“That’s what I was afraid of. We cannot take the chance of any more infected making their way here. We have to quarantine the island. We may have enough boots on the ground to take care of what we have here already, but if we don’t isolate the island it won’t make any difference,” Stone said.
“The Perdido Bridge was knocked out by a barge this morning so if we can shut down the Holmes Bridge over the ICW, then we should be pretty much contained,” Durham said.
“We will set up a traffic control point there at the bridge and shut it down. How many officers do you have left Sergeant?” Stone asked Durham.
“Honestly, I have no idea. There are myself and two other officers here left. Everyone else went home, got killed, or is on the road, and our commo is done for,” Durham said.
“How was the armory holding out, Top? Maybe we can pull 3rd Platoon from there,” Stone asked Reid.
“About a dozen, they have their hands full there. Most of our people took their families to the armory to keep them safe. They have the gates closed and aren’t letting anyone else in,” Reid said.
“Well, 1st and 2nd Platoon are spread out everywhere and tied down. Looks like we just have our 4th Platoon guys here, but they have been pretty chewed up,” Stone said.
“That bridge is six-lanes wide. I am not sure we are going to have enough vehicles to stop traffic, much less the manpower to enforce it,” Durham said.
“What about that thing, sir?” Reid asked, pointing at the gigantic red and white fire department ladder truck. It was over forty feet long, parked on the far side of the Town Green at the fire department. Its huge white telescoping ladder was mounted on the rear of the truck and rested across its entire length. “I’m sure we can use it to plug that bridge.”
Stone nodded and turned towards Billy, “Can you drive that thing, gunslinger?” he asked.
“I worked for Biloxi FD for ten years and wasn’t really a ladder guy, but yeah, I could probably get it down there to the bridge,” Billy said.
“Outstanding. Well, Top, get with 4th platoon. Leave two squads here to watch the Community Center but get the rest of the Road Dogs and go down to the bridge. I will follow while Mr. Harris here brings up the laddertruck. Sergeant Durham will gather as many of the local police as he can and meet us there,” Stone said.
“Hooah,” Reid said and walked off barking orders at the nearby MPs. He still had not spit.
««—»»
On the mainland foot of the nearly mile-long Dr. WC Holmes Bridge over the Intracoastal Waterway (ICW), Billy wheeled the ladder truck across its width from end to end. He had to use a 9-point turn to wedge the monstrous 40-foot Pierce diesel truck evenly across all six lanes. Below the tires of the truck, the waterway laid 70 feet below the bridge. He pulled the 35-ton beast’s nose to the interior wall of the bridge and killed the engine. Billy left the cab, dropped the outrigger supports, and cranked out the 100-foot ladder over the rear of the truck to close the final 30-foot gap between the truck’s tail and the bridge’s south wall. This allowed the ladder to be a giant arm that could be lifted to allow vehicles to pass through if needed, and then lowered again.
Spud jumped down from the rear cab of the fire apparatus wearing a found firefighter’s helmet. His handcuffs were now flapping from only one wrist. Durham had acknowledged that there was no one left at the police station to guard him and accepted his offer to tag along, but still refused to remove the handcuffs altogether.
They had found only a mechanic left at the fire station, all of the firefighters being out on calls or killed in the outbreak on the Town Green. The mechanic showed them the keys to the ladder truck but elected to remain locked inside the now empty station with a fire ax at his side. An orange-suited inmate with a neatly cleaved skull lay motionless in a growing pool of black blood in the station’s engine bay, testifying that the mechanic knew how to use the ax.
Leaning back against the laddertruck, Billy looked out over the highway headed north from the island. True to his orders, First Sergeant Reid had led a half-dozen other MPs and two hummers just ahead of the laddertruck to establish a roadblock. The two hummers were pulled together nose-to-nose in an inverted ‘V’. From each vehicle, an MP was sticking out of the roof like a gopher behind a mounted machinegun facing down the road and away from the bridge.
