Payload

by RW Krpoun

  “Two, are you at Delta?”

  “Roger that, Six.”

  “We’re moving directly to your location, on foot and under pressure. Move north and effect a pick-up, over.”

  “Got it six. Moving now.”

  Checkpoint Delta was about a mile and a half south of town on this same county road, so Marv hoped it was almost over. Moving alongside a red-faced Addison he spiked a zombie, appalled to see dozens more lurching up the road at their best speed. “Keep up the pace, guys,” he called between swings. “JD is on the way.”

  It seemed like an eternity, but Marv finally heard the RV behind them. Risking as glance, he was gratified to see that JD was backing towards them at about twenty miles per hour.

  They had outdistanced the zombies, maintaining a twenty to thirty foot lead by the time Gnomehome rumbled to a stop and the door banged open, but by then all six Gnomes were wheezing and blown, arms like lead and lungs heaving.

  “Inside and to the back, clear the path for the next guy,” Marv motioned Chip towards the door. “Bear, Dyson, Addison, Brick.”

  He spiked a zombie and stumbled back past the rear axle, walking sideways, a gray-skinned zombie closing on him, a man in a ripped and bloody sports coat. As Brick lunged up the steps into the RV Marv turn and smacked the zed’s hands aside with his shield, planting the hammer into its skull. “Airborne Ranger, maggot,” he snarled. Wrenching the weapon free, he staggered up the steps, the door closing behind him.

  Sagging into the passenger seat, he dropped his hammer and wearily accepted the cold bottle of water JD passed him with one hand as Gnomehome lurched into motion. “Thanks. You know where we’re going?”

  “Yeah, clean shot.”

  “That was too damn close,” Marv shook his head after downing half the bottle. “On foot with hammers…you can’t imagine. We must have killed three or four hundred all told, and they keep on coming over the bodies. It’s like fighting ants.”

  He finished the bottle. “Three minute showers, guys. Get cleaned up, reload, and get your mind back in the game. The day is young, and FASA hasn’t forgotten us.”

  One of the rescues was babbling something, probably thanks, but the Ranger tuned them out. They weren’t important, they weren’t the reason, they were just a means to an end, said end being transport across the water barrier. The payload had to get through.

  Sophia nodded, the sat phone balanced between her cheek and her shoulder as she typed. “All right, they made it out-on foot? Really? Amazing.” She frowned at the PC’s screen. “They rescued some people from a storm cellar. Can you get back in? Good-I want to know who lived in the house where that cellar was, and any connections to them. They got those people for a reason, so find out that reason. Check the cellar, too.”

  She put the phone down on the desk. Maybe Doctor C was right in thinking that these were just dumb brutes.

  Gap Brayston was a wizened seventy-something with a Springfield M1903 slung over his shoulder and a Colt Commander in a shoulder holster, dressed in a pressed work shirt buttoned to the neck, faded jeans, and a red lobsterman’s hat that had faded to a dull pink. “I gotta tell you boys, I had my doubts,” he admitted as he rolled the gate to his boat yard closed and locked the chain. “My help done scattered, and I’m not spry enough for rescue work, although I was fixing up my truck to try to try anyway when the phone rang. The Good Lord never lets us down.”

  “We were glad to do it, sir,” Marv nodded tiredly. “But we need to get across the river.”

  “You need to get across, and I need to head down it,” the old man nodded. “That’s what I’ve been workin’ on since I finished breakfast. You need gas or diesel for that motor palace you’re driving?”

  “Diesel, sir. You wouldn’t happen to have any spare gas cans, would you?”

  “I ‘magine I’ve got four or five I don’t need. C’mon, we’ll sort that out and get you across the water.”

  Even after they got Gnomehome on the barge it took just over an hour to get to the landing stage on the west bank, a period Marv spent scanning the skies for signs of a helicopter. Addison took the opportunity to work on pipe bombs, while the rest of the Gnomes relaxed.

  “Ten fifty,” Marv shook his head as the RV rolled up the concrete ramp and across a parking area to a gravel county road. “At least it’s before noon.”

