Apex Fallen

by C. A. Michaels

  Eckhart sighed. “Which is why Scott is here. With our current Avgas supplies we can either mount a lot of small helo sorties over the foreseeable future or we can throw our entire supply at this mission. I’m going to chat to General Ike when he is back in, but I think this is something we have to do, to secure our long term position out here. We’d only gone over the briefest scenario, but Scott here...” the Brigadier tailed off and waved at Colonel Galatchi to continue.

  “We’ve got the airframes and I’ve got enough pilots to be able to throw a squadron up, temporarily at least. Ground crew is few and far between, mainly because they have been re-tasked on other duties, but we can recall them to get us airborne. Our Apache’s will be grounded – no need for attack helicopters – but we’ve got some of the new small utility UH-72 Lakota helicopters if we need to move a few troops or for recce, and then our UH60 Blackhawks for any larger troop lifts. What is most important to us now though is our twin-rotor CH-47 Chinooks, which could be used to lift any equipment or supplies we need. If we are going to head to Boulder then we’ll be pretty much exhausting our entire supply of Avgas but we’ll run out sooner or later regardless, so best what little we’ve got of it count. Our initial idea, which we had gone over before, would be to take –” Brigadier Eckhart waved him quiet.

  “Scott, I’ll interrupt you for a minute. Dan, Lance, unless you have anything else to do I’ll assign you on this task. My main effort is setting up Fort Carson so we can survive into the future, and as part of that power is going to be key. I need to direct my attention elsewhere now but I’ll leave you two to assist Julia. Consider yourselves to be part of my staff and you can tell people, if you need to get anything from them, that you work for me. Anytime you need to see me or talk to me my door is open to you. For now, though, I’ll leave all planning to you guys and Scott. Assume that we’re going ahead with this task, but I’ll confirm it once I’ve had General Ike’s approval. Please excuse me now though, gentlemen and Julia, as I need to get other projects in motion, too.”

  The four of them – Dan, Lance, Scott and Julia – left the commander’s staff and walked out into the sunshine. They found seats on a concrete sidewalk and Scott continued to fill them in on their planning to date.

  “Our plan is to take around four to five Chinooks all the way up to Boulder to uplift the equipment. They would be lead by three to four Blackhawks, which would carry Julia and a work party of around 60 soldiers. They will secure a landing site near the factory, manhandle the equipment out and then load it onto the Chinooks. We had tossed up the idea of staggering the Chinooks’ flight plan so one would arrive every half an hour, could be loaded and leave before the next one got in, but hadn’t settled on anything.”

  Dan nodded. He’d done his fair share of airmobile operations, both in training and a few cordon-and-searches in Afghanistan, but he knew Lance would be the expert in this regard. He stayed quiet and let the Ranger speak for them.

  “OK, sounds pretty good. A lot of it will depend on the location itself – how quickly we can secure it and then the mechanics of moving and loading this equipment. I don’t like the one fight going up – no flexibility. What I would suggest...” Lance paused and looked at Dan.

  “Go ahead,” Dan said, “you’re the expert on this one.”

  “I suggest that a small recce party goes in early, probably 12 or 24 hours ahead. This is standard special ops stuff – either take in enough firepower and soldiers to take a place by force, or do with stealth and precision. In this case we haven’t got a choice. We need to get eyes on the location though, so we can tailor the main air-mobile to either an all-out assault, with the soldiers from the Blackhawk clearing and holding both a Landing Zone for the Chinooks and the factory itself, before the CH47s arrive. If the place is secure then we can call back using the helo’s radios and the squadron can head up as per you original plan, Blackhawks leading and the Chinooks spaced out by 30 minutes. That way the Blackhawks spend less time on the ground, use less gas and give the General here a few more flying hours to play with. For the recce party it would need to be myself, Dan and a couple of others. We’ll be in radio comms to Julia and, if the factory isn’t dangerous, we’ll try and identify what needs to be moved and where it is.”