The sun was growing low in the sky over Billy’s left shoulder, and it would be dark soon enough. He tried the handheld radio inside the laddertruck’s cab in an effort to reach any other emergency vehicles that may be on the net but got only static and feedback.
Billy walked down the bridge from the truck to the hummers to see what else he could do. He wanted to get back to the Community Center and his daughter. Every minute he was away from there was a minute that Wyatt could be brought there. He walked into a conversation between Stone and his MPs.
“So what’s our load out look like, Top?” Stone asked.
“Well, I signed out a Beretta but I only have one mag worth of ammo. Between these four MPs we have: 3 NODs, 2 GPS, an empty 5 gallon water can, enough MREs for a week, radio batteries that aren’t for this radio, a pair of unloaded M240s, a pair of unloaded M4s, a shotgun with 9 slugs, and 3 Berettas with about 50-rounds of 9mm between them,” Reid replied.
“The TOC made contact with a Coast Guard cutter at Dauphin Island that is bringing us some ammo. All we gotta do is keep this bridge closed until they get here and it should be all good,” Stone said.
“Hell, I jumped into Grenada with less than this and we had to beat 1,500 Cubans there. We should be able to hold off the whole Red Army with what we got,” Reid said, patting the 82nd Airborne patch on his left right sleeve that denoted combat service with the unit. “It’s not like we have government funding or anything.”
Stone took note of Billy and Spud listening in on the conversation, “Don’t take First Sergeant Reid too seriously, Mr. Harris, he thinks the moon landings were faked and wrestling is real.”
“Time will tell on that moon bullshit,” Reid growled through the unfiltered pea gravel in his throat. The snuff in his mouth was just visible whenever he spoke.
“Spud and I are going to walk back to the Community Center from here, if that is alright, Captain.”
“Do you have any rounds left in that .38 of yours?” Stone asked.
“Four, it’s a five-shot, and well, I had to use one earlier,” Billy replied.
“It’s best you stay here in case we have to move the ladder on that truck to let someone in,” Stone said.
“I can show your guys how to do that, won’t take five minutes,” Billy argued. He was not feeling spending the night on the bridge, especially with these clowns.
“They will be too busy watching this TCP for now to run back there and open that ladder. Besides, I may need you and your little criminal friend here to help hold the line. After I get some more MPs up here, we can let you go. Looks like you are stuck for now, Mr. Harris.”
“Fuck that, I’m out of here,” Billy said. “The only army I was ever a part of was the Salvation Army, and that sucked.”
“Sorry, I can’t let you leave, it’s too dangerous right now. I appreciate your cooperation, Mr. Harris,” Stone said matter-of-factly.
Billy looked at the Captain and blinked. He did not need this. His son was missing. His daughter was huddled in a Community Center after seeing the unimaginable, and now this prick was kidnapping him. Nope, sorry.
“Look, I drove the thing down here for you, but I gotta go now. I have a son to find and a daughter to look after,” Billy said as he turned to walk away. Spud turned to follow him.
“Mr. Harris, what do you think is going to happen to the town if we don’t stop the infection here?” Stone called out.
Billy stopped and looked back, “We’ll be just fine.”
Stone shook his head and pointed down the highway beyond them. “I spent four years in officer training, and another four years on active duty before I transferred into the Guard. In Ir
aq, I fought my platoon through 20 ambushes. What most people see on this bridge is a pretty view over the Intracoastal Waterway. What I see is a natural choke point with good flank security. This is the only place we can stop Disease-K from getting into town.”
“I’m going back to my daughter,” Billy said.
“Mr. Harris, even if you do not want to listen to me think about what I am saying. We have to stop this and we have to win it here. If we don’t, there won’t be a single one of us left alive, your daughter included, by morning,” Stone yelled after the pair as they walked away.
Billy stopped walking at the ladder truck and he and Spud looked at each other.
