LZR-1143: Evolution

by Bryan James

  “Past the first ring road,” she called in, referring to the first of two small roads that ringed the Monument, the first one being about fifty feet from the large obelisk.

  We had about four minutes.

  I reached the spiral staircase to the top level, which extended to the right, up toward the First Class level. I crawled in carefully, a touch of claustrophobia compelling me to move quickly to the second level. This cabin was virtually empty, most of the passengers having somehow found a way out—likely crawling through the same passage which had afforded me entry.

  I awkwardly moved between seats, finding it harder to gain footing between the larger spaces in First Class. The cockpit door was battered down, shards of wood and metal hanging from the dented and mangled frame. Blood and gore covered the pasty white walls and the blue and gray carpeting.

  As I got closer, I saw the exposed bone of a partially eaten arm hanging from the short sleeve of a white shirt with golden epaulettes on the shoulder. The arm twitched once as I entered the cabin, but the head couldn’t raise towards me, the tendons and muscles having been severed so severely as to render it useless for feeding—unless you put something into its mouth.

  And I wasn’t going to do that.

  He moaned slightly, his other hand twitching uselessly as I realized it was melted to the controls, a small electrical fire having scorched the panel in front of him.

  I put the machete to the exposed bone of the spine behind the torn throat and pushed down, severing whatever connection between the head and the body that delivered the mobility to the undead. The hand went limp and I looked around the cabin, noting the massive amounts of blood spread around the small space and scanning the controls for the radio.

  I had played a pilot once, in “Desperation Air,” and they had shown me where ... There!

  It was a complicated looking piece of electronics, but as Kate made her way to the door to the cockpit, I was already flipping the power switch. A faint, dull red light blinked on and a frequency read-out lit up. I quickly searched for an extra headset, and Kate handed me one she saw on the floor near her foot. I pulled them on and pressed the button activating the transmitter.

  “Hello? Anyone out there? My name is Mike McKnight, I’m a civilian, and I’m with two other people who need help. We are inside the crashed 747 on the National Mall, and require assistance. I carry with me a possible vaccine to the virus that caused this shit, and we need a lift. Does anyone copy this?”

  The radio hissed, and I switched frequencies, trying again.

  On the fifth frequency, a garbled voice shot back.

  “ ... is Captain Gladding in ... repeat your last ...”

  I got the gist, and repeated the important parts.

  From the rear of the plane, Ky’s shouted voice, “Past the second ring. Closing fast!”

  That meant they were less than two minutes away. We needed to leave.

  Now.

  “I don’t have a lot of time here, we need a pickup. I know you have choppers. We will be at the Lincoln Memorial, understand! Lincoln Memorial! Ten minutes, or the last possible hope for a damn cure to this plague dies with us!”

  I threw the headset down and started back, following Kate as she crawled to the first floor, and then picked her way toward the tail.

  “17th Street,” said Ky, dancing nervously outside as if she had to pee.

  Romeo was whining, running back and forth between us as if to convey his own little sense of urgency about the matter.

  We shot out from the shattered plane, and I yelled to Ky.

  “Lincoln Memorial, Ky! Let’s go!”

  We didn’t need to tell her twice.

  We were fifty feet away from the plane when the first zombie stumbled around the crumpled nosecone of the 747. It saw us running and moaned loudly, pausing as it did so, head lolling on its neck as it looked to the sky briefly, then back to us, moving forward again.

  A chorus of moans responded from behind the doomed jet, spurring us to run faster.

  We ran through the dry reflecting pond, all the water having drained from the massive cracks imposed by the ruined jet. Pieces of the cement were scattered around the pond, and a deep rivet ran most of the length of the pool, dirt and debris covering the ground.

  As we got closer to the Lincoln Memorial, I realized that it had been fortified at some point, similar to the fortifications around the Capitol. Sandbags lined the foot of the stairs, and blocked off the two sides of the open-aired monument, leaving only one line of access to the main site inside the many columns. The massive marble statue of President Lincoln looked out on the shattered Mall, gaze seeming to lend gravity and sorrow to the sad state of his nation’s capital.

