by Mike Staton
“What’ve you got?” Kat crept up next to Judith’s tree to take a peek for herself.
“Camp of some sort.” Judith shifted to the side to make room for Kat.
They lay at the crest of a small hill; more a bump in the terrain than anything. Below them rested a pretty traditional campsite. Several olive drab tents were set up around a stone fire pit. A blackened, metal grate rested over the fire pit. Several small, shallow trenches had been dug just beyond the tree line. Kat assumed the trenches were latrines for whomever resided at the campsite. A blocky red and black generator sat next to the middle tent with cords running under the side and into the interior.
She felt fairly certain that the generator wasn’t running as, while they were distant, she thought she’d be able to hear it. “Know how to use this?”
“We all went through rifle and pistol training with Karl.” Judith took the .22 from her.
“I take it you remember then?” Kat’s question was rhetorical as she swept Gloria off her backside and brought it to a proper firing position. She eased it into her shoulder. “Seen anyone that might catch a reflection off my scope?”
“Huh uh. Not a soul.” Judith mirrored Kat as she brought the .22 up to her shoulder and sighted down the iron sights.
Kat made a quiet noise of affirmation and plucked the caps from her scope. She sighted down on the camp, using the optics to get a close up view. She swept her magnified view of the camp over the tents. A brief breeze ruffled a flap, but no other movement announced anyone in the area. She took a few minutes patiently scouting the campsite. Her distant investigation revealed a set of tire tracks that wove away from the camp between trees that seemed barely wide enough to fit the vehicle. After she’d finished, she let out a soft sigh.
“Unless someone’s sleepin’ in a tent right now, this place is a ghost town.” Kat looked at Judith. “You want to tell Percival or shall I?”
“I’ll keep watch. You go.” Judith turned back to looking down the hill at the camp.
Kat nodded. “Treat my .22 with respect.”
Judith nodded once.
Kat backed away from the position. Once she’d belly crawled away from the tiny crest, she slowly rose to a low crouch and duckwalked back to Percival’s position. She dropped back to a prone position when she got up next to him.
“What’s up?” Percival lifted his visor.
Kat relayed what she’d seen. “And there doesn’t seem to be anyone home.”
“Could be they’re out on patrol or down in Valentine mucking things up.” Percival’s helmeted head swung from Kat to Samuel and back.
“Or hiding in the tents. It’s not exactly warm out. But the fire pit’s dead. No smoke or embers I could see.” Kat shook her head. “Too many unknowns.”
Percival nodded. “And no outside information.”
Kat nodded in agreement. “Thoughts?”
“Dangerous. I can go down and check it out,” Samuel whispered.
“Too dangerous for you to go alone.” Percival looked at him.
“Even with me watching through my glasses,” Kat added.
“That would be the point of my volunteering. You’re still important and valuable.”
“So’re you.”
“And we’re not having this discussion as I’ve already said ‘no.’” Percival’s words held a rod of steel that told her he wasn’t going to flex on the matter. Samuel apparently heard it as well as he dropped the subject. “We need more information. Think we’d get it from your radio?”
Kat shook her head. “Not really. Well, maybe. But it’d be patchy and unlikely and using it might clue them in that we’re here. If they’re listening to our frequency. I mean, it ain’t exactly secure.”
Percival nodded once more. “And it’d be a crapshoot to try and catch their transmissions.”
“If they’re piping anything out at all in the first place.” Kat shook her head. If they knew where to listen and the enemy were squawking it’d be useful, but there were far too many unknowns. She licked her lips and started to say something. She cut herself off as she noticed Krista approaching.
She tipped her head toward the approaching woman. Percival’s helmet swung and rocked in a nodding fashion. They waited silently until Krista joined them.
“Sitrep?” Krista lowered her tiny frame into a crouch by the nearest tree. Her head remained on a swivel. “Why’re we stopped?”
“Campsite.” Kat relayed her report of the site. “Judith’s keeping an eye on it. Was quiet when I looked at it.”
