“Have at it, soldier.”
Lewis held up the tan MRE packet. “Sir, you don’t mind?”
Kinnick shook his head. These men never ceased to amaze him. Lewis shoveled the food into his mouth like it was his last meal.
Kinnick picked up the receiver. “This is Kinnick,” he said.
“Kinnick, this is Travis.”
“Good to hear your voice, sir,” he said.
“Yours as well. We received a communiqué from NORTHCOM stating that the Pittsburgh Quarantine has failed; multiple bases have been overrun.” General Travis had a few less pieces on his United States chess board. “Remaining units are being instructed to retreat west.”
Relief for the Pentagon just got a little further away.
“Yes sir,” Kinnick said, a bit softer.
“This is the important part: The CO of the Pittsburgh quarantine, Colonel Jackson, stated that he is moving west with a group of civilians. He has commandeered an airport mobile lounge from those civilians,” General Travis said.
Another commander disregarding orders on treatment of civilians.
“The communiqué states that Colonel Jackson has a civilian doctor in his group, a doctor from Mount Eden. This might be our guy. I need you to get to Pittsburgh ASAP. Quarantine Base Rattlesnake is their last known location. We can’t get them on the line so you are going to need to get a visual on them.”
“Yes, sir. We are moving now,” Kinnick said.
“And Colonel.”
“Yes.”
“Stay alive out there.”
“I will do my best, sir.”
“That is all we can ask. Find the doctor.”
“Copy that, General, sir.”
Master Sergeant Hunter stood nearby, catching bits and pieces of the conversation, hands resting on the butt of his slung M4. His beard pressed to his chest.
“Master Sergeant. We need to be operational in twenty mikes; we got a hit on our guy,” Kinnick said.
Master Sergeant Hunter smiled through his thick beard. “Yes, sir. All right men, you heard the colonel. Let’s make this party mobile.”
The men geared up, hustling from helicopter to helicopter. How in the hell did that doctor get to Pittsburgh? Kinnick thought.
Kinnick had almost forgotten the sickly thin girl sitting on the edge of the helicopter, blanket wrapped around her narrow shoulders. She gripped it tight as if she would never part from it. Natalie Berman. She was Representative Berman’s daughter. Twenty-one years old. Senior at Georgetown University. Biology major.
Kinnick had to make a decision that would dictate whether she lived or died. Follow orders and leave her here for rescue, meaning she would certainly die. In fact, he would be so responsible, he might as well just shoot her in the head now and get it over with. It was a mercy compared to the suffering she had been through, and the suffering she would surely endure at the hands of the infected. Although Kinnick had space onboard the helos, she was a non-mission priority. Civilians were collateral damage. Their safety was the lowest priority. Can I leave her in good conscience?
“Natalie. Everything is going to be okay,” he said. She looked at him with a thousand-yard stare, her eyes never focusing on one thing. She could have been pretty once, but now she just looked like a mangy scared rat. He patted her shoulder, trying to be comforting, and she flinched under his touch. He pulled his hand away, saddened. He waved Master Sergeant Hunter over.
“We have space for her, right?” he said.
“Mission priorities state that we are not to aid civilians if it endangers our mission in any way, sir,” Master Sergeant Hunter said, standing in a relaxed yet aggressive stance.
“Master Sergeant Hunter, do you think that she will jeopardize our mission?” he said.
“Sir. If she makes one of my guys a half-second slower than he needs to be she could jeopardize the mission, but at this point, there is not much left to jeopardize. I know this is a wild fucking pig hunt out here. I do not expect to come back alive. Sins and Skins,” Master Sergeant Hunter said.
Kinnick nodded. Things were plain for Master Sergeant Hunter. Get the job done. Follow protocol when it was needed. Don’t follow it when it wasn’t necessary. Give your life if needed and hope it meant something. Or just be a soldier of fortune. Kinnick’s job was to see the bigger picture. Keep Master Sergeant Hunter and his men pointed in the right direction. Although, at this point, any direction would do. Enemies were everywhere.
“Good, she is riding with us then,” he said.
