel to The Gathering Dead ) Page 24
