Phantoms of the North: An Alice in Deadland Adventure (Alice, No. 6) (12 page)

Salil rested his rifle on a small
rise in the ground and sought out his targets. He was rewarded by the sight of
some movement. It had only been a slight movement, but with no other living
things out there, and with no wind, he would take his chances that he had his
man. He moved his crosshairs on the spot where he had seen something move, then
adjusted a bit for the range, aiming slightly higher, calculating where the
bullet would land, and then squeezed the trigger.

Jamal had been handpicked by The
Khan for this mission. He was one of the few among the Phantoms who had formal
military training, having served in Pakistan’s elite Special Services Group as
a commando before The Rising. He had been working for the Taliban, like many of
his colleagues, and when The Rising took place, he had melted away into the
tribal areas as the cities were engulfed in a nuclear catastrophe and the spread
of the Biters.

So far the three men with him had
done their job well, which meant that they had fired their rockets where he
told them to based on what he spotted through his night vision scope, and they
had not exposed their positions to return fire. Till now. One idiot, tiring of
lying there and shooting rockets into the night, sat up to stretch.

‘Get down, you fool!’

Jamal pulled the man down, and a
split second later he felt the thud of a bullet impacting against human skin as
the man was hit in the shoulder. He screamed and fell down to the ground. Jamal
wanted to cut the man’s throat but this part of their mission was almost over.
He looked through the scope and saw the glint of a sniper rifle scope. He moved
slightly left and saw someone prone on the ground. The flowing hair suggested
it was a woman, holding a rifle. There was no way he could make out any details
at this range, but if there was a chance that it was Alice herself, then The
Khan’s orders had been clear. Take a shot at her before they retreated. Killing
Alice was not part of his base plan, but if the opportunity presented itself,
they were to take it.

‘Look through your scopes at two o’
clock. You’ll see a small barn when I send up a flare. Aim for that barn. Shoot
your rockets and then get on your horses. We do one pass on the farm at that
area, and then retreat to the staging area like The Khan ordered.’

Salil thought he had got his man,
since he saw movement that could have been an arm flailing, but then it could
have been nothing more than wishful thinking. Still, he was pretty certain he
had a bead on them and he settled down, ready to take another shot if he got
the opportunity.

Just then he saw more movement,
slightly to the right, and the unmistakable shape of a man was visible in the
green glow of his scope. The man brought a tube-shaped object up to his
shoulder. Salil was temporarily blinded as a green flare went up, bathing the
area around him in bright light. He blinked and got back to his scope.

‘Gotcha.’

Salil fired a split second before
the man fired his rocket. The man was hit just as he pulled the trigger on the
RPG launcher and as he fell back, the rocket went a bit high. However, Jamal
had spotted the muzzle flash from Salil’s rifle on his own scope and ordered
the second shooter to aim slightly to the right of the barn.

The second rocket homed in on
where Alice and Salil were lying.

The first smoke trail went high
and slammed into the field somewhere behind them.

‘That was close. Did you…’

She never had time to complete her
sentence before the rocket struck the barn above them and exploded. Alice
instinctively covered her head and flattened herself against the ground, and
felt a push that rolled her into a depression in the ground near her. As
someone who was now half Biter, she could be killed only by a direct hit to the
head, and while she felt no pain, she could feel fragments from the rocket and
pieces of the barn slice through her skin.

Salil had spotted the rocket
coming in and knew that it was too late to do anything. Alice was just feet
away from a small hole where water had been collected for irrigation. He couldn’t
do much to save himself but he would try and save Alice. He kicked, sending her
sprawling into the hole seconds before the rocket hit.

Then there was darkness.

***

From the back of the farm, there
were gasps of horror as everyone saw Alice and Salil’s position get obliterated
by a rocket.

‘Come on, we’ve got to help them!’

Chris was racing towards the
burning barn before anyone could stop him, followed closely by Teresa. Haroula,
carrying a shotgun she had retrieved from the main building, was behind them.
Teresa was the fastest of them, and she skidded to a stop near the barn. Salil
was lying under rubble, bleeding from several wounds. She had no idea if he was
alive or not. A few feet away she heard some movement. It was Alice, and her
legs were trapped under some heavy planks that had fallen and trapped her.

Alice managed to turn halfway and
looked up at Teresa.

‘Get this stuff off me.’

Teresa tried, but it was just too
heavy for her to budge. By now, Chris had come by and he stood there, looking
at Salil’s body.

‘Help me!’

He was shaken back to reality by
Teresa’s shout, and he went over, trying to help her move the plank, but even
with the two of them putting all their strength into it, they could barely
raise it a few inches. Enough for Alice to turn a bit more so she could face
them, but not enough for her get out. That was when they heard horses galloping
towards them. Teresa looked up at the darkness outside and thought she could
see shapes moving towards them. The ground around her was suddenly riddled with
automatic weapon fire and she dove to the ground.

‘Take this.’

Alice handed her the handgun she
had been carrying at her belt. Like every other kid her age, Teresa knew how to
shoot, but she had not seen much combat, just two ambushes against Zeus back in
the US, where she had been one of the spotters. She had called in their
position, but never got a chance to fire in the battles that ensued. Now as the
horsemen closed in, firing on the move, she clicked the safety off on the gun.

On her left Chris picked up Salil’s
rifle. It was very big and heavy for him, but he lay down flat on the ground,
resting it on the rise that Salil had used. He looked through the scope and saw
three horsemen, now no more than fifty meters away. Two of them were firing
from rifles, while the third had his hand hanging limply by his side.

‘Teresa, shoot!’