After Kinnick had Master Sergeant Hunter redistribute his men across the helos, they reached Pittsburgh in less than two hours. In just enough time to find the bases along the outside of the city overrun.
Quarantine Base Cobra was burnt to the ground. QB Adder was overrun. They hovered over QB Boa for fifteen minutes thinking they saw signs of the living, but nothing came of it. They circled the city, looking for signs of life. Things moved, but none of them were alive.
“Master sergeant, can we get a comm link with any of the bases below,” Kinnick asked.
“No links coming up, sir.”
“Keep searching. Somebody has to be alive down there.”
“What do you think about setting down at QB Rattlesnake? It’s atop Mount Washington,” Kinnick asked his NCO.
Master Sergeant Hunter took a moment to put a large pinch of chew into his cheek and spit the residual long cut from his mouth. He tapped Sergeant Lewis’s big shoulder and he turned, taking the tin.
“I wouldn’t put down in the middle of those Zulus if I had too. There is no real good way to do it. That is my honest opinion, sir,” Master Sergeant Hunter said. Kinnick nodded. He understood the man. He couldn’t see anything good happening from setting down either.
“But, we will, if you order us to, and I will make sure we come out alive,” Master Sergeant Hunter said with a smirk. “But Lewis over there,” he pointed at the bear man leaning off the side of the chopper, “I’m pretty sure he won’t make it,” he said.
“Fuck off, you little rabbit turd,” Lewis shouted back. “They can take my gun from my dead lifeless fingers.”
Kinnick stared at the abandoned city below. His men were the problem solvers at a micro level. Speed, surprise, and aggression. The only problem was that he didn’t have an infinite number of these honorable warriors to toss into the meat grinder. Even if he did, for every man he lost, it added to the enemy’s ranks. He wasn’t going to lose more men over a pointless search.
“Let’s take these birds north of Pittsburgh to Coraopolis. Refuel and search again.”
The pilots turned the birds north, leaving the City of Bridges behind.
Master Sergeant Hunter gave him a wave, his gloved hand pointing down below. “Crockett is reporting a civilian watercraft running on the river,” he said.
“How are we on fuel?”
“Got enough for a few passes,” the pilot voice echoed in his headset.
“Good. Send Crockett up to Coraopolis to refuel and we will swing in and take a look at our amphibious friends,” Kinnick said.
“Roger that, Crockett out,” the pilot crackled in his mic.
Kinnick felt the pilot tilt the chopper slightly downwards and they began their descent. His gut dropped like a dip on a roller coaster ride. He hated that feeling and tightened his harness.
STEELE
Monongahela River, Pittsburgh, PA
Steele tightened his pack to his shoulders, pulling down hard on the shoulder straps. The pack was light. It only held a long length of rope, some extra mags, and some water. He strapped his M4 carbine across his back and tapped the handle of his tomahawk to make sure it was there. He was bootless, opting for climbing the pillar barefoot.
The saviors of the West sat before him. Ahmed, a twenty-something, former collegiate baseball player, held his arm in a crappy sling. EOD Specialist Barnes, an old timer with a big belly hanging over his belt, pulled at the furry mustache on his lip. Everything hinges on u
s.
“Make sure to secure that rope to something heavy at the top. I will send up the explosives, and then I will follow up,” Barnes said. The boat rocked slightly in the water. The thrashing of the infected had died down, and bodies that had once writhed now lay still.
“I will see you two SOBs later,” Steele said. He stepped out of the boat and hugged the wall. The bridge had been built using large indented stone blocks making climbing an easier task. His fingers dug into the cracks, and he was off at a snail’s pace.
After two minutes of struggling, Barnes shouted at him. “Christ, boy. If you move any slower I may die of old age by the time you reach the top.”
“Is that a promise?” Steele grunted down at him.
“No. I come from a long line of centenarians.”
Steele looked down at the man burning a cigarette between his teeth. Still close enough that if he fell, he didn’t think it would hurt, as long as he landed in the water. Barnes gave him a little wave, shooing him up the pillar. Nice and easy, Steele. No point in falling and having to start over again.
