Vampire Apocalypse: Descent Into Chaos (Book 2)

by Derek Gunn

  “…we’ll have to…bastard Harris when…it’ll be too late.” The men shook hands. And then, abruptly, the first man turned and headed quickly to the door. April only barely had enough time to straighten up and announce her arrival by calling to Lucy that she was here before the man suddenly loomed before her. She used her voice and purposely forced the words out as an unintelligible mess and looked blankly at the man as he passed. He barely glanced at her, but she did catch his lips forming the words, “Stupid half-wit” as he passed.

  She didn’t recognize the man, but that was not uncommon with all the new people. She smiled blankly at him, re-enforcing his impression of her, as he pushed past her. Then she moved into the room, calling again for Lucy but hoping to see the face of the other man. She only caught a brief glance as the man was forced to move to the side as Lucy entered from the far door but she could have sworn that the man had been Ian Phelps. What was he doing down in the supply centre? Normally he wouldn’t dirty his hands with common folk. She would have to let Steele know about this. He would know what to do.

  Chapter 8

  The stink of fuel hung heavily in the air around the vehicles by the roadside. Thick palls of smoke belched from cold engines that had not been started since the war with the vampires. The throaty rumble of the engines as they growled into life shattered the early morning air and their smoky pollution rose upward and spread across the sky like a cancerous growth. William Carter stretched his stiff shoulder as he rearranged the sling and sighed. He looked down at the bandage as the throbbing continued and then at the new insignia on his shoulder and smiled despite the pain. It was just his luck that he had nicked an artery when he had shot himself and had nearly died before the doctor was able to stop the blood pouring out of him. It still hurt like hell but his new rank of Major had helped ease the pain. He was still a little weak from the ordeal but he could hardly refuse his superiors’ newfound confidence in him.

  He had been careful not to embellish his story too much but it had been necessary to concoct certain elements to fit with the evidence. He looked back at the line of trucks and armored cars along the road and whistled. Von Kruger had been livid that Wentworth would dare to attack his fuel supplies, and had ordered a full retaliatory action. Carter hadn’t thought at the time he had arranged his heroic tale that such a full-scale operation would result from his actions, but he could hardly go back now. He had not really thought out his plan very well. He had intended to tell his superiors that he had not really gotten a good look at his attackers but certain parts of his story were already established before he had come out of surgery and he had had to improvise.

  By the time they had found him he was unconscious and they had rushed him into surgery to close the artery and replace the blood he had lost. This, he found out later, had been the subject of much debate, as blood was never given to thralls. The vampires would never condone such waste. The surgeon had removed the bullet from his shoulder and it had been identified as a .22 caliber round, so they knew that he had been shot within the range of a pistol, so he must have seen something. Von Kruger had been most eager to learn as much as possible about the raid so he had approved the use of the replacement blood. It meant, however, that when he woke, and in fairness to himself he had still been quite groggy, he had had to describe his attackers.

  He had not seen another soldier other than Wentworth’s men in years so he had stuck with what he knew and described them perfectly. In reality he was only confirming the conclusions his superiors had already made, so it wasn’t really his fault. He had expected a lot of shouting between the states with Wentworth denying his involvement, and that it would all blow over after a while—after all, it was only one fuel truck and a few guards that they had lost. He hadn’t expected the entire south brigade to be mobilized.

  Everything had spiraled from there and he had been caught up in the preparations for war like a leaf in a gale, unable to stay still long enough to think. He was still terrified that someone would discover his lies and that he would spend an eternity being tortured by the vampires. As a result of this every time he was asked to contribute or to confirm a point about the attack he ended up telling his superiors what he thought they wanted to hear.

  He had even received a promotion for his bravery, which he had been delighted with, but now found himself leading this brigade. There was a severe lack of men tested under fire in Von Kruger’s army and his superiors wanted men who had proven their courage under fire to lead them. His superiors had also assumed that he would want the honor of leading the retaliation for the killing of his own platoon. However, that came with a whole new set of problems. Namely, that he was expected to lead from the front.

  Sometimes even the best of plans bit you in the ass.

  What if they find out that Wentworth never sent those men? The thought kept coming back to him and sent his stomach into convulsions. But who else could it have been? It was unlikely that any other large force of men could have made it from another state without being seen by someone as they crossed at least two borders to get here. The vampires would have spotted any such convoy in their nightly patrols.

  No, it had to be Wentworth. But surely he must know that Von Kruger would retaliate or demand compensation? Was Wentworth that desperate for fuel that he would risk that?

  Wentworth had far more guards and far better armor than they did, so they would be a difficult foe to defeat; however, it was unlikely that they had sufficient fuel to run the majority of their heavier weaponry. That swung the advantage over to Von Kruger’s forces. His own tanks and armored cars were filled to the top and raring to go. However, if Wentworth was expecting an attack then he could lay in wait for any invading force and tanks did not need fuel to just sit and wait. They could be torn to pieces as soon as they crossed the border.

