Zombie Theorem (Book 4): Aces Mortis

by James Wallace

As they entered the outskirts of Los Angeles, they stopped at a Mercedes dealership, hiding the bus inside the maintenance garage after clearing out the three, dead mechanics they found haunting the bays. Dio and Hootie fortified the large garage roll up doors and blocked them with half running cars. That evening they sat as a team going through their options and studying the map they found in the department manager’s office.

  Chun stood and stretched, gathering his thoughts over the arguments that were raging around him. The team was starting to show frayed ends and tears, this was the ultimate test to their bonds. They were so far out of usual that they had no idea where to go from here or how to govern themselves. Chun had to find a way to get his men under control again and work as a team with a clear mission and objective they could all rally behind.

  Chun was saved by Butch again as he stood and knocked over a wrench onto the concrete, shocking everyone to silence from the loud sound. Butch stood there, feet planted to the ground and his massive arms folded across his barrel chest. “I am sick and tired of this shit, men. You are all tier one operators in this nation’s greatest special forces team to exist since Richard Marcinko first created we Seals. We are not fucking swabbies nor are we John fucking Q public. Now shut the fuck up and pay attention to our Lt or I will rip each one of you a new fucking orifice and shit down it,” he dared each man to argue or retort, his eyes narrowed and a hard look etched itself on his face.

  The men fell silent and turned as one to Chun. “Thank you, Master Chief. Men, we need to get our house in order. We have many options and I will ask for your opinions on them in a minute. Until then, pay attention and take notes,” he motioned to the map he had attached to a cardboard advertising stand up he had found in the showroom. “We have a plethora of military bases surrounding us that we could roll up to and join in on the fight. We have Marine bases, Air Pukes, and an Army base nearby that I am sure would love to have a group of hard men able to bring death down upon any target. But I still believe we should head to San Diego and check on our Seal brothers and see if they are still in on this fight. Suggestions? Bitching? Now is your time to speak up,” Chun looked over to Butch to see if he still had his support. The Master Chief looked to be chiseled from granite, standing there assured of himself. He gave Chun a sideways look and nodded his head slightly.

  The team sat quietly for a moment. Then as always, the clown of the group, Hootie, spoke up first. “Lt, you forgot one option,” he had a stupid grin on his face.

  Chun looked to the map and went over his plans one more time in his head. “What option is that, Hootie?” He asked.

  “We could set up our own fiefdom and rule over Southern California!” As he finished, Dio reached over and smacked him in the back of the head. Hashkeh gave him a look that could kill most men.

  Butch walked over and reached down, grasping Hootie by his combat vest and lifted him straight to his feet and marched him to the center of the group. “Anyone want to vote for dickless’ idea?” The team hissed and booed, knocking Hootie’s idea to the ground to die a cold, lonely death. “Go sit the fuck down boy, before I let Hashkeh skin you alive and serve you for dinner,” Butch growled.

  Hootie wiped the smile from his face and grew serious for a moment. “Honestly Lt,” he turned to survey Chun. “I vote we head to find our Seal brothers and decide where to go from there,” Butch patted his back and then rubbed his close-cropped buzzed head of hair.

  “Finally, the clown speaks something worthy of our attention. I agree with him Lt, let’s go find our brothers,” Butch spoke.

  Chun met each man’s eye and in turn they nodded their head in agreement. “We have been out of touch for just over a week and it looks like all civilization has gone to hell. Tomorrow morning, we will head out. Get a good night’s sleep, men.”

  “Hey Lt, I have an idea,” Pico spoke up and waited for Chun to motion him to continue before speaking. “That bus is a piece of shit and is a giant bullseye. I say we ransack the manager’s office and find the keys to those two G-Wagen SUVs sitting out front. They are some bad ass four by fours, fast, and tough. We can split the team and work together. If given some time tonight, I might be able to add some gun ports on them if you want,” he waited as Chun looked to Butch and came to a decision.

  “You and Dio go find the keys and bring them in here. We can do some modifications and go with your plan,” he turned his back on the team and went back to studying the map in front of them.

