Purge of Babylon (Book 5): The Ashes of Pompeii

by Sisavath, Sam

  Better safe than sorry, I guess. Seems to be the island’s other motto, right after ‘just in case.’

  He slipped the night-vision goggles back on and moved closer toward the tree line until he was less than a yard away. In his dark clothes, he would be completely invisible (or pretty damn close) even if the men on the approaching boats had their own night-vision gear. Which, of course, they did. He remembered seeing them when they were prepping a few days ago back at the staging area. Even so, the tree line would provide him plenty of cover. That was his one and only advantage when the soldiers stormed the beach.

  Should have left when you had the chance, pal. Live and learn.

  Finally, after what seemed like forever, the sound of the first boat motor reached him. It had taken them a while because they weren’t moving very fast. He guessed the fact that the island was pitch dark was the reason for their cautious approach. That, or they were dragging it out, dreading what awaited them. So maybe they were smarter than he gave them credit for.

  A click in his right ear, followed by Danny’s voice. “Hey, Keo.”

  “Yeah,” Keo said. He didn’t bother whispering. There was no point. The enemy was still too far away and the closest person to him was Danny, further down the beach.

  “Carly tells me you’re on your way to see a girl in Texas.”

  “Uh huh.”

  “How’s that going?”

  “About as well as you and this island.”

  Danny chuckled. “That good, huh?”

  “Yup.”

  The boats had begun to spread out, which signaled they intended to hit the entire length of the beach at the same time instead of concentrating their forces into one spot. Too bad, because he would have loved to see what ten boats landing a few yards apart would have looked like, especially while he, Danny, and Gaby were pouring as much lead as they could manage at them.

  “You’re all right, for a merc,” Danny was saying.

  “You’re not bad, for a soldier.”

  “You don’t like soldiers?”

  “Never had much use for them.”

  “Oh, I don’t believe that. I bet it goes deeper. Parental involvement, perhaps?”

  Keo grinned. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, grunt.”

  “Heh heh, I knew it. What’s the matter, the old man rode you too hard?”

  “Something like that.”

  “You should have rode him back. Old people hate it when you ride ’em like a horsey.”

  “Yeah, I should have thought of that.”

  Watching the boats moving against the phosphorous green of his night vision was a surreal experience. The way the spotlights were bouncing up and down as the vessels picked up speed (and the rumble of motors gaining in intensity as a result) made him think of a legion of BMX bikers doing stunts as they charged.

  “You wanna hear a joke?” Danny was asking.

  “No,” Keo said.

  “So this couple are out on a date and the guy realizes he’s out of condoms. He decides to make a pit stop at a grocery store and runs inside…”

  “Hey, Danny,” Gaby said.

  “What’s up, kid?”

  “I’ll give you a buck if you shut up.”

  “Tough beach,” Danny said.

  *

  Party boats, Keo thought when the first vessel emerged out of the black canvas like some demon from the pits of hell.

  It was white and long, with red-hot rod flames along the sides, and flat. The driver sat in the middle, guiding the steering wheel while two men crouched at the stern and two more manned the bow. They were wearing battle gear, complete with ballistic Kevlar helmets and knee and elbow pads. Keo could almost see their faces constricted into tight grimaces as they held onto the speeding boat as it burst out of the water. Like him, they were all wearing night-vision goggles, the long lens bobbing up and down like extra appendages.

  Hot rod was the first boat to hit the beach fifty meters in front of him, its sharp front hull digging a trench as it was driven forward by a roaring motor. The driver was battling with the steering wheel, looking almost spastic, while the passengers hung on to keep from being thrown off by the erratic vessel. When they were closer, he saw that the two up front were actually attached to the boat by coiled cables clipped to their belts. Flurries of sand arced through the air as the propellers came into contact with the beach.

  Still on one knee, Keo lifted the M4 and switched on the laser pointer underneath the barrel. A red beam pierced the darkness, clearly visible through the green of his NVG. Keo stood up and focused on the boat that had made landfall first; it just happened to be directly in front of him. He watched the two on the bow struggling furiously to free themselves from the cables. One of them finally got himself unattached and was standing up when Keo settled the half-inch red dot on the man’s chest and put two rounds into him. Despite being unsuppressed, unlike his MP5SD, both shots were barely audible against the raging storm of ten boat motors roaring in his ears at the same time.

  The dead man slumped off the boat and his partner, seeing his comrade go down, decided to give up trying to manually detach himself and began ramming the butt of his rifle into the hook that held him hostage.

  Losing your cool during the heat of battle is a good way to die, pal.

  Keo shot him in the right thigh, then squeezed off two more rounds even as the man was going down. He was pretty sure he hit the guy at least one more time. Fifty meters should have been a difficult shot for him, even with the long-range ability of a rifle, but the red laser dot made it a cheat. Not that he spent more than a nanosecond giving a damn.

  The two on the stern had already decoupled themselves and were hopping off the boat, even as more vessels shot out of the water and made landfall to the left and right of them. More sand arced into the air, and the roar of the motors became deafening.

