“Defenses?”
“They have walls, though they aren’t as strong as they appear; too low. They do have a good field of fire all around though, and I think I saw trenches on my way in. If I were to hazard a guess I’d say they were filled with firewood; I smelt petrol.”
“Bonfires they can light if attacked?”
“That would be my guess. It would make the beach a well lit killing ground. They have spotlights too.”
“So we would sustain casualties.” The Professor was now tapping the end of the pen against his teeth. Not for the first time, Stranger pondered jabbing that pen through his eyeball and into his brain.
“We would.”
“But we could overwhelm them with force of numbers, yes?”
Stranger nodded. “Probably. Don’t ask me to guess how many lives it’d cost, but I think eventually we could breech their defenses.”
He smiled, the sneery smirk of a crocodile that smells blood in the water. “What about their provisions?”
Stranger made a play of wrinkling his nose in disgust. “Basic. Tinned food and rat seemed to be their diet, and I think they were running low on tins. They have water, but mainly its drawn from the sea and boiled or made potable with purification tablets.”
“Fuel?”
Stranger shook his head. “None that I saw,” he replied honestly. “Didn’t see any vehicles either. They have some electricity but that seems to be mainly pedal generated.”
“How quaint. Anything else to report?”
“Nothing at all.”
The Professor said nothing. He stared down at his jottings. Stranger could almost hear the cogs whirring in his skull—the permutations and equations. Stranger hoped he’d done enough to ensure the outcome of these thoughts.
The trick was to suggest that a community was too strong to attack, whilst not making it seem so well stocked that it was worth attacking anyway. It was a balancing act, but one he’d managed in almost every case, because the Professor actually trusted his judgment.
It was a trust that came at a price. For every community that Stranger contrived to spare, he had to sacrifice another three at least. Sometimes it was easy, because the people running a township weren’t any better than the pirates aboard the Reina de Isla. Occasionally it was unavoidable if the settlement was so weak that even lies wouldn’t save it.
Mostly though, it was hard deciding which ones to save. Sometimes it simply came down to the fact that he’d saved the last community, or the one before that, keeping the Professor’s trust so that he could protect some at least from the ravages of the crew. Those who survived the assault would invariably be either absorbed into the ship’s populace, or brutally executed as worthless.
Not that this fact ever made Stranger feel any better. Saving dozens at the expense of hundreds was a poor tradeoff, whichever way you looked at it, but it was all he had. He was taking a risk now, because he’d contrived to save the settlement before last, but he liked Father Daniel. More than that, he liked the little community at Hobbie’s Surf Shack. Unlike most they actually had a chance; a good sized population, fresh food, power, water aplenty, and, perhaps most importantly, a strong community spirit.
It was out of his hands now. The Professor would make the decision, one way or another, and Stranger could do no more for them, although he’d tried in more ways than one. By now, Father Daniel would have read the hasty note Stranger had written and left on his desk. A short apology come explanation, followed by a greater block of text describing tactics, weaknesses in the settlement’s defenses. Beef the wall up, plant bonfires outside, make the jetty more secure…again it wasn’t much, but if the Reina de Isla did decide to sail on by, then Hobbie’s would be a harder target in the future.
Finally the Professor looked up. “I’ll sleep on it,” he said. “You can go now.”
Inwardly Stranger grinned, but he kept his expression weary, unemotional. He’d probably done it though. If the Professor had to sleep on it then that meant he wouldn’t attack; it was a face saving gesture because he didn’t like to appear weak by saying no right away. By morning he’d have contrived a reason not to attack, probably Rolf 37 would have highlighted a new target, a better target. Likely Stranger wouldn’t be able to save that community.
He stood, no longer having to feign tiredness, because it was all he felt. More tired than he’d ever felt before, tired of this life, of being on a leash. One day though, he’d sworn to himself, one day he’d find a way to nullify the explosive over his heart, and then the Professor and his lieutenants would get what was coming to them, and Stranger, and the majority of people on this ship, would be free.
As he walked towards the door he paused and looked out of the single porthole. He saw only darkness, a deep impenetrable night that shrouded the entire planet and, perhaps now, always would.
Freedom was a nebulous concept.
About the author:
Paul Starkey lives in Nottingham, England, and has been writing for over ten years. He’s had several short stories published, and his debut novel, City of Caves, is published via Lula. Find out more about his work at https://sites.google.com/site/paulstarkey70/home
Bringing in the Dead
by K.C. Ball
We shoulder through green stalks of August corn, waist-deep in mist spread upon the Ohio bottom land like a raveling shawl of soiled lace. Nine wraiths; wrapped in much-patched camouflage and come to settle an old debt.
“Talk to me, Becker,” the sergeant says.
“All clear, Sarge.”
Their voices murmur to us through transceivers nestled in our ears. The sergeant sounds like a kettle drum cranked tight. Becker’s voice as dark and rich as a cup of straight-up coffee.
