by Dave Lund
Between the north side and the south side of Camp Pendleton stretched numerous fire roads, dirt trails, and hills. This was terrain the M-ATVs were specifically designed for, so besides taking time, Aymond wasn’t worried about his guys making the drive. The rest of the team tasked themselves with maintenance of their weapons and rested, rotating an on/off schedule. They had to remain ready to be a ragtag QRF for the recon team if need be. Aymond debated keeping them all together for support and conducting the recon as a whole team, but given the layout of Pendleton, he was mostly OK with just the small recon element while giving the rest of the team some much needed rest.
Ski spent hours scanning the nets with the mounted radio in one of the M-ATVs, but with no positive news. Nearing 1400 hours, he thought he’d found a transmission on the HF band, but couldn’t get a good signal. He did note the frequency in his notepad to check again later; if it was a real transmission, and maybe if they could get on a higher piece of ground, he might be able to make contact then.
Flagstaff, AZ
Morning came with little fanfare, although the interior of the FJ smelled strongly of body odor and general uncleanliness. Groom Lake said they had showers. God, how I could use a shower … maybe they have a bathtub ... to be able to soak in a tub, ahhh, what dreams may come. After a round of morning necessities at a nearby tree, the trio pulled off the dirt road and back onto Highway 89 north, eating their MRE breakfasts as they drove. Towns so small that Jessie was surprised they even had names passed by the windshield. Jessie opted to drive again. Already feeling nauseous from her breakfast, she couldn’t think of sitting as a passenger; she wouldn’t be able to keep her meal down. With each passing day, she seemed to show more and more; women had always told her that second babies showed earlier in the pregnancy, but she hadn’t experienced it before. Her jeans unbuttoned and unzipped, a piece of 550-cord used as a belt was about the only thing holding them up when she stood. She doubted that maternity pants would be easy to come by, but maybe she could at least find something more comfortable soon.
They were in Grand Canyon country, the wide open great American nothing for miles and miles on end. The upside was that with nothing came nobody, and nobody resulted in no undead, and also no cars in the road. So, the needle pegged at sixty, Jessie hoped to make Groom Lake by sunset. Her best estimate, looking at the atlas, was that they were in for an eight-hour drive. However, at the first car they saw, they would need to stop and syphon gas to top off the dwindling supply in the cans lashed to the roof rack.
Nearing lunch, the trio crossed the Navajo Bridge and found three vehicles abandoned in the parking lot of the overview. Erin volunteered to be the unlucky one, syphoning gas while the other two held security. A half-hour later, they set out with a full tank of gas, full cans on the rack, and Erin trying to rinse the taste of gasoline out of her mouth. Jessie had never seen the Grand Canyon in person before, but the terrain they passed reminded her a lot of Palo Duro Canyon in Texas, where she and Bexar had camped a few years ago. The tiny highway gave way from the desert canyons to the mountains with their majestic trees once again. The two-lane road was barely painted, the yellow line cracked and faded. In the road were a number of large RVs, seemingly abandoned, but after what Bexar and Jack told her about the RV park in Big Bend, she wanted nothing to do with them. They could have held scavenged treasure, for all she cared; right now her laser focus was pointing to Groom Lake. She absentmindedly rubbed her belly between gear shifts, her AR set across her lap for the probable need to use it.
Time ticked by, noticed only by the gradual dance of the sun across the cold blue sky as the mountains and trees gave way again to desert. She slowed to pass through the tiny town of Fredonia, which looked abandoned and untouched, as if every person had simply packed their bags and left. Jessie’s mind turned to finding maternity pants once again, but she dismissed the thought as the farming community barely had a gas station, much less a women’s maternity clothing shop. More importantly, it was a marked waypoint on the atlas to take the next road on their grand tour across America.
