H7N9: The Complete Series [Books 1-3]

by Campbell, Mark

  Tear gas canisters and smoke bombs were lobbed over his head and landed amongst the unruly populace. Dense, white fog inundated the area and sent many running off for fresh air. Others covered their face with rags and t-shirts as they staggered around aimlessly in the haze, throwing their projectiles wildly and blindly.

  Teddy tucked his nose in the crook of his arm and ran through the smoke. His eyes teared up and his lungs burned, but he dared not stop.

  People stumbled around inside the milky haze, wheezing and coughing.

  Teddy jostled through the dancing silhouettes and pushed his way through until he was out of the smoke and on the other side. His vison was still blurry and his breaths felt labored, but the fresh air helped ease his symptoms.

  He stopped in front of the gallows to catch his breath.

  The crowd that was gathered earlier had dispersed deeper into the camp, but the mangled corpses of Sgt. Mayville and his officers lay left behind, strewn in the snow.

  Teddy wiped his irritated eyes with his coat sleeve and looked up at the administrative building that was only barely visible through the smoky air. “So close, yet so far,” he mumbled to himself.

  With the dust-up between the riot squad and the civilians intensifying, he knew there was no way he’d be able to waltz inconspicuously between the two groups and take the main road up to the building—he knew he’d have to find another way.

  Teddy glanced down the footpath that led back to his dorm, and saw that a growing group of civilians were busy smashing in random dormitory doors with a large piece of lumber from the wreckage of the gallows while their peers egged them on like deranged cheerleaders. Lawlessness had an intoxicating allure on a population that had been reduced to little more than an unskilled labor force.

  Two husky men brought an orderly out from one of the dorms and threw him on the pathway outside. Within moments the crowd went to work on him with homicidal glee. Collaborating scum they screamed as they stomped the life out of him.

  Disgusted, Teddy looked away and went back to searching for a way to get back in the building where Ein was being held. Just when he was about to give up, he happened on a narrow alleyway just past the gallows.

  His expression brightened; he had gone down that path weeks before on his search for Ein. The alley led between two warehouses and let out into a lot near the turnstiles of the motor pool area where the busses gathered for work call.

  It would be a straight shot to the administration building.

  Just as he started to hurry towards the alley, gunshots rang out.

  Teddy stopped, ducked down, and covered his head, but the shots weren’t directed at him—people in the mob were firing at the riot troops.

  A frantic voice came over the radio in his pocket: Foxtrot to Jayhawk Control! Civs are using firearms!

  A calmer voice responded: Jayhawk Control to all units, use of lethal force is authorized. Fire at will.

  The response was immediate and deafening as the riot troops started firing their automatic rifles into the crowd.

  People screamed and fell back as they dropped their clubs and rocks and toppled over each other as they retreated.

  The troops pressed forward and shot at anything that moved.

  Some of the protestors were armed with either small-caliber handguns or ill-gotten rifles retrieved from slain officers and tried to hold them off, but they were easily singled out and picked off.

  Teddy sprinted across the courtyard and took cover behind the wreckage that was once the gallows. He got down and pressed his back against the wood, desperately sucking in air.

  The protestors back on the pathway scattered, ducking and diving behind mounds of trash and vanished down alleys and side streets. It only took a few minutes for the pathway to be completely free of anyone except those wearing a uniform, and those who lay dead.

  The riot troops stopped firing, dropped their magazines, and reloaded as they looked around at their handy work.

  A sergeant keyed his mic and looked towards the control tower barely visible through the haze. “Control, do you have a visual on the area?”

  Negative, Foxtrot—it’s too saturated with chemical agents. We have no visual, over.

  The sergeant stepped forward, raised his helmet’s visor, and pointed towards one of the alleys. “Break off in pairs and sweep the backways!”

  Teddy peered around the edge of his cover and watched with impending dread as the riot troops started to fan out with their weapons ready. However, movement above them caught his eye. The movement was obscured from the eyes of the tower through the smoke and wasn’t something the troops on the ground had even bothered to look for.

