by J. W. Vohs
Anderson nodded, “All right, I’ll give the orders. I’ll be up there too, on the edge of this car. Try to stay where I can communicate with you during the fighting.”
Carter shouted, “Got it. Give ‘em hell.”
All of the Indiana soldiers were fully engaged with the infected by the time Carter climbed up and assumed a position at the far right, within shouting distance of Anderson’s position. A small pile of corpses already surrounded the train, and thousands more infected were gathering behind the front line. Carter noticed that there were zombies and other creatures at different stages of the viral evolution mixed in with the crowd, but the vast majority of the attacking force were full-fledged hunters. Less than twenty yards away one of the Utah men held onto his pike just a moment too long after a gigantic hunter had grabbed the other end and pulled hard on the shaft. The unfortunate soldier toppled into the mass of monsters below and screamed for nearly two minutes as the flesh-eaters tore him apart and devoured pieces of him as he still thrashed mindlessly about.
The death reminded Carter of why he was up there, and he casually knelt down on the roof of the boxcar and began spearing the infected in the face with a long pike he’d grabbed from the piles he’d had stored before leaving home. Twice in the first hour he’d had to let go of his weapon when a powerful hunter had grabbed it and tried to pull him from his position. Each time he’d found another lying in the long box The Castle’s fighters had filled with pikes before their departure, but the number of weapons was rapidly declining as more and more of the soldiers lost them to the creatures below.
Carter knew that one of his people had either fallen or been pulled into the horde, the abrupt ending of his screams finally indicating that he was dead, and another of the Utah fighters had gone down as well. Everyone was growing tired as the piles of dead at the base of the train continued to grow. Wielding the long, heavy pikes for lengthy stretches of time was a difficult way to fight, and the more experienced soldiers kept switching their weapons from side to side as the battle dragged on.
Shouts from a place on one of the Utah cars were quickly followed by another round of horrific screams, indicating that at least one more soldier had fallen. Carter looked over toward Hyrum, who after receiving a report from one of his men shouted above the noise of the battle, “One of those bastards was able to jump from a pile of corpses and pull one of our soldiers off the roof by the ankle. Should I order my people back down into the cars yet?”
“No!” Carter yelled back. “Just move ‘em away from the edges for now. Ya’ll know when ya can’t hold ‘em anymore.”
Anderson flashed a thumbs up to indicate that he understood, so Carter did a quick tour around his own car and looked over the second one as well. Just as with the big fight at The Castle nearly three months earlier, the corpses of the infected were piling up and being used as fighting platforms for the following waves of attackers. He didn’t have a great eye for numbers, but John did, so he moved to the side of his former CO and asked, “How many are still alive?”
John pulled his pike up from the gore below his position and took a long look around the area. “I can’t be sure, but I’d guess there’s still four or five thousand out there, and I don’t think we’ve killed that many yet. This horde’s almost as big as the one we fought at The Castle, and a hell of a lot more dangerous. We just lost another man off the rear car who must have been unconscious before he hit the ground; I didn’t hear any screams before Rickers yelled over to tell me about it.”
Carter just shook his head for a moment and frowned, “Ya got any ideas for gettin’ us outta this mess?”
John immediately asked, “Can we back away from them?”
Carter looked shocked, “Aw hell, I didn’t even think of that.”
“It just entered my mind too. Why don’t you go see what the situation is down there; ask Simmons what he thinks.”
Carter nodded, “Keep a close eye on the Utah crew. They only have two hatches on each car and we can’t let ‘em get trapped up there.”
“I got it; you go figure out a way to get us outta here.”
After leaving John, Carter returned to his position next to Anderson and shouted out his need to know what was going on in the forward locomotive, warning him to have plenty of security when crossing the exposed areas above the couplings. A few minutes later the Utah commander was back at his post, and even across the gap between the cars Carter could see that he was ashen-faced.