Cortez, CO
Bexar couldn’t sleep after returning from the church. Every time he began to drift off, his dreams fell back to the little girl sacrificed on the altar like some animal. Sometimes Keeley’s sweet face appeared, sometimes it didn’t. In less than three months, Bexar had gone from the comfortable life of a city cop riding a motorcycle, to having lost his daughter, his wife, and everything he knew. He had been confronted with evil at a level he had never imagined could exist. The strangeness of some culturally significant cults that touched the newsfeeds every few years paled compared to the savagery he’d seen here. Even in Jonestown there was just death, not the inhuman violence and disregard for life he saw last night.
Cliff and Chivo somehow slept. Conditioned to combat, they could switch off and shut down quickly. Bexar gave up on sleep and sat looking at the map of the town with the notes and information that Cliff gave him, formulating a plan. First, they had to burn the church down. He couldn’t set foot in there again, and he couldn’t leave all of those people doomed to hang and struggle against their bonds as reanimated corpses. Cliff had told Bexar about the middle school and the chemistry lab, but Bexar had failed middle school, high school, and college chemistry, so the closest he came to an understanding was how to use a field tester for the presence of narcotics. Cliff listed off what was in the storage closet; Chivo smiled and told Bexar not to worry about it, that they could make something special. Chivo didn’t elaborate and Bexar really didn’t care. He saw three simple steps: Burn the church, burn the elementary school, and kill everyone that came out from positions of cover.
It was well past noon; the other two men still slept. Bexar, wired, sat in the living room on the first floor and stared at the black screen of a blank TV that would never work again. Burn them down; shoot the runners. Like killing fire ants.
Camp Pendleton, CA
The reports were not good. All of Camp Pendleton that could be observed was heavily damaged and overrun with the dead. Aymond thought about pointing the convoy east and never looking back, but he wanted to check the Recruit Depot. Even between training cycles, some of the cadre might have survived. However, that was secondary; he wanted to get to The Center. If anyone would have survived, it would be his rival brothers in the SEAL teams at Coronado. It would be foolish to give up now and turn east without at least checking those places. The first task was to get his team back together at a rendezvous point located near Bonsall, and then actually make it to San Diego. There were many densely populated areas between here and there. It was important to keep his team together; if they were overrun, then they would be overrun together—no more recon patrols for now. I-15 to I-5 was their most direct route without driving straight down the coast. If there are any SEALs left in Coronado, at least that is a semi-defendable location ... blow the bridges and only worry about the southern approach.
Groom Lake, NV
With this attempt, Bill had success. The transmissions back and forth weren’t very good, fading in and out, but he would take it. He had at least created a backup communications platform in case the shadow internet failed, or for any other reason. Bill trusted his radios more than he trusted fiber optics. After all, his radio technology had worked for over a hundred years; it was proven.
Now if he could set up self-reliant repeaters at specific intervals throughout the nation, he could have a coast-to-coast radio net. He would place them on the highest points, mountain tops, buildings, making it easier to get the radio waves from point to point. As it stood, however, Bill might as well have been trying to land on the moon. Telegraph line ... if only the lines still were up, a little juice and some tin tapping for communications. All we need is wire, miles and miles of wire. The burst of excitement fell to feeling overwhelmed at the totality of the situation they were all in. They all realized that it would be the complete luck of the draw to live long enough to see the start of a project that ambitiou
s, much less see it completed … or to have enough people left in the world to even need it.
Bonsall, CA
The convoy once again together as a team, they pointed east through the edge of town, back towards I-15, away from the mountaintops and dirt roads of safety, and into the asphalt jungle. Pervading all was the weary feeling of combat troops headed into a mission that has bad intel and a high likelihood of enemy contact. It felt heavy in the vehicle, and Aymond wasn’t sure if it was just him or if everyone felt that way. His two new corporals and their Humvee were sandwiched in between the first and second M-ATV in the convoy, so if they had a failure, the trailing truck could push them to safety. After his years in the Marines, Aymond just didn’t trust the Humvees to perform; they seemed to always break down, specifically when you needed them the most. However, it was all they had so it was what they would use. The number of vehicles and Zeds on the road as of yet was light, but Escondido would be their first test, the first larger city, and they would be there very soon.