  And he would be the first across the border.

  He went over the plan again in his head. He was to be one part of a three-pronged attack on a town five miles over the border. He couldn’t think of the name of the town, he had been too awed at the planning meeting to take much in. He had never been to such a session before. He usually received his orders via the radio, or in rare cases through a dispatch. He rarely even met his direct superiors; they preferred to spend their time in the larger cities where their every need was pampered to. Along with his superior officers there had also been three vampires at the meeting. He had not even seen a vampire in years, not up close anyway. He had forgotten how terrifying they were. They seemed to carry the very darkness with them and shadows seemed to loom around them like palpable shields. He was glad that they had ignored him, as he would never have been able to sustain his lies if they had questioned him in earnest.

  The plan had been set in motion remarkably quickly and Carter suspected that this had been planned for some time now and they had merely been waiting for an excuse to put it in motion. They had good intelligence on the town and the map that he had received after the briefing had held all his objectives, his route and even a suggested deployment. It was just as well that he had not taken a single note during the briefing. He was to attack from the southeast; his main objective was to take out the local military headquarters. The expected garrison was in the region of two hundred in total and for that he had a force of seventy-five guards, two armored trucks and three tanks. Easily enough to crush an unsuspecting enemy force without armor, but pathetically few to take on a fortified town that lay in wait for them.

  He looked at his watch and signaled the radio operator in his truck to give the order to advance. He ducked down into the armored cage as the engines revved around him and built to an impressive crescendo. He sighed as they passed the dirt-encrusted sign that welcomed them to Michigan, though the words were no longer visible. There were very few signs left on any of the roads now, though some trappings of the old world could still be found dotted around.

  Most, however, had been torn down long ago for their precious metal as resources had become more and
more scarce. He suspected that Wentworth had left this sign in place to make sure there would be no excuse for crossing the border by mistake. Mistaken border crossings would be the least of his worries when he saw this battalion coming towards him, though. The trucks rumbled over the border and Carter felt his stomach suddenly settle for the first time since he had woken from surgery. He was committed now and that knowledge seemed to have a calming effect. If they were expected then it would be a short battle, and if they were not then he could look forward to more glory. It was too late to worry now either way.

  Harris watched the convoy pass the border and head into enemy territory. He felt conflicting emotions as he watched the thralls invade Wentworth’s state. He felt some responsibility for the carnage that was sure to follow. Hundreds would be killed or maimed as a result of his plans, and even though they were thralls, they had been human once. He countered this responsibility with the argument that these men and women had chosen to become thralls and no one had forced them to treat humans with the contempt that most of them did.

  He thought of Evans, the General whom Steele had told him about. He had resisted the control the vampires had over him and had helped them all survive the assault on the ‘Cave’. If he had done his job properly he would have stayed out of the range of the rebels’ guns and merely leveled the upper floors with his artillery, burying their small community under tons of rock. But he hadn’t. He had deliberately delayed the heavy armor and then sent it through the waterlogged approach. Finally, he had blown up that same artillery and, in so doing, exposed his own complicity.

  If Evans had still retained some part of his true self was it not possible that others did as well? Some of the thralls had jumped at the chance to gain the favor of the vampires, but others, he knew, had only done so to try and save their families. The plans he had set in motion would not distinguish between those who deserved to die and those who did not. It gave him nightmares that he had to balance that against the extinction of every captive human over the next few months from the serum’s effects. Things had grown far more complex than they had been when they merely bit at the thralls’ heels with their infrequent and ineffectual raids. Now, his decisions had to take into account far too many issues and he really was not sure he was up to the job. It was a hell of a responsibility, and one that he wished he could pass to someone else, even someone like Phil Regan, who obviously craved the power.

  It seemed that such decisions sought him out though. He had not wanted to lead during the Vampire War but circumstances had conspired against him and thrust him forward. He had not asked to lead now either but he had no choice. He had failed before and been responsible for his team’s deaths, though he was not sure what he could have done differently. He still had no idea why he had been the only survivor, and he still woke most nights in a sweat with his team’s cries fresh in his mind. Was he about to do the same now?

  The responsibility ate at him constantly and his fear of another failure was what kept him going. Father Reilly had told him a few months ago that he could only relinquish the responsibility when he was happy that the job would be done as well, or better, than he could do it. The only problem was that he knew that there was no one he could trust to do as good a job. Whether he liked it or not, he was good at it, despite his previous failures. He had not told Father Reilly about his previous command; every time he had tried the words would just not come. He felt deep shame for his own survival and worried that others would think that he had somehow purchased his survival with the blood of his friends.

  He pulled away from his position and made his way carefully down the rocky outcropping towards the small cave where the others waited. He sighed deeply as he descended with troubled thoughts heavy on his mind. It was still early and the sky was still in transition with the horizon painted in the dull grey of false dawn. The breeze carried with it the stink of fuel and he shuddered, though whether it was from the cold or from the anticipation of the day’s events, he wasn’t entirely sure.

