Run (Book 2): The Crossing (9 page)

12

“Jesus, look at them all.” Anna was looking at monitor that was displaying thermal optics. “There must be two thousand, where did they all come from?”

“How do we find him in alla that?” Dallas demanded waving his hand at the screen.

Androwski was leaning over and looking into the monitor as well. “Lone Wolf, do you copy? Lone Wolf, this is Wanderer, are you receiving? Lone Wolf, if unable to speak, squelch twice, over.”

There was no response, just dead air. The population of undead at the airport had grown substantially. The team couldn’t figure out why though, as there were no living people in the area that they could see, and the dead weren’t attacking any fortifications of any kind, they were just milling about. Androwski began to check his weapons.

Rick put his hand on the lieutenant’s shoulder. “Andy, we have no illusions about who’s in charge, but you cannot go out there. You can’t.”

“Boone wouldn’t leave anyone behind, and I mean to find him.”

“We can look, but not outside this vehicle. Do you think Boone would want you to die looking for him?”

“Rick, I’m a SEAL. We don’t leave people behind.”

“I understand, but don’t you think that the mission is more important? A possible cure for this plague? If you get killed, that’s one more trained person that can’t help us get where we need to be.”

“Rick’s right, Andy,” added Seyfert. “You go out there and you’re just gonna get dead. And Boone will have your ass if you go looking for him with no recon.”

Androwski glared at Seyfert. “So we leave him? We just leave Boone? Is that it?”

“No, we recon and give him some time to get to us.”

Stark interrupted from up front, “Well whatever we’re gonna do, we gotta do it now.”

All eyes went to the monitors. The horde had noticed them and was on slow approach. Two were sprinting toward their position, only a few hundred meters away.

“Stark, zoom in, how many are coming after us?”

“Looks like all of ‘em, Chief, they look damn hungry too.”

“Fine then,” began Androwski. “We let them come. We’ll back away when they get to a hundred meters out. When they close the gap again, we back away again until we’re a mile off, then we boogie around or through them back to the airport and look for Boone from the LAV.” He looked at Seyfert. “Sey, take out the runners with the short gun.”

“Roger that, sir, good call.”

“Lone Wolf, this is Wanderer, if you can receive but not transmit, we’re backing up to draw the Limas out. Stay put and we’ll be back for you in thirty mikes.”

The undead presence at this particular airport, with the only nearby city a smoldering ruin, was extremely large. The runways were also intact, and considering the military had destroyed most of the highways and byways in this area, this was an anomaly. Androwski surmised that the runways were not destroyed in case the US armed forces needed a place to land and refuel in this part of the country. This might also account for the large numbers of zombies in the area. The uninfected were trapped with no way to escape when the undead hordes reached their doors. The only thing left for the creatures to do was to search for food in the immediate area, or move on. Apparently they hadn’t reached the moving on stage yet.

Doing some quick math in his head, Stark calculated that there were approximately three thousand undead marching in their direction.

“Can’t we just run ‘em over?” Dallas asked.

“I don’t know,” Stark told him. “Enough of them might get stuck in the wheels and gum up the works. Then we would stop moving. I don’t want to stop moving.”

Dallas harrumphed, “Me neither. You keep drivin’, Stark ole buddy. I’ma shut up now.”

It took longer than thirty minutes to lure the undead from the tarmac and into a nearby field. Almost an hour after the LAV had begun tactically withdrawing, Stark threw the vehicle into high gear and skirted the swarm heading east back to airport. Not wanting to miss a canned dinner, the mass of bodies began following immediately. The team would have less than an hour to collect Boone before the undead arrived on their heels.

The vast majority of the former humans had followed the vehicle, but some strays remained at the airport. Rick, Seyfert, and Androwski used the sniper rifles to cull the herd, and then the search began in earnest.

“We can’t go in the larger buildings,” advised Androwski, “but we can run around and look in the windows, and look in those hangars.” He thumbed at two large hangars on the east side of the facility. “God help me, but we need to split up. We’ll cover twice as much ground twice as fast. Dallas and Anna, you go with Seyfert and check out those outbuildings. Don’t go inside! Rick and Chris, you’re with me.”

“Where are we going?” asked Chris nervously.

“To check out those hangars on the east side. That’s the direction Boone was heading when we separated. Stick together, nobody leaves a twenty-foot circle from the others in your squad, and don’t engage unless absolutely necessary, just run. I want everybody back here in thirty mikes regardless. Constant contact, zero chatter. Stark remain on station unless we call. Any questions?”

There were none.

“Thirty mikes, no more, or I assume you’re in some shit and we come looking for you. Radio check.”

Everyone said
Check
into their throat microphones. Androwski nodded and began jogging away, Chris and Rick following. They skirted a hissing thing on the ground with broken legs in a runway worker’s uniform and made it to the first hangar. The massive aluminum doors were spread open, and the sun was glinting off of the tinted glass windscreen of a private jet.

There was a small parts loft above a work area in the back of the hangar. Metal stairs on the left side ran up to the loft, and the four large windows were all broken out of the workshop. Androwski was moving forward slowly, taking in everything as he progressed. Rick had their rear, with Chris in the center.