  Meanwhile, the driver of the hot rod had ducked his head behind the steering wheel, and the only thing Keo could make out from him was the twin protruding lens of his NVG over the console. Keo ignored the hidden man and turned his attention to the two running up the beach, one of them struggling to maintain control of his rifle while the other had lost his night vision along the way.

  They weren’t the only two trudging their way forward, their heavy boots and equipment causing them to sink into the soft beach, further slowing them down. They should have considered that when they were gearing up for the attack. He thought of something the British used to say called the 7 Ps: Proper Planning and Preparation Prevents Piss Poor Performance.

  More boats were landing one by one now, hitting the long stretch of sand many meters apart. He wondered if that was part of the plan or a byproduct of the drivers trying not to crash into each other in the darkness.

  As soon as he fired his first shot, Danny and Gaby immediately joined in, pouring bullets into the surging mass of black-clad bodies trying to jump off their vessels up and down the beach. The pop-pop-pop of automatic gunfire clashed with the continuous whirl of machinery, creating an odd melody that was painfully out of tune.

  They had plenty of targets to choose from. Too many, in fact. The surging men looked like ants trudging and falling and stumbling as they attempted to flee from the open. They might not have any combat experience, but he couldn’t fault their tactical awareness. They knew just enough to understand that standing on the beach right now was a death sentence. Most of them hadn’t even returned fire, probably because they had no idea where he or Danny and Gaby were.

  Keo flicked the fire selector on his M4 to full-auto and emptied the remaining magazine into the group of black-clad figures directly in front of him. They were already angling left toward the opening in the woods that led to the hotel grounds. Most of the soldiers were irresistibly drawn to it like moths to the flame, while only a few stayed behind to use the beached boats as cover and to return fire into the woods.

  He didn’t know how many had already fallen, and he didn’t bother counting
. He just knew that men were going down as he oscillated his fire from left to right, shearing the leaves and branches that had kept him hidden until now. The smell of burning foliage filled his nostrils and Keo was still smelling it as he emptied his weapon.

  He hustled to his right, ejecting the magazine and slamming in a new one as he went.

  A group of charging men was returning fire. They didn’t know where he was exactly inside the tree line, but even an idiot could tell his general vicinity after his last barrage. And that was where they were concentrating their fire now. Fortunately he wasn’t there anymore, and was still moving right, continuing to use the woods to his advantage.

  He took a step closer toward the beach, stopping only when he could see out again, and went down on one knee, ignoring the zip-zip-zip of bullets slamming into the section of the woods where he had been just seconds ago. He was now a good twenty meters from his last position and the soldiers were still stuck in no-man’s land. The group of battle-dressed figures that had unleashed on him was reloading, while others continued running toward the passageway.

  Fallen black-clad bodies zig-zagged the length of the beach, stretching from the parked boats to the trees. That was a sign Danny and Gaby were doing their part. Not that he expected any less from the soldier, though the girl continued to be a revelation. The pop-pop-pop of automatic gunfire continued back and forth, still smashing against the roar of motors that had been left unattended as their drivers darted for safety.

  The group that had returned fire on his last position had just finished reloading when Keo stepped outside of the trees and onto the beach, opening up on them. He felt the sand sinking under his boots as he pulled the trigger. He was so close to them that he didn’t even need to use the red dot this time; he just kept the trigger depressed until all four men had fallen down and stopped moving.

  Keo quickly searched for more targets, but there were none to be found. The rest had already made it into the opening at the center of the beach and were on their way to the hotel grounds right this moment.

  How many had gotten through? He couldn’t tell. If there were at least four per boat (five in some), that meant over forty soldiers, easily. And he was pretty damn sure he didn’t see forty-plus bodies lying on the beach at the moment.

  He tossed the carbine, then unslung the MP5SD. The familiar feel of the submachine gun immediately reassured him, and Keo took hurried steps back into the tree line where he wouldn’t be exposed. He hadn’t gotten completely back inside cover when he heard the hellacious explosion of gunfire coming from the cobblestone pathway to his right.

  It seemed to go on forever, and Keo found himself standing still and listening, wondering how many were dead or dying. That would depend on how many had managed to survive the beach.

  Ten? Twenty?

  A lot.

  He looked back at the bodies lying under the moonlight. Too many to count. Some were his, some were Danny’s, some were Gaby’s. It wasn’t anything he hadn’t seen before. Soldiers died—often. Even weekend warriors. And these poor bastards were only shot with small-arms fire. It beat having an arm or leg amputated by a large-caliber round from close range. He’d seen plenty of that, too.

  You pick up a gun, this is what happens. Sooner or later, someone has a bigger gun, or has a better fighting position. Either way, live by the gun, die by the gun.

  One of these days, that same thing would happen to him. Keo was fully prepared for it. He had been ready, even before the world ended. Surviving when so many had perished that first night had been a miraculous event. It was akin to making it through the Rapture. He was pretty sure someone, somewhere, had screwed up.

  Keo looked back at the beach, past the unmoving figures and at the boats. Almost all of the motors had shut down except for a couple still running, still sending streams of sand and water into the air behind them.