  Butch looked over the team and shook his head. “You heard the fucking Lt, get your asses moving!” he growled using his best command voice.

  The men leapt to their feet and scattered, working again as a well-oiled machine. Butch smiled at their retreating backsides, this is what he knew they all needed, a concise plan and tasks to do more than just surviving day to day. Butch busied himself, clearing out two bays and pulling hand tools and welding equipment to the tables, bordering them. He heard the roll up door on the west side of the bay go up and then two distinct motors as the two G-Wagons rolled to their open bays. The door closed and was reinforced again. The SUVs looked like enclosed jeeps with narrow bodies, but with a good amount of ground clearance and equipped with steel push bars attached to the front grills. Lupo and Dio huddled together going over their approaches to the modifications and assigning duties to the rest of the team.

  Hours went by as the men went to work, busying themselves with cutting holes in the doors, allowing the barrels of their weapons to pop out and fire. Hootie had a great idea to reinforce the front end of the vehicles adding rolled steel to the hood and up the windshields. This way, they didn’t need to worry about the dead breaking through and getting to the driver. It also reinforced the front end and allowed them to push some obstacles from their path. They installed electronic winches to the front and rear of the vehicles and wired in extra batteries for juice. When they were done, the vehicles looked nothing like they did when they rolled into the garage. Hashkeh put the final touch on them by painting their unit patch on the doors. A tattered playing card, an ace with a black spade and white skull in the middle with the words Aces Mortis. Hashkeh added Tacent Messores. Or for you who do not speak Latin, Aces of Death, Silent Reapers. The name given to them by Kevin Um, Butch’s old sea daddy.

  Chun looked over the work and smiled broadly at the attention and work his men showed. “Alright men, good work now rack out. Tomorrow is going to be a bitch.” If Chun knew how right he was going to be he may have just had the men turn North and leave San Diego far behind.

  The next morning, the sun started to break, chasing the shadows and cold of night away. The men of Aces, divided into teams, with Chun in the lead vehicle and Butch in the rear. They divided their measly supplies and ammo into each vehicle and prepared to move out. Hootie drew the short straw and hopped from Chun’s vehicle to open the big roll up doors, allowing the SUVs to exit the garage. He pulled on the chains, raising the door and stopped when something shot out from under the door. He stepped back, raising his 1911 and crouched down to look under the door. What he saw froze his blood, he let loose a blue stream of curse words under his breath and turned back to the vehicles. He gave them the ‘enemy seen’ hand motions and turned back to the chain. He slid his gun into his chest rig and grabbed the chain up high, he counted to three in his head and pulled on the chain as fast as his hands would move. The door sprung up revealing the small horde of dead that had gathered due to the noise from the vehicle modifications the night before. Pico appeared beside him, M-4 raised to his shoulder.

  “I got this covered move to the vehicles.”

  Hootie drew his 1911 again and fired into the closest head to him and then sprinted for his SUV. He dove into the back seat and slammed his door closed as Chun gunned the engine, guiding the heavy SUV into the crowd of dead in his way.

  Pico continued to fire into the horde dropping them with one shot each. As he was turning to jump into the next SUV he felt intense pain rip into his neck. He dropped the M-4 o
nto its sling and reached back pulling the offending blood covered zombie free and threw it to the ground, before pulling his 1911 sidearm and putting the zombie out of its misery. He knew he was dead and would not put his brothers in danger, he whispered: “I will see you soon Charlotte.” He sketched a salute to Hashkeh and put the 1911 under his chin and promptly pulled the trigger, blowing out his brain through the top of his skull. His body fell to the ground as his brothers screamed out in terror.

  Hashkeh, driving the second SUV, gunned his engine making sure to stay close to Chun’s rear bumper. They tore out of the dealership and roared down the road like Hell itself was on their asses. It was then Butch called over his radio to Chun.

  “We lost Pico Lt. The fucker was bit and took himself out,” he reported.

  “God, Damn it! We have never lost a man on our missions and now within days we have lost two!” Chun answered back spitting with anger.

  “Another web-footed Seal stands at the gates of Heaven guarding her from the demons of Hell,” Hashkeh spoke.