About halfway, his fingers began to cramp. He flexed his fatigued hands one at a time and chanced a look downward. He immediately regretted it. The water seemed to be infinitely far away, and he felt like he couldn’t get close enough to the concrete. His heartbeat hammered in his chest. Heights were one of his greatest fears.
Steele hated roller coasters. He hated climbing ladders, yet here he was free-climbing a bridge pillar. He took deep breaths, but it only seemed to heighten his state of panic. He would have to climb down and have Barnes do the initial climb. It was the only way. His feet locked into place, frozen mid-climb. Every tiny breeze threatened to blow him off the pillar. He gripped tighter, and his toes curled, unable to go up or down.
“You chicken shit. Come on, climb,” Steele whispered to himself. I can’t. I can’t do it. He hugged the rock close, feeling the sturdiness of the structure beneath his skin. He knew Barnes and Ahmed watched him, but even the pressure to help them and their mission was easily dismissed in his mind.
Steele closed his eyes and rested his face on the cool rock. The faint splashes of the dead reached his ears. The moans of the dead above him pushed down onto his ears. He tried to clear his mind. He centered his thoughts and they formed into a portrait of Gwen. Not Apocalypse Gwen, but Gwen from before. Blonde hair hung around her shoulders. Her lips curved up into a smile. Her eyes twinkled like she knew a joke that only she had the answer to.
“Come to me,” she whispered. He let her fade, finding strength in her.
It struck him deep inside. If he wanted to see her again, he would have to do this. The only choice was up. He had to make it to the top. Not only Gwen depended on him, but the men below depended on him. Colonel Jackson was depending on him. Hundreds, no, thousands of lives depended on him getting to the top, and planting the charges, that would blow the bridges. No more looking back. Steele focused on the steel girders crossing the bottom of the double decker highway bridge.
He ignored the wind that threatened to blow him off as it tugged at his hair, clothes, and pack, sending his M4 tossing and turning on his back like it was having a sleepless night. His body couldn’t ignore the wind as it made his wet clothes chilled. His limbs shook as he pushed them onward.
Hand over hand, he crawled to the top of the pillar. He crouched at the top, on a foot-wide ledge where the bridge attached to the pillar. He caught his breath and would not turn around; not wanting to risk freezing up again.
Inches from his head, a maintenance hatch to the highway swung loosely open. It screeched back and forth in the wind. May as well be a tornado siren. Steele gazed through the opening, waiting for threats. Nothing waited above, but he could hear them.
Moans pricked his ears. It was eerie to hear the dead human voices, but no other sounds of the city. No rumbles of traffic or honking of horns. A couple hundred feet in the air, with no option of retreat, the sound had a particular “pucker effect” on Steele. Must be quiet, no place for gung-ho heroes here.
He grabbed a rung of the ladder one hand at a time until he reached the hatch. He inched his head above the hatch, steeling himself for anything. The bottom highway lay dark and abandoned, untouched by either car lights or sunlight. The cars stood rigid, recreating their owners’ final attempted flight from the city, like an old black and white photo. They were in a junkyard motorcade.
All the vehicles were pointed the same way, attempting to escape through the Fort Penn Tunnel that led out of Pittsburgh and through Mount Washington. Safety lay only through the mountain. He wondered how many people made it through the tunnel before it was closed. All of these people had been trapped until the infected came for them, knowing full well that freedom was just on the other side of the mountain.
Steele quietly slipped himself over and up onto the bridge, bringing his carbine up to his shoulder as he scanned for infected. Maybe having a bunch of the bastards jump into the water wasn’t such a bad thing. He moved to a crouch, still scanning, and stood up further, using the cars as cover. Heads bounced into and out of view in the distance. Good for right now. Bad for planting the charges.
He quickly tied the rope around a steel girder, ensured the knot was secured tightly, and threw it down to the boat. That way they wouldn’t lose the cargo if he dropped it, or if Barnes fell. The rope tugged taut, and Steele hauled as quiet and fast as he could manage. Keeping his back against an abandoned coupe, he watched every-way possible, aside from down. Hand over hand he heaved until the pack reached the top. He untied the knot and tossed the rope back down to Barnes and waited. Steele watched the infected near a break in the bridge, almost fifty yards away. Someone had driven a car through, or someone drove them through the railing. Five minutes ticked away. Where is the old bastard? Steele glanced down the hatch. A beet-red face looked up at him, cursing and shaking his head.
