I gripped the body of the high explosive round over the end of the mortar, and took one last look out onto the objective – as soon as the round fell in the tube, all hell would break loose. I knew that we’d take casualties; I knew there was the chance I’d never see Jo again. And I knew as soon as this round was in the air, everything would change. Cruze leaned into the mortar, forcing her body weight down on the base plate. In the distance, I could hear laughter coming from the soldiers, smoking and joking as they gathered around the bonfire to warm up against a cold night.
I glanced at Cruze and saw her eyes narrow through the holes in her balaclava. Her gaze was fixed on our target with laser precision. “You going to drop that thing?” she whispered, her eyes never leaving the men around the campfire.
I took one last look at the target as I released the bomb. “Round’s away,” I whispered.
A hollow metallic
thunk
filled the air as the bomb rocketed out of the mortar tube. I kept my eyes focused on the group of soldiers as I reached for another high explosive round and dropped it in. Time seemed to freeze in place – though the sound of the mortar echoed through the coulee, not a single soldier huddling around that fire made even the tiniest attempt to take cover.
Seconds later, the round hit with a blast that shattered the silence. I grabbed another round and dropped it down the tube as a mixture of smoke and screams filled the air. Three of the enemy dashed for cover as the next round hit, blasting body parts in every direction. Then the shooting started. From the bridge, the sentries were firing on our position. Bullets cracked over our heads, but not for long; Mel’s first round blasted a hole in the razor wire fence. Screams could be heard, both from the bridge and the modular tent, as I launched another 60 mm round that lit up in a ball of fire and molten metal. I watched with stone cold concentration as a soldier ran for the safety of the river, only to be cut down by a burst of machine gun fire.
“Stand by,” I said firmly as I grabbed my binoculars and scanned the area. Small fires were burning all around the tent as I searched for movement. Blood stained the freshly-fallen snow, where two soldiers lay dead. I panned to the right and spotted the civilians inside the compound, standing a few feet away from the fence. Another burst of machine gun fire rained down on the bridge and I watched the tracer rounds screaming across the coulee, the ricochets bouncing high into the air over the tops of the metal arches. The sound of gunfire echoed through the coulee every few seconds and I thought for sure I could hear that missing APC rumbling somewhere in the darkness.
“Something ain’t right,” I whispered to Cruze. “This was too easy. Way too easy. We cut them down and we’ve got rounds to spare. Do you hear an APC?”
Cruze lowered the mortar and gazed out across the river. “Or it might just be a really frigging successful fighting patrol. Do you see anything?”
“Just listen,” I whispered.
It was a faint hum that increased and decreased in pitch ever few seconds. A sound that could only come from a diesel engine.
“I hear it … if that vehicle is headed our way we gotta move now!” said Cruze
There was another explosion as one of Mel’s mortar rounds hit the bridge, lighting up the darkness with a massive ball of fire.
I peered through my binoculars at the scene in front of us. “All I see are the dead and the nearly dead,” I said grimly. “I’ll ready a flare. Have an eye for any movement.”
She grabbed the binoculars and said, “Will do. Say the word and we’ll double across the bridge.”
I nodded as I inserted the flare into the pen-sized launcher. I pulled back the plunger with my thumb, and then raised my arm in the air, releasing the flare. A neon green streak of light shot up in a high arc, signaling to the rest of the team to move across the bridge.
“Let’s go!” I whispered as I stood up, carbine in hand. I pulled my weapon to my chest and, with Cruze in tow, dashed down a forward slope to the edge of the river. In seconds we’d made it to the smashed fence in front of the bridge – there was a gap wide enough for an entire platoon to cross through. There were two small impact craters next to the body of one of the soldiers, lying on his side in the snow. He twitched a few times as we doubled past his corpse and onto the bridge deck. Cruze crouched low, her carbine pointed toward the compound a few hundred meters away. I raised my weapon to my shoulder and rested my cheek against the butt, my eyes scanning the area for anything that even smelled like a potential threat. After about thirty seconds we’d made it to the other side, so we dropped down onto our bellies and waited for the rest of the team to arrive.