  Dan and Scott nodded. “Sounds good,” Dan said.

  “No, it doesn’t,” Julia said. Lance looked at her, part confusion and part humor.

  “I’ll come with you guys. If I can spend ten minutes inside that factory before the Chinooks arrive then I can be more productive that if you were to spend ten hours in there, even if you could talk to me.”

  “Look, ma’am,” Lance started but fell quiet as Julia glared at him.

  “It’s OK, Sergeant, I can handle myself. I did my degree in Applied Science and Engineering at West Point and have done two tours to Iraq before I left to be a contractor at Lockheed. I can hold my own and I can shoot, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

  Lance smiled and shrugged. “Fine by me. Actually, this might throw up a problem though – the first lesson we learn on Ranger Assessment and Selection is to never allow officers to out-number enlisted soldiers on any patrol...”Julia’s serious expression lifted a little and she laughed.

  “Well, we can easily get a recce party up there in one of the UH-72 Lakota’s. I’ll warn out one of my Lieutenants, Hannah, and she’ll fly us up. She’s got the most hours on the Lakota than anyone else who survived. I’ll jump in myself as co-pilot, as you’ll need someone to make an assessment on the Chinook’s LZ and I’ll be able to stay and help co-ordinate and marshal the rest of the helo’s in. Normally I’d have a command helo airborne for the duration to lead from, but with fuel short that’s a luxury I can’t afford. Still, I want to be on the ground so I can make sure things go smoothly. My Executive Officer back here will be more than capable of holding things together in my absence.”

  Lance shrugged. “Three officers, then. Guess fate really is against me on this one.”

  ***

  It took Dan and Lance less than ten minutes to find an empty couple of stretchers behind the back of the converted gym and, within thirty seconds of lying down, both men were asleep. They were woken two hours later by a Sergeant from the operations cell. He passed them two cups of coffee in disposable polystyrene cups as he asked for them to report to the ops cell.

  “It’s on,” one of the ops majors told Dan and Lance when they stepped in. “The commander is in an orders group with his staff, but Brigadier Eckhart sent a message that the Boulder mission is approved. He hasn’t given you a timeframe so I guess that is over to you.”

  Dan and Lance were still feeling stunned as they struggled to shake off the deadening of their senses still lingering from their deep sleep. They could barely mumble that they understood the message while sipping their coffee.

  “And we’ve got a Ms Middleton and Colonel Galatchi waiting for you outside.”

  Scott Galatchi had brought with him the Lakota pilot, Hannah.

  “We’re good to go,” Scott said. “We can head anytime over the next three days, with the main squadron sortie set for 24 hours after we arrive.”

  “Tomorrow,” Lance said. “I’m guessing that the production facility is on the outskirts of Boulder, and that the majority of hacks will still be in the suburbs. If we leave it much longer they might start roving further afield. Better chance of finding the facility quiet if we go early. That’s my gut feeling, for what it is worth.” Julia and Dan nodded.

  “OK,” Scott said, “we can go tomorrow. It would be better for us if we leave after nine so we can have ground-crew sorting the Lakota out in the light – we could pull a few people from an over-night security detail, but it just adds a bit more friction into the mix.” Lance shrugged and looked to Dan.

  “Fine by me. Dan?”

  “Nine it is, then.”

  Scott made some marks in a notebook and then looked to Hannah. “Hannah here is going to be our Lakota pilot.”

 
; Hannah spoke for the first time. She was a short women in her mid-twenties, easily the youngest of the group. Her dark brown hair was tied back in a pony-tail and, despite her relative youth and the task that faced them, she didn’t look at all phased. Her voice was relaxed and gave the impression that she was almost bored by it all.

  “I’ve studied the maps of the area but it’s hard to make out any details and we don’t have access to our normal mission planning software, so we’ll be going in and improvising largely.”

  She then nodded back to her commanding officer, Scott, who picked up the conversation.