“Looks like I tagged along just to go from the frying pan into the fire,” Spud said.
— | — | —
CHAPTER 16
The sun had fully set by the time the first stragglers had shown up at the bridge roadblock. The breeze from the waterway below them had made the checkpoint rather cool and Billy pulled a turnout coat from the rear cab of the laddertruck. He looked comical wearing it with his deck shoes and cargo shorts, but it was warm. It had been some time since he had worn NOMEX and leather that reeked of a house fire and it brought back memories.
In the distance, Billy could see flames arc into the sky both in isolated pinpricks on the island and the mainland. The orange glow licked at trees and he watched embers climb high into the sky, like Japanese paper lanterns, before burning out.
Billy and Spud had taken up the task of stopping traffic coming from the island trying to get to the mainland. Billy had turned on the light bar of the truck and its red and white strobes cast a lightning show across the waterway and reflected off the bridge itself.
Occasionally, they would have a lone car drive up with a family trying to leave the island, or a worker who lived on the mainland but had been trapped in town during the outbreak. Spud, still wearing his newfound fire helmet, took joy in leaning forward into the window of the vehicle and advising them in an official sounding statement that they were out after curfew before directing them back across the bridge to the Community Center.
He told Billy that it was the first honest job he ever had.
The MPs at the roadblock past the ladder truck stopped traffic from their end. They turned a dozen vehicles back and only let two, containing people who were uninfected and had identification that showed they lived on the island, pass through their roadblock. Billy could not help having a sinking feeling after each went under the raised ladder of the fire engine, wondering if they had messed up by letting them through.
Ominously, the electricity had blinked off around 9pm and all of the streetlights and storefronts down the highway plunged into darkness. Within a half hour, the MPs had opened fire on two infected that had run up to the roadblock from the darkness on foot. It was widely thought they were attracted to the lights.
The bodies of the two had been drug into the shallow culvert just off the side of the bridge. Reid had placed chemlights on them so their location would be obvious. The green glow of the light sticks seemed otherworldly, like souls hanging around the bodies, waiting for further directions.
Wearing their gas masks and hunkered behind their hummers, the six MPs barricaded themselves and stared down the dark highway in front of them.
From Gulf Shores behind them, a battered police car slowly drove with its blue lights flashing. Parking next to the laddertruck, the car door opened up and Durham stepped out from the driver’s seat. The bullet holes, blood, blown out windscreen, and windows verified it was the same car from the school that morning. A tarp thrown over the bloodstained seats flapped in the breeze through blown-out windows.
“How are things here on the northern front?” Durham asked.
“I’m still suing your ass,” Spud answered. “And don’t get rid of that car, it’s going to court with me.”
Durham ignored the short criminal and his stolen fire hat. “We heard shots from this direction, but we haven’t had a chance to send anyone ‘til now,” he explained to Billy.
“Spud and I haven’t shot anyone, but the MPs had to put down a couple fellas doing the Highway 59-Fun Run who didn’t want to stop,” Billy said.
“Everyone okay?” Durham asked.
“The two runners aren’t, but other than that, we are just hanging out digging the moon. I was thinking of walking down to the marina and grabbing my poles, see if I can snag a big red from up here,” Billy said.
“How’s everything in town?” Billy asked the police officer.
“Settled down some bit. We have about 500-people including my nana crowded into the Community Center, City Hall, and the Police Station. The gunshots seem to be dying down. Things are real sketchy and there are a few more infected running around the streets but we plan to send out teams at first light to clear them out,” Durham said.
“Any more news from the outside world?” Billy asked.
“Yes, actually, that is one of the reasons I came up here, but I should probably tell Captain America up there to keep from having to repeat this.”
Billy whistled and waved thirty feet away to Captain Stone who peered into the darkness through a pair of night vision goggles. The Captain handed the goggles to Reid and trotted up the bridge with an odd limp to the ladder truck to join the meeting. He removed his protective mask as he jogged.