  They traveled for five miles at insane speeds until they left the outskirts of the city behind. They tried to stay on roads but when that was not possible they would go off road crashing through wooden fences and cutting through chain link or barb wired fences. Their main goal was trying to keep as close to possible a straight line to their objective. Once or twice they had to stop and reorient their position. Hootie kept saying they should turn on the GPS but as Chun kept pointing out, they were not taking main roads and trying to stay away from populated areas. The day passed quickly, each man dealing with the deaths of their brothers Blakk and Pico in their own way. They found themselves parked between two small hills, allowing them to maximize their force protection to its limits as the sun started to set on the long day. The one thing they were starting to lack was fuel, the SUVs were thirsty girls, draining their tanks fast and demanding more. They had just emptied the last of their reserve tanks into the SUVs and were just now discussing where to acquire more.

  “I am going to send Hashkeh and Lupo out to search for farms and cars and find us some more fuel. What do you think, Lt?” Butch asked.

  “Good idea Master Chief, send them out with instructions to not fail and to get their asses home by daylight or they can walk to San Diego,” Chun ordered.

  “No problem, Lt,” grumbled Hashkeh as he materialized from a nearby shadow, surprising the two men. “I don’t fancy a walk through this valley and into San Diego without my brothers,” he said, all seriousness on his face.

  Chun hitched his thumb over his shoulder, “You have your orders, Petty Officer, get moving.”

  Lupo came around the vehicle carrying two five-gallon gas reserve tanks and two more strapped to his pack. Hashkeh motioned to the setting sun and they took off at a jog. Disappearing fast into the encroaching darkness.

  “Chief, get Dio and Hootie to look over the vehicles and get any maintenance done, and order Rascal to go over the inventory again and break out something to eat,” Chun ordered.

  “We have plenty of candy and junk food from the vending machines back at the dealership and plenty of treated water. I am a little worried we need to find real food, our bodies are not used to consuming this shit,” Butch offered.

  “Roger that Chief, I had the trots from last night’s chocolate heavy dinner. Why don’t you and I range up and recon our little area and look for something to eat?”

  Butch gave him a thumbs up and moved out to relay Chun’s orders. He came back in a couple of minutes carrying one of the big canvas duffel bags from the gun shop. “Figured if we found anything we could carry it back in this. I might be a little hopeful, but better to have and not need than to need and not have,” they walked away into the hills and slowly made their way around the area.

  Hashkeh kept up a quick pace but noticed Lupo was falling behind with his heavy awkward load. They stopped to rest and Hashkeh took over the burdens, and then continued. They came upon a road and paralleled it, watching for traffic or the dead. They watched as a couple of trucks went by, but kept their anonymity, not wanting to take on the public or stretch their supplies to help others right now. They finally came to what seemed a small camp with a giant bonfire and an assortment of cars, trucks and heavy vehicles scattered about. They laid in the grass and watched the camp, observing and taking notes. They counted fifteen men, dressed in hunting gear or biker’s leather and watched as they drank mass amounts of what had to be beer and passed around smokes. A couple of the men would disappear into a nearby tent and female screams would then ring out. Hashkeh figured he knew what was happening and was not very happy. He was proven right when a truck pulled up and a group of young ladies were dragged from the bed and tied up then escorted to nearby tents.

  They pulled back a little deeper to speak without fear of being heard. “Hashkeh, we both know what is going on in there, but we were ordered to get supplies and hurry back, not play cops.”

  Hashkeh was emotionless as he sat there fingering the small axe Butch acquired for him from the gun shop. “Call in the situation. I am going to recon them and then we can work out a plan and take the trash out,” he disappeared into the shadows before Lupo could say anything in return.

  “Dammit Hashkeh.” He mumbled under his breath but followed his orders. He called out on the radio. “Master Chief, Lupo. Over.”

  A minute went by and Lupo was starting to think the radios weren’t working when he heard Butch’s voice come through his headset. “Lupo, Chief, I read you five by five. Go for report. Over.”

  “Hashkeh and I found something you are going to want to see. We found a camp of assholes, fifteen to be exact who are raping and beating women. Hashkeh is ranging out and running recon. He is requesting back up. Over.”