  At least thirty shrouded figures rose to their feet on the dormitory rooftops along both sides of the pathway—each of them held a glass bottle in their hand.

  The figures lit their cocktails and hurled the bottles down at the riot troops.

  With a loud whoosh the entire battalion went up in flames. The troops screamed in agony and terror as they dropped to the ground and floundered in the snow in a futile attempt to put out the fire. Some staggered forward and flailed their arms wildly above their heads in an almost comical fashion. Their body armor bubbled and melted against flesh. Ammunition in their tactical pockets popped like firecrackers.

  After almost two whole minutes of suffering, the final corpse lay still as the flames steadily rose—Camp Jayhawk’s riot battalion was no more.

  The figures on the rooftop slipped away while the protestors on the ground emerged from their hiding spaces, cheering and whooping in celebration.

  The voice coming over the radio in Teddy’s pocket was suddenly no longer calm: Jayhawk Control to remaining ground units! Dormitory security is compromised—lost contact with Foxtrot. Fall back to the administration cordon! Heavy armament squadron is clear to move in and suppress all hostiles! Repeat—heavy armament contingency is a-go!

  Teddy got out of cover and ran down the narrow alleyway towards the motor pool. He came to an abrupt stop on the other side.

  A small army was gathered in front of the administration building on top of the hill. Four rows of officers all carrying assault rifles stood poised and ready. Other officers, many of whom were badly injured, limped up the hill to take cover behind their defensive line.

  At the base of the hill, the vehicular sally port rolled open along its tracks and a convoy of eight Humvees slowly entered the compound. Each of the vehicles had dual .50 CAL machine guns mounted on their rooftop turrets and were manned by officers wearing heavy ballistic armor. Three black FEMA police SUVs followed the convoy with their blue lights flashing.

  Teddy’s stomach knotted—he knew that there was no way he would be able to break through their line and reach Ein. If he wanted to get to his destination in one piece, he had to go back and wait.

  A crowd of unruly protestors ran up the hill and chased after the wounded, fleeing officers. Most people in the ragtag group of men and women were armed with little more than pieces of lumber and crude steel rods.

  As soon as the group neared the vehicular convoy, the gunner atop the lead Humvee fired.

  Streaks of orange cut through the crowd and kicked up plumes of snow and dirt as the tracer rounds hammered bullet shaped patterns on the ground.

  After a mere five seconds of firing, the gunner stopped.

  The group had been reduced to gory heaps of sexless flesh. Dismembered arms and legs lay in pools of crimson goop; fingers twitched and some of the legs still writhed around as if they were part of some sort of grotesque fish.

  The convoy rolled onwards, over the bloodstained snow, and headed towards the dorms.

  Bullets ricocheted off of the vehicle’s armored panels as a small group of rebels cautiously looked out of cover and fired automatic rifles from the warehouse’s rooftop next to Teddy.

  The mounted guns swung up towards the roof as the vehicles kept moving—the gunner pressed the triggers.

  A series of concussive blas
ts disintegrated the upper level and caused the roof to collapse. The rebels fell to their deaths as their battered bodies became entombed by chunks of debris.

  Teddy’s ears rang as the high-caliber projectiles made a thunderous sound as they struck against the concrete structure. The building shook.

  Panicking, he turned and ran back out of the alley towards the courtyard.

  Chunks of concrete rained down all around him as the building started to fall apart.

  Teddy slid over a patch of ice and tumbled out into the alleyway just as the building imploded. A growing pall of dust and concrete powder hung over the courtyard and spread through the adjacent alleyways.

  Coughing and covered in soot, Teddy got back on his feet, dusted himself off, and staggered onto the main pathway.

  Teddy was pushed around and nearly knocked down as terrified civilians brushed past him. They dropped their blunt weapons and were running away from the administration building. They craned their necks and looked behind them as they ran for their lives.