Krista nodded. The flight helmet made it impossible to read what was going through her head. “Follow me. All of you. There’s nothing behind us, conspicuously empty woods. Leads me to believe they’re ahead of us.”
Kat nodded. She glanced at Percival and Samuel. They weren’t the quietest of people, but if Krista wanted everyone to move forward. “I’ll take point.”
Krista waved her forward.
Kat popped off her belly and moved at a low crouch up to the edge of the small crest in the hill. She dropped back to her prone position and crawled up next to Judith. “Anything?”
“Huh uh. Just as silent. Who’s with you?” Judith didn’t look away from the camp.
“Everybody.”
“Have you seen anything?” Krista asked as she crawled up next to Judith.
“Am I to answer that now or should I simply wait for everyone to get in range to hear me say ‘nothin’’ again?”
“I don’t need any snark,” Krista answered. “Percival, you’re with me. We’ll sweep around right and approach cautiously. Judith you’re with Samuel. Sweep left and move in at the same time. Kat, you cover us from here. Judith, hide her before you set out.”
Kat nodded and took out her spare magazines for the .22. She passed them to Judith before spreading out into a proper shooting position and waiting.
A few tense seconds passed before she heard soft sounds of affirmation from the others. She heard a single set of rustling footsteps move away from her. She assumed they belonged to Percival. A heartbeat later and she felt Judith moving assorted underbrush over her.
The seconds dragged by, feeling more like minutes that turned into lifetimes before Judith and Samuel’s footfalls receded from her position.
She took deep, even breaths and kept an eye on the campsite as a whole as well as zoomed in portions through her scope’s eyepiece. She watched for movement, any indication that someone who might do harm to her friends, or had done harm to her friends, was in the camp. All the while, she steeled herself for the possibility that she might need to shoot someone.
And she had no intention of shooting to wound.
The first hint of movement came from the east. She spotted Percival first as he took cover behind a tree. It took her half a second longer to spot Krista as she moved in a low crouch, her carbine raised, to the edge of the camp.
Kat held her breath and moved her focus away from the Air Force Lieutenant and back to the camp as a whole. Percival moved up behind Krista, his shotgun raised and ready. A tent flap shifted against the wind.
Kat held her breath, brought her aim to the corner of the tent flap. She didn’t have a clean shot, but was certain that the movement wasn’t due to the wind. And she didn’t have any way of warning Krista and Percival.
Kat slid her finger from along the rifle’s trigger guard to curled around the trigger itself. Krista swept through the camp, past the tent as the flap moved again. Percival moved quietly up behind her. He swept his shotgun past the tent moments before a man burst from its interior with a rifle trained on the pair. He wore army-green digital camo BDUs, though they didn’t help hide him from Kat’s crosshairs.
“Drop ‘em. Hats off. Who are you?” The man’s shouts drifted up the hill to her as his rifle bobbed between Percival and Krista.
Kat’s breath caught in her throat. Krista and Percival had distinctly different reactions to the demand. Krista let go of her carbine, letting it fall against
her body as she slowly lifted her hands in the air and turned toward the assailant.
Percival’s shotgun shot up into a ready position and he started to move to face the man. She couldn’t read Percival’s face, thanks to his helmet, but his body language spoke volumes of rage and intent.
“I said drop it! Do it or I’ll shoot!” The man’s rifle swept toward Percival.
Time slowed for Kat as her adrenaline spiked. She let out a slow, steady breath, settling her crosshairs over the base of the man’s skull. He faced away from her, rifle raised and ready. His deep voice barked another order. Maybe he wouldn’t actually shoot?
But she’d hesitated before when Percival’d faced a zombie in the campus square. He’d been given a death sentence then because she’d doubted for the briefest of moments that she could make the shot. Or Heidi. Had she been quicker to action, the handful of blood would never have even been thrown. This time would be different.