  He could take one of those boats and leave right now, take his chances back at the channel…again. (Second time’s the charm, right?) Would the sniper still be there? What about the men in the Jeep? Or was everybody already here, storming the beach? It made sense for the collaborators to throw everyone at them at the same time. That’s what he would have done—

  BOOM!

  The island shook under his boots and continued for at least two full seconds before settling again.

  An explosion. Not a big one, judging by the short duration of the aftershock, but big enough for him to hear it over the continued churning of the few remaining motors on the beach.

  Keo looked back into the woods, toward the northwest part of the island. He knew the sound (and feel) of an explosive device going off when he heard one, even from a distance.

  “What was that?” a voice gasped in his right ear. Lara. “Anyone know what that was or where it came from? Someone answer me!”

  No one answered for the longest time. Or maybe it just seemed like a long time. It could have been only a few seconds.

  Keo looked back at the boats again. Nine of the vessels had gone silent, leaving a lone one to continue spinning sand into the air. It was a nice white bass fishing boat, just big enough to take him wherever he wanted to go.

  So what was he waiting for?

  He sighed, turned around, and waded through a sea of black and green and shadows, dodging trees and pushing his way north as fast as he could. He was carrying a noticeably lighter load now without the M4 and most of its ammo. The MP5SD was gripped tightly in front of him, and he used it to bat at branches in his path.

  “The shack!” Carly finally shouted through the radio. “It’s the shack!”

  “Shack?” someone else said. Male. It sounded like Nate, but it was hard to tell because his heart was beating too hard against his chest. “What shack?”

  “The one at the power station!” Carly shouted. “It’s open! Lara, the shack’s open!”

  CHAPTER 19

  JOSH

  “It’s dark; I think they turned off the lights,” Travis said, his voice partially obscured by the harsh sound of wind rushing against him. “I can’t see shit.”

  “It’s an island,” Josh said, his own voice slightly muffled by the gas mask over his face. “It’s not going to start moving now. Just keep going straight and you’ll run into it eventually. Besides, that’s why I ordered everyone to pack night-vision goggles.”

  “Have you ever assaulted an island with night vision?”

  “Just get the job done,” Josh said, slightly irritated.

  Travis might have laughed at the other end of the radio. Or snickered. It was a little difficult to tell, because sounds echoed inside the close confines of the tunnel.

  “This is a stupid plan,” Travis said.

  That’s your part of the plan, but it’s not the plan.

  “Keep going,” he said. “We’re taking Song Island tonight—” even if I have to sacrifice you to do it “—because that’s what she wants.”

  That did it. Just mentioning her was enough to shut Travis up.

  Next to him, Sonia shifted her legs again, the soft plopping sound of her boots moving against the puddles of water that had settled and still continued to drip-drip-drip lazily from the ceiling above them. It wasn’t nearly as bad as when they were moving through the length of the tunnel about an hour ago. He was glad he was wearing combat boots because there was no telling what types of infestation had taken root inside the concrete structure ever since Will and the others sealed it up months ago. Or thought they had, anyway.

  The gas mask he was wearing helped, the breathing apparatus filtering out all the suffocating stink of the long tube that connected the shoreline with Song Island, eventually opening up onto a large shack next to the power station.

  Josh glanced down at his watch and was glad it had glow-in-the-dark hands. Travis and the boats had just started off from the marina a few minutes ago. It would take them a while moving at their current speed to reach their destination. Making them take off from the familiar marina was on purpose; Josh
wanted the island to see them coming, to draw all their attention.

  “How long?” Sonia called up the stairs.

  “Five minutes!” a voice shouted back down at them.

  Josh could see and feel the staccato glow of the cutting torches working their way against the steel shack door above the stairs right now. At one point, the people responsible for constructing Song Island had used the tunnel to bring supplies over from the mainland, transporting them by trucks to this cavernous room that looked like some kind of tomb at the moment, even with strategically placed LED portable lamps to light their way. The door was going to be a tight fit, and he would have preferred to use the wider cargo elevators, but those weren’t going to work without any power available down here. No, it would have to be the stairs and the shack.

  He spent the next few minutes glancing at the gas-masked faces standing, sitting, or leaning against the thick walls around him. Thirty. That was how many heavily armed soldiers in battle gear he had brought with him through the tunnel, unnoticed by whoever was in the Tower at the time.

  It hadn’t been easy, but once darkness fell and the island, predictably, went into action to get ready for the impending attack on the beach, Josh’s people were able to sneak over to the tunnel entrance and remove just enough of the rubble to gain entry. Under the cover of night, and wearing all-black while carrying nothing that would give them away against the blackness, they had made the almost mile-long walk from their vehicles to the tunnel entrance. Josh had been counting on whoever was in the Tower tonight being accustomed to movement on land by Kate’s creatures as soon as darkness fell. Removing the debris took time, but he had plenty of men to make short work of the necessary labor.

  After that, it was a matter of jogging through the tunnel that extended under Beaufont Lake like an unused limb. The thought of moving under the large body of water had been unnerving at first, but that was just the side effect of having once “died” out here. It had been one of his worst experiences, and the idea of being trapped down here was almost paralyzing. But all he had to do was remind himself that the others were watching him, waiting for signs of weakness, and he was able to power through.