  “Shit! Okay give me your posit, and hold your ground until we get there. Over.”

  Lupo gave him their position and signed off. He crept a little closer and pulled his rifle forward and his eyes moving from target to target, assigning names to each man and woman he saw. One guy was dressed in overalls, bald and had a giant beer gut. Lupo assigned him the name Bubba and made note to watch him since he seemed to be the one giving out orders. Twenty minutes crawled by as another truck carrying six armed men and what looked like a couple of children arrived. The men laughed and busied themselves roping up the kids. Lupo’s blood was boiling, and he was ready to start taking men out if it hadn’t been for his training that is exactly what he would’ve done. But he breathed in and noted the arrival and updated his little notebook. Hashkeh crawled up next to him and they spoke quietly updating each other with what they found. A rustling sound came from behind the two men and they turned as one finding Chun and Butch belly crawling up to them.

  “Lt, these bastards have women, and now children as slaves. I am afraid of what their intentions are. They have been drinking beer and just now switched to hard liquor. I was able to get close enough to see that they are consuming mass amounts of meth,” Hashkeh updated them on the count of the men and shared Lupo’s notebook and information. Chun and Butch took turns scoping the encampment and coming to the same conclusion as Lupo and Hashkeh.

  “Okay, this is how we are going to play this. One man each point of the camp, we will snipe the most dangerous and as many men as we can before moving in to finish them off. But we cannot take the time to take in these people, we will have to be content with freeing the captives then getting our fuel and moving on,” he assigned positions and gave them ten minutes to get there.

  They broke up and Lupo was assigned the spot he was already in since he was familiar with it. Ten minutes passed and the radio clicked open and closed announcing that Hashkeh, Butch, and Chun had arrived at their positions and were ready to go. Another minute passed eerily. Lupo was assigned to take the first shot. He scanned the camp before finding the one he designated Bubba and placed his sights just to the right of the heart. The man raised a bottle of something to his lips when Lupo let out half a breath and then
squeezed his trigger, letting it surprise him. The bullet zipped across the small distance in a hurry and punched a small hole into Bubba’s exposed chest, breaking two ribs and tumbling through the man’s lung, collapsing it and exploding out his back, leaving a much bigger hole then the entry. The man stayed standing for a moment, bottle still tipped up, the liquor pouring down his face and covering his raised arm and chest. As if in slow motion, his hand released the now empty bottle as it fell to the ground and bounced off the soft dirt. Bubba’s legs let go next, as his knees collapsed and his big fat body fell face forward, cracking his jaw on the bottle and leaving his body in a jumble on the ground.

  Three more quick shots exploded from the darkness and found their targets, destroying bodies and taking men’s lives. Lupo quickly found his next target and fired, he waited for a breath to make sure the body fell before moving to the next target. In three quick minutes, only four men stood alive in the camp. Lupo was assigned to stay on his rifle as the rest moved in to deal with the leftover men. Lupo watched as the big Navajo appeared in the camp, he grabbed a man by the hair, yanked his head back, and buried his axe into the man’s chest. He used the axe as a handle and dragged the man into the shadows. Chun was next, he came from behind a tent and spun his sword through the air and sliced an unfortunate man’s throat open, nearly decapitating his head off his neck. He swung two more quick times separating the man’s hands from his wrists and then disappeared into the nearby tent. A moment later he was pulling a small naked man out by his long hair. Chun’s face was a mask of violence and hate, he forced the man to his knees and then twirled fast, raising his foot at the last second, connecting with the man’s head. The crack of the neck could be heard all the way to where Lupo sat.

  Lupo moved his rifle around until he found two more men standing together back to back, large handguns raised. Butch came out of nowhere, his 1911 in his hand. He yelled to the men but they turned quickly bringing their muzzles to bare on him. Butch though, fired four quick shots, striking the men in the chests and heads, before they could aim. Their bodies fell to the ground together, coming to a rest in sitting positions each body holding the other up. Lupo was amazed at the speed and well-aimed shots from his Master Chief.