The Dying of the Light (Book 1): End (17 page)

Kim moved down the steps, slinging her battle rifle out of the way and drawing her pistol with its attached flashlight. “Hello?” she called. “It’s all right now, the monsters are gone.”

I started down the steps, my SCAR held at the ready. I didn’t know why my instincts were telling me to hang onto it, but I knew that there could be others down here. As I moved off the steps into the room, Kim was a few feet in front of me, her flashlight trained on a small child huddling in the corner, still and quiet. Too quiet.

I reached out a hand for Kim, whispering. “Kim, something’s not…” She had half-turned towards me when the boy exploded out of the corner, moving faster than any walker I’d ever seen. He had almost reached her when my flying tackle took her out of harm’s way, and he tumbled to the ground, spinning and coming back at us with a speed I’d rarely seen in normal humans, much less zombies.

Suddenly there was a burst of gunfire, and the boy went down in a soggy, bloody mess, his corpse landing not five feet from me. I glanced over at Kim, and she was wide-eyed as she looked at me.

“Hold still, David. Do. Not. Move.” I froze at the command, not knowing why she said it but trusting in her enough to follow the order without question. From a pocket on her ACU, she drew a small white handkerchief, and slowly dabbed at my left temple, near my eye. As she drew it back, I saw dark and congealed blood and swallowed. I hadn’t been hit, so the blood must’ve come from the boy. A few centimeters the other direction, and I’d be as dead as he was: infected, I would most likely have been killed by my own squad or, even worse, by Kim herself. She drew another white packet from her uniform, tearing it open with her teeth and applying the moist cloth inside to the same spot on my temple.

Sterilization 101. Just because the blood had been wiped off didn’t meant that the risk was all gone; all it took was one tiny little prion in your bloodstream, and you were as good as dead. Once she had finished, we both gave each other a thorough inspection, eliciting a slightly embarrassed cough from Reynolds, standing at the bottom of the cellar stairs with a wisp of smoke trailing from the end of his rifle.

Kim turned beet red as she and I clambered to our feet, and I hid my smile behind one gloved hand. Maybe it had been a little
too
thorough of an inspection, at that. One thing was damned sure, though: I was going to recommend eye protection be included as standard gear for all AEGIS personnel immediately.

We exited the cellar and regrouped at the Humvees. Kim looked at Jake Powell. “Jake, Bravo’s on clean-up. Get moving.”

Jake didn’t look happy, but he knew why she had assigned his team the onerous duty of cleaning up the farmhouse. After the loss of Roberts, Bravo team and its leader were going to be in more than one commander’s doghouse before it was over.

As they began collecting the necessary equipment from the back of their vehicle, I heard the unmistakable sound of tires crunching over dirt roads, and a spray of dust and pebbles greeted us as Kim and I turned towards the Sheriff’s car.

Kim half-turned to me, and I held up a hand. “I’ve got this, go call the colonel.” She looked relieved, and walked to the back of the lead Humvee as I met the Sheriff, running over to us in his haste to find out what had happened.

“Stop right there, Sheriff.” He glared at me and made as if to move around me, and I put one hand on his chest and shoved him backward several feet. The Sheriff was not a small man, but neither was I, and he hadn’t been trained by U.S. Army Special Forces. He opened his mouth with every intent to berate me, but I went on as if nothing had happened.

“This is a United States Army matter now, sir. For reasons of national security I’m afraid that I can’t go into the details, but you will be given information on a need-to-know basis by appropriate personnel. For now, I’m ordering you to return to your office and make sure no more calls have come in with similar reports. We need to know right away if there have been some, and you can help us the most by getting back to your post.”