She’s on point, tall and regal, six feet and seven inches of lethal elegance. We call her Long Tall Sally and each of us would give assorted pieces of ourselves to lay with her. Becker has never offered, though, and we’ve never asked.
“Collect on me,” the sergeant says.
He materializes from the corn, squat and powerful; we are all a breath behind.
Somewhere close, a robin twitters. A new-day’s sun hangs just above tree-covered hills to the east. The Tuscarawas River, lazy and brown, slides by us to the west. A nasty heat makes early promises and the last breath of night touches us, carrying our targets’ stench, reminding us of who we look for and what we lost.
***
Those years ago—April 2012—plague sped around the world on air-borne vectors, flensing civilization to its bones.
No one knew where it began, but billions died within six days. On the seventh day, while God was resting, the virus presented its mutations; demonstrated to us that we had breathed easy far too soon. Within another week, tens of thousands more fell and arose again, infected, and we soon discovered the mutated virus spread fastest via body-fluid contact.
And the infected are everywhere. They mock us as they mimic human ways, reminding us of creatures in old movies while they wear the faces of people that we knew and loved. No one has counted their number across what used to be Ohio’s Tuscarawas County, but we know the number of untainted souls.
One hundred and forty-three.
Fifty-seven reside within a walled compound that used to be the Canton Water Works. They share their food with us. They tend our wounds, help us scavenge fuel and ammunition, but they won’t ride with us.
Melinda is their leader, a woman of enormous energy and charisma. The sergeant loves her; we all know it, even if he’s never said the words. She’s begged him more than once to end what she calls madness, to join her in her struggle to restore a sense of order to the world.
He always tells her no; we already have a mission.
***
The open space before us has gone to knee-deep grasses, but it once was a manicured golf course. The clubhouse squats at its center, set upon a low rise of land, an easy pace from the river. It’s a moldering heap of splintered timbers and jagged flats of
plate glass, surrounded by stretches of buckled concrete.
The sergeant nods toward the place. “Melinda says seventeen Infected are nested there. Two of them belong to us.”
Jelly readies his flamethrower, not looking at the sergeant. “She say which two?”
“Does it matter?” The sergeant’s attention is focused on the clubhouse.
The rest of us sneak peeks at both of them. What can Jelly say? Stupidity can get you killed. He’s not the nervous sort, but he fiddles with the trigger of the flamethrower. It burps a six-inch jet of orange fire. We all pretend to ignore it.
The sergeant nods at Becker. “Okay, let’s do this.”
We advance, fanning into attack line, with Becker at point. All’s well until we’re ten yards from the building and then a dog mooches around one corner and lifts a hind leg.
He’s a big mutt, enough Rottweiler in him to guarantee a nasty disposition. In mid-piss, he spots us. He forgets about his bladder, comes head-on at Becker, not uttering a sound. We hold our breath as Jelly strikes the match. Fire engulfs the dog and as it burns away his life, he howls revenge.
There are muffled shouts from inside the clubhouse.
The sergeant spits at the dog. "Jesus, next time let’s just play Wagner over loudspeakers."
Becker looks to the sergeant for direction. “Blades?”
“Damned straight.” He holsters his pistol and draws out a set of khukuri blades.
Jelly kills the match and pulls a twenty-two-inch machete from a belt sheath. We each draw our blade of choice. Becker kicks her way into the nest, brandishing a broad sword, and we’re at her heels.
The place reeks of unwashed bodies and unabashed sex. The pack stands ready, ten adults gathered around five younger. Two of the younger clutch infants. Most of the adults are armed with crude clubs, off-balance and unwieldy, but one brandishes a cavalry saber. Lean and shaggy, wearing squalid fatigues with an oak-leaf cluster pinned to one collar point. Cooperman. Dunbar is close at hand, blond hair a rats’ nest, uniform in shreds, holding a Browning automatic rifle.
The sergeant is first to act. His arm snaps and a steel dart juts from Dunbar’s eye.
Too late. The clatter of the Browning engulfs the clubhouse. Coated thirty-caliber slugs climb Jelly’s rib cage, sliding through his Kevlar like pushpins into cork. He spins away, dying, and the last round ruptures his napalm tank.
Jellied gasoline coats us all; thank anything but God the match is out.
Cooperman bellows an order, sounding like a deaf man struggling to touch the shape of words. The Infected surge to attack. The nasty fuckers don’t slack off but they don’t stand a chance against Rangers. Breathing through our mouths, we ignore the stench and press the attack. Within a breath, all of them, adult and younger, are still and finally dead.
Except for one.
Cooperman fights on against Becker, but she pushes hard. Her broad sword is a blur, finding its way past the saber again and again. She forces Cooperman back against a wall. Their blades are grinding, edge to edge, when Cooperman grabs Becker’s vest, pulls her close, and kisses her. Even in the dim light, we see the tip of Cooperman’s tongue probe Becker’s cheeks.