A deathly calm had washed over the coulee. In the distance, I could hear the cries for help from the men we’d hit with the mortar. I could make out three distinct voices, one of which was calling for his mother. After a few minutes I heard the
clump clump clump
of footsteps as our team doubled across the bridge. I got up on one knee and gestured for them to hurry the hell up. Sid arrived first, his body covered with belts of ammunition. Somehow he’d managed to lug not only the machine gun receiver, but also the tripod. His carbine was slung across his back.
He dove into the snow next to me, panting heavily as I grabbed the tripod and opened its legs. Sid dropped the receiver inside and locked it as I pointed up the highway. “Kill anything that moves, Sid,” I said.
“Yeah,” he gulped for air. “I can do that. I got your backs.”
Seconds later Mel and Doug were on the ground next to Cruze. I motioned for both fire teams to get up and start our area clearance – individual fire and movement if the bullets started flying. Each of us would provide cover fire while their team member moved and we’d reorganize ourselves once we’d won the firefight. Only this time I was thinking the firefight might already have already been won. The lack of enemy fire from Sunray’s troops didn’t sit well with me.
“Nothing should ever be this simple,” I said, before I motioned for each team to move forward. “Be extra vigilant. I got a bad feeling about this.”
Cruze covered me as I dashed across the open ground, ducking down behind a mound. As soon as I’d dropped to one knee, I heard her footsteps clumping through the snow. She raced ahead about a dozen meters – out of the corner of my eye, I could see Mel Dixon and Doug hustling forward, their weapons at the ready. The brush next to the modular tent was on fire and thick white smoke drifted across our field of view. I moved forward of Cruze until I spotted the blasted-out remnants of the bonfire, along with the impact craters from our mortar rounds. There was a pair of dead soldiers in front of us – one of them still clutching a plastic coffee-cup. His entire back was blown out, and I could see his exposed ribs sticking out like branches on a tree. The air smelled of blood and iron and smoke as I checked his pockets for intelligence, but there was nothing to be found. Cruze doubled past me and checked on another soldier, slumped over a battered oil drum.
“This one is still alive,” she said firmly.
I nodded as I watched Mel and Doug checking the bodies of three other soldiers. “Is he conscious?” I asked.
“Not for long,” said Cruze, as she stuck her finger in the man’s neck to check his pulse.
The word had barely left her lips when a single shot rang out, hitting Cruze in the thigh. She made a gulping sound as she fell back, her carbine landing at her feet. What happened next was purely mechanical. I saw the wounded soldier clutching a Browning 9mm in his lap, the barrel still smoking – without even thinking, I raised my carbine and fired three quick shots into his chest. The gun dropped into the snow as he slumped forward.
“Cruze!”
I shouted as I raced to her. She was lying on her side, clutching her right leg. A large blood stain had soaked through her combat fatigues and into her camouflage snow pants. I quickly pulled a field dressing out of my pants pocket and tore open the wrapping. I could see Mel and Doug about to run over to offer first aid, and barked at them:
“Check the rest of the bodies!
I’ll tend to Cruze!”
I pressed my hand against her leg, reaching underneath where the bullet had entered. I was surprised to feel an exit wound.
“Shit!
I should have seen that coming,” she cried out. “How bad?”
The bullet hadn’t severed the artery, but it wasn’t good. I pressed the field dressing against the wound and wrapped it on so tight the jolt of pain brought tears to her eyes. “You’re not dead yet,” I said. “Where’s your field dressing?”
“In my other pocket,” she said, wincing. “I’m really sorry about this, Dave.”
“Don’t be,” I replied, as I ripped into her field dressing and placed the huge gauze pad against the exit wound. “That prick paid with his life.”
Cruze reached for her carbine and grabbed it by the sling. She pulled it to her chest and clutched it tightly, like a child squeezing a Teddy bear. “You were right, this was too easy. I should have been more careful. I should have checked him for weapons.”
I pulled the other field dressing tight around Cruze’s now swelling thigh, creating a tourniquet to control the bleeding. She didn’t cry out. Not freaking once.
“I need you to provide covering fire if the shit starts flying, Cruze.”
“My leg – is the bullet still in there?”
I shook my head. “In and out – clean wound. Let’s see if you can get up.”
