Moosehill Militia (Book 1): INFECTED

by Paul Christian

  Commander Wilson was the third Seal onto the wharf. He saw no Infected or anyone for that matter. One of the Coast Guard Cutters was on the opposite side of the middle wharf the Georgia was moored at, and the other Cutter was on the first or southernmost wharf. Wilson sent his second in command Lieutenant Roy Robertson with half the force and engineers to that wharf and Cutter to get it operational.

  All the Seals had their full load out of equipment, but also carried a silenced 22 or hush puppy as it was commonly refereed too. Any Infected they ran into would be dealt with by the silencer. They were under orders to not attract the Infected if at all possible. So the rifles would only be used if they were compromised and in dire straits. Wilson’s team observed the USCGC Seneca that was moored at their wharf, all appeared quiet. Wilson gave the signal to move and the thirty three seals on his team silently rushed the gangway and up onto the ship. Here they split up with a team of engineers escorted down a hatch by half the seals, and to the rear of the ship toward the engine room.

  “Petty Officer Rose led the way to the bridge.” Commander Wilson told one of his Seals First Class Petty Officer Rick Rose or RR lead the way inside a hatch and forward to the Bridge. Rose was a giant of a man standing six foot four and not an ounce of fat on him. He could have played middle linebacker for any NFL team if he had chosen. Now he was in his element, point man on a dangerous mission. Rose heard a noise up ahead while leading down a passageway. He believed the Bridge was just ahead up one ladder. Seals were given some leeway on the weapons they carried, Rose carried a custom made Spax twice the size of a normal one that the Marines carried, and he admired the tool and contacted the company and had his made at three times the price of the normal size.

  Rose carried the large Spax in one hand and his silenced 22 in the other. Just as he thought if must have been some ship noise that he was unaccustomed too, three Infected dressed in enlisted men’s clothes came out of a hatchway right in front of him. They turned quickly and rushed him. “Fuck, Infected.” He whispered loudly back over his shoulder, even as he lined up the forehead of the first Infected in his 22 sights and pulled the trigger. The second Infected came at him from the other side and he left his Spax buried in its chest where it lodged after carving through its head and neck. The last he shot in its open mouth as it tried to bite him. The whole incident took around ten seconds, Commander Wilson registered as he watched from three places behind Rose. He picked the right man for point, Wilson thought to himself as it ended.

  “Good job Rose, but let’s keep moving to the bridge.” Wilson whispered to everyone. They advanced up one ladder and came to a hatch which was open and led into the rear of the bridge. A quick search revealed no Infected. Wilson kept a few seals on the bridge and sent the others to start clearing the rest of interior of the ship. By tactical radio he contacted the team in the engineering section, they too encountered Infected killing two with no casualties. After ten minutes it was determined by the engineers that they could have the ship up and running in one hour. Wilson heard from Lieutenant Robertson, his ship had no Infected they could find as yet. Their estimate to get their ship operational was around five minutes longer than his ship.

  Commander Wilson contacted the USS Georgia and informed Captain Prescott that there mission was a go and he could start to pull back to the lower part of the inner harbor for now. The Georgia acknowledged.

  One hour later both ships started to reverse out of there berths, when a lookout spotted a light on in one of the buildings and a man waving at them. “Damn, we have survivors in that Coast Guard Building.” Commander Wilson informed all parties that were part of this operation. “Roy, keep pulling your ship out of the berth, we will get them.” He told Roy Robertson on the tactical net. “You sure skipper, I could still get half my men onto the pier to help you.” He told Wilson. “Okay, do it before you clear the dock, send them my way.” Wilson replied.

  The USCGC Seneca came to a stop and moved forward slowly again. Twenty of Wilson’s Seals with George leading the team onto the pier himself, meet up with the fifteen Seals from Robertson’s team. They huddled for a few minutes while Commander Wilson explained the plain.

  “Here’s the deal we have an unknown number of survivors in the middle building. Did anyone else see survivors or lights from any of the other buildings?” Wilson asked. He only saw shaking heads. “Then we move straight in to the middle building and enter through the rear double doors. Use you’re hush puppies as long as you can, watch out for survivors and we search from the ground floor moving up, any questions?” No one did, these men knew their business. “Move out.”

  The Seals naturally took up positions as they moved to the middle building that Wilson thought was probably quarters for the crews. The Seals entered the bottom floor and immediately put down a half dozen Infected that were loitering around the lobby area, in a smooth choreographed way. The seals split up and ascended the stairs on either side of the lobby. Reaching the second floor they again came across a dozen Infected. The Navy Seals not being in a generous mood hacked the heads off most of these afflicted. On the third floor they encountered furniture blocking the stairwell. “Hello anyone there?” one of the men called up to the barricade. “Who is it?” Someone called down. “It’s your mother you idiot, do the Infected talk to you because they sure don’t to us, you tool.” The sailor responded. “Okay, Okay, that was pretty stupid.” A seaman called down. Whoever was up there were working on removing the barricade.

  Ten minutes later they found out that there were one hundred and twenty Coast Guard Sailors in the building and were quickly running out of food. Commander Wilson organized them for the dash to the Seneca. The Seneca was prepared to pull away as soon as all were aboard.