There was a whoosh behind me, and I felt heat on my back as I watched the Sheriff’s eyes grow as round as dinner plates, and I could see the flames from the farmhouse reflected. I thought he was going to have a heart attack on the spot when he began spluttering at me. “You can’t just go around burnin’ people’s homes, boy, I don’t care who you work for. We’ve got rights, and no one — not even the Army — can take those away just yet. Now listen here, this is
my
town…”

I almost slapped him at that point. My hand was on its way, but I managed to stop myself as the sheriff’s eyes got big once more.
It’s not his fault he’s just a good ol’ boy
, I thought.
He’s just protecting his town — as he sees it. He doesn’t know what’s really going on, and he didn’t just lose a friend to a bunch of fucking monsters
. I took a deep breath, and smiled — or at least made the attempt. It must’ve fallen short, as the sheriff recoiled.

“No,
you
listen here, Sheriff. If you want to tell me how to do my job, then the next time you have crazies eating each other and attacking people, we’ll just let
you
take care of it, okay? Until then, just
do your fucking job
and help me.” I took another deep breath. “Please?”

I swear I thought I heard him whimper as he walked back to his car, got in, and drove off. There was a guy who was going to have a hefty therapy bill. I turned as Kimberly walked up. “David, did you actually
slap
that man?”

“Absolutely not, ma’am.” I struggled to keep a grin from my face. “I sure wanted to, though.” We both looked over at the farmhouse, now a tall pillar of flame that would consume the zombies, the invisible molecules that had created them, and all other evidence that they were ever here.
A tragic, tragic accident, and no doubt about it; still, it’s better than John Q. Public figuring out what’s
really
going on.

Commander Anderson joined us and nodded to the deputy’s squad car. “I assume that’s going to be handled, too? Ah, I see.” He appeared pleased as Bravo team moved the car into the field and placed a small explosive charge inside the trunk.
Another unfortunate accident
, I thought as they moved away and the charge ignited, incinerating the car and the rest of the evidence.
All these old police cars should be replaced. Absolute deathtraps.

Anderson turned back to Kim. “Well major, it wasn’t a perfect mission, but all things considered, you did well.” We were all somber, knowing that the loss of even one soldier would hit us all soon. Families like the one our team had become didn’t take losses lightly.

Kimberly nodded to Commander Anderson. “Yes, sir. I’ve taken the liberty of contacting base. The colonel has already routed a clean-up crew for the medical center; their ETA is one hour, sir. As it turns out, a major renovation project that had been planned is going to get an early start, sir.” She smiled at the cover story, and shrugged. “At least they’ll still have the hospital.”

“Agreed. Let’s pack it up, this mission is over. I’ll coordinate the cleanup from here, and act as liaison with the Sheriff,” Anderson said. “Your orders are to proceed with all speed to Hill Air Force Base for extraction back to Fort Carson. You can drop me off at the Sheriff’s office on the way.” He handed her the camera from his helmet. “Make sure that this gets back to Colonel Maxwell. Do
not
give it directly to Mr. Gardner, clear?”

Kimberly and I both came to attention, saluting. “Clear, sir.” she said. As he dropped the salute she immediately began recalling everyone to their vehicles. Ten minutes later, we were westbound on 121, headed for Salt Lake City and home. The C-17 ride back was as quiet as any flight on the big birds ever got, leaving the crew shaking their heads and wondering just what the hell had happened, until they saw the body bag strapped carefully in beside us.

They say war is hell; I doubt zombies are what they had in mind, but they’re still right.

Chapter Nine

Fort Carson, Colorado

We all filed into the briefing room in a somber state. Losing Roberts — Victor to his friends — was a hard blow to our morale. Even to an experienced, battle-hardened team, a loss is hard to take.

Colonel Maxwell strode in as though he owned the place, like always, and slammed down a stack of reports on the desk at the front of the room. The gunshot-like sound cracked back and forth between the cinderblock walls, and brought us all to attention behind our tables without our even realizing that it had happened until it was done.

Not only had we lost a man, we were all ready to rack out after having been in action or on the way to or from it for the better part of two days. Some of us looked better than others, but none of us were cheery.

“What a sorry bunch of low-life assholes this is. I’ve scraped better soldiers than you off the bottom of my boot.”