“All the engineers are dead,” Anderson shouted. “Nothing but blood smears and a few scraps of clothing in the locomotive. I don’t know if they tried to get back to us or opened the door for some other reason, but the hunters got in there and killed ‘em.”
Carter was shaken at the news. Two of his folks were in the front locomotive, but Simmons had been with the rear engine when they’d plowed into the massive gathering of infected. He yelled across to Anderson, “I’ll go down and check the rear locomotive. Maybe they’re still alive.”
Anderson nodded and returned his attention back to the attack taking place all around his position. Carter scrambled down into the deserted boxcar and quietly made his way across the coupling leading into the second Indiana troop carrier. Zach Kinstler was inside, sitting with his back against the wall and quaffing water.
“Ya’ll okay?” Carter asked the fierce teen.
Zach nodded before explaining, “Got dizzy-headed and knew I was dehydrated; had to take a break before I fell over the side. The hunters are almost up to us, you know? What’re we gonna do then?”
Carter shrugged as he quickly crossed the car, calling out over his shoulder, “I’ll think of somethin’.”
Once again he was able to make it across the coupling, this time entering the rear locomotive with a great deal of apprehension over what he might find there. He was relieved to find Ted Simmons shouting out orders to three other railroad-men, all of them spearing infected from the small windows in the cab. The tough old Marine touched his cap and grinned, “Hey sergeant, how’s everyone doing up there?”
We’re holdin’ our own, Ted, but we got big problems creepin’ up on us real fast.”
“The dead are piling up again, aren’t they? Just like the Battle of the Castle?”
“Yep,” Carter nodded. “In less’n an hour we’re all gonna be cooped up in the cars with no way out.”
Simmons frowned but said nothing as Carter continued, “And I got some really bad news for ya too. All the men in the front locomotive are dead; the hunters got ‘em.”
“Oh, hell,” Simmons muttered. “They open the door or something?”
Carter just shrugged, “Probably, but we don’t know fer sure. Listen, Ted, any chance ya can fire up this engine and back us up?”
Simmons thought for a long moment before replying, “Well, yeah, but they’re all over us. If enough of ‘em pile up behind the locomotive they’re gonna stop us again, just like they did a few hours ago up front.”
Carter reassured him, “Just back us up a few hundred feet, so these critters ain’t got piles of dead to climb up and reach us. Still gonna take all our strength to kill ‘em all, but at least we won’t get trapped in the boxcars.”
Simmons nodded, “You’re right. We’ll fire her up and I’ll hit the whistle a few times so all you folks up top can grab ahold of something before we start moving.”
Carter gave a slight smile, “That’ll work, Ted.”
After returning to the top of the train and telling his squad leaders to spread the word about the new plan, Carter trotted over and shouted instructions to Hyrum Anderson. The leader of the Utah troops looked incredibly relieved, as two more of his fighters had gone over the edge in the last ten minutes. Everyone kept on fighting until they heard the whistle blow, then the soldiers grabbed the hatches and anything else to hold them on top of the boxcars as the train slowly inched it’s way backward. Carter felt like laughing aloud he was so happy to see the plan working, when suddenly a hunter leapt atop
the car about twenty feet away.
The soldiers who saw the creature drew weapons with one hand, but didn’t let go of whatever hold they had on the train while it was moving. Carter immediately saw that his people were in danger, doubting that short swords wielded by exhausted, one-handed fighters would keep the determined hunter from grabbing a leg and pulling somebody down into the horde below. Against every instinct for self- preservation, Carter climbed to his feet, pulled his mace, and stumbled toward the creature that already had a death grip on Maddy Johnson’s ankle in spite of the repeated slashes she was landing around his head and neck. She just couldn’t find the leverage to thrust the tip of the blade into the hunter’s head.
