Soldier On: Surviving the Zombie Apocalypse (10 page)

Mike Desantos, Sergeant Maddox and Sergeant First Class Lopez took the left doors while Sergeant Clark, Sergeant First Class Haskell, Chief Warrant Officer Brent and Staff Sergeant Calvin were spread out on the right.

Clark made first contact. The undead woman wore the standard uniform: comfortable thick soled shoes, cheap looking black nylon slacks and a flimsy cotton vest loosely tied over her white cotton tee shirt.
Huffington Executive Cleaning
was silkscreened in red cursive on the vest. She stood silently swaying, gazing out the picture window, captivated by a murder of crows feeding on the corpses that littered the circular drive. Glacially slow, like an automaton at Disneyland, the female zombie turned and faced Clark. Her alabaster face, expressionless and devoid of intelligence, looked like it was finished with paper-Mache. The only evidence of injury that Clark could see was a blood-stained compress on her forearm. Her soulless eyes fixed on him. Invigorated by the sight of prey, the zombie lurched into a cubicle wall and collapsed face first on the floor legs and arms still pumping.

Without pause, Sergeant Clark spanned the distance and put his boot on the ghoul’s neck. The thing bucked and flailed, fighting against his weight advantage. The experienced killer went to a knee and inserted the tip of his combat knife where her spine and skull came together. Sergeant Clark pushed the blade firmly into the creature’s brain, forever ending its struggles.

Mike Desantos was busy systematically clearing the rooms on the left. Judging by the expensive sports memorabilia and nicely framed degrees they had to be the mid-level manager’s offices.

Clark wiped his blade on the cleaning ladies apron and stepped back into the hall.
One tango down,
he relayed using hand signals.

Desantos acknowledged with a quick nod.

The Delta Team thoroughly cleared all of the rooms branching off of the hallway.  Only an oversized set of double doors remained. Emergency lighting escaped from beneath the doors but there was no detectable movement or sound. Clark cautiously jiggled one of the handles,
unlocked
. Next, he ever so slowly opened the door on the right while Clark covered with his H&K MP7.

The cavernous space beyond the double doors was unremarkable. Multiple burgundy filing cabinets, three copier machines and a water cooler stood like sentinels on the wall to their left. Row upon row of cubicles stretched the length of the room.

“It’s a cube farm.”

“A what?” Desantos asked.

“A room crammed full of workstations.” Clark answered.

A slight stench hung on the air, blood was smeared here and there on the walls. It was obvious someone had been attacked here.

Mike took the left, Clark maneuvered to the right. The emergency lights flickered momentarily but stayed on. Both groups of operators were at the midway point of the large room. Suddenly several heads gophered up from various cubicles around the room. The zombies began moaning and started moving about.

Mike came to the realization that both teams were cut off from either set of doors and most ominously each other.

Mike was advancing towards the far door when a ghoul emerged from the cubicle ten feet to his right. Apparently it had been casual dress day when the middle aged man died. His Levis and knit Izod were caked with dried blood. Mike’s suppressed machine pistol spit a quiet three round burst. The tight grouping punched a fist sized hole in the zombie’s forehead, its bald cranium erupted, and blood and brain matter splashed the white ceiling tiles.

 Haskell found himself cut off from the others; two of the creatures had him cornered.

“
Haskell watch your six.
” Clark yelled into the comms. He was too late with the warning.

They all looked on as Haskell fired a sustained burst point blank from his machine pistol. The bullets stitched the undead office worker across the gut. The resulting blowback showered the doomed shooter with putrid yellow guts and fecal matter.

 Mike watched helplessly, both flesh-eaters had a hold of Haskell and were tugging him to the floor. The gut shot creature opened its jaws wide and took a mouthful of the sergeant’s face, shook its head like a shark and came away clenching a hunk of the soldiers flesh in its yellowed teeth. Haskell put his hands on the pulsating wound, hot copper smelling blood sluiced between his fingers. His uniform blouse was changing from tan to crimson from the neck down. Enraged, he found his MP7 hanging from its sling and with a sustained burst decapitated the gut shot zombie, its head bounced away with the piece of his flesh still in its mouth. The other monster felt his wrath as well, two shots at point blank range sprayed bone and brains across the cubes and wall behind them. Haskell stood on shaky legs and continued to take it to the enemy.

Mike Desantos and the other Delta members looked on in awe as the sergeant went out on his own terms. The brave operator put down four more undead with clean headshots before a female zombie pounced on him. The man had lost a lot of blood from his fatal wound and his strength was beginning to ebb. Sergeant Haskell wrapped both hands around his attacker’s thin neck and tried to roll out from under her frigid body. The dead weight pressed down on him, gravity was winning the battle as the ghouls teeth inched closer to his neck.

Haskell had never smelled anything as stomach turning as the stench wafting from her open mouth. With the final bit of energy left in him, he thrust two fingers into its eye socket; the exploding eyeball showered his face with milky white fluid. Haskell drew his knife with the other hand and plunged the seven inch blade into her temple; it was his last act as a living breathing human being.

The six operators moved through the space, shooting and reloading as they weaved between the work spaces. Sergeant First Class “Low-rider” Lopez kept an eye on their six. Cordite haze from the gunfire hung suspended in the air, diffusing the already dim emergency lighting.

The fractured team regrouped before the next pair of double doors.

General Desantos spoke to his team, “Check yourselves for bites, scratches or any wounds. Lopez, make sure Harvey can’t reanimate and pull his tags. We’ll collect his body on the way out.”

“He sure put up a hell of a fight,” Clark intoned.

