“Roger that. I’ll make sure everyone going with us has done their PCIs and everything is still tracking.”
“How are our guys looking?”
“We’re good to go, sir. Guerra was going to go over PCIs with the guys as soon as they finish with the sand table and then get some chow.”
One of the runners from the TOC stepped into the barracks. “Captain Hastings?”
Hastings looked up. “Yes?”
“Sorry to bother you, sir, but you’re needed in the TOC immediately. Colonel Victor is expecting you in the conference room.”
“Any idea what’s up?”
“No, sir. He just said I needed to move with a purpose and get you back ASAP.”
“Okay. Go ahead and tell him I am on my way right now.”
“Roger that, sir.” The runner spun and hurried back outside.
“Wonder what’s up now,” Ballantine said.
Hastings shrugged. “Who knows? But I’m betting it’s not good news. Listen, is everyone packed up and ready to roll? Talking about the civilians now, not our guys.”
Ballantine nodded. “You know it. The scare at the OP put the fear of God in everyone.”
“Good. Hold down the fort. I’ll be back as soon as I’m done.” Hastings gathered his planning materials, grabbed his weapon, and headed for the door.
*
Hastings knew something had to have changed. They weren’t under attack at the moment, and meeting in the conference room meant that they had something they wanted to discuss with him. Please don’t let it be that thousands of reekers are right up the road. What are the chances it could actually be good news? But he already knew the answer to his question: slim to none.
When he stepped inside the TOC, nothing seemed out of the ordinary. He strode to the conference room and gave a quick rap on the door as he entered. Colonel Victor and Colonel Jarmusch were there, as well as the senator and a few support personnel who looked to be setting up some commo equipment in the room.
“Come on in and grab a seat, Captain,” Victor said.
Hastings slid into a chair at the table. “What’s up, sirs?”
“As you know, we’ve been trying to establish communications with others within the government or any other military units,” Victor said. “Obviously, we haven’t heard much of anything to speak of, but about twenty minutes ago, the commo guys picked up a transmission. We have an individual on the other end who claims to be US Army. He’s about thirty to forty miles away, maybe fifteen from the rail yard at the Naval Support Activity installation on the other side of the Susquehanna River in Mechanicsburg.”
“I’m not familiar with that facility, sir,” Hastings said. “What do we know about this location and this individual?”
“Well, that’s where it gets interesting.” Victor gestured at Jarmusch. “Alex, do you mind explaining?”
“Not at all, Dave. The facility is a warehouse depot for program and supply support for the weapons systems that keep our Naval forces mission ready. As you can imagine, they store a lot of mission-essential equipment and parts for the Navy, but they also store less common items not found in the US equipment inventory. This is typically foreign weapons and equipment the US has acquired from around the world, most of which are categorized as non-attributable items.”
“And they just store this kind of stuff right in town there?” Hastings asked.
“Yes. It’s not widely known, though, even by most of the people who work there. It’s kind of the old hide-in-plain-sight trick, if you will. And at the end of the day, the place is just a warehouse facility for storing things, and these types of things need storing, too.”
“So we have a Navy depot facility with spare equipment and guns.” Hastings wondered why no one had mentioned that to him earlier. “Who is this individual on the other end?”
“He’s identified himself as Master Sergeant Slater. Says he’s Special Forces.”
It took Hastings a moment to put a face to the name. “You have got to be kidding me! Are you serious?”
Jarmusch and Victor exchanged confused glances.
“Yes, I’m serious, Captain,” Jarmusch said. “That’s what he’s told us so far.”
“Captain, do you know this person?” Cornell asked.
“Well, sir, I wouldn’t say that I know him, but I know who he is. We ran into a Master Sergeant Slater from the Seventh Special Forces Group in a small town prior to our arrival here. Said he was part of Task Force Boston. We spoke briefly with him, and he gave us a case of water then left in a Toyota Prius, of all things. Said he was headed to Fort Bragg, and that was the last we saw of him.”