  “Everyone keep moving to the ship, my Troops will cover the rear so if you hear shooting keep moving and get up the gangway onto ship as fast as you can and get out of the way. Be careful, don’t go wandering around below. We cleared the ship but I wouldn’t call it one hundred percent secure yet. Understood?” he heard a lot of yes sirs.

  “Let’s move.” The few Seals leading moved out quickly and the Coast Guard sailors followed just as fast. They moved in a compact mass straight down the middle pier to the gangway for the Seneca, which had been reattached by the men left onboard. Wilson hanging back with a dozen of his men noticed a group moving from between the middle building and the building to the north. He wasn’t sure at first, but then he heard the moan and the feet shuffling.

  “Time to go to the rifles gentlemen.” He told the men with him. More Infected were coming around the corner, looking back toward the ship not all the men were aboard, the gangway was a bottleneck.

  Wilson started the party by firing first at the closest to him. Shooting two in the head. That was the signal to start shooting. The Seals opened up with controlled aimed shots, trying to put the Infected down with one round to the head. These men were elite warriors and expert marksmen, and many of those first shots took down Infected. Wilson was worried the noise they generated shooting was sure to attract more Infected. He and his men slowly retreated while continuing to shoot the Infected. Halfway back to the gangway he saw a large mass of Infected come around the corner of the building from the area of the main gates. Damn he thought, “Time to let them have it.” He yelled out. And opened up on full auto into this new group. The men went to continuous fire in controlled bursts and changing magazines smoothly with practiced ease. The Infected were falling like dominoes, even so they were closing on his men. Looking back, the Seneca’s gangway was clear. Wilson stopped firing and starting going behind his men and slapping their backs, signaling for them to breakaway and get to the ship. He pulled a pin on a grenade and tossed it into the group of Infected twenty yards away, his men seeing this turned and ran for the gangway. Wilson ran with them. He didn’t even turn as the explosion went off running hard for the Seneca. Wilson was the last over the gangway, it was pushed off onto the pier as the ship moved slowly backward into the
harbor channel. Job well done Commander George Wilson congratulated himself and his men. The Seneca and the Escanaba followed the USS Georgia back down the harbor channel and into the Atlantic heading for Cape Cod.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Day +11

  Day +11

  Mike was meeting with Mac and his company commanders this morning. As the company commanders filed into the conference room, he had an idea of what he wanted to say and how he wanted to start this mission.

  Somethings been on his mind for a while now. He realized early on that with the level of growth he couldn't just make decisions arbitrarily. Mike and Mac were meeting to plan these operations and that was it. He now felt with the size and complexity that the Moosehill Militia was growing at he needed a staff and should be including his higher level officers and department heads on a regular basis. "Good morning everybody, tomorrow's a big operation, everyone remembers those trains we talked about outside the Smith & Wesson plant. We need to bring those trains in with the equipment on them before some other rogue group takes them and uses them against us or other surviving enclaves.

  With that in mind I plan on taking three Moosehill Company’s and the two U.S. Marine Company’s. The whole outfit basically a battalion will be acting as Air Mobile infantry for this operation so we'll be using most of our air assets. Along with the soldiers we will be accompanied by a contingent of mechanics and anyone else with the experience to move those trains, also machine operators for the Smith & Wesson plant to identify what we need to take with us. It’ll be the job of the mechanics and electronic specialist to get those three trains up and running. Bravo Delta and Echo Company’s will be going for the Moose Hill contingent. All the U.S. Marines will be going. That leaves Mac with Jack Majors in Alpha Company, Sean with Charlie Company, and the two new company’s Golf and Foxtrot here, where they will continue with local clearing operations and base security.

  They won't be sitting on their asses, Mac will leave one company here for security and the other three will be conducting sweeps through Paxton all the way down Route 31 past the Abby into the west side of Spencer down toward the Spencer Fair Grounds and the Big Y Discount Supermarket that they already cleaned out, to make that section more secure for the Abbey Base.

  I’m letting you know with the addition of those two trains with the mechanized armor we will be able to expand the MH Militia into at least two or three full mechanized battalion or maybe two mechanized and one air mobile battalion, with more in the future depending on manning levels. That will essentially secure our safety and allow us to expand our clearing attempts and hopefully bring in more survivors that are still alive out there. After that we can concentrate on securing the towns immediately around us I'd like to secure the Worcester Airport, and start a regular air service between the surviving groups that we know of. We will probably find more out there as we go, this is all about preserving our way of life. I’d really like to find out who's responsible for this infection situation because this is not natural, somebody out there knows something and I'd like to find them.

  Changing the subject briefly, everybody knows that we had a few suicides on the base. The truth is we had more than a few, to date we've had thirty four, these people have been so depressed and despondent over losing loved ones that they decided that they had to take their own life. We need to keep everyone active and busy getting engaged in the community that we are building, so any ideas that you can come up with along those lines, let me or Mac know. Next on the list is a need to come up with an Advisory Council. Its exactly what it sounds like, a council to advise me on running this organization. I will be staying in command for the foreseeable future with Mac as my executive officer.

