Dead Storm: The Global Zombie Apocalypse

by Nicholas Ryan

  General Guo cleared his throat and looked at the faces around the room, meeting Minister Yi Dan’s eyes last.

  “No, Minister.”

  A murmur of hushed outrage and quiet alarm rippled around the smoke-hazed room. Guo felt himself trembling, his legs heavy as lead. He was an experienced combat veteran, one of China’s most revered soldiers, yet in this room he was cowered by the immense power the Politburo members wielded. A trickle of sweat broke on his brow.

  “No?” Yi Dan kept his voice neutral. “Why?”

  “Minister this afternoon I was in the air observing an assault on the infected by our attack helicopters. It was the first time I had seen the massed force of the enemy in daylight with my own eyes,” he began to shake his head, as though still unable to comprehend the chilling sight of the undead. “They number in the many millions – an inhuman tide of bodies that howl and snarl. They move like a vast herd of wild animals, and they have no fear, no morale. I saw tens of thousands mown down and blown into the dirt today – but still they kept moving forward, unafraid, incensed and savage, despite the hail of cannon fire and rockets we launched into them.”

  “Tell us more,” Yi Dan insisted. The Minister could feel a superstitious dread descend on the room; a sense of inevitable despair and foreboding.

  “They do not die, Minister!” Guo’s voice broke with emotion. “I saw many of the infected dismembered by cannon fire, and others fall into the mud with horrendous wounds. And yet they rose again! They swarm across the earth like a plague.”

  “You cannot hold them, General?” President Xiang felt his blood chill. It seemed impossible that the might of China’s armies and technology could not hold back an unarmed horde.

  “I will do all in my power, President Xiang,” Guo vowed. “But I must have more support. The plan I presented to the Politburo called for massive air and artillery strikes to weaken the enemy before they can overwhelm our defenses – and yet I still do not have the fighter bomber support I requested.”

  Yi Dan made a short cutting motion with the blade of his hand. “It is coming, General,” he said curtly. “The commander of the 31st Fighter Aviation Brigade has been relieved of his duty for incompetence and replaced, by my orders. You will have your air support in the morning, and all the additional aircraft you require.”

  Guo nodded. He prayed tomorrow would not be too late.

  “What else do you need, General?” Minister Jiang Xiaogong rejoined the discussion. The wings of his collar were awry, and the top button of his shirt loose. His prominent Adams apple bobbed nervously in the old man’s throat.

  Guo hesitated. It was pointless asking the Politburo for more armor – tanks would never reach the battlefront in time to be of use. The nearest units, he knew, were in Shandong. “Attack helicopters,” Guo answered. “I must have enough additional helicopters and munitions to fly continuous operations around the clock. Until the infected close within the range of our artillery, our best efforts to weaken their strength can only be achieved through air assaults.”

  All eyes around the room turned on Yi Dan expectantly.

  “Of course,” the Minister nodded. “I will issue orders immediately.”

  Guo nodded his thanks. He felt buoyed. He had realized in a startling moment of clarity that he had not needed to fear this meeting. It was the Politburo who was fearful. All Guo stood to risk was his life. For these men, the fate of China and their own grip on absolute power was at stake.

  They needed him – or other men like him.

  “Thank you, Minister,” the General gruffed. He bowed again. “Now, if you will excuse me, I would like to return to the battlefront. There is much to do, and precious little time to do it in.”

  *

  After the Politburo meeting had adjourned, President Xiang and Yi Dan sat in the shadows of the big empty room alone with their quiet despair. Both men’s minds were haunted by unspoken fears. The world they had dedicated their lives to and the power they had ruthlessly fought and clawed to attain, was slipping through their withered fingers.

  “If General Guo fails?” President Xiang asked the question.

  Yi Dan sighed. He was tired, and he had smoked too many cigarettes. His throat felt raw and scratchy. “If our defenses are breached at Fuxin, we will not have the time we need for Tong Ge to convert enough ships. All will be lost. China will fall, and be ground into the ashes of history,” the Minister prophesized.