The train lurched with a sudden burst of speed, causing Carter to stumble right into the monster and knocking both of them down to the roof of the car. Carter’s training instantly kicked in and he let go of the mace to draw his dagger. He could tell that he and the monster were sliding toward the edge, but he concentrated on shoving the blade up under the hunter’s chin, through the soft palate, and finally into the lower half of the brain. The beast stopped moving but still had both hands clenched into the leather of Carter’s jacket as the train lurched yet again, sending the dead hunter’s corpse toppling over the edge of the roof. Carter was sure he was a goner, but Maddy and someone he couldn’t recognize through a helmet had both grabbed ahold of his legs and wouldn’t let go.
Agonizing seconds passed as Carter hung suspended over the crowd of frenzied hunters chasing the train and repeatedly jumping toward him in an effort to pull him the rest of the way down to where they could get at him. Finally, mercifully, the train slowed to a halt and several other soldiers crawled over and helped to pull Carter the rest of the way back up onto the roof. For several minutes he and the others lay gasping as the rest of the fighters picked up their weapons and resumed the battle. As the shaking in his limbs finally stopped somebody passed him a water bottle and he took a long pull on it, followed a few seconds later by an even bigger drink. He wiped his mouth with the back of his glove, muttered, “thanks” to the people who’d just saved his life, and returned to his post next to the Utah commander.
With the train pulled back from the scene of the day’s fighting, the soldiers had a new lease on life. Thousands of hunters were still coming at them, but even they seemed to sense that their opportunity for victory was now gone. Twice during the long afternoon helicopters buzzed the battlefield, and each time they passed new packs of hunters would soon straggle out of the surrounding countryside to join the attack. The men and women fighting for their lives from the tops of the boxcars didn’t have much time to notice the correlation between the choppers and reinforcements, but Carter and most of the other professional soldiers realized that there seemed to be some sort of connection. Nevertheless, with long hours of combat still ahead of them they had no chance to discuss anything about the situation beyond the occasional shouted command or call for help.
As the sun was finally setting on the day-long battle, the last of the hunters seemed to realize the futility of their suicidal assault and faded away into the growing dusk. Five more soldiers, all of them from Utah, had died in the fighting following the movement of the train. Carter sat dazed and exhausted on the roof of his boxcar, mindlessly nibbling a granola bar. He finally noticed the awful odor wafting up from the ground around the train, and looked with newfound disgust at his gore-encrusted leather armor. Suddenly even the thought of taking another bite of his snack made him gag, and he tossed the remainder away as if it was some sort of stinging insect.
He slowly stood up and took a long look around the area, finally deciding that at least ten thousand infected corpses littered the ground in huge piles. He didn’t have the final toll of killed and wounded among the humans, but as with The Battle of the Castle, to say that this contest had been one-sided would be an understatement of epic proportions. Of course, if Simmons hadn’t been able to move the train when he did the outcome of today’s battle might have been completely different. But the bottom line, Carter realized, was that he and Hyrum Anderson had brought their forces through one of the largest attacks since the outbreak began, and they would likely live to brag about it.
After telling his squad leaders to make sure everyone ate something and rehydrated, Carter met with Anderson to discuss their next move. Ted Simmons was present to offer perspective on the railroad situation. The old man listened politely for a moment before interrupting the two commanders’ musings over the day’s events. “We have to clear the track of corpses before we can move forward, and I think the sooner the better.”
Remembering his final view of the battlefield as the last rays of the sun had faded away, Carter asked, “Any chance we can just go back the way we came and take a different track home?”
Simmons shrugged, “Well, yeah, there’s always a chance we could do that, but I wouldn’t advise it unless there’s just no other alternative. I mean, we had some mighty good luck on the way out here. The switches were where we needed them to be, the track was in good condition, none of the bridges were out; hell, there’s so many things that could be wrong on America’s tracks right now you wouldn’t believe it. We know we’re clear all the way home if we stay on this line, trying to find a different route presents all kinds of problems that are worse than clearing the tracks ahead of us.”
Anderson offered his opinion, “Carter, there can’t be too many corpses on the tracks. All we have to do is clear a path for the locomotive and be on our way; it’s not like we need to move all of the dead infected lying out there.”