  “We’ve assumed that you’ll want to land as close to the factory as possible, we’ll shut the helo down and then move with you. If we need to abandon the aircraft out there then that’s fine as I’ve got more airframes than pilots as it is, and we can ride back on one of the Blackhawks or Chinooks if it does come to that. If we need to go SERE,” – Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape – “then we’ll fight our way back to the Lakota and evac that way.”

  “That works.” Lance was taking the lead in planning the mission, but all the officers were happy to let him do so, given his background.

  “I’ll confirm more actions later tonight, but we’ll need to see what sort of equipment is available before we finalize our planning.” Lance pointedly looked at the pistols on the hips of the two pilots.

  “I’d feel comfortable if we could get you guys something that packs a bit more firepower, too.”

  ***

  The major in the operations cell had to recall one of the clearance teams from outside the safe zone but he didn’t seem concerned by their request.

  “We’ll do everything we can for you guys. That’s our job, and you’re working to the commander,” was his simple response. Someone from the brigadier’s staff must have filtered down the message about Dan and Lance’s task and everyone seemed ready to oblige them.

  Lance had asked to get access to the 10th Special Forces Group’s storage rooms. While the operators would have suited up and left with their own kit, he explained that their armories were along the lines of a ‘golf-bag’ with each operator keeping multiple weapons, rigs and tools they could select from for any specific task.

  “It’s impossible that they took everything, so if we can get into their lockers we’ll be spoilt for choice. At least, I hope so.”

  Because the buildings in question were outside the safe-zone, they would get escorted their by a clearance team who would help secure the area for them.

  “It’s not as hard as it looks,” the major organizing the show for them said.

  “The SF boys cleared their lines before they left, and they occupy a series of fully fenced compounds inside the base, so it is unlikely that the area has been over-run again by the hacks. No doubt there will be one or two infected in there that missed the initial cull so keep your wits about you and watch your security, but it won’t be an Alamo out there like we have had with the other areas.”

  The biggest delay occurred while the staff tried to find the combination codes to gain access into the compound and buildings. After some searching they found the details in a folder marked ‘Ft Carson Duty Security Officer’ that had been in the S3 cell the entire time and Dan, Lance and Julia were ready to be escorted out. They had agreed to pick up equipment for the two helicopter pilots who would remain behind to plan the flight.

  The realities of the fuel crises at Fort Carson were obvious as they had to walk the 6 clicks to the compound. Dan felt like exhausted but realized that the dozen soldiers escorting them would have walked a hell of a lot further that day and they didn’t seem to be grumbling about it.

  “It’s easy when we stick to the main thoroughfares,” the Sergeant in charge of the escort team told Dan.

  “It’s when it comes night or we have to go down the side-streets and into the buildings that it gets really gnarly. If you end up having to do so yourself then my advice is to always follow a flash bang into a building if you think one of them is inside. The hacks hate that – it completely throws them – and if you are lucky they will even flee through a back door or out the windows so position a cut-off team out back, and you might get a few easy kills from an ambush arrangement.”

  The escort party put down three hacks that were hiding in the gardens along their route. All three of the creatures were found in a prone position, snarling quietly but not actively stalking them.

  “Injured ones, looks like they’ve all been shot in the legs,” one of the soldier’s observed as he lined up a head-shot from a few meters away.

  “We’re a lot more thorough with our kills now, but when they first turned on us it was a different story.” Dan asked how the clearance was going.

  “Good, in our allocated area. The hacks have already been hit by a few patrols, so now it is more hold and clear rather than assault and clear. The housing lot here will be the worst, as a lot of the guys are going to see wives and kids in their hack form. We have done patrols along the roads of the base housing, assembling every survivor that would come out to us and bringing them in, so those that remain will be hostiles. There are rumors that they will only send the single guys who don’t have dependents in for that job. That’s something I’m not looking forward to since I’m on one of the single ones. Then again, I’d prefer to be facing that clearance rather than mourning my family or not knowing altogether.”