  President Xiang reached for a cup of rice wine and then frowned into the bottom of the bowl, as though it were a crystal ball from which he could divine the future. It was very still and silent in the room. Xiang was uneasy. A hard knot of fear in his chest shortened his breathing and his stomach was sour with a warm oiliness.

  “What can we do?”

  Yi Dan’s face was dour and bloodless. His voice was dry as parchment. “We must find a way to buy more time, and a place we can prepare as an alternative defense,” he said.

  “Where?”

  “Wanli Changcheng,” Yi Dan saw no other option.

  “The Great Wall?” Xiang asked incredulously. “But Yi, parts of it have crumbled into serious disrepair.”

  “Yes,” Yi Dan conceded. “But parts remain standing, Xiang,” he forced a thin smile onto his face. “It depends on how you would view your cup. Is it half-full, or half-empty?”

  “Is there time to repair and defend the Wall?”

  “Is there a choice?”

  There wasn’t. The price for their survival would have to be paid with the lives of China’s soldiers.

  NEAR EAST AND SOUTHERN ASIAN ANALYSIS OFFICE

  CIA HEADQUARTERS

  LANGLEY

  The phone seemed to ring on forever before a sleepy disoriented man finally answered with an irritable croak.

  “This better be important.”

  “Is that any way to talk to an old drinking buddy?” Nick Blakely responded lightly.

  “Who the fuck is this?” the man’s voice on the end of the phone line twanged with a broad Australian accent. Blakely checked his watch and made some mental calculations – something he realized he should have done before impulsively dialing.

  “Jesus, sorry, man. I didn’t realize. It’s after 3 a.m. in Hong Kong, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah,” the Australian said. “Except you’re calling Western Australia. Fremantle to be precise. Now who the fuck is this?” the Australian had come wide-awake but remained bristly.

  “Andy, it’s Nick Blakely…”

  “Blakely? I don’t know anyone by…” then suddenly the tone of voice changed to become incredulous. “Spook?”

  “Right,” the CIA analyst said.

  “Christ. It’s been ten years!” Andy Winspear said.

  “I know,” Blakely apologized. “I thought you were still living in Hong Kong.”

  The two men had met when Andrew Winspear had been living in Asia and had joined a network for young members of the shipping industry based in Hong Kong. Over the years the group had grown from informal gatherings to a vibrant, active association made up of owners, brokers, charterers, lawyers and insurance experts. The Network often arranged information events with shipping experts around the world, and had hosted conferences with visiting naval officers. Blakely had attended a meeting as the guest of a US frigate Commander, and had spent the rest of the evening with the Australian at a Hong Kong bar. A friendship had formed, and then waned as their careers took them on different journeys around the world. Blakely had returned to the US and continued his work in the CIA.

  “What are you doing in Fremantle?” Blakely made small talk, the way friends feel obliged to do after too long apart.

  “Wife and kids,” Winspear explained succinctly. He had turned thirty-five last October – a ruggedly good-looking man with a sun-tanned face and the sharp twinkling eyes of someone accustomed to outdoor life and wide horizons. “The pollution in Asia doesn’t make it a great place to raise a family, so I came back home.”

  “Are
you still in the shipping industry?”

  “Sure,” Winspear said. He was sitting on the edge of his bed, looking out at a view of Freemantle’s Fishing Boat Harbor, lit and shimmering beneath the night sky while his wife beside him still slept. “I’m a senior Vice President of Dutch Eastern Shipping Lines.”

  “Impressive,” the American analyst said.

  “What about you?”

  “I’m still working in finance,” Blakely lied.

  “Bullshit,” the Australian laughed. “Still trying to drum up secrets, huh?”

  Blakely winced. The Australian had nicknamed him ‘Spook’.

  The CIA agent didn’t waste time denying the Australian’s claim, or spend any more time with friendly preamble. He got down to business. His voice became serious.

  “Andy, I’ve got a friend over here who has a problem. He’s… he’s in finance… and he’s been pouring over some satellite images taken at Dalian, in China. There’s something going on there, and he’s trying to figure out what the Chinese are up to. They’ve got a hell of a lot of ships in port, and more anchored off Dashan Island. I thought you might be able to interpret the information and give him some guidance as to what it all means.”

