by James, Glynn
“What?” Drake intoned. None of this sounded good.
Martin still read aloud. “Each power doubling is a point-three decade increase…”
Jakobs spoke, sounding much more stressed suddenly. “Definitely cresting critical! P/P0 passing one-point-two-zero!”
“Right,” Martin said, swiveling from tablet to station. “Right, okay. Preparing to remove the neutron source—”
Jakobs interrupted him. “Criticality spiking! Core is going supercritical, and fucking fast!”
“Shit! I’m pulling the fuel rods. Drop the control rods! Safo!”
“All of them, sir?”
“Yes, all of them! Now, now!”
Drake only realized that several warning lights were on in various places around the control room once they started to wink out. After that, he remembered to start breathing again. He watched Martin furiously flipping through readouts on the touch screen, evidently trying to assess the damage. Drake finally got up the courage to approach him. He put his hand on the rapidly breathing Brit’s shoulder.
“What just happened?”
Martin turned to look him in the eye. “The most wonderful thing. We didn’t have a meltdown. The rods are a wreck, and the core’s in a state I wouldn’t even want to try and assess. But it’s all stable.”
Drake tried to swallow, but his mouth and throat were too dry. He couldn’t do it. “I don’t suppose we can try again.”
“With this reactor? Not for two years, would be my guess. And not with me driving it.”
“And the second reactor?”
“Do you want to risk losing that one semi-permanently, as well?”
The remaining air seemed to leak out of the XO.
“So that’s it, then. We’re not getting out of here.”
* * *
When Drake emerged again from the bowels of the ship, the flight deck was shrieking. Not from the rescue and recovery effort around the construction site – but from the two F35s swooping in for a landing. Their engines belched an unholy roar that you really didn’t want to hear without the big noise-canceling headsets the flight deck crew wore, and their tires screeched and spewed white billows of smoke as they decelerated to the tune of several Gs.
Drake just counted himself lucky there was enough clear flight deck for them to land on. At over $280M per plane, pushing most of their F35s off the flight deck into the Atlantic had been goddamned painful. He was glad to have these two back, and expected Fick and his men had been glad to have them, too.
A jumpsuited flight deck officer approached him at a jog. “Commander! We’ve got no instructions from PriFly. Do you want us to strip and stow these birds?”
Drake exhaled and looked around him. The shallows of the Virginia coast were going to be their home for the duration. Only the weather wasn’t going to stay so nice as it was now.
“No,” he said finally, sounding exhausted. “Refuel, rearm, and refit.” He turned and began to trudge back to the island. As he walked off, he added: “We’re going to need them.”
Back on the flag bridge, amidst a flurry of activity prompted by the two epic failures up top and down below, a junior officer accosted him. And he asked Drake his perennial favorite question: “Should we inform the Captain?”
Drake dropped down in his chair and gave him a bored look.
“Go for it.”
The Price
Beaver Island
Ali was putting instinctive fire into smoking figures at medium or close range, looking over the top of her big sniper optic, moving through the forest too quickly to get a proper sight picture. She was running now – all of the Alpha operators were. “This is great,” she said. “Flaming fucking zombies. Just when you think we’d plumbed the depths of horror…”
Head down to his EOTech sight, which acquired targets a lot more quickly, Henno recited, “‘Why, this is hell, nor am I out of it.’”
“What the hell is that?” Predator asked, fast-limping alongside.
“Marlowe. Faustus.”
Great, thought Predator. Smart-ass British special operators, quoting Elizabethan playwrights at me…
But now the smoke was growing thicker, socking them in and reducing visibility to a few meters – and they could also see trees burning in earnest not far ahead of them. Those who hadn’t had wet cloths over their mouths pulled them up now, coughing violently. As Handon put evenly spaced single shots into zombie heads, he mentally cursed Gunny Fick. But then he thought: Hell, why keep it to myself? He hailed him.
“You here yet?” was how Fick answered.
