So It Begins (15 page)

  “Suggestions?” said Shaker.

  “We find a place to hide and secure the girl and come back for her,” said Hastings.

  “I don’t like the idea of leaving her behind,” said Shaker.

  “You think I do? For all we know, she’s the only survivor in Knob Lick,” whispered Hastings.

  “And Benedict won’t let us back if we don’t get at least fifty people,” said Kline.

  “Fuck Benedict. If she’s all we can find, he’ll damn well come pick her up. He can leave us, but he won’t punish a child for my sins,” said Hastings, for the first time admitting out loud that she had made a mistake in not rescuing the citizens of Ozark. “Or anybody else. We comm for evac no matter how many survivors we find inside. We risk their lives the longer they’re dirtside.”

  Shaker hesitated, then said, “Ma’am . . . would you like to assume command of the assault? You’re the only one of us with battlefield command experience.”

  “Which was not long after the lot of you were out of diapers. No, you were right to take command of this team. I’ve screwed up these people’s lives. I’ll do what I can, but I’m not going to take your first command away from you. Especially when you are doing such a good job of it.”

  “Thank you, ma’am. It means a lot,” said Shaker.

  Hastings nodded at him. “I will offer some advice, however. If we can enter through one of the windows on an upper floor, we will have a better chance of keeping the deaders out.”

  “I was thinking the same thing,” said Shaker.

  “I can rig a grappling hook to our belt lines and we can scale the wall,” said Lao.

  “Or we can search for an extension ladder,” said Dorna.

  “Well, if you want to do things the easy way,” replied Lao with a smile.

  “They keep the ladders in the tool shed,” said Gail, who had walked over to hear better. “Do you think you can get everyone out?”

  “We’re going to try . . .” started Shaker.

  “Absolutely,” said Hastings. “Problem is, we have to keep you safe, and bringing you with us to take the building isn’t going to do that.”

  “I don’t want to be left alone,” Gail said.

  “I understand, but if we leave someone behind with you, there is less chance of us living long enough to get to the people inside the building. The shed looks strong. We could have you lock it from the inside and open it when we come back for you,” said Hastings. “How does that sound?”

  “Scary,” said Gail.

  “Good. Scared is good. It’ll make you careful, help keep you alive.” Hastings took out her personal sidearm, took off the safety, and handed it to the girl. “Do you know how to shoot?”

  Gail nodded. “My daddy taught me.”

  “Good. This has twenty shots. Only use them if you have to. The noise will attract more deaders.”

  “But you’ll come back for me?” asked Gail.

  “We will,” said Shaker.

  “You have my word that we will not leave you behind,” said Hastings.

  “Okay,” said Gail.

  Dorna used her stemmers to move into the masses of deaders and attack. The best the remote could manage was randomized blows which were almost totally ineffective, so Dorna changed tactics and had the stemmers run away as living-like as the programming would allow. The fast, sudden movement triggered the prey centers of their reanimated brains and they gave chase, leaving only a handful of stragglers at the east side of the building. The quintet moved quickly with the girl between them toward the shed. Lao used his Host-issued multi-tool to cut the lock.

  Luck smiled as they pulled out an extension ladder. Hastings helped Gail get inside and showed her how to lock the doors using the chain and a bolt.

  “You’ll be back for me?” she asked again, nervously.

  Hastings made an X over her chest with her index finger. “Cross my heart. Do not open this door unless one of us tells you to.”

  Gail nodded and Hastings shut the door.

  The quintet made a mistake by running for the wall. One of the stragglers caught the movement out of the corner of his eyes and came after them.

  “Incoming five o’clock,” said Kline.

  “Everyone up the ladder as soon as we have it standing,” said Shaker.

  Lao and Shaker laid it so the top was on the sill of a third floor window.

  “Go,” shouted Shaker, hitting Lao on the back. Lao climbed as fast as he could, smashing the glass with the butt of his plasma rifle, using his gloves to clear out the shards before climbing in.

  Next up was Dorna. She left the remote below the window, but had the far end of her belt line hooked to the device. Once she was in, she reeling it up after her.

  Next up was Kline, but the deader had crossed the school field and was, approaching the soldiers.

  “Damn,” said Hastings and shot out both the dead man’s knees. It stopped his approach, but the shot of the plasma round was heard by more of the reanimated, who now converged on their position. While the first had been moving as a leisurely searching pace, the others were now racing, as were others from around the town. “Go!”

  Shaker shook his head. “My command. You go, I’ll be right behind you.”

  “Damn straight you will be,” said Hastings, pulling out her retractable beltline and hooked the clip on the back of Shaker’s battle belt. “I’ll pull you up, you pick off those deaders.”

  Shaker nodded and sat on the ladder, his back to the building. Hastings climbed up, pulling the larger man behind her. The rungs were of the self-turning variety, which made the task much easier, but still a challenge for the fifty-plus-year-old woman.