“Androwski, can you fly—”

The SEAL’s left fist flew into the air, and Chris silenced himself instantly, falling to a crouched position. Something was moving in the workshop. Androwski signaled the men to follow him towards the back of the hangar and they did so with great stealth. Rick caught up to the other two and put his hand on the SEAL’s shoulder. Rick indicated the oval windows on the port side of the plane. One of them was covered in streaks of gore from the inside. Androwski pointed two fingers at his eyes, then Rick, then at the plane. Rick nodded understanding and slung his M4. He drew his suppressed sidearm, sighting at the door to the aircraft.

Chris was sweating profusely as they made their way toward the workshop. It was pitch black inside, the bright sun outside not being able to penetrate this far back. All three men switched on their tactical lights and scanned the area, Rick looking back toward the plane at all times. Gore spatter was evident on some jagged triangles of glass still in the workshop window frames, and several bodies were strewn about with holes in their heads.

Something was slapping on the concrete floor inside the dark room. Androwski lifted his weapon up so that the tac-light could pierce the gloom through the smashed windows. Two huddled forms were pulling choice morsels from a third prone shape. When illuminated, they turned almost casually, faces dripping. One stood up, immediately and began to stagger toward the light, the other continued his meal uninterrupted. The bolt ratcheted on the lieutenant’s MP5SD3 as he sent a suppressed round through the walking creature’s cranium. Adjusting his aim, he destroyed the second thing as well.

Peering into the room, they were able to discern that the unfortunate victim had been a man in a business suit, and not Boone. Androwski put a round through the victim’s head before turning away.

As they moved from the area, Androwski pointed his light up into the loft area. He couldn’t see over the lip of the loft. Putting a booted foot on the first aluminum step, he looked back at his friends. There was no place left to hide in this hangar, and they had checked it thoroughly except for the loft. The SEAL called out softly, “Boone. Sir, are you up there?”

There was no response.

“Shit. Stay here.”

He took the stairs slowly, slashing his light through the darkness above. He peered over the edge of the loft but was unable to visually clear the room because of the racks of airline worker clothing and lockers. “Sir, are you up here? Sir?”

He couldn’t detect any movement through the racks and banks of lockers, but there were blood drops on the plywood floor leading toward the back of the loft. He started to move further up the stairs when he heard Rick through his earpiece.

“Contact! Fifty meters and closing.”

Androwski rushed back down the stairs and met Rick and Chris, who were aiming at a small group of dead people plodding toward their position. Rick holstered his Beretta and unslung his M4. “You guys fire with the suppressors, and I’ll hang back unless they get close.”

Androwski wiped his forehead. “Keep our six clear, and don’t fire unless you have to.” He sighted a small boy and fired, but missed. “Fuck.” He ran forward and Chris followed, raising his pistol. Rick followed as well, glancing back to keep from being surprised from the rear. Chris fired and the boy fell. He fired again and woman in a security uniform fell beside the boy. Androwski looked at him with his brows raised, and Chris shrugged and fired again.

The SEAL followed suit, and soon nine more undead had been destroyed. Both men reloaded, and Rick caught up with them.

“Where’d you learn to shoot like that?” the SEAL demanded.

Chris had already slapped a fresh magazine in his Glock and was filling the empty magazine with loose rounds. “I never fired a weapon in my life until you guys trained us in San Francisco. I used to kill the hell out of people in the Battlefield games though. My KDR was almost nine to one.”

“What’s KDR?”

“Kill-to-death ratio. It’s how many times you kill others versus how many times you get killed.”

“Fascinating.” Androwski shook his head. “So you learned to shoot by playing video games. Why am I not surprised?” He smiled and looked at Chris. “You keep your head. If I knew nothing else about you, I would accept you on my team. I’m glad you came.”

“Yeah, well, zombie plagues notwithstanding, I’d rather be shooting people that
aren’t real
while sitting in front of my computer.”

The SEAL smirked at Chris. “Nerd. Oh, and my KDR is like, two hundred to one. And those fucks were firing real bullets at me. Let’s find the chief.”

Chris jacked the slide on his weapon. “Sure. Noob.”

“We’ve got twelve minutes left, let’s hit this next hangar.”

13

Dallas couldn’t help but look at Anna as they jogged toward a small, windowless, white building constructed from cinderblocks. She reminded him of someone from long ago. Not just the fact that she was extremely fit, or the color of her auburn hair, but her attitude. She was tough as nails, and brave. Hell, anyone who would agree to cross a zombie-infested United States to secure a possible cure for humanity was damn brave. Dallas smiled. He snapped back to reality when a dead woman came around the corner of the tiny structure and started ambling toward them.

Seyfert stopped and drew his combat knife from a shoulder sling. “Hold fire!”

Incredulous, Dallas stopped him with a hand on his shoulder. “You touched, boy? You got an eight-inch reach with that pig-sticker.” He pulled his shaft of re-bar from his belt. “Time ta’ cowboy the fuck, up…er…sorry Anna.”