The FJ
The three of them stopped long enough for Jessie to pee and to top off the fuel tank from a gas can before hitting the edge of Colorado City. The barren world, punctuated with hills and homesteads, passed by them mind-numbingly dull, but broken by Erin voicing her opinion that she would actually like to encounter some of the dead so she would have something to shoot at for a little while. The statement earned a scorning look from her mother. Arizona gave way to Utah, followed by more unending road. The town of Hurricane came and went with only a few undead bouncing around the streets, turning to follow the SUV, nearly unnoticed by the women as they passed.
Like a shot of caffeine, making the turn onto the ramp for I-15 changed the mood in the FJ instantly. Long gone was the grey boredom of a road trip through the middle of nowhere; back was Erin press-checking her M4 and Sarah sitting up in her seat, ready to do something. She didn’t know what, but she was ready. Jessie shifted gears and had to slow coming into St. George, the largest town they had seen since Flagstaff. The vehicles on the road were densely packed, once again causing Jessie to drive shoulder to shoulder, threading the needle through the small gaps, catching the front bumper on the edges of vehicles only a couple of times. Jessie drove in first gear, painfully slow; the undead approached the FJ only to bounce off the fenders as it passed by just slightly faster than their walking speed.
“Just keep your window up, Erin; we don’t need one of those hands reaching in here.”
Erin just grunted in response to her mother.
The number of vehicles slowly dwindled, as did the number of undead, until they neared the southern edge of the town, Jessie was able to shift through the gears and gradually get back to a respectable traveling speed. Mountains to the east, the sun blazed angrily into the windows of the passenger’s side windows of the FJ. Sarah estimated that they had about three hours until sunset. Jessie glanced at the map and guessed they had about three hours until they reached Groom Lake. As full of nothing as this part of the country was, Jessie just didn’t care anymore. She was tired of driving, her back hurt, and she still felt nauseous. She was going to make it to Groom Lake; she wasn’t sleeping another night in the FJ.
Cortez, CO
The sun sat low on the horizon. Cliff and Chivo were up and joined a sleep-deprived Bexar at the kitchen table, the city map laid out in front of him. Cliff liked the idea of burning down the church; if they did it right, it would give them a place to set an ambush. First, they needed darkness, then they needed to go to the middle school and the chemistry lab.
“I don’t know. Will they respond to the fire? If so, how many? How many total people are we dealing with here?”
“That’s an unknown, Chivo. I haven’t had the time or resources to accurately account for all the people, much less what sort of weaponry they have. We have a rough idea of how many of their numbers we’ve killed between the three of us, and a guess as to how many they had before, based on same. We can suspect that the patrols haven’t been as heavy as they were before, from what you two tell me, so I think we’ve put a significant dent in their numbers. As for weapons, well, we know they have RPGs. Jake stated that they had crew-served weapons as well, but I haven’t seen any of those in play.”
Chivo said, “We’ll have to assume that they will be employed in a defensive position to their HQ.”
Bexar nodded.
“First we need to get to the middle school and pull supplies from the chemistry lab. And I still have the instructions from a guy named Bill who was in your facility about a high frequency radio setup.” Chivo looked at Cliff.
“Not yet. I don’t want to break the news of all the deaths until I can say we carried out justice and that we’re headed to the SSC.”
“Why not back to Groom Lake?” Bexar asked.
“Clint needs help. Wright will be able to keep Groom Lake running just fine; between him and the civilians they should be able to continue to pull in survivors as they’re contacted. We, however, have a more important mission. With a sitting President, we need to try to get any remaining elements of the military organized and centralized. We start by clearing out small pockets of area, creating safe zones, then slowly work our way across the country. The large masses, the Zs, those are going to be a problem. We’re going to need serious hardware, maybe even some of our suitcase nukes to make a dent in those.”
