“We’ll keep a close eye on those tunnels to ensure they don’t catch us with our pants down.”
“The M1 is ready to go again as soon as you spot something. It might be our saving grace.”
“What about the other M1 I saw back at the outpost?”
“It stays there, to protect the civilians as a last resort.”
Fischer looked up at the tall buildings around them for the helicopters.
“And the Apaches?”
“Running low on fuel,” Massey said. “Trying to keep them as a last resort as well.”
Fischer hated seeing them hold back on their most powerful weapons, but he decided it was a good plan.
Last resort, he thought.
“Radio if you need me,” Massey said. “I’m going to check the defensive barricades again.”
Fischer took a long swig of water, then looked between Tran and Chase. “You boys doing all right?”
“Remember how you promised a drink on the beach when this is all over?” Tran asked.
“Of course.”
“I’m thinking a luxury cruise now.”
“You both deserve it,” Fischer said. “I know you didn’t sign up for this when you joined Fischer Fields, but I have to commend you for stepping up when the country called for us.”
“We go where you go, sir,” Tran added.
Meyer called from the truck. “Mr. Fischer! I’ve got activity!”
Adrenaline flooded Fischer. He ran as fast as his old bones would take him back to the engineer.
Spikes of activity bloomed across the monitor. Seismic waves bounced around the neighborhoods surrounding City Hall Park.
Fischer grabbed his radio. “Commander Massey, they’re on their way. I’ve got confirmed activity about six blocks north. Looks like they’ll be inbound at Centre and Chambers.”
“Copy, we’re moving the M1 now,” she replied.
The tank’s diesel engines growled to life and the treads crunched over the disheveled street. Men followed behind it as they found new positions, aiming toward the intersection at the corner of City Hall Park.
“Four blocks now,” Meyer reported.
Fischer gripped the barrel of his shotgun.
“Three blocks now!”
Ten minutes passed before the ground started to crater around a manhole on Centre. Fischer watched through the windshield of the truck. Tran and Chase got beside the vehicle, aiming at the shifting and cracking pavement.
For a moment, only the crackle of fires in the park and abandoned buildings nearby could be heard. Then the asphalt fell away in a loud crash.
A Variant climbed from the freshly formed pit, rearing back on its legs, muscles pulsing under sickly gray flesh. It opened its mouth, saliva spraying from its teeth as it screamed. A pack of monsters erupted from the tunnel behind it, a mix of armored juveniles and the sinewy adults.
“Open fire!” Massey yelled.
The concerted boom of rifle and machine gunfire exploded across the block. Tracer rounds cut from the machine gun nests in the neighboring buildings. Even as the first wave of monsters perished under the onslaught, others squirmed between the dead bodies of their brethren, climbing onto the street.
Grenades sailed toward them. Blasts sent chunks of singed meat smacking against asphalt and clouds of smoke blooming from new fires.
The M1 fired with a deafening boom. A geyser of asphalt and dirt burst from the hole with a resonating boom. The beasts’ bodies were thrown into the air, then came down in a gruesome rain of mangled body parts. A wave of dust billowed from the impact site.
“They’re still coming!” Chase said.
Fischer moved past Meyer and aimed out the open window of the truck. He sighted up one Variant galloping out of the rolling cloud of dust and debris.
With the butt of his shotgun tight against his shoulder, he squeezed his trigger. The blast tore through the monster’s chest, sending it tumbling over itself.
“Shit, sir. Shit!” Meyer said. “We’ve got more activity under the park.”
Fischer turned back to the screen. “Under us?”
“Yes! The beasts are digging a new tunnel.”
Screams echoed outside as a Variant lunged at a soldier, tearing into him with claws and teeth. Another man went down as juveniles piled on top of him, ripping him apart like a pack of dogs.
Fischer held up his radio. “Commander, the Variants are attacking from Elk and Chambers!”
“That’s near the M1,” she replied.