  Behind the sandbags, a large green tent was erected on the first landing. A red cross inside a white box indicated the purpose of this station, while two Humvees were parked on the first landing, fifty caliber guns amazingly intact on the roof emplacements. Unlike the barriers we had passed on Route 50, D.C. was probably abandoned late, and considered a hot zone after that. Very few looters coming through under those circumstances.

  A small gap in the sandbags allowed us through, and we ran for the top of the stairs to recon the small area for more weapons.

  On that front, we were finally rewarded.

  In addition to the fifty caliber machine guns that were loaded on the roof of each Humvee, there were several M-4’s, a crate of grenades marked “M67 Anti-Personnel” on the side, and the royale-with-cheese, master of disaster, find of all finds: a large gun pre-mounted on a huge tripod laying undeployed in a wooden crate.

  The label read “XM134” and until I opened the crate, I didn’t know what that meant.

  Now I did.

  I hastily moved the gun into position behind the last barricade at the very top of the stairs, almost in Lincoln’s crotch. The legs folded out and clicked into place, and I grabbed the belt of ammunition, dragging it across the marble floor and inserting it as I ignored the absurdity of mounting a last-ditch defense against zombie hordes on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial.

  We hauled the grenades to the first barricade and jumped to the top of the Humvees. I pulled the slide on the gun and heard the satisfying return as it clicked back into place. Across the sandbag barricade, I saw Kate do the same. Under strict orders, Ky was behind the last barricade, waiting for us and covering us with one of the M-4’s, which Kate had loaded for her and removed the safety. She had never fired a gun before, but gave Kate a withering glare when given the brief instructions.

  The large pack was approaching, through the reflecting pool, and almost to the tail section of the plane which rested at a slant merely fifty feet from the bottom of the stairs. A red and white striped concessionaire’s booth sat in the middle of the creature’s pathway and I wondered if it had a propane or gas connection for cooking food.

  I pulled the trigger on the machine gun and it vomited a stream of bullets into the concrete in front of the booth. Behind the tail section of the plane, they were coming.

  They filled the reflecting pool and the dying grass beside it, their shuffling feet and stuttering walk anxious and quickened by their hunger. They were relentless, these citizens of D.C..

  I looked to Kate, who was leaning over the gun, sighting her first targets. She glanced over, and I gave her a thumbs up.

  “Remember, they get to the bottom of the stairs, and we move back to the big gun.”

  She nodded, turning back.

  Thousands of bodies were pressing forward, funneled into our kill zone by parked cars, the piece of aircraft, and the structure of the memorial itself. To get to us, they had to get through us.

  I tested my theory, lining up the concessionaire in my sights and firing.

  The bullets marched up and through the shack, tearing away the cheap plastic walls, through the small tires below, and into the closed glass doors. I brought the line of fire down to where I thought a gas tank might be, just as the leading column of the
great herd was passing through.

  A ball of flame erupted from the small, prefab building, flattening more than fifty creatures in the concussion. The blast wave hit us both, smoke and dust taking us in the faces. I wiped dirt and soot from my face as I smiled, watching the creatures on the fringes pick themselves up slowly and join those that followed.

  Then, I started to shoot.

  The gun rocked violently in my hands as I fired short bursts into the approaching creatures. The line of metal I was throwing into the heads and torsos of the crowd was devastating. Heads simply disappeared in clouds of red and brown mist, pieces and chunks of skin and flesh fired into the air. I imagined that I could hear the splattering impact of large rounds entering and leaving the bodies and body parts I destroyed, and I began to get sick with the raw carnage I was creating.

  Body parts fell to the ground, severed by the constant line of metal rounds, like I was wielding a giant sword and slashing through the tightly packed ranks.