  Once we get to the point of having separate battalion’s Jack Majors will be commanding one Battalion and Dave Maddox will be commanding the other and then we'll see where we go from there. We have more volunteers than we have vehicles to put them in at this point. We've been planning to have some air mobile companies but now with the amount of air assets we have, we could increase from company size to a battalion. These are all thoughts, I’d like everyone’s opinions in the near future."

  "Any questions you guys have?" Mike asked.

  "Mike what are going to do about paying the Troops, or for that matter anybody who's working for us now and in the future?" Jack Majors asked.

  "Good question Jack, I don't know if everyone here knows, but I won one and a half billion dollars. I spend close to a billion on everything we've done here the other half a billion is sitting in a unspecified location in this complex with 500 million dollars’ worth of silver and gold coin in different denominations. I propose we start hitting Banks as we move along for any coins in their vaults in safety deposit that we can add to that total. That will be our gold and silver reserve that we will base our currency on.

  Right now we're all working to survive and at some level between groups we will be bartering supplies and information and services and then once we get past that we're going to need a monetary value system. At some point in the future I will propose that a monetary system be based on hard currency and not paper money. That should keep any inflation down and avoid some of the problems we've had for last fifty years here in the United States and around the world, quite simply we won't be spending money we don't have.

  “Okay back to the Trains, if we can get these trains moving, those tracks lead right into Spencer right behind Klem’s Department store, where there is a big train depot that brought train loads of new motor vehicles for all the car dealerships in Central Mass. When we get those trains there, it'll be just a matter of unloading and driving those armored vehicles back to base. Most of the Troops can ride back on the train, we may need the protection. That leaves the helicopters which have a lot of lift capability, they can be rigged up with netting so they can move any other supplies we find directly back to Moosehill.

  “I'm sorry Mac, I knew your left holding the fort here but that's a perk of being the commanding officer.” Mike told Mac with a grin.

  “ Yeah, yeah, you just like going out and having fun and leaving old Mac here to take care of the home base I get it, that's my job.” He winked at everyone else.

  “I wonder what's going on in the rest of the world maybe we can find out from Admiral Rin at some point. They must have some contacts with the greater world. I wonder if it's as bad elsewhere as it has been here or even worse. Let's go to the airport and make sure all the equipment is ready for tomorrow I’ll be leaving at first light.” Mike said as he drove to the airfield.

  ***

  Mike was at the Moosehill Airport at five a.m. after kissing Mary goodbye while she slept in her bed. Charly came over to stay with her while he were gone.

  Around five thirty a.m. Mikes Moosehill Troopers and the U.S. Marines started showing up. One of the hangers was cleared and being used as a staging area. The main runway was shut down for use, other than the thirty eight Huey’s and nine Chinooks sitting on the tarmac waiting to fire up there engines for the coming mission. He could see pilots walking around their birds conducting last minute checks. Additionally two Chinooks and two Blackhawk’s were being prepared for the civilian specialist coming on this mission. There are electronics specialist along with mechanical engineers and every other hard science including some heavy equipment operators, who have been studying how to move trains. Luckily we found some books at the local Library on train engineers.

  One Moosehill Company and one U.S. Marine Company will be going to Smith & Wesson first. The U.S. Marines to secure the parking area and perimeter while the Moosehill Company goes into the building to clear it for the civilians. The other two Moosehill and one U.S. Marine Company will arrive ten minutes later giving them time to organize a little.

  Those three company's after organizing will move west along the track that are about a quarter mile down the track’s from the Smith & Wesson factory.

  Then the Civilians will fly in, some being escorted to the tr
ain and the others entering the building to see what can be relocated. Hopefully we find lots of supplies at Smith and Wesson and we can take back some Gun smithing and repairing machines. He also hopes to find a large inventory, but who knows they might have had a big shipment leave the day before the event. Mike contemplated.

  He walked out of the Control tower and over to the staging area. Mike was dressed like all the Moosehill Troopers with a general purpose BDU, combat boots, helmet, M-4 Assault rifle, load bearing Mollie vest with a thigh draw 45 Caliber Glock 21 today. He had two knifes that he usually wore secreted on his person and his SPAX survival Axe. In his pack he carried three days of MRE’s extra socks and underwear, a compact survival blanket and built into the pack a camel water bladder. Mike also carried a short range, within five miles, radio for tactical communications. His radio man carried a longer range radio that required some antenna set up.

  Colonel Mohan’s personnel retinue was Jake as his aid, a radio man called Sparks, go figure, and two security Troopers that provided, you guess it security. Mike thought with a chuckle. Between the Troops, Marines, and civilian specialist and the pilots, there were around a little over seven hundred on this mission, by far the biggest mission to date for Mike and his crew.

  He walked into the hanger and watched each company sitting on the ground around their CO’s who were explaining again, each company's roll in the coming mission.

  “Good morning Mac, up early today?” Mike voiced.

  “Well, you know, have to make sure you amateur’s get off on time.” Mac bantered. They both watched the five company's going through last minute instructions. Mike could hear the helicopters starting their engines outside getting warmed up.