  He turned his head to see what they were running from and saw, barely visible through the dust cloud, one of the Humvees as it turned onto the pathway with the rest of the convoy behind it.

  Teddy’s eyes widened. “Oh, shit…” He turned away and ran with the others.

  The gunners opened fire and Teddy broke into a sprint.

  People in the crowd were cut down mid-stride as bullets found their random marks. Pieces of the footpath blew-up into the sky as errant rounds bounced off of them and chipped away at the dorms.

  A man running next to Teddy suddenly erupted like an overripe pomegranate and spritzed him with blood and chunks of meat when he took a direct hit in the back.

  More and more people in the retreating group were slaughtered and Teddy could hear the convoy’s engines as they began to close the distance.

  Teddy felt like a clay skeet waiting for a marksman’s bullet—but he knew he’d never survive if he stayed put.

  A shrouded figure on one of the rooftops hurled petrol bombs at the convoy.

  The bottle shattered on the lead vehicle and sent flames across the windshield, but didn’t slow it down. The gunner swiveled his weapon up towards the figure and fired.

  The figure fell to the street as part of the building crumbled away.

  Teddy seized the opportunity that the distraction provided and took a hard right, and disappeared down an alleyway while the gunner was distracted.

  Others tried to follow him, but they were too slow—the gunner’s tracer rounds splattered them against the concrete wall and slung them across the snowy asphalt.

  On the other side of the alley, Teddy found himself standing in a narrow service corridor that ran between two rows of dormitories. Debris of the old gambling huts and vendor stalls rendered the passageway nearly impassable. People were cowering and hiding amongst heaps of trash and behind the old stalls.

  On the rooftop in front of him, Teddy noticed a group of three people carrying what looked like some sort of grenade launcher as they hopped from roof to roof following the convoy. Guess they raided the armory and found some new toys, but he doubted a few launchers would do much good against FEMA’s offensive onslaught—especially after the number of men he saw waiting up at the administration building.

  Teddy crawled over the remnants of a shop and hurried down another alleyway. He exited onto the main footpath that would lead him back to his dorm. Given the circumstances, he figured he’d be better off waiting for a more opportune time to get to Ein—perhaps the fighting would lull once the sun went down and colder weather moved in.

  He jogged towards his dorm and couldn’t believe just how much damage had been done in such a short amount of time.

  Many of the dorms had their doors either propped open or smashed in. Bodies of both officers and civilians lay face down half-buried in the snow. Some who were still alive but incapable of walking on their own, writhed in pain on the ground and cried out for help as he passed.

  Just ahead of Teddy, an officer, a young man with short red hair, came staggering out of an alley. His rifle and helmet were gone and his wool balaclava had been removed from his head. His broken nose was crooked and his dislocated jaw hung down against his throat allowing his tongue to loll freely. Purple knots were forming all over his face from where he had been struck.

  Teddy slowed his pace when he noticed that the man was still weakly gripping a fiberglass riot baton.

  The officer had a dispirited, defeated expression. He glanced at Teddy once, but paid him no mind as he tottered awkwardly along the pathway.

  Teddy gave the man a wide berth and then broke out in a jog once again.

  There was an explosion somewhere behind him that shook the ground and shattered a few windows.

  He wondered if that was the end of the convoy—he wondered if the launchers had finished the job.

  Unfortunately, his answer came as he heard the gunners give a deafening response.

  When he finally managed to get to his dorm, he found Zoey pacing back and forth, whining and whimpering with her tail and ears lowered.

  “Zoey?” he called out. “How did you get out?”

  Zoey looked over at him, but she didn’t have her usual exuberance. She trotted towards him and continued to whimper.

  When he realized that her fur was mattered with blood, his heart sank.

  “Oh no…” he muttered.

  Teddy ran to her, bent over, and ran his fingers through her coat to find out where the bullet had struck.