  I slowly swung the stream of fire from left to right, and right to left, stopping at the midpoint where our two streams converged, then back to the opposite side. The creatures continued to come, one after the other. They began to stumble on the fallen bodies and parts of their comrades, and I periodically had to adjust fire downwards to account for the crawlers—either those who had stumbled to their knees, or those who moved still, despite lacking knees.

  Torsos hit with multiple rounds shattered, sending ribs and flesh along with pieces of rotting clothing into the horde behind them. Moans shattered when bullets tore into mouths and throats, ending in ripping coughs or wet, terrible groans.

  But still they came.

  We peppered now, unable to maintain full streams of fire, ammunition waning as they stumbled forward. I aimed shots now, firing bursts into heads and upper torsos, taking out five and six to a burst. They fell, blood and gore splattering the steps of the memorial. Marble and concrete ran slick with red and brown blood and effluent.

  But still they came.

  I was a farmer and the gun my scythe. I was a swordsman, a plowman, a reaper. I was death final, and silence supreme.

  But still they came.

  I was one man, and they were legion.

  And still, they came.

  My gun clicked empty and I pulled myself out of the turret, bounding to the marble floor and pulling grenades out of the box two at a time. I pulled the pins and threw the explosives into the thickest collections of creatures. Explosions rocked the area, and my ears rang with the deafening sound of the grenades and the sputtering fire of Kate’s machine gun. I threw more, one at a time, pulling pin by pin and throwing mindlessly, an endless stream of explosives coursing over the sand bag barrier, tearing zombies apart and spraying dead flesh across the ground.

  It was a dying ground for them. A final resting place. A place of extreme violence and of horrific dismemberment.

  And they came. In droves and en masse.

  Kate screamed loudly in frustration as her gun spattered to silence, and they moved forward for her without hesitation. The second her gun went silent, they were there. Bodies slamming against the side of the truck, circling to the front to make the short trip around, through the gap.

  I knew a lost cause when I saw it.

  Chapter 42

  She started to rise, but panicked as her clothing caught on an exposed piece of metal. She pulled too hard, and stumbled forward, falling from the turret, bouncing off the door once, and onto the hard ground. I heard the crack of bone as she fell forward, her leg caught awkwardly in the metal ring as the weight of her body brought her down.

  They were flooding up the center of the stairway, now, only twenty feet away. I rose and fired a long blast from my M-4 into the leading edge of the tide as they flooded toward the gap, but it was like spitting into the ocean.

  I discarded the rifle, running toward her.

  She groaned once, face torn in pain. I looked to her leg, and to her torn shin, where bone was exposed from the compound fracture. She screamed again, and then went silent, passing out from the pain.

  My blood screamed as the first row of creatures, only ten abreast as they struggled to push through the funnel created by the parked trucks, came within striking distance. Behind me, Ky was shouting, warning me of their approach.

  But I knew.

  I knew them.

  And I knew they were going to die.

  I had no time to pick her up, and I turned, drawing the two blades from their twin sheathes on my hips. I darted forward, slashing and stabbing. Heads severed and hands fell to the ground. I swung defensively, tearing through bone and flesh to keep grasping hands from her prone body and their ragged, compulsively gnashing teeth from her small frame. I stabbed and slashed with desperation, taking heads through the eyes or the throats, eager to down as many as I could as efficiently as I could.

  But I was only one, and they were many. My strength and speed were failing as their numbers pressed forward.

  Behind me, Ky was still shouting, and as the blood boiled in my veins, I thought I heard her scream above the madness.

  “Get! Down!”

  The very air vibrated in my madness. I heard her voice and I trusted it. I dove down, body covering Kate.

  The hiss of a thousand snakes, the buzz of a million bees. The air moved as bodies fell, blood rained over us. Gore spat into the air. Moans didn’t die, they simply evaporated into the air.

  From the top of the stairs, Ky was aiming high with the minigun, the electric motor humming and the cannon firing on all chambers. Several creatures, too close to us for her to take as they came up the stairs, stumbled closer. As I pulled Kate to my shoulders, I reached my arm back with the machete, even as my muscles signaled their fatigue.