“Hurry up. I thought I was slow,” Steele hoarsely whispered down. The portly man continued his slower than death pace. A piece of car wreckage clanked nearby.
Steele looked down his optics in the direction the noise had come from. Fuck. What did that? Nothing moved. Steele could always feel it like a sixth sense when something or someone watched him.
Barnes pulled himself through the hatch, pushing his tactical girth onto the concrete.
Steele lowered his carbine. “What took you so long?”
Barnes panted on the ground. “Did. You. See. How. Far that was? I haven’t had to work that hard since the nineties. When you were chasing little Timmy around the schoolyard.” Barnes pushed himself off the concrete with a smile.
“Fuck off, Barnes,” Steele whispered back.
“Just saying, boy. Your generation doesn’t know what it’s like to be a man. You guys are all so metro.”
“Do you even know what ‘metro’ means?” Steele whispered.
“Yeah, of course. You like guys and girl stuff,” Barnes breathed.
“Jesus, Barnes. Just worry about the explosives. I’ll deal with any metrosexuals we run into.”
“That sounds perfect. You do have the experience.” Barnes grinned beneath his caterpillar mustache and collected his pack of goodies.
Steele had grown used to the fact that this man was going to call him boy for the rest of their lives, which Steele conceded at this point was probably going to be very short.
“We gotta make our way to about there. About thirty yards past that hole in the railing.” Barnes pointed. It was a long way through a maze of crushed metal and bodies. The last thing Steele wanted to do was fight his way back to the hatch.
“In and out before they know we were here,” Barnes said, licking his lips.
“I agree,” Steele said.
Scccrape. Scccrape. Sccccrape. Something dragged itself in their direction.
“Shit, should we take it out? Barnes said.
“No, let it pass,” Steele said. He pointed to a car with an open door nearby. They edged over and crawled i
n. Steele slowly reclined the seat to keep out of view. Barnes pulled a checkered blanket over himself from the backseat. An undead woman fell onto the hood, intoxicated with infection. Steele didn’t move. He held his breath. Long matted hair hung down, shoulder length. Its lips and mouth were worn away from the constant feeding, revealing rotting yellow teeth. Its body was covered in black, festering wounds. It clearly had taken a round through the shoulder recently as its arm hung in a black coagulated bloody mess.
The infected let out a falsetto moan. Steele rested his hand on the hilt of his knife. They were going to be screwed if this bastard drew attention to them. The infected smeared its functioning hand across the window, leaving a muddy, bloody handprint. Its dull cloud-like eyes ogled Steele. Keep moving. You nasty bitch. I’m not the piece of meat you are looking for. She stumbled off the hood and struggled away. The tension faded from the car. When the scraping became less audible, they exited.
Steele left the door open for fear that the sound would draw it back. He put a knee on the pavement, covering Barnes as he grunted his way out of the backseat.
“You should have gone in the back. It wasn’t made for a man of my stature,” Barnes mumbled.
“Lay off the candy bars,” Steele whispered back at him. Barnes humphed behind him. Steele slung his carbine and loosened the tomahawk from his belt. He stepped gingerly, knowing that a wrong sound could send a hundred infected upon him in a moment. They threaded in and out of the abandoned cars like fancy stitching on a quilt of car patches.
Cars had been rammed into rails, front ends crumpling, back ends smashed in by other cars. Some doors were open, the remnants of the occupants strewn about the ground. Haphazardly collected supplies and trash were thrown about the highway bridge. Holding their close combat weapons ready, they kept low, backs bent like they stalked deer in an urban forest. Steele stopped and ducked behind a white SUV near the middle of the bridge where Barnes joined him.
Barnes let out a heavy sigh. “I need you to watch my back while I set up the charges on the support beams.”
The End Time Saga Box Set [Books 1-3] Page 61