  Shaker started shooting the nearest zombies and learned that Benedict hadn’t been kidding when he told them a firefight with deaders was something you never got used to. When facing down weapons that can cut them in two, human foes, and even most of the other monsters, will take cover or at least flinch as they are turned into chopped meat. The reanimated were drawn to the noise of gunfire like moths to a zapper, so shooting them only increased the frenzy of their attack. Firing at them was the one way to make sure a soldier attracted the most attention from deaders. The zombies in the back would rip apart the reanimated in front of them for a chance at gunner chow. Of course, not shooting them tended to allow the reanimated to either eat or convert their human foes. Usually both.

  Hastings barely climbed fast enough to keep Shaker out of zombie hands. The hungry dead tended to be weaker at higher motor functions. That didn’t mean they couldn’t climb ladders; it just meant they didn’t do it pretty. One tried to walk up it and fell through the rungs, so the next one managed to step over him with one foot before tripping face first. His fall allowed the female dead next in line to walk over him to get closer to the soldiers.

  Fortunately, by this point Hastings was already through the window, yanking Shaker in behind her.

  “Lift the ladder. Shake and shoot ’em off!” ordered Hastings. Working together, the quintet pulled back and pushed down, lifting the ladder and the three trapped deaders off the ground. The next wave of dead men and women reached up and pulled down hard enough to lift all five soldiers off the floor.

  Shaker and Hastings let go and opened fire, tearing the zombies on and below the ladder to bits of bone, muscle, and organ jelly. The trio of soldiers who were still holding the ladder dropped down and pulled it inside the window.

  “Try not to touch that end,” said Dorna. “Big contamination risk.”

  “Let’s secure this building ASAP and check the basement shelter,” said Shaker.

  “Do we need to guard this exit point?” asked Kline.

  “No way deaders should be able to climb up the side of the building,” said Dorna.

  “We go down one floor at a time,” said Shaker.

  And they did. The upper floors were good, but the first floor had been compromised in several sections, too many for a five-person force to secure, so they locked the steel fire doors from the stairwell to the first floor before descending to the basement.

  Shaker looked to Hastings, but the older woman nodded for him to do the honors, so he knocked.

  “Host forces here. Is anyone alive in there?” asked Shaker. “We have the area secured.”

  A bolt scrapped against metal as it was drawn back and the door opened a crack, just enough for a man with a bearded face to verify Shaker’s words.

  “Oh, thank God. I’m John Ruddy, the mayor.” He looked up. “Colonel Hastings? You came down for us yourself?”

  “How many are in there with you?” said Hastings, ignoring the reference to her former rank.

  “We lost part of the town. We got as many as we could in the shelter. There’s six hundred and twelve of us in here.” Each of the quintet’s faces lit up at how many survivors there were. “And we’ve been out of rations for two days,” said Ruddy.

  “Mayor, we’re going to need to get everyone up to the roof for evac. I’ll need those of you who can still walk to help those who can’t,” said Shaker. “Kline, call for some Harpies.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Kline, using his long-range comm as the others helped the townspeople to the stairwell. Twenty minutes later, all the civilians were topside on the school roof, instructed to lie down in the center and stay away from the edges. That gave the soldiers access to watch or fire at the deaders. The civilians took up almost half of the open space. Although there was fear on their faces, there was also relief at having someone else take charge.

  “Kline, where’s the Harpy?” said Shaker.

  “
Kyklopes
control said ETA is two hours,” said Kline.

  “Why so long?” asked Lao.

  “Coordinating drop sites,” said Kline, shrugging in apology.

  “I hope we have that long,” said Dorna, looking over the roof’s edge. “The deaders are in a frenzy. They can see, hear, and smell the civilians and the original damage to the building may be worse than we thought. They are literally tearing apart the south side of the building. They keep this up and that entire wall could collapse and bring part of the roof down with it.”

  Shaker joined her at roof’s edge. “Damn it. We’re trapped. We’re only five floors up. That wall falls and they might be able to use the rubble and exposed structure to climb up to get us.”

  “Be quieter,” whispered Dorna. “You’ll panic the civies.”

  Hastings grabbed the long-range comm from Kline. “
Kyklopes
Control this is Colonel Hastings.”

  “Ma’am, you know your rank was stripped . . .” The air jockey’s tone was polite, but there was a condescending edge to it.

  “Shut the hell up and listen. We have six hundred plus civilians on a rooftop of a damaged building in Knob Lick that is in danger of collapse and is being overrun by deaders. We will lose the goddamned civies if we don’t have a Harpy at our position in fifteen,” said Hastings.

  “I’m sorry, only Major Benedict has the authority to change pickup schedules,” said the voice at control, without a hint of actual regret in his tone. In fact, Hastings heard a few sniggers in the background at having the architect of this disaster screwed by it.

  “Then put Benedict on now,” ordered Hastings.

  “The Major is busy right now. I will make sure he gets the message,” said Control. Hastings could practically see the smirk on his face.

  “Just because I screwed up, don’t punish these people,” pleaded Hastings.