by Munson, Brad
She huffed out a bitter laugh. “Ha. Some choice. Submit to the trials or be released into …” She lifted her chin at the darkened wilderness beyond the shamblers. The groaning was getting louder as the last of the winter light drained from the sky. “... that. Their world. That’s as good as murder.”
Now it was Sherman’s turn to shrug. “It’s still a choice. And even that’s not true. People are surviving ‘out there’ all the time. Proof just walked in our gates again last week – that new group we just welcomed today. They were out there for months, all on their own, and they made it.” He turned back to look at the lantern light and firelight streaming out of the Town Hall’s windows. They had shut down the electricity for everything but heat, and it hadn’t slowed down the party one bit. He was glad of that. “Those RSA boys?” he said, and was surprised at the bitterness in his own voice. “Cowards and crazies, Anna. Every single one of them. And still it worked out. They lived.”
“Yes,” she said harshly. “Most of them.”
“Yes, most of them. I know that.”
“And they’re still in prison, still in the facility.”
“And will be as long as we want them to be. You need to monitor them for long-term effects. And what do you think the alternative is? You think I’m going to let them roam free among the population? You know this, Anna: You’re the only thing that’s keeping those traitors alive.”
She did know it. They’d had this conversation before, many times. It just wasn’t what she had expected. When Stiles had arrived, when the first crude tests went so well, when the vaccine suddenly appeared in her lab, almost like a gift from God, she had been so excited, so ready. And now ...
Sherman put a hand on her shoulder. The fingers of his gloves touched the line of her jaw. She was a grown woman, weighed down with responsibility and weariness, but she was still very beautiful. “Anna. You’re no Doctor Mengele, and we’re not Nazis. But this is the way it is. And you’re doing the right thing.”
He checked the shadows, looked back down the path to the Town Hall to make sure they were all alone. Then he leaned forward and kissed her, long and sweet. It wasn’t the first time, and even as she responded, he hoped it wouldn’t be the last.
When they separated, he could see she was truly smiling for the first time that day. Smiling at him.
“Now come on,” he said. “Let’s get back. Time to save the world.”
CHAPTER FIVE
The alarm jolted Stone out of a sound sleep. It was still half an hour before sunrise, ten minutes before his internal clock would have awakened him anyway, and the buzzing was so loud it felt like somebody hammering from the inside of his skull, trying to get out.
For two heartbeats, ancient instincts made him paw for a bedside alarm clock. Only then did he realize the bone-rattling BUZZ! BUZZ! BUZZ! wasn’t coming from anywhere in his room.
It was the perimeter alarm. It was sounding through the entire complex.
Offutt Air Force Base was under attack.
Since the moment of his arrival more than six months earlier, Stone had considered himself constantly on duty. He slept in an extra pair of (usually) clean BDUs; he had his weapon cleaned and loaded, waiting by the side of his bed. And after a lifetime of practice, getting his boots on only took a single BUZZ! of the alarm. Then he was out the door, into the corridor, shrugging into a parka with his M-16 up and at the ready.
Stone hadn’t gotten any younger since he decided to join the forces at Offutt, but he had forced himself back into even better shape than he’d been a year ago. Middle-age was no friend, but it wasn’t a deal-breaker either. He had always been a big man, broad-shouldered and thick-necked. Weights and workouts and morning runs had added two inches to an already impressive chest and melted away even the suggestion of a belly. The black ops excursions against the RSA assholes hadn’t hurt either. But none of that was going to matter if—
The door across the corridor from his quarters flew open as he stepped past it. He spun, weapon up, and identified Kurt Allen as the younger, faster man barreled out of his own room. Allen was the only other member of the team that had saved Omaha who had joined Stone at Offutt; they’d become fast friends in the months since they’d arrived. Now he was outfitted almost identically. He even wore the same expression of tense, concentrated awareness.
“Sit rep?” Allen asked as he checked the corridor, up and down. He fit the words precisely between the BLAAT!s of the alarm.
“No idea,” Stone said, just as clipped. “Just—”
As if in answer, a deep, unhappy voice cut over the alarm. “Multiple breaches, ground forces, northwest and southeast. Chopper and ground assault at North Gate. Vehicles approaching.”
All bad news, Stone thought grimly. He took an instant to orient himself, then nodded towards the far exit. “Northwest breach for us. Let’s go.” They were closest to that quadrant; it was where they could do the most good first.
He and Allen bashed on every closed door with the butts of their rifles as they passed. “Breach!” they shouted. “BREACH! NORTHWEST QUAD NOW!” Stone heard doors open behind him, the sounds of a few feet running – not all of them booted, he sensed, which was just plain stupid. Seconds later he and Allen pounded through the northeast entrance, advanced a dozen yards and stopped. Stone could see ground troops pouring though a wide gap in the chain-link half a football field in front of them and off to the left. The edges of the fences, both inner and outer perimeter, were blackened and twisted. Some sort of explosive, he assumed, maybe with a corrosive cocktail added. A genuine fence-buster that made a big, wide hole.
He heard the sound of the choppers off to his right, but he couldn’t be concerned with that at the moment. The announcement had said the air assault was focused on the North Gate, yes, but he’d have to let others deal with that for the moment.