“Well, we have him on the line now,” Victor said. “He has an interesting proposition for us. Perhaps you can talk to him and verify if it’s the same person you spoke to earlier?”
“Yes, sir, not a problem. What do you want me to ask him?”
Victor gave a slight shrug. “Just see if the voice sounds familiar, I guess. Then we can fill you in on what he’s proposed to us. We were going to run it by you and get your thoughts on his plan regardless, but since you might know him, it’s worth having you speak to him before we respond to him further.”
The commo guys had finished setting everything up and were standing by.
Hastings walked over to the other side of the table and picked up the handset. “What’s his call sign, and who are we?”
“He’s using Papa Zero Three. You can use your call sign if you want, sir,” the commo technician said.
Hastings keyed the mike. “Papa Zero Three, this is Crusader One One. Over.”
There was a pause, then a man responded, “Crusader One One, this is Papa Zero Three. Go.”
“Papa Zero Three, am I speaking to Master Sergeant Slater? Over.”
“Crusader One One, roger, this is Slater. Who’s this? Over.”
“Sergeant Slater, this is Captain Hastings, Tenth Mountain. Can you verify what kind of car you were driving when we met last? Over.”
“Crusader One One, it was a silver Prius. Much better mileage than those Humvees you lightfighters refused to leave. Over.”
Hastings looked over at the colonels and Cornell. “Has to be the same guy. How many SF guys can there be out there driving around in a Prius during the apocalypse?”
Everyone chuckled.
“What do you want me to tell him, sirs?”
“Tell him that we’ll contact him at this time tomorrow with further instructions,” Victor said.
“Papa Zero Three, Crusader One One. Over.”
“Crusader One One, go.”
“Papa Zero Three, we need you to come back up on the net this time tomorrow for further instructions. How copy? Over.”
“Roger, WILCO.”
“Crusader One One, out.” Hastings looked over at the others in the room. “So can someone fill me in on what’s going on here?”
“Was he really driving a Prius?” Colonel Jarmusch asked.
“Yeah, he was. He said it was more durable and got better mileage than the BMW motorcycle he had before we met him, sir. So what’s his plan?”
“Apparently, there’s a small group of survivors at the Naval Support Activity, mostly people who work at the facility and some family members. They asked if we could evacuate them. When we explained we would be at the rail yard just north of them, Master Sergeant Slater proposed that, if we could send a train engineer down to his location, they could evacuate their group back here on a train at their location. The rail line has a sideline that goes into the facility. They have a train at their location, but no one who knows how to drive it.”
Hastings grunted. “Okay. I guess we’d be using a Black Hawk, then. Where are we supposed to land a helicopter?”
“There’s a helo pad at the south end of the facility, not far from the rail line where the train is located,” Jarmusch said.
“So why don’t we just send the birds down there and evac all of them?”
“We made
that same suggestion,” Victor said. “But when Slater told us what’s on the train at his location, that information changed everything. Do you know what a Phalanx Close-in Weapon System is? Or rather the land variant, the C-RAM?”
“No, sir. I can’t say I’m familiar with that weapon system.”
“It was originally designed for naval use, but a land-based version was created that rides on a trailer. They used them in Iraq, around Baghdad. C-RAM stands for Counter Rocket Artillery Mortar, and it consists of a twenty-millimeter Gatling gun capable of firing forty-five hundred rounds per minute, a generator, and a radar unit on a lowboy trailer system. They were planning on taking them off of the train and using them to defend the naval facility before we made contact with them. They’re running out of food and supplies there, so coming up and bringing the C-RAMs with them makes the most sense. They also have a few retirees familiar with the system, and they say they can make it work against the reekers.”
“I see. That’s good and all, sir, but where are we supposed to get another train driver?”
Jarmusch said, “Lieutenant Munn says he can train one of his guys on how to get the engine up and running in the rail yard where the other trained engineer will be. So if he has any issues, we’ll have an actual engineer on site who can work through any issues they encounter.”
