“More than one,” Wally said with no trace of pride or boasting in his voice. He watched the colonel look him over.
“I bet you have. Tell me this: what is so important that you would sell out your city for?”
“I owe someone,” Wally admitted. “She’s all that matters to me.” He carefully and slowly shrugged his backpack from his shoulders and laid it in the dirt at his feet. “May I show you?”
The colonel motioned for him to proceed.
Wally dug out the picture of
Bree
, handing it over to him. “I know she’s alive. I can feel it. Have you seen her?”
Before he ever finished the question, Wally knew the colonel had. The recognition in his eyes was obvious. The two of them stared at each other.
“A trade, then?” the colonel said. “As I suggested before?”
“What do you want?” Wally asked, knowing he’d pay any price asked of him.
“I think it would be obvious. I want detailed information on New Denver’s defenses and how their militia operates.”
“So you
have
seen her, then?”
“Better than that, son. I know where she is. Her name is Dr.
Bree
Weston, isn’t it?”
Wally felt his knees go weak. His hope was confirmed. “Tell me,” he said quietly, hardly able to speak at all from the emotion coursing through him.
* * *
Sebastian slid from underneath the APC. Oil and grease stained his hands and spotted the loose, gray clothing that passed for his uniform. Thane stood over him so filled with rage lightning seemed to dance in his eyes.
“Well?” Thane asked as Sebastian scurried to his feet.
“It should be good now.”
Thane nodded at him, then turned to the others of his squad. “Get your gear reloaded onboard and let’s roll, people.”
The last few hours had been a nightmare for Thane. It was as if he could feel Wally’s lead on them growing as they sat helpless, waiting for Sebastian to get the APC functional again. Thane knew nothing about such things and was forced to trust Sebastian’s hasty repair job. Whatever happened to the APC as they first tried to leave New Denver put them hours behind. Thane watched the others climbing inside it as the city’s air raid siren began to wail. Cursing, he smashed his fist into the heavily-armored vehicle’s side.
“What the Hades?” he demanded.
The siren meant the city was under attack or soon would be, but that didn’t make sense. The beasts always came at night. Despite their delay, it was still hours until sundown. For a fleeting moment, Thane considered ignoring the siren. Odds were, with the APC repaired, they could fight their way through whatever was outside the gates . . . but opening them would leave New Denver in far too dangerous a position. Then he heard the noise. An Apache came swooping overhead, doing a flyover of the city. Thane recognized at once that its intent was to scope them out. It was being used as a means of recon, but for whom?
“To the wall!” he shouted at his squad, his legs already pumping beneath him as he left them behind.
Thane reached the top of the wall. The guards on duty stood there staring in total shock at the convoy of military vehicles closing in on the city. Two jeeps with mounted .50 calibers, an IAV Stryker, and three troop transport trucks pulled ahead and poured on the speed for the city gates. They came to a stop below them. Thane’s anger flared white hot, knowing his vengeance on Wally would have to wait a bit longer.
“Citizens of New Denver,” a voice boomed through the Stryker’s loud speakers, “the Last Federation greets you. We’ve came seeking an alliance against the beasts. Open your gates so we may enter and discuss the terms of our new friendship.”
A young guard next to Thane looked at him and asked, “What . . . what do we do, sir?”
Thane resisted the urge to strike him. “We kill them where they stand and pray we can take that bird of theirs down before it does too much damage to the city.”
Raising his AK-47, Thane took aim at the gunner of the closest of the two jeeps.
* * *
Colonel Holmes saw the gunner in the jeep to the Stryker’s right take a round through his face that sprayed blood and bone fragments into the air as the man rolled from the back of the jeep and thudded onto the ground behind it. The man’s corpse had barely struck the dirt before a rain of lead hammered down upon his men and the Stryker’s roof.
“Return fire!” he screamed, thankful he hadn’t dared making his demands from the
Skryker’s
turret. Whoever was leading New Denver’s forces was one cold-hearted and hardcore bastard. Holmes thought the city’s defenders would at least talk enough to try to feel out who he was if not be outright fooled by his offer and let him inside their walls. Now his men were caught in the open and taking heavy losses for his mistake. Of course, he had some cards yet to play.
Tapping a button on his helmet, he switched from the loudspeaker controls to his comm. unit. “Ron! Tear those idiots a new one!” With the order given, Holmes leaned over to the Stryker’s driver. “Take us through those gates!”
The young man’s eyes bugged out, but then he nodded and his foot floored the Stryker’s accelerator. Holmes was counting on the gates being weak enough for the tank-like vehicle to plow its way through them. The rogue Hunter, Wally, had told him the beasts had made another run at the city recently and not all the damage to the gates was repaired when he’d set out on foot, leaving the place behind.
As the Stryker barreled towards the gates, Ron came streaking over them, making an attack run. Twin missiles left trails of white smoke in the air as they impacted with the top of New Denver’s walls. Holmes was flung forward as the Stryker sent wooden shrapnel from the broken gates flying and rolling into the city proper. The heavy vehicle spun, but managed not to tip over as it whirled around. Ignoring the pain in his side where he’d bounced off its dash, Holmes scrambled for the turret. He flung its hatch outward, grabbing the grips of the .50 caliber waiting above him. Hot steel casings flew from its side as he opened up and cut a swathe of blood and gore through a wave of the city’s defenders rushing to reinforce those already on the wall.