  Zoey gave him a timid, sorrowful lick as he did.

  Teddy stood back up, confused—it wasn’t her blood. He started walking towards the dorm and noticed that the door had been broken in just like so many others. “What happened, girl?”

  Zoey trailed behind him as he entered.

  Teddy stepped inside and stared ahead at the harrowing scene before him.

  Perry, or what remained of him, lay twisted in the middle of the room. His red armband hung out of his mouth like a lolling cotton tongue. His eyes had been gouged out. He had been stabbed multiple times—the piece of rebar that had done the job still lay beside him.

  Teddy, speechless, did the only thing he could think to do. He grabbed a sheet off of one of the empty bunks and covered the man’s body. He watched as the blood seeped through and formed crimson stains on the fabric. “I’m sorry…” he whispered.

  The gunshots outside seemed to get closer and the sound of police sirens seemed to come from everywhere.

  Teddy stood back up and looked at the open door as snow blew inside. He knew he couldn’t stay out in the bunks—if an officer saw him when they passed the open door, they’d kill him. “Come on girl… Let’s go hunker down somewhere until this passes.”

  He grabbed a couple of blankets, led Zoey into the communal shower, and did what he had done most of his adult life—he waited.

  CHAPTER 18

  Throughout the day Teddy heard skirmishes between the rebels and the police outside. The thin walls did little to mask the noise. Small-caliber gunfire was answered with the mechanical roar of the .50 CAL automatic turrets. There were a few explosions—some so close that bits of plaster shook loose from the shower ceiling—and they were given a thunderous response from heavy artillery and mortar rounds.

  As Teddy listened, he entertained the thought that perhaps the rebels were winning, but he knew better. He reflected back to what he had told Ein on the train: we will fight and we will win. What a damn fool he had been to believe his own bullshit. Anger only got a man so far—how could he stand against an entire battalion when he was armed with nothing but a bad attitude and… what had Hock called it?

  “Grit…” he said to himself with a humorless grin.

  That hadn’t gotten him too far, had it?

  He tried to turn his thoughts to something more purposeful. He may not have been able to stand up to the new regime, but he intended to keep his promise to Ein and get him out of that place even if
it cost him his life. It was a fool’s errand, but he owed it to the kid and he owed to Jane and Danny.

  Perhaps, he thought, his twisted mind considered saving Ein as some sort of penance for leading Jane and her boy to that fucking stadium.

  Either way, there was no way he would make it very far waltzing out in the middle of a warzone.

  Teddy managed to wash most of the blood out of Zoey’s coat and she seemed grateful if a little cold. The two of them sat in the corner of the shower covered in blankets.

  Zoey slept lazily across his lap—she never ventured more than a few feet from him.

  Teddy knew that dogs had a funny way about them. They seemed to know things. As odd as it was, her presence brought him comfort and he figured she must’ve sensed that on some animistic level. He sat content under the blankets with the mutt across his lap, tucked away from the cold air that whistled inside the dorm through the open doorway, and listened to the radio traffic as he stroked her damp fur.

  The radio told him some interesting stories.

  Just as Teddy expected, the armory got hit during the onset of the madness, but it didn’t sound like they had picked up anything especially useful besides the launchers.

  While the convoy was busy chasing after everything that moved, a group of rebels broke into the food storage warehouse and helped themselves to whatever they could carry. By the time the officers got their shit together and responded, the rebels—and the food—was gone.

  The news about the food wasn’t taken very well by some of the cops. A couple of the SUVs took off and Jayhawk Control sent another two SUVs after them, but none of them returned.

  Three of the dorms went up in flames.

  Jayhawk Control spotted a number of holes in the fences where people had cut through and escaped, but nobody bothered to secure the holes and mend them despite being ordered to do so.

  Sometime in the afternoon, Jayhawk Control went radio silent when one of the rebels fired their launcher up at the tower and sent it toppling down.