“That way,” Victor added. “We can send Munn to the naval facility to bring the C-RAM and the survivors back here.”
Hastings was momentarily nonplussed, but he didn’t let it show. Senior officers always rat-fucked a plan if you gave them half the chance. “Do we have enough airframes to support this additional operation, sir?”
Victor nodded. “We do. It’ll take some work, but we can get everything in order.”
“So when do we envision doing this, sir?”
“That’s what we wanted to talk to you about. We’d like to do it at the same time we do the rail yard operation.”
Feeling a bit overwhelmed, Hastings ran a hand through his hair and exhaled loudly. “Am I to understand you want to add this to the current rail yard operation?”
“That’s correct. We want to knock this out all at once in light of the emerging threat,” Victor said.
Hastings had heard similar buzzwords while deployed overseas. They wanted him to fit ten pounds into a five-pound bag as if it were no big deal. Fuck me. Just when I was almost done with the OPORD, this shit has to happen. This is turning into a cluster quicker than a monkey gets fucked. “Sir, I was just about done with the OPORD for the rail yard mission, but adding this piece into the equation is going to push my time table to the right becaue I’ll have to go back and make some changes and additions to my plan,” he said, making one last play for sanity.
Victor smiled. “That’s quite all right. We anticipated as much. We’ve already started the staff on the coordination pieces for the additional airframes and the additional personnel needed to go to the naval facility.”
Hastings cocked an eyebrow. “Really?”
“Really,” Victor responded. “Listen, Hastings. You rolled in here hot to trot. Don’t tell me that an additional contingency mission is going to put some curl in your flattop?”
“No, sir. Has the Shadow been tasked to fly the naval facility yet? I’d like to get some current imagery of it and ID where the helo pad is located.”
“S2’s already on it. You should have your imagery shortly, if it isn’t already waiting for you,” Victor said.
Hastings sighed. “Gentlemen, with all due respect, I think we’re stretching ourselves thin, trying to add this in at this stage in the game. If we have a major contact while on the objective, it’s going to be doubly tough to respond effectively. I’m not afraid of the extra work. I’m just concerned we may be biting off more than we can chew by executing the naval facility as part of the rail yard operation.”
“Your concerns are justified, Captain Hastings,” Jarmusch said. “We discussed the additional risk this adds to an already risky mission, but we all agreed the end justifies the risk.”
Senator Cornell spoke up. “For the record, Captain Hastings, I’m going on the books as authorizing this action and taking full responsibility if it’s ever called into question as to why we took such a risk. I have the utmost confidence in you and your men to accomplish this mission. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t have asked that this be added to the operation. With that said, all of our resources are at your disposal.”
“I thank you all for your confidence in me and my men, but we are just a small part of the team here,” Hastings said. “A lot more of your people will be on this operation, as well. I’ll need an additional twenty-four to thirty-six hours to make the additions to my existing OPORD, possibly more if the airframes aren’t ready or if something unforeseen happens.”
“It sounds like this is settled then,” Victor said. “Don’t let us keep you, Hastings. Our next hard time will be back here to come up on comms with Slater.”
“Roger that, sir. I’ll get back to it then.” Hastings nodded to the men and headed for the door. It was going to be a long night.
*
Hastings reassembled his plan to integrate the new contingency mission. Sleep was a forgotten luxury, but he found he didn’t miss it. He was afraid of his dreams, afraid of seeing his family massacred by the hungry dead while he watched, powerless to do anything except for scream. He insisted the rest of the troops get some rest, including Ballantine. While they still had tasks to accomplish, he needed to ensure everyone was ready and as close to their peak as possible before they stepped off. While Hastings would be commanding many more soldiers, the five who had accompanied him to Fort Indiantown Gap were all that remained of his light infantry company. They were ass-kickers and hard chargers, and he felt a deep responsibility toward them. He thought he’d felt the heavy weight of command before, but he’d been wrong. Everything before Task Force Manhattan had been a dress rehearsal. He truly dreaded the prospect of losing one of his guys.