Cruze held her carbine out in front of her chest and I grabbed onto it for leverage as I pulled her up to her feet. She bit her lip as she draped her arm around my shoulder. Ahead was the one remaining Coyote reconnaissance vehicle. The rear doors were wide open and I helped Cruze slide into the back. With a huge effort, she pulled herself across the jump seats and climbed into the turret. Her head popped up through the hatch and she spun the turret so that the barrel of the 25 millimeter chain gun was pointing toward the highway.
“Don’t take all freaking day,” she groaned. “Let’s get those civvies and head the hell out of here!”
“I’m on it,” I said as I doubled over toward Mel and Doug. They’d regrouped, and were lying in firing positions covering both sides of the river. I motioned for them to follow me and we carefully made our way towards the wire compound. The creeps struggled against the chain in a desperate attempt to reach us. Perhaps they’d caught a whiff from our mortar attack, or maybe all the commotion triggered their need to feed. It didn’t matter to me either way. I raised my carbine to my shoulder and fired a pair of shots into each creature’s head.
Doug was the first to approach the wire compound but the moment he laid eyes on the civilians, he stopped dead in his tracks. He bristled, and then slowly raised his weapon to his shoulder.
“What the hell are you doing, Doug?” Mel snapped. “Get the wire-cutters and let these people out of there.”
Doug shook his head and made a pointing motion with the barrel of his carbine. His voice was shaking. “This abattoir is something way worse than anything we could have freaking imagined. Look at them.”
I shone my flashlight onto the group of civilians. One of them took a tentative step forward – a skeletal-looking man, with hollow eyes and a hastily patched wound on his neck. His skin was pale and the whites of his eyes had turned yellow. He raised his hand and gestured for our group to stop.
“Don’t come any closer,” he said weakly. “We’re dead already.”
Mel shone her light into the compound. Together, we saw that each of the five people carried wounds we’d long ago become familiar with. They were the kinds of wounds that came from getting too close to the creeps.
“We’re all infected,” he whispered, as he dropped to his knees. ”They put the living inside here with the creeps. It’s our punishment for fighting back … for trying to stop them taking over what’s left of our homes and families. When someone turns we’re forced to fight the monsters with our bare hands. The two you shot … those were once my sons.”
“If you’re infected and close to turning … why chain up the creeps?” asked Mel. Her finger was on the trigger.
A woman of about forty placed a bloody hand on the man’s shoulder in an attempt to offer comfort. He sobbed as she turned towards us, rolling up the sleeve of her sweater to show us the swollen bite wound on her left forearm.
“For their amusement.”
I blinked. “Come again?”
“One of the soldiers took pity on us and tossed in a chain – the six foot pickets are all around us to hold the razor wire. There used to be more than a dozen of us. Jasper here probably has a couple of hours until he becomes one of those things. You need to get the hell out of here, boy. You need to tell everyone … tell them what they’re doing to us. Tell them Sunray is a madman and that he’s got to be stopped! It’s too late for us now. But you’re all armed, just like Sunray’s soldiers. Just do right by us before you leave. Do the right thing.”
The man who’d been sobbing abruptly stopped. He raised his head and gazed at the three of us with a look of despair.
“Carlsbad Farms – it’s across the border. That’s where you’ll find people who are willing to fight. They’re starting a resistance – they’re going to take back Eden. You need to get to Carlsbad Farms. It’s off the main highway past Alsask. It’s got running water and power. Sunray knows about it … he just don’t know where it is. It’s one of the reasons we’re in here … to make our families talk. You gotta stop him!”
The other three gathered together and looked at us pleadingly. Each carried a wound, and each was counting down the hours and minutes until it was their turn to transform into the stuff of nightmares. I glanced at Doug and Mel for a short moment, and then said, “Cruze is in that Coyote. Scrounge as much fuel as you can and any supplies. Load it up, and get that pig started – we’re going back to the hide and we’re going to find this Carlsbad Farms.”
“What are you going to do?” asked Mel.
I spun around and roared at her. “
Just fucking do it!”
She didn’t recoil at my outburst, and the look on her face told me that she understood. I spent the next few minutes learning as much as I could from the five infected until I heard the sound of the Coyote’s diesel engine rumbling to life.