“Harvey saved a few of us for sure. I
will
put him up for a medal when we get home.”  Desantos peeled off his ballistic eye protection and rubbed his red rimmed eyes. The pace of action during the last few days was taking its toll on him. As far as running hot ops went, Mike knew that he was getting close to the end of his shelf life. Before the dead started walking he had even confided in his wife Annie that this was going to be his final year going out with the teams.

Omega came along and changed everything. There would be no office in the Pentagon for him. There
was
no Pentagon. When President Clay pinned the two stars on him he asked himself why? Deep down he was coming to the realization that ops would never stop for him. As long as Annie and his kids were alive, he would stay as sharp as possible and continue to lead his men against all enemies-foreign or undead.

General Desantos felt it was time for a pep talk-something to spur them on. “Team, this building is meant to keep things in, very small and deadly microbial things. The door to the Level 4 containment area will be a very tough nut to crack. If we make contact, make your shots count. We don’t need any extra bugs getting out. Our objective is to bring the scientists and any hard drives and flash media we can round up, back to Springs.” He looked each man in the eye momentarily, wanting to drive home the importance of the mission. “
The man that we are going to retrieve
... is trying to figure out what makes Omega tick. What little information that Springs has received tells us Doctor Fuentes was making strides forward. The problem with staying here is
security
.”

“Seems super secure to me Sir.”

“Sure it’s secured
inside
...more so now that these ones are dead.”  Mike pointed at the leaking bodies scattered about the floor of the cube farm. “But this building is on the periphery of Atlanta. There is no way to keep the enemy at bay, and unfortunately there isn’t enough ammo left to kill them all. The more activity that takes place in here the more attractive it becomes to those things out there. Already they’re swarming here-all because of our lone helicopter on the roof.”

“How many people lived here in Atlanta?” Lopez asked.

“More than five million,” Desantos answered letting the number take its sweet time rolling off of his tongue. “I don’t mean to put any undue pressure on you men, but the fate of mankind hinges on our success or failure today. We can not fail.
We will not fail
.”

Clark felt a chill trace his spine,
that was a General Patton moment
, he thought, before he cracked the door and entered the stairwell.

The Delta Team swiftly descended the remaining fourteen flights of stairs to the sub-basement. On many of the landings, behind the closed doors, things moved and bumped. The sickly sweet smell of death was with them all the way.

The door at the bottom of the stairwell looked like it belonged on a bank vault. The side facing the team was completely flat and fashioned from a slab of solid polished steel.

“Smile, were on Candid Camera.” Lopez poked the muzzle of his stubby weapon at the black dome suspended from the ceiling.

“If there’s anyone left alive inside, there hasn’t been any communication from them for two days.” Mike said.

Sergeant Darwin Maddox inspected the door and came away looking concerned. He conferred with Desantos. “This one is a ball breaker. Eight titanium rods, the size of my wrist, are buried six inches into the jamb all of the way around. I have det cord, what I really need is an acetylene torch...or a couple of pounds of C4.”

Lopez deadpanned, “What, no acetylene torch in your goodie bag?”

“
Quiet.
” Desantos barked. “Lets put our heads together on this one.”

A whirring noise, followed by a series of loud clanks, echoed up and down the stairwell.

For a millisecond, to a man, they looked taken aback, and then the years of training took over.

Desantos and Maddox crouched in the dark, underneath the stairs and covered the blind side of the door.

The other four men charged back up the stairs, climbing them in big strides. Once they regained the high ground they trained their machine pistols on the blast door.

The team watched as the massive slab began to swing slowly inward. Suddenly the air pressure changed. Desantos opened his mouth and worked his jaw trying to pop his ears. He wasn’t very concerned who emerged...because as far as he knew the dead couldn’t open doors. Especially not a two foot thick hermetically sealed one.

Outbreak Day 5

Hanna, Utah

Cade gave the bodies of the three boys a quick inspection. Someone had taken the time to line them up side by side. The oldest of the three had a deep gash that split the top of his cranium from ear to ear. Gray scrambled brain matter sloughed out of the horrific wound. The other two appeared unscathed until he leaned in closer. Each body was minus one eye. The entry wounds were small and Cade didn’t see any obvious exit wounds. It was apparent that the coup de grace on the kid, with the Grand Canyon in his dome, was committed during a fit of rage. Whoever had to kill these boys a second time didn’t like the imposition.

Although the three boys were no longer a threat, it was obvious that they had at one time reanimated and pursued the flesh of the living. Now, despite their hideous appearance, they were still and seemingly at peace. The bodies had been bloating in the sun for awhile and Cade was grateful that the wind was blowing the smell of death away from him.

Cade crouched silently in the shade of a Douglas fir and surveyed the two story weather-beaten home. It was in need of cosmetic fixing but seemed otherwise well taken care of.

There didn’t appear to be anyone in the house, or at least no one that was moving about. Before approaching, he looked around for any walkers. Satisfied he was alone; he sprinted across the brown grass and bounded up the stairs. One of the treads creaked loudly under his weight; the nails used to secure it had been exposed to the elements and had long ago worked loose. Cade froze and craned his neck focusing his right ear in the direction of the closed front door. Suddenly the wind picked up, setting the branches of the white aspens clacking.

The sound reminded him of the bamboo wind chimes his wife Brook had brought home from the Oregon coast.

After a few ticks, it was evident the noise had not piqued anyone’s curiosity. Cade finished his ascent of the stairs and crouched on the porch to the right of the front door. He tested the patinaed door handle,
unlocked
. Before he did a little breaking and entering, Cade checked his six for any approaching threats.

With the exception of the rotting corpses at the end of the drive he was still alone. The wind abruptly changed direction, bringing the stench of the dead with it.

Cade pushed the door inward revealing an ornate mahogany foyer, beyond, a beautifully carved bannister followed the curve of the stairs to the second floor. Apparently the owner paid more attention to the interior of the house than the outside.