  Dropping the blade, I pulled the pistol from my waist band, firing one shot into each head from several feet away.

  This was the merciful death.

  I bolted to the side, giving Ky a broad range of fire. She didn’t waste it.

  As I stumbled up the stairs, the minigun tore through the invaders, shredding flesh and bone, grinding bodies to pulp. She had a narrow window of fire to concentrate, and as the bodies dropped in place, she widened her fire, moving backwards and further out. The high velocity rounds were terrible, and I watched, stunned as I dropped behind the last barricade, as the tracers illuminated the carnage.

  “We told you to stay put,” I managed to say over the clatter of spent rounds and the hum and explosion of the gun. She stopped firing for a moment, only to throw me the kind of look only a twelve year old could.

  “You can go back down, and I’ll take a break if you want,” one eyebrow lifted.

  I sighed and stepped back.

  “I thought so,” she said, even as her finger jammed back onto the trigger.

  They continued forward, thousands of them flooding toward the narrow approach. I looked past the point of fire, into the packed throngs behind. They still extended into the reflecting pool, and hundreds more were now filtering out of the trees lining the park and from Constitution and Independence, moving slowly to join their friends and neighbors as they pressed forward. I relieved Ky on the gun and she followed the ammunition belt into the crate, her voice rising worriedly over the clatter of the weapon.

  “You’re going to go dry any minute,” she said, and I followed her voice to the rapidly shortening band of ammunition. Cursing, I started firing in bursts.

  Without the withering rate of fire, however, they started to advance again. In short bursts, the cannon was devastating but it wasn’t the fire hose of lead it had been before. They could move forward when injury was not a consideration. They could advance when death was merely another word.

  As the belt shortened, then ran out, the electric motor clicking and the barrels steaming from the heat, I leaned against the closest pillar, watching them fill the void and pour through the gap.

  I scanned the sky above the Mall, looking for the air support that had n
ever come. I cursed the sky and leaned forward for the M-4 that I knew would be the last weapon I ever fired.

  As they shambled up the stairs, a mock homage to the nation’s greatest president, who would now preside over the death of hope, Ky appeared at my shoulder.

  “So ... what now?”

  I simply stared, unable to answer. We had pulled this girl from the farmlands of Delaware to die like this. I had no answer but action.

  I sat down behind the closest sandbag and raised the carbine, pressing the trigger in semi-automatic fire, aiming for the heads of those closest to us.

  The front ranks withered and fell, their torsos exploding and their heads liquified.

  I looked down at my rifle in confusion.

  What the hell kind of gun was this?

  Even as I stared in bewilderment, Ky yelled loudly.

  “Yeah, baby!”

  Three Blackhawk helicopters were flying low and slow over the top of the memorial, having approached from the rear. Even as we watched, they were coming broadside to the aggressors, their trio of miniguns blasting more steel at the advancing horde, driving them back, and again away from the memorial.

  I collapsed against the sandbags as Ky jumped up and down with glee. The helos hovered in place before the one in the center began to descend, blades spinning up the dirt that wasn’t soaked in gore. I moved to grab Kate, picking her up carefully and stepping toward the sandbags to move down the stairs.

  “Holy crap, Mike, check it out!” Ky was pointing up, and I squinted into the bright light, even under my sunglasses.

  Four large, green airplanes with boxy tails and rectangular wings were flying low, two banking in and over the Mall from the left, and two from the right, emerging from over the Capitol and dropping low.

  “Uh, yeah, we need to move, Ky!”

  She bolted ahead, careful to move slowly over the slick, red steps, Romeo close behind, tail held between his legs in fright.

  The airplanes were flying slow—slower than I thought a jet could fly. Twin engines mounted on the tails whirled and screamed and as they approached, I saw the make, even as I stumbled down the steps: they were A-10’s, an aircraft designed to kill tanks.