She staggers back, spitting out her fear and rage.
Cooperman presses the advantage, but Becker knocks the saber aside. With furious energy, she slides her blade through ribs, piercing the stuttering heart beneath. The saber clatters to the floor and Cooperman collapses in a heap beside it. Dead and come back to us at last.
“Shit.” It’s all the sergeant can think to say. He trots to Becker, reaches out to her.
She shrugs his hand away, sheathes her sword, tears off her helmet and pitches it aside. She kneels before him; the top of her head is just below his chin. She draws a measured breath and bows her head.
Her close-cropped hair lies tight and wet against the perfect curve of her skull. She’s crying. Hell, all of us are crying, even the sergeant is blinking fast.
He raises one gloved hand toward her, as if to offer benediction, but he doesn’t touch her. He sighs. “There’s still eight hours before we’ll know for sure.”
Becker’s chin comes up; her eyes are angry and demanding, the look of a trapped animal with no idea of escape. She taps the middle of her forehead with her index finger. “Bullshit. We all know right now. Do me.”
The sergeant draws his pistol and presses the barrel to Becker’s forehead. She strips away her gloves and slips her long fingers around his hand; granting absolution.
And he pulls the trigger.
After a time, we collect our own, torch the filthy nest, taking care to stay well back from the flames, for the scent of napalm hangs upon us like a shroud. At last, we carry four body bags back through the corn and lash them to the rack on the HumVee. The sergeant slides behind the wheel and starts the engine. It’s the only sound during the twenty-minute trip back to the water works. Jelly would have told us awful, misogynistic jokes. About the old Jew that wins big in the lottery by playing his Auschwitz tattoo. About Little Johnny who runs in circles while he plays because his right foot’s nailed down. The top ten list of ways to profit from Armageddon.
Melinda and her people meet us at the outside gate. Their welcome smiles fall away as they count our numbers. We lug the body bags to the field cemetery, our jump-boots clicking on the concrete walks. The clean, gentle aroma of mature maple trees fills our noses as we dig new graves and lower our fallen comrades into the ground.
We offer no eulogy because every word has been said too many times before.
When it is over, Melinda moves close to the sergeant. “Stay this time. You’ve done enough.”
He shakes his head, as he steps toward us. “Can’t; still three more of us out there.”
***
Melinda doesn’t understand the measure of our debt.
Summer 2012, we were the remnants of Fifth Battalion, Rangers. Forty-eight men and women come to Tuscarawas County to maintain order, when we all still had hope that order could be had.
Major Cooperman was upbeat. “We’ll be back to beer and football before you know it.”
Two days later, we stumbled into ambush. Cooperman, Dunbar, and thirty others fell in with the Infected after that attack. We’ve searched for them since then and we’ve had losses.
Melinda believes balance is returning to the world. She says the Infected haven’t abandoned their humanity. She tells us new customs are taking root. She says there are new standards, too, upon which what it means to be human must be measured. Our mission jeopardizes all of that, she claims.
That’s her concern, not ours.
We will not surrender. We will bring in our dead. No matter what the final cost may be, we will leave no one behind.
About the author:
K.C. Ball is a word junkie. She’s been reading speculative fiction since she was nine; writing fulltime since January 2008. K.C. has published more than thirty stories since then, most recently in Analog, Flash Fiction Online, and the Writers of the Future 26 anthology. She is an active member of Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America and a 2010 graduate of Clarion West speculative fiction workshop. K.C. lives in Seattle.
The Last
by Timothy Miller
Chris slid the whetstone along the sword, taking comfort in the familiar rasp of stone, steel, and oil. The metal was bright now, no blood, no gore, just a few nicks marring the gleaming edge of the three-foot blade. That would change, an indisputable fact evidenced by the campfires stretched out beyond the monastery wall.
A husky man with an angry red scar stretching from his ear to his chin stepped up beside him. “You should clean your gun.”
Chris nodded toward a muzzleloader rifle he’d propped against the battlements. “Already did, Mike.” Putting the whetstone into his pouch, he took out a stained rag and began to polish some of the oil from the sword. “Seems almost a waste of time. I only ever get one or two shots off before the retros hit the wall.”
Mike rubbed a hand over his hairless scalp. “These guns make you wish for the old days, I know.” Hefting his own rifle, he scowled down at the fires. “Even one shot is better than nothing. Besides, these peashooters and the nail bombs give us the edge on those freaking rejects. Technology always wins over muscle, just like the committee says.”
Chris raised an eyebrow. “Oh, really?” He pointed to the massive double-bladed axe strapped to Mike’s back. “What’s that for then?”
Mike glanced over his shoulder. “You mean this? Just trying to keep up with the times. It’s more of a fashion statement than a weapon.”
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