“Good to see you again, Sergeant Durham, how is your department coming along?” Stone asked.
“We’ve found eleven of our officers dead so far and only have a few left standing. I wanted to bring everyone I could down here but honestly, I am about all that is left. Everyone else is out with your other MPs chasing shadows in the dark or helping to put out fires,” Durham explained.
“Have you had any commo with anyone off of the island?” Stone asked. Billy noticed that the captain for once did not have his wraparound sunglasses on.
“The telephone network is gone all together. The radios and TVs gave one last message then went to dead air. It’s of the new President giving his welcome address and saying we are at war with just about every country that has ever burned a US flag,” Durham said.
“We figured as much. Our TOC group at the armory gave us updates that some odd traffic has come through. They also say that word is you are the new police chief. So congrats on that,” Stone said.
“I’m still suing you, Chief, and your whole box of doughnuts,” Spud interjected.
“I don’t mean to interrupt you, sir, but we have contacts just under a click forward!” First Sergeant Reid barked out from the hummer roadblock, never taking his eyes from the night vision he watched the highway ahead through.
Stone and Durham started for the roadblock, followed by Billy and Spud. When they reached the hummer, Reid unhooked the device from the plastic mount on his helmet and then passed the night vision device, or NOD, down the line to the Captain who observed for a few seconds before passing them to Durham. The police officer soon handed them to Billy who stood nearby.
Billy peered through the rubber-cupped eyepieces of the NOD and tried to make sense of the green-washed scene down the highway from him. He could see a number of abandoned cars, a miniature golf course, and a few rows of dark storefronts. What looked like a marathon of two dozen shambling people was moving down the road right at them. He could see a bloom of bright white flare in the device each time the group was illuminated by the strobe of the ladder truck’s flashing lights. Each flash seemed to re-confirm that the group had Disease-K.
“Do you think they are infected?” Billy asked Reid as he passed the device to Spud.
“Well, I don’t think they are just a group of citizens out for a stroll. The blood stains and bullet holes rule them out of being a church group,” Reid replied.
Stone was busy talking into the radio about ammo and reinforcements. The four enlisted MPs were checking the magazines on their pistols and digging through the hummers for shovels. Reid continued watching the approaching group through the NOD retri
eved from Spud and muttered updates on the range every thirty seconds or so.
“600 meters…” Reid said to the group.
Stone was walking up to each of the MPs on the bridge and talking to them. He physically reached out and touched each solider on the shoulder and gave them their orders in quiet tones. “Blow anything to shit that you see between that tree and the ditch,” and, “Dust anything to the left of this bumper,” among others. “Lay your magazines out so that you can get to them without fumbling in your pouch.”
“So what’s the plan, Billy?” Spud asked the leather man.
“Come on,” Billy said as they walked back calmly to the laddertruck. He grabbed a flat-head axe from the tool compartment and handed it to Spud. Billy himself hefted a Halligan tool and then put it back in favor of a seven-pound yellow Denver tool. The Denver tool was a rugged device that looked like a Louisville Slugger with a 5-pound sledgehammer on one end and an industrial strength fireplace poker on the other. It was used in house fires to rip apart walls and ceilings. Billy figured it would do.
“I’m not really built to be Paul Bunyan, Billy,” Spud said, looking at the fire axe.
“And I’m not John Henry, but as a last resort, if they get back here, we have to be able to meet them with more than our dicks in our hands,” Billy said.
Spud nodded and looked back towards the hummers.
“500 meters,” Reid growled.
Billy noticed Spud climb up the side steps of the truck and stand on the top of the cab. With the outriggers out the truck was a good two feet higher in the air than normal. Billy resisted the strong urge to find a hiding spot next to Spud and remained on the ground.
Billy noticed Durham walk past him back towards his car.
“Getting my shotgun, I’ll be right back,” the police sergeant explained as he passed within a foot of Billy.
Last Stand on Zombie Island Page 9