The tank fired another round that decimated the entrance of the tunnel. A group of beasts disappeared in a violent inferno.
Fischer expected that to be the end of them, but more monsters squeezed out from the cracked slabs of asphalt and rubble, bloody and burned.
Sniper rifles cracked from above, like angels of war, protecting the men on the ground from the creatures getting too close.
“They have stopped right below us,” Meyer said.
“Get out of here,” Fischer said. “Retreat to the main defenses and stay there.”
“But sir…”
“Do it,” Fischer said. “We can’t hold this position.”
Another pair of Variants made a break from the broken entrance of the tunnel. They rushed at the vibroseis truck. Fischer hopped beside Tran and Chase while Meyer ran.
They brought down the first monster, but the second ran low, ducking behind the bodies of its comrades. It coiled and jumped, soaring toward Fischer. He clenched up, watching in what seemed like slow motion as the beast descended on him, claws extended.
Suddenly the beast’s mouth disappeared in a blast of pink tissue and bone spreading. Tran kept his rifle aimed at the creature when it crashed to the ground, finishing it with a shot to the back of the head. Blood pooled away from the beast to Fischer’s boots.
He tried to control his breathing.
“Fischer, where are those monsters on Elk?” Massey called over the radio. “I can’t spare my men there if they aren’t actually coming.”
“They’re beneath the street,” Fischer replied.
Suddenly part of Chambers street cracked. The monsters had stopped climbing out of the hole on Centre. A loud roar carried up out of the fissures across Chambers.
But this was not the cry of a monster. It sounded like rushing water.
The heavy weight of horror plunged through his insides at the implications.
“Massey, pull your men off the streets!” Fischer yelled over the radio. “Get them away from the buildings and move that tank back to the park! NOW!”
Dirty brown water exploded out of the cracks in Chambers, pouring through the streets. Soldiers backed away from it like it was poison. It wasn’t the water itself Fischer was afraid of. It was what that rushing water meant.
The tank growled as it rotated and then powered down Chambers toward the park. The asphalt buckled under its tracks, crumbling away in an instant. A massive hole ripped down the road, swallowing men and vehicles.
The tank crashed through the collapsing earth, followed by the second vibroseis truck. It took Fischer a second to realize what had happened. New York City’s famous water system was fed by gravity, meaning the huge tunnels that had once transported tap water to buildings throughout the city were still filled with stagnant water.
“The Variants burst a water main!” Fischer shouted. “We all have to fall back!”
Variant shrieks echoed up from the splashing untreated water filling the tunnel they had dug. Human screams followed, giving Fischer no illusion of what was happening in this freshly formed canyon. He looked back into his vibroseis truck and saw more seismic activity on the screen.
Another sinkhole formed under a building where machine gunners and snipers were roosted. One of the Apaches was stationed atop it. The building started to quiver, cracks tracing up its side. The Apaches blades started spinning, but it was too late. The building collapsed inward, and a huge cloud of dust rolled over the park.
Panicked voices exploded over the radio.
“We’re pulling back from Pumphouse Park!” someone yelled over the radio.
So it’s not just here, Fischer thought.
His mind thundered with questions on how this could be happening. The Variants had pulled a tactical maneuver, distracting the defensive forces and striking in a way no one could’ve predicted.
A second building collapsed into the growing sinkhole. Water flooded the streets, and a debris cloud rolled over the defensive forces. Soon the gray and brown haze was too much. Fischer could only see shadows moving in the dust.
Screams and the sound of gunfire split the air.
Tran and Chase pressed up against the back of the truck, fighting off monsters emerging out of the haze. The truck’s geophone monitor burst with more activity as sinkholes sucked in men and spat out more Variants.
There was no way he could hold the truck with just Tran and Chase. This station was already lost. There was nothing they could do but retreat.
Cracks formed in the ground around them, the earth trembling.
“Massey!” Fischer yelled into his radio. “We’re abandoning the vibroseis truck and headed your way!”