The frigid morning air bit at his exposed cheeks like a nasty animal. It was cold out here, cold as shit. It added to the sense of exposure as they stood there; he felt almost naked with virtually no cover between him and the approaching enemy. Lying flat on the icy ground to present as small a target as possible, then laying down fire as soon as the attackers were within range – well, that could work, he supposed, but it wasn’t preferable to ...
“Wait a minute,” he said aloud. Allen – just under six feet, not quite as musclebound as Stone, dirty blond hair just a trifle too long for regulation – took him literally and pulled up short right next to him, rifle up.
“What?” he said, wound tight as a watch spring.
“They’re not armed,” Stone said. “Shit, they’re not even alive.”
It was almost as if he was wearing telescopic goggles. His vision zoomed forward and saw the approaching attackers clearly for the first time, even in the dim light of dawn: they were shamblers. Ragged, wounded, hungry shamblers, pushing through the breach in slow motion. He could barely see the back end of the mob in the morning mist, but he estimated three hundred, maybe more.
Half a dozen of the men in his squad pounded up behind him. He gave a quick glance over his shoulder and was quietly pleased that they were properly outfitted and armed now. He didn’t want anybody slowed down – or worse yet, killed – because they hadn’t taken the time to dress for the weather. He had personally chosen and trained each of these men. He expected the best from them, and so far he hadn’t been disappointed.
“You four,” he said. “Cameron, Douchet, Blankenship, Trent. You take this bunch. Forward ‘til twenty yards, then head and shoulder shots. Hand to hand with bayonets and pikes if you need to, but stop them all. None of them make it to the barracks.”
His men surged forward, past him, moving towards the line of engagement. Allen started to join them, but Stone put a hand on his arm to hold him back. “They can handle it,” he said. “We’ve seen these guys work before. We need to go to the main gate. I have a bad feeling.”
It was painfully obvious: This, like the breach to the southwest, was a clumsy diversionary tactic. Their perennial enemy, the “Renewed States of America” – God, how he hated that lying name! – seemed addicted to it. But it was plain: Air support was being limited to the assault at the North Gate only. That was where the real action was, and where the real damage could be done.
Stone turned and sprinted northeast across the frozen grass towards the guard towers and barriers that had been built to fortify the gates. It was good work, but it had been built for a specific purpose: to keep the infected out. It wasn’t adequately designed to stop an actual armed assault by humans. There hadn’t been the time or the matériel to make that happen yet.
Now it was too late.
As they ran, he heard the gunfire erupt from his boys behind him. He allowed himself one quick glance over his shoulder: They were doing the job. Shambler heads were exploding at a distance; his soldiers had long since learned how to economically line up head shots, and they had the ammo to make it happen with a single hit. As the front line of infected went down, the shamblers close behind them stumbled over the new corpses and began to fall as well, but the living soldiers took nothing for granted. As they approached they poured fire into the falling and fallen bodies, just to make sure they would never rise again. Head and shoulders, he had told them. Like the old shampoo commercial: Head and Shoulders, every time. Most of them didn’t know what the hell he was talking about, and that always amused him for some reason.
They rounded the corner of their massive barracks where they had been sleeping just minutes earlier, and two things happened at once: A stiff wind from the east cut into them like knives made of ice, and they saw the angry-insect silhouettes of three Apache assault helicopters wallowing in the air just over the watchtowers, laying down gunfire and launching missiles at an almost leisurely pace. There was something odd about those missiles. It took Stone more than a moment to recognize it. They weren’t Hellfires; Hellfires were designed to penetrate armor and would simply make a big hole in the ground. No: These were exploding on the surface and throwing out deadly shrapnel with every contact.
“Hydra 70’s,” he said to himself. Nasty anti-personnel weaponry. They’d made the same modification on Adan Forrest’s own Apache; the Hydras were far more effective against the infected. And the RSA had figured that out too. Meanwhile, return fire from the Offutt troops on the ground had barely begun.
He could already see that the assault troops attacking the North Gate weren’t like the shamblers behind him. They were very much alive and heavily armed. No infected first wave here, though the same twisted wreckage of chain-link showed how they had breached the base’s perimeter. These were disciplined, fast-moving human, highly trained soldiers, intent on taking territory.
But not doing too much damage, he realized. They’re not here to destroy the base. They’re here to secure it. It was no secret the RSA was running low on military hardware; this just confirmed the intel they’d been discussing for weeks. This whole assault was as much a resupply mission as a strategic battle. Cold comfort, he thought bitterly, but it’s nice to be right.
He scanned the terrain between their position and the front gates and found exactly what he was looking for. He permitted himself one tiny smile.
“There,” he said. “Low and fast.”
They hunched over and sprinted, as quickly as they could, to the tan, hulking vehicle parked fifty yards in front of them. The FPI Cougar MRAP was a diesel-powered box of armor on massive tires, twice as tall as a man and impossibly ugly. It was also an effective Command and Control vehicle that Stone had used on countless missions in the last six months, ever since they’d salvaged it from an overrun USMC armory a hundred miles to the south. That was a mission he didn’t care to remember, but the yield – three of these massive vehicles – had almost made it worth it. They had been very lucky; one of them – this particular one, in fact – even had the CROWS system installed, tech that allowed the operator to aim and fire the vehicle’s weapons systems without leaving the driver’s seat. Most of those had been shipped to combat theaters immediately upon completion. Now that little innovation was going to come in very handy.