* * *
Thane shoved the young guard in his path from the wall as he leapt for cover and the air exploded with heat and flames. The young guard screamed as he plummeted to the earth below and the missiles blew a gaping hole in the wall where they’d stood. Neither of those things mattered to Thane. He survived and that was what was important. Though most of the attackers in the convoy lay twitching in the throes of death and in pools of their own blood outside the wall below, their leader was now inside and the blasted Apache was slaughtering what remained of his own men.
He spotted Sebastian in the crowd below on the wall’s interior side. Sebastian was hightailing it for their own APC with Roberts by his side. There was no sign of Brian, but Thane spotted
Josey’s
corpse. It lay on the stair heading to the top of the wall, half buried on a pile of rubble. A fist-sized piece of shrapnel protruded from her forehead and red wetness leaked from her eyes, flowing over her cheeks like tears.
Thane knew the enemy APC below needed to be dealt with or despite their losses the soldiers of the Last Federation might still be able to turn the tide of the battle. Thane’s AK-47 was gone, lost in his efforts to stay alive. He drew a sleek, combat knife from a sheath in his boot and moved with the grace of a cat across the remnants of the wall above the gates. Silently, he threw himself from the wall, arms spread like wings. He landed on top of the APC directly behind the gunner whose uniform wore the stripes of a colonel. The colonel must have seen him, but couldn’t sweep the .50 caliber around to aim at him in time. Thane lunged forward, the blade of his knife sinking into the colonel’s throat all the way up to the hilt. He gave the knife a few twists, each accompanied by a gurgle of pain, before ripping it free of the colonel’s mangled neck.
Thane looked up at the sound of a roaring engine bearing down on him. Sebastian, behind the wheel of New Denver’s single APC, was gunning it on a collision course with the Stryker. The Stryker was wedged up against the wall by the force of the impact. One of its wheels bounced over the dozens of bodies littering the interior side of the city’s gates. Thane swept up a blood-slicked rifle from the hands of a corpse and ran towards the city’s shattered entrance. He saw the few remaining soldiers of the Last Federation in full retreat, fleeing for the
treeline
in the distance.
The Apache came streaking down towards New Denver’s streets again. A missile flew skyward to meet it head-on. The helicopter erupted in a ball of fire. Its burning wreckage disappeared as it descended into the depths of the city before the second explosion of its crash rocked the earth beneath Thane’s feet. Brian stood across the street from him with a lopsided smirk on his face and a smoking RPG in his hands. Thane walked calmly towards the damaged Stryker as its driver, bruised and battered, tried to climb out of it to collapse face first at his feet. The driver desperately attempted to draw the 9mm holstered on his belt. The tip of Thane’s boot kicked it from his hand as he finally got it free, sending it spinning through the air to land several feet away.
“Uh-uh,” Thane said without mercy as he knelt beside the driver. “That’s enough of that.”
“Please,” the driver said. Most of his front teeth were missing along with part of his chin, the entire front of his uniform soaked in dark red. “Please don’t hurt me anymore. I’ll tell you whatever you want to know!”
Thane smiled, leaned in closer, and took the driver’s hand in his own. The driver howled as he broke two of the man’s knuckles with the force of his grip. “I know you will. How many more of you are there?”
“No more!” the driver shrieked. “We were it. We don’t have a home base. The convoy was our home.”
“Thank you,” Thane said. “That’s really all I needed to know.”
The driver looked relieved as Thane started to get up. Without warning, Thane plunged his blade into the top of the driver’s skull. The man’s eyes rolled up as he pulled the blade free with a grunt.
* * *
Greg sat on his knees, staring at the setting sun with tears rolling down his cheeks. His eyes were red, his voice hoarse and nearly gone. He’d crawled out of the home he and Anna had shared for so many years and left it behind him. He could still smell the scent of her death in his nostrils and couldn’t believe she’d finally found the courage to let go. Footsteps like thunder jerked him back to reality. He spun, surprised to find his rifle clutched in his shaking hands, and raised it, expecting to see one of the beasts emerging from the trees to end his suffering. His finger squeezed the trigger from sheer reflex. The rifle cracked, bouncing against his shoulder. A round blazed from its barrel to ping off something metallic and ricochet harmlessly away. Greg’s mouth hung open and the rifle slipped from his grasp. Before him stood a gleaming, silver giant at least twelve feet tall.
“Get down!” it boomed at him in a hollow, robotic voice. It raised the cannon-like weapon in its hands, aiming at something across the clearing from them. Greg twisted his head to see three rotting Bigfoot charging towards where they were as he flopped onto his stomach, covering his head with his hands.
The metal giant opened fire as Greg’s ear rang and hurt like all get out from the sound of the massive cannon thundering above him. A stream of high-velocity rounds erupted from the cannon with something akin to a sonic boom. The two closest undead beasts were reduced to flying clunks of shredded meat and a red mist hovered in the air where they had been seconds before. The surviving beast managed to dodge the core of the blast, but still took some serious damage. The bulk of its left side was gone, making it look like something from a sick cartoon, as it tried to keep moving. The power of the beast’s own muscles finished what the blast had begun as its main body split apart above its legs like a banana peel. Its head remained intact, dangling from the two barely-connected pieces below, as it slumped forward from the lack of a neck and chest to support its weight. The beast continued to function, dragging the mess of its body with its arms, crawling towards them with snarling lips, pulling itself sideways against the dirt. The metal giant lowered its cannon and stepped over Greg, advancing on what remained of the creature. The beast’s head popped like a spoiled melon under the giant’s silver foot as it smashed down onto it.