To avoid that, he labored over the operational plan for almost twenty-four hours. Tweaking and retweaking elements, altering blocking positions, and reconfiguring force compositions. By the time he was finished, he wasn’t as certain of the new plan as he had been of the old one. The old one had been simpler, and a simple plan was a solid plan. In the new one, they had two major operations running concurrently, and that meant more moving parts, few troops to deliver success, and a greater likelihood of Murphy’s Law coming into play. But the command group had spoken, and he had no choice.
He finally knocked off in midmorning, after Ballantine and his wife both insisted he wind down for a bit. Even Diana sided with them, which was an interesting turn of events.
“You should listen to them, General,” Diana said. “You really do look like shit.”
“I didn’t know you cared,” Hastings responded.
Diana arched an eyebrow. “It’s not like it’s a betrothal or anything, guy.” When Hastings had only grunted in response, she asked, “You do know what betrothal means, right?”
“Yeah. You must be college educated to use words like that.”
“NYU,” she said. In the background, Kenny began asking for more hot cheese. Diana frowned and glanced over at the boy.
Hastings thought she looked exhausted, as well. “You should get some rest as well. Maybe Kay can look after Kenny for a while?”
“Yes, I can do that,” Kay said immediately.
“I’m fine,” Diana snapped. “Go to sleep, General. And when you wake up, get off your ass and win this war. I’ve got to get back to pole dancing.”
Hastings chuckled dryly then headed over to the bunk he had claimed. He collapsed onto the thin foam mattress and fell into a deep sleep.
He did not dream.
*
The plan finally had a name: Operation BOXCAR.
As Hastings walked toward the lead vehicle, he went over all of it again in his mind. The force consisted of three maneuver elements: Guerra would b
e leading the ground convoy element, designated Apache; Hastings had control of the main effort, Lakota, which consisted of two Chinooks; and Ballantine would head Blackfoot, the element going to the naval facility with a couple of Chinooks. The Chinooks were all using the call sign Gunslinger to keep things simple.
The operation would use phase lines as control and timing measures in order to provide mutual support to all the elements at any stage. Hastings was certain that the plan would not go smoothly—no plan ever survived the first contact. Even though the enemy formed a monolithic threat, its attack retinue was limited, which meant most of the surprises they might encounter would be from happenstance, not from planning on the part of the opposing force. Because of that, he wanted as much flexibility in the plan as possible so that the elements could help one another out if they got into a tight situation. There was no QRF in reserve; no one was coming from Fort Indiantown Gap to support them if they got stranded. They would be on their own and would have to self rescue, something that was becoming par for the course.
The heavy hitters of Apache were several Special Forces RG-33 Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles armed with Common Remotely Operated Weapon Station systems that had been on post. The MRAPs were heavily armored, a response by the military to provide troops in Iraq with equipment that could reasonably survive the detonation of an improvised explosive device, or IED, a booby trap that had proven to be surprisingly effective. Hastings knew there was very little the reekers could do to stop an MRAP. Perhaps the only other vehicles that could do more damage simply by driving over the zombies were Bradleys and Abrams tanks. The CROWS system in each vehicle ensured the MRAPs could reach out and kill the reekers at a distance, with a mix of 40-millimeter grenades and .50-caliber or 7.62-millimeter machine-gun fire. Also part of Guerra’s Apache element were uparmored Humvees, which were more maneuverable than the MRAPs, and a handful of deuce-and-a-halfs and five-ton trucks. The vehicles had as much ammo, chow, water, and gas as they could carry. The deuces and five-tons had shuttled the ammo from the ASP to the staging area, where it was cross loaded onto the other vehicles, and then they all went back and filled their beds with more ammo for the trip. If there was one thing Hastings didn’t want to run short of, it was ammo. Fortunately, they had an entire ASP at their disposal, so he made good use of it. As the ground convoy was to provide outer perimeter security for the main body while occupying the objective, he wanted to ensure they had as much ammo as possible.
These Dead Lands: Immolation Page 24