She steeled her guts and smoothly drew the cold trigger back. Gloria barked once and kicked hard back against her shoulder. The spiraling, metal death cut through the air and punched its way bloodily into the man’s neck and back out of his throat, ending somewhere buried in the dirt by Percival’s feet.
Kat calmed herself with a breath of cold air as she smoothly worked the bolt of the rifle and ejected the spent casing. The man in the camp’s hands let go of the rifle he held and jumped to his destroyed throat. He toppled to his knees as she slid the bolt home and seated a fresh bullet. She couldn’t hear his gurgling as he flopped onto his back, his hands struggling to staunch the geyser of red pouring from his neck.
His feet beat the ground in a quick stucco of desperation and death throes as Percival moved up and stood over him. He kicked the rifle away as the army man went still.
Kat adjusted her gaze away from the death scene, swallowed down bile, and swept her zoomed in gaze over the other two tents. She caught a glimpse of Samuel and Judith as they approached from the west. She held her breath for a moment. No other movement announced itself to her.
She watched as Krista, Samuel, and Judith cleared the campsite, including checking the tents. Percival kept a close watch on the dead man. Kat drank in the earthy scent of the ground before her, focusing on her duty to keep watch over them to keep the thought of having just killed someone at bay. It was a trail she could delve down into at a later time. Right now…
Krista came out of the third of the olive drab tents and twisted to direct her gaze up at Kat, though it fell well to her right. Krista lifted a gloved hand and beckoned her down.
Kat nodded, more to herself since the woman down in the camp couldn’t see her, and let a wave of exhaustion wash over her. She hadn’t realized just how tiring laying in place could be. She let her head sink forward to the earth and drank the cold ground in as she felt for the spent casing before she shook off the twigs and branches that Judith had laid atop her. She slipped the metal into her pocket and stood with Gloria.
It didn’t take her long to descend into the camp. She carefully didn’t look at the man on the ground. She didn’t want to see the carnage of what she’d done up close. She moved past the first tent and over to Krista.
“You…” She swallowed back bile, shook her head and started over. “You beckoned?”
Krista’s helmeted head twisted to focus on something past Kat for a moment before swiveling back. “You okay?”
Kat swallowed, closed her eyes for a moment. The arterial spray from her mind’s eye was far worse than the reality had been. She let out a shaky breath. “Yeah. I’ll be fine.”
“I won’t ask you why you did it. I won’t judge you either, so long as you can live with it.” Krista’s pitched her voice low enough to not travel past Kat. “What do you make of this place?”
“Looks kind of the sort of set up we did with the Colonel.” She licked her lips and shrugged and embraced the distraction. “Basic.”
“Basic, yeah. A little ramshackle. And a single guard?” Krista moved toward the closest of the tents.
“Was he a guard?” Kat shook her head. She looked over her shoulder at Percival who still stood over the dead man. Her gaze dropped down to his face. She’d destroyed his throat. Raw meat stood in bloody strands from where her bullet had passed through. Blood painted his face and chest and the ground around his body. His eyes remained opened and stared sightlessly at the bare canopy above.
“I can’t do this right now.” Kat turned away to move toward Percival.
“One question.” Krista’s hand dropped onto Kat’s shoulder and ceased her movement. “Could you do it again?”
“If necessary.” Kat didn’t look at her friend. She also didn’t hesitate in answering. “He was going to shoot Percival. I’d do it a thousand times over if it meant protecting my friends again.”
“Good. Go do what you’ve got to.” Krista’s hand lifted off Kat’s shoulder.
Kat nodded and walked away from Krista. She moved across the campsite and up next to Percival. He hadn’t moved since the bullet had destroyed the corpse before him. She glanced at the man, swallowed bile and fixed her gaze on Percival. She reached out and lightly touched his arm.
Percival jerked; flinched away from the touch. His helmeted head swung toward her.
“Who was he?”
“Sergeant Bloku.” Percival shook his head, reached up and snaked his hand under his helmet to unclasp the chinstrap of his helmet. He pulled it off and tucked it under his arm. He scrubbed tears away from his eyes, which were red and puffy.