  “How did FASA find us, assuming that wasn’t just a random terror incident?” JD wondered.

  “If it was random, it was a damned unlikely coincidence,” the Ranger shook his head. “Thing is, they lost us after the RV park and they didn’t pick us up until today-the RV was under cover last night. And they found the rescue group, not the RV. Unless somebody swallowed a GPS tracker, it makes no sense.”

  “We’re missing something, or they’re real damn lucky,” JD agreed. “Still, we’re across the river, and I think we’re off their radar for the moment.”

  Chapter Nine

  “Fastbox 2 is across the Mississippi River,” Sophia told the back of the chair. She never understood why Doctor C sat with his back to the door so all his staff briefed smooth leather.

  “What?”

  “Early this morning I was able to reacquire their trail. Ground recon examined where they had gone to ground, a cartel relay point, which they looted of supplies and fuel and apparently constructed a device of some sort. Air recon picked them up in the midst of a rescue effort in Chatham, Mississippi. The helicopter disabled their vehicle, but was damaged by ground fire and had to disengage. We expected that the volume of infected subjects would eliminate them, but the ground recon team that arrived later established that they fought their way clear on foot. Footage is in file 1007.”

  “They got out on foot?”

  “They fought their way out-if you look at the file, you’ll see they simply went through the infected as if they weren’t there.”

  “Who are these men?” Cyrus wondered out loud.

  “Part of it was good planning and solid tactics,” Sophia rolled her eyes-she did not care who these men were. People were unimportant in any regard save that as a subject for terror. “In any case, we established that the target of the rescue was the grand-daughter of the owner of a small river barge company. Checking the company’s boat yard revealed packaging material from explosives of the same type as were looted from the gravel company whose truck they had used for the rescue. They are west of the Mississippi.”

  “How much of a lead do they have?”

  “An hour, maybe two, sir.”

  “Return your assets to the ready reserve. I’ll assign you a helicopter and a ground team in Arkansas and assets from District 13. You know their destination, so work the pursuit from both ends of the equation.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  After cleaning the common areas of the RV Chip scrubbed the hammers clean. “Thanks,” Marv accepted his. “You OK?”

  “Sure,” the husky Gnome nodded. “I just like to keep busy.”

  “In Afghanistan, some guys got a little hyper in the down time, trying to keep their mind off what they saw,” Marv shrugged. “You want to talk?”

  Chip hesitated. “Dude…I dunno.”

  The Ranger studied him. “Not like video games, huh?”

  “At least they didn’t scream or thrash around-that part was the same.” Chip sat in Doc’s green camp chair with a sigh.

  “Actually, that’s the part that really weirds me out,” Marv admitted. “You hit the brain and it’s like switching off a computer. They just fold, limp. I don’t think they even twitch. Not a sound, either. Its…eerie. Even more strange than them being zombies in the first place.”

  “At least they’re not kids.” The husky Gnome was silent for a moment.

  “Kind of a rush, isn’t it?” The Ranger grinned. “You wouldn’t think you could be scared and exhilarated at the same time like that.”

  Chip’s face came to life. “Yeah…like….dude, it was kind of…cool.”

  “Welcome to combat-a
firefight is the weirdest thing in the world. A buddy of mine said it was like getting a blowjob while you have the dry heaves. Horrible and a complete trip at the same time. Afterwards you don’t know whether to cry or beat your chest.”

  “You feel a lot of really negative energy afterwards, too. I was trying to work all that off.”

  “Everyone deals in their own fashion, but it gets a little easier with practice. Some guys come to love it.” Marv stared out the windshield. “I like going in, that rush when you’re putting it on the line. Thing to remember is that a fight jams your body chemistry up bad, and it ties your emotions into a hard little knot. Sooner or later that knot has to come loose, and your body has to purge the system. Just ride it out-you’re not going crazy, you just have to let it get sorted out. Time will do it. And it does get easier.”