“We must have heard you wrong. I thought you said the western approach was clear.”
“Clear is a relative concept.”
Yeah, Handon guessed, and probably a fluid one, too. He signed off, and focused on moving and shooting well – which were, not coincidentally, the two most important skills for a commando. The third was communicating. With the airport coming into sight through the trees now, Handon called it out, and called the formation and approach.
They were coming in at the far end of the runway, maximally distant from the tower and few small buildings of the airport. And, to Handon’s not inconsiderable disappointment, they were also maximally distant from the aircraft, which he could see parked all the way down at the other end.
The only easy day was yesterday, Handon thought.
And even yesterday had been no goddamned picnic.
* * *
Fick heard Alpha’s firing first, coming out from the trees at the far end of the runway, along with billows of smoke from the blazing forest. In another minute, they were visible – a tight and disciplined formation, moving smartly and putting down effective fire.
It wasn’t like him, and he damned well hadn’t expected it… but Master Gunnery Sergeant Fick suddenly found himself getting emotional at the sight of them – the miraculous lost-and-found-once-again Alpha team. They had all come a really long way, and already sacrificed so much. But now they were finally going to link in together.
And maybe even all get out of there alive.
The very first thing Fick did, while watching Alpha advance up the runway, weapons pointed and chugging off to both sides, was hail the Kid up in his sniper OP. “Chesney. Party’s over – get your ass down from that high-rise mausoleum.”
There was a delay before his response came through. It seemed to be accompanied by a lot of lead coming down from the tower. “Negative, negative – I need to cover Alpha’s approach. I’ve got a perfect vantage for it. And there’s a lot of shit coming their way.”
Fick stabbed at his mic button. “Stow that horseshit, Corporal. Alpha can damned well take care of themselves. Now get your ass down here, while the getting’s good, RFN. And bring the prisoner with you.”
“Roger that, Gunny. Just a couple more targets, gotta clear the runway…”
Fick swallowed a few foul words, but he was out of time to argue. Alpha was nearly there, and he was damned well going to go out and greet them.
And make sure they didn’t get killed on his watch.
* * *
Handon could hear rounds snapping overhead, and figured they were coming from that half-demolished air traffic control tower. That’s where he’d put his overwatch. And whoever was up there was definitely covering their asses, as they fought their way up the exposed tarmac.
At about the halfway point, he realized with a twinge of horror that he could now recognize the silhouette of the aircraft on the tarmac. No fucking way… It couldn’t be, could it? A B-17? Those crazy sons of bitches. But then he realized he could also distinguish one particular figure among the defenders of the ancient WWII bomber – stocky, powerful, covered with blood and soot, looking badly singed, firing non-stop in multiple directions… it could only be Fick. The man rose from a crouch and, still firing to the south, moved out to meet them.
Handon, already on point, pushed out further ahead.
He put up his hand, elbow bent. Gunny Fick did the s
ame. The two men grasped hands that were like vises, both of their biceps bulging under their uniforms. Neither was in their first youth anymore. But both were as strong as armored bulls – Handon a little taller, Fick a little stockier.
“What took you so goddamned long?” Fick said, holding Handon’s steel-blue eye.
“Had to finish our pleasure cruise,” Handon said. Belatedly clocking the black scorches and untreated burn wounds across the Marine leader’s upper half, he wondered what kind of hell these guys had been through taking and holding this airfield.
Looking past Handon at the rest of his people, Fick noticed the wide variety of injuries on those guys – and figured maybe the operators of Alpha really had fought their way across a city of three million dead guys. He also saw the scientist for the first time, and gave him an appraising look. All this for one man…
But he snapped out of his reverie quickly. “If you’d like to fly with us today,” Fick said, “kindly get your asses on board that aircraft.” He nodded toward it, while pulling out his radio. “I’ve got to make a call…”
“Yeah, me, too,” Handon said. And while he herded his team toward the bomber, he hailed Sarah Cameron on their agreed-upon channel. She pretty clearly wasn’t here ahead of them, which meant she almost certainly wasn’t coming. And which also meant she was almost certainly dead – if not already, then probably soon. And if Handon’d had any illusions about being able to wait on the tarmac for her to show up, this chaotic 360-degree battle shattered them. They were going to be lucky to get the hell out of there alive themselves.