  “Sure,” Winspear said. He was an intelligent man, with a sharp incisive mind. He knew enough to be able to read between the lines, and he also knew enough to not make his interpretation obvious.

  “Can you email me the images?”

  “No,” Blakely said. “But if you log on to the DY Commercial Data website, you can see what we’re looking at. I’ll email you a link.”

  DY Commercial Data was a European commercial satellite imaging company operating from corporate headquarters in Paris.

  Andy gave his email address. Blakely sent the link from a third-party Hotmail address and included a cell phone number in his message.

  “Okay, mate. Let me make some coffee. When I wake up, I’ll take a look and get back to you. Nick, is this urgent?”

  “Yeah,” Blakely said. “And it’s real important.”

  “Give me a couple of hours,” Andy Winspear hung up.

  FUXIN CITY

  JINZHOU-TONGLIAO DEFENSIVE LINE

  NORTHEAST CHINA

  “We will marshal our battle tanks here and here,” General Guo stabbed his finger at the topographic map, “and launch a lightning attack against the undead to push them back.”

  There was a moment of shock and surprise from the assembled officers. At a meeting just twenty-four hours earlier, General Guo had declared his intention to use the Army’s Type 99 tanks as forward artillery pieces against the infected, lining the defensive perimeter with the heavy armor to supplement the massed batteries that were gathered six miles further west. Now, the General’s strategy had suddenly changed.

  Guo’s staff and unit commanders peered at the map spread across the folding camp table. Their faces were grim and intense. Guo had identified Dabazhen to the north and Biezhen in the south. Between the cities stretched a long forested mountain range ten kilometers forward of the Army’s defensive perimeter.

  Guo was standing in the Fuxin train station’s car park, a grimy clearing of industrial land he had made the location of his command post. His APC was parked in the shade of nearby buildings, surrounded by several armored 8x8 wheeled communication vehicles and a dozen staff officers. A formation of attack helicopters blazed overhead, flying due east to launch a fresh attack on the approaching horde. They filled the sky like a swarm of angry hornets, their stubby wing mounts bristling with rockets. The thundering roar of the helicopters rotors was mind-numbing. Guo pressed his lips together and waited impatiently until the formation had flown past and the skirt of their downdraft had blown itself out.

  “I have observed the infected and how they move,” Guo drew the attention of his commanders back to the map. “They travel in massed herds like animals, and they move quickly. They are formidable because they are relentless and cannot be deterred by firepower, but…” he raised his finger like a school master making a point to a class of eager students, “…they have a weakness that we can exploit; they move predictably, following the contours of the land. They roll towards us like a great tide of filthy water, but like water, they follow the path of least resistance.” Guo saw curious expressions from the circle of men pressed close about him. He narrowed his eyes and his expression became cunning. “So we can predict their movement as they approach our defenses, and use that knowledge to meet them with the iron hammer of our tanks.”

  The clutch of subordinates made dutifully enthusiastic grunts and growls. They were keen to engage the enemy. Guo felt a knot of pride in his chest. Once again he returned to the map, tracing the edges of a wide valley that ran west from Shenyang to the mountain range and then split into two separate arms.

  “This land must once have been the location of a mighty ancient riverbed,” General Guo indicated the contours. The depression stopped at the mountain barrier and split north and south like a river that had once branched along two new paths. “Dabazhen and Biezhen are cities built in the shallows of these ancient watercourses, bordered by gentle escarpments. That is how the undead will approach us,” Guo declared with absolute confidence. “They will follow the prehistoric lowlands.”

  The mountain range was criss-crossed with winding roads that cut across the high peaks. The Group Army’s operations officer cleared his throat delicately.

  “General, if the infected stay to the roads, they may seek instead to cross the ranges and come directly for our lines.”