  “Thanks, dude.” Chip heaved himself to his feet and slapped the Ranger on the shoulder. “That helps. I’m gonna get lunch started.”

  A bleary Bear stepped up between the seats and handed Marv the board-mounted sat phone. “This damn thing keeps buzzing, woke me up.”

  “Thanks.” Marv checked the missed call screen, then hit the call button.

  “Fastbox two?” Lieutenant Colonel Nelson sounded tired.

  “Yes, sir. I’m glad to hear from you.”

  “And I, you. When you didn’t answer I was pretty concerned.”

  “The phone was damaged-the guy who repaired it had to fasten it to a board to hold it together. Too cumbersome to carry, sir. Why the commo blackout, sir?”

  “FASA,” Colonel Nelson sighed. “They hit our satellite repeater and the backup. Put our facility off-line until not long ago. The good news is that it cost them a great deal to pull it off. They’re starting to unravel-they’re a patchwork of existing organizations, both extremist and criminal, and all but a few are already on a database somewhere. Where are you?”

  “Arkansas, sir, and rolling west.”

  “Damn, Sergeant, I was worried that the Big Muddy would have stopped you. Well done. Now, I’ve got good news and bad news for you. The good news is I should be able to link you up with a helicopter and take the payload off your hands very shortly. The bad news is that I want to hand you an empty payload and have you continue your mission.”

  “Sir?” Marv scowled that the dusty road ahead of them

  “They’re hot on your trail, son. I expect you know that, but the NSA is hacking into their commo networks and the word they’re giving us is that FASA is trying hard for the payload. I’ve put together a handful of Federal agents, loans from civilian agencies, and a bird from the Department of the Interior’s counter-fire program. Random assets that are completely off the grid insofar as FASA is concerned. They’ll take the payload and get it home. Meanwhile Fastbox Two stays in play.”

  “Tying up FASA assets,” Marv said slowly, thinking hard. “So we slow down just a little, maybe make a couple not-so-great route choices, and keep them busy.”

  “Every man-hour they commit to Fastbox is one man-hour not being used to pull down our country. The RV park operation tied up every asset they had for a hundred miles, and while it created a zombie outbreak, it did so in a very isolated area. Besides the diversion of resources, between you and the zeds they lost an entire team at the park, and you created considerable mayhem when you hit that base. You guys saved a lot of lives by bringing that horror show down onto your own heads. That same operation could have compromised a mid-sized town.”

  “The rest of my team are civilians,” Marv reminded the officer. “I’ll have to read them into the mission, sir.”

  “Go ahead. I’ll need their names and data, because I promise you that Uncle Sugar isn’t going to forget his favorite nephews. All of you, especially you, Sergeant, can expect the gratitude of the nation.”

  “Yes, sir. Prepare to copy.” Marv already had the facts in his notebook. “And these two were killed in action at the park, sir. At some point they will need recognition for their families’ sake.”

  “You can count of that, Sergeant. You have my word, and that of the President-I’ve briefed him myself.”

  “Let me talk to them, sir. But I’ll continue on as Fastbox Two regardless, sir.”

  “Outstanding. I’m going to send you a new sat phone and charger with the extraction bird, along with written orders and a CEOI. Is there anything else you critically need that I can get in short order?”

  “Nothing much that won’t tip off the watchers, sir, although if you could get us manuals on battlefield medicine, medics, and all that it would help-we have medical gear, just no medic. But there is one thing-can you get the NSA or someone to establish how they are tracking us? We lost them after the RV park, but they picked us up today, just showed up out of the blue. We did use a landline phone, but we had a blocker unit and maintained communications security.”

  He could hear and keyboard being tapped. “FASA has purchased or hacked access to a lot of ordinary databases-cell phone, TV, Net providers, credit cards, that sort of thing. Are you using cell phones?”

  Marv swore. “No, sir, but I think I know how they’re doing it.”

  “Good. Now, give me your location and we’ll set up the meet.”

  Marv flipped open the road atlas. “Well, we’re about twelve miles east of Monticello, heading north-northwest.”