  “Well?” Warkowski asked him as he dropped to the level ground in front of the small cave. Harris always marveled as how quiet the big man could be. He had a knack for blending into his surroundings that was uncanny and Harris was happy that the big man was on their side. He had discovered earlier that it had indeed been Warkowski’s shot that had saved his life and, true to his word, he had hugged the big man and planted a kiss on his cheek. It had given them all a much needed light relief, especially in light of Steele’s and Rodger’s wounds.

  Rodgers would be fine, if a little sore for a while, but Steele would take longer to heal. He had been hit three times. While none of the bullets had hit anything vital, thank God, one of the bullets had merely grazed his side but it had torn a chunk of flesh away and it had bled terribly. The second bullet had struck him just above the kidney but, luckily, he had been turning at the time and the bullet had missed the organ and had exited in a neat hole just below the left rib. The third bullet was still lodged in his back and caused him agonizing pain every time he moved as it grated against the bone. He was sleeping now.

  He was lucky to be alive at all but it complicated their return to base. They had planned to walk and so avoid the vampire patrols, especially in light of the attack that was beginning just a few miles away. They had not expected there to be such a reaction from their first raid, and certainly not such a quickly organized retaliation. They had expected that it would take a number of raids over the next few weeks before anything major happened. Now the vampires would be more vigilant with all that was happening.

  On top of that they would now need transport to carry Steele back and that meant leaving a trail. They had only survived till now because the vampires did not know about them. Even before, when they had attacked the town openly, they had survived only because the thralls had grown so complacent that they did not really consider the rebels a threat. If they had known then, it would be a completely different story, one that he was not sure they could have survived. It was essential that they continue to grow their numbers in secret.

  “They’ve crossed the border,” Harris answered and he could see that the different emotions that crossed the faces of those before him. Elation for their success was tempered by the realization of what was about to happen.

  “What do we do?” Rodgers asked as he stood and crossed over to Harris.

  “We’ll have to split the team, I’m afraid,” Harris sighed as he scanned the faces in front of him. “Aidan, you’ll have to stay here and watch Steele until he wakes up.” Aidan Flemming nodded. “Dave,” Harris looked over at Dave Sherman where he sat cleaning his weapon, “we’ll need to get as many civilians out while the fighting is going on as we can. Can you get transport for us, something that will blend in?”

  Sherman nodded and rammed a clip into the XM8.

  “Rodgers, Ortega, you’ll come with me,” Harris continued. “We’ll try to sneak out as many as we can in the confusion. Dee and Warkowski can give us covering fire.” Harris looked at the faces in front of him and nodded. “Okay, people. Let’s move out.”

  The rumble of the tanks seemed to roll through the hills like distant thunder. At first those few guards on the early shift thought that a storm was coming and cursed their luck at being on sentry duty. The town was spread out over a mile and it nestled in a low valley that protected it from the southern winds but left it open and unprotected to the northerly winds that cut through the town far too often for the guards’ liking.

  It was a small enough town but it had still retained a large company as it was the first town of any size close to the border, and so it served as the only base for a hundred miles. Most towns lay abandoned all across the state with most of the surviving population held further south where the weather was warmer. Duty in this area was normally a punishment and morale was low at the best of times.

  Their strategic location meant that they had vampires resident in the town so, no matter how low morale got, desertion was unheard of
and guard duty during the day was maintained with surprising dedication. They had built a low wall all around the town in the early days of the vampire’s rule but had quickly fallen into a bored routine that had left the wall unfinished and far too low to serve any real defensive purpose. Guards on the night shift were only vigilant while the vampires were near but when the creatures returned an hour or so before dawn the guards tended to return to the warmth of their barracks.

  For this reason the first anyone knew of the attack was when the tanks crashed through the low walls surrounding the town. The sudden roar of engines and sustained cacophony of noise as the attacking forces opened fire caused guards to spill out of their barracks in total confusion. The guards were completely unprepared for an attack and the sudden noise and appearance of the metal behemoths sent most of them running back into their barracks where they crashed against those still coming out. Deep booms shattered the morning air as the tanks spit forth shells and the ferocious noise of the explosions as the shells slammed into their targets woke any who had not heard the initial approach.

  The thump of more shells and the shriek of explosions were joined by the lower stuttering of machine gun fire as the attacking forces spilled from trucks and armored cars and began to fire relentlessly into the throngs of confused defenders. Many of Wentworth’s guards were cut down before they had a chance to organize any sort of defense but a few did manage to overcome their shock and began to return fire. They took a heavy toll as they retreated back towards the relative safety of their barracks and used the building as cover to lay down severe fire against the unprotected attackers. While the building may have been effective against small arms fire it did not afford any protection against the tank’s heavy shells and they were soon torn to pieces as the tanks destroyed them piteously.