  Dan hadn’t really put too much thought into his own family. His parents and his brother and sister were back in Virginia, and there was no way of telling how they had gotten on. He’d been so busy it felt sort of impersonal and that, if they were dead, they were dead. It would be different, he knew, if he was in the same state and he could do something about it. He wasn’t and, while he’d love to hear somehow that his family – and his younger sister especially – had survived, he knew that wouldn’t happen and he knew there was nothing he could do about it. For some reason he felt more angst over his ex-girlfriend, Rebecca. He’d spent the last few months with her but things had gotten rocky as his deployment came up. Eight months is a long time for a girl to be left alone, it turns out, and it seemed easier to let things go between them. He was still missing her over his pre-deployment training but despite their promise to stay in touch as friends, he’d failed to give her a call or flick her a text. It seemed easier to think of her fondly rather than try and say something substantial, and he didn’t want to hear that she’d found someone new, either. For some reason his lack of contact was really weighing him down now, and he was even a little upset at even the thought that she mightn’t have made it through this. If this is what I’m going through it must be absolute hell for the guys with families. It also struck him that, despite spending the last few days together and somehow now working together as a team for the commander’s staff, he had absolutely no idea about Lance’s background. He’d only just learnt Lance’s rank and surname a few hours ago when he introduced himself to the Brigadier.

  Lance and the soldiers seemed lost in their thoughts for most of the patrol, keeping to themselves. Julia stuck close to Dan and Lance but didn’t seem to want to talk and Dan couldn’t think of anything to say, either.

  The 10th Special Forces Group occupied a number of large, compartmentalized compounds that were all ringed by a central gated perimeter. They passed through the first set of already-opened gates without issue, but Dan could see the soldiers start to increase their level of awareness. They were suddenly at a low-ready with the stock of their M4’s and M16’s tucked into their shoulders and their heads seemed to be on swivels, constantly scanning around them. They’ve seen the hacks flank groups and stalk them, and they don’t want to be caught out the same way. As unlikely as an attack seemed Dan, Lance and Julia stayed in the centre of the patrol. The soldiers had worked as a patrol together and had their basic drills worked out. It seemed better to stay out of their way for as much as possible and let control the situation. Both Dan and Lance had sourced a few magazines for
their HK416s before they left. Even though they didn’t expect much in the way of action on their excursion they both wanted to be prepared.

  The patrol halted outside another set of locked doors.

  “Which way?” the patrol commander called back. Lance looked at the various signs and then signaled to a building complex a few hundred meters away.

  “We’ll go to the stand-by squadron’s ready rooms. A force is always ready to go out the door quickly in the event of emergencies and they should have left a good stash behind when they went up to Denver.”

  The patrol found the right combination to the locked gate in their notes and commenced a slow, deliberate clearance of the area. There was evidence of a violent fight at close quarters, with a number of bodies strewn around the open area. Every hack appeared dead, though, but the patrol stayed alert.

  “Here,” Lance said, pointing to a series of low, single story hangars opening onto the compound. Each hangar had a roller door large enough to fit a humvee through. The patrol commander entered another series of combinations, struggling to find one that worked, and then lights above the hangar doors blinked from red to green.

  “Alarms off,” he called out and then walked along the front, hitting each door’s large ‘open’ button. Each roller door groaned into life as chains hauled them up. Soldiers knelt in front of each door in pairs as they opened, rifles raised ready to shoot at anything that may have been alive inside. The buildings appeared to be clear but, unlike the outside of the compound, there were no bodies or any evidence of a struggle inside.

  “These hangars would have been empty when Stalin struck,” Lance explained to the patrol.

  “They would have only been accessed by the team before they went out the door to Denver, and otherwise they remain closed, so I wouldn’t expect any hacks to have either been in there or made it into there.”

  He was right and a brief search each pair confirmed that the row of hangars was free of any threat. Lance had a quick chat to the patrol commander and then waved Dan and Julia over to him.