Latecomers would not be admitted.
With that, the twin 50-cal in the tail of the plane, which had been silent while Reyes reloaded, started up again – none too soon. The position they were defending was now down to the eastern edge of the main runway, and the control tower. But they were losing the control tower, as dead poured in from the east.
Trotting up to the aircraft, Fick frantically hailed Graybeard, and got him. “Interrogative,” he shouted. “What’s your status and ETA?”
“Got a little bit ambushed, which slowed me up. But I’m finishing filling the gas cans now. I can be back there in about fifteen mikes.”
Fick’s lips parted and his gaze went long. It wasn’t soon enough. It was going to be all they could do to keep the bomber defended while they loaded it up. And they’d be rolling down the runway in only a couple of minutes. There was no way they could risk waiting longer – there was too much at stake for them to all go down now. Fick couldn’t believe it.
Graybeard wasn’t going to make it.
* * *
The pilot came running around the edge of the plane, angling for the belly hatch. “I’m starting the engines!” he shouted at Fick as he ran by. But then he spotted Alpha team, including their weapons, rucks, and other gear – plus the scientist, with his bag, and the random girl they had along as well.
“Ah, shit,” he said.
“What?” Fick asked. “What now?”
The pilot stuck his face in Fick’s to be heard over the battle, which seemed to be building to yet another bloody and perilous climax around them. “We’re supposed to weigh all this crap! And check it against the flight manifest! Or we might not get off the ground. This isn’t the world’s longest fucking runway. It was all supposed to be the mechanic’s job…”
Fick shook his head. “No time! We’ve gotta go! Either we’ll get off the tarmac or we won’t.”
Looking extremely stressed, the pilot turned and resumed running toward the hatch.
“Are we even close?” Fick shouted after him.
Turning one last time before jamming himself inside, the pilot shrugged and shouted. “I don’t know! Start throwing shit out – throw out everything you can…”
The four engines started up in sequence a few seconds later, big-ass propellers churning the air and adding to the racket and chaos. The horde was collapsing on them from all sides. Fick looked back and saw that the Alpha shooters were still shooting, when what he needed was them getting on the goddamned plane. “Go, go, go!” he said, windmilling his arm. “Load up!”
Looking forward again, he could see Brady was still single-handedly holding the desperate northern flank. Fick shouted at his back: “Ma-rines! We are lea-ving!” Brady looked behind him and flashed that nice smile of his, mouthful of perfect teeth. Every jarhead knew that line – and knew that the Colonial Marines in Aliens were “very tough hombres.” Brady nodded, and began a fighting retreat back around the side of the plane, still spraying bullets and grenades.
But then something impossible happened: he fell down, knocked over backward by some invisible force. He hit the deck in a whuff of dust, ruffling the blanket of empty shell casings on the ground, which floated up gracefully around him.
Fick stopped dead, eyes wide. And then he heard it before he saw it: firing, long bursts of full-auto. And it was not from their own lines. It was from out at the treeline.
His first thought was: Fuck me – another demented-ass Canadian, lighting us up?
But, then, in another second he was able to make it out visually. It was in fact a Canadian soldier. But this one wasn’t demented. He was dead – and on fire, flaming from helmet to boot toe. He was also carrying a 5.56mm light machine gun, fed by a 200-round belt from a semi-rigid pouch hanging underneath (fondly referred to by the Marines as a “nutsack”). Like most squad-level machine gunners, he would also have anywhere between two and five more nutsacks of 200 rounds each, loaded onto his belt and load-carrying harness – perhaps a thousand or more rounds in total.