“Alpha!” Tran yelled.
His rifle burst to life as a creature barreled through the fog toward them. The monster let out an ear-splitting shriek, muscles rippling under its fur.
Bullets plunged into its flesh, blood spraying from the wounds. But the monster kept coming with a tide of Variants following in its wake.
“Move!” Fischer yelled.
Tran and Chase led the way, stopping every few strides to lay down covering fire.
The Alpha slammed into the vibroseis truck behind them, pushing it over. Variants scaled the toppled vehicle, jumping over it and chasing after Fischer and his men.
Fischer slowed when he saw a monster feasting on a body ahead. He fired a buckshot into the ugly creature, knocking it off the victim. A second passed before he realized the shredded body was Meyer.
Most of the engineer’s face had been mauled off, and Fischer only recognized him by the Fischer Fields logo emblazoned on his coveralls.
“Goddammit!” Fischer shouted.
Gunfire cracked behind him as Tran and Chase back peddled while firing at the Alpha still hunting them.
“Run!” Chase yelled.
Fischer pumped another shell into his shotgun and brought the weapon up to blast a Variant in their path. Tran and Chase took measured shots at the other creatures, cutting down the Alpha’s forces. They hit the bigger beast with periodic bursts and it finally started to slow.
“Reloading!” Fischer said as he plucked new cartridges from his vest.
Tran’s rifle bolt clicked back. “Me too!”
The Alpha seemed to sense their momentary weakness and barreled forward, knocking aside smaller Variants. Chase fired, but the beast was too fast. It grabbed Tran, then yanked him backward, disappearing back into the dust cloud.
“Tran!” Fischer shouted. He pumped his shotgun and ran after the beast.
“Wait!” Chase yelled.
Fischer strode out into the dust cloud with Chase by his side.
“Tran!” they both yelled.
More explosions burst behind them, screams piercing the crack of increasingly sporadic gunfire. Fischer saw almost nothing through the rising dust cloud as other buildings collapsed.
He continued yelling for Tran, but the man was gone, taken underground where he would suffer a worse fate than being torn apart up here.
“Sir, we have to go,” Chase said.
The roar of a diesel engine sounded in the distance, and Fischer followed Chase toward the noise. They broke through the dust to find a black four-by-four pickup with a group of soldiers in the bed, and another climbing up.
“Get in!” Massey yelled from the driver’s window.
Fischer looked back toward the dust cloud one last time, praying Tran wouldn’t suffer long.
A hand grabbed Fischer by the arm. Chase helped him up into the bed of the truck as they abandoned their friend to the monsters.
***
In the troop hold of the C-130, Beckham stared out one of the small windows. The first molten rays of the sun climbed above California. The pilots had said they were only about ten minutes out from Team Ghost’s evac site. The morning light washed through the aircraft as the crew and a handful of soldiers in the jump seats made their final preparations for landing.
None knew what to expect.
This was enemy territory.
Horn clicked a drum into his M249 SAW. Then he reached inside his vest and pulled out a black bandana emblazoned with a skull, an old memento of his time on Team Ghost. He tied it around his neck.
Nathan Brooks, the Army Ranger who had lost his glasses, had offered to help, but like the other injured Ranger who had survived the crash in Cleveland, he couldn’t do much. The kid was practically blind without his glasses, and the other Ranger had broken an ankle after jumping out of the Black Hawk.
“Once we land, everyone who can will hold security,” he said. “This area is going to be hot, and we know there are hostiles, both human and Variant. But we want to go in and out quick and quiet. Do not shoot unless you’re given the order. Got it?”
Nods all around.
The plane dipped lower and Beckham started toward the rear door when a message hissed in his earpiece.
“Captain Beckham, we just got a message about Ghost,” said the primary pilot. “We need you up here.”
Beckham hurried to the cockpit.
One of the pilots turned to him. “Command just pinged us. Ghost called them on the sat phone a while ago. They’re surrounded by Variants about a mile from the rendezvous coordinates.”