“I’m twenty six, I’ve heard the F word a couple times.”

Red-faced, Dallas nodded and strode forward.

Anna looked indecisive. “Wait! Androwski told us not to engage!”

The rebar looked wicked as he pointed it toward the dead thing. “Anna, that thing is in the way. We can’t git to that building without her comin’ up behind us.” He squared off ten feet in front of the creature and let her close the distance. He used a backhand swing and she dropped, but started to get back up. Two more overhand whacks and she stopped moving.

Dallas was wiping his forehead with his sleeve when he noticed Seyfert standing next to him looking between him and the twice-killed thing. “Damn.”

The three of them spread out and approached the structure. When they reached it, they came together and looked at the door. It was heavy steel and locked. Seyfert knocked on the door, but Boone didn’t answer. They moved on to the next structure, which was significantly larger. As they came upon it, they realized that the half that they couldn’t see had burned, and the far side of the roof had collapsed. Two motionless corpses guarded the building, both shot in the head.

The third and fourth buildings didn’t have much in the way of anything, but as they approached the fifth, a large crowd of undead coalesced. “We’ll never make it to that building,” Seyfert told them as he looked at his watch, “and we’ve only got eight minutes left to get back.”

“What if he’s in there?”

“Then he’s fucked. We can’t get to him like this. Maybe we can use the LAV to get closer, but I’m making the decision to bug right now.” The cries of the oncoming pack of monsters were getting louder.

Seyfert pinched his throat mic. “Chief, do you copy?”

“
Roger that, Two, you got anything
?”

“Big pack of dead fuckers coming, but no Actual.”

“
Is it the group we tricked with the LAV
?”

“Negative, this is a new group, smaller than the other, but there are still plenty. I’m calling this end of the mission and we’re gonna RTB.”

“
Solid copy, we’re doing the same
.”

“Copy that, Chief. See you in eight mikes, out.”

“Okay civvies, move out. We’re gonna hoof it back to the LAV, and meet up with squad one. We can discuss the plan of bringing up the armor to check that last building with the chief when we’re snug.”

The three of them jogged back to the LAV. Squad one was waiting with the rear ramp down, and Androwski was inside speaking to Stark.

Rick turned when he heard them coming. “Nothing at all?” Seyfert ran past him up the ramp.

Anna shook her head as she caught her breath. “Doughnut. There was one more outbuilding we couldn’t get to because of a group of dead, but he wasn’t in any of the places we checked.”

Rick looked past her. “Yeah, I see them. We should get inside.”

Chris hit the button to close the rear ramp, and noticed everyone listening to Stark and Androwski speaking. Stark in the driver’s chair, and the lieutenant in the front passenger’s seat.

“It was the same message, but it wasn’t on a loop. There two were replies, and at each reply, directions were given to a secure location to be picked up. The city itself is crawling with the dead, it had a population of just over a quarter million before.”

“And you’re sure the message was live?” demanded Androwski.

“Yes, sir, they were quite specific. They said to…” Stark put his hand to the left side of his headphones and looked down, his eyes focused. “They’re on now.” He flipped a switch, and a tinny voice filled the LAV.

“…can make it to any of the coordinates stated, we will come for you and bring you to safety. There are over eight hundred members of the United States armed forces guarding us. We have armored vehicles and aircraft. Food, shelter, and huge walls. Do not give up hope. Come to The Triumvirate, and the Three will provide. Repeat, you are not alone. There are nine thousand of us, and we will help you. Get to the following coordinates in rural Nebraska, Iowa, Missouri, or Kansas. The Crossroads Mall, forty one degrees fifty eight minutes point four one seconds north by…”

The voice listed more locations with coordinates, then repeated itself one more time, adding that it would be back on at the top of the hour, and every half hour after that.

“Sir, do we respond?”

“Negative. Our mission is the priority. McInerney told us to help anyone we could as long as that help didn’t compromise the mission or time to complete. Besides, I’m not sure I trust a voice on the radio.” The sounds of the approaching dead could be heard through the hull of the LAV, and the lieutenant shifted his attention to the monitor. “Damn, here they come.”

The dead were almost on them when Stark fired up the diesel engine, and with a belch of black exhaust from the snorkel pipes, the behemoth began to move.

“Actual, this is Wanderer, we need to…” Androwski sighed, “Wanderer is moving out. Suggest you RTB at Rock by any means necessary. Good luck.”

The eight-wheeled vehicle turned in a wide arc and fled back toward the other LAV. Leaving one friend behind, they would bury the friends they had lost as the sun set.

A solitary figure stood alone in the control tower, watching the LAV drive off through his binoculars. As they faded from sight, he tossed his broken and useless radio on a lightless air traffic console and sat in a wheeled chair. Putting his feet up next to the discarded radio and leaning his head back, he thought about his parents. They couldn’t possibly be alive, they were in San Antonio Texas. He hissed his breath in as pain lanced through his left forearm. He looked at the semi-circular wound and pulled his MK23 HANDGUN, unscrewing the suppressor and placing the weapon in his lap.
There’s always a zombie in the bathroom
, he thought to himself.