“The sooner the better,” John’s voice boomed out as he and Tina joined the small conference. “We just killed most of the hunters that existed in this area for miles around, maybe more than twenty square miles. Plus, those helicopters haven’t attempted to contact or help us in any way. They’re always around when the hunters bunch up into these massive groups. Could just be government elements monitoring a new stage in the evolution of how the virus affects the infected, or, and I know this sounds crazy, somebody might have learned how to attract and direct massive numbers of hunters with those choppers and they’re leading them in our direction. Regardless, we don’t want to give the hunters an opportunity to regroup here, or any chopper-conspiracy a chance to gather a new army somewhere ahead of us.”
Everyone was silent for a moment until Carter nodded and said, “Ya gotta coupla good points sir. Hyrum, let’s get our people organized. Snipers up top and four squads of security folks a hundred meters from the tracks in each direction. I’ll lead my people out to clear the corpses. Everyone else needs to stay geared up and on alert in case we run into trouble out there, but I don’t wanna wait another minute to get movin’ on this. I gotta feelin’ the LT’s right; he usually was when we were fightin’ in the Middle East. Let’s do it.”
An hour later everything was in place and Carter led twenty of his soldiers out to remove the mangled corpses from the tracks. Everyone involved carried weapons and wore NVGs, and the Utah troops had set up a security cordon with the same gear. Carter had no idea how thousands of infected had mindlessly attacked all day long only for the survivors to disappear without a trace, but he was thankful that not a single hunter showed up to bother the clean-up crew as they completed their grisly task. In the end there really weren’t that many corpses actually blocking the tracks, and in less than half an hour the way was clear for the locomotive to pull the expedition away from the battlefield. As soon as everyone was aboard and accounted for Carter looked over at Ted Simmons, who had remained with the Indiana troops during the clean-up, and commanded, “Take us home old-timer.”
Chapter 15
The train pulled directly into Albion the following afternoon, a clear day with a coolness in the air that reminded everyone that the harvest was near. The guards to the west and south of The Castle had heard the locomotive approaching the area and called in the information to the command center. Andi was monitoring the radios wh
ile Deb dozed in a nearby chair that she had occupied for the last twenty-four hours as she waited for more information about her husband. Now certain that the locomotive was approaching, Andi promptly sent a message out to the training yard where Jack was teaching a group of young teens how to kill the infected with the least risk to themselves. Jack immediately dismissed the kids and rushed to join his fiancé in the motor pool where she and Deb were waiting in an idling Jeep. After a quick word with the guard commander he jumped into the passenger seat as Andi gunned the accelerator.
Ten minutes after the trio arrived at the tracks in the middle of town they heard the train approaching from the west, and not long after that they watched the locomotive roll slowly into Albion. They all waved when they saw Carter hanging out from an open door, but the tall, lean soldier was only looking at his wife as he drew closer to the small group of people waiting to welcome the retuning force. Carter hopped off the boxcar as it slowed to a halt, nodding once to Deb before turning to help the fighters under his command climb down wearily from the blood-spattered train and make their way over to the trucks waiting to carry them the rest of the way home. A list of the dead had been sent back to The Castle over the radio a few hours after the fight the day before, and now Jack and the others could see that many of the remaining soldiers were limping and nursing a host of injuries ranging from sprains to concussions.
Vickie helped guide a crippled soldier into the waiting arms of medical volunteers, then she looked up in search of her husband. Sal was easy to spot, towering above the group of teens he’d organized to unload the supplies and equipment bound for the infirmary. When he saw his wife, he rushed forward and scooped her off the train. Though she assured him that she was fine and could walk to the trucks unassisted, he refused to put her down until they reached one of the vehicles. There were tears in his eyes as he released her from his embrace and choked out, “We missed you so much . . .” Just then Josh and Manny came tumbling over the seat whooping and shouting and clamoring for their mother’s lap.