For Maxwell, this was practically a compliment. The sad part of it was that he was being literal; his time at Fall Creek had been no easier than mine.

Someone — Powell, I thought — started to say something, but the colonel stopped him short simply by leaning over and placing his hands on the squadleader’s table, staring nose to nose with him.

“If I want to hear from you ever again, maggot, I will by-god ask you. The next time you open your mouth it better be to answer a direct question or you will be scrubbing the lab floors with a toothbrush for a month.” I doubted even the colonel would consign someone to cleaning the floor of the exam rooms, but you never knew what Maxwell had up his sleeve for someone who had screwed up so profoundly. “You get me, boy?”

Jake nodded and whispered. “Yes, sir,” he said, his posture showing more than anything how defeated he felt.
If he stays squad leader, I’ll be surprised
, I thought. I glanced at Kim, and it appeared that she was thinking the same thing. Then she looked over at Reynolds, pity and sadness crossing her face before turning back to Maxwell.

Why would she be especially sad for him?

Returning to his accustomed spot at the front of the room, the colonel took an at-ease stance. “As much as you screwed up today, you’ve now tasted real combat, some of you for the first time. Now you know what it’s like to be in the shit, your life on the line. I’m not glad he’s dead — far from it — but Roberts’ sacrifice has provided us with a valuable lesson. One I want you all to think about carefully over the next two days while you are restricted to quarters.”

He grunted when the expected grumble of discontent didn’t appear. “Good. At least you
know
you fucked up.” Maxwell sighed and stood easy. “Problem is, so does higher. Or they will soon enough. Those of you with a brain bigger than my thumb will have already noticed a distinct lack of grey suits in this room.”

I glanced around, realizing I
hadn’t
noticed, trying to confirm what he had already told us.
Boy, we are in the shit today
, I thought as almost all of us turned to look as well.
With attention spans like this,
God help us if we got attacked right now. We’d be walker-bait in a heartbeat.

Just like Roberts.

I don’t remember the rest of the debriefing; a sort of grey haze had fallen over me, and I was running purely on automatic at that point. The next thing I knew, there was a quiet knock on my barracks door, and Kimberly entered, looking over her shoulder. She glanced at the room’s other bed, empty and bare, and then at me with one raised eyebrow.
I doubt she even realizes how many of Maxwell’s mannerisms she copies
. I shrugged. “It would’ve been Roberts’, but I traded with Reynolds for you.”

She smiled, but I could see her eyes glisten with tears as she sat next to me on the bed. “Victor. His name was Victor,” she said, choking the words out as if they were the hardest thing she’d ever had to say.

I slid an arm around her shoulders and held her close to me as she finally broke and collapsed into me, tears streaming freely now. “His name was Victor,” I said, just holding her close as her tall frame was racked with sobs. Eventually, the pain had passed somewhat and she was able to look up at me.

“How can you not be crying? Don’t you
care
?” she asked, leaning away.

“Of course I care,” I said, a little harsher than I intended, and she flinched. I took a deep breath and continued, pulling her back to me. “Of course I care. He was a good friend; a good man. I’ll grieve for him, but right now I can’t think about it. I have to sort of… put it away and forget it for a little while, or I’ll lose it.”

She sniffed and wiped some of her tears away. “I wonder how Reynolds is doing,” she said, her words barely audible.

“I’m sure he’s doing about as well as any of us. Why?” I asked, remembering her looking at him in the briefing room.

She sat back up and looked at me, her surprise plain. “You mean you didn’t know?”

“Know what?” I said, completely mystified.

“He… he and Victor… they…” She appeared to be on the brink of tears once more as I took her hand, and suddenly, I knew.

“Victor was Tom’s ‘choice,’ wasn’t he?” I asked.

She nodded. “He was going to be, but Tom never made the move. He kept saying he would get to it when the time was right, and I never pushed him. I should’ve made him do it.” She shifted closer to me on the bed, laying her head on my shoulder. “I went to his room and knocked, but he’s either not answering, or not there.”