“One of the assholes from Knoxville?” she asked softly. Her hand drifted back to his arm.
He responded with a nod. “One of the ones, I think, who chased… Killed Sarah. I…”
Kat nodded. She couldn’t possibly understand the pain he felt, but could sympathize. She felt better about having shot the man. “He won’t hurt anyone again…”
Percival’s face contorted through a myriad of pained expressions before it settled into one of depthless anger. “He died too quick.”
It hadn’t seemed a quick death to her. Bloku’d literally choked on his own blood as he bled out. It wasn’t the way she’d have chosen to go, that’s for sure. If she’d aimed half an inch higher her bullet would have caught him in the base of his head and ended his life far quicker. To her, the disturbed dirt from where his feet had tried to find purchase with frantic kicks spoke volumes of suffering.
“I won’t apologize for taking the shot.” She felt resolute in that statement and squared her shoulders at him. “He was g—“
“You did what you felt was right.” Percival shook his head, scrubbed his hand across his face, and stepped back from the corpse. “I… You probably saved me again.”
“Damned spiffy I did. You owe me doubly now.” She turned to keep facing him. It had the side-effect of letting her turn further from the corpse. She kept finding herself looking down at its demolished features and the pained, bloody expression locked on the man’s face. He’d not, despite what Percival had said, died easily.
Percival pulled his helmet back on and snapped the chinstrap clasp closed. He took a deep breath, and let it noisily out through his mouth. It was the sort of breath that one drew in to release tension and frustration. He sucked in a second.
“You okay?”
With a roar of anger, he whipped his sledgehammer over his shoulder with one hand and slammed it through the air and into the dirt. The dirt beneath what had been Bloku’s head. A head he’d reduced, in one violent motion, to an unrecognizable, bloody pulp. Brain, blood, and bone radiated out from the jawbone of the former sergeant.
Kat staggered away from the viscera, some of which had spattered onto her jeans. A bloody, brown eyeball rested just left of her boot.
She spun away from the carnage, dropped Gloria as she fell to her knees and just barely cleared her mask before she emptied her stomach onto the ground. She violently expelled breakfast for what felt like a lifetime, until nothing more would come up.
* * *
Percival left one hand on the sledgehammer embedded in the ground and through Bloku’s head. He let out a calmer breath. The fucker’s brain matter spattered on his jeans, but he didn’t care. He’d been seeing red and felt fully justified in the desecration of the body. Could even justify it with the fact that this meant the man definitely wouldn’t rise as a zombie.
Not that, at this point, that was a true concern. No, he’d ruined the ability to identify this corpse via his face simply because he felt certain that the man’d been among the two who’d shot him and Sarah.
And that was just the short end of his crimes.
Percival uncoiled his fingers from the sledgehammer’s shaft. A sliver of pain darted up his forearm. He’d likely ripped stitches out in the gesture, but felt better. The flash of red hot, lightning fast anger was gone and he felt serene. He drank in a breath of cold air and let it out slowly.
He became aware of those nearby. He pulled his gaze from the wreckage of a man before him to his teammates, his friends and associate. What he could see of Samuel’s face had turned pale and uncertain. Lieutenant Adams’s carbine had risen to a low ready. Judith’s gaze was locked on where Bloku’s head used to be. Kat noisily vomited onto the ground.
“You with us?” Lieutenant Adams’s voice cut through the silence that had come over the camp like a knife through the cold air.
“I’m here.” Percival reached out and coiled his fingers around his sledgehammer’s shaft. He wiped the head on Bloku’s BDUs before he worked it back into its holster on his back.
“That was unnecessary.” Lieutenant Adams’s carbine lowered regardless.
“Making sure he didn’t get back up,” Percival shot back coldly. He moved a few steps away from the corpse and over next to Kat.
Lieutenant Adams shook her head and ducked back into the tent she’d been searching.