“Suitcase nukes? I thought that was just a bullshit story.”
“Did you believe in Area 51 before now, Bexar? How about the underground at Denver International Airport, the SSC, Chemtrail?”
“Well, kind of.”
“As a general rule, a conspiracy theory starts when some grain of truth sneaks out. We then work hard to wrap that grain of truth in a huge shell of crazy so people are aware it exists, but believe it is bullshit being spewed by an unstable person.”
“Makes sense.”
“Regardless, we’ve got to take care of our immediate problem. Chivo and I can make the IEDs. Bexar, you’re going to be our security at the middle school while we work, keeping watch towards the main street and watching for patrols.”
“I don’t get to watch the magic happen?”
“Nope. Magicians never reveal their secrets,” Cliff said with a wink.
The FJ
Small towns came and went without much fanfare. The few undead on the Interstate bounced off the fenders as Jessie threaded the needle between them and the handful of abandoned vehicles. North of Las Vegas, through the tiny town of Moapa, and across a few more desolate small highways, they turned onto the colorfully named “Extraterrestrial Highway,” Highway 375, and drove into the mountains.
“How will we know where to turn off? This is a secret base, right? I doubt they have signs.”
“Sarah, I don’t know. Bexar just said we’d know it when we got there and to look for ‘the black mailbox,’ although I have no idea what that is. There are supposed to be large ‘No Trespassing’ signs along the dirt roads into the base, so I guess that’s what we look for.”
The sun was below the horizon now. Driving using the headlights, they approached a turn off to an unmarked dirt road. Parked next to it was a plywood sign with an arrow pointing up the dirt road with “Safety” painted in red spray paint.
“What do you think?”
“I don’t know; there’s no mailbox.”
“Jessie, I’d say take it. Worst case, we turn around and come back. Quite frankly, as desolate as it is out here, I’d be surprised if we actually saw another walking corpse.”
Erin slept curled up against the gear in the backseat. The headlights barely lit the dirt road, but Jessie drove along the bumpy route slowly, hoping that it was the correct way and also hoping that she didn’t break the FJ out here in the middle of nothing.
I-15
The drive on I-15 wasn’t bad, better than typical rush hour traffic by a long shot. That was until they reached the edge of the city of Escondido. At that junction, the lead M-ATV’
s remotely operated M2 fifty-caliber machine gun sprayed burst after burst of fire in front of the convoy, while the driver had to make sweeping maneuvers side to side, around disabled vehicles. The trucks were strong enough to push vehicles out of the way, but there was no way Aymond could risk disabling one of their vehicles with aggressive actions.
Aymond stared out the windshield. My God, it looks like a nuke went off here. Everything is destroyed, burned; there’s no way anyone could have survived all of this. This is so fucked. He keyed the mic for the intra-team radios. “Guys, the Recruit Depot is between cycles; we’re in heavy trouble. I’m actually going to ask for opinions on this one. So … who wants to just push on to Coronado? If anyone else could have survived, it would be someone from The Teams.”
In each of the vehicles, a quick debate was held, yelling over the engine noise and weapons fire. Each of the MSOT members wanted to push on to Coronado, so the plan was set into action. Aymond had driven from Camp Pendleton to Coronado on more than a few occasions. The route was familiar; the unknown was if the Coronado Bridge was still standing, if it was blocked, and if they would have to take the convoy all the way south to Imperial Beach and back up.
What should have been about an hour’s drive took the convoy nearly three hours, Aymond’s M-ATV having to take the rear position due to running out of ammo for the truck’s primary weapon. He hoped the bridge would be standing and they could cut the drive short. They could use the beach as a buffer and set a solid perimeter to keep the Zeds off of them if need be, but what they needed most now was more ammo and more friends with rifles. At least one of the two would be found on the island housing The Naval Amphibious Base, home of the West Coast SEAL teams.