Chapter 45
As Bravo Team squatted beside the dock
with their rifles fixed on the treeline, Boyd hopped off the tugboat and made
his way back to the rest of his team. “The boat’s all set. We can be at the
Farragut
in fifteen minutes,” he said into his earpiece to Carlie as he stared into the
jungle. He only got static in return. “They should’ve been here by now.” His
eyes strained to see any movement at the mouth of the jungle where the narrow
dirt road began.
He thought about the map he studied
earlier and recalled the two routes leading to this dock. One was the dirt road
and the other was a narrow ravine to the west.
Carlie’s not going to lead those
things towards us on the road. She’ll take the other route instead
.
That’s
what I’d do rather than risk an all-out battle in the open here.
He sprang up and instructed all but one
of his men to follow him. Boyd instructed his second-in-command to pilot the
small boat towards their location and to be ready for a hasty retreat.
“The rest of you are coming with me a
half-click over to a ravine where we are going to set up our claymores and turn
Carlie’s exfil route into the mouth of hell. Then we’ll have the
Farragut
pound this shoreline into oblivion if any of those things move in on us.”
Chapter 46
“Keep moving, it’s just up ahead,” said
Carlie as they trotted along the ravine floor, darting around fallen branches
towards the opening where the passage ended at the beach. The walls were fifty
feet high in this section and began flaring out. Pavel was hobbling and moaning
with each footstep on the uneven terrain. Carlie could see the foliage above
breaking and the sound of movement intensifying. As she turned to check on
Pavel, she saw the silhouette of a thin figure leap with surprising agility
through the air down into the drainage to her right. She immediately raised her
rifle and fired off two rounds at the creature’s head but it had already moved,
making a rush for Amy. She smoothly swung her M4, placing a round in the jaw,
dropping it in mid-air, then placed another round in the temple while it
thrashed on the moss-covered rocks next to them.
“Get Pavel and the others to the beach,”
she said to Shane. “This is a natural chokepoint. I’ll buy you some time.”
“The hell you will,” Shane said. “You’re
not…”
She grabbed his arm. “Go, Pavel
is
the light at the end of this tunnel. We need him—the world needs him to make it
off this island. Now, leave,” she said, pushing him towards Pavel. “All of you,
run!”
Chapter 47
Shane led the group towards the faint
opening ahead. Pavel was supported on either side by Amy and Jared while Matias
scanned the surrounding ridges.
As they moved, the sound of Carlie’s
rifle fire resounded off the earthen walls. With the ravine opening up to the
beach, Shane could see men crouched on either side with their weapons fixed on
him.
“Hold your fire,” shouted Boyd, who rose
from a clump of bushes to the left. He ran up to Shane, waving his hand back
for his men to follow him. “Keep walking straight to me,” he said, pointing at
either side of the ravine. “There’s a shitload of claymores set up at the
mouth.”
“Damn fine sight you are to see,” Shane
said.
“Likewise. The boat is just fifty yards
offshore from here,” he said, pointing back to the inky black waters.
“Get him on board. He has vital intel
that we need,” said Shane as he stepped aside to reveal Pavel behind him. “I’m
going back for Carlie.”
“Copy that. The XO said that we’ve got
major enemy movement inbound from the jungle towards this location. He’s all
set to light up the beach when we give him the go-ahead.”
“Not until Carlie is back here,” he said,
sprinting back down the dark passage.
Boyd glanced down at Matias’ handheld
device and could see the swarms of creatures moving in on Carlie. “Damn, no way
she’s gonna make it out of there with that many fucking pus-brains coming at
her.”
Chapter 48
As the moonlight increased, it washed
over the surrounding ridges, outlining the forms of the creatures beyond Carlie.
From her concealed position amongst a clump of shoulder-high gnarled vines, she
could see that there were five of the larger mutants pacing around the edges on
either side. They were emitting low hisses and frantically searching the jungle
floor. Behind them were another thirty or more of the slower ones milling
around as if awaiting direction. Some of them resembled former smugglers clad
in blood-soaked garments while others looked like fishermen.
The dense storm clouds returned and
painted the area black again. Looking through her rifle’s nightscope, Carlie
saw that the five mutants were sniffing the air and scanning the area below for
any movement.
Did they lose our scent or can’t they see well?
The constantly
shifting light and weather conditions must be skewing their senses.
They
can’t adapt in time to get a fix on my location.
She studied the more
aggressive creatures as they moved around, trying to locate her, noticing that
they would sniff the air and then look at each other as if collating
information like a pack of wolves.
They must have led or directed the other
horde of creatures here. That first one I dispatched was probably a scout but
how is that possible? They’re supposed to be dead.
As these thoughts ran
through her weary mind, the rain began to fall again with great intensity,
obscuring the images in her scope and eliminating all sound from the ridges. There
was no way she would be able to keep track of them now that her senses were
hampered.
Knowing she would be doing a blind
retreat, Carlie edged her boot backwards and crept slowly over the slippery
logs on the ground. As she stalked down the ravine she strained to hear any
movement but the rainfall obscured any other sounds. Carlie took a few more
steps backwards, keeping her rifle leveled ahead.
If I can just make it
another twenty feet that should give me more of a lead and then I can turn and
move faster.
She continued to inch away from the deadly threat above as the
rain eased up. One more step over what felt like a clump of downed palm fronds
and then she would turn and increase her stride. The storm’s intensity paused
again and the clouds cleared briefly enough to jab tiny fingers of moonlight
through the canopy.
This is it—gotta run now.