  To the Colonel’s surprise and relief, Guo smiled indulgently. “Han, perhaps they might,” Guo conceded, then smiled like a wily old fox. “But the entire mountain range will be put on fire. We will set it ablaze. The undead will not pass through the flames, and they have not studied the lessons of Sun Tzu,” he said in a sudden moment of levity that caught his subordinates off guard. On a more serious note, he gravely intoned:

  “Therefore those skilled in war bring the enemy to the field of battle and are not brought there by him,” quoting from the ancient collection of revered warfare strategies.

  Several tank commanders nodded their heads in somber agreement.

  “We have chosen the ground for our defense. Now we must take the war to the enemy,” a senior officer said with patriotic fervor. “They are unarmed. We will crush them.” Others nodded in solidarity.

  “We will position our tanks to the north and to the south of the mountain range, obscured on the streets of the cities. When the time is right, both formations will spring from their concealments and drive into the heart of the undead, grinding them into the dust, plowing them into the earth like weeds,” Guo said fiercely. “We will crush them under our tracks and under the weight of our armor, and we will shred them with our heavy weapons and mounted machine guns.”

  A spontaneous cheer erupted from the men around the General. They growled like attack dogs, eager to be let off the leash.

  “And behind our victorious tanks will come our ZBD-04 Infantry fighting Vehicles,” General Guo played to his audience, buoying them with patriotic confidence, “who will sweep the remains aside with concentrated fire until we have driven the undead back and made them easy prey for our swooping helicopters. It will be a slaughter to match our ancient triumphs against the invading Mongolian hordes. It will be our greatest ever victory.”

  “When, General Guo?” a Colonel with a frowning, craggy face pleaded impatiently. “When will we attack?”

  “At first light,” Guo said. “We will move forward into position tonight under the cover of darkness and begin the attack at sunrise. It will be a full day of blood and battle – but be warned,” Guo moderated his men’s impatience with a word of caution. “Once the attack begins, the tanks must not stop, must not pause for any reason. To become still is to become overwhelmed and lose momentum. You must keep moving, keep driving the undead beneath the crushing weight of your tracks until both pincer attacks meet in the middle, like
a hand clenching into a mighty fist.”

  WQZT-TV TELEVISION STUDIOS

  WASHINGTON D.C.

  “Secretary Poe?”

  “Who is this?” Defense Secretary Jim Poe had snatched up his personal cell phone without first identifying the caller. He was at his Pentagon desk, drowning in paperwork. Now he regretted his impulsiveness.

  “This is Carly Clementine from WQZT.”

  “Who?”

  “Carly Clementine from – ”

  “This is a private number. How did you get it?”

  “You gave it to me, sir, after a White House press conference last summer.”

  Poe frowned. He didn’t remember sharing his private number with anyone from the media, least of all the ‘Perfumed Bulldozer’. Clementine’s reputation in Washington was fearsome. He became suddenly guarded.

  “What do you want?” the Defense Secretary asked carefully.

  “A comment, please, sir,” Carly said brightly. She could tell by the man’s voice through the phone that she was hitting a brick wall.

  “About what?”

  “The crisis on the Korean peninsula.”

  “No.”

  “But, sir – ”

  “No.”

  “What about off the record?”

  “No.”

  Jim Poe disconnected the call and stared at the phone for a long guilty moment afterwards. He felt impolite for hanging up so abruptly – it went against his good-mannered upbringing.

  But it had been Carly Clementine… and therefore a matter of self-preservation.

  FUXIN CITY

  JINZHOU-TONGLIAO DEFENSIVE LINE

  NORTHEAST CHINA

  The Type 99’s trundled through the barricade of wire as a full armored brigade; one hundred and twenty four heavy tanks, jouncing their way east. As they drew closer to the ragged range of mountain peaks, the vast formation broke apart into two snaking columns, each of two battalions. Sixty-two of the steel beasts wound their way north. The remaining units raced south. Theirs was the longest journey over the most testing terrain. They drove in single file through a wide mountain pass and when they crested the spine of the ridge, the abandoned city of Biezhen laid spread in the valley before them, silent and dark as a tomb in the moonlit night.