  “OK, guys, gather around,” Marv leaned against the fridge. “Time to get everyone read into the plan.”

  When the Gnomes, less JD who was driving, had gathered in the main area, he held up the payload. “This is the payload. FASA is an amalgamation of various fringe groups and lunatics; they created the virus that is causing all of this mess, built it in a lab or labs in Indonesia. The spooks were closing in so they had to move their plans up. They got seventeen bombs loaded with the virus before the US nuked their labs and production facilities. Some of the bombs were destroyed in transit, but one was captured. The Feds caught it in Miami-I was part of the detail guarding the capture effort at the port. From the bomb they extracted samples of the un-deployed virus.”

  “I don’t get the science, but apparently the lab-state virus is special because they weren’t done refining it or whatever else they do. Something scientific. Anyway, they split what they captured into three portions, and sent it out by air, land, and sea. Fastbox One, Two, Three. I was part of the security detail on Fastbox Two, moving by air. We had a mutiny, and long story short I ended up on foot in Florida, but I had the payload. Fastbox One made it to the destination despite a commando attack by FASA operatives just short of the destination. Fastbox Three ran afoul of zombies and the sample was destroyed with a thermite grenade.”

  “The science geeks are making amazing progress with the material from Fastbox One, and they really could use more of the material. Why I’m not sure, but like I said the science is beyond me. All I know is that getting this to them will help. On the flip side, FASA wants this very, very bad. If they get it, they can make more bombs. Without it, they’re creating zombies one bite at a time.”

  “So the reason FASA is coming at us is this payload?” Chip asked.

  “Exactly. I didn’t tell you because I’ve been under orders this entire time. I didn’t hide the risks, just the reason. Some here knew more than others, but now I’m laying all the cards on the table.”

  “Why is the USA reduced to moving this stuff by RV, dude?” Chip asked.

  “Because FASA has some infiltrators in the US military and government services, and because they put a bounty on it-remember that I told you about the gold and inoculations? It wasn’t because we killed their guys, it was because of the payload. The government could only send a team that was completely trusted, and right now vetted teams are in short supply. They assassinated the Chief of Staff of the Joint Chiefs and a bunch of Congressmen in the last couple days-resources are thin and getting spread thinner. Plus I lost contact with my controller for a while.”

  “Now, here’s the good news: in less than an hour
we will hand off the payload to a team on a helicopter who will whisk it to where it needs to be.”

  “Good,” Bear nodded.

  “The bad news is they are going to give me an identical payload container, and I am going to continue my cross-country run to the secure site the where real payload is destined to be researched.”

  “What? Why?” JD asked from the driver’s seat.

  “The team picking up the real payload is off the grid. FASA used a massive amount of resources attacking that RV park-that many zeds could have turned a good-sized town. If they think we still are Fastbox Two, they’ll keep throwing resources at us, resources that won’t be used to attack civilians, infrastructure, or cee-three sites.”

  “What’s ‘Cee-three’?” Dyson asked.

  “Command, Control, and Communications, basically headquarters units.”

  “So we act as bait to draw FASA away from soft targets,” Bear mused.

  “More like chum drawing sharks, dude,” Chip shook his head. “But I thought we lost them?”

  “We did, again.” Marv jerked his thumb towards the TV. “But when we connect with the satellite, FASA knows.”

  “So you’re going to watch some HBO,” Dyson said slowly. “You’re going to keep them on the trail.”

  “Yeah. I’m gonna be the bunny faking a hurt leg that lures the wolf away from the den.”

  “Easy way to get killed,” Bear pointed out.

  Marv shrugged. “That’s my choice. I’m not gonna give you a John Wayne speech-when the payload gets handed over anyone who wants out can take their weapons and their share of the food. I need the RV because of the sat link, but nobody else has to put it on the line. You guys are solid, I haven’t soldiered with better, but no one can ask more of you than you’ve already given.”

  “I will fight for America,” Brick said.

  “I better get full immunity for everything,” Bear shook his head.