He reached the side of the Cougar and crouched behind it, out of view. Both the attackers and the defenders were too busy to notice any movement so far away. As he leaned against the freezing cold cowling, Allen arrived and crouched next to him and took it all in. His cheeks were flushed with a combination of excitement and reaction to the cold. He opened his mouth to say something, but an echoing BOOOM! interrupted. Stone slipped an eye around the edge of the MRAP and looked up to see the fire-blossom of one of the Apache’s missiles as it exploded at the base of one of the gate watchtowers. The supports cracked and the tower tumbled like a pine tree under a logger’s axe.
Men with guns – some without coats, a few even barefoot – were finally streaming into the wide, flat expanse of frozen grass between the gates and the admin building. In the last year, Forrest’s people had basically torn down and rebuilt Offutt, but one major flaw – as far as Stone was concerned – still remained: C&C, at least the obvious part, was still way too close to the edge of the installation, and they were going to pay for that now. Worse, the Offutt troops looked hesitant and disorganized, and Stone knew why: Their leader was out of town.
Damn it, he thought. Terrible timing for us, and probably on purpose.
Stone shuffled sideways, to the back of the Cougar, and dogged open the rear doors. They had stripped down and remade the interior of the troop carrier to serve the purposes of their rescue and salvage operations; he knew exactly what was inside and exactly what he needed.
As he hopped up, he plucked extra clips of ammo for both his M-16 and his sidearm and shoved them into every pocket he could find. He turned, only half-looking, and tossed more of the same to Allen, who stood watch at the open rear doors. Then he slung his rifle over his shoulder and hefted a second, even larger weapon that was racked on one wall, remembering an especially brutal moment during his last tour of Iraq, not long before the outbreak.
He hated to admit it, but this baby just might come in handy.
Enough. He turned and climbed out of the Cougar, closing and latching the hatch behind him. The sound of gunfire and something far worse was growing louder and more rapid on the battlefield beyond the vehicle. He cheated another look and cursed: The RSA ground troops were already establishing fortified positions. Stone watched helplessly as one, then another, then another Offutt soldier fell under fire.
“Goddamn it,” he said under his breath. He moved again to the covered side and nodded at the driver’s door to the massive MRAP, five full feet off the ground. “Get this fucker fired up,” he told Allen. “Move towards the gate. Slowly. And take one of those choppers down.” He hefted his weapon again, and he could tell by his partner’s expression: He already knew the plan.
Allen grinned and his cheeks flared even more brightly. “My pleasure,” he said. He reached up and popped open the vehicle’s door while Stone risked another look at the gates.
For the five hundredth time, Stone thought of the truly amazing sharpshooter Krueger, and wished the irascible old soldier had accepted his invitation to join them here at Offutt. Pain in the ass though he was, the old bastard was a master marksman, maybe – quite literally – the best one alive, but he had chosen to stay and protect recovered Omaha rather than move with them to Offutt. Stone couldn’t blame him; they all knew how important the Omaha Fac and its community was, but right now … that asshole could have been picking off key members of the RSA fortifications even now, from a distance, and turning the tide of battle. Or at least slowing them down. But now? No such luck.
The Cougar shuddered abruptly and roared to life with a deep, grating mechanical cough. Stone knew how lucky he was to have Allen as a partner: the man had taken it upon himself to become the ultimate utili
ty infielder, teaching himself to drive, pilot, and even maintain pretty much every kind of vehicle on the base, from motorcycle and ATV to these massive MRAPs and everything in between. And here he was proving himself again, as the armored troop carrier lurched forward.
Stone side-stepped to stay tight behind as it slowly trundled across the field towards their target. No one noticed – not the RSA assault troops, and not the Offutt defense forces, who were still trying to get themselves together.
Guess we’ll have to save the day, he told himself. Yet again.
The slippery trot across the icy ground seemed endless, but Stone knew that was an illusion. It just felt that way. Every gunshot, every explosion meant another precious life lost, another irreplaceable bit of battle tech destroyed, and they simply couldn’t afford either one – not now, not yet.
Then, abruptly, the Cougar stopped. Close enough, Stone thought, and he knew Allen was thinking the same thing. He looked up just in time to see the Cougar’s turret swivel twenty degrees, the long snout of the Browning M2 poking out and lifting, just a little ... and a little more. Allen was controlling it expertly from inside the MRAP. He’d done it before, but never with a target like this in his sights.
The RSA ground troops and Apaches still hadn’t noticed them. Good, Stone thought. Stay sloppy. He was already braced when the M2 fired – three shots, evenly spaced, so loud it actually made him flinch.
The Apache nearest them screamed and tilted in the air, then spiraled to the frozen ground like a dropped stone. He saw the crew, injured but alive, scramble from the wreckage and stagger towards the RSA lines.