Beckham clenched his jaw.
“How do you want us to proceed?” asked the pilot.
With only moments to decide, Beckham scanned the sky for aircraft and the freeway below for contacts.
He didn’t see any hostiles yet. “Take us down. Horn and I will go in on foot to clear their escape.”
Beckham made his way back to Horn.
“Trouble?” Horn asked.
“Plenty.”
“You know I’m always ready for trouble, but what does plenty mean?”
“Ghost is pinned down by Variants. We’ll need to extract them.”
Horn pulled his skull mask up. “Then that’s just what we’ll do.”
“Prepare for landing,” said the primary pilot.
A few moments later the plane touched down on the interstate, wind rushing over the spoilers as the engines applied reverse thrust, and they decelerated hard into a stop.
A crew chief pushed a button on the bulkhead, opening the rear ramp.
“Back into the fray,” Horn grumbled.
He strode down the ramp with his SAW shouldered. Beckham raised his M4 and loaded a grenade into the barrel-mounted M203 launcher. He followed Big Horn into the morning sunshine.
“Good luck,” came a voice.
Beckham glanced over his shoulder. Brooks raised a hand from the troop hold.
All but two of the thirteen soldiers and the crew streamed down the ramp past Brooks to hold security.
Beckham jogged toward the coordinates where Ghost was supposed to be waiting. Maybe after their sat phone batteries had drained, they had actually made it there on their own, escaping the monsters.
But Ghost and the injured Wolfhounds were nowhere between the trees and grass where they were supposed to be. They might not have escaped the position where the Variants had first surrounded them.
The team’s last known location was only a mile away. Beckham started running, Horn following. They could make it in under eight minutes if they ran hard with their gear. Maybe less, but they weren’t the same men they were back when they had been on Ghost.
They got through an open field in a few minutes but slowed on approach to the tree-covered hills. The terrain provided cover, which also meant shelt
er for a hostile ambush.
Horn held up a fist.
The chatter of small arms fire echoed over the hills.
“Sounds like one, maybe two guns at most,” he said.
Beckham didn’t like what that might mean and started running again. He didn’t stop until he got to the crest of a hill. Navigating through the trees, he took a knee on an overlook of an RV park.
These were the coordinates where Ghost had reported they were being surrounded.
Corpses lay scattered across the grass. The ground was so soaked with blood that the dirt had turned to mud in some spots. But the bodies weren’t human—they were naked beasts, flesh riddled with bullet holes, spread around a camper trailer.
Beckham zoomed in on the open door. The echoing pop of a gunshot pulled his gaze away from the scope.
Horn pointed to the edge of the forest.
Beckham led the way cautiously down the hill and across the corpse-strewn park.
One Variant was still alive. Partially buried in a crater of dirt from a grenade. The upper torso was still connected to the bottom by thick strings of gristle, somehow keeping it alive.
It reached up and took weak passes at them with a claw.
Beckham didn’t waste a bullet or slow to pull his knife.
The beast wasn’t going anywhere and wasn’t long for this world anyway.
Shrieks sounded from the forest as they approached, and another gunshot answered. Then three more pops.
Beckham and Horn bolted toward the sounds. A trail of corpses took them through the forest and along a road.
Streaks of blood painted the asphalt. Empty bullet casings and shotgun shells lay scattered across the cracked street that traced up another hill.
Horn caught up to Beckham, breathing heavily, and they approached the top side by side.
They heard snarling and cracking, then a sickening crunch followed by a shout.
“You want more, puta?”
The familiar voice had to be Mendez.
Another voice, this one female, came next.
“Keep them back!” yelled Rico.
Beckham and Horn neared the top of the hill. Sweat drenched their fatigues.
About two hundred feet away, a group of ten Variants prowled around Team Ghost, circling and waiting to pounce.
Extinction Cycle Dark Age (Book 3): Extinction Ashes Page 13