And every single one of them was now trying to cook off from the heat of the flames that danced over every part of his body like a spectral wedding dress.
The rounds in the pouches were firing off in all directions, like the world’s least accurate machine gun battery. Shrieking high-velocity rounds zipped forward, back, left and right, into the ground and up and out into space.
But the belt which fed into the gun was actually being fired out of it – once the first round in the chamber cooked off, it cycled the action, bringing in the rest of the belt behind it and shooting them all off in sequence. The weapon, chattering away, hung loose on the dead soldier’s sling, pointing roughly toward the deck – where the rounds were ricocheting off the tarmac. And, much worse, as sometimes happens, many of them were impacting the smooth tarmac at an angle, but then skittering forward and straight down it, parallel with the ground – and straight toward the team’s feet. Or else they’d finally hit a rough patch and go shooting upward again.
Jesus Nutbusting Christ, Fick thought. What the hell else could go wrong today?
He could hear rounds plinking into the skin of the plane behind him, and others snapping the air over his head. He felt one tug at his sleeve as it missed him by an inch. And now he could also hear Brady hollering, clearly wounded in some way. Fick glanced behind him. The fucking scientist was still out on the tarmac, as the Alpha guys collapsed on the hatch to the plane. “Get the fuck down!” he shouted – but immediately regretted this. Down on the deck was actually a terrible place to be, with rounds skipping along it in all directions…
Fick raised his rifle, took a bead, and cranked off a shot, then another. But as he fired, a round hit the steel toe of his boot – it didn’t penetrate, but stung like all hell. He ground his jaw against the pain, took a steadying breath, exhaled half of it, and took a final bead on the fucking post-human Fourth of July fireworks display still gamboling in on them.
He fired a single round. It impacted the machine gunner’s chin point and took him down.
Unfortunately, the burning sonofabitch hit the ground face first, lying on top of his weapon… with the barrel still pointed at the plane. And now the hundreds of rounds in pouches on the back of his belt were cooking off in all directions, most of them dangerous. And, worst of all, within two seconds he had been overrun by the general mass of other asshole dead guys, making it impossible, or at the v
ery least insanely hazardous, for Fick to try to reach him.
Not that there was any way to turn him off even if he could.
It was all basically going to total shit now, falling apart everywhere. They had to get the hell out – now. “Go, go, go!” Fick shouted, as he pulled himself to his feet, raced forward into fire and death, and hauled Brady to his feet. He couldn’t tell where the big man was hit, but he was definitely still alive. Arms on shoulders, the pair retreated back to the plane, stumbling backward, both now firing their weapons with their free hands, rounds coming back in all around them, and an uncountable dead army surging forward in the midst of it all.
Over his shoulder, Fick could see Alpha finally loading up via the belly hatch. He shouted back to them, “Ditch your gear! Ditch everything you can! We gotta shed weight!” The plane was already rolling on the tarmac, lining up its take-off. Brady, perhaps only half alive, was still shooting, and Fick slapped his ass to get him in the goddamned plane. The twin 50 in the tail was still going crazy, trying to take up the slack. Fick, last on the ground, now took desperate shots in all directions, knocking down the lead dead guys in the implacable assault.
This was it – this was the end. One way or another.
He heard Brady shouting to him from the hatch.
“Now or never, Gunny!”
Fick turned, ran, and pulled himself up into the hatch as the plane began to pick up speed. He hauled his feet inside, then moved down half the length of the cabin, stumbling over a riot of people and gear. He almost started to smile, as the plane accelerated around him.
Maybe they were going to make it after all.
And that’s when it hit him. MotherFUCKER. The Kid – Chesney was still up top in the control tower. And they were now about to leave him behind. Frantically, Fick moved to the blister window, stuck his head out – and saw Zulus swarming in through the demolished front door of the tower as it receded behind them.