She turned and saw a large
mutant six feet from her, its slimy yellow face aglow in the overhead light. It
rushed forward, emitting a low hiss. Carlie had no time to aim at the
creature’s head and unloaded her rifle into its torso. With its chest and
abdomen leaking fluid, it staggered back briefly until her M4 clicked empty
then leaped forward, grabbing the barrel. She tried yanking it free and
backpedaling but the beast was too powerful despite its massive wounds. Carlie
swiftly drew her Glock and fired into its head three times, watching it
collapse onto the slick rocks at her feet.
Within seconds, she heard the howls of
the other creatures above as they began leaping over the edge. She hopped over
the nearly headless figure and sprinted away. Carlie could hear the ravine behind
her filling with frenzied movement as if a flash flood was about to overtake
her. Rounding a sharp curve, she paused, turning and firing at two of the fast-moving
mutants who were nearly ten feet away. She clipped one in the ear, the bullet
exiting out through the opposite temple. It went down fast, causing the other
slower-moving creatures behind it to get hung up in the narrowing passage. The
second mutant almost seemed to know where she was aiming and vaulted off the
muddy embankment towards the ridge and came down a few feet to her left.
Carlie kept squeezing the trigger on her
Glock, point-shooting at the creature and piercing its snapping jaws until her
pistol slide locked back. She unconsciously inserted another magazine and
stepped forward, slamming her soiled boot onto the downed creature’s chest. “Oh
yeah, take this, you piece of shit,” she yelled while placing two more rounds
into its thrashing head. She didn’t wait to look back down the ravine and
yanked a grenade off her vest, tossing it into the torrent of creatures rushing
towards her while darting in the opposite direction. The blast lit up the path
ahead enough for her to almost make it to the mouth of the ravine. The air reeked
of a mix of burnt flesh, jungle soil, and rotting leaves as she zig-zagged
along the passage of tangled vines and bodily remains. As she raised her
forearm to block the stench from her nose, she saw something rushing towards
her from ahead.
Chapter 49
“This way, Carlie,” said Shane, who was running
up the ravine. He sidestepped and abruptly stopped to fire off several rounds
that Carlie heard whiz by her, followed by the soft thump that occurs when lead
meets flesh.
Shane kept firing as she approached then
he turned to meet her in their sprint to the beach. “This is gonna be close,”
she yelled.
“Like a mad dash to the finishing line,”
he said.
As they exited the drainage onto the
black sand of the beach, Carlie saw Boyd standing in the distance to her left,
waving her to the opposite side of his location as Boyd’s men began draining
their rifles into the ravine.
She felt Shane tugging on her shirt
sleeve as he pulled her to the right towards a series of boulders. Only then
did she notice Boyd holding something in his hand. Carlie followed Shane to the
ground behind the boulders, hearing the waves crashing behind her. The sound
was quickly obscured by the throng of greedy flesh-eaters pouring past the
mouth.
Carlie could make out Boyd pressing the
trigger device in his right hand, causing the ravine entrance to erupt. She
covered her ears and thrust her body onto the damp sand as multiple explosions
rang out. The first wave of zombies emerging from the mouth of the entrance was
splintered, with dozens of bodies spread out along the beach and treeline. The
mouth of the ravine looked like it had suffered a mudslide of human remains and
the leaves of palm trees above were dripping with blood.
Carlie inched her way up and peered over
the boulder. Boyd was running across the soiled black sand towards her when a
mutant rushed from behind him. She raised her pistol and placed two shots
squarely in the eye socket, causing the creature to drop instantly. Boyd slid
up alongside her. “Damn, I didn’t even see that one,” he said, panting, then
grabbed her arm. “The XO says there are more creatures headed to our location. The
boat’s this way,” he said, directing her.
She and Shane got up and sprinted to the
shoreline, crashing through the waves. Carlie could just barely make out the
white bow of the ship glistening in the moonlight. As they swam, the shoreline
erupted in fiery explosions as the
Farragut
’s 20mm canons lit up the jungle.
She could feel the thumping of the powerful rounds impacting as the beach was
pounded repeatedly. With the flaming treeline illuminating the waves, she could
clearly make out the nearby boat bobbing offshore. Her feet lost contact with
the rocky surface and she started swimming. A minute later, she was yanked out
of the water by Matias and Amy, who pulled her up onto the deck of the small
tugboat.
She shook her hair and wiped a hand
across her eyes, clearing off the sting of saltwater. After doing a quick
inventory of both her teams and Pavel, she turned towards the beach, watching
the ribbon of fire searing the remaining treetops near the mouth of the ravine
like an orange python was undulating through the forest. As the boat lurched
into the waves and sputtered away, she saw a handful of creatures emerge from
the smoke and rush to the shoreline. Three of the larger ones were thrashing
their hands in the air and bellowing while the others paced around, stumbling
into the still-hot craters that dotted the beach.
Most of the storm clouds had been
ushered out and the moon provided unobstructed light to the waves ahead and the
outline of the
Farragut
a half-mile out as the tugboat inched closer.
Carlie moved past Shane, patting him on
the shoulder as they gave each other grateful nods. She moved alongside Pavel,
who was sitting in the corner with his arms wrapped around his knees.
“You OK?”
Pavel looked beyond her at the flaming
shoreline of the island and then back up into her eyes. “Do you know what the
word ‘toska’ means, Ms. Simmons?”
She tilted her head slightly and then
nodded back. “Yes, I understand,” she said, looking up at the moon briefly,
then leaned towards him. “We’ll be back aboard the Destroyer shortly and then we’ll
see about getting you to our headquarters in New Mexico. You’ll be safe there.”
Pavel didn’t respond and only lowered
his head between his knees. Carlie turned and moved back towards the others.
“What did he say—
toska
—what does that mean?” said Jared.
“There isn’t a direct translation into
English—it’s a sensation of tremendous spiritual anguish.” She paused to
exhale. “It’s a longing with nothing left to long for.”