He aimed and fired. He had never
fired a rifle, having been trained on handguns as was the norm for young kids
his age, and was certainly never trained as a sniper. So he didn’t compensate
for the movement and his first shot went wide.

Jamal had been watching the rocket
hit and in the glow of the explosion, he was sure he had seen blonde hair
moving below. It had to be Alice, and now was his chance to finish her, if she
was still alive. He had two fragmentation grenades at his belt that he would
throw into the burning barn and finish them off before they rode back.

He was firing when a bullet passed
within a couple of feet of him. Then someone opened up with a handgun. Several
shots, fired in quick succession. Not necessarily very well aimed, but so many
rounds, coming in with the element of total surprise, did their damage. Faizal,
the wounded man, took at least one round in the leg and screamed in pain. He
aborted his run towards the barn and turned his horse around. Never matter,
Jamal would finish this himself.

Teresa had emptied the clip and
wasn’t sure if she had hit anything or anyone, but she would not let these men
take Alice. She asked Alice for another clip and loaded it, getting ready as
the horsemen came closer. Meanwhile, Chris had seen one of the men get hit.

‘Good shooting, Teresa. You got
one!’

He aimed at one of the two
shooters and fired. At such close quarters, he did not miss.

The man to Jamal’s left went down,
thrown off his horse as if an unseen fist had come out of nowhere and punched
him. Jamal was now barely ten meters away and he snarled as he threw his rifle
away and took a grenade in each hand. That was when Haroula stepped up,
standing above Alice, shotgun in her hand.

‘Nobody ruins my party.’

She fired as Jamal was about to
take the pin out of the grenades. He was peppered with pellets that tore into
his body and fell, dead before he hit the ground.

Between the three of them,
Haroula, Chris and Teresa managed to free Alice and she ran out to check on
their enemies. She was bleeding from a dozen shrapnel wounds, but nothing
serious enough to slow her down. She looked to see if Salil was alive, and was
relieved to see his hand moving. He might have been badly wounded, but at least
he was alive. Two bodies lay just meters outside the farm wall, and she turned
one over, shining a flashlight on the body to see who they had been attacked
by. Teresa, Chris and Haroula were next to her. The man’s face was covered in a
mask, and when Alice wrenched it off, everyone gasped as one. Alice stared at
the face she saw.

What kind of creatures were they
up against?

She heard a distant boom and
looked to see a fire rising from the direction of Wonderland.

***

The Khan threw his second grenade
into a building at random. He had been carrying two grenades, and had asked his
men to aim at windows that had their lights on. Some of his men had marveled at
people having electricity, and in his own mind, so had The Khan. However, to
his men, all he said was that it made for easier targets. A couple of his men
had wanted to go in and loot and ravage, but he ordered them to stay together.
They wanted to strike and get away before reinforcements got there.

The people of Wonderland had been
too shell-shocked by the attack to respond, and for the crucial first few
minutes, The Khan’s men rode and attacked at will. Then the first sign of
organized resistance came, not from humans, but from Biters.

From a narrow alley to their left,
a dozen Biters streamed out towards them, and a rider who had been too
distracted admiring his handiwork as he watched a building burn was caught unawares.
Hands reached up and pulled him down, and he screamed in terror once before his
throat was ripped out. At such close quarters, the horses were terrified at the
smell and sounds of the approaching Biters, and a horse reared, throwing his
rider off balance. The Khan watched in frustration as three Biters swarmed over
the prone man and tore into him.

He took out his handgun and shot a
Biter in the head, but then realized that it was futile to keep at it now that
the element of total surprise had been lost.

‘Pull back!’

His men wheeled their horses
around and he was about to join them when a solitary figure rode into view on a
bicycle. It was a girl, but not just any girl. Blonde hair flowing behind her
as she rode, an assault rifle slung across her back.

Alice.

‘Rashid, Alice is here.’

Rashid also stopped and saw what
his leader had seen.

‘Let our men pull back. So many in
this narrow street and we will get swarmed by the Biters. Come, let us ride
down an enemy together, just like the old times, side by side. Come, my
brother. You can have the glory of cutting off the witch’s head and I’ll watch
your back.’

The Khan looked back and saw his
riders fade out of view in the darkness and threw his sword to Rashid, who
caught it expertly by the handle, smiling at this unexpected honor.

‘Yes, My Khan. I will bring you
her head.’

Rashid yelled and galloped towards
Alice. The Khan watched him pick up speed and then calmly turned his horse
around and rode away, narrowly avoiding two outstretched hands as Biters lunged
for him. If Rashid did manage to kill Alice, it would be an unexpected bonus.
Either way, there was no way he would get back alive. It was a win-win all
around for The Khan. He would allow Rashid the honor of a martyr’s death, one
which he would celebrate with his men. Also, he would ensure that the one man
who could have challenged his leadership would be now out of the picture.

***

A rider charged at her, screaming
in a foreign tongue. It was surprising for one man to attack while the rest of
his comrades escaped, but if he wanted to die, she would gladly grant it to
him. He was carrying a sword in his left hand and a submachine gun in his right
hand and guiding his horse with the reins between his teeth. It was a fantastic
display of horsemanship, but Alice had no time to stand and admire him. He
began firing when he was about twenty meters away, spraying the wall on the
building behind Alice with bullets. She jumped off her bicycle and rolled on
the ground, coming up in a crouch behind a garbage disposal bin that was
nearby. Several bullets pinged off the bin but did not penetrate it, stopped by
the metal or the bags stuffed with garbage inside. At such short range, Alice
did not want to risk using her rifle. Instead, she took her handgun in one hand
and